Birthday at the Museum

Yesterday was my birthday.  I woke up with no plans except to take care of Elliot.  This didn't seem like a memorable birthday, so I started brainstorming, and came up with.... trip to the museum!

I would say I chose the Natural History Museum because it's the most kid-friendly.  But really it's all the same to Elliot.  I chose it because it's my favorite. 

First things first: here's how you get there.

I forgot what a nice building it is.

Here's the statue of the founder of the museum, Robin Williams.

Elliot was not as impressed by dinosaurs as the other kids.

We spent most of our time in the interplanetary wing.  At Elliot's request.

His interests are diverse.

He's wondering how an ecosystem can sustain itself without breastmilk.

That's our combined weight on Halley's comet.

Pretty good for a point-and-shoot camera, right?  Why are we wasting all that money on the Hubble telescope?

And of course, it's a New York tradition to get ripped off in the museum cafeteria.

I decided not to give him Diet Coke.

I couldn't agree more. 

Hope Elliot is okay while i am gone.

Spontaneous birthday trip to the museum of natural history!

Early Winter Morning

Some more random Puerto Rico photos

Another unsigned onesie

Who did it?  Come forward and claim your prize.

Office Roll

I wrote an earlier post about Elliot trying to roll over, and my efforts to support him.  

He no longer needs my support. 

The big day was Saturday, Feb 20, 2011.  I was working in the hospital that day, covering for a co-worker who was out with a torn ACL.  It was a 12-hour shift, so I had to be there at 7am, and I rushed out of the house without my keys.  On a normal weekday someone else would be around to open my office for me.  But on a Saturday that wasn’t the case, so I was locked out.  I told Hannah and she generously offered to bring my keys at lunchtime.  

Angel that she is, Hannah also brought me lunch when she arrived.  So we sat in my office, munching on curry and rolling the black wheeled chairs across the slippery hardwood floor.

Then Elliot, in a surprise move, pooped his diaper.  Sploded it.  The diaper bag was produced, and the little portable pad was laid down on the hardwood floor for a quick change.

Once the dirty diaper was removed, we let him hang out naked for a while.  Partly to air out his nether regions, and also we knew that he found it easier to practice rolling without a diaper on. 

It happened quickly.  He tucked his little fists behind his ears, lifted his right leg in the air, and swung it sideways.   He started to roll toward his left, and as usual his left arm acted as a hurdle, preventing him from flipping onto his belly.  But instead of flopping back to the right, this time he gave that strong left leg another kick, and it popped his torso up and over the hurdle of his left arm.  Suddenly he was on his belly, both arms flapping to the sides like tiny penguin wings.

(If those feeble words don’t conjure the image, just click below.)

Success!  His first unassisted roll!  We think it was the hardwood floor that gave him extra purchase.  

The only catch was that he had been lying on a narrow black changing pad.  So his roll rolled him off the pad and onto the floor of my office.  The floor that six doctors walk across only minutes after being in patients’ rooms.

That was over a week ago now, and he hasn’t gotten sick, so I think it’s safe to say that he’s free of multi-drug resistant bacteria.  But he did have a few black specks of dirt stuck to his penis when we picked him up.  

Puerto Rico Day #3 -- San Juan

Baby Blues

I'm amazed he can keep his eyes open with all that lash hanging off...

Do Anything for the Limelight

Left Handed

When Kate and Ed were here in February they made a perception observation.  "We think he may be left-handed," Kate said.

Ever since then I've been watching more closely, and I see what they're getting at.  He does seem to reach and grasp with his left more than his right (I'll see if I can get some video of this for y'all).

But does his current fumbling correlate with future handedness?  As a scientist, I decided to go back to the primary source material: Wikipedia.

Seriously, I did a little med search on the topic.  There's almost no scientific research about how behavior at 4 months correlates with which hand the baby prefers.  (That hasn't prevented a massive proliferation of mommy websites, with self-professed experts doling out their thoughts.   From these sources, opinions on the question vary from 3 to 18 months.)

But if there's no research on babies and left-handedness, there's lots when it comes to adults.  One of the more interesting studies showed that there are more left-handed people in more violent societies.   The conclusion of the authors:  a punch coming from the left hand is a surprise, which is an advantage in a fight.  So the more violence, the better idea it is to be a leftie.

Aside from schoolyard brawls, how else might being left-handed affect Elliot's life?  For one thing, it turns out that us "normals" who use our right hands, put all of our language ability in the left hemisphere of the brain.  Lefties, because they're all twisty turvy, split the language ability between the two hemispheres.

For most people, for most of their lives, that doesn't matter one bit.  But if you had a stroke that knocked out one hemisphere (I can practically hear Hannah shouting at me to knock wood right now), then you would have a significant advantage over a right handed person with the same condition.

And this is one of the most fascinating paragraphs on all of Wikipedia:

Of the seven most recent U.S. Presidents, five have been left-handed, including Barack Obama, while a fifth is said to have been ambidextrous.Ronald Reagan, who was left-handed by birth,^[29][30][31] became president after he defeated left-handed candidate George H. W. Bush in the Republican primary election. Four years earlier, Reagan had lost the Republican presidential primary to incumbent left-handed President Gerald Ford. George H. W. Bush succeeded Reagan and later ran for re-election against left-handers Bill Clinton^[32] and Ross Perot.^[31] Clinton's second term opponents included Perot, and Bob Dole who had become left-handed when his right arm was paralyzed in combat 50 years earlier. Obama defeated left-handed Senator John McCain in his race for the presidency.^[33] Thus, a left-handed president was often the only possible outcome of an election.

Also, left-handed people apparently earn 10-15% more than righties.

Puerto Rico Day #2 -- The Jungle