Huh? (New and, If Not Improved, At Least Longer and More Pointless...)

While going through the basket of clean laundry that sits at the end of our bed (in eternal (but eternally unfulfilled) optimism that it might actually be put away), Hubby accuses, "You used one of my socks out of context!"

This is what I'm up against.

[Update:] This is the way my brain works--after Hubby made that comment on Friday morning, my brain kept chasing its own tail about what the real "context" of a sock was. Hubby meant that I had used one of his socks with a sock from a different pair, thereby leaving an unmated sock in the basket.

(It is way more important to one of us than the other that our socks be mated. I've always lived by Steven Wright's philosophy in the sock department--he doesn't go by color, he goes by thickness except in my case, since 98% of the socks in our house are white and color isn't an issue, I don't go by style, length,ownership, or even thickness, but by availability, which means I'm often wearing a girl's ankle sock that's been widowed in a freak accident involving teething puppies and a men's crew sock with a stretched out top that flops against my calf like a partially shed skin.

I do try to avoid Hubby's socks and I do try to go for everyone else's socks that are worn out or already mismatched--in other words I try to go for the socks that have been abandoned and rejected by the rest of the family (and thus less likely to be missed, or in Hubby's case desperately pined for). If I am reduced for whatever reason (pick one: a) laziness, b) disorganization, c) desperation, and d) extreme tardiness brought on by all of the above) to grabbing Hubby's socks, I am always, always careful to take a matched set both because I know it ruins his whole day to have a single in a basketful of pairs and because if I take a pair, I am way less likely to be "caught" and have to listen to him rant about "people" (by which he means me) "stealing" (by which he means borrowing--no he probably does mean stealing, but really it's just borrowing) his socks (by which he means his socks).

What happens, though, is that regardless of my stealthy, pairs-only sock stealing, and regardless of whether I've actually stolen any of his socks or not, I still have to listen to him rant about missing socks, which he's always convinced have been stolen, not merely misplaced in the dryer or wherever it is they disappear to by the millions in "normal" (by which I mean not my own) households. Despite his deep-seated conviction, I had not stolen/borrowed a single (or pair of) sock(s) in several weeks prior to the morning in question. And speaking of the morning in question, let's close these parentheses and get on with the brain-chasing-tail portion of our post.)

I'm not sure what you would call using a sock without its mate (On one of its trips around the futile tail chase, my brain observed that socks--especially those purchased in multipacks--are actually polygamists and can be mated with any other sock from their pack as well as with any other sock from any other pack of the same style/brand/size. Socks are the Casanovas of the clothing world, but again, I've wandered from the original point which was:) I'm not sure what you would call using a sock without (one of) its mate(s)--mismatching, misusing, misappropriating or (to use some letter of the alphabet other than "m") stealing a single, but whatever you call it, I'm pretty sure that using a sock "out of context" must mean something entirely different than merely pairing it with the "wrong" sock. (Right or wrong sock is a gray area if you ask me and not merely because most of the once white socks that comprise 98% of our household's sock inventory have been overworn and underwashed to varying shades of that color.)

To the extent that a sock (or socks, though for the purposes of our argument, it seems more accurate to deal with the sock on an individual basis) can be said to have a context, I'm pretty sure putting it on a foot is precisely the context in which a sock belongs. Now, if you were to use the sock, say, as a mitten, that might be a little out of context. And if you were to mix a martini (shaken or stirred) in a sock--an enterprise that would no doubt fail in a spectacular fashion, particularly if you were using one of our very off-white socks--that would be using a sock extremely out of context.

When it comes to the expression "Put a sock in it." we are once again in a gray area. Is this proper sock context or not? I'm not sure, why don't I try it and find out?

I Don't Really Miss The Poopcentric Conversations

Recent events have had me yearning for the simpler (in my memory at least) times, when the kids were younger and the biggest crisis we seemed to face was what to tell them about Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. An evening spent one-on-one with Other Kid, who's about to turn six (SIX!!!!) reminded me that those long lost days had some pitfalls of their own.

For one thing, he requires constant entertaining--even though tonight my contribution consisted mainly of slouching back on the couch while he orchestrated a Beanie Baby attack on my head, it seemed endless and exhausting. For another, the conversation often leaves much to be desired.

At one point, trying to distract him from beating me in the face with a stuffed (but surprisingly firm) anteater, I said, "Hey, I heard you went to Ponderosa for dinner."

His response--which he gave all in one very long breath--was, "Oh yeah, and I ate everything they had there, they have nothing left, ha ha, tricked ya', I couldn't really do that, my stomach isn't big enough, but for such a small butt crack, I sure can poop big turds."

Yeah, I'm not missing those days so much anymore.

Perfect Post for August: Perspective

As I've hinted, implied and outright whined about here lately, I have been in the middle of one crisis after another for what feels like months. Even in the midst of all the blubbering, I try to tell myself that lots and lots of people have it way worse than me and this is absolutely true.

Perhaps it is the petulant child in me that doesn't find much comfort in that thought.

In any case, when I found 30 Days Is Just 1,440 Back-to-Back Episodes of DragonTales over at Looky, Daddy, I couldn't help thinking that the Universe was trying to send me a message that it's tried to send me a bazzillion times before. Everything's relative.

So, for the friendly, timely and entertaining reminder, here's my button:



And, The Dad, it's all yours!

See other winners at Suburban Turmoil and Petroville.

Two Milestones In One Week--Almost More Than One Mom Can Stand

A few weeks ago, while reading the short story collection The Lives of Rocks by Rick Bass, I came across a passage in the short story "Goats" that seemed directed specifically (and maybe even a little eerily) at me:

"I've read recently that scientists have measured the brains of adolescent boys and have determined that there is a period of transformation in which the ridges of the brain swell and then flatten out, becoming smoother, like mere rolling hills, rather than the deep ravines and canyons of the highly intelligent, and that during this physiological metamorphosis it is for the boys as if they have received some debilitating injury, some blow to the head, so that,neurologically speaking, they glide, or perhaps stumble, through the world as if in a borderline coma.

Simple commands, much less reason and rules of consequence, are beyond their ken..."

Though Mr. Bass was writing fiction, I know this to be a fact. Not because I Googled it (although I did because that's the kind of geeky girl I am), but because I've spent the last seven years with one, then two, then lord help me, three teenage boys. I know without a doubt that at some point something goes horribly (and, let's hope, temporarily) afoul inside their brains.

Son-Three was arrested last week, two days before Son-One was dropped off for college. And you thought he was too busy with "Bible study" to get into any real trouble.*

Son-Three had some friends over--they had been at soccer practice together earlier in the evening and then "walked around" together for a little while before ending up in the tent in our backyard. I looked out before I went to bed at eleven and I could see five distinct teenage boy shadows and figured we were good--after all, we'd been good every other night this summer. There's a TV out there and a Playstation, a boom box (or whatever they're called now) and a few old chairs. It's essentially a soft-sided guest house.

Anyway, they were out there--Son-Three and four of his friends: G, C, M and M's foreign exchange student, three days off the plane from Brazil. I went to bed. And was awakened at 3:30 by the local police. Son-Three and one of his friends had been stopped driving the flower delivery van. (The police officer said, "We called Cranky Boss Lady, and she was not aware that they had the van." You think? Um, Son-Three doesn't have a license and it was 3:30 in the morning--were you thinking I thought she gave them permission to drive the vehicle? I don't mean to mock law enforcement, but--okay, maybe just a little, from a respectful and anonymous distance.)

Apparently, the five boys were out there in the tent and S, the Brazilian foreign exchange student, was anxious to meet some "American girls." (In instant messages before he came to the States, S told Son-Three that he had had a girlfriend in Brazil but that he broke up with her so he could "do single in the US.") The only American girl available at 2-something a.m. was NF, of Bible study fame, who lives a long, dark four miles from our house and who happened to have an also available friend staying over that night.

Somehow--and I'm not sure exactly how and the reason I'm not sure exactly how is that asking them how it happened and what they were thinking when they did it seemed the ultimate exercise in futility because was there any answer they could give me that would even approach normal human logic? so I didn't ask--the boys came to the conclusion that the best way to get the girls to our house was to take my shop keys and get the shop van.

I assume the shop van was preferable to the car in our driveway because a) it's an automatic and our car is an aging and temperamental manual and b) the van would be much less likely to be missed during this escapade than would our car. (Son-Three may be an idiot with a (temporarily) unridged brain, but he's an idiot that realized he has two parents with insomnia and three nocturnal (especially during the summer) siblings who would certainly wonder where the car had gone.)

So, leaving the other four boys in the tent, M and Son-Three walked to the flower shop where they used my key to get in to the shop to get the van key. Son-Three had the presence of mind to lock the shop behind him. He did not, however, have the presence of mind to turn on the headlights.

By the time he realized that not only were his headlights not on, he had no idea how to turn them on, a police car was coming around the bend from the opposite direction. Full-on panic must've set in at that moment and Son-Three was pushing, pulling, turning and jiggling every button, knob, and dial within his reach, all to no avail**. He had the windshield wipers waving (front and back), the radio blaring, the A/C blasting and he'd probably turned the overdrive on and off six or seven times. They were pulled over and taken to the police station. After an hour and a half of questioning, they were released to their exhausted parents.

Cranky Boss Lady, in an unprecendentedly uncranky move, declined to press charges so the boys were only charged with unauthorized use of a motor vehicle, which is a misdemeanor but since neither of them has ever been in any kind of trouble before, it's likely to be dismissed as long as neither of them gets into any additional trouble in the next six months.

Here's hoping this etched some deep ridges into their brains and not just some new lines on their parents' foreheads***.

*Yes, I know, and more importantly, so does he that "Bible study," especially advanced, unprotected "Bible study," has its own share of potentially very real "real trouble."

**The light switch is on the dash to the left of the steering wheel. Difficult to find under normal circumstances and, I would imagine, much more so when you're busy crapping your pants at the sight of an oncoming police car.

***The jury's still out on the new ridges, but it does appear as though Son-Three has mono (he's being tested in the morning), which I can't help seeing as a little viral karma.

Thisclose To Speechless

The countdown is on.

Of course, in some ways the countdown has been on for nineteen years or so, but now we're really coming into the final days of The Countdown.

Son-One leaves for college on Friday.

This Friday.

It doesn't seem really possible to me since I just dropped him off for kindergarten a week or so ago. I know all those "my how time flies" sentiments are cliche, but I believe they're cliches for a reason...they're universal emotions--and they kick you in the gut, no matter how prepared you are, no matter how many people you know who've been kicked in the gut before you.

You can see it coming but you can't get out of the way.

They've Reserved The Deluxe Suite In Hell For Him...

No, not Dick Cheney, my sixteen-year-old son.

We were in line at the grocery store the other night and the woman three people in front of us said hi to Son-Three. I didn't recognize her so I gave him the "who's that" look and he said, "That's NF's mom."

NF is a girl he sometimes hangs out with, for lack of a better word. She's one of the girls Daughter-Only refers to as one of Son-Three's "four or five girlfriends," not quite grasping the subtle (and somewhat sleazy) distinction that while you definitely can make out with your girlfriend, not everyone you make out with is your girlfriend. Yes, I fear my youngest son has become something of a player, a boy-slut, but that's a post for another time...

Back at the grocery store, Son-Three chuckled to himself--a somewhat frightening sound, I don't mind saying--and launched into this story: "I was up at [a friend's house who lives near NF] and wanted NF to come over, but it was 11 o'clock and her mom wasn't that excited about it so I said [here his voice switches into his little white boy version of a ghetto player voice], 'Put Wanda* on the phone.' Then I told her I didn't understand why she didn't want NF to come over for Bible study."

I gasped and used all three of his names--with an exclamation point--right there in the checkout lane.

Now barely able to speak for laughing so hard at his own cleverness, he continued, "So Wanda says [here he switches to his middle-aged mother voice, laced with sarcasm and snootiness], 'Oh, and what Bible verses will you be studying this evening?' And I grabbed the Bible off the bookshelf and read her something from Corinthians."

I was appalled.

And, okay, maybe a little tiny bit proud, too.

*Not her real name. And while we're on the subject of "Wanda," she clearly--judging from the smiles she kept shooting our way--found Son-Three quite charming. I keep telling him, "With great power, comes great responsibility." It doesn't seem to be sinking in yet.

1-800-Frivolous Lawsuit

So, there's this guy who sends his girlfriend flowers through the online flower ordering service 1-800-Flowers. And the company sends a thank you for the order to his house, where it is intercepted by his wife, who naturally curious, calls the company and receives all the details of the order, including the card message ("Just wanted to say that I love you and you mean the world to me."). And now of course, the guy is suing for a million dollars or something...


A few other facts: the couple were already in ("amicable" according to his lawyer) divorce proceedings--this revelation has made things considerably less amicable, but the girlfriend/flower thing is not the root cause of the divorce. And the guy claims that he asked that the order be kept private and was assured that the company honors requests not to discuss orders with "third parties."


My first reaction--mostly a wife reaction--is that the guy is a weasel, not just for cheating, but also for not having the balls to accept his just desserts (apparently the difference between what the wife had been willing to settle for and what she's asking for now is $300,000--so it is quite a plate of dessert). And, perhaps worse yet, for filing a lawsuit that has brought national attention to his idiocy--and no doubt additional embarassment and pain to his wife. (They were already getting a divorce, I know, but if you think this whole thing isn't an additional kick in the gut, you would be so wrong.)


My second reaction--as a florist who has been on the receiving end of more than one curious wife phone call--is fascination with the subject. Cranky Boss Lady and I have often wondered about florist-client confidentiality and what we owe and to whom. We have mostly let conscience and common sense be our guide--a wife whose name is also on the credit card account the flowers were charged to can have any information she wants. With everyone else, we proceed with caution. But then, we don't promise anything in the privacy department either--as 1-800-Flowers apparently did.


Which brings me--and not a moment too soon--to the real point of this post. Even though I think the guy behind the suit is a weasel (among other less family-friendly words), I'm pretty sure he's telling the truth about 1-800-Flowers essentially promising something (privacy) and then not delivering...because 1-800-Flowers is one of the most disorganized, unprofessionally run companies I've ever had the displeasure of dealing with.

The way the service works is that they offer a variety of products, some of which I believe are shipped directly from their own warehouses and the remainder of which are ordered through local florists through a "wire service" (like FTD or Teleflora). The wire service collects the money from 1-800-Flowers, takes a percentage and pays the rest to the filling florist.


My first problem with the service is that partly because you're dealing with not one, but two middlemen, you're getting (0ver)charged enough to be sure all three parties get their "cut." We have heard cases where a customer has paid as much as double what we would've charged for the same arrangement if they had called us directly--and even when the difference is not so drastic it's always ten or fifteen dollars. Now if you go into it knowing you're being overcharged and you feel that the extra "convenience" is worth the extra money, then good for you, but I feel like maybe a lot of people don't really realize how much extra they're really paying for something that in the end (witness Weasel Guy) may not be as convenient as you'd hoped.

My second problem is from the florist's point of view. We repeatedly get orders from this company that are for towns we do not serve. Without getting too much into the intricacies (too late, I know) of the flower business, the wire service we deal with has a directory of florists and which towns they serve. Despite the fact that 1-800-Flowers has access to the directory, they send us orders for towns 50 or 60 miles from our shop--towns which, needless to say, we aren't listed as serving. These orders are received over a computer system and then we are required to refuse the orders over the same system, which takes a few minutes max--no big deal except, say, at Mother's Day when there aren't many minutes to spare--especially for orders we're not actually going to fill (and therefore we won't actually be paid for) and then add to that the fact that we get the same exact order five or six times in an afternoon, even after repeatedly refusing it.

Then, just when you feel your only option is to bash the computer screen with a sledgehammer or your own head, the order stops coming over the system...because they're going to start calling the order to you sometimes four or five times in an hour--even though you've repeatedly told them you don't go to that town. My guess is that these little people in their cubicles don't want to be the one who has to contact the customer to let them know their order can't be filled so they kick it back into the system without noting the previous refusal.

This is just the tip of the 1-800-Flowers iceberg and I realize I've probably lost all but the most bored* of my readers, but anyone who's still out there, don't you think I have way more of a case against 1-800-Flowers than Weasel Man?

*And if you weren't bored before, you sure as hell are now.

Oscar De La Hoya!

Something is very wrong with my brain, I just thought you all should know.

All night, I kept chasing the name Oscar De La Hoya round and round in my brain. I would wake up from a deep sleep with my first conscious thought being "Oscar De La Hoya."

Sometimes it was a question: "Oscar De La Hoya?"

Sometimes it was an exclamation: "Holy Oscar De La Hoya!!!"

Sometimes it was a simple declarative statement: "And then, Oscar De La Hoya."

For one memorable and seemingly interminable stretch between 4:17 and 5:02 or so, I engaged my brain in a long and circular debate about whether fixating on the name Oscar De La Hoya was somehow racist. Not surprisingly, considering the time and my sorry, sorry state of mind, I came to no conclusion.

If there's help out there, please send it soon.

Perfect Post For July: Do You Sense a Theme?

It should come as no surprise (after recent posts involving my getting teary-eyed over peanut butter cups and explaining to the Universe what an unselfish, level-headed lottery winner I would be) that this summer has been a bit overwhelming for me and some of those closest to me. There are a number of icky things going on, some of which I will likely elaborate on soon, and some of which require major decision making.

Decision making is not my strong suit. I've noticed especially in the past ten years or so, that I spend a lot more time reacting to things around me rather than acting to take any control of the things around me. Part of what holds me back is the nagging voice of self-doubt.

Yes, my self-doubt has a voice--a grating, whiny voice whose every sentence starts with "But..."

I thought I was a little strange, hearing voices and all, but then I found "My Inner Critic" over at The Silent K. Krista is well-acquainted with her inner critic--to the point of knowing her critic's desperate need for a pedicure. After reading her post, I realized I'm not alone in all that toxic self-doubt. I am, in fact, in some pretty good company.

So, for some good advice for putting that inner critic in her petty little place, here's my button:




And Krista, it's all yours.

(For other winners see Suburban Turmoil or Petroville.)

Pay No Attention To The Tiny Beads of Blood Popping Out On My Forehead...

I often talk about how crazy my job makes me, but the truth is my job, by itself, is practically a cakewalk--I do paperwork, make deliveries, do some flower arranging, nothing too challenging but not too boring either. What really makes me crazy (beads-of-blood-popping-out-on-my-forehead-frustrated-crazy) is Cranky Boss Lady.

As the observant among you are no doubt able to discern from her name, she's cranky quite a lot of the time, but I've come to expect it and I'm usually able to adjust for it so it's actually less of a problem than the other stuff. Stuff like the "conversation" we had today about potstickers...

For lunch, she brought a bag of frozen potstickers from home and was talking about where potstickers "come from" (you know, other than from her freezer). She said, "Aren't they Korean or something?"

And I said, "I have no idea. I do know they're on the buffet at the Chinese restaurant."

"Yeah, but I don't think they're Chinese. I think they might be Vietnamese or Korean or something."

Again, not being an expert on Asian cuisine, let alone on potstickers specifically, which I've never even tried before today because at the Chinese buffet they're sitting there looking sort of larval and not at all tempting, not something I'd want to put in my mouth or study academically, I said, "I really have no idea--all I know is they're on the buffet. It's entirely possible that more than one country makes potstickers."

"I know, but I just don't think they're Chinese. 'Potstickers' just doesn't sound Chinese."

Duh. How do you have a conversation with someone who thinks the English word "potsticker" sounds more Korean than Chinese?

The saddest part of all--and I would only admit this to you, my Internet friends--is that I came straight in the door from work and Googled "potstickers," about which I'd like to remind you, I don't give one small crap, and what I got was repeated mentions of China (including a column about Chinese-American author Amy Tan's family tradition of making potstickers on the anniversary of her mother's death). In fact, "potstickers" are also called "Chinese dumplings."

A further frightening truth: This entire post is an attempt by me to distract myself from my urgent need to call Cranky Boss Lady at home to tell her that "potstickers" might not sound Chinese but they are, in fact, Chinese. I won't let myself call because calling and saying "I told you so" especially when I didn't actually tell her at all (I repeatedly said I didn't know), is so something she would do.

Which brings me to the real crux of the problem here--I guess it's not really Cranky Boss Lady who's the problem, it's the horrifying things she brings out in my personality that frustrate and, frankly, terrify me.

(Tune in next time when we discuss why (according to the wise and wonderful CBL), salmon is "man fish.")

It's Like Winning The Lottery...Sort Of, But With Less Money and More Medication

Last week, Daughter-Only woke up with a very sore throat and some stomach, um, disturbances. Worried about strep, I called to see if she could be squeezed into the doctor's office. They said they could fit her in if we came right away, so I dropped everything at work (not that there was much to drop, summer being a slow time in the flower business) and, an hour and a half later, we emerged from the doctor's office with a diagnosis of Coxsackie virus, commonly referred to as "the summer virus," which the doctor helpfully informed us he had just recovered from. He recommended zinc lozenges for the throat pain and Pepto for the other stuff.

So Daughter-Only suffers nobly for several days--her nose is stuffed up and her throat is froggy and mostly all she wants to do is lie around on the couch (which is not all that easy to distinguish from the regular lying on of the couch that goes on from time to time). But Saturday morning, she woke up and her voice was almost completely gone. From her spot on the couch she croak-whispered, "Mom! Mom! I can't talk."

I said, "Okay." and she said it again...and again...and again*, each time a little more urgently. Finally, I said, "I don't know what you expect me to do about it, you know, other than jumping for joy."

For the record, this is not the proper response to your daughter's distress at being unable to speak. But, in my defense, the girl does talk a lot** and for the past few days she's been stuck at home with no viable outlet for all that talking except for me and her other family members. All the other members are male so basically it's been me and me fielding the yammering.

Speaking of the "men" of the house--especially the adolescent ones. A bit of advice? If someone in your house comes down with Coxsackie virus and you happen to also share that house with teenaged boys, don't, whatever you do, let the name of that virus slip. Because while the possible variations on the word Coxsackie aren't exactly endless***, they are endlessly amusing to said boys and tediously annoying to everyone else.

*For someone who couldn't talk, she was certainly able to talk a lot about not being able to talk.

**Yes, before you volunteer to help me figure out where that chattering might originate, I do know exactly where she gets it from. Thanks.

***In fact, they seem to be limited to Coxsuckie, Coxsucker, and Coxsucking and one or two unsuccessful attempts to work the "sack" angle.

Scheduling Conflict

Three or four days ago, Son-Two says to me, "Mr. C (the volleyball coach) wants me to play in a tournament on Saturday. Do you think I should?"

Confused, I said, "Sure, why not?"

In a voice saturated with duh, he said, "Mom, the last Harry Potter book comes out Saturday!"

*PS--Do you have any idea how much I love the fact that my 6'2" seventeen-year-old badass of a son is so excited about the release of a book?

One Of Those Women

There's a guy who comes into the shop every few weeks--he's one of our advertising representatives so, technically, he has a legitimate business reason for being there, but he always ends up staying longer than is strictly necessary and often stops when there's no real business to be done. He will sit on the futon in our office and pour his heart out, mostly completely unprovoked. I consider him one of the Shop Groupies, even though he would no doubt be appalled by that designation.

He's been married for seven years and been with his wife even longer than that--double digits, I think. They have a daughter who will soon be turning four. For the longest time, his wife's main complaint about him has been that he doesn't do enough around the house and his main complaint about her has been that whatever he does do, she criticizes him for.

Especially when their daughter was an infant, his wife was hypercritical--she would literally count the stack of diapers before she left him alone with the baby and then count them when she got home to be sure he'd changed the baby "often enough." (The fact that the kid didn't develop a rash and/or wasn't sitting in a soggy diaper when Mom got home was apparently not proof enough.) She objected to the way he burped the baby, to how he wrapped a blanket around her, to which direction he wiped her butt in. It was completely insane and made this guy even less motivated to help. I mean, let's see, I can help and have every move I make criticized or I can save the energy, not help, and be criticized anyway. Pretty soon, not helping is just the only logical choice: it conserves energy.

Anyway, I listened sympathetically to this guy's plight (and, living in a small town, I also heard (through a mutual friend) his wife's side of the story, "He never does anything to help out...") and the whole time thought to myself, maybe a little smugly, "Jeez, at least I'm not one of those women, who complain about every little thing when their husbands are only trying to help."

And I wasn't. Until I was.

Hubby makes tuna salad without draining the tuna. Hubby browns ground beef in the microwave. Hubby doubles the butter in the packaged rice recipe (his response when I asked him if he'd followed the package directions? "No, I doubled the butter, but I decreased the water to make up for it."). Hubby repeatedly purchases the exact opposite type of toilet paper that I buy. Hubby was just trying to help...does that make these errors any easier to overlook?

I now understand completely how those women end up that way. They marry men who lack the domestic common sense gene.*

*Hall of Fame lack of common sense: I've got a friend who was so proud and grateful for the way her husband helped out with their infant son until...she realized he was wiping the baby's face not with the sensitive skin baby wipes but with the bleach wipes she kept for wiping down the counter.

Perfect Post For June: My Own Worst Enemy

Working as I do with the woman who is destined to win the gold if cutting off your nose to spite your own face ever becomes an Olympic sport, I've given a lot of thought to the expression, "She's her own worst enemy." And, mostly, what I've thought is that we're all pretty much our own worst enemy. For myself and so very many of the people I know, self-sabotage is written in pen on our daily agendas--looking when we should be leaping, leaping when we should be looking and a thousand variations on that theme. What holds most of us back, it sometimes seems to me is our own damn selves. If I do have an enemy in my life worse than myself, please don't ever let me meet him, her or it in a dark alley or even on a brightly lit street.

Somehow, after reading "Probably some people would just say stubborn..." I know that Lori over at Superfantastic knows how I feel. Not only did I laugh out loud several times while reading the post, I walked away with a new motto: "Present Me loves nothing better than screwing over Future Me."

So for your knack for being your own worst enemy (not to mention the ability to tell funny stories about it), here's my button:





And, Lori, it's all yours!



Check out other winners at Suburban Turmoil and Petroville.

Deeper Than He Looks

My brother, often referred to here and elsewhere as Baby Brother despite his inching ever further into his thirties, is the youngest of my siblings and the only boy. He was also born nearly two months premature and was always small for his age. None of these things lent themselves to being taken terribly seriously--especially by his older sisters. We babied him, of course we did, it could hardly be helped--and in some ways we still do.

We may have created a monster--not just in him but also in ourselves. We consistently expect less of him than he's probably capable of giving and, in return, he gives less than he's capable of giving. He's the go-to guy for a good time--all his nieces and nephews will tell you so, but you don't get the feeling that he spends a whole lot of time contemplating the meaning of life.

Every once in a while, though, I get a glimpse of the deeper, more philosophical side of Baby Brother and I realize that he too struggles with the issues that try men's souls.

On a recent day trip, he came out of a convenience store bathroom and offered this observation: "You know, piss on a public toilet seat* is really one of the great dilemmas in life. You don't want to wipe it off, because it means touching someone else's pee, even indirectly, but you also don't want to leave it there and let the next person in line think you can't hit the bowl."

*"Piss on a public toilet seat" is the funniest phrase isn't it? It could be a directive, a milder form of F- You, or, as it's intended here, a very specific puddle somewhere. Either way, I'm pretty sure it belongs on a CD cover--not sure if it would make a better album title or band name, but you just know they'd line up to buy Piss On A Public Toilet Seat.

Serving the Community

Our school district (and maybe the whole state for all I know) has a community service requirement for graduation. Each student must log 20 hours of community service during his or her senior year. Naturally, many of the students put off their service until the last possible minute and then scramble to find acceptable community service opportunities.

For three nights in a row (tonight was his second), Son-One is working the Little League concession stand. When Son-Three heard this news in the car on the way to drop Son-One off at his assignment, he said, with a completely straight face* and tinged with just the right note of mock disbelief, "You know how to concess?"

*It just hit me how often the phrase "with a completely straight face" is a key element in my "amusing" anecdotes. Apparently the only way to be truly funny is to act like you're not being funny at all.

Overwrought Much?

I have been exhausted lately, watching my siblings face alternating crises while facing one or two of my own. Sleep is one of the first things that goes when I'm under stress. (The things that go after sleep probably don't bear talking about.) Sleep always abandons me just when I need it the most.

So I'm exhausted and feel constantly on the edge of hysteria and I've known for weeks that the tiniest nudge could send me around a bend. I just didn't realize how tiny.

Hubby and I were in the grocery store candy aisle, where I was trying to find a six pack of candy bars that would satisfy everyone (or at least not outright offend anyone) waiting at home for their junk food fix. Hubby saw a six pack of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups With Caramel on the shelf and said, "Ooooh--caramel--have you tried them?"

Let me stop here to tell you something that you may not know about me: I hate peanut butter, always have, I hate it with a fiery passion I usually reserve for human beings rather than inanimate foodstuffs. You, of course, can be forgiven for not knowing that fact about me. Hubby, however, has been married to me for almost 20 years--twenty years in which it has somehow escaped his attention that I hate peanut butter.

I consider my hatred of peanut butter to be a fundamental fact of my personality, a core element of my Self. And somehow, Hubby has no idea or, maybe worse, has completely forgotten, that I hate peanut butter.

I am not so overwrought that I actually said any of this in the grocery store, but I am so far gone that I did get a little teary-eyed standing there.

Flower Sending Hall of Shame

Some days the only thing keeping me at my job (you know other than the big, big bucks) is the glimpse into people's minds the job allows me.

One day I had a guy come in and when I said, "How can we help you today?" He said, "My fiancee is about to kick me to the curb and I really need your help. You know what chicks like, right?"

I said, "Well, for starters, most of us don't like being called 'chicks.'" Then I sold him a dozen roses, which would never have worked on me, and must not have worked entirely on the fiancee because they broke up shortly after that. However, they did reconcile six or eight months later and were recently married, so maybe they were time delayed roses or something.

More recently, we had a kid call from out of town to send his girlfriend a dozen roses with the message, "Me and my hangover miss you." Other than the obvious grammatical issues*, I was amused by his willingness to admit he got drunk without her. Maybe he tried to pass it off as missing her so much he needed the escape. But if he missed her that much and he was drunk in a bar so far from home, what other "escape" might he have indulged in?

My favorite of all time though, was the guy who came in the morning after he "did something stupid." He asked for help writing the card. Cranky Boss Lady (who's not above prying) asked, "Did this something stupid involve another woman?" It did, so Cranky Boss Lady, in her infinite wisdom, came up with "I'm sorry. She means nothing to me. I love you and only you." When I came back and found the order on my desk, where it was waiting for me to write out the card, I was appalled.

First of all, he didn't write the card himself, while he was there? When the card arrived in someone else's handwriting, my first thought if I were the wife would not be a forgiving one--he obviously messed around at least a little and then he compounds the error by letting the staff of the flower shop in on his "mistake."

Secondly, the line "she means nothing to me" is actually not at all reassuring. She means nothing to you and yet you're willing to risk your marriage to do whatever it is you did with her? What the hell does that say about what your marriage means to you?

Third--and this is not card-related so much as flower-related--I'm thoroughly over flowers as an apology. You have no idea how much of that we see. There's actually an enclosure card with a guy in a dog house on the corner of it and plenty of room for an apology. I mean, I know everyone makes mistakes, but how did men get it into their heads that flowers will make everything okay? And in the case of doing something stupid that involved another woman, I personally would find flowers insulting--I couldn't help feeling that the flowers were an attempt to minimize and even trivialize the mistake.

But what do I know? I'm just the cynical chick behind the counter who overthinks everything.

*I've created a monster or two in the grammar police department. When I was telling the boys this story (as a cautionary tale, mostly), Son-Two goes, "Wow! Wow! What horrible grammar!" assuming that was the point of my story.

Adventures In Parenting: (Another) One I Never Saw Coming

A couple of months ago, while reading Allen Shawn's (excellent) book Wish I Could Be There: Notes From a Phobic Life, I came across this quote about parenting: "...I do know that dealing with growing children is like being in a batting cage with ball after ball being thrown at you. You hit the balls you can. Amazingly, the score gets kept for a very long time."


I get that--maybe a little too well. Sometimes it seems like not only is there ball after ball coming at me, but that most of them are curveballs or spitballs or...or...Well, you get the point.


The latest curveball is pretty minor league in the grander scheme of things (recent events in our extended family have taught me nothing if not to be grateful for the petty little parenting disasters I daily face), but I feel like a major league idiot for not seeing it coming.


Son-One has really been blossoming lately--he's been to more parties and events in the past month than in practically his entire four years of high school combined. He even went to the prom--which may not seem miraculous to anyone who doesn't know just how much Son-One takes after his social caterpillar mother, but trust me, it's miraculous, not loaves and fishes miraculous, but maybe the Red Sox finally winning the series miraculous. Maybe it's been brought on by the fact that he's suddenly realized that he's graduating soon and this will be his last opportunity to really spend some time with some of his classmates.

All good except when one of the classmates he wants to spend time with turns out to be Son-Two's ex girlfriend. (Yes, Son-Two snagged an older woman or, more accurately, she snagged him.)

Friday evening, Son-One told me he wanted to go camping Saturday night with AC, otherwise known as Son-Two's ex-girlfriend. Son-Two and AC were pretty serious, for the high school level, dating a good portion of Son-Two's sophomore and AC's junior year. They broke up, sort of messily, in February 2006. They maintained an on-again, off-again, just friends kind of thing--the kind of thing that's enough to give a mom heartburn trying to fight off the growing certainty that her son's feelings are being toyed with, intentionally or not.


In February or early March of this year, Son-Two started seeing a new girl, AW, right around the time that AC started cropping up more and more often in Son-One's conversation. Right around that time, Son-One came home one or two afternoons with AC's name (written in pen in her handwriting) on his arm. I raised an eyebrow but didn't say a word and I hadn't heard much mention of her since.

Until Friday. And he wants to go camping. With his brother's ex-girlfriend and his friend G and his girlfriend (who is friends with AC) and maybe a couple of other people and AC's parents will probably be there.

I can't help myself, I say it: "Are you planning on making out with your brother's ex-girlfriend?"

He looks a little sheepish--as though the thought has maybe occurred to him--and then assures me, "That would be too weird." He assures me it's a strictly friends kind of thing.

On Saturday, as the countdown for the trip begins, Son-One is rushing around the house gathering things and Son-Two shouts from the computer room, "Son-One's going camping?! Who's he going camping with?"

I look at Son-One, "You didn't tell him? You better get in there and tell him. I thought he already knew. I'm not telling him."

The telling was uneventful and Son-One came out with a Mom-you're-so-immature expression on his face and said, "Mom, I've known AC since we were in elementary school." What he meant, as was evident in his tone, was, "Duh! We're sophisticated high school seniors with a deep and meaningful friendship that we wouldn't taint by making out."

Apparently, the fact that his kid brother got there first means nothing, but the fact that he shared a cubby in kindergarten with the girl makes all the difference in the world.

Perfect Post For May: Getting Gotten

The characters in Which Brings Me To You* by Steve Almond and Julia Baggott discuss the importance and rarity of being truly understood. Jane writes to John: "I'm not afraid that I can't give love, fully, doors swung wide open. I'm afraid that I will not be really and truly, deeply understood...Aren't our souls--again, I apologize, but I don't have a better term--listing toward some kind of benediction, and what better benediction than love? And not some generic version of love store-bought in cans like those novelty gifts of Florida sunshine, maybe not love at all but just understanding--which the world rations and hoards."

Being understood at the deepest level is one of those feelings that can be tremendously comforting or tremendously terrifying, depending on your level of comfort with yourself at the moment. Like most of us (I hope), I've spent some time thinking about the people who "get" me and the people who just don't get me at all. (Not to mention the people I get and the people I will just never get no matter what.) Sometimes when I'm whining about how so-and-so just doesn't understand me or know me at all, it hits me that I've been instrumental in that person's failure to get to know me on a deeper level. We hide so much, even (maybe especially) in our closest relationships. Being understood is something I alternately crave deeply and fear even more deeply.

Nita over at Advanced Maternal Age has a husband, Bear, who "gets" her, at least part of the time, and in her post "the best Mother's Day present ever," what Bear gets about her involves books thus appealing both to the married-damn-near-twenty-years side of me and to the nose-stuck-so-deep-in-a-book-I-can't-see-daylight-side-of-me.

For a double-play of perfection, here's my button:


And, Nita, it's all yours.

Other winners at Suburban Turmoil and Petroville.

*Highly recommended, by the way.

Blog of Dreams?

A voice came to me in the night--it was just like Field of Dreams, without any of those pesky promises:

If you write it, they may or may not come--they might be busy or find you boring or their Internet access may be patchy at best. But if you do NOT write it, they definitely will not come.

This Is Your Brain. This Is Your Brain On Mother's Day.

Mid-way through Mother's Day Week, Masked Mom to customer on phone:

"Go ahead with your credit nard cumber."

Now I ask you, would you trust this person with your mother's flowers let alone your credit nard cumber?

Perfect Post for April

Sometimes the reason a post is perfect is as simple as it being something you could've written yourself. That's the case with this month's post "What Are You Afraid Of?" by Kenna Fearing over at Fear Not: On Company Time.

So, for saying so many things out loud that I've only said in my own little head, here's my button:



And, Kenna, it's all yours.

Other winners at Suburban Turmoil and Petroville.

Let's Make a Deal: An Open Letter to the Universe

Dear Universe:

If you will only let me win the lottery--and I don't even need the BIG, GRAND PRIZE jackpot, first or even second place would be just fine and would solve so many problems--I promise I will give generously to reputable charities and that I will do so anonymously because my goal wouldn't be gratitude and glory but to give back.

I promise I would spend the rest wisely--not go out and purchase five or six luxury SUVs or wall-sized big-screen TVs and I wouldn't buy fancy shoes and jewelry and go on trips around the world. No, I would purchase a modest house--not build one, thereby using fewer of our dwindling natural resources and I would set up trust funds for my kids' college. Hell, I wouldn't even quit my sorry ass job--at least not right away. Cranky Boss Lady needs me, after all and, though I often dread going there, I know in my heart that if I didn't have somewhere I had to be, I might never get out of bed except to move to the couch where I would spend the entire day, except for forays into the kitchen and the bathroom, which I would literally have to talk myself into.

In short, Universe, I would be the most responsible, mature lottery winner of all time. And while I know that money doesn't solve all problems, I do firmly believe that some of the problems we have would be easier to solve if there were just enough money so that we could stop worrying about money and spend more time and energy on the other problems that need solving. And I would, Universe, I so would--I'd be the Superhero of Non-monetary Problem-Solving. You've never seen anything like it, Universe.

And, yes, Universe, I know (perhaps too well) how pathetic it is that playing the lottery is currently my only financial strategy, but for a variety of reasons, it's all we've got at the moment. So could you please add that in to your calculations as well?

Thanks,
Masked Mom

Driving While Under The Influence (of Flatulence)

So I pick up the boys after their tennis match last night and I have to run in the store on the way home. As I am purchasing nutritious and inexpensive sustenance for these ungrateful brats, they are, um passing gas, breaking wind, whatever euphemism you want to use for filling my car with practically visible gaseous fumes. Apparently, they had stopped for burgers on the way home at a little burger stand a few miles from town. (As Son-Three said, to his own great amusement, "Now I know why they call it Rockburger.")

Seriously the smell was a wall that I had to push past to take the driver's seat. None of them had even opened a window, which I immediately did, gagging all the while. Nothing entertains them more than knowing they can make Mom puke. I'm backing out, still gagging when Son-Three says, "Mom do you think you should drive under the influence of flatulence?"

Between gags, I can't help laughing a little which only makes me gag more, making them laugh more. Then Son-Two says, accusingly, "Mom you told me 'flatulation' wasn't a word," reminding me of a conversation we'd had on the subject several months ago. (It's a running theme. Of course it is.)

I say, "Actually, when we talked about it before, I thought you were saying 'flagellation,' which is punishment, usually self-punishment, usually as a penance or in some other religious context. But I guess flatulation could be punishing someone else with your flatulence."

Sometimes it's so cerebral and intellectual around here I can barely stand it.

Random Cuteness

Other Kid, the little boy we used to babysit, is not so little anymore. He's a five year old in size 5 shoes and size 7 jeans--at five, he's only a few inches shorter than 12-year-old Daughter-Only. Even though he's not here forty-plus hours a week anymore, I still see him fairly regularly and still somehow am stunned by how quickly he's growing up.

In keeping with his size, age, and gender he works at being mini-macho and usually is too grown up to have his hand held by an actual grown up in public. He made an exception during a visit this afternoon while he and I were out for a walk. He was balancing on a curb and grabbed my hand to steady himself. Once he'd returned to the regular sidewalk, he didn't immediately let go of my hand. We walked along for another twenty feet or so, hand-in-hand.

Then Other Kid said, in a very matter-of-fact tone, "Let's not hold hands anymore. Someone might freak out if they see us. They might think we're married."

Virginia Tech

Greater minds than mine will probably have much more profound wisdom to offer on this subject, but here I am to try anyway.

First, of course, my heart goes out to all the friends and families whose lives have been touched and forever changed by this horrific event. It seems silly and inadequate to say so but it's sincere and really all any of us can offer at the moment.

Second, I had to stop watching the coverage last night because of the way the media is attacking the decisions of the university police--were the proper steps taken, was notification made in a timely fashion, etc, etc. I would be the absolute last person to say we should assume that people in power have done the best they can do and are always operating in our best interests--I know for a fact that that's often not the case. Furthermore, I believe it is not only our right as Americans, but our responsibility to question and even scrutinize the actions of the people in charge of protecting us. And if those people have failed through incompetence or deliberate negligence, I would be the first to say they should be held accountable.

But here's the thing: in this case, first and foremost, not all the information is available yet. There are facts that haven't yet been released that may play a part in our understanding of the decisions made by the campus police. They have stated that they thought the original shooting was an isolated "domestic situation" and that there was no threat posed to anyone else on campus. We now know that that wasn't the case, so it seems obvious to all of us in hindsight, after the fact, that they should've done more to stop additional violence. We know it happened, we make all our judgments based on the fact that it was going to happen. But the officers in charge didn't have this additional information--they had only what they had before them to make decisions about what steps to take.

When something as senseless and huge as this happens, it's only natural to want to make sense of it--to point fingers and assign blame. If we can figure out whose fault it is (besides the obvious choice of the shooter who apparently removed himself from the equation), perhaps we can keep it from happening again. It is much more comforting to assume incompetence or negligence on the part of campus security than to assume that a determined and disturbed individual will sometimes be capable of wreaking havoc no matter what defenses we engineer.

Perfect Post For March

For a long time, I've had a theory about regret--it's pointless. First because you can't change the past (you can't do or undo or do differently anything you've done or failed to do in the past) and, second because even if you could change the past, to do so would put everything in your present at risk. I believe strongly that our present is built of all the tiny moments that came before it and to change one moment might change everything--including all the things you wouldn't trade for anything.

The problem with theories is that they're so theoretical and when you're living life, especially as a parent with all the second-guessing that comes with the territory, regret is inevitable, it's an emotional reflex--and theories tend to fall a little flat in the face of all that reality.

Some days the gap between what I meant to do (and who I meant to be) and what I've actually managed to do seems like an unbridgeable chasm that stands between me and whatever possibilities are out there in my future. As miserable as it is to look around your life and feel that you've blown a million chances to do things better, faster, stronger, and just plain righter--to make all the "right" choices so that all the people counting on you could suffer a little less--there is some comfort to be found in knowing that we all face those feelings of failure.

Jules over at Dirty Feet and Lilywhite Intentions reminded me of that in her post "intentions fall to the floor." In just one short paragraph (and a few spare sentences), she cuts right to the heart of that sick feeling I've had in the pit of my stomach more and more often these days.

So for saying so much in so few words, here's my button:




And Jules, it's all yours.

Browse other winners from this month at Suburban Turmoil or Petroville. MommaK has set up a library of past winners so you can see a full year's worth of awards (and counting).

Considerable Redness and Swelling...*

I have delivered flower arrangements for eight years and during that time have encountered a number of hazardous conditions--icy steps, snarling dogs, knee-deep mud pits people pretend are driveways, half-naked old ladies (no lie, once we called to let this woman know that we would be there in half an hour to deliver a plant we had repotted for her and the seventy-three year old woman came to the door in just a T-shirt and panties (bringing "granny panties" to a whole new level). Worse, the door was at the bottom of a set of stairs that led into the kitchen and as she was too frail to carry the gigantic plant, I had no choice but to follow her up the steps with her jiggly, saggy, old-lady butt right in my face.), not to mention various hazards in funeral homes including wheeled casket stands that someone has forgotten to lock so when you go to put the casket spray on the whole thing lurches back and forth and you have a moment of panic in which you're absolutely certain that you're going to spill the dead guy and how the hell are you going to explain that one to your boss, the family of the dead guy and the already grumpy funeral home director.**

Despite all these hazards (for which, incidentally, I think I should get hazard pay, but of course I do not), I have only ever seriously injured myself once while on deliveries--the day I totaled Cranky Boss Lady's car (because, of course, nothing bad would happen to the shop van, it would happen to be the day the van was at the mechanic's getting new tires and I was driving CBL's personal vehicle, a fuschia Ford Escort, which I just don't think was a coincidence) until Wednesday.

Wednesday I was delivering to another little old lady--a great customer, who has money to blow and regularly does so at our shop. She's housebound though so we take everything to her. She has a little set of six or eight stairs leading up from her garage to her kitchen. I've probably been up and down those stairs a thousand times. On this particular day alone, I'd been up and down them four times. I had brought in all the spring wreaths and wicker baskets that she'd ordered and was getting ready to leave when she asked if she could see the arrangement she was sending to someone else. No problem, right?

I went out to get it--an artificial arrangement in a little metal airplane done in patriotic colors for a guy who just had surgery to fix a deviated septum-- and brought it up to her. She was delighted with it and I turned to leave with the arrangement in my hands and promptly stumbled at the top of the stairs--or more accurately stumbled all the way down the stairs, almost but not quite regaining my balance several times before falling forward at the bottom of the last step and landing on my face on the concrete garage floor.

I never let go of the arrangement! I skidded on my face because I was so intent on not dropping the arrangement. (Save the arrangement, save the world?) It hit me that every time I've started to slip on an icy sidewalk, I have held whatever arrangement I was carrying up in the air to protect it to the best of my ability--the same way I would hold a child I was carrying. Gosh, that's just sad.

Sadder yet is my face today--two days later the bruising is still coming to the surface, the swelling is settling and shifting, the brush burns are an icky brown color that looks like it's oozing even when it's not. As an added bonus, I'm sore everywhere--Hubby and I have been debating whether it's the landing or the trying to catch yourself that does that to every muscle in your body, but whatever side of the debate you come down on, you still can't get off the couch without creaking and groaning and whining and moaning.

I need a raise.

*In case no one else is as much of a geek as me: "considerable redness and swelling" is from the Dr. Scholl's Gel Inserts commercial. One of those "I'm gellin'" asinine commercials. This one the guy's "not yellin' even though there's considerable redness and swellin'" from some dippy waitress who spilled hot coffee on his leg.

**Granted, this only happened once, but one "I almost spilled the dead guy!" is enough.

Tune In Next Time When I Make Ronald McDonald Bawl Like A Baby...

I've been at the parenting thing for almost nineteen years now--you'd think by now they couldn't surprise me anymore, but somehow at the least expected moments, in the least expected places, they can still leave me speechless (snorting with hysterical laughter, but speechless).

The Scene: KFC drive-thru

Staticky Disembodied Voice: Welcome to KFC, can I take your order?

Masked Mom: Yes, I'd like a twelve piece bucket, please.

SDV: Would like you original recipe or extra crispy?

MM: Extra crispy, please.

SDV: (silence)

Son-Two (from the backseat with deadpan sincerity): Mom, do you think the Colonel's disappointed that you're not ordering original recipe?

Nose-Worm Update!!!!

(Masked Mom's Media Monday is on hiatus--but don't cry too hard. It will return with more pithy and pointless commentary as soon as things settle down a little around here.)

When last we saw the ...and-then-it-moved! nose-worm, it was at the hospital lab in a yogurt cup. The small-town hospital had no luck identifying it except to say that it wasn't a "common maggot."*

So off the little bugger (booger? bogger bugger?) went to Penn State where university minds went at it--and determined it was a carpet beetle larva. Apparently, little larva craweld up father-in-law's nostril while father-in-law slept.

The (almost) good news? It can't have been up there long because it was too "well-fed."

Yum.

*Actually this was originally reported to me as "human" maggot. I'm taking some liberty in assuming that someone somewhere lost something in the translation and that "common" is close enough to "human" to count but makes a whole lot more sense. Nevertheless, I'm afraid visions of a "human maggot" will be wriggling in my head all night.

The Odyssey

Over the weekend, Son-Two participated in his fifth Odyssey of the Mind competition. He's been an avid OMer since seventh grade--almost always on the "structure" team, whose goal is to produce a balsa wood structure (to specific criteria--criteria different and a little more difficult each year) capable of holding more weight than the next team's. This was no problem at this year's regional competition (which blessedly has been held in our own school for the past two years), since there was no other structure team in his division. They were guaranteed a place at the State competition just by virtue of showing up.

The guaranteed spot did nothing to dissuade any of the team from staying at school until nine or ten each night last week, putting the finishing touches on the structure as well as polishing their skit (another requirement). This year's skit had to include a "special effect." Son-Two's team chose to make one of the girls on the team disappear in a box created from plans they found on the Internet. The night before the competition, Son-Two was pretty sure the box was going to collapse on stage and humiliate them all. Instead, it worked perfectly--so perfectly in fact that the small crowd gasped and Son-Two's team was approached all afternoon by perfect strangers wanting to know how they'd done it.

Despite gasp-inspiring special effects, OM isn't really audience-friendly. The individual performances/tests are held in small classrooms throughout whatever school the competition's being held in--there is little or no seating and, in fact, even standing room is at a premium. The other part of the competition is "spontaneous" in which only the members of the team can even enter the room with the judges. After a (long) break for lunch, there is usually some sort of "entertainment" while the judges tabulate their scores and then there are the awards. There are often gaps of several hours between the different "events." Gaps spent aimlessly wandering the halls, an activity which I got plenty of in my own high school years, thanks very much.

The second or third year Son-Two was in OM, Daughter-Only was begging me for weeks before the competition to go along. I kept telling her she would be bored and that I didn't think it was a good idea. She kept begging and then she put together a six page packet explaining in words and pictures why it was so important to her to go. All incredibly well thought out and convincing. My favorite part, though, was when, in her opening paragraph, she referred to OM as Oblivion Minds. She was only eight or so at the time and I suppose it's just as impressive that she knew (and could spell) the word Oblivion as it would've been had she actually gotten it right.

I let her go and I can't help thinking it's significant that she hasn't asked to go again. I haven't gone the past two years either. Son-Two seems genuinely not to care whether I'm there or not--he's so over his mother showing up places...not to mention he'd barely get to see me anyway.

I'm kind of sorry I missed it this year, though. The marching band, who was in charge of the concession stand, burned some popcorn, setting off the smoke alarms and causing the building to be temporarily evacuated. I always miss the good stuff.

Masked Mom's Media Monday: Daylight Saving Time

The negatives of Daylight Saving have been enumerated elsewhere (including by Masked Mom herself), but what I've yet to see articulated in any convincing fashion were the "positives" of Daylight Saving. That's probably because there are no positives or the ones that do exist aren't concrete or provable.

This year's Daylight Saving adjustment is all the more annoying and pointless because it's happening three weeks early, a change for which there are the same vague (and unsupported) explanations as for Daylight Saving in general. (And including the three-weeks early change in a bill called the Energy Policy Act of 2005 does nothing to convince me that it's going to have a provable positive effect...)

A friend and I were talking about the fact that having it come three weeks earlier is going to be a huge pain in the ass for computers and computer programs--not so much for us at home but for people in companies with more sophisticated programs that are auto-set to change the first weekend in April. At home, it's a matter of manually changing the computer clock twice--once this weekend and once again when it springs ahead all by itself, completely unaware of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which I still see as kind of a pain in the ass especially since (again) there is no logical proven purpose to it.

Way worse than resetting the clocks on my computer and around the house is trying to recalibrate my internal clock--not to mention recalibrating my kids' internal clocks, which are always running behind in any case. Daughter-Only "forgot" to reset her clock last night and has to go in late to school today--don't worry I didn't fall for it--especially since their father calls all of them as a back up to their alarms (which "fail" regularly)--but she's late nonetheless since the argument we had over whether that was a valid excuse for oversleeping an hour took a considerable amount of time*.

It would be fantastic if the energy savings from this change were great enough to justify the energy we're expending to adjust to it.

Masked Mom's One-Word Review: Pointless.

*I would like to take this time to thank Daughter-Only for trying to get away with that excuse since it reminded me of the best ever "I forgot to change my clock" excuse, which was given by an assistant manager when I worked at Burger King, who claimed he was an hour late because he forgot to reset his clock--except that it was October and anyone with even a basic understanding of "falling back" would realize that if you really forgot to reset your clock in October, you'd have been an hour early instead of an hour late. Duh. The asst. mgr.'s name was Kirk, and we all called him Capt. Kirk to his face (pseudo-affectionately) and behind his back (completely mockingly). I once made the mistake of saluting him (he was a Capt, after all, and due a certain amount of respect) and he had a little fit about how "sarcastic" I was. My argument was that I wasn't sure how an action, rather than words, could be sarcastic. Of course, I was aware then (and even more so now that I have teenagers) that it's entirely possible to be sarcastic without saying a word, but it was worth playing dumb to see the color red poor Capt. Kirk's face turned. Hmmm, I think it just hit me (not for the first time) where Daughter-Only gets her knack for winning losing arguments.

Who Knew?

You know that "new car smell" that everyone raves about--that smell that's so sought after that there are actually air fresheners called "new car scent?" Turns out the inside of a brand new water heater has practically the same smell. All my hot water for the past two days has had that smell--it's sort of distracting to walk into the bathroom after someone's had a shower and have the whole room smell of "new car." But I guess there are worse things a bathroom could smell like, right?

On the subject of bathrooms--have I mentioned that Hubby always, always puts the seat down? Something else he's really good at? Putting in a water heater so we didn't have to call (and pay) a plumber.

He's my hero. (This week, anyway.)

Masked Mom's Media Monday: Signs of Spring

Masked Mom's One-Word Review: Yum.

I meant for this post to be a true ode to the fantastically amazing only-available-this-time-of-year Cadbury Mini Eggs, but this week has been a kicker--Cranky Boss Lady, crankier than usual; customers more demanding than usual; water heater on the fritz and needing replaced just as the temperatures dipped back into the single digits; a friend having to have his wife removed from the house because of increasingly erratic behavior including drinking copious amounts of alcohol among many other things. So, Yum is gonna have to cover it.

Perfect Post for February

Blogs seem to come in two main varieties--snarky and sincere. Sure, there are the snarkily sincere hybrids and the sincerely snarky versions as well. But whatever the main subject of a blog--gossip, politics, family--they seem to fall on one side or the other.

Ocasionally while reading the sincere variety of blog, you'll come across a post so real and raw and open that it reminds you why you were drawn into the world of blogs to begin with. Kim's post, Round and round (again), was just that kind of post.

In a few short paragraphs, she captures the ups and downs and backs and forths of being the adult child of an alcoholic. So perfectly does she do this that even if you've never "been there", after you read her post, you'll feel you know exactly what it is to be there.

So, for your honesty and the courage to share, here's my button:



And Kim, it's all yours.

(Other winners at Suburban Turmoil and Petroville.)

Masked Mom's Media Monday: Anna Nicole

Masked Mom usually shies away from celebrity gossip--on the grounds that there is so much gossip to be indulged in about people I actually know that I just don't have the time and energy to indulge in gossip about total strangers. However, I can no longer avoid saying this here (though I've already said it elsewhere)--with all the drama surrounding the circumstances and repurcussions of Anna Nicole's death, the biggest mystery as far as I'm concerned remains why so many men would admit to having had sex with her*--even for the money. I just don't get it.

Masked Mom's One-Word Review: Baffling.


*I realize that some of the ones "admitting" having had sex with her may not actually have had sex with her and I've been trying to figure out whether I consider it worse to have claimed to have had sex with her when you didn't or to have admitted to having had it when you actually did. I have to say admitting it still comes out worse because you would've had to have had actual sex with Anna Nicole, who I'm pretty sure was the offspring of an alien and a blow-up doll.**

**I have no doubt that I'm going to Hell for saying mean things about a dead lady so don't feel the need to tell me how eternally damned I am, 'kay?

Please Let This Be The "Best" Story I Hear All Year...

Cranky Boss Lady's daughter was in the shop yesterday afternoon and started talking about her father-in-law, whose health is somewhat poor--he's diabetic with heart problems and a knee replacement surgery last year went horribly wrong and he's basically been suffering one infection after another for the past year. Before telling us the story that follows, she did warn us that it was "really, really gross" and I feel it's only fair to pass that warning along--this is a Blurt Alert, Code Red for anyone with a sensitive stomach or a really vivid imagination.

Most recently, the father-in-law has been fighting off (not so well) a sinus infection. They thought they had it beaten but he was still feeling a little discomfort so the ear, nose and throat guy went in (up?) to take a look and did find a small spot way up there that looked like "some kind of fungus." (It's always intimidating when those medical types bring out all that complicated terminology, isn't it?) Because of his other medical conditions, the father-in-law couldn't take the anti-fungal medication so they were basically in the wait and see mode.

Over the weekend, the father-in-law was sitting in his recliner in the living room when he sneezed. He opened the tissue, as instructed by the ENT guy to check the color and having made a mental note of it, he folded the tissue and set it on the table beside his chair and then...it moved!

When Cranky Boss Lady's daughter got to that part of the story, I shrieked like a cheerleader on a roller coaster. I'm not sure whether it was her delivery or the fact that I was only half-listening to the story to begin with and those words "it moved!" dragged me right into it.

In any case, the tissue moved and it was discovered that there was "some kind of worm" in the tissue--a worm that had only recently been inside the father-in-law's head. Mother-in-law came in with a clean yogurt container, dropped the tissue in and immediately transported the whole mess to the doctor for identification. It's been sent to a lab.

Prayers would be appreciated--for the father-in-law, but for me as well because I'm pretty sure if I hear a story "better" than this this year, I might never recover.

Masked Mom's Media Monday: Valentine's Day

Still recovering from Valentine's Day, Masked Mom offers this rerun of last year's Valentine's Day Rant...

Is Valentine's Day the most romantic day of the year or a purely commercial holiday, which only suckers fall for? Being on the one hand a cynic by nature and on the other hand employed in one of the so-called industries that benefit directly from the commercial aspect of the holiday puts me in an odd position in that argument. (Rock(ME)Hard place? Not that bad, but close.) The couple-of-day rush at Valentine's Day pays my salary not just for a couple of days, but for a couple of weeks or more so I don't know where I, or the shop, would be without it, but of course I think it's asinine that so many people (almost all men) spend so much out of what amounts to a Pavlovian response to societal and (in the case of demanding, high maintenance women) interpersonal conditioning. Not only do I think it's asinine, I bitterly resent having to jump through hoops for these suckers who not only fall for the hype, but wait for the day of the hoax-holiday and expect my help in working some miracle in their romantic relationships.

That was my mental landscape last year as I put in 36 hours over the course of three days. I was arranging a dozen roses, which with balloons and delivery charges came to right around $100, when I wondered, really, what emotion would motivate someone to spend $100 frigging dollars on one day. I don't buy it as an expression of love--I think it's fear of the highest magnitude. There are two kinds of guys spending $100 on Valentine's flowers--one is living in fear of his woman (a condition commonly referred to as pussy-whipped, or just plain whipped for the faint-hearted among us) and one is guilt-ridden for his own failures the rest of the year. As with all sweeping generalizations, there are exceptions...I just haven't met any lately.

I don't have much faith in the grand gestures--they are hollow and pointless in unhealthy relationships and wholly unnecessary lily-gilding in good relationships.

I hate, too, the dismal lack of creativity and individuality we see on this holiday. A dozen roses is the grand gesture of grand gestures, widely understood to speak of commitment and depth of emotion. It's so arbitrary and, ultimately, meaningless because it pushes the same buttons, at least theoretically, for every couple everywhere. It's not personal in any way--I just don't get it at all. Clearly, there are a lot of men and women who do get it (women who have tantrums when they don't get it, in fact), but I just don't understand why. How can a cliche move anyone?

That said, I'm off to go recover from arranging a million roses.

Masked Mom's One-Word Review: Overblown.

PS--This year, we got about eighteen inches of snow from 2pm on the 13th until 3pm or so on the 14th. The only thing more exhausting than waiting on ten million customers is worrying about what's going to happen when those ten million customers don't show up because they're snowed in. Not to mention worrying every single second because we had two delivery vehicles out in that crap.

With Friends Like These...

One of my favorite parts of parenting adolescent males is the glimpse it gives me inside the world of high school guys. I had only one brother and by the time he was in high school, I had a couple of kids and wasn't around much to see it. Now I get a much closer view--and I find their world sometimes baffling but always, always entertaining. Some of the things they say to each other are absolutely priceless.

An example: One of Son-Three's volleyball* teammates (the previously mentioned Player Five--the one who got his braces stuck in Daughter-Only's zipper on the trampoline) was complaining that he didn't get as much play time as he would like. Son-Three, a sophomore, said, "Well, you are only a freshman."

Player Five sarcastically replied, "Congratulations! Your parents boinked** before mine."

*The volleyball season is over and the boys' team took first place for our conference.
**There's a very real possibility that the actual word Player Five used wasn't quite as family friendly (or sort of family friendly) as "boinked." It may, in fact, have had an "F" somewhere near the beginning of the word...

Masked Mom's Media Monday: Philosophy Made Simple

A widower and his three adult daughters (all of whom are leading increasingly complicated lives), an avacado grove, a Hindu wedding, an artistic elephant, a Mexican brothel and, just maybe, the meaning of life. Considering all that author Robert Hellenga has packed into its pages, Philosophy Made Simple is a surprisingly slender and quiet book.

It sneaks up on you--this story of widower Rudy Harrington trying to understand the world and his place in it--and by the time you realize how invested you are in the fates of all the people (and one fascinating elephant), there's the last page. But, as with any book of value, it never really ends. You carry its essence with you in your own search for understanding.

Masked Mom's One-Word Review: Enlightening.