Green Lawn Mower

So, my bro-in-law Nathan's lawn mower died, which is a problem, because I always borrowed it. Thinking that he was likely to muddle along or borrow his neighbors, I bought a new one. A cordless electric. I am in love. Comparing it to the previous gas mower (not a very old one):

• Power: toss-up. I ran it through 10" wet grass and it did a great job. If it had a few more moments of "woah, too much" than the gas, it made up for it by never stalling.
• Noise: no contest. It sounds like a fan. I can hear Isabelle talking to me in a normal voice, whereas with the gas, if Carrie screamed at the top of her lungs, I got a vague impression that maybe there had been a sound.
• Smell: no contest. All I smell is cut grass.
• Weight: at 77#, it's a little heavier. But it's well balanced and easily maneuvered, and, if I need to actually pick the darn thing up, I pop out the battery, and then it's lighter than the gas.
• Endurance: here the gas probably wins with a big yard. Mine's a 0.1 acre, and it had no trouble. Other have mowed much more, but if you have acres, you might need to mow half now and half tomorrow.
  
• Bonus: no gas can. Never leaks gas. Never have to run for gas. No oil. No spark plug to repair.

Bicycle Adventures

I took Isabelle out for her first ride on her bicycle. Her brilliant father bought her a five-speed, which he can't put training wheels on. But we gave it a try! I warned her, "Nobody learns to ride a bike with falling off and getting hurt once."

Off we went. After half an hour she had more directional control, and a little bit of balance. Woopee. Then just as we decided we were done for the day, the inevitable spill happened.

Isabelle barely scratched her knee. Her father, however, in his effort to keep her upright, tripped over her bike and caught all his weight with his outstretched thumb. I don't think I broke it, but I haven't been in this much pain since I don't know when--probably the time I drove a splinter the size of half a toothpick up under my thumb nail.

Isabelle composed a poem for me:

Bikes crashing,
Babies flying,
Daddies crying.

All Species Day

Isabelle went to All Species Day as a Jaguarundi (Central & South American wildcat):


That's her friend Zella as the black cat:


Notice her stuffed cat, who, for the occasion, put on a "girl costume."



This is some random guy dressed as a N'avi warrior (the guys from Cameron's Avatar), whose picture I couldn't resist taking.


I also had a teacher-moment. There was a young woman there, probably fifteen-sixteen, who looked familiar. It was only after I left that I realized I had last seen her as a little stick of a fifth-grader in my student teaching. I haven't been doing this long enough for that to happen!

Song

Sing to the tune of "Yesterday."

Mania
My daughter's gone insania
Her shrieks would shatter crania
Oh how did she get mania?

Where did my girl go?
I don't know, she won't stand still
But if this goes on
Very long
I'll need a pill.

Isabelle's First Poem

Fat
by Isabelle Helene Rouillard Wightman

Fat Fat
What about Fat?
Bake Fat
Make Fat
Buy Fat
Eat Fat
Cook Fat
Book Fat
Fat is very tasty
People like Fat.

How to play banana

So Isabelle wanted to wrestle, and I wasn't up for so much activity. She proposed a number of variants on wrestle, like "naughty horse," which involves her riding on me and tipping her onto the floor.

Looking for redirection, I said, "Let's play..." and I couldn't come up with anything, so, stalling for time, I said, "Let's play banana."

Frown. "How do you play banana?"

uhh... "You walk along, and then you say, 'woops I slipped on this banana.'"

"Great idea!" she exclaims.

Next thing I know we are playing a game that involves throwing yourself on the floor and blaming it on a piece of fruit.

Have to be quicker, next time.

A Taste of Preteen

I came home today to discover the door to Isabelle's room firmly closed, and a sign on the floor in front of it that said, in big letters:

Doo Not Disdrb

Check this out

Now I might be an infatuated dad, but I've been looking at this boat of Isabelle's for some time, now, and I'll be damned but that boat is coming toward me. It's in 3/4 profile with perspective.

I was somewhat relieved when I found out that she was drawing from another picture, not her imagination, which means we don't have a Mozart-level prodigy on our hands (six year-olds do NOT draw with perspective), but even so, she was able to capture the picture. I'm impressed.

An extended Christmas story

Overheard one morning while Isabelle played with the little wooden creche set:

And then after the angel of the lord appeared to the shepherds, she appeared to the reindeer, and she said, "Guess what? There's going to be a new holiday. And you get to pull the sleigh.

Mix and match, why not? It's an old tradition.

Martinis & Pete Seeger

Am I the only one who gets irritated that the word "martini" is used for every cocktail in those restaurants that don't use the word "margarita" for every cocktail?

This is a martini: gin, a drop of vermouth, and an olive. If you use an onion instead of an olive it's a gibson. If you use scotch instead of gin it's a rob roy.

I suppose, to be open-minded and flexible, I can allow a vodka martini or a sake martini. But the other day I have a drink that was sweet and chocolate-coconut flavored, called a, I don't know what, an "arctic frost martini."

Cocktails are a cultural thing. They are evocative. A party where martinis are served conjures up an image, quite different from a party with margaritas, different from a party with mint juleps or old fashioneds. Even as recently as The Simpsons Bart was commended for his perfect Manhattan. Connecting with history, and doing something very well, have been tossed away for shallow "creativity."

Which brings me to Pete Seeger. He was a folk singer, like thousands of others today. But unlike his descendants crooning in coffeehouses across the country, Seeger didn't write many songs. Mostly he sang old songs. Nowadays, you'd be hard pressed to find one in a thousand folksingers who would admit to singing "Froggy Went A-Courting" at their last concert. Instead, they write their own songs. Twenty years later, a lot of those songs sound pretty dated. But the old ones are still great.

You know what else? Pete Seeger could sing. Bruce Springsteen--while his album was really cool, and a true folk album--sounds like a croaking frog next to the man he honored.

A Story by Isabelle

Isabelle has been writing stories at school. I find her acquisition of writing to be fascinating, so I thought I would share the picture...
and the story, interpreted for those without extensive experience in Kindergarten phonetics:
Many alphabets don't bother with vowels, Isabelle doesn't either sometimes: "wr" for "were" and "trnin" for "turning." I'm also quite intrigued with her use (and inversion) of the "ck" trope: "Kculrs" for "colors" and "wokc" for "walk." She (or should I say "hse") often inverts "sh", although not, apparently "th". Isn't the human mind fascinating?

Ripping Apart the house.

Here is our house. Note the broken retaining wall, and the tilted stairs:

Another View. This piece of the wall has been broken for 20-30 years, but it has been moving, each spring, a little further over the sidewalk. Contractors assured us it was held in by steel rebar.


Contractor touched the chunk with a backhoe, and over it went. Guess it didn't have any rebar, after all. Here is what our yard looks like, after the stairs have been removed:


View from the porch, showing holes on either side of the wall, because the water main and sewer ran under the stairs and under the wall, and were in danger of breakage, so this was the time to fix them.


What fun!