Embedded Files
In October, I got a job at the Army Research Lab near DC, so no more going back and forth to Ohio. The ARL is within minutes of the University of MD. I've really enjoyed the trips to Europe for conferences (part of my PhD work). I also finished the book I've been writing for the last few years, about artificially intelligent creative machines before 1900 (yeah, it's a short book).
This year we filled out the paperwork so that we could transfer our home to the Newfoundland time zone for the winter. It means a little trouble changing our watches every time we go in or out of the house, but I get to sleep in until 5:30 (traffic), Daniel doesn't need to get to school until 10, and we have an extra hour of light in the afternoons.
Lesli was in the running for most weird diagnoses, but some jerk with Kleinfelter's and retrograde amnesia won this year. (Lesli was newly diagnosed with Psuedo Cerebri Tumor, Sjogren's Syndrome, Barrett's Esophagus, and Venous Sinous Stenosis (severe narrowing of two major veins on either side of her brain) this year.)
Daniel (8) is in chess club, but he objects to being forced to actually play games instead of just studying it in the abstract.
-Doug
Anecdotes
December 2009
Lesli- Do you want to go sledding with Poppy?
Daniel- Not right now. I want to rest a little.
Rest in peace.
Lesli to Daniel- Finish your sandwich and I'll give you a treat.
Doug- Do you have any ice cream?
Lesli- No.
Doug- Then how are you going to get me to do anything?
[Asking Lesli if she was each thing in the 13th article of faith]
Daniel- Are you honest?
Lesli- For the most part.
Daniel- Are you true?
Lesli- Yes.
Daniel- Are you chaste?
Lesli- Yes.
Daniel- I've never seen anyone chase you. You can hardly run!
[Daniel was holding his stuffed animal--Winnie the Pooh]
Lesli- You really love that Pooh, don't you?
Daniel- Yah. I'm glad it didn't come out of my bum.
[Aunt Marti, her kids, their dogs and guinea pigs had come over to visit]
Doug [family prayers]- Dear Heavenly Father, thank you that we could have everyone over, [pause] and their dogs.
Uncle Steve- Oh great! Christmas is over! I can say butt again! I can call my children butts!
Daniel- I had an eraser shaped like a 50 dollar bill, but it broke in half. Now it's two 25 dollar bills.
January 2010
Doctor to Lesli during lumbar puncture procedure to test cerebral-spinal fluid pressure-- 'Try to relax. Pretend you're at the beach, [pause] with a needle sticking out of your back.'
Daniel- Is there such a thing as Penguin day?
Lesli- No. Why?
Daniel- Well--there's a Groundhog day.
February
This morning Daniel's voice was gravelly. He asked why and I said it was probably post nasal drip from lying down and having allergies.
Later, his computer game broke so that all the characters sounded underwater and gravelly.
Lesli- What happened to the sound?
Daniel- I don't know. I think the computer got some yellow drip.
Daniel- [smiling] Maybe she got in a crash!
Lesli- Don't say that! It isn't funny.
Daniel- It is if you smile when you say it.
Daniel- Where's the golden pig?
Lesli- When you say golden pig, it sounds like something out of Indiana Jones.
Daniel- Indiana Jones doesn't look for golden pigs.
Lesli- Or out of the Bible.
Daniel- Well, maybe in the bible.
March
Daniel- What if there were a movie for kindergartners called 'Harry Potter and the Order of Phonics?'
Daniel- Poppy, if the library has books, movies and CD's, why does it always have posters on the wall persuading us to read, instead of watch or listen?
Daniel singing while playing Lego Star Wars:
"I'm a little droid,
short and stout.
Here is my handle,
here is my spout."
April
[Before Uncle Sean came back east, he hadn't seen Daniel much.]
Lesli- All your aunts and uncles love you.
Daniel- Well, there's Uncle Sean. He doesn't know anything about me --except that I'm real.
Lesli- The rain is making all the living things happy.
Daniel- It's not making me happy.
Lesli- I mean all the plants and stuff.
Daniel- What about the animals that drink it?
Lesli- Yeah, probably its making them happy too.
Daniel- Well, I'm an animal and I drink it, and I'm not happy.
[Sharing a picture book with Doug]
Lesli - Look at the picture for 'Xanthophile.' It's the second to last page in the book.
Doug- Thanks, but I know how alphabet books work.
Lesli- This is an alphabet book?!!
Daniel- People always ask me what play station I have and I say PC and they say they've never heard of it.
May
Daniel- Is there such a thing as a 'hot?' Because there's such thing as a 'cold.'
Merrick [Daniel's then 4 yr old cousin]- Daniel and I are brothers because my Dad is sisters with Lesli.
Doug- I thought I was wrong but I was wrong.
Daniel- A knight acts very boringly. They're like firefighters. Each time the fire alarm for a fire goes off, they jump up and laugh. [It turns out he was playing Mad Libs. I just thought he was being weird. -Doug]
Daniel said, "My thigh really hurts. Do you have to call me Israel now?" (He was referring to a story in the Bible wherein Jacob wrestles with the Lord, and gets wounded in the thigh.) Then we discussed whether or not it was an angel or God that he was wrestling with, and Daniel said it was God and went and got the Bible and told us what chapter and verse to look in.
June
Merrick [excited]- My superhero cat is the greatest superhero ever. He can fly. He can be invisible. He has super speed. He can shoot lightning out of his eyes, and rainbows that kill people.
Doug- Oh yeah? Well, my superhero is the greatest of all possible heroes. His name is ontological man. And he has the power of actually existing.
Merrick- Well my superhero is better, you know why? Because he has's superstrength. He defeated all the cat enemies in the whole world. Even back to Jesus's time, he defeated all the cat enemies ever. He was before Jesus. He was even before God. He created hisself. He even born-ed himself.
Daniel- Poppy, I'll give you my crown of glory, plus a dollar, if you tell me what that Lego thing you made is.
Daniel was trying to come up with words starting with 'ps' and he said, "Psycho Psychic Psychiatrist." I thought that would make a funny TV show. - Lesli
Daniel said the 'Old Bear' Stories [DVD] are so nice they make him cry. I said I wasn't sure what he meant. He said--You know -- cry out of happiness. I think he didn't quite mean that but it was the closest he could come up with. They are very sweet stories.
September
[election day]
Daniel- "You know, it's no use putting signs in your yard saying who you're gonna vote for because of course no one else is going to vote for that same person just because they saw that dumb sign."
Daniel- The supervising hair stylist is the guy I like worst in every movie.
Lesli- You look guilty. What were you doing?
Daniel- I was thinking of a time when I was guilty.
Lesli- What did you do?
Daniel- Which time? There's about a million of them.
Daniel- Guess what I have hidden under the covers?
It's a baby gun.
Lesli- There are no baby guns.
Daniel- See, it rattles. [slightly broken toy gun that made a rattling sound when he shook it]
October
Daniel- Mommy, I have a question.
Do people ever say I have a question when they don't really have a question?
Lesli- Is that your question?
Daniel- Yes.
Lesli- Then the answer is yes because you just did.
Daniel- What's your favorite season?
Doug- I like all the seasons for different reasons, but fall is probably my favorite, because it's not too hot or too cold and the leaves are very pretty and the air smells like something is going to happen.
[Daniel's cousins, Jude and Hermione, 2 and 4 yrs old respectively, at Daniel's birthday party-- talking about Daniel's spinning train toy, with which Jude was smitten]
Jude- I want to buy it.
Hermione- Jude, this is not a store!!
Doug- Lesli has all the classic symptoms of a hypochondriac, except she always ends up actually having the diseases.
Daniel- Third person omniscient is not good for murder mysteries.
Lesli- why?
Daniel- Because if you can hear what the murderer is thinking you'll know who the murderer is.
Heidi [filling out form]- Do I have to list my allergies if I don't know of any?
Sean- Hey, is it before 5 yet?
Lesli- Our pupils get bigger in the dark.
Daniel- But cats pupils don't. They get smaller in the dark.
Lesli- Yes, cat pupils do get bigger. All animals' pupils get larger in the dark.
Daniel- Even llamas?
November
My Cat
by Daniel
I love my Mom.
I love my dad.
I love my aunt Kat
but I love no one more
than I love my cat.
If your wondering wich one
I love them all.
I never not
throw them a ball.
Some of them don't know our call.
but thats ok
as long as they don't get hurt as they drop
and fall.
I just hope their isn't a pet day
to let my cat get lost in the school hall.
I don't think my cats
have ever seen my uncle Paul.
My cats always want
to get out of the wall.
Daniel- I always wish I had something to go back in time so that I could undo mistakes. Permanent mistakes.
Lesli- You haven't made any permanent mistakes yet. I promise. You're too young.
Daniel- Unimportant mistakes, then.
Lesli- What mistakes?
Daniel- It's too hard to explain.
Daniel- Poppy, when people go back in time, how come they don't get younger and younger until they're born and then before they're born and then just go "poof"?
Doug- Here's something to think about-- what year did Adam and Eve live?
[Daniel goes and gets his Bible stories book.]
Daniel- The New Testament starts on page 220, and the story of Adam and Eve is on page 6. So we just need to figure out what plus 6 equals 220 and then we'll know . . . 214 years.
Doug- You're assuming each page covers one year.
Daniel [patiently]- Of course. But they just cover the most interesting thing that happened that year, not all the boring stuff.
Daniel- I lost the pee-pee alarm. Now you have to help me find it.
Doug- Oh no, now we're going to have to pee everywhere in the house until we find it.
Daniel- I don't think that's the best way.
Doug- Well, I guess we could use a squirt bottle.
Lesli- A couple of nights ago there was a full moon.
Daniel- Yeah I remember. It looked like butter that was spread-- like a big thing of butter with a couple of spreads around it.
Lesli- The kitten is evil.
Daniel- Cats can't be evil on purpose. They don't know what evil is.
[Playing word game 'Everyword']
Daniel- You can't have talcs because talc is the plural. There's no such thing as 'talcs.' Just like you can't have 'sugars' because sugar is the plural. [pause] Unless you have more than one kind -- like if you have more than one wife -- then you could say 'sugars' to them.
December 2010
[Doug put on a classical Italian CD]
Daniel- Is this the Will Ferrell overture?
Daniel- Mommy got a new 'Inspector General' DVD.
Lesli- It's from Canada so we can't watch it.
Daniel- Oh--so they're speaking Canadian?
[Watching girl talk about her first proposal in the 1959 movie 'It Happened to Jane'--transcribed by Daniel]
Daniel- My first proposal was in 1st grade.
Mommy [pauses movie]- What do you mean?!
Daniel- Somebody asked me to marry them when we grow up.
Mommy- Who?
Daniel- Caroline somebody.
The same thing happened in kindergarten, except I asked them.
Mommy- Who?
Daniel- Kyra.
Lesli- Go get ready for bed.
Daniel- Ok, ok, OK!
Lesli- Why did you say that third 'OK' in a grouchy manner?
Daniel- That question doesn't have an answer.
-finis-
November 2010
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