Rain, rain, go away (also drizzle, sleet, ice, snow…).

It is raining again today. I think the universe should make a rule against it raining on Mondays and Wednesdays. My race is in two weeks. I have to run to keep up, Universe! I can’t keep missing days. I need to keep up the pace or this 3 miles thing is going to evaporate. And how will I be able to test things out like some sort of slim-ish fanny pack? I guess I need one – I don’t really want one. But where else am I going to store my gloves, key, tissues, cell phone… How do people do this? What do they do with all their stuff? (Karyn – you’ve run races before right? HELP!) Right now, if I get hot, I just take off my jacket and fling it in my driveway when I lap around the block. I don’t think that is an option during the race, but I’m just guessing here. Maybe, Universe, if you could make it a tad warmer during Race Day, that would solve some of my issues (like gloves). Would low 60s be feasible?

Speaking of weather requests, how about warming it up to the mid- to upper- 60s in the here and now? I’m all for seasons and having wintry weather during winter, but I need a break. This freezing drizzle and grey, gloom, and doom just isn’t cutting it any more. In fact, it’s become downright depressing. I need some sunshiney, shirt-sleeve, beer-drinking on the patio kind of weather. My sister and Sars will be here very shortly and I think they would like a break from winter as well. So see what you can do, mkay?

I will give in and let you keep the clouds during my commute (to eliminate the sun shining in my eyes) if you can get rid of the slippery roads. My tires, they do not do too well in the rain. Or the damp. Or the ice. Really, in anything less than ideal conditions. The two shots we have at ice and sleet this week does not have me jumping for joy. Perhaps shrieking in fear would be a little closer to accurate. So quit with the rain because I do not like hydroplaning at a modest 30 mph. My car does not like the massive lakes in the outside lanes, Sam-I-Am. And I do not like fearing for my life when I turn onto the access road from a dead stop and slide precariously towards the steep, steep (and unfenced) embankment. It makes me think I will go splat! onto the freeway below and there is a limit to how high I can raise my life insurance before the insurance people freak out a little. So – no raining just before or during commutes. Or during the early evening hours when I run. Thankssomuch.

One of those chances for sleet and snow happens to be on Thursday. Which, really, is kind of funny. Want to know why? Because my sister and Sars are supposed to arrive on Thursday! Ha ha ha ha ha – of course they are! My sister – well, all of Philadelphia, actually – received almost 3 feet of snow this weekend. It’s not supposed to snow like that in Philly. The 23 inches of snow they received at Christmas was a record-breaker – and forced my sister to cancel and reschedule all sorts of Christmas travel plans. Then they had this new record-breaking storm. And they’re supposed to get hit again on Wednesday. That’s why it’s funny. Apparently, winter thinks my sister’s hott and will follow her anywhere. Maybe we should hire her out. Who wants a snow storm?

In the meantime, I will sit here amongst the freezing drizzle and wait for bloggy inspiration to find me. All this grey is not good for my creativity.

Three cheers for the Saints!

We hyped the game all week. The girls were excited to get their football party – as excited as they were confused that the Patriots weren’t playing. (Gracie asked what the Superbowl was. I told her the two best teams played each other to find out who was the best team that year. “The Patriots are playing?” Love that kid.) I bought all the usual football party fare: pizza (stuffed-crust DiGiornos), hot wings, chips, homemade onion dip, Fritos, peanuts (in the shell, lightly salted), cheesy popcorn, beer, soda…. it was a veritable feast. The Ex brought the girls back early and we made up the traditional football pool and the girls helped me pick squares and draw numbers. We were all set to par-tay!

Which is why I cracked up when I turned on the television and five minutes later Gracie came into the kitchen and asked why football was on.

Me: …

Good on you, Saints! You deserved it. The fact that you beat the Colts? Made it even better. It was a great night. Now relinquish the title to our Pats next year or I shall have to hate you for all eternity. (Go ahead and ask the Cheeseheads and the Colts if I’m kidding.)

At least we’ll eat well.

You’re not supposed to use food as a reward. You’re also not supposed to plan festivities around food. Whoops.

Kim and Sars are going to be here on Thursday and so far we have planned: going out for Irish Nachos on Friday night, spending the rest of the night baking, going to the Log Cabin village and on a picnic on Saturday (if the weather cooperates), having a birthday party (with CAKE!) for Kim on Saturday night, drinking and playing games with my friends after the girls go to sleep that night, having a fancy tea party with all kinds of desserts and fancy tea on Sunday, and going to IHOP for breakfast on Monday before Sars leaves us. Maybe it’s just me, but there seems to be a lot of food involved…

In case I had any doubts remaining, my grocery shopping took care of that this morning. It took me FOUR HOURS and three different stores to get what I needed…and I still forgot the honey. (We don’t use honey at my house so I had to buy some. I know. We’re weird.) I bought bottles of wine – both to consume and to make drunken cheesy bread. I bought four different kinds of soda because I don’t usually have it on hand. I bought some ginger cookies sandwiched with lemon cream from Costco that I have seriously been coveting for three years; they cost $8 a box (a big box, but still!) so I haven’t had an excuse until I thought of our tea party. I also bought fig newtons to go with the Mayan Hotties: cookies are covered. We’ll have leftover birthday cake and my sister is making homemade cran-orange scones. She’s also brining fancy spreadables to put on the tasty scones. I bought blueberries (my sister wants a blueberry cake) and vanilla bean ice cream. I bought 20 lbs of potatoes (and I bet we use them all) and a roast beef to made Sunday night. I bought several pounds of half a dozen different kinds of cheese (including cream cheese) and an assortment of crackers in bulk. I have dips and humus and appetizers. I bought an embarrassment of riches food – now I just have to try not to eat it until my sister and Sars arrive.

To keep out of trouble, I’ve worked myself to the bone to get ready. If Kim were coming alone, I’d change her sheets, tidy “her” room and call it even. Maybe – if I had time – I’d mop and vacuum. But since this is Sars’s inaugural visit, I had to deep clean the bathroom, clean the guest room, change her sheets, put out the new pillows and blankets, I vacuumed and shampooed the carpet around the eating area, and the list is only halfway done. In between chores (and four hours of grocery shopping), I’ve been working on my sister’s birthday present. It’s a secret, but I promise to spill once my sister opens it! My point is, with all that work that I’ve done last night and today, can you blame me for testing the ginger lemon cookies? Thank god the other two sleeves are sealed separately or else the tea party would be minus one very tasty treat!

Better without the details.

I’ve been home with a sick kiddo today. She was sick to her stomach at 2 a.m. the night before last. But it didn’t seem to bother her, so I chalked it up to too much chocolate and sent her to school. She was sent home before lunch for…well, you don’t want to know. Let’s just say I owe the custodian a really good gift. The Ex picked her up and said she was fine. Off she went to school and…she repeated the experience. Tenfold. So I stayed home with her today. Here’s hoping she doesn’t try to three-peat tomorrow.

Instead of dwelling on all the ick, let’s look at some mini-reviews! I watched two of my 25 Movies in January and read a new book worth a mention. Doesn’t that sound much better? I thought so.

Movie 1: A Beautiful Mind
You know when you see a movie preview and there’s just something about it that makes you want to see it? There’s some sort of resonance with it. I don’t know how to describe it except that for me when that happens, it looks story-like – book-like – and sort of hazy and magical. That’s how the previews for this movie happened to be, only I avoided watching this movie for years. The problem was that the idea of schizophrenia and mental illness hit a little too close to home for me, and so I avoided it. It only took me nine years to come around and be okay with just the idea of watching the (cough:fictional) movie; I told you I don’t like change. In any case, I watched it. It was…just what I thought it would be. On one hand, how many movies can you say that about? I would much rather the movie or book live up to expectations than fall far short of them. On the other hand, the movie didn’t exactly blow me out of my seat, either. It was a good movie. Russell Crowe – an actor I don’t particularly care for – was phenomenal. I didn’t think Jennifer Connelly was nearly as good as everyone else raved. The story line was better than most, but I was still able to watch the movie like I do most others – in 20 or 30 minute increments during dinner or as I had time. (This drives most people nuts, I know. Great movies make me watch them all the way through, so hush.) I don’t know that I’d press someone who hasn’t seen it to run out and rent it, but I would tell them to stop flicking the channels if they happened to catch it on TV.

Movie 2: Bringing Up Baby
My sisters are going to hit me – but I thought this movie was an utter disappointment. Perhaps I expected too much from it. After all, it does star two of my favorite actors: Cary Grant (who would be on my List of 5 if he weren’t dead) and Katharine Hepburn (whom I adore and would want to play me in a movie if she wasn’t tall, skinny, flat-chested and…well, also dead). I loved Grant in An Affair to Remember. I was head over heels for he and Hepburn in The Philadelphia Story. Why, oh why, oh why couldn’t I have loved them in Bringing Up Baby? I wanted to like it so much. But Grant seemed discordantly out of character, the scenes didn’t seem to flow, and really the title didn’t seem to fit at all. I even watched most of the movie in one sitting (although if I’m fully confessing, it’s because I wanted to get it over with – that’s how much I disliked it). It’s funny: the one part of the movie that kept making me laugh was when Susan’s aunt was talking. Only West Wing diehards will get this, but she reminded me so much of the woman in season 5 or 6 who was protesting the Daughters of the American Revolution. “I am Marion Coatsworth-Hayes!” Susan’s aunt sounded so much like her it gave me the giggles every time. Still – if that’s the best Baby could do, I’m afraid I won’t be repeating the experience.

The Book: The Elegance of the Hedgehog
I don’t know if  can squeeze a mini-review from this book. I feel like it deserves a full review, but I’m not quite sure I have the words yet. I really loved the book, the characters, the plotline, the abstract discussions, the artfulness of the book – and still, not being versed at all in philosophy, I knew that I was only catching about one-fourth of what was offered. DON’T let that deter you from reading this book! Sure, a lot of the first half of the book seemed pretentious and philosophical meandering for meandering’s sake, but without it I don’t know that the characters would have seem as fleshed out or as dear to me when their storylines take off in the second half of the book. It seems a bit contradictory that stuffy, intellectual observations of a frumpy concierge and a precocious tween could “flesh” them out when hardly a dozen lines of dialogue are spent between them, but it really helps you know the characters when their paths cross and the plot explodes. Yes, explodes. Not a word you come across in philosophy texts very often. Um…I think.

There you go – mini-reviews of some movies, a book, and not my day. You’re welcome!

Love flings open the door.

Looking back, one of my favorite parts about my childhood – and something I’m gaining an entirely new appreciation of – is that my mom was never stingy with our playdates. My house was the one where all my family and friends and siblings’ friends gathered. Playdates were scheduled, friends showed up at home with us, neighbors walked in the back door, and family members stopped by unannounced because everyone knew we were always home and they were always welcome. All my mom asked for was a headcount for dinner.

Now that I’m the mom, I wonder how in the world she did it. It made a big difference, I’m pretty sure, that she didn’t work outside the home until I was in high school. By that point, my friends and I required very little supervision. In fact, by that point I didn’t even bother asking my mom’s permission for friends to come home after school. We just all showed up at the door. But in the early days, my mom acted the social coordinator. I remember very clearly one day when I was in kindergarten, my mom asked if I had any friends that I would like to ask to come over and play one day after school. I was surprised, at first, and then told her that yes, I would like to Todd Buckevitch to come play. I can vaguely remember my mom’s initial surprise that I named a boy, but she got over it quickly. My best friend in the whole world was my cousin Jonathan; I had grown up playing with the boys, so it seemed natural to me to play with them at recess. My mom dutifully called Todd’s mom and set up the playdate. He came over after school and my mom fed us a snack and kept an eye on us while we played matchbox cars and pretty much tore up the house. Then Todd’s mom picked him up before dinner. It was the first of zillions of playdates with hundreds of friends and I love my mom for it.

Especially now. I don’t know how working moms manage it. Gracie is starting to create a definite circle of friends in before/after care (I don’t hear as much about friends from elementary school) and she has two best friends in particular – A. and Y.  I see A.’s dad quite often (in fact, before I knew he was married, I might have plotted in my head to set him up with one of my friends) and we had gotten to the point where we stopped and chatted when we saw each other. Still – I am usually so frazzled and caught up in my day-to-day routine that it took me weeks to remember to ask him for their contact info, and even longer to email him and set up a playdate. I couldn’t do the after-school thing because all of the grown-ups involved work an 8-5 job. Weekends are tricky because I only have the girls every other weekend and then I forget to schedule a playdate until the Thursday or Friday before “my” weekend and most families don’t plan last minute like that. But, finally, I managed to do it and Gracie and A. were thrilled!

Of course, my life being the way it is, as soon as I set the playdate for last Saturday afternoon, my friends from down the street called and asked if I would mind watching their two girls on Saturday night so they could sneak out on a date. My girls and their girls are inseparable whenever we hang out, so I took a deep breath, thought of my mom and said I would love to have the girls over that night! What’s better than one playdate? Two playdates back-to-back!

At first I thought I was crazy. Then I just gave in and decided not to sweat the small stuff. And then I decided I was a genius because having J. and N. come over 30 minutes after A. left meant that I didn’t have to deal with the post-playdate meltdowns! Double-win! Really, it all went much, much better than I thought. Everyone was well-behaved, nothing went wrong, and I didn’t even have any major fights to break up. I can’t brag about that when I’m dealing with just my two! Plus, for one afternoon I felt like I lived up to the extremely high standard my mom set.

I bet my mom didn’t think she was setting the bar or living up to one or anything else along those lines. I bet she gnashed her teeth a time or 60. I’m sure she suffered through many a rambunctuous afternoon. She did it because she loved us and she wanted us to be happy and to learn how to love and be loved. I think it worked. Now it’s my turn to take a deep breath and plunge into the craziness for my girlies. Thank god there’s laughter amongst the chaos!

Happy Love Thursday, everyone! Take a chance and throw the door open today and see what happens to come your way. Friends, laughter and happy surprises are out there, but sometimes you have to invite them over.

That’s Gracie; that’s my girl.

Second quarter report cards came home last week. Clearly – Gracie is my girl. First of all, there were the grades. Scoring on kindergarten report cards goes something like this: the kids get X’s for skills that are well-developed, /’s for skills that are still developing and need a little work, and C’s for areas of concern. Gracie is an overachiever: she had mostly X’s with a few /’s for a second consecutive quarter. All of the skills she had /’s in last quarter were upgraded from “still developing” to “mastered.” The few areas that she did score lower in were new skills – and some of them I know she knows, like understanding that reading progresses from left to right and top to bottom. I know she knows because she is devouring Junie B. Jones right now and it’s not like the kid is reading backwards or anything.
 
There was, however, one area in which Gracie did not do so well. No, it wasn’t math – she’s not like me in that respect. In fact, Gracie’s teacher told me she is leading the class in mathematics. No, it’s gross motor skills. Gracie backslid from X’s to /’s in such areas as balance, standing on one foot, hopping, walking in a straight line, etc. In other words – my baby got a C in gym. Yeah. That’s not exactly why she’s like me – I didn’t almost fail gym until at least high school. (You know – when the caring stopped.) The similarity comes more from the fact that OF COURSE she “needs work” in her gross motor skills – this is my kid who can’t stand up for two seconds in a row without falling over and injuring herself! She can’t walk and talk at the same time! We call her Gracie, for crying out loud! And she totally gets that from me.
 
Now I just need to figure out whether she still gets a cash reward for her report card when she’s downgraded to a “C” in those areas on her next report card. After all, it sort of is my fault. (I’m just getting myself used to hearing that before she hits her teen years. I figure I need lots of breaking in.)

Oh, good. I haven’t had a medical malady in a few days.

I thought I was scared when, over Christmas, I had a few twinges in my bad kidney. I drowned myself in water and (I’m pretty sure) passed the stone. Then I was relieved, and my symptoms went away instantly, and it was good.

Until Saturday happened.

Saturday I woke up at 5 a.m. with kidney pain and pain in a place that you don’t really want to know about. Let’s just say I’ve had pain there before when I had my kidney stones and I knew exactly what it meant. Among other things, it meant the pain in my lower back that I’d had the night before was not from a pulled muscle. So I got out of bed, took a pain pill my urologist had given me from the last go-round and went back to sleep.

When my girlies finally dragged me out of bed two hours later, I began Operation: Drown the Bastard. I think I drank 3 gallons of water on Saturday and made roughly 1,000 trips to the loo. Unfortunately, it didn’t do much to calm down my kidney spasms, but my other pain never came back so I guess that’s something. At some point in the evening – sometime after Gracie’s first playdate and before the second one was over – my kidney pain faded to a dull ache and never came back. I don’t think I passed a stone, but I don’t really trust this temporary truce. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop.

While I’m waiting for that, I’ve been keeping up my water intake and researching what I’m not supposed to eat. Black tea is out. Black raspberries are supposed to be out. Nuts and nut butter are out. Coffee is supposed to be used sparingly (I wonder where 3 cups/day would fall in that spectrum?). And chocolate? Chocolate is definitely out. (Silly, silly doctors with their silly, silly handouts.) But I think that must be a typo. Surely they can’t expect me to go through this without chocolate. Especially if I’m also supposed to go without draft beer! Gah! Why don’t they just add “wine” and “living” to the list of forbidden items while they’re at it?

Hopefully my excessive water drinking and whining, begging, and pleading with the universe will do the trick. In the meantime, I’m on water refill #3 of the day and I think I’m kinda freaking out the girl who sits next to the loo. I wonder what I can get her to believe. Heh. I have to have some fun with this, right?

A new nickname was born.

My sister and her friend are coming to vacation visit at my house in one more weekend. Really, they’re not arriving until a week from Thursday, so almost two weeks, but it sounds much sooner if I say “one more weekend.” It’s the grown-up version of “one more sleep,” I guess. And it is very important to make it seem like it’s much sooner because I AM SO EXCITED!!!

Apparently, my girls are too. (Of course!) Auntie Kim told them on the phone today that she and her friend were coming to visit very, very soon, and so we spent our dinner time talking about all of the fun things we will do when Auntie Kim and Sars arrive. I should point out that Sars isn’t her real name. It’s a nickname. One of many. Her real name is Andrea, but sometimes I forget what it is and I have to think really, really hard. So we just stick with Sars. And that is how we had this conversation:

Me: Auntie Kim is going to sleep in Gracie’s bed, and you will sleep in your bed, and Gracie will sleep on her trundle bed.*
Bee: And who will sleep on Auntie Kim’s** bed?
Me: Auntie Kim’s friend Sars is going to sleep on her bed.
Gracie: What’s her name?
Me: Sars.
Bee: OH! I like Stars!

Heh. “Stars” is going to blow Bee’s wee little mind. I can’t wait!

*Our “trundle bed” is really just Gracie’s old crib mattress tucked under her twin bed for safekeeping. We are not that fancy, yo.
**That is what we call the extra bed, because 99 times out of 100, that’s who stays in it.

The cost of doing business.

I gave up a long time ago on “free” (hobbies, games, products, etc) ever really being free. Running definitely isn’t free. You would think it is – all you have to do is run around, right? Wrong. So, so wrong.

Way back when I first took up running, pre-dating my Couch-to-5K days, I went out and bought myself some official running shoes. In case you haven’t heard, official=expensive. I went to a discount designer shoe store and tried on all the Asics running shoes they had. One of my acquaintances who is hardcore into working out used Asics, so I figured they were probably the way to go. I settled on some Asics Kahana Gel Strikes, or some such ridiculous fancy sounding name. $80. But it was an investment and they would last forever and keep me as injury-free as was possible. Okay, there’s the shoes. You need to invest in quality shoes. I was done, right? Wrong.

Once you have the shoes, you’re going to need some gear. I bought two or three sports bras ($17 a pop) and two pairs of running shorts ($11 each). I had t-shirts coming out of my ears, so I didn’t need those. I had a few ratty ones of my own and all of my then-husband’s old t-shirts from his (much skinnier) military days.  Almost $200 and I was all set for my “free” running stint.

Well, then the divorce happened and the running stopped. (The aerobics didn’t, but that’s an entirely different set of expenses.) Flash forward to Secret Agent C talking me into this Couch-to-5k thing. I had the shoes. I had my gear from before. Surely I was in the clear now, right? Right! For awhile, at least. Then the weather started getting colder – stupid weather! – and I needed some warmer clothes. So Santa picked up two pair of capri running pants ($15 each), a running jacket ($20), a fitted tank-top in case the cotton jersey’s didn’t fit under the jacket ($9) and a long-sleeve fancy-schmancy running shirt ($11). I had two pair of running pants I was using as lounge wear that I finally hemmed so I could wear them outside, but I was still out another $100. And that’s not even going into the money I spent to replace my iPod or the number of earbuds I’ve bought to find some that won’t fall out while I’m running, the ace bandages, re-usable ice packs, and braces I’ve bought to keep me in one piece, or the reflective gear I should buy to make sure no one tries to run over me.

The point is: I finally, finally got to where I think I’m in the clear. I might want to pick up another pair of shorts or some new sports bras when the weather warms up, but they’re not necessities at this point. I’m good. Which is why my shoes wore out. Yep, I needed new (expensive) running shoes. My knees were starting to hurt every time I ran. I had been running this C25K program for the past 5 months – and before that I was using them sporadically for over a year – and they say that shoes are good for x number of miles or about 6 months of regular usage. I have no idea how many miles they’re good for because I knew I was never going to hit that number. So I went out and bought some brand new shoes. Or, at least, I tried to. My shoes are not imprinted with their name. They have a number and the shoe size printed on a tongue-tag. That number was not helpful when I searched all the shoe sites. I finally googled it and that’s how I found out I had Kahanas. Then DSW wouldn’t let me use their coupon. And Zappos wanted my first-born in exchange for their sneakers. Amazon had them, but they couldn’t ship them for over a week – and that was with Super-Saver shipping, so no telling how long they would take to get here once they shipped. No worries, I would try the local DSW store – nada. In a fit of desperation before I resigned myself to sore knees while I waited for Amazon to slow-boat my shoes to me, I tried Famous Footwear. I found them! The price was not cheap, but the gratification would be immediate. And to be honest, the price was only $5 more than I would have paid on Amazon. So I gave in and bought my shoes. Then I went and had stomach issues on Monday and weather issues on Wednesday and that is why I didn’t even get to run until this morning. Le sigh.

But! NOW, now I am all set. I am good. I am ready to go! And also I no longer care that the registration fee for my race is $25. Because at this point, who cares.

Um…not really.

I like how that title works on so many different levels. This isn’t really a post – I had company last night and it deluged on the way home, so there were muddy carpets (and little girls) to clean and dinners to cook and movies to watch all on top of the company to entertain. Could I elbow a short post in there somewhere? Um…no. Not really.

No problem! I would just wake up early this morning and bang one out. Ha. Ha ha ha! We were supposed to have ice this morning. And if there wasn’t ice, the weathermen promised freezing rain. Or ice pellets of magical proportions (or something). Instead, we have Day 2 of The Flood. So work wasn’t even delayed. No matter – I was going to have to leave early to drive slower (and more safely) to drop the children off and navigate the flood plains streets to work. I could write a post then since I would be so early. HA! So, um…not really.

And speaking of the deluge, the girls – they were excited. Because all. of. that. rain! meant that they could use their Hello Kitty umbrellas. That would be helpful – the girls wouldn’t get soaking wet and I would have to keep yelling at them to keep their hoods up and walk faster towards the door…right? Um, not really. Have you ever tried keeping an umbrella over your head while trying to manually open a kid’s umbrella and then holding that open while you try to assist the child out of a very tall jeep, and keep said child’s bag from dragging in the standing two inches of rain? NOT EASY! Then try adding another child, another umbrella, and another bag into the mix. Also, these “cute” umbrellas had these “handy” loops at the end – supposedly to carry them or hang them on a hook. Really, those Death-Loops are for holding the umbrella and swinging it around like a baton of death when the umbrella is closed, or to catch onto everyone else’s umbrella causing mass confusion and soakage (because hello! it’s pouring!) when they’re open. The umbrellas? So not helpful!!

And that – that – is why there is no post here this morning. But it is Friday and I’m splurging on Starbucks at lunch and I have a few Hershey Kisses sitting here waiting for me to savor with my coffee. So while it sounds like maybe I’m in a bad mood – um…not really!