Papa Dog's Blog

Family Vacation

2011-08-01T14:28:00.000-07:00

We had a fine three-day stay at Long Valley Ranch, near Ukiah. Baby Dog was taken more than anything else by the presence of a hammock strung between two trees, and she spent a good deal of each day lying in it, swinging around, and reading her books. Mama Dog took some perverse enjoyment in hiking in 90 degree weather. I took great pleasure in napping most of the days away. But the one who got the most out of the trip, paws down, was Girlie Dog. She chased a deer, caught a fish in the pond (and then rolled in it until she was absolutely disgusting), and chased small prey through the brush, bounding on her hind paws like a kangaroo. It was a much-needed rest for us all and we can't wait to make our next trip there.

An Update

2011-01-27T19:59:00.000-08:00

Things are going well, thanks. Baby Dog is so not a baby anymore. She's six and a half and is doing very well in Grade 1. Doggy Dog passed away in May of 2009, a very sudden deterioration sparked on by the usual big-dog hip problems. We had a mourning period of about eight months and then adopted Girlie Dog, a husky-shepherd mix who was then 2 years old and has been quite a handful compared to our sedate old dog. She gets along splendidly with Baby Dog, though, which is one thing we always felt we were missing out on with Doggy Dog. Girlie Dog consents equably to being hugged, tugged, lain on, and rolled on.

More Coming

2010-07-11T11:51:00.001-07:00

I suppose I should start updating this thing again sometime.

April Wine in the Hall

2010-02-09T10:07:00.000-08:00

Well it's finally happened. April Wine is being inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame. Thanks to you, the readers of this Faversham. It's been a long road, but thanks to your letters and e-mails CARAS finally relented and put April Wine in the hall. So give yourselves a round of applause.

Be sure to watch the Junos on CTV on Sunday, April 18th to see the induction ceremony. Keep on rockin'.

So 2006.

2010-02-04T18:12:00.001-08:00

According to an article in the Wall Street Journal today, blogging is "so 2006." Huh. Scrolling down this page, I find that was the year I stopped blogging regularly. How about that.

And in other news...

2009-09-15T11:24:00.001-07:00

...Kristine is surprised to see a new post here.

Much Better, America

2009-01-20T16:08:00.000-08:00

Four years ago, there was a black armband on the faversham. Not today.

Your Official Guide to Levels of Coldness, As Compiled By an Actual Canadian

2008-12-12T16:09:00.001-08:00

65º F (18.333º C) and up - Hot
55º F (12.778º C) - Warmish
45º F (7.222º C) - A Little Cool
40º F (4.444º C) - A Tad Chilly
32º F (0º c) - Seems Like It Could Get Nippy Soon
20º F (-6.667º C) - Guess I'll Wear My Toque
0º F (-17.778º C) - Cold
-20º F (-28.889º C) - Really Cold
-40º F (-40º C) - Really Fucking Cold (must maintain temperature for at least two days straight for classification to be certified)

An Email I Just Sent to Thomasandfriends Period Commercial

2008-05-17T10:20:00.000-07:00

Dear Thomas and Friends:

My almost-four-year-old daughter is a great enthusiast of the Thomas series and enjoys many of the games and activities on the Thomasandfriends web site. Today we were reading the various character gallery entries in the "Engines" section of the site, and I found a couple of errors that I thought should be brought to your attention. Both are in the entry for Lady Hatt.

First, it refers to Lady Hatt as a "kind and gentile woman." While I'm sure that description is accurate in all its particulars, I have a strong hunch it was supposed to read "kind and gentle woman."

Second, it says that Lady Hatt is wont to scold the engines if they behave properly. If that is true, it must be very confusing for the engines and a great hindrance to their moral development. Surely the gentle gentile lady only scolds them if they behave improperly.

Thank you for providing countless hours of learning and entertainment for my child and my thanks to your webmaster for inadvertently providing me with a good laugh.

Best regards,

Papa Dog

Concrete and Barbed Wahr

2008-01-21T22:05:00.000-08:00

So Baby Dog has two new musical obsessions. One is Puff the Magic Dragon, which she sings and discusses from first thing in the morning until last thing at night. The other is Lucinda Williams' album, Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, to which she was introduced by Mama Dog. Today, Mama Dog made Baby Dog a binder filled with the printed lyrics to all the songs, each song encased in a heavy-duty plastic sheet protector, ready for the tough punishment that surely lies in its future. I was a little disconcerted when I saw Baby Dog reading out the words to "Metal Firecracker," which includes the line "You wanted to undress me." I mentioned that to Mama Dog, who replied, "She'll just think it means Lucinda was getting ready for a bath." Well, okay.

Anyway, among Baby Dog's favourite Lucinda songs is "Concrete and Barbed Wire." Tonight, Mama Dog made a point of asking Baby Dog to say, for my benefit, the name of that song. Our little girl faithfully pronounces it just the way Lucinda does, in her Louisiana drawl. "Concrete and Barbed Wahr."

Baby Dog Reads

2007-10-16T21:04:00.001-07:00

Baby Dog's been reading her books out loud since she was less than 18 months old. It ceased to be a novelty long ago. "Yeah," I'd say to people, "she reads them out loud, but it's not really reading. She just has them all memorised."

Several months ago I noticed that she was recognising specific words. She started out reading signs. Two of the first words she knew how to spell were "no" and "parking." Again, it wasn't really reading - she had memorised particular sets of letters and recognised them in different contexts. "It's pre-reading," I'd say.

Well, a couple of weeks ago, the last shoe finally dropped. I finally noticed that she could always find on the page the word I was reading in one of her Thomas books. I decided to do some experiments. I pointed random words out to her in different books, without reading the page aloud myself. Invariably, she knew what the word was. Then I wrote some random words on a piece of paper - ones I knew she was familiar with. Again, 100 percent. Today, I wrote on a piece of paper the phrase "That dog is in the house with a big cat." She read it out without hesitation. I went on Amazon and printed a page from an Eric Carle book she's never seen before. It read "So the mouse ran on. 'Do you want to be my friend?'" She stumbled minutely on "mouse," but sounded out the consonants and extrapolated the word correctly.

So, it's official. Three years and four months. Baby Dog can read.

How Cretins Boogie

2007-08-30T21:41:00.000-07:00

Not content to merely do violence to the Constitution, America's standing in the world, and the rights of our own citizenship, the Bush Administration has also declared a War on Rhythm. They may want to come up with a better name, so as not to confuse those wonks working on abstinence education policy. But what else can you call a spectacle like this:

It's Laura Bush who really makes you cringe, looking even whiter and stiffer than her husband. Actually, if it weren't for his atrocious term of office, I'd have no issue with Bush in this one. Here, more than most places, his true personality comes out, in that he dances like a man who did a lot of blow and a lot of booze, and, left to his own devices, would be hanging out on his farm in cutoffs and a t-shirt smoking a blunt and listening to CCR. He seems like a guy who'd probably be fun to hang out with if he weren't president and one were interested in a weekend of booze, blow, bullshit conversation, and skanky broads.

But by way of contrast, it's departing supervillain Karl Rove who, characteristically, brings the most destructive gusto to the administration's new war. Scroll to 5:45 in, or 2:45 from the end to witness the new innovation in shock and awe.

That spectacle was so ghastly, so utterly horrifying, that I had to watch it in two sittings, even though there is only two minutes of content.

A friend summed it up best in an email:

"In the '60s (I think)
Norman Mailer (I think)
said about one of Andy Warhol's early films with Edie Sedgewick (I think)
"A hundred years from now, people will look at this and say,
'This is what it was like before the plague came."
That's what I thought of as I watched Rove mincing and mugging--essentially doing a Minstrel Show.
Great googely goo!"

A Brief Encapsulation of What's Wrong With America

2007-07-31T18:39:00.000-07:00

Two-thirds of the front page of today's SF Chronicle is given over to an obit to some hockeyball guy I've never heard of and can't believe anybody else has either. In a tiny box below the fold is the headline about the passing of Ingmar Bergman. Bergman's obit got most of the front of the Datebook, granted, but still--what kind of world is it when the death of some random jock wrangler is considered that much more important than the passing of one of the absolute titans of 20th century cinema?

Rock Glasses

2007-07-09T12:28:00.000-07:00

Back in the old millennium, when I was still a drinking man, I had a policy. Anytime a bar charged an outrageous amount for a cocktail, I would assume that the glass was included in the price. I think my cut-off point was five dollars… that seems a perfectly reasonable price now, but it struck me as exorbitant then. I gradually accumulated a diverse collection of rock glasses and, in one memorable incident, a martini glass from the New Orleans Room at the Fairmont Hotel. That last I still feel a little guilty about – you really expect a martini to be overpriced – but it seemed, for complicated reasons, like the thing to do at the time.

Recently, Baby Dog finally graduated from sippy cups. Mama Dog bought a passel of little plastic tumblers from the Internets, but they proved to be so lightweight that they were extra prone to spilling. Gradually, we settled into a routine wherein Baby Dog gets her water in the plastic tumblers but her milk in a small, bottom-heavy glass. It was only this morning that it occurred to me that all the small, bottom-heavy glasses are in fact rock glasses I purloined from bars years ago. You probably hate as much as I do stories whose only point is “isn’t life funny?” but hey – isn’t life funny? It sure never would have occurred to me back then that I was stealing milk glasses for my daughter.

Baby Dog's Third

2007-06-26T13:56:00.001-07:00

Chuck meant it as a joke (I presume) after last June's post, "Baby Dog's Second," that I shouldn't blog again until I wrote "Baby Dog's Third." Regardless, I screwed that pooch - there have been five scattered posts between then and now. I'd give an account of Baby Dog's big day but Mama Dog already did that elsewhere and, well, the stuff that's kept me from blogging for nigh on two years hasn't exactly let up and I'm now thoroughly out of the habit. So please, join Charles in looking forward to my next post: Baby Dog's Fourth!

In the Neighbourhood

2007-05-07T20:59:00.000-07:00

One of Baby Dog’s current night time songs is “In the Neighbourhood,” by Tom Waits. If you don’t know it, it goes:

Well, the eggs chase the bacon round the fryin' pan
and the whining dog pigeons by the steeple bell rope
and the dogs tipped the garbage pails over last night
and there's always construction work bothering you
In the neighbourhood
In the neighbourhood
In the neighbourhood

Friday's the funeral and Saturday's the bride
Sey's got a pistol on the register side
and the goddamn delivery trucks they make too much noise
and we don't get our butter delivered no more
In the neighbourhood
In the neighbourhood
In the neighbourhood

Well big Mambo's kicking his old grey hound
and the kids can't get ice cream 'cause the market burned down
and the newspaper sleeping bags blow down the lane
and the goddamn flatbed's got me pinned in again
In the neighbourhood
In the neighbourhood
In the neighbourhood

There's a couple Filipino girl's giggling by the church
and the window is busted and the landlord ain't home
and Butch joined the army yea that's where he's been
and the jackhammer's digging up the sidewalks again
In the neighbourhood
In the neighbourhood
In the neighbourhood

The thing that’s funny about this is that back when Mama Dog and I were first together, I had this tradition of playing that song just before I left for work every day. I was pretending it was the theme song of my sitcom or something, and as I went out to walk through my neighbourhood on the way to BART, Tom would be growling along in accompaniment. Or something like that. Anyway, like most of my silly obsessions it fell by the wayside after a while, but Mama Dog sure must feel like something’s come around again every time she hears me singing Baby Dog to sleep.

Also, in full disclosure – when I sing the song to Baby Dog, I edit three things. I change “goddamn” to a weaselly “gosh-darn,” just because I don’t want her volunteering opinions about the goddamn delivery trucks at daycare. Secondly, I change “Filipino girls” to “Filipina girls,” because, you know, they’re girls. And lastly, I say “we don’t get our butter delivered anymore,” because I just can’t bear the thought of her employing double negatives at such a tender age.

VAMFW

2007-01-17T13:42:00.000-08:00

I think I’ve written before of this, but I’m too lazy to look it up just now – we have a habit in our little family of adding the modifier “-ass muh’fuh’n” to perfectly innocent phrases. Like, “Doggy Dog’s a good-ass muh’fuh’n dog.” Or “Merry-ass muh’fuh’n Christmas.” For me, this goes back to the day years ago when some guy on the street saluted Ambrose’s car as a “Raw-ass muh’fuh’n Cutlass.” I’m not sure what Mama Dog’s history with it is.

Anyway, I’ve long been in the habit of answering “Very-ass muh’fuh’n well” when asked to complete some ordinary household task. “Would you please get me a fork?” Mama Dog would ask. “Very-ass muh’fuh’n well,” I’d reply.

When Baby Dog began to acquire language and we started to clean up our act verbally, I was loath to lose such a piquant phrase from my vocabulary. Being a bright-eyed clever little fellow, what I did was truncate it to an acronym. VAMFW. Only I’d pronounce the acronym phonetically. “Could you pour Baby Dog’s bath?” Mama Dog would ask. “VAM-fwuh!” I would reply, con gusto.

Eventually, the inevitable happened; Baby Dog repeated “VAM-fwuh!” and laughed loudly. She had no idea what it meant, but she finds many of Daddy’s funny little words worth repeating and laughing at.

The other night, Mama Dog asked me to do something, and I said “VAM-fwuh!” Baby Dog echoed me, with laughter. Mama Dog asked her, “Baby Dog, what does ‘vam-fwuh’ mean?” Baby Dog pondered for a moment and answered, with gravity, “Okay.”

How about that? She can translate nonsense from context.

The Irish Rovie

2006-12-05T17:10:00.000-08:00

Baby Dog’s new favourite song (as of the last couple weeks) is The Irish Rover. That’s one I’ve sung to her now and again since she was very very small, but which she never seemed to latch onto until now. When Baby Dog latches on to a song, though, she latches firmly. This song is now required every time I put her down for bedtime or naptime. It figures on the Napster playlist at every meal (the version she knows is the one by The Pogues and The Dubliners). It’s part of every car trip and every neighbourhood walk. For those who don’t know the song, it’s a very spirited Irish sing-a-long, a shaggy dog story about the strange voyage of a strange ship with a strange crew and a stranger cargo. It’s hardly a lullaby, but that’s Baby Dog for you.

The reason I’m moved to post about it now is this: since the song’s renaissance in her playlist, she’s enjoyed taking part in the singing. Each verse ends with the phrase “The Irish Rover!” I’ll pause at that part, and she’ll sing it out – pronouncing it “The Irish Rovie,” true, but that’s the way her ares sound now. Anyway, at bedtime last night, Baby Dog sang along with me for the entire song – all five verses. I knew she could fill in blanks if I paused in the song, but I never realised she had the whole thing memorized. And it’s no simple stuff, either. Check out the lyrics:

On the Fourth of July, 1806
We set sail from the sweet cove of Cork
We were sailing away with a cargo of bricks
For the Grand City Hall in New York
'Twas a wonderful craft
She was rigged fore and aft
And oh, how the wild wind drove her
She stood several blasts
She had twenty seven masts
And they called her The Irish Rover

We had one million bags of the best Sligo rags
We had two million barrels of stone
We had three million sides of old blind horses hides
We had four million barrels of bones
We had five million hogs
And six million dogs
Seven million barrels of porter
We had eight million bails of old nanny-goats' tails
In the hold of the Irish Rover

There was awl Mickey Coote
Who played hard on his flute
When the ladies lined up for a set
He was tootin' with skill
For each sparkling quadrille
Though the dancers were fluther'd and bet
With his smart witty talk
He was cock of the walk
And he rolled the dames under and over
They all knew at a glance
When he took up his stance
That he sailed in The Irish Rover

There was Barney McGee
From the banks of the Lee
There was Hogan from County Tyrone
There was Johnny McGurk
Who was scared stiff of work
And a man from Westmeath called Malone
There was Slugger O'Toole
Who was drunk as a rule
And Fighting Bill Treacy from Dover
And your man, Mick MacCann
From the banks of the Bann
Was the skipper of the Irish Rover

We had sailed seven years
When the measles broke out
And the ship lost its way in the fog
And that whale of a crew
Was reduced down to two
Just myself and the Captain's old dog
Then the ship struck a rock
Oh Lord! what a shock
The bulkhead was turned right over
Turned nine times around
And the poor old dog was drowned
And the last of The Irish Rover

I’m compelled to point out in the spirit of full disclosure that Baby Dog’s renderings of many of these lines are best classed as approximate, but she’s for the most part very close. It’s no doubt a handicap that practically the only words in the whole thing that have a concrete meaning for her are “dog,” “goat,” and “horse” (for all of which she supplies appropriate sound effects when I sing the song otherwise unaccompanied). And besides – I haven’t any more clue than she does what “fluther’d and bet” means, and she pronounces it at least as well as I do.

Also:

2006-11-20T15:38:00.000-08:00

The other day, she announced thoughtfully (and without discernable precedent in the conversation), “I should be a bus driver.” We take this to be her first announced career aspiration.

No, You’re Not Seeing Things: This Is a New Post

2006-11-20T11:49:00.000-08:00

Charles has been in town off and on this past month. When he was here at the start of November, he made some crack about how my next post really ought to be called “Baby Dog’s Third.” The next day I set out to write a post about anything, just so long as it would be done before next June. I got as far as “Charles is in town” before I was overwhelmed by work obligations and had to put it aside.

Having made it through an entire first paragraph, I have to say that things are looking up today.

For those not in the know, the last year has been the busiest one of my life. I have a full-time job, the familial obligations with which you’re familiar if you’ve read the faversham, and a couple of very involved extracurricular projects that have made it impossible to post regularly here. Even after dropping the paying freelance work I’ve done the last few years I’ve been too busy to do more than think about blogging. Still and all, it’s time I did a little catch-up before Baby Dog exits the terrible twos.

Though she’s been exhibiting many signs of a will of her own, the twos haven’t been that terrible. She has learned new rhetorical devices to forestall policies with which she disagrees (“But I do want to stay up! I really really do!”) and is not above resorting to tantrums. Last night at Halmoni’s she showed unexpected signs of having studied the oratory of Benito Mussolini, emphasising each syllabic break with a shake of her fist as she forcefully intoned “I want to get out of the high chair right now!”

Mostly, though, she just can’t help being her cute, diligent, sweet-tempered self. Here, for Charles to roll his eyes and skim past until the third birthday, is a list of cute Baby Dog items that I’ve been meaning to post about should I ever have time.

Friend Shark: Among her newer stuffed toys is a killer whale that Mama Dog found somewhere or other. I think it’s Shamu, but I’d have to check the label to be positive. Baby Dog decided early on that it was a shark and cannot be convinced otherwise. We told her it’s a killer whale, thinking maybe she’d find that cool, but the best compromise we could arrive at is that it’s a killer whale named “Shark.” In the last week or two, Baby Dog has decided that the critter is in fact named “Friend Shark.” A favourite game right now involves me circling Friend Shark around Baby Dog’s head, doing the Jaws theme: “Doo doo…….Doo doo……Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo….” until at last Friend Shark attacks and gobbles Baby Dog’s back. For some reason, it always has to be her back.

The Horse on Seventh Avenue: Baby Dog has had many additions to her bedtime songbook in the nearly six months since I last posted. I’m not sure how it got in there, but “The Boxer” by Simon and Garfunkel was one of the additions. I remember very clearly the first time I sang it to her at bedtime, I was doing the “seeking out the poorer quarters where the ragged people go” part when I flashed ahead and realised that I had a dilemma coming up. Namely, that part about the “come-on from the whores on Seventh Avenue.” That’s the problem with a folky light rock song that’s thirty years old and has long since been mulched for muzak. You forget that it really sprang from those same gritty streets from the Sidney Lumet movies. Not wanting Baby Dog to entertain her little friends at daycare by singing about whores, and thinking as fast as I could, I sang the line as “the girls on Seventh Avenue.” The line passed unnoticed and Baby Dog went to sleep. Later, I told Mama Dog about it, and she made a suggestion I should have thought of myself: “The horse on Seventh Avenue.” That’s how I’ve sung it ever since, and Baby Dog always supplies a “neigh” as an illustrative sound effect when we get to that part. Okay, maybe it’s a cheat. Maybe she’s going to grow up thinking I didn’t know what “whore” meant. On the other hand, maybe she’ll eventually think Daddy had a particularly filthy mind, updating a simple transaction between consenting adults to some sort of horribly degrading donkey show.

Spider-Man Update: Yes, she dressed in a Spider-Man costume for Halloween. She also has a Spider-Man trick-or-treat pail (unused this year since we didn’t go out, but ready for use next year), two Spider-Man dolls, a personalized Spider-Man book, a Spider-Man sticker book, a Spider-Man colouring book, two Spider-Man pillows, a Spider-Man quilt, Spider-Man pyjamas, a Spider-Man song on her Napster playlist, and the Spider-Man cartoon opening credit sequence bookmarked on Youtube. She’s all set for Spider-Man stuff for the rest of her childhood, but thanks to everyone who’s contributed.

The Halloween Party: We took Baby Dog (in her Spider-Man costume) to a neighbour’s daytime Halloween party. It was a Child-Friendly party, with a back yard full of toys and all the kids in costume. In a “you-know-you’re-so-far-north-in-Oakland-that- it-might-as-well-be-Berkeley” moment, our little girl was dressed as Spider-Man (she could by no means be persuaded there was such a thing as “Spider-Girl”) and another little boy at the party was dressed as a fairy princess. We really ought to have gotten a picture of the two of them together. Maybe you had to be there for this part, but we thought it was funny… Baby Dog’s most enduring memory of the party was meeting Watson, the cat of the house. Watson was very friendly, and sprawled on a table in front of us, accepting petting with great equanimity. Baby Dog has hardly ever been able to touch a cat – they usually run away when a toddler approaches – and she stood on her chair, able only to giggle and beam as she rubbed Watson’s belly. After a while we got distracted by other things, and by the time Baby Dog remembered the cat, Watson had disappeared. She lumbered about the yard, calling him: “WAAAAAT-SUUUUUN!” We’ve observed that our little girl is not really a delicate little flower. She was the loudest baby in the hospital on the day she was born, and time has diminished neither her powers of volume nor her ability to drop down into most unexpected levels of bass. She sounded like a little foghorn. “WAAAAAT-SUUUUUN!” Unsurprisingly, the cat did not come.

I’m sure there were other things I meant to blog about the last six months, but that’ll do for now, I think. I’ll try to post again before next June 25.

Baby Dog’s Second

2006-06-25T21:36:00.000-07:00

Two years ago Baby Dog emerged from the womb and today we had a party to celebrate that grand entrance. In those first hours of her life I remarked more than once on how lucky my daughter was to have inherited the face of her mother. Mama Dog insists now that Baby Dog looks more like me. I disagree, but as we see more of Baby Dog’s personality asserting itself, I see the many ways she takes after me and I can only hope she learns more quickly than I did how to bear up under the handicaps I may have passed along. It’s become very clear, for example, that she doesn’t care for gatherings of unfamiliar people. I’ve pretty much written the book on that one. Practically from the moment we arrived at Halmonie’s house for the party, Baby Dog was looking at me hopefully, saying “Go home now?” She actually coped better at this one than she did at the BBQ/picnic a few weeks back (probably because the surroundings at least were familiar), but still, I’m pretty sure her favourite part of the party was the same as mine: when we snuck out for a few minutes to mail some letters at the mailbox on the corner. Well, okay, that and the chocolate cake.

After, when the only ones left were Mama Dog, Baby Dog, Halmonie, and me, Baby Dog lay down on the blanket under the canopy in the back yard and played with her Lego train engine, zooming it around like an airplane and singing a song she’d learned in daycare. It was the first time she’d looked relaxed all day, and as Mama Dog and I had one more slice of cake apiece so as to carry that much less home* and Daddy treated himself to a hard-earned glass of wine, we whiled some moments that were perfectly happy and companionable. She’s young, and nothing’s set in stone, but if she takes after me as much as it seems, she’s going to find such moments hard to come by in any company but that of the trusted few. I hope she adapts better than I did, and finds a way to relax in the company of strangers; but if not, I hope she at least she can always have such contentment after the party’s over and the company has gone away.
___________________
*Our story and we’re sticking to it.

Stripey Shirt

2006-06-13T10:13:00.000-07:00

So, Baby Dog has reached the age where she has clear if sometimes somewhat randomly achieved preferences in food, music, activities, and now clothing. I mentioned her attachment to the Spider-Man t-shirt that Mama Dog got from a thrift store. It didn’t take long before she started saying “Spider-Man shirt” each time she got dressed for the morning. A while back, I was trying to put on a new shirt, a striped one that Mama Dog had picked up somewhere or other, and Baby Dog became defiant. In addition to having acquired preferences, she is also starting to assert defiance when these preferences are thwarted. She squirmed and whined and resisted being put in this awful new shirt. “Spider-Man shirt,” she insisted. This defiance phase is constantly requiring new and cunning stratagems on the part of her parents who, fortunately, are up to the task. I held the shirt up so that she could see it. “Look,” I said. “It’s striped. It’s a stripey shirt.” Then I started to sing, to the familiar Spider-Man tune, “Stripey shirt, stripey shirt/Put in on and it doesn’t hurt…” Intrigued to find that this shirt, too, came with a song, Baby Dog put up her arms and consented to be dressed. I continued to improvise. “It’s a shirt, partly red/There it goes, over your head/Hey there/There goes the stripey shirt.” And so on. Naturally, this has become an entrenched part of the ritual every time I dress Baby Dog in her now-beloved stripey shirt. The lyrics are different every time, but she doesn’t seem to notice.

Unintended consequence: last night at dinner time I turned on the Napster as usual and asked Baby Dog what she wanted to hear. She answered: “Stripey shirt on the computer?” I had to explain to her that “Stripey Shirt” is a song only sung by Daddy and that it does not exist in recorded form. I played “Spider-Man” instead, but clearly it wasn’t the same.

Apparently It Really Can Sell Anything

2006-06-06T11:53:00.000-07:00

I’m still not ready to post regularly again, but yesterday I came across something in the paper I just had to share with you. The photo below was on the back page of the Chronicle business section yesterday.

I showed it to Mama Dog much as I’m showing it to you, with the paper folded so the ad copy couldn’t be read. I said, “See this picture of a fellow with his face buried in a young lady’s cleavage?” “Uh-huh,” said Mama Dog. “Can you guess what it’s advertising?” “Uh…Viagra?” she ventured. Good guess, but no.

The answer, if you dare, is here.

Papa Dog Holds No Monopoly On Lame Posts

2006-05-31T21:20:00.000-07:00

See, it's tough to work and blog and have a life, so I do have a lot of sympathy for poor Dr. Duvalier, for his life includes wife, child, and quasi-professional textual activities. But the thing is, the guy's a good writer, and, well, a twenty-two month streak is a terrible thing to break. So here I am at the office, after midnight, listening to John Zorn and saying it ain't so.

My guess? The poor bastard needs a nap. So sleep, good Doctor. Let your friends pick up the slack. And if you really are putting down the Faversham for a while, know that we have sincerely appreciated the great effort that you've put into it these long months. You're good with the words, and that ought not go unsung. We're glad you've put them down, from the tales of pre-marital waste to the love notes to the wife, the smart-ass analyses of children's narratives, the passionate plea for your adopted country, even the cute bits about making the baby laugh.

Thanks, Doc. Don't stay in that sick room too long.

Reality Check

2006-05-30T22:14:00.000-07:00

I guess it’s time to face the fact that something has to give, and that’s it’s going to have to be this faversham. I’ll be back when I have something to say and time to say it.

To Him, Life Is a Great Big Bang-Up

2006-05-29T23:27:00.000-07:00

So, Mama Dog did a little thrift store shopping a while back and returned, somewhat mysteriously, with a Spider-Man t-shirt for Baby Dog. Even more mysteriously, this shirt quickly became one of the little girl’s favourites. She had no context for Spider-Man, no familiarity with the character. Possibly she just liked the colours or the sound of the name, I don’t know. In the natural way of things, I eventually succumbed to the temptation to sing what I could remember of the Spider-Man cartoon theme song while putting the shirt on her. Soon, she was requesting the song from me. I scoured the Napster for the original, to no avail. Eventually, I found an appealing lounge arrangement by something called the Gabe Lee 3, and added that to Baby Dog’s Greatest Hits. Now the song is a staple of meal times (on Napster) and bedtime (me singing to her). I never thought I’d have to re-learn the peculiar syntax of “Wealth and fame? He’s ignored.” Nor did I ever think I’d be able to sing “Is he strong? Listen, bud, he’s got radioactive blood” without laughing. But that’s what fatherhood does to you. For those not in the know, here are the words:

Spider-man, Spider-man
Does whatever a spider can
Spins a web, any size
Catches thieves, just like flies
Look out! Here comes the Spider-man!

Is he strong? Listen, Bud!
He's got radioactive blood.
Can he swing from a thread?
Take a look overhead.
Hey there, there goes the Spider-man!

In the chill of night,
At the scene of the crime
Like a streak of light
He arrives just in time

Spider-man, Spider-man
Friendly neighborhood Spider-man
Wealth and fame, he's ignored
Action is his reward

To him, life is a great big bang-up
Wherever there's a hang-up
You'll find the Spider-man!

Infatuation

2006-05-29T17:44:00.000-07:00

The sunlight catches the city by surprise. It came so gradually, this slide towards summer. The city feels like someone who was dejected in life and suddenly found himself in the embrace of a new infatuation. Winter was easy, but it doesn't change the flush of pleasure that comes with the first unpleasantly warm day when the gals walk about in flimsy clothes and men dress with more attention paid to comfort than to style. Gone are the layers of gore-tex and wool; sweat beads collect upon our brows and the trash starts to smell just a tiny bit pungent.

I was sitting in the park when the sky began to turn. Twenty Puerto Rican guys were playing futbol and I was reading Knut Hamsun, writing me a letter from the Norwegian wildneress, condemning the lifestyle of the city-dweller and his disconnect from nature. The street noise surrounded the park and would be interrupted by the occasional songbird. The sky was blue and open, the sun gave off a rejuvenating burn. But from the distance the dark clouds marched in like a passing battalion. Great thunderheads that boomed and flickered. The rain came first in occasional fat droplets and quickly increased its tempo, turning the field immediately to mud. The children scurried off the swings and beneath their parents umbrellas. The Puerto Rican dudes continued their game, just like the professionals, and I put my book in the dry safety of my bag.

The rain passed in a quarter hour and I was soaked to the skin. The sun was back out and I walked across Brooklyn, letting its warm embrace dry my soggy clothes. Small steam came off the bricks of apartment houses as the water returned to the sky. The flimsy dresses were back out from under cover of awnings and tap rooms. This city has left behind the slow solitude of winter. It is a great moment, like the start of a relationship, where the lonely cold is gone, but the oppressive heat of routine has not yet set in.

Still no New Leaves

2006-05-28T22:37:00.000-07:00

But soon. Really.

After the Party

2006-05-27T22:40:00.000-07:00

We had a big party today. It wasn’t in our house at least, but it still involved a lot of schlepping and toting and much jumping through of logistical hoops. We are knackered. So no new leaves tonight.

Doggy Dog is a Red Stater

2006-05-26T23:00:00.000-07:00

The other morning, Baby Dog was indulging in her recently acquired pre-meal ritual of looking inside the fridge (the “refrigelator” as she puts it) and identifying the contents of the Tupperware and other containers therein. “Strawberries! Avocado! Cheese! Yogurt!” As it happened, one of the Tupperware containers housed the leftovers from the previous night’s beef soup. When she reached up at it, Doggy Dog, who’d been unobtrusively monitoring her actions, lunged. It was no big deal, really. I was standing between them and at his first movement I said “No!” sharply, and he stopped on a dime and retreated. Baby Dog never even noticed, she was so absorbed in the contents of the refrigelator. But it was a sobering reminder of the wisdom of our doggy/baby apartheid policy. She’ll never be in the same room with him without close supervision. There’s just no telling when his little doggy brain is going to interpret Baby Dog’s benign curiosity as a threat to his food supply.

I told Mama Dog the story, and she got a little freaked out. Halmonie got very freaked out at third hand when Mama Dog passed it along. It revived the idea of finding a new home for Doggy Dog, though only briefly and not too seriously. “He sees her near the meat and thinks he’s acting in his own best interest to defend his food,” I said. “He has no idea that he’s doing the worst thing he can possibly do for his own well being.” That sounded familiar to me. After a moment’s thought, I realised why. “He’s like a lower income Republican,” I said. Mama Dog laughed. “The meat is patriotism.” Yes. It’s the American flag. It’s a partial birth abortion ban. It’s the God-given freedom to deny basic civil rights to homosexuals. “Yeah,” I said, “it’s what he thinks he has to protect, but acting to protect it just puts him that much closer to losing his place in this house.” Protecting the flag and the unborn and the traditional definition of marriage only gets him a big tax cut for people way richer than himself and a gradual dismantling of the regulations and social services that are there to protect him.

Featuring Guest Blogger Oscar Wilde

2006-05-25T21:58:00.000-07:00

Last time I do this, promise. Take it away, Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde.

The artist is the creator of beautiful things. To reveal art and conceal the artist is art's aim. The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things.

The highest, as the lowest, form of criticism is a mode of autobiography. Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.

Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom beautiful things means only Beauty.

There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.

The nineteenth century dislike of Realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.

The nineteenth century dislike of Romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass. The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium.

No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true can be proved. No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style. No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything.

Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art. Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art. From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor's craft is the type. All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril.

Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors. Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree the artist is in accord with himself. We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.

All art is quite useless.

Featuring Guest Blogger Joseph Conrad

2006-05-24T23:20:00.000-07:00

After yesterday’s post, it would be just to mortifying to come back to you without a solid piece of prose. I don’t have one of my own handy, so I’ll have to turn to an actual GOOD (though dead) writer to fill in for me. Take it away, Mr. Korzeniowski.

“And this also,” said Marlow suddenly, “has been one of the dark places of the earth.”

He was the only man of us who still “followed the sea.” The worst that could be said of him was that he did not represent his class. He was a seaman, but he was a wanderer, too, while most seamen lead, if one may so express it, a sedentary life. Their minds are of the stay-at-home order, and their home is always with them—the ship; and so is their country—the sea. One ship is very much like another, and the sea is always the same. In the immutability of their surroundings the foreign shores, the foreign faces, the changing immensity of life, glide past, veiled not by a sense of mystery but by a slightly disdainful ignorance; for there is nothing mysterious to a seaman unless it be the sea itself, which is the mistress of his existence and as inscrutable as Destiny. For the rest, after his hours of work, a casual stroll or a casual spree on shore suffices to unfold for him the secret of a whole continent, and generally he finds the secret not worth knowing. The yarns of seamen have a direct simplicity, the whole meaning of which lies within the shell of a cracked nut. But Marlow was not typical (if his propensity to spin yarns be excepted), and to him the meaning of an episode was not inside like a kernel but outside, enveloping the tale which brought it out only as a glow brings out a haze, in the likeness of one of these misty halos that sometimes are made visible by the spectral illuminination of moonshine.

His remark did not seem at all surprising. It was just like Marlow. It was accepted in silence. No one took the trouble to grunt even; and presently he said, very slow:

“I was thinking of very old times, when the Romans first came here, nineteen hundred years ago—the other day. . . Light came out of this river since—you say Knights? Yes; but it is like a running blaze on a plain, like a flash of lightning in the clouds. We live in the flicker—may it last as long as the old earth keeps rolling! But darkness was here yesterday. Imagine the feelings of a commander of a fine—what d’ye call ‘em?—trireme in the Mediterranean, ordered suddenly to the north run overland across the Gauls in a hurry; put in charge of one of these craft the legionaries—a wonderful lot of handy men they must have been, too—used to build, apparently by the hundred, in a month or two, if we may believe what we read. Imagine him here—the very end of the world, a sea the colour of lead, a sky the colour of smoke, a kind of ship about as rigid as a concertina—and going up this river with stores, or orders, or what you like. Sand-banks, marshes, forests, savages,—precious little to eat fit for a civilized man, nothing but Thames water to drink. No Falernian wine here, no going ashore. Here and there a military camp lost in a wilderness, like a needle in a bundle of hay—cold, fog, tempests, disease, exile, and death—death skulking in the air, in the water, in the bush. They must have been dying like flies here. Oh, yes—he did it. Did it very well, too, no doubt, and without thinking much about it either, except afterwards to brag of what he had gone through in his time, perhaps. They were men enough to face the darkness. And perhaps he was cheered by keeping his eye on a chance of promotion to the fleet at Ravenna by and by, if he had good friends in Rome and survived the awful climate. Or think of a decent young citizen in a toga—perhaps too much dice, you know—coming out here in the train of some prefect, or tax-gatherer, or trader even, to mend his fortunes. Land in a swamp, march through the woods, and in some inland post feel the savagery, the utter savagery, had closed round him—all that mysterious life of the wilderness that stirs in the forest, in the jungles, in the hearts of wild men. There’s no initiation either into such mysteries. He has to live in the midst of the incomprehensible, which is also detestable. And it has a fascination, too, that goes to work upon him. The fascination of the abomination—you know, imagine the growing regrets, the longing to escape, the powerless disgust, the surrender, the hate.”

Brownstein, Nixon, Leaves

2006-05-23T22:37:00.000-07:00

I saw Brownstein when I was on my secret mission. One of the first things he said to me was “I’ve got a funny present for you.” It turned out to be a vintage inflatable Nixon punching bag, acquired somewhere in NYC, the place where you can find anything. What fun for the whole family! I wish I could find a picture of it on the Internets. It catered to the obsession with Nixon shared by Mama Dog and yrs. sincerely, and is a fine addition to the household objects that Baby Dog can point at and accurately say “Nixon!” Moreover, it’s a small dummy, just the right size for Baby Dog to play with, which she’s been doing since I brought it home. Not, like, continuously, but, you know, regularly. Like.

Anyway, another gift Brownstein passed on was that of judicious disapprobation. He didn’t say it in so many words, but he took me to task for letting the faversham go down the crapper. It’s true I’ve had way too much on my plate for quite some time and have been giving this page especially short shrift. That’s as should be, of course – if this thing was my top priority, there’d be cause for worry. Still, I’ve felt bad for some time for not keeping up my end of the entertainment compact, and while I can’t promise to turn over a new leaf and keep it overturned, let it be known that I’m giving actual thought to how I might make this a more substantial faversham on a regular basis.

Just not tonight.

This Still Won’t Be a Proper Post, But….

2006-05-22T22:31:00.000-07:00

I was only gone three nights, but Baby Dog seemed noticeably older to me when I return. More mature. She was standing in the living room, playing with Halmonie when I walked in the front door. She looked at me with jaw-dropped amazement, which turned into a big grin. Had she thought I wasn’t coming back? Who knows. I tried to explain every night for a week before I went away: “Daddy’s going on a trip. He’ll be gone tomorrow, which is Thursday, and he’ll be gone on Friday and Saturday, but he’ll come back Sunday.” By the time I left, she was repeating the whole spiel back to me, but I don’t think she understood much of it. The first thing she said to me on my return was “Kiss,” so I knelt down to give her one. She patted my stubbled face. “Beard,” she said. “A little bit,” I answered. “Do you want Daddy to grow his beard back?” “Beard,” she replied, patting my chin again.

Papa Dog is Back…

2006-05-21T23:05:00.000-07:00

…and will get back to posting tomorrow. Thanks to Mama Dog for holding down the fort in my absence.

AMEX Ad

2006-05-20T22:11:00.000-07:00

You must have seen those magazine ads for American Express, the "My Card" campaign featuring such celebrities as Kate Winslet and Ken Watanabe. If you haven't, the two-page spread shows said celebrity in a soulful pose -- obviously in the midst of deep contemplation -- to convey a sense of tranquilty and fulfillment. Of course those qualities are the polar opposite of what is normally associated with credit cards: greed for material things or despair over insurmountable debt. A questionnaire appears on the verso and features open-ended questions that have been allegedly answered by the featured celebrity in its own handwriting.

Here's a sample:

Proudest moment - When I gain trust from someone.
Biggest challenge - Life.
Perfect day - Searching for something I cannot reach.
Inspiration - I am inspired by so many things every day.
My life - is about taking my own path.
My card - is American Express.

That's all fine and dandy for Mr. Watanabe (who, from the photograph seems to have a bit of an equestrian fetish). But here's what I'd say:

Proudest moment - Holding my brand-new baby girl for the first time and thinking, "I made this!"

Biggest challenge - keeping the house clean

Perfect day - Sleep until 8 a.m., then have Papa Dog tie me down with rope so that I am not tempted to run around all day completing tasks.

Inspiration - Pristine water occuring in a natural setting.

My life - is what I have made it. I blame nobody.

My card - is usually Mastercard, except for when I buy gas, in which case it's American Express because that's all Costco accepts.

Splinter, Snail, & Bedtime

2006-05-19T21:26:00.000-07:00

I found a wood splinter on Baby Dog's palm the other day. I was going about my usual business of wiping Baby's hands after supper in what we call minty bubbles (a metal bowl of warm, peppermint soapy water) and spied the puffy, red sore. "Oh no!" I exclaimed to Halmonie; "Baby Dog has her first splinter!" Halmonie said, "Oh no, eek! I can't possible do it! You do it!" and went into the next room. "Of course I'll do it," I thought, and proceeded to sterilize a sewing needle and my Tweezerman in a shotglass of rubbing alcohol. I then lifted Baby Dog onto my lap, took her hand, and began making a small hole in her skin out of which to pull the splinter. All the while, I reassured Baby Dog by telling her that we were going to use "Mr. Tweezer" to pull the splinter out and that she'd be okay. Baby Dog withstood the operation like a champ, until the needle pricking started to hurt. There was a bit of fussing, but no all-out bawling or screaming. After a couple of attempts, I pulled the offending piece of wood out and said, "All better!"

I find it amazing that, when kids have no preconception of something scary (e.g., a needle poking at their skin), they are fearless. Baby Dog regarded the sharp needle that I was about to jab into her flesh and didn't even flinch. Until I started poking and prodding too vigorously. I'll bet that next time she has a splinter, she'll recoil in fear when I get out the needle and tweezers. But maybe not. She's has a high tolerance for pain and discomfort, our girl does.

I've never removed a splinter from anyone's body but my own, but when I saw that Baby Dog had a need, I jumped right to the task with no fear. In a way, it was the opposite experience of what I've just described. While tweezing Baby Dog's wound, I could not shake the mental image of Ian Holm cutting a hole in his daughter's neck (to prevent her from dying of a spider bite) in that heart-breaking film by Atom Egoyan, The Sweet Hereafter. No fear at all. While I am all too aware of the scariness of certain situations, when my daughter is in danger or is hurt, I am all over it without a second thought.

Shellicky Booky

It rained in the East Bay today, which meant that the snails were out in full force. I found several on my evening dog walk and, on a whim, brought one into the house and placed it on the ledge of the bathtub while Baby Dog underwent her nightly ablution. We stared at it for a long time before it gathered the courage to put out its horns and start sliming along the porcelain. When it finally did, I said: "Okay, that's enough of that," and swiftly crushed the pathetic mollusk under my shoe. Well, no I didn't. I took it outside and placed it in a puddle on our front steps. But when I was a kid, I'd think nothing of crushing snails under my feet. What a sadistic little brat I was!

* * *

A Break in the Routine

Tonight bedtime was easy. After Baby Dog's bath, I read her "The Cat in the Hat Comes Back" (less fun than the original), sang her a couple of songs on the rocking chair (Dites Moi, Bicycle Built for Two, and Hush Little Baby), said "night-night," and put her in her crib to sleep. There was no "Start beginning" or any kind of fuss whatsoever. I was not even asked to go around the room so that Baby Dog could touch her owl, the moon, the pinecone, the ampersand, and other decor. We successfully broke from the bedtime routine! Perhaps our daughter is feeling more control over her world, therefore has less of a need to institute rituals for everything.

By Twizzle

Guest Blogging - Day 1

2006-05-18T15:53:00.000-07:00

Didn't get a lick of sleep last night, thanks to the horrors of the Bay Area real estate market! To make a long story short, Halmonie, her Realtor, and I are involved in a bidding war with a seller that, to any sane person, would seem to border on the criminal. I'm talkin' Enron-type scandalous! Don't pay no mind to anyone saying the market's turning soft; it's still a total seller's market out there and a cut-throat one at that. The good thing about all this? Our house has at least tripled in price since we bought it in 2001. Too bad we ain't sellin'.

I've caught Baby Dog's cold and, on top of the insomnia, I'm cranky as all hell. No filters on anything I say when I'm this out of it. In an HR "work values" feedback session today I complained bitterly that my institution's compensation is shit. Then, I told a co-worker that the HR Director (a woman) looks like Bill Gates. You can't insult someone much lower than that. Okay - maybe Donald Trump. On the positive side, Papa Dog is off on a cool secret mission right now. Too bad we can't discuss on this faversham.

Last - Doggy Dog's bubo-like growth is showing no signs of improvement/shrinkage. I've been spraying the affected area twice a day, but it's still sore. He's gonna have to have the thing surgically removed, but not until we've taken him to the vet for bloodwork, first. What a total ass-pain. Well, more for him than for us. Poor doggie. He's 9 years old -- approximately equal to 56 in human years.

By Twizzle

On Vacation

2006-05-17T23:01:00.000-07:00

Papa Dog’s taking a little vacation. Mama Dog will fill in for the next few days. Maybe she’ll tell you about Baby Dog and the splinter. See you next week.

Shellicky Bookey

2006-05-17T23:00:00.000-07:00

Baby Dog’s new favourite song is another one from the Clancy Brothers, a very brief ditty that’s part of the “Children’s Medley” on In Person at Carnegie Hall. It goes:

Shellicky shellicky bookey
Put out all your hor-ns
All the ladies are comin’ to see-ee ya
(Repeat)

If for some reason you weren’t already aware of it, a shellicky bookey (spelling approximate) is a snail, and the intent of the song is to coax a snail out of its shell. Baby Dog learned of this song in the aftermath of a snail sighting wherein the snail was relieving itself. I wasn’t there, but Mama Dog swears that’s what happened. Our routine now is that Baby Dog requests “Shellicky Bookey,” I dutifully sing it baritone, and she solemnly observes “Snail take a poo.”

And If She Hadn’t Deleted Her Old Blog, I Could Link to the Post that Proves It

2006-05-16T22:42:00.000-07:00

I was on an elevator today with two young ladies, chattersome twentysomethings. Big Blonde Girl was carrying on an apparently continuously streaming monologue for the benefit of Rapt Small Asian Girl. From the time the door closed on the ground floor to the time it opened on my floor maybe thirty seconds elapsed. During that time, I counted seven “likes” and three “y’knows” from BBG. I only started counting after she’d been at it long enough that it started to annoy me, so I estimate the full total for the thirty second trip was somewhere in the neighbourhood of twenty “likes” and ten “y’knows.” It didn’t really irritate me that much, but it would have pissed Mama Dog off.

A Short But Peaceful Night’s Sleep

2006-05-15T22:24:00.000-07:00

Hey, Baby Dog slept all night last night! I was still short of sleep because I stayed up late, but still. No screaming fits in the wee hours. That really makes a difference. Unfortunately, with nothing to complain about and a way too busy week looming ahead, faversham inspiration is scant. So let’s just leave off until tomorrow.

Tough Mother's Day Morning

2006-05-14T19:33:00.000-07:00

Baby Dog woke up at one-something Saturday a.m., howling like a bean sidhe, responding to all sleep-restoring gambits with the same screeched two-word complaint: “Start begiiiinnnnnniiiiiiinnnnnng!!!!” This went on for an hour, virtually non-stop high-decibel screeches and tears. It was probably necessary for us to be reminded that, as verbal as she is, Baby Dog’s really not yet old enough to be a truly reasonable creature, and that once such a tantrum begins meaningful communication of any kind becomes impossible. Mama Dog was the one who finally figured it out, by recognising the tone of the scream; it was the same as her pre-verbal “hungry” cry. We put her in the high chair, gave her a bran muffin, and we were all back to sleep within fifteen minutes.

This morning, Baby Dog woke up screaming again, though she let us sleep in until almost five. We again took turns trying to get her settled to no avail. It didn’t seem possible she was hungry again – unlike Friday night, she ate a full supper last night – but the sound was the same, so Mama Dog gave her breakfast. Unfortunately, while we were ready to go back to sleep after that, Baby Dog was convinced it was time for the day to start. I piled a bunch of her books in her crib and Mama Dog and I tried to catch the necessary few winks while the girl entertained herself. Around seven it became clear that Baby Dog wasn’t going to go back to sleep and, furthermore, she was tired of her literary selections. I hauled myself out of bed and took Baby Dog into the living room. I set her in front of her Mr. Potato Head set and curled up on the couch under an afghan, bobbing up and down about the meniscus of consciousness. Baby Dog looked up from the potato parts and said “Daddy is lying down on the blanket.” She had the order wrong – the blanket was on me, not the other way around – but I was impressed by the complexity of the sentence. Seven words. I’m pretty sure that’s her longest one yet.

Around nine, I got up to give her a snack, and shortly after that Mama Dog got up, having achieved as much of a Mother’s Day sleep-in as she deemed possible. All four of us – Papa, Mama, Baby, and Doggy – went out on a family walk, our two-year-running Mother’s Day tradition. We went to Bloomies to buy Mummy some flowers. I don’t think we took Doggy Dog last year, and he made things difficult this year, yelping when we had to stand too long in the flower line. Baby Dog fell asleep in the stroller on the way home, something she hasn’t done in ages (mostly because we’ve largely stopped using the stroller since she got the hang of walking). She was in her crib snoozing peacefully at 11 a.m., and a peaceful Mother’s Day midmorning descended.

Baby Dog’s Latest Amazing Feat

2006-05-13T22:55:00.000-07:00

When Neighbour Mike went out of town, I agreed to pick up his mail for him. As it happened, I was home from work for a few days so I could be sure to get the mail shortly after it was delivered. I’d pop around the corner a few times every day with Baby Dog in tow. We’d walk around the corner, looking at the sights along the way, and go straight on to Neighbour Mike’s mailbox. If the mail hadn’t yet arrived I’d say, “No mail yet,” and we’d head home.

Today, Baby Dog asked to go out for a little stroll. I didn’t feel like crossing the street to check out the house with the kittycats, so instead we took a left turn at the corner, taking us in the direction of Neighbour Mike’s house. When Baby Dog caught sight of his front door and his empty mailbox, she said, “No mail yet.”

Now here’s the thing: that time Neighbour Mike was out of town? It was last year, end of August, start of September. Baby Dog was barely over a year old and only speaking isolated words…lots of words, but not much in the way of phrases or sentences. She never repeated the phrase “No mail yet” back then. I’ve never had occasion to repeat it in the context of Neighbour Mike’s house. But somehow she has retained it well enough to dredge it up eight months later. I know this won’t come as news, but I hopelessly marvel.

Good Night, Irene

2006-05-12T23:13:00.000-07:00

Hey. I’m tired and drawing a blank, but I’ve been doing pretty well with the faversham the last while, so I’m not going to waste any guilt on this. I’ll write something more substantial tomorrow.

A Sick and Tardy Commute

2006-05-11T23:17:00.000-07:00

I ran into Papa Funkadelic on the BART platform this morning. He asked how I was doing and I said “Out on my feet.” I felt completely fine yesterday and was sure I’d be good to go to work in the morning. I was even okay when Baby Dog got us up fifteen minutes before the alarm. For some reason, though, once I ate my Oatmeal Crisp and Raisin, I started feeling queasy again, and by the time I was waiting for the train I felt like I could potentially pass out and pitch forward into the tracks. Fortunately, if it came to that there was someone in front of me to break my fall. I explained all this to Papa Funkadelic. “I think maybe the Oatmeal Crisp and Raisin is tainted,” I said. “Maybe it’s just the thought of going back to work that’s making you sick,” he suggested. “Could be.” “Either you need to change your cereal or get rid of your job.” I pondered that. “It’s probably easier to quit my job,” I decided.*

The talk turned, for convoluted reasons, to Politics and Prose, as Papa Funkadelic said, “One of the last big independent bookstores.” “Cody’s on Telegraph,” I said, not at all a non sequitur. “I almost choked up when I read that,” P. Funk. said. “I worked there for seven years.” Indeed, Telegraph will not be itself without Cody’s, but I don’t want to dwell on that now. I’m sure I’ve quoted Sam Krichinksy hereinbefore: “If I knew things would no longer be, I would have tried to remember better.” Well, I know that things will no longer be, and I still don’t think I’m remembering them well enough. Let’s all remember everything we can about Cody’s on Telegraph.

By and by a train was announced. The BART system had apparently been recovering from delays by the time I made my late arrival, and though they were supposedly back on schedule it had already been a long wait for the train. I was second in line, and there was a horde behind me. The sign announced that it would be an 8 car train. If you don’t commute in the Bay Area this means nothing to you, but a full-length BART train is 10 cars long. In commute hours, the difference between 10 cars and 8 cars is the difference between a pleasant 20-minute ride to work and an eternity with your face in some mouth-breather’s armpit. “If it’s packed, I’m not getting on,” I said. “I’m not feeling well enough to ride in a jammed up car.” “Next one’s not for 15 minutes,” P. Funk. said. I told him about the system delays. “There’s probably an unannounced one two minutes behind,” I said. “That’s what I’m gambling on, anyway.” “Well, I’ve gotta take this one,” he said, and when the train pulled up he did just that, cramming himself into an already crowded car. I don’t think this occurred to him, but he probably pissed off eight or ten people behind us. P. Funk., I’m sad to say, cut line to come talk to me, and his ostensible line buddy didn’t even get on the train with him.

I’m still sure I made the right decision not to get on that train – I would have suffocated before I got to the tube. But the decision, sadly, was based on wishful thinking and faulty intel, like most bad decisions these days. There was no next train two minutes behind. Only another 8-car train fifteen minutes away. So I made my second bad decision. When the Pittsburg Bay Point train showed up, I decided to ride back one stop to Orinda. I calculated that I should make it there with a minute to spare to catch the SF train and maybe have enough of a head start to get a seat. As it happened, either the SF train was early or my train ran slow; as the door on my train opened at Orinda, I watched the doors on the SF train across the platform close. It was pulling away before I was halfway across the platform, and the next train wasn’t for thirteen minutes.

That’s when I called V the GL at work and asked her to put a sign up on my computer saying that with any luck I’d be in by ten.

The silver lining was that when that train finally arrived thirteen minutes later, it was a 10-card train and only sparsely populated. I was able to sit down and even nap all the way to Embarcadero. When I debarked, the queasiness was gone, and I’ve felt better all day. Maybe it’s just the morning commute that’s making me sick. I’ll let you know tomorrow.
___________________
*Do not fret, Mama Dog! I was merely making a humorous sally! Gainfully employed I shall remain!

Another Sick Day

2006-05-10T15:52:00.000-07:00

I was at my desk yesterday afternoon when it started sinking in to me that I’d been kind of dizzy and out of it all day. Once I noticed that, I realised that I’d also been kind of tired and achy and bordering on nauseous. You’d think I’d notice this sort of thing sooner but, well, there you have it. I thought maybe some fresh air would do the trick so I went out and walked around the block. Did you know that outlet bookstore is gone? All boarded up. Wonder when that happened. Guess it’s been a while since I walked around the block. Or left the building. Anyway, I felt a bit more alert when I got back to the office, but as soon as I sat back down all I could think about was how badly I wanted to lie down and take a nap. I actually considered going back to the hidden hallway by the low-rise elevators and curling up on the floor. That’s when it finally occurred to me that I needed to go home.

Fortunately, there had been hardly any work all day anyway. I put a sign up on my computer and made arrangements for someone to come in in the evening if necessary. Then I went home and went to bed. So far as I can recall, I’ve never had the flu in my adult life, but I think that’s what it was. I was slightly feverish and totally lethargic. I spent most of the night in bed, getting up only to put away the dishes (a task I refuse to delegate – long story) and help put Baby Dog to sleep. I hadn’t really wanted to do the latter because I feared exposing her to my pestilence, but she just wouldn’t put up with this unauthorised change in routine. She does this thing where she calls out “Here comes Daddy! Here comes Daddy!” and it starts out as a hopeful invocation and ends up in a tearful lament. It’s very difficult to resist. “Daddy’s not feeling well” and “Daddy’s sick” and “Daddy has to go to bed” just wouldn’t give me a pass. I took her on The Tour and sang her a song and tried to breathe away from her, and eventually she settled down. I hope she doesn’t carry on like that when I’m out of town later on.

I was asleep by 10 a.m. and got to sleep in to the decadent hour of 6:45 and have since spent the day mostly watching my stories and lazing about. I’m feeling much improved and think I’ll be good to go back to work tomorrow. Seems like one or the other of us has been under the weather continuously for a while. We took turns having colds, then Baby Dog had the weird vomiting thing, then Doggy Dog had his growth, now this. Being sick sucks, if you were wondering.

First Profanity

2006-05-09T20:53:00.000-07:00

[Papa Dog is taking a break from blogging due to illness. Today's post is by Twizzle (Mama Dog).]

On Sunday, Baby Dog uttered a vulgar expletive for the first time. Not out of the blue, of course. She was merely repeating what I had said seconds earlier when a stupid slow driver was taking too long to pull out of the parking lot at the Mexican restaurant where we had just eaten with the Pirates.

Most of the time, I am remarkably restrained when it comes to swearing. Around the house, I'm all like "Shoot!" and "Darn!" and "Oh my goodness!" when a diarrhea-soaked diaper drips poo on the floor or I accidentally fling my strawberry into a pile of dog fluff, rendering it inedible. It's only when I get behind the wheel does my mouth become pottified.

"Fuck!" I exclaimed at the slow-ass driver. "Fuck," Baby Dog echoed. "Bwa ha ha!" I chortled to Papa Dog. "Did you hear that?" "Yes," said Papa Dog. "Ignore it and DON'T LAUGH." I couldn't help but titter for the next five minutes about Baby Dog's outburst. She had uttered the word so clearly and so without context. It was got-damned funny and will most certainly be written up in the Baby Dog Book of Firsts.

Trainspotting with the Yellow Kid

2006-05-08T17:21:00.000-07:00

Last night we had dinner with the Pirates at Picante, then the lot of us went to a playground the Pirates knew near Aquatic Park, where we could do a little trainspotting. Trains are Baby Dog’s new thing, but so far she’s only seen them in books or the miniature steam version at Tilden Park. We wanted her to see a great big air-fouling, plains-despoiling, buffalo-eradicating freight train. This particular playground is set right behind a heavily traveled line of track, and Mama Pirate promised trains went by on no more than fifteen minute intervals. As it turned out, I think it was more frequent than that. We couldn’t have been there more than half an hour, but we saw four Amtrak trains and one small freight train. Baby Dog got to see them very clearly as they passed by, and was most excited. It was a shame that there wasn’t a good long freight train with all the cars she’s learned from her books (cattle, tank, gondola, box, hopper, tender, engine, caboose), but one can’t have everything.

As almost a by-product of the trainspotting trip, Baby Dog actually played in the playground. She showed more interest in trying out rides and playing with toys than she ever has before, at least in my presence. She went on both baby swings and (closely monitored) big kid swings. She went down the slide a bunch of times. She played in a sandbox with Baby Pirate.

We also – and I hesitate to post about this because it’s mean of me to say but not so mean I still can’t help finding it funny – met a child who was a dead ringer for The Yellow Kid, right down to the Deliverance hair style and the peculiar nightshirt garment (though the kid we met was in pink or something rather than yellow). As we left the playground I said, “Is it just me or was that The Yellow Kid?” The Pirates, who know their comic strip history, laughed and agreed. Mama Dog, who doesn’t, was nonplussed. When we got home, I Googled this Image and she burst out laughing because no, it wasn’t just me.

Maintenance

2006-05-07T22:47:00.000-07:00

For some reason, whenever the car has to go to the shop so does the dog and vice versa. Mama Dog got stranded on the freeway last week on account of what turned out to be an expensively cracked radiator. Doggy Dog has had a sore on his right rear haunch that he’s been persistently worrying for a month or two, and we’ve been too deficient as doggy parents to have time to take care of it. In our defence – slim as it is – we kept thinking it would surely heal soon.

Anyway, we took Doggy Dog in for a tune-up today and fortunately the vet didn’t seem that shocked by the wound. She wasn’t 100% sure what it was because it was too small to properly biopsy without cutting the whole thing off. It’s most likely a benign cyst, though there is a chance it’s something more serious. She gave us some topical spray which will make it go away in a couple of weeks if it’s just the cyst. If it doesn’t go away in two weeks, Doggy Dog will have surgery in his future, to remove the thing entirely. Is it just me, or was pet ownership a simpler and less costly thing in our parents’ day? Back then, if your dog had cancer it was generally diagnosed post-mortem if at all. Well, it’s our day now. Doggy Dog, neglected though he’s been, is part of a family of four. We’ll give him the spray and hope he has a benign cyst. If it’s something worse, he’ll get the surgery. We’d do as much for the car, after all; and it isn’t even a member of the family.

A Tiny Bit of Potpourri

2006-05-06T22:08:00.000-07:00

Darby day, and my horse didn’t even finish in the money. That’s okay because I was ironically one of the few in my family who didn’t put any money on it. Betting on horses? That’s trusting to chance. Give me poker any day.

On a completely unrelated topic – if “cupboard” is generally pronounced “cubbard,” why isn’t “clipboard” pronounced “clibberd?”

Doctor’s Orders

2006-05-05T16:56:00.000-07:00

Okay, that was an error. Baby Dog’s symptoms didn’t match up with what the doctor predicted if she had the dreaded gastro bug, so we got a bit lax in the area of following advice. We gave her some Pedialyte as directed, and she liked that okay, but when supper rolled around, it was very difficult to tell that she’d ever been sick. She bounced to her feet and scurried kitchenward, yelling “Suppertime for Baby Dog!” which is what she’s been doing these days. Actually, sometimes she says “Breakfast time for Baby Dog!” or “Lunch time for Baby Dog!” Matching the rallying cry to the actual meal is pretty hit and miss.

She was clearly eager to eat, and Mama Dog had prepared some bland and cautious dishes for her. A bit of rice, a bit of tofu, water, and Pedialyte. She gobbled that up with such gusto that we got lulled. When she saw what we were having – leftover pesto pasta – she reached out and yelled “Want some!” Pesto pasta is one of her absolute favourites. She eats garlic like she fears a vampire invasion. We let her have some pasta. That kind of understates it. It was all we could do to restrain her from leaping out of her highchair and grabbing the pasta while we waited for it to cool down.

Shortly after I posted last night, Baby Dog woke up crying. I went in and lulled her back to a state of calm which proved temporary. When Baby Dog cried again, Mama Dog took a shift. Baby Dog proved inconsolable. I went in and tried again, rocking her on my lap and singing The Whistling Gypsy. In a heart-rending mixture of enthusiasm and misery, she sang along while sobbing. Somewhere in the third verse, she made an ominous burping noise, and then next thing I knew we both had partially digested pesto pasta all over our laps. She heaved thrice, handily coating the sleep sack with pine nuts, garlic, and bile. I called out to Mama Dog, who hurried in with the little pink tub that was Baby Dog’s first bedroom. Baby Dog obligingly popped a couple more bits of corkscrew pasta into the bucket, and was done.

“I have no idea what to do now,” I observed with full candour. We agreed that whatever happened next would be best handled in the bathtub. I stood up, holding Baby Dog in such a way that the contents of her lap wouldn’t spill, and duckwalked into the bathroom. Miraculously, not a drop of her dinner had landed on the floor, and really only a tiny portion had landed on me. The vast majority of it had been caught by the sleep sack, which I stripped off her in the tub.

We were also fortunate in that it wasn’t a very liquid bit of barfing, all in all. With the sack and her jammies off, we found that Baby Dog really only needed her face and neck cleaned off. She continued to cry through the cleaning process, but afterwards we wrapped her in fresh pyjamas and a clean sleep sack and I rocked her some more, cooing about how much better it feels to have thrown up than to have to throw up. She seemed to agree, and was calm again before too long. Once she seemed relatively content (considering), I put her back in her crib, kissed her good night, and went back to my Thursday night chores, which seemed likely to never end. They did end, though, and eventually I lay in bed, vacillating between the urgent need to get some sleep and the urgent need to hear Baby Dog’s every little sound and movement in the next room. I was of course terrified that she was going to barf again in her sleep, which my imagination painted as at best filthy and at worst a Jimi Hendrix experience. It’s counterintuitive, but there are times – and these are one of them – when the sound of your child making a miserably mewling cry is an incredible relief. Eventually, I dropped off to sleep and we were all still whole and sound in the morning.

Baby Dog stayed home today, minded by Halmonie. We all agreed that strict adherence to doctor’s orders would be the plan for the day.

Tough Day for Baby Dog

2006-05-04T22:18:00.000-07:00

Baby Dog had to go home from daycare today because she was vomiting. The daycare people figured it was something she ate, because she wasn’t feverish or otherwise symptomatic. It happened right after lunch. We think some leftover fishcakes that were in an imperfectly sealed Tupperware container are the culprit. Mama Dog called the Dr. Chuck-Morris’ office and was told that it could be a gastrointestinal virus that’s going around too. Based on Baby Dog’s subsequent behaviour, though, that doesn’t seem to be the case; the symptomology they described has not come to pass. In fact, by the time I got home from work Baby Dog was so much her regular self that I wouldn’t have known she’d been sick if I hadn’t been told. The only noticeable difference was that she cried more easily at small frustrations and went to sleep with less fuss at bedtime. She didn’t even ask for the “Bingo” encore after being tucked into the sleep sack. She must have been exhausted. She’s cried out in her sleep and been resettled a couple of times since so we’re braced for a tough night, but I think the daycare was right – bad reaction to food, not a developing illness.

Grumpily Before Bed

2006-05-03T22:41:00.000-07:00

Last night, I was all ready to post and go to bed at 10:30 – then Blogger started to drown in molasses. Every action took ten or more minutes to complete. That’s: open my blog, click on the Blogger link, log in, go to the list of posts, click “create new post,” paste the stuff in from Word, and click “Publish.” That’s six separate actions, and literally they each took ten minutes. Goddamn Blogger kept me up an hour later than necessary on a night when I thought for sure I’d get to sleep early.

Tonight, Blogger’s working fine and I have nothing to say. But I’m getting my damn sleep.

Little India

2006-05-02T23:14:00.000-07:00

Quite unexpectedly this evening, Baby Dog toddled over with her copy of Little India and thrust it out to be read. She’s had this book since Charles visited in February – he thought the graphics were cute – but she’s never shown too much interest in it and we’ve never pushed it because it seemed perhaps a little beyond her age group. A request is a request, though, so I popped her on my lap and started reading.

“Little India, by Sanjay Patel,” I said. “This book belongs to….” I prompted, and Baby Dog rattled off all four of her names like one long compound word. “Gods of India,” I continued. The first page has a very cute picture of Ganesha and a lot of text describing his significance in the Hindu cosmology, so I said, “Okay, that’s Ganesha. What does he look like?” “Elephant,” Baby Dog observed. I flipped the page. “Okay, here’s Brahma. See his beards? They’re white.” I flipped the page. “And this is Durga…”

“Start ‘ginning?” Baby Dog interrupted.

“Uh…okay. Little India, by Sanjay Patel. This book belongs to….” Her name again. “Gods of India. Okay, here’s Ganesha again.”

“Start ‘ginning?”

“I don’t think I missed anything, sweetie.”

“Start ‘ginning?” Her lip trembled and tears started to brew. It was then I realised my error. She knew – somehow she knew – that I wasn’t really reading the full text. There was no way she was getting off my lap without a summary of the basic fundamentals of Hinduism.

“Okay. Here’s Ganesha. One of the most popular Hindu gods, he is recognized (sic) as the god with an elephants (sic) head. Ganesha is the eldest son of Shiva and wife Parvati. Ganesha brings good luck, and clear obstacles as symbolized (sic) by the axe he carries….”

I was somewhere around the fourth incarnation of Vishnu, Baby Dog listening raptly, when Halmonie wandered in and heard what I was reading. Halmonie doesn’t think much of eastern religion. She refers to the Dalai Lama as “What’s his name, that con man.” She shook her head and laughed, that her granddaughter was so entranced by the story of Narasimha. Well, she’d better get used to it. Ich bin ein Oaklander, but Berkeley’s only three blocks away.

Kiss the Beard

2006-05-01T13:47:00.000-07:00

I forgot to shave over a long weekend a while back, and then forgot again for another day or two, so at that point it officially became a beard. I meant to shave the beard off the weekend before last, and then again this past weekend and forgot both times, so now it’s a biggish beard and Mama Dog will no doubt soon be casting forlorn glances at it and making cryptic little hints like “Are you going to be shaving that damn beard off anytime soon?”

The new wrinkle in all this is Baby Dog. I’ve been bearded many times since she joined our lives, but this is the first time she’s been old enough to take an active interest in my facial hair. When the stubble first filled out on my jaw, she scrutinised it and patted it cautiously. She learned to call it “Daddy’s beard.” She learned that the part on my upper lip is “Daddy’s moustache.” And, surprisingly, she seems to have taken a real liking to it. In fact, she likes to kiss my beard. I’ll be rocking her and singing to her at bedtime when suddenly I notice that she seems to be gazing at me in adoration. Historically, she’s spent night-night song time absorbed in playing with Piggie or her own toes or whatever, but more and more she’s been staring up at me. I’ll punctuate my song by kissing the side of her nose at the end of each line, making her giggle uncontrollably. Inevitably at some point she’ll say, “Kiss the beard?” and I’ll lean my big Daddy chin down at her to accept this token of her affection.

So now my personal grooming’s at a crossroads. I rather agree with Mama Dog that my grizzled old face fur is nearing a state of gross unsightliness, but the lure of unsolicited baby kisses is powerful medicine. I’m afraid I’ll have to keep it at least until the moustache hairs start growing into my mouth.

Things We Did this Morning

2006-04-30T22:38:00.000-07:00

Baby Dog didn’t wake up until just before eight this morning, which was nice, but the sleep-in value was greatly diluted by the fact that the dog woke us up roughly once an hour all night long. Evidently he had the Trotskies, because there weren’t any possum corpses in the yard this morning. I was able to go right back to sleep after every interruption, but I don’t think Mama Dog fared as well. I got Baby Dog up – she greeted me by my first name as I walked into her room – and gave her breakfast while Mama Dog grabbed an extra little increment of sleep.

We did a pretty thorough morning at Tilden Park. Took another ride on the steam train, then went to the Little Farm for the first time in a while. It was sheep shearing day, which was novel. Baby Dog got to see one of the sheep getting shorn. “Baa baa black sheep,” she observed, accurately in all particulars. “Black sheep’s getting a hair cut,” I told her. “He doesn’t like it much. That’s why he’s saying ‘baa baa.’”

I Wrote a Good Long Post Last Night, So Sue Me if I Pass the Buck Tonight

2006-04-29T23:02:00.000-07:00

Mama Dog’s light hearted afternoon shopping jaunt had an unfortunate culmination, ending with Baby Dog getting a fascinating first look at a tow truck in action. You can read the whole story here.

The Elaborate Bedtime Routine as of 4/06

2006-04-28T23:40:00.000-07:00

They say babies like their routines – that doing the same stuff the same way at the same time every night is a comfort thing, a means of exerting a little control over an environment that is otherwise beyond their power to control. Either that’s extra true in Baby Dog’s case or she’s inherited some of the old man’s compulsive tendencies. We’ve long had our bedtime routines, but I’ve been noticing lately that the routines are accumulating like barnacles. We add new wrinkles, but none of the old ones ever get ironed out.

The basic bedtime routine for a long time has been: 1) bath time; 2) stories with Mummy; 3) night-night songs with Daddy, then into the sleep sack and a short period of chattering in the crib before sleep. The concert repertoire has evolved over the months. Right now, the stand-byes are “Whistling Gypsy,” which we sing in a duet, and “Thunder Road,” which I do solo pausing occasionally for Baby Dog to fill in blanks. (Daddy: “Roy Orbison singin’ ‘For the Lonely’/Hey, that’s me and I want you…” Baby Dog: “Only!”) At some point, and I’m not sure when, the routine grew to encompass a post-singing ritual that we call “Our Tour,” or sometimes “Touching Things.” I pick Baby Dog up and we circumambulate her room. She has a number of pictures on her walls and on her dresser, and Baby Dog touches them each in turn, calling out their names. This started out with her wanting to touch the piggy drawing or the bunny rabbit drawing; every time I’d set her down she’d remember a different picture she could touch. I decided that if we just went around and touched all of them there would be a greater sense of closure and she wouldn’t have an excuse to get back up at the end. It’s worked like a charm, though of course the route of The Tour has grown to include more and more stops as time has gone by. Here’s the path as it stands now (the script varies only at a geologic pace):

First we go to the Iwao Akiyama print (not this one, but it’s representative) of the owl and the moon that hangs above the changing pad. First Baby Dog touches the owl and says “Owl” while I say “Hoo! Hoo!” Then she touches the moon and says “Moon!” while I remain silent. Then we go over by the garbage can where Mama Dog’s crayon portrait of Peter Rabbit eating a carrot is hung low, where Baby Dog can touch it as she toddles about the room. “Who’s down here?” I ask. “Rabbit!” Baby Dog exclaims, as I make rabbit noises. Then she touches the carrot and says “Carrot!” Next to that is a picture of Mama Dog with a background photoshopped by her father. “Who’s up here?” I ask. Baby Dog touches the picture, for some reason always hitting just to the left of Mama Dog’s face, and says, “Mummy!” “What does Mummy say?” I ask. “I love you Baby Dog!” Baby Dog exclaims. Then we go over to the armoire, where just in the last few days I’ve started saying, “I guess we should touch the doggies.” The “doggies” in fact are just random burls in the wood of the armoire, but when she was much smaller, first learning to talk, Baby Dog apparently decided they looked like dog faces and started calling them that. So she touches the doggies and I say “Woof woof.” Then I hoist her up so that she can reach the Crate and Barrel box that sits on top of the armoire. “What’s up here?” I ask. She stabs a finger on the capital C and exclaims “C!” Then for some reason she goes all the way to the end of the word and touches the little e, exclaiming “e!” From there, she works her way backwards: “t! a! r!” You’ll have to ask her why she does it that way, but she always does. Then we go around the corner of the armoire to the other side of the box, and I saw, “And what’s around here?” Baby Dog continues, at this point always unfailingly in the correct order: “Ampersand!” (Yes, she actually says “ampersand.”) “B! a! r! r! e! l!” Then we exclaim together “Crate and Barrel!” From there, we go to the cow calendar that hangs over her dresser, and she touches the current month’s cow. “Who’s up there?” I ask. “Cow!” she replies, and I add the colour commentary: “Moo!” Then we crouch down by the side of the dresser where there are two more Mama Dog portraits: a pig on top and an itsy bitsy spider on bottom. “Who’s down here?” I ask. “Piggie!” “Oink oink, snort, snort,” I add. I drop her down a little. “Who’s down here?” For some reason, Baby Dog makes an unintelligible reply each and every time, and I have to say “Who’s down there?” again before she clearly says “Spider!” and I can add “Itsy bitsy!” At this point, we’re in the home stretch. We go to the foot of the crib, where a card with a picture of a pinecone hangs. “What’s over here?” I ask. She touches the card and says, “Pinecone!” At that point, I swoop her onto her back for descent into the crib and bundling into the sleep sack. As I do so, we have a final jubilant chorus which has evolved into four lines that we trade off on kind of randomly. They are: “We touched everything!” “We’re good everything touchers!” “Yay us!” “Yay Baby Dog and Daddy!”

Now, you’d think that would be more than enough routine to satisfy a troupe of rain men, but like I say we keep accumulating new action items. The last few nights have apparently cemented in Baby Dog’s mind the need for a musical encore to come down from the frenzied climax of the picture-touching tour. The funny thing is, the song she always wants is about as unlikely a baby-quieter as you’ll find, but it always works to bring her down. Every night at this point, she asks me to sing her “BINGO.” The one about the dog, with the clapping. This is supposed to be a rousing audience participation song, but for some reason it sends Baby Dog quietly to bed, even after she’s clapped my hands for me through the entire song. I don’t even know where she learned the damn song. Daycare, I suppose. It’s been so long since I’ve heard it performed I can never remember if I’m supposed to be dropping letters off at the start or the end of the song, and I find myself switching it around from verse to verse. I haven’t done clap-I-N-G-clap yet, but it’s been close.

Time for Another Rerun

2006-04-27T22:56:00.000-07:00

I still don’t feel up to blogging, so why don’t we dip back into the Papa Dog archives and see what I said my top five movies were exactly one and one half years ago. I don’t believe the list has changed much since then, though I might substitute Rear Window for Northmeal West if I were to bestir myself to write a new list tonight.

Damn, and The Godfather’s not on that list. Neither is Chinatown. Well, don’t get me started.

Elephant in the Room? What Elephant in the Room?

2006-04-26T23:04:00.000-07:00

Some of you know what’s been going on here the last couple of days. I’m not going to blog about it, and please don’t anybody post any comments about it, but thanks to all who’ve called or written or stopped by. Things are okay and otherwise the same as ever here. We watched half a movie tonight, Doggy Dog got his regular walks, and Baby Dog went down to sleep without a fuss for the first time in a week. I’ve tried out a new ice cream flavour – Häagen-Dazs caramel cone. And lo, the planet turns.

Stupid Nasal Passages

2006-04-25T21:51:00.000-07:00

They’re, like, all constricted, but there’s nothing in them to blow. This is the worst part of the cold cycle.

My Nose Is Stuffed Up, My Throat is Scratchy, and My Head Hurts Just a Teeny Bit

2006-04-24T22:25:00.000-07:00

Mama Dog complains that when I do these little keep-the-streak-alive posts they aren’t, well, interesting. I say, sue me. She’s the one who gave me the damn cold in the first place.

Has Been, You’ve Been, We’ve All Been a Has Been

2006-04-23T20:23:00.000-07:00

The other day, I finally listened to the first couple of tracks of that new William Shatner album. It’s weirdly awesome (as in “inspiring awe or admiration or wonder” — mostly wonder).

Choo Choo

2006-04-22T22:29:00.000-07:00

When ducks were the thing, we showed Baby Dog a bird sanctuary. When pigs and cows ruled, we took her to The Little Farm. Now the obsession is trains, thanks to the oeuvre of Donald Crews (Freight Train and its sequel, Inside Freight Train), and The Little Engine That Could as interpreted by Watty Piper. She also is quite familiar with Burl Ives’ take on that same story, which is on Baby Dog’s Napster play list. Thanks to the Crews books, she knows more about trains than either of her parents do. The bar’s not really very high there, but still. She can correctly distinguish by silhouette the shape of a hopper car vs. a tank car, and knows that the tender carries the coal that powers the engine. She knows what a trestle is. She knows that the sounds “choo choo,” “puff puff,” “toot toot” and “ding dong” are all involved with such enterprises, and judicious use of these sounds can even be used to entice her to eat her broccoli. All that being the case, we’ve felt we were long overdue for a ride on Tilden Park’s steam train, and today we finally went.

The Tilden Park trains are wonderfully authentic scale models of genuine steam engines. Baby Dog was immediately thrilled to hear the “ooooo-oooooooo” sound of the steam whistle as we pulled into the parking lot. I oooooed along with it, making her grin hugely. We arrived just as the train was pulling into the depot. It only takes fifteen minutes for the train to make its circuit, but still we hurried to buy tickets so as not to wait for the next run. Mama Dog, Baby Dog and I all bundled into one car. They’re flat little open-air things, kind of like the carts you see in old movies set in coal mines. I asked Baby Dog if she knew where the tracks were, and she pointed to the adjacent set. All the way through our trip through the park we were able to point out things she had seen in her books: trestles, tunnels, water towers, and of course the steam engine itself. Every time it oooooed, she would beam and laugh. Going through the tunnel seemed to be a bit worrisome to her, but the passage was brief and she didn’t seem to mind it as much the second time.

I’m sure this is an outing she’ll be talking about for some time to come. And we bought six tickets, so I imagine we’ll be going back again.

You Bet Your Bippy

2006-04-21T22:21:00.000-07:00

I’ve been running on short sleep all week and have a busy weekend ahead of me. Right now is my chance to finally get a bit of rest, so I’m going to call it a week and say goodnight now. “Goodnight now.”

Training Day

2006-04-20T22:20:00.000-07:00

Got sent by the job today to take InDesign training today. I resisted as much as I could, because my experience of software training has always been that it’s a waste of time and money. Why pay hundreds of dollars and keep me from doing my work for a day when I could get the same benefit out of half and hour looking at the manual? Worse, they scheduled the thing to start at 8 a.m. one BART stop past the place I can never make it to by 9. To be there on time, I’d have to leave the house at 7:15, which has been laughably impossible for a long long time. The only way to manage it was to tell Mama Dog that she was on her own this morning. I literally wouldn’t have a second to spare to help with Baby Dog – not time to change a single diaper nor spoon a single bit of kiwi into her mouth.

The way things worked out, Baby Dog didn’t even wake up until I was about to leave. I was afraid I’d miss her entirely, but fortunately she roused herself with five minutes to spare. I was out the door a minute late, at 7:16, and somehow caught the train before the one I was after. It was good I managed that, because the train I did catch ran slow, depositing me at Montgomery BART at 7:55. I hurried the two blocks to the training centre, and made it at 8:01. Only one other person from my office made it earlier, so I was good.

I was delighted to find the training nowhere near the pointless slog I’d expected. I could have gotten all the same information out of half an hour with the manual, yeah, but things have moved along a bit since the last time I took software training (in 1989, to learn WordPerfect). For one thing, the training terminal has an Internet connection and nobody cared if I kept flipping back to IE to check my email. I managed to transact way more personal business during the course of the day than I could have in my own office. I’d have to count the day a waste of the company’s money, but I take back what I said about it being a waste of my time. I didn’t get asked a single idiotic question all day long, I never had to smell C the MH’s noxious perfume, I didn’t once have to hear WGP’s braying and meaningless greeting of “Okaaaay?” and in the end I made it home about an hour earlier than normal. All in all, it was a bit of a holiday.

Parents and Children in Movies

2006-04-19T22:36:00.000-07:00

Right on the heels of watching Decline of the American Empire, we watched The Barbarian Invasions. What a beautiful goddamn movie. The first one was really good, but too dispassionately analytical. The sequel is the most genuinely moving film I’ve seen in I don’t know how long. Last night after watching the first half, Mama Dog and I were talking about how a movie like this seems a lot different to us now that it would have before we were parents. The parent-child issues don’t have quite the same immediacy when you’ve only lived one side of that equation. I thought The Sweet Hereafter was a sad and beautiful movie eight years ago, but I think it would rip my guts out if I saw it today.

Wednesdays: Now With 3,000% Less Fun!

2006-04-18T23:04:00.000-07:00

Back to full time at the dirt farm as of this week. Tomorrow will be my first Wednesday in a long time not spent at home with Baby Dog. It makes our financial picture rosier, but I’m going to miss my girl.

Baby Dog’s First Visit from the Easter Rabbit. Not.

2006-04-17T22:30:00.000-07:00

It’s been a while since I had to think about these Christian/capitalist holidays, but if I remember correctly, the one this past weekend has something to do with a rabbit nailing Jesus to a chocolate cross. Or was it a duck? Anyway, Mama Dog has fond memories of waking up on Easter Sunday to find a basket of goodies left behind by the Jesus Rodent. She wanted Baby Dog to have similar memories in her dotage, so we resolved to put together a splendid basket for Baby Dog’s First Easter When She Has a Vague Idea What’s Going On. The daycare helped give us a leg up; they sent all the children home with little Easter baskets on Thursday. It contained little plastic eggs filled with candy that we wouldn’t dream of feeding our child but would be happy to consume ourselves. Mama Dog reckoned we could fill the eggs up with stuff we would let Baby Dog have, top the thing off with relevant stuffed animals she already owns – Bunny Rabbit and Ducky, e.g. – and call that an Easter basket. Yes, I know, it sounded as lame and half-assed to us as it does to you, but the girl’s not even two yet. She would have thought the basket in and of itself was something new and enthralling.

Yes, note the conditional there. “Would have.” We managed to be even lamer and even less fully assed.

Saturday night, Mama Dog said to me, “Remind me to put together a basket before Baby Dog wakes up in the morning.” “Okay,” I said in that way I do, “remember to put together a basket before Baby Dog wakes up in the morning.” We said ha ha and then watched the rest of The Decline of the American Empire. When we were done it was past our bedtimes and neither of us felt like doing any work. “What about the basket?” I asked. “I’ll do it in the morning before she wakes up,” Mama Dog said. We slunk off to bed.

That was the night that Baby Dog’s cough erupted and kept us awake from three a.m. on. Ironically, the one whose sleep was least affected turned out to be Baby Dog. She was up and raring to go at six. As you may recall, Halmonie came over and let us sleep in. When we dragged our bums out of bed at nine, Baby Dog was already three hours into Easter Sunday with no bunny basket in sight.

Moving at the speed of rationalisation, we agreed that she doesn’t really have a clue about Easter this year and that next year’s going to be the first one she’ll have any memory of. Stay tuned this winter to see how badly we botch Christmas.

A Rough Night

2006-04-16T22:29:00.000-07:00

Last night was a rough one. Baby Dog has had a sniffle and a cough the last few days. Because it wasn’t too bad and because of one logistical thing or another, we never got around to replenishing the supply of Baby Tylenol that she used up during her last bout of croup. At three in the morning, we discovered the error of our ways. Her cough kept waking her up, and then she kept waking us up. Mama Dog didn’t sleep at all between threeish and fivish. I took the fivish to sevenish shift. Then Mama Dog called Halmonie to come over and save the day. We were then able to sleep in until ninish and somewhat recoup our sleep deficit.

First order of business this morning: off to the drug store for Baby Tylenol.

The Whistling Gypsy

2006-04-15T23:02:00.000-07:00

I find myself once again too tired to gather any thoughts of my own to post, so tonight’s entertainment will consist of the lyrics of Baby Dog’s new favourite song, The Whistling Gypsy, as performed by The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem. She requests it at bedtime and mealtime, and we hear her singing the chorus herself at odd moments. It goes a little something like this:

The gypsy rover came over the hill
Down through the valley so shady
He whistled and he sang ‘til the green woods rang
And he won the heart of a lady

Chorus:
Adi-doo, adi-doo da day
Adi-doo, adi-day dee
He whistled and he sang ‘til the green woods rang
And he won the heart of a lady

She left her father’s castle gate
She left her own fond lover
She left her servants and estate
To follow the gypsy rover

(Chorus)

Her father saddled up his fastest steed
Roamed the valleys all over
Sought his daughter at great speed
And the whistling gypsy rover

(Chorus)

He came at last to a mansion fine
Down by the river Clady
And there was music and there was wine
For the gypsy and his lady

(Chorus)

“He is no gypsy, my father” she said
“But lord of these lands all over
And I will stay ‘til my dying day
With my whistling gypsy rover”

(Chorus Twice)

Grandpa Pays a Visit

2006-04-14T22:30:00.000-07:00

A little girl with the unlikely name of Grandpa* was over to the house tonight. Grandpa is about seven years old, slightly older than my marriage to Mama Dog. This was her first visit back to the Bay Area since her first year of life, so I suppose it was all new to her. When I got home from work, I was very surprised to see Baby Dog and Grandpa sitting side by side in the living room, each reading one of Baby Dog’s books. Last time we had a small visitor – Baby Pirate – there was crying and tantruming when the books were touched. We had resigned ourselves to the idea that Baby Dog was going to be fiercely possessive of her books for some time to come. Apparently, this does not extend to bigger children. Baby Dog seemed very happy to interact with Grandpa, and did not begrudge her the use of any of her toys. It was quite remarkable.
__________________
*So unlikely that it's not really her name. But it kind of is.

I’m So Bleary-Eyed with Fatigue I Could Swear the Last Post Was About Hockeyball

2006-04-13T22:24:00.000-07:00

Really sorry to do this again, but I’m going to have to call it a night without writing a proper post. I can’t remember the last time I did one, though I suppose I’d see it if I scrolled down. I’ll try to turn over another new leaf soon.

Sudden Death

2006-04-12T18:26:00.000-07:00

[Today's is a guest post by paul Anonymous]

We ended the season in fourth place, so in the first round of the playoffs we would be taking on the third place team. It was a best of two series. If one team won both games, or won one and tied one, then they would win the series. However, if each team won a game, then it would go into overtime, and whoever scored would win the series.

We lost the first game 3-0, so it was do or die for us.

There was only one ref to start the game. On the first shift the other team was way offside, but the referee didn't call it, and they went on to score. They got two more quick goals, and we were down 3-0 midway through the first period. Things weren't looking good.

We finally scored near the end of the period. We got our second goal with 5 seconds left in the second period.

In the third period we got two goals, and suddenly we were in the lead. The other team was getting frustrated, and they started playing dirty. Amazingly, the refs started calling penalties. So for the last two minutes of the game we had a two man advantage. But we got sloppy, and let one of their guys walk in on our goal. He scored just as the buzzer went. The ref ruled it went in after the buzzer, so it was no goal.

So it now went in to sudden death overtime. The other team was still playing dirty, but the refs were calling it, so we had a two man advantage. We were buzzing all around their goal, but we couldn't put the puck in the net. The overtime period ended scoreless.

Now it came down to a shoot out. Three shots for each team. Whichever team got the most goals won. The goofy thing was that both teams shot at the same time, so you'd be looking back and forth, trying to decide if you should be watching to see if your guy scored, or if your goalie stopped their guy.

The first shooters on each team went, and both missed. The second shooters went. They missed. The third shooters went. Our guy missed, but their guy scored. It was a hell of a way to lose the series.

After that we went to the bar and commiserated.

My Favourite Cute Anthropomorphic Dirty Joke

2006-04-11T22:41:00.000-07:00

I have absolutely nothing on my mind tonight and tomorrow paul is threatening to blog about some hockeyball thing, so I’m going to take pre-emptive action and tell a cute dirty joke today.

So this penguin’s taking a vacation in the American southwest, driving through Arizona and New Mexico, investigating the exotic arid climes. A couple miles outside Bisbee, his engine starts to make some alarming hiccoughing sounds, so he pulls off the Interstate and looks for a garage. Because the penguin’s stranded, the mechanic agrees to take a look at the car just as soon as he finished up the job he’s on, but it’ll still take an hour or two. He suggests that the penguin take a look around scenic downtown Bisbee and come back in two hours. With nothing better to do, the penguin agrees and toddles off to investigate the pottery and Navajo blankets.

Hailing as he does from a chillier land, the penguin is soon overwhelmed by the desert heat. He spies an ice cream parlour and stops in for a refreshing cold treat. Soon he is comfortably seated on a sidewalk table under a big umbrella, enjoying a large cup of vanilla ice cream.

The problem at this point, of course, is that penguins have flippers rather than arms. He’s learned to steer his car by pressing his flippers firmly against the wheel, but he’s never really got the hang of using a spoon. After a few embarrassing mishaps, he finally casts decorum aside and plunges his face into the cup, lapping up the ice cream. When he’s done, there’s vanilla smeared all over his face, but he’s cooler and considerably happier. He sees that it’s almost time for his car to be ready, so he takes an ineffectual dab at his face with a napkin and toddles back to the mechanic, vanilla dripping from his jowls.

When he gets to the garage, the mechanic looks at him and says, “Well, it looks like you’ve blown a seal.”

“Oh, no,” says the penguin, “that’s ice cream.”

The Sort of Thing I’m Liable to Notice on a Dog Walk During Daylight Savings Time

2006-04-10T22:24:00.000-07:00

Tonight, for a very brief time before twilight, the sky was Simpsons blue and the clouds were Simpsons white. Then it was night.

I Knew This Night Would Come

2006-04-09T21:13:00.000-07:00

It’s only fairly recently that I’ve added my repertoire of night-night songs to Baby Dog’s Napster playlist, and they’ve quickly attained “most requested” status. That in itself is not unusual – any new addition, be it to playlist or bookshelf, is subjected to repeat scrutiny until she has its measure. But she has seemed to be paying particular attention to the Clancy Brothers’ live version of The Parting Glass and to the John Prine trilogy: Donald and Lydia, Souvenirs, and The Torch Singer.

More and more at bedtime Baby Dog will make a request of something that’s on her Napster playlist. The ABC song, say, or Itsy Bitsy Spider. I’ll gamely give it a go if I know the words, and she’s usually satisfied. Sometimes, she’ll clarify her request: “Itsy Bitsy? On the computer?” I tell her that the computer’s off and she has to satisfy herself with Daddy’s crappy voice, and she usually seems content with that. Sometimes she keeps after the idea, but I’ve generally taken that as a ploy to put off bedtime for a little bit. It never worked, but she seemed keen to keep trying until it did.

Tonight, when I asked Baby Dog what night-night song she wanted to hear, she made no reply. Every night for months she’s had some specific request. Not tonight. “How about Donald and Lydia?” I asked. We hadn’t sung that in a while, and we were running early for once. A longish song seemed in order. “On the computer?” she asked. “No,” I said, “the computer’s off. Daddy will sing Donald and Lydia.” “On the computer?” she persisted. “No, honey, computer’s off. We’re just going to sing night-night songs together, okay?” She didn’t say no, so I started singing the song.

Almost immediately, Baby Dog started to chatter about her piggy. This is not unusual, so I soldiered on, singing about the fat lonely girl behind the counter at the penny arcade. Baby Dog observed that the piggy sat in the mud and that it ate celery. I sang on. Midway through the first chorus, Baby Dog said: “Turn it off.” I stopped, unsure what she meant. “Turn what off?” I asked. She thought intently for a moment, trying to form the words. Then she said: “Turn off Donald and Lydia?”

So there it is. I am forced to recognise that my little girl is now musically sophisticated enough to know that next to John Prine (or any other professional musician, including possibly even William Hung), Daddy’s singing is crap. Bittersweet, yes. She’s growing up, and that’s good; but in some areas she’s going to want better than I have to give.

Pooped

2006-04-08T23:02:00.000-07:00

Another working day off. I’ll have to catch up with you later.

Shook Up

2006-04-07T22:41:00.000-07:00

I thought paul was going to guest blog tonight, but I guess not. We went out and saw Earthquake in sort-of Sensurround. It wasn’t any better than it was in 1974, but it was even louder.

Start ‘Ginning

2006-04-06T23:08:00.000-07:00

The title phrase was once viewed hereabouts as a small piece of adorableness. Baby Dog would employ it to indicate that she wanted to hear a given book in its entirety (as though we ever read them any other way), starting at the beginning. She would scramble over with, say, The Very Busy Spider in hand, and say, “Verybusyspider! Start ‘ginning?”

Later, she found applications for the phrase in the music world. She would ask to hear, say, Badlands. By the time I had the song up on the Napster, she’d be chattering about something else, and would be so absorbed in some new entertainment that she’d fail to hear the start of the song. Suddenly she would notice that it had been playing for a while. “Start ‘ginning?” she would ask, whereupon I would be expected to restart the track.

At bedtime, “Start ‘ginning” has gained currency as a rather transparent ploy to prolong the time before sleep. “Starry Starry Night?” she might request. I begin to sing; she begins to chatter about the pig in the mud or the frog jumping the fence. Halfway through the first verse, she says, “Start ‘ginning?” At first, I thought this was the same situation as with Napster – that Baby Dog just hadn’t been listening and wanted to hear the part she missed. But when she trots out “Start ‘ginning?” three times before a verse is finished, I must admit she’s playing me. “Daddy can’t keep starting at the beginning, honey,” I say, and soldier on.

Lately, the phrase has become a weapon in the just-starting Terrible Twos campaign. It is being applied indiscriminately and confusingly to any situation that fails to meet Baby Dog’s exacting standards. This morning, we were playing a game involving Baby-Dog-ups (that’s where I lie down on the floor and bench press her ten times), “Whoa!” (that’s where I sit on the couch, set her on my lap facing me, then dip her back and upside down until her head almost touches the floor, exclaiming “Whoooooooaaa!”) and bounces (that’s where I bounce her up and down on the couch, saying “Bounce! Bounce! Bounce!”). We did two sets of Baby-Dog-ups, a few run-throughs of “Whoa,” and were on to the bounces, when she exclaimed “Start ‘ginning?” Assuming she meant to go back to the beginning of the game, which was the Baby-Dog-ups, I started doing that, and she burst into tears, howling “Start ‘ginning!” I know that it’s futile trying to reason at this point, but I tried anyway…“Start at the beginning of what, honey? Daddy doesn’t know what you want?” This only increased the volume and the tears. Luckily it was breakfast time just then, so there was a ready distraction before it became a total meltdown.

At bedtime, “this little piggy” was marred by a similar “Start ‘ginning” incident, which no amount of rocking and singing could quite cure. Little bursts of tantrum continued throughout song time and point at stuff on the wall time. When Baby Dog was tucked away in her sleep sack, I was at last able to soothe her happily to bed by making pretend burp noises at her. To ward off a bedtime tantrum, sometimes a dad’s gotta do what a dad’s gotta do.

I know Baby Dog is (a) just trying to exert a little control over her environment and (b) frustrated because, advanced as she is, her ability to communicate still lags behind her desire. But gosh golly it sure will be good when she can reliably find the words for what ails her.

Briefly

2006-04-05T22:57:00.000-07:00

Baby Dog’s a bit sniffly, but the fever seems to be down. Mama Dog and I both had big headaches tonight, though, so I fear we’ve caught whatever the little girl had. Business continues.

I'm a Cheap Bastard

2006-04-04T21:21:00.000-07:00

[Today's is a guest post by Mama Dog.]

Baby Dog has fallen ill again this week, poor little girl. I dropped her off at daycare yesterday as usual, then got the call at around noon saying that Baby Dog had a fever of almost 103 and would I please pick her up immediately? (There's a zero tolerance for fever at our daycare, as there is at most others.) Luckily, Halmonie lives nearby so I gave her a call and asked her to pick up the girl and take her home. Halmonie obliged willingly, of course.

Today, Baby Dog stayed home with Halmonie all day, as she was still feeling feverish. There's a 24 hr. quarantine rule at the daycare, anyway, so we didn't have a choice.

Tomorrow is Papa Dog's last Wednesday off until he goes back to working full-time, so the plan was for him to spend one last day with Baby Dog. She will be home tomorrow.

By Thursday, I'm hoping that Baby Dog will be up and running and ready to go to daycare.

Just now, as I was staring blankly at the refrigerator, wracking my brain for a blog post topic, I noticed the daycare holiday closing schedule posted thereon. It read: April 7, 2006: Friday (Good Friday). Therefore, if Baby Dog goes in on Thursday, she'll only have attended about 12 hrs of daycare this week, for the price of 40 hours. I haven't the energy to do math at the moment, but if I did, I believe the hourly rate would fall somewhere between highway robbery and "hell of" expensive.

Here's why I'm cheap: I'm thinking, since Friday's a holiday, perhaps we should send Baby Dog to daycare tomorrow (on her planned day off with Papa Dog) -- just so we get closer to our money's worth. It just kills me to pay a full week's tuition for a day and a half.

Let me reassure you that I'm not that heartless and pragmatic. Ultimately, we'll do what's best for Baby Dog and we'll do what will make her happiest. If she's feeling the slightest bit under the weather tomorrow, she's staying home. If Papa Dog really wants to spend his last stay-at-home-dad-day with Baby Dog, then she'll stay home. It's only money, after all.

First Thoroughly Lame Post in a While

2006-04-03T22:44:00.000-07:00

Long and involved day today, and now I’m too tired to do the paying work I have to do, let along blogging. This whole week’s going to be more of the same. Do I have a volunteer for guest blogger duty?

Baby Dog’s World is Growing

2006-04-02T22:14:00.000-07:00

This weekend’s new thing: Baby Dog has been singing songs we didn’t teach her. Some are songs we can recognise (the Anglo version of Frère Jacques) and some are ones we just can’t plain figure out. There was something about Kelsey Kitten, but I can’t remember if that was a song or prose. Whatever. These are all presumably things she’s learned in daycare. Her knowledge base is definitely expanding outside of this house.

Baby Pirate is Two!

2006-04-01T22:19:00.000-08:00

It was – no joke – Baby Pirate’s second birthday today. The party was at Habitot and the guest list, naturally enough, consisted of families with small children. The Funkadelics came, as did Mama and Baby Whippet (Papa Whippet having had some class or other to attend). In a way, it was a new thing for us. This was the first time we’d brought Baby Dog to Habitot since she learned to walk, and it made for a markedly different experience. She still spent most of her time in the Littlest Kids’ area, but she toddled fully around the room, exploring and playing, rather than plopping down in one spot and waiting for toys to be handed to her. She also had much fun in the water play area, splashing and rummaging around for fish toys. She went into the walk-in spaceship for the first time, and when she saw the mural of the solar system, she ran quick-walked straight to the ringed planet, exclaiming, “Jupiter!” For that last she can thank…uh, I guess he’d be Uncle Dog…who dug up an oversized Solar System book at a yard sale someplace and gave it to Baby Dog for Christmas. She has since pored over that book so many times that she’s learned the names of all the planets, though of course Saturn is the only one she can easily recognise in different contexts. (She can also identify Valentina Tereshkova, but only by the picture in the book.)

Lunch afterwards was at Cancun Taqueria, where Baby Dog sat for the first time in a booster seat rather than a high chair. All told we had about three hours in the midst of various dense crushes of humanity with much noise and activity and yelling children and high-calorie food. All four babies were quite primed for long naps by the time we were done. Happy birthday to Baby Pirate and I’m now ready for some sleep myself.

The Name Baby Dog Invented for the Metal Colander

2006-03-31T22:21:00.000-08:00

“The Honeycomb Bowl.”

Chasey Cheddar

2006-03-30T21:50:00.000-08:00

“Chasey Cheddar” is the latest mystery phrase. Baby Dog started repeating it a week or two ago apropos of nothing apparent. I think the first time we noticed her saying it, cheese might have been under discussion, but after that it was totally random. After a while, we theorised that perhaps “Chasey Cheddar” was a character or story element in a book that has been read to her at daycare. Mama Dog kept meaning to ask the daycare lady about it and kept forgetting. She finally remembered this afternoon, and got a not entirely satisfactory reply. Daycare lady couldn’t think of any story that “Chasey Cheddar” might have come from, but suggested that perhaps Baby Dog was remembering that one of her little peers, Casey often has cheddar for lunch and has to be coaxed to eat it. This theory doesn’t entirely hold water, because every morning when I ask Baby Dog who she’s going to see at daycare, she lists off her classmates, including a perfectly pronounced “Casey.” It doesn’t seem logical that she’d turn it into “Chasey” in only this one circumstance.

So. Any guesses? Anybody have a Chasey Cheddar action figure or pop-up book?

Baby Dog Continues to Be Smart

2006-03-29T22:31:00.000-08:00

Today we took Baby Dog to the physical therapist again. We really could have skipped the appointment, since the girl is most definitely walking now, but it seemed like the thorough thing to do, and besides she seemed to enjoy herself last time. Sure enough, the therapist quickly confirmed that Baby Dog’s motor skills are at an age-appropriate level and that she’s achieved all expected milestones. We actually spent more time talking about Baby Dog’s verbal skills, which thoroughly impressed both the therapist we saw today and the one we saw last time, who happened to pass by in the middle of our session. At one point Baby Dog was looking at a multi-coloured ball, correctly pointing out each block of colours: “Yellow, red, or-ange, green, blue, white.” The therapist said she’d never encountered a less-than-two-year-old who could do that. This is a child development specialist saying this, mind, so I hope you’ll excuse me for being extra insufferably proud of my genius daughter.

Yeah, okay, Mozart was writing music at that age, whatever. She’s genius enough for us.

Sir, We Have Never Met Before, Is That Correct?

2006-03-28T21:12:00.000-08:00

I asked Robert Runté to shill for me, so now I have to shill for him in return… Robert says:

“As part of a class experiment, I have posted a hoax web page (meaningless nondata) at http://people.uleth.ca/~runte/research/surveyresults.htm

“Using various 'black hat' tricks, my class and I have managed to move it up to #5 out of 13,300 Canadian web pages in response to the Google search on ‘Grammar Checker’ (quotes included); and to about #160 spot out of 313,000 on the whole Google WWW.
If anyone is inclined to assist us in our experiment, linking to the hoax page in your blog, web page or similar will increase Google's ranking of the site. I'm curious to see if I can push it any higher, and how long it will take to sink as the links date....”

There’s your shilling returned, Robert. Thanks.

Paying the Bill at Macy’s

2006-03-27T22:36:00.000-08:00

Somehow or other, one bill managed to escape Mama Dog’s grasp this last week, a Macy’s bill from, embarrassingly enough, the last time she bought me some underdrawers. She noticed the bill on Saturday after post office hours, and saw that it was due Monday. Fretting ensued. Would she be able to convince them to waive the late charge by calling and saying it was in the mail? Perhaps we could take a side trip on our very busy social Sunday (two different birthday parties forecast) and pay at the Macy’s in Walnut Crick. “No problem,” says I, “I’ll just go to the Macy’s in Union Square over my lunch hour on Monday.” “That’ll take your whole lunch hour,” says Mama Dog. “I don’t mind,” says I. “Are you sure?” she asks. “That’s why I offered,” I replies. Except for the specific details of Macy’s, Union Square, lunch hour, and Monday, we have this conversation regularly.

This morning as we were rushing about getting ready to get ourselves and Baby Dog out the door, the subject came up again. I suspect that sometimes Mama Dog has reservations about my competence in the areas of certain practical tasks. I’m not sure where these reservations come from because I am assuredly competent, but she has them nonetheless. “When you pay the bill,” she asked, “will you get a receipt?” “Oh,” I said, in that smart-ass way of mine, “is that what you want me to do? I was just going to crumple up the bill and the cheque and toss it in the front door as I passed by.” (This may actually be where she gets her reservations; just a guess.) “No,” Mama Dog groaned, shifting to exaggerated literalism, “I want you to go to the payment office and present the bill and say ‘I should like to pay the balance owing on this bill’ and give them the cheque and get a receipt.” “Oh, okay,” I said, “let’s compromise; as I toss the wad in the door while I pass by, I’ll yell ‘HERE YA GO!’”

The lunch hour sojourn to Macy’s turned out to be entirely pleasant and even productive. It gave me an unaccustomed little pocket of free time in the middle of the day to actually think without irritating work-related interruptions. I was able to devote upwards of twenty minutes of thought to my next project, and managed to crack the problem with the narrative structure that’s been eluding me for the last five years. I think I’m almost ready to write the thing. Thank you, Macy’s.

It turns out also that I practically could have wadded the thing up and tossed it in the front door. There’s no payment office. You just pay at any cash register. No muss, no fuss. I was in and out and back to the office with a total elapsed time of only slightly over half an hour. I even had time to eat my lunch before the afternoon’s first irritation. I must try to get out of the office more often.

Saturday Siesta

2006-03-26T22:19:00.000-08:00

Yesterday afternoon when Baby Dog went down for a nap, Mama Dog took the opportunity to take a snooze herself. I hunkered down on the couch to read my book, leaving Doggy Dog to whine on the other side of the gate. Baby Dog’s toys were all over the floor, and I didn’t feel like cleaning them up; since many of them look to Doggy Dog like very chewable dog toys, that meant he stayed in the kitchen. I’m very into the book, but I’m also running on short sleep through the week. I’d only read a couple of pages when my eyelids started to feel droopy. I stretched out and dozed.

A while later, I was jolted awake by the sound of Halmonie trying to get her key to work in the door. As my head cleared, I realised the funny picture we presented; me sacked out on the couch, Baby Dog napping in her crib, Mama Dog asleep in our bedroom, and Doggy Dog twitching his hind leg as he dreamed on the kitchen floor. Each of the house’s four major rooms was occupied by a different member of the family sleeping away the afternoon.

Brolly II

2006-03-25T21:39:00.000-08:00

Perhaps inspired by yesterday’s post – but more likely inspired by the continuing rainfall – Mama Dog spent some time today looking for a new umbrella. “I’ve never had a really good umbrella,” she told me.” I have. Best umbrella I’ve ever had. It was a big wooden-handled item from London Fog. I found it hanging on a bus bench in downtown Oakland one day in 1996. I don’t believe it was raining that day. I looked this way, I looked that. Nobody was around. According to maritime salvage laws (which I believe are recognised as transferable to bus routes), the umbrella was mine for the claiming. It was a great umbrella. Not very compact, but sturdier than any I’d owned before or since. I used to feel like a Secret Service man, escorting Mama Dog with the umbrella over both our heads as she ducked in to the car. All told, I had it for about three years. With a literary inevitability, I left it hanging on a bus bench in downtown Oakland. I hope it’s still ably serving the lucky person who found it.

Brolly

2006-03-24T21:59:00.000-08:00

The last couple of days being mostly dry, I assumed the rain had finally observed my repeated directions to go away and come again in San Jose. I went out this morning without looking at the weather icon in the newspaper, and consequently I didn’t think to wear my raincoat. When I emerged from the office in the afternoon to grab a slice of pizza, I was chagrined to find that there was a light but insistent downpour. I fortunately only had a block to go for lunch, but still I got quite damp on the way, and my recently shorn hair did little to keep the water off my face.

When it was time to leave for the day, I managed to come up with an old and long-neglected workhorse; the Emergency Work Umbrella. It’s been sitting under my desk for so long I’ve forgotten where it came from. I think it might have been left behind by my predecessor in 1997. I don’t recall the last time I used it; the raincoat is so effective that I rarely need an umbrella. Any storm big enough to get me wet in that raincoat would also come with gale winds strong enough to swoop me off like Mary Poppins if I opened an umbrella.

Once outside, it was clear that I’d need the protection. Again, the rain was light but pervasive, like a shower head set to a really fine spray. The umbrella was small and old, but I thought it would be up to the task. I popped it open and heard a peculiar clatter as bits of plastic from the handle dropped immediately to the sidewalk. The handle stayed on, and the parasol went up. There spokes were crooked and there were tiny little holes at their edges. Some water made it through, but for the most part I stayed dry. It would last to the BART station. Once safely underground, I folded up the umbrella and another bit of plastic fell off the handle.

Mama Dog had assured me that it wasn’t raining in the East Bay, but as I emerged from the BART parking lot, it started to spray again. I opened old Dobbin once more, and again another piece popped off. I tried to make myself narrower so as to fit in the space that seemed driest. Thankfully, there was no wind, as the umbrella was looking flimsier every time I glanced at it. I could just see the top popping off in a stiff breeze.

When I made it home, mostly dry, I knew the time had come to put the work umbrella out to pasture. For one thing, the button that opens it was one of the little plastic things that had fallen off on the way home. For another, the remains of the handle were now composed of sharp little edges just waiting to serrate an unwary hand. Give it to the umbrella, though…it held itself together through one last rainfall. The little umbrella that could.

Quick Post, Then I’m Finally Going to Watch the Season Finale of The Shield

2006-03-23T22:01:00.000-08:00

I don’t think I’ve ever done this before; I totally forgot I had a doctor’s appointment today. Didn’t find out until Mama Dog called and said there was a reminder message on our home voice mail. My fault for not writing the thing down in my Filofax and then never looking at my Filofax even if I did write it down, but still – what’s the point of giving me a reminder call on the day of the appointment? I was all the way across the Bay with nobody to cover for me at work. I couldn’t have made it even if I’d heard the reminder first thing in the morning.

In other news: Baby Dog has taken to making incomplete clapping motions when she gets really happy or excited. Sometimes she does it one-handed. And yes, I did call it the sound of one hand clapping.

Another Smooth Commute Day

2006-03-22T11:28:00.000-08:00

Worst commute in a while this morning. Got to Rockridge not much later than usual. There was a crowd milling about the Station Agent Hut. Ordinarily that would attract my interest, but I had other things on my mind, so I went through the fare gates, up the escalator, and onto the – mostly empty platform. Mostly empty? That’s odd. The few people on the platform were all talking on cell phones. I looked at the overhead signs and saw a message flashing to the effect that West Oakland station was shut down due to police activity, and that there was no service to San Francisco. Lovely.

I pulled out my own cell and called Mama Dog. She had heard about it on the radio, but had no further information than I did. Less, in fact; she’d only heard that trains weren’t stopping in West Oak, not that service to SF was curtailed entirely. I wandered down to the station level and heard a bit of what the station agent was telling the milling crowds. Bus service was going to be set up in downtown Oakland. I stopped to ponder. I’ve been through situations like this before. It always seems that right when they finally get the bus service working, the train service resumes. Best to sit tight. I went back up to the platform and heard an announcement saying that bus service would be running from 19th Street station, and we should all take the next Fremont train there. That seemed as good a plan as any to me; I was leery of getting on a bus, but the Fremont train would at least get me two stations closer to San Francisco.

After a few minutes, a train showed up showing San Francisco as its destination. No telling what that actually meant, but I got on it anyway. The train operator was making announcements, but as is usual on a BART train, they were inaudible. I wandered from car to car, hoping to find one with the speakers turned up louder, but they were all a fuzzy little whisper. At the last car, I managed to stand under a speaker and by standing on tiptoe I could discern most of what the operator was saying. It was the same information over again; police activity in West Oak, no service to SF, buses from downtown. The only difference was that she was saying buses would be at 12th Street station (where the train was destined to go out of service), not 19th; good enough, that’s even one more stop closer. The train stopped and started, apparently bent on stretching the five-minute ride to MacArthur to infinity.

I noticed a woman with what looked like a walkie talkie standing at the end of the car, an ear to the speaker by the white phone to the train operator. She set down her bag and pulled out a reflective vest. BART employee. She announced the same information I had just re-heard, and her voice was if anything quieter than the crappy speakers. She walked up and down the car, whispering to the people she passed that West Oakland station was closed due to police activity, that there was no service to San Francisco, that the train would go out of service at 12th Street, and that there would be buses there to San Francisco. At least, that’s what I think she was saying. I could only make out scattered words as she passed by.

Somebody asked if she knew what the problem was in West Oakland. “The station’s closed due to police activity,” she said with a strange note of definitiveness. Like she honestly thought that repeating that vague pronouncement answered the question. Here’s a thing I don’t get – it’s like on 24 or any movie or show about terrorist threats or asteroids from outer space or whatever – the first instinct of Authority is to keep the public in the dark so as to avoid Mass Panic. But what possible harm is there in telling a train full of people what precisely it is that’s fucking with their morning commute? Do they think we’ll riot in the cars? Smash windows and loot one another? It really would be helpful to know whether the problem is a vagrant urinating on the third rail vs. a bomb leaving a smouldering crater where the platform should be. Like, it might make a difference to my plans for the rest of the day. Why not tell me?

As we lurched along, another passenger asked nobody in particular, “What’s the next station?” We’d been lurching along so long I’d quite forgotten, and judging from the blank looks around, so had everybody else. I looked out the window and got my bearings. Oh, right. We still haven’t made it one stop to MacArthur. The station agent announced then that the train wouldn’t be going to 12th Street after all. It was going out of service at MacArthur. Due to police activity at West Oakland. Etc.

When in the fullness of time the train finally limped into MacArthur station, we off-boarded onto an already full platform. I couldn’t guess how many trains had already emptied out here. I pulled out my cell and called Mama Dog, who took a look at SF Gate. Bomb scare at West Oakland, it said. No further information. Okay, then. I’d rather not go through a station with a bomb scare. See what I mean? Having just a little clue about the circumstances helps me plan the rest of my day.

Unlike the train speakers, the platform speakers are nice and loud. Even with the babble of several trains’ worth of people yammering on cell phones, the next announcement was clearly audible: “Bus service to San Francisco is beginning now.” Audible, yes; helpful, not really. These buses are to be found where? Last I heard, they were supposed to be at 12th Street. Do I still have to wait for a train? Or are they waiting outside for me? Most of the crowd seemed to think the latter; they started filing down the stairs to the station level. I was torn. Yes, I did want to avoid going through the Bomb Threat Station, but I also wanted to avoid being packed into a sardine bus. There looked to be a very long line ahead of me. I hesitated just long enough to hear the next announcement:

“The police activity at West Oakland station has been resolved, and service to San Francisco is resuming immediately.” True to form. Refer back to the second paragraph of this post. The bit about “I’ve been in situations like this before.” I looked back down the tracks toward Rockridge and saw two trains sitting there trying to decide which direction to go. Then the direction signs on the platform lit up: “10 car train to San Francisco” on Platform 4. I shoved through the crowd and made my way to the end of the platform. The crowd was sparser there and, miraculously, almost nobody was forming a line at the entry points. Everybody was standing around in clumps looking at their Boysenberries and talking on their cell phones. I stepped up to the rearmost entry point and was third in line. Since the approaching train was sure to be empty that meant the happiest news of the day: I was for once going to get to sit down on my morning commute.

The train pulled into the station, and the doors opened on an empty car. Not only did I get to sit down, but I got to site down on the seat next to the wheelchair area, the one with all the legroom. I pulled out my book and commenced to ignore the rest of the world. I barely even noticed when we passed through the Bomb Station. I arrived at work only an hour later and entirely unexploded. The bomb scare was evidently some idjit’s idea of a joke. And so begins another day.

Today, Staccato

2006-03-21T22:11:00.000-08:00

The plumber came to find out why our laundry sink backed up this weekend. He reamed the main line. Turns out there were tree roots growing into the underground line to the sewer. Short term: stuff’s working now. Long-term: it’s costing money.

Halmonie watched Baby Dog when I went out to get a haircut. I came back shorn to a quarter-inch. When I came in the door, Baby Dog turned around and stared, wide-eyed. “…Mummy?” she ventured uncertainly. She knew the person at the door had to be one of her parents, though it didn’t look like either one; something was just plain wrong. “Daddy got a haircut,” I said, and knelt down. “Remember we went to the barber once? Daddy has a fuzzy head now. Pat Daddy’s head.” She did that, and giggled. “Daddy!” she decided.

We went to Cody’s to get presents for Papa Pirate, whose birthday was today and Babies Whippet and Funkadelic who were born less than a week apart and are having a joint first birthday celebration this weekend. Papa Pirate got a book on birthday cakes. The babies are each getting the board book version of The Grouchy Ladybug, but don’t tell them that.

And All that Bumpf

2006-03-20T17:23:00.000-08:00

Stop me if I told this story a couple of years ago....

Something reminded me of J today. She was the office manager at the place I worked at in Vancouver, a tiny little public information office in the Provincial government. There were only three of us; D the executive director, J the office manager, and me the secretary. It was possibly the slackest job I’ve ever had, and I’ve had some slack ones. I’d arrive bright and early to open up the place, then J would come in and look at her mail, and then around 9 D would show up, toss her coat and bag in her office, then spend the first hour or so of the working day briefing me on what all I’d missed because I didn’t have a TV set. This was the early 90s, and it’s because of D that I know Kathie Lee Gifford’s son’s name is Cody. This information has not stood me in particularly good stead, but it was duly acquired in service of the Province of British Columbia. D also liked to tell me all about Murphy Brown, with whom she identified strongly though she was a good deal younger. She told me I was her Eldin. It would be a few years before I really understood what that meant, and I ultimately chose to take is as a compliment.

J was a dotty older lady of the type being mocked at that time by the Kids in the Hall (and at an earlier time by Monty Python). She was impossibly cheerful and unfailingly dim, good-hearted to a fault and secretly filled with simmering resentments. She drew from an idiosyncratic lexicon, and had certain particular verbal tics that drove D crazy. For D’s amusement I started compiling a list of J-isms, and I sure wish I had that list with me today. One that comes to mind is “and all that bumpf.” Usage examples: “If you have time this afternoon, can you re-sort the brochures and all that bumpf?” “No, I didn’t do much over the weekend, just gardening and all that bumpf.” “Time to change the toner cartridge and all that bumpf.” In other words, there is no proper usage; it’s just some extra noise tacked on to the end of any sentence, like “y’know?” only odder.

One thing about J I recall with fondness is her devotion to the ritual of tea. Twice a day, promptly at 10:30 and 3:30, she would emerge from her office with a tray laden with teapot, sugar, milk, and cookies, and whatever pretence of work was then underway would screech to a halt while we had a thoroughly civilised tea break. In the unlikely event that someone from the outside world happened upon the office just then, they’d have surely been invited to join us. J, whose passion at home was the cultivation of orchids, really should have been the resident dotty old lady in a quaint English village in the 1950s, maybe in an Ealing comedy. How she ended up managing and office that did next to nothing I have no idea. Tax dollars at work and blogfodder many years later.

Briefly (Again)

2006-03-19T22:17:00.000-08:00

Supper tonight was with N&C at Café Niebaum-Coppola in North Beach. No Francis sightings this time around, but the service was excellent and the food was really good, particularly dessert. Chocolate torte for me, panna cotta for Mama Dog (on account of they were out of the tartufo). Baby Dog was home being babysat by Halmonie, which was a shame since N&C haven’t seen her since she was teeny. Maybe next time.

Enid Blyton (Briefly)

2006-03-18T22:25:00.000-08:00

One odd thing that Mama Dog and I have in common is that we both read a lot of Enid Blyton when we were little. Anybody else have a store of Enid Blyton memories? I’d tell some of my own, but I’m practically asleep at the keyboard.