me and the congressman

I will spare you my rant about easy access to firearms. Are people starting to see that maybe it isn't a good idea to put a gun in the hands of anyone and everyone who wants one and sell bullets at Wal-Mart no questions asked?

What kind of country is it when you cannot even take a nine year old child to meet your member of congress?

Here is a photo of me meeting Lloyd Doggett in September. I was skeptical of him at the time but he thought I was the best boy ever. He is not our congressman but we sure wish he was. He, like Rep. Giffords, barely made it through the election.

The best thing about Lloyd Doggett is that he argues with Governor Rick Perry about education funding. After spending 27 billion dollars that the state didn't have, Rick Perry turned down over 800 million of federal money for education and now he wants to cut pre-k, kindergarten, and grade 12.

Also, Rick Perry shot a coyote last year so you know he is an evil guy. He carries a gun while he jogs (more evidence that he is bad).

happy 19th birthday to me (yesterday)

Yesterday, I celebrated my 19 month birthday. Here is a photo of me starting the day at 7:20am. Not the greatest photo (too fuzzy and goofy expression) but you can see that I was happy to be awake and even happier to make movies and snapshots of myself.

In the morning, we played inside (trains and cars and ball). It has been freakishly cold here for the past few days - like in the 30s during the day and even colder at night - so this limits the amount of time we can play outside. I would stay outside forever with little regard to the temperature but my mom is a bit more of a sissy than I am and my dad is the worst; he won't even leave the house if it is colder than 60!

In the late morning we met my dad at Whole Foods for a birthday lunch. yum. Afterward, my dad took me to the Blanton Art Museum and my mom had yet another meeting. This has been a busy week for her because there are lots of projects coming up. zzzzzzzz

Yesterday was the one year anniversary of my first (and only, thus far) trip to the ER. As my mom changed my diaper last year on my seven month birthday, she pulled me by the arms from laying down to standing even though she had frequently lectured my dad not to do that. Out popped my elbow. Just like that, I went from giggling to screaming in pain. My mom has viewed just enough seasons of ER to diagnose my injury so off to the doctor we went and, from there, we were sent to the children's hospital. They popped my elbow back in just as suddenly as it popped out and I was immediately recovered. I learned that my chubbiness makes me more prone to such an injury and this might happen again. But my tennis career was over then and there.

does it get any better?

I am back into an I hate shopping phase. It was fun for a while but, now that I run and climb and love looking for trouble, shopping is a nightmare and I generally make it miserable for everyone else.

My parents mostly banked on the goodness of Santa this year but they had to do a little bit of shopping for themselves. The weekend before Christmas, my mom went shopping on Saturday (which really meant she spent hours sitting in traffic) and my dad shopped on Sunday. They also did a lot of shopping from the internet.

On Sunday, my dad opened one of his boxes from Amazon and pulled out this long strip of packing paper; it was like 15 feet long and this seemed to be the greatest gift imaginable. I ran all through the house with it trailing behind me. My cat also thought it was pretty great. Later in the day, my mom decided to take me to the Whole Foods playground and my dad met us there after his dreadful shopping trip. In addition to all of the veggies and healthy food my mom bought at Whole Foods, she also bought salted caramel cupcakes which she said were too rich for her and she wanted to vomit after one bite. You can see from the photo that I had absolutely no troubles with the cupcakes.

After this day, I just didn't think things could get any better.

tractor

Here it is . . . the moment everyone has been waiting for! This is a photo of me on Christmas morning.

On Christmas Eve, Santa rode in on his tractor and brought me some tractors. It always pays to be a good boy all year and leave Santa some nice cookies and a picture. Thank you, Santa.

shoes

First off, my dad wants people to know that I am the best tooth brusher in the world.

Now that we have that out of the way, I can tell you about my new shoes. I recently had a growth spurt thanks to the 1000 or more peas I have been eating at every meal of every day for the past week. Suddenly, my shoes were getting too snug. So we went to Nordstrom this afternoon, dreading the shoe-buying experience. Last time I went to Nordstrom, I was served by a gruff fellow named Simon Bloodbath (perfect name for a guy like him) and I did not do well and I grouched up; in fact, he sold me shoes that did not even fit so my mom had to return them! I much prefer the pretty ladies with silky long hair. Today, I lucked out because Simon Bloodbath practically ran the other way when he saw me coming so I was helped by . . . I don't even know her name but I am in love. She sized my feet over by the fish tank and let me take my sweet time trying shoes and looking around. I also bought some slippers because I hate it when I run around in bare feet and I get kibbles. My parents sweep frequently but the kibbles cannot be avoided with two cats, one dog, a gravel walkway, and ME! My slippers have firetrucks on them.

The woman who helped me today said she couldn't believe that I could ever be grouchy when buying shoes. She gave me a balloon and said I should be a model for Nordstrom. I guess she is in love with me too. I was pretty cute today in my pirate sweater and I was a perfect gentleman. I have been practicing my manners and have perfected please, thank you, excuse me, and yes sir. I also say "much" which is short for thank you very much.

happy new year

I know everyone is anxiously awaiting tales and photos from Christmas. Since I have been sick, and my mom is too, we are still trying to catch up on everything that fell by the wayside in the past week or more. Our living room still looks like a tornado tore through and dropped down every tractor in the state. A boy can never have too many tractors. or cars. or trains. or books about tractors, cars, or trains.

Here is a photo of me on New Year's Day. I finally accomplished my goal of stacking one car on top of the other. You can see how proud I am of this engineering feat. (p.s. the Ronald McDonald car was a hand-me-down. I DID NOT and will not ever EVER go to McDonald's. I just happen to like that car because it has a dial that expands the cargo area.)

New Year's Day is also my grandmother's birthday. HAPPY belated BIRTHDAY! Since I was sick, I didn't even mail her a birthday card. shame on me . . . especially since she flew all the way here to visit me on my birthday.