Baby Radar
How is it that babies know exactly where NOT to go? Is there an inherently provided 'Baby Radar'? Aidan seems to certainly have, and makes continual use of, this feature.

Last night, as my lovely wife was off enjoying some baby free time with her girlfriends, Aidan and I were left home, alone. After looking at each other, each trying to figure out what to do with the other, Aidan determined that I was not interesting enough to play with and ::Beep Beep Beep - Target in sight...::: immediately headed towards the stairs. Aidan has learned that he is able to climb the stairs, slowly, one at a time, pausing at each step to be sure that someone is watching his each small accomplishment during the vertical ascent.

I headed Aidan off at the pass, er, bottom stair and brought him back to his toy depot in the middle of the floor. After discovering that there were no new toys to play with :::Beep Beep Beep - Target Aquired::: off he headed to the indoor potted tree in the far corner of the family room. The pot, being full of dark, damp dirt is certainly fun to dig one's hands into and play with. Once again I swooped in and interceeded much to the disgust and subsequent verbal complaining of Radar Aidan. Having cleaned his forward based crawling appendages providing, what I was to find out, better traction for faster mobility, Aidan was again placed on the toy laden reservation where he sat - for nearly 5 seconds.

:::Beep Beep Beep... something on the outer reaches of the radar, better investigate::: And off Aidan went towards the kitchen, banking right, around the island based oven/stove, and then straight into the laundry/utility room where, ::: Beep Beep Beep, Target Locked on ::: sat Mocha's food and water dishes. With sloth like reflexes I manouverd around the seemingly laser guided Aidan and picked up the food dishes before he was able to arrive. Clean up on isle 5 averted. No sooner had I placed the dog food dishes on the counter... ::: Beep Beep Beep... ::: Thunk! Damn! A sneak attack! The large cardboard box, formally holding Aidan's new booster car seat and currently staged to be broken down and hauled off to the recycle bin, had been pulled down and the corner of it was currently being subjected to large amounts of drool and the gnawing of tiny teeth. I think the run for the food dishes was just a cleaver ploy to divert my attention from the real target. At a young eight months Aidan is already outsmarting me - No real surprise there.

The rest of the Aidan/Dad bonding time was spent eating cheerios, chunks of banana and the ever popular formula - every once and a while I let Aidan have some too.