Does this book make my butt look big?
I caught Chickadee in a lie this evening; I gave her two more chances to recant–neither of which she took–and then when I revealed that I had evidence to the contrary, she dissolved into tears and demanded to know why I hate her. Having come to this interaction fresh out of trying to make her brother try on his Easter clothes (“Take your pants off and try these on. Take your pants off. TAKE YOUR PANTS OFF! Monkey, please PUT YOUR UNDERWEAR BACK ON.”), I did the logical thing.
I announced that as soon as they were in bed, I would be phoning the Easter Bunny to tell him to skip our house.
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Oh, the places I’ll go!
Spring has sprung; I’m healthy again; my Rykas are broken in; I finally bought myself a knee brace. Training is now officially in full swing.
[Now would be a good time to go make a tax-deductible donation, but only if you 1) have boobs, 2) like boobs, or 3) love someone who has boobs.]
One of the things I hadn’t really thought through, when I signed up for this, was how much TIME it takes to train for an endurance event. It’s one thing to say “I’m going to exercise every day.” It’s quite another to undertake a regimen where, ideally, every workout is several hours long. I have no idea how people who work normal schedules could possible manage training.
The other thing I hadn’t realized was how much of my town I’d be seeing.
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Know your trauma
Would you like to come over to my house and take a shower, or flush a toilet? You totally can, now. My filter is unclogged and my tanks have been pumped. (That sounds so much more fun than what actually happened….) It cost $1 less than what I paid for yard clean-up. So, if I’d known yesterday that this was going to happen, when Yard Guy pulled up on his tractor I would’ve been all “Okay, if you can do the whole acre for a dollar, I’m in!”
But it’s not MY trauma (or, more accurately, my bank account’s trauma) that needs discussing.
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The walls have ears
Wow, what a lot of good suggestions for my bit of “play” money in the previous post! I can tell that my readers are of an impeccable breed who really just want to help others. Help others get facials, massages, and pretty shoes, that is. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
I had to chuckle over all of the iTunes suggestions. I don’t own an iPod. That was actually one of the things I was considering, although I worried about where I could set it down in my horse-drawn buggy. Anyway, it’s sort of a moot point, now.
[Here you must picture me sighing heavily, tossing a meaning-laden and sorrowful look in your general direction.]
What? Oh, right. I suppose you want to know why. Well, if you insist.
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It’s “Help Others Spend Their Money” Day!
It’s all the fun of spending money without actually, you know, spending any of your money. What more could you want?
Two items for your consideration:
1) Although I’m still bitter that Grace didn’t make it past semi-finalist, you should go vote for the Swiffer Amazing Woman of the Year from amongst the finalists. The winner gets $5,000 for the charity of her choice, as well as fame, fortune, and a lot of Swiffer products. Go read about those ten amazing women and if you are not moved by their stories, check to see if you have a pulse.
2) The IRS has decided I am impoverished and should therefore get a pity refund. Naturally I am trying to act all tough and indifferent and “hey, dude, I totally wanted to eat all those ramen noodles” but on the inside I am doing a small watusi of glee. Necessity dictates that I shall be using the money for bills and groceries, mostly, but if I were to, say, set aside perhaps $100 of it for something unnecessary, what do you think I should spend it on?
Can you feel the extra B vitamins?
Today was my first day teaching math enrichment in Chickadee’s class. Someone else actually handled the first session (last week) and had already caught me up on where they were and what should happen next and all of that. I arrived with plenty of time to spare so that I could set up our table, which is conveniently located right outside the cafeteria. Apparently studies have shown that children learn best in a noisy hallway!
Our first unit (unfinished from last time) involved weighing packages on an ancient balance scale, so most of my prep time was spent trying to get it to read 0 for more than three seconds.
Once all was ready, I headed down to Mr. Wonderful’s room to fetch the kids.
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To have and have not
My eBay auctions are over, and the most memorable part that will remain in my mind was a woman mailing me to ask if my shipping cost on an item was a typo. I mailed back that it was not, and she responded telling me that she hoped I could sleep at night, despite the fact that I was “ruining eBay for everyone” with my “outrageous inflation.” I mailed her back a somewhat civil explanation of the weight of the item and calculated cost, then asked her to please not bother bidding on any of my items, because I felt her attitude was ruining eBay for everyone; but that she should have herself a pleasant evening.
As I weighed the box and printed out the shipping label, tonight, I discovered that–and I assure you, it’s sheer serendipity–the actual shipping cost to the winning bidder? Is exactly what I charged. I’ll be sleeping just fine tonight. I suspect that woman, however, will be kept awake with her righteous indignation and the neverending job of patrolling the world.
All that anger over a few dollars. How much do you want to bet Indignant McEBayQueen has plenty of money?
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Picture my hair as expensive salad
It is amazing what twelve hours of continuous sleep followed by a bowl of off-brand Froot Loops will do for your outlook. I’m still sick, but now when I cough up chunks of stuff I sort of feel like maybe I am just clearing out the remnants of whatever virus this is, rather than puzzling over each bit of production and wondering if I would recognize actual lung tissue if I saw it.
I… hope you weren’t eating, when you read that. Sorry.
Anyway, I was so busy being sick this week, I forgot to tell you all about my trip to the salon before the illness swallowed me whole.
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Sharpen your pencils
Quiz time!
No peeking at your neighbor’s paper.
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Ain’t technology grand?
I spent most of my evening trying to transfer some files from my old dinosaur of a computer over to my shiny new(ish) computer. I thought I’d transferred everything to my laptop before I moved the old computer, but I thought wrong. The ONE file I wanted tonight was nowhere to be found. But! It was on the old computer! So I turned it on and plugged in my jump drive.
Old computer does not recognize the jump drive. Old computer laughs at my attemps to install the correct driver. Old computer would like to see me just try to use that interloping jump drive. Fine. After an hour of that, I decide I will simply copy my file to a floppy disk. Would I like to format the disk? Yes. Cannot format disk. Would I like to format disk?
I would like to rip off my own arm and beat myself over the head with it, actually, thanks!
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