Today was my 11th annual jaunt to one of the local middle schools to judge [School Name] Project presentations. It's one of my favorite days of the year. All the 8th-graders in town have to do a semester-long project on a topic of their choice that culminates in a written paper AND a presentation in front of community members posing as judges. We rate them 1-to-4 on various things (not just the writing, or the actual speaking, but like 10 different specific things: tone of voice, extra 3D/show-and-tell stuff, ability to recover from errors, etc.) It's extraordinarily rare for me to give anyone a 1 for any part of it. Today was a LOT of 4s. And they were actually a pretty good collection of presentations this year. Some years I feel like I've stepped into Lazy Teenage Hell. Not much of that this time, thank God!

So here's the topics they presented today, with commentary as appropriate:

• Creating video games (a good start; he had some technical difficulties getting started, but he's obviously interested in the subject and juiced about studying for this career, so that always helps a lot)
• Computer programming (another job-related one; not too many people get excited about writing code, but this kid is one of them!)
• History of tractors (yes, really, chosen because he's "been driving tractors since I was, like 7, and my grandpa used to have, like, 48 tractors"--and it was actually fun to listen to him gabbling on about John Deere and Allis-Chalmers, etc.)
• Renewable energy (well done; I wanted to ask her how she feels about the current policies in D.C. but I didn't want to start WWIII in the judges' area....)
• New Orleans (we should all go, and here are some Voodoo chips and Mardi Gras beads--it's ALWAYS good to feed the judges!)
• Childhood in Nazi Germany (this was absolutely fascinating--the kid's babysitter/nanny when he was little was a woman who grew up in Germany during WWII; she was 7 when the war ended; he did an absolutely wonderful job integrating her stories with historical research)
• Jamaica (we should all go to Jamaica, which is a constitutional monarchy without a monarch where their favorite drink is rum; I think this is the first time they were allowed to do vacation destinations as a project, and I got two of them)
• History of [the city in which she lives] (barely phoned it in, and ended with "it was hard to find information because it's not a very big town"--my first question was "Did you GO to the public library?" Kid: "Oh yeah, I got a book there." Me: "I work there. We have file cabinets FULL of stuff about the city's history." I was pissed. Don't expect me to believe you started this project prior to May 10, dude!)
• Schizophrenia (nicely done, though she talked so fast I'm not entirely sure what she said--but she had a LOT to say!)
• Hockey history (first 6 professional teams; surprisingly interesting, despite my overall lack of interest in ice hockey)
• [state north of us] university sports (fun, and interesting reasons for doing this topic--neither parent went to college at this school--and he's stoked about getting an athletic scholarship there in a few years)
• How did WW2 start/end (ah the obligatory WW2 talk...yawn--seriously, kids, it's interesting but find a different angle--see above re growing up in Nazi Germany)
• Large animal veterinarian (another one that gets done often, though usually not specifically large animals--however, she raises pigs and her sister has horses, so she's motivated, and interesting)
• North Korean human rights (this was a split-personality presentation: the kid had a speech impediment and maybe some other, cognitive, issues, and he pretty much just read his slideshow to us; BUT he knew his stuff, he did research (he's not Korean), and it was topical and I learned a BUNCH of stuff from him. BRAVO!!)

LUNCH (I brought a cheese sandwich and walnuts and almonds and begged a bottle of pop from the teacher's lounge--and I read about books while I ate)

• History of basketball (another topic about which I have zero interest, but the kid made it fun to listen to)
• Animal shelters (yet another perennial--she didn't kill herself with research, but it was clearly presented and heartfelt. And there were no pictures of puppy mills, which was a blessing; there are usually horrible photos that go with this subject)
• Pediatrician (possibly the most professionally-done speech of the day. She kicked ass in terms of speaking and researching, citing sources in the speech itself, and just generally Doing It Right)
• Volkswagens (who knew there were VW hobbyists? And this kid is specifically into VW buses! He had me hooked--and then he started explaining all the engine specs...yawn...but his enthusiasm was palpable)
• Airplane piloting (this was one of those kids with the "modern" hairstyle that mimics the kids -I- went to middle school with 40 years ago; he wasn't all that into the whole academic thing, but he wants to be a pilot and has actually co-piloted a plane, so that was cool)
• Law enforcement (unfortunate: very quiet, pretty much never looked up from reading his notecards, obviously scared out of his mind; and he wants to be a cop)
• Cosmetology (she wants to do makeup when she grows up, or model; I know what you're picturing, and she's not any of those things, but she definitely has presence and poise)
• The Holocaust (what a way to end the day: a dispiriting and dispirited talk on genocide; I'll eat my hat if she did more research than opening her history textbook; too bad, really--she has a wonderful speaking voice)

And then we ran for the parking lot to beat the lines of parental cars. On the way home I stopped at Aldi's--where I had to be physically SHOWN where the refried beans are, since I still can't find them on my own because I'm apparently BLIND--and Walgreen's--5 Rxes for Beast.

Oh yeah, because I'd set this day up in March, and last week Beast scheduled his cortisone injection into his lower back for this morning. So I took him over to the office for that, and he'd set up a ride to come home. I'm a horrible wife. But really: he's had something like 10 of these things now, and it's pretty much all show for the insurance company. Maybe it'll help with some of the pain, but it hasn't been much of a winning option yet (since 2011, mind you), so we all know the doctor will see him, post-cortisone, next week and (hopefully) schedule surgery for "soon" which realistically means June sometime. For those keeping score at home, this will be #2 on the lumbar region. The first time was in 2012 where he had a laminectomy, ablation, and other fancy words (the doctor told me immediately post-op that there was "scraping" of the nerve off the vertebrae--hurrah for technical jargon). Then he had similar stuff done inside his neck in December 2015, after the debacle of our vacation in October when he ended up in the ER waiting room for 9 hours in St. Louis.

He's in bed asleep, which isn't shocking at all. He warned me it was likely he would be. I have no idea if I'm supposed to wake him, so I probably will just let him sleep. Maybe the pain level will be such that he can actually rest for a change.

So, yeah. Just another day in the life of.

Facepalm

Sometimes people are dumb. The sad thing is that these answers aren't a lot different from those given by people in my grade...35 years ago. We are now adults, and I'm sure they haven't figured any more out since then. So it's not JUST kids that are dumb.

Some outtakes:

• We fought the Cold War to "finish war."
• There are 400 amendments to the Constitution. Nope, there are 24 apparently. Or 20.
• Our nation's capital is Austin.
• If the President and Vice President both die, the First Lady gets to be President.

Q: Who were we fighting in the Revolutionary War
A: Union v. Confederate
A: Ourselves (I guess this is true in the sense that they were British citizens fighting for independence from Britain)
A: Europe

Q: What is the name of the Vice President of the United States now?
A: Klenton

Q: What did the Emancipation Proclamation do?
A: Free Africans.
A: Emancipate us from England

However, if you are interested in sparking a conversation with someone--especially teens--don't talk directly to them. [also found at Teenagers are Ridiculous]

Home repair

Today's been a weird day. It doesn't feel like Sunday--I worked yesterday, and I have tomorrow off. I went to church, but even that was weird as our pastor is on sabbatical for the summer so we are having guests and backups while he's gone. Like the Supremes but no Diana. Anyway...it was a good sermon.

Then I came home and we started moving the smaller things out of the living room and dining room in preparation for the guys' arrival on Tuesday to repair the damage from Beast's last escapade. Tomorrow Katherine and Alan and baby E are coming over for a few hours of family time, and after they're gone we'll move out the big furniture: couch, dining room table, etc.

Sparky graduated two weeks ago today, so he's been home since then trying to get his "adult life" started. Going through all the crap in his bedroom, sorting and tossing out stuff, and on the phone endlessly about jobs, apartments and friend drama. There's a girl...young woman. He has been a trouper, but he so very desperately wants to be O.U.T. and on his own. Not enough to be going door-to-door looking for jobs, though; that's notable. And he still has to finish one class this fall, so he can't get a full-time 'normal' job unless they're ok with him bailing for a few hours a week for 16 weeks.

This week, Beast is back on the road. He'll be in Michigan all week visiting the Mother Ship (his term for this site). The following week he's doing a swing through L.A. and surrounding areas. I'm honestly kind of glad to see him go. Life is much less stressful and worrisome when he's not around.

Meanwhile, this coming Friday, my brother Del is coming to visit because he's got business visits to make in our area. So he'll be using us as Home Base for those for ....some period of time. The day after we found out about this, my nephew James called after 7 months of silence. I wasn't able to pick up the phone, so he texted: "call me omg" which could mean anything from "I'm engaged!" to "Dad died!" to "I just crushed my hand between a forklift and a wall and I'm calling from the ER!" None of the above as it turned out; he is closing on a house, moving in this coming week, and has invited us up to 'inspect' (a.k.a. ooh and ahh over) it next Sunday. Del wanted to see him and Don while he was in the area anyway, so we'll just make it a family thing.

(It just occurred to me that I'm probably supposed to let Katherine et al. know, which is tricky since Del surely wants nothing to do with seeing her, so I wasn't going to tell her that he was here, but now that James has this house thing, I have to tell her that...holy shit, I'm still in high school! This is why [my?] family is so fucking annoying. Guess I'll just lay it all out tomorrow and let the chips fall, etc.]

Work is...work. Frustrating. Explosively irritating. I'm doing better at Keeping My Mouth Shut and Being Nice to Coworkers (smh) and I got a decent annual performance review last month at the end of our fiscal year. Aside from the BS that I have to be nicey-nicey while other people can bark and snap, it's actually going pretty well. So behind in cataloging it's no longer an issue to anyone but me, I guess, but I think that's just life. We're under a city-wide hiring freeze due to our new governor's political maneuvering, and we're short about 1 FTE person which means we're all pitching in more than usual. Life goes on. And on

Beast informed me late last week that he's pretty sure that I've developed apnea. He says that since my surgery in early February, I've gotten substantially more snore-y and stop breathing briefly at night only to start back up with a snort. So I've called my doctor to schedule a sleep study. I think the doc is also going to make me start taking insulin or at least start monitoring my glucose level very closely. It would be useful if I would stop eating so much crap. Maybe I'll take him up on signing up with the medical practice's diet-and-nutrition program.

Two of my nieces--Katherine and Marguerite--are pregnant again. M is due in the next 3 weeks and K is 'officially' due in October, but she will probably go in early and be induced because of this.

So that's the update.

It's been forever. Again.

Last week was [Middle School] Project judging and I've been meaning to blog about that for a week. I even kept a list of the projects. So in the event that I put this off for another 11 weeks....here's the list and assorted comments.

• Club Feet (this was one of my [Anglo] Sunday School kids, a special request I made since he said it was ok for me to sit in; he didn't tell me he was presenting in Spanish! And he did pretty well--language was not the problem with this presentation; he just didn't do a lot of research, but he did answer questions well--also in Spanish--at the end)
• Improving Your Singing Voice ("everyone can sing!"--uh, no, not really, but I'm glad you're so enthusiastic)
• Foster Care to Adoption Process (yes, her family has done this)
• AMC--Congenital Joint Problems (this was the first time anyone has ever brought in a visual aid that was a person, in this case a sweet 6-year-old boy in a wheelchair who lives next door to the presenter; the presenter is the daughter of one of the secretaries at my therapist's office who came to watch, so that was weird, but fun)
• History of Soccer
• Forensics
• The Color Barrier in Sports
• Building Trades (a perfect example of a kid who is a lost cause academically who did a good job on this project because of his interest in it...)
• Extinction
• Mobile Gaming (...and the obverse: someone who is clearly interested in the topic, but skated through the work and tried to fake the presentation)
• Interior Design as a Career

Lunch (dash to BK for burger and GIANT diet caffeine beverage)

• Autism
• Lego (the presenter is autistic, but his enthusiasm trumped his innate limitations in the speech-making department--and the timing of these two presentations was interesting)
• Cats (WTF, dude, WTF--so awful, and the kid is so needy and wrecked I just wanted to cry through the whole "presentation" during which he had his back to us for at least half of the time)
• Depression in Teens (again with the stellar timing, since the previous kid is all kinds of massively depressed)
• The Northern Lights
• Becoming a Preschool Teacher (she will be a delightful teacher!)
• Anesthesiology as a Career
• Make-a-Wish Foundation
• Nuclear Power (in spite of a serious speech impediment, this was easily the best, most enthusiastic, most seriously intense presentation of the day; the dude WORKED on it, and had a blast!)
• The History of Disney (kind of a mishmosh of the company and the studio and the family--not a great presentation)

This is my tenth year doing this, and every year I'm surprised, irritated, thrilled, saddened in almost equal measure by the snapshot of the kids I see. Even the lousy presentations are often done by really decent kids. In ten years, I think there've been less than 5 who have pissed me off to the point I wanted to flunk them on principle regardless of the merits of the project. In general, they are good kids, just trying to get through a pretty massive project and learning SOMEthing (even if it's just 'hey, I shoulda put in more work!'). And the teachers are always enthusiastic and positive; they just want all of them to succeed. It's kind of inspirational.


I'm not making promises about coming back. It seems like the kiss of death. But, y'know, maybe.

What the matter with kids?

The same thing is wrong with kids that's wrong with the adults around them. In the past 5 days, I've had two teens of my close acquaintance struggle with some pretty serious issues.

One of them is my godson's brother. It's a complicated situation, so suffice it to say that he wants to change his name back to the name he was given at birth, prior to his adoption. For the record, neither name is particularly "weird" and he is 18 and in the Army. Because he's 18 and all that goes with that, he immediately told his family about his decision and gotten some major blowback from his mom--not the easiest person in the world on a good day--saying she will disown him if he goes through with that. He's surprised, which he shouldn't be, and hurt, which makes sense. I have no idea if he'll do it because he is, after all, 18; so far it's just a Facebook name change. From my standpoint, he should do what he wants but he needs to understand consequences of those actions. And I'm super-happy he's 1000 miles from his mom for the foreseeable future. Best choice he has made is to join up, get some seriously solid discipline in his life, and get out of his toxic household.

The other problem is more serious. I teach Sunday School to middle school kids along with a parent of two of the kids in the class. Obviously, over the past two years I've gotten to know these kids--the whole class--pretty well and love them to death even when I'm ready to throttle them for being goofy. Yesterday, the mom of one of the kids pulled me aside to tell me that her 13-year-old son is going into the 'hospital' tomorrow for addiction treatment. Last year, they discovered he was cutting himself. Then he joined the football team in the fall which brought some social standing in school and seemed to inspire a more confident bearing. Apparently in November he discovered a pot supplier and started using that, and at some point added some painkillers he found in his parents' medicine cabinet. His mom told me that he had specifically told her that it was OK if she told me what was going on. So I found him in the Sunday School room--alone--after church and gave him a big hug. Meanwhile, his 14-year-old sister is overcompensating as usual and being a completely hyper-spaz "perfect child." Thank God she's actually smart and funny, but she's really needy right now too.

Kids have hard lives. They don't always know the best way to get through the hard parts and make things harder in the long run. It's painful to watch.

And don't get me start on my own son. Sparky's awesome, but there are times when I just want to shake some sense into him, even as I realize that he's got to figure out this whole thing about life/job/school for himself and live with his decisions. Fortunately, he seems to be muddling along in mostly the right direction. Finally.

Avoidance

I should be working on this morning's Sunday School lesson, or at least settling on what I'm doing with the (probably small turnout) class today, but I had a thought.

You know when you get together with a friend who brings along some friends of his* own and it brings some deeper understanding of your friend? You get to see how he^ interacts with others, you get to meet some potentially cool people--I mean, after all, they are people someone you like has chosen to spend time with so you should have stuff in common--and maybe make some new friends of your own. This is the expected outcome, I think, in gatherings of this sort.

So, what does it mean when you come across someone in the Friend of a Friend situation that you absolutely loathe? Like, on sight. And then he^ opens his* mouth and confirms that he^ is worthy only of being swatted or ignored at best. And once you've been introduced he^ ignores you and prates on and on about how wonderful your mutual friend is in every way. Which, technically, of course is true. I mean you both like this friend, right? But suddenly you are questioning your friend's judgment in the friend-making department and wondering if you also are a complete jackass.

It's even worse when you have a good friend who is married to an asshat. Or, in my case--though this is NOT where this thought originated--a sister whose husband needs to be dropkicked into oblivion.

What does one do when one sees a friend being toadied to? Agree with the toad? Ignore the toad? Argue with the toad? There's no win-win solution and I just end up feeling weirdly distanced and disconnected from my friend and sort of jealous and weird and insecure and middle-school-y.

Which brings me full-circle to the need to do some work on Sunday School stuff.

________
* or her
^ or she
Both done for ease since having to write "he or she" in every case would be ludicrous and I just can't deal with "they" all the time. In this case, it got kind of convoluted writing "they" anyway.

12 Days of Christmas Blog Challenge

5 Life lessons you learnt in 2013 (29th December)

I'm still working on internalizing and living most of these, but they are the ones that I had to keep going back to revisit because they are HARD for me.

1. Detachment from drama is necessary. I've never liked drama, or dramatic people, but this year was a solid reminder that this is a wholly rational thing--drama isn't good for me.
2. Babies' births are everyday miracles. I watched one arrive this year, and it's pretty unbelievable. Another addition to the extended family looks like it will be arriving any day now, and I'm beyond excited even though I won't be there this time.
3. Grades in school do not indicate success in life. I hope. ;-)
4. Say no and mean it, and then don't feel guilty about it.
5. People, in general, are good and helpful and friendly. I think most of us have a much larger support system than we recognize, or utilize.

Click on image to play along

Holidailies

12-11 -
Grinch Week: Kids these days! (alternative title - "Back in *my* day...)

I try very hard NOT to say either of these things without deep irony-slash-sarcasm. Kids are kids, regardless, and I'm sure when I was a kid a lot of people felt I was an entitled toerag. I will say that I'm glad I am not a kid today, specifically a teenager, because the stresses and fears and pressures seem so much greater than they did when I was younger. Maybe that's just having a larger worldview than I did then, and maybe it's partly that I wouldn't want to revisit those (teenage) years under ANY circumstances.... Regardless, there really is nothing new under the sun, and most kids are awesome. Only the small percentage of really horrible kids get most of the attention from crabby adults, which is a shame; they'd be less crabby if they noticed the thousands of pretty cool people they ignore!

New baby in the family

Welcome, Elias, to our family!! Weighing in at 5 pounds, 11 ounces and 19 inches long (and slightly over two weeks early on purpose), he is totally gorgeous. Mom is fine, baby is fine, there was very little drama at all, and that's a very good thing after last time.

Then I came home (arriving about 6:30) and got to be the heavy, making Beast stop working in the yard--he could barely stand on both feet without weaving in place--and then making him a sandwich that he fell asleep while eating. After waking him up, for ten minutes, he got crabby ... but also went upstairs, fell into bed, and had a muscle spasm in his left leg for 20 minutes. Once it settled, we got his CPAP on and going and he's sacked out for the night.

Whee.

Still and all.

New baby. 

W00t!

What a week...

Talk about an emotional rollercoaster...

Christmas was awesome; completely boring with lotsa good swag for all.

Work this week was about as close to vacation as work could be. It's gonna be hard getting back into this whole "having a boss" thing in two weeks, but Techie Librarian is looking like she's ready to be OVAH-WITH this interim director gig.

Thursday morning I found a post from one of my college profs about one of his colleagues (another prof in the same department) who has been a joy to get to know outside of prof-hood, and who has been battling cancer for several years. It sounds pretty bad--the war is nearly over.

Thursday night sucked for other nonbloggable reasons.

Yesterday, the check from the sale of FIL's out-of-state condo arrived.

My eyes have gotten quite bad this week, especially in the shifting from one distance to another. As in...it doesn't happen.

Beast has been very occupied this week with getting the house wired to legally and safely be able to plug in the generator to power the house if/when we lose electricity the next time. He's done a lot of research to make sure he knows what he's doing, purchased several new parts, watch a gazillion videos, showed Sparky (irony much?) some basic and not-so-basic wiring tips, and hasn't electrocuted himself. Plus, he installed an automatic battery-powered light next to the fuse box that will come on when the power goes out.

Yesterday I had a headache all day. Took aspirin at about 10:30, Tylenol at 1, and Advil at 3, and then worked a manic-busy 2-hour shift at Reference. Two other reference staff had already left sick, and the only other one there was trying to wind things up to go on vacation, so I really couldn't leave. The headache was one of those perfect storm headaches: tension, sinus, and eye-strain all at once.

Went and picked out new eyeglass frames for the Rx I got last month. It's a new procedure since last time I bought glasses (new insurance), so it took awhile longer. But people were super-nice at the new place, which is off-set by the fact that I probably won't get the glasses for about 10 days. Back up the truck: I'll be chugging down the painkillers this week.

We got the @*%^ing paperwork for the last step in settling FIL's estate from BIL today. After three weeks of him being a Class-A dick about it.

Tonight I got a text from a former youth group member asking if I was busy tonight. Well, it turned out she wasn't able to leave the house, but she texted me the "gist" of things. Her mom and step-dad are ultra-conservative, which makes me rather insane since they are blessed with some pretty awesome kids. R is simply one of the most conscientious young people I know, and has been since I met her at age 15 when she started coming to youth group. The "gist" of today's problem: she came out to her mom & step-dad on Wednesday. They are not handling this in a very enlightened way at all. She didn't go into details, but I can imagine that their response would be the most rancid "Christian" spewage. She spent Wednesday night at someone else's house--a friend, I can guess who, but she didn't say. Friend, in the case, meaning friend, period.

So let's see: this week, medical issues, the vague threat of electrocution, general family strain (holiday edition), work weirdness, good fun, lots of sleep, and someone asking for support.

Basically, life is full of good and bad. I'm sadder than sad about Dr. H. and R.'s parents. I'm grateful she has taken that step and that she trusts me (and Beast). I'm getting more and more concerned about my eyesight, but hoping the new glasses sort that out. I'm looking forward to the new year with some good positive feelings about work, household, and financial stuff. And the guinea pigs always make me giggle, even when I'm shouting at them to stop squeaking already, I just gave them food for cryin' in the rain!

Oh, and I have another great-nephew, as of December 5:

And on that happy note, I will close.

Brick Wall

There's a woman at church with whom I work on doing stuff with the children quite often. I have no idea why, but she clearly can't stand me. She doesn't understand my humor, she ignores me as much as possible, and that line has gotten closer and closer to "all the time" as time has passed in the past 12 months.

For the life of me, I can't figure out what it was/is that I did/do that gets her hackles up. I have nothing against her at all although her oldest child annoys the Cuh-RAP out of me and I don't understand why she doesn't try to correct him. I've tried to joke with her, I've tried to show her that I understand how hard it is to stay home with kids all day and carry on with a career, she clearly knows I like kids in general (her other two are fine, and in fact her oldest is whip-smart and I do like him too in spite of his behavior).

Yet, this morning she totally took a comment I made completely wrong (when she cam in after activities had started, I jokingly said she was "late" to which she replied frostily that no she wasn't, in fact she'd been there since 8:30 and was only out of the room for a really good reason...which was true, and I was smiling when I said that to her. Even the kids in the room understood I was kidding!). This afternoon her Facebook was updated to say, "After seeing that I was upset about something not nice someone said to me today, my wonderful six-year-old made me this card. Tear." [and a picture of cute little card]

Now, granted, I'm not the only person she interacted with today, and I left church over two hours before that was posted, so it is eminently likely that someone else was "not nice" to her. But I am at my wit's end trying to figure out what to do. I guess I'm just going to have to write her a note (email or Facebook PM) or corner her at church somehow and ask her why she's upset with me. Part of the frustration I have is that she hasn't addressed it with me already, or dealt with whatever it is on her own, but she's fairly young and I probably wouldn't have been able to do that at her age. So....blergh.

Regardless, I have to figure this out soon, because the atmosphere just keeps getting more and more toxic when we're together. The kids have got to be picking it up at some level. I don't really enjoy working with the kids when I'm trying like mad not to say or do anything hurtful to her (which also annoys me because, really, we are there to work with the kids, so drop your attitude at the door, yo!). All of which makes me wonder if I come across somehow as being a right bitch, or just "old" and not worth her time, or what.

The more I'm around people, the more I like dogs. Really. So much less complicated.

[redacted]

Y'know what's annoying? When you have a great post title...and you get pipped (definition #2 in the second one down) by someone you don't really like on their blog.

So, instead of writing the post that went with that title, I'll just give you updates:

• The kid who was bleeding in the street furthest from us had a massive bicycle wreck, with himself only it seems. He's in the hospital but recovering ok.


• The older kid who was bleeding in the street nearer was a drug dealer who got shafted on a sale and went after the buyer by jumping on the hood of the car as he and his girlfriend drove away. She sped up, then stopped, effectively flipping him off the hood, and then left. He's in a coma on a vent. The buyers have both spent some time in jail this week--she's still there, he's bonded out. Average age of the three of them? 20.5

Sparky's 19.

He's spent most of the daylight hours the past three days weeding all our gardens and trimming shrubs and bushes back into some kind of shape, so we can now see the house behind them all. He's also taken some time to look around for some actual jobs, and is trying to decide whether he wants to become an "independent financial services marketer." [My answer for the latter is: "Dude, seriously? You'll totally SUCK at this!" but it's his decision, really.]

So. That's the news. Time to eat dinner.

Weird Day

Woke up to rain, and thunder and lightning. When I left the house, it smelled and felt like spring--yes there IS a difference between spring rain and autumn rain--but the sun was out.  By 11 it was back to full cloud cover. And a tornado watch.

Took a nap and woke to find out that there had been a tornado sighted within 15 miles of us, and one that touched down about an hour east of us.

Just now checked Facebook and found out that my coworker's baby has arrived. No further details yet--just a note from baby's uncle and rumors from another coworker. Still. Yay!

More yay that FIL is getting out of the hospital tomorrow, unless things fall apart again.

And in spite of the cancelled trip East for Beast (ahem), the condo may be on the verge of being sold. So, three yays and a lot of WTF.

Oh for cryin' out loud!

First, Sparky forgets my birthday last week.

Now, tonight, he has arrived home having stopped for a scheduled haircut...with no hair left. He wants to "look like Chris O'Donnell." Well, except he's blond and 40, and you're a redhead and 17.

His hair was gorgeous and styled really well since he got the 10" cut off in July.  I'm crushed. He looks like he's going into the Army tomorrow.

Neighborhood football

Something I love, that I never take for granted and intentionally fight for, is that we have a BIG yard that is

w i d e
o p e n

The people behind us also have a pretty big open area across their yard.

So two guys just rang my doorbell--J. who lives behind us and L. who lives next door (JesusGOD they're getting tall!). They're wearing touch-football flags on their waists and J. says, "Can we play football in your yard? There are, like, a ton of guys." L. chimed in with, "Even some high school guys." In response to my raised eyebrows (not too many high school kids around here), he hastily added, "Freshmen in high school."

Of course I said sure. They are asking because Sparky's not outside to "approve" it ... and I suspect they were sent to ask by some adult or another. It looks to me like there are about a dozen kids--probably close to a ton, I guess--and they are supervised by another neighbor so it's not going to turn into a riot.

I really hope that kids continue to play in our yard. I don't ever, EVER want to be the curmudgeon in the neighborhood, the woman who hates kids. Play on, guys!

Miscellany

A headline from a nearby paper that I read on occasion; I have kept saved for weeks in my RSS feeds because it makes me laugh EVERY time I see it:

Woman falls out third-story window, found on neighbor's couch

She was fine when found. Just drunk. Surprise, surprise.

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Speaking of which, Sparky informed us there was a WHOLE LOT of drinkin' going on in Germany, among both the American and the German teens. He is appalled. APPALLED! His appalledness makes me roll my eyes and snort.

Wait till college, hon, just wait!

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Pics from our vacation:

Because one really has to stop here when you see this sign, no? I didn't go in; Beast did. I stayed outside and took pictures, because I just oculdn't handle the schlock value. Beast was impressed. I'll bet they have good bathrooms.

Windmill farms have sprung up all across the plains, which is wonderful. However, you can't deny how spooky they are on the horizon.

This is scenery I grew up seeing as a child as we meandered around Wyoming and Colorado. This donkey is in Kansas, but otherwise it looks completely the same as the hundreds of others I've seen.

This is the view driving from Kansas to Colorado Springs. The road waaaaaay off in the distance is about 20 miles away, and still another 20 miles from the Spgs. Bor.Ring.Dri.Ving.

The Beaumont (duh) in Ouray. Our room was the third window from the left, where the curtain is open a bit. I can't imagine there's a boring or bad room in this place. And yes, the street is that steep. lol

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I played hooky from work today, staying home to cull through the pages of "Cookery" changes that need to be made in our catalog while watching NCIS reruns on the USA Network. I made it halfway through in checking (not fixing)...in four hours. I may dream about "Cookery (Tofu)" and "Cookery, Acadian" tonight. Gibbs as a gourmet cook? Ducky making foie gras?

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Germany is out of the Cup race, but I'm kind of secretly glad that Spain is in. I don't know why, and don't tell Sparky; he's bummed that Germany lost.

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And I'm going to bed.

The more things change

...the more they stay the same.

We now have zero exchange students at our house. Picture Beast and me with our jaws on the floor and our hands thrown up in the air: WHAT!THE!FUCK! Yesterday's email from Sparky's German teacher reads, in part: "Despite your saying you do not need a break; the German teachers would still give you a rest. ... C[...] says she would be OK with moving to another family. She says you have been great hosts and should not infer anything in our moving her at this time. Mrs. P[...] had offered to place another student Tuesday when we all learned the Germans could not return to Germany. C[...] would be staying with Julia .... Also, perhaps with the disappointment of not returning home, being with another classmate is good idea psychologically."

I actually totally get that last bit, so I was somewhat mollified after I read this. And, to be honest, it was quite lovely to come home from the conference last night and have the house to myself (Sparky was at a study group) and not have to worry about anyone needing a ride or help finding something to eat or do here.

In other news, on the train home last night one of the women with whom I was traveling discovered that she had misplaced her wallet. She got off at the next station and called back to the city ticket office--the last place she knew she had it with her--to see if someone had turned it in. She also called her husband who checked online and found that someone had already used the credit card, within just a few minutes of the wallet being left! Sigh. So, obviously she's not getting it back.

Which coheres with the status of my bag. The Lost & Found woman said that sometimes it takes a little while for things to make their way back to her, so I should check in again today and next week, but realistically...I'm out a nice half-pack, a curling iron, a flashlight, and some charger cables. Some other stuff too, but nothing really horrible or irreplaceable. Well, except perhaps my notes from the first day of the conference. I've made a list of what I can remember having packed in there so I can hit the stores and replace what I need this weekend.

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OK, Sparky has headed off to school and I swapped hours today at work so I don't have to leave until noon. I'm going back to bed. I almost fell asleep in the middle of CSI:NY last night and ended up going to bed at 9:45. Still feel like I could sleep a month, but I keep waking up with thoughts of "Oh, yeah, _____ was in the bag too!" or "I need to make sure the girls...oh, never mind" or "I need to figure out what we're doing for _________" etc. Time to revert back to having nothing scheduled every hour of the day!

We have a fridge full of food too, so I don't even have to cook for awhile! Yay!

Gambling...

At 4 this afternoon, I was leaving work, Beast was on his way to Biggish City to the West with two of the current three teens in our house to play Laser Tag, and we had a rather boring evening ahead (after a pretty boring rest-of-the-day).

Right now there are 18 people in my house, 16 of whom are under 18. Two large pizzas have disappeared, and their are large chunks missing from the other four still on the kitchen counters.

We could open a shoe store in our entryway.

One of the German girls has a MAJOR crush on one of the host boys, and isn't being particularly subtle about it. Then again, they are only scheduled to be in the States for about 56 more hours, so needs must.

Eight teens are in the basement playing pool, and eight are in the dining room playing poker. [Poker rules explained in Germlish are pretty amazing, by the way. Lots of "funf."]

My Presbyterian forebears are whizzing around in their graves, but I'm having a blast just watching.

Disturbing

Disturbing Dream #1: I'm visiting a blog-friend, a guy I've never met. Sparky is with me. And I'm very aware that Blog-Friend is getting a very wrong impression about my visit and reason for being there, in spite of Sparky's presence. The guy is just a few years younger than me, never married (that I'm aware of) and in the dream he's living in his college frat house. Uhm. [I'm certain he does NOT live in a frat house, in the non-dream world]

Disturbing Dream #2: My boss has cancelled our contract for IT support to save money. Just a little blip of a thought/dream. I hope it doesn't come true.

Disturbing Facebook update: Upon logging on this morning, I found two updates from one of the youth group members:

soooooo, apparently my parents some how found out about what we said yesterday night, and decided "eh, what the hell...since they all know anyways, we might as well step it up a notch or two...or twelve!!!"
not exactly the way i wanted to start my monday morning...and its not even 7 o'clock yet!!!!!

...apparently since i dont know what im talking about, and im a stupid teenager who doesnt know how to deal with life...thats what i deserve...feeling the love in this house.

I'm trying to figure out what they were talking about last night that would cause this sort of reaction from parents (well, her mom is a little wack sometimes), especially since I was on the phone with her mom during the meeting. Did she somehow overhear something while I was on the phone with her??

Double-booked

Today was all about Sparky. He field-tripped to the Giant City to the East to shop for Christmas presents at the Christkindlmarkt. He loves that--the idea is to use their German (hence class credit for shopping), and he really liked getting up later than usual (which he didn't, but that's normal). Then tonight we had two school-related meetings. We ended up splitting up and I attended the one about the ACT testing that is upcoming while the boys attended the one about the German exchange program next spring and summer.

His ACT pre-test composite is 28. The trip will cost $1850, and we are expected to host a German student for three weeks next spring in exchange for Sparky having a place to stay the following month.

So, there ya go: life starts heating up again. Whee.

In the short term, I have GOT to get the Christmas tree up one of these days. And cards...oy. Cards. sigh