Livingston, I Presume

Make someone happy

I'm never going to please everyone with my rants on the state of the world, but I can recommend some light reading that might brighten your day a little, particularly if you are a parent. Looky Daddy is holding Contest the Fourth for creative parental songwriting:

The rules are simple. Take a well-known children's song, a tune we all recognize, and devise your own lyrics.

Here's a concise ditty from The Dad to give you an example:

Potty Training at My House (Row, Row, Row Your Boat)

Sit, sit, sit for hours
Sit and pout and slouch
Then jump up and run top speed
To poop behind the couch

Apparently he has been time traveling to my house circa September 2006.

Entries are in the comments, and there are some very funny offerings. I even threw my (rashy) hat in the ring.

Enjoy!

Bad mommy blogger

I am already at seven minutes over Connery's normal naptime, so I'm tempting fate severely, but I did want to at least acknowledge my continued blog existence. I've been working hard on several stories and have not felt like forming any more sentences than I had to. (You can tell from that oh-so-graceful construction that in reality I've been sparing you from awkward prose.)

Besides, what is there to blog about these days? It's not as if there's an important campaign going on or any key debates in our nation's capital. I mean, it would be one thing if people were rioting in Hungary or there had been a coup in Thailand.

Thank heavens there's nothing like that afoot.

Worth a look

An old friend of mine from college has recently moved to Jerusalem for intensive Hebrew language studies in preparation for rabbinical school in Germany next fall. He's been blogging about his experiences, and I'm really enjoying the read. Today he posted about the ordination of Germany's first rabbis since the Holocaust. I first read about the story in an Associated Press article and immediately wanted to send it to Paul. When I went to his site, I found his own thoughts on this milestone, as well as a very impressive translation that he did from an article in Die Zeit that highlights one of the three men who is to be ordained, a Czech.

I've never considered myself to be a conventionally religious person, but I really enjoy reading about issues of faith as presented by deeply religious and thoughtful people. I guess the key in that sentence is thoughtful. There's nothing blind or rote about what I read on Paul's blog, and for that I'm grateful.

Something there is that doesn't love my blog...

My first post of the second or third time I've tried to start a blog was just eaten by Typepad. Previous posting attempts have been eaten by iBlog and blogspot. I'm just going to keep moving through the software out there until I find one that works. Or perhaps I just need to stop writing such tasty, tasty posts.

Anyway, here it is. I've started a Mommy Blog. And I know it's sooooooooo mid-2004 to have a Mommy Blog, on top of the fact that everyone in the world except me already has a blog (though most haven't updated it since April 22, 2003). Just call me late to the party.

It's Day 4 of The Raging Headcold From Hell, which I am sharing with my mother, even though we live some 200 miles apart. Today I have started cataloguing the various advantages to having TRHcFH, and at the top of the list is changing the diaper pail. Normally, emptying the Diaper Champ involves an elaborate three-step process, all done while holding my breath. First, I must--at great risk to my delicate fingertip flesh--open the pail using the patented FingerScraperLever. Then, after removing the interior trash bag, I must race about the house carrying said bag and emptying the contents of various tiny tiny trash cans into the bag so as to avoid wasting trash bag and therefore landfill space. Finally, it's time to tie up the trash bag and pour copious quantities of baking soda into the new bag to prepare for the next cycle. Please understand that I am asthmatic, so doing all of this while holding my breath can be quite challenging. But not today. Oh no. Today, I was all about the leisurely emptying. I can't smell a thing. Hooray! One scary thing is that I used some Glade air freshener in the can and *could* smell it. Now that's scary. What the hell do they put in Glade that I can't smell blueberry-and-bran diaper death but I can smell country flower blend?

Connery is learning the difference between work and play. Several times a day he announces to us, "I'm going to work now." We tell him to have a nice day, and he walks away and then comes back a few minutes later. We ask him if he processed a lot of files or interviewed any interesting people. He seems to like "talking to customers." After breakfast, he informed me it was time to play. "You come play with me, Mommy." So I sat down, and he got out his tools. Tapping me with the hammer he said, "Fix, fix! I fix you, Mommy."

Perhaps I should get him to work on my nose.