Bee-Stung Headbutts and iTunes Temptations

You know that bee-stung look that is so popular with women they will have their lips injected with collagen to plump them up (and gee, it doesn't look obvious or anything!)? I got that for free this morning when Little Gary headbutted me on the upper lip. He does that sometimes, just suddenly smacks his head into whatever facial feature of mine is closest and most unlucky. There's no such thing as an attractive bee-stung nose look. Ditto with the eyes and cheekbones. But this morning, for about sixty minutes, my mouth looked really pouty, full, and kissable. I was just disappointed that it was wasted on the clean laundry. Why couldn't he do that just before I have to go grocery shopping?

This evening I went to a meeting outside the neighborhood pool. It's in danger of being taken by the IRS for overdue property taxes, so the board members sent out flyers and got together the meeting in a last-ditch effort to save the pool. The demographic of our community has changed in the last 40 years -- since this neighborhood and the community pool were built -- from young families with lots and lots of kids to grandparents with no kids around as the kids grew up and moved out. Now we have lots of seniors (lots!) and few young families. Because of that, membership at the pool has gone down, and with dwindling membership has come decreased revenue for fixing stuff. The water heater needs replacing, the pool needs resurfacing (my kids come home with bleeding toes because the floor of the pool is so rough), things have to be brought up to the new code, etc., etc. Our problem is to somehow find $22,000 to keep the pool going for the year, plus another $8000 to pay off the property taxes that have accumulated over the last three or four years. I'm stymied. Hopefully we'll all come up with something.

Joseph (Child Five) came up to me today intensely pleased with himself.
"Mom!" he said, his face incredulous and happy. "Mom! I just beat the whole entire Lego Batman game!"
I gave him a high five and some high praise while considering my culpability in the fact that my four-year-old is allowed enough time to get really good at video games.
"I think I'm going to fall over now," he said then, pausing dramatically to sway from side to side before falling elegantly to the floor in a swoon. I laughed for a long time.

Husband just bought himself a new toy: an iPod Touch, which is a little computer/MP3 player. As he got a great deal and because the MP3 player he recently bought is not working very well (and will be returned to the store from whence it came!), and also because he wisely (though not happily) had to deny himself a much more expensive toy a month ago, I was happy. He uses his commutes, like many do, to fill his head with knowledge. He downloads the podcasts from writingexcuses.com, which come in convenient little 15 minute segments and listens to those a lot. He also listens to old General Conference talks. Sometimes I almost wish I had to commute somewhere so I could do that. My car rides are mostly filled with children's questions and comments while I attempt to also listen to NPR. (Lyn, you and Addie might be interested in those podcasts, by the way, as aspiring writers.) I am using the slightly annoying MP3 player he had until I get around to returning it and may be forced to rack up a large bill at iTunes.

Okay, not forced. But mightily tempted.