Happy belated father's day to any of you who might be reading (or to the partners of those who are reading). I had a very good day yesterday.

Shelly made a yummy pancake breakfast and Julie gave me a picture of herself at her summer school in a very fancy frame that she made. Then Shelly and the girls "gave" me my father's day present. I say "gave" because I had ordered it a week ago and it's been sitting in my office since I arrived last Monday. I got a very cute card from the girls and proceeded to open the box for this



But, not only did they give me this lovely gift, Shelly even gave me a few hours alone in the afternoon to rearrange my desk and get the monitor set up!

I should have taken a picture of my desk before and after. I actually took the opportunity to remove some of the excess cables that were behind my desk, too. Though, there is still a pretty scary rat's nest of cords and cables. Someday I'll really go through and clean up that mess. But, for now, things are set up very nicely. I now have to also clean up the junk that got pulled out. Right now it's all just sitting in a pile on the floor in my office.

It really is a great looking monitor. I have a 20" lower-end Viewsonic panel at work and this 22" one trumps it. As it should since it's nearly twice the price. I do notice a bit of back light bleeding from the top and bottom but I never notice it when I'm actually using the panel. The webcam is a nice feature, too. VGA, DVI-D and HDMI inputs. It's got the glossy finish on the panel versus a matte finish. But, that hasn't been a problem either.

Today is our seventh wedding anniversary. I can't believe we've been married seven years already. It doesn't seem like it's been that long and yet it seems like it was ages ago. That summer of 2001, we had several friends get married, one friend had his first child, and then Sept. 11th happened and the world changed (for the worse in some respects).

In any case, what can I say about my wife? She's a great cook, a hard working and caring mother to our kids, and she puts up with me. Can't ask for more than that. We're going to the Melting Pot for dinner tonight. My folks are coming over to watch the girls and (if we're lucky) put them to bed.

Happy anniversary, Shelly!