Here are some pics of Noah Scott Wood and the rest of my family.

If the above link doesn’t show the pics use this backup.

My hope to be surprised lived less than 12 hours.

7:45 AM: My mom tells me how well the baby’s doing. “He’s feeding,” she says.

3:46 PM: My father carbon copies me on a congratulatory email from the builder constructing my parents’ new home. “Our builder just found out about Noah this afternoon,” his email starts.

So, I have a nephew named Noah.

I don’t know his middle name yet. Here’s to hoping it’s not accidentally leaked to me sometime in 10 hours between now and when I arrive in Asheville.

At 9:12 PM EDT tonight I became an uncle.

I don’t know if I have a niece or a nephew and I don’t know the little one’s name. I want be surprised when I visit Asheville later this week. Kelly and my parents are doing the best they can to talk about Baby without using personal pronouns. There’s no name yet.

Interestingly, Baby came almost three weeks early and was born on the same day as both the father and grandfather. I’ve been instructed to call People Magazine in the morning with the story.

This is the first niece or nephew and for both sets of parents the first grandchild. First babies are special. I know this first hand–I was the first in both my parents’ families and there are a disproportionate and overwhelming number of pictures and video spots starring me.

It’s weird and exciting to suddenly have a new family member. For years it was four of us in the immediate family–Kelly, me, and our parents. Then John married Kelly in 2003 and there were five. Baby makes six.

In the same timeframe I’ve lost two grandparents. Life changed slowly over a lot of years, and in the last three has changed a lot.

I wasn’t there for the baby’s birth, which is a new life regret. Note to self and anyone else who happens to read this: Do not let work, your schedule and routines, money, or anything other practical consideration come between you and life’s important events. There will only be one first niece or nephew/grandchild. Kelly, John, and my parents were all there, and I wasn’t.

Today’s regret can’t detract from the fact today’s a great day. Talking to Kelly, my Mom, and my Dad and listening to Baby on the phone overwhelmed me.

Whether I’m here or there, I am an uncle.

For the first time ever I was drawn in to an advertisement on a Web page. This is definitely worth noting.

It happened on The Onion. Something animated caught my eye at the right of the page. It was an ad for the movie My Super Ex-Girlfriend.

Here’s what was great about the ad:

• The video caught my eye without startling me.
• The name of the movie and leading cast member names were constantly displayed at the top.
• By default the audio was disabled, but there was a prominently (but not distractingly) displayed link to enable audio.
• The video does not loop; once it completes there’s a link to replay it.

I actually watched the video a second time.

The movie story seems kinda funny. The story idea would seem to be a reasonably effective way of getting guys to go to a chick flick. (Using Uma Thurman as a lure doesn’t hurt, either.)

Apparently Apple didn’t do much real-world testing.

“Suburbia is where the developer bulldozes out the trees, then names the streets after them.”
- Bill Vaughan

(Yes, I know I don’t post a quote every day.)