Houdini does it again

There are certain things that Misha REALLY enjoys. Cheese, bath-time, animals, and playing outside. With the mom either busy or ill this past little while and with spring fever evidently kicking in, Misha always enjoys outside time.

Yesterday I came home feeling somewhat ugh. The flu has run it's course through my family these past couple of weeks. I don't know if I got the flu or a cold bug, but yesterday I decided to come home early from work and rest. Feeling a little achy. When I got home I tried to rest in my room, but the wife, who still has a nice cough, wouldn't let me rest, so I relocated to the living room, taking Misha with me.

Alisa was doing her math homework, the Houseguest was doing something at the kitchen table. Misha was playing around. Kiril and Dasha asked if they could play outside to which I responded to the affirmative. Like all kids their attention to detail lacks something significant, and when the left the house, the front door was not securely shut.

I fell asleep finally but was rudely awoken. Kiril motioned me over to the front door. When I stood up and walked over, I beheld Misha in the arms of a strange couple. They had retrieved him from the center of the semi busy street just to the north of my house. Being still a bit groggy, I got my semi-profuse thanks and tried to figure out how it had happened seeing as how both Asya AND the Houseguest were sitting in view of the front door. It turned out that Asya had even closed the door when she saw it open.

This is the second time Misha has escaped and headed that direction. The first time, I was in the shower and Ira was surfing the net when the cat (who is not currently a housecat) appeared. She went to investigate and saw the door open and then went looking for Misha who was nearly to the same road.

Gonna have to buy a bell to tie around that kids neck...or a ankle monitor. Geez.

EU trying to take over the world

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5- year phase-in plan that would become known as "Euro-English" .

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of "k". This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter. There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where! more komplikated changes are possible.

Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling.

Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent "e" in the languag is disgrasful and it should go
away.

By the 4th yer people wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v".

During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensi bl riten styl.

Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru.

Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas.

Don't come knockin at my door no mo!

Last night I received a knock at the door. I was in the middle of getting dinner on the table to feed the ravaging hordes of kiddies swarming about my legs. It was a loud obnoxious knock of someone who either knows my family, or isn't bloody well likely to. It turned out to be the latter.

Even more annoying than telemarketers are door-to-door salesmen. Some guy was out promoting his business's wares. In this case, it was home security systems. He claimed to be promoting in this area and if I was willing to post his advert on my window, then he was willing to give me FOR FREE the system and installation at a savings of several hundreds of dollars.

I am sorry, but
1. I hate door-to-door salesmen.
2. When I tell you I am not interested, I will give you one freebie to continue with your promotion because I understand it's your job and you have been scripted.
3. If you fail to stop after the 2nd or 3rd hint, I am not going to be nice any more.
4. I gotta get a No Soliciting sign.

This guy was pointless, he wouldn't listen when I told him I was getting dinner on (hint, not a good time), when I wouldn't let him in my house to look at my back door (hint, why do you want to enter my house?), when I told him more than once that I wasn't interested (hint, I am not interested), and when I still was not interested (hint, still not interested). I finally had to shut the door on him. What I should have done is told him that if he showed up again I would shoot him in the foot, and under no circumstances would I ever buy from his company for the sole fact that he was a schmeckel and wouldn't leave me after I stated my disinterest.

It's decided, I am going invest in a door sign and a water pistol. If the sign doesn't discourage them, I am sure the water pistol will.

Misha does drama

We have been trying to get Misha to expand his language skill for quite a long time. They are better than his reading skills but lack behind his ninja skills. For those who do not speak russian, here is the translation:

Papa: How does Misha sneeze?
Misha: Aaaaaah!

Papa: How does Misha laugh?
Misha: laughs

Papa: How does Misha cry?
Misha:

Papa: How does Misha scream?
Misha: squeaks.

Papa: How does Misha cough? (2x)
Misha: Coughs.