As many of you may already know, I am now a father of two beautify girls as of two Mondays ago.  My second daughter, Reanna Rae Rutledge, was born on April 7th at 5:19 p.m.  The full story and pictures are on my family blog.

One great benefit of working at Microsoft is paid parental leave for new fathers.  I began leave the day of the birth and plan to be off work for about six weeks.

There's something of a showdown occurring in my life this week.

As you may know, I recently moved to Redmond to start a job at Microsoft.  Things worked out to where I can commute on the city bus to work everyday.  It's a nice chance for me to read, relax, and allow my wife to have the car at home.  Well, it turns out that the city of Redmond will actually pay you to use alternative transportation to commute to work.  You log your trips on their web site, and after your first 45 trips they will send you a $50 cash card.  After that there are no incentives, but hey, $50 is $50, so I'm going for it.

Now things get a bit more interesting.  The city is changing over this incentive program on May 1st, so you must finish your 45 alternative commutes before that time.  I'm pretty close - I have 42 commutes under my belt already.  I should finish my 45th on Friday . . . that is unless my daughter is born before then.  The due date for the baby is on Thursday, so she could come at any time.  When she comes I will immediately go on parental leave, and I will probably stay on leave through the 1st of May.  So, it's now or never!  Will the baby come early, or will I be able to continue commuting and snatch up that $50 cash card?