Later, Nader

We're down to the last few days, and one thing is becoming more and more clear: Ralph Nader will not be our next President. This may come as a shock to some of you who were thinking that the election was kind of like final jeopardy, where the competitor with $500 can still win by betting zero if the two leaders with $15,000 each bet everything and get the question wrong. Sorry, Ralph. I think your descent into political oblivion will be unsafe at any speed.

But let's not get too cocky, fellow BBBers. We need to get out the vote! So crawl at top speed to your nearest polling place...and bring your parents along to make sure someone legal actually does the voting. But if you see mom or dad putting their fingers on any name that doesn't rhyme with Mobama, start screaming bloody murder!

My grandma and grandpa Weinberg visited this weekend! They haven't seen me in a couple of months, and weren't they surprised to see me shaving already! Ok, maybe not. Teeth probably come before stubble. But what a great time! I pulled out my new favorite shirt to surprise them...how's this picture to blow your generational mind:

Proud to be a Weinberg! Greatest...shirt...ever!






My parents got me this totally cool present - a radio flyer walking wagon! I have to admit that I don't like to walk very much -
I'm working hard to perfect my crawl first - but I LOVE being pushed around in the wagon.





My friend Kiley came over tonight and even she took a turn pretending to push me! Ah, the life. Next time she'd better bring grapes to feed me while I lounge around!







Oh, did I mention that I'm taking swimming classes? Don't get too excited - it's pretty much singing songs and spinning around while my feet happen to be in the water. It's not like I'm swimming laps! But I love being in the pool, provided I'm not drinking from it, which can sometimes be an issue. My parents haven't dunked my head in the water yet, but I have a feeling that's coming in the next couple of weeks, so I'm saving up an especially scary scream to freak them out when that happens!









One more thing - I love to swing at the playground - but does it make me strange that I love having my hat thrown in my face? Listen to how I go into a giggling fit every time there's a direct hit!







Big election day on Tuesday!! What am I going to do with myself when this is all over? I'll probably have to gear up to start mocking Palin for her 2012 run...I hope my parents wash my mouth out with soap just for thinking that. Ugh!

Love.
Spencer

Happy Halloween from The Flash!

He's a miracle!







Savior of the Universe!







He'll save every one of us! But he sometimes gets thirsty and needs his sippycup.



















By the way, yes, my dad brought his ipod speakers and blasted the Queen song "Flash" while we walked around the neighborhood. Someone pointed at me and said, "hey, that kid has his own theme song!" Word.

I loved this couple! Sarah the hockey mom and Joe the plumber. I'm surprised I only saw one of these.





Happy halloween! When can I eat candy??

Love,
Spencer

"Dada" leads by 34 points in Oct 27 Spencer/Zogby Baby Poll

In partnership with Ziggy Zogby (no relation to the actual polling guy) I just finished the first ever presidential election poll of babies aged 6 to 12 months. We did fisher price phone interviews with 2,500 babies nationwide from a cross-section of income, weight and teething status.

And it was a landslide. The results (which no doubt will be on DailyKos tomorrow...):

Dada: 57%
Baba: 23%
Bbbb: 7%
Obama: 6%
Undecided: 5%
Kucinich: 1%
Palin: 1%

We found it interesting that McCain received zero votes in our poll, probably because babies assumed someone that old must already be dead. But Sarah Palin did receive a total of 2 votes from Alaskan Inuit infants who stated they believe that Palin has some choice breasts that yield ambrosia mixed by Zeus himself

OK, so as promised here are a few more pictures.

Here's me and my friend Kiley having some lunch. We're so messy. I swear we don't actually eat the spoons...but we love to chew on them.








Here I am inspecting a fake stove with my parents' friend Amy, who came to visit me!









And here I am learning to play the xylophone!







Wheeeee! Have you seen anything so cute? I'm so conceited!







Love,
Spencer

Brilliant.

You must check out this link. Shout out to my big cousins Carie and Lizzie for finding this...

http://www.cnnbcvideo.com/index.html?nid=SJ9Uo.h2P4E.a4V4s4in_zQ1OTg2NDU-&referred_by=11477186-LG9hJox

Love,
Spencer

Palin in charge of the Senate? Say it ain't so, Joe.

It's official. One of the two vice presidential candidates is officially a moron, and it's not Joe Biden. And the veep candidates for the crazy minor-party candidates don't count in this quiz. I can bet you that Ted Kennedy had a Dunkin' Donuts-induced heart attack when he heard the news that Sarah Palin said that she'd be his boss if McCain won. Of course, then he remembered his 3rd grade constitution class and realized she 's whacked. Apparently at Sarah's 3rd grade civics class, they spent too much time teaching about how the 2nd amendment (right to bear arms) was added so that early Americans could defend themselves against velociraptors. She probably also believes that Americans have the right to remove the arms from actual grizzly bears and do whatever they want with them. A little free investment advice: if Palin wins, invest in bear prosthetics. This comes from a baby who, because his father has been too lazy to set up a 529 plan yet, didn't lose a penny in the market crash. So you can trust me more than that mad money nut Jim Cramer.

You'll notice in the upper right hand corner of my website a bunch of my favorite links. One of them is the UVA sports page. Today UVA's football team upset ranked Georgia Tech for their 4th straight victory, puting them at the top of the standings in the ACC's coastal division. This is a team that a month ago was destroyed by both UConn and Duke - I'm not talking basketball here! - and now they can't lose. Now I'm not deluded enough to believe that UVA's team is any good - they're in the ACC, after all, and the ACC is just terrible this year. But for all you UVA fans out there, this is the exact REVERSE of what we expect from the Wahoos - start out 7-0 and THEN collapse to end the season. It's exciting but frustrating. Wouldn't surprise me if UVA won every game to finish the season, and then look back and realize they should have been 11-1, with the only loss to USC.

For anyone who is not a UVA football fan, my apologies for boring you with that missive.

Oh, a little bit about the star of the blog: me. I'm eating lots of different foods these days - ground turkey, whole wheat pasta, lentils, pluots, eggs, you name it. But I'm clearly a normal American boy. I just don't like broccoli, just like George Bush 1 (please let this be the only comparison anyone ever makes between me and a George Bush). Here's my dad trying to pull one over on me by trying to sneak broccoli into my mouth when I was enjoying some yummy pears. You may need to watch this a couple of times to truly understand my annoyance at my dad feeding me something I so obviously dislike...



I'll post a bit more tomorrow when I can upload some more photos of myself...

Love,
Spencer

My Big Day!

You know what today is? It's October 16th. I'm 9 months old!

"So what?" you might say. "Spencer, are you going to celebrate your birthday every month for the rest of your life?"

My response: Yes. Mom and dad, start thinking up lots of presents. Throw in 8 days of Hannukah, Arbor Day and the Chinese New Year, and I'll be getting PS3 games pretty much every other day.

Quick side note: you know what my favorite holiday is? Japan's "Respect for the Aged Day." I'm not making this holiday up - it's held the third Monday of September. I mailed out cards to many of you, but if you didn't get them, feel free to blame the US Postal Service, which still doesn't have a mandatory retirement age.

Anyway, back to the point of my blog today...this birthday is especially important.

Let this blow your mind for a second: As of yesterday, I'd spent the majority of my existence inside my Mom. But today, I've been outside more than inside. I'm an outdoor baby! A mini-citizen of the outside world!

What does this mean?
1. I've now breathed more air than amniotic fluid. So my gills are probably gone by now.
2. I've now eaten more food through my mouth than through my belly button (although let's be honest - some still gets into my belly button)
3. I've now heard more beatles and beethoven direct from the ipod speakers than muffled through the earphones my dad used to put around my mom's belly
4. When I kick and punch, I can hurt my mom in more places than just her uterus. But I would never do that! I love my mom!

It's an amazing feeling to be an outside baby. I was born at 8lbs., 1oz and 21 inches. As of my doctor's visit yesterday, I'm 21lbs, 4oz (quite the little chubster) and 29 inches. I'm almost half as tall as my mom! Then again, she's terribly short, so that's not such a...dare I say...tall order?

So what do I like the most about the outside world that I couldn't experience about the inside world? That's easy - breast milk. But a close second is following the presidential election!

I'm so sad that last night's debate was the last debate. I really enjoyed the 4 debates (including the veep debate) - not just the event itself but also the anticipation, and watching the CNN pundits score the debates like olympic figure skating judges. It's fun to mock David Gergen for falling asleep and Bill Bennett for being loopy.

I was so proud of Barack last night. He slapped McCain in the face...verbally of course...when McCain wouldn't end the Ayers discussion with the killer line (I'm paraphrasing here) "All this distraction says more about your campaign than it does about me." Then McCain continued pressing the issue! Maybe he didn't hear the remark. Maybe he was thinking about whether he put his dentures in the Efferdent back on the bus. But he appeared so clueless after that.

The other thing I loved was that Barack didn't take the bait when the moderator (who was the best of any of the debates) asked whether the veep candidates were qualified to be President. He could have launched into all of the issues - rape kits, abuse of power, witch doctors, ducking the media, you name it. But he stayed above the fray. Clearly, getting into her experience would have given an opportunity for a McCain one-liner response, like "I'd take her over you" or something silly like that. But it just goes to show how sharp and thoughtful Obama is. The guy just gets it.

Now that I'm an outside citizen, I do desperately hope that I'll be able to vote. ACORN came by the other day and registered me - for the Babytarian party, of course. But I'm not sure that was kosher. Especially because I also saw Boutros-Boutros Ghali and the sign for Prince on the registration list. But it's a first step. Some day!

Anyway, I'm excited to be 9 months old. Happy Outside Day to my friend Kiley, too - she was born the same day as me! Here we are playing together a few days ago.



Aren't these next 2 the absolute cutest pictures ever? I'm so conceited!!!






Love,
Spencer

I am Joe the Plumber

Aren't we all, in a small way? Here's one person who is definitely Joe the Plumber: www.joetheplumber.com. I hear he's among the best plumbers in Amarillo, Texas. Maybe top 10.

More to come later on tonight...

Love,
Spencer

The Great Pumpkin

With all the turmoil in the markets, it felt fantastic to take a weekend and just feel normal. But let's be serious - it's not like the failure of Wamu or Lehman impacts the day-to-day life of an 8-month-old. I just like to sound dramatic about a trip to the pumpkin patch.

I'm not kidding. My parents took me pumpkin picking, or as Sarah Palin calls it: "Punkin Pickin." This probably will come as a shock to many of you. There are a few activities that a family of Jews can be reliably expected not to undertake. Eating casserole, for one. Watching mixed martial arts is a good example as well. Easter egg hunt - definitely no. And pumpkin picking? I'll just say that we were the only wandering Hebrews in the county.

But I have to say - at the risk of having my circumcision revoked (ouch!) - that it was a lot of fun. Pumpkins are big and orange and they are outstanding at helping me stand up. Here are a few pictures to give you a sense...






What's with my dad rubbing his nose on his sleeve here? The pumpkin stem has an underrated taste.







This one's more my size. Insert your own picture caption according to your personal threshold for suggestiveness.









Time to go on a ride with my pumpkin friends!






Boo! I'm a skeleton!







Just a note: the final presidential debate is on Wednesday night. It won't be a town hall style debate, so that means no McCain wandering around the stage looking for his lost kitten. But I can assure you I'll be watching...

Love,
Spencer

what don't i know? the unexpected.

John McCain said this tonight in the boring debate. Seriously, he actually said this. You know what else he doesn't know? What's going to happen in the future. What? He's not a fortune teller? Or at least a fortune cookie? Dumbest comments in debate history. Even dumber than Palin.

All in all, my assessment of the debate tonight was that both candidates are adept at evading tough questions, and that John McCain is pretty much a jerk. Also, Wolf Blitzer is seriously annoying, and kind of looks like a Monchichi.

Did you notice that McCain never mentioned the word "Palin" tonight? He didn't even say any word that rhymes with Palin that Palin might say...like "sailin," "trailin," "wailin," or "moose." That's telling. He's distancing himself from his own VP pick.

I never commented on the vice presidential debate last week - my bad! - but really it was a nonissue. Contrary to expectations Anderson Cooper did not explode. Bummer! But anyone who walked away from that debate thinking Sarah Palin either "won" or is ready to be a President of anything either didn't watch the debate or has a sick sense of humor. The woman is just not smart. Why do we want a vice president who had to go to 4 different colleges in order to graduate? I'm not making this up - check out wikipedia.

Less than a month left until e day. I'm not registered, but I'm still hopeful that the supreme court will come through for me. Oh, did I mention? I've hired a team of crack lawyers, just fresh from their defense of OJ, to petition the court to demand baby suffrage. Fingers crossed! Unfortunately, I haven't learned how to do that yet. So cross them for me.

You MUST check out this video. This is, without a doubt, the cutest video in history. My friend Regina is so funny when she plays with me!! Listen how I've learned how to scream. My parents love that, I assure you. No matter what they tell their friends...



I could watch this video all day.

Love,
Spencer

Blockhead!

No, I'm not talking about Sarah Palin...

I'm talking about my new favorite activity - taking my shape blocks out of their box, and putting them back in! How cute is this...



Love,
Spencer