The exercise:
Write about: the count.
That was a nice Mother's Day. Good weather, good food, good times.
The only drawback was not being able to connect with my mother, but hopefully that will be taken care of in the next few days.
Mine:
While Max and I were having breakfast this morning and Kat was sleeping in, I decided to compile a list of all the words he's learned to say so far. These were all words that he'll use on his own, not just repeating after someone else. I also decided to leave out his sound effect words, despite how excellent his woof is.
I knew I'd forget some, but by the time I served Kat breakfast in bed I figured I had a reasonably complete collection. I presented it alongside her toast and eggs, titling it Max's Words, Mother's Day 2014.
Of course it bugged the crap out of me that there were words I'd forgotten, so I kept adding to it throughout the day. Now, with my bedtime fast approaching, I'm basically satisfied with what I have cobbled together.
Apparently by 18 months of age, toddlers should be able to say between 10 and 20 words. I remember our public health nurse saying 18 words by 18 months was about right, which was 6 months ago. At the time we couldn't imagine Max having that many, as he really only had maybe three or four that he used consistently.
Now all of a sudden he's got 80. That I was able to think of today.
2 comments:
Well if Max has got such an excellent woof you should get him a bassett hound puppy. As I recall, their voices "break" when they reach about 6 months or so and they find they can do a new "woof" that's referred to as belling :) He can teach Max!
80 words is very impressive, you've clearly been teaching him well! I wonder how long it'll be before you're wishing he'd shut up?
The count
"Odnose B is the only language in the world that is known to have killed all of its speakers," said Clarice, her tone slightly hectoring, "and someone is running a numbers station using it."
"By someone she means the Tailor," said Byoti. He was corpulent and sweaty, and his personal odour filled the office. Clarice glared at him. "What?" he asked, his accent disappearing for a moment, revealing it for the fake it was. "He's not Voldemort. You can his name without him appearing behind you."
"Anyway," she said meaningfully. Alex raised a hand, more amused by their interaction that scared, but wishing that the room had better ventilation. "What?"
"What's a numbers station?"
Clarice stood up and walked behind her desk, pulled the chair out (it was on five little castors) and sat down. Then she put her head in her hands.
"Really?" she asked. "Don't you get that in basic training these days?"
"Nuh-uh," said Byoti. "We dropped it and dead-drops in favour of social networking and engineering."
"Oh gods. Oh fine then. A numbers station is a radio station where all that is broadcast are numbers. There is a radio station out there that is a broadcast, twenty-four hours a day, of someone counting in Odnose B."
"Sounds painful," said Alex after a moment.
"It should be impossible," said Clarice. "I said at the beginning, that language kills people who speak it, and it destroys electronics that synthesize it. So your job, Alex, is to find the numbers station and find out how the Tailor is doing this."
Greg - I think I'll take a pass on the bassett hound, but thanks for the suggestion :P
I do not envy Alex his assignment!
Post a Comment