Do and don't

Over the past few days, I've learned a couple of useful things with respect to 3.5-month-old babies:

DO wash your hands before assembling a bottle of milk. It happens that just a touch of chili is sufficient to transform the bottle nipple from a conduit of sweet nectar into a lit match held to a great pile of Screaming Baby-brand gunpowder.

DON'T cough. Particularly, having just executed a textbook bedtime routine - clean diaper and sleeping clothes, reading a book, (non-chili-flavored) bottle, gentle laying in crib - don't cough. In a remarkable biophysical process, the sound waves of the cough are instantly metabolized by the baby into adrenaline and pain, causing immediate screaming, followed by 45 minutes of inconsolable fidgetiness.

How first-time parents get paranoid

At Owen's one-month checkup, the pediatrician noticed that Owen prefered to look to his right and encouraged us to encourage him to look left (eg, position ourselves to his left). A few weeks ago, Kerry noticed that Tiny O actually had flattened the back right of his skull through his preference for lying on his back - the only way he really can lie - and looking to his right. So we mentioned this to the (different) pediatrician at Owen's two-month checkup. I expected to hear a chuckle at our exaggerated concern, followed by something about soft baby bones and the typical, rounded shape returning once he could sit up, etc. Instead, she said, "Oh yeah, we're seeing a lot of that now that we tell parents to have their babies sleep on their backs. It won't be so noticeable once the hair grows in."

So all the well-meaning advice to us not to worry, that we won't do anything with any permanent affect on your newborn: not entirely true. Due to our disregard for symmetrical sleeping positions, Owen may never be able to play the king in "The King and I".

On the positive side, our redoubled efforts to correct, or at least minimize, the head-flattening led to a cool moment this evening. Owen was asleep in his bouncy chair, with head to the right, natch. I reached down and just turned his head and most of his torso to the left, with only the slightest of stirrings. Kerry was impressed. "Way to go, Dad." I felt like an all-star, even though the credit was really due to his comatosery. I might as well have been proud of shifting a 12lb, 4oz bag of rice in its bouncy chair.

This could have been me

When I was a kid, I had lots of LEGOs.

I had an M. C. Escher book.

I programmed computers and was good at math.

At Rice, I even had a course that required building a LEGO robot.

But today, I'm not building this, or these, or any of this.

Where did it all go wrong?

Someone is eating the moon

On my way to the train station this morning, I had a pleasant surprise when I happened to see a lunar eclipse. It was almost a total eclipse. Might have been - the moon was still disappearing when I boarded the train and lost sight of it.

Still more milestones

Yesterday, Owen made his first trip to the mall. Within minutes, the mass consumerism overwhelmed his little system, and he passed out. He was relaxed for well over an hour of us eating and puttering around. Then, Owen had his first meal out, a bottle at Nordstrom's, sitting next to the piano. (The boy has fine tastes.) There was a big storm while we were at the mall, and when we drove home, Owen had his first specific indication of his tax dollars at work: a Howard County worker was cutting up a big tree - 54 years old, by my ring count this morning - fallen across Ivy Terrace, our only road home. So we drove down our neighbor's driveway, which actually connects to another street, and as we dashed along the side of our house to the front door, Owen was caught in the rain for the first time. All in all, quite an evening for the little guy.