Last Sunday, we decided to go for an afternoon drive to Turners Falls. We caught a glimpse of the town from the highway earlier this summer and thought we should go back to visit. We were somewhat disappointed when we got there–Turners Falls turned out to be one of those towns that looks more inviting from the highway than it does from Main Street–but we enjoyed ourselves nevertheless.
In my research, today, I came across a very cool optical illusion. (You can find it here.) Stare into the center of the inward-moving circles and then watch as you seem to “zoom in” on the statue. I found that if I moved my eyes from the statue to other parts of the page, even the text would appear to zoom in. There’s more optical illusions linked to the page. Check it out, but don’t hurt yourself.
Up until about a month ago, I thought L was a different kind of kid. We didn’t have any horror stories that had to do with L getting into something he wasn’t supposed to and wreaking havoc with it. I began to think that we had lucked out. Maybe there was something about L’s temperament that kept him out of such trouble. I was wrong. He just hadn’t reached the right age yet. Last week he discovered how fun it was to give the toilet paper roll a good spin and watch it unravel, a discovery that has landed him on the naughty chair several times. Yesterday, while Pam was at work and L was having his bath, he decided that it would be fun to take the water that was in the tub and dump it out beside the tub. I’m surprised the neighbours downstairs didn’t have water leaking from their ceiling. This morning, while I was working in the kitchen, L came from the other room carrying a spool of thread he had found near Pam’s sewing machine and announced that he was putting “a string around the house.” Sigh.
It occurred to me yesterday, a few days after speaking to my sister on the phone, that I had forgotten to wish her a happy birthday. To make matters worse, even if I had remembered to wish her a happy birthday when I spoke with her, I would still have been about a week and a half late. Sigh. If it’s any comfort, Sis, you’re in good company. I don’t treat you any worse than I treat your brothers.
Anyway, Happy Birthday. I hope you have a great year.
As all you parents out there know, young children have a way of placing certain restrictions upon one’s social life. Dinner and a movie. What’s that? Pam and I can easily count on one hand the number of times we’ve been to the theater since L was born. I’m sure that won’t change much after the arrival of #2 in October.
We’ve learned to make do with Blockbuster. We tell Blockbuster which movies we want to see and they send them to us in the mail. Sometimes, we take the mailed movies to the store where we can exchange them for an in-store rental. It’s actually a pretty good deal. The average cost for renting a movie this way is about half of what I remember paying for a rental 10 years ago. Anyway, we end up watching about 1 to 2 movies a week. Last weekend, Blockbuster informed us that it was shutting down its website for a day to do maintenance. They compensated their mailout customers by giving each of them a coupon for a free “Favorites” rental in store. (“Favorites” is actually code for “movies that nobody ever wanted to watch or wants to watch anymore.”) So we decided to take advantage of the free rental.
The movie we chose was a genuine, made-in-Canada film called ‘Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner‘. It’s “Canada’s first feature-length fiction film written, produced, directed, and acted by Inuit.” It’s one of the most unique movies I’ve ever seen. It’s a movie that feels like a documentary of Inuit life and culture. I highly recommend it.
Warning: If you aren’t comfortable watching a nude Inuit man run for his life across the partially melted ice of the arctic–yes, you get to/have to watch his “manhood” wave in the chilly breeze for the whole scene–then this movie is not for you.
Though most people don’t know this, you don’t have to be on Twitter to tweet. You can tweet wherever you want. I think our blog is a good a place as any, so here goes:
Potty training…two steps forward, one step back.
Gotta feel for this kid.
It’s spring break this week. For undergraduates, spring break is a week off that is best spent lounging on a Florida beach. For graduate students, spring break is a week free of teaching responsibilities that is best spent working on one’s dissertation.
Well, I decided that I should take at least one day off this week, so today Pam, L, and I took a little drive into Vermont. We had lunch at a cute little diner near White River Junction.
L tried the lemons.
Later, we went to the VINS Nature Center where they care for and rehabilitate injured birds.
On the way home, we stopped to look out over the Quechee Gorge.
Even though I remain fond of the CBC and some of its programming, some of NPR’s programming here south of the border has really grown on me. Two of my favorites are Car Talk and Prairie Home Companion. I first encountered these shows the summer I spent driving truck. I don’t listen to them religiously, but I always have a good time when I tune in. The reason I decided to blog about them was because I happened to tune in to Prairie Home Companion’s joke show yesterday and couldn’t stop laughing. Follow this link to hear it yourself.
L’s imagination is growing by leaps and bounds. We often find him chattering away while he plays with his trucks, tractors, farm animals, and other toys. Here are some pictures of his most recent farmyard. Of course, he had help building his barn…
…and he didn’t supply the round bales himself.
Today when I came home, L was sitting on the couch “reading” a story to his frog.
