Edgy Mama

In our household, spring has arrived with the advent of baseball season. If you, too, have a sports-obsessed child, you know this already.

Yesterday afternoon, my girl’s fave team, the Cleveland Indians, played their first game against the Chicago White Sox.

Here’s what she wrote this morning in her “reporter’s” notebook:

“In the eighth inning Casey Black hit a three-run double that bounced off the fence. Which putted the Indians a 10-7 lead. Also in the second inning the Indians got seven runs.

The Indians are in first place and the Tigers our division rival are in last place in our league. In the seventh inning the score was 7-7. The White Sox had us in danger there were runners in the corners with one out and Rafel Bentacourt was pitching to a good hitter but he struck him out to make two outs. Then the next hitter grounded out. Rafel Bentacourt got us out of a lot of trouble.

Then the White Sox didn’t get anything exciting.”

She needs to work on punctuation, but she’s a pretty good sports reporter. For a 9-year-old.

I know it’s mid-January, and I’m just now getting around to uploading my holiday shots.

That’s festive Biscy snuggling with his stuffed squirrel. Well, it was stuffed until he ripped the innards out. He still loves it though. The squirrel’s tail contains a squeaker, which makes the pup happy. Prey makes us all happy, doesn’t it?

I know you nerds remember the opening scenes of “The Empire Strikes Back,” where Luke is kidnapped by the snow creature and rescued by Han Solo.

My boy is obsessed with Star Wars right now, so we watched the first film (number IV) this weekend, then started in on V (Empire). I decided you have to watch them in the order they were made, otherwise you already know all the dramatic plot twists, like: “I am your father, Luke.”

Plus, this was the order in which I saw the films, so there.

About an hour after we turned off the DVD player, my boy says, “Mom, you know snow monsters can’t swim.”

“What?” I ask.

“Snow monsters, like the ones who live in Antartica, can’t swim. That snow monster who was gonna eat Luke? If Luke had jumped in the water, the monster couldn’t get him. Remember Rudolph?”

Ahhhh, clarity. The Abdominable Snowman’s fear of water is his undoing. Yes. I didn’t mention to the boy that jumping into frigid water might save you from hydrophobic snow monsters only for the few minutes before you become an ice cube.

I wonder if this has any relevance to the boy’s upcoming swim lessons, which he is not happy about?

Later, when I told the boy that he could watch the second half of The Empire Strikes Back, he said: “Okay, but it’s kind of gross.”

“Why is it gross?” I asked, remembering some of the fight scenes and wondering if they were too gory for a 5-year-old.

“Because the princess kisses Luke Skywalker,” he said. “I don’t like that part.”

Yeah, kissing. Gross. As he watched the second part, I heard a squeal.

“Mommy, mommy. The princess kissed Han Solo too!”

I imagine, if he’d known the right word, he would have been thinking, “That slut!” But we try to avoid name-calling in this house.

I’ve been working too much this week. Oh, and single parenting, which counts as double overtime.

So, not much to report, but if you want to see some adorable photos of kids dressed up as their favorite book characters that I took for the newspaper today, click here, then scroll down to “Featured Galleries” and click on the photo gallery called “Book characters come alive.”

That’s all I got for you.

FRIDAY UPDATE: Ack! I also have a front page photo. This wasn’t an assignment. The photo is just a snap I took in my daughter’s classroom, but the newspaper called yesterday asking if I had a random recent classroom shot to go with a hot story for today’s A1 section! The on-line headliner might change during the day, so it’s the story titled: “Senate bill may force merger…” Check it out!