It's still about Hope.

Much like the short-timers who have been clogging MY treadmill at the gym for the last two weeks, I started off '09 on such a roll! Five posts in the first seven days or some nuttiness? Then nothing. Zip. A desolate blogging void. Is it possible I'm becoming a Bi-polar Blogger? There's certainly some evidence to indicate so. Even the resolution-crazed treadmill hogs at the gym have lasted longer than I did. I give 'em another six days until I get my trustworthy treadmill back all to myself. Mine!

Of course, this day couldn't pass without a brief comment on the big events of this day so I am being yanked out of the Blogging Abyss. So, let's see...what happened today?...I got all the laundry done (an undisputably magnificent feat that happens with the frequency of an eclipse), I got a ticket (darn out-of-date inspection sticker and suck-the-fun-out-of-my-day, John McCain-loving policeman!), and Little A got a pencil from the substitute teacher for being such a good boy today. Speaking of which....he had a substitute teacher because his teacher was in Washington. Seriously! AND Big E's teacher was in Washington! Super Seriously! I have been eaten alive with piercing jealousy because they got to go to.....

.....this little gathering of politicos in Washington. That's right. TODAY was the inauguration.

Somehow the PTA watch party ended up at our house (one of only seven houses in all of Austin without cable. Sorry, no CNN or MSNBC...and you wouldn't get FOX even if we DID have cable because it just would not be allowed. If you want to see what "the other side" is saying, you'll have to watch elsewhere). So we flipped between the networks and were careful not to stand in the way of the rabbit ears as we watched, commented, laughed, cried, exclaimed, and admired. And THAT was all over Michelle's dress. Badum bum! But seriously folks....

As the Obamas escorted the Bush's to the helicopter I began to feel a slight trace of pity and sorrow for GW, who (I feel) was never really up for the enormous job that was thrust into his lap.

But I digress... It was a sensational day. The sun shined. The Obamas shined. The American people shined. Tomorrow, back to the real world and the real problems. But today - was a good one. Now we hope.

Bring on the cold

I will never fear camping in November again!

Unless it's really, REALLY cold. Because I'd have to get out of THIS sooner or later and THAT would not be good.

I couldn't wait to try out my new sleeping bag today and sure enough, it was toasty warm. The whole time I was in it I couldn't escape the vision of this As Seen On TV apparel / blanket contraption that assaulted my eyeballs at the gym this morning:My tolerance for temperature variance in the winter is below low. Our thermostat stays at 68 degrees during the day and I bundle up like I'm preparing for an dogsled race. If I'm sitting, I'm under a blanket. And yet. I don't think I could put myself in one of these. All I can think is Sith Lord or Helen Roper (remember Three's Company?) and her famous caftans, which pretty much defined mature ladies of the 70s, in my mind.

I definitely prefer the Sith Lord.

My Sally Field moment

Facebook: The best thing to happen for birthdays since the cake.

I've been fairly effective at spreading the word about my birthday over the years, incrementally adding the amount of "airtime" I give to that particular topic each year so as to not overwhelm everyone years ago when I first moved to Austin. It's all about baby steps! It seemed I needed to ease into my birthday being front and center in January rather than hitting everyone hard.

This tactic has been a smashing success and now, with Facebook, the word is definitely out. The full breadth and scale of my birthday was felt yesterday when every time I checked my email the Inbox was overflowing with birthday wishes from friends from coast-to-coast, and even a few from across one or two oceans. Or the phone was ringing. Or my phone was buzzing with texts. I feel so loved.



You like me. You REALLY like me!

Oklahoma!

The Christmas pilgrimage to Oklahoma took place before the holiday this year, completely throwing off my MoJo. Although it was a great trip with Much Fun and Family Togetherness, I was unable to get my Christmas cards out. I had decided to switch to a postcard format to Save the Earth but then days slipped through my fingers and it just didn't happen. My disgraceful procrastination resulted in an email greeting, which, on a good note, has literally added years to the Earth's life expectancy. Or so Bubble Boy has reassured me.


The Togetherness Activities in OKC always include a trip to the Science Museum of Oklahoma, aka The Omniplex. After about 20 years of not changing anything, they've finally made some great updates and there was fun for all. Explosion shows, rides on a Segway, pirates, legos, marble runs, and multiple studies on motion, electricity, and all that other science-y stuff.

We couldn't get The Boy away from the marble run.

Somehow we managed to get eleven people to The Nutcracker on time. My crowd-a-phobia was threatening to rear its ugly head but I stamped it down and think I was successful in not seeming too bitchy and short-tempered. If you didn't see it that way, please hush up and let me enjoy my fantasy. Little A watched with rapt attention as the music played and the dancers danced. He was equally mesmerized by the orchestra as the dancers. We had the opportunity to meet some of the dancers after the performance. Little A was so excited to have his photo taken with the Prince / Nutcracker. His comment afterwards (with a VERY concerned look and in hushed tones), "he looks REALLY different up close". Um. Yeah.

Clara did not look so different and was very sweet.

This is what I was off doing when I should have been addressing and stamping Christmas cards. I hope that my public confession here will beg a smidge of forgiveness. Think of the earth.

First time ever

It's January 3rd and all remnants of Christmas are packed up and stowed away, waiting patiently to be pulled out again and hastily put up next November. Bubble Boy just about blew an artery when he came in and saw what I was doing.

See, upon moving in together in mid-April many years ago, we had to take my Christmas tree down to make the move. Mid-April. That's like, a whole season-and-a-half away! We were very close to having a very Merry Valentine's Day a few years ago before Bubble Boy took some initiative and packed everything up himself. It used to be that I really liked looking at it, and there still is a little bit of that, but mostly it was because I HATE the tedium of wrapping everything up, packing it safely away, hauling it up to the attic. It's just so much more fun to UNpack it and make the house festive.

So, I'm hoping this is a sign for the year to come. Maybe I won't procrastinate as much. Maybe I'll stay on top of all that requires being stayed up on top of. Maybe. There's always a First Time!

A look ahead...way ahead.

The new year is upon me and in a lot of ways, it doesn't feel any different. Big E confirmed this fact when we got up this morning and the wave of that mysterious something that a ten year old expects is going to roll in and change their view of the world with birthdays and new years wasn't there. The day seemed much like every other day except we all slept until after 8:30, which would usually indicate something dreadful had happened. But after some contemplation on how science fiction-y 2009 seemed to me when I was a wee tot of ten years old we began to look at the day a little differently.

Many things have changed since 1982. Hair, for example. We confirmed this with a brief viewing of my senior prom video. Oy vey. Wow. I can't say that the hair was particularly beautiful, but no one can say there wasn't a lot of it. Big E wondered more than once how we got our bangs THAT puffy.

Then we contemplated how different the world would be in 2035. What would we say about hairstyles now? What would we say about our clothes, computers, cell phones, appliances, Barack Obama? Would we have reached Mars? Will space travel be open for tourists? What would cars look like? Would they fly like I assumed they would by now way back then? What would music sound like? Would Hannah Montana make explicit albums, a few bad movies, take up yoga and the Kabbalah, move to London and adopt a British lilt?


Or maybe the world will get simpler, more local. Devolve a little. You never know. It sounds nice, actually.

For now, the Christmas decorations are almost down, the kids' rooms have been purged and the beer that exploded in my freezer last night has been cleaned up. The house smells like a brewery, but that's OK. The inauguration is less than three weeks away. Things are looking up.

All for show

Certain things have had to be set aside these last few frantic weeks leading up to the Memory that was Christmas. It's a lot of work to make memories that (hopefully) will not be recounted years from now to my children's therapist as they try to move past their childhood scars. Now it's over, the kids seem happy and the floor is cleaner than it has been in a long time.

I'm starting to sense a theme to my Christmas gifts. Last year, I welcomed the Roomba into our home for a brief stint as entertainer, pet and sometimes floor cleaner, when she wasn't wandering drunk and disoriented, under the dining room table or running alongside one particular wall in the dining room that she held an unnatural (and perhaps unhealthy?) attraction to.

This year we say hello to the Steam Mop by Bissell.

Surely Bubble Boy isn't consciously issuing a commentary on my lack of floor care by inundating me with floor cleaning gifts, do you think? Surely not. Luckily, I believe we will have better luck with Steam Mop than we did with Roomba, who eventually earned her pink slip and was sent back to whence she came. Although not nearly as entertaining, Steam Mop gets the job done, albeit without attracting a crowd of onlookers watching the hilarity of a Jetson's-like Rosie with a short-circuit stagger through the house.

All this to say I am feeling pressure to write a bunch of posts before the month is over if for no other reason than to have more than two posts in December. No matter that the posts may have nothing to say (although there is SO MUCH to say....O' Irony - how you smite me!) - dammit, I shall post! Something at least. Even if just for show.

The Last Day

Today the kids went off to their last day of school in 2008 wearing their PJs. It was strange getting Little A out of bed and cajoling him to "put on your jammies". We didn't have PJ day back in the days when I went to school (Remember? The Big Chief tablet days?) We also didn't have Read-In days or Game Days. Or Bring Your Stuffed Animal to School Day. It was just work, work, work and More Work. And we liked it!

I have been saddened to learn Big Chief Tablets were bought out and shut down on my birthday seven years ago. (See how I slipped in a shameless plug for my rapidly approaching birthday? Smooth.)

So while they're carousing around the school in PJs I have six hours to do everything that needs to be done for the rest of 2008. Wish me luck.

The Heat is On

My little girl has become a lady. It happened so fast. Seems like only months ago we were bringing her home, all warm and soft and sleepy.

Juno, that is. See, time flies fast people...especially in dog years. It appears that I have piddled around and missed my initial window of opportunity to be a responsible pet owner and have my pet spayed or neutered.

And here's where the Real Ignorance comes in. Having never had an indoor female dog that was not spayed I didn't realize what being "in heat" really meant. I knew this referred to a time when love-crazed, pheromone-drunk he-dogs flocked to the she-dogs with feral tenacity. I've seen the movies with a pack of dogs (clearly representing rough and tough bad boys) as they chase after the pretty poodle (i.e. the damsel).

That's not all there is to it.

My first clues were a few drops of blood on the kitchen floor. Initially believed to have come from Little A, who, with relative frequency, injures himself and fails to mention that he's BLEEDING. A close inspection revealed no damage to The Boy and I was left pondering. Surely couldn't be Big E. We hear about it for days when she ALMOST hurts herself. Bubbly Boy denied any trauma and so I went about my business.

Needless to say we finally figured it out and I consider myself schooled. And I'll be calling the vet. Very soon.

The posts that weren't.

Um.

Hello there.

It's me. Bubble Girl. Been a bit busy-ish. There have been oh so many blog posts these last two weeks. Too bad they were all in my head, and now, now that I have 15 free minutes when I have slightly more than faint brainwaves, I can't remember them. That's how I roll.

Oh, they were good ones too. Full of wit and ironic humor about the day-to-day life of a suburban mom and her quest to keep her nostrils just above the surface of the water lest she be sucked into the underworld beneath her laundry room. Imagine my shock and relief when I discovered there are actually books written about this underworld. I thought it was only MY house.

Since I can't remember the wit and irony that would have blessed this blog for the past nearly two weeks, I will just give the quick rundown so later on, when I'm basking in the sun on the beach enjoying the rum and a sea scrub mud body masque, I will recall these hectic weeks and maybe even miss them. Maybe.

There was Thanksgiving, of course. Which coincided with The Boy's 6th birthday. Six. It's hard to convince yourself that six is still kinda toddler-ish. Pretty solidly into big kid territory. Family. Food. Games 'til all hours. LOVED that part. EVEN when I lost (and lost BADLY). The birthday resulted in a lot of remote control helicopters flying around the house. Imagine giant wasps on acid buzzing around the house. And into my head. Good times.

A few movies have been watched. Only one worth reviewing which I will save for a separate post. Another viewing of Twilight with Big E. She liked it fine but didn't go nutso over it. I'm so proud of her. Dexter. How can I be so fond of a serial killer? It's worrisome.


Science fair. God. Shoot me before science fair next year. Not a kill shot...just a wound.

Book fair entertainment co-mistress of ceremony. ME. In front of people in a public place. I managed not to melt into the carpet and beamed while Big E and Little A read their winning poems in front of the audience without showing any of their mommy's public speaking fears.

That sums it up. You're all caught up now. We'll start fresh again.....sometime....soon. -ish.