WHY SARAH ROCKS

Sunday, April 30, 2006

Sarah has got to be just about the best kid in the whole world.

She found a dirty old nasty Pooh bear toy at the zoo and insisted on finding its rightful owner, because what if it was someone's favorite toy? (And, it ended up being.)

She also helped her friend clean up her room after a playdate, even though Sarah didn't make most of the mess, because she thought it was just the nice thing to do.

I know she has her whole life ahead of her, but I don't know how she could make me any more proud than she already does. She is a genuinely good human being. My job is... done? Now if we can get Becca to stop poking the dogs and shoving things up her nose....

VISITING REAL MARMOSETS

Went to the San Diego Zoo this weekend. It's a nice zoo, though it does seem to have a preponderance of ugly animals (wombats, capybara, tapir). We gave the marmosets Gizmo's regards. The highlight was seeing a tree kangaroo with a joey in its pouch! Then later, Sarah made an origami zebra. She was able to follow the complex folding instructions, which gave me a headache.

PROGRESS

Our Lisle home officially belongs to someone else. In another 20 days, the same will be true for our Florida condo, and we will be California homeowners. Not moving till July though... we'll rent the house back to the current owners. So it's a couple more months of close quarters for us.

A SAN DIEGO HAIRCUT

Monday, April 24, 2006

Talk about a bad hair day!

We took our cat, Gizmo, to be groomed today.

In Chicago, a Persian cat is given a long shaggy cut. He is trimmed and bathed and dried. A fur coat is considered to be an important and even prized thing in the Midwest.

In San Diego, there is a large military presence. It's warm. Hair is kind of a nuisance. Maybe we shoulda seen it coming. Nonetheless, we were shocked and quite mad when we picked up poor Gizzy. He looks like he is ready for Basic Training. Actually he doesn't look like a cat anymore, he looks like one of those monkeys called marmosets. I feel sorry for him. I feel sorry for the person at Petco who picks up my phonecall....



A marmoset.

MS CHEESYPANTS

Wednesday, April 19, 2006

On Sunday, we met a longtime friend of mine (ex-Burnett, so more like former combat buddy) and went swimming at a hotel complex where he and his family were staying. After we were done and dried, Becca entertained the entire swimming population by eating cheese Doritos, wiping her hands on her pants, and then when she discovered she was turning her pants orange, she announced, "Look at me! I'm a Miss Cheesypants!" and did a little Cheesypants dance.

I relate this to you so that if you see this term on the Internet, you know where it originated.

COMBAT PARENTING

Monday, April 17, 2006

Well, Don is off in Illinois packing up our belongings, canceling our bank accounts, and getting a well-deserved break from his kids and his little apartment. And hating it!

Knowing the kids would miss their dad a lot, I decided to meet a friend and her kids at Disneyland. During spring break. On a weekend. Easter weekend. With the dogs in tow.

Most people think I am crazy. This is not the case, I just don't really think about the consequences of things until they're upon me. Thank goodness, because we would not have near as many Adventures.

Compounding the crowds was the fact that Becca's bladder seems to be growing at a slower rate than the rest of her. She can drink a liter of fluid and her tummy can be okay with it, but she will then have to pee continuously for 3 hours. Net result: I saw more ladies rooms (aka, damsel's, tinkerbell's, princess', and Minnie's rooms) than I did actual rides. (But there are some darned clever bathrooms at Disneyland.)

As well, Sarah has a very conservative nature (colloquially speaking, she's a chicken), so she really only wanted to go on the kiddie rides that were meant for kids Becca's age. Becca has a wild streak (colloquially speaking, she's a nutcase), so she generally wanted to go on anything that looked like it might launch her straight to San Francisco if the belt wasn't tight enough. Between the 2 of them, there wasn't much common ground. I got to see It's a Small World though, so I can hardly complain.

We did stand in a particularly long line -- 75 minutes -- for the new Monsters Inc. ride at California Adventure Park, and it was a dumb ride if you ask me. (Nobody did, so don't feel obligated.) Becca is not capable of waiting for anything longer than 3 seconds, so we had to find some things to do. Here are a few of them.

Pick a scab open and try to suck all the blood in your body out of the open wound.




Make up new dance moves (only good if the temperature is moderate, otherwise not recommended, too sweaty.)













Give your sister love.



Pick paint off the queue banisters (this ride has only been open about 4 months, and already the banisters need repainting. Serves them right for making 4 year olds wait 75 minutes!)

Practice WWF moves like bumping bellies as hard as you can.

Ask to go pee. Every 20 minutes.

There are people who go to Disneyland every month and feel deprived if they can't go. Personally, I need a vacation from this vacation. (Though I could now writing a coffee table book called The Restrooms of Disney...)

SHEDDING

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

So now that we have bought a house, and we officially sell our house in Lisle in 16 days, it's time to refocus on yet another move.

All of our furniture and household goods that did not come to the apartment in the last move -- which is a substantial amount -- have to be either sold or moved within a couple weeks. So we're quite active on ebay and craigslist, shedding some items that just don't seem to have a place in our new place.

It's not sad, but it is sort of strange selling things that are a couple thousand miles away. When someone asks a question, it's impossible to go and look at the items! Doing it all from memory and photos.

I still can't believe that in just a couple weeks, the house we built at the beginning of our marriage, will belong to some stranger. Feels weird.... and maybe it always will, to some degree. The saving grace is knowing where we will be going, and being excited about that place.

WHAAAA?

Well. Becca's diving headfirst into the swimming pool, lead to some water in the ear, which lead to an ear infection, which Becca did not complain about, so she suddenly spiked a fever and went DEAF for seemingly no reason!

This spurred some important discoveries.

  • Our pediatrician is open on SUNDAYS (hooray)
  • A child who continually says "WHAAA?" and makes you repeat yourself, may actually be hard of hearing and not simply trying to annoy you.
  • There are certain casualties to being able to swim everyday.