Book reading

My book ("How About a Kiss for Me?) is finally coming out on June 10, and of course I'm extremely psyched about it. My debut reading was to a classroom of hyperactive 3- and 4-year-olds (my favorite kind) at Samuel and Ethan's school. Samuel videotaped and provided emotional support.

If I could make a living just writing books and reading them to hyperactive 3- and 4-year-olds...that would not be a difficult decision.

Roll tape.

Honey, I blew up the dog

Bailey saw a police horse today on our block. He'd never seen a horse before. He started barking like crazy. He probably thought it was a huge, bodybuilding dog on steroids.

Top 5 exciting things that happened this weekend

1. Bailey got into the groceries and ate an entire pot pie. He spent the next 24 hours lying around the house whimpering, pooping, and vomiting on the boys' beds. He has recovered.



2. Ethan found TWO live bugs in his toy castle in his bedroom. After the initial screams of terror, he and Jennifer hand-washed every piece of the castle and all of the figures, then vacuumed the bedroom and re-set everything up again.



3. Samuel created a post-it-note daily countdown to our trip to LA in 3 weeks to see all the filming locations from "Back to the Future." (I'm taking the boys with me on a business trip.)



4. My family left me at the Diana Ross Playground in Central Park this afternoon beause I was so preoccupied drawing a chalk railroad track for some little kids that I didn't hear Jennifer repeatedly telling me, "We're leaving now, come on, it's time to go." When I looked up they were gone.



5. Ethan persuaded us to buy a ShamWow at the Amsterdam Avenue street fair. He was so excited that we could save hundreds of dollars a year on paper towels. We were thinking of asking the salesman if they work on pot pie dog vomit.

Lucky man

When I came home from work today I saw Jennifer and Ethan walking the dogs home from the pet store. They didn't see me, so I just followed them down the street toward our building.

And I thought, you know, if I had come here in a time machine from 30 years ago and been told, "This is your block. That's your wife, and that's your son"...I would've smiled and thought, good, so everything turns out okay after all.

Ethan on Technology

"Dad, isn't it amazing how people build things? Like cameras? And televisions? And now they even have a scented lightbulb. They're called scented, non-burning candles. And just think, it all started with people hitting each other with rocks."

"A Lousy Comedy"

Samuel and Ethan were in a school play this week. Ethan says he was forced into it; he played a non-speaking louse. Samuel sang in one scene and played William Shakepeare in another.



He may want to hang onto that costume, because I have an idea for another remake...

Mother's (and Grandmother's) Day

My mom and dad are visiting, and Jennifer is in Illinois visiting her parents.

It may sound like either Jennifer and my parents don't get along, or we are one of those hippie families that takes separate vacations. Neither is true.

Jennifer's dad had to go into the hospital unexpectedly a few days ago, so Jennifer flew out on Friday morning to be with him. He is back home and doing fine. So she is with her own mother on Mother's Day, and I am with mine, and so there is some synergy to that.

Samuel and Ethan prepared breakfast in bed for my mom this morning. Not sure if she was actually ready to wake up, but whatever. She's rolling with it.

Happy Mother's Day.

Ethanism

"Dad, why do some grown-ups stop thinking about having fun and just think about how fancy stuff is?"