Don’t you just want to gobble her up?

I spent the last morning of my 20s hanging out with a 5-day-old kid. She is pretty awesome. I even forced an awkward CLH to holding her. I let her sleep on my chest while I laid on the floor, and she was all wrapped up like a Freebird burrito.

When you hold a sweet, innocent baby, you get a kind of warm fuzzy feeling inside. The feeling is so strong I’ve been on a high since this morning. I can’t stop thinking about it. That’s the evilness of babies. They exude this pheromone that makes you love them so that you won’t eat them instead. Seriously. It’s in some medical journal somewhere.

I am the oldest grandchild on one side of my family and the second oldest, by several years, on the other side. Tomorrow I am turning 30 years old, and some of my cousins, ten years younger than me, are already parents. People now feel that it is appropriate to ask me why I don’t have children, and the only answer I have is that I just haven’t felt it yet. Even today, spending all morning with a 5-day-old and a 9-month-old — I didn’t want to put ether one down, but I also didn’t want to take either one home.

Trailer: Piano with Wind and Trains from Andrew Laker on Vimeo.

I just found out my friend Butch, whom I’ve written about before, has had his first feature-length doc, PIano with Wind and Trains, accepted to the Chagrin Falls International Documentary Film Festival.

Butch and I met while working at a small suburban newspaper — he was a photojournalist and I was in my first real job as a reporter. We had the most evil of editors, but fun coworkers who made the job tolerable and a margin of creative freedom. Later Butch found a job that would let him experiment with video, though he still does a lot of photography work too.

I am excited about this film fest not just because I am credited in the doc as a creative consultant but also because it’s a friggin’ good movie, a heartwarming story, and because I am proud of my friend.

These pictures were taken in June, when Mr. Projector threw a Dive-in Theater party at his apartment.

He showed the film Am I Normal? and was about to screen Ski Party (the only beach bunny movie to be filmed *not* on the beach) when apartment security broke the party up.

A few days after Hurricane Ike, Aaron was in a single-vehicle scooter accident. He suffered some nasty road rash, a fractured bone, and was released from the emergency room on crutches. One week later, Aaron was unable to move and was back in the hospital with crippling pain.

It took doctors a few days to determine he had developed a Staph infection that spread to his kidneys, heart, and brain. The doctors performed open heart surgery to remove as much of the bacteria as possible, replacing his mitral valve in the process. His hospital bills piled up at an outrageous rate (close to $500,000) and he has no medical insurance.

Sadly, Aaron is still in the hospital.

Saturday, his friends in the Houston Scooter Battalion and the Sunday Punchers Scooter Club will be throwing a benefit for him at Aurora Theater. Here is the Facebook link for the event.

We’ll be screening some movies from his old 16mm educational film collection, as well as a never-before-seen episode of the Mr. Projector video podcast. There will be a live auction, Mr. Projector gear for sell, and FREE BEER. Tickets are $10. It’s 6-8 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 22 at Aurora Theater in The Heights.

If you can’t attend, please consider donating via Paypal on Aaron’s website. The link is on the left-hand side if you scroll down a bit.

My long-time friend and all-round creative person Butch Laker has finished his documentary on underground wrestling (wrasslin’) in Indiana and has set it free online. Click here to learn more about the bloodiest, strangest and most fear-inducing film on wrestling you’ll ever see. If you like it, please leave him a comment, and forward his link to your friends.

I haven’t seen Megan in, what, six years, but she lives in San Diego and that is where I will be for the next five days. I hope I can see her. I have many friends and family in California but most of them are far away from San Diego.

I am going to San Diego to attend Tiki Oasis. I am going because I have thousands of frequent flier miles to use and friends to see and also I need to find some way to burn up the four weeks between right now and my reunion with my husband in Germany.

I’ve never been to San Diego, or that far in south in California before. I am planning to eat at taco trucks for every meal. The weather there is supposed to be 75 degrees every day. That astounds and confuses me. It’s been so hot in Houston for so long that I have no idea what 75 degrees feels like. I have no idea what to pack (and I’m supposed to be leaving in seven hours. I should be sleeping). Seventy-five degrees sounds awfully cold to me. Seventy-five degrees sounds like winter!

The Rule household has been hashing and camping with friends in the woods of Southeast Texas all weekend. We are currently recovering from fresh thorny-vine lacerations, sunburns and a two-week-old case of poison ivy.

What have you been up to?