zen.org Communal Weblog

Just joined StumbleUpon at the suggestion of a friend, and I found this Star Wars thing

someone’s got waaaaay more time that I do. Except that I wound up watching it….

So, what is it with dark beer & men’s intestines? Last night after a surprise birthday party for a friend, we made it home in time for several explosions to occur.

There are not enough candles in this house.

So I’m plugging along in my html course (web design here I come), and one of the assignments is to create an image map & link to a bunch of…whatever. Just download this little free trial sofware and get your homework done. So, boutell.com here I come, download mapedit….and the little geek in me goes “ooooo. this is soo cool! I wanna do this again! ” Wonder how they made this work….

and for only $10 I can own it!

bwahahahahaha

Pete & I have been planning to remodel our kitchen ever since we moved in six years ago. The place is 30+ yrs old and was built in the housing boom when plenty of folks decided to move to California. So the cabinets were thrown together – nails protude from either side of the shelves inside of the cabinets, the dishwasher is going, the stove is going, and as an additional insult, there’s lovely 70’s wallpaper on the kitchen walls, ceiling, and door to the washroom. There’s also four different types of flooring in about an 800 sq foot space – spanish tile for the entryway & bathroom, fake wood for the living room, carpet for the dining room (?!?) and a different tile in the kitchen/washroom.

We met with a designer to look over cabinets, discuss layout, ponder functionality. We tramped the showroom floor for an hour and a half reviewing counters, wood type and space saving ideas. Our first floor was measured. Now we’re also doing the bathroom.

Our designer took a week off to get her daughter settled into college. Then she had jury duty. Now her mother-in-law has passed away. We’ll wait on the kitchen design, but we have the quote for the flooring. I’m looking into a home line of credit.

And so it begins.

Geez, what a whiny little pootyhead that “Overbooked” is. Email her & tell her so.

*snicker*

Time for bed….

It is eleven days until September and six days until the kids go back to school. My year has sped off without me.

I made a big decision months ago to go back to school and learn web design. I’m working as a consultant doing web content management for the company that laid me off 3 years ago, and winding down my bookkeeping gig of 2 1/2 years. (I gave a four week notice the first week of July, but my replacement wasn’t found until the last week of my employment, and then she only lasted three days. So can’t I please come back to help out???) The grandfather clock has just struck midnight, and I’ve finished all my readings and quizes but not my final assignment on Unit 2 (2 of 6 units for the course). At this rate, December 21st, the deadline to finish the course, will come all too quickly.

Did I mention that I’m the fundraiser for my daughter’s Junior Girl Scout troop? They don’t only sell cookies in the spring, but magazines & nuts in the fall. And there’s talk of some other fundraiser to ensure there’s enough money for the trip they’re planning in three years. (They’ve got to sell plenty of goodies before they’re no longer small & cute, but big & pre-pubescent.)

I’ve signed Merin up for volleyball, Sean up for soccer. Sean may do cub scouts. Merin has a knitting class in mind for November. (Start by making your own knitting needles, learn to knit & they can also choose to do carding, weaving, felt making or even spinning fleece they collect from angora rabbits.) Both Sean & Merin are bugging me about playdates – they miss their friends, why am I not scheduling sleepovers?

I know I’m not alone with a busy life. It’s just that any time I try to cut something out to give me more time, or allow me to do something else, my time evaporates. I’m not a tv buff – the only show I’ll watch regularly is The Daily Show. Movies? I gotta remember to cancel Netflix since we’re not using it much. Although I do dream of getting a maid service to deal with the housecleaning, the looming kitchen remodel and the associated bills have me scampering away from that idea like an angora rabbit. Kids do the chores? Well, yes, but that doesn’t necessarily save me that much time if I have keep hounding the kids to do them.

And I’ve promised Pete that I would can my spicy vegetables this weekend.

Somewhere there are two hours a day I should be able to reclaim. If you find them, let me know where I’ve put them….

It has been one week since attending my son’s kindergarten field trip to Happy Hollow, and long enough to let the experience settle within my being to write about it.

I have been on several field trips before, so I was not a complete newbie. I had assisted teachers in herding children through the Teddy Bear Factory, end-of-year celebrations and Sean’s Jr. Kindergarten trip to Happy Hollow. (For those of you that aren’t California, Bay Area residents, Happy Hollow is a cross between a zoo and a fairground, plenty of animals & rides for the kids) However what was new in this experience was that, with 90 kindergarteners in tow, the teachers had plenty of parents lined up to escort a group of children. And my group had Sheri, Shannon, Soo-Young and my son Sean. I also had Sheri, who was a twin, and her sister was on the other bus with her mother. I learned quickly that Sheri had, um, strong feelings about this. Sheri’s mother and I quickly made plans to meet up at the park in order to deter further theatrics.

The bus ride brought back memories of my grade school days and the coveted back-of-the-bus seats. Nothing bounces like the seats beyond the last row of tires on a bus. My four charges opted to let the entire entourage know when vehicles were about to pass our bus, (CAR!!! CAR!!!) until several classmates encouraged silence. I knew then I had a lively group.

There is a phenomenon that occurs during certain field trips, especially those that are held at places with play equipment. First, if there is a group of children, they will run in equal and opposite directions. Second, the harder the children play and run, the more tired the ones responsible for said children will become. Needless to say, I was $%*I&%^ exhausted by the end of the day.

Note to playground authorities: Perhaps a sign should be posted near any self-propelled twirling device that reads “do not ride after lunch”. Fortunately my group rode before lunch, and equally as fortunate that each child opted to get off (after I dragged them) before they were too dizzy to walk. Not so with Christian, a boy from another group. And I was certainly not going to clean up after him.

I am now looking forward to another trip to the Teddy Bear Factory. And perhaps the Planetarium or library. I have learned my lesson: sign up early for the field trips. Get the ones that the kids are filed in orderly groups. Looking after your own child(ren) at a playground is harrowing enough.

But you’ve got to love the bus ride.

Once upon a time, in a state far, far away, I used to write if not daily, pretty darned often. That was before marriage, kids, and work, and when writing was part of my major. I graduated, married, moved, multiplied, and now rarely a written word. It’s been at least a dozen years, and I miss that bit of myself. So perhaps I can find that bit of me here.

Chick with Stick

Two years ago I started playing 9-ball on a team with a friend I used to work with, Doug Evans. They asked my husband Pete to play, but after he refused they asked me. (He was already out playing roller hockey one night a week and teaching a night class. Guilt may have had something to do with his answer.) The team plays Monday nights, maximum eight players on each team, and each player is rated with a skill level. A team puts up five players a night to play one match each, and the sum of all skill levels (for those that have played) cannot be more than 23. At the time (if memory serves) they had a 7, 6, 5, and three 4’s.

So they needed someone who sucked. Me.

Two years into it, I have crept up to a skill level 3, I have two team trophies and am invited to the MVP tournament this weekend (for my skill level – heaven help me if I had to play a 6+ player). Not bad for the sacrificial lamb….