Science projects don’t have to be dreaded. Just ask Abby. She’s excited about hers.
Would you like to help?
Read more about the project and how you can participate here.
Ramblin’ Prose
A little bit of everything that doesn’t make sense to a rational parent
Camille’s list grows
At one point she wanted a diamond.
Now, it’s just a star. A real star.
“A real star?” Mom asked.
“Yeah, you know, like from outer space. I really want one.”
OK then.
What else does she have on her list? Let’s see, there’s the magic book with real spells inside that really work. then there’s the spy kit, but not that cheesy thing in Target with boys on the package. A real spy kit. “That’s what I want to be when I grow up,” she says.
Get Smart is one of the DVDs she wants for Christmas. That may explain the spy kit.
The star? That’s one for the shrink.
Age before vanity
It’s only been a year since I last changed the prescription in my glasses. This was after five-or-so years of plunking down my co-pay and walking out with nary another nickle going to the ophthamologist or his evil minion the optician.
This time, the news wasn’t good. All the doctor’s talk, his words and his body language, was leading to the inevitable conclusion: The P word.
Progressive lenses.
He assured me that this was a better solution than - heaven forbid - bifocals, the glasses with the line of demarcation separating your young self from your old self. The progressive lenses completes my Picture of Dorian Gray where in my mind’s eye I’m still 18 and can’t sit still, while in real life I’m sitting still and can’t get up. It’s the time when glasses perch at the end of your nose and your arms telescope back and forth until the optimal distance between reading material and clear vision is achieved.
My heart sank. I warned him not to tell me, but you know doctors, he had to come out and say it. So I slugged him. I slugged him with a verbal barrage of reasons why I was still too young to wear progressive lens, knowing all too well that the exam he had just performed clearly showed that it was time to give in.
I will have some time to make the transition since insurance won’t cover a lens change for another month (Hello, universal heath care?).
I’ll probably toast the end of my youth this weekend. Raise a glass of Geritol for me, too.
Toothless but happy
I am surprised that Camille’s current toothless state hasn’t upset her. She’s actually enjoying it!
The tomb of Queen Susankamen
Children love talismans. Stuffed animals, security blankets, good luck charms. One of the sweetest things Camille does is leave little tokens under our pillows from time to time. We’ll be getting ready for bed, and find a polished stone, an artificial rose bud, a piece of her jewelry.
Since I’ve been sick, they’ve both been especially sweet and considerate. Abby bought me a bracelet from Ten Thousand Villages with the money she took on her Girl Scout trip to Montreat this weekend.
Not to be outdone, Camille pulled out the stops this afternoon. When I finally succumbed to the need for a nap, I woke up in the kid version of an Egyptian tomb, covered by her beloved Blanks, and surrounded with stuffed animals and sweets.
Needless to say, I arose.
Ramblin’ Prose theater poll results
Yes!
The D.C. landmark that Abby thought had to do with movies was Ford’s Theater. No worries, she knows now.
I’d love to go on this trip, but sadly, if you’re the daddy of a girl, you’re not allowed to go. They want parents to be able to stay in the same room as their child as a chaperone, but having a male in a room with several girls is torture I just can’t bear. Actually, that’s not why they won’t let dads of girls go and I certainly understand why.
Susan can’t go because of school. Abby’s a big girl and knows what to do and how to look out for herself.
I do wish I could go, though.
Bond puts the “p” in pun
Lines delivered at the right time are a joy. Sometimes you see them coming. Sometimes they’re unexpected.
The latest Bond has captured Susan’s imagination. She’s dying to see Quantum of Solace (what kind of name is that?), but unable to leave the house for any extended time because of her illness. So here’s a sample of some of Bond’s famous sex puns I found on Maxim.com to make her feel better.
Let us know if you like them.
The line that has been crossed
Henry Louis Gates Jr.: “In Our Lifetime”
Quite a bit of history I didn’t know about.
Gmail has themes!
I guess I should have figured that there would be themes in Gmail because iGoogle does, but I just wasn’t paying attention. Playing around tonight, I found love in Shiny theme. I hope I don’t end up like Shiny fish.
Theaters are sometimes just theaters
Abby came home with a little homework to get ready for a trip to Washington, D.C., next year. But she’d forgotten the place she had to look up on the Internet.
“It has something to do with the movies,” she said.
She was working with another student and wanted to call her. I said it was okay. Susan dragged herself upstairs to help Abby figure out what she needed to look up.
While I was cooking a couple of mondo hamburgers, Susan came downstairs with a big smile on her face.
“Do you wanna guess what she was talking about?” she asked.
Check back Sunday for the answer.
Sometimes kids speak this way, too
They do! But hey, you’ve got to cut them come slack because, well, they’re kids.
I began enjoying “great” prose in 2002 after I discovered DubyaSpeak.com.
For example, here’s the site editor’s top pick of Dubya’s all-time greatest gaffes:
There’s an old saying in Tennessee — I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once — shame on — shame on you. You fool me, you can’t get fooled again.
I could really see the kids coming up with something like that. (For examples, check out Camille-ism and Abby-tudes). I’ve been know to flub my words, too. But we won’t go there.
I haven’t found a site that really captures the essence of Sarah Palin speak, but we’ve all been regaled by her prose. I came across this one just today and, of course, I had to share. Enjoy!
My concern has been the atrocities there in Darfur and the relevance to me with that issue as we spoke about Africa and some of the countries there that were kind of the people succumbing to the dictators and the corruption of some collapsed governments on the continent, the relevance was Alaska’s investment in Darfur with some of our permanent fund dollars.
