Yes, I have some news!

I feel the need to set the record straight. If you haven’t heard yet, I’ve been offered a promotion at work. My wife has been telling people I was offered the “Head of Technology” position. In reality, I have been offered the Manager, Technical Services position for our Publishing Operations Division. Which I have tentatively accepted, I most likely will officially accept after we talk money when I return from my business trip to Minnesota.

You may or may not know that we recently purchased one of our biggest competitors and have been going through integration activities since January. Part of this activity is to determine how we will integrate staff between the two companies. Obviously, this has caused plenty of stress and sleepless nights. I don’t think I have had a good night sleep since Feb! The hardest part is that I kept everything a secret from Jaime because A.) I didn’t want her to worry and B.) I didn’t want her to get too excited and harass me daily for updates. ;-) Things just don’t happen fast in a big company.

I am very thankful to finally know what my role will be. The down side is that I will no longer be managing our online testing team. I developed our online testing team from 2 assessments and 1 employee (me), to around 14 assessments, 6 Project Managers and 9 designers located in Iowa City and Austin, TX. It’s been my baby for the past 3 years. However, I feel confident that I built the team on a solid foundation and will look forward to seeing how they grow moving forward.

I’m excited with my new role, and once again I will be asked to grow a division from infancy. I will start with 11 employees, several in San Antonio, and it is the group that has been tagged to experience the most growth over the next few years. It will be a huge challenge to develop this group and determine its role over the next few years. I can’t wait to get started!

But anyway... I just wanted to set the record straight. I am not the “Head of Technology” (yet), or the CTO, or CEO, or King. The title is “Manager, Technical Services.

Oh! And the other question people seem to ask. This does not require relocation. I will continue to work in Iowa City and have no plans to move away from Center Point. Even with the frickin gas prices! (Side note, a guy from our meeting today just returned from France. After you figure in the exchange rate, gas is about $9/gallon in France!!!)

Hope all is well with everyone else. Nice to see my wife still is not blogging after she begged me to set this up!!!

I better get some sleep, I have an exciting day of value stream mapping tomorrow morning. They better have some coffee this time!!!

To be or not to be

I’ve decided that on Friday’s I’m going to try and take the time to write about whatever the hell I feel like. Last week of course was my debut with a debate about what I lovingly refer to as my “Junk”. What better to follow up that in-depth piece than with a post about Jaime’s female anatomy! I had a great post all ready to go titled “To C or not to C: My Wife’s pursuit of the perfect C cups.”

Unfortunately, she said if I posted anything about her anatomy there would be no need for the Peter Peter Cottontail debate because we would begin practicing abstinence. Hmm… Did I find a way out of surgery?

After a couple of days debating this choice, I’ve decided to change my topic. So consider this…

To be or not to be: Tim’s pursuit to get in shape.

If you know my wife, she can eat all day and doesn’t seem to gain a pound. And to make things worse, she’s got a 6-pack after having 2 kids! Me on the other hand, the only time I have a six-pack is when I buy one at the grocery store! Mmmm… I could use a beer now. But anyway, I digress.

A few weeks ago, fueled by a streaking incident (don’t ask), I decided its time to get my fat ass in shape. My wife and I recently purchased a workout video called Hip Hop Abs with Shaun T. Shaun T looked like a pretty cool dude in his info commercial. I now think he’s a butt pirate. Sorry, my mom hates that term. I now think he’s a little bit on the fem side.

So now picture this… Jaime, Blasi, Cole and I all downstairs doing hip hop abs together! With moves like “The Freak”, “Get Busy”, and “Night Fever”. I am so glad we finally got shades up in our basement!

Now my pursuit to lose a few pounds has proven a couple of things to me.
• I have absolutely no hip hop skills. Seriously, my body is not even able to move the way some of these moves require.
• My kids take after my Wife.
• I need to work out by myself because I get too distracted by my Wife and her ability to dance.
• Doing Hip Hop abs after a few beers isn’t the best idea.

So there you have it, I’ve committed to get into shape, at least a shape that isn’t quite as round as my current shape. I’m thinking this will become more of a personal struggle between me getting off my lazy ass and doing some exercise and my love to do anything BUT exercise! Like drink beer and play golf!

Anyway, until next time. Drink and be merry… And if you talk to my wife, tell her to quit the excuses and start blogging!!!

Family Photos

Every night I come home, The Wife asks me why I haven't posted anything about the kids on the Blog. I keep telling her that updates on the kids and family are her responsibility and I'm just here for the occasional humor relief. She claims she doesn't know how to write well (What does this say about our high school educations?). So I guess it's up to me.

And in typical Tim laziness, this slideshow is all you get for now.

Peter Peter Cottontail

I never really realized how difficult it would be to determine what thought provoking content I would want to discuss in my first real blog post. I could discuss my relationship with my wife, which is always entertaining. Or how about an affectionate tale about the kids? I suppose Jaime will fill this blog with nothing but news and pictures of our kids, so I will leave that up to her. I guess there is one topic that is very dear to me that has been on my mind a lot lately. My Penis.

Yes, you read that correctly, my Penis!

You see, The Wife and I have decided that two beautiful and wonderful kids are enough to fill our heart with happiness for the rest of our lives. So, yes we are done having children. The only problem is that Jaime comes from a family that gets pregnant just from drinking out of the same cup. So we need to do something to make sure we are done having children.

Apparently, there are only two humane options to do this. Jaime could get her tubes tied or I could get my wingding snipped (rumor is this can increase your likelihood of getting prostate cancer). Obviously, I vote for Jaime to get her tubes tied. If you think about it, she has gone through the excruciating pain of childbirth twice, she is tough enough to handle major surgery. Jaime has other thoughts though.

At Jaime’s last yearly 55-point inspection she asked the FEMALE doctor about the prostate cancer risk. Apparently that is a myth, or at least that is what her FEMALE doctor said.

So… It looks like I am going to lose this argument and have to face the knife. Which turns out really bothers me.

Jaime, on the other hand, seems to enjoy the notion and is dying to setup an appointment. Where is her empathy for the thing that has brought her so much joy over the years?

I’ve tried to discuss my concerns with her, but she is consumed with delight that I will be getting snipped. So I guess I will air my concerns here. I’m only 31 years old, isn’t that a little young to get your balls cut off? I mean what if my next wife wants to have children? (That’s a joke honey). OK, I guess my real concern is this… It’s not a huge surface to work on down there, if you know what I mean. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not small by any means, I’d say I’m modestly equipped. But, what if the doctor misses? Or slips? Or doesn’t put things to sleep correctly? What if my Peter gets turned into a cottontail?

Please pray for me.

Also, I started a poll to the left for who should get fixed. Please vote for Jaime!!!

18 years!

I don't know if Tim remember's this date, but this is when we first started dating in Junior High. I knew when I first saw him, I wanted him (forever). Love u Honey!

Holy Crap

Apparently blogging is bigger than MySpace and Jaime insisted we conform and start a Blog so she can be like all her friends. In advance, I would like to apologize for any annoying comments about her hot husband.

Site looks a little lame right now...