He's the One That I Want

I swear I thought "the haircutter-lady" was going to physically gobble N up today as she trimmed his hair and he yammered away (and away and away) to her. More than once, she squeezed and pinched and kissed him on his head. I was pretty close to taking a bite or two out of him myself; he was just that edibly and incredibly adorable.

My favorite part was when she had combed his hair up and over to the side, slicking it over with some water to keep it down while she cut another section.

"I look like Danny," N announced.

Haircutter-lady and I exchanged confused glances.

"Danny who?" I asked.

"Danny. Like the one you like?"

It took me a second, but then I hooted with laughter. "You mean Danny like in You're the One That I Want?"

"Yeah," he said.

Now it was Haircutter-lady's turn to hoot. "You are right, sweetheart, you do look like Danny. You look like Austin!"

"Yeah," N said again, preening. "I know it."

*****
Em and I have started reading my brother-in-law's new book, Nacky Patcher. Tonight, after we'd worked our way through the first 10 pages or so, stopping often for me to define words and phrases, she looked thoughtfully at me.

"Uncle Jeff does the kind of writing I like so much, where he really describes his characters so that you really get to know them," she said, in her I-should-be-used-to-it-by-now, much-too-mature-for-a-9--year-old way. "And he uses so many difficult words."

Pause.

"He's the one who, when he comes to visit, goes out into the back yard with Uncle Bruce and burps. It's hard to believe that that's the same uncle who writes like this."

I can't decide if that's a compliment or a total smackdown.

*****
Finally, a little self-promotion: I recently took on a freelance gig writing a once-a-week blog entry about bipolar disorder for Everydayhealth.com, and now that they finally have their blog tool up and working, I was able to put up the last five weeks of posts. Ignore the fact that they all have the same date...they were actually written each Friday in June, and will be added to on a regular basis from here on out.

Here's the link: My bipolar blog

I'd love to hear/see/read your comments, if you have any. And feel free to pass along the URL to any and everyone who might be interested.