Busy Mom's Looking Glass

2011-01-26T09:49:00.003-05:00

If you haven't been paying attention to the riots in Tunisia or Egypt, or to the President's State of the Union address, or to Gabriel Giffords, you may have noticed that an American icon, Jack Lalane, is gone.

According to Richard Goldstein of the New York Times Mr. Lalane did some pretty incredible things in his wonderfully long life time of 96 years. Did you know that when he was 60 he swam from Alcatraz Island to Fisherman's Wharf? That is a distance of a little over a mile. "Not a big deal," you might be thinking, but he was handcuffed and shackled! "Okay, a little bit of a big deal, but come on, not the 'be all-end all' of big deals," you might be thinking now. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that he was also towing a 1,000 pound boat.

When he was 70 he did something only slightly more impressive. He swam the mile and a half through Long Beach Harbor, again shackled and handcuffed (which begs the question, how exactly does one swim handcuffed and shackled), this time towing 70 boats along with 70 people.

These examples only highlight his accomplishments later in life. Mr. Lalane accomplished a good many things early on. Let's take a look. There is the fact that he was able to host a successful fitness television show while wearing the most ridiculous jump suit ever seen on a man. There was his juice machine. He convinced scores of people to forgo chewing forever. That's impressive. But maybe his most impressive feat of all was one that was least known.

Jack Lalane managed to get his wife to not only take, but more importantly keep, his last name. Ms. Elaine Lalane, to you, I send my deepest sympathies.

It's been a long time, baby!

2011-01-21T12:20:00.003-05:00

Wow, It has been a long 1 1/2 years since I have been here. So much has happened. Cassie is going to The National Guard next month, Ariel graduates from high school in just a few short months, Michael is a sophomore, Jacob is in 8th grade, Matthew is now in Middle School (ooooh!) and Hannah is in kindergarten. Oh, and I am in school too now. Je suis etudiante de francais. I think that's how you say it, anyway. I am learning French- for all of you anglophiles.

I'll be back. I promise it won't take me a year and a half this time.

2009-06-29T06:58:00.002-04:00

My oldest daughter went to Europe for a week a couple of months ago. She loved Amsterdam and hated Paris. In fact she even created a chart to describe the differences between the two cities.

Paris vs. Amsterdam
Long distances vs. short
Rude people vs. helpful
Dirty town vs. everyone recycles and bicycles
Hates English vs. everyone speaks English
Very busy town vs. Pretty much like our town busy

So you see, Amsterdam is much better than Paris.

It reminded me of an article I read about a year or so ago. The columnist was explaining that Parisians are not rude, they are different, and we perceive the difference as rudeness. She went on to explain that first- Paris is a big city and like most large cities, the people tend to have less patience so when a tourist comes along looking for directions they have already been dealing with this all day and don't have any patience on reserve. She also said that Europeans in general and the French specifically, have a greater sense of privacy. They don't assume that just because you are standing in line beside one another at the grocery store you automatically become friends. This brings me to the reason I am writing today. I have been heard more than once saying that anyone who has the misfortune of standing in line next to me has to be my friend for the next few minutes. I can not imagine how arduous an eight hour flight would be if my seat mates didn't want to talk. Wow! Talk about torture!

There were two men standing in line in front of me at Barnes and Noble. They were sort of giggling and they kept looking at me. I was pretty confident they weren't laughing at me, but were more concerned that I may have overheard their little tete-a-tete. I hadn't, but while listening to them carrying on like twelve year old girls my eyes fell upon a CD by some woman (I honestly can not remember who) but she looked so much like Michael Jackson that I was taken aback. So I grabbed the CD and said to the men, "quick, who does this look like?" and sort of flashed the CD at them and then turned it away to quickly for them to see the name of the artist. They had no idea but it led right into a conversation.

I have stood in line when I saw something funny and wanted desperately to share it with anyone- anyone at all. I have a tendency to find so many things funny. I recently went to a Rays game at the Tropicana Stadium in St. Pete with a couple of girlfriends. They abandoned me for a while to visit a friend. While they were gone I became close friends with my neighbors. We did the wave together, we discussed the intelligence of staying at a Holiday Inn Express, we talked about all sorts of things- we were friends, buds, comrades. Ah those fifteen minutes of friendship we all shared!

So, if you see me standing in line at the grocery store, or sitting on a park bench, or having a coffee all by my lonesome at the coffee shop, please come join me and tell me a funny. I wont get all Parisian on you!

Maybe the Binky Fairy took it!

2009-01-08T12:52:00.004-05:00

Hannah has a binky, passy, pacifier, lovey or whatever other stupid name you want to call it. She didn't start out with it. When she got dropped on her head when she was a month old the people in the hospital gave her one. She liked it, so.... why mess with a good thing. It has been thirty nine months since she was introduced to that stupid thing. More than once did we think she was done with it. She has lost it, gone four of five days without it just to find it again and start all over again. We convinced her that the Binky Fair would like it. If Hannah put her binky under her pillow the bink fairy would come during the night and leave a toy, much like her cousin the tooth fairy. Hannah was all for it. She happily placed it under her pillow before she went to sleep. In the morning she found a cute little toy that she played with all day, that is, until she wanted her binky. I tried to convince her that she wanted the toy more but for whatever reason she did not believe me. She cried, she wailed, she whimpered, I gave in. I told her that if she put her toy under the pillow the binky fairy would come and take the toy and leave the binky. She finally got her binky back and took a long, overdue nap.

That was a few weeks ago. We have tried since then to try it again. Nope, not happening. Everytime she loses it she tries blaming the binky fairy. "Maybe the binky fairy took it!" she says with big sad eyes. I remind her that the binky fairy NEVER takes a binky that a little girl wants to keep. She still isn't too sure. She has lost it again. This was her last one. She chews them so they all eventually break and she only had one left. I really do not know where it is, really. It has been three days so far.

My husband buzzed his head. He looks great. I've been trying for a few years now to get him to do it. I asked Hannah what happened to Daddy's hair. "Maybe the binky fairy took it!" was all she said.

2008-10-09T09:18:00.004-04:00

Have you ever read a book that had so many characters that you had to write them down to keep them all straight? I know that sometimes in school students are required to, although I can not personally remember being assigned to do so. The first book I can recall doing this with was It by Steven King. That book had (if I recall correctly) about eight main characters and it flashed back and forth between the past and present. I remember being frustrated at my inability to keep them all straight, so I wrote them all down. By the Way, I thought it was a terrible book and at the very end of the book he wrote the day he started it and the day he ended it and it took him, I don't remember exactly, but about five years to write and I remember thinking what an absolute waste of five years of his life and a month of mine. I am a quick reader and the fact that the book took me a month to read is an indication of what I thought of it. It would be years before I would pick up another Steven King novel and then it was when he, temporarily, switched genres. It was Misery, which I loved by the way.
I recently read the Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan. Again, eight main characters. It seemed as though the movie revealed more about their lives, although I don't remember more than two or three significant differences between the two. It just seems as though the movie was longer some how.
Now I am reading the Tale of Two Cities. Holy Smoke- talk about a lot of characters! I have index cards that I use to keep them all straight. Actually, I am not reading, but rather listening to it. I got for free from Loudlit.org . I got it in MP3 format and uploaded it onto my IPOD. Because the copyright for this particular text expired you can get it for free from a number of places. The reader is great from this particular sight. They are currently trying to raise funds and will be releasing The Scarlet Letter as soon as their goal has been met. Currently simplyaudiobooks.com is offering Count Dracula for free as a download. You may remember me mentioning simplyaudiobooks in a previous post.
I purchased a book titled the Compleat Cast of Characters in Literature published by SparkNotes, which contains over 8,000 entries. It helps, sort of, if you need a simple reminder of who's who. So, I want to know who else does this. If you keep a list of characters when you are reading let me know. I can't possibly be the only one.

I would like to note here that while a great deal of intellectual property is available on the internet for free, most of it is not available legally. Stealing is stealing, don't do it. If you can not afford to purchase it, you can not afford the penalty if you are caught, and if you have children you can not steal and tell your children not to steal. They are not stupid. They will know that you are being a hypocrite.

Volunteers needed........

2008-10-07T11:50:00.003-04:00

I have a bit of an obsessive personality. Whenever I have a strong interest or curiosity about something I am rarely satisfied with a passing knowledge, rather I will learn and learn until I have a supernumerary knowledge of the subject, often boring my friends and family to tears in the process.

I have a large yard and big dogs who love to run around the yard. Our dogs come in and go out of the house as they please, because we leave the sliding door ajar for them while we are home. The neighbor behind us had two Chihuahuas who would be let out at the same time every day and one of our dogs would run to the fence separating the properties waiting patiently for the little ones to come out to play. They would run back and forth along the length of the fence happily barking at each other. Well, our dog got ticks. And she shared them. With us. Not just a tick here and there, but more like there were ticks everywhere! I was, like most normal people would be, completely freaked out. Totally grossed out. Absolutely panicked. Would my family, my precious babies get bitten and contract some horrible disease like Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever? I didn't know. I had to find out. I HAD TO LEARN EVERY SINGLE THING THERE WAS TO KNOW ABOUT THESE MINUSCULE ARACHNIDS!!!! So I did. First I found out that it is uncommon for ticks in Florida to carry deadly diseases. So, once I found that out they kind of lost their creepiness. I began to see them more like long term mosquitoes and less like tapeworms. I studied them and looked for them on the walls, in crevices, along the door frames and in corners. I discovered that they do not live on the floor. Sweeping and vacuuming will only get up the poor unfortunate tick that happened to fall on the floor or jump off of his/her host at the most inopportune time. I thought, maybe if I introduce some of their natural enemies I could eradicate them. They only have one- the tick bird. And I am not getting a tick bird or a cow for the tick bird to ride on while it eats the ticks. I thought, we can take a vacation and starve them to death. Did you know that ticks can go into hibernation for over a year if food is too scarce? Don't feel bad, I didn't either. I found out that even the so-called experts don't know that much.

WARNING: what you are about to read may be too much for the squeamish. I am going to give you a very brief introduction to the life cycle of the tick. A tick hatches, it has six legs. It finds a host and has what is called the first blood meal. It stops eating and grows two more legs, which is why it is an arachnid. Remember the whole, kingdom, phylum, class thing we learned in biology? Arachnid is the class, it is commonly and mistakenly used to refer to spiders because of the movie by the same name. A spider is simply a type of arachnid. Anyway, once it grows it seventh and eighth legs it finds a mate and another host, if it is a female it then latches on and fills up with blood and maturing eggs. Once she has had enough blood she leaves the host, finds a proper place to lay her eggs, lays them, and dies.

Because I am a bit odd I took one of these engorged,female, ticks and put her in a jar. (Do not make the mistake of calling them pregnant. Only mammals get pregnant). Everyday I would open the jar to get her some oxygen. I am not really sure how much she needed, but I thought, hey, a little wouldn't hurt. Then one day, almost magically, I looked in the jar to discover that she had laid her eggs and withered up and died. There were hundreds of teeny tiny little eggs. Maybe even smaller than the period at the end of this sentence. A week or two later imagine my dismay when I looked at my jar and discovered that someone had opened it up and tossed in some sand. (For those of you who have never visited the Sunshine State, sand is Florida dirt. It is in copious supply.) I had read at a University website that ticks are attracted to the carbon dioxide that mammals release and that is how they find their hosts. Well, I picked up my closed jar that was now full of sand, well not full, not even near full, more like a teaspoon, maybe. Anyway, I picked it up, stormed into the family room where all of my children were sitting and demanded to know WHO PUT SAND IN MY TICK JAR????? Then, I glanced at the jar and saw all of those teeny tiny pieces of sand moving toward my hand. Oh my goodness, they were not pieces of sand, my ticks hatched.(Insert "Awwwwwww" as though I just said my baby birds hatched.) They were moving toward the warmth that they felt through the glass. So much for relying on universities to get things right. I was so proud, in a warped sort of way, of my accomplishment. You would have thought I had been the one to hatch them. I could not understand why no one wanted to see them, or hear about them, or even ask me some random question about ticks so that I would have a chance to WOW them with my brilliance. No, I was destined to go it alone. To ride the road to knowledge all by myself. I felt like a misunderstood scientist. Now, I could truly empathize with Doctor Frankenstein.

I got an email today from Ariel's high school. It was asking for parents to volunteer and it came with a brief questionnaire asking questions such as what hours could you work, what type of work would you be interested in, clerical, classroom, tutoring, etc. My favorite question however? What is your expertise? Do you think..... Is it possible....Suredly I tell you, I am sure they could find a place for the tick lady.

And the winner is.........

2008-10-03T13:46:00.004-04:00

A couple of days I got to be the judge for a "Who is the Biggest Idiot" contest. Truth be told it was all rather unofficial. I was in line at the grocery store and the manager had to be called to the register. It seems that the woman in front 0f me was making a purchase for a tax exempt organization and forgot to give the cashier the tax exempt certificate before the cashier completed the transaction. The manager kindly and respectfully informed the woman that once the transaction is completed it is out of his hands. Now, having worked for this particular grocery store years ago, I knew that this was not entirely true. I knew that he could refund the order and create a new one this time making it tax exempt. But, should he have to? Should he have to pay for the labor of his employee because this woman did not present the certificate in time? I don't know. I don't know the answer to that question. It is clearly an opinion and everyone's could be right. Here in Florida most food items are tax exempt anyway. Certain junk foods, such as soda, are not, as well as prepared foods. So the majority of the time the tax paid at the grocery store is very little. I have beside me a receipt from a recent trip to the store. It is for $172.88 of which $4.08 is tax. The tax was for the diapers, wipes, ice pops, and a ten dollar bottle of wine. Four bucks is not significant compared to 172 bucks.

So how much was her tax you say? Hold on to your seat. Twenty six cents. She refused to leave the store until this was remedied. The manager even implied that the 26 cents was a measly amount that she should just come up with on her own. Was he right? I don't know, again opinions. So what did they do?

They moved to another register, because by now the line at this one was getting long. He got a cashier to void all of her items, re-ring them, and this time apply the tax exemption saving her the wopping twenty six cents. I wonder how much this cost him. Let's say he pays the cashier seven dollars an hour. He paid $1.75 just for the fifteen minutes it took to do all of this, and depending on how many hours the cashier works and how much his paycheck is it could be as much as another twenty five cents for the stores portion of the social security and medicare and this does not include worker's compensation just to get that woman her 26 cents. So he made his point by paying more than two dollars to prevent giving her twenty six cents.

How about her. What did she lose? Who knows. I am sure she ate dinner later, got home later, stayed in traffic later, stood on her feet longer. But by golly, she still has her twenty six cents. She continued talking about it long after the manager decided to do this for her. She was clearly upset, she was going to get people to see it her way. So, add to the list above, she got a little more stress for the evening. I bet that went well with her dinner. Maybe she should have gotten the ten dollar bottle of wine and had a small glass. It would have cost her sixty five cents in tax, but by golly, she would probably have felt a whole lot better.

Dude, I'm not Chinese!

2008-09-25T07:14:00.002-04:00

Yesterday we got Chinese food delivered for dinner. Before the guy showed up I told my family that I was going to tell the delivery guy that I didn't think he was really Chinese. With one eyebrow up I would accuse him of being Mongolian instead. They all rolled their eyes at me.

The delivery guy was a very white kid with red hair. I raised one eyebrow and said, "I don't think you're really Chinese" I did not accuse him of being Mongolian.

He told me this story. When I first started this job I went to house where a young kid, around 8 or 9 answered the door. He looked at me suspiciously and said, "You don't look Japanese." His mother, who was in another room and couldn't see me yelled, "He's not Japanese, honey, he's Chinese" The little boy's eyes widened and he looked at me even more suspiciously than before so I gently told him, "Dude, I'm not Chinese"

Welcome to America

2008-09-22T18:56:00.002-04:00

Today I met a woman from Denmark. Whenever I meet a newcomer, not a visitor, from another country I like to ask them a series of questions. I interview them so to speak. I like to ask them culturally speaking what do they like most about the US and what do they miss most about the motherland.

It is funny the things people say. I met a couple from South Africa and spoke to the husband and wife separately. The husband said he misses absolutely nothing (spoken emphatically) about South Africa, the wife said she only misses friends and family, but they are all gone now so she doesn't dwell on it. In fact she was reluctant to even talk about it. One day I met two different English people who both said the same thing. They both like the weather. When I pointed out them that the weather isn't cultural they said that our culture is affected by the weather. We go to the beach because of the weather, we go the park, and sit outside because of the weather. They didn't know each other by the way and were not together when I spoke to them.

People from communist countries never miss anything. Not even the food. I guess that underscores how the smells and tastes of things evoke emotion and memory.

So, wondering what my new friend said? Well, first she hesitated. She wasn't thinking about the question, she was trying to figure out how to say it. A look a relief washed over her face as she seemed to find the right words and said, "Americans are friendly. In Denmark this conversation we are having would not be happening. If you had said hello to me I would have wondered how I know you." Then she sort of cringed and continued, "But, American friendships seem to be more shallow and superficial." I certainly couldn't disagree with her, I have never had a friendship in Denmark. Maybe that is why so many of us make the distinction between friends and acquaintances. Maybe Danes have fewer acquaintances. She also didn't like how few people RSVP and how many show up late to events. I told her that I think that is a Floridian thing, not an American thing.

I like to google customs and traditions for different countries. Some are so funny. I found one that said it is considered impolite to knock on the door of someone in the Netherlands and ask for a tour of their home. I have to wonder where that is not considered impolite. I found out that in the US it is rude to allow the door to shut behind you when there is a person standing there. Again, where is that not rude.

It is fun to look them up. Give it a try and tell me what funny things you have found.

School Notes

2008-09-21T12:57:00.000-04:00

Neurologists must love the first week of school. Every parent (alright, mother, I was trying to give the guys the benefit of the doubt) who has filled out twelve different sheets of paper all asking for the same information has experienced the seering pain that runs through the arm as you look at the pile of papers that are still left to fill out.

Do not despair! I have come up with a solution. A solution that is so simple it is going to knock your socks off! A solution that is so efficient you are going to wonder how to spend your hours of freed up time. A solution that is so fabulous you are going to think it just might bring world peace. Okay, maybe that last one was a little far fetched.

Labels. That is right. You heard me, labels. I made sheets of address labels that have my name, address, phone numbers, and email address and did the same for my husband and now, instead of filling out twelve different sheets of paper times six, I just place a label in the appropriate places. I now have more time to do the dishes, the laundry, bathe people, and cook dinner. You can imagine how thrilled I must be. All kidding aside, it really has saved me quite a bit of time and my wrist no longer hurts so know I can spend more time doing this.

I know that some schools have sheets of fill-in-the-blank style notes for their students. I think this is a great idea and I made some up a few years ago for my own family. They have check boxes for each child's name, check boxes with a list of potential reasons that I would be contacting the school and my name and phone number listed with a blank spot for my signature. It too has saved me a lot of time. It looks similar to this.

DATE____________

Dear_____________Staff

___Ariel
___Michael
___Jacob
___Matthew
___Hannah

___was late today due to

___was absent on ________ due to
___ will be picked up at _____ for
___will be going home with
___I would like a conference/phone call please
___Other

Thank you

Mrs. Diana (phone number)

If you are interested in getting it in Word I will send it to you and then you can just make the appropriate changes. Le me know, I will be happy to send it to you.

Less Is (usually) Best

2008-09-20T09:19:00.001-04:00

Do you, like me, have the occasional mountain of laundry? I have noticed that there seems to be two responses to laundry. Have enough clothes so that you can always find something for everyone to wear (the common approach), or have so few clothes that you absolutely must do the laundry regularly (the smart approach). Because of the size of my family I sometimes can not get around the mountain. And unlike Mohammed, I have to actually go to it.

A number of years ago I used the common approach. It actually started when my oldest was a little baby. My husband had a stepsister (whom he'd never met) who had a baby about a year before ours. That little girl had more clothes than Bette Midler. So, her grandmother would send us boxes and boxes of beautiful clothes. We were poor and greatful for those clothes. I saved all of it. When our second was born she got all of those beautiful clothes, plus some of her own. Then the boys started coming and all of these clothes just kept piling up and piling up.

It hit me one day that even if we could find all of their clothes and had enough closet space for all of it, they still couldn't wear it all. That was when I started donating it and throwing it away. I figured out how much clothes they each needed. It was (and still is) something like this. Four pairs of shorts, two pairs of pants (we live in florida), three play dresses. Four to five pairs of underwear, two pairs of dress slacks or dresses, five casual shirts, two dress shirts and four to five pairs of socks. That is really all we need. Oh, and two pairs of pajamas. Truth be told, my boys rarely wear pj's which is fine with me. It means less laundry. Of course when it gets cold they need more pants and a sweater and jacket, but winter only lasts about two months here. If you have ten dresses, fifteen t-shirts, ten dress shirts, five pairs of shoes and two pairs of sneakers, etc... that is insane. Get rid of those clothes! And please, don't waste the time of Goodwill and Salvation Army employees by sending them stained and torn clothing. No one wants to buy that junk. Throw it away!

As my children have gotten older and some of them have stopped growing, this is the habit I have encouraged. All of the fully grown people in my home turn their hangers around the week of their birthdays. Next year, any hangers that are still backwards have clothes on them that we haven't worn in a year. If you do this enough and teach it to your children it will become so much easier to keep their closets current. I have one child who loves clothes. With him I have to be a little more creative. With Jacob, before I will take him shopping he has to get rid of as many shirts or shorts (or whatever it is that he is asking for) as he hopes to buy at the store. Jacob gets more hand-me-downs than anyone else and I have to really stay on top of his closet.

Give the whole "turn the hangers around" thing a try and reduce the little people's wardrobe. If you try this let me know how it turns out for you. I'd love to hear from you.

The Upside-Down Show

2008-09-19T22:45:00.001-04:00

Have you ever had the good fortune of watching the Upside Down Show on Noggin? It stars Shane Dundas and David Colllins and it is out of Australia. I love it. I think Hannah enjoys it a little too. It is so funny, in a silly sort of way. They teach a lot of prepositional phrase type stuff- under, over, in, out, on top of, you get the picture. But their real focus is on encouraging the use of imagination. So much of the show is simply these two guys pretending stuff. For example in one episode one of the guys is pretending to play ping pong with his pretend pet. He makes the noises and hand motions as if he is really playing, but even a young child would know that he is pretending. The use of imagination is heavily encouraged. The really great thing is that these guys, who act like two grown men with severe ADHD, are really FUNNY. Kind of like Robin Williams type funny in Mork and Mindy. (Oh my Gosh, did I just date myself?). (Here is an FYI, my favorite movie is PeeWee's Big Adventure, so I like silly things).

Give the show a try. Go with an open mind and you may just enjoy yourself watching it.

Tax Collector's Office, Here I come again and again and again!

2008-09-18T22:45:00.003-04:00

Our business owns quite a few vehicles and some of the tags expire in June and some in December. Our personal vehicle tags expire in August. On Wednesday August 27th I went to the tax collector's office to renew my personal vehicle that my daughter drives. While I was there I asked if any of my business vehicles had expired. The friendly clerk looked through all of the tags and assured me that all of the vehicle tags that expire in June had been renewed. The very next day August 29th I was in one the of company vehicles and I parked downtown for a couple of hours. When I returned I was quite dismayed to discover that there was a ticket on my windshield. Fortunately for me it was only a warning ticket, but it said that I had an old/expired plate. So back to the tax collector's office I went. A different clerk took the ticket and told me that that particular plate had been replaced and that we probably put it on the wrong truck. So, I immediately went to the shop and sure enough, there the tag was on the wrong vehicle. My husband put it on my truck and I told him that I would go back to the tax collector's office the next day. So the next day, the 30th I went back and a different clerk helped me. I asked her if I could just go ahead and renew it or if it was too soon. The vehicle that was now missing the plate expires in December. She said it was too soon. It would cost me $20 to replace the tag, but then she said if I waited until next month (September) I could renew it. Well, if you have been paying attention to the dates you might have realized that the next business day would be just a few days later, September 2. The first is Labor Day. So, four business days in a row I paid a visit to the tax collector's office.

When I got the plate off of the truck I forgot to take the registration. I asked Bob to grab the registration for me. The next day I called him and asked him if he had grabbed it for me and he said, "no, why did you get pulled over?" I am happy to say that NO I did not get pulled over. So far I have a perfect driving record. I did get one non-moving violation once for having a right rear light out. I was making a right turn and used my hand to signal. There was a cop behind me who pulled me over for not signaling and I said, "I did signal. I used my hand." So he gave me a seven dollar ticket for my light being out. So fast forward to about two days after I asked him to bring the registration. I am on my way some where with two of my boys and sure enough, I am rear ended! Guess what? I DON'T HAVE MY REGISTRATION!!! Well, I didn't get a ticket, but, you guessed it. I have to go back to the tax collector's office to get a copy of my registration.

My life is bigger, but sometimes the pain is too...

2008-08-14T08:27:00.005-04:00

Today is one of my son's birthdays. He turns twelve. He was born the day after my brother's birthday. The one who is dead.

Jaime died from a drug overdose. I miss him everyday, but I am not sad everyday. I was not sad yesterday on his birthday, but the day before I was and spent the whole day trying not to cry, except for when I did cry.

I spoke at my father's funeral in March. The only thing I really remember saying is that I would often call my father to talk about Jaime and I remember gritting my teeth and saying something like, "and he would say, 'why are you so angry?' " as I looked up at the ceiling and closed my eyes.

Jaime called me, drunk. I told him he was an idiot, or something along those lines. Two days later I called him to tell him that Hotel California was on the radio. When we were little he locked me in my room and wouldn't let me out until I memorized the whole first side of the album by the same name. From that day on I would occasionally call him when I heard any of those songs. He didn't answer so I left a silly message on his machine. He was probably already dead when I left that message.

My brother Vinnie had a visitor at his shop. A friend of his. He came to offer his condolences. Vinnie had no idea what this guy was talking about so the guy just came out and said, "Jaime is dead."

Vinnie called his wife who called all over the place trying to find out if Jaime was dead. He died in a different county and she did not know that so it took a little while to find out for sure.

Vinnie and his wife went to my father's house to tell him. My mother had just moved and no one had her new address. She lives an hour away. We couldn't call her and tell her we were visiting, we had to tell her over the phone. Have you ever heard the wind howl? That is the sound of a mother mourning her child. I believe it is the collective cries of all of the mothers who have buried their children since Eve herself.

There was never an official notification. No police officer ever knocked on our door. That only happens on tv.

I called the funeral home and set up an appointment for the family to go and see him. We needed to know for sure. It was kind of funny, because no one ever said that. It was just something that we felt. Vinnie didn't go and my stepmother waited in the waiting room. My mother had had surgery on her feet shortly before this so she was in a wheelchair. My stepfather wheeled her up to the coffin and my father walked up there beside her. We all waited respectfully until they walked away. When I walked up I was overcome with anger and I started yelling at Jaime. Then I, literally, ran out of there. My husband followed me and held me outside. Whenever I drive past that funeral home I imagine myself running outside and my husband holding me and I wonder if anyone saw me that day and what they thought if they did see me. My mother cut a lock of Jaime's hair and we went back to my house.

The memorial service was held at the Salvation Army church. It was standing room only. The foyer was so packed with people that they were shoved up against the side lights. I spoke. Have you seen that little movie that has been traveling the Internet called the dash? I haven't seen it, but it is about the dash between the dates on a tombstone. The dash is what really matters, the stuff that happens between the day we are born and the day we die. I said that at his funeral long before someone made it a movie. I told these people, the ones he tried to stay sober with through AA, and the ones that he spent so much time with at the Salvation Army shelter, I told them that I knew a different Jaime then they did. Jaime never called me when he was sober. He didn't spend time with his family unless he was drunk. We were not a drinking family. He was not avoiding temptation, he was avoiding us. I told those people, as I looked into the faces of my children and nephews, that they should make sure that their nieces and nephews don't get to know them at their funerals. I was told later that a lot of them called their families after the service. I wonder if that is true.

The pastor who spoke said that the pain will not get smaller, but our lives will get bigger and it will make the pain seem smaller. I didn't agree, my father did. As far as I am concerned, five years later, the jury is still out.

Our vacation 2008 Part 6

2008-08-01T13:57:00.000-04:00

Thursday, July 31, 2008

We went back to the mall today. We walked around for a while and Bob got a remote control helicopter. Matthew had gotten one the first time we to the mall, but I guess Bob wanted one too. Michael got something that goes in his sneaker and keeps track of the distance and speed that he runs. Jacob wanted one too, but we wouldn’t let him spend his money on it. We had some lunch and then headed home.

Friday, August 1, 2008

Our last day here. We decided to go to Baltimore for a little while. Rabbi Mishkin suggested that we go to Inner Harbor. We got a late start and arrived there around noon. I stopped into the visitor’s center and got some info. We went into some type of indoor shopping center, not really a mall though. We ate and the portions were HUGE and it wasn’t even that good. We were hoping to find a kosher restaurant, but we were too hungry to hunt for one.
We did some shopping. Bob and the kids went into ESPN zone and I went into a Barnes and Noble. One by one, each child arrived in the bookstore. I knew that one day my influence would show itself. I bought a guestbook for the house we were staying in. They did not have one.
Then we walked around the corner and we all sat down for a little while. We had done quite a bit of walking. Hannah took great delight at chasing the birds. She literally shouted with glee as she ran them out of town. We stopped at a shoe store and got Hannah a pair of sneakers and a couple of pairs of socks. Then we headed back to the truck and drove home.
We had all of our left over food for dinner. We packed everything up that we could and packed up the trailer. We cleaned up as much as we could too.
We had a nice vacation and I am happy that we went. I would have preferred to spend more time in DC and Annapolis. I probably would have enjoyed Baltimore too. Too bad we didn’t get to spend more time there. I never did make it back to BBU.

Our vacation 2008 Part 5

2008-07-30T13:55:00.002-04:00

Wednesday July 30, 2008

Yesterday the family went to DC. Great huge place, too much to do in just one day. We took a train in. Okay, let me expand on that. We went to a ‘park and ride’ sort of place. We drove around the parking lot a few times and discovered that there were no spots, there were, however, a whole bunch of spots that were reserved for people with permits between 2 AM and 10 AM. It was about 9:30 and we saw a woman who parked in one of those spots and she explained that if we sat there until 10 we would not get a ticket. So at 9:45 most of us headed to the station to buy our all day passes while Bob and Ariel stayed at the truck. Like clock work, they headed up right after 10 and we got instructions from one of the metro people and boarded the train/subway. Fifteen minutes later we were in the heart of DC and only two blocks away from the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. We spent a few hours in there. We saw an IMAX film on black holes. We ate at the giant McDonald’s, then we left.
We went to the Capitol Building and found out that if we go to this one tent, we can get free tickets for a tour of the capitol. More than half of the family did not want to go. It was decided that Cassie and I would go back the next day. As we approached the station there was a trumpet player blowing away and Jacob put a dollar in his hat.
We headed back to the parking lot on the packed subway and arrived about 15 minutes later. We stopped at the grocery store on the way home and got enough for three dinners. I cooked roasted chicken for dinner and Mark, the owner of the house, stopped by to drop off some paintings. Bob took him on a short electrical tour of the home, pointing out all of the mistakes and potential disasters. Shortly after that, it was lights out.
We left the house at 9:30. Bob drove Cassie and me to the ‘kiss and ride’ place. Isn’t that a cute name? By ten we were in DC. We walked over to the capitol building and got our tickets. We were really hungry, okay I was, so we decided to grab a hotdog while we waited for our turn for the tour. We went into a botanical garden building hoping to use it as a short cut. Nope, just one way in and out. So, we went back to the capitol and waited patiently for our tour to begin.
There were a whole bunch of Asian people who appeared to speak very little, if any, English whose tour began 20 minutes after ours, but they stood in line with us anyway. At 10:20, our tour time, they marched right out with the rest of us, but were quickly sent back under the tent.
The tour was not nearly as exciting as it could have been, it was more a tour of the art than of the building itself. We went into the rotunda. That was pretty cool. There is a white dot in the center of the floor where people who have been or will be laid out for viewing are put. So far it has only been presidents, except for a police officer a couple of years ago. Rosa Parks will be put there after she dies. That is really cool. It has a fresco all around the top of the circular wall. It represents America’s history.
After that tour we went across the street to a building that a police officer told us we could find lunch. While we were walking to the cafeteria I saw some pretty neat names on the placards of the doors such as, Sub-committee to Middle East, and Committee of Finance. While we were in line I asked the woman in line behind me what building we were in and she said the building that my representatives’ offices are in and that we should go to the offices. So we did. As it turned out our particular reps were not in that building so we went to the basement and walked through underground tunnels to get to the correct building. We went up to Vern Buchanan’s office and signed the guest book. You never know when you will need an alibi. Then it was off the Library of Congress. We used the same underground tunnels, then to the Supreme Court. It was not in session. We were allowed to wander the halls a bit. We could not go on the circular staircase, but we were allowed to check it out.
From there we took a bus and a train to the White House. We could stand about a half a mile away and wave. I think W. and Laura saw me and waved back. Not really sure, though. It may have been a shadow.
From there we caught the train again and went two stops, got off and found a t-shirt vendor and got Ariel an FBI jacket she had requested. We got back on the train and headed back to the kiss and ride place where our family was lovingly waiting for us. It turns out that they spent the day at the house and bowling. I made chicken cutlets for dinner.
Jacob and Ariel caught some fireflies and put one in a jar. I wouldn’t let them keep it, though.

Our vacation 2008 Part 4

2008-07-28T13:52:00.000-04:00

Monday July 28, 2008

This morning I ate breakfast on the back porch. I was awakened, for the third day, with the bright morning sun shining in my face. The bed faces the east and there are no curtains on the windows. “GOOD MORNING!” the sun seems to shout at us. “Milk please, milk please,” came next from Hannah. I tried to buy myself a few more minutes in bed by insisting that she give me a hug and kiss before I get her some milk. It didn’t really work. She simply stood on the side of the bed waiting for me to lean over. I got up, made some coffee, and realized that the kitchen is set up all wrong. The sink and cups are in one corner of the kitchen and the coffee pot is in the other corner. So, you go to the coffee maker and get the pot, go to the sink to fill it, go back to the maker to fill the maker from the pot. Go to the cups, get a cup, go to the fridge for the creamer which is in another corner, then go over to the coffee maker again. Tomorrow morning I am moving the coffee maker to the same corner as the cups. I didn’t even mention the fact that the coffee pot spills its contents all over the place every time something is poured from it.
I walked around the yard a little. The grass was still wet and I hate getting my Birks wet. Bob tried sneaking up on me. He startled me, but I knew it was him so there was no heart stopping or anything that dramatic. Sorry Bob. The yard is gorgeous. The house sits on seven acres and the description claims that this is a tree farm, but outside of seeing lots of trees, there is no evidence that this is a farm.

Cassie and Michael took a trip up to Dunkin Donuts. Now that Cassie is an employee of Double D (as I like to call it) that has become a favorite place. The truck did not start when they tried to leave. It seems that my positive (whatever the heck that is) has a loose connection. The truck did this to me a few weeks ago at Southgate Mall. It wouldn’t start or turn over or anything. Bob came to the rescue, again. Good thing I had the truck tuned up and all that good stuff before we left. Thanks 21st Century Auto. In their defense, tightening up the connections on the battery is not usually part of a tune up. We are heading out to do some shopping today. Target, here we come!

We never got to Target. We went to the mall instead. We all split up and it went like this- Cassie and Ariel in one group, Michael and Jacob and the second group, and Matthew, Hannah, Bob, and me. Bob took the little ones into an Under Armor store and I went to Starbucks. It took a really long time to get our coffees and when I finally got them I made my way all the way back to the UA store and they were gone. I called Bob and he said he was at Sbarro’s. I walked to the other end of the mall and got to the food court, walked over to Sbarro’s. No Bob. I called him, no answer. I called him again, again no answer. He finally called me back and said that he was at still at Sbarro’s. That was when we realized that there was more than one Sbarro’s at this gigantic mall. Everyone purchased a little bit and about four hours later we headed back to the house.

Tonight the kids actually cared a little about the fireflies. Ariel and Jacob tried to catch one, but they had nothing to put it in.

Our vacation 2008 Part 3

2008-07-27T13:41:00.000-04:00

Sunday, July 27, 2008

We headed into Annapolis today. I loved it. I hope to go back. It is the capital of Maryland and it has the state building which has a fascinating history. In Annapolis is also BBU, Belly Button University, commonly referred to as the Naval Academy. We did not go there, but I hope that we will. They give free tours as long as everyone who is over 16 has a picture ID. There are plenty of row houses and old shops and I could probably spend an entire week there for a vacation.

On our way into town we stopped at Home Depot. Hannah’s car seat is wobbly and sliding all over the seat so we got a piece of wood to put under it. We are hoping it will stabilize it. A woman there gave us all sorts of suggestions for things to do in town. It took us another ten minutes from there to get to the water. We found a pretty good parking space. Parking spaces are not easy to come by.

Once we got parked we looked around for a little while letting the children shop. The sky started to get dark while we ate at Subway for lunch. It started drizzling while we were in there and then storming shortly after we walked out. Oh my Goodness, what a storm! A huge bolt of lightning temporary shut off all of the lights on the street we were on, it scared the day lights out of me. I had asked a shopkeeper what we should expect from the dark sky and she said that it should rain for a short time and then quickly blow over. Some of the kids wanted to go back to the house so Bob grabbed the keys and an umbrella and ran to the truck. On his way back to us he had to drive all over the place. There are a lot of one way streets. By the time he finally reached us, the rain was almost over! He and Jake took a short drive while the rest of us continued with our shopping and sight seeing. We stopped at a visitor center and got a book with maps and stuff. We met back up and let the kids do some shopping. We got Joe a really cool thank you gift. He is taking care of the house and dogs for us. It is a metal sculpture of a building and it says, “Joe’s Sports Bar.” A perfect gift, if I may say so myself. Bob picked it out.

We left Annapolis around 6:30 and went to an overrated, over priced seafood restaurant. It was PACKED. There was a Boy Scout troop there that we had seen in around town. There were probably 40 or so of them. We got home around 8:00 and saw fireflies. I have not seen them in probably 25 years. I could not believe the lack of interest my kids had in them. I was disappointed.

Our vacation 2008 Part 2

2008-07-26T13:37:00.001-04:00

Saturday July 26, 2008
I guess the boy’s room was okay except for the continually running toilet. The girl’s room however was NOT! Because I always wear my shoes my feet never touched the floor before going to bed. I sat on the bed and slipped my feet out of my Birkenstocks and under the covers. Cassie and Ariel slept in one bed and because Ariel sleeps like a banshee she woke Cassie up constantly. I slept with Hannah. Everything was fine until I heard something fall around five in the morning. I opened my eyes and saw that Hannah’s hand was above her head at the top of the bed and her binkie was no where to be found. I knew that meant the she dropped it behind the bed. I stepped off of the bed to see it I could find it and discovered that the floor was wet! Well, just before we went to bed Ariel told me that she could not get the toilet to flush. Ugh! All I could imagine was that the toilet had backed up recently and had flooded the floor. I was completely grossed out and couldn’t fall back to sleep. I tried, but I kept thinking that Hannah would wake up and want her binkie and then I would have to step on that disgusting floor again trying desperately to find it in the dark and that was before I thought about her pacifier sitting on the floor.

At six o’clock I finally got up and took a shower. Bob knocked on the door shortly after I got out of the shower. All of the boys were up and dressed. All of the girls were still sleeping. I made everyone get up and get ready, being sure to tell them to wash their feet in the tub and put their shoes on before stepping out onto the carpet. I found Hannah’s binkie resting on one of the bars of the headboard, so it did not have to be thrown out.

We went across the street to Shoney’s for breakfast. The waitress accidentally delivered Jacob some bacon so Michael spent the rest of the meal teasing me, pretending that he was eating bacon. Ha ha, Michael.

We finished breakfast and were on our way. We stopped at a rest stop in Virginia and one of the guides suggested a particular route and gave us a map that showed all the to Harwood. Then we stopped at Taco Bell for lunch.

We got to Maryland around 6:30 and had another hour to Harwood. The GPS did not bring us to the right house. Bob pulled up to the house and I said, “This is the wrong address.” It is difficult sometimes to recognize a house from a photo. We drove down the street looking for the address but the house numbers were getting higher and higher. We turned around in the cul-de-sac and went back. There was a hidden driveway and there was the house.

Earlier in the trip I had called the owner to tell him that we were almost there and he had opened up the house and turned a couple of lights on for us. As soon as Bob pulled into the driveway and shut the truck off the kids immediately ran up to the door yelling that the house was beautiful. What a relief for me. It is not easy finding and renting a vacation home on-line that will please the family. Is it big enough, too big, does it have decent furnishings, is it too fancy for kids, is there enough to do in the area? These are just a few of the questions I have to ask myself while looking at the pictures and reading the description. The owner did say that it was 12 miles from Annapolis, but I misread it and thought it was in Annapolis. Those are twelve long miles on curvy, hilly roads and there is nothing in the immediate area. That was evident as we were approaching the house. I was anticipating moans and groans, so when instead I heard sounds of delight, I was relieved. It is beautiful. The home was built in the 1920’s. The owner, Mark, told me that it had burned down and was rebuilt using some of the original bricks that had been brought over on ship from England in the 1700’s. So it was unclear to me if the house was rebuilt in the 20’s or originally built in the 20’s. I think it was rebuilt. The furnishings are a little too traditional for my tastes, but I can appreciate the beauty of them. There is a library with a piano that Michael enjoys playing. Ariel’s room is next that. Between her room and small sitting room with a fireplace is the downstairs bathroom. Of course, seeing as how it is summer, we will not be using the fireplace. In the sitting room is the door to the basement. When we were driving through the neighborhood to the house we were talking about basements and Matthew really, really, really wanted to stay in a house with one. When we arrived it was not obvious that the house had one. He started crying from his disappointment. Imagine how excited he was when he discovered that there was one. He and Bob quickly descended into the darkness and just as quickly reemerged. Then we took the key and told Matthew that he was not allowed to go back down. He was happy, he had finally been in a basement. Beside the sitting room is the formal dining room and then the kitchen with a small hallway, and then finally a breakfast room with a small table that probably seats three. It has a bench instead of chairs. Then there is the upstairs. Our bedroom is a long room that has the bed on one end facing the wall, it has a bed wall behind it. That is what Bob called it. I have never seen one before, but he has. Behind the bed wall is a sitting area with a desk and a small couch, past that is a lounge chair that is opposite the large open bathroom that has a water closet. Past our bedroom is the upstairs bathroom, then the laundry area, one bedroom that is Cassie’s room, and then the boys room that, like our room, has a small sitting area with a daybed and a television. Their room has three beds and a desk.

After unloading the truck and trailer, bob unhitched the trailer and we headed to the nearest grocery store. It was in an unsavory neighborhood and I was a little nervous until I saw a cop in the store, working. We got KFC for dinner and then settled in for the night.

Our vacation 2008 Part 1

2008-07-25T13:37:00.000-04:00

Friday July 25, 2008

Today we were supposed to leave early for our vacation. Michael’s team, the Lakewood Legends, is in an IBC tournament in Clearwater and the last day is supposed to be today. So far they are undefeated. Yesterday it rained so there has been some rescheduling and now the last day of the tournament will be tomorrow. Unfortunately for the team they lost both of today’s games and are out of the tournament so we headed out of Clearwater around 4:30. We have the trailer with us, which is great so we could fill it up with all sorts of stuff for our trip without running out of room.
We had decided earlier in the week that the kids would rotate their seating arrangement clockwise at every stop. It sort of worked out okay. Michael and Jacob managed to get next to each other and that always creates lots of drama. We stopped at McDonald’s in Waldo, Florida for dinner. Now we know the answer to the question, “Where’s Waldo?” Jacob’s legs were hurting and he was over tired and everyone was getting a little chilly because it had been raining most of the trip so we were a little damp. When we opened the trailer to get out some jackets we discovered that the trailer had been collecting water from the rain and much of the stuff inside was wet or damp including Jacob’s jacket. He was using a red duffle bag for his clothes so now his jacket has red dye all over it. That combined with his legs and tiredness did not make for an enjoyable meal. I gave him some Tylenol for the legs before he ate. When we left Micky D’s I sat in the back between Mike and Jake and Jake fell asleep with his head on my lap. We drove until we got into Georgia and stopped at an exit that showed about six hotels. First we went to La Quinta, where we were told that there was no room at the inn. Then we went to Hampton Inn where we were told there was no room at the inn. Then we finally stopped at Days Inn. A manger would have been better.

Welcome...

2008-07-21T09:00:00.007-04:00

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

with silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" -Emma Lazarus (The New Colossus)

I have fabulous news. My friend Dee Dee, the one I told you about in an earlier post, passed her exam to become a citizen of the United States of America. It was her second attempt.

She went to Tampa, Florida and arrived approximately 30 minutes early. A security person opened the door and checked her paper work, allowed DeeDee and her husband, Earl, to enter and told them to have a seat. Two and a half hours later Earl went to a security person and asked him if it is normal to be sitting that long. What Earl did not mention is that she had a urinary tract infection and was afraid to go to the bathroom for fear that she would not be there when she was called. The security person asked if they had turned in the paperwork and Earl responded that they were told to have a seat, not to turn in paperwork. The paperwork was immediately turned in after that brief conversation and she was quickly called. The examiner, whose name I do not know, told DeeDee that because of her, she (the examiner) would miss lunch. My friend is already a nervous Nelly, this only made it worse. The examiner was short with DeeDee and rude. She spoke in an accusatory tone and scared the crap out of my friend. DeeDee failed the test. She knew all of the answers and when she came to my home the next day I ran out to meet her and hear the great news and she cried when she saw my face. We cried together. It took a tremendous amount of courage for her to apply for citizenship. For some people this would be no big deal, not for DeeDee. She is unpretentious, honest, loyal, and hardworking, all of the qualities that we should desire in immigrants. She is also insecure and despite studying EVERY single day for more than half a year, she was afraid of how she would do.

Her second attempt was far different. She arrived early again and was allowed to enter with her husband. The paperwork was turned in right away and she was hardly sitting when her name was called. The examiner introduced himself and led her to his office and when he saw her shaking, asked her repeatedly to calm down, assuring her that everything would be fine and that she had nothing to be nervous about. He first made sure that all of her documentation was in place and correct. Then he told her that he would ask her six questions and reminded her that she had nothing to be afraid of because she knew the answers to them all. She did not tell me all of the questions she had been asked, but the first one was, "Who is John G Roberts?" I mention this to you in case you thought he was going to ask what the colors are in our flag or who was the first president or something equally easy. After answering the final question correctly he congratulated her. What a different experience for her the second time around. I had been at a meeting with my phone ringer off. As soon as I left the meeting I checked my phone (my kids were all home and they usually call me twenty times), there was a call from her. I quickly returned her call and she shared the wonderful news with me. I saw her the next day and that time we shared tears of joy. She may be sworn in as early as next week, but at the latest, next month. Congratulations, DeeDee.

Excel at Excel

2008-07-17T18:58:00.005-04:00

This is not a paid advertisement.

I am a bookkeeper, a keeper of the books my daughter likes to say. I have Quickbooks and Excel, but I really only use Quickbooks. It is mostly all I have ever needed, but when I saw a class being offered for Microsoft Excel by Fred Pryor Seminars I thought I would give it a try. I wondered if the reason I wasn't using Excel more was because I just didn't know much about it.

I took the class that was being taught by a man named Jaime Chailland. Both the class and the instructor were great. I learned so much. I have slightly increased my usage of the program, but considerably increased my understanding of it. I was able to "clean up" a bit what I had already been using it for and make the worksheets much more user friendly and seeing as how I am the user, that made it all the better.

I highly recommend the class. Now, one of my classmates told me that she had taken many similar classes (she did not mention any names of instructors or companies) and told me that she was pleasantly surprised at how entertaining our instructor was, that many of them are dry and boring, so kudos to Jaime.

Taking Everything by Storms and Swarms

2008-07-12T09:28:00.003-04:00

A few years ago I saw a really neat t-shirt. Well, it wasn't really that neat, but I misread it and put a really neat twist on it. I thought the shirt said "Etymology, taking the word by storm". Fancying myself an amateur etymologist I found the shirt to be too cool. When I started to comment on it to the wearer, I got a better look at it and realized that it said, "Entomology, taking the world by swarm". Fancying myself an amateur entomologist as well, I thought this was pretty clever too. But, what I thought was most clever, was that I was able to come up with the first idea, all on my own. I do not know now, how I misread it. I am sure that there were pictures of insects on it, but I did none-the-less.

New York Times

2008-07-11T10:00:00.004-04:00

I live in Florida, but the New York Times is my homepage. That sounds funny- it sounds like the New York Times is my homeboy. Anyway, sorry for the digression, I like to start my day with some news. First I had it at Yahoo. I had Yahoo as my homepage practically from the first day that I had Internet. Then, dissatisfied with the way the news was presented (the format, not the content) I switched to Comcast, which was even worse. So, I decided to try the NYT. So far, so good. If at some time I decide I need a switch I will go to USA Today next. The reason I am telling you all of this is because you may not know that the NYT has articles on the web that you can access going as far back as 1851! I was looking for an article that I read a few months ago and when I tried their search I got articles going all the way back to 1911. I was able to easily restrict my search to articles written in the last year. This is really cool. Check it out. This is especially a great resource for students who want to be able to access information for papers and don't want to rely strictly on books or the (notoriously unreliable) Internet.

Why won't my rabbit bark?

2008-07-10T08:11:00.003-04:00

I have a rabbit named Fido. I like the rabbit well enough, the problem is that he won't do some of the things I want him to do. I had him checked out and there is nothing wrong with him, for example, we know that he does not have ADD or Tourette's, or anything like that. Yet, no matter how hard I try I can not get that rabbit to behave.

The other night I had to go outside to get something out of my car. I wanted the rabbit to come with me in case there was- I don't know- an intruder or large animal or something. I wanted the rabbit to protect me and it wouldn't! Then there was the time that I wanted to go jogging with him and he wouldn't run along side of me. Fido wanted (get this) to HOP!! I was outraged. I am a little embarrassed to be admitting this to the world. Fido never barks at the mailman or smells new visitors to see if they are trustworthy. He doesn't get excited and run around in circles wagging his cotton ball tail when I get home. I am seriously wondering if there is something wrong with my rabbit.

I knew a couple who had two boys and they had a birthday party for one of them. They had a house full of little boys who were acting like- little boys! The father was clearly perturbed. The boys were not being destructive, they were not running around the house screaming, they were simply being little boys, yet the father wanted the boys to behave like 30 year old women. That idea, that is far more prevalent than it should be, is as ridiculous as a person expecting their rabbit to behave like a dog. I am not talking about things like ADHD, which I very much believe is a real problem, not a made up diagnosis for parents with normal boys and too little patience. I am talking about boys wanting to run around, wanting to climb (sometimes on top of things, sometimes under things). Little boys who would rather jump on a trampoline than read a book. There is nothing wrong with this. In fact it is quite normal. So next time you see a little boy hopping around on one foot in church, or wanting to climb under the seat in the movie theater and you find yourself getting annoyed, imagine a bunny running along side the fence barking at a bicyclist and remember how ridiculous you are being.

The Vacation from H-E Double Hockey Sticks

2008-06-10T12:10:00.002-04:00

It was almost a year ago that my family went to Arizona. I fondly blogged about our experience there and eluded to another vacation that we had had once. We were going to Disney World with our three children. It was December 1994, the week between Christmas and New Year’s. We had an infant, a two year old, and a five year old. They were so cute and life was wonderful. We planned a wonderful trip to Disney World- a place where all things are wonderful.

I had, at the time, a 1973 Chevy Chevelle Malibu. That car could kick butt. It could leap tall buildings, it was impervious to bullets, it could have created world peace if only it had been given enough time. BUT, it was old and needed a paint job, and yada yada yada. We bought it from (this is not a joke) an old lady who had to sell it because she was going into a nursing home. It really was a great car that we had to get rid of because we ran out of car seats. We got a minivan when I got pregnant with number 4.

The plan was that my brother, who is an auto body guy, would paint the car while we were away. DH reserved a car at a rental place. We headed out for the place and he assured me that he had a general idea of where this place is. We drove up the road for about five miles, then down the road for about five miles, then up the road for another five minutes when DH admitted that he did not know where he was going, so we pulled off onto the side of the road to a payphone (this was before most people had cell phones), got the phone book out, called the place, and got exact directions. Of course, we were no where near the right place. Twenty minutes later we pulled into the parking lot of a used car dealership! They lied. It really did say that it was a rental car place in the phone book. Sooooo, my darling husband went in and to get a car and while he waited he overheard a salesman on the phone with the Greyhound bus station getting a ticket so that he could go get a rental car that had broken down in some other city! DH hightailed it out of there, well actually, he used their phonebook and phone to call a reputable rental car dealership.

So, off to the airport we went where the rental place was located. We enter the airport grounds and pass the signs "For short term parking –left turn here", "For long term parking left turn here", those sort of signs. We pass a sign that says “Rental Car Drop Off- Left Turn Here”, we knew that the rental car pick up had to be next. NO, IT WASN’T!! There was none, pick up was the last turn before your butt gets kicked to the curb. Well really to the exit booth. We approached the exit booth and told the attendant what happened and she told us to go back in and just before we reach the exit booth make a right turn. “That is the rental car pick up area” she smiled at us. Hmmmmm. Here is where you raise one eyebrow.

We reenter and pass all of the signs, just as we approach the drop off area we slow down, anticipating the pick up area- guess what? There is no %@$ right turn! So, back to the exit booth we went. This time when we approached the rental car drop off we pulled in there! We are such rebels. The attendant came quickly. I am guessing that he didn’t think the 1973 Chevy Chevelle Malibu tank we were driving was a rental. We explained why we were there and he replied, “Well hurry because this is the drop off area”. Ugh!

I know what you are thinking right now. You are wondering how you can trust me to be telling this story accurately. After all, it was 1994. Well, let me assure you, first of all I keep a journal of our vacations, remember? And secondly, I never promised that I would tell you the exact way that things went down. So There!! All that matters is how I remember them.

The letter we wrote to our local police department- with all of the identifying stuff removed.

2008-06-04T14:04:00.004-04:00

June 2, 2008

To Whom It May Concern:

On May 30th my daughter was one of the graduates at the High School graduation ceremony held at the local Arena at nine o’clock in the morning. As I am sure you are well aware, the crowd was quite large and there was considerable traffic. My family came in separate vehicles with my wife driving one vehicle. While she left with enough time, she poorly anticipated the traffic and did not get to the doors before nine, at which time the doors were locked. My wife, three of our children, one of whom is 2 ½, my nephew, and mother-in-law waited outside for the doors to open. Because she pulled up and let the older children out of the car while she went to park, the children were right at the doors when they reopened. My son, Michael who is 13, and nephew, Tyler who is 17, were allowed in and the doors were locked shortly after that for a second time. This time my wife, her mother, and our toddler were still left outside. Because we were not told that the doors would most likely be reopened my son was concerned that his mother would not get to see our daughter graduate so he and my nephew offered to trade places with my wife and mother-in-law. My wife had been holding the baby for almost a half hour and she instinctively handed her over to my son as they switched places at the door. When I approached and asked for the baby, Officer John would not allow her to come in because my wife handed her over to our son. I think it is important to note here that my wife had major surgery six weeks earlier and had been standing in the sun, as mentioned before, and had been holding the baby almost the entire time. When I asked the officer why the 2 ½ year old couldn’t come in, he said it was because my wife had handed her over to our son! The baby was screaming and kicking for her mother at that moment. If that had been the only lack of judgment your officer used that morning that alone would be enough for any normal person to be furious. I can not imagine what was going on in his mind, but there is nothing that can convince me that lack of compassion is standard police procedure! Fortunately, my mother-in-law had not traded places with my nephew yet so she was able to bring the child in.
Tyler and Michael waited patiently with the rest of the people hoping the doors would again be reopened. When they were, one hundred people were allowed in, including Michael and Tyler. When they passed Officer John, he literally grabbed them by the shirts and shoved them out the doors telling them that they traded places and could not reenter. When I asked him why, I was told that reentry was not allowed. We were not told ahead of time that reentry would not be allowed, but if we
had, Michael and Tyler still did the right thing. Michael stood outside of the Arena crying, not able to understand why he could not reenter the building. I am incensed that my son and nephew were treated this way. The only contact my son has ever had with a police officer has been with his School Resource Officer through DARE at his former Elementary School and this incident. My wife and I have raised our children to consider the police as good guys and treat them with respect. While that is not going to change, it is difficult to explain to him how it is that a “good guy” would treat him this way, especially considering that his “offense” was trading places with his mother, likewise, Tyler’s offense was trading places with his grandmother. Maybe we should be grateful that Officer John allowed me to hand the boys some money so that they could “hang out” at the Circle K during the ceremony. Hmmm, I can not be the only person who finds it disappointing that an officer would rather see two teens hanging out than allow them to reenter the building to observe a graduation ceremony. I must mention that at this point there was not even one single person left standing outside, but reentry still was not allowed!
The very least that I expect from this letter is an apology to Michael and Tyler for being treated so poorly, but what I really want is a change in policy that allows the use of common sense. In a world where children beat each other up and post the video on the internet, children who still trade places with their elders should be held up as examples, not treated like criminals. These were not two boys who wished to go off and do their own thing instead of being with their families. They wanted to be inside. This was a graduation ceremony, not a concert, a bar, a fair where there was an admittance fee- a free ceremony, open to the public. I hope that you are as outraged as me at this situation. If someone had grabbed the officer in the manner that he grabbed these teens, the outcome would have been much different. A little mutual respect goes a long way.

cc: Principal of the High School

Father's Day

2008-06-03T11:45:00.000-04:00

I bought my husband a summer membership at a local country club for Father's Day. It is really a family membership, but I would not have purchased it if it hadn't been for his love of golf. The winter is our busy season, so they have this incredible summer membership. Actually, they call it a summer memberhsip, but it is for half of the year, May 1-October 31. We will take him there for lunch on Father's Day and give him his membership stuff.

Oh, for those who read yesterday's post............. we did a five minute room rescue. It was our first one so far, there was only a little complaining!

Summer summer summer................

2008-06-02T09:00:00.004-04:00

..................it turns me upside down! Remember that song by the Cars? It really has nothing to do with the season, but its still a catchy song none-the-less.

Got any fun plans? We are planning on going to DC for a week. As far as our day to day plans, the two older boys will be going to baseball camp. The oldest girl will be working, the middle girl is hoping to babysit, and the youngest boy...........nada, zippo, zilch! I am thinking I will take this summer to teach the boys about the Flylady. For those of you outside of "The Know" she helps pathetic people like me who can not keep their houses clean. Just fifteen minutes at a time. So, that is what the boys will do. I will make minor adjustments to her system to make it more appropriate for young people. She does this 27 fling boogie where you grab a garbage bag and throw away 27 things, I hand them a bag and tell them each to put ten things instead. I will break their room into zones and have them work in the zone each week. At least that is my plan. I'll keep you informed of how it goes.

Big Changes

2008-06-01T11:30:00.004-04:00

The end of this school year brought some significant changes for our family. Our oldest daughter graduated from high school. Yeah! Our second son completed elementary school and is off to middle school. That all by itself is not that significant, however, we were pretty darn close to alot of the people at that particular school and we will miss them. I know what you are thinking- you are thinking that son #3 is still there and daughter #3 will go there, but you are mistaken my dear friend. We are very fortunate to live where we do. Our county has school choice, meaning that you can apply for a school other than your districted school. Our districted elementary is far from great, so we applied for, and received a different school. Our #3 son is "gifted", (a term I abhor BTW)and goes to a school that has a full time gifted program, which is also outside of our district. As far as daughter #3 is concerned, we still have two more years before daughter #3 is old enough to go to elementary school and we have no idea what will happen between now and then.

Well, to say thanks, I threw a thank you party for the teachers at the elementary school who my children have had over the last four years, and some of the support staff who showed us particular kindness. Please take the time to properly thank you children's teachers. I know it means alot to them, and it shows your children that you think showing gratitude is important.

Pay it Forward

2007-11-24T10:36:00.000-05:00

We live about a half hour away from a toll bridge that we go over about six times a year. Everytime we go over it with our second daughter, she insists that we pay for the person behind us. It has become a "thing" that our family does now, with her or not. It is kind of cool.
After I pay for us, I give the toll collector another dollar and tell them it is for the car behind us, then I drive away quickly. Occasionally the driver behind us catches up and they hardly ever wave hello or thank you, or anything else acknowledging our gift. It doesn't upset us or anything its just weird. One day my husband had to go over the bridge and lo and behold, the toll collector told him that the person in front of him had paid for him already! My husband told me that when he pulled away from the toll he tried to find the car that had been in front of him, but couldn't remember what it looked like. Now the mystery had been solved. The people don't usually wave thanks, because they don't know who I am. So to all of you going over toll bridges, pay it forward every once in a while. It will give you a smile, and if you don't get a thanks, that's okay. Your smile should be thanks enough.

Gobble Gobble

2007-11-19T12:16:00.000-05:00

I am hosting Thanksgiving again. I love it, it is my most favorite holiday. I love the colors, the foods, the smells, and the company. I will make a turkey, of course, and my grandmother's turkey stuffing. There will be all of the usuals like cranberry sauce, potatoes, and rolls. But I always like to add a little something new and I don't hesitate to cut out anything unpopular. I stopped the sweet potatoes a long time ago because no one ate it. My brother in law was upset at my decision so I suggested that he bring them. So he did, a great big casserole of sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top. Everyone took their obligatory scoop and he returned to his home with 3/4 of his sweet potato casserole in tact. He never requested it again. I got a couple of recipes from Martha Stewart's website that I might try. I'll let you know how they went, that is if I try them.

Dear Busy Mom

2007-11-14T12:55:00.000-05:00

Years ago I worked in a restaurant and created a silly advice column for the break room. I thought I did a fantastic job and would like to try my hand at it again. So, in honor of my inaugural advice blog column, I have recreated a question that I read not too long ago.

Dear Busy Mom,
I recently moved into a new apartment building and have met some of my neighbors. The man who lives next door is constantly shouting hello to me from down the hall and is always inviting me to his apartment for dinner parties that he and his wife host. How do I get this man to leave me alone and to understand that I do not appreciate his invitations?
- Just want to be left alone

Wow, this is a pretty serious problem. I can relate, sort of. A few years ago I has some ticks in my home that I could not get rid of. That must be how you feel. I can not stand it when neighbors act so, uh, what is the word....... oh yeah, neighbourly. Ugh!! What's next, are they going to offer to take you to the hospital if you have an appendix attack, or if you fall down the stairs? How thoughtless of these people to actually invite the new neighbor over for a dinner party! I am so shocked by their behaviour that I am having a difficult time coming up with advice. Okay, here is my advice. Clearly you can not do anything about their friendliness, so I suggest you move to Saudi Arabia. You can don a burka, and NEVER have to worry about a male neighbor speaking to you. Or you could move to the Alaskan bush, where you could walk for days without even SEEING another person, never mind having to suffer the humiliation of saying hello. Or you could just act like a grown up and tell him that his invitations are wonderful, but you are a considerable introvert and would not likely ever attend.
-Busy Mom

Ugh! How long will my home look like this?

2007-11-09T13:19:00.000-05:00

Do your children............ no, I am sure your children NEVER do anything like this. I have this little piece of art that I distastefully call the Michael Jackson statue. I wasn't going to tell you what I call it, but then I heard Jay Leno making an equally distasteful joke along these lines, so here it is. My husband absolutely HATES it when I call it that, but it still causes me to chuckle. So, here is the sculpture and here is how I found it the other day.

Okay, I did laugh when I saw it. This is just the sort of thing you might find in the home of a large family.

Simply Audio Books

2007-11-05T11:03:00.000-05:00

Okay, at the risk of sounding like an advertisement, I need to tell you about this cool company. I am not getting any benefit for this, other than hoping that other people might join, listen to some cool books, and keep learning and thinking.

The company is called Simply Audio Books and their concept is similar to Netflix. They have two plans the rental club and the audio club. The rental club works like this- Simply Audio Books sends you an audio book at their expense, you listen to it, and then return it in the prepaid box, and they send you the next one on your list. I signed up for two at a time, which costs $29.95 a month, or $25. if you prepay 12 months. You can get an unlimited amount of books, but a limited amount at a time. So at first I got two books. When I was done listening to the first, I sent it back and starting listening to the next one, then the third one came in the mail, and so on. The other club is called the download club. You can download in mp3 format instead of getting the audio book in the mail. It is $21.95 for two downloads, or $19.95 if you prepay for 12 months. The problem with the download club is that it is a limited number of downloads a month. so, if you sign up for the two downloads then that is all you get for the month. So, I prefer the books. They have a free download every month too.

Right now I am listening to the last cd of a Short History of Nearly Everything, and I must admit that I am kind of sad that it is almost over.

Now, as if that wasn't cool enough, every time you refer someone who joins they increase the number of titles you can have at a time. Check it out for yourself. They have a free trial.

A real live nephew, well okay neice, of my Uncle Sam

2007-11-02T09:56:00.000-04:00

Here are the answers I promised you.

1. Red, white, and blue
2. 50
3. White
4. One for each state in the Union
5. 13
6. Red and white
7. They represent the original 13 states
8. 50
9. Independence Day
10. July 4th
11. England
12. England
13. George Washington
14. Bill Clinton
15. Al Gore
16. The Electoral College
17. Vice President
18. Four Years
19. The Supreme Law of the Land
20. Yes
21. Amendments
22. 26
23. 3
24. Legislative, Executive, and Judiciary
25. Congress
26. Congress
27. The Senate and the House of Representatives
28. To make laws
29. The people
30. 100
31. (INSERT LOCAL INFORMATION)
32. 6 years
33. 435
34. 2 years
35. The President, Cabinet, and Departments under the Cabinet members
36. The Supreme Court
37. To Interpret Laws
38. The Constitution
39. The First 10 Amendments of the Constitution
40. (INSERT LOCAL INFORMATION)
41. (INSERT LOCAL INFORMATION)
42. Speaker of the House of Representatives
43. William Rehnquist
44. Connecticut, New Hampshire, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Rhode Island, and Maryland
45. Patrick Henry
46. Germany, Italy, and Japan
47. Hawaii and Alaska
48. 2
49. A Civil Rights Leader
50. (INSERT LOCAL INFORMATION)
51. Must be a natural born citizen of the United States:
Must be at least 35 years old by the time he/she will serve:
Must have lived in the United States for at least 14 years
52. Two (2) from each state
53. Appointed by the President
54. Nine (9)
55. For religious freedom
56. Governor
57. Mayor
58. Thanksgiving
59. Thomas Jefferson
60. July 4th, 1776
61. That all men are created equal
62. The Star-Spangled Banner
63. Francis Scott Key
64. The Bill of Rights
65. Eighteen (18)
66. The President
67. The Supreme Court
68. Abraham Lincoln
69. Freed many slaves
70. The cabinet
71. George Washington
72. Form n-400, "Application to File Petition for Naturalization"
73. The American Indians (Native Americans)
74. The Mayflower
75. Colonies
76. (a) The right of freedom of speech, press, religion, peaceable assembly and requesting change of government
(b) The right to bear arms (The right to have weapons or own a gun, thought subject to certain regulations)
(c) The government may not quarter, or house, soldiers in the people’s homes during peacetime without the people’s consent
(d) The government may not search or take a person’s property without a warrant
(e) A person may not be tried twice for the same crime and does not have to testify against him/herself
(f) A person charged with a crime still has some rights, such as the right to atrial and to have a lawyer
(g) The right to trial by a jury in most cases
(h) Protects people against excessive or unreasonable fines or cruel and unusual punishment
(I) The people have rights other than those mentioned in the Constitution
(j) Any power not given to the federal government by the Constitution is a power of either the state or the people
77. The Congress
78. Republican
79. Abraham Lincoln
80. 1787
81. The Bill of Rights
82. For Countries to discuss and try to resolve world problems; to provide economic aid to many countries
83. In the Capital in Washington D.C.
84. Everyone (Citizens and non-Citizens living in the U.S.)
85. The Preamble
86. Obtain Federal Government Jobs; Travel with a U.S. Passport; Petition for close relatives to come to the U.S. to live
87. The right to vote
88. The place where congress meets
89. The President’s official home
90. Washington D.C. (1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.)
91. The White House
92. Freedom of: Speech, Press, Religion, Peaceable Assembly, and, Requesting Change of Government
93. The President
94. George Washington
95. November
96. January
97. There is no limit
98. There is no limit
99. Democratic and Republican
100. Fifty (50)

I'm a Yankee Doodle Dandy

2007-11-02T09:42:00.000-04:00

I have a good friend, who after 44 years of living in the Good Ol' U.S. of A., is applying for her citizenship. She brought me over the questions that she received from the Department of Justice, Immigration and Naturalization Services. She will be given an oral quiz and all of the questions will be from this list. She may have one question, she may have them all. See how many you know. If you are an American citizen and you don't know most (if not all)of these answers, shame on you, not on your American history teacher. I will publish the answers tomorrow.

1. What are the colors of our flag?
2. How many stars are there in our flag?
3. What color are the stars in our flag?
4. What do the stars on the flag mean?
5. How many stripes are there in the flag?
6. What color are the stripes?
7. What do the stripes on the flag mean?
8. How many states are there in the Union?
9. What is the 4th of July?
10. What is the date of independence day?
11. Independence from whom?
12. What country did we fight during the revolutionary war?
13. Who was the first President of the United States?
14. Who is the President of the United States today?
15. Who is the Vice-President of the United States today?
16. Who elects the President of the United States?
17. Who becomes President of the United States if the President should die?
18. For how long do we elect the President?
19. What is the Constitution?
20. Can the Constitution be changed?
21. What do we call a change to the Constitution?
22. Haw many changes or amendments are there to the Constitution?
23. How many branches are there in our government?
24. What are the three branches of our government?
25. What is the legislative branch of our government?
26. Who makes the laws in the United States?
27. What is Congress?
28. What are the duties of Congress?
29. Who elects Congress?
30. How many Senators are there in Congress?
31. Can you name the two Senators from your state?
32. For how long do we elect each Senator?
33. How many Representatives are there in Congress?
34. For how long do we elect the Representatives?
35. What is the Executive Branch of our government?
36. What is the Judiciary Branch of our government?
37. What are the duties of the Supreme Court?
38. What is the Supreme Law of the United States?
39. What is the Bill of Rights?
40. What is the Capital of your State?
41. Who is the current Governor of your State?
42. Who becomes President of the U.S.A. If the President and the Vice-President should die?
43. Who is the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court?
44. Can you name the Thirteen Original States?
45. Who said, "Give me liberty or give me death"?
46. Which countries were our enemies during the World War II?
47. What are the 49th and 50th states of the Union?
48. How many terms can a President serve?
49. What was Martin Luther King, Jr.?
50. Who is the head of your local government?
51. According to the Constitution, a person must meet certain requirements in order to be eligible to become President. Name one of these requirements.
52. Why are there 100 Senators in the Senate?
53. Who selects the Supreme Court Justices?
54. How many Supreme Court Justices are there?
55. Why did the Pilgrims come to America?
56. What is the head executive of a state government called?
57. What is the head executive of a city government called?
58. What Holiday was celebrated for the first time by the American colonists?
59. Who was the main writer of the Declaration of Independence?
60. When was the Declaration of Independence adopted?
61. What is the basic belief of the Declaration of Independence?
62. What is the National Anthem of the United States?
63. Who wrote the Star-Spangled Banner?
64. Where does Freedom of Speech come from?
65. What is the minimum voting age in the United States?
66. Who signs Bills into Law?
67. What is the highest court in the United States?
68. Who was the President during the Civil War?
69. What did the Emancipation Proclamation do?
70. What special group advises the President?
71. Which President is called the "Father of our Country"?
72. What immigration and naturalization service form is used to apply to become a naturalized citizen?
73. Who helped the pilgrims in America?
74. What is the name of the ship that brought the pilgrims to America?
75. What were the 13 original states of the United States called?
76. Name 3 rights or freedoms guaranteed by the Bill of Rights?
77. Who has the power to declare war?
78. What kind of government does the United States have?
79. Which President freed the slaves?
80. In what year was the Constitution written?
81. What are the first 10 Amendments to the Constitution Called?
82. Name one purpose of the United Nations.
83. Where does Congress meet?
84. Whose rights are guaranteed by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights?
85. What is the introduction to the Constitution called?
86. Name one benefit of being a citizen of the United States?
87. What is the most important right granted to U.S. Citizens?
88. What is the United States Capital?
89. What is the White House?
90. Where is the White House located?
91. What is the name of the President’s official home?
92. Name one right guaranteed by the First Amendment?
93. Who is the Commander in Chief of the U.S. Military?
94. Which President was the First Commander in Chief of the U.S. Military?
95. In what month do we vote for the President?
96. In what is the new President inaugurated?
97. How many times may a Senator be re-elected?
98. How many times may a Congressman be re-elected?
99. What are the 2 major political parties in the U.S. Today?
100. How many states are there in the United States?

Utube- where were you when I needed you?

2007-10-24T10:16:00.000-04:00

When I was about 14 I attended the fair with my next door neighbor. I do not even remember her name. I really remember very little from that time in my life, my parents were separating and it was exceptionally painful. This however must have been an outstanding event in my life.

We were going on that ride that you sit in and it looks like a roller coaster, except that the cars just go around and around, forward, then backward, then forward again. The music is outragously loud and only the front of the ride is visible, when you are at the back you are behind a large wooden facade. It has a different name every where you go.

Well this girl and I were going on it and I was in front. We were looking for an empty car to sit in. She was talking and all of a sudden she stopped talking. It must have been in mid-sentence because I turned to see her and she wasn't there. She had completely disappeared. There was no where for her to go so I stood there, I am sure, looking stupid. Suddenly I heard, very quietly, "Dianaaaaaaa". She was actually screaming but because of the outragously loud music it seemed quiet. I could hear my name but I couldn't tell at first where it was coming from, then I saw this tiny hole in the floor and realized that she had fallen through this hole and now was standing under the ride calling me. I don't remember anything else. I am sure they got her out. "They" being the people who also put the machine together I am sure and left the hole there to begin with. Ever wonder if they drug test these people?

Well, a model just recently had the same experience as my neighbor. http://tv.yahoo.com/show/28908/news/urn:newsml:tv.ap.org:20071022:falling_model__ER:

Hmmmmmm! Would we have attracted international fame if Utube had been around then? Oh well, my fifteen minutes of fame came and went and no one even noticed.

PT 5 Dallas Airport

2007-10-22T16:32:00.001-04:00

Remember when I had you picture me raising my eyebrow at the comment that the SP in Phoenix was paying close attention to everything that was in the bags? What I said exactly was:

As each bag is scanned by the machine SP#1 watches the monitor closely (You need to imagine seeing my right eyebrow go up as if to say, "Yeah right". I will explain more about that later).

It is four o'clock in the morning, in Dallas and we are going through security. We did not have to check any bags because we already checked them all in Phoenix. We have again, taken off our shoes, loaded the car seat, loaded the stroller, you get the picture. This time, however, we DECLARE the gun ahead of time. The SP (who does not yell or treat us like imbeciles,) tells us that is fine, just set the gun aside, now I know what that means, so I put it in its own tray. We move along without event. We all get through the x-ray machine, put the gun back into the bag from whence it came and another SP takes the bag and moves to a different table. I know this is hard to imagine, but there was no yelling to close down the line, no yelling to turn over the car seat, there was a request that I take the car seat apart, but they actually believed me when I told them it didn't come apart! I did not know why it was taken to another table until the SP started going through it. He took out a large tube of toothpaste, I said, "throw it away", the a tube of nasty gelatinous candy, I said, "throw it away", a small bottle of mouthwash that my husband had in this bag for probably five years, and I said, you guessed it, "throw it away". After all of my stuff has found a new home in the trash can the SP informs me that the gun has to be checked and can not be carried on. Hmmmmm. Does that mean that none of my stuff actually had to be thrown away? It could have all been checked with the gun. Oh well!

Do you know what that means? That means that we consolidate our carry on stuff, someone, I mean I take it to the counter, check it, answer all of the questions- no there are not explosives in this bag, and then that's right, go through security again. Take off the shoes, empty the pockets, get x-rayed, get puffed, fill my pockets, put on the shoes, and find my family who is waiting at a little cafe eating breakfast. We ate our breakfast, drank our coffee, waited patiently for the plane, boarded, rested, disembarked in Tampa, claimed our luggage, got a gigantic cart for all of our stuff, stepped out into the sauna that we call Florida, found our truck, loaded it up and headed for home. It took two hours to get home and ten minutes to discover that one our our bags was left at the Tampa Airport. It is funny today. Want to go with us on our next vacation?

This was still nothing compared to the vacation we have dubbed "The Vacation from Hell". If I run out of things to say, or if I have requests I will share that some time.

Pt 4 That Dangerous Rice Milk

2007-10-21T21:04:00.001-04:00

I have to take a moment here and explain that I am a rule follower. I don't like to make waves and I believe that given an opportunity, I can explain what is happening and everyone will get a good chuckle and we can move on. I know that if I insist on trying now to explain to the SP I will only be slowing things down. I know that as soon as the police office arrives I will be given the time to explain. So, I wait patiently while all of the other passengers glare at my huge family and think, "Hey lady, don't you know what causes six children?"

Now I wait, with all eyes staring at me while one of the SPs walks down the corridor- note, not SP#2 who is still sitting on her behind- and tells my husband something. Then one of the children yells to me, "It's the cap gun" Oh my goodness! I can not believe this. The cap gun did it. Someone did not pack the cap gun in the check in luggage. AHHHHHHH!!!!! So here comes Officer Airport who looks at the machine (our bag is still in the x-ray machine)and then at me and says, "What is in this bag that might have me concerned?" Now, I am not feeling scared or intimidated here, but I did feel as though Officer Airport thought she was talking to a second grader and it was a bit annoying. So I say, "It must be my son's cap gun." With a sigh of relief she says, "Yes it is." I fully understand, and appreciate, the concern for airport security, but some things are a little silly. Not one person who has committed an act of domestic terrorism on our country brought their children along for the fun. What upset me was not -the police being called in, the stopping of the line, the seriousness of the situation. In all seriousness, it is quite possible that we could have looked away from our bags for a moment while someone did slip a gun into our bag, hoping that the SP would not worry precisely because we are obviously not terrorists and then reclaimed the gun while on the plane. No, what had me so upset was the way my family was spoken to and treated, as though speaking to us in any fashion other than rude might result in the attitude that guns on planes are not dangerous.

Officer Airport took the bag to another table so that the line could be reopened and searched it. Removed the gun, examined it, determined it to be a child's toy cap gun and pardoned the gun from a sentence of a lifetime in a landfill. No, she allowed us to bring the child's toy cap gun onto the plane and gave a stern and grave warning. "This toy gun must remain in the bag at all times. If it is removed and seen by other passengers panic can ensue. AND if there happened to be an air marshal on board, real guns could be drawn!"

"No problem!" I declare. However, my husband was not satisfied. He needed to explain, he needed Officer Airport to truly understand, that we are not careless parents. No, we are not the kind of people who think that bringing a gun, even a toy gun, on board a plane is just a big joke. So, every time Officer Airport takes a breath during her diatribe, he squeezes a few words in. And every time he speaks, she stops speaking and then starts ALL OVER AGAIN when he is done. I finally elbow him and tell him to be quiet so that we can leave.

Finally, the nightmare ends. We are on the plane. We can see the sun setting on our vacation. We know that home is approaching. Ahhhhh, the peace, the tranquility. Then I remember. We have to do this again tomorrow morning at the Dallas Airport!!!!!!!

Pt 3 Arizona or maybe Rice Milk Will Not Crash a Plane part 3

2007-10-20T10:19:00.001-04:00

It is off to phase two of the security. Child #6 could not drink cows milk. She could only drink rice milk. Now we got all eight of our tickets for free with our frequent flyer miles and the only catch was that we would have to spend the night in Dallas on our way home. We would arrive in Dallas at 10:00 pm and leave the next morning at 5:00 AM. That would leave no time to go to a store. So our carry on bags had to have anything that we would need for over night, including rice milk for the baby. Now, I knew from going to the airport and airline security websites that we might be allowed to get her milk on the plane. It is at the discretion of the security personnel.

We are standing in line with about 50 other people. We take off our shoes and put them on the conveyor, take the baby out of her stroller, put her humongous car seat on, unpack our video camera, empty our pockets, and tell the security people about the milk. It is important here to get a full understanding of the events and spirit of the situation. About 50 people who DO NOT WANT to be in line behind us who are all talking, a recording over the loud speaker continually reminding us of the 3-1-1 rule (3 ounce bottle or less (by volume) ; 1 quart-sized, clear, plastic, zip-top bag; 1 bag per passenger placed in screening bin. One-quart bag per person limits the total liquid volume each traveler can bring. 3 oz. container size is a security measure.)a man who keeps shouting that if we need one quart zip-top bags he has some and where the garbage cans are for containers that are larger than 3 ounces, security people talking- well they were mostly yelling, machines beeping, "puff machine" puffing (that is a machine that sends a puff of air at you and then "smells" the air looking for the scent of explosives).

I declare the milk first, before we do anything else and the security person (SP from here on out) tells me to "leave it out". I am not really sure what that means so I held it in my hands. Well, then SP #1 yelled at me to put it in its own bin. I guess that is what is meant by "leave it out". I can see that the car seat is not going to go into this machine, and the SP can tell too. He tells me to take it apart and I assure him that it does not come apart. Well, eager to show me just how much of an idiot I must be, he begins tugging on different parts of the seat until he relents. Maybe the person who owns and operates the car seat, does actually know something about it. One of them, SP#2, whom I might mention, sat in a seat across the corridor the entire time and not once did I see her get up, yelled at me to turn the seat over. So I turned it over. I guess I did not turn it over the right way, so she yelled some more for me to turn it over. This went on and on until I figured out what the rude SP meant. I am still baffled at why she could not simply get up and turn the seat herself. So finally the car seat will go forward.

Each member of the family has gone through the metal detector without an ounce of fan fair. Life is looking GOOD! I am the last member of the family. I give each child his or her shoes and bag and send them to the end of the corridor with Dad to reduce the confusion. As each bag is scanned by the machine SP#1 watches the monitor closely (You need to imagine seeing my right eyebrow go up as if to say, "Yeah right". I will explain more about that later) and he elbows the SP#3 next to him and says, "look at this". The SP#3 says, "Close it down and call the police". WHAT??!?!! It is rice milk for crying out loud. I keep thinking if they will just ask me about it I can explain to them my babies dietary needs, but no, you have to really stress the "no" when you say that in your head- but noooooo, no one asks me about it. They just close the line and scream "CLOSE THE LINE, CLOSE THE LINE, CLOSE THE LINE. GO TO THE OTHER LINE!!!!!" Oh, for crying out loud- you think the other 50 people were a little annoyed before one of the two lines were closed, imagine how thrilled they were now.

Pt 2 Arizona or maybe Rice Milk Will Not Crash a Plane part 2

2007-10-19T07:54:00.001-04:00

Okay, so with my cart full of luggage, I approach the counter. I am completely organized and I know what I am doing. Each child, except for number 4, is sitting quietly (sort of, well as quiet as five young people can be) and I hand the woman behind the counter one boarding pass. She types some stuff on her computer, asks me a question or two about the person for whom the boarding pass has been issued, takes one bag, puts the tag on the bag and hands the bag to me. I hand the bag to child #4 who then takes the bag over to the x-ray machine and onto the conveyor belt, where we wave (telepathically anyway, we wouldn't want people to really see us WAVING good bye to luggage) and then he returns to the counter with me where we, unceremoniously begin the process again. Now we are at bag number four when she decides to ask some questions about the baggage. The questions go something like this, "Do you have any blah blah blah" or maybe it was more like, "Oh, you wouldn't happen to have any blah blah blah packed would you" or something else along those lines. While the way the question was presented isn't really that important the blah blah blahs ARE! The blah blah blahs are flammable things like matches, fireworks, lighters, etc. Not wanting to be the cause, or effect, of a mid-air explosion I say, "Well, we do have caps for a cap gun packed". Errrrrrrr!!!!!! Did you hear the breaks on the machine we call progress stop short?

"Oh, I am not sure if you can have any caps on the plane" She looks over at the men running the x-ray machine and says, "Well, if they didn't notice them then I guess it must be okay" She must have thought about that for a moment because then she said, " well wait a minute" and began to type away on her computer. "Hmmm, hmmm, hmmm" is all she is saying. She keeps looking up from her keyboard and reassuring me, "Give me just a minute". I am thinking, "Oh, okay, she only needs a minute to figure out if our caps are going to crash the plane" Now it is my turn, "hmmmmmm".

She looks up, sticks her pointing finger up in the air and says, "give me just a minute" and walks away to see, I guess, I don't know, the wizard behind the green curtain? She comes back a few minutes later, and says, "Just one more minute". Now I am not exaggerating when I say that this took about 10 minutes, just to find out it the caps are going to cause a flying catastrophe. In the mean time, while waiting for the news, I turn to child #4 and say, "which bag has the caps in it?" He says, "one of the bags that has already gone down the conveyor" AHHHHHHHH!!!!!! Now if you are anything like me you are asking yourself why on earth the woman waited until after three bags had been sent before asking me these obviously important questions.

So finally emerging she announces that she has just one more place to ask- the x-ray men. She walks over and says something quietly and they respond, almost yelling, "OH NO, NO CAPS ALLOWED ON THE PLANE. NO WAY, UN UNH, NO CAN DO, ETC. ETC. ETC" You get the picture. "Okay, which bag has the caps in it?" she says smiling. Child #4 and I exchange dreadful glances, "one of the bags that already got sent to wherever bags go". In my infinite wisdom I put colored ribbon on all of our bags, so it made the bags easy to describe. She calls to the keeper of the bags and has our three bags sent back. Children #1 and 4 now go all the way to baggage claim, bring all three bags back, remove the offensive caps and put all three bags back on to the conveyor and now we can move on to the rest of the bags. Here is about where my husband showed up. Let's hear it for showing up to the airport a couple of hours early.

Okay, so you will still have to tune in next time to find out what happens to the rice milk!

Pt 1 Arizona- our vacation! or maybe Rice Milk Will Not Crash a Plane

2007-10-18T11:38:00.002-04:00

I always keep a journal when we are on vacation. It is funny the things you forget.......... and remember. I love to read my vacation journals. What is really funny is the way I will retell a story months and years later compared to the way it actually happened. I have a way of taking a half hour to tell the story of something that only took ten minutes to actually happen. Here is an example.

While in Arizona we went up to Jerome. A really neat town that everyone who goes to Arizona should see. It once was a mining town that was dubbed "America's Sinnningest City" or something like that. The two main industries were mining and prostituting. And it seems that the only form of entertainment was drinking, gambling, and well, hanging with prostitutes. While it is no longer a mining town, or a hotbed for red light bulb salesmen it has a pretty neat history and they have manged to use their infamous history as a marketing ploy- that worked- on us anyway.
While we were in Jerome we got two of my boys cap guns. The kind that look like little guns. They got caps of course too. Well the younger son managed to use all of his caps before we headed home from our vacation. So when it came time to pack the bags, I told both boys to be sure to pack their guns in their regular suitcases, NOT the carry on.

Fast forward to the airport. The Phoenix airport. The same Phoenix airport that was recently cited for allowing airport and airline personnel access to restricted areas without proper searches. The same one that tragically a woman, Carol Anne Gotbaum, mother of three young children, died at while in police custody.

Anyway, my husband dropped us off at the airport and proceeded to the car rental place, I could share a long story about the car rental place, but that will turn this half hour story into three quarters of an hour. So, here I am at the airport with six kids, a LARGE car seat for the baby, the stroller, eight bags to check, eight bags to carry on including (but not limited to[I love saying that]) an extra large bottom of the line commercial video camera in a water proof case that looks like it must be carrying arms.

We needed two carts to carry all our stuff into the airport. One cart is carrying our carry on baggage, the other is carrying our check in baggage. I am pushing one and oldest boy is pushing the other one.

Tune in next time to find out what happened to the rice milk.

1984- No more!

2007-05-26T22:25:00.001-04:00

Well, I like to read a chapter a day of a classic literature. I do it online at The Literature Network. I have been reading 1984 which is a bit creepy, but I wanted to finish it. It seems like the right thing to do. Well, imagine my disappointment when I went to read it this morning and it was (gasp!) gone. That's right, gone. This is what was left in its place.........

"Webmaster's Note, 5/10/2007 - We have been informed by the rights holder that this work is still copyrighted in our territory. So we have removed it. You may still read our original summary though to the left."

I didn't want to read the summary. Oh well. I will be moving on to another piece of lit. I will keep you informed as soon as I decide what I will be reading.

5/22/07 My Eighth Grader's Graduation Speech

2007-05-22T19:43:00.000-04:00

This is the speech my eighth grader wrote, and has been asked to read at her school's end of the year program. The names have been changed to protect the innocent/ guilty / and undecided.

Before I attended this school I was home schooled. When I went to school for the first time, I was terrified. I actually remember crying the night before school because I was so afraid that I wouldn't like it. However, on my first day of school, a girl I didn't even know invited me to eat lunch with her and her friends. This girl, Annie Oakley, is now my best friend. We did not become such good friends until our trip to Sea Camp later that year. On that trip, we had to dissect squid. I was completely grossed out, but luckily I was partnered with Alexander Petrovsky, who seemed to be the most excited about the dissection.

Last year, in 7th grade, was one of my favorite years at this school. We went on a lot of fun trips, including my favorite trip, which was the 7th grade leadership retreat. Even though we were not staying in a hotel, able to take showers, and we had to canoe our luggage twenty-three miles through a river, I enjoyed it. We all go to bond on that trip. My favorite part of that trip was the log game. We all had to alphabetize ourselves on a thin log without talking or falling off. If you did talk or fall off, they would "handicap" you. I was one of those people, so they made me blind by tying a bandanna around my head. I am not going to lie; it was scary. I had to put a lot of trust into the people helping me along or else I could have fallen. Eventually, after yelling and getting stressed out, we finished. When I finally took off my blindfold I realized that I was at the tip of the log, hovering above the water. I had put all of trust in my classmates to let them lead me across this log. They all kept me safe and made sure that I wouldn't fall.

Another highlight of my time at this school was being on the basketball team. I had been on it for three years and adored it. I'll admit, I wasn't the best at all, but I still had fun, especially with the girls on the team. I loved being on the car ride to our games, listening to music with the girls, and just getting pumped up. I wouldn't trade that experience for the world.

I don't just enjoy the trips and sports, I enjoy these teachers too. Mrs. Mathematics has always been here, except for when she was on maternity leave. Whenever I had problems with my friends or anything, she was there to help me. I have always felt comfortable talking to her about anything. Mrs. History is so much fun. She is such a kid at heart and is such a joy to be around. Mrs. Science has always tried her hardest to make sure that I understand what is going on and I can tell that she truly cares about me. Last, but not least, is Mr. English. He is one of the funniest people I know and he is always making me laugh. He is a very easy person to talk to and has a way of relating to me. Even though the work is hard, I am grateful for how hard my teachers have pushed me. I know that I will be prepared for high school.

I feel safe in this school and love it. I love how this school doesn't just have students sitting in desks all day long; we actually get to do projects as well. What other school can say that they build machines in science class, make street signs in Language Arts, and dress up in Social Studies?

At the end of 6th grade I thought that I was going to be switching schools, and I couldn't bear the thought. We hear the teachers and administrators saying all the time that this school is a family, and it truly is. We care about each other and love each other. When my parents saw how upset I was, they let me stay at this school. I can't explain how much I have enjoyed my four years here, and I am grateful to my teachers, parents, and administration for giving me the opportunity to be a part of this family.

9/21/07 Sunday Dinners

2007-05-21T09:54:00.000-04:00

9/21/07 Sundays seem to be the best day for family barbecues. Saturdays are just too darn busy, sooooooo, Sunday it is.

Yesterday we had one of my dearest friends and her family over. Well, I should mention that her husband is my husband's brother, but that is besides the fact. Her name is Sherrie. She just started a new errand business. She runs most kinds of errands for people. She has always done it, now she will get paid for it.

For the grown ups I bought Delmonico Steaks. For the children I bought stew meat chunks and put them on skewers. The kids loved their shish-ka-bobs and we loved our steaks. I sprinkled liberally with Emeril's Steak Rub and grilled. We also had salad and my SIL made her world famous potato salad.

They also brought their dog, Harley. They will be staying at our house while we are in Arizona, so I wanted them to come over so I could show her how to work all of the weird things in our home, like the broken dishwasher, all of the crazy light switches (my husband is an electrical contractor), etc. We also wanted to be sure the dogs would get along well. Our Zoey would not stop barking at Harley. She was making me bonkers. Her insuperable bark would reverberate through my body. Eventually we put her in a room where she could not see Harley. All three of our dogs are female German Shepherds. Harley is an American Bulldog.

5/19/07 My honor kid can beat up your Pomeranian!

2007-05-19T10:29:00.000-04:00

Yesterday my nephew had a big baseball game. It was the state finals and they won. It is alot of fun to watch young people enjoying themselves. I had not seen his brother (my other nephew) through almost the whole game so I called him on his cell to see where he was. After he told me I said, "Well, I am right beside third base if you want to come over and see me". when I hung up a girlfriend asked if I thought he would come. He did, and he gave me a big hug and a kiss. In the last few months he has grown at least 6 inches. He was already taller than me, but now he towers over me.

My oldest daughter is fluent in sign language. She is a junior and was asked to sign at the graduation ceremony this morning for the seniors. I think it is such an honor and we are so proud of her.

It is interesting how our children excel. My second daughter has been asked, and often accepts, to read the Torah on Shabbat (Saturday morning Temple Service). I love seeing her up there, my oldest son, and his younger brother of 2 years, both play baseball. They really are quite good. Of course, the older one is little better, he has had more experience and is stronger, but they are both good. When the older one gets up to bat the other team yells, "Back up!" to their team mates. He has even been told to go ahead and take first base, by the coach of the other team, without getting an opportunity to bat. The second son always smiles. Even if he strikes out, he always has a huge smile on his face and the parents always love him. He is one of the smallest kids on the team, and is two years younger than several of them, yet parents have told the coach to have him pitch to finish the game. They really are good, I am not just saying that.

Now my youngest son doesn't like sports. He doesn't have too many friends. However, when he was three he would sit on my lap and ask the sound of the letters on my t-shirts. He taught himself to read. By four he was a fluent reader. He would even help his older brother with his homework.

The baby is still to young to "wow" her with her specialness. I'll keep you posted on how great she is.

5/18/07 My IPOD

2007-05-16T09:58:00.000-04:00

My IPOD is so cool. I bought it used at Target.com. I don't listen to too much music, but I thoroughly enjoy listening to books. When ever we get a book on CD I immediately download it to my IPOD. I have this cassette tape thing that plugs into the IPOD and then I can pop it into my cassette player in my truck and listen to it.

I know what you are thinking. You are thinking, "Why don't you just listen to the cd in your truck, you idiot". But, you are forgetting my crazy lifestyle. See, I lose my CDs in my truck. Or little people take them out to put in their own and they get scratched. I can hear you again. Now you are thinking, "Don't let them take your CDs out." Well, it is true, I could do that, but in the mean time I am losing precious CDs while I wait for my children to learn this. I would rather just put them on my IPOD.

What cool things have you done with your MP3 player?

5/17/07 A Collective Sigh of Relief for the End of the Year

2007-05-16T07:40:00.000-04:00

I am sure that I am not the only parent who loves having their children home for the summer. I LOVE MY KIDS!! I am jealous of the time that my children spend with their teachers. Only once have I looked forward to them being in school and that was after the baby had been sick for six days, which took place less than a week after another had been sick for six days, and a third had missed a day of school before her eighth grade trip to D.C. The second youngest told me that he had a headache and asked if he could stay home and I said, "No! I need you to go to school today." Those six days that the baby was sick I spent doing almost nothing while she laid on my chest with a 103 fever. I really enjoyed that first day with everyone healthy and doing what they were supposed to be doing.

So, with summer starting less than a week away I am wondering what fun things we might do. The two boys will be playing some baseball, and my oldest will be working. I think I might try to get my youngest boy (7) into a really neat science camp at a local hands on science museum. It is a little pricey, but there would only be one doing it. He would have a blast. He also MUST learn to ride his bicycle. He just hasn't wanted to and I have not been able to convince him that it is worth it. This will be my goal this summer.

Oh yeah, we are going to Arizona for a week in June. That should be fun.

5/16/07 Mother's Day

2007-05-15T16:58:00.000-04:00

5/16/07 For Mother's Day this year I got a fuzzy steering wheel cover, a bouqet of flowers, a grocery bag, dinner, and some hand made goodies.

I love the gifts my children make for me. Especially if the spelling is wrong and the coloring goes outside of the lines. I love the handmade ceramics. My oldest took a ceramics class this year in high school and I love all of the cool things she has made for me.

My steering wheel cover was terribly difficult to get on. Fortunately my nephew was walking up the driveway while I was trying to get it on and he was strong enough to do it for me. It is super soft and try not to rub it too much while I am driving. That's just weird.

I had asked for a particular book or grocery bags. I am tired of using the plastic bags. They are such a waste, so I wanted reusable canvas bags. I didn't get the book, but I am happy about the bag. I figure that everytime I go to the store I will get one until I have enough.

5/15/07 Eight grade graduation

2007-05-15T13:15:00.000-04:00

Next week five of my children will be promoted to the next grade. PROMOTED, not graduate! Am I the only one who thinks that all of the mini "graduations" are ridiculous? Of course my eighth grader is going to ninth grade. Just like almost every other eighth grader in the country, so why is it such a big deal?

Maybe if I only had one or two children I could enjoy it, instead I just resent it. All of these special/silly ceremonies steal my precious time.

I enjoy watching my children grow, and learn, and experience new things, but I just cannot get into this.