Anders Amazes

Anders continues to amaze.  Beyond learning to count to 100 forwards and backwards.  He is now trying to conquer Spanish.  He can count to 30 and he recognizes all the numbers up to ciento or 100.  He can count all the numbers up to 100, but not all at once.  Thus, by the high Anders' standards he can count to 30, but not 100...yet.  He also does funny word play like rather than fall down, he'll say "fall up."  He does stuff like this all the time.  I can't think of more examples now, but he plays around with language in a way that I know is not normal for a 2 year  old.
I have a couple of vague memories from being Anders' age.  One of them was pooping in the car while on vacation in South Dakota, the other was switching Duke Boys from Bo and Luke to Coy and Vance.  I honestly remember that second one, which Anna still does not believe, but when I remind her of the prodigious amount of TV I used to watch with my aunt Marilee, she relents a bit.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dukes_of_Hazzard#Coy_and_Vance
Anders just doesn't care about TV that much.  It is but one of the many things he enjoys doing in a day, but only if it's a show like "Super Why" or the weather or the scoreboard of a basketball game.  He loves watching youtube videos of numbers and letters.  He says "youtube! youtube! youtube!"  I had one of those "he's growing up in a far different world than me" moments yesterday as he requested a "numbersletters" video on youtube.  I pulled out the computer and we watched it.  I recalled waking up and waiting for Sesame Street or Saturday morning cartoons to start, and then if there was some interruption I had to wait a day or a week for that event to come around again.
What a great time to be a kid.  That got me to thinking about all the things to which Anders has been exposed.  He goes to the zoo once or twice a month.  I didn't go to a real zoo until I was 7 years old.  We've gone to the Gulf of Mexico the last three Saturdays.  I didn't see the ocean until I was 8 years old.  Anders has so many great opportunities to quench his thirst for knowledge and broaden his range of inquiry.
We've had another spurt of visitors with Anna's parents and my mom visiting on successive weekends, then we met up with one of Anna's former roommates and her 2 year old daughter in Galveston today.  It seems like these visits come in waves.
I was quite pleased with KU's NCAA tourney run.  It hasn't turned beastly hot yet.  Highs are in the low to mid 80s and it cools off at night.  A quarter mile wide tornado passed eight miles west of my hometown in Kansas, Marquette.  The conditions are  right for more tornadoes tonight.  I hope and pray our family and friends up there are all okay.
The school year is starting to wind down.  We are excited to get out of town before the heat gets too unbearable down here.  Oh, next Saturday is Texas Independence Day!  I am so excited for this pseudo-holiday.  I don't think we will make it to the historical reenactment of the Battle of San Jacinto on the east side of town in the shadow of America's tallest obelisk, but maybe next year...  I've started reading a book about Texas "Lone Star Nation" in honor of the blessed events of this month.
Anders went quickly and decisively down his first curly slide, at least that I've seen, today.  He also sang part of the Glen Campbell 1960s country hit "Galveston" today.  That's Dad's influence...