Back to School (and Succinctly Yours!)

Well it's back to school for everybody around here, including me, and I have to readjust to both the early morning wake up routine and the early bedtime. I was so exhausted Thursday and Friday that I missed a Book Blurb Friday over at Lisa Ricard Claro's blog (this is the first one I missed since Lisa started it!), but I just couldn't bring myself to get on the computer any more. I am hoping to get back into my school rythym soon.

I tried to get some extra sleep this weekend, but was kept up by the terrible wind and rains that we got as a result of the hurricane. In fact, I know exactly when our electric went out because I picked up the clock to check how long I had been awake. So, at 2:05 this morning our electric went out, and at 12:00 pm it came back on. We are counting ourselves lucky because we have no real damage except some broken tree limbs, but my brother-in-law and his family still don't have power, and they are saying it could be a couple days until they finally get it back on. In the meantime they are living in their camper (it has a generator) for what may be an extreme camping trip... Were any of you affected by the storm? At one point I thought maybe our basement would have been safer!

Now it's time for Succinctly Yours, another writing meme that piggy backs on the idea of Susan of the Stony River Blog.

Grandma Goulash posts a picture and you are to write a 140 character or word story about it. You can also use the word of the day in your post if you wish. This week's word is sagacious. Here this week's picture and my take this week:

Nora wanted to live life to the fullest after a cancer scare, so despite seasickness worries and fears of the ocean, Mary packed her bags. (140 characters)

I hope to try to swing by your blogs soon!

A little rest (and Book Blurb Friday!)

Now this isn't quite me-I have been doing laundry and "hanging" around with the kids-also no TV, but plenty of computer and book time...

It seemed that time nearly stood still when the school year ended, and the kids and I (or maybe just me) have enjoyed a much needed moment of slothdom. For once I didn't have to get up early or race anywhere, and I must say it was nice. (I realize that if left to my own defenses, I would make a great hermit-LOL!) But the kids are now bored with my lack of activity, and truthfully so am I, so I'm off to join the world once more tomorrow. (I'm ferrying my daughter and a team member back and forth to practice at noon, and then there's that trip I've been putting of to Walmart, and the store...sigh!)

What are you all up to now that summer is upon us? We had record low temps the past couple days (so no pool) and then it rained all day today (still no pool), so I'm glad it's

 Book Blurb Friday! This is where Lisa Ricard Claro, from Writing in the Buff, posts a picture meant to serve as a fictional book cover.

It's your job to write a blurb about the book in 150 words or less to entice a prospective reader. Are you up to the challenge?
Here is this week's picture and my story:

Lights Out in Vegas
Robert and Kate, recent empty nesters, decided to head to sunny Nevada for a much needed winter break. They planned to visit Las Vegas first, staying at the elegant La Casino to do a little gambling, and then move on to Lake Tahoe to relax.

The couple found the glamour and excitement that is sin city hard to resist, and won nearly a million dollars-most of it from La Casino.  However, Robert and Kate grew uneasy on their last night. There were looks from managers who doled out their winnings, and as they headed back to their room, all eyes were on them, watching, waiting…

The couple thought they were imagining things, especially after reading a card with well wishes from the owners, and seeing the gift of La Casino’s mints. But when they each took a piece, everything became fuzzy, and soon they were not alone. (147 words)

Well, it's getting late, and I promised myself to go to bed at a decent hour, so I hope to make the rounds to your blogs tomorrow. Can't wait!

End of the school year madness, a party to plan, and Book Blurb Friday!

My last day of school was yesterday but instead of taking a much needed break, I have been running around all day picking things up for my son's end of the year party tomorrow, and cleaning my house. To say I'm sick of cleaning would be a definite understatement.

Yesterday I was scheduled to leave school at 11:30 (I was taking my half day compensatory time for four hours spent at back to school night in September) but I didn't leave until 1:30. I had my kids with me because I thought I could tear my room down and clean it for the summer in four hours, but there were trips to the bathroom, and then snacks from the snack machine, and then my daughter wanted to help me-I finally let her use my three hole puncher to update my class binders and things picked up from there.

After being together for 6 hours, my kids were bored and tired of each other, so naturally they began to argue-about where we were going to eat lunch, what we were going to do at the party, what we were going to have for dinner, etc. My son had a mini-meltdown because he wasn't happy about where we picked to eat at for lunch, and he sulked most of the time we were there, almost to the point of refusing to eat until ice cream was mentioned as an after meal treat.

Today I promised fast food after we ran around getting our party things, and my daughter nearly gave me heart failure-she discovered 15 minutes after we left that she forgot her purse, and inside that purse was her new cell phone, and $20 in her wallet... I turned the car around and called my husband to see if he could quickly look up the restaurant's phone number for me and then call me back with it while I raced to get back there. My saintly husband called the restaurant and found out the purse had been turned in with the cell phone and the $20, and I really can't believe it. There are still good people out there!

Now on to Book Blurb Friday. This is where Lisa Ricard Claro, from Writing in the Buff, posts a picture meant to serve as a fictional book cover.

It's your job to write a blurb about the book in 150 words or less to entice a prospective reader. Are you up to the challenge?
Here is this week's picture and my story:

A Race Back in Time
Jake’s capsule landed with a thud, and he was barley able to crawl out onto the rocky pavement. Where he was remained a mystery because the controls on his craft had been badly damaged by the landing, but one thing he did know- he had achieved his life’s goal and successfully traveled back in time. Now he could search for the prized compound his people needed to fight off fighters from Omega Centauri.

The time sweeper on his wrist read the year 2011, but there was something odd about this town. Jake kicked at a can lying on the ground and noticed metalloid pieces of what seemed to be some type of explosive device everywhere.

Jake picked up one of the shards and turning it over in his hand he saw a now familiar mark and his blood ran cold-could they have gotten here before he did? (147 words)

Once again I'm not too happy with the title, but it's growing on me... Sorry about posting so late-I can't wait to check out the other stories. (I am sure they lean more to the dark side-sorry, we've been watching the Star Wars movies, LOL!)

What a weekend...(and Succinctly Yours)

The weekend is gone and I sit here amazed. All week we were getting ready for my son's first communion, then Friday came and with it guests, then there were room arrangements, beds to be made, and meal planning… Then Saturday we all headed to church for the ceremony and then back home for a luncheon and dinner, and by Sunday morning everyone cleared out and we were all left exhausted.

My daughter bunked with me because I thought we had similar sleeping patterns-let's just say that there's usually not a lot of movement from either of us and we don’t snore (as far as I can tell.) Well, I don’t know what got into my daughter, but every time she turned my way her legs and arms were flailing about, and I got kicked and smacked in the head several times! I spent the whole night fighting her off but gave up around 3 am, and both Saturday and Sunday morning I woke up with a leg on my back, so I AM TIRED!

I can finally relax with the Sunday night meme Succinctly Yours, another writing meme that piggy backs on the idea of Susan of the Stony River Blog. Grandma Goulash posts a picture and you are to write a 140 character or word story about it. You can also use the word of the day in your post if you wish. This week's word is tempt. What a hard picture this week! Here it is and my story:

Jim could see the world through the lens of his camera but he was blind to the problems in his life with Mary-until it was too late. (And a meager 132 characters!)

I'm curious about how everyone else saw this photo because it took me a while to compose tonight's story. See you soon!

A little bit of this and a little bit of that

I haven’t been feeling well lately, and since I’ve been spending a lot of time at work and home on the computer (doing work related things), I haven’t felt like jumping on for fun. I also haven’t been sleeping very well (at least for the past two weeks), but I’m not entirely sure why. I always seem to rewind a lot, just like a tape recorder-thinking about something, then something else, then going back to the start of my thoughts again. I think this might be a woman thing, but I’m not sure-I do know that I've been trying to read the most tedious stuff right before I close my eyes so I can fool my mind into turning off.

This lack of sleep is affecting me during the day, although this week hasn’t been as bad as last week. For instance, I have always had a problem with keys, where I would put them down while in the middle of doing something, and then not know where they were. This literally would drive me crazy, until I found ways to minimize the problem-I have one key chain now with all car, house, and work keys, because the more key chains I had, the more I was prone to leave one somewhere. And I got into the habit of putting them back in my purse as soon as I got home from work and keeping them with me at all times when I was at work.

For the most part this key habit has worked fairly well, with the exception of this week. After my first period class I could not find my keys (no keys meant I couldn’t unlock my desk drawer), and I had spent the morning going back and forth between my studio and my classroom- the only thing I could think of was that I might have left them in the studio door. Did I mention that every key that I own is on one key chain? Three sets of eyes looked for my keys-the front desk secretary, one of my students, and me-and we all came up empty handed.

I was starting to panic and thought the worst, so I sent out an e-mail asking all my co-workers to be on the lookout. I then tried to retrace my steps once again during my free period, and not finding anything, considered myself lucky to at least be able to get into my large cabinet. I needed a cable from in there, so I opened a drawer in this cabinet, and there were my keys! I must have had this same thought about the cable earlier that day and got distracted!

Now this isn’t the only weird event attributed to my lack of sleep. I instinctively pick up my kids clothes that don’t make it down the laundry shoot in our bathroom (okay, some battles I just don’t feel like fighting at the end of the day), but for some reason, I walk over to the garbage can instead. I've tried to throw away just about every item of clothing that I get in my hands, and I don’t realize my mistake until at least something drops in!

I can’t drink coffee because of how it affects my stomach, and I swore off caffeine a year ago, so trying to pep up in the morning has been hard. I’ve been trying to chug down a cup of decaf tea with loads of sugar to try to get a jump-start, but I’m only fooling myself. My mouth was on some sort of autopilot today getting the same message from my head three times-I actually repeated an explanation three consecutive times, until the students started snickering and so did I-you have to laugh at stuff like this!

And apparently I have to be careful with nighttime routines. Last night I reached for my face cream when I should have been reaching for the toothpaste (I am so glad I didn’t get a mouthful!), and when I sat down to take off my socks, I noticed that one was blue and the other black. Now I could tell you that I mistakenly grabbed the socks early in the morning, but the fact is I lay out all my clothes the night before…

My conversations with my husband in the morning have been reduced to just grunts, (as well as my conversations with him right before bed), so he is now grunting back at me whenever I do actually try to talk to him, just to get a rise out of me-um, it hasn’t worked though because I’m just too tired. Goodnight every…ZZZZZZ………………

Ok, I couldn't help myself-I decided that I had to have a little pick me up, so here's a link to a little Santana and Michelle Branch with The Game of Love-just a little bit of this to help you out this evening.  Enjoy!

Ho Hum...

I have a very weary soul.I guess you could say I’ve been a bit stressed the past couple days (my stressors are both technical and human)-I should be exclaiming "So hum" (I am that) and enjoying time with my family, but I’m muttering "Ho hum" and secretly hoping for some peace. Writing is just one of the ways I use to deal with all of this, and the other is cheesecake, but since cheesecake keeps my tummy gummy, I’ll stick with the writing (at least for tonight.)Just be prepared for a pretty jumbled post…

I am slowly starting to comprehend why everyone says that little boys are harder than little girls because my son exhausts me in so many different ways. We have been living through the "week of the wart" as we try to home medicate a wart on my son’s heal. I am searching for just the right word to describe my experience with this malady but one just won’t do. Okay, I know I’m the mommy, and I should be taking care of these kinds of things without a second thought, but I’m dealing with a mixed bag of emotional stuff that includes revulsion, guilt at being revolted, annoyance for having to deal with something this "yucky," and finally concern and worry because I think my son may have to see a foot doctor (and I know that won’t be fun!) And of course, this is all happening just a short time before our beach vacation…

I am also realizing that my son’s little mind is a vast array of disjointed thoughts and unanswered questions, and the more time I spend with him, the more confused I get. I can’t quite figure out if he wants answers to his questions or not, even though he does ask me directly-it’s almost if he needs to ask the questions so that he can formulate his own answers, and our discussions have me going, "Huh?" Okay, here are some excerpts of a few of our conversations this past week:

I was getting ready to take the kids to the movies Friday afternoon when my son started asking or um, telling me about time.

"Mom, how long will the movie take?"

"The movie is an hour and a half, so if it starts at 1:55 it will be over around 3:30."

"Oh, so it will be half an hour."

"No, it’s an hour and a half."

"Okay." He sits and watches me get ready for a few minutes then says, "So if it’s a half hour it will be thirty minutes long since a half hour is thirty minutes."

I stared at him with my mouth hanging open and my brain went, "Huh?" Then my brain told me I wasn’t going to get anywhere with this one, so I numbly nodded my head in agreement. (Sometimes it’s best not to pursue that which cannot be pursued…)

Here’s another equally puzzling exchange that took place in the car. We were driving down the road in silence (a rarity I assure you) when my son asks me a question.

"Mom, who’s that lady who was born in the 1900s but died in 2000?"

"What lady?"

"You know, the one who lived in the 1900s." And then my brain went, "Huh?"

Now being quite schooled in history, my daughter pipes up, "Is it Betsy Ross?"

So someone needs a little refresher when it comes to American history, but she was trying to help, so I just said, "I’m pretty sure she died quite a long time ago since she lived during the American Revolution."

My daughter was relentless, "What about Susan B. Anthony?"

My son was elated, "Yes, that’s her. Didn’t she make the American flag or something?"

Okay, history isn’t a big thing with my son either.

"She was a suffragette."

My son wasn’t letting this one go. "She suffered from what?"

"She was one of the first women suffragettes," (I was sort of a proud that I knew the answer to this one) "and she fought for women’s rights."

"But how did she suffer?"

Well, how am I supposed to know that? So I gave a decidedly sophisticated answer, "I don’t know," and my brain once again told me to just let it go… (I'll Google it later.)

My son’s thinking is not the only thing that puzzles me-his behavior these days has been unique. He develops these little habits, and one he started doing this week is "pretend" crying, making these breathless, whimpering noises whenever I tell him to do something. And when I tell him to do anything, his immediate response is, "No," and it’s aggravating, as, well, you know... The consequence for the first sign of a whimper or a no answer is to lie down on his bed until I say he can get up-and for a guy who doesn’t take naps or likes to sleep in general, this is torture, so I’m hoping he stops this soon (at least before daddy has a coronary!)

Now I do have two children, and although my daughter doesn’t have the behavioral issues that her brother has, her tween brain is just as confusing and frustrating. She has become a walking, talking "get me" machine-every time we go anywhere she starts her requests, and it’s usually for junky, tidbit type stuff that would end up getting lost in the black hole in our house-formerly known as her room. Clothing and shoe purchases I’ll agree to because she is growing like a weed, but I stay tough when it comes to the junk (but daddy easily caves…)


And let’s get back to the black hole, otherwise known as her room. Do you know where she finds most of her lost items? In her bed! We're talking pencils, items of clothing, you name it and she sleeps alongside it every night, and my brain once again goes, "Huh?"

Last but not least are the technical troubles we’ve been having lately such as a leaking furnace, a faulty satellite dish, printer issues, and a fun time with Blogger. (You do know I’m throwing a mega dose of sarcasm your way, don’t you?) Well, the satellite dish issue has been fixed, we are working on the furnace issue, I gave up on the printer, and my Blog has me shaking my head. I wanted to just tweak my blog a bit just to make it more professional looking, but that one tweak took me nearly six hours to fix. I tried out one of the new designs Blogger has but mistakenly clicked on "Apply" because I thought I could just go back to my original format-silly me! I first thought the design was doable until I checked my website with MSN-none of my sidebar widgets worked and my buttons were piled all over each other. I still can’t figure out why because everything looked great with Firefox and on my smart phone. Can you say, "Huh?" Thank goodness I kept a copy of one of my reworked formats, although I still had to work with it for over an hour before everything looked decent enough. I think I’m going to make a dummy site to rework some designs before applying them to my site, but right now I will keep my tired look a tad longer.

I had wanted to add my husband in here as well, but he keeps looking over my shoulder, my neck is stiff, and it’s getting late so I will leave off issues with him for now. Sorry about the length of this post but I did warn you. Wish me luck as I add the stress of packing to my long list of stressors. Goodnight everybody!

Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde, meet my son...

I had a wonderful Mother's Day yesterday, but it's the night that was a real killer. Is there something about a seven-year-old boy that I don’t know about but that I should know about, at least for my sanity's sake? I think I read somewhere that little boys are harder to raise than little girls, and that mothers of sons age faster than mothers of daughters, but I didn't believe this-but after the week I’ve had, I’m a believer now!

First some background knowledge and the “good” about my son.

• He is certainly a unique soul, unlike no other little boy that I have ever known, and I’m not just saying that because I’m his mom. 
• He’s quick, taking in all the facts about every situation-it’s hard to pull a fast one on him.
• He is very ritualistic-he still tells me goodnight the same way he did when he was two, and gives me a hug when I leave for work in the morning.
• And he is creative-he can spend hours writing and illustrating stories that actually involve a plot, although his latest depicts me as the bad guy and this has got me thinking…

But like everything in this world, there is also another side of my son.

• If I want him to explode, all I have to do is tell him to stop what he is doing right away. I have tried to counteract this by setting the kitchen timer and saying that when it goes off he needs to stop, and this has helped a lot.
• Sometimes his conversations about various topics seem never ending, especially when he hits me with a barrage of questions concerning said topic, and then follows me around the house until I can answer him-sometimes I can’t!
• He doesn’t respect boundaries, especially when it comes to his sister’s chapter books. What’s hers is his and he barges in her room without asking so that he can rummage through her bookshelves, and he then leaves her books all over the house. And speaking of books, he is never reading just one book, but a minimum of three, and he reads each at different times during the day.
• His creative mind causes him to come up with all sorts of night (and day) terrors, so getting him to sleep and keeping him asleep is next to impossible.

His latest fear is of spiders, and we’re talking a full-blown screaming/crying sort of fear, and unfortunately his room has been the place for several spider sightings this week. Here's how the latest went down when I was cooking dinner the other night:

“M O M! There’s a spider on my ceiling! Come and get him because I can’t read when it’s here!”

“I can’t do anything about it right now, so just come into the kitchen.”

He rushes in to describe the intruder. “He’s this big,” he makes a circle about the size of a quarter with his thumb and pointer finger, “and I could see his fangs.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t this big,” and I made my fingers look as if they were holding a speck. Sure enough, my son’s sizing estimate may have been a bit off, and I tried to focus on how little the spider is and how big my son is-it didn’t work.

“Look, if it’s up on your ceiling it’s not going anywhere soon, so go back to your reading and I will get it when I can.” Famous last words...

He seemed satisfied for a time, maybe for five minutes or so, and then I heard another blood curdling scream.

“MOM! He’s coming down from the ceiling!”

Now why couldn’t this thing stay up there until my husband got home? I headed into my son’s bedroom and he was crying uncontrollably-it seems that that Mr. Spider could shimmy down his web pretty fast because he was nowhere to be found! I had to strip my son’s bed to make sure the spider wasn’t hiding in there, and I offered to move his bed to search even further, but my Mother’s Day present was underneath, so I said daddy would move it when he came home.

My poor husband wasn’t even in the door before he got hit with the spider story, and he promised to move the bed and deliver a final blow to the fanged little fellow before dinner, but the bed is heavy… At dinner, my son started the inquiry.

“Daddy, did you find the spider?”

“Yep, yep I did.”

My daughter and I looked at each other and then at my husband speculatively (I didn't hear him moving any furniture), but it was my daughter who yelled foul. “No you didn’t dad.”

“Yes, I did. Why doesn’t anyone believe me?”

My son, quiet for a few minutes, asked, “What color was the spider daddy?”

My husband didn’t lose a beat, “It was brown. Yep, I killed it with one of your old comics lying under there.”

Um, yea, they’re like almost always brown but that appeased my son, at least for the time being. He kept asking me all evening if I was sure daddy got the spider, and although I tried to reassure him, in the end he didn’t believe either of us and we were up with him a few times that night. Heck, I can’t believe I am still up now because my son was up at 11:40, 12:15, 12:30, 1:00, and 1:30 this morning.   First we consoled him, and then we got angry and  threatened him-he would lose all that was good, action figures included. In the end, you could still hear him, letting out a sob every five minutes or so until just a little after 2-my husband was snoring beside me, but I just lay there, waiting, hoping… And since my alarm goes off at 5:30 weekday mornings, I could barely function today, but my son? He actually seems chipper, while I on the other hand feel as if I have aged another two years in the past 24 hours.

Looking back to just relax (with a little Lionel Richie)...

Things are hectic in my world with many impending deadlines before the Easter holiday, soccer start up with my son, and my daughter's gymnastic season won't end for a couple more months, but I am doing my best to keep in touch with all of you. My post tonight is not what I had intended, but mental and physical fatigue always goes along with the pressures of not having enough time for what I have to do and want to do, and I decided once again to “look back” in order to relax.

I am a child of the 70s and 80s so I tend to look to music from those eras when I need a breather. Tonight is Tuesday so I am going to treat you to a favorite soothing tune of mine from the 80s-Lionel Richie, former lead singer of the Commodores, singing “Hello.” I will touch base with you later in the week with a longer post, I promise, but until then, sit back and enjoy!

Let's look back

I needed music today-I had a pretty stressful day at work because students are still trying to turn in projects for this marking period and grades are due tomorrow, I had to drag two kids through the grocery store and my daughter insisted on being the only person to put items in the cart, I had to rush home to get dinner together, and hubby wasn’t going to be home until after 8. I had a phone call in the midst of my kid time, and my little angels decided to run around like banshees while the dog barked. Let’s just say that when my husband called at 8:15 I was in no mood to chat-I needed some tunes, and not just any tunes. I needed something to remind me of my youth, so America was my band of choice. And, since I haven’t done Tuesday tunes for a while, I thought you might enjoy reminiscing too. I couldn’t stop at one so here’s America with “Ventura Highway,” “You can do Magic,” “Horse with No Name,” “I need you,” and "Sister Golden Hair." Hopefully I have something for everybody...

And, 30 years later they still sound good...

Danger: Foul mood ahead. Save Yourselves!

I'm in a foul mood this evening and I wasn’t going to post because of it, but I'm hoping that getting it out this way might make me feel better. First my computer is not being very nice to me. I spent much too long trying to type up an assignment that I need for Friday, and every time I tried to save a new portion-yes, I practice “safe saving”-Word came back with a !#@*# message box indicating that an error had occurred and the program would be shutting down. And you guessed it-the recovered document didn’t include the latest additions. GROWL!

The weather

I have about had it with this frigid, rainy weather we've been having-I can’t find an umbrella and we have half a dozen or so somewhere in this house, and I am cold to the core. Plus the rain will prevent my husband from bringing a donated couch and loveseat up to school tomorrow (it's for our broadcast studio and it's been taking up residence in my garage, instead of my car, for a month until the donation was approved), and I don’t like getting into a cold car...

My health

Wait a second, hack, gag, cough, gross…I can’t seem to shake this croupy cough that has controlled me for more than a week now, and it’s really zapping my energy level. In fact, it's wore me down so much that I haven’t worked out for a week because I’m afraid the exertion will make it worse, and since I haven’t worked out I feel awful-it’s an endless cycle.

 

SLEEP!

Then there is the one problem that I know that every mother can relate to, and that's the lack of eight hours of uninterrupted, REM staging, glorious sleep. Last week my son was the reason I wasn’t enjoying a peaceful slumber-he was waking up two times a night, usually around midnight, and then happily again between the hours of 2:30 and 3:30 am. The reason? Some of it was due to nightmares, but even he can’t explain the rest. This week he's sleeping fine but I am the one waking up around 3:30 am, and the thing is that I don’t feel tired when I first wake up, but I can barely pull myself out of bed at my regular 5:30 wake up time-why did I have to pick a profession that started so darn awful early? I would be so much happier if my day started at 10 am… And the really sad part about this early waking (this will make you weep, I promise) is that since I went on my “be a healthier me” kick, I cut out all caffeinated beverages, so that wonderful jolt that a good ole cup of Joe gives is not happening from sipping water all day! Sorry Areeba-I know I promised, but I have to say this: "Man am I tired!"

And here I sit without my lunch made, my clothes out, or my pajamas on-I vowed I would go to bed earlier, but… I congratulate all the brave souls who made it to the end of my cranky post, and I wish you all a good evening.