Summer Thoughts (perplexed edition)

• The Frog-o-Sphere (or whatever they call it)! It's a Grow-A-Frog for those who have problems with delayed gratification. I knew it would be fascinating when Martha clobbered me with the double barreled, "I'm bringing home something new from work, by the way did I tell you about the strange smelling shipment we received?" They are soothing to watch. And I think they (African Dwarf Frogs - please don't release into the wild) have already gone through a growth spurt as manifested by the floating chunks of sloughed off skin. But the snails are supposed to help take care of the detritus.

• The Wall Street Journal has joined the war on cankles. I'm not sure what to make of that. But while I'm on the subject, I must say that though I've never been a big proponent of choosing a female physician just because she is female, there is a benefit when you call to report a prescription reaction as 'causing swelling bad enough to create cankles.' She will know what that means. The (male) rheumatologist I see wouldn't know a cankle if it smacked him upside the head.

• There is going to be a WoW movie. A movie about a game. A game made into a movie. (Wasn't Jumanji enough?) I just don't get it. Rubik's Cube? Sudoku? What game will be next?

• Oh, I've now been informed that I am the last person on earth to know about the WoW movie.

• There is an upside about having a vehicle which is...less than aesthetically pleasing. (besides not worrying much about theft) Rick finally called his doctor about his annoying cough; not so much worried about his health but to stop the nasty looks from the family. The doctor sent him straight to the acute care center at the hospital. I wasn't too concerned - until I realized I hadn't heard from him in about 6 hours. When I called Fran (who was trapped in my bedroom, wrapped in a towel, waiting for the sailors to leave so she could run to her room...but that's another whole story) she said the hospital called to see if Dad got home alright and to speak with him. They couldn't leave a message...confidentiality and all. But he wasn't home. Since I had the car - a good looking car - I said I'd look into it. I picked Martha up from the toy store and headed over to the hospital. If he was still there he wouldn't be hard to find. Martha spotted OBO before I did. Why do we call it OBO? The picture does no justice to the advertisement painted on both sides by the previous owner: 4SALE $500 OBO. Painted with something like regular old Rust-o-leum. Or some substance not readily removed or painted over. It's no clunker. It just looks like one. I'm not saying I'm not slightly embarrassed to ride in it. I'm not that detached. But I do find it amusing to see the Sheriff's cars constantly scoping it out when they see it parked on the street. If Rick had had my car, the search would have been much more arduous. Navy blue Jeeps are everywhere. So we walked into the emergency room and asked what was up. There was a break down of information between acute care and emergency room and we found our transferred pater familias resting comfortably with his pneumonia diagnosis and treatment underway. What do relieved family members say? "Thank God," or "So your cell phone is dead, would it have killed you to ask to use the phone on the wall just two feet away from you? Don't you think we worry? And what kind of operation are they running here when they call the house to talk to you when they should know you are sitting here hooked up to an IV and oxygen? Huh? What kind of operation??? If it wasn't for that fugly van of yours we'd still be looking for you. By the way, the cough sounds better already. And no swine flu or whatever it's called. That's good. Thank God."

• next time: "Fatherhood of the Traveling Pants!" A true story.