kellementology

life according to me

Category: Peaflock

  • Sunday, Sunday…So good to me…

    It’s quiet now.  So quiet I can hear the refrigerator running — a strange way to measure quiet, but still.  Okay, so if my Mac was in the bedroom where it’s been recently, instead of on my kitchen counter, then I guess being able to hear the refrigerator would be huge.

    You know.  The distance and all?

    Okay, so maybe not.

    Everybody’s gone.  The MoH and the RTR are on a hike.  Do they hike?  Erm…no.  But we’ve sort of decided that we’d kind of like to think about possibly learning.  Maybe.  Notice that I’m not with them.  I’m in the kitchen, of course, again indulging myself in an on-line baking gab fest with other passionate foodies.  And the Gramster got in her car to go for a walk.  That’s where you drive somewhere more interesting than Reach-Out-and-Touch-Your-Neighbor-Gated-McCommunity-Hood to park your car and then get out and walk.

    Did you notice I missed Friday?  (Insert affirmative response here.) I thought about it, and somehow the time got away from me.

    You’re not dying to know why?  What?  Are you cranky today?

    Well.

    I’ve been using two guide books to assist my vacation planning.  One is Rick Steves‘ Italy 2008 (lotsa advice in black and white text from someone who has a great reputation) think Nitty Gritty — and the other, a very colorful guide published by DK Eyewitness Travel:  Italy (you know, lots of cool drawings, photographs, color, and less text) think Bright and Shiny here.  That one would be for the menfolk.  I figured I’d go light on their attention spans.

    Anyway, having gotten all the lodging taken care of, I decided to tackle the recommended strategy for avoiding long lines.  Now, it isn’t that I don’t particularly enjoy standing in long lines.  I am an SDSU grad, after all, and back in the day before on-line registration, all we did was wait in line.  Serious ones.  It was the beginning of my quest to develop some semblance of patience in my time on this planet.

    Where was I?

    Lines…oh yes.  Avoiding them.  It would be the heat.  I’m spoiled rotten.  Completely and thoroughly.  Like today.  It’s a non-balmy, somewhat breezy, wannabe sunny but not quite makin’ it 69 degrees on this Sunday in Paradise.  So I’m beyond worried about heat, and sweating, and well, honestly, my tongue lolling about on the pavement while I’m there.  How gauche.  Erm…quanto viscoso!  Or something like that.

    I am so not someone who can do heat unless it’s in a kitchen, and even then, it’s not pretty.  And I know none of you are feeling the love over this right now since I’ve taken a gander at your temps and you’re sweltering.  Most of you!  Okay, so not you, paisley, but still.

    So, getting reservations in Florence to see Michelangelo’s David and the Uffizi are highly recommended.  Now here’s your quiz.  Do you just ignore the suggestion to call, or get on line because you are a firm believer that anything is possible on line?  (Insert Jeopardy music here)

    You are correct!  I got on line.  And yanno?  The booking fee is more than the fee the museum charges and I am so not interested in paying anyone for their network, or whatever it is they spend on their servers.  So I decide, with my tail firmly between my legs, to call.  You know, punch the umpteen gazillion digit number into my phone, and then rely on redial until I get through…

    Monday: after 10 or so calls, I decide to refer to the business hours, and realize they’re closed on Monday.  Fine.

    Tuesday: after 10 or so calls, I do notice that the phone rings in two ways — a regular “busy” signal, and another odd-sounding, and irregularly buzzing type sound which I figured was a “ring.”  And no, I’m not on speaker phone because the phone’s not near my computer.  Gawd forbid that I have to get off my ball, trip over the Doggo who is laying on her bed to get to the phone should someone deign to answer my call.  I also learn that if you let the phone “ring” more than 40 times, a recording tells you all lines are busy.

    This is key information. (Lick the end of your pencil and write that down.)

    Wednesday: I told the MoH to set the alarm for 3am our time so I could call then.  Really.  But the idea of getting up to engage in this rapidly expanding exercise in futility, going back to sleep, then getting up again at 5:00 to beat the streets with my VBF seemed pointless.  So I spent another morning analyzing Italian telephone rings and busy signals.

    Thursday: After the MoH telling me that I should just suck it up and book on line (consider that this would cost almost $80 for the four of us for ONE museum),  I spent the morning making more inane phone calls that no one answered, stressing the entire time that I was not accomplishing anything.  Horror of all horrors.

    Disclaimer:  Okay, so I have to qualify “not accomplishing anything.”  That would be accomplishing anything for the trip.  Picture the whole forward motion thing on a football field.  The ref blows the whistle, right?  The rest of the stuff I should be taking care of is well, being taken care by the Gramster who needs to stay busy.

    Friday: I have a renewed burst of phoning energy, really looking forward to the crick I know I’ll have in my neck and a beet colored ear before I’m done.  I plan to arise at 3am and proceed downstairs to the MoH’s laptop.  In the dark. Pick up the phone and “dial” the phone number I’ve  dialed for what seems like the millionth time.  It sounds so loud in the quiet house, and it already feels different since there’s nothing to occupy my mind while I’m listening to the beeping of the busy tone, or the odd ringing.

    I decide to log on to Concierge to surf through the info they have about Italy.  After about the 4th attempt calling, I notice the phone number Concierge has for the place I’ve been trying to contact. The last three digits of the number catch my eye, and in the dim light cast by the screen, I look back at Steves’ book noticing that something isn’t quite right.  I see an 883 in one place, and an 833 in the other.

    Oh. My. Gawd.

    I try the different phone number.  It rings three times, and an English speaking voice, cheerfully and heavily accented in Italian answers.  In less than three minutes, I’ve booked two reservations for four people.  Three.  Minutes.

    After how many days?

    I smell a letter coming.  And it’s stinky.

    Dear Rick Steves…

    And newsflash.  The menfolk are back from their hike.  In case I’ve swayed you about Paradise and palm trees, here’s another look without the Pacific.  Makes you want to move East, doesn’t it?

    No, it’s not smog.  It’s that lovely June Gloom that we get.  If you’re into pure sunshine, June would not be the time to visit.

  • Italia! 30 days and counting…

    It looks like the theme for June will be food and vacation planning. All fun and games, right? Sheesh. I don’t think so! It’s only the 2nd and my tongue’s dragging on the ground. Okay, so not exactly, but still.

    On the vacation front…
    I finally found Fattoria Settemerli — the perfect farmhouse (lah-tee-damn-dah) about 15 minutes outside of Firenze. Now, being one who will always remember that episode of I Love Lucy when the four friends were headed to California and stopped at that fleabag motel, you know, where Ethel had to tie Fred to the bed with the sagging mattress? And the train. The train…Bwhahahahaha! Cheese sandwich? Not ringing any bells?

    Nevermind.

    Like I said. The perfect farmhouse. There’s a bus stop nearby, and yes, I absolutely Google mapped it to make sure AND checked the bus lines and wasn’t THAT fun. But I did read a few reviews that mentioned something about having to venture up a hill with luggage and wheels bumping over the rocks in the road, so we may be in for quite the adventure. The MoH says that’s the point, so no problem. I booked it.

    But my exhilaration lasted about two seconds because the next step in my planning is figuring out how to get from Rome to Naples to Sorrento to Naples to Florence to Rome. We’re taking the train for the most part, but do you have any idea just how many trains there are? It’s amazing. Erm…and so is the cost. But it became a no brainer when I read in one resource after another that road traffic is horrible, gasoline is approaching $10/gallon, and that at least in Naples, no one pays attention to red lights or stop signs. Suggestions mention needing to “Do what the locals do, and make eye-contact with the drivers while you cross.” Now that sounds exciting, yes?

    Besides, without the hassle of a rental car large enough to fit the four of us and our luggage, the MoH will actually get to see the countryside with no white-knuckle driving responsibilities this time. Sure, it will be somewhat blurry at about 180mph, but hey!

    And for those of you still scratching your heads about why I’m organizing this instead of using a booking agency: A) I’m a glutton for punishment; B) It’s insanely fun; C) I’m a complete control freak about things like this; D) I missed my calling and really wanted to be a Travel Agent instead of a teacher; E) I have absolutely nothing to do with my time and totally miss planning every moment of adolescents’ literate lives 70 hours a week.

    If you chose “C” then you are correct, win the Maserati, and can collect your winnings in your dreams. Don’t forget to listen to the engine before you go, because if you’re like me, that’s the closest you’ll ever get to a Maserati, right? But thanks for playing.

    On the food front…

    I’m the hostess with the mostest for the monthly cyber bake I’ve been participating in for over year now. It’s top secret, so I can’t say what we’ll flood the web with at the end of this month, but part of my responsibilities as co-host are to monitor the forum for the other bakers who may have questions. Um. They have lots?

    And you remember that there are nearly 1,000 participants, right?

    Thankfully, there are people far more knowlegeable than myself in this group, and they chime in with suggestions and direction, too. It’s quite a bit of fun.

    And to get warmed up for our trip, I’m digging into regional Italian. I figured what the heck. I can go to Italy and have a decent source of comparison in my head when I cozy up to a plate of Fritto Misto di Mare or Saltimboca alla Romana. It has to be good, doesn’t it? A die-hard foodie cannot go to Italy and come home disappointed, can she?

    On the home front?

    My mom is really on the ball. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear her name was Cinderella. She cleans all day. Vacuums, sweeps, waters flowers, does laundry, folds it and puts it away. Cleans cat boxes. Cleans garage refrigerators that should be donated to science, or nuked. I know. You’re wondering if you can get that service. But try and tell her not to. It doesn’t work. She’s downstairs right now finishing dishes I left in the sink last night. This is not a crime in Paradise unless you make it one. Leaving dishes in the sink, not having your mother do them. Or preventing her. We have this problem with never quite being able to fit the dishes into the dishwasher because it fills all day, then only half the dinner dishes go into it. And I suppose I could really wax on about this particular dilemma, but I have trip planning to do.

    Museum reservations to make so that we can bypass long lines was numero uno on my list today, but phones ring oddly in Italy. I can’t tell if it’s ringing and ringing, or busy.

    Restaurants off the beaten path to find so I can truly say we enjoyed something special while we’re there. This is challenging, but there are some really good Italian blogs with good leads…

    Start on our itinerary. I make a small binder for the MoH when we go on vacation so he can speed read through everything while he’s on the plane. It has reservation papers and vouchers, maps, and print outs of possibilities for all kinds of things. He likes it.

    Assign homework. The menfolk are getting a subject to bone up on so they can be the expert when we’re standing in front of yet another Renaissance painting, the assigned person can talk about more than our interpretation of it.

    That’s enough for a Monday, I think.

    Isn’t it?

    You’ll be soooooo sick of this whole Italy thing by the time I’m finished.

    Ciao, bella. Gracie per la chiamata. Abbia un giorno piacevole.

  • Teenagers, school, and grey hair.

    Teenagers, school, and grey hair.

    How do we get to Friday so quickly now when it used to seem as if it was forever hovering in the distance of my pseudo nine-to-five work week? It’s amazing, and I’m left feeling yet again that I need some kind of a drive through where I can order a few more hours each day with a super-sized box of salty hot fries.

    And I’m pensive. But that shouldn’t stop my Friday Follies, because I’ll indulge in a bit of Peaflock egocentrism instead of worrying about the economy, or whether I’m being green enough. About whether the RTR will persist in his subtle efforts to resist all half-assed attempts at parental pressure to become a neurotic type-A studentisto at some point in the future. Smart young man.

    So how is my almost 16-year-old last birdie in my nest doing these days? I thought you’d never ask. Outside of continuing to be the gentle and respectful, scruffy around the edges, but hugging type person that he’s always been, I’d like to say he’s seen the light and has become an organizational sensation with a sparkling bedroom. A notebook that one might be able to detect some semblance of order. A backpack whose lumpy contents I don’t have to wonder about.

    He hasn’t.

    But his bathroom is cleaner than ours now, because The Gramster is sharing it with him. It looks like a real bathroom now with a mirror you can actually see your reflection in.  And he’s loving the guitar, the lessons, and even his cool guitar teacher. I keep asking him when he’s going to get House of the Rising Sun down so I can sing, and you know, I think he’s working on it. I’ll let you know if I actually get a gig on YouTube so you can spit your cereal milk or coffee all over your keyboard.

    But school? Well, let’s just say we’re gently reminding him that if there’s not a solid “C” in Spanish and Algebra II, then the MoH has decreed that when we get back from Italy this summer, he’s getting a J.O.B.

    So I’m still trying to figure out exactly whose consequence that is since the RTR doesn’t have a driver’s license, and since I remain challenged to completely understand which higher plane of existence he spends most of waking moments on, I’m not comfortable with the idea of him being behind the wheel of any vehicle. Too. Scary. That means that I would become the J.O.B. taxi.

    I hate driving. Thoroughly.

    Besides, I think our philosophy is losing credibility faster than you can yell, “Phony!” at me. If I haven’t raged enough about it before, or, if you were smart and skipped through the pretty pictures of those twenty or so posts, you know that I do have rather strong opinions about the general quality of public education. In spite of the two decades I spent working as an educator — a damn good one, thank you very much — I’ve always believed that what we do best is try to fit all children into the same sized hole. And because my pensiveness is about my son today, and not public education, I’ll leave it at this: If I truly believe that, then how, how, how do I continue to find myself veering toward that norm? It’s amazingly difficult to pull away from that force.

    So how is the RTR winning this? About two months or so ago, his art teacher invited a spokesperson down from a school in San Francisco to speak. The funny thing about it is that each day when I pick him up at school, we have the same exchange:

    Me: How was your day?

    Him: Pretty good (although this fluctuates between other responses such as, fine, average, normal, okay…)

    Me: Did anything new and exciting happen?

    Him: No.

    It’s one of those warm, fuzzy mother and son moments that we smile about. So it figures that the one day I forget to play the tape, he actually has something to say:

    Him: Mom. You know how you always ask me about whether something new and exciting happens at school?

    Me: Yah?

    Him: Well today, a person came to our art class.

    Me: What did he talk about?

    Him: Well she was from this art school in San Francisco and it sounds really cool. You don’t have to have SAT scores.

    Me: Really? *Oh. Swell.*

    Him: Yep. And when she asked if anyone wanted information, I raised my hand.

    Whoa. This is the part where I have to control myself and not act like I’m giddy that he is showing an interest in something that doesn’t resemble tiny military figurines or tanks, World War II and YouTube comedy segments. He’s spoken to someone from admissions on the phone twice.

    Do you know how difficult it is to keep up with the whole, “It matters that you WORK hard in school, because in life you have to WORK hard if you want to find the right kind of WORK for yourself instead of just finding a job that pays well- blah-blah-blah-dee-dah-work-work-work…” diatribe when the school your son has decided he’s attending has this philosophy:

    The Academy of Art University maintains a no-barrier admissions policy for all undergraduate programs. The Academy was built on the educational philosophy that all students interested in studying art and design deserve the opportunity to do so.

    All he needs is a high school diploma. Period.

    Okay, so… and parents who are willing to pay the tuition.

    But it’s right up his alley of interests. So go figure.

    Guess the MoH is going to have to whip out his checkbook. But the RTR is still taking the SAT next Saturday.

    Just. Because.

    And the next two years will fly by as we continue to pander to the great education god in the sky and resist temptations to walk the streets with signs that plead, “Will clean your bathroom for son’s GPA.” Okay, so maybe not.

    He told me the school doesn’t recognize GPA, either.

    Go figure that his non-plan looks like it’s going to work. Just think about all the grey hairs and wrinkles I could have saved worrying about that sweet kid.

    Where does the time go?

  • The family that views together?

    My mother loves watching television. Loves. It. So it’s been a challenge for her since arriving back in Paradise to adjust to our television viewing habits. Um, we don’t exactly have any?

    She’s got to feel like she’s in TV Hell.

    We do have shows we enjoy, but from my perspective, it’s more about being with my menfolk in the evening after dinner than the show itself. Sappy, but true. Now, the MoH would probably say, “Whatever,” to my response being the avid one-who-looks-forward-to-his-three-shows-that-aren’t-sports type person that he is, but you do get the idea, right?

    Outside of those few shows on our highly intellectual viewing agenda (American Noodle, Bones, House, Top Chef…), we surf. Someone grabs the clicker while I’m putting the finishing touches on the latest recipe I’m subjecting my family to and their job is to find something we’ll all enjoy while we’re eating — nothing anyone really cares about. You know, like Dirty Jobs, which is great viewing while eating. Have you seen the one about the clean up after the toilets exploded? Nice.

    This isn’t always as easy as it sounds since we’re usually ready to park our butts on the couch with food and beverage in hand around 7PM most nights. There’s never really anything on. One-hundred-fifty channels, not counting choices for the On-Demand channels or pay-per-view options and there’s nothing on. If you have a closet full of clothes and often feel as if you have nothing to wear, it would be similar to that feeling. Completely hopeless.

    Like I said. We surf. It doesn’t matter that it’s 6:50 or 7:12, the one with the clicker stops at whatever looks good — erm, that would so not be Cash Cab, okay? Who thinks of that crap? We settle in while we eat, try to ignore the Doggo who waits patiently for any finished plate to lick, never blinking lest she miss that opportunity, and like the relatively content saps we are, watch whatever is semi-interesting. Sometimes, that means staring at the pretty pictures on one of the HD channels.

    This is all very contrary to what my mom is accustomed to. She is a stalwart TV Guide person, planning her television viewing time meticulously. In fact, she enjoys reading said TV Guide aloud to others so that they, too, can know what is on and marvel at all the possibilities. So I’ve explained the on-line Guide to her. You know. That place that lists all shows on all channels across all hours of the next few centuries? Yes. That one. I’ve also shown her how the DVR works. That way she can record her favorites, then watch them while I’m wasting the prime years of my life *snort* sitting at my Mac every freaking morning of the week. Okay, so maybe not weekends. But still.

    So she’s adjusting, but it’s got to be strange. Annoying? Probably downright aggravating. I know we can be that way. So I also encourage her to watch television in our bedroom when we’re downstairs. Warm the bed up, blow the cobwebs off the Sony and fire up the engine to see if it still runs. And she has. Once.

    We have been enjoying American Noodle together, and that’s been fun, but I’m sure she’d like to hunker down with her own schedule, with her own television, which, by the way, is sitting in the garage with the rest of her Earthly possessions and is just about as big as the little bedroom I wedged her into. In fact, now that I think of it, that television is so enormous, I wonder if it will fit through the door.

    Okay, so maybe not that big. But I don’t want to think about trying to carry it up the stairs. Besides, we don’t have cable active in that part of the house. Gawd forbid giving the RTR another reason to hole up in his cave. Besides, can TVs actually pick up stations without being hooked up anymore?

    So this morning, after diligently recording Boston Legal and Grey’s Anatomy, do you think she’d actually be able to sit down and enjoy them? One would think so. But for some reason, the sound wasn’t working on the television. One of us must have pushed a mysterious button on the clicker and it’s hopeless to try and figure out which one it is without dorking the entire operation up beyond all repair. So I clicked off the power surge for a few minutes and let the whole thing reboot.

    It works now.

    But she’s upstairs messing around with her laptop which was freezing up every time she had more than a couple of windows open.

    I have my fingers crossed that it’s fixed now, too.

    Because, like I said, I’m in the prime of my life and have so many swell things to get on with.

    Like vacation plans.

    I finally found a cute little place in Sorrento for the second leg of our trip to Italy (I booked an apartment in Rome for the first leg) which is happening in less than six weeks and I am sooooooooo not ready…The Hotel del Mare sits nearly at the Marina Grande and is a winding, hilly walk to the center of Sorrento. A great way to work off the breakfast that comes with the room!   It sounds like the four of us will be shoulder-to-shoulder and have some family bonding time.

    But I am starting to get pretty excited about the whole thing.

    It’s finally beginning to feel real!

  • Friday in my world.

    Welcome to my Friday Follies. I figured it was a great way to cover what competes for attention in my brain. You know. In case anyone is actually interested. And since Friday is only so long, I can’t exactly include my entire list.

    Question of the Day/Week/Month/Lifetime: Would any of the unthinkably serious crap that is taking place in the world right now be happening if women ruled? Seriously. Clearly, I’m not opposed to men in general. I’m quite fond of four of my own, all of whom are quite pleasant humans. But I will never, ever understand what possesses some to be so consumed with a desire for power, that they destroy what and whomever lies in their path. It makes absolutely no sense.  I would say, “Nuke ’em ’till they glow,” but Greenpeace would revoke my membership and I’d have to take my sticker off my Mac.

    Now I’ve heard everything: BBC News is reporting today that we can now blame the obese for the planet’s energy woes. I can officially expect the BBC to pick up some of the crap I write since they have decided to bring attention to this illustrious study and call it news.

    For the shopper who has everything and can’t resist yet another… um…thing: The ultimate cake server. My VBF handed it to me unopened the other day on our morning walk saying she didn’t want it. I think it was something she received at a dinner party? Lo and behold, a wonder of design revealed itself after I was done fighting with the packaging. Just chuck the magnetized heel, and you’ve got a swanky brushed stainless cake server that may or may not fit in your utensil drawer. My VBF is sooooo getting this back.

    For summer travel plans: Consider Paradise your destination. Palm trees, fish tacos, an excellent ball park with a less than stellar ball team, and no more spine-wrenching plunges into bathtub-sized potholes! An end to days of signs warning of sewage spills at the bay? Standard & Poor has finally given our fair city an acceptable bond rating again. We will now get to use plastic to pay for street repairs, faulty sewer lines and broken water mains. Party on! Maybe they can also do something about our pump prices?

    My gentle menfolk: I am willing to act like I’m somewhat interested in anyone who can convince me that a person interested in the arts needs to take advanced mathematics. But I think I’ve heard it all before. The RTR will be bypassing pre-calculus for statistics as a junior next year since it’s the lesser of two evils and he has to take a third year of math. The MoH has concocted a bribe — monetary — if the RTR can squeak by with a “C” in Algebra II and Spanish. He does have an “A” in PE, however, which is huge when one considers that actually moving his now more than 6′-tall lankiness is not something he enjoys. And that he has a swim coach who makes the entire class do 45 laps — yes, that would be 45 — to compensate for kids caught sneaking into the locker room early. Maybe the RTR needs to swim with me this summer. And pigs will fly.

    My Tiny Paradise:

    I saw this guy early this morning when I should have been sleeping in. My VBF had an early appointment so I didn’t have to stumble out of bed at dawn’s crack to walk. Do you think I could actually sleep? Um. No. So of course I got up and thought…Hell. I can take macro snail shots while enjoying my coffee! He looked so cute, I couldn’t bring myself to chuck him over the wall into the early morning traffic. Which probably saved me a law suit now that I think of it. Gawd forbid that I hit someone’s Maserati with snail guts.

    On the menu? Feh. I never have a menu. But my friend Gina always does. *sigh* In my next life, I’ll be as organized. Our meals are all mushed around in my head with all this other crap I think about. But I have finally edited the photos from our latest dinner party featuring Rick Bayless’s Mexican cuisine and will be getting around to doing that mammoth post today. And I’m thinking next week is going to be Indian…Tiki Masala, anyone?

    Me & my mom: Things are great! We’ve only had 3 arguments, 5 disagreements, uttered 49 sighs of exasperation, clucked our tongues 89 times, and been disgusted with one another once or twice. Don’t get me wrong — that’s all normal — at least it has been since I was In High School. We have our laughs and snorts, too. We’ve been on a few field trips, (Wally World, Target…) have drunk umpteen gazillion pots of coffee, analyzed the state of the human condition at least 14 times, moved my bedroom around, and jeered each other’s candidates with gusto. Her cat finally ventured down the stairs by herself today to be greeted by my hissing pretentious attack cat, and the doggo has stopped following my mom up and down the stairs, realizing her favorite person isn’t going anywhere. Her hips thank her. The dog’s. Not my mom’s.

    I’d say that’s enough folly for a Friday.

    Don’t you?

    I feel so much better now.

  • Perfect Days & Apologies

    I think this is the longest I haven’t written since beginning this place I miss so much when I don’t write. And the only legitimate explanation I have for not writing may not make much sense to most.

    I can remember living in a dreary apartment when I was finishing my degree. It was brown. Regardless of how much I enjoy that particular color at this point in my life, somehow, brown then seemed dreary. And it was. It was a means to an end, and I tolerated it because I had to.

    Well, I’ve been having trouble tolerating the orange. I know brown isn’t orange, but still. Surely you must have an inkling of an idea of why this is a problem. Let’s just say my house isn’t in order. Or my blog, in this case. It makes me sad.

    I actually like the layout. I really do. But I spent quite a bit of time on thinking about changing out the orange and switching the font, and all that sort of thing, and when I looked in my files, I saw strange things.

    Can someone please tell me why, oh, why do designers have to subject the rest of us to their particular style of code? I understand creative license, and all, but man.

    I can figure it all out. Really I can. I just don’t want to. I want to download a theme, plug in my widgets, make minor adjustments, maybe have some fun designing a header or two, and then think about writing. Because that’s the whole point of a blog, isn’t it?

    So in fewer words, I’m working on this theme, but not since Thursday, which was days and days ago.

    I guess I just become disgusted, and avoid the problem. And that causes yet another problem because I truly enjoy being here and taking the time to spread my particular style of propaganda. Except I haven’t.

    (more…)

  • Blog Wraps & Ballsy Mothers

    Clearly, my blog is having an identity crisis. A few days ago, my aunt who lives in New York emailed and said my blog wasn’t loading. Outside of that sounding like some strange kind of medical condition, I cringed knowing that things didn’t bode well for my new theme.

    I put a message up at MyBlogLog to see if I could get some responses and people were kind enough to let me know whether they could open my site or not.

    It turns out that Internet Explorer and the Evil Empire *just kidding Bill* was somehow connected to the problem. No comment on that one other than I routinely encourage everyone to download Firefox every time I get a chance, which works just fine. Scott of My Thermos offered to take a look and also pointed out that ads running on my site might also be contributing to the problem. It was pretty cool. His help. Not the problem with the ads. I had downloaded Skype some time ago so that I could IM with my baking friends, so he suggested we use that to try and figure out what the problem was. Like I said. Cool.

    In the meantime, I’ve taken everything out of my sidebars, reported the problem with the ads to BlogHer who quickly responded and guess what?

    It still doesn’t work.

    And the reason everything is purple is because I was trying out different themes this morning and then got sidetracked with my mom (which is normal because we’re sort of unfocused when we’re around each other…) and then I forgot the purple thing was up. I’m trying to find something that will work. You know, because I don’t have anything else to do but play with this ridiculous thing.

    She made it back to Paradise in one piece...catbox and all. But my mom! She made it! w00t! And our doggo has been beside herself with delirious happiness since my mom arrived. My mother is her favorite human in the world. She’s worn herself out following my mother up and down the stairs as her things have been unpacked and now she’s limping pretty badly. The doggo. Not my mother.

    She rolled in at about 3PM Sunday after leaving New York on Wednesday morning. She drove over 700 miles on Saturday alone. Amazing, huh?

    Remember those tornado warnings she drove through? The ones she was supposed to stop and find shelter from? Yes, those. She said it was like the sky just opened up, with blackness on both sides of the I-40 as it angles in a northwesterly path through Little Rock, AK. We later heard that six people died very near there in that storm.

    But she is here safe and sound. We stuffed her full of Huevos Rancheros a la MoH and some wine.

    Stay tuned for more adventures with mom.

    So for those of you who are sick of seeing those books in the background of my photos, you’ll have a change of pace since I’ve moved my Mac from the office to put together a bedroom for my mom. She’s up there fluffing her nest right now going through the things she’s managed to hang on to after moving three times in less than a year. New digs for my Mac.

    It makes me tired just thinking of it. Seriously.

    Thanks for your tolerance with my blog wrap. I’ll get situated.

    And you know about flying pigs, right?

    Um-Hmmm.

  • Dorothy, you’re sort of in Kansas.

    This morning before leaving for work, the MoH told me that my mother was headed into some very severe weather. Right before heading upstairs to see for myself, I heard that storms had gone through in the night and that someone had died in Missouri.

    Glancing at the clock, thinking of the two hour time difference, and knowing my mother’s Emily most likely woke her up at the crack of dawn, and that she’d been driving for a few hours already, I knew my mother was probably not in a great place.

    “Where are you?” I began as I have for the past few days.

    “Headed into Little Rock, AK,” she responded as I stared at the weather map opening up on my monitor covered with huge yellow and red sections punctuated with exclamation marks indicating tornado watches.

    “Mom, there’s an enormous storm headed right for Little Rock. You have to stop. Go into a coffee shop or something.”

    “Well, it’s strange, because there isn’t anybody on the road this morning.” She’s been traveling on the I-40 with lots of big rigs. “But my sister called a while ago and told me to turn on the radio and listen. I heard about last night.”

    “There’s nobody on the road because they know about the weather, Mom. You have to stop. You might have to leave Emily in the car.”

    “Okay, don’t worry about me too much.”

    About 45 minutes or so have gone by as I continue to watch the weather and I finally decided to call her again.

    Do you think she stopped? No. She drove right through it saying “it got really dark for a while, but the sun’s out now so I’m going to stop for lunch.”

    Unbelievable.

  • Open up that golden gate…

    Some time last summer, my mother decided she needed an adventure. A permanent one. She figured that before she was too old to actually do something about it, she would relocate to the East Coast. Maybe that doesn’t sound like an adventure to some, but when you’ve lived in one place for over 40 years, and you’re not planning on returning, it’s an adventure. She’s always had wanderlust, and if someone asked me to sum her up in one rich word, I’d say she’s a dreamer. And that’s not anything to be ashamed of.

    I am, too.

    How does one live any time on this earth without dreams? Without wonderings and urges or hopes to go places different than what she knows best, or become someone other than who she is now?

    I can’t imagine.

    But I’ve also learned that most often, dreams require work, and sometimes, the timing of all that’s necessary to make them come true is wrong. It takes amazing strength to admit that maybe, you’re just not strong enough to make it work. You’re tired.

    Lonely.

    My mother, who turned 70 late last year, has, with the help of her sister, once again packed up her little white car, bundled up her cat, Emily, and yesterday set out for home from upstate New York.

    She’s outfitted with a trip itinerary courtesy of her brother-in-law, a cell phone, and two daughters and a sister who are at computers, keeping watch of weather, and looking for motels along the way.

    Amazing, isn’t it?

    I think she is.

    Anyone who likes to wander,

    ought to keep this saying in his mind:

    “Absence makes the heart grow fonder”

    of the good old place you leave behind.

    When you’ve hit the trail a while

    seems you rarely see a smile;

    that’s why I must fly out yonder,

    where a frown is mighty hard to find!

    California here I come,

    right back where I started from.

    Where bowers of flowers bloom in the sun,

    Each morning at dawning

    birdies sing an’ ev’rything:

    A sun-kiss’d miss said, “don’t be late,”

    That’s why I can hardly wait,

    Open up that golden gate,

    California here I come.

    You go, Mom.

    Escape

  • Who pulled our plugs?

    Who pulled our plugs?

    A couple of days ago, on the day after the official end of busy season, I was speaking to someone at work and mentioned that I’d considered calling 911 when I woke up that morning, in jest, of course. You may recall my whining about needing air in my tires or something, yes? And when the individual questioned me about whether or not I was in charge of my own destiny, I became annoyed.

    (more…)