.. and I don’t know why.

#1 I’d like to blame the drugs I’ve been taking (muscle relaxer for a majorly knotted up back, stayed home tuesday because of the inability to move my head). However, the side effects listed include dizziness and nausea, but nothing about being bitchy and wanting to run away from home to a tropical island while crying “WOE IS ME!” The drugs, I think are not the problem, but the fucked up back probably is. Today it feels better.

#2 I’d like to blame the fact that I decided way too late to make some little things for my family members and need to ship them soon in order for them to get there and am too stressed out about it. This is probably it.

#3 But what I AM blaming is my husband, who is just pissing me off for no reason and I want to throw things at him. I keep thinking of all the reasons why this is ALL HIS FAULT and when the list starts with “needs to clip his fingernails more often” and ends with “should be able to read my mind” even I can tell, in my deranged state, that I am messed up. In the head. As in, KOO-KOO!

I know that the reasons are probably parts #1 and #2 and none of part #3 (maybe a smidge of part #3), but that doesn’t help me stop with the #3 and the need to throw things.

I feel like crying and throwing things. Big lumpy things. Cross your fingers for me, and give James your sympathies for having to live with a crazy woman.

… the prodigal wallet has (been) returned. All was intact, including $15 bucks in cash.

We killed the fatted calf and made merry. The wallet that never strayed sulked and wondered what outrageous thing he should do to get some attention around here. We ignored it and slathered more attention on the wayward-but-now-has-returned-to-the-path wallet.

OK, not really, but I did stop on my way home from picking it up for ice cream. Please, everyone, come attend my seminar on How-To-Save-Your-Marriage-With-Extra-Thick-Chocolate-Shakes. It’s a winner. The jist of it is, bring ice cream. DO NOT say ANYTHING along the lines of, “See, I told you it would turn up, all that screaming until you were hoarse was for NAUGHT,” if you really want the effects of the ice cream to take effect.

I need to get that keyringer thingee.

the summation:

• we left thursday for jellystone park, a campground (with cabins! that have AC! and showers! they also have tent campsites too. But guess which one we picked!) with all sorts of fun things to do like a humgous waterslide, 2 pools, mini golf, paddle boats (on a very small, and somewhat swampy pond) and a huge field and play ground. Oh, and it’s by Luray, with all that has to offer. We camped (cabin-style!) swam, golfed, swam, went underground to gaze at huge stalactites/malagnicryptonitites, mini golfed, wandered and got lost in hedge mazes*, saw animals, petted animals, swam, ate ice cream, mini golfed and swam. And went on a wagon ride with Boo Boo. We left for home on Sunday.

*ok there was just one, and i was the only one to get lost, but i got out eventually. see? here i am, writing this. proof.

• swam at our own pool
• lost my wallet. AGAIN. Those of you who have been following our heroine for some time will know that she is notorious for this activity. Usually, she confines it to wallets. But she has been known to lose her keys as well (if you’re going to just read one of those links, choose the keys one, because it’s funny. the wallet one is just depressing). She has been known to take Losing Things to epic proportions. She also seems to think that talking about herself in the third person will somehow take away the shame of the latest loss, which is STILL ONGOING. That’s right folks. It’s still lost. Constant monitoring of the bank activity is ongoing, but other than ordering a replacement driver’s license (which can be done online, thank GOD) and carrying her husband’s credit card around, the wait to see if it turns up continues. Please cross your fingers for her. And your toes. And by the way, go look around manassass for it would you please because our heroine is looking at imminent divorce for this “habit” of hers and despite her insistence that “it ALWAYS TURNS UP!” her husband is not buying it and is growing quite bored distraught shrill interested in divorce lawyers… let’s just say he’s not happy.
• took the kids to their first day of school. not too big a deal for jocelyn, as she moves across the hall from her old class, and her old teacher was in the classroom when we arrived. Much bigger deal to Ethan, who….

  STARTED KINDERGARTEN TODAY.

  I actually wondered if he realized if this was a big deal, as he is still at the same school he’s always been for the last 2 years, just in their private kindergarten now. I was a big dumb dumb, because he has pointed out the ways he knows this is a big difference in several ways this morning:

  “Daddy, I’m going to learn how to READ and WRITE AND SPELL!”
  “Mommy, Kindergarteners go on FIELD TRIPS! I’M GOING TO GO ON FIELD TRIPS!”
  “Mommy I’m five! I’M A KINDERGARTENER! I CAN’T WAIT! I’M FIVE!”

  A couple of kids were naturally squeamish on leaving their parents’ arms to venture into the classroom, but Ethan leaned way back, made a “pweeeeeooohhhhh!” sound, ran in place for a few steps and then took off into the room. That is my son. The epitome of my son. The kindergartener. HE’S FIVE.

• Just in case you missed it, my wallet is out there. Just longing to be returned to me. Do your duty and go find it, would you? I’ve already tried, TRUST ME. I am looking into this keyringer device that may perhaps save my marriage one day, as it is now hanging by a thread.

More pictures of cryptonitites, goats, mini golf, first day of school to come this week. No hedge mazes though. Or wallets.

… when I heard this story involving Jocelyn.

Go on over to James’ often neglected site to hear it for yourself.

I waited to relate this until I had the pictures taken and off the camera and uploaded. Yay!

We had a lovely father’s day. The kids got up and snuck downstairs while James and I slept in a bit. I must say, this is the nicest part about them getting a bit older. When they started making a bit of a racket, I got up and went downstairs with them so daddy could sleep in.

We got out the present we had gotten for James and got to work. I mixed up some concret, poured it in the mold, and then the kids got busy sticking glass bead-like things in it, making hand impressions, and trying very hard to distract me so that they could do letter stamps all over the place willy nilly. I, however, used my mom-powers to not get distracted and kept all the words as actual words.

The resulting garden stepping stone turned out quite nicely.

I am pretty unoriginal, as this is the same thing we did for Father’s Day 2 years ago. I’m glad I got a fancier kit this time, because in the other one, we had to just scratch the letters into the concret with a toothpick and it really didn’t look that great. We had to embellish everything with paint.

I don’t mind that it’s unoriginal and now we have 2 because look at those handprints! We’ll want those later! Too cute!

So we made the stepping stone and set it in a safe place to set for 2 days. After we let James sleep in, we brought him breakfast in bed (poptarts and coke) and all the homemade cards and pictures the kids had made in school.

The sweetest part of the day was after I shooed the kids from basically jumping on Daddy, he turned to me, his eyes moist and said, “I’m so happy we have them. I love being a daddy. They make me so happy.”

We spent the rest of the day poking around at the Potomac mall (legos for ethan, new shoes for jocelyn) and then came home to launch teeeny tiny rockets at a nearby soccer field.

Everyone had a great day.

Thanks for being such a great daddy, James. I love you.

-amy

me: *cough, hack, cough, cough* *clutch at glass of water, guzzle guzzle*

james: are you feeling all right?

me: *stare* No! I’m not all right! That’s why I’ve been saying, for the past 2 hours, every 10 minutes, “boy, i don’t feel good. damn, my head is going to explode. jeez, i feel like crap. argh, i feel downright shitty.”

james: *grins a little*

me: Hi! I’m your wife! Do you EVER listen to me?! Do you ever pay attention to anything I’m saying?! My name is Amy, by the way!

james: Are you annoyed about something?

I stare at him and then we both break up laughing.

My honey turned 34 on Saturday, and while we had a kick ass costco chocolate cake (not those birthday/party half sheet cakes, but the round, layer, ‘you’ll die from chocolate overdose’ cakes) it really wasn’t the greatest. Why? Well, because he got strep. Sucks, huh? He claimed to want a ‘do-over’ for his birthday, and I could relate, as my birthday was stuck in working overtime hell.

I hope the upcoming year is better than the actual day was, sweetheart. Happy birthday!

Jocelyn: I’m going to be a DOG!
me: really!
j: yes! a PINK dog!
me: will you have a doggie name?
j: yes! I will be Jocelyn the Pink Dog.
me: will you do doggie things?
j: yes! I will dig and dig and ruff and ruff!

this morning, her hair was looking pretty crazy, so I brushed it, giving commentary like, “Goodness, look at all this CRAZY hair!” When I was finished, I announced, “All done!” and Jocelyn replied, “Now my hair is BEAUTIFUL HAIR!”

I wish I could remember some of the cute funny things Ethan has said, but they have escaped me. They are this long involved stories of the trucks, and the cranes, and the excavators, and how he is a worker man.

one last story, with no children involved:

we’re both sitting on the couch, me with my laptop and james with nothing, all settled in after the kids are in bed.

me: crap.
james doesn’t take the hint and ask, “what?” he just sits there, watching tv.
me: oh shoot. james honey?
james: yes?
me: would you mind terribly getting me a pen or a pencil?
james frowns at me.
i try to give him my best puppy dog face
james: what will you give me?
i curse the weak-ass puppy dog face. must practice puppy dog face.
me: my eternal love?
james just looks at me.
me: my eternal devotion?
james: what else you got?
i just look at him. finally i drop all puppy dog faces and cut right to negotiation.
me: what do you want?
james: A backrub.
i frown.
me, starting to get up: Never mind. I’ll get my own pencil.*
THE END.

#epilogue: he laughed and got me a pencil. Two, in fact. but i thought the story ended better on that last line. Also, don’t you think this story would be better if something else were in place of “backrub?” I wanted to replace it, but I stuck to the facts. Because I’m a fact-sticker-to-er. I’m nothing if not truthful. Also, I am the best backrub giver in the world, so of course he wanted a backrub. Hey. Don’t read anything into that. BACKRUB giver, you sicko! I need to stop while I’m ahead. TOO LATE!

It’s been so long since I wrote regularly I’m trying to get back into the swing of it. It doesnt’ help that our internet at home is sporadic at best. The internet people are going to come to the house tomorrow to check our gateway to the series of tunnels and tubes (the gateway is called a “cable modem,” who would have figured!) and take some readings and hopefully we’ll be back to blazing lightning superfast internet soon!

-amy wishes for warmth and sun

or at least better.

My back is A-OK, I must say. It’s not back to totally normal, but day to day activities are now able to take place without feeling like there’s a knuckle driving into my spine. I can’t just sit on our couch in the evenings though. Most nights I spend sitting on a stool, and for some reason sitting in my car gives me that knuckle in the spine feeling as well. It is getting much better though, and I was even able to sit on the couch last night for a whole 20 minutes! The arm pain was not nearly as well as I would have liked on MOnday, and so I did take Tuesday and Wednesday off to make sure that situation was totally under control. Sucks to be using this much sick time so early in the year, but I don’t think it was avoidable.

We do have some exciting news, we took advantage of me being unable to work by going car buying yesterday. We bought James a 2006 (so, used) Subaru Impreza WRX STI. (Read: super super sporty-fast-maniac-huge-spoiler-car) I did all of the legwork, which I kind of got a thrill out of doing and totally enjoyed, by calling around to all the dealers in a 250 mile radius to try to get the bottom line price. I managed to fanagle the price down while James sat looking out the window at his soon-to-be new car and drooling. I must say, it’s a very pretty car. So shiny! So fast! So pretty! I told him we should name it. He kind of laughed, and said he’s never named a new car before, so the rest of the day I kept dropping girl names.

“Don’t drive Miyoki through too many slushy puddles!” (she is a subaru, after all)
“Little Katelyn is soooooo pretty!” (I don’t actually like that one, because I think of a little toddler girl for some reason)
and finally, I’d open the garage door and call out, “Good night, Natasha!” before going to bed.

So yeah, congratulate James on his new baby, and condole with him on the departure of the very first car he ever bought, the ford contour SVT (it never had a name.)

Other names I can come up with (or came up with):

Shirozaki
Kirusawa
Miyzaki
Suzuki
Hiroshima
Natalie
Natasha
Katelyn
Mae
Totoro
The older sister in Totoro whose name I can’t remember
Mawazaki

Here’s the from it’s listing photo (ie: not a photo we took) It has silver wheels though instead of the gold (we made them switch them) Click to see a bigger version:

Anyway, it’s back to the grind now. Jocelyn’s birthday is on Saturday, we’re having a little party for her, and she has informed us that she wants THREE BALLOONS. Every time we ask her what she wants for her birthday, she says THREE BALLOONS!

So she’ll be (at least) getting 3 balloons on Saturday! Yesterday morning, she looked up at me and asked, “Am I three now?”

Not yet sweetie! Oh I wish it would be never! Ok.. maybe not really. But she was a baby such a short time ago. Sniff sniff!

more updates later. yeeee-haw, it’s good to be back!

so what do you want for your birthday?
a 50 f/1.4 lens.
(long long stare, and confused look)
OH! I mean a 50 f/1.EIGHT lens!
but we already have that.
I know, I’m saying, I already got my birthday present. you don’t have to get my anything.
Well. I’ll have to think up something.
OK, but you have a $40 limit.

——-

Me, sitting on the couch, wrapped in blankie just so, with laptop on lap.
James, just walked in.

Oooh. Can you hand me the remote?
(gets and hands me the remote)
And that pillow?
(gets and hands me the pillow)
Ooohh, and the phone?
Kiss my ass.
I will, if you get me the phone.

(luckily, he didn’t make me kiss his ass. I would have though, rather than disturb my perfectly constructed blankie and laptop work cocoon.)

——-

late late at night. we are in bed. it is dark. and very quiet.

will you scratch my back?
moaning and groaning about having to scratch the itchy girl
that’s what you should get me. a back scratcher
But you already have me!
you should get me a back scratcher that doesn’t make ‘oh i’m so put out by this’ noises
heh.
ooh, actually what I should have said I wanted for my birthday is a microwave that works, and pipes that don’t sound like the acopolypse is upon us when you flush the toilet.
I’ll just get you a backscratcher that moans and groans.
But I already have that.

a cute one, for good measure.

at the dinner table, everyone sitting down and eating, which doesn’t happen as often as it should. right in the middle of dinner conversation of the doings of school, piano class, tutus, and the butt and fart jokes (from ethan, oh lord please make it stop):

jocelyn: Daddy is my BEST FRIEND!
(collective “AWWWWWWW” from the parents)

——

the work is letting up. there will be work done over the weekend probably, and all the overtime i put in in the last week was balanced out by the bouts of not working due to the DC metro area being covered in ice, and also a boy with a sick tummy who stayed home yesterday (it was from eating a not-ripe-enough banana and needing to poop, he’s fine now, thanks).

hopefully we will return to our regularly scheduled blogging next week, where i have lots to tell AND SHOW you! Our swap package arrived, and boy was it a hit!

-amy