Digital Alphabet Soup

Granted, it is my hope that both boys excel in reading and have a love of learning. We read to them most every night and take every opportunity to teach them letters, numbers, etc.

So... the morning I'm waking up after seeing Motorhead and Heaven & Hell (Dio-era Black Sabbath) I hear Irene say "Joey, are you eating the keys from Daddy's computer?"

Today Joe-bro decided to get his first solo study in the alphabet when he pulled off about half-a-dozen keys of my iBook keyboard and proceeded to chew up two of them.

After screaming, spanking, and delicate surgery to repair the damage his two year-old fingers to my 6 year-old computer... everything is ok. So the 'G' key and the right command key have some character marks now. The computer itself is still quite functional, but a little worse for the wear.

So my question now is do I keep the keys as they are to remind me that all the work I do is for my family... or do I cash in his college fund to by a new Macbook?

Very tricky, my son

Milo asked, "Mommy, can I watch Spongebob?" I told him to ask his dad.

Milo then went to his dad, and asked, "Daddy, can I watch Spongebob? And you can't say 'no' because it's a bad word, so you have to say 'yes.'"

Tricky...

Milo asks "Why?"

Mark burned the Boomtown Rats' "The Fine Art of Surfacing," which we listened to in the car today, both to and from school.

On an unexpected trip to the store, we were playing the song "I Don't Like Mondays" and I offered that I thought Tori Amos' version was better, blah, blah-

The we heard the little singing voice of Milo:

"Tell me why, I don't like Mommy. Tell me why, I don't like Mommy."

It was so sweet, his sad little voice.

Mark and I nearly peed our pants.

Father of the year at the gas station

So on Saturday we stopped at the neighborhood gas station to fill up the car and get a wash after our big trip to Colorado. A couple of funny things happened. #1 - While I was filling up Milo asked if he could help. Not wanting to have to chase him around the pumps while Joey potentially cried, I opted to open Milo's door and let him hold Daddy's keys while I filled up instead.

As the tank was filling I heard a 'beep' from the car and I figured it was just Milo touching one of the buttons on the key remote. It wasn't until I shut Milo's door that I realized that the 'beep' was Milo engaging the lock on the door. So there I was, both kids locked in the car with the keys inside... and me on the outside.

Fortunately I've always let Milo lock and unlock the doors with the car remote. We have fun with it. Milo hits the button and I say 'the car farted' when the horn honks. This came in pretty handy. However, it did require me stand there and yell "Milo, make the car fart" through the window. He eventually hit the correct button and all was well.

The second funny thing.. we've certainly taken our trips through automated car washes. The odd thing this time was that Joey became terrified of the sprayer and screamed in horror each time it went by. I was able to calm him down, but it was hard not to laugh a bit.