A Rousing Welcome

I came home from work Tuesday evening to an empty house. Never one to repine my bad fortune I curled up with Pride & Prejudice and made the best of it. I never noticed the note on the table indicating that Lia and the girls had gone to the pool. They returned about 7 o'clock. On entering the door, Julia called my name. I answered her call. The girls shrieked and squealed and galloped the great length of the apartment to greet me.

Not content with calling me "Diego," the girls have lately applied this sobriquet with endless consonantal variations ("Bee-bay-boe" is a favorite). Thus Eli came gallumphing into the room crying, "Dee-day-doe! Dee-day-doe!" She then paused, and in a fit of precocious poetry, smiled at me and said, "You look like a poe-tay-toe!" Pleased with herself, she laughed merrily and leaped into my arms, as did Julia.