King Con

King Con

One of our kids’ favorite pastimes is standing on the window sill and watching the people below on Broadway. Because of Conrad’s bull-legged stance, unintelligible grunting noises, and constant banging on the window, I told Claire that he looked like King Kong. Weston thought that was funny and said, “His name is Conrad, not King Con.”

Jellyfish

Weston in Georgetown, MA

Claire: “Do you know who was really stung by a jellyfish?”

Julia: “Who??”

Rich: “I was stung by a jellyfish.”

Julia: “Tell us the story, Papa.”

Rich: “Well…”

Weston interrupts: “Once upon a time, Papa got stingeded.”

Rich: “The end.”

Under the Sea

new england aquarium

Despite my pleading, Claire would not let us take the $15 Fung Wah bus to Boston this Thanksgiving. That didn’t stop Julia from throwing up and we had two eruptions on the way. The difference was this time we could pull over and clean ourselves up. Maybe Claire is right about the bus.

We wound up having a great time. One highlight was the New England Aquarium. There we took the kids to their first IMAX experience. We were told the tamest show playing was Deep Sea 3D, but I guess everything is relative. I carefully balanced the 3D glasses on Weston’s nose and watched closely and tried to gauge his reaction. Right after the opening credits a fish swam toward us and Weston let out an extremely impressive scream. I quickly removed the glasses and he calmed down. I kept putting the glasses back on, hoping he’d get used to it. It was like flipping a light switch off and on. If I put the glasses on, he’d scream. If I took them off, he’d be quiet. I felt bad because he could either be frightened or watch blurry patterns move across the screen (The movie is meant to be watched in 3D). Julia, on the other hand, had the time of her life. She was standing and trying to grab the jellyfish that appeared to be swimming in front of her. I imagine she was a quite a nuisance for the lady with poofy white hair who was sitting in front of us. I was worried it was going to be another instance like the hot dog at the Mets game.

Weston enjoyed the aquarium much more than the movie and loved watching the sharks swim by. Julia walked around the aquarium like a jellyfish bobbing up and down. So, Julia is now “Princess Julia Jellyfish” and Weston is “Please-don’t-eat-me-I’m-too-young-to-die Weston.”

princess julia