Back like a rebel making trouble

Despite the warning from my friend Shane that the purchase of a Macintosh computer becomes, invariably, the fast track to Scientology, I have at long last decided to purchase an IMac with some early Christmas assistance from Grammie (Thanks a million, Grammie, you earn the Mr. Steve Humanitarian award for the year even though I know that seeing pictures and videos of the kids is one of the larger motivations behind your tremendous act of altruism) and additionally from all of you folks clicking on the completely non-enticing ad at the top of my blog page in contribution to my twenty fifth concurrent occupation. Thanks, friends and family. Welcome back.

The Mac functions have a wee bit of a learning curve to them which feel a bit like driving in London for the first time... Big Ben... Parliament... but not so bad that I inadvertently end up in Piccadilly Circus. I based my decision to go Apple on the fact that everyone I know who has gone over to the dark side of Macdom has given nothing but positive feedback, so there may yet be something to this hype. Besides, I need a reliable computer that will wash the horrible taste of the old Dell laptop out of my mouth lest I turn against computers all together and opt to live in a cave atop the Himalayas, leaving only little scribblings on the wall. Hail Xenu.

Lately, Amelia is finally giving forth the additional effort to actually repeat the words Nadine, Elijah and I say to her rather than just labeling everything with a blanket statement of "that". With this important development comes the challenging part of attempting to decipher the language she tries so desperately to master as she frustratingly regurgitates it back to us in a series of monosyllabic phonemes progressing inevitably into a crescendous screech. Ah, the joys of having a high frequency high amplitude vocal cord. Fortunately, as the weather gets colder, the question of whether Amelia wants to scream outside upon each offense is answered most often with a simple "no". 

Zach has concluded the world as he knows it is no more than his own private jungle gym as he has been getting in touch with his inner monkey. If an object has a foothold, no matter how large small or wobbly, Zach will climb it like it were Kilimanjaro. He seems at his absolute happiest when he can climb up on the couch while holding a toy of his choice as if he has finally come to achieve one of his most coveted life goals. Come to think of it, that so happens to be one of my life goals, too. Huh, that's weird. 

Equally chatty, though not yet quite as intelligible, Zach often speaks streaming sentences like a news radio host, all in a language he invented.  My best guess is that he is making up jokes since he will often stop talking to laugh spontaneously at the punch lines only he seems to understand. Here's one of my favorite jokes he tells; budga-budga-budga-budga, hahaha. Well...perhaps it loses something in the translation. 

      

I'm sure some of you are wondering how the training of Niko is progressing. I'm happy to say he is coming along nicely in both departments of obedience and operation dry carpet thanks in no small part Cesar Millan. After reading his books, Cesar's Way and Be the Pack Leader, I have managed to get Niko into a more submissive state by establishing my position as a calm assertive pack leader. It is truly an exhilarating experience to walk an animal the first time without it being the other way around. One thing I've discovered with puppies, though, is that they require a continual reminder of their subordinate position otherwise, if not addressed immediately, my control of him quickly degrades from status of dog whisperer to old yeller. In short, he goes right back to being a doggy dog. Take for instance Saturday night, as Niko was fervently exploring the living room, he managed to get his head stuck in a jack o lantern candy bucket. He ran around in haphazard circles wearing this large toothy pumpkin grin juxtaposed humorously to his obvious state of panic. It was exactly like a scene from America's funniest home videos except that I wasn't so cruel as to leave it on him for fifteen minutes while I found the video camera and some working double A batteries.  No, I got him calmed down as quickly as I could. After a few moments of realizing that flying blind may not be the wisest mode of locomotion he stopped and I was able to free him from his plastic pumpkin prison. 

Perhaps the only thing more exciting than having a well trained puppy is having well behaved kids. I can remember having that feeling long ago when Elijah was 20 months old. He was proudly one of the best behaved kids I have ever met, even to this day. I used to call it beginners luck and in retrospect that might have just been the case. Amelia has just a couple social graces short of Jackie Kennedy and may need a bit of polish. Perhaps I am to blame for not realizing that my one concrete adage of understanding about the female mind, which is "let them have their way" may have one little thirty pound caveat.