More Snippets From The Road

Day 3: VERMONT

Lessons learned so far

1. When Sexyhusbandomine suggested we pack the small dop kit that contained items like tweezers, asprin, and various other travel sized sundries I said "O NO WE DON'T NEED THAT" which is the karma equivalent of giving The Fates the finger. So of course, three days later I need EVERYTHING THAT WAS IN THAT DOP KIT. We happen to be staying at the only hotel in North America that sells pantyhose and condoms in the gift shop, but no Advil.

2. We stopped yesterday to take The Spawn to Great Adventure in the Middle of NoWhere in Upstate New York. They had decorated the entire theme park for Halloween. We anticipated that this meant some spider webs and plastic pumpkins. The severed limbs by the Merry Go Round threw us for a loop, as did the decapitated ghouls who stood by the mini bumper cars. While we lunched on chicken tenders and hamburgers, a zombie with a cheek wound that exposed his teeth and tongue and looked rather wet and red and bloody, stole CBoy's french fries. We left right before the scheduled "Witch Hanging," which was right outside of Wiggles World.

3. I am reading Jose Saramago's novel BLINDNESS and it is totally riveting; the kind of book you cannot put down. Because we are sharing a single room, I went into the bathroom last night to read but could only devour a few pages because CBoy kept shouting I CAN SEE THE LIGHT UNDER THE DOOR MOMMY TURN THE LIGHT OFF and i was very tempted to remind him that THE ZOMBIES only come out when it is dark, but I didn't.

On The Road Again

We've spent the last two days driving up to Vermont.

The drive has gone something like this:

leaves
leaves
leaves
oooo pretty leaves
cows
leaves
ooooo pretty leaves
cows
cows
horses
leaves
leaves
oooo pretty leaves

Another 365 Day Journey Around The Sun Begins

I have often accused my fabulous Sister in Law, Debbie, of being a Pack Rat. I tease her about the fact that she keeps a plastic container full of old greeting cards. An entire bunch are from her First Baby Shower; WHICH WAS IN 1989.

I am an apartment dweller. We Save Nothing. ( I need every square inch of space in which to accumulate toys my children don't need. Like the mini trampoline. Or the fur real life-size Pony. But I digress.)

Debbie says I would be singing a different tune about saving All Things Sentimental if I only had an ATTIC or a BASEMENT or even a GARAGE. And this morning, for the first time, I thought she might be right. Because on this, the fifteenth anniversary of my thirtieth year, I was presented with these beauties......

From CBoy
HAVE A PENUT BRTHDAY


And look how accurately he captured what the ravages of time have done to my good looks! (Do those two lines indicate chicken skin at the neck area?)

CBoy suggested I read it again after a few glasses of wine, the same way I approached the dramatic reading of FROG AND TOAD ARE FRIENDS the other night: because the W on my shirt (that would be W for WAKY) transforms to M for MOM when the card is held upside down.

Next it was The Banana's turn. "What a Wonderful Job of Cutting!!" I exclaimed. "What a Great Choice of Blue! What an Amazing use of Markers! What Fabulous Doodles!"


"O Momma." She said, disappointed. "You didn't mention the best part. LOOK...PURPLE DUCT TAPE." And while it doesn't show well in this picture, there is indeed a wide swath of purple duct tape--kindly provided by The Spawn as a possible solution to the chicken skin at my neckline?

But my favorite part of her card is the subliminal message "GAAW" that she has hidden in the scribbles which accurately describes how I feel about this particular milestone---GAAW! GAAW! GAAW! My very spit gets caught in my throat at the thought. Then again, I can't complain about another birthday when I consider the alternative. Better to be older than dirt than dirt that is old, I always say, in my WAKY way.

Just A Blog Before I Go

The title of this blog references Graham Nash, who wrote Just A Song Before I Go and who also threatened to sue my butt for putting "Our House is a Very Very Very Fine House" on a platter because apparently I violated all sorts of copyrite laws, and therefore owed him A GAJILLION DOLLARS AND ALL MY UNSOLD PLATTERS, or so said his High Powered Attorney. At settlement, we shipped several hundred of those babies to Mr. Nash--I wonder to this day if he gave them to all his friends for Christmas. Prior to that, I actually wrote to him and asked him if we could DONATE the amount of the settlement and the product to the victims of Hurricane Katrina--which apparently pissed Mr. Nash off even more, and got me Banned for Life from the discussion boards on his website, not to mention some Very Nasty Emails from a group of CSN fans. (You think those people are tye dye pot smoking Gen Xers, but your opinion changes quickly after the second death threat.) But I digress.....

1. I am off to Shy-Town for the next three days, hence the title.

2. Thank you again for all your well wishes. Some of my best friends now live in my computer.

3. I am fully recovered and managed to easily find the 6 lbs. I lost with the flu. Actually 6 lbs. Plus. You know how when you throw up after having five Gin and Tonics that the very THOUGHT of Gin makes you feel a bit queasy? The same is true for getting the flu when you are on a strict Jenny Craig regimen. I cannot look at a frozen turkey wrap at the moment.

4. The Banana turned 5 on September 20 and so we held a three day fete and issued commemorative china.

5. Between organizing the live animals and finding The Banana a monkey costume, I forgot to fill the pinata. I am not a big fan of pinatas. Maybe it's because our first experience with one was so bad. We managed to find the only INDESTRUCTIBLE DRAGON PINATA in the world for CBoy's 3rd--and after giving 22 children three turns each with a steel baseball bat (INDOORS BY BREAKABLES MAY I ADD), Sexyhusbandomine had to reach for the chain saw. When the candy finally exploded all over the floor, it was like a SALE day at Macys. CBoy ended up crying and clutching two half unwrapped packages of Smarties. I had to take some Valium.

We soon switched to the kind where everyone gently pulls a ribbon and the candy finally falls out the bottom, but that was still too wild for my taste. So last year I wrapped the candy into individual sandwich bags so that there was only one bag per kid and then I made them SIT DOWN TO GET IT. After they used the Purell, of course. And I checked each one for choking hazards or peanut oil. Twice.

So we did not have an Evil Pinata. But we did have Mimosas and Bloody Marys, which is why people like to come to my kid's parties.

6. I cleaned the Art Cabinet yesterday and Complicatedboy had used up half a stack of Xerox paper drawing BOOBS of all sizes and shapes. Sexyhusbandomine is oddly proud of this new artistic phase.

7. I decided we could no longer keep NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC in the magazine rack in the bathroom.

8. I got my first piece of HATE EMAIL in response to this blog! Virtual High Five! I am amused by the fact that the person who sent it was reading posts in JUNE. However much time they spent reading four months of my drivel is time they are Never Going To Get Back. I'm just sayin.

9. Hate Email does not bother me, unless it is scented with patrouli oil and contains lyrics from Teach Your Children Well.

10. That is all: see you in a few days.

This is Sick

This blog is temporarily closed due to illness-and for once it is not connected to The Cocktail Flu. This blogess spent last night sleeping on a bath mat trying to throw up quietly, so as not to wake the children. I will be back when I can keep some saltines down.

In the meantime, I suggest you stock up on the Purell.

The Banana Is Almost Squished!!

Before our first child was even born, we hired the BESTEST CHILDPROOFING COMPANY EVAH to come and lock down everything in Chez Veasey. And they did: in order to throw a used kleenex away you had to enter a six digit security code onto a stainless steel padlock and have your iris scanned. Every cabinet, every closet, every door, and every portal to an alternate universe (that would be the toilet seat) was rendered unassailable. There was not a sharp corner to be found anywhere in the apartment and all the window guards had window guards. You had to be strip searched to get anywhere near the Drano.

Banana is going to be five on Saturday and our standards have been lowered somewhat in the past four years. You can now open the refrigerator without having to provide five forms of ID, and as mentioned in a previous blog we saw the RETURN OF THE COFFEE TABLE. We stopped worrying about TOYS WITH SMALL PARTS and felt ok leaving the cough syrup in the medicine cabinet instead of contracting with the Brinks Truck each time The Spawn had colds.

In fact: this weekend we believed that I could go and WORK OUT (read: walking at a moderate pace to the strains of Hanson's MmmmBop) while Sexyhusbandomine took A SHOWER and The Spawn watched cartoons, ate cereal and basically hung out in our SAFE little universe.

Except The Banana decided she wanted to GET DRESSED-which was not part of the Master Plan. Neither was the fact that we had recently purchased new dressers from Ikea and in keeping with our new loosy-goosy attitude, had not secured them to the wall.

I admire the fact that Banana thought she had discovered A MORE EFFICIENT WAY OF REACHING HER UNDERWEAR. Why go to the trouble of moving the conveniently located stepstool over to the dresser when you can simply build a staircase by pulling out the bottom two drawers? I imagine that before the entire dresser fell over on top of her that she was congratulating herself on her ingenuity.

We were very lucky that Banana ended up with only a black eye and a few bad bruises. And the memory of her father coming to her aid: Naked and Sopping Wet with a chin half covered in shaving cream.

To sum up what we all learned:

-WORKING OUT is not worth losing a kid over. It's a sacrifice, but I am willing to give it up. Oh, sure I'll miss the sweating and the pain and the boredom: I'll just have to burn those calories being a Better Helicopter Mom. No one argue with me about this TOTALLY SELFLESS ACT.
-Sexyhusbandomine is now allowed to take baths only after the children are asleep. If he MUST shower while The Spawn are in his care, he must do so fully clothed. Which will save me the trouble of some laundry-so as you can see Banana got the Efficiency Gene from me.
-The Spawn must immediately RETURN TO THE BUBBLE.

That is all.

AUTHENTICALLY drunk post

Oh shoot. It's Friday and I forgot to give you a blog. My Gosh, Look: you are almost out of water as well. DO I HAVE TO TAKE CARE OF EVERYTHING IN THIS HOUSE.......
(Just re-read entry this morning. O My Head. Finding it difficult to crack open a can of Tuna and Shrimp for the kitties. )

Bananna has been in Kindergarten for two weeks now. Today she came home and announced her biggest discovery to date. Apparently, they had "cooking" as a lesson, and she was excited to announce that POPCORN DOES NOT ALWAYS HAVE TO COME OUT OF A MICROWAVE. I feel betrayed. It's as if they started teaching Creationism and didn't give me a heads up so I could rid the house of the plastic dinosaurs. I am worried she will start to suspect that HAMBURGERS DON'T COME FROM THE DINER DOWN THE STREET. I knew I should have Home Schooled.
(This is true, darnit. And now, of course, she will start insisting on 'real' popcorn and next thing you know she'll balk when I announce that Cereal is What's For Dinner Tonight.)

CBoy got an A on his very first spelling test. CBoy has a very relaxed teacher this year. The kind that will let you get out of gym if you have cramps, if you know what I mean. I am happy for CBoy that he will not have the anxiety of Jumping Through Hoops in Second Grade, but worried that he will not be Jumping Through Hoops in Second Grade. Yes, being stretched out on The Rack of Fear and Pressure is unpleasant, but doesn't it make you taller in the end?
(Note to self: watch referring to kid's teachers while drunk blogging. This is not in line with the "Kiss Ass All Year So He Might Get an A" policy that we have firmly established.)

We're going to an Obama fundraiser next week and I don't have anything to wear. I don't want my ass to remind people of the National Debt. But everything I try on makes me look Massive. And Republican.
(Note to self: Spray Tan. Takes off another 20 pounds.)

Pinot Grigio doesn't have to cost $27.00 a bottle to be good. But if you have a few glasses of the $27.00 variety, it makes the 8th glass of $7.00 Pinot Grigio taste like Ambrosia.
(This sounds a bit snooty and ewwww. Sorry readers. I'm not always entertaining while drunk-sometimes I am just plain obnoxious.)

This week I lost two more pounds on Jenny Craig and they came off my feet. So now I have floppy boobs and narrower feet. I am thinking next week I might have thinning hair.
(And the wine I had last night went straight to my thighs giving new meaning to the words: Weebles Wobble.)

Thanks for sticking with me and reading. You Rock! Goodnight Detroit!
(I don't remember writing this. Thanks for holding my hair back and for leaving such great comments.)

September 11, 2008.

This is a short film we made as a tribute to the events of seven years ago. Some of the images in the film come from a memorial we started called TILES FOR AMERICA, which started as a small collection of ceramic angels and grew to encompass several thousand tiles and cover half a city block thanks to the participation of people all over the world who had something to say.

I know that the clouds must clear
I know that the sun will shine

LOVE FROM ARIZONA

In true stalker fashion, Miss Thystle (www.missthystle.com) sent me a package that arrived today. Sadly it did not contain an ear or her husband's worn undergarments (she saves those to send to Oprah. Oprah gets all the good stuff), but it did contain some goodies from her home, the 48th State to join The Union. I think it is only fair that I virtually reciprocate with the equivalents from New York.

First off, she sent this excellent Dumb Ass Hot Sauce-(almost losing her foot in the process of obtaining it for me).



Awesome!
Now, allow me to send her the New York equivalent:


We call this "Piss in a Bottle" because...well, it actually IS pee. It's how the Great Bums of our city often void their bladders. Then they leave these bottles on the sidewalk. Which may be one of the reasons our city has a recycling problem.

Next: she sent Bananna some local gems.




Beautiful. Let me send her daughter M some of New York's rocks:

(In the eighties we used to wear this in a little bottle around our necks with the cutest little spoons. Just like Stevie Nicks.)

Finally, she sent CBoy some of the local wildlife--this great scorpion paperweight, and some rattlesnake eggs which he is soooo going to get a lot of mileage with in terms of practical jokes.


I feel compelled to send her some of our New York wildlife:


Yeah- I know what you people were thinking: New York is all about King Kong and crazy polar bears in the Central Park Zoo. Nope: we grow our reptiles big out here. Then we roast them on our balcony hibachis and slather them with hot sauce.

Big thank you to Kiki!! XO!

Dear Readers: I do love presents. South African readers-feel free to pop something shiny into the mail this week, and you guys in France see if you can stuff Johnny Depp into a box.

TGIF-Thank Gawd I'm Fabulous

I don't really care so much what I write in this post, as long as I don't end the week on a Whiter Shade of Palin. The discussions this week have plumb worn me out, and I visited many of your blogs to discover that some of my Favorites were having The Most Craptastic Week Evah! Were I a Conspiracy Theorist, I would venture the opinion that there was a connection between current politics and this wide spread malaise. Maybe there is a "Tip-Top Super Secret Organization" that is trying to End The World by having all women on the same hormonal cycle at the same time. That would be a whole new War Of Terror.

Obviously, it is up to me to SAVE YOUR WEEKEND. So I leave you with these gifts. Because I heart you cyber friends. And I'm not just saying that because I'm drunk.

So here is Today's HAPPY THOUGHT:


And another happy thought:


Here's a thought that was happier in distant memory than when I actually Googled it


And finally it's great that a Bleeding Heart Liberal Wack Job from New York such as myself can find so many good hearted compadres in other parts of the world. Cheer to you Australia, Dallas, and of course......

Song For My Sisters

Hooray for you, My Sisters-
whatever choice it is you've made:
to Stay at Home or Go to Work
clean your own home - get a maid.

Hooray for you, My Sisters
whatever choice was right for you:
Change each and every diaper
or pass off the ones with poo.

Hooray for you My Sisters
(With apologies for this prose)
I celebrate that you had options
and don't judge the path you chose.


Hooray for you My Sisters
who did not blog with disdain
judgmental narrow minded statements
about the woman beside McCain.

Hooray for you My Sisters
"cuz with judgments we ALL lose
because we never Really Know
til we walk in someone's shoes.

Hooray for you My Sisters
May your daughters grow up strong
and know that whatever life they choose
they won't be judged as "wrong."

Hooray for you My Sisters
(and to you, my loving brothers)
who understand that the only way
we rise is by lifting others.

This post is not about who you are voting for or if you are a Republican or a Democrat. It's about women tearing other women down for the choices they make AS WOMEN to work or stay home with their children. We cannot continue to pour so much of energy into this debate instead of focusing on how to improve the options available to our daughters. And if i just lost half of my readership in Utah by saying that, so be it. I don't usually politically blog--I try so hard not to provide you with any true content--but yesterday was a very sad day for me when I visited many familiar urls only to find diatribes about how women should stay at home. I judge the judgers, dammit.

Not on The List

Today was The Bananna and Complicated Boy's FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL (Can I get an AMEN to that...and shall we now Gather at the River for a cocktail or two, because Fall Drinking Hours officially begin at 9 am now.) Bananna started Kindergarten and CBoy began his maiden voyage as a Second Grader. Both kids had long lists of school supplies that we needed to provide on day one, and we dutifully fulfilled all requests--even the Teacher's "Wish List" because there's nothing we like better than starting off a new year by being a Kiss Ass. One can always hope that future transgressions in Math and Reading will be offset by that jumbo box of Clorox Wipes we so generously provided on September 2nd.

The big change this year is that I am no longer allowed to accompany Cboy to his classroom door, where traditionally we would part like two people in a Lifetime Television movie; in which one character is going off to war and the other is dying of leukemia. Ordinarily, I add an extra ten minutes into the whole process so that after we stop embracing, he can stand at the classroom doorway, wistfully watching me walk away and down the hall, stopping to say "I love you" in sign language every two feet by pointing to my eye, my heart, and then him. Apologies to those of you who at this point have thrown up a little in your own mouths. I feel it is my duty to provide CBoy with enough material for the analyst's couch. I take this job very seriously.

So finding out that he would have to go TO THE THIRD FLOOR ALL BY HIMSELF kind of threw a wrench into everything, and with all the commotion and hubub that is involved in the first day, I handed him what I thought were two bags full of goodies from Staples.

I wonder what his teacher is going to think when she opens them up and discovers a full week of lunches from Jenny Craig.