News from the home front (or Friday kid-blogging)

Wednesday Speck discovered consonants. That is, she went from sounds like "aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh" and "hah!" to distinct series of "dadada bababa," out of the blue. Some of the phrases even have a sort of conversational intonation. For some reason, this gives me the first sense of what she will sound like when she finally talks (tomorrow, or four months from now, whenever) -- will be amusing to watch the gradual progression from Chat Only She Understands to real words . . .



Meantime, the day passes mostly like this -- a series of things put into her mouth (plastic, wood, metal, cloth). All those advanced grabbing, reaching, and bending skills in service of turning the world into her chew toy. heh.

Good stuff

I didn't watch any of the convention speeches last night after Clinton, but have been watching John Kerry's speech this afternoon (see here) and it was more lively and feistily engaging than anything he managed when a candidate himself. Worth a listen, not least for the way he called McCain on his double-talk and actual record. If only we could have nominated *this* guy four years ago...

Line of the night

From Bill Clinton: "The world has always been more impressed by the power of our example than by the example of our power." Ah yes, I remember that America . . .

Monday giggles

Well, the video is a couple months old, but when, exactly, do baby videos cease to be amusing?? Here we see the kinds of random tricks that Speck can teach her parents by giggling in response...


Tee hee!

My half cent

I guess I always sort of thought it would be Biden, for age, experience, general feistiness. Yeah, those gaffs could be problematic here and there, but I suspect he'll be pretty tightly handled. Anyway, the man who brought "Noun, verb, 9/11" to Guiliani during the early debates might just have something to say to "P.O.W. is the answer to all things" McCain in days ahead...

Quote of the day

Wisdom tells me I am nothing.
Love tells me I am everything.
And between the two my life flows.

- Nisargadatta Maharaj

(via whiskey river)

Hah hah hah

Just this. I hate to revel in stupid issues, but if we're fighting about image, I guess we're fighting about image. Tee hee/sigh.

(via dailyKos)

Ouch! (the latest)

This amateur political ad seems to me to be extremely on point: the more unpopular Bush becomes, the more McCain supports him and his policies. Something for the Undecideds to think about.

Who speaks for the troops?

John McCain likes to say he does, but apparently active military folks are a bit leery of his foreign policy viewpoints: they're donating to Obama at a 6:1 ratio. Put that in your conventional narrative and smoke it.

(via Atrios)

My kid's cuter than your kid

...or maybe not, but still pretty damn cute. Here she is within a day or so of having learned that she could sit up under her own power (5.5 months old). Look at me!



Unfortunately, we have hit a bad patch of stranger anxiety just as Grandma is about to become part of a three-person child-care plan, and the extended screaming is taking years off the lives of the adults in the picture. All quite unexpected, given her otherwise sunny disposition. Wish us well...

The man behind the mask

It's pretty clear that McCain isn't the "maverick" that the press would have you believe, but this piece from Digby makes clear that he's not even a very nice man (ok, and a vindictive hypocrite). I'm not sure that the traditional media can let go their well-established narrative slant to allow for such realities to come out, but I think that the voting public deserves a more balanced picture.

Too bad

A year or so ago, I was really rooting for John Edwards to win the Democratic nomination. Obviously, current news indicates that that would have been a disaster. I find myself too weary to read the details of all the coverage, but suffice it to say it tarnishes the moral credibility he's built through his work on poverty, and it also raises questions about his overall judgement. Feh.