Saturday, October 28, 2006

Endless

Cleaning is endless. Illness is endless. We have endless bouts with both of late. Zoe was sick, then me, then Katharine. Zoe is sick again. She is doing Mock Trial as I have said before. She has journalism two times a week which gives her an eleven hour school day. She has honors chem, honors algebra/trig and honors English and she is learning Spanish. Mucho homework nightly. So when there is practice for mock trial until 9:00 two nights a week, those end up being fourteen hour days at school. Then they practice again on Sunday for three hours! I never spent that much time at school. I know, it shows too! Anyhow, she had homework after she has these long days and she is so tired. She came home from mock trial on Thursday with a 103+ temp. Her throat is sore again and she has a head cold. I am not sure if it is a relapse or a brand new one, because she has what Katharine had last week. Needless to say, she stayed home in bed Friday! I have yet to see her this morning, but she is feeling better. Still, she has oodles of homework to do. She actually enjoys what she is doing, at least I think she does most of the time.

Katharine spent the night at a friend's. She got out of school early (block day, you all have those?) then took the bus home with her friend. Went to the Boo Blast, which is a yearly carnival at a local school. She just called from her friend's house and they are making pancakes. I could hear the smoke alarm and people screaming all in fun. I wonder about her school year. Last year she had homework nightly. I had heard that 7th was the hardest year in middle school. It still bugs me though, because next year she will be back to having a lot of homework in high school. I wonder about homework too. I think often times it is work that didn't get done in class and came home to be finished. Maybe the teachers are better this year and the kids are getting their work done in class? Why would there be less homework this year? Why does 8th grade seem to be too easy to really be learining? This year is a piece of cake!

Had an issue with Katharine's manager too. She wanted Katharine's eyebrows waxed. I gave in and had them done, but not perfectly, still some innocence to them. She has the greatest eyebrows I have ever seen. Likened often to Liz Taylor's. Katharine went to acting class on Sunday and the manager was not happy. Wants a little more off. I asked why and she told me to pretend I was a casting director. I did. She said, when you look at Katharine's face, what is the first thing you see? I said, those spectacular eyebrows! Nuff said. She has beautiful eyes too, but they aren't as noticeable. So, back we go to have them waxed a little bit more. They will remain beautiful. She will never have skinny little eyebrows! Plus, she is only thirteen and she doesn't need perfectly tweezed eyebrows.

David and I cleaned off my pool table this morning. Trash bags full of clothes and linens to put and give away! It was piled about three feet high. Embarrassing, yet easy to access the clothes. My plan is to put away one bag a day next week. That sounds like a good one right? The Fly Lady way. I should also throw out twenty seven things a day as she suggests.

My main reason for somewhat cleaning the garage happens twice a year. Once at Christmas and once before GS nuts arrive. They arrive on a pallet at 10:00 tomorrow morning. Then I need to separate them into troops and people will come by for their troop orders. Maybe by this time next weekend, I will be able to use my table again! Then Christmas will come and we will use it to wrap gifts! Luckily I have a good cover on it. I had it refelted a few years ago and wanted to make sure the top stays pristine! Still, cleaning is endless.

Endless was posting this. It kept saying there was an error. Then it showed posted four times, but not to the actual blog. I deleted three and waited several hours to post and finally, it works!

Saturday, October 14, 2006

iPod crazy

Several years ago when iPods came out, David bought me one for Christmas. It stayed in the box for years. I had no interest whatsoever in having an iPod. I had my computer which had my music on it and I was happy with that. I had the radio in the car and was happy with that.

At some point, my stepdaughter Daniela was visiting and we got on the subject of ipods. I told her I had one and never used it. I offered it to her and she was stoked. I was happy that she wanted it and it was no longer sitting unopened in the garage.

So, with all that said, I wanted an iPod for my birthday this year. I think it will motivate me to walk. I hope so anyway. David and the girls got me one with a cover called skin. It is clear rubber and plastic and it keeps the black iPod clean and fingerprint free. Not only that, it has the cutest little video player ever! Two inches. Awesome sharp picture. I don't know how often I would use the video, but I did see Law & Order on it the other night. It was on my computer, left over from when the TV was broken and I downloaded some TV shows onto my laptop. This thing has amazing sound too. Now I need to think of a name for it! How fun is that???

All my songs have been uploaded to my new iPod. Until tonight that is. Katharine burned about a hundred songs for me, which I had to type in the titles and artist names before I imported them to my laptop. Tomorrow I will put them on the ipod. I cannot wait to hit shuffle and play the eclectic mixes of music I have.

I also got a sore throat for my birthday. It has been very sore for a week. Today is the first day I can swallow without pain, but there is still that little feeling when I swallow that reminds me it was sore. Also, ice water still kind of burns. Whatever this is, it seems to be going around.

We are watching Annie on TV right now. Katharine was recently cast as Lily for her school play. The version we are watching has Kristin Chenoweth playing Lily. Audra McDonald, Victor Garber and my fav Kathy Bates are in it as well. It is funny to listen to Katharine do a Brooklyn accent. She is great at accents, but usually British is what I hear. This is fun and different. I am sure she will have a blast playing the role. Tomorrow she goes up to LA for her acting class again. Every Sunday and David is kind enough to do the Sunday drive.

Today I took Zoe shopping for mock trial clothes. She is taking it very seriously. She was told what kind of clothes to buy. She plays the defendant. An artsy student accused of bringing a bomb to school. She says she didn't do it! They practice two times a week after school. They meet in the class and talk about the trial and then the actual practice begins at 5:00. She gets done about 9:00. David had five pizzas and other stuff delivered last Tuesday. Each night a parent feeds all the kids who are on the team. They have dress rehearsal in two weeks and then they compete against other schools in the actual courthouse. It has been great for Zoe and I am happy she is enjoying it so much.

That is about it as of now. Not much else going on. Weather has been cool and fall like. My favorite time of year!

Friday, October 06, 2006

My Birthday is Here Again!

Yes, my birthday is here again, actually it is in two days. No, sit down, don't get up. Thank you, thanks, sit down please....Okay now you are embarrassing me, but thanks for the birthday wishes....Not like the big four oh, or a big five oh. Just a forty sevenish birthday. Too close to the big five oh on one hand, but better than the alternative on the other!

When I was twenty seven or twenty eight, I seriously had to use the calculator to figure out my age. I had one handy because I was a purchasing agent and it was there. I really could have done the math in my head or with a piece of paper and a pen, but I didn't have to. I went back and forth with was I twenty seven or twenty eight? I believe I spent most of my twenty seventh year telling people I was twenty eight. People don't believe that anyhow. Oh, twenty eight or twenty nine, sure you are Nancy! I am not one of those perpetual twenty nine year olds. Neither would I want to be!

Especially bad when somebody asks my age and I have to think or do the math. That is what is happening again. I hate being born in a nine year. You know 1959. I am so bad with my nines. 1960 would have been nice. Easy to count how old I am and I would have been born in a whole different decade as well. As it stands now, I was born in the fifties! UGH. Two months away from being born in the sixties!

I have been ensconced in Girl Scout registrations and nut sales. I know most of you only heard about nut sales from the Girl Scouts last year when I mentioned it. Not the biggie like cookies, but still enough to keep me jumping. Everybody has to have all orders into the computer by 9am Monday morning, or it will cut them off. If they don't get their jobs done, I must hunt them down! This weekend is the final presales and did I mention selling magazines? Oh yes, the Girl Scouts are doing that as well as nuts, under the name fall product sale. I had a training meeting scheduled with about a dozen women. I think five showed up. This inevitably leaves me with a ton of emails and phone calls, last minute being my favorites, to ask questions. I will answer them and probably enjoy it to a point. However, it falls on my birthday weekend. Notice the pun? Falls...

It is next to impossible to get everybody to the table for dinner this school year. My birthday will be no exception. David has to take Katharine to LA for her acting class. Zoe is doing Mock Trial and they will be meeting Sunday afternoon to practice. It is really okay though. I am blessed with a loving husband and great kids. Just seeing the girls blossom and have fun being teenagers is great. Loving people who love me back. Truly a great birthday gift.