wesley tanaka

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Seeing the world through a kid's eyes

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Before we had Ryan, Emily had predicted one benefit to having kids would be we could see the world afresh through their eyes.

Great Timing

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I decided to carry Ryan on my shoulders today for the first time.  Since he can't sit up on his own, I held onto his arms so that he wouldn't fall over backward.  I carried him into the kitchen and Emily said "oh, he's smiling!"  I wanted to see it myself, so I carried him back into the bathroom.  At this point, he wasn't smiling anymore.  But as I was watching him watch me in the mirror, he

Ryan's First Emergency Room Visit

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Gorgonzola was known as “Baby Boy Tanaka” for the first few days in the postpartum unit, but Emily and I eventually settled on his name, "Ryan Takeshi Tanaka".

During the first two days after Ryan was discharged from hospital last Friday, he got increasingly fussy while we were trying to feed him.  He had too few wet diapers and too few stool diapers, and on Sunday, his temperature spiked into a fever.  His pediatrician had us take him to the emergency room.

Headache, Hour 100

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I've had a headache off and on now for around 100 hours.  The bursts of pain are conspiring together with a brain in a restless, roving mood to keep me awake.

Gorgonzola at –9 months

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Yesterday, Emily and I met a woman who told us about her friend who is also pregnant. Said friend didn't want to know the gender of the fetus, which left the woman with a conundrum—what to call the baby? Not really liking the word "it", she told us she decided to call it "spawn."

Our doctors use a "'baby' as a pronoun" strategy.  "When 'baby' is born...", "You should feel 'baby' kicking...", "'Baby' might still turn between now and then..." etc.

Human Butter

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You don't want it!

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Pokez has an combo on their menu named "13. You don't want it!"  I asked the waiter what it was, and he said, "you have to order it to find out!"  I pictured it being a $8.25 plate of bones, horse hooves, and misshapen pieces of plastic.  So I didn't order it.

Extracting vanilla

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An attempt at extracting vanilla from a vanilla bean with vodka. The initial pre-split state of the vanilla bean:

Notes from Cook's Illustrated issue number ninety-seven

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Notes from Cook's Illustrated issue #97 (March and April 2009):

Something I respect in people

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The ability to not at all care about that which does not matter.

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