January 20

Puck started his morning with compliments.
“You smell good, Daddy. You smell good, Mama. You smell like blue…”

The mist still hung heavy. Sometimes, when there were such mists, Collette imagined that alternate terrains grew behind it, than from what was really there: mountains, valleys, the sea…

Over at the house, Carrie-Bri was preparing for her first day of training. But first, she painted a curly moustache on Puck.
“That’s chocowet (chocolate) on my face, guys,” he announced, as he tried to lick it off in rapid successions of his little pink tongue.
Later, Carrie asked him where his off-and-on switch was located. She pretended to flip a switch on his back.
“That was a massage,” said Puck. “That’s my wight fwistch (light switch).”
This was followed with Carrie asking him about various friends and family members coming over to see him.
“Is Lucia coming?” she asked.
“Lucia’s not,” he said seriously. “She’s at her house.”
“Is Uncle Relevance coming?”
“Umple Relevance is not. He’s just a wittle shyyyyy…”

During Puck’s nap in Carrie’s room, he never fell asleep, being too busy making faces at himself in the mirror and talking to himself.
“Hi! Hi! I just Puck… Look at this! This is my best mow…”

Meanwhile, Rose had attended Taco Bell with the guys from work.
Joe had another full day of class, nine to five.
Linnea was at gymnastics, followed by Culver’s frozen yogurt, and youth group.
Mom had a hair appointment.
Carrie was gone by noon to The Melting Pot where she learned that she had to memorize a manual-sized list of, pretty much everything imaginable and more.
And OLeif had another meeting at seven o’clock regarding his free-lance work on the side, but not before he had given Puck a bubble bath and taught him how to say, “Et tu Brutus!”

So once Puck had enjoyed his dinner (and fed nearly every piece of it to his tiny rubber purple turtle) and was down sleeping soundly for the night, Collette wrapped up writings and laundry and watched a newly discovered Irish television series: Ballykissangel.