It's Election Day!

Stop everything and get to your polling place!

 Hiya, Friends and Big People!  Zoe here, and it's a big day.  It's Election Day.  It's a big Election Day, because it's a year divisible by four, and we have to pick a new President.  And by "we," I mean "you," Big People, because I'm not old enough to vote yet.

Now, I don't know much about politics, and I'm not here to try to get you to vote one way or the other.  That's nobody's business but yours.  What I am here to say today is that if you're old enough to vote, and you're registered to vote, and you aren't hooked up to a life support system, you need to get yourself to your voting booth, Friends.  This is serious stuff.

My voting place is in this direction!

I've been reading a lot about the history of our nation, about the patriots who died for the right to vote for the people who'd represent them.  I've read that there was a time in this country when people weren't allowed to vote, because of the color of their skin, and they risked their lives to be able to vote.  I've read that women weren't able to vote, and they had to fight for the right.  So many people have had to fight to have their voices heard! 

It's crazy for me to think about all that, because for my whole life, most Big People are allowed to vote.  I just can't imagine not voting, if you're allowed to.  I cannot wait to be old enough to vote.  It's not that I feel like I don't have it pretty good the way things are, but voting gives you a voice in how things are run around here.  Goodness, I'd like to have a voice in what I get to have for lunch everyday.

Big People: Don't mess this up!  Go vote!

So if you're thinking about not voting today, even though you're allowed to vote, Big People, I urge you to change your mind.  Your vote DOES matter.  You DO have the power to change things.  It IS important to vote.  If they could come forward in time and talk to us today, all those people who had to fight for their right to vote, they'd tell you to get to your polling station and cast your vote.  They wouldn't think of sitting it out.

And one last thought, Big People, from me, Zoe, on behalf of all the little kids just like me.  Definitely vote  today, Friends.  Don't mess this up.  This is our world you're keeping warm for us.  Someday, my people are going to be in charge, so we're hoping that you leave the world a little better for us than you found it. 

No matter HOW you vote, Friends, remember, Zoe loves you!  Muah!

An After-Halloween Surprise!

This is my face when Gramma brings me animal crackers!

Hiya, Friends!  Zoe here!  Well, just when I thought it couldn't get any better, what with trick-or-treating on Halloween on Wednesday night, and then getting to eat my Halloween cupcake for dessert on Thursday night, guess what happened yesterday! Guess!

My Gramma stopped by and brought me a Halloween card, and an orange teddy bear with a witch hat, and that's not even the best part.  She also brought me some animal crackers.  Oh, wow.

You know what.  I love animal crackers.  The best ones, of course, are the ones shaped like little giraffes.  At first, I felt awkward about eating the little giraffe-shaped animal crackers, but I asked my Little Giraffe friends about it, and they said I shouldn't feel at all awkward for eating the giraffe-shaped ones, because they're just cookies!  So there we have it!  It's okay to eat the giraffe-shaped animal crackers!

You'd think that I'd go all monster on a bag of animal crackers, but I don't.  I can make a bag of animal crackers last for days, especially when the bag has a zippy top.  Boy, I like those zippy tops.  I can have Mommy give me two or three animal crackers at a time, and the bag gets all closed up with the zippy top, and the next animal crackers I eat, they're as crispy as the first ones I ate out of the bag.  How about that?!

We sure live in some pretty spectacular times, Big People, do you know that?  Bags with zippy tops, little cookies in the shapes of animals, little devices that bring us the voices of people that are far away... spectacular times!

Well, Friends!  All this talk about animal crackers is making me a little hungry, so I'm going to go see if I can get Mommy to open that zippy-topped bag and give me some of my animal crackers.  I hope you have a good day and get to enjoy something that you really like today!  Remember that Zoe loves you!  Muah!

My Favorite Word!

"Shan-duh-LEEEEEEEEEER!"

Hiya, Friends!  Do you have a favorite word?  I do!  It's a word that makes me smile every time I hear it.  It makes me laugh.  Do you want to know what it is?  It's "Chandelier!"  That's my favorite word!

You have to say it just right.  Just saying "chandelier" all normal and boring doesn't make me giggle at all.  But if you say it like this, "shan-duh-LEEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRR!" It gets me every time!  It's a fun-sounding word!  Try it, Friends!  Shout out "shan-duh-LEEEEEEEEEEEEER!" and just see if you can do it without giggling!

It's one of those words that if you don't know what it means, you might have something pictured in your head that's completely different from what the word really is.  For instance, before I knew what a chandelier was, I had it pictured in my head as a dance, where the fellow wears a shirt with colorful-tiered sleeves, and the lady wears a fancy dress with puffy short sleeves and a long colorful tiered skirt, and they jump and maybe play castanets.  Maybe do some swordplay.  Although I could never figure out how they'd do with the swords, with all those colorful tiers on their sleeves or on their skirt.  Swords and all that material don't seem to mix, at least not in my head.

That's all neither here nor there, though Big People.  I found out that I think what I was thinking of were "flamenco dancers," whenever I heard the word "chandelier."  I still don't know where the swords came from... Oh, yes, I do!  I was also thinking of the Three Musketeers!  They had swords, didn't they?  So in my head, chandeliers were flamenco-dancing musketeers that could either be men or women.  One thing I've never understood in my whole life is why do the fairy tale princesses always wait for some prince with a sword to come rescue them?  Why don't those princesses just pick up a sword of their own, or a stick, or a cattle prod, and rescue themselves? 

I love to look at chandeliers!  They're pretty!

That's the kind of princess I want to be!  The kind of princess who just rescues herself, darn it!  Don't expect to see me standing around, wringing my hands, and wondering if my prince is going to come save me!

Did I just drive us down a side street?  I think I did.  I get all wound up, and forget what topic I'm supposed to be staying on. 

Sword-fighting dancers and self-rescuing princesses aside, I was relieved to find out that chandeliers are really lights that hang from a ceiling.  And in the downstairs of my house, we have three of them that I love to look at!  One of them is right over the couch in the living room.  It's made of brass, but not shiny brass.  Old-looking brass.  And it has twelve lights on it, with lightbulbs that look like candle-flames. How about that?!  And the one over the dining room table that I look at while I sit in my high chair and eat is a lot like the one in the living room.  They both have pretty crystals on them, that I imagine wearing like earrings, but they look so nice on the chandeliers that I probably will let those crystals stay on the chandeliers, and then I'll find other sparklies to wear as earrings, when I'm old enough to wear earrings.  Then the other chandelier is in the front hallway, and I can see it from my high chair, and also from my office.  It's made out of crystals, but is in the shape of an egg, so we call it the "egg lamp," even though I think it's my favorite chandelier in the house.  My favorite is when my office is dark, and the egg lamp is lit up.  It's almost as good as a disco ball, but not quite. 

So there you have it, Friends!  My favorite word in the whole English language, so far.  Chandelier. 

Halloween Retrospective!

Hiya, Friends!  Zoe here.  It's still Halloween night as I write this, and I've just returned from my mission of plunder.  Daddy took me trick-or-treating!  I came home with a cupcake!  Wow!  AND Mommy had only five trick-or-treaters at our house, and she has a buncha mini Smiley Cookies left, so I'm thinking this was a victory for your pal Zoe!

Anyway, I bet you're wondering if I have pictures.  Do I have pictures?  Yes, of course, I have pictures!  Now, I hope you don't mind, but I'm going to share with you my pictures that I submitted for my Special Halloween Report on Facebook.  It's sort of double-dipping, but I don't do this very often.  Plus, they were really fun pictures, and I want my friends who aren't on Facebook to see my special report.  Here goes:

Rozzie and I quibbling over semantics.

 Rozzie and I saw a movie the other day, with the grumpy old men that forgot about Halloween and gave out laundry detergent and staplers instead of candy. I asked Rozzie if she thought that if anybody gives me detergent and a stapler for Halloween, if I give Mommy the detergent, did she think Mommy would let me keep the stapler? I really want a stapler. Rozzie said the chances of someone giving me detergent and staplers are slim, and that there's a fat chance Mommy'd let me keep any of it? There we go again with fat chances and slim chances, and none of it makes sense to me!

I've wondered my whole life why when Big People think something is unlikely, they say "fat chance" or "the chances are slim."  Those things mean the same thing, but fat and slim don't mean the same thing!  It's confounding!  If anybody has any insight into this, I'd like to hear it, for sure!  

Anyway, moving on.
  

So this pig rides into a bar on a pony....

I thought I'd ride Patches around to go Trick-or-Treating, but as it turns out, Patches said it's too cold and rainy out there for me to ride him tonight. Plus, he's pretty sure there must be an un-funny joke about a pig riding a pony into a bar. I don't know, Big People. Is all this Halloween hype empty? I mean, if it were as great as I've built it up in my head to be, Patches here ought to be chomping at the bit to go trick-or-treating with me, rainy cold drizzle or no!  If trick-or-treating were as great as I think it's cracked up to be, Patches would have put his winter saddle on, and his snowshoes, and just cowboyed up for the opportunity to go trick-or-treating.  

With as much as I've looked forward to this my whole life, all I can think now is what a disappointment it'll be if it's just not all that much fun.

 

Oh, dear.  Does my tail make my butt look big?

What's this on the floor? It looks fascinating! It's a fly-swatter! Seems insanely useful to have, a fly-swatter! Maybe I'll get a coupla fly-swatters in my trick-or-treat bag! Hold on. Do I even have a trick-or-treat bag?!

There's some gold in this house, and by gold, I mean there's Sharpies!

Who cares about the trick-or-treat bag? I've found me a Sharpie! This is the ultimate find for Halloween! Friends, this is one of the cool Sharpies that clicks like a regular pen, BUT IT'S A SHARPIE! Wheeeeeeee!

I think Mommy just didn't bother with a costume, and she's blowing fairy dust up my butt with this Donna Quixote thing!

This is me and Mommy. She says her costume's a suit of armor, and a big sword and a lance, and that she's Donna Quixote and I'm Sancho Piglet and we're going to go tilt at windmills! I have no idea what she's talking about, but she says when I read the book, I'll think this is hilarious someday!

My parents are the laziest Halloweenies in the history of forever!

 So I guess it's pretty cold outside. Daddy's taking me trick-or-treating. Isn't he supposed to dress up, too? What's he being for Halloween? He can't steal Mommy's Donna Quixote idea, so maybe he's going as a college kid? I don't know. All's I care about is my laundry detergent and stapler! Let's roll, Daddy!

Where's my Sharpie?  All my cool treasures disappear!

 
Wait, wait! I'm not ready yet. I forgot my Sharpie. What's that, Rozzie? ... Well, I need to take my Sharpie along, trick-or-treating, in case anybody wants me to draw a smiley-face on the back of their hand, of course! ... Why would I draw smiley-faces on people's hands? To remind them that Mommy has Smiley Cookies she's giving out! Do I have to think of EVERYTHING AROUND HERE? Hey, where'd my Sharpie go?

 Well, Friends, I'm off for my first Trick-or-Treat experience with Daddy. He claims I'm just going to spread Halloween cheer, but I'm really hoping for laundry detergent and a stapler. I'm going to offer my laundry detergent to Mommy in hopes that she'll let me keep the stapler. I've wanted a stapler for a while now, and haven't been successful in my requests. Also, if you see my Sharpie tonight, please let me know where it is, but don't tell Mommy I have it, mmmmmmmkay, friends? Even though she's dressed up as a knight with invisible armor, she's still my buzz-killy Mommy. ... Oh, and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

I'm beginning to think Mommy doesn't want me to have cool things like Sharpies and staplers. 

 The pictures were taken before I left.  But now that I'm home, I can report that Patches the Pony missed out.  Trick-or-treating is great!  I mentioned my cupcake.  I love cake!  And Daddy got some candy.  I mostly did just spread Halloween cheer.  That's kind of my thing that I do.  Not always the Halloween part.  I like to make people happy.  But I didn't get any detergent, and I didn't get any stapler.  And my Sharpie still hasn't turned up.  

Friends, do you know if there's anything I could purchase and stick to my treasures I find, so if I clap my hands, my treasures could whistle or something to let me know where they are?  If you know of anything, I'd really appreciate your sharing your knowledge with me.  I find all these cool treasures, and then Rozzie rats me out to Mommy, or I get really excited about my treasures I find, and I show Mommy, and next thing I know, I can't find my treasures anymore.  That Mommy!

But I was really happy with the results of my plunder tonight.  I mean trick-or-treating.  It was definitely worth the wait, and it was worth letting Mommy make me take a nap this afternoon.  Don't tell her, but if it weren't for that nap, I wouldn't have made it!  I know I wouldn't have!

Mmmmmmkay, Friends!  I'll see ya tomorrow!  I hope you enjoyed my Halloween Special Report!  Remember, whether or not you give me detergent and a stapler or a disco ball, Zoe loves you!  Muah!

Today's the Day: Happy HALLOWEEEEEEEEEEN!

Stay tuned for me in this costume this year!

 Hiya, Friends!  Well, today's the day!  It's Halloweeeeeeeeeen!  I'm so excited!  It's been such a week already, and today's finally the day, and I'll tell ya what, I'm not sleeping through it this time!  I'm not sleeping at all, by golly!

Anyway, I haven't put on my costume yet.  I'm going to put it on later today, and Mommy will take pictures, and I'll put them up on this blog tomorrow!  How about that?

You know what I like about Halloween, Friends?  I mean, what I like about it already?  It's a day when you can really be anything you want to be.  If you want to be a princess, you can be a princess.  If you want to be a piglet, you can be a piglet.  Why, if you want to be a vampire or a zombie or a ghost or a computer programmer or a butcher, you can be all those things, too for the day! 

I like clothes that double as anatomy charts!

Halloween is a day of endless possibility!

When else can you just open up your imagination and make it so?  When, Friends?  You can be ANYTHING you want to be on Halloween!  You don't even have to be in your own species!  Look at me, for instance.  I'm going as a piglet today!  That doesn't mean I want to be a piglet for real!  But it's fun to try it out for just the day!

But what if next year, I dress up like a doctor, and I like being a doctor, and I like it so much that I decide I'm going to work really hard in school and college and go to doctor-school, so I can be a doctor every day?  Why, that'd be something, wouldn't it?

I don't have to decide what I want to be everyday when I grow up, not for a long time.  So I have lots of Halloweens to try lots of things on.  I have lots of days in lots of years to open up my imagination and explore the possibilities, and you bet that I'm going to!

Pumpkin for a day, on my first Halloween!

Halloween just seems like a door.  A door for my imagination, and all I have to do is walk up to it, bold as brass, and knock, or maybe push the doorbell, then when the door opens up, I'll say 'Hiiiiiiiiiiiiya!' and walk right through, and just sit down with Possibility, and flip through the pages and pages of what Possibility has to offer! 

I think it can work for any of us like that, Friends!  It doesn't have to just be little people like me who gets to have endless possibilities!  I hope that today, you knock on Halloween's Door to your Imagination, and flip through all the Possibilities it has for you! 

And, too, I here there's lots of candy to be had on Halloween.  Here's to endless possibilities, and a bottomless bag of candy!  And always remember: Zoe loves you, Friends!  Muah!

Hallowheeeeeeeeeee!

Life as a ladybug is fabulous!

Hiya, Friends!  Well, you haven't all blown away in the storm, have you?  It's quite windy out there! 

As you can see, I'm in another of my bubble costumes.  This time, it's my ladybug costume.  I like it.  Aunt Colleen calls me her "little ladybug," so I think of her every time I see a ladybug!  When I dress up like a ladybug, then I REALLY think about my Aunt Colleen!

Daddy's a fan of ladybugs!  How nice!

I wore my ladybug costume when we took Rozzie to get her bath at the vet's a couple weeks ago and then I wore it in to the Texas Hot in Downtown Wellsville.  I think it made the day more fun for everybody.  It definitely made the day more fun for me, and my days are always lots of fun to begin with! 

It made me wonder what ladybugs eat.  I suppose ladybugs in real life eat leaves and stuff.  Meh.  That's kind of expected.  What I wonder about is what ladybugs would eat if they could eat anything they wanted!  My guess is red Jell-O with lotsa whipped cream up on top, because that's what I ate when I was dressed up like a ladybug.  I bet ladybugs also would like cake.  I just get that feeling.  And because they're ladybugs, they don't have to worry about eating too much sugar like people do. 

Boy, wouldn't it be great to be a ladybug and not have to worry about that?  I bet it would.

Well, Friends, if I still have my electricity and Internet from Outer Space tomorrow, I'll see you!  In the meantime, remember that Zoe loves you!  Muah!

Happy Halloweek!

This is my Zebra Vest!  Halloween, I'm ready!

Heya, Hiya, HIIIIIIIIIIII-YA! Friends!  Zoe here.  I'm back.  I. Am. Back.  Just in time for this Frankenstorm thing.  So we'll just take it one day at a time, whether I'm here throughout the storm.  I'll be here.  Yeah, I'll be here.  I just might not be able to get online.  Our Internet comes from outer space, and when there are too many clouds up in the atmosphere, sometimes our Internet can't get through them to us.  And there's also the matter of electricity.  Frankenstorm might be knocking out our electricity.  I hope not, but if it does, you'll be having another few days of a break from me.  But let's just not think about that happening.  Everything's going to be fine.  And I'm not going to talk about Frankenstorm anymore.  You know why?

IT'S HALLOWEEK!  HAPPY HALLOWEEK, FRIENDS!  I've been waiting all year for this!  The week that has Halloween in it!  No matter what the weather, I'm going to be celebrating Halloween all the ding-dang ol' week, because Halloween is SO MUCH FUN!  I'm not sure how I'll celebrate.  Maybe I'll wear all my Halloween gear.  Maybe I'll have Mommy read me my Berenstain Bears Halloween book all week.  I bet she'll like that!

I don't know what I'll do all week for Halloween, but I'm sure in the Halloween spirit.  I even have three costumes!  That's right!  Three!  My zebra costume that's in my picture up above, my ladybug costume that I wore a couple weeks ago, and my piggy costume I wore last year that I'm going to wear again when I go to Gramma's house trick-or-treating on actual Halloween, weather permitting.  I'm not really a diva or anything.  I mean, I sort of am, but I'm not.  I have three costumes because I still fit my piggy costume from last year, and the zebra and ladybug bubble costumes were a 2-fer, and Mommy says I can wear them for outside-vests until it gets too cold!

There are some Big People who'll think it's ridiculous that I'm riding around in a shopping cart, wearing a zebra or a ladybug bubble-vest, but you know what?  I'm little.  I'm going to dress outrageously for as long as I can, and I think that any adults that might say I'm ridiculous for wearing my outrageous clothes are just jealous that they can't wear zebra bubbles out and about like I can.  And what I say to THAT is, "Why not?!  If you like to wear zebra things, run your freak-flag right up the flagpole and let the freak-flag fly!  Wear your zebra outfits!  Wear your tiger stripes!  Wear your glittery-ball antennae!  Whenevertheheckyawant!  Do it!"

That's what I have to say about THAT, Friends!  Celebrate Halloweek with me by wearing something outrageous, even just once this week!  It'll be fun!

Mmmmmmkay, Friends!  I've gotta go for now.  My East Coast Friends, let's all stay safe in the storm!  My Friends from Everywhere Else, live it up for Halloweek!  And remember that Zoe loves you!  Muah!