August 20, 2007 | It's not a regret, it's an "experience", The Year of Living Changerously

(Not to be confused with this rockin’ mama over here, you understand, but I believe there’s enough asshole to go around.)

Recently those of us participating in BlogHerAds were asked to state for the record whether or not we could commit to profanity-free writing as—go figure—some advertisers would rather not spend their dollars on pottymouths. Although I didn’t have to think twice about checking the “I do hereby solemnly swear to use my genteel language and only fart butterflies” box over on Want Not, after some thought I decided that I wasn’t comfortable making that pledge here. Because although as a writer I generally feel that there are better ways to express yourself than profanity, sometimes nothing else will do.

Sometimes you just have to be able to say, “God. I’m such an asshole.” (more…)

August 18, 2007 | It's not a regret, it's an "experience"

The good news: For my birthday, Otto’s brother Wild Thing drove their mom’s car down here all the way from Boston. The reason? She’s giving it to us. It is old and battered but runs fine and—most importantly—the air conditioning runs ice cold. I am thrilled to have a set of wheels again.

The bad news: Otto and Wild Thing headed out this morning and I waved them off, saying that the kids and I would swim a while and then go run errands. Because TWO WHOLE CARS THAT WORK—that means we can do different things at different times! Except that I just realized I don’t actually have the keys to the new car. Whoops.

Edited to add the following corrections: The car is not old, it is simply older than my previous car. It is not battered, it just has a couple of dents. I am very very very very very grateful to have it and it was incredibly generous of my mother-in-law to give it to us and equally generous of my brother-in-law to drive it down. The keys were here and I didn’t see them because I’m a moron, and in fact this entire post was written because I’m an asshole who doesn’t know how to just say “thank you” and shut up. In fact, all clarifications can more or less be summed up by pointing out that I’m an asshole. Which I am. I hope that clears up any confusion.

August 17, 2007 | It's not a regret, it's an "experience", The Year of Living Changerously

Today is a particularly good Friday. The children have nearly made it through their first week of school, and to celebrate that we decided they could ride the bus home this afternoon. This has less to do with any reward logic (because, let’s face it, they’d much rather be picked up and we’re all a bit worried about what happens on the bus) and more to do with things like since it’s the end of the week, if the experience scars them horribly I have all weekend to help them get over it; plus yesterday the crossing guard lady yelled at me in the pick-up line and I realized that if I continue picking them up every day I am going to die young. Because for days now I have watched people cut in front of me in line and I have seethed in silence, and yesterday I went around a PARKED AND EMPTY car and this lady came up to my car and told me to GO TO THE BACK OF THE LINE FOR CUTTING. At which point I reverted back to my most primitive New Yorker roots and said to her, “You have GOT to be kidding me, lady.” So.

Also, tonight we are having what I have been promised is the best cake in the world on account of I have managed to stay in (more or less) one piece for thirty six whole years. (more…)

August 16, 2007 | My name is Grumplestiltskin

No, you didn’t miss anything. This is a two-part story (see? tale of TWO cars?), but I’m not ready to tell you part 1, just yet. Part 1 cannot be told without flames shooting out of my eyeballs and veins bulging in my neck. Part 1 is the story of why—nearly eight weeks after moving—I still do not have a car of my own. Part 1 should come first, I’ll grant you that, but, um, too bad.

This is part 2. This is about Otto’s car.

So I moved down here, carless, and Otto and I were drunk on love and possibly cheap beer, and we said that me not having a car would be NO PROBLEM for a little while, because Otto has a car! And Otto would not be going back to work until August (oh, hey, look—it’s August) and also, Otto had an extra car so we’d be perfectly fine. Hahahahahaha. (more…)

August 15, 2007 | What do I do all day?

Someone commented on the last post that they’ve noticed that I’ve switched to posting in the morning now that I’ve gotten married. Actually, I was still posting at night until this week, when I realized that 6:00, she arrives EXTREMELY EARLY. That is always true, I supposed, but she arrives PARTICULARLY early if you’ve been up late working, blogging, or beating the pants off your husband in Scrabble. (I joke. We have never played strip Scrabble. But now that I think of it….)

So I’m trying to get to bed earlier, and I’m trying out posting in the morning instead of at night. I haven’t decided yet if I’ll keep it this way, but so long as it continues to be dark when I get up (even though it’s the middle of summer), I’m going to try to get to bed at a reasonable time.

Because I? Am old. And I need my sleep. (more…)

August 14, 2007 | It's not a regret, it's an "experience", Offspring: ecstasy and agony

The first day of school was—if not a success—acceptable. Our school has what is supposed to be an orderly procedure for distributing children at the end of the day; there’s a web of driveway and parking lot areas that IN THEORY make for an optimal traffic pattern. The buses go in HERE and the people who are parking (why are you parking, people??) go in HERE and if you’re picking up, you pull in over THERE and someone comes to ask you which child you’d like to kidnap and eat for dinner and then they radio back to the holding pen and someone brings your victim out. It’s a great system.

Or, it WOULD be, if anyone bothered to follow the rules. You know, I came over a thousand miles to this school, and I still managed to put on my big girl pants and ASK SOMEONE where I should go and what the procedure was for the end of the day. And yet I was able to sit there in my car (and sit there I did, for about 45 minutes) while people who’ve attended this school for years went IN the OUT drive, parked on the LAWN, and cut in front of other people. I wanted to put every one of those people into time-out. (more…)

August 13, 2007 | Offspring: ecstasy and agony, The Year of Living Changerously

For the first time in about seven weeks, I am sitting at my desk in broad daylight with nothing but the droning of the fan behind me as background noise. I have a million things to do, of course, but I have a solid six hours before I have to talk to anyone else, get anyone something to eat, settle a squabble, or decide whether or not we can go swimming now.

First day of school, baby. How do I love the public school system? Let me count the ways. No; scratch that. That would take up precious minutes that I could spend eating cookies because there’s no one here to see me.

Make no mistake—I’m thrilled they’re back (as early as it is) and my expectation is that this will be a great year, but I worry for them, too. I worry for both of them in different ways and for different reasons, but they’re my babies and that’s my job. (more…)

August 11, 2007 | Ottomatic For the People, The Year of Living Changerously

(Which is why this is okay, because I skipped last month.)

Dear Otto,

Happy three months of being hitched! That’s a full quarter of a year, and we still like each other. I think by this point in my last marriage we already had our doubts, so WAY TO GO, US!

This month has been the first time we’ve lived together the entire time, WITH the kids here, and everyone is still alive and minimally scarred. That’s not to say that I am not going to shove all three of you out the door on Monday morning when school starts (hooray), but even at the end of a trying day seeing your face does not make me snap “What are YOU looking at??” so I think we’re doing great. (more…)

August 9, 2007 | Haven't been hit by lightning yet!, Offspring: ecstasy and agony

Today we went to Open House at the school where Chickadee and Monkey will be resuming their education next week. This is the school I fought tooth and nail to get them into, so believe me, I am THRILLED they’re going there.

We met Monkey’s teacher first. She’s a sweet, calm woman who is in her 40th year of teaching. She told me she’s seen it all and can take whatever the kids dish out. I believed her. I sort of wanted to be in her class, myself.

We met Chickadee’s teacher next. I don’t think she’s 30 yet. She’s young and pretty and nothing she did or said was a problem and yet I found myself wishing Chickadee had gotten one of the more seasoned teachers.

Does this make me age-discriminatory or am I just being honest about my daughter’s propensity to chew up and spit out the young and unsuspecting?

August 8, 2007 | Friends, Offspring: ecstasy and agony, What do I do all day?

Good news! Today was not nearly so hot as yesterday. I mean, yes, OKAY, it was 101 today just like yesterday, and the heat index was around 108, but it was PARTLY CLOUDY. So. Ever so much better.

Today would’ve been a good day to stay inside and do work, and I managed to do that, for most of the morning, but eventually I had to give in to my children’s demands that we goooooo swiiiiiimiiiiiiing.

And because I can only spend so long in the pool with them before I start wondering important things like “would it be child abuse to pick up this dead cricket and place it atop my child’s head?” or “how many more times must I watch THIS VERY IMPORTANT JUMP which—amazingly!—looks just like every other jump this child has taken off the diving board so far?” I thought it prudent to call in reinforcements. So I begged Tammy to come over, since she’s a work-at-home slacker like me. (more…)