Tuesday, November 27, 2012

What Name to Use

I am going back and forth on what name to use on my blog and other Internet postings.  R. Bradley Andrews is much more distinctive, but seems a bit too formal in many uses.  Brad Andrews is simpler but others have dared to use the same name out there!

I thought about a clever alias, but the ones that come to mind seem to presumptive and I have already pretty much decided that I am going to live with my core ideas being connected with me.

I am shifting to the simple Brad Andrews either way, but we shall see.  What choice has everyone else made in this area?

Friday, November 23, 2012

Another Holiday Season

The holiday season has been very rough around our house for the past few years.  Things were somewhat fun when our children were young, but we had horrible times as they got older, especially since their acting out increased greatly around this time of the year. 

(See my adoption blog if you want to know some reasons why.)

This year was very quiet.  My oldest son just moved back to the area of his birth family so he and his family did not come over at all.  My wife did go down to see our youngest daughter who is the only one that lives at all close and the only other one that still talks with us.  She had a good quiet time and then came home.

We did brave the crowds at Walmart at 8pm to take advantage of some of their sales.  It is amazing what some people will do to save a few dollars.  We got a couple of cheap DVDs and my wife did most of her Christmas shopping.  I did get a cheap Targus laptop backpack, but I am not sure that it is as good as it looks like and I may just stick with the Jansport one I got cheap with a timely visit to a discount shoe store just after school started.  It seems to have much more room and a reasonable 2 compartment layout.

I doubt I will go next year, but it was an interesting experience.

I may head out to by some educational toys tomorrow at Michaels, but I am not going to do much else.