In an earlier post, I mentioned my friend Shanon and her daughter, Elena. Elena is 2 and really smart, funny, and personable. Her favorite movie is Shrek and she runs around quoting lines from it. She calls her mother "a noble steed" and as we were going into a restaurant a few weeks ago, she started saying "Thank you, thank you, I'm here all week. Try the veal!" It's funny in the movie but funnier coming from a 2 year old.

Shanon & I are Chinese food connoisseurs. We went to a place called Xiang's Kitchen which, in my opinion, is the best Chinese place in town. So anyway, we had eggdrop soup. Elena wasn't paying attention to the bowl and hit the edge with her elbow, spilling soup everywhere. Shanon reminded her to be careful, that she had spilled her soup. At the top of her voice, Elena says: "I'M SORRY SOUP! I'M SORRY! I DIDN'T MEAN TO SPILL YOU! I'M REALLY SORRY, SOUP!" The people at the booth behind us actually got up to see what was happening.

We went to the park & rec's playground today. Elena wanted to slide. After a few trips down, she started pulling at her shorts, saying they were stuck. "Do you have a wedgie," Shanon asked. Her daughter nodded before going down the slide one more time. She immediately started working to free her wedgie when she stood up. Shanon fixed the problem and Elena was happy.

When we were done at the playground, we walked to Shanon's mother's house. Before we all left for lunch, Elena went to the bathroom. She came out and announced: "I have a wedgie. Wanna see?" She proceeded to pull her pants off and show off her butt where the wedgie should be. "See? See my wedgie?" Controlling the laughter that obviously wanted to break free, Shanon explained to Elena that the wedgie was gone. It had left.

As we were walking out the door, Elena looked underneath a bookcase and said, "There it is! There's my wedgie!" It had now become a tangible thing...Super Wedgie! She had to say "see ya" to it as we left.

We went to a Chinese restaurant, of course, in Fountain. The host who sat us seemed enchanted by Elena...who wouldn't be?...and at the end of the meal, brought her a bracelet, a ring and a little football player eraser from the toy vending machine. She put the jewelry on, the ring going on her middle finger since it was her biggest finger. As we walked out, Shanon told her to show her ring to the nice guy that gave it to her. She did exactly what she was told: she extended her middle finger only and displayed the ring.

There's so much I could tell that's funny about Elena, but since I can't think of much to write lately, I better save that for a later entry.

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