For Bo

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More Than Just for Paper

Ohh.....the wonders of childhood!!!
Swinging on a tire swing from and old tree....
Hunting for frogs along a creek bed.....
Playing hide and seek with your friends....
Tossing a stick to your dog....
Jumping on the bed....
Spinning in your dad's new office chair.....

Hmmmm....which one of these might cause you to visit the Urgent Care?

Bleary eyed, I was awakened by my dear Iz with his sad voice saying...."I hit my head on the desk." He didn't cry much and moments later he was gone. But within ten minutes, he was back saying "There's blood!!!"

Now, you must know that the sight of a tiny speck of blood in my family causes a reaction beyond belief. Iz is especially prone to this overreaction. It is usually due to the fact that he has picked at a scab or eczema and NOW THERE'S BLOOD!!! I am almost always in the "buck it up" club and tell him that if he hadn't been picking, there wouldn't be blood so next time, don't pick. I learned long ago that the best response to a not so iunjured but fussing child is the kind that checks him over quickly and says, "You'll be fine, dear." So...when my child presented in the doorway with the cry of "Blood!!!" I knew better than to overreact.

Ski got to him first and took a look. When he said "Oh my..." I knew I was in trouble.

Everyone fetched the necessary equipment for an injury and brought them forth -- a nice big towel, the trusty brown bottle of peroxide, and my bowl of cottonballs. While there was not nearly as much blood as I know a head injury can produce, there was a bit. And as I looked, I doubted that this problem could be solved with the materials I had on hand. I cleaned as best as I could and the flow of blood seemed to be slowing. So....after dressing myself, I proceeded to call my ped. Unfortunately, they only remove stitches and don't put them in. At least that saved me an hour trip to the other side of town. So, off we went to UC -- or as Iz calls them, his "arm doctor."

Wouldn't you know, we had the same dr as we had the last time. It makes you feel like a very bad mother when you see the same dr for an injury to the same child in only a matter of months.

In the end, he got 6 staples in his head because his older brother and sister thought it would be great fun to spin him in Daddy's office chair. And hopefully, the spinning in chairs will not be happening again. He has a deep scalp laceration. Oh, and my kid is a super trooper. He said "Ow" once while the staples were going in and smiled the rest of the time. He got treated to fries, cranberry juice, and some soy icecream. And mom and dad get to wake him at 12 and 4am for two days. And Iz gets the honor of being the first in all 8 of us to have had staples.

Adventures in Dating

I love date night. There is always something interesting going on. Even if we go somewhere boring, something unusual is bound to happen. Tonight was no different.

I inherited a strong desire for pie from my mother. Of course, I grew up in an era of automats, Woolworths lunch counters, and pie carousels. Mom's favorite thing to do was to shop with her mom and stop for coffee and pie. At a very young age, she introduced me to the delights of pie noshing. To this day, I crave pie. Unfortunately, it is increasingly difficult to find a place that makes good pie. Ski knows that I long for a good piece of pie so he is always trying to hunt a place where we can have some. I think it is a lost art. Pie evidently only comes in a box from the deep freeze at Wally World or something.

Tonight, we walked into a place that had a case with cakes and pies. I thought yipee... My heart raced at the thought of bakery delicacies melting in my mouth. As I perused the menu, I saw what looked promising. There, among other more mundane pies and cakes was listed coconut crème pie. I began thinking of mounds of whipped cream like substance billowing over a yellowy pudding-like coconut concoction and nestled into a delightfully flaky pastry crust. Ohhhh....it is one of my very favorites!! While I had my eye on that and was dreaming and drooling, Ski spied blackberry cobbler. Ski is nutty about blackberry cobbler. He thinks that the messier a food is, the better it tastes. It doesn't get any messier than blackberry cobbler with ice cream melting over a flaky crust hiding extra gooey blackberry goop seeping out. The melting ice cream makes lovely swirls of pinkish purple and the warm/cold combo is just heavenly.

The waitress came and we placed our orders. We chatted while we waited.

In a little while, the waitress deposits two plates in front of us and is gone in a flash.

What is this?!?!?!
My pie resembles nothing I have ever seen before!! It is almost frightening to look at. BTW, the above pic is NOT my pie. It is merely a vision of what I had hoped and dreamed for.

My heart begins to beat rapidly as I realize that the pie I ordered has been made by someone who has no clue what coconut cream pie is. How can that be?!?!? Did they let the guy who washes the dishes try his hand at making pies tonight? As I am so sadly disappointed, I look up to take a peek at Ski's dessert. Now HIS looks like dessert. But, he gives me a look and a disappointed sigh and says quietly...

"This is not what I expected."

Yes, they made blackberry bread pudding and sold it as cobbler.
How could they?!?!?!

I ask if he wants a bite and he asks me the same.

Selfishly, I am hoping that he loves my pie and will beg me to have it. Such is not the case.

As we are deciding whether he is just being nice to offer to eat my pie or whether he actually prefers mine to his, the host comes over.

"How is everything?"

We look at each other -- thankfully with food in our mouths.

We both nod.

"Are you sure?"

I say, "Yes, it's good!!" as Ski mumbles something similar.

"Oh good....for a moment, I thought that there might be something wrong." Relived, he wanders away.

Ski looks at me sadly and says...."I just lied!!!"

We switch desserts and when the waitress comes and asks cheerily if we are enjoying everything, Ski just nods and I say "yes."

Ski says with great shame..."I just lied -- AGAIN!!"

Me?!?!?
I don't care.
I have no guilt!!!!!
Well, what am I going to say?

--Do you call that coconut cream pie?!?!?! It is like and easter egg without the benefit of chocolate. It is like pecan pie with coconut instead of pecans. This is NOT coconut cream!! Where are the fluffy topping and the pudding-y yellow insides? Are you INSANE?!?!?! This is NOT coconut cream!! Give me a cookbook and I will show you what coconut cream is!!

--And since when is bread pudding a cobbler? Where is the sickeningly sweet goop? Aren't Southerners supposed to know how to make cobbler?!?!?!? Even Wikipedia knows how to make a cobbler!!!

So, yes....its food and its edible, but NOT what I wanted.

Ski wanted to buy some cupcakes. They looked innocent enough. I begged him not to.

And for those of you who don't know what a pie carousel is, here's a treat for you...

Pie Carousel from glass on Vimeo.

BTW, did you notice which one pie is missing the most?!?!?! I'll tell you....it isn't lemon meringue!!

Oh, and for my family who thinks I love Key Lime pie....
I like a REAL one once every say....10 years or so.

Of Cats and Dogs and Other Things

Or.....
How I can relate to my son.

A few years ago, I started running with Ski. My running didn't last long. First of all, my knees couldn't handle it. I have torsion in my legs and have always had issues with my knees. That constant pounding on the pavement was just a little too much for them. However, before my legs gave out, I discovered that I had exercise induced asthma. When I went to see my dr, he asked me a bunch of questions and told me I was pretty much textbook. That was a few years ago. Since then, I have had a few times when things popped up here and there. Driving in the car, I would have a major coughing fit. Sitting outside, I would do the same. Having a ds with asthma, I knew that this was not a great thing. Also, I would frequently have coughing fits as I laid down at night in my bed. Of course, like most people, I put off seeing my dr about this. Just a coughing fit now and then... Well, in the middle of June, I had an asthma attack daily for two weeks. I would try to go without using my inhaler and finally, I'd give in. I finally called for an appointment with an allergist who could not see me until the end of July. I went to my gp and he patiently listened to me and although my lungs sounded clear, he took me seriously and gave me some medications to get me through until I saw the allergist. His parting words were, "Be sure to tell the allergist that you recently got a dog."

So, this past Monday, I saw the allergist. My lungs sounded great to him. My nose, however, must be astonishingly blocked because my gp wondered if I could even SMELL out of my nose and the allergist also commented on how swollen and pale it was. Not encouraging words to hear. I basically failed two asthma tests. One told the dr that I had tons of inflammation in my lungs. After the second test that I failed, the nurse came in and told me that she was going to give me 6 puffs of Albuterol. I was incredulous. I said "SIX???!!!!" I normally take only two at a time and that makes my heart race like mad. Thankfully, she must have heard the panic in my voice and only made me take 4 puffs. I was able to barely pass the test, but I became incredibly silly. Just ask Ski. I laughed uncontrollably and I had a difficult time calming myself down.

In addition to the breathing tests, I got 66 skin pricks on my back which were both ticklish and painful all at once. I also had about ten intradermal shots on my arm which just plain hurt. Of all of these tests, I discovered that I am really allergic to cats, dust mites, and also walnuts (no surprise here) and pistachios, but I am hoping that pistachio is a false pos.

I have new asthma medications and get to have a joyful week on steroids -- or as we call it, "joy juice." Lets just say that at the moment, while typing this, I'd like to sit here and have a good cry. If you'd like to know more about steroids, just ask Simon. He loves them....

All of my life with the exceptions of a few years early on in our marriage, I have had a cat in my house. My mother loves kitties and we have had at least one forever. We have one now, the size of the Hindenburg, that lives in my house. Interestingly, since the dog came to live with us, the kitty has been mainly upstairs and had taken to sleeping under my bed. She is now banned from my bedroom. I need to clean out my bedroom thoroughly and cover my mattress, boxspring, pillow, and probably get a new comforter since my old one is dry clean only. Oh, and then there's the blinds and curtains. Everything needs to be either covered or easily removable and washable. Sounds like fun, huh?!?!? So, since we have this kitty that my dd would die if anything EVER happened to her, and dust mites are basically everywhere, we are seriously considering that I do immunotherapy (40 shots -- once a week).

And lets talk about walnuts. Do you know how much I hate those things?!?!?! My mother is nut obsessed. Her favorite candy is chocolate covered nuts. In fact, my mil I think is her long lost sister in terms of the nut/cat thing. Dh and I spent our childhoods picking nuts out of everything. And guess which nut was the ONLY nut my ds tested negative to on his allergy tests!! You've got it....WALNUTS. Well, I don't care. They now have good reason to stay out of my house. Oh, and I noticed that when it said walnut it said "Walnut (English/Blk)". Black walnuts taste like dirt!!! Blech!!!!

Hungry for drive-thru?? Got $42.69???

These guys have more nerve than I'll ever have. I'm told this idea has been around for a while using rap, but this is great stuff. Oh, and my sweet B used to run drive thru for Roy Roger's in PA (even got a mega-high score from a secret shopper--though not perfect--'cause the company doesn't EVER award a perfect score). Anyway, this is in her honor......(I love watching the order screen (= )

Cat Stories

Iz, who is 6, has a very creative mind.
One Sunday morning, while on our way to church, he began telling us a story. It involved one of our kitties and these have evolved into what I affectionately term as Cat Stories. I think it all began in response to an incident where mom and dad asked once again which child was responsible for a mysterious event in the house. Of course, no one claimed to be the guilty party and I probably said something like...."Well, I guess it all happened by itself." Iz took that and ran with it. He began relating how Missy had done this or that which eventually led to the incident in question.

Now, when I am bored or the two of us are alone somewhere or we are driving as a family in the car, I ask him to tell me a Cat Story. They end up being hysterical. They are all about the misadventures of our kitties. They play games, cook on the grill, make spaghetti. You name it, our kitties have done it!! It is especially funny to picture one of our kitties doing these things since it is very obvious that she does NOTHING but eat and sleep. Sometimes, the other kids will try to join in, but their stories are not nearly as creative or funny as Iz.

Heck with June, what about July?!?

Those of you who blog know how much of an effort it sometimes is to think of something amazing/interesting to post about consistently. Esp. when life outside the computer desk gets busier (in waves).

No, we're not giving up the blog. I'm still aprehensive about Facebook--though I don't really have a reason why. So we'll continue to do our thang in this space.

I have a post I began in May about B and my trip to Biltmore. I have a lot of pics and have been attempting to add them to the post but have failed to finish at the moment. I think I tend to write longer posts when I could probably break them up and get more out. So, Biltmore and Biltmore Garden pics are coming.

I'm also transitioning to working from home full-time (still with BofA). Much of our recent evenings have been spent painting the former girls/toy room and assembling curtains, desk, file cabinets. etc. I have a few "before" pics and plan on taking some "after" ones and posting them too. I'll be hanging shelves and getting a new chair and monitor (from the bank) next week.

So thanks for sticking with us and reading my boring post. As a reward, here's a video from Weird Al that made me smile about WDW's Jungle Cruise. (not my favorite attraction by any means--I'm a Pirates, Haunted Mansion, "old School" Tiki Room and Mr. Toad fan)

Skipper Dan

WHERE On Earth Did June Go?!?!

Hey, I bet you thought that we were swallowed by our dog!!
Nah....
We're still here. Out doggie does try to eat everything she sees, but so far, we are still here.

Not much is going on. No, I mean REALLY!!!

My garden is not doing too well. While I have about a gallon of roma tomatoes on my counter praying I will turn them into some sauce, my plants are in sad shape. I can't figure out whether it is fungus, bugs, or what. I bought some neems last week and I hope to salvage as many as I can. Two of my tomato plants are beyond hope. Out of 6 zucchini plants, I have a grand total of ONE zucchini. I do have lots of cucumbers, but I think that they are all pickling so I guess I'll have to pickle them. I have some beans, but they aren't producing well. I will never try beans again. LOL. I have two peppers working on growing. I do have watermelons the size of marbles.

The doggie is getting fatter. The vet keeps telling us to feed her more. She loves us tremendously. I had to place a frantic call to the vet when she ate a prune that dropped to the floor due to an expression of sweet brotherly love. Prunes are fine even though if you look online you will find them placed with raisins and grapes which are toxic to dogs. She also seems to have a great fondness for gluten free bread. This she snatched from her first try at counter surfing. She doesn't like angry dogs barking on tv.

The older skibums are reading Greek and Roman classics through the summer. Nat, of course, is thoroughly disgusted. Iz is working on reading, although the last two weeks were somehow lost on me.