that's not the Bush style. He doesn't rush headlong into gunfights at the OK Corral, he corrals folks until they say they're OK about the gunfight.---Weekly Telegraph. (Sorry, I'm still trying not to gloat...)

The first thing this morning I watched was Charles Osgood on Sesame Street. The first show was 33 years ago today (we were in England and missed it.) I notice Big Bird used to have a pointy head. There was Gordon, may he rest in peace. Osgood also did a story on Congressional Medal of Honor awardees in Shreveport. It's such a thrill to see how integrated Shreveport is now. (THAT was *35* years ago, and the city was still pretty much Unreconstructed South.)

Genevieve's birthday party was at 10:30 at Gymboree, which was just too early and far away for us, so we planned to meet everyone at Mamama and Grandpa's for lunch. It was clear as we started, but we ran into the storm of the year on the way down there. We spied 3 accidents. At Pleasanton traffic and the weather were so bad we were nearly stopped a couple of times. We arrived at the grandparents' house almost an hour late.

I really tried to get pictures of both cousins, but if one looked at me, the other looked away, so I'm settling for this picture which shows Genevieve and the sweater I knitted for her. (I was working on this last year for Christmas, and really chugging along, and then Gerhard died. Then I looked at her last November and decided it didn't actually matter since it was more a 2-yr-old size. I finished this, bunny buttons and all -- they're such a pain to do up that Monica says this sweater is a pullover and that's that--- in the spring, and then I was working on the pants... but there's no way at all that the pants would ever fit.) Genevieve liked the sweater, and the bunnies.

Our other present to her was a basket we got at Loretto with three Winnie-the-Pooh books and a baby doll. Her reaction to the baby? "Don't LIKE the baby!" and push it back into the basket. Monica's face was a picture. This doesn't bode well for the new arrival. However, once Alex played with the baby, and once everyone rather ignored the whole thing so that contrariness didn't pay off, she decided she liked the baby.

Monica and Mark gave her a bigger-than-she-is Jimbo clown doll from Gymboree. Mark's sister gave her a stroller which Jimbo doesn't fit into at all, so of course Jimbo must go in it, and the as-yet-unnamed baby doll (I had a real pretty baby doll when I was G's age, and I named her "Walter") goes into the back. She also scored a keyboard from her aunt Roni and family, and a LeapPad first computer from the other grandparents.

Roni and Monica gave each other purple sweaters, that look very much alike. Growing up, it was "don't give us alike things, we're so very different" but my Irish twins are discovering that's not exactly true. They each gave me the same (really appropriate) birthday card, too.

Mark's mother had made a lovely lunch which we all enjoyed. Alex is staggering around really efficiently these days, and liked the baby doll. G. also had a carload of gifts they hadn't had a chance to open yet. Monica says early winter birthdays are great since they have to come indoors and they get bored, so new toys are wonderful.

Genevieve sort of knew who everyone is, but she was especially thrilled to have two grandpas. She says "dada" for "djadja" but mostly Rich is "other grandpa." She figured this out by herself... Monica was asking her who everyone is and it was "grandpa" and "other grandpa" (I'm impressed with how well she puts language together.) and then "hi other grandpa" to Rich, and "hi other grandpa" to Paul. She's beginning to joke. We all rewarded her by laughing, too.

We left about 3. Fortunately, it wasn't so rainy going back. We stopped in Benicia to see my cousin and child, who is really 2 today, but they apparently forgot I'd said we were coming by. I left a puzzle for Jimmy.

The Practice appears to have stopped picking on Republicans for the moment and to take on Catholics. I think they stepped over the line: people may or may not vote with their feet, and to be sure, Boston is a particular problem, but it's not the job of the Hollyweird bunch to suggest how lay Catholics should behave.

ObGoe: (It's been 17 months, and it's another Sunday) a letter to the editor from someone he knew in Davis.