Alright, now this could actually be pretty neat:  Glow in the Dark Bubble Bath

Bet the grandkids would love it! 

Oh!  Oh!  And by jingo, here's just the thing for getting Dmitry to haul his carcass out of bed in the morning:  Grenade Alarm

That oughta do it. 

This afternoon was the Grandparents' Day party at Benjamin's school:

Here I am with the Boy of the Hour.  ;^)  Of course, darling Bryson was also on hand:

That's him with his other grandfather.  And here's Benjamin in his regular spot in his classroom:

Golly, it's hard to believe he's old enough to be in preschool already. 

Yesterday evening at dinner I was telling Don about the various bits of biological minutiae with which Dmitry was being bludgeoned, leading Dmitry to pause in his enthusiastic munching of the Chicken Enchilda Casserole I'd made for dinner (recipe on the back of Campbell's Chicken Verde soup, and we're quite fond of it) to grimace and protest, "Hey!  I'm eating here!  No talking about disgusting stuff!"

Don was then heard to mutter, "Inhaling, more like" - referring to the speed with which Dmitry's dinner was disappearing - causing Dmitry to smartly repeat, "Hey!  I'm inhaling here! No talking about disgusting stuff!"  

After dinner it was time for the textbooks to be hauled out and dumped onto the table, so Dmitry settled down with his geography text and pack ("I wanna try to catch up with Ariel...she's way ahead of me") then looked at me expectantly.

The biology text and pack were just sitting there, you see.  He cleared his throat before ingratiatingly inquiring if I could help find some of the answers to the questions he'd skipped.  My enthusiasm for such a course of action wasn't much, between thinking he really ought to do it himself (though considering how long it takes him to painstakingly try to find the answers, he might be finished with the first pack (of ten) by Christmas), plus the undeniable fact I finished ninth grade a long time ago, so how come I've got to suffer through it again?

Upon my pointing out my reasonable reservations, Dmitry fixed me with those soulful, Slavic eyes as he wheedled, "Mother and son quality time?"

Sigh.  

The kid's good.

I don't recall trying to learn all this stuff back when *I* was in 9th grade!   Actually, I don't recall much of this stuff, period.  Maybe it's been discovered in the interim?

Whatever, last night Dmitry had brought home his biology text, which was huge, and struggled to work on his pack.  To his dismay, the subject currently being studied qualifies - to him, at least - as "suggestive themes"......i.e. reproduction, genetics, etc. 

Only Dmitry would consider THAT to be "suggestive themes"! 

But mercy Maud, this stuff is hard!  I was overwhelmed, and cannot imagine what it must be like for Dmitry as he attempts to learn (taken from another source):

"Just like spermatogenesis, oogenesis involves the formation
of haploid cells from an original diploid cell, called a primary
oocyte, through meiosis. The female ovaries contain the primary
oocytes. There are two major differences between the male and female
production of gametes. First of all, oogenesis only leads to the
production of one final ovum, or egg cell, from each primary oocyte
(in contrast to the four sperm that are generated from every spermatogonium).
Of the four daughter cells that are produced when the primary oocyte divides
meiotically, three come out much smaller than the fourth. These
smaller cells, called polar bodies, eventually disintegrate, leaving
only the larger ovum as the final product of oogenesis. "

This is in 9th grade?  What happened to fruit flies, and Bb, bb, BB, etc.?  I did rather well with genetics in 9th grade at Stripling Jr. High, but have no memory of delving into such detail as this. 

Lest there be any doubt as to how totally clueless I am when it comes to today's World of Entertainment, doubt no longer.  

Here's how clueless I am.....I'd never heard of Steve Irwin until news of his death surged over the news meta like a tsunami.

Turns out even Dmitry knew who he was, for pity's sake.     When I yelped in frustration at this ("The Russian kid knows who Irwin was?") he pointed out "Mom, what do you expect?  You never watch television," in a voice clearly expressing his opinion of people like me, who so neglect their cultural duties in that realm.  

Wonder who else The World knows about that I don't? 

Most likely the list is long and distinguished. 

I wish I knew why it is it doesn't seem to be possible for programmers to come up with a truly fair person v. computer backgammon game.

Backgammon's my favorite board game and for ages I've attempted to locate an on-line game that doesn't cause me to shriek with frustration.  I don't get a whole lot of opportunity to play IRL, with a pair of honest-to-goodness dice, and there's no denying occasionally one side or the other has a real run of either good or bad luck, but it's for sure no one's luck's ever as ghastly as it is when playing a computerized opponent.

Several years ago there was an online game that was so frightfully tilted toward the computer I could accurately forecast the computer's next roll at least 70 or 80 percent of the time.

Now, folks...that's not normal.

I don't object to a slight tilt in the computer's favor, but when it wins 80 to 90 percent of the time, that's not much fun.

Out of curiosity, is this solely a problem for backgammon, or is it common for online board games?

Speaking of stuff that comes in the mail, what the deuce happened to Publisher's Clearing House Sweepstakes?  Used to be it was all over the TV and I swear the big, heavy envelope was dumped in my mailbox a minimum of three times a year, but I can't recall the last time I got one.

Did the company go four feet in the air, or did they make good on their threats and because I didn't order enough magazines, my name was ditched off the mailing list? 

It's begun.  Let the record show that the first Christmas catalog was delivered on September 2d. 

Addendum:  Kathryn pointed out below that I'd been seriously remiss by neglecting to specify exactly which catalog beat the pack, and right she was.  It was The Lakeside Collection's Christmas Gift Collection 2006:

Found some good stuff in it, too.  In fact, I'm giving serious consideration to the Lighted Christmas Character Ski Lift, a bargain at only $39.95:

Wouldn't that be cool? 

The Original Photographer in the family is my sister, Jeanne, as she demonstrates with the following photos:

Amazing how Charles cooperates with his aunt.

This has to be my favorite of Hannah and Cole together! I can't imagine what on earth Hannah was telling her cousin, but by golly, she was obviously laying it on the line for him:

Here are the above poppets with their respective fathers, my son, Alex, and my nephew, Justin:

While there at Jeanne's house, Hannah took a brief ride on one of the decorative rocking horses:

Here's another marvelous picture of Hannah, taken last Sunday at the family party:

Didn't she look adorable? Notice she was wearing her sailor dress, thus matching her daddy and Uncle Charles. Speaking of her daddy, Jeanne captures a terrific shot of Mom and Alex:

And the last one is of me and Jessica:

Thanks for the super pix, Jeanne!

Football!

It's here.  Oh boy, is it ever here.  Football games last night (a tie between the Cowboys and whoever it was they played....wouldn't that be annoying?  To pay for then sit thru a game that winds up being the same as 0-0?), tonight, tomorrow, and Sunday.

Don's in hog heaven.

I'm going to go shopping.

What other course of action is there, other than shoving a foot through the TV screen?