Friday, February 22nd, 2008
I glanced up the stairs as I flipped pancakes this morning, and saw Kong, who’ll be three in a couple weeks but hasn’t outgrown the nickname he earned two years ago, standing at the top, blood running down his cheeks.
“Oh my goodness!” I exclaimed, running toward him to inspect the damage as chocolate chips smoked to the griddle. “You have blood all over your face!”
I quickly paged through possible causes in my head, casting blame on his siblings, checking out his fingernails, as I wiped superficial streaks of blood away with my papertowel to reveal long pink scratches down both cheeks. “What happened?”
” ’snot blood, mom. It’s my whiskers,” he insisted defiantly, apparently unaware of the bloody streaks.
It took me a minute to interpret the response, but recognition slowly settled in.
“Can you show me what you used to shave your whiskers?”
“Sure,” he shrugged, taking me by the hand. He led me into my bathroom, opened the drawer and pointed to an old razor. “I just use daddy’s shaver.”
Perhaps I could just cage him until he’s 30?
Posted in Kid Speak |
Wednesday, February 13th, 2008
Every year, starting in mid-January, Hubs and I have a conversation about how we really don’t believe in celebrating Valentine’s Day. Because we’re cynics, see. Virgos. And Valentine’s Day is one of those holidays we practical types poo-poo. You’ve heard all the arguments. … Created by Hallmark. Just another consumer oriented holiday that couples have to stress out about. We should show we love each other all year not just on February 14.
But this year when we had the conversation, Hubs boldly asserted that I protest the holiday outwardly, but that inwardly I really love it. I am, he insisted, a closeted fan of Valentine’s Day. For evidence, he noted that I always give him a gift (usually handmade -like a CD of all ten years worth of “our songs” or a photo collage of pictures of us). Plus, he observed that I have a disproportionate and unexpected amount of regard for Outkast’s ”Happy Valentine’s Day.”
After taking this all under advisement, I decided he may be right. So let me proclaim it.
I ACTUALLY THINK VALENTINE’S DAY IS KIND OF SWEET.
Now that we have that out of the way — Some celebratory Valentine’s Day Randomness.
You can send an e-card to your sweetheart that plays Outkast’s Happy Valentine’s Day. All the lyrics of the song make me smile, but my favorite part:
Ya won’t believe in me, but you would fancy leprechauns or groundhogs. No thank you, Easter Bunny. (There’s all this talk about Santa Claus, but see love will rule supreme.)
If you want to make a CD for your sweetie of appropriate songs of the month and the holiday the ThingThrowers started a list last week that might assist.
Or, you and your kids could write your own Valentine’s Day rap using these … really crazy mad-lib lyrics from the songwriters at FamilyFun.com.
Last year, I linked to my then-favorite and topical episode of The Office where Kelly and Ryan hook-up, but unfortunately it’s been removed for copyright reasons.
Feel free to join me in my love of the holiday of love in the comments. Maybe we can start a movement. How are you celebrating?
Posted in Everything Else |
Wednesday, February 6th, 2008
I gave up a lot of things during the holidays and the doldrums of January. I didn’t just quit blogging, I took an much less intended breather from exercise. But, finally, last Saturday on my favorite holiday, Groundhog Day, when the temperature briefly jumped enough to take it outside, I met up with Running again.
Last year at this time I wasn’t a runner. In fact, well into the spring of last year, I hated Running. During the early parts of my training for last fall’s Twin Cities Ten Mile, I had to give myself strange assignments (like silently, and geekily, reciting the Periodic Table of Elements) to help pass the time when I was running, to keep me moving, to avoid thinking about how much I hated it.
Throughout my training, I kept waiting to feel that “high” that runners always talk about. I kept waiting to experience that “lost time” where I just wandered into my thoughts oblivious to my aching legs and burning lungs and forgot I was running. Unfortunately, it never really happened.
To be honest, even when I ran the Ten Miler, the first half went okay, but I spent miles 6-9 arguing with running. The mantra Boy, running sure sucks would start to creep into my head, and I would push it away. At about mile 7, when I couldn’t keep pace with my friend D. any more, Running and I got into an argument.
“You’re right,” Running said, “this does suck, why don’t you just walk.” And I said, “*&&^ you, Running. I gave birth to nine pound babies. I can do anything for twenty more minutes.”
Despite the argument, I was elated to finish, and looking forward to keeping up my training. But I sort of fell off the wagon, and I really hadn’t run, at least not for any length or with much consistency, since the race - until last Saturday, when I crawled back on.
As it happens, by the time I got out running on Saturday, I really had myself all worked up about a number of personal issues, including, of course my purported crisis de blog about which I’ve been whining endlessly. Somewhere around mile 2 it occurred to me that I have a nasty need for purpose and structure that sometimes holds me back. It occurred to me that I don’t really need to have A Great Bloggy Plan. I don’t really need to know why I’m writing or for whom. The thing about the format of the weblog is that I can just blog when I can about what I can … just because I like it, and that’s reason enough.
The fact that this came as a complete shock to me should give you some insight into one of my faults (one those who know me observe frequently) - I can spend a whole lot of time analyzing, worrying and stressing my way to conclusions that seem quite obvious.
I was still mulling all that over Saturday during my run when I suddenly realized that I’d run more than a mile without paying any attention at all to Running. I had made it to the end of my goal without thinking about Running once. Not only was I lost in my brain, oblivious to the physical strain, but I also had such endorphin-induced clarity of vision.
As I walked to the car, smiling and contemplating all this, Running piped up enthusiastically, “So, Leo, does this mean we’re finally friends now?”
“Nope,” I replied, “We’re still not friends. Now, Running, you’re totally my bitch.”
Posted in Biography of a Blog, Ten Mile Madness |
