You'd think that people would of had enough of silly love songs.

Thank a lot, Jessica. I couldn't figure out what song was in my head all day!

So... I haven't been this excited about school-- specifically college- in a loooooong time. I am inclined to believe this is a good thing. I'm especially excited at writing again. I can't believe how much I've missed it! I really have, though, and I'm ready to start again. I'm sure I'll be rusty at first, but it should come back fairly quickly, right?

At the day care last night Chris, Chris who you've heard of many a time, was pretending to race his car, and it was really sweet. He's nine now, but still rarely acts like it, and this moment of childlike playtime was nice to see... until he pretended to jerk his car to a stop and roll down the window. "Mann, why'd you pull me over?!" Then he went to "jail" and had one of the play phones and had several conversations along the lines of "Man, you better get me out of here or I'm gonna kill all you and your families!"

Sad, huh? I had asked him the night before what he wanted to be when he grew up, and he said a rapper. And I asked what else he might wanna be, should that fail. And he said a robber. If not that, he wants to fight pit bulls.

I'm going to bring him pictures of robbers and pitbulls all torn up and sad Monday, and some pictures of nice pits and firefighters and policemen, and hopefully spin things off in a good way. Once I got him talking about those last two options, he actually was more interested. Those are normal nine year old dream jobs, aren't they? Maybe some astronat pics?

So now a question, and I'm going to aim it specifically at my black friends, though I'm sorry to segregate and I value opinions from everyone: any idea how I can get this kid uninterested in this kind of behaviour? I'm not suggesting he's acting up because he's black or any such nonsense, but I am saying that he has been taught that to be a cool, to be black, he has to be a thug and he has to cuss and hit women (yes, we have conversations to that effect... he's so young to have seen that stuff...), and when he's in trouble, he thinks it's because he's black and we are white (even though half the day care instructers are black... when he's in trouble with them, he just thinks it's because they're mean, but when it's with us, it's because we're out to get him). I think I'm doing all that I can, considering what needs to be done is he should be taken out of his home, but I figured I'd ask for suggestions anyway. Surely he's not already lost in society at nine years old?

On a happier note, one of my professors mentioned Flipper yesterday, and that made me super happy. I remember that show. :)