Something I gaked from babybabble

Things Little T and Special K are already better at than me

• Getting (and holding) the attention of a room full of people
• Charming people into doing what they want
• Nonverbal communication

Special K's superior skills

• Better dexterity
• Knowing when someone needs a hug
• Telling difficult truths without offending people

Where I still have an edge on my kids

• Verbal and written communication
• Spelling
• Reading
• Hand writing (though I fear Special K's hand writing will soon be better than mine)

Yesterday while shopping we had one of many moments that indicate the teenage to come.
Special K pointed to a game and asked, "Why is called Kids on Stage?"
I replied, "I dunno."
C rushed up, "How do you know it's called Kids on Stage?"
Special K said in her best 'you are so stupid adult' voice that I'm sure we'll hear a lot more of when she's a teenager, "Because I read it."
C peered at her, "Really? Are you sure you didn't see it on tv?"
Special K rolled her eyes. "No, dad" she replied, all patient condescension.
C burbles excitedly, "But it has silent e."
Special K just looked at C with her best 'So?' look.
I shrug.
Special K has been playing a spelling game on JumpStart Kindergarten for months with silent e and including the word stage. I guess she's actually been learning to read from the game.

In the past week Little T has made a huge leap in his speech. He's started having conversations. I admit these conversations are on the level of Koko the gorilla and not typical conversation, but they charm me.
Mama mama, up up
I pick up my 23 pound baby. My wrists hurt.
He grins hugely at me.
Mama mama down.
I let him slide down my leg just the way he likes. He laughs and laughs.
Mama mama up up
I pick him up again. My wrists hurt even more.
Mama, down.
We repeat this game several times, even though my wrists are killing me.
Yes, he's learned "Mama will do whatever you want as long as you talk to her."

Top Ten Signs My Kids Live In Silicon Valley, my second post on Silicon Valley Moms Blog.

10. My 4-year old daughter says, "I can speak Spanish" and says a Spanish word. We're not a bilingual family nor does she attend a bilingual preschool.
9. My daughter takes her own pictures with our digital camera.
8. My daughter asks me, "Why don't we order that on Amazon?"
7. My 2-year old son's playgroup is coordinated entirely via email.
6. My daughter asked, "Is the opposite of ok 'cancel'?"
5. When I asked "Do you know the recycling song?" on the playground, the kids knew several different recycling songs and sang them to me.
4. My daughter sent her first email at 3 years old and received her first email at that age too.
3. I first discovered my daughter could read when she read words on a video game.
2. My daughter says, "Let's go out for sushi."
1. My daughter says, "I need to go do my work" and goes and types on her own laptop (an old IBM Thinkpad) given to her by her dad.

Yesterday Special K discovered 'Knock Knock' jokes. Over forty-five minutes we spent telling them until we begged her to stop. Thank the gods for the Internet, so I could look them up. And she got her first pun. The classic

Knock Knock
Who's there?
Boo.
Boo who?
Don't cry. It's only a joke.

Most of hers were more estoric like:
Knock Knock
Who's there?
Skunk.
Skunk who?
Skunk Flower.

I hope she's not going into that heavy joke-telling phase. If she's in that phase and Little T's in the 'walk me' phase, I may truly go off the deep end.

I give you a skunk flower

As I wrote in February I fell in love with the David Hasselhoff video "Hooked on a Feeling". Apparently so did many other folks. If you haven't seen the video, you're missing out on many delights like Hasselhoff catching a fish between his teeth.

Flush with the success of this video, he started a small tour. In this concert video of "Hooked on A Feeling" , Hasselhoff says "It started a small phenomenon. In 1993 I made a video for about $10 and it was the biggest flop. Now it has 700,000 viewers."

Then he produced another video "Jump In My Car" Sadly this video doesn't capture the utter silliness of the original video and of course Hasselhoff is much older. He merely looks very sleazy. The video features K.I.T.T. and advertises hasselhofftour.com I traisped over there all excited. Yes, I'd pay to see Hasselhoff sing that silly song, but sadly no tour. David Hasselhoff is truly hooked on a feeling. He only seems to have one song in him. I would not pay to hear him sing "Jump In My Car. Watching him sing it in concert was even worse than the video.

However perhaps Hasselhoff may have more than one tv series in him (like Shatner who BTW also had one kickass song). Hasselhoff mentions before singing "Jump In My Car" about a possible pilot with a K.I.T.T. they found in Australia. Stay tuned.

This 1.1 million-dollar house on our street is almost identical to ours. Both are 3 bedroom 2 1/2 bath houses built nine years ago by the same developer. No, we don't live in a mansion. Yes, housing prices here are crazy.

I got woken up by the 4.7 earthquake this morning. So did Little T. Fortunately we both went back to sleep. Normally I totally miss earthquakes, but I distinctly felt and saw the entire bedroom shake. C felt nothing. I was slightly worried we'd get a big earthquake before we sold our Oakland house. Well that house is all sold now, but perhaps the process gave me earthquake sonar. I've wanted to feel earthquakes since I moved out here over twelve years ago, and never felt a one until today. However I hate being woken up. So I'm not sure whether to be excited or annoyed with this newfound power. Maybe it wasn't an earthquake I felt, but sticker shock from the house down the street.

Okay now I know I'm an bad mom, because this series of doomed ducklings made me laugh out. I think mostly because I think it's a twisted metaphor for motherhood. You try to get your ducklings safely across the street. You're looking for traffic and all kinds of other bad things, but you miss the grating, because it doesn't really affect you. Then the world thinks you're bad or evil, because your ducklings fall down the drain.

gconnor has Sophie, Killer of Socks Well, our cats are also brave sock killers. They hunt down socks from our neighbours and bring to them to our back porch. Right now their trophies include a blue baby sock, a man's white athletic sock and a woman's black sock. I have no idea where they came from. And they remain on our mat. I can't match my cats' bravery. I hesitate to knock on a neighbour's door, sock in hand, and say "Excuse me, but I think my cats might have stolen your sock. Does this sock belong to you?"

I wonder how the cats steal these socks. Do our neighbours hang socks out to dry and the cats steal from the line? Do the cats sidle into the house all plantative and folorn and while the neighbours' backs are turned, my cats sneak socks? Do the cats creep into the house on little cat feet and whisk away socks? The cats aren't saying.

frumiousb kindly sent us some Dutch knick-knacks including a small yellow clog with wooden tulips. Now this clog is bright yellow and has a sort of tip at the end that does look like a kind of duck's beak. This prompted the following conversation between me and Special K

Special K: Why does that duck have tulips in it?
Me: It's not a duck. It's a shoe
SK: It's a duck. It's yellow.
Me: It's a special shoe from Holland.
SK: No, it's a duck. This is a shoe. (She brings me one of my shoes. A large brown Mary Jane shoe.) This is a shoe.
(She points to the clog.) This is a duck.
Me: (bursting into laughter) It's a yellow clog.
SK: (laughs too) No, it's a duck!

Ganked from dawnd I loved raining meters down on smiling Laura and George Bush. at the White House. You can pick any web page and choose your method of destruction.

Emailed from giandujabird I loved this video of David Hasselhoff singing "Hooked on a Feeling!" It brought me back to days of watching Knight Rider with my brother. Picture me waving my arms in the air in time to the music. Special K liked this vid too.

Pulled from plantgirl, owlmoose and cubes


I particularly like the last one, but kids, please don't try this at home.

Someone is giving away a free permanent LJ account. You can't nominate yourself, but you nominate anyone else who posts regularly on Livejournal. Spread the love around and nominate someone. Go here for details.

I was thinking about this as I was driving to pick up Special K from preschool. How sometimes the kindness of strangers has gotten me through the hard times. The permanent account thing reminded me of this story that I wanted to tell a long time ago. But I didn't, because I was embarrassed. But it still warms my heart. It cheered me up an hour ago.

My local parents club started a hospital helping hands program shortly after Little T's second hospital stay. A baby Little T's age had leukemia. I'm glad to say she's cured now.

I didn't know any of the parents and it was very freeing. You can always tell when someone makes a meal with love and sometimes those meals literally were the best thing that happened to me that day.

One time a parent packed a little surprise for Special K in a special box with Disney Princess gold-foil chocolate coins, some stickers and a little candy watch. Special K had been acting up that day, unable to express her stress and anxiety about her brother, but she just lit up when she saw that package. "Is that for me?" she squealed. My eyes tear up when I think of it even now. Those gold coins inspired her for a couple weeks, because she got one at the end of the day if she was a good girl. It was even her idea! And by then the immediate crisis was over.

How for the past week I've just wanted to be happy, and happiness has eluded me. And the sunlight glinted off the trees and the sky was a perfect blue and suddenly I was happy. Before Little T was born, I was happy or at least cheerful most of the time. Life just seems too inherently funny not to laugh at it most of the time. Rushing to the ER and being in the hospital does have its hilarious moments, at least for someone with my sense of humor. Unfortunately several weeks of dispensing the same medicines over and over again and being sick with a lingering cold virus just isn't funny, at least not to me. The same jokes get old. Maybe a greater comedian than can find fresh ones. But at last days of sun after days of rain, and I remember that at some point I will get over this cold. And I need to stick my head over a steaming bowl of water. And I do find that funny. I find the idea that pharmeuceutical companies have spent billions in researching the best cold remedies, but this steam is the best thing for me. It makes me smile.

So how about you give me more smiles and share your stories about the kindness of strangers, or if you like what you've done for a stranger?

Website from the SF Chronicle columnist Jon Carroll via C
Hey kids, go to the Creating Awareness of Education Standards web site, and read the smut in books that you are supposed to be protected from. Comes complete with a handy list of really dirty words in each book. Except that the site says that Shakespeare isn't dirty, because "Shakespeare's works contain neither a pervasive nor gratuitous amount of sex, violence, or vulgarity as do many of the other required reading assignments. For example, they do not teach our children about new types of sex (Song of Solomon which includes references to bestiality, necrophilia, and pedophilia."

So kids, if you want to read about bestiality, necrophilia and pedophilia with your parents's blessing, read Shakespeare. because these concerned parents say Shakespeare is smut free. The site says "most Blue Valley parents do not want their children required to read books featuring teens in sexually active roles" but Romeo and Juliet are classics. They contrast Shakespeare with "sexually stimulating and graphically vulgar content such as Beloved and Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison." So haul out your crib sheets and read some Shakespeare today!

And hey, if you don't want to bother with crib sheets, go and read Master and Commander where you can read about randy sailors rutting goats. Also on the Blue Valley concerned parents recommended list.

Remember kids, dead white guy writing=classic. Live black woman's writing=smut.

spoon story shadesong blogged about describe folks who live with chronic illness or debilitating disabilities. When I was pregnant with Little T, when I was healing from Little T's traumatic birth, I guess I had fewer spoons. Though the analogy isn't quite fluid enough to really work for me personally. Ironically I'm too tired to think of a better one, except a battery though that's hardly original. Any thoughts?

I've been searching for a radio station that I can customize and actually works. That perfect match. Looking for a girl like you to come into my life, Pandora Maybe you're the one I've been searching for all my life! Thank you Neil Gaiman!

Julie produced this wonderful spoof of a Baby Einstein video. Even if you're not a parent, I think you'll find it funny.

The kids are laughing together at some joke known only to themselves. Little T doesn't cry when he falls down and his head hits marble if his big sister is there to watch. It amazes me how well they get along. I remember that my younger brother regarded me with adoration when we were kids, but I also thought he was rather a pain until he was sent away to boarding school. Special K seems to really enjoy entertaining her little brother. And bossing him around. Now that part I did enjoy. "Here's your baby shark that you must play with." And of course he does. Then they both laugh again.

C sent me this article just after wrangling with T's medical bills: Treated for Illness then lost in a labryinth of medical bills.
It spurred me on to write more.

I wrote 1000 words today of my non-fiction book. It gradually coalesces into a sleek shape all its own at 10,778 words.

shadesong blogged about how she and her husband shared an inside joke. My husband C and I share a lot too. A lot of them wouldn't even seem funny to outsiders even if we explained the whole story. It takes a special person and a special situation to laugh in the ER. We make a lot of jokes about death too. I think it stems entirely from the past year. We make a lot of jokes that relate to stuff the kids do. The kids have a wide range of peculiar gestures and noises that they make at various stages of development. Sadly I can't blog about most of them lest the teenaged versions of these kids google this blog and descend upon me with all the wrath of outraged adolescence. But you dear reader would laugh and find them sweet and cute.

Well okay I'll share two things with you. Right now Little T is so delighted with the sheer ability to move. Just before he leans forward to move he gives this little grunt of sheer effort mixed pleasure. Sometimes we'll grunt in the same way.

When both kids are particularly outraged about something, they'll fall silent and open their mouths wide to draw in a lung full of air so they can scream their loudest. Special K was kicked out of the nursery for being too loud. And Little T was the loudest in the NICU until he got his first dose of Interferon. C and I will now open our mouths wide to express manic outrage.

I didn't know that my friend Ned Spofford was over 70. He writes poetry.

I also forgot to mention that I got my start on my emergency supply kit from Arnold Schwarzenegger and Safeway. Back in the summer, Safeway was offering subsidised kits under the auspices of the Red Cross. The kit was in a red backpack with a list of suggested additional supplies and photo of Maria Shriver. After all, it'd be good to see her face in an emergency.