Post TV Camera

Jack has introduced a new pre-bedtime ritual: taking pictures. After his milk and post-bath TV show he says, "camera!" and runs downstairs to retrieve my digital camera. He only wants pictures taken so he can view the pictures on the camera. This activity is related to the I-need-to-push-buttons-on-things-that-are-not-toys mania. As I've written before, he expresses this desire by wanting to push buttons on remotes, buttons in the car, and my wife's iPhone.

Tonight, I convinced him to swing around a toy that has two plastic balls that light up when under centrifugal force.

Hi There

Jack says hi to his baby sister.

Hey Now, Hey Now

One of Jack's favorite music videos from Noggin is The Dirty Sock Funtime Band's "Dino-Soaring." The band and the song were featured on "Jack's Big Music Show" on Noggin but we caught the video on the tail of a "Wonder Pets" episode. The chorus features the phrase, "Hey now, hey now," and that's how Jack refers to the song (and when asking to see it on the upstairs TV).

The video shows the very psychedelic band members dancing around with kids on a rainbow like sound stage. The song has a great beat and is very danceable. You can see for yourself:



Tonight, I snapped the following pictures of Jack dancing to the song.

At the Park

Today both my attractive wife and I accompanied Jack to the park. When we arrived, we saw Jack's Day Care playmate James and his mom. Jack and James love hanging out together and were thrilled to see each other at the park. We spent well over an hour trawling around the park together.


At one point, we reached the Big Kids Swing Set. For some reason, Jack has an aversion to swings and has not yet tried the kiddie swings in the 3-5 year old play structure. My attractive wife got on a swing and Jack asked if he could push her. I snapped the picture below. Quite possibly the cutest picture I've ever taken. :-)

Few More Minutes ...

Jack firmly is into testing boundaries and limits, especially at bed time. For the last three nights, he's opted out of story time which usually follows bath time and saying goodnight to mommy. Jack's favorite line these days is, "Few more minutes," which is used to extend whatever activity he's currently involved in. He's used to try to get more TV time, more bath time, more play time, etc.

"Few more minutes..."

I first heard the phrase at the park when I told Jack it would soon be time to go back home. I can only imagine he heard my attractive wife or myself say it on some occasion. He loves to say it while taking bath and after I say something like, "it will be rinsy time soon."

Bye Kitty

Today Dewy and Day-Day's' cat, Bibi Kitty, had to be put down. She was seventeen years old. Jack loved to play with her, especially outside in our condo association's shared back yard area. Like most cats, it took some time for her to warm up to us. She was especially patient with Jack. As they got to know each other, she eventually would let him pet her in his ham-handed way. If he got too bothersome she would gracefully move just out of reach. It seemed to me she knew that Jack was a human kitten, so to speak. She never once bit or scratched him.

After I returned from my year in Iraq, she seemed to warm up to me too. She actually let me pet her when we were outside and, more recently, when we visited Dewey and Day-Day in their unit next door. Jack would see her and say, "Kitty is here!" and pet her while saying, "Nice." It was very cute to watch.


In the last week, Kitty's health took a dramatic turn for the worse. Dewey and Day-Day said they though they might have to put her down. When I came home with Jack this afternoon, Dewey told us that they had gone to the vet and had her put to sleep. They came back and buried her in their unit's back yard. We will miss you, Kitty.

These pictures date from June, 2007.

Achmed and the iPhone

Jack still can't get enough of our iPhones. He's partial to my attractive wife's because she has loaded more games on it. There are some really cool ones. One is TappyTunes where you can play a number of familiar songs by tapping on the iPhone's screen. There's also a drawing program, a Majong game, and a ball puzzle game. The problem is that Jack keeps touching other icons on the home screen and calling up the iTunes store, texting random people in my attractive wife's contact list, and rearranging the icons on the iPhone's desktop.

Yesterday, after waking up from his nap, my wife gave him her iPhone to play with. When I went up to check on him he had the SMS text screen up and was composing an indecipherable text message to our city's police department (I'm only hoping they don't have the ability to receive text messages).

Jack hiding the iPhone under the blanket

He's also knows how to access YouTube on the iPhone. For some reason, he keeps pulling this video of ventriloquist Jeff Dunham's "Achmed the Dead Terrorist" routine.



It's not at all appropriate for a three year old but he likes the expressive skeleton dummy Dunham uses. He laughs maniacally while watching it. After watching the first few minutes of the video, Jack went around saying, "I'm a terrorist!" Oh boy.

The Hell of Packaging

For those of you without kids let me get you in on a secret: toys a bitch to extract from today's adult pilfer-proof packaging. Two Christmases ago, I didn't seem to notice. Last Christmas, I was in Iraq. This past Christmas (2008) I struggled continually to get the toys Jack received free from their bondage-like enclosures.

This weekend, my attractive wife bought Jack a new bath toy (The Wonder Pets Save the Whale). Just before dinner tonight we showed it to Jack who was quite pleased with it. Here are some photos chronicling the multi-stage opening process:

The toys snug in their package.

Cutting the taped flap on the bottom right-hand corner opens the bottom revealing a space under the whale.

Opening the bottom reveals that the whale is secured to the box by three sets of plastic tie wires.

Detail of the plastic wire ties and their plastic backings.

Plastic wire ties untied. They were intricately wrapped around the nobs in the plastic bases with the skill of a Renaissance Faire hair brader.

Whale almost free. In order for the whale to be pulled free, all the wires had to be straightened out. Note he plastic tie wires are still attached to the whale via small holes in the plastic body. It's mouth is securely taped shut.

Pulling the wire ties out of the whale's underside required more straightening and yanking. Detail of the packing tape around the Whale's mouth. It was a bitch to peel off.

The whale is liberated and happy. Now on to The Wonder Pets figures.

My practiced eye sees they are encased in two layers of industrial cut-resistant plastic. I can't tell at this point if the figures are further secured to one of the layers. Note Jack in the background asking why it's taking so long to open.

Cutting and peeling away the first layer of plastic with regulation Steak Knife.

Peeling away the first layer revealed they were just sitting inside the next layer! There was no need to further untie or peel them away from some other maniacal form of tie down. Here we see the whole ensemble sitting together seconds before Jack whisked them away.

Mud

We've had some much needed rain lately here in Northern California but it makes going to the park messy. Jack doesn't mind at all; in fact, he loves the mud and puddles. This morning we went and found most of the play structures to be dry and usable. Jack nevertheless was more interested in the various puddles and soggy grass lawns. He loved the smacking sound his shoes made when running over the wet grass. Of course, I had to keep up with him and my shoes got all muddy as well.

Splosh. Splosh. Splosh.

On the far side of the park, he found drain that was half full of water. He delighted in dropping very small rocks into the drain. It's some kind of put-things-into-receptacles reflex, I guess. He spent a good fifteen minutes dropping rocks into the drain and then squealing with delight today.

Plop. Splash. Squeal.

This is a behavior he exhibited when he was very young. He used to delight in trying to clog our pool filter with dead leaves. Viz:

September, 2007

Light Swaber (Redux)

Last month, my attractive wife and I bought iPhones. Jack loves them and seems a natural at playing with the touch screen. He zeroed in on my attractive wife's iPhone because she has a hot pink case for it. I also loaded some games on it I thought she would like (Spider Solitaire, Brick Breaker). Jack likes them better but is not that good at actually playing them.

This afternoon after arriving back home from Day Care I made the mistake of showing Jack my iPhone which has the Star Wars Light Saber application on it. It's just a glorified ad for a video game, "Star Wars: The Force Unleashed", but does feature five Star Wars characters and their light sabers. Once activated, you can move the iPhone around and it will make appropriate sound effects. To Jack, who is a fan of the animated series, Star Wars: Clone Wars, this is pure gold. He wanted to play with it all night. I let him play until it was time for dinner and then again after his bath. I fear I won't be able to take out my iPhone if he's in sight. He can ask, "Light Swaber game on your iPhone?" It's cute up until the tantrum starts when I say he can't have my iPhone. Oh boy.

The Force is strong with this one.

Lost and Found

First off, let me offer a lame excuse about the dearth of postings recently: I finally registered for Facebook and spent several days finding both my current set of friends and a fair amount of people I had lost track of long ago. It's been great getting back in touch but it does sap a lot of time as those of you with Facebook pages know all too well.

Lately, my attractive wife has been suffering from punishing insomnia. She's constantly tired due in large part to her being the second trimester of pregnancy. Paradoxically, she often wakes up in the middle or late part of the night and is unable to get back to sleep. Her doctor said she could take Tylenol PM to help but that didn't work well a few nights ago when a passing fire truck work her up around 10PM (she stayed up until 2AM before fitfully falling back asleep). More frustrating for me is that there is little I can do about it.

My wife elected to take a late shift at work today, partly to increase the chances of getting a better night's sleep tonight. She stayed late this morning with Jack at home. At one point, she put Jack in his glider chair in his room watching a favorite show and went to take a shower. As she was getting out of the shower, she heard Jack wailing and crying in the upstairs hall outside his room, "I want my Mama!" He had "lost" her and couldn't find her. My attractive wife consoled him and reminded she had been in the shower all the time. Poor guy.

You've Got Mail!

While away from the house on Saturday, I received the following email on my iPhone. At first I thought my wife's email account had been spoofed but a closer examination of the syntax revealed the true source of the message:

From: Attractive Wife (xxxxx@me.com)
To: Rico (XXXXX@me.com>
Sat, Feb 7, 2009 at 11:20 AM
Subject: n
Mailed by: Me.com

n
Nnm ndmdmxmdmeoeodlro&:
Smzmz
Snx x fhwgvxbsbvxbsnzvzvavsvv.

vzzbebsb bbnajzmznjdgzjdvEbahwhahxndnsvanHGzzvxbcx Nzbxnwbml


Sent from my iPhoneenbb

Break. Break.

Jack loves the iPhone. When we brought them home, my attractive wife made the mistake of showing her pink case enclosed iPhone to Jack who wouldn't let go of it. He is fascinated by the touch screen and the fact we can make the animated screen credits for "Scooby Doo" appear on demand (via YouTube).

Chips

Jack loves chips, whether they be ordinary corn tortilla, potato, or nacho. To him, the chip is an exotic cousin of the Ritz cracker, another big favorite. The other day, we gave him some chips in a red plastic cup after he finished his dinner. He took them upstairs and, in anticipation of getting ready for his bath time, plopped himself in front of his bedroom TV and began munching away.

The Other Jonny Quest

I'm happy to report that Jack is now hooked on Jonny Quest. I Tivo'd the show after his positive reaction to the Jonny Quest mash up/short that was tacked onto the end of a recent Power Puff Girls episode.

Jack calls the original show, "the other Jonny Quest" since he saw the stop motion short first. He loves all the characters, especially Hadji and bulldog Bandit. For me, it's been great reacquainting myself with this show, which I liked as a kid but don't remember actually seeing a lot of the episodes. My attractive wife thinks the show is a little weird what with four guys living on a mysterious, government-owned island in the Florida Keys. I had to explain that Dr. Benton Quest is a highly prized scientist working for the U.S. government and that Roger "Race" Bannon is his full time government bodyguard. She thinks there's something else going on.

Jack watching the end credits of Jonny Quest

The show is wonderfully Cold War but a bit heavy on the xenophobia. A Russian/Soviet submarine crew is the unnamed collective villain in a episode called "Arctic Splashdown" whose plot is taken straight from the movie "Ice Station Zebra." Then there is the reoccurring Asian evil scientist, Dr. Zin, who is best remembered for constructing a giant spider robot that infiltrates Dr. Quest's government laboratory in a flying saucer. Jack particularly likes this episode. Via the robot spider, Dr. Zin taunts Dr. Quest as he tries to discover the secrets of Dr. Quest's experimental para-power ray gun. I'm pretty sure Jack doesn't yet appreciate the Cold War intrigue but he likes the monsters and robots.

Gana

This evening while carousing in our bedroom, ostensibly to say good night to my attractive wife, we overheard Jack saying, "Come on Gana."

"Who's Gana?" my attractive wife asks from the bed.

"Gana," Jack answers, "is a very beautiful lady and she's orange."

Jack is a Steelers fan

We hosted a Super Bowl party ... sort of: we had my sister-in-law and her oldest daughter, whom Jack adores, come over for the first half. Jack had a great time. My attractive wife and sister-in-law grew up in Pittsburgh so it was a nail-biting fourth quarter. Jack pretty much was oblivious but we still dressed him accordingly.

With Cousin Erin

Fourth quarter tension

Victory! Posing with The Terrible Towel