A Day With Smart Chick

My niece, Kjersti, is going Can zoloft Levaquin 250 mg cause weight gain to be Chloromycetin 500mg - 30 pills five in October.  In over four years on earth, I have never spent a day alone with her.  Ever.  It’s always been with family, or just her brother Bjorn.  Never only Kjersti…until Friday.

Kjersti is a smart chick.  She knows what she likes.  She likes pink.  She loves books.  She is Ally payment inseparable from Orlistat 120 mg her creature comforts, including a Sarafem 10mg - 90 pills plush yellow chick with glasses called Smart Chick.  A gift from her uncle (my counterpart), it followed up a previous present he gave her of a pink cap with “Smart Chick” across the front.  We wholeheartedly support her embracing her braininess…as long as she uses it for good, and not evil.

She’s stepped a toe across that line more than a few times, always with a hasty apology:  “I sorry. I never do that again.”

Until the next time she does it.  Five minutes later.

Kjersti is quite particular.  She isn’t difficult to read; she’ll say to my face exactly what she is thinking.  Her facial expressions show her emotions accurately.  She is not passive-aggressive.  Much.  When she is passive-aggressive, she does it grandly.  My favorite of her is, “You know, Auntie, people who love people who are allergic to dogs don’t have dogs.”

That’s some compound manipulation there.

I can’t help it that we found out she’s allergic to Grendel after I got Grendel.  For the record, she’s allergic to her own dog, Danny, but I doubt her parents have gotten the same guilt trip that I have…which could also be due to my vigilance in ensuring that Kjersti is fair to Grendel.  That Grendel isn’t bawled out for merely existing.  To say that Kjersti and I butt heads at times would be an understatement.

Sometimes, I just choose not to make eye contact.  It’s safer that way.  DO NOT ENGAGE.

But, I have come around to realize that I simply don’t know her very well.  My own niece.  50 percent of the youngest generation of the bloodline.

The louder 50 percent.  The bolder 50 percent.  The female 50 percent.

When I say it out loud, I am sad.  She and I have a bit more in common than she does with her own parents.  We’re both the second-born children; both girls.  There’s a bit more that goes into the role of the second-born than the first.  We have to be a bit louder.  A bit bolder.

Especially, if we’re female.

So, I went to her house on Friday a little apprehensive…but a lot happy.  I wasn’t going to force anything–no “We’re going to get to know each other and we’re going to like it.”  Lord knows that wouldn’t work with either of us.  So, I went with one goal.  I needed to make my way to Rosedale to get a few “slippery” nightgowns for my Gramma Ruby, her great-grandmother.  If we didn’t make it, I’d go later.  No big deal.

It was raining.  Ugh.  Rain.  Bringing Grendel over was part of the deal as he could play in the backyard with their dog, Danny.  Usually this is a great idea, but it’s usually not raining.  So, I had to be a bit more vigilant than usual about keeping the dog and the niece separate.  Something Grendel wasn’t good at doing since she’s so close to his height and coated with foodstuffs to lick off.

Fleeing the house turned out to be a great idea.  We puttered around for a couple of hours.  I made sure not to push any points that didn’t require pushing.  Sure, you can wear your hair “flat.”  Yes, you can wear your pajama pants.  No problem, you can eat a fudgcicle before we leave.  By the time we loaded ourselves into my Jeep, we were damp but we had a mission.  Rosedale for nightgowns, then lunch, then dessert at Cupcake, then the library, then home.

I love mapping out plans.  Things that make sense are fun for me.  It was a good loop and could all be achieved before naptime, rain or shine.  There was an incentive built in, there was tastiness to be had, and there was meeting my goal of getting Gramma’s gift and meeting Kjersti’s goal of reading the entire children’s section of the library, seven books at a time.  We were good to go.

Rosedale wasn’t packed, but it was wet.  We raced inside and went (almost) straight to JCPenney…with a side trip to the gaming store (?) and a minute or two spent caressing the coin-operated gumball machine bank.  Kjersti was a good helper for finding the nightgowns.  As a four-year old, she understood the criteria of slippery (so that great-grandma doesn’t get stuck in her bedding) and a gown over pajamas (no pants!), so together we searched. Kjersti’s also good at bending rules…the green nightshirt should’ve worked fine because it was “slippery to her.” Making my purchase, I released the reigns and would let the day go where it would.  As it turns out, it went on the escalators three times and then to Claire’s.

What little Simvastatin warnings girl wouldn’ t want Ceftin 250mg - 60 pills to go Ceftin 250mg - 90 pills to Claire’s?  It’s a girl trap.  Kjersti was bewitched, bothered, and bewildered…and wanted to be bejeweled.  Part of me wants to indulge her every whim.  But, the louder part of me knows that the stuff in there is crap.  So, I steered her for the clearance racks.  She doesn’t need to know right yet that her Auntie’s generosity has a price cap of $3.

With a new butterfly necklace and bracelet in her own shopping bag that she got to carry herself, we went for lunch at Green Mill.  I enjoyed so much just getting to observe her.  When I prompted her to tell the host that we’d like to be seated, she said, “We’d like a table for two persons, please.”  Then, when we were seated, she said that she’d “like to start with a milk.”

Without her brother horning into conversation–or as the Hardy to her Laurel–Kjersti was a font of amusement.  She’s quite articulate, even with a bit of a speech impediment.  (Knowing how much she likes to be correct, I’m sure she’ll grow out of that soon enough.)  What cracked me up the most was what wasn’t said aloud, but her conduct.  I was sharing my fries with her and she was sharing her bread and macaroni and cheese with me, the problem was that there was only one spoon for a utensil at our table.  I took a bite, just expecting she’d roll with it.  Kids are germy.  Who cares?  Instead of taking a bite with the spoon right away, she wiped it off with her napkin and then took one.  Then wiped it off and handed it to me.  I took a bite and handed it back to her.  She wiped it off and used it.  You get the drift.  It was the cutest little rhythm we had of eating our lunch together.

As I was paying the bill, she was monkeying around on her chair.  I cautioned her that she’ll go “head over teacup” if she kept it up…and she did, so she did.  She was on the floor.  There was a hush in the dining area.  I immediately wanted to tell her that she shouldn’t have been doing it in the first place–what did she expect?  That’s what I would usually do–she knows better, why baby her?

Except now I saw Kjersti as the Smart Chick on the floor with a look of mortification on her fair face.  Her proud features crumpled and I picked her up off the floor and stroked her hair as she buried her face in my neck out of humiliation.  Even smart chicks need to be picked up and dusted off from time to time, whether or not it’s their own darned fault for being on the floor to begin with.

She perked up when I mentioned going for cupcakes and then the library.  It’s hard to be mortified when you’re grinning ear to ear.  So, we went.  Auntie and Kjersti jumped through puddles for a whole block until we got into Cupcake on University Avenue.  She ordered Lansoprazole odt the hot Toprol XL Motrin 600 mg 25 mg pink Paris Hilton cupcake and I ordered the Salted Nut Cluster.  As we made our way to a table with our cupcakes atop napkins atop plates, I cautioned her to use both hands and watch where she was going so that her cupcake didn’t go “head over teacup.”

When it did take a header, I sighed.  Rather than say anything about how she should’ve been more careful with it, I told her that it’ll be okay if we just brush it off.  Expecting her to balk at the germs, I was surprised (for more than one reason) when she replied, “Auntie, your cupcake is on the floor.”

And so it was.

Together, we were a train wreck.  We picked up our cupcakes, dusted them off, ate them…and lived happily ever after.  Two smart chicks with bad coordination out and about on a rainy day in St. Paul.

Barely a dent. An almost Buy Celebrex Online perfectly pristine Buy Cozaar Online Paris Hilton cupcake.

Kjersti's long, elegant fingers Buy Lotrisone Online made quick Lipothin 60caps - 2 bottle work of Risperdal 3mg - 30 pills the wrapping. It was soon devoured...not as delicately.

My salty, caramel nut cupcake was not so lucky.  It gooed itself to the floor and came up with a slight bit of difficulty.  Ah, well.  It tasted great.

My salty, caramel nut Zovirax 800 mg cupcake was Tetracycline 500 mg not so lucky. It gooed Coumadin 2mg - 90 pills itself to the floor and came up with a slight bit of difficulty. Ah, well. It tasted great.