two more signs the world is coming to an end sooner rather than later...

At Walmart...

The QB was checking out with some groceries and the clerk held up a head of cabbage and said, "Uh...what's this? Lettuce?"

When the QB said cabbage, the clerk said, "Oh, right. Sorry. I'm not very good with vegetables."

On the Phone with a record store:

I asked the clerk if they had any recordings of "Swan Lake." The clerks response:

"Uh.. Who's the band?"

Need a Break from Christmas?

How about some Halloween Pictures! (We're still catching up)

I For costumes I bought two gray sweatsuits and sewed on fins, eye and teeth to turn the little guys into sharks! They're not in time out, just showing off their fins!

The sharks needed a surfer to chase after of course, so the Student took that job. And for me, well we couldn't think of anything that fit well for a preggo lady.
Pregnant Hula Girl? Nope
Whale? Feeling like that anyway, don't want to make Halloween emotional!

Anyway, I decided just to go as a pregnant witch! And if the pic looks a little funny it's because it's from the point of view of a 6 yr old.

Get him boys!

Another existential moment....

Last night, I found myself sitting on my living room floor in the dark, watching this ambitious, if not terribly unpredictable version of Pride and Prejudice, all by myself. Okay, I wasn't alone, really. My very pregnant wife was asleep on the couch above me, her foot resting on my shoulder, and our recently-neutered dog lay on the floor beside me, snoring and twitching occasionally, but in terms of conscious participants, it was just me and the movie on the laptop. I don't know what this moment means, except that maybe sometimes proximity is all that people (and dogs) need--proximity to some other living, breathing, thinking thing.

The QB and the dog had me. I had them. and we had the movie.

It could have been a better movie.

We all could have been awake for it.

And the dog could have refrained from sitting up every five minutes to lick its fresh wound, but you can't have everything, right?

Snow...snow...never eat...what was that again? Never eat...

The QB made sugar cookies tonight for Family Home Evening. She was planning on just making stars with yellow frosting, but then the Monkey insisted they use the snowman cookie cutter too. We didn't realize it until after we'd decorated all the cookies, but thanks to the Monkey's insistence, tonight we ate:

"Yellow snow"-man cookies.

oh well. They were delicious.

The new dog

This is Copper, our new dog. He's a boy, at least until tomorrow morning. This is a picture of him just after finding out about our trip to the vet tomorrow.

"You're taking me where?" he said.

And, as you can see from this photograph below, he is very well trained. Notice how expertly he has plopped himself down BESIDE his new bed, instead of on it. We think this may represent some measure of artistic predilection on his part--very avant garde, very "thinking outside the bed, err--box."
Interesting note. He and Mr. Baseball both react the same way to discipline. They both get really excited, as if the embarrassment/shame/frustration/whatever of failing to live up to expectations generates a lot of energy that has to be released in some way. Mr. Baseball usually gets wiggly and starts talking in goofy voices. The dog usually runs laps around the couch and rolls on his back at my feet, as if to say, "I'm sorry, really, I am. I know I'm bad, but look, I'm on my back now, totally exposed. That's got to count for something, right? Please don't hate me, please."

He's not bad. just new to all of this "living with bipeds" stuff. He's been a backyard dog most of his life and hasn't had a lot of rules. He couldn't sit or stay when we got him (still can't really) and his on-leash etiquette made going for a walk like trying to play with a thirty pound yo-yo. But he's getting better. five days of morning walks and he's right along side me most of the way without much tugging or getting distracted by the neighborhood smells.

Can you imagine having a nose like a dog's that takes in smells like we take in the visual world around us. What a smellscape! Rain gutters and stale garbage and burning chimneys and rotting leaves and cigarette smoke and that old chewing gum on the concrete and the stale urine on the fire hydrant and the cotton seed on the wind and ketchup packet smashed into the asphalt and the broken beer bottle and the McDonald's bag in the field and maybe even the cockroach droppings and a stray bit of exhaust carried in on the breeze--all picked up by the dog's nose, all registered and cataloged and labeled with at least two questions? "What's that smell?" and "Should I follow it?" I SEE most of this on our walks, but he smells it. It's got to be an entirely new dimension, a lens on the world that gives him what I imagine language gives us, a unique view on his surroundings specially adapted to his needs as a dog--a view we can neither appreciate nor ever hope to appropriate any more than he'll ever really appreciate or be capable of using language to the extent that we do.

I've read that some autistic savants associate specific emotions, colors, energies, and feelings with numbers--I wonder if a dog can tell the difference between an angry smell and a happy smell, a safe smell and a dangerous smell, a clam smell and an energetic one. who knows. We bought some old chicken at Walmart the other day that smelled pretty angry.

He's learning...I'm learning...we're learning...

Why Mr. Baseball is going to be a good husband...

So in primary today (the children's class at church) a teacher asked the group about their favorite restaurant and called on Mr. Baseball. His answer:

"My house, because my mom makes really good food."

Well done, Mr. Baseball, well done.

The nice thing is, we're pretty sure he meant it.

Behind a Few Months on Pictures

September was a crazy month, we did a lot of swimming in the pool at our temporary apartment in between house shopping, starting school and adjusting to Lubbock. One of the most fun things was celebrating Mr. Baseball's 6th Birthday! He loved the Pirate Legos and his Pirate Hat cake (even though it was a little floppy).

Mr. Baseball you are so smart and caring and thoughtful. Sometimes I'm amazed at all the things you know about and want to learn. Just last night on our Mom and Son date you told me you wanted to be a Architect and a Baseball player! That's ambitious but I have no doubt you'll be able to do and be just about anything you want to. We love you and your bright spirit!