At the mann music center

Megan Did Lot's of Dishes

What was conceived as a "small" soiree to unofficially celebrate my birthday last night became a multi-course meal for 10 people. It was cajun-themed. Especially good was the jambalaya that Megan made for the first time. Unfortunately, I had to work the same night, so immediately after dinner before any clean up was initiated, I headed straight to bed. When I awoke to go to work, Megan was still doing dishes!

Thanks a lot honey for putting so much work into a "little" party. I love you.

The combo of sunshine and rain means we might see a rainbow

Birthday Trip

For my birthday this year, I wanted to take advantage of our new proximity to NYC, so I asked Megan to take me to the city for the day.

12:00 PM. Arrived / parked in Midtown Manhattan. Stopped at the American Girl Place to pick up something for Paige (a surprise we'll reveal soon.)

1:00 PM. Briefly met Carl near Times Square (he works their after all.) He gave me a birthday gift, some barbeque rubs from Dean & Deluca. He also gave us his business card, so we could later impersonate him in order to get into the Metropolitan Museum of Art for free. Finally, he directed us towards lunch.

2:00 PM. Lunch and beer (me only, not the pregnant wife) at the HB Burger.

3:00 PM. Took a taxi to the Met. We went immediately up to the rooftop for the impressive Maelstrom exhibit and the even more impressive view. Then took a casual stroll through the Modern, Egyptian and Asian art sections.


5:00 PM. Horse-drawn carriage ride through Central Park.

6:00 PM. Dinner at Pampano. The weather was wonderfully temperate, so we sat on the terrace.

8:00 PM. After a bit of stroll we hopped into the car to head home. Unfortunately, we had to deal with traffic getting into the Lincoln tunnel and three, count-em THREE, bottlenecks, on I-78 W to get home.

So, yeah, I'm really exhausted. Thank you, Megan, for treating me to an activity-filled day and thank you, Paige, for letting us go.

Sitting down for dinner after a busy day in NYC

Living with a pregnant woman means finding 4 kinds of ice cream in the freezer.

Blogging From Work

In Delaware, this rarely happened, but one of the emergency departments I work at in Allentown has about 30,000 visits per year, which is not overly busy. My shift starts at 10 PM which is usually very busy, but then the volume of patients seriously slows down around 3 AM. I see over half my patients during the 1st 3 hours of my 9 hour shift. This leaves me with some free time at work. I previously used this time to actually call my old job. I figured they were the only other people awake at this hour that I could waste time with.

The other activity is, of course, updating this blog. So what have I been up to? Well, this previous weekend, Megan and Paige were away. They went to Ocean City for the annual Dilger-Clan beach trip. Since my pregnant wife was out of the house, we used this opportunity to paint some rooms. With much help from my mom, we painted Paige's room pink and the expected baby boy's room blue.

My dad came up to visit too and he brought my cousin Clayment (from France) too. I used the opportunity to show them around the region. It's changed significanly since I left five years ago, grown more cosmopolitan.

Otherwise, I also traveled to NYC this weekend, specifically Coney Island for my favorite music festival. I've sung the praises of the festival in the past. Once again I went with Derek and Carl. We watched three artists: Japandroids, Grand Duchy, and Built to Spill. I loved the Japandroids. They were enthusiastic and their live show really made me appreciate their album more. Grand Duchy really didn't sound any better than your mediocre local college band, and their only claim to fame was the presense of Frank Black (or is it Black Francis again) on guitar. Built to Spill was the greatest surprise for me. I only have one album from the mid-1990's and from the set I heard, I really should have continued listening to them beyond that. Their music has only grown more complicated and beautiful since the bratty, but still pretty, There's Nothing Wrong With Love.

Anyway, sorry to cut this short, but another patient just registered into this emergency department. How about some pictures of the newly painted rooms to hold you over?

More Pics from Ocean City

Friday, July 10: The mommies were away, but we managed to have a whole lot of fun.

Saturday, July 11: Took a few candid photos. The kids made a couple of friends.

Sunday, July 12: Started the day on the boardwalk and ended at the pool.

Girls' Field Trip

This was our first trip to Ocean City, Maryland since the move. Instead of popping down for a couple of days between shifts, I had to formerly take vacation to get to the beach. We joined Mary and her kids there. The first two days were standard but very fun. We basically spent those entire days on the beach, digging holes, jumping waves etc...

Today, Alexander joined his grandparents, so we took the three girls on a special field trip. First, we went to Assateague Island to see wild horses. Then we had our annual lunch at Seacrets and finally, took the girls to Northside Park's large playground. The best pictures, of course, have all three girls sitting side-by-side.

Back in ocean city

Paige drives while Bandit navigates

Picanick with Mom Mom

We get all the good parking spots

My current running route for this new neighborhood

Meme came to visit