When is “big” too big?

/ Shane / 1 Comment

Oliver is a big boy. He’s not 2 yet, but he weighs more than Evie did when she was 3.

The other day we were at a restaurant, and an enormous guy with a voice deep enough to vibrate my sternum came over to tell us that he could tell Oliver was going to be big when he grew up, and he’d never heard a boy with such a deep voice. He went on to say that Oliver was a “little Brian Urlacher”.

Although Oliver is heavy, he doesn’t look chubby. However, we charted him on the growth curve. He’s off the chart on weight, and about 90th percentile for length. You might think that means that he’s just big, but actually if you plot his height vs. weight, he’s over the 95th percentile on that one too, which means he meets the definition for obesity.

Now, I don’t necessarily think there is a problem with his size. I think that he is built very solid, and there’s probably not much we could do to change that. I also think that kids grow at different times, and probably other kids will catch up to where he is.

Certainly, there are not many kids on this planet who eat healthier than he does. Today he ate oatmeal made with milk, mixed with applesauce, peanut powder and chia seeds and 1 – 2 oz. of milk for breakfast. For lunch he had a hard-boiled egg, 1/2 a cup of brown rice, 1/4 cup of mixed vegetables, 2/3rds of an apple, and 6 oz. of milk. For supper he had 1/2 a cup of whole wheat couscous with sauteed zucchini and chickpeas and about a tablespoon of peas, with about 2 oz. of milk, followed by 1/4 of an orange for dessert. Now, not every day is necessarily that good, but I would say this is pretty average. It occurred to us the other day that he might never have had a cookie from a package in his life, and maybe not more than 8 oz. of juice total in the almost two years he’s been around.

Biologically speaking, I have trouble believing that a kid who is eating that healthy could possibly get obese naturally. So again, I’m not really worried about it. But I guess everyone could use a little more exercise, so now that the weather is getting nice, we’re going to try to make an effort to play outside a little more.

With a little luck, our little linebacker will one day play for a better team.

It feels way too soon to be dealing with this

/ Shane / 3 Comments

We have come into something of a sticky situation regarding Evie’s social interaction. It has become apparent that Evie’s a part of a group at school, and there is another girl that that group doesn’t like.

After some delicate questioning, it seems that there’s really nothing about this girl that Evie doesn’t like, nonetheless, she talks about her in such disparaging tones. I have to believe that this is coming from the circle of friends (not to be a naive father or anything, I’m sure all those girl’s dads are saying the same thing). There really isn’t anybody that Evie doesn’t like (unless she has a really good reason), but it’s the thing to do to make fun of this other girl, so she does it too.

Of course, she’s too young to fully grasp what’s going on here. We’ve seen her play with the girl when her friends aren’t around, and they seem like they get along. Evie tells us she has a good time with the girl, but then later said she told her friends she didn’t have fun playing with her. She told me, “But daddy, I only said I didn’t like her when she wasn’t there!” and really thought that made it okay. I think in the back of her head though something is bothering her about it, because when I said, “Evie, I’m very disappointed in you,” she burst into tears instantly.

I really have no idea what to do about it. I’ve tried asking her how she’d feel if she were in this girl’s place. I’ve tried telling her that she shouldn’t talk about people behind their backs, but instead act as if the girl was always there, listening. I’ve tried reminding her that she does have fun with this girl, and she shouldn’t say she doesn’t like her if it’s not true. I’ve tried just about everything I could think of.

It’s kind of the worst part about childhood, and I’d really rather she didn’t participate in it. Do we just throw our hands up and say, “that’s childhood?” Is this just girls being girls? Aren’t you supposed to be older than 4 before you start getting catty with the other girls? Is this happening younger now then when we were kids?

My Homeless Problem

/ Shane / 6 Comments

Homeless people present a problem for me.

On one hand, I feel so bad for them and I really want to help people in need. On the other hand, they see the giant “SUCKER” written on my forehead, and they take advantage of me as much as they can. Consequently, I have to preemptively ignore them and/or be rude to them, so as not to be scammed by them, which makes me feel like an absolutely horrible person.

I could tell stories about homeless people all day long, like the beggar in Italy who followed me for blocks screaming at me in Italian after I gave her some, but not all of my change (hey, they have 1€ and 2€ coins over there!), or the guy who used to accost me on my back porch whenever I was grilling because he “needed money to catch the bus home” (several times a week apparently), or the guy who holds the door open at Dunkin’ Donuts to guilt you into giving him something on the way out (yeah, I can get my own door, thanks), or the guy who gave me directions in my own neighborhood and then tried to get me to give him money for a homeless shelter where “you can get work, but only if you stay overnight and that costs money”, or the lady who tearfully asked Sara for grocery money for her kids and pulled her grocery list out of her cigarette pack (sorry kids, mama’s gotta smoke). But I don’t want to tell you any of those stories. I want to tell you this story instead:

When we were in New Orleans, a homeless guy singled me out of the crowd and started talking to me (I guess he could read that big SUCKER on my forehead).
“I bet I can tell you where you got those shoes.”
“Where I got my shoes?” I asked, trying to remember where I got my shoes.
“I bet I can tell you where you got those shoes!”
“Uh, okay?” I bought them in New York City on vacation. Is there a tag on them or something? How could he know that?
“Well, I don’t know where you bought them, but right now you’ve got them in New Orleans, Louisiana!”

And before I could react, he tossed a big sticky wad of goo on my shoes. I looked down incredulously, but he whipped out a cloth and started polishing my shoes. Continuing to be the biggest idiot on the planet, I thought, “Good, you better clean that crap off my shoe!”

When he was done, he stood up and said, “That will be $20 for the shoe shine.”
“No way, I’m not paying you.”
He raised his voice. “You owe me $20. Are you trying to cheat me?”
At this point, my face got red. I felt angry, but also embarrassed. I didn’t want to cause a scene. In other words, he had me right where he wanted me.
“I’ll give you $10.”
“No way, you owe me $20 for…”
I hardened my voice. “I’ll give you $10.” He knew I meant business.
“Okay,  fine.”

In other words, despite his rudeness and manipulations, I still ended up giving him $10. SUCKER.

Sometimes I even think “maybe I’m being a jerk, maybe a few bad eggs have spoiled begging for everybody”. But the other day, as I was driving by the guy by Evie’s school with the, “Homeless, please help, God bless” sign, I saw him pull a cell phone out of his pocket to check the time (to be fair, he may have been checking to see if he had any texts). I couldn’t help but feel a little cheated there. I’ve never given him money, but in the few minutes I spend sitting at that light twice a week, I’ve seen him get a lot of serious cash.

Lately, Evie’s been asking questions about them: how do they live without a house, where do they sleep, can they get married, etc. She hasn’t yet asked about giving them money or why we don’t help them, but it seems like the next logical question. How can I explain it to her? Am I teaching her not to be compassionate? The thing is, it really does eat me up inside to treat them as less than human, something to be ignored. I want to help people. If only I could separate the scammers from the honest people.

Honestly? I’m not sure any one of them is honest, based on my experiences.

Quote Monday tramples babies

/ Shane / Leave a comment

Evie: “Can an iPhone call people too?” – Not as far as I can tell.

::Oliver buckling his baby into the high chair and lovingly feeding him::
::Blender starts::
Oliver: “Smoothie time! Smoothie time! Baby, get out!”
::Throws his baby on the floor::

Me: “Ugh, I hate dishes.”
Sara: “And yet, you still eat.”

::Oliver was sick::
Sara: “Oh Oliver, I hope this is your worst day.”
Evie, aghast: “Mama! Tell him to have a good day!”

Robot Orchestra

/ Shane / Leave a comment

I have seen one robot playing music, but I have not seen *many* robots playing music. And something so cool might as well be set to the James Bond theme, right?

 

Sure, you could have made a robotic synthesizer with speakers, or even one robot to play the music, but there is definitely something cooler about the fact that it is many robots coordinating together to make the music.

It is also frightening to see them working together like this. Definitely reminds me of the swarminoid. Sure, for now the robots just play music and get books off of shelves, but is it that hard to imagine them coordinating an attack on the human overlords, or the manufacture of additional robots of their own design? We’re swimming in dangerous waters my friends.

Link via Sylvain.