Sara, the alert watch-poodle, assesses the back yard

July 31, 2008 | Category:

Since we're too stupid for words, it seemed like a good idea to take Sara with us, this year. You know, on our annual trip to New England, In a car. 999 miles each way.

Then it occured to me, you know, that my family should be warned. 'Cuz Sara? She's special.

Here's what I wrote:

OK, I just have to warn you about a couple of things with Sara. Look, she's a great dog. You will not meet a better dog alive. No kidding. I mean, she may look like some pansy poodle, but deep inside? She's got the lion heart of a golden retriever. That's not to say she doesn't have a few...idiosyncrasies. *ahem*

ROCKS
So, uh, Sara likes rocks. She likes to find them, and chase them, and attack them. She likes to race around the yard with one in her mouth, toss it in the air, pounce on it, and race it around some more. She really, really, really likes to collect them. In the house. One for every room, you see. Because no room is really special until it has a rock in it.
If Sara is headed INTO a house, you can sort of bet she's hiding a rock in her mouth. Especially if she's skulking. Skulking is a BIG giveaway of some rock hoarding.

WATER
Water is only good if it's kept cold in a toilet bowl. She doesn't understand why people pee in her water bowls. She especially doesn't understand why people get all snickety with her for dripping water on a bathroom floor. It's tiled, right?
She has not, however, figured out how to open closed toilet lids. That just about stumps her. Just a piece of advice, there.

MOTHS
Sara is a certified level 3 Ninja supersecret moth killer. She hates moths. Moths are evil. Butterflies? Are just incognito moths. And little itty-bitty birds are moths with bird suits on. ALL these suspects need to be barked at, and good. Plus? Chased down and EATEN. Moths make good eating. Don't even need to cook 'em. Sushi Moth, YUM. If Sara sees a moth, you can bet she'll be on the case. And she'll STAY on the case until you remind her, gently (by yelling SARA YOU STUPID OVERGROWN SHEEP GET YOUR ASS BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!) that she needs to stay in the yard and live and let die, moth-wise.

FURNITURE
Sara believes she is a 4-legged person. As such, she should be allowed to sit with other people in people-sitting places. Since she doesn't shed and is somewhat dainty, it's possible her owners let this go on for a little too long and she is now, sort of, kind of, stuck in the habit. She has, however, learned the word 'OFF' and will obey. I mean, there will be a dirty look involved but she's a good girl at the end of the day.
The one place she won't get off of without a mulish staring war is wherever her boy is sleeping. She understands her mortal duty to guard her boy, and in fact if asked 'Where's your boy?' she will race to side wherever he is - even if that's in someone else's house. Sara Sleeps With Boy. This is an understood law of nature, like rain on picnics. One does not mess with it.

STALKING
Once boy is asleep, or at camp, Sara reverts to her deeply held beliefs that a) Any Human in a Pinch Will Do and b) Naps Are Good.

Ipso facto there you go-go, her favorite thing to do in a boy-free environment is to nap leaning on some other human. If a human is not immediately available to be ON then being NEAR is her second-favorite place.

She especially has a knack for leaving her tail under wheelie office chairs. An offended 'WOOF" will accompany any unwarned movement of these chairs. If humans do not comply with THE NAP LAW and persist in moving about, then Sara will - of course- move about with human. Human gets a glass of water? Sara follows. Human does some dishes? Sara follows. Whenever human pauses in one place for more than 10 seconds (the '10 second rule') Sara will slide her looooong legs down to the floor and lie down with a grunt. She will be asleep before her chin actually gets lateral. She will be awake by the time the human (see: STALKEE) takes a step. This is all very cute and sweet the first couple of days. After a while, though, one begins to wonder if an order of protection is necessary. It is not. Simply say "Sara? MOVE!" and with a groan she will seek an alternative human, or lacking that, a spot near a floor fan where she can lay and feel her ears flap in the breeze.

Yes, we bring a floor fan.

And, finally, GOING OUT
Sara is, for all the groaning and once-in-a-while barking, mostly a quiet and gentle dog. One with impossibly long eyelashes and Groucho Marx eyebrows.

DEFCON BERT: When Sara wants 'OUT' (and Sara is a very fastidious dog who does not have accidents, thank you) she will find a human and stare at them. When the human looks back, she will lift an eyebrow. This should be translated as "Excuse me, I need to go out" and can be confirmed by asking her "Go Outside?" to which she will respond by smiling. One needs only experience this once to understand.

DEFCON ERNIE: Should the human wait too long, BOTH eyebrows will start to go up and down. This should be translates as "Excuse me, I am about to explode" and she may even gesture at a door with her chin to make the point.

DEFCON ANIMAL: If the human STILL doesn't notice her needs, she will then stick her head under the human's nearest hand and rub her eyebrows under it. This should be translated as "DON'T YOU READ EYEBROW, YOU DENSE HUMAN?!" One suggests a rapid jog to the door at this point.

OK, that's about all of her weirdness. I think. She doesn't chew furniture, loves to fetch, understands if you won't let her sit in the passenger seat for errands, and allows little children to pull her ears. Comes when called, can carry her own leash, and loves all other creatures. Except moths. Never moths.

So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, LATER!

July 25, 2008 | Category: On The Job

CD is driving home, for the last time, from C0untryw1de.

For the three of you that may remember, he took that job in 2004 as a contractor. He was hired, not too long after, as the job grew. And grew.

Eventually, he was the IT department supporting like 12 branches and 600 people. Pretty much on his own. He eventually squawked, and they hired him someone to help.

OK, maybe I AM a little biased about my guy. But C0untryw1de agreed - some time back the very remote (like Mount Olympus kind of remote) executives took notice of the dozens of emails from people across the power spectrum about how wonderful CD was and the very dashing way his superhero cape rippled in the wind and informed him that he would be promoted in title and pay to reflect the job he was actually doing.

We all know what happened next.

Yeah. Nothing.

In the meantime, the mortgage pendulum swung and CD watched over 400 people get laid off. Watched them walk by his office on the ground floor, wide-eyed in disbelief and holding a box with their belongings.

While his status in the department shielded him from a layoff, it didn't shield him from what has been going on at that company. One bloody Monday morning, executives stood at the elevators and turned 90 people away as they came into work. CD came home utterly shattered in spirit.

So you can imagine how good it felt for him to finally be offered a job somewhere else that he wanted. After turning down other offers and wondering if his own standards would eventually bite him in the ass.

Anyway, he was graciously sent off by those who were left, today. He's driving home right now, his own cardboard box in the back of the car.

Oh, and the Olympians? Were outraged that he quit. In fact, despite 2 weeks notice, despite confirming it with phone calls, he ended up exiting himself. He called me as he was opening tickets so that his access would be removed and soberly handing over his equipment to his second-in-charge.

By the time he'd left, he was loaded down with hugs and calls and email addresses. But not one of his management so much as said goodbye.

No, I'm not kidding.

Cracking Myself Up With Myself

July 23, 2008 | Category: In My Life

So I am going through my archives, cleaning up the category settings and making backups, etc. etc.

When I was leaving my job, I carefully went and hid any post that had anything to do with my job. Now I am un-hiding those, little by little.

Some of them are so, so sad and angry. But others? Just crack me the hell up. (How pompous does THAT sound? Ew.)

How do you know how to deal with this? She asked me.

I could have said; it's standard Project Manager process. Which it is, but of course I didn't learn it that way.

I learned because I once took a flamethrower to a vendor over a 50 million dollar contract. And once I had pretty much burned down the house, the yard, the block, the car, the vendor, and oh - myself.... along came a guy, probably dressed in black.

He leaned over my steaming self and said, calmly; You know Maverick, we got lawyers for this.

Hate 'Em

July 22, 2008 | Category: Well, That Was Random

I frigging hate National City Bank.

If it was just that their management was a bunch of rude, unhelpful, overcharging, bureaucratic asses - I think I would actually suck it up. You know, I was with that bank when it was MidTown, then MidAmerica. We got history. I know the way to all the branches.

But they have just consistently screwed with me and my money since they took over this spring. So I opened accounts over at Bank of America and planned to go in this morning and shut down National City once and for all.

As a final 'Fuck You' to me, this morning they hit me with a slew of fees including, and this is my favorite, a couple of BOUNCE ones (at $34/each) AHEAD of any charges actually hitting the account.

Now I gotta go in, and smack that shit off my record and get my virtual money back. Oh, yeah. WAY to make me feel warm and fuzzy about leaving you.

And if we lived together? I would SO throw your furniture and Zeppelin CD's onto the lawn.

Big Boy Room

July 21, 2008 | Category:

These past weeks, we've been gutting Bear's room and turning it into a 'big boy' room. Emptied out all the extra clutter, patched the walls and ceiling, and CD took an old 4-poster bedframe we've had for years and DIY'd it into a really cool frame for his new queen size bed.

We had to upgrade him from the twins because Sara the dog MUST sleep with him and she totally hogs the bed, dude. Because his room will be painted in cream and white (with the red/white/blue curtains remaining) - we told Bear he could choose a color for his bed if he thought the wood was boring.

And he did. "Phantom Blue" and it totally rocks. We set it up last night, and I'll put a picture up in the photostream as soon as I think of it to show the "after" (although the room isn't done yet).

Can I just say, it's a little bittersweet to be cleaning out the remnants of the "little boy" years? I found myself hiding my tears more than once.

It's so hard...

| Category: Mother to the First Power

It's hard having a 7 year old smarter than me....

Driving home from camp.

Me: Hey there's a police officer on one of those things!

Him: One of those things?

Me: You know, 2 wheels and a stick?

Him: You mean a Segway, Mommy?

Me: Yeah. Thanks, kid. (Reach back my hand for a high-5, get a knuckle bump instead.)

Everything that is done in the world is done by hope*

July 20, 2008 | Category: In My Life

When you're making 6 figures, you got options. You can live in the city, near the city, or in some palace left of nowhere, just down the lane a mile or two.

But when you're contemplating something a lot less finer for a lot less coinage, then it's time to draw a line down a piece of paper and really weigh what you get for what you give on the geological side of things.

This is not a post about real estate.

Several years ago, CD and I decided to reevaluate how and where we were living. We knew if we were going to cut back to his salary, that it would be smart to move somewhere more rural. And, hey, our dream is a log cabin on a lake somewhere so it wasn't like we were twisting our own arms.

I had a lot of fun, we did really, researching and traveling to different places and getting the flavor of them. All of us enjoyed comparing the realities to the ideas we'd get in our heads, the discoveries, the sort of Hemingway-esque romance of it all.

Last summer, we got the house ready to show and put up on one of those 'sell it yourself' sites. The world hadn't crashed yet, but you could smell it in the air like rain. So even though there was a list of things still to be done - we were willing to lose some of that sweat equity to get it sold.

And then? We didn't sell it. And then? We didn't go anywhere.

So every once in a while, I get these emails; "Hey - you talked about moving for, like, eons. What's up with you still being where you is?"

Instead of continuing to point lovely people at the archives, which don't actually explain why we didn't move, I thought I would actually explain why we didn't move.

Ready?

Continue reading "Everything that is done in the world is done by hope* "

New Post Up at Chicago Moms

July 16, 2008 | Category: Chicago Moms

Just a little reminiscing..... HERE

Reasons I Am NOT a Published Author

July 15, 2008 | Category: In My Life

5) Over 3,000 people look at my first page. Only 700 turn it to see what happens next. Clearly? I SUCK.

4) I don't write in complete sentences. No. Really.

3) My dog has a bright blue wet splot of paint on her butt. My child has informed me that he's taken up 'Bratology'. And my partner just whispered in my ear that he's only got about 30 minutes left in him, so if I want sex it's all on me.

2) My esteemed and learned editor, employer, and Yoda of Words says that I need to start using plots, 'cuz they're important.

1) I dangle my modifiers. I hang my participles. My female characters hate me. My male characters swagger a lot. The pets in my stories NEVER have freshly painted bottoms. In other words, see #5: I SUCK.

(Off to drink his orange-infused vodka and see if nail polish remover works on dog fur.)

And then...

July 14, 2008 | Category: Thy Wedded Life

So, CD quit his job!

I'll tell you after he's served his notice where he worked - and you'll get right away why this place wasn't a happy place to work.

Wait, wait, don't tell me - you want to know if he got a new one first?

HE DID!!!!!!!!

After all these years, he found a job he wanted and the job wanted him right back. (Well, 5 months of interviews later. No, not kidding.) He starts in about two weeks, and if I were any happier or prouder? I'd frigging explode.

For those who are curious - he's an IT SR. ADMIN. The new job bumped his title, but he was already doing the work at soul-sucking job. His long-term dream is to be a robotics engineer, and he goes to school part time for it.

Oh, and one more thing - the new job, like the old one, has the hours he wanted - 6AM to 3PM. He likes being home in the afternoons to help homeschool, take classes himself, putter on the house, and throw the ball around.

Excuse me while I sorta float around for a while :)

Testing*Testing*1...2...3...

July 11, 2008 | Category: Best Of

Hey, my analytics aren't working and no one is commenting...

I mean, I have totally overhauled the site and pretty sure uglified because no one has said 'boo'....

Is anyone still out there? I mean, I'd understand if you weren't, but....

Anyone? Anyone?

Bueller?

(Chec, one vote for some of the how do we get beyond the depression posts.)

Even After

| Category: Family, It's a Trip

A friend said to me not long ago that being around CD, Bear and I can be a little hard to take because we sort of block others out.

That wasn't easy to hear.

I don't want to be that person. I don't want us to be that family. I think of myself, of us, as open. Curious.

Isn't it strange how wrong I am about the person in the mirror?

A couple of years ago, we started putting up walls because there was so much pain and anger around CD's depression. As much as I vented, there was that much more I couldn't - wouldn't - say.

And I never realized that even as we healed, the wall obviously didn't come down. Although Bear has many friends and is really social - the truth is that we seem happiest these days when we're the 3 of us, whether piled on the couch with Sara watching Mythbusters or walking along the river with our ice cream cones.

This can't be healthy. But I'm not sure I know how to let go, let in. I tell myself we're just a close family, and maybe we are. Yet...

Even after everything becomes all right again, it isn't over.

This is the bug that boggled a crowd

July 10, 2008 | Category:

So there we were, post July 4 parade, and the boys (there were like 8 of them in a huddle) starting saying "Cool....!!!"

Turns out that this little bit of fluff on the ground was a BUG. What kind? Nobody knows. Just one of those "nature is wicked" kind of moments.

What Is Everybody Looking at?

July 09, 2008 | Category: Best Of

I began scrubbing this site back in January, and have now begun to see some of the changes. My favorite part? Is that this time I broke the ARCHIVE pages and not the MAIN page. Darling, as long as the front page looks good I can just about convince myself that I'm a goddess.

Although....I miss that picture of Charles DeGaulle airport - it was so beautiful, and I remember the moment I took it, leaving Paris and my heart just aching.

But alas alack life goes on, or so the Beatles sang. And this is soothing, and I finally made some rounded corners. So? What do you think?

In other news...I am so overwhelmed by my to-do list right now. Between the freelance gigs, the house, the budget & bills, and leaving for Boston in less than a month for our annual visit... What needs to happen is that all these details should be prioritized and organized. The problem is, every time I sidle up to my list to really tack a whack at it? It growls and tries to bite me.

Just saying.

I've had 8 hours of sleep since Monday. In case anyone is wondering if I'm high. The answer is: "Oh, there's an easier way to get this lightheaded?"

Randomly Pictorially Happily Lazily

July 08, 2008 | Category: In My Life

I am trying to finish editing 2 articles that were due yesterday. I THOUGHT they were due today, because I can't count to 7. Clearly, I have lost my mind. Funnily, I don't miss it.

Randomness:

1) I hated the finale of Doctor Who, Season/Series 4. Partner loved it, but I thought that RTD took too many easy outs as a writer and I'm so disappointed that it's been 4 days since we curled up to watch it Saturday night with all our excitement on and... it's still making me wince.

2) One of my additions for the Chicago Mom's Blog got picked up into syndication at several newspapers, including the Miami Herald and Sacramento Bee. That? Feels better than chocolate.

3) Two friends are going through divorce, a cusp of troubles so many are having. Bad times seem to begat sad times and I'm getting a LOT of hits on my 2004-2005 archives to when CD and I were watching our own marriage just fall apart. It makes me wonder if I should dredge that up and write about from the perspective I have now - or if anyone cares to hear that sometimes, it does get better. Not very salacious, though.

4) This Todd Bentley/Lakeland Revival thing is making me go 'hmmmm'.

5) NEVER would I EVER have thought I would be a homeschooling mom that makes her own laundry detergent. ME?! Who had a standing drink order at the American Airlines Ambassador's club? I'm going to get a t-shirt made - "Not the woman you think I am, won't vote my demographics. Try again." (Although, I have to admit to loving the whole clothesline thing.)

Updated Flickr, because I am SOOOOOOOOOOO frustrated with this assignment and needed one more thing to distract me???? Even a screencap of my newly organized Mac desktop!