The Key To Holiday Bliss Lies With The Mayans

Skip Christmas and party like a rock star instead!

To avoid sounding like a whiny baby, I just deleted hundreds of words, a litany of complaints about the holiday season and why it is (for me) the least wonderful time of the year. My distaste for this season stems from a complaint that from Thanksgiving through New Year’s Day my workload doubles while my pay increases not at all. In addition to my regular duties (chauffeuring, cleaning, cooking, laundry, errands, homework detail, etc.), I add holiday shopping, wrapping, baking, decorating, stuffing, mailing, coordinating, and distributing. I sat down today and took a good, long, hard look at my calendar for the next three weeks. Then, I researched a one-way flight to the Seychelles. Holidays at home with all the family or solo vacation in the Indian Ocean? Tough call.

I spent my day putting the finishing touches on some homemade gifts, which means I now have gifts for teachers, office staff, and neighbors completed. The Christmas cards have been ordered and are on their way. Tomorrow night we’re shopping for the family we adopted. Things are starting to come together. I could almost make out the faint sparkling of New Year’s Eve fireworks ahead, but then I remembered the greatest part of my busy season has not yet begun. Suddenly I was thinking again about a white sand beach in a warm ocean.

Tonight my husband requested that for his December birthday I gift him with a temporary cessation of my holiday apathy and my Grinch attitude. Because that’s way less expensive than what I was going to get him, I’m going to grant him his wish. I’ve strained my brain thinking about the best way to achieve it, and at long last the answer finally came to me. I need to disregard the holidays altogether. To that end, today I firmly committed myself to belief in the Mayan calendar. If the world is going to end on December 21st, then there really is no point in jumping through hoops for Christmas. And, since hubby’s birthday is the 20th, I figure we’ll focus on partying and let the rest go. Please excuse me if you don’t get our Christmas card or receive any cookies from us this year. The world is ending, and I’m busy living it up. The way I have it figured, the Mayans invented chocolate. Heaven knows they weren’t wrong about that. So, put aside all the stress of the holidays and join me in partying like it’s December 20th, 2012. On December 21st, if we’re still here, at least we’ll have enjoyed the holiday season.

Posted on 03/12/2012 by Me

Photos, Plimsolls, and Paybacks

Sometimes people (especially my mother) tell me that I share too many personal things about my husband in this blog. They think he must be some kind of saint for tolerating what I write here. I don’t agree because everyone who knows a writer should be well aware that they should be careful of what they say lest they wind up as blog or book fodder. It comes with the territory. The reason I don’t feel bad writing about my husband is because he’s a photographer. He’s always walking around with his camera, snapping unwanted photos, and calling it “art.” Just tonight, after I’d crawled into bed after washing my face, hair still up and sans makeup, he thought it might be fun to snap a photo of me despite my specifically asking him to do no such thing. For this action, he received the look of death, a look which he of course captured with his fancy camera. He then had the nerve to show it to me and wax rhapsodic about how great the camera is in low light. Evil.

There's a glass slipper in there somewhere, I'm sure. — There’s a glass slipper in there somewhere. You just know there has to be.

In retribution for this unfair photo, I give you a photo and a story of my own. This is a photo of a small portion of my husband’s shoe collection, the portion that is currently in residence on the floor on his side of the bed. He also has shoes stored in our closet and in the laundry room. I understand there are splinter sects of his shoes hiding throughout our house like rebels in caves in Afghanistan. Yes. My husband owns a lot of shoes. He owns more pairs of shoes than most other men I know. He probably owns more shoes than many women I know as well. In fact, for a man who has such a difficult time selecting a pair of shoes to purchase (he once spent about 1.5 hours picking out a pair of Birkenstock sandals, which he promptly rethought and then returned the next day for a different pair), it’s borderline miraculous that he could ever have found the time to purchase so many pairs. I make no claims as to the quality of his shoe collection, but the quantity is impressive.

I have friends who are married to men who might be casually referred to as a guy’s guy. These men spend their weekends watching sports. They know how to fix things around their home. They wouldn’t be caught dead sipping white wine. They don’t buy copies of Real Simple. They don’t know the difference between a Mary Jane and a peep toe. These friends often bemoan living with their more caveman-like husbands. They tell me they wish their husbands were more like Steve. By that, I assume they mean more interested in shoes. I tell them to be careful what they wish for. A husband like Steve may be able to tell you which pump looks best with your pencil skirt, but this knowledge comes with a price. A man who is knowledgeable about shoes will require a lot more closet space, and you’ll still have to live with a mound of man shoes next to your bed.

Posted on 02/12/2012 by Me 4

Selling My Sons To The Gypsies

Don’t let them fool you. They are not this quiet!

My weekdays begin in pretty much the same way every day during the school year. I don’t need to set an alarm because my boys, early risers that they are, wake me up by busting into our bedroom sometime between 6:15 and 6:45 a.m. They do this because years ago, when Joe was in preschool, we let him shower in our bathroom before school. Our brilliant logic was that 1) our shower is enclosed in glass, which meant less mess, 2) I’d have just one shower to clean instead of two, and 3) while he was showering I’d be able to lounge in bed and ease my way into my crazy day a bit more slowly. The arrangement continued to work great when Joe was in kindergarten and Luke began preschool. Two showers for the price of one, and I could be getting ready while that happened. Fast forward six years, though, and suddenly this arrangement is slightly less than ideal. Now they alternate showers, which means they’re using all my hot water. They also bicker about fairness like old ladies accusing each other of cheating at canasta. And, they’re doing all this in the space where I am trying to sleep. Not cool.

This morning was Groundhog Day all over again. Just starting on my sixth hour of sleep, the bedroom door flies open and as if the house is on fire the boys rush in fussing and yelling.

“I called it first!” Joe yelled.

“You were first yesterday,” Luke retorted. “It’s my turn to go first.”

“But, Luke, I got out of bed first so I could be the first in the shower.”

“It’s not your turn, Joe!” Luke complained.

I was livid. Well, I was as livid as an exhausted person who is barely awake can be. It’s not bad enough that I must wake up before 7 so the boys will be on time to the private school I chauffeur them to. Apparently, I’m meant to wake up to a noisy parade of foot stomping, whining, and caterwauling.

“Boys! Boys! Boys!” I yelled, without flipping over. “Please shut it. I don’t want to wake up to your fighting! Joe, it’s Luke’s turn today. Sorry.”

At that point, I rolled over to see at exactly what ungodly hour they had disrupted my REM sleep. It was 6:25. Are you kidding me? Twenty minutes earlier than my alarm was set? Then I noticed that Steve was still in bed. What the? He usually leaves for work by 5:30.

“Why are you still in bed?” I asked. He sat straight up.

“Why am I still in bed?” he asked right before he flew out of bed and headed toward the shower, boys still bickering over who was going to shower first.

“Your father. Your father is going to shower first because he’s late. Then, Luke will shower because you were first yesterday, Joe. End of story. Now stop fighting or I’m kicking you out.”

The rest of the getting ready process went smoothly. Steve was gone in a flash. Luke got through his shower quickly because his brother pestered him from outside the glass enclosure the entire time. I sat in bed waiting for them all to get out of the room so I could get ready and then make myself a latte, which I desperately needed. When I was a kid and we misbehaved, my mother used to threaten to sell my sisters and I to the gypsies. Are there still gypsies? If so, will they still hand out cash in exchange for random children? I try not to make empty promises, like the one where I threaten to sign away my legal rights to them if they don’t stop fighting. I mean, I’m fairly sure they know I wouldn’t really do that. At least, I don’t think I would. But, if they come in tomorrow morning yelling at each other before 7, I just might have to check into that gypsy thing a bit more seriously. Unless, of course, you know of someone who is in the market for a couple mostly sweet, slightly used, early rising children? You should know I’m not a great negotiator. I’m positive you could get a bargain. History suggests that I might be entertaining offers from serious buyers as early as 6:30 tomorrow morning. Only 24 days shopping days left until Christmas, you know.

Posted on 29/11/201229/11/2012 by Me 2

One Thing Leads To Another

Today I want to share with you a cautionary tale, an example of how a small first-world problem can morph and change into another small first-world problem and another after that on into infinity. If you’re not careful, a tiny first-world problem just might cost you your sanity. My mother always said that you can tell the size of a person by the size of the things that bother them. If that’s the case, I’m smaller than I want to admit. (And, I’m not talking about the quarter of an inch I afford myself when I tell people I’m actually 5’5″.)

First World Problem #1: A year ago September I got a new car. Well, it was a new car to me. It was actually my father-in-law’s car, which he had decided to replace with a newer version of the same thing. My new car was two years old when I got it, but it had one flaw. It smelled like my father-in-law. Now, this is not to say that my father-in-law is a stinky man. He’s not. In fact, I’m sure his hygiene is impeccable. After all, this is a man who safety pins his socks together so he never loses one to the black hole that materializes when you close the door to the clothes dryer. The car simply smelled like leather and my father-in-law’s cologne. No offense to my father-in-law, who is the kindest, most generous man I know (aside from his son), but I didn’t want to spend my days in a car that smelled like him. I merely wanted my car to feel like my car and I couldn’t feel like that when every time I opened my car door the aroma from within reminded me of Jim.

So, I went in the house, grabbed a scented car disc from the Scentsy company, attached it to my rear view mirror, and waited for the day when I felt like the car was mine. Sure enough, one day, I noticed that Jim had been replaced by a pleasant, cinnamon scent. The car was mine, and I kept it mine by replacing that disc every three months.

First World Problem #2: A week ago, I noticed that my car no longer had that pleasant, Welcome Home, cinnamon smell. So, when I got home I marched into the house to grab a new disc. It was then that I realized that I was out of my favorite scent. I had two choices on-hand for a replacement...Sunkissed Citrus and Coconut Lemongrass. After weighing my options carefully, I went with the second scent, installed it in my car, and forgot about it. Long about the time I needed to pick the boys up from school, the car was well-saturated with the smell of coconut and lemongrass. My car smelled like Thai curry. It was a distinct change from the cinnamon, but I’m working on dealing with change with more grace so I inhaled deeply and carried on. By the time I got back from chauffeur duty, however, I noticed that I was quite stuffy. I am a person who is sensitive to smells, and apparently the new scent was not agreeing with my nose. It’s no good to have a car air freshener that makes you ill. It had to go. Hubby removed the offender, I took some Sudafed, and I waited for the scent to fade.

First World Problem #3: It’s now a week later and the coconut-lemongrass smell in my car has lightly faded but is still pervasive. For some reason, it won’t skedaddle. So now, every time I get in my car, I smell Thai curry. Thai curry (especially green curry with tofu) is one of my all-time favorite meals, and my car smells exactly like that. It’s disturbing. For starters, no one wants to smell green curry at 7:45 a.m. before coffee. But later, when I get in my car in the afternoon just at the time I’m trying to avoid late afternoon snacking, my stomach starts growling at what seems to be the lingering scent of take out Thai curry. Then today, not unlike the reaction of Pavlov’s dog to the introduced stimulus, my mouth watered when I got into my vehicle. This is not a good development.

First World Problem #4: This afternoon I mentioned to hubby in a text that every time I enter my car now I want Thai food. His response? Ooh…Thai food. Apparently now hubby wants it too. Any guesses what we’ll be eating for dinner tomorrow night? I’m hoping that the combination of satisfying my Thai food craving and installing a new scented disc in my car will turn things around for me in this first-world problem situation. That way I can go back to being annoyed that the new LTE network in Denver isn’t quite consistent enough for me and my first-world-awesome iPhone 5.

Posted on 27/11/2012 by Me 4

Sorry — I Gave At The Office

Okay. You caught me. I am late writing this blog again. Why? Basically because, well, I am insane. I am normally a busy person. I don’t think anyone who knows me would dispute that. But, during the holiday season, I become the rough equivalent of an ADHD squirrel on four Red Bulls. I take my normal daily workload and add a few items to it. Today was our planned “lazy day” at home. In my head, I imagined watching football while casually stringing lights on the tree. Somehow, though, that leisurely day dissipated into chaos. We put the exterior Christmas lights on the house, hung the wreaths, washed and folded four loads of laundry, meticulously placed seven strands of lights on a 10 foot tall Christmas tree and then decorated it, adorned the boys’ tree with ornaments, posed for our annual holiday card photos, edited said photos, designed and ordered 100 holiday cards online, cleared the refrigerator of the last of the Thanksgiving Day leftovers, and did it all without murdering our children in the process. I think that’s a reasonably full day, don’t you? So, I hope you will excuse the fact that this is a brief and prosaic entry, devoid of pithy sayings and greeting card sentiments. I hope you’ll understand that today I gave at the office and have nothing left to offer.

On a side note….to the cyclist who chastised us for parking briefly near the front of our neighborhood while we used a self-timer to attempt to capture at least one decent photo of our four-person family for our holiday cards, thank you for starting off our holiday season with the kind of spirit we’ve come to know and expect this time of year. It wouldn’t be the holidays without a spoil-sport Grinch now, would it? Keep calm and merry on, friends.

Posted on 26/11/2012 by Me

Squirrel!

Sometimes I wonder how I get anything done. Ever. I take the most circuitous routes when I begin a task. I guess I’m too easily distractible. I’m kind of like Dug, the dog in Up. I start out doing one thing and then somehow…SQUIRREL! So, that is what happened to me again tonight and that is why it is late in the evening and I am once again staring at my self-imposed deadline, which is less than an hour from right now, and shaking my head. The Squirrel effect seems to worsen at night and when I’m hungry and when I’m procrastinating and when I’m sleep-deprived and occasionally when I’m over caffeinated. Now that I think about it, it’s truly miraculous that I ever complete a task successfully. But, I digress.

Tonight I began researching airfare for our now decided upon Spring Break trip. We bid on and won a vacation rental last Saturday at the boys’ school auction. Now I have to figure out how to get us to our destination with the least expensive airfare. It’s all very exciting. And, while I should be focused on filling out paperwork so we can schedule all the testing we need to have done to get IEPs and/or 504s set up for the boys for next school year, researching vacation travel is a far less odious task so that has taken priority.

I began on Expedia, but as I was looking at the ludicrous cost of airfare for this trip the wind kicked up outside. We get a lot of high winds here in November and December so I immediately began wondering if tonight would be really windy. So, I buzzed on over to the site for the NBC news affiliate here in Denver to check our weather conditions. I was pleased to note that although we’re in for a cool down tomorrow, no high winds are predicted tonight. Dodged that bullet. But, while I was on the NBC site, I started wondering what the heck has been going on in the world since I’ve been checked out this week. Off to Fox News I went to figure out what is being reported on currently. I perused the headlines as I had planned but then, at the bottom of the front page in the Latest News section, a story caught my eye about some folks in the Florida panhandle who poached their neighbor’s pet turkey for their own Thanksgiving dinner. From that story, I noticed a link to the best and worst swimsuit photos from Hollywood. That seemed like an adequate distraction, so I went off to check those out. After deciding that most people over the age of 50 look sad and droopy at the beach (yes…I mean you David Hasselhoff and Ivana Trump), I was feeling discouraged about being just 5.5 years from that dreaded physical cliff (I can’t bring myself to care about the fiscal cliff because there’s nothing I can do about that cluster). In a desperate attempt to elevate my spirits, I texted with my friend Heather for a while. At which point, Heather reminded me that it won’t matter what I look like in a swimsuit at the beach in March because I’ll be at the beach in a swimsuit in MARCH. Well played, Heather. And, so I put my phone down and decided to get back to Expedia because I still have not booked any travel yet.

At some point in the next few weeks I will break down and actually commit to a flight itinerary…probably not without a massive mental meltdown as my shaking fingers attempt to input the credit card number I have memorized. But, I will do it because I have paperwork to fill out and I can’t get to that task until I have something really incredible to look forward to as a reward for all my hard work. And now, as I sit in bed and finish this blog, I’m wondering how I will be able to get the house cleaned, the table set, and the meal cooked for dinner at 4 p.m. because I am sure there will be myriad distractions tomorrow. Distractions are the thing that….wait…do we actually own enough napkin rings for 12 place settings?

Posted on 21/11/201222/11/2012 by Me 3

Facebook Knows Me Too Well

A while back I wrote a blog about fate, coincidence, and signs. My premise was that life presents you with signs that attempt to nudge you in the direction you’re supposed to be heading in this life. If you’re paying attention and are self-aware, you will notice the signs the first time they present themselves to you. If you’re not, the signs will keep appearing over and over until you take notice and then hopefully hop aboard the clue bus and go forward. I still believe this to be true. In light of this belief, however, I’ve been struggling with something that keeps happening in my life.

Just before Halloween and in honor of that spooky holiday, I changed my Facebook profile photo to a shot of me in a witch costume I wore to pick up my boys from school last year on October 31st. It seemed appropriate to deck myself out on Facebook for one of my favorite holidays. I thought it was kind of a cute idea. On November 1st, I promptly removed the photo of witchy me and replaced it with a photo of me from our trip to Moab last spring. For the past two weeks, though, that photo of witchy me keeps reappearing randomly as my Facebook profile photo without my changing it. It’s happened both on my iPhone Facebook app and on my Facebook page on my MacBook. Now, I’m sure this is nothing sinister, but it’s starting to get a little weird.

When I see that witchy photo, I go in and change it back. Simple enough, right? No need to freak out about it. It’s probably just some sort of mix-up with the cookies from the Facebook app, right? It’s definitely not some type of sign. If it were, what would it be a sign of? I should do some serious research into Wicca because perhaps that is my calling? I should wear black more often? Hats really work for me? Tonight, I told my hubby about it.

“You know that photo of me that I put up for Halloween?” I asked.

“The one of you in the witch costume?” he replied.

“Yep. That one. Remember how I told you a week or so ago that it was back?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I changed it then and today it’s back again,” I said. “Do you suppose someone is trying to tell me something?”

This is when he began laughing.

“What are you laughing at? This is not funny,” I said, right before I started laughing too.

“I don’t think the universe is trying to tell you that you’re a witch,” he said and gave me a hug. “But, it is a pretty big coincidence,” he added in that quiet sort of way that’s meant to be an underhanded remark. Then he started laughing again.

“Fine. Side with the universe. And Facebook,” I said as I changed the photo back to the one of me in Moab on one of my happiest days ever.

Now, I don’t really believe the universe is trying to send me a message with the repeated appearance of that witchy photo, but it does kind of bother me a bit that Facebook seems to know me a bit better than I think it should. 😉

Posted on 14/11/2012 by Me 9

The Babysitter Confession

We’ve never had to pay an actual sitter. Shocking, I know. Our sons are 9 and 11 and, for their entire childhoods, when we’ve needed a date night or decided to go away for a weekend, we’ve had family members available to watch them. This situation was partly by design and partly the result of fate. When we were in our early 30s and decided we might like to have children, we moved back to Denver to be closer to family. This wasn’t as much a babysitting ploy as a desire to have our children grow up near their relatives. Both Steve and I grew up at a distance from our aunts, uncles, grandparents, and cousins, and we knew we wanted something different for our children. In 1999, when we first moved to Denver, we had three sisters and one grandmother nearby for babysitting. After Joe was born, Steve’s parents did what they said they would never do; they bought a second home here so they could see their grandson more often. So, soon we were up to three aunts, a grandmother, and a set of grandparents. Five years later, my father moved back to Denver and we both had our entire families within 30 minutes of our home. And, as fate would have it, no one else in our family has children, so our boys are the only grandchildren and the only nephews. People actually want to spend time with them. Yeah. I don’t get it either.

Now, before you go off on how lucky we are to be in this situation, how lucky we are not to have to pay someone to watch our children, I need to tell you what it costs to have your family members watch your children. It’s not a monetary cost. But, trust me, there’s a price for their services. For example, when family members watch your children, your home is an open book. They have unlimited access to your dirty bathrooms and your unorganized pantry and they’re family and working for free. So they’re not afraid to help themselves and to snoop around. You come home from a relaxing evening out and are greeted with “You have more hair spray than Donald Trump” or “I’m going to borrow all three seasons of Arrested Development that you own on DVD.” And, you can’t mind because they just spent three hours with your boisterous, exhausting children with ADHD so you didn’t have to. As much as you’d like to protest, you’re powerless.

Another hidden cost is extracted through paybacks. Your sister comes over and spends eight hours with your kids so you can go on a long bike ride with some friends. You have a great time and find you are actually excited at the prospect of sitting around watching Madagascar for the 99th time with your kids now that you’re home. And, just as you’re thanking her for babysitting, she casually mentions that she could use some help with a little project she needs to complete at her house next weekend. Oh…and you might want to bring that steamer you own because the wallpaper you’ll be helping to remove is really stuck on there. Well, there is no getting out of that situation. She helped you out. She expects reciprocity. You must comply.

Tonight I discovered the highest cost of all. My sister and brother-in-law came to spend two and a half hours with Joe and Luke so we could grab some wine and tapas at a local wine bar. We had a magnificent time talking about our hobbies and many things other than our children. The boys were thrilled to show their uncle their new Skylanders characters and do battle. When we returned home, we discovered that our children had been loaded with candy and taught some new songs. Thanks for that, Uncle Chris. Tonight as I drift off to sleep I will be singing a never-ending tune about a moose that stood around with one hoof on the ground. Not sure exactly which second-rate summer camp taught you that ditty, but I’m ever so grateful. Could you please teach the boys the diarrhea song next? That would be awesome.

Oh. All right. I jest. Of course we’re eternally grateful for the years of dedicated service our families have put into being the best aunts, uncles, and grandparents in the world and caring for our boys with the same love and devotion we would. (Scratch that…they’ve probably cared for our sons with more love and devotion than we have…or at least more patience.) I can’t imagine how many thousands of dollars we’ve saved in childcare over the past 11 years, not to mention how fortunate we’ve been to know that our boys were actually safely engaged in play rather than placated by a television for four hours while we paid some random teenage girl to talk incessantly on her cell phone to her boyfriend. Still, when the boys are old enough to stay alone for a couple hours on occasion next year, I’m probably not going to miss the guilt I feel when I have to find someone, anyone, to hang with our boys so we can grab dinner. It will be nice to be free of that monkey. Come to think of it, I’m definitely not going to miss the moose from that song either.

Posted on 10/11/2012 by Me

I Can Resist Anything…Except Temptation

“I can resist anything except temptation.” ~Oscar Wilde

Everyone has their temptation. As a rule, I like to think I’m fairly well in control of mine. My weakness is candy. As you can imagine, Halloween is a nightmare for me. We bought five large bags of Halloween candy this year. I handed every bit of it out, only to discover that my boys had returned from their trick-or-treating with the rough equivalent of what I had spent the evening unloading. Seriously? What kind of cruel joke is that?

Since the boys went back to school, I’ve begun working out again. I hike. I skate. I practice yoga. The combination of the increased exercise and the decreased eating out generally puts me back to what I like to call my “winter weight.” My winter weight is 7-8 pounds less than my summer weight. I know it seems odd that I’m thinner during the time when most people become more sedentary, but I’m a stay-at-home mom. When my boys are home for the summer, I have less time for myself and exercise goes to the back burner. When they start back at school, I have more free time to hit the yoga studio. It just works out that way.

But, right about the time when my clothes are fitting again and I’m feeling happy about my healthfulness, Halloween rears its ugly head. Don’t get me wrong. I have willpower. I do. I can live with unopened bags of candy in my house for weeks. No problem. But, the minute something is opened (be it a 5 pound bag of peanut M&Ms or a can of Pringles), all bets are off. I can’t stop myself. I have issues. You see, there are two very large bowls of candy sitting on the kitchen counter right now. And, while I can turn my nose up at a Butterfinger or Twix, I’m eating Tootsie Rolls, Nerds, and Twizzlers like a bear storing up for winter hibernation.

Tonight I had a craving for one of my favorite candies…Hot Tamales. I’ve been addicted to those red capsules of evil dating back to my days working for Mann Theaters in high school. I would buy a box on my break, take it into a theater, and down the sugar while watching part of Out of Africa or Back To The Future. I bought a few boxes weeks ago because I like to have a stash on hand for family movie nights at home. The boxes have been in the top cupboard of the pantry for weeks, and I’ve done an excellent job of ignoring them. But, tonight, blame it on the candy floodgates having been opened by the decadence of Halloween or blame it on PMS, I wanted those stupid cinnamon-flavored pieces of nutritional garbage. (First three ingredients: sugar, corn syrup, modified food starch. Nutritional value = -536.)

I brought them up to my room where I began watching a Netflix rental. I set them atop the books on my nightstand and stared at them. Or, rather, they stared at me. Perched atop The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle, there seemed to be a battle of the forces of good and evil playing itself out an arm’s reach away…the tamales representing my baser, selfish wants and the book representing my desire to bring myself to a higher realm of consciousness, my zen. I really wanted to tear the box open, but I would look at Tolle’s book and remind myself that I didn’t need the candies. I simply wanted them. I was full from a pizza dinner with the family. I’d eaten more than I usually do at dinnertime, and I was already feeling a bit uncomfortable. (Ever since my gall bladder and I parted ways, I can’t quite eat the way I used to. Getting old sucks.) And, I knew that eating 500 calories of food dye and sugar would make me feel absolutely miserable both physically and mentally. I pushed thoughts of the devil candies from my mind. I watched my movie. I played Word with Friends on my iPhone. I ironed. Yes. Ironed. On a Saturday night, even. I read aloud to my sons. I stuck my tongue out at the red box in defiance.

It worked. The box still sits unopened on my nightstand…three hours after its appearance there. And, I’m feeling fairly smug about the whole thing. My pants will still fit tomorrow. I did it! I resisted temptation. I feel like I could take on the world. Now, I merely have to hope that my level head and nerves of steel persist through the night because I’m too tired now to take them back downstairs and tuck them away in the cupboard above the pantry where they belong. You know, one could rationalize that cinnamon candies are just a few ingredients away from being a cinnamon bun. That makes them justifiable as breakfast food, don’t you think?

Posted on 03/11/2012 by Me

Into the Virtual Wastebasket I Go

I have started writing this blog tonight no less than four times. Each entry has ended the same way. I select all the text, hit delete, and prepare to start again. I’m crumpling up pages of text virtually and tossing them into an imaginary wastebasket. Why I am struggling so mightily tonight to write? My only explanation is that my thoughts have been scattered today. As a writer, I’m one who needs time to reflect deeply, and my thoughts today have lingered on the shallow end of the pool.

It’s been a long week. My brain feels as abused as a New Jersey shore house battered by Hurricane Sandy. So, rather than spew some nonsense here that can at best be described as the ramblings of a woman overwrought by lying political ads, way too many Skittles, and far too little sleep…all in combination with a slow-moving chest cold…I’m going to pack it in. I am selecting all, hitting delete, and tossing myself into the wastebasket. Time to empty the trash. I can start fresh tomorrow.

Posted on 02/11/2012 by Me 1

Live Now and Zen

Because even when it seems like a gag gift, the present is still a gift