Time Flies When You're Soaking Wet

My Lovely Husband will be 32 tomorrow, and he’s going into it kicking and screaming. I hadn’t realized it was such an issue for him until he confessed that he really thought he was turning 31.
2005-1973=32, Baby.
I may be 6 months older, but he can’t make the difference even larger just by wishing it. I told him that he can feel as young as he wants (I myself often feel about 12).

Darling Daughter has been stuck in high-glam mode for a couple of days now, so the dress-up box and make-up bag have taken up semi-permanent residence in the living room. Yesterday she was a fairy, complete with feather-bedecked wings, magic wand, and high heels. She discovered that the heels can poke holes in cardboard, so part of the evening was spent perforating the flaps I had cut off a box. Later, though, she declared that even fairies like to be comfortable, and she changed her heels (still with the wings) for sock and tennies. That’s my girl!

I was also supposed to be a fairy, but I was in turbo-cleaning mode; I allowed myself to be dolled up a bit with make-up and a choker made of a shoelace and an enormous, blue silk carnation. I think it was just the right touch to go with my Muppet t-shirt and flannel pajama pants.

First, D.D. wanted to have a fairy ball, but as it was just the two of us (L.H. was out), that was a bust. Then it was time for fairy school. I had my wand revoked for not attending class and for not watching Dave the Barbarian. D.D. is a harsh teacher, people.

Later that evening, she changed into what she thought looked like a belly-dancing costume, complete with veil. She gets this really serious look on her face when she’s dancing; it’s almost comical, but you can tell she’s totally earnest.

This morning she wore one of her tutus plus a metric ton of make-up, including a purple stripe under her eyes and across the bridge of her nose. So she could be an Indian ballerina, don’t you know. She opted to ditch the make-up and tutu but keep the bun to go into town, of which I heartily approved to myself, although I told her that whatever she wanted was fine. She obviously thought she looked great (and we repeatedly told her she looked great; sue me), but no one would mistake her for a mini-Britney Spears, so I figured, what the hell. But it turns out that she’s more modest in public than at home, so she wanted the make-up off before going out.

The weather today is just fabulous—sunny but mild and only occasionally overcast. I don’t think it’s gotten over 80. Mmmm... D.D. and I went to the playground to enjoy the good weather. She ran about for 10 minutes or so, then decided to read and cool off. She had a book handily tucked into her large, black, vinyl purse, which I had to tote for her starting when we got off the bus. I’m sure it’s the perfect accessory for my Harry Potter t-shirt and jeans. She managed to read about 30 pages and finish it while we sat there.

After writing the above, Mother Nature ran up behind me with a large “Kick Me” sign. D.D. and I went into a shop, and while I was buying her a long-sleeved Barbie shirt and some new socks, it started to rain. Buckets. Neither of us had a jacket or an umbrella, but at least we had the new shirt to pull over D.D.’s sundress. So instead of getting an ice cream while we were out, we got hot chocolate.

Last year, D.D. swore that the icky Tales from the Cryptkeeper cartoon series [I know...what were we thinking?!] was not scary and that she liked it. We cut her off when the episodes started repeating, and then it went off the air. We foolishly thought we were safe. It recently came back on, but now, as soon as the intro starts, D.D. yells, “Turn it off! Turn it off! Turn it off!” and puts her hands over her ears. She has decided that the music creeps her out, and if we don’t turn it off quickly, it gets stuck in her head. I can relate to that. [B-O-M-B-Y!] When we got in the car the other day, some “heavy” rock song was playing on the radio, and D.D. informed me that it was her and her dad’s favorite song; it was also the only song that could banish the TftC theme song. I think she just hasn’t given BOMBY a chance.

Growing Pains

Sometimes my Darling Daughter seems so grown up; part of being a precocious only child, I guess. Like today while watching The Wizard of Oz, she said, "Wow. That Miss Gulch is a real bitch." She got reprimanded, of course. Then a little later, when Auntie Em declared that she couldn't say what she wanted against Miss Gulch because she herself was a Christian woman, D.D. asked, "She means what I said earlier, right?"

Then other times, I'm reminded of just how little she is. Like when her friend spent the night, and they slept in a pile of teddy bears and baby dolls.

But this afternoon showed me how she's really both at once. She set up her Play-doh sundae maker thingie and offered me a series of ice creams whose flavors were based on their colors. Typical 8-year-old behavior. Then she wanted me to rate each flavor as part of a taste test; she labeled the containers with the label maker. I wasn't aware that marketing was so in among the third-grade set.

I Am the Stupidest Woman Alive

So today, I let two strangers into my home. Vacuum cleaner salesmen. Or rather, one salesman and one trainee. It only occurred to me after I had let them in that maybe it wasn't such a good idea, since it was just me and D.D. at home. I'm afraid I was only paying half-attention to the spiel, the other half of my brain trying to remember the number for the police while simultaneously planning either a hurried escape or a lunge toward the knife block in the kitchen.

Anyhow, it was a cool vacuum cleaner, if I had *an extra grand plus change* for a household appliance to suck hair and kitty litter off my floors. It came with so many attachments, I'd probably have to devote a whole closet to the beast. One attachment had a brush for cleaning between the coils of the radiators, but I bet that Swiffer brush doo-dad can't run more than five bucks, no?

My favorite attachment, though, was introduced with a flourish: "For the man." It was a tube with what appeared to be a cloven hoof on the end. My brain re-engaged and went into overdrive at that point, trying to figure out *how* it was to be used by said man. Hygiene? Personal grooming? My guesses were getting wilder and more graphic; it must have shown on my face, because he hurried to explain that it sticks to the wall where *the man* is drilling a hole, to suck up the bits of plaster and sheet rock that are knocked loose. Of course! Because only *men* know how to use a drill. Riiight!

Needless to say, we didn't get the vacuum cleaner, although I did let L.H. be the one to turn them down over the speaker phone at the door when they returned later. Yes, I am a chicken. I've decided from now on to just pretend I'm not home if L.H. is not here and the doorbell rings, because I'm obviously incapable of turning away polite but potentially murderous door-to-door salesman.

The Arts and Crafts Movement

...at Chez Nee.

Darling Daughter and I have been trying to find ways of entertaining ourselves that don't involve so much tv on these wet and dreary days. Monday, it barely reached 70F. We were able to get out for about an hour for some errands during a timely break in the rain, but we weren't home five minutes when it started again. Otherwise, we've been stuck at home. On Sunday, we even had some rock-salt-sized hail.

So far, we've made play dough (1), worked on a paint-by-numbers of a princess on a pony, half-finished a tiny model of a funicular car, and built and rebuilt many, many Lego buildings. [FYI: MegaBlocks are compatible with Lego Duplo.] D.D. has declared that she wants to be called "Bob-ina the Builder." We've also baked a couple of batches of cookies.

Yesterday we watched A Christmas Story, and D.D. wanted to write a "theme" like Ralphie: "What I Want for Christmas." It quickly turned into a letter to Santa, which she folded, sealed with a label (she discovered the label-maker we got from her aunt and uncle for xmas, so now everything in the house is labeled with its name and/or price), and has hoarded it away for December. She wished a kitchen robot for me, a watch that turns into anything you want for her dad, and a McDonald's kitchen playset for herself. At one point while brainstorming, she was trying to come up with a way to combine a coffee maker and a massage chair; she will make a fortune when she figures it out.

I was trying to remember the bedtime story I used to tell D.D. as a toddler, about the floppy fish who didn't want to go to bed. So she wrote a title, "The Adwentures [sic] of Floppy Fish," and started dictating a few lines of text. When we looked at it again the next morning, she said, "That's good, but...it needs about 50 more pages!" I don't know when she thought I was going to whip out 50 more pages of a story I couldn't remember.


(1) LilSis's Play Dough Recipe
2 cups flour
½ cup salt
1 Tbsp. cream of tartar
1-3/4 cups boiling water
2 Tbsp. vegetable oil
food coloring

Mix together the dry stuff; mix together the wet stuff and add it to the dry stuff. (Actually, I usually wait to add the food coloring until after the dough is mixed so I can divide it and make several colors.) Cool for 10 minutes. Knead until smooth, adding flour if needed. It lasts several weeks if sealed properly (those ziploc containers work well). D.D. really enjoyed following the "recipes" on the back of the food coloring box for exotic colors like dusty rose and turquoise.

Medicine and Mayhem

My GYN offered to put me on an estrogen patch (1) instead of taking out my IUD like I asked—thanks, Doc!—so if I start acting all whacked out or express a desire to wear polyester outfits, well, you've been forewarned.

(1) She normally prescribes this to women going through "change of life," as my grandmother calls it.

L.H. has been warning me since I got the IUD that I shouldn't dick around with Mother Nature, and apparently a hormone-laden, plastic, uterine irritant is just not enough to knock her out. Who would have thought?

While at the doctor's office, I had the second worst phlebotomy experience ever. Normally, nurses look at me and have a Tootsie Roll moment, where they see a giant, pulsing vein, then they start to drool. The first vial was filled without a hitch. The second vial—two squirts, then nothing. What the hell? I couldn't have been *out of blood.* [L.H. asked if I heard 'pssst' when she put the needle in. ha ha] So the nurse looked at the partial vial and said, "It's probably enough." She slapped a band-aid on my arm, told me to press on it, and sent me on my way.

While I was waiting at the pharmacy across the street, I felt something wet on my arm. I had bled through the band-aid and my sleeve. Despite my legendarily full veins, that's never happened to me before. And it hurts like hell, to the point that I almost made myself cry test-poking it.

And in the window of the apothecary, I saw the PHARMACIST OF THE DAMNED. Marionettes are creepy enough, but a *pharmacist puppet* is downright disturbing somehow.

Our neighbors have 2 (normally) well-behaved Yorkies, Lola and Arthur. [And what is it with Yorkie owners and gay pet names? I wouldn't be surprised to meet a Hell's Angel and his Yorkie Priscilla.] Today, L. and A. have been barking almost non-stop for *5-and-a-half hours.* You'd think they would have barked themselves hoarse by now, but no such luck. After the first hour, we heard another neighbor knock on the door and ring the bell, but no one was home. Personally, I think the dogs have eaten their owners and are barking for fresh meat. L.H. is doubtful for some reason. In any case, they have just reconfirmed for me my hatred of small, yippy dogs.

Missy Cat is still taking it slow and easy after her near-death experience, but I think she's feeling more like her old self, because she tried to rip Eliza Cat a new ass for sniffing at her.

I noticed while down in the village that hairdressers must be the only people in the world who can get away with wearing a metal-studded, low-slung belt *and* thong FMPs (2) at the same time. Outside of a music video (and the aforementioned beauty parlor), I don't think I've ever seen the combination in the real world.

(2) FMPs=Fuck Me Pumps

Oh, How the Mighty Have Fallen, So to Speak

Missy Cat has just proven that intelligence is *not* her defining trait. She wouldn't come in from the roof-top terrace when I called her, so I slid the door to; if she wanted in, she'd have to beg (or miaow, I'm easy). Instead, I heard 'thump, thump, thump', and she was gone. L.H. went outside and checked all around the house, and there was no sight or sound of her. I took a turn during his and D.D.'s bedtime reading and found M.C. crouching in the bushes by the front door. She had apparently fallen (jumped? slipped?) from the roof of the third floor. She loves L.H. more than me, so she let him pick her up and bring her back inside.

As of bedtime, she has a light nosebleed and seems ginger on her feet, but she let me pet her and didn't try to bite off my hand when I pressed all over her belly, looking for possible internal injuries. According to a paper I read online about high-rise syndrome, cats who fall several stories tend to have injuries to the face and chest, and fractures of the limbs. M.C. doesn't seem to be in bad pain when she walks (no crying or falling or limping, just a stiff gait), so we're hoping she's better—and wiser!—in the morning. If not, there's a vet right down the street.

I am relieved as much for D.D.'s sake as for the cat's that things turned out so well (knock on wood), because Missy Cat was suddenly D.D.'s own, personal, favorite cat the minute she went missing. L.H. and I are planning to wake up early just in case.

At least we found her before it started to rain. I think it may have got up to 80F during the day, but at bedtime it was probably closer to 60F. Ick.

***

M.C. doesn't seem to have developed any further complications during the night, but we did notice a scrape on her belly this morning. It must be tender, because she nipped me when I tried to touch it. But she had made it up onto the couch on her own, and later she joined us on the bench at breakfast, so she must have been feeling much better to make the effort of hopping up on the furniture to be so sociable. Now we need to figure out how to block up the balcony where she can't get out onto the roof. Of course, with all the cool weather recently, we probably didn't even need to have that door open yesterday (but L.H. isn't happy unless he has every door and window in the house open, even when it's 60F outside).

A Little of This, A Little of That

Yesterday, D.D. declared she was just *too excited* because Gwamma is coming and Austin Powers will be on tv. See, Gwamma, you're in the same popularity category as Austin Powers. It's true love!

[L.H. said I should rename this "The Grandma Stroking Blog," but is it my fault that D.D. is so sweet all the time?]

My daughter is generally averse to eating anything that looks remotely natural, like vegetables, but apparently she decided to suspend the rule when it comes to cherries. Last time we bought some, she put a cherry in each cheek (several times) and was all, "Look at me! I'm a squirrel!" Unfortunately, she was a squirrel with diarrhea, because she ate most of the pint by herself at one sitting. That'll learn her.

I HATE driving down the hill in our village, because cars are parked all along the downhill side, but even more than that, I HATE riding in the passenger seat when L.H. drives down the hill. He is not driving recklessly, but he drives as close as possible to the parked cars, forcing me to gasp, flinch, and clench my gut. Not the most preferred method of exercising my stomach muscles, let me tell you. And it will never get better. Sigh.

While on our outing over the weekend, D.D. spotted a pizzeria that we will NEVER, EVER dine in. Have you ever seen the cute little pizza cook statue that adorns the sidewalk outside an Italian/pizza restaurant? He usually has a board where the day's specials are posted. This one was also holding up a tray, on which was a severed pig's head. Not remotely appetizing.

I don't remember if I mentioned here that L.H. was in a funk of despair over the state of his flowerless geraniums, but it appears that his concern was premature, nicht wahr? 

So Sad!

It seems that Darling Daughter has lost track of the number of days until Gwamma and PawPaw come, but she has a good excuse—her classmates got so annoyed with her continually announcing the countdown that she stopped counting. The shame! The infamy!

My pleasure in container gardening has turned to rage at the ants who dare to chomp my plants. Somehow, our *fourth floor balcony* has become an ant haven. They don't seem to be damaging my food plants (chives and parsley), but they're eating the hell out of the leaves on my (not yet) flowering plants. They really seem to have a jones for one type with long, grass-like blades; they've eaten most of them down to the stems! After a few violent, ineffectual rages, I got smart and looked for ant killer when I went grocery shopping. Success! The stuff smells like seasoned salt but kills like cyanide. Woo! hoo!

The ants are lucky that I didn't take a page out of the neighbor's book and bust out a flame thrower. L.H. and I thought that was kind of overkill for weed removal, but to each his own.

L.H. is in the dog house right now. [I wonder if I need a set of crocheted fridgies like his grandmother has—a dog house and several animals, each labeled with the name of a family member. The problem with that set-up is 1) magnets don't stick to our fridge, 2) I try to avoid crocheted ugliness, 3) it's a little too passive-aggressive for my taste, and 4) it's more fun to tell off my loved ones in person than to relegate their crocheted likeness to the crocheted dog house.]

Anyhow, yesterday L.H. talked us into a "short" day-trip since the weather was so nice. A "quick" trip to two nearby towns turned into an 8-hour excursion that included a hike to a spring that is allegedly the site of a major event in the Nibelungenlied (when Siegfried gets whacked), and another hike (that D.D. and I passed on) to a chapel dedicated to Saint Walburga. We packed a lunch to take with us, but we were still starving and tired when we got home. L.H. is in the dog house because he conveniently "forgot" to mention that he wanted us to do the last two things, which doubled the length of our outing and added the hated element of strenuous exercise.

More D.D.

There are few things in the world my child loves more than water, string, and paper, or any combination thereof. [The mini-crossbow with suction-cup arrows she got from a magazine in the meantime might be giving the other bits a run for their money, though.] L.H. and I have seen a wide variety of mail games D.D. came up with on her own: Delivery Duck, who speaks in a robotic quack; Letter in a Bottle, which requires a full bathtub and an empty soda bottle; the Mail Basket, which is an Easter basket tied, with a string, to the upper railing on the stairs and hoisted up and down between sender and addressee; and your basic Mailbox, which started out as a Lego box, but through the power of D.D.'s imagination and a coat of paint, has become—a mailbox!

As I've been cleaning out D.D.'s toy boxes (a couple of Rubbermaid storage bins and a cardboard box left over from our trip to Texas at xmas), I have come across more bits of paper and pieces of string and yarn than a whole kindergarten art class could use in a year. Once I got all the string detached from her toys, I made a mental note to address the string tied to every knob, bed-rail, and handle in her room tomorrow. Too tired today. Frankly, I'm surprised she hasn't accidentally strangled herself by now.

Once I finished the first toy box, I was covered in dirt and glitter, so I felt filthy but glamorous. Fortunately the other boxes turned out to be much cleaner. Hoorah! The boxes are sorted and repacked, but I still have to go through a couple of shelves in the cabinet and the space under her playbed, then actually *clean*, like with the vacuum and a dustrag. A mother's work is never done.

D.D. should actually be helping me more, seeing how she has so much free time on her hands. I'm not talking about school vacation; she is restricted from tv over the weekend because she used up *an entire bottle of dishsoap* washing a toy tea set with only 3 place settings. L.H. and I still haven't figured out how she managed to do it: she was only out of the room 5 or 10 minutes, and there was no mountain of suds to indicate that *an entire bottle of dishsoap* had just been used up. She got punished because this is not the first time she's done something like this, and she's been warned not to do it. It is really frustrating to be giving her a bath and find that both the liquid soap and the shampoo bottles have been filled with water, so there is about 5% soap to 95% water. Aargh!

She has tried to be more helpful around the house to make up for it, like being my quiche-mixing helper and table-setter last night, but she's going to find that from now on, she's going to have more chores, if only to keep her out of trouble.

Correction to July 26

L.H.'s comment about my abruptly ending post from a few days ago actually referred to the fact that several lines disappeared between typing and posting, not my bad post-ending skills. So I dug out the original post (thank goodness I learned my lesson from using Hotmail not to type directly into a Web-based program) and have fixed it. Sorry.

Just Call Me Cussy McFoulmouth

Despite evidence to the contrary here, I really don't curse that much. Well, I don't consider it to be much: my daughter is not unfamiliar with the words "crap" and "ass." But I try not to let it be every other word. Of course, all bets are off when I'm driving the hairpin-filled road over the hill to get D.D. to ballet. Last week was particularly bad; *three* assholes had driven over the line into my lane in a curve. Hel-lo! White lines, people, use 'em! I have noticed a lot of the locals kind of aimlessly slaloming up and down the hill, and it drives me batshit, because—dangerous!

So I'm glad that D.D. has way outgrown the parroting stage, because the grandparents would be treated to a tiny-voiced rendition of "Goddamn! Asshole!" [Yes, two separate words—one to curse the situation and one to curse the shit-for-brains endangering our lives.] Worse for me, D.D. is in the reminding stage, so I get to hear that I shouldn't say such bad words. I'm thinking, "Hey, kid, you're lucky I don't have a missile launcher on this car, because the input from your eyes would be much worse than that from your ears."

She's not Miss Perfect, either, let me tell you. While trying to construct a temple out of Legos (so she'll be an architect instead of an engineer!), there was a repeated series of collapses during the roof-building phase, followed each time by an angry "shit!" So I got to be the reminder, which is actually the natural order of things.

Now I'm remembering when she was a toddler, and she'd refuse something to eat by saying, "I don't want that cwap!" It was so funny that we had a hard time scolding her with a straight face.

But it's not all cursing and carrying on at Chez Nee.

D.D. decided the other night that her tie-dye t-shirt just wasn't fancy enough, so she bummed some gold ribbon off me and began to sew it in a big bow on the front, then to take the extra and make a loopy pattern across the stomach. Tres chic!

She and her friends have decided to make an all-girls club, and they call themselves the "Wild Girls", after the soccer movie called Die Wilden Kerle (the wild guys). The only thing is, the other girls in their class also want to be the Wild Girls, so it's a permanent point of contention between the groups, I'm afraid.

Yesterday was D.D.'s last day of school. She has 6 weeks off for summer vacation and goes back in mid-September. She was awake for 10 minutes this morning before she declared that she was bored. It's going to be a long 6 weeks.

I just hope she goes back to staying in her own bed all night. One morning at 5 am, I heard her alarm go off, then she came cheerfully traipsing up the stairs with her tiny American Girl lamp as a flashlight (15 watts can be pretty bright in a dark room). She was quite proud that she had gotten herself up, but I was less pleased to be awoken when I had an oral exam a mere 4 hours later. Then last night she made it into our bed again. Of course, it was stiflingly hot, so I can understand that it was hard to sleep. L.H. hooked us up with the fan, and we managed to sleep the rest of the night in slightly crowded coolness. (LMIL: it clouded over this morning, so that makes 1 hot day for about 8 cool days; think you guys can handle that?)

We heard this horrible song on the American radio station. It was a "heavy-ish" rock song, and the chorus was something about "Have a Nice Day", sung in this kind of tough-guy, growly voice. It was the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I couldn't tell if it was supposed to be ironic or sarcastic, which would make it seem more acceptable in my book, but I got the impression it was sung straight. I mean, did the band have a big, yellow smiley face on their album cover? Are the other songs on the album "Y'all Come Back and See Us" and a remake of "You Are My Sunshine"?

As much as I'd like to blather the day away, D.D. and I have a date with her horribly messy room.

You wanted photos, you got photos! Here is the perfect dress for a hooker on her big day. 

A Week of Fun

L.H. pointed out that my last post ended rather abruptly; to tell you the truth, I ran out of steam and notes at the same time. But you are free to think that I was abducted by aliens at that point, or that I was rendered unconscious by the neighbor's "washing machine music," as L.H. calls it.

***

Life didn't come to a complete halt for us once the university semester was over on July 15. L.H. is just now finishing up the last of his grading, and I had the 2-part Latin exam looming over my head. Plus I had a week of marinating in Harry Potter 6.

I did manage to crank out a baby outfit over the weekend for a friend who is due in August. D.D. and I had checked out 2 DVDs from the book bus, so I spent a lot of my weekend crocheting and watching Monsters, Inc. and Bend it Like Beckham. I'm a whirlwind of activity! [There's a scene in BILB where the heroine is being fitted for a sari, and the seamstress quips, "I'll make these mosquito bites look like juicy, juicy mangos." Damn! Why isn't she my seamstress?]

I have also spent a lot of time being a grouch. I blame it on hormones, or maybe the thought of my second Latin exam poking me in the brain. Of course, one day I think we all got up on the wrong side of the bed, because none of us could be civil. "L."H. even asked if I was "riding the crimson wave," to which I responded that he was a "whirling vortex of suckitude." That put us in a better mood; L.H. has suggested that we start using my new phrase everywhere. [Actually, I *think* I came up with it on my own, but I'm like a word-magpie, picking up shiny words I come across. So I don't want to make any easily refutable claims.]

L.H. had a really crappy Monday last week, even compared to mine. I had the 3-hour Latin exam, but he locked himself out of the house. He was scheduled to pick up D.D. from school and take her with him to a meeting on campus. As it so happens, HP6 was delivered that afternoon, and in his haste to dress (it was a hot, muggy day) and meet the mail man in the stairwell, he left his keys inside. With every window in the house open against the heat, a pretty strong breeze gets drawn into the apartment...and the front door slammed shut. L.H. was so flustered by being locked out that he forgot he had shoes in the wardrobe in the stairwell and went to pick up D.D. *barefoot*. The new neighbors let the 2 of them stay there and tried to call the landlord. When they got ahold of him, his helpful advice was to borrow a ladder from his shop downstairs and climb up the roof to the open terrace door (on the 4th floor). The whole afternoon was a disaster.

Then another day he had a minor accident on his bike.

[Oh, no! The Maniacal Laughing Woman just got on the bus!]

All in all, it was not one of his better weeks.

[Now she is talking loudly to herself, to the point that the guy behind her got up and moved to the back of the bus.]

Yesterday while on an errand, I walked past an unfortunate example of why tanning is bad. This woman was probably 60. She had on a blouse with a wide neck, which had slipped off her shoulder. There was no bra strap, so I got an eyeful of a broad expanse of what appeared to be rich, Corinthian leather. *shudder*

We have spotted more doppelgangers this semester. A friend of a friend was teaching D.D. belly dance, and it turns out that she looks almost *exactly* like my friend Dani, down to the color of her hair and the style of her makeup. And a guy in my Latin class is the spitting image of her husband, Jason, if only Jason grew his hair out waist length and dyed it black. It's getting a little freaky.

Every few weeks, an old, white van will be parked across the street, then after another couple of weeks, it'll be gone. I don't know if the owner has a work schedule like on an off-shore oil rig—2 weeks home, 4 weeks on the rig—or if he just can't always find an open spot on that stretch of the street, but the reason I notice the van is that the back side windows are covered with a poster from Pirates of the Caribbean and a poster of what I think is a VW Golf. Now, I'll be the last to complain about Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom being visible from my house, but it still seems odd for someone to cover their van windows.

On the street that runs parallel to the main shopping street, there is a high turnover in businesses. My newest favorite shop for window browsing sells scented oil and crystal lamps and fountains. If I had an extra 300 bucks to blow on myself, I'd buy the fountain that has a base made of jagged amethyst crystals supporting a clear crystal ball that spins on the flowing water. It is mesmerizing. Of course, if I had it, I would spend all my time gazing at it and would forget to, you know, eat and stuff, so maybe it's better that I enjoy it from the safety of the shop window.

My butt has fallen asleep because I am sitting on the floor in the hall outside my teacher's door, waiting to talk to him during his office hours. Perhaps I will stand and wait. Ciao!

[Added after the office hours:]
I just found out that I made the second highest grade on the final for one of my linguistics classes (German inflectional morphology). The guy whose history course I took (which is only graded pass/fail) said my exam there was "weak for a third semester student." Fuck him right in the ear, says I.

More blibber-blabber, but with love

I have finally crawled out from under my rock. I did the oral exam for Latin this morning and found out that I passed the whole thing and should be getting my certificate in the mail soon. Hoorah! Now I can stop cramming Latin into my brain and start doing more important stuff, like money-earning work and writing self-indulgent blibber-blabber on the Internet. Woo! Hoo!

After encountering Maniacal Laughing Woman on the bus yesterday morning, I realized on the trip home that Drunky Hair Guy is really not so bad. So he flips his hair and is a bit unsteady on his feet. [Then again, the way he was fiercely scratching his head, I was glad to be sitting half the bus away.] At least he doesn't burst into hysterical laughter while everyone around him looks the other way, strenuously avoiding eye contact. The MLW got off at my stop, and she had another spastic laugh attack in the middle of the street. Thank goodness I've mastered the art of purposeful walking and managed to outdistance her.

Attack of the low-rise jeans! Aaack! I swear, there are only about 10 women in the world with the right shape to wear these pants, and yet they are squeezing the hips of every young woman I come across. It is bad enough when the end result is two fleshy pockets at waist-level that appear to be filled with mashed potatoes, but it is worse when one of the pockets is sporting a large hairy wart (seen in the shopping district). I know, people can't help having warts, but for the love of all that's sacred, don't exacerbate the scary hairiness by making it protrude atop a gelatinous mound of denim-bound horror.

If you ever think of renting the movie Seven Days to Live, don't bother; we saw it on tv recently. It's supposed to be scary (and I guess the zomby-ish creatures arising from the backed up sewer in the basement are icky), but at the "Fall of the House of Usher"-esque climax where the house collapses, Lovely Husband had to say, "So I built another house. That one fell over, caught on fire, then sank into the swamp." If the scariest part of your movie prompts quotes from Monty Python films, you've missed the boat.

I know I've mentioned the bicyclists around here, and up until a few days ago, L.H. and Darling Daughter had a little joke about them: Boy, are they going to be pissed when they realize how far off course from the Tour de France they are! Hee! Hee!

Call for help

Help! I am trying to think of something that is technically edible, but slightly disgusting. Along the lines of escargot, but not just lying around in nature. Maybe something that has to be prepared, like a jar of pickled eggs. And it must be "clean" enough to hold in the hand without filthing it up (or maybe in a cloth sack).

Ok, let the brainwaves roll in!

Decisions, decisions

Exhibit A

Exhibit B

Which of these would you vote to be the next Village People action figure? I think they are looking for a new band member under the title "Future Guy" or "Space Man."

Reading is my life

In case anyone has been wondering what I've been up to:

3-hour Latin exam on Monday (translating from Latin into German, eek!)

Harry Potter 6

My husband doesn't understand the way I read books: I read the book, then I reread it multiple times in a row, or at least bits of it. I may have read the equivalent of 3 HP6s over the last 2 days. And D.D. and I are reading it for her bedtime reading; we're up to Chapter 3.

That means my brain was full of Latin, but I got rid of it in favor of Harry Potter, and that's all that's in there, no independent funny, so sorry, but I will try to pull myself together soonish.

Please everyone cross your fingers that my dear friend WestTexasGirl has a wildly successful interview and gets the perfect job today. Hell, I'd be surprised if they didn't offer it to her on the way out the door (and if they don't *threatening glare*...).

I'm Ba-ack!

Before my exams, my brain was like a balloon, inflated with particles of knowledge. After the exams, my brain is like a deflated balloon, period. There's not a lot floating around in there right now, but I can at least cobble together my notes from over the last week into a post. Be forewarned that is will be slightly more hodge-y, and much more podge-y, than usual.

Back when we were making our toilet-paper-tube puppets, Darling Daughter liberated some craft supplies and made a new sign for her door. It's quite nice—multicolored stars she painted in watercolors with her initial made of popsicle sticks glued on top and painted blue—but I kind of miss the old sign:
"Knock 76 times to enter!!!!"

My Lovely Husband likes to try out different foods and drinks. Our grocery store is a bit dull in the food department, so he's been throwing in a bottle of this or that wine or liquor when he thinks about it. Recently it was single-malt whiskey, knowing that a former acquaintance was quite fond of it. He wasn't impressed. When I saw him drinking some a second time, I reminded him that he had previously said it tasted like rubbing alcohol flavored with dirt. "But it's the dirt of the Scottish highlands!" was his response.

The first of the week was cool and wet-ish, with temps in the 60s and low 70s, but it has been pretty warm the last couple of days, in the low 90s. That is when I (and many other students) appreciate the coolness of the stone-and-tile basement library in the English department. Slipping off one's shoes and placing one's bare feet on the cold, cold tile is a popular pasttime while one studies.

Absurdity is the cure for grumpiness. One of my hard-core studying days last week, I was en route to Latin and in quite a bad mood. But that all changed when I spotted an elderly woman, obviously a tourist (but from where?), wearing a baby-pink vest with a matching scarf and ball cap...and hair. I almost fell off the sidewalk when I saw her. She looked like Dot's poodle at the end of PeeWee's Big Adventure.

That afternoon I saw a dog that looked amazingly like the robot dog from Battlestar Galactica (Muffit, for the geeks among you, and no, I didn't know that; I had to look it up). Except this dog didn't have the metal bands and was dark gray. I might not have noticed him, but he was walking along a 2-3 foot high wall that has a sidewalk and bus stop on one side and a 20-foot drop on the other.

Start rant. Then another day, I had a rage moment on the bridge. There is a pair of towers you have to pass between on the "historical"(=touristy) side of the bridge, and an *American* tour group was blocking the way while their guide tried to get them to gather off to one side. Yes, it was raining, lightly, and yes, the towers are connected and give some protection from the rain, but it is a narrow area, and these people all had apparently functioning umbrellas. It pisses me off to run across thoughtless tourists, and the Americans piss me off even more because they are reinforcing the "ugly American" stereotype. I'm sure jillions of *polite, quiet* American tourists grace our streets every year, but the jerky ones are the ones that get noticed and give everyone else a bad name. End rant.

I know there are lots of cultural differences between Europeans and Americans, but one I find quite interesting is that of maternity wear. From back when I and my friends and acquaintances were pregnant (starting 9 years ago), maternity wear in the US was either cutsie or plain, but it was all of the full-coverage variety. When we were in Sweden, we noticed that tight, stretchy, not-very-maternity-like-to-me clothes were the norm. And visible bellies. I think that is the case throughout Europe, but it may be gaining in America. I'm not sure. Anyhow, a preggie in one of my classes doesn't seem to be dressing at all differently from her pre-preggie state: low-rise jeans and halter tops. I know she's quite a bit younger than I am now, and is probably younger than I was when I got pregnant, but I always have the impression that after class she's going to go clubbing, belly and all. Weird.

Kenny Rogers almost broke up my marriage. L.H. had been (thank the 7 dwarfs! in the past!) stuck on a couple of ole K.R.'s songs, bad enough in itself, but he was conflating them, so the Gambler had lyrics from Coward of the County. Now, my mom had a few K.R. 8-tracks when I was a small kid, and we were big on K.R. for a while, so it pained me that he was messing them up. Oh, and also that he *would not stop singing.*

I've mentioned the sign/kiosk-thing across the street, but there are more up and down the main road, and they are all over the place throughout Germany and have been for about 150 years. Right now D.D.'s favorite sign is a big photo of a banana, labeled "kiwi." Turns out it's an ad for an exhibit on the guy who introduced them [(added to clarify) the kiosks] to Germany. But it gets your attention.

Another sign I've noticed is for the Backstreet Boys tour. Something like "Never gone." My ass. Who's heard of the BBoys since, like, my sister was in high school 10 years ago? And I would guess they're a little too old to try to pass themselves off as "boys." I mean, look at what's happened to Chris Kirkpatrick from NSYNC (however you spell it; where's the damn H?).

From the Bridal Shop of Horrors: apparently they realized something was amiss with one dress, because it was in the window one day and gone the next. It was actually quite pretty, strapless and white, except for the randomly placed silk flowers. They appeared to be white poinsettias, and they appeared to be sprouting from the armpit area. I can't imagine that's comfortable on your big day.

In other plant news, the parsley and flowers for cutting and drying that I planted from seeds are up and growing. I'm quite pleased with their progress, considering my usual lack of success with things green. The parsley is still small, but it tastes like parsley! Imagine that! I hope to have some flowers blooming by the time LMIL and PP come (31 days, D.D. informed me (if I remember correctly)).

What's up with me

Rain

Cold weather

Period

Bloody nose

Exams (1 down, 4 to go)

See you in a week!

Eat Your Heart Out, Siouxsie Sioux

Yes, that was *breast*

Sorry, I meant to include the following info and link:

The Columbia World of Quotations. 1996.

QUOTATION:
Music has charms to soothe a savage breast,To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.
ATTRIBUTION:
William Congreve (1670–1729), British dramatist. Almeria, in The Mourning Bride, act 1, sc. 1 (1697). Opening lines of play.

As I told Lovely Husband, I like to think of this as a "learning blog." Or rather, a "showing off blog." Same difference.

Newsflash!

I just measured Darling Daughter, and she has topped 50 inches (50-1/4 to be exact). That means that she has grown 4-1/8 inches since we moved here (2 years in September).

Also, my husband has the cutest muffin butt. It's been a life-long blessing for him--just ask his mom. She tells the following story: when he was 9 or 10, a little girl of his acquaintance was heard to say that she liked the way his pants fit in the back. So do I, little girl, so do I.

Back to your regular programming...

Love Your Inner Hulk

Nee smash!

And not in your girly, screechy, glass-breaking way, either. I need a club.

Nee smash trees!

Nee smash bushes!

Nee smash fellow bus passengers!

Nee smash loud, inconsiderate classmates!

Nee smash girl wearing iridescent sequined flip-flops! ROAR!

Damn. D.D.'s "B-O-M-B-Y" song soothes the savage breast when I want to SMASH stuff.

Also this Ilona video creeped me out at first, but now she makes me irrationally happy. (Be patient for the it to load.) We see it in the morning on the kids' channel.

***

I don't know about that saying, "The exception proves the rule." (1) The *rule* proves the rule; for example, "nee should avoid sharp objects," proved by nee stabbing a craft knife under her fingernail while making puppet wigs. (Later that night I sliced strawberries without doing myself a mortal injury. Go me!)

(1) Actually, it's "prove" in the sense of "proofing yeast", i.e., testing it.

The puppets have been a medium success. D.D. spends too much time saying she's bored, and since I have been hoarding boxes, toilet paper tubes, bottles, and every other craft-able item for D.D.'s after-school class, I liberated a few items for "Stewart Family Puppet Theater." A laundry detergent box was transformed into a breathtaking stage, ready to present the comedic highs and tragic lows of the toilet-paper tube soccer players, as drawn by D.D. and yours truly. I dipped into my yarn stash (which takes up a whole under-the-bed craft box) and made several wigs (aka pompons) that can be easily crammed into the top of the tubes. We've had the most fun so far making the hair "grow" by pushing a popsicle stick up the tube. Stay tuned for further adventures in puppetry.

***

We had several days of pleasant weather—which is high praise from me—but a low-pressure system named "Zeus" moved in around lunchtime and put an end to it. After L.H. left to pick up D.D. from school (around 3), it started to rain. When it started to hail (pretty tiny bits), I jumped in the car to carry out my "rescue operation" as D.D. put it. I found the two of them taking shelter in the open garage of one of D.D.'s school mates. His mother drives like a bat out of hell, so they were hoping the rain would let up before she careened into her garage and crushed them. So not only did they not get pelted by hail, but I also saved them from certain death. Go me!

We got a letter from my grandmother in West Texas, and she mentioned the hot weather there. D.D. immediately grabbed some notepaper and wrote:

"Hi, Ma, don't you dare to talk about the weather! The weather is very, very super bad! Love, D.D."

Hee!

Shoe Envy, Muppet Love, Mitten Fate, etc.

At the end of D.D.'s ballet lesson, some teenaged girls came in the waiting/changing area to get ready for their tap class. One of them had on the !cutest! sandals. I was sorely tempted to steal them when her class started, but reality (=I have ugly feet) intruded and set me straight. The shoes were black with little wedge heels and flip-flop style straps (which I normally hate!). The straps were decorated with silver lines in a geometric pattern and had little dangly beads in dark colors. Why do you persecute me, oh cute footwear?!

It was murderously hot at the ballet studio, but one grandma dropping off a dancer was wearing a short-sleeved sweater (!). It did have camels on it, but since I'm pretty sure they're not some kind of totemic protection against the heat, I think she could have worn something lighter.

Fortunately, it has cooled off. It's been raining off and on for a couple of days, and today I don't think it got out of the 60s. It was muggy, but at least not too hot.

D.D. rediscovered the make-up she got for her birthday, so I've had a make-over or two this week, and she has gone from looking like a little girl with dark pink eyeshadow to a little girl with pink eye to a punk girl to an American Indian who only had berries to work with for his war paint. It took 2 days and several face-washings to get all the glitter off my eyes the first time, so I wouldn't let her use glitter on me the second time. It was horribly distracting to keep spotting the one piece of glitter stuck in my top lashes, or the one stuck on my bottom lashes, both on the same eye.

When we were walking to school this morning, we noticed a house where the gate was open. D.D. didn't think it was a good idea to leave it open, because maybe someone would steal their flowers. I told her I thought it unlikely, but she said, "Maybe some teenagers are nuts for flowers. Did you ever think of that? Those teenagers are crazy." There you have it.

Thanks to the power of television commercials, I had one of the crap-alicious songs in my head from the psuedo-band called Banaroo. I was trying to come up with a pun on their name but got stuck; D.D. came up with Banacrap, but she made it clear that it was a suggestion to help me out, and not an endorsement.

I got a triple dose of Muppet love today. First, I saw some bird puppets in the window of a chic toy store (no Barbies there!), and they looked a lot like the birds from Sesame Street, cute and fuzzy. Then I saw Statler and Waldorf in a magazine ad (they are pimping a bank in Germany). Then I saw them again in a poster in a shop window. Now I am complete.

No fug to report on, per se, but I saw a guy at the bus terminal who was wearing a dark blue polo-style shirt, jogging shoes with white socks—so far prototypical frat-boy wear—but with red shorts sporting bright yellow flowers. I was thinking, if a woman wore that combination, she would probably get lots of weird looks, but I doubt anyone but me looked at that guy twice. And I was thinking, "Fool!"

I'm not really a spontaneous shopper; I'm actually quite "male" in shopping style: know what I want or need, go where I think they have it, buy it, and leave. But a couple of weeks ago I was browsing the books on display outside a used book store (as I was walking by on my way to class), and they had a book of traditional Swedish mitten patterns to knit (for only 3 euros). I'm sure they were not expecting to actually sell the book, but how could they have known that a fledgling knitter whose husband has a fetish for all things old and Swedish would happen to walk by that day? It was fate, I tell you.

Put on Your Reading Depends

I'm afraid I'm becoming a blog addict. If I don't write something for a few days, I go completely overboard when I finally get around to it. (Why doesn't this happen with my fiction writing?) So be forewarned.

We've been pretty busy recently. Last Friday—the hottest day of the year in Germany—Darling Daughter's class had an outdoor party. Fortunately, there was covered seating and cold drinks, and it started to cool off as the sun went down, so we didn't die. There were only 2 injuries, neither to our child, so it was a success!

Then on Saturday we went to a midsummer celebration thrown by the German-Swedish club, of which we are members. There was a flower bedecked May-pole, a short program by the Swedish school kids (including D.D.), and various games. Plus dancing around the May-pole. One woman with a mic was giving detailed directions before each song. (Later someone pointed out that it would have helped the German half of the German-Swedish club if she had not given all the directions in Swedish.) Most of the kids and almost half of the adults got up to dance in rings. In addition to the able-bodied dancers, I spotted a few elderly folks, 3 or 4 pregnant ladies (one heavily so), a woman with an infant strapped to her front, and a girl with a soft brace on her ankle. Swedes take their midsummer seriously!

We expected it to be hot, but a storm had blown in the night before, and we got a few sprinkles throughout the day to keep things cooled down. Just in case, I packed a lot of heat-friendly foods for our picnic, including watermelon, cantaloupe, plums, cherry tomatoes, cucumber slices, and condiment-free ham sandwiches. I'm surprised we didn't all get diarrhea after chowing down on all that water-filled good stuff.

Although the above-mentioned storm cooled things off for a day or so for us, it caused big problems in other parts of Germany, including flooding, property damage from hail and high winds, and some injuries. We had seen in the paper that there was flooding in Paris, so I guess we got lucky.

Speaking of Paris, I can now announce that my Lovely MIL and PawPaw (I thought people might get the wrong idea if I used S.D. (for StepDad)) are coming to see us in August, and we are going to take a group trip to Paris for a few days. Plane tickets have been purchased and hotel rooms reserved, so there's no backing out now, Gwamma, hahahahaha! D.D. is so excited that she declared a couple of weeks ago that if Gwamma ended up not coming, D.D. would throw away her pompoms and never dance again, except ballet. That is serious.

Unfortunately, the restaurant next door closed after, what, 7 months. So we'll have to drag them a light farther away to get some authentic German cuisine. And we ourselves had never gotten around to eating there. Oh, well, our loss.

According to the temperature gage in our village, today was just as hot as last Friday (36C=97F). I wore jeans. Of course, I could be melted into a puddle of goo, but I'd still yell, "Turn up the heat!" in my best crotchety old lady voice.

Although it is hot, that is no excuse for the 2 morons I saw diving off the bridge into the river of doom. Well, one moron made it into the water, and the other moron got talked down by two locals with some sense. I watched the whole thing from the bus stop.

At least I haven't encountered the +summer –shirt –shoes guy on the bus in a while. I take that back: I saw him wearing shorts, and vest –shirt, and some Birkenstocks that he probably slipped off but I couldn't see. The flesh, it creeps when I spot him taking up a section of 4 facing seats because no one wants to sit next to an overweight, balding, sweaty, half-naked man on a bus with no AC. Capice?

I did see Vin Diesel on the street today, but he's much shorter than I would have guessed. Shortly after that, I saw another bald-ish guy wearing almost the exact same black shirt, but he had man-boobs, so I'm positive he's not also Vin Diesel.

The bus stop gives me both pleasure and pain. Pain, because after I give up my place on the bench to some old people, they compound the imposition by starting to smoke heavily, joined by the teenaged parents hanging around nearby; and pleasure because I saw a woman who couldn't have been a day younger than 65 drinking from a *baby bottle*. Minus the nipple, of course, because she probably couldn't suck that hard, but any adult who considers a baby bottle an appropriate drink container (it looked to be tea) needs a reality check. Then I looked to my left and saw another grandmotherly type about to put a baby bottle, *full of milk and with a nipple*, in her mouth. "What in the Hell is going on today?" I thought. She was teasing her grandbaby in the stroller next to her, not having a delicious snack of formula on a hot day. Whew!

D.D. has mentioned several times today (unconvincingly) that she hopes she doesn't faint due to the heat. Every time I make her drink some more water, she points out that she probably won't faint now. The cat was out of the bag when I took her to ballet, which is un-air-conditioned: "I hope I faint!" said with a grin. I promised her that if she did, I'd drag her out of the room. Then I made her drink some more water.

I'm trying not to be paranoid about the heat, but D.D.'s little classmate didn't help things this afternoon. She walked part of the way home with us after school, and she assured us that D.D. has a "pale blister" on her neck just like the one she herself had had the time she didn't eat or drink during a heat wave. (Ok, whose parent doesn't make their kid eat, and especially drink, during hot weather?) L.H. pointed out that it's not a blister, just a white splotch, and it's most likely due to the patchy job he did of applying sunscreen to her the last time.

L.H. thinks people are trying to take advantage of me when they ask for a little help with something they've written in English, like a couple of girls in my classes. One had translated a letter of recommendation for an au pair position in England (took 5 minutes to look at, plus 10 minutes of chatting), and the other is taking a translation course in the English department, but had missed half of the semester due to surgery on her foot and her professor didn't have time to look at her assignments. So I corrected them and arranged to meet her this morning to return them. I was a few minutes late, but she didn't come, so I assumed she had a class and headed home. On the way to the bus, I stopped in a department store, on the hunt for the Perfect Gift (tm)—*whisper* but it's a secret. They didn't have it, but I looked at their cookie cutters since I need to expand my collection (all xmas and Halloween right now). People! Who wants cookies shaped like *tea pots*? Or *spoons*? Really! That store needs to find a new supplier.

So I leave the store, and I see the girl walking by. Turns out she had missed her bus into town and was just running late. So we made the swap, but then she gave me a pretty Chinese fan to say thanks. (It really came in handy at the ballet studio, too.) I feel like I'm finally building up some positive credit in my karma account after stirring up a bunch of family shit last week (which I won't go into here).

Of course, I will probably use it all up by mentioning the horrible dress my classmate was wearing last week. What is the deal with sequins lately? I don't mean a design with sequins on it (btw, Gwamma, D.D. is the talk of the second grade with her new sequined shirts); I mean a whole section of a garment covered in sequins. Think early Elton John. After the following horrifying event, I saw that a "boutique" in town had placed several partially sequined items in its window.

Anyhow, this girl was wearing a halter-top dress: the top was covered in black sequins; the bottom was a nightmare of chartreuse and white and black in a kind of Mondrian pattern. With loafers. Because nothing says "glamorous" like white leather loafers.

Thanks for hanging in there!

Throwing You a Bone

For various reasons, I'm not particularly in posting mode right now, but to keep gwamma and the aunties happy, I figure I can post some oldies but goodies from D.D.'s speech log. (L.H. has been keeping notes on her language(s) development since she started talking, but about 1/4 of the entries are just cute things she said.)

Enjoy.

Age 4
(about Swedish) "That's the old stuff to talk; I like new stuff like I'm talking right now.... I don't like stuff that's junky and funky."

D.D.'s version of the Pledge of Allegiance: "...to the United States and North America and South and April and March. Very good."

"I flang it." (past tense of 'fling', don't you know)

In her Yoda phase: "Pin can you not hold in your mouth." (I had some sewing pins in my mouth.)

Why she supposedly couldn't speak Swedish anymore: "A little troll that's named Maha, he came and took the Swedish away from my heart."

D.D. wanted to tussle with L.H.: "Daddy, bend down so I can kick your butt."

When I was cleaning out the coffee pot with vinegar: "That's the worstest coffee you ever made!"

Yoda redux
me: "There are lots of buildings [in Dallas]!"
D.D.: "And big are they, too."

Age 5
During a difficult BM: "I'm gonna die!"
After I tried to comfort her: "I *want* to die!"

After visiting the grands in LA: "Fangers. That's how Pawpaw says it."

L.H.: "Why did you put a cotton ball in Barbie's dress?"
D.D.: "Because so her boobs will look bigger. Fashion style."

D.D. wanted Lucky Charms, and she promised to eat "the lucky *and* the charms."

While watching a funny movie: "This part cracks me off!"

Age 6
While watching the wedding scene at the end of Star Wars, Episode 2
me: "I think grabbing onto a metallic hand [Anakin's] would ruin the moment."
D.D.: "A can of tuna on someone's head would be a little romantic."

Inside D.D.'s brain: She was musing that the only holiday when devils like to come up to the world is Thanksgiving, because they like to see those dead turkeys.

After eating corn chips in the car: "My tummy is upset. It's upset at those Fritos because they were so salty."

While looking at some golden, bejeweled chalices in a museum: "Too much God."

To the philosophical question, "Why are we here?": So we could eat and drink and so God could watch us on his television.

Age 7
On why she had been in trouble in the recent past: "Sometimes I go far away from my right self and I do bad (stuff)."

D.D. wanted to take a knife to her hard-frozen ice cream, but her dad counseled patience.
(translated from German) "*groan* Patience takes too long."

"Daddy, I would like a thermostat for tomato soup with Mommy's homemade bread" [in her lunch box].

L.H.: "What's this device called?" [pointing to a comic strip drawing of a guillotine]
D.D.: "A head off-chopper?"

Flip-flops and dying, etc.

I saw a woman in high-heeled mules make her way unsteadily across the cobblestone courtyard where I was studying; she then unlocked a bike and proceeded to mount it. I thought "Holy shit! She's going to kill herself!" To my relief, she dug around in her giant Gucci bag and pulled out some regular flip-flops, thereby avoiding catastrophe.

Then I saw a girl wearing turquoise rubber flip-flops...laced up the calf with matching satin ribbons. She looked completely ridiculous. What was she supposed to be, ballerina-slash-beach bum? Roman-slash-transvestite? I do not know.

Later, while crossing the bridge to the bus, I saw a man swimming in the river. He must have a death wish, because the city government's weekly newspaper recently carried a warning to stay out of the river, due to it being so filthy. (My husband has been in it once, and I made sure to read the article to him in the spirit of "I told you so.") After I got to the bus stop, I tried looking for the swimmer, but I spotted two little bunnies in the shrubbery instead. Cute! And much better than watching some guy dissolve in the river.

I know I said I drive like a granny, but really, I follow the speed limit. The only time I creep along is when I have to go down the main road in our village that has cars parked all along the down-hill side. Have I mentioned that the streets are all narrow? I thought so. Anyhow, I cruise along *at the speed limit* when I'm on the road to the grocery store, but inevitably, someone will insist on tailgating me. So when I spotted the 'falling rocks' sign recently, I thought that would be the answer to all my prayers: tailgaters crushed by falling rocks, i.e., instant karma.

The annoying pseudo-band has another annoying song: Space Cowboy. I will go on record as saying that only Elton John could pull off a song with that title. This band is definitely no Elton John, therefore they should just hang up their jocks.

The weather has been wonderfully warm—no, hot—and I am soaking it up. There were a few clouds earlier this week, but it didn't get too cold, and we've only gotten the tiniest sprinkle, so today was a bit humid. But hot! Woo! Hoo!

I'm Unappreciated

My hair is getting really long, so I've taken to wearing it up in a braid or a bun (shades of my grandmother). I like to think that when I take it down, I have luxuriant waves, but one day I noticed that my unbraided hair keeps separating itself into thin, scraggly, pseuo-dreds. Ok, I thought, screw the braid; the bun won't let me down. Last night, D.D. said I had a bunch of "crinkly little hairs", and L.H. commented that my hair looked frizzy, then corrected himself: bushy.

When L.H. was little, he had a knack for pushing people's buttons, to the point that his mother feared for his life when he started in on his older, bigger brother. He hasn't outgrown this trait. Of course, my mom says I had a smart mouth, but I—Wait, scratch that. Never mind.

I was just remembering the time in junior high when the guy who sat in front of me in math started calling a blond classmate "Goldilocks" and myself "Shitty-locks." My thirty-two-year-old self hopes my thirteen-year-old self told him he was a total dick. (He grew out of it, if I remember correctly.)

I hope that something like that doesn't happen to my beautiful, brunette daughter, but I imagine anyone who tried it would get a punch in the face for his efforts.

I finally broke down and hit the "Jeans Palace." According to the Levis site, the JP carries their jeans. I know exactly what style and size of Levis fit me (having just bought a pair while in Texas), so I thought shopping would be a snap. Encouraged by the "30% off brand-name jeans" sign, I entered the den of iniquity. Where I promptly had a heart attack and fell over. !!86 euros for Levis!! (and not even in the style I was looking for). Even with the discount, there is no way I would pay half my grocery bill for jeans. Sheesh!

I like to read fantasy novels, and I'm giving writing one a shot, but I have to admit that I feel a little silly writing a bare-bones outline of the plot; I actually used the word "ensorcel." *mental note—fire that part of my brain* I think I need to jazz things up, like use mafia-esque terms: the wizard whacked a bunch of people. Now I feel less silly.

My Lovely Husband just put out a bunch of geraniums and some plumbagos—or, as we call them around here, his "precious plumbagos." That goes back to when he had a huge wall of plumbagos growing outside our front door, and he would disappear for a while each evening in order to water and prune and rearrange his darling plants. The new flowers are in flower boxes all along both balconies (over one another on the east-ish side of the house). Since we have a kind of Bavarian-looking house, L.H. insists on the flowers to go with the look. I'll give him his prop and say that I enjoy the view out the kitchen window much more after his flower-planting orgy. So there.

Short but Coherent

I remember that last year the pedestrian bridge was often littered with dog poop, but it's been surprisingly clean this year (knock on wood). So it was upsetting to see that a man—an American!—appeared to be encouraging his little dog to evacuate on the bridge this evening. It's a good thing his wife came and made them move along, because on behalf of all daily bridge-crossers, I would have been forced to stab him with my pen.

Outside of the occasional motor starting in the tiny parking lot outside my classroom, we hardly even notice it's there. But today someone's car must have sprung a mighty leak, because gas—not exhaust—fumes filled our room. Latin is brain-damaging enough; I don't need a side order of toxic fumes, thanks.

Lovely Husband and Darling Daughter toted some of her friends to the pool yesterday, but L.H. has a militant disregard for SKIN CANCER, so he didn't bother to put on any sunscreen, and now he's all red. HA HA! It's my wifely prerogative to mock, didn't you know?

L.H. tried to thwart my plan to educate the online public about the wonderful world of Star Wars-themed paper products by using the first paper towel off the roll, thereby throwing off the pattern so that Chewbacca's feet or head are systematically chopped off, but my patience and cunning have paid off. Chewbacca is not only friendly and unassuming, but he kicks ass at cleaning up hairballs.
 

According to the front page of the regional newspaper, this is the new look for summer. Personally, I think it's a cheap rip-off of Siouxie Sioux, and she should be pissed.

[When I told him why I had the digital camera out, my "Lovely" Husband called me "e-Margie." I am putting this on the list, and if I ever decide to leave him, it will be entered as evidence of mental abuse. (ha! ha!)]
 

Blabbedly Blab Blab

Thursday morning I was waiting for a shop to open so I could drop off some film for developing, and to kill some time I wandered to the window of the plumbing business next door. In addition to the usual collection of sinks and fixtures, there was a toilet, with a most unusual lid. It was painted in wavy stripes that forcibly reminded me of The Scream. Now I am having all these strange associations.

I also looked in the window of the drug store, and lo and behold, there were *cotton balls*. When D.D. was having some cold-related ear problems, I needed cotton balls to keep the drops in her ears, and I could not find them anywhere in the damn drug store. Of course, I could have just asked, but I generally avoid asking questions in German. Besides, shouldn't cotton balls be with the baby supplies? Right? But no, they are by the cosmetics, so it makes perfect sense that I have never seen them before.

***

Bikes aren't allowed in the main shopping/pedestrian street in town, so they all take the parallel street that connections many of the university buildings. German bikes have bells, and people use them to warm dummies who walk 5 across while they chat to get the hell out of the way. I have to say that I feel much safer walking around here than on the UTexas campus, where I constantly feared the 2-wheeled messengers of death.

I also feel much safer on a bus. I know I have mentioned before how narrow everything is around here—the end result of living in a valley and/or an old, pre-auto town—but the buses can squeeze through the tiniest gaps without knocking off rear-view mirrors. It's actually kind of weird to be passing another bus (or a streetcar) so closely that you can tell the passengers on the other bus are also holding their breath. I wouldn't trust an Austin bus driver not to hit a traffic sign, much less pass a bicyclist on a narrow, twisty, mountain road.

***

When I take D.D. to school, we often see the man who delivers the lunches for the after-school-care kids (there's no lunch at school here otherwise). He cracks me up. He's this middle-aged, kind of dumpy man, but the radio in his truck is blasting dance music of the techno variety the whole time he's at the school. A Night at the Roxbury, anyone?

***

The grandparents and aunts and uncles will be happy to know that my Darling Daughter still says "fanger" (instead of "finger"). I believe she does it quite consciously, but it's better than no drawl whatsoever.

Off the Cuff

Lovely SIL sent me an appropriate accompaniment to my toilet-reading post. Enjoy!

I met a girl! (If you thought of Cry-Baby, you are my soul mate.) Well, she's been in 2 of my classes all semester, but we just introduced ourselves briefly today. She's also American, although I didn't catch where from. Seeing how I'm so socially reluctant, it was a big deal for me.

Here are some interesting things I saw on the way home on the bus:

Neighboring houses with almost-matching, wrought-iron, birdcage-esque gazebos on the street side. One was serving as a rose arbor.

Two crows standing on some driftwood swirling in the river. They didn't seem to notice the water or the swirling.

A red hang glider circling over the abbey. He seemed to be heading for one of the fields nearby.

Otherwise, I got nuthin'.

All the News That's Not Really News

D.D. managed to injure herself twice over three days. First, she slammed her hand in the car door. She had a big bruise just below her wrist that was tender the first day. She was complaining at school that it hurt, so the secretary put an ice pack on it, then wrapped a gauze bandage around it so her friends could sign it. She managed to whip up plenty of sympathy and attention for herself with one bruise.

Then last night she flopped over the back of the couch onto the seat, a not uncommon occurrence around here, except that she managed to land with her heels on the coffee table. Ouch! She had a scrape on one ankle, but when I felt all over her foot while she watched tv, she didn't even flinch. Until she noticed what I was doing, then it was, "Oh! My foot!" I made her run cold water over her foot in the tub, which she said helped. So she's not permanently maimed.

One night this week, D.D. wanted to listen to her Soul Control cd, but we have to switch around a bunch of plugs to turn on the stereo, so I talked her into using the jambox in the kitchen. She wanted me to close it off with a makeshift curtain (no door) so we wouldn't peek, because she wanted to "dance for herself." We promised to stay in the living room, but we wondered what the neighbors downstairs thought of the rhythmic thumping coming from her jumping around and dancing in the kitchen.

D.D. has decided that bad people should have giant apple heads (but not red), for easier spotting. Like Dracoy Malfoy, for instance. He'd have a big, pale, apple head with a sprig of blond hair where the stem would be. If only life were so simple.

She has also decided to forego those pesky "idioms" and "conventions of standard English." We were watching the second LOTR movie, the scene where the Ents attack Saruman's fortress. L.H. and I were explaining what was going on to D.D., and I remarked, "How would Saruman like to get a taste of his own medicine?" D.D. corrected me: "A taste of his own *poop*. That would be much worse." And we couldn't convince her that her way wasn't the best. I can't wait to see her first school essay in English when we get back to the States.

L.H. and I have a running argument about who has the worst taste in dining: he says my instant coffee tastes like it's infused with tuna, and I point out that hot dogs wrapped in bacon is not exactly a gourmet dish. A side argument is dunking: he does, I don't. *shudder* I hate soggy food.

On Sunday we took advantage of some nice-ish weather (not too cold; overcast, but not raining) and went for a "hike." There are trails all over the place around here, so we weren't hiking in the "mountaineering" sense, but we did have a nice, long walk. At one point we came across a marshy area that is purportedly a wallowing spot for wild boars, who were thankfully absent. While standing around a tiny observation hut above the spot, we heard the *very loud*, *very disconcerting* droning of bees. We didn't see many bees except down near the water, so we think they may have been in the cane off to the side. L.H. and I started wondering if any Africanized bees have made it this far north.

We had to cross a road at one point and saw—I don't know what you call them—a three-wheeled motorcycle. (Silly me, it's called a trike. Why didn't I know that?) We've seen quite a few since the weather warmed up (comparatively speaking). During the memorable 4 days when it was nearly hot (sound like a legend in the making: "The Almost-Heat-Wave of '05"), the road that goes through our village and over the mountain to the next village was overrun with bicyclists and motorcycles, including the trikes. One day I counted from the window as a motorcycle club went up the hill; I lost track at 70, but I'm positive there were at least 100 riders.

Anyhow, when we saw the trike on Sunday, D.D. said she wanted one, hot pink, with her name written on both sides and a big 'one' on the back. My little motorcycle mama.

On the drive home, we were passed by a bicycle. Yes, I was driving, but it was a steep hill, so I was in a low gear and riding my brakes, and the dude was peddling as fast as he could go. As a matter of fact, I got stuck behind another bike that was coasting down the hill. So I'm following one bike and being tailgated by another until he had a chance to pass us both. The humiliation! (Not really. I'm an unashamed granny driver these days. "Better safe than dead" is my motto.)

More Observations From Around Town

I'd like to report another sighting of the Old French Whore, in town instead of on the bus this time. She had on an acid green top and a floral-print skirt in hot pink, with a matching hot-pink sweater draped jauntily around her shoulders. I spotted her tottering across the central bus terminal on stiletto mules. Ouch! Surprisingly, the top and skirt coordinated, but caused me to lose my color vision for several minutes afterward.

Farther along in the shopping district, I spotted Simon LeBon's copycat younger brother, who apparently had just been unfrozen from his cryogenic sleep. His polo couldn't have been pinker, his loafers less sockless, or his jeans less tightly rolled at the ankle. And after sleeping through the 80s and 90s, it must have been difficult for him to lift his head with all the residual styling products weighing it down (but nevertheless leaving him with the timeless "rooster-head"). Ah...those were the days.

I found myself staring at my classmates again today. The reason was pretty straightforward in one girl's case—she had bubble-gum pink tips on her nails, set off with a silver glitter line. In all other respects, this girl was non-descript: naturally styled hair, light make-up, simple black blouse. But I guess the heart of a disco queen can beat in any of us.

The other girl looks a lot like Audrey Hepburn: small, pointy, pixie face and large eyes. Quite cute, actually, and always tastefully made up. But the clothes! Today she wore a leopard-print blouse; her hair was piled high and topped with a dusty-rose silk flower, which just happened to be the same color as her leather jacket. Unfortunately, neither matched her black cat-eye glasses or giant dangly bead earrings. I often think maybe I should glam up, but then I see this girl and realize how easily fashion-retarded people like myself can make a misstep or 12.

While crossing the bridge on my way to the bus stop, I passed a guy singing loudly *in falsetto*. People! Headphones do not make you invisible!

My Dear Friend was telling me about the series of freaks she's had to teach (at the university level), the most recent being a girl who bursts into song during class. Maybe she thinks she's in a Björk film.

There's a tanning salon around the corner from my building at the university, and the signs they have outside kill me. One poster is for the brand of tanning beds they use, and it features a woman crouching in a desert, wrapped in *tiny strips of foil*. The way she's squatting, she appears to be giving birth, and I have to wonder: to what, a baked potato?

The other poster is actually their logo, a drawing of a man in a bikini on a lounge chair soaking up some sun. It's nice to see a man used for once, except that some of the color directly above his bikini has been scratched or rubbed away, so his crotch appears to be smoking. Hee! I don't think that's really going to bring in the male customers.

Weather-bitching level: 2.5
Once again, I've been duped! Over the last 2 days, it's been gradually getting warmer...then it rained this morning, with sprinkles on and off throughout the day. Sitting in the house, it's cool, but if you have to move around outside (like to pick up your kid from school), you are instantly soaked in sweat because it is so humid. Damn you, Mother Nature!

Doesn't Yoda look ready to take names and kick ass? Cleaning with these babies makes me feel powerful. Keep tuned for more photos as we make our way through the multi-pack (C3PO, Chewbacca, and Darth Vader are slated to put in appearances). 

The Wonderful World of Pants

I am beginning to take an obsessive interest in pants. They're fascinating! For instance, I am noticing a definite trend in pants that double as optical illusions.

Exhibit A
Tan cargo-style pants with gothic lettering, in white, across the seat (seen as the wearer was heading into the Ladies'.) It appears that someone from Pimp My Ride went crazy and started putting letter decals on everything in sight, and the afflicted pants caught on. Unfortunately, the letter-applier stayed true to the original form (an arc; you know, like on the back window of a low-rider), and I suspect that has a magnifying/distorting effect. Have you ever successfully seen what's inside one of those Magic Eye posters? (Dude! It even works online!) Same effect.

Exhibit B
Dark-colored, pin-striped, tight, women's pants. These are not being worn as part of a suit, either (although I did see a woman in a pin-striped suit recently, and her pants did not melt my brain, because they were properly tailored). No, these pants are topped with baby tees and cropped sweaters and such. It makes my eyes water to see the lines distorted over the bulgy parts, and it's horribly unflattering. Who talked these women into thinking that straight vertical lines are attractive on a normal, curvy figure?

And to make matters worse, I saw a pair on a *pregnant woman*. I know! What was she thinking? If there's one thing a pregnant lady has, it's bulges, trust me, and this lady's pants were affecting my brain like acid-laced Fruit Stripe gum.

Coinciding with my pants fetish is the need for new pants. Well, jeans. I really need to find a store that carries petite, i.e., short, sizes, because I was ready to stab my eyes out after roaming the juniors section of the large department store. I even braved the horrors of a shop helpfully named "Pretty Fashion", but I detest pre-distressed jeans, and also the size problem; on the other hand, I was very much tempted to buy from their array of silk kimonos and Mandarin evening gowns. I have no plan whatsoever to enter "Jeans Palace", and I learned last year that H&M caters to women who are 6 feet tall with legs shaped like dowel rods, i.e., not me.

***

[Grossness Warning]
If you are like me, you have a large-ish stack of unread books, perhaps left over from your *cough* university classes. Maybe you would like to read them but don't feel you have the time. I am here to share with you my new system: put a book in the bathroom! Toss Redbook or Reader's Digest or Carpentry Weekly in the trash and get edjumicated! It'll take you forever to finish (for this reason I suggest starting with a compilation of essays or articles), but at least you'll be making progress (no pun intended).

***

Le Mariage Royale has foisted another travesty of formal wear on unsuspecting passersby. The gown on the left in the window is not too bad on first glance: a simple design in white with dark red piping along the bodice seams—bold but not ugly. Until you see that someone added a row of cross-lacing, with a red tie, up the left hip. Perhaps it was supposed to be a corset top, but the seamstress misplaced her glasses and decided to keep on with her work anyway.

The dress on the right.... I can only speculate that it's part of a new line aimed at retired prostitutes, those who found the red-trimmed dress too demure. I can't even describe it, but suffice it to say that it is a confounding amalgamation of mini-skirt/mermaid dress, tiny tulle ruffles, and plunging necklines.

Composed June 9

The Weather-Bitching Level is back! And it's a 2.7! (0 being 'nothing to bitch about weather-wise' and 3 being 'I will never stop bitching', i.e., winter.) According to the weather-lady on tv yesterday, we're having the coldest June in recent memory. South of us they even had a frost. In June! It hasn't even hit 70F since over the weekend. One morning, we saw smoke rising from someone's chimney, and that evening my polar-bear child wanted a blanket to go with her long jammies during the bedtime reading. I hate! the cold. The only way the weather could be worse would be if it started raining, which will probably happen now that I've said it.

You see some interesting people riding the bus, but after a while you get used to your fellow commuters. Today there was a new face on the bus, and it was *crazy*. Not like threatening crazy, just avoiding eye contact but talking loudly *in English* crazy. I didn't catch what exactly she was saying, but she seemed to be addressing someone; I checked her out several times, because I thought she might have a cell phone with a headset or a mini-recorder, but I didn't see anything of the sort. Great. Now the Germans around here will think Americans are war-mongers AND crazy.

But that wasn't even the scariest thing to happen on the bus that time. Whenever we came to a stop, you could tell the driver was trying to stop as gradually as possible, letting off the brakes 2 or 3 times before coming to a complete halt, at which point the brakes would make a terrible noise. I was concerned that perhaps there was a bicycle up in the wheel well, with or without bicyclist, but I didn't notice once when I got off. I was also worried that we might start to skid since the noise was a bit like the sound of brakes locking. Have I mentioned that my house is at the top of a steep hill?

Do you ever notice yourself blinking, then you can't stop noticing, and then you wonder how weird you must look because you're consciously blinking? I think this awareness of involuntary movements is becoming a theme with me.

My Darling Daughter had a wart on her foot; I didn't dawdle in treating it, because I've had a plantar wart before, and having a doctor jab a skewer covered with wart-poison into her foot is not something I would wish for my daughter. Anyhow, a couple of days after starting to use the salicylic acid on her foot (carefully!), I noticed that the wart on my thumb knuckle was making a break for freedom. Now, this has been a tenacious wart; I've accidentally scraped the skin off that spot *twice* with a cheese grater—don't try that at home, kids!—yet the wart always returned. I guess the wart got wind of the acid and decided not to stick around to be the next victim, so after picking off the little seed thingie—which was literally hanging out—I am officially wart-free.

I took my Latin mid-term today, and I don't think I bombed, so that was good. I did go through all the psychological stages of studying, though:
denial—"I've got plenty of time!"
panic—"There's too much to learn!"
death wish (self)—"I want to lie down and die."
death wish (instructor)—"If he had a heart attack last night, I won't have to take the test today."
and resignation.

Games You Can Play with Your Child

The next time your child gives you a kiss, throw your hands over your face, writhe, and screech, "It burns!" Guaranteed child pleaser, and sure-fire way to get more voluntary kisses.

***

My Darling Daughter was reading a book the other day, and I popped into the living room to ask her a question. She gave me a curt "No", which, translated for any non-compulsive readers out there, means, "Shut up and go away." I wasn't offended, but I ran back into the kitchen for a giggle because it was so me as a child. She really is Mini-Me.

***

D.D. got a big birthday box in the mail from her gwamma that was filled with one large and several small packages. Interestingly, she started with the small boxes: "A tiny waddle bottle!" Joy! Molly, her American Girl doll, really raked it in with an entire bedroom suite, complete with a tiny working lamp, a bed, a dresser with a drawer in it, and water bottle (obviously). D.D. had to stop in the middle of the proceedings to get batteries for the lamp, and she's been dragging it around the house like she used to carry her blankie as a toddler, because you never know when she might need the extra light of a 10-Watt bulb. She also generously offered to let L.H. take it with him to an 8 p.m. meeting in case it was dark when it ended; he pointed out that the car's headlights should provide plenty of light, thanks.

The bedroom suite has been in the living room, in the "clubhouse/hotel" under her play-bed, and in the bed next to D.D.'s pillow. I'm surprised she hasn't jabbed herself in the eye with a wooden edge (even if it is covered by a corduroy bedspread) in her sleep. In the mornings, I tickle D.D. awake, then she gently wakes Molly by slowly lifting her upright until her eyes open. She's a much sweeter mom than I am.

***

When we were in Paris, we had dinner with Lovely Husband's friend, and she roasted a chicken. D.D. wanted the wishbone, but we couldn't find it as it was probably broken up in the process of carving. So the friend's daughter explained that this was 'poulet', not 'chicken', therefore French chickens must not have a wishbone. Shades of Gary Larson and his "Boneless Chicken Ranch." Hee!

***

There's a formal-wear shop near the German as a Foreign Language department called "Le Mariage Royale." (Makes me think of a plastic clock L.H. 'rescued' from the garbage room when we lived in Sweden that was helpfully labeled "High Class Clock.") Every time I walk by with D.D., she says I need to get one of the (wedding) gowns on display. I've repeatedly pointed out that I'm not exactly in the market for such a dress.

Most of the time this shop has duelling gown models in varying degrees of tackiness in the window, but these days they have a bridal couple *made of balloons*. The groom is a column of gray balloons topped with a white balloon with a Lego-esque face drawn on it. I think he also has a gray top hat. The bride is a column of ivory balloons with a white balloon head and a veil. But that's not all! She's also got a tube balloon (like clowns bend into poodles and swords and hats) for arms at waist height with a pink bouquet attached to the front. It's a classy display for a classy shop.

***

Usually I'm pretty nonchalant around here about my blog. I'll mention to L.H. that I've updated it, or tell him if I felt I had something particularly witty to say, but otherwise I try to play it cool. But sometimes, like a couple of days ago, I get all hovery and want to watch L.H. while he reads. (Because I'm a megalomaniac—surprise!—,a term we've been bandying about recently.) He finally told me I was creeping him out, kinda like the old lady in The Wedding Singer who wants to watch Adam Sandler eat the meatballs, because "That's my favorite part!" So I'm backing off. But maybe I'll install a surveillance camera. Hmmm....

The Bird Man of Ziegelhausen

My husband's family, at least on his dad's side, has a strange affinity for birds. His grandparents used to have a house full of the vermin, I mean, parakeets and cockatiels, plus doves out back, and his grandmother used to cook scrambled eggs for them and let them drink out of her coffee cup. (Needless to say, I have never kissed her on the mouth. And I don't leave D.D. unattended around her in case she decides to cook her up and serve her to the rest of the family.) Family grudges have been held over who let whose bird escape. And L.H.'s dad is always going on about a song he composed and taught his bird to whistle. He'll be on Broadway next.

In the past, L.H. has shared my distaste for all things feathery and indiscriminately excretory, but now he swears he's been hearing a bird outside our window who is singing the Munchkin-Land tune from The Wizard of Oz. I think he's getting some fumes up through the floor from the teenager in the apartment below us. I haven't heard the bird myself, but L.H. claims he was vindicated in the case of the piss bugs (which we actually saw in action on one of his grandmother's trees), and he will be proved right this time. Quite a track record, eh?

According to the Partaay Quiz (that's not misspelled) L.H. took at D.D.'s behest on the Disney web site, Dijonay of Proud Family fame has labeled him a "Party Pooper." "That explains why I never get invited back; I should go before I leave home," he quipped. (We're all about scatalogical humor around here, since we're in BIL withdrawal.)

And in related news (wait for it...), D.D.'s German is not just bleeding into her English these days, it has taken it hostage and is only letting it out for cigarette breaks. She doesn't use the cute kid-English for bathroom functions anymore (one and two, remember?); instead she has to "make a big (or enormous, in her case) or a small." If you don't learn any other German idioms from this site, be sure to master this one.

The weather is driving me mad(-der; ha ha *twitch*). If the first day of Summer is June 21, why am I still wearing jeans and a long-sleeved shirt and a jacket? We had four clear, warm, sunny days about a week and a half ago, then a pretty powerful storm blew in with thunder and rain to cool things off, which we appreciated at the time. On the plus side, it also knocked a bunch of baby chestnuts off the trees, so that means less head-conking this fall. On the minus side, it seems to have also taken casualties among the apple trees down the street.

Since then we've had cool, wet, almost warm, windy, and cloudy, but no truly warm weather. Why oh why did we buy that oscillating fan? I feel like a fool for pushing our long-sleeved clothes and sweaters to the back of the closet, because who knows when we might need them again (like today)? In Texas, you put everything made of yarn away in May, and you get it back out in October. There is no overlap in the seasons. Here, you never know when a new one has started. L.H. found out that it is now safe to put out geraniums, i.e., no threat of frost. At the start of June! Ok, I should stop this line of complaining before I give myself a stroke.

Some of the Spring/Summer phenomena I have noticed around here are UGLY pumps and loafers, and thin, white cotton pants. If you ask me, the latter are a recipe for disaster. And the former—so ugly! I saw one woman in normal clothes and *gold glitter flats*. D.D. had a red pair as a 4-year-old that we called her Dorothy shoes (it's the Oz recursion!), but I had never thought of them as appropriate for 25-year-olds. The other shoes look like someone sent a dumpster from the 80s through a time portal that landed in the local department stores. Eek!

Another Summer pastime is mowing. I have seen the following techniques used here in our village (keep in mind that the sides of the valley are steep, and houses are built up along both sides): mowing with an industrial-strength, tractor-type mower; weed-whacker followed by raking; a scythe; and sheep. The last two amuse me to no end, especially since I can watch the mad scyther while I wait for the bus near D.D.'s school, and we can sometimes hear the sheep bleating from at home; they usually sound pretty pissed off, although I don't claim to be a sheep interpreter. I would be pissed off, too, if I were an ersatz lawn-mower, lazy owners.

True Confessions

I need to get something off my chest. You'll probably want to sit down for this. If you have a weak heart, be sure to pick up the phone and dial 9-1 before proceeding to the next line.

I de-haired my legs.

Yes, I realize this is a terrible shock, but it is true nonetheless. Note that I did not *shave* my legs, as that usually entails copious blood loss for me, and I'm trying to keep my anemia under control.

I finally caved and bought some depilatory cream because we had four very warm (high 80s) days and no AC. Hairless seemed a much cooler way to go. The stuff I bought didn't stink and promised to last twice as long as shaving (so that would be two days as opposed to one for me). I will never take a razor to my legs again.

As long as I'm coming clean, I ironed today, and not even my own clothes, and not even because someone needed it right then. I know! What is wrong with youth today? Gwamma sends D.D. beautiful dresses, and usually I am lazy enough to let her go around wrinkled, but today I needed to re-melt an iron-on back on, so I ironed the whole dress, plus one of L.H.'s particularly wrinkly shirts. I realize that this unprecedented act of housekeeping is a desecration to my mother's name, but I can still make her proud to be my mom with my closet full of half-finished craft projects.

My lovely MIL sent me two cute blouses, so with them and my freshly de-haired legs in mind, I decided to go shopping for a skirt. Normally, the only thing that would be worse is falling into an open sewer, but I braved *two* department stores in search of a prairie-style skirt. (At least, that's how I think of them—I don't know fashion.) By the second store, I couldn't even bring myself to go up to the second floor. It was a soul-withering experience, and I have decided to just be happy with my long denim skirt for now.

And, I was a black drag queen in a former life, but you probably already knew that.