CURRENT KICK # 777

Fried egg sandwiches for lunch. Loaded with veggies. Pickles on the side. (mmmmm, pickles)

LOVE: take 3

Why I'm beginning to adore my eight year old buddy:

1. Right now she's selling pictures she's created to strangers on the sidewalk

2. She's over the top and doesn't care

3. She eats a lot of candy (notice the blue lips above)

4. She likes bright dresses and she's got a daring and unique sense of style (once she wore a t-shirt as a skirt to school)

We designed and made this dress, sash and headband in 2 hours. Material: her choice.

5. She's always excited

6. When she's having fun she'll call me from wherever and invite me to come along

7. We have a secret club and we send each other secret notes

8. She's so vibrant and full of life. She's lovely.

CURRENT KICK # 555

Patch-clamping.  I've been at it all week. It's awesome. And it's given me about three nosebleeds from thinking so hard. 

Take a guess

This over bedside goodnights with Dex:

"Why am I excited to go to school tomorrow? 

1. It's not because Wednesdays are hot lunch days.

2. It's not because Wednesdays are skating in the parks days.

(...I don't know, these things are all the ingredients for my kinda good time.....)

 

No...it's:

3. Because tomorrow I start Chess Club!"

Hm.

Who knew.

Today's Motto

"I'm a grown up. I can do what I want."*

_____________

*Sort of.

How to: have fun in the back of a car

Self stimulate (i.e., suck your thumb)

Sing to the rock 'n' roll

Balance your boots on your head

Take off your clothes (of course!): nudity makes everything more entertaining.

On My Island

"On My Island, nothing, absolutely nothing ever happens"...well, except this (the view from the boat almost docking on the island):

Those, my friends, are gigantic turbines (2 of 86): creepy. Those little white things below: houses. 

Things found #3

From A La Claire Fontaine whose refrain goes:

"Il ya longtemps que je t'aime, jamais je ne t'oublierai."

Parenting Milestone #9: March Break

Secret visitors from a secret land. Aka: my other sister et al.

The future always takes me by surprise. Surprise! It's March Break! Most kids, normal kids, everyone else's kids, go to camps and trips and have "organized" experiences during their march breaks. This was my conversation with Dex:

Me: So! how about a circus camp?* You'll learn tricks!!

Dex: ah, no.

Me: Hockey! what about a hockey camp? Or a soccer camp?

Dex: I'm not really into organized sports.

Me: Swimming lessons? How about learning to swim?

Dex: How about some other time? I already know how to swim anyway...

Me: Well, using life jackets doesn't really count dude.  

Dex: How about just playing? At home. I think that'd be fun.

Me: sigh. You're wasting your youth child.

So instead they come to work with me and we do "Fun Things" like buy donuts and play in large atriums with garbage, get muddy in the park, explore buildings and places we should not be and take different "secret" routes to school and back again. And the kids say "This is awesome!" and "Sweeeeet." How does it get any better than this?

__________________

*Screw you guys! A circus camp sounds incredible!

Today's Motto

"Love can do Everything"

CURRENT KICKs #2.76887667899 and #2.768876679

#2.7.....899:

The Velvet Underground. 

For islands, for Lou Reed, for standard 240 series volvos, and summertime, cassettes and everything I've forgotten. 

#2.7....9:

Fucked up 80's and 90's Music Videos

For laughs. 

(tax dollars hard at work)

How to please a six year old

Event: An after-little-boy-dinner trip to the on-campus grad student pub to celebrate a defense.

Encouragement: Having already decided NOT to go, a 5 p.m. call from said pub from my eight year old buddy claiming there were "A lot of people" and "You'd better come quick." To an eight year old, five is deemed "a lot."

Me and my entourage: suited up, trudged across the park for some Wednesday night adventure.

Entertainment: Beer and grown-ups for me; for them, juices of their choices, running around the two story building, playing with people big and small.

Emphatic exclamation:  Dexter says "That was the BEST day of my life" because of the seemingly unlimited candy from the 25 cent candy dispensing machine, the fooseball, and getting to stay up late (well, in their minds).  

Today's Motto

"Baby, be good, do what you should, you know it will work alright"

Being a Single Parent

Best Part: 

One-on-one hang-around time with the boys. And successfully keeping everyone alive till the end of the day (yes, everybody high five).

Worst Part: 

The "I don't want to go to sleep cause then I have to wake up and do life again" end of the night feeling. And when I hear scary noises, remembering I've lost my bedside bat, my "home/emily protection system"...........   That's it. I'm sleeping with the rolling pin. 

Today's Motto

"Every day is garbage day"

(Tuesdays just roll around too quickly these days.)

CURRENT KICK #10 hundred zillion

The English Patient. On Repeat. For two days now.

I think I may have grown a second vagina. 

And all the crying? is not helping the congestion.

Who knows. Maybe it will cure me. In the end.

*and PS: 10 hundred is a number. It's close to infinity.

Dear World:

I just have to tell you, I feel like someone ate me, and shit me out.
It's really bad when cold cement floors look deliciously enticing for a nap. And the only reason I didn't lie my hot head down on them is because I'm pretty sure sleeping at work in the hallways is unacceptable.
I am not myself: I don't want to watch romantic love stories, talk shit, drink myself silly, read magazines, or even eat candy. And I turned down a free lunch. And an invite for Friday afternoon shinanigans.
If you're listening, please kiss my forehead. Lie me down. Then you can be on your way.
In return, I'll try to be a better person.
Even if it means washing out the bottom of the garbage can when I notice that it's disgusting.
Your inhabitant,
e.l.s.

CURRENT KICKs #888 and #889

#888: kleptomaniacly stealing abandoned combination locks from the locker room floor. I just don't understand myself sometimes.

#889: wearing "head tubes" (made by me, cloth, tube-ish, bigger than a head band, tight like a hat, kinda like a bandana but more stretchy, cheaper than a hair cut).  

Today's Motto

Carpe Omina!

and: if you run stairs, do it with the men's cross country running team. 

Hmmm. So maybe:

Carpe Onmes!*

*Don't be fooled. I 100% suck at latin. 

Belly Rides

Hanging out

Sitting in the kitchen area listening to The German bullshit.

Things found #2

My Brother: Birthday Surprise

Sunday Action Plan

A bunch of stuff I plan to do today in order to feel less like the lazy jerk that I am and more like an outstanding winner:

1. Use the buttermilk to make pancakes for brunch

2. make muffins for lunches (hopefully use buttermilk)

3. Read two chapters for my "book club"*

4. paint the nails on my Other Hand: maybe. I'm almost positive I hate finger nail polish, hence the "only paint one hand for now and see how it makes me feel" experiment. When I look at my painted nail hand, for some reason it makes me feel like a middle aged jewish woman. And since I'm neither Jewish nor middle aged (yet) it makes me feel uncomfortable.

5. Resist the chocolate cake (that called for the damn buttermilk in the first place)

6. Force the kids to eat some ice cream. There is too much in the freezer and there is no room for things like "frozen fruit and vegetables." And since I'm such a good parent, they hate ice cream along with food like "chips and cookies." Maybe if I sprinkle broccoli on top they'll act like regular children. 

7. Wash little boy underwear. They change their underwear like ten times a day. I don't know what this means.

8. Finish those goddamned pillow covers

9. Call my mother

10. File T4s before midnight and process a bunch of other over-due government paper work.

11. Go to the gym and run a small marathon

12. Sear some fresh tuna for my gourmet dinner

13. Read a science article at least twice

14. Find the transfer cable for my camera

15. Put pants on Lew

16. Put pants on me

I'll feel like a fucking super hero and high five myself at least ten times if I power through this list. Although, I've been Sunday Emily before and know that she is extremely lazy and generally disinterested. Which makes me afraid for the future.  

*Consists of me and an eight year old girl.