Is it the future already?

Well! Where were we?

Hello, there! Hey! It’s been two weeks since my last post, but 2007 will be all about me not apologizing for everything, so here I am, not apologizing. Je ne regrette rien. I’m like Edith Piaf, except in the countless number of ways I am nothing like Edith Piaf.

Coincidentally, this is the first day Henry has returned to school since the 20th, which was the last time I wrote anything more than a sentence fragment. A lovely break it was, for all concerned. I won’t deny that I had my moments when I longed for delicious freedom, and maybe a minute or two of tasty silence, but all in all my kid has been excellent company. I shall keep him, after all.

As we always do, we celebrated Christmas with my family. (It really comes in handy around the holidays to have a Jewish spouse. I recommend it.) Before the holidays each member of my family called to grill me on Henry’s deepest, most intense desires for Christmas. I told my sister that about some educational, worthy items he would doubtless enjoy in the coming months. There was silence on the other end. “Yeah, we don’t give a crap about that,” she said. “Dominick [my brother-in-law] just wants to get him the one gift that’s going to make him flip out.” Then my mom called to announce that she also wished to work my son up into a hysterical froth. The competition was on.

In the end, he was pretty even-keeled about all the gifts; the light sabers (TWO OF THEM. And they light up!) from my sister and brother-in-law were met with more enthusiasm than my Human Body Encyclopedia, but guess what he spent the week reading? Not the light sabers! He was too busy running around outside whacking trees with those! He received a pocket watch from my mom, which he has enjoyed far more than I believed possible. (Ask him what time it is, and he’ll pull the watch from his pocket, peer into it, and announce, “It’s 20.” Leave it to him to announce the one time that it never is.) And oh my word, the Transformers. So many Transformers. Transformers that I have to transform while Henry lovingly thwaps my skull with his dual light sabers.

Maybe all the head trauma is why it required more brain power than I alone possessed to write my last Wonderland post of 2006. I enlisted Eden’s help, because she’s funny and smart and good, and also because I was so out of practice stringing words together, I needed someone else nudging me along. Reminding me to add punctuation, and so forth.

What else? New Year’s was spent with our best friends, whom we conned into leaving the city and staying over at our place. Suckers! We made linguine with clam sauce and then spent the evening geeking out on YouTube. Watching things like "Saints Row Bugs: The Musical." We are a thrilling group. At least we managed to stay awake until midnight. That’s something, isn’t it? Hello?

And now here I am. It’s 2007, and I’m still not living on Mars. This future is nothing like I thought it would be, and yet it’s so much better.

Comments

[Meg]

To la vie en rose in 2007.

[Kyran @ NTS]

it is my great dream to be able to sing la vie en rose --en francais--someday (at present, "the Rabbit of Seville" is my party piece). let's get together with cheroots and hang out sometime and be all waif-like and smoldering.

[Leslie]

I'm glad you're back! I needed the giggle.

[Amy]

Happy New Year, Alice! I'm so glad you're back--I missed reading your posts.

[Lisa Milton]

The year can begin - Alice is back. (I love both blogs, by the way.) And why does it take uber-mom powers to transform those Transformers anyway? Gets old fast. That's why several of our cache of 'formers are just that - they have moved on to torment other families. Hope 2007 is off to a good start.

[Sandra]

OK - so he got light sabers. But DID HE EAT??? Come on - the suspense is killing me!!

[MissusB]

Not living on Mars, AND, no hover cars. I mean really, the Jetson's really gave me some big expectations for the 2000 years! I feel as though I have been gypped.

[jody2ms]

Happy New Year!

Did Henry get the light sabers that Pop! Up! at the touch of a button. Our boys did, and I am waiting for the moment when I have to take one of them to the ER with a ruptured spleen after having the saber Pop! Up! forcefully into someones upper abdomen.

[alice]

Sandra: nope!

Well, some blueberries. And many cookies.

[Poppy]

Hey, I'm just glad Henry didn't starve. After you didn't post for two weeks, I thought he had shut down all his alimentary processes to punish you for daring to serve salad. I went all fetal position.

But it's OK. Henry lived to swing a light saber.

I'm sitting upright now, and presently, I shall learn to walk.

[chirky]

Worse than being unsure whether I was going to stay awake until midnight, I was greeted with another cold, hard look at g-r-o-w-i-n-g older: white hairs.

ON MY LEGS.

[motherbumper]

But don't the light sabers make you feel like we are living on the Mars? Or at least Dagobah? I really thought we'd be living on the moon with British accents by 1999 so what do I know. Happy New Year!

[motherbumper]

Obviously I don't know the English language. Let's drop the "the" from Mars and pretend it didn't happen.

[Katie]

Hi! I have been lurking about for a few months now. I have 17 month old twins with the same affinity for blueberries as Henry. Have you noticed that as the price goes up, the size of the container gets smaller? What the hell is that, a quarter pint? Two blueberries for $5??!! Also, I loved the Edith Piaf reference (my daughter's name is Edith). Happy 2007!

[liz]

Recently, I have found that most of my family gatherings end up, at some point, with us gathered 'round the computer watching various YouTube videos.

[elise]

Sadly, when I look at a non-digital clock, I still think that the correct time could very well be 20.

Henry, best of luck to you with that. But if you never get it? You'll have a kindred sister in Texas. And lots, and lots of digital options.

[megan]

It scares me that the main difference between my husband and your 4 year old son is that when asked what time it is he responds with, "Time for you to get a watch. Ha."

The moral of the story: they never really grow up and Happy New Year! Which I spent sleeping on the couch between re-runs of CSI. I am the biggest nerd. I win.

[dorothy]

At least no one in your family decided it would be a good idea to give Henry his first Barbie. Who is wearing Britneyesque espradrille wedges and a crotch-high skirt. And who the little angel stripped naked and left lying around the house from the instant she was received.

Naked Barbies make me feel so violated. (sigh) I'd kill for a light saber.

[Susan]

I hate Transformers with a white-hot passion.

Happy New Year, Alice!

[Suebob]

Henry is just smart enough to have figured out the 24 hour clock already. Maybe he will be a pilot or a general...

[The Dad from Looky, Daddy!]

My six-year-old got a digital watch for her birthday. She put it on and proudly proclaimed the time as "one hundred and twenty three with flashy dots."

Soon she'll tell me that my VCR says "one thousand two hundred with flashy numbers."

[How About Two?]

Here via Looky Daddy!.

Yes, the 21st Century is not as good as it looked in the movies. Where's my flying car? Where's my vacation on the moon? Where's my robot to do my bidding?

Really, where the hell are my socks?

[raine]

merry future to you too!

[Christine]

It could be 20.

He's just on European or military time, afterall. Given the fact that it's a pocket watch of all things, I'm going to guess he's just feeling more European these days.

[Starshine]

Happy New Year, Alice! I'm glad it's so much better than you imagined!