Good Times

I am starting to think the stepped-up posting schedule I'm on might be a mechanism for avoiding the huge amount of work I have to do in my real life job, that I should be working on right now, at 10:30 on a Saturday night. Oh well. As a backlash to the boring blah blah wordy posts of late, I give you a zillion photos of our fantastic Saturday.

It was company picnic day, at a place called Remlinger Farms, which is like a mini proto-Disneyland from another era. Except for the amazingly bizarre and anachronistic Native American...display? (two mannequins in a canoe, one inside a teepee, lots of fakey artifacts?), the place was a slightly surreal kind of delightful.


Mmm, animal food vending machine pellets...Naomi asked me if, when Luna got too old, we could trade her in for a goat pet instead. Which like many things she says, made me laugh out loud and broke my heart. Muriel was terrified of all the animals.

She was not that happy about the crappy canoe ride either.

Naomi and I aboard the inscrutable flying pumpkins.

Hay maze!

Which led to the hay jump. This was actually pretty fun, though mildly emphysema-inspiring with the hay dust, so we didn't stay long.

Choo Choo! The picnic lunch was good, and yes, I did win a door prize. Sweet!

Home, nap...U-Pick! We went to the blueberry farm right by our house.

Naomi got the hang of it pretty well.

We harvested a grand total of 48 cents worth of blueberries. I calculate Muriel ate about 30 cents worth in advance of the scale and cash register part.

Naomi's friend Carmen was the champ, though.

The blueberry farm could not be more conveniently located, right next door to our favorite Chinese place. I hereby decree that all dishes must henceforth be served within a beautiful ring of bright green broccoli. Unless it's pancakes or dessert. Happy Saturday, ya'll.

One is Silver and the Other is Gold

This has been THE week for connecting with old friends. Last Friday, I had a tasty dim sum lunch with a friend of mine whom I met freshman year of high school on our church softball team. It has been at least twelve years since we saw each other last, and probably six or more since we even spoke on the phone. I also had the good fortune of meeting his wife of many years, and his friend who lives around here and is in the same field as I, which led to a few boring minutes for everyone else in the lunch party, as you may imagine. They were leaving the next day for their Alaskan cruise, so, yeah, lucky ducks.

After the lunch I had the pleasure of talking on the phone with someone I went to Catholic grade school with in Orlando, Florida, something like a hundred and fifty years ago. Ostensibly the conversation was a plea for mentorship, and I got some, so that was good. But the most fun was lining up estimations of the mean nuns vs. the nice nuns. I have little doubt that all of these nuns have shuffled off this mortal coil, so it's probably not cool to name names on the mean ones, but Sister Eugenia, if you can read this, you were the sweetest. Thanks for choosing me to be the mom in the mock baptism.

This week, in addition to having a pretty interesting phone chat with a high school chum I re-met at the reunion, a friend from graduate school contacted me to let me know she was going to be in our own little suburb. Amazing! Grad school represents kind of a lost year for me- I didn't excel in my classes, and I spent most of my time trying to figure out how to work the forty hours of crappy retail that enabled me to eat and pay my rent and still at least skim some of the forty hours of assigned reading for my classes every week. It's a bit of a blur. But I did get a couple of good friends out of it. Though this week's visitor had been out of my loop for a long time, she and her impressively cute 8-month-old daughter and their local host agreed to come over to our house for some dinner. She is just as I remember her, energizing and definite and beautiful, but now with the added bonus of a tot that is almost cute and sweet enough to make you consider having more of your own. Almost, I said.

Oh yeah. It's been a good week. Just to keep up my streak, on Monday my college BFF and I will be meeting up with some of my dearest companions from the 80s, the members of Depeche Mode. Cue the synthesizers.

Song of the Summer!

You know how every year some smarty pants on NPR (or, someone who actually knows something about popular music on NPR) picks the song of the summer? I remember a couple of years ago it was that Gnarls Barkley song, something like that? I don't know what song NPR canonized this summer, maybe because my prime NPR listening minutes have been focused on a new station. Muriel is my carpool buddy (Naomi rides with her dad), and lately we have been spending a lot of time listening to this station, because it plays cool music and NO COMMERCIALS.

Muriel is not a talk radio person- she gets annoyed when the announcer comes on between songs. "I don't like this song!" is her mantra, always when there's talking, sometimes also when there's music. Anyway, so that's the scene- Muriel and I rolling toward toddler camp, blasting the radio. And somehow in the span of a week, we heard this song three or four times. It is a little dorky, but also kind of mesmerizing, and it really grew on me. More importantly, though, it grew on Muriel. She was singing along on the first listen.

She went home and started singing it to Naomi, who jumped right in and started singing along too (having never heard the actual song). I say singing, but really, it's more like chanting. There is nothing that Naomi and Muriel won't chant for an entire day. It messes with your sanity. Seriously, these girls should go straight to the sports venue of an under-cheered sports team and start things up. (Naomi actually spends a fair amount of time chanting "Who likes Muriel? I do, I do. Who likes Mommy? I do, I do." So she's all set for a very civilized sporting event of some kind.)

Before you start looking around for a phone number for CPS, I promise that they do not sing the "Gonna get a vodka soda with a lime" part- only the chorus. You push, I'll go. You push, I'll go. Over and over. Ha! We got our song. Somebody call NPR.

Acclimated

Every region has their own approach to weather. In Minnesota, as I recall, the weather is something you always talk about in polite conversation, however, no one makes a big deal about it. Weather nonchalance in the face of pretty regular weather extremes. Same with Arizona. It is hot as the face of the sun there, but people pretty much go about their business. Here in the Pacific Northwest, there are two weather-related social patterns. One is that you must affect that you prefer those cloudy days of endless drizzle (OK, maybe some of them do, how do I know?) to any other kind of weather. Two, whenever the weather goes to any extreme whatsoever, it must TAKE OVER YOUR LIFE COMPLETELY.

I think I can say with relative certainty that we finally really fit in here- in the weather spirit of the Northwest, this absolutely insane heatwave has ruled our lives for the entire week. The girls have embraced the new policy of brushing their teeth during a cool-down shower. Tonight when I told Muriel it was tooth brushing time, she said, "I want to spit on the floor!" The floor of the bathtub, but you can see why the born rebel appreciates this approach. We have been camping out in the basement for three nights- it started out about fifteen degrees cooler than the main floor, but now it's probably only about an eight degree spread. We have been trying to avoid cooking, moving the dog downstairs during the day, wearing only a diaper to bed (ok, that's Muriel too). Every little bit helps.

Tonight we went for dinner to the local crazy mall food court that we frequent, because we are all class all the time. Turns out it was not such an original idea. Everyone on the Eastside was trying to stay cool at the mall. Under normal circumstances, this mall is already like the Mos Eisley Cantina. Every species, humanoid and otherwise, hangs out at this mall and throws down some mah jong and gives crochet lessons and plays Magic: The Gathering. But throw a 102 degree evening into the mix, and the joint really jumps.

Also: because the weather here only gets really interesting in one direction or the other for about two weeks out of the year, we are ill equipped. So not only is the mall mobbed with people, it is mobbed with people attempting to dress for the searing heat of a border town when for most of the year they wear their fleece vest or the long sleeve polo shirt they got when their software release finally wrapped up. A sight to behold, is all I'm saying. The girls had penne pomodoro, Jim had the halibut bento box, I had the Italian chop chop. We sat and watched the refugees drifting past, peering at everyone's table as is the custom at this establishment, to see what they might want to order next time.

You know in the movies when there is a burst of ominous music or chase music or comic music, and the camera pans and there is an actual group of musicians there? Ha! We had the perfect soundtrack for the whimsically surreal, because of course the performer at the stage was an accordian player. We got Girl from Ipanema and this one tango we like, and other than that, a lot of songs that made you feel like any minute a troupe of mimes was going to come down from the ceiling on trapezes and infiltrate the crowd. We took the girls and two quarters to the carousel, but even that was mobbed, and I could see from the look on the faces of parents that had gotten there after us that they were prepared to pretend they had gotten there first.

We changed course to the ice cream place, a chain where ice cream is not good enough and must be enhanced with other sorts of dessert items. (Shout out to my MN homies- I miss the St. Paul Creamery like mad. Can't imagine the line you would have if you had the weather we have.) The stress of their deployment was beginning to tell on the ladies behind the counter, who were trying to direct the traffic through gritted teeth. Naomi stuck to her pattern of ordering based on color (watermelon sorbet, anyone?), and I was intimidated by the pissed off ice cream scooper into ordering a medium (which was gigantic!) mint chocolate something. Mmmm minty.

Home, toothbrushing in the shower, bed in the basement, and as the grownups sat out on the patio, listening to that guy a few houses down who shouts for HOURS on end (what is he shouting about?)... a sensation of coolness in the air! Awesome. Tomorrow it is supposed to only get to around 86, which is cooler than the inside of our house has been this week. We can go back to daydreaming about drizzle, waiting for the next big weather emergency to rock our world.

J. Bungler

Lately at work I have been disastrously effective at making mistakes. I make a mistake every day, it feels like, and two or three big ones per week. I know why it is happening- I am at a crossroads of many different projects, have only a minimal amount of ownership of most of them, and still have to keep track of them so I don't miss an important deadline like sending files off to be included in the manufacturing stream in advance of a product release. I have been a giant lucky duck in that none of my mistakes have had the impact they could have (whew!), but still, yuck.

This week, however, I am absolutely certain that I will make no major mistakes. Why? Because I completely exhausted any reasonable allotment for mistakes big and small for one human over the weekend. A narrative of this would be too long, so here's the list:

• Forgot to put the salt in the banana muffins. (It's only a small amount, but it matters.)
  
• FINALLY found the dog nail trimmer- cut the dog's poor toe. Blood!
• Took kids to beach on "hottest day of the summer"- clouds roll in, raindrops start falling.
• Put the half-n-half on to "heat but not boil" for homemade ice cream recipe, turned around, then back to stove minutes later to witness volcanic half-n-half eruption. It boiled alright.
• Thought I could use candy thermometer for hot water and yeast mixture (100 to 110 degrees) for first time ever homemade pizza dough. Realized that candy thermometer starts at 200 degrees.
• Couldn't remember what number cup of flour out of four I was on, for same pizza dough recipe, threw in one more, just in case.
• Next day, "punched down" dough, as instructed, waited for the second rise...er, no second rise.
• Tried to spread dough around on oiled parchment paper (also, thought kids would think this was super fun, but not so much) and transfer to grill - nowhere near round or flat.
• Set up ice cream maker (stand mixer attachment), churned, churned, churned, added strawberries...ice cream DID NOT FREEZE.
• Agreed to just pretend ice cream was milkshakes, tried to get attachment off stand mixer, spilled giant gloppy "milkshake" all over kitchen floor.
• (Great one to close with) Assumed dog's toe was done bleeding, after 24 hours, let her come downstairs with us to escape the blazing heat, found dog toe blood all over downstairs carpet.

I bandaged Luna's paw pretty thoroughly last night. It remains to be seen whether the bandage will persist through the day. The beach trip was really fun despite the raindrops. The pizza looked fairly grotesque but actually tasted good. The ice cream glop tasted great, and we'll eat some of the actual frozen variety tonight, assuming our actual freezer works better than our ice cream maker thingy.

Ah- and one item where I did not make a mistake- starting Naomi on the much-vaunted "chapter book" experience with The Boxcar Children, about a group of little go-getters who turn the specter of homelessness and orphandom into a delightful plucky adventure of resourcefulness, re-use, and cooperation. (Wonderfully, the author does not give the kids any chance whatsoever to cry, feel sad, or otherwise reflect on the fact that their parents are DEAD. Sheesh. But good for my purposes.) Naomi gets SO MAD when I won't read her more than one chapter before bed, and she spent the weekend constructing a faux boxcar in the corner of the living room and making Muriel be one of the brothers. Good stuff.

This week: Slumber party in the basement. It is hot as blazes in these parts, and the basement is, shall we say, khooler.

That's More Like It

Yeah, the professional photog is back on staff. When Jim got home on Sunday, we went out to a beach park our friends had told us about, and brought some sand diggy toys Muriel got for her birthday. It occurred to me that I had completely forgotten what it's like to be a kid, because of course these girls had to go in the water (even though the day was both gloomy and chilly), and got themselves extremely damp and sandy. It was a rousing success.

Oh, and on the way out, we passed a picnic, and two kids from the picnic group were maniacally chasing the ducks around. I suppressed an urge to scold. Then the bigger kid (seven, maybe?) picked up a handful of sand and gravel and hurled it at the duck, at close range. I can't remember what I said, something fairly innocuous like, "Hey, hey, hey- take it easy on our duck friends." We passed the picnic group, and that's when I noticed that they were eastern Europeans. duh duh dunnnnnnh! As we were leaving two of the guys started following us to the parking lot. Track suits, gold chains, shaved heads, grim expressions. Holy crap! I had picked the wrong duck-attacking kid to scold! But they were just getting something out of their car. Whew.

Today was a pretty great day. Work has been kind of brutal of late, and today things seemed a lot more under control for some reason. I left a teeny bit early, made some pasta in a hurry, and left it on the stove while we went up to the pool for a dip. Hopping around in two feet of water for forty minutes makes my kids hungry and sleepy, which meant a satisfyingly focused dinner at which Naomi had three servings of pasta and Muriel ate something like ten asparagus spears, and a lovely bedtime with no objections. After the dishes, I took Luna for a walk around the blueberry farm, where unscrupulous summer lovers were sneaking some berries in advance of the opening of U-Pick season. It was a fantastically beautiful evening.

I choose to dismiss the part where my employer mailed me a free "book," the title of which may as well have been "Get Your Family Skinnier." Thanks!

Girls' Weekend

Jim's Father's Day present, besides the disastrous garden stone, was a plane ticket to California. As delightful as family life is (and it is), I had to admit to myself that getting out of my deeply carved role for the few days I was out of town for my reunion weekend was more than a treat- it was (in a small but good way) life altering. So now it's Jim's turn, and this is the weekend- he's visiting our good friends who used to live in Minnesota, but have since moved to San Clemente, which from the sound of it is very nearly paradise. Who knows what he will get out of it, besides the dual treasures of seeing old friends and eating a lot of fresh seafood. What I am getting out of it is a weekend with the girls, in a more concentrated than usual sense.

This, too, has been good for me. I am having a lot of fun with them, of course. But it is also liberating to know that EVERYTHING is on me, and there's no grousing or resenting (my perception) that I have to do it all. I can't even resent Jim for being out of town- I sent him there. It feels good to just do what needs doing and not think anything of it. Can I carry this with me out of the weekend? I hope so.

So, what's been going on? Kid's choice dinner, Friday night = macaroni and cheese, shrimp gyoza, and corn. With chocolate milk. I ate a lot of gyoza. This morning we went to our favorite breakfast place, ate some eggs and pancakes, and rode the mini-carousel. Our friends came over to play after breakfast. We ran around, created a stressful and messy group painting project (not my best idea ever), and waved our ribbon sticks (more props to Gramma for the mad present buying skillz). We planted peas in our garden this year in an effort to just raise pea vines, our favorite veggie dish at the Chinese restaurant, but we don't really know how or when to harvest, and the result is that instead we just have a whole bunch of peas. Which little girls, it turns out, love to pick and eat. When I went out this evening to put away the wacky pop-up gazebo that I got as my latest free Employer Swag, the picnic blanket inside, strewn with eviscerated pea pods, looked like the set of a pea horror movie.

While Muriel napped, I tried to debut a new movie with Naomi- Babe. She was not having it. I am not sure what she didn't like about it, except maybe for the part where she had no idea what was going on. She convinced me to turn it off in favor of her favorite DVD- Here Come the ABCs by They Might Be Giants. So many of these wacky songs are firmly lodged in my mind's ear, and I know the same is true of my kids, because the other day when I was absentmindedly singing a refrain that is something like, "I C U, I C U, and U R OK..." Muriel said, no, I don't like that song, and agreed to hear "QU" instead (one of my favorite videos in the collection). Then at dinner, Naomi was singing "The Alphabet of Nations," which is extra fun to hear a kid sing, since they have no idea what the sometimes obscure country names actually are. Except for West Xylophone, of course.

After an extended laundry folding session in the basement (which is much cooler than the rest of our house), we decided to hit the pool. Last time we went Naomi had been been kind of rotten, outright ignoring my direct requests (for example, to get out of the pool and come to the locker room right. this. minute, that kind of thing). The consequence was to be not coming along next time we went swimming. But since today was the next time, and there is no option for leaving her behind- the only option was not going at all, and it was a HOT day! So we agreed she would wait ten minutes to get in the pool after Muriel and I went in. This worked out pretty well, though if Muriel could have at least tried to pretend she was having a good time without her sister, that might have made the consequences more consequential... Eventually, we all enjoyed the swim, if you can call scuttling around in a foot and a half of warm water swimming.

When I posted my temporary single mom status on FB today, someone made a crack about how now I'll have to take all the photos. I took this as a challenge. And since I am being all self sufficient and grrl power, I am downloading, exporting, and posting those photos, with no coaching. So there! They're not great, but they are pictures.

Getting ready for the trip to the pool. I wasn't able to actually get any photos at the pool, which is too bad, because the look of intense concentration on Muriel's face the whole time made it seem like she was not into it at all, when in fact the opposite was true.

After the swimming, we spent a few minutes on the playground at the club. Naomi figured out to get out on one of the bars to hang- it was pretty impressive. Muriel wanted a piece of that action.

OK, yes, I'm holding Muriel up. Was it convincing?

This girl just passed her 2 year old doctor check up with flying colors, and came out between 10th and 20th percentile for weight (I was thinking she was terribly skinny). Yea, Muriel!

So yeah, fun abounds on our girls' weekend. If I can just keep the yelling under control. Ha.

In Which Muriel Declares Independence from England and Being One

You guys, where to start? It has been one heck of a long weekend. I took Thursday off to get ready for a visit from my parents and my 12-year-old nephew. They got in that evening around the spaghetti and meatball hour. Naomi had been very excited for their visit- she's a devoted fan of Gramma, and Muriel is mildly obsessed with Grampa, but unfortunately for both elders, the girls' little hearts were swayed by the cousin. They followed that poor kid around, called out for him if he left the room, and glommed onto him in every way imaginable. And he was the best sport imaginable, really- what pre-teen boy would be as kind as that to two little maniacs? He deserves a medal.

We engaged in some low-key tourism on Friday, nothing out of the ordinary. Also, it was extremely hot, and I found an inflatable squirty thing we got for Christmas (thanks, AP!) in the basement and made Naomi's day.

Saturday was Independence Day (if you missed that somehow), which meant another trip north for the Kirkland Fourth of July Parade.


Yes to the WWII POWs, yes to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, YES to the Veterans for Peace, the Unicycle Kids, the Blue Thunder drum line, and the beloved DeLorean Club. But Kirkland, PLEASE add some musical numbers to your parade! Besides the drum line, we had some kind of church youth group banging pails, a band of Indian youths who chose not to play as they went past us, and the Rainbow City band, playing, you guessed it, Thriller. Not that I didn't appreciate it. But that was it for the whole parade. It's like going to a party where there's not enough food. It's nice that there's a party, but before long, it's difficult to focus on anything else except how hungry you are. Kirkland, gimme a beat!

It is with some shame and resignation that I further admit that Naomi declared her favorite part of the parade this time to be the girls with the puff balls (a.k.a., the cheerleaders from a local high school). Sigh.

After some sternly enforced napping back at the house, we had some traditional Fourth of July fare (here's where I admit in a nod to my previous simile that I fear I underfed my guests- especially my nephew, who is used to eating what his family eats- because I am in the groove of feeding the four of us, and was constantly running out of everything) in the backyard. We had agreed to try to see some fireworks, the first time for Naomi, so she stayed up LATER THAN EVER in the interest of this outing. My mom, being the best toy buyer I know, had brought presents for the girls that included a set of beautiful silk pieces in rainbow colors. Naomi accessorized with them all weekend long, and that is the reason she looked like this at the fireworks.
Oh- my mom had also bought her a super cute wristwatch, and someone told her the fireworks would start when the little hand was on the ten. At some point I thought it would be a good idea to go to the bathroom before they started, so we hit the portable, which was unfortunately pitch dark inside. Yikes. When we were in there, she started to sound a little panicky, and I was all ready to calm her down, and she said "This was a terrible idea!" Ha! She explained that it was too dark to see her watch, and what if the little hand made it to the ten, and the fireworks started, while we were in there?! Fortunately we made it back to the blanket. We had a good spot, good luck with parking, overall the kind of fireworks experience that would make you consider going again. Naomi enjoyed them with her hands over her ears the whole time. Happy Birthday, America!
It was fun to have my folks in town. While out doing their own thing, my parents went to Fred Meyer, which is a store here that sells really just about everything with the exception of cars and houses. They loved it- my dad said it was like Walmart, but cleaner and nicer! Sweet. A woman helped them at the watch counter, and because my dad is that guy, he asked her where her accent was from. Tobago, she told him, and then she asked him if he knew who he looks like. Fidel Castro. Ha! She said it was OK, Uncle Fidel loves his people. When my parents told me this story later, I had a stomachache from laughing. My dad has gotten Burl Ives and the occasional Santa, but Fidel is a new (awesome) one.

The rest of the weekend was focused on Muriel and her big party. We decided to have a barbecue Sunday afternoon, which turned into a fried chicken-cue instead. Jim went and bought friend chicken at some place in Seattle that is ostensibly quite famous for it (it was good), and we threw down the usual accompaniments. The party was fun (I thought) and well-attended, and included our dear friends and a visitor they brought along, friends from Naomi's school, a friend from Muriel's school, and one of her teachers and his wife and beautiful baby girl (who is Muriel's darling- she loves that baby). Oh, and a coworker of Jim's. Having Muriel's teacher there was excellent, not only because he is so nice, but because he obligingly demonstrated his super niceness to my parents (who are not always so subtle in their opinions of my status as a working mother), and they really liked him.

Muriel clearly comprehended that the party was for her. She looked wicked awesome in her birthday dress, and even kept her hair clips in for a while.

What I should really do is devote a post or five to the girl of the week. Muriel is such a fantastic and complicated little person. She is clever and musical, sympathetic, quick to anger, quick to apologize. She likes to sing and dance. She likes to go along with her sister, and utterly thwart her sister. She puts everything in her mouth, but rarely actually eats anything (food included). She makes funny faces. She insists on having her "injury" kissed whenever the dog licks her (no thanks!). She shouts the lyrics to "Doe, a deer" as though they are a rallying cry for freedom. She is the life of the party. And now she has been around for two years- can you believe it? We're so glad to have her.

The Man, The Myth, The Father

I would be remiss, as I often am about so many things, if I didn't give a shout out to the other J. Khooler in the wake of his special role-appreciating day. He is a really good dad. He cooks delicious dinners. He puts pony tails in Naomi's hair in the morning. He reads stories to Muriel. He lets Naomi play CDs in his stereo. He attempts to explain scientific stuff to them. He queues up the Chicken Dance on his ipod. He plays the piano with them. He digs in the garden with them. Geez, what exactly have I been doing all this time?

For Father's Day, the girls and I attempted to use a fun garden stone kit to make Dad a special fun garden stone, only we (I) failed miserably and ended up with something that looked like a giant unbaked cookie with glass gems and letters white-glued to it. It is crumbly as hell and if we move it off the kitchen counter, it is likely to completely implode. Oh well. Naomi did a good job keeping the whole thing a secret, until I asked Dad where the big jug of bubble solution was, and he said it was in the shed, and she said, urgently and loudly, "Don't let him go in the shed, Mom!" Ha.

We celebrated, also, by going to the aquarium. Although Seattle seems like a candidate for a truly spectacular aquarium, the one they have is just OK. It's been improved by a giant wall of tank when you first come in, where you get to watch a chipper woman (on the outside) exchange banter with a scuba diver (on the inside) who is quite obviously freezing her flippers off. For me, the best part of the whole place is the octopus. It is a good-sized creature, and seems oh so very sentient, and (therefore?) really pretty menacing, in a way. Magnificent.

I also appreciate the mammals (seals and otters!) and the shore birds, including curlews and plovers and fancy puffins. All of which are fun to say. Also it was senior citizen day, so there were more than four occasions where I was compelled to scoot my kids out the way of an oncoming walker. Which I was happy to do. And of course because it is Seattle, there are many, many salmon.


Hi, fry!

I am not a great photographer, so Jim tries to position me before I take a shot (subtly, but I know what he's doing), so as to fill the frame optimally. But I still move in or out as my misconceived whim directs me. Oh well. Here's Dad on his day with his daughters, and the artificial orca tail.


Ah, and Saturday on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, in a story about the world's most unhygienic tourist sites (culminated of course by the Blarney Stone), what else got a shout out but Seattle's spectacular Wall of Gum? Yea!


And finally, a couple of girls who really, really love their Dad.

Expand My Brain, Please

Here's a lofty request- I am looking for some great thinkers. It has come to my attention recently that I have a deficit in the great thoughts department. A friend and I were talking recently about the wisdom you get from your parents, specifically aphorisms that stay with you through adulthood. The ones I remember are so situationally specific (and sometimes kooky) that I cannot even count them in this survey. This is not a slam on my parents- I have already discussed the pragmatism that runs in my bloodline. It's good to have a little advice on hand about specific situations in life.

But lately, also, I've been kind of hooked on the Happiness Project blog on Slate.com. This woman has got the sayings in spades- all kinds of meaningful thoughts on happiness and what is important in life. I know she probably has access to helpful quote anthologies and the like (a good shortcut for me? hmmm), but still, it strikes me as so desirable to be able to turn back to some book I got a lot from once in my life, and revisit the ideas, and see what they can do for me again. But wait, you say, didn't J. actually study these thinkers? In KOLLEDGE? Doesn't she already have a stable full to ride around when she wishes? Sort of, is the answer. But there are a lot of writers I never read, or barely did, the non-fiction writers in particular. I have some ideas of where to start, holes I already know about, like Emerson and Thoreau. But what else is out there for me? What, people?

It doesn't have to be the classics, also. If you think Stephen Covey is a genius, for example, I'm interested in hearing that. If you like some ancient mystic or other, again, interested! Frankly, whatever you have liked lately, or whatever you have come back to, I am interested. Show me what you got. I'd also love to hear just the quote or just the line that you return to.

And for inspiration, I dedicate this post to Baby H-C. She was a long time coming for her new parents, and she is going to change their lives like no great thinker ever did. Best wishes to the H-Cs- wish I could be there for some overnight baby holding!

Special Guest Star!

If I have not rhapsodized previously (though I believe I have) about how much I love to have visitors, allow me to do so now. Or again. Whichever. This weekend I was treated to a visit by my old friend L, who lives in New York City and spends her professional time enlightening humanity on the classics.

How do I know L, you ask? I used to live with her when I first moved to the Twin Cities. She and her mom were looking for a housemate, I was looking for a dog-tolerant home for myself and my Luna, and the prairie stars aligned. At first L and I were just friendly housemates, coming and going and not having too much to do with one another, but then came the fateful day when I dearly wanted to see Chumbawumba (you're reading that right) at First Ave., and this dear, sweet (party-ready) recent college grad was willing to tag along. We had a lot more fun after that (including my first martini), though we were roommates for only about six months, and when she moved to Oxford to pursue her dream of sifting through the loose pocket change of people who have been dead for thousands of years, I visited her there on a few occasions for some of the best times I've ever had. And I don't just mean the cucumber sandwiches at the tea joint.

One of the most interesting things (for me) that came up in our conversation this weekend was the realization that she and I are photo negatives of each other in the career arena. L is a person who knew exactly what she wanted to study, exactly what she wanted to end up with, exactly what she had to accomplish to get there, exactly how to work to accomplish those things. Girl had goals! Lofty ones! And met them! Whereas I have had the goal of being employed, figured out something I could be employed at, the rest is kind of snoozy history. Interestingly, although she feels like her work has resulted in a job she truly likes for a number of reasons, her satisfaction is not necessarily tied to the achievement of all these goals. Should I feel a bit better about that? Doesn't matter- since I knew her before her her career kicked off, even I get a measure of satisfaction from the way she accomplishes her goals. This woman kicks ancient historical ass, and looks good doing it.


Right?


Of course we went for breakfast at the market. That is where we go when you come to visit! You can go too! Come and visit us!


The girls enjoyed terrorizing the tourists with their calla lily magic wands. Thanks, Auntie L!


Guess who we ran into at the comic shop?


We thought this was tea for White People. Oh, White Peony, OK.

If I have any regrets about the weekend, it may be that I was a little too relaxed with L's visit. I had a few plans, a few meals lined up, but other than that the poor dear had to spend a fair amount of time floating around in the pool of our family life, which does not always have the strongest current. And she was completely victimized by my tots, who made her read something like one hundred and fifty books to them.


As a bonus aside, L brought along sweet little water bottles as gifts for the girls. Muriel's had a stopper in place of the screw top, and Naomi's came with a carabiner for attaching it to a bag or a coat or whatever. Which she persisted in calling a "hooker" the whole weekend. Funny!

So. Rad.

You guys! You guys! My 20th high school reunion weekend was Tewtally Awesome! I would further describe it as bitchin'! This is a seriously long post so please skip it if you're in an impatient mood.

I flew to Arizona on Friday morning, but early. Lucked into breakfast with an old friend from college days, who is making the world safer from terrorists the old fashioned way- building legal cases against them. However impressively grown-up he is now, and even after not seeing him in at least a dozen years, it only took about a minute to feel like I was talking to the college era version of him. Funny (good funny) how that works.

Back to the airport to pick up my home girl E., then off to Tempe for a family lunch. It was so good to see them- I always have a dual experience with my family, the moment of yes, they are me, I am them, this is where I come from, of course, and then the Wow do I not so much fit in here. Stupid adulthood with all its complicated ideas and whatnot.

We had a room at the hotel hosting the reunion events, so back up to Paradise Valley for some relaxation (ahem, cheap Riesling) in the room in advance of the Friday night cocktail party. I had a rule for myself on this reunion, based on my behavior at the ten year, and it went a little like this: Drink less. I still drank, though, I'm just saying.

The Friday event was, in a word, supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. Good turnout, lame appetizers, cash bar. I spent some time talking to a teacher I never had (who tried to convince me I was in one of his business classes?), and kept polling people on who would be coming the following night, so I could sign their Saturday dance card and move on. There were a few people I wasn't sure I would see that did show up- yea! I am not sure whether it was just the delight of being at a party I hadn't organized (sad, J.), or the whiskey and ginger ales, but I had a really fantastic time.

Saturday morning we managed to get all sunscreened up and head out to a local mountain trail for a hike. I had read that the summit trail on this mountain (we used to hike it a lot when I was first in AZ as a teenager) is the most heavily hiked in the nation or something, and I can attest that we were getting out of someone's way about once every two minutes. Rarely was it the other way around, I'm afraid. It's a steep hike. But the top affords quite a nice view of the valley, and some refreshing gusty winds. We also saw some badass lizards, who seemed not the least bit intimidated by the Manhattan sidewalk crowds of hikers.



If I felt my age a bit on the hike, I felt it in a different way at the place we picked for breakfast, cleverly named The Breakfast Club (and where you can get smart-alecky black t-shirts with quotes from the movie emblazoned on them). The food was fine (though seriously, who offers you eggs with toast on a menu and then only gives you ONE piece of toast?), but I kept thinking grouchily that the music could really go down a notch. Oops! Fogey alert!

In the afternoon we headed to a spa near the hotel. It was a swanky place, but so kitschily decorated that it was hard not to smile the whole time. Also, in addition to the big "relaxation space" with comfy chairs and high end chewy granola bar snacks and a wacky Van Goghish sky-painted glass ceiling, there was a little pool and hot tub in the side yard, that we were welcome to use (though we did not). Between that pool and the matching tan seersucker robes, it was a little like a kind of groovy cult we had temporarily joined.


Anyway, massage (ahhhh), facial (ooooh), manicure (enh), and after a quick but meaningful junket to Jack in the Box, back to the hotel to tart up for the big dance.

(In case you were wondering, yes, we were completely overdressed. And we didn't really care.)

In short, the dinner was not bad, actually, the group photo was silly, but kind of funny, I guess, the DJ had his year-range about right, we got a few dances in (why do people always bring up Elaine from Seinfeld when I dance?!), and the conversations were fun, fun, fun. When the event ended, we went to the lobby bar, when that place closed down we went to the hot tub (feet only, yo). I had a genuinely hard time heading back to my room at 2:30 or whenever it was.

I am giving this whole play by play in place of what was the heart, the essence of this weekend and why it meant so much to me. What a nice example of my writerly shortcoming (in turn maybe an example of my life-living shortcoming)- it's easy to write in the breezy voice about the things that go on, but one of the points of writing is to help you think about things, to help you figure them out. I know it would take me too long to get a post up on this weekend if I took the time to really write out what was so striking and emotional and wonderful about it (and maybe that thoughtful, reflective person could resist the urge to insert that perhaps I was so struck and emotional because I was drunk and sleep deprived!).

But for fun I'll take a breezy crack at it and say that first, when you (I) go through life wondering how much of yourself to show to the people you meet, and then come back into a group where the people more or less already know that you, from way before, wow! It's so easy! Second, you get a chance to ponder the threads you dropped, directions your life could have taken, and to appreciate in turn the ones you held on to. Third, you get the people, the nice, funny, interesting people who surprise you, or turn out to be wonderfully, exactly as you remember them.

I don't know if this assessment can explain the happy, emotionally split-open feeling I'm having even a few days later, and I'm guessing not everyone has the same experience at their high school reunion. I haven't even mentioned the wonder of spending the weekend with someone who knew me since I was thirteen (and has liked me all that time), sitting on a beautiful resort room patio for great long stretches, reading magazines and lounging in a chair, and participating in no childcare whatsoever (thanks, Dad!). Reunion weekend, I have a big crush on you. Call me!

Folktastic!

This is the third year we have attended the NorthWest Folklife Festival at Seattle Center, and the first when I think Naomi was really old enough to appreciate it. We left Dad and Muriel at home to increase our festival going efficiency (and to prevent having to leave for naptime). I had a feeling Naomi would appreciate some of the Asian dances (by which I mean, the costumes), so we stopped first at the Thai dance performance. The costumes were as beautiful as I had hoped, and the dancing was lovely (though- if you understand Thai music, such as it is, and can boil it down into a sentence or two- I am interested!). On the way to the next performance venue, we stopped to hear some shape note singing, which I have heard of but never witnessed. It was a "participatory event," but we didn't really participate. Neat.

The second dance venue we went to had Indian dancing, and we timed it perfectly to catch a dozen adorable (mostly white) girls in wonderful outfits performing two Bollywood dance numbers. So fun! I want to sign Naomi up for that right now. I thought after that, Naomi would be less interested in the classical Indian (grown-up) dances, but she loved those, too, and kept negotiating for a few more dances before we left to get lunch. We ate some food, wandered around, and even took a ride on the ferris wheel next to the Space Needle. Seattle-ish!

We were not the most adventurous eaters. In addition to the beignets we started off with, we had jerk chicken on a stick (me), hot dog (her), mango lemonade, and shishkaberries. Naomi pointed out a man in a skirt (kilt). She enjoyed the Scandanavian polka band (Swedish Pride!) and the ren-faire ladies handing out ye olde fliers. For my part, I wondered, can it really be true that one out of every three Seattle-ites is in a bluegrass band? And where do you get a washtub anyway?

It will be obvious from the pictures that our professional photog was not along on this event. Instead of beautiful and well-composed slice of life pictures, you get mom putting kid in ridiculous posed situational slice of cheese pictures. Oh well. It was a really fun day!

We got to the Seattle Center really early, about two hours before things got rolling. I wasn't that sure of the start time- I knew the performances started at 11:00, but I assumed (incorrectly) that at least "The Mighty O" (mini organic doughnuts, you may recall) would be open earlier. Wrong! Some places in the Center House were open, though, so we stopped for a pretend foot massage at this fifty cent foot massager (clearly not built for the shorter set- Naomi's feet were a good foot over the foot massaging metal plate). Shouldn't it be in the shape of a foot instead of a hand?
We also got steamed milk and beignets. Had to kick off the day with some unhealthy snack.
When I asked Naomi's favorite Thai dancer if we could get a picture with her, she was extremely gracious. I didn't give Naomi enough warning, though, so she wasn't sure how to handle it. We have since examined the picture many, many times.
Here, Naomi poses with young Zeus, who happened to be at the festival, all be-togaed and giving out samples of Greek yogurt.
After we got home, Naomi wanted to take some pictures. There is a weird close-up of my shirt that didn't come out perfectly, but she took a few cute ones. Muriel just said, Hey Naomi, do you like seafood? Good one, Muriel.

More on Goals, Plus Miscellany

I recently read an article about a study that looked at whether stating your goals publicly made you more or less likely to work toward and achieve them. The study found that going public with your goal made you feel like you were already on your way, and that goal seekers who didn't declare themselves didn't have that half-way there feeling, so they worked harder toward the goal. It was interesting to me, of course, because it has been and will continue to be a year of public goal setting. But my goals are small, and daily-ish, and accountability plays a big factor in this kind of habit-change goal-setting. I think the goals in the study were more about finishing law school and getting a good job, or something similar. I am not going to commit to anything like that in my new month resolutions...

On a slightly different note, I have read more than one article about how you should respond when people tell you about something difficult they are going through. One angle is that women tend to understand the importance of just listening and sympathizing, whereas men want to offer solutions to the situation. If this is true, I am definitely in touch with my masculine side, because I am all about offering unsolicited advice and trying (in my mind) to help create solutions. I think I have inherited a streak of overly-self-assured pragmatism, from my mom, her mom, even my dad's mom. This response, though, can mask the sympathy I genuinely feel. It seems like a lot of my friends are experiencing hard times right now- losses, illnesses, uncertainties. It makes me want to get better at just listening and showing I care without immediately forming a task force. Crap, now I have publicly declared my goal and am less likely to follow through...I am going to try, though.

Here's another public goal, related to the last paragraph- less complaining! I feel extremely lucky all the time, to have the friends and family and home and job and dog and so forth that I do. Good health. Health insurance. A well-stocked pantry (not now, but most of the time). A garage to park my reliable car in so I don't have to get soaked trying to get my kids out of their car seats. Car seats. Clean water that I don't have to walk miles for and carry in a big jug. A safe neighborhood. That bake-your-own pizza place three blocks away. Really, piles and piles of things go right in my life. So why do I complain so much? I'm locking it down. I know from endless work-related goal setting nonsense that I have to make my goal achievable, measurable, what was it... relevant? So I may have to frame this for myself a little more concretely. But I think I can get started without that.

On a completely unrelated note,

Bonus enrichments from Naomi's school experience:

Whacking herself on the face with an open palm over and over, in the world's most literal (though, not really funniest) manifestation of slapstick humor. Of course, Muriel also does it, always when there is food on her hands. Fun!

Derivative art. There is a girl in Naomi's class who draws really lovely flowers- lots of very uniform petals, always with a big swoopy rainbow in the sky above them. Now ALL of Naomi's art showcases flowers with a rainbow. In her defense, she does get a little Warholian with the image, making it small, making it big, putting it on the dresses of whatever princess she's drawing...

New vocabulary! I don't always feel like I'm the best mom I can be, that's for sure, but when Naomi came home from school saying that she "haked" something, I gave myself a hearty pat on the back. Because at the age of four, she wasn't familiar enough with the word "hate" to even say it properly when she finally learned it. Yea! Then of course I faced the dilemma of whether to correct her pronunciation. I hake it when my mom corrects my pronunciation.

Playing zombies. I can only imagine what this looks like on the playground, but at home it is just Naomi, saying "I am a zombeeeeee" in a not-quite-creepy-enough voice. Sadly, there is no walking with arms straight out (or is that only mummies who do that?), or twisty, sideways lurching like the zombies in the terrific movie, "Shaun of the Dead." She has passed this on to Muriel, though, so the other day they both had scarves draped over their heads, and were shuffling around saying "I am a zombeeee." Yes, I should have video-ed that instead of the twirling lesson. I know.

Finally, Mother's Day Recap

This year on Mother's Day, Jim left (in the morning) for a business trip to Minnesota, but not before racing to church to drop off my Sunday school lesson plans for whatever sub they could find, seeing as I had come down with some kind of pink eye-type thing the day before. Neat!

A few days before Mother's Day, I was grousing to my friend about how Jim sometimes relies on an offer in place of an action. Like saying, "I'll give you a foot rub," which is not the same thing as delivering a foot rub. The difference is subtle, but important, especially if you are the sort of person who always hears the silent escape plea in any offer. So when he said something late in the week before Mother's Day about me figuring out what I wanted to do on Saturday, just for me, or whatever, I was grumpy. I have to figure out my own treat! That does not count as forethought!

But of course I was completely mistaken. There was forethought, and planning, and secret keeping. Jim got Naomi out of school early on Friday, and they came home and baked me an apple pie. Not only was it delicious, it was beautiful (which my pies never seem to be). Jim said Naomi peeled the apples, and mixed everything up. Here is the evidence:




And here was another bit of fun over the weekend.

Happy Mother's Day!

To all my friends who are mothers, who will be mothers, who have mothers, and who mother others, love to you this Mother's Day!