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    Monday, June 29, 2009

    Why I Need Some Rabbit Repellent


    See those stumps? They're supposed to be bean plants (and sprouts).
    Clearly the deal Greta (the younger of the two Wondermutts who will chase anything but rabbits) has worked out with the rabbits includes the perk of them getting to destroy my garden.
    I'm trying repellent first. Then I move on to a pellet gun.
    Be warned, rabbit.

    Sexy New Hair and Other News Of Interest

    OK, so I was feeling frumpy. Hadn't gotten a cut in months, feeling chubby, ungroomed and slovenly. So I took several steps this weekend to remedy said frumpy feeling.


    Pedicure. (my first ever)

    Haircut. (from my awesome stylist who gave me a new look)

    Cute new top. (on clearance at Younker's + a gift card = cute cheap lil' thang)

    Tea paaahty. (OK, so it was for the 5 year old, but I got to stay and play)

    Jillian Michael's 30-day Shred, Level 1. (kicked my chunky little butt, which she promised to do)


    So now I've worked out, gotten a new cut, new toenails, had a fun weekend (including hearing Mrs M's fabulous hubby's band play last night at Village Pointe - so good, and one of our favorite summer traditions!) and pampered myself a bit. According to Greg, none of that did any good, as he claims I was a rotten biotch all day (not his exact words, but definitely his sentiment). Hmmm. Maybe some more pampering is in order. Sorry, dear. I'll try to do better. Promise.


    Let's see, what else? Yeah, that's about it. Some random factoids for you:


    ~ The boy who did my pedicure had the same haircut I had just gotten before I went and saw him. I think it looks better on me. Then again, maybe it was the Asian hair with blond highlights that didn't look quite right.


    ~ The stuff in my garden is growing like weeds. As are the weeds IN my garden, by the way. If we don't get a dry morning one of these days so I can get out there and get the weeds yanked out of there, they are going to take over. We are eating radishes (as much as one can snack on radishes) and hope for more veggies soon.


    ~ Greg's slow spell at work is O-V-E-R. So is him spending much time at home with us, or getting enough rest to keep up with how hard he's working during the day. The checks are nice, but we sure miss having him around.


    ~ We are traveling next month. I am giddy at the very thought of it.


    ~ I still hate fireworks. I'm pretty sure we've discussed this. But this pretty much sums it up: Big fireworks displays for all to see and enjoy on the 4th, put on by professionals = exciting and fun and beautiful entertainment. (But still a potential risk of fire and/or explosion). Fireworks sold for personal use = Stupidest. Idea. Ever. SO many kids are injured every year, SO many people hate the noise and air pollution, and it's a gigantic waste of money and causes HUGE amounts of litter every year. SO dangerous - under what other circumstance would most let their children play with EXPLOSIVE MATERIALS!?! Kids are not qualified to set off explosives, and keep hurting themselves and others to prove it, so why we keep letting them do it is beyond me.


    ~ My new haircut = trendy and cute and rather hip, if I say so myself (although I'm pretty sure calling it those things negates its coolness, yes? Yeah, I thought so...), and it's all because I was definitely leaning towards the "brown football helmet" look and I think 36 is a little young for that, yes? Yes. So that, and my cute hip sister telling me that "short in back, longer in front is all the rage" led me to pursuing a new 'do.




    It's 12:30 and both Greg and I are still up. Insanity. He's messing on the computer, and I am doing this. Much as I love you all, I have to close and sleep now. More to come this week, I hope. Have a wonderweek, all.

    Thursday, June 18, 2009

    The Circle of Life

    Last summer, I broke my elbow. A radial head fracture, nondisplaced, thank goodness. Mom came to my rescue, driving down to spend the weekend, care for the house and kids, and I would not have survived those first few days without her.

    And yesterday she decided to call in that favor. She fell at work and broke the same bone, and so now I go to care for her, gladly, with a keen understanding of uncomfortable she is right now, and how much having someone you love come and take care of you makes a gigantic difference.

    So I send out an early Happy Father's Day to all, especially to my sweet, dear Greg - the kids are so very lucky to have you, as am I. There could have been no better father for my children than you. As we spend these next few days apart, know that I am with you in spirit, I miss you "like a child misses their blanket", and I can't wait to see you this weekend. Love you always.

    To my readers, have a wonderful weekend. Gotta get this show on the road.

    Saturday, June 13, 2009

    Seriously, Mr. Rogers Might Pay To Move Us Out

    I thought the ivy was a big deal, in principle, anyway.

    As Ron White would say, I was WRONG.

    Greg was out of town today. The neighborhood "art festival" was going on, just up the street. The kids and I, looking for some afternoon entertainment to pass the time while Daddy was away, hopped in the van, new summer shades donned, ready for some good fun!

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    Not wanting to haul two kids, a stroller AND two bags with me, I took my wallet with money/cards/checks/DL, and my camera, and my phone, and shoved them into the diaper bag. I stashed the now-nearly-empty purse under the table console between the driver's and passenger's seat.

    We locked up, arrived on Maple Street, and saw the festival before us.

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    Ok, not so huge, but hey - face painting and hula hooping - that can't be bad, right?

    So, face-painting it is - one Fairytopia and one Batman, please...

    First Samantha...

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    Jackson waits patiently...

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    Ta-da! Beautiful, yes?

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    And then Jackson...

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    He is...Batman.

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    How cute are they?

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    I know, right?

    Then on to some hula hooping fun....

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    Followed by some kettle corn and listening to some music. Our tummies were telling us it was almost supper time, so begrudgingly the kids came along towards the van, parked in a nearby public parking lot, facing the street leading right up to the festival. We had been there less than an hour, by the way. I noticed a sweet-looking elderly gentleman in a suit, in the same parking lot, with his car's hood up, and I made a mental note to go back and ask if I could call someone for him once I had the kids buckled in. Now that's a bad day, I thought to myself. (Ahh, sweet irony. How you love to hate me.)

    I unlocked the doors of our van - Samantha entered the van first, from the back hatch which I had opened, and as she walked to the front of the van, she gasped in surprise, gave out a strange little squeal, and yelled to me, "MOMMY - what is that sparkly stuff on your seat?!!?"

    What, indeed?

    You know what it was. I knew what it was before I walked the long walk along the side of the van. More of the "sparkly stuff" was all over the pavement.

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    Fuck.

    Driver's window - gone. Shattered in 132 gazillion pieces (but thank god for safety glass). And you surely know what was gone from between the seats - my nearly-empty purse. There was a belt-buckle scratch on the side panel, just below the window frame, from where they clearly dove in through the window to get their ill-gotten booty (or ill-booten gotty?....sorry, MASHism). And there was a big fat scratch next to the window where they clearly missed the first time they swung the crow-bar, or whatever they used to fuck up my van and my day.

    In broad daylight, mid-afternoon, on a street being traveled by festival-goers, this little douche bag robbed me. ROBBED ME. The ivy is now entirely laughable, right?

    As I exclaimed, with as much control as possible, that the van had been broken into and that my purse had been stolen, Samantha broke down and cried, afraid we couldn't get home because of the glass. I explained we would get home, that it would be OK, and to come to the back of the van and sit down while I called 9-1-1.

    And so they did, and I did. I explained my particular emergency, which gained me the phone number where I was told I could call and leave a MESSAGE for the POLICE to file a police report, which they would only be doing over the PHONE, in the next 1 to 36 days, or some shit like that.

    What? NO police on-scene? No checking the area, no looking for witnesses? Okee-day.

    The emergency operator sounded about as thrilled with that procedure as I was. I did not shoot the messenger, and thanked him for his time.

    So Johnny Crackhead wanted cash, yes? Clearly, since he took my purse, but left the two portable DVD players that were in a bag, open, right between the captains chairs. They left a camera. They left valuable iPod and phone chargers and cables. They left my stereo. Just wanted the cash, so they thought they'd just take the money and run. (Sorry, Steve Miller in your head all night now..."whoo-hoo-hoo"...)

    Well, idn't that just too fucking bad for them. They shoulda taken the DVD players. Why? Oh, well, because as you know, I TOOK the good stuff with me. That $12 Walmart purse got them some chapstick, my favorite dollar-store lipstick (fuckers), my only perfume (fuckers again), a broken tie-tack of Greg's, a spare, unmarked key, my check register with no account numbers, checks, or deposit slips, some nail clippers, a tampon or two, and probably a couple of pens I liked (fuckers once more). For the life of me, I can't think of one valuable thing that was in that bag. Which I think is the funniest thing I've heard all week...unless you consider that despite their lack of gain, I still have to replace a window tomorrow.

    I left a message for the police. I assume I'll hear back from them at some point, for all the good it will do.

    Fortunately I had towel in my van, which I laid over the glass on my seat. After I confirmed there was no glass near the kids' seats, I got them buckled in, and then remembered our elderly car trouble victim in the next row, clearly visible from my van. I walked over, and asked if I could call someone for him. He smiled and explained that, "no, one'a 'dese rods was just a lil' bit hot but it's cooled off now" and he was "fi'n ta be on his way". I said I was glad for that, and just wanted to make sure he was alright. I wondered out loud if he had seen anything near my van. He looked puzzled as I explained what had happened. He said he'd been there half an hour and had seen nothing.

    (That information strenthened my suspicion that Johnny Crackhead was watching the parking lot, looking for a woman leaving her car with no purse, and struck just after we left the area. Little creep.)

    We left later in the evening, once Greg was back home, to grab some take-out, and vacuum out the glass at the car wash (not sticking all that glass in my vacuum, thankyouverymuch). While we were in a hurry to leave, somehow Jake got left inside and Greta got left outside.

    Uh, lemme just tell you - Jake likes that scenario NOT. AT. ALL. He has separation anxiety (much of the reason we got Greta), and takes it out on the trash when he's left alone.

    And so he did.

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    Yeah, because I didn't have enough stress, OR enough messes to clean up today.

    Nice relaxing Saturday, huh? Makes you feel good about your day, though, doesn't it? You're welcome, dear reader. Anything for you.

    Thursday, June 4, 2009

    Even Mr. Rogers Would Think This Neighborhood Sucks

    I bought some plants. 'Kay? I brought them home. I knew exactly what I bought:

    1 clematis
    2 phlox
    1 coreopsis
    1 dwarf bee balm
    1 organic tomato plant
    4 english ivy

    I got them home and unloaded. I put them on the top of the retaining wall that lines our driveway. I left them there to enjoy the afternoon sun, intending to plant them in the evening.

    Within an hour and a half, I stepped back outside to look at them again, and ponder location and other such decisions to be made about my new plants.

    Clematis, so beautiful, love that purple color...maybe back fence, north end...coreopsis and bee balm, back bed under Jackson's window...phlox under the picture window up front...tomato plant in my Topsy Turvy that some awesome friends gave me...and those four ivy will go in the rock wall, three in the big wall, one in the sm--

    Wait. One, two, three...

    What the fuck? Where's the fourth ivy?

    Yes, I'm sure there were four. Four. I bought four of them. I double-checked my receipt. One, two, three, four. I also remember double-checking the cart before I returned it at Menards.

    I peek into the van's back window.

    Nothing.

    I check under the van, along the rock wall, high and low; I move ALL the other plants into a line in the lawn and count again; I look on the steps, the porch, the flower beds and everywhere else I've been since I got home.

    Nothing.

    Someone STOLE a 3x3 pot of english ivy? Seriously?

    Some lame ass walked their loser self UP into my driveway, in BROAD daylight, snatched one of MY english ivy plants, and took off, undoubtedly giggling all the way.

    Who does that?!?! Who steals a tiny, teeny little $1.50 plant? A kid? Maybe. Certainly an adult lacking the moral fiber to restrain themselves from petty larceny on a Thursday would at LEAST take the expensive plant, or at the VERY LEAST one of the big ones, yes? But what would a kid want with an ivy plant?

    Here's what I hope. Wait, lemme ask this - do you know much about english ivy? Well, it's, uh, persistent. And hardy. And agressive. I hope Johnny Plant Stealer takes it home and plants it. In a bed with some really nice, delicate, small flowers that they spent a lot of money and time on.

    And I hope the ivy grows its very best, like a good little ivy, and I hope it chokes out every stinking plant in every flower bed they own. I hope it climbs up their house and covers their windows, and climbs up their roof, and clogs up their chimney, and grows through their gutters and everywhere else it can think of to grow.

    You want ivy? I hope you get it. You asshat.

    I can't WAIT to move out of this neighborhood.

    Wednesday, June 3, 2009

    Creative Genius That Melts Your Heart

    S: Hey, Mom?

    Me: Yeah?

    S: Um, violets are red...wait...

    Me: Do you mean "roses" are red?

    S: Oh, yeah! OK...roses are red, violets are blue, every breath I take for you. {beams with pride at my gasp of joy}

    Me: Oh, honey, that is SO beautiful! {melts into floor, taken down by the cuteness}

    I can see by the look on her face that while she is pleased with herself, she has now realized she just promised to breathe only for me. Being the literal, smart, problem-solving-minded child that she is....

    S: Oh, mom, wait...listen! Roses are red, violets are blue, every breath I take for you...and me.

    That's my girl. It's nice to say you'll breathe for someone else, but you've gotta save some for yourself, too. Nice lesson, actually.