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That is... (Reply to this comment)
by knotheadusc
a beautiful picture of you and your baby. I know I'm very late in saying this, but congratulations!
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Jul 05 '08
6:17 am PDT
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(Belated) Congratulations! (Reply to this comment)
by asafono
Brian,
Congratulations on the successful shipping! Now that you are in upgrade/maintenance phase, I hope you enjoy it as much as it sounds!
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Feb 26 '07
10:09 am PST
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Re: you *geek* (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
I love you, and your little son, too!
I love you too, and Donovan did when you were around, though he's at a fickle age and surely doesn't remember. He will again later, when you stay here during your training: for now there's just so much storage in his brain, and so few guides telling him where he filed stuff.
hugs,
- Brian
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Feb 20 '07
10:34 am PST
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Re: I adore... (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
You look so proud!
Thanks, Shelly. My role in his actual gestion was quite easy, to be honest – very unlike your role, say – but the maintence and reprogramming tasks have been a lot to learn. You may be looking at pride, or just intense relief; sometimes they're hard to tell apart even from inside.
congrats back at ya,
- Brian
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Feb 20 '07
10:32 am PST
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Re: Huzzah! (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
I applaud your decision to launch the product on the anniversary of my own launch by my parental design team
We thought that was a nice touch, yes. We almost didn't make the planned release date, though; we had to extend the workday to almost 11 p.m., with a pained and exhausted Cindy, the designer responsible for the actual release, repeatedly announcing "I can't go on" and "I can't do this". Luckily, she underestimated herself.
you can expect it to develop many unique features, and occasional "bugs."
In other words, it should fit right into the household.
I'm probably not going to grab your crotch anymore; it wouldn't feel right doing that to a daddy
Sure, alright. Now that you know the crotch is fully multi-functional, you're more afraid of causing accidental damage? I suppose that makes sense.
cheers,
- Brian
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Feb 20 '07
10:29 am PST
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Re: Congratulations to the Block family! (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
My very best wishes to you and your family, Brian. I think you'll be an incredible father!
Thanks, Marsha! (You're missed here on Epinions, btw.) The "incredible father" theory has, if nothing else, survived three months without being actively disproven - that's a relief. And i watched Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip last night, so i just learned, without trying it myself, that it's a bad idea to stick a baby's head in the guillotine.
cheers,
- Brian
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Feb 20 '07
9:57 am PST
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you *geek* (Reply to this comment)
by slayergrl99
I love you, and your little son, too!
I just stumbled across this, and you, in your sleep deprived state, are absolutely hilarious.
Love you, hun
Gabby
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Feb 11 '07
7:24 am PST
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Re: Congrats! (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
Looks like a high-quality product. Is he fully warrantied?
Unfortunately not, due to very high production costs and a process designed (as yours was) to promote diversity, rather than exact substitution, of product offerings. It's a sensitive issue.
Then again, the U.S. didn't have a third A-bomb if the Japanese had shrugged and said "We didn't really like Nagasaki anyway"; Donovan, we hope, can follow in this low-production tradition and put those filthy Japs to rest on his own. As long as i can still buy their cars and pop music, that is... the quality of my 3:30 a.m. analogies is another sensitive issue.
My own company has found that both economies of scale and the experience curve (a la Boston Consulting Group) have application to this industry, and our own operations have recently grown to four times their original number.
My company is more than a little awed to imagine your firm's (handsomely met) challenges. Double the output, we can picture. Well, Cindy _often_ can...
an extremely low-impact population bomb,
- Brian
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Jan 29 '07
12:41 am PST
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Re: - (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
Happy 2007 to you and yours
Happy 2007 to you as well! Mine's started very nicely, thanks -- except, of course, for the severe lack of Internet time...
awake and asleep on the baby's naptime,
- Brian
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Jan 29 '07
12:35 am PST
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Re: prettyvacant (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
you and the princeling/ munchkin/ future (current?) Muppet-and-Regina-Spektor-lover are much cuter than, say, kittens. Or, say, Antonio Banderas
Princeling is present tense for three of those, but only a future Muppet (he needs aspirations). And plaudits to your very careful, stylish exaggeration: if you'd said we were cuter than Antonia Banderas _petting_ a kitten, suspended disbelief would've come crashing down.
on a side note, it's spelled Tamagatchi
I'd tell you and Wikipedia to argue this one out, but then you might do so, and forget to keep writing Regina Spektor reviews.
the world is everlasting, it's coming and it's going, so why shouldn't our music reviews be the same?,
- Brian
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Jan 29 '07
12:32 am PST
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Re: :) (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
CONGRATULATIONS
:) Heya, Chad! Back at you, from what i hear. I hope the delivery went/will go smoothly: your genes seem well worth passing on.
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Jan 29 '07
12:21 am PST
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Re: aww (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
That's the sweetest and funniest thing ever by you. Hope little D grows up and resembles both his parents
Thanks! I just hope he mixes and matches properly. If he gets my mechanical skills, artistic talents, and attention span, but Cindy's physical build, he will have every right to complain to the Gods, and will resentfully refuse to believe that They play dice with the universe.
He's a cold-hearted snake-eyes,
- Brian
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Jan 29 '07
12:18 am PST
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Re: Re: Re: Christmas present! (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
I think the proper shutdown feature (ours was on CD-rom) does take a period of 12 to 24 months to be shipped, and maybe a bit longer to really kick in properly
For now we have an improper shutdown feature, which works pretty well as long as the Donovan's mommy clutches him to her bosom. Unfortunately his daddy, whose bosom is far less bounteous, is not able to operate this feature.
We missed one upgrade version and now our model thinks everything is a reindeer. We're having both the missed software and the most recent software shipped in. It's like installing expansion packs for The Sims, I tell you
As he ages, i'm told he'll start uploading various expansion packs automatically. I hope he gets the Sims' dating pack, rather than Grand Theft Auto's: see http://www.mcsweeneys.net/links/lists/11DavidAbrams.html, which i believe Mr. Abrams compiled rather than made up.
cheers,
- Brian
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Jan 29 '07
12:13 am PST
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Re: da donovan (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
While I'm not about to launch my own original product anytime soon, I am, as you know, in the business of 10 and 11 year old (or "fifth grade", as they call it) programming(1), and, given how many of their designers have misused these products, it is my responsibility to undo many mistakes
I'm happy, though not at all surprised, that you footnoted the "programming" with a self-correction; these days, there are teachers who'd utter the same sentence with no shred of irony. In fairness to the designers of these other products, it's not like it's _easy_ to avoid misusing a product that doesn't come with a reliable off-switch.
quality product developers are still willing to let their creative juices flow(2)
Shh! This is a family site. That means you are not supposed to discuss the biological processes by which families are made.
10 PRINT "WAAAH"
20 GOTO 10,
- Brian
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Jan 29 '07
12:08 am PST
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Re: teamfreak16 (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
Congratulations, man!
Thanks, Scott! There's part of me - the impishly objective-observer part rehashing this same thought from my wife's and my outdoor pre-rock-concert wedding - that thinks someone ought to balance out the cries of "Congratulations!" with "You're making a horrible mistake!". But the congratulators _were_ right at the wedding, so i hope y'all are again.
cheers,
- Brian
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Jan 29 '07
12:01 am PST
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I adore... (Reply to this comment)
by lambchops
your profile picture. You look so proud!
Shelly.
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Jan 28 '07
4:31 pm PST
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Huzzah! (Reply to this comment)
by DavidK93
Dear Brian,
I am overjoyed by the successful release of your innovative new product! In particular, I applaud your decision to launch the product on the anniversary of my own launch by my parental design team. As your new product matures, you can expect it to develop many unique features, and occasional "bugs." But if it proves to follow a developmental path similar to my own, you can expect the Donovan to acquire impressive computational abilities, although it may experience persistent networking deficiencies.
Your Friend,
David
P.S. The picture is totally adorable! And I'm probably not going to grab your crotch anymore; it wouldn't feel right doing that to a daddy.
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Jan 07 '07
6:32 pm PST
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Congratulations to the Block family! (Reply to this comment)
by katmar
How cool is that little product?!!! :)
My very best wishes to you and your family, Brian. I think you'll be an incredible father!
Always,
Marsha
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Jan 07 '07
12:37 pm PST
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Congrats! (Reply to this comment)
by consumingfiyah
Congratulations on the new addition to your family!
Carl
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Jan 05 '07
4:39 pm PST
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Congratulations on your new product! (Reply to this comment)
by reginafug
I also love your photo... very sweet!
Best and warmest wishes to you and family,
Regina
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Jan 03 '07
9:58 am PST
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Would it train me well... (Reply to this comment)
by bettega
...for my son that is due in april? ;-)
Happy new year
Bettega
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Jan 02 '07
7:11 pm PST
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Congrats! (Reply to this comment)
by panguitch
Looks like a high-quality product. Is he fully warrantied?
My own company has found that both economies of scale and the experience curve (a la Boston Consulting Group) have application to this industry, and our own operations have recently grown to four times their original number.
I can assure you that this ramp up in no way endangers the boutique character of our product offerings, thanks to the diversification in each release.
-Andy
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Jan 02 '07
10:10 am PST
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Re: Congratulations on a successful product launch! (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
diaper relapse is probable through the first several years of the launch phase, unless the product has been significantly updated since 1997
It's been updated quite a few times ... but a disturbing night spent poring over the paper trail reveals that the updates were by Microsoft. We're doomed.
Adorable baby, Brian - and you look like one happy dad!
Yeah. I really am. Given that all my adult experience with children is with the 11-and-up crowd, meaning that i've no idea what i'm doing most of the time, i wasn't expecting that yet. But yeah... which means i can enjoy Donovan now, before he gets old enough to read that preceding sentence, and starts drawing hostile conclusions.
worry, and be happy,
- Brian
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Jan 01 '07
12:28 am PST
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Re: The best ride without the accompanying nausea... (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
Enjoy and Treasure. The time goes by really quick
See, when you wrote that, i had no idea what you meant. But last night Cindy discovered that wrapping Donovan tight in his new Velcro-enhanced swaddler will cause a brand new nighttime effect - in him, but also in us - called "sleep".
It sounded crazy, but then i experienced it for the first time. I was laying quietly in bed in the dark, listening to the first track of Maria McKee's Life is Sweet, and suddenly the whole album was over. I looked at the clock (with its glowing numbers) and discovered that almost four hours had passed _without my feeling a thing_. It was spooky.
And then it happened again. So i'll make sure, as you say, to enjoy my kid before this stuff takes over my life.
that's a wrap,
- Brian
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Jan 01 '07
12:26 am PST
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Re: Congrats!! (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
He looks adorable!
*makes note to get photos of Donovan in his shifty, side-to-side-glancing, sinister-plotting mode, which, to be honest, is _also_ an adorable look if you don't stop to wonder what he's plotting about and whether it involves learning to walk while we're not looking*
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Dec 31 '06
11:17 pm PST
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Re: That's gotta be.. (Reply to this comment)
by voxpoptart
..the coolest birth announcement I've ever read.
Thanks! Of course, most parents don't wait 37 days to come out with theirs. Multiply 37 out and we get ... sheesh, 111 spare minutes i had to plan this. Total cheating, i tell ya.
cheers,
- Brian
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Dec 31 '06
11:06 pm PST
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- (Reply to this comment)
by George_Chabot
Great news, Brian, thanks for sharing! Happy 2007 to you and yours!
Your bud
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Dec 31 '06
4:29 am PST
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... (Reply to this comment)
by prettyvacant
oh, that is adorable and a half right there...you and the princeling/ munchkin/ future (current?) Muppet-and-Regina-Spektor-lover are much cuter than, say, kittens. Or, say, Antonio Banderas.
on a side note, it's spelled Tamagatchi. You'll never get very far in life if you can't spell useless things, unless of course you're never around useless things, in which case feel free to go far in life.
Ali
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Dec 30 '06
3:57 pm PST
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Re: Re: Overjoyed... (Reply to this comment)
by lammet
Dear CEO of Block Enterprises,
RE:Writing Comment Reply: 15 Minutes: $125.00
The cheque is in the mail.
-The happy shareholder
PS: Happy New Year to all at BE :o)
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Dec 30 '06
3:34 am PST
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:) (Reply to this comment)
by lemon_lime
CONGRATULATIONS!!
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Dec 29 '06
9:19 am PST
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