NEW BABY PHOTOS

Well, not of the baby itself per se, but it's certainly part of the picture. Here's a shot with a happy mommy and daddy.


And check out the fantastic job the daddy did on replacing the old window trim!

Turns out it's not necessarily the baby's head I was rubbing and poking as I previously discussed. It might very well have been the baby's backside. According to Jill's nurse-midwife, the baby is turning upside down and rightside up, so nobody knows. We still think it was the baby's head based on the shape.

Yesterday we went through a litany of possible names.. I'm the only one that likes Rufus... and spoke them to the baby. I figured the baby had a right to input on a name, so we felt for response after saying each name a few times. Only two got a response:

William and Charlotte

But I'm not inclined to name my own son, if it is a boy, after myself - plus, William is a little too popular of a name right now. What about Ronald Wilson?

By the way, I forgot to mention that we registered the baby at Babies R Us. You are welcome to check out the registery if you care to, but please feel no pressure to do so. I'm not very crazy about when people send announcements and invitations to absolutely everyone in hopes of casting a wide net for gifts. The news is then cheapened, in my opinion, amounting to nothing more than an invoice. So there it is: all is appreciated but nothing is expected.

JUDY HOME FROM THE HOSPITAL

I didn't get to post it Friday, but Judy did actually get to go home on Thursday rather than Friday. They still expect her to have a speedy recovery. She's pretty well confined to her bed with her foot in a cast, elevated with a pillow. Unfortuntely, she has to use her crutches more than she cares to because the halls in their home are to narrow for their wheelchair with the leg support fully extended. Otherwise, all is going well over there.

MOM AND DAD CHANGE REAL ESTATE GEARS

Jill and I had dinner with them at the Raccoon Lodge Friday night.



They let us know they backed out of the five-acre deal, feeling that the general contractor was trying to rip them off and would likely do so no matter where they purchased up there because there wasn't much competition. So, they're looking for a home more like ours.. smaller, likely 30 years or so in age, and with a bit more land than the typical new home these days. All in all, I think this is a good strategy, also.

RONALD REAGAN

I'm not going to bother writing a lot about President Reagan. You'll find tributes on TV - it's times like this I'm grateful we don't have cable TV and its monotonous, redundant news channels - and all over the web, among the best of which is this one by Peggy Noonan, a columnist for the Wall Street Journal and a former speechwriter for him.

But I've been impressed with the resonance his death has had in the minds of most Americans across most of the political spectrum. It seems that to those who are Democrats/liberals/members of the press, Reagan was a "great leader" whose legacy was chiefly "the restoration of American spirit and confidence" but little else - what incentive do they have to canonize him? To those who are Republicans/conservatives/libertarians, he walked on water... and even Jesus didn't get to personally vanquished the great hobgoblins of the 1970s: Jimmy Carter, Walter Mondale, union contract-driven stagflation and the Soviet Union.

Somewhere in the middle is the the truth about Reagan and his legacy, though I have to admit that I lean towards the latter category of inclination: major change in the world is a very complicated thing, but there's no doubt in my mind that his rhetoric, decisiveness, charisma and ability to stare down the Soviet Union and force them to blink will and should be most remembered. A negative legacy is there as well: I have seen firsthand the human toll his militarization of Latin America has taken. All too many women and children south of Mexico are widows and orphans - and their peace, that comes only with justice, is just now beginning to take shape. We might not have pulled triggers, but we gave aid and comfort to those who deserved the exact opposite.

But on the balance, the world is a better place because of him, no matter what some bitter opponents might say. Who but the malevolently self-loathing would prefer the Soviet Union's health? He was like everyone's favorite feisty but good-natured grandfather; a welcome member of the family. And just in case you forget how much like family he was received, here's the 1984 Electoral College map. As you can see, nearly the entire country was blue - and, so it seems, it has been since Saturday when the sad but long-expected news broke.



Rest in peace, Ronald Wilson Reagan.