Archive for October, 2009

Dear Mother Nature,

Are you feeling better after your little hissy fit? Eighteen inches in a 36 hour period shows, after it was 85 ten days ago shows true cajones. So nice of you to let the sun out to play this afternoon. Just, Ma, please recall what I said this summer: if you’re going to give us 65 and rainy in July (which you did, you psycho bitch), you’d better pony up 65 and sunny in February.

Smootches,

Jen

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Dear Rosie,

You are the greatest dog in the history of dogdom. But you could knock off the shedding already? The carpets need shaving. According to Ma Nature, it’s winter and you’re going to need all that fur to keep you warm. I mean, you poor thing, you went out the last couple of days and discovered that the snow went up past your short little legs. Low undercarriage, you know. I know vacuuming more often than once a month would probably help, but the vacuum is terrible. It was terrible before you came home with us last year, and now it’s really pissy that I make it work harder. So help me out and hang on to the hair. You’re getting a pedicure and bath tomorrow, that’ll make it ok, right?

Love,

Mama Jen

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Dear Vacuum,

Bugger off. You suck when you shouldn’t and don’t when you should. I hate you.

Jonesing for a Dyson Animal vacuum,

Jen

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Dear husband of mine,

I love you. We’ve been together for 16 years this month, married for a little more that 13. But right now? The stress pinned in the red zone and actually straining to move past it…sigh…is alimony cheaper or an office outside the house? Think about it…or I may smother you in your sleep and decide for you.

Fluffing my pillow,

Jen

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Dear Howard the Headache,

Yes, you’ve been irritating me all day. Yes, I took you to two elementary school Halloween parties today. And, yes, I’ve been sending ibuprofin your way all day. But, really, the bungee jumping from base of my skull into my shoulder blades is a bit much, even for you. Piss off.

Searching for the acupressure point,

Jen

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Dear Halloween,

I am wearing a costume. I am myself in an alternate universe. What you see is based on your reality, not mine.

Hand over the peanut butter cups and no one gets hurt,

Jen…or is it?

It’s snowing. A lot. Like, you’re going to see Denver on the evening news LOT. I think there’s maybe eight inches on the ground now, blowing and drifting, with another 18+ expected by tomorrow night. The kicker?

My kids had school today.

Districts all around us plus the University of Colorado canceled classes, but our district sent the kids for their book larnin’. After school activities are canceled, businesses are shutting down for the day left and right, and sounds like rush hour tonight is going to be horrific. Likely no school tomorrow.

Oh, and our satellite dish is out. At least we still have power. It’s such a wet and heavy snow that the power lines often like to express their displeasure by snapping and demanding some TLC before agreeing to return to work.

My basement office is a cave today, with the snow on top of the window well cover getting heavier and heavier. I have every light on down here and it’s still gloomy.

I’m not getting comments emailed to me…again. A setting must have gotten janked. I did, however, catch the comment that my feed had an extraneous space; that has been corrected and NOW you should be able to subscribe. That’s why my subscriber count went from 105 to 5…that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. I fully expect it to spike…snort.

In a matter of minutes I will have a couple of freezing, wet, hyper boys come blowing into the house, demanding hot chocolate and pleading for me to join them outside. I will provide the hot chocolate and laugh hysterically at the request. I don’t go out in this crap, I did my time in college marching band. This year celebrates 18 years since the Three Hour Rehearsal In Horizontal Sleet and I’m still thawing.

And just in case you think “poor you!,” it’s supposed to be 60 on Monday. Send galoshes, it’s gonna get messy.

I have to attribute this to Stimey, who posted it on Twitter last week, attributing it to someone else and that’s as far as I’m going because frankly, I’m already lost.

Do you use Google Reader? Yes? Good. Overwhelmed by the sheer number of UNREAD you have there? You too!? We should get together for wine!

Sorry, I digress.

Here’s a neat little trick for catching blogs without reading them solely in a reader. Go to your Google Reader page. Upper right hand corner…see “settings?” Click on that happy little button. Ok, now, see in the orangey area there’s a link to “goodies?” Click on that. Catch “Put Reader in a Bookmark.” Drag that “next” button to your bookmarks toolbar. And…voila! Whenever you click on the “next” button in your bookmarks toolbar, you are automatically directed to the next unread blog in your reader. Slick, no? You don’t have all the UNREAD (you really must say that in a Darth Vader-like voice) posts staring at you, and you get to see all the cool blog designs out there. I’m finding I’m commenting more, because I have to comment before I can hit “next” again. I used to click on posts in my reader, intending to comment, and they’d stay there for days before I’d actually comment. Yes, I apparently collect tabs. Sigh…no wonder my computer hates me and runs so slowly.

Yay! New trick! And while I have your attention, again, please change all Never a Dull Moment info to Laughing at Chaos info.

AND! While I have you here…I’m not going to do a traditional blogroll down the sidebar. Instead, I’m creating a page of “peeps” (see above there? Where it says {Reading List}? It’s going in there). If you’re interested in being a Chaos Peep, let me know. But here’s the catch: I want a short description of you/your blog. Humor is good, too. I can rework it if you like, but I want a description to go with your name and link.

Enough. If you hadn’t heard, Denver is about to get hit with 8-14 inches of snow over the next 48 hours, starting tonight. I preparations to make…milk (check), gas in car (check), wine in house (check). We’re good! Let it snow!

Part of my morning routine, once I turn off the two alarm clocks, is to crank up the iPhone and stick it right in my eyes so the glare wakes me up. Not for everyone, I know. I check email, headlines, my actions and calendar for the day, Facebook, and my horoscope. The horoscope is a new thing for me. I’ve never really read it in the paper, except maybe on my birthday, but now it’s part of the “let’s hope the glare wakes me” routine.

The horoscope on Facebook this morning had the option of seeing my Chinese astrological predictions for November. Ok, it’s another minute in bed before hitting the treadmill, let’s see what my Chinese stars are saying. I’m not linking because it has my full name and birthday and I’m just wary enough to not post that. But I’ll cut and paste.

NOVEMBER 2009 OX PREDICTIONS

Some breakthrough ideas you have for new methods or initiatives will be resisted by the powers-that-be in the month of November. Don’t fret. The time may not be right for these notions to be implemented. Put your ego in your pocket for now. You can always present those proposals next season when those in control may have moved elsewhere. The times they are a changin’. Nowhere will you notice this so vividly as in your financial sector. Money simply is not plentiful. Cutbacks and layoffs continue to be in the news every day. More companies or government agencies like yours will be merging to save costs and increase production. On the home front, events are moving along smoothly. You won’t be asked to intervene with teachers or upbraid children for their mischief this month. Your health however could use a quick makeover. You have too long let discipline take care of itself. Little by little you may have slipped back into former dietary indiscretions. Reduce your intake of wine and spirits. Stop eating so much meat and return to the recommended regimen of 5 helpings of vegetables and/or fruit per day. Eating food that is still alive and hasn’t been cooked to death will help regulate your digestion. Add music to your life again. You have been too long without it.

Interesting. Certainly had me thinking, which is extremely dangerous for me before coffee. I actually do have some breakthrough ideas right now, but have no intention to act on them just yet. Perhaps next season. Financial sector? Yeah, I already know things are tight and will get tighter over the next 12-18 months, so thanks a lot there, Predictive Ox. Things smooth on the home front? Won’t have to intervene or upbraid children this month? Oh Sweet Baby Jesus, say it’s so! Mama could use a break! Hey, Predictive Ox! My “former dietary indiscretions?” Sounds like I’m having an affair with Little Debbie or something! Wait…what’s that??? “Reduce your intake of wine and spirits.” Are you kidding me? Tell ya what, Predictive Ox, if it’s really true that I won’t have to intervene or upbraid children this month, then the reduction in wine will naturally follow. You do your bit, I’ll do mine. Finally, and this is the one that got me, “add music to your life again. You have been too long without it.” No.Kidding. I’m working on a wicked hard two-minute piece for a December recital and it feels great. I’ve missed it. The hard work, the gentle frustration as I work out a tough lick, the feeling of total accomplishment when I know I’ve rocked it. Tastes great. Thanks Predictive Ox. Sounds like a good November ahead.

Speaking of November, anyone remember what happens in November? Anyone? You in the back? Sorry, didn’t mean to wake you. People! It’s NaBloPoMo!!! I did it last year and didn’t die had so much fun I’m doing it again! A blog post a day keeps the mental cobwebs away. However. I’d love topics to write on, to prime the pump, so to speak. If there’s something you’d love to see me expound upon, leave a comment here and it goes into the queue (I love that word. It’s just a fun word). It will certainly be an interesting month, as we see if A’s new meds kick in well, as we travel to Iowa for Thanksgiving, as we all hurtle towards Christmas like an out of control train.

Now I shall consult my Magic 8 Ball on my next activity…

I have cobwebs in my brain. Not the whole thing, just in the nooks and crannies that aren’t easily reached. This blog got kicked into a corner several weeks ago and has sat there, sad and lonely, growing quite the collection of dust bunnies and dog hair clumps. No real reason, it just happened, probably as I was dashing off to do something or other. But now…now I have a dust rag and I’m not afraid to use it! Be afraid, be very afraid.

So help me, if I have one.more.person comment on my purchases at Costco, I’m going Lara Croft on someone’s ass. Today I had not only a fellow customer comment on how much was in my industrial-sized cart, but the checkout dude asked if I was stocking up or had a large family. DUDES! Shut it! Yes, my cart overfloweth today. But let’s look at a few facts, eh? I have two boys still in pullups for overnight. Big box there. I have four people in my family; two work from home, the other two take lunch four days out of five. Of the four people in the family, there are three different diets. I can’t have gluten, A can’t have dairy, and J and Tom are “normal.” I was out of paper towels, toilet paper, dishwasher detergent, cereal, eggs, coffee, sugar, bread, fruit, vegetables, gluten-free flour, juice boxes, soy milk, lunchmeat and cheese, and items for lunch. I hate to grocery shop, so it’s better for me to hit Costco every 4-6 weeks and stock up. Ninety percent of my purchase today was food. The only real splurge? The milk-chocolate covered bing cherries.

Teaching an eight year old to swallow pills is akin to stabbing yourself in the eye repeatedly with a rabid squirrel. Why, oh why, are ADHD meds in do not crush or chew or the mattress police will appear at your door pill form? Their target market is youngish kids, the very ones who cannot swallow pills. Poor A floated to bed tonight after practicing (and failing miserably at) pill swallowing, and I guarandamntee I’ll be washing sheets in the morning, pullup or not. He starts on the Intuniv tomorrow morning and please, Sweet Baby Jesus, let it work.

Have you visited Colorado Bento yet? Denise and I are working on this little project, and it’s been all her all week (Denise, I’m sorry! ). Colorado Bento, this new design/domain, and HEY! Let’s f*ck with Jen and her exhaustion issues all went live this week and I’m still reeling, trying to keep up. So Denise has taken this idea and run with it, and hopefully I’ll be able to catch her this week. (Hear me universe? Back off! I wanna write!)

I’m starting a book club. You know, because I have nothing else to do with my time. Frankly, I just needed an excuse to get together with girlfriends to chat and drink wine and “book club” sounds sooo much classier than “gonna go drink wine with my girlfriends and gossip.”

The boys love to rake leaves. I love not raking leaves. Heh. I won’t tell if you won’t…

Tom and I are taking a parenting class on raising twice-exceptional children. Finally! A parenting class that actually applies to the cherubs we have! Gasp! Shock! So nice to actually be able to talk about A with other parents who are suffering managing like we are. That said, the reading is pretty heavy and guess what! We’re behind on it. Big surprise.

Know what you get when your husband works 60+ hours a week from home and you work from home and you know it’s only going to get more stressful until June? Infreakingsanity. When you start pondering what kind of paycheck you could earn plus what you might get in alimony, you know it’s time to step away from the edge of the abyss and do something, anything, to change the subject in your brain.

I’m still working with Cathy, my awesome web guru, to fix a few little bugs here and there. I think Robin asked if she still needed to change her feed settings for the new site. Yes, please. Because of the way Google does web tracking (or somethingorother), I purty please need all my devoted readers (all dozen of you) to change your feed readers to the new feed (really and truly it’s different). In the future I have to close down the old Never a Dull Moment site/reader so that Google doesn’t think…oh hell, I have no idea, I just know that Google doesn’t like finding the same content on two sites, figures it’s all spam, and what results is something akin to breaking the space/time continuum, and I know you don’t want to be responsible for that. So, please, change your feed readers, blogrolls, bookmarks, and all those other things we tell our kids didn’t exist when we were their ages. Then tell two friends, and they’ll tell two friends, and…

And what’s this? Back here in this dark recess of my brain, covered in dog hair and ewwww, what is that? That, my friends, is my mojo. A little spit, a little polish, a good night’s sleep and watch out, there’ll be no stopping it.

I think we can all easily agree that the economy right now is crazier than a shithouse rat (aha! I found a place for that phrase, thankyouverymuch Michele who has been my friend since kindergarten and have recently found on Facebook!). Unless you’ve been living under a very comfortable rock, you know this. And yet, it hasn’t hit our home until recently. See, Tom’s career is such that he works 12-18 months ahead and we have a pretty good idea of what his income will be well before the new fiscal year.

Today two things happened. Tom came down this afternoon, pale as a ghost, and told me that he had gotten his numbers for this year and he’s not even 2/3 of the way to where he was this time last year. Translation: this isn’t good. The year after (remember, he works 12-18 months out) looks fantastic, but this year not so much. The other news I got was just as painful. A’s very best friend in the whole wide world and the kid who has his back is moving at the beginning of December. The economy kicked the family in the teeth and they are moving to a less expensive area. A is devastated, and while he won’t talk about it right now, I know it’ll hit him soon.

Things are ugly out there. I keep hearing that the economy is improving!, but I’m not seeing it. There are still too many foreclosed homes in my neighborhood, too many empty storefronts, too much discomfort in people’s eyes. I spent two hours this afternoon hammering away at our budget, and will likely do another couple tomorrow. With this comes a great deal of guilt on my part.

I quit my very part time job a few weeks ago. It was something a long time in coming, and it was a home-based business so I was my own boss, but I couldn’t do it any more. I didn’t even make a whole lot, but it was income, and I voluntarily gave it up. For the first time since about age 12, I have no income. None. Zip. Zilch. Nada. I’ve never brought home a huge paycheck, but I’ve always had something.

So I will continue to hammer away at our home budget, pray nothing happens to kill it, and keep my eyes/ears/heart open for an opportunity that speaks to me.

In the meantime, someone toss a straight-jacket on the economy.

Never a Dull Moment is now Laughing At Chaos! (Did’ja notice the name change?) The rumors are true, I’ve moved. And, of course, there are boxes and dust everywhere. I keep tripping over things, and sneezing as I do so. But the new digs are magnificent. Christy at Ruby & Roja did an incredible job on the design, got all the little things I was thinking about into a cohesive and colorful design. Cathy at Desperately Seeking Wordpress worked on the technical mumbo-jumbo that would have sent me rocking and sucking my thumb under my desk.

OH! You want the address. Well, if you found this, then you’re here. But, please, do me a solid and change your bookmarks to www.laughingatchaos.com. And the name of the site, too.  If you visit via a feed reader, you’ll need to change that too, please.

Stay tuned, I have ideas for this little slice of internets real estate. Been thinking…dangerous, yes. I love this new design, love how it has captured my crazy, wonderful life. And now…I will play with it.

Denise asked if I was going to go easier on the authorities  in the freaky Balloon Boy case, now that it just keeps getting weirder and weirder. Yes, yes I am. My apologies to the authorities after my last rant. But now, I have more to say.

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Heene,

On the scale of frakked up parenting moments, this goes all the way up to 11. You don’t have the brains God gave the humble turnip. You thought this little scheme would work? Really? You apparently forgot the cardinal rule of parenting: kids can’t keep secrets. I haven’t been surprised by a birthday or Christmas gift in years, and you somehow thought a six year old boy would keep this under wraps? I’d ask what you were smoking, but I’m afraid you’d think I was serious and offer me some.

Dear Larimer County Sheriff,

I’ve been watching you on the news. Love the attitude. Love that you’re not taking any shit from the media. Go nuts. Investigate the hell outta this family. Move those kids to a more appropriate home; from the sound of things, the dad is a wee bit unstable. There have been previous investigations into domestic violence, and young boys don’t need that as an influence.

Dear media,

Talk to the sheriff. Ignore this wackadoo family. Please.

Love and kisses,

Jen

So…you might have caught a little news story about a six year old boy here in Colorado who took his family’s helium balloon for a joyride this afternoon. The handmade craft (and I mean craft as in craft project, as well as aircraft), believed to be carrying the child, soared over the Colorado landscape this afternoon and encroached so far into DIA’s airspace that planes in and out of the airport were diverted. All’s well that ends well, and the youngster was found at home, hiding in a box in the attic over the garage.

Lots is being said about the family, about their appearance on the show “Wife Swap,” about their beliefs, about how they’re raising their three sons. Storm chasing and such.

I am so relieved that this young boy is safe. Tom turned on the tv at lunch and we both about had a stroke. We have rabidly slightly curious sons and it wasn’t difficult at all to imagine what the parents were going through.

But here it comes. The parental backlash. You know it’s coming. Why were the boys home from school? Why were the parents inside, leaving the children unattended out in their own backyard? What kind of family builds a helium balloon in their backyard? Are the children safe in such an environment? Maybe we should remove them from the home while we investigate this uncommon parenting style.

I believe it was a school holiday. Because parents don’t need to be on top of their children at all times, especially when the kids are in the backyard. The kind of family that wants to expand their sons’ minds by teaching hands-on science. Damned right, they’re safe; more kids should have such an environment. Remove them? Why not just follow up with a full-on lobotomy, so the world is safe from thinking and experimenting and curiosity.

Yes, there was a massive search. Yes, this made international news quickly. Yes, it was a terrible accident, with the perfect ending. The young boy is safe. Isn’t that what’s most important? Go easy on the parents; they have a full weekend of hug/smack ahead of them.

Breathing now…

I think I wrote on that quote once before, but it’s particularly apt lately. I’ve long since given up trying to control the waves, there’s no point in that. I can’t. Waves have their own rhythm and nothing I do can change that. The best I can do is surf them.

So I’m learning to surf.

I thought once the boys were back in school the surfing would get a bit easier. I’d be able to finally get onto that slippery board, rise up, and enjoy the view while balancing on that wave. They wouldn’t be pulling me back down into the water, demanding that I tow them into shore while at the same time trying to swim the other way.

What has happened instead since that glorious day of August 19th is that now both boys have their own boogie boards, so they’re out in the water with me. The storm way out on the horizon has blown up bigger and deeper waves, and the undertow is strong. The boys are laughing and splashing, thinking this is fun!, while I’m terrified, trying to keep them on their boards while not losing my grip on mine.

To ride these intense waves and not go under, I’ve had to jettison a lot of cargo. This little piece of the internets has suffered deeply as I just haven’t been able to write as I’d like to. Date nights are now 2e parenting seminars. I haven’t read, much less commented on, any blogs in days. Right now my counter is glaring 408 at me. I’ll likely MAAR most of them and I hate doing that, as I started blogging to be part of a community.

My biggest and heaviest cargo was also the most difficult to jettison. I finally decided to drop the home-based business I’d had for over three years. Business, family, sanity: pick two. But it had to be done. With those waves, and the undertow, and the two boys beside me having the time of their lives while I try to keep them happy and healthy and safe…it had to go.

You need only go back and reread my last five posts or so to realize that the waves are doing their damnedest to drown me, and I refuse to allow that to happen. A does indeed have Central Auditory Processing Disorder; I believe the term used was significant. So he now has an ear filter that helps eliminate some of the distracting background noise. He has started vision therapy again, and if I could remember to actually do the exercises with him, I’m sure it’d help a lot. All his GI tests came back entirely normal, and we have yet another appointment this afternoon to determine the next course of action. God bless the school’s GT teacher, who is really fighting for me regarding the whole 2e diagnosis; the district’s requirements…sigh…let’s just say I adore her and want to buy her a puppy for working so hard on A’s behalf. In addition to all this, A has been off any ADHD meds since the end of July, which has been wonderful for appetite and growth, both of which are bigger. It has sucked for attention. Hyperactivity is no more than any other 8 year old, but inattention is so bad Tom and I are at our wits’ end, and it’s no wonder the school doesn’t believe he could possibly be gifted. However, it appears that the Holy Grail Of ADHD Meds is coming to pharmacies in November, and A’s doc will have samples in (pleaseGodohpleaseGod) the next couple of weeks. By Thanksgiving we might have a kid who could actually focus for longer than (not really kidding here) 10 seconds.

The other son? I’m trying so hard to not lose J in all this.

In the grand scheme of things I know this all isn’t life or death. I look around and see others hurting far more than I and the guilt hits hard. There was a terrible bus crash in Idaho this weekend, with a high school marching band on board. Every director’s nightmare. Tom knows the band, knows the director, had dinner last winter with the teacher who was killed. My issues are so insignificant in comparison.

The waves keep coming, stronger and deeper, at all of us. But with every slip off the board I get stronger and wiser, and eventually I’ll be able to stand on that board, on top of the meanest wave, and ride that sucker to shore with a smile on my face.