sick day

Little C and I made a movie today!  A claymation of a little creature having a snack.  Well what do you do when your child is home sort of sick?

He was involved with the thinking and planning and the talking about it in the car and he picked the subject matter and then he took off to work on the musical he is writing.  So the fingernail marks in the clay are all me.

His musical is set on a Scottish moor where two opposing factions sit in wait in their castles waiting to see who will make the first move.  In the meantime, a sassy tap dancing magician (with a hat) and a big red dog are sneaking back and forth between the two sides trying to decide who the fierce dragon should roast first.  

I think his show will beat my show.  Devour it, even.  But I will have to talk to him about copyright infringement because the dragon sounds a lot like Little Edie.  

I will try to post the clay thing.  And I PROMISE to sneak up and film his next rehearsal.  Then you can be the judge.

Miss M is my favorite and my best!

My latest Broadway Obsession is Grey Gardens.  And it is only partly because I think my Grandmother is Little Edie's Long Lost Crazy Sister.

We got home from school today and I was still singing after I exited the minivan.  My garage has great acoustics.  I don't know whether you know that.  I mean...do you know that?  And that is when Miss M told me something that will forever and always make her my favorite daughter.  (Sorry Little C, that includes you when you put on your sister's dance costumes and call yourself "Pearl".)

Miss M:  You sound just like her.

Mama:  (freezes)  What?

Miss M:  The woman singing that song.

Mama:  Da da da da dum!  

"The woman" in question is the Divine Christine Ebersole.  And the song was not one of the brassy numbers Little Edie sings.  It was the reprise of Around the World.  

The girl has me all figured out.  She can have whatever she wants for ever and ever. 

Which calls to mind another favorite..."When you're good to Mama, Mama's goooooood to yooooou!"  (Matron Mama Morton in Chicago).

Quote

"When I'm three she will tell me I slept under her heart, and I'll envision a warm and well-lit place where I waited to be born."

-Ursula Hegi, Floating in My Mother's Palm

S-T-A-U-N-C-H

"Staunch women...we just don't weaken."

-Little Edie (from Revolutionary Costume for Today, lyrics by Michael Korie)

The Sport of Bra Shopping

Let me start this by letting you all know that bras are not a casual subject with me.  They have to (pardon me) pull some weight around here if they are going to make it into my regular rotation.  As a rule, I do not buy bras from anyone under the age of 35.  Yes.  I am discriminatory.  But I simply cannot stand one more perky-breasted little 19 year old handing me some lacy little thing with spaghetti straps telling me this bra is perfect on everyone.

If you line up all of the bras you have ever owned and all you can spell is "AAA-AA-A-B-B" then I do not even want to talk to you.  I can spell "D-O-D-E-C-A-H-E-D-R-O-N".  I wonder if they see me coming and panic, like the servers at an all you can eat buffet when John Goodman walks in.

But not today.  

I was relieved to see a woman about my age working the back room at Victoria's Secret today.  I went straight to the new "Perfect One" knowing I was taking a risk.  That whole individualized Bio Fit fiasco (yes they were tears...no they were not mine...but if you don't have breasts you should not be selling bras!) came flashing back.  That whole "sister size" theory they have is a load of excrement.  

I never noticed before that those doors do not lock from the inside.  Only the Key Master, Wielder of The Tape Measure can open those doors.  And she did.  While I was changing.  I had pulled a shirt over the bra to see how the girls looked in a real-life situation.  I bent over to make sure we wouldn't be pouring out of the top.  I did that little shakey thing.  I felt like they were pointing a little East and West when viewed from the North.  But I guess I was taking too long for the Key Master.  She knocked and yelled something at me to which I replied something that sounded uncertain about this purchase.  I guess that meant feel free to come on in and feel me up.

Because she did.

She stood behind me and grabbed the sides of my boobers with her tiny hands and started talking a mile a minute about how this is a perfect fit and how the shape was great and the placement was good because they were within the framework of my ribcage.  I apologized for being so sweaty.  When I questioned the wide angle they were pointing at she came around to the front of me and leaned in to get a better look.  If I had hiccuped right then, she could have lost an eye.  So she grabs them again and tells me the angle works because of the good separation and that my nipples were lined up fine.  Then she dried her hands on her pants and left the room.  Was I supposed to tip her for that?

By the time I had my own underpinnings back on and was ready to go she had three more bras listed on a little card for me to try on.  I was so nervous!  No one has ever bossed me around at the bra shop before.  I did not like it one bit.  But neither did I know how to make her stop so I just bought the damn bra.  

I am making Moose return it for me tomorrow.

Shiksa Can Cook

Moose brought home Babka last week from a Kosher bakery in town.  It was ok.  The chocolate filling had a good flavor but the bread:chocolate ratio was off.  I am all about the ratio of ingredients in my sweets.  That is why the tiny square Snickers are far superior to any other size.  Also, the Reese's Peanut Butter Eggs leave the regular cups in the dustbin.  It just has the proper thickness of chocolate to the heavy peanut buttery filling.  Instead of giving anything up for Lent, I have decided to pick things up for Lent.  That Catholic upbringing still hangs with me.  Sort of.  But I am being extra nice to myself for the season.  You should try it.  It involves peanut butter eggs.  

Back to the Babka.

So the Babka had too much bread in comparison to the chocolate.  And the bread was a little too...bready.  Not sweet-doughy enough for my liking.  And...can you believe they call themselves Kosher?...no streusel on top!  I think I remember reading somewhere about pork, pickles, salt, and streusel on the Babka in a college Judeo-Christian Heritage class.  

But it is not really their fault.  My standards for Chocolate Babka were set pretty high.  You see, I have experienced Zabar's Chocolate Babka.  I am spoiled for anything less.  So yesterday I went looking for a recipe.

I went to Smittenkitchen.com and she directed me to Martha.  I should have known to start there.  It is SO good!  Think warm cinnamon roll full of chocolate covered with a crisp streusel that tastes like little sugar cookies.  Plus, the raw dough has the soft yummy texture of  a baby's bottom.  There were so many craving going on all at once I could hardly stand it.

Not Zabar's.  But very close.  

I am off to deliver a plate of chocolate thanks to the vet clinic for all their work with Tanner last week.  I am going to make a little snack for myself too.  Otherwise, if I hit a red light, I might end up delivering half a plate of thanks!  After all--it is Lent.

Life Lesson from an Old Dog

I couldn't blog about this last week because we were too close to losing Tanner. I was pretty sure the sobbing would have shorted out the keyboard if I had even tried.

Our old lady has several fatty tumors around her body. They run from marble sized to about double that. None are cancerous. But one got infected. It got infected by a nasty bacteria that looked like it was rotting her leg. It was growing at an alarming rate. At this point the vets mumble things like "necrotizing faciitis" and "sending sample to the CDC" and you hear it but you don't.

Go ahead and say it. We know. Nothing NORMAL happens to this family when it comes to medical emergencies.

Once it ruptured (yes, she was at home and yes, it was as gross as you might imagine) I ran her to the vet for her third visit in three days and this time she stayed there. Moose and I were having phone calls about getting the kids from school to go and say goodbye to her. The vet called almost in tears. Every tech I talked to throughout the day kept telling me that she is the sweetest dog they know. It all felt like a dramatic build up to a sad ending.

And then the radiographs showed no bone involvement which was great news. This pocket of goo was the size of half a baseball on her leg and she was swollen from hip to toes but the redness was decreasing and there were no new areas of necrosis which was great news. And one wonderful tech sat with her all day hot packing and massaging her leg to keep the blood circulating. They flushed and cleaned out the huge hole in her leg and she turned the corner.

She has been very tired and very sore for over a week. But this morning she was bouncing around the living room when I got home from dropping off the kids. So I took her for a walk. And you know what? She was pulling me the whole time! This is the dog who would rather nap in the sun than go for a walk. Any other day she would weigh the pains that generally plague a 14 1/2 year old dog and opt for staying home.

I think that in comparison to how truly sick she was and how much pain she was in that the grinding arthritis didn't seem so bad.

What an optimist.

I tell my kids that being optimistic is not the same thing as pretending there is no risk in life. That is called being stupid. But the existence of risk doesn't mean you have to get bogged down by it either. True optimism is when you can see a situation as a whole--every side of it--and still believe, with all your heart, that something good will grow from the experience.  

Poop Soup

OK, dogs. Today I am considering trading you all in for hamsters. They don't track muck all over my house. They don't rip up the fragile grass making mud-bogging pits all over the yard. Their medical care consists of a shovel and little else. And, mostly, their poo is very, very tiny.

Spring cleaning takes on a whole new level when the snow melts around here.

Oh, and Dr. Fancypants...I found those 11 packs of Hubba Bubba that went missing your last visit. You might be interested in adding this little fact to your lectures: did you know that even when a gigantic wad of bubble gum is ingested in one sitting, it does not exit in one "sitting" as one might suspect? But the 24 pack of crayons also consumed...those come out in one big, colorful mass.

Eduardo, you are my new favorite.

OCD: It Makes the World Go Around...

...and round and round and round and round and round and round and round and round and round and round...


(Please note the syllables in the title and the body of this post are all in multiples of five. That's for you Lorraine!)

Ta da!

I am finally decorating my bedroom.  It all started with a quick trip to Anthropologie.  And the duvet and bedskirt were very much on sale.  Like cheaper than Target on sale but not quite IKEA prices on sale.  Anyway...

Moose came home for lunch to help me finish the paint on the mural on the wall.  What?  A mural on the bedroom wall?  Are you thinking Italian restaurant type mural?  Wrong continent.  Are you thinking Moose as a reclining nude?  We laughed thinking about how the modern version of that would have him in a recliner with a remote and a beer bottle strategically placed.  (We do have young children!)  But what I did come up with was a faux finish that makes it look like I have a 4'x5' antique silk print on my wall.  The plan is to frame it with 3" chocolate brown molding.

And no, I did not press my breasts into the paint. Those were test spots for the metallic glaze.  They will be behind a mirror for my vanity anyway!  Plus, the paint was wet. It dried to a more even sheen.

I get burned again

The latest installment in the life of our heat-challenged hero in which she gets burned again.  This episode: Hot Coffee.

Alpha Monkey had finished the second coat of paint (roughly the color of 85% cocoa dark chocolate) of the base coat for the mural she is painting on her bedroom wall (pictures to follow).  She had even cleaned up the supplies and herself (no pictures to follow).  She wanted a little drink but as it was only 4 in the afternoon on a Sunday she thought it had better contain coffee too.  She is nothing if not respectable.  Alpha Monkey took out a lovely, glass Irish Coffee mug from the china cabinet, filled it with coffee from the pot, and plopped it in the microwave to super-heat it so the cold Bailey's from the fridge would make it just the right temperature.  Removing it from the microwave, she poured in the Bailey's.  But suddenly, she noticed how dusty the mug was so she grabbed a linen napkin and held the mug as she wiped it clean!  All was well until she held it up to the light to make sure she removed all the dust before putting it to her lips.  Alas, the hot liquid sloshed a bit over the edge and splashed upon her wrist.  Ouch.  She assumed there was enough alcohol in there to kill anything that might cause an infection in the burn so she wiped it off on her shirt (the linen napkin was all dusty) and went to her bed to enjoy the drink and watch the paint dry.

Join us again next time when Alpha Monkey bites into the won ton in her soup a burns herself from teeth to trachea. 

HA!

47 seconds.  But it would have been less if the treadmill didn't have to ramp up to speed.  

(Does my competitiveness no longer qualify as mild?)

I hate math

No, this is not a guest post from one of my kids.  Miss M actually LOVES math and was crying while home from school sick yesterday because her teacher did not send her any.  Big C is in a bit of a love-hate thing with it.  When he sees the point and we can make up short plays about why NOT knowing these things will ruin your life he loves it.  And he even remembers it.  Little C loves anything that the other two can do that he can't.  Highly motivated, that one.

No.  I hate math today for my own selfish reason.  Specifically, I hate rounding.  Well, one rule of rounding in particular.  Let me explain.

If you have the number 5.1499008 (which happens to be the metric equivalent of 3.2 miles) it rounds to 5.1 even if bumping out to the hundredths place would make it 5.15 which would itself round to 5.2...see!

But why do I hate this so much?  Well, over there in my blogroll there is a fun thing called run with e.  e is Emi.  I call her my Swedish blog friend.  She is clever and funny.  She is also a runner and she presents other runners with little challenges as motivation.  Emi is very altruistic this way.  We all need a little motivation now and again and she motivates people all over the world.

I no longer consider myself a runner.  Running ruined my life.  Well, ok, not my life...that was someone else...but it did mess up my skeletal structure something fierce.  But I started to run again because of Emi.  My only goals have been 1. to get halfway through the distance before someone else wins, and 2. to not quit.  But then something funny happened.  I had a long run last week.  True, it hobbled me for the weekend, but it also made me feel competitive.  What? You didn't know this about me?  Really.  It is mild.  Or it was, until I saw that I was actually placed quite well and, depending on time zones and such, I am still in the running.  (Horrible pun--unintentional.  Awful cliche--entirely my fault.)

Back to the math.  Getting over 25k is a psychological booster.  Coming up just shy of it is a bit of a bummer.  I mean 24.9k.  Ouch.  No chance I cut myself short either as I run on a treadmill for the cushion and ice avoidance and it counts for me.  Bending the rules of rounding would come in awfully handy right now.  

Instead I am off to run 0.1k just to make a point and feel better about myself at the same time.  I'll time it and let you know how long it takes!