More dumb things: the lost hour edition

Each year daylight savings is a bit tougher for me. Yesterday was bad, but today was worse.

1. I fed the cat and put the remaining cat food away in the cupboard instead of the refrigerator.
2. I dropped half the stack of plastic cups on my head when I was getting one for Henry's juice.
3. I put Henry's bagel into the toaster oven, when it dinged I discovered instead of toasting I was cooking it at 400 degrees.

Eight years!

Henry turned eight today. Sniff. He has grown up so much during the last year which makes me very happy, but it's hard to see him get so big.

His (very kind and skilled) teacher had his entire class make him birthday cards which he brought home in a big manila envelope. Very sweet. We're taking him to Grover's for dinner so he can get a giant cheeseburger.

At the moment he's getting whupped by Lucy at Mario Cart. But she can't stop asking: "Why I'm not the oldest, Mama?" "Why I can't be big already? I hate being little."

Brand New Dumb Things!

1. I was looking for a hooded sweatshirt in Lucy's closet this morning when I discovered a brand new pair of girl's Lands End snow boots in her current size that I had forgotten about. Lucy has been in need of a new pair of boots since mid-January and I didn't buy new ones because I thought we'd just make due. At least I didn't cave in and buy a second new pair this season.

2. When Lucy and I came home from pre-school today I helped her inside, and then got distracted sorting laundry and checking e-mail. Half an hour later the mailman rang the doorbell (bringing me my new Atlas of Bird Migration!) and said, "you know your car door is open, right?" I had forgotten to bring in the rest of our stuff from the car, including my purse! At least I didn't leave the car running -- hope the battery is not dead.

On an unrelated note, it dawned on me that Henry is now old enough that I no longer feel the need to enforce things like our "no cheesy t-shirt policy" and our absolute refusal to allow toy guns in the house. He got a combo gun/light saber thing for his birthday as well as a Pokemon t-shirt. He loves both so much. I hope we're not making a mistake by giving in. The next thing I know my kids will repeal the "no eating ice cream sold from trucks" rule and summer will be a series of ruined dinners and frantic searches for pocket change.

What's going to happen when she can actually drive?

Lucy just got a remote control car tangled in the hair at the crown of her head.

I was able to free her without using scissors.

That is all.

The popping, the dripping, the staining...

1. Last night at dinner I was making Yellowfin tuna salad from this month's Cooking Light when the rice mix that I was microwaving exploded. There were tiny little multigrains everywhere.

2. Henry had a sesame bagel with butter and grape jelly for breakfast. When the time came to don his boots and coat I noticed that he had gotten globs of grape jelly all over his pants. Not just one little spot, but three quarter-sized spots that were sticky to the touch. It was too late for him to change, so I just sent him off to school like that.

3. Lucy has had a cold since Friday, which I now have as well. I was pretty much hell-bent on sending her to school today since she has had a week off, she is mostly recovered, and I need the break. But she is still asleep! She has been up really early every day of vacation.

Checking in

Just a quick note to say that although Cary and I are both a little overwhelmed and concerned about the plane crash, which was about five miles from our house, we are all fine.

I'm just trying start focusing on something else, but I end up sitting here in front of the computer checking various websites for updates.

Even in the face of this tragedy it makes me glad to see that the firefighters (who are all volunteer -- something like 7 different companies responded to the scene) and all the other people involved in handling the aftermath seem to be doing an amazing job.

The children are completely unfazed, high on Valentine's Day candy, and at the moment I don't even care if they want to eat every last piece (just don't tell them I said so).

UPDATE: We lost a neighbor on the plane. While less of a personal loss for our family, the deceased was our babysitter's father, and she is just the loveliest, most delightful girl. I can't imagine what she is going through.

Just want to bang on the drum all day

So I've had some really terrible jobs. Here's a few things that happened at each of them.

1. My first job after college was at a start-up bio tech company. My title was "analyst" but they really had no idea what they wanted me to do. I answered phones, did a little accounting, graphic design, and even bottled liquid wax that they sold to investigators. The male counterpart (same age, same title) sitting next to me was not expected to answer the phone, nor was he expected to plan his lunch time with the other "girls" who answered the phone. We were expected to put in long hours which was hard for me because I had so little work to do. I lasted a year. It was a very long year.

2. Then I went to work at an academic library shelving books like I had in high school. I liked it better their though I was kind of apalled by my boss' lack of work ethic. She once sent me to Filene's basement in the middle of the work day because there was a big bra sale. I liked working with the students though since they were only a few years younger than I was. I lasted two years.

3. After that I went to Grad School and my "job" there was the best part of my school experience. I really have no complaints, even though I did a lot of data entry so much of the reading was in Spanish that it wasn't boring.

4. My first job after grad school was in my field. I was stunned by how little work I had to do and spent entire days thrifting for kitchenware on eBay. At one point I was supervising three people, none of whom ever seemed to have any work. Pointless meetings abounded. I lasted a year.

5. I worked briefly in healthcare in an underserved area. The office was incredibly unprofessional. Smoke would drift in from the guy working next door and no one knew what to do about it. The director used like 6 different fonts in her monthly newsletter and would only let staff sharpen their pencils when she wasn't there (she had the only pencil sharpener). Before long I was doing computer trouble shooting, billing, and nutrition counseling. I lasted a year, and during that year I endured a country music radio station in the office!!!

6. Then I took a job doing legal work for a manufacturing firm. (Was I using my English degree? The world may never know). I had my own office and a great boss. But I didn't really have enough work to fill 40 hours. (They asked me to keep track of my time for tax/billing purposes and it was not unusual for me to have 12 billable minutes in a day.) My boss didn't seem to care so I read books and did the NYT crossword puzzle online. The best part about this job was that everything I did was conducted by phone, e-mail, or fax, so I never had to go to pointless meetings. I still exchange Christmas cards with one of the lawyers, whom I've never met. I would have stayed there but after Henry was born I didn't want to put him in daycare for a job that I was only lukewarm about. They let me work from home until H was about 14 months, but I really couldn't go back. And that was it. I lasted two years, but more than a year of it was spent out of the office.

I have no earthly idea how to convert these experiences into something better in the future.

The more they know, the less they show.

1. Lucy will now change into her pajamas without assistance, but only if I leave the room and agree with her that the change happened "by magic."

2. Henry was desperate for the neighbor to come over to play, and then when the boy got here all he wanted to do was play his DS.

3. Both kids thoroughly enjoyed our house guest - my former roommate. Henry followed her lead and slept with an eye mask, while Lucy just followed her around the house.

4. Lucy got a kiddie yoga DVD from Santa and yesterday and today we did some of it together. I was sweating by the end. She is very fond of the friendship flower pose because she gets to hold my hand.

Lazy Link Dump

I haven't stopped writing reviews, but haven't mentioned it in awhile.

I say nice things about my friend Daryle in the VenusZine staff faves here.

I am less kind, but fair, to Animal Collective here and probably overly generous to Cars and Trains over here (both at Donnybrook). Almost forgot about Vic Chestnutt and Elf Power too, way over here, also at Donnybrook.

Some Civil Servants are just like my loved ones

Now that President Obama has his dream job, I should really start thinking about finding one of my own.

I've never had a job that I've really loved or been devoted to. I can't imagine what such a job would be either.

It dawned on me recently that I have a commitment problem when it comes to choosing a career. In that way I'm not so much different than my single friends who have their own issues with committing.

Consider the evidence:

1. I'm picky. I don't want just any job where I mentally punch in, punch out and have to put forth very little effort.

2. I have unreasonably high expectations. I want to love the job and the job to love me back. I also want good benefits, a lot of vacation time, and to not have to feel guilty when I take time off to hang with my kids.

3. I'm in a long-term (going on three years now) relationship with a gig that doesn't pay me anything.

I could really use an employment yenta.

Cultural Commentary from Henry

1. Yesterday Lucy was excited to see some Barbie-esque dolls on TV. As she's oohing and aahing over them, Henry turned to me with his eyes rolled and said, "She's asking for dolls from High School Musical 3." This is especially funny since neither of my kids has seen or heard any part of the High School Musical series -- but it doesn't stop them from having opinions. When they are old enough you can be sure I'll watch the South Park version with them.

2. As he was getting dressed in the morning a commercial for Hotel for Dogs came on. He said, "Mom, I don't think Hotel for Dogs is appropriate. I think there is romance. (pause) Between humans!" So I said, when do you think it would be appropriate. He struggled for a moment before answering, "12."

3. He was pissed because his school had an assembly that featured Glenn Colton who he angrily described to Cary as a performer who plays "popular country, not real country" music. I'm also almost positive that Henry has never heard Hank Williams or Patsy Cline, but he's always had a very sensitive schlock meter.

There is no frigate like a book

It dawned on me last night as I finished Death Comes for the Fat Man by Reginald Hill that I stopped reading when Henry was born because reading simply took me too far away from the present moment.

It's a relief to be able to get lost in a book again, even if Cary interrupts me every so often to make me watch a hockey replay.

Making and Baking

Instead of a link dump, I'm finally going to post pictures of stuff that I've made, especially holiday-related stuff.

First, I made my own bows! I used this Craftster tutorial and the Paper Source and Sephora catalogs, plus a back issue of Magnet. It was very fun, and really not that hard.

Then I ordered this cool wine bottle wrapping kit from Chronicle Books for Cary so he could make the wine for his work partners look festive.

Next I started baking. I don't bake much, so there are always plenty of things to go wrong. Since the kids had a snow day Friday and Cary got the day off too, I decided to use the extra time to make homemade marshmallows, after seeing how good Emily Martin's looked. Much to my surprise they turned out really well, and are delicious plain or dipped in chocolate.

That's when things went pear-shaped. Yesterday I attempted to make Sarah's delicious sounding Kima's Melt-a-ways. The dough was extremely sticky even after chilling it for an hour, and when baked the cookies ran all over the tray. A quick back and forth on Twitter with Sarah confirmed that I had accidentally doubled the butter. Doh! I started over and the second batch turned out very well. If you want to see a pic, check over at Sarah's blog. Hers is much prettier than mine.

Now I'm making Chocolate Cheesecake Candycane bars. All was going well until the mixture wasn't puffing. Turns out, the oven wasn't on. They turned out OK, but I don't have a pic because they aren't finished yet -- I still have to glaze them.

Boy, can't wait until I have to cook a three pound tenderloin on Christmas Day.

In other handmade news, I'd been wanting to post a picture of my pinecone cheese ball.

And the beautiful duvet cover that my mom quilted for my bed.
What a lot of pictures! -- now I'm off to glaze those cheesecake bars.

Because Nobody Asked, again -- Best of '08

I did a lot of record reviews this year. Some of my favorites were even records that I discovered through writing reviews, which is even sweeter.

Top 10 of '08

1. Thao and the Get Down Stay Down - We Brave Bee Stings and All
2. The Ting Tings - We Started Nothing
3. Vampire Weekend
4. Pas-Cal - I Was Raised on Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Laura

I will be listening to records 1-4 well into 2009, while 5-10 are less likely to endure.

5. Lykke Li - Youth Novels
6. White Denim - Exposion
7. Ladytron - Velocifero
8. Jenny Lewis - Acid Tongue
9. Islands - Arms Way
10. Her Space Holiday - XOXO, Panda and the New Kid Revival.

Next year I'm already excited about new records from Andrew Bird, Metric, and Annie. I haven't had much time to listen to the Santogold record, She and Him, or Deerhoof's Kill Maggie, so maybe those would have made the list if I didn't run out of time!

Now I wear the red dress, paint my toes and twirl

So Lucy and I are feeling (appropriately?) full of ourselves at the moment.

She just said to me, as she stepped out of the bath, "We're smart right. We're the smartest people in the world, right?" She was genuinely distressed when I told her that, no, we are not the smartest people in the world.

She had her Nutrcracker dress rehearsal tonight. She is an angel, one of many, and can't wait to don her feathered wings for the Friday night performance. After she was done rehearsing she was all sassy, wanting to run around and introduce herself to all the other little ballerinas and show off her twirling. She wanted none of my advice, my lap, or even the seat next to me. I practically had to carry her out of the theater.

Pretty much out of the blue I got a chance to interview a musician that I, well, I pretty much worship. I've only "interviewed" one other musician (unless you count my family) and that never saw the light of day. So this was a pretty big deal. But I was going to have to do the interview while at the dress rehearsal.

I immediately inventoried what might go wrong. In the last 24 hours I drew up questions, cleared them with the editor, asked anyone who would listen for moral support, listened to the band non-stop, procured Cary's microcassette recorder, watched the band's DVD (twice), and tested my cell phone on speakerphone picking up an answering machine (Hi, Mom).

So I left Lucy just as she was about to go on stage and set up a mobile office in the minivan.

The interview went way better than I could have hoped.

Believe you me I'll be posting if (no, when) it goes to press.

There've been some heaping doses of what went right lately. You know what that means -- trouble is right around the corner!

Home, will infect whatever you do

I went to see David Byrne with my mom last Friday night, and though I'm not exactly able to concentrate at the moment (two kids singing two different songs) this is the closest I will get to peace today, so I thought I'd better put down some thoughts about the show.

David Byrne's voice is still tremendous. He also has incredible stage presence -- he got a standing ovation just for coming out on stage.

He played Talking Heads songs. Never would I have expected to hear "Cross-eyed and painless" or "Life During Wartime" live. But he also played more well-known songs like "Burning Down the House," "Take Me to the River," and "Once in a lifetime." And never for a moment did the performance feel like a victory lap. Byrne was with us every step of the way.

I was too young to see the Talking Heads when they were together. But this show made up for anything I missed.

The new songs held their own. I particularly like "Home."

But it wasn't just a new song vs. old song kind of performance. It was a Performance. Everyone wore white. He had three back-up singers who danced and three back-up dancers who sang, and at one point danced and sang with electric guitars in their hands. The dancers almost stole the show. I don't think I've seen as joyful a performance outside of Lucy's pre-school.

I had the sensation while I was at the show that this was the sort of positive experience I'm always hoping for at shows, but rarely find. And I'd completely forgotten what a Talking Heads super fan I was -- I involuntarily knew the words to all the songs.

While I was there I kept thinking, "this can't get any better." And then it did. And it did. And it did.

Also, this is my 300th post. I can't of anything else I'd rather be writing about.

What Went Thankful

So I'm thankful for all of the usual reasons: family, friends, Sufi. Even though the last two weeks have been very sad for some of my best friends, I'm fortunate to have gotten to spend a little extra time with them. I do wish my brother could be home today since yesterday was his 25th birthday, but he went to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, which is pretty cool.

I'm also thankful for a few less important things:

1. Fess Parker Frontier Red - which we drank last night, after we won it at an auction at Lucy's school. It's a wine I would have never chosen myself, but it was delicious despite having a screw cap. It was so good that we went out and bought another bottle for dinner today, and at $10.99 it isn't over-priced either.

2. You may have noticed a new box on my blog -- for the Sixty One. It's a music site where you earn points for listening to new stuff, and can then spend those points to bring attention to songs you like. It is addictive. You can check out my hand-selected picks by listening to the stream through this page.

Almost forgot, I review the new Surf City EP for Donnybrook.

Not ready for this

Of late Lucy has started referring to one of her school friends as her "boyfriend." Our conversations have gone a little something like this:

Me: "Where did you get the idea of a boyfriend?"
Lucy: "You had a boyfriend and then you got married."
Me: "Yes, but I was 25 and you are 4."
Lucy: "Will you call A's mom and have him come to our house so we can get married?"
Me: "Don't you think you are a little young to be thinking about getting married?"
Lucy: "Oh Mom, we're just pretending."

Me: "What is it that you like about A that makes him your boyfriend?"
Lucy: "He likes to play with me, except when he doesn't want to play with me, and he makes me laugh."
Lucy: "I just love my boyfriend. He's in my heart."
Me: Silence.

Also I review the White Denim record for Donnybrook, as well Larytta, and going back a few weeks, the latest from the Sea and Cake.

It was a long afternoon

I learned today that a good friend lost her father. I've known her since first grade and spent so much time at their house over the years that I got to know her father pretty well too. May he rest in peace.

While still reeling from this news I looked outside and saw our neighbors playing with the stray cat that had appeared and then disappeared last week. This was no typical outdoor stray. This cat seemed HUNGRY and came when called. I regretted letting it wander off last week because I knew he had a home, but without a collar I had no idea how to find the owner. It ended up across the street today because it had followed a neighboring high schooler home from school, and she was as taken with the cat as I was.

My neighbor's son suggested checking at one house a few blocks away because he thought he'd seen the cat there. But the trick was that I couldn't leave the house because I was waiting for the cable guy. So I brought the cat inside and put him in the basement. I put Sufi in Lucy's room. I called the Vet's office and the tech suggested making Lost Cat signs which I did.

When Cary came home I had a few minutes before he and Henry left for violin, so I went out to hang the signs. I spotted a neighbor not far from where the cat might have come from. He sent me to one house, who sent me to another, where, I'm not kidding, a guy with a Russian accent was working in his garage with a blowtorch.

Anyway, it turns out the cat was Mr. Blowtorch's. Hurray! So I sped home, scooped the cat into the car and delivered him home. I learned his name was Tommy. To his credit the cat took off again before I could even get back in the car, but at least next time I see him I know he has a place to go to, even though I'd probably run too if my owner was playing with fire in an enclosed area.

What a weird day.

This will be the first week in my life where I'll have gone to multiple wakes. I hope it will be the last.

Why is it always a mixed bag?

Henry had a pal from school over, and it went really, really well. The kid was fun to have around, and got us all out of the gloomy pissiness that seems to infect the family when we spend too much time together.

That was the bright spot. I was feeling good because I'd called a mom of a kid that I didn't know and no blood was spilled. Lucy cried so hard because she didn't have "anyone from outside this house" to play with, but she survived once we broke out the model magic clay.

Cary came home with a grin from ear to ear. He'd upgraded out TiVo without asking first. What he didn't know was that a) I'm still recovering from the TiVo impersonators and the techno-fear they instilled in me and b) my parents have this newer TiVo and it's a pain in the ass c) we will get fewer channels than we do now for the same $$. It's reasonable to suggest that he should have known all three facts. BUT, he was trying to do good. AND there is a chance it will all work out. I wash my hands of the entire process starting ... Now!