Do you know anybody

with the middle name Wayne?

Beware

Grandpa Weeks loved Marmaduke

I always wanted a Great Dane like Marmaduke. Now I found this site and, no offense to Marmaduke, his creator, or my Grandpa Weeks, but it's pretty damn funny:

Marmaduke Explained

Shelf

Feeling oh-so-proud
Ikea shelf self-installed
Nuts. Where's that level?

What was I thinking / H is for Helper / TH is for ?

Choir practice last night. If I do say so myself, we sound kind of awesome after only three reheasals. But last night when I walked into rehearsal I wondered were we really going to be able to sing well the first concert on Sunday? Then I looked more closely at the schedule. A-ha. I missed a couple of things. Before each concert it appears there are two extra 2.5 hour practices. I totally missed that. So I had to cross off my list not one but two ladies' nights out this week. Next time...

And then Hope. She's only four and we admire her work ethic. Give that girl some corn to shuck, windows to wipe, carpet to vacuum, dogs to feed, YMCA towels to fold and watch her go to town! She was my tag-along this afternoon and in each and every errand she made herself useful:

1. Dress-fitting (choir dress). The sewing lady seemed to be impressed with wee Hope's quiet help. She stood beside the woman while she stuck pins in my dress, stepped a little closer, and before I knew it, Hope was putting the pins in the hem and marking it with chalk, then pulling out the pins and putting them back on the pin cushion. Just doing what the lady told her to do.

2. Hair cuts. Things were slow at Fantastic Sam's so when Hope asked if she could sweep up the hair after her hair cut and mine the owner said, "By all means!" She swept it into the dust pan and carried it all to the garbage. All by her little self.

3. Grocery shopping. We try not to shop at Byerly's because it's so freakin expensive. But it is soooo luxurious I can't help it sometimes. Plus they bag your groceries and I'm from Iowa where bagging your own groceries is unheard of. (That's one of the bigger adjustments an Iowan has to make when she moves to Minnesota, by the way.) So we shopped for a few items (kettle corn) and then Hope asked the clerk if she could help unload the car cart. And she did. About 15 items including two 12 packs of La Croix that she lifted herself.

She was a hard worker today. Hope, we salute you and your work ethic.

And then there's Hank. He's turning into a great reader and a good student who gets his homework done right away. Every afternoon when he gets off the bus, the first thing he does is open up his library book or magazine and sits on the couch to read.

But we have some learning to do:

MOM. Danny said the TH word to the teacher today!

(The TH word?)

He told her to SHUT UP!

Bumper sticker

I child-proofed my house
but they keep finding a way in.

Sink or swim

Hank has a friend who is a good swimmer and his mother suggested that Hank join this friend in participating on a swim team. We went to the first practice tonight so that the coach could watch him swim and decide if he was team material.

Apparently anyone can be on this swim team because, although the coach kept asking Hank to get out of the water and walk to the end of the lane because I'm pretty sure he was afraid -- like I was -- that Hank and his 0.2% body fat might drown during the inaugural practice session, the coach tossed him a team swim cap at the end and said, "Hank, buddy? You're in."

Swim little fishy, swim!

Way to start a Monday

I like Gnarls Barkley music but maybe my subconscious does not. In a highly vivid dream last night (this morning?) I had the poor guy in a head lock under one arm while the other arm (mine, I'm horrified to admit) bashed his head in repeatedly. Sometimes there was a knife. There was a lot of blood. It was a full-blown horror movie scene. I am very glad to be awake.

It reminded me of a friend from graduate school -- a very mild-mannered friend -- who was getting her doctorate. She came to school one morning, exhausted, and explained that she was up all night in her dreams being chased and shot at by someone with a gun.

Facing the music

Marathon number 10 will have to wait. I'm just too ill-prepared to expect to finish on time and be ready to sing. There were five inspirational stories about marathon participants in the Star Tribune this morning. One runner experienced the lack of motivation I have experienced the past year and described how he finished just ahead of the sweeper vehicle in 2004. I don't want that to be me. I want to run the next one with a decent amount of training and a deficit of bunion pain. I am sad about being a quitter. Nevertheless, I will be cheering on Mary, Adam, and Jen here in Minnesota, and Arnold in Cali.

It's not all sad. Look what Mr. Bickerson found in the garden to cheer me up: Jimmy Eggplante, the last (probably) gift from the garden.

I enjoy my fair share of country music but

What is the deal with the cowboy hats? Gary just flipped past a show called, Music with Altitude, and the person who appears to be the lead singer is wearing a large cowboy hat. My thought is the show could be called, Music with a Large Cowboy Hat. The singer could be Kenny Chesney but it's not. If it were the show would be called, Music with a Large Cowboy Hat and Singer Who Prefers the Sleeveless Look.

What's a rainy Saturday good for?

A marathon table tennis session. What else?

In the classroom

Is it true that Hank has a snake?

Did Hank tell you that?

Okay, okay. And I only really have one dog, okay? I told him I had four dogs, a black widow spider, and a boa constrictor.

Who loves mac and cheese more than me?

She does!

The cabin looks different

MOBA

This was one of the first websites I remember purusing back in the olden days when the internets were brand new.

I hope it will brighten your day like it does mine.

Dog, from The Museum of Bad Art

Oh, I just saw this one. That's going to be my new favorite.

Squirrel update

You can go at least three cool September days with one dead squirrel in a garbage can as long as you don't open it or the garage door.

Not on my diet

I went outside this morning to let Peggy out and to get the paper and I swear I could smell kheer that must have been coming from the Indian restaurant just across the highway. This is a nice-smelling neighborhood; I forget which factory it is but sometimes, when the breeze blows in the right direction, there's a scent in the air like chocolatey-good Ovaltine. But I've never smelled kheer out there. It made me go googling for the ingredient of rose water. As a result, I must have this cake:

Persian Love Cake

And now I'm thinking about cardamom.

And for some unrelated reason, lime.

Sigh.

Another squirrel bites the dust

Peggy runs faster than an least two of the squirrels in our neighborhood.

I wonder how much extra BFI would charge a customer to come pick up the garbage five days early because there happens to be a dead squirrel in the can.

Coveting

I don't like to do it, but I do it. You know -- covet stuff. It doesn't help that my favorite triathlete, Mary (at circuslunch.com) made me aware of the website known as Mighty Goods. She's right -- you go there and see if you don't start drooling over 90% of the products they advertise. I've been reading the archives and I'm only up to November 2005. I haven't seen any perfume posts in that blog...which leads me to this:

Dawn Spencer Hurwitz

If you like perfumes please do set aside four or five hours one day and peruse her website. I love reading about her perfumes and oils even more than I like to read cookbooks. Her Perfection Connoisseur perfumes are amazing. You can order samples of everything. I have owned Cafe Noir and Perfume de luxe. They were my favorites until I bought a sample of Piment et Chocolat and I have been thinking about ordering some of that heavenly perfume for a Christmas present pour moi. (Are you listening, Santa Bickerson?) Pepper, chili, pimento and chocolate -- all wrapped up in an amazing perfume.

Text of one of our songs

Beneath These Alien Stars

by Vesta Pierce Crawford

Beneath these alien stars-
in darkness I have stood alone.
More than mountains come-
between me and my home.
The desert wind has waved my hair.
Desert sands have etched my face.
And the courage of the mountains-
has bound me to this place.
And something of its peace I've won;
I have stood with only God-
between me and the sun.

Now you get to imagine the music to which those words are set. It will be part of our first concert on October 1st.

Sweet dreams

Hank got this tent from his cousin for being a ring bearer in his wedding this summer. Guess which creature in our family crawls in it every night. I think every boy should have a tent-sleeping dog in his room.

Ooo...now I'm REALLY mad

If Jean Paul Gaultier wants to take fat people for his catwalk shows, we are not going to stop him.

Have I mentioned before that I think it takes zero talent to wrap fabric around supermodel people who weigh 35 pounds?

You all know I have issues. Wanna hear the latest? Two days ago I ran into an acquaintance I hadn't seen in six months or more at the Y and she pointed at my stomach and went like this:

"Ahh! Are you EXPECTING?!"

Oh, I'm expecting all right. I'm expecting to go right home and do 700 sit-ups. Thanks for asking.

The Bickersons are at it again

We fight best when the chips are down.

I made a factual statement today after Hope and I got Mr. Bickerson home from his outpatient knee surgery. All I said was the truth: that Mr. Bickerson has a lower-than-normal tolerance for pain. That doesn't mean I love him less than I would if he had a high pain threshold. It doesn't mean he is less manly than a manly man. It means he cries easily when there's pain. Or wants to cry. (I can tell.)

So he lashed out when I simply stated a fact. He said that pain tolerance is inversely proportional to intellect and the reason I tolerate pain so well is

"...well -- put two and two together. No, wait. Let me do that for you..."

Well played, Mr. Bickerson. Well played.

And now that the scanner works you knew I would be obligated to post pictures from his knee surgery, didn't you?

I can't tell what that last picture is on the left. Is it the door to the operating room? Was he pointing the way to the bathroom? I don't get.

Hope's quote for the day

"Damnik! My harp is beeping!"

Choir rehearsal tonight

And no matter what anybody else says you can never enjoy too many Bon Jovi choral arrangements. EVER.

Hope and Joy and Hope

After looking at the picture I posted below of Hope's first day of preschool (sophomore year, that is) I decided to go ahead and write down a couple of things that I've been thinking about today.

Five years ago I was driving Hank to My Gym for his "gymnastics" class in Eden Prairie. By the way, in case you're wondering, gymnastics class for an 18-month-old pretty much consisted of him diving into a ball pit over and over and over. I had already watched the coverage of the planes at the breakfast table and, although my eyes were glued to the TV, I knew I needed to go on with some kind of a normal day. So Hank and I drove to class while I listened to it all on the radio.

I'll never forget Peter Jennings asking incredulously, "You mean the facade of the tower has collapsed?" And the reporter replied, "No. The entire tower has collapsed."

I felt an overwhelming urge to put up a flag and I called all over town to see where to buy one. There had been a run on American flags.

I waited anxiously to get email from Andrea, who was in San Francisco, who waited anxiously to hear from her family -- in NYC. Relief when she and they were okay.

I remember feeling connected to people you would see out and about -- at the grocery store, the gas station, gym class -- through sadness.

I remember later that day after watching all of the TV coverage all I wanted to do was watch Mr. Rogers and Little Bear and The Andy Griffith Show.

When David Letterman came back on a few days later I think I cried harder watching that show than any other.

Time passed. We looked up and saw planes in the sky again. And then Hope came along.

It just struck me today that she could have been named Joy based on that picture in the post below. We complain and joke about how much she cries but when she smiles? She smiles bigger than most and it makes up for all the tears. And then some.

Here she is singing a song(s) she learned today at school:



Old MacDonald? on Vimeo

Someone in this picture is HAPPY about the the FIRST DAY of SCHOOL!

Figured out the scanner

Hank's depiction of himself on the first day of school

Gary's dad was a cool cat

New shoes

I told Mary that I am counting on the happiness of having these new shoes to carry me through at least two of the 26.2 miles on Oct. 1. Don't you think new shoes equate to two miles of happy running? Unless of course it is raining or snowing or the wind is blowing or the sun is shining too hot or if there are people on the course at mile 12 shouting "You're almost there!" In that case I will probably be muttering and cursing to myself the entire race.

Lots of marathon runners joke about calling a cab around mile 19-20. This is the first time I am actually thinking about carrying my cell phone and enough cash to get me home from any point on the course.

Sad. Very sad.

Workaholic?

How else can you explain this?

I think that if I ever end up in prison I would take that as a sign that I should think about giving up the criminal lifestyle. At the very least, I would give up that portion of my criminal lifestyle that required me to put cell phones in any unusual orifice.

He looks good in a desk / Pretty in pink

It's the third day of 1st Grade and it looks to me like things are going well so far. We met his teacher and saw his classroom tonight at open house. I forgot how much of a thrill it was to get an official desk in school and put all of your pencils and crayons in it and make it all nice and organized. Really beats the tables and carpet squares of kindergarten. Every year he'll have something new and more grown-up to look forward to.

Meanwhile his sister is finding creative ways to pass the time. What possibly could be more fun that putting on your fuchsia tutu and tennis shoes and hitting the neighborhood park?

Holy working breed, Peggy!

Mother was a blue heeler and father? A lab? A border collie? We don't know the paternity but she has to be part sled dog. This morning for our run/bike event I added some weight: Hope in the Trek trailer. I still had Peggy leashed to the rear frame of my bike. I did not peddle. She pulled us for 3.5 miles and this time we went up a few slight hills that were hilly enough that she had to dig in to get us up them. She seemed to enjoy it. Hope was shouting most of the way: "GO PEGGY!! YOU GO GIRL!! WHOO!" We had to stop at 3.5 because Peggy was huffing and puffing really hard but I think she would have gone around the loop again if we told her to. Is there some kind of strong dog contest I could enter her in? Because I think she'd win.

Quote of the day

"Nothing says Labor Day
like a turkey pan filled
with flaming gasoline."

- George

I must make

Caramel Apple Cupcakes

Official end of summer

Labor Day 2006 is history. Tomorrow Hank gets on the bus and becomes a first grader. Life with afternoons filled with kid activities, bargaining to get out of quiet time, fighting with his sister, playing with his sister, deciding which park to go to, which friend to play with, and mid-afternoon YMCA activities is over. Changed forever.

Hank wants to be so grown up these days. He has the soundtrack for High School Musical that he loves. Occasionally he picks up my shuffle and listens to some of my stuff. He's learned the lyrics to Why Can't We be Friends by War and sings along to that. Grown up music.

Last night he wanted music on as he was falling asleep. He doesn't ask for music every night but every now and then he wants some. He had a couple of CDs to choose from on his shelf and then last night we found his old lullaby CD in the corner. That's the one he wanted. We talked about how it was the one I played at least three times a night when he was a new baby and he'd wake in the middle of the night. I told him I'd sit in the blue rocking chair at 2 a.m. and would reach over to the floor on the left side of the chair to press play.

"You would? What else did you do?"

"I'd rock you and feed you until you fell back asleep. You'd have your nee-nees."

"I DID?! Oh don't TELL me that! That's DISGUSTING! (Laughing) Did I go back to sleep? Then what did you do? Was Peggy there? She wasn't? Who's Ed.....wait a minute I remember Ed. He sleeped with me in my room....."

And so on.

It makes me so sad and so happy and so full of joy to hear all of those questions and all of those baby lullaby songs and feel all those memories. All at the same time.

Labor Day pictures are here.

First the caveman

Now this. Watch Burt Bacharach's face when he sings lizard licks his eyeball. He almost laughs. Is the lady really not an actor? She does a great job of not falling off the piano bench from laughing.



I'll buy anything Geico sells.

Tugs the heart

I read Hank the entire school lunch menu for the month of September before bed tonight. Up to today he had been insisting that he wanted to take his lunch to school. I've been pushing the hot lunch option because I loved hot lunches at school and I want him to, too. He told me that he was worried that teachers will make him eat a lot of things he doesn't want to eat. I tried to reassure him that no one would force-feed him anything. As I was reading all the items to him, I got to about September 15th and he pointed at that date and said, "Well, Mom. I'll probably be able to read better by this day and so then I can start eating hot lunches at school."

He's worried that he'll have to read the menu!

I assured him that pointing politely and saying, "I'll have some of this, please," would probably work just fine.

Hey, how's the training going?

Marathon Number 10 is in one month and I'm doing more and better cross-training than I ever have in the past. But I have a problem. A significant problem. In the past year or so I have developed an aversion to the idea of running long distances during training. If it wasn't Twin Cities Marathon's 25th anniversary or my 10th marathon I would happily cash it in and volunteer on the course. I've always wanted to do that even though I know tears would be streaming down my face for six hours just watching all those people run. It gets me all choked up just thinking about it (and I get all weepy-eyed thinking about my friend, Mary, running her first).

But I think I've decided to go ahead and run. What are the chances that one long slow distance of six miles (ha aha ha hahahahah!) and new shoes will see me through? My goal for the marathon is to finish without broken feet and knees and with a limited amount of swearing or crying during the race. VocalEssence has a concert at 4 p.m. that afternoon so I will have to be walk on and off some risers by 3 o'clock.

Wish me luck. It's gonna supersuck.

Well, anyway. Here's the reason I started to write this post: Inspirational running music that helped me make it through mile two today. :-) Dick Dale, Miserlou

(Hmm. Maybe this was what the yesterday's anxiety dream was all about.)

Anxiety dreams

I guess six-year-olds are too young to have the traditional school anxiety dreams (e.g., go to school naked; show up for class and there's a final exam that you never studied for; etc.) so my subconscious decided to have one for him.

I was back in college. Voice juries were on the schedule. I had six songs to sing and I had not practiced a single one of them even though I had had the music and the accompanist for weeks. All my old teachers were in the room, waiting. There were lots of other well-prepared singers lining up to sing. There were black chairs and pianos everywhere. I kept looking at my music and trying to figure out a reasonable way out of my predicament. What kind of excuse could I come up with? At one point I realized I was still asleep and possibly dreaming but I was feeling really anxious and a strong urge to keep sleeping and resolve my problem.

I didn't resolve it but when I finally woke up Hope was standing by the bed staring at me.

I felt a great sense of relief knowing it really was just a dream, that I didn't have to sing in front of a bunch of judges, and that it was time to get up and start the day, get some breakfast, do the laundry, feed Peggy, vacuum dog hair, answer 6,000 questions by 9:30 a.m., break up three wrestling matches by 10:00 a.m., unload the dishwasher, load the dishwasher, unload the dishwasher, grocery shop, pay bills, mow, wipe jelly off the kitchen floor, say NO 50,000 times by 10:30 a.m., throw away broken toys, clean pee off the toilet, walk/run the dog, clean the cement dust that blew into the house yesterday while the cement guys sawed through the basement crawl space, retrieve neighbor's dog who magically escaped through our temporary fence gate, and give Peggy her third bath in a year (but second in the past two days), de-dog hair the bathroom...

...and, really (I know it might sound crazy) love every minute of it.

A boy's dream come true

And a play pit