Average Bear

Yogi has it better than a millionaire.
That's because he's smarter than the average bear.

I'm not so much calling myself an average bear, or smart or not smart. However, in very many ways, I probably do have it better than than a lot of millionaires, except, of course, in the having money department. I shall backtrack.

This has been not so much a good day, although it's mostly okay now. Once again, I fell asleep after four, and after a couple of hours of disturbing dreams, I woke up about 6:15, shortly after which it became apparent to me that I must have a UTI.* Ick. I slept for another couple of hours, woke up feeling pretty crappy, decided not to go out, and left it at that. At nine, I called the doctor's office and they called in a prescription for me.

The Hubs had a business appointment and K went out for a long walk, so I was here alone, which rarely happens these days. I thought this would be my golden opportunity to start a little packing -- it's only five and a half weeks until the Disney trip, so I'm getting a late start for me -- but I found there really wasn't much I could do at this point except put a few things inside the suitcase that I had had sitting on top of it. Oh well, I had some bills to pay, so I fired up Quicken. That's when the fun started.

Let's just say the family Chai is having its own little economic crisis and it all hit the fan today. It's always been a bad subject for me, but with the help of therapy and other stuff, I've managed the stress very well for awhile, but it fell on me hard today. The old familiar knot reappeared in its traditional place in my gut, and I was stressed out, more than I've been in ... well, a year, really; I started taking the anti-depressants a year ago this week. I was still holding on, though, I was managing. I just knew I'd need to have a talk with the Hubs when he got home.

K came home, we had lunch and such, and then, I guess it was around 3:00? Maybe? we had an odd bit of an altercation, this because she commented about something she saw in the backyard and I didn't hear her and said "What?" and she repeated it and I still didn't get it and must have said "What?" again, and she lost it. And I felt like shit, mostly because it makes me angry when she does this; I mean, I didn't ask to become hearing impaired and I don't personally enjoy it, and I was close to being a mess already. She quickly gathered up her things and retreated up to her room.

The Hubs came home moments later, and we talked. I told him that other than the obvious need for more money, it needs to be not my problem anymore because the stress is not good for me. And he took it, I think, and told me that the meeting he was at all day was in setting up a kind of new business plan and stuff, so, YAY! I felt soooo much better after I talked to him and got the weight taken off of me. And while I was adjusting to the knot getting smaller ...

K came downstairs, took the remote off my desk and switched my TV from Law and Order to a new channel we're getting called Boomerang. Why? Because there was a Quick Draw McGraw cartoon on -- she had been watching it upstairs -- and she knows that Quick Draw is my most favorite of the Hanna-Barbera cartoon characters. (They show the Yogi Bear and Huckleberry Hound hour every day at three.) It was an apology that worked for me, and after grinning like an idiot at the cartoon for a few minutes, I gave her a hug. (We also watched a very early Snagglepuss cartoon together.) Oh, and K had offered to make dinner (chicken parm) if I don't feel up to it.

(I mentioned to the Hubs that I have never gone so begrudgingly to Disney World; I wouldn't have spent a dime on a trip now, but I didn't have much choice, it being the wish of a dying aunt. The second Florida trip, in September, is something I could also pass on, but unfortunately, we didn't go to my cousin's first son's Bar Mitzvah two years ago because of a threatened hurricane, and not going to this one would cause a breach in the family that no one wants. I'm pretty much taking both trips against my will, which is not to say that I don't want to enjoy them when I go. I just wish someone else had paid for them.)

So, it's been quite the day for me here. Not so much ups and downs, but a long down followed by a nice little sequence of ups.

*For those that need an explanation, a UTI is a urinary tract infection.




no wait ... it's

no. more like


okay. I'll go with
and maybe one more
watching L/O :: ENTRY #2083
READING: ----- by -----

HelpMe

So it's about 2:30 Tuesday afternoon, and we're "watching" -- I use the term loosely -- the Michael Jackson Memorial, which I had vowed not to watch. I forgot that K would be home and would want to watch it, for the performances, she says. Probably. Anyway, I have to be quiet, because any remark I've made so far -- something about Stevie Wonder's song, I think -- she says "Well, you don't have to watch it, you know! I can go upstairs! You can change the channel!" Oy. So it's on. As I type, Al Sharpton is speaking. And I finally figured out who he reminds me of, but you've got to be old to get it:


This is the main cast of a TV show I loved when I was very young. It's called Amos 'n' Andy; it was based on a very successful radio show. Amos, on the left, was a hard-working, sensible cab driver who reminded me for some reason of my grandfather. Andy, on the right, was the slightly dumb buddy that you see on every TV show. The man in the middle was Kingfish, a demagogue in their little community, full of scam and bluster, and always trying to get Andy to buy into his doomed get-rich-quick schemes. The way he talked was bigger than life; every simple sentence was a performance, and almost nothing was ever sincere.

Guess who Al Sharpton reminds me of? Nothing like living up (or down) to the qualities of the worst kind of stereotype.

Anyway, Michael Jackson. I'm not that interested, but I'll say my piece. He was very talented, although I never understood the worldwide adulation. I don't think he was a pedophile. I think he was a damaged man who never grew up, and whose family exploited him from the minute they saw he had talent, and they still are, and they will continue to do so. His life, no matter how grandiose, was a sad one. If his children brought him joy, he and brought joy to them, so much the better. And now their lives will be sad because there is no way they can continue to live the sheltered lives they did, and everything will change for them. They've been put in the care of a 79 year old grandmother whose husband is certainly the man who made Michael what he was (not in the good way.) When the grandmother's time is done, they will pass to Diana Ross, who is 65, and has already raised her children. And then? Something needed to be more well thought out.

I wonder if this memorial is what he wanted, or if it's just what his father wanted so he could make a buck off the whole thing.

++++++++++++++++++++++++

I felt pretty rotten yesterday after the colonoscopy, which is unusual. Fine for the first few hours, but then I had a low grade fever and could not get warm for hours, or eat. I felt better by nine or nine-thirty, and all through the night, though. I saw four on the clock before I fell asleep. This sucks. But will come in handy tonight, because R's flight, scheduled to arrive around 7:30, has been delayed (hello, Newark Airport!) and is now coming in around 1:45. That's in the a.m. But I'll be awake anyway, so what's the diff?



watching the travesty :: ENTRY #2081
READING: ----- by -----

Bein' Green

It's not easy.

I've said before that the Hubs is Mr. Recycler, the Garbage Police. Also a vegan. Now, who doesn't support the whole idea of recycling and being green? I'm taking baby steps.

A year or two ago, I switched all the light bulbs in the house to those compact fluorescents. Let me tell you, it is nasty when one of those breaks, or burns out.

A few months ago, I banned paper plates and cups from the house, along with disposable plastic tableware. (I really, really hate to wash dishes.)

The other day, I picked up some paper towels and toilet paper to try. It's unbleached, and made from recycled fibers. (Presumably not from recycled toilet paper fibers.) We haven't started using them yet, because I just stocked up on Bounty and Charmin last week. Those two are on the list of the worst environmentally friendly paper products. Who knew.

Next, once I've got the paper all sorted out, will be dishwashing and laundry detergent. I also picked up two huge bottles of Tide on sale last week, so that'll be a while, too. And then the other cleaners.

Why? Why not? Why not, hey, everybody stop using stuff that puts toxins in our bodies, our houses, our water. Just seems to make sense to me, I guess.

I will not, however, use the compost in the summer. We have a big compost bin outside and a small stainless steel one on the kitchen counter. I have no problem using the little one and dumping it outside all winter long, but I went outside to do it yesterday, and of course, a cloud of those horrid little flies flew out when I opened the lid. I swear, I almost stripped to my naked torso* right there on the porch lest I bring even one of them inside with me. So, for the summer, I throw my apple cores in the actual garbage, and let the little pail sit there until the Hubs takes it out. Those flies freak me out.

(*for kitchenlogic.)

But my big success of the day was the finding of the educational documents. Last weekend, K got her brandy-new master's degree diploma in the mail. (We're not fans of going to the ceremonies.) She opened the envelope, said "Oh, it's here," and R said "You have mine someplace, too, right?" And I said, "Oh, sure!"

Uh .... uh ....

I looked with something less than zeal here and there throughout the week, and it -- her graduate diploma -- was not where I was sure it was. And then I started to think: where were their undergraduate diplomas? For that matter, where were mine? I tore the family room apart this morning and came up with zippo. Nada.

What I did find, which surprised me, were copies of all my teaching certificates, which is pretty funny because I just received the duplicates of those I requested from the state to the tune of $80 in money orders (what a pain), but I found what I needed, even the one that the state somehow neglected to send me. Which made me think, now where could everything else be?

I have a sort of captain's chest which we use as a coffee table, but it has doors on one side and is full of all the family pictures. It was the only place left I could imagine all of it being, so I looked. What I found was actually a nice archival storage box for each of us, full of the kids' report cards, camp swimming awards, and all that stuff, and our diplomas. All of them, except mine from library school -- no idea where that is, don't care -- and the Hubs', which he has framed someplace. I found all our high school diplomas (all from the same school), and even, tucked into my box, my kindergarten diploma and my three years of high school Latin awards. Aw.

So that's my accomplishment for the day. I barely slept last night, was wide awake from about midnight to four, and couldn't sleep this afternoon. I sure hope I sleep tonight, or I'll be cranky tomorrow.


watching L & O/SVU :: ENTRY #2066
READING: ----- by -----

TGIF

Once again, work is fine, I just can't bear to wake up in the morning at a quarter to six. Ah ..... I can sleep in until maybe eight tomorrow.

I took a break from the Andrew Jackson book today, and read a cute little middle-school level book called The Diary of a Wimpy Kid, which I understand is also an online comic strip. Very cute. Back to Jackson shortly.

Nineteen school days left.

Busy day tomorrow, what with the MIL and the seafood and the shopping. I could pass out right now, but it's not even eight yet and it's still light out. Something from childhood says it's wrong to go to bed while it's still light out, which stems, no doubt, from lying in bed in a room darkened by shades, wearing those itchy seersucker pajamas, and hearing other kids still playing outside. And my mother wondered why I kept popping into the living room begging for water or another story or something. And why I have insomnia, lying in bed for hours waiting to fall asleep. I've been doing it since I was four. The only difference is that now, I'm really tired, and I want to go to bed at 7:30.



watching FAMILY GUY :: ENTRY #2055
READING: American Lion: Andrew Jackson by Jon Meacham

Just Goes to Show

I'm having another nice day, despite an all-day headache and a not-so-great backache, but that's just details. And yes, it is damn cold out there, and I hate going out all bundled up, but I got some tasks done this morning and then put in some Wii Fit time -- I've lost another pound, I think -- and then after lunch, K and I decided to go to Target.

Well. Her class, starting Tuesday, is meeting in a middle school not far from Target, so we took a ride to see where it was. No problem. We found it right away, and then decided to follow the signs to the Garden State Parkway to get home.

Well. There are signs to the Garden State Parkway virtually everywhere in North Jersey. I think they must have been put up in the 1950's, and haven't been repaired or looked at since. Some of them have been bent sideways, and some of them are missing the arrow below the sign to tell you which direction to go in. It took us nearly an hour of traveling through scenic New Jersey just to get back to the damn highway. It was an insane waste of time, but was more along the lines of "Look at what idiots we are" than it was "Oh, SHIT!" And it was nice to get home, eventually.

I think I'll just see what I've DVR'd recently and watch that tonight, and just maybe sleep well. I woke up a dozen times last night, although I fell right back to sleep each time.



WATCHING FRIENDS :: ENTRY #1966
READING: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell by Susanna Clarke

Stuffed

Y'know, we get Chinese food every Saturday night and I haven't been enjoying it much lately, but tonight I got Chicken and Pan Fried Noodles and I am stuffed full of it. I was hoping that after dinner I would have the energy to work out, but now I think I'm too heavy to get out of my chair. And I have actually lost a pound or two recently, which is motivating, but this may be holding me back tonight.

I couldn't fall asleep last night until three. Ugghhhhh. Today is like walking through marshmallow, and a surly K at the supermarket this afternoon was not helping me. Yes, the supermarket was crowded and full of idiots, now leave me alone. I didn't invite them or make them stupid; it's not my fault.

Tomorrow I need to put away the laundry I did on New Year's Day and possibly take down the Christmas stuff. I don'wanna. I do want to do some cooking so I have lunches for the upcoming week. I don't even really feel bummed about going back to work on Monday; ya gotta do whatcha gotta do. I just wish tomorrow could be another lazy day, like most of the vacation. I like that.

Oh, I'm running out of iced tea, I have to go make more or I'll be up tonight at three with nothing to drink ---



WATCHING FAMILY GUY :: ENTRY #1953
READING: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell by Susanna Clarke

I'm Getting to It

I feel like I've been awake forever, and all of that time I've just been ... getting things done. Does that make any sense?

I wasn't worried about R flying last night, really I wasn't, but I didn't fall asleep until two-ish, about the time her connecting flight would have been leaving for New York. I slept well once I slept, but I got up at 5:45, so, you know, not much.

It's another car-swapping day, so after school I went with K to bring R's car back to her apartment, and then we picked up K's car at the service station, and when the Hubs gets home, we're dropping his off. Notice that my car isn't involved in any of this, yet I am part of every trip, and if anyone is without a car tomorrow, it will be me.

So I'm looking into acupuncture, because my shoulders and neck are really sore and stiff and not getting better. I would definitely do it, if I could only track down the right doctor and find out how much and such. (It's not covered, but certain providers will give me a discount with my insurance card.) I'm also thinking about looking into a possible cause of the sore shoulders and neck, which would be doing something about the excessive weight I'm carrying around on my frontage. I called my insurance, who said that breast reduction is covered if it's medically necessary and not cosmetic. And I'm thinking, a surgeon won't even do it unless you're big enough, and that size would be by definition medically necessary. I don't think you could do it just for cosmetic reasons, although I assume there are cosmetic benefits. I don't know, the woman on the phone was not terribly clear. And what kind of doctor would have to certify the necessity of it? An orthopedist? Questions, questions.

Anyway, the Sibs had a little surgical procedure this morning and is fine, I talked to her earlier, but I'm going to give her a call before I have to go out again to the service station.

WATCHING WIFE SWAP :: ENTRY #1939
READING: Slam by Nick Hornby

F Your A

Hmm ... not quite right. I've picked up, via R, her boss's habit of saying F Your I, instead of FYI, or for your information. But this is more for your amusement. Or mine. Or it's not funny at all.

When I was ranting about the ILs the other day, I forgot this part. Every year since 1981, the MIL asks me what the girls want for Christmas, and this year is no exception. For the last ten years or so, I send them links from the girls' Amazon wish lists. They then buy as much or as little as they want, who cares. This year, after I did that, the FIL decided for some reason that he was not going to buy from Amazon, so the MIL was trying to decode the links to see what the gifts were. (Didn't occur to either of them to click on the link to see what it was.) No Amazon is nothing to him, as he does none of the shopping, so this was a make-work project for the MIL, I guess, who has one barely functioning knee. So, good decision on his part. And then she told me today it turned out she already had enough for them so didn't need my links after all. Uh huh.

He called earlier, told me his entire reason for calling, then asked for the Hubs so he could tell him. The Hubs and I, you may recall, watch TV in separate rooms and he has no phone extension. So I brought him the phone, he talked to his dad, and then brought the phone back to me, saying his mom wanted to talk to me. And when she was done, guess what? Dad wanted to talk to the Hubs again, so it's once more throwing off the blanket, and so on. Hey, guess who's getting real old?

It's about twenty after midnight and I am up as a pup. No reason, except the sore neck does make it hard to find a comfy position. I've texted with R, who is currently between flights in Salt Lake City. So she's fine, and K is staying over at R's tonight to keep the cat company (or to get away from me, either way) and I really want to sleeeeeep because my alarm is going to ring in five hours and twenty minutes.

Hey, maybe I just couldn't sleep because I knew I hadn't posted today and that you would miss me so. Well, this was it. I'm going to try to sleep again.


WATCHING MERMAID GIRL :: ENTRY #1938
READING: Slam by Nick Hornby

How Do You Make an Obsessive-Compulsive Happy?

Stick to the plan.

I was blissfully alone this morning as I got up, Wii'ed, and went about my recently revised morning routine. Not that the Hubs would have gotten in my way if he'd been up; we pass in the morning like ships in the night. But he was taking the day off today so he slept in, and K had nothing to do today so she was going to sleep in, too.

*sigh* I heart my routine. The only strange thing was that when everything that needed to be done was done, and I still had five minutes before leaving the house, I crashed. I sat down to read diaries, and suddenly my eyes got heavy and started to close. I pulled myself together and came to work, but once the testing started in the building and the library was empty, I put my head down on my desk for ten minutes and more or less slept. Very strange, because I both slept last night and had nice solid protein for breakfast. (When I'm Crohnish, I crave protein, and could have eggs three times a day.)

Ah, the sleeping. In response to a comment, I did try melatonin several years ago, but it had no effect on me at all. The Valerian Root Oil capsules that I'm taking now, though, are very good. Even the nights I've had trouble falling asleep for the last week -- and that was caused by a late phone call that disrupted my sleep routine for many days -- the Valerian helps me sleep more deeply once I do fall asleep. So I'm a fan of the Valerian.

Why, you may wonder, does K have nothing to do today? Ah, the joy of being the parent of a crazed student. I have these two daughters, you know. R started to read on her own at three, did a book report on The Little House in the Big Woods in kindergarten, did fourth grade math in first grade, and then proceeded to never do homework as long as she lived, and never care whether any assignment was in on time or at all. She got good SAT scores and decent, but not outstanding, grades. As long as her English teachers kept giving her books to read that weren't in the curriculum, she was happy.

The other one, however, learned to read in kindergarten like everyone else, and was on grade level with all her other subjects, but always complained about every assignment: she would never finish it on time, she would fail, she couldn't do it. Naturally, I assumed that this one was a struggling student; it took me years to realize that she was the crazy bright one, but had stress issues. I don't think she every missed a homework assignment from first grade up, and I don't know if she ever got less than an A in anything except advanced science in high school. She even got A's in math in high school, although she retained absolutely none of it. (That's my kid.) Whereas the other one intuitively understood all math (thanks to her dad) just as she had intuited reading; the only reason she didn't get A's was because she didn't do the homework. She got A's on all the tests.

I digress. K's big final project for her Methods of Teaching class is due on Thursday. It's the biggest deal in the education program other than student teaching. It's a teaching unit that consists of a minimum of six lessons. Early last week, she said she was going to get started on it, but with the holiday coming, she didn't see how she could finish it. She would have to work all day Friday, for starters, but we ended up having lunch with the Hubs' family on Friday. Oh, she was so behind!

(Note: I did not know at this point that "get started on it" meant that she already had her complete outline and four or five of the lessons done.)

She worked all weekend. No, it was never gonna happen, and if it did, it wouldn't be what her professors wanted. She couldn't fit it into six lessons; it was looking more like ten. It would be too long. It wouldn't be enough. And anyway, she had four other minor assignments to do, also due on Thursday. Couldn't be done.

We discussed some of it Sunday night. She said that on Monday she would show what crap she had to one of the professors so she would have time to do it all over, but then he didn't show up for his office hours. Yesterday morning, I printed it out for her in school -- about 125 pages -- and she went and got a binder and plastic sleeves and put it together. She made an appointment to see the other professor, who looked it over and beamed at her. It was perfect, he said, and wouldn't even give it back to her for more tweaking; consider it turned in. And about those other four assignments, he would speak to his co-teacher and see if he could get those cut back.

After dinner last night, she said, I don't know what to do! Should I take a break now? Work all day tomorrow? I still have that other stuff to do! An hour later, she came back downstairs and said she was all done.

It's exhausting to be her parent. But she's gonna be the most prepared teacher in America once she gets going.

Oh, and I was going to comment on the so-called Christmas wars thing. If someone says Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays to me, it's all the same, and I take it in the spirit it was meant. Everybody needs to chill out on this one. When you are a minority in a country or an area, you need to accept that the world is not being tailored to you. I sang Christmas carols in school as a child, and with the Girl Scouts, and that's the way it was, even when my class was 90% Jewish and so was the teacher teaching us the songs. (I remember Mr. Miller the music teacher, who was both Jewish and gay before any of us knew what gay was, teaching us In Excelcis Deo in 7th grade chorus, and I thought it was such a beautiful song.) Those of us in these religious minorities, whatever they happen to be, either need to get used to the way it is here or live someplace else where it's different. No one is forcing us to believe, or even behave, in any way, which is what the Constitution protects us from. And if someone in a store says Merry Christmas to a Muslim, the Constitution protects the right to do that, too. It's not meant as an offense, it's meant as a gesture of goodwill. Take it from whence it comes, and let the rest go.


WATCHING FAMILY GUY :: ENTRY #1926
READING: The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

Time

I just now realized that I wrote this entry at school this morning and forgot to post it. This coincided with K going down to put in a wash and finding a dead mouse in the basement. She reacted as if this was someone she knew personally. Hey, she didn't want the mice in her room, and there are no mice in her room. I went downstairs and scooped it into a box and took it outside. A mother's work is never done. Anyway, earlier today, I wrote:


Today is cousin Edie's birthday; she's 92. The unquestioned matriarch of the family now, it seems, but she is beyond knowing that. For some people, Alzheimer's comes on very slowly, but she was fine, more or less, until maybe four years ago, after which her decline was steep. The good news is that she no longer remembers the pain of losing her husband and older son. The bad news is that she no longer recognizes the son who comes to visit several times a week. But she's happy when she sees him, even if she doesn't know exactly who he is.

Ah, no intention, really, of making this sad, although it is, of course. I just wanted to say Happy Birthday, since there's no point in my calling her and saying it in person. On to something else.

Another by-product of the working out is that I'm drinking a lot more water. I don't generally like to drink water, but apparently I enjoy it after exercise, which who knew, because I would have to have exercised extensively before now to know. Dr. Resnick will be very pleased with me, I think. At the very least, my kidney function test should come out better.

And less Crohnish today, I think. I guess I ate some things over the holiday that had to work their way out of my system (which I don't mean the way it literally sounds.) It started with eating the Hubs' soup the weekend before, and continued on through rice pudding with raisins and small handfuls of macadamia nuts. Actually, I think the macadamia nuts went well. It was the finocchio that got me. (This is pronounced fenookie in our third generation half-Italian home. It's fennel. We slice up the bulbs and roast them, and then, whatever's left after Thanksgiving dinner is a snack for me. But maybe not so much in future.)

... Later ...

So now let's hope that the mouse thing isn't going to keep me awake tonight. My evenings are carefully structured to lull me to sleep, so the last thing I needed was a little adrenaline surge, not to mention a trip outside in the 35 degrees with no socks or jacket. (But I did put on shoes and a sweatshirt.) The real question is, if I'm so sleepy all day at work, why can't I just fall asleep when I want to at night? Hmmmm?


WATCHING RACHEL MADDOW ON MSNBC :: ENTRY #1925
READING: The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

The Challenge

I think the hardest part of waiting two and a half years to retire is going to be staying awake.

I wasn't tired during the whole Thanksgiving break, even though I was having trouble falling asleep, because I could sleep later in the morning. I got up at 5:30 today (and had a wonderful workout), and now I can hardly keep my eyes open. (It's only 15 minutes earlier than my old routine, so it's not that. I need to sleep until eight is what the problem is.)

Anyway, the SCM is out, and it's a testing day, which means that the schedule is all jumbled up, and the person who assigns the substitutes took mine away for two of the periods I really needed him to be here. So when I needed to step out for a few minutes, I locked the library doors and went. I was just lucky there were no kids here at that particular time. But it worked out okay for me, I guess.

I need to make a CVS run after school; there's two-for-one on packs of hearing aid batteries this week, and if I don't get there early in the week, the size I need is gone. And another item or two. K said she was going to campus to work and to talk to her professor, but I imagine she'll be home for dinner.

R did not come by yesterday, choosing instead to spend the day with her sweetie just hanging out. For some reason, I think my children think this bothers me, as in I need to have them around all the time, or at least know what they're doing. Neither is true, of course. What I want is for them to have their own lives. Do I feel the need to talk (or email or something) with R every day? Yes, I do, because she lives alone, and someone who lives alone should touch base every day; it's a safety thing. If and when the time comes that she lives with the sweetie, I'll assume that he knows where she is, and if she'll be late, etc. etc., and if she's missing, he'll call me. I didn't speak to my kids every day when they were away at college because I knew they had roommates or friends who had the brains to call someone if they were missing.

My tired brain is starting to make less sense, I think. Six minutes until the bell (late today because of the testing) and then twenty more until the late afternoon person gets here and I can go. I need a nap, which I will avoid, even though not taking a nap yesterday didn't help me fall asleep any earlier. (Oh, okay, maybe it did. I fell asleep around one instead of two.)

I didn't look for the trainer today because of the strange substitute situation mostly, but I have worked out a good routine for the Wii Fit, based on stuff I found online here and there. So my questions are really about my hurty knee and my sore neck/shoulder, and what to do about those. I'll see what I can do in the next few days.

Later, home. Not only have I done more exercise today than I have in one day since I was maybe twelve, I've been drinking lots of water. Dr. Resnick will be so proud of me.

Many of the packages I was expecting arrived today, most of them Christmas gifts. But one was my replacement Mickey Mouse watch



(I put the lip balm there to show you how big it is. It's a big watch.)

and one was the supposed best sports bra in the whole wide world, Oprah's favorite sports bra! Aside from being bright blue and looking something like the breastplate on a German opera singer, the fit was terrible. Searching on the Internet for a sports bra will make you believe that anyone over a double-D simply does not take part in any sports-type activity, and not many double-D's either. But instead of just sending the blue bra back to Amazon, I called the company it actually came from, and the woman on the phone was very helpful and nice, and I'm sending it back to them and have already ordered two different ones from their website directly, and with a coupon code even. We'll see how that goes. All the sports bras I see in stores look like they were made for nine year olds, or Polly Pockets.

I'm going to sip some more water now, and configure my iPhone to play soothing sounds when I try to fall asleep later.


WATCHING KEITH OLBERMAN ON MSNBC :: ENTRY #1924
READING: The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

Still Standing

It's taking all the effort I can summon up to stay in my chair and not lie down on the couch. Or the floor. Flat would be nice, but I can't risk a nap, as much as I'd like one. Ever since that late phone call on Tuesday, I've had trouble falling asleep before one or two in the morning, and since it's back to work tomorrow with a 5:30 wake up call, no nap for me today. Maybe it'll help.

I have been the busy bee. I got all the laundry done and put away yesterday, including things that needed to be laid out to dry, which I avoid when I can. The living room remains orderly. Starting yesterday, but mostly today, I froze lots of lunch portions of all the leftovers, as well as the stuff that wasn't left over so I had to make more. K and I did get to Target today a little after nine and it was empty, so the returns got done, as well as a few more gifts bought.

Well, I guess I am hooked on the Wii Fit, but it's probably the healthiest addiction I've ever had. I am feeling good in terms of energy and such, but certain parts of me are just always sore. For example, I can't have a bad back for 35 years and cure it in two weeks of working out, and my feet hurt because my feet hurt. I know that as I learn to do the exercises in better form, some of the hurting will go away, and even what doesn't, well, it's still good for me. It wouldn't hurt if I could talk to a human trainer about it (as opposed to the trainers in the program, of whom I'm getting a little tired, I can tell you); I wonder if I could talk to the trainer at school. I know there is one, but I have no idea where he even works, or if talking to him about this is available to me. I mean, for all I know, he's only there after school to work with the athletes. I'll have to see what I can find out about that.

So, other than everything hurting, I feel pretty good. I've been Crohnish here and there for the last few days, but nothing serious, I think, just a blip. I've experimented with some foods I've been careful about, which may have aggravated it a bit, but on the whole, doing well.

Back to the book mines tomorrow.


WATCHING TCM :: ENTRY #1923
READING: The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

Hello Out There in Internet Land

I'm having a silly morning, and it took forever to fall asleep last night, so I'm not too clear about the whole thing. My car is in for service, so I'm driving my nephew Little K's car (since he's away at college), which rides very nicely for a car with 130,000 miles on it (and, as my sister reminded me, once had an unpleasant encounter with an 18-wheeler.) It took me forever to find the cup holder in it this morning.

I have a new mindset when it comes to the mice. Kill'em, kill'em all. After I posted yesterday, I went in to finish the shelf cleaning and such that the Hubs had started for me, and we ended up doing it mostly together, and while I didn't find more signs of mice presence, I am just fed up with the whole cleaning up thing. It seems they found a bag of soup beans on a high shelf, and wouldn't you know, this must be their favorite thing in the whole world, and everything we had to move on every shelf below it spilled more bean pieces onto the floor. Everything is safe now, clean, in a plastic container if necessary. I told K that I expected wake up in the middle of the night last night and hear a squeaky indignant voice yelling "What the FUCK??!!", but it turns out I wasn't asleep anyway, and wasn't even asleep when I got a wrong number text message around two. Anyway, kill the damn mice; I just want them out of my house.

Which is a disaster. We may have to postpone Christmas until April, since there is no place to put the tree. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The next step in the Great Mouse Hunt is to have K's bedroom closet taken care of. Last week, I got a clothes rack on wheels, a temporary place for all the stuff that was in the closet, and someone can always use a clothes rack on wheels. She put it together, it was good, and then Saturday afternoon, she brought it down to the living room, in pieces. She needs another one! Mommy needs to call the handyman to get the closet worked on! Y'know, we went to Target, and when we came back, she said Oh, we forgot to get a new clothes rack. Oh, did we? Must have been my mistake, or else my intention, because I'm not spending more money on another one and then on the closet and really, why don't I just take my paycheck and flush it down the toilet? Anyway, I have no idea where her clothes are and I don't want to know, but I have someone coming to give me an estimate on the closet Wednesday after school, which you know certainly means that I will sit by the phone, straining to hear the doorbell and no one will ever come. But we shall see.

In another case of something I had no intentions of doing, we had a breakdown in the computer network at school this morning, and naturally, all the work I needed to do was computer-related, including checking in a copy of Twlight which had just been returned and was on my desk. So I read the first page or two and now I have to read the rest of it. The cat-in-the-library book will have to wait. I'm in the mood for another page-turner, or at least a grabber, which the cat book is not and everyone knows Twilight is. It seems I have no choice in the matter.

My haircut, btw, rocks. It's exactly what I had but a little shorter, which means it'll last a longer time, but I had no trouble getting it to look just right today and I love it. I am terrible at that thing where you hold your arm out and take your own picture, but I'll see what I can do. It's actually impossible in the iPhone, because the back of the phone faces you, of course, and you can't even tell by touch where the button is to press since it's part of the screen. Perhaps I shall step away from my desk a moment and see what I can do with the real phone.

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lalalala
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Okay, I took a picture, but it didn't look cute, it just looked fat. What I need is some kind of remote for the mirror, and when I get myself to look in the mirror exactly the way I want it to look, I click the remote and there's a picture. Why hasn't anyone thought of that yet? Isn't this already the most narcissist society of all time? (Rome, maybe Rome. But maybe not.)

It's about 1:30, and I am going to have the coffee in my thermos now.

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We moved into The Mouse House 23 years ago today.


WATCHING WIFE SWAP (from last night) :: ENTRY #1912
READING: Twilight by Stephanie Meyer

How Excited Am I?

It looks like we may be getting to meet R's "gentleman friend", as she refers to him, in the near future.

Excellent.

This came out in emails with her this morning that started with a movie I thought she'd want to see that I'd recorded and continued on in an "Oh by the way" way. Maybe we can arrange to go out to dinner with them. I suggested that K meet the guy first -- got to pass the sister test, you know -- and she said they're having dinner together tomorrow night.

I am sooooo excited!

In other news, the SCM is back today and we are cordial, but no more, really. I'm better about the situation now, because I think I've done a few things, or made a few decisions, that give me a little bit of control back. He still can take off whenever he wants to because I can't stop that, but I've made some adjustments in the work he does, which is virtually nothing to begin with. Anyway, hard to explain, but I am better with it, which is all that counts.

I didn't watch Heroes last night because I knew I was too sleepy to follow it, so I guess I'll watch it over the weekend. I watched Two and Half Men instead, because I needed something mindless. This is, I think, the first time I ever saw it first-run when it was on; I usually just watch the syndicated reruns every day, which my kids think is the most ridiculous show on TV and they can't believe I watch it. Which means that in a year or two they'll discover it and they'll be watching it too. It's so hard to be a trendsetter. *sigh*

I slept right until the alarm this morning, very rare for me, so I woke up all kind of confused and in a way, five minutes behind on my routine since I always wake up at least five minutes before the alarm. Not that I don't have scads of time there in the morning, it's all a matter of who gets the bathroom or kitchen when. But it all worked out. Really, when the alarm goes off, I get up and go through all the steps like a robot, no thinking, just doing each thing in order until they're all done. That was one of the things I loved about this summer, not doing any of that, or at least, doing it in my own good time. But I made the mistake of having coffee with dinner last night, and even though it was decaf, it had me up three or four times. Note to self: don't do that anymore.

**************************************

I watched WifeSwap yesterday at 4:00 because there was nothing else on, an old one, I guess, and although the brief moments of that show I've seen before were annoying, this episode -- the first full one I've seen -- took the prize. In brief: one family is an upscale urban San Francisco clan with two adorable little boys; the husband is some kind of stylist (like he creates wardrobes and "looks" for people), and the other family is an Iowa farm group with two teenagers. Sounds fine at that point, but I gotta take a side here: the farm folk did not

- send their children to school because they worked full time on the farm
- clean their house, because they believe that all bacteria is good for you, or as the father said "Do you really think god would put anything on this earth that would hurt us?" Yes, he said that, and yes, I think we all know pretty well that He has.
- cook their food, including meat, because they believed that raw meat was better for you
- wash their hands, even if going directly from the never-been-cleaned toilet to prepare raw meat for dinner.

They did have a shower, which the swapped wife almost threw up when she saw. It too had never been cleaned, and was probably not all that much used, either.

I found this family infuriatingly stupid. Yes, of course, have your own lifestyle, knock yourself out. Eat raw meat, if you must, but you know, wash your damn hands first. And by the way, prepare your children for the world outside your farm. These children will know how to be good farmers, but they will have no skills whatsoever to function in the world beyond, which just maybe, they might need. It was as if these parents expect their children to live there with them forever. When the swapped wife suggested her changes -- part of the show's routine -- the 16 year old boy started shaking and crying, he was so angry.

Anyway, it was just really strange, I thought. And the only reason these people don't get sick, probably, is that they're never exposed to outside germs or bacteria, only to their own. Once again, not so much preparing their children for actual life.

So, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. Or something. Who used to say that? I have no idea.


WATCHING FRIENDS :: ENTRY #1881
READING: When You Are Engulfed In Flames by David Sedaris

I Want to Go To Sleeeeep NOOOOOOOWW

I'm not, of course; I'm staying up to watch the debate, or at least make sure I record it, because I can't imagine I'll be awake through the whole thing. I keep remembering the presidential debate in 1976. (Yes, I'm old.) Let me recap for you.

It was a debate between Jimmy Carter, who no one had pretty much ever heard of, and Gerald Ford, the incumbent president who had never been elected, but was considered a really nice guy by just about everyone. I was watching the debate alone in my room at th3e graduate students' dorm at Rutgers University. So it's rolling along, and there was some kind of question about Poland, and Soviet influence there, and Ford -- the president -- said something along the lines of "Poland is not under Soviet influence. It never has been. I don't think the people of Poland think they're living under Soviet influence."

It was a huge giant DUH. Jimmy Carter's jaw dropped; it took him a minute to come up with a response. I don't remember who was moderating, but he was speechless, too, and everyone in the audience just watched like it was a car wreck. I yanked open the door of my room and ran into the hallway, where every door was opening and suddenly people who never spoke to each other were all asking "Did you see that? Did you SEE that? Did you see THAT?"

It was a moment. Perhaps there will be such a one tonight. It was considered a significant event in Ford's loss to Carter in the election.

Anyway, moving on. I am just too tired; I hope I sleep tonight. Once Bill Maher's show is on, I should be good. I love that show, but it always puts me to sleep, and I record it, so after it's been on, if I wake up again I just start it over, and it runs in a loop all night, which is good for me. I'll actually watch the show tomorrow when I'm sitting up at my desk. Tonight should be a good one, too, right after the debate.

I just ate some baked fish that I had in the freezer, and I am still starving. I've got another piece in there, but I don't know. I really do need some gourmet chef from somewhere to get into the habit of stopping by my house every day around five with leftovers from all the classes he's taught that day. Yeah, that's the ticket. That would work.

My cousin sent me some more pictures from the wedding, so now I actually have a few of the bride and groom. Nice, since I didn't actually take any of them myself. There were other pictures, too, and my daughters, of course, look beautiful. I look, in a word, fat. In another word, old. Although now that I look at them again, I can't say I look especially disfigured in them, which is how I see myself in most pictures, so I guess that's good. And I don't think I actually was fat, I think that I turn my head a certain way when I'm being photographed to avoid the whole disfigured thing, and it makes my face look wider, somehow. Of course, the double chin doesn't enhance anything, but that's not fat, that's genetics; my mother had a double chin when she weighted 110 pounds. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.


WATCHING GILMORE GIRLS :: ENTRY #1864
READING: Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! by Fannie Flagg

Hello.

I am going to respect the wishes of my chosen candidate and therefore not discuss today's political (if that's what it is) news, because he says that candidates' families and especially children should be off limits for discussion.

I will only say this: it's as if this year's presidential campaign is being scripted by someone in Hollywood. And not in the good way.

Okay. In preparation for tomorrow's early rising, I set my alarm for six this morning. It went off, I said "Oh, it works," and I went back to sleep for two hours. I get a late pass tomorrow, so to speak, because I don't have to be there until eight, so the alarm is set for 6.30. We'll see how that goes.

I am absolutely exhausted today. My own sleep research lab this summer turned up an interesting fact: I will sleep deeply and for a long time as long as I have nowhere pressing to be in the morning. If I set the alarm for, let's say, seven, I will wake up at five and just drift in and out after that. If I have no place to be until noon, I will sleep happily until eight, maybe later. This does not bode well for me, but it does explain why I'm always so tired: on school days, I'm likely to get a couple hours less sleep than I'm actually entitled to. My back hurts today, too, but that will pass.

I spent an hour or two early this afternoon in the kitchen, cooking up mostly a lot of little lemon chicken nuggets, which are now neatly packed in lunch-sized portions. I was going to make it from a package of chicken breast tenders -- easier and quicker to trim than boneless thighs, even though I only like dark meat -- but the chicken breast tenders packages were buy one, get one free, so I had twice has much to cook up. I also cooked and froze little turkey burgers, and a spaghetti squash, which divided up into seven or eight packets. I can eat squash, which fortunately I also like. So I should be good to go on lunches for a couple of weeks. Maybe more. I just have to keep buying fruit. And next weekend maybe make more rice.

I would also really like to finish this book tonight, and I don't have much left, but I keep falling asleep, or at least, closing my eyes. I hope A.J. Jacobs does something else goofy and writes another book because I'm enjoying him, although how much his wonderful and long-suffering wife will put up with, I don't know.

Okay, I have got to find something to eat here, although really, I'm not in the mood.


WATCHING SCRUBS :: ENTRY #1847
SUMMER BOOK #9: The Know-It-All by A.J. Jacobs

To Clarify:

I checked on the Peter Pan stuff, and it was on TV several times, but not always the same version. The actual original cast was only telecast once, in 1954, so I certainly don't remember that, but it was shown again a few years later with the almost-original cast, which is to say, they replaced the children, but everyone else was original. This is the one I remember, which was shown twice; a few years later they did it again, again only replacing the children. I'm sure I saw that whenever it was on, too, but what I remember is the second one, which I always thought did have the original children in it, but it didn't.

Well, I'm glad I cleared that up.

Today was the foot doctor and the MRI. I think I'm done with the foot doctor, since I am never taking time off from school again for that, and he only works Friday mornings and said I should come back in six weeks. Don't hold your breath. The MRI was fine, only twenty minutes, I only had to go about halfway in, so if I opened my eyes, I could still see out into the room, pretty much. No big deal. I'll get the results on Monday, and I'm not going to do anything about that either.

I have many, many appointments next week, including, at last, a nutritionist on Friday. And court on Tuesday for my traffic ticket. Boo court.

I got up very early for summer this morning, 6:30, and I am soooo tired now. I've been much better with the tired this summer since my body has fallen into its natural sleeping pattern. Sadly for me, this pattern involved falling asleep between midnight and one and waking up around eight. I like it a real lot, but I doubt my employers are going to let me keep it up, considering that first period starts at 7:55 and I'm kinds supposed to be there by then. Hmm. Something else to look forward to in retirement. So anyway, I'm going to go relax on the couch now.


WATCHING FAMILY GUY :: ENTRY #1820
SUMMER BOOK #3: The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon

Dear Heavens

It's ten after six. How on earth am I going to go out at 7.30? I'm considering closing my eyes for the next hour or so, if I can, but then what will tonight bring? Sleep, I'm thinking, but maybe not. Oh well, if I can't sleep, I can catch up on my Law and Orders.

Play tonight at the high school; I'm meeting the Colleague there. It's opening night. I don't know how many kids asked me today if I was planning to see the play, and when I said I was coming tonight, they got all excited. Freshmen can be so cute sometimes.\

I had five nice classes today, but our computer lab was sub-zero, about 15 degrees colder than it was at my desk, about ten feet away (but on the other side of a wall/door.) And so it goes.

No big missions today, still haven't gotten my CVS bargains, but I did clear out the clog in the bathroom sink. Go me. This is the excitement that is my life.

Okay, I'm going to see if I can catch twenty winks, or at least ten.

WATCHING MASH :: ENTRY #1747

Hello!

Hello! My eldest nephew, JJ, answers the phone and says Hello! and sounds just like the MovieFone guy and when he does it I can't answer him because I can only laugh. I'm just sharing.

I am just soooooo tired today and there's no reason for it at all. I fell asleep around 9.30 last night, cracked open an eye at 10 and again at 11 to change the channel, and again at 3 to turn the TV off, but I never got out of bed that I can recall (or, as it were, off the couch) and I woke up with the alarm, which is maybe the third or fourth time that's happened this school year.

Ooh, I just had fun. It's first lunch in the library, so I'm here -- the SCM is at lunch -- and in the last few minutes I was asked for stuff on the Beatles and hippies, anything we had on the Salem which trials, and a basic summary of Andrew Jackson. And that's where the fun is, if you're a dork, I guess. This is the fun part of being a school librarian, jumping from one topic to another, seeing what it is they're looking for. As I've said many times, I don't like my job, but I love my work. So there ya go.

Okay, back to the exhaustion. I have had three cups of coffee today, although sadly, my experiment to see if I could have a cup of real (aka, caffeinated) coffee for my second cup was a failure. (Which means I had three cups of decaf today, but hey, it's got some.) I thought I could have just one cup of caf a day, hours after my blood pressure med, and it wouldn't interfere. And it didn't. No shakes, no feeling quivery or anything. But the heartburn! And it only took me two weeks to make the connection! So I'm back to just decaf, and as little chocolate as I can get away with, including no chocolate at all at night because that will just kill me. Really, I'm going to be a joy one day in the little old tattooed ladies' home when they have to cope with all my special diet needs, not to mention my plaid blanket problem. (Although, I've recently realized that I don't sleep under a plaid blanket in the family room, so what's up with that? I've justified it in my mind by deciding that the family room is two steps down from the rest of the house and it's a well-known fact that *ahem* serpents cannot go down stairs. SHUT UP! Leave me alone with my fantasy rationalizations!)

Today is pedi day which means that tomorrow is tattoo day. I have already said that this is my last one, but god help me, I'm reconsidering. Wonderful Niece expressed her amazement that not one of my tattoos is Mickey related, and you know .....

My day continues to amuse. Here it is, almost time to leave and a boy came in and asked for a book by title. I looked it up and asked him "The one about the siege of Stalingrad?" and he pumped his fist in the air and said "YES!" and ran to the shelves to get it. He was very cute.

And now, home after the pedi, and listen: I know what I want for Mother's Day. The Sibs and I have been getting our pedis here forever and until today, neither one of us thought to turn on the massage in the massage chair. Ohhhhhh ..... heaven. It was wunderful. Well, they're always asking me to tell them what I want, and now I've got something to say.

However will I stay up for Lost tonight?

WATCHING MASH :: ENTRY #1743

VaCaDay 3

John Adams is dead, finally. (And Thomas Jefferson survives. No, wait ...) It was a good mini-series, but it seemed never-ending, which I suppose has something to do with Adams living into his nineties and being a relatively unpleasant person throughout. (The phrase used to describe him repeatedly in the movie 1776 is "obnoxious and disliked.")

I think I have not slept well the nights I watched those episodes, for some reason, and last night, after all the tearful moments of everyone dying here and there, I just tossed and turned for hours. So I'm very tired today. But it was a good day.

I went to Kohl's twice, even though I tried on what I bought in the store, I realized at home that one pair of cropped jeans were okay, but the other fit me really well. So I took back the okay and got another really well in a different color denim. In between, I took stuff to recycling, dropped off my tattoo design so they can prepare it for Thursday, bought lottery tickets, and listened to more Harry Potter in the car. I'm also eating a lot of jelly beans. If I have them in the house, I will eat them. And I have them. But I'm closing the jar now.

I thought I would try one of my exercise videos this morning as soon as I got up, but you know, that early morning exercise thing is a part of my past. I got up mentally prepared to do it, and as I limped into the bathroom on the hip that aches for the first hour or so that I'm up every day, I said to myself "Who are you kidding? You're lucky you can walk at all early in the morning." So. But I did do arm exercises with weights last night, and I'll do that again tonight. I'll have to see when I can work in anything else.

Otherwise, I'm just tired. I really hope I sleep tonight.

WATCHING MASH :: ENTRY #1734