Yesterday I installed a new (NEMA 10-50R) outlet for our dryer (replacing the old range-style outlet [10-30R] on the same circuit). I hate working with electricity. I've been shocked plenty with 110v and was scared crapless at the prospect of getting zapped with 220v. My fear was that whoever wired the breaker box hadn't properly labeled the dryer circuit, although it was the only 30amp circuit...so why so scared, Paul?

I also figured out, using Science™, why the dishwasher backed up when Jenny ran the in-sink-erator. It backed up for the same reason the in-sink-erator backs up when the dishwasher drains (but in reverse). Except that apparently the dishwasher doesn’t drain on its own, the circulator pump needs to cycle first. The Science™ part is that I figured this out by treating the dishwasher like a black box and drawing a diagram, then testing the black box by running coffee grounds and other stuff through the in-sink-erator. So Science™ has at least two uses:

1. Asking stupid questions during ultrasound tests
2. Figuring out really basic plumbing problems.

The “fix” for the dishwasher — such as it was — was the run the dishwasher through the end of its cycle. Also (and FFR): don’t drain a full sink all at once through the in-sink-erator.

I need to point out here that I am not usually a handy person, so this is probably about 50% of the Handy Homeowner stuff I’ve done in my whole life.

Probably Related:I'm trying to teach myself some knots from Knots and Splices. I never remember knots. I remember a few knot fundamentals, like slipknot, double-8, and hitch, but my knot philosophy is “if you can’t tie a knot, tie a lot.” Someday I’m gonna have to teach my son how to tie good knots. I can’t throw a baseball and don’t know jack about cars, so I figure need to pass on some kind of manly stuff.

After our first week in the new house I am — and whoa, where did this come from — missing Lake Oswego?

Well, objectively, here’s what our old neighborhood had going for it:

1. It was a great place for walking dogs.

We have Marshall Park now, which is pretty primo dog-walking territory, but our Lake O digs were literally across the street from George Rogers Park, with its open field and duck-infested Willamette river beach. Caninirvana.

But I think the feeling I have right now is not so much missing Lake Oswego as a realization about what my life might feel like in five short months. At that time I will be a father in addition to a homeowner — which are good things, yo, that’s not the point. The point is, five or ten or twenty years after that, when I think back on the carefree, minimalist, jetset lifestyle Jenny and I had five or ten twenty years previous, the last place I’ll associate with that lifestyle will be our lovely but barely usable apartment in lovely but barely usable Lake Oswego.

So I’m feeling what, pre-emptive nostalgia? This is why I have so much trouble with displays of emotion

Yesterday we had our Big Eighteen Week Ultrasound Show. Jenny’s sister came along. The OHSU crew were nonplussed by the entourage, they all said something along the lines of “oh we’ve had way bigger groups than this.” For a Science Guy™ like me, an ultrasound of your own biological offspring is like the Best. Movie. Ever.

Owing to my ventricular septal defect I’d seen ultrasounds of my own heart before, including the cool Doppler ultrasound where the arterial blood is red and the other kind is blue. So I’m kinda used to ultrasounds and they’ve always been kinda fun. Our first two baby ultrasounds were on the same pretty-good-episode-of-Nature plane of cool. This one went in IMAX territory.

If anyone ever asks me why they should learn about science, I’ll tell them: because someday you’re probably going to watch an ultrasound of your genetic progeny, and you’ll want to understand what the hell you’re looking at.

A little knowledge of anatomy is handy, of course, but so is an ability to ask penetratingly stupid questions. The kind of questions I like to flatter myself only Science Guys™ like me would ask. Questions like:

• So do you use higher frequencies for better resolution?
• Or longer waves for deeper tissue penetration?
• Were you really good with Rubik’s cubes? Because of the, y’know, 3D-thinking-stuff?
• If bats and dolphins “see” with sonar, does that mean they see through us, like they can see our bones and fluid in our bladders?
• If kids can hear higher frequencies than adults (which is true! Remember the special sound that used to distinguish the picture tubes in color TVs from those in black and whites sets? Did you ever wonder why newer color TVs don’t make that sound? Well, they still do [except of course for LCDs] — you just can’t hear it any more.) — anyway if children can hear higher frequencies than adults because their ear bones are smaller, can fetuses hear sonar?
• Is that the ventricular septum?

And, yes:

• It’s a boy
• He has all his parts in all the right places
• He doesn’t have a heart defect like his old man
• He’s a little ahead of schedule, so either he’s a fast grower or we’re bad at math
• Jenny is doing great.

This weekend we moved from our Lake Oswego apartment into the new house. The event represents reversals in two of the major trends in my life. Briefly:

1. I will no longer change addresses every five months
2. My pile of possessions will grow, not shrink

Constant mobility, occasional poverty, and a tendency toward minimalism drove me, in the last 5 years, to pare my stuff into a tiny pile. Minus the furniture (which I share with Jenny and which was — all of it — Jenny’s coming into the relationship), everything I own would fit into the back of the Subaru. There’s a certain amount of overlap between things that are unequivocally “mine” and those that are “ours,” of course.

Jenny and I fit all our possessions into a 700 sq. ft. apartment, and it wasn’t a tight fit. Now we’ve expanded into three times the floor space. Our shared tendencies to prune and compact led to such comical displays as a neatly organized stack of boxes and storage containers in the far corner of the otherwise empty walk-in closet attached to the largest bedroom in the house — which will itself probably remain empty for several months (if not years).

It’s like when zoo animals are given larger enclosures, but continue to pace around in circles the size of their old cages.

Jenny and I ran new-homeowner errands this afternoon. We discussed what items from this move were to go to Goodwill or Craigslist, coupled with the twin conversation about what new stuff to buy to fill our absurdly empty house. Jenny was keen to replace (upgrade, rather) items already in our possession. I gained a key insight into our different perspectives on the world: Jenny likes to get rid of things, and I prefer not to buy them in the first place.

For what it’s worth, house-buying is (thus far) a scarier and more stressful prospect than parenthood. I wonder how I feel about that in five months.

Yesterday we signed all the papers closing on our new house.

And in mid-June the Souders pack will have an extra member.