by popular demand

Living in Thailand with light haired, blue-eyed kids is a huge ego boost to kids and parents. Maybe too big--the jury's still out. In UT, nobody cares about my kids. Their status is somewhere between kids in Asia and kids on a plane. Here in Bangkok they are rockstars. Whenever we take them out, other than school or church, they create a near wave of attention with repeated requests for photos and pinched cheeks.

This is just the annoying business as usual for Violet but Eliot soaks it all in like a sponge. A very narcissistic sponge. She told me the other day, "People always want to take pictures of me because I am so beautiful." No way this turns out poorly.

I would be more concerned if she wasn't such a sweetheart. As soon as we move back to UT she will just be one of all the other kids. After this realization breaks her heart, she will hopefully rebound and be normal. Let her soak up the attention while she can and we will deal with the consequences later.

Last weekend Rocky's company hosted a retreat up in Khao Yai. I'm never one to miss a trip to the mountains and when I agreed to go he casually mentioned to E there was a talent show and asked if she would perform the dance she has been learning at school. Eliot loves to perform, she is a showman at heart. I have already sat through a dozen improvised shows this month (thank you, easily concealed iphone). She was thrilled with the prospect of showing off her newly acquired skills and readily agreed.

Nearly everyday until the show, she how much longer until her dance. It was like the lead up to Christmas. When she found out, a few hours before the show, that she was not actually the entire show she was crestfallen. After being asked to take photos for 30 minutes she recovered her glow.

With the help of some actual Thai girls, she polished her dancing and her performance was fantastic.

Unfortunately for you the cameraman (woman) was not. Not only do I go in and out of focus but I missed Violet's warm up, raise the roof clap, before the dance. I also failed to video Violet's encore/farewell performance that involved her riding her scooter through the next act. That was our cue to leave.