Amanda and I volunteered at Grow Zone after going to the 9:00 service at church today.  There were a lot of boys in my room today, which often leads to a bit of wildness, but everything went pretty well.

I was thinking of doing several things when we got home- raking a bit perhaps, things of that nature.  Instead Amanda and I had lunch and got sucked into watching The Soup then Saturday Night Live.  Taylor Swift hosted.  I had really low expectations for her, but she wasn’t that bad.  I nodded off though and missed the last skit or two.

At about 4:00 we got to Matt and Melissa Davis’ house.  Melissa was throwing a cookout birthday party for Matt.  There were a number of babies there.  Two of them, in fact, were even younger than Milly.  It was also the first time Milly got to hang out with their daughter, Penelope, and by hanging out what I mean is them sitting on a blanket together.  They did grin at each other though, which was cute.

Once we got back I worked on removing the oven from its spot in the kitchen.  It wasn’t really all that tough, but I had to pry apart a few pieces of wood as it was built into the counter.  To my momentary consternation I discovered, after pulling it out some, that the oven was tethered to the wall via a power cord, instead of having a plug.  After a little consideration I realized that I could remove the back panel and saw where the cord connected.  I just had to unscrew some nuts to disconnect the wires.

So I found a wrench and started unscrewing the nuts.  Amanda, who was on the phone at the time, heard an electric buzz.  She didn’t hear me yelp a four letter word and drop the wrench.  So yeah, I had 220 volts pass through the right side of my body.  I felt a little burn going from my fingers down to my right foot.  Oddly, my right nip was a bit extra tingly.

An electrician I am not, but I really should have known better than to touch metal to a live cord like that.  The next thing I did was to find the breaker for the stove and turn it off.

I was fine though.  It obviously hurt when the electricity ripped through me and I tingled for a bit, but I felt fine shortly after.

In case you’re wondering, I was removing the oven because we’re getting a new one.  We’ve had a new used one on the porch for a bit, but Amanda’s grandparents decided, for some reason, to buy us a brand new one.  It’s supposed to be a surprise for Amanda, and I haven’t actually told her yet, but she knows.  It’s being delivered tomorrow.

Milly’s got a few new things lately.  She looks like she’s trying to crawl, which we can tell because when we put something just out of reach of her she hitches one leg up like she’s trying to push herself, but she’s not quite kicking off.

She also started making a new noise yesterday.  She starts off kind of opening and closing her mouth without a noise then works a “ba ba ba ba” into it.  Sometimes it’s more of a “ma ma ma ma,” which Amanda uses to claim that “Mama” is her first word.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it yet, but for a while we’ve had a little game we play where I’ll tap Milly’s mouth with my finger then she’ll start to say, “aaaaa,” so it comes out as “ah-ba-ba-ba-ba,” which seems to entertain us both, though she gets bored of it pretty easily.

Zach Dotsey