Another late night. Man, she slept all day. Last night was rough. My stomach went nuts on me just before bed, and I was up until 2 slugging Immodium. Here I am again, though. Katherine has just fallen asleep. She nursed around midnight, and was clearly not tired at all. So I took late shift, and let Kara go to bed. She was pretty fussy, but she finally fell asleep an hour and a half later. She's due for another nursing at 2, so I'll see what happens at that point.

I would just like to point out to anyone who watched the opening ceremonies of the Olympics that I believe I am generally capable of understanding and interpreting the artistic metaphors presented without a play-by-play announcer making the whole thing sound like a Thanksgiving parade. I really half expected them to say, "next, you'll see these four people come out with special shoes that have metal blades called, "skates", or something similarly pandering. Apparently the 'Merkan people aren't too bright.

Wow. Katherine is having a complete freakin meltdown. Kara was so exhausted tonight that I am taking the late shift. Her nursing schedule is 10:30, 12:30, etc. So I get her at 11:30, and play guitar for her for a little while. By noon, she's in complete scream mode. I comforted her for ten or fifteen minutes, like the book says, and then I put her down and let her cry it out a bit. This is by far the worst she's cried in a long, long time. It really sucks.

OK, for those of you who have been reading my blogs expressing the concern about the United States' refusal to consider the Cuban detainees, "prisoners of war" under the Geneva convention, the government has just clarified it's position.

They claim that Taliban and Afghani fighters will be POW's, and protected, but Al-Qaida fighters will not.

Al-Qaida is an international terrorist group and cannot be considered a state party to the Geneva Convention," said presidential spokesman Ari Fleischer

There are other aspects to this. First, the United States wants any U. S. troops captured to be protected under the Geneva convention, which leads to this declaration today for the Taliban and Afghani troops. Second, they won't extend this to the Al-Qaida fighters because under the Geneva convention, a POW is only required to give their name, rank, and serial number. So that's got to be a big part of it. The United States can't interrogate Al-Qaida using whatever means necessary because they will violate the Geneva convention. And I think you can rest assured that there will be (and probably has been) some very, very intense, um, interogation of these, um, "unlawful combatants." The fact is that these detainees are critical to the war on terror, and the hunt for Bin Laden, and if these folks were POW's, the U. S. would lose potential access to very valuable information.

Do you agree with this position? Doesn't it seem like we're bending the rules a wee bit here?

Tonight is kindof a landmark night. Kara is out at a party, and I'm at home with Katherine. It's actually my first night alone with her, and Kara's first night out without her. So far, it's going pretty well. We did our fourth bottle feeding about an hour after Kara left, and that went fine. It actually went better than nursing has been the last day or to. Just a sec, crying commenced...

Still crying, but I'm going to take a little break. She might be getting hungry again. Anyway, so this is a pretty big deal because Kara get's to do her own thing for the first time. I have a feeling she's going to come home missing the baby terribly. I think she's only been apart from the baby for a few hours this Saturday when she had her hair done. I'm not a bad Dad, really. I got a call from a telemarketer hawking kids products. She heard the baby in the background, and I said, I'm kinda busy right now...

Putting the soap in the washing machine, and throwing the plastic cup in. That's brilliant.

I took a personal day off work today for a few reasons. The appointment with Katherine's surgeon, a wake, car inspection, and a few other things. Around 3 PM, I found myself at home, and had run out of "things you have to do during the day". So we went to BJs. It was really stupid, I mean, it was just a shopping trip, but it somehow had huge value. We stocked up on baby wipes, cleaning stuff, toilet paper, and so forth, and spent a fair amount of money (all really good deals, though), and filled the back of the Explorer. But it's amazing how hard it is to make that trip without taking a day off work. I've been trying to get to BJ's for about a month, and it just doesn't happen.

Well, I wasn't entirely wrong about Katherine having a horn. The surgeon told us that there is a little bit of cartilage in the skin tag, and that it will require surgery to fix correctly. Apparently when the ears form on the fetus, they are rows of little nibs or tags like she has now, and then they grow and combine over time to become an ear, but this is a rogue tag that didn't connect. Her ears are fine, but there's just this one extra bit. So it's a bit scary, because she'll have to go under general anesthesia, and she has to be at least six months old for that. Then, there is a period between four and five where they can't have general, but they won't do local, so you have to wait until they're eight until you can have it removed if you don't want to put her under. The surgeon told us that having her under general is statistically safer than her riding in the car, although that's kind of a worn out argument at this point. Especially since I just hit a parked car at the airport a few weeks ago. But anyway, so we wait six months, and then take her in for outpatient surgery. She's only under for a brief period of time. The surgery is very fast. It basically takes them longer to prepare for it than the procedure lasts.

Hey, here's some news for you all. Katherine has a visit tomorrow with a plastic surgeon. Yep, she's only 7 1/2 weeks old, and she's having work done, so to speak. Actually, she has a little skin tab on her ear. I call it her horn, but that's another story. You can see it in this picture in her gallery. So anyway, we have a consultation tomorrow, and they may just take it off. I was actually a bit worried that it would be considered cosmetic, and that insurance wouldn't pay for it. But I guess the insurance company also realizes that she'll be seriously abused when she gets a little older if we don't do something about it.

Even after the Patriot's win the Superbowl, they still don't get any respect. I heard an announcer say something like how they beat an unbelievably superior team. How superior?