Want to send Pterry a get well or thank you card?

Gotta love the power of the internet.

I'm not *entirely* certain that this is, in fact, what the man meant when he said "in this case I would only entertain offers from very high-end experts in brain chemistry", but I'm sure that doesn't quite matter.

I don't think I'll participate, though. I always think that what everybody really needs in situations like this (aside from a new Discworld book, which I cannot provide) is food, and I can appreciate that people don't often eat homemade food mailed in from strangers, so....

Oh, man.

Here I am at the SICM, and hardly anybody is here today. There are two little 25-month-or-so girls with their moms, and one of them has her two new baby brothers with her as well.

And the moms are chatting about the kids' hair. And oh, one of them has straight hair. This, I learned, is "pretty" and "nice". The two of them were totally oblivious to the fact that the other one has a head full of curls - except when they go "not like hers" and even say outright that it's not as pretty because it's not straight. Right in front of curly-haired kid. And this was curly-haired-kid's mom (though the other one wasn't too far behind)!

You know, I don't care if they are only two. They understand a lot. If you're going to comment negatively about your daughter's appearance (or another child's appearance, for that matter - unsurprisingly, neither Angelique nor Evangeline have straight hair, and they also were sitting right there) you might at least have the class to do it where the kid in question can't hear. Or spell, or something.

Right around this point I discovered I had some scrunchies in my pocket, so I quickly pulled Evangeline's hair up in three buns. Not great buns, but for 5 minutes work, not that bad. Why did I do this? Because I can. And because her hat hair was showing, but I didn't say that.

This is tragic

Children are targets of Nigerian witch hunt

( Warning - this is highly disturbing )

African Crucible: Cast as Witches, Then Cast Out

( Ditto )

It sleeted today.

(And apparently we're currently at a solar minimum, which explains how we can get sleet in the middle of global warming, I guess. I'd prefer snow.)

It naturally did not start sleeting until after I'd gotten the kids all kitted up to go outside. This means I was one of very few people willing to brave the weather to get to the museum today, so we had it largely to ourselves.

On the way to the museum, walking the 3 blocks or so from the bus stop, it really was coming down. Evangeline was, by her request, on my front, and after I told her twice that no, I could not prevent the sky from falling down, she resigned herself to burying her face in my chest and moving her hands up to ward off any wayward chunks of ice.

What's interesting is that when I told 'dul and Jenn tonight that it had been sleeting, she piped up at the table "Snow in my eye! Snow in my EYE!!" until I said that yes, snow *did* get in her eye.

I didn't know kids could do that yet, tell stories about what had happened in the morning when it was already dinner time!