Ben & Shae Cecka's family in Gilbert, AZ

Ji went to the doctors today for his six month visit. Everything is good and healthy. The growth percentage for hieght (28″) is up, weight (17lbs 12(?)oz) and head circumference are both down but all three are still within average range.
He was quite the charmer, as expected. Tony, the nurse, absolutely adores Johnathan and always stops to make him laugh when we meet in the hallways. Dr. Cannon, who was picked out for our little guy before he even came along, was quite impressed with how social of a baby he is. Johnathan couldn’t wait to get his hands on Doc… and then the stethoscope in his mouth.
I’m not yet on a first name basis with the poor vaccinist, but she has been there for each wretching baby injection and makes little effort to warm up to us. I suppose she understands the best strategy is to just get it done and get us out. Ji got five shots today: DTaP, Hib, Polio, PCV, and Influenza. I laugh when the baby book has a spot for his shots, and then a line to write in the reaction. Mine cries… has anybody known any different? Wouldn’t you be a little concerned if you poked your baby with a needle and injected him five times and he didn’t cry? Yeah. He was a pretty good sport, though. He turned flourescent pink and SCREAMED and pretty much stopped once I picked him up. He gave the boo-boo lip and a little whipmer but that was about it. That’s our brave little prince.

The thing about journaling is you have to write about what happens, when it happens. If the task is put off for too long, more things to write about come along, and the things that you wanted to write about before have become too many and now you’re left with a headful of ideas to write down, but it doesn’t get done.

Too many special and new things have occurred this month to not share them with you all fabulous and fine people. So, in light of all this, here is a brief overview of things that have happened this month in cronological order.
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We just finished reading the three book series by Philip Pullman titled His Dark Materials. It was really an awesome story with some extremely controversial themes. Really makes ya wonder. We both found it interesting that a Sci-Fi book could invoke so much discussion about real-life issues. Philip Pullman questions God, the Church, and reality. Not that he is “anti” any of these things, but he brings up many alternate views and questions. A definite recommendation for anyone that enjoys a good spin.

Now we’re off to Middle-Earth with our friends Bilbo and Frodo. We just started The Fellowship of the Ring by JRR Tolkien. I don’t know how many times I’ve read it now but I still enjoy it just as much.

Tom Wolfe came out with a new book this week as well titled, Charlotte Simmons. He researched for several years at different colleges around the country (some big some little) and attempted to capture the real college experience of today. Hopefully it shows up at our library at some point. Right now they don’t have a very good selection of his work. I just might have to have a little talk with them and see if they can’t order some of his lesser known (and more interesting) writing.

I wrote this essay for my English 101 class. The purpose was to tell about an experience when we revisited a place or time in our life. I chose to talk about my history with Starbucks, what took me away from it (and California), and then what I observed when I came back.
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