Photo Friday: Oh Snap

The dogwoods are starting to bloom. Which means we're due for a cold snap.

I sort of don't mind it, really, because at this point "cold" is a relative concept. Upper 70's and lower 80's for the past week has gotten me rather spoiled, though. 60-ish weather is going to be a bit of a shock.

But this puts me ever closer to that magical point where it gets warm and stays warm. Just one more cold snap before summer.

Both sides of my street are lined with pink and white dogwoods. Most of my neighbors have azaleas in full bloom. My street is the prettiest street in town this time of year.

Yay spring!




-- Mox

My mind, it is so small.

Things I should have given up for Lent:

1. Talking out loud to myself

2. Cursing

3. Cursing out loud to myself

4. Cursing at inanimate objhects

5. Cursing at other people under my breath

6. Holding imaginary conversations with someone I'd like to curse at

7. Doing this out loud

8. Cursing myself




-- Mox

Duck: calm on the surface, paddling like hell underneath.

It seems I spend a good deal of my time peeved about something.

Yesterday I had to call my mortgage company to try and ascertain why they had assessed me a late fee on my last payment, when I had mailed it out on the 12th, which is in advance of the 16th deadline. Turns out they didn't receive it until the 22nd, so voila, late. That'll be $38.18, please.

A cursory check of the postal service website tells me that the check should have been received in their offices (in Atlanta) within two days' time. So either the post office here screwed up (likely, because the PO here is notoriously slow) or whoever received it at the mortgage company took their good sweet time in posting my payment.

Not a lot I can do about either scenario.

And oddly enough, that's not what pisses me off. I don't generally get all worked up about things that are out of my control. No, what's got me in a lather is the customer "service" I received.

My husband is fond of reminding me that customer service is the easiest thing to give and yet the hardest thing to get. As a man who works in the convenience store industry, he knows what he's talking about. I don't know why that is but it's just not human nature, I guess, to be pleasant and helpful. I find it hard sometimes, myself.

First off, I understand that there's not a whole lot that people can do about the sound of their voices. But people who hire for telephone customer service positions would be well-served to actually listen to what people's voices sound like before setting them up with a workstation and a headset.

Secondly, I understand that customer service people, particularly those who talk to people who are sending the company money, are by necessity a bit jaded. They've heard every excuse in the book. They deal with a lot of people who are actually TRYING to pull the wool over someone's eyes. It's hard not to answer that call without presupposing you're dealing with a liar.

Here's the thing: I am not a liar. The reason I am not a liar is that I am not good at it. If I were a better liar I would lie like a rug and not give it a second thought. But I cannot lie with any sort of conviction and therefore you won't catch me doing it. It's probably why I'm not a better writer: I can't make up shit to save my soul.

So I called my mortgage company to see if I could get this straightened out, and silly me, I thought I would be able to work this out. After all, I've never been late on a payment before, not once in all the eleven years I've had a mortgage. I've probably been spoiled by the great customer service I've received at other companies -- even credit card companies -- and it seemed reasonable to me that forgiveness should be relatively simple to get on this.

But no.

You know what I got? I got a guy with both a nasal voice and a snotty attitude. When I first heard his nose talking I cringed a little bit but, you know, thank god at least English was his first language. (Sidebar: don't get me started on customer service reps who speak a heavily accented English. Just don't.) I explained the situation to him and you know what? I got exactly bupkiss. Obviously, this guy has become accustomed to dealing with deadbeats and wasn't going to brook any excuses. He launched into a spiel about the many ways I could avoid this in the future starting with, hey, mail it on the first like you're supposed to, you bum (implication mine), or set it up to be automatically deducted from my account on a certain day (um, no). Several times I opened my mouth to interrupt but it was obvious he was working from a script of sorts. Nothing I said changed his tone or position.

I took it as a personal affront to be spoken to that way. Do not lump me in with that group of people with sob stories about how they can't pay their mortgage.

I suppose I could have escalated the issue and asked to speak to a supervisor, but at a certain point you have to ask yourself: is this worth $38 to me?

Customer service. Hah.

Now would seem to be a good time to shop around for a new mortgage. See what I can come up with. Rates are (according to the media) at historic lows.

Is $38 and a snotty attitude worth a couple hundred thou? I think not.




--Mox

That's odd.

I love to watch people. Now that we've had a spate of warm days, people have come out of hibernation, and that means I've had a quite a lot to watch here lately.

Here's something that makes no sense to me: people who smoke a cigarette while riding a bicycle.

Is it just me, or is there something a little off about that?

I understand that not everyone has a car, or wants a car, or has access to public transportation, so they have to get around by whatever means possible. But you'd think that if you were going to ride a bicycle, you'd want to do it without a cigarette hanging out of your mouth.

Here's the thing: riding a bicycle takes two legs and two arms. And in the case of an incline, it also takes some lung and muscle power. Smoking a cigarette takes at least one hand/arm and some lung capacity. Why would anyone want to complicate something as simple as riding a bike with the added bother of having to keep up with a smoke?

I won't even get into the health stuff here. All I'll say about that is this: exercise = healthy; smoking = not so much.

People are funny.




-- Mox

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Man.

80° over the weekend. Glorious.

My kid and the neighbor's kid were out running around in their swimsuits yesterday. This is March?

I dragged the porch furniture up out of the basement yesterday. The cat was a bit miffed that I took her favorite sleeping spot away, but I'm glad to have the extra space restored in the basement. Now if I can just get to St. Vincent de Paul with the stuff I'm giving away, I'll have even more room down there.

I gave up on wearing turtlenecks several weeks ago but it still seems to be a big leap to shorts and sandals. And yet, here I am. Please note that you do not hear me complaining.

One of the things I love about spring is its' ephemeral nature. The quick succession from bud to bloom to leaf happens almost in the blink of an eye.

One of the surest signs of spring is the sound of birds singing in the predawn hours. That's one sound I miss when fall comes. But in the spring, the birds are singing to catch a mate and the air is saturated with the sound. I have a pair of doves checking out the vine-covered pergola over my deck as a possible location for their nest. If you've never awakened to the sound of a dove's soft cooing outside your window, I suggest you search out the experience.

To delight in the act of creation, whether through your own hands or through the observation of other creatures, is one of the traits that ties us to God, I think.




-- Mox

Photo Friday: Dandy

The old wives' tale (or old farmers, whichever) says that spring has officially arrived once the dandelions bloom. Dandelion blooms are said to signal no more snow.

Well, guess what's blooming in my yard?

Huzzah!




-- Mox

I think I will write a sonnet, about my Easter bonnet.

Every so often, things will work out just right, where a beautiful, sunny, warm day exactly coincides with my day off.

Yesterday was such a day.

The First Day of Spring came in gently yesterday, with sunshine and 75° weather (in March! can you believe it?) and everyone out and about and in a great mood. There was a sense of firmly shutting the door to winter and turning the lock. Windows down, stereos blaring, flipflops out of the closet, and all of us grooving along in sync with the weather. I love it.

I am now sufficiently emboldened to try and find something to wear for Easter.

I think that, at least for me, shopping is about 95% attitude. If I'm feeling frumpy or overtired, nothing I see is going to make me happy. But set me out for the mall on a fine spring day and see what I come back with.

Yesterday I decided to save myself a huge wad of cash. I bought a $30 (on sale!) slipcover and threw it over my 12-year-old couch and voila -- a new couch. My husband was very pleased. Next will be a slipcover for the wing chair that the cats seem to want to climb all the time. All told I'll probably spend a tenth of what I would have on new furniture. I'm feeling quite smart.

If I could slipcover my husband then my happiness would be complete. Same sturdy frame with a new exterior, something a little softer that wouldn't be such a pain in my ass. If it were only that easy.





-- Mox

Sprrrrriiiiiiiinnnnngggggg!

Nature's first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leaf's a flower;

But only so an hour.

Then leaf subsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay.

This has been SO worth waiting for.


Enjoy these few glimpses of Spring in my neck of the woods.

-- Mox




poetry, courtesy of Robert Frost, of course; from New Hampshire, 1923

spring, courtesy of Mother Nature

Hamlet, Act III, Scene I

I've probably mentioned this before (and frankly I'm too lazy to go hunting around in the archives, especially in the 700+ posts at my old blog) but I am a heavy sleeper. I sleep the sleep of the dead. It's a combination of sheer exhaustion and a clear conscience most of the time, but it's also genetic: my father's side of the family are all sleepyheads and can nod off at a moment's notice.

I realize what a blessing this is, of course, particularly when I have the odd night of poor sleep.

I've been having restless nights for the past week or two, and man, am I crabby. Part of it, I'm sure, is a little bit too much caffeine and not nearly enough booze (next year I won't be quite so ambitious as to give up The Drink for Lent) in my day-to-day existence. My nerves, they are a little jangled.

Is there anything worse than being wide awake at 4am? Let me answer that for you: yes. What's worse than being wide awake at 4am is dropping back off to sleep at 5:15. When your alarm goes off at 5:30. Which gives you a bad case of foggy brain. So you remedy that with cappuccino, which of course has caffeine so you can get through the morning. And maybe you have a little sweet tea for lunch. Which sets you up with enough caffeine to carry you through the rest of the day and most of the coming night, so that at 4 the next morning, guess what.

At four in the morning the theatre that is my mind is a series of disjointed thoughts, some dreamlike in their level of weirdness, some based so solidly in reality that there's no way to dismiss them. It's like being awake for my dreams, and for someone who rarely remembers her dreams it's a little disconcerting. Apparently I worry about stuff a lot more than I thought.

The good news is today is the last day of winter.

The end.




-- Mox

More than bunnies.

For all of the nail biting I do as a parent, there are moments where the planets are aligned perfectly and I can let go of the breath I'm holding. And even though they're only moments in the grand scheme of hours and days and weeks and months, these moments somehow sustain me as if they were events that last longer than the fleeting seconds they're actually comprised of.

Yesterday held one of those such moments.

I've been fighting a particularly ardent battle of wills with Spawn as of late, and I don't know if it's seemed harder because of Spawn's high spirits or because I'm feeling ground down. Whatever the case, it seems that I've been on the kid's case a lot more than usual here lately, and whenever we get locked into this pattern I end up feeling like a particularly bad parent, a parent who can't seem to do anything but correct and discipline. It sucks the joy right out of my soul, to be that parent.

But Spawn has a way of restoring some of the joy with a look or a word or a touch, or a combination thereof. Yesterday as I was in the role of Drill Sergeant Mom, emotionally and physically shoving Spawn toward getting ready for church (we have been out of the habit, and when you are out of the habit it gets quite difficult to motivate yourself to get back in), Spawn stopped me dead in my tracks with a hug and a kiss and these words: "I love you more than bunnies."

Hmm. How about that.

I don't know where that phrase came from, but Spawn's been saying it to me almost from the moment first words became first sentences. And if you really think about it, what could be a sweeter sentiment, because most of us regard bunnies as soft and cute and pretty innocuous and how could you not love a bunny, even a little bit? It speaks volumes to me about the depth of the kid's love for me, even when I'm not being a perfect parent. That I could be doing it all wrong, yelling and being punitive, with a frown on my face most of the time, and still merit such simple, uncomplicated love from the one person who would be well within rights to withhold such affection from me... boggles my mind.

Now, it didn't make Spawn any easier to deal with from that point on, because the kid is in a stubborn, I'll-do-it-my-way mode of thinking right now. But it did give me the strength to keep on going. And it forced my brain to get off the path I had been on and try a new one. Sunday afternoon was less angst-ridden.

I often indulge in "what if" thinking, extrapolating what our lives would be right now if we'd never had a baby. Certainly, we'd have a lot more money. We'd probably have traveled quite a bit, too. We would be on track to retire at 50. I might have gotten my book written, or learned to paint, or gotten into the best shape of my life. But would it be possible to have my faith restored in myself just with one simple phrase?

I highly doubt it.




-- Mox

Photo Friday: Winter ain't done with me yet.

Earlier this week, we had temperatures of 75 and 80. Today, the above is what we have.

It's funny, how warm 40 degrees can feel when you've had temps in the 20's, and how cold it can feel when you've gotten used to 60's and 70's.

Spring officially arrives next week. Someone needs to tell Winter to start packing.




-- Mox

The word for the day is: ugh.

I am having a hard time this week pulling it together, folks. Today I forgot to pack my lunch. I've certainly never forgotten to eat, so forgetting to pack my lunch... how is that possible?

I had to sit down yesterday and try to explain to Spawn why I find Bratz dolls unacceptable. Do you know how hard it is to explain to a six-year-old the concept of "tacky"? Never mind the whole idea of "sexy" because at this point members of the opposite sex are still fairly cootie-ridden and there is no way to explain that someday the two camps are going to notice one another without freaking the kid out.

Oh, I so remember this from my own childhood. Except for me it was a purple coat. (Funny, the things that your mother will deem unacceptable.)

As a child, I went shopping with my grandmother every so often and on one occasion I found and fell in love with a purple coat. So my grandmother bought it for me. And my mother, finding the color of the coat to be "tacky", made my grandmother take it back. I remember being quite heartbroken.

Some thirty-odd years later I understand the concept of tacky, even though at the age of seven all I knew was that my best friend's favorite color was purple and my mother was a great big ol' meany for not letting me keep that beautiful purple coat. Apparently, in my mother's mind back in the early 70's, purple was a color that "nice" girls did not wear, at least not as an overcoat.

Funny, how you become your mother even though you try not to.

Spawn was out shopping with my mother yesterday and somehow managed to wrangle a new umbrella out of her, a Bratz umbrella. I have a strict no-Bratz policy in our household, because I find them trashy and oversexed and the tacky third cousins of Barbie. And make no mistake, I played with Barbies myself as a girl. I didn't understand the feminist backlash against them then, and to an extent I don't now. Maybe it's because I've not attached a sexual meaning to Barbie's huge hooters, despite dressing and undressing her thousands of times.

As adults we get hyper-vigilant about all things sexual when it comes to our kids, and that causes even somewhat rational people like me to come down hard on oversexed Barbie knockoffs like the Bratz dolls. It's just not an image that I want Spawn to think is okay.

And lest you think I'm a huge, latent feminist nutball, looking for sexual meaning in children's toys, let me tell you that my sensibilities get offended by other things, too. I also banned Barney from ever entering our house when Spawn was a toddler. Because I thought Barney was simpering and I could not stand that goofy giggling voice.

I am weird, I know.




-- Mox

From the "Things I Don't Get" File:

What is so all-fired sexy about Justin Timberlake?

And if he's bringing sexy back then where has it been all this time?

I'm taking this as further evidence that I am getting older and further out of touch. But in my estimation the boy needs to 1) grow a pair, 2) shave his neck, and 3) bathe.

As a matter of fact, I see a lot of junior celebrities who could use a good hose-down.

A few years ago while waiting at the salon for a haircut, I picked up a People magazine. At that point I had been buried in diapers and children's videos for a couple of years, and I was shocked to find that I had no idea who three-fourths of the people listed in the magazine were. So now I try to keep up, at least marginally, with pop culture. And because now I am an embittered old crone whose days in the sun are far behind her, I find myself more often than not shaking my head over what passes as "sexy" these days. Apparently filthy appearance is the New Sexy.

Didn't the grunge look die with Curt Cobain? (Aha! I know who he was!)

I find myself longing for the Golden Age of Hollywood, not so much because I was around back then (because I wasn't, thankyouverymuch) but because back then when the celebrities stepped out they were decently dressed and clean. Their hair was combed. There were no "wardrobe malfunctions." No one came in looking like they'd just done a hundred hard miles in the heat, on foot, wearing clothes picked up off the floor in their skank apartment.

Maybe this is why I can't find decent clothes to wear, because fashion emulates pop culture.

I don't get it. I don't get why anyone would want to cultivate a look that suggests someone coming off a three-day drunk.

Which brings me back to my original point: I don't understand what is so all-fired sexy about Justin Timberlake. And if this is what passes as sexy these days then apparently my ovaries have already dried up.




-- Mox

Style, and the lack thereof.

My husband and I took a rare trip to the mall the other day, since we both still had gift cards from Christmas burning holes in our wallets. And you know what? We didn't buy a damn thing.

Every season I find something about the latest fashions to hate. This season it seems to be everything I see.

Long, floaty, tiered skirts. Dark colors. Mod prints. Embellished jeans. "Distressed" fashions. Buttons and doodads and contrasting stitching and weird cuts. Even at Talbots, which I have long regarded as the holy grail of clothes I can wear that don't look painfully trendy.

I am not a hippie, nor am I a hipster. I am no longer a teenager. I am most definitely NOT a matron. I'm not out there selling my wares, but I'm not interested in covering them with shapeless sacks, either. I am not six feet tall and 100 scrawny pounds. I have hips.

Do you know how hard it is to find clothes for my particular fashion niche? I'd like to define my sense of fashion as "classic" but a lot of what's considered classic is also what my mother wears and I am really fighting that. It's bad enough that I'm starting to sound like her, do I have to morph into her style, too?

Clean lines, nice fabrics, basic pieces. That's all I ask. Oh, and for things to not cost a fortune.

Apparently I ask too much.

I have entered into that fashion no-man's-land of What to Wear When You're Shoving 40. Designers don't really give a shit about my age group. Nothing is designed for the "funny, I don't feel old" generation, it's all for teenagers who want to look like they're pulling their clothes out of a dumpster.

Of the dozens of things that I tried on, only one outfit, a nice navy blue pinstripe suit, really looked good on me. And it was $300.

Well, hell. It might as well have been $3000.

Is it my imagination or is everything crazy expensive these days?

As a kid, every year I would get a new outfit for Easter. As an adult, I haven't had a new Easter outfit in years. And it doesn't seem like this year I'll find anything, either.

This is depressing.




-- Mox

Damn, y'all. I need a vacation.

Over the weekend it was 62 warm and sunny degrees. I spent my entire Sunday out in the yard doing cleanup work, and true to form for a weekend warrior, I am sore today. I am also going to Hell, do not pass go do not collect $200, because I used the time change as a convenient excuse not to go to church yesterday.

I now have spring fever something awful.

The fact that spring break is coming up and I am consigned to working the whole time is also wearing on my nerves. My whole life I've never done spring break. My whole life I've either spent it sitting around the house while my parents worked or I've worked that week while everyone else is at the beach. Why oh why can't I be one of those people who gets a vacation for spring break?

It's just not fair, I tell you.

I am also playing that mind game with myself, you know the one, where I look at the clock and say to myself, "but it's really blank o'clock." It was hard as hell to get up this morning. Nice to have that extra hour of daylight at the end of the day, mind you, but the mornings are going to be a pain until I adjust. Thank god for coffee.

I really just feel like bitching today.




-- Mox

Photo Friday: picking and choosing

Here is what $7 will buy at a used book sale:

Eleven books, plus two others not pictured here because they are gifts. All of these are MINE.

The nice thing about being on the inside of this book sale is that kids and parents get to shop first, before it's opened to the general public on Saturday and Sunday. You wouldn't believe the stack of books Spawn got for a mere $8, some of which were my favorites as a child. And I couldn't believe I got both Steinbeck and Hemingway for 50¢ apiece. In hardback. And as I'm always looking to expand my (still non-existent) library with works that have stood the test of time, I snapped those up pretty quick.

The hardest thing about helping to set up the sale the other day was resisting the urge to set aside a box for books I wanted to purchase. Well, that and the urge to read instead of stack.

In other news, it's going to be 70° here today. The downside of that is I have to be indoors, at work.

If I could pick and choose today, I would choose to be outside in the sunshine with my nose in a book.




-- Mox

All hail independence.

Sometimes a mom has to take a stand.

Occasionally I'll get into a little tiff with my mother about the amount of independence I am encouraging Spawn to have at the tender age of Six. It seems my mother would enjoy seeing me doing things like pack the kid's suitcase for little overnight trips until the kid is, oh, twenty five. Mox don't play that shit. Spawn packs. I check the packing. Usually we're good to go with only minor adjustments to the contents of the suitcase (i.e., removing the flip flops and packing tennis shoes, it is still winter, after all).

But I encourage the independence because I know that 1) it will help the kid to leave the nest someday and 2) cut me a break. Because I want the kid to be able to leave the nest without the guilt that is still visited upon me periodically (why do you think that I still live in Podunk, I cannot leave because they would follow me) and I am determined not to play the martyr card.

As of late we have been having a struggle with dinnertime. I recognized that the Martyr thing was starting to rear its' ugly head when I started feeling used for cooking semi-fabulous dinners that Spawn would summarily declare "disgusting." Oh, the culinary rules of Six -- no gravy of any sort, not even on mashed potatoes, no green veggies ("Mom, how about you give up asparagus for Lent?"), absolutely no tomato sauce of any kind, which lets out spaghetti and pizza as quick-cook substitutes on nights I don't have time. The kid would exist on Wendy's cheeseburgers if I allowed it. And I don't.

So last night I decided: enough. I'm tired of cajoling the kid into eating, tired of witnessing the pained expression of someone who is forced to eat Salisbury steak oh the humanity, tired of enforcing the eat-your-vegetables rule. I knew that Spawn had the upper hand in this little struggle and I made up my mind that I was done fighting. The kid could starve for all I cared.

I gave my husband a brief heads-up -- we were not going to talk about food at the table, we were going to go on and eat our dinner and if Spawn turned up a nose at the food then the kid would just sit there with an empty plate and watch us eat.

Which is what happened for the first five minutes of the meal. Spawn sat there and looked at the empty dinner plate and at the food that was on the table ("gross" and "disgusting" and "I don't like that") and then asked me to fix a PB&J. When I didn't leap up to fix it, the kid did it personally.

So okay, the kid ate, got some protein in, and I didn't leave the table exhausted from a battle over food. If Spawn wants a PB&J for supper then I've had a demonstration that I am not the only one around here who can make one.

My mother was mortified. How could I not plan and cook my dinner around those few foods that her precious only grandchild would eat? What kind of a mother am I? After all, she fixed me Spaghettios whenever she cooked Navy beans for supper when I was a kid. (Side note: Spawn will not eat Spaghettios. I have no idea what is wrong with this kid.) But I am a hardnosed mom when it comes to suppertime. I fix what I fix and the chips just have to fall where they may. Imagine, me subsisting on Kraft Mac 'n Cheese every night because that is one of the "safe" foods that Spawn will eat. Nuh-uh.

Please do not tell me that I am doing this parenting thing wrong because I happen to believe that short of abuse and neglect there is no wrong way to do it.




-- Mox

I have never understood the concept of a "used" book.

Today I am spending my morning in the locker rooms under the bleachers of Spawn's school gym, helping to set up for the annual used book sale. Over 40,000 used books are sold every year to support the school library. You'd think that in a podunk town this size there wouldn't be 40,000 extra books lazing about, but apparently the absence of anything resembling a nightlife results in a certain sort of intelligentsia.

I am just as cheap as anyone else when it comes to spending my money on things that have been pre-owned, but the whole idea of a book being "used" is somehow odd to me. Sure, I bought used textbooks in college because they were cheaper than the shiny new ones, and often with great notes in the margins, but to me the term "used" implied diminished and that doesn't make any sense to me. Are the words any less meaningful if someone else's eyes and brain have read them first? Is it worth less because the spine is broken?

Not that I am going to argue at pennies on the dollar for tomes, of course. And helping to sort and set up gives me a sneak preview and lets me pre-shop. The school library makes money, my tuition bill doesn't go up (as much) and I get stacks of new reading material. Everyone wins.




-- Mox

Sweet nothings:

SAMBUCA CHOCOLATE SAUCE
Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

1/2 cup water
2/3 cup sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (preferably Dutch process)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/2 stick (1/4 cup) unsalted butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup Sambuca, or to taste

In a small heavy saucepan combine water and sugar and boil, stirring, until sugar is dissolved. Remove pan from heat and whisking cocoa powder, whisking until smooth. Whisk in salt, cream, and butter and return pan to moderately low heat, whisking until butter is melted. Simmer sauce until thickened slightly, about 2 minutes, and stir in vanilla and Sambuca. Cool sauce completely and transfer to a jar with a tight-fitting lid. Sauce keeps, covered and chilled, 1 month. Serve sauce warm over ice cream.

Makes about 2 cups.
(Source: Gourmet, December 1994)

Really good with honest-to-god Italian spumoni.





-- Mox

Loopholes.

The thing about giving something up for Lent is that on Sundays whatever it is you gave up, you can have. My pastor calls that concept "little Easter" and as far as I'm concerned it is a loophole that I can live with, though I don't ordinarily take advantage of it.

When you have been enthusiastic enough to believe that you can give up chocolate and alcohol for Lent, the key to using a loophole like that is Midnight. As in, technically, Sunday begins at midnight on Saturday night. Which means, when you are attending a birthday party on Saturday night and the party moves to the clubs at midnight, you are golden.

It has been a very long time since I came in stumbling drunk at three in the morning.

Amen.




-- Mox

Photo Friday: Hey, buddy.

Driving into work this morning, I noticed a few of the trees already have swelling buds on them.

At this point in the winter, I will take any sign of spring that I can get.

A cursory check of my yard has found that my daffodils, tulips, and hyacinths are also quite ready for spring. I wish I could say the same for my crocuses (crocii?) but the squirrels have dug all of them up and, I suspect, eaten them.

We are currently in Day Two of In Like a Lion, and frankly I am more than ready to be done with the constant blowing. If the wind would die down it would be relatively warm around here.

Spring break is coming up in a month. Do I have any plans? No. We started checking into the cost of things and you know what? The first week of April is the most expensive week of the year for traveling to places warm and sunny. Were I not trying to work the miracle of the loaves and fishes on a daily basis around here taking a beach trip might be feasible. But since I have yet to discover the trick of feeding five thousand, the whole notion of leaving town is tempered by the fact that I would get as far as the city limits and have to come back.

One soul: for sale.






-- Mox

Lion/lamb.

Some ruminations on this first day of March:

I don't know why I bothered to do my hair this morning.

How is it that a person can go to bed dog-tired and yet not sleep well?

I need a vacation.

And a winning lottery ticket. Otherwise, no vacation.

Bury Anna Nicole already. Sheesh.

I really should not have given up chocolate and alcohol for Lent. Next year I'll be smarter.

But I probably will be breaking Lent in a big way when I go to my friend Denise's birthday party on Saturday night.

I don't have time to be working today.

I did not low-carb it for breakfast this morning and I do not care.

How much longer until quitting time?






-- Mox