My Family and Other Animals

The Bunnies Hopped to Their Little Home in the Woods, Ate a Good Supper, and Went Straight to Bed. The End.

2012-01-30T17:38:00.000-07:00

Sian just passed her driver's license exam. She is officially a licensed driver. I hope she's happy, since I am now sending her on every errand I can just so I can sit home and watch movies all day. Well, okay, not really. I don't watch movies all day, but I can still send her on all my errands for me and she actually enjoys it. I'm getting used to this really fast.

The other day, as I was reading Little Gary into sleepy oblivion, Husband walked by and said, "When is the last time you read a fiction book?" Yes, I was reading Slouching Towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline, by Robert Bork, out loud to my four-year-old. In my defense, Little Gary often enjoys listening to me read my books aloud because the sound of my voice soothes him when he just wants to take a nap -- especially if I'm speaking gibberish as far as he's concerned (there are times when he only wants stories about bunnies in the woods or monkeys on the bed, you understand, and won't be satisfied with the idea that the welfare state is only getting more support because of envy). I, on the other hand, spend a lot of time not being soothed by my reading material. Bork's book isn't exactly easy fare, either intellectually or emotionally; however, I feel compelled to educate myself as much as possible. At least when I read non-fiction I can get stuff done while I digest ideas. When I read good fiction, nothing at all gets done until I finish.

Case in point: I finished Bork's book and picked up The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold. When I finished it the next day at around noon, I was still unwashed and in my pajamas, the kids were talking about eating their own shoes for nourishment, and I had to swim up and out of the story for what seemed like hours. In fact, my emotions were extremely close to the surface for a long time afterward. That's what happens when I read fiction. It's just a mercy that The Lovely Bones is fairly short or Husband might have had me committed.

Book report: Slouching Towards Gomorrah, though written in 1996, is incredibly insightful and applicable to events going on today. Bork intelligently interprets cause and effect for the radicalization of American institutions and the reasons behind our slackening morality as a country. I think Bork is as much a prophet as Tocqueville, whom he quotes extensively. There is so much I would like to say about his points, and maybe I will in future posts (this is your only warning). Even if he sometimes sounds like the Grumpy Old Man, I would love to be able to write as well as he does.

And, as a bonus, it puts four-year-olds to sleep quite nicely.

Just now, I sent said four-year-old with his older sisters to get an ice-cream cone from the grocery store. How sweet is that?

Why Bollywood Has My Vote

2012-01-15T11:06:00.000-07:00

This morning when I went to collect the whites from the dryer, I found a dead mouse. It was all wet and bedraggled, stuck to the metal next to the lint catcher, a smear of dark blood trailing down to its body. I admit I squealed in surprise when I realized it wasn't lint, and then I fetched some tissue and disposed of the broken little carcass. Somehow, poor, wee mousie got himself in with the wash, where he died a horrible death. His revenge, however, was in getting blood all over the whites while he whirled gaily with them in the dryer, so now I have a pile of clothes that need to be hand washed for blood spots before being re-washed in the machine. I have the blood of a mouse upon my garments. Well, I actually have the blood of many mice upon my garments in the more figurative sense. I do feel bad for them, the little vermin. I usually say something over the body before disposing of it; something like, "You were the perfect mouse, doing exactly what a good mouse should do. I'm sorry you had to die, but we are at cross purposes here, since good mice are exactly what I don't want and can't have in the house. You poop and pee indiscriminately on everything and make nests in all the wrong places, which is horribly unhygienic. You also have a creepy way of rustling about at night and scritching on the drywall. I hope you're frolicking in pleasant fields now, where there is nary a cat to hunt you or evil humans who desire your demise."

I guess that's not so much a eulogy as an indictment and justification.

So I've found that Bollywood movies are smashing entertainment when I'm on the treadmill. They're perfect because they're often silly in a lighthearted and fun way, colorful, full of music, romantic, and lengthy (thus prolonging my workout). Plus, the English subtitles can sometimes be hilarious. I have always been fascinated by India, and while these movies aren't often extremely deep, they're surprisingly insightful. They usually revolve around a boy and a girl and love. I'm a sucker for love stories, but unlike the shallow, amoral, and insipid fare of American romcoms, Indian romances Bollywood style are good for the whole family. They convey a sense of morality and duty to family. They compel you to root for the triumph of the love of the two main characters, which is always threatened by something dire -- whether the threat is from family or circumstances -- or both -- but you want them to triumph in the right way and not take the easy way out.

In American romances, the movie ends when the hero and heroine finally overcome the obstacles and share love's first kiss (or its equivalent). In Bollywood movies, it is forbidden for the hero and heroine to kiss on the mouth, so that first kiss never happens (though they tease you with it constantly). Instead, the hero and heroine declare their love and do a lot of dramatic hugging. You'll probably also get a music video at that point. Then, just when you think it's over (because that's where an American romance would end), a Bollywood movie provides a thoughtful intermission, following which you're off and running into the second half of the film, where a new set of obstacles arise and must be overcome. It's like getting two movies in one.

And the dancing! So fun.

They're insightful because they give you a glimpse into what Indians think of themselves in relation to the world (remember, they spent a long time as part of the British empire, and that had a huge impact). You also get a sense of what honor means in their relationships with family and in the romantic arena. Bollywood, of course, produces just one type of Indian films. There are plenty of exquisite Indian movies that are beautifully filmed and highly dramatic, sometimes extremely disturbing and heart wrenching, and exhibit the real pain of life. Bollywood concentrates on humor, music, and comic romance, but they're still very interesting. Plus, it's hard to walk on the treadmill when you're crying too hard; exercising while laughing is just so much easier.

New Year, New Treadmill

2012-01-02T12:03:00.000-07:00

As you can see from my last post, my routine got a little upset during the holidays, and I didn't keep up with my mental exercises from The Four Day Win. I was observing to myself this morning how quickly I reverted back to old thinking patterns. The Dictator wiped off her red lipstick and started shouting obscenities and insults about my plumpness and Wild Child purposely re-tangled her hair and went back to launching pizza cravings as retaliation for the mere thought of counting calories. The moral: the mental exercises really, really work, but only when conscientiously undertaken.

Husband and I bought ourselves a Christmas present, which we had had on layaway for a while. We'd been in the market for a number of weeks, but on Black Friday, we decided to shop around for a good deal on a great treadmill -- even though we didn't get around to shopping until late afternoon. Amazingly, we found an amazing deal, so last week, we brought home our new NordicTrack in the back of the van. Somehow, we hauled it up the stairs (I nearly blacked out, it was so heavy; as it was, I couldn't walk for quite a while because my thighs were completely jelly), and it's now the newest addition to our bedroom furniture. The idea was that Husband would exercise in the early mornings before leaving for work and I would use it for regular morning workouts and then as a means to take much-needed breaks from sitting at the computer for hours a day, writing. Further, I could multi-task my exercise with mental downtime by watching a show on Netflix. Although we haven't yet managed to move everything in the room to facilitate television watching with treadmill exercising, I have had a lot of success with reading and using the treadmill at the same time. What I never expected (and what veteran treadmill users are probably completely familiar with) is the sea-leg feeling you have after completing a workout and walking again on non-moving ground. Weird.

While Husband has enthusiastically dived into the workout/counting calories mode of getting fitter and healthier, I've had to be very careful about where I let my thoughts stray. His enthusiasm is contagious, but I know all too well that I need to continue moving through the mental preparations before I start actively limiting caloric intake. Seeing the success I've already had with changing my thoughts, I'm much less inclined to allow The Dictator to guilt me into what I know has never worked for me in the past, even if that's what nearly all the professional diet advise urges. We'll see how it goes.

For now, the entire family is enjoying our treadmill. Even Little Gary informs me he has to exercise and then walks a quarter of a mile to half a mile at a time.

The Gift of Air

2011-12-31T13:20:00.000-07:00

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. One's late and the other is timely. I think I may get my Christmas cards out in spring, if I can manage to continue thinking about getting it done after another week or so. I'm not holding my breath.

Speaking of breath, asthma shaped our Christmas celebrations this year. Sophia, who was having a slumber party for her 13th birthday, dragged herself up the two flights of stairs from the family room early last Friday morning and sat outside my bedroom door, crying and trying to breathe. I thought I heard an odd noise, sort of a mewling sound, and went to investigate. There I found the poor girl, gasping for air, fearful tears running down her cheeks, her lips blue. My brain, which does occasionally kick into useful action, told me to get her to the emergency room right away. Since the hospital is only a five minute drive from our house, it would have taken longer to call an ambulance, so I put her in the car and away we went. Her birthday party guests, some of whom had driven in from The Big City, were left abandoned. I only shouted to Sian on the way out the door that I was taking her sister to the hospital.

The doctors didn't let her out for four days,but Husband and the other kids hauled the presents to Sophia's room on Christmas morning and we opened them under the kind and watchful eye of the respiratory therapist, who had to give Sophia her breathing treatment. Otherwise, Sophia's hospital experience was kind of pleasant, even if she was hooked up to a bunch of tubes. No one fought her for TV control, and she got to pick whatever she wanted to eat from the hospital menu. By Monday, however, she was pretty done with it, and we were very glad that she was released and allowed to go home. She's been fine ever since.

And her birthday guests did eventually get home, poor things.

Why it Takes Four Days

2011-12-15T10:26:00.001-07:00

I made myself stand on the scale this morning, just to see. Lo and behold, I've lost six pounds, and that's without actively cutting my caloric intake. I've been a lot more thoughtful about what I eat simply because I am not fighting cravings now. If you've never had the overwhelming guilt that comes with your weakness against food cravings, you don't know the relief I'm feeling. To let go of that constant tug-of-war between rational thought and irrational wants is like taking a vacation in the most peaceful, relaxing location where there are no cell phones, no insurmountable expectations to fulfill, and no guilt. I'm sitting on a beach, watching and listening to waves crash on the shore. I'm in the shade (since I'm not a sun lover) on a cool, deep patch of grass (hey, it's my dream. I'll have grass on the beach if I want it) under a palm tree.

Another side effect of all this mental work is that I'm dealing with stress better. Not perfectly, but better.

As promised, here is the reason why Martha Beck called her book The Four Day Win. Through her own studies and those of others, she noticed that beginning to make a change takes about four days. It's the first four days that are often the hardest, but after that, it's an exponential rise to making a habit if you don't quit. Habits take about 21 days to cement, so going through a series of five 4-day exercises plus one day will help you create a new, healthy habit. Since we humans really, really resist change -- even when the change is good for us -- it's easier to make these ridiculously easy daily goals for four day increments than it is to focus on the long term. Each day you achieve your ridiculously easy daily goal, you get a reward. You get a slightly larger reward for accomplishing four days of that goal. Setting ridiculously easy daily goals helps you ease into change without resistance.

One of her examples of how these four day increments can really work is from her own experience. When she wanted to begin working out, she knew that it would take a bit to get used to going to the gym and doing a workout routine. Based on her past failures to maintain a workout regimen, she started ridiculously easy. After the kids were dropped off at school, she drove to the gym and sat in the parking lot for the length of one song on the radio. Then she drove home. She did that for four days, and after four days, she was used to driving to the gym right after dropping off the kids. Then she went into the gym and walked on the treadmill for the length of one song. Then she left. After four days, she walked for the length of two songs. Suddenly, after all these extremely small goals were met, her body decided it really liked to work out, and she found that she was completing full length workouts with no resistance and no need to make that daily decision (do I go or don't I?). After 21 days, when the habit was cemented, it had become something that was difficult to change. The key was to start easing into that new habit without causing a "fight or flight" reaction inside.

Oooh, the latent psychologist inside me has been grinning from ear to ear.

The Watcher

2011-12-11T15:41:00.001-07:00

The Watcher is neutral and stands apart from the constant tide of thoughts and emotions running through my body and my mind , but The Watcher is full of nothing but compassion and love for Wild Child and The Dictator.

Following Martha Beck's instructions in The Four Day Win, I've been practicing becoming The Watcher. It's not very easy at first. You have to be able to step back from all the millions of big and little thoughts that race through your head and all the ups and downs and sidewayses of emotions that attend those thoughts. When I have sufficient quiet time, I have successfully achieved this state. Then I look kindly at Wild Child and The Dictator and tell them how much I love them and am grateful for them. After all, each of them is only trying to protect me in her own, extremely specialized way. As The Watcher, I speak to both Wild Child and The Dictator, thanking them for the role they play in my life and then asking how they can work together instead of fighting each other. I've had some incredibly insightful experiences doing this, and this visual has really helped me "see" the changes that have been made. Wild Child is starting to comb her hair and The Dictator has taken to wearing bright red lipstick. The Dictator is learning to ask rather than demand, and Wild Child is learning to trust.

Another exercise Beck has me doing is to communicate directly with Wild Child. Since my dominant brain hemisphere is the left side (I'm right handed), and I have begun to pay even more attention to the language of Wild Child (emotions), I'm teaching Wild Child my language as well. First, with my right (dominant) hand, I write down a question. Then I switch the pen to my left (non-dominant) hand and answer it. Here's what happened the first day I did this (Wild Child's answers are in italics, and she doesn't believe in punctuation):

How are you?

confused scared hurt

What can I do for you?

give me time don't judge don't starve

I won't starve you. What do you want to eat today?

bread olive oil apples

If we eat those, will that help you start trusting me?

We'll see need proof HCG was awful like a war zone don't do that again

I have no intention of doing that again. That was awful. I want to eat plenty of foods that make us feel good (healthy) but never deny us anything.

Good. I'll cooperate if we don't go hungry

What's crazy is that as I've been doing this, I have begun to lose serious cravings. I'm always reassuring Wild Child that I will not deny her anything, and because she's content that she won't be forced to go hungry, she doesn't make me fixate on how yummy a pint of ice cream would taste or linger on the smell and texture of pepperoni pizza. Peanut M&Ms haven't even been an issue. I love pie, but I haven't been compelled to seek it out. With most foods, I can take it or leave it. There's no temptation to binge.

I keep checking to find out if I'm hungry, rate how hungry I am, and then decide (as a committee with The Watcher, Wild Child, and The Dictator) what to eat. I keep tabs on how my hunger is doing as I eat, too. It doesn't take very long and I don't spend inordinate amounts of time doing it, and at this stage, I haven't actively begun limiting caloric intake. Though I'm still in the pre-contemplation stage, it's already put me farther ahead mentally than with any diet I have ever attempted (or any non-diet guilt trip, for that matter).

I do know how weird it sounds to refer to myself as multiple people, but I know it's all just different aspects of me. Creating visuals for each aspect and referring to them as "she" helps me identify those pieces of me that are in conflict and give them a chance to have their say.

Tomorrow, in my final installment about this book and my preliminary experiences with it (until I want to report something again), I'll explain why it's called The Four Day Win.

Oh, I'm Just SOOO Complex!

2011-12-10T16:20:00.000-07:00

Meet Wild Child and The Dictator. They both live in me, and both of them are very good at what they do. The Dictator is extremely talented at telling me what I need to do in order to reach my weight loss goals and also very good at telling me what a failure I am when I have a weak moment and lose control. The Dictator not only harasses me about weight loss but also about all the shoulds and must-bes and impossible standards I have floating around in my head as ideal states of being. With her hair pulled painfully back into a tight bun under her military hat and her little whip cracking ferociously, she's scary and powerful.

Wild Child is extremely timid, dressed in her bark and moss, with her dark hair a wild halo around her head. She might appear to be compliant and docile, but oh, she is so stubborn when she's backed into a corner. Put enough pressure on her and she'll literally grow in size, hissing like a cat and baring sharp teeth, threatening total annihilation to the enemy.

Up until now, The Dictator and Wild Child have been locked in a constant battle for survival, each against the other. The more The Dictator imposes strict diet regimens and goals, the quicker Wild Child whips out irresistible food cravings.

Martha Beck, in The Four Day Win, took my nebulous theory about what is going on inside my head and turned it into a vivid visual. The Dictator is my mind, the computer, trying to grant me my wish of effortless weight loss without the use of harsh diets and dangerous "miracle" pills and potions. The Dictator is logical and educated, if not entirely rational about her approach. She threatens and bullies and dictates in order to get me to comply with eating less and moving more. She's just doing what is natural for her to do, which is to pursue my desires, and she'll boss me into being thin if it's the last thing she does.

Wild Child is my body, the creature. Where The Dictator is the predator, Wild Child is the prey, and she reacts to the harsh orders from The Dictator by defending herself and her existence with every trick she knows how. In her view, The Dictator is ordering her to commit suicide, and the survival instinct is simply too strong. Her job is to keep me healthy, and if The Dictator is going to starve her, she will react by going into famine mode: eat as much as possible and store fat.

When Beck had me visualize Wild Child and The Dictator as two-inch beings on the palms of my hands, it was an ah-ha! moment of incredible clarity. There they were, those two warring factions in my self, suddenly so defined and crisp. But how to get them to stop fighting and work together toward the common goal of reaching a healthy weight?

Enter The Watcher.

Not Losing Hope, Just Hoping to Lose

2011-12-09T15:35:00.001-07:00

It is a tomorrow, and I am continuing my thoughts from my last post. I simply can't make myself finish my work this afternoon since I've been writing exhaustively for the past few days while dealing with all the million other things that have come up. So the orthodontist is going to have to wait, along with the people who want their Lap Band blurbs. Sorry, y'all, my brain only works for free today (but I'll have it all finished by Monday, I promise.).

I believe I was in the process of telling you of my weight loss hope.

A while ago, a friend of mine was sharing what he has called his "Sneak Up on You Weight Loss Plan," where he basically made some minor changes over time that have added up to losing over 40 pounds. Instead of starting a formal diet, he just made sure half his plate was covered in vegetables, and he learned to enjoy the pleasant meditation of a daily walk. I was thinking about how I've often thought the same things, only when I think them, I suddenly crave an entire pizza. It must work to make these small lifestyle changes, I thought, because he's been losing weight, but how do I make it work for myself without going food postal? The big and sudden changes of a formal diet are out, but how small do small changes have to be to stop triggering that rebellious streak in me?

Then, last week, I suddenly felt a very strong and sudden need to go to the thrift store and look at the books. Since I had a little time that evening, I asked Husband to accompany me, and I went to check out the books while he went to find those amazing deals he has a knack for finding. After a while, I came across a book called The Four Day Win: End Your Diet War and Achieve Thinner Peace, by Martha Beck, PhD. I did a quick perusal and decided to buy it, although I left numerous other diet books on the shelf. I hadn't gone with the specific intention of buying a book about dieting, just some vague notion that I simply must go and look at books at the thrift store, so I also grabbed a book about Color Code personality (turns out I am very definitely a White with almost equal secondary Blue and Yellow aspects), a thick coffee table book about China with some excellent text and amazing pictures, and a world Atlas that seemed pretty much up to date.

I read The Four Day Win in two days because I couldn't put it down except to attend to things like working and feeding hungry children. Not only is Beck hilarious (I couldn't help laughing out loud frequently), but she addressed every single one of the issues I've been dealing with when it comes to my dieting failures. In fact, after I read the entire book (because I like to read the entire book before I go back and start implementing things) I had already begun to change.

Tomorrow, I will tell you what has begun to change in my head so that when I woke up this morning, I absolutely knew that the pain of staying the same has become greater than the pain of change and that I am already making and keeping the "ridiculously small daily goals" that will make a big difference.

Reaching Metabolic Nirvana Again, I Hope

2011-12-06T22:07:00.001-07:00

I have often wondered why it is that the moment I even contemplate starting a diet, I balloon out like a desperate puffer fish on steroids. You know how people joke that just thinking about a piece of rich, chocolate cake makes them fatter? That's me. With the power of my mind, I can literally add pudge to my thighs.

Now, I don't want you to get any ideas that I'm using two chairs at once to sit comfortably, or that I'm wider when I turn sideways than I am when I'm facing you, but for the longest time I've carried more weight than I like. I have thought of myself as somewhat defective in the whole losing weight area, since my childhood, teen, college, and mission years were spent in some sort of metabolic Nirvana. I ate what I wanted and never, ever worried about getting chubby. After I started putting on weight with each pregnancy (have I mentioned there have been six?) is when I learned of my defect. After all, I know what to do: eat less and move more. So why, oh why, if I have the key piece of knowledge to lose chub, is it so %&*$ hard?? Why do I immediately, upon contemplation of cutting out sugar or being virtuous about never eating after 8pm, run to my nearest grocery store and stock up on peanut M&Ms? Why do I -- without fail -- sabotage my righteous intentions?

Actually, I know why, because I've thought about it long and hard while I snorked down a pint of Ben & Jerry's Peanut Butter Cup ice cream or absent-mindedly whittled my way through a bag of Fritos and a container of cottage cheese. I have a very stubborn streak. When I'm told what to do, even by myself, I rebel on principle. I can't even make a to-do list without feeling smothered. The thought of restricting my diet to celery, cabbage soup, or a slice of dry Melba toast makes me absolutely frantic. I obsess about food when I'm dieting. I think of nothing else, and I count the hours until I can eat another meager, unsatisfying meal. That HCG diet? Torture. And have I gained it back? Really, do you need to ask? I admit to having been extremely disappointed in my lack of iron will.

And yet, I have still searched for a diet that would allow me to eat what I want while I changed my gastronomic desires to more closely resemble a person who doesn't crave access to pounds and pounds of sugar and refined flour at every turn. If only, I reasoned, I could somehow WANT to eat healthfully while finding unhealthful food to be pleasant but not necessary (so I could indulge in the occasional slice of cheesecake but feel fine with leaving half of it on the plate, for instance). Is this diet heaven a possibility?

Yes. The answer is yes. Weep with me, gentle readers, for joy.

And I'll tell you more about it tomorrow (or, well, I say that, but lately things have been crazy, so I can't really promise that it will be tomorrow, per se, as much as a tomorrow. I'm just keepin' it real, my peeps.).

A Whole World of Pain

2011-11-23T07:26:00.001-07:00

I've made the trip back to the office of Young and Beautiful Dental Professionals again, this time with Sian in tow. The girl needs a root canal and crown, bless her, at the tender age of 16. She's meticulous about brushing and flossing, so she's understandably annoyed that she ends up with cavities while her younger sister, who isn't quite so fastidious, never has any.

As it turns out, I, too, need expensive dental work done. A while back, I had a tooth break apart while I was eating a burrito, and now that tooth needs an implant. I know I should have visited the dentist right away, but as I wasn't in any pain, I kept putting it off. I think another bit of the tooth must have fallen out because suddenly I'm in agonizing pain at times. The dentist looked at it and said, "How are you sleeping at night? The nerve is exposed!" and promptly prescribed antibiotics and a narcotic pain killer. The antibiotics have certainly helped alleviate that tight, feverish feeling I had developed, but the pain killers make me loopy and dizzy so I only use them at night if I really, really need to and rely on ibuprofen during the day. For now, I have a barometer jaw. If we have a storm front coming in, I can tell you about it as soon as I get over the desire to scream.

Sian is getting the root canal done today, and I'll have this troublesome tooth extracted in a few days and begin the process of getting an implant. Funny that I just wrote a couple articles about dental implants not that long ago. It helped me sound somewhat intelligent during my dental visit. I also managed not to burst into tears when they handed me the papers outlining the costs, so I was really on a roll.

A couple weeks ago, Sophia, Elannah, and Joseph tried out for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Sophia and Elannah both made it in this time, and Joseph was perfectly happy with his consolation prize: a VIP ticket for the performance. Sophia was Phineas Finch, avian friend to Snow White, and Elannah snagged the role of Bob the Head Dwarf.

Sophia is the bird in bright orange, which I think is a great color on her.

Elannah is on the upper right, sporting a black beard and unnaturally rosy cheeks.

They auditioned and began rehearsals on Monday and performed on Saturday. Husband, Little Gary, Sian and I went to see it, and since we could only get seats in the back, I plopped Little Gary on the floor at the front so he wouldn't get bored and start wandering. It worked. He stayed there the whole time, completely fascinated.

I found this when I was uploading the pictures:

Mom: Superhero

2011-11-10T12:14:00.001-07:00

Yesterday was my mom's birthday. She's only 10 years older than I am, since she's holding at 39 and I just turned 29 again. Funny how that happens.

My mom is one of my greatest examples of charity. Since I can remember, she's been serving other people. She'll help whenever and wherever she can. She has spent hours and hours doing things for others that will alleviate suffering, bring joy, help out in a time of need, and make people feel special. She'll help to the point of exhaustion, in fact, and she's had to learn to take care of herself, too. She's a wonderful woman, and I love her so much. Happy birthday, Mom!

RaNdOm

2011-11-01T22:08:00.001-06:00

Since I didn't take a picture of any of the kids in their Halloween costumes, this is definitely not a post about Halloween and trick-or-treating or anything. It's not cause I don't love my children; it's just that I have a blank spot when it comes to grabbing the camera and taking lots of photos to provide happy memories for years to come. I think if you opened my brain (assuming I was not currently using it, which might be more often than I care to admit even if I'm breathing), you'd see a big open area where good scrapbooking skills are normally kept. There's nothing there. Just a big hole.

I'm currently fighting a pie craving. Well, to say that's only a product of recent days is misleading, since that particular craving is usually on the ebb side of ebb and flow. Just when I think I've got it licked, back it storms. I should probably ramp up my Zumba efforts.

No Slide Guitars Were Smashed in the Making of this Post

2011-10-27T13:22:00.000-06:00

I have a distinct loathing for slide guitar and jazz flute. I don't know why. It's one of those visceral hatreds that has no rational logic behind it, but this loathing has prevented me from ever being a country music fan. And I'll just turn any music off if I hear a jazz flute. Either that or I will mock it mercilessly. There are a few exceptions to the jazz flute rule (Dave Matthews Band's Crush being one of them), but if it smacks of the '70s in any way, I don't hold back. There are no exceptions to the slide guitar rule.

What's sad about that is that I know the people who play those instruments not only love what they do, they're really good at it. They've practiced for hours and hours over the weeks and months and years, and then they perform their music and I'm over here, immediately biased simply because of the fact that for some reason, I can't appreciate it in any way.

On the other hand, I will always listen if it's a guitar not being slid upon. My brother, Aaron, studies the fine art of classical guitar, and when he gives us a concert during our frequent family dinners, it's always something I could soak in for hours. Sadly, there is usually a cacophony going on in the background. Did I mention I have six kids? And my house is particularly echo-y?

My dad sent me this little video recently. He found it on an old flash drive of his. It's a couple years old, it's not great quality, and the lighting is truly awful, but I love it. Aaron would hate it because he wasn't perfect during this impromptu performance, so I didn't ask permission (shhh!). (I imagine you couldn't possibly care that we've since painted the walls, removed the red curtain, and moved that black bookcase in the background, so I won't mention any of that.)

He's written a few of his own amazing pieces since this video was taken, and when I can get the stars to align, I'll get a good recording. I honestly think he could sell an album. I'll tell you right now (because he's not here) that when he's in his music groove, it's like sitting next to a lighthouse. His fingers fly, and the sound is incredible. It shines.

I've asked my other brother, Robert, to send me a recording of his band, but so far he's forgotten. Robert wrote a song called "Getaway Car" that I really like in particular. It's the juxtaposition of the lyrics (a guy running from a crime he's just committed) with the soft, sort of ethereal quality of the music.

I own a CD of music my dad composed for my sister, the massage therapist. It's peaceful, quiet, and utterly magical -- just the kind of music you want to hear while you're having a relaxing massage. I remember being ill with some sort of flu a few years ago, and that was the music that helped me cope. He also composed a piece called "Seattle Machine," inspired by the huge junk sculpture in the Seattle Airport. I can never listen to it and not dance. I have got to figure out how to get that on here, so if anyone with more technical expertise is reading this, please give me a clue.

Me, I don't compose. Like my dad and sibs, I hear new music in my head (which my sister-in-law assures us is not the norm, which surprises me), but I don't have the skills to write it down. I also don't take the time to plunk it out on the piano. What I do love is that I just spent my birthday money on new piano music and I made excellent choices. In fact, I stayed up until way after midnight a couple nights ago just playing. I can get away with that because I can put on headphones, but I can't get away with the fact that I am a lot older than when I used to play that late on a regular basis. I'm still paying for the short night. But it was worth it.

Half-Way to 80

2011-10-21T23:15:00.000-06:00

I am officially middle-aged. Yes, yesterday was the red-letter day, and while I would like to claim that I am a mere 29, everyone who reads this blog and knows me would know that I have one too many wrinkles to make that claim. But just one. Really, most people would assume I'm 30. Right? Don't answer that.

For my birthday, I was fed breakfast in bed by Elannah and Joseph, who whipped up some granola with milk, two slices of wheat toast with butter, a sliced apple, a leftover waffle cookie (Gabrielle made them for a youth activity), and a big glass of milk. I'm not a milk drinker, so I kind of wasted all that milk, and I was full after two bites of granola and a couple apple slices, but it was a lovely sentiment.

Next, Sian took me out to breakfast. I couldn't eat much (see above), but it was a lot of fun to hang out with my darling oldest daughter for a while. When we got back home, she presented me with a homemade gift: a necklace holder.

It was perfect! Up until this point, I hadn't done anything to sort my jumble of necklaces that were either tangled in a plastic zip-top bag or thrown on my closet shelf. I mean, I've talked about doing something, but it never seemed to be an important enough task to spend time on. But Sian heard my complaints and made this all by herself, the wonderful, smart girl. She also hung it up and organized my necklaces for me by color while I was being whisked away to The Big City for a few hours by Husband.

In The Big City, we spent some time doing what I liked, which included visiting a book store and eating a week's worth of calories at Five Guys Burgers. (Best burgers and fries ever?? Uh-HUH!) We even went to see a movie. We bought tickets for Rise of the Planet of the Apes because it started sooner than anything else, but on the way to our theater, we got sidetracked by the fact that Real Steel was just starting in the EXTREME HD THEATER SURROUND SOUND BLAST YOUR HEAD TO BITS THE SCREEN IS SO BIG AND COOL, that we ended up watching that instead. Sure, it's Rocky with robots, but it was a lot of fun. Cause robots! (They didn't explore any of the other obvious uses for robots in other parts of society, such as the potential to use them as really big and scary military tools, but perhaps that wasn't really what the movie was trying to talk about. Hugh Jackman as a cool dad? That was good enough for me.)

On our way home, we picked up pizza (though we were both still very full from lunch) for a family movie/pizza night. Some of my kids still hadn't seen Napolean Dynamite, but maybe they weren't really old enough for it when it did come out. They all loved it now that they're six years older.

All in all, it was a wonderful, calorie-intense way to turn 40. I loved it. Today I got to crochet a lot after writing some web text. Work and play. When did "play" morph from going dancing half the night to crocheting a twin-size ripple afghan in single crochet stitch?

And who cares?

The Creeper of Walmart

2011-10-15T13:25:00.000-06:00

The saga continues at Walmart. Turns out, Anthony, my Walmart Boyfriend, has been two-timing me all along. In fact, he may very well be three-, four-, or even five-timing me! Anthony is a busy, busy boy. (Get up to speed on my soap opera here and here.)

Here's how I found out I am not the only woman who receives his creepy affections:

About a month ago, our ward congregation had a potluck picnic. There were softball games, water bottle rockets, and, of course, food. It was a grand time. I even managed to hit some balls, which was very satisfying even as I cringed at my sore obliques the next day. Husband, taunted by the outfielders and their good-natured ribbing, also hit some balls (I couldn't stay to see the entire thing since I was called away to rescue Elannah from a tree into which she had climbed). He showed them the Brits are no pansies.

During dinner, I had to take Little Gary to the bathroom, and as I was coming back to the pavilion where everyone was eating, I distinctly heard my name spoken in a loud voice. When I walked into the pavilion, Linnea called me over.

"Listen to this!" she exclaimed, and beckoned to our friend,Carol, to start talking.

"There's this guy at Walmart who keeps telling me how beautiful I am. Every time I run into him, he tells me I just make his day," said Carol.

"Tell her his name!" said Linnea excitedly.

"ANTHONY!" Carol and I shouted at the same time, and I burst out laughing.

"She was telling me about this guy at Walmart who is always complimenting her, and I thought that sounded familiar," said Linnea.

We had a good laugh with all the people sitting around us.

Then, two nights ago, I ran into Carol again.

"Eva, I have to tell you," she began, "I'm scared to go to Walmart by myself! I've been trying to avoid it as much as possible, and I definitely stay away from where he works. But last night, I was just walking in, and he came right up to me at the entrance and told me how beautiful I am. I said, 'Thanks' and tried to walk away, but he followed me and said, 'Can we exchange phone numbers so we can talk and text each other?'"

We spent a few minutes shuddering. I mean, at first glance, Anthony seems completely normal. Friendly and complimentary, of course, but normal. And then it starts getting weird. I don't find men creepy just because they tell me I'm beautiful. That would be stupid. But Anthony takes that a step further and you feel like he's in the middle of a relationship with you that you don't remember having.

Linnea wants to make it a girls' night out. Carol and I and Linnea (and whoever else wants to come now that they've heard the story and are curious about this guy) will go to Walmart, find Anthony, and then get a group photo which I will post on my blog. Either that will make his day or he'll be unpleasantly surprised to be outed as a Walmart Casanova.

I still avoid the cereal aisle.

You Already Are Perfect. You Just Forgot What that Feels Like

2011-10-04T11:36:00.000-06:00

So here's the thing about love: it's additive. When you really feel the pure love of Christ, or charity, your ability to love grows as you love. It's a muscle that gets stronger with use, just like running or lifting weights makes you stronger the more you do them. The more you love one person, the more your ability to love all people grows, and vice versa. Unconditional love is the very makeup of the universe, and it's available in buckets and truckloads and planetfuls for those who want it. There is nothing more joyous than feeling unconditional love for yourself and being able to then feel it for others. It puts you on a very high energy vibration, where you are open to truth.

If you think love is subtractive, meaning that the more you love one person the less you can love another, that's not love. That's something based in fear. Charity, unconditional love, is based in faith. Where there is faith, there cannot be fear.

Whew. I just had to get that out of my system. I've been thinking about this for a very long time, and I am convinced that I came to this earth not only with the ability to love but with the desire to grow in that ability. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one.

One of the many pieces of knowledge that set me on that path of thinking is one that I was given years ago by a good friend. It's called Remembering Wholeness, by Carol Tuttle. My friend, a woman who was going through some struggles of her own, told me about this book and how much it had meant to her. I checked it out at the library and read it, and I cannot tell you the utter joy I received from pondering and praying about the concepts within. For some reason, I never bought it, though I wanted to find and read it again (it was always checked out at the library, and I guess I justified myself out of buying it because I didn't feel I deserved it or something).

Recently, Husband found it at the Deseret Industries near our home, and I have been reveling in it once again. This time, however, I have a slightly different perspective. I have already been making use of many of the concepts Tuttle talks about, and now I can see not only how far I've come but where I still need to grow. Isn't life such a great adventure? There is so much to learn and experience, even when you are doing the mundane activities that support your physical survival.

The Last Book You'll Need About How to Write a Book

2011-09-15T14:08:00.000-06:00

I just finished the best book I've ever read about how to put together a story well. If you're a writer or wanna-be writer, this is the one for you. I was so excited when I was only two pages in, I could barely contain myself. Now I've finished and I'm working on my outline for my novel with a lot more confidence and delight than I had before when I was kind of confused and vague about what needs to go where. Plus, knowing this stuff makes me a much more effective manuscript editor.

The book? Oh, you want to know? It's called Story Engineering: Mastering the 6 Core Competencies of Successful Writing, by Larry Brooks. Never before have I seen the process of writing a novel so well broken down, with all the necessary elements of what makes a great book defined. Brooks' constant and deliberate use of fragment sentences annoyed me quite a bit (the editor in me wanted to grab a pencil, and since I often read out loud in order to cement concepts in my brain via both visual and auditory methods, it was awkward to get those fragments read right), but the book is informative and the author is knowledgeable. He really, really has a problem with people who write organically (meaning that they simply write multiple drafts, letting the story take them where it will and then going back to see what's wrong). Brooks also calls it "pantsing," as in "writing by the seat of your pants," and he gives the reader many good reasons to abandon the practice without giving up creativity. Not being one to pants, I was already sold and I'm even more sold now that I'm armed with the tools I need to lay out my story.

School Daze: Food for Thought

2011-09-14T19:47:00.000-06:00

What, exactly, are teachers supposed to do? Do they just teach reading, writing, and 'rithmatic? Or are they also responsible for a child's emotional well-being, his grasp of societal norms and taboos, basic manners, and mentoring?

It's a good question, isn't it? I mean, our kids are with their teachers almost more than they are with their parents, so teachers, in some ways, are forced to fill the role of parent in many situations. A teacher with a class of 35 or more kids somehow has to help those kids learn all the basics in any given subject and deal with classroom management. And then we get all upset when they don't also spot every single problem our kid is having emotionally, physically, or spiritually; in fact, some parents get downright sue-happy when they realize that their precious little one isn't being treated with all the special, tender one-on-one time that the parents deem necessary.

I'm not being bitter or cynical here. I'm just throwing out some food for thought. Are teachers actually supposed to be responsible for all of that or is it possible that parents have now placed on teachers too much responsibility while avoiding it themselves?

A conversation I had with a friend today really brought that issue to the fore in my mind. She has intimate knowledge of what goes on in schools in our area, and one school in particular is atrocious. At this school, the principal has cultivated such an image of being a "pal" that he does not in any way demand responsibility or accountability from the students. The kids, who are in high school, attend class when they feel like it, leave school grounds when they feel like it, and abuse their teachers when they feel like it. The teachers at this school have no recourse. If they send a student to the principal's office for discipline, the principal lets them hang out with him, telling the kids to wait "while the teacher cools down." No one gets punished for multiple tardies or unexcused absences. If a parent comes to complain about their student's failing grade in a class, the teacher of that class is ordered to allow the student to make it up, even if the failing grade was a result of homework and attendance negligence.

I wonder what the principal thinks his duty as the leader of his high school actually is? When those kids graduate with what amounts to an eighth grade education (or less, depending on how well they did before they made it to this high school), they will be ill equipped to enter the workforce or attend college. Not only will their academic skills be lacking, they'll find that attendance is required, they have to be accountable for their performance, and no one is going to cut them much slack if they continue to act as if everything is to be run on their own time. They won't be ready to transition to adulthood.

This has already been proven. When a new high school was built in a town close by, students from Atrocious High (not its real name) were allowed to transfer. Nearly every single one of those who began attending the new school eventually transferred back because they couldn't handle having to show up to school on time, stay all day, and hand in their homework. There was no Pal in the head office willing to let every bad behavior slide. Plus, the principal of this school didn't appreciate being called by his first name.

The Atrocious High principal is an example of exactly what education should not be. He's incompetent and dangerous, and those kids will have to work for years to undo the damage that's been done to them by his personal desires not to upset anyone at any time. So again, it raises the question: what, exactly, is a teacher responsible for?

Because where are the parents of these kids? Why haven't they demanded that he be fired? Why are there no letters to the editor or calls to the district Board of Education? The teachers at Atrocious High are afraid to speak out because they'll be fired, and no one wants to be fired in this economy. Yet, they have all the responsibility and none of the authority because the parents of these kids and the principal are working together -- whether through open approval or silence -- to ruin these kids for life. Teachers can teach to empty classrooms or demand homework from kids who openly mock them, and in the end, they will be blamed for not giving them an education in life as well as letters and numbers.

2011-09-12T18:00:00.000-06:00

Last week, I made rice pudding. I do that once in a while, much to the joy of my family (and my brother, Aaron, who happened to be visiting). But this time, I did something so crazy, so off-the-wall, that people just weren't sure it would turn out okay; and it turned out to be a brilliant success! Tonight, I'm going to share that success with you, and if you play your cards just right, you might become almost as popular as I am around these parts. But you'll be popular in your parts, of course, assuming people in your parts like rice pudding. These parts are my domain. So step away.

Here's what I did to the rice pudding (oh, aren't you excited??): I used only coconut milk instead of cow's milk. I know! YUM! The recipe is absolutely divine with regular milk, but when I put in 1/2 gallon of coconut milk instead, I totally ramped up the exotic taste factor along with the calorie count. And not only that, but I (wait for it...) sprinkled ground cardamom over the servings of those who felt a little more adventurous. Bliss. I don't know what it is, but that subtle, delicate whiff of cardamom that settles onto your palate like a flitting butterfly a moment after the creamy, softly textured pudding hits your tongue...well, it's indescribably delicious.

If you're thinking to yourself, "That's all fine and good, but not all of us are as rich as you are, Eva, to buy 1/2 gallon of coconut milk!" then I can't blame you. I did buy the milk at such a steep discount from my favorite grocery outlet that I'm worried that telling you how much I paid for it would sound like bragging of the most uncouth kind. Let's just say that I didn't spend over $2.00. I'm not made of money.

Here's the last rice pudding recipe you'll ever need. Play with it how you will, but as-is, it's perfect. It makes a lot, so share some with family and friends.

Anna's Pig-Out Rice Pudding, by Anna Tanner (I don't know Anna Tanner, but I definitely want to give her the credit for coming up with this.)

2 cups hot water
2 cups long grain rice (don't use jasmine rice. It clumps. I found that out the hard way)
1 cube butter
2 teaspoons salt

Put all ingredients in a large saucepan and boil until almost dry. Then add 1/2 gallon milk. Stir really well and turn the stove down to medium/low. Cover. Stir occasionally for the next 45 minutes to 1 hour. You'll know it's done when the rice is tender and the pudding starts to thicken a little.

When the pudding is ready, whisk together:
6 to 7 large eggs
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 TABLESPOONS vanilla (yes. That's right)

Add the egg mixture to the pudding and stir to combine. The pudding should begin thickening up right away. Let the egg cook about 30 seconds or so, and then turn off the heat. Serve it hot, room temperature, or cold. You can sprinkle individual servings with cinnamon (or add a dollop of jam) if you like.

If you want to try my version, replace the milk with 1/2 gallon coconut milk and sprinkle with ground cardamom when serving.

Solved: the Guy is Cuckoo

2011-09-11T17:49:00.000-06:00

I've had so many people ask me for an update on my Walmart boyfriend that I've decided to indulge your curiosity, you voyeuristic fans of mine. I hate to be the one through whom you must live vicariously, but if that's what it takes to satisfy my public, then so be it. I will go out and enjoy all these new experiences just so you can imagine how thrilling it would be if you were me. (sarcasm fully intended)

I believe the questions were these: was the worker at Walmart conducting some sort of sadistic experiment, or did he actually think I'm beautiful? And what would he have said had he come back from his break and I hadn't scampered quite so quickly and anxiously through the opposite exit?

I now have the answers, gentle readers! Prepare to be thrilled and amazed as I relate the ongoing saga of Anthony the Walmart Guy: Crazy for Me or Just Plain Crazy?

So here's what's happened so far (cue olde tyme soap opera organ music). After that little incident I related in the previous post, I managed not to run into him for a few weeks. In fact, I avoided that section of the store as often as I could, just to be sure. Why it got me so rattled I couldn't say, but Husband had a pretty good time laughing at me and my nervousness. Then, one day when my in-laws were here, the four of us ran to Walmart to pick up a few of the things they needed to take home to the British rellies (that's how they sometimes say "relatives" in England. They also refer to presents as "pressies," and vegetables as "veg." I think they have some sort of aversion to saying words full-length, since they also tend to chop off whole syllables in their place names, as well. For instance, when a word is spelled "Leicester," any normal human who can read English would assume it's pronounced "Lie-chest-er." NOT SO! If you say that, you're a tourist! You must say "Lester." Don't yell at me about it. I'm just the messenger here. Spend a good 18 months or so in England and learn all the silly rules yourself while exploring cool castles, eating real fish and chips, and attempting to speak to the locals about God. This message is not endorsed by any linguistics professors, tourism boards, or fish and chips councils.). The British rellies always fancy a bit of Lucky Charms cereal (probably because they live so close to Ireland), so we were standing in the cereal aisle discussing the relative merits of buying brand-name cereal in a box as opposed to generic stuff in a bag, when lo and behold! Walmart Boyfriend stepped up with fresh stock for the bins.

He gave me a big grin and probably would have spoken to me, but I did the whole smile with dismissive nod thing. Then, when his back was turned, Husband and I started giggling like fools. The in-laws didn't notice, but if they did, they probably assumed we were acting exactly as we normally act (is that sad?).

Another few weeks went by, and I had become complacent -- dangerously so. I was alone, walking down the baking aisle, when Walmart Boyfriend suddenly appeared like a somewhat tall, slightly dark apparition before me. Fortunately, when I am startled I often revert to Confident Mode (except in some critical situations, of course), so when he smiled at me, I smiled back and said with great elan, "Hi." Then he said, "You always look so beautiful." As if I receive lovely but outrageous compliments from perfect strangers all the time, I responded, "Thank you." He stuck out his hand. "My name's Anthony." I stuck out mine. "Eva. Nice to meet you." Then I smiled pleasantly and sailed blithely away down the aisle before he could think of something else to say.

Was I suave? Absolutely. Was I confident? Oh yes. My heart didn't even beat any harder with delayed adrenalin than usual. Is he crazy? Without a doubt. I got a really good look at him, and he should be hitting on my daughters, not me. Definitely crazy.

One of the good things about this is that I now know I haven't met him before and just forgot. I thought I might have suffered a serious memory gap there. I would post a photo of him, but you can't expect me to walk in and ask him to pose while I take a picture, can you? That might give him the wrong idea entirely. We constantly beautiful beings have to be careful (sarcasm fully intended).

Husband Wrote the Last Line

2011-09-08T23:08:00.000-06:00

Today was Husband's three month checkup. Blood was drawn, vitals were taken, and the verdict was delivered: all is well. Hemoglobin up, platelets up, and all other signs indicate continued good health.

As we were leaving the parking garage, Husband said mysteriously, "And now I can continue the gaseous exchange with the infinite." Thinking I had somehow missed the profound meaning of that statement, I shot him an astute, "What??" Then I laughed because I couldn't help it.

"It's a phrase that keeps going through my head," he explained. "My brain keeps telling me it's terribly clever and I keep telling my brain it's incredibly stupid."

Now, I completely understand having an argument with your brain (though I try not to delve too deeply into the question of who, exactly, is doing the arguing), and I have written before about the strange and disturbing heated discussions one can have with oneself over flawed ideas, logic, and reasoning (including, but not limited to, waking up in the middle of the night just so you can stew and stress over something you know perfectly well you'll take care of the next day; or being plagued by luscious thoughts of eating dirt when you're anemic but knowing it's not a good idea to indulge). So I just laughed and laughed, and he laughed with me. If we are crazy, let us be crazy together. Maybe it's a writer's curse.

We celebrated the good news of his continued health by going to my parents' house and picking up my wheat grass juicer and sundry other items like CDs, books, and the like, which had been hiding under stuff in the garage or the spa/workout room. (It's been two years that we've lived in this house, and I think we'll be done moving very soon. Won't my parents be glad?) I've been wanting my juicer for a while now. If you've never slugged down an ounce of fresh wheat grass juice, you haven't lived. You certainly haven't lived with the intense and repeating wallop of fresh green grass tickling your tongue and punching you in the throat all day long. Take my advice and only drink a half-ounce or less until you get used to it -- if ever you do. It's kind of an acquired taste.

Since I haven't forced Husband to ingest any hippy health remedies like wheat grass juice lately, I don't think he can blame me for his terrible gaseous exchange with the infinite, now can he?

Kid History Makes My Mouf Feel Aw Tingwy!

2011-09-03T13:46:00.000-06:00

The family behind the Kid History movies are at it again, and I have two new ones to add to the collection. I embedded the first four videos here and there are now two more for your viewing pleasure. I personally think the sixth one is the best so far, but as I have laughed repeatedly and heartily over all of them, it's kind of hard to pick a favorite.

The kids and I are always quoting these movies, proving that the geek genes that compel a person to quote movies at random moments, to the annoyance of everyone around them, is as much a product of environment as heredity. We're in good company, though. Even the neighborhood kids have taken to creating their own t-shirts with quotes from the movies. One girl around the corner has a shirt that says "Girls are mermaids" on the front, and on the back, "Some boys are mermaids, too."

Gabrielle was sitting in one of her high school classes last week, supposedly reading quietly from her textbook. She started thinking about Kid History 6 and couldn't stop herself from laughing out loud. Her teacher asked her why she was laughing, since the textbook was not really conducive to humor, and Gabrielle explained she had remembered a quote from the movie. The teacher started quoting from it, as well, and soon all the kids were giggling over their favorite parts. It's become a phenomenon.

And here's a little bonus:

Those Roberts boys are geniuses. Genii? Those Roberts boys are really smart.

Seriously, Though

2011-09-01T21:51:00.001-06:00

Seriously, though.

Yesterday was a red-letter day. The part for the vacuum cleaner arrived in the mail and Husband replaced the old, broken part. The vacuum now sucks. Yay for Husband! We could have spent the $50 on a new vacuum, but since you can't buy anything that will work longer than, say, five minutes for $50, it was well worth it to spend the money to fix our otherwise excellent vacuum cleaner. Sure, it's mostly held together with duct tape, but that sucker does a fantastic job.

Today, carpets were Hoovered. That's how they say it in England. That's just a bonus fact 'cause I'm feeling all generous and whatnot.

Tonight, I went downstairs to fetch Little Gary from the family room since it was bedtime. He had finally managed to snag a turn on the TV and was playing a video game, so he wasn't excited to hear I was going to end his fun and force a tooth-brushing. I'm tired, and dragging a small but determinedly stubborn boy up two flights of stairs was suddenly too much to deal with, so I plopped down on the couch and put my face in my hands.

"Are you going to watch me play, Mommy?" he asked excitedly, always happy to have a parental audience.

"No, I'm going to sit here and cry," I said in martyr tones.

"I will give you a hug and a kiss to make you feel better. And a raspberry. But a raspberry is gross," he said, not missing one move in his game.

"Thank you. But I also want to go to bed," I said.

"Well, go then!" he said helpfully, waving his hand at the door. He leaned over and nudged my shoulder. "Go on, then, Mommy! Go to bed."

Aww. How sweet. He's much more concerned about my well-being than his own, and he's only four. But as his mother, I can't let him wear himself ragged on my behalf. He's in bed now, the poor, selfless dear.

One Music-Induced Stupor Coming Up

2011-08-29T16:04:00.001-06:00

The Christmas season has started for choirs everywhere. This may or may not be good news depending on the choice of music, but for me, it's EXCELLENT!

Our choir director has chosen a good pile of great stuff; I like all of them. But by far the best two pieces are the ones about light: Lux Arumque, by Eric Whitacre; and O Nata Lux, setting by Guy Forbes. I have ever been a huge fan of ethereal a cappella pieces, and Eric Whitacre is one of the most amazing composers of this type. Those distonal chords and the resonant high sopranos...the sheer magic of it is enough to suspend me completely in a music-induced stupor.

The words of the song are taken from a poem by Edward Esch.

Light,
warm and heavy as pure gold
and the angels sing softly
to the new-born baby.

Whitacre had the poem translated into Latin:

Lux,
calida gravisque pura velut aurum
et canunt angeli molliter
modo natum.

Here is Whitacre's virtual choir performing the piece. Enjoy. Then come and see us perform (minus about 160 voices) in December.

Musings on Becoming Expert

2011-08-25T16:52:00.000-06:00

I just finished up editing and evaluating a manuscript. Yesterday, I had the pleasure of handing it back to the very nervous author, who was expecting me to tell him never to write again. Instead, I congratulated him for having actually written a novel, since many people have it on their bucket list but only a few ever accomplish it. Then I showed him the pages of notes I had written for him; he nearly fainted when he saw the editing marks covering every single page of his book. I think in that moment he really felt like throwing up his hands and never trying again, though he was paying me to tell him what worked and what didn't.

I told the author that he had the beginnings of a great book, despite what it looked like after I got through with it. I told him that constantly practicing his writing will only make him better and better, and if he gets sick of his current novel, he can start another one. Why not? Plus, even the most famous published authors have often written multiple novels before getting that one acceptance letter among a huge pile of rejection slips.

While dropping off Little Gary for his first day of preschool today, I saw a poster outside one of the classrooms at the elementary school. It said, "Every expert started out as a beginner." I love that. No one is naturally perfect at doing anything without hours of dedication and practice. Even if you have a talent, only the time you put in to honing it will make you an expert. You don't even have to have a natural ability for something to get good at it if you're willing to work. Nothing is out of bounds for anyone; you just have to decide where your efforts will be placed.

Sounds like good advice to me! I think I'll finally pull out that dusty old manuscript I've had sitting on the shelf for far too long and start becoming an expert.

Thar She Blows!

2011-08-24T11:28:00.000-06:00

I tried out some spray wax last week. The hairstylist used it at the salon on Elannah and convinced me to purchase some, dangling the carrot of a 50% discount. Elannah looked adorable, and I wanted to do something with my new, shorter do, so I went ahead and bought a bottle. It feels a bit odd (like having wax in your coiffure!), but I was able to scrunch my hair into light waves and have them stay put all day.

The next morning, I looked in the mirror and laughed so hard I nearly took a picture. Nearly. Obviously, I couldn't keep the wax in my hair unless I was willing to sport some ultra-funky look (which I wasn't on a Monday), so I took a shower to wash it out. I shampooed once and shampooed again. Then I checked the spray wax bottle, which said, "A second shampooing may be necessary."

Phhht. Understatement. I shampooed my hair five times, and I still couldn't get it all the way out. The only reason I gave up shampooing was because I was running out of hot water.

Several showers later, I think it's finally been washed down the drain. I now view that sleek, white bottle with a jaundiced eye, though I haven't thrown it away yet, thinking there must be some good use for it. What if I want a mohawk? A girl never knows when the urge will strike.

Word to the wise: Paul Mitchell is laughing all the way to the bank.

Other than using myself as a guinea pig for crazy hair products, I've been so busy that I have spent the last month ready to puke with stress at any moment. Some people thrive on stress and busyness. Not I. I crumple. My brain functions take a vacation, my hands wring themselves, and I occasionally try to hyperventilate for good measure. Where did my tolerance for stressful situations go? Has age and experience put me at a level where the smallest things will send me over the edge?

I do remember being this stressed in high school. In my senior year, I found myself as the yearbook editor-in-chief AND layout editor, co-editor of the literary magazine, choir president, and occasionally involved in the school's drama productions (once as a singing narrator in a Russian play and once as living scenery during Shakespeare's Twelfth Night) (and no, I wasn't an overachiever. My GPA was never a 4.0. Necessary involvement was the bonus of attending a school where my graduating class was only 40 strong). I was also in the city youth orchestra, president of my seminary class, and dating a boy I could only see in the late evenings because of his schedule. There was some hand-wringing going on that year. In contrast, college was a huge relief.

I have, however, come through this month's numerous deadlines, duties, and responsibilities with only a few new twitches. I never did throw up, and getting the kids ready for school in the mornings seems easy in comparison. This morning, I took time to dance to some 80s music Husband bought for me. Nothing relieves stress like belting out "Because your kiss, your kiss is on my list. Because your kiss, your kiss, I can't resist. Because your kiss is on my list of the best things in liiife!" with Hall&Oates, or rocking out to "Eye of the Tiger."

No pictures were taken to preserve your sanity.

Let Me Fly

2011-08-04T21:30:00.000-06:00

If you've been reading this for a while, you'll know I love singing in my county choir. They're a fun bunch of people, and the director is absolutely amazing. Not only does she pick challenging music, she's very good at what she does, and that makes all the difference in the world in a choir.

Here we are singing "Let Me Fly" in our last concert. It wasn't my favorite song, and it's the first one of the concert, so those sopranos were really reaching for the high notes, but I thought I'd share it because you can actually see me in this video. After all, this is my blog. I'm in the second row, right in front of the white column. When the female soloist steps down to sing in the microphone, you can see just about all of me.

You're lucky my daughter ran out of disk room before we got to "Pink Panther," when I went just a little crazy with a pink feather boa. How embarrassing. My alter-ego completely took over.

Oh, you love it when I let loose.

You scare me. I mean, I'm lucky there wasn't a pole right there or I'm not sure what you would have done.

Naw, nothing that bad, but it was hilarious watching Husband's eyebrows try to climb into his hairline.

Believe me, I'll never forget.

The choir director did encourage me to have fun, remember? Right before that number, she whispered to me, "Let it loose! Just like dress rehearsal."

I'm not talking about this anymore. My parents-in-law were there. I blush just thinking about it. Hee hee hee!

I am so much more a part of you than you'll ever care to admit, and you don't mind one bit.

Hush, now. That's our little secret.

Ahem. Anyway, I'm pretty glad there's no recording of that part of the performance. Honestly, when I get on stage, sometimes I really do just let it all go, and I'm never quite sure what's going to happen. Never hand me a pink feather boa and ask me to sing "Pink Panther." It will be better for all of us. Besides, it's hard to sing when I'm shimmying. In my defense, if some of the other women hadn't been laughing so hard I wouldn't have been encouraged to be quite so outrageous.

She's Got Brains, She Does!

2011-07-27T17:08:00.000-06:00

I was trying to explain socialism and communism to Elannah. I talked about how all things are held in common and no one has any personal possessions. I talked about how a few elite members of such a society are in charge of distributing everything that is produced and telling people where and how to work -- about how any money earned above a certain benchmark is taken and given to someone else who needs it more. This "utopian" society is supposed to create equal outcome as well as equal opportunity.

Elannah thought about it for a while and then said, "But that means no one would feel like it was worth it to work hard. Whatever they did would just be taken away and given to someone else."

Ah, my dear. At the tender age of 10, you have uncovered the great fallacy of Marxist reasoning.

The Ganja Brownies Explained

2011-07-25T22:35:00.000-06:00

Let me preface this little tale by stating unequivocally that I am so boring and straight that I have never even been tempted to use illegal drugs of any kind or abuse prescription drugs. There was never any positive consequence that I could see from them, and I'm wise enough in that respect to be able to benefit from others' bad experiences.

Besides, even the legal medications I've taken haven't produced anything that equals the natural high of living a life full of joy. Laughing gas was a huge disappointment -- I never even cracked a smile. Excedrin makes me feel spacey, and I absolutely loathe the jittery feeling pseudoephedrin in sinus and cold medications gives me. I'd rather suffer. I've had several prescriptions for heavy-duty painkillers that I've filled but never used, simply because I got along just fine with ibuprofen. Ibuprofen is great for headaches and other pain, and I don't have to worry about feeling all weird and loopy. I hate, HATE, HATE feeling weird and loopy because of a medication.

I've also steered clear of alcohol. Never touched a drop. That wasn't a hard decision, either, even if it was such a general part of high school life (not college. I went to Brigham Young University, and I don't think I met anyone there who drank. And yet, my friends and I had so much fun anyway!). Besides the fact that drinking alcohol is directly in contradiction to my faith as a Mormon, I know I've got alcoholics in my family tree. Even if that wasn't enough, the thought of losing control of my upper faculties always scared me to death. I never knew if I would be a social drinker or end up as an alcoholic, and it just wasn't worth it to find out, even if I had ever been tempted.

So it was with huge disappointment that I realized that marijuana did absolutely nothing for me except induce such an intense need for a nap that I almost fell asleep standing up. I mean, I get that feeling when I've spent too many nights taking care of sick kids, so there's certainly nothing novel or exciting about being dreadfully sleepy.

Little Gary, on the other hand, apparently just can't handle a little marijuana.

What happened was this: a woman whom I have met a couple times offered brownies to me and my son. Given the setting and the situation, I had no reason to suspect they were doctored, although I had begun to notice that the woman was acting high. Little Gary got three brownies, which he downed in a flash. I got one brownie, and as I chewed, I detected a distinctly herbal quality not normally found in brownies that I eat.

I asked the woman if she'd made them herself, and she said she had and then rambled on about using applesauce instead of oil. I have never noticed applesauce to cause an herbal tea flavor, and when Husband came around the corner, I told him my suspicions. We briefly considered forcing Little Gary to throw up the brownies, but didn't know how we'd manage that.

About ten minutes after eating the brownies, Little Gary was hyper. HYPER. His pupils were dilated, he was terribly thirsty, and he was manically running around like a crazy thing. We watched him for a bit, and then I suggested he get a Priesthood blessing. Husband and another man gave Little Gary a blessing right away, and immediately afterwards, Little Gary's pupils began going back to normal. His hyperactivity, however, remained quite, quite intact.

Husband went and asked the woman if she'd put marijuana in the brownies (he was furious, of course), and she denied it, though she was swaying on her feet so badly she nearly fell over. She was also questioned by two off-duty policemen, but they apparently didn't find enough reason to do anything further. The woman drove away, which was not a good idea, given her condition.

We went home and Little Gary spent a few hours running full tilt through the house until he suddenly stopped, lay down on my bed, and fell deeply asleep. I also wanted so badly to lie down and take a nap. I was not only horribly lethargic, I couldn't really think all that clearly; but I had family coming over and didn't have time to sleep when I needed to cook dinner. It was terribly unpleasant.

A week later, I got the news that the woman had confessed to baking marijuana into the brownies, although she hadn't meant to harm anyone -- especially any children. Several other kids had also been fed the brownies. I was asked not to press charges and to have mercy on her since she had told the truth. After all, we'd eaten the evidence, and she didn't have to 'fess up, but she wanted to be honest and apologize. Since no permanent harm had been done, I didn't press charges, knowing a little about this woman's history and her present difficulties in life. I ran into this woman at the store (you run into everyone in this town at the store eventually), and she apologized personally. She's gotten help since that incident. Regardless, I won't be eating anything she makes. Ever.

Wasn't that a fun little adventure? We have a new tale to tell, and Little Gary might feel a natural aversion to brownies for a long time yet. And I can keep my utter conviction that nothing that is meant to artificially increase enjoyment, happiness, or relaxation comes even close to the natural joy that dwells inside you when you're living a life you can be proud of and from which you gain so much real happiness and joy.

Those ARE Little Gary's real eyes. Undrugged. And his face is dirty as usual.

I May be Feeling Low but at Least I'm Not High

2011-07-20T18:06:00.000-06:00

You wouldn't think my life had a lot of drama going on, but you'd be wrong. In the last little while, I have:

* Caused a Family Brouhaha of Epic Proportions Through My Own Stupidity
* Gotten High From Being Fed Ganja Brownies

That might not sound like much, but for the nearly middle-aged, stay-at-home-mom, quiet writer's existence that I have cultivated, it's pretty horrible.

I am just teasing you with this because I'm not at all in the mood to write more about either topic.

What I AM in the mood for is to eat a gallon of peanut butter/chocolate ice cream, but that's because I am stressed and craving carbs and not because of any illegal substances in my system. Besides, I ate the marijuana brownie days ago. That's over. I will explain that incident later when I feel more humorous, because it's kind of a funny story. Funny hmmm. Not funny ha ha.

In the meantime, I'm going to distract myself so I don't eat a gallon of ice cream. Tempting as the thought is, I find that extra pounds don't make me any less stressed. Hello, cello. Be my friend this evening.

A Visit from the British In-Laws

2011-07-13T22:29:00.001-06:00

Well.

Last week my parents-in-law dropped by for a little visit from England. They brought suitcases full of presents and British goodies and financed some very fun adventures. Sure, Husband's car's transmission went CLUNK 50 miles from home (fortunately, it stopped right by a mechanic's garage), and my mother-in-law (MIL) caught the stomach flu from me, but we generally had a wonderful time while they were here.

This week, it's time to pay the piper. Because Husband is off-track from teaching at his year-round school, we're writing eight hours a day. We worked out that if we total 20 articles a day -- 100 total before the pay period ends -- we can pay the mortgage. It's a worthy goal, but UGH! it's been a long three days so far. Next week, when we go down to five articles a day per person, it will seem like a vacation. I've written about Kansas City real estate one too many times. Ditto Florida country clubs. I did get to write an article about spandex bodysuits and one about whipped cream chargers, which was a nice break. But by about 6pm, my brain is well and thoroughly shot. Done. I'm only writing this post because I'm not getting paid for it.

Tomorrow we still have to get our 20 articles written, but we're taking a break in the late morning to have a picnic with family friends who are visiting from out of town. I'm very excited about that.

Now you're all caught up. And I'm going to bed.

My MIL and FIL. Lovely British accents, even lovelier people.

Eva Aurora: Indiscriminate Smiler

2011-06-21T10:52:00.000-06:00

I am a smiler. I smile at people. I smile indiscriminately at people. I've been an indiscriminate smiler for as long as I remember, but I made a conscious effort to smile at people for a reaction during my LDS mission in England. People in England are not indiscriminate smilers. In fact, they can be very conservative about doling out smiles to strangers, and sometimes in that often gray and rainy country, I just wanted someone to smile back at me. I took a liking to that infrequent and startled genuine smile some fellow pedestrians or mass transit users would flash back at me -- a woman with small children, an old man in somber black shoes and fedora, a college student caught up in his internal thoughts. I smiled then and now at men, women, and children. Especially children. Who can't smile and make funny faces at a baby sitting in a grocery store cart? What greater reward than that sudden, explosively honest grin of an innocent toddler? Extra points for a giggle.

Occasionally, my habit as an indiscriminate smiler gets me into trouble. For example, one evening I walked into my local Walmart to grab a few groceries. On my way through the entry, a Walmart employee, whom I have seen several times stocking shelves and who has smiled and acted as if he knows me (though I have tried and failed to remember ever having any conversation with him at all) happened to be walking toward me. I smiled at him, as I always do, in what I -- perhaps, erroneously -- imagined was a neutrally friendly way, and he walked right up to me and said, "Hey, beautiful. I'm going on break right now, but maybe after that I'll see you around here." Then he walked off.

Say what?

He said it so quietly I almost didn't hear him, and he didn't say it suggestively. It was like we were continuing a conversation we'd had earlier, as if we were familiar. Except I've never talked to him. I have certainly never winked at him.

I'm not used to being hit on as a woman of nearly a certain age with six kids and some stubborn baby and pizza weight to lose, so I freaked out a little bit. I forgot half the things I went in to get because I was suddenly very anxious to leave. I waited in a busy line that was surrounded by tall shelves of impulse buys rather than the more visible express lane, and I left through the opposite exit, walking through the parked cars in the lot instead of taking a straight shot to where my car was parked. It wasn't that I felt threatened by his demeanor. I just felt really, really stupid.

I told Husband about it later, thinking he would laugh. Oddly enough, he seemed a little upset at first, but that may have been because I went for the "exaggerated for grand effect" approach by starting off with, "So, it seems I'm dating someone at Walmart." I got the "What does that mean?!" without an accompanying "laugh of disbelief awaiting the inevitably humorous explanation." I told him what had happened and how stupid I felt about it.

He said, "Well, you do smile in a friendly way at men."
"But I smile at women, too!" I said.
"Yes," he answered. "But the men don't know that."

The reason I've cultivated an attitude of indiscriminate smiling is two-fold: I genuinely enjoy getting a smile back, and in the back of my mind, I'm making mental notes all the time about who is more likely to smile at a stranger. I had a friend in high school who once said to me with some exasperation, "You're always conducting an experiment, aren't you?" He was right, though I only conduct my silly little social experiments in a very benign sense.

Do you want to know the results of this years-long, unscientific study? It's harder to make eye contact with women (probably because I am a woman and therefore subconsciously uninteresting and non-threatening to other women), but when they do make eye contact, they are quick to smile back, although if they're very preoccupied, they'll only acknowledge your smile with a little forehead twitch while they're thinking about something else. Men are generally a little startled by eye contact and a smile but they almost always smile back. It's a cultural thing, too. Americans are simply more likely to smile or grin frequently, which makes us seem like superficial idiots to people from cultures where smiling is reserved for special occasions. In some cultures I frequently come across, eye contact and a smile is obviously considered a come-on from a woman, and I'm always forgetting that in my indiscriminate smiling habit. This may be where my troubles at Walmart lie.

Children of all cultures smile readily, up to a certain age, where the strong heritage of their parents begins exerting influence.

Husband eventually saw the humor in my dilemma, and I have decided to be more circumspect in my smiling habits. It will take a lot of constant inner dialogue to break that habit, but while I may not smile indiscriminately, I will still smile.

Neutrally Friendly? Or Just Too Friendly?

A Man of Integrity

2011-06-07T11:29:00.000-06:00

I just added another link in my Blogs I Love to Read sidebar. It's called Gay Mormon Man, and I stumbled across it when researching information for an article I had to write about blogging. I was really impressed by the viewpoint of the author, a man who calls himself Calvin Thompson, and who describes himself as a somewhat conservative Mormon man who is also gay. Cal is married and has children and his wife is fully aware of his sexual orientation, but Cal is also convinced that the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are true and wants to be in full fellowship with the church (which, I might point out, doesn't mean that any person would ever be forced to be married, gay or not!). He seems also not to be anti-gay because he doesn't loathe himself and all others who undergo same sex attraction.

With all the hubbub of California's Proposition 8 (which was passed and which states that marriage is defined as between a man and a woman), Peter Vidmar's resignation as the Chief de Mission of the US 2012 Olympic Team over the issue of his having voted for Prop 8 and contributed money to the cause, and the question of whether or not homosexuality should be considered absolutely normal and healthy as a lifestyle, I have thought a lot about what it would be like to be gay and LDS. Cal's blog is a great example of one man's decision to accept himself and to also accept that he is in charge of his own happiness.

I don't know the author at all. I also have no idea what it would be like to have same sex attraction. I have to rely on the experience of others to gain some insight, therefore. I absolutely believe that every single person on this earth is a child of God, no matter their skin color, economic status, or sexual orientation. I certainly don't care to have the burden of judging anyone else's heart, and I'm relieved that Jesus Christ repeatedly stated in the Bible that His is the job of judgement because He does not view us by sight or sound alone. He knows us better than we know ourselves; He knows our hearts, and He will be absolutely fair and just and also as merciful as He can be with each of us when we stand in front of the Judgement Bar and account for our mortal lives.

While I uphold the LDS Church's stance on chastity, which applies to all people, both heterosexual and homosexual, my heart has often cried out for those who feel same sex attraction and who also want to be a worthy, temple recommend-holding member of the Church. How awful it must be to undergo not only the questions about the value of one's own self as somehow "broken" but to get through it while often hearing insensitive and hateful remarks from others around them, and also to be consigned to a state of eternal singlehood if they choose not to marry. Singlehood can be hard on heterosexuals, of course, but for a homosexual with a testimony and who wishes to receive all the blessings of the temple, that state must also be accompanied by the knowledge that to have a relationship that is more than just friendship with someone of the same sex that they are attracted to is forbidden. I imagine it must be a horrible and lonely burden sometimes, even if they are seeking to follow the Spirit and have a strong and abiding testimony.

To me, Cal is not a hero for being homosexual, just as I would not choose for a hero anyone else based on sexual orientation. Cal is a hero because he has reasoned and pondered about his options and has chosen to follow a path that may not be easy but means that he is living what he, personally, believes. Consistently living what you believe means having personal integrity, and that integrity makes a person heroic. I'm sure he's been vilified by those who believe that when you accept your homosexual orientation fully, you should also fully embrace the proscribed lifestyle or you are somehow a traitor to your kind, as well as other "well-meaning" individuals who have too much judgement to spare when it comes to knowing who is going to hell and who is going to heaven. I can't say I'm sorry that I'm spared this particular test in life, but I admire people who can go through it with as much grace as this man.

2011-06-04T14:27:00.000-06:00

It's about time Joseph learned to ride a bike. He's nearly seven, and the thought that he can't yet ride a bike might be horrifying in the extreme to many parents out there. As if we haven't fulfilled our parental duties and he will be scarred for life!

Please. Get real. We've just saved him a couple years' worth of accidents is all.

No, seriously, we didn't teach him before because he wasn't willing. Always a cautious child around bikes, swings, teeter-totters, and other pain inducing technology, it's only recently that he's come out in favor of his own bike riding lessons.

Since I'm putting pictures in today, let's see what else I have. Oh, yes. The back splash in the kitchen. Husband measured it all out, and somehow I ended up doing the actual work. I had a good time and learned a lot about laying tile. It ain't perfect, but I was learning as I went. Note the glass canister on the top shelf. It's got half a batch of Husband's brown sugar fudge in it.

When we went to The Big City, I was gifted with something I've been sighing about for a very long time (just ask Husband). My mom's neighbor, with whom she was very good friends, recently passed away; the son offered a lot of her things to my mom. One of them was a glass cake stand with a glass dome. I saw that on Mom's counter and just gasped. "Ohhhh! Cake stand...with a glass dome! Ohhh!" Mom laughed and graciously gave it to me on the spot. She did remind me that with it comes a very important responsibility: because her neighbor always had something in it, though it wasn't necessarily a cake, it was now my duty to have something to keep in it at all times.

Right now, it's holding half a fresh coconut, which isn't shown here. Hey, I didn't have time to bake.

I'm So Blue

2011-06-02T20:56:00.000-06:00

It's blueberry season. I don't think I need to say much more than that, as I'm sure you're all scrambling out of your seats and heading for the blueberry patches or the grocery store. If I had a blueberry patch nearby, I'd probably be grabbing my buckets that I had stored in the garage for this very purpose and then spending a long, sunny day stripping bushes of their blue bounty. As it is, I have to rely on the grocery store. Expensive, but soooo worth it.

Sooo worth it.

I'll see you later. I have a date with a bowl of blueberries.

Truly Horrible Poetry, But With Meaningful Intent

2011-06-01T09:43:00.000-06:00

Late owls salute dawn.
Honeysuckle scents the breeze.
A mouse-blessed cat leaps.

I'm back outside getting an early morning constitutional these days. I go despite my tired eyelids and my neck, which is still a bit painful. Funny, but after Sian, Husband, and I had an hours-long relaxing and humorous shopping trip in The Big City yesterday, my neck was just fine. I woke up this morning and it was painful again. I imagine that has to do with getting back to work with the addition of all six kids now being out of school and gearing up for whiny boredom.

To counter that small stressor, I composed the above pathetic verse during my walk/jog today. I would have added something about "The incongruous sight and sound of a trim, red minivan blasting gangsta rap," but not only did that very real experience not evoke the bucolic imagery I was going for, but I couldn't figure out how to include it within the restrictive syllabic requirements of a haiku.

I walk naked, but only in the sense that my ears are not stuffed with music-conducting electronics. I used to run with music, but I gave that up long ago in favor of quiet contemplation -- and you can see the inerudite results. Still, it's very peaceful to concentrate on the movement of your arms and legs, listen to your breathing, savor the mental observations about the world around you, and let your thoughts take you where they will. If bad poetry is born of such contemplation, well, there are worse things in the world. (I think.)

As I mentioned already, Husband, Sian, the two little boys, and I took a trip to The Big City yesterday. Our purpose was to shop, and to obtain our goal we needed to drop off Joseph and Little Gary at their grandparents' house. I thought that taking them to The Big City was a better idea than leaving them at home, where their sisters might not enjoy watching over them as closely as they require. Grandma and Grandpa were happy to spend some time with them, so Sian, Husband, and I embarked on a journey for new birthday clothes for Sian.

Five and one half hours later, we were still looking for the perfect pair of jeans that didn't also cost as much as next month's mortgage payment. Sian was getting very discouraged when Husband suggested we stop in one last store at the mall. At Sears, we found jean perfection and steep sales, a happy combination. Sian walked out three pairs richer, with a smile on her face.

To Sian (Though She Already Knows This and Lives It)

The true beauty of a girl
Cannot be measured by the makeup on her face
Or the brand names sewn on her clothes.
True beauty is not defined by her body measurements
Or the money in her bank account
Or the adornments hanging from her ears, encircling her neck, or sparkling on a finger.
The true beauty of a girl
Is measured by the light she carries inside,
Which grows brighter each day
That she recognizes her inherent and divine worth as a daughter of a loving
God.
The world measures beauty in fickle terms,
And to be beautiful to the world is but a fleeting and empty accomplishment.
True beauty is lasting, and rich, and meaningful,
And will only be found through study, prayer, a joyful heart, and loving service.
But the promise of true beauty is that it transcends the fickle, worldly measures
To adorn a girl as she becomes a woman, and a woman throughout the decades of her life,
Until she stands once again before her Father and offers to Him the whole of her heart
To be encircled about by His arms and hear the words, "Well done, my darling and beautiful daughter. Welcome home."
That is true beauty.

(The above was written on Tuesday, May 31)

Such a Pain in the Neck!

2011-05-29T19:48:00.000-06:00

Arrr! What happens when your stressed-out, rock hard shoulders meet a sudden leaping out of bed in the early morning to turn off the high decibel house alarm system set off by a three-year-old trying to get into the garage to find a popsicle in the freezer?

Pain happens.

Fortunately, it was a bad enough pain in my neck to warrant a day of rest Saturday (and since it was too rainy to work in the yard, no residual guilt), during which I watched several movies. Sian wanted to have a Pirates of the Caribbean marathon movie night for her birthday, so we had rented the first three movies for Friday night, but no one but Gabrielle and I made it through the first movie. That left us with some serious movie watching to do on Saturday. No writing, no heavy labor -- nothing but couch.

But the pain wasn't enough to keep me down for too long. I was feeling much better in time to go to choir practice last night. Husband was concerned, but I told him I would come home if I couldn't handle it. The endorphins released during practice prevented me from feeling much pain until it was over, when I kept dropping my keys on the floor for some reason. I suspect the key dropping was due to latent frustration at not being able to consistently nail that interval between "cares" and "I" in Star Wars: A Tribute to the Music of John Williams, although that might be overthinking it a bit.
...........

Little Gary is fully potty trained. Yes, as long as he's completely and utterly naked, he never has an accident. The trouble happens when he starts wearing any sort of clothing on his lower half. Sigh. A friend of mine says that potty training isn't so much about training the kid as training yourself. Little Gary trains me all the time, though. He'll say, "Mommy, I say 'I love you,' and then you say 'I love you, too,' and I say 'I love you, too.'" Today, he climbed up onto the headboard of my bed and instructed me, "Mommy, say 'be careful, my darling!'"

After potty training five other children, I wonder why I still feel completely new to the situation every single time?

Well, me hearties! I'm getting up early tomorrow to get me some exercise before the little landlubbers begin awakin' and demandin' food and attention. That means I'll be needin' to get to bed at a reasonable and decent hour o' the night. And I'll need to lay off the pie (is that possible?).

Don't Look Up With Your Mouth Open, and Sweet 16 Already??

2011-05-26T16:20:00.000-06:00

There must be a mathematical law for the multiplication of seagulls. Clearly, it's a function of available food, so if S is seagull and F is food,

S = F(ST)+ sMD
Or, to put it plainly, the number of seagulls equals available food multiplied by seagull telepathy added to the seagull multiple dimension theory (because it's just common sense that seagulls couldn't multiply that fast at an outdoor BBQ without coming from some near dimension).

Pigeons might operate on the same mathematical principle, but seagulls are uncanny. I've lived around seagulls or herring gulls nearly my whole life, and I believe my study of them warrants some publication. Maybe a book deal. Any takers? I'll call it Bold and Hungry: the sharp beaks behind the plaintive cry. Oprah will read it and weep, and it will become an instant best seller.

Ooh, I can't wait!

While I'm holding out for the millions coming my way, I have been attending end-of-year school functions that include dancing and grilled hot dogs (and thus, seagulls), and singing. Elannah had her gymnastics recital, after which the manager told her that she would love to have her on the competition team. Sian has finished her final round of tests and homework assignments just in time for her 16th birthday (today!). Gabrielle pulled up some low grades and turned them into high grades at her dad's urging by slogging through missing homework assignments and completing all the extra credit she could get. Sophia received a certificate signed by the President of the United States for achieving perfect straight As throughout her entire elementary school career. Joseph is mentally done with school and getting him to go this last week has been a Herculean exercise, but since the first grade had more homework than any other grade this year, I can understand his mental exhaustion. And Little Gary had a test for preschool.

And now, a note about my beloved first daughter, who has reached the tender and frightening age of 16.

She is a lovely child and she was born knowing right from wrong. When she was little, perfect strangers used to stop me on the street or in the supermarket aisles and tell me she was just like a porcelain doll with her fair skin, bluest of blue eyes, and darkest brown corkscrew curls. She's all grown up now, and she's beautiful inside and out. She loves goodness and doesn't understand badness. Her stack of books to read is taller than mine. She tries hard to push herself and achieve so many things.

I'm not sure where she came from, frankly.

I credit both her grandmothers when I see Sian's manifesting genes, and she is certainly her maternal grandfather's willing disciple, listening intently as he shares his knowledge and wisdom with her.

Happy birthday, my darling girl. You are precious to me, and I am so proud of you for what you are becoming and have accomplished already.

I Didn't Think I Would Mind Being Worshipped. Turns Out, It's Much More Uncomfortable Than I Realized.

2011-05-19T21:03:00.001-06:00

Yup. I'm definitely a cat person.

I have a friend who has an adorable little toy shihtzu named Jazzee (after the Utah Jazz basketball team), and every day I bring Jazzee over to our house to get some exercise and attention, as my friend is home-bound and not able to get down on the floor for serious tug-of-war. For some reason, when she's here, I am Jazzee's preferred person. Even though the girls are the ones who generally take her on walks, if I'm around, all others rate only a quick, uninterested glance. I rate cuddles and kisses and constant companionship. She follows me everywhere I go.

Somewhat like a certain three-year-old I know.

As cute as Jazzee is -- and she's adorable, with a face like an Ewok! -- that kind of attention is exhausting. I was contrasting her devoted and glue-like loyalty to a moment when I stooped down and gave Lincoln a thorough and very purr intensive scratch around the neck and ears. When he had had enough, I went off to put the laundry in the dryer, and Lincoln resumed his interrupted nap, not in the least concerned about my current plans or whereabouts. Jazzee, however, followed me closely, not taking her eyes off me for a second so that I would not give her the slip and dash off to the bathroom and lock the door, or something equally heinous.

I promised my friend that should anything happen to her, Jazzee has a loving home with us. In fact, Jazzee had a sleep-over one night just for fun. It was more tiring than that last sleep-over Elannah had with a billion little friends running up and down the stairs all night long and leaving the milk out on the counter. Jazzee wouldn't sleep anywhere but on my bed where I was, and Husband was not having a dog on the bed. For half the night, I tried to pawn the dog off on the girls, only to have her click-click her little nails on the wooden floor and bound back up the stairs to my room again. If I left her on the floor, she sat and stared at me (I could feel it through my closed eyelids). When she felt she had waited too long, she gave her signature single bark. After a couple more minutes, another bark. Repeat cycle of pawning and returning and barking.

Finally, longing for sleep, I plopped Jazzee up on the bed at my feet, where she happily lay down and proceeded to make loud smacking noises for about five minutes before her final, tired sigh, when she settled into slumber at last. Any time Husband or I moved and jostled her, Jazzee would repeat her smacking routine and loud sigh before falling back asleep. Although Husband slept in between those times, he woke up with the impression that Jazzee had been smacking her tongue just about constantly through seven or so hours.

How do people deal with dogs? Aside from the whole training issue, how does one put up with that kind of attention? I guess I could get used to it in the daytime, but nights would drive me crazy. Compound her need to be around me with her incessant nocturnal smacking and the fact that Myles the Cat, king and chief ruler of our household, took an instant and violent dislike to the ball of fluff that entered his domain (and Myles is the one who sleeps on our bed), and there would possibly be some sort of civil war -- and not just between the animals.

Let's Get Naked!

2011-05-18T13:30:00.000-06:00

Little Gary keeps coming up to me and saying, "Great catch!" and then swatting me on the behind.

A week ago, he said to me in sepulchral tones, "Food...water...atmosphere!"

And while we stood in the checkout line at the store, I was holding him to keep him from running freely and happily out the exit without me. He kissed me on the cheek and shouted, "Let's get naked!" Let's just say I didn't get the "good parenting approval glance" from anyone behind us.

I know where he gets a lot of the phrases he repeats, and it's my fault. He gets them from Spongebob Squarepants, which is his absolute favorite show of choice now that Dora the Explorer has dropped to second place in his personal ranking system. As my youngest son gets older, it's increasingly more difficult for me to get my work done while his siblings are at school. I cringe that he watches so many episodes of Spongebob, but one of his favorite things is for us to cuddle up together and watch a show. I've seen so much Spongebob I can tell you that in the "let's get naked" episode, Spongebob and Patrick are trying to sell chocolate without much success. Discussing possible sales approaches, Patrick says, "Let's get naked!" and Spongebob replies in perfect deadpan, "Nah, let's save that for when we're selling real estate." Maybe Little Gary remembers that scene so embarrassingly well because I laugh every time I see it.

Usually, I'm feeling a complex mixture of emotions, ranging from joy that I can spend time with my son (even if it means some Spongebob viewing, which is still WAY better than watching Dora episodes. YAWN!) and stress that I have so much to do and can't get it done. Oddly enough, I have to be able to think in order to write what I write, and it's hard to think when Little Gary is demanding attention. And, really, he has every right to my undivided attention -- at least for a while. He's only going to be three once. The problem is that when the older girls get home, they're tired from school and don't feel all that excited to take him on a bug hunt or play Indiana Jones on the PS3. Then, when the younger three get home, there's the constant knocking on my door, the phone ringing, the problems that need resolving, lessons or appointments they need to be driven to, and complaints about there being no snacks in any part of the house. Frankly, as a stay-at-home mother, there is just no good time to sit for hours and think up clever sentences for my articles. Something and someone gets neglected. If I had an office outside the house, things would still get neglected but I would be able to ignore it better.

Last night, I asked Husband to make dinner so I could finish some articles. I didn't have any plans, and I hadn't been to the store, so he had to get creative. He rose to the task admirably, and when dinner was ready, we feasted on scrambled eggs, petite pois, hot dogs with hamburger buns, fries, and canned chili beans.

The obvious solution to my dilemma is to never sleep. I could get a lot done in those dark, silent hours of the night. That just doesn't seem to work, however, so I struggle along. I wouldn't work if I didn't have to, but on the other hand, it's nice to know I'm improving my writing skills and being creative (as creative as you can be when the article you're writing is about cement foundations)while bringing in some much-needed cash. If I've got my A game going on, I make a lot of money per hour. My fingers fly, my bank account says ca-ching!

(Just so you don't think I'm making the BIG bucks, "ca-ching" is pretty relative. I make way more per hour than working at Wal-Mart, but I don't work eight hours a day. At least, I don't work eight hours a day writing.)

I'm thinking of applying for Little Gary to get into pre-school. If he gets in, he'll get a chance to play with other children during the week, since I never think to schedule play dates for him. That would cut down on the Spongebob consumption, and maybe he wouldn't spout sudden and inappropriate exclamations at the store. (I'm not sure where the "Good catch!" butt-swatting thing came from, however.) For now, I have decided to spend time with him during the morning and early afternoon and then just grit my teeth and get my writing done as well as possible in the late afternoon and evening, despite the constant interruptions. It would certainly help if I just sat down and made a meal plan and did the shopping, because then the girls and Husband can cook dinner while I finish up. I sometimes get up early to write in peace and quiet, but Little Gary has taken to early risings, as well. He's uncanny.

Blurb. Fun Word.

2011-05-04T21:25:00.000-06:00

I landed myself a somewhat permanent assignment with my work, but it is not without pain. The nice thing, of course, is that I can count on earning a certain amount of money each month, which is nice for a freelance writer. The hard thing is that the assignment -- writing 60 blurbs a month about LAP-BAND (registration symbol) and this type of bariatric surgery -- just about kills me. It's enough to make me cry, really, but I like the money. Fortunately, I can take all month to write 60 blurbs, which equals about 3 per each work day. That's much better than when I had to write all 60 in a week. I nearly had a mental breakdown.

Speaking of work, my talented and strangely single brother, Aaron, got promoted. He's now doing SEO work, which is fancy talk for getting stuff the company writes for clients to be seen by web crawlers and put on the first pages of searches. It's why I have to include keywords in the blurbs, articles, web text, and blog posts I write.

Did you know that the most often viewed post I have written is by far was entitled "Amateur Black and White Photography"? It's not saying much to state it is the most oft-viewed post, because I don't get more than a handful of viewers anyway (which is fine with me). Another popular one is about storing wheat in buckets. If I wanted to start another blog and make it specifically informative, I would have an idea of where to take it. That's SEO working. Search Engine Optimization.

I had to catch up on my Lap Band blurbs tonight, and my brain is done. I almost got a picture of the kitchen back splash, but I forgot when the remembering was crucial. If that doesn't make sense, too bad.

I Do NOT Have Prescription-Strength Diarrhea!

2011-04-27T21:30:00.000-06:00

I have been without a cell phone for a long time. A long, long time. For me, that's been just fine. For anyone trying to get hold of me to tell me something or ask me questions or beg for a ride, it's been irksome. Husband finally remedied this by ordering me a used phone from eBay, a Motorola Razor in hot purple. I wanted a phone I could just flip open and talk on. I don't use a whole lot of functions on a phone except the actual phone. If I could afford an iPhone, I'd get one, but my iTouch works great for everything that doesn't need dialing.

So my phone arrives, and Husband puts my SIM card in and gets it all set up for me (cause if it was left up to me, the phone would sit there for months doing absolutely nothing), and then when I test it out, I find that I can't hear the person to whom I am speaking. The person to whom I am speaking can hear me all right, but I can't hear anything back unless I turn on the speakerphone. It's annoying, and the seller is sending us a refund, but in the meantime, this is what I have.

While I was at Elannah's gymnastics class today, Husband phoned me. I had to turn the speakerphone on, and when I informed him he was on speaker, Husband loudly and obnoxiously yells,

"Hey! I just wanted to remind you to pick up your prescription for diarrhea medicine!!"

Then he laughed and laughed and laughed. See what I have to put up with?

Spoiler Alert: the Mouse Gets Eaten

2011-04-21T22:22:00.000-06:00

Cats are just as full of personality as any human. This is not news to cat people, of course, and I guess I am, after all, more of a cat person than a dog person. I like the independence of felines. They don't really need you until they do, and that suits me just fine. I don't always enjoy the constant love and affection of a dog -- not that I don't appreciate their loyalty and devotion. Far from! It's just that dogs smell so awful when they're wet. And who knows where their tongues have been moments before they lick your face thoroughly??

Having said that, cats do pose their own sorts of challenges. We got our cat, Lincoln, for Gabrielle's birthday last year, and he's a character. Myles, our older, bigger tom, is really kind of a scaredy-cat, if you'll pardon the expression. He was always cautious, but when he got picked up by the pound for hanging out with the wrong crowd around an apartment building a number of years ago, he got even more cautious. We were lucky to locate him after he disappeared, and my sister bought his freedom from the animal shelter cage for $150, which was more than most of us could afford at that time. Lincoln, however, is the quintessential boy: curious, active, and always ready for a fight. Once we got him neutered, he settled down a great deal, and now he and Myles are the best of friends where once they were devoted enemies.

Myles doesn't make a lot of sounds, but I can pretty much read his mind because I've known him for nine years. He will come and sit in front of me, not quite looking into my eyes and giving the occasional tail twitch or eye wink and I'll know he's thirsty and his water's gone or that he wants to be let outside. He purrs immediately when I stoop down to give him a good scratch under the chin. Lincoln I don't know all that well yet. He plunks himself down in front of me, stares me directly in the eyes, and gives me the most earnest look a cat ever gave, and I'll still have to guess what he wants. He has a little, squeaky mew, like a kitten's, and when he gets bored at night he'll stand outside my door mewing until I drag myself out of bed and try to guess what it is he wants me to do for him. I would ignore him, but I'm a light sleeper and he'll just mew until I get up anyway. He's got me well and thoroughly trained. If, after I've tried to let him outside or give him a little food and it turns out that's not what he wanted, I'll grab Myles off his proud spot on our bed and dump him outside my room door. "Go entertain Lincoln, Myles. You're nocturnal." Usually, Lincoln will shut up and the two will either lick each other vigorously until they start to play fight, or they'll run like crazy things up and down the stairs. I just try to get back to sleep.

The other morning, I spotted a mouse on the floor of the pantry. After my initial surprised yelp, I turned around and grabbed Myles so I could throw him into the pantry and he could do his job. He didn't understand what I was doing and was quite affronted at my efforts to throw him anywhere. I dropped him and grabbed Lincoln, who was too surprised to argue. The moment Lincoln's feet hit the floor, he located the mouse and grabbed it. Mouse in his mouth, he came out of the pantry to get some entertainment from his breakfast. Unfortunately for him, however, the mouse had expired either from suffocation or fear. He refused to play. Lincoln batted the tiny, furry body around for a moment and then looked at me with his big, brown eyes. I was heading downstairs for something, and he followed me eagerly, and this time I could tell he was waiting for me to throw him at another mouse. "Hey, buddy," I said to him, "I'm not the mouser around here."

When Linc and I got back upstairs, Myles had helped himself. The mouse tail was sticking out of his mouth while he chewed vigorously. Myles is not picky about those sorts of things. Good boy. I'm just glad our cats don't lick me.

Eric Cartman Suffering From Quantum Jitters. Classic.

2011-04-18T20:23:00.001-06:00

I have started numerous blog posts, only to abandon them due to time constraints, lack of anything really pithy to say, or just out of a fit of pique. Isn't it fun to have a fit of pique? The next time you don't want to do dishes, have a fit of pique and leave them alone. Come back when you're ready to get sudsy. And then tell me what your fit of pique involved. I think it should involve throwing something -- in a non-injurious fashion, of course.

Speaking of fun things to say (like "fit of pique"), today's word is "infarction," as in: Husband and I and some doctors thought he might have appendicitis, but it turned out he only had an infarction of a piece of the fatty apron that surrounds the transverse section of the colon. An infarction is when some part of you lacks blood supply and dies, and in this case, a piece of that fat got twisted, which cut off its blood supply, and then died. Fortunately, while it has caused him some pain and happened to be located just by the appendix, it isn't something that requires surgery. Dodged that bullet!

Hey, if Husband can truly say that a piece of him has died inside, does that mean he's now qualified to write country music?

Though we spent some long, late hours at the ER on a Saturday night, we were highly entertained by the Irish medic. He instantly picked up on Husband's accent, and then spent a lot of time cheerfully abusing the Welsh while Husband just as cheerfully abused the Irish. They both abused the Scottish, of course, but I don't recall any abuse of the English. The English just don't have enough obvious quirks to be abused, I imagine. Or, at least, Husband and Irish Doctor simply didn't have time to get that far. Another endearing quality of Irish Doctor's was that he was amazed we had six kids and that they were all mine. Amazed! And he took a poll of all the other medics and doctors hanging around (who all happened to be 20- or 30-something males, and who all wandered in at various points to poke and prod Husband's abdomen) and came and told us they all agreed that Husband looks too young and I look to good to have had six kids. Awww, bless!! May the wind always be at his back, and may the sun shine on his shoulders wherever he travels in life.

Between PTA volunteer assignments, working, putting up the kitchen back splash, and carting children from one activity to another, I managed to invent a recipe. Well, I took one recipe I know for hot chocolate and made it different, I should say. Husband came home with some Stephen's Gourmet drink powder -- you know, the company that makes all those delicious hot chocolate mixes? A colleague of his was drinking a spiced pumpkin-coconut flavor they have out now, and Husband mentioned that I would love something like that. I believe coconut milk is a pantry staple, and I love to try exotic, non-alcoholic drinks. His colleague gave him some of the mix to bring home so I could taste it, and it was pretty good. There should have been more coconut, and the spices were a little pumpkin pie-like, but it was very creamy and warming.

I decided to make my own version. It's definitely interesting and tastes nothing like the Stephen's mix. I quite like it, but I can't think of anything to compare it to. You'll just have to try it and see if you like it. I dumped stuff in, so I'll have to approximate measurements. Play with ingredients that you like. You could go more with a more traditional pumpkin spice mixture, such as nutmeg and cinnamon, of course.

Pumpkin Coconut Kick

1 can unsweetened coconut milk (NOT coconut cream!)
1/2 can sweetened, condensed milk
3 cups regular milk
1/2 to 3/4 cup pureed pumpkin
1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom (cardamom is pricey, but a little goes a long way)
1 teaspoon ginger
a dash of cayenne pepper

Mix coconut milk; sweetened, condensed milk; and regular milk in a heavy saucepan. [At this point, you could change your mind and just add 3 Tablespoons of cocoa powder if you want the most delicious hot chocolate you've ever tasted] Whisk in pureed pumpkin. Combine cardamom, ginger, and cayenne in a small bowl and add a little of the milk/pumpkin mixture, mixing until smooth. Add spices to the milk mixture. Heat until just simmering, or whatever temperature you like a hot drink to be. Ladle it into mugs. I didn't try this, but a dollop of not-too-sweet whipped cream would go very nicely on top. Now, enjoy the kick in the back of your throat, and if you have a cold, this will probably help cure it.

If that drink isn't your style and you now have a bottle of cardamom you don't know what to do with, try this:

Lassi

One soda-size can fruit nectar in your choice of flavor (Kern's does a good fruit nectar)
Plain yogurt
a little sugar, to taste
1/8 tsp cardamom

Take a tall glass and fill it 1/3 full with plain yogurt. Add in as much nectar as will fit. Add the cardamom and whisk the mixture thoroughly. Add more yogurt if you like it thick, or more nectar if you like it thin. Taste and add sugar if you like it a little sweeter.

My brother made this for a group of his friends one night, and he just made pitchers of the stuff rather than individual glasses. He bought the large cans of apricot nectar, and I gave him some of my cardamom so he didn't have to splurge on an entire bottle he will never in his life use up.

....
In self-education news, I finished my bout of fiction reading (with a great deal of enjoyment) and decided to devour some non-fiction this time around. I picked up two books: Everyone Loves You When You're Dead, by Neil Strauss; and The Hidden Reality, by Brian Greene. The Strauss book is a series of portions of interviews of various musical and acting celebrities that Strauss performed and did not publish during his years as a writer for various publications. It's fascinating. There are lots of bad words (celebrities can be so foul-mouthed!), but the insights into people who have come into fame (or not come into as much fame as they think they should) are very interesting.

Greene's book is equally as fascinating in an entirely different way. It deals with quantum mechanics and cosmology in explaining the existence of parallel universes. And dang if he doesn't explain it in such a way that I can understand it! After that beautiful a-ha! moment when the first few chapters all fell into place in my head, I was able to explain it to Husband and Sian in such a way that they could understand it, as well. Greene even uses Eric Cartman from South Park (which I do not watch, but fortunately still understood the reference) as an example. Millions and millions of round Cartmans sitting on top of mountains, either affected or unaffected by quantum jitters. It's a giggle moment. I'm still working my way through the book, but mathematically, I now believe in the possibility of infinite parallel universes.

I have to grout the back splash in the kitchen, but when I do, you'll get pictures. I'm pretty proud of myself.

Counting a Few Blessings

2011-04-05T11:30:00.000-06:00

I'm having a great day. It's not anything specific, but I have an overall feeling of joy. Joseph does NOT seem to have pneumonia and is steadily improving. I've got my tunes on and I stop intermittently to dance. I've got things to look forward to. My toe and fingernails are painted a decent, grown-up color.

The snow is melting and the weather forecast says it will be somewhat warm today. I redesigned Elannah's gymnastics studio in my head yesterday (it will only cost hundreds of thousands to build the improvements I have imagined, but when you're dreaming, money is no object). I've got great friends. I am successfully turning down sugar left and right. The cats are funny. I played the piano for quite a while this morning. I intend to pull out my cello later.

My mom just called and asked if I'd look up some draperies for her on the internet. My grandmother is moving in with my mom and dad, and Mom's busy getting the house ready for her to begin living there as of this Friday.

Once I manage to plan and execute dinner in a timely fashion, this day will be pretty much perfect.

"Are You Drinking in the Gutter??"

2011-04-02T17:07:00.002-06:00

My kids showed me this little series of YouTube videos called Kid History. I have laughed so hard my latent asthma has surfaced.

If you want to laugh so hard you get wheezy, watch these. Gather the children. There are four total.

Stop Being Nice!

2011-03-30T13:16:00.002-06:00

Check out this very interesting view. You have to admit she's got a great point, and she's not at all nice about it.

A Moment When Faith Triumphs Over Pain

2011-03-29T18:25:00.000-06:00

Update on Husband: I have good news! The cyst is NOT basal cell carcinoma. It's just a cyst, and as a cyst, it's on its way out. I got the call from the resident doctor a few days ago, who told me that though it looked just like basal cell carcinoma, it was nothing. She also said, "He [Husband] was right. He's never going to let us live that down, is he?" She was laughing when she said it, so I guess she understands that while he will never let them live that down, he'll lord it over them with humor.

Thank you to those who were sending prayers his way! Who knows? Maybe those prayers created a miracle. I can certainly believe that.

............................

I had to do something today that I was not looking forward to. I attended the viewing of a tiny baby, who died a couple hours after being born. I have been to viewings before, but they've always been of adults, and I did not think I would be able to get through seeing that tiny form lying in a casket without dropping to my knees and sobbing.

I didn't know the parents of this baby girl. They live in our stake, and as I have just received a new calling in the stake Relief Society Presidency, the new president felt it was appropriate that we go and support this family in the hour of their need, so I met the other women at the church. None of us felt ready, but we finally entered the room to speak to the parents.

It's amazing the power of faith. The parents had known since the third month that their baby would not survive birth for very long. An ultrasound showed that the baby girl's brain was not developing, so the parents had some time to come to grips with the news that their littlest one would not survive. They also were able to spend time preparing their older children. Because the parents had been sealed in the temple for time and all eternity, they knew they would be able to see their little one again. During the time that we talked to them, they gently comforted us instead of the other way around. The little girl lying in the casket looked like a tiny doll. The photos and digital slide shows on display were images full of joy and love instead of grief and pain. The room was full of peace.

All the same, I really don't want to do that again. As we left the room where the casket lay and walked back out to the foyer, all of us let the tears finally fall. I hope that if I had to undergo an ordeal of that magnitude I would have the strong faith, grace, and joy that those parents did. Still, I am not asking for that kind of trial.

Why Have One Cancer When You Can Have Two?

2011-03-22T16:10:00.000-06:00

Update on Husband: I'm making this an official update because there are developments. Husband's drug reaction did get worse, as far as the itching was concerned. I'm happy to report he did not succumb to insanity, but it was a little touch and go for a while.

Yesterday we went to the dermatologist to get the cyst on the bridge of his nose checked out. Thirty minutes into our visit, we were still discussing his sudden allergic reaction to penicillins and what the doctor could do to ease some of the horrible itchiness. The resident doctor, a lovely, vivacious woman, prescribed a strong hydrocortisone cream (which didn't work, in the end. In fact, the itching got worse, much to Husband's dismay) and some strong antihistamine pills to knock him out so he could sleep at night (the pills did work, and Husband finally slept very soundly for the first time in four nights).

We finally got around to the problem of the cyst. Husband had put a bandage over it for a week to keep it from being irritated by his glasses, and it had shrunk down remarkably. The resident took one look and said, "Basal cell carcinoma." Husband said, "No. I would really rather it was not." The resident, however, was not swayed. The attending doctor came in for a minute, looked at the cyst, and said, "Basal cell carcinoma." The resident took a sliver for a biopsy, and we now await the news. Basal cell carcinoma is not by any means lethal, but it will be annoying to have to get it removed. I told Husband that now he can brag about surviving two different cancers. Because he was itching so badly, he didn't appreciate the humor of that.

I'm the Best Mom Ever! (until I'm not)

2011-03-19T17:13:00.000-06:00

Husband had two teeth pulled yesterday and three cavities filled. He hasn't been all that thrilled about going to the dentist, needless to say, so to add insult to tooth-pulling injury, he managed to have a reaction to the 2 mg dose of amoxicillin his doctor prescribed to be taken an hour before the extraction. By the time I came home, he was beet red all over and felt awful. Even after the pain killers kicked in and his jaw wasn't aching so badly, he suffered from massive chills and bad nausea. Today, he's still a deep shade of red and is starting to itch everywhere. It's not as bad as the last time he had a drug reaction, but we thought he was allergic to the sulpha drug he was taking. He's never had a reaction to a penicillin before.

Well, he's had worse, I guess. At least there's that. The last time he had a reaction, he itched constantly and intensely all over for an entire week after the horrific rash faded. It nearly drove him crazy. This time it's annoying but not inducing near-insanity. There was no rash, and his jaw's feeling pretty good.

Is it bad that I am glad I am well and can take care of him instead of feeling sympathetically ill? If I could take the pain and itching for a while, I sure would, but I guess it's okay to be glad that I'm feeling just fine. Someone has to feed the three-year-old, after all, and yell at the kids (again) to get their chores and dishes done.

Husband is actually better at jollying the kids into cheerful work than I am. I come down like a drill sergeant, especially when I've asked them and asked them to get their stuff done and they can't seem to find the time in their busy schedules of looking for funny YouTube videos. I start barking out orders when it's painfully apparent that me being nice is me being ignored, and they immediately get that hurt look on their faces like I am being both unreasonable and unfair. "You're mean, Mom," they say, and I mutter, "Yeah, I'm mean because I don't want you living in filth." They don't hear me, and if they did, they probably wouldn't appreciate my scathing wit and spot-on accuracy.

For the record, I'm also the Best Mom Ever! It just depends on the circumstances.

Other news:
Sian has had two triumphs lately. First, her short story won first place for fiction and a guaranteed place in her school's literary magazine. Second, she placed second in the school talent show. She played her own version of Suzanne Ciani's "Butterflies" on the piano.

I didn't mention to my children the fact that the theater company that put on "Annie" is having auditions for their next production, "The King and I." There are children's parts, but I just couldn't fathom the idea of all those hours of rehearsal again. I was tempted for about five minutes to try out myself for some part in the chorus or something, but logic soon set in. I got over that little bit of theatrical desire pretty quickly.

I'm off to the grocery store for chicken noodle soup and gummy worms. Husband decided he wants soup and ginger ale for dinner, and I'll get gummy worms just because. I bet I'll be The Best Mom Ever! when I get home. At least the house is somewhat tidier.

More Home Decorating Progress

2011-03-17T17:58:00.000-06:00

You've seen them in magazines and you've wanted one for yourself.

A CHALKBOARD WALL!

I've been loving this. It's the wall right next to the garage door, and it isn't visible unless you walk all the way into the kitchen. Yes, there are other chalkboard paint colors, but I liked the classic black. We were going to paint magnetic paint underneath, but it's $20 a quart (!) and you need three coats to make it magnetic enough to stick anything to it in a serious way. We figured if we want magnetic, we'll frame a piece of metal and hang it on the wall. What's more likely is that we'll just keep using the front of the refrigerator. The chalkboard is easy to clean with a wet cloth.

With a chalkboard wall, anyone can express him- or herself. Considering the little smart-alecks I've been raising, that may or may not be a good thing.

Here are the two shorter shelves. We put them up in the dining area near the back door, and they currently hold the piano books (of which there are not enough, in my opinion). They're IKEA shelves -- pretty but not sturdy -- so we put brackets underneath them to ensure stability. We did that in the kitchen, too.

Finally, I have a photo of the color swatches we put up for the wall going down the stairs. There are three of them. That might surprise you. The third color is so light it's hard to see at all. None of these colors made the cut. Ugh.

Thoughts on Being a Mutt

2011-03-15T17:48:00.000-06:00

A friend sent me a subscription to Latina magazine. It was a joke because my maiden name is Spanish, though I have no Spanish blood whatsoever pumping through my veins. My paternal grandfather (that's my dad's dad, in case you're tired and don't want to think that through) was my father's step-father, and his family came from Spain, stopped in Mexico for one generation, and then moved on to California in the early part of the 1900s. If my grandpa hadn't adopted my father, my maiden name would have been a lot more Irish.

Since I was getting the magazine, I figured I'd read it since it isn't in Spanish (I speak no Spanish. I speak a few -- like, three -- words in French and German and I remember a small smattering of Latin from high school, but I am definitely a mono-lingual gal). It's kind of eye-opening for me, a white girl living in the United States. For one thing, while most Americans can trace their roots to other countries and are proud of those roots, it seems to be a little more pronounced with the Hispanic and Latin population. Every single person who writes for or is featured in this magazine gets a blurb that identifies her roots, whether they're Cuban, Mexican, Brazilian, Columbian, etc., etc. I have never seen that in any other magazine, and that's probably because so many of us are mutts. I would have to list my Swedish, English, Scottish, Irish, early American revolutionary and Dixie South lineage, which is the abridged list.

That's what has struck me most, this strong identity with the Old Country, whichever one it is. When my Swedish great-grandfather bought himself a first class ticket to the U.S. in 1912 at the tender age of 15 (he had his inheritance and he had heard that first class passengers didn't have to go through Ellis Island, where he would surely have been sent back to Sweden because of his age), he melted into the roiling masses of New York and never looked back. Somehow, he found his way to Minnesota, which still has a strong Scandinavian population, married himself a Swedish girl, and made himself a millionaire through sheer grit and hard work. I met him a few times when I was a little girl, but I didn't know much about him until I read his autobiography, and his autobiography didn't talk much about his wives (two of them) and children. That's regrettable. I have no idea if they maintained any Swedish traditions at all. His first wife died young and he remarried, and I'm not sure if his second wife was Swedish or not. Certainly no Swedish or Scottish (or Spanish) traditions were practiced in our home when I was a kid, and I was supremely ignorant of the well-beloved traditions my Swedish mission companion held dear.

But, see, it didn't matter all that much to us. We were American. Our roots were precious, but they weren't to be clung to. That was the mindset of that era, though, during the waves of emmigration to the United States in the early 1900s: you move here, find people who speak your language and share your culture, and then try to be as American as possible so your kids will be better off than you are. I think the mindset is different now, or maybe for some cultures it has never really changed. I pass no judgment here. I merely write what I have observed. It's one magazine in a thousand, but it's been an interesting thing to read and think about.

If reading this magazine would impart to me the ability to move my hips like they were oiled, I'd read that magazine every single day. It would SO help my Zumba moves!

Coin Wars

2011-03-11T16:14:00.001-07:00

So it's been a busy week.

First of all, to add to my list of Things I Should Have Done But Procrastinated Too Long On, I was nominally in charge of the spring PTA fundraiser for the elementary school. The problem was I continually forgot to attend any PTA meetings, so on Sunday night, I got a call from the PTA president about the fundraiser, which began last Monday. I had seen the signs up at the school and felt very badly about the fact that time had scurried along so quickly, and I apologized profusely for neglecting to be on top of it. She was very, very kind. In fact, she's the type of person who has great ideas and a die-cutter, so she'd already created the posters and all the equipment needed for the fundraiser. All I had to do, she said, was show up and do the work.

Hey, I can do that. Tell me where to stand and I can stand like a pro. Just don't ask me to be in charge of anything, obviously.

This particular fundraiser is, in my expert opinion as a mother of six former, current, and future elementary school students, genius. Sheer genius. I hate fundraisers. HATE them. Most of the time, the kids are all hyped up from an assembly by the fundraising company's spokesperson, who tells them about all the fantastic prizes they'll win for making sales, so they come home waving their packets of catalogs full of overpriced chocolates or cookies or knick-knacks, ready to hit up all the neighbors and extended family. And after all that work, the school is lucky to get 50% of the profits. This fundraiser, on the other hand, was the brainchild of members of the PTA at this school and includes no useless profit sharing. All the proceeds go directly to the school.

It's called Coin Wars. In past years, it was called Penny Wars; but this year they simplified the rules a bit. The premise is simple: each grade has a bucket into which the students deposit change and paper money. All the coins count as positive points (in past years, pennies were positive and silver was negative), and paper money counts as negative points. The strategy is for each grade to dump all their change into the bucket for their grade and all their paper money into the buckets of other grades, thereby raising their own positive points and negating positive points for other grades. The change gets added up at the end of each day (we took the money to the PTA's credit union, which has a coin counting machine) and the total points for each grade is the amount of change minus the amount of paper money. For instance, this year the fourth grade totally nailed the win by bringing in over $100 in change. The rest of the grades didn't stop them in time, even when over $60 of paper money was added to their bucket on Thursday and Friday (the Coin Wars extends over a full school week). Some kids and parents save up all year for the Coin Wars.

The winning grade gets posters on their doors and a prize. And bragging rights, of course. Last year, the prizes were collectible pennies all snug in a little plastic box and display foam for each student in the winning grade (I think it was the 3rd graders, actually, which explains why this year the 4th grade won). The price was negligible and the PTA had money to fund all the programs it puts on throughout the year. This year, the winning grade gets to pick $300 worth of new playground equipment. They're all glad the kindergarten didn't win.

It was fun. I got to leave Little Gary home two of the days because a responsible older sister was home sick from school. I also got to hang out with some of my friends, including Linnea, and meet new people from the PTA. The days I brought Little Gary with me were more trying, and I didn't plan very well by bringing things to keep him occupied. Linnea had a couple quarters so he could get treats from the machines at the bank. Everyone managed not to gag at the stench of his stinky diaper today. At least, they were very polite about it and didn't mention it. (No, I haven't potty trained him yet)

I did have to miss Thursday's mad coin collecting and run to the bank, however. Instead, a friend filled in for me at the school while I went with Husband to The Big City for a doctor appointment. All is well with his blood counts (though those platelets may never make a full recovery), but Doc was very concerned about a cyst-like thing on the bridge of Husband's nose that is aggravated by his glasses. "Oh!" she said. "I'm thinking that might be a type of superficial skin cancer!" and made an appointment for Husband to see the dermatologist. I'm thinking that she's an excellent oncologist and sees cancer everywhere and that the cyst-like thing might turn out to be just a cyst that is aggravated by Husband's glasses eyepiece. In any case, there's no point worrying too much about it until next Monday, when the derm will have a look.

The Coin Wars didn't pull in as much money this year as it has in the past. Two years ago they made over $1000. I imagine it has something to do with the sour economy. It could not possibly be that I didn't have my act in gear in order to advertise sooner. Still, it's a growing tradition with the kids, and it's free to put on. Plus, the neighbors and extended family members are thankful.

New Paint and Funny Skit Ideas

2011-03-08T20:09:00.000-07:00

I have pictures of progress!

I thought the wall behind the old cupboard would be horrid, but it wasn't too bad. Husband spackled in the dent, where it looked like someone had ferreted out the stud with a hammer, et voila! nice, smooth wall. We had shorter shelves to put on the shorter wall, but I liked the long shelves on their own. We'll install the shorter shelves in another place. Once the backsplash is put on, I'll start adding decorations and lighting. I'll also add a magnetic knife strip and a paper towel holder under the shelves and a bread box on the counter.

The living area suffers greatly from lack of sufficient lighting. Not only will we eventually install a mantel over the gas fireplace, we'll also have pictures on that wall. I want to put a couple of tall green palms on either side of the fireplace with uplights behind them to cast shadows on the ceiling. We also need a nice area rug. I have relegated the old red and white rag rug to the donation box. I never did like it. I'm not country enough.

Here is the front door area. We left the wall over the stairs to the basement white because I want to paint it in such a way that it becomes a focal wall. I'm playing with ideas. One idea was to paint that wall a deep orange with a bronze glaze over it. Another is to leave it white and put colorful artwork on it, lit by picture lights or track spots. Right now, I have a nice selection of thrift store picture frames I am going to spray paint orange and arrange on the wall in a pleasing way -- just the frames.

Change of subject:

If you ever find yourself in a situation where you need a funny, easy skit, "Janie Gets Hit by the Bus" is perfect. Unfortunately, I don't have video to embed here, as I'm not sure who recorded us performing this in a highly skilled manner (ha ha ha) a couple weeks ago.

The story is this: "Janie Gets Hit by the Bus" is a movie being filmed. The parts for the movie include Janie, Janie's friend, the Bus Driver, several Rowdy Kids on the bus, Janie's Mother, and the Doctor. All parts are onstage during the entire performance. The movie director is in charge. Here's a very rough script idea, but you can ad lib or write your own more structured script.

Director: Okay, people! You all have your parts. Please find your places and we'll start filming.

(All players go to their places without much enthusiasm or emotion)

Director: "Janie Gets Hit by the Bus," take one. And...action! (exits stage)

(During this run through, none of the players exhibits emotion. It is very flat and undramatic)

Janie: Catch the frisbee. (mimes throwing a frisbee to her friend)

Janie's Friend: I caught the frisbee! I'm throwing the frisbee.

(Janie and her friend continue miming playing frisbee while the Bus Driver and Rowdy Kids come from an upstage corner toward Janie. The Rowdy Kids are silently fighting in the "back" of the bus.)

Bus Driver: (turning to face Rowdy Kids) Shut up, you kids. (Bus Driver runs into Janie)

(Janie falls down. Janie's Friend, the Bus Driver, and the Rowdy Kids crowd around to look)

Bus Driver: Oh, no. I hit Janie with the bus. I better call her mother. (holds hand up to ear like a phone.) Ring, ring.

Mother (center back): (picks up "phone") Hello?

Bus Driver: Janie's been hit by the bus.

Mother: Oh, no. I'll call the doctor. (hangs up. Picks up "phone" again) Ring, ring.

Doctor (backstage corner): (picks of "phone") Hello?

Mother: Doctor, Janie's been hit by a bus.

Doctor: I'll be right over. (whirls hand above head like an ambulance light and makes a siren noise while walking to Janie)

Director: (rushing onstage) Cut! Cut! No, no, no! That was a good run-through, but there was no emotion. I want emotion! I want drama! I want people crying in their seats because Janie's been hit by the bus! Back to beginning places, everyone, and this time, give me some emotion! "Janie Gets Hit by the Bus" take two! And...action! (exits stage)

(This time, the players follow the same basic script, but they overdramatize everything. I mean, in this take, it goes beyond emotional to Shakespearean tragedy in the umpteenth degree. This take is absolutely hilarious if done well. Playing frisbee has never been so fraught with emotion. The Bus Driver is in a rage. The rowdy kids are beating each other SILENTLY! to a pulp. You get the idea. Ham it up!)

Director: (rushing onstage) Cut! Cut! Wow! Very emotional. Thank you. But that was a touch too slow. I want people to be bowled over with the strength of it. Speed it up just a bit, please. Places, everyone. "Janie Gets Hit by the Bus" take three! And...action! (exits stage)

(This time, of course, the actors go incredibly quickly, racing through the entire script in less than 20 seconds. What's really funny is when Janie falls down in fast motion. The fourth time, the director tells them to slow down, so they go in ultra-slow motion. I usually yell "cut!" about halfway through to spare the audience sitting through the entire thing. The fifth take we chose to do opera, which resulted in a hilarious impromptu duet between Mother and Doctor. The more the actors ham it up, the funnier the skit is, of course. No one can be afraid to be foolish.)

The Secrets of Tortillas

2011-03-07T20:08:00.002-07:00

Here are the secrets for making tortillas: practice, a good recipe, and buying a rolling pin. I bought a tortilla press, but the one I bought was made of cast aluminum, which turns out not to have a lot of strength. The lever snapped off the second time I used it. If you're going to buy a press, spend a little more and get a good cast iron or heavy-duty aluminum one. I found that the rolling pin got better results with the flour and wheat tortillas. I like thin tortillas, and the press can only flatten a tortilla so far. A press is almost essential for corn tortillas, however, as they don't hold up well to the rigors of being rolled.

Chewy Flour Tortillas

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 ½ tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
2 tsp vegetable oil
¾ cup lukewarm milk

Stir together the flour and baking powder in a large mixing bowl. Add the salt and vegetable oil to the lukewarm milk and whisk briefly to incorporate. Gradually add the milk to the flour, and work the mixture into a dough. It will be sticky.
Turn the dough out onto a surface dusted with flour and knead vigorously for about 2 minutes (fold and press, fold and press). The kneading will take care of the stickiness. Return the dough to the bowl, cover it with a damp cloth, and let it rest for 15 minutes. (This dough will not rise, but it needs a rest.)
Divide your dough into 8 balls of equal size, cover them, and let them rest again for about 20 minutes. Avoid letting them touch if you don't want them to stick together.
Dust your work surface with flour. Working one at a time, remove each piece of dough and pat it into a 5-inch circle. With a rolling pin, roll out the tortilla, working from the center out, until you have a 7- or 8-inch tortilla a little less than 1/4 inch thick. Transfer the tortilla to a hot, dry skillet or griddle. It will begin to blister. Let it cook for 30 seconds, turn it, and let the other side cook for 30 seconds. Remove the tortilla, place it in a napkin-lined basket and cover with aluminum foil. Repeat for the remaining tortillas

Whole Wheat Tortillas

2 cups whole wheat flour
½ tsp salt
2 Tbsp olive oil
½ cup warm water (or more)

Mix flour and salt. Add olive oil and stir to combine. Add warm water, 1 Tbsp at a time, until mixture begins to pull away from the sides of the bowl. Knead dough on a floured board for 3 minutes (20 folds). Shape into a sausage and let rest for 15 minutes (cover with a towel). Cut the dough into 10 – 12 parts [I like making about 8 parts]. Roll each part from the center out. Heat a griddle or skillet on medium heat. Put each tortilla onto the dry griddle and cook for 30 seconds on each side, longer if you want more crisp tortillas. Keep the cooked tortillas warm in a tortilla keeper or with kitchen towels.

For corn tortillas, buy a bag of masa harina and follow the directions. Masa harina is corn flour mixed with lime, which removes the skin of the kernal and allows the corn to release niacin, which is a useful nutrient. Corn tortillas are probably the easiest thing ever. I like to make them a little on the wet side so they spread more thinly. Put a piece of plastic wrap on both sides of the tortilla press and place the ball of dough so that the tortilla will be sandwiched between the plastic. This step makes it simple to remove the tortilla.

In my next post, I promise two things: pictures of our newly painted main floor and an overview of "Janie Gets Hit By a Bus."

I Heart Patrick

2011-03-04T13:03:00.000-07:00

Husband ordered the newest Patrick Rothfuss book, which I have been waiting impatiently for for a very long time. When it arrived on Tuesday, I made the mistake of reading the first few sentences. Today, I have finished the book and can now reclaim 100% of my brain for other things, like washing dishes, vacuuming floors, and general housely maintenance that got severely neglected while I lived in Kvothe's world. Sick kids managed to get in the way of my reading or I would have finished the book earlier, and Sophia has had a LOT of days absent from school now, but most of them seem to be doing all right now aside from hacking, asthmatic coughs.

I was thinking about the experience of severe physical pain and how that changes you. I was also thinking that I have experienced severe physical pain but never severe emotional pain -- the kind that can buckle your knees and leave you weeping to the point of exhaustion at odd moments. I have come close a few times and it was mercifully brief, but I know I don't know what that kind of pain truly is. I'm good with missing out on that, of course, but if I ever had to go through it, I was remembering what a friend of mine said after his beloved wife died: that the only way past is through. He said that he has to experience each moment of pain fully because it's the only way he can find a way to the other end, where the pain dulls a bit and he can find joy again.

Strangely, that's often true of physical pain, too. When there is no relief, no way to hide from it, physical pain must also be embraced in order to be controlled and subdued. Oddly, too, the experience can be a blessing after it's over, a crucible of learning.

Phew! Enough of that! I'm not in pain, no. Not even a headache. I was just musing.

A Stitch in Time is Just Plain Fun

2011-02-27T15:45:00.000-07:00

My mind usually goes blank the moment I get to this point. I'll have plenty of things to say, but faced with this empty white box, it suddenly all sounds so inadequate or too personal or just plain silly. Ah, well. Onward nevertheless.

I have taken up crochet again. I first learned a basic chain stitch when I was 14 or 15, and I never forgot that. During my teen years, I learned a couple more stitches and made a large number of curly bookmarks; but it wasn't until I was dying of boredom during my first months of my first pregnancy (when I couldn't work because I was so sick all the time) that I took it up in earnest. My first Christmas present to my new in-laws was a lacy floral afghan worked in squares that were attached together, neither warm nor practical -- merely decorative. Since then, I've played around with patterns and even completed several baby blankets and hats, but blankets and afghans are boring, and one can only have so many crocheted hats in one's closet that one doesn't wear. What I want is to create wearable, fashionable clothing articles like blouses, skirts, and jackets.

While "crochet" and "clothing" in the same sentence probably resurrect a horrible 70s flashback for most people, there have been great strides in yarn and pattern development since then. Even I am very picky about what crocheted items look good enough to wear (as opposed to much lighter and less bulky knit items), but I have now collected a good number of patterns I'm determined to try out. This one, for instance, and this one. For some reason, crocheted skirts have always fascinated me. I am also going to try making a skirt with Irish crochet motifs, as well.

But, just like exercising, where you can't just start running miles and miles before building up some endurance, I had to go back and remind myself of the basics. This weekend, I put together these two items from scrap yarn:

This one is actually a square used for a scarf pattern. Both sides of the square are the same, but you have to attach the second color (bright pink, in this case) and work through the same pattern, attaching the separate squares at the edges. I like to work out a pattern with scrap yarn, first, and I only had worsted-weight yarn in these colors instead of sock yarn in something more subtle. I ended up with a square that I can use as a trivet for hot pots because it's so huge, but now I know how to work the pattern.

This one is a square for an afghan. You crochet the flower first and then attach the second color yarn at the back of the flower and work the square. I was working from a symbolic pattern rather than a written pattern, and I eventually figured it out, but I later realized that I had crocheted the square with the wrong side showing. Now I know better. I was thinking that if the flowers were a rainbow of colors on that light gray background, it would make a pretty afghan (if, again, fairly non-functional except for decoration).

Why crochet at this time? I'd like to answer that question by asking you this: what does a girl do who has a desperate desire to create something pretty but little money to do it with? Crochet is great for that, if you have yarn already, which I did, just. A hook, some yarn, and you can create a fabric out of thin air. When you start buying specialty yarns and making lovely things is when it gets expensive. My friend, Lynn, spins a lot of her yarns, with which she knits and weaves fantastic things. She taught me to spin, too, but I haven't done that in donkey's years. It's a very satisfying process, however, and knowing you're creating something with yarn you spun yourself makes you feel pretty good -- like you're keeping a dying art alive and making useful things. Very pioneer. Very resourceful.

Good News and Bad News

2011-02-23T16:35:00.000-07:00

Elannah has been in gymnastics classes for five weeks. Last week, Husband fielded a phone call from the manager of the gym, and she told him that Elannah's teacher said that Elannah needs to move up to the next level immediately and that her talent needs to be taught. So, yesterday, Husband and I met with the manager and discussed the options. Elannah will be moving to Elite Level 3, which meets twice a week instead of just the one time, but also involves a much greater financial commitment as well. Since Elannah doesn't move from one place to another without turning it into a gymnastics trick, and because of her boundless enthusiasm for gymnastics, we've decided to make the commitment and move her up. We know she won't get into the Olympics (too old. She's already 9, and if she wanted to be in the Olympics, she should have started at age 3 or 4. Plus, that level of competition is pretty brutal, so I don't think she's going to miss much emotionally), but she might be good enough to get herself a scholarship to college if she keeps at it.

Assuming, of course, that life as we know it exists after Dec. 21, 2012. Ha ha ha. Just kidding. But did you notice oil hit $100/barrel again today? And the entire Mid-East is in flames? I'm just sayin'.

Last night about 2am, Joseph burst into my room in a panic. He was barking like a seal and gasping for air so hard he could barely muster up the ability to cry like he wanted to. I didn't even have time to call 911 or drive him to the hospital. I carried him downstairs to the basement, where it's cooler, and started him on a double dose of albuterol in the nebulizer, which is what they would have done at the hospital. Poor little guy thought he was going to die, and to tell you the truth, I was a little panicked myself. As soon as the medicine was going, I said, "Okay, baby, you keep breathing and I'm going to say a prayer." I prayed as hard as I ever have, and moments later, Joseph's breathing eased up just enough to help him fight the panic level and get calmer. We were up for hours while he worked the albuterol's side effects of jitteriness out of his system, but he's doing much better today. I think I might need to get him some steroids, however.

I could probably take a very long nap right here at the desk.

Weekend News Report

2011-02-20T13:03:00.000-07:00

I am pleased to report that I can now make three different types of tortillas: corn, flour, and wheat. It's not hard to make tortillas, but until Thursday, when I had to fill in for the woman who was going to demonstrate making tortillas but canceled, I had only a theoretical knowledge of the process. Following an afternoon in the kitchen, experimenting, I emerged triumphant and covered with flour, three stacks of tortillas wrapped in foil to keep warm for my family's dinner. I immediately had to run off and demonstrate my new skills at a Relief Society activity on beans and tortillas, which turned out well and hit the mark of being both practical (using food storage stuff) and delicious, as well as giving the ladies plenty of time to socialize. Today, I have a crockpot full of black beans cooking for dinner, and I'll make flour tortillas, though they will not be perfectly round by any stretch of the imagination.

Last night was the ward spaghetti dinner and talent show, which was a fundraiser for the Young Women's camp. Each auxiliary had been asked to contribute a talent, so the Relief Society presidency got together and I suggested a classic skit: Janie Gets Hit By the Bus. While not many are familiar with this particular skit, trust me when I tell you it has the potential to be hilarious. I roped Husband into playing a part, and he made me laugh so hard as the doctor that I nearly couldn't finish my part. I know at least one of my readers will remember that skit and the performance we put on 20 years ago that had the audience in tears, they were laughing so hard. Justin as the bus driver? Oh, man! Classic. And how you rolled your hair in a bandana and stuck balloons down your shirt as the mother? I still laugh about that.

The talent that stole the show, however, was when the bishopric danced to Michael Jackson's Thriller.

Sian played her violin. I accompanied her on piano to "You Raise Me Up." A good time was had by all.

"Oh wind, a blowing all day long; Oh wind, that sings so loud a song!"

2011-02-16T10:25:00.001-07:00

It was a restless night last night. The wind, hungry and fierce, as it often is out here when the sun goes down, tore at the edges of the house and tried desperately to get in and devour us all. It pulled intensely at the siding, the nails creaking and groaning in protest, and when it couldn't get in that way, it tossed the garbage cans around in frustration. Its relentless battering kept me tossing and turning, which probably explains why I had all the blankets this morning and Husband was unconsciously hanging on to the miserly amount of covering I hadn't already pulled off of him.

It's still blowing hard this morning. When I opened the door for the cat to go out, the wind howled through the opening like a freight train. Lincoln, his fur standing straight up around his face and looking more like a tiny lion than ever, backed quickly away from the sudden attack of air, turned tail, and sought the peace of the rug in front of the fire, where he immediately began licking his fur into submission.

The power has gone out twice. That's unusual out here, despite frequent high winds. In The Big City, the power was always going out. It went out when it was windy, snowy, rainy, someone hit a power pole with their car, or a bird or squirrel (rare enough as the squirrels are out here) had gotten itself exploded. I think that the power people might have turned off power just for fun at times, giggling maniacally to themselves at the plant, wondering how many pages of incredibly important documents had just been lost because some computer user didn't save her files often enough.

Despite the wind, our Gabrielle is being honored by the mayor tonight. She was nominated by two teachers in one month to be recognized as an outstanding student at school, and the double nomination automatically means she gets to go to City Hall and hear people say nice things about her, after which she will have her picture taken with the mayor. The picture will be printed in the town paper. I'll see if I can scan in a copy.

Also going on tonight, Sian and Sophia will be attending New Beginnings at the church. New Beginnings is for the girls who are or are turning 12 this year and will enter the Young Women's program, and because Sophia just turned 12 in December, she will be one of the honorees. Of course, the program happens at exactly the same time as Gabrielle meets with the mayor, so there is a huge conflict. I was also supposed to speak at the New Beginnings program, but I haven't yet mastered the art of being in two places at once (sigh), so my part of the program has been removed. Sian is playing a piano accompaniment while the young women sing, so half the family will be at church and the other half will be at City Hall.

I have to run. Elannah just called me and asked if I could bring her reading journal to school. She forgot it this morning and it's lying on her shelf next to her bed. Little Gary and I will brave the wind to heroically restore the journal to Elannah, after which we will triumphantly run some errands.

Another Hun Moment

2011-02-13T22:22:00.000-07:00

Sian is driving now. She passed the written test, produced the correct documents, and now she can drive on a learner's permit for a year. Of course, she wants to drive everywhere. Fortunately, she's pretty good at it, but I like to think it's because of her good genes and my expert tutelage. When I yell things like, "BRAKE! BRAKE NOW!!" she listens very well.

She's a good driver. A very good driver.

She's got a permit to dri-ive! She's got a permit to dri-i-ive. She's got a permit to drive, and she so cares!

In other Sian news, I have been teasing her about her first "hun" moment. We were walking a neighbor girl home (it was dark), and when Sian walked her up to the door, I distinctly heard her say, "Okay. Goodnight, Hun." I tactfully didn't mention it for at least three or four seconds, but then I just couldn't keep it in anymore.

"Did you just call her "HUN"?" I crowed. "Oh, wow! You ARE a [insert our town name here] -ian now!"

"I did not! Did I?" she cried. Then she buried her face in her hands. "Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no."

As her caring and tender mother, I have found every opportunity to mention it to as many people as possible, as much to nip this disturbing trend in the bud through the process of mortification as to laugh. With her. WITH her. Right, Sian?

To the Point

2011-02-10T16:54:00.002-07:00

I bet you thought I couldn't write a short post. Well, miracles can still happen.

BOOM Goes the Dynamite!

2011-02-09T22:15:00.001-07:00

It's been a while, and you probably don't remember it very well (at all), but remember this post? It was a quote from Marco Polo, who discovered the use of fiat money in China.

For those who don't know, let me explain quickly (whatever) what fiat money is. In a nutshell, it's money backed by nothing but the "good" promises of the government. Way back when, people used to trade in gold and other precious metals or valued commodities. Gold happens to be heavy and hard to lug around in large quantities, so people with gold started asking goldsmiths to hang on to their gold for them because the goldsmiths had good vaults for that kind of thing. The goldsmiths wrote out a receipt for the amount they were holding, and the owner of the gold could then go about town knowing his money was safe. When he wanted gold, he could come back and show his receipt and get some of his gold, whereupon the goldsmith would issue a new receipt that reflected the lower amount the owner now held.

This went on for some time, and with good, solid gold backing every transaction, prices stayed very level for years on end. After all, gold is difficult and expensive to mine, so the small addition of new gold into the marketplace every year didn't cause a lot of inflation.

It didn't take too long for gold owners to realize that they didn't even need to go back and collect physical gold in order to buy something. They could use a note from the goldsmith instead, and if the goldsmith was credible and trustworthy, a note from the goldsmith was as good as...well, gold. When the gold owner signed over one of his notes, the new note owner could go to the goldsmith and take possession of the physical gold if he wished. Or, he could pass along the note to another person, who then had the choice to collect the physical gold or use the note as legal tender.

Up until 1971, this is what trade looked like in the United States. The dollar bill you had in your hand could be traded in for a dollar's worth of physical gold or silver, should you so choose.

Ah, but there was a twist. Let's go back a little bit to the goldsmiths with the vaults.

With all that gold in their vaults and knowing that the owners, who now had handy and lightweight pieces of paper to use as legal tender instead of lugging around a sack full of gold coins, the goldsmiths realized the the chance of all the gold owners coming in to collect their physical gold at one time was pretty close to zero. This meant that they could make some money on the side by lending gold to someone else, charging the guy some interest, and then getting the gold safely back into the vault, with the interest disappearing into the goldsmith's pocket. Gold owner Bob knew his gold was available whenever he needed it, but goldsmith Jim could lend some of Bob's gold to Sam for a certain amount of time, and Sam had to repay the loan with a bit extra by the time his loan was up. Jim pocketed the extra interest, and Bob's gold was all back together again.

That was the birth of fractional reserve banking. The goldsmith had a reserve of gold (brought in by the original owners and stored in his vault), but he loaned out portions of it to others who did not necessarily have gold in his vault. The gold was therefore fractioned (kind of like being in two places at once: both in the vault and in Sam's hands), and the goldsmith was banking (ha ha) on the fact that Bob and all the other gold owners wouldn't come walking in at the same time and demand all their physical gold, which Jim no longer had. Sam had some of it, Andy had some of it, and so on (watch that scene in It's a Wonderful Life where Jimmy Stewart explains this to the panicked banking customers).

Fractional reserve banking is what makes banks their money, and sometimes banks got greedy, fractioning their reserve to dangerous levels. When account owners wanted their gold, the bank had fractioned it so far that they didn't have the physical gold on hand to give to the account owners, and the bank went belly-up. The lucky ones were the account owners who got there first and got their gold. The unlucky ones didn't get anything.

Banks and credit unions all do business this way, with the profit either going to line the bank owners' pockets or getting divided amongst the account holders. The smart ones don't fraction their reserve past a certain level, of course.

In 1971, President Nixon decided to ditch the gold standard. Suddenly, the American dollar was free-floating with nothing to back it except the collective belief that these pieces of rag paper and ink were worth something. And because the dollar was the world reserve currency (meaning the entire world trades in American dollars for oil and other imports), the Federal Reserve could print more money whenever it felt a need. (Don't get me started on the constitutionality of the Federal Reserve. Let's just say that it is the fox in the hen house and leave it at that.) This dollar, which is now backed by nothing except a promise, is called fiat money, fiat coming from the Latin "let it be done," meaning that it is printed and made valuable by government decree. Now is a good time to re-read Marco Polo's description of ancient China's pretty painted notes.

What is significant is that every single economy that has succumbed to the sweet and easy temptation of fiat money has collapsed. Every. Single. One. Why? Because, like children wanting a sweet and not wanting to wait until after dinner, it's simply too easy to pay debts and take care of business by printing more money. With no need to worry about the amount of physical gold in the treasury's reserve in case all the creditors decided to cash in their dollars for gold, paper money just keeps sliding off the printing press. What happens when you flood the market with something? The value of all of that thing rapidly gets reduced. I am reminded of the Spongebob cartoon wherein Mr. Krabs sold Spongebob a ridiculous novelty hat for an exorbitant price. Mr. Krabs congratulated himself on pulling the wool over Spongebob's eyes until he found out that those novelty hats were worth $1 million. By the time he got it back and went to claim his million dollars, truck loads of the caps had been found and his hat was worth nothing.

Using silly cartoons to make a point is my prerogative. Don't be hating.

Flooding the market with dollars means that each of those dollars has less and less buying power. Add to the risk of massive inflation (the dollar has lost 95% of its value since the Federal Reserve took over the tender, loving care of the American economy) the fact that some of the big movers in the world (China, Russia, France, Japan) are now talking about ditching the dollar as the world's reserve currency and you can see why I'm stressing about my food storage. Think gas is expensive now? Just wait. And it's not just prices of commodities. It's the way of life that we are used to. Seriously, people, I don't think it's too much to say that things will go BOOM in a big, big hurry. Remember Germany after WWII? Yugoslavia in the early '90s? This will probably be worse.

Thank you for indulging me. I had to get that off my chest.

Strange Dream

2011-02-09T11:10:00.000-07:00

I had the strangest dream last night. I woke up (in my dream) and found that I was alone in my room with a little baby boy. I didn't know who the mother was, but I obviously had to start taking care of this tiny, helpless baby who had no one else, and within a very short time (in my dream, days passed like seconds), I loved the child, though at first he was just something that needed help. When I ventured out with this baby in my arms, I found Husband and some friends, who told me that the baby was really mine. I had given birth to him a few days before. I was frantic that I had lost my memory of having a baby, and they told me that they had uploaded all my memories of the labor onto computer discs in order to spare me the memory of pain (oddly, I had given birth in Mexico. I have never been to Mexico).

In my dream, I was very deeply upset about this, and I sat and thought about what they had done for a long time. I looked at the baby boy, whom I now loved with all my heart, and wished that I had been allowed to keep the memory of the pain of labor so I would have felt connected to the baby from the very first time that I saw him. I felt a fear that I might have abandoned the baby had I not grown to love him, never knowing he was mine. Though the pain of labor is so horribly intense (I guess even my unconscious self remembered that), I would rather have the pain and the memory of the pain than have it taken away, because the joy of the outcome was so worth it.

I'm still thinking about that dream. And, no, don't take it literally. I'm not pregnant.

Or Maybe Those Are Not Actually Wigs!

2011-02-07T17:52:00.000-07:00

I've been lucky to be nearly swamped with web text lately. It pays pretty well, and I like that particular type of writing, which is coming up with text that will show up on the website pages of a client. I especially like writing for the clients who provide a lot of information about their company, what they do, and why they do it. Some clients expect me to be a magician, and they test my psychic and magical abilities by teasing me with a glimpse of what they might do (but not exactly what, why, and how) and then want me to produce wonderful words to get customers to call them. ??? Today, for instance, I was writing for a company that does hydraulic cylinder repairs and chrome plating. All the information they gave me could fit onto the head of a pin, and all that information was also the only information on their current website. I had to make up some FAQs that sounded completely ignorant because I know nothing about what people would most likely ask when they first call up a company that does hydraulic cylinder repairs. I didn't even know when they're open or closed.

Moral of the story: if you want someone to write great website text for you, give them enough information to work with.

The only clients who give me way too much information are the lawyers. Now, I have read one really well written and edited law firm website, but that's obviously not the norm. The ones I deal with seem to be trying to give the general population an education in law equal to their own. They include lengthy paragraphs about specific areas of law that they cover, minute details about what constitutes what type of crime, in-depth explanations of laws, and exhaustive biographies. One website had 10 pages on it, all with at least 1000 words each. It's my job to condense all that information into about four pages that someone who hasn't yet passed the bar exam can understand well enough to want to call this particular lawyer and be ready to plonk down money for his or her services -- or at least get a free initial consultation.

It's stimulating work, to say the least. I've set up an appointment take the bar exam, just to see how much I already know. I figure I've seen enough Law & Order to wing it in court if I can just get the license to practice.

I'm kidding, I'm kidding! Please don't sue me!

FAQs for British lawyers (or barristers or solicitors, or whatever you call yourselves): What's up with the powdered wigs? I'm sorry, but I always think of the stories about how much lice people in the time of powdered wigs put up with, and I get all itchy watching the second half of British Law & Order (DONG DONG). Is this a sentimental hearkening to a time of rampant head lice, men wearing white face make-up full of lead, and Charles Dickens (admittedly, Charles Dickens came some time after men with white leaded faces, cupid bow red lips, and high heels) (I'm sure lice was still around, though)?

Maybe American lawyers should wear Davy Crockett-style leather frontier hats in court. Wouldn't that be fun?

I apologize for this post. Sometimes the joy of writing just to write overwhelms my good judgment and I come up with this sort of unedited, stream-of-consciousness stuff that will, nevertheless, get published to my blog.

My Personal Experience With HCG

2011-02-01T22:16:00.000-07:00

I'm trying the HCG diet for a second time right now. It is for this reason that visions of gooey mountains of pizza will come suddenly and unbidden into my mind's eye, followed by a deep and sincere longing for bread, cookies, and all other things made of refined flour and sugar.

You've been living in a hole in the ground if you haven't heard about HCG yet, and you're probably thinking it's the biggest crock in the world simply because it's so hyped up. I can tell you that unlike most other diets (which for me includes eating healthier and exercising), it actually works. I studied it a long time before I took the plunge the first time in order to understand what it was I was putting into my body.

In a nutshell, you take HCG drops (or injections) every day for 23 days while following a very low calorie diet (500 calories/day) for 24 of the total 26 days. HCG is Human Chorionic Gonadotrophin, which is a misnomer because it isn't a sex hormone (oops! Those silly scientists jumped the gun!). It's a hormone that pregnant women secrete in order to allow the body to break down and utilize abnormal fat (that fat you can never get rid of no matter how hard you try) so that the bloodstream is constantly providing nourishment to the fetus even when the mother isn't eating every single minute. Taken by injection or sublingually, HCG allows the body to break down and get rid of abnormal fat when used in conjunction with a very strictly limited list of foods eaten in a precise order. And you don't even have to be pregnant! Goodness knows I've NEVER lost weight by being pregnant, even with all that throwing up.

I take the sublingual drops, which work just as effectively as the injections for me. If you're thinking of starting the diet, let me give you a few helpful tips.

1. Do NOT start the HCG diet when you know you'll be faced with a holiday or event that traditionally involves large amounts of family and food in the same room -- especially if you are the cook. I did my first session during Thanksgiving and the Christmas season last year, and I ended up cheating constantly because of the temptation. I'm no stoic. I like fudge. And mashed potatoes. And Christmas pudding with virgin brandy sauce. Although I still managed to lose 12 pounds in 26 days, my advice to you is to pick a very dull couple of months, say January and February or April and May. You can manage to skip the Valentine's chocolates (buy the chockies on sale right after Valentine's and stash them away for when you can put sugar back into your diet. Better yet, don't buy them at all) where the long weekends of Thanksgiving and Christmas will probably do you in.
2. Sublingual drops from a reputable source are just as good as the injections, I think. At least, when I was following the rules, I was losing an average of a pound a day. Every person is different, but that's my opinion.
3. When they tell you to eat as much fatty food in the first two days of the diet as you can handle, just thank your lucky stars and dig in. Skimping on those first two days means you'll have more side-effects like headaches later. Besides, at what other time are you ever going to have a diet that encourages, nay, DEMANDS, that you shove doughnuts and pizza and hamburgers down your gullet until you're ready to explode?
4. After those first two days, when you start on the restricted, strict 500 calorie a day thing, you're going to be playing mental games every single moment. The "no hunger diet" advertisement makes me die laughing -- at least for the first week. Your brain will be shouting at you how hungry you are, how stupid you are for thinking you aren't good enough and need to go on this stupid diet for stupid society, even if you really want to get to a healthier weight. Take it one hour at a time and keep yourself busy every single moment. Drink lots of water in the morning and then have lunch and dinner.
5. After the first week, your body will actually get used to it and be much happier. In fact, you'll start feeling pleased with how light and clean you feel inside, which is probably the effect of not grabbing a taste of every delicious food that passes your nose (I am speaking of myself here). As you see the scale go down every morning -- or nearly every morning -- you'll also have the incentive to keep going. When I'm weak, I also remember the money it cost me to buy the drops in the first place and that, once opened, they're only good for 30 days. That helps a lot, too.
6. If you are not already instructed to do so, take a liquid Vitamin B12 supplement every day. B12 helps the HCG get more easily absorbed into your bloodstream. I've found it helps me immensely.
7. Recognize that your body is going to think it's pregnant. I have no idea how this translates for men, but for me, my face is breaking out, I occasionally have a mood swing (not too many), and I tear up at tender commercials. Okay, that might be normal, but I'm saying that I DO feel pregnant -- minus the morning sickness, which is its saving grace. If I was throwing up and feeling nauseated all the time, no slick advertisement or thoughtfully written scientific paper in the world could make me do this again.
8. Follow the regimen. There are books now that have great recipes for the HCG phase. I keep it pretty simple, though, and my meals take about five minutes to prepare. Example lunch: 100 gram tilapia filet fried on a hot skillet with a touch of cooking spray and seasoned with salt and pepper; one medium sliced tomato seasoned with salt, pepper, and vinegar (I do cheat there because I douse them in malt vinegar and not apple cider vinegar, which often gives me a tummy ache); an optional two slices Wasa light rye bread (when I started last year, NO STORE IN THIS TOWN had any Melba toast. I figured I'd try Wasa, and I haven't noticed a problem, except that it's completely tasteless and so utterly dry that I have to pile my tomatoes on top of it for flavor. It is easier on my teeth than Melba toast, however.); an apple; and lemon water or Pero with no sugar.
9. Endure. If you're feeling really weak or light-headed all the time, you might not have a good source of HCG and are actually just starving yourself senselessly. I'd say stop the diet and eat more calories. Otherwise, do your best to stick with it. When I had a microscopic taste of Husband's fudge (seriously, so tiny you could barely see it!), I immediately had a carb craving so badly I almost lost it. I'm the principal cook around these parts, and tonight I made one of my favorites for my family -- chicken-chili-cheese enchiladas -- but I did not succumb to temptation. Husband helps me out by pretending the food I make is absolutely disgusting and pulls faces to show me he's barely choking it down, even when he goes for seconds. It's very kind of him.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask. Right now I'm on Day 8 and I've lost 6 pounds. Yes, I could eat an entire football team sculpted of pizza if you put it in front of me, but it's not bothering me so much. It's mostly because I like the taste of pizza and I like to eat, but I'm again recognizing the difference between true hunger and bored hunger.

This entire post, though absolutely true, is also a keyword experiment. We'll see what happens and I'll tell you why I would conduct such an experiment later.

SOCKS? Oh, the Horror...

2011-01-31T22:26:00.001-07:00

Just a quick note to say hello. I AM alive, but it's been a week full of writing work and visions of pizzas. I'll explain more about that tomorrow.

On Tuesday, a friend from our congregation kindly came over to diagnose the problem with our gas fireplace. The pilot light had suddenly been snuffed out last year during a major snowfall, and Husband could never figure out how to start it again, though he read the manual, fiddled around for hours, and went online to see if there was any information there. Our friend pointed out the shorted wire and then got the pilot lit again. After he left, we all sat around the toasty fireplace singing Kumbaya and hugging each other in our joy.

The reason we were so ecstatic is that our furnace has been acting up. Sometimes we'll wake up and the house is 57 degrees, which is toe-chilling at best, and I've had to wear socks during the day to keep working at the computer without turning into a web text-writing popsicle. SOCKS, people! I hate socks! Husband has made repairs as he could, and he actually had it going pretty well for a long time, but our friend (who is an expert at these gas appliances) told him we'd need a new part. With the gas fireplace on now, we keep plenty warm. The upside to the dodgy furnace performance is that our gas bill has been very reasonable for a winter month. Also, our hoodies, sweaters, and SOCKS (yuck!) have been put to good use.

I'm going to bed. Well, let me clarify: I'm going to bed under my heated blanket to read the rest of Love During the Time of Cholera, another of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's strangely compelling little tales of people going through life. I also read Infidel, by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, and half of a book by Erma Bombeck just to keep my sanity intact due to the potential for Serious Matter Overload, or SMO.

All About Hair

2011-01-23T21:48:00.000-07:00

If, like Kimara, you're interested in making brown sugar fudge here's the recipe Husband used. Happy confectioning! Make a double batch and share with the neighbors. They'll think you're amazing.

For those of you who breathlessly follow my Facebook statuses, you already know that yesterday I tried out a homemade hot oil hair treatment designed to bring silky softness and shine back to heat-damaged hair. It worked like a charm, too. Here is the recipe and directions.

Fresh From Your Kitchen Hot Oil Hair Treatment:

1/4 cup olive oil or vegetable oil
1 Tbsp cream conditioner (not the leave-in kind)

Mix the oil and conditioner in a saucepan until it's mixed together and warmed. You don't want to dump incredibly hot oil all over your scalp unless you have serious, therapy-worthy issues, so make sure the oil is cool enough for comfort. Then, when it's the perfect temperature (which is a completely relative measurement), somehow get the oil mixture into your dry hair. I just dumped it over my head from a measuring cup, but a less messy solution might be to put the mix into a small squirt bottle.

Once the oil mixture is in your hair, wrap a towel around your shoulders and comb it in for even coverage. My hair only goes to my shoulders and I don't dye it, so I didn't wrap my hair up in plastic wrap; but if you have long or really damaged hair, you can wrap it up for 30 minutes or so. I think it nearly goes without saying that you should avoid plastic-wrapping your entire head. There are dire consequences to that.

I left the oil mixture in my hair for about 10 minutes, after which I hopped into the shower and shampoo-ed twice to get it completely out. I might leave it in for longer next time just because I got to sit around feeling pampered and a little like I was in a spa, except this spa needs constant maintenance and there seem to be a large number of kids who live in it who frequently get hungry...

This morning before church, I cut the boys' hair.

No, I didn't touch the girls' hair. I don't do girl haircuts unless they want to look like well-shorn missionaries, which is seldom (read: never) the case. Besides, who wants this little gymnast to look like Sinead O'Connor?

For the next two weeks, Husband is off-track, meaning that his class has a two week break. Husband does enjoy that part of the job -- especially when his off-track time coincides with our kids still being in school, which means he can write during the day without a lot of interruptions. Believe me, when they're home, he hangs out with them and they love it, but he does take advantage of their absence, as well. His heart grows fonder by the minute.

Blood Sugar Spike

2011-01-22T15:45:00.000-07:00

For the last year, Husband has been on a quest to make the perfect brown sugar fudge. He got it right once, and then suffered failure after failure as his fudges turned out crystallized and crumbly.

Today, I am happy to report, has been a red-letter day in his quest. Today he has found the perfect recipe and created the perfect brown sugar fudge. Right now, I'm just a wee bit sick of brown sugar after sampling his fudge and then sampling some more just to make sure it was still perfect.

Husband mostly confines his cooking ventures to the sweet variety. Whenever I make cranberry cake, he makes the cream/butter sauce that goes on top. He is great at mixing up custard, and he once made the best bread pudding I have ever eaten. Unfortunately, despite evidence to the contrary, he continues to be convinced that he is no good at cooking and that since I am better at it than he, I should be the one to make dinner.

Gabrielle is just fine with her daddy cooking up sweet stuff. Husband has passed along his British sweet tooth to all of his children.

Colors and Cunning Plans (Sans Turnips)

2011-01-17T12:49:00.000-07:00

In the continuing saga of choosing a paint color for the main floor, we went back to Home Depot and sorted through some more blues. Husband wants something bold that can't be interpreted as white, so the lighter, barely tinted silvery blues were out in favor of these three: bleached denim, French country, and Cayman Bay, from left to right.

As soon as we put them up, we loved the darkest blue, which is deeply pigmented with hints of purple. Husband was so enamored, he decided to paint a bigger swatch to get an idea of how it would look over a large area.

It's dark. But maybe with high-gloss white trim and white sheers on the windows, it would be gorgeous, we thought. We lived with it for a day or so, staring at the wall for long moments while getting a drink or cooking meals. Yesterday at church, Husband nudged me about halfway through the first meeting. The back of the pew in front of us was covered in a material that is very similar to the Cayman Bay blue we liked. We looked at each other and nodded. It's too dark.

So, Southern Breeze it is. That's the green one we first put up. The paint swatch looks a lot grayer in the store and much greener on our wall. It's very soothing, and it will look good in a semi-gloss finish (paint test pots only come in a flat finish, which reminds me of milk paint). All the trim will be high-gloss white, and eventually, we'll replace the current baseboards with a much taller baseboard. I like tall baseboards.

Speaking of boards, are you bored yet? I told you not to get me going on decorating ideas and colors. It's too late now. You didn't stop me in time and now I will tell you about my cunning plan for extra storage (and it does NOT involve a turnip. (That was a reference for you Black Adder fans out there.)) (Are double parentheses even legal? (and do I care?))

Here is the kitchen island as it currently stands. Blah, boring, builder's grade:

My cunning plan is this: At the end of the knee ledge, where the chairs are, I will add a vertical board and a new, higher eating ledge for people sitting at the counter. Not only will this better hide the island mess from people in the living or dining areas, but I will be left with a space under the counter for pull-out shelving units on each side.

If that doesn't make any sense, it's because I didn't explain it very well. Just trust me that it's a very cunning plan.

I'm going to go immerse myself in Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude. I'm nearly done, and I have found it an incredibly compelling book, even if I have to keep looking at the family tree at the front to keep track of who's who. I may or may not also be involved in cleaning things around the house. I can't promise anything except to fold some laundry because it gives me an excuse to watch a movie.

Flippin' 'Eck! I'm Still Going on About British Stuff!

2011-01-14T19:19:00.000-07:00

I waited too long and the light was bad by the time I took this picture, but you can kind of get an idea of the color I plastered all over the kitchen wall. I really like it, but Husband is always more careful with his heart. We'll be trying some other colors before we come to a decision. Fortunately, one of my friends suggested some colors she has used in her house, and since they are in the right color family, I'll be checking those out and painting them on the wall.

I finished 12 pages of web text today. It took hours because I either had so much information it was a huge job to edit and turn into original content or too little information, which means I had to come up with something clever and marketable and related to whatever the website sells. My brain was sweating by the time I was finished. Well, it's a lady's brain, so it only perspired, of course. Delicately, and with ultimate feminine grace.

By the time I finished writing, I realized that the only thing I'd eaten all day was a chocolate chip cookie. No wonder my head was swimming. A quick meal of beans and cheese on toast fixed me right up. Some British things were never meant to be forgotten, and beans on toast is one of them, even if American baked beans are a world apart from British baked beans. I'm not saying one is better than the other, mind you. They're just different.

I remember buying cans of baked beans for 5 pence each and a loaf of bread for 20 pence at the grocery stores in England. When you're a poor missionary, that's a good, cheap meal. I ate a lot of beans on toast and rice with soy sauce during those months. I didn't know how to cook then. I also ate a lot of ramen noodles, but never the tomato flavored ones. I don't understand tomato-flavored ramen noodles. I may be judging an entire culture unfairly, but tomato-flavored ramen noodles are just wrong.

On the other hand, pickled onion-flavored potato crisps are so, so right!

In one of the areas I lived in, we used to pick blackberries from the wild bushes along the roadsides and apples from the tree in the backyard, which belonged to the people we lived with. We made pie with them. Doused in custard (another British culinary star), it was delicious.

I still use my knife and fork British style. It's so much more logical than the American style, which involves a lot of picking up and setting down of the knife. That's time wasted when you could be eating.

Well, let me get my old bones out of this rocking chair. I've been settin' a spell, and my fingers are just a-ramblin' on with all these memories.

P.S. When you say "tuna" in England, it always sounds like "chuna." Whenever I cook with tuna, I always see the face of the British missionary who pointed that out to me. I also see his face whenever I hear Prince on the radio. He really, really liked Prince.

Alter Ego

2011-01-12T22:17:00.000-07:00

I know, I know. I'm lacking in the picture department again. I do plan to remedy that with an entire blog post dedicated to me making faces. Or not. I was thinking about doing a sort of "My Day in Pictures" idea, but you'd all be very bored to see 100 photos of me sitting at my computer cranking out web text. I might still do it but just pretend that my life is crazy and adventurous -- even a little dangerous! (cue Mission:Impossible theme music. Doom, doom, DOOM DOOM, doom, doom, DOOM DOOM, BAH dah yah! BAH da ya...)I'll be sure to add the pictures of me cooking against all odds in the kitchen and making my bed on the very cusp of danger.

I should be careful. Being flippant about my fairly calm and mundane daily tasks might just jinx me with some horrible surprise or other. Goodness knows we don't need another one of those weeks like the one when we found out Husband had leukemia. Calm is good. Though I wouldn't mind the sudden announcement that we were going on vacation to somewhere lovely and completely catered, I like the ability to easily predict what will happen in my day.

Don't believe a word of it! She has the wanderlust so bad she has to make a conscious decision NOT to drive to Las Vegas every time she gets near the freeway.

Husband and I went to Home Depot and bought a test pot of paint. When we got home, I put a whole bunch onto the wall in the kitchen that isn't visible to anyone unless you walk all the way into the room. It's a gray green/blue, and I love it. It's so soothing.

She wants to paint the floors black, but Husband won't let her.

I had the remains of a roasted chicken in the fridge, so I made a homemade chicken-vegetable soup with whole wheat spiral noodles. It was pretty good because I put enough pepper in it to give it a kick. A buttered slice of sourdough bread made it a treat.

She fooled herself into thinking the kids would like it, but she found a bowl full of someone's rejected soup sitting on the floor for the cats, who didn't like it, either. She should have gone for pizza and blown every last cent in her checking account. C'mon! Throw caution to the wind!

All right. I guess an introduction is in order. Meet my alter ego, Aggressa.

That is the stupidest name I have ever heard. I prefer Isis. I call you Molly. And if you let me out more, we wouldn't have separate names. Remember when we were one and the same? Good times.

Anyway, I'll end this now before we have an argument and people think I've got a split personality.

Let's go to Las Vegas. Then we'll just keep driving until we hit the ocean.

Good night.

A Quick Update for the Curious

2011-01-11T12:43:00.000-07:00

Update on Husband: All is, thankfully, well. You never think you're going to be happy for a virus, but I'm very grateful that that's what it seems to be. Blood test results came back with a continuing uptick in numbers, some beginning to border the normal range. Husband avoided the dreaded bone marrow biopsy, and even scored a two month wait between doctor's visits!

A Little Worried

2011-01-08T14:30:00.000-07:00

I can't think that I have anything remotely interesting to say today. I spent the morning cleaning the kitchen the way the kids never do, so now it's well and truly clean. That should last for about...5 minutes..., and that might be an overestimation.

Husband has been feeling pretty ill this past week. He's run down and doesn't feel well. I try my best not to get hysterical every time he has a sniffle or feels tired, but I have to admit that I'm quite worried by now. I will probably never get over that.

Fortunately, he has his check-up on Monday, so we'll see if it's just a virus or if his blood results come back saying something more sinister is going on.

The British Are Coming!

2011-01-05T11:41:00.014-07:00

I can say hello to my mother-in-law! Hello, Mum! Welcome to my blog!

We call her "Mum" because she's British, and that's how they talk to their mothers over there. I would call her "Mumsie," but I have never heard Husband say that, ever, and I wouldn't want to inadvertently offend. (The only people I've ever heard say "Mumsie" were the little boarding school brats on television shows, and they say it with that special English lilt to their words, like the one I acquired while serving a mission there and the one Madonna was mocked for picking up. In her defense, it's hard NOT to start talking that way.) Our children call her "Nanna" to distinguish from my mother, who is "Grandma." See how nicely that all works out? Now, we just need slightly different names for fathers and I'd never have to say to Husband, "Which dad? Mine or yours?" I don't think it would be appropriate to follow the pattern of putting a "u" in "Dad" like "Mom" becomes "Mum."

Now my Mom and my Mum are reading this blog. Husband talked up my blog to his mother during a recent phone conversation, so it's just as well I've been including more pictures of the kids and pretending that what I write is somewhat about them and not just about me. She'll find out soon enough, though. Sorry, Mum. Mom already knows the sad, sad truth.

I'm really blessed to have such great parents and great in-laws. My parents and my in-laws are also very good friends with each other, so a visit from my in-laws is a happy time all around.

I first met my future mother- and father-in-law and nearly all my future brothers- and sister-in-law during my mission. My mission president arranged to have them all over to his house a little while before the farewell meeting for the month's departing missionaries, of which Husband was one. (For any returned missionaries reading this who don't know our story, that just elicited a gasp.) Prez walked me over to his house where they were waiting to meet me and size me up, and I nearly died of nervousness.

"Are you nervous?" he laughed, and held my hand comfortingly for a moment.
"I'm going to throw up," I responded.

But they were lovely (see how easily I slip back into British-speak?), and I felt nothing but love and acceptance from them. My father-in-law likes to tell the story of how he asked me what I was planning to do after I got home from my mission and I answered, "Marry your son, of course!" as if it was so obvious and he was just a little dense. He's not at all dense, of course. I just want to clarify that.

Right-o, I'm off to exercise, what what. Ta, me ducks, and be sure to check back for more about me.

Toodle-pip!

Endings

2011-01-04T09:33:00.000-07:00

Apparently, I am weak on my endings. This is what I've determined after having several of my guest blog posts returned in order for me to spruce up the endings. I can see it now that it's been pointed out, but I can also see how that applies to a lot of areas of my life. I'm usually pretty good at beginnings. When I finally begin something, I begin in a big way; I even last until I'm past the middle part. But when it comes to the end, whether it's my articles or guest posts or a project, I stumble. Either I lose interest or I fizzle out and leave things a little undone.

It's a lesson to myself. I have a goal to change that. And today, in the four blog posts I have to write, I will concentrate on making the endings strong and vibrant so the readers (reader? Do any people actually read those things or am I writing completely into a void?) finish with a sense of completion and satisfaction -- or, as satisfied as one can feel about a post written on the different types of filling machines.

I'm kidding. I do get to write about other things, most of which I have never contemplated at much length before: jobs of the future, mistakes people make when trying to sell stuff on the internet, honeymoons in Florida, etc. The greatest advantage to what I do is that I learn a lot of new things, if only in big enough chunks to write something that can imitate expertise. While this might make me dangerous, I do have some great ideas about honeymooning in Florida, if anyone cares to ask.

The End.

Quietly Understated? Phhht. Who Needs That?

2011-01-03T09:59:00.001-07:00

I've had so many comments about the new background on my blog. Sooo many! People keep coming up to me and saying, "I LOVE the colors and the pattern. It's so you because I know you love bold colors and patterns, even if you never wear them. You mostly wear black, blue, and green solids, so I love that you've branched out and put something up there that is as daring as the patterns you'd love to scatter throughout your home. But never wear."

All right, I lie. I've had two comments, and only because I asked Husband and one of the girls what they thought. Both of them diplomatically said, "It's very colorful!" Husband added, "It looks Indian."

When given a choice, I will always pick bold, saturated colors. Even when I (shudder) go clothes shopping, I'll pick the bright colors first; it isn't until I get into the dressing room with the crappy, florescent lighting that makes any person -- even skinny, attractively mopey-looking Kate Moss -- look like they are at death's door, that I decide I'd rather not stand out too much in a crowd. Besides, I just look better in dark, solid colors. (I do have to say that the Old Navy store I visited recently has great lighting in their dressing rooms. I bought a dark gray sweater because I looked so good in it. Also, they size their clothes much larger compared to other stores, so I had to go back out and find a medium instead of a large. I knew it was just because of the sizing, but I still felt illogically elated.)

I do, however, have an extremely difficult time resisting the urge to buy chunky necklaces. I will confidently wear a weird necklace where I won't don highly patterned, brightly colored clothes. Case in point is this one, purchased last week at Rue 21. It was on sale.

Yes, it is composed of real metal strips attached to a chain. I wore it to church yesterday, but I slipped it under a V-neck sweater (black) so that only a small portion of the strips showed through. It kind of looked like I was wearing a metal tank top, but because I tried to move as carefully and gracefully as I could to keep it from clanking, no one asked if I had on chain mail.

It has a certain elegance and industrial sophistication, don't you think? But what it really says is please don't walk near me if you are carrying powerful magnets.

As for my blog background, I beg you to tolerate it at least a little while. Soon enough, I will get bored with it and change it to something else, although I can't promise it will be anything quietly understated.

The EMPTY Cracker Box, an Exploration of Desolation

2011-01-02T18:47:00.000-07:00

I have permission to put this video on my blog. Sophia wrote, directed, and filmed The EMPTY Cracker Box. It stars Elannah and a neighborhood friend, and it features Gabrielle and Sian.

Just watch it all the way through. I think you'll find it just a touch European.

Feasting

2011-01-01T20:30:00.001-07:00

A change is as good as a feast, so they say. In my case, a change gets me so hungry for more change that I start looking around with a speculative eye at every aspect of my life. I've got a whole list of resolutions. It's January, and it's a month ripe for changes. It's too cold to do much else, anyway.

I hung a picture today. Somehow, I had never graduated to knowing how to do that beyond tapping a nail in and watching it slide right back out. Today, Husband called me downstairs, interrupting me from folding laundry while watching a really, really stupid movie, and instructed me in putting in a drywall anchor and screw. How satisfying it is to use power tools. And now, one of our two original Clark Ostergaard paintings is hanging proudly. It's of a New Zealand barn swallow flying past a broken barn window (Clark is a painter of the the natural world). The detail is incredible, and Clark gave it to us when Husband found out he had leukemia. It touched Husband's heart so much, and we love the painting. I need to get a picture light for it, and it will be perfect.

After the picture hanging, Husband and I sat and discussed wall colors. We do that sometimes, but usually it's me with all the excited plans and Husband tolerantly listens to me while wondering how much work and money it would cost. By now, though, he's sick enough of the white walls to get behind the idea of buying paint, moving furniture, spending more than we thought on equipment, prepping the walls, and finally painting.

Before I start boring you with decorating details, however, I will share some more pictures, continuing with the Christmas present opening. In my last post, Elannah was admiring Sian's gift, which was some good skin cream Husband found. Sian also got a shopping spree for clothes, as she is growing out of everything she owns.

Gabrielle desperately wanted a Snuggie in leopard print. She also got a clothing shopping spree, and on Monday, Dec. 27, she and Sian and I went to the Big City and spent hours trolling through the sales looking for great jeans and shirts. We ate lunch at Pier 49 Pizza, and Gabbie declared it "the best day ever!"

Sophia is a movie maker, so Husband found her a reasonably priced digital video camera of her very own. She's made a ton of movies on it already. In fact, she made one that she showed Husband and me today, and I'm still laughing. When I get permission from the parent of one of the kids in it, I'll post it here.

This child is so bendable she can stand on her own head. She loves gymnastics and has taught herself quite a few tricks. She's unbelievably strong. For Christmas, she got her fondest wish: gymnastics lessons at last!

For the little boys, it's mostly about quantity. Little Gary, especially, loves to open presents. In fact, when his sisters want to entertain him, they wrap his toys in tissue and he gets to open them. Little Gary got books and puzzles, and Joseph got a LeapFrog computer with a bunch of learning games.

Happy New Year to all! My folded laundry is still sitting on my bed.

Several Pictures Accompanied by Long-Winded Explanations

2010-12-29T23:33:00.001-07:00

So I got a little busy over Christmas. So sue me. I'm here now, and I'm posting photos, much to your surprise, since I often say I will and then I don't.

Without giving you an entire rundown on the whole holiday weekend, I'll just say it was fun but I didn't feel all that well. Christmas Eve Asian night was a big hit. The only thing that didn't work were the onion bhajis, which are fried onion fritters. I didn't cook them long enough, and the centers were still gooey. Bummer. Otherwise, it was good stuff.

Christmas Day dinner ended up being frozen burritos instead of ham and potatoes and Yorkshire puddings and roasted vegetables and gravy, and we still haven't had time to have the ham dinner yet. The day was great: nothing but lounging after the present opening session in the morning. My parents and brother came over for a couple hours in the later morning, but they left again to go to my sister's house, and they took Gabrielle and Elannah with them for an overnight. Strange how having only four kids in the house seemed so much quieter.

Sunday, or Boxing Day, if you're British like Husband, was when we went to my parents' house and had Mom's spaghetti for dinner, along with about a ton of treats she'd cooked up. Coconut macaroons dipped in chocolate = a merry Christmas for me. I brought my cello and Sian brought her violin, and I, my mother (on violin), Sian, and my dad (on piano) played the Silent Night arrangement I'd made. My sister would have played her flute, but she'd already packed it for the big move to Wyoming the next day. Sophia got it all on her new flip video camera. I may post it, but I warn you that we hadn't warmed up. The first time I put bow to string and played was when it was my turn to come in. In my opinion, it was pretty rough.

We all took turns telling the others what present we had decided to give to Jesus this year, and the kids made paper ornaments with their gifts written on them for the tree. After all, it's HIS birthday party.

Here is the living room, complete with tree that does NOT lean in any fashion. I wonder how long it's been since we had a tree that didn't need to be tied to the ceiling to prevent a gradual decline? Anyway, after more than a year in this house, we are still holding on to the black, white, and red decorating scheme, but now I know what I really want to do. Walls, prepare. Your white days are numbered.

Below, you see the island in the kitchen. Husband found a couple tall chairs, so we finally can have kids sit up there and draw or eat while I cook. The cats also think they're great because now they have easy access to the countertop, where I am sure to be opening a can of tuna or getting some delicious kitty treat for them. That's what I'm there for, after all!

Husband very cleverly created one of the best Christmas presents ever -- at least for Joseph and Little Gary.

He created differently sized rectangles on all the pages so the kids, who are constantly drawing comics (especially in church meetings!) have a way to get really creative with them. Joseph's book is almost nearly filled up already.

The opening of presents commenced at about 8:30am on Christmas Day.

That's it for now. It's late and I'm tired. I have more photos for the next post, though.

I've been writing guest posts for blogs all day today. The idea is to write a posting about a certain subject that goes along with the blog's theme. The owner gives permission, and I write the post, inserting a keyword that will be linked to a client's website. All of these blogs I write for have advertising on them, so they welcome appropriately written postings, but the other day I wrote about axle scales, filling machines, and ways to defeat depression. It gets hard to be creative with my own blog.

P.S. If you read any blog posts about the Top 5 Business Opportunities of 2011 and it happens to be one I wrote, just know that I was coming up with stuff off the top of my head. I'm no expert in business, but that's what I had to write. Husband commented that people read these things and assume it's from some expert, so who knows if people looking for a good business opportunity for the New Year might decide to go into salvage because I said so? Or real estate (which was how I fit in the keyword)? Or reasonably priced services for Baby Boomers? Oh, the POWER! Buahahahahaha!

As Supreme Ruler of the Universe, I Declare There Shall be More Pie!

2010-12-24T16:19:00.002-07:00

I had a truly surreal moment the other night. I mean, it was like Escher came and plopped down right into my head, and all it took was a comment from Husband.

See, for years now, I've been puzzled about something. You know how you say something or express an opinion and suddenly you start hearing it everywhere? I keep wondering if I'm just repeating something I heard somewhere else and just managed to get into the middle of some sort of fad. It's hard to imagine I am a true bellwether.

Anyway, the idea had been working itself into my subconscious that I am in this world in a sort of Matrix-style way. Alien intruders aside, I keep feeling like I am creating my reality, to the point that I can make anything happen that I choose to. Husband said something without even meaning to (and really, it would take way too long to tell you what it was and why it triggered this surreal event) and for the next couple hours I could not shake the feeling that I am creating reality like a candy maker creates taffy by stretching and pulling it.

I know this sounds extremely strange. I promise, I'm not certifiable. The feeling went away after a night's sleep, and it might all have been due to some MSG in my take-out and one too many late nights. I'm mostly back down to earth now, but it was such a heady feeling I'm not sure I don't miss it.

My other reality-creation happened today when all the kids pitched in to get their chores done and the house nice and tidy for when family comes over to dinner tonight. Mostly, things went smoothly, and the bathrooms are no longer war zones. Also, I have a few of the dishes for tonight's Asian-inspired Christmas Eve meal in preparation mode, so the cooking load will be a little lighter later on. I even remembered to refrigerate the onions for the onion bhajis. I always cry when I cut onions. I've become pretty good at chopping them with my eyes closed, but I'll have a LOT of onions to chop and I'd like to keep all my fingers, thank you. Refrigerating the onions makes them less tear-inducing.

I have taken tons of pictures already. Tomorrow, I will post some of them. Right now I'm ready for a nap.

Samosas, and Naan Bread, and Curry! Oh My!

2010-12-21T13:13:00.000-07:00

For the love of Pete! I'm sick of writing.

And no, I'm not ancient and wrinkly, but sometimes I like to say "for the love of Pete!" just for fun. I never get to insert that particular phrase into any of the things I write -- any that pay, I mean. But wouldn't it be fun to get to write "For the love of Pete! When you plan your honeymoon trip to Florida, just promise me you won't get eaten by an alligator!" and have the client just rave about it? That would open up whole vistas I could explore.

It would never fly.

Since I am sick of working, I will attempt to accomplish something in the domestic arts area of my life. Today, that means cooking. More specifically, that means cooking Indian food.

During my last trip to The Big City, when Gabrielle kicked me and the kids out of the house in order to perform her science fair experiment on several unsuspecting friends (she said, "I don't need any extra variables," meaning me and her siblings. Aren't they cute when they talk all science-y like that, even when they're being snotty?), I dropped by my favorite Indian spice store to stock up on some things. I left the kids in the car with the car running and tried to hurry, but the proprietor of the shop regaled me for about 15 minutes with easy Indian recipes for curry, korma, and naan bread. I told him I should have written them all down, since they sounded so good, and he handed me his card so I can call him at any time to ask any questions. I might just do that, but me and Bal Arneson, the Spice Goddess on the Cooking Channel, have been getting along pretty well lately, and she's also good at explaining things.

When I got back into the car, I smelled very strongly of incense, but I still remember that I can either cook a korma dry or add coconut milk to make the sauce. I'm pleased that my short-term memory sometimes kicks in when it's important.

The reason I'm putting together sweet potato cakes, Indian style, is because I'm gearing up for Christmas Eve. My brother, Aaron, recently listed as his favorite Christmas tradition the following: "My sister cooks Chinese food on Christmas Eve." I know he loves that, so on Sunday, when he and my parents and my sister and my nephew all came over to celebrate Sophia's 12th birthday (happy birthday, sweet, deep-thinking, hilarious, artistic, tender, and beautiful daughter!), I consulted with him. "Aaron," I said, "how would you feel about me including Indian food with the Chinese?"

Happily, he's all for it. The menu is now thus: Bulgogi (which is Korean, but who cares? It's delicious and it's Asian), chow mein, orange chicken, sweet potato cakes, naan bread, samosas, and some sort of curry. If I can find the mango chutney for the sweet potato cakes (which are, technically, yam cakes, since they're orange and not white), so much the better. I can't wait!

For the love of Pete! How did HE get in here?

Time Travel in the Form of a Brown Paper Accordian File

2010-12-18T21:09:00.000-07:00

My mother found my accordian file. When she told me she had it and asked if I wanted it, I practically yelled, "YES, PLEASE!"

As you can see, it's stuffed full. I have to keep it in a box. What it holds are all the letters that were written to me from my late high school years until I finished my mission -- six years of correspondence from my friends and family. The manila envelope you see next to the file contains a packet of copies of letters that my dear friend and old college roommate put together for me. It contains all the letters we wrote to each other, from the time we found out we were to be freshman college roomies until 1995, when she was serving a mission and I was married and had my first baby. It's a good three inches thick.

If you wrote to me during that time, I have your letter. In fact, I took the letter out of the envelope and then stapled the letter and envelope together, filing both under the the first letter of your last name. I liked keeping both the envelopes and letters, and over the years, I have pulled out various wads of paper and felt a pang of nostalgia as I recognized the handwriting of one friend or another. They were written before the internet, before email and Facebook, before you could dash off a hurried digital message to someone halfway around the world and know they would receive it in seconds. These letters were highly anticipated, eagerly read, and joyfully responded to (hopefully they were responded to. If I didn't write you back, I apologize 1000 times!).

When I look at that file, I realize how many friends I have lost contact with. On the other hand, I am in contact with many of them, in that casual, "I don't know what you're doing every second of your life, but I'm sure glad I can ask any time" sort of Facebook way. Even if I don't get or send actual paper missives through the post anymore, I love knowing these people are still in my life, if only as a picture and a few status reports.

When I got the file from Mom, Husband laughed. "You're not going to descend into another letter-reading binge, are you?" The last binge I went on took two days and resulted in me getting really quiet and thoughtful as I relived those times. I don't believe I even felt like cooking (although that could also be due to the fact that I haven't felt like cooking for a few years now). I've been careful not to get too sucked in this time. I think, however, it's only a matter of when, not if.

Santa's Reindeer are Actually Named UPS, FedEx, and USPS

2010-12-16T10:04:00.001-07:00

Update on Husband: Fortunately, there's nothing to say here. Husband's blood levels are still steadily increasing, he feels great, and he's getting 1 1/2 weeks off for Christmas vacation.

....................

That's it! I'm revamping my blog. One does get so very tired of the same colors all the time, and I am nothing if not a woman who enjoys safe changes.

Tonight is the second-to-last of the Christmas performances my family is involved in. Sian is playing in The Big City with her chamber orchestra, so I will be taking her and Gabrielle out of school a little early in order to get Sian to her venue in time. Gabrielle will be babysitting the boys (Joseph is home with asthma problems today), and I told Sophia and Elannah to prepare to walk home.

GASP! Walk HOME? All 3/4 of a mile? Yes. Take your boots and a coat, for goodness' sake. The snow is deep and you have to walk through the field because I don't want you on the side of the road waiting to get hit by inattentive car drivers.

Anyway, Sian was busy working on her page for the school paper one day and did not hear the announcement that all chamber orchestra players would need to submit their $10 for dinner at one of the nicer Big City downtown restaurants, so the only options she would have had would have been to either sit and watch everyone else eat or wander off looking for her own grub. Or, I guess she could have shelled out the $30 undiscounted price for her meal, but she simply does not have as many babysitting jobs as she used to and couldn't afford it. Instead, I will drive her there and then she and I will go out to dinner -- just the two of us -- before heading back at a steady pace of exactly 63 mph (the van is desperate for a tune-up and simply refuses to go any faster). While we bonded a couple days ago when I drove in a bunch of young men and young women to visit Temple Square and then got separated and lost from them for a good 90 minutes, I was so busy grumbling about how I didn't have a cell phone with me and even if I did, I didn't have anyone's numbers, that it was not as relaxed and congenial a bonding moment as it could have been. Temple Square was pretty with all the lit trees, and we got to talk to a couple pairs of sister missionaries in the South Visitor's Center, but it was still stressful to have no idea where everyone else had scarpered off to. At least I was comforted by the fact that no one was going home without me.

Tonight should be much more relaxed. Sian is growing up into such a wonderful young lady, so I am happy to get a chance to sit and talk to her without being distracted.

Our last Christmas performance of the year will be on Sunday at church. I will be singing with the ward choir, and Sian and I and three other musicians in our congregation will be playing the Silent Night arrangement. Is it bad to be relieved that there will be no more rehearsals for anything for a while?

Husband, who is the absolute best gift shopper in the universe, has relieved me of any burden in finding Christmas presents for the kids. One by one, boxes have arrived at our door bearing gifts ordered from all over the country. Husband doesn't even need to step foot into a store, which is one of the greatest perks of all, and, yet, the gifts he chooses are so perfect for each child. I can't wait to see their expressions when they unwrap them.

I really shouldn't be writing this. I have a gazillion pages of web text to finish before leaving this afternoon, and my three-year-old has run out of diapers, necessitating a trip to the store. Either that or I drop everything and potty train him at last. Hmmm. Maybe next weekend would be a good time to get him off the diaper habit. That would be a great gift. Merry Christmas to me!

When the Battery Charger Arrives from Hong Kong, YOU Get to See Pictures

2010-12-13T11:00:00.000-07:00

I've got some pictures.

I know. Try to contain yourselves. Please. It's embarrassing how you're carrying on about this. It's just a few pictures.

Way back on Thanksgiving Day, I took a test shot of the kitchen island covered in our traditional all-day goodies. We don't eat Thanksgiving dinner until nighttime, and during the day, we just have a spread of fatty, sugary, and completely bad-for-you foods for snacking. After this picture was taken, Husband became disgusted with the distinct lack of sweet snacks and ran to the store for cookies, candy, and other tooth rotting material. Some of it was put into a spare jar I had in the cupboard, which was the inspiration for Joseph's little container in his previous drawing (see last post).

This is Joseph, age 6. He's got a lot of my side of the family in him.

And this is Little Gary, age 3. He looks a lot like his daddy, and he's just as much of a character.

Saturday morning, our church held a Breakfast with Santa in the gym. Gabrielle, left, wore her pajamas not because it was so early but because her cat, Lincoln, pee-ed all over her other pairs of jeans while we were taking an emergency trip to the vet's the night before. Lincoln had some battle wounds, which were infected and causing a high fever, and I told the vet to just go ahead and neuter him while he was under anesthetic. Poor cat. Anyway, Gabrielle, Joseph, Little Gary, and Elannah wanted to go see Santa and have breakfast at the church. Sophia and Sian elected to stay home, but Husband grabbed a couple extra candy canes for them, too.

Everything is better when there's bacon.

That night was my last choir concert of the season.

Husband in the front at the microphone. He was the announcer for both the Friday and Saturday concerts, and both nights he made us all laugh hard. On Friday, Husband was cracking everyone up and one of the basses looked at me and said, "Where did you find this guy?"

I wore my heels the second night, though they made my feet numb, because I was always stuck at the back and couldn't see the director very well. I figured with heels, I would add a couple inches to my height and maybe have a better view. It worked pretty well. You'll also be happy to learn that I didn't mess up too badly on my small duet.

Our last song was "The Twelve Days of Christmas," which is kind of like the "99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall" type of song for the holidays. It just keeps going, and going, and going...

Our version lasted 10 whole minutes. Husband told the audience that the concert was now half over and we would be singing our final song, which took a minute for some people to get but made the choir start laughing immediately. Unfortunately, it was a terrible song for the autistic child in the audience. His mom was telling me that he, as many autistics do, like to know what's going to be happening, so when it was announced that Twelve Days was the last song and then kept going, and going, and going, he got quite upset.

Must They Grow Up?

2010-12-12T18:50:00.003-07:00

I was tidying my room the other day when I found this:

Joseph obviously drew this one day while crouching on the floor of my room, where I later found it while tidying up. I laughed so hard I couldn't see. The caption says: "I told you to eat dinner frst!" (Joseph's spelling).

A happy little guy FINALLY gets hold of the candy jar, and triumph is his. Make note of the smear of chocolate around his ecstatically smiling mouth.

Angry eyebrows, hands on hips, hair all on one side of the head. Yup, it's me. Now you know for sure I don't use Botox.

Kerfluffle

2010-12-08T14:16:00.000-07:00

I started a Twitter account, but I know I will not have the same addiction that I did with Facebook. Really, it's just too much, and I'm only following about seven things? groups? Twitterers? (I have yet to learn the terminology. Where's some of those young, hip folks when I need them?) I've only tweeted twice, and both of them sound like Facebook statuses. Statusi?

There are five big yams roasting in the oven downstairs. Who wants to come over and smell my house?

I've lost 13 pounds on the HCG diet, and the only reason I didn't lose more was because I started the diet right before Thanksgiving and succumbed to temptation. Don't ask me what I was thinking, because I couldn't tell you. Still, 13 pounds is a good start, and now I've got incentive to continue the healthful and slimming benefits of not stuffing my face with delicious but oh, so calorific junk. Thus, roasted yams, which are nature's candy. PLEASE, people, if you are going to be merrily generous and bring over plates of goodies for Christmas, either give them to my kids (which guarantees I won't get any) or make them appear much less gooey, sinfully rich, and festively tasty than they currently look. My slimmer self thanks you. But maybe I can just take a nibble of that fudge...

Our friend, the master mechanic, can't figure out the blinker malfunction on the van. If HE can't figure it out, Husband will feel a little better about not being able to fix it, either. Unfortunately, we can't get the vehicle registered until the blinker is fixed, and I'm now driving on very expired tags. Is it the multi-function switch itself? Or will the wiring have to be McGuyvered? Stay tuned!

I got a much larger paycheck than I expected. I must have done my math wrong. I like it when it's wrong in that direction.

These random pieces of information have been brought to you by the letter C (for "crunchy") and the number 4x (for those currently undergoing the rigors of learning algebra), but only because I'm in such a very odd mood.

A Tale of Floss

2010-12-07T12:00:00.000-07:00

There once was a couple who liked to floss and brush their teeth every night before bed. The husband flossed his teeth before brushing and the wife flossed after. Each of them had their opinion about which was more effective, and one day, they shared those opinions with each other.

Several months later, the couple noticed that they had both switched their flossing patterns. The husband now flossed after brushing and the wife flossed before. When they asked each other why, both of them admitted that the argument of the other had been so persuasive they had changed.

It's All About the Music. Seriously. The Whole Thing.

2010-12-06T18:54:00.000-07:00

Update on Husband: Blood levels up for the fourth week in a row (if I'm counting correctly, which might be asking too much). The only thing that dipped were his platelets. They blamed the chemo, Cladribine, again, but I think Husband is just being lazy.

Ha ha ha.

No, all kidding aside, he's feeling better than he's felt in a year. The doc couldn't find his spleen, despite all the palpating she did (palpating: good word for parties!), so it's nicely tucked up under his rib cage right where it should be.

..................

I've been a singing, musical fool lately. My choir has been performing parts of our Christmas program all over the place. Last week, we sang at Temple Square in Salt Lake City in both the Assembly Hall and the North Visitors' Center. My parents and my brother showed up and were extremely enthusiastic. My parents leaped up at the end of our performance in the Visitors' Center and yelled "Encore!," which prompted the director to have us sing another song. Sure, I may have goaded them into doing it before the performance, but does it really matter?

We also performed for a Santa Parade and during a United Methodist Sunday service. I've never been to a Methodist church service before, so it was both fun and informative. They even invited us to lunch afterward, which was very nice of them, though I couldn't stay.

This week, we sing for some Master Gardeners and then we have our two big performances on Friday and Saturday nights here in my little town. Our entire program of 14 songs will probably take about 45 minutes to an hour. One of the soloists can't be there on Saturday night, so she asked me to take her place in one of the songs. It's a duet of three or four measures during a very ramped-up version of "The Twelve Days of Christmas." It's short, but it's still enough to make me sweat;at least it's the last song and my voice will be fully warmed up by then. I have to hit a high E, which for my decidedly alto voice can sometimes sound squeaky.

I did finally get the Silent Night arrangement finished, and my dad performed his magic and got it printed for me. I've been playing my cello a lot lately, both for fun and to get myself in gear for this, and now my left index fingertip is smarting and stinging with overuse. It's okay. It will callus up harder and I'll have my tough fingers back again.

I achieved musical Nirvana two days ago when I played for three solid hours. If any of you musicians have ever achieved musical Nirvana, you know what I'm talking about. Suddenly, your world is only about the notes, the sounds, the phrases, and there is nothing else. The music begins to tell you stories and you are transported out of this world and into another. I used to get that all the time when I would borrow my dad's church keys and go play the grand piano in the church's chapel in the middle of the night for hours. I would only stop when I was so tired I couldn't see straight anymore, but by then, I would have reached that alternate state of consciousness where I forgot everything but the music. You don't think in words anymore. You only think in sounds and sensations. My kids will talk to me and I'll look at them blankly. I can't process language. I have to switch back to my left brain again with a conscious, wrenching effort.

Anyhoo, enough about me and music. In fact, I better quit altogether and go make dinner. Husband and I went grocery shopping at our favorite grocery discount store today, and now I've got lots to play with. Will it be sloppy joes and fries with a veggie? Will it be homemade pizza? Or will it be fried ham slices, honey-mustard carrots, and rolls? And since I'm asking questions, could one of you please come over and make it for me?

Happy (GASP) Thanksgiving (COUGH) To All! (GASP)

2010-11-29T09:52:00.000-07:00

Update on Husband: Things still look good. Although we didn't end up getting his blood results before Thanksgiving hit, he still went to church yesterday. I didn't even wake him up, figuring he was going to stay home until he knew for sure if he still had an immune system, but when I came back to my room after rousting the kids out of bed and feeding them breakfast, there he was all dressed in his Sunday best and combing his hair. It was very nice to sit next to him in the chapel.

....................

It was a lovely week, all around. Despite all of my kids, who were hacking and coughing and having sore throats, Thanksgiving and post-Thanksgiving Friday were wonderful. We had family over on Thursday (yummy, juicy turkey), and on Friday we went to my parents' house to see the family members who couldn't make it Thursday. I got to hold my new little niece, who is beautiful and delightful and so, so intelligent (like her parents and her siblings. And her favorite aunt, of course.)

Pictures, you ask? I promised pictures? Remind me not to do that again. I jinxed the camera and the battery died. The battery charger hasn't arrived yet, so all I have are a few test shots of the kitchen island, which I will post since I don't have anything else. I will post them when the battery charger arrives, of course, because the camera won't turn on otherwise. (Do I do the same thing to cameras that I do to watches? Is it me??)

Friday night, we forgot to take the asthma inhaler with us. We didn't remember that we'd forgotten until it was too late to turn around. By dinner time, poor Sophia was gasping and her back hurt from the tension of trying to breathe. We put her into the bathroom and turned on the hot shower to steam things up while my sister ran to 7-11 to get her a cup of coffee. Sophia sat in the steamy bathroom and sipped old, bitter coffee for a while before we left to take her home. Being LDS, we don't drink coffee, of course, and this worried the other children tremendously. Husband explained that the coffee was being used medicinally in this case, just like there is alcohol in cough syrup ("There's alcohol in cough syrup??" exclaimed Elannah. "Good or bad alcohol?" Um, well, alcohol is just alcohol, dear. It's all in how you use it, although there are certainly alcohols you wouldn't want to drink recreationally or medicinally. Which reminds me of a story of our tour guide in Italy...).

Anyway, halfway home, Sophia was fine again. She got to quit drinking the coffee, which she said tasted awful, and it was Joseph who ended up needing the nebulizer when we arrived back at our house. He was okay after taking the breathing medicine, and I slathered Vic's Vapo-Rub all over the soles of his feet to calm his cough. We didn't end up missing dessert after all because my mother sent us home with one of her home-made pumpkin pies.

Pre-Thanksgiving Day Turkey Brining Ruminations

2010-11-24T09:17:00.000-07:00

Update on Husband: For two weeks in a row, Husband's blood numbers have increased, which is a very good thing. He just had his blood drawn yesterday and we should hear the results today. If the levels are up again, he has decided he will start attending church on Sundays once again. I am very excited about that, although I had lots of practice getting all the kids ready and going by myself when he was a bishop. It will be very nice to sit next to him.

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You know how life gets all busy and crazy and you have a million things to remember to do, so you're happy to simply remember at least some of them, but that prevents you from thinking very deeply because living on the surface is just about all you have the energy and time for?

I feel almost frantic these days, and it isn't one of those feelings I enjoy. I mentioned that before in this blog. I like to have time to sit and ponder things a bit, and I don't like being so busy with a to-do list that I can never catch up.

The good news is this: I have made great inroads to completing the arrangement of Silent Night for piano, cello, two violins, and a flute. I went over to my parents' house on Monday morning, and my dad gave me a crash course in Finale, a music writing software program. He also let me borrow his laptop that has Finale on it so I could come home and carefully and slowly insert notes for each instrument and hear how things sound all together.

Today, I brine the turkey. Fortunately, once it's in the brine bath I don't have to do anything -- just let it sit and soak up salt and water. It's nice when things get done and you don't even have to be there to keep them going. I won't cook an un-brined turkey anymore. Once I found out how juicy and flavorful turkey breast tastes after 24 hours in a salt bath with vegetables and seasonings, I was spoiled. I use a big cooler, an entire box of Kosher salt, some raw carrots, onion wedges, celery leaves, pepper, and other seasonings. It works wonders. You can't do the table presentation of a marvelously golden-brown turkey surrounded by stuffing and garnishes, but wonderfully golden-brown turkey usually means the breast meat is dry. I'll take taste over presentation when it comes to turkey. You're going to have a lot of it (I bought a 20 pound turkey this year), so it had better be fit for eating day after day.

This year, there will be pictures of Thanksgiving and family. I finally have the batteries (no battery charger, yet, but the batteries I got are fully charged) for the camera, so I can take pictures of everything.

Troubled

2010-11-16T08:03:00.000-07:00

I am troubled. I don't have my food storage completed and this is very troubling to me. I think it's very, very important that every one of us have a full year's supply of food, and I don't have it done. It's keeping me up at night.

Invasion of the "Huns"

2010-11-13T12:00:00.002-07:00

I really like living in a small town. One big advantage is that a traffic jam consists of seven cars. It's also nice that you can reach any destination in my town within 10 minutes. Our town is not so small that you could possibly know everyone, but I often see familiar cars driving around, even if I do not know their owners.

One odd habit of small town dwellers, however, is that so many people call you "hun." For you non-native English speakers, "hun" is short for "honey," which is a term of endearment between spouses or parents and children. In the movies, it's the middle aged waitress in the dingy diner who calls you Hun in a raspy smoker's voice while she smacks her gum and gets her order pad out.

"What can I getcha, Hun?"

I don't mind middle aged waitresses calling me Hun. That's fine. They've earned it. But the other day, I was at the drive-through line for a burger and the order taker, who looked like she was no older than 18, kept calling me Hun. And she repeated it at the end of every sentence, as if she had a record to break for the number of times she said it.

"Can I take your order, Hun?"
"What kind of soda did you want, Hun?"
"Ice, Hun?"
"Ketchup or fry sauce, Hun?"
That'll be $5.20, Hun."
"Here's your change, Hun."
"Your food will be right out, Hun."
"Here you go, Hun."

I figure the middle age waitresses must start somewhere with the habit, but I never realized that they started out as young order takers in fast food restaurants. And the way this girl said it was like it was foreign to her, as if she were just starting the habit and continuing through force of will. Maybe someone told her that's what you say in a small town restaurant or the customers get miffed.

It happens at the grocery store, too. There, the Hun-ners are closer to my age, and they seem comfortable with the word, not finding it necessary to end every sentence with it. It still throws me off a bit, but I can accept it.

I'll accept it from the skinny young girl at the fast food restaurant, too, because those burgers are to die for.

Yo! I Ate Your Plums. Cold. But Good. Thanks. And Sorry.

2010-11-12T13:29:00.000-07:00

Update on Husband: This week's blood results are in! Neutrophils are down to 1.1 (when they fall below 1.0, we have to worry), platelets are slightly up, and hemoglobin is the same. While Husband has enjoyed going back to work this week, it wears him out. Every day after he gets home he crashes for a nap. Still, he's enjoying teaching again, and the kids in his class seem to really like his book. He's been reading a little bit out loud to them every day.

................

On Sunday night, my brother, Aaron, came over for dinner. After dinner, the kids pulled out a book of poetry and began reading it out loud, which is usually enough of a reason for Sophia to start laughing so hard she gets wheezy and needs to take her asthma medicine. This night was no exception.

Either I'm really, really uneducated when it comes to what makes good poetry or I'm extremely picky. To me, poetry is probably one of the hardest things to get right. When it's really good, it is a thing of sheer beauty. But when it's bad...

And poetry is so often bad.

For instance, the girls read one poem that sounded like it had been written on a post-it note and stuck to a fridge somewhere:

This is Just to Say

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

~William Carlos Williams

Now, most of you reading that poem would probably sigh in delight and think about the wonderful image it paints. After all, it came from a book entitled The Best Poems Ever: a collection of poetry's greatest voices, edited by Edric S. Mesmer.

Even I can see that the poem looks and sounds lovely in its printed form. I, however, first heard it read out loud by a sarcastic 15 year old and I couldn't help thinking that I could have written that post-it (although I would not be likely to eat cold plums. I have sensitive teeth, you see.)That's how much of a Philistine I am. To make matters worse, I've corrupted most of my children, apparently.

Sian actually happens to be a poet, and she is shaping up to be a very good one. She's not only a natural poet, she works hard at it. As soon as she posts her latest, I will provide a link to it here.

I decided to try and come up with a poem, but since I have no faith in my abilities, the poem would, of necessity, be pretty awful. I already have the title: Amateur Mushroom Hunter. I'll post it when I finish it. To be forewarned is to be forearmed. Or something like that.

Another of My Endless Theories

2010-11-07T14:46:00.000-07:00

Update on Husband: I noticed a couple days ago that my blog was mentioned in the Neighborhood News of my former ward as the place to get updates on Husband's condition. Therefore, I welcome any friends who may be checking up on how things are going. Yes, you are in the right spot. I use a pseudonym for myself, Husband, and the kids, but you're in the right place.

Summary: Things are going quite well, thank you. Husband is going back to work tomorrow. His class will be back on track. He's feeling pretty good, if still tired (low hemoglobin), and he's been fixing things up in the yard and the house. Today he made sure the kitchen was so tidy I couldn't help but be inspired to make cookies and other baked goodies. Smart man.

...................

Here's my theory, developed long, long ago, on the real reason people hate talking to salesmen:

They are afraid they'll get sold something they don't really want.

Admit it! Deep inside, you're afraid you'll somehow buy something you didn't want; that, somehow, some mysterious hypnotism will overcome you and the next thing you know, you're waking up with a roomful of encyclopedias and a checking account that's $2000 lighter. Or, even more frightening, that you've recently converted to a different religion.

I know people say it's because pushy salesmen are so annoying, or religious fanatics knocking at their door right during dinner or TV time is just the height of bad manners, but a little investigation will prove that it's really about fear.

The reason I even set about forming this theory was because I had to explain why so many people slammed the door in my face when I was a missionary, though I was ever so polite and non-confrontational. Yes, I know that having someone come to your door or approach you in the street to talk about religion is the quintessential no-no, but I knew it was much more than mere botheration that caused so much anger.

Once I figured it out (and I may have only figured it out for us passive-aggressive types), I am much less worried about talking in a friendly manner to people at my door. Whether they are trying to sell me something or share their beliefs, I am willing to hear them out, and I'm not worried that I'll somehow end up with the encyclopedias or the vacuum or joining a different church because I was overcome with charm or charisma. (I am still wary with people over the phone, however. They like to talk fast and sell immediately, and I have no interest in buying something I haven't had a chance to look over, thank you very much.)

Through experience, I also know when to politely stop a sales rep with a firm "no, thank you." And I just don't answer the door when the Kirby Vacuum people come around. They never leave once they get in the door. Never. In fact, I believe we must have brought one with us when we moved here. Sometimes there's a strange knocking sound from one of the boxes in the garage...

Memories of My Killer Brain

2010-11-02T17:32:00.001-06:00

Update on Husband: Good news yesterday! Husband's white blood cell count doubled, which puts him well into the "I have an immune system" Club range. Although his platelets fell again for the third week in a row (which even his doctor admitted was weird), he can go to work with just a little less worry. He has decided to station a table with three large hand sanitizer pumps outside his classroom door and require anyone who leaves to sanitize upon entering. This might cut down on absences in his class, as well, if the kids aren't getting as sick. Today he went to work to begin preparations for next week, when his class comes back on track.

.....................

I spent a very short time, during my pregnancy with Sian, being addicted to soap operas. I got over it when I realized that a) the plots never moved along, and b) those characters were all deeply insane. What person in their right mind would hang out at a hospital all day, plotting and scheming fantastically unwise plans for revenge that never, EVER work out quite the way they expect?

I know, of course, that all those characters are completely fictitious, so you don't need to worry that I had a break with reality or anything. Nevertheless, I am addicted to a soap opera again. This time, it's the South Korean soap, Cinderella's Sister, and it doesn't even faze me that I have to read subtitles. (I'm used to that with my fascination for Bollywood films.)

Also, Lyn said something in a comment on my last post that reminded me of another time when my brain has tried to kill me. I already told you about the time during pregnancy when I would find myself walking into the kitchen to get a spoon to eat dirt from the backyard (and which horrible craving was solved by taking an iron supplement). At times, when I was severely sleep deprived, I would be driving around running errands. If I had a book in the passenger seat for those inevitable waits in doctor's offices, the DMV, or if I grabbed lunch out, I would have to fight a very enticing urge to just pick up the book and start reading. My brain didn't even care to make me wait until I was at a red light! I had to constantly remind myself that reading while driving was a huge no-no. Over and over I would have to stop myself from reaching over and grabbing the book. To fight the terrible desire to read myself to death, I had to turn on the radio and sing very loudly, concentrating on the words. When I started getting more sleep, the urge went away.

Funny things, these bodies.

It's been hard to get posts written lately. Busy, busy, busy. Halloween was fun, sort of. The kids were each given $10 to spend on costumes with the promise that they could keep whatever they didn't spend. Suddenly, they were a lot more frugal about what they wanted to buy. All of them managed to come up with something to wear except Little Gary, who refused any costume or makeup help and declared that he was "just Gary!" I kind of dressed up for the first time in years, myself. I was Cleopatra with an Egyptian headdress and the whole heavy eyeliner thing, but I couldn't find a tunic I was willing to spend gobs of money on, so I was Cleo only from the neck up. Next year, I'll make myself a costume and be Cleo from head to toe.

I voted today. A very earnest man from the Democrat Party called me and reminded me to vote (not that I'd forgotten or anything), but I had to confess that I had no intentions of voting for any Democrats, though I am also skeptical of most Republicans, as well. He thanked me for being nice to him, though.

I promise more pictures soon. I'm just waiting for the battery and battery charger to arrive in the mail, and then my camera will be ready to be tested and played with.

The Staring of the Calves

2010-10-27T16:46:00.000-06:00

Update on Husband: Sadly, I have to update here. Things seemed to be going oh, so well, until two weeks ago when Husband's blood results came back. Everything had dropped. In particular, his neutrophils had dropped so low that he was again neutropenic, which means that his immune system was pretty much non-functional. He had to go back to his low microbial diet (no raw foods) and stay away from everyone. We waited all week for his next blood test, hoping the results would be better; but, no. This week is the same.

Obviously, it's discouraging. The doctor says that it sometimes takes the particular chemotherapy he had (Cladribine) a while to work, and his blood may be up and down for a few months. Husband can work if he is on an antibiotic, and he's feeling fairly well despite his lack of hemoglobin and platelets. The problem is that he's BORED!!!

......................

On Tuesday night, which is Taxi Mom night for me, I had to go to the church several times in order to drop off kids for various activities. The church is right across the street from a very small ranch, and there are often cows or horses in the pens beside the road or walking on the circular exerciser. The smell of manure wafts through the air on a Sunday morning.

Anyway, on Tuesday, the large pen was filled with calves. The first time I drove by, all the calves were standing alertly at attention. They were all pointing in the same direction, watching some men trim the trees that grow in the grassy margin alongside the church building. When I came back a little later, all the calves were again alertly at attention and pointing in the same direction, only this time they were looking toward the horse pens. I don't know what was so fascinating about the horse pens, but by golly! it was interesting enough to stand and watch closely.

I don't know much about calves. The closest I've ever gotten to a cow was -- okay, I have milked a cow, which is pretty dang close. But I'm not familiar with cow behavior. I just thought it was funny.

And if I had my NEW DIGITAL SLR CAMERA that Husband ordered for my birthday, I would have taken pictures of calves standing alertly at attention and posted them here for you to see. That's right! My battery-eating Kodak Easyshare is being relegated to becoming a toy for children once I have my new Canon in my hot little fists. I will also have a polarizing lens to play with. I'm so very excited!

Of Footwear and Vessles and Authenticate Increase, of Cruciferous Vegetables and Reigning Monarchs

2010-10-22T17:59:00.004-06:00

It was my birthday on Wednesday. I turned 39. I decided to take stock of myself.

A few more wrinkles: check
Three gray hairs: check
The need to diet: check
Life satisfaction: check, check, and CHECK!

I am very happy with my life, which is a good thing to know as I speed through that last year before hitting middle age squarely in the tush. Therefore, I made some goals for me to reach before my next birthday.

Reach my ideal weight for health reasons (and telling myself it isn't in any way connected to my vanity, which I know to be a complete falsehood, but at least I know I'm lying to myself)
Play my cello much more often
Hang out with my kids as much as possible
Take a vacation with Husband

As I was driving home from the library on Wednesday (it WAS my birthday and that IS one of my favorite places), Gabrielle asked how old I was. Then she said, "Wow! You don't look 39. You look 25."

Ah, that kid. I laughed until the tears came out of my eyes.

"No, Mom, it's true!" she protested. Then she was quiet for a moment while I continued to chuckle fondly. "Okay," she said, "You at least don't look any older than 30."

I think she's my favorite.

I got a wonderful birthday gift the day before my birthday. A friend I've know since my first area on my mission (who happens to be a follower of this blog) had a layover in The Big City during a business trip to an exotic South American country. Husband and I drove to the airport to pick him up and he treated us to lunch. It was fun to catch up.

Sian had a high school orchestra concert on Tuesday night. All the players wore their Halloween costumes, and my darling girl wore her Snow White costume I made for her last year because she looks just like Snow White. I did insist she put on more red lipstick for the "lips as red as a red, red rose" look, though.

Since my razzle grappling trashbiting camera doesn't work very well, my dad took her picture and emailed it to me. Ain't she purty?

Her chamber orchestra did very well, and the combined high school orchestra also sounded quite nice. My favorite piece was "Concerto for Three Kazoos and an Orchestra." Especially when the kazoos tuned up.

Today I have been working on editing a number of websites that were written by people whose first language is not English. That would be fine and all, since many people both speak and write English very well as a second language, but these particular writers are only shyly acquainted with our national language. They also use a thesaurus like many people use humor: indiscriminately and with blunt force. The results are often unintentionally hilarious. Who wouldn't want to read something entitled "A Favorite Pastime: Passion Ideas You Will Like"? Sadly, it was only about hobbies, however. Still, among the surprising ideas contained within was this one: "Individuals who live in a nation sometimes turn into fascinated with elevating decorative chickens, pigeons, or pheasants." Further encouraging the reader to take up raising birds as a hobby, the author noted, "...you can even increase some prize winners!"

See if you can spot the misuse of a thesaurus in this sentence: "Pastime bicyclists have gotten more and more widespread to see cycling alongside lesser traveled highways seeing the countryside up shut and personal."

I laugh at these, but I would never attempt to write an article in another language. I don't know enough of another language to be even a little dangerous, much less only slightly comprehensible. At least they get paid for their unintentional hilarity.

Those Salty Vacuum Manufacturers!

2010-10-17T15:59:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, I was helping to clean up after a particularly enjoyable Super Saturday at the chapel and I went to the janitor's closet for a vacuum. I noticed an old carpet sweeper shoved into a corner, and printed on top of it in fancy factory letters was the name, "The Shagger." You can bet I did not in any way make any comments or juvenile jokes about it. At all. To anyone who might have laughed until her face turned red and I had to quit talking just to let her breathe. No. That would have been completely inappropriate.

Ahem.

In non-naughty vacuum news: A few weeks back, Husband went right ahead and published his own book. He wasn't getting anything but rejection notes from the various publishers and agents he's sent it to, but so many people have asked to read it that he figured it was easier to pass it around in book form than as a massive 3-ring binder. He designed a cover and had three softcover books printed by a reputable printing company he found online. It only cost about $12 per book, which is very reasonable, considering he couldn't in any way claim a mass production discount. He's using one to edit again (still finding a few mistakes!) and he got permission to read the book to his class because it isn't published and he can't be accused of promoting sales to the children in his classroom. The people who have read it so far have loved it, and not all of them are close family members! (Ha ha ha. I hope you found the humor in that last sentence.) But, seriously, most people who are reading it find that they can't put it down. One reader (a colleague of Husband's) reported reading it all day and staying up into the wee hours to finish because he just had to know what happened next. He's begging for the sequel. I'd say that's a good sign.

Slammin' Farzle Rabbit Cramulation on a STICK!

2010-10-15T20:41:00.003-06:00

When I went, last Saturday, to Sophia's play in which she had the part of Sleeping Beauty (the younger), I found two new batteries for our crappy, battery-eating camera. I handed the camera and brand new batteries to Gabrielle as we were climbing into the car on our way to the performance and told her to carefully insert them for the purpose of taking blurry, unsatisfying pictures in a show of solidarity for Sophia. Gabrielle did insert the new batteries, but forgot to turn off the camera; by the time I went to take pictures, the batteries had been completely drained.

The only reason I refrained from saying really awful words is my sense of decorum, the fact that there were many, many children surrounding me, and my friend, M, who was sitting next to me in order to watch her daughter, who played a fairy.

I was thinking I need some good "swear" words. Sian used to say "bucket!" quite a lot, until I pointed out that it's just a little too close to another obscenity for comfort. Now she says "pickles." I don't think that can be misunderstood.

The point of uttering an obscenity is to be able to say something harsh and release emotion without having to think too much. Thinking too much about what you're saying distracts you from feeling properly angry, which is why the tried-but-true obscenities will always be popular; they're shocking, they have become unthinking habit, and they convey the desired attitude of disgust or anger or surprise. For the very practiced, they also substitute for other words of more descriptive substance, which is when a person starts to sound very ignorant. It's a short and slippery slope from an occasional utterance to lethargic reliance.

I've often used the word "expletive," but I've always loved the grace and elegance of Booth Tarkington's put-upon father, Mr. Little, in Tarkington's book, The Fighting Littles. Mr. Little was expert in swearing without actually saying anything offensive. "Job jab the dob dab bastinadoed Hellespont!" Husband and I frequently shout "Black enameled bath plug!," but that's only when we want to make each other laugh by using a phrase Husband grew up hearing from his father. More often, I say "crap," which is a truly awful thing to hear echoed from the mouth of your cherub three year old. I gotta quit that.

What word(s) do you use, if you don't desire to truly offend with the normal list of obscenities? I am very interested to know. Please comment on that.

And, by the way, M took many pictures of Sophia for me on her camera, which she said she will email to me. When she does, I'll post them here so you can see my sweet Sleeping Beauty (the younger).