Curious Children and Drunk Deer

As they have not been here very long, and been mobile even less time, small children seem to be exceedingly curious. The only problem is that their curiousity sometimes leads them to explore things that perhaps better sense would tell them to leave alone. This morning, after enduring the stink long enough, I took Kathleen's diapers out to the trash. Her diaper pail is a small step-pedal one with a lid. When I returned, I found her chewing on the lid.

Every evening, Kathleen gets a bath. If perhaps you question the necessity of a small child having a bath every night, you've never seen them after crawling around the floor and backyard all day. Our bathtub is equipped with the usual soap-holder, in which we keep our soap. Thus far, Kathleen has not been too interested. Yesterday evening I heard her coughing, and looked over to see her sticking her tongue out with some measure of disgust on her face. She was chasing something underwater, and I saw that it was little bits of soap. Intrigued to see if she would like some more, I helped her catch a bit, and then watched as she made the same face while spitting it out. However, as soon as she dropped it, she started fishing again.

I have a mug that I like to keep cold water in. Kathleen is fixated on it whenever I have it out. This morning I went outside to move the sprinklers, and came back inside to find her splashing in a big, wet, puddle on the carpet, right next to my now-empty mug.

Brandon told me once of a TV show where it showed animals in the savannah all getting together around a tree surrounded by fermenting fruit and having a party together. The footage was complete with weaving animals, clearly drunk. On our morning run, Kathleen and I pass by a house that has several apple trees. Some of the apples have fallen, and the owner has piled them up in a grassy, treed area near the house. This morning as we rounded the corner past the now two-week old apple pile, I smelled the sweet aroma of fermenting apples. Evidently the local deer had smelled it too; as I looked over at the apples only a few feet away, he looked at me, froze for a moment, and then bounded off. Was it me, or did he weave just slightly?