Werewolves, Bigfoot and Vampires

Okay, here's an argument at our house: does Bigfoot exist? Depends on which member of the household you ask. Not mentioning any names, but the senior member of the family is outvoted 2 to 1 on this question. Alex is as skeptical as I am if you're talking about Sasquatch. It is an altogether different case if you bring up the Loch Ness monster. Alex is a die-hard Nessie fan. I can let that slide on the off chance that I might get to go to Scotland on a fact-finding mission.


Alex is a fan, in general, of all sorts of creatures. His favorite Abbott & Costello movies are the ones that include the Wolfman, Mummy, Frankenstein or the Invisible Man. (Yes, I know that it should be Frankenstein's monster but Abbott & Costello are not correct there, or in many other places.) So, I should have expected it a few nights ago when he showed me a scratch on his knee. "Mom, I have to tell you something. Last night I got scratched by a werewolf."


"Oh, no, are you going to be a werewolf?" "Yes, at the next full moon." He then demonstrated how he would snarl and growl, and asked me when the next full moon was. I have no idea. Since he doesn't stay up after dark, we may be safe. At least until he's older and his bedtime is later.


On the subject of vampires, I have a deep, dark secret. Okay, probably not as deep or dark as I would hope. I am a huge Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan. The TV series, not the movie. (The movie has its moments, especially those with Donald Sutherland in it, but it is not nearly as successfully entertaining as the TV show.) I can probably tell you the plot of most episodes by watching the first 5 minutes. Most likely, I can quote at least one line of dialogue from each one as well. A few weeks ago, Nickelodeon's teen channel started running Buffy at midnight each night. Alex saw some of the ads during the afternoon while watching his beloved Drake & Josh. (I am not nearly so proud to say that I also know the plots of every episode of Drake & Josh. Sometimes I make Alex change the channel when I've reached my lifetime quota of viewings for an episode.) Alex mentioned in passing that Buffy the Vampire Slayer was cool. I agreed. Then he asked who "Rex" was on the show. "Rex?" "Yeah, Rex." Now in seven seasons of Buffy I do not recall a character named Rex. I wracked my brain for minor characters, guest stars or villains that could have been Rex. Nothing. I had no idea.


Finally, last night we were watching Drake & Josh yet again, and the Buffy commercial came on again. The tagline asked what was more difficult - high school, fighting vampires or facing her ex. On that last part it showed her talking and fighting with Angel (played by David Boreanaz). Alex looked at me and said, "That's Rex." No, it's not, his name is Angel. Ohhhhh, "her ex," "Rex," NOW I get it. The kid hears as well as I do!


He almost got in trouble over my faulty hearing yesterday. On the way back from swimming lessons we had the car windows and roof open to help him dry off without freezing in the A/C. The radio was on, too, when he announced (I thought) that "Girls were dumb." WHAT?! We do not talk about people that way, much less girls as a whole! I was just getting wound up when he added, "They're not people, they're animals." I was about to stop the car on the side of the road so that I could yell at him more effectively when he said, "I said TURTLES, not GIRLS!" Well, that's a different kettle of fish altogether. Carry on. But we don't know that turtles are dumb either! We don't want to be species-ists.


To close, I'll try to put beach pictures up over the long weekend. We got some good ones. Here's is one showing how we spent Father's Day.

This is my brother Brad, my Dad and Alex at the bar at Lulu's at Homeport Marina. It's an open restaurant but there were lots of fans and we sat on the water. When they brought the appetizers, Alex dug into Mimi's onion rings as Art and I stared in amazement. He said, "What? I eat these all the time." Huh? I missed that memo. We'd never seen him put an onion in his mouth. So two vegetable triumphs this summer: carrots and onions, at least the deep fried kind.

NOT Old Enough to Know Better

Last week Alex and I were in The Beaded Tiger to get a couple of bracelets that I'd broken fixed. Everyone who works there is remarkably tolerant of the million or so questions Alex asks about the beads, the tools, what they are doing and everything else he can think of. At one point he asked the very nice lady rebuilding my bracelet, "How old are you?" Before I could say anything she said, "Old enough to know better." Alex considered that for a moment, then she asked him, "Alex, how old are you?" He immediately answered, "NOT old enough to know better!" Isn't that the truth!

Which brings us to the other little incident from last week. As Art went to get him out of the tub, there was a thump, splash and yelling from both of the guys. I went in to see what the problem was. Alex was out of the tub, Art was fussing at him and most everything was wet. What happened? Art walked in to find Alex going up into a handstand IN THE TUB. Yes, there was water in the tub, and no, it doesn't help that he had goggles on. He apparently was on his hands and knees, lowering his face into the water to look with his goggles. That gave him the notion to just kick his legs on over into a handstand. More fussing was done. Alex's theory that you can't drown in three inches of water was refuted, more or less scientifically. Case in point: NOT old enough to know better!

Butterfingers

At the end of school Alex's multi-age class had a "Family Feast and Awards Program" extravaganza. Ten minutes before it started we told Alex that it was time to go. "But I'm supposed to dress up. I need to wear church clothes! And a tie!" After fussing at him for not saying anything sooner, we ironed his white dress shirt, found his red and black tie and matching socks, church shoes that fit (sort of) and headed out the door. He doesn't have a black belt, so we left his shirt untucked.

When we got there, just five minutes late, I told his teachers about his dress code. They all laughed. As I suspected, they did not issue a dress code for the performance. The kids asked what to wear and they just told them to dress nice. When a few of the clothes-horses asked "church nice?" the teachers said that was fine. His teacher told me that Alex then said that he usually wore a tie to church. For the record there were three boys in ties for the evening. Alex's friend Ian had on shorts, a dress shirt and tie, and his buddy Jamie wore shorts, a plaid shirt and one of his dad's ties with a map of the world on it. They all looked good. Especially when they rocked out to the musical portion of the program.

A high point of the evening was the class's rendition of "We Are Family." They modified the lyrics to include "in a multi-age ant colony." (Ants are their theme.) Many pictures and videos were taken. Each of the family groups (8 groups made up of 5 children with a mix of kindergarten and first graders) sang a song. They were very cute and did a great job. After that, there were the awards.

Each child got a candy award - Snickers for a child that's funny, Peanut M&M's for someone "small, sweet and a little nutty," etc. Alex got the Butterfingers award for breaking the most things accidentally. On the way home Art asked him about breaking things. He said, "Son, you don't break that much at home, why do you at school?" Alex replied, "Well, they have a lot more stuff." I tried not to laugh. Art said that wasn't a very good reason, to which Alex answered, "It's SCHOOL property, Dad." I guess Art shouldn't worry as long as it's not OUR stuff.

It was a late night, and Alex didn't get in bed with the lights off until after 9. It was rough getting him up the next morning. He wasn't unhappy about it; he just didn't see a need to go to school anymore. He thought the program wrapped it all up nicely, and they should be done now. I kind of agreed. Art said he didn't particularly want to go to work, either. In the end everyone agreed that we had to go whether we wanted to or not. Alex was persuaded to go (at least for that day) because he wanted to get people to sign his yearbook.