Boredom complaints stopped long enough that I had to go investigate. Later:

F: Can we go to the Dead Sea someday? It looks like a lot of fun!

Learning to apply his own sunblock.

F: Do I look like a ghost?
B: Not really. More like a clown.
R: He looks like a old lady!

Still rubbing it in.

R: Daddy, you should take a picture of my feet.
B: Ok.
R: Do you know how they got this way?
B: Yeah. I rescued you, remember?
R: Yeah. I was crying a lot. But did you know the mud was so sucky that it took my shoe all the way OFF?
B: I did not.
R: That's why I was crying, and that's why one of my hands is muddy. Because I had to use it to get my shoe out.
B: Yuck.
R: It's pretty funny, isn't it?
B: I'm glad you think so.
R: Well, it wasn't funny then. But it's funny NOW!

In bed.

B: So what was the best part of today?
R: I don't know! I got to watch shows and then there were PEOPLE here! And they brought KIDS! And I PLAYED with them. There was a really little girl who couldn't walk without her Mommy or Daddy holding her hands. And a bunch of my friends from school. And a bunch of F's friends from school, who some of them are also MY friends. And there was CAKE! And LEMONADE! And I got to stay up late. And catch fireflies. And I catched fireflies that LIT UP! That's never happened before! And then I let them go and they lit up again. It was so much fun, but I think I stayed up too late, because now I'm super tired and all I want to do is go to sleep and can we please stop talking now Daddy?

I guess there are times I'm glad she can't read?

R: Thanks for the directions, Daddy, I don't think I would have known how to do that!
B: I think the sun will dry out the bin MUCH faster now.
R: Yeah, but I don't think I really NEEDED your directions. I probably could have just checked in my journal. (Holds up book)

It's really happening!

F: This is the last one where I look like me.

B: You know who you look like?
F: Who?
B: You look like your Uncle Michael
F: NOOOOOO! HE'S BALD!
B: I mean you look like he did when he was seven.
F: Did he have hair then?

B: There's one Battleship peg on the floor over here. One extra bedtime kiss for whoever finds it.

(Scramble, R finds it.)

B: Congratulations!
R: Thanks, Daddy, but I was wondering, can we have a different prize instead?
B: Maybe. What do you have in mind?
R: A whole day of "R in charge"

Pancho and Lefty was really fun this morning. Heard F singing the chorus (not for the first time), convinced him to go get my guitar and found him the (slightly wrong IMO) lyrics on google. He sang along pretty tentatively.

Then we sat in a chair together and I explained what the song meant. (Probably says something that I hadn't thought about what a violent song it is in quite some time.) He was wide-eyed throughout, but (like every 7-year-old?), the most he would cop to is that it was "a little interesting."

Then we typed out the lyrics and printed them and we sang it together again.

Felt like a pretty good Dad exercise.

F's biggest takeaways:

1. There are things called fonts. They are fun. We have several copies of the lyrics printed in several different fonts. His favorite on the screen was Desdemona, but the printout was crappy. His favorite printout one was Lucida Blackletter, but he has trouble reading it.
2. "Coulda" is an elision of "could have," not "could of." He flat out didn't believe me about this. Kid's mind is blown.

R: Daddy, Mommy went to her meeting!
B: I know.
R: Daddy, Mommy went to her meeting WITHOUT HER PHONE!
B: Really? Oh, well.
R: Daddy, you have to TELL HER she forgot her phone!
B: Um, how?
R: Send her a text!
B: And what would happen if I did?
R: It would ... she'd ... OH NO! Is she going to be ok?
B: She'll be fine. Do you know how old I was when I first had a phone I could carry around?
R: 12?
B: Nope. I was 33. I did ok before then, right?
R: But how did you ever find anybody?
B: I don't know.

R: Daddy, F is actually trying to ruin my princess party downstairs!
B: Send him up to talk to me.

B: R says you're trying to ruin her princess party. Are you?
F: Sort of.
B: What do you mean?
F: R says her princess party means I can't be downstairs. Or, if I'm downstairs, I have to sit at the dining room table and not get up and not make any noise.
B: Yeah, I can see why you'd want to ruin that. What if we figured out something that would make you both happy?
F (reluctantly): I guess that'd be ok...
B: What's wrong with that?
F: I'd rather we came up with something that makes me happy and makes R sad.

We are funny people.

F: Do you know the joke about the photon?
B: The one you learned from me a couple days ago?
F: Oh. Yeah. You probably do. I'm going to tell it anyway. A photon walks into a bar.
B: Checks into a hotel?
F: Yeah. They ask him if he has any bags, and he says no, I'm traveling light.

B: What's big and red and eats rocks?
F&R: What?
B: A big red rock eater. What's big and brown and eats rocks?
R: A bear?

F: I've got one. What did one fish day to the other?
B: I give up.
F: Nada. Really, it only works in Spanish.
R: Hahahahaha!

No comment.

F is put off by the unfairness of his try-it bites vs R's, because we won't force her to try meat.

F: It's not like there are any adult vegetarians!
B: Um, of course there are.
F: Well, yeah, but not any adults I know.
B: What about Andrea?
F: She's a vegetarian???
B: Yeah. Also, what kid vegetarians do you know?
F: R!
B: R H-R?
F: No, my sister.
B: Oh. Yeah. But, besides her?
F: Um, W.
B: Are you sure? I coulda swore I fed that kid a hamburger at some point.
F: Well, he's not THAT kind of vegetarian. He's the kind that, when there's pepperoni on his pizza, he won't eat THAT meat. He's also a pizza vegetarian about black olives and green olives.

F: Look at this mind machine I invented!
M: What does it do?
F: It lets me read your mind.
M: Nuh-uh
F: Really!
M: Oh yeah? What am I thinking now?
F: Sleep... sleep... sleep... coffee... coffee...
M: Wow! It works!

F: Do you want to switch sides, so you can read MY mind?
M: No way!
F: Why not?
M: That's a scary place! I bet there's nothing in there but Minecraft and poop!
F: That's not true! I think about Star Wars and Legos a lot, too!

There is no more clean underwear in R's drawer. Or in the clean-laundry-to-be-put-away pile upstairs either.

B: G'night, R
R: G'night, Daddy. Daddy, I really hope there's underwear in the morning, or school might be canceled!

F: Sprinkles (I can't get him to call them jimmies) are weird. They don't actually make anything taste any better. They just make food LOOK like it'll taste better.
B: So, it's for the people who wouldn't eat the ice cream otherwise?
F: Well, everybody will eat the ice cream anyway. But maybe with sprinkles, they can charge more for it... Really, what they should do is put sprinkles on things like broccoli and noodles and cheese.

B: How was school today?
R: It was good!
B: Did you play with J at recess?
R: No, she was only there for two weeks this summer, and that's over. I'm sad about that. So I played with C.
B: What did you play?
R: We played bats!
B: You mean baseball?
R: No, bats.
B: How do you play bats?
R: Sometimes we play on the corrallogate (this is her word for the vaguely geodesic metal climbing structure at many playgrounds. The whole family uses this word now.) and we hang upside down. The rest of the time we run around eating mosquitos.
B: Do you screech?
R: No, it bothers everyone else too much.