Today we fly out of ohare airport in chicago for my cousin's wedding in Bend, OR. I am not looking forward to this grueling journey.

The kids are sick and we had to take them to the emergency room here in Kenosha (not an emergency, except that our insurance covers emergency room visits when we are out of new jersey, but not standard doctor visits). The kids both have pink eye and Ben has an ear infection. I thought the nursing care at the ER in Ktown was excellent. I usually don't completely evaluate the doctor until a few weeks have passed; if in hindsight, I feel like the problem has been adequately addressed, I'll be happy with the doctor. It was a fast trip too, probably only because the ER was not very busy, but we were in and out in two and a half hours. A record setting performance.

Benjamin has learned to enjoy chicken wings. He loves to screech around the house chewing on one for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. He also has learned to say, "Smit - tee."

Both kids have really enjoyed my mom's dog, despite the fact that he's terribly ill-suited for my mom's life style. One thing in smitty's favor is that he is also incredibly tolerant. You can pull on his ears and swat his nose all day long, he barely notices.

After Ben went to sleep the other night, Smitty was howling. My mom sent him to his room, and Smitty got a time out. May was very interested in Smitty's time-out. She asked, "How long will Smitty have his time out for?" Then she asked, "Does he have to go right to bed?" May really liked seeing someone else get a time out. Smitty did not cry a lot when he got his time out. He was rather stoic about receiving his punishment.