On this cloudy morning, our new back porch is a mosh pit for Baby Cianna, who is hopped up on orange juice. She's a whirling wonder.

We're starting our house hunting journey after lunch.

- mike lee - baltimore - tip: to get a kid to smile for the camera, run at them from 10 feet away while making weird whooping sounds, and then snap the photo when you get close. works every time.

I keep trying to put on my I [heart] Social Security bracelet in the mornings, but Cianna always says "Pretty!" and grabs it from me to wear (1). She gets irate when I ask for it back. Such a girl.

Today was a morning of chasing "issues" all around the office and then a crowded ride on Amtrak (2) back to Baltimore for an afternoon of working with contractors (3) at the house.

Our row house is 80% empty of furniture, 95% repainted and pretty clean from top to bottom after a cleaning service made a final pass today. The big public open house is this Sunday afternoon. Tomorrow afternoon, we'll continue house hunting in Montgomery and Calvert County. House shopping in the spring is supposed to be fun, but today's grey skies and cold temps could sap some of that feeling if repeated tomorrow.

- mike lee - baltimore

Because I'm signed up to attend TED2006 next February, I got my first bi-monthly book club package from them today. The regular mailings are meant to keep our brains stimulated with new thinking until the event itself.

In the box was Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner's Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. The book is about the radically creative thinking of University of Chicago economist Levitt (read NYT profile linked above).

Also offered is the latest eye candy book from the strategic design firm IDEO, Thoughtless Acts?: Observations On Intuitive Design. The little rubberband-bound book is a collection of photographs showing how people unconsciously adapt to everyday objects, places or situations to produce unintentional design consequences.

I'm chronically behind in my reading--Gladwell's Blink is staring at me from the nightstand--but I may have to drop everything to dive into Freakonomics, which looks fascinating.

- mike lee - washington, dc

Cianna screams "bye byeeee" as we leave for work.

- mike lee - langley park, md

Courtesy of Shag and Atomic Books.

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Our house is officially on the market now. Brochures have been printed and a sign is up out front. We had two visits already today. It'll probably be sold in a week or two. I made another run to the self storage place (3) while a cleaning service rep toured the house with wife to prepare an estimate for a "move out" clean-up. We drove into another pretty sunset after dinner at the egyptian pizzeria.

- mike lee - baltimore

After lunch and farewells to co-workers and the Hyatt Hotel, we crossed the Bay Bridge on our way back to Baltimore to spend some more hours packing up our house.

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Amy and I are making s'mores at the Stone Hearth Fireplace by the Crescent Pool behind the hotel. A cool breeze is conveniently blowing the wood smoke towards the river. This is the perfect place to reflect on the day.

- mike lee - cambridge, md

We concluded the afternoon with an action plan, took a two-hour break, and now, in the golden light of sunset, are driving out to the Canvasback Restaurant & Irish Pub for dinner.

- mike lee - cambridge, md

In the second half of the morning, we did some exercises to capture unique aspects of our group's culture and talked about aspirations for the future. Lunch was mexican, and then I took a walk to the end of the hotel's Breakwater Pavillion where I found a patina'd brass spotting scope. Pictured is a view of part of the bridge over the Choptank River. Now back to dive into employee opinion survey data.

- mike lee - cambridge, md