Category: Family

Wyoming, like the rest of the west, has been under a drought for quite some time.  On the way back from evening Mass in the snow yesterday, Teresa the five-year-old jumped in her seat:

“What are those black things moving on the window?!”

Jacinta explained that they are called “windshield wipers.”  Guess she hadn’t seen those in action before.

Tina, weeping and laying on the floor, her gleeful rush cut suddenly short:

“That wall was being NAUGHTY!”

Well, I was sick over the weekend, and then behind on work because I had been sick, and what with this and that I fell off the wagon on my blogging.  But it shouldn’t be a problem; if it comes down to it, I’ll follow Tina around for half a day with my laptop in hand until I’ve caught up on FTTs.

But today’s Funny Thing happened at work.  As I strolled from my office to the photocopier, I became aware of a crowd of students spilling out of Dr. Grove’s office, and that from his office was emanating the loud, distorted, angry sounds of “metal” music.  (Or maybe that’s metal “music.”)  As I floated over to the door, Dr. Grove himself saw me from his post behind a Led Zeppelin video.

“Ah,” he noted, “this is one of those moments in WCC education that needs, er, explaining.”

It turned out to be his music class.  They had come to his office to watch videos of rock and other musical genres as part of a seminar discussion.  At that moment they were trying to decide whether the distortion level on Robert Plant’s guitar meant that his “music” was just noise, or whether it actually has some kind of unique musical appeal.  They listened to some atonal “highbrow” music for contrast, a strange and wandering piece that made me feel I was being brainwashed via some kind of disorientation technique.  Dr. Grove suddenly noticed me still standing at the door, and he paused:  “Did you need to say something to me?”

“No, I didn’t,” I assured him.  Then I smiled:  “But I might say something to you later.”

David sat with pen and blank page before him.  “Whatcha doin’, Dave?” I asked.  He explained that he was trying to decide what to draw.  “Well!” I exclaimed, “What could be better to draw than MY BEAUTIFUL FACE?!”  And I assumed a pose.

He set to work.  For a couple of minutes he stared at me earnestly while moving his pen–not looking at the paper very often–and at last I got a peek at his progress.  “Oh,” I said slowly.  “I didn’t know I looked like a gummy bear.”

“I was trying not to tell you,” Jacinta said from the next room.

Must be because I’m sick.

As I mentioned before, my sister Sarah sent chocolates as a present to Tina the three-year-old, but we decided to give the chocolates out as rewards for good potty behavior.  This has kept the name “Sarah” current in the household, for sure.

Today, Tina observed several times, “Sarah is good.  She sent me chocolates.  Sarah is good.  She is a good girl!”

Again, as much as I appreciate the continual reminder about Aunt Sarah, I regret tying her good name to such a base reality.  That said, Tina hasn’t had a single accident since the chocolates arrived–so I’m afraid we’re sticking with it!

Teresa the five-year-old: “This one must be yours, because it says, ‘Papa’!”

Early this afternoon, I put down my laptop and stumbled wearily toward the kitchen for a drink of water.  Tina the three-year-old appeared around the corner, wearing only underpants and a silk scarf tied around her neck; in her hand she brandished a fly-swatter held with the hand pointing out.

“I am Zorro!” she announced.

“Hi Zorro,” I replied, and stumbled on.  This has been a theme lately.  My parents gave the kids a complete DVD collection of Disney’s “Zorro” series, and they watch a couple of episodes every weekend.  Tina has taken to it more than any of them.  Although usually wearing more than underpants, Tina has adopted the reversed fly-swatter as her official rapier, and she charges through the house shouting, “Ne-e-e-i-gh!”  (That’s Zorro’s horse, in case you can’t tell.)

A few days ago, she bounced into the kitchen, announcing to Jacinta, “I am Zorro!”  “Go use the potty, Zorro,” Jacinta responded.

Tina’s face darkened:  “Zorro doesn’t use the potty.”

Um.  Good point.  That’s true.  Not in the Disney version, he doesn’t.  Jacinta recovered quickly:  “Yes, but Zorro keeps his pants dry!”  It took a few minutes of back and forth (“He doesn’t use the potty!” “But he keeps his pants dry!”) before Tina had to concede the justice of the argument and marched off to her seat.  While on the potty, she insisted that she was Tina (you can probably guess the premise behind that).

But as she arose from the seat of ignominy, clasping in her right hand her fly-swatting rapier of daring-do, and raising her face once more, she proclaimed:  “I am…Tina-Zorro!”

Ash Wednesday is always hard, but today I had to feel sympathy for someone else:  we had a candidate for the college presidency here for an interview this afternoon.  As I introduced him to the faculty, I mentioned my own experience with hiring processes.

When I applied at Ave Maria University, they kept me up late, gave me a lot of wine, and then began asking questions.  That was one approach to getting a man’s guard down.

Then when I applied here at WCC, I interviewed on Ash Wednesday.  That afternoon, when I was hungry and weak, the president and the dean got me alone in an office and grilled me.  That’s another approach, I suppose–but not half so nice as the wine!

[Disclaimer: I don’t really think that these institutions intentionally practiced psychological warfare on me.  They did it by accident.]

[Epilogue to the above:  I got the job both times.  So apparently I would say the right thing even under the influence of a truth serum.]

So I left for work yesterday and headed north toward Main Street.  A couple of blocks from my house, as I passed 7th and Cascade, I saw a dog–a big dog–chasing a car.  The car pulled onto 7th ahead of me, and the dog pulled onto 7th behind me.  The three of us continued toward Main.

Half a mile later, the car and I both pulled right onto Main.  The dog pulled onto Main behind us and occupied the righthand lane, keeping pace with traffic.  Three blocks later, the car made a sudden left, and the dog continued to follow me for another block or so before stopping to sniff around and look disappointed.

Wow, I thought to myself.  I didn’t know they still made dogs like that.

Tina: “There’s a popsicle on the bird fever!”