D and Hello Kitty

Two weeks ago, a store that's located between our house and D's kindergarten put four large Hello Kitty dolls in its front window.

D was, to put it mildly, excited.

(I'm too lazy to make a picture, so you'll just have to imagine a skinny five-year-old with several pigtails pressing herself onto a storefront window, arms outstretched, trying to... show Hello Kitty her devotion? Bring a doll to her through sheer willpower? I'm not sure.

I'm lucky the store only opens at 10; I'm not sure the staff would have appreciated it.)

As the days went by, the number of Hello Kitty dolls in the window slowly dwindled, until earlier this week there was just one left. D was not pleased.

"Mommy, you are going to buy me a Hello Kitty," she ordered.

"We'll see," I answered.

"Mommy, you are going to buy me a Hello Kitty, or I will destroy you," was her response.

Ahh, those parenting moments where you can tell you must be doing something right.

Anyway. I tried to explain to D that threats of destruction wouldn't help her cause, but the truth is, she was going to get a Hello Kitty doll either way, because I'd bought one a week earlier and was saving it for Hanukah.

We don't even usually do big gifts on Hanukah - but how could I resist? The thing about giving gifts to young kids is you just get so much happiness for such minimum effort. Adults get less visibly excited about winning the lottery than 3-year-olds do when you give them a cookie.

So yeah. D got her Hello Kitty, I got to enjoy the sight of her wiggling in excitement as she opened the wrapping (OK, OK - as she pulled it out of the bag), and nobody got destroyed. All is well.

***

D just started speech therapy this week, after months of waiting for an appointment to open up. I couldn't help but be briefly concerned that her occasional threats to destroy me are going to sound a lot more disturbing once she can enunciate them properly.

***

D is not the only one around here who threatens to destroy people on occasion. One of her older sisters was overtired and angry at everyone earlier this week, and told her sisters through tears:
"I'm going to destroy you both! I'll destroy your brains! But you don't have brains - that's the whole problem!"

***

S also got a Hanukah present - a wooden train set. So for the past day, whenever the table hasn't been set for meals (and sometimes when it has) it has been home to her train. When she came home from daycare today, her first announcement was, "I need my train." Like I said - so easy to please.

ipad, again

It turns out I'm really busy this year. Who would have thought that finishing university would be this hard? Except of course for anyone who's gone to university, ever.

So blogging is probably going to be at a minimum this year. Which is really best for all of us. Trust me, you don't want to hear my "funny" stories involving orthonormal matrices.

But in the meantime, I'll share a brief story involving S, from this morning:

*S grabs the iPad from the shelf*

*I take it away*

Me: S, you're not even dressed yet. You can't have the ipad.

S: (pouts)

Me: Do you want to pick out your clothes, or should I pick them out for you?

S: You pick my clothes. (pause) I'll stay here and guard the ipad.

 

OK and one more, involving two children who shall not be named (but whose identities will probably be ridiculously obvious... )

The story opens with me practicing reading with one kid

Me: Good job, [Kid]! You're getting really good at this!

Kid: *beams with pride*

Sister: Yeah, good job!

Kid: STOP IT! DON'T TALK TO ME! I can't think with your TALKING!

(I think "good job" sounds like an insult when it comes from a big sister... Which I can sympathize with, because frankly, as a big sister myself, I probably meant "good job" sarcastically about half the time.) (but not anymore, Snan! Now I truly am awed by your accomplishments. Good job!)

Consider yourself warned - O - Other people's kids

Today I had to take someone else's kid home from daycare with my kid.

It did not go well.

Long story short, the kid decided he didn't want to go to his afternoon daycare, and decided to make it my problem by throwing a tantrum, complete with screaming, crying, "don't wanna"s, more crying, throwing himself on the floor, and crying. (I guess that's actually the whole story. It felt long at the time.)

The daycare assistant, who is a truly lovely person, tried for several minutes to help. She even offered him a prize. I would not have offered a prize, but then, I'm not the type often described as lovely. (It's not that I was entirely unsympathetic to him - I was just far more sympathetic to myself.)

Eventually I managed to convince him to come with us by using a mix of soothing words and lifting him up and physically forcing him down the stairs kicking and screaming.

When I got home, I related my ordeal to Viggy, concluding with, "I don't like dealing with kids."

"Right. That's why we have so many," he (rather reasonably, I guess) pointed out.

Which brings me to today's warning on dealing with Other People's Kids. The warning is this: it is hard, and it stays hard.

Maybe that's an anti-warning in a weird way. Like, if you're not a "kid person," if you think newborn babies all look alike (and none of them are particularly cute), if the sight of someone else's kid kicking and screaming makes you think "his parents owe me a shot of vodka" instead of "aww poor baby" - you might find that parenting is way better than you expected.

On the other hand, if you expected that learning to love your own spawn would give you some kind of insight into dealing with other people's offspring - yeah, good luck with that.

It's not just that your kids are magically easier to deal with because they're yours. I mean, I'm sure that's true too. I'm not an expert on the human brain or anything, but it seems likely that there's a big chunk of it dedicated to making sure people nurture any small people carrying their DNA, instead of drowning out their whining with the help of massive amounts of vodka.

But it's also that you get to train your children. I'm not saying it's easy, or that it always works. But you get years to do it. Years in which your children come to limit themselves, more or less, to the types of bratty behavior that you personally find it easiest to live with.

I can think of things my kids do that I could see driving other parents nuts. The high volume, the constant pool of water on the shower-room floor, the attempts to "cook" that I clean up on a near-daily basis... I'll stop here.

But I can live with all those things a lot easier than with full-on tantrums, or kids crying for upward of 2 minutes. Both of which I barely ever have to deal with.

So yeah. I have a bunch of kids, and I'm happy to have a bunch of kids, and we all get along just fine most of the time. But don't expect me to be any good at dealing with anyone else under the age of 15 or so.

And if I ever announce that I'm opening my own afternoon daycare, someone please tie me up until I'm talking sense again.

Monster

Yesterday S left the room where she'd been playing with her sisters and their friend, and came to see me in the kitchen.

"Mommy, there's a monster," she informed me matter-of-factly (or, in the original Hebrew and original pronunciation: אמא, יש מפלתת).
"Oh, a monster? Where?"
"Up high."
"Mmmm. OK."
(this repeated a few times)
"Mommy, there's a monster"
"OK, but there's not really a monster."
"There's a monster."
"But not really."
"Up high."
(this repeated a few times)

Finally, I went to see the monster.
"Where's the monster?"
"Up high!"
"Over here?" *points* "There's no monster here."
"Up high!" *points higher*
(this repeated several times)

Finally, after S left the room to go tell someone else about the monster, we had a breakthrough:
"Girls, why does S think there's a monster in the room?"
"Oh yeah, that. She was bothering us, so we told her there's a monster in here that only eats girls named S, so that she would leave."

Ahhh, sisterly love. (Remind you of anything, Snan?)

And what happened to the monster? When Viggy came home a few minutes later, S immediately approached him about it. And rather than try to deny its existence, as I had so foolishly done, he immediately went into the room and started eating it.

"OHM NOM NOM. YUMMY MONSTER. Is it anywhere else?"
*giggle* "Over there!!!"
"OHM NOM NOM. I'm eating up the monster!"
(this repeated several times, after which we didn't hear about the monster again)

Return of the Sweet Potato

Today D came out of the girls' room crying hysterically. After she managed to calm down a little, she told me through sobs that she was crying because Adi, N and their friend had "cursed" her.

Specifically, they'd told her that she's "one of the people who lives on the moon" and also "a mushy sweet potato."

I had a talk with Adi and co about being kind and patient with younger siblings, but also pointed out to D that she had provoked them by calling Friend "retarded" and telling her "you have a sweet potato on your head."

So... hopefully everyone learned a valuable lesson? (My lesson - spend a little more time setting up the daily schedule to give A, N and D a break from each other for at least part of the day... ).

Mmmm, fresh math

I started a new math course today. The class doesn't officially start until next week, but I got a bit of an early start because I'm such a conscientious student. That and I have a final exam in another course that I wanted to avoid studying for.

Anyway. The first chapter is entirely review, which was fun, because hey, free chapter. I did encounter some new notation that briefly confused me, but it turned out that it was just a dead bug that fell on the page.

It's a little weird that this course starts with concepts that were included as an introductory review in at least 2 of the prerequisites. I assume that's just because the textbook hasn't been updated since several decades before they designed the current curriculum.

(Just checked my hypothesis. This book was written in the mid-80s. Not bad for this school. I've had math books where the word problems involving money used the lira.)

I also started a new course in political science. Have you ever noticed that math and political science are difficult for two opposite reasons? Math books cram information into 1 page that it would take 10 pages to review properly. Political science books take 1 page of information and spread it out over 20 pages, leading the reader to struggle for minutes to understand what the author is saying before realizing that the answer is "nothing."

For now, both courses still look new and exciting. Just do me a favor and don't remind me I said that when it's May and I'm still in this (year-long) class.

Alternatives to Homeschooling

In recent decades, homeschooling has become an increasingly popular alternative to traditional schools (or maybe it's becoming less popular. I don't know, I'm making this part up).

There are several variations of homeschooling:

-the fundamentalist Christian kind where you insulate your children from the sinful outside world (to be fair, as a graduate of the public school system I have to say that demonic involvement in its oversight would explain a lot)

- the kind where you spend two hours a day making your kid read a book, do absolutely nothing else, and laugh as they continue to score above the public school average on standardized tests

- unschooling, which is where a child learns through their natural life experiences. In other words, where you don't make them read a book for even two hours a day

- more stuff I'm probably forgetting, because I have no idea what I'm talking about.


So as you can see, there's considerable variety there already. But still, I think there's room for something new. Some brilliant new method of reaching children's hearts and sparking their love for learning.

And who better to come up with it than me, a random college drop-out whose lack of desire to homeschool her children is outdone only by their lack of desire to be homeschooled?

I present to you:

1. The Child-Led Path method 

Both homeschooling and schooling (school-schooling?) come with benefits and challenges. The Child-Led Path allows parents and children alike to enjoy the best of both worlds.

How it works: the "path" in this case is an actual, literally path. Specifically, the one leading from your house to your child's school.

The parent brings his or her children to school - but at the child's pace. The decision to approach the school quickly or to, instead, engage in creative free play is in the child's hands. 

This method is really about trust. Trust that our children know, in their hearts, what is right for them. Just as our bodies tell us what they need if we only listen*, so do our minds. All we need to do is to open ourselves to their message, to let them tell us whether it's time for formal education, or for checking out that weird-looking snail. 

Today's schools so often destroy the mind-mind connection, leaving our children unable to tune in to their own intellectual needs. With the Child-Led Path, we regain that lost link. As our children tap into their mind's needs, they will lead us to the right balance of school, play, and family - naturally.

Practical tips:

-Expect the Child-Led Path to take approximately two hours for each half-kilometer between your house and the school. 

-The time during your walk is valuable educational time! You, the parent, can make sure that playtime is also learning time by encouraging your children to learn more about the various things they see along the way.

* if your body is like mine, what it truly needs is coffee, pizza, and Ben and Jerry's. Which I can only assume is the ideal diet for my body type.

2. The Freedom to Wonder Method

One of the chief aims of homeschooling is to encourage children's natural curiosity. Children of all ages love learning, naturally, just like they naturally love other tasks that require effort. We can teach them so much without forcing knowledge on them, simply by listening and responding to their questions.

But do we really listen to our children's questions? For many of us, the answer, unfortunately, is "sometimes." Sure, we happily answer our 6-year-old when she asks "what is a bank?" But so often, we brush our 2-year-old aside when she asks "why is a bank?"

Parents who follow the Freedom to Wonder method believe there is no such thing as a stupid question. Or an absurd question, rhetorical question, or misworded question. If a child asks, that means they want to know the answer - and our job as parents is to help them find that answer. Not to brush them aside with phrases like, "Don't be silly," "I already answered that," or, "Are you sure you meant 'plopar' bear, and not polar bear?"

Freedom to Wonder means treating every question not as a nuisance, but as an opportunity to explore together. Parents who follow this method generally find that there is no longer a need - nor, indeed, time in the day - for formal study. 

Practical tip:

-Sometimes children, especially younger children, repeat questions. Too many of us then shut down their inquiries, insisting that the answer we gave should suffice. Freedom to Wonder means encouraging questions no matter how often they are raised. When a child asks again, it means they are still curious. Perhaps our initial answer was unclear - or perhaps they simply want to delve deeper into the subject at hand.

 3. The Apprenticeship Method

Both homeschoolers and school-schoolers sometimes appeal to centuries of tradition to support their preferred method of education. Which is pretty ridiculous. The argument over whether 

1. kids spending most of 8 hours a day sitting in a classroom or 

2. kids spending most of the day in a suburban home using K-8 software 

is more like the traditional way of doing things is, frankly, an argument that neither side is going to win.

Some people might say, "OK, so let's just ignore tradition. Weren't most kids illiterate 200 years ago, anyway?" Ignore those people. For we must look to the past to lead our children to a better future.

So what were kids really doing 200 years ago? They were out there working alongside the adults, learning valuable life skills and being socialized into the adult world naturally (also, pulling their own weight).*

The Apprenticeship Method returns to the educational method our forefathers really used: throw kids into the deep end of the working world. What better way for a child to learn the skills that he or she will need in the working world than actually being part of the working world? What better motivation than knowing that hard work and know-how will be rewarded not with a meaningless letter on a piece of paper, but by cold hard cash? What better way for parents and children to bond than to share their days side-by-side, not as teacher and student, but as a team?

*(source: this book we read in school that one time about some kid who was like an apprentice or something? And he burned his hand with silver, I think. Also there was an American Revolution in there somewhere. Snan, do you know what I'm talking about?)

*****

Thus concludes my presentation of genius breakthroughs in the field of education. Please feel free to contact me with any lucrative book deals.

Attack of the flies

Me (reading): "... the bad fairy was so sorry that from that day forth, she wouldn't even hurt a fly."

N: But what if it was a giant, evil fly?

Conversations

"Mommy, is our fish kosher?"
"Yes."
"Oh, too bad. I didn't want us to eat him."

******

(Speaking to a child who's been mentioning for days how much better things are at her friend M's house)

*child jumps on sleeping sisters*
"Stop that RIGHT NOW! Or you are going to be sleeping all alone in the play room!"
"Fooya! You're making my life annoying!"
"And what do you think you're doing? Are you making everyone's life nice right now, or are you making life difficult?"
"I'm making you a stupid life! *pause* If I lived at M's house, I would only sometimes make life stupid."

****

(D speaking to A in the middle of a game)
"Let's pretend that I'm the little sister, and you're the big sister."

Yeh yi doh

As someone old enough to remember when she first got a computer with The Internet on it (dial-up, naturally), it can be really freaky to watch my kids - who were all born in the past decade - in action.

It's most disconcerting watching S. All the girls know how to work the iPad like champs, but there's something weird about seeing a child who still hasn't quite mastered the concept of "poop goes in the toilet" grab the iPad and have her favorite movie up and running in a matter of seconds.

Her favorite movie, by the way, is the video footage Viggy got at D's channukah party last year. I have heard the songs they sang at that party SO MANY TIMES.

Anyway. So S can do nearly anything on the iPad. But then she's totally stymied by the youtube search the kids prefer, which uses vocal input, and it's really sad and cute.

The other day I found her staring at the screen with great concentration, saying, "Yeh yi doh."

*youtube fails to yield video results*

"Yeh Yi Doh!!"

*nothing*

"YEH YI DOH!!!"

*nothing*

What she was trying to make it show her was her second-favorite video of all time: the clip from Frozen with the song Let It Go.

I'm sure it's only a matter of time until someone invents a voice search that can be used by toddlers. Maybe something that lets you choose between the various real pronunciations you might have been going for (with pictures, naturally).

Heck, it's probably been invented already, but S has a technologically ignorant mother who won't learn about its existence, let alone spend the time figuring out how the ipad app store works in order to actually buy it. And she can't buy it herself, because the ipad doesn't recognize "ahpah appsh." Poor S.

A sweet potato on your head

For whatever reason - superb luck? accidental good parenting? - my kids don't seem to have picked up any curse words.

They have, however, picked up the idea of curse words.

Tonight D did some Very Bad things, and was unceremoniously dumped into time-out. A couple of minutes later I decided we were probably both ready to talk.

As I approached a glowering D, she looked up at me and hissed, "Watermelon."

"D, why are you acting like this? I know you're a good girl and can be so nice, why do mean things to your sisters and Mommy and Daddy?" I began.

(Note: this was a mistake, for a couple reasons - number 1 mistake being that I asked "why." Never ask why. You don't want to know.)

"Because. Everyone was ANNOYING me," she explained.

"But when you hit N and took her things, maybe you were annoying her."

*Glare.* "Sweet potato. Sweet potato."

"What could you do instead of hitting?"

"Sweet potato."

****

Two minutes later, D has stopped hissing vegetable names at me and is ready to talk.

Me (attempting a This is a Teaching Moment voice): "So what do you think would help you remember not to hit?"

D (instantly): "If I went to Jerusalem for two days."

".... "

"We could stay in the same hotel where we stayed last time."

"Who would go to Jerusalem? Just you?"

"No, me, and you and everybody who lives in this house... And then I would remember not to hit."

"But honey, we were in Jerusalem before, and it's still hard for you to remember not to hit."

".... I don't remember being in Jerusalem before."

"You remembered the hotel just now."

".... No! I don't remember the hotel at all."

****

Would you believe that N, of all people, is a very stubborn child?

N loves to learn. But N loves to learn her way.

Right now, she's learning to write. OK, great. I suggested maybe she wanted to learn to read first, but no. She wants writing. So maybe she wanted me to sit with her and work on letters? No. Should I help her figure out how to spell words? No! She will write letters, and then I will tell her what she wrote. And that is how she will learn.

So we have dozens of scenes like this (translation by me):

N: Mommy, what did I write? Did I write "good girl"?

Me: No, honey, it says "Gomshpal."

But she perseveres. For what it's worth, N's way generally seems to work pretty well for her - she's somehow picked up a grade-level-and-beyond knowledge of letters, math, and English - so for now, I try to just nod, smile, and be grateful yet again that I don't homeschool. 

Well that got dark fast

This morning I decided it was time to change the water in the fish tank. The sales guy said to change the water once a week, which I've interpreted to mean once every nine days.

Here is our fish tank, pre-water change:

Do you notice anything strange about that picture? Like, say, only one of the fishes having fins or a tail?

That's not just because I got lazy halfway through drawing.

In real life, I didn't notice the change right away. "Mommy, that fish looks dead," N noticed.

"No, honey, he's just holding still so I don't catch him," I told her (while trying to transfer the fish out to a bowl so I could empty their tank). Dead fish float, right?

But a minute later I had to admit that she was right. Also, EEEEEWWWWWWW. Gah. Why did I have to joke about survival of the fittest????? Why???

This whole "pets" thing was bad enough when I thought all I'd have to do would be to remember to give them food and clean water once every few days. I am SO not prepared to deal with gruesome fish murder.

The other fish, henceforth to be known as Murderfish, kept swimming frantically away as I tried to catch him so I could change the tank water. I think he realizes I know what he did. In the end I gave up, and am waiting for Viggy to come home and dispose of the dead fish, and figure out a smart way to catch the living fish.

Fortunately, the girls do not realize that Murderfish was involved in Otherfish's death. They think Otherfish got sick and stopped eating (and then his fins fell off, leaving only bloody stumps? I'm not sure what they think happened there).

RIP, Otherfish.

Now the kids are out playing or sleeping, it's just me and Baby E (who is now known as "[E] fat-face," but in a loving way). So I have to go do math. In the living room. Alone. With Murderfish.

Gah.

Maybe it's time for a softer, cuddlier pet. Like, say, a hamster. (warning - link not safe for sanity) 

Chapter 402: In Which we Get Pets

As the title indicates, we are now the proud owners of two real, live (for now) pets!

By "proud," I mean "extremely reluctant."

It began with S's end-of-year party at daycare a couple weeks ago, where for whatever reason, they decided to give each child a going-away present of a real live fish.

WHO DOES THAT???? Who thinks of parents bringing their toddlers home for a month with no daycare, and thinks, "you know what those people probably want? Another fragile, needy living being to care for!"

Maybe you all don't think of goldfish as being particularly needy. OK, maybe to you they aren't. But we're a family that managed to kill cactus. More than one cactus. 

Of course, you could always choose to give the fish away or something. If you don't mind breaking your kid's heart.

So we brought our fish home, and Adi instantly fell in love with it and gave it a name that I've already forgotten. Adi has already named each and every one of the several dozen street cats living in this area, and my brain is out of room to remember these things.

She also started petting it. Yes, petting the fish. At least she didn't take it out of the water to hold it, like a friend's child did (more on that later).

In the meantime, N and D are asking questions like, "Can we feed him cereal?... Why not?... Can he go swimming in the bath?" and I'm mentally giving the fish 20% odds of living to see the weekend.

Later that day, we went to E's house, where we learned that their fish (given to E's little sister S, who is in daycare with our S) had returned its soul to its Maker a rather short time after arriving in their home (remember the child who took the fish out of the water to hold it? That was E's little brother).

While I tried to quell my feelings of guilty relief that someone else had managed to kill their fish before we killed ours, Adi was busy realizing that her fish could die, too. So then I told her that, yeah, goldfish sometimes don't live very long.

At first she was teary at the thought of her goldfish not living for long. But within 2 minutes, I overheard her and E debating over what they would do with its dead body - bury it? or feed it to Mitsy?

I had to remind her that her fish could very well still be alive. I think they were almost disappointed.

Anyway, our fish couldn't live in a bowl forever, and E's mom needed replacement fish for her broken-hearted toddler. So we went to the pet store and ended up with one little plastic fish tank each, two fish for her, and one more fish for us (I figured that if I had remembered the breed of fish right, they could be friends. If not - a valuable lesson for the kids on survival of the fittest).

Our two fish are still alive, for now, and not in Mitsy's stomach. So - yay us. Now let's just hope they are sufficient as family pets, and don't turn out to have been gateway pets that only encouraged Adi in her dreams of hamsters and cats that are allowed in the house.

(I shouldn't mock Adi's dreams. At least she just wants a hamster. Dani wants a pet lion.)

Tummy

Child (grabs my tummy fat and squishes it): Your tummy is almost fat!

Me: :(

Child: But it isn't fat.

Me: :)

Child: It isn't really fat, because Baby E isn't in there anymore. It just looks fat.

******

Remember a few posts ago when I said the problem with Hamas is that it still views Israel as a colony?

It turns out someone smart totally thinks the same thing.

I thought the same thing as a news analyst. That means I could be a news analyst! If I were able to turn my one-paragraph ideas into three-page essays. And also to have said ideas 10 days earlier.

Wait, what?

So last Friday Hamas announced that we don't have a ceasefire anymore, and there's been not infrequent rocket fire ever since.

I think I speak for most Israelis when I say - wait, what? Are we still doing this? I totally thought the summer war was over.

I mean really. Viggy is back home, the emergency supplies are in the process of being eaten, I even got the kids pool passes (non-refundable pool passes! Good thing the pool is just out of range). What gives? And Hamas - weren't you, like, just complaining about how Israel keeps bombing you two minutes ago??

Have you not noticed a pattern over the past few years of firing rockets at Israel not creating happy results in Gaza?

I seriously think Hamas suffers from some kind of mental disorder. Like really bad OCD, but with "bombing things" as the sole repetitive behavior.

******

Viggy was busy "playing snakes and ladders," as his commander put it. "We find the ladders, and make sure the snakes can't climb up them." (in American, that would be "chutes and ladders," but then the joke doesn't work.)

So it was all very stressful, and we're glad he's home. S in particular spent a while insisting on being with "ABBA SHEL ANI" ("Mine daddy") at every possible moment.

Viggy's brother (one of them) is still in reserves. While reserves anywhere outside the Gaza area has been considered "safe" in recent weeks, he actually has some pretty crazy stories. Like, there was one riot where soldiers were hurt and a Palestinian guy was killed.

Specifically, the soldiers were hit by tear gas fired by some overenthusiastic Border Police officers, and a Palestinian protester died after warning fire led him to drop his Molotov cocktail (you're supposed to throw them... ). But still. Scary stuff.

******

An update on my earlier remarks on the civilian casualty rate in Gaza:

The death figures have been updated. Assuming the new ones are accurate, the revised civilian casualty rate would be significantly higher than my initial estimate (over 40%, instead of under 30%), which was based on the first several hundred deaths.

I don't actually assume the latest figures are accurate. On the one hand, it's true that heavy fighting in Seijaya (only some of which was accounted for in the mid-war death toll) and (briefly) Rafiah probably meant more civilian casualties. On the other hand, the more serious ceasefire talks are, the more Hamas tries to bring pressure to bear on Israel, and it's lied about civilian deaths in the past.

My method was simple, and also obviously flawed: I just looked at the differences between how heavily represented various population groups are in Gaza as a whole, vs. in the list of dead (eg. children ages 0-14, men ages 45+, etc), and calculated how likely it would be to get that degree over overrepresentation/underrepresentation in a random sample (or a 50% random sample, or 30%, etc).

To be clear, I wasn't assuming that any particular group is more likely to be involved in terrorism, only checking how random vs. non-random the deaths seemed to be.

The main flaw is that there are reasons that certain groups of non-combatants might be overrepresented. For example, there was a fairly clear trend toward a higher death rate among 10-14 year old boys than among other children aged 14 or younger. I doubt that's due to actual involvement in armed combat; more likely, it indicates a certain approach to safety (that is, boys that age proving they're brave by being deliberately uncautious). Similarly, the disproportionately high death rate among women in their 20s (compared to other girls/women) could be due to the fact that wives and sisters of Hamas and Islamic Jihad commanders are in that age range, and are dying with their relatives in airstrikes.

So my method is flawed. OTOH, all the other methods I've heard of are equally flawed if not more so. (The worst: trusting Hamas to say whether a given person was a "militant" or not, because they tend not to lie about that sort of thing (remember after Operation Cast Lead, when they claimed for the better part of a year that only 50 Hamas members were killed in fighting? Only to later admit that it was around 600?... No? Only I remember these things, because I am the nerdiest of news nerds? Fine, be that way)).

I was glad to see the New York Times begin to somewhat address the issue. Albeit a couple weeks after everyone learned from the American media that Israel is killing Gazans at random, but still. It's something.

******

And now the chunky baby is asleep again, and my rant must end. After all, I might be taking the kids to the pool tomorrow.

Does anyone else find it concerning that a band called "Megadeath" is cancelling a performance in Israel due to the security situation?

We're too dangerous for MegaDeath. That can't be good.

*****

And in the latest "uhhh.... what?" media moment - CNN talking about why there have been "so many civilians" dying in Gaza.

Beyond the fact that it's a little weird that they say "so many" about what is - sadly - a very standard civilian death toll during wartime (by my unprofessional (but disturbingly thoroughly researched) estimate, about 25% - if all Hamas data are accurate, and not taking into account whether civilian deaths were caused by Israel or Hamas), it was really strange that they spent several paragraphs talking about the reason that Palestinian civilians might not leave their homes despite warnings. When the fact is that civilians did leave their homes after being warned.

Maybe there wasn't 100% evacuation, but from everything I've heard from people who were actually there, nearly everybody did leave. Most civilian deaths were in airstrikes, misfired Hamas rocket, etc - not from being anywhere near the scene when soldiers arrived.

A bit odd, then, to see the media explaining why it was that people stayed.

*****

Less "odd" and more "infuriating" to see what CNN had to say about the tunnels.

For one thing, because the bit about how the IDF destroys tunnels was complete and utter BS. Just - zero relationship between CNN's version of events and the truth.

"The main way to obliterate the tunnels is by airstrikes and artillery bombardment" - no, neither of those things work against the larger tunnels, which is why soldiers were there in the first place. Does CNN really think that Israel sent tens of thousands of soldiers in on foot to do something that could have been done from the air?

Do they not have interns who could check this stuff?

And then: "The tunnels have, for some time, also been used as vital supply lines to Gaza, through which food and other necessities have been transported."

The tunnels that Israel was busy destroying in central and northern Gaza? Those tunnels?

CNN. For real. You're a big news station, surely you can afford at least one intern whose job it can be to look at maps for you.

*****

Also funny that CNN feels the need to explain to its American audience why a difference in available technology might mean one side has more casualties than the other. How many American civilians died in the Iraq war, again? I mean, do we really think that Americans need that concept explained to them at this point?

"You see, guys, it turns out that it's safer to kill someone by bombing them from within a tank with its own missile defense system than it is to charge out blindly from a hole in the ground with a rifle. Who knew?"

Of course, the main reason for the uneven casualty rate* here - as in the Iraq war - is that the war is taking place on Hamas' turf, in Gaza, and not within Israel.

(* or if you're CNN, the "disproportionate" casualty rate. Not that I'm bitter, or anything.)

*****

I'm trying to avoid criticism on whether media is "pro-Israel" or "pro-Palestinian." That's all controversial, and subjective, etc.

But this is just getting the facts wrong.

Years ago, I was somewhat disturbed to find myself working at a news station with little, if any, actual news experience.

Later, I was highly disturbed to realize that the largely amateur, openly politically oriented news outlet I worked for was at least as professional as most of the "big name" media outlets. At least we had actual first-hand sources, and didn't claim to be reporting from sites we had no access to. 

Years ago, I focused on local activism because I didn't have the resources to get involved with problems overseas.

Now, I focus on local activism because I realize that I don't know what's really going on overseas. Every media report boils down to two things: what local parties with a strong interest in promoting their narrative have to say (the PLO says Hamas is a "political party"? You don't say!), and what a handful of reporters on the ground who can't afford to anger the powers-that-be feel safe saying.

*****

(For the record, the sense I get is that most reporters feel like they morally have to support Israel's right to self-defense, but morally can't support anything that kills innocent people. Which leaves them in an awkward position, given that there's never been a war in which innocent people haven't been killed.

In an ideal world, this would perhaps lead to a real debate on the morality of self-defense, or to an in-depth look at how Gaza turned into a hellhole stuffed full of bombs and ruled by would-be-genocidal fascists, and how the world can turn that whole situation around.

In our world, it leads to reporters bouncing back and forth between "rockets" "but dead children!" "rockets" "dead children!" like ping-pong balls in a game being played by two people on speed.

IOW - less "anti-Israel" or "anti-Hamas," and more just plain "uhh... guys... how can we present this decades-long conflict in a way that won't require anyone to think too hard?")

And now we're done

Pop quiz: What's the one thing no Israel-Gaza conflict is complete without?

If you guessed "ironic music videos," you're totally right! (Partial credit for "pointless deaths," "weapons in a UN facility," "that one horrific bombing that each side denies involvement in," and "at least three broken ceasefires").

The video in this latest round of summer violence was provided courtesy of Hamas.

The lyrics are essentially, "Attack... attack... obliterate the Zionists... Zionists are scaredy-cats who hide from rockets" (the fact that Hamas apparently sees hiding from rockets as weakness explains a lot, actually).

The music is disturbingly catchy. Listen to this more than once, and you'll find yourself in the very awkward position of trying to explain to a coworker what it is you were just humming and why.

Israelis couldn't sit by and let Hamas mock them with a catchy "attack Israel" music video. So in a response that I guess might sort of make sense, on some other plane of reality, with the help of enough quality drugs, they decided to create their own "attack Israel" videos.

So here you have it - Hamas' "Arise and Attack" video:

The Lion King version:

The "dancing soldiers" version:

Tel Aviv style:

And re-worded to express angst over a breakup:

There's also a trance version, and some seriously "what the hell is that" versions.

"But Ali," some of you may be saying. "I'm an orthodox Jew. How could I listen to Hamas music videos at a time like this??"

Don't worry, I've got you covered. There's also an a-cappella version for the nine days:

****

Not quite a version of this meme, but I got a kick out of Wile E Coyote, the Hamas version:

****

And an "ironic music videos" retrospective:

Nothing will ever beat "Fall on you Til"

The view from here, as of 1:30 in the morning

And now for something new and different: more on the war!

I won't be coherent this time, either.

So for lack of intelligent things to say, I'll just express my feelings, and how they contrast to what's generally presented in the press.

I think there's a kind of perception, outside Israel, that Israelis hate Hamas and want to crush it because of all of their hate and anger.

Now, I'm not going to say that Israelis like Hamas, or anything. But I think we have a lot more on the line than it might appear. Of my female friends, over half have a husband, brother, or boyfriend in the army right now.

This isn't a big country. At this point, pretty much everyone knows someone who knows someone who was killed. Pretty much everyone loves someone who's in harms way. So nobody is like "yay war" just for the sake of revenge or anger. It may give me warm fuzzies when bad things happen to Hamas, but I care about my husband getting home safely about a zillion times more than I care about venting my own ill will.

So why do people support the war? (sorry, "operation").

Not so much because they're angry, but because they're very worried.

What looks like a cycle of violence to most outside observers looks totally different from an insider's perspective. Here in the Middle East, you can see that it's clearly a downwards spiral of violence.

We're doing better than six years ago in that six years ago, when Hamas fired a zillion rockets at Israel, they hit a whole bunch of houses, schools, etc, and now we have the Iron Dome and cities are way better protected. But - six years ago, they were hitting Be'er Sheva. Now they're hitting Eilat and Haifa.

So if you're reading news in America, that may not sound too different (six of "unnecessary double vowel sounds," half a dozen of "how do you do that gutteral 'ch' again?"). But it means missiles that can go twice the distance. It's the difference between around 20% of Israelis living in the high-rocket-frequency zone and 100% (those people living too far north for Hamas' current capabilities were under fire from Lebanon and Syria over the past couple of weeks). 

And it's important to note that the 2008 situation was practically unthinkable just 3 years earlier. When some people warned in 2005 that if Israel withdrew from Gaza, there would be missile attacks on Tel Aviv, the reaction was largely, "Yeah, right. Like that will happen." 

So it's not so much, "Crush them!!! Whoot! We're number one!!" as "Guys, we did this in 2006 and 2008 and 2011 and we're getting more #$%#$ rockets flying at us than ever. Can we please just get it over with this time? Before they get chemical weapons? Yes, it will hurt, but waiting won't make it easier."

I know, I know - if it's a cycle of violence, why not break the cycle by trying not-violence? (OK, only half of you were thinking that). But the thing is, it's hard to break a cycle of violence when the other party has vowed to keep being violent no matter what you do. That, and violence works a whole lot better than many people give it credit for. Past military operations really have significantly set back terrorist groups, or have made certain tactics far less feasible (I think we've all noticed the drop in suicide bombings here over the past decade. That wasn't due to Hamas or Islamic Jihad becoming less enthusiastic about the idea of convincing teenagers that it would be awesome to off themselves in the most murder-y way possible).

Will this work? I don't know. I do think that Hamas' infrastructure has taken an enormous hit. 

*****

And now, advice for the political left:

Convincing people that we need to limit military operations works way better when you focus on specifics.

Like, if you just say, "Israel is killing too many innocent people," your non-left-wing-Israeli listeners are probably hearing, "You have no right to self-defense," or maybe "You guys are big, homicidal bullies."

But if you say, for instance, "It might be better if Israel just didn't use airstrikes in assassinations. It's too hard to control who's around, so you get, like, five innocent people killed just to kill one Hamas guy" - people might not agree, but they'll listen. Just my humble opinion.

Bonus points if your alternate proposal for dealing with terrorist leaders involves assassin robots, because that would be cool. A sign that the apocalypse is near, but cool. 

*****

Note to certain relatives who may be reading this: the baby is awake, so it's totally cool that I'm posting after 1:30 am. (This has nothing to do with all the coffee I drank today or my decision to exercise at 10 pm, it's all the baby.)

War and kid stories

A kid story (involving the war).

So I overheard Adi and her friend S talking politics at lunch ("We're winning." "Yeah. Hamas is only winning at being stupidest."). At one point, Adi, in all seriousness, said:

Adi: They [Hamas] should be thanking us!

Why?

Adi: We have the Iron Dome, so we know when there are missiles coming. But they don't have the Iron Dome. So we call them and tell them that there are missiles coming toward their house!


OK, it's sad if you overthink it, but as an insight into my daughter's understanding of the news it made me laugh. (apparently missiles are a natural phenomenon affecting Hamas and Israelis alike).

****

I started to share a whole lot of other thoughts, but then I realized:

1. I have a whole lot of thoughts. Like, pages and pages worth of stuff to say.
2. Not a whole lot of it is super-clear.
3. I should probably sleep.

So - those few of you willing to tolerate my sleepy musings about war and global politics will just have to wait.

The missing Hamas terrorists

Has anyone else noticed that Hamas fighters are completely missing from the international media's ongoing Israel-Gaza body count?

Every breakdown of Israel's casualties is along the lines of, "[Number] of Israelis have been killed, [X] soldiers and [Number-X] civilians."

Every breakdown of Gaza's casualties is along the lines of, "[Much Bigger Number] of Palestinians have been killed, most of them civilians."

So for one thing, that "most of them" (AFP was even claiming 80% civilian casualties at one point, although they made sure to cite "rights groups") is almost certainly untrue. Given the age and gender breakdown in Gaza as a whole compared to the age and gender breakdown among those killed, it's extremely unlikely that the civilian death toll is even all that close to 50%, let alone higher. (Odds are astronomically against an 80% civilian death toll.)

(My knowledge of both math and politics comes in handy, for once).

Obviously the ideal is no civilian casualties. I'm not saying the current rate is fine by me. Just saying that the media is, as always, full of crap.

But that's not even the strange part (I expect the media to be full of crap). The strange part is - why not "[Number] of Palestinians have been killed, [20% of Number] Hamas fighters and [80% of Number] civilians."?

OK, we don't know the exact numbers. So, say, "1,050 Palestinians have been killed, an estimated 500 of them Hamas members and at least 300 civilians."

But no. The fact that Hamas' people are dying by the hundreds is left for the reader to figure out themselves, through their own mental calculations.

If I saw that in one or two news stories I'd think it was a coincidence, but so far it's been literally every single one (except perhaps in Israeli media).

I'm leaning toward thinking that it's intentionally soft wording aimed at protecting news agencies' people in Gaza. As in, Hamas would not be kind to any reporter who dared to explicitly state that its death toll is far higher than the IDF's. Their PR has always involved denying their own losses.

Whatever the reason, it makes Israel look pretty terrible (the wording gives the not-so-subtle sense that there are only three parties involved: the IDF, Israeli civilians, and Gazan civilians. True, nobody who's following the news could actually think that, but I believe wording has a subconscious impact regardless).

Other conspiracy theories welcome (as are links to articles that totally disprove my theory by using explicit wording re: Hamas casualties).

Questions for the Left, advice for the Right

Given the circumstances, I can't help talking politics a bit now.

When I think about politics right now, I mostly think about how sick I am of slogans. "Crush Hamas" - how? What do you mean "crush"? I don't think killing them all is going to happen. "Stop fighting, start talking" - to who?? Hamas? What kind of compromise can there possibly be there?

Anyway. I've been left with some questions for the Israeli political left, and some advice for the political right.

 

I'll start with the questions. Here is probably a terrible place to ask those questions (I'm pretty sure that after the several lulls in posting I've had in the past few months, the only people still reading are my mom and sister (hi guys!)). But I'll write them down here, to get it out of my head.

- The big question - what's the alternative the left is suggesting right now? A ceasefire without destroying the rest of the tunnels? A military operation that's run differently (eg, no airstrikes, or house-to-house fighting instead of bringing in the bulldozers, or vice versa)? 

Right now it feels like all the focus is on how sad and terrible it is that innocent people are dying. Which, yeah, it is, but - not to sound like a horrible person here - what's your point? I think it's clear to everyone that we're in a situation where innocent people are going to die no matter what course of action we choose. (go in to destroy tunnels = war with Hamas = people dying, don't go in = tunnels used for attacks = people dying...)

I guess that's not just a question for the Israeli left, but for the world in general. So many politicians, so many words about how sad and terrible the loss of life is - so few concrete proposals as to how things could be different. (And no, buzzwords like "compromise" and "peace talks" and "ending the cycle of violence" do not count.)

- Do you take Hamas at their word re: wanting Israel destroyed? Or is there a sense that if Israel ends the "siege" and takes similar steps, Hamas would become more moderate (or alternatively, would be replaced by different leadership)?

- Why does the political left tend to treat Netanyahu as if he's anti-peace and doesn't really want to negotiate? What's the big difference between what Rabin offered and what he's offered?

*******

And advice for the right: we can't afford to let "racist" be a word that only the political left uses. 

I think the political right got so used to hearing "racist" as an automatic dismissal of its own ideas that at some point it basically just dropped the word from its lexicon. Not good.

I don't think there's nearly as much racism on the political right as one might think from reading talkbacks and similar media (facebook feeds, etc). But there's enough that we need to take it seriously, and soon.

*******

My two cents? Yeah, you didn't ask for it, but you're going to get it anyway...

I think the main factor in this conflict, still, is the refusal to recognize Israel. Hamas keeps using tactics that have historically worked on foreign occupiers, not realizing that its own perception of Israel as a foreign occupier doesn't make it so. 

Terrorism might drive out some colonialist soldier who just wants to get back home to Britain/France/wherever. But try that against someone in the only home they've ever known, and you're going to get a very different reaction. 

******

OK, that's more than enough of that. I hope to return soon to our usually scheduled programming of random crap my kids said/ tales of terrible housekeeping/ poop jokes.

Suspense

(No, this isn't about the fighting)

(conversation translated by me)

Me: Adi and N, if you girls can sweep the floor for me, I'll be able to shower now and we can leave sooner.

Adi: But I'm at the most suspenseful part of my story! I'll do it, but don't ask for any more help after this, because I'm at the suspense! (אני במתח)

Me: Honey, you don't have to do it. I'm just suggesting it, if you want to leave more quickly.

Adi: Oh, OK. So then I'll keep reading the suspense.

D: Mommy, I want to read the suspense too!

Me: OK.

D: .... What does 'read the suspense' mean?

Tablecloth

Viggy and I discuss whether or not we need a new tablecloth:

Him: We need to replace this tablecloth.

Me: Why do you say that? Because of the nail polish stains?

Him: No, I meant because of this brown stuff here.

Me: I think that's just the table. See, it's ripped a little in some places, so the brown shows through.

Him: No, this brown stain.

Me (pointing): This brown stain?

Him: No, on the other side.

Me: Oh, that stain. Yeah, that does look pretty bad.


This is what you get when neither spouse is particularly aesthetically gifted (no offense, Viggy).

By the way, I highly recommend plastic tablecloths if you have young kids. Not tablecloth covers, just big sheets of plastic-y stuff that go over the table and stay there. That way there's no need to mess around with placemats or with constant tablecloth-washing. Just grab a sponge and give it a quick wipe. Or, if it's been more than 5 minutes between mealtime and cleaning time, just grab a chisel and scrape it down (cornflakes and milk, as it turns out, create a mixture that's probably strong enough to build houses from).

Adi's cat

Adi has a cat.

It is not an indoors cat. Those of you who know Viggy personally may have guessed that already. Ditto for those of you who've seen my house, and who realize that I need a small needy animal shedding on the furniture like I need a hole in the head.

(which has always struck me as a bizarre expression, because in fact I do need holes in my head, otherwise I would die. It should really be "like I need a new hole in the head. That is not a piercing. Or a third nostril that somehow allows me to breathe underwater.")

Anyway. "Adi's" cat is one of the three cats that hangs out outside our building. There are three of them, named (by her) Tal, Purr, and Mitsy.

Adi's favorite by far is Mitsy, or as everyone else knows her, "that one with the freaky eye."

Mitsy is white, with patches of gray that may or may not just be dirt, a freaky eye (naturally), and an ever-changing array of nasty scratches that may explain why she's somehow still skinny, despite the fact that several different people all feed our building's cats and the other ones are pleasantly round.

Mitsy is also actually a boy cat, but we are not allow to mention that. The fact of "her" male-ness was discovered fairly early on in the game, but not so early that A and N weren't already very attached to the idea of Mitsy as a girl. And anyway, you can't call a boy cat "Mitsy" (apparently), and obviously it would take some time to come up with an equally creative boy name - so for conversational purposes, Mitsy is female.

A couple of days ago N mentioned that Mitsy might have babies soon, and I didn't manage to refrain from reminding her, "Honey, you know Mitsy is really a boy, right?"

Adi was very offended. "Mommy. You're not supposed to say that!"

"I'm sorry," I told her. "I just meant that Mitsy might not be able to have kittens for... biological reasons."

Adi considered for a moment, then nodded. "OK."

It's not so bad having a cat with this sort of set-up. The kids can play with it and feed it scraps, but it's not my responsibility and it doesn't come in the house. And it seems good for Mitsy, too. She looks like she needs some positive attention.

Unfortunately, Mitsy seems to have been a gateway pet, as Adi is already asking for a pet she can keep in the house as a present for her next birthday. She wants a mouse, a bird, or a gerbil - any of those things is fine, as long as it's female.

Viggy is trying to talk her into a fish. Even that has its potential downsides - most notably, Adi's inevitable heartbreak when the fish dies of neglect/overfeeding/being invited by the younger children to join them in the bathtub. (On the other hand, one could argue that one of the main purposes pets serve is to teach children about the inevitable reality of death... )

Anyway. Now I must return to life and its many demands (laundry to fold, homework to do, popcorn to eat...). In the meantime, if anyone has a particularly durable type of pet to recommend, feel free to leave a comment.

Rocket fun times

We haven't been getting as much rocket-related excitement as our friends from elsewhere in the country, but a couple of rockets have hit uncomfortably close to where we live.

So today I waited until the kids changed out of their "bathtub rainstorm" clothes and cleaned some of the buckets of water off of the floor, then sat them down for a rocket safety talk. I talked about how we might hear a siren, and where we should go if we're outside (into a building) or in our house (into mommy and daddy's room). But don't worry too much, because there probably won't be rockets here, it's just important to know how to be safe.

A couple of minutes later I came across Adi leading the girls and a couple of their friends in saying tehillim (psalms). Adi was quick to tell me that they were definitely NOT scared, but were only praying for other people who might have rockets fired at them.

A few minutes after that, D didn't want to put on her shoes. D never wants to put on her shoes, so I didn't think much of it. But then she curled up in Viggy's bed looking sad. I asked her what was wrong.

"Mommy, I don't want to go outside until after the rocket falls down," she explained.

Then to make her feel better I told her that the people firing the rockets are stupid and have terrible aim, and that some of their rockets even fall down and hit them by accident. That cheered all the kids up a little too much. Adi and her friend spent the next few minutes entertaining the younger kids by playing the part of "terrorist who blows self up."

Ahh, childhood.

Then we all went out to the park (a safe enough place, considering that 1. we're far enough from Gaza that we get over a full minute warning in case of attack, 2. our park is small enough that nowhere is more than 50 seconds or so from shelter - even at a child's pace).

On the way back, D was thinking more about rocket safety. "If we were in M's house, the best place to be would be under the table," she said.

"Why is that?"

"Because you are not allowed to move the chairs."

Party time

It's the end of the school year. Which means one thing (one thing other than soul-crushingly hard final exams, that is): end-of-the-year parties in preschool.

Last week we had parties for N, D and A very nearly back-to-back.

For those of you not familiar with the Israeli preschool system, a party in preschool isn't just a bunch of bored parents sitting around while their hyper offspring eat cake and run around. The hyper offspring are expected to put on a production that usually involves upward of one hour of singing and dancing.

This is apparently the Song Lady's sole opportunity to show the parents that she has been providing valuable enrichment activities for their children, and thereby to justify her salary. Personally, I think she could probably earn more by doing nothing with the kids all year, then passing a hat around at the beginning of each preschool party and warning that the production length will be inversely proportionate to the amount of cash collected.

But that's just me. A lot of parents seem very enthusiastic about these things, actually.

For whatever reason, at D's end of the year party they started by giving the kids red sashes to wear as ties. This was a bizarre choice.

I have to admit, performances by 3 and 4-year-olds are actually pretty fun. The kids are old enough to have a general sense of what's going on, but young enough that things are going hilariously wrong on a near-constant basis.

(D was actually more or less on track during her whole party. She did get a little extra excited at the beginning and start jumping around in the middle of the room while the preschool teacher was still giving her welcome speech. But from that point on she was remarkably focused. She was using her tambourine as a tambourine while the child next to her busily licked his, and she wasn't one of the kids who caused the "hold hands and walk in a circle" bit to devolve into chaos.)

And on the bright side, these events provide hours of free entertainment for younger siblings down the line. S can spend hours watching old footage of D's hannukah party from last year.

Still, I wish that if preschool teachers didn't have the sense to cut these parties way, way shorter, they would at least provide a little in the way of entertainment for those of us not endlessly fascinated by watching small children forget the words to songs.

I can dream.

all of the smarts

I am currently trying to understand Green's theorem (on the relationship between the line integral over a curve and the double integral of the space bounded by the curve) with a wet shirt on. Wet because I tipped the cup before bringing it to my mouth.

However much luck you all wish me with this math course, it will not be enough.

In other news, I have a most excellent excuse for not being in touch recently - having a baby. The baby is squishy and fast-growing and likes to sleep, making him an all-around excellent baby. Other baby facts: he was born very hairy, but now has a bald strip running around his head from where his head rests on the mattress, and he hates showers, a fact he expresses through shrieks that stop just short of reaching dog-whistle range.

I hope to add more later; for now, back to Green.

more stories

Yesterday evening I asked my kids to help me by picking up the clothes and towels on the floor of their room and putting them somewhere I could reach.

After 15 minutes, Adi had made several trips over to bring me piles of clothes, and N had sort of helped, too. D had been cutting paper.

Me: Wow, A, thank you so much for all your help!
N: Mommy, I helped too!
Me: Yes, thank you to you, too, N! You helped clean up and encouraged D to help.
D: Mommy, look! I cut my paper into the box and not onto the floor!

Awwww.

***

Child: Mommy, right it's fun to be a girl? Because boys only think they're in charge.
Me: What do you mean?
Child: Like, when we ask Daddy something, he says, 'I don't know, ask Mommy.'

***

Did I mention that one of my children got a marriage proposal from a little boy in her kindergarten class? She accepted, but on the condition that her mommy only lets her get married in another 15 years.

This happened on the way to her class. As we kept walking, we had the following discussion:

Her: I know why he wants to marry me.
Me: Why is that?
Her: Because we kissed on the lips last year in preschool. And again this year. And we'll do it again next year in first grade.
Me: Oh.
Me (feeling like I should parent, or something): Umm... maybe it would be better to just kiss friends on the cheek?
Her: Hmm. Maybe. But it's our bodies, so we'll do what we want with them.

Oh man. How did I get myself into this before they even started grade school???

***

Did I mention that the girl in the above story was not D? But Dani also has her admirers. Today she was upset on the way home from preschool, and a little boy (YC) who's in her class came over to give her a hug.

Her response: "Go away, YC! Do you want me to hit you?"

***

As for me, I'm still hanging around being enormous. With the threat of an impending math test no longer looming over my head (long story short, it turns out I was allowed to postpone it to the end of this next semester even without giving a reason), I've discovered that my urge to clean the house really is due to the "nesting instinct" (aka that urge women get to clean everything just as they reach the point where they can barely move to so much as pick up a sock) and not just my usual "procrastination instinct" (familiar to anyone who's had a test they really don't want to take). Thanks to a few hours of work this morning, I've brought my computer space and the kids' bedroom from "filthy" to just "messy" - yay!

A collection of random stories:

Recently I arranged with the mother of A's best friend, E, for A to go over to their house after school. When the bus came, she told both girls about the playdate.

Their response: "our prayers were answered!!"

Yes, apparently they had literally been praying for A to come over to play. The story continues (but in a form not all readers will understand - sorry about that):

When they decided on the bus that they should pray for A to come over and play, A asked, "So what prayer should we say?"

E suggested the Amidah. A was worried, "I don't know that one by heart yet." So instead, she said Modeh Ani.

***

On a different occasion, E was at our house playing with all the girls. N was the princess. I overheard the following:

E (to N): You're the princess, and your mother is dead.
N: Do we have to say she died? Can't she just be at work?

***

On yet another occasion, E and her two younger brothers (who are N and D's age) came over briefly. After a few minutes, E's brother who's in first grade came over.

"Ali, the girls are all in the bathroom."
"OK, thanks for letting me know."
"No, but they're all in there!! Only N is really using the bathroom!"
"I see. That's a little strange, but I allow it."
"But they're all in there! Why??"

I had no answer.

***

One of my kids came up to me this evening, "Mommy, I have a funny joke! Are you listening?"
"OK, what's the joke?"
"Your tummy is so fat that it could explode!!" (child cracks up)
".... " (it's funny because it's true, apparently)

***

A different child was asking this morning when the baby will be born. I told her I don't know (my calm while discussing it was impressive, if I do say so myself, considering that "AAAAUUUGH when will this baby be born?????" has been on my mind quite a bit lately (no, I'm not overdue, just prone to pre-labor panic)).

Her conclusion, "I hope it's very soon, because I can't get my arms around you to hug you anymore." Aww.

***

For those who may not have heard, D was in the hospital this week, after suffering what appeared to be a broken nose at gan. Fortunately, her nose wasn't actually broken, just very swollen.

(It's good to mention these things now, before some of you come to visit and find D with two black eyes... )

So anyway, she and I were in the emergency room for x-rays and all that good stuff. She was so, so good when it came time for the x-rays; she held totally still like they asked, and this with me not allowed in the room. The technician was shocked.

It was a funny reminder of what a wonderfully well-behaved child D can be, when she's not doing the kinds of things that get her nose almost broken (number of times since then that D has engaged in perilous activity: too many to count... ).

***

While we were at the hospital, D asked me if people can go underwater. We talked about the different ways people could stay underwater for a while (submarine, scuba gear). After we'd covered that, she said, "Good. After N's birthday I want you to take me to the ocean and we'll go in a special underwater boat and I can see mermaids."

I had to explain that mermaids are not real. But there are lots of other interesting things under the water! Like fish in all kinds of colors, and coral reefs, and sharks ("imaleh!") and whales ("hmph")!

She thought for a minute, then said, "OK, so after N's birthday I want you to take me to the ocean and I'll go underwater and see lots of fish. (Pause, scowl) But they'd better not all be blue fish."

***

Meanwhile, I continue to half-study for my math test. I say "half" because cramming just isn't the same in my current situation. I'm studying a few hours a day, but I'm also tired and having frequent contractions and frankly just can't bring myself to care that much about whether various series converge anymore.

I tell myself that the math doesn't particularly care if I care about it. As long as I can remember how to actually solve the problems... As to that, the test is set up as five problems, each with a part A and B which are unrelated to each other, and I'll need to solve 4 of the 5, so a total of 8. At this point, I feel fairly confident in my ability to solve about 6 problems on each test - both A and B for a single problem, and just one or the other for the rest. Dar.

Half of my brain is half-hoping to go into labor before the test, so I can get an extension ("half" hoping because it's hard to fully hope for labor, which can be... less than fun). The other, probably wiser half realizes that postponing the test may not put me in a better situation (more time to study only helps if you're actually using it to study, as it turns out).

Anyway. Time to sleep. Or maybe sleep for two hours, then give birth. Not that I'm panicking, or anything.

Waiting, whining

OK so I am very very pregnant. I mean, technically there are only two settings ("not pregnant" and "all the way pregnant"), but we all know what I mean. I am enormous, cranky, and tired.

I was making a half-hearted attempted not to whine about the difficulties of the last month of pregnancy. After all, it's not like anyone ordered me get pregnant with what will hopefully be the fifth kid in the family. In fact, I'm pretty sure most of you, had you been asked, wouldn't have recommended it. So what right do I have to whine?

On second thought, though, I realized that I feel free to whine about work, even though I'm lucky to have my job and nobody told me to work there, and I feel free to whine about math, even though nobody told me to major in math. So I'm going to go ahead and whine about this as well.

(On third thought, it might not be such a good idea to look to my own behavior as a standard for appropriate behavior... )

Anyway. I'm big and tired, and things hurt.

There. Whining done.

*****

So... why try for five kids? I wanted to write a whole post about this, but I'm not sure I have a whole post's worth of explanation. Suffice to say, I have yet to not be very happy about deciding to try to have a kid, after making the decision in the past (maybe that doesn't suffice to say. But it's all I can state semi-coherently for now, so I'll have to stop there).

*****

So... I must really be hoping for a boy, right?

I'm going to give you all the benefit of the doubt and assume none of you were actually thinking that, but based on the comments I've been getting in recent weeks, it's definitely something some people think.

So no. I am really, genuinely not hoping for anything but a healthy baby. Viggy too.

It's so weird how some people are about a baby's sex. I'm not someone who thinks that men and women are naturally the same, and the only gender differences are cultural - not at all - but seriously, it's not like if you've met one girl or one boy you've met them all.

A boy baby would be an interesting new person, and unique in our family. A girl baby would be an interesting new person, and unique in our family. Yes, we would have four other girls, but so what? If we have a boy, he'd be one of about 180,000 boy babies born worldwide that day. And yet, still not interchangeable with any of them.

(OK, at least not after the first six months or so. As much as I really do care for even the small squishy new babies, they are pretty interchangeable.)

(There. Gender rant done, too.)

*****

And since you've let me rant so nicely, a couple of kid anecdotes -

My mother in law was here recently, and brought the kids some clothes. Among the clothes she brought were three t-shirts with a picture of Dora the Explorer.

All of the t-shirts are six 6. And all of them now belong to S.

She doesn't insist on wearing all of them at once (I'm not sure if that's because even she has to draw the line somewhere, or if it just hasn't occurred to her yet). So instead, she wears one, and if anyone tries to touch one of the others, she wrests it from their hands and runs around with it, usually while yelling "S's shirt!!!"

Did I mention that she's taken to referring to herself in the third person?

She's going to be Dora for Purim, for the simple reason that if we can't get her to wear anything but Dora-themed clothing anyway, we might as well just go with it.

Did I mention that she barely ever watches TV, let alone Dora (which A and N have rejected as a "baby show")? But it doesn't matter. The beauty and wonder and just plain right-ness of Dora are so obvious to her that she doesn't need things like TV shows to help her see it.

**

S is very attached to Adi, who recently explained, "It's like we're beads on a bracelet. N and D are right next to each other, so they're very close. S and I are at opposite ends of the string. But then when you loop the string around, we're right next to each other! So we're very close too."

**

Adi is on the way to becoming a true bookworm. Today I had to call her name four times before she looked up from her page, and I'm not sure she was listening even when she did. I'm so proud.

**

D has started writing me notes. No, her writing isn't that good. But that doesn't stop her from scribbling on pieces of paper, bringing them to me, and saying things like, "This note says I love you, Mommy."

I'm not sure how much of it is an attempt to express herself even without knowing all the letters, and how much of it is an attempt to justify the quantity of paper that she's been cutting into note-size pieces (D and scissors get along like lighters and gasoline, ie, a little too well). But either way, I find myself keeping her notes. 

Stupid Ali Stories

When Snan and I were children, I would sometimes tell her stories (I wasn't evil all the time, everyone needs a break now and then). Her favorites were always the Stupid Ali stories, with subjects like "that time Ali walked into the door" and "Ali's public attempt to use stairs ends very badly."

I thought of the Stupid Ali stories yesterday afternoon, during a routine ultrasound to estimate the baby's size (why they think mothers-to-be need to know exactly how many pounds of human they'll be pushing out... I'm not sure why they do it, but apparently it's a thing). After being bizarrely shocked at the baby's "large" size (on track to be about 7-8.5 pounds, just like all his/her/its sisters), the ultrasound tech turned the screen to show me a shot of the face.

My reaction: "Wow, it looks just like a baby!"

The ultrasound tech very kindly nodded as if I'd said something profound, rather than saying what I would have said, namely, "Lady, what the hell did you think was in there???"

***

Which reminds me of the time that I was around eight months pregnant with D, and Adi (who had just turned 3) decided that she, too, was pregnant. With twins. Twin sheep.

***

So I finally found someone to tutor me in Infi 2.

It was actually very, very hard to find someone, despite living in what's basically math geek central. It turns out that almost everyone who works as a math tutor doesn't feel confident teaching infi 2, and almost everyone who's taken infi 2 has no interest in teaching (/ability to teach) the material. Yes, I realize that this probably isn't a good sign regarding the course itself.

Anyway. This week, during our third tutoring session, the tutor looked at some of the work I'd done and said in a somewhat surprised tone, "You really do like math, don't you?"

Well, yes. Just not at the end of the semester. And even less so after what should have been the end of the semester, when I'm spending my "semester break" preparing for the "OK, moron, we'll give you one more chance" round of finals.

To be honest, I'm pleasantly surprised that my non-hatred of math managed to shine through as early as the third meeting.

(and on that note - back to improper integrals... )

Books!

Time for another book review:

The Leftovers (author, Tom Perrotta, category, fiction)

(Before I get started I should note, for the sake of complete transparency, that the author is part of my extended family. But I should note in regards to that note that in my world, being part of my extended family doesn't necessarily mean I'm going to pick up the phone if you call, much less buy and read your book. So bias is unlikely, I think.)

The basic premise of the book: three years ago, a bunch of people suddenly disappeared in an event very much like the Rapture, except for the part where the people who went missing seem to have been a completely random sampling of humanity.

"So... like 'Left Behind,' but for agnostics?" you may be wondering, if you are unfamiliar with Tom Perrotta's work. But if you've read anything of his before, you know it's all about the relationships and the personal discovery. Forget brave, suspiciously young and buff scientists investigating the mysterious disappearances, or people lobbing grenades at each other in some post-apocalyptic hellscape - how will the mass disappearances affect Kevin and Laurie's marriage? Will Tom realize he's been sucked into a cult - and if so, what will he do next? 

That might sound boring (at least relative to the option with the grenades), but I promise, it isn't. I don't usually like the kind of books that are less about where the story goes than about where the characters go (couldn't we have at least one suspiciously buff scientist-adventurer?), but I read this whole book by mid-afternoon.

And I realized something: I realized that I need a new scale for reacting to books, with more options than just "like" or "didn't like."

"Like" works for books that are both society-approved and make nice feelings when you read them. I'm thinking Harry Potter, Pride and Prejudice, that kind of thing.

"Dislike" works for books that society doesn't approve of and that are just plain boring and bad (I won't give examples here).

But there are so many other categories. Liked-it-but-would-never-admit-it, for example (looking at you, Twilight...). Couldn't-finish-it-but-don't-want-to-admit-that (cough *anythingbyDickens* cough). 

Perrotta books are a conundrum. When an author does a brilliant job conveying the precise feeling of being on a horribly awkward date, or of watching a relationship fall apart - is that something I "like"? Well, I didn't want to stop reading, but I don't exactly enjoy the emotions being evoked. 

I know, I know - that's what literature is supposed to be. Deep feelings, thought-provoking situations, etc, not sparkley vampires and happy endings. It's true. 

But it needs something more than just "like." Some pithy way of expressing "I was completely sucked into the story, and here I am recommending it to my friends - but the feelings it made me feel were often not fun." 

(It's sad how far back I have to dig in my memory to find other books like that. Studying math has turned me into a reader of almost exclusively no-brain-required books - or that's my excuse, anyway.) 

Nope, no kids' book this time

Normally I'd review at least one other book here, but it's late, and I'm large and slow and tired, etc, I'll spare you all the whining and excuses. 

Instead, I will redirect you to here: http://www.cracked.com/photoplasty_781_34-childrens-books-updated-modern-problems/ 

Read it, especially the #1 entry, which is a work of pure genius. 

(For readers who are unfamiliar with the "cracked" website - any article from there should be assumed to have naughty language and jokes about body parts/bodily functions. Continue at your own risk.)