Thursday, July 7th, 1977-the Gambler's Special

Well, today was the "gambler's special", the 7th day of the 7th month of the 77th year.  I t was also my Mom and Dad's 42nd Anniversary.  Today was very quiet day for Pete and me-we slept late, having for once nowhere to go, and napped early.  We had a hamburger and green beans for lunch.  Pete put the hamburger in the pan, the green beans in the pot, and tuned on the stove.  He helped with the cooking but refused to make his bed all day today.  Sometimes we was an elder statesman and sometimes a one year old (funny, my wife often makes the same kind of commentary today-PL).  He told me today when he was a parent he was going to name his son Scott because Bryan (presumably Babcock, my cousin?-PL) had a friend named Scott who went with them to the movies.  He (Pete) was on a story binge today.  I told him Elephant's Birthday Party, Pinocchio, and Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy (the movie plot) 3 times each.  He played his organ and told me he was "making music about Jesus".  I had to tell him the story of Jesus' life and death and resurrection while he played.  He is very much concerned with things of the spirit.  He had an adventure tonight.  Vicky Plaza wanted to come over and play while we were cooking dinner, but they decided he would go to her house after dinner instead.  I walked him over to Vicky's house and left him to play-then Vicky walked him home when it was time for him to come back.  They telephoned me while he was there so I had the novel experience of talking to him on the phone.  They left the phone off the hook at Vicky's house, so our phone was out of commission for some time.  I could hear them watching the "Brady Bunch".  When Pete got home he suddenly remembered he wanted to watch "Electric Company" and had missed it so he cried.  I talked him into watching the end of "The Waltons" with me and then we switched off again  (I used to watch "Hawaii Five-O" in London, but its much too violent for Pete).  "The Waltons" had John Boy in a fight and I had a hard time explaining that to Pete (a boy was annoying Mary Ellen and John-Boy told him to stop and then they had to fight...).  We played football and hide & seek, round and round the two big trees on the front lawn.  Then we listened to "Fox in Socks" and read The Little Red Caboose, Ten Little Monkeys, Elephant's Birthday Party.  Pete ate nearly a whole can of green beans I heated up.  He decided to bathe in the morning-Nicole is coming over at 10:00am while Marily cans cherries.  We read comic book excerpts and Sagggy Baggy Elephant.  I read The Soft Rain today.