OC Family - Moms. Kids. Life. - (Back to Work Dad)

Sleep, the ultimate oxymoron

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:11:00 GMT

I like sleep, sleep is my friend. However basic math has gotten in the way toddler + teething does not = sleep. I have long known that I needed sleep, and the less I get, the worse it is for beautiful wife. Case in point, when I am really tired, I have waking dreams; I once pushed her out of bed because I needed to save her from a set of skies that were about to fall on top of her, valiant yes, good idea, not so much. I mean who keeps skies over their bed.

I recently realized that even more so, it can effect my work, aside from the normal, taking 8 different attempts to spell "Hi", I couldn't get a simple sentence out either, and this is just with a little dude getting up at 5:15 because his two year molars are coming in. What the heck am I going to do when number 2 comes along? I'm going to need a freaking translator.

You know when I was in college I rocked sleep, I could sleep for hours, hours I tell you. I wish I had known that in a few years I would be begging for an extra 15 minutes. I might have cherished it a little more. There really isn't such a thing as a good sleep, in fact, "Good sleep" is the ultimate parenting oxymoron. There is okay sleep, there is crappy sleep, there is no sleep, or even a complete lack of sleep, but no such thing as a good sleep anymore. Oh well, it's worth it, and that's why God invented caffeine:

In praise of good customer service

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 16:15:00 GMT

For the most part, customer service gets a bad rap, we usually have something to complain about, and good service more often than not, goes unspoken. I learned my customer service skills at the hands of the Walt Disney Company, so I would say I have a higher standard then most. So last week when I had to "over the top" (that's Disney speak for good) customer service experiences, in the same day no less, I felt an obligation to share.

Disclaimer, I should explain that both of these are unsolicited, and beautiful wife and I paid full price for both of these experiences.

Now, I love woot.com, and have purchased more then a couple of items from them, including our beloved Roomba. A few weeks back we ordered up beautiful wife a netbook from woot.com, complete with accessory kit. The netbook was red, and the accessory kit was supposed to match, it didn't. Honestly, I didn't even notice, opened up the new toy, and moved on. The next day I received this email, which not only blew me away because I hadn't even complained, but it also cracked me up:

Being the color conscious Wooter you are, we apologize for the minor heart attack we caused when you opened the package containing the Red Acer Aspire One 10.1" Netbook with Accessory Kit. "How DARE they!" you may have exclaimed as you saw that the red accessories were very much not red and would never go with your decor, "WHATEVER WILL I DO". But let it never be said that Woot does not care about matching accessories!

We still have these red accessories in stock and we will be sending these out to you, and everyone else who ordered the red netbook, automatically. No need to reply to this email, we're simply giving you a heads up to expect another package with the correct accessories- we'll send out the tracking to you when we have that available. We apologize for any inconvenience that our oversight may have caused you!

Sincerely,
Woot Member Services

Now that is how business should be done.

That evening beautiful wife and I had a date night planned over at the Melting Pot in Irvine, which is just about our favorite restaurant and they were debuting a new menu item that night. So of course we had to go. Earlier in the day I had been tweeting how much I was looking forward to dinner there, and low and behold the Melting Pot followed me on twitter, we joked back an forth about bad resume we had seen lately and then I headed home. When we got to our table this was there:

And you wonder why we like the place so much? By the way you can follow them too here. Do you have any good customer service stories? Let's hear them!

Want to find out more about the back to work Dad, find me here:

You can follow me on twitter here, if you would like job hunting advice, email me at adam_thedad@hotmail.com.

We need your help

Tue, 23 Feb 2010 20:31:00 GMT

Attention parents of more then one kiddo; beautiful wife and I need your help. We need your help to prevent this:

** Please note, this baby doll is over 30 years old, most damage is due to that and not little dude. No babies were harmed in the writing of this post.

So here's the issue, as you may or may not know we are due with baby boy number 2 in the beginning of April, and we are trying to get our 21 month old little dude acclimated to having a baby in the house by using a doll. As you can see above, it didn't go well. In fact it was an epic failure, complete with a def-con 4 meltdown.

So we'd like to hear what you did; oh wise parents of multiple children. How did you do it? Do you have a trick? Leave it in the comments, and I'll update you with what works.

Thanks!

A new room for little dude

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 20:44:00 GMT

... Or how to redo a room with nothing but a camera, paint, and a box full o' old stuff.

This past weekend beautiful wife and I finally got around to decorating little dude's big boy room. I thought I'd share some of our more brilliant ideas. When we did the nursery originally we did a beach theme and we were having trouble finding cheap decorations so we decided that since, you know, we live 3 miles from the beach, why not go take picture on our own, blow 'em and hang 'em on the wall. Here's what we cam up with:

Pretty cool right? Well we decided to run with that idea for a sports themed (Read baseball and hockey) room. To see where I took the hockey picture, check out Suzanne Broughton's post here. The stadium is a playoff game at Angel's stadium.

Add to that a couple of my old (think highschool) jersey's:

And a sweet accent wall:

And you are golden! What do you think?

Oh and little dude would like to wish you a belated happy valentines day, because there just aren't enough pictures on this post:

This one's for you babe

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 15:26:00 GMT

Dear Beautiful wife,

I wanted to thank you, to thank you for being supportive, for the sacrifices you have made in the last year. Thank you for the love you have for me and our little dude. Thank you for being a trooper while growing our second little dude. I thank you for your laugh and for making me laugh, for putting up with me, for lifting me up when I am down. Thank you for being understanding, compassionate, intelligent, a beautiful. Thank you for filling the part my soul that was empty until you came along.

I love you.

Adam.

P.S. I can't wait to share more moments like this with you:

A first haircut!

Sun, 07 Feb 2010 13:59:00 GMT

So, after 20 months, it was finally time, and I with my steel resolve not to let any son of mine have a mullet, and beautiful wife's and my fear that little dude was going lose his flippin' cute curls, we set out. Out for that momentous occasion, the first hair cut. Luckily we had heard through the grapevine of a great place to get little dude's hair cut, called Cool Cuts for Kids, check it out here. I gotta say, it was worth every penny of the 18.50 plus tip we paid for it. They had elmo or any number of movies for little dude to watch, and be entertained, plus he got his hair cut in a fire truck. They also have video games for the older kids, along with a play area for kids to wait in. Let me walk you through the experience:

Before:

The fire engine, notice little dude is standing, but the awesome hairdresser is not phased, nor does she make him sit down:

The hairdresser was wicked fast, yes I said wicked, which is great because it allows for less opportunity for a meltdown, total time from before picture to after is 8 minutes:

What have I gotten myself into:

After!:

Haven Gastropub is great until...

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 20:47:00 GMT

...Until you get to dessert and realize your pregnant wife can't have any of it.

Let me explain, I'll start at the beginning. Last Friday night there was a little get together of OC bloggers called blogcrush. There was going to be beer and food, I was in. It was also a great chance for a date night with beautiful wife. It started off well:

Then it got better, these are the best chips I have ever had, and let me tell you I've had a lot of chips in my day:

Then it got really good (please note the name of this beer is not suitable for a family publication):

Then it got 4 times as good:

Then came the tragic part, so far the beer was good, the food was great (both organic and locally grown), and the prices were very reasonable. Not to mention the ambiance and company was great as well. But what made beautiful wife make this face;

Let's take a closer look:

Aside from the bacon ice cream (which bacon makes beautiful wife want to vomit), and the one with bleu cheese (a pregnant no-no) all the desserts are made with copious amounts of liquor! What the heck! Oh well, it was a great night, and highly recommend Haven Gastro pub, unless your pregnant with a sweet tooth.

Want to find out more about the back to work Dad, find me here:

You can follow me on twitter here, and on Facebook here, if you would like job hunting advice, email me at adam_thedad@hotmail.com.

Pretend City pretty much rocks

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 20:14:00 GMT

So, Pretend City, pretty much rocks. Let me tell you why. Last weekend Beautiful Wife and I took little dude over to Pretend City in Irvine, check them out here.

I mean they are a whole city:

Little dude had the time of his life, for one fantastic reason; nothing was off limits, he could climb on anything, ride anything, and go anywhere, oh and dance his little booty off, check it out, he's a dancing machine:

And I'm pretty sure he is going to be a race car driver at some point as well:

Or maybe he'll be a Farmer

Or a firefighter

Or he'll be just plain awesome. Let's go with that. Check out Pretend City folks, we liked it so much we bought a year pass, we'll see you there!

Job hunting do's and don'ts

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 12:50:00 GMT

Hi folks, hope you're all staying dry, from out my window here, it still looks pretty wet, but I've seen more sun in the last half hour then the last 5 days, so it's a start. I thought I'd take a break from storm watch though and share with you all some does and don'ts for your job search. By the way, all of these have actually happened. Take a look, if you have any thoughts shoot me a comment!

1. Don't: do this on your resume: Objective: Job. Do: Put a meaning couple of sentences that are tailored to the position your are applying for. Even Better: Customize your entire resume to suit the job, no need to include an objective, if your resume reads like the job description.

2. Don't: Make up job titles that have nothing to do with your work experience. ie. Social Media Professional, when your experience only talks about a little bit of graphic design work. Do: Use a job title that makes sense. Even Better: Use a job title that makes sense, but works across an entire industry, ie. don't use Account Media specialist level 7, use Account specialist or Media Specialist.

3. Don't: Leave dates off of your of your job experience. It makes it look like you are hiding something. Do: Include months as well as years on your resume. Even Better: Be prepared to account for any gaps in employment, and remember that the employment rate sucks right now, and it is perfectly acceptable to not have worked for a year. (if you were unemployed in 2001-2002, same rules apply especially in IT.)

4. Don't: Format the bejeezes out of your resume. Do: Keep it clean and simple, don't use tables and special formatting. Often times your resume will be passed from one person to the next, sometimes on different systems, your formatting can get jumbled, especially if a company is putting your resume in an applicant tracking system. Even better: Keep it in a .doc format, try and avoid a PDF.

5. Don't: Submit yourself willy-nilly everywhere under the sun. Do: Read job descriptions carefully, and submit your resume to those positions you actually are qualified for. Many people believe that it is a numbers game, and while to some extent it is (if you don't apply, you won't get a job), applying to the same company on multiple occasions for a huge variety of positions will only turn you into a joke.

Here are some bonus tips for you:

1. Follow up on your applications, try and call in, but at least send and email. Don't be a stalker!
2. You should never pay to have your resume reviewed.
3. You should never have to pay to get a job, ever.
4. Staffing companies are not the enemy, they will help you with your resume, and if you research them well enough and find one that works extensively with your skill set, they'll even get you a job.

Well, I hope this helps, let me know what you think in the comments section.

Awesome Pic o' the day:

Want to find out more about the back to work Dad, find me here:

You can follow me on twitter here, and on Facebook here, if you would like job hunting advice, email me at adam_thedad@hotmail.com.

A public service announcement

Sun, 17 Jan 2010 13:27:00 GMT

That's it I've had, this has gone to far! It is time that I bring to light a growing problem in today's society. I fear it shall bring down civilization as we know it, if we don't do something about it soon. Let me explain, no, that will take to long, let me sum up.

You see that thing in your ear, yes, the one that you use to talk on the phone? Yes, that one. TAKE THE FREAKING THING OUT OF YOUR EAR WHEN YOU AREN'T ON THE PHONE OR DRIVING! Whew, sorry I feel a little better now. Look, I understand the convenience of using a hands-free device to talk on your phone, I really do, I use one all the time in my car, and at work. Here's the problem though, as a show of respect to those around me, when I am not on the phone or driving, I take it out of my ear.

Today was the last straw you see, at church today, a blinking red light caught the corner of my eye, upon closer inspection, sure enough, someone had their hands-free in there ear, in the middle of church. Are you really going to take a call, I mean really? Come on people, put it away! In another instance I saw a father and mother at a table in a restaurant with there family, both of them had it in their ears. Way to show your family that they are the priority.

Look, I don't know why you feel you need the thing in your ear all the time, maybe you think it's high tech and cool, maybe you want people to think you are important, but I'm going to tell you what it makes me think. I think you are rude, and slightly pompous, there, I said it. Now please stop.

Thank you, that is all, I will now step down from my soap box.

Here is an awesome pic of little dude to make it all better.:

Want to find out more about the back to work Dad, find me here:

You can follow me on twitter here, and on Facebook here, if you would like job hunting advice, email me at adam_thedad@hotmail.com.

Goodbye to my stay at home Dadness

Sun, 17 Jan 2010 13:23:00 GMT

Well, it was a long good road to get back to where I am today. I have what comes as a bitter sweet announcement for all of my imaginary friends out there. Two weeks ago week, I started a new job. Yup, you read that right, I'm a working Dad again. I say bitter sweet because really, that's what it is. It's sweet, because well I have a job, a paycheck, and insurance again, and I will be able to provide for my family once more. It's bitter because, although I never thought I would say it, the time I got to spend with little dude, has become irreplaceable. I would not trade it for the world.

So what comes now with my humble little blog. Well, if you take a look around you will see some changes, a little visual changes here in there. But primarily one thing will never change, this blog is first and foremost about being a Dad. Now however, I'm adding and extra purpose, you see i have spent the better part of my career after college finding people jobs, helping to create great resumes, and walking people through a hiring process. Not to sound self promoting, but I'm pretty good at it. add into that my experience of job searching for myself in the toughest job market most of us have ever seen, and I think I can be a resource.

In a time when 3 out of 4 jobs lost are attributed to men, and many of them Dad's, I feel i am distinctly positioned to help out those who need. So stay tuned for Dad advice, news, and events, with some good old fashioned employment advice for some added flavor.

Want to find out more about the back to work Dad, find me here:

You can follow me on twitter here, and on Facebook here, if you would like job hunting advice, email me at adam_thedad@hotmail.com.

Change is coming, and it is good

Sun, 17 Jan 2010 13:22:00 GMT

Well folks, you are about to see a new Dad around here, coming in the next week there will be a big change on this humble little blog. You see I got a job, and just finished my first week. It went well, thanks for asking. But it means that I can't really call myself a stay at home dad any longer. So I am re-inventing myself. But you'll see more about that next week. For now, I want to share something with you all, before making the changes around here. The time I spent with my son for the greater part of last year are irreplaceable and I've learned a lot, things that I think most Dad's need to hear, and maybe even some Mom's. Take a look:

Nobody loves a son more than a Father, except maybe his Mother, but she has a 9 month head start.
I am not nor will I ever be playing Mom, mister Mom, or be a substitute for a Mom, you can call me a Dad, or a Father. Remember, Dad's don't mother our kids, we father them.
Little Dude, I promise to chase you when you want to be chased, throw you in the air when you ask, and take you outside as much as possible.
I will never be afraid to take you to the store with me.
I will also never be afraid to watch you and take care of you while your Mom is out.
Father's can handle anything their kids do, if we just stop and think about it.
Value the time you get with your Son, you may never get that amount of quality time again.
Your laugh, will never get old, and I promise to make you laugh as often as possible.
I love my little dude more then I ever though possible.

Me and my boy awesome pic o' the day:

A Friendly Soul

Sun, 17 Jan 2010 13:19:00 GMT

So little dude and I were at the grocery store the other day, and as we were cruising around he started saying hello to everyone who walked by (he does this often).

Little dude says "hi!" to an elderly woman, who stops, smiles, and says "what a friendly soul." To which I said thank you, and moved on. But here's the thing, it stuck with me all week, and the more I thought about it the more I realized how true it is. Moreover I also think it is a wonderful description of what we really all should strive to be.

Little dude comes by this so naturally, that despite my thank you to the kind lady, taking credit for my little dudes kindness, I really had no control over it. It really is amazing, he says hello to everyone, and I mean everyone, with the same cheerful attitude, and you know what, they all smile back. He once said hello to a big angry looking dude, who cracked a smile and said hello right back.

Even better, he doesn't seem to let other people crack him. If he's happy, it doesn't matter if there are a bunch of other kids around him having stage 12 meltdowns, he's still as happy as can be. Don't believe me, check this picture out from our fabulous new years eve party, see if you can pick him out:

So I think this year I will try and be more like little dude, say hello to random people, and not let anything ruin my good mood.

Awesome winter dude pic o' the day: