Preschool Graduation

Well its official - my baby has graduated preschool. Put away your Kleenex, it's okay, really.

Funny thing is, I didn't know she was actually IN preschool.

Come to find out, she has been in preschool for exactly 2 weeks. She turned 5 over Memorial Day weekend, and moved from the "4-year-old class" to Pre-K, aka Preschool.

Two weeks!! And graduating already!! My Lulu, preschool prodigy. Takes after her mother, I'd say...!

It was all very cute, in an eyerolling kind of way. The kids had fun, sang us some songs, pictures were taken, there was cake and punch. Most of the parents stood around and chatted, probably about their little geniuses. I was amazed at how many people seemed to be thoroughly caught up in the whole affair.

We busted out as fast as possible. The fanfare was borderline nauseating.

We had just endured what JeepMan calls a "Hallmark Holiday." An occasion made up for the sole purpose of selling a product. Now don't take this literally... I am not saying that Preschool Graduation was created for the selling of merchandise, but to me it illustrates the penchant for today's society to, as a friend of mine bluntly puts it, "glorify mediocrity."

Some of you just gasped.

You think I am calling my daughter "mediocre." Well, I suppose I kind of am. Webster defines it as "Of moderate to low quality," with a synonym of "Ordinary." Now I'm not calling Lulu "low quality," but in the vast spectrum of humanity, I suppose she is pretty ordinary. I mean, the kid is FIVE. Of course she's special and precious to us, and those who love her. But do I expect others to see her that way?

You might say, "Of course!! Each child is precious and special and unique and wonderful!!" And I wouldn't argue with you. What you are likely implying, though, is that each child should be TREATED as special and unique and wonderful. And that's where I would have to politely disagree. I wouldn't presume for you to actively recognize and applaud my child's fabulousness with enthusiasm. The fact is, all children being unique, special, and precious... well doesn't that put them all on the same shelf?

See? In the words of one of my favorite Demotivators: "Always Remember That You Are Unique. Just Like Everyone Else."

Call me a kill-joy, party pooper, whatever... I just don't see the point of celebrating all these so-called "milestones." Its not for the kids. Lulu doesn't have any clue what just happened, she just knows we took her out for a Frosty afterward. And guess what? She and all her friends will be right back at school tomorrow like nothing ever happened. Its for the parents, and looking around the crowd at this gala event, there were two kinds: freakishly enraptured and checking their watches. Not much middle ground.

To me a milestone should represent a pivotal point in the life of the person experiencing it. Birth, death, yes. Marriage, sure.

Graduation... I suppose, but don't ask everyone and their friends' friends to celebrate with you. It makes people feel obligated and generally annoyed. Oh, they may come, but believe me, they are bored out of their minds.

Now I don't assume I speak for everyone, but I certainly speak for many and likely a majority when I say that your graduation, or your child's graduation, is really only monumental to you, your child, and perhaps grandparents or very close relatives. To anyone else, it's 2 or more hours of life that they will never recoup. And be it known that I speak of high school graduation, or possibly college.

Not Junior High. Or Primary School. Or Kindergarten.

Or Preschool. Seriously, people.

I Hate My Husband

So I'm not into New Years' Resolutions. I think they're lame. I don't get why you have to have a special day to make commitments to change.

That said, the timing of my commitment to get into better shape and lose some weight was, well... coincidental.

I refuse to call it a New Years' Resolution because if I do, I will surely break it.

For the past few years, as my metabolism has slowed and my diet and exercise regime has remained unchanged, the pounds have crept on. My recent goal for the dreaded "Holidays" has been to not GAIN any weight, and I have succeeded.

Weight gain or no, however, I am always left with a "holiday hangover." Not the alcohol-induced kind, but the overindulgent kind. I love good food. I have a horrible sweet tooth. And in a social situation, it's very hard for me to monitor what's going in my mouth. So while I might not eat in excess, I certainly eat poorly. Fat after fat, carb after carb. By January I feel like a giant beached walrus. Every year.

Well this year, I decided to make a significant change. Until recently, I didn't need to exercise to lose weight. Cut the portions, moderate the simple carbohydrates, watch the fats: PRESTO! 20 lbs lighter.

Not so much this last year.

Is 35 a magic number? Did my metabolism hit a predestined wall? Who knows. Who cares?
The end result is the same. Dieting alone wasn't working.

I'm not stupid. I KNOW exercise is important. I have always done some form of core/strength training. I love resistance training. Isometrics. Yoga. Pilates. Abs, buns, thighs. Bring it.

I despise cardio. Always have. Even in high school, in my prime, running track, I hated it. Hate the feeling that I can't catch my breath. Hate the burning in my lungs, the coppery taste in my mouth. The hammering heart. The rubber muscles. The lactic-acid buildup: the "burn."

And conventional cardio is just plain Bor-Ing.

I don't run. I won't ever run again...on purpose. As in - if I'm not being chased. My knees, hips, and ankles can't take it with my arthritis. It hurts my back when my, *ahem*, ample bosom is bouncing along (trust me, they don't make a bra that can restrain these girls on a jog!).

Treadmills, stair climbers, ellipticals, stationary bikes: dull, dull, boring, dull. Music? Not a distraction. TV? Book? Nope and nope.

So I finally found the solution... SNEAK in the cardio. Get it with your resistance training!

I joined Curves. 30 second intervals of intensive targeted-muscle-group resistance training, with 30 seconds of recovery (cardio) in between. For 30 minutes.

You get the cardio from the resistance training. GENIUS!!

But this isn't an ad for Curves. Do what you want, I don't care. Whatever works for you.

The point is, I'm proud of myself. I've been vigilant about my diet. I've been busting my butt at Curves. Hey, baby... I've lost SEVEN pounds. In three weeks. Not bad, you might say.

What's the problem?, you might ask.

It's HIM. JeepMan.

My rat-bastard husband.

Don't get me wrong, I love him.

But I hate him too.

That Man has not lifted a weight. He has not done any form of cardio outside of his daily routine. He has not changed a THING except his diet, which is essentially the same as my diet, just slightly bigger portions.

And he has lost 20 lbs since Jan 3rd.

Stab me in the eye with a fork. Push bamboo splinters under my fingernails. Put me in a roomful of chocolate that I can't eat.

It's not fair. I hate him.

Christmas: The Afterword

Sorry I've been away but I've been kinda busy with work and I actually joined a GYM! If you can call Curves a gym. It's circuit training, and it's kicking my butt. In a good way. I think.

Anywhoo - I promised you a belated crappy Christmas gift story, so here goes. Coincidentally, this gift was also from "Unclue" Mike, the giver of the aforementioned stolen coffee. He got the kids each a book, one that you special order from some company that then inserts the child's name into the story as a protagonist. Sounds like something any 4 or 7 year old would be pleased with, right?

Plato got one of these when he was 3, also from Mike, who spelled his own name throughout the book as "Unclue Mike." Plato couldn't have cared less, but it made JeepMan and I snicker-snort every time we read it.

So I wondered, as these books arrived in the mail, if the same mistake would have been repeated. Plato would certainly notice now, and even Lulu might: she writes her name everywhere she can, and has even learned some other words to read and spell.

The wail that erupted from her as she opened her book was pathetic. I tried to calm her and find out what was wrong, and finally just grabbed the book. He'd spelled her name wrong. Phonetically. As in "Loo-Loo." She was so mad that Plato got his own book and she didn't that she flung the book in the trash and had a temper tantrum right in the living room.

Poor thing. All I could do was comfort her and explain that Unclue Mike isn't the best speller in the world, but at least he tried.

She was having none of it. I think he's on her naughty list until further notice. That girl can hold a grudge, big time.

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The next Christmas epilogue involves MIL. You didn't think it would all just stop because Christmas is over, did you? Oh, no!

It must be understood that MIL had specifically asked us not to get her the usual college-team apparel and knick-knacks that we usually get her (she's a knick-knack fiend), and instead asked for some music CDs and maybe a bottle of wine.

My MIL fancies herself a wine snob. Because her friends fancy themselves wine snobs. So I suppose she is a wine snob by osmosis, because she certainly hasn't studied wine or had a wide range of exposures to wine. Regardless. By turns her self-proclaimed snobbery can be humorous (she calls "Riesling" "Reasoning"), annoying, or downright embarassing (complaining over a perfectly good bottle of wine at a restaurant).

Well we got the CDs, and ended up getting her 2 bottles of wine. She only likes sweet whites. Recently she's begun to try reds, but only with ice in them, as she thinks they taste horrid at room temperature. Hmmm....her friends must be dabbling in reds as well...

We didn't go too much out on a limb for fear her head might explode: we got her her favorite brand of Riesling, and a second bottle of the same brand's Late Harvest Riesling (sweeter). Reasoning (ha ha) that the sweeter the better, I figured we could introduce her to something new while not venturing too far outside of her, *ahem* 'area of expertise.'

She seemed pleased with the wines when she opened them, and we had her favorite with dinner. I suggested she open the other so we could compare, but she refused. We told her to just let us know what she thought.

JeepMan went to visit her the week after the holiday, after dropping me off at the airport. He'd actually forgotten about the wine, but he hadn't been in the door for 10 minutes when she told him, "That wine you got me? I had to dump the whole bottle down the drain. It tasted like VINEGAR."

This is nothing new. A few years back, someone she hangs with poured a bottle down the drain for tasting like vinegar, and ever since that has been the fate of approximately 1 in 3 of the bottles she opens. I myself have been told by a sommelier that I have a discriminating palate. Who knew? But at a wine-tasting with a group, I was able to pick up on some qualities of the wines that many others could not discern. Cool. But the point is, of all the wine I have drunk over the years, I have only opened 2 bad bottles. And only ONE of them was actually vinegary.

But here's the real kicker. She asked JeepMan: "Did you even look at the date on the bottle when you bought it?? It's from 2006!!"

(forehead slap)

(ow)

Were I the benefit-of-the-doubt-giving kind, I might say, "Well, maybe she knows something I don't. Maybe 2006 was a really bad year for late-harvest Riesling in the Sonoma Valley..."

I can't extend that sort of latitude here. She thinks 2006 represents some type of shelf-life recommendation. A "Use By" date.

She thinks the wine was expired.

So what do you think? Wouldn't a normal person just not bring it up? Or if pressed, lie? But she did neither.

That makes me think she is:
a) self-aggrandizing;
b) condescending;
c) both.

I'm going with c.

And next year, I think I'll just skip the preliminaries. She's getting a gallon of distilled white vinegar. She can just dump it straight away.

And hey, it'll clean her drain too!

Happy Birthday Lulu! (+ a wee little rant)

Today my gorgeous, loving, smart, precocious, strong-willed, darling daughter turns FOUR. It's kinda crazy. It seems like it wasn't so long ago that she snuggled her tiny little 7lb. body into the crook of my neck and sighed her warm, sweet baby breath into my neck as I bent slightly to brush my lips against her downy newborn head.

And here she is today. How time rushes by! You can see her strong-willed-ness plain as day in this pic: she insists that whatever pants she wears must be rolled up. Jeans to capris, capris to shorts....I shudder to think what she plans to do with shorts... And the socks must be pulled up too. Usually I insist on short socks but today was chilly and it's her birthday so what the heck? She's happy.

She was most excited about taking birthday cupcakes to her daycare for her 4-year-old class. Here's where my rant begins. When I was a kid one of the coolest things about having a birthday was getting to take treats to school. My mom was quite clever so I brought the best treats, and the class always loved me and said I had the "best mom ever". I would nearly bust with pride, and the treats were always fantastic. Running a close second was the cake I would get at home and of course the presents.

So we got a note a couple months back saying no birthday treats at daycare. They instead encouraged us to send gift bags of little toys for the kids (read: small bags of choke-hazards and junk). Ugh. They have since relented and okayed treats IF, and only IF, a comprehensive list of ingredients is attached. Mind you, treats are still discouraged, but if one MUST send them, they will somehow be screened for allergenic and/or offensive ingredients.

I think they did the list thing just because they figured no one would want to take the time to bake AND write a synopsis. They don't know ME. I just rustled myself up some vanilla cupcakes, glopped as much homemade birthday frosting on them as they would hold, sprinkled them with pretty artificially-colored sugar sprinkles, and cut out the ingredients list from the box, taping it on a notecard with a few other ingredients,. Eh -VOILA, Lulu had a whole mess of contraband cupcakes to take to day-care.

All the while JeepMan was telling me I shouldn't do it, that we should just buy some apples or carrot sticks and dip.

Birthday apples? Birthday veggies? This would have been a sure way to get ostracized and possibly beaten up after school when I was growing up.

I think birthdays are for sugar. And calories. And fun. And special treats. If the moms can't hack their kid eating a cupcake, then tell the staff they can't have one. If your kid is allergic to something, I'm sorry, life sucks, and the rest of the kids shouldn't be punished for it.


Miss Teacher's eyebrows damn near made contact with her hairline when I walked in with the cupcake tray. I promptly handed her the ingredient list and told her Lulu wanted to give cupcakes for her birthday and that's what she was going to do. 'Nuff said. They said, "...Okay..." for what else, really, was there to say?

You and I both know all the teachers are in the back room scarfing the leftovers anyhow. And do I care? No way! Birthdays are for cupcakes, with oodles of frosting and sparkly sprinkles. And don't anyone try to tell me otherwise.

***Addendum: Curses! The daycare gestapo got me...sent me home most of the cupcakes I made, minus a few the staff ate and one for each of my kids. Said, "Sorry, but these didn't come out of a certified kitchen so we aren't allowed to serve them." WTF is a "certified kitchen?" 'Cause I'm telling you from first-hand foodservice experience that I have never seen a commercial kitchen that is cleaner than mine at home. Certified what? Roach -free? Pesticide-free? Kosher? Vegan? WHAT??? Oh, well. Maybe next year I'll just have the daycare make Lulu's cupcakes in their own CERTIFIED kitchen. Grrr...****

Make-Up Sex

Got your attention, huh?

This is really more of a rant, but what follows may not be suitable for the easily offended, or my Mom.

Everyone else, read on. It's not that bad, really...

So my day was ... tarnished by a squabble between me and JeepMan. It was of the usual flavor: him overreacting to something really inconsequential, me reading probably waaay too much into his overreactiveness. The point is, we'll get over it and get on with our lives none the worse for wear as we always seem to do.

We don't live by the oft-advised: "Don't go to bed mad." Guaranteed that if we argue in the evening, we will go to bed mad. Then in the morning, we'll sort of mutually "forget" about it. Translate: neither of us wants to apologize, and neither of us has the desire to expend the energy that would be required to resume an argument that no one can (will) win.

Because let's face it, there usually isn't a winner in our arguments. He's too pigheaded to admit he's wrong, and I'm too pigheaded to admit he's right.

So we just get it out, get it over, and get along...

...every once in a while, though, he wants to get it on.

Yeah, I'm talking about "Make Up Sex." The much-glorified topic that I simply don't get. And by "get" I mean "understand." Actually, I think I DO understand it, but HE definitely doesn't. Because I can't be wrong about this. I just can't. Please tell me I'm not....

As JeepMan understands it, Make Up Sex is this: Sex. For the purpose of making up. So, we have the sex, and when we're done, we've made up. A means to an end.

Which is totally ass-backwards in my mind.

As I understand it, Make Up Sex is this: You make up. Then you have the sex. You have the sex because you've made up, and the making up makes you feel like you might actually want to have sex. It seals the deal, so to speak.

'Cause frankly, when we're arguing, that's the last thing on my mind.

In JeepManLand, the high emotions of the arguing should be getting us aroused somehow. Like the "pissed-off-ed-ness" can be somehow channeled into "take-me-now-this-very-second-ness." Wouldn't that be nice?... but I don't see it happening in MomInScrubsWorld. Ever.

Sucketh up to me, and thou shalt receiveth what thou seeketh. That, my dear husband, is Make Up Sex. At least in THIS marriage, baby.

Anyone else? Thoughts? Opinions? I'm dying to hear...

***Oh, and can anyone tell me how to do that fancy thing where you type a word than strike through it? I love that and can't figure it out!***

Not My Kind of Town

Just got back from Chicago; spent 4 days there covering cases. It's been a long time since I can remember being so relieved to get out of a town...not so much the being home part (though that is very nice indeed), but just to be OUT of a town.

As my faithful readers know, I am from a smallish town. We call ourselves a city, but to me the word "city" connotes a large metropolis, and Collegeville is not a metropolis by any bending of the imagination! Chicago is definitely a city by my personal definition, but I'm calling it a town because Frank Sinatra did...and who's gonna argue with Frank? Not me!

While I currently reside in a town of roughly 50,000, I was raised in a town of about 14,000. I don't think I'd ever want to live in such a tiny town again...definitely not that town because it has succumbed, over the years, to drugs and all the associated problems.

Oh, and because it is an intelligence-sucking vortex. When I go to any store or restaurant in that town I feel my IQ threatening to run off a cliff with the rest of the mental lemmings (sorry Mom and Dad; no offense to you or your friends - you have all managed to remain above it... Kudos!).

Conversely, I would never ever want to live in a large town like Chicago. In my youth (recent, of course ;)) I used to think it was fun to visit the big cities. Centers of industry, entertainment, and opulence. Loci of unspeakable violence and rampant poverty. The clamorous contrast! The promise of raucous spectacle!! Exploration. Adventure. Risk.

In the wisdom and clarity of responsible adulthood, the adventure is now unappealing. The risk is now unacceptable because I have two little semi-helpless, damn cute humans relying on me to come home. And a husband who is secretly terrified that one day I won't. Aside from the idea of rendering my family sans mother/wife, I truly don't like the big-town atmosphere. And it's not just the smog.

As I arrived in Chicago I felt this... aura. It is still hard to describe. It was like a giant, oppressive, intangible weight; a stifling negativity with an undercurrent of urgent restlessness. It was completely alien to me, an atmosphere I wasn't sure I could safely breathe.

I arrived at night and my first impression was of the absence of dark. Even from miles away I could tell I was approaching the city by the growing glow on the horizon. As I entered the city proper, my eyes goggled at the abundance of garish signage and harsh lighting. There is no natural darkness in any large city. It occurs to me that there must be many people in current existence who have never been outside on a moonless night and known what it is to feel simultaneous trepidation and wonder at being a tiny human in a vast universe. For us small-towners, it is a common opportunity; but its familiarity doesn't lessen its sacredness.

Sorry, folks; your big-city Imax planetarium just doesn't cut it.

I was instantly on guard, compulsively scanning my surroundings, forcing myself to be hyper-aware: the traffic, the aimlessly wandering bands of shady-looking adolescents. I scavenged through my mental files under "Personal Safety," desperately trying to remember every scam and associated safety tip I ever learned:

Don't stop if a cop tries to pull you over. It could be a rapist or murderer. Put on your hazard lights, call 911 and ask if there is a trooper in the area, then proceed to a safe place.

If someone tries to carjack you, don't let them in the car, WHATEVER YOU DO. Slam on the gas and honk your horn. Run them over if you have to.

If someone rear-ends you, don't get out of the car. Lock your doors and call 911. Leave yourself room to pull away in your car if you feel threatened.

And so on, and so on. And that's just the "stuff to remember" while in the car!! Mentally and emotionally exhausting: it never let up for 4 days.

Traffic? I won't even go there. I've never had to "commute" in my life. The furthest I've ever lived from my workplace is 15 minutes. 15 minutes in Collegeville? 8 miles. Across town. In traffic.

15 minutes in Chicago? About 4 blocks. If you're lucky. Road rage is very real. Courtesy is regarded as weakness and is to be ridiculed or even punished. No wonder people carry guns in their cars. I got the "Illinois Wave" more than once, and I consider myself lucky that I didn't get worse! I'd chalk it up to my out-of-state plates, but my new Fleet vehicle has no plates.

I met some nice people at the hospital accounts I visited. Out and about, however: totally different story. Perpetual pissed-off-ed-ness is the dominant state of mind. I'm not a cranky person; I tried to make eye contact, offer a sincere "thank you" or "have a great day." The overwhelming response was knitted brows and a suspicious look; I swear I once heard a mumbled, "What. Everrr..." as I walked away. Apparently it's not acceptable to be courteous out of your car, either.

Now I know people from Chicago. The people I know, I like. TellYaWhat: I like them even more now! Anyone who can live there and maintain not only sanity but a positive and personable attitude? Good for You!! Hurrah!! Bravo!!

As I left Chicago, I remember the exact moment I felt normal again. As the Interstate I was on peeled from six, to four, to two lanes, and I was finally on a route with only one label...it lifted. It was as if I had been holding my breath for four days...and I finally exhaled. The rugged gray landscape surrendered to rolling green plains and freshly turned fields of rich, black soil. I opened my sunroof to let in the unsullied spring air, the occasional fragrances of crabapple blossoms and damp earth filtering in. My shoulders relaxed. My brain uncurled from its fetal position. I laid my head back against the headrest, and set the cruise control.

There's nothing like a big town to make you appreciate the small town life.

Greetings from The Road

Well here I sit in my lovely hotel suite with about an hour on my hands. I have been out-and-about visiting my favorite blogs - check out MonkeyGirl's latest controversial post with 47 comments (and one new, uhm, Interesting Blog). I can't decide if "The Dawn" is for real or if she really just has mixed-type delusional disorder...regardless her brand-spankin'-new blog should provide for some amusement, albeit possibly the eye-rolling kind.

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Back already? Ok, here we go!

I am at an Embassy Suites which I am sure would be the Dollar General of hotels to The Dawn. Certainly she only stays at Ritz-Carltons or elitist (AHEM...) EXCLUSIVE resorts where she can make sure her Rolex is properly safeguarded and her anthropologist-cum-rock-star husband can find a secluded retreat from the flock of passenger pigeons that inevitably follow him everywhere. Oh, I forgot, they're extinct. Likely at the hand of The Dawn.

I am at the dollar general hotel chain in pursuit of education "[ej-oo-key-shuh n]." Although I was NOT the valedictorian of my class, and my friends (yes I had them and still do!) are not flipping burgers anywhere (they are all quite successful, thank you), I have managed to scrape together the relatively puny (compared to The Dawn) complement of brain cells I was born with and make something of myself. Although I was an ICU nurse for 6 years, and a cardiac electrophysiology nurse for the last 6 years, I am taking a refresher course over the next 6 weeks in cardiac electrophysiology.

That's where we go up into people's hearts and purposefully try to put them into malignant and/or lethal arrhythmias, study those arrythmias while making sure the patient doesn't die on the table, make three-dimensional geometric maps of the heart chamber, and voltage-time maps that we can superimpose upon this gathered geometry, creating a very good picture of what exactly is happening in this patient's heart. Then we burn the culprit area, do some follow up testing, and more often than not the patient goes home and never has the same heart problem again.

Shucks, I know I'm no Personal Injury Attorney, but Darn it, I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and gosh darn it....people LIKE me.

Providing services that help doctors save lives, or bilking honest hardworking folks out of money they don't have because a "client" suffered whiplash (*gasp!*) and emotional distress (*wail!*)?

I'm torn, but I'm going to have to go with Saving Lives.

Before anyone gets their size-zero panties in a bunch, I know that there are people out there with legitimate claims, and I know The Dawn helps them too. But I can HONESTLY say I have never provided my services to dramatize and inflate claims of "personal injury" at the expense of an innocent someone-else.

Looking down from her lofty moral high ground as she does on my sister-in-the-trenches MonkeyGirl, maybe The Dawn can say that too.

.....riiiiiiight.

"But..." you say.

Ok, taxpayers don't count. It's not my choice to give healthcare to our country's orange-jumpsuited, shackled and cuffed "sickly" who are frequently looking for a vacation from the Big House and the guaranteed attention of any female, attractive or not. But it's my professional obligation. And I do it with an outward smile.

Then vent in a HIPPA-compliant fashion.

On Responsibility

I rented a video last Sunday. Not yesterday, but 9 days ago. I don't rent movies much, but it seemed like a nice idea. The movie was ok, not great, and it was a 5-day-rental. I can't fathom why a person would need 5 days with any given movie, except that the rental places are banking on the possibility that you will forget to bring it back and they can charge late fees. Incidentally, that's what happened to me. It was due Friday at 10pm, at which time I was 75 miles away. Why I didn't return the stinkin' thing on Monday (we watched it Sunday night) is a moot point, but that's what I should have done.

It nagged me all weekend to a degree. My nature is that I like organization and symmetry. Indeed, my favorite shape is a square. I like things neatly packaged, and I absolutely loathe loose ends. I hate having debts (although I am resigned to a certain amount of debt as it is an inevitable by-product of my middle-class situation). And so it was that I was motivated to venture to the video store at 9:37pm last night to return the offensive overdue video.

The store has an outside deposit box for returns. I chose to go inside and return it personally. When you step inside there is a counter with a slot in it that reads, "Drop Return Videos Here." I set my DVD on the counter and waited for the girl sweeping the floor to attend to me. She turned off the vacuum and looked at me quizzically. I told her I wanted to return the overdue DVD and pay the late fee. She walked over to me, looked at the video as if she had never seen one before (a fact I doubt, considering where she works), and again gave me the questioning look. I pushed the DVD across the counter at her and gave her my best oh-so-patient "let's move it along, moron" smile. Finally, she spoke: "You could have just dropped this in the slot right there, you know." Oh, duh, silly me!!

Again, I reiterated that I was certain I owed a late fee and I wished to take care of it "since I was here and all." She mumbled an "oooooookaaayyy...?" which sounded suspiciously like a "What-Everrrr...?" and gestured to the guy running the register, apparently indicating that he would take care of my freaky situation. He came over, took the DVD, inspected it like it was the holy grail, checked it in, and charged me my $2.10, which I paid in exact change. The two of them stood there and watched me leave, glancing uneasily at each other. I imagine the same reaction might have been evoked had I been Jesus Christ, or a space alien.

Is it so unusual for a person to want to take prompt responsibility for his or her actions these days? I probably won't rent another video for the rest of the summer, so why would I want a surprise "mystery" late fee when I rent my next movie? Additionally, I suspect that if I just dropped the movie in the slot, it might be the next day before it would be checked in, and there would have been a 3-day fee instead of two. Come on people, I know the game. Everyone's out to make a buck!

I am now free to start my Monday with a "clean slate," oh joy.

Quiet House/MIL Rant #2

Wow. It's quiet.

The kids are at mom-in-law's house. She finally got rid of her houseguest, so we let them spend the weekend there.

I guess that needs some explaining.

As you are aware from my previous posts, MIL's ideas often don't jive with JeepMan's and my ideas. Last October, she dropped a bomb: she was bringing her nephew to live with her. Her nephew, JeepMan's cousin (I'll call him LT), fit any conventional description of a "troubled" person.

LT grew up in the southwest. His father (JeepMan's uncle) is a drug dealer, currently doing jail time. LT grew up in chaotic circumstances. His mother died of heart failure, waiting for a transplant, when LT was only 13. LT's father had sporadic employment and was evicted from more than one home. They sometimes lived in hotel rooms. LT had no guidance or supervision, did poorly in school, and never had an example of a responsible person to model himself after. MIL decided he needed "a better life." Generous, right? So what's the problem?

The problem is that LT was 20 1/2 years old when MIL decided to "give him a better life."

MIL said she was bringing him here to the midwest, letting him live with her for a month, then kicking him out of her house if he hadn't found a way to make it on his own. This scenario was fraught with potential pitfalls, as JeepMan and I saw it. LT didn't have any life-skills. He didsn't have any idea of what a responsible adult was expected to do. He was so under-educated, he couldn't even get a driver's license because he couldn't pass the exam! How was this young man supposed to come to a new state with no savings or driver's license, get a job, save some money, find a place to live, and become independent within 4-6 weeks?

Well he arrived last November. About that time, we told MIL that the kids would not be allowed to come to her house and spend the weekend while LT was living in the house. Formerly, the kids would go there once a month or every other month to spend a weekend. This was great - the kids enjoyed it very much and we liked having some couple time for ourselves, too. However, we don't know LT. We have never known him. He was an absolute stranger that JeepMan just happened to be related to. He was a 20-year-old kid with a sketchy past and no guidance. We simply couldn't have our kids staying in the same house with a young man we didn't know or trust.

When MIL found out our position, she blew up. She yelled and screamed and accused my husband of being suspicious, passing judgement, and being a jerk. She made threats of legal action to force us to let the kids come for weekends. JeepMan and I were stunned and angry at her actions, but we stood our ground. Our children have had no unsupervised visits with MIL since October. We simply cannot trust strangers around our children, especially young adult male strangers with unknown morals.

MIL has calmed down since then, but we have seen her underbelly, and are certain that we would never want our children to go to her in the event of our untimely deaths (God forbid). I would like to believe that her impassioned (but certainly misguided) response to our decision was motivated by her devotion to the kids. There has never been an apology, or even an acknowledgement of the fact that we were simply being responsible and protective parents.
In fact, neither she nor us have spoken of it since it happened; it sits there between us like the proverbial gorilla in the room.

LT has moved out - 6 months later. MIL found out after just a month or two that having LT living with her wasn't going to be the experience she had romanticized in her own mind. LT didn't want her controlling him and she is, to her core, a control freak. She felt that since he was living in HER house he needed to follow HER rules and do what SHE wanted him to do. It didn't take long before he was staying out "too late," drinking "too much," and doing "too many" things she didn't know about or condone. I think in the end he was pretty desperate to get away! He now has a part-time job at a fast-food restaurant, and a coworker/girlfriend who hasn't yet tired of chauffeuring him around. After a few months of blowing his paychecks on Playstation games and fancy cellphones-and-cellphone-accessories, he and his girlfriend scraped together enough money to get an apartment together. He has been told that he cannot return to MIL's place.

I hope the best for him. He seems like a nice enough guy, though I still wouldn't trust him with my kids.

So this weekend is the first that the kids have been away for 6 months. A small part of me feels a little queasy about this. The kids will definitely be interrogated (subtly) about the weekend when they get home; this is no different than before, though. The time to ourselves is really nice every once in a while, and I think kids should spend time with their grandparents sans parents. We have stayed nearby both sets of grandparents specifically to facilitate this kind of relationship between the generations.

JeepMan and I had a nice meal together last evening, then walked around our local ped-mall, enjoying the perfect cool evening and listening to a free outdoor jazz concert. We stayed up late, then slept in this morning. For lunch, we had panini sandwiches on the patio at a little Italian deli. We went shopping, and I bought some new plants; he bought some new bolts. I puttered in my flower beds while he puttered in the garage. He is still in the garage and I am blogging. Soon I am going to take a nice hot shower (uninterrupted by peeking children wondering if they can get in with me!), then we will head out for a good dinner and maybe even a movie that isn't animated...

Life is good.

But... I can't wait see Plato and Lulu tomorrow. I'll grab them and kiss their chubby little cheeks, hug them close and press my face into each of their hair - inhale their indiuidual scents: shampoo, sweat, sunscreen, and that special Plato or Lulu musk that goes up my nose and straight to my core, exhilirating the primal mother within me.

Yeah, that'll be great too.

JeepMan's OCD

I wrote on an earlier post that I would write sometime about JeepMan's OCD (for anyone who doesn't get it, that's Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder). It drives me absolutely crazy.

Does he really have OCD, you might ask? Well, clinically he might not qualify, but if you are logging the amount of time and energy he and the family have had to devote to his obsessions, I would give a vehement YES.

The strange thing is that his OCD seems to be direct-able by him to the things that he wants to obsess about. The Jeep, for instance. Or purchasing things that excite him (often Jeep-related). Or the lawn.

A recent example of his OCD: last weekend. I took the kids swimming last Friday evening. I did this not only to have some fun quality time with Plato and Lulu, but to get us out of the house for JeepMan's premeditated obsess-fest. He had told me that he was planning to do some maintenance on the trailer that we use to tow the Jeep, and to "get the truck ready to pull the trailer." Silly me, I thought when we bought the truck last month that it was ready to pull the Jeep...I mean, it has a hitch, four tires, and an engine! So I knew we would not see him Friday night anyway.

Well, his plans changed. He went out with his office for pizza and beer on Friday. Fine, no big deal....until Saturday. Saturday ended up being spent doing all the things that were supposed to be done Friday.

I can't even tell you what he did. There was a lot of banging from the garage. There was a mysterious grinding sound, some kind of loud whiny air-tool sound (right when the kids needed to be napping, of course), and I think I heard a few expletives from time to time. It wouldn't be so bad but this puts me on "kid duty" all day, and I can't get much done while keeping 2 kids from killing or mutilating themselves and/or each other all day.

The other rotten thing is that when he is doing these kinds of things he is in a foul mood until he is completely done. So when I went to take the kids outside later in the day and they got in his way, or wanted to talk to him, he was short and cranky with them. There is no use trying to reason with him when he is in the "OCD-Zone."

Anyhow, I thought the episode was over on Saturday. Was I wrong. Sunday started with the kids whining, wanting to do "something fun." What, I don't know, but JeepMan said we would all do something fun that day. Little did I know that "doing something fun" involved hooking up the trailer, driving the Jeep up onto it, and "going for a test drive" in the truck. OK, now this bores ME; you can imagine what fun it was for the kids. Granted, we did have a fun evening, but this little fiasco took up a good chunk of the day.

So there went our weekend, thanks to my husband's OCD. And it's not the first weekend that's been obsessed-away.

Other examples:

-When we did our landscaping, I can't believe we didn't end up divorced. Every damn landscape block we laid had to be leveled in 3 directions, checked, rechecked, and rechecked again. And we laid probably 500 landscape blocks. It nearly killed me.

-When JeepMan took out the Jeep/Trailer/Truck ensemble, he had to take pictures. Lots of pictures. From all angles. If you look through our photo CDs you will find hundreds of pictures of the Jeeps, close-ups of tires, pictures of parts and tools. Tell me, who is ever going to look through these?

-Our lawn is perfectly manicured, fertilized on a schedule, and trimmed to a precise height based on what time in the season it is.

Now, I love this man. I love that when he does something, he wants it done right. I guess I just wish I could direct his obsession toward the dishes, or our house, or finishing the basement.

M-I-L Rant #1

We were riding in the car last night after eating out (which we do too much). It was pretty quiet, then Plato dropped this bomb:

Plato: Mom? I've had a shot drink before.

I looked at JeepMan, who was driving. He frequently tunes out the kids when driving. He didn't offer any explanation.

What is a shot drink, Plato?

Plato: Well, you drink it from a little glass and you chug it.

We often have chugging contests at the dinner table to see who can finish their milk first...MILK. It's a fun way to encourage dairy intake.

Where did you have this shot drink?

Plato: At Grandma's.

I could feel the heat rising to my face. I forced my voice to stay calm. Of course I knew which Grandma. My mother would never think to give my kids shots of any kind. I looked at JeepMan: blank expression.

Are you listening to this?

JeepMan: Yeah, my mom had us all do shots for St. Patty's.

That's it, no elaboration. I could see that I would have to pry it out of him.

Shots of WHAT?

JeepMan: Well, Mom and I had Bailey's and the kids had chocolate milk.

Plato: Yeah, Mom, I CHUGGED it!

The Boss: ME TOO MOM!!

Somehow the fact that it was "only" chocolate milk didn't make it that much better. I have an issue with the fact that the kids are even being exposed to this kind of behavior. Now I know I was a relatively naive kid, but I truly didn't know what a shot was until I was about 18. I guess I believe in keeping my kids oblivious to things like this as long as possible. It's not like naughty words and sexual innuendo, which kids are just going to be exposed to on some level by their peers at a relatively young age whether you like it or not. Things like shots are things you can choose to deny or severely limit exposure to until they are quite a bit older.

Rational as that may sound, try explaining this concept to my mother-in-law. The fact that she was such a great mother to my husband (choke) doesn't help much; the fact that she could never comprehend that something she did was wrong renders it impossible.

Final example: her idea of funny is taking pictures of my children wearing beer caps and putting empty beer bottles up to their lips.

Call me crazy - I don't see the humor in it.

Work vs. Life

A coworker of mine made an observation yesterday about Americans and work. She said, "You know, in Europe they have a saying: Americans live to work, while Europeans work to live." Not an hour later this same coworker was trying to guilt trip me into staying for an extra 1-2 hours to do another case.

Guess she sides with the Americans.

While in most scenarios I agree with Americans and their values, I heartily side with the Europeans on this one. I have spent 11 years in the work force, 9 of those years searching for a job that fits my specific needs. See, I have this ethical flaw...I want to spend time with my family. Unfortunately, our budget doesn't allow for me to be a stay-at-home mom. I have often said that being a stay-at-home mom would drive me crazy, that I wouldn't be as good a parent because I would be terminally stressed. I was kidding myself; creating justification for the choices I have made. I have come to the realization that stay-at-home moms find things to do. They also find other stay-at-home moms.

But I digress. The point of this rant is that I have chosen my current job primarily because I can leave it at work. I can work a normal workday (I worked night shift for 6 years...blech!). When the workday is done, I can go home. I don't have homeowork. I don't have to plan for the next day. I do not have to carry a pager and be preoccupied that it might go off and I have to drop everything and go save a life. I don't need the overtime pay, and it doesn't compensate for my time away from my family anyway.

After 10 hours away from my kids, is it wrong to be possessive of those precious 2 hours I get before they need to be in bed? My coworkers without children seem to think so...even some who HAVE children seem to think so. THEY live to work. I work to live.

I didn't fall for the guilt trip, by the way. I went home, had dinner with my kids, tucked them into bed, and got to hear both my kids tell me they love me and I am the best. $60 in overtime couldn't compensate for that, baby.

And hey, if I hadn't been home, I would have missed this:

Dinner Table Conversation 3/26/07

Plato is thinking.

Uh oh...Wait for it...wait for it...

He swallows his meatloaf and says "Mom?..."

"What's Uranus?"

The Story of JeepMan

Looking back through my posts I get the impression that I am portraying JeepMan as a jerk. While it's true that he can be a jerk, I can also be a real...pain. Most of the time we get along fine. As I have already said, he is a really good dad. And I have to give him props - he does very well considering his background. It's amazing that he is not more of a jerk, or a deadbeat dad, or in jail.

JeepMan (I'll call him JM for this story) was born to a very young couple in a tumultuous relationship. JM's dad was a dope dealer who left (or was kicked out of the house) when JM was two. His dad was in and out of his life until JM was about 8, at which time he was put in jail for drug trafficking and for having false identity (he always had an illegal alias). He has been in and out of jail ever since.

JM has few good memories of his father. He says the only good thing he got from his dad was the ability to throw darts and play pool (both of which he does very well). JM remembers being taken on drug deals with his dad, and to this day associates the smell of cigarettes with the dope deals. He remembers going out "for fun," and driving along gravel roads looking for license plates in the ditch that his dad could put on his car so his own couldn't be tracked. His dad never paid child support. He tried to stay in touch with JM over the years, from jail, but JM never had a desire to reciprocate. Go figure.

JM's mom, on the other hand, lived a pretty wild life. JM had to switch elementary schools at least 10 times, sometimes going back to one he had attended before. This was because his mom frequently moved in with whatever boyfriend she had at the time. Then when they would break up, they would move out. JM never made many friends, and the ones he made he couldn't keep. JM was an obese child, which didn't help his social situation. JM was put into situations where he was exposed to his mom's, ah...adult activities... Suffice to say activities a child should not be exposed to. He witnessed fighting, occasionally his mother being hit. When he started high school, his grandparents bought a house for he and his mother to live in so he wouldn't have to be moved around. About this time, his mother was beaten so badly by a boyfriend that she was hospitalized. By this time he was so jaded that he walked into her hospital room and told her she got what she asked for, then walked out. She changed the locks on her house, then a week later gave the same guy the new key. JM moved in with his girlfriend.

He was with this girlfriend for several years. When he moved to college, he found out after a few months that she was cheating on him. She got pregnant by this other guy, and eventually married him. About this time we became friends. He went home for a summer and one of his mom's boyfriends convinced her that JM should be paying rent and buying his own food. He never went back after that. A few years later we started dating and eventually got married.

The saga still continues with his mother. Very long story short, she has gotten married to a good man with a very good income. She has embraced the "rich-bitch" lifestyle wholeheartedly, and seems to forget her former destitution and poor mothering. It is difficult for JM to be around her most of the time and their relationship has been strained (though she seems blissfully unaware of this). To top it all off, (and a whole other story) his grandmother is basically a psycho. Hope it doesn't run in the family.

It is amazing to me that JM has any idea of how to be a husband or parent. His best friend in high school was from a picture-perfect type of family and he spent a lot of time at their house. That is probably the best thing that ever happened to him in his youth. I have to give him credit for doing the best he knows how, but it has been difficult. When we have our problems, I always have to remind myself that I KNEW who I was marrying. I can't make up new expectations, change the rules.

So that is the short version of the story of JeepMan. I'll post this now and add to it if needed later.