Love those Banana Slugs

Last week was my Mom's birthday (sorry to guilt all those readers who forgot...) and as a present, my Dad gave her...a night away from me?? What's with that? I've heard that lots of parents like to celebrate by leaving their kids with someone else and escaping for a while...but how do they think that makes us feel? Do they think we don't realize what's going on? Just because I'm still not sure that the image in the mirror that looks like me and moves like me and drools like me is actually me doesn't mean I'm an idiot!

Also in honor of my mom's birthday, we went away for someone else's birthday this weekend, my parents' friend, Patrick. I like Patrick a lot. He makes me laugh, probably because he has a beard and bearded people look funny to me. For example, the old Radovan Karadzic was scary. He had no beard.

The new Radovan Karadzic with the white beard? He's funny! In fact, he kind of looks like a Monchichi, or the dad from Teen Wolf when he changes to a wolf near the end to make his son understand that he's not alone...sniff...uh oh, I'm getting verklempt!

We went down south to Santa Cruz, which many people will remember was on the t-shirt that John Travolta's character in Pulp Fiction was wearing after he was hosed down by The Wolf. I thought the entire city had converted to a big t-shirt factory after that movie, riding on the wave of publicity it afforded. But apparently most people in Santa Cruz ride on other, actual waves.

Santa Cruz was very bohemian and trendy. In fact, Santa Cruz was everything I thought Berkeley would be when I first visited Berkeley, but the town of long-haired anti-war demonstrations and the original Peet's Coffee store (yum!) has become uber-yuppified - so much so that Jack Kerouac's ghost has probably wafted down to Santa Cruz.

Here's me and my dad at the famous Santa Cruz Boardwalk. That's me in the hiking backpack, my most favorit-est place on earth!!:







My parents took me for my first trip to the ocean! Clever readers will recognize that my home town of San Francisco is, in fact, on the same ocean, and ask why my parents had to drive 2 hours south for my first ocean experience. Short answer is that SF's beach is nasty. Those of you who have visited it totally feel me. Indeed. That was my best impression of Omar from The Wire. Yes, I watch The Wire. All babies fear Baltimore.

Funny thing about the Pacific Ocean in northern California...IT'S FREAKING COLD!! Even with my chubby...ahem, healthy...little feet, the cold went straight through to my bones. We didn't get it on video, but when the surf rolled slowly at my feet, I was like "ooh, i love water. put it in a sippy cup!" But when it hit my feet, I was like "waaaaaaaah. this must be what antarctica is like!" How do thin fish deal with an ocean like this?

OK, on to some political news. In the last week, Barack got back from his middle east tour, during which time John McCain actually got funny. I have to admit I just plain loved the quip he gave that Barack's attitude towards Iraq was the "audacity of hopelessness." Score one for McCain's writers.

But you have to applaud Barack for taking a no-win situation and executing it well. A flawless trip to the center of the war on terror wasn't going to win any votes...but any slip-ups were sure losers. And according to the 67,253 people in the media that followed him everywhere he went, he came off ok. Even the prayer he put in Jerusalem's western wall was a winner. But my advice to Barack on this one: next time you're in the holiest of places - a site where it's said that messages go straight to God's ear, provided they're crumpled up and stuck in a 2,000-year-old crevice - ask for something that you'll enjoy. Like a Wii programmed so that you always beat the computer, but you don't know it's programmed that way, so you always feel like a champion. Or for a billion dollar lottery win. Or maybe to be President?

It got me to thinking, what would I put onto a slip of paper to stuff into the Western Wall. First, it would probably include a heck of a lot of drool. But if I could form words out of that drool...even better, words in Hebrew...they would say the following:

Dear Wall,
You're very tall and old. What's with all these people rocking back and forth at you? Doesn't it scare you that you'll crack their heads open? Anyway, please help me out with the following:

Health and happiness for my family

Make me taller than my mommy and less funny-looking than my daddy

Next Tuesday let me crawl out of my crib, across the hallway, and into my parents' bed so quietly that when they wake up in the morning and find me in between them it completely freaks them out.

Give me a Wii programmed so that I always beat the computer, but so I don't know it's programmed that way.

Grant me 50% less drool, 90% less snot and 40% more hair

Invent a diaper that automatically converts poop into jellybeans. That way I never have to be changed and my parents can just tip me over and pour out my poop into the jellybean jar. I probably still wouldn't eat the jellybeans, though. Yuck.

And can you do something about the summer fog in San Francisco? I'm freezing here!

Thanks, my man.
Spencer.

Below are some pictures of me eating avocado in by best stain-obscuring green outfit!