September 26, 2005

warning: I am going to talk about shoes

So I set out today to cure my weekend bad mood, and wound up shoe shopping! Because, as everyone keeps pointing out, shoes don’t make you look fat! They make you feel less fat! And less cranky! Hooray!

I went six different places and tried on a hundred pairs of shoes (no, not really, but close). And I didn’t buy anything.

The problem is this: I am looking for a pair of flats with a pointy toe, which Clinton and Stacey swear will make my legs look longer. Do you have ANY IDEA how hard that is to find? Particularly in a season where the round-toed ballet flat is everywhere, looming on every shelf, making my ass look huge. How hard was it? Nearly impossible.

Fortunately, Nine West has this lovely pair (I want them in ‘camel’). But $70.00 seems like a lot of money for shoes I can’t run in. I don’t mean ‘run’ like ‘go jogging’, I mean ’sprint through the bookstore to catch my children before they go out into a parking lot by themselves and get run down by an SUV’. That kind of running.

There is also this pair, which are a pink ribbon fundraiser (nine percent of the purchase price goes to breast cancer research). Also $70.00, but nearly SEVEN of those dollars goes to cancer research! And they are pink! And sparkly! But I would do better to write a $70.00 check to the Komen Foundation.

In the end, I didn’t buy either pair. Because I don’t really need them, and it’s a lot of money, and they are about the least practical shoes in the world. Which is why I want them. Both pairs. Right now.

And this blazer to wear them with.

blame it on the lattes

Good morning, sunshines!

First of all, a big thank you to everyone who played Distract Susan–you will all be pleased to know that I watched very little CNN this weekend, and spent some quality time reading new-to-me blogs that I would never have known about but for your comments! Hooray! Cake for everyone!

To reward you all, I got up early this morning and wrote a really eloquent post about why it’s actuallly MORE difficult to have an extra adult around on the weekend–and Blogger lost it. Yes, I know, I should draft my posts somewhere else, but I didn’t and now I want to smack someone at Blogger. Because I was already in a bad mood and then, after I carefully dissected my bad mood, BLOGGER ATE MY POST. Dammit.

Fortunately, some other folks I know are feeling essentially the same way I am, so I will send you off to visit Jenny and Busy Mom, both of whom are way funnier and smarter than I am and said pretty much exactly what I was trying to say. And later I will write more about my specific bad mood. Or maybe I won’t–maybe it will finally feel like fall here today (instead of the 97 degrees we had yesterday, which would put anyone in a bad mood) and I will have a happy funny story to tell you! Or something.

In the meantime, I’m off to run Mommy errands (grocery, cleaners) and return a pair of shoes (because round-toed ballet flats really DO make my Mom Ass appear to be sitting right on top of my ankles! Go figure) and balance my checkbook. But the kids will be in school, and there might even be a Pumpkin Spice Latte in it for me.

September 23, 2005

why I should NOT have cable TV

Hey, it’s Friday! So let’s play a game! To distract me from my continuous CNN viewing!*

Are you ready? Okay, here’s the game: tell me either how you got here or what the squiggly letters are at the end of the ‘post comment’ section. Or what you ate for lunch. Anything! I don’t care if today is your first or your 200th visit (some of you are getting close, by the way)–speak up! Say something!

Come on, it’ll be fun!

And if you are looking for first-hand accounts of What It’s Currently Like To Be In Houston, go here. Then take a moment to speak with whomever it is you speak with about these things. Please tell them that I said thank you for my sister-in-law and her family’s uneventful and safe trip to OKC.

I’ll be back later to tell you about Henry’s field trip and the birthday party we’re going to this afternoon. Outside! On a day when the predicted high may be in the low 90s! Whoo hoo!

*Why I must stop watching CNN: did you know that the Governor of Louisiana has asked everyone who chooses to defy the mandatory evacuation order to write their social security number on their arm in permanent ink to make identification of the bodies easier? Yep.

September 21, 2005

random Charlieness

Charlie has been feeling a little ambivalent about school lately. He will cry halfheartedly at breakfast, until he realizes that Henry is ALSO going to school (and thus that he will not be missing anything at home); when we get to his classroom, he insists that I carry him in, and then attaches himself to my leg (there’s a bit in The Nanny Diaries about the ’spatula’ move that all the mommies use to scrape the child off their $400.00 wool trousers and deposit him on the nanny. I need to get the book out again and see if I can practice that–). Of course, his teachers are busy chatting with the mommies of the children who do NOT need to be physically removed from their parents (it is ALWAYS the mommies who hang out and visit–the daddies, so very wisely, drop and run). So EVERY SINGLE DAY I am left saying, ‘It’s okay, Charlie, you’ll have a great time! Look, no one is playing with the castle! Hey, maybe one of these friends wants to play!’ all the while wondering how long it will take a teacher to notice that I AM STILL HERE and that I have a three-year-old wrapped around my thigh. Ugh.

Last week, as I pulled in to the parking lot at Charlie’s school, he announced quite clearly, ‘You are NOT leaving me here.’

But I did! Ha ha! And, by his own accounting, he had a great day.

In other Charlie news, we are making no headway whatsoever on the potty training. But he has learned to blow his nose, which is huge since, like his brother, he is allergic to EVERYTHING that grows in our yard. And it’s not really true to say that we are making NO headway with the potty; it’s just going
V E R Y S L O W L Y. And it is still very messy.

Yesterday morning, Charlie said to Wade, as he does every morning, ‘Daddy, are you going to work today?’

‘Yes, buddy, I am.’

‘And is Henry going to school?’

‘Yes, he is.’

‘But I’m NOT going to school.’ (This was true; he only goes on Monday and Thursday.)

I asked him, ‘Are you going to work?’

‘Nooo!’ he said laughing.

‘Don’t you have a job?’ I said.

‘Nooo!’ Then he thought about it. ‘I DO have a job! My job is to use the potty!’

Apparently his mommy is not the only one around here trying to get fired.