Today, I'm Proud to be Irish.

Found, Part Deux.

I always understood and accepted (mostly based on jokes told by New York residents and Saturday Night Live skits) that New Jersey's environment isn't really taken care of by its residents.

Without such intention, this blog pretty much proves it. But before you dismiss it, scroll through a few pages. The photography is pretty good, and the scenes the author captures are worth your time.

We Now Speak "Samhili," Too.

We speak fluent Jackanese. We now speak Samhili, too.

As a good little baby should, Sam has been making repetitive sounds for a month or so. But only this last week did he begin to associate them. Much to Ashley's delight, Sam did not follow Jack's lead and instead said "Ma-Ma" first (as opposed to "Da-Da"). Crawling in her direction, he'll babble on, "Ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma..."

Further (and quite unsurprisingly, considering the child's voracious appetite) his next word was associated with his main form of sustenance: Ba-Ba for "bottle."

Hopefully, "Da-Da" will be listed as one of his first five words.

In Other News,

So we can't bribe, threaten or cajole Jack to use the toilet for #2, but oh sure, your robotic vacuum cleaner will. Life is just laughing its rear off at us right now.

Pottytraining Diaries - Week 16

Peeing in the toilet is now generally accepted convention in our house.  #2, however, is not.  In fact, it's willfully avoided.  Nowadays, Jack wears underwear during the day, and a "pull-up" diaper at night.  He likes to drink water and/or milk before bed and he routinely urinates in the night so we've retreated to the use of a pull-up during the bedtime stretches.  Interestingly enough, he does not release #2's in his underwear, and recently has been waiting for bedtime to relieve himself.  

This week, however, Jack had an unexpected surprise: the need to "go" long before bedtime.  Ashley tells me that while she was tending to some laundry, Jack disappeared into his room and closed the door (nothing to be surprised by, he will take "personal time" for 10-20 minutes at times, playing peacefully in his room as he desires.)  This time, however, he remained in the room for almost 35 minutes before Ashley, sensing something was askew, knocked and asked what he was doing.  She could hear the noises of his handheld computer game, so she cracked the door.  He announced, "I have poop."  

Ashley was shocked and disappointed, thinking that he had fumbled and let fly in his underwear.  But upon closer inspection, she discovered he was wearing a pull-up.  Apparently, Jack had retreated into his room, removed his shorts and underwear, climbed up onto the top of his dresser (where the pull-ups are kept), donned the training pants, dropped the Cleveland Browns off at the Super Bowl, and never missed a beat.  

The one bright spot from all of this is that he's learning how to dress/undress himself.  

Jack Knows His ABC's AND His Pop Culture Icons

[Scene:  Jack and TJ sitting on the couch watching baseball.]

Jack:  Do you know that lady with the big thing on her head that I saw at Aaron & Tina's today?

TJ: No.  Remember, I was working, not having fun with you today.  

Jack:  Well, her name was Lady GaGa.  [looking at TJ with all seriousness.]

TJ: [caught off guard by the name-drop of "Lady GaGa," begins to chuckle heartily.  Jack, at first confused, joins in and starts laughing at his unintentional joke.]

Jack:  HER NAME IS LADY GAGA [laughs]

TJ: [laughs]

Jack: HER! NAME! IS! LADY! GAGA! [falls down laughing]

Ashley: [to TJ, incredulously] You know who Lady GaGa is?

Sam is Crawling

We've been monitoring Sam's progress for a while, expecting that any day now, he'd figure out how to keep his knees up and under him and coordinate his arms and legs to start moving on his own.  Jack crawled at nine months, but we didn't expect Sam would match that date since he was eight weeks premature.  We were wrong.  When I arrived home today, I put Sam down on the bed while I changed.  He immediately took a four point stance and started scooting toward me.  Previously, he could achieve only the four point stance, rock back and forth, and then push himself back up into a seated position.  For a while, he was pushing himself backwards, but driving in reverse wasn't his goal, I imagine.  

While we celebrate this momentous occasion (pun intended), it's time to break out the electrical plug covers, and start moving all items below waist level to higher ground.  

Facebook is my Happy Place.

I'll admit it: I really dig Facebook. It probably has not generated one red cent of business for me, but it makes me feel good knowing that I can keep in touch with my close (and not so close, and some just people I barely know) friends.

In a rare but nonetheless free moment, I jumped on to see what people were up to and ran across a "note" written by a law school classmate and fellow Law Review slave, Sarah.  It's called "Mosaic of Me."  It is as follows:

---

Rules:

a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search (http://www.flickr.com/).

b. Using ONLY the first page, pick an image.

c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into Mosaic Maker. Change rows to 3 and columns to 3 (http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/mosaic.php).

d. Save the image and post it on this note.

If you're tagged, pass it on. And tag the person who tagged you.

The Questions:

1. What is your first name?

2. What is your favorite food?

3. What is your favorite color?

4. Favorite drink?

5. Dream vacation?

6. Favorite hobby?

7. What you want to be when you grow up?

8. What do you love the most in life?

9. One word to describe you?

Here's what I came up with (and yes I did follow the instructions):

So for the rest of you out there who blog, I invite you to go through the excercise. Heck, it beats writing original content any day.

[Answers: 1) TJ, 2) Sushi, 3) Blue, 4) Bud Light Lime, 5) Fishing Quietly, 6) Golf, 7) Marine Biologist, 8) My kids, 9) Tired.]

A Sad Excuse for a Post.

Things have been a little hectic for this writer. I keep telling you people to encourage Ashley to write on this thing, but so far, she's been unpursuaded. Step it up a notch, please; I do have a day job, you know.

Since the last post:

• Sam cut one tooth, then another (both bottom front), and has started sleeping longer stretches in the night (6 to 8 hours at a time), inbetween the nights the teeth were coming in which were "not fun";


• I went to The Masters in Augusta, Ga. It was incredible; and,


• Jack has taken two swimming lessons and, for the first time, dunked his head under water and did "swimmy arms" by himself. To date, he's been deathly afraid of water and getting near it, although he does enjoy the 2' deep kiddie pool at the Club. He was very proud to tell me that he had gone underwater, and I was equally proud of him for it.

Our Little Existentialist Veterinarian

During a recent outing, Jack and I had the following conversation.  To preface it, you have to understand that with potty training in full swing, there's a lot of talk about pee-pee, poo-poo, and the various tools and mechanisms linked to those activities.  

The conversation began when Jack told me, not five minutes after leaving the house and not six minutes after I had asked him if he needed to use the facilities before we left the house, that he needed to relieve himself.  This conversation ensued:

TJ:  "Jack, can you hold it buddy?  We have about five more minutes left in our drive."

Jack: "Yes, Daddy.  I have a gate in my penis."

T:  "[chuckling] Oh really?  That's good.  Please put a lock on your gate until we get to the park."

J:  "Okay.  [pause]  Jesus put the gate in my penis."

T: "[now a little confused at how we arrived here] Is that so.  I'm glad he did that.  Please use what he gave you."

J: "Okay.  Jesus made my penis."

T:  "Well, sort of in a round about way, yes. But... [I had no idea where to go from there, so I just faded off.]"

J:  "God made Jesus."  [Ed. Note:  Romanians agree.]

T:  "Well, not exactly, but we'll cover that ground when you're a little older and we can discuss the Trinity."  

[a 90 second pause.]

J:  "Daddy, who made God?"

T:  "Uuuuhhhhhh..." 

I tried to explain that "some" believe that we (man) created God (the "opium of the people" and all that jazz) and that others like us believe that God just is and was.  A little deep for a three year old, but I did my best to put it in his terms.  Thankfully, he chose to change the subject shortly after my mini lecture:

J:  "Daddy, when Mommy and me went the mall a few weeks ago [it was more like two months ago] we saw doggies.  One of the doggies ate his own poop.  Then he prolly threw up 'cuz when doggies eat their own poop, they throw up."

Existentialism and veterinary advice all in one 10 minute drive!