the funniest woman i ever seen was the great-granddaughter of mr. clean

we're back in durham after six days and 1800 miles of driving. as you can see from this video, not all of our waking hours were spent in eve's new car. we also managed to see all the indiana grandparents and great grandparents, much to everyone's mutual delight. at her peace and hope's, eve discovered a love of roses, cilantro, and basil plants while being carried around their edenic garden. she also said a sad good-bye-for-now to her dog-dogs. recent reports and observations indicate that eve and zoe already miss each other, but argos has completely forgotten his nc roots.

at her e.m. and a.b.'s, eve had a bout of baba hysteria, as you can see on this video. yes, she is completely naked, and yes, that's one of the reasons she's laughing so hard. this is just a cut of the whole sequence, which lasted for about four minutes. after that, eve got all diapered and pj'd, and promptly fell into a happy pups coma.

during the trip, she also managed to get and nearly get over some nasty diaper rash (hence the lady godiva moment), and cut three teeth! the first two to come in are her top incisors, followed by a bottom front. our little vamp.

and of course henry the horse dances the waltz!

this pups loves her some canines. we were cooking dinner and placed eve in the center of the kitchen in her favorite seat -- the saucer of delight. few devices in life bring such pleasure. she was having such a good time, and in such a great mood, that the only possible addition was to merge the kitchen and the animal kingdom into one harmonious, furry world. as the photos demonstrate, evesie and zoe were all for it. argos harbored some very real, very valid trepidation.

oh, hans castorp

in this house, we like 'the clash.' that joe strummer outfit is probably one of my favorite bands in the world. 'the clash' have a song that begins with this sneering vocal: "this is a public service announcement...with guitars!" the song continues to list all the things that should be available to people and that, sadly, aren't. things like food and safety.

eve's list of necessary items for survival would likely include a pile of toys. she's a little bit less like 'the clash' and more like hans castorp, the eponymous hero of this post. hans is the main character in thomas mann's 'the magic mountain,' which is probably one of my favorite books of all time ever. in that masterpiece, hans visits his cousin who is staying at a sanatorium in the swiss alps because he has tuberculosis. spending time in a sybaritic mountain retreat was reputed to be the proper--nay, necessary--way to treat the illness. hans develops a small catarrh while spending time with his cousin, which necessitates his seven-year-long stay up in the mountains, collecting theories of time and the world, warm blankets, books and records.

hans castorp and 'the clash' go together, and they both have something to do with eve. in one of ted's better punning moments, he rewrote the first line of that above quoted song so that you could sing it like this: "this is a public service announcement...with catarrhs!" the dogs have long loved this version of the song because it involves big side-slapping pets and shouting and walking in circles.

eve loves puns and the dogs, neither of which you can see evidence in these photos. you can, however, see how she's become a bit like hans castorp of late. when she plays with toys, she collects as many of them around her as possible, and then methodically takes each one up, inspects it, pulls its ears, chews on it and talks to it. if hans were a baby and not a floundering young man, this is probably what he would do, too. i'm sure she's saying something important while she talks to her toys because her actions seem so deliberate and methodical, and yet joyous at the same time. unfortunately, she's also exhibiting that other not-so-fun side of hans: illness. this poor old pups is battling a little ear infection and a little chest infection (a, should i dare say it, catarrh?). in spite of her recent diagnosis, she's mostly up to her usual tricks, as you can see in the final picture of this post, but she's also prone to sad and sleepy moments, like two of the photos in the series.

let's hope in the coming days that she becomes more like those anarchist art school boys and less like good old hans.

so we live a life of ease

on our bi-weekly trip to babies 'r us (part of our 'nice little saturday), we saw a guy walking out of the store with one of these kiddie pools. we decided immediately that we had to get one (in keeping with our latest mode, known popularly as impulse buying). fortunately the kiddie pool was only $6 and has already proved to be the best $6 spent recently. evesie loved it. so, in the interest of expanding her horizons, we must now plan a trip to the ocean once it's warm enough for her. the other great boon about the kiddie pool -- something about the plastic-conditioned water allowed us to sculpt the perfect faux-hawk. after said styling, evesie promptly passed out and didn't really wake up until this morning -- still rocking the faux-hawk.