Jason has never been much of a morning person. He comes by it honestly, of course—I can be a bit of a bear for the first few minutes after getting up, as well. Anyway, it was no big surprise this morning that he threw a little fit when I put him in his booster seat. Based on past experience, I might have expected a tantrum due to having served him the wrong food, or his mother leaving the room, or just being too tired. Were any of those the reason this morning? Nope. This morning he was angry because I wouldn't let him bring a book to the table.

(Here I'd just like to pause a moment and reflect on how difficult it is to write efficiently when the Olympics are on. The last paragraph took me half an hour to compose.)

Now, parenting has brought me a number of unexpected experiences. I find myself saying and doing things all the time that I never thought I would. But I honestly never thought I'd have a problem with my son reading too much. I mean, you want your kid to be a good reader, right? But lately it seems like all Jason wants to do is read constantly.

Of course, by "read" I don't really mean that he can understand the words. But he loves to sit and turn the pages and examine the pictures, shouting out the names of everything on the page. He's even started to memorize some of the ones that we've read to him. In any case, that's what he wants to be doing all the time. Well, that and watch Sesame Street.

And that's fine. I mean, it's great. I love that he loves books. The problem is that it's getting in the way of other, necessary activities. Like eating. Jason has never been the best eater, and now when he's distracted by a book it can be quite an ordeal to get him to pay attention to his meal. Not to mention that Jason's hands get absolutely filthy when he eats, and he has no aversion to smearing food on anything he can get his fingers on. The table, for example, or his hair, or, of course, books.

We've been consistent about not letting him bring his books to the table, so it's just a matter of time until he gets used to it. In the mean time, I expect this will get on my nerves. All things considered, though, this is a pretty good problem to have.