He’s becoming more independent and simultaneously more willing to listen, and I find these little bowling outings to be a good safe and fun place for him to learn the acceptable boundaries of public behavior.

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Also to learn Lynyrd Skynyrd.

I expected that the correlation would be strongest in Presidential election years where the incumbent was eligible and certain to run again. In years like that, the minority party seems to be able to generate a lot more media coverage because there are more candidates and simply more interesting drama because the nomination is not a foregone conclusion.

Second strongest correlation would be Presidential election years where there was no foregone nominating conclusions.

Third strongest would be mid-term elections.

Finally, I would’ve expected no measurable correlation on elections below the Federal level, on the theory that there would not be enough national media coverage to move consumer opinion widely enough to affect CCI.

So I went to the Internet and found only a pittance of data. There was only enough history to cover a few election cycles, which means that no conclusion would be statistically worthwhile. Unwilling to pay $225 for a more complete history, I leave the rest as a project for the School of Random Research.

I read somewhere that after a stressful day, you should listen to NPR on your way home. The calm timbre of their commentators’ voices can help relax you. I don’t actually follow this advice, of course—with Sirius radio, an iPod, and the CD audio book of the moment all readily available, NPR rarely gets airplay on my way home.

On days when I pick Logan up from school—which is more accurately described as “when I go to school and play with Logan for an hour or so before heading home”—we generally listen to Sirius 80 Symphony Hall. He likes to identify the instruments being played as we drive.

Anyway, last night during bath time I bring up our Logitech mm50 portable iPod speakers (which, by the way, really are conveniently portable since I don’t have to keep them plugged into the electricity full-time). The Economist just launched their audio edition for subscribers, and since they read the full text, I’ve been very slowly getting through it. But the voices are calming and have pleasant British accents, so I thought it might have a soothing effect for Logan during his bath, and plus I could listen to a portion of this week’s issue in the background.

There was no apparent effect either way in the bath, but after dressing for bed and watching our night-night movie, he was still wide awake. Perhaps the thought-provoking nature of The Economist was a little too stimulating for this particular four-year-old?

So I put him to bed and went to my bedroom to work. Shortly I hear him reading aloud from The Very Best Daddy of All. Good, I think, he will read his book and then soon be off to sleep.

Instead, he comes striding in and we have a little conversation about staying in bed and falling asleep. I walk him back in there and put on Mozart: Complete String Trios & Duos on my iPod in the mm50 outside his room. Nighty-night and I go back to my bedroom to waiting e-mail.

A bit later Corinne comes home and joins me in the bedroom. “I don’t think he even noticed me walk by his room,” she said. “He was sitting in his chair conducting the orchestra.”

Sometime between that moment and an hour later when I went to check on him he fell asleep in the chair, probably dreaming in Mozart and conducting up a storm. I put him in bed, tucked him in, and picked him up in roughly the same position this morning. He had a good night’s sleep.

I wanted to thank you for my current inability to walk and move normally. Lack of time was always my excuse for not exercising, but now I’m getting the “If David has time in his schedule to exercise, then you do too” argument, and I have no good defense for that one.

I know that I’ll appreciate it in the long run and I’ll enjoy some benefits in the meantime once I’m not quite so sore, but still…thanks for setting a (painfully) good example.

J

Anyway, I happen to have a discerning ear for timbre and sound quality. I can hear the difference between a 128Kbps MP3 and a 128Kbps WMA file quite easily, for example. I actually prefer lossless encoding, and yes, I would be one of those people who argue that vinyl sounds better than CD, although I am not so impractical as to actually own a turntable. I can live with CD quality. I can live with satellite radio. And apparently I can live with crappy headphones, because I have for so long now.

So I’m adding these Shure e3c headphones to my list. They are not studio quality, but they are reasonably priced, get great reviews, and are still convenient.

As you may know, the Crabtrees hang at only the hippest, most exclusive, uptown party-like-a-VIP locales that NashVegas has to offer. We have the bling-bling, the dope whips, and the juice to do it.

So after tearing up the lanes at Donelson Bowl, we headed over to sample the haute cuisine at the nearest McDonald’s Playland. After a couple hours of playing hard, sliding on both the green and yellow slides, making friends, and just generally kickin’ it preschool, I was pretty thirsty, so I left Logan and Loggie’s Mom to get a refill.

After I left the table, Logan asked “Momma, is Daddy my best friend?”

This was a big moment for me as I realized just how precious our relationship is, how lucky I have been to have been so involved with him as he has grown from a baby into a preschooler, how many fathers often miss these years that I have been able to enjoy, and hopefully how much trust there is between us.

It was all the more special as I simultaneously considered the fact that as he gets older, I may very well have to give up my best friend role to be the father and leader he will need to develop into his best self as a man.

Plenty of time for that later, though. And maybe it won’ t have to be. I am good friends with a bunch of people I provide leadership for at work; some even report directly to me, while others report to people who report to me; some I knew before the reporting relationship changed, while others have always reported to me.

Some have told me in the past how remarkable it is that we can have both types of relationships in place and actually have them enhance one another rather than get in the way. But of course, they could just be kissing up.

Until proven otherwise, though, I prefer to think that I am able to do both because in both roles I genuinely pull for their success, in life and in their work.

So that’s where I’m leaving it with Logan for now. Best friends forever.

An article in the March 17^th, 2007 edition of The Economist cites work published in Current Biology regarding the circadian rhythm. Apparently people can be genetically predisposed toward being an owl or a lark.

Now if I can just stop coming into pots with Q8s from early position…but I’ve got at least twenty years to work on that.

The Economist goes on to question whether genetic testing might be on the horizon for certain types of third-shift work. Doing so opens up a whole mess of questions about what fair hiring criteria will look like in the future. I can definitely see testing happening for construction workers, airline pilots, doctors, and other professions where lives may be at risk if a lark is running the demolition team at midnight.

More appropriate than a genetic test may be a real-world skills test at the late hour under question. An employer could gather information on predicted employee performance without having to rely on genetic characteristics. After all, we’re a very long way from being certain about how all this works.

So we introduced the idea of consequence-free choosing in the form of Choose Your Pajamas. No matter what he chose first, we told him That’s a good choice and immediately unfolded them as we placed them on his bed.

The idea was to reinforce the finality of his decision and that decisions don’t have to be perfect, but they do need to be made.

Anyway, now Logan chooses his pajamas with a fierce determination. I open the drawer and barely get the words out before he has pointed to his choice and slammed the drawer shut. I have to ask him Can you show me again which pajamas you chose please?

He still waffles on other decisions when he’s cranky, but generally can make up his mind pretty good now. And he can choose pajamas like nobody’s business.

Well, tonight the doodle board made the trip upstairs with us for bath time, and we went through the familiar routine…except he didn’t choose any pajamas.

He looked at them in the drawer and then simply returned to the chair to write on his board. I walk over to ask him again to choose and find that he has written the word GAP on his board…matching the word stitched on one of the three pajama choices that were visible to him.

He looks up at me smiling proudly, awaiting my reaction.

That’s a…good…choice, I say.

We had our bath and he went to bed easily, tired from a full day of play, and stylish in his latest Gap sleepwear. It was a good night.

While messing about, I noticed that the car beeps the same pitch for both locking and unlocking. How to tell them apart then?

Unlocking beeps twice; locking beeps once. Okay, so how am I going to remember that during the next Nashville classic spring thunderstorm? Well, I guess I’ll just have to memorize that locking is…hey, wait a minute!

Lock. Beep. Unlock. Beep. Beep.

Phonetically: lok. beep. un lok. beep beep.

One syllable. One beep. Two syllables. Two beeps.

Simple. Memorable. Beautiful.