Charlie's 529 Plan

This is currently our only means of saving for Charlie's college education. I would guess that we contribute about 35 cents per night. At this rate, 35 cents x 365 days/yr x 16 years, we will have roughly $2,044 saved towards Charlie's education when he turns eighteen. The average cost of a 4 year education at a public university in that year is estimated to be $260,000. I am thinking we are going to fall slightly short of the mark.

How Charlie Goes Down The Slide

To The Movies!

This afternoon we braved uncharted territory: We took Charlie to see his first movie, a matinee showing of Kung Fu Panda. I had dismal expectations -- I did not think it was unreallistic that I would spend half the movie chasing Charlie around the lobby, the price of admission down the drain.

But for once, I was in for a very pleasant surprise: Charlie sat through the entire movie with a bag of popcorn between his legs while skillfully managing his Sierra Mist in and out of the cup holder, completely enthralled.

This opens up whole new worlds! We can go to the movies again! We can see "Ice Age 3!" The new Madagascar movie! Okay yeah so maybe we will still need to get a babysitter and see a grown up movie every once in a while. Discussing the plot nuances of Kung Fu Panda did get us very far on the car ride home.

My Son the Grown Up

This morning we had a meeting with our financial planner. When we arrived, in an attempt to instill good manners as usual, I said to Charlie: "Charlie, say hi to Ed."
Charlie strode over with his hand outstretched, grasped Ed's hand and shook it. "Hi Egg!"
Oh, my little boy is growing up so fast!

How I Just Spent The Last Hour

I just spent the last hour cleaning out my yahoo inbox. It might have been more than an hour. I have been pestered, you see, by this annoying phantom email that shows up as unread whenever I log on to my account. This has happened before -- some spam email turns up that is lost in the bowels of my account. Always, before I have been able to use the 'search' option, search unread messages, and delete the offending email. Not in this case. My account, you see, has apparently gotten too large to search. This email has been plaguing me for months, maybe more. I have made half-hearted attempts to search for it in the past, always to no avail. Tonight I finally decided I had to take drastic measures and purge my account to get rid of it. Which I unfortunately had to do one page at a time because I am too dumb to figure out how to delete my entire inbox, if yahoo allows such a thing.

8,000+ emails.

Some of which dated back to 2001.

I stopped deleting emails as a matter of course roundabout 2004.

It was a loooooong endeavor. Purchase confirmations. Travel itineraries. Pregnancy bulletins. God damn I have bought a lot of things online over the past few years. A bazillion emails from Mandy, mom, Mike. (Why does Mike email me so much? He lives with me.)

And do you know where I finally found the offending email?

It was the very last f*cking one.

Yes, go ahead, laugh. I dare you.

Maybe Just Maybe...

I can stop calling Charlie "Charlie Manson" (or, alternatively, "Damien") now! In the past 3 weeks he has only bitten at daycare.... drumroll please.... ONCE!!! This may or may not be due to the fact that a) they watch him like a hawk now and b) his favorite victim was moved not-so-coincidentally to another classroom.

One Of Those Nights

Charlie is having one of those nights. You know, one of those nights where he is just not falling asleep and I am in there every 5 minutes fielding requests:

"Mama -- blanket!!" This means that the blanket he uses for a pillow has a minute drool stain on it or some such and must be rearranged in such a way that the offending two tufts of fiber are nowhere near Charlie's cheek or any other body part.

"Mama -- poops!!" No honey, you do not have a poopy diaper. Mommy can smell your poopy diapers from a mile away.

"Mama -- diaper!!" The poopy diaper has failed and a vain attempt ensues to convince me that there is something else fundamentally wrong with his diaper that requires changing.

"Mama -- water!!" A request to top off his nighttime sippy cup.

And the latest (presumably he has run out of all other options):

"Mama -- kiss feet!!"

Go to sleep honey... please....