Michelle and I picked up the rest of the family at around noon on Tuesday. Baby boy's dedication song on the way home was, of course, "Beautiful Boy" by John Lennon.

We are all very happy to be home and together once again!

On Aidan's second day he was visited at the hospital by his Grampa Robert, Grandma Frances and Auntie Jazmin.

Uncle Robie had unfortunately taken ill with the flu and needed to stay home. Hopefully he'll have a chance to see Aidan this weekend.

By the afternoon of his birth day (Chinese New Year, coincidently), Aidan has proven himself to be quite the little eater with a very healthy appetite. Baby boy is breast-feeding regularly and digesting often. ;-)

Michelle is quite the big sister and is already a great help. She just adores her little brother.

Aidan presented Michelle with a welcome gift, an Angelina Ballerina doll, which she loved.

On his birth day, Aidan was visited at the hospital by his Tia Fina, Yadira, Flora, Alfonso Jr., Maria, and Gloria. He also received a very special phone call from his cousins Kristin, Clareese and Officer Tom.

Aidan Robert Millan was born healthy and beautiful at 5:36am on Sunday, January 29th, 2006 at Arcadia Methodist Hospital. He weighs 7 pounds 8 ounces and is 20 inches tall.

Mom did an amazing job with a 100% natural labor and delivery. Big sister Michelle is especially proud of her little brother. Spirits are very high with the family.

Click the photo below to visit his Flickr photoset:

We just arrived at the hospital. Josie is already dilated approx. 4 cm.

:-D

We visited Doctor Fong and Morrison's office today. Baby's amniotic fluid levels are fine, his heart rate is right on the money, and he's currently "sunny side up", though he should be facing towards the back. This all tells me he just needs a little more time. I'm aiming for this weekend.

Doctor Fong gave us the option of inducing tomorrow or waiting it out until next Friday. Josie opted to wait and I totally stand behind her decision. :-)

After using a Mac for approximately three years, I finally encountered a system error that impeded upon my Mac's ability to boot into its Aqua GUI environment.

Fortunately, as a failsafe, my Mac did instead boot into its 'single user mode' console. From here, I was able to begin troubleshooting the problem. I tried an fsck file system check and several system reboots by typing 'reboot' into the console.

After a few reboot attempts I began to catch sight of a bit of text being flashed for split-second relating to a missing '/etc/hostconfig' file. Sure enough, this vital file, which keeps a list of the basic system startup services (i.e. Apache, Spotlight, CUPS, etc) and their boot time status, was missing.

To fix the problem, I mounted my PowerBook's drive with 'mount -uw /' and then, referencing the '/etc/hostconfig' on my Mac mini, I manually created a new one for my PowerBook using vi. I then typed 'reboot' into the console and my Mac proceeded to boot up normally. I was relieved.

Still, why this happened perplexes me. The only system task I recall doing as of my last power-up was an edit of my Apache '/etc/httpd/httpd.conf' file. I only uncommented three lines of it to turn on PHP support for Apache. Afterwhich, I used Mac OS's 'Sharing' preference pane to restart Apache.

It's unfortunate that this procedure could have somehow deleted '/etc/hostconfig'. Though there is definitely a connection between the 'Sharing' pref pane and '/etc/hostconfig', I would only expect the file to be modified and not deleted completely.

Fortunately, in the end, the problem was easy to resolve and my Mac is now back to normal.

Oh, and yeah, still no baby news to report. ;-)

Thanks guys!

We're still waiting on Baby Boy.

Since we are well past our Saturday due-date, it becomes necessary to have baby's heart rate monitored.



All is well and doctor has requested we come back on Thursday for another check-up. Providing baby doesn't come sooner, of course.

At only two and half years old, Michelle is already learning how to use a computer. She has mastered the mouse and does a surprisingly excellent job of navigating through her games and the web page I made for her.

(Click for video)

When I'm not building web sites for the company I work for, I like to relax my mind, body and soul with some gardening. There's nothing quite like a little gardening to help relax and massage one's mind. No schedules, no pressure and no annoying voices blabbering about constantly. Like a neighbor once told me, gardening can definitely save you from some trips to the shrink.

It's wonderfully fulfilling work and here are some other good reasons to do it yourself...

1. You'll get a nice workout.
2. You can meditate and flush out most of the mind-crap from the week prior.
3. You don't have to pay someone $50-70 per month to do it for you.
4. You learn a lot about proper face protection, but that's a whole other story. ;-)

Anyway, here is my first major yard project, a planter area for the front yard. I'll be adding more plants soon but, for now, I suppose this is a good start.

Before:


After:

This is pretty cool. This site will let you perform a Flickr image search by merely drawing a simple sketch.

It's not perfect but it did manage to pull up a couple "eye" drawings as a result of my sketch. Good concept and I look forward to seeing it improve.

I'm in the market for a new Mac, but with Macworld San Francisco just around the corner I should definitely hold off.

Fortunately, MacRumor's Buyer's Guide is there to provide predictions on the release of new Apple products.

One of the leading proponents and reviewers of the Microsoft scene decided to buy his wife a Mac mini for Christmas. Smart move! His site, www.winsupersite.com, is one of the best for updates on the latest Microsoft technologies. I check it periodically to stay abreast of Microsoft's latest attempts to keep up with the innovations made by Apple and the open-source community.

Personally speaking, I did the same thing for my wife over a year ago and her day-to-day computer use has been far smoother than it was with her PC. Typically, the only problem that comes up has to do with some of the proprietery Microsoft web pages out there. Still these are rare and, in such cases, trying these sites in Internet Explorer for Mac usually provides a good work around.

Beyond that, the only change we've needed to make has been a RAM upgrade, as she's found her Mac to be far more useful than we originally anticipated.

As further testimonial, last November my dad decided to buy my mom, a PC novice, a 12" Apple PowerBook. My mom took to Mac OS X very well and she has been the first family member in over eight years to not bombard me with the typically annoying PC related complications and problems. In fact, things have been so good with her Mac that I typically end up being the one to ask her how things are going. I would never think to ask a PC user this question without planning to give up a complete Saturday of mine. ;-)

Mac OS X, in my opinion, is the BEST consumer operating system in the world. I've tried them all and though it's not perfect it does come very, very close!

On January 1st, 2006 at 3:30pm, Michelle and I attended the 'Nemo On Ice' show at the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim.

I must admit that I was very impressed overall by the show put on by Disney. If you have children I highly recommend this one.