Seamus is taking a relaxed approach to toilet training

1st ice cream cone of the summer

Yay, the rain is finally gone!

Seamus is enjoying a vanilla cone from the amazing Walnut Beach Creamery. He actually likes eating the cone better than the ice cream, though.

Looking forward to a fun summer with the little bug!

I love our neighborhood

This was an evening of firsts for Seamus: his first Italian-American street fair, his first time in a moon-bounce thing, his first useless plastic street-fair souvenir ... and he even saw his first parade! To top it off, there was a high school graduation ceremony in our park. It was a big night in Wooster Square ... I'm glad that we live here.

The brave muskeevy hunter

Seamus saw us killing mosquitos with a broom, so he grabbed it from us and started running around, whacking it against the walls and yelling, "I got a muskeevy!"

Later, Greta was complaining about a bite on her foot, so he kissed it to make it better.

Everything's more fun with a Schmoo, even being infested by parasitic vermin.

Dad's death-defying descent, part 2

The video portion of our broadcast begins with me acting studiously nonchalant and relaxed while preparing for the jump:



Note my "what the f*** am i doing?" pose at the very end ... hahahahaaaaa! Actually, I was just shading my eyes to look at something, but it's a nice shot ... good one, Mr. Videographer.

In truth, I was more giddy than frightened -- I was working on four hours' sleep, and my lovely wife had engineered the day so that I had no inkling of the skydive until I was almost at the airport. I couldn't quite believe what was happening and I just went with it.

The next clip shows us climbing to 13,000 feet -- at this point, I was strapped to my instructor/tandem partner, and wedged into a tiny plane with an open door with three other maniacs who were doing solo dives (plus my instructor and the pilot). As you can see, it was a beautiful day in a beautiful part of Connecticut:



Another great shot there at the end, of me doing breathing exercises to try to slow down my heart rate. The videographer (a very friendly Marine named Chris with two cameras strapped to his helmet) clearly knows what he's doing.

Just before the jump was the only time when I felt really agitated. I thought about Greta and Seamus, the inherent foolishness of jumping out of an airborne plane, and my $500,000 life insurance policy -- but then I remembered that Nick, my instructor, had told me that he had over a thousand jumps under his belt. Seemed like pretty good odds to me.

The next video starts with two of my fellow passengers jumping solo -- they were a student and instructor. That's what I want to do next year! Next, Nick and I scoot over to the open door and swing our legs out. This is when the full scope of the insanity of the act hits you. Although it may appear that I am passing out at this point, I am actually just following Nick's instruction to put my head back on his left shoulder (presumably so that I don't headbutt him during the jump).

The actual moment of jumping is nothing at all like jumping off of a wall or something like that. Because you're in a swiftly-moving airplane, it's more like being yanked violently downwards with a rope. It's an incredible adrenaline rush.

Actually being in freefall is no longer quite so adrenaline-charged, but it's definitely surreal ... "Am I really falling through the sky?" is what's going through my mind at this point.

I love the moment when Nick grabs my hair and pulls my head back so that I'll notice and wave at Chris the videographer falling in front of us.

During freefall, my face looks slightly weirder than usual because of the incredible wind pressure.



My one wish is that I had given Chris the heavy-metal devil sign with my hands. Or possibly the surfer sign. Or the Vulcan "live long and prosper" sign. My point is, when preparing to be videoed while skydiving, practice some cool hand signals.

Finally, you get to see us landing. The parachute-open part of the jump is actually quite relaxing: the wind goes away immediately, and you swing back and forth gently while you descend, enjoying a view that cannot be obtained any other way.

The euphoria after landing is indescribable. I felt exalted and I wanted to go up again!



Many thanks to Nick and Chris and all the fine folks at Connecticut Parachutists (http://www.skydivect.com), but especially to my sneaky, amazing wife.

Risking one's life as a means of denying encroaching mortality

Someday, Seamus should get many hearty laughs out of this photo:



Despite appearances, I am not in fact soiling myself during the moment depicted (I checked my jumpsuit afterwards). Nor did I keep my eyes tightly shut during the jump. Here's a slightly more flattering photo:



I'll put video clips in my next post; those are even funnier.

The curse of the Blau nose confirmed by a new generation

Twice now, Seamus has pointed at my nose and exclaimed "Squidward!"

Squidward is a character on Seamus' favorite brand of televised entertainment, the Spongebob Squarepants show:



Thanks, Seamus. Thanks a lot.

Monday with the Schmoo at the Zoo

Nice...

Saturday with Seamus

Thanks for the pics, Bizzer!!

This week...

Seamus said, "I go school!"

Seamus drew all over himself.

Aqua-Buben

My illustrious co-worker, Yahor, and I played hooky from work on Friday and went to the Norwalk Aquarium. He brought his relatives from Germany, including his adorable little nephew, Jan.

Here's Seamus pointing something out to Yahor (he's probably delivering his commonly-issued order, "I go dat way!") --



Seamus wanted to pet the rays ...



... also in attendance was Seamus' friend Skyler, who took the opportunity to practice his pole dancing ...



... and even though there were lots of beautiful fishies to be seen, the kids' favorite place was the playroom, where Seamus and Jan got to know each other a little better:





Oh, and Greta pretended to be a turtle:



In short, a fine time was had by all!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Here's my little Irishy boy with green cookie frosting all over his face. Thanks, Auntie Teri!!

Seamus has little green fingers

... and Greta has spring fever! Yesterday was warm and spring-like, and while I took Seamus out grocery shopping, she took a machete to our overgrown back yard and started clearing it out in preparation for spring planting. She has big plans for a vegetable garden, flowing vines to cover the chainlink fence, and a pumpkin patch for Seamus to work on.

Today has been damp and cold -- perfect English gardening weather. When I got home from work, I bundled Seamus up and the three of us went out back. While Greta attacked the remaining undergrowth with remarkable vigor, Seamus ran around with a trowel, yelling, "I wan' dig! I wan' dig!"

I predict many more happy (warmer) gardening days for Seamus and his mom!

Nickelodeon's "Noggin" channel has little segments showing little English children learning how to garden -- the segments end with the kids saying, "Oi've got li'l green fingahs, 'ave you?" It makes me think that the one and only thing that would make Seamus cuter would be an English accent. If I could figure out how to instill one in him, I would.

I, Robot

Seamus has decided that he likes robots. In fact, he occasionally decides that he *is* a robot. To facilitate this amusing delusion, Greta constructed a robot costume for him yesterday, which delighted him -- see below. As you can see, his cuteness is increasing exponentially, proportionately to his rapid language acquisition.

Sorry about the sucky cellphone video quality ...

Seamus On The High Seas

Earlier this month, we took Seamus' remarkable great-grandmother on a Caribbean cruise for her 90th birthday. She had a great time, and so did we ... on the rare occasions when we weren't busy chasing him down hallways and trying to prevent him from breaking everything.

Auntie Leenie sent him a little sailor's hat for the trip:


Seamus had a great time on the big boat ... he could eat french fries and pizza any hour of the day or night; they had a very nice little kiddie pool that he splashed around in, and he slapped the captain's leg.

His very favorite thing, though? The laundry room.

More sentences!

Seamus' language acquisition took a big leap forward while we were on our cruise over the past ten days -- he now says:

"I go OUTside"
"Pick up!" [he is asking to be picked up, not making a phone call ...]
"I put." [when setting something down]
"I got a ..." [insert attempt at name of object here]

and my favorite ...

"Okay, Da." [said in a "I shall humor you in this instance" tone in response to requests that I make of him]

It's lots of fun watching his little brain figure out the English language!

All that learning makes him sleepy:




PS: He also waves and says "bye-bye" to many inanimate objects, though not so much to humans.

His first sentence!

Two days ago, he put a box over his head and yelled, "I can't see! I can't see!"

Really, he did!


Addendum: my sister-in-law Carol says I should have answered, "That's because you have a box on your head, you idiot!!"

Seamus' favorite present

... was received on the 9th day of Christmas this year. Much better than nine ladies dancing, in his opinion (if not in mine).

Apparently, the oil company Hess, evil though they may be, has a tradition of selling truly awesome toy trucks during the holiday season. For 2008, it was a front end loader with its very own transport truck. Both pieces have lights, motors, and all kinds of other cool surprises.

Seamus has hardly let it out of his sight since he opened it -- thank you, Cousin Logan!

Critters enjoying their pet beds

... each in their own way.

Thanks to Seamus' great-grandmother for the excellent Christmas presents!