Just a couple of nitpicky items...

One...Halloween apparently should be renamed to skankaween. Seriously. Do they even MAKE costumes for little girls anymore? Why in the HELL do they have a French maid costume for 8 year olds? Excuse me? Whodawa? Does it come with fishnets and condoms? I started noticing this last year, when I was looking for a costume for me...that I basically had two choices: sexy_something or medieval looking costume that covered every inch of my body. Nice. Thanks. And now they're doing the same for kids? Bullshit. BULLSHIT.

Two...When the shit is the time change? This weekend coming up or did I miss it. I'd like to think I didn't miss it. But they're really screwing with me here.

Three...Kids clothes. Holy mother. Alex? Alex is easy - he could care less what he wears as long as it fits. Actually...as long as it fits and it's black. Hmmmmm, I wonder where he gets THAT trait? Owen on the other hand is my little clothes hound. Very particular. And right now he needs new jeans. And new shoes. And well, new everything because he won't stop growing no matter what I do. We measure our kids on the laundry room wall. Owen has grown almost 2 inches since March. Oy. I asked him where he wanted to go shopping. The mall. The mall? Yeah...they have cool clothes at the mall. Ummmm, okay. Why in the shit do you know this? The thing about the "cool stores" is that they're really for teens...not for preens or tweens. The one store that did have jeans in his size? Ummmmm, yeah...$60. SIXTY DOLLARS for a pair of jeans he probably won't be wearing in 4 months. I can't do it. I just can't do it. I have no problem spending $60 on a pair of jeans for me. If I wear them like I've worn my other pairs, I'll have them for 5 years easily. That's what, $12 per year? Divided by 365 days in the year...that's....ummm...365 into 12.00...well...pennies a day. PENNIES. But $60 for Owen...can't do it. Same with shoes. He's got high dollar taste when it comes to shoes (hmmm, wonder where he gets THAT?) and I get it. I do. BUT...his feet keep growing, too - and I just can't do it. We solved the jeans problem last night and got him some shirts, and a Colts hoodie which he loves. At least he's reasonable. When I tell him that we just can't afford to buy him things that expensive while he's growing, ultimately he's fine with it. And when we found him some great jeans on sale for $21..."Mom, these are really cool jeans. Why would anyone pay $40 more for jeans?" Yes, dear...that's right. Why?

So today my youngest son left the house in new clothes looking quite spiffy and NOT wearing two different colored socks.

I love the change in the weather.

The kick is up and it's..........NO GOOD!

It's a sad day for us - Alex did not make the pep band. He's fine with it - what we now know is that there are only 5 kids in it, and that they had a lot of drummers audition, but not a lot of guitar players. WHAT? Since when are there too many drummers?? It's always been my experience that there are never enough drummers. Ever. EVER. Especially at this age when parents usually don't want to buy their kids a drum set - don't have the room for it - don't want to listen to it. Although, I think in retrospect, if you talked to my dad, he might have actually preferred the drums to my early clarinet endeavors. Oh how he hated when I would squeak and sqwak my way through various concertos like Mary Had a Little Lamb, Somewhere over the Rainbow and the theme from M*A*S*H (which Julie and I learned all on our own without ANY sheet music. we were truly gifted.)

So anyway - there are 3 seniors and 2 sophomores in this year's ensemble, and Alex is content with garage band 101 and the blues jam for now. There's always next year.

It's report card time, and both boys are doing very well. Alex took it tough at the beginning of the year, but now he's humming right along. I can see all of his grades online, so I already know what to expect there. Kathy and I had a long talk about looking at grades online. She contends, that now, as a parent, she thinks this is brilliant. But as a student? She would hate every minute of it and feel very violated by her parents looking up her every quiz score. I try to use this information for good and not for evil. I think it's been a catalyst for conversation...but I know he hates it that I know his test scores before he does. HA! Sometimes it's GOOD, though - like after his unit test in Bio - he totally nailed it and when I picked him up after school I told him so. Made his night...

Owen did fine - he actually got a B+, something that hasn't happened in like 7 report cards. He was a little bummed to break his all A streak. But he had perfect attendance, so he bounced back. He loves receiving perfect attendance certificates. Don't ask me why. It's just Owen.

The air is cool and crisp, kiddies...
The Sox put a whoopin' on the Rockies last night. Fenway does have magical powers, I think.

Pray for rain in SoCal...

She ran calling wiiiiiiiiildfire...

So Southern California is LITERALLY a hot mess. You can hardly look at any news source and not hear something about the devastating fires out there. On a fortunate note, I think only one fatality and some injuries. How odd to be saying that one fatality is actually a fortunate situation. The people are evacuating. They are listening and getting out.

This morning they interviewed a couple who was in Las Vegas when the fires started. The husband's mother was staying in their house watching their dogs. She's 81. Neighbors came pounding on her door and told her to get out - at this point she could actually see the fire. She called her son to ask him what he wanted her to take. Can you imagine? You can see fire and you actually call your son to see if there's something you can grab before you literally run for your life. His response - NOTHING. Get out. Get out now. This couple, sitting in Vegas while everything they own is going up in smoke, what do you do? Put it all on red and pray?

They had moved into this house 4 years ago - because they were living in the mountains, and the wildfires were getting too out of control up there. They decided to move where they felt it was safer, and now, here they are with nothing. Whatever clothes they took to Vegas, and two dogs. That's it.

So on this topic...if you had enough time to respond...a fire is coming and you have to get out. What do you take? What are the things that are irreplaceable to you? Kids, spouses are a given here. If you're about to lose it all, what do you grab on your way out the door? Your wedding album? A sweater your grandmother knit for you?

I know what's in my heart and my soul tells me to sing

I'm gonna be thankful for this feeling that music brings
Ohhhhh it brings...

WHAT a weekend...what a weekend...I went out to Blues Island with Bob Mandarino and the Undercover Blues Band. What a great place, what a great crowd! Lordy who runs chicagobluesbeat.com was there and took a ton of pictures. Eventually he will also write a review, and I think he'll have good things to say about all of us. He's also going to come out to little Roselawn on Sunday and partake in our Blues Jam, so that will be a blast. IF you live locally, you should all make a point to come down this Sunday, the 28th. Killer Ray will be back, and he puts on one hell of a show! Sunday, 4-8 - be there or be square!

I've had an offer, of sorts...to potentially sing with a new band. A funk, blues, jam type of deal. They think I would be a good fit for them, what we don't know is if they are a good fit for me! They're local, and it could be fun, but who knows. I think I might go and sit it with them for a rehearsal and see what comes up.

So it's very exciting, everything that's happening. I'll keep you all posted!

Still no update

He talked to some girl, who said it should be posted somewhere. Where? Alex has no idea. When? Alex has no idea. He's not the best on information gathering, that one. BUT...his grades are looking good. He has been working his ass off and it shows. I'm so very very proud of him, for so many reasons...

I got him into a class called Garage Band 101 - you get together once a week for 8 weeks and learn as many songs as you can. He's playing with kids younger than he is - the bass player is 11, a 5th grader named Will. One guitar player is 12, the other is 13, and Alex on drums. After 8 weeks of learning what they can, they give a "concert." Should be fun. Alex liked the first session, the kids seem nice, the instructor seems nice. It's a good activity for him...better, maybe, than playing with the "old farts" on Sundays. :)

I'm eating California Roll and fried rice right now for lunch...mmmmmmm...

How is everyone? Where is everyone?

No, no, no...I don't have an update

And believe me, it's killing me WAY more than it's killing you. Oy. I can't take the pressure.

FOOTBALL SEASON IS OVER!!! And I know I shouldn't sound this happy about it but I can't help it. I just can't help it. One less thing to do. Hooray. The game yesterday was pitiful...mentally, our boys never showed up. They had themselves licked before they took the field. What can you do with that? Buncha head cases that team. I knew when MC scored the first touchdown that it was over for us. Rallying is not something our boys do. In any sport. ugh. Instead of getting mad, they get defeated.

Alex jammed again last night - and this time I sang with him. Good times. He really likes going up there, now...and there's so much for him to learn! He watched Steve for a bit, and Steve could tell he was paying attention, because when he got up there to play, he started mimicking some of the stuff Steve was doing. It's all improv and great - I'm so impressed by him. I purposely improved the hell out of some of the songs I sang with him so he could play around. Fun fun fun....

Bears, Bears, Bears...tsk, tsk. How did you let that happen? Oh yeah Adrian Peterson. Your nemesis for the day.

I love Devin Hester...love, love, love watching him play...

Rockstar Alex...

So Alex was practicing for his audition last night...and his laptop has a video camera on it. I tried to catch at least a little bit of him playing. The video isn't great...and he just started playing this song over the weekend...but I think he sounds damn awesome for 5 days of practice on it. (And he's learned 4 songs in that amount of time) Wish him luck...auditions are today from 3-4pm. I've never seen him so excited about something before...

TURN DOWN YOUR SOUND - it's kind of loud.

And now for something completely different...

I want to talk to you all about something very personal to me. So make sure when you comment, that you're nice.

Lunch.

Yeah, that's right, lunch.

I'm struggling these days with lunch. I lost my work-wife to her babies...so I don't have nearly as much excitement over lunch as I used to. So a lot of times, I'm not even really motivated to eat. I'm trying to get the girls in the cubicles outside my office to get on the eating out every day train, but they're just too damn disciplined in bringing in their lunch. Now some might argue that this is a good thing. BLASPHEMY.

I am a chronic lunch eater outer. I try...I really do...to want to bring in leftovers, or bring in some heat-a-meal-with-no-flavor, or pack a sandwich. But...ew. No. I can't do it. I'm surrounded by so much good food here that it's just impossible. I have no will power.

So my struggle is that I'm typically not leaving to get lunch. At all. So apparently instead of choosing a crappy sandwich from home, I choose nothing. And that's just pitiful. I know this. What are you guys doing for lunch? Today I didn't eat. And that's not good. Because right now I'm cranky and starving and it's just too late to go eat. But I want to.

Maybe I'll go next door real fast and grab something from KFC. Ew.

Guess what city will NOT be getting the Olympic games?

Three guesses...

If you said Chicago...you'd be right. They made a nice pretty audition tape. They were a big success when the Olympic Committee came...but what they forgot is that the OC is always watching. And this tragic Chicago marathon? Yeah...that's a pretty big test to fail. Especially since the marathon has been going on for 30 years. If they can't successfully hold an event they've been holding for 30 years...how can they possibly handle the international onslaught of the Olympics?

They ran out of water. Emergency medical personnel couldn't keep up. This cannot look good for our fair city to the OC.

So who's fault is it? Kevin says it's the runners fault. They shouldn't have run it. They should have known better.

I disagree. After talking with Jen - she says that she had the run of her life. She was posting great times at the markers and felt the best she's ever felt. She took it easy at the beginning and paced herself nicely, taking necessary breaks, pumping her fluids. HAD THEY NOT RUN OUT OF WATER, she would have had a strong finish, too. Luckily she and her running partner had people to bring them more fluids. Others were not so lucky.

I think these athletes train under these very conditions and know their limitations. I don't think anyone enters a marathon thinking it will be easy, or not taking it seriously. These people train for months...years...and the city of Chicago let them down. I'm not blaming them for everything, they can't control the weather. But they knew it was going to be hot, they should have been more prepared. Handing out ice to runners finishing the race? They did it wrong.

I'm sure Jimmer is going to have something to say about this one - he'll side with my hubby. And that's fine too...what do you all think?

I have so many rockstars in my life!

Seriously!

First - Alex is sooooooo cool! He got up yesterday at the Sunday Blues Jam and totally played the hell out of that drum set. The first song he seemed scared to death, but by the third song, he had totally and literally found his rhythm. I was so proud. His dad was there, too...so that was fun. Kevin and Ben both sitting in the front row, taking pictures with camera phones...I almost cried. I've been telling Kevin over and over how good Alex is...and now he knows I'm right. I mean, I know I'm his mom, but people, he was really, REALLY good. REALLY good. Can you feel me beaming?

Second - Jen finished the dreaded Chicago Marathon! Total rockstar!!! Even when they were telling them to stop running, and they were...like every 2/10 mile. She and her running partner had family members bring them water and gatorade and she finished. I got the report from her mom, who said Jen was amazing and feeling great. What a great personal victory for her! Everyone should be very proud.

Owen's team lost a tough one to an undefeated team yesterday. I was so proud of all of those boys. The team was bigger, and therefore could switch out full offense and defense. Our kids mostly play both sides of the ball...so our quarterback, runningbacks, and most of the offensive line are also playing defense, they never get a break. We were winning 7-6 until the 3rd quarter and then...well our little engine that could ran out of steam. We were absolutely not out-played...we held them so many times but couldn't get ourselves to the goal line. The other teams always creamed the opponent by 20 or more points...so the fact that we lost by only 2 touchdowns and never let them score an extra point speaks volumes about the heart of our boys.

So I'm a very proud mama and friend today. Happy Monday to all!

Before you bash Dan Rather...

You may want to get it all straight. Until I read this from the Huffington Post, I hadn't truly digested how BAD our TV and written news really is. There's a reason we're seeing so much Anna Nicole, Brittney, Lindsay, Paris bullshit. The corporate media has done that intentionally. INTENTIONALLY. Have you never wondered why we've never seen this much fluff/pop/hollywood shit in our newscycles before? Because corporate media didn't want to rattle the GOP political machine by reporting actual news...because reporting the actual news meant reporting the war...and reporting the war meant telling the truth that Bush shang-hai'd us into Iraq because there wasn't any reason for us to go there.

I've read a lot of articles, in fact, about how there really IS no investigative journalism anymore. Have you seen any? Aside from the "to catch a pedophile" series, if you can even call that investigative journalism. Have you? And the lead-in bullshit? And the fluff. Ugh.

Even if you don't agree with why the media has changed, you all have to agree that it has, in fact, changed and changed for the worst. And for someone as celebrated and talented as Dan Rather to be the fall guy? Well, that says an awful lot about how bad it truly is. Speak on and speak out, Mr. Rather.

Anyway, the article is very interesting, so I wanted to share.

No need for organized streaking protest...

And I think the Janet was even going to join in...

The expulsion hearing reinstated our thong boy. Thank heavens. The administration recommended expulsion, but the board decided against it. Smart board.

I have a couple of things to talk about today.

One - Asparagus. No, not the vegetable, the restaurant. It's an upscale thai/vietnamese restaurant in Mville. HOLY CRAP. You must all come. Find a way. Make it happen. Girls - we must plan a girls dinner there. The cocktails are fun. The menu is to die for. Sample:
"asparagus beef lover: beef tenderloin marinated in our exclusive steak sauce, grilled asparagus, premium japanese soy sauce and stir-fried thai basil mixed vegetables along with brown rice."

Ummmm, YUMM-O.

Two - Gamba. Stop everything you're doing and go there immediately. Ever been to Cafe Venezia? Venezia Bar & Grill? Same guy. We ate there last night for the Janet's birthday dinner. It was brilliant...BRILLIANT. Not a cheap date, but the food was well worth it. Everything was yummy, yummy, yummy.

Grab an eating buddy an head out. That's an order.

Honey, Let's Never Pass Out Angry Again

Men vs. Women sterilization...it's a double standard

So this morning on the Today show, they did a whole segment...two segments actually on young men in their 20's getting vasectomies. Men who have no children, no spouse...who maybe want to get married someday but definitely don't want to have kids.

Did the doctor try to talk him out of it? No. Urologists gave him no resistance. Did family members? Maybe. But my point is this. If a 28 year old woman with no kids, no spouse walked into her OBGYN and told them that she wanted a tubal ligation, the doctor would talk her out of it. Most won't even consider it. I know people who have been turned down even after the woman has had kids. My sister-in-law being one of them. I did a little research on the net and they say that only 1/3 of young women who ask for tubal ligations actually get them. And that's only because they go to several doctors. SEVERAL. The attitude of the medical community is that "they'll regret it" - but do they share that same sentiment with the men?

If a young girl wants a boob job, a tattoo...these are "permanent" procedures that can be reversed, yes? So why all the shit about getting your tubes tied?

Thoughts? Do you know someone who was talked out of their tubal by their doctor? Family? Friends?


Article on women denied TL

Ummmm, overboard anyone??

What in the FUCK is happening in Chesterton? Have they lost their DAMN minds? Seriously? Expelling a kid because he ran across a football field in a thong?

And just so we understand why I'm so pissed - he could have beat the shit out of someone...which, by the way, is a CRIME called battery, and they would have suspended him for 3 days, but not expelled him.

And the choir members who HAZED other choir members with BODILY FLUIDS - they were suspended, not expelled. The fact that they only use the words bodily fluids when they talk about it tells me it wasn't saliva...they would have said saliva, I think, so I'm speculating it was urine or something worse. And that, too, is a CRIME called battery.

But this boy, who didn't hurt anyone, wasn't naked, committed NO crime, not even indecent exposure because he was covered with a thong, was expelled for the remainder of the school year. It's the most ludicrous thing I've ever heard.

If he had just run across the field, fully clothed, would they have even punished him? Probably not. So the issue isn't the running on the field, it's his state of dress. What if he had worn shorts? What then? It makes me want to organize a team of streakers for the next home game in various states of dress.

Idiots. I'm sorry, but when a kid pulling a stupid prank gets the same treatment as someone caught doing drugs in school? I think the administration needs to re-evaluate their punishment criteria. I'm embarrassed to be a Chesterton alum today.

Pre-expulsion article
Article in the Muncie Star