Only in my dreams...

I know I'm not the only person on Earth who has a recurring nightmare.  Mine started shortly after my eighth birthday and I still dream it to this day.  That's thirty years of the same, exact nightmare, for those of you keeping score at home.  A darn long time to be haunted by the same dream.

Like I said, I'm not the only person on Earth who has a recurring nightmare, but I betcha I'm one of the only people on Earth who has a photograph of it.  You see, on my visit to my childhood home this past week, I was going through old photographs that my parents have in boxes (and boxes, and boxes) in their house.  I was looking for a few, specific pictures out of what must be tens of thousands of photographs, and I wasn't holding my breath that I would find those few for which I searched.  (My father has been an avid photographer for my entire life, photographing just about everything right down to my very first diaper rash.  I kid you not, though that wasn't the picture I was trying to find.  I've inherited his shutterbug tendencies, and as such can rival Dad's collection of pictures already, though the vast majority of mine are digital and therefore just taking up space in the external hard drive, instead of haphazard piles in no particular order stuffed into cardboard boxes.)  I found some of the ones I had hoped to find, along with many others that I set aside for future blog posts and/or blackmail (I've already sworn a solemn vow to one of my sisters that certain photos of her from our childhood will never be posted by me to Facebook...).

The one I didn't intend to find - one I didn't even realize existed at all - was the one that captured the moment of my recurring nightmare.  Here it is:

It doesn't look too nightmarish, I know.  What you're looking at is a photograph of an evening in December, 1979, when my parents took me, along with two friends, into New York City to celebrate my eighth birthday.  We went to Rockefeller Center and saw the Christmas tree.  We saw the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular.  We saw the decorated windows at Macy's and along Fifth Avenue.  We then went to the Trump Tower, which is where the picture above was taken.  I am the girl in the bright orange hat with the pompom almost as big as my head on top.

If you aren't familiar with Trump Tower, the interior is gorgeous.  Here's a shot I found online of the inside:

Coincidentally, it appears to be decorated for Christmas as it was on that night in December 1979.  (There are other shots of the Trump Tower here and here, for those of you who aren't familiar.)


That night, as we went up the series of open escalators, I first felt the gripping fear that would become my biggest phobia - a fear of falling from a great height.  (I do not have a fear of heights, per se, but only one of falling from a height.  I feel perfectly fine on top of the Empire State Building, where falling over the edge accidentally is a virtual impossibility - falling on purpose from the top must take some serious effort, indeed! - but standing on a balcony just one or two stories up and looking over a railing freaks me out.  I do not know if this technically is just acrophobia, or fear of heights, or if it is something separate.)  I was looking down as we climbed the floors and my palms began to sweat, my heart began to pound, my skin became clammy.  I shook it off at the time, but that was the beginning of the end of my previously phobia-free existence.


The nightmare, which I first had that night, is this: I am with my family at the Trump Tower at Christmastime.  In my dream, I am of varying ages; sometimes I am a child, sometimes I am my actual age at the time.  However, in my dream, my youngest sister - who would've been two at the time of the dream's onset - is always an infant, and for whatever reason, my mother has given her to me to hold.  I am holding her, both of us bundled in our winter coats, scarves, mittens, and we're climbing the escalators.  As we rise higher off the main floor, my sister moves suddenly in an attempt (I always think) to see the waterfall that cascades down the one interior wall and I lose my hold on her.  She falls from my arms, plummeting over the side and then I wake up.  She never gets rescued nor does she hit the floor before I am awake, panicked and sweaty, sometimes having screamed aloud.

That was the nightmare I had that first night, back in December '79, and it has been virtually the same since then.  I do not dream it as often as I did as a child, and there doesn't seem to be any one, specific trigger for it, but I do still have it occasionally to this day.  This is the only recurring nightmare I have.  I had one other as a child, but that one (about a giant, floating eyeball, of all things) stopped when I was maybe 11 or 12.  I just never realized there was a photograph to go with the dream.  Freaky, huh?

(By the way, I have been to Trump Tower many times since that night.  I've even ridden those same escalators, both as a child and an adult.  It never did alleviate the nightmare.)

What about you?  Am I the only one to have a recurring nightmare that began in childhood?  Anyone else share my fear of falling from a height?  Have I just outed myself as certifiably freaky?
 

Feet, Fi, Fo, Fum

So, my feet? They're not that beautiful.



I hate my feet, actually. They're *not* feminine or delicate, they're noticeably different sizes, and my heels especially bear the collected consequences of 37.5 years of running around barefoot or in sandals as often as possible (including outdoors - even growing up on the farm with its gravel driveway and hard-packed-earth barnyards), and my toes? My wonky toes with the cracked toenails, the warped pinkie toes and the committed-to-shaving-for-life-thanks-to-a-foolhardy-spontaneous-act-back-in-the-late-80s big toes? They're just uuuuuugly. Fugly. Gross.



You think I kid? Fine, I'll prove it to you:




Oooh, yeah, I forgot about my "if it's almost summer, Heather's got the Birkenstock tan lines" across-the-top stripes. You should see them by the end of August...





You're sorry you ever doubted me now, aren't you? I may be prone to exaggeration, but not when it comes to my feet. I told you so. Don't worry, I'll spare you a shot of my other heel, not just out of pity, but because I almost fell over and gave myself a concussion attempting to photograph the bottom of this foot.


So, anyhow, I hate my feet. I actually hate all feet, with the exception of teeny-tiny baby feet and "still small enough to be cute" kid feet. Kiddo's feet used to be a thing of beauty. I loved those tiny feet, with their tinier toes. I called them "toe niblets" a la corn niblets and I'd eat them every chance I had. Now, at the age of six, her toe niblets are no longer so cute. They're crossing the border into FEET territory, as in get 'em away from me NOW please!, utilitarian-only feet.


Yeah, I have the opposite of a foot fetish. I have a foot phobia.


This is why I'm fairly certain that I have lost my last remaining shred of sanity. Why so certain, you ask?


Because I'm pondering the possibility of getting a pedicure tomorrow. Me. The one who hates her feet (and as I've demonstrated above, with darn good reason. Nasty, nasty appendages stomping about on tack strips and gravel, carrying me hither and yon...). The one who never lets ANYONE touch her feet, with the exception of my favorite massage therapist (who also happens to be a good friend) and even then, I don't let her touch my feet much or every time I go for a massage. Hubby doesn't touch my feet (nor does he want to - he's not exactly running after me, begging to rub my misshapen, gnarly, hirsute ham hocks) and Kiddo only does when she is feeling particularly death-wishy.


Why then would I even think of a pedicure?


I don't rightly know, except.... Hubby had a golf tournament today. (Wait, I know, that didn't make a lick of sense. Also, why is that even a phrase - a lick? Is sense a lollipop? I mean, I don't have much of it, so I guess that's why I don't know this...)


See, Hubby had a golf tournament today, and after that tournament was over, there was a dinner. A dinner with a raffle, for which Hubby bought 6 tickets. The raffle prizes, to hear Hubby tell it, were awwwwwwesome. Flat screen TVs. Wiis. Blueray players. 8 gig iPod Touches. Super-fancy golf clubs. Last year, Hubby played in the same tournament and entered the raffle and didn't win ANYTHING. Hubby really, really, reaaaaaally wanted to win a flat screen TV this year. He was extra-hopeful because he didn't win anything last year, as though Lady Luck would be extra kind to him with that whole "random drawing winners out of a hat" thing this year.


Hubby didn't win the TV. Or the golf clubs. Or anything else remotely cool-n-manly.


Hubby won a $100 spa gift card.


To a fancy-shmancy, ritzy, frou-frou spa.


Lady Luck must like girls. Girls with super-short Mom hairdos and rhinocerousean feet.


The gift card came with a list of services and their prices. Let me tell you, $100 doesn't go too far at this spa. I could get a "partial highlight" but not with a cut, wash or blow dry. Heck, they charge an "additional $15" to spritz some leave-in conditioner into your hair before you leave. A wash and blow dry with no cutting or anything else is $30. So, forget the hair salon - and besides, I just got the bird's nest tamed, so it's barely long enough to do now anyhow.


Facials were the next thing on the list for me to consider. Hmmmm, there are a couple that are under $100 (and many more that are well over $100, by the by) but I don't know whether I want someone looking at in depth and then touching my Acne-Like-I'm-a-Teenager/Wrinkles-and-Age-Spots-Like-I'm-a-Crone combination skin for any length of time. (Guess I have a thing about my face just like I do about feet...)


Then I considered the massages. There are a couple that are less than $100, but I don't know that I'd want to go all Full Monty at Le Chic-n-Ritzy Spa in front of strangers. (I did go Full Monty at the hotel spa in Vegas one time, but that was a sort of "what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas" thing, whereas this spa is less than 5 miles from my house and I might see these people again and that would freak me out.) Besides, I have a massage therapist that I adore (and if you're local, you should go check her out - Joan at A Healing Sanctuary and tell her Heather sent you!) and I have a gift certificate Hubby gave me for Christmas that I still haven't used there yet.


I thought about the Seaweed Wrap, the Mud Wrap and the Salt or Sugar Scrubs (with Vichy - what the hey is that anyhow??) for about half a second combined. I know from watching TV and movies that those sorts of Wraps aren't delicious things to eat, but rather things that involve getting naked and then being scrubbed and swaddled in various substances for apparently 50 minutes. Again, can you imagine running into the Wrap Technician the following week at the grocery store? No thank you!


So, where does that leave me on this spa list?


Manicures and pedicures.


Now, manicures are decidedly out. I've had two manicures in my life: the first for my wedding and the second for my big appearance on Jeopardy. For both those occasions (and for the junior and senior proms), I grew my nails out and they looked all nice and pretty - for about 48 hours after the event in question. Yes, I am a lifelong, chronic nail biter. It's less likely to kill me than smoking cigarettes, so please don't chastise. I know it is a terrible habit. I know I need to stop - and I have, many, many times before. Sometimes for whole weeks. But that is neither here nor there.


What's left if the manis are out? Pedicures.................... The "Signature Spa Pedicure" is 80 minutes long. It would probably take them 80 minutes to recover from their initial shock upon viewing my 37.5 year old, decrepit hooves and gown up accordingly for the necessary HazMat levels. While I do hate my feet and only give them the most perfunctory of sporadic attention (beautification-wise, I typically paint my toenails a few times over the course of the summer, never removing the polish at summer's end, either. I use the gradual chipping/growing out of the nails under the polish as a timekeeper to know how long it has been since summer ended...), I wouldn't mind having nicer looking feet. Almost pretty feet, even. At least, feet that looked human instead of rhinocerousean.


So, there you have it. Way more info than you ever, ever wanted about Heather's Hooves. I know that there are those of you out there who love pedicures. Should I be considering this, boldly going where no Heather's Foot has ever gone before? Will they be utterly grossed out at the sight of my ham hocks clomping in through the spa doors, all gnarly in my Birks? Will the sight of my heels make them cry and/or recoil in horror? Will they snicker aloud at my big toes' 5 o'clock shadow?


So I wonder, do I dare and, do I dare?


And if I do dare, what is standard pedi-etiquette? Do I make small talk with the pedicurist? Do I bring a book? How does it all work, exactly?


Help!


If I do go and have a pedicure (and weirdly enough, the more I write about how much I hate my feet, the less this seems like an obviously lousy idea and the more I think I might just want to do it! See, told ya my marbles and sanity are gone!), I will post "after" pictures for you to see. If I don't go, though, you can rest assured that barring a George Clooney or Hugh Jackman autograph adorning one of my feet, you will never, ever see a photograph of them like the ones above ever again. Promise.


(PS - Please don't think I'm not super-excited about and grateful for this spa gift card. I totally, totally am. I'm beyond thrilled. It's just so unexpected and not my typical thing that I'm a bit overwhelmed by all the fanciness of the spa services menu. I swear to you I love this gift card, am thrilled that Hubby won it - not that I would've been sad had he won a WiiFit or flat screen TV - and touched and appreciative that he gave it to me. I mean, they *do* have "Gentlemen's Manicure" and "Gentlemen's Pedicure" and "Gentlemen's Cut" and "Gentlemen's Facial" options there, as well...)

Stuff

I have too much stuff. Physically (hello, cellulite!), mentally (hello, thoughts that won't stop running through my head at night) and especially around me. Confession time: I'm a pack rat. Well, not in the negative sense of the word - I don't hoard old newspapers and magazines and things that out to long since have been thrown away for decades so that one day I'm discovered like this person was... I do, however, have a highly sensitive sense of nostalgia, which leads me to hold on to certain stuff.

Stuff has been on my mind lately, so much so that I'm not even sleeping soundly. You see, my days are now consumed by stuff, because we're in the midst of step one of selling our house and moving: decluttering. (Funny how Blogger doesn't recognize "declutter" as a word, because my own brain has issues with it as well!)

Over the weekend, we rented a storage unit up the road and began the process of decluttering our house. We've lived in this house for nine years now, and let me tell you, that is plenty of time for a sentimental sort like myself to amass a lot of stuff. Heaps of it. Stuff crammed onto bookshelves (and let's not forget all the books themselves, either, as Hubby and I both are Bookworms Extraordinaire and Kiddo is quite a bookworm as well), stuff squeezed into drawers, stuff jammed into cabinets, under beds and on top of other stuff. Now, with the decluttering? It is so not pretty.

Hubby and I used to be quite good at moving. Back in the early days of Hubby-n-me, we moved a lot - between 1994 and 2000, we moved six times, winding up here in our first owned home in January of 2000. During that period, there wasn't much chance to accumulate stuff, and our belongings were regularly purged as well, the better to fit our stuff into the back of first our Festiva, then our Tercel, along with the smallest U-Haul we could get away with for maximum affordability. We'd donate books to the local Friends of the Library, drop boxes of clothes and linens off at Goodwill, etc. We were lean and mean and had room to spare in our bookcases, hutches, cabinets and drawers.

Well, now we've had nine years in one place (with a lovely, large basement) in which to collect stuff. Also, five years ago we added Kiddo to the mix, and Sweet Godmother of Wilma Flintstone (™ Anna Lefler), did the stuff just exponentially explode! Let's face it, when one has a child in one's home, the stuff starts flowing in pretty much at birth (bottles, onesies, burp cloths, diapers, diaper accoutrements, rattles, teething toys, binkies, et cetera et cetera et cetera....)


Oh sorry, got carried away on a wave of musical nostalgia there. I'm back now. Shall we dance? No, no, back to the topic at hand.... Stuff. So, there's baby stuff that takes over your entire world. Then, as the baby grows into a child, not only do the number of toys and books and clothing and shoes and mittens and hats and DVDs and stuffed animals grow as well, but so does the art work. Dear me, the art work. The precious scribblings that eventually mature into actual pictures that resemble actual things and people (well, assuming said people have gigantic heads from which their arms protrude and no bodies beyond legs that may or may not include feet)... then they start school and the art projects become multi-dimensional and take up even more space... and then there are the photographs. Oh, the photographs. Now, Kiddo is an only child. Lucky for us, in this regard, as I have, and I am only ever-so-slightly exaggerating here, ninety thousand framed photographs of her hanging on our walls and displayed on shelves and end tables and the piano and, heck, on any mostly-flat surface in my house. (I also have several nieces and nephews, so there are actually additional kiddos who occupy frame space too.) I mean, I had lots of photos in frames before I became a mom; pictures of Hubby and me, our family and friends, even beloved pets... but since Kiddo was born? Egads.

And now, all the stuff? It must go. Tucked into boxes, hauled off to the storage unit, never to see the light of day again until the summer (or late spring, if we're really lucky). Oh, the agony. The good news is that Hubby is not nearly as much of a stuff aficionado as I am, so we aren't hopelessly mired in things. He also is much more likely to get rid of something, to just throw it straight out into the garbage without a second thought, than I. (I must steel myself against looking into the bag after bag after bag he carries out to the garbage bin in the garage. I will confess, in previous moves, I've been known to Dumpster Dive in my own home to rescue some picture or memento or another from the trash.) It is true, most of the stuff Hubby tosses out is stuff I never miss, stuff I haven't thought of in years, but that doesn't mean he's right, right? And you never know when you might need one of those things........

Beyond the hassle of actually boxing stuff up (and the aches of actually loading and unloading it thereafter) is the time-suck involved. Again, this is an area where Hubby does a better, speedier and more efficient job than I. I spent a good hour yesterday thumbing through a pile of random, old things that I'd managed to save for decades now (and which had been living on the topmost shelf of the bookcase that stood in our bedroom for the past nine years, but now is off in the storage unit, leaving a weirdly blank wall in its place). Case in point, this photo, which is a Polaroid (I don't think they're even making Polaroid film any more...) of me surrounded by my sisters, brothers and one of my best friends, taken sometime during the winter of my senior year of high school (oh, and while I'm on the subject of stuff, the dresser you can partially see on the right hand side of the picture? Hubby and I just moved that out of our basement and off to the storage unit yesterday...):
or this newspaper clipping also from my senior year of high school (note: it was January. I was wearing white pants. WHITE PANTS. Granted, they had a black pinstripe, but seriously? White? In January? I don't know that I can even use "it was the 80s!" as an excuse there... I mean, yes, we hadn't been told our picture was going to be taken for the paper that day, but still, I chose to wear white pants in January of my own free will and thought I looked good that way. WTH was I thinking?) (I wish that I could say those white pants were the worst of my youthful fashion transgressions - other than the hair, of course - but alas, I am having horrific flashbacks right now to a different pair of pants. A pair of cream colored, corduroy, jodhpur-style pants. That I wore with knee-high, high heeled, black leather "riding" boots. Thinking I looked good, hip and fashionable. Oh Sweet Godmother of Wilma Flintstone. Why am I even considering going to my upcoming 20th reunion?!) (also note: I blacked out the names of the other kids in the photo here because they may not be so keen on having ancient pictures of themselves bandied about the interwebz):

or this picture, which my youngest brother (then 6 years old) drew for me to hang up in my dorm room my freshman year of college (he and I share a common love of Garfield, which Kiddo now has developed herself):

Yep, I've saved them all for decades. How could I throw them out now? I couldn't, so into a box and off to storage they went yesterday, along with two mismatched socks that Kiddo wore when she was first born, that are so insanely tiny that I can't believe a human being could ever really be small enough to wear them. Kiddo didn't believe it either, when I showed them to her before tucking them into the box. And to think that even though they were "preemie" sized, they still were so large on her that the heel part went halfway up her leg... *sigh* Whoops, sorry, carried away by nostalgia again, my bad.

Other stuff, I am trying really hard to get rid of, though. (Beyond the cellulite - though I must tell you about the Zumba class I did for the first time last Friday morning. That's another post though.) Stuff like old Christmas cards. I never throw away Christmas cards, or at least, not easily. The record for oldest card I came across during this weekend's decluttering? 1991. In my defense, it was a photo card... I also have wedding cards (hello, 1995), congratulatory cards from Kiddo's birth and subsequent baby showers (by being born 5.5 weeks early as she was, she managed to be a guest at all of her baby showers), her baptism, Mother's Day cards (okay, at least those only go back to 2003), anniversary cards, etc. I found in one stash a few cards and notes that Hubby gave me back when we were first dating. Awwwwwwww. I showed a few of them to Hubby when he came upstairs to check on my progress - or more accurately, as he suspected, lack thereof, and he just rolled his eyes. Romance and nostalgia really are the stuff-keeping enemies of Operation Declutter.

So, in closing, 2009 is turning out to be the Year of the Great Decluttering here in Heather's world. Just promise you won't laugh if you spot me rooting through the trash bags to reclaim some of my stuff, or sneaking off to the storage unit to visit my stuff in the months to come, mmmkay? As you can see from what I've already shared above, if I've known you (IRL) for any length of time, the odds are quite good that I still have photos you might not want me to make public...!

What about you guys? Is anyone else a victim of nostalgia and sentimentality like I am? Any other pack rats (no pejorative connotation intended) besides me? What do you do with old cards and letters? Should I try to sell some of the more valuable stuff on Craiglist or Ebay, or just go ahead and freecycle it all like Hubby wants to get rid of it faster? Anyone want to buy a ladies' Movado Museum watch, never worn, new in box? (I would've worn it but the dang strap is too delicate and short for my ginormous man-hand wrist.) What was your worst teenage fashion mistake, and would you care to share a photo of it with the blogosphere? *grin*

When worlds collide part deux

Yes, I'm back - still here and not, as Hubby put it on the phone when I called him post-lunch, brimming with excitement, "chopped up in a million pieces in the back of some weirdo's trunk." Hee! Kristin was just as wonderful as I knew she'd be from stalking - erm, I mean loyally following - her blog and haunting her Facebook page as well. She was gracious, friendly, fun, as talkative and outgoing as I am, and also told me exactly how it is that all those big boats we see cruising up and down the canal manage to get onto the canal - I'd always wondered and now I know! Woo! Plus, she enjoyed the same kinda lunch I do, that being a cheeseburger and fries, though I opted for a cherry Pepsi and its caffeine over the milkshake, which, while delicious, wouldn't quite have given me the same caffeine boost. (Also, I would've wanted an Oreo shake, and I don't do Oreo shakes in public, because one of my things is how I never eat Oreos in public since I always, always manage to get little, black specks stuck between ALL my teeth. I didn't want to scare Kristin off before she'd even gotten to know me, after all, not to mention I don't like asking people "Do I have something stuck in my teeth?" at a first meeting!)

Anyhow, Kristin had her camera and some kindly gents who were walking through the parking lot post-lunch offered to take a picture of us both, along with a bunch (literally!) of humongous balloons that her daughter (who has the same name as my kiddo) brought home from an event last night. Kiddo is presently enjoying them in her room, which is how I have a moment to sit at the computer at this time of day...



So, yay to meeting bloggy buddies IRL and having them be wonderful and not Creepy Dudes who live in their mother's basement, and yay yay yay for new friends!

This is one way to spend a Sunday afternoon...

Yep, that's me on the far left of the "Spring!" ride at our local amusement park. (It really deserves its exclamation point...) This was my first time on it, despite being season pass holders to this amusement park for the past two years, and Hubby had to capture the moment for posterity as he couldn't believe I was actually willingly partaking of this ride. (The kiddo, who rode the Spring! with me, had been on it before.)

In case you haven't read through my archives, I have a bit of a thing about heights. (Hence Hubby's astonishment at my willingness to get on this contraption.) I'd like to say I was brave and confident enough to make it through the approximately 2 minutes that the Spring! bounces up and down and up and down and up and down.........


Sorry the close-up is a bit grainy - Hubby was shooting with our new camera for the first time and was playing around with various settings. However, even with the fuzziness, I believe you can still clearly see that yes, I am screaming my fool head off.

The things we do for fun........

(The Spring! still beats going on the Tilt-A-Whirl or the Spinning Teacups, both of which fall squarely in Hubby's domain.)

Let's go to the movies!

Back in the pre-kiddo days, Hubby and I went to the movies a lot. We saw everything. Seriously. There were some really not-very-good or utterly random movies that we saw in the theater. Movies that now, when we flip past them on TV, we turn to each other and say "Can you believe we once paid money to see this in the theater?" But back then, it wasn't odd. The only time we didn't go to the movies was when we'd already seen everything that was playing in town. We'd see at least one movie a week, sometimes two or three. By the time the Oscars rolled around, we'd already seen all the nominated films and performances. I was an ace at picking winners in the various Oscar pools back in those days...

That all changed, as we feared it would, once the kiddo was born. Now, going to the movies is a Major Event for us. (Case in point: we didn't see Million Dollar Baby, despite all its Oscar gold, until it was on TV. Not even in DVD new release, but when it was the Saturday night movie on HBO.) All the other parents out there reading this will be nodding understandingly right now, I'm sure. It somehow becomes exponentially more challenging to go to the movies once there are younger children in the mix. First, there's the money issue. I'm not even talking about the insane cost of tickets or the popcorn and sodas. (Though that "golden flavored topping" must really contain actual gold to cost what it does for a nickel's worth of unpopped corn kernels, not that we ever get the "topping" because ew, could there be a more chemical-rich, natural food ingredient-free substance on Earth?) Movies were pretty expensive five years ago, too. But, when one adds in the price of a babysitter, well that doubles the cost of an evening at the movies before we've even walked out the door. Then, there's the time factor. Most of the time, we're too pooped by Friday night to head out in the evening, and by the time Saturday night rolls around, we're pooped again. (Perhaps this has less to do with having a kid and more to do with the fact that we're just getting oooooolder...) We used to go to matinees a lot, pre-Kiddo, but now our weekend days are taken up with family activities, so there isn't as much free time to spend a couple of hours at a movie theater except in the evenings, when, like I said, we can barely keep our eyes open long enough to watch a movie from the comfort of our own couch.

What winds up happening is that nowadays, we judge which movies to see in the theater much more discriminatingly than we did pre-Kiddo. It takes something like a Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings to get us to go through the effort of lining up a sitter, ingesting sufficient caffeine and/or napping in preparation for a night out, and spending the money. Whereas before, a passing interest was enough to get us to plunk down our dough and park ourselves in stadium seats in the dark, now, it has to be something BIG.

That was, happily, the case this weekend. We secured a babysitter, took out a second mortgage to amply stuff our wallets with cash (not really, but seriously - $17 for a popcorn and two sodas? Oy!) and headed out to the multiplex. The movie that got us out to the theater was The Dark Knight. (The last movie we saw in the theater prior to today was VeggieTales Pirates Who Don't Do Anything, last January. Oh, and I did see Sweeney Todd - can't miss Alan Rickman, after all, plus it was a musical! Not just any musical, but Sondheim! So, that is TWO movies in the theater, seven months ago. Pathetic!)

Yes, the movie was great, just as we'd hoped - yay! (Hubby and I both loved Batman Begins, which, sadly, we did not see in the theater but on DVD. One more reason we really wanted to catch this one on the big screen.) Heath Ledger definitely warrants all the good press, though I do wonder if he'd be considered such a sure thing for an Oscar nod if he hadn't died... The one thing that took me by surprise, considering that I'm a spoilery kinda girl - I cannot resist reading a spoiler, yep, I'll always click the link or scroll down or keep reading - was Aaron Eckhart. I was not expecting what I saw regarding his character at all, and yes, I am familiar with the characters in the Batman story. I don't want to spoil anything for anyone else (there must be a few folks out there who haven't seen the movie yet besides us, right?) so I'll try not to get too specific here. Let me just say that Eckhart's character is going to give me nightmares, I'm sure of it. I wound up trying to block things out on screen with my hand but it was too late. I'm the owner of a very active imagination, and Eckhart ties in nicely to two of my worst, recurring nightmare themes. There are images now seared on my brain that will be waking me up around 2am for weeks to come. Dagnabit. This is totally like when I went to see Pet Semetary, and was greeting characters from that film in my dreams for weeks thereafter. I've already warned Hubby, so he will be prepared should I wake up screaming in terror... I'm just hoping that some nice, white noise rainfall sounds on my iPod will be enough to lull my subconscious into dream-free submission...

But potential nightmare issues aside, I'm really glad we went to the movies today. I can't wait until the kiddo is old enough to see more grown-up fare and we can resume our more regular movie-going habit again. I wonder what the next movie we'll go to see in the theater will be? Probably Harry Potter in November... It certainly won't be The Mummy 3 or even Mamma Mia, which are two films I betcha we'd have seen as new releases back in the day...

Confession: I'm a Starbucksaphobic

I just finished reading an amusing post over on a fellow SITSta's blog, and even as I chuckled, I felt that familiar feeling of, well, not dread exactly, but more like... unease, creeping through me.

You see, I have a phobia. Not one of my things as much as a pure, all-out anxiety. That phobia is this.... *deep breath* I'm scared of Starbucks. Not just scared, terrified, and not just Starbucks, actually, but any of those "hip" or "trendy" coffee joints. You know, the places where they have baristas instead of waiters, where the sizes are things like venti or grande (which I think is supposed to be a medium, and then "tall" is actually "small" right?) and one is forced to use descriptions like "skinny" to apply to a beverage. (Actually, I object to having to refer to any food as "skinny" now that I think about it, dagnabit!)

I simply cannot place an order at Starbucks. I get nervous at the thought - my palms are getting clammy even as I type this. It is utterly confounding to me how one gets a plain, old beverage there.

Of course, it probably doesn't help that I don't drink coffee. That might account for how the current trend of fancy coffees has passed me by and left me, quaking and uncaffeinated*, in the dark. I'll have a cappuccino or espresso every once in a great while when out to dine in a nicer Italian restaurant. (Seeing as how we rarely go out to dine anywhere that doesn't automatically come with paper napkins, straws for one's beverage and usually some sort of toy or prize included with the meal, you can figure out how just how infrequently this occurs.) I've probably had 4 coffee-based beverages in the past 10 years.

That isn't to say I don't enjoy other beverages that are served in a Starbucksesque establishment. I'm groovy with a nice, warm cup of chai, and I'm a total fool for a good hot chocolate. As a matter of fact, when my sister-in-law still lived in town and worked for a time at Starbucks, she would make me the best hot chocolates (not according to strict Starbucks recipe though - she'd add extra squirts of chocolate to them for me). Even with family working there, I still trembled at the thought of walking up to the counter, and when she was there, I didn't even have to really order, per se. (SIL eventually left Starbucks and our town in favor of a career lawyering down in the big city. Law school included a stint working at the Gap, which coincided nicely with the kiddo being born, so as a babe, she was decked out in all manner of hip-n-trendy baby clothes courtesy of her aunt, including a black, turtleneck onesie in which the kiddo-as-a-babe looked ready to take up residence on the Left Bank and frequent poetry open mic nights with a carafe of wine and a croissant. But I digress...)

So, Starbucks (and other coffee joints of its ilk). It scares me. I face that menu board and it is like I am unable to read or understand the language. I don't get why it is necessary to have such a complicated menu. Is it just that it is cool to say you want a venti, skinny, half-caff Americano? (I totally just googled "Starbucks ordering menu" to get those terms, btw.) I mean, I confess I'm a bit of a nerd and also kinda square, so maybe I'm just missing out on the fun or coolness factor here.

Perhaps if there were a Starbucks for Dummies I could study up on, I could conquer my fear. Then again, I can just keep on avoiding fancy coffee shops and not have to worry about it at all...

* I don't actually avoid caffeine, mind you. Perish the thought! I'm as eager to get my blood pumping with a nice jolt of caffeine in the morning as the next mom of a five-and-under. I prefer to get my caffeine, when necessary, from either soda (or pop as they say in my present neck of the woods) or chocolate. Yes, I drink soda in the morning - not every morning, but when necessary. Like right now, when I've got a cup of Mountain Dew's new "Voltage" flavor sitting next to my bowl of yogurt, blueberries and granola. Don't judge me, you coffee-drinkin' freaks, and I won't judge you either. Deal?

Meme tag

Okay, my friend Andy tagged me with this meme days ago, so I'd better get to it...

Favorite person (outside family)? I have a few BFFs that I've been friends with for years (and in one case, decades) now, and they all rate "favorite person" status in my book. In the online world, I adore my fellow Beat Cats - a great group of women and I'm happy and humbled to be friends with them all.

Favorite food? My favorite food category is also my dietary downfall: dairy! From cheese to butter to sour cream to ice cream, I just love dairy products. Especially cheese. And ice cream. Thank goodness my second-favorite food groups are fruits and veggies, otherwise I'd be in real trouble!

Quirks about you? Isn't this the same as the various things I keep blogging about? Well, let me think of a new one.... hmmm. Here's one I don't think I've mentioned yet: I am part shark! Okay, not really, but I did have an extra set of adult teeth that started making their presence known when I was just a tiny tot. That led to eons of orthodontia (I'm fairly certain Drs. Wright and Sterritt are now comfortably ensconced in their respective palatial island villas thanks to my wonkiest of teeth) and also many, many, many pulled teeth. Too bad the Tooth Fairy only handed out a quarter per tooth at the most back then - I could have my own (albeit slightly less palatial) island villa by now if she'd been paying out at today's rates!

How would the person who loves you most describe you in ten words or less? Patient, loyal, talkative, funny, high-maintenance and a little bit crazy.

Any regrets in life? Regrets, I've had a few, but then again, too few to mention... I guess the thing that I regret the most is a bad relationship I stayed in for much too long and for allowing myself to continue believing that loving someone enough could make them change, even when I was getting hurt on a daily basis - it took me a long time to acknowledge that there are just some people out there in the world who are irredeemably, unrepentantly bad. I also regret ever wishing for time to pass more quickly when I was younger because these days, it goes by much too fast!

Favorite Charity/Cause? I'm all about Sensory Processing Disorder and children with special needs these days (hmmm, I wonder why?) and since in general I'm a bleeding heart liberal, I believe in many, many causes (and hopefully the next US President believes in some of them too...change we can believe in...)

Favorite Blog recently? Does I Can Has Cheezburger count? I am presently a teensy bit obsessed with turning our real life kitty into a LOLcat, so I've been alternately stalking her with my digital camera and spending large chunks of time poring over the latest LOLcats (and laughing a lot) while I wait to capture the perfect shot. (No one ever accused me of having a lack of ambition!)

Something you can’t get enough of? My family, Scrabulous, fresh fruit, time in the day, George Clooney and endurance to adequately up my workouts at the gym.

Worst job you’ve ever had? Telemarketing - I lasted one evening! It was a gig through a temp agency that Hubby - then just my boyfriend - and I signed up for one summer during college. The job was poorly explained to us and turned out to be terrible. We both hated it and barely made it through our shift. At the end of the night, we went to get our timecards signed by the supervisor, who was upset because apparently it was a multi-week assignment (we'd been told by the temp agency that it was just for that one night) and it was a struggle to even get paid since he said we were quitting. It was a misunderstanding and we legitimately only thought we were going to be working that one night, but even if we had initially agreed to do the whole stint, we would've quit. Ugh!

A close second to that job was the summer I dog-sat for some friends of my parents who owned, bred and showed AKC dogs - mostly pugs, along with some bulldogs and a couple of boxers. The dogs lived in crates in this big, basement kennel and had to be let out into the dog run (a large yard) several times a day. Let me just say that me and dog poop? We don't mix well. The smell of dog poop induces my barf reflex faster than any other smell on Earth. I can take cat barf, kid barf, any other animal or human waste, really, but there's something about dog poop... even thinking about cleaning out the crates (some of the dogs weren't entirely housebroken) or scooping the dog run now, over 20 years later, makes me want to vomit.

What job would you pay NOT to have? Dog poop cleaner (ha ha ha)... Podiatrist or pedicurist, dentist, slaughterhouse worker... there are a lot of jobs out there I would not want to attempt, no matter what the salary!

Favorite Bible verse right now? Well, there's always good, old John 3:16, can't go wrong with that one. Also, Philippians 4:4-9 and 1 Corinthians 13. Those aren't my "right now" favorites as much as my "all time" favorites.

Guilty Pleasure? Bad television, well-buttered and salted popcorn (real butter, please, none of that "golden-flavored oil" crap they try to give you at the movies) and wearing jammies for as much of my day as I can possibly get away with.

Got any confessions? I bite my nails. I also don't thoroughly rinse out the milk jugs before I throw them in the recycling bin. There may be others, but not that I'll 'fess up to here and now.

If you HAD to spend $1,000 on YOURSELF, how would you spend it? I'd buy a mega-supply of the daily, disposable contact lenses that are now the only kind I am able to wear. They're more than twice the cost per box of my former lenses, so $1000 would cover me for a little less than two years' worth of daily lens wear. I'd stretch it out, of course - I betcha I could make $1000 worth of lenses last me at least 3 years.

Favorite thing about your house? Our yard, which Hubby and I put in - every last blade of grass, tree, shrub and plant. We had our house built, so when we moved in, there was no yard, just uneven, rock-filled clay covered with a scant, pitiful layer of "top soil" that did nothing to improve the quality of what lurked underneath. Close second: the kiddo's room, which is the only room in our house that we've "done" (paint, border, etc) in the 8.5 years we've lived here. The rest of our walls are the original eggshell white the builders painted them. Pathetic, I know.

Least favorite thing about your house? Lack of a playroom/rec room for the kiddo, in which to house her stuff. It'd be awfully nice to have a coffee table instead of a mini-trampoline in the living room, for example... Another full bathroom would be nice, too. And having walls that were painted with something better than the "scuffs, stains and chips easily" finish in eggshell white, especially in the kitchen and bathrooms. (And painted by someone other than Hubby and/or me.)

One thing you’re good at? Being a mom. Not to boast or anything, but it has been my favorite job and the thing I'm most proud of, and I do think I'm pretty good at it most days.

If you could change something about your circumstances, what would it be? I would make us wealthy enough that our retirement and the kiddo's higher education were assured, and that our parents' retirements (which are much closer to reality) also were financially secure.

Who would you like to meet someday? All my Beat Cat friends. Preferably in a tropical location with delicious, frozen, fruity beverages on hand.

Who is your real life hero? My husband.

What is the hardest part of your job? Well, I'm a stay-at-home mom, so the hardest part of my job is the paycheck - or lack thereof, I suppose. Seriously, though, there are times when being the parent of a child with SPD can be pretty challenging, either from dealing with the kiddo herself or the wider world in relation to the kiddo. Some people just don't get it, and that can make things tough.

When are you most relaxed? When I'm home, in my jammies, with my family, snuggled under one of the pile of throw blankets on the back of the couch with the cat purring on my feet.

What stresses you out? Money, the rising cost of gas and groceries, when someone in my family is stressed out (or my friends), when the kiddo is having a bad day, wondering exactly where our country is headed and if the best candidate will be our next president...

What can you not live without? My family.

Do you agree or disagree with the recent article that reported that blogs are authored by narcissists? I'd be willing to venture that more bloggers than not are narcissists, but aren't we all to some degree, blogs or no?

Why do you blog? I enjoy reading other folks' blogs, so I figured maybe someone out there would enjoy reading mine. (Yep, narcissistic - there ya go!)

Who are you tagging? Like my dear friend Coco, I'm going to defy the Meme Rule Gods. Anyone out there who reads this and blogs and feels like playing, consider yourself tagged. Please link back so we know you did!

And here are the RULES, which I kinda disregarded for #3:
1. Answer the questions
2. Link back to whoever tagged you
3. Tag eight bloggers to do the same, 2 from each category:
New/ newer bloggers (since we want to share the love and send them traffic)
Bloggy friends
Bloggers you’d like to get to know better
Bloggers you don’t think will respond, but you hope will.

If you're reading this in the buff, I don't want to know...

I am a very social, outgoing person. I will talk to just about anyone, just about anytime. I will strike up conversations with complete strangers without a moment's thought. Yes, I am that person who starts talking to you over the banana selection in the grocery store, or while waiting in line at the post office, or sitting on the benches at the playground. I know this isn't everyone's cup of tea (including my own hubby, who is far more introverted than I) and that some people are positively put off by having a total stranger start chatting with them, however innocuous said chatting may be.

You know what puts me off? There is one thing, socially, that I cannot take. I have this thing about having conversations with total strangers if either those strangers or I myself am in a state of undress. Call me a prude, but yikes, I cannot stand it.

Unfortunately, my current fitness regime is now affording me at least six chances a week for Naked Stranger Chat to occur. You see, I've been going to the gym at least once a day to work out (trying to go while the kiddo is in school, but some days I have to bring her with me, deposit her in the Child Watch "Kids' Gym" play area and then do my thing) and those during-the-day hours are when the Y women's locker room is positively crawling with nude oldsters. (Thank you, Silver Sneakers program.) I mean, kudos to the seniors who are committed to keeping in shape and staying active and healthy. I salute you. I just prefer not to do it while either of us are au naturel.

And I'm not just talking about a friendly nod or "Hi" here, either, lest you think I am insanely uptight. No, I'm talking full-on, multi-paragraph conversational exchanges. Like the other day, when I was cornered en route to my locker by a larger, older woman who wanted to learn all about my iPod - or "iPer" as she called it. (I'd left my earphones in as an evasionary tactic, thinking if I clearly couldn't hear anyone, they wouldn't talk to me. Wrong. They just came closer and talked louder. Eek.) She started out three lockers down (a decent space) and advanced inexorably even as I backed away 'til there was no more away in which to back. Even worse, I was trapped between a row of lockers, the full length mirror (so it was like she was in front of and behind me) and a bench upon which sat another naked old bird. She was busily covering every last ounce of her skin with a generous slathering of lotion (seriously - at one point she lifted each boob in turn in order to lotion up the area underneath, thoroughly and meticulously) so clearly, I did not want to get any closer to that action. Lotion Lady joined in the iPod conversation, as they both have grandkids who are perpetually plugged into those silly contraptions, and it was an excrutiating four minutes before I could extricate myself and flee the scene. I've had other, slightly less terrifying conversational situations with the nekkid Silver Sneakers crew, (notably yesterday when the locker room was positively buzzing with chatter about the snow flurries we had in the morning. I know, snow in May - gah!) and I'm getting a bit better at not getting that "deer in headlights" look I've caught in my reflection (there are mirrors everywhere in the locker room) though I think it is more of a "naked appendage wobbling within my personal space border" look, which is perfectly understandable. I mean, these ladies put their business everywhere - on the benches (no towel underneath them), at the sinks, in the toilet stalls, using the hair dryers. Seriously, why can't they just get dressed first, do all these things later? Though as long as they get dressed before they talk to me, that's all I really care about. (I also make absolutely certain that no bare flesh belonging to either myself or the kiddo ever comes into direct contact with any of the benches, or the floor - last week, the kiddo and I observed a woman giving herself a Naked Pedicure. Not just a quick repair job on a stubbed toenail, mind you, but full-on, filing the callouses off the bottoms of her heels and clipping her toenails - there were nail clippings and bits of skin flying everywhere. Ew.)

Maybe when I'm a senior myself, I won't have such issues and will cheerfully stand around in the buff, talking to total strangers about my grandchildren, the weather, the temperature in the pool for today's Osteoarthritis Water Aerobics class, or which episode of Matlock or Murder, She Wrote was on the day before. Maybe. That day, however, is still a few decades off, so in the meantime, I'll have to come up with some other strategy to avoid Naked Chatting in the locker room. *shudder*

Six random things

Whee, another meme - this one from my dear friend Coco's blog...

Six Random Things About ME!

1. I can wiggle my ears. (This may not sound like much, but it has already garnered me Coolest Aunt Ever status in the eyes of my four-year-old nephew, who was quite disgusted to learn that his own mother can't do this. "But Aunt Heather can, Mom!" Hee!)

2. My feet are two different sizes, both unfortunately large. My left foot is a 10, my right foot is a 9. I generally buy size 10s and then deal with always having one shoe being a size too large. I recently read Helen Mirren's new memoir and she mentions in it that she too has two different sized feet, and mentions the first time she ever had shoes that fit both her feet, which happened after getting two different pairs - this was the year she won all the awards for playing Queen Elizabeth, so apparently I just need to get nominated for an Oscar (or at least a Golden Globe) and then I'll be able to have two matching-yet-different-size shoes brought to me, along with fabulous, couture gowns. At the very least, it is something that Dame Helen and I have in common, so that's kinda kewl.

3. I eat my food one thing at a time. Always have, ever since I was a child. I also have issues (aka another one of my things) with foods touching. I don't have a conscious pattern or plan to the order in which I eat my food, but after trying to figure out what my subconscious pattern is, I've found I generally eat the meat item last and I usually start with the vegetables, unless there's salad and then I eat that first. I must say one of the things I enjoyed when I lived in Italy (student exchange the summer before my junior year of high school) was the fact that meals were served one thing (course) at a time, even at home for plain, old, non-company, informal meals. Also, I rotate my plate so the food that I'm eating is closest to me. Yes, buffets and holidays are rather nightmarish, and yes, I'm the butt of many jokes (my uncle never fails to ask me if I want one of those plates with the dividers at Christmas dinner) because of it, but I just can't help it!!

4. I was on Jeopardy once. (March 11, 2003 to be exact.) I came in second thanks to a killer Final Jeopardy question, but Hubby was proud of me for "not betting like a girl" on the Daily Double or FJ and I don't think I embarassed myself too badly at any point. (Of the questions I answered, I only got two wrong. Not too shabby.) Even though I didn't win (cue Weird Al here), we still threw a huge viewing party - over 100 friends came, ate pizza and cake (that featured the picture below on it - no one would eat my face HEE!) and watched my 22 minutes of semi-fame. So much fun!!

5. I cannot for the life of me dance. I have zero dancing ability. I cannot, even with lessons, adequately or accurately perform any real dance steps. This was more of an issue back in school, when I longed for a career in musical theatre but dreaded (and failed miserably) each and every dance required of my part in the various school shows. The worst of the school show dances was senior year when I had to jitterbug... I still feel the need to apologize to the unlucky boys who had to suffer through being my partner back then. Nowadays, my public dancing opportunities are much more limited, and it's a good thing, too. The Electric Slide? I'll invariably wind up facing the wrong direction. Forget anything more complicated than that. I did briefly master the Macarena (the year it came out and was all the rage, several of our friends had weddings, so I had the opportunity to see it, if not do it, on a pretty regular basis) but even that has left me. Just about the only dance I can do is the Hokey Pokey - I even manage to screw up the Chicken Dance. Yes, I am that stereotypical Rhythmically Challenged White Person. I'm not quite as bad as Elaine Benis, however...

6. I know how to dock tails and perform castrations, and I've done both many times in my life. (To lambs, folks, let's not let imaginations run wild here...) I actually know multiple methods for properly castrating and docking tails. When I was in fourth grade, we had a public speaking assignment for which we were to do a five minute presentation on a topic that would be "different, interesting and educational" for our classmates. When I mentioned this assignment at dinner that night, my father (he of the perennial jokester personality) suggested I do docking and castration, pointing out it wasn't something anyone else in my class was likely to know much about. (True enough - the only other kid in my class who lived on a farm was a boy named Dale, and his family just kept chickens - no docking or castration required there.) Unfortunately for my future chances at popularity, I took Dad seriously and duly created my five minute presentation on just that subject, complete with illustrated diagrams drawn carefully on large sheets of OakTag, and memorized my speech. The morning of the presentation, I asked my mother if I could take our elastrator to school as a prop. It was then my parents realized what my topic was, and this was not the most opportune time to learn Dad had been kidding. It was too late to change subjects at this point, and I was darn proud of the effort I'd put into it and insisted I wasn't redoing anything. So, I sealed my fate as Weirdo Nerd Girl by confidently and loudly describing the various methods of docking and castration, with color diagrams and props. No one had a single question for me (I'm sure if we'd been in junior or senior high, they would've come up with something), but the teacher, who had left the room and returned with a few other teachers specifically to watch my presentation, could barely stifle her laughter. She was crying from the effort of not laughing. Thank goodness this was before the digital video, camera phone and YouTube era. I did, later that year, do the same presentation to fulfill an annual requirement for my 4-H club, and no one - not a child or adult - found my topic the least bit funny then. It seriously was several years later before I realized the true extent of what I'd done that day. Obliviousness and innocence saved me on that actual day in 4th grade, but retroactively, I was horrified!

So there you go. Six random things about me. Feel free to join in the fun, either in the comments section here or on your own blog, and please link back if you do!

(Oh and in non-random things about me related news, the kiddo is doing much better. No more vomiting, no more fever, enough antibiotic in her that school looks like a probability for tomorrow.)

I? Am an eeeediot, with a capital EEEEEE.

Seriously, I'm losing whatever few remaining marbles I once had rolling about the vast cavern of my noggin...

The latest YMCA session brochure came in the mail a few weeks ago. We've been planning to sign the kiddo up for swimming lessons again for the summer, so I figured I'd start with the Spring II session that goes through June as well as the June-August summer session. (The kiddo is seriously part fish, and has adored swimming lessons since we first started taking her, back when she was two and a mere "Shrimp-Kipper" in the pool with Mommy or Daddy. At the end of last summer, she passed the test to move up from "Pike" to "Eel" which is when the kids are in the deep end of the big, cold pool, instead of in the shallow, warm-water instructional pool. The Big Time! Oh, and also thankfully well beyond the "parent in the pool" level as well, woot woot!) I procrastinated, as is my style, on doing the registration (which could be done many ways - online, over the phone, by mail.....) until the other day when I was at the Y to work out and therefore had to be at the front desk anyway to check in, so I finally got around to it, since after all classes started for the new session this week. Yes, I patted myself heartily on the back for finally getting her registered on Monday for the class starting this afternoon. Talked up the whole swimming lesson thing to the kiddo all week, getting her even MORE psyched than she already was about the recommencement of swimming for the season. Today was an agonizing trial of patience for her, since school lets out at 11:30 but swimming doesn't start until 4. I tried to fill the time up with various tasks and errands that had to be done anyhow, thinking it would help time pass - things that she usually enjoys, even, like the post office and the drive-thru teller lane at the bank (y'know, where the cannister shoooooops up the tube and into the little banking outpost office like magic...). She got progressively more grumpy that it wasn't yet time for swimming with every passing millisecond. It was on the verge of getting ugly. She had her (brand new, chosen by the kiddo herself from the Land's End catalog and delivered to her by the UPS dude last week) bathing suit on by 2:30 and everything.

FINALLY it was time to head over to the Y. She was literally BOUNCING with glee at the impending swimming lesson - a bundle of pure excitement and joy. She didn't even complain about the pre-pool shower (which in a few weeks I'm sure will revert to its previous PITA status and become once again the thing I try to avoid if the lifeguards aren't paying attention) and was sitting poolside with the other kids with a few minutes to spare 'til 4pm.

I say hello (being the "talk to anyone" sort that I am) to the other mothers who are sitting on the bench opposite from where the kids are sitting, and catch an odd look or two in response. Well, I'd be lying if I said that catching odd looks from folks was an unusual occurrence for me - alas, it isn't. I usually chalk up this particular level of look as a "wow, this total stranger sure is chatty" type and don't really give it another thought. (As opposed to a serious Hairy Eyeball look, which is just one reason why another of my things is a total phobia of being out in public with my fly inadvertently open, and why I therefore typically safety-pin my zippers to the back of the button placket on any pants/jeans/shorts I am wearing. Also why I will never eat Oreos in public - they are the one food that invariably encrusts itself between all my teeth in a weird, chocolate grillz sorta way that makes me therefore horribly self-conscious about eating them outside the privacy of my own home/minivan, where floss and/or toothbrushes are handy. But I digress...) I wandered back over to where the kiddo was sitting poolside as the teachers swam up. I'd only intended to introduce the kiddo and explain that she was a brand-new Eel who hadn't taken lessons since the end of last summer, and as such might be a bit rusty on certain things, but as I was launching into this little spiel, I noticed I was getting the same Odd Look from the teacher.

Hmmm. This was a bit puzzling, I mean, after all, she's the teacher, shouldn't she be expecting my officially-registered child? Doesn't she have the list somewhere with the kiddo's name thereon?

Well. Turns out that the class that the kiddo is in starts NEXT week. Today was the final class of the session that's been going on for the past two months.

Damn. I am an eeeeeeediot. I must've looked at the YMCA brochure at least a dozen times in the past few weeks, and I'm telling you that I was absolutely positive it said that this session was starting this week - the 21st. Nope.

The panic that filled my heart must've been showing on my face at this point, because all I was thinking was "Oh holy heck, now I've got to pull the kiddo away from the pool while the other kids hop in the water, strip her of her bubble and haul her out of here and that is no going to be pretty AT ALL" because the oh-so-kind teacher then went on to say "But she can stay for today, that's fine."

Bless that woman. She saved me from what would've been the Meltdown to End All Meltdowns. I made a thousand apologies to her at the end of class, and she graciously said that she totally understood where I could've gotten confused, since normally the sessions are timed with the school calendars, and as Spring Break was last week, it was eminently sensible for one to assume the new session began this week, but for some reason the sessions didn't match up with the calendar just this one time.

Eminently sensible for one who didn't see the lime-green lettering on the brochure on one's kitchen counter that reads "SPRING SESSION II: APRIL 28" across the front in 36 point font, that is...

So, my latest Bad Mommy Moment was averted thanks only to the kind-heartedness of the YMCA swim instructor. The kiddo went on to get right back in the groove and was happily swimming laps (in the big pool!) and jumping in off the side in no time. I think I may bring her flowers next week...

Why I will never, ever use a neti pot, except on one (highly improbable) condition

I know, I know, neti pots are fantabulous and using one would cure me of all my ills. Here's the thing about why I will never, ever willingly use a neti pot. I haaaaaaate getting water in my nose. Actually, in my nose, eyes or ears. Now, regarding the ears, I have good reason - I'm super-prone to getting ear infections and even getting a drop or two of water in them in the shower can bring on a doozy. As a kid, I had loads of ear infections, including a double-eardrum-rupture sitch on an airplane en route to Florida. Ow. So, my over-caution with water in the ears, not an unfounded concern. The eyes and the nose, I have no valid reasons, it's just a thing of mine. You know, a thing... we all have 'em, right? When I had to swim underwater as a child, like for swimming lessons, I would suit up from goggles through nose clips and ear plugs. Seriously. Nowadays, I have no reason to go underwater. If I'm in a pool (and I am quite a bit these days as the kiddo appears to be part fish), I do that genteel, leave-my-glasses-on, half-assed backstroke or pseudo-doggy-paddle/frontstroke that keeps my ears and face nice and dry. If heat-induced insanity or other madness takes momentary hold and I do decide to dunk underneath the surface, I will close my eyes and hold my nose and ears closed for the entire time I'm submerged. Yes, it is a tremendously funny sight, I know. But, it is a thing of mine, and thus, I will never willingly insert anything up my nose that will flood it with water or any other liquid. Unless George Clooney asked me personally to do so, and I seriously doubt that George is overly concerned with or even aware of the state of my sinuses. I won't even do it at my doctor's suggestion/advice/order - when we lived in NH, I had a crotchety, old country sort of doctah who advised me to fill a serving spoon with warm water and salt and snort that concoction every two hours 'til my sinus infection cleared. Never did it once, though I have become accustomed to using the saline nasal misty spray stuff. So, there you go. I have many things and this is one of them. Maybe I'll post about one of my things each week... that'll be sure to entertain and amuse the masses! Hee!

At least the nasal steroid spray (which smells weirdly of roses and geraniums - kinda like an old lady-esque perfume) is not that bad to administer and working very well. By this afternoon, fully dosed up on the nasal stuff, Muccinex, Tylenol and Advil, I felt up to the task of bringing the kiddo to a classmate's birthday party. I lasted as long as the kiddo did, but an hour and a half inside one of those "greenhouse-style-glass-from-floor-to-ceiling" McDonald's Playplaces with 18 screaming, crazy 4 and 5 year olds? Not what the doctor, George Clooney, or anyone else ordered. Whew. I'm so beat now that I'm planning to be in bed by 8pm. Maybe 7...

Oh - one last thing, have to give a quick shout-out to my hubby for subbing for me as worship leader in church this morning, which was a Communion Sunday on top of everything else. Thanks, dude!