Candy has a beautiful post on her blog about how empathetic and thoughtful and kind Griffin’s been lately. It’s not all butterflies and gentle breezes.

To encourage baths, sometimes we grab a cup full of ice cubes, and I hand them to G to melt under a drizzle of hot water.

Griffin (holding 2 ice cubes under the hot water): Eieee! Melting. They’re melting. … They’re dead. More babies please!

Ocelot: what?

G: They [the ice cubes] are babies, when they go in the water, they die.

O: what???

G: You’re the momma. 2 babies, please!

I was talking to Julian about a work situation and didn’t realize that Griffin was intently listening.  Then this happened:

Me:  Blah, blah, complain.

Griffin: That isn’t very nice.  If he says that again you should tell him “Don’t say that!”

Me (surprised):  Wow, thanks Griffin!

Griffin:  Do you want me to pat your back?

Me (really surprised): Ok?

Then he then came over and patted me on the back.  And then I did feel so much better.

Well, I’m not.  But, Julian and Griffin are waiting to board a plane to SoCal right now.  Next week is a preschool vacation so Julian had already planned to take a week of vacation to hang out with Griffin.  Then he realized it would be a great time for the two of them to visit friends and family in Southern California.  So, off they go for five days, this will be by far the longest I’ve been away from Griffin.  They’ll be going to Disneyland and having all sorts of fun adventures possibly involving dolphins and rockets.  We recently got video calls working with Julian’s dad so I’m glad I’ll be able to see them once or twice while they’re gone.

Every parent I’ve told this to has asked the same question, with the same inflection.  “What are you going to do?”  I’m going to miss them like crazy, call Julian’s cell phone every few hours, and also I’m going to get so much done.  Landscaping, house organizing, exercising.  Maybe I’ll take a bath and read a book!  Julian saw my todo list and cracked up at the optimism, he threw in a request for me to rent a bulldozer and regrade the back yard while I’m at it. 

Preliminary talks have begun between Candy’s Griffin blog and The Accidental Ocelot on a possible merger.

Ocelot employee(s) has/have been apprised that should the deal go through, no layoffs would be planned, and assurances of continued responsibilities would be guaranteed for at least the subsequent 30 days.

FCC approval is not expected to be required, even though there is substantial market overlap and overall competition within the industry segment could potentially be reduced by levels approaching 50 percent. While both parties vigorously claim that the merger would not threaten quality, quantity or overall readership experience, analysts contacted for this story remain skeptical.

Others see potential benefit, should the merger proceed.

Even if both sides can arrive at an accord in principal, technical issues could mire progress or even stall the deal altogether.

Negotiations were expected to be ongoing, and could last through the month before a proposal is presented to the board for discussion. A public vote could follow, but may not be acknowleged, and the results would undoubtedly be ignored, if anyone participated to begin with.

I’m a few weeks late with this post, but Griffin is four!  It’s amazing how quickly he’s grown up.  At two he was just vaguely aware the party was for him.  This year Griffin planned everything, he picked the venue, decided what decorations and flavors he wanted for the cake, and he counted the days until his birthday for months in advance.  One time he got mad at Julian and told him “You’re not invited to my birthday party!”  and I sounded exactly like a mom when I told him “If it weren’t for your dad, you wouldn’t even have a birthday!”

Birthday 2008

In other news, he’s officially outgrown the dairy allergy!  We had the food challenge test at the allergist this morning.  We gave up on waiting for the test a few weeks ago and had already been giving him dairy foods, but it’s nice to have it officially confirmed.

Super Villian Training

(continued demonstration of exceptional devotion to) Super Villian Training

Rock Star Marketing Gimmick Training

Entomology Training

View from my office during this morning’s storm.

Tenny Park this afternoon.

Monster in the clouds.

Capital upon reflection.

Candy dropped off our recently minted 4-year-old on her way to the airport. Dodging tornados along the way, she made it safely to NYC.

Meanwhile, Griffin (depicted in monster paint from his school fair & picnic) and I spent a lofty 6 hours down and about town. The boy is a master meanderer. We didn’t have any particular plan, it just basically took us that long to get from work to home with no pressing need to actually arrive home at any given time.

He’s also developed my love for running across boulders at water’s edge (woo!).

Monster About Town