Wednesday, May 21, 2008

This Just In ...

... from this month's issue of National Geographic. There's a cute and colorful chart showing the top 50 most-translated authors of all time. Care to hazard a guess as to who's the Number One (besides the Bible)? Leave a guess in the Comments section and I'll post the answer in a day or two.

Oh, and I knew I was forgetting something last night in the Calama-line post. Act IV: Caroline spies another parents observing the taekwondo class from outside the door. In fact, he's standing next to us. He has an impressive lower-torso protuberance, i.e. a LARGE beer gut. She points, and asks -- and the child does not mumble -- "Mommy, what's in his tummy?" Arghhhh! I 'm like lightning, down on the floor next to her, whispering in her ear, "FOOD, and shhh!" She looks at me in bewilderment, probably expecting to hear "a watermelon" or some such thing, and clearly unsatisfied with my answer, but I immediately start chattering brightly about something going on inside the class, and avoid eye contact with said parent for the duration.

Eliza finally had her coveted sleepover last night, with her best friend Rhynn. They're quite a pair, Rhynn with a precocious imagination and Eliza with her gullible loyalty ("Rhynn has a SECRET WORLD, Mama. Acacia said it was her imagination but she's WRONG."). If Rhynn ever runs for office, Eliza's going to be her campaign manager. Rhynn will make all sorts of wild claims to the voters, and Eliza will look straight into the camera and swear up and down that the candidate is NOT making this up. So anyway, everything went quite well, and I have to admit, it was both weird and ... bad-mommy-points, about to be awarded to me ... kind of, um, peaceful this morning, to just have the other two. We all slept in a bit. After breakfast tacos, during which the phone kept ringing every two minutes and we didn't get our customary reading time, Ian and Caroline decided they were going to have a Reading Festival in Ian's room, and went off hand in hand (literally). Amazing. When I went in there later they were both sprawled out with books, and Caroline informed me that she was reading Little Engine That Could TO Ian. It is sooo interesting, and I say this with complete neutrality, how removing one child from the equation changes the whole dynamic sometimes.

Just for a couple hours, of course.

5 comments:

Jenny said...

First, my guess is...Dr. Seuss?

Sleepovers must be "in the air". LOL

I can help with the blog makeover anytime after June 3. LOL

nicole said...

plato?

Unknown said...

Hahah, you told her that FOOD was in his belly. Hah, not sure why that cracks me up. I'm trying to imagine what I would tell my little one if I was in that position...

Tracee said...

No guesses..I will look it up in a minute...but that is so cute about Ian and Caroline together! The dynamic here changes drastically when we have only 2 around also. Doesn't matter which two, it changes. Of course, it changes for the Better (yes I'm trying to cheat you out of the bad mommy award, LOL) if either of the littles is gone. If Philip is gone, I'm up a creek w/out a paddle. He is quite the peace keeper around here, for the most part.

Anne said...

My guess is Shakespeare. Is there a prize? :-)