More photo blogging, because I am too blah and nothing-doing for real content. This is my poinsettia, which I believe is the same age as the Thanksgiving Cactus--about 2 years. I don't know if you can tell how tall it is, but I would estimate about 2-1/2 feet tall. I put it in this dim corner and hope it will turn reddish by xmas. So that makes 2 store-bought plants I have managed not to kill. I feel like I'm finally getting my money's worth--except I refuse to pay more than about 2 bucks for a plant, so I am getting more than my money's worth! 

Day 1 of the Thanksgiving Cactus blooming. I counted 8 flowers in various stages of opening on the front and 2 fully open ones on the back. Those white blobs all over are more buds. I also bought a tiny, fuscia-flowered Cactus at the store yesterday (on the right). Go me! 

*This* is the view from our study window. Eat your heart out, New England! 

I love Halloween-themed foods! (minus those Peeps my SIL mentioned) These are "french fries", if you can't tell. The pumpkin-shaped sugar cookies didn't last long enough to be photographed. 

A Groovy Kind of Fall

It looks like the Italian ice cream-mongers have fled to warmer climes. Where once fantastical concoctions of frozen dairy products graced the tables, now stand racks of leather goods, cheap clothing, and Lebkuchen. But the joke’s on them! It has turned warm-ish, enough so that dandelions are sprouting up again, aphids have swarmed our still-blooming geraniums, and I can walk outdoors in my shirt sleeves. That means we’ve had sunshine and temps in the 60s. On a drizzly but warm day, I overhead an elderly auditor in one of my classes remark that it felt like summer had broken out again. Well, given the kind of summer we had, I guess he’s right.

I saw a couple of ads in the window of a department store for Paris Hilton’s new perfume; I would now like to scrub my brain with bleach and never shop in that store again.

Luckily, I was able to counteract the effects somewhat by discovering the print ad for the men’s deodorant commercial I was banging on about previously. Turns out it’s from Rexona. The photo on their web site shows men commuting via bus-roof, but the print ad shows them commuting by hanging from the open door and landing skids on a helicopter.

I really should stop window-shopping, because I am frequently disturbed by what I see. For example, the bra with the x-straps on each side. The bottom legs of the x are attached on each side of the cup; the middle of the x sits at about the collarbone. God knows what the back looks like with all the straps going hither and thither. It makes me wonder who would want to strap down the tops of their breasts after enclosing the rest in a cute little demi-cup. Must have been designed by a man.

The wedding shop finally came through with a beautiful dress—in an ugly green-yellow crayon color. The dress itself was lovely—strapless but with one decorative (not structural) strap made of small silk flowers; the empress-style bodice had vertical pleating all the way around; and the skirt was straight but not tight (not something someone my height can carry off—sob!). Then they had to go and ruin it with the steno-pad paper color.

I generally make it a rule not to comment on people I know personally, but some people practically put a gun to your head. The grandma of one of D.D.’s classmates came to pick her up from school while I was waiting for D.D. I saw her walking up the stairs with a grumpy frown on her face; combined with the black, fuzzy sweater with red, black-spotted shoulders, I couldn’t help but think she looked like a ladybug with a bad attitude.

I might laugh at drivers getting speeding tickets and old ladies in ladybug clothing, but there is a line even I will not cross. I saw a man who had injured himself tripping over a knee-high chain that he hadn’t seen; it surrounds a small square near the mayor’s offices, so I guess it’s to keep people from trying to park there. Anyhow, at first I thought he was having a heart attack, because he was sitting on the ground in the midst of the pile of stuff he had been carrying and rubbing his ribcage on the left side. But when I offered to help him, he seemed as equally embarrassed as hurt. I could totally see myself doing that—which is one reason why I spend a lot of time scanning the ground and my immediate surroundings when I walk (and also the dog poo)—so there’s no way I would make fun of him. Drat my tender side!

Letting It Down Easy

Dear Computer,

I love you, but I can’t keep seeing you. The hours and hours of mind-numbing entertainment with you were great, but now I’ve got to move on. We’ll still see each other once in a while, but we’ll be more like work-friends who don’t socialize outside the office, and less like real friends that happen to work together but go to each other’s kids’ birthday parties, whose husbands fool around on the guitar and brew beer together, who laugh themselves into asphyxiation watching Waking Ned (Divine) together.

No, it’s strictly a working relationship now: a little email, some word-processing, a bit of Internet research, and the occasional blog post, but that’s it. No more evenings spent surfing the web and other people’s blogs; no more hours of solitaire; no more 26 levels of Homing Hippogriffs.


I hope you understand.

Sincerely,
Nee

Ps. Lovely Husband hasn’t abandoned you. I hope you like Democracy Now webcasts, though.

More Musical Bitching

The most horrible remake of Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” has been playing in an endless loop on Nick. Somehow this girl group from The Netherlands, Bad Candy, has managed to suck all the life out of what started as a really fun, upbeat song, and have turned it into a dull, plodding travesty of pop music. I just hope they don’t get their mitts on “She Bop.”

It hasn’t gotten down to freezing at night yet, so I put my Thanksgiving cactus back outside. I went out to put some laundry in the drier (on the lower balcony), and I noticed that what I had first taken to be the buds that grow into leaves, are actually buds that grow into flowers. I am going to have about 30 blooms on this baby in a couple of weeks, and I will post a picture here to prove to the Internets that I am *not* a plant killer.

I survived the first week back to school, but D.D. starts her first school holiday at the end of next week, which means we’ll start a week-plus of kid juggling. That, I might not survive.

We’ve had rain off and on since Wednesday (it’s “on” full-blast as I type), but have only been sprinkled on while out and about, thank goodness. The first time, D.D. wanted to know why God couldn’t go pee on some other continent. So now it’s a running joke that God is taking a whiz when it rains:
“Ha, ha, Mom! You’ve got God-pee on your glasses!”
“Yeah, well, you’ve got it on your jacket.”
“That means it’s holy.”
We’re a whole family of heetherns.

We’ve decided that it isn’t worth the time and money to light the tile oven this winter. It did not play a very major role in keeping the house warm last year, and it was a pain to try to keep going. So we’re holding on to the last few sticks of firewood for a special occasion.

And to fill out this banal bit of fluff I like to call a blog post, I’ve decided to include something I jotted down as a writing exercise during a break in one of my classes. I call it, “Classmate”.
diffident but annoying; sharp, nervous movements as he shifted from foot to foot, drifting back and forth between the electronics cabinet and the podium, making me want to glue his feet to the floor

Ding, Dong, The Witch is Dead

Tra la la la la la! I just showed my UT transcript (you know, where I already have a degree in German) to my advisor in the Foreign Language department, and I get to skip the class that is taught by the worst teacher I have ever had, including the one in third grade. Even though another faculty member misplaced some very important (for me) paperwork, I am so happy to be shot of the witch that sunshine is shining right out my ass. That’s happy!

I just realized that I graduated from UT 9 years ago. !!9 years ago!! Ohmygod! I mean, married 10 years—no biggie. Child turned 8—twinge, but no tears. Entered the adult world from the womb-like environment of the university 9 years ago—aaaaahhh! (insert scene of running about, screaming incoherently)

Sorry about that. It’s out of my system now.

So... The wedding shop has been a big disappointment to me lately. The dresses on display have been perfectly nice. I didn’t really care for the beige formalwear, but it was more of a “personal preference” thing and less of a “crime against the institution of marriage” thing.

But then my faith in humanity’s ability to fug itself was renewed in the main shopping street: I saw a woman in pants that appeared to have been made of black garbage bags. It’s the new Glad designer-wear (as opposed to their designer-ware)! There was only a thin layer of shiny, black plastic between her and the world. Fortunately, I think she may have already caught on to her mistake, because she was headed into the jeans store.

Here’s a quick request to the family for D.D.’s xmas shopping: books. She’s always complaining that she doesn’t have enough books to read, and she’s basically read everything in her room multiple times (even the new books from Gwamma this summer have been read through twice). They are less bulky than any toy, and you can go crazy in the Half Price Books or on eBay and not feel guilty, and not break the bank on shipping. Thank you for your attention.

And Bone-Head was her Name-O!

On Wednesday (a week ago), I ended up sitting around outside D.D.’s school because I stupidly forgot that trying to run an errand in the afternoon in our village is an exercise in futility. I had to take D.D. to the doctor the day before for a sore foot (something is irritating or inflaming her Achilles tendon), but the pharmacy didn’t have the meds in stock, but instead of going straight there the next morning when they were supposed to get their delivery, I decided to roll it into my trip out of the house to pick up D.D. from school.. Dumb, dumb, dumb! I will never learn that this particular pharmacy is *completely closed* on Wednesday afternoons. Except now I have a note in my Palm, if I remember to check it.

Then I was walking to the bus stop on Thursday morning, and I looked up to see a beautiful full moon just above the trees. There had been a LOT of fog in the mornings last week and the one before, and the whole scene of moon and fog was beautiful. Until I realized, “Hey, IDIOT—that’s the sun.” So I probably seared my retinas staring at “the moon.”
Fact of Nature: 1
Nee’s Brain: 0

There’s a reason I don’t accompany L.H. out in public. At D.D.’s ballet recital, he described one of the other dads as sporting a “poodle mullet.” He fusses at D.D. for calling cartoon characters “Trottel” (meaning “moron, jackass, idiot, twat, schmuck”—take your pick), yet when it comes to his own name-calling behavior... I, on the other hand, call names with abandon and don’t apologize, which might be one reason I don’t have a lot of friends here. Heh.

D.D.’s poor ballet class got screwed at the recital. Halfway through their dance, the CD skipped to the end. They ended up rushing off the stage in a confused bunch, but managed to run back out in a neat line to take a bow. D.D. said she feels like someone is picking on just *her*: none of the other groups had problems with their music, and in school she thinks the teacher is ignoring her raised hand (usually to choose instead one of D.D.’s mortal enemies in the back of the class). Shit happens, Baby, but not all the time.

It was downright cold this morning (by 11 am it had gotten *up* to 50F), so I made sure D.D. was well-bundled before we walked to school. She complained that she felt puffy in that jacket. Then she made up this whole explanation that she was once a marshmallow in my belly (1), but then she grew into a real baby that I gave birth to, then she was hit by lightening (I think?), and now she’s “Puffaloaf” from the land of “Puffalot”. She confided that it was supposed to sound like the Care Bear land. Ahhhh.

(1) If that were really the requirement for having children, I would have remained barren, because I hate eating marshmallows and all marshmallow-related foodstuffs, such as Peeps and circus peanuts. Ick!

So We’re Not Ozzie and Harriet

This evening L.H. and I realized that we are a special kind of couple. I had accused him recently of “asshattery”, and after I choked on my dinner for the umpteenth time tonight, he started speculating on whether I might be “deformed.” We totally cracked each other up with our cheek. I love that man.

Loose Ends

Darling Daughter is trying to find a balance between fitting in with her peers and not being bored/annoyed by them. The latest school-yard fad is collecting and trading paper. Not any old paper, but stationery decorated with these mouse characters. At first, D.D. was not interested at all, but then she admitted that maybe she would like to try it. I got her a couple of notepads, and she had a heavy day of trading last Friday. But Monday morning when we discussed whether she wanted to take her collection to school, she admitted that she wasn’t really all that into it after all, since it was basically an excuse for a hen party. Picky, picky.

I have started tutoring someone in English on Tuesdays, so I found myself outside my normal route this morning. That means new opportunities for people-watching, and I spotted a doozy: Drunky Hair Guy’s MOTHER. She had to be. She was old enough that she had a permanent stoop and slight palsy (and I heard her making that weird sucking sound that elderly people missing teeth unconsciously make), but her long, straightened hair and lipstick were magenta, and her clothes (except for the D.A.R.E. t-shirt) were all leather, with the jacket sleeves rolled up. When she got off the bus, she slung her bag over her shoulder, put her hand in her pants pocket, and strutted away.

Lovely Husband insisted that we go ahead and crank the heater up, even though we haven’t awoken to any less-than-68F-indoors mornings yet. But please don’t think he did this for his cold-natured wife or clothing-averse child. It was completely for the sake of the batch of mead that is fermenting up against a radiator in our living room. You can see where his loyalties lie.

It turns out my xmas cactus is really a Thanksgiving cactus, at least, that is what this site has led me to believe. Also, I have been taking care of it completely wrong, but it doesn’t seem to care. It put on four blooms recently, and after I brought it in out of the cold last week, almost every single “branch” put on a new leaf at the end. So take that, Schlumbergera Bridgesii fanciers!

In my then muddle-headed state, I left out a contender for favorite commercial. A model is sashaying down the catwalk in her orange C&A cardigan and black slacks, all very tasteful. On one side are your typical fashion-show attendees with their notebooks and their cameras. On the other side are the male version of the bystanders when the Beatles landed on American soil—men shrieking and crying and fainting. Hee!

I thought I was the only person disturbed by the side-effects (no pun intended) of low-rise pants, but thanks to I, Asshole, I now know that the icky side-pooch mashed potato-bag of love handles caused by low-rise pants are called “muffin top.” My life is complete.

Happy Birthday to Me

Knowing that I started this puppy up last October, I checked just now to see exactly when. And it was exactly TODAY, one year ago that I started inflicting my words on the Internet. wipes tear from eye It was a bit like realizing in March that I'd been married 10 years. Whoa! Where has the time gone?

Anyhow, thanks to all my beloved friends and family (all 5 of you) who've stuck through it with me. Here's to another year of navel-gazing and bitching!

Paris Revisited

The specter of the un-blogged Paris trip has been hanging over me ever since we got back, but I have to admit that we were so busy and having such a good time that I didn’t jot down a single note while we were there. Trying to reconstruct the entire trip at this point seems fruitless, but I thought I’d at least hit the highlights. [LMIL—feel free to jog my memory in the comments.]

Lovely MIL’s Travel Guru (TM), Rick Steves, advises going to the Eiffel Tower in the evening because the lines are shorter, but we got an even better treat than a short wait. As we were walking away at 8 pm, flashbulbs started going off all over the Tower. It was an amazing sight that lasted about 5 minutes. Rick Steves never mentioned *that*!

The sewers were overrated. The history of Paris’ water and wastewater systems is fascinating, but it would have been more interesting if 1) the sewers we were walking through were a lot older without so many modern contraptions, and 2) if the museum was not situated *directly above flowing sewage.* The smell was strong enough that we never got used to it during the hour or more we were down there.

We skipped the Louvre for Versailles, which words just can’t do justice to, if you’re into a palace made of mirrors and gold. One fantastic feature that we will never again pass up on at a museum or historical site was the self-guided tour via headphones. It kept D.D. from getting bored out of her skull, and it was easier to learn about the rooms we were passing through than if we had to crowd around signs with hundreds of other visitors. Versailles—2 thumbs up.

LMIL insisted we eat in a real French restaurant at least once, so we got a recommendation at the hotel and settled in for a 2-hour meal. I ordered Steak Tartar. The waitress asked if I knew what I was ordering. Oh, yes. Mmmm...raw meat. If the idea of trichonosis never scared me off raw bacon, what’s a little raw ground beef prepared by a French chef? Everything was wonderful.

All in all, we had a great time. We were able to rein in L.H.’s checklist-tourist tendencies by hopping on a tour bus that lets you get on and off as often as you want for the whole day, so we were able to see lots more places than the first time, although we didn’t get off at as many. LMIL had her off-the-beaten-path tips from ol’ Rick Steves, so we even saw a few things we hadn’t known we’d missed before. I think LMIL is already trying to figure out how to get back to Paris, maybe as a “chick trip” with her sister. You could spend months there, only visiting one place a day, and never run out of places to see.

D.D. Takes Ballet By Storm

Today was the pre-recital trying-on of the costumes that the ballet teacher spent the whole summer vacation (6 weeks) sewing. She had a couple of ladies helping her who I think are participants in her adult dance classes. Anyhow, they were a new audience for the hyped-up little girls (and one boy). I could hear from the waiting room that someone must have pulled D.D.’s string:
“I’m from America. My whole family is English: my mom, my dad...”

“My grandma sews for money.”
I got a mental image of LMIL standing on the freeway with a cardboard sign. Hee!

***

While LMIL was here visiting, she and D.D. had planned to make smothered steak (or “smothered snakes” in our idiolect). We ran out of time (or maybe energy) before they left, so I was forced to make it on my own. D.D.’s verdict? “Gwamma-licious!”

This 1950s vampire warns, "Don't Block My Driveway." 

Little Route of Horror

We often see some unusual, potentially frightening things on the way to and from school. For instance, a couple of weeks ago, some contractors were putting some pipes in the yard of a house on our route. Scary! I know! Anyhow, one of them had this fake arm sticking up from under the front end of his truck, and it made me think of that segment from Creepshow 2: “Thanks for the ride, lady!” That movie gave me nightmares for like a year; I think I was 12 or 13 when I saw it, and my dad made sure to jump out and yell “Thanks for the ride, lady!” as often as possible. Needless to say, I didn’t mention that association to D.D.

Then there’s the charming dog we like to call “Cujo.” He looks like a white Husky, but I don’t know dogs. We only see him about once every 2 or 3 months, but when he’s out in his yard, snarling and trying to eat us through the fence, D.D. and I usually jump out of our skin. D.D. is usually an Animal Friend(TM), but on the rare occasion when I wonder why we haven’t seen Cujo in a while, she hopes he died.

Finally, there’s this fantastic “Do Not Block Driveway” sign (see prior post; stupid Blogger seems to think I've used up all my photo space). It just seems to sum up the whole surreal experience of Walking To School.

D.D.-isms

On the way home from school this afternoon, D.D. noticed that a street sign at the end of our block was lying across the top of a utility box instead of its usual place on the pole. She blamed some nameless, reckless teenagers: “Stupid teenagers are very crafty.” I can’t wait to see what she says about them when she is one.

When we got to the front door, she was telling me, “Last night, when I was terrorizing the squeaker [out of the Taboo Junior game], I was trying to get my Wut [anger] out.” She then went on to describe how she smashed it against the door to her room, stepped on its head, and even bit it a little. Between the crying and the carrying on, she managed to give herself a pretty bad headache. All this because we fussed at her for changing the tv channel without asking first. It’s a bad habit she has, and this time L.H. was taping something.

Now is the Time on Blogger When We Writhe in Self-Embarrassment

I have this handy way of learning something so that I NEVER, EVER forget it. It is called mortification. For instance, my high school boyfriend corrected me that it is “PRE-rogative.” (Stupid Bobby Brown.) We were both being asses about it, but that crow, it was bitter to eat, let me tell you.

As I spend more time on the Internet, I find that I mortify myself more and more frequently. That is only natural in a medium where words are all you have to present yourself. When I am not careful how I phrase something, or I try to be cute or flip, it invariably comes back to bite me in the ass. In the most recent case (in the comments of a blog I follow), I tried to go back and briefly but politely restate what I said, but I know it probably came off as being defensive. So now I have basically messed it up for myself to “hang around with the cool kids,” so to speak.

Fortunately, I have this little blog in which to do my penance. Consider this my dose of self-mortification.

Not Clear on the Concept

Lovely Husband was in a self-affirming mood yesterday. “I have lots of hobbies: I play guitar; I brew mead; I carve wood...”

“You’re a Viking,” Darling Daughter helpfully supplied.

We had to explain that being a Viking is more a way of life than a hobby.

Reason #2 for Grumpiness

Reason #1 is the past week of rain. #2 is the fact that I am 32 years old, and this is my hair:



Thanks, Dad.