Walking Backwards

Finally, a sense of giddy excitement has settled over me. My freaked out self has disappeared. In one hour, Joe is driving us to the airport. We take a plane to Dallas, then to London, then to Pisa. From Pisa we take a train to Florence where we pick up a rental car to take to Certaldo where our villa is. The weather channel says it is going to rain all next week, but I know it is still going to be beautiful. I'll be there for almost one month (we come back October 28th). Nicholas seems to be blissfully unaware of the trip at hand. We told him that this was the morning that we were leaving and he told us "no, it's not." The books we've been reading him on the subject and the chain of days before we leave and the constant talking about it and reminding him of it were apparently too abstract.nicholasggddgdy (he is on my lap wanting to type). It is going to be hard on him, but I know he'll be okay. He'll have my undivided attention for the majority of the time we're there. He'll have doting family members and friends to spoil him, too. He'll miss his father, but will make it the three weeks (I hope) until Joe gets there. I'll update here when I can. We will be visiting the internet cafe a few times a week so that my brother can keep up with his classes. I'm going to try to post pictures, too. So ta-ta for now.

ps. I figured out the subject for my paper - Early sexual equality in Etruscan civilization.

HOLY CRAP!!! I'm leaving day after tomorrow! I have to pack! I'll write before I leave with the details.

Love happy hour. Love that I get to post highly inebriated. Three very special martinis later and I'm happy as a clam. The fourth sentence and I've already had to make some major revisions and spelling corrections. Never drink and type. Can't wait to babysit tomorrow morning. Pfft, I'm drunk.

Nico and I just got back from preschool to a quiet and (relatively) empty house. Today was his last day at school before we leave and his teacher made a big deal of it; it was pretty cool. During circle time she asked Nicholas if he was going on a trip and told all the other kids that Nico was traveling far away in an airplane and he was going to be gone for awhile. She talked about how he would bring back pictures and be able to tell stories about his trip and everyone said how much they'll miss him. He felt like a rock star. I'm sad he'll be gone from there for so long because he likes it so much and I really enjoy having him go there. I adore his new teacher. *Sigh* Another thing to miss. T-minus four days and counting. Friday morning seems to be getting closer and closer.

So, this weekend extra people abounded. Originally we were expecting seven persons and their three dogs and cat, but it ended up just being Joe's sister, her fiance, and her son. We watched movies or played games in the evenings and ran around during the day. It was fun, but I am glad to get back to normal and I'm sure they're thankful to be in their own place. Joe's sister was such a polite guest, she made dinner two nights and bought me flowers before she left. Nico had fun with his cousin Tyler who is about to turn two. New levels of sharing were reached. Not too bad at all. My OCD was sufficiently suppressed and I didn't freak out at the chaos that surrounded my house, either. We're hoping to visit them in Houston as soon as life settles down for them. It was fun just hanging out without an agenda. Shamefully, I forgot to take pictures the entire weekend. I guess there is next time. Thankfully, nothing happened to their abodes. Joe's grandparent's house and the houses and jobs of other family members weren't so lucky. Joe's mother is supposed to be without power until next week, his aunt without power for a month. The grandparents were told that they might not be able to return to start rebuilding until further notice. Hope everyone else out there is okay.

I should be cleaning the house right now and packing and getting ready to go out tonight (happy hour with the other renegade mamas), but after so much action in my house I kind of like being able to sit at the computer and veg. I'm also trying to make a plan of how to post when I'm over the great blue ocean. If anyone has ever used the voice-posting thing, let me know. Also, I'm thinking of switching to TypePad. If anyone has used that platform before, comment pros and cons please. I'm probably going to syndicate it here because I have finally reached 300 POSTINGS!!!!

Right now we have a house full of people, so no time to blog. I'm not very interesting right now, but I really wanted to talk about the guy who hit on me at the Container Store. I don't like being flirted with and am intimidated by obvious displays of romantic interest from strangers. I also missed Thievery Corporation because of the unexpected guests, so nothing to talk about there. Look for more here Tuesday at the latest.

Just got home from picking up Nico from preschool. I'm sick. I've been sick all day. Joe isn't going to be home until 11 tonight. I have to get ready to watch baby H tomorrow. My house is a wreck. My inlaws just left a message that they'll be here tomorrow to stay out of Rita's way. I have to go to the grocery store. Wahhhhhhh!!!!! I want to be babied now, thank you!

Joe and I are in talks on whether or not we want to provide Nico with a younger sibling. I have always been a die-hard only-child supporter, Joe has waffled between wanting one and wanting two. However, something has come up that has made us buckle down and start contemplating the idea instead of letting our indecision make the decision for us - Nicholas asked us for a baby. That sneaky kid. I really thought he was cut out for the life of an only child. Both Joe and I involve him in tons of activities, he goes to a great co-op preschool and has a great time with the kids there, and he has a difficult time sharing the attentions of his parents. We also are finally starting to get out again. I'm going to school, Joe is hanging out with friends, we are going out with each other; it's nice. I'm just worried about what we have to give up and the sacrifices Nico is going to have to make to be a big brother. Will we be able to be there as much for him if we have another child to take care of. Gah! This is a tough decision. No easy answer, either.

This is not a movie review because . . . we didn't go to the movie. My F------ car broke down - AGAIN! While we were out running errands, of course. It's working now, but it utterly ruined my Sunday. Now I have to go be helping parent at my son's preschool; the most exhausting job on the face of the planet. I'm definitely napping this afternoon.

Yesterday was Fight Club. While some of Nicholas' playgroups may be closer to the movie Fight Club, I was actually referring to my soapmaking efforts. My friend Annie, Geoff, and I are all crafty-types and are making soap this year to give as x-mas gifts. It's fun, we spend most of our time eating and talking, but some work does get done. I think we will have made a total of 150 bars of soap by the time this batch is done curing. I made bergamot soap this time around, Annie did lemon/peppermint, and Geoff made a batch of lemon-eucalyptus soap. I'm going to miss the cutting and curing again because I'll be out of town, but I'll find a way to survive I think. In November, we're probably going to have to do a couple of crafty-days a month because we have a lot of other things we want to try out. I'm sure Joe will be thrilled.

My dad also came to visit yesterday. It's the last time I'll see him before we leave and then I'll be gone for five weeks. I'm gonna miss the big guy. I did feel kind of bad shortly into our visit because he noted how much I was complaining about everything. Really, I went on for about twenty minutes about how stressed I am and all the work and money that I'm putting into this trip. I had to explain that I was just using him as a sounding board for all my frustrations and that, yes, I am glad to be going. I fall into that bad habit a lot. I vent. And the people I'm venting to don't get to hear the upside. They must think I'm miserable . . . really, I have it pretty good. It is definately something that needs to be worked on.

I'm off - Joe and I are going to see The Brothers Grimm this afternoon and I have to pack Nico's bag and snack, so he'll be able to survive for a few hours away from us. I'll post the gripping movie review later.

Banned book week starts this year on September 25th. Just one short week away, so start getting your plans on. This year I'm donating a few of the banned books to my public library and (hopefully) going to a seminar at a bookstore here in town about censorship.

Here is a link for more info about banned book week:

American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression

Baby H is asleep and my little guy is playing with his flashcards, so a moment of typing silence for me. I did get my bookmarks taken care of to the best of my abilities. I completely lost all of my homeschooling bookmarks, but give me a couple of hours of uninterrupted computer time and I'm sure I could find them all again. The bookmark backup was about six months old, so several had to be updated as well. I went though my history, too, and added all the sites I've visited regularly in the past ten days or so. It still seems a little short, but that may be a good thing. Look at it as a forced culling of my computer. Lord knows I could clean up this thing.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Eight hours later . . . . . .

I knew the quiet was too good to be true. Baby H woke up after a short 45 minute nap and Nicholas skipped his nap for the afternoon. When Annie came to pick up her kid I felt like a dazed circus performer. Nicholas was on the rug holding a hula hoop and demanding "Dance! Dance with H....! Dance Mommy!!!!!", children's reggae music played in the background. Life around here is so surreal. I've also been on the phone/computer every free moment today. My mom asked me to play travel agent and book our hotel in Rome and I've been trying to get in touch with a million corporate sponsors for my son's school's silent auction. People get bitchy when you ask for donations, even if that is the job of the person you're asking. Vacation two weeks from tomorrow, baby!

Mentioning vacation, any idea what in the hell I'm supposed to pack? Really, I have to be super efficient. We're going to be there for five weeks and have to use minimal luggage. Nico has a suitcase, I have a suitcase, we each have a bookbag, and we're sharing a small dufflebag. For FIVE WEEKS. My bookbag is already full of . . . well . . . books. Nico's is filled with crayons and coloring books and magnetic letter tiles. I also have been advised to bring five weeks worth of pull-up diapers for the little guy. There goes his suitcase. With my shampoo and medication and spare Converse, I'll have room for a pair of jeans and a toothbrush. But hey, that's all you need really.

Now I'm off to shower and contemplate my to-do list, which is extremely long right now. I also have another meeting of Fight Club this Saturday, so I need to get prepared for that.

I would love to sit and chat and tell you about my day, but Nicholas over here decided to delete my profile on Firefox. I now have to go through the painful process of re-aquiring all of my bookmarks and settings and such. I wish I was making this stuff up. This kid is a computer genius! He is also quite good at getting under my skin.

Bookgroup decided to go with The Brothers K, in part to my push in addition to the ringing endorsement of another person there. I was all excited until I realized that I wasn't going to be at the next meeting.

I'm leaving for book group in about twenty minutes or so. Amazingly, I finished the book this month. I would go whether I finished or not, just to experience the joy of adult conversation, but I enjoy having something to contribute. My goal for the year of reading a book a week has fallen waaaaaaayyyyyyyyy short. I don't think I realized how much time school was going to take this spring and then I got lazy during the summer. I'm now averaging about two books a month. I *heart* reading, but man is it hard with kids and school and a life. I have a stack of books on my headboard that are just itching to be read and about a hundred more that I want to get to sooner or later. So, I've decided this goal is of a book a week is for the birds. Instead, I'm making a goal of six books to finish by the end of the year (I mean, we have Christmas and vacation coming up). Of course, book club books are going to totally screw-up this list, but here it is. Suggestions are welcome.

1. Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer (got this one in my suitcase)
2. The Master by Colm Toibin (also in my suitcase)
3. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon
4. The Brothers K by David James Duncan (this one is set aside because of chaoticness now)
5. Dubliners by James Joyce
6. Persuasion by Jane Austin

All of these books are in my house and have not been read (or at least completed). I really need to read all of the books I have before I get an influx of more. Whenever I visit a bookstore I can't go away empty-handed and everyone knows the gift of books is the way to go with me. Not only that the public library's Monster Book Sale is coming up, and that is always bad for my bookshelves.

Hmmmm . . . my entry from Friday didn't post. Too bad, because it was cool. Not because of the content of course, but because Nicholas did something to my keyboard, I have no idea what, that started scrolling my text backwards. Everything was written the wrong way, which was cool, but annoying. When I tried to enter a web address into the address bar it came out as moc.reggolb.www. You can imagine what my entry looked like. Nicholas has the amazing ability to hit hot keys that I didn't even know existed. I even asked my husband and et al computer geeks and they had no idea either. We figured that it had something to do with character encoding, but none of the changes I made did anything to solve my problem. So I ended up falling back on the standard protocol for fixing unknown origin Windows problems - reboot. Seems to have worked.


Yesterday was my day to get out of the house and run errands. I know of about thirty other ways I would rather spend my Saturday, but things have been such that my free time now is taken up by what "has" to be done. I'm leaving in two and half weeks and I still have about 75% of stuff-that-needs-to-get-done to do. Yesterday, the morning was spent at the mall and the afternoon was spent trying to find the stuff I couldn't find at the mall at other stores all over the place.

The mall was - like a mall. It wasn't crowded when I got there, but by the time I left it was overrun. For some reason I was targeted by every single kiosk sales person and was asked if I wanted to try nail care products or knock-off sunglasses or hair extensions. I would cut through stores whenever I could, but I had to practice the oblivious-maneuver on several. No matter how loudly or proximal they spoke, I would not acknowledge their existence. I had a shopping agenda. Sadly, the mall was not equipped to satisfy my agenda. I went for a bra (note the maximum nipple coverage)and a simple black dress that was fairly wrinkle-resistant. I left with a bra and haunting visions of myself in flower-printed chiffon. Not one store had the dress I was looking for. No, I didn't want an asymmetrical hem with gauze overlay. No, I didn't want transparent sleeves. No, for the love of God, I didn't want metallic threads or sequins. I just wanted a comfortable travel dress. Is that too much to ask? Apparently.

After I left the mall I went to what seemed like a thousand other stores and still didn't find anything. I even entered the horrors known as Dress Barn, and they didn't have anything even close. There was a lot of polyester animal print, though. I have given up finding the dress at this point and am just going to get some nice pants and a fancy-schmancy shirt. Now to find that.

This is a test run to see if I can get my 43 things account to post directly to my blog. Guess it worked:

Just got back from Chuck E' Cheese. My son LOVES the place, while I think it sucks. Okay, it doesn't suck too badly because it does have skee-ball, however, the pizza is awful. I don't know how they do it, but it is too salty, too oily, and too tangy all at the same time. I didn't get to play skee-ball very much either. I got to watch Nico play. He made it into the 40k ring once, thank you very much, but I still had to sit there for ten minutes for each game. He would throw the ball and it would roll up the ramp just to the point where it starts to raise into the gutter and then roll back. This was made even more frustrating because he was throwing over-hand. There was no way to get any more momentum behind that ball. At one point this little boy came up and started asking me for tokens. Thinking that with Nicholas' game being the way it was, if I didn't find another way to make our pile of tokens disappear, we were going to be there forever. So I gave him a token each time he asked for one. He was cute, he was Nicholas' age, and he was aiding my plan to get us out of the loudest restaurant in the universe at an hour that might work for Nico's bedtime. It all was working out according to my diabolical scheming. . . until his parents showed up and told him not to take anymore of our tokens . . . and he kept taking them. I didn't mind, but then I felt like I was encouraging bad behavior in children who were not mine. If I gave this kid a token, he would be disobeying his parents. He kept asking for them, though. I told him that he had to ask his parents, so Nicholas gave him one. Fortunately, we ran out of tokens as they were dragging the little boy away from the skee-ball area kicking and screaming. Damn coupon for forty tokens.

Damn, I'm going to get it. I missed Nicholas' preschool parent orientation last night. Don't think that it was because I didn't want to go, which I didn't, I had a migraine. I get those horrible debilitating migraines that send you to bed in a dark room in total silence. I have trouble moving my left side and spend most of the time concentrating about how to get through the pain. I lose some of my vision. Sometimes I vomit, which is the absolute worst thing to happen to a person with a migraine. So, as you can see, I couldn't go to the meeting. However, they are going to wonder why I didn't call and leave a message, why I didn't send my husband in my stead. I'll have to explain that that wasn't possible, that, no, it wasn't just a headache, what I have this morning is a headache. That my husband had to care for our son. I couldn't do it because the screaming in pain would have freaked him out. I'm going to be made to feel really guilty, I know.

I have to say that, when enrolling my son in preschool, school politics were totally foreign to me. Having to go through the layers of leadership and keeping all those people happy is strange. We have a school director, a president, a teacher, and a room representative (another parent who is "in charge" of organizing all classroom helping parents and meetings and parent-involved activities). I have to keep all of these people happy or else I am going to end up with last picks for days off and extra work days at the preschool. I have a great fear of what the PTA is going to be like when Nico is in public school. Right now it seems like some of the people involved get a great deal of satisfaction and self-worth from the mere fact that they feel like they can order me around.

Long weekend. This long weekend especially has been long. Joe and I didn't realize until Sunday night that he was going to be home Monday and that all of our rushed weekend work didn't have to be done right then. So we didn't do it, and still haven't done it. The bathrooms haven't been cleaned. The snacks haven't been set up for next week. The laundry is still in the dryer. I think that when we are given the extra time, the permission to take it easy for just a bit, we get greedy and take more than our share. Give us the chance to sit on the couch and read and we get engrossed in our books and don't get up. Allow a little time for computer games and we get sucked in. We talk on the phone longer than usual and we linger while out shopping. Normal people get things done on long weekends. They stand in queues at the hardware store and push wheelbarrows full of gardening goods around their yards where I can see them and feel guilty. We, of course, don't adhere to the normal societal rules of long weekends. Somehow, we seem to get less done.

So, some may know that my husband is from Louisiana, that most of his family still live there. That we have friends in Louisiana. That we spent our honeymoon in the French quarter in New Orleans. Because of that we were increadibly thankful that not a single person we know was hurt. Our friends in Slidell are now without a livable home, but they are alive (and livid). Joe's grandparents are safe; they live in Lake Charles which was far enough away not to sustain any damage. The aunts and uncles made it okay, but they lived in areas far enough from the hurricane. Our family was so lucky. I can't watch the news, though. Every time I turn it on I start sobbing in sadness, anger, and frustration. There is nothing I can do. I can't stop the thousands of people that I see on television from suffering, from dying of dehydration while waiting to be rescued. I have no idea how to stop ten year-old girls from getting raped while in emergency shelters or how to keep infants from wasting away from exposure. I sent money. All that we could. Joe's company matched us 150%. I'm taking Nicholas to the shelter here today with clothes and water and toothpaste and shampoo. It's right down the street from my house. I pass by it and see the people sitting outside and cry for them. Joe wanted to go to New Orleans this weekend and do all that we could to help. I'm selfish, I said no. I'm not taking my three year-old to see that, to have to protect him from that. I hope that these people get the help they need soon and all the help they need to make their lives whole again after it's all over.

Holy Christ this game can suck your time away:



*Edited because my score improved after I figured out the letters don't have to be touching*

*Edited again because this core just kicks ass*

I almost forgot! My new carrier came in the mail yesterday. I was so worried that we wouldn't get it in time for our trip, but YAY! A horrible pic of me carrying the munchkin around. Yes, the pocket is urban camo, thank you very much.

Argh! Nico's new teacher just left. Today was her "home visit" to our house. It did not go well. Nicolas was freaking out about one thing or another the entire time she was here. There was much screaming. There was pouting. There were two full-blown tantrums. All I could tell her was that he normally does not act like this. Really, he can be bad, but it is not normally this intense. And he WANTS to go back to school. I wonder what kindergarten is going to be like.