OurFirstMarriage » News and Stuff

Facebook Group

Patrick — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 23:52:13 +0000

There is now a Facebook group for Our First Marriage. I’m not going to tell you how to find it. If you can’t find it on your own, you need to spend time in the Stupid Box. We’re looking to see if we can utilize Facebook to expand our audience, and possible help connect better with our listeners. We’ haven’t worked out the details, but I am thinking that we will cross-post to the group, although the podcast won’t be posted there. Listen closely to the next couple of podcasts, there will certainly be more information coming about the Facebook group. Also, I’m thinking of creating a contest that may have a nice little payoff for the winner.

No OFM this week

tom — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 13:09:02 +0000

It was my birthday this weekend and we were out of town (for someone else’s birthday ironically enough). We tried to get one recorded but it just didn’t work out. Look for some new recipes in the next few days. I think I’m going to post both a taco and a taco sauce recipe. See ya next week!

Update on OFM

tom — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 13:45:21 +0000

You may (or may not) be wondering what is going on with OFM. Well, first of all, we will be back to our normal update schedule starting next week. We may even put out a few extra episodes to make up for our two weeks off. Second, we didn’t do any podcasts with my parents. Mostly because we couldn’t find the time but also because we didn’t really have anyone express any interest in it. Third, Tanel and I spent a lot of time talking about this podcast and what we want versus what we are getting out of it. We may be seeing some changes in the future – for the site and the podcast. If you’ve got suggestions, now is the time.

100th Episode and New Poll

tom — Wed, 28 May 2008 20:10:47 +0000

On the right you’ll notice a new poll. We’ve got the 100th episode coming up soon. We’d like to do something a little special. Please vote and let us know what you think you could do. Generally, we podcast after the kids go to bed (around 10pm) on Friday or Saturday night but for this special occasion, we perhaps could do it at a different time that is more convenient for everyone. We know that Pat and Theresa are planning on coming up to be on the podcast but we were wondering what the rest of our listeners would like to do.

We’ve done live shows before on Ustream where our listeners can watch while we record the podcast and we answer questions afterwords but we could probably do some sort of Skypecast or video conference thing to get more people involved. If you are interested in being on the show somehow, email me (you know the address) and let me know what time on the weekends works for you in general. As long as we record it before the day it is supposed to be posted (even if it is recorded a few weeks early) we’ll be OK. We look forward to hearing from you.

Welcome Theresa!

tom — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 01:57:51 +0000

If you caught our camping podcasts, you know who Theresa is. If not… shame on you! They were pretty good. Well, after camping Tanel thought it’d be a good idea if Theresa contributed to the website in some way (for the full story, tune in to Wednesday’s podcast) and one thing led to another and now she is! You’ll find a bio here and her posts under Theresa’s Corner. We’re really excited to have her on board and can’t wait to hear all the exciting things this librarian has to say… even if she does keep shushing us all the time . Welcome aboard Theresa!

Ustream on hold

tom — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 23:05:10 +0000

For the time being, we won’t be broadcasting our podcast recording sessions over ustream. This weekend Tanel’s parents are staying with us, next weekend is Easter, and the weekend after that we’ll be camping. If we can manage next weekend, we’ll let you know. We’ll still be recording and putting out podcasts, just not ustreaming them. I’ve even figured out a way to record while we’re camping so look for some “on location” podcasts in about 3 weeks.

Ustream… when?

tom — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 17:45:37 +0000

Honestly I’m not sure. If you’ve been listening, you know about the arranged marriage which turned out not to be arranged. Well, we’ve got them coming over to dinner tonight. I have no idea how this will turn out. Even if they leave early, we might be too wiped to podcast. We’re playing it by ear. I highly recommend you sign up for our email notifications as that is the easiest way to get notified when we are about to go on ustream. I’ll try to give you as much warning as possible. I know that I receive the email within 2 minutes of me posting so it is pretty instant. If we don’t record tonight, we are definitely on for tomorrow night. Saturdays tend to be late nights for the kids but we’ll try to limit naps (ours and theirs) so that we can be online as close to 10pm as possible.

New Stuff on OFM

tom — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 01:11:32 +0000

Well, it’s been a busy few days. Thanks to a good friend of mine, OFM has got a new logo and a ton of new graphics. It’s definitely kept me busy putting together banners and such. I’ve popped up a new poll for those that want to let us know what you think about the audio quality of the podcast. Just visit us at OFM and scroll down – it’s on the right. Last, here’s a few links to a couple of things that I thought were funny. Dos and Don’ts with Babies, and School Humor. There’s a good chance someone is going to be offended by that first one. Make sure to tune in for the next few Podcasts. Tanel wants to talk about crazy people and she’s got a few things she hasn’t told me yet. Should be a gas.

Tom

We’re BACK!

tom — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 15:32:27 +0000

OK, so the website went down. I can only blame (thank) Camoosta for that. Their added traffic caused us to use up our monthly bandwidth in about 3 weeks. That’s a good thing. Going down isn’t. We’ve changed the way we stream our Podcasts (which is the major cause for our lack of bandwidth) so this will never happen again. Sorry for the inconvenience. I have a Podcast to post for today that I’ll try to get edited and posted ASAP.

-Tom

No new Podcasts this week… probably

tom — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 16:56:16 +0000

Tom was sick over the weekend so we didn’t have a chance to record any new Podcasts. We’ll try to do one for Wednesday but it depends more on kid’s bed times than our desire. If not, we’ll see you next week.

Edit: We recorded one tonight. Look for it Wednesday or Thursday.

No new podcast this week

tom — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 02:09:03 +0000

There will be no new podcasts this week. Tanel and I were both sick all weekend and we just didn’t have the energy. Look for something new on Monday. Our apologies.

Want to see our faces?

tom — Sat, 24 Nov 2007 02:52:40 +0000

From now on, we’re going to start streaming the video of us recording the Podcast on Ustream.tv. You can watch us here. There is also a chat function where you can send us messages and ask us questions live. While we generally record on Saturday nights at around 10, that isn’t set in stone (depends on when the kids go to sleep). We will probably be recording an episode or two tonight (as soon as Capitan Evil goes to sleep). If you want to receive email announcements when we are about to start broadcasting, you can join our email notification list (click the link above or subscribe below). Just make sure you select “News and Stuff” as one of the categories you are notified of. This is your chance to hear the unedited versions of the podcast. We look forward to seeing what this exciting new feature of OFM brings.

My Dad, the Poet!

tom — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 19:45:07 +0000

Looks like my Dad will be getting another poem published. Now I know where I got my writing genes from!

He Danced!

The day was soon to come
The wedding of an elder son

An autistic child doesnâ€™t travel well
And in my sonâ€™s case itâ€™s a living hell
He tarnished my thought of wedding music
When I told him he was to be included

A dance of wills began as he tried to undo
The uncertainty that I was leading him to
â€œIt makes my stomach hurt and Iâ€™m afraid.â€
Are some of the things he repeatedly said

On my knees was the only place to go
But he could not replace his thoughts of woe
He continued to complain, anguish and cry
â€œIâ€™m not going, if I have to flyâ€

And every other reason came to his lips
As he hoped he would make me give up this trip
This dance continued without a pause
As he tried to understand the cause

But I was listening to a different song
For his safety, he had to come along
The day came and the music grew louder
Groom, bride, guests and flowers

Before I knew it, it was done
The groom and bride were finally one
Real music began and not just in my head
I realized my son had enjoyed where he was led

And not just the planes, clouds, mountains and farms
The next thing I knew, he had the bride in his arms
No longer to the music in my head
But this dance was to the prayers I had said

Whatâ€™s so special about this dance?
For an autistic child it is a chance
In this place full of music, noise and chatter
Something happened that really mattered

He came out of his world of sameness and rote
And entered mine full of joy and hope
That smile on his face as the music was followed
In this room that has now become so hallowed.

What is so special about this dance?
Not just for a bride giving him a chance
But for my son,
He danced
He danced

Thomas G. Andry

I’m not sure this will help anyone sleep but…

tom — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 13:51:34 +0000

Tanel and I got a kick out of this video. I only wish the audio was better.

Comments on OurFirstMarriage

tom — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 16:31:50 +0000

When I set up this web page it was set so that you had to be logged in and registered in order to post a comment. I changed that recently so that anyone could comment. After what can only be described as an obscene amount of spam, I’ve changed it back. The logging in seems to deter most of the spammers so that’s what we’re going with.

Email Notification

tom — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 17:02:54 +0000

After oodles of requests from people that obviously have never heard of an RSS feed, I’ve installed an Email notification system. On the top right of the screen, click on “contact/notification”. From here you can subscribe to receive an email every time we update the page. I haven’t tested it yet (this post will do just that) and have no idea how well it works but try it out. Oh yea, and vote for us on Podcast Alley.

Edit – Testing to see if edits generate a new email – oh and if you received this in error, let me know and I’ll make sure to unsubscribe you (and everyone else). I can’t tell who’s subscribed and who isn’t). You can unsubscribe from the email or here.

Edit 2 – OK, looks like if you are already registered here, you’ll have to subscribe manually (that’s good). Also, edits don’t generate a new email (also good). Tanel and I tend to edit our posts on occasion (mostly for clarity, spelling (like I misspelled Gandhi yesterday), and to add links) so don’t be hesitant to visit the site just in case the post changed.

My Apologies

tom — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 07:00:57 +0000

I’ve had a rough couple of days with this site. I’ve tried to get things tweaked and for the first time, I’ve broken the site. Actually, I broke it, fixed it, broke it again, figured out why it was breaking, broke it again, emailed the creater of a plugin who confirmed that I was right about the breaking, fixed it, broke it, and fixed it (and can now continue to fix it if I run into that problem again).

During the course of this I noticed that there were ZERO subscriptions to the Blog feed which I found odd. I decided to just cancel the feedburner blog feed and go with the straight rss (those of you out there that know what I’m talking about are wincing right now). Yes, I royally screwed everything up. Not only that, I figured out that I had royally screwed everything up from the beginning! The Blog feed that was supposed to provide all the Blogs AND the Podcasts was only providing the Podcasts! In fact, it was simply redirecting everyone to the Podcast feed, hence NO subscribers. For those of you that are interested in keeping up with our news and Tanel’s thoughts, the feed can be added from from the top of the screen (with IE) or under Admin, the Entries RSS on the lower right of our screen, or just click here. I’m terribly sorry about this whole mess. If it makes you feel any better, I’ve killed myself and emailed some poor guy named John over at Feedburner so many times that his email program has probably automatically designated me as spam. Once again, I’m sorry.

Autism Advocate Prints Poem

tom — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 19:59:31 +0000

My father’s poem (which was posted here first) is going to be printed in the next issue of Autism Advocate! We thought it was great and we’re glad that others do as well. Congrats Dad! Look for an interview with my parents on raising an autistic child on our Podcast in the near future.

New Content

tom — Fri, 25 May 2007 15:53:08 +0000

Scroll down and notice that we’ve added a little poll about the time spent breastfeeding (don’t worry, we’re not interested in your personal info and you don’t have to register). Plus we’ve added some links to breastfeeding stats. We’ll be adding more as we come across them. I’ve also fixed the tags on the first and second podcasts (sorry about that). Enjoy.

Podcast Delay

tom — Sun, 20 May 2007 15:04:22 +0000

The Podcast will be delayed about 24 hours. I’ve got to run out of town for the day and couldn’t get it edited in time. I won’t be back until very late tonight and probably won’t have time to finish it. It’ll be up sometime Monday night. Sorry for the inconvenience.

We have a computer down!

tom — Tue, 15 May 2007 22:48:16 +0000

Tanel’s computer took a dump so her blogging (which has only just begun) is going to slow down for a bit. Here’s hoping the tech support guys at her work can get it up and running soon.

Also, I’m thinking of shortening our Podcasts to about 30 minutes. If anyone has an opinion (yea or nay) respond here. We were hoping to do one on Friday and a second on Saturday but that doesn’t seem to be working out. I’m committed to getting at LEAST a weekly Podcast out so we’re really leaving ourselves no room for error. With a 30 minute Podcast we can tape two in a night and then stockpile them a bit. That way we have some for emergencies or when we go on vacation (whenever that may be). If I get too many backlogged, I can start releasing an extra one on Wednesdays occasionally. Any thoughts?

Welcome from Tom

tom — Tue, 01 May 2007 05:44:00 +0000

Everyone welcome to Tanel’s blog. I might end up writing a few entries here or there but for the most part look for me in comments, posting Podcasts, and the occasional news item. Read the About page, have fun, and welcome.