Joshua, Take a Jersey

I can vividly recall the traumatic experience of traveling to the UK as a 10-year-old. Not because the trip was harrowing, but because I was dressed (by mom) in a pair of beige corduroy longs, with a beige jersey (so thick I battled to bend my arms, and I think it was size too small, which didn’t help) and beige suede shoes. Man mom was proud.

So … Joshua spent the first hot evening of winter '09 in a Bob The Builder gown. "I don’t think he'll need a gown," I offered. "Yes, but it's so cute," she said, ignoring the red cheeks and adjusting the little hat. I didn’t argue, but I was at Heathrow, '82, all over again. Poor kid he doesn’t stand a chance. Imagine the end of grade 9 subject choice conversation. "Ballet and the History of Politics? What kind of subjects are those. Maths and Science. As long as you live under my roof, you'll take Maths and Science." And he'll go on to design lingerie and hire people to do all the computation I would have done, and curse me for forcing him to do Maths and Science. I've put Bob The Builder's gown at the back of the cupboard, unwashed. I hope no one notices.

A Pig in the Sheet

When Peter had the vision of the sheet, the one with all kinds of animals, clean and unclean; there surely wasn't a pig in that mix. Surely God knew/knows that H1N1 is serious. Everyone's panicking. Not least of which the SA Pork Association. Aids from monkeys, mad cow disease and swine flu. Imagine Joshua's world - cancer caused by breathing, brain damage from TV and organ failure from drinking water. Oh hang on, that's been happening for years. The more things change ...

Josh had a little flu scare a week back. Or maybe it was his teeth. Tracey and I had a flu scare each. Turned out to be a 24hr viral infection but not swine flu. Sick as dogs though. I can understand the panic but wish it would pass. Same parents who are bleating about closing schools would happily send their kids to parties where there's no supervision. Priorities.

On that note. We still wake frequently to satisfy Josh's empty stomach and sore teeth routine between 7PM and 5AM. Two routines. One solution. Food. We can't get angry with the kid. He gets more adorable each day. He's stringing the odd sentence together. They're generally odd sentences, but he gets 'Amber, OUT' more often than not. (Untrained parent-ears will hear 'aadr et' but we know what he means.) Now we have to teach him to say 'Piggy, STAY.'