Category Archives: Current Affairs

Nibbled

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“Quack”
I looked around the kitchen, rather surprised to hear a duck while doing the dishes. He stood on the other side of the dishwasher door, his fine green head tilted at me.
Okay, a duck. In my kitchen.
“Quack”
He cocked his head sidewise and stared at me. This was not what I had been thinking about. In fact, I had been thinking about Luna. She’s been ice skating a bit lately and she has an expo this weekend. We forgot about the date and scheduled something else at the same time. Crap.
“Quack, Quack”
What the hell? Now there were two ducks staring at me. Where did the other one come from? Besides, I don’t have time for this! I also have to get Soleil to her hockey practice. She’s really getting it down now, this who hockey goalie stuff. If we could only work on her focus. She has trouble focusing at school too. It’s really becoming a problem.
“Quack”"Quack”"Quack”
The original drake hopped up on the dishwasher door. Brave bastard. Where did that other duck come from? And the others? There’s 4 ducks standing in my kitchen. The dog is outside. I should go get her. She’ll scare the ducks away, but she is such a scared dog. I am so glad that she did well at the pet hotel this trip. I worry about the next trip. We’ll be gone longer. Does she miss us? Does she think we’ll be leaving her forever?
“QUACK!”
Wow!Simultaneous quack!I didn’t know ducks could do that. Holy hell? They are multiplying faster than I can think and three of them are now perching on the top rack of the dishwasher. Can ducks actually perch? I mean, the webbed feet and all. Damn, I need to actually walk the dog today. Poor thing. And email. I have a bunch of emails to send out for the data analysis project. Too many things!
“QUACK, QUACK, QUACK, QUACK!”
Okay, this is getting surreal. The ducks are taking over my kitchen, they get are getting braver and braver and I can’t get to the broom closet right now to scare them away. Oh, right, I have to sort through the drawers and pull out the extra clothes that the girls don’t fit in anymore. I can’t believe how fast they are grow…OUCH! That damn duck just bit me! Well, more of a nibble than a bite, but STILL! OW!
The room is now filled with ducks all creating a cacophony of quacks. They all move closer and I can see now that every thought of every task I need to complete brings another duck into existence. They advance with those brown and orange beaks nipping, biting, pecking. I am quickly drowning in a sea of water fowl and destroyed by all the things I need to do in my life.
And that is how I was nibbled to death by ducks.

Totally and completely fried

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  • It’s not the work. It’s the amount of items that are all #1 priority and I always select the wrong one to attack first
  • It’s not the activities. It’s the time it takes to get the girls ready for them. The girls want to go, they just take their damn sweet time.
  • It’s not school. It’s the homework.
  • It’s not the homework. It’s the fighting and screaming and the "it’s not fair" over the homework assignments.
  • It’s not the housework. It’s the lack of recognizing that putting things away when done makes it so much easier.
  • It’s not the laundry. Oh, wait, yeah, it is the laundry.
  • It’s not the commute. It’s the time spent idling because there are too many people on the roads.
  • It’s not the money. Because I don’t think it’s worth it anymore.

Don’t call me a hockey mom

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The activities for this school year:

  • violin, Saturdays 9:30-10:15am
  • ice skating, private lessons, Wednesdays afternoon
  • ice skating, theatre on ice, Wednesday afternoon for 6 weeks
  • hockey, 2 practices a week, 1 game a weekend
  • Girl Scouts. Both girls, and me
  • Hebrew School, Wednesday 3:40-5:30!!! and Sundays 11-1:30(both)
  • 3/4 day of school on Wednesdays.

I have far too many things on my plate to be a hockey mom. Just call me mom.

So tired of being treated like a female.

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What is so sad about the title of this post is that "treated like a female" seems to be understood.

Wednesday, Dr. Jay and I celebrated our 14th wedding anniversary. We went out for a nice dinner followed by a wonderful walk through a pre-American graveyard and finally back to our car for a ride. Within 20 seconds of starting the ride, I was going around a rotary, a traffic circle in most parts of the country, when someone failed to yield. I moved too much to the left and hit the curb, blowing my tire. Great. I drove a tad bit further and pulled into the parking lot near the North Bridge in Concord, MA. We got the jack out, placed it in the right spot, someone came over to help, we got 4 out of 5 lugs off. Then we all stared at the 5th. It was a locking lug nut. Fine. We searched the ENTIRE car. No locking lug nut key (It looks like a long nut that has a funny pattern that goes over the locking lug nut). Ended up calling AAA. They sent a flatbed truck that got lost because the AAA call center isn’t local. If you say "I’m in the National Park parking lot, across from the Old North bridge, by the Old Manse", to someone who isn’t local, they get confused. When you tell them 50 Monument street? They tell the dispatcher something else with a 15 in it and certainly not Monument street. My legs got covered with mosquito bites. Dr Jay got 1. Bastard.

Finally, we got the flatbed to where we were, and he asked "Did you check the glove compartment?" Um, no I’ve been sitting out here getting eaten alive, missing the game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals and it never occurred to me to check the glove compartment. OF COURSE we checked. We checked everywhere.  On the way home, the truck stalls, the guy has to pull over because he isn’t sure my car is secured correctly and then tells us about the time he lost a car because he forgot to secure it. OMG.

The next day, I took Dr. Jay’s car to the tire place in town and explained the situation. They asked "Did you check the glove compartment?" UGH! I ended up getting AAA to tow it again to the tire place (it was a back tire and it was BLOWN, not with a low leak). The AAA operator? "Did you look n the glove compartment?" Hello????

The guys did replace the tire and my maintanance plan, which I normally don’t get, did cover half of the tire. All of the locking lug nuts have been removed. However, they called me and suggested that since my battery is 5.5 years old, I should replace it. Um, why? I asked if they checked it out and they did. All was well! Then I was told that BOTH back tires would need to be replaced, but the front ones were newer. I pointed out that THEY had replaced all 4 tires 2 years ago. Amazing that suddenly, only the blown tire was to be replaced.

I do feel that they treat me like this because I am female. That if I were male, they would be a bit more honest. Sigh… 

 

Trying the weekly thing:

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This week at Chez Space:

LCE or THE REALLY BIG THING: I haven’t decided if I should call this the "LCE" (Life Changing Event) or the "RBT" (Really Big Thing). I think I like RBT better. There are changes coming to our lives. Nothing bad, nothing that involves babies (seriously folks, 2 is more than enough), but changes are coming. I hope this will make a lot of things in our lives smoother and easier. I can’t put the details out. I don’t know how long this will take, but it is something we’ve been talking about for a few years and now is the time to deal with it. Once things get moving and firm up, I will write about it more, but I may need to write about it a little, hence the RBT.

Hit the Ice: So, Luna has an ice skating competition on Sunday. Dr. Jay took her to the rink this morning to practice. She’s doing much better with small wobbles. I have promised her a new skate bag (she wants THIS(but not this color) and new skates for her next skating session. Her current skates are getting tight and I HOPE we can just reuse the blades, but I am not sure (yes, blades and skates are separate). Dr. Jay was helping her perfect her crossovers and she showed him that she can sort-of do a Waltz-jump. She fell the first time, but she nailed the second. Wow.

Hit the Ice II: Yes, Soleil made a hockey team. She’s doing a skills clinic for the next 8 weeks, so hopefully this will help her skating. In the fall/summer we need to get her goalie pads of her own. I want to wait because she’s going to have a growth spurt soon. At least I hope she does because so many kids are taller in 4th and 5th grade. They just TOWER over the 3rd graders.

Fiddlin’ Around: Soleil’s first concert was earlier this month. She was the only 3rd grader in the 4th grade string orchestra. Cool.

Woof: I have been going around the net looking for a dog. Yes, the SpaceFamily will soon have a dog. The girls have been begging and I agreed when they were 5&7. Um, they turn 7&9 this summer. Woops! Eh, I think this is better! We have an insane May, but I promised them that we would start looking in June and I promised Dr. Jay that I wouldn’t fill any paperwork until after our meeting in May (AAS meeting, Boston). We’re looking at a beagle, but, I saw this little guy today. She’s missing a leg, but she is so cute… I hope she is adopted by the time we are ready. I would hate to think of her waiting that long.

Fractional: Can I just ask why the hell we are teaching 3rd graders fractions? They haven’t covered long division, but we expect them to know fractions? WTF, Massachusetts, WTF?

Baby steps to independance…

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Massachusetts does not set a specific age at which a child can be left home alone. In Massachusetts, such issues are decided on a case-by-case basis.

Sunday was busy. After our spree at the American Girl Store, my kids were thrill to be up early, not having Hebrew School because of Feb. break, and setting up the American Girl School in Soleil’s room. She managed to snag the Doll School kit.   Very happy kid to get that. A friend was coming over in the morning to play and then Luna had her birthday party to attend.

Around 10am, I was moving laundry around because that’s my most favorite thing on EARTH! LAUNDRY (that was the sarcasm font, just in case you missed it). Soleil called down that she was seeing things. I started to worry about letting her watch Ghost Hunters with me on Wednesday night. She described what I know as a visual aura. The precursor to a migraine. I get verbal auras. I can’t speak good no how when I’m getting a migraine. (Okay- it’s more that I stutter and grasp at the correct word. I will substitute poorly such a dictator instead of dictionary.) But I have had visual aura and this worried me. Luna already has a history of migraines.

I asked her to take some water and rest. Resting to my children is like a fish and a bicycle. Useless in their opinion.

In about 30 minutes, she told me she had a headache. I gave her some tylenol right away. Then asked her again to rest. She drank the medicine, thereby pushing her liver to its maximum workload, and cocked her head at me as if to say "Rest? I do not think that word means what you think it means." She ran off to play.

Our playdate friend showed up. They decided to watch pokemon because watching TV with a friend is so much better than anything else. Soleil crumpled in the corner of the couch. After TV, they played a little and then we made lunch. Soleil still complained of a headache, so I passed her advil. At this point, I was CERTAIN she had a full migraine. This girl does not slow down. In the past, tylenol has handled all of her headaches, but I also know from Luna and myself that it does NOTHING to a migraine. She downed the medicine like chocolate milk (perhaps a shot of tequila would be a better comparision) and announced, "I’m going to rest on the couch".  I nearly fell over.

An hour later, she was asleep on my couch, the playmate was cleaning up to go and I had 20 minutes before I was driving Luna to her party.

"Do I have to go with you?", she asked.

I stopped and thought. Let’s see: She’s 8 and a half. In third grade. She has my cell phone number memorized. She knows which neighbors to go to in an emergency. She knows how to dial our phones. Why not? It’s less than a 10 minute ride to the party and it’s a drop off party. That means, maybe 30 minutes at the most if I get stuck talking to parents.

At some point, I do need to build up the trust to let her be home alone.

"Would you rather stay home while I drive Luna up?" I ventured

"YES!" Okay, she sounds like the headache has gone away.

We went over all of the emergency instructions. She passed that with flying colors. We went over when to answer the phone and when not to, when to answer the door (NOT) and approved activities while I was gone. She asked to watch TV in my bed, so I said sure.

I left. Luna was very annoyed that her sister got to stay home. I explained how when she was older, she could start, but for now, Soleil needs practice and we need to learn if we can trust her abilities. Once Luna saw the party, she was off and could not care less about her sister. I talked to the parent in charge and went home. I got a phone call on my ride home, so I didn’t check out if she would answer the phone or not.

When I arrived home, she filled me in that Massachusetts had called the house phone, so she didn’t pick up. I checked on how she was feeling and she was still sluggish, but better. The house did not burn down. No fire trucks, police cars or ambulii were outside of my home.

I get afraid to let them grow, but at the same point, she needs to have independance. Right?

When good is good.

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So, Dr Jay is down in Miami to be with his parents while his mom recuperates from her broken hip. I am playing single mom.

We went down to the American Girl Store on Saturday. I do spoil my girls here. I allowed them each $60 to spend. Soleil had earned a $24 outfit on top of the $60 (Because I bribed her to do her multiplication. Because I will use whatever motivation I can to get her to understand that if you tell yourself you can’t, you won’t. If you have a goal, you can reach it!) Each girl ended up spending $76, so I suggested they pay me back $10 of the $16. Soleil agreed and paid up right away. Luna still wants me to take it from her bank account. I still need to explain that it will come out of her piggy bank (she has enough, but she’s 6. ’nuff said.)

Friday, I got a chance to play scientist. The girls and I are reading a book where "a blown ostrich egg" was mentioned. Soleil asked what that was and I explained. She begged for us to do that with a chicken egg. So, out came the drill, a sharp needle to puncture the yolk and a straw to blow the air through without putting our mouths up to the egg. It took about 15 minutes, but we got everything out and then filled the shell with water and blew that until it was clear. It’s fun to just say "sure, let’s try that". I think I need to do that more.

Yesterday, Soleil got her first migraine and even fell asleep on the couch! If you’ve ever read here before, you know this girl doesn’t sleep!

Luna had a "glamor party", and came home looking like a 6 year old tramp. Then her cheeks broke out from the blush. I’ll have to toss it today, but I’ll let her keep the eye shadow.

Things are good. Life is good. I am missing Dr. Jay, but when I look around me, I can’t help but feel good. 

 

I did it!

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I’ve kept my t-tapp experiment going. What I noticed was that it was 2 steps forward and 2 steps back. Most of this was a lack of constancy. With the help of two friends, I started a 14 day bootcamp with T-tapp. This means, doing the basic, 15 minute workout, everyday for 14 days. I DID IT!

15 minutes a day? Easy, right? Not really! It was harder than I thought. Now my goal is 4 weeks of every other day. I think this will be okay. Tomorrow I start the every other day. I think this might be harder in the sense that I might get frustrated if I miss a day. BUT I have noticed some shifting in my body shape and I have noticed a change in my mood. Between these two things, I am going to do my best to keep going. I need to get my body in a good physical condition.

And I will do it! I will! 

When to say “enough”?

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I love sports. Except for golf and basketball. Basketball squeaks too much and golf? Men running around trying to fit things into holes? Yeah.

But NHL hockey, AHL hockey, Even my kid’s hockey, baseball and football, I have been a fan. Yes, I rooted for the Buffalo Bills in the 1990s when they went and lost 4 consequtive SuperBowls. Yes, I still cheer for the Sabres and I have recently accepted that while the Buffalo Bisons will be my favoirte AAA baseball team, I am a Red Sox fan.  Oh I agree these guys are away over paid, I agree they whine, I agree we need more womens professional sports, BUT, I like my sports.

And then on last Thursday, Dave Duerson committed suicide. He had played for the NFL, he was a pro-bowler and had won the Super Bowl twice. He was active in the player’s union and worked with retired players and their disability claims.

What is the issue here? This happens.His personal life had spiraled down recently. Finances and family gone bad. And like most men, Duerson used a gun to kill himself. In the chest. Not a quick a painless shot to the head, but a shot to the chest where it could be instant, or take minutes to die. He was 50.

He left suicide notes (text messages actually) to have his brain sent up to Boston University for study. It is possible that he suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a disease associated with repeated concussions.This disease is also associated with depression. CTE used to be only associated with boxers. Now it is becoming more and more suspect in NFL player’s suicides. 

Dave Duerson deliberately committed suicide in a manner that would allow his brain to be studied. A life cut short because he did what he loved; played football. I want to repeat that he was 50. 10 years older than me. Dead because he suspected a damaged brain that would make his life no longer worth living.

While I want to know the results of the examination, while I know the media outlets will carry this information, I also want to know, when do we fans say "ENOUGH"?

ENOUGH to hits to the head.

ENOUGH to saying "Man up and get back out there"

ENOUGH to implying or even outright stating that players of any sport need to suck it up during injuries.

ENOUGH to letting people die for our entertainment.

Me time?

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How does one really find me time?

Yesterday, after I finished my 4 hours of work, I sat down to read. I was able to mostly finish "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" in quiet. Then, I had kids, dinner, snow, mess, run out for 3 hours for shopping, etc.

I got my friend Becky a T-shirt that reads "If mom’s not happy, nobody’s happy. Me Time." She’s a widow, so she is mom all of the time. It’s not even a "dad has the kids for the weekend" type of parenting, it’s her.

How does she find me time? She stays up to ungodly hours of the night and lives on little sleep. It’s a habit she started after her husband died and she couldn’t sleep.

I don’t know where to find me time. I have so much I want to get done, and so little time to do it. Sigh.

How do you find me time? When do you read? Exercise? Cook? Bake?