Mind your language...

Felix is currently in one of the many "difficult phases" kids go through; among other things, he now gets really angry and throws a tantrum when we don't obey his every whim, crying violently, throwing stuff around and hitting people. Difficult phase for mommy, too, because what happened to my sweet-tempered toddler? :P Yes, yes, I know, part of the normal development of volition and identity, absolutely indispensible, yadda yadda. Still difficult!

However, at the same time he is being adorable. He talks a lot (when he is NOT having one of his furios fits) now, often incomprehensible syllable combinations but he also likes to echo things he picks up from us. (Not so ideal when I was talking on the phone and Jörg was telling me about one of his colleagues who had been behaving like a real prick, so I said Was für'n Arsch! ("What an asshole!") - and Felix piped up "Aaach! Aaach!". Oops! Now we're officially in "Mind your language!" territory!

But just now, we had the most amazing conversation. (Well, amazing for proud parents. Bear with me.)
I was actually trying to coax him into trying to say his name - I didn't expect him to succeed because [f], [l] and [ks] are all sounds he can't yet reliably produce, but it would be nice to know what he comes up with! (I'm suspecting that sometimes when he says "Bebi", he actually means "Felix".)
Anyway, the following conversation ensued:
Me: Felix?
Felix: Ja! ["Yes!"]
Me: Bist du der Felix? ["Are you Felix?"]
Felix: Ja!
Me: Wie ist dein Name? ["What is your name?"]
Felix: Mei nahm! ["My name!"]

The amazing thing is not that he repeated the end of my sentence - as I said, he does that a lot at the moment. The amazing thing is, of course, the conversion of dein into mein: Presumably, not an accident (he can pronounce both [d] and [m] without difficulty, and they're articulated in different places too) but the actual understanding that "your" turns into "my" when the addressee turns into the speaker. Which is... quite an accomplishment, I think? I mean, those are complicated concepts for someone who is only just beginning to codify the world and only just discovering self-awareness.
So... YAY! Clever little fellow. (Never mind that he can't pronounce his name! ;)) I'll keep my ears open to find out if he does this consistently!

EDIT: I forgot to relate his great feat from a few days back! Backstory: Felix loves to take a bath with his daddy, and because otherwise I get to do most of the fun and not so fun stuff with Felix, bathing is strictly daddy-time. Anyway, on Monday, Jörg came back from work pretty late. So...
Jörg: Sollen wir jetzt noch in die Wanne? ["Should we go into the tub at this late time?"]
Felix: Baden! ["Bathe!"]
That settled it! So he not just repeats things, he can also 'translate' concepts into words that he can say. \o/

Blaaaah.

The Flixster is sleeping.

I should be painting.

Well, I should be doing a lot of things. But on the recreational front, one of them is painting. Either Easter eggs (to give to various family members in a week's time), for obvious reasons, or the Prophecy of the North painting I started.

But I don't wanna. I've finished all the broad background work, now I have to tackle the finicky detail stuff, and I'm apparently not in the right mode for that. (Who knew I had different painting modes? Well, I found out that I do. I'm still in "some rough brushstrokes make a sea and wet-in-wet stick figures make a distant crowd" mode, and this is absolutely incompatible with faces and clothing and stuff. Don't know how to get myself into "finicky detail work" mode. Ruined Finarfin's face already. Blaaaaah.)

I think I'd like to do some gardening, but even if it weren't beginning to get dark-ish, there's still snow everywhere, so that's not a feasible option.
Of course, I could also work on some of my story WiPs, either fannish or original, but we're 21 days into B2MeM - I need a break.

All I seem to be able to do right now is read some senseless snippets or brief LJ entries and comments and stuff. Or chat maybe. I can't focus on anything longer. (This may actually have to do with being unable to focus on the process of painting the foreground figures? IDK.) I'm in a tumblr state of mind, it seems. But all my usual sources of senseless and/or brief snippets of information, entertainment or communications appear to be dried up just now.
Typical.

Whine, whine.

I hate it when I don't seem to be able to do anything useful (or even useless) with myself. Maaan, I'm almost 30. I really should have learned to pull myself together by now, no?

Apparently not.
Blaaaah.

Still not Spring.