And if that’s good enough for the Cookie Monster, then it should be good enough for all of us. :)
Sorry so long in announcing my winners here; we had kind of a crazy weekend. More on that later. BUT…my winners are
City Girl, for being the first to get my reference.
And I Left My Heart at Preschool, for my random drawing!
I’ll send you an email to get your physical address. Congrats and enjoy.
For the rest of you (Kori), I’ll have an another drawing in the not too distant future.
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* Bumper Sticker of the Week: Frodo failed. Cheney has the ring.
* Thing 2 is running track this summer and I think it’s going to kill me. Three nights a week clear on the other side of town. At rush hour. My biggest problem with it is that it makes it hard to keep to my diet since I can’t cook as much. On the plus side, I do run three nights a week while he’s practicing.
* 20 year high school reunion. Go or no go? Discuss.
*Saw a guy today driving a Prius. And throwing trash out his window.
* I had this list of books that I wanted to read, but I just can’t make myself do it. They are all Books You Should Read and very serious like. I’m not there right now. What am I reading to settle down at night? Calvin and Hobbes anthologies. Suggestions anyone? Nothing too serious and nothing that could get turned into a Lifetime movie. Thanks!
* Saw an ad for a sleep aid called “Melissa”. Think someone is trying to tell me something?
* I was going to post some orchestra music, but WP requires me to purchase a “Space Upgrade” for that. Since I am cheap, no music for you.
* It’s a good thing that I have some permanent birth control, because after seeing my beyond adorable nieces in their recital this weekend, I was sorely tempted to go for the girl.
* For my next trick, I’m going to try and work with blogger so that it points to here when people click on the google search. See, I get a ton of hits from “LG Dishwasher Error Codes”. My longtime reader remembers the saga. Anyway, since I got hits from all over the world with that, I want to see them on my clustermaps! We’ll see how that goes.
* Speaking of appliance follies, the ice door on my fridge is opening and closing all on it’s own. In the middle of the night. I have enough trouble sleeping, thankyouverymuch, I don’t need the Refrigerator of the Damned keeping me awake. Although watching the cats deal with it is kind of amusing….
* Do you people not like cookies? Leave a comment on this post and this post to be entered into the cookie drawing. You’ve got until Friday midnight to enter. I know more of you have made the jump that have left comments. I have clustermaps and I can see you! For instance: Seattle. I see you. I know you are there. Don’t you want cookies?
That’s it for me! Thanks for stopping by and see you next week! Go by and check out Mrs.4444 for more Fragments!
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Don’t forget to check out this post and this post to be entered into the cookie drawing. You’ve got until Friday midnight to enter.
A fun thing that I’ve been reading to wind my brain down is this book called “I Hate Myself and Want to Die”. Don’t worry, it’s not about that. It’s about really, really, really bad/depressing songs and just what makes them so bad. And it is frickin’ hilarious. Amazon didn’t have a picture of the same edition I have, which is this pathetic little stuffed bunny with droopy eyes and ears and loose threads. Pretty pathetic looking, but still funny.
Anyway, so I was thinking along these lines when I was with Spouse in the garage this evening. He needed some help working on the timing of his car (he’s restoring a 1966 GTO) so I was more than willing to help. Ok, maybe not more than willing, but it was the least I could do. Anyhoo…so the radio is on..
“Ok, this is funny: I walk into the garage to help you with your car, and “Start Me Up” is playing
“Yeah, yeah. Very funny. Focus Mel. Focus.”
“Ok I am focusing. I’m focusing on the fact that there isn’t a front seat in this car and all kinds of things sticking up and I don’t want to sit on any of them.”
The Stones finish up, and then we hear the first strains of an iconic late 70′s song filter through….
“Oh my God. This is my LEAST.FAVORITE.SONG.EVER.”
“You mean the Pina Colada Song? Oh yeah. It’s bad. Any song that starts out with ‘I was tired of my lady’ is going nowhere fast. We played this in band in middle school.”
“Oh THAT’S appropriate. The only redeeming quality about this song is that it ends.”
“Concur. I think these two are waaaaay beyond couple’s counselling if you ask me.”
“Tell me about it. I mean, can you imagine the scene at O’Malley’s? I walk in and see you? I’m so not going to be all ‘Oh, it’s you’. It’s going to be more like “WTF? You’ve been trolling personal ads? You a-hole. And of course, you’d be like ‘You frickin’ whore! You’re posting personal ads? Get your shit out of my house this instant!’ So NOT planning an escape. Unless it’s to a divorce lawyer.”
“Hah! But it’s just more of that baby boomer mentality crap that I can’t stand. Start me up.”
“Nope. That song’s over. Sorry.”
Anyway…just a little snapshot of life here at ZeCasa.
So, do you have a song that just makes you want to rip your eardrums out? Discuss.
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“So Mel. Where did you get that image for your header? It’s soooo cool and original. I’m green with envy!”
I know, I know. It’s pretty cool, isn’t it? Well, I think so, and since it’s my blog, I can say what ever I want. :) This is an original work by Thing 1. He did this at art camp last year (the same one where we had an issue with un-requited love). It’s actually in this year’s catalog for the art camp. He’s really proud of it, and he should be. It’s got a nice balance and feel. At least I think so, and my opinion is the only one who counts here.
I figured since I talked about how worried I was about him, I would show you the kind of potential he has. This same kiddo also came up with an alternative history for the Pacific battles in WWII. He based his project on the idea that the ships at Pearl Harbor needed to have been deployed differently so that they would be able to defend themselves better against any attack. He then posited that having more ships available would have shortened the war in the Pacific dramatically. Pretty cool stuff I think. Anyway, he’s a fabulous kid going through a rough patch. I just don’t want this rough patch to define his development.
Ok, now if you recall, you have to leave a comment on this post as well. That’s right: I want you to tell me how fabulous my kid is. Do it for the cookies! And don’t forget to post a comment on yesterday’s post as well. City Girl already has her cookies, but there is one more up for grabs.
BTW, thanks for all of your comments on my other post about Thing 1. My task right now with all of this is to keep it in perspective and be there for him. Your comments helped with that.
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Now that I’ve settled in a bit, I think I’m ready to throw a party! Thanks to all of you who have made the jump and have put up with my horrible attitude as of late. Not that my attitude is completely better mind you, but I’m working on it day by day.
So. The party! As my long time reader knows, I make some wicked cookies. People fight over my cookies. They kick some serious ass, if I do say so myself. And I’m generous with my recipe. I share it all the time, even here on the blog. But everyone I give the recipe to says that they can’t reproduce my results. Either that or they are just lazy and want me to keep making cookies. Any-way, I will once again ship a batch (about 5 dz) of my cookies to you if you enter my giveaway!
To enter, just leave a comment on this and Wednesday’s post by Friday. And as an added bonus, the first person who can correctly guess where the title of this blog comes from, will receive a batch as well. So, that’s two batches up for grabs!
Al-righty then! You know what to do!
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gently down the stream (of consciousness).
Warning: this post is going to ramble. A lot. I have an issue I need to work through and you guys get to take the bullet. Thanks. 
Thing 1 has always been a different kid. Not so much a square peg, as a bigger peg, if that makes any sense. He’s very smart, creative, and sweet beyond anything. He also won’t take shit off of anyone, and he was like that even as a little dude. Everything about him is so freakin’ intense. And he was like that from day one. I’m really glad I had him first, because if it had been the other way around, I don’t think I could have handled it. I didn’t know any better, so it was ok, I guess.
But now, things are getting harder. He’s been diagnosed with dysgraphia, which we’ve dealt with and he’s doing fine with now. Well, mostly. But he’s always tested as NOT being in the ADD family. In fact, I’ve kind of enjoyed throwing that back in the teacher’s faces a bit. Recently though, I’ve come to the conclusion that there is more to the story.
Without going into too much detail, he’s having a very hard time with focus, and when he has a hard time with the focus, he loses his temper. And his temper? Well, let’s put it this way: his ancestors on one side did the blitzkreig and the other side used to rip the beating hearts out of sacrificial victims. With some Irish thrown in for good measure. It’s an impressive, and frankly scary temper. It scares him, too. But we only see it when he can’t focus and he gets frustrated. He knows that it is a problem, but he’s powerless to do anything about it. After the last outburst about two weeks ago, we had a nice chat about it all. In which he told me that it actually hurt him to focus.
So we’ve decided to have him re-evaluated. But here’s the thing. We are totally opposed to any drug therapy for this. But I have to admit, at the last outburst, I would have kicked a kitten for a pill to make his pain stop. But really, the best thing, I think, would be some CBT to help him learn to cope with it all. I don’t see meds as a solution. At all. I don’t want to take the chance of the meds changing all of the other wonderful qualities he has. Qualities that when he is older will serve him so well. It’s just that they don’t do well in a classroom setting.
Homeschooling? Not on your life. Someone in this house would be dead in a week. Thing 1 has a personality that is waaaay too close to mine to make this effective. There are some half-and-half options that are intriguing, but there are no secular options for that in this town. I am religious, but I’m Lutheran, which means I don’t want any of THAT stuff involved in my kid’s education, thankyouverymuch.
I’m trying to come up with the best way to help him be the adult I know he can be. My side of the family has a LOT of really smart, talented people who just…..well, just. I mean, I grew up thinking that every family had lots of valedictorians and concert quality musicians and PhD. candidates and stuff like that. But we (and I include myself here, too) just never did much with all of the talent. And Spouse’s uncle has to be one of the most intelligent people I’ve ever met. But he’s so, how do I say this, WEIRD, that he just never got his shit together. If he were a kid today, he’d totally be Aspergers. I am so afraid of that being his life. Oh, and as an added bonus: Spouse’s family has a disproportionately high number of suicides. So am I starting to have kittens over all of this? You betcha.
So we’re going to do the eval….and then what? At least he’s on board with the whole thing. He realizes he has a problem and he wants to do better. That’s encouraging. And how much of this is my expectations? Am I so wrapped up in him that I’ve got some preconceived notion of what he should be? Have I lost perspective on all of this?
Thing 2 doesn’t worry me like this AT ALL. Even though he also has dysgraphia, for him it’s more of a motor skills issue. He’s totally happy to use his AlphaSmart in class and is a model student in every way. I know Thing 2 is going to be just fine. But I’m really starting to worry about Thing 1.
I guess part of the ambivilence is that I wonder how much of this comes from the fact it is so freakin’ competitive around here. I mean, no one takes anything at half measures. Yeah, I live in one of THOSE neighborhoods. Is he really just a normal 11 yr old but since he’s not “at the top”, there is something “wrong” with him? Are we caving into some sort of societal pressure to make him what is expected? And what is expected anyway? I’m just so torn about it all.
So that’s part of what’s been keeping me up nights. We’ll do the eval as soon as we get the insurance all squared away. I just hope it doesn’t give us more questions than we already have.
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I like this meme. For bonus points, maybe I could haiku my fragments? But that’s an awful lot like work, ya know? Maybe next week?
So. My fragments:
Bumper stickers of the week:
Hey, do any of you know how I can get rid of the extra title up there? It’s it’s real real annoying annoying.
Bought some sheet music today of a piece I played over 20 years ago. It’s going to come back pretty fast I think. Happy day. :)
I think I should have a blog warming party. I’m thinking cookies. You want in? Come back on Tuesday for details. Yeah, I’m a cookie tease. What’s your point?
Right now I’m trying to make the most useless marketing piece ever work for the mailed invites for this auction thing. I feel really bad for the charity because it looks like the first marketing company really took advantage of them. And now we have to deal with these pieces they made. I think they designed them in this way to make us dependent on them. Grrr…
Thing 2 won a trophy at the cubmobile derby last week. Yay!
I can’t decide what is more telling: The fact that I haven’t called a meeting of our church women’s group in over six months, or the fact that no one has asked me when the next meeting is. Can we say “lack of interest?”
I’m going to Dallas this weekend to see my adorable nieces in their dance recital. I can’t wait! I have some pictures of me when I did dance recitals. I think I’ll bring them for the girls to see. I think they’ll get a big kick out of it.
After I finish up my work tomorrow, I think I will detail my car. It’s yucky.
I’m not sure how I’m going to handle next Thursday. I have a speaking engagement at 6:30 30 miles away that will last until 7. Thing 2 is crossing over into Webelos that night. That.Just.Sucks.
I hear Rush (the band, not the commentator) from Thing 1′s room. It doesn’t sound nearly as hard as it used to. Oh God, followed by early Madonna (I think the song is “Celebrate”). Eeek. WTF station is he listening to?
I really need to start sleeping. In a big way. But I keep picking a helluva week to give up caffeine….
Okeydokeythen. That’s it for me. Have a great weekend! It’s a long one, too!
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Well, I imported the old blog, figured out how to do more widgets, and things are looking up. It looks like I’ll stay. It’s a pretty nice neighborhood, now that I’m getting used to it.
Why did I move? I like the UI better than blogger. At first I didn’t think I could use as many widgets, but I cracked that code a bit. I also like that the stats are easier to use, but I do like seeing where people come from. So sitemeter may still find it’s way here.
Still have a lot to do around here, but it’s really freakin’ late and I should sleep now.
Later!
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Sorry there’s no place to sit, but I’ve spent all the time I can today on this and it’s time to move on. Anyway, here are the new digs. :) I’ll be sprucing up the place a bit over the next few days. It will be just like home in no time.
Later!
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