Now that my internet is behaving again (at least for the moment), I can catch up on weekend happenings. Just as I was about to post on Friday evening my internet crashed. Boo! And it wasn't even raining. I swear Comcast does it on purpose just to keep you guessing.
Friday was a bit of relaxation day because I had caught up on my required five job contacts for the week. I always leave it last minute because I hate it and it depresses me. The internet job boards are idiotic and show you things either way out of your knowledge or lump you in Sales. As has been stated here before, vehemently, I hate sales. At least, sales for things I am not passionate about. If it was handmade soap or yarn, I'm sure I could sell ice to an Eskimo.
Saturday we planned to visit the local cemetery with my son's cub scout pack and plant American flags on the graves of veterans. This went off without a hitch although it was windy and cool and the ground was hard as a rock in some places. I said hi and thanks to everyone whose grave I gave a flag to, even if their ground was stubborn. But I expect vets to be tough.
It was earlier than my normal rising time, but the sun was bright and the day was clear. My fingers were getting blisters by the end of it, but it was a small price to pay. I was working on even less sleep because that morning at 5:30AM I was woken out of a dead sleep by the feeling of little legs crawling on my LIPS. Yes, on my lips. I was dead asleep, dreaming even, and in two seconds I was wide awake flailing around in my bed, barely keeping from yelling. I never get up that fast, ever. But for bugs crawling on me, I am awake before I know I am awake.
It was a moth, medium-sized grayish brown. I see these all the time in the summer and they usually get in and beat themselves senseless against the skylights at night, keeping me awake. This was the first time I ever had one crawl across my face before. It was the grossest thing ever. It flew onto a window ledge but rather than pursue it I rolled over and covered my head with a sheet, muttering curses on it and its ancestors and descendants, if any. In the morning it was gone.
We've caught and squished three so far this weekend. They kind of blend with our carpet. But only once did they dare to trek across my face. Little monsters.
Sunday was preparation and shopping for my elder son's birthday. He is now twelve. I remember twelve. Now I feel old. My son begged me to make his cake for him, and since that suits a one-income household better (and generally tastes better too) I obliged with a simple chocolate two-layer covered in candy sprinkles. I even wrote happy birthday and his name without making it a cake wreck either (misspellings, running out of room, etc.).
I am very proud to say that the majority of my son's gifts were books. He reads voraciously, staying up late with a light under the covers, losing track of time, books scattered around his room, all of it. Just like I used to.
On Saturday evening my husband and I put Stephen King's The Stand on Netflix and watched the first episode. We saw it when the miniseries first played on TV back in the early 90's. I can remember liking the whole thing, except for the increasingly cheesy portrayal of the Walking Man. I suppose in that decade there was only so much they could do with special effects, but he was much scarier in the book. I still like to watch the stories of the other characters though.
The first episode has already inspired me to reread the book itself, a 900+ page tome which I finished in five days on my first reading of it, when I was fifteen, I think. My father was an avid collector of Stephen King novels, and I would read them as he got them, reading them off his shelf during the summer. I had to read quite a few to catch up to my father, he was always getting a new one. But King had a style I found impossible to be distracted from for long. 'Salem's Lot was the first Stephen King novel I ever read, and that was so scary to me I wore a cross around my neck for a year after that. I believe I was thirteen or fourteen. The 'Salem's Lot vampires will always be the "true" vampires to me. No sparkly romantic nonsense in King's monsters. These were demons, they were out for souls, and the vampire hunter was the true hero.
Then I tried The Shining. Even scarier. Isolation, madness, and psychic powers? Plus a hotel that's trying to kill you? Awesome. By then I was well hooked.
Imagine my excitement when I found out that the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, about an hour or so drive from our house here in Colorado, was the hotel that inspired King to write The Shining. My first impulse was to rent a room and stay the night. Is this the right thing to do for a person who awakens out of a dead sleep at the merest tickle of bug legs? Because the Stanley is genuinely haunted. The Ghost Hunters have it recorded (whatever you think of them, I don't think they fudged that one, they had no need to. There was too much going on, haha). Not to mention the people who work there and see things nearly every day. The thought excites me.
If I were a character in a horror novel or movie I'd be the one going to look for what made the noise, or going hunting for the monster. I probably wouldn't live long, but it'd sure be exciting, hunting the bump in the night.
Monday, May 30, 2011
Thursday, May 26, 2011
How Does Your Garden Grow?
The dish planter out in front of our house, which sat empty all last season (at times upside down in the shrubs if wind happened to catch it) now holds a bright red geranium, three plants with tiny violet flowers, and a sweet potato vine. I was somewhat undecided in picking out the plants initially, but they do look good together and once they fill in they'll look like they came that way from the store. And all for about the same money as the pre-planted pots at the garden store, except I chose the plants I wanted. Hooray for overcoming indecisiveness and making use of what you have. I'm proud of myself.
My interest in gardening and digging in the dirt goes straight back to my mother and father. My mother kept houseplants and regularly transplanted them. I remember sitting at the table as she spread out newspapers, put gravel in the bottom of a new, larger pot, and carefully lifted the plant from the old pot. The smell of the potting soil was rich and pungent, and I observed my mother's hands, dusted with loamy dirt, carefully separating pot-bound roots and setting the plant in its new home, firming the new soil around it. She regularly watered and fed her plants, and they flourished, except for the christmas cactus which refused to flower again after the first year. But those plants are notoriously fussy. Our houseplants ranged from cacti to mother-in-law's tongue to jade tree plants, with others making appearances now and then as interest waxed and waned. I remember the windows on the sunny side of our house being almost unreachable due to the plants set near the window on stools or on sills to catch the light. Every Saturday was watering day. Our house was green inside, and that seemed normal. Other people who had few plants or none seemed unusual to me.
My father also grew indoor plants, but his true forte is as an outdoor gardener. He grew up on his grandfather's farm, a true working farm with cattle and crops; they made their own wine. My father's first love is the tomato. Wherever he's lived, if it had a yard big enough and sunny enough he'd grow tomato plants. And not just one or two. Ten or twelve of them at least, each one with soil carefully mounded at the base in a hill to hold water, and a stake set into the soil beside them as they grew, for the vines to climb up. Carefully and lovingly tended, the tomato plants could easily grow over our heads, and the rich green smell of the vines with fruit ripening on them is still one of my favorite scents.
One day when I was nineteen or twenty my stepmother came running down the stairs frantic; my two year old brother was nowhere to be found. It was summer and the front and back doors were open, the screen doors easy for a child to push open. He could have been anywhere. My father ran out the front while I went out the back. Two steps out the back door and something prompted me to turn my head, towards the tomato garden. There was my brother, in nothing but a diaper, holding two huge red tomatoes as he walked towards the house. It made me laugh, which startled my brother into dropping the tomatoes, but we grinned at each other. We both loved Dad's tomato garden.
My father still has a garden, and tomatoes still dominate it, though he adds cucumbers and eggplants as well as peppers, and sometimes lettuces and radishes. I try to emulate him with my small garden of three or four plants, with varying success over the years.
My aunt and uncle had the ultimate garden, at least to a kid. It was huge, probably an acre if not more, with everything from sunflowers to peas, broccoli, lettuces, beans and carrots. There were tomatoes, cucumbers, herbs, eggplants, cauliflower, corn...and probably much more that I simply missed. My favorite memory is of pulling up carrots, washing them at the outside spigot, and eating them immediately. The garden was a source of fresh, good food, which I did not realize at the time. It just seemed normal to me.
Woodchucks had nothing on my uncle. I remember he shot two in one week that decided to raid the broccoli plants. I did not at all feel sorry for the woodchucks. They trespassed and were eating food planted by my uncle and meant for us. Any other invading animals met a similar fate; my uncle was not intending to share with the wildlife.
My father had a similar mindset, but he was not a gun owner. One year, after planting a tomato garden at my grandmother's house, his ripening tomatoes kept mysteriously disappearing overnight. Fearing a raccoon, my father took a baseball bat and sat out, hidden in the plants, waiting for the critter. The culprit proved herself to be my great-grandmother, who lived downstairs from my grandmother. She loved fresh tomatoes too, and had been sneaking out at night to filch them. I wasn't there for the confrontation, but I always wished I was. It would have made a great addition to the comic reel running in my head.
Last year I bought plants for my sons, one each, to plant themselves. My younger son also brought seeds home from school for the summer that exploded all over the garden with wild abandon. I fully intend to pass on this love of digging in the dirt and watching green things grow. There's always been something more than satisfying about eating food you grew yourself.
And even if your tomatoes don't turn out quite the way you hoped, you can always have a rotten tomato war in your own back yard.
My interest in gardening and digging in the dirt goes straight back to my mother and father. My mother kept houseplants and regularly transplanted them. I remember sitting at the table as she spread out newspapers, put gravel in the bottom of a new, larger pot, and carefully lifted the plant from the old pot. The smell of the potting soil was rich and pungent, and I observed my mother's hands, dusted with loamy dirt, carefully separating pot-bound roots and setting the plant in its new home, firming the new soil around it. She regularly watered and fed her plants, and they flourished, except for the christmas cactus which refused to flower again after the first year. But those plants are notoriously fussy. Our houseplants ranged from cacti to mother-in-law's tongue to jade tree plants, with others making appearances now and then as interest waxed and waned. I remember the windows on the sunny side of our house being almost unreachable due to the plants set near the window on stools or on sills to catch the light. Every Saturday was watering day. Our house was green inside, and that seemed normal. Other people who had few plants or none seemed unusual to me.
My father also grew indoor plants, but his true forte is as an outdoor gardener. He grew up on his grandfather's farm, a true working farm with cattle and crops; they made their own wine. My father's first love is the tomato. Wherever he's lived, if it had a yard big enough and sunny enough he'd grow tomato plants. And not just one or two. Ten or twelve of them at least, each one with soil carefully mounded at the base in a hill to hold water, and a stake set into the soil beside them as they grew, for the vines to climb up. Carefully and lovingly tended, the tomato plants could easily grow over our heads, and the rich green smell of the vines with fruit ripening on them is still one of my favorite scents.
One day when I was nineteen or twenty my stepmother came running down the stairs frantic; my two year old brother was nowhere to be found. It was summer and the front and back doors were open, the screen doors easy for a child to push open. He could have been anywhere. My father ran out the front while I went out the back. Two steps out the back door and something prompted me to turn my head, towards the tomato garden. There was my brother, in nothing but a diaper, holding two huge red tomatoes as he walked towards the house. It made me laugh, which startled my brother into dropping the tomatoes, but we grinned at each other. We both loved Dad's tomato garden.
My father still has a garden, and tomatoes still dominate it, though he adds cucumbers and eggplants as well as peppers, and sometimes lettuces and radishes. I try to emulate him with my small garden of three or four plants, with varying success over the years.
My aunt and uncle had the ultimate garden, at least to a kid. It was huge, probably an acre if not more, with everything from sunflowers to peas, broccoli, lettuces, beans and carrots. There were tomatoes, cucumbers, herbs, eggplants, cauliflower, corn...and probably much more that I simply missed. My favorite memory is of pulling up carrots, washing them at the outside spigot, and eating them immediately. The garden was a source of fresh, good food, which I did not realize at the time. It just seemed normal to me.
Woodchucks had nothing on my uncle. I remember he shot two in one week that decided to raid the broccoli plants. I did not at all feel sorry for the woodchucks. They trespassed and were eating food planted by my uncle and meant for us. Any other invading animals met a similar fate; my uncle was not intending to share with the wildlife.
My father had a similar mindset, but he was not a gun owner. One year, after planting a tomato garden at my grandmother's house, his ripening tomatoes kept mysteriously disappearing overnight. Fearing a raccoon, my father took a baseball bat and sat out, hidden in the plants, waiting for the critter. The culprit proved herself to be my great-grandmother, who lived downstairs from my grandmother. She loved fresh tomatoes too, and had been sneaking out at night to filch them. I wasn't there for the confrontation, but I always wished I was. It would have made a great addition to the comic reel running in my head.
Last year I bought plants for my sons, one each, to plant themselves. My younger son also brought seeds home from school for the summer that exploded all over the garden with wild abandon. I fully intend to pass on this love of digging in the dirt and watching green things grow. There's always been something more than satisfying about eating food you grew yourself.
And even if your tomatoes don't turn out quite the way you hoped, you can always have a rotten tomato war in your own back yard.
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
One Who Patiently Endures
Some time ago one of our favorite priests gave a sermon about "patiently enduring" the trials and tribulations of life. This priest is one of our favorite priests because he is a self-admitted geek and thus he uses references from the Lord of the Rings to Star Trek to Star Wars and everything in between. He really connects with us as we are also self-admitted geeks and we love it when he is running the Mass.
During this sermon, he mentioned that the true meaning of the word "ninja" can be translated as "one who patiently endures". I thought this was kind of neat; a priest who is fascinated by and has studied ninja, being just as geeky over them as I could be. I'm definitely not a Ninja vs. Pirate person...I'm more of a Why not both Ninja and Pirates? Together? Battling enemies while sailing aboard a steam-driven airship over a post-apocalyptic zombie-ridden alter-earth?
Okay my inner geek got away from me there, but you have to admit (if you're a geek too) that it's a cool scenario.
We quite recently found out this priest is leaving us, and going to a church in an adjacent town where his ability to connect so well will definitely be huge asset. The congregation will be college students and young families, and they I'm sure will quickly see his merits and come to love him as we have. It still sucks though. Every time we get a cool priest he's moved somewhere else on us, or at least it feels that way to me.
A vague idea I had after listening to his ninja sermon solidified when my husband leaned over and told me I had to complete the idea before he left in June. And so I did. He was surprisingly easy. The difficult bit was the throwing star made of embroidery floss. That gave me fits until I just set my teeth and did it come hell or high water. A small hook and extremely thin threads do not a happy person make me. ("Ninja" from Christen Haden's Creepy Cute Crochet)
I am a crochet ninja. Fear my steel hook.
During this sermon, he mentioned that the true meaning of the word "ninja" can be translated as "one who patiently endures". I thought this was kind of neat; a priest who is fascinated by and has studied ninja, being just as geeky over them as I could be. I'm definitely not a Ninja vs. Pirate person...I'm more of a Why not both Ninja and Pirates? Together? Battling enemies while sailing aboard a steam-driven airship over a post-apocalyptic zombie-ridden alter-earth?
Okay my inner geek got away from me there, but you have to admit (if you're a geek too) that it's a cool scenario.
We quite recently found out this priest is leaving us, and going to a church in an adjacent town where his ability to connect so well will definitely be huge asset. The congregation will be college students and young families, and they I'm sure will quickly see his merits and come to love him as we have. It still sucks though. Every time we get a cool priest he's moved somewhere else on us, or at least it feels that way to me.
A vague idea I had after listening to his ninja sermon solidified when my husband leaned over and told me I had to complete the idea before he left in June. And so I did. He was surprisingly easy. The difficult bit was the throwing star made of embroidery floss. That gave me fits until I just set my teeth and did it come hell or high water. A small hook and extremely thin threads do not a happy person make me. ("Ninja" from Christen Haden's Creepy Cute Crochet)
I am a crochet ninja. Fear my steel hook.
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
A Flood Only a Mother Can Clean
Oh, it's raining again. Yippee?
Well, at least the grass is thick and lush and green. Rain has to be good for something, right? At this rate the lawn will have grown well past my knees before it can be mowed again. The impending snowmelt, which has been delayed because of unseasonably cool temperatures, has people worried here in Colorado. Our snowpack is already well above a hundred percent of normal, and every time it rains in the foothills it's snowed in the mountains. We do have normal seasonal temperatures approaching rapidly though (yay!), and that snowmelt will shortly be in area rivers and creeks, likely making them top their banks a bit. I doubt it will be close to the flooding along the Mississippi, but some areas that saw wildfires are going to be a concern because they'll have nothing to stop soil erosion and mudslides if there is even a minor flood.
At home I have a slight concern of my own; I heard water dripping somewhere up near the swamp cooler in the roof. It might have been tapping on an air vent, but I couldn't be sure. I couldn't find any damp spots in the plaster on the ceiling, but there's an old stain there from a previous problem, which is ominous. For those of you who don't live in a dry climate; a swamp cooler is an air conditioner for the desert, of which Colorado is considered high desert/plains. You run a water line up to your roof, which is connected to a machine that looks like an external air conditioning unit. The water drips from the line into the machine, which drips the water onto pads, then uses a fan to circulate the water-cooled and now-moist air down into the house. I was a skeptic when I first moved here, but it works really well and even better than a conventional air conditioner by putting some moisture into the air. Unfortunately it now might be the case that some flashing around the base has been damaged or pulled up by storms and is now allowing rain to leak into the roof. Priority number three, I guess.
The youngest spent the day at home with Dad and I, mostly watching cartoons and playing his DS. He insisted he wanted to go to school, but he threw up last night at bed time and the school rule is twenty four hours. After he finished yacking up his day's intake of toast and water (all we would let him have), he expressed surprise I cleaned out his bucket so quickly. Yes, a bucket next to his bed saved the day and the carpet. Even his Dad expressed surprise at how fast I cleaned it out. No surprise to this Mom. I have had plenty of practice.
Our youngest is unfortunately a yack-machine. He's thrown up more times than I can count or remember; I just know it's unusually often. I can't decide if he's got a weak stomach or is extremely sensitive to nausea. Most of the time the rest of us are unaffected. We eat the same foods he does, he washes his hands well and is clean, I am very aware of expiration dates and we eat nothing that's even mildly suspect. Yet he keeps out-vomiting us by a ratio of three to one. We suspected it might be his medication; the doctor torpedoed that today by saying it was more likely taking it would make him sick than not taking it, like the last two times he was sick.
I think I've narrowed it to possibly hot dogs, raisins, or an overload of heavily flavored chips, all things he had before he got sick. But, understandably, I am hesitant to test my theories. I think what I'll need to do is throw out all the "bad" foods and restart with some gluten-free, nitrate-free, sugar-free foods. All of which will be very traumatic to a kid who loves Chicken McNuggets, Toaster Strudels, and Gummy Bears.
But I think I've reached my limit for speed-cleaning the puke bucket now.
Well, at least the grass is thick and lush and green. Rain has to be good for something, right? At this rate the lawn will have grown well past my knees before it can be mowed again. The impending snowmelt, which has been delayed because of unseasonably cool temperatures, has people worried here in Colorado. Our snowpack is already well above a hundred percent of normal, and every time it rains in the foothills it's snowed in the mountains. We do have normal seasonal temperatures approaching rapidly though (yay!), and that snowmelt will shortly be in area rivers and creeks, likely making them top their banks a bit. I doubt it will be close to the flooding along the Mississippi, but some areas that saw wildfires are going to be a concern because they'll have nothing to stop soil erosion and mudslides if there is even a minor flood.
At home I have a slight concern of my own; I heard water dripping somewhere up near the swamp cooler in the roof. It might have been tapping on an air vent, but I couldn't be sure. I couldn't find any damp spots in the plaster on the ceiling, but there's an old stain there from a previous problem, which is ominous. For those of you who don't live in a dry climate; a swamp cooler is an air conditioner for the desert, of which Colorado is considered high desert/plains. You run a water line up to your roof, which is connected to a machine that looks like an external air conditioning unit. The water drips from the line into the machine, which drips the water onto pads, then uses a fan to circulate the water-cooled and now-moist air down into the house. I was a skeptic when I first moved here, but it works really well and even better than a conventional air conditioner by putting some moisture into the air. Unfortunately it now might be the case that some flashing around the base has been damaged or pulled up by storms and is now allowing rain to leak into the roof. Priority number three, I guess.
The youngest spent the day at home with Dad and I, mostly watching cartoons and playing his DS. He insisted he wanted to go to school, but he threw up last night at bed time and the school rule is twenty four hours. After he finished yacking up his day's intake of toast and water (all we would let him have), he expressed surprise I cleaned out his bucket so quickly. Yes, a bucket next to his bed saved the day and the carpet. Even his Dad expressed surprise at how fast I cleaned it out. No surprise to this Mom. I have had plenty of practice.
Our youngest is unfortunately a yack-machine. He's thrown up more times than I can count or remember; I just know it's unusually often. I can't decide if he's got a weak stomach or is extremely sensitive to nausea. Most of the time the rest of us are unaffected. We eat the same foods he does, he washes his hands well and is clean, I am very aware of expiration dates and we eat nothing that's even mildly suspect. Yet he keeps out-vomiting us by a ratio of three to one. We suspected it might be his medication; the doctor torpedoed that today by saying it was more likely taking it would make him sick than not taking it, like the last two times he was sick.
I think I've narrowed it to possibly hot dogs, raisins, or an overload of heavily flavored chips, all things he had before he got sick. But, understandably, I am hesitant to test my theories. I think what I'll need to do is throw out all the "bad" foods and restart with some gluten-free, nitrate-free, sugar-free foods. All of which will be very traumatic to a kid who loves Chicken McNuggets, Toaster Strudels, and Gummy Bears.
But I think I've reached my limit for speed-cleaning the puke bucket now.
Monday, May 23, 2011
They Don't Make 'Em Like They Used To
Today was a busy day, what with dentist appointments for the elder child and I, the younger child developing a stomach bug and getting sick in the two equally lovely ways you can get sick with that condition, and the husband going to see his doctor.
The younger child being sick caused somewhat of a logistical snag until Dad volunteered to take him with. Well, he didn't really volunteer; I pointed out how, since I was going to be in a dentist's chair with air and water hoses and electric toothbrushes jammed in my mouth, I would not be able to stop any "antics" like yelling in the waiting room or running up and down the halls. Dad was going in for a consult basically and could put the muscle on if needed, though that was doubtful since he'd have eyes to watch every move the younger son made. A reasonable solution, which might have worked better if younger son hadn't gotten sick on the ride over. Luckily it wasn't too messy and father was seen without further incident. I had a pukey towel waiting in the washer for me as a souvenir of this little trip.
Meanwhile, elder son and I went to have our teeth cleaned and our gums poked mercilessly. They kindly removed a loose tooth my son had simply by plucking it out. My son was all grins after that. They even gave him a tiny plastic box to put it in, which was so cute I was jealous of it for a little bit.
I am not a person who is afraid of the dentist. I have been to good dentists and bad, and had everything from fillings to braces to root canals done, even some (shallow) fillings without anesthesia. Nothing has fazed me. Even the throbbing pain after a scraping with the metal instruments doesn't bother me. The reason I'm not bothered by this mild discomfort and occasional ache is because afterward, my tooth surfaces feel like glass under my tongue. I absolutely love that. That tells me my teeth are squeaky clean, polished, and ready to blind.
I'm not completely crazy; I'd rather avoid another root canal than have to lie there for two hours with my jaw cranked open, watching the dentist use a blow torch to heat a wire cherry red then stick it in my mouth (!!! no one told me to expect that, it was seriously interesting). I think he was fusing something or other, I wasn't really listening to his quiet explanation so much as watching where that red hot wire was going, or trying to. But I do admit I like my bi-annual cleanings and look forward to them, and I love the ever-changing technology that makes it easier and quicker than ever. Sonic toothbrushes? Heck yes, please. Gimme the new advances, I'll even try them out first.
Which all makes me wonder why, if we have such rapidly evolving technology, that cars seem to be made crappier and crappier. After the dentist I had to go pick up quarts of motor oil for my car, which was sounding like it had a dry throat, again, less than a month after I put oil in it. There is no spot in my driveway, the car is not burning oil, yet it's sucking the stuff down like free drinks in a Vegas casino.
I complained about this on Facebook, to which I got a slew of replies along the lines of, "Your car is broken, take it to be fixed." Which I did know, but was avoiding because I still don't have a job, and getting my 30-year old cracked and dissolving fillings replaced (before they poison me with something in them that seemed like awesome new technology thirty years ago but is now considered highly toxic) has become the new priority.
I can remember several cars my family had over the years that never gave me the trouble this one has for the past four years. We owned a VW hatchback wagon, bright orange, and had it seemingly forever. The body rusted out long before the engine went; my sister and I used to get yelled at for poking in the rust patches in fascination. My father owned a Honda that was passed to my sister, and it literally had to be driven til it died, at the ripe age of fifteen. The body of the Honda rusted out long before the engine quit as well.
My family takes care of its cars with regular maintenance, and most of them, barring a few that were totalled in minor crashes (protecting their occupants superbly), lasted over ten years. It's been a struggle to keep this car on the road and running, even with regular maintenance. Its age? Nine years this March.
I love it because I know how it handles, and it has my aftermarket radio that I love in it, and because it was my first-ever car I bought new. But when it acts up it breaks my heart. I want this car to last me another six years, but at the rate it's going I'll be lucky to get two. It's a Saturn wagon, with those bouncy door panels that were so innovative and kind of neat, back in 2002. Awesome new technology! The factory where they made my car with pride is long closed and forgotten. A few years after that, Saturn itself was gone. My car, an instant if not-so-long-lasting classic. I need to put in a couple more quarts of oil tomorrow. At least the fiberglass door panels will never rust out.
They definitely don't make 'em like they used to.
The younger child being sick caused somewhat of a logistical snag until Dad volunteered to take him with. Well, he didn't really volunteer; I pointed out how, since I was going to be in a dentist's chair with air and water hoses and electric toothbrushes jammed in my mouth, I would not be able to stop any "antics" like yelling in the waiting room or running up and down the halls. Dad was going in for a consult basically and could put the muscle on if needed, though that was doubtful since he'd have eyes to watch every move the younger son made. A reasonable solution, which might have worked better if younger son hadn't gotten sick on the ride over. Luckily it wasn't too messy and father was seen without further incident. I had a pukey towel waiting in the washer for me as a souvenir of this little trip.
Meanwhile, elder son and I went to have our teeth cleaned and our gums poked mercilessly. They kindly removed a loose tooth my son had simply by plucking it out. My son was all grins after that. They even gave him a tiny plastic box to put it in, which was so cute I was jealous of it for a little bit.
I am not a person who is afraid of the dentist. I have been to good dentists and bad, and had everything from fillings to braces to root canals done, even some (shallow) fillings without anesthesia. Nothing has fazed me. Even the throbbing pain after a scraping with the metal instruments doesn't bother me. The reason I'm not bothered by this mild discomfort and occasional ache is because afterward, my tooth surfaces feel like glass under my tongue. I absolutely love that. That tells me my teeth are squeaky clean, polished, and ready to blind.
I'm not completely crazy; I'd rather avoid another root canal than have to lie there for two hours with my jaw cranked open, watching the dentist use a blow torch to heat a wire cherry red then stick it in my mouth (!!! no one told me to expect that, it was seriously interesting). I think he was fusing something or other, I wasn't really listening to his quiet explanation so much as watching where that red hot wire was going, or trying to. But I do admit I like my bi-annual cleanings and look forward to them, and I love the ever-changing technology that makes it easier and quicker than ever. Sonic toothbrushes? Heck yes, please. Gimme the new advances, I'll even try them out first.
Which all makes me wonder why, if we have such rapidly evolving technology, that cars seem to be made crappier and crappier. After the dentist I had to go pick up quarts of motor oil for my car, which was sounding like it had a dry throat, again, less than a month after I put oil in it. There is no spot in my driveway, the car is not burning oil, yet it's sucking the stuff down like free drinks in a Vegas casino.
I complained about this on Facebook, to which I got a slew of replies along the lines of, "Your car is broken, take it to be fixed." Which I did know, but was avoiding because I still don't have a job, and getting my 30-year old cracked and dissolving fillings replaced (before they poison me with something in them that seemed like awesome new technology thirty years ago but is now considered highly toxic) has become the new priority.
I can remember several cars my family had over the years that never gave me the trouble this one has for the past four years. We owned a VW hatchback wagon, bright orange, and had it seemingly forever. The body rusted out long before the engine went; my sister and I used to get yelled at for poking in the rust patches in fascination. My father owned a Honda that was passed to my sister, and it literally had to be driven til it died, at the ripe age of fifteen. The body of the Honda rusted out long before the engine quit as well.
My family takes care of its cars with regular maintenance, and most of them, barring a few that were totalled in minor crashes (protecting their occupants superbly), lasted over ten years. It's been a struggle to keep this car on the road and running, even with regular maintenance. Its age? Nine years this March.
I love it because I know how it handles, and it has my aftermarket radio that I love in it, and because it was my first-ever car I bought new. But when it acts up it breaks my heart. I want this car to last me another six years, but at the rate it's going I'll be lucky to get two. It's a Saturn wagon, with those bouncy door panels that were so innovative and kind of neat, back in 2002. Awesome new technology! The factory where they made my car with pride is long closed and forgotten. A few years after that, Saturn itself was gone. My car, an instant if not-so-long-lasting classic. I need to put in a couple more quarts of oil tomorrow. At least the fiberglass door panels will never rust out.
They definitely don't make 'em like they used to.
Friday, May 20, 2011
Here Comes the Sun Part II
So this morning the grass was still squishing, but at least....yes....the SUN came out! I felt like going out into the middle of the cul de sac and dancing a sun dance with pagan abandon, but I settled for enjoying it while driving the kids to school instead. I'm sure the neighbors appreciated that.
Of course my youngest was thrilled because today was his school field day, and the school had brought in inflatable bouncy houses and slides. I don't remember those at my school's field days! The best I could hope for was not to throw up while doing the forehead-to-the-bat-handle and spin around it twenty times (Did you ever do that? It's funny as heck to watch everyone else do it and fall over dizzy, until it's your turn.), or break an arm doing the wheelbarrow races. Field days have gone carnival apparently. The bouncy structures were going to be available until five in the evening, but at about four a roll of thunder and some dark clouds appeared, causing them to shut it down early. Since we weren't able to get back to the school until then (had to pick up eldest from his school), my youngest was sorely disappointed, especially since the weather didn't even then have the courtesy to oblige with a thunderstorm after that warning growl.
The dog was absolutely loopy all day, racing from one end of the yard to the other when he was let out, and he begged to be let out often. I didn't blame him one bit. You have to grab these sunny days when you can, lately.
I pulled up my bootstraps and went out and checked my seedlings; crushed, as I had envisioned. I don't even know if the cuke and squash seeds are still in their dirt mounds, or if the pounding hail and rain obliterated them too. Oh well, I guess this weekend I go fight the hordes for more. Only this time I go out early. Haha, I say that now. We shall see.
More wild animal weirdness; I saw three little gray squirrels when I came back from dropping my kids at school. They were playing on and around the fence separating our yard from our neighbor's, doing typical crazy squirrel stuff and scampering around jumping at each other. Then one breaks off to run across our yard, right up to my car door. Where it sits, looking around and looking cute, not realizing I'm less than a foot away staring down at it. I watched it for a few minutes, then had to break the spell by opening the car door. I had a brief vision of the little thing running in and going whack-bonk on me, running all over the car chittering, jumping in my hair, me screaming, like a Lucille Ball comedy, but it ran under the car instead. That's my inner life; one long comedy reel. People wonder why I might sometimes grin or laugh for no apparent reason? It's that reel playing. Smile, you might be the current star.
I'll leave you with a song that's been one of my favorites since I was two years old. Probably my first favorite, if we count such things. Thanks Dad.
Of course my youngest was thrilled because today was his school field day, and the school had brought in inflatable bouncy houses and slides. I don't remember those at my school's field days! The best I could hope for was not to throw up while doing the forehead-to-the-bat-handle and spin around it twenty times (Did you ever do that? It's funny as heck to watch everyone else do it and fall over dizzy, until it's your turn.), or break an arm doing the wheelbarrow races. Field days have gone carnival apparently. The bouncy structures were going to be available until five in the evening, but at about four a roll of thunder and some dark clouds appeared, causing them to shut it down early. Since we weren't able to get back to the school until then (had to pick up eldest from his school), my youngest was sorely disappointed, especially since the weather didn't even then have the courtesy to oblige with a thunderstorm after that warning growl.
The dog was absolutely loopy all day, racing from one end of the yard to the other when he was let out, and he begged to be let out often. I didn't blame him one bit. You have to grab these sunny days when you can, lately.
I pulled up my bootstraps and went out and checked my seedlings; crushed, as I had envisioned. I don't even know if the cuke and squash seeds are still in their dirt mounds, or if the pounding hail and rain obliterated them too. Oh well, I guess this weekend I go fight the hordes for more. Only this time I go out early. Haha, I say that now. We shall see.
More wild animal weirdness; I saw three little gray squirrels when I came back from dropping my kids at school. They were playing on and around the fence separating our yard from our neighbor's, doing typical crazy squirrel stuff and scampering around jumping at each other. Then one breaks off to run across our yard, right up to my car door. Where it sits, looking around and looking cute, not realizing I'm less than a foot away staring down at it. I watched it for a few minutes, then had to break the spell by opening the car door. I had a brief vision of the little thing running in and going whack-bonk on me, running all over the car chittering, jumping in my hair, me screaming, like a Lucille Ball comedy, but it ran under the car instead. That's my inner life; one long comedy reel. People wonder why I might sometimes grin or laugh for no apparent reason? It's that reel playing. Smile, you might be the current star.
I'll leave you with a song that's been one of my favorites since I was two years old. Probably my first favorite, if we count such things. Thanks Dad.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Interminably intermittent internet
Apologies for missing yesterday. My internet was not allowing me to remain connected for longer than five-minute stretches, and while I can type fast, I can't type that fast. Comcast only decided to declare an area outage after we called them complaining this morning. And of course there's no clear reason why, and it just randomly cleared itself this afternoon. Maddening.
Yesterday it started out raining, moved into lightning, thunder and hail, and didn't let up all day. I have never seen it hail for twenty minutes, but it did. I'm afraid to go look at my seedlings; I know they're chewed up but my heart just can't take it yet.
My youngest was all excited about a tornado warning that popped, grabbing his teddy, his Nintendo DS, and his Calvin and Hobbes library books and hiding in the basement with his dad and I. It was exactly what I had done as a ten year old one summer in New England, except I somehow managed to stuff a sizable collection of stuffed animals and model horses into three pillowcases and lugged that downstairs. This was quite a bit before the days of handheld electronic devices. In fact it was a couple years or so before Pong (Remember Pong? I do.). You can tell a lot about a kid by what he chooses to save during a tornado warning.
The pictures are of some of the hail we got....yes it's hail, not snow, although it's four inches deep in the road.
Some of it was still hiding in the shadowed spaces under trees and bushes this morning, although that quickly melted when it started raining again.
This morning was my youngest son's spelling bee. I've been making him study all week, despite his protests that he's the smartest kid in the class. I'd also warned him not to cause a scene if he didn't win. He's extremely competitive and has Asperger's to boot, a combination that produces some impressive tantrums when he's handed something unexpected during his day.
He was more wiggly and uncontrolled than the other kids at first, but a quiet word from his teacher calmed him down and stopped the antics. She's a great teacher. He won the whole thing, as he predicted, and I was proud of him although I had to have a word with him about his poor sportsmanship. He attempted to tease one kid for missing a word, but a dark scowl and a head shake from me subdued him right away. For some things, I can badger him all day trying to stop him from misbehaving, but I've found that if I am truly deeply offended by something he's done and let him know it, it'll stop that behavior in its tracks. It takes a strong facial expression of outrage.
Yesterday when I picked up my eldest son from his school it was hailing so hard it sounded like gravel was being poured over the car. Today it was raining, heavily. My son got soaking wet twice in two days getting picked up from school. And I saw kids waiting in the pouring rain, offered seats in cars and refusing -refusing-, from middle school angst or dopiness or whatever. Actually, now that I think about it it was probably to guilt their late parents over how soaking wet they were, and get some extra video game time. There's no other rational reason I can think of to refuse a warm dry seat in a car, surrounded by plenty of other waiting parents who'd see anything untoward. Of course I've also seen these kids walking to school in a t-shirt and shorts in 20 degree weather so who knows. Better to look cool than possibly spare yourself frostbite and pneumonia, I guess.
I still have no job and no leads on one. The search continues, but now it'll likely be for part-time. I'm exploring the hand-made market, but with all the possibilities, I'm paralyzed by my knowledge. I know a little about a lot of things, but I'm a master of none. Am I good enough to sell any of it? Only time will tell. I think I have to sell myself on myself first, the toughest job of all.
No, I still haven't cut out the pj shorts pieces yet.
Yesterday it started out raining, moved into lightning, thunder and hail, and didn't let up all day. I have never seen it hail for twenty minutes, but it did. I'm afraid to go look at my seedlings; I know they're chewed up but my heart just can't take it yet.
My youngest was all excited about a tornado warning that popped, grabbing his teddy, his Nintendo DS, and his Calvin and Hobbes library books and hiding in the basement with his dad and I. It was exactly what I had done as a ten year old one summer in New England, except I somehow managed to stuff a sizable collection of stuffed animals and model horses into three pillowcases and lugged that downstairs. This was quite a bit before the days of handheld electronic devices. In fact it was a couple years or so before Pong (Remember Pong? I do.). You can tell a lot about a kid by what he chooses to save during a tornado warning.
The pictures are of some of the hail we got....yes it's hail, not snow, although it's four inches deep in the road.
Some of it was still hiding in the shadowed spaces under trees and bushes this morning, although that quickly melted when it started raining again.
This morning was my youngest son's spelling bee. I've been making him study all week, despite his protests that he's the smartest kid in the class. I'd also warned him not to cause a scene if he didn't win. He's extremely competitive and has Asperger's to boot, a combination that produces some impressive tantrums when he's handed something unexpected during his day.
He was more wiggly and uncontrolled than the other kids at first, but a quiet word from his teacher calmed him down and stopped the antics. She's a great teacher. He won the whole thing, as he predicted, and I was proud of him although I had to have a word with him about his poor sportsmanship. He attempted to tease one kid for missing a word, but a dark scowl and a head shake from me subdued him right away. For some things, I can badger him all day trying to stop him from misbehaving, but I've found that if I am truly deeply offended by something he's done and let him know it, it'll stop that behavior in its tracks. It takes a strong facial expression of outrage.
Yesterday when I picked up my eldest son from his school it was hailing so hard it sounded like gravel was being poured over the car. Today it was raining, heavily. My son got soaking wet twice in two days getting picked up from school. And I saw kids waiting in the pouring rain, offered seats in cars and refusing -refusing-, from middle school angst or dopiness or whatever. Actually, now that I think about it it was probably to guilt their late parents over how soaking wet they were, and get some extra video game time. There's no other rational reason I can think of to refuse a warm dry seat in a car, surrounded by plenty of other waiting parents who'd see anything untoward. Of course I've also seen these kids walking to school in a t-shirt and shorts in 20 degree weather so who knows. Better to look cool than possibly spare yourself frostbite and pneumonia, I guess.
I still have no job and no leads on one. The search continues, but now it'll likely be for part-time. I'm exploring the hand-made market, but with all the possibilities, I'm paralyzed by my knowledge. I know a little about a lot of things, but I'm a master of none. Am I good enough to sell any of it? Only time will tell. I think I have to sell myself on myself first, the toughest job of all.
No, I still haven't cut out the pj shorts pieces yet.
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