Do anyone else’s kids make their stuffed Pokemon dance on the kitchen table at breakfast while humming Grieg’s “In the Hall of the Mountain King”?
No, that’s what I thought.
Category Archives: Daily Life
A Spoonful of Sugar Helps the Beefsteak Go Down
We had flank steak, naturally cut into thin strips, for dinner last night. My older boy doesn’t care much for steak in any form, and particularly disliked the flavor of the marinade Jane used. We consequently teased him about some of the things he does like. There’s an ice cream place we’ve been to on vacation, for example, that sells Twizzler-flavored ice cream. David’s been known to order it with Reeses Peanut Butter Cups mixed in. We suggested that if he liked that, he might also like his steak better if he dipped in sugar.
He tried it.
He actually tried it.
On the other hand, he also actually ate some of his steak….
“He’s so bossy!“
So I was reading The Hobbit to my five-year-old daughter, and I got to the part where Bilbo is riddling with Gollum. Just before Bilbo asks Gollum that fateful question, “What have I got in my pocket?” Gollum hisses, “Ask us! Ask us!”
I got just that far, and then Anne offered her considered opinion of Gollum: “He’s so bossy!“.
Well, yes, I guess so; but I guess it takes a five-year-old girl to see that as Gollum’s dominant trait.
There’s Hope!
I have been seriously remiss. I haven’t written a book review in ages; I’ve not even posted links to interesting things I run across. As a blogger, I’ve been most ‘scrutiatingly lazy.
Today, though, something happened that I cannot ignore: my beloved 5-year-old daughter, Anne, has demonstrated the beginnings of a sense of whimsy. She’s always been fairly literal-minded, and as Jane and I are inclined to flights of whimsy I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve heard these plaintive words: “Daddy, are you being silly?”
But there is hope! Today, Jane reported the following exchange:
Anne: What’s for Dinner?
Jane: Snails
Anne: No we are not! You never buy snails this time of year.
Of such little acorns mighty oaks do grow. 🙂
We Interrupt This Period Of Silence
Sorry about the lack of posting recently; first I had a bad cold that lasted for a couple of weeks, during the second of which I was going to work anyway and lapsing into a solitary torpor during the evenings. (“Solitary torpor” is the state of being too braindead for anything but computer solitaire.) Just as I was getting through that I fell into a serious case of Photoshop. Then my eldest got his tonsils and adenoids out; and he’s been having a rocky recovery (though I think he’s through the worst of it). What with the pain and worry, I’ve again been settling into a solitary torpor during the evenings. This may last for a few more days; but then I’m due to go on a business trip. So it may be into February before things wake up around here again.
Red Letter Day
So we put our two girls to bed tonight, the five-year-old in her bed and the two-year-old in her crib. And as she sometimes does, the five-year-old crept out of her bed to play quietly for a while. Unusually, the two-year-old expressed an opinion:
“Annie, go to bed! One…two…NOW!”
Our five-year-old was unmoved, and the two-year-old had said it several times before I realized what I was hearing.
Ian’s OK!
He’s got a few words up at Banana Oil.
🙂
Whither Banana Oil
It’s been three months. There’s been no definite word of Ian’s whereabouts or state of health, and Banana Oil is still showing that same WordPress database error.
It seems extremely unlikely at this point that any serious harm has come to him; the consulate’s been actively looking for him, and if he’d turned up at a hospital–or worse–the word would have gotten out. Barring thriller plots, of course, which as I say I figure to be extremely unlikely. That was my main concern, and I’m glad to be able to lay it to rest.
That really leaves two main possibilities. Either he’s engaged in some job or other that prevents him from getting on to the Internet, or he’s purposely decided to cut ties with some or all of his friends on the ‘net. I’m hoping for the former, as cutting ties without a word of explanation would be a really shabby thing to do, and I don’t wish to think that of him.
The thing is, I don’t believe he expected Banana Oil to be down; in one of our last e-mail exchanges he mentioned arranging for his web hosting service to be renewed for another year. It’s entirely possible that there’s one final post on Banana Oil explaining that he’s going to be incommunicado for a while–which none of us can see because the database went down and hasn’t been restarted. (If he wanted to simply turn off Banana Oil, there are more obvious ways to make it happen.)
Anyway, I hope that he’s OK; and I hope that he’ll get back in contact eventually. I’m not going anywhere; I can wait. In the meantime, I’ll continue to keep him in my prayers.
Ogres, Ogres, Everywhere, and Not A Clue To Think
Ok, so Dave and I have been talking about this game, Ogre, for a couple of weeks now. I’ve been working on algorithms so that the Ogre, a big humongous cybernetic tank, will be able to crush all opposition on the battlefield. I’ve been showing the fruits of my labors to Jane. David and I have played the game in her presence.
Tonight I discover that all of this time, she thought we were talking about ogres, i.e., monsters, large, vaguely humanoid, of the one or possibly two headed variety.
One planet, two different worlds….
Diet Watch
I haven’t mentioned my diet in quite a while, but I’m still on it, and still walking at least 30 minutes a day. It’s been a little over a year and a half now…and I’m down 70 pounds as of today. Woo-hoo!
The View from the Foothills 