My Baby Can Talk

I haven't been feeling well the last couple days. Seems like I picked up a little bug at day care. I have sniffles and a fever and feel pretty rotten. I've gotten some tasty purple medicine to make me feel better and lots of love from mom and dad. But the best medicine seems to be chilling out in front of the TV.

Mom and dad try not to let me watch very much TV. And there's no TV at day care. But when I'm sick and fussy, TV is very calming. It's the only thing that makes me forget about how lousy I feel. One might say television has sort of a numbing effect. That's me in the picture watching TV in my rocking chair with my friend Herman.

Recently, I started watching a new video called My Baby Can Talk: First Signs. It's supposed to teach me sign language. As the box says: "Babies are able to communicate at a much earlier age than they are able to speak." In other words, mom and dad can't understand what I'm saying to them, so they need to teach me these silly signs. I communicate just fine. It's mom and dad who should be watching videos on how to understand baby.

That being said, I like watching this sign language video. There's a nice lady who shows all the signs and explains what they mean. There's also a little baby who makes the signs too, but she sets the bar pretty low for the rest of us babies. Then there are lots of pictures of animals and food and more of that annoying baby music. I think mom and dad are hoping that if I watch the video enough, I'll start making signs when I'm hungry or tired rather than doing what they perceive as random crying.

The video teaches useful words like "eat," "drink" and "dinosaur." It shows the sign for "cat" which is nice, but I can already say "kih," thank you very much. My favorite sign is for the word "car," of course, because I love car rides. But the video leaves some things out that I really need to know how to say. Words like "poop," "TV" and "neglect." In fact, a video on semaphore would probably be much more useful. At least I could use flag signals for people outside my window to come and rescue me. Meanwhile, I'll keep watching my sign language video and see if I can get mom and dad to understand me. Getting them to do what I want will be another story.

~:O

The Maryland Zoo

Today I'm introducing a new feature on diaperlogue called "diapereports." I hope these reviews will provide helpful insights, from a baby's perspective, on toys, books, videos and other baby-friendly activities. Reviews will offer a good rating: "a Pacie"; or a bad rating: "a Stinky Diaper". I offer this rating system as I'm not coordinated enough to give a simple thumbs up or thumbs down that could be reliably discerned.

This first edition of "diapereports" focuses on the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore. You see, I have this favorite video I like to watch. It's a Baby Einstein video called Baby MacDonald: A Day on the Farm. It features lots of animals walking around. So mom and dad thought I should get to see some of these animals in person. So today, we all got in the car and took a ride to the zoo.

The outside of the zoo is pretty drab looking. The parking lot was in pretty bad shape. My stroller bounced so much on the uneven ground I thought I was going to spit up. I bet the parking lot of the Beirut Zoo has fewer holes in it.

When we got to the entrance, mom and dad forked over a hefty admission, but I got in for free. As is typical, dad doesn't take me anywhere that he needs to buy me a ticket. Cheapskate.

Walking in the front gate, I was looking forward to seeing all the animals. But it took us a while to find any. First we went to the Children's Zoo. It featured animals from the Maryland habitat. There were some ducks and turtles, but I didn't see any kitty cats. If they live in our house, surely they'd have some at the zoo. I like kitty cats. I call them "kih" for short.

The best part of the Children's Zoo was this big barn with farm animals. Just like in my video. I got to see a real life cow up close. He was big. He smelled bad, too -- like way worse than one of my messy diapers. In fact, the cow didn't use any diapers. He just made his business right there in the ground. And his messes were really, really big.

Then mom said, "Oh, look at the jackass!" I turned around to look for dad. But mom was referring to the actual jackass walking around his pen. He came up to the fence and let me touch his nose. That's me in the picture touching the jackass's nose. It was wet and soft.

There were also chickens, turkeys and pigs. But most of them were too shy to come anywhere near me.

We left the children's zoo and went to walk around the rest of the park. Unfortunately, it was all downhill from there. We walked to the African exhibit. Baltimore is a long way from Africa. There were a couple funny looking birds and other animals just standing around and eating grass. Most of them were too far away for me to really see them. Mom and dad kept pointing to things, but I couldn't really tell what. All those animals just blend in to the background.

We went to see the lions. I was excited because I like kitty cats. But they were all sleeping or hiding. I didn't see them at all. Then we went to see the cheetahs. More kitty cats! But they were also hiding or too far away for me to see them. So we walked over the hippos instead. Those guys are so big, dad thought I would get to see them for sure. But they too were all sleeping inside their special house.

Wild animals sure do sleep a lot. All these sleepy animals made me want a nap.

Before we left Africa, I did get to see a couple giraffes. They were really tall. I guess when you're that tall, it's too hard to lay down and sleep. So they were awake and walking around. That's me in the picture checking out the giraffes. I wanted to pet them, but mom wouldn't let me.

After walking through a few more sleeping animal exhibits, it was time to go home. We got to take a special tram out of the park. I liked the tram. It was like a big car ride, and I love car rides. That's me in the picture on the tram playing with mom's Coke bottle. Maybe mom should have given her Coke to some of the animals so they wouldn't be so sleepy.

Overall, I was not impressed with the zoo. I don't think mom and dad were either. The exhibits were all pretty lame, even when the animals weren't sleeping. And the whole place is pretty shabby. Even the pig sty wasn't worthy of its name. Maybe when I'm a little older I can appreciate a zoo more than I did today. But by then, I hope mom and dad will take me to a nicer one.

~:O