why did I come home again?

good question.

The joys of parenthood

I never realized how hard it would be to find those little metal buckets (you know the ones I mean; about 3 1/2 inches high, you see them stuffed with candy as a teacher present or whatever) or even just little plastic flowerpots! I mean, jeez! Dollar General - no. Ace Hardware - no. Target - no. Walmart - had some smallish plastic flowerpots, and some miniature washtubs, but none of those little buckets.

Washtubs it is.

So while I'm looking for little metal buckets, or little plastic flowerpots, we run into an old - I guess she's a friend; or used to be a friend. Gah. She's okay, just carries baggage with her from the past that I'd just as soon skip.

J sent me this AWESOME link - said he figured it was right up my alley, and that it reminded him of me, too. I went and read it.
WOW WOW WOW WOW
It's like - the me that could have been. I *wistful sigh* used to be a perfect size 6. Before I got happily married, mothered and domesticated, I had considered becoming a Geisha... and the brain on this chick! Here, go read her: Elle Wakefield

One of the links on her blog led me here: Nationmaster. She was talking about how the US spends more on defense than all the other countries of the world COMBINED, which was bad enough... I started poking around, looking at other statistics. I took a look at percentage of GDP spent on education by different countries, and just about swallowed my tongue.

WE COME AFTER LIBERIA? ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
We come FORTY SEVENTH:
#1 Moldova 10.3%
#2 Namibia 8.5%
#3 Denmark 7.7%
#4 South Africa 7.5%
#5 Uzbekistan 7.4%
#6 Barbados 7.3%
#7 Saudi Arabia 7.2%
#8 Sweden 7.1%
#9 Finland 7%
#10 New Zealand 6.9%
#11 Botswana 6.9%
#12 Norway 6.9%
#13 Israel 6.9%
#14 Jamaica 6.8%
#15 Cuba 6.7%
#16 Tunisia 6.6%
#17 Saint Lucia 6.5%
#18 Ukraine 6.4%
#19 Lesotho 6.4%
#20 Estonia 6.4%
#21 Jordan 6.4%
#22 Seychelles 6.3%
#23 Latvia 6.1%
#24 Congo, Democratic Republic of the 5.9%
#25 Ireland 5.7%
#26 Libya 5.7%
#27 France 5.6%
#28 Slovenia 5.4%
#29 Belarus 5.4%
#30 Australia 5.2%
#31 Fiji 5.2%
#32 Lithuania 5.2%
#33 Swaziland 5.1%
#34 Dominica 5%
#35 Austria 5%
#36 Venezuela 5%
#37 Netherlands 4.9%
#38 Macedonia, The Former Yugoslav Republic of 4.9%
#39 Liberia 4.9%
#40 Hungary 4.9%
#41 Morocco 4.9%
#42 Bolivia 4.8%
#43 Panama 4.8%
#44 Belize 4.8%
#45 Saint Vincent and the Grenadines 4.7%
#46 United Kingdom 4.7%
#47 United States 4.7%
(Caveat: this data is from 1990-99.)

fever dreams...

Middle school sucked. Add Higgins (from Magnum PI) as your French teacher, and then have him teaching you art that day. Add pissed off new student who gets upset with Higgin's evaluation of her French skills and proceeds to beat the living dogsh*# out of him.

There was lots more, but the mental image that stays with me is sitting in a room in the teachers-only area with my mother (the science teacher) and Higgins, picking fragments of the bicycle (that the girl used to help beat him with) out of his skin with tweezers from my keychain multitool.

It doesn't FEEL like winter...

I want one of these!

While putting the kids to bed tonight, I had a couple of interesting invention ideas.

For deaf people, a wristwatch that has an alarm function that rather than beeping, pokes you. Some sort of mechanical mechanism that makes bumps stick out rather than a beep, or vibrates, or maybe a tiny shock or something - great for deaf people or people who want a silent alarm that isn't obvious say, in a meeting, or in a movie...

altho, now that I think about it, I think I can do that with my cellphone. Hrm.

Altho a deaf person wouldn't have a cellphone, now that I re-read it.

Anyway, the other idea I had (as I was trying to put the kids to bed and the damn phone kept ringing) was some sort of device that you could connect between the phones and the wall (like the DSL filters we have) that had a centrally located button that you could push that would prevent the phones from ringing. ('cause if you've got 5 phones in the house, it's a pain to go around and turn all the ringers off, and if you take the phone off the hook, then nobody can get thru.) When a person called it would answer and say "we're currently trying to put the children to bed, if this is an emergency please press 1, otherwise please leave a message and we'll call you back." so if they pressed 1, the phones would ring, and if not, it would forward them to your voice mail.

Dinner party yesterday was awesome - and our house is gorgeous, and the food was incredible, and I had about 7 people not come, but all the rest were there and it was wonderful.

J & Patrick are still working, so I have the house to myself... it's kinda nice; clean, decorated for christmas house, I got the kids to bed & asleep by 8:30... quiet, calming...

*contented sigh*

I've taken this before, but it's interesting to see what's changed since then...

Your Results:

The top score on the list below represents the faith that Belief-O-Matic, in its less than infinite wisdom, thinks most closely matches your beliefs. However, even a score of 100% does not mean that your views are all shared by this faith, or vice versa.

Belief-O-Matic then lists another 26 faiths in order of how much they have in common with your professed beliefs. The higher a faith appears on this list, the more closely it aligns with your thinking.

1. Unitarian Universalism (100%)
2. Liberal Quakers (96%)
3. Neo-Pagan (89%)
4. New Age (86%)
5. Mahayana Buddhism (82%)
6. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (81%)
7. Theravada Buddhism (80%)
8. Reform Judaism (75%)
9. Secular Humanism (72%)
10. Bahá'í Faith (69%)
11. New Thought (69%)
12. Taoism (67%)
13. Orthodox Quaker (66%)
14. Scientology (66%)
15. Jainism (64%)
16. Sikhism (62%)
17. Nontheist (58%)
18. Hinduism (57%)
19. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (50%)
20. Orthodox Judaism (47%)
21. Islam (46%)
22. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (40%)
23. Seventh Day Adventist (37%)
24. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (31%)
25. Eastern Orthodox (23%)
26. Roman Catholic (23%)
27. Jehovah's Witness (15%)

My mother, bless her Roman Catholic soul, would probably be saddened to learn that it barely made the list. (Of course, I doubt her test results would make R.C. the top choice either.)

What a week

Colonoscopy, sick kids, sick me...

Reminds me of a joke.

"bitch, bitch, bitch...
whine, whine, whine...
You wanted a puppy, so I got you a puppy
you wanted a baby, so I got you a baby
now the puppy eats the baby and what do you do?
bitch, bitch, bitch...
whine, whine, whine!"

Anyway. Hope everyone out there is survivng well & happily; Let's go out & have coffee some time.

Shower thoughts...

Got up early today; am planning on taking M to school and then coming back to take J for his colonoscopy. Poor man - he said he might not be able to be that far away from a bathroom, or he'd come with me.

While I was washing my hair, I had a sudden thought.

I'm going to run for elected office.

(I have a lot of hair, so I had a lot of time to think about this in the shower.)

After reading the latest news about who's taken money from Abramoff, how pork is attached to bills, how congressmen vote for bills having hardly read them, or read just the summaries.... hell, I can do a better job than that.

I'm crazy, you say? Welll, yes, but evidently 18% of the American people will have a mental disorder at some point in their lives, so at least I'm representative of the population, you know?

Sordid past - yup. So what? I definitely learned from my mistakes.

Kids are awake - gotta go get them ready to go. What do you think?

Note to self:

colonoscopies are not for the faint of heart.

Not because having a camera shoved up your ass is less than enjoyable, but because hyperosmotic laxatives are fucking evil.

I can't wait for the weekend.

Bleah

This is the second or third time I've opened up this web page to make an entry, and gone "eh..." and ended up closing it without typing anything.

I had two moments of cheerfulness on the way home this afternoon - drove through two rainbows! I think Moira saw them when I pointed to them, too. I'm not sure.

I'm at that place in my life when I'd like to make a few friends so I have somebody to talk with during the day - but the idea of going out and meeting new people is exhausting. People suck, as a general rule, and I just don't have the energy to use on sucky people right now.

Speaking of sucky people, if I ever doubted it, I now have proof that karma really does come back around.

My Adiumy is a turkey wearing a pilgrim hat.

I think I'm going to see if I can find any sane, mature people who want to play some sort of role playing game. I was looking over the 3.5 edition players' handbook last night... interesting new stuff. J also showed me Victoriana which I think I'd enjoy.

Moira is still sick. She's evidently like me when I was a kid - get a cold; develop a secondary ear infection. *sigh*

It's a wonderful rainy November day here - not very cold; great napping weather. I'm hoping to get both kids asleep so I can check out for a little while.

I'm looking forward to my date on Saturday! I didn't even realize it, but the new Harry Potter is coming out, and J's taking me to the movies! Hopefully our babysitter is available.

More babbling another time.

Does this make me a soccer mom?

Christmas came early!

This should make the trips to Tennessee this Christmas and St. Louis in January much more comfortable. :)

EEEEEEEEEE!!!

As I sit here working on our family webpage, J is playing Neverwinter Nights - he's playing a druid with a hawk companion.

Heeheeheehee

I can't wait to start playing!

It's been so long, I'd forgotten what it was like...

Euphemisms are a wonderful thing.

Am slogging through the days lately. So much to do, so little energy. Sometimes my brain is revving at 300+mph, and sometimes I'm in neutral. It's been hard on the transmission.

Had weird dreams last night. Probably hormone inspired. It was old home night; there were many many many people from my past in this dream. Oddly enough, though, it wasn't a BAD dream.

Wow I'm tired. I wonder if the kids will let me get a nap today.

shower thoughts

Was thinking about what I heard on Wait Wait Don't Tell Me earlier - the Journey song that became the theme song for the Chicago White Sox - after they won the world series, there were probably a ton of fans who ran out and bought it.

And then I thought no, they probably ran home and downloaded it.

And then I thought you know, I think the peer to peer sharing network thing is karmic retribution to the music industry for all those decades of fucking over the artists.

Just a glimpse into how my train of thought works.

And there's the caboose!

Happy Fitzween

I don't feel it's Fitzmas yet. I'm hoping for more. Because I don't think Libby did it on his own.

As my friend said - one rat bastard down...

I wish I could put this on a bumpersticker

This makes some excellent points and would probably remind some people of some of the facts they have forgotten. So, all you supporters of the Iraq war, read on:

".....
Yesterday, the President also said:

"Some have also argued that extremism has been strengthened by the actions of our coalition in Iraq, claiming that our presence in that country has somehow caused or triggered the rage of radicals. I would remind them that we were not in Iraq on September the 11th, 2001 -- and al Qaeda attacked us anyway. The hatred of the radicals existed before Iraq was an issue, and it will exist after Iraq is no longer an excuse."

.....
let's just deal with facts and the way that they are perceived in the Arab world. America (and it various partners) were in Iraq before 9/11. We virtually occupied Kuwait militarily and had a presence in much of the Gulf region, including the Islamic epicenter Saudi Arabia, as part of our decade-long containment and confrontation with Saddam Hussein. We operated CIA paramilitaries and special operations forces throughout the Kurdish zone (Iraqi territory), collecting intelligence, fomenting coups, supporting an insurgency against Baghdad. We were bombing Iraq regularly as part of our enforcement of the southern and northern no fly zones, and we were carrying out even larger bombing campaigns to support United Nations inspections or to exact unilateral retribution. We were doggedly maintaining sanctions until Iraq cried uncle.

So yes, "the hatred of the radicals" existed before Iraq was an issue, mister President, but Iraq was an issue.

Virtually every 9/11 hijacker, virtually every suicide bomber and insurgent in Iraq today grew up in a world where the stand-off in Iraq symbolized a war with the Arab world. Load on top of that a far more consequential concern about the plight of the Palestinian people, and mix in grievances about the bombings of Afghanistan and Sudan, the notions of occupations in Somalia and Kosovo, civilian casualties always framed as America's fault, even the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.

The common theme is the impunity of America and the subjugation of the Arab and Islamic (and the powerless) to the western world.

And now in societies where half of the population is under the age of 15, it is not regime change and the grand democratic experiment in Iraq that resonates: it is fighting the omnipotent.

The White House and much of Washington continues to be stuck in a post 9/11 nightmare where I believe the groupthink imagines a monumental threat to the United States and western society that just doesn't exist.

Yes, President Bush, extremism will exist after Iraq. It is made all the more potent and rewarding as we bumble about labeling it "evil" and ignoring what it feeds on.

We may fantasize about a great crusade we are embarked upon, but our greatest danger in the future is a tin ear we also have to Islam's and al Qaeda's equal fantasies. Their fantasies, and our actions, like it or not, drive the violence all around us."



Pass it on.

We're done!!!!

*Dance about, clap hands with glee*

Not only did we finish getting the last of our crap out of the old house last night at midnight thirty, but I get home and get to take a luxurious shower whilst my husband tells me that 50% of people polled think that if Bush lied about the reasons for war in Iraq that he should be impeached. And yes, before you ask, there WERE republicans that were asked. 20% of them said yes. *grin*

Now I just have to figure out our budget and try to get rid of a few bills. *sigh*

News update!

Jeremy must be part cat, because I think he just used up one of his nine lives.

He's at home. From the ICU. He's got a broken wrist, and has to go to the neurologist to check him out because of the brain swelling. He said he has a killer headache, but otherwise seems in good shape.

Fucking amazing.

And I don't have to beat the shit out of him for riding in the back of a truck, either - he was sitting on the side chatting while the truck was idling; the driver didn't realize he was sitting there and floored it, which of course sent Jeremy flying.

I feel much better now.

I'd be screaming in frustration if I had the energy

God I wish we were done moving.

*sorta collapses into bed*

Did I mention I had a really bizarre dream night before last that I seduced Mel Gibson & he fell for me? 'Course, I was way hotter in my dream than I am in real life at the moment. I looked like my 19 yr old self. Ironically, when I was 19, I had a mental impression of my body that I was fat & unattractive. Now that I'm 30, every time I look in the mirror I am shocked that I don't look like the 20 yr old that the inside of my head still expects to see... I look more like the mental impression of myself that I had when I was 19. What a gyp.

Anyway, today was interesting. Stayed up way too fricking late reading comics, news, setting up NewsFire, etc. last night. M woke me up around 6 or 7... I think I managed to get both of them back to sleep at about 10. We were all originally going out to dinner to celebrate my dad's 85th birthday, but Sue's husband Jim (who also just had a birthday) was sick and so they couldn't go, and mom said she had too many papers to grade, and it's parents' weekend at FSU and there's a football game, so it would be hell at any restaurant, etc. - so J says he wants to go cook dinner for dad instead.

Some of J's boss's family lives in New Hampshire, and he'd given us homemade dark maple syrup (damn, is it good), so J made a pecan crusted pork loin that had been brined in Strongbow cider & maple syrup. Black eyed peas, greens, dad made cornbread (yes, we asked the birthday boy to make the cornbread - nobody else's is as good), J & I made this absofuckinglutely DIVINE salad - roma tomatoes, yellow tomatoes, shallots, roasted garlic clove antipasto, some sweet onion, lemon juice, and salt/pepper/spices - I'm drooling just thinking of it. Italian creme cake for dessert (dad really liked it; I was proud of picking out something different for him this year rather than a german chocolate cake like always - this might even become a new favorite!) and then we got out the music.

It was a wonderful evening. M was dancing to Tom T. Hall, Boots Randolph, the Louvin Brothers, Dylan (played Bear Mountain Picnic Massacre for mom, who laughed out loud at it), Marty Robbins... J sat down with dad and played him some great music, which I loved to see.

After dinner and dessert, while J & dad were listening to music in the living room, I actually remembered to take the compost can out for dad - however, either the liner of this can is leaking, or something had slipped between the liner and the can, because when I lifted it out it was positively COATED in eggs and maggots. EEEEEWWWW. Fortunately I'm not squeamish, so I picked up the handles and was taking it outside when one of the handles came off and the can crashed to the floor. It remained upright, so there wasn't rotten produce to clean up - but a whole lot of maggots had gotten shaken loose onto the floor. EEEEEWWWWW So I'm now trying to figure out a way to get maggots off a linoleum floor. It's a bamboo green color, and mom couldn't see the maggots, so I was trying to get them up - let me tell you, best method I found: broom and dustpan. Maggots are kinda cylindrical, so they roll into the dustpan like little squirmy rice grains. (Once they were in the dustpan mom could definitely see them, and was massively grossed out.) Mom jokes about it being an ending to a wonderful evening - and then the phone rings.

It's the 2nd grade teacher at mom's school (who, btw, was MY second grade teacher, and whose birthday is the same day as mine) who mom (indeed, my entire family) has been friends with for years. I'm in the living room, and I hear mom say in that voice that is not like any other, "Oh My God... Oh My God..." So I drift towards her to make sure she's okay and to find out what's up.

Most of you probably don't know this, but I used to tutor children. Math and science, mostly. Jeremy was a kid I tutored in science - he was smart, could be a sweetie, could also be somewhat ignorant - came from a conservative family, I think - anyway, not Nobel Peace Prize brilliant here, but definitely had potential. Lazy and disorganized, so I kinda identified with him. ;) He was a ninth grader this year. He was riding in the back or on the side of a pickup truck, and fell out - he has massive brain damage and they're not sure if he's going to survive.

I used to think I was cold & unfeeling. I've never had anybody REALLY close to me die - kids I'd gone to school with, friends of my parents, my ex-husband's grandmother... and while it was sad, I never really felt deeply touched. First time I saw my dad cry was pretty rough... and when Daniel's dad died in a car accident I felt awful for Daniel, but didn't really know his dad... but none of it was personal. Perhaps it's because I'm now a mother; I have a son. I knew Jeremy's mom. I'd kidded her about keeping Jeremy on his toes with his homework, prodding him to be organized... I'd chatted with Jeremy and two girls he hung out with/dated, and gotten an interesting glimpse into the life of a young adult... I can't imagine what his mother is going through right now, but in some ways, I can...

And after leaving my parents' house, both J & I admitted to having premonitions that dad won't make it to his next birthday... hell, I had the feeling he wouldn't make it to tomorrow morning. I hope we're wrong on that one.

So, off to soothe my son back to sleep for the 2nd or 3rd time tonight... having a stuffed up nose sucks, poor guy.

I love Friday nights

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.