LEA IS NOT FRAGILE X! What a freakin' relief. I guess we understood this to some extent even before the test results came in this morning -- she is clearly developing at a normal rate, almost as if she had read What to Expect in the First Year herself and was keeping track on a little checklist. Turning over back to belly: Check! Belly to back: Check! Laughing out loud, generally at Daddy: Check! She can sit up with help, something Alex couldn't do until he was around eight months. She seems on the very precipice of crawling. But she could be doing all this and still be Fragile X. Girls are less affected by the genetic disorder, as they have a backup X chromosome. If one is broken or completely conked out, the backup kicks in and pulls some extra weight. Boys only have the one X chromosome, and that is why Alex is not yet speaking. We got the phone call this morning: This is Jkfjdofewp Labs calling to report that Lea Berlin's Fragile X test results are negative. As emotionless as if she had said ...and here are today's Lotto numbers. But it changes everything around here. Now we have to be careful not to favor her -- the NORMAL child. The SMART child. That would be instant doom for any prospects Alex might have. And really, Alex is doing great. His state-funded special education teachers report on their dealings with other Fragile Xers -- children older than Alex who cannot feed themselves, who are completely non-verbal at 10 years old, who are emotionally unstable. Alex is none of these things -- he is, in fact, an utter delight. Okay, he's not speaking, but he has a high pitched squeak that we refer to as "singing." It is his "everything is right in the world" sound. Yesterday he climbed up on his toy chest and sat for a long time looking out the window, singing to himself, happy as Rod and Todd Flanders. Okay, he is slightly damaged. But considering all I have read about Fragile X, he seems at the very top of his class.

WAAAAY BACK when I was working for the Incredibly Shrinking Toy Company, I was forced to make a few decisions that, at the time, I wondered if I would regret. The screen size and text resolution of these products is way beyond bad, and yet we intented to pack in a full dosage of learning: History! Science! English! (Or, if not English, then your geographical area's language of choice.) I wondered idly whether it was even possible to write History and Science content for a product that cannot display words of longer than ten letters. Now, having been laid off, I find myself working freelance for the exact same company, writing the very content I once only considered in the abstract. And it's just impossible. I spent a chunk of today writing American Geography match-up questions -- but without mentioning any city or state or landmark over ten letters in length. Goodbye, Pennsylvania! Adios, North Carolina! I need 120 geography questions and began to choke after, oh, fifty. I crossed the finish line, ultimately, but every step was a painful step through hip-deep muck. Tomorrow: World History! Another 120 questions. What I shall write about I have absolutely no idea. But the money's good... and for now, it's the only money coming in. So I'll keep my complaining to a bare minimum.

GENERALLY, WHEN BERT IS SLEEPING OR READING, and Ernie bursts in with some insane game to play or song to sing, Bert resists at first, but is usually swept up in Ernie's enthusiasm by the end of the skit. This is how the two famous Muppets have complemented each other for thirty years -- Bert prim and introverted, allowing his inner child to be released only through the machinations of his roommate, the impish Ernie. Generally, at the end of the skit, Ernie does an abrupt about face: He stops singing or walks away from the game, and if Bert, swept up in his newfound emotional freedom, dares to keep singing, Ernie rebukes him: Keep it down, will ya? I'm trying to sleep! Which of course were Bert's exact words at the beginning of the scene. Bert winds up emotionally exposed, and embarrassed. In short, Ernie is a passive-agressive little shit, and even if his mind games occasionally allow Bert to break out of his shell, that is only a side effect. Ernie's main purpose is to humiliate his long-suffering friend. On today's episode of Sesame Street, I saw a Bert/Ernie skit I had never seen before, although it is almost certainly a rerun. Bert is reading. ("It was the best of pigeons, it was the worst of pigeons.") Ernie enters, but before he can even say anything, Bert says "No!", attempting to cut off any foolishness right from the start. Good luck. Ernie will not be denied, and soon he is singing "The Addition Song." With each new number, more and more animals and monsters and Muppets join Ernie and Bert, singing along. This time, Bert is not swept up into the bouncy musical number. For the duration of the song, he stands in the center of the picture, holding the book he wanted to read, scowling. His unibrow is curved down dramatically, indicating a plateau of anger rarely seen. He says nothing, but he looks an inch away from killing somebody. When the song ends, Bert snaps. I mean, snaps. He screams at Ernie, flailing his arms, and it would not have surprised me if Bert had fallen to his knees and wept loudly. It's really very alarming. He begs Ernie to get rid of all the intruders and just let him read. And Ernie, in response, simply leaves. Bert is left there surrounded by various penguins and aliens and an elephant. Holy smokes. One day there's going to be a Sesame Street skit in which the police bash down Bert's door to find blood everywhere, and Ernie's head in the oven. No jury on Earth would convict him.