Blog Archives

Dad gone bad

1/31/2014

According to Facebook, 148 people saw my post yesterday about calling the cops on my daughter (if you don't know the story, I suggest you read yesterday's post).

148 people? Really? As opposed to the 8 who saw the post on Steam Powered Giraffe from the day before? How do people find these "scandalous" posts?

Apparently police activity is a hot item, even in the neighborhood. My doorbell rang yesterday evening and it was my neighbors from across the street. They were concerned because they hadn't seen my husband's truck for a few days after seeing it for a week prior to that.

Let's just correct the observations here: they hadn't seen my husband's truck in the evening because he got home after dark and he left for work the next day in the dark; meaning they couldn't see it because it was dark. He was either visiting his mother or working overtime, so he really hasn't been home during daylight hours this whole week.

When I told them he was working overtime, they went, "Oh, we were worried because we saw the police here yesterday and we hadn't seen his truck for a few days, and he had been home for several days before that and [we jumped to conclusions about the stability and quality of your husband]... "

I think they thought maybe "Dad went bad." I guess it's not surprising they would jump to that conclusion given the shady goings on in the house next to them over the years. But we have never been people to give the impression that there was something strange going on here.

The other funny thing is from what I've seen from inside their house, their living quarters are in the back of the house. So the only thing I can deduce from their questioning is that they are spending way too much time looking out their front window monitoring the neighborhood; they're retired, they can do what they want.

And I have to admit, it is nice to know someone is looking out for us and they would be there to help if necessary. At least they knocked on our door to find out the scoop rather than gossiping with the other neighbors; not that anyone else noticed the police in front of our house.

It just made me laugh to think that anyone would think my husband could go bad. Sure, he doesn't always take out the garbage before it gets too full and he really shouldn't be working so much overtime because of his back, but my man is one of the most gentle, tolerant [considering he lives with three women], patient men you'll ever find.

Tune in next week for the continuing story of "When Dad's Go Bad;" coming to a theater near you.....

Hit him harder

1/30/2014

I had to call the cops on my oldest daughter yesterday.... Okay, it wasn't directly because of her, but because of something she did.. or didn't do; well she didn't really do it, it wasn't her fault, she was involved, but still I had to call the cops...

I'll just tell you the story. I went to pick up my youngest daughter from the bus and when I got home and walked in the front door, my oldest daughter was sitting on the couch. She is learning to wash and brush dogs and although the training is free, she has to come up with dogs to practice on before our groomer feels comfortable letting her handle client dogs. She had taken the Chev HHR to pick up/drop off a friend's dog because her car doesn't have an open trunk space like the HHR.

I could tell by the back of her head something was wrong (cuz that's what mom's do). I thought, "Bad day dog grooming?" "Did she get bit?" "Lose a dog?" So I said, "Are you okay?"

She wailed, "No! I hit a jaywalker. He was running across the turn lane and I slowed down and thought he was going to stop, but he kept going and I hit him!"
"Is he okay?"
"He just got up and ran away!"
"That's weird, he must've been running from something."
"I need a hug!"

If there was ever a time to pull on my parenting panties, this was it. "Damn, I hate when that happens."

I gave her a hug, let her cry on my shoulder a bit, assured her it wasn't her fault and told her we needed to call the police and report it in case the person she hit reports it. So I called and explained it to the dispatcher, who said she should have stayed at the scene, but they could send an officer out to the house.

Why stay at the scene? The supposed victim got up and ran away; where is the scene exactly? He was jayrunning across a 6-lane city highway (including turn lanes), she was driving in a turn lane; she wasn't exactly responsible for the accident. She wasn't in trouble though, and didn't have to return to the scene, so I opted to have the cop come out to the house.

The officer shows up about 20-30 minutes later and says, "I already know what happened, but go ahead and explain it to me." Oh, my daughter and I had done our research; I had Google maps pulled up with the street view of the exact location to show him where she was and where the guy ran out from. It didn't get that far.

She explained what happened and the officer said, "He was a shoplifter running away from security guards and if your car isn't damaged, you don't need to contact your insurance company."

Then Lucy kitty decided the officer should love her and jumped up to the back of the couch where he was standing in the door way. He petted her until she bit him. She jumped down and ran around the corner down the hall.

We chatted with the officer a little more while Lucy commenced racing up and down the hall. The officer pulled out a laser pointer and began to beam the red light while Lucy chased it.

It all became rather humorous at that point; who gets into these predicaments anyway? I asked him about staying at the scene and he said she should have pulled into a parking lot and called 911. Did you know that? They don't exactly teach you in driver's ed what to do when you hit someone and they get up and run away.

Then the officer said, "You should have hit him harder." He was joking, but not really because they know this guy and haven't been able to catch him. Then he left and Lucy waited in the hallway for the red dot to reappear.

Later, my youngest and I took the HHR to practice driving and she noticed the mirror was folded in. My daughter didn't hit the guy, the guy must've hit the car seeing as how he popped the mirror in and the mirror is on the side of the car. His timing must've been off; as he was fleeing across a 6-lane highway, he was probably looking behind him. Then my daughter saw him, slowed down, which he didn't expect, and he ran into the side of the car. She was so shocked she just couldn't remember exactly what happened

I just have this image of him running into the car and sliding down the window, screeeeeeeeee. It wasn't funny when it happened, but again, who do these things ever happen to?

Not surprisingly he didn't report that he'd been hit by a car. But for that kind of trauma to my daughter, she should've hit him harder.

Steam Powered Giraffe

1/29/2014

After I blogged, I realized I had the house to myself again. I know this happens a couple times a week these days, but my focus has been so concentrated on my family, it just felt weird not to have anyone in the house. It put me in a melancholy, unproductive mood.

So I did what every normal American mom does when she finds herself at odds with her day... I wasted it.

My daughters don't think I wasted it because I spent the day looking at Steam Powered Giraffe videos and trolling their website. They are my oldest daughter's favorite band and we are all going to see them in concert this weekend.

I don't know if you remember, but this is the event I was shocked and appalled my oldest was grown up enough to get tickets on her own and plan to drive to on her own. I was coming to terms with it, but she was so excited about this band she wanted to share it with us.

Then my youngest daughter got excited about it, so my oldest bought my youngest a ticket for her birthday. Then my oldest put together some of their videos and bios and emailed them to us.

She showed me some of their videos while I was standing in her room one day and she constantly talks about what the band is doing. I started getting excited about it and so did dad, so we bought tickets.

Yesterday I figured I needed to catch up with the whole of the band before the concert by actually reading the email my daughter sent and watching all the videos. So I did.

Now I'm really excited about the concert because I know it will be a great show and although I'm not in groupie mode like my kids, we'll be taking them up there in the morning and dropping them off for fan events.

Here is their website and a couple of their videos for your viewing enjoyment; you'll know why it was worth wasting a day on:

http://steampoweredgiraffe.com/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojYK6CW8gdw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDRHx4cPgbE

Thing that makes me go Hmmm

1/28/2014

I'm still working my way through my list. Besides a few things I need to pick up at the store, I only have one more phone call to make.

I hate making phone calls, especially ones to sales-type places when I want to cancel a service. Has anyone else ever had dealings with Life lock?

It's rather expensive every year at about $250 for my husband and me. It comes right out of my credit card. The problem I have with this company is I'm not sure what they do. I have opened several credit card accounts and never been alerted by this company that credit has been opened.

I called them and asked them why they hadn't alerted me to the fact a credit card was opened and they told me it's because they don't have that particular store on their watch list, but they assured me if anything ever went wrong they would still guarantee my credit safety whether they caught it or not.

Over the past five years my credit card or debit cards have been compromised three times and either the credit card company or my bank have been the ones to catch the discrepancy.

I just bought a new car. Nothing. That means my credit scores have been tapped into and I've just signed a contract for several thousand dollars under my name and they haven't alerted me.

But here's the real sticker for me: I lost my credit card and called the credit card company and they had a new cards with a new number issued to both my husband and me. But Life Lock was able to put my yearly payment through anyway; without contacting me for a new number.

Hmmm?

There is nothing wrong with just sitting

1/27/2014

I'm writing this while I'm on hold with our medical center. The estimated wait time is 10 minutes because we all wait until Monday morning to call about our ailments.

My husband needs a follow up doctor appointment for his back because he took two days "leave of absence" and he needs a note from his mommy... uh doctor. There is a thick pile of paperwork he needs to fill out just to have an unexcused absence from work; or two days off without pay. Really?

I guess I understand this to an extent because there are some people who abuse the 120 days family/medical leave they are allowed, but the paperwork seems excessive considering these are days without pay. Oh well, gotta go with the system.

I have just written my first list of the New Year. I went from having nothing on my calendar when the year started to having all these little irritating strings to tie up. The problem with these particular strings is I'm holding on to the beginning of them.That means I have to follow them until I find their other ends.

It's really not a big deal because isn't that what life is; strings of problems? I posted some philosophy last month where someone said not to think of them as problems, but to think of them as challenges or something. For me they are unwelcome distractions, but none I can't handle. Come to think of it, I kinda live for successfully solving these unexpected issues. I'm pretty good at it.

I take a lot of pride in how I handled my day trip to Portland a couple weeks ago [see 1/20/14 if you don't know what I'm talking about]. Everything that could go wrong went wrong, but only for me. I rolled with the punches and the experience was as good as it could get for my daughters, who although concerned about me couldn't do anything about it. For once I felt like a good role model (which I was not thinking as I barfed in the Safeway toilet).

As parents we often don't feel like great role models because it seems our kids reflect the worst of us with glimmers of light sprinkled in between when they do something wonderful or thoughtful without being told.

[Speaking of distractions, I just took a short break to hang some laundry and yell at my kids to get out of bed.... it's grading day, so no high school and it's not a class day for my oldest. I'm pleased I didn't forget it was laundry day though.]

So I've written a list so I'm not procrastinating. I've written a list so I seem productive. I've written a list so I won't forget what I'm supposed to do. And although I've started the laundry already, I added it to the list.

But before I started anything this morning, I sat in my chair in the living room, drank a cup of coffee, watched the morning come up and organized my thoughts.

There is nothing wrong with just sitting.

Can hardly wait

1/24/2014

I had a low key day yesterday. I spent many a moment just sitting in a chair in the living room, watching the sun change the trees outside my window as it moved through the day. What a great day!

I went grocery shopping and nothing pre-made sounded particularly good for dinner, but I was inspired by a large bag of snow peas I found at Costco. Then at Fred Meyer, I went looking for some sort of stir-fry sauce to make my snow peas shine.

They had Thai yellow curry simmer sauce. I'm not usually a big fan of curry, but I had something with curry in it a couple months ago and was kind of awakened to the flavor. For some reason, our palates change as we age and curry was sounding really good to me.

Like always when I write something, I had to look up why our palates change. I won't go into it here, but here's a good article on it: http://www.womansday.com/health-fitness/7-things-you-didnt-know-about-your-taste-buds-119709

Okay, so the directions on the jar said to put the whole jar (it was about 12 oz.) into a pan, let it boil and add two cups of assorted chopped vegetables and some sort of meat. Two cups? What kind of a meal is two cups of vegetables when you're serving a family of four? I ignored it.

I chopped a crown of broccoli, opened a can of bamboo shoots and water chestnuts, a red pepper, and the snow peas. It was probably more like six or eight cups.The curry sauce was a lot of liquid in the pan and I figured if I stir-fried it and kept coating the veggies, the flavor would spread. I added smoked turkey kielbasa for the meat, mostly because it was easy.

I was right. I, personally, could have used a stronger curry flavor, but I think the pre-mixed sauce was milder than if I had made it myself. Maybe the red curry simmer sauce would be stronger.

For my family it was perfect; it was a first for them and they liked it. It was so colorful and beautiful when I brought it to the table, no one could resist.

We put it over Bistro Rice Blend I bought at Cash and Carry awhile back. It has a lot of color on its own. I had only used it once before because the directions had me stymied: 1 cup of rice to 4-4 1/2 water. I always use chicken broth to add flavor to rice and I didn't want to use four cans of chicken broth. The rice blend is not supposed to suck in all the water, but stay wet the whole time it cooks. Then you dump the extra liquid out.

It took me time to process these odd directions, but I was on a roll to try new things yesterday. I remembered my sister told me about a friend who, I think, was from India. She cooked her rice wet and drained the excess liquid. So I committed to the Bistro blend, put just two cans of broth in (about 4 cups) and add four more cups of water to get my x4.

I have to say, not having to wait until all the liquid was soaked up in the rice made it a lot easier in the end. It was really good too, along with the beautiful Thai curry stir-fry.

I bought sliced mushrooms for the stir-fry, but didn't put them in. Once everything was in the pan, I decided it would be a little too much for the whole concoction.

Can anyone say mushroom burgers? Yum. I can hardly wait for dinner.

I could just cry

1/23/2014

My husband went back to work today... thank God for small miracles.

I don't know if it will stick, but he is markedly better. He used the last of his vacation and sick leave for the year on Monday, so he was motivated to get back on the job to get paid. His vacation gets renewed tomorrow, so it was just a couple days without pay.

I wanted him to take as long as he needed to fully heal, but it made him crazy to take those couple days without pay and I am so happy to have him out of the house this morning.

My oldest just left for school, my youngest is in school and my husband is at work. I don't even know what to do with myself.

It is grocery shopping day, so I eventually need to do that; I have to if I want to run the full dishwasher, so I'll head out to Costco in a couple hours.

Right now I feel like stretching out on the couch and wiggling my toes and reading a book. I probably won't, but knowing I could without anyone asking me for something is an indulgent feeling.

For the past week I have been concentrating all my energy on my kids' needs and my husband's back issues. Last night I suffered from major burn out. I'm afraid my patience ran thin when my husband kept going over the details of his mother's illness.

It's not that I don't care, I do, but we discussed it, talked to his sister, and then he wanted to discuss it all over again and again and again. I had nothing left to give and told him if he didn't have anything new to tell me, the conversation needed to end for the evening.

I made a great dinner; what more do you want from me?

My kids are better at perceiving my burn out and I didn't hear a peep out of them last night.

I will rejuvenate by spending the day alone and find something at Costco for dinner when I go shopping.

For now I am alone in the house... I could just cry.

Only 336 days...

1/22/2014

Can you believe we are half way through the school year? My youngest is taking 1st semester finals this week, there are only 336 days, 15 hours, and 52 minutes left until Christmas as of this writing (http://www.xmasclock.com/).

I did get a lot done yesterday after I blogged. I did laundry, my husband is still home laid up with his back (but getting better), and set up a new router and router extender for our WiFi. It was much easier to set up than the Apple Airports that may or may not have bit the dust (I can't tell because I can't get snobby Apple people to talk to me about it because, horrors, I was using a PC to run it; but I am not bitter; okay I am, but I'm past it now).

After I got the base router hooked up with the same user name and password as we were using with the airports, it automatically connected all our laptops. When my youngest opened her laptop, the new router reconnected her with printer capabilities and started printing all the documents the Apple router was apparently holding back from the last two months.

I recognized an old assignment and wondered if they had to revisit the whole project again. Nope, it was literally just stuff that was stuck in cyber space for the past month.

However, I couldn't get the extender to work properly, but help was only a phone call away because I jumped off the Apple wagon. My computer guy made a house call at 7:45pm to finish the hook up. And although it cost me, the total of the router, extender and house call was less than the cost of one of the Apple airports. Now that I have everything configured, my computer guys can remote-in if I have problems.

After I got the base router set up and the phone call for the on site visit scheduled, my husband and I went to Home Depot to get a latch to fix the sliding glass door and buy more wood pellets. We were down to two bags and although it would have been easier for me if we would have just purchased a few more to last until my husband's back was better, I think it will be awhile before he should be hauling 40 lb bags of pellets.

So we bought a ton. That's 50 bags, you save a little when you buy a ton at a time ($20), but it's nice to know there is a paid-for heat source and this will last the rest of this winter and probably next too. Also when you buy a ton, they just load a pallet onto the truck.

When my oldest came home between classes, I warned her she'd be helping unload the pellets. I picked my youngest up from the bus and went to get her passport picture taken for her upcoming trip to London and I warned her about the unload too.

After dinner, I whipped the kids into action, backed the truck up to the fence and had one kid hand the bags from the truck over the fence and the other kid and I hauled the bags in and stacked them.

My kids hate to break a sweat. I told them they could be chopping the wood and hauling it into the house like I did when I was a kid. They whined, "Yeah, yeah, five miles to school in the snow, up hill both ways, bleh, bleh, bleh."

Then my oldest exclaimed, "Now I don't want to go back to school! I'm so tired." Wow! It only took about 20 minutes. So I told her to consider it her walk for the day and the exercise adrenaline would probably kick in before she went to school.

My youngest didn't really complain, but I could tell she was irritated because she gets quiet when she is. Big whiny whiners; dad usually hauls it in my himself, but he never will again now that I know things.

Only 336 days, 15 hours, 12 minutes and 10 seconds until Christmas.

When the conductor goes AWOL

1/21/2014

As usual, like all holidays do, yesterday threw off my whole schedule. My sister called me to check in last night from her home in Oregon because of yesterday's blog. She wanted to see how I was doing and since she lives so close to Portland, she felt bad that she couldn't have helped me in my distress while touring the college.

There was nothing she could have done, but I kept thinking through the whole conversation, "Doesn't she usually call mom during this time on Sunday night?" Then I realized it was Monday.

No kids in school, no laundry done. Have you ever realized how dependent we are on the orchestra our lives play out every day?

My alarm goes off at 6:15am, I hit snooze twice. My feet hit the floor at 6:25, I grab my water cup off my nightstand, close and lock the window, go to the bathroom, brush my teeth, put my night guard (mouth piece to ease teeth grinding) in to soak and take my meds.

I get fresh underwear, dress in yesterday's clothes, put my slippers on, go to the kitchen, fill my daughter's water bottle and grab her lunch out of the fridge. I take it to her room where she is putting on her makeup with her hair pinned out of her way.

In the living room, I grab my cell phone, let the cat out, open the curtains and check for frost. If it's frosty, I go out and start the car to defrost. At 6:39 I tell my daughter it's time to go, head out to the car, scrape any remnants of ice and get in and wait for my daughter.

She comes out between 6:40 and 6:42 and we head off to the middle school a couple miles away. If it's the earlier time, we are in front of the bus, the latter, we are behind the bus. We pull into the parking lot, when the bus arrives we exchange farewells, "Bye," "Have a good day," "Love you," and any plans remembered at the last minute, "I have to stay after school today," "I'm picking you up from school today."

I wait and make sure she boards the bus (my oldest daughter once walked up to the bus door and a sub driver didn't even see her, closed it and started taking off), then I head back towards home.

At the light back to the main road there is always a car at the opposite light leaving for work and a bus on the side of the road killing time until their pick-ups begin. I get to the road our house is on and I pass the Kentlake bus and think, "See? The kids would still have to get up as early if they went to their assigned school."

I listen to 100.7 the Wolf on the radio, then when I get home I turn on the kitchen radio, make my toast and coffee while listening to their schtick that starts at 6:55: "Fitz files" and "Why today doesn't suck."

When my breakfast is ready, I sit and listen to "What are you kidding me stories of the day." Then I just listen to music and random banter until I see my neighbor leave to take her son to school. I know it's 7:25 by then, so I get up, turn off the radio and head into the computer room to blog.

After this my day can continue to orchestrate in a productive manner, like on a normal Monday when I remember the laundry or go completely awry, like today while my husband is sitting here talking to me while I'm trying to blog because he's still laid up with his back.

Sigh. It's Tuesday, I need to do laundry, the the sliding glass door handle needs to be fixed and we need wood pellets before Home Depot quits selling them. Not what I would have chosen to do today if my husband weren't home.

I think the conductor went AWOL.

Who needs reality TV when my life is a sitcom?

1/20/2014

Now I fully understand why society is abandoning soap operas and moving toward reality shows. Life is far more interesting than fiction can ever be. We just can't make those things up.

I'm not much of a reality show watcher, especially the shows that follow certain families around exploiting their idiocy. Really though, life happens when we least expect it, but I think watching people at their most raw is painful.

You know I'm going to write about my weekend, right? This story might be painful to read or maybe it will just gross you out, but step back and you'll see how funny it is. Just remember, I write so you won't feel alone.

Friday my oldest daughter and I had an appointment to tour Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland. My youngest daughter decided she'd like to go along and see what an art college was like, thinking toward her future (she really didn't want to go to school, but it was still a good idea, so I agreed; plus she's the more talkative of the two and stays awake on road trips).

I felt great Thursday morning; the APAP machine for my sleep apnea was finally showing results. I was excited about making the day trip down to Portland the next day; I was going to feel great for all the driving I'd be doing.

Friday morning, I woke up at 6:20am in a clammy sweat. I was starving and just thought it was because I didn't have my normal peanut butter toast before bed and my body didn't have the protein in it before I fell asleep.

So I got coffee, ate something and tried to recover. About a half hour later I rushed to sit on the toilet, if you know what I mean? Oh, oh. Now what? The kids would be up in an hour. We're supposed to drive to Portland.

As I sat and brooded about the situation I thought, "Okay, this has happened before and it passed within an hour. I'm not cancelling. My daughter needs this trip."

I visited the bathroom a few more times, got my daughters up, showered and was cautiously optimistic. It seemed to have passed, although I began to feel nauseous. Just to be safe I covered my brand new car seats with a plastic bag and a towel, threw an extra pair of pants and underwear in the back and we were on our way.

The nausea kept getting worse and all I could think about was that I needed a 7-up. So when the kids were ready to stop in Chehalis for coffee I decided I'd get a 7-up after they got their coffee. I parked at Starbuck's, reached for my purse and no purse.

Are you kidding me? I called my husband and asked him if I had left my purse. Yes. There it was, hanging on the coat rack. We talked about my oldest daughter driving the rest of the way, but this was my new car, we didn't know where we were going, she didn't feel comfortable driving a car she wasn't familiar with in a place she wasn't familiar with.

Worst case scenario: I really do own a driver's license and if I was stopped, I'd get fined for not having it, but it wouldn't be a disaster. My oldest daughter had her debit card with her for money. Just don't get stopped.

So we got Starbuck's, I got my 7-up at McDonald's, used the bathroom for assurance and went on our way. We got lost of course; shot through the city and ended up heading towards Beaverton, turned around at the zoo, waded through the heavy traffic back to PNCA and made it by 1:00pm. Our appointment was at 2:00pm.

I was feeling sicker and sicker with my belly full of 7-up, wondering how I was going to make it through a tour.

We checked in and the administration guy who was going to tour us had a meeting and suggested we try one of the local cafes for lunch and return at 2:00. We walked into the first cafe we found and the smell was so pungent, I thought I was going to lose it right then.

I said to my daughters, loud enough that they could hear over the noise, "I can't stay here, it smells," as I turned around and walked into another customer who heard it too.

We got out onto the sidewalk and spotted a Safeway. I told the kids they probably had a deli and then I could find something I could eat and it wouldn't be as crowded. So we headed down there, I decided I could eat a Greek yogurt, the girls stood in line to get a sandwich and I headed for a bathroom.

"It's right next to the flower stand, but stop by the service department and get the code for the door." OMG! I wasn't sure I was going to be able to navigate all that.....

Thank God no one was in the bathroom, it was clean and it was a single bathroom so no one was there to hear my distress. I walked in, locked the door and answered the call of the porcelain god. I felt much better, but had to deal with another problem.

You moms and older women will understand this bladder issue: for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. The force of liquid expelling from one end forces liquid from the other end. So as I pulled myself off the floor I turned around and sat down.

Happily my jeans were safe, but my underwear were in an unacceptable state. I had more in the car, but couldn't wear them to the car and expect my jeans to remain unscathed. I removed my shoes, pulled off my jeans and my underwear, put my pants and shoes back on.

I was going to wrap my underwear in a paper towel and stuff it in my pocket until I got to the car. I looked at them. They weren't a new pair. I have a lot of underwear. So I tossed them in the large garbage can in the bathroom.

After I ate the yogurt I felt a bit better, but still pretty bad. We got back to PNCA and I proceeded with trepidation. Everything ached, I bumbled my way through the tour, every stairway seemed like a mountain, but I did it.

I was grateful for the heavy traffic leaving Portland so I didn't have to make directional decisions quickly. We got back into Washington, stopped at the first rest stop to rearrange: I got the talkative child in the front, the one who needed a nap in the back, pulled the unneeded plastic bag and towel out from under my butt, used the restroom one last time and headed home.

Normally, it's hard for me to drive that long without a power nap, but my lower back was so tight from the strain of the day that I had my pain to keep me awake.

I drove in the dark without a panic attack, drove through an Auburn Dairy Queen for food for my kids, got a little lost picking my way through Auburn to highway 18, stopped at Safeway for a turkey sandwich that looked exactly like the one my youngest daughter had eaten at the Safeway in Portland because I became fixated on having one as my stomach recovered and became plain hungry.

We got home a little after 7:00pm, I ate my sandwich and was in bed by 8:00. I expected to be down for the count the rest of the weekend. But I slept until 8:30 Saturday morning, got up and felt like nothing had happened. In fact, my youngest daughter and I spent the next two days helping friends clean out their spare bedroom and organize for their Japanese exchange student coming in a couple months.

Who needs reality TV when my life is a sitcom?

<<Previous