Hi John, I'm Dave

David has a new porcelain friend and I freakin' love it! Goodbye diapers, hello toilet paper. Great job, Davey!!

Happy shots

This would be the before going to bed picture. Trust me, you do not want to see the after picture. Angie decided that Tom is now old enough to survive a whole night and most of the next day without breastfeeding and thought it would be wise to go out and celebrate this feeding milestone. Why she decided to bring home her trophies is beyond me. Our cat used to bring home dead mice to impress me. Oddly enough, I had pretty much the same reaction; I shook my head and got the mop and bucket.

Since I know how you little you trust me and how much Angie loves this kind of attention, I will show you the after picture after all. You can thank me later, sweetie.

What I won't reveal is exactly what time this lovely photo was taken. I will tell you, though, that it was Tom's second afternoon nap.

As Mama snored away her guilt from pilfering pub glasses, I grabbed the two coherent boys and hit the streets. Peter was tagged for a play date at Arman's, so David and I dumped him off and went to hit the waves.

David likes hitting anything and his surfboard was red, so he was tickled wild. Like most wild things, they have no control and no fear. At one point, a couple of boys in their teens picked up his toy boat as it floated past him. Mistake. David ran up to them, yanked the boat back and gave them his patented 'back off' look that he must have learned from Mama. He didn't say a word, but something about his shaking and the dried up spittle around his lips told them wisely to walk away. I was glad; the older of the two looked like he could seriously kick my ass.

After a few hours, we headed back to Casa de Gitana. Tom is now mobile, which is great except he has no sense of direction yet. Apparently, his inner compass instructed him to crawl into the bathroom and get stuck under the sink.

As you all know by now, whenever my children do something really embarrassing and painful, but not life threatening, I first run and get the camera. Then I laugh. After that I take some pictures. Then I laugh again. Sometimes I even shoot some video and laugh some more. Eventually, the screaming starts to hurt my ears and I come to the rescue.

At least the screaming dwarf woke up sleeping beauty. And just in time - we picked up Peter and took the Zoo Crew to an outdoor festival down by the river. On the way, we stopped in, imagine that, a pub. Our favorite pub, to be more specific. The Brass Monkey, to be less vague.

Peter learned how to play table soccer and he kicked ass. Pun intended. In true sportsmanship form, he quickly learned to stick his tongue out at the other players. Since we were in a pub, I kept my eye on the kleptomaniac, but Angie was too busy trying to get David to be quieter. Mmmm...why?

After a Guinness and a little quiet air, we strolled across the bridge to the festival.

As soon as we got to the other side, David found something that made his heart go BOOM, BOOM, bonky-BOOM!

It was red, it was loud - need I say more? Ok, I will. It made him excited. REALLY excited. The only thing that could have wound him up even more is if he could have jumped on stage and partied like a rock star. Bang, Destructo, bang.

Well, that was certainly the up, but I knew there would be a down. Eventually. Despite my wife's occasional battle with tranquillity, I am a patient man. They had beer on tap, so somehow I tolerated the rather long wait.

The dwarves started getting sleepy and snoozey just as the band finished their last song. It also started raining just as we left, thanks to that Murphy bastard. At least the shower woke them up long enough for us to herd the wild things back to their cages.
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Ladder Talk:
1) What was the best part of your day?
Peter: When we went to eat by my singy class.
David: When I played with Legos with Peter.

2) What was the worst part of your day?
Peter: When I fall by the band down and now I got a band-aid.
David: When I cry 'cause look - this lion was in my bed not.

3) What would you like to do tomorrow?
Peter: To go to kindergarten and bring something with for tell and show.
David: When we play and Mama and Papa can look, too, but mommy not sing.

Happy Blogday to Zoo!

Our family blog is a lot like a child. Both can be a real pain in the ass at times, it often feels like they are sucking the life out of you, and you rarely get a pat on the back for not killing them. In the end, though, the blood, sweat and tears are all worth it. At least I keep telling myself this.

The blog started exactly a year ago. It was shortly after a trip to Ireland with Eisi to claim our Guinness record on getting hammered and to kickoff his European road trip. In Dublin, he explained to me that he had a blog. I told him that I was really sorry and asked if it was contagious. He gave me a look that I know all too well from Angie and then he explained to me using one-syllable words exactly what a blog was. Mmmm....intriguing.

The dealer had not quite hooked me yet and he knew this. To put the nail in the junkie, he asked me to ghost-write one of his blogs, which I titled Shit, ducks and other fun things for kids... I had a lot of fun and subsequently wrote the next two, Day three and we end up in jail and Freaky Freddy and Scary Susie. Need. More. Blog.

Since ghost-writing is what got me into this mess, I am going to try and hook my two readers. In the next couple of days, I will announce a contest, where I will provide several good "flashback" stories that have yet to be written. You know the Zoo, at least from my whacky perspective - you can choose one and write your version. I'll be grading them with a big fat red marker and publish the one with the most color. Stay tuned. Or not.

Since it's the Zoo's birthday, and I am the proud father, I feel the urge to flash a few figures and brag a little. Show me your stats!

Other than last month, which was plagued with David's birthday, my birthday, and a bunch of sick animals, the Zoo has consistently grown. Since last year, we've had over 5,000 visits and have gone from a monthly average of zero readers to 813. We now have a monthly average of 1,800 page views. If you're not asking it, I certainly am - where the hell are all these freaks coming from?

Uh, everywhere. Specifically:

Germany (DE)1,956 United States (US)1,540 United Kingdom (GB)140 Europe (EU)100 Canada (CA)79 Switzerland (CH)68 Australia (AU)31 France (FR)24 Bahrain (BH)23 Italy (IT)22 Czech Republic (CZ)22 India (IN)20 Greece (GR)9 Philippines (PH)9 Bulgaria (BG)9 Bosnia and Herzegovina (BA)8 Spain (ES)8 Singapore (SG)6 Portugal (PT)5 Brazil (BR)5 Netherlands (NL)4 Malaysia (MY)4 Turkey (TR)4 Denmark (DK)4 Russian Federation (RU)3 Sweden (SE)3 Ireland (IE)3 Belgium (BE)3 Thailand (TH)3 Pakistan (PK)3 Poland (PL)3 Romania (RO)3 Lithuania (LT)3 Norway (NO)2 Ukraine (UA)2 Cyprus (CY)2 Korea, Republic of (KR)2 Egypt (EG)2 United Arab Emirates (AE)2 Venezuela (VE)2 New Zealand (NZ)2 South Africa (ZA)2 China (CN)2 Kuwait (KW)2 Sri Lanka (LK)1 Lebanon (LB)1 Netherlands Antilles (AN)1 Kenya (KE)1 Indonesia (ID)1 Albania (AL)1 Serbia (RS)1 Cook Islands (CK)1 Puerto Rico (PR)1 Dominican Republic (DO)1 Mexico (MX)1 Croatia (HR)1 Israel (IL)1 Iraq (IQ)1 Hungary (HU)1 Taiwan (TW)1 Morocco (MA)1 Slovenia (SI)1

Ok, I must admit, I have never heard of some of those countries. Thanks for reading, though.

As long as I am bragging, I can also point out that in April, The Johnson's Zoo placed 3rd out of 1,600 blogs in the family category of humor-blogs.com. The Toilet Roll, the Zoo's sister blog, placed 1st in the cartoon category. We are also nominated for the Best Humor Blog on blognetawards.com - in fact, it's not too late to vote. I know, I'm shameless - I'll stop if you vote for me.

Ok, enough about us - how are you doing?
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Ladder Talk:
1) What was the best part of your day?
Peter: When I played computer.
David: When Peter played with me and I laugh so many.

2) What was the worst part of your day?
Peter: Today, nothing was bad. Sorry.
David: When Mama say over and over me to open my mouth for brushing teeth and I no like that.

3) What would you like to do tomorrow?
Peter: To go to Kindergarten and play games with Arman.
David: When Peter play with me.