PREOCCUPIED

I have been preoccupied lately and have not blogged. My bad. I blame Facebook in part, and the Boy in part.

First Facebook. I have not been on Facebook all that long, but I have to admit that it is much better than I expected. I find the burden of having a relatively paltry 90 or so friends to be minimal. On the other hand, I have communicated with people much more than I did in the past. This is especially true of some of my younger cousins, and people I knew in high school. So, I am blogging less, but communicating more. Interesting.

The Boy. Oh the Boy. Today he deuced in the potty for the first time. It wasn't quite this, but it was cool. He's not yet two, so we are not "training" him so much as we have a potty available, we explained what it's for, and we let him sit in there with us. Frankly, I could do an entire post about someone wanting to spend time in a room with me while I drop the kids off at the pool, but that may be a different post. Anyway, at the same time the Boy has had a massive explosion in his language abilities. Today he said "go up, Daddy." And it made sense in context! I can barely keep up with all of his new tricks. Oh, and he LOVES talking to people on Skype. What the hell?

And finally, a tip. If you live in the Chi, you don't get to hear The Splended Table on NPR. That is too bad. The show is oh so ripe for parody, but it is also a very good, very informative show. You will never need to know everything they talk about, but you will learn something in every episode. Check out the podcast.

PERSPECTIVE

I just realized that this is my 667th post on this blog. That means that the one before this was SATAN'S post! Davos must be SATAN'S gathering! It all makes sense now.

Anyway, that's not what I wanted to post about. I wanted to post about the vital importance of perspective. Today it was 52 degrees in Chicago. 52 is not really all that warm. Nevertheless, we opened windows upstairs and downstairs, and took U out for TWO walks today. There were kids in the playlot. There were people EVERYWHERE when we were out. People were acting like summer had arrived and we were all free.

I describe this not because I think it is a real revelation to anyone who lives with seasons, but because it is such a joyous day. This day in April or May is not that big a deal. But in February it is the kind of day where people are smiling, kids are playing, people are out talking to neighbors. Good stuff. Of course, I'm sure a lot of scumbag gang bangers will shoot each other (some people can't let anything be nice), but it is still a great day. We should have a name for these days, when winter gives us a break for a few days. Maybe I should write in to the Atlantic.