This is what Christmas morning was like at our house; Meno-made Cinnamon rolls and bacon on my recently acquired Holiday plates. I ate three rolls and 5.5 pieces of bacon.
Now we are in San Diego, lounging at a fancy hotel, eating too much and walking in the cool, but sunny weather. You'll be pleased to know that there has been no outdoor nudity. Because that would be against the rules. Those Californians are no fun.
There is an ocean here:
And cliffs:
That is all. Carry on....
Em passed her driver's test on Tuesday. She was very nervous beforehand. She even asked The Mister to take her out and help her practice parallel parking on the morning of the test.
On the drive home from the DMV, i text-messaged the Mister with "The eagle has landed." He was at lunch with a friend and apparently he showed the friend who laughed and said, "Your wife has a good sense of humor."
All The Mister wanted to know was "how did she do on the parallel parking?" She nailed it. Full points.
Her first solo flight was to the grocery store to get a celebratory gallon box of goldfish crackers. As we have learned, in this house, goldfish cure everything.
To date she has made 3 excursions and returned safely, with a huge grin on her face. I think her world just became a little larger.
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I had lunch yesterday with QT, who is in town visiting her family and some friends. It was a typical day in Seattle. That means raining and cool. She didn't have an umbrella or a hat, so we spent a bit of time looking for one, chattering through two different stores. (I can reveal no details of our chattering, as i am a safe-house for sensitive information.)
The Nordstrom's $48.00 umbrella was rejected. Off to Macy's, where the masses shop. We both bought cool style umbrellas which could double as a cudgel. (This is the direct cause of the sun appearing while we ate lunch. It never fails)
Since QT lives in the frozen, landlocked North, we had to find a lunch place that served seafood. Which we did, sitting at the bar in Matt's, sipping champagne and a Bloody Mary, and chattering. (Do you sense a theme here?)
It was lovely to see her. I hope that it will happen again, sooner rather than later. Did you get that hint young lady?
Here is my favorite Holiday tchotchke. It's my favorite because it was given to me my a man who used to work for me. He is Hindu and i am an atheist, and it's a nativity scene. I find that amusing. It plays "Silent Night" and the part of baby Jesus is played by two tiny blinking light bulbs. 
The End:
(I was going to call this A Primer for Men, but that would be sexist and i realize that it could also be A Primer for Teenaged Girls.)
It's in pictures, so that even you will be able to follow along.
This is bad:
When you reduce the toilet paper to shreds and can see the cardboard roll, leaving it this way is rude. No really. I know, who would have thought, right?
Look! Right behind you is a toilet paper bonanza, a veritable breeding ground for toilet paper, there for the taking:
There is also a catnip mouse next to the toilet, in case you need something to play with:
Reach out and grab a new roll, like this: Don't be afraid, it won't hurt you, they are very gentle, and soft, and absorbent.
Place your new friend, the fresh roll, into its new home. Look at this, look at what you have accomplished.
Take a bow. You deserve it after this impossible difficult for you task.
This is one of those family stories that gets told while the one person who the story is about cringes and tries not to appear angry.
When my older brother Tim was 8 or so, he had a particularly rough year, behavior wise. (I think he might have been diagnosed as ADHD today.) Thus my mother thought it would be the height of amusement to put a lump of coal in his stocking that year. The rest of the family talked and tittered behind Tim's back for weeks. How clever, how funny, how he deserved it.
My oldest brother, Don, snuck out of the house one night and rustled up a lump of something that was probably asphalt, but close enough, and into Tim's stocking it went.
I thought this was pretty funny back then, but secretly i was glad that it wasn't me who was in line for this humiliation. My 6 year old self's laughter was mostly from relief, as well as from the joy of being included on the "right" side of this joke.
Tim's reaction is lost in my memory to my excitement of a Christmas morning. I know he got all his other presents, but my mother had sent a powerful message. When i think if it, i feel ashamed of my part in it, even though i was 6.
I had to laugh when i read the first line of liv's latest offering:
"another self indulgent post " she wrote.
Isn't blogging really all self-indulgent posts? I mean, here we are writing about the minutia of our lives and the even minuter minutia of our brains.
I wish liv was here today. I need a girly girl to go shopping with me and help me find a top to wear to tomorrow night's work party for The Mister. I want something that will show off the girls, which will be at eye level for most of the men.
The dinner is being held at one of the most exclusive restaurants in Seattle. There will be plenty of libation. We were told to take a cab so we could indulge freely in these libations.
It would cost us about $100 to take a cab from where we live. Some free dinner.
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I got a huge laugh today when i was out walking. I walked past a Jiffy Lube place that had lost its "J". Big bold sign declaring IFFY LUBE.
I think my laughing frightened the woman who was a few yards ahead of me. She sped up a little. I could have caught up with her if i had wanted to though.
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The symptoms:
So here's what i've been working on in my quilting group. The group i joined earlier this year and wasn't sure i would like. It's a table runner.
Here's one square:
And here's the back of another square:
If this doesn't get me a merit badge on my "I'm a real girl" sash, i don't know what will.
My next project will be a quilt for Em to take to college with her. She is keen on that idea.
Today: Rain, heavy at times with wind.
Tomorrow: Rain to showers.
Wednesday: Cloudy with showers.
Thursday: Scattered showers.
Friday: Cloudy with showers.
Saturday: Rain at times.
Sunday: Partly cloudy with showers.
You get the idea. Rain. Liquid sunshine my ass.
The Mister planned an after Christmas trip for us this year. He booked it two days before San Diego went up in flames.
Guess where we are going?
Yep, San Diego! We will be staying at a place which is still there, and still beautiful, in La Jolla. We are leaving the day after Christmas and will be returning on New Year's Eve. We will spend the time wandering on the beach, window shopping, hiking and eating good food.
Even if it rains, it will be warmer than it is here. This trip will prevent me from curling into a little ball and staying in my bed with two cats for the rest of the winter and most of the spring.
If any of you have knowledge of San Diego, please chime in with the names of restaurants, places to go, hikes to take, anything you think we should see. Thanks.
Man, a lot of the bloggers i read are in a mood lately. Me too, but i'm not going to talk about it, because i know it's partly the dark and the time of year. This too shall pass.
I have realized recently that i need to get some more things going in my life because next year Em will be gone, and i will miss her, and her company, and i will be alone even more than i am now.
I like being alone, but not all the time.
So i have my net out for things. Today i might have joined a book group. A women's book group. This is amusing for two reasons;
1) I don't like to talk about books i have read, unless i don't like them. The more i like a book, the less i like to talk about it. I'll just have to hope they pick books i hate.
2) (This sounds so awful, but it's true) I usually don't like groups of women, especially if they are earnest women. I find myself bored all to hell by earnestness. I like a little smart-assedness (is too a word) with my conversation. Sometimes it seems that women are too fucking concerned with convincing each other how nice they are. Yawn.
See what a great attitude i will be taking into this venture with me?
When i was growing up, we ate dinner all together, pretty much every night. While i can't say it was always that great of an experience (what with the lima bean* and the table manner fights) it is what i thought families did, ate together, every night.
So i brought that expectation into my marriage, without even realizing that it was an expectation.
I held on to that expectation for a long, long time. The Mister tried to accommodate me, but after we had Em, things changed. (Understatement of the Century.) He worked a lot, and i was home. So he would tell me what i wanted to hear, that he would be home by, say, 6:30. And then he was late, almost every single night. That made me mad. So i was mad at him, almost every single night.
After we were separated, and then weren't, i realized that i would have to give up my image of our family having dinner together most nights. Because being mad at my husband almost every single night was not good for our relationship (duh).
Giving up that expectation has freed me. In fact, the sad thing is now that i kind of prefer it when the Mister isn't home for dinner, because Em and i will eat pretty much whatever is around, and if the Mister is home, i feel like i should make an actual meal.
Although i am happier without the family dinner expectation, i still feel that it's his loss.
*We used to drive my mother wild when she served those awful frozen lima beans for dinner by popping them into our mouths and swallowing them whole, like pills, thus avoiding the need to chew and actually taste them. I thought it was brilliant, my mother, not so much.
One side effect of having friends (me) who have children (Em), is that sometimes you have to listen to them brag or complain about their kids.
Hi friends. I will be bragging.
Parent-Teacher conferences were last week. It was pretty much a love-fest about Em. Em's English teachers have always loved her, and that love has been returned. I knew that she was a good writer, but (in my mind) decent writers are not uncommon. It's not a skill to be sneered at, but it's not exactly unique. Of course shitty writers are as ubiquitous as gum on the side walk.
This is Em's senior year. Her English teacher told us that Em is the most outstanding writer that she has ever seen in high school.
I got a little teary with pride.
I haven't wanted to think that she might really be unusually talented. Because of the kind of person i am, not wanting her to have expectations that are too high, not wanting her to get a big head...Blah, blah, blah. Silly mommy.
Em, four days old.
See this quilt? This quilt became Lammie, Em's blanket. I think of someone who's baby lost her own Lammie recently, at the hands of a careless relative.
Lammie is still with us, 17 years later. Em is 17 today; no one is more surprised than me at this event. She still sleeps with Lammie every night. On weekend mornings, she comes down with Lammie wrapped around her body, or her head. Lammie does not look as good as he (Yes, Lammie is a boy) did in this picture anymore, but Lammie is still all of a piece.
Lammie was made by a friend of my mother's. I know she had no idea that this quilted blanket would become so precious to my child.
Lammie has traveled all over the country with Em. A few times, when we thought we might have lost Lammie, she has had to sleep with a "substitute Lammie." But Lammie has always been located.
This picture was taken on her first Thanksgiving. The Mister and i were still in the fog of "Oh, shit, what is this thing we have done." The Mister went to the store on Thanksgiving morning and bought a turkey breast and some potatoes, and we fixed a meal and the three of us, all alone, ate our meal in wonderment. Em did not have any turkey, except maybe second hand.
It remains a favorite memory, this first Thanksgiving, and our baby, wrapped in this item that was to become a legend in our family.
This is my sewing machine. It is well over 50 years old. I find it compellingly beautiful in its art deco simplicity.
My mother guilted (is too a word) her father into buying it for her right after my oldest brother was born. He had forgotten her birthday one year and she told him that she would feel much better if he bought her this fancy new sewing machine. It cost $100 dollars.
When i went off to college, i sort of appropriated the machine, because right about then my mother had bought herself a newer fancier Bernina sewing machine that could do things like zig-zag and embroider. The one above goes forward and backward, and that's it.
Over the years i have sewn some wonderful Halloween costumes. One year i made a dragon, including silver and gold lame wings. It still exists somewhere deep in the depths of chaos that is Em's closet. Perhaps i will mount an expedition sometime soon and try to find it.
Last year my mother asked me if i ever used this machine, because her fancier Bernina had bitten the dust. She was trying to get it back! HAH! As if. She was forced to go out and buy another machine to replace that cheap piece of junk.
Soon i will show you what i have been sewing on it. Because i know you care.
A young Em, sitting pretty at about 4 feet above the floor.
My to do list today is long:
1) Vacuum
2) Put vacuum away (if i do vacuum, i can never seem to manage this last step. Makes it easier to get the vacuum out if i never put it away, right? Tripping over it for a week seems a small price to pay.)
3) Clean kitchen (this means mopping the floor too, as the cats are NOT neat.)
4) Move laundry along (I never say "Do Laundry" as the laundry is never ever truly done.)
5) Grocery shop: zucchini, hamburger, mushrooms, good bread.
6) Even up quilt blocks for table runner.
7) Cut sashing for said quilt blocks.
8) Make bed (AWWWW, there are sleeping puddy tats on it. Mustn't disturb.)
9) Go to bank (where they will try to cross sell me some shit. I hate banks, not least of all because i worked in one for YEARS.)
The list sits there and mocks me while i play Text Twist on msn games. How many words can you make from the title of this post?
The interaction between me and a friend, who is complaining about her weight and not getting any exercise;
I suggest walking. I offer to go with her. "Yes, but that hurts my knees."
Swimming? That's easy on your joints. "On no, my skin is too dry to tolerate chlorine."
Sit ups? "They kill my back."
But sit ups will help your back, really. "Yes, but i just hate doing them."
How about biking? "Yes but the seat hurts my fanny." (Yes, she used the word fanny.)
I give up.
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I wrote the above a few days ago, thinking to be all superior. Maybe you would comment about how great i am, and after some token arguing i would agree.
Then came the part where i realize that i'm an ass.
There are a few things that i need to work on, but my very own "Yes, buts" get in the way. Not so superior am i. I will try to say goodbye to my "Yes, buts." Then, when i am perfect, probably by the middle of next week, i will feel free to criticize others.
The Mister and i were loitering at the appliance store yesterday waiting for a service person, when i heard a woman say "Hi Mister" to him. Seeing who it was, i suddenly became extremely interested in a display a few feet away. The Mister chatted with her for a few minutes, and i ignored them. After a while it was our turn so i said "hi" to her and we left the area.
It was a woman that used to work for us around the house. She bugged me because she would flirt with the Mister. When he wasn't around she would often bring him up to me by saying something like, "I know that the Mister likes ____" or "I know how ____ bothers the Mister." As if they were best friends.
I didn't not like it in a jealous way, since the Mister didn't flirt back, it was just stupid and i felt a vague sense of embarrassment for her.
Our next stop was lunch and i was telling the Mister that she annoyed me and why. He said that on his part, he felt as if she disliked him, and it was creepy to talk to her.
I don't see why we aren't both right. Flirting as aggression.
Today something so rare and so beautiful happened to me that i just have to share it with you.
I was driving in my car, headed straight through a light, when some person in a minivan shot over from the right turn only lane so she could get ahead of me at the intersection.
I swore at her, annoyed but impotent to do anything about it.
The next intersection was a four way stop sign, at which she failed to stop.
But wait, there was a cop sitting a little way back from the intersection, monitoring. I look over at the cop and think, "Oh please, oh please, oh please." The cop pulled out, lights blazing and stopped the minivan.
YES!
I passed the cop and the van pulled over on the right and looked right at the pinhead driving.
I smiled and waved.
I think i probably didn't use all of my fingers when i waved, but my smile was genuine and heartfelt.
In my dream last night:
I woke up at 4 am feeling heavy and sad. I moved over closer to The Mister so i could reach out and touch him. In my sleepy state, i wondered why i keep having these dreams the past few weeks.
Then i remembered that it was during this time of year that the worst thing that has ever happened to me began. In the cosmic scheme of things, it's not all that bad, but it was a disaster for me.Deb, at Tired Mummy asked me to do this here meme:
Write five things you want to be when you grow up. Big dreams that seem like folly, but in your heart of hearts are very real and dear to you. Things that maybe you have forgotten about in the ebb and flow and toil of the everyday, but that never really leave your soul. What you would do if anything was possible?'
1.) I want to sing, to be able to sing. I feel sorry almost every day that i can't sing. And i really can't. Even i can hear that i'm awful. I don't want to famous, i just want to sing, beautifully.
2.) I will write a novel. A science fiction/fantasy novel. Set in a world that makes sense, but has some mystery. Maybe underwater. As an example, i love John Varley's Titan, Wizard and Demon. I want to have written them. I don't write them because i lack the drive and the discipline. Oh, and the writing skills. Maybe someday.
3.) I might study to become a physical therapist. I have always been fascinated by the body and how it works. In biology class, when the teacher was showing those open-heart surgery movies, and everyone else was gagging, i was leaning forward in my seat to get a better look. I love those posters of the flayed human, showing all the tendons and muscles and ligaments.
4.) I will open clinics for women all over the world that will provide them with free birth control, free knowledge, free adoption services, free abortions, free fertility treatments, free medicine. It disturbs me to think of all the women in this world who do not have basic control over their bodies.
5.) I want to be more serene, less reactive. I want to understand more quickly how little of what happens is about me. I want to express curiosity in the face of criticism, rather than defensiveness. I manage these things sometimes, but it is not my natural bent. When i was younger, i saw my future self in this way, but i'm still working on it.
I don't usually tag people, but if you are a NaBloPoMo-er, TAG, you're it. I mean, if you want to, you know, because it's not required or anything.
When i went to bed last night, i had on pajama bottoms.
This morning, they were missing. (Cue Twilight Zone music.) During the course of an extensive search, I found them within throwing distance of the bed.
In order to get to the bottom (Hah! Bottom.) of this mystery, this evening I will round up the usual suspect and interrogate him.
It's a sad thing when one is not even safe in one's own home.
