Armless, or better, Armful, or better, Signs that it's time to head back to the gym for toning exercises

Weekly cute: perhaps as part of his oedipal fixation, or maybe as a compensation for his refusal to nurse properly as an infant, Jonah has developed a tactile fetish for what he calls "chubby": "Dad, I love your chubby," he'll say, while patting my, ahem, svelte and rock-hard abdomen.

But as I said, he is an oedipal soul at present, so this fetish has as its apex the squeezing of Wendy's upper arm. The other day, by her account (and I should tell you she has instructed me to share this story), Jonah was in the middle of his squeeze fest when he made this comment:

"Mom, I love your arms. They're just like play dough."

Ay caramba.


We should also say that our other two kids are cute, it's just that they rarely do anything expressly cute, since they are of course manly men. But, we did get a few calls last weekend from girls calling Christopher to inform him that some girl named Alex S likes him.

Christopher's response: turn several shades of red, stammer, and hang up. Also, avoid the phone for the next two days, but never be very far away when it was answered, and without exception ask the respondent who, what, and what else.


Report cards are in (well, Riley's is. Christopher "never got [his]"). Uh-huh. Anyway, Riley is at year level or better in all but two of his subjects, to which he is a newcomer, and his Arabic teach anticipates him being at year level by year's end: in Spanish, where the expectations are higher, he'll almost be there. We may have an heir-apparent.

Peace out.