Heigh Ho Twitter!

Hullo folks. Yes, this is Mum and Pa... and, sadly, no - we're not not quite restarting the blog yet.


Like we said, we wanted to relaunch when a pre-arranged tipping-point of sorts was reached, and that hasn't yet come. Details will be revealed at that time.


But, for now, we're sort of cheating on our own promise, by starting up on Twitter instead. That's right, we're now on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mumsthewordorpa, so do Follow us. We'll try to supply updates on how the little fella is doing... he's not so little any more, but in fine fettle. We hope to reconnect with some of the great folks we came to know while the blog was humming along... and even if and when Mum's the Word (or Pa) does resume, the Twitter feed will remain a great means through which to chat, communicate and alert.


So, again, come follow us! And let us follow you, by telling us where to find you.

Why we've 'gone quiet'

Nuclear submarines disappear beneath the waves for months at a time to prowl undersea and play war games.

We're obviously not a nuclear submarine, but we have gone quiet for a while, so we thought we'd put up a quick post to say that we are - as alluded to already in some responses to comments - on sabbatical. The blog hasn't died, it's having a rest, but we have every intention of reactivating it once the circumstances are right.

Hopefully, the appropriate circumstances will come by soon and we can surface dramatically - splaash! - with turbines churning.

Meanwhile, thank you for your messages, notes, inquiries and comments. Sonny is very well and babbling away every day, fair scuttling around and even trying to climb up playground ladders (giving Mum little heart attacks each time). His favourite word at this time is 'Mummy carry', which is a bit of toddler blackmail which really means 'Mummy, pick me up now or I'll commence loud protestations of the teary variety'.

All the best and bear with us just a little longer, everyone!

The Pa Pa Pa problem

The other day, Sonny managed to get his father skip-hoppity happy when he blurted out 'Pa' as the said parent was entering our flat after work.

"Aha, so he recognises me," said Pa, puffing up his chest ever so slightly and casting a pitying glance at Mum.

Strangely, Mum did not seem particularly put out. "Go on, ask him who Sonny thinks he is," she responded. So Pa poked the little fella in the chest and said, "And who are you?"

"Pa!" chirrupped our one-and-two-month old creature enthusiastically, causing a sneaking suspicion to dawn on his father.

"And who's this?," he demanded, pointing at Sonny's grandmother.

"Pa!"

Apart from bruising egos, of course, the incident does make us wonder exactly what concept of identity toddlers can possibly possess. Could Sonny believe there is some sort of 'Pa' club to which both he, his father and his grandmother belong (Mum, typically, is addressed as 'Milk' or a garbled 'Mpagh')? If so, where could he have derived that idea? We've spent quite a bit of time pointing at ourselves and trying to attach the appropriate signifiers: Somehow, the signals got crossed.

Actually, it's even more confused than that. A couple of weeks back, Pa was able to get Sonny to thump his chest (that's Pa's chest, not Sonny's) by barking, 'Who's Pa?'. So, to all intents and purposes, he was clearly on the right track to recognition. Even more mysterious is why Mum should have been left out of the big happy 'Pa' club.

Apart from crossing our fingers and hoping the arrow signs get sorted out in his little brain, we're also now waiting to see when Sonny will call himself by his first name. This would seem to be a fairly significant moment, since it would clearly signal a deepening of self-awareness.

He'll probably start working on that knotty issue once he understands that he's not his father.

Time-travelling with Sonny

It's a sentiment completely lacking in originality, but time can really play tricks with you.

Yesterday, Sonny - or rather, we his parents - celebrated his first birthday. Since the little fella hadn't a clue what was going on, we restricted ourselves to a small little cupcake with a candle on it and a small rubberised toy car. His two-year-old cousin - or rather, his parents - couriered over a much larger toy car while the folks at the infant care centre surprised us with a few designer togs.

Truth be told, Mum is still pinching herself (something she normally leaves to Sonny to do) over how speedily it has all gone. "It's really been a year?", she whines intermittently. And truth be told, it really did seem as though it was just yesterday, or perhaps a week ago, that we brought the little fella home from the hospital - only to rush him back in for some tanning in the wake of a touch of jaundice. Quite a few more things had happened since then, from the one-month reign of terror promulgated by our confinement lady - and her ultra-greasy food - to trips abroad with Sonny, bouts of illness and an inordinate number of 'he's hit his head again' episodes. How these could all have fit into the one week they seem to have taken in all is a metaphysical mystery.

Now we'll have to set aside our 'What's to expect: The first year' manual for something that will cover Year Two (and beyond). Though given the rapidity with which Time lays down its markers, we might as well be stocking up on 'What to expect: The teen years'. Then again, just as the watched pot never boils, perhaps expecting things to zip along will guarantee a snail's pace instead. And there are some aspects of life-with-Sonny that we're not really desperate to prolong - from the need to laboriously feed him his meals to his inability to keep himself clean.

The little fella, of course, is blissfully unaware of our meandering musings. He ignored the lit candle for his cake (we had to blow it out ourselves) but was especially interested in ripping to shreds the gift-wrapping for his cousin's toy car. We chanted 'Happy birthday' in the face of blank incomprehension, even if Pa's spectacles attracted his exploratory fingers. Perhaps in a year or two, it will make sense to actually hold a party: Right now, it would be meaningless. Though, come that time, we might again be going on about how quickly the intervening period has passed.

Big deal, so the fella can walk...

It's one of those critical toddler milestones ranking right up there with the first tooth and first decipherable utterance. Sonny burst past the 'first step' marker the other day, and then some: He managed to plod a couple of footlengths unaided before crashing to the floor.

"Oh," said Mum, who happened to be on hand. Then she forgot about it for the rest of the day. It was only the next morning, on the way to work, that she recalled the occasion - and rang up Pa ("so you'll have something to write about for the blog").

What's this, you cry shrilly? Has some variety of 'parenting fatigue' caught up with us, that we are not prancing about like deer on drugs whenever Sonny ticks one of those 'First...' boxes? Well, it's more like we've become curiously adept at seeing 'the other side' of any supposedly joyous development.

So Sonny has started to walk? Well, break out the party hats and all that, but doesn't that mean there are now even more varieties of 'nasty falls' we need to be guarding against? And it surely means he can poke and pry into even more forbidden zones, necessitating another round of 'moving stuff up higher shelves'?

Or let's take another example. Sonny can now call for his mother by name (assuming her name is 'Maa'). Sure, drinks all round. But the flip side is that he's that much closer to pummelling us with an endless stream of inane questions and demands. We'll also have to attend to him more closely now when he issues his customary burbles, since he might actually be saying something comprehensible. Of course, 99.9 per cent of the time, it's still nonsense.

Want another? All this teeth-sprouting business (nearly forgot: Huzzah, huzzah) is taking a toll on Mum, even though Sonny only has three for now. Each extra chomper is an additional weapon to be deployed in biting down on the poor woman.

Some folks might suggest that we are assuming too much of a sour disposition. So don't get us wrong. It's great - no, it's marvellous - that Sonny is growing up. But if you think about it, that's pretty much the standard programme for babies, right? No real surprise to be had. Ho hum and all that. Not that we're asking for a nasty shock. But we're still waiting for the little fella to do something that flat-out astounds us, that will have us staring at each other and tossing away parenting books in consternation.

Outbreak... and after

For parents of toddlers in Singapore, it's right up there with sudden fires or wicked child kidnappers.

Hand, foot and mouth disease is an endemic childhood ailment that visits thousands every year - usually lasting only a few days. However, a handful of truly unfortunate victims never recover: When word breaks that a kindergarten, creche or other care centre has seen a case, the place clears out faster than you can say, 'Aa-ti-shoo'.

Just a few days ago, Sonny's infant care centre fell under the shadow. The first victims had been enrolled in the facility for older children next door, but then two of the little fella's playmates became confirmed HFMD statistics. We were sombrely told that it was best Sonny be kept at home for a few days while the place received a thorough wipedown, since HFMD can be spread through saliva left on shared toys.

Luckily, Mum happened to be clearing her leave and it was near the weekend anyway. Still, we suddenly had Sonny with us for a more prolonged spell than we ever envisioned. For the next couple of days, he tagged along as we embarked on various excursions - to condominiums in our ongoing research for a possible purchase, to eateries and the library. It was the longest continuous spell we had spent with him, and it seemed to us it stoked his clingy side: He became, if it were possible, even more dangerously attached to Mum and even more inclined to break into tears if left to himself. For our part, we scrutinised every newly-discovered pimple or freckle, wondering if these were the first harbingers of the disease: We even absented ourselves from a friend's party, not wishing to be responsible for Sonny innocently transmitting HFMD to one of the other tots there.

The next week, of course, Sonny was re-deposited at the infant care centre. Yet his increased propensity for tears hasn't yet abated. A doctor Pa chatted up told us that we ought to soothe him as soon as possible, but we are still occasionally letting him cry just to see how long he can keep it up. So far, the answer seems to be: For as long as it takes, which is bad news for the 'shun-him-to-discipline-him' school of thought. But we're now eyeing our upcoming holiday to the Arabian peninsula with some trepidation. If two days was enough to make the little fella extra-needy, 10 unbroken days with us might push him into some new and even more frenzied dimension.

At least, though, the HFMD scare gave us a warning of what might come. You know what they say about silver linings and clouds...

Farewell, faithful fan

A sad end has come for someone who'd become part of our little family.

Even as a new year dawned upon us, we had to say goodbye to Ivy, our clip-on fan with the flexible neck, soft blades and fascinating light patterns. She was could have been tailor-made to amuse and cool down our Sonny, but - alas - perhaps too much so. The little fella made it his personal project to explore Ivy extensively using his main research tools - his chomp-happy mouth and destructive fingers.

As chronicled previously (click here), Ivy duly lost one of her blades to Sonny's ministrations, yet kept on whirring bravely. From then on, we tried our best to keep her from harm's way. But inevitably, Sonny found a chink in our defences, darted in and ripped off another blade. A one-bladed fan isn't much good for much, though Mum tried one last move. She dismantled our valiant fan and sought to purchase some fabric so as to make new blades - but had to admit defeat after hunting around our neighbourhood shops.

Yesterday, therefore, she unveiled Cab, Ivy's replacement. She looks very similar, though more blocky of construction and clad in green rather than Ivy's purple one-piece. There's an ever-changing light-pattern too - with even more possible combinations than with Ivy's. Still, it won't be the same. Some might wonder how we could ever become attached to a Made-in-China mass of plastic, wires and circuitry. But half the time, it isn't so much the charm or personality of someone or something that matters as the emotional investment we are ourselves willing to extend: How much we see in it, rather than what it exhibits in and of itself.

Some philosophers like to remind us that anything we observe and encounter in the world is never "the thing itself", but rather a sort of joint project between our own inclinations and observational powers, and what is presented to us to be observed. Looked at it that way, there's no reason why a rock, or a tree or a fan, should not come to be seen as idiosyncratic, quirky or crammed with character. In fact, it pretty much follows that when we find someone, someplace or something bland or boring, it would be a reflection - not a flattering one - of our own failings and flatness of soul.

Scandal of the 'Handsome One'

The other day, Mum was rocked to her fingertips to hear one of the staff at Sonny's infant care centre refer to one of the other babies there as 'Handsome One'.

It's not as though we've been telling ourselves that our little fella was especially comely, or even that we've heard many compliments directed at the putative attractiveness of his features. A few 'Cute's, a scatterings of 'Good-natured's and the odd 'Friendly' had come our way, but precious little else. Yet there had been one exception to the pattern.

For a while, certain members of the centre staff had referred to Sonny as 'Handsome One'. Again, we knew that a vast population of infants had not been scrutinised before the title was awarded in open competition - in fact, there were just four other babies when we enrolled Sonny a few months back. Yet the staff had us going for a while. For one thing, they didn't dole out flattering nicknames to every inmate, as far as we knew: There was no 'Model Baby' or 'Beautiful Belle' being lionised. It was nice, though rather irrational, to think that Sonny had at least received some recognition - whether or not we privately felt he was handsome.

But then came the day the 'Handsome One' tag was applied to someone else. By now, the number of babies at the centre had swelled (to almost a dozen) and apparently someone else had passed the secret standard being wielded. Or, we thought vindictively, a sneaky staff strategy had perhaps been finally exposed: Every child was a 'handsome boy' or 'pretty girl' when the parents visited with no other mum or dad about.

Mum's expression perhaps telegraphed a sense of our mild outrage that day. Anyway, she has since been told that Sonny was 'the Original Handsome Boy' (as though he were a venerable recipe at a fast food chain) and his handsomeness is being insisted upon when Pa shows up to deposit the little fella there in the mornings.

Of course, perhaps we are being paranoid. It's just possible that Sonny's handsomeness is waxing furiously, so that the folks at the infant care centre - being professionally attuned to these things - can't help remarking upon it (as with this other 'Handsome One').

Christmas tree, nightmare tree

The fear was as disturbing as it was out of place.

The Christmas tree was cheery and colourful, adorned with the customary decorations, faux presents and assorted shiny bits. But the little child shrank back in what was quite clearly terror, his eyes little moons as his body shuddered convulsively.

Mum looked on in puzzlement. She was in the foyer of the infant care centre where Sonny spends his weekdays, and the little child - perhaps eight months older than our seven-month-and-a-week-old - was usually one of the friendlier inmates. Yet unless the staff had been tossing him into the pine cones again and again in some sadistic game, Mum could come up with no explanation for his behaviour. Most young children, after all, love Christmas trees and must be sternly warned not to mutilate them. Terror, however, was definitely animating the situation.

Eventually, after subtly questioning a couple of caregivers, we learned that the child in question had previously brushed up against the pine needles. Somehow, this had left him with a memory of great discomfort. Yet presumably every other child in the centre must have had tactile encounters with the tree. Why did just this one react so negatively?

We took away from this mystery a reinforced sense of the essential strangeness of children. They take fright at inexplicable things, with emotional residue attaching unpredictably to chance encounters. A tot will become fixated with some gewgaw or other and spend weeks trying to penetrate parental defences in order to gnaw at it (we're thinking of Sonny's unceasing charges at Pa's slippers here). They find someone to be terribly fun, and someone else deadly boring, with no rhyme or reason to the distinction.

And how different are we, as adults? We like to imagine that we are much more logical, far more able to behave in accordance with preferences lashed all about with tendrils of reasoned thought. One sometimes wonders whether this is as much an imagined characteristic as the child-feared horrors of the Christmas tree.

Mythbuster: Mess, what mess?

Homes are notoriously transformed from tidy pads into Sargasso Seas of toys, pampers clean and used, how-to books and all the detritus of parenting once there has been an addition to the family. Thus runs the conventional wisdom, anyway, and Heaven knows there's truth to it. But before neatfreak parents-to-be run out wailing in despair, we should reveal that there are ways in which Sonny's arrival - almost exactly seven months ago now - has actually upped the hygiene factor in our little abode. Here are five:

(1) Clean surfaces: We always tried to fire up the vacuum cleaner every few weeks or so, and Mum would occasionally receive a message from above and decide to wipe down surfaces. In just this last week, however, she's hoovered the place three times. It's all thanks to Sonny's unstoppable urge to crawl everywhere, and Mum's determination that he shouldn't be dirtying his hands and every other part of his body as he pulls himself along on his explorations. So there's actually less dust about than before the little fella's advent.

(2) Clean clothes: Our clothes usually sat unlaundered for up to a week while we waited for the pile to get high enough to warrant switching on the washing machine. Sonny, however, is a force of nature when it comes to drooling on shirts, soiling shorts and otherwise single-handedly creating a load of wash-soon-please garb. We add our own items on the mix and suddenly our washer and dryer are getting three workouts a week.

(3) Clean home paraphernalia: It's a bit of a grab-bag, this, but our cushions and fans have all been transformed by the little fella's magic touch. By which we mean that we really couldn't have his eager, questing hands get all grubby as they grip our tower fans, chair legs or curtains (well, the curtains are the next project). So Mum's been busy with a wet cloth. Meanwhile, the little fella's penchant for contributing a portion of his just-imbibed milk to the immediate surroundings means the cushion covers are being regularly changed.

(4) Clean study: We used to have a cosy study where Pa would retire to a comfortable chair, laptop and worktable. There would be books strewn about and dust gathered accordingly. Then Sonny arrived, the study became the baby room and suddenly the computer has a shrunken space in the hall, atop a side table. The original worktable has become the depository for packs of wipes, baby supplies and creams. Once a day, it hosts Sonny's little tub for a bath. A spare bed has found its place in the room too, for changing the little fella. The net result is that the room once known as the study is now kept cleaner than before on account of its more sensitive infant-related role.

(5) Clean guest room: Further to (4), the guest room is now less cluttered since one bed has been redeployed for baby duties. The space freed up means the room is more easily maintained too.

A frightening fall

Sonny presented us with our first heart-stopping moment yesterday. Mum had been getting ready to bathe him, so she left him on our spare bed-cum-changing station while she popped into the bathroom to fetch a pail of warm water. She had our plastic protective barrier up, which runs about two-thirds the length of the bed, and took the precaution of facing the little fella away from the edge of the bed.

Once she got the water running, Mum stuck her neck round to see how Sonny was doing. To her horror, he had spun, skedaddled past the barrier and was peeking down towards the floor. Before she could grab him, the little fella toppled headfirst down and slammed temple-forward to our parquet flooring. After a second of stunned silence, the tears began to flow.

The next hour or so was taken up with Mum trying to comfort the little fella (which proved quite easy to do), then worriedly ringing up a doctor friend for advice. The medico was reassuring: Babies' heads are very hard, she said. Just watch for any vomiting, drowsiness or loss of co-ordination - head for the hospital if these signs manifest themselves. Otherwise, your son should be all right.

Almost 18 hours later, all seems well. Sonny is as frenetically active as ever and is presently trying to climb up Mum (we may have a mountaineer in the making here). We can't even find the bruise corresponding to the knock to his head and he never did seem especially in need of a hug - though the doctor had warned that he might be extra-needy. In fact, it is pretty much business as usual, though we remain wary. Still, if we are lucky, the entire episode will prove a useful dry run for future emergencies, medical or otherwise. There's no getting away from surprises in the parenting business, or so well-placed sources insist, so we might as well get used to being dealt a few.

Tagged! Seven random facts

The estimable Ruth, whose Ruth the Mom delivers jolts of humour as regularly as an expresso machine produces good java, has linked us into an entertaining round of tagging.

The rules, as reproduced on the left, require that we offer seven titillating - oh, all right, just random - facts about ourselves (we're counting Mum, Pa and Sonny as one virtual person). Then we'll tag seven other bloggers - who may or may not wish to keep the ball rolling.

So here are the facts:

1) Sonny has been perfecting the art of dry-eyed crying. When he wants attention, he sits there looking crafty (you need to work on an expression of injured innocence, youngster), and sends out exploratory howls that increase in volume the longer he is ignored. He did that for 45 minutes straight last night, until Mum caved in.

2) Mum does a good interpretation of a zombie. That's because she is very tired these days and will call Pa on the way to work to moan, in tones that invoke the living dead: "I'm sooo sleeepy". Why? See item (1) above. Our efforts to steel ourselves and not rush immediately to Sonny's aid have robbed Mum of much shut-eye.

3) Pa comes from a line of heavy sleepers. His father before him napped so incessantly that Pa's brother once wrote in a primary school essay: " My father's hobby is sleeping". Now Pa is carrying on the tradition - aided by drowsiness-inducing medication that he regularly takes. The upshot is that he can sleep through anything: Ringing telephones, traffic noise and even the phenomenon addressed in item (1).

4) Pa has ten toes. To be more exact, he is presently wondering why it is that nature has given humans ten, as opposed to six or four. He can understand that an even number makes better evolutionary sense, since it presumably allowed primitive humans better balance as they fled sabre-toothed tigers or whatever menaced them thousands of years ago. But why 10? In fact, why does this tag game stipulate seven, rather than eight, or nine, random facts? Such inane thoughts are fairly typical of frustrated philosophers, or possibly people who - despite claims to the contrary - are sleep-deprived due to the phenomenon addressed in item (1).

5) Mum is an inveterate dreamer. That is to say, hardly a night goes by without her embarking on remarkable adventures or braving terrors in her sleep. Of course, this was before the advent of the phenomenon addressed in item (1) and a subsequent loss of sleep.

6) Sonny has sealed an unholy alliance of some sort with the infant care centre. Maybe they're bribing him with an extra-soft blanket. It's the only explanation for why, going by the logs kept by his caregivers, he snoozes for hours and hours over there, depriving them of a chance to earn their salary. Instead, Sonny chooses to stay awake at home, preferably when his parents are trying to get some shut-eye. Should they be impertinent enough to deposit him in his cot, he will immediately commence the activity described in item (1).

7) The economy may be in danger of going to hell in a handbasket, but Mum and Pa are doing some cautious househunting. There are a number of reasons for this: The hope of settling in a district with better schools and taking advantage of market trends. With a slightly larger pad, too, we could deposit Sonny in his own little room at some distance from ours, and let him indulge in the activity described in item (1) while we snooze happily away.

Well, there's the lot. Now for the folks being invited to join the tag party. All have blogs that we enjoy visiting:


I) Enchanted by Scraps
II) Mumsgather
III) Nona Nita
IV) Sheena and Greg
V) Sturgent
VI) Jane
VII) Penny

Righto, it's time for a nap.

How to (mis)read a photograph

Yesterday, we received a lovely package in the post: A photo album assembled online by Sonny's aunt (presently in exotic Arabia), then printed, packaged and posted to us by the folks at Shutterfly. It features a range of family snaps reproduced in impressive colour and clarity, capturing and memorialising the little fella's first few months.

The magic of digital visuals has made it easier than ever to store and document the lives of even us ordinary folks. But that's not to say we can really trust photographs, since they don't necessarily tell us the truth. Even in the days of the Soviet Union, photographic 'evidence' or 'documentation' was pretty much what the regime wanted it to be. Kodak-moment snaps of groups of national leaders would be touched up and airbrushed until individuals that had fallen from favour magically disappeared from history. This sometimes happened successively, so that a portrait of five people would become one of four, then three, and so on.

So too, when we leaf through someone's photo album, what the owner has chosen to leave out is at least as interesting as what's kept in. In Agatha Christie novels, in what is surely one of the least implausible elements of many whodunit plots, there are always photos on mantelpieces or in drawers that show the killer in a telling pose with the victim. This will seed the realisation that - gasp! - they were actually former lovers, or an illegitimate mother-and-daughter pair, or suchlike. Less dramatically, just imagine you were going through your Uncle Ed's holiday snaps. Who was he hanging out with most? Which places did the posse visit? Which spots impressed them the most? Chances are, perusal of the photos will reveal some clues - and posing such questions can sure make holiday albums more fun to get through.

Yet wouldn't you be interested in knowing which places repelled the holidaymakers the most? Which persons were so weird they were roundly shunned and left to their own devices? What subtle bit of enchantment eluded everyone's coarsened eye? These are the photos that were not taken, or torn up and tossed away, or consigned to the drawer that's never opened. And as it is with our holiday example, so is it with every photo album, from someone's birth to when he is pottering about in his adult diapers. The missing photos are the ones that fill in the blanks in someone's character - and without them, the truth is forever elusive and justice not done.

The magical Good-Lah policy

We're going to sound like crazy insurance agents at first, but bear with us while we tell you about a policy that keeps reaping dividends.

We're referring to a mental policy, and it got its start (ridiculous as it may sound) one day at a casino. There we were, throwing away our hard-earned cents at an activity that involved guessing whether the next card in a face-down deck was going to come up red or black. If we guessed red, but black came up, we'd lose our bet. Red, and we doubled our (pitiful) stake. Anyway, we got into the habit of chorusing, "Good lah" whenever the wrong colour came up ('Good lah' being the endearing, Malaysian-accented equivalent of 'Jolly good'). The tenuous logic behind the forced merriment was that, given the law of averages, so long as we kept betting red, each time black came up made it the more likely that red would be next up.

We never did make much money. For one thing, the game didn't use an actual deck of cards at all, but rather an enormous computer-generated stack of decks, which meant that - for all practical intents and purposes - the probabilities accompanying each red-or-black choice were always 50-50 (those who could explain this more succinctly, preferably using easy-to-understand examples, are welcome to do so). But adopting the Good-Lah policy is easily translated into a broader attitude towards life in general: It simply means that, when something comes along that seems to have negative consequences, we may take it as something likely to lead to a positive outcome down the line, so long as we stay the course.

Yesterday, for instance, saw an instance of Good-Lah in action. Our Sonny has been driving us to distraction by his insistence on gumming down on anything he can get his hands on (as reported in 'Mad mouth alert'). No win there, if this was Fate dealing the cards. But we've also been feeling rather anxious over introducing non-milk foods into Sonny's diet. We'd heard of titanic struggles in which the baby energetically spewed the proffered vittles in sundry directions. So we were gearing up with bib and cloths for our first try-out. But as it turned out, Sonny's insistence on chomping everything and anything made the whole process preposterously easy. We spooned up some cereal and he would willingly take it in his mouth. A twist or two of the spoon, as he munched away, and it was mission accomplished. Good-Lah indeed.

Of course, the more cunning (or perhaps just pessimistic) reader will note a corollary of this policy: It's just as likely that, a few turns down life's road, Sonny's rapid acceptance of solid food might lead to some unwanted outcome: Suppose he develops an insatiable appetite and goes from plump to obese before our horrified eyes. To keep the policy viable, therefore, we'd have to keep extending the negative-to-positive scenario into infinity (eg Sonny gets so fat, he learns the joys of exercising, but then...). At some point, we seem to be reduced to just saying that you can never be sure what's going to come up next. It's all about adopting a suitable attitude and enjoying the ride.

Good-Lah. Or make that good enough.

Quietly weird hobbies

Some folks have innately spectacular or at least social hobbies: Climbing every hill above a certain height in Scotland, say (the so-called 'Munro-bagging' bug) or collecting coasters from bars and pubs.

Then there are really quiet pursuits that can confer relaxation and calm, but seem utterly bizarre - in a quiet, modest way - to everyone else. There was an uncle of ours, for instance, who rather enjoyed washing-up after meals, and did so to exacting standards. Pa, in a similar vein, likes to fold and put away the laundry. After the clothes emerge from the dryer and washing line, good and dry, he tosses it all into an untidy pile on an armchair. It is imperative that everything be crumpled and creased, since the joy to be derived is in turning the mess into well-ordered, sorted-out rows, everything folded just so and organised according to type of garment, owner and size.

Anyway, the earliest signs are emerging that Sonny may just be taking after Pa in this regard. Having blogged extensively on his habit of gathering his toys before playing with them (click here for the post), we ventured to suggest that this showed an innate tendency with humans to 'claim ownership'. But there could be a less high-falutin' explanation at work: That Sonny is simply naturally inclined to favour organisation, and was gathering the toys into a neat pile before commencing to eat them.

It would seem that a love for making order out of chaos is the driving force behind a vast number of disparate pursuits. It might animate the fervour of stamp collectors, coin collectors and others of that ilk. It would, of course, not explain why some seeking wild adventure, parasailing and that sort of thing. But then people are different after all.

Perhaps we could try and categorise and organise the different types...

A-smuggling we will go...

We keeping delaying the start date of our life of crime. Call it a lack of imagination.

There's a bit of secret background that you need to know about Pa: He has long hoped to rear chickens. Some people hunger for a Ferrari or a fine watch. Maybe your secret dream is to pilot your own yacht. Pa just wants to be able to have a little brood of chickens, enough to supply the family with breakfast eggs and the occasional roast bird. And he wants Sonny to grow up with a similar familiarity with these feathered friends.

There are two obstacles to this bucolic idyll, however. First, we live in a condo where the keeping of pets is tightly regulated and where loud clucking and cock-a-doodling would likely trigger mass unrest. Second, after a regional outbreak of bird flu, Singapore did away with pet hens, so that there is simply no supply from which to begin an illicit brood. We went as far as identifying a half-way home for drug addicts that had an impressive flock of Siamese midget chickens. These were especially quiet birds that might have gotten us round the problem of noise. But as we were swooping in for the final purchase, the government got there ahead of us.

We're now trying to decide how best to bring in chickens from across the Causeway. We know of friends who've been able to coolly stroll through Customs with squirrels concealed in belt pouches, but the problem is that squirrels are pretty much voiceless whereas even young chickens emit cheery peepings. Had we a car, we might be able to conceal two chicks in the boot (but then again, there might be an unacceptably high risk of injury or death). It hasn't helped that the scourge of global terrorism has seen the introduction of scanners and stricter checks. While our research is incomplete, it is likely that being caught smuggling fowl would land us in jail, or at least guarantee hefty fines.

Pa is increasingly resigned to the fact that, barring a relaxing of rules, his chicken dreams won't be hatching for a while. Pitifully, our home is littered with chicken-substitutes like a piggy-bank that looks like a (rather dim-witted) hen, a chicken radio, a chicken wind-up toy and so forth. Sonny sports rompers overrun by little chicks (though they could be ducklings). And as he grows up, the little fella can expect special excursions to wet markets in Malaysia so he will have close-up exposure to various types of chickens. All preparations, of course, for that blessed day when the fetters of fate are shattered and the chance for a coop finally opens up.

Cluck-mania? Pa has a dream...

Little logic to dress sense

A few days ago, we visited Pa's old secondary school in his hometown, so he took the opportunity to buy himself a T-shirt printed in the school colours. Today, he wore it out to town and felt like a million bucks. Which may seem strange to some.

Admittedly, now that we're back in Singapore, nobody within a few hundred miles would have heard of the school - the name of which, in any case, wasn't even emblazoned on the otherwise nondescript T-shirt. It was, basically, a boring white and green affair, adorned with an anonymous crest recognisable only to die-hard school loyalists. Pa's feeling chuffed might make sense, some folks may suggest, if the garment could function as a form of identification, signalling to others a sense of shared identity and pride. But since even this factor was absent, whence comes the satisfaction derived by Pa?

But is there really any mystery to this? By wearing that T-shirt, he probably opened up some psychic channel to every pleasurable schoolday memory still half-submerged in his subconscious. Beyond the basic needs of shielding ourselves from injury or weather-related harm, we wear what makes us "feel good". Some people choose clothes - or dress their own children - so as to announce that they have "arrived", socially or financially. Others put a premium on comfort. Sometimes, though, things are murkier. But that's why people are more interesting than computer programmes.

What, then, is our approach to dressing Sonny? The little fella, still shy of entering his sixth month, wishes only that whatever coverings are provided be pleasantly chewable. We're not adhering to any rigid blue-because-he's-a-boy stipulations, though it's true that he only has one pink shirt (with a cute cartoon Highland Cow). Basically, we prefer clothes that can be easily put on and removed when drenched with milk or saliva. And nothing long-sleeved, please - as much because that puts far too much fabric within gumming reach as on account of the tropical weather.

A boring litany? We'll wait till he gets old enough, and he can make up for it by being a true-blue fashion eccentric. Whatever makes him "feel good", eh?

A uniform from the get-go

You occasionally read about how some American parents are uncomfortable with the idea of sending their children to schools where uniforms are worn. It's seen as the first step to a sinister groupthink, where free expression is discouraged and the spark of individuality is snuffed out.

Boy would these parents explode if they visited Sonny's infant care centre. In our son's cohort (ooh, that sounds militaristic already), nobody is older than 18 months, and everyone sports the same green and white uniform. It's a romper - easily soiled, if truth be told - in a cotton fabric for easy washing. Parents bring their children in dressed in civvies but pack two sets of the uniform; centre staff bathe the babies before each kit change.

Now, why might babies need to wear uniforms? There are arguments, of course, for why schoolchildren should be dressed alike: It gives them a certain pride, cancels out differences in parental income since everyone looks the same and reinforces shared values (the uniforms typically sport the school crest, or motto, or the like). But none of these would seem to be very relevant to infants and toddlers, most of whom are still trying to learn the forbidden secret of crawling.

Rather than doing anything as conventional as asking the centre, we've figured out a couple of possible explanations. For one thing, the centre is linked to an adjacent nursery and kindergarten. These older children wear uniforms of the same colour combination, so there would simply be a pleasing consistency and continuity in tricking out even the 'pre-kindergartners' in essentially the same get-up. It's probably also a case of branding: Other parents might notice the striking uniform, replicated across the age spectrum, and make inquiries. In less time than it takes to darn a sock, they might become paying customers!

And what do we, Mum and Pa, think about the uniform requirement (since, as we've observed before, we chose the centre primarily because it is sited next to our condominium, and not because of its reputation, activity mix or the like?) Well, mainly, we're a little annoyed. Since all the children wear the same uniform, and everyone gets two baths and uniform changes a day, the clothes get mixed up. Our nice set of fresh rompers has already been confused with those of other children who've obviously been at the centre longer, so that we've ended up with crinkly, spotted clothes belonging to strangers.

Thank goodness the caregivers are going to be stencilling Sonny's name onto his romper soon (though maybe it's too late). Even though that sounds suspiciously close to wearing name tags - and so marks a further step down the road to militaristic Big Brotherism.

Lesson of the famous crabs

On our last night in Pa's hometown, we came to learn of a seafood joint of national repute, renowned for its barbecued crabs. We motored to the approximate location given by an Internet search, and found the eatery after a few false starts.

How delicious was the fare? The verdict was a generally positive one. But what really made an impression was how the existence of this 'famous eatery' had somehow eluded both Pa's mum, his brother and himself despite the compactness of the town and their long years in residence. It was Pa's sister-in-law, a complete foreigner to the place, who had heard of the restaurant from outsiders, who would drive in just to dine on the crabs.

It shows, if it shows anything at all, that you can't ever know something so well that some aspect or facet of it might yet come to light and surprise you. In fields of scholarship, even the greatest experts can be caught unawares by new knowledge. In life, too - to recycle a cliche - 'the best-laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley', which is to say that the most careful strategising and plotting can be up-ended by some unexpected twist of fate.

In childcare, too, we figure, the same sentiments are worth holding onto. Poring through parenting tomes or making exhaustive Net trawls may give us a false sense of confidence, a belief that we've anticipated all the possible emergencies and surprises that infants might throw up. But whether it's some weird malady, or quirk of infant conduct, or something too surprising even to characterise in advance, it's better that we adopt the assumption that the unexpected will happen. It makes the whole childcare business more interesting anyway.

Rather like running across some hidden-away restaurant serving challenging, but appetising, fare.

Psychic powers reveal friends

Sonny's best friends, as the two loyal readers of this blog will know, include a toy mouse and a cloth book (see 'Fantasy friends arriving'). But in a while, he'll be acquiring some flesh-and-blood pals, starting presumably at the infant care centre where he spends his weekdays. However, we're going to exert our psychic powers right now, and reveal that we already know who these friends are going to be. That's right, here - inevitably - are some of Sonny's future companions:

1) The Health Hazard: Whichever care centre Sonny might be at, there will still be one child who specialises in coming down with colds and the flu, then cheerily spreading them to everyone else. If everyone in the place is originally a hearty, strapping monster with an overdeveloped immune system, then a wicked Illness Incubus will fly over the place and zap some unfortunate, who will then become the Agent of Disease. For instance, the care givers at Sonny's current centre have already begun speaking of spreading sniffles. There's no escaping it, clearly.

2) The Bully: In any brood of little ones, one of them will somehow arrogate to himself the role of Mr Throw-his-weight-around (no, we're not offering another Mr Men book title, to join those mooted in 'New Mr Men characters, anyone?'). He - or she, in these enlightened times - will laugh too loudly, play the boss and possibly even shake everyone down for extra lunch money. Typically, he will have at least one sidekick, a snivelling fool who is feckless when the main man isn't about.

3) The Overachiever: Obviously, no collection of kids would be complete without one smart-aleck who'll have started reading ahead of everyone else, knows more and (usually) is better able to get to the right side of the care-giver/teacher. Chances are he'll not be the most physically impressive specimen, so the Bully will be able to exact some measure of revenge - even if constrained by his victim's ability to appeal to the care-giver/teacher.

4) The Nobody: Not everyone has a starring role, but that fact benefits the inevitable fellow who'll be so utterly colourless it proves remarkable. This kid won't be picked on because he's mastered the art of being invisible (whether he wants to or not), but he'll also be forgotten for games and other festive activities unless he literally jumps into the ring yelling. Which, of course,
would be completely out of character.

We'll stop here, though the list could be lengthened. If the pool of children is small - as is likely in Sonny's case - you might think that some of the characters might be go unplayed. Not a chance. Someone will just have to double up and play two roles, though it's hard to imagine someone being both The Nobody as well as The Bully, for instance. However, someone might be both a
bully and still be perpetually falling ill. And which role would Sonny play? We certainly don't want him to be pushing his weight around, and being the smart-aleck attracts too much opprobrium.

In the end, though, the social dynamics will evolve of their own accord. Really, being a quiet Mr Nobody doesn't seem the worst option...