Or genius child?
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Monday, August 30, 2010
Stuff that Bugs
I think it is all related to number 2 on this list but I promise to do a happy version of this tomorrow. But for now here are all the annoyances currently happening to me:
1. Internet is down in the apartment where we live. No one cares since they are doing some "project" before school gets in session so while our neighbors are able to successfully log on intermittently, we cannot at all. Thank goodness for my built-in verizon service which is mucho slow. And why I can't post a video I am dying to show you of little Megs.
2. I strained a muscle in my middle back--have you ever done that, where you just reach a certain way and BOOM your neck/back hurts for a couple of days? Well that happened to me this morning. After I JUST got a good routine going at the gym, too.
3. It took me six phone calls to get doctors appointments with my kids. And I had to practically beg the doc to see us. They are choosy these days and apparently our family doesn't meet their guidelines. I went in person and cried in the doctor's office as a last ditch effort and at least that worked.
4. While gone this summer we accrued a bunch of library fines and now I don't want to go back and get books but I really, really want to read the one I have on hold there.
5. No new sequels to look forward to anymore.
6. My parents are both dead. This is not a new annoyance, just an old injury flaring up again.
7. Katie's move to D.C. is officially painful now. We could pretend it was all fine while traveling, but I felt her absence yesterday and it was almost all that I could take. I ALMOST went out in my car during the last hour but it turned out to be a combined men/women so I could sit next to Steve who I like more than anyone in the world in spite of the fact that...
8. Steve is deaf in his right ear. It is reparable, but as it takes six calls to get an appointment at the doctor we obviously don't have the time to invest in that exercise so I have to play musical chairs in church to sit on the correct side to make my snarky comments.
9. The Kirby vacuum doesn't work that well these days. I should probably take it in to get fixed but I am loathe to spend a single dime considering what we paid to buy it. Also, the shampooer only comes out in a single little stream, not a robust one, and I haven't done the carpets yet.
10. My eldest child is going through a grumpy phase. Hopefully more sleep will alleviate some of that.
1. Internet is down in the apartment where we live. No one cares since they are doing some "project" before school gets in session so while our neighbors are able to successfully log on intermittently, we cannot at all. Thank goodness for my built-in verizon service which is mucho slow. And why I can't post a video I am dying to show you of little Megs.
2. I strained a muscle in my middle back--have you ever done that, where you just reach a certain way and BOOM your neck/back hurts for a couple of days? Well that happened to me this morning. After I JUST got a good routine going at the gym, too.
3. It took me six phone calls to get doctors appointments with my kids. And I had to practically beg the doc to see us. They are choosy these days and apparently our family doesn't meet their guidelines. I went in person and cried in the doctor's office as a last ditch effort and at least that worked.
4. While gone this summer we accrued a bunch of library fines and now I don't want to go back and get books but I really, really want to read the one I have on hold there.
5. No new sequels to look forward to anymore.
6. My parents are both dead. This is not a new annoyance, just an old injury flaring up again.
7. Katie's move to D.C. is officially painful now. We could pretend it was all fine while traveling, but I felt her absence yesterday and it was almost all that I could take. I ALMOST went out in my car during the last hour but it turned out to be a combined men/women so I could sit next to Steve who I like more than anyone in the world in spite of the fact that...
8. Steve is deaf in his right ear. It is reparable, but as it takes six calls to get an appointment at the doctor we obviously don't have the time to invest in that exercise so I have to play musical chairs in church to sit on the correct side to make my snarky comments.
9. The Kirby vacuum doesn't work that well these days. I should probably take it in to get fixed but I am loathe to spend a single dime considering what we paid to buy it. Also, the shampooer only comes out in a single little stream, not a robust one, and I haven't done the carpets yet.
10. My eldest child is going through a grumpy phase. Hopefully more sleep will alleviate some of that.
My Cube
EDIT: Some people thought this was weird. So it was this cool site where you could create a digital cube of your "personality" which is basically an image search of your favorite art and entertainment. This is what I put together.
Quiz #2 for the week: Can you identify what the six sides are supposed to be?
Here is the link so you don't have to hear that AMAZING song each time you come here. And she is not ugly.
Quiz #2 for the week: Can you identify what the six sides are supposed to be?
Here is the link so you don't have to hear that AMAZING song each time you come here. And she is not ugly.
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Trivia
I went to a fan party for a certain book at a bookstore that hosted a trivia game and debate questions. Here are my trivia questions for you with images that will serve as helpful hints:
1) Name the store:
2) Name the book:
3) One of the participants in my group (we were divided up into districts) is trying out for the part of one of the characters in the movie that is slated to start filming in February. Name what character he is trying out for:
4) Guess what the girl who works at the store is saying to me while I am trying to get photographic evidence of being with this kid (in the event he gets the part)
5) Do you think he should play that part? Here are a few more professional photos so you can see what he would look like on the screen:
In case I get in trouble for putting these pics up over here I want to make sure and give credit to this website. I put the pics here instead of forcing you to follow the link because I didn't want to encourage middle-aged women to look at young male models, especially cuz he was a sweet kid and his mom was super nice, and I wouldn't want to make anyone go over there or anything.
Answer to trivia:
1) Borders
2) Mockingjay of course
3) Gale
4) "Um excuse me, you aren't allowed to take photos in the store."
5) Yes. He was really a nice and humble kinda person. His mom was like "he is trying out for the HG movie" and the girls in the room recognized his name, I think he was a star in the high school play when they did To Kill a Mockingbird. But anytime his mom would start to say something he would act super embarrassed because he didn't seem to want the attention. I mean, except for the modeling and acting and all. But it seemed sincere so he gets my vote.
5) Yes. He was really a nice and humble kinda person. His mom was like "he is trying out for the HG movie" and the girls in the room recognized his name, I think he was a star in the high school play when they did To Kill a Mockingbird. But anytime his mom would start to say something he would act super embarrassed because he didn't seem to want the attention. I mean, except for the modeling and acting and all. But it seemed sincere so he gets my vote.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
On Not Getting Uglier
I saw this article today about Gen X women hitting a midlife crisis and as a gen-xer and 35 year old I wonder if it applies to me.
Except it doesn't.
Because unlike many women, I didn't look better when I was younger. In fact, if I look back at my college photos I probably weigh around 25 lbs heavier--or more--back then. After 4 kids and a mortgage, I do not feel in crisis mode.
I am not having a body image issue because I can probably fit into my wedding gown--that was altered to fit a thinner girl than me who borrowed it a year later.
Last week I was telling a story to a friend of mine about how on my mission in Spain a woman called on the phone and asked if I was "¿la gorda o la flaca?" and I knew that I was "la gorda" because my companion was super skinny. I used it to illustrate how it was really good for my self-confidence to live in a culture that openly identifies your worst features and when my daughter Bridget uttered a sound of pity I laughed and told her that I learned a long time ago that my real skillset was not my beauty. And then it dawned on me in that one moment--I really and truly don't care anymore that I don't rival my gorgeous college roomies. Or that I will never be the kind of woman who turns heads when I walk into a room.
Because my happiness, my real joy comes from laughing at my own snarky comments, which honestly are really funny. Mostly.
Or from working with a teacher who starts crying out of relief because I have explained how to fit a square peg into a round hole and she finally understands how to do it.
Or from hearing my kids say "mom you are awesome" because I have taught them to say that to me.
So while there was a time in my life where being beautiful seemed to be the most important thing that would always elude me, my mind has finally brainwashed itself into believing that I am beautiful in a way that people have to know me to see. And that makes me feel superior.
My gen X companions might be out seeking ways to seek their former hotness but I have decided to skip that phase and hang tight with the "comfortable in my skin" biz.
After I lose 10 pounds.
Except it doesn't.
Because unlike many women, I didn't look better when I was younger. In fact, if I look back at my college photos I probably weigh around 25 lbs heavier--or more--back then. After 4 kids and a mortgage, I do not feel in crisis mode.
I am not having a body image issue because I can probably fit into my wedding gown--that was altered to fit a thinner girl than me who borrowed it a year later.
Last week I was telling a story to a friend of mine about how on my mission in Spain a woman called on the phone and asked if I was "¿la gorda o la flaca?" and I knew that I was "la gorda" because my companion was super skinny. I used it to illustrate how it was really good for my self-confidence to live in a culture that openly identifies your worst features and when my daughter Bridget uttered a sound of pity I laughed and told her that I learned a long time ago that my real skillset was not my beauty. And then it dawned on me in that one moment--I really and truly don't care anymore that I don't rival my gorgeous college roomies. Or that I will never be the kind of woman who turns heads when I walk into a room.
Because my happiness, my real joy comes from laughing at my own snarky comments, which honestly are really funny. Mostly.
Or from working with a teacher who starts crying out of relief because I have explained how to fit a square peg into a round hole and she finally understands how to do it.
Or from hearing my kids say "mom you are awesome" because I have taught them to say that to me.
So while there was a time in my life where being beautiful seemed to be the most important thing that would always elude me, my mind has finally brainwashed itself into believing that I am beautiful in a way that people have to know me to see. And that makes me feel superior.
My gen X companions might be out seeking ways to seek their former hotness but I have decided to skip that phase and hang tight with the "comfortable in my skin" biz.
After I lose 10 pounds.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Obligatory Self-Promotion
So last year as you may recall, I gave you a sob story about getting the flu as a lousy excuse for my horrible orange creation during the Hunger Games Cake Decorating Contest.
This year let me give you a different excuse for voting for me: I love my cake. I think the craftsmanship is mediocre for reasons outlined below, but I had so much fun coming up with the idea and talking to my kids about it and teaching my husband about the book as I researched the different districts that I just was happy with the process of creation even if it didn't play out exactly as planned.
If you haven't read the book I highly doubt you would bother to keep reading this post because you will be running out to catch up with Hunger Games and Catching Fire prior to the release of Mockingjay at Midnight tonight but this year's contest is of course hosted by the one and only Jespy. If you don't know about Jespy (known around here as jennyesp) than I feel sorry for you since she is truly a delightful person. She has a great deadpan kind of humor and btw has kept me reading for the last year via both a blog and random texts, not to mention that we are super compatible on goodreads...and the rate at which she keeps up with iPhone games is one of the key reasons I miss that particular device. She is kinda competitive, especially when her sisters get involved so keep your head down and don't make too many snarky comments if you are playing cards with them.
So back to me, the contest, I want you to know that I pulled into town at 4 pm yesterday, got my cake made, and was ready to move onto frosting when I realized I was out of both butter and powdered sugar. Since I didn't have any untapped neighbors I decided to google search "frosting without powdered sugar" and sure enough I ran across a nice little Royal Icing that you can use for such occasions. I had to boil sugar and cream of tartar until it hit 238 degrees F, whip up some egg whites to stiff peaks, and then mix the two concoctions together whipping constantly until cool. A lot of work, eh? But that is how dedicated I am to this contest. And did I mention my kids started school this morning and we have been gone for 10 weeks? So anyway the frosting didn't actually turn out to be stiff enough for detail hence my poor quality detail. But it is shiny so that part worked out.
Down to biz. Here is the cake. Your job is to go to the site and vote... not even for my cake, just for the best one because honestly there are some really good ones. But you have to give me SOME points for thinking it through, no? I thought putting the numbers on there was kind of Captain Obvious/Oprahlike but I couldn't help but think there might be some who would be confused.
Need some help?
District 1? They make luxury goods for the capital which is located there in the Rockies.
District 2? Yeah those are the careers. Training for the annual games because that is the way they roll.
District 3? Explosives. Want a close up?
District 4 is of course fishing. Love my shiny lake?
Yeah so then you got Foxface showing her meano face in district 5
Factories/industrial district 8
Districts 9 is of course electricity
11 agriculture
10 livestock
and 13 we know is nuclear power.
SPOILER ALERT
District 12?
12?
It WAS the coal mining region but now....
There is no district 12.
This year let me give you a different excuse for voting for me: I love my cake. I think the craftsmanship is mediocre for reasons outlined below, but I had so much fun coming up with the idea and talking to my kids about it and teaching my husband about the book as I researched the different districts that I just was happy with the process of creation even if it didn't play out exactly as planned.
If you haven't read the book I highly doubt you would bother to keep reading this post because you will be running out to catch up with Hunger Games and Catching Fire prior to the release of Mockingjay at Midnight tonight but this year's contest is of course hosted by the one and only Jespy. If you don't know about Jespy (known around here as jennyesp) than I feel sorry for you since she is truly a delightful person. She has a great deadpan kind of humor and btw has kept me reading for the last year via both a blog and random texts, not to mention that we are super compatible on goodreads...and the rate at which she keeps up with iPhone games is one of the key reasons I miss that particular device. She is kinda competitive, especially when her sisters get involved so keep your head down and don't make too many snarky comments if you are playing cards with them.
So back to me, the contest, I want you to know that I pulled into town at 4 pm yesterday, got my cake made, and was ready to move onto frosting when I realized I was out of both butter and powdered sugar. Since I didn't have any untapped neighbors I decided to google search "frosting without powdered sugar" and sure enough I ran across a nice little Royal Icing that you can use for such occasions. I had to boil sugar and cream of tartar until it hit 238 degrees F, whip up some egg whites to stiff peaks, and then mix the two concoctions together whipping constantly until cool. A lot of work, eh? But that is how dedicated I am to this contest. And did I mention my kids started school this morning and we have been gone for 10 weeks? So anyway the frosting didn't actually turn out to be stiff enough for detail hence my poor quality detail. But it is shiny so that part worked out.
Down to biz. Here is the cake. Your job is to go to the site and vote... not even for my cake, just for the best one because honestly there are some really good ones. But you have to give me SOME points for thinking it through, no? I thought putting the numbers on there was kind of Captain Obvious/Oprahlike but I couldn't help but think there might be some who would be confused.
Need some help?
District 1? They make luxury goods for the capital which is located there in the Rockies.
District 2? Yeah those are the careers. Training for the annual games because that is the way they roll.
District 3? Explosives. Want a close up?
District 4 is of course fishing. Love my shiny lake?
Yeah so then you got Foxface showing her meano face in district 5
Factories/industrial district 8
Districts 9 is of course electricity
11 agriculture
10 livestock
and 13 we know is nuclear power.
SPOILER ALERT
District 12?
12?
It WAS the coal mining region but now....
There is no district 12.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Home Again
Before I fill you in on the details of the rager that was Steve's grandma's 90th, let me tell you about my dreamy return home after 10 weeks.
You know how you walk in the door after a long vacation and your house is sorta clean but not really? And how you have no food in it? And how it is the day before school but you have no snacks for them? And how you have ants *because you live in family housing? And how it is Sunday so you want to keep the sabbath but also eat so you have to eat rice and refried beans assuming you have some in the pantry? Maybe some cereal with powdered milk (okay gross I would never do that but I hear some people do.)
Well my friends, let me tell you about my neighbor Clarice. Her husband is from New Zealand and since we were out of town for the summer, his parents came and stayed in our apartment for a couple of weeks. As "repayment" to us (since it had absolutely no negative affect on us whatsoever considering the apartment was just sitting here unused) we came home to the following:
1) A brand new refrigerator. The sealing strip has been busted for four years but we just shut it twice every time, never bothering to report it--Clarice called right away and next thing you know, boom, new fridge. And someone cleaned behind it which is even more magical and tragic. Tragical.
2) A clean house. I know that I have an amazing husband and I mean this in no way to be offensive to him, but he was here without me when they left. He packed and took the circus on the road with four kids by himself. I KNOW that the house was not this clean when he left. I just know. All towels were folded and put under the bathroom sink, the floors were vacuumed and swept, and all sheets were clean. Additionally, she cleaned off the bottom bunkbed and organized all items into a grocery bag. The kids room was especially marvelous.
3) This one is going to blow you away. Ready? A house full of food. Picture walking in the door and seeing your kitchen table stocked with enough snacks for kids' lunches for two weeks. Snacks galore. Imagine opening your fridge and seeing it full to the brim with fresh fruits, cheese, eggs, milk, yogurt (organic!) and a variety of other goodies. In the freezer? Salmon and chicken. Frozen gogurts for the kids--four boxes. No lie people.
4) A new vase and an envelope full of cash. It is probably tacky to list the amount here but let's just say it is the equivalent of a week's worth of groceries for our family of 6 people. Since they already provided us with two weeks worth of food, the extra cash seems, well, frankly amazing.
I have never done anything this generous for anyone and you can be sure that I am going to add this to the list of tricks that I would like to pull off at least once in my lifetime. Isn't it awesome? I just really am amazed that a woman with five kids of her own, a full blown time consuming job working for housing, and a husband working on a Ph.D took the time to do all of this for us. If you know Clarice I supposed you are probably not surprised, but wow, awesome, no?
This is on the same day as I received some pretty special hospitality from a friend of mine, Vegas style. I will share that story next but first I would like to collect a few stories from others--what is the nicest thing anyone has ever done for you?
*Seriously, even if you don't live in FSH, I find that ants are a major pain but if you go with the Terro, you won't regret it.
You know how you walk in the door after a long vacation and your house is sorta clean but not really? And how you have no food in it? And how it is the day before school but you have no snacks for them? And how you have ants *because you live in family housing? And how it is Sunday so you want to keep the sabbath but also eat so you have to eat rice and refried beans assuming you have some in the pantry? Maybe some cereal with powdered milk (okay gross I would never do that but I hear some people do.)
Well my friends, let me tell you about my neighbor Clarice. Her husband is from New Zealand and since we were out of town for the summer, his parents came and stayed in our apartment for a couple of weeks. As "repayment" to us (since it had absolutely no negative affect on us whatsoever considering the apartment was just sitting here unused) we came home to the following:
1) A brand new refrigerator. The sealing strip has been busted for four years but we just shut it twice every time, never bothering to report it--Clarice called right away and next thing you know, boom, new fridge. And someone cleaned behind it which is even more magical and tragic. Tragical.
2) A clean house. I know that I have an amazing husband and I mean this in no way to be offensive to him, but he was here without me when they left. He packed and took the circus on the road with four kids by himself. I KNOW that the house was not this clean when he left. I just know. All towels were folded and put under the bathroom sink, the floors were vacuumed and swept, and all sheets were clean. Additionally, she cleaned off the bottom bunkbed and organized all items into a grocery bag. The kids room was especially marvelous.
3) This one is going to blow you away. Ready? A house full of food. Picture walking in the door and seeing your kitchen table stocked with enough snacks for kids' lunches for two weeks. Snacks galore. Imagine opening your fridge and seeing it full to the brim with fresh fruits, cheese, eggs, milk, yogurt (organic!) and a variety of other goodies. In the freezer? Salmon and chicken. Frozen gogurts for the kids--four boxes. No lie people.
4) A new vase and an envelope full of cash. It is probably tacky to list the amount here but let's just say it is the equivalent of a week's worth of groceries for our family of 6 people. Since they already provided us with two weeks worth of food, the extra cash seems, well, frankly amazing.
I have never done anything this generous for anyone and you can be sure that I am going to add this to the list of tricks that I would like to pull off at least once in my lifetime. Isn't it awesome? I just really am amazed that a woman with five kids of her own, a full blown time consuming job working for housing, and a husband working on a Ph.D took the time to do all of this for us. If you know Clarice I supposed you are probably not surprised, but wow, awesome, no?
This is on the same day as I received some pretty special hospitality from a friend of mine, Vegas style. I will share that story next but first I would like to collect a few stories from others--what is the nicest thing anyone has ever done for you?
*Seriously, even if you don't live in FSH, I find that ants are a major pain but if you go with the Terro, you won't regret it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)