Entries Tagged 'Family' ↓

Aha! Found it. Recently I mentioned Elizabeth's new catchphrase, innoo da tikkamix which I thought was from Wonderpets. I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be "into the thick of it."

Turns out, it's Backyardigans. It's actually a song from the episode "Into the Jungle".. Thanks, Wikipedia!

"Daddy, you'll never guess what Juliana's gonna be for Shay's dressup party? Ariel Wedding. That's what I'm gonna be!"

"How'd you know that? Do you guys get together and talk about that?"

"Yes."

The question, of course, is, "At what age to little girls start gathering together to discuss what they're going to wear to the party?" The answer is, 4 and a half.

However, there is still a glimmer of hope:

"But it's ok Daddy, more than one person can be Ariel Wedding if they want. Two people are going as Snow White, too."
Yeah, sure. Tell me that at your high school prom when somebody's wearing your dress, sweetie.

When Katherine was just learning how to speak, she used to say that the Indian sitting on the Land-o-Lakes margarine was Jesus.

Well she's 4 1/2 now and quite articulate. Last night over dinner she showed me the margarine and said, "Daddy, that's an Indian on there."

"That's right," I told her, "And you know what? When you were little, you used to say that was Jesus."

Pause. "Yes Daddy, I know," she told me. "I said that because she wears her hair long like that, and that's how Jesus wears it."

So, there you go. If your child says something that you don't understand while they're still learning to talk, make a note of it and ask her a few years later when she can explain it better. "Remember when you said innoo da tikkamix? What did you mean by that?"

Actually "innoo da tikkamix" is an Elizabeth quote. This appears to be the battle cry of something called a Wonderpet, from what Katherine tells me. My best guess is they're saying "into the thick of it" or something like that, but I can't seem to google anything to confirm that. On the contrary, the catchphrases of the characters are clearly listed on wikipedia and they're not even close.

Either way, Elizabeth thinks that "innoo da tikkamix" is hysterical and will run around the house saying it. Anybody know what it really means?

I'm reminded of the old Steven Wright bit: "I kept a diary when I was a baby. Day one, still tired from the trip. Day two, everyone talks to me like I'm an idiot." and, more relevant, "Whenever I'm the room with a baby I like to write down every noise they make, so when they grow up I can say, What did you mean by that?"

File under "wow, that actually worked."

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Stupid news story of the day is the video of Tigger attacking a 14yr old boy. I'd just like to point out that a 4yr old can distinguish "Daddy, that's not Tigger, that's someone dressed up like Tigger." I always wondered about that whenever I'd hear that nonsense about "irreparably damaged because my kid saw Mickey take his head off."

Anyway, watch the video. Looks pretty obvious to me that the kid, coming into the picture late, does something at the back of Tigger's costume. Maybe he just put his hand too close to Tigger's neck, maybe he actually started feeling around for a zipper because he thought it would be funny. Either way, Tigger wraps and bars the arm (nice!), and then whacks the kid.

So what's the dad do? Goes on the news. What's he expect to get out of it? Disney will pretty safely fire the guy in the suit, it's a big no-no to hit the guests (or to hit on them, which is a different lawsuit :)). I think they already offered the family a free day at the park. The father wants a face to face apology from the kid in the suit, which I'm pretty sure Disney won't allow because they're not supposed to break character like that.

What the father apparently doesn't care much about is how stupid he's making his son look on national television. "How hard did he hit you, son?" he asks for the cameras. "Pretty hard," says the son, "I could feel it through the soft gloves." I think he even said "I can still feel it" at one point.

So…your kid is on video being a punk, and then on the news being a big wimp. Nice dad.

I just can't help envisioning a real Tigger beatdown, and how the kid would explain that. "And then, and then…he kept bouncing up and down on me with that springy tail of his, boing! boing! boing! And the laughing….oh, the laughing….sometimes at night I can still hear the laughing. HoohooHOOOO! HoohooHOOOO! And there were Pooh and all his friends, just pointing and laughing….."

And by that I mean the grammar of my 2.5 yr old, Elizabeth. My Shakespeare friends are gonna kill me :).

Elizabeth feels that the word "windy" is similar to the word "cold". Thus, where you might say "I'm cold" on a particularly cold day, Elizabeth would say "I'm windy" on a windy day.

She also knows that when she says this, the nearest grown up will tend to say, "It is a little windy." However, it is often "Not too windy."

She does not, however, grasp the concept of past tense. "I'm windy" could mean right now, or it could mean yesterday. This was particluarly noticeable the week after trying to get pictures taken with Santa where she would tell me every morning, "Santa's not scaring me." In other words, "I was not scared of Santa."

Today, during our fabulous 60 degree day in early January, I took the kids to the park. When we came home and Kerry asked Elizabeth how it was, she replied, "I'm too a little windy!"

Normally I don't blog politics, but I think this story's got a punch line that's right up my alley. You may have heard the who big issue with Rep Keith Ellison (D-MN) taking his oath on a Quran instead of a Bible. Even better, it was a Quran once owned by Thomas Jefferson. This made big news because Rep. Virgil Goode (R-VA) made a big stink over it, saying that if you're gonna swear in on a book, it should be the Bible. Even though the Constitution clearly says "no religious test shall be required", in other words you can't make somebody swear on a religious text. (Technically the official swearing in is done with no book at all — the issue is about what book they use for the traditional photo opportunity that happens after the fact).

Anyway, what's the punchline again? It's done, it's over, he swore in, the world didn't end. What I like about the story is Rep Mazie Hirono, one of two Buddhists to be sworn in during this election, opted not to have a book at all, saying "Whatever happened to the separation of Church and State?"

Love it.

Ok, here we go.

• Get back on the weight loss track and hit my goal weight. Right now that'd mean dropping about 12 more pounds. 6 of which I'd gained over the holidays 🙂
• Get published in a meaningful way. I've written a couple of e-books before, but none of them are going to ever even make it onto the radar, as far as secondary income goes. I'd like this year to write and publish something that I feel could make me some pocket money. Whether it does or not, well, I don't control that.
• New mantra: Complete the bad stuff so there's more time for the good stuff. At any given time I've got a good dozen projects running around my brain. Some work, some personal. Some practical, some blue sky. Some take two minutes, some take two years. Whenever I focus on one, particularly one of the "have to get done" ones, I have a horrible habit of spending all my mental energy thinking "As long as I'm working on this, I'm not working on [other, probably more fun project]." And when I do allow myself time to work on the fun ones, I'm inevitably thinking "Man, I should really get back to the boring have-to-do and just do it." So, I don't win on either end. My new goal is to tackle one project at a time and stay focused on it until I make meaningful progress. I won't say "finish", because often you'll hit a wall where you can't finish it right that moment. But by making recognizable progress I'll at least feel better about putting it down and moving on to something else.

There you go, that's my list. Consider it documented. Who else wants to volunteer?

The other day I wrote about my "not so Zen" children who were baffled at the concept of one hand clapping. In one of those moments where I like to say "The universe is small", I see a news story about a company called Zen Babies. I did not go looking for it, it just fell in my lap. There ya go.

So, the story of the day is about the woman who put a baby through the x-ray scanner at the airport. The baby was quickly extracted from the machine, taken to the hospital (something she apparently did not want), and it was confirmed that the baby's fine, no damaging exposure was sustained.

But man, the fodder for Incredible Hulk jokes is just outstanding! The kid's got a new nickname for the rest of his life.

Don't make that baby angry. You wouldn't like him when he's angry.

Baby smash!

He's turning green! Oh, wait, no, that's strained peas.