I was reminded, this morning, of the old Saturday Night Live skit where they said “You can pick your nose, and you can pick your friends, but you can’t pick your friends’ nose,” a maxim with which Eliza is clearly unfamiliar.

Since my last post on the subject, she now demands that we “Kuh!” every night before she falls asleep, and every morning when I enter her room. Nights, she falls asleep in my arms, but mornings are less predictable. Sometimes, she fidgets and twitches until I give up and get up, other times she nestles in a goes to sleep.

This morning, she stretched her arms up to me as usual and we setted into the bed together. She nestled in, looked up, and stuck her finger up one of my nostrils.

I pulled it out, and she stuck it in again. She wasn’t doing it to be funny or clever, and she didn’t even get cranky when I removed it. She just really thought there should be a finger in that hole, because she persisted until we both fell asleep. We may, in fact, have fallen asleep with one of her fingers up my nose.

***

Words that are more fun when spoken by a 16-month-old:
Filthy — Fiwfy!
Clown — Kwan!
Crack — Cwap!
Cool — Koow!
Sad — Shad!
Happy — Heppy!
Crash — Kwash!
Dude — Doot!

***

Eliza has a chore; she has to give the kitties their treats in the evening.

I hand her the opened can and she digs out a tweet! as the cats slither around her. “Moh-SEE!” she says to Moe, trying to get her attention before hurling a treat onto the ground. “Bah!” she says to Barney. When he doesn’t pay attention, she makes that little tongue-clicking tsk tsk noise that you instinctly learn to make to get cats’ attention. When he comes over, she holds out her open hand with the treat on it, and he nips it off her palm. It tickles, and she laughs, and then she gives him another one.

***

New animal noise:

“Eliza, what sound does a tiger make?”

“Wraaaaw!”

***

The other day while we were outside and Eliza was sitting in her plastic bubble car toy, one of our neighbors came over to ask me a question. I had to run into the kitchen for a second to get her a piece of information, so I asked her to make sure Eliza didn’t go into the street.

Ten seconds later, when I came out again, I saw my neighbor looking bemused as she pushed Eliza down the sidewalk in her car toy. I thanked her and told her she didn’t have to do that.

“Oh, she told me to,” said our neighbor as she shook off the remains of the Eliza Imperative Tense Brainwashing.

***

We went to the Big E, a big local multi-state fair thingie, with S and T. S and Eliza are clearly becoming fast friends. As we were getting getting, Eliza walked over to S. and tried to kiss her. They were more air-kisses but still, we all just about fell over from the cuteness.

They also thought it was hysterical to be sharing the backseat and cackled much of the way there and back.

***

Independently of each other, Jim and I started kissing Eliza when she hurt herself, and she really likes this.

Now, whenever she falls or stubs a toe or smacks a knee, she runs over, says, “Keeess! Keess!” and offers up the offended body part for treatment. It’s funny enough when she sticks the top of her head in your face, but it’s even better when she tries to stick a foot or a knee in the air.

Injuries are referred to variously as “Bok! (Bonk)” “Boo-boo!” or “Ting! (Ding)”.

Four years ago today, Jim and I said our vows.

When I walked up the aisle, I was really, really excited to be getting the show on the road. Everything about the day thrilled me, from the weather to my dress to, mostly especially, my honey standing at the front of the tent waiting for me.

So I kind of booked it. When I was almost there, though, the random thought popped into my head that I had paid $300 for these two cellists who were sawing away at a lovely version of Handel’s Water Music, and I really wanted to get my money’s worth.

Vamp! I thought. Uh, except how does one do that at a wedding? Oh, here’s Jim’s Mom. I’ll kiss her, that seems like a nice gesture. Hey! And then I can also kiss Jim’s dad and step-mom, thereby extending the walk even more. Oooh! And can’t forget Mom and Steve, of course. Whee! Kisses for all my friends!!

Finally, I get to the front. Oh, Hi, Honey, I said, and gave Jim a big kiss.

Apparently, you should not get carried away with the smooching at your wedding until after the ceremony, because I caused quite the stir among some of the more traditional elements when I did this, because, you know, now I was unclean and all, kissing the groom before the vows were spoken. And Jim and I had no previous carnal knowledge of each other at ALL, no, no, no, because we had remained completely chaste for the previous 7 years, and also, when we lived together, we TOTALLY had separate bedrooms.

Anyway. If I had it to do over again, I would do exactly the same thing because a. I’d probably get carried away again and b. why wouldn’t I smooch the sweetest, funniest, most patient, most awesome dad-being, man I know?

Happy number four, honey!

When we returned from the wedding last week, the cats were acting really odd. Then Jim pointed out these funky little brown things on the bookcase. Because I come from a culture that refers to chocolate jimmies as “mouse poops”*, I instantly recognized them for what they were.

I have all that extra testosterone floating around my body since I quit karate, so I decided to take on the mouse, mano a mano. I somewhat damaged my credibility as a nemesis, though, when I caught sight of the mouse and shrieked, “Omigod honey, it’s so cute!”

Anyway, Barney was all, “Clear the way girls, I’ma catch me a varmint,” and hunkered down by the entertainment center where Mousie had stashed itself to wait it out. The mouse made an ill-advised break for freedom and ended up behind an end table. I tried to lure it into a paper bag with some bread, but that did not work, and then Barney grabbed it and carried it around for a while, with me trying to keep up. Because he’s a. a cat and b. sort of an idiot, he kept dropping it and picking it up again, and then running with it into a different room while Moe ran along behind going, “Hey, what’re we doing now? Can I play? Huh? Huh?” Moe catches mice the way I play basketball, about which more another time.

Meanwhile, Jim and Eliza were trying to stay clear. “Keep the baby away from the hanta virus carrier, dammit!” I seem to remember yelling at Jim at one point. What can I say, I got a little carried away.

Anyway, several trips up and down the stairs later, Barney dropped the mouse on the living room rug, and in the ensuing melee (Barney: “Check me out, I am THE MAN!” Moe: “Wait, WHAT are we doing?” Me: “Shitshitshit!!!! Don’t kill it don’t kill it don’t let it poop on the rug!”), the mouse ended up behind one of the speakers, which was in a corner.

Moe, in her one display of usefulness, sat on one side of the speaker. I waited on the other. I nudged the speaker over far enough so Moe and the mouse could see each other, and it worked - the mouse ran away from Moe, right in front of me, and I slammed the Tupperware down over top of it. (I had the Tupperware because when my friend A. had a cat-mouse situation in her house a couple of years ago, she used a Tupperware to trap the mouse, and in the heat of the moment, all I could think was “Tupperware! I must have Tupperware for successful mouse-trapping!”)

Anyway, I had the mouse, and yelled for Jim, who had wisely removed himself and Eliza outdoors, away from the swearing and the disease carrier.

He brought a pad of paper to slide under the Tupperware so I could carry the mouse outside and release it into the wild, also known as the neighbors’ yard.
___

*Belgium. And it is a sign of how committed we are as a country to our chocolate that this doesn’t put us off our food AT ALL.

How I self-medicated my cold last night:

a lot of broccoli
some celery sticks
some carrots
can of chicken broth
whole milk
package of cheese (I used cheddar and monterey jack)

Cut up veggies and throw in pot with broth, setting aside a handful of broccoli florets, uncooked, for later.
Boil until everything is tender.
Use handy dandy soup-masher-upper-stick-thingie to blend veggies into unrecognizable light green pulp (use a blender if you don’t have the stick thingie)
Pour in some milk (start with a cup) and some of the cheese. Blend some more.
Add rest of cheese and enough milk so it’s actually a liquid.
Add uncooked florets.
Simmer on very low while you go do other stuff until you think, Ye gads, I forgot my soup! Or 15 minutes, whatever.
Pour into bowl, eat.

UPDATED: I forgot to add: If you want, add some rosemary in with the veggies, and some salt and pepper to taste.

And healthy? I don’t know. It kind of seemed like alfredo, only less liquid, to me. But tasty is for sure.

In response to the harrassment from one Grandma Texas and one Auntie Johanna, some baby cuteness.

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