Noah says "NO!"

It's been an interesting week here at the spherical home, because Noah's day care provider has been on a well-deserved vacation from her charges, and we had to play tag-team to handle the little guy during his week off.

I spent the whole day Monday with him, Daddy got Tuesday and Wednesday, we split Thursday, and I got today. It was mostly a lot of fun.

Yesterday and today, I'll admit, I used the TV as more of a babysitter than I'd usually be okay with, in order to get some work done, as I was on a deadline. But once that was past us this morning, we hopped in the car, went to the grocery store, got a bundle of balloons and a gift for a colleague who's having a baby next month, and then tried to entertain ourselves for the weekend.

After a week of rain and cold temperatures, suddenly today it was 95 degrees and 210% humidity and just as miserable out as you can imagine. Oh, plus bugs. Never forget the mosquitos.

At 2:00, we tried the playground, but the equipment was simply too hot to play on. Noah ended up inside the tube in the only cool spot, requesting that his claustrophobic mama climb in there with him. "Nothing doing, kid." We went home, and I began making a case to go to the pool. "nope, I don't want to," he told me. "I want to go outside." "Nope, I don't want to," I replied, "because it's too hot outside, unless we go to the pool." He picks up a Mickey Mouse plushy, and in a funny voice says "Mickey says no." I took the debate to Mickey. "Wouldn't it be nice? In the pool and the water? Where it's not so hot? We could go get in the pool, and swim, and be cool and outside at the same time!" "No," Mickey replied, "Mickey says no." This debate went on for some time. Finally a very serious voice announced his bottom line: "Noah says NO!" Oh my. I hardly knew how to respond, except to tickle him.

Spherical Hubby arrived home around 4:30, and I explained the predicament. "C'mon, let's go to the pool," Hubby announced. Somehow this made it okay. We went, and for 2 hours, Noah splashed and played and had a complete blast. "You realize we could have been here all afternoon," I pointed out to no avail. We had to drag him out of the pool at 6:45 to go home to dinner. He's too tired to eat, even -- lying on the sofa beside me, watching a Tivo-ed Mickey Mouse Clubhouse episode, and fighting sleep.

The end of a long and wonderful week.