100th post

We would like to submit to the Committee for a More Phonetic Universe (or CMPU ) the following list of number spellings compiled by Owen as we were in the kitchen making a Peanut Butter sandwich.

1 - wun
2 - toow
3 - free
4 - for
5 - fif
6 - sisx
7 - sevin
8 - at
9 - nin
10- ten

100 - wun hugred

photo update

I just downloaded pics from three pretty major events.

1) Doug's b-day. Happy 34, Doug.
2) Field trip with Sophie's class to MOCA (museum of contemporary art)
3) Emily's unprecedented bout of domesticity.


Early Saturday morning (the 13th of January) Sophie got up and began decorating for a surprise party (even I didn't know about it.) She set the table with fancy glasses, with confetti inside to enhance the party atmosphere, place mats, a birthday cake made out of construction paper and superhero guests seated about the table. She also had a drawings of Doug and notes to him taped to the wall. When she couldn't find streamers she lined the room with caution tape. It all looked great! We busted out a little "you say it's your birthday" and served pancakes as the ceremonial birthday breakfast fare. These pics are from the rocking out portion of the festivities.




Alright, on to the museum. It was an exceptionally beautiful day so we hopped the bus and went down town to tour several outdoor sculptures and the Skin and Bones aka Fashion and Arcitecture exhibit at the Museum of Contemporary Art. There were over 50 kids, 10 parent volunteers and 2 teachers on 1 school bus. It was crazy. Although, i didn't know really what crazy meant until we met the bus driver. Ms. Sullivan was cranky and loud and used the meanest tone with the kids AND the teachers. She said things like, "Oh, no. you ain't getting up. SIT DOWN!! I'm not gonna axe you twice. I'm just gonna turn this bus right around and take you back to school if you don't all QUIET DOWN! blah, blah, blah. Everyone was totally scared of her by the time we got downtown. wow. But everything else was great.









And, of course, the rolls. Anyone that knows me very well can tell you I'm a little uncomfortable with most things domestic. I've never been great at laundry or cooking or keeping that immaculate house everyone loves to come home to. However, after nearly 12 years of avoiding, I think I'm finally embracing. I must be. There is no other explanation for the following photo.



Or the fact that I own a Kitchen Aid. I'm scared to admit this, but i went to walmart a few weeks ago and bought a sewing machine. I know. In fact, the day of the rolls, i found myself baking the rolls for dinner, doing laundry in all 4 washing machines downstairs AND sewing chair backs for the primary room all at the same time. I think I was even wearing an apron. I nearly exploded.

I'm sure my family prays this alien woman hangs around. I guess we'll have to wait and see.

I just killed a squirrel

A big, fat one right in front of preschool. I was just driving down the street and he came from the right side. I barely saw him out of the corner of my eye. Crazy animals run out all the time but they rarely match up with the tires so i thought it was nothing. But then after a little bump under my left tires, i checked the rear view mirror. There he lay, this huge (squirrels are massive in our area because they eat so much crap from humans) flat smoosh of fur. His tail twitched several times and i nearly vomited in the car as i was driving. Ew. I killed a cat once in high school. I was driving down Bell Road in the Sprint and i plowed a gray cat as it darted into the road. I felt like I'd killed a little kid or something. I don't even like cats but the feeling was so yucky, i just burst into tears.

Ah well, poor fat squirrel. Hopefully your rodent kinsfolk will be wiser, or faster, than you.

did you ever see...

that reality TV series where there were 2 people competing to see who could get fired first? I was thinking about how funny it was when one of the contestants, a 20-something brunette, was doing everything she could to get fired from Kinko's by the end of the day. Around 3pm she just laid down in the middle of the floor and yelled, "boring, boring, everything is boring." I think that did it. She won the thousand dollars or whatever. I've been sittting here trying to get movtivated to blog about Doug's Lasik Surgery today and could only think of that dumb show. ha ha. the surgery was anything but boring, I assure you. I know because they let me go into the surgery room with doug and hold his hand while they suctioned, sliced, lasered, re-flapped the surface of his eye then smoothed it out with this mini sponges. so interesting.

The worst part was smelling the "cool" burning tissues as they lasered. ew. Doug has been laying down with his eyes closed for almost 6 hrs now. He peaked a little as he sat up to drink something and got so excited when he could make out things across the room. It's only going to get better from here.

Oh, did I mention I have 20/20 vision? The assistant pulled out this sweet eye chart for me while we were waiting and i could read 3 lines above the very bottom. The way i see it I just saved our family a couple thousand dollars. hmmmm. what can i go buy?

I turned on a Star Wars documentary for Owen to watch so I could help Sophie finish her project. After a few minutes he starts yelling, "Hey, i saw dad on TV. Mom, I just saw dad."

So he ran in and got doug and made him sit there until he could show him what he saw.

"Look, there you are talking to Han Solo, and to Chewy, too. Dad, why are you holding Yoda?"

You can't handle the truth!

That was pretty much me at the deposition yesterday. oh, The dreaded deposition. alright, maybe not quite like jack nicholson. In fact i'd love to say it was just blah, blah, blah, and i got all worked up for nothing. but i didn't. it was exactly like the attorney said it would be. I thought our guy was being a bit dramatic when he said the other guy would be sneaky and tricky and that he might come off angry. He said that he'd get into this question and answer rhythm so don't follow it because you can end up falling into his little trap. Doesn't that sound dramatic? But it wasn't. it was exactly like that. And there were six people sitting around the table staring at me while the court reporter clicked away every single 'um' and 'but' I uttered. hmmm...click, click, not that i recall....click click click, so....click. The other guy, forgive me jomama but i can't remember his name, had the skin of a haggared aging rockstar and voice that admitted to smoking 2 packs a day for the last 30 years. His office was laughable, but of couse, i wasn't laughing because i wanted to run away and cry. All in all I did fine. I didn't fall into too many of his snares, fumbled a few unexpected questions but really didn't give him anything meaty to use against us. I know that because he said, "that wasn't so bad was it. I couldn't have been, you didn't know anything." sweet. I will say that attorneys morph into actor mode for this kind of thing. He was pretty jovial when we got there and then became very cynical and sarcastic when he was asking me the questions. which, by the way, he had on paper stacked probably 10 high. each time he'd turn a page there'd be another huge page of questions waiting underneath. i couldn't wait to ge to the bottom of the stack. I guess we get to read a transcript of it in about 2 weeks, so that'll be funny. It's over. I couldn't be happier. Our attorney said i was one of the better witnesses he'd worked with and that I'd be fine if we have to go to court. probably more of a blowin' sunshine thing but whatever. i pray that doesn't happen.