Life on a Tightrope

That’s progress, baby

Three days! Three whole days since I last posted, and the question of the day is, have you missed me? Maybe you thought I went ahead and moved to Yemin Moshe, without so much as a see ya later, ‘gator! Lots of things have been going on, but first and foremost, I am oh, so tired. All I need is one night of uninterrupted sleep and I’ll be good as new. Or good as something; something that is better than tired. I won’t go into why I’m tired because I promised God I wouldn’t. One can’t go around breaking promises to God because Who Knows What Might Happen.

The fact that I’m tired hasn’t gone unnoticed on the home front. It’s not hard to pick up on the occasional (OK, maybe more than occasional) crabby attitude, the dazed look I sport more and more often, and the ever-growing circles that have set up camp below my eyes. Each day I plan to go to bed “early” but it never seems to happen. Whether it’s Alison getting a sliver of fingernail embedded in her throat (and just try telling a child with an aberrant lingual frenulum to stick her tongue out, so you can grab the sliver with tweezers) or Blythe deciding to wake up on the hour, each hour, until midnight – something comes up. So the other day I noticed myself falling asleep at stop lights and was determined to get to bed by 9:00, even if the house did look like a tornado wound its way through our rooms, destroying things in its path.

But then… Alison decided it would be a good night to play the just-one-more-thing-Mommy game. As the clock crept ever forward and I still hadn’t pumped or folded the two loads of laundry on my bed, sleep seemed as far away as it had that morning as I dragged myself to the shower. Finally, Alison stayed in bed and I wearily shuffled to my room and found this…

There are a few things you might notice about this photo.

One: The time on the clock says 7:25, because did I go find my camera and take a picture before diving into bed? No I did not. So this is a re-creation (not to be confused with a dramatization) of what I found, but rest assured this is exactly the way it looked. Although Jeremy may or may not have been lounging there waiting for me the night before.

Two: See the beautiful rose? Alison did get up out of bed one more time and so loved the idea of me finding a rose on my pillow that she asked Daddy to please surprise her with a rose when she woke up in the morning. Which he did, because he’s the best daddy, ever.

Three: There is a note behind the rose. I do have a close-up picture of the note, but I decided I’d keep it to myself because it’s mine and have I ever mentioned that I don’t like to share? But suffice it to say, if ever we find ourselves on one of those game shows where we could win a million dollars by correctly answering the question, “What movie does your husband quote from most often?” the answer would be Indecent Proposal even though he might be tempted to say Forrest Gump.

Four: See how smooth the bed looks? There is no laundry on the bed. Out of camera range, there is no pile of clothing waiting to be folded. The laundry was folded and put away by my husband. The man who hates folding laundry more than any other chore, besides maybe cleaning up diarrhea and even that would be a close call.

Five: A mere ten minutes later, I was asleep. Not just ready for bed, not just in bed, but asleep.

I didn’t necessarily get to stay asleep. But the sentiment? It just can’t be beat.

Life in general

Where My Money At?

It’s April 15th, do you know where your money is?

I DO. I just sent it off to the post office (not with the mail carrier, of course) in a tear-stained envelope where someone will stamp it with today’s date. I am certain that the people who receive it on the other end will do a little victory dance on their desks and order a round of lattes, paid for out of the tax payer’s ever-shrinking wallet. Handing Uncle Sam that kind of cash would be enough to turn a girl Republican, if a girl wasn’t already quite firm in her political beliefs.

2007 was a stellar year for us. But, tempted as we were to put our money somewhere fun, (the newly fantabulous BMW X-5 got more than a few looks from us) we held it close to our collective bosom. Sure we splurged here and there, but for the most part we were sensible. We’re just ~~cheap~~ smart like that. When we started our new business at the end of last year, we were lucky enough to have some capital to get off the ground and be able to live off of our savings. Well, technically we’re still living off of our savings, but today that little nest egg magically transformed from a dinosaur to a robin’s egg. Ouch!

In honor of all those who are hurtin’ today, I’m going to list a few tricks we’ve employed to reduce our spending over the past six months. A lot of these earn bonus points for both helping the environment and dropping your poundage.

* Trade services with the Preschool. Dude, we’re paid up till Kindergarten

* Eat out less. We love to eat with friends, but we trade dinner nights at each other’s homes, instead. Then the kids can play instead of squirm and we still get the occasional night-off from the kitchen.

* Plant a garden. Produce is expensive, especially if you buy organic.

* Drive a fuel-efficient car, and drive only when necessary. We live on a ranch, so walking/cycling anywhere is impossible. But we try to consolidate our trips “into town”.

* Hand-me-downs are THE BOMB, as are buy-sell-trade children’s clothing stores.

* Go brunette. *sob*

* Home-make gifts. They require thought and time, but doesn’t that make them more special? I tell myself that, anyway.

* Use up those gift cards that are stashed in a drawer somewhere.

* Cash in credit card miles for gift cards and travel vouchers.

* Put only $20 onto a coffee card, and make it last all month.

* Borrow books from the library or friends instead of buying.

* Share a subscription to favorite magazine(s).

Here are a few money saving tips that you ought to avoid:

* Using duct tape for hair removal instead of waxing.

* Re-using any kind of feminine hygiene product.

* Washing clothes in your kids’ bathwater.

* Letting the dog “wash” the dishes.

Feel free to share your money saving tips!

Allergies Ranch Life

A belly rub gone wrong

It’s another gorgeous day here in paradise so we spent Blythe’s nap time hangin’ out on the sidewalk this morning. In attendance: Alison (decked out in a lacy pink dress over the top of her pajamas – it’s Sunday, who am I to judge?), me, a bucket of sidewalk chalk, Cage (overweight dog), Simon (curmudgeonly old cat) and Tiger (Simon’s effeminate male offspring). Now that you’ve met the cast, picture each of the above (minus the chalk) fighting for a turn in my lap. The lap will never be large enough, people.

Cage spent his turn sprawled out, upside down, drooling on my pants and feet while I scratched and rubbed and petted him. I gave him a good long turn in the lap and then… the itching started. And then the sneezing. And the watery eyes followed by some hives and DANG, what on earth did he roll in that I am allergic to? Could he have rolled in a large pile of pepperoni? Unlikely, although that is probably the equivalent of a dog’s wet dream. Might he have coated his fur with the juice from a watermelon (not to be confused with watermelon juice) or pumpkin innards? Probably not.

Unfortunately, the list of odd things to which I am allergic seems to grow with each passing year. For example, did you know that one could be allergic to the urea that is so kindly called an “inactive ingredient” in most lotions that have SPF? That’s right, save your skin from the sun by coating it with urine. Someone else’s urine, at that. But don’t worry, it’s inactive. Wait just a minute here… urine. You know, Cage probably DID roll himself in some pee, and I just rubbed it all over my hands, arms, and lap. At least I didn’t give him any kisses today, ’cause that would just be disgusting.

I see a bath in his immediate future, do you?

Blogging Business Entertainment

BOSSY does San Francisco

Warning: If you have no interest in BOSSY, don’t bother reading this post. I’m detailing this event as though her ~~stalker~~ biggest fan got locked up an hour before and I’m trying to be his second. Or her second, as the case may be.

Yesterday afternoon Jeremy and I loaded up the car with some Emu-chili (shut-up, it was totally delicious), a bottle of Barefoot Pinot Grigio, some strawberries and chocolate. Plus some other stuff that’s really none of your business. We kissed the kids good-bye and headed off on our mini-roadtrip. The excitement! The open road!  Oh wait, I forgot my camera so back we went. But then. The excitement! The open road! It took about four hours (with bay area traffic) but we arrived right on time to Cat’s fabulous apartment in San Francisco.

After depositing our offerings on the buffet and making hasty trips to the bathroom (where Cat strategically placed this),

we got to chat with BOSSY and some super-cool Bay Area Bloggers. Hopefully you can find their links on BOSSY, because I’m terrible at keeping track of such things. Poor Jeremy, I told him that a couple of other guys were going to be there but turns out they couldn’t make it. I promise, honey, they did exist.

BOSSY said Jeremy looks just like her cousin so I captured the family reunion in this photo.

And then I stepped up to the plate, and BOSSY’s all, Damn! and tried to help me out by doing the tall-person-meets-a-midget stoop.

You can’t know what to expect going into a situation where you don’t really know anyone and where you feel like you know all about someone but they don’t have a clue about YOU.  So BOSSY was all, “Yea, my son…” and the rest of us were all, “Uh-huh, yea, he’s tall, and he has brown hair, and he’s 18, and he’s going to go to Columbia, and he’s all for Barack Obama…” and then BOSSY was all, “Um, what was I saying?”. Just kidding. It was a lot more natural than that and I must say, BOSSY is a totally normal person. I don’t know what else I expected, but there you go. I kept calling her, “her” because I had been referring to her as BOSSY this whole time, but it’s really weird to say, “So, BOSSY, have you been pooping alright?” but yet I had a hard time calling her “Georgia” because she’s BOSSY. But she’s not actually bossy. Are you following this? Wait, how many glasses of wine did I have?

Here are some totally stalker-ish photos for you.

BOSSY’s non-toe cleavage shoes. I also have a photo of her bling-y belt, but it looks more like a shot of her crotch and this is not that kind of blog.

BOSSY setting up a shot.

Let me take a moment here to say, maybe one of these days I will figure out how to make my photos look prettier, as in, not all washed out with red eye for all mankind. Until then, you all have to suffer – particularly those of you on the other end of my camera. Especially when I’ve had a few glasses of wine so that each glass increases the number of clicks exponentially. Left hand, drink, right hand, click. Gotcha.

There was great conversation, lots of laughter, and a totally comfortable atmosphere.

And I really wish I had noticed my whole eye was covered by my hair.

I’d like to say THANKS to BOSSY, Bay Area organizer Stefania, SF host Cat, and all the other bloggers who came – we had a great time. The biggest thanks of all goes to my husband: thanks, babe, for going to this estrogen fest with me on our date night; for driving 7 hours round-trip; for not waking me up as I slept in the passenger seat at 1 AM; for supporting me and not complaining even once.  I’m the luckiest woman ever, and I know it!

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