nags of a similar ilk

"Wait. You're wearing the same clothes as before?"

"Yeah."

"Do you have clean clothes to put on?"

"No."

"You don't have any clean clothes?"

"No."

"You brought two pairs of clothing with you for a week?"

"Yeah."

"Are you wearing clean underwear?"

"No."

"Do you have another pair of clean underwear?"

"Yes."

"Go put them on."

"Ohhhhh-kaaaaaay."

Sam walks away. A few seconds later...

"Oh wait! I DO have clean clothes."

Yeah, I thought so.

Sam declared today at dinner that he doesn't eat vegetables. Aside from the "I hate asparagus" comment, followed by my eating all of his aspargus from his stir-fry, he ate all of the vegetable-only meal I gave him, thereby disproving his notion he eats only meat and dairy.

I'm not telling him otherwise.

We went to Trader Joe's for precut vegetables for the stir-fry. He selected a curry rice dish as the side, while I selected mixed vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, carrots), asparagus and bell peppers for the stir-fry.

I wasn't sure he'd eat it all, but throw in the vegtables, some sauted tofu and a ginger-soy sauce, take out the asparagus, and the kid willingly ate it all.

With no meat.

Maybe tomorrow we'll have salmon fajitas. See if we can go two days as pesci-vegetarians together.

Note to self: when an eight year old boy says that his nintendo is enough to keep him occupied on a two hour flight, don't believe him.

Sam and I flew back to California today. I had flown over to Phoenix yesterday to spend a brief time with Mom and Eric, before whisking Sam away back home for a not-quite-week-long week at Auntie Kitt's. I tell you, "Auntie Kitt" is the dumbest incarnation of any "Auntie" name I know of. Though, nothing will ever beat "Auntie Em," "Auntie Kitt" is particularly unsavory. Doesn't have a good ring to it.

Maybe it is time to switch to Kathryn. Or Kate. Kate McQueen. Now that has a ring to it.

Except that it's also REALLY close to the name of the character Cindy Crawford played in her one and only (and thank goodness ONLY) acting role. *shudder*

Yeah, so, Sam.

He did an okay job keeping himself entertained on the plane. We did play a game of dot box, though.

I thought he did really well, catching me off guard a few times. 43 / 112 boxes? Not bad, given I have probably 400 games of experience up on him.

Sam also took some good photos out the window:

We're not planning on doing much today. We'll see how the day goes.

Flew out to Arizona today to pick up Sam for this not-quite-annual-but-we're-getting-there visit to California. Because the timing of my flight out didn't really work well for both our normal Velocity class and any work time for Kris, I asked Andy if he could take me to the airport. I'd even make it as easy as possible on him, by driving my car to his work, and he could keep my car for the day, as I'm returning with Sam tomorrow.

That worked for his schedule, so before lunchtime, I headed over to his work, and he headed out to drive me to the airport, noticing as I did the twelve squirrels running around the tree next to my car, under my car, and near my car. I've never had four squirrels pause three feet up on on a tree trunk and stare at me, wondering what I'm about to do.

So, Andy pulled to the exit of his work's parking lot, an exit which happens to be one side of a four way stop. He made some comment about how a coworker was almost hit at the intersection, as he looked to the right to verify the car to the right was stopping. He looked to the left, to see a fire engine stopped at the stopsign. He looked right again to confirm with the car on the right, and pulled forward, accelerating into the intersection.

Just as a moron in an black SUV flew around the fire engine and into the intersection to our left.

Now, not only did the SUV run the stop sign, he went straight through in a left turn lane.

Andy was still looking right when I yelled "WAIT! WAIT!" Now, technically, "STOP! STOP!" would have been a better call to make, but even "Wait!" is better than "UHN!" and a lot of pointing. I was pleased I was as coherent as I was.

Andy hit the brakes hard just as the SUV (driven by a man of Indian descent, and not, as you might stereotypically think, an Asian woman) also braked, and we missed each other by a foot.

As Andy accelerated away, the SUV driver looking sufficiently sheepish for his moronic move, I commented, "Well, I hope that doesn't set the tone for this trip."

It didn't. My plane landed safely.

Andy, on the other hand, was nearly hit in the same intersection on his way back to work, by another driver running the stop sign by going straight through the left-turn only lane.

A few years ago, Sam came out to visit me. Honestly, I've lost a year, because I thought he visited me two summers ago, but the blog says 2005, and the blog never lies. Well, that's not true either, so the blog was lying there. It mostly speaks the truth, and it matches well with the photo time stamps, so, there we go. 2005.

The following year, I stayed in Phoenix with Sam, to spend my week with him in Mom and Jackson's company. That was a disaster, since the two of them are thick as thieves and never seemed to form separate identities when the other is close by. That, and I had other personal issues I was trying to deal with at the time, that prevented me from being able to take care of him in California.

I have no idea what happened last year. I think maybe the grandparents trumped the aunt last year.

This year, though, Sam is heading on out, and I have the free Southwest ticket to prove it, since it'll cost me enough to fly him out. I think he's old enough to fly out as an unaccompanied minor, but his parents are freaked out by this prospect, so I'm flying out to get him, flying back the next day with him, flying back at the end of the week, then back home again. Phew! Lots of flying. Too much flying.

So, what do we have planned this year?

In no particular order, we're going to

• figure out a Father's Day present for Chris
• learn to program using Alice
• learn to throw a disc, maybe learn to play ultimate
• ride bikes, if I can find one for Sam
• go on a hike, or two
• garden, like we did last time he was here
• cook, or at least bake
• walk the dogs
• swim
• and Great America! Because Sam loves coasters now. Booyah!

How we're going to manage all of that in three, maybe four days, I have no idea. We might have to remove one or two from the list, depending on how interested he is in some of those.

For the programming part, oof, might be biting off more than I can chew on that one. Having seen Randy Pausch's Last Lecture video (of course, you've seen it, right? of course you have), I took a second look at Alice, and decided, well, we'd give it a try. The idea of teaching programming through storytelling is compelling, but will an 8 year old be able to learn it? I think so.

Besides, how cool would it be to say, "I started programming when I was 8." ? I mean, really! I can't say that, though I can say I started programming in the 8th grade. Might have been the 7th. I don't recall. Jessica, can you help me out here? When did I have Mr. Osborne for math?

So, we'll try the programming lessons. Of course, this means that I'll need to take time to learn Alice before helping him along. I bought a book, which should help, but, gee, finding the time? Right. Focus.

Time, and the right computer. I suspect the program is a Windows program. I doubt it'll work on my Linux box. Maybe on my MBP, but, well, do I really want Sam using my laptop? Nah.

As for cooking, Mom suggested making waffles, ice cream and cupcakes: lots of stirring and putting stuff into the fridge, less so chopping and the like.

Maybe we'll make bread, too. Oh! And something that uses the food processor. That'll be fun: using the kitchen power tools.

I'm looking forward to the visit, though, very much so. I wonder where I can find a couple kids to practice with...