Dogs are so weird

Jumping neck deep in a creek full of 40F water to splash and swim = lots of fun.

Being put in a bathtub 4in deep with warm water for a bath = torture.

Strange dogs.

It's Xmas Eve and My Doctor is a Dumbass

Two posts for the price of one, yay!

First, it's Xmas Eve! Squeeee! And we have nothing that we have to do. Oh, I'm going over to groom Miss Maggie Moo in a bit, I've got a few presents to wrap, stuff like that. But that's all stuff that is fun. And we might go swimming in a bit. Or not. Maybe we'll just hang around and relax.

Part 2. My doctor is a dumbass. I've never noticed him being a dumbass before, soI was a bit surprised. I guess the last appointment before the staff clears out for the holidays is not a good one to have.
I went in because I've been having joint pain, muscle pain/fatigue, memory problems, muscle cramps and crap like that. It's been going on for months, and gotten markedly worse in the last 6 weeks.
Dr. Google tells me it could be RA, lupus, lyme disease, thyroid problems or fibromyalgia. And, I have a family history of fibromyalgia.

I got told that fibromylagia doesn't run in families (it does, too), that it's a catch all for people in pain that no one can figure out what's wrong with them, fat people have joint problems, etc. WTF?

He did at least ask if I was depressed or stressed out (no to both). Didn't ask if I was sleeping all right, didn't even offer to check thyroid levels until I suggested it. Basically, he did nothing. Needless to say, I'm a little ticked.

I know that for fibromyalgia, there isn't much treatment, but there is for thyroid issues, RA, lupus and lyme disease. They need to be ruled out, or even in. Hell, I almost hope it is my thyroid because then it will be all fixed with a pill. I just don't want to have to take a pill for the rest of my life.

But, he did tell me to come back at my convenience to get my thyroid checked, and I'm going to demand that they check for anemia and some other things, too.

OMG, I think we're done.

We found the elusive wok at the other Target. Kids are bought for. Nephews, parents, siblings. The manwhore even managed to shop for me while I was shopping for the nephews at Target. Stick a fork in us, we're done.


On a totally unrelated note, I was at the barn yesterday giving my horse a butt massage with liniment (for her arthritis and I was totally thinking that I don't rub the manwhore's ass for him while I was doing it). While I was there, I got caught in a sudden downpour. I mean it went sprinkle, sprinkle, WHOOSH! I came home in a different shirt and no bra and he took one look at me and started laughing. Apparently the drowned rat look I was sporting precluded any speculations that I had done anything other than beg a dry shirt to get home in. Bastard.

This is what I get for being indecisive, isn't it?

We are almost done with our holiday shopping, except I'm pretty sure that the manwhore hasn't gotten me a damned thing yet, despite about 50 gazillion hints that I want the cotton candy pink mammoth crocs.

We would be done except for a gift card if I hadn't been so indecisive two weeks ago and just bought my brother's gift then. He wants an electric wok and the only one Target had was $35 which was a wee bit out of my intended price range. So, I thought I would look around. But I haven't seen one any where else so we went to Target to Xmas shop tonight and get the wok. Only, no wok. They were sold out. Now I have to go hunting for one, don't I? Whah!

Have we been transported to the PNW?

We haven't seen the sun in a solid week now. It's been raining for 5 days straight. When it isn't raining, or even when it is, it is foggy. Not just a little fog, but thick, rolling fog that cuts visibility down to less than 1/4 of a mile at times.

And its cold. And damp. And I don't like it. I want some fucking sunshine. If I wanted this kind of weather, I would live in fucking Seattle. But I don't. So, give me back my sunshine before I go insane!

We might be in for a rough winter

Friday we had two inches of snow on the ground and the kids were out of school. (The weatherman said the last time we had measurable snow in Dec was 2000, and '97 the last time we had that much.)

Today the roads are a solid sheet of ice and we've got a two hour delay to school. It was amusing watching the dogs ice skating across the deck, though.

Bliss is

A fire roaring in the grate,
A cup of hot chocolate beside me,
A good trashy romance novel in my hands,
Gifts under the tree,
Cheesy Christmas music playing.

Yesterday I could have added 2" of snow on the ground, but it's all melted today.

Still, a nice couple of days here.

Rain, rain go away!

Jesus H. Christ, enough already. Three straight days of rain with temps hovering in the upper 30s is enough. Cold is one thing, but cold and wet makes for miserable weather. And the temp is supposed to start dropping this afternoon so all this rain could be turning to snow and ice, although it isn't expected to stick. Just enough to make the roads nasty.

It's so dark here that this morning I overslept because the bedroom was so dark until well after 8AM.

So, go away rain, come back sunshine!

The tooth is out

We are back from the dentist and Ellie did great. They said she never went to sleep but laid there and watched the tv on the ceiling the whole time. The tooth is in a little box and I need to hit Tarjay to get the promised Barbie.

I've decided there is a huge downside to a pediatric dentist (we usually use a family dentist who doesn't have many little kids for patients): all the screaming little kids. There were kids who were three or four years old who screamed bloody-fucking-murder the entire time they were back there and all they were having done was a cleaning. Dude, damn.

Maybe I have a tree problem

Can you have too many Christmas trees? Oh, you can? How many is too many? Why am I asking, well, um, maybe we have 5? Yes, 5 Christmas trees. Yes, we put them all up.
We have:
The big, "nice" one in the living room. The is the main tree, the one the presents go under.

A 4ft one in the den with all of the ornaments the kids have made at school (because I'm a bad mom and don't want construction paper and cotton ball stockings on the tree downstairs).

A 1 ft mini tree that goes on the entertainment center. This was the tree I had in my first apartment and I'm not ready to part with it.

A pinkish/purplish Disney princess tree in the girl's room that sits on their dresser. It's about 1.5 ft.

A 1 ft tall stuffed felt tree that goes in Sam's room. It has soft ornaments on it and the whole thing can be played with.

So, that's not that many Christmas trees, is it? Uh? What's that you say? A 12 step program? Nevermind, me and my Christmas trees are quite happy, thank you.

Why is there a man in a white coat knocking on my door?

A smashing end to the holiday weekend

Literally, a smashing end to it.

Let me give you the highlights of the previous days first. Emma has reactive airway disease and as of today, she's still trying to hack up a lung.

We found out the hard way that our dogs get car sick, or one of them does. Hard to say. But there was poop and puke galore 3 times, as we had 3 car trips to make with them.

Other than those two things, the weekend was just grand. Much turkey and dressing and family and all was good.

We got started dragging out the Xmas stuff today, got the tree up. Then we decided to take a break. I wanted to go to yoga and Bill and the kids wanted to swim.

After yoga I went to tell them it was time to get out of the pool. Sam went to jump in one more time and did this odd spin while he was in the air that had him facing the side of the pool. And he smashed his chin on the side as he went in the water.

I yanked him out before it started bleeding, but before the lifeguards could get the first aid kit, he was covered neck to toes in blood, with a trail of drips around the edge of the pool. Got it staunched and slapped a butterfly and a bandaid on it, but the lifeguard could see that it wasn't closed. So off to the ER we went.

3.5 hours later, he has 5 stitches in his chin. It is about 1.5 in long and it was open nearly 1/4 of an inch. I'm pretty sure I could see the fatty tissue layer. Ew.

It took three people to hold him down for the lidocaine and the stitching. The only good thing is that he completely exhausted himself and he conked out shortly after we got home.

I need a drink.

A new holiday tradition

I swear this is not a tradition I want to keep going. Last year, Ellie and Sam both had pneumonia right around the holidays. They were sick right before Xmas, though.

This morning, I took Emma to the doctor for a cough that wasn't going away, and while she doesn't have pneumonia, she is wheezing. Two breathing treatments later, she's kind of wired, but breathing better. We have more albuterol for later.

And while we were there, Sam fell (well, Ellie pushed the stool causing him to fall) and hit his head on the floor so hard that the nurse and doctor both heard if from other rooms. He's fine, but I'm feeling the need for alcohol and chocolate. Too bad I have to drive.

Optimism vs pessimism

I've been pondering this lately. I am a pretty optimistic person. The glass is half full, things will work out, bad times don't last, etc.
I know people who are the exact opposite. Glass is half empty, things will always go wrong. You know the type. Maybe you are the type.

So, what I'm pondering is what makes some people inherently optimistic and some pessimistic? Is it nature? Nurture? Upbringing or genetics?

Confusing my thoughts on that issue is the fact that my brother is on the pessimist side of things. Same genetics. Same upbringing. What made us so different?

My husband and his sister are also opposites, with him being the more optimistic one. Now, he's not a perfect optimist. He still will assume that things will go wrong, places of business will not be open on holidays without checking, things like that. I'm not sure his sister ever sees anything good in life. Again, same parents, same upbringing.

What's the difference? What makes on person from a family be happy and optimistic and the other be pessimistic and unhappy?

I personally can't remember ever being a pessimistic person, except when I was a teenager. And any teenager worth her salt is angst ridden, downtrodden and pessimistic. Even then, I was still mostly cheerful. I just had my moments. So clearly I was either born with this personality trait or learned it very early on.

I've had the thought that even pessimistic people can learn to be more upbeat, but I don't know that for sure.

So, my deep thoughts for this week, what makes some people pessimistic and others optimistic?

Thankfulness and forgiveness

Before I dive into the deep thoughts, I want to say that we walked out of Target at 9:30 last night and holy crapdamn, it was snowing! It's too early for that shit. No accumulation or anything, but it was shocking, nonetheless.

Now on to the deep thoughts.

I have gotten back into my yoga routine, going 2x a week most weeks. I can't believe how much I missed it, and how much yoga improves my attitude. Now I'm generally a fairly happy person anyway, but regular yoga helps to smooth out the tendency to get snapish, because I do also have a tendency to get snapish.

Last night at the end, she had us sit with our hands in a bowl shape. This lets us fill up with blessings. I get a little sentimental this time of year anyway, because I freaking love the holidays, but it just hit me really hard last night in yoga class how blessed I really am and I was fighting tears. This came in the wake of having a crappy day on Wed, so it was especially profound.

But, I am so thankful for my life.

I am thankful for my family. For my children that love me and are healthy and bright. For my husband that loves me for who I am, unconditionally. He likes my off kilter sense of humor, he doesn't care when the house isn't spotlessly clean. He is supportive of my writing, has made it possible for me to do things and have things (neigh!) that I thought were years away.

I am thankful for our house and the piles of kid clutter. I'm thankful for two cars that run well. The dogs that chew everything up, the cats that puke on the floor.

I am beyond thankful that my parents are still healthy and have many years still with us, and so does my grandmother.

I'm thankful that my husband has had to work late this week, because he has a well paying job with a company that is stable.

Things are just very, very good for me, for us right now. The economy is in the shitter, but we are ok. Better than ok, I think.

The only dark spot in my life this year has been with my in-laws. I've bitched about them on this blog, complained about them in real life to some people. They hurt me and Bill both quite extensively and you don't get over that kind of hurt over night. I'm sure they were hurt, too, but I felt like we apologized to the point where we were apologizing for being who we are and not just for a thoughtless action.

My father-in-law has never apologized for his part in all of this, and honestly, I don't think he ever will. And that has been a bone of contention with me, especially since one of the things he said about me was that I am self-centered. Egocentric people don't recognize that their actions have an impact on other people and never feel the need to apologize for them.

Anyway, it has been a long, hard year in dealing with them, with my own feelings. Bill and I have had some of our biggest fights because of this. This situation has been a black cloud hanging over an otherwise pretty much perfect year. Quite frankly, if it weren't for Bill, I would have washed my hands of them. I could have walked away and never laid eyes on his parents again and not batted an eye. I also probably would have held a grudge against them for the rest of my life.

But, they are my husband's parents and while he has been hurt enormously, too, he still loves them and wants to give things a chance. So, I've had to deal with them and everytime that has stirred up the hurt all over again and I have been unwilling to forgive them.

Well, I am letting go. The wounds are not healed, but holding onto the hurt was simply keeping them fresh. Things will never be the same between us, I don't think. But I refuse to keep hurting myself and Bill by holding onto the grudge. They are who they are, and while my inlaws may never be people whom I consider "my cup of tea" they did manage to birth and raise the man who is the other half of me. Clearly they cannot be all bad. So, I am forgiving them for the hurt they have caused me. Not for them, but for myeslf and my relationship with Bill and for my children who have remained blessedly unaware of all of this and still love them them with open hearts.

'Tis the season, after all. And I'm going to embrace it with both arms.

Oh, hi Mom, I'm just fine.

Words to put fear into the heart of any parent. If you aren't a parent you are probably thinking WTF? If you are a parent, you're probably nodding. If not, you kid(s) are probably still pretty young.

Why would that innocent little phrase strike terror into my heart? Paired with the "I'm not guilty" look I know it means Sam has been up to something. Paired with a lack of pants and I'm running for the bathrooms to see which toilet is clogged with toilet paper. This time, he apparently kept trying to flush what looked like 95% of a roll of TP. I had to slog through toilet water. I had to clean up toilet water out of the floor. There is toilet water in my bedroom carpet because apparently the bathroom floor slopes slightly.

Oh well, at least the bathroom floor is clean now.

Ohhhhhmmmmmm.....OW!

There is nothing like ending a yoga class with someone having to call 911. Not me, and not one of my classmates, though. There is a running track that passes around the outside of the Y and beside the classroom. We were finishing up class on Sun when we heard kids running (which was fine, it is a track to run on) then WHAM! THUD! AHHHHH! OOOWWWW!!! So, our instructor jumps up and runs to see what happened. She forgot her mic was still on and said "Oh my god! Oh my god!" which of course came through the speakers loud and clear.

Well, that got the entire class to jump and run. I happened to be closest to the door and got there first. There was a boy, abotu 10 or so, who had lost it in the curve and busted it face first into the wall, right on a corner over a balcony. Actually, when Sandi yelled "Oh my god!" I thought someone had gone over the balcony.

The kid wasn't over the balcony, but he had hit, bounced, spun, hit the floor and was all contorted on the floor. We rolled him over and the first thing I did was to kneel by his head and hold his head still. Fuck if I know how he could have broken his neck, but you never know.

Apparently I looked like I knew what I was doing because another lady from the class sat down and asked if I was a nurse. Nope. Just cool in a crisis unless it is my kid. But she was a nurse, so I just held his head while she checked him out.

I did have to tell Sandi to go call 911, though, just to let the EMTs check him out.

The kid walked out of the Y under his own steam and was probably sore and had a hellacious headache yesterday. I do hope that his babysitter (mom was out of town) took him on the the ER to get him checked just in case. He hit his head pretty damned hard, not once but twice.

Poor kid.

Wow, I'm going to be doing some letter writing

Well, email probably.

And clearly I need to make it a point to watch the news and read the local papers more often. We got a letter home from school yesterday from the principal apologizing for the "humor" column he wrote last week in the paper for the next town over.

Here, go read it:
http://www.murfreesboropost.com/news.php?viewStory=13866

When I went and Googled the paper's webite, the link to that article was the 2nd hit to come up. Clearly he has stirred up people in the community with his lame attempt at humor.

Let me say first that I am always for freedom of speech and freedom of thought. I could care less who the man voted for. But he is a position of authority over my children and even if he doesn't consider himself a racist asshole, that is clearly how he comes across in his column.

And not only that, he looks like an idiot, too.

Points to consider:

1. If you go outside of the 2 "metro" areas of our county, it is pretty much nothing but farmland.

2. There are kids from immigrant families in our school. Kids whose parents struggle to speak English at all, much less with an accent. Besides that, why would you mock a man for his accent if you thought his ideas for running the government were good?

3. It doesn't matter how black or how white Obama's parents are. He is the only person that hasn't been a pasty white rich old man (barring Kennedy who wasn't old) to have been elected President of the U.S. That is historic.

4. And that song at the end is just over the top.

Yep, I may be late to this bandwagon, but he'll be hearing from me sometime today after I calm down enough not to use words like asshole, dickwad, fuckhead and just plain ingnorant.

Update, Part Deux

So, the tooth is broken to below the gumline. It would take a root canal plus the crown to try and save the tooth. So, since it is a baby tooth, the dentist's advice is to pull it. Mama is not thrilled with our first tooth fairy visit being a pulled tooth.

But, they will sedate her to do it, so it won't be traumatic for her. Just for me. Her appointment is Dec 10. I'm sure I'll be posting closer to then and freaking out.

Edited to add: They called to tell me how much arm and how much leg. We have a $50 deductible for having the tooth yanked, and then $150 for the sedation that my fuckerbutt insurance won't pay a penny towards. Fucking fuckers.

Quick tooth update

The dentist man looked at the tooth. There is actually more of it missing than I thought. More like 2/3 of it, instead of the 1/3 I thought. And, the nerve is exposed just a hair on the back of it, so he is sending us to a pediatric dentist at 8:30 AM tomorrow to see about having a crown put on it. Dentist man said he can do adult crowns all day long, but he won't do them on kids.

Wish us luck, and I'm beginning to fear I may be giving them an arm, leg and my first born to pay for this. Of course, my first born is Ellie of the broken tooth, so maybe they'll just keep her.

A chip off the old block

Or, in this case, a chip off the young tooth. Ellie somehow hit her mouth on the side of the pool last Thur night and chipped about 1/3 of one of her incisors off. It's a baby tooth, but still, it's a pretty dramatic chip. She kept claiming that it didn't hurt. Not really. She can just eat on the other side of her mouth. Uh-huh. Doesn't hurt? Yeah right. But last night she actually asked for some advil.

Since our dentist isn't open on Friday, I called this AM to see if they could get Ellie in to look at the tooth. We have an appointment at 3PM. I don't even know what they can do for her, but since it's hurting, we'll go see.

Dentists are notorious for charging an arm and a leg and insurance not covering crap. So, cross your fingers that maybe they'll only charge us an arm.

So, who did you vote for?

Did you vote for a black man? Because I sure as hell didn't.

I voted for the American people. I voted for the 17 million working Americans who don't have health care.

I voted for our planet, for our environment, for the push towards a greener future.

I voted for our economy because trickle down economics (thanks Ronnie Reagan!) doesn't work. I voted for the poor who are getting poorer.

I voted for the servicemen and women who are involved in a war that was based on lies, that are being killed in a country where they aren't wanted. I voted for them to come home, to live to fight another day for a cause that is just, a cause that is actually worth dying for, not for a battle that has been being fought between desert tribes for hundreds of years.

I voted for my children and their future. I voted for their educations, their health, their planet, their security.

I voted for hope, because for the first time in my adult life, I have actually been afraid. Afraid of unemployment and of losing my home, of not being able to afford health care.

I voted because I think that a woman's health care decisions are between her and her doctor, not her and the voters (and because I know that the GOP has no intentions of actually doing anything about Roe v. Wade, its just rhetoric.)

I voted because I don't give a rat's ass if you worship god, Buddha, Zoroaster, Mother Nature or the Flying Spaghetti Monster and no one should have the right to tell anyone what is moral or not.

I voted for change because I was truly afraid where this country is going.

I did not vote for a Muslim. I did not vote for a person who is not a citizen. I did not vote for a person who refuses to say the Pledge. I did not vote for a person who won't produce a birth certificate. I did not vote for a person who's education was paid for by terrorists. (Seriously, haven't you people heard of Snopes.com?)

I voted for Barack Hussein Obama, not because he is a black man, but because he is a man that I can believe in. Because the hope on the faces of children who can look and him and believe that they, too, can grow up to do great things for their country gave me hope.

History was going to be made either way this election went. I am simply glad that history was made in a way that I am proud of, in a way that I believe in. Because yes, we can make history in America still!

Yes we can!

Oh my God, yes we did! We did it! I am so proud of my country. We have made history. Tonight, people of every color came together to vote for hope, for change, for the ultimate ideal of democracy. Tonight, in this the greatest country in the world, a man that 150 yrs ago would have been a slave, a man that 40 yrs ago would have sat in the back of the bus, a man that grew up with FoodStamps, tonight America has elected a black man, a man with a "funny" name, Barack Obama as our next President.

Yes we fucking can!

I have a secret!

Neener neener neener! I'm not telling until after Xmas!

It's over!

The last soccer game is played, the trophies are handed out (except for the two that didn't show up at the party wtf?). No more practices at 6pm. No more hunting for shoes and shin guards every Sat morning. No more whining kids (or me) about having to go. Yay! It's over!

And honestly, they aren't playing again for a long, long time. At least a year, maybe two. We have other things to do with our time now.

I think I'm going to go off my rocker before next Tue.

Honest to god, I have not ever, evah, been this tense over an election. If Obama loses, I'm going to cry. I don't think he will, and I'm confident enough that I have a bottle of champagne in the fridge that I will probably pop if he wins.

But damn, I am really, seriously in fear for what it will be like if McSame wins. Oddly enough, I feel like the lone voice in the wilderness around here in fundy land. Tennessee is a red state, always has been, probably always will be (which makes me wish that my vote actually counted towards national totals and not just towards our electoral college votes) and there is some strong McCain love here.

In fact, today, my neighbor came over and we were talking about something and somehow the economy got brought up. Now, we all know the economy is in the shitter, right? Stocks are falling, banks are failing, people are losing their homes. Not a pretty picture. Yet she actually said that she was afraid of what the economy would be like if Obama wins. Really? REALLY?? Are you fucking kidding me? She thinks that 4 more years of the same old, same old is going to make things better? REALLY?!?!?

Can I have some of what she is smoking, please?

It smells cold!

We're supposed to have our first frost of the season tonight and already you can smell it in the air. There is that particularly crisp, clean smell in the air that signals ice, frost or snow. I suppose that it is starting to freeze in the upper atmosphere, which causes the smell.

But I don't care what causes it. I love it. Fall. Yummy yummy!

And best of all, maybe all the motherfucking mosquitoes will die, Die, DIE!

Did your mother run over your dad with a tractor?

What a question to ask a possible stranger, but hey! Did she? I know someone whose mother did indeed run over his dad with a tractor and I just found him on Facebook! I haven't talked to him since around the time the girls were born and he went off to Afghanistan. I've missed the hell out of him, and even though he's up in the land of maple syrup, caribou and Mounties, hopefully we can reconnect.

It makes me all verklempt

Ok really, some of you will think I am crazy. But, I have this little fantasy of the perfect Christmas morning. In my fantasy, there is a little bit of snow on the ground, but that really is cuh-raze-eee because this is the South and there ain't no such thing as a white Christmas here. I've seen one in my 33 yrs, and that was ice, not snow.

But anyway, my fantasy. In my fantasy, we tell Ellie and Emma to look outside, and there is my friend D holding a horse for them. Maybe they have a box to open with a saddle and bridle in it, something to drag out the moment. But the doorbell rings and they look out and there is a horse for them. I can just see the looks of awe on their faces. Hell, I can see the look of awe on my face. I fucking cry like real live tears just thinking about it. I want to do this for my girls more than anything else in the world. I want to do this for them as badly as I've wanted just about anything, except for my children themselves.

I want do to this so badly for them that I ache with the desire. Crazy? Probably. Maybe it's because the one thing I wanted more than anything else as a kid was a horse and I never got one. Honestly, so far as I know, my parents never even gave it serious thought. But, I still want that horse, and now my girls are as horse crazy as I am and I want to do this for them.

Today the ache is even worse, because my friend D has made me an offer on board that has me going "OMG OMG OMG OMG OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG! We can afford that!" *swoons dead away*

So. My thoughts have turned to horses and I'm searching Craigslist, Kijiji and Dream Horse like fucking mad. Now, I'm really not getting my hopes up too high. Just dreaming. But there will be discussions in our house tonight and grandparents called soon to see about contributing for Christmas, maybe. Maybe.

If this is not meant to be this year, it's not meant to be. But I swear by all the gods and goddess that one day I will be posting to this blog that finally, finally, finally, I'm buying a horse for the girls and I. One day. I swear it.

My Southern child

Make that Suhthun' chil'.

After we got back from our trip to S.C., Em drew a picture of herself playing in the tidal pools, a place all the kids dubbed "Puddle Land." She titled the picture all by herself. Puddale Leind. Sound that out in Suhthun' English. Pud-daaaale Leeeeh-ind. Southern indeed.

Sometime today I'll fight with the scanner and see if I can scan the picture.

I'm not dead yet!

Just on vacation. Well, I was last week. We went and crashed with my cousin and her family in Beaufort, S.C. It was a lovely time, beautiful area and I wish we'd had more time with them. Here are a few pics of us on the waterfront in Beaufort.



















And one of all the kids. Can you tell which one isn't mine? Damn, our family genetics are strong.

Retail therapy

It is amazing what dropping some cash on a new outfit does for my mood. I don't shop for myself much at all, and I pretty much always feel guilty about it. But when my mood is in the shitter, and I've got something moderately stressful coming up (yay for family reunions), having something new to wear make me feel better.

It's odd, because usually clothes shopping pisses me off. I'm too fat, or too short, or my tits are too big or I can't find shoes that fit my odd feet, but it seems like when I really need a lift, everything falls into place. Pants, shirt, sweater and cute shoes. Voila!

Yay for shopping!

Ow. Ow. Ow.

Big, fat horse + short, fat, out of shape me = holy crap damn I don't think my legs stretch that far. Actually, they do, but I don't usually hold a stretch that long. You know those muscles that connect your groin to your leg? Those feel like someone tried to play wishbone with my legs but didn't succeed in breaking the wishbone.

I've had sore legs from riding before, but it's been on a horse that I had to maintain a constant squeeze to even keep him at a walk. That makes for sore muscles. But this is different. This is too much stretch to even sit on the horse.

Yoga, here I come.

Short girl + big horse

= holy shit it's a long way up there and it's a long way down. D and I have decided that I'm just lacking in enough riding skills and confidence (mostly confidence) to ride Taco, who is my buddy. He's a love, but he likes to go fast. I'm not ready for fast.

So, she put me on Random today. Random is a 16 hand quarter horse mare that used to be a hunter/jumper. 1 hand = 4 inches. 16 hands is about 5 1/2 ft. So, as measured from her back, Random is about 5 1/2 ft tall. I'm only 5'2". Her back is taller than my head.

I stood on the ground and thought, holy crap, how am I ever going to get up there? But I did, and D said that I have beautiful posture when riding. My position is almost perfect. But, she can tell I'm not relaxed. And I'll be riding Miss Big and Pokey for a while.

So, I'm sitting up there thinking, holy crap, now I've got to get down. I swing my leg over and start sliding down. And I just keep on sliding. The ground really was a long way away. lol

I'll get there. I know I will. But it's amazing how confident I can be on the ground and still be so nervous in the saddle.

Using your kid as a human shield

Perhaps this is not the best idea. Even if you are just playing a rambunctious game of "harass the manwhore" while swimming. Manwhore grabs kid, I dive at manwhore, manwhore blocks with the kid. I have a black eye. Kid has a bump on her head.


To add insult to the injury, about 20 minutes later, some guys bounced a basketball of my head. I was about to get out of the pool to get Emma a towel and I ended up sinking under the water so no one would see me cry. The manwhore asked what was I crying, what's wrong? "It fucking hurt, that's what!" says I.

Just call me Sarah Palin

Just this morning, I was elected VP of my local RWA (writer's group). I volunteered for the job, but really I didn't have a clue what the VP actually does. Sound like someone else you've heard of?

So, I now know that I will be responsible for organizing the meetings for the next two years. Eek. But, I don't know anyone, or have any contacts. Again, sound familiar?

I don't really have any experience sitting on a board of officers, either. Bell? Ringing?

Thank god being the VP of a writer's group is so much less important than being the VP of a nation. And the learning curve is a little easier. I know people that know people. Experience isn't that critical here. People will give me ideas.

As a matter of fact, I have an entire page of ideas for future meeting that I brainstormed with group members at lunch. So, I think I can pull off this gig. And unlike Sarah Palin, if my President happens to drop dead (fortunately she isn't some old guy with a bad health history) I won't have to step up. I don't think. Maybe I should find out.

Makes me wonder why people voted for me. Oh yeah, I was the only one that volunteered (well, someone else did, too, but she was happy to throw the ball to me when she found out I was interested). Thank god the American voters have other choices.

The worms crawl in

the worms crawl out. The worms are in my puppies' poop, grossing me out.

Ok seriously. I'm calling the vet in a few minutes, but I've had enough with the wormy poop. This is 5 days of it, and in my opinion, that's longer than the "couple of days" the vet said it would take to clean the puppies out.

And this morning there was something that I'm telling myself was maggots and not tapeworms crawling all over my kitchen floor. Dozens of them and they were all over the place, although the worst of them were right in front of the back door. Drawn to the sun, maybe?

I am done with worms and wormy things.

Honestly, if I had known the puppies had worms this bad, I would have told the girls "No." I would have thrown my vote in with the manwhore and promised them that we would get a puppy from somewhere else soon. But, quite frankly I didn't believe him when he said we would look for a puppy somewhere else.

Add to that the fact that I am a little bit (irrationally) pissed at him because I wanted to adopt an adult dog and he insisted that a puppy would get along with the cats better (the cats haven't even been an issue). Sure adult dogs can have worms, but one from a rescue would have been house trained and not shitting piles of worms in my motherfucking kitchen floor.

The puppy training is going well

They are going to have me trained in no time. Haha! Seriously, they are doing really good for such young puppies. We're only having a few house accidents, all the fault of the humans. They have to go straight out when they get out of their crate. Out! Carried out! Down the steps! To the grass! Don't let them run around the house! Kids and the husband got fussed at this morning. Sox can't even get down the steps by herself, so really opening the door and expecting them to go out on their own isn't happening yet. But, she at least went out to poop on the deck and Goldie made it down by herself to go on the grass.

And they are so stinking cute playing with each other and the kids. I think even the manwhore is glad we have them.

We have two new babies in the family

Like we needed anything else to drive us insane (I think we've arrived at our destination) we adopted two puppies yesterday. They are lab mixes that my parents' dog had. And if they don't get the damned bitch spayed, I'm going to kick their asses.

But, the kids just fell in love with one of them, and we decided to get two in hopes of cutting down on the crying. Today, they have been to the vet, wormed, de-fleaed, and had their first vaccine. Then to Petsmart for collars, leashes and stuff for them to chew on.

Seeing the girls running around the back yard being chased by puppies made all the hassle worth it.

Operation water bottle rescue

Remember my previous post where I mentioned the water bottle falling out of the van and rolling into the storm drain? Well, I made three trips back up to the school to try and retrieve the damned thing. Can't throw $15 down the drain, now can I?

The first trip I took the grill tongs thinking I could stick my arm in and reach it. Result = failure. The drain is too deep and the gap in the grate too small for my arm anyway.

The second trip I had my friend's pick up pal magnet on a handle. I knew that the handle was going to be too short, so I wisely brought some yarn to tie around the handle. I thought it would be a breeze, because it is a really strong magnet. Result = failure.
Apparently the water bottle isn't the kind of stainless steel that is magnetic. Dammit.

The third trip involved the magnet again, a roll of packing tape and a broom. I put a wad of tape on the magnet (it wouldn't stick to the broom) and lowered it down. Then I got the broom down there and pushed the tape firmly against the bottle. Result = Success!
It took three attempts to get it, but I did get it. I'm oddly giddy about the whole thing. I feel like I've beaten the odds or something.

I wish I had a digital camera. My bitches at Sybermoms were asking for pics and I would have loved to oblige them. Ah well. Ce la vie!

Sometimes a good day goes bad

Or at least irritating. Yesterday started off nice. The manwhore took a mental health day and stayed home. He took the girls to school then we took the boy to school and headed to Target. Nothing's better than a little Target shopping without any kids. Home for some marital bonding, lunch out, and then I was off to get the kids while he mowed the grass.

This is where it went downhill. First, I got flipped off while driving. But hey, asshole, don't get pissy if you sit through two changes of the fucking traffic light and someone honks at you. You got car troubles? Put on the damned hazard lights or wave people around you. I'm not psychic, so how am I supposed to know that you can't go, especially after you did actually drive your car up to the line? Hm? Up yours, too, asshole.

Then, after giggling over being flipped off (it was funny, in an indignant, I can't believe you did that, asshole, kind of way), I arrived at the girls' school. We pull into the line and Sam was wanting stuff out of his lunch box. So, I get out, open his door and I'm giving him stuff. I notice that there is a bunch of crap in the girls' way, so I started trying to clean up the van some. I opened the door on the other side and went around to move some more stuff. As I was going around, one of our stainless steel Thermos water bottles fell out. And woudn't you know, we were right next to the fucking storm drain and the damned thing rolled into it before I could catch it? I could se I couldn't reach it with just my arms, so I cursed mightly but quietly (lest Sam repeat something at his overly god infused preschool) and got back in the van.

Feeling foolish but determined, I got the girls, came home and sent the rest of them swimming. I grabbed the grill tongs and went back to the school to see if I could get the water bottle. No luck. The opening in the grate wasn't big enough for me to get my arm in and the drain is deeper than I realized.

My friend with the horse farm has a magnet on a pole that she loaned me, so I'm going to go early to pick up the kids (when hopefully no one else will be there to watch) and see if I can get it with that.

This is what I get for trying to save the damned environment and buying $15 fucking water bottles.

Sigh. (But the day got better when I got to ride for a bit last night!).

Ok, I'll admit it, I was wrong

I have, in the time that the girls have been in school, wondered why it is that my elementary teachers got by just fine without parents helping out in the classroom, but today's teachers seem to expect parental help. I figured they were getting parents to do stuff that they would otherwise have to do at home.

Now last year, the only times I helped out was for parties and field trips and such, because that was the only time the teacher ever asked for help. Of course, in the readiness class, they didn't have homework or anything to do at home.

This year, the kindy teacher told the parents that she needs help in the classroom, and I was mentally rolling my eyes. But, when she sent out an email last week asking for some help, I told her I could give her a few hours on Tue. So, I show up and sure enough she has me copying and paper clipping and tearing out and folding. Boring. Time consuming. But, I got an eye opening look at what goes on in a kindy class. And let me tell you, the woman needs help.

Granted, everything I did was stuff she could have done at home (other than the copying) but it took me two hours and I can understand why she doesn't want to be up until all hours doing it if she can get some help because there is no way she can do that kind of piddly paperwork at school.

There are 17 kids in her class (average for their school). Of those there is a kid with autism (he has an aide at least part time and is pulled out for therapy part of the time), a kid who while very smart, barely speaks English, a kid who has some sort of ADHD diagnosis and was off her meds yesterday (the girl told another teacher she was off her meds, so I just overheard) and three kids who it was recommended that they be placed in the readiness class (the one the girls did last year) and their parents refused (so they are very young and immature. All of them had tantrums and/or cried while I was there).

Those 6 kids could easily take up all of her attention, but the teacher does very well at making sure they don't. Still, they get much more attention individually than the easier kids do. In fact, while I was there, she barely interacted with my two girls at all, simply because they weren't constanly bugging her and calling "Mrssssssss. Staaaaaaaannnnnnllllllllleeeeeeyyyy! Looooook! Anna's doing that! He's touching me! Mrssssss. SStaaaaaaaaannnnnllllleeeeeyyyy!!"

I suppose my kids don't do that because if they did it at home I would simply kill them. I was ready to run away screaming and my name isn't Mrs. Stanley. Eek.

So yeah, even with an aide for one kid, an education assistant an hour or so a day, I think the teacher needs some help, at least with the piddly paperwork stuff.

This probably makes me a perv

But oh well. Actually, it really reveals my boob envy.

Anyway, the girls had a birthday party to go to yesterday. The mother of the birthday kids (twins that were in the girls' class last year) had on a tank top with little spaghetti straps. I couldn't figure out how she was managing to wear a bra and it not show under the shirt. She had to have a bra on because she had the nicest, perky, round tits I've seen on anyone over the age of 25, especially for someone who has 3 kids. Clearly she had to have a bra creating that illusion. Right?

When she leaned over to pick something up right in front of me, giving me a full frontal shot right down her shirt, I realized there was nothing under that tank top but her. No bra. Those tits really are full, round, firm and perky. And she has to be pushing 40.

Now I'm wondering if they are real, and I should be totally jealous, or if she's had them lifted or enhanced and I should be finding a surgeon. Not that I need mine enhanced. I need my un-enhanced. But a reduction also includes a lift, so I'll come out of it with firm, perky boobs, too.

I must be insane

This fall we have all three kids playing soccer. That means practices 2 days a week on Mon and Wed and games on Sat, with two different game times. And the girls are still riding horses, although not much since it's been so hot.

And, they came home from school having heard about the Girl Scouts and begging to join. So, we went to the info meeting last night and basically committed to joining the Daisy Scout troop that wil be formed for their age. So I will be adding a Tue night Girl Scout meeting to the mix twice a month.

Insane, huh?

Glasses update

So, Tar-jay's optical shop was open on Mon, Labor Day. But, the glasses could not be fixed. No big surprise there. Fortunately, they had the same frames in stock and so they were able to just put the lenses from the old frames into the new ones. That saved us a little money. And since the frames were less than a year old, they replaced them for 50% off. Even more money saved. Yay!

It only took 5 months

Sam's glasses got broken today. I hesitate to say that he broke them, because I highly suspect that Emma did it. I'm sure it was an accident, hence the "It was an accident, Mama!" from Emma when I asked her what happened.

The manwhore rushed down to Target in hopes of a repair job, but the optical shop was already closed. We'll hit them up first thing in the AM and see what can be done.

Long weekends

Yay for three day weekends! Except I'm wanting to do something fun and I have no idea what. We don't have the money to really go anywhere. We're talking about a picnic and trip to the farmer's marker today. Whoohoo. How exciting. We go to the farmer's market most weekends.

I'm bored, can you tell?

My first rejection letter

Finally, after nearly 6 months, I heard back from Harlequin. An "I'm so sorry to tell you that your story isn't what we are looking for" letter. It was very nice, wasn't even a form letter, but an actual letter with helpful criticism (my conflict isn't strong enough), and an actual signature from an editor. It could have been worse. Definitely not bad for a first rejection letter.

The manwhore was watching me all excited while I read it asking "Well?" I had to tell him, "Oh honey, if it is a letter, it isn't good news. They call you on the phone for the good news."

Onwards and upwards, I suppose.

No glasses for you, little girl!

Em had her appoint with the eye doctor today, and he says she doesn't need glasses. Yay! I confess to being rather surprised, but at least it was a pleasant surprise. I mean, she quite clearly could not read the eye chart at the pediatrician's office. No faking, no not really trying, clearly couldn't read it. It even seemed like she was having trouble reading some of the eye chart today, too. But, the dr did his little trick with the toy in his mouth and the light and lenses and declared that she didn't need glasses. All righty then. I'm not going to argue with that.

School supplies

I'm starting to hate this part of back to school and this is only the second year I've done it. We got the basic list off of the school website a few weeks ago so we could shop during the tax free weekend. We got most of it at the hellhole that is WalMart, since we were at Mother's that weekend and Target wasn't handy, but spent less than $40 for both kids, so I was happy. We were only missing two things from the list because they were out.

I managed to find the watercolors at the grocery store. But I spent three weeks looking for motherfucking construction paper and just today found some at another WalMart. It is the crappy Rose Art stuff, but the teacher can just deal with it.

Now we knew that once we met the teacher, she would have a specific list for her class, and she did. We met the teacher last Thursday night and the girls started school on Monday (the boys in the class started on Fri). Not a lot of time to gather up the rest of the supplies. Target is still out of construction paper, was out of the binders that she wanted until yesterday and had nothing at all like the binder pocket or the composition journal that the teacher wanted. Apparently, she shops at WalMart and didn't bother to make sure that the pocket and the journal were carried any where else. I suppose she just assumed that being name brand stuff, they would be easy to find, but she was badly mistaken.

I ended up making a special trip to WalMart today just to look for the damned journal and binder pocket. No journals and I bought the last two pockets that they had. And I almost forgot to look for them.

Forunately, two other parents found the journals somewhere and bought a bunch of them for the class. All I have to do is send in some money to pay for them, much to my delight.

I'm rather hoping that the teachers have learned that if all 7 kindy teachers at one school are going to ask for the same journal, that it would be better for them to just order them theirselves and then make the parents pay them back. Because I've sure as hell spent more than $2.70, or even the $5.40 for two of them in gas from driving hither and yon looking for the damned things.

Don't read the poem

Today is the girls' first day of "real" kindergarten. Emma was very excited and even Elli was ok with it and seemed excited once she got there. They have one girl from their kindergarten readiness glass last year in class with them this year, so they were happy to see her. Sam wasn't happy to leave them there, but he will be starting preschool in a few weeks and probably protesting that.

I must say, I didn't cry or even feel sad. That is, until I got home and opened the little letter the teacher sent home for the parents. I didn't even read it all, but it started off with something about how I've had them for 5 years and blah blah she'll love them like her own, blah blah. Then I cried. Damned poem. So, when you're kids go off to school, don't read the poem, unless you feel the need for a good cry.

Glasses, Part Deux

Potentially, anyway. The girls had their 6 yr old checkup today. All is good, El is in the 36% for weight, Em in the 6% (holy what a difference 5 lbs makes, Batman!), and they are generally healthy.

But, Em failed her eye exam. Crap. She failed the 20/40 line in one eye and the 20/50 line in the other eye. I don't know how bad a person's vision has to be before she gets glasses, though. I guess we'll find out.

Oddly enough, we hadn't noticed her sitting in front of the tv or holding books up to her face or anything. But, she clearly couldn't see the eye chart today, so something is up. The pediatrician got her an appointment with the ped ophthalmologist in less than two weeks, so we'll know soon enough.

It's always humbling to realize you aren't right

I swear, my poor besainted mother has "The shrink is IN" tattooed in invisible ink across her forehead. That's what she gets for having degrees in psychology and counseling, I suppose.

Anyway, apparently dh and I both unloaded on her this weekend. For me to unload on her is nothing new. I was surprised that the manwhore did so. Apparently he needed to talk and she has a way of magically making people talk. Both of us are still stressed and stressing about the crap that is going on with his parents. His dad didn't show up for the girls' birthday, with the lame excuse offered by MIL that he wasn't feeling well. Maybe not. Who knows? But honestly, at this point, I pretty much don't believe her. Personally, I could give a rat's ass if I never laid eyes on the man again, but it is breaking the manwhore's manly heart, and the kids noticed he wasn't there, as well.

So, we were both tense and probably snippy. And we'd had a really stupid fight earlier in the week, adding to the tense and snippy. We've both realized we aren't always the greatest about communicating. I mean, I just found out after nearly 8 yrs of marriage that the manwhore can't stand the feel of wet clothing. (Hence the stupid fight. I sprayed him with the hose and he got mad.) I've also had the realization that likely my perception that he overreacts when he is mad is just that, my perception. Mother pointed out to me that I don't really have a good role model for male emotions. My dad just doesn't get mad, or sad, or much at all. Maybe he's part Vulcan. So, when the manwhore gets mad, I immediately make the jump that he is acting like his dad and going too far.

We stayed up until 3am Sat night talking about it all, after we had both worn Mother's ears out. But, it needed to be said and hopefully things will be easier. Honestly, as marriage problems go, ours are pretty minor, but a marriage can always be made better with a little understanding and communication skills.

As for me, I hate to not be right. But, I was not right about this. See, I don't even like to say that other word. Wrong. I was wrong! Argh! I clearly don't know how to judge anger. I will work on this. And then I will be right about stuff again. lol

6 years

It's gone by so fast, I just want to stop time for a while. Six years ago tonight, I was in preterm labor with the girls, terrified out of my mind for them. El was born at 12:31 AM and Em at 12:44 AM, Aug 8, 2002.
I won't go into the details again, but I was thinking earlier today how funny it is that the 6 weeks I spent on bed rest seemed like an eternity, and the 6 years of their lives have flown by.

When you have premature babies, once you are confident that they are actually going to live, their health is fine and all that, then you start to wonder what being premature has done to their intellectual development. Or at least I did. Today, I think I'm finally convinced that their brains are working just fine. They had their kindy screening this morning and when they were done, both teachers sat me down to tell me how they did. An average score is 100. A really high score is over 120. Em scored 130 and El 122. They had sections of their tests that they had perfect scores on. El copied all the little line drawings perfectly, including the one the teacher said none of the kids ever get (a heart, who knew a heart was so hard to draw?).

I know it is just a screening for kindy placement, but still, I'm about to burst with mama pride.

A really cool evening

I'm sure that this was just one of many cool evenings in my life to come as a writer, but it was a really cool one in my life so far. I realize that it possibly marks me as some sort of antisocial dork that I think so, but oh well.

Last night, while the manwhore and spawn were at home noshing on Domino's pizza, I was sitting in a restaurant in Nashville sipping enjoying a pomegranate cosmopolitan and crab cakes whilst literally rubbing elbows with the senior editor from a certain publishing company. Across the table was the owner of said publishing company and also at the table was a lovely lady who I think she said was the marketing director (I blame the pom cosmo and noise for not catching her exact title). Rubbing elbows around the rest of the table were a half dozen other romance writers, published and unpublished alike.

After a long leisurely dinner, we all met up at the Parthenon (yes, there are two of them in the world, one of them in Nashville) where Sherrilyn Kenyon was hosting a launch party for her latest book. You know you have arrived when you have book signings in the Parthenon at the foot of a 20 ft tall statue of Athena. Actually, she probably knew she had arrived when she saw the size of her advances, but I digress. She is big in the vampire romance genre, so there were people walking around in costumes, some vapirish, some just goth, and some Greek in honor of the location. There was a live band, dessert goodies from the Melting Pot and at least 500+ people there, including editors, romance bloggers and the ilke. I didn't drag my ass home until about 11:30PM.

All in all, a very cool evening (even if it was freaking hot outside and like an oven in the Partenon).

Well, crap-a-doodle

Crap-a-doodle doesn't really describe the sinking feeling I got in my stomach when I open the mailbox and saw an envelope from the company that the manwhore interviewed with a few weeks ago. He really, really wanted that job, and I really wanted him to get it. If nothing else, the fact that it was only like 2 miles away from our house would have saved us money at the gas station.

Of course, you only get a letter when they are informing you that they've hired someone else. He hasn't really talked about it, but I think he had already given up hope anyway. I wasn't feeling terribly optimistic either, but I was really holding on to a little sliver of hope for him.

Alas, it was not to be, I suppose. Doesn't make me any less pissed at the universe that it didn't arrange things the way I wanted them.

You know what pisses me off?

When I get out of the habit of exercising and when I finally drag my ass back to yoga after not going for months and all the stuff I could do really well, I can barely do now. I had to come down out of some poses because apparently my shoulder muscles have atrophied from lack of use.

I really wish the Y had more yoga classes that I could conveniently get to, but they don't. And doing yoga at home just isn't the same, at least for me. But, I'm going to keep going, I swear!

I'd like to thank my mother

And all the little people. Not really, I'd just like to thank my mother. Apparently she had some genetic mutation that the rest of the family doesn't have and passed it on to me. What kind of mutation, you ask? Well, let me tell you. Last Saturday night, we were having a family party for my great aunt's and uncle's 60th anniversary, and most of us women were standing around yapping and the talk turned to my youngest aunt and her plans to have a hysterectomy. And I find out my 35 yr old cousin is planning a hysterectomy, and her 11 yr old niece has periods that leave her anemic, and my 17 yr old cousin has horrible periods. And around the circle it went with every woman in the family talking about the horrible cramps and floods of blood and what not. Even the women who married into the family.

Everyone except my mother and I. No cramps, no days of soaking a super tampon every hour, no counting down the days until we can get our uterus cut out.

I have had problems with my periods, but for me it is a weight issue. If I stay under a certain weight, I never have problems. So, I can't put myself in the same category with the rest of them that every period is filled with misery.

So, thank you, Mother, for what ever happened to make us different.

Not much baby girl stuff left

OK, I know what you are thinking, my "baby" girls are going to be 6 in 2 weeks. Time for the baby stuff to be long gone. It's not like I've been holding onto it. I've put stuff in consignment sales and given it away over the years. But, I have another friend due any day now with a baby girl, and I was looking for stuff to give her. I was shocked to discover that I have almost no 0-3 month girl stuff. I'm not sure I found anything. I still had quite a bit of summer 3-6 month stuff, but her baby will need winter/fall stuff then. And I seem to have cleared out all the winter/fall 3-6 month stuff.
There is one box I can't reach that doesn't seem to be labeled, so I'll have the man check it when he gets home. But, I think that maybe my babies are growing up and I don't have many of their baby things left. I've saved the special things, but still, it makes me a little triste.

I do still have a bunch of baby boy stuff left, though.

A funny that really I shouldn't laugh at

You know how it is, your kid does something that is either inappropriate or fell or something, and you can't help but laugh, even though you shouldn't. Well, this one is a falling kid story.

We went swimming yesterday evening and then had supper at Logan's. Sam snarfed his mac and cheese and then pretty much just fell over asleep in his seat. No nap + lots of swimming = really tired kid. So, he was snoozing away when a waiter dropped a stack of plates. It was so loud that even I jumped. Sam startled half away, tried to roll over and fell off the bench and under the table. Splat! And then, the manwhore and I couldn't reach him. Poor kid had to sit up so manwhore could get a hold of him. B finally got Sam picked up and snuggled on his shoulder and of course Sam was crying, cause wouldn't you cry if rolled over and landed on a hardwood floor in your sleep? But, he just conked right back out.

And manwhore and I was laughing at the poor kid.

He slept most of the night, too. He woke up once and crawled in with us and then I had the manwhore put him back to bed. Sam didn't make another peep until about 6:30 this morning.

Proud mommy brag coming up

Two of them, actually.

We are regular swimmers at the Y and last week one of the lifeguards stopped us as we were getting ready to leave. He asked how old the girls are and then wanted to know where they learned to swim so well. He was really surprised when I said they were going to be 6 in a few weeks and commented that he has seen them using some of the same swimming strokes he does (breaststroke and such). I told him they'd had lessons for the basics and the rest was just regular visits to the pool over the last few years.

We were swimming again yesterday and I asked El when she was going to go down the big water slides. Keep in mind that these slides are probably 15 ft tall and spill into 5ft deep water. But, she asked if she was old enough, so we asked the lifeguard. It was the same one that had complimented them on their swimming ability, so he told her she could go ahead. And El spent the next hour going down the slides. I was so proud of her!

Em wanted to try, too, but she got about half way up and decided it was too high. Maybe next week.

Things that make me odd

Or a little bit strange anyway, at least amongst my friends and family.

1. I recycle, like everything I can. Tons of plastic, glass, grocery sacks.

2. I use cloth bags for shopping (when I don't go off and forget them) to cut down on the plastic bags I use.

3. I wash ziploc bags and reuse them.

4. I don't use paper towels or paper plates (making that even more odd, I haven't yet given up paper napkins and I used disposable diapers with my kids.)

5. I make my own laundry detergent.

6. We eat almost no processed food, and what little we do eat is as minimally processed as possible. If I can't pronounce the ingredients, we don't eat it. We avoid things with artificial colors, too.

7. I pick up litter when I see it, and so do my kids.

8. We're planning to change out the lightbulbs to CFLs, but we haven't had a bulb to burn out in forever.

I'm sure there are other things, but I won't mention them here. I am quiet comfortable with my oddities and like myself because of them. I think they make me who I am and possibly even a bit more interesting.

Buying local produce

We went to the Farmers' Market Sat to see if we could stock up on local produce for the week. We did, but I was actually a little surprised at how little is in season in middle TN right now. Clearly, I have not gardened. There were tons of cantaloupe, watermelons, blackberries and blueberries, tomatoes in more varieties than I knew existed, squash and zucchini, eggplant, greens, cucumbers and green beans. And not many of the booths had green beans. And many of the farmers had peaches from the Carolinas.

Sounds yummy, right? I think so, too. Only no one in my family but me eats squash, eggplant or greens and the kids don't like green beans. They don't like blackberries or blueberries, either.

I was surprised at the lack of other melon varieties, too, but I suppose those are the best sellers. I know that broccoli and lettuces are cool weather crops, brussle sprouts, too. But I was expecting to see lima beans and butter beans, etc

We did stock up on fruit and some squash. And prices were a little cheaper than the grocery store, so we'll try to make it as weekly a trip if we can to try and save a little money. Besides, the peaches and tomatoes we've eaten already have been to die for. Yum, yum!

Rambling thoughts on America's fat crisis

Having a child that to my shock falls in the category of overweight, I've been thinking about this a lot lately. So some random thoughts.

Thought 1:
Statistics say that 30% of American kids are overweight or obese. We were at the splash pad yesterday and I thought about that number. "Nah," says me, "There aren't that many fat kids here." So, I counted all the kids, no easy task when they are all running and screaming. There were about 20 kids there. Then I counted the ones that, based on my observation of my own fat child, appeared to be overweight. 6 kids. Well hell, that is 30% of the kids overweight. And three of those kids were clearly in the obese category, including one little girl who was about 8 or 10 who had such a belly on her that she looked pregnant. Eek. So, even in my mostly middle class community, there is a weight problem among kids, at least according to my unscientific survey.

Thought 2:
I was talking to my neighbor, who is a nurse, about the fact that Sam is overweight, according t his doctor. She was completely incredulous, and said "If that child is overweight, than we are all obese."
I looked at her a bit funny but didn't say anything. I mean, she isn't blind. I am 5'2, and weigh 200 lbs. That puts me so far over the line into obese it isn't even funny.
She is taller than I, but probably weighs pretty close to what I do. I betcha she is obese, too, and doesn't realize it. The manwhore, who was standing there, is also obese, and I betcha that her husband is, too. Two of her kids are at least overweight, and might be obese.
Are we so immune to fat that even a nurse with 20 yrs experience doesn't recognize overweight and obese when she sees it?

I suppose she thinks of obese people as weighing 300+ lbs or something, but the truth is, I would have to drop down to 160 just to get my fat ass in the overweight category. 135 is what it would take to get me to healthy.
At least I am aware of this fact and working on it, although it is slow going. If she doesn't recognize her own weight problem and that of her kids, and she is a medical professional, then how is the average person supposed to recognize their family's problems?

We are addressing our fat problem by cutting out sugar as much as we can, so we shall see where it gets us.

Underwear optional

Apparently, this in an underwear option establishment, at least for the boy. I swear, everytime I turn around, I'm seeing his buns. I assume it is because he is going to the bathroom (but who pees that much?).

You see, or perhaps you don't, he has to strip completely from the waist down to do his business. I haven't figured out how to teach him to pee standing up, yet, so he sits for everything. To keep from spraying the floor, he's decided he has to strip. Then, he doesn't put his undies back on. So, I get an eyeful of 3 yr old butt.

Happy Birthday, America! Now shut the fuck up!

God, I am turning into such a grumpy old lady. But damn, we are a tired family. I'm fucking exhausted from the 4 days of painting and wallpaper stripping. I just finished up the last of the trim work about 30 mins ago. The kids are all tired, the manwhore is exhausted as well. And it is 11pm on the 4th of July.

Which means that people have setting off fireworks in my neighborhood for 3 solid hours now. It was nice for the first hour because we had a really nice show. But now, my kids are trying to go to sleep, I want to go to bed, so enough already. We're free. Yay! Huzzah! We've celebrated. Now put a sock in it. The city ordinance says this shit is supposed to be over with at 10pm, so SHUT UP!

Pray for me, Forrest

I'm about to start stripping the ugly ass, rose covered wallpaper out of my dining room. Keep your fingers crossed that it comes down easily.

I hate wallpaper.

Traveling, weddings and stay-cations

We had our last weekend on the road to go to the manwhore's cousin's wedding yesterday. Yes, yesterday, Sunday. It wasn't even a real wedding, but a vow renewal ceremony, and they've only been married a year. But they eloped and didn't tell anyone for like 6 months, so they basically had the wedding they avoided the first time around. It was beautiful and I doubt that I will see either of them again unless someone else gets married or dies.

My father in law and I basically pretended that we can't stand each other, but managed to not speak more than a handful of times.

Fortunately the kids, who are angels and travel like champs, were a buffer. They were totally charming and I know the photographer took several pictures of us and the kids. The bride is so going to look at her proofs and wonder who the hell those people are. rofl

On the way down there, I had a rare moment of less than stellar parenting and accidentally locked Em in the van. We had stopped at a Cracker Barrel for lunch and I thought she had gotten out on the other side while El looked for her shoes. Only she didn't. When El hopped out, I hit the button to close the door and the manwhore had already locked the van and gone inside. Em yells "Wait for me!" just as the door latched. She looked at me with these huge, terrified eyes, and I stood there in a total panic for about 10 seconds trying to figure out how to get her out and not leave her alone. I realized that I would have to go get the keys from manwhore and grabbed El and dashed into the restaurant. I practically had to tackle manwhore to get him to stop and give me the keys and I ran back out to let my bravely trying not to cry child out of the van. Bless her heart.

Now, both girls are with their beloved Aunt Dede spending the rest of the week with her. Manwhore has taken the week off and we are going to spend our time stripping wallpaper and painting the dining room, living room, foyer, and downstairs bath. Maybe we'll get it all. This will be the extent of our vacation this year and manwhore calls it a stay-cation, since we will be staying home.

Fatty, fatty 2x4

Not me this time, but my son. He had his 3 yr well visit with the doctor this week and he is 36 in tall and weighs 36 lbs. Which according to their height/weight/BMI charts puts him in the overweight category. What. The. Fuck? Seriously, what the fuck?

Now, maybe I'm living on a boat on that river in Egypt, but when I look at him, I don't see fat. I can see his ribs for christ's sake. When he laughs or cries he's got six pack abs. But online weight and BMI calculators agree that he has a BMI of 19+, which is overweight.

So now, I'm all paranoid about letting him have cookies, or ice cream or seconds at dinner if he asks for them, and while I thought that he actually rather healthily, I'm scrutinizing everything he eats.

le sigh And here I thought he was going to be the kid I didn't have to worry about his weight and eating. With El's pickyness and Em's trouble gaining weight, I was so relieved to have a kid that eats well, gains weight steadily and is just all around healthy. And now I find out he's fat.

I'm hoping against hope that he is gearing up for a growth spurt and will shoot up two or three inches in the next few months, which will put him back in the normal category.


Edited to add: Also, when the pediatrician was giving me the "What not to eat" lecture, I felt like she was thinking I was a big, fat liar every time I told her that we didn't eat fried food, don't buy chips, they rarely drink juice, the chocolate milk is low fat, etc. I'm fat, the manwhore is fat, but we really are a whole foods, whole grain, if you can't pronounce the ingredients don't eat it, kind of family. It's possible to eat too much healthy food, too. But I felt like she was looking at me being fat, and my denial of my kid's fatness and thinking that I was going to go home and feed him cheetos and ho-hos for lunch. I'm not saying that my kids never eat junk food, but it is a rare treat for them to get it.

It's Wednesday

Wednesday. The middle of the week. My house is a mess, laundry is overflowing the baskets and I'm tired. The trip to KY for the wedding was lovely. Two nights without the kids rocked. The wedding was beautiful. Lexington is horse country, so I was in heaven. But we were exhausted and then I went to a baby shower on Sunday after we got back to my parents'.

And I'm pooped. All of us are pooped. Em has dark circles under her eyes, Sam is sleeping late most days.

And we have yet another wedding/vow renewal/whateverthehellitis this weekend to go to, and I don't wanna. I just want to stay home and veg. But it is the first wedding in the manwhore's family since our own, so we have to go.

And I have to do laundry and at least make sure bathrooms are disgusting and that we can walk across the floor without breaking our necks. Wah.

On the plus side, I've gotten to ride two weeks in a row and maybe I'll get to go ride again on Sat. I'm coming along in my assertiveness with the horse, Sunny (he's a lazy old fuck) and hopefully by the end of summer will be able to ride Taco, who is not a lazy fuck, even though he's old and quite the handful.

Let the traveling begin!

Yay. Not. Actually, we are almost done with the traveling. Only 2 more weekends to go, but these two weekends are long distances. This weekend we are going to KY for a wedding, only first we have to drive to my parents' house in Al to drop off the kids. We live in TN, if you remember, so we are going 2 hrs in the opposite direction just to get rid of the kids. Then back to get them on Sun and to a baby shower.

Next weekend we are going to GA for another wedding, but the kids are invited to that one, so no side trip to AL to leave them with the grandparents.

With the price of gas these days, we might need to take one of the kids along with us in case we need to trade one for a tank of gas.

Happy Birthday to my little man!

It's hard to believe that is has been three years since he was born. He is my joy, my light, my love and I am so fortunate to be his mother.

And Happy Father's Day to my manwhore, my rock, my heart and soul. Sharing Father's Day with your son's birthday has to be the best gift of all.

The things people get their knickers in a twist about

Last week, the aircraft carrier Harry S. Truman returned home after a 7 month deployment. Thousands of family members were there to welcome their sailors home. I understand from people I know who are navy wifes that dressing up and choosing just the right outfit can be pretty important to them. After all, they haven't seen each other in months, so they want to look their best.

During this particular homecoming a photographer took this pic of a waiting wife wearing hot pink shoes. The pic was published in the Virginia Pilot newspaper.

Oh, the controversy a pair of hot pink shoes can create. There were people writing letters to the paper insisting that the pic was sexist and inappropriate, that is sexualized the carrier's homecoming, that it ignored the female sailors, etc. What. The. Fuck?

Honestly, I think the picture is fabulous. She's standing there with her feet nervously crossed in her brand new shoes, which she was so excited she forgot to take the price stickers off of.

There is an interesting discussing of this pic on the Smart Bitches website I've got a link to on the side over there and another one on Sybermoms. General consensus of those two groups of women seems to be "Jesus, can't a bitch wear some pretty shoes on a happy day?"

Dust

I hate dusting. Despise it. I would rather clean a toilet than dust. I try to keep the knick knack crap to a minimum just so I don't have stuff to catch it. Most of the time, I just flat out don't dust. I do about 4 times a year. The result of this is that I was rather embarrassed at the amount of dust in my bedroom yesterday when we had a guy here painting ceilings. After he got done, I got in there and dusted like crazy, even to climbing up and vacuuming the dust off the top of the plant ledge. It was about 1/2 in thick. Ew. I even washed the curtains. So, I'm betting that the manwhore's chronic sniffle and allergies are going to be a hell of a lot better in a few days now that I've reduced the amount of dust in our room by about 90%.


I should totally just suck it up and dust once a month if I want to or not, huh?

South Beach Diet, week 1

So, I've survived a week with no sugar, white flour, bread, potatoes, basically no starches whatsoever. And, for my efforts, I am down 5 lbs. Yay me!

I may have hit my limit with eggs and omelets, though. I've had enough. But, I spent 5 out of the last 7 days at my parents' house and didn't have access to as much variety of food as I do at home. I've got cottage cheese and stuff I can do for a few days.

I can tell my clothes are fitting looser, too. So, hopefully the dress I have to wear to two weddings this month won't have me sucking my gut up like I did at Easter every time I sat down.

South Beach Diet, Day 2

No, I won't bore you with daily updates, but they say the first few days are the hardest, so I thought I would just brag that I have made without touching a cookie, koolaid, the bread basket tonight at dinner or anything carbolicious. Surprisingly, I feel great (I've done Fatkins before and felt like total crap and couldn't make it through the 2 week phase 1. I actually went to the dr because I thought I was sick.)

And I'm not going hungry. Yes, I miss bread, but I'm not dying for it. Hard to miss it too much when you can have celery stuffed with herbed cheese or endive with tuna salad. I miss it the most at breakfast, like I thought, because I'm a cereal-aholic. I miss having some toast with my eggs.


I've actually expanded my palate a bit, too, even though phase 1 is fairly restrictive, because I've been in a rut with my eating. Now I'm having fun with omelets and different things for lunch.

Now, in two weeks I might not be saying that, but for right now, I'm handling it.

I don't want to be the baby!

Poor kiddo. I think Sam has about had enough of being the baby in the family and being bossed around by everyone else. Last night, he was mad because we wouldn't let him stay at the bookstore with the oh so wonderful Thomas the Train layout. When we got home, he threw himself in the floor and declared "I don't want to be the baby anymore! I want to be the daddy now!"

In other news, I started the South Beach diet this morning. So far, so good. The first two weeks are probably going to be hell, because I am a cereal loving girl, even though it is healthy cereal, and after 6 weeks of disgusting hospital eggs, I'm not a fan of eggs. But, eggs are pretty much what you can eat for breakfast during phase I (when you are breaking the sugar cravings). I'm sure I will joyfully fall face first into a bowl of grits or oatmeal when the two weeks are up. But, I can't seem to get motivated to lose the fat ass any other way, and since the maintenance phase is how I try to eat anyway, I figured why not give it a whirl. I shall report back with my progress from time to time.

Not a fabulous start to the summer

I broke my toe yesterday. Or rather, Sam did, since he knocked the stool over that landed on my toe. It's the big one, and I swear to god that it hurt as bad as my post c-section morphine pump not working pain for the first two hours or so. Being my big toe and since it hurt so fucking badly, I made the manwhore come home and drive me to the ER for an X-Ray. Mostly I was concerned that it might have been crushed or something horrible. But no, just a tiny fracture in the bone at the end of my toe.

Tiny, uh? I swear, I never, ever want myself or anyone I love to experience a real broken bone, because I don't think I could handle it. I was sobbing over a broken toe, so I can't imagine what I would do with a real broken bone.

But anyway, they gave me a dose of lortab and sent me on my way. It took it nearly two hours before I noticed a difference in the level of pain, although I was definitely sleepy. So, I conked out for a few hours and woke up to an only sore toe. Much better.

This morning is it mostly just sore and I'm just taking advil as needed. But, I doubt I could get my riding boots on for a few days, at least, so no riding for me this week. Damn it.

The last day of school

Today is the last official day of school. I say official because they haven't actually had class since last Thur. Fri was their little graduation ceremony and we checked them out when it was over, then they were out for Memorial Day and yesterday was a teacher workday. Which brings us to today. It is only a 2 hr day, and they don't even have to be there that long. We'll go pick up report cards and leave. Why in the hell some idjit in the administration set it up this way is beyond me. The girls are still sleeping and I hate to have to wake them up just to go get report cards.

Graduations in BFE Alabam

I shouldn't be surprised, not really. But I was. Stupid me, right? Anyway, oldest nephew graduated from my alma mater last night. Yeah him and all that jazz.

But I pretty much twitched through the entire ceremony because of all the praising Jesus and Bible verses that were quoted. The way this high school does things is to have all of the speeches done by the top ten honor students.

They started with a prayer, and the girl that said the prayer was preaching, praising Jesus, saying "I love you, Jesus!" and really just being over the top with it.

After that, there were 9 other speeches (or maybe only 8, I think one of the honor students sand the National Anthem), and of those at least half, if not three fourths of them quoted Bible verses, preached a little sermon or told their class mates to go out in the world and be good little Christians.

Really, it was quite annoying. I know good and damn well that I cannot possibly be the only heathen/non Christian that was sitting in the audience. Even BFE Alabama is part of the global community these days and personally, I think the students should be encouraged to remember that fact. Instead of a prayer, they could have a general sort of blessing, or a fucking moment of silence to contemplate the abyss the graduates are about to fall into. The other speakers could be encourage to look somewhere besides the Bible for inspirational quotes.

But, they won't be, because no one cares that there is likely a handful of people who think differently. In fact, they probably hope that all the praying and Jesus loving will cause us heathens to see the light and turn out lives mindlessly over to Jesus like they have. Or to be hypocritical fakes like they are.

I'm thinking seriously about writing a letter to the principal, but I doubt it would do any good. After all, every bit of the Jesus loving was done by students, which makes it all nice and legal. Annoying, but legal.

Talk about giving me a swelled head

Yesterday the manwhore went across the street to help our neighbor move some furniture around and he took the kids with him since I was having lunch with an old friend. When I got back, he told me that the neighbor said our kids are so well behaved that we should teach a parenting class. *falls on floor laughing*

Now I agree my kids are very well behaved, but does that really qualify one to teach other people how to parent these days? That seems a sad commentary on the abilities of people to parent their children these days. Although, now that I think about it, the best parenting books I've read have been written by other parents, not just some random expert. It just so happens that they were parents who were also an expert in pediatrics or counseling or something related to children.

Cute kid and noisy roofers

The Samster "graduated" from his preschool class on Thurs. They do a little program with the little kids where each class gets up and sings some songs. It is cute as hell and usually pretty funny. This year, the 1-2 yr old class only had 3 kids in it, and one didn't make the program. So, two terrified 1 or 2 yr olds had to stand there while we all listened to their teacher sing. lol

Sam's class was next and they did better. Some of them actually sang, including Sam, and I think they all did all the little hand motions and stuff.

The next class had the star of the morning, though. I think she is also 3. Apparently this little girl had an itch on her leg, or really needed to potty. She had on a skirt and started off pulling it up enough to scratch her leg, then it just kept going higher and higher until the parents were about to fall out of their seats laughing. I was trying not to laugh and ended up laughing so hard I had tears. Poor little girl. Someday her parents are going to humiliate her with that video.

At the end of the school year, the teachers give the parents a little book of photos they've taken of your kid throughout the year. The manwhore and I were looking through it and it was so obvious that Sam was having trouble seeing what back in the fall. Both of us pretty much went WTF? why did it take so long to notice? But, he has his glasses now, so no harm done, except to the mommy guilt-o-meter.


As a side note, my roofers are here. Bright and early on a Sat morning, no less. It sounds like a herd of elephants is up there. And they haven't even started putting the new roof up, they're just getting started taking the old one off. Whee.

We've been stimulated!

Yay us! And it was more than we were expecting. We were anticipating 300x5. Instead we got 600x2 for the manwhore and I and 300x3 for the kids. Whoo hoo! I'm not sure why, but hey, I'm not complaining!

Also, our new roof is sitting on pallets in my front yard. It was delivered yesterday and who knows how long it will be before they come and tear the old one off and put the new one on. Hopefully not long, because every time the wind blows, more of our roof blows off.

You know what's weird?

My writing thus far has been Harlequin-esque type short contempories. Well, I have that one historical that was the first manuscript I finished, but even it is rather short for a single title at only 75,000 words. So, anyway, I'm finding myself thinking of Harlequin when I think of selling my books. Could be it's only because we were supposed to have an editor from Harlequin at our retreat (see former posts for the details) and now I've just got Harlequin on the brain.

But here's the kicker. I don't really love Harlequin books. Some of them have been enjoyable and some are definitely better than others, but I don't love them. What I love are the big, fat historicals, or the longer, slightly suspenseful contemporaries, a la La Nora.

Now I realize that Nora Roberts didn't start out with the spine tingling, read them 20 times and not be bored novels that she writes today. I've been reading some of her early stuff and some of it is trite and full of predictable plot lines and punishing kisses and forced seductions. (Some of that is likely just a product of the fact that's what romance publishers wanted in the early '80s. She started with Harlequin, I believe.) Still, she was a topnotch writer even then. She's just gotten better at her plot lines. Less of the innocent young woman and jaded older man type stuff. More strong, carries a big Bitch Stick heroines and heroes that like the big Bitch Stick.



So, I remind myself that while I may not love Harlequin novels, I am still honing my craft and I have to start somewhere. And if I do manage to sell something to them, I'm not chained to them for the rest of my life. I can work on writing the big, fat historicals full of Lords and Ladies, innocent virgins and pirates, and what not.

My days of freedom are numbered

School is quickly drawing to a close and summer is almost upon us. Sam only has one more day of preschool and the girls only have two weeks of school left. I can't believe this year has flown by so quickly.

I'm both looking forward to and dreading summer. I'm ready for the drudgery of the school routine to be over with. If we want to go swim on a Tue, we'll be able to. If we need to go shopping, we won't have to worry about an 8PM bedtime.

But, I know that boredom will strike. The house will be a mess. They will eat us out of house and home.

My current plan is to make them do some "school work" most mornings. Practice reading, spelling their names, etc. Not much, just a little. And then several days a week we will go swim or to the water park, walk to the park when it's not too hot, have picnics. Basically try to keep them busy, and me from going insane.

I'm sure summer will be over before I know it, and I'll be relieved for them all to go back to school. But right now, I'm looking forward to having them all under foot during the day.

GOOOOAAAAAALLLLLL!!!!!!!

Have I mentioned that Em is playing soccer again? This is her third season playing (El didn't want to play this time). So my 10 weeks premature, needed a vent, minor brain damage, gross motor skills delay, 8 months of PT child is captain of her soccer team, the star player because of her get out there and try attitude. Amazing isn't it?

And, after 2 1/2 seasons of soccer, she scored her first goal yesterday! *little sob* Of course we forgot the damned camera or video camera, but the look of total disbelief, wait did I actually score, OMG I SCORED A GOAL that went across her face was priceless and I'll never forget it.


Honestly, soccer has been the best thing for her, and really you can't even tell anymore that this is the child whose idea of running was a speed walk just two years ago. She hangs right there with the other girls, her feet flying up behind her just like all the other kids. And, she's learning balance and building stamina that is carrying over to other activities as well.

I am so fucking proud of her I could bust!

Oh, and I have to add, that El was just as excited as we were to see her sister finally score a goal. And she didn't make any the two seasons she played soccer, either.

So, I've actually been riding

Tues I actually rode Reno before his catastrophe. He's looking much better today, too. We even saw him trotting some, and he's nickering like he usually does, so he's feeling better.

Anyway, I rode him for about 15 minutes on Tues, and oh boy were my legs ever sore yesterday. They still are today, but we got Sunny (the newest horse) out and started Parelli work with him and then I rode him. A says I did really well for not having ridden in coughmumble20yearscoughmumble. Sonny's owner has messed her knee up and is having surgery tomorrow, so she can't ride and has asked that he be ridden, so I'm happy to oblige. She's a bit new to horses, too, I think, and said he can't be ridden with a hackamore (no bit) and I was riding him just fine with one today. lol

I'm like a kid in a candy shop though, I want more, more, more! When can I ride again? lol

The aftermath of shock

Yesterday, Reno got hurt, badly. The vet was at the barn and D asked me to go get Reno and tie him to the fence. When it was his turn, D went to get him and Reno freaked the fuck out. He reared and broke the 4x4 fence post off at the ground and ripped off 20ft of fence. A board hit D and knocked her down, but she is ok. He took off slinging boards all over the yard. He hit the street and either tripped on the still dangling fencepost or just slipped, but either way, he fell. He looks like a person whose been in a motorcycle accident and slid along the pavement at high speed. He has road burns on his face and head, split the skin on his shoulder, peeled the skin on his knee, other cuts and contusions and road burns of varying severity all along his left side.

A, his owner, arrived right after this all happened, and she was in tears. D was fighting tears and so was I. $350 later, the vet had patched him up as well as he could, and we were standing around really just reeling with shock and trying to figure out what we did wrong.

The truth is, no one did anything wrong, it was just one of those things. The horse panicked and we'll never know why. He's hurt badly, but it could have been so much worse. D could have been hurt, the horse next to him could have been hurt (bless her heart, she's a brat, but she stayed calm through it all), Reno could have broken a bone or been killed.

Today, D and I were still just reeling. It's like the day after someone you love has been injured right in front of you. I keep replaying it in my mind and I'm scatter brained and irritable. Basic post shock behavior.

The good news is that he will recover, but it will be 3-4 months before he can be ridden, and will have a scar on his knee. A is a newlywed and not flush with money (are any of us?) and really couldn't afford this vet bill, so D and I are pitching in where we can. I'm going to cover grain and supplements for him for at least a month or two and D isn't going to charge her to fix the fence.

And we're just grateful that it wasn't any worse than it was.

I HATE REWRITING!

HATE IT! pulls hair out hateithateithateit!

In college and grad school when I had papers to write, I just wrote them, spell checked them, had someone proof read them and turned them in. I never rewrote anything, unless it just wasn't working. Bam! they were done.

Now, I'm working on this contest entry and have someone critiquing for me and I'm having to rewrite the scene and I've read these same 10 pgs about 50 times now, and I'm sick of them! ARRRGGGGHHHH! But I can't really put it down because the contest deadline is in 2 days. Nothing like leaving it to the last minute.