Sibling Rivalry begins

I have noticed lately that my two boys have been going at it a bit here and there. Sure, my 3-year-old has both attempted to hurt his little brother and also has been 'overly affectionate' with him, but it seems that little Mikey is now fighting back so to speak - if both are sitting on one of our laps Mike will try to claw at Mitch's face and/or grab his hair. He also exhibits this behavior when Mitch takes away a toy that he is playing with.

I am sure that this will last for many years to come -as I know from the experience with my brother, who is about the same distance in age from me as they are from one another. I just hope it requires fewer trips to the ER :).

A little more about my morality post

... apparently there was some confusion about the details, it seems that the person in question was not asked to become a prostitute but rather a bartender in a brothel. While this is probably not as offensive and reprenhisble in the eyes of most people, there is still an issue here in the form of legalized prostitution. Imagine me, as an Orthodox Jew and the grandson of Holocaust survivors being assigned to work as a programmer for a white supremacy group? Or an arab 'charity'?

I guess I really want to make two points here:
1) It is definitely a low point when the unemployment office is filling jobs at a brothel.

2) Granted, the incident happened in Germany, but imagine here in the US if I was forced to take a job where the employer's mission or the nature of their business was completely contrary to my religious, social or political beliefs.

I guess in the latter, I would have an out, as I am sure that I would not pass the interview, but still, to even think it a possibility makes me cringe.

Morality

I was watching Fox News the other night on TV, when they ran an very interesting story. Apparently, a woman in Germany had her unemployment benefits taken away because she refused a job as a prostitute. Apparently, since prostitution is illegal in Germany, a job as a prostitute is treated like any other job, and if you are referred to a job that you are qualified for and turn it down, you lose your unemployment checks.

This is ludicrous! Legal or not, and fitting the description or not, this job is dangerous!! - Prostitutes can be exposed to HIV/AIDS and other types of disease (Even condoms break), shouldn't there at least be an opt out for her here?

Even so the topic of this post is Morality - this story just seems to be one more step towards the lowest levels of immorality in the history of I world. I am not going to chime in on what I think that the other steps are, or what does or doesn't constitute moral behavior, all that I am saying is that this is definitely a sign of our immoral times. I just don't want to think how much lower we will sink between now and the time that my sons are adults. G-d save us.

David Asman on this story: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,146657,00.html

I have also pinged 'A-stitch-in-haste', not sure 100% what his opinion is, but there was some talk of this being a hoax

Mikey

I talk about my older son, Mitch, an awful lot, and not too much about his younger brother. But the truth is I love them both equally. Mikey is just something else. He isn't tracking as big as Mitch did, nor is he as physically advanced in some ways (At his current age, Mitch was walking for almost 2 months already, while he is just beginning to pull himself up), but what he lacks in stature he makes up for in spirit. He is a feisty (in a good way) child, and very inquisitive. Walls can't contain him, something which will take on a larger literal dimension when he does learn to walk. And trying to change his diaper - forget about it, he just doesn't sit still. I had to learn to do it one handed because the other hand was necessary to hold him down with.

We have a standing policy in our house (a bad one, admittedly) that if one of our kids wakes up within two hours of our wakeup time, we let them stay in bed with us. We have done this several times with mike, had him fall asleep with us, and only to be woken up by a pair of tiny hands clawing at your face.

As I sit their with him on my lap in the rocking chair in his room, all the memories of Mitch at his age come back to me. Sometime I wonder if I am giving him too little attention, and others I wonder if I give him too much to spite his older brother.

At the very least I need to give them equal time on this blog.

My new-look little boy....

So after a snow delay, we finally cut Mitch's hair last Sunday (1/30). It wasn't as traumatic as it initially seemed it would be (for him or us), and I have to say he sat still while the whole thing went on almost to the very end when he got some shpilkes and wanted to go play with his cousin.

It seems like only yesterday that I was cradling him as a newborn baby in my arms, and now he is is a little man. Now his education is just beginning. We are sending him off to Yeshiva in the fall, and I can hardly wait until he comes home talking about the weekly Parasha.

As for the traumatic effects we were anticipating, it seems that while the teachers in his pre-school were oohing and aahhing his he new coiffure, while the kids hardly noticed the difference.