YOU HAD ME AT "HELLO"

We all remember the cheesy line "you complete me" from Jerry McGuire, right? Today I say those words in all honesty to my husband. M, I love you from the bottom of my heart, and I truly believe that we are soul mates. Happy birthday, honey. You are my favorite.

THE MODERN COLONIALIST

Yesterday was Colonial Day at K's school. If the kids dressed up in colonial-era clothing (or gave it their best shot), they got extra credit points. Here was K's choice of outfits:


K sports a pair of navy blue dress slacks, floodwater-length, tucked into twice-worn soccer socks. (On his feet are a pair of modern style ebony lace-up shoes, but the teachers let that slide.) Topping this ensemble is Dad's Old Business Shirt (DOBS), complete with ring around the collar, cinched in at the waist with Mom's Old Brown Belt (MOBB). Our model is unaware that he wore a woman's belt to school all day. Fortunately, so was the rest of the student body.



K is a very shy kid, so I was concerned all day that he'd be [gasp!] noticed! And would come home irritable and colonially grouchy and vowing never to go to school again. But that didn't happen - not only did he enjoy Colonial Day, he said it was one of the most fun times he's ever had at school.

Kids.

WHAT'S UP

If I were my 10-year-old, I'd sarcastically say "the sky" or "the roof." Fortunately, he can no longer say "gas prices," as they have taken a nosedive lately. My favorite filling station currently has regular unleaded at $2.19 per gallon - a price I've not seen in over a year.

So here's what's been going on during my silence the past week or so...

• Tnk is returning to full duty next Thursday. I cannot believe she has recovered from that horrible accident, nor can my mind grasp that my little sister will be back on patrol, at night, with all the bad people and drunks (not that those are mutually exclusive). This is seriously messing with my sleep patterns. It was hard enough worrying about her when she was 100%, but I worry that there may be lingering effects from her accident that may, in the right (or wrong) scenario, compromise her safety. Oh God, I just worry. She would not be happy with me for writing all this, but I don't care. This is my journal and my feelings are relevant. My feelings are relevant. They are. If I could lock her in a little box and keep her safe forever, that's exactly what I'd do.
• Of course, we all know that wouldn't solve anything. She'd just hate me then.
• K played a great soccer game today, and his team won 9-0. This was a milestone for him because it was the first time he'd been on the field since his arm was broken during a game last March. Unfortunately, I missed it because...
• ...I was at BLT all morning. No, not the sandwich; Basic Leader Training for Girl Scouts. That's right, I'm becoming a Girl Scout Leader. I am optimistic about this because I know it will be great for my daughter and me both. I foresee lots of paperwork in my future, but hopefully not lots of tantrums. (Particularly not tantrums by parents.) The reason I'm getting into this now is because Pey's current troop consists of 18 girls - 17 second graders, and Pey, who's in 3rd. What that means in layman's terms is that at the end of this school year, Pey will be the lone scout bridging into Juniors. And next year, her leaders would have fun trying to figure out things that both the Brownies and a Junior could do. Trying to nip this in the bud, I attended Rally earlier this week and was successful in forming my own troop - 6 third graders, and 2 second graders. Not ideal, but much better, as no one will be alone anymore.
• Good news - Hubby has been offered a new job. He's really excited about it as he'll finally be using the two degrees that his parents paid for. He will finally be out of the heavy-deadline business, and cannot wait to get started. Right now, it looks like October 9th will be the big First Day. I'm so proud.
• University of Texas clobbered Rice today in a total blowout. By the end, UT had put in the third string and still managed to rack up more points. I felt bad for Rice because I think Texas was blowing off some steam from their loss to Ohio State last week.
• Fish, if you're reading this, email me because I have some puppet news for you. (Like how I buried that in the big middle of this post? Oops.)
• Pey's friend J is here right now. J called an hour ago and said, "Can I come over and spend the night?" Anyone else would have gotten a quick "uh-uh," but J is Pey's best friend, plus J's mom agreed to be my GS co-leader, and even attended BLT with me today. I kind of feel like I owe her, although in truth J is usually no trouble and Pey likes having another girl around. I guess the dog and I aren't enough femaleness.
• For the record, J's mom was mortified when she heard that J called and invited herself over. I just had to laugh. Some people are hard to get mad at.

That's about it for the rambling. I'm exhausted and will probably be heading to bed really soon. First, though, I have to make sure J and Pey (never noticed that that rhymes before) are down for the night.

Hope you all had a great weekend.

IT'S MY LIFE

A couple of days ago, we took a family drive and went out for dinner at a little restaurant called Skeeter's, then ran a couple of errands. Just for fun, I took our new digital camera with me so that I could document a day in the life of, well, me.

The picture on the right is me in the van, taking an ever-so-candid shot of myself on the way to the restaurant. You might notice the stick-straight hair. After years of stick-my-finger-in-the-light-socket frizziness, I finally gave in and paid Supercuts to straighted my tresses. Did they ever! Take that, Texas humidity! I'm including a "before" picture taken at the reunion last week (why oh why did my hair have to look like that at the reunion?!?)














Before - Chewbacca. After - Rowr.

Moving on.

Pey looks terribly surprised about something. What's in that ketchup, anyway?










At Skeeter's, you can draw on the butcher-paper tablecloths. Here's Pey's drawing of Kirby, who is either quite winded or blowing a bubble. I never took Art History, so I'm at a loss.












Here are the kids acting all fly (in other words, "weird") in front of the restaurant after dinner. I had to crop out some unsuspecting hubcap-missing Toyota's license plate out of the picture, lest one of you innernet stalkers got a hankering to stalk him. You're welcome, Toyota owner. Now get a hubcap; your car looks dumb like that*:













Here's the gas pump where we filled up after dinner. Notice we're paying $2.29 around here right now. Road trip, anyone?












Here's the Kroger where I do my weekly Grocery Game (GG) shopping. I used to hate Kroger because of their stupid shopper's card. Now I know that it's a blessing sent straight from the heavens. Well, maybe straight from corporate headquarters, but who am I to quibble? Between my coupons and that card, I paid $49 Sunday morning for $110 worth of groceries. That's a savings of around 55%! Every week, I challenge myself to spend even less than the week before, and so far I've been successful. I'm totally addicted to GG'ing. It's like crack to me. (Someday I'll post a picture of my overflowing pantry and then you'll understand.)








(again, cropped out lots of license plates - all you car owners owe me for saving you from certain death)

And there you have it - a day (afternoon, really, but you probably wouldn't like the early-morning me) in the life of this Houston girl. Any questions?

*Before anyone accuses me of being a snob, a quick reminder: I drive a 1995 Saturn SL-2 with 172,000 miles on it. It recently got a new headliner, which helps somewhat with its appearance, but it still leaks some mysterious shit from underneath the passenger seat, sports a large winding crack across the windshield, has a console that vibrates more than my cell phone, and has more "doctor" appointments than I do. But hey, at least it has all four hubcaps.