I finally upgraded my camera and got myself a bunch of delayed Christmas and birthday presents. Naturally, as a good and loving father, I shared this bounty with the kids by letting them play with the box my necessary and desperately needed family memory making equipment came in.
Forgive me for being a bit scatological, but when you have you children it’s a big part of your life. Thankfully the boys have passed beyond the stage where this is much interest to me, but little Miss Poo-Bits still keeps it relevant. Her latest variance of interest is double pooping. This consists of making some poop, which if it weren’t for Alice bouncing around with her underwear around her ankles, you’d swear had to be the work of one of her older brothers. Then, literally five minutes later, she does it again. She hardly eats, and certainly does not look like she has space for large internal storage, so it’s really quite impressive. I wonder if Ripley’s would make a trip out to verify…
Polynomial is very fond of chewing up toilet paper rolls. We have had to stop having toilet paper on a roll in the downstairs bathroom because Poly will destroy it anyway. At first it would just be a problem if we left it overnight, because that’s where Poly stays. More and more over time, though, it’s become problematic to leave toilet paper on the roll for anything length of time. The end result of this process has came a few days ago. Charles had used the bathroom, so I had gotten down the toilet paper for him, which he put on the roller. I was dealing with an Alice issue at the time, and didn’t catch the significance of Poly hanging about outside the bathroom’s closed door with Charles inside. A few minutes later Charles is out and I find Poly padding about the house in a good mood with a string of toilet paper hanging from her mouth. I checked the bathroom and yes, there was a huge pile of shredded toilet paper. Poly has apparently learned that “boy in bathroom” means “fun paper chewing”.
Alice likes to watch Mom or me playing Guitar Hero. I like to torture Alice by changing songs to be about her, so I started singing to Rock You Like a Hurricane “rock you like an Alice-cane”. Alice didn’t like that, until I explained that
Then, Alice thought it was a cool variant. Now she sings it herself, now and then, although she wouldn’t sing it for her teachers at school. She even got in to an argument at dinner about it, denying the existence of Charles-canes and Corwin-canes, because nothing was more powerful than an Alice-cane.
P.S. I tried showing Alice some videos of the actual bands performing some of the songs, but that rapidly degenerated in to Alice wanting to see videos of people playing Guitar Hero, which I wouldn’t play, even for my favorite daughter. That did not end well.
I managed to get Corwin to start playing Guitar Hero again. He had given up on it because his parents played it, and (Mom especially) were better at it than him. However, I managed to get a perfect score on one song, which gives you cool looking gold stars for the rating instead of the normal ones. This seems to have convinced Corwin that it’s worth the effort so he’s been trying to get a perfect score as well. He finally managed it last night and was very happy. I pointed out that the important thing was not that he had matched me, but that Mom had not.
Yesterday that snow was still way too dry to be useful, but today was sunny and not too cool so the snow melted just enough to be excellent for packing. I made the kids go outside by giving them the choice of cleaning up the basement or playing in the snow. Despite the enforced excursion, some fun was had. I also decided that for once, we’d try building a snow man. I discussed it with the kids, projecting as much enthusiasm as I am capable of, and as a result the snow man was built as my solo project. Oddly, although the snow was good for snow balls, it didn’t roll up as well for the snowman, but I managed to get a couple of good sized snow balls. After some assembly, Corwin made a small head for it, along with a couple of arms and a few facial features. At least it was of enough interest that the kids stood near it long enough to get a picture.
P.S. I asked about sledding, but no one was interested. “Snow way”, apparently.
We got about 3-4 inches of snow today, despite weather forecasts of just a light dusting. Mom was thrilled, even though she canceled her plan to go up to visit Grandma because of road conditions. It was still snowing a bit when the kids got home, but acting on instructions left by Mom, I kicked them out in to the bitter weather. After snack, and getting ready, and much whining by Charles about how we won’t let him have boots (immediately preceding my putting boots on him).
We got the driveway shoveled before the snow plow arrived. When it did, Mom remembered that the front loader was still in the dead end. I ran over to save it, not knowing there had been enough water left from the previous precipitation to form a very smooth surface of ice under the accumulated snow. I took a massive spill, but pushed my brutalized body through the agonizing pain to try and save the front loader. Instead, I think I broke it because it had been placed there when the aforementioned precipitation was still liquid, resulting in a front loader that was strongly attached to the road (much more firmly attached than various bits of superstructure I attempted to use for hand holds). So, all in all, not the most successful rescue I have participated in. The snow plower driver, having far more pity than my loving wife, avoided plowing over the front loader.
The ice mired front loader
The kids had an argument at the dinner table tonight (which, bizarrely, did not involve the volume of Alice’s mastication). Alice had decided to count the cups on the table and ended up at the wrong total because she’s forgotten how to count. Corwin and Charles immediately started correcting her but Alice, convinced of her numerical ascendancy, denied their claims. This lead to a crescendoing frenzy of ordinality until eventually I had to forbid all counting at the table. At least it distracted Corwin enough that we didn’t have to endure a constant stream of suggestions for improving Alice’s table manners.
Dad: Alice, you can’t just leave your coat in the middle of the floor!
Alice: OK. You can hang it up, then.
Mom has created another Guitar Hero victim. She finally convinced Charles to give it another try and he’s started playing a bit, although not as dedicatedly as Mom. He discovered on his own that the base guitar parts were easier (or more regular, at least) and he’s been working on those. He does OK, although his favorite part is still buying stuff in the virtual store. That’ll end soon, as there’s only so much stuff and he’s already bought most of it.
Mom still gloats about crushing my fragile ego and scores whenever possible. She has taken to just asking “what’s a song I can beat your score on?” without even a pretense of compassion. I am reduced to spending endless hours practicing, so that I can eke out slightly higher scores for Mom to overcome in a humiliating fashion. At last, I am of some utility for her.
Corwin’s moment of ignition
This evening was the annual Blue and Gold banquet This was Corwin’s last, and he is officially a Boy Scout now. Through some concentrated effort in the late summer and early fall, Corwin managed to complete all of his Webelos requirements and got his “Arrow of Light”, which he can carry over to Boy Scouts.
Corwin also demonstrated his knack for getting short changed in public activities. Each boy who got his Arrow of Light also got a physical arrow as a token of the award. I had to remind the presenters that Corwin was supposed to get one as well. That may not have been the best thing to do, as each arrow had a piece of flash paper attached to it. The scout is supposed to pass the arrow through a candle flame and have the paper flare without burning up the arrow, to demonstrate the righteousness of the scout. Corwin, however, held his arrow in the flame so that the paper flared and then the arrow caught on fire (due to the flammable paint on it). Corwin thought this was cool, and everyone else had to convince him to put it out before his reputation was completely ruined.
P.S. Charles moved on from Tiger Cubs to Cub Scouts (Tiger being kind of a pre-Scouting level). This mean he had his face painted, which he endured very well for being Charles, so he also survived with his good name intact.
Alice wanted to rescue one of her princesses1 from the basement, but she was unwilling to go down by herself. Charles said that it was OK if you had the light on, because there weren’t any monsters or ghosts there. Alice was not mollified, but Charles, being the brave protector that he is, was willing to escort her to the infernal depths. I am happy to report that the princess was successfully rescued.
1 In Alice’s ballet class, there is a girl who is not obsessed with princesses, believe it or not!
Mom took the training wheels off Charles’ bike earlier this week. This is Charles on his first outing without them. He didn’t fall over, but he managed only a few pedals per attempt before he would slow down and use his feet for balance. I think it was more a lack of motivation, as he was out trying only because Mom was … encouraging him. He switched back to his preferred Charles powered vehicle soon after.
The boys have tomorrow, Friday, and Monday off from school, so they had their Valentine’s Day party today. Mom went to help out with Charles’ class, Corwin not being quite as appreciate at having a parent hang about. Mom said there were lots of little activities, but Charles spent most of his time at the food table, working up a major sugar rush. Mom’s solution to this was to take him out on a long walk around the park. There was much crying and wailing, which seemed to work off a lot of energy. For the first half mile or so, Charles lagged back as far as he could without losing sight of us (too much). Eventually, though, the emotional distorting excess energy was dissipated by his vocalizations and he was actually in a good mood by the time we made it back to the house.
This evening was Corwin’s last meeting for Cub Scouts. He graduates up to Boy Scouts on Saturday. He didn’t seem very impressed with the milestone.
Alice has now started telling jokes. Here’s her best effort —
Alice: Knock knock!
Dad: Who’s there?
Alice: Banana!
Dad: Banana who?
Alice: Banana sugar and milk! [laughs almost hard enough to fall out of her chair]
No, no, she’s far too young to be doing stand up routines at social events. Check back in a year or two when our savings are a bit more run down.
While we were out enjoying the last of the snow, Charles got a shovel and jammed it in to one of the snow piles. He then announced that he had made Alice a CD player out of snow.
Mom has completed all the songs on Easy and, tonight, all of the songs on Medium. Mom wants to be sure to note that she did both of these before Corwin.
On a personal note, I would like to state for the record that I got through the first three songs on Medium on the first try, which Corwin did not. Bwahahaha.
Corwin’s funny, though. Mom has a lot of trouble with him keeping a steady beat during violin practice, and I can see it when he plays. He’ll shred right through some tricky note sequence and then crash and burn on steady quarter or eighth notes.
Charles hasn’t tried again since his earlier experience.
Alice is a leading edge technology adopter. She’s been going around with her toy cell phone and taking pictures with it. I am not quite sure where she picked that up, as I very rarely use my cell phone camera, and I don’t think has ever done so. Probably some street corner filled with delinquent toddlers oversupplied with technology by indulgent parents.
It is raining in a serious way today. It rained yesterday, and with all of the snow melting, there’s a lot of standing water about. I was actually concerned driving home from scouts about whether the van would make it through some of the puddles. At one point I spotted a round drain in the street with 4 inches of water around it, creating a very cool looking whirlpool. It was so cool that even Charles made happy noises when I showed it to him. I just hope the basement doesn’t flood again.
I went on a Guitar Hero bender this weekend and finished the Easy career sequence. Well ahead of Corwin and Dad, I might note. This is probably a once in a lifetime thing since I normally don’t spend enough time gaming (having a life and all) and Corwin and Dad quickly pass me by, so I must savor it while it lasts.
The medium setting looks a lot harder. I’ll actually have to practice and not just sight read my way through. For the metal songs I wasn’t familar with like Miss Murder and Number of the Beast, it was purely note reading.
I will note that Corwin is much better at the game playing aspect than I am. In the guitar battles, you have to pick up attacks and throw them at your opponent while playing. The first opponent took me 8 or more tries to get through. The other ones just took two times each. However, Corwin has passed all guitar battles in the first attempt.
Corwin had a birthday party sleep over at Josh’s tonight, so Mom took the spawn out shopping. As a result of my letting her out unsupervised, she impulse purchased Guitar Hero III. She had to take Alice out for a play date immediately upon her arrival home, leaving me stuck with the task of opening it up and getting everything set up. Ah, the sacrifices I make as a dedicated husband and father. Naturally, being dedicated, I had to try it out to make sure it was working OK before Mom got home. It was good for Corwin, as he laughed at me every time I missed note. It was so embarrassing that I broke down and did the tutorials, which doubled my scores. Corwin and I had a good thorough time testing the game until Mom got home. Then it was time for her to rock (I was sent off to dispose of Corwin at Josh’s house, which I had to drive to twice because when Corwin answered “yes” to “do you have Josh’s present?” he meant “what?”). Mom didn’t play for the entire rest of the evening, she took a couple of breaks, until she got too fuzzy to play just before midnight.
The kids liked it. Alice liked to watch Mom play, and pepper her with questions during the especially tricky note sequences. Charles mainly liked putting stickers on the guitar. I had to stop him from doing the full set while Mom was gone, explaining that since it’s Mom’s guitar, she gets control of what stickers go on it.
I am working the camera
The weather reports last night promised a lot of snow, but I didn’t believe it because they promise and promise piles of snow and then it rains. But lo and behold, this time we got a noticeable (4-5 inches) amount of white fluff. It was bad enough that the schools announced they were close the previous evening (and there was much rejoicing among the spawn). The roads were bad enough (and we didn’t want to shovel out the drive so early) that we kept Alice home as well for a full house of family togetherness.
We eventually had the entire family out shoveling, which let us keep up with the 60+ year old grandmother across the street. I set it up for Corwin as a learning experience, assigning him a specific section of the driveway (about a third), rather than a time limit, so that his normal tactic of operating at the minimum level to avoid constant negative stimulus. I had to strip off my coat because I was overheating, but Corwin stayed fully bundled up the entire time, which provides a rough upper bound on his intensity of work. I told him could work as slow and inefficiently as he liked, but he wasn’t coming in until his section was clear. He still took much longer than necessary, but at least he was outside and I didn’t have to listen to complaints that Alice wasn’t helping.
In the afternoon we went out for some sledding with Jack and his mom. The older boys didn’t last much longer than Charles and Alice — both of them had to do driveway clearing and that apparently wore them out for the day. Alice took one ride down and then sat on Mom’s shoulders for the rest of the outing.
Charles had a break down in to tears when told he was going sledding, but we, cruel beings of Utter Evil that we are, forced him to go along anyway instead of leaving him home alone. You can hear his piteously whining during his forced descent in this video:
Very sad. Despite this, when pressed upon returning home, Charles admitted that he had “medium” fun.
