Twas the Night before Christmas 2011

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, the illness was spreading, to even my spouse. the stockings were slung on the couches with care by two of our kids, (the littlest pair) With his blankie and bucket my husband reclines, while i deal the wrapping, sickies and whines and my own rolling stomach gives me despair i know soon my turn to throw up will be there. Then from upstairs, there arose such a clatter, i sprang from my wrapping to see what was the matter and what to my exhausted eyes should appear a miserable teen with the flu i did fear hunched over a bucket, sweating and shaking this illness was not one she was faking her stomach how it quivered, and her smile, how it wavered, her legs were weak and wobbled like jelly this spread through the house so rapid and quick i`m trying my best not to get sick. now the stockings are stuffed, placed here and there Christmas gifts await them, there`s still time to spare, Now there`s a sound from upstairs, so unhappy, run quick oh lovely, my toddler is also now sick. i just sneak a quick rest-, i`ll just shut off this light merry Christmas to all, please no one else barf tonight!

A morning in the life of uptight boy

I've titled this a morning in the life of, but the reality is, it took only about 15 minutes for him to run the gamut of things to freak out about. These are the things I deal with every morning with him. Sometimes I haven't got the time really, which makes for some bad conflicts and really just slows us down more. Here we go. Me. short on sleep, accidentally fell back asleep after alarm, two teens also overslept due the absence of screaming toddlers acting as alarm clock. Giant pile of dishes cause I had a long council meeting last night and didn't do them when I got home, lunches not made,one child laying on the floor in a blanket claiming to be freezing to death. etc... In the middle of me washing dishes as fast as I can because the lunch containers need to be done, youngest one , my super uptight about everything boy starts to cry- "i'm pooing! " me- you mean peeing? Him, -Yes, it's getting on me! I drop the dish i'm washing and race him upstairs to the potty. It's too late, he has peed in his 'Mater pull up. As I'm pulling the pull up off, i bump his sock, making it slide a smidgen off his foot. Him -HEY! You wrecked my sock! me, "ok, I'm just going to get you new socks and some clothes for today" Taking advantage of his prone position on the toilet, i yank his shirt off and toss his dirty clothes in the hamper. Him, very indignant- I don't want No Shirt! You took my shirt! Me (pulling on his socks) just a sec Him upset- my sock is ruined! (the seam was a millimetre off his toe line. seriously. sadly,-or luckily- I understand how horrid that is.)Me, smoothing it out, nope look it's perfect now. Him, I have no shirt! Me-yes, i'm getting you another one., (which i did lickety split before he could discover the joy of nudity). I opt for his favourite t. Unfortunately I put it on backward. Him, on the verge of hysterical tears now. "it's on wrong, you did it wrong! it's the wrong way, that's not cool dog! " (it has a weiner dog on it, cool dog on front, hot dog on back. sad i know). I get it turned before he can continue in that vein, and slip his pants on before he can notice I got a bit of water on them and get upset about that. Then I go to hurry on with getting everyone else ready, before he can stress about anything else. Does anyone else have a child who is that particular about their clothing and stuff?

November.

Well somehow we are into November and only a few weeks away from Christmas.Yes that high pitched scream of terror really is coming from me. I haven't got any gifts yet. Seriously, this time of year I'm usually done, but having no money is really cutting into my ability to buy gifts for anyone. Lately we have all been blessed with illness. Couple that with the awesome fun prep I'll be doing for a colonoscopy and endoscopy on Monday, and woohoo what a party! Why on earth is the other thing called an endoscopy anyway? That one isn't going in the back door at all. It's one that goes through the upper half right? I think? I could swear that they were talking about swallowing that one. I'm not sure I'll be swallowing anything the way I'm feeling.

Divination by Apples

Way back in the stone ages- (in the 70's and early 80's when I was a kid), there were many tried and true divination methods used for determining your future spouse. Since most of us were saddled with apples in our lunches most of the time, apple prediction became a popular pasttime. The idea was to hold your apple, then turn the stem, with each turn saying one alphabet letter. Then when the stem popped out, that was the first letter of your future partner's first name. No matter what I did, I always managed to get either the Letter E, or the letter C as the first one, and always the letter B . Which bugged me as a child because the only person I knew with the initials EB was my grandfather. Certainly not the boy I had a crush on from SK to Gr6! At any rate, I wrote the whole apple thing off as a fraud. Until grade 10, when I fell in highschool love with a boy who had the initials CB. Ahhh, a match made in heaven! And it lasted right up until the end of the school year. le sigh. Then for over two years I dated a bad letter combo, MH. What on earth I was thinking, I really can't say. I escaped that abuse finally and promptly met a CB- hooray! Sweet guy, tutored me in Math, which I wanted to upgrade. And then he had the nerve to move. Not just to another town, but he moved to Ireland for University. That was back in the days before the computer and the internet. Keeping in touch meant horrid cross atlantic phone calls. We parted as great friends- Then another bad choice ...or a few...then an LB. Pretty close right? L could be mistaken for C if your handwriting was shite and you squinted. That relationship only lasted until third year University, the power of the predicting apples was so strong! Shortly after that one ended, I met a guy, he was a friend of an acquaintance i had met once, my ex-boyfriend's twin brother's ex-girlfriend's ex room mate's friend to be exact- not my type really- His name turned out to be Ed. Last name started with a B. It also turned out his first name on his birth certificate started with a C. So, covering all the bases there, EB, CB. I would like to say, we lived happily ever after-but the apples of my childhood couldn't guarantee that I suppose. We did get married after we knew each other almost 6 weeks. We are still together almost 17 years, and 4 kids later, so hey who knows. maybe those apples knew what they were doing when their little stems twisted off in the E or C spot each time! And no, I didn't plan my life around the apple, it just amuses me that things worked out this way.

I used to travel up north every summer as a child to visit my Grandparents who lived in Sudbury, Ontario. My Dad grew up there, spending his summers swimming in lake Ramsey, or out at their cottage on Lake Penage- Don't picture anything too fancy, it hadn't changed much by 1998 when it was sold, from how it looked back when it was built in the 1930s or so. (i'll have to ask my dad about what year it was). Anyway, as time went on, the cottage became more accessible by road-I imagine when my dad was a kid it was probably a dirt track going in. When i was a kid you had to walk down from the main road, close to the length of a city block, down a steep hill. Trust me, we tried not to forget anything in the car- plus with bears around, who wanted to be alone running back up there to get it?! As you came down the hill you passed the outhouse, then finally the cottage, built into the side of the rocky northern landscape-. It was a white log cabin like structure with a porch on it,( red as far as I remember)Luckily there was a porch or else we kids would no doubt have fallen and rolled down the hill every time we stepped outside, because that walkway to the water and boathouse/steambath was plenty steep and rocky. Surrounded by pine trees, and the rocky northern landscape,it is burned into my memory, and I wish that my grandparents hadn't insisted on it being sold after my Grandmother's death. The Sudbury of my childhood had very few trees,though by my teen years increasing the height of the big nickle mine smokestack has caused a resurgence in the tree population, and it wasn't as bleak. But still, visits to my grandparent's house were not as fun for us as visiting them at the cottage. We would all tumble out of the sweltering station wagon, hauling pillows and suitcases and make our way down the hill where my grandparent's dog Korky would come racing out barking. My grandmother always seemed to dress the same at the cottage (camp actually. People out there called them camps. I guess because they were hunting camps when they started using them- my grandfather actually had a heart attack while the two of them were deer hunting out there on the icy lake- naturally in the days before phones out there, they weren't able to reach help in time) Anyway, invariably she would come out, a neat tidy woman wearing her slacks or sometimes camp shorts, white socks, white biway sneakers, a cardigan or blouse (depending on how hot it was), and sometimes her white camp hat-tilley style! Her hard little rounded belly when we hugged- and how she seemed to shrink as I got older, caught up and passed her in height finally. You entered into a super organized kitchen, which in turn opened into the other main room which had two walls that were almost all windows (weirdly enough, they didn't open! just tiny circles a the bottom, which had a flip piece of wood that covered them up when it got too chilly. I don't recall it ever being too hot though, except at night). My grandparent's bed was in the corner of the room, away from the windows, on the same side as the cabinets that held the dishes, cutlery, and other cottage necessities. There was a tiny black and white tv that didn't get any channels. A radio from before they invented FM, and the other side of the room held a large table, big enough to fit 8 of us, and afreezer, chock full of food- The one bedroom was through there, we slept in there in bunk beds, the four of us kids, two per bed. I'm guessing that the room was about 7 by 8 at the very most, likely not quite that large even. In later years there was a bedroom added, in an enclosed porch outside , but I only slept in it one or two visits that i recall, with my grandmother. I was terrified of bears coming in and barely slept between the fear and the constant drone of mosquitos. Whenever i was assigned the top bunk in the little room, i would lay awake for hours because the light from over the table shone right in through the window, right into my face-while my parents and grandparents played seemingly endless games of euchre and twenty one. That's something I totally miss about the cottage, cribbage, twenty one, euchre with my grandparents. we really only went there for 2 weeks or so each summer, after we got the haying done, but i have so many memories. One time a baby bear had gotten up a tree right by the cottage door, and there was the risk in case the mama bear was still in the area- Underneath cottage, built into the hill was a big storage area- fridge etc. I'm not sure that my grandparents could close it off, but i feel like the wood and lots of outdoor stuff was stored down there. I used to make my way across the giant rocks along the shore, to the steep rockface just to the right from the camp, between ours and pitkethleys' and pick blueberries from the scrubby little bushes up top. I liked perching up there looking out at the lake, across to the island there, pretending I was the only one around. My favourite thing though was the boathouse which also housed the steam bath. There were bunk beds down there for guests, and my parents usually slept down there- Sometimes i swear I still smell the cedar in the steambath woodstove, heating the rocks to a sizzle- getting to toss a cupful of water onto them was a treat- we'd lay on the benches in there, cool damp wash cloths on our faces , trying to stay cool and remain in there as long as the adults. Then, the door banging shut behind us, we'd race out, feet slapping on the paving stone path, racing across the cement pad to the diving board or water's edge and plunging into the clear chilly lake. In the woods just outside the steam bath , but near the "beach" was where my grandparents parked the little aluminum boat that belonged to my dad, and also where my grandfather (step grandpa really) was often found cleaning fish, in his green workman pants, plaid shirt and fedora hat. Sometimes early mornings he and I would go out fishing, zipping across the lake in the silence of the dawn. I don't think I ever really caught much other than rock bass, but my grandpa would bring back some fish, and we'd be have fresh fried fish for breakfast along with the mountain of toast, bacon and stuff my grandmother used to put out. As I got older, I used to love just sitting on the dock I don't think I realised I missed it this much- One sound that can transport me there is the sound of leaves on the wind. that Rushing sounds that northern trees make, starts far away and building as it reaches the shore, wooshing away over the water. If you haven't heard it, I'm afraid I'm not a good enough writer to convey it. It's a poignant sound to me, one I've come to associate with the end of the summer. When asked to come up with a happiest memory, that is what popped into my head. The sounds I would hear laying in my bunk at night- the rush of the trees, the wind racing though them towards the water, the lapping of the waves on the rocky shore, and the Johnathan G bumping against the sides of the boathouse. I still remember how it felt, to awaken, feeling as though i was on the water, the bunk seeming to rock with the waves- Lake Penage, i miss you so!

Travel time!

The long awaited moment of our summer had finally arrived- the car was packed, the kids were up and we were ready to hit the road- Destination: Port Clyde, Maine!
About 12 kms into the trip my dd2 asked "Are we there yet?" -and not for the last time either.
Only about 1200kms remaining!
By the time we reached our stop for the night, which was roughly halfway I was thinking about buying earplugs and maybe a plane ticket for myself.
We stayed two nights in my In Laws trailer/motorhome. The kids swam at the beach, my hubby went fishing with his dad and the kids and I hung out with their Memere (their grandma Sheila), which they always enjoy.
Then early Sunday morning we were back on the road. It was just after 8:30 when we cleared Montreal. We felt we were making pretty good time.
Winding through the mountains, we saw some beautiful scenery (as we blindly followed my gps down some bizarre side roads). It was gorgeous, but there was no where to stop to pee, or eat which is kind of a necessity when travelling with 4 kids.
We came to the border in Caanan Vt without barely any warning. It was a tiny little booth, with one car ahead of us and a fantastic view of the mountains which had fog curling around their tops-
The nice border officer let us use the toilet there (thank goodness!) We were out of Vermont within 2 or 3 minutes and into NH.
It was a while before we came upon the next thing resembling civilization- a store called LL Cote in NH. We ate at subway because we had no real option for anything else, and kept on moving.
It was about 5 when we were an hour away from the cottage, so we stopped at Target to buy some milk and food supplies. A short jaunt down the tiny little highway (can you even call that a highway?), a million cries of I have to pee ( now!!!), 89 kms later and we were there-
Totally worth it. Perched on a point out in the ocean, Port Clyde is a very picturesque area which reminds me very much of Northern ontario, but with ocean views, and lobsters and quaint towns instead of mines and lakes. We unpacked, and immediately hit the beach as the tide was out- sweet relief to be out of the car, believe me! This was our first view of the beach on our street-

SAHM -synonym for lonely, or maybe acronym for Sits At Home Moping

When i thought of stay at home mom's ,before I was one, I pictured cutesy groups of lululemon sportin' moms with their styling kids having coffee and hanging at the park, or the beach, their houses, whatever. Sipping icey drinks,laughing,like yaya sisterhood of the travelling pants ( a combo of the fun,faith, and loyalty of the two movies).
I imagined myself with friends to hang with, bounce momtastic ideas off, our kids would be like siblings in their familiarity and comfort level in one another's homes.
Alas, it is not so. Finding friends is like dating. You have to attract them, have similar values and time availabilites.Thankfully you don't have to worry they will want you to put out at the end of every playdate.
I have lost more than one friend through their return to their career,(or moving away, or divorcing and moving away.) followed by the insane busy lifestyle that goes along with that.
It is hard not to worry that it is me and I am just unfriendable. The thin fancy moms have zero trouble finding a clique that wants to hang out a few times a week, hosting playdates, taking walks,joining school council together, or just doing whatever.
I have tried all the traditional mom meeting methods. Parks, playgroups, classes,school. My dd's jk class was almost exclusively bussed last year. Try getting to know other parents then!
The plain truth is I am so brutally lonely and my kids are never the right age group to ones that attend the same classes as us. Or they are only available evenings/ weekends, when I am not. Everyone else also seems to have great houses, cleaned to perfection. It is so discouraging.
I vow to get out to more things and stop living like a hermit. If I can get anyone to talk to me that is.I am running, working out, and hopefully getting the witchlike mole removed from my face, and who knows, maybe I will find some compatible friends then?

Garden woes, this heat must go!

For the first time ever, we planted a little vegetable garden. We had the wettest spring I can remember. Took us until the end of May to actually be able to go outside long enough to dig the garden and plant it.

Things were growing along nicely when suddenly all the rain just disappeared. We woke up the other morning to a bit of dampness on the patio table so I imagine it rained, but I can't confirm it.

My zucchini are shrivelling and turning yellow. My pumpkins are wilty, carrots are not even growing anymore, and my potatoes, poor potatoes, they have the longest skinniest tops on them ever from the early extended rains when they struggled toward the sunlight. I don't even know if they will grow potatoes on them! My beans are finally creeping up the bean tower,but my peppers are stunted and suffering a bit now. My eggplants basically died under the jungle like cover that is my potatoes. My herbs aren't faring much better. The truly hearty lemon verbena and mint are gigantic, thanks to the rain earlier on, but the stuff we planted later is not growing. They look exactly as they did when my husband planted them after his birthday. Maybe not exactly the same, they were way healthier looking at the greenhouse!

Now, I'm all for summer and warm weather, but it's getting ridiculous! By the time it creeps to 48 on Thursday with the humidex, I won't need to cook, I'll just be able to go out and butter my sad shrivelling veggies on the vine and serve them for supper!

Summer thrills...

School's out, and I say hooray! And for me the countdown begins. Not the excited counting the days for the kids to return to school, more like the bummed countdown of how fast the summer is flying by.
It's all bittersweet to me these days. Each passing day, every moment of growth and discovery the kids make is another day closer to their own adulthood. Next September marks the start of SK for my youngest girl, and grade 10 for my oldest son. When their feet spring out the door that day, I will hear their steps echoing away into adulthood, and I am excited for them as well as filled with wrenching sorrow that their steps must necessarily carry them away from me.
However, that day is approximately 52 days away, and I will try to remain carefree and enjoy summer with them while I can.
So far the youngest ones have been enrolled in some classes at the early years, and we've been busy with dental appointments and Drs and all that thrilling stuff. We took a trip to visit my husband's family in the bustling metropolis of Cornwall, On.
The younger kids had good time, it was their first time camping, although we did that in my FIL's motorhome so I am not entirely sure it counted as camping. We got to go for a boat ride, visit a cottage, hike, visit 2 sets of their grandparents,stopped at the Big Apple in Coburg, took a trip to Prehistoric world, and BBQ'd it up with family.
All the kids got to see fireflies for the first time. There were so many it was really lovely.
The first morning we woke up after not really sleeping,and Zans was in a foul mood so we drove to a local Tim Horton's for coffees and a treat for the kids. We were going to take the ramp to the 401 to Cornwall, but then I spotted the East Montreal one...and off toward Montreal we went!
We didn't go all the way there though, just as far as Dorion. Bailey really had to pee of course, so we just popped into the golden arches. She thought it was cool to be peeing in Quebec, though she was disappointed in the lack of French flags. I guess we've done most of our travelling through the States, where flags are in abundance.
Now Zander keeps saying he wants to go back to "The Bus" as he called the motorhome, and the beach. Poor guy, doesn't realize how FAR it was, in traffic....
Bailey was excited to get to class the day after we came back. I naively thought she couldn't wait to tell her friends about the dinosaur exhibit or the boat ride/swimming in the St Lawrence. What does she say as she bolts from the car in excitement? "I can't wait to tell Lainey that I peed in Quebec! "
Of course that was the highlight of the trip. I guess when we drive to Maine in August I should find a lot of special bathrooms for her to stop in and impress her friends!

Drs make mistakes too apparently.

So I was at the hospital Monday getting a mole removed. I've waited over a year to get one on my face done.I'm tired of kids asking me if I'm a witch. I tell them I am, but I don't usually eat kids for dinner.
Sadly the dr couldn't do it. She wants me to see a plastic surgeon because she couldn't remove it without leaving a big hole. I did get her to remove one on my arm that suddenly turned black. I'm not worried about it, but my sister was pestering me about it so I got it removed. Everything was fine. At first. All through the check in, the waiting, the choppity chopping, here was the conversation, repeated several times, with several staff ending with the surgeon and her nurse "so, you have a latex allergy?" Me "yes". She whips the mole out and I'm done and voila I get stitched up leave the hospital. I come home for a bit, not feeling really awesome. Kind of feeling dizzy and weird, and no idea why. My arm is turning a really weird shade under the bandage wrap. I go back out after 20 minutes at home to pick up the younger kids then off to get my oldest up at the highschool. As I'm waiting in the car for him, the freezing is starting to wear off. It's been almost an hour since they finished me up.
I still feel strangely like I got high or something. My arm is mottled purple around the bandaid. I'm thinking weird, she didn't say purple, she said it will be white for a while.
I sit there looking at the see through bandaid. Super slow wheels turn in my head as I'm feeling weirder by the minute. My 4 year old daughter who I just picked up from school pipes up from the backseat, "Mom, how come your band aid doesn't look like my special safe (latex free) band aid? it looks like the old ones we had" And Ding ding ding, I finally know why I feel totally bizarre and why my skin feels on fire around the frozen zone.
Ripping off the bandaid, I see my skin is beginning to rash and look ugly under there.
No harm no foul overall, but what on earth is the point in telling them that you are sensitive to something, if they aren't really listening?
It is worth mentioning that the surgeon actually called me on my cell shortly after that, having attempted to reach me at home, upset because she had realized her error, and wanting me to come in and switch it. She had called my house, my drs office, (where my dr wasn't actually sure because it didn't say on my chart I was allergic, but she felt like she remembered something)to when she finally reached me, and I was able to say, everything was fine and I already taken care of it.
But seriously, what if my daughter hadn't said something? The weird way I was feeling, I don't think I would have put two and two together on my own, cause that has not happened before.
I do know that I can't use cheap toilet paper, or some mascaras, or cheap nasty elastic underwear or socks...Certain fruits cause me grief and I recently learned it was because they are often a problem for latex sensitive people.
Latex, definitely not my friend, and I clearly have to be more vigilant on my own behalf from now on!

Hey Neighbours!-You cutting your grass is a pain in my ...

My neighbours are the type to mow their lawn twice a week. It is annoying, not good for the environment, not great for your grass, and most importantly to me, not good for my son.
He has "sensitve lungs" (AKA Asthma, though they won't call it that until he is older).
The latest round of grass mowings occured on Sunday. I gave him claritin, with no noticeable improvement. I estimate 8 or 9 people on my section of the street mowed their lawns. By Monday morning our little guy couldn't breathe very well. We dosed him with his inhalers , repeatedly.
Took him to the park, because I figured it's a plain park, lots of rocks, not too many plants.
Luckily for us there was a parks and rec dude there mowing the lawn, while smoking a cigarette and driving a smelly diesel tractor. We left and came home, he was getting worse quickly. He fell asleep (not normal) at lunch time. He woke up after an hour, with very laboured breathing, and he couldn't even climb the stairs without crying and having to stand there and catch his breath. Only 6 steps!
I took him to the ER. They kept us a while locally and gave him oxygen, and pulmicort, prednisone and ventolin. By 7 at night, he was a bit better, but still had low levels of oxygen, and everytime they took away the oxygen his levels dropped immediately too low.
They rustled up an ambulance and we were whisked off to another hospital that had a pediatrics unit.
More treatments, overnight observation etc...
Anyway, he was better until we went outside, and he started breathing in some freshly cut grass.
Laboured breathing again instantly. I will continue to monitor him, and hope he isn't that severe again. The specialist said it was likely a combination of his allergies and a virus attacking his system a the same time.
And now I'm the jerk with the A/C running though it is only 27 out-, trying to minimize the allergens in my home. So, next time you are mowing your lawn..again...please think about some of the people out there who could use a week off from your noxious fumes or freshly cut grass!
The dr said it likely combined with a virus at the same time. Yay, what luck for us! It was a horrible feeling seeing him getting into the ambulance. I hate sickess.
I'm crossing my fingers that he never have to go to back.

Rapture...or not.

Well, the rapture came and went, and I'm still here. Bugger. And I was so counting on not having to do the dishes or anything after dinner. What a shocking disappointment this must be to the crazies, I mean people, who left jobs and homes and families during this recession, to trek across country to meet up for their rapture event!
I'm sorry, but really, did you think it was going to be that easy? Voila, poof, you are saved from this existence, so enjoy?
Well, in any event, I am glad that I err'd on the side of caution, planting my garden, paying my bills,and returning my movies to the video store on time! Maybe they meant 6pm PST.
Wait, I hear some kind of explosions, and I see lights in the sky!
Oops sorry, it's actually just my neighbours letting off fireworks, because it's Victoria day weekend.

Mommy Look!

Mommy look!

Almost every minute or so , this is what my soon-to-be two year old says.
"Mommy look- i hop like a bunny!"
Mommy look-i crawl like a turtle!"
"mommy look- I play with puzzle." and on ..
A few hours into the day, I'm not always listening 100percent, like when I was making lunch Friday. A colossally bad day of bad days, involving no hot water, no hot water heater appointments available...and many more fun things.(but luckily for you, that rant isn't the subject of this post!)
Then in a vague way, I hear him say...
"Mommy look, abs' swim"
I'm in the kitchen cutting food up. I respond, "oh yeah? ok, good for the abc's, glad they like it".
Then my brain clicks into gear. Abs's (what he calls abc's for some reason) swimming? where? the only open water would be...the toilet. Of course. Where my 4 year old just was. Using the toilet. Awesome.
I ask, "are you in the toilet?"
He says
"Yes mommy, look abs's swim in toilet!
To which my dd pipes up from her bedroom, "well it's a good thing I remembered to flush this time isn't it mom?"
thank goodness for hand sanny. Because I had no boiled water ready, and cold water just didn't seem sanitary enough.
A lesson to be scrubbing that toilet on a daily basis i think. And a lesson to be listening a little more closely, no matter how many times a day I hear that phrase
"Mommy look..."

You'd never see Obama stealing a necklace....

So, every once in a while, a bit of celebrity gossip oozes it's way into my unfortunate ear canals, or dances at the corners of my vision when I'm trying to look up something serious on the 'net.
This morning Lindsay Lohan's name caught my eye.
She is apparently fighting a charge of theft, over a 2500 dollar necklace she stole.
I'm sorry, but isn't she stinking rich? Aren't the majority of these spoiled, self centered, boo hoo, I'm famous so I have to steal/lie/cheat/drink/do drugs/ etc, rich, and so similar you could exchange them, and their petulant behaviours, without noticing? And aren't they a waste of good space and resources here on the earth?
Maybe I'm just jaded, because I'm struggling to get by, and have no time to go steal a necklace worth as much as my car, nor the Chanel wardrobe to wear to court...
It seems to me,as though a large portion of the people drawn to the spotlight are so addicted to the attention, that they will do anything to stay there, self destructive behaviour included. And don't give me the sob story that they have such tough lives, their jobs are hard, they have no privacy, etc...THEY CHOSE IT
And yes, guess what? a lot of people are in the limelight for various reasons, but they don't need to dress like they're hooking on hollywood blvd, do drugs or drink until they can't say their lines, or be insured by anyone in the business.
I'm sorry, but you are acting. ACTING. Not curing cancer, or dealing with dying kids. It's not the end of the world if you flub a line! Get some perspective.
And then go get a real job, if you hate being an insanely rich celebrity and icon for the masses.
Then you can see what a real life, with real problems, is like.You don't see Oprah tooting a little coke in the backroom of the studio. She keeps herself together, and acts the good role model 24/7 I think. Of course, I don't know, because I don't really follow celebrities, so maybe Oprah goes on closet benders or something, but if she does, that closet door seems firmly shut.
If Lohan can't afford a 2500 dollar necklace after all her successes, then her money manager is an idiot. I'm sure she can afford it, so maybe she just has such poor impulse control, that she couldn't resist? It's disgusting either way, the way celebrities just do whatever they want, whenever they want. Diplomatic immunity for celebrities is an accepted way of life, and it's not reasonable. They don't belong in a cushy hotel type jail. Stick them in with the regular people who commit the same crimes. Do the crime, be treated like the criminal you are, not a celebrity, because that's a status that is undeserved when this immature behaviour occurs.
And L.L is by no means the first, or the worst celebrity to do stupid things.
I heard on the radio this morning that David Arquette has battled alcoholism since age 4 when he had his first beer. And by 12 he had a full on addiction. Seriously?! WTF was wrong with his parents?
You know, being a household name doesn't have to go hand in with poor judgment, bad behaviour and drugs. And I see you shaking your head,because most people just accept it as the norm, but it's not.
I bet you'd never see President Obama out there stealing a necklace. And he is under tremendous pressure and the constant scrutiny of the entire American population (and a lot of the rest of the world too), so if he can do it, without making the millions these spoiled stars and starlets are making, then really, they can do it too.

Weekend of bad luck at the NavCan

So they say bad things happen in threes. I'm not sure if that is true, or if I'm just so special, I get bad things occuring in higher numbers.
On our weekend trip to go to a birthday party for my MIL, I managed to...
knock over a stack of cups in Tim Horton's, then spilt my iced cap backwards over the counter, into their sink, and onto the floor-
Then I scraped my leg so badly on the edge of the hotel's crappy cot, before drifting off into a near doze, wherein two of my children cried, kicked and fussed all night.
It was crazy cold in the room, and turning the heat up, didn't seem to help, it seemed like it was a tiny bit warmer, that's it. (My oldest daughter ended up sleeping in her winter coat, it became so progressively cold during the night.).
The next morning I managed to drop and smash a glass in the cafeteria.
So, that was more me, 4 uncommonly clumsy things I did basically in a row.
I didn't continue on to become more injured, or ruin anything else,though some other annoying things happened. Had my son choke and throw up in the hotel restaurant eating the nasty crap that was supposed to be the breakfast (seriously wish i'd seen it before we'd had pay for it), and we had to book a second room the second night, because we really couldn't all sle5ep in the room my dh's sister booked for us. ..6 people, and a "suite" that was a sofa bed, a roll in cot, and a double bed. no door between the rooms, a bathroom that made me feel claustrophobic.
Night two involved both my little ones falling out of bed, and subsequently me getting no sleep. My husband and eldest son slept in the next room, which was also painfully small.
If I ever have to go to a family thing in that town again, I won't be wasting my money staying at the NAVCAN. I'd have better luck at the super 8 motel I bet, and that is saying something!

Sick is a 4 letter word!

I am so sick of people being sick! Sickness should be outlawed, and the word sick declared a dirty word.
Now my son has Scarlet fever. Seriously. I didn't even think that still existed, but it does. It comes with an awesome high fever, and a red bumpyish rash, that can be all over them, except it leaves a white ring around their mouth. Untreated, it leads to rhuematic fever, heart, kidney issues, etc. Treated quickly with antibiotics, the rash goes away pretty quickly, along with the child's non-stop screeching.
The ER dr asked me if I have other exposed children. I said yes ages 4-14. I asked "is it a risk?" She responds, "yes mostly just for ages 4-17".
Well, oh goody. Now we just wait and see if anyone else gets it. Hope not!

Time to wean!

The time has come to finally wean my little guy. I don't mind the extended breast feeding. I mainly object to the fact that I am exhausted all the time, and now so is he. He has developed a habit of waking up every 40 minutes or so, all night long, so he can nurse. Even if I get him down for an afternoon nap, he wakes after 30 minutes to nurse, and doesn't always go back down.
I'm so tired I can't even go running anymore. Heck, I can't even get motivated to go to the store for toilet paper.
I'm in danger of falling asleep every second that I am seated. I regularly fall asleep during conversations with people at home. It's not great.

But, starting out this exhausted, makes me not that interested in trying other options to get him to sleep. My husband works seriously long hours, so he can't go to work at 5 am, for a 2 hour drive, with broken sleep. He doesn't get home until around 7:30 at night, so that's just not fair to really deprive him of sleep as well.
I'm at a loss. I had hoped the baby would wean himself by now, but he hasn't.
I wish someone could wave a magic wand over him and make him decide he is a big boy who only wants to eat big boy food, etc.
But then at the same time, he is the last baby I'm ever going to have, so is it really that bad, not getting any sleep?

Sylar the saviour?

So, I'm just catching up on Heroes now. All the seasons, over the last many weeks, and now I'm approaching the final two episodes. I feel like producers ought to have at least created a final wrap up episodes to take care of the loose ends that I can tell are going to be hanging!
Anyway, whatever, tv producers screw us watchers all the time. Sorry, not profitable, too bad, no closure for you! I'm at the part of season 4, where Sylar is trapped in his mind, and Peter petrelli has joined him to free him, so they can get to the carnival and help Emma. Is it just me, or is this turn around in Sylar's character a bit much? He's sliced and diced people up and down the continent for the last few years. A short stint as Nathan, and suddenly he can't stomach being awful anymore?
I'm not sure I'm buying it. Possibly this is why it got cancelled.
I don't care, I always knew that Sylar had it in him to be a hero, rather than just a killer. I secretly love Sylar and hoped he would turn to the good side one day.( i guess that isn't a secret now is it?!)

Who has time to blog?

I think of some of the insightful blogs I've read, or the politically charged ones, or the whistle-blower style blogs. I barely have time to read them, let alone write something equally worthwhile. I have no idea how anyone has the time! I would love to write the kind of blog that people turn to for the latest uproar in the world. But for now I'll have to be content with finding the time to even scratch out a handful of meager words here and there.

Only a few months till Spring!

Here I am, in the midwinter humdrums. It rains, and snows, and freezes, and freezes rain. And then my wipers freeze to the windshield and I don't notice until I turn them on! Then my blood freezes when i hear that screeee screeeee as my wiper arm goes up and comes back down, sans le blade.
It's going to be -18 tonight, a high of -10 tomorrow. blech.Thank goodness spring is only a few months away!

Were the Mayan's off by a year?

So, it's 2011. The year started off with a bang, or more exactly, with the deaths of many birds, fish, and other creatures around the world. I have seen this being referred to, as "the Aflockalype". Seriously?
The stalled weather system that brought snow to parts of the lower United states, for the first time since..well, ages, couldn't that be to blame? Freezing cold temps, where the animals aren't used to it?
I'm not sure about the dolphins, or the fish, but it does seem more than just a bit weird, all these animals dying with a week of one another. I'm certain it's not related to pollution, or anything we've done to wreck their habitats or anything along those lines...naturally not our fault!
Scientists can claim all they want, about how it always has happened and we didn't know, and how the internet has made news from around the world available simultaneously, so we are simply noticing it more.
Really? I'm not buying that, because the internet has been around now for about 17 years, in usage wide spread enough, that I have had it.So, this happens all the time, just not in the last 17 years?
And what about the increase in devastating weather, earthquakes, etc?
Ok, now that I am willing to believe is more noticeable due to the fact that we are more numerous ourselves, and taking up so much more physical space. I mean, if there was a hurricane wiping out parts of Lousiana, say...600 years ago, would anyone have noticed? Not likely, because no one was there.I mean there was a big hurricane that wiped out an island of Texas 100 years ago or so (and who even knew there was an Island there?!)
So, ok, maybe I'll give the scientists that one. But the Mayan's predictions for 2012 are looming nearer, which certainly lends credence to these doomsday scenarios that people are so fond of, doesn't it? Even google has gotten in on it,http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&oe=UTF8&msa=0&msid=201817256339889828327.0004991bca25af104a22b
What about the predictions that stated it is 2011 that is the end of the world?
Could that be correct? I don't know. I do know that according to my daughter, if i don't open the baby gate for her to get up to the bathroom RIGHT NOW it will be the end of her world, so I guess i'll muse more about this later!

Jan 6 2011

It's New Year's Resolution time!

I resolve to...uh... do....umm...
ok, I resolve to try to come up with something and make it stick! Nah, not really. Resolutions are just so darn hard to keep up with. Life seems to get in the way.
I do resolve to write a new post later on today or tomorrow, likely about the weather doom and gloom, and all the disasters that seem to be making headlines.
Is it the end of the world?! I'm going to guess no.
Is there some nefarious evil villain at work destroying our planet's eco systems, or causing the planet to spin off it's axis or something, making things go awry? Stay tuned to find out!