Speaking in Code

Cookie?No Cookie...Cookie?! Yum, Yum, Yum, Yum, Yum!

My days now begin with the persistent patter of a small boy who, after the initial Mom-Ma! howl of the morning will break into that dangerous, slow sweet smile of his and insist that a cookie must be had. His vocab seems to be picking up speed...every day, he adds a few more words to every one's delight. I find myself being amused right along with the Grands and Greats...and while I shudder to think what he's going to be repeating (Um, those words came from an eighties movie...yeah...an eighties movie...we'll just keep running with that one -- Dang you, Eddie Murphy!) soon enough, his grasp of different concepts is still fairly impressive. He's begun to dance (first on one leg then on the other) to the Classical Baby shows (*Please note -- Classical Baby dvds are the COOLEST presents to give any preggers-people...you can watch them over and over again, and still find them charming and completely incapable of making your skin crawl).

He claps his approval of song choices, he lu-lu-lus along with the singers. He is very happy. Don't get me wrong, when he lets loose, the tantrums are fierce and loud. He's so tall and so strong now that the playpen-time-out area (Kiddie Jail) now needs to be fastened to the love seat to prevent it from tipping over and his favorite move now is a dead drop hang from the end of my arm while we walk along (as I think he's almost dislocated my elbows to begin with, I'm not overly fond of this move). I am not good at loud. Let me rephrase. I am very good at being loud...not so good at taking loud. I am constantly reminding myself that one of us has to be the calm, rational adult, here...lately, it hasn't been me...as I find I'm reminding myself to be an adult after I have just gone three-headed Ghidorah. Most of the time, my outbursts end with me feeling foolish, and Josh totally ignoring me as he he bounces joyfully onto his father. "HORSE!!!" he cries out in delight, happily rupturing Jon's spleen and doing godawful things to Jon's poor kidneys. Jon makes a fine horse. Josh rides him around the living room with delight. "Daddydaddydaddy" has become his most favorite person... Yes, I have been officially usurped and replaced...they get together (after Jon attempts to have some downtime right after work) and it is boyfest. I confess to a certain amount of perverse joy in the fact that someone else is getting mauled and jabbed, and I can take a breather. Josh looks for Jon in the morning, and pads through the house cheerfully calling for "Daddydaddydaddy." He will pick up the remote, or a phone and pretend that he's talking to Jon. The conversations run like this: "hello?bye. Trac-To Trac-To (Tractor) Mine?! Mo-oh (More?!).Yum-Yum-Yum-Yum-Yum. Bath! Daddy?!" Jon isn't quite certain what to make of this switch, but is gamely trying to go along with it...not that he has much choice. Everything Daddy does, Josh wants to do...and Jon has inadvertently begun to alter his behavior more often in an effort to head Josh off at the pass. They are really, really cute together, and Jon is helping Josh practice his maniacal laughter...but often I see the look on Jon that I used to see on our old lab Mac as he patiently (though not without the air of a martyred saint) allowed the younger pups to jump around him and tug at his ears. Mac knew it was a lost cause, but he wanted us to KNOW that he knew it was a lost cause. As Josh careens off of his father, causing untold internal damage to his sire, and laughing hysterically, I see the look Jon gives me...and I can't help it, it makes me smile.

* * * * *

Yet another accident...happened at a quarter to five on Saturday the 8th...lady hydroplaned off of the road and out of control 30 feet from our house...directly into our well house, which splatted nicely all over the lawn. We had just installed our new dryer, and a new toilet and we then had no water! blech-- that got fixed the next day. Had the truck gone 12 inches one way at the start of the fiasco, it would have crashed into the guardrail, and since the airbag didn't deploy, she would have been dead. If she had been over 6 inches either way when she hit the well house, she would have gotten the truck tires stuck in the well, and would have flipped the truck. Again, thirty feet over, and that big old blue Ford would have taken out Josh, Tim, Jon and myself. As it was, Tim had a surveillance camera on top of the well house, and I watched the truck come off the road from the television set by the window, and charge down the hill, and from the camera's angle, it looked like it was heading straight toward me -- Tim almost had another mess to clean up when I saw the screen go white and heard the crash. I think I was shouting to call 911 before she even hit. (Apparently, 911 is actually something of a joke in the area I live in. We are so far out in the boonies, that you will actually get a faster response just calling the local fire department or police instead of the 911 operator...if you call 911, the operator will just put you on hold and connect you to the required department. No, I'm not kidding.)

Luckily, the lady seemed uninjured and has insurance...and her truck, well house or no well house, I want that truck! It was a brute of a Ford and with the exception of a cracked windshield, a few scuffs and dings, and a broken-off rear view mirror, it was just fine and dandy. She had to climb out of the passenger door, as the well house roof had landed on her side, and we had to turn off the pump...although it took us a little longer to turn off all of the power. (Jon and I think Tim has somehow earned many brownie points with higher powers in a past life...By rights, at one point, someone should have been doing the real version of the electric slide.) Tim's camera is MIA, our brand new Josh pool is seriously demised, and sundry garden tools have completely ceased to exist, but all people and their respective parts are accounted for. AND, her insurance covers it all, and will get us a brand new, spiffy well-house!!! I am pondering what else we could put in the path of road-jumping trucks....I know I really need a new couch...hrm...

Jon and Tim and Torey and Rhonda did much of the cleanup...and resetting of the wiring and plumbing in the well...but as usual, every time Jon does water work, he ends up in bad shape...his legs, back, neck, and joints get painful, and he's had a fever and can't eat much, but he is bull-headed and headed straight back to work. I'm expecting to hear the same from the other cast and crew. The well has ice-cold spring water, and it can take a lot out of them when they have to muck about in it, and it usually does.



More to come.