I'm not George F. Will, exhibit #19,837

I could type my fingers to the bone, and then down to the first knuckle after that, and never turn a sentence this clever:

Having received nearly 53 percent of the popular vote -- better than Ronald Reagan's 50.7 percent in 1980 -- Barack Obama won 100 percent of the presidency, and almost that much of the nation's leadership expectations now that the public, which really should diversify its investments, invests such extravagant hopes in presidents.

Maybe it IS a clown car!

Doctors said the mother knew at 23 weeks that she was going to have seven babies. Neither she nor her doctors knew she was carrying eight babies until she delivered Monday night.

Meaningless noises

And for once, I'm not talking about the ones that come out of my mouth...

Theo is, for lack of a better term, phone-obsessed. I can't have a conversation in front of him, and half his toybox is half-filled with dead cell phones, toy phones, unused cordless phones, and old remote controls that he mistakes for phones (honest mistake -- they have a keypad, after all).

A very good friend bought Theo a toy phone for Christmas. His reaction to new phones is always hard to guess in advance, but this has become one of his favorites. We play together with it almost every day ("Hello, Mr. President? We're calling to support the toy stimulus bill.") and it is a reliable attention-getter in the car.

The phone just made the craziest noise -- an infinitely repeating series of half-second tones. I think back in ye olde days they called it a "busy signal."

When I heard it, all I could do was laugh and tell Theo, "Bud, you're never going to know what that means."

One more thing: A quick search for "busy signal" brought up this press release, which also made me giggle.

Jobs and Apple

What Walt said:

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Via John Gruber.

For Diana

The youtube page gives away the joke, so rather than send her the link I'll post it here.

Stay at home daddy tip

When you leave the room just long enough to pee, your son WILL open the trash can and start eating the used coffee grounds near the top.

Yeah, naptime should be a BLAST today!!!

One of my favorite categories...

Natalie reminded me on Facebook that I haven't used this one in a while.

"Theo, you're not climbing on that. The dishwasher is not a toy."

Travelblogging

The calendar says we've been away from Norfolk 12 days, but it feels like forever. We drove off the afternoon of the 29th, later in the afternoon than I'd hoped because Ruth was busy at work. The late start actually ended up being a good thing, because it kept me from wanting to make the drive to Chicago all in one day, like I normally do. The second day was still a long one after stopping in Hagerstown, MD, but spending the night in a crib rather than the back seat of a Volkswagen meant Theo was in a much better mood all week.

I tend to be a hermit when we spend time with relatives, but this trip we've been far more social -- positive influence from my wife and son and it also helps that my sister was with us much of the time. We spent New Year's Eve with Kevin & Denice, their son Michael, and our friend James, who was in town from Atlanta to see the Winter Classic (The Bastard!).

New Year's Day we hung out with Ruth's cousins and their family. Theo had all kinds of fun with his cousin Natalie -- too much fun, it turned out. He refused to nap all afternoon, leading to an overtired boy who woke us every so often all night long.

The other highlight of our time in Chicago was a visit to the Shedd Aquarium with Kevin, Denice and Michael. Theo and Michael ran each other ragged, I think Theo was just as happy to check out all the doors as he was to look at all the fish.

We've been almost a full week now at my parents' house. I haven't done much other than sample my Dad's homebrew and enjoy all the extra hands available to help with Theo. We spent a day with my Grandma over in Indiana, Ruth and I spent an evening out catching up with friends and the ladies spent a day shopping.

Theo seems to be learning a new word every day and some days it seems like a word every hour. Watching him interact with his grandparents has been the best part of this trip.

I'm not looking forward to the drive, but going back home again with no plans for another trip anytime soon sounds really nice right now. Between all the trips and Ruth being gone for two months, the house is still in chaos. We never really settled into our last house and I'd like this one to feel like home sometime before Ruth's next orders come through...

The other challenge will be getting my good routines back -- I was running and writing regularly before we left, but haven't done either on this trip.