Such is Life

I was just folding the laundry (just a little glimpse into the life of an international woman of mystery and intrigue) when one of my daughters' shirts got me to thinking. It read: Music is Life. You've seen, perhaps even worn, variations on the theme: Football is Life, Lacrosse is Life, Cheering is Life, Star Trek is Life - whatever your 'thing' is, someone is out there willing to take your money for the opportunity to allow you to advertise it. My husband's online moniker is Bass is Life.

I don't lay claim to any of those slogans.

And for a moment there - as I folded that shirt - it made me a little sad. It must be nice to have a passion that is so encompassing that it defines life for you. I have no such passion. I like to knit - but is it LIFE? I couldn't imagine a day without writing - but is it LIFE? Music, reading, shopping for shoes - all enjoyable pastimes, but LIFE?

It doesn't feel like living without sunshine. Maybe sunshine is life. But that can't be - because it's not all I need. A beautiful sunny day with a toothache still sucks.

Then I turned my thoughts towards my hubs - Bass is Life. Not a lot in this world makes him happier than his bass. And not a lot in the world makes him more angry, frustrated and depressed. He experiences moments of great pride and accomplishment behind that bass and moments that make him feel worthless. There's a fine line between love and hate, and his feelings for that instrument balance on it tenuously.

Hmmmm - now that I think about it, that DOES sound a lot like life...

He's Still Preoccupied With Number Eighty-Five

So my mother hates Joe Paterno. No, wait, that's harsh. My mother hates Joe Paterno's glasses. I mean she has really strong feelings about those glasses. My dad will casually mention Joe Pa, and my mom will go off. "How can you even listen to him when he's wearing those stupid glasses? They're so stupid! I can't even pay attention to what he's saying because his glasses are so stupid." Sometimes she'll even punch her fist into her palm for emphasis. She becomes visibly agitated when he is interviewed. "He is so ridiculous! What is he trying to prove with those stupid glasses?"

The last time my dad was due for new specs, he casually announced, "I'm hoping they have some nice frames like Joe Paterno's."

"I'll divorce you."

They've been married for fifty-one years and have weathered many a storm, but this, apparently, would have been an unforgiveable offense.

"Why would you even SAY that? Oooooh! He looks so STUPID in those glasses. Why he would wear those stupid glasses I'll never know."

I guess there's no accounting for what we decide to get passionate about.

Lately my husband has been demonstrating a similar preoccupation with Chad Ochocinco, wide receiver for the Cincinnati Bengals. It started out innocently (and logically) enough. "What kind of a douche legally changes his name to his jersey number?" I had no answer for that. It did seem like a sort of - well - douchey thing to do. I imagine many folks asked themselves and perhaps their significant others the same question, or a reasonable facsimile thereof.

But that wasn't the end of it. Almost every time Ochocinco is mentioned, Tom will say some variation of, "What an idiot. Ochocinco. What kind of stupid name is that?" or, "So what happens if he goes to another team and number 85 has been retired? What're you gonna do then, OCHOCINCO? Stupid."

I have taken to answering his outbursts with, "His name is almost as stupid as Joe Paterno's glasses."

Comparing Tom to my mother usually buys me - and Ochocinco - a few moments of respite. But just a few. Because sooner or later, Tom will be shaking his head again and saying, "Ochocinco. Idiot." He tries to say it quietly, but I still hear him.

If I ever want him to divorce me, I'll just have to legally change my name to a number. If I want to be divorced and disowned, I can change my name to a number and get myself some big glasses.

Good to know.

Morphine and Chocolate

Well, maybe just chocolate.

I wanted to go to Starbucks for hot chocolate this morning after I dropped Liv off at band practice. It was dark and cold and just felt like a hot chocolate sort of morning. But then I thought about the price tag on a cup of Starbucks hot chocolate and thought - "that's something I should indulge in with someone, as a treat, not take home and drink alone."

So I came home and made hot chocolate from scratch. Because I wanted to. Because I wanted the whole process. Because, I found, I didn't just want hot chocolate. I wanted to make hot chocolate. I wanted to measure ingredients and stir them over low heat. I wanted to smell the chocolate as it heated up. It took a long time. And as I'm enjoying these first tentative sips, I'm appreciating it much more than I would be if I'd just picked it up at the drive-thru.

And here's the kicker: It's really not that good. I made it with skim milk. I used cheap cocoa. It's - mediocre at best. So why am I enjoying it so much?

I think it's one of those 'everything I need to know, I learned in kindergarten' things. Sometimes the process is more important than the product.

A couple years back I visited the Crayola factory with my family. Lea was a pre-schooler and Liv was barely a toddler. At the end of the factory tour, they had different stations set up to play with Crayola products, old and new. At the time, ModelMagic was new. Lea made a few things, smashed them, started over - in a word, she played. I played, too. No, I didn't. I worked. I started making this elaborate little sculpture. I was meticulous. When Liv started to cry and Tom suggested we move on I became very irritated. I'm not DONE! It wasn't that I was having so much fun with the process, I became quite obsessed with the product. Which I wasn't going to keep anyway.

How many times have we seen a child work for a long time (in child years) coloring a picture, only to casually throw it away when they were done? Our adult response to this is that they're not taking pride in their work. We retrieve it and carefully smooth it out and tell them how pretty it is. We ask them to tell us about their picture. The truth (more often than not) is that they're just done coloring. The process is over. The product never really mattered. And we are annoying them.

That's a difficult concept for success-oriented adults to wrap their brains around.

But I can wrap my cold hands around a warm cup of mediocre hot chocolate.

That'll have to be enough for today.

Random Randomness That's Random

Today, as you know, is 09/09/09. What a cool, orderly date. All nice and round and even. Not random at all. And yet...

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Last night we went to Liv's band orientation. There were lots of things to sign up for and everyone had to sign up for multiple things. Before the speakers were done speaking, parents were rushing the stage to get to the sign up sheets. It was an astoundingly rude display. The teacher just looked sort of helpless. I don't know what he'd do with kids who acted so rudely, but he clearly didn't know what to do with adults who showed him no respect. Many in front of their kids. And we wonder why so many kids feel like the rules don't apply to them...

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I was a wiener this week! Blue Violet over at A Nut in a Nutshell ran a contest and yours truly won a coupon for $45 off $100 purchase at Old Navy. I got the coupon today and spent it tonight. Grass doesn't grow under my feet, baby. We got quite a nice little haul for the whole family, and I am most appreciative.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Another cool thing happened, too. The Redhead Riter passed along a couple goodies to me:


This one is the bookworm. It came without rules. My favorite! Not a big rule follower! The lines are not my friend! This is not really contradictory to the above bit of randomness where I complained about people thinking they were above the rules. I don't break rules if to do so would be blatantly RUDE...

Ahem.


Check that out, all fancy and sparkly-like! Who adds sunshine to my day? Well YOU do, silly!

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The other night I dreamed of pizza. This is not as unusual an occurrence as it perhaps should be. But this dream was special. I could actually taste and identify, like, every piece of pizza I'd ever eaten in my life. I wonder if this is the east coast version of having your life flash before your eyes? I remembered pizza from my childhood. Pizza from that little shop at the beach. Pizza from my grandpa's bar. Pizza from a restaurant I went to ONCE on a vacation when I was LITTLE. Pizza from every pizza shop in my small college town. To extend the old saying that pizza is like sex: even when it's bad, it's still pretty good - I guess this was the equivalent of a pizza lover's wet dream. A full-on pizza orgy. Hmmm. What shall we have for dinner tonight? Oh! I know!!!!

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

My uterus will leave me in three days. My mom will arrive in five. Anyone wanna hazard a guess as to which future event is making me more nervous? 'Future events such as these will affect you in the future.' If you actually get that reference, I don't know if I'll cheer for you or weep for you. Probably a little bit of both. I'm multi-faceted like that. Plus, I'm pretty hormonal.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

As my sweet baby Lea would say: Peace, Love, Randomness.

Can't You Read the Sign?

Just a couple giggles for your Friday afternoon pleasure:

I went to the hospital today for some pre-admission testing today. I found relatively convenient parking (I KNOW! Right?) and started walking into the building. I did a double take as I passed these signs:


Now perhaps I'm demonstrating my own less visible handicap, here, but doesn't it seem as though the handicapped entrance is right through that concrete? I pictures folks in wheelchairs backing up, speeding up, and disappearing straight through the barrier, like Harry Potter and his pals running through platform 9 3/4 at King's Cross Station to catch the Hogwarts Express.

Then there was this sign, passed on our way home from my parents' house last weekend:


I guess that might be convenient if you want to drop your animal off at the clinic while you have your back realigned and grab a quick tattoo. One stop shopping. For the animal loving tattoo enthusiast with poor posture.

Randomness and a Winner

I heard you missed me, I'm back. I brought my pencil - er - netbook. Give me somethin' to write on...

I'm looking forward to visiting with everyone this week, which is really the only thing I'm looking forward to upon returning home. Away = Good; Home = Suck. But hey! Time for the interwebs! So it's not all bad.

First order of business - a winner of the pay it forward giveaway has been drawn. A couple days later than I promised, but I wanted to include pics of the drawing to keep it on the up and up and, as I mentioned, for some reason neither Tom nor I can figure out, I can't download pictures on the road, even though I have all the same equipment with me. He actually used that as a selling point when I was so bummed about coming home, "But when you get home, you can download your pics!" Always look on the bright side of life. (this is the part where I whistle...)

So without further ado:
We decided to do the drawing on the boardwalk in front of the casino, since a drawing is SORT of like a gamble, even though you don't really have anything to lose. Also because we were in Atlantic City so we could.

We put everyone's name on a slip of paper, but then couldn't decide what to draw it from. Pink was along for the ride, so we put her to use. Practical AND beautiful - is there anything that owl can't do? Lea is pretty cute, too.

A wider view of the boardwalk.

Turn around 180 degrees to this.

Pick a good one, Liv!

Savant is a wiener! (I always suspected as much) Congrats, Savant! I'll send you an email soon to clear up the deets.

And in birthday news, today is Tom's birthday. He got to spend it driving from Atlantic City to Uh-hi-uh. Try not to be jealous of his amazing good fortune. At this moment, we are sitting still in traffic somewhere in West Virginia. See? Everything about going home blows.

If you look in the mirror and don't like what you see, you'll find out firsthand what it's like to be me. (yeah, my angsty teen and tween are into My Chemical Romance. What can I say? It's a good lyric.) So I've written about weight and weight issues before (sigh). This weekend we went to Tom's HS reunion. I was nervous because I so hate the way I look and I didn't want it to reflect badly on him. I spent weeks trying to convince myself it didn't matter, but it always does. I can't tell you how many times I thought about bagging it. But go I did. I was so nervous. Meeting people has been scary for me ever since I gained the weight (before I put it on, meeting people was my favorite favorite). But I went and I quickly downed some liquid courage and before long it didn't matter if I was cute or not because I was having so much fun. Switched from vodka to rum and found myself doing the Time Warp (again). Next morning a lot of people had posted pics on Facebook and I was all, "Oh my SHIT I'm fat!" (Also - drunk doesn't look as good as it feels. Frack.) But you know what? The bottom line is that I DID have fun, a LOT of fun, actually, and if anyone judged me OR Tom because of it, I didn't know about it. (And I usually do know or at least suspect - there's a certain paranoia that comes along with hating how one looks.) Maybe I'm the one who needs to become less judgmental. If I'd let my insecurities keep me in I would've missed a really good time.

I just spent two weeks in Eastern PA and South Jersey and didn't even make an ATTEMPT to hook up with any of the people I TRULY MISS because I am so embarrassed about how I look. How freakin' dumb was that? Cut off my nose to spite my (ridiculously round) face.

Workin' on accepting who and what I am. Baby steps, baby steps.

Well, back to the grind. In as much as my life of leisure can be considered a grind. The laundry will wait, unpacking will wait, groceries will wait - I wanna see The Time Traveler's Wife. (Maybe that explains all the time jumps in this post. Am I home? Am I at the beach? Am I on the road in West Virginia? - yep, that's it. Time travel. I'm all of those places and more.) And download a bunch of pictures. I wonder why nothing ever gets done around here? Weird.

Random Randomness That's Random

Here's what's been running all around in my brain:

-Meta stuff: I've been reading a lot of posts lately in which people are blogging about blogging. I need to do a little bit of that, too. I feel so selfish AND self centered saying this, but here goes. I have been visiting relatives for the past week and will be for the next week. I have a little time each day to write, but not a lot. I have been using a lot of that time reading and commenting on blogs, as is my habit. Some of you may (or may not - how big is my ego, anyway?) have noticed that I have been less faithful about it this week. I intend to be even less faithful next week. I'm in the middle of a visiting vacation. I'm taking a little time off.

Here's where the selfish part kicks in - I MAY still post. I have found myself all kinds of inspired on my cousin's beautiful grounds and I may manage to find time to do that. But I just can't make the time for more - not this week. I apologize if that sounds bitchy or selfish - I'm really not either of those things (much) but there's just so little time and I need some of it for me. When I get back home it will be business as usual, I promise.

- The Week of a Thousand Bands: I will post about the concerts I saw this week, but I'm holding off on that till I get home, too. It's the dangdest thing - I can't upload pictures on the road. Same camera, same laptop, same cords - works at home, doesn't work on the road. (Yes, I have a laptop AND a netbook on vacation - because that's how my mind works. See why I need a break?) It must be a server issue or something, although that makes very little sense to me. But anyway. Since I had GREAT seats for these shows, I definitely want to be able to show you pictures. So that's on hold, but only for a little while.

- Close Encounters: Between bands at one of the shows, I pulled out my journal to jot down a few quick notes. A gentleman approached me and asked if I wrote in a journal religiously. (I'm really more of a secular scribbler, but that didn't seem to be the information he was actually seeking...) I told him I wrote a blog and that I liked to jot down ideas for it from time to time so I wouldn't forget. He replied, "A blog. Is that, like, a computer thing?"

"Yeah, something like that."

Ya'll! There is a whole chunk of society out there that doesn't even know we exist and I met one of their scouts! I hope I represented us well...

Sex and Money: (now that I have your attention...) Before our last show, Tom hit the ATM. It informed him that our balance was dangerously low. That didn't make sense, as that particular day was pay day and his check should've been deposited. He started making calls - first to the bank (no sir, we received no direct deposit to your account today) Then a text to his boss (dude! something I need to know?) Then a call to HR. He THOUGHT he knew the number for HR. He dialed it with a 1-800 prefix and got nothing. He tried again with a 1-888 prefix and got more than he bargained for. Let's just say that apparently a lot of beautiful horny women are hot for my husband and would like to tell him so for a small fee. For the next 10 minutes his texts alternated between 'account balance low" warnings and variations of "hey, stud, feel like talking?"

We figured out the money thing (which was and remains a total pain in the ass, but isn't germane to this story, so I'll skip it) but the sex thing remained. He pointed out that it said if he texted 'end' to a certain number, the requests would stop. He hesitated to do so, lest that be a pay service, too, or, you know, lest whatever. But these hot sexy girls were getting pretty persistent. Something had to be done. He sent the end request and it was honored, so that ended well. And gave us something to talk about.

So that's what's running around in my brain today. If you haven't entered my 200th post giveaway, do so! When I'm done with my selfish me-time, I want to make something for you! (I am still getting used to the netbook keyboard and originally typed 'somethong'. Maybe they have a job for me somewhere texting hot, lonely guys...)

Runnin' all Around My Brain (Alice Edition)

Here is some of the randomness that is runnin' all around my brain this fine Saturday morning:

ALICE!!! Tonight I finally get to see Alice Cooper. Regular readers may recall that I wanted Alice to be my first concert, but my mom put her foot down. She is no longer the boss of me. School's Out, baby. I may not be Eighteen, but I still like it. I am all atwitter. ALICE!!!

Check it out: The fine folks over at The Knights of Moleskine, Spirit & Ale have invited me to join their blog as a contributor. (Flattered? Um, yeah!) I've written a post about the festival we attended last night, so stop by and check it out.

Did I mention ALICE???

Oh No! There goes Tokyo!- Guess who's opening for Alice? (I mentioned that I'd be seeing Alice Cooper in about 10 hours, didn't I?) Blue Oyster Cult. BOC. I saw them once in the 70's. It was awesome, or so I'm told. I fell asleep. Yeah. Let's go with that...

aliceAliceALICEALICE!!!!!

FestWear - did you know that my entire summer wardrobe consists of the gauzy dresses and skirts purchased at festivals and on the boardwalk? Well it does. Judge if you must, but it makes this bohemian suburbanite awfully happy. I got a new red dress last night. It's purdy.

Lines form on my face and hands... oh! was I singing out loud? Sorry! I'm a little preoccupied. You probably hadn't even noticed, bless your heart.

Big 2-0-0 - did you know I'm only a post or two away from my 200th post? I'm planning something I hope you'll find fun. Watch this space.

Only Women Bleed - Well lots of chores and errands to do before heading to the fair tonight. Did I mention I have concert tickets, too? Well I do. Goin' to see Alice Cooper, I am. Oh, Alice. It's only been 33 years since my mom said "no". Tonight I defy her! (and I'm takin' her grandbabies, too)

Anatomy of an Earworm

No, no, no - this isn't going to be a squicky post!

It's about those songs or - more accurately, song fragments - that get stuck in your head and won't let go.

Everyone gets them from time to time, some people are more prone to them than others. Some songs are more likely to stick than others. Once they're stuck, there doesn't seem to be a lot you can do to unstick them. Which wouldn't be so bad if it was a song (or song fragment) that you liked. Quite often it is not. Quite often a fragment will stick and you don't even KNOW the rest of the song. I think these frustrate me, personally, the most.

I like to share when I get a particularly persistent earworm. I'll sing it out loud over and over. This brings a lot of joy to everyone around me, because I have quite a lovely voice and that loveliness is much magnified when I sing the same line over and over again in as many different keys as I can find (or come close to). People always say things like, "Oh, for the love of all that's holy, please, please stop." I know that this is because everyone has their own personal threshold for loveliness. I exceed that on occassion, I guess. It's a gift. And a curse.

For weeks - WEEKS I tells ya! - whenever my brain had a quiet moment, I subconsciously filled it with M-E-T-H-O-D-O-F-L-O-V-E. (Oh, you're welcome! No problem at all!) And that is very typical of an earworm for me. A pop song that I maybe didn't love, but was certainly aware of (MMMbop, anyone?) that just sneaks in there and makes itself at home. I've read that commercial jingles provide earworm fodder for a lot of people and - while I imagine that's quite annoying - I think it means the advertisers have done their job very well (Gimme a break, gimme a break, break me off a piece of that Kit Kat bar).

For the last three days, though, the earworm that's been accompanying me is one I'm in no hurry to rid myself of. I've been hearing Billy Joel's 'Vienna' , particularly (but not limited to) the line, " you know that when the truth is told that you can get what you want or you can just get old." My usual response to an earworm is annoyance that ranges from mild to crazy-making. My response to this one has been that perhaps it's telling me something. It is such a beautiful song - click the link if you're unfamiliar - with such a beautiful sentiment. I think maybe there's something in there I need to hear right now. Perhaps when I successfully noodle it out I'll conquer the earworm.

I'm not going to rush.

The first line of the song is "slow down, you crazy child".

I hear ya, Billy.

Better Living Through Technology

I have been feeling a little blue. Nothing huge - people deal with a lot worse on a daily basis. Sometimes just knowing other people have it worse doesn't make it better. It just adds feeling selfish and insensitive to the list of things to beat oneself up over.

This morning I thought about the reasons I should get out of bed:

1. there is laundry currently sitting in the washer AND the dryer.
2. there are dishes currently sitting in the dishwasher AND the sink.
3. the vacuum hasn't been run in (mumble, mumble, some time, I guess...)

Then I thought about the reasons I should stay in bed this morning:

1. there is laundry currently sitting in the washer AND the dryer.
2. there are dishes currently sitting in the dishwasher AND the sink.
3. the vacuum hasn't been run in (mumble, mumble, some time, I guess...)

But get out of bed I did. I took my meds and sat down at the computer, purely out of habit. I can't eat for an hour after I take my meds, so I use that time to read my e-mail and catch up on all of your yummy blogs since I can't indulge in a yummy breakfast for a while. Before I was even through the e-mail, my mood had lifted considerably. I had not one but two awards waiting for me.

Sandy at It's a Jungle Out There gave me this cute little panda as a reward for leaving consistent comments. Aw, thanks Sandy! You're no slouch yourself!


That probably would've been enough to brighten my mood, but I read a couple more e-mails and found that this was waiting for me at Fran's blog, Very Random. For what, you ask? Why for leaving consistent comments.


Now perhaps you're saying to yourself, "It must not have been much of a funk, if it was lifted by a couple of blog awards." But that's only because you don't understand the nature of the funk to which I had succumbed. I was feeling - like we all do, from time to time - pretty insignificant. I was feeling like nothing I do matters - I don't make a difference. (There's more, but I don't want to talk about it. Suffice it to say that the insignificance thing was playing a pretty strong supporting role in the drama that's been running on my cerebral stage for the past couple days) And along come these two ladies - at the same time - telling me that in some small way, I do.

I needed it, and there it was.

Right there on my laptop.

Comin' through on the wide world of web.

Deb at Suburb Sanity posted about the bloggy support system today, too. It really is quite a powerful and wonderful thing. Deb also talked about turning off the AC and opening the windows, which I did, and I think that has also had quite the impact on my mood. When you let the dishes in the sink all night, a little fresh air and a cross-breeze is never a bad idea... The birdsong it's allowing to come in isn't so bad, either.

So, thank you, Sandy, Fran and Deb. Sincerely. For saying just what I needed to hear just when I needed to hear it.

And thank you all for giving me funny, insightful, heart-wrenching, heart-warming, informative posts (not usually all at the same time, though sometimes some come close) to read each day. And thanks in advance for the bloggy love you're gonna leave me which will make a rapidly improving mood even better. (It's true. I'm not above pandering like that. Pitiful, really.)

As Random As I Wanna Be

Some thoughts that have been runnin' all 'round my brain:

I'm a WINNER
I never win anything, but I won a Starbucks gift card from Melissa B. at The Scholastic Scribe. She has a pretty nifty thing going on, and you should check her out tout de suite. Thanks Melissa B! Now I know what it feels like to be a winner! (It feels much better than being a loser. I'd always suspected as much.)

Potter Time
I'm gonna NEED that coffee, 'cause this early to bed/early to rise chickadee went to the midnite (12:09, to be more precise) showing of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. Liv went to some lengths in her preparation and I'll try to get some pics up on the craft blog later today to document that. Those little witches and wizards have just grown up right before our eyes. And in this one, Dumbledore.... well, you know. And if you don't, I certainly don't want to be the one to tell you! The inferi were just as creepy as I expected them to be, too.

Too Old to Rock and Roll, Too Young to Die
Tom is auditioning for a new band. I love the songs he is playing over and over (and over and over), so I am loving the audition process. He thinks maybe it's time to get back to his rock and roll roots and I couldn't agree any more wholeheartedly if I tried. Wish him luck!

You Know Those Old Married People Who Start to Look Like Each Other?
I got new specs this week. The woman at the optometrists office helped me choose my frames. When I brought them home, Tom said, "Those are my glasses."

"They ARE very similar."

"They're not similar, they're the SAME."

We took them off and compared and - sure enough - my husband and I have identical specs. Is it sad that we're old enough not to worry too much about how completely lame that is? Maybe I should get us some matching jogging suits to round out the look. No one has ever accused us of being just too darn stylin'.

Gimme a Head With Hair
I need a haircut. A new style. A new do. The specs on this are simple:

- I want a style that makes my baby fine hair look full.
- I want a style that expresses my personality and makes me look youthful without making me look like I'm trying to be younger than I am. But it absolutely cannot make me look old.
- I want an actual style, but I don't want to spend any actual time on it on a daily basis. A sophisticated style that could be air-dried and finger combed would be ideal.
- I want a style that will look good when I take off the motorcycle helmet, even after a REALLY long ride.

Is this too much to ask? Why do hairstylists run screaming when I approach them? Rhetorical questions. Maybe what I REALLY want is a new hat. I'd need that hat to make a statement without screaming "Look at me!". Of course I'd need a hat that...

Do-Over
I want to retitle yesterdays post as "Mood Swing". Todays post is random and fragmented. Yesterdays was not supposed to be. Maybe a different title would've helped with the cohesiveness. Live and learn. There are no do-overs.

You Always Knew Eating This Stuff Would Lead to No Good

A couple weeks ago I noticed that the Playland was gone from our local McDonald's. Shortly thereafter, their sign stated that a new Playland would be opening in July. As my kids have long outgrown the usefulness of McDonald's Playland, I didn't pay much attention. (If it doesn't directly affect me, it can't be all that important, right?)

The other day I drove by and their sign said, "New Playland Open!" I decided to drive around the front to take a look. This particular McDonald's is in the same parking lot as my grocery store and I usually drive in behind it. I know I didn't owe you an explanation, but I realized I was making it sound like I spent a LOT of time at McDonald's, which is totally not true. I don't even like double cheeseburgers. And my kids hate milkshakes. Ginormous Diet Cokes for $1? I wouldn't know anything about that. And it's none of your damn business, anyway, so stop judging me!

I couldn't believe what I saw.

Gone were the bright primary colors and happy statues of the old Playland and in its stead was this:


McPrison.

I guess the Hamburglar is tired of playing second fiddle.

The family and I started thinking of new Happy Meal possibilities:

- a metal file in every meal!

- an 'Oz' tie-in promotion!

- Madame Alexander Dolls resembling famous criminals for the girls and Hot Wheels resembling famous get-away cars for the boys! Collect 'em all!

Really, McDonald's. I know eating this stuff is not good for you, but as far as I know it isn't a CRIME (yet).

*** Lea took this picture for me. She said, "Wouldn't it be funny if we got arrested for stalking the McDonald's playground? Maybe they'd make us spend the night in Playland". We all shuddered and moved on quickly.

Bird is the Word

So we're running a quick errand today - Tom and I in the front seat, the three girls in the back. A low flying bird flies right in front of the car. Busy street, no room or time to swerve. Thud.

Tom and I exchange "Oh shit" looks and he checks out the rear view mirror. No squashed bird in sight.

But...

But...

We had all heard that distinctive thud.

"Did we hit it?" came tentatively from the back seat.

"I don't know."

Nervous silence from the animal lovers in the back seat.

Nervous glances between the adults in the front seat.

And then...

And then...

Several miles down the road, like a phoenix rising from the ashes, we see a bird take flight from out of nowhere.

That's not exactly true.

We saw a bird take flight from the grille on the front of our car.

"Did you...?"

"Was that...?"

A huge collective sigh of relief came from everyone in the car.

I have never seen anything like that.

That's not exactly true.

Because I watch a lot of cartoons. Or I did. Or I do. Whatever.

This is the sort of behavior one sees a lot of in cartoons.

We imagined what we did not actually see. The bird ran into our car, wings spread out over the grille, two 'X's taking the place of his eyes. Smaller birds circle his head in a drunken game of ring around the rosie. He shakes his head like a dog with a mouth full of slobber, complete with sound effects. You know the one. You've watched a cartoon or two, too.

Yes you have, shut up.

He shakes it off, flexes his little bird muscle wings, and flies off into the sunset. Or - erm - noonday sun.

The evil forces that would hold him down foiled again.

There's a life lesson here, but I have no intention of getting sappy in a post about cartoons. Learn your own damn life lessons.

Th-Th-Th-That's all, folks!

Wash Me

We are staying on a small island just off Marco Island in south Florida. Goodland, where we're staying, is a little fishing village with a post office and 4 bar/restaurants. That's about it. To get to anything else we have to go through Marco.

Today we went shopping in Naples. Off Goodland, through Marco, to Naples.

Now Marco is quite an affluent area. When we went swimming at a pool there yesterday, we did not use a trash can. We used a rubbish bin. This cracked us up, for some reason, and we spent a good deal of the rest of the day saying "Oh, rubbish!" in our best fa-fa-fa voices and our most affected accents.

On our way back to the island after our shopping trip today, someone's lawn sprinkler hit us just as we were entering Marco. My niece, Shelby, asked from the back seat, "What was that?"

"Sprinklers, what did you think?" answered her mom.

"I thought maybe they didn't want to have to look at our dirty old car on Marco, so they were washing it for us."

Shelby is a funny little chickadee.

Shelby is 10 years old and has just started her own blog to talk about her dog and her life.

My daughter Lea, who is 13, just started a blog too. It is chock full of teen angst, as you would expect.

Stop by and give them some love, if you've got the time. And if you know any other young bloggers who might be interested in following, I'm pretty sure they'd follow back.

(I am fully aware that it's positively shameless to use this forum for promoting two of my favorite girls, but shame is overrated. If you do visit them, read Shelby's older posts and scroll on through for Lea's first post... just sayin')

The Great Flap-Jack Flop

Liv: There's no cereal.

Momma: There's plenty of cereal.

Liv: There's no GOOD cereal. Can we make pancakes?

Momma: No - we're out of flour.

Liv: No we're not. There's lots of flour in here.

Momma: We're out of white flour.

Liv: So?

Momma: Sooooooo? So let's see what we can do...

I used my same old usual recipe that Liv and I love. We make pancakes together pretty often and she is a talented sous chef. She gathers all of the ingredients as I need them and puts them away as I finish with them. In lieu of white flour, we decided to use 1/2 whole wheat flour and half soy flour.

We should've known this was a mistake as soon as we saw the texture of the batter. It was - hmmmm - a bit on the firm side for pancake batter. No worries. We added a little more buttermilk. Still pretty darn firm. We added a little water. Getting closer - still a little on the glue-y side. I'd like to say that we added liquid until the correct consistency was achieved, but the truth is that we added liquid until we gave up.

The griddle was hot and I dropped the batter unto it with a spoon. When all of the pancakes had been ladled out, I licked the spoon.

Oh, give me a break. You've done it too.

Please.

It was - wretched.

I can handle a lot, but this concoction I spit right out. I never do that. I flipped the pancakes then rinsed my mouth out. Awful awful awful. And because of the glue-y texture, it just wasn't coming out. I was gonna need to brush my teeth - a LOT - to get rid of this taste. And one doesn't have the leisure to brush one's teeth when one has pancakes on the griddle.

At this point, by the way, they actually looked pretty good. But that taste was still lingering in my mouth and I wasn't going near them. I told her she could try one but didn't have to. She took one bite and offered the rest to the dog. The dog, who thinks it's a fine, fine day if she can find a pair of dirty socks or underwear to gnaw on, rejected it.

Liv: Can we go to Tim Horton's?

Momma: Yes. Yes we can.

Of Houses and Homes

I used to ask my students to close their eyes and imagine a place that they walked into - perhaps for the first time - and instantly felt at home. The vast majority of them would name their parents house or their grandparents house, sometimes a beloved oft-visited vacation home - rarely did they mention someplace that was shiny and new.

Now I've heard that:

Home is where the heart is.

Home is where you hang your hat.

Home is just another word for you.

I get all of that. I do. But I think there's more to it.

An example: My favorite aunt, Aunt Jennie, lived in the same suburban split level all my life. Growing up they lived about five hours away from us and I just lived for those visits to her home. I loved it there. Looking back, I couldn't tell you why. It's nothing I can put my finger on. It was just a place that made me happy. A place where people who made me happy lived.

When I was in grad school I lived much closer to her than I did to my own mom - about an hour away. I went to her house almost every weekend to study because I would get distracted in my apartment, but I could concentrate at her house. Plus she cooked for me. Once when I was sick, I bundled myself up and drove my sick self up to her house because any difficulty the ride imposed upon me would be more than balanced out by the TLC I would receive once I got there. It was not a bad decision.

A few years ago my cousin, her son, bought a beautiful HUGE house. As she was getting on in years and recently widowed, he built a wing on his house for her. It is beautiful and has about as much square footage as her whole house did. It was an amazingly loving gesture. The last time I visited her in the old place was nice - bittersweet, of course - but I was happy for her. By all of the things we measure standards by, she was trading up. Bigger, newer - you know what society values as well as I do. She was going to be livin' large.

So it took me by surprise when, as we were all packed up and ready to leave - hugs all around - I just couldn't walk out the door. I couldn't walk out that door knowing it was the last time. I was overwhelmed. Tom and the girls started packing up the car and I just sat on the steps - bewildered - overwhelmingly sad and totally surprised by my own emotions. Aunt Jennie sat down next to me. I've probably got a good 6 or 7 inches on her, but she sat down next to me and put her arm around me. I instinctively buried my head in her shoulder and sobbed. I felt guilty even as I was doing it. This was HER home. She shouldn't have been comforting me, I should have been comforting her. She didn't speak, except to say, "I know, Tam, it's ok. I know." I didn't speak at all. I didn't have any words.

I had never lived there, but it was home. And I'd never see it again.

Tom used to get annoyed - well, probably more hurt than annoyed - with me when I referred to going to my parents house as going home. But it is. My parents house is small and humble - nothing too special, certainly not in comparison to the McMansions springing up all over the place. But it makes me feel so recharged when I spend some time there - even just a very little bit of time. Recharged. Grounded. Loved. Home.

My mother always referred to her mother's house as home. "Going up home".

My grandmother referred to her mother's house as home - long after her mother had passed away, when she asked one of us to drive her to their town to visit relatives she would say, "Can you drive me down home sometime this weekend?" So even without her mother, that place was still home.

Dad's was always "The Homestead". Now the homestead conjures up images of a big sprawling ranch to me. If it does the same for you, erase that image right now. Dad's homestead - where his parents raised nine children - was a two bedroom house set up on a small hill. That's right. Nine children. Two bedrooms. The parents had a room, the girls shared a room, and the boys slept in the attic. This sounds like a nightmare to me! It sounds like home to Dad.

Because home is more than a house - and I think it's also more than the people who inhabit the house. I still love my Aunt Jennie. I still love visiting her and spending time with her in her big ole sprawling house. But it's not home.

I think it's perhaps a complicated equation involving a place and people and perhaps even time. Home has a feel and a smell and a sound. Home is a multi-sensory experience. Home cannot be forced or manufactured; home just needs to be.

Maybe I'm overthinking it (what? me? no!).

It is what it is and you know it when you feel it. What feels like home to you?

The One Where There's Cussing

I visited briefly with my parents last weekend (No! That's not what the cussing is about!). They were recalling a family vacation, taken when I was quite young. I told them I had one and only one very clear memory from that trip. We were looking at airplanes - I don't know if there was an air show or a museum or what - but there were lots of small planes. Like boats, most had a name and many were elaborately painted. One plane in particular had a picture of a red-headed pin-up girl posing provocatively painted on its side. This plane was called "The Strawberry Bitch". Old enough to sound out words, but not old enough to understand this particular word combination, I asked what 'bitch' meant. My mother turned the most interesting shades of reds and purples and said something on the order of, "That's a bad word! I never want to hear you say that word again, do you understand me? Never!" Her eye was twitching and she was pretty shaken up. I like to imagine that my sister and I looked at each other and smiled. "Bitch!" one of us would say - the whole rest of the day - causing the whole reaction all over again. In fairness to us, she really should have just calmly explained to us what it meant and why it was bad. But she didn't. She just gave it - and us - power. I remember later that night, returning to our travel trailer. My sister and I made a game of hiding in all the spots we could fit into that we knew she couldn't and yelling "BITCH!" periodically. I'm not positive, but I think by the end of the night Mom may have been weeping.

Before you think my sister and I are TOO awful, please remember that we had absolutely no idea what this word meant. Honest.

Flash forward. I'm a mom with children of my own. They are clamoring for ice cream. As I am scooping it out, they are standing so close to me I can hardly breathe. The dog wants in on whatever action is taking place, so she starts jockeying for position, too. They bump me and a scoop of ice cream lands squarely on the dogs head. Before I have a chance to think, I've exclaimed, "SHIT!" The moment it's out of my mouth I'm sorry. I get on my knees - eye level with the little girls - and say, "I am so sorry. I said a bad word and I shouldn't have. I'm very sorry that I said that. Do you forgive me?" My eldest immediately offered her forgiveness and I thanked her. Off she went with her ice cream.

The youngest held back. "I forgive you, Mommy, but I don't know what bad word you said. I only heard you say shit." She had the sweetest little baby voice...

"That's the bad word."

"Shit is a bad word?"

"Yes. Please stop saying it. I'm very sorry I said it." It was starting to sound REALLY ugly by now.

"But I don't even know why shit is a bad word. Shit doesn't SOUND bad. Why is shit bad, anyway?"

She's said it five times by now, if you haven't been keeping the tally.

By this point my husband has removed himself to the next room and is doing that silent laughing thing in my direct line of vision. You know it. It's the laughing you do when you know it's completely inappropriate to laugh but you couldn't stop yourself if you tried and the harder you try to stop the worse it gets. His face was red. I'm pretty sure he was producing tears. His whole body was shaking. He wasn't gonna be any help.

Well, shit. How am I gonna get out of this one?

But get out of it I did.

Being the (ultra-classy) super-genius that I am, though, I didn't learn from my mistake. A month or two later the eldest is in kindergarten. The youngest is in pre-school, but this was one of her days off. She was playing downstairs. I was folding laundry upstairs with the door shut. There was a floor and a door between us. I took a phone call that frustrated me. Upon hanging up, I quietly muttered, "stupid, fucking stupid."

Immediately I hear, "Awwwwwwwwwww!!!!! Mommy said a baaaaaaaad word!!!!!!!"

Oh, shit.

The little pitcher had made her way upstairs while I was on the phone, big ears and all.

You know the drill. Down on my knees. Eye level. Hands on shoulders.

"I sure did, and I'm not very proud of myself. I'm sorry I said that and I'm sorry you heard it. Will you forgive me?"

She maintained eye contact and said, very sincerely, "I do forgive you, Mommy. But you know you should never say stupid."

Cinco de Mayo

Hola! Hoy es Cinco de Mayo. No es una dia muy importante por los Mexicanos, pero es una dia mucho importante por los Norteamericanos a beber la tequila. Y la cerveza. Pero mas importante? La tequila.

Me gusto mucho la tequila.

Ok, here's the thing: don't jump all over me for my ridiculous butchering of the Spanish language. It is, as they say, limited by disuse. There's a very good reason my use has been limited. Like to hear about it? I thought you might.

All those many years ago when I lived in Texas I had a job which required me to communicate on a daily basis with Spanish speaking Mexicans. I dealt with one gentleman in particular very regularly. He always communicated with very broken and labored English.

One day I thought to myself (I thought), "I speak Spanish very well! Why am I making him struggle with his English when we could be communicating so easily in Spanish?" I thought this, you see, because I had taken four years of high school Spanish and three years of college Spanish. I'd always gotten pretty easy 'A's' and my teachers had always complimented me on both my speaking and writing . Yepperdee, I was one confident communicator.

Folks, if I could remember what I said to him that day, I would tell you, but I can't. It was a long time ago, for one thing, and for another, what happened next is such a vivid memory that it easily supercedes whatever inconsequential words I uttered to inspire it.

What happened, after I made an earnest effort to speak to him in his native tongue was: he laughed. He didn't just laughed. He LAUGHED!!! Not lol or LOL, but ROTFLMAO!!!!! He doubled over, holding his belly with both hands. He wiped away a tear and laughed some more.

I stood there, confused, trying to figure out what I'd said or done that was so funny. "What? Que? What?" His only response was more laughter. When he came up for air, I asked, in English, "What is so funny?"

"What you say!"

"What I said was funny?"

"Si" he answered, barely managing to stifle another giggle fit.

"What did I say that was so funny? I want to know so that I can correct it."

He paused for a moment and clearly considered his answer. "I think it was no so much what you say. It was how you say. Here, people say Spanish bad with Texas accent. This I hear. I never hear no one say Spanish bad with Yankee accent before. You sound so funny!" He let out one more giggle, but this one was more controlled. "Sorry for laughing." he added. I watched him mocking my pronunciation and shaking his head as he walked away.

That, my friends, was the very last time I attemped to speak Spanish. My confidence was shot all to hell. So was my desire to make things easier for him. He wants to laugh? He can struggle with his damn English. You won't catch me making an effort again.

Years later, when I was teaching ESOL, I retold this story many times.

I learned a lesson that day. Respect the effort. If he had gently corrected my word choice or my pronunciation - even if he'd chuckled a little when he did it - I would have learned and possibly even improved. We could have learned together. As it was? I gave up. I didn't need to be laughed at and I'd be damned if I was going to set myself up for that again.

We both lost out that day.

So I guess I'm just saying, appreciate the effort.

Comprende?

Y tambien? Una tequila mas, por favor.

What's In Your Wallet - er - um - Bag?

Last week, Jenny Penny over at Welcome to My Momplex discussed finding yourself in your bag in a most delightful way. It made me take pause and wonder if I was indeed hiding in my bag, too. As luck would have it, this brilliant idea occurred to me at a bar (where so many brilliant ideas are hatched then forgotten). I was talking to my husband, my sister and one of our friends about the post and how I was gonna go ahead and look for myself.

I emptied my bag on the bar. I had my own wallet and Olivia's wallet. Nothing too telling there. Phone, keys. Pretty standard. No less than three notebooks and a handful of pens in varying colors. A mostly neglected datebook. A camera. A library book. A reusable shopping bag. And my pizza schlepping apron.

My husband's man bag yielded a first aid kit, an umbrella, several pens, a highlighter, chapstick, a mostly neglected journal, an eyeglass cleaner kit, a reusable shopping bag, a magazine, a wallet, keys, and a phone.

My sister's bag contained a lot of smaller bags. Two for coins alone. Whether she separates them by denomination or what, I do not know. But it wouldn't surprise me. She had the lovely eyeball bag I'd made for her when she first started having problems with her eye. It contained meds and supplies for taking care of said eye. She had a little wind-up walking eyeball toy. She had 2 hair picks and some hair wax. She had another little bag dedicated to feminine supplies. (These, too, found their way onto the bar) She had several tubes of chapstick. She had sunglasses and reading glasses - each ensconced in their own container. She had several little 'business card cases' full of gift cards. She had a toothbrush and toothpaste.

Her friend had a tiny little bag. I expected a wallet and a phone. But there was more. A lot more. She had nail files and nail glue (multiples of both). She had pictures of her kids in baggies. The pictures, not the kids. 'Cause that would be wrong. And, as I mentioned, her bag was way small. She had several lipsticks and chapsticks. And the piece de resistance? She had jelly and sugar packs pilfered from restaurant tables.

We talked about our quite different bags and the contents within and tried to determine what they said about us.

We decided that my husband was the boy scout - prepared for any eventuality.

My sister is clearly very interested in organization - there was a place for everything and everything was in its place. She also has a little thing about eyes.

Our friend had a completely random assortment of things she found necessary for her day to day existence. Perhaps indicative of the random nature of life? Perhaps just indicative of her mad love for individually-sized portions of jelly.

And me? It would appear that I like to document stuff. Weird revelation for a blogger, no?

Let Them Eat Cake

So my friend Beth says to me (she says), "We should take a cake decorating class."

"Oh, we totally should!!!"

She had recently purchased a cake decorating kit and was itchy to get some practice. I am always looking for an excuse to get out of my house. Seemed like a win.

But then we started looking at dates and schedules and decided we couldn't really make a multi-week commitment. I had taken a beginners course years ago, so we decided that we'd have a decorating day, armed only with what I remembered, what we could ascertain from the books I had saved from class, and any tutorials we could find on the interwebs. We are smart chickadees, and not entirely un-crafty - we could totally do this.

We figured the worst that would happen is that we'd end up eating an ugly cake.

We agreed that Beth would bake the cake and I would provide the frosting.

As I was awaiting her arrival, I made a batch of frosting and a batch of decorators icing. And I made an unexpected and completely accidental discovery. I have always liked wedding cake. I never knew why - seemed like it was just white cake with white frosting - which is fine and all, but just nothing I'd really go out of my way for. But wedding cake? Oooooh, I loved me some wedding cake. So today when I was preparing the frosting, I ran out of vanilla. I used all of the vanilla I had left in the frosting and there was none left for the decorators icing. On a whim I substituted almond. Just a little bit, not the full amount of flavoring that was called for.

And it tasted like everything I ever loved about wedding cakes. Awesome.

So Beth arrives with two beautiful from scratch layers of yummy chocolate cake.

And we realize that between us we have no food coloring or - more importantly - no decorators tips. I had books, and a practice board, and tons of parchment, but no tips.

Frick.

This experiment was gonna be pretty futile without those tips. So we started right off with a road trip to the craft store.

We got back and set to work.


This is what our two layers slapped together looked like. For my Western PA friends - does this not resemble a ginormous gob?


Beth got right to work frosting the cake.


Lea helped for a little while. Here she is piping on a little bit of the border.


And here's Beth piping some flowers directly onto Lea's finger. Yummy!


Our border looked a little something like this. It didn't resemble anything in the book, but we thought it was kinda cool.


Next step was some little blue flowers. We were pretty darn impressed with ourselves at this point.


Next we added these pretty peach flowers. Not bad for a couple novices with no real instruction, eh?

But then it got weird.

We started looking through the book and found instructions for making a little piped icing clown. And here we were with some horrifyingly hilarious clown head pics that I had found in the basement with my cake decorating supplies.

We did what anyone would do, I'm sure.


We made a two-headed scary clown.

With a booty that wouldn't quit..

Why two heads?

I think, perhaps, the more pertinent question would be, why not?

Why a bodacious booty? Child please.


Of course Pink got in on the act... And perhaps the vodka provides a little explanation for the two-headed booty clown.

Seriously, ya'll, You should have seen the concentration Miss Beth put into that booty. Can you see how she even raised one foot in a saucy flirty fashion? Man, we had WAY too much fun with that clown... We pictured it just gossiping and laughing away with - um - itself. Probably on a princess phone. And then we sang a little "Going Steady" from "Bye Bye Birdie". Because it seemed like the right thing to do. Because, really, when is bursting into song NOT the right thing to do?


So, in conclusion:

Delicious cake? Check.
Excellent company? Check.
Extemporaneous Show Tunes? Check.
Scary (but delightfully so!) Two Headed Clowns? Check

Sounds like a good day to me.