Kid C Expresses his True Feelings

Kid C came home yesterday with a gift for me. 

The kids in his class were instructed to make these bunny bags, and then write how they feel about their moms. The other kids wrote messages like, "I love mom. She's the best! She makes me food and ties my shoes!"

Kid C's message was this: 

(If pressed, I'd admit I like mom.)

I'm pretty sure I can guess his thought process: 

"I like mom okay. I mean, I could take her or leave her. I'm not gonna get all mushy just 'cuz I glued a few whiskers on a paper bag. Sure I made her a bunny bag, but c'mon folks, it's a bunny bag. It's not a diamond bracelet. I will leave her a note befitting the bag." 

That'll do, kid C. That'll do.

It's Spring Break for us. You can tell by the weather.

So even though the kids are out of school, it's not so bad. At least they'll be able to play outside. Jump on the trampoline and stuff.

Personally, I can't wait to do a little sunbathing. Mother Nature, what did I ever do to you?

No blog on Friday. Happy Spring Break. Don't forget the sun block. What's everyone doing? Anyone going on vacation?

The Tivo Talks Smack

Howdy. How was all y'all's weekend?

We hooked up our Tivo to the internet this weekend, which means we were able to pull up Youtube videos on the big screen.

I couldn't believe it. Now I know how my parents felt when they saw their first Atari, and their joysticks actually made the little Pong ball move.  Like how is it possible? I push buttons on my remote, and my television thinks for itself, and grabs what I want through radio waves in the air. (Fine, I didn't get my degree in computer science.)

However, we did run into one problem: the sheer idiocy of the search screen.

You have to navigate to each letter and press enter, and it's not like the tivo is gonna give you any breaks, like the google search engine on a computer does. You want a space? You have to find it. There's no space bar in Tivo Search! And there's definitely no auto fill.

No.

The Tivo's all, "I want each word perfect and complete before I get up off my bum and hand over what you want. I don't work for half a word. I've got a family to feed."

Literally, the Tivo said that to me.

Sam and I were settling in Saturday night, and we decided to search for the gag reel for It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

It took me twenty minutes to type the word "It's."

Sam's all, "I'm gonna go do the laundry, let me know when you're finished."

He came back just as I was erasing "gag reel" and trying to find the letters for "bloopers" instead. Because I put in "gag reel" and the Tivo was all, "I'm sorry. I do not recognize stupidity. Try it again, suckah."

Then after I typed "bloopers", the Tivo was all, "Zing! It's outtakes! Looooooo-zerrrrrrr."

It reminded me of this:

Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard

Thanks for all the well-wishes on Friday!

Yo

Good news: My dad's latest tumor markers came back normal today. He continues to kick Pancreatic Cancer's arse, and we are grateful for the time with him. I'm celebrating today!

Have a great weekend.

In Which I lose my bid for Re-Election... and Who Knew Caucuses could be so Fun?

I lost my delegate bid last night at our neighborhood caucus.

It's okay though, because lemme explain my caucus. Usually our numbers are sparse at these things, especially for my particular party in my particular state. Most of our caucuses (or cauci?) are held in a janitor's closet with overflow room in a refrigerator box.

At the caucus two years ago, there were like three of us. We needed two delegates, so Diane nominated me and I nominated Diane, and Mike voted for both of us.  And then the janitor cast the deciding vote.

But last night, there was a huge crowd in the Skyline High School cafeteria and things got a little spicy.

I don't want to get all political on my blog, so I'll try to use a secret code:

Igniting Incident 1:

Our local Congressman (We'll call him "Jimmy") is a Shmemocrat, even though his district is mostly Freepublican.

"Jimmy" cracked corn...

Said local Congressman voted against a very recent bill dealing with Stealth Scare Perform.

Of course, the Shmemocrats in his district are very mad about this.

Igniting Incident 2:

Neighbor "Jane" decided to run against him, even though she's in the same party.

Jane- ready for a fight

Incident 3:

Out of all the 300 attendees, sitting at all the 30 tables, in all the cafeteria, in all the world, "Jane" and "Jimmy's representative" were sitting at our little precinct table.

Awkward.

At one point "Jimmy's representative" gets up to address the whole crowd, and defend "Jimmy's" vote, and the loudest heckling comes from our table. (Not from me. I don't heckle unless I'm in a Twilight movie. At this point I was really just wishing I was home watching American Idol.) 

Then Jimmy's representative has to return to sitting at our table so we can hold court and vote for delegates. Here's a recap:

So yeah, I didn't nominate myself this year. I've served my term. It's someone else's turn, especially since this year might be the year rotten fruit is thrown. And I don't eat fruit.

Princess for Hire Book Signing, My fish Keep Dying, and a really lame lunch discussion

Thing 1

Um... evil Chopester died. And then our snail, Quid, died. Apparently we're the only ones in the universe who can't keep "unkillable" fish alive.

I was ready to pack up the aquarium and call it a life, but then Sam came home from the pet store with another one. We cleaned out the tank of death really well, and we used more bleach than ever, so our new little bugger, Chopes, would feel at home. Please don't report us to PETA.

I'm trying not to get attached. Chopes will flare his gorgeous fins, and Sam will be all, "It's so beautiful!" and I'll be all, "Meh. Whatev's." and Sam's all, "Look at the fins...  they're like golden fiery spikes!"

Thing 2:

I went to Lindsey Leavitt's book signing for Princess for Hire. She did a great job- totally down to earth and delightful- and she had a great turnout.

(Catie, me, Lindsey, Valynne, Emily, Sarah- who's book comes out April 17th)

She read from her book, and she also made little goody bags with candy necklaces and little tiaras. Several little girls showed up in full princess regalia. (Did I use that word right? Regalia? It doesn't sound right, and the more I look at it, the wronger it sounds...) 

Afterward we went to the Dodo, where my mouth ran amok. As usual. This time the discussion started with the Chippendales vs. the Thunder from Down Under, and ended with me ranting about how the sexual orientation of strippers shouldn't shouldn't matter.

 

 vs.

My impassioned argument was strange for several reasons because:

1. I've never been to either show.

2. I have no plans to go to either show.

3. So why do I care that the Chippendales look more feminine than the Thunder from Down Unders?

4. I mean, no one was arguing with me, and yet...

5. I kept repeating myself.

4. And my voice kept getting louder and louder and the nice women who were brunching right behind us looked disgusted...

5. Because women who "brunch" as a verb shouldn't be exposed to such filth.

6. Yes, I just said "exposed" while talking about strippers, and I just giggled to myself in my kitchen

7. And it comes full circle- I need to grow up.

8. That's what she said.

How was y'all's weekend?

Our Fish succombs to Evil, and Lindsey Leavitt's book signing: Come hang with me!

Today's crazy. I spent the morning at the salon, cheering on my stylist as she tried to fix my latest hair fryage disaster. Sorry so late. Longer letter later.

Thing 1:

Our fish, Chopie, died. 

(Chopie, in happier times)

Yesterday, Kid C walks past the tank with my sister, when he stops and says -- with instant tears in his eyes, "Chopie's dead."

me calling from the other room: "Don't be silly. Betta fish live for years. You have to work to kill them."

my sister: "Oh yeah, he's totally fine." But behind Kid C's back, she's looking at me and shaking her head, and mouthing the words He's totally not fine.

So I take a look. Chopie's upside down, floating in the center of the tank (not the top... who knew?) and his eyes are literally bugging out of his head.

I shoo Kid C out the door, and tell him everything will be okay. Then I call Sam and order him to grab another Chopie asap.

Sam comes home with this:

Most decidedly, this is not a Chopie lookalike. In fact, it's the opposite of Chopie. 

So, I did what any other mother would do when presented with a learning opportunity. At some point, every kid has to learn about life and death.

I told Kid C that Chopie had a rough day, glimpsed the afterlife, saw a light at the end of the tunnel, and decided against going toward it. Instead, Chopie turned to the dark side. 

He is now known as "Chopester", Chopie's evil alter-ego, much like Angel vs. Angelus.

 Don't worry. I told Kid C that someday, if Chopester works really hard, he just may earn his soul back and return to his original colors.

2. Wanna hang with me?

Tomorrow (Saturday), Lindsey Leavitt is signing books at The King's English at 2:00. I'll be there, as will most of my writer peeps. I met Lindsay in L.A. at the SCBWI conference, and she very much rocks.

Her book PRINCESS FOR HIRE looks fabulous and I can't wait to get my hands on a copy.

So, if you're available, come to the party and find me and say hello. 

Okay, back to the madness. Anyone else's husband turn into a completely different person during March Madness? Sam's coming home early today. He never comes home early. Methinks it hast something to do with 10 grown men trying to put a ball through a hoop.

Kid B Makes a Discovery... and Contests Galore!

First, a couple of items of interest... at least to me:

1. Book Reviews:

Hubby Sam reviewed five books at his blog, including Andre Agassi's autobiography and Todd Strasser's Wish You Were Dead. If you like to read, check it out.

2. More Chances for Free Books:

My WIFYR (Writing and Illustrating for Young Readers) contest is open until the end of the month. Basically if you're not signed up for this most excellent conference and you sign up before March 31st, and then you leave me a comment telling me you did, you will be entered in a drawing to win one of five signed books! (Chances are very very good you'll win.)

Also, if you tweet about the contest and the workshop, I'll put an entry in for you.

Tweeting/blogging/facebooking: +1 entry
Signing up: +5 entries

You can leave a comment here telling me your entries, or on the original contest post. Yeah, I know. It's confusing. But not really.

Fellow 6-er and #2 Crazy Emily Wing Smith is holding a contest too. You don't even have to register to enter hers. You can tweet about it or blog about it or other easy stuff.

Another fellow 6-er and #4 Crazy Valynne Nagamatsu is doing a contest too.

And again, fellow 6-er and #5 Crazy Kim Reid is in on the action too.

So basically, you can sign up for the conference (or even leave a comment in some cases) and enter all contests!

Coincidentally, if you sign up for Emily Wing Smith's workshop, you'll be hanging with 1/3 of the 6. If you only sign up for the afternoons (a bargain at $125) you'll meet 5/6 of the 6. Sorry if that's confusing, I just love to use fractions to describe social events.

On to the post...

So, if you've been a long-time reader of the blog, you may have deduced I have a boy with special needs. I don't blog about it a lot, but something happened this week that cracked me up.

(Kid B playing the piano, and his cousin Asher digging for treasure)

When you have a kid with special needs, you celebrate every accomplishment just as you would with an average kid. Their little successes might appear smaller, but they're not. You just have to use the right lens.

So we often find ourselves making announcements  like, "Kid B knows where his ears are!" and "Kid B only sang the alphabet song three times today!"

We celebrate every tiny step forward, and we're lucky that he has teachers who join in the celebration and document his progress in a daily journal. 

Nothing comes easy, and little jobs like potty-training last for years, it seems. The journey is arduous, but not without its moments of levity. 

On Kid B's latest progress report, his teacher wrote:

"B's doing much better on the playground. He's actually exploring the equipment... Instead of just playing with the wood chips."

So, after nearly a year, Kid B noticed the playground housed more than woodchips, and he was excited. And it became a milestone. Like: "By 4 years and 3 months of age, child should discover that woodchips are not the funnest part of the playground." He's right on target.

We laughed so hard. I don't know if this is universally funny, or if it's "special needs" funny, or funny ha ha, or funny wah-wah wah. But it's been two days, and I'm still laughing, so I thought I'd share and you can laugh with us.