Archive for August, 2008

1) Put down a deposit on a new Honda Civic Hybrid, to be delivered in November

or

2) Adopted a dog

or

3) Donated a large sum of money to Sarah Palin, to assist in name recognition (ok, enough politics from me already)

Two of the above choices are true. Guess which two.

Introducing Rosie! She’s a five year old basset/beagle mix. I think she may be more basset than beagle, ’cause she’s pretty low-key. I’m pretty sure we just adopted an ottoman with a pulse.

She is very definitely a mama’s girl. She loves on me something fierce. Her favorite thing is belly rubs and hugs. And sleeping. She’s real big on sleeping. Rosie the Wonder Basset is also a little on the heavy side and could stand to lose a few. I may not be an expert, but I suspect a basset shouldn’t weigh 48 and one-half pounds.

Rosie doesn’t bark. Haven’t heard her yet. She went over and met Haley, our neighbors’ three year old labradoodle, did the whole sniffing thing, and left. Haley is still quite the puppy and Rosie was having none of that. Might interfere with finding a shady spot in the yard. Or sleeping.

So I’m sure there will be more stories of Rosie the Wonder Basset. She’s been with us about a day and we don’t know what we did without her. Astonishing that a passed-out ottoman can make such an impression.

That was one hell of a speech, one our children will be studying in school for decades to come. As I watched it, I felt an unusual sensation. It was warm and tingly…it was hope. I felt hope for this country, for the first time in a long time. Eight years, to be exact.

Denver, as a city, outperformed itself. Everything I’ve read has described the city as an exemplary host. While I am proud of that, we’re now going to have a whole buncha people moving here. ; )

And, finally, the word came down from on high not ten minutes ago that McCain has chosen Sarah Palin as his running mate. It’s supposed to send a message. Yup, I know what message it’s sending: pandering to women. And, dude, women hate to be patronized. Just thought you should know.

This is going to be one hell of an election season.

And if I could get my damned laptop back from the Geek Squad, I’d enjoy it a lot more.

Hoooo-eeee! Hillary gave the speech of a lifetime last night. Impressive. She said exactly what she needed to say and it was good to hear.

Now, if tonight’s speeches go as well (yeah, I’m looking at you, Billy Boy), I’ll be able to breathe again.

I can’t understand how the polls are still so tight. I answered polling questions today, so I’m sure my opinion will make the difference. I’ll try not to break my arm patting myself on the back.

In other news, I’m still laptopless. I’m getting the shakes and have a sick tightening in the back of my throat. I have so much on that thing and rely on it so much…I’m not worried about losing any data, since I subscribe to an online backup service, but I need that info now. Phone numbers, emails that were on there when I took it in…you name it, it’s on there. Geek Squad said it might be ready tonight, but to expect tomorrow.

In still other news, I’m about to throttle my darling husband. I started to research office space lease costs and about had a stroke. Maybe alimony and child support is cheaper. Learn from me, my darlings. If your husband has the opportunity to work from home, talk him out of it. Especially if he’s a perfectionist workaholic with stress issues. ‘Cause you’re not gonna wanna do 20-life after smothering him with a pillow as he sleeps.

Finally, we passed on the puppy we met with last week. She just wasn’t the right fit for us. On paper she was perfect, but my gut was telling me it wouldn’t work. So after a bunch of research, we went with my gut. Misty is going to be the perfect dog for someone, but not us. Too high energy and I already have my hands full training the boys. Maybe a guinea pig. Or fish. Or a talking parrot…though God only knows what that poor parrot would learn from me!

Tomorrow: another day with the boys in school. Huzzah!

Well, we chickened out and didn’t take the boys down into Denver today. Too much chaos and uncertainty to feel comfortable taking them. If it was just the two of us, we would have been down there in a heartbeat, if for no other reason than to watch Rachel Maddow mop the floor with Pat Buchanan. That’s always fun to watch. So we didn’t go.

Instead, we were treated to overtired little boys melting down after we dragged them in from the playground to bed. Betcha wish you were me, right? But there is a speech tonight….who is it, who is it again? Ah, yes, Hillary. She has quite the mountain ahead of her this evening. Not only does she have to mend some seriously damaged fences and create some heartfelt goodwill, but she’s following Michelle Obama’s speech of last night. Michelle’s speech last night was…wow…fantastic. It was exactly what she needed to do, what she needed to say. And it was a pleasure to hear the speech.

I am still laptopless. And I have realized just how dependant I am on that little piece of machinery. It is my brain. How sad. But I am truly having a tough time focusing and planning for my day/week without that thing. It’d better be ready tomorrow or the shakes will start up soon.

In other great news, I am an aunt again. Tom’s brother and wife had a little boy this afternoon. And we laughed, heartily. For they will get to witness what it is like to have brothers in the house. {insert evil cackle here} It’s one thing to be the brothers, it’s something else entirely to be the parents of those brothers.

I should really sign them up for a wine of the month club.

And I still don’t have tickets to Obama’s speech on Thursday. Sigh…

We are thinking, however, of heading downtown tomorrow with the boys for a little hands-on civics lesson. Or not. I’m all for the education of my sons, but I really don’t much care for crowds, and as much as I love watching politics (it really is my reality tv), I’m not much for conflict.

And besides, we can’t be entirely sure that A won’t be dancing around singing, “Obama is my man, Obama is my man…” or that J won’t look up at Chris Matthews and declare, “McCain is a poopyhead.” I wish I were kidding, I really do. These are my sons. : )

In other news, my laptop decided to totally lose its shit last night and crash. Repeatedly. Let’s recap. I saw the black screen of death, the black screen of death with multiple blue vertical lines, the red screen of death with my screen saver bubbles superimposed upon it, and flat-out not responding. Of course it worked again this morning, but I dragged its sorry motherboard over to the Geek Squad, where it is currently in isolation for the next 2-3 days. Can’t have it imposing its bizarro views on other unsuspecting computers there. They’d better get that thing working, I need my baby. We have our disagreements (mainly I want it to work without me thinking about it, and it thinks it has free reign to screw with me), but I love my computer. 

And now I must go drag the boys from the school playground (note to self: get a damned gate already, ’cause the lifting J over the fence, and climbing over it my own self, is really getting old), shove food down their throats, scrub permanent marker from J’s legs (and pre-K starts tomorrow, thank God the teacher knows us!), and throw them into bed. In under two hours.

Because the speeches are on then. Must go chill the wine.

Give ‘em hell, Michelle!

See, I come through! And eventually I’ll get the Pancake Puffs post written. No, really, I will. Someday.

I couldn’t find any pictures of our crapalicious patio, and I went back two years in PSE. My eyes are bleeding by the sheer numbers of photos I have…and my brain hurts by the thought of getting all those printed. So just believe me when I say that it was messy, ugly, and not fun to be outside.

Introducing our all new and beeeyoutiful patio:

This is looking straight at the patio. We covered the existing cement slab (ugly gray slab with cracks, thankyousomuch builder!).

This is looking a bit to the right. You can see how the path, the lovely lovely path, continues past the house to the front. The small shed there is new; we had a slab installed so we could be one there. It holds the lawn mower, the boys’ bikes, and the boys’ scooters.

This is looking from the back door (you know, the one the boys never close and now the screen is just a suggestion to bugs? Yeah, that one). You can see the uber-cool detail in the pressed cement.

This is looking back up to the back porch. Like the color? Me too. And the surface is so soft and smooth. My favorite part? See that step? Yeah we never had a step there before, just a huge 18 inch leap or heave-ho. A step. Mmm…hey, if you went five years without a step there, you’d be pretty happy right now too! : )

So there ya go. Our new and improved, make mama happy patio. How many times have see sat out there to eat dinner. None. Yeah, we’re a work in progress.

I’m sick of sitting on top of my cell phone, waiting for the text from Obama and instead getting oh-so-hilarious prank texts from my husband. Doodoohead. So I was thrilled to get a lurvely award from the delightful Mrs. V (who looks remarkably like my mom of 30 years ago) at Don’t put boogers in your neighbor’s cereal (the most amusing blog title I’ve heard in awhile).

Ooh, something shiny! To go with my “something shiny” week! (Seriously, my attention span has been about 30 seco…hey a puppy!)

Sharing the love:

Christina Downloaded. Go give this girl some love. And stay and give her more. She has a very challenging son and needs her peeps.

Cake Wrecks. Okay, I haven’t commented on this blog yet, but I read it and laugh. And who doesn’t like guffawing at pastries gone terribly wrong? Wonder if a cake could be made to look like the blingy award?

Hula Doula. She lives here in Denver and I swear, if I could make things better…let’s recap. An illness, a long-awaited vacation during which she learns her house has completely flooded, a return to a rental home, and cap it off with a very serious car accident (thankfully she and her kids are okay). Go give her some lovin’ too.

And I think I’ll wrap it up there before I give the whole internets a big hug and start singing Kumbaya. Have a great weekend.

All summer long, day in and day out, A was up with the sun. Sometimes before the sun. Sometimes the sun would just look at him and think, “Why the hell are you up? I’m not even up yet. The rooster thinks you’re insane too, by the way.”

And yesterday, the first day of school, as predicted, we had to dynamite him out of bed at 7. Today it was 7:30, which used to be our “Holy Hell, we have to leave NOW!!!!!” time, but because the new school starts at 9:05, it was more like, “Get your lazy butt out of bed already, will ya?”

Finally, I predicted something regarding my eldest son that was correct. His entire life, his only predictability was to be unpredictable, his only consistency to be inconsistent. I got it right this time.

I’ll try not to break my arm patting myself on the back.

There’s green crayon melted inside my dryer and laundry is stacking up like planes over Ohare the day before Thanksgiving.

Ahh….so good to be home. Sigh…

Well, not really. A starts on Monday, J a week later. But tomorrow early am I leave for four days, so that makes today the last day of the summer!!! Can I have a hallelujah?

Thank you. I needed that.

I will now begin radio silence, as I desperately need to pack, get everything ready for A to start school, run errands, and basically just do things that do not involve the computer. Much.

Monday I’ll be doing the “Happy Happy Back to School” dance and pouring virtual margaritas. C’mon by.