Mine mine mine, all mine: Trucks, and the many faces of Drew

Charles bought himself a truck last week. As homeowners, he explained to me, we were remiss in not owning a pickup truck. A pickup truck can be used for many things, such as picking up mulch for the flowerbeds, hauling trash to the dump and buying ladders long enough to reach the roof of our two-story house.

And if it should happen to just look really cool and manly, well, that's just a bonus, right?

I'm really thinking that Charles might actually divorce me and marry this truck. And the sad thing is, I think Drew would choose to live with the truck.

I put him in my car - my boring, sedate, sedanly Mercury - yesterday to take him to school, and he immediately burst out with, "No! I wanna ride in Dada truck! Dada TRUCK!"

Earlier this week, while riding in the truck, I asked Drew to demonstrate his grasp of different emotions.

We started out with basic ones, like mad...

And then we moved on to happy...

I'm not sure what the balled-up fist is all about - maybe he's thinking, "I'm so happy I could punch someone in the face!" I've been that happy before, yes I have. I'm that happy right now, as a matter of fact.

Then I challenged him, and asked him to show me 'surprised'. This is what he came up with...

Not bad, huh? Then I asked him to show me "bored face."

Bored face looks more like what I would consider mad face, but then again, I'm usually mad when I'm bored too, as in, I'm so pissed that I have to fold laundry right now, this is so boring, why can't these clothes just fold themselves?

And finally, apropos of nothing much, allow me to demonstrate how well we've taught Drew table manners...

Notice, if you will, the delicate and manageable bites that he takes, and the way he chews with his mouth closed. And how he enjoys a little bit of popcorn shrimp with his ketchup.