Obama Is One Cool Cat

A neat photo, courtesy Reuters:

Speaking of Obama, Ryan and I had the following conversation a few days ago:

Ryan: Change! Yes we can!

Stephen: Oh, you’re voting for Obama now?

No, daddy. Change my diaper. Yes we can!

Sebastian Has A Broken Computer

Sebastian calls me up this morning to ask me about drive recovery, because the hard drive in his desktop failed spectacularly over the weekend. We discuss various options and eventually decide the best thing is to just go out and buy a new hard drive.

We got a little off-topic.

Stephen: So what I’d do is get a new drive, and maybe an external firewire drive to use for backups.

Sebastian: Ok, sounds good.

Good luck with that. I’m going to go get some breakfast even though the dentist explicitly told me not to eat anything solid.

Ooh, maybe you should get a milkshake instead.

And a second one as a backup.

Maybe a USB sundae.

(nerdy Homestar Runner voice) Excuse me, do you have any VGA-compatible hash browns? My stomach is not DVI compliant.

I always get the firewire stuck in my teeth.

I don’t know why, but whenever I talk to my brothers the conversations always wind up with rapid-fire jokes. Crazy.

Da-dee

Ryan’s understood a lot of English for a while now, but he’s been pretty adamant about not speaking it. You can ask him to point out certain things (“Where’s the couch? Where’s your hair? Where’s daddy’s nose?”) and it sometimes surprises me that he knows almost every word I’ve thrown at him. The only ones that really confuse him (and we’re still working on these) are the ones that require fine distinctions, like ‘whore’ versus ‘slut’, or ‘beer’ versus ‘watered down piss called Budweiser’.

I’m kidding! He really just gets confused when you ask him about his knees or elbows — right now he thinks they’re synonyms for leg and arm. He also gets confused about carpet versus rug versus floor. Normal stuff, considering that there’s qualities shared between them and there’s only a limited number of examples in the house I can point out to him.

Recently, though, he’s been starting to say more and more words the best he can. He’ll say ‘ma-mo’ when he points to Elmo, his little sister Alyssa is ‘ee-aah’, please is ‘dee’, that sort of thing. He’s been pretty consistent about them, and a few of them are starting to become more well-formed. Sometimes, I can tell that he knows what he’s trying to say, but I haven’t figured it out yet.

Which is interesting, you know. I didn’t realize that, as an adult, I’d have to learn English again.

So I’m getting Ryan ready for the day, and he indicates (by trying to leap out of my arms) that he wants to go over and say good morning to his “buddies” — a large wall decoration featuring the Sesame Street characters. So we lumber over there:

Stephen: Say ‘Good morning, Elmo!’

Ryan: Ma-mo!

Good morning, Cookie Monster!

Ke-ke!

Good morning, Oscar the Grouch!

Da-dee!

A pause.

No, say ‘Oscar the Grouch!’

Da-dee! Da-dee da-dee da-dee!

Like I said, he’s a pretty sharp kid.

A conversation with Sean

Sean and I are discussing the horrible static sound that my cell phone produces whenever someone attempts to call it, or when I try to speak into it, or when I carry it around in my pocket.

Sean: What was that? It sounded like a game of ping-pong. (making paddle noises) Wiksh! TIK wisch WIKSH! Tik tik tik WIKSH!

Stephen: Well, I’m parked in front of a large concrete building, so it’s probably a dead zone. Or, my cell phone sucks.

Ah HAH! You know, Stephen, the first step in admitting you have a problem is.. uh.. thinking about whether or not you have a problem.

Always a fine report from Sean.