Embedded Files
to sum up:
Daniel (10) fifth grade
Douglas (37) twenty-fifth grade
Lesli (38) still sick
our year in retrospect:
(Doug and Daniel are furiously sword-fighting in the living room)
Doug [quotes Shakespeare's Julius Caesar in the middle of a battle]– ‘Cry havoc and let loose the dogs of war!’
Daniel– Isn't haddock a kind of fish? Shouldn't it be ‘Cry haddock and let loose the FISH of war?’
Daniel’s poem–
After my cello
I made some yellow jello
and then I felt
very mellow
then I met king zello
we roasted some marshmellows
we decided to play kello
What a fellow
Daniel [squeaks on cello]
Doug– If they wanted to stop a riot the police could plug into speakers the size of a room and use that note as a weapon.
Daniel– Are we ever going to move away from this house?
Doug– Why? Is there somewhere you want to move?
Daniel– No.
Doug– Is there somewhere you don't want to move?
Daniel– Actually there is. The middle of the ocean.
Elena [5 yr old cousin]– Can I slap you?
Daniel– Uh, no.
On an FBI TV show, two agents are towing a seized 1969 corvette. One of the agents says he wants to drive the 1969 corvette, which he’s never done, and the other replies, “You can ride in the tow truck. It will be a new experience.”
Daniel– It’s not every day that you ride in a tow truck either.
Doug– Well, that’s got to be my favorite car.
Daniel– The tow truck?
Daniel [to Lesli]– I hate being sick. It makes me lie around all day like you.
Daniel– Hey Mommy—have you ever noticed that when you’re not a very good drawer, that when you’re trying to make it look more realistic, you start making it look less realistic.
On Saturday, after the birthday party for Sean—
I gave Kathryn a hug in her car as she was leaving and from the back seat Elena [5 yrs] said, “What am I—carrion?” (She wanted a hug too.) -Lesli
A Monk TV show DVD came in the mail. Lesli– I just got this brand new and look at this!! [points to a little rip on the side of the case]
Daniel– Mommy, what you’re being is written right here [points to the words ‘obsessive compulsive’ on the front of the case]
Daniel [regarding the roadshow he was in]– There’s going to be more than one performance? Just like Broadway!!!
Daniel– I'm 25% chicken nugget, 75% vegetarian.
On a walk in Frederick Municipal forest, I was pointing out the trees and things.
Daniel– Mommy sometimes you seem exactly like a nymph from Greek mythology.
Lesli– What do you mean?
Daniel– They’re the spirits of the trees, plants, creeks and rivers. They were responsible for the beauty of nature.
[I told him that was a very nice birthday present.] -Lesli
Doug [adds Apple Jacks, golden raisins, and milk to his ice cream]– That should be interesting. I've never tried it this way before.
Daniel– And NO ONE ever will AGAIN.
Lesli [for the 7th or 8th time]– Daniel, go turn on the bath!!!
Daniel [playing boardgame Risk instead]– Mommy, I will. Patience is a virtue.
Daniel– I am superior to all my siblings.
Daniel [reading about a survivor camp for troubled teens]– Who would send their child here?
Lesli– What is it?
Daniel– Survivor kid—
survival of the fittest.
Lesli– It’s not really like that.
Daniel– Listen: “No food, no shelter, no fresh water. Alone in the wilderness.
Can you stay alive and make it back to civilization?”
(pause) Well maybe a ‘Hunger Games’ fan would send their child there.
Daniel [taking cat Tabitha's opened canned food downstairs with Tabitha meow whining in pursuit]– I'm like the pied piper of Tabitha.
Daniel's voice floating from another room, "Definition of poop– a raised deck in a ships stern." (I was expecting him to be crass—turns out he was reading a random bit from a book off the bookshelf)
Kathryn coined the phrase ‘imminent bottom’ today. She had a three week old kitten sitting in her lap and
Daniel [playing boardgame]– I get to draw a mission card from the pile.
Doug [singing song from Backyardigans]–
We’re on a mission to Mars,
We’re on a mission to Mars
Blasting into outer space
No idea what we’ll face
We’re going to Mars.
Daniel– How did you remember that?! The last time we watched that show I was 4 years old!
Doug– It’s a jingle. I can remember every jingle I’ve ever heard. It’s the world’s most useless superpower.
Daniel– No, the most useless superpower is being able to go to sleep wherever you want.
Doug– You mean like your Grandpa Stay?
Daniel– Exactly!
Daniel– Mommy, do you want to play 20 Questions?
Lesli– Play it with Daniel.
Daniel– Are you talking to your subconscious?
Lesli told Daniel not to bring legos on the bed. Daniel came onto the bed holding the legos in his hands.
Lesli– Daniel, I told you no legos on the bed.
Daniel– They’re not on the bed. They’re above it.
Daniel [eating graham crackers]– Alexander Graham is dead. He invented the graham cracker a long time ago.
Elora [cousin–in–law 8 yrs]– His descendants are still alive and they have the last name of Graham.
Daniel– How do you know he would have descendants that would keep his last name?
Elora– How do you know he didn't have descendants that would keep his last name?
Daniel– How do you know he had descendants at all?
Elora– To take care of his business.
Daniel– He could just hand his business over to the deputy when he died.
Elora– What if the deputy died the day after that?
Daniel– He would just hand it over to the third in command.
Elora– What if they both died the day after that?
Daniel– That couldn't happen. It would be too much of a coincidence.
Elora– It wouldn't be impossible.
Daniel– Why are we having an argument about Alexander Graham?
Daniel– What does God do with tithing?
Lesli– The church uses it for buildings and stuff.
Daniel–Then why do they say it’s giving it to God?!!
Doug– Well where do you think God gets all the elements to make the worlds out of? He has to buy them.
Doug [in dark as we’re going to sleep]– Now I’m imagining God shopping at the elements store—and it looks just like the Lego store.
[later—from his mattress in dark across room]
Daniel– I was thinking—how do they get the money up there? Do they launch it in a rocket?
Doug [admonitory]– You are aware, Daniel, that God doesn’t live somewhere that we can reach with astronauts?
[Daniel gave Doug a birthday card he chose for him of an old man playing ping pong which reads, ‘Many Happy Returns of the Day’]
Doug– Is that how I look?
Daniel– That's how you look playing ping pong.
Doug– I see. Nice to see I'm aging so well.
Lesli [trying to tell Daniel to do his piano practice]– Daniel—Go spaghetti your feet in the piano!
Daniel [singing to himself]–
My bonny lies about the ocean,
My bonny lies about the sea,
My bonny is basically a complete liar.
Lesli– I don't know why Doug got Daniel that old, plastic robot dinosaur.
Doug– What? It makes perfect sense. Look, if you order things by awesomeness, what are the top 3?
Number 3– Dinosaurs
Number 2– Robots
and Number 1– Robot dinosaurs.
Daniel– Who is Blaine Young?
Doug– He's a politician. Lesli's archenemy.
Daniel– Whoa! He must have beat out a lot of people to get to the top of that list!
Doug– I should ask Owen [works at NASA] where they are sending this hurricane.
Lesli– What?! Doug– Weather control. It's what they do at NASA. Think about it, if they weren't controlling the weather, why would NASA be involved? It doesn't make sense.
Lesli– Do they really?... I don't think... I'm pretty sure they don't call it weather control.
[contributed by Aunt Kelli]
Kelli– Daniel has strep with a rash which is called scarlet fever, but he doesn't have a fever.
Merrick [7 yr cousin]– Oh, so he just has scarlet.
Lesli [as Daniel was getting ready for school]– Stop complaining.
Daniel– I’m not complaining to you, I’m complaining to the all-powerful organizing principle of the universe.
Doug [about Daniel’s Bob the Builder talking stuffed toys]– Bob and Wendy are having a debate up in your room.
Lesli– Go take off whatever is on them or they'll run out of batteries.
Doug– I just kicked them.
Lesli [to Daniel]– I can't believe they still have batteries. You've had them since you were almost a baby.
Daniel– I don't think they run on batteries anymore. I think they've become self-aware.
Daniel–Are you a glass half full person or a glass half empty person?
Lesli– I think that whole thing is silly. I think it's all the same. However, if you're asking whether I'm an optimist or a pessimist, I'll let you decide.
Daniel– I'd say your an opti-pessimist, which means you make the good things seem like bad things and you make the bad things seems like happy things somehow.
Lesli– What kind of a game is it where you can just leave it running and do nothing to get points?
Daniel– An awesome game.
Daniel– I had a dream in the car that I was awake in the car. At least, I think it was a dream. I might have actually been awake in the car.
Daniel– Did you know there's a city in Ireland named Leslynn which is where the name Lesli comes from?
Lesli– Neat.
Daniel– Isn't it funny that your name is Lesli and your Mom's name is Lynn?
Lesli– Yes. So are you saying that in a way I'm named after her?
Daniel– In a way.
Lesli– That's neat. Thanks for telling me that.
Daniel– (Talking to himself upon getting a new high score on angry birds) Ha! I am victorious! Tremble in terror, my former self! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Daniel– ‘Our choir teacher taught us this song- [he sang]
All that singing
Hear it ringing
Earthworms winging
Christmas bringing
and everyone was confused because earthworms don't have anything to do with Christmas.’
I asked him if the teacher really told him ‘earthworms winging’ and Daniel said yes, and that other kids heard it too and I said, ‘Well I know that song and it doesn't have the word earthworms in it so the teacher must have just added that line for some strange reason.’
Daniel– Well, what does it really say?
Lesli– I don't remember, but not 'earthworms winging.'
Daniel– I'll look it up.
He came back and said sheepishly that the line really said 'earthwards winging.'
-end-
Alexandra (3 yrs) ran up and started to plop down on her lap on top of the kitten. Kathryn intercepted her daughter's bottom before it squashed the kitten. It didn't faze the kitten, probably because it didn't understand what could have happened to it, but it got scared a little later when Kathryn yanked it off her shirt.Kathryn– The kitten was more scared of being pulled off my shirt than of the imminent bottom.
Lesli – She's never experienced an imminent bottom before.
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