There are a few things in this life that I just don't understand. Actually, there are several. Truth be told about it, there are so many that a lot of the time it keeps me in a state of mild confusion.

Thing number one: They used to have cigarette commercials on TV. Now, I don't remember ever seeing any when I was young because they have been banned from commercials for a verrrrrrry long time. Question is: why do they still have commercials for beer, wine, whiskey and a host of other alcoholic beverages on TV? Not understanding this at all. I have never personally heard of anyone hitting someone with their car while they were under the influence of nicotine. I have also never seen someone try to beat the mess out of someone three times their size because they had been smoking. And there has never, in my recollection, been heard by any spouse or significant other "Honey, I'm sorry. It was a one night stand. We had been smoking cigarettes all night and I don't really remember the rest of it." Just curious......maybe the tobacco companies weren't willing to pay the government as much money as the alcohol companies. Hmmmmm..........

Thing number two: What happened to excessive skin exposure on TV being a late night thing? I can be watching cartoons and all of a sudden a deodorant commercial with the half-dressed woman dancing in the leather pants at the club comes on. My kids have the rest of their lives to see half-dressed women once they get grown. I don't think they need to see it on the commercial break of "Sponge Bob".

Number three: What is really going on with "sport tampons"? What in the world is a "sport tampon"? Women have been playing sports with the same old non-athletic tampons for years. Next thing you know, they'll be selling "extreme tampons" or maybe even "extreme sports gel tampons". Are they trying to get men to buy them? We all know that pretty much only men can be swayed by a product with the words "sport", "extreme", or "magnum" on it.

Four: What has happened to Cartoon Network?? Used to be the place for me all night long, with "Tom and Jerry" and "Cow and Chicken" and even "Johnny Bravo". Now, all they have on after 7 p.m. is Adult Swim. And my cable company is telling me that I can add Cartoon Network "Original" on to my cable lineup for only "a few dollars a month." Ummm.......no. Why can't adults pay the extra for Adult Swim and keep the cartoons on for the kids? Just another example of grown-ups ruining everything fun.

And last but not least.....why do doctors make you wait 2 weeks for the results of any test when they know they can have the results back in about 24 hours? And why, oh why, do they tell you that your appointment is at a certain time and please don't be late when they know, they KNOW, that the doctor is actually overbooked and you are going to be sitting in that waiting room for at least 2 hours reading those same crappy out of date Ladies Home Journal and Fish and Stream magazines from 1994??

Sorry about the kvetching.......but sometimes ya gotta let it out on screen so you don't let it out on your husband:)

Peace allllllll...................

Saturdays and Random Stuff

So, I thought I would check out this new template and see if it worked for me. I dunno......looks a little too shushi fushi....but we'll see.

Anyhooooo......I hate Saturdays. Hate may be too strong of a word though. Loathe, detest, dislike immensely maybe. Saturdays are boring, there's never anything on TV, and all the yard wark is just staring you in the face like "Are you gonna get to me TODAY maybe?" And with Grover working six days a week, it's just like Friday except without the paycheck and any good movies. I find it hard to believe that I spent all those years as a kid looking forward to this day of the week and now I just wish it would hurry up and go by. Grover says it's because Saturday is a play day for people and I've forgotten how to play. I haven't forgotten......I just don't have time! By the time I finish cooking and cleaning and cutting the grass and cleaning some more and bandaging cuts and scrapes and bee stings and washing the dog and washing the car and all the mundane junk associated with my life these days, I really do not have time, much less energy, to play. And that's kinda sad.

Moving on......

Lukas, who is 4 and a half, is now working on simple addition. He can read and write his ABC's and he loves math but he has no interest at the present time in learning how to read words. I'm trying and he's resisting. But I'm pretty confident he'll start within the week. That's how he is. He has to do it in his own time and his own way. Fortunately, his own time is pretty quick.

However, Jakob, who is 3 and a half, is now reading. Everything. Anything. He just started out of the blue last Monday when I was working with Lukas. I was going over words with Lukas when Jakob came up and just started reading the list. After a moment, as it is with reading, Lukas got bored and went on to more interesting things. So I tried to see just how far Jakob could go with this reading thing. He did pretty well, if I may say so. The biggest word he got was "submarine." It was incredibly exciting for me (of course, I am his mom.....that may make all the difference.)

Joshua, who is almost 14 now (4 more years buddy and you're outta here!;)) is in a dance group. They have been involved in a local competition and have made it all the way to the semi-finals. The finals are next week. That, plus band, and his new found fascination with weight lifting has been enough to keep him out of trouble this summer, so far anyway.

My goddaughter, Terriana, is leaving for Florida today. She's spending the rest of the summer with her dad. So, by the time she gets back (and we deprogram her from 2 months of being spoiled rotten:)) she'll be ready for the 1st grade.

And the dogs are outside, rolling around in the grass play fighting and the cats are in the house rolling around on the carpet play fighting. And Lukas and Jakob are just fighting......don't think there's any play in this one. Aaaaaahhh, brothers......gotta love 'em cause you can't shoot 'em :)

Well, that's my Saturday. How about yours?

Peace alllllllllllllllllllll..............................

Numbering My Days

There is a verse in the Bible, where it is escapes me just now. It says something to the effect of "Lord, teach me to number my days." Now, I could go off on a whole tangent about this but.....well, you know what? I think I will.

The whole upshot of this verse is to never take a day for granted. It could be your last. And this is really heavy on my mind today because yesterday was a very strange day. It seemed like everyone, and by everyone I mean EVERYONE, even the cats, was tripping about one thing of the other. Everyone wanted to walk around with a chip on their shoulder, some pebble sized and some big ole boulder sized. (We won't discuss what size mine was, suffice it to say I was walking with a serious lean.) And late last night when I was lying in bed, it came to me: this could have been a wonderful day and we just about ruined it because none of us wanted to keep it that way. We all wanted to act ignorant and demand what we wanted when we wanted it and act as if the whole world should have paid attention. It was sort of a messed up day and we're the ones that messed it up.

And it may have been our last.

Oh, no, nothing dangerous or bad or unfortunate happened. But what if it had? What if we hadn't made it through to see today? The best thing that anyone could have said about our last day was....."Well, they seemed to be in a bad mood all day....man, that sucks." The last memory my children would have had of me is that I was not my normal outgoing, effervescent, ebullient self.....that I was a grouch.

Everyone is entitled to a moment every once in a while. A moment. Not a day, a week, or a lifetime. How much time, how many days have you wasted being in a bad mood, being upset, being ticked off or frustrated?

I'm not saying you should walk around singing "Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy" all day every day. We are, after all, only human. But take into account how much energy you are putting into negativity, and how much time you are wasting.

I do not want to look back at the end of my life and say "Man, i could have done so much more if I would have only gotten my head out of my butt and the chip off my shoulder and just done it." I want to live every day as if it were my last, and accomplish as much as I can in a 24 hour period. Carpe Diem and all that. I want everyone I love to know that I love them every day, even if I am having a moment. And I want those moments to be shorter and fewer and farther between. Because, all in all, it's a good life and, when it isn't, half the time the fault can be traced back to me.

Live like you were dying and I think you'll live a lot better.

Amen.

Peace allllllll.................................

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY GROVER!!!!

And because it's your day, you get the big piece of chicken tonight. (Yes, I'm talking about dinner people, nothing else!)

And Happy Father's Day to the rest of you wonderful gentlemen out there. Enjoy it while you can. Tomorrow's Monday, remember:)

Peace allllllll...............................

Lessons Learned

For the past couple of days, I have had the distinct, if dubious, honor of babysitting mine and Grover's goddaughters. Their mom had to go to Atlanta for a couple of days to take care of some business, didn't want to drag them down there for 3 days and so here we are. They are both girls, aged 6 and 2. Add to that my two boys and we have four children, 6,4,3 and 2. Whoo hoo!! What fun. And what a learning oppurtunity this has been for me. For example:

I learned exactly how many stuffed animals it takes to fill up 2 blue plastic wading pools that are already full of water. Answer? 24

I learned that yes, if properly lying face down and head down, 3 people CAN go down a slide at the same time.

I learned that the 6 year old wants to grow up and marry the 3 year old and the 2 year old wants to grow up and marry the 4 year old.

I learned that alllllll children under the age of 4 will take their clothes off once they go outside.

Foxy the dog learned what it is like to be ridden by a 2 year old.

I learned that my children are abnormally tall for their ages (3&4) as they had to bend down to hug the girls (2&6 respectively).

The cats learned how to swim.

The boys learned that if two people are on the monkey bars and they meet in the middle, that the boy is obligated to jump down so the girl can finish. They also learned that if they do NOT do this, they may get whopped one.

I am used to carrying my boys to bed if they fall asleep on the couch. They weigh 60 and 45 pounds. What I am NOT used to is carrying someone who doesn't weigh that much. The two year old fell asleep and I bent down to pick her up and thought she would be heavier than she was. Upshot of that was I almost tossed her over my shoulder like a bag of potato chips. Good thing she's flexible;)

I learned that when you say something to a two year old and they say "Huh?" and you repeat yourself 5 times and each time they say "Huh?" to stop after the second time. Why? Because if someone else asks them what you just said they can repeat it word for word. They were just messing with your head. Why? Because they can.

If you see a 4 year old and a 6 year old standing in the corner of the yard talking to each other break them up....they are up to no good.

Ditto on the 3 year old and the 2 year old.

But the most important thing I learned is this: when it is summertime and the sun is beginning to set and there is a cool breeze blowing......and you can smell the honeysuckle in the air.....and you watch children running and laughing and occasionally stopping just to turn their face up to the sky and smile in the purest form of praise there is....

And when you see them all sitting on your bed watching "SpongeBob" and they are laughing with the exuberance that only innocence can provide.......

And when you see them sleeping peacefully, even if they are hanging half-way off of the bed....

Don't interrupt. Just enjoy.

Teach your children well. But learn as well as you teach.

Peace alllllll.......................

Corneas and Commotion

Okay, so remember I had mentioned in a previous post that I had had a scratched cornea? Well, that diagnosis came at the very end of the best time I have ever had in a hospital. Let me tell ya the story:

The day that I got this injury, Grover was at work so he couldn't take me to the emergency room. Well, that was okay, because Rachel was home and she said that she would do it. So we dropped the kids off over at Tara's house (Rachel's daughter) and proceeded to go to the hospital. Now, bear in mind that I only have one contact in, I can't really see very sharply, the bad eye is red and just running water when I open it so I'm keeping it closed. This sort of gives me the pirate look without the eye patch. So, we're going down the road and everytime we stop at a red light, I look over at the car next to us and go "Aaarrrgh!" Fortunately, road rage is not really common around here or else I may have ended up in the hospital with something much worse, like some broken bones.

So, we get to the ER and I sign in and get triaged and everything and in a relatively short amount of time, I am taken back to Direct Care. Now, for those of you who don't know, Direct Care is a separate section of the ER, pretty much reserved for bumps and bruises and colds and corneas......nothing too severe ever shows up in Direct Care. They send people who are realllly in trouble to Trauma. So I'm glad that this is where I am going because it's a looooooot faster this way. This is where the trouble starts.

I'm lying back on the gurney (it's in one of those open bay areas) and I have the head part of it up. Rachel is sitting by me with her feet on the bottom of the gurney. You know that lever that says "PUSH" to release the top of the bed? Well, see, it doesn't matter whether you push it with your hands or your feet, as I found out really quickly when the head of the bed dropped completely down unannounced, almost flipping me upside down onto the floor. Turns out Rachel had accidentally kicked it. Accidentally? Yeah, right.

While I was waiting to see the doctor, the area started filling with patients. Some of them looked like they didn't feel well or were in pain. But some of them looked okay. (You know, sometimes pill heads will come in the ER with "symptoms" so they can get a pain prescription). So Rachel and I came up with an idea, which we didn't get to use. She said "You know, why don't we, whenever we see a patient come in here, sneak up behind them and yell "RUN!!!!" and if they run we'll know they don't really need to be here." I know you probably had to be there but this idea struck me as hilariously funny. I started laughing and couldn't stop. Now you have to have the visual here........I am sitting there looking like a pirate and braying like a donkey and Rachel.....well, when she laughs she sounds a lot like a hyena....seriously. And every time a new patient would come in or leave, we would look at each other and whisper loudly "RUN!!" and start laughing all over again.

It got to the point where one of the nurses had to come over and tell us get quiet or we would have to leave. We tried, I promise you we tried. Alas, we were not completely successful but it was enough to keep them from calling security.

I would like to take this moment to apologize to anyone we may have annoyed, irritated, frustrated or otherwise discombobulated that day in the ER. I understand that there are sick people here, yes nurse, I am sorry.

And if, the next time I go to the hospital, someone looks at me and yells "RUN!!!!", I'll know where they got it from;)

Peace allllllll.....................

One Tid And A Couple Of Bits

Well, since there really isn't a whole lot of interesting stuff on the news lately and no one has really gotten on my nerves in a couple of days, I thought that I would just throw out some relatively unknown facts about myself and my family. Some are a little weird and some are a little scary. Or that could just be me:

1. I hate flourescent colors. Have hated them since they hit their heyday in the 80's. They make my eyes hurt and they are just ugly.....really ugly.

2. I rock back and forth when I talk. Sometimes just a little bit...sometimes a lot. I once got so agitated during a conversation I actually rocked myself right on off of the couch.

3. My best friend, Rachel, sees dead people. For real, like in "The Sixth Sense"....she has since she was 4 years old and she is now 45....some she knows, some she doesn't. She doesn't sleep a lot.

4. I never clean the house before 1 p.m. and I actually prefer to clean it just one more time before I go to bed when everyone else is asleep. That way it doesn't get trashed and I wake up to a clean house, which makes my day much better.

5. I am ambidextrous....which translates to freak of nature;)

6. Every morning when I wake up, I say "This is the day that the Lord has made. I will rejoice and be glad in it." And somedays I have to remind myself of that:)

7. Whenver I catch a cold, I sleep on the couch. Don't know why..I think it is a comfort thing for me.

8. When I was little, we owned a black hen named Fay and about 30 rabbits. Have no idea why, but it was fun and fostered my love of animals.

9. I always mute the TV when commercials are on.

10. Rachel has a lot of illnesses. The last two times she was in the hospital she had to stay about a week each time. The bill was around $200,00.00 Yep, you read that right. And when the business office called her she told them she would be in on the first of the month to pay it off. The woman then proceeds to tell her "Okay, I'll put you down for the first." I'm sure Rachel will just make that payment tomorrow. She's a few days late.

11. Grover has selective hearing. He can't hear me say a thing unless the words "money" or "chocolate" come up. Then he'll wake up from a dead sleep;)

12. Lukas is afraid of cars coming into his room at night while he's asleep. (Because the headlights of cars going down our street shine through his window)

13. I'm afraid of Lukas coming into my room at night while I'm asleep. That means I'm going to get kicked at least 5 times before I give up and go out to the couch.

Okay, are you thoroughly bored yet? Yeah, I know...so am I. But never fear, someone's bound to interest me (or at least tick me off) in the next day or so;)

Peace allllllllll...................

Snob

Let's see.......what is the best way for me to put this? Okay, I think I've got it. Here we go:

I cannot tolerate a snob. An intellectual snob that is.

Everyone on this earth was born with a certain amount of intelligence, some more and some less than others. But most of us, by the time we are grown anyway, have figured out how to put our pants on and wave good-bye. Most of us also recognize the importance of a good joke, not to mention a good cheeseburger. I like to consider that our common thread of humanity.

I am not talking about everyone.....just a select few. You know, those people who are constantly trying to impress others with overt displays of their "intellectual superiority." The kind of people you see in public and you know, you just know, that when they go home, they put on their smoking jackets and puff on their pipes and sip their Earl Grey tea and look down their noses at the "common man."

Don't get me wrong. I'm a fan, a big fan, of book learnin'. Have a little of it myself. I , too, know how to read and cipher and such. (Did I spell cipher right?;)) I even know Pig Latin. But I do not believe that it is ever, EVER, in good taste to beat someone over the head with all them there books you done learned from. Do I beleive that these "intellectual giants" (and I DO use the term loosely) should never converse with us normal folk? Well, of course not. But, dude, just sit down and talk. Have a normal, fun conversation. Eat a cookie. Tell a knock-knock joke even. Because I have to tell ya, your pedantic displays are not impressing anyone, except maybe you. And your flatulent condescension is gettin' a little too funky for me. You can find information in books but not wisdom. That, my friend, is found out there in the real world. You do remember where that is don't you?

Now, to other end of the spectrum.......Paris Hilton just got out of jail after 3 days. 3 days......just goes to show that money really does talk sometimes.....and very loudly at that. Think she learned anything, other than how to use a payphone? We'll see. Think her 3 days with the "common man" had any impact on her? Oh, yeah, that's right. She was sequestered for her stay in the big house. Separated from everyone else based on who she is. Hmmmmmm.......that sounds like a whole different kind of snobbery, now don't it?

Peace alllllllllllllll................

Fussy and Almost 40

You know, like most people out there (closet masochists excluded), I hate to be told "no". I don't like it but most of the time I can get over it. It is what it is. HOWEVER, there is one thing that I hate worse than being told no and that is a qualified no. A qualified no for those of you who may not know this is a no with an exlanation attached. I don't need an explanation of why you're telling me no. I have already gone over these possibilities in my head before I even asked you the question. Is your explaining to me why you are telling me no going to change your no to a yes? Of course not. So why are you wasting your time and mine. Just tell me no so that I can consider you a jerk and go on with my day versus explaining it so that I consider you an illogical jerk.

There, that feels better. Must be this countdown to 40 that I'm on that has me all irascible and stuff;). Grover just turned 40 last month......and hasn't felt well one day since then:) I tried to tell him it's all in his head, that he just needs to stop brooding over it since he's in the last half of his life now and doesn't really have that much time to waste. (he didn't think that was funny either...I did;)) Turning 40 for me is like getting a shot. You're all tensed up waiting for it to happen and then when it does you go....."hmmmm, that wasn't so bad after all." Of course, there are the grey hairs and creaking joints and lack of nimbleness to look forward to but I've had all that going on since I was 30 so what's the big deal? And I'm already sounding like my mother more and more everyday: "Oh, these kids these days. It wasn't like this when I was growing up (yeah it was, I just don't want to admit it)."

But there is part of almost being 40 that is the most time consuming and sometimes painful part: the whole reflection over your life thing.Going down the list of mistakes and regrets and shoulda coulda wouldas. If I could change anything that has happened in my life would I? I might change a couple of things but nothing too big. Yeah, I've made a lot of mistakes (a LOT) in my life but they have all been a part of getting me to where I am now. And where I am now ain't too shabby. I'm not Bill Gates or Stephen Hawkings or Halle Berry but who cares? I am what I am and that's good enough for me. (But not good enough for my kids in 10 years probably;))

We'll see how I'm doing when I'm almost 50.

Peace allllllllll...............

Seven Days

So, since it will probably take me a little while to catch up on the past few months or so, let me spend a few moments just catching up on the past week. In the last seven days I have had:

a corneal abrasion, otherwise known as a scratch on the eyeball. Since I wear contacts ALL the time and have for the past 2 years, I have never been bothered to purchase a pair of back-up glasses (yeah, I know...stupid is as stupid does NOT do). Consequently, for about 2 days I had to go around with one contact in and one out. 20/20 vision in one eye and 20/200 in the other. Do you know what that does to person's depth perception? Nothing nice.

a burn on my hand. What happened you may ask. Simple...I was taking biscuits out of the oven and because I couldn't really see them very well, I put my bare hand not on the potholder but on the pan itself.

a really ugly cold, which I then proceeded to give to everyone in the house.

I cooked a wonderful dinner the other night which included baked fish. When I put my childrens' plates on the table and told them it was time for dinner, Lukas comes to the table, looks at the fish, looks at me and says "Oooh, Mom.....that looks asgusting." Not disgusting, but asgusting. This ain't "Hell's Kitchen" young man.

I went into my kitchen the other day and Lukas had gotten a pack of hot chocolate out of the cabinet, put it in a blue tumbler, put cold water in it and was trying to put it in the microwave to heat it up. When I walked in on him in the middle of this and asked him what he was doing, he replied "Making coffee mom, what're you doin'?" He wasn't trying to be a smart aleck...just a grownup. Oh, if he only knew.

Jakob was in the backyard swinging the other day and had to go pee. I suppose in his mind it was just a little too far to actually come in the house and use the bathroom so he just whipped his pants down and took care of business in the back yard. What I wouldn't give to be 3 again:) (Or just a guy somedays;))

Jakob has also developed an affinity for anything that buttons or zips. Okay, that would be okay if he hadn't gone into the winter clothes and found a fleece jacket of his that does both. Now he won't take the thing off except to bathe. And the second he gets out of the tub he puts it right back on. Which I wouldn't even be concerned except he wears it outside to play and it's like 90 degrees during the day now. I've tried to hide it but he keeps finding it. And let me tell ya, when he puts that on and the sunglasses he's become so attached to, he looks just like a mini jazz musician out in the backyard. Let's just hope that he doesn't finish off the outfit with his dad's hardhat again. Now that really will have the neighbors calling the funny farm. I believe in self-expression but come on now.

Josh got a concussion on the slip and slide the other day. He slipped instead of sliding and landed on his head. Fortunately he's got a hard head and a looooot of hair.

Has anyone been watching the Flavor of Love Girls: Charm School? That Larissa is one eeeevil little girl. Yeah, I know it's brain rot but after a full week of watching Sesame Street, Backyardigans and WonderPets, I have to have something to zone out on.

I know that this post is all over the place but give me a couple of days to get my mind refreshed and remolded back into the steel trap it once was, albeit a bit rusty;) I feel like I've been in hibernate mode for a while.

And now I'm going to cook my pot roast since today I can see it and won't be coughing over it .

Peace aalllllllllllllll.................

Dennis Quaid Said It Best

Hello boys!!!!! I'm baaaaaack!

(Oh yeah, that goes for the girls too).......

Peace allllllll...............