Seventy One more to go...

"I bet I can live to a hundred if only I can get outdoors again."
--Geraldine Page as Carrie Watts, in The Trip to Bountiful

As of 2:30 a.m. this morning, 29 and counting.

A very happy Un-Birthday to you!

Ava just recently turned 18 months old and half-birthdays are pretty important when those six months constitute a third of your life. I don’t know where I’ve been, but suddenly I woke up one morning and Ava had transformed from my cute bum-scooting baby to a charming, precocious toddler. There is a lot going on with her, too much to write at once, but here are some highlights of who Ava is right now.

She has a very sweet, affectionate disposition and will give hugs and kisses to family, bears, balls, and plastic frogs alike. She has many of the social skills of a child a year older. Her hair has grown into beautiful (yet unruly) blondish-gold ringlets and I haven’t a clue what to do with them. Those curls are a hand-me-down from Jon’s side of the family so I’m learning how to tame them as I go. But for now her locks are as happy-go-lucky as she is. She’s 30 inches tall, has five teeth, and has finally broken the 20-pound mark and gets to sit facing forward in her car seat.
Ava still doesn’t say a whole lot; most of her verbal repertoire consists of onomatopoeia (favorites are beep, pop, tick tock, and any animal sound) plus “up” and “baby.” She's very expressive and our days are filled with "wow" and "uh-oh" and exclamations of all kinds. But she’s learning signs as fast as I can teach them and even making up some of her own. She probably knows around 50 signs now and by far the most popular ones are “daddy” and “outside.” SUCH a daddy’s girl, it’s unbelievable. Ava has a perma-grin whenever Jon is around and when he’s not, she’s constantly signing for him. Anytime they tickle and wrestle she signs, “More more!”
Balls of any sort are irresistible to Ava and she often tries to carry more of them than she has hands for. (In contrast, the more realistic a doll is, the more scorn it receives.) She loves to be read stories and spends a lot of time with books on her own. She likes to put things on her arms and wear them around as bracelets, like stacking rings and rubber bands. But mostly, Ava revels in playing outside. Especially in the dirt. Or sand. Or mud. Or water. She may look just like her Dad but Ava’s got her Momma’s need for sunshine and soil running through her veins. Somebody should buy this girl a sandbox.

Proof of people out there as dumb as I'd feared

As you may already know, Utah Clean Energy and Governor Huntsman recently called for a one-hour “lights out” to take place on the evening of September 19th. Residents were asked to turn off all the lights in their homes between 9 and 10 p.m. Apparently, the goal was to raise awareness for wise energy use and to demonstrate the potential power (no pun intended) of collective energy conservation.

Well, Rocky Mountain Power was “unable to measure any reduction in energy use” that night. I’m sure that many people (including me, embarrassingly) simply weren’t aware of the request. (More likely, no change was detected because energy for lighting only accounts for 14 percent of Utah’s urban energy use and appliances, especially air conditioners and refrigerators, suck up the bulk of the rest.) But some people must have tried to “make a difference” and dimmed their lights on the 19th as a few darker pockets around the Salt Lake valley were noticed around 9 p.m. While these people genuinely want to help make a difference in their community, I think most people try to exude an image of conformity and political correctness when it comes to environmental issues, especially now that green ideas are becoming more mainstream. While some may actually have a basic understanding of global warming and energy crises, I believe that many people speak to environmental concerns to preserve their “trendy” image while inwardly balking at personal lifestyle changes, suspecting that these issues are all just a passing fad and climate change is some far-away abstract condition. It’s all about image, right? But I’m kind of digressing…

Then there’s people way out at the other end of the social spectrum actually working against the greater good. It appears that some people live in the world of fourth grade defiance and, to my great amusement and triumph, lay themselves bare while publicly bragging about their idiocy to the Salt Lake Tribune. Maybe the scales at Rocky Mountain Power were tipped partly because of this turd. Thank you, Mr. Christensen of Taylorsville, for validating my suspicions as to the ability of this community to think beyond its own front door.

…My son and I turned on all our outside lights around the house [on Sept. 19],
including all the headlights on the four gas-guzzling cars we have parked in our
driveway. We also turned on every light in the house, along with all the radios
and TVs.
I hope this will send a message to the governor and the rest of the
world – and to some of our liberal neighbors – that my family is not going to
believe nonsense and become a family of global-warming zealots….
…My family
is more than happy to unscrew any lights not working and screw in new ones
ourselves, then keep them all burning ‘till hell freezes over.

Um, nice pun. I’m so glad that he’s teaching his son these life lessons. I’m sure he’s also the type of father who blows cigarette smoke daily in his kids’ faces and then rants to the paper that HIS family has no need for silly healthcare.