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Yesterday I raked seven more bags of fallen leaves.
What, did you think I mis-dated this blog...something from last October that somehow just got posted in April? Nope. I procrastinated fall clean-up long enough that it's become spring clean-up. Gotta love that the kids can jump in leaf piles all year round!
So, while we were out there, the boys kept asking to plant something. Anyone have any suggestions of something that would be easy? And likely to grow and not be eaten by bugs or wild animals? I've got the complete opposite of a green thumb (what's that? An orange thumb?)
Random unrelated thought: The boys are telling the most hilarious jokes. For example: I ask, how old are you, and they answer "Twenty. And a half". Or, they say apropos of nothing, "Mommy's a ....BOY!" and dissolve into gales of laughter. Or they start to sing the alphabet: "A B C D E F....L!" That one can get them both laughing for twenty minutes at least, as can their newest similar joke: "1 2 3 4...8!"
I'd ask where they get this sense of humor, but it's totally from me. They didn't get me hair color or eye color or any of my physical traits, but they've been blessed with my ridiculous sense of humor. I just can't wait until they're old enough to understand my favorite joke:
Ask me if I'm a truck.
Are you a truck?
No.
It's so funny to look through and see what google hits are bringing people to my blog.
For me, it's often the carrot oatmeal chocolate chip cookie recipe. I can't believe how many people google that recipe. Oh drat, now I've mentioned it again. Sorry, all you random googlers who are now ending up here. And hi! Welcome! Follow this link to the recipe, with my apologies for the extra step.
The other google search I used to get all the time was for "what a card". I'm not sure who's stalking me around the internet (I do use "what a card" as my handle on other sites as well), but they must have either given up or finally bookmarked my site (if so, hi former stalker!)
I also get a lot of poopy diaper kid related hits. I guess potty-training failure drives people to the internet. Hi all you failed potty-trainers! Welcome, I'm happy to commiserate with you and glad to have the company.
I think the random google hits are one of my favorite parts of having a blog. That no matter how odd or insane I think something I've said is, someone is bound to end up here having done an even more odd or insane google search. So this one is for you, random google searcher! I love you a little bit!
I've just started reading The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon, and thought I'd share a fun quote with you:
He had devoted an embarrassing number of hours to mute concentration--brow furrowed, breath held--to the development of his brain's latent powers of telepathy and mind control.
Hee! Remember doing that? I'm a Star Wars girl, so for me, it was the hours wasted trying to "Use the Force". Unfortunately, I've been forced (hee, hee, get it? Forced??) to face the fact that my midichlorian count must be exceedingly low as nothing ever moved for me. Not even a wiggle. I'd be lying in bed reading and would have to get up out of bed, walk all the way across the room, and turn out the light (don't even ask why my parents didn't get me a small nightstand light, but all I had was the overhead). Every night from about age eight to age twelve, I'd try and try to use the force to turn out that light. Nothing. Ah well. It's funny, because I am a SLIder and have been plagued with Street Lamp Interference as an adult. (Look it up! I'm only half kidding about this. I really do have this problem, although my theory is that my mind is just somehow more tuned into lights turning off than the normal person. I.e., I think lights go off often for everyone but normal people don't even notice.)
In college, TK lived with a guy who would spend hours trying to use his mind to do things like even out the spinning of a fan. You'd think he was a stoner...nope. Or stupid...nope (in fact, he graduated as valedictorian of the engineering program of the very large school we attended). He was just a really odd guy. Fun, nice, and kind of one of those people who was so smart he looped back around to dumb. I wish we'd kept in touch with him. I'd love to hear an update of how his mind control powers are going.
So what are your stories of your efforts to develop your latent telekinesis?
Random unrelated thought: B-man is cracking us up because he's becoming just as bossy as his mommy. He's started giving us advice. I say, "I'm tired" and he says, "Maybe you should take a nap". TK turns a corner a little too fast in the van, and B-man's little voice pipes up from the backseat, "Maybe you should slow down". It's pretty hilarious!
I worked this weekend at the Mother of Twins sale. No, we weren't selling Mothers of Twins. Don't get smart with me!
Anyway, I came home and told TK that I spent about an hour on Saturday morning rearranging a whole crapload of books. He said, and I quote, "That must have been your best day ever." He wasn't being sarcastic. I gave him a look and he said, "What, you love books and you like rearranging books."
That's true. I don't know if I'd classify it as my best day ever, but I do have a weird fascination with organizing books.
So how are your books organized? Do you alphabetize by last name of the author? Do you break up your books by genre? Size? What's your system?
When TK and I met, granted I lived in a dorm room and had a small collection of books with me, but I used to organize my books by size and color. Big books on the left, and colors ranging from darkest to lightest from left to right. I'm a very visual person, and I remember my books by what the covers look like, so this system makes tons of sense to me. It drove TK insane, though. So, now our book shelves are separated by genre and alphabetized by author within each shelf. Although my one concession is that I still separate hardcovers from softcovers and move all the oversize books to the left side of the shelf. I just can't have them jutting out willy-nilly in the middle of the shelf, even if that's where it technically should be.
Of course, our bookshelves go in cycles. Currently we're in an "overloaded" time, with books stacked where ever we've been able to fit them. Soon, we'll have to cull through to donate some and then I'll re-alphabetize. And perhaps that will be my best day ever. Wedding day, the day my kids were born: sure, those we good days. But can they really compare to reorganizing books?*
Random unrelated thought: I just read The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon. I really loved it, probably because the style of the book is so familiar and comfortable to me. It presents a very believable picture of what I've imagined life is like for a person with autism, although the main character was far more able to function normally than many of the children with autism I used to work with. I loved all the lists and the logical layout and how every thing the main character does is does for a distinct reason. Really wonderful. I know it gets mixed reviews, and I was afraid it wouldn't be well-done...that it would be too reliant on autism stereotypes, but I found the characters to be reasonably well-developed. I especially like how it obliquely touched on how difficult it is for the parents of a child with autism (or any severe special need). It was really interesting to see that through the lens of the child.
*Disclaimer: I'm totally kidding. Just thought I'd clarify for people who don't get me.
I just finished Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America by Barbara Ehrenreich. It was an interesting book. The author took a variety of low-wage jobs in different areas of the country and tried to live on that wage. I didn't love it, and some of it was a little dated (it was published in 2001, researched in 1998-2000), but overall, it was a very thought-provoking read.
I came across this quote at the end that got me thinking:
When someone works for less pay than she can live on--when, for example, she goes hungry so that you can eat more cheaply and conveniently--then she has made a great sacrifice for you, she has made you a gift of some part of her abilities, her health, and her life.
I'm mostly quiet about politics, but I may as well come out of the political closet just a little and admit my leanings are definitely in the socialist direction. I find inequities like this disturbing, and I don't have a solution besides giving to charities. But that seems so distant and inadequate. I don't know. It just seems like there's something wrong in America where the people who we rely on in so many ways are paid so little while others are raking in millions of dollars as a result of their work.
Shortly before the time when Barbara Ehrenreich was researching this book, I was right out of college and working my first job. TK was in grad school, and we were living together in Atlanta. The job I took paid $20,000 a year, which comes out to about $10/hour*, far more than the approximately $6 - $7 the author made at any of the jobs she worked while researching this book. I'll be honest: we couldn't make ends meet at $10/hour and had to rely on credit card debt to get us through that first year. We lived in a sketchy area. Nothing like the places the author described, but we did have to call the police a few times, and shortly before we'd had enough and moved out, a delivery truck driver had his truck stolen at gunpoint out of our parking lot. We had almost no furniture, just a bed, a cheap table, a futon, and the tiny TV I had used in my dorm room. We didn't buy much of anything, or do much for entertainment besides hiking in local parks. But we were never really in trouble. First of all, we were able to qualify for credit cards, which let us float for a year under the assumption that better times were ahead (thankfully, they were). We both had health insurance through my job. TK always could have dropped out of school and gotten a job had he needed to. And I could have gotten a better paying job quite easily. So we were never really living anything like the lives described in this book.
But still, I think back on that time, seeing how difficult it was for us making nearly double what the people working jobs like waitressing, housecleaning, or retail were making. How can anyone be expected to live on that, let alone support a family? And most of those jobs were hard on a person's body...the biggest risk in accounting (besides all those paper cuts**) is carpal tunnel syndrome.
As I said, I don't have a solution. I just think that the first step is to even recognize there's a problem.
So, book review time: would I recommend this book? Surely, although I didn't love it in many ways, I think it was a very worthwhile book to have read. It's one of those books where the idea of the book is far better than the execution, but the execution is good enough (and the book is short enough), that it is still a wonderful read. Anyone know of any similar books I may enjoy?
________________
*That assumes a 40 hour work week, which anyone who has ever worked accounting knows does not exist during month-end close, when I'd work somewhere between 60-80 hours a week. I remember during one particularly hellishly long week calculating out my actual salary and realizing it was below minimum wage.
**I'm not kidding about the paper cuts. Filing was especially rough on the cuticles. I'd always keep bandaids in my desk as I'd end up bleeding from a paper cut usually at least once a day. I don't know how normal this is, though. I'm admittedly klutzy.
Or perhaps that should say Math, 972, Me, 0.
Help, I've been undone by the difficulties of halving a recipe. What the heck? I used to be an accountant, and I'm completely able to divide, say 1/2 cup into a 1/4 cup if I only want to make half a recipe.
But I've got an excuse because today I'm making bread. And bread is the bane of my existence. Everyone has one type of food they can't seem to master preparing (right?? It's not just me, right?? Why do I hear so much deafening silence?) For me, it's bread. I can never make bread right. It's too dry, or too moist, or it falls, or it never rises at all. Or I screw it up entirely all on my own, by, say, adding double the amount of flour.
Yes, this goes down as one of the better self-inflicted screwups in the annals of What A Card bread making. I was halving a recipe so as not to have far more bread than we could possibly eat. I put in half the yeast, half the water, half the milk (both heated to the appropriate 110 degrees I may add), half the sugar, half the salt, half the egg, half the shortening. Yes, somehow I managed to get through all that, appropriately halving every recipe quantity. Then I get to the flour and for some unknown reason add the entire amount. I'm stirring and stirring and stirring and it's not coming together. It's just flour with some kind of wet parts. It's not bread dough.
Then I realize what I have done. Now I have a choice: do I try to salvage this mess by doubling all the other recipe amounts? Screw that. I tossed it all. I'm going to buy my stupid bread. Mumble mumble mumble annoying mumble mumble homemade mumble mumble idiot.
Random unrelated thought: I've been tagging clothes to sell at a Mother of Twins club sale, and have been driving myself crazy. I keep forgetting what prices I'm using for things. Am I selling Carter's sleepers for $2.00 or $2.25? Gap t-shirts for $2.50 or $2.00? Children's Place shorts for $1.75 or $2.75? I'll come across a piece of clothing, know that I've already priced a similar piece of clothing, and be completely unable to price the current item without digging through all my piles to find out how much I tagged the last one for.
Like there's going to be someone checking to make sure I've priced things consistently. Like someone is going to come up to me and complain, "Why do I have to pay $1.75 for this when she found the same thing for only $1.50?" Like anyone is even going to notice amidst the gigantic piles of zillions of other people's clothing.
But I just can't do it. I keep digging through the pile, even though I realize that a 25 or 50 cent price difference between two similar items doesn't matter...
Never before have I been so glad to have hands made out of asbestos as yesterday. See, I was in a hurry to get out of the house on time to get to a Mother of Twins meeting. And I was busy trying out a new recipe.
It's all Barbara Kingsolver's fault. And my friend Sheri's. The two of them, working together in an evil unknowing collusion, made it necessary for me reveal my asbestos-hands superpower. They made me cook a frittata last night. This is going to be news to both of them. I mean, Barbara Kingsolver doesn't even know me, and Sheri has never, in my memory, mentioned a frittata in my presence. But together, they set in motion a chain of event that led to this fateful day.
Sheri, in a really sweet gesture since she knows I like to cook, sent me the gift subscription to Taste of Home she got when she renewed her subscription. And I do really enjoy it, cutting out tons of recipes, some of which I even end up making. One in the most recent issue was for an asparagus-feta frittata.
How does Barbara Kingsolver factor into this? Well, as I've mentioned a zillion times previously, I'm reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, and in it, she waxes poetic about one of my most favorite vegetables on earth, the wonderful asparagus. I know, those of you who know me well probably are not overly surprised to discover I'm in love with what is arguably the most phallic-looking of all vegetables. But anyway, in the book, she talks about asparagus to the point where I'm practically drooling, and even mentions an asparagus frittata.
This was too much of a coincidence for me to ignore. I had to immediately make an asparagus frittata. So that's what I did last night. Now we're coming around full-circle, back to the point of this post. See, you just have to wait for it!
It took longer to set in the oven than the recipe called for, and I was impatiently waiting, getting closer and closer to the time when I needed to leave to get to my meeting on time. For those of you unfamiliar with the intricacies of frittata-making, it's a recipe you start in a skillet on the stove, then you transfer the entire skillet to the oven to let it bake.
When it was finally set in the middle, I took the skillet out of the oven and set it up to take a photo. Because doesn't everyone have to take a picture of their food before they eat?
The picture didn't even turn out any good! I was in too much of a rush. I got out a plate, grabbed the handle of the skillet, and CRAP! I forgot a pot holder! I told you, good thing I have asbestos hands, or that would have hurt.
Oh wait, April Fools! Someone had switched my asbestos hands for plain ol' regular hands, without any heat-repelling superpowers at all. So it did hurt. And my left hand is burned. Stupid frittata. It didn't even taste that good, maybe because I was sitting there with my hand in a bowl of ice water while eating.
But ha, at least I got back at Barbara Kingsolver in one small way for her complicity in my most recent kitchen accident. Shhh, don't tell anyone, but that asparagus came all the way from California to my kitchen in Boston. I'm sorry, but asparagus is one of those veggies that even when it's trucked (or flown) from halfway across the world, it's still awesome. Maybe not nearly as awesome as fresh, local asparagus, but in my mind, even bad asparagus is good asparagus. So I got a jump-start on the asparagus season, and still have half a bundle sitting in my fridge. I think I'll just roast it and sprinkle on a little parmesan cheese and eat it for lunch today. Hopefully I can just remember a pot holder when I take it out of the oven.
Random unrelated thought: What do you think the odds are that I can make it across town to get my car inspected without getting caught by a police officer with an expired inspection sticker? We'll soon see! For the first time in my entire life, I forgot to get my car inspected. It was due in March, and I didn't think of it until last night at 9 pm. Now it's April 1, and I'm breakin' the law. I swear, at one point in my life, I was a really organized person. Now I can't even seem to remember to get my car inspected in THIRTY-ONE days. It's not like I forgot something for a few minutes, or a day, but a whole freakin' month.
Between forgetting an all-important pot holder and forgetting to get my car inspected for an entire month, I'm beginning to wonder if my brain is on holiday...
