WOOHOO! And Ow.

Well, it's official. James can swim! Not far, and not fast, but he can swim. He swims under water, even! I cannot believe it! We're so proud of him, and he is so proud of himself. It's just amazing to see the difference in this child- from the fear of even putting his nose in the water, to totally submerging himself and swimming- in only four weeks of lessons! Go Red Cross!

That said, "OW!" I have managed to use body parts while swimming that don't get used at any other time in one's life- not hiking, not biking, not even birthing! The closest description I can give to how I feel is that all-over, throbbing ache that comes on about three days after a no-holds-barred fist fight (win or lose, doesn't matter, it hurts a few days later). For those who've never had the joy of experiencing a fight like that, um, it's like having the brunt of the flu three days after you fell head over teakettle down two flights of stairs. I am SO glad tomorrow is the last day for swim class! Ohhh... ouch. Pass me the Ben-Gay!

We hit the library for "Quest 2" on the Summer Reader's program. James took his reading list from the previous two weeks and showed it to the librarian, then asked for suggestions based on his reading list. She had many suggestions, and most of them were crap. We went ahead and checked out a few because after a while I think she started to feel offended that we weren't taking the bait on anything. (Well, and she started bringing them TO US when we showed no interest in going to get them ourselves... *shrug*) The two we gave in and picked up are... um, well, not great. There is a series of picture books (that was all she would recommend until he told her he read The Boxcar Children on his own) about a lab named Suzy. Or Sue. Something like that. We got, "The Black Dog Gets Taken to the Vet by its Ignorant Owners", which is one in the series. The dog falls and bonks its head while chasing her friend cat. The owners swoop the dog up and take her to the vet, who takes a full body x-ray, gives her a shot (?!? for what, it doesn't say) and then sends her home with medicine to take. This vet would probably neuter a dog that's in for a deworming. The boys caught on to the discrepancies, too, and they talked my ear off about it. The flow is too choppy, the dialogue is forced. The cat is cute. That's about it.

The other book, well, ok, the title is fair warning: "Walter the Farting Dog". The bodily function humor is actually written rather sweetly, as far as that can go. It's certainly not the dog's fault he's flatulent. It's the illustrations and the father's behavior that completely creep me out. First of all, the kids look like zombies. The father looks like "Pat" from Saturday Night Live. Then he goes and sells the family dog for ten bucks while the kids are off getting ice cream and LIES about it when they come back (oh, he also eats the dog's ice cream). The father is a creep. He's an androgynous creep, at that. Never does he apologize, not even in the end, when Walter is a hero. Nope, not good old "Sell-Out" Dad. He hogs the glory, praises the dog profusely in public, and never fesses up. I hope Walter farts in his after shave bottle.

Still no word from Blogger as to what has infected my poor blog. I am tempted to just redo the entire look. *cringe* Oh, I hate to do that! But this is just silly, all the text wrapped wonky around to the sidebar. Pffttt. For those who are hanging in there and still reading: bless you!

Alrighty, the baby is sound asleep. I'm going to lay him down and go hunt for some kind of pain soothing balm I can marinate in for the night! See y'all tomorrow!

Dy