Updates, Thoughts, Questions, Feelings, Blah

So it’s been another month come and gone.  Christmas is over, I think I finally got everything put away about a week ago!  Seriously, every year I find something that I ‘forgot’ to put away and it makes me crazy.  This year was 2 big wall hangings.  How I forgot to put the one by the back door away, I don’t know, particularly considering that I could see it every time I left the house, but it never occurred to me that it was Christmas related, I guess.

School is settling into the doldrums.  The ethics class is fascinating and leading to good discussions.  I was really jazzed about the archives class, but it’s turning out to be a total fizzler.  There are more than 20 of us in the class, we’re all supposed to post every week and respond, and on a good week, we’re lucky to pull together 12 comments.  I suppose this should make it easy to get an A, all I have to do is really light up the message boards, but there isn’t much to respond TO and the readings are so dreadfully dull, I feel totally unmotivated.  I spoke with my advisor on the phone a couple of weeks ago and he’s pushing me into an archives track, which is fine and probably which way I will end up, but based on this class, I’m thinking about renegging on the whole thing.  This summer I’m dedicating my time to the research methods class and then will have my core classes done.  In the fall, I will take introduction to digital collections and some other class that I can’t remember off the top of my head.  If I still like it, then I guess next year I’ll start looking around for internship possibilities, even if that means putting my baby in day care!  YIKES!  My mom needs to get off the stick and move north.  I really, really dislike distance learning.  It was so nice to talk on the phone to an actual human being, and coming from someone who HATES talking on the phone, that’s saying something.

In Leah news…  She is actively dismissing becoming “a big girl”.  Today marked the day I finally decided she didn’t need to be in a crib any more, and I took the front of the crib off and converted it to a toddler bed.  She screamed and cried and yelled at me furiously.  “Mommy!  NO BREAK MY BED!”  Tonight when it was time to get into bed, she was still incensed.  We are down to our last pacifier and I am not buying any more.  She’s been biting through them and I am just mortified that she still uses one.  I swore she would NEVER use one from the day she was born and here she is nearly 3 and it’s her thing.  She doesn’t have a favorite stuffed animal or a blanket, but that stupid pacifier is her thing.

I registered her for pre-school earlier in the month.  She is going to go 2 days a week, even though I wanted her to go 3.  That was more selfish on my part.  I think pragmatically it’s best that she ease herself into it.  She really liked the super expensive corporate day care preschools and she hated the preschool I wound up putting her into, but I felt good about the teachers, the atmosphere, and the kids who go there all seemed happy.  They had a good, diverse mix of kids, and it is a Montessori program that we can actually afford.  Her little friends Jilly and Anna will be going there as well, so I’m excited she will have friendly faces to look for.

Consequently, I have to get her potty trained and she flatly refuses to do it.  She knows how, she knows when, she just doesn’t want to.  I’m going to try a couple new things and see if they work.  Thankfully we still have 7 months until the rubber meets the road, but it would be nice not to have to lug diapers everywhere we go. 

She has given up on dance lessons for the time being, much to my dismay, but as I listened to myself talk to my mother about my feelings on that matter, I realized that I am really trying to overcompensate in not having had children for so long by pushing Leah to do and have everything.  I was saying “But I want her to…” a lot and that really has everything to do with me and nothing to do with her.  She is perfectly happy to spend her days at home with me, playing and reading and having fun.  We take little adventures as the weather permits and recent conversations with an expert have led me to realize that Leah’s crazy behavior stems from a desire to have choices and be included in decision making, so many times I let her choose between 2 things and decide what she wants to do for the day.  I also let her choose to get ready.  Today was the first time in FOREVER that I didn’t chase her all over the house to get dressed, and she very calmly and serenely let me put her shirt and pants on her and when I opened the back door, she placidly walked to the car and waited to have the door opened instead of tearing around the backyard, cackling while I try to catch her.  It was a banner day until I “broke her bed”.

In other non-Leah news, today I got a letter in the mail that I did. not. want. to. open.  It was from Manhattan and was the dates for my 15 year college reunion.  Jeepers, has it really been that long!?  This led me to indulge in my once-a-year-or-less Google binge of people who have been and gone in my life.  There are 2 men in particular who I always think of and Googling one brings up nothing and Googling the other brings up almost too much.  They were both people I thought would be in my life forever, both people I could talk to and laugh with about anything.  I suppose in thinking about them now, it’s not with a sense of “What If?”, but a different kind of nostalgia.  I have looked for other friends and reconnected with some who responded and some who didn’t, and I think, “Why?  What makes the difference?”  Anyway, I’m not going to my reunion and I only Google for my own nosiness, not out of any general sense that I would make different choices.  I look over the grand arch of my life and I think I’ve done pretty well.  There are few things, if any, I would change and I think my choices have stood the test of time.  So I’m not going to the reunion.  Every time I get together with Joe, it’s like a mini college experience—my husband and his partner are kind enough to look the other way while we play dorky drinking games and giggle over the same stupid crap that made us laugh 17 years ago and makes us laugh today.  I’m in touch with my good roommate on Facebook, and Joe’s housemate Todd, and everyone else would be able to find me with a quick Google search, so I just let it lie.  But I’m happy to hear from anyone :)  Just in case, you know, you ever Google me.

I’ve thought of many of my friends in the past months, wondering, “If it wasn’t for Factor X, would we still be friends?”  For instance, if we didn’t have Leah, would we still be friends?  I don’t know, I have a sense that some people just hang around because Leah’s so cute.  Mike and I were talking at dinner about some neighbors who suddenly seem to be giving us the cold shoulder and our confusion as to why that is exactly.  It is hard to get out and around any more—when Leah was a baby, it was easy.  No resistance, she was like, “Yeah, I’ll go eat lunch at thus and such, I’ll just sit in my carrier and eat my fist", but now requires entertainments.  Still, now that I’m cutting back on other commitments, I will make an effort to be a better friend.

The big news is that I dropped out of my book club.  It wasn’t going in any direction that made sense to me and I found myself getting increasingly frustrated and upset about the whole thing.  During the last meeting, I just sat there with no one saying anything and thought, “This is such a waste of my time”.  I had been thinking it over for a year and finally just decided to pull my own plug on the matter.  I also gave up on AFS and being a liaison.  Right after I got back from my dad’s house, I spent all day Saturday running up to an AFS interviewing event.  I interviewed 3 kids and hung out a bit with a couple members of the area team who were pretty open about how things have been going and I don’t think there are too many kids left in the original homes they came to this year.  When I got home, we had a big email about all the things we were supposed to be doing as liaisons that weren’t getting done, and I just decided I really couldn’t handle it all on top of the classwork and being a mom and a wife, so I drafted up a resignation and sent it out.  It was an immense relief, although a bit of a disappointment in myself not to follow through on my commitment to the girls.  But it was a bigger challenge not to follow through on my commitments at home.  SO I chose the lesser of two evils.  I have offered and they have accepted that I can take them out once more before they depart.  Given that it’s February and I already have no free weekends until May, I’m not sure when that will be, but we’ll work it out.

Leah’s 3rd birthday is upcoming.  Her big present is that we are going to see the Fresh Beat Band in concert in DC.  She has no idea, but I got her the CD the other day and she goes CRAZY when it’s on, dancing all over the place.  If you haven’t seen her video on Facebook, you are missing out.  Friend me. :)  We are having her party on March 31 since her birthday falls on Easter Sunday this year.  My mom is coming up for Easter and my sisters-in-law are coming for the party, so I’m excited about that.  It’ll be nice to have both families around to celebrate. 

Mike and I are leaving on April 14th to go to Myrtle Beach for a week. Dad and Linda are coming to babysit Leah for us here at home while we relax and celebrate TEN YEARS OF MARRIAGE. And they said it’d never last.  Pfff.  Well, actually I don’t know if anyone did say that, but if they did, they were wrong.  Hard to believe it’s been that long and how much has happened in those 10 years!  New homes, new states, new kids, new friends, new lives!  Jeepers.  (That’s my new word as I am really, really working on not cussing now that Leah’s favorite word when something goes wrong is, “Damnit!”  Although, come to think of it, I don’t say that, so I don’t know where she gets it).  I’m hoping to enjoy a couple of tours and different attractions in SC.  We’ve been to Myrtle Beach so many times that it seems like home, but it’s really one of my favorite places ever.  Still, it’d be nice to see what’s in the area besides what we already know.

Well, I’m rambling, so I’m going to close here and go to bed.  My Lenten “thing” is to go to bed early and to meditate for 15 minutes a day in an effort to relieve some of the stress I feel.  I haven’t managed to meditate once, but I have been going to bed earlier, so there’s always that.  Until tonight when I suddenly felt ramble-y.  So good night and I’ll be back with more another day!  :)  And don’t forget to get in touch if you’re a long lost friend!

Bitches With Books

October marks the last month of any given year of our book club’s schedule.  This October was particularly special, in that I had asked all the women in the club if they would grant me a wish and come down to Fredericksburg once for book club.  I haven’t hosted a meeting in my home since November 2004, when we lived in Centreville, because the commute to the ‘burg is insane.  I was pleased when everyone agreed to come on down and lose out on a Saturday of their precious weekend to come to my place and talk book.

Last month’s meeting got a little rowdy, and while we were all laughing and crying and enjoying ourselves, Lauren suggested that we should include a night at the bingo hall at the end of book club as part of the F’burg experience.  Then I was beyond excited!  So it was set, October 2 was books and bingo day.

I selected The Last Days of Summer by Steve Kluger as my book for this year.  I love going to book club and discussing the books, don’t get me wrong, but I also wanted to shake things up a little bit and try something new.  Since I knew we’d have a good amount of time between book club and bingo, I decided to change our format of eating and discussing to include arts and crafts hour.

Cecily contacted Steve and he agreed to call into the club meeting at 2:00pm.  We were scheduled to start the meeting at 1pm, but of course with a car fire on I95, everyone got to the house around 1:30.  We tucked into our food (Dinner theme:  What would you serve if your favorite celebrity came to dinner?), and then discussed the book for a few minutes until the phone rang and Steve was ready to chat with us!

He is a fascinating book club speaker and talked with us for about 45 minutes.  He told us lots of stories about how the book came to be, who the characters were, and so forth, and a hilarious story about the Tony Awards (seriously, if you ever have him call into your club, ask him about that one!). 

Afterwards, I finished off with one of my favorite quotes in the book and then it was time to set the schedule for next year.  We have an awesome round up of books coming up this year (see below for the list) and I’m really excited to get reading!!!  We asked Penny to take a group photo as well.  She agreed, but we had pre-arranged that after we took one regular shot, we would all make a peace sign like Penny does in most of her pictures.  Oh my gosh, she was so embarrassed and laughing.  it was ADORABLE!

The it was time to get busy and do some crafty fun!  I asked each member to bring a picture of someone who had changed their life and be ready to talk about it.  We went around the circle with our pictures and everyone started talking about the person who influenced them.  More than a few tears were shed as we talked about moms and best friends and teachers and aunts and uncles.  It was a special and moving experience that I can’t hope to capture here, but it was awesome to be a part of. 

Then I got out all my scrapbooking materials and we set up shop on the coffee table.  Pretty soon scraps of paper were flying, stickers were being exchanged, and projects began to take shape.  I’m so glad I decided to do something a little different—I think it was a whole lot of fun for everyone and gave us all a lot to think about.

 

The person I selected was the school librarian from my school growing up.  I first remember meeting Mrs. Collins (at the time, Miss LeBel) when I was in kindergarten and she really inspired me with what has become a lifetime love of reading.  In 1998, when I had moved home and was trying to figure out what to do with my life, Mrs. Collins would request me all the time as her sub when she was out.  In the spring of 1999, she asked me to be her long term sub while she battled cancer, a fight she ultimately won.  Then she was diagnosed with MS and retired from the library.  This spring, I was lucky enough to see her at my dad’s retirement party, and introducing her to my husband and my daughter was a special moment for me.  Then I sat down with her and began to talk about the new crossroads in my life:  what’s next?  What am I going to do with myself after Leah doesn’t need me full time any more?  Mrs. Collins responded, “You would make a great librarian.” 

So here I am now applying to library school, the final push in the right direction having been applied.  And I have asked Mrs. C to write me a reference.

Back to book club…

After we all finished our projects and shared them, we had some time to hang out and relax until bingo.  We started packing up at about 5:45 and headed over to Wawa for some extra provisions in case our meeting leftovers didn’t hold out.  We got to bingo a trifle bit late, so we all had to cram around a table for 6 (and there were 7 of us and the people next to us were not giving an inch!). 

Luck held.  Melissa won big, $100, her first ever bingo win!  For most of the night, we were all sitting around laughing, eating, and hoping for big winnings, but Melissa was the lucky draw.  Then a few games later, my number came up at the exact same time 6 other people’s lucky number came up, so I won a whopping $14.  Ah well, it nearly paid my admission! :)  A win is a win is a win, right?

 

Anyway, at the meeting, we officially agreed that a) we would change our names from NoVa Lit Chicks to Bitches with Books and that b) Books and Bingo will now be an annual event and I’ll get to host, so I am over the moon excited with how great that is.  My favorite girls, my favorite game, my favorite hobby!  What gets better than that? 

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Bitches With Books Year 7 Reading List

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender
The Opposite of Me by Sarah Pekkaner
The Mighty Queens of Freeville by Amy Dickinson
Gift from the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay
The Postmistress by Sarah Blake
The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom
A Scattered Life by Karen McQuestion

and 4 choices to be named later.  Happy reading!

Thus Begins The Insanity!

Tomorrow is April 1, and in a week, my baby will turn 1.  It is something I simply cannot fathom.  She is a beautiful, smart, funny little darling, and while we’ve had moments of stress and anxiety in the past year, I would not have changed a thing about it at all.  I have a dream job—staying home and raising a little person.  What a joy!  Even though I just had some Easter portraits done at Sears, I scheduled an appointment to have some more portraits done on her actual birthday over at Picture People, since they sent me a coupon. 

Today, Leah and I went to the mall with my friend Lisa and her little guy, Daniel, who is about 5 months older than Leah.  We walked them around the mall, they both met the Easter bunny, we had a nice lunch, and let them play at the playpark in the mall.  Lisa and I met last summer when I decided to have a Pampered Chef show and put a notice in every mailbox on the street to try and meet my neighbors.  Unfortunately, Lisa couldn’t make it, but we started walking together around the neighborhood.  Leah was still too little to play much, so we didn’t really hang around, but now that Leah is a little bit bigger, we’ve been spending more time together.  Tomorrow, we are going to go up to DC to see the cherry blossoms, have a picnic, and let the kids play out on W. Potomac Park.  It should be a great day.  We are both going back to WW the Saturday after Easter (Leah’s birthday party), and we’ve been motivating each other to walk a couple miles each day when the weather is nice.  I have been enjoying having a friend right down the street and we have common interests and a similar parenting philosophy.  The other night, she, Daniel, and her husband were walking around our block and stopped over.  John and Michael hit it off like a house on fire, so I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of them!

Work started on the house today.  The main level and all the brick and the front porch were powerwashed and the old shutters were removed.  It looks kind of odd in that whoever lived here before didn’t bother to paint underneath the shutters when they painted the house, so we can actually see the color of the original brick.  It makes me wish even more that whoever did it had not painted the brick, but what’s done is done, so now we will finish the job.  We picked what I hope is a nice yellow color, although I suspect that it’s going to be more beige-ish.  I’m reserving judgment till I see it, but I hope I’m going to like it!

Then it’ll be time to get ready for the weekend!!!!  I plan to spend Friday shopping and defrosting a giant turkey, as well as starting to prepare the coconut cake I’m going to make for dessert (unless I wimp out at get the Wegman’s Ultimate White Cake, which, frankly, is AMAZING).  Saturday will be spent doing preparations for Easter, and then in the evening I’ll be going off to dinner and bingo with Wendy.  (Anyone else want to play?  We’ll be in the usual spot!)

I’m really excited for Easter.  I think we’ll have a nice crew and it’ll be fun having some kids around.  Most importantly, Mr. Gobble will be out of my freezer, freeing up valuable real estate for provisions for the party.  I hope the painters get the house painted by Easter is the only thing!  I plan to take Leah to church first thing and then we’ll get cookin’!  So far, Manda is bringing potato salad, Melissa is bringing devilled eggs, and Wendy is bringing a ham and mac n’ cheese to make her fussy eaters happy.  I think we’ll have a nice variety of food for sure.

Monday is book club.  We’ll be discussing Olive Kitteridge and then I will post a review here afterwards.  Friday, Michael is having some training on Leah stuff, and then we have to go to DMV, since we just discovered his ID expired a year ago!  Then we’ll start preparing for the big blow out.  My buddy Joe is coming down Friday to help out, and we’ll go and get the food.  I hope the weather is nice—we’re going to try having a cook out and I would love to be outside as much as possible.  If you’re coming and it’s nice, please bring a camp chair, lawn chair, etc. if you have them.  Saturday is the party and then Sunday I have choir practice.  Then Jennifer arrives that Thursday, and we’ll spend Friday apartment hunting.  Saturday we will take her back to Richmond to the airport, go to a birthday party in Richmond, and hopefully meet up with some new friends we’ve been corresponding with through our adoption attorney—they are hoping to adopt soon, and have turned to us for advice.  The following week is our wedding anniversary, and a pile of dress rehearsals for the chorus concert, which is the following weekend.  The 24th, I am getting together with my friend Kris, whose kids and husband will all be out of town.  The 25th is the big concert (tickets are still available at the low, low price of $85!), and by then, it’ll be the end of the month!  Sheesh, I’m tired just thinking about it.

I’ve been in contact with a friend from home since I sent out the email asking people to vote for Leah.  I said to her that if we won, we would come visit her while we are in NYC, since she lives in NYC, and she told us not to wait, to come anyway!  Turns out she lives right near where I went to college, so I’m thrilled that I can go visit my old stomping grounds, show Michael Manhattan College, and we can go around NYC.  We are hoping to get up there in June.  And of course, in May, we’ve got our trip to Myrtle Beach lined up.  I got Leah some clothes today and a bathing suit—this one a one piece to compliment the two piece her auntie sent her.  We are so excited to be going, although sad to hear the Wellses can’t join us after all!!!  I plan to do a lot of R&R that week.  And it’s nice the fee for the condo includes the maid service, so we can just walk on out of there Saturday morning with nary a thought.

We have become the smoothie king and queen.  We had a box of oranges to use up, so I juiced them all and then put the juice in the blender with the strawberries I had picked and frozen last summer.  YUM!  Since then, we’ve been trying different kinds.  We had strawberry lemonade slush tonight, and last night we had peach-berry.  Michael has loved them too, and we have similar taste in fruit, so it’s working out very well.

So that’s about it.  Less than a week till I get to go back on Facebook, but it doesn’t seem as important as it did nearly 40 days ago.  I have enjoyed blogging again, so I can see myself reading other people’s updates, and I’m sure I’ll post updates, but I just hope I keep up with my blog. 

Till next time!

Stuff!

Well, my husband must really love me, is all I can say. This week, I'm out 4 nights. Sunday I had choir practice, Monday I had book club, tonight I am going to see the Harlem Globetrotters with the Heplers, and tomorrow I am going up to see my friend Debbie from DBVI for dinner. He has been so, so patient and taken such good care of Leah while I've been sowing my wild oats. Although, I will say, we had a little incident on Sunday that I thought was pretty hilarious.

I came home from choir practice, and he says to me, "Susan, Leah threw up on her shirt." I said, "Oh really? What did you do?" "I washed it off with a washcloth, but then it was wet, so I just took it off her and put her to bed. I covered her up nice." "Yeah, but what is she wearing? Did you put PJ's on her?" "No, I don't know how, I just put her to bed and covered her up." I went upstairs, and sure enough, there was Leah, sound asleep wearing nothing but her pants and socks. I turned the heat up a bit just in case it got cool, and let it go. But I thought it was hilarious and so new-dadish!

My in-laws stopped in for a quick overnight on Monday on their way home from Florida. It sounded as if Florida was a bit of a bust for them this year--much cooler temperatures than usual. Still, I'm sure they had their usual good time, and it was real nice to see them an extra visit, even if I was gone for most of it. Book club was a lot of fun, although it was awfully strange without Judy there for the first time in 5 1/2 years. I have heard through the grapevine that this may be a permanent state of affairs, so perhaps it'll be something I have to get used to, but I haven't heard anything about that as yet. We were hosted by Maggie at her house, and it was her book that we discussed, but unfortunately she got a call right as we kicked off and had to leave because her daughter had a little fall. It was great that she trusted all of us to be in her home without her, and fortunately she got good news about little Natalie--no broken bones! We did clean up after ourselves and got a nice note from her yesterday, so it reminded me again of what a family the club has become. Everyone really is there for you when you need them.

Yesterday I was feeling a little blue, so I texted Cindy and Wendy to see if they wanted to have lunch with me (Manda, do you text? If so, I need your number!). Cindy replied that I could come on over to her place, so we made plans to have lunch at Chick-Fil-A and then I would go to her house for a Cricut tutorial. Just as we left Chick-Fil-A, my phone buzzed and it was Wendy! She said she was free for lunch tomorrow (which is now today) and did I want to meet her at 12:30 at Chick-Fil-A. Hahaha Good thing they like us in there!!! So we are dining at CFA this afternoon. They have a wonderful greeter/drink refiller/hostess in there named Deborah and as we were leaving, I said to her, "See you next time!" Little did I know next time is 24 hours later!

Last night we had dinner with the Heplers at Chilis. I had to get my Globetrotters ticket from them and will meet them up north in Stafford today. The game is at North Stafford High, and since I have been to Stafford High for basket bingo and Colonial Forge for choir practice, I think I'll have covered the local high schools now and should know where all of them are.

LOST last night was amazing--not quite as good an episode as last week, but awfully good nonetheless. We really are getting down to the end, only 10 episodes to go, and they really are starting to make sense of the whole thing, even though there are still many unanswered questions. I am enjoying the hell out of it, and will be sad when it is over, but at least I have my DVD's and I can go back through and re-watch the entire thing from start to finish to see what I've missed and what makes sense now in light of later episodes, etc. I haven't kept up with Project Runway as much this season. I think last season was such a bitter disappointment, and this season I just don't seem to care. Isn't that awful? I was such a fan. And this season has been so much better than last season, I feel kind of guilty for not watching! I read the Project Rungay blogs to see who wins and loses, and maybe I'll catch up eventually, but just haven't felt like it lately. I also haven't felt like staying up to watch Hoarders, but at least I've been catching up with that on A&E's site.

For anyone who has asked, no, we still have not heard anything about our exchange student. We are just waiting to hear if the school will accept her. We were hoping to hear by the end of January, but then with all the snows in early February, we still haven't heard anything and here it is March! We would love to get in touch with her and start getting to know her a bit better, but I guess we just have to be patient and let things take their course.

In the meantime, we've decided to do some flipflopping of our house if we are able to. We are going to move the home office downstairs into the basement and make Mike's office upstairs into the extra bedroom. This makes sense for a number of reasons: 1. Caroline will have a closet! 2. When the baby wakes up at 6:00am and wants to play, I can take her downstairs and not have to worry about waking up a slumbering teen! 3. The guestroom is a bit larger than the upstairs room, so I could put up a desk for my new scrapbooking hobby! 4. Mike can go use the computers and radios as much as he wants at any time of the day or night without having to use his headphones or worrying about disturbing anyone. 5. At night when we are all doing our own thing, we will still be on the same floor and easily accessible to one another without having to holler up and down the stairs. 6. Our upstairs floors are really creaky and it won't keep anyone up any more if they are trying to sleep in the spare room if someone's moving upstairs and creaking around.

The two questions that will hold this operation up are: 1. can we get that room wired for ETHERNET and 2. can we get his radio antennas wired into that room. He's got a buddy from the ham club coming over to have a look, and then we'll ask our friend about the computer wiring. He could go back to using wireless, but I've been informed he does not want to do that.

Once we find out if it's possible to do this, I'll have to go on a marathon painting binge, since I'm sure Michael doesn't want a pink striped office. It was a lot of work and I enjoyed it and loved the stripes, but I think something a little more subdued will probably be better for a man cave with a wife-corner. I will probably also repaint the office, but maybe not. The color does match all the bedding we already have, so I may just leave it for now and if Caroline doesn't like it, she can help me repaint it. If anyone wants to help paint or move furniture, we'll pay in pizza, beer, or whatever else floats your boat!

We are excited that Mike and Lesley's niece is moving to DC this summer, so even though it's not Mike and Lesley, it's the next best thing :-) She is coming to stay at the Cookie Jar this April and I'm going to take her apartment hunting while she's here so she can get off to a good start when she makes the move in June. She is a great gal and of course we hope this will be an even bigger incentive for Mike and Lesley to move on up here too!!! :-) Damn the housing market is all! But I know they cannnot resist Leah's siren song, so I have a funny feeling they'll come on up sometime sooner rather than later, as Lesley said :-) Jennifer and I have been swapping emails back and forth to figure out a game plan, and we have just over a month to figure out what we want to do, so I know it will be great. I'm of course going to steer her towards living on the Virginia side of things, because we know how those Maryland types are. Haha!

As for Weight Watchers, well, it seems like I get going and then I get off track. I really did great my first week back, down 4.2 pounds, and then BANG! The snow storm hit and we sat around and ate brownies and cake and did puzzles and read books and stuff. Then the storm was over, and we went to Greensboro and enjoyed ourselves. Then we got back and I just couldn't face it the first week, and that week turned into two, turned into 3. I know it is something I need to do, I have made concrete goals for myself and I want the results, I just have to get into a mindset of where it's going to happen. I remember where it all went terribly wrong--we were up in Plattsburgh when my dad first had the attack and we went to the store, and I thought, "F*** this, I'm getting some Doritos." It's all been downhill from there. I know I can, and I know I will, it's just a matter of when! :-)

As for FlyLady, everything is just great! I do a quick clean every day, and my in-laws were SO impressed when they walked in Monday. They were like, "you have done a lot of work around here!" Between that and Michael's "It's a whole new Susan!" campaign, I guess I was a real slob before :-) But I'm happy with how things look and how easy it is to maintain. If I could just get Leah to pick up her toys...

I guess that's about all the news that's fit to print from Fredericksburg. I am very nearly ready to break out my Cricut and get scrapping, just need to go get some pictures printed off at Walmart and then I'm going to town. I'm so excited. I'll post some pictures of what I create. I got a couple of extra cartridges at Joann's yesterday since they are 50% off right now, so I can use different fonts, etc. on the book. Cindy gave me a great tutorial yesterday, so I'm feeling pretty confident I'll be ready to scrap in no time!

Hope everyone else is doing just dandy :-) Drop me a line, update your own blog, let me know what's going on!

Just Random Stuff

Not much has been going on lately that I really want to blog too much about, the typical family drama rearing its ugly head now and again, but I’m getting through it and I’m frankly tired of dealing with it, so am working on strategies to make it through without destroying myself in the process.

Other than that, life has taken on a pretty even keel.  I cannot believe my little baby is 8 months old already.  I saw a picture of her as a 1 month old and I couldn’t get over it, how she couldn’t sit up on her own, she was just a little mushy lump.  I miss that little mushy lump, but the Leah that is emerging is an absolute joy.  She is my favorite person in the world.  She makes me laugh and she makes me cry tears of joy.

My book club met Monday to discuss The Third Angel by Alice Hoffman.  Most of us didn’t really like it, and I heard “This is not Alice’s best”, which cracks me up because when we read Blackbird House in another book club, we heard, “This is not Alice’s best!”  So, what is Alice’s best?  I have Illumination Night here, but I’m hesitant to read it.  I can get through her books pretty quick, though, so even if it sucks, maybe I’d be OK just to add it to the pile.  I am presently reading In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash by Jean Shepherd, which is this month’s book club selection; we will discuss it on January 4th.  When I get through it, and it’s a Christmas book so it’s a great time to be reading it, I’ll have read 65 books this year.  I am also going to try to plow through Elizabeth Berg’s The Handmaid and the Carpenter, which I wanted to read last Christmas, but didn’t get to.  Otherwise, that will be next year’s Christmas selection.

I got out our Christmas decorations this week and put them up—I don’t know if I have lost things or I have more house or I’m missing a box, or what, but honestly, the house looks pretty bare.  I have a nativity set in the basement and one up in the living room, plus a couple little odds and ends, but I can’t seem to locate a few things I know are ‘somewhere’.  Ahh, the mystical somewhere.  Our tree goes up next week on the 19th, and then the fun begins.  This weekend, Melissa will take Leah for us on Sunday so I can actually really clean and scrub the house from top to bottom and get the Christmas shopping done.  I am so excited to have this time to get things done, and not to have to worry about screaming baby.  She provides good weight training, but it’s hard doing a lot with 18 pounds of extra weight strapped to me!!!

I am also weeding through things and getting rid of a bunch of junk and setting other things aside to have a yard sale this spring.  I would like to get rid of a lot of the junk that has accumulated in the past 4+ years.  With the extra money, I’d like to buy a wardrobe for the basement guest room so people can hang up their clothes when they come visit and buy my sister a couch so I have someplace to sit and sleep when I go visit her.  I suspect I’m going to have to find a lot more things to sell in order to accomplish that.  I’ve found a lot of interesting stuff.  I found a Geocoin I didn’t know I had—this one from something called GeocacheTreasures.com which no longer exists.  It’s a beauty of a coin, I must say.  I also found wedding invitations for 2 of my roommates from Utah.  Armed with the information on one of them, I found the last of the girls I’d lived with for 4 months in 1997.  Facebook is an amazing place!  With that, I’ve now been reunited with all 5 of them, and we are now swapping Christmas cards and emails.  It was a short time, and for me an intensely unhappy time, but they were all an absolute blast to hang out with, and I’m glad to see them and their families.  Funnily enough, Amy (who I actually shared a room with) and I both have daughters with birthdays in April and our roommate Christina is expecting her first baby *drum roll please* next April!    The long lost Jennifer has surfaced in New York, my old home state.  It would be fun to have a reunion sometime.

It hasn’t really sunk in yet that Leah’s officially ours.  In a way, I’ve just lived the past 8 months as if she is—I have loved her fiercely and determinedly.  The visits were not particularly invasive; if anything they were a chance to ask questions and get advice about parenting.  Of course, we are now being asked if we want to/will do it again, and our answer is a firm “Probably” although we both agreed we might like to try foster care next time.  We’ve been incredibly blessed with Leah and her adoption and the process and people we worked with, and it would be nice to work with a child in need of a home who just needs a chance, be it permanently or temporarily.  We have decided to let Leah be in charge of when or if she wants a brother or sister, but neither one of us is in any rush right now to get into another situation immediately.   We just want to enjoy our little girl.

That’s really about it.  I’ve been invited to attend DBVI’s Christmas party on Monday and told not to show up without Leah, so that is our Monday plan.  Monday night, we’ll be going out with Landry and Meredith to trivia night at the Fredericksburg Pub.  We are lucky to have a wonderful babysitter here in town who is great with Leah and very patient.  She even has the foresight to pack earplugs for those times Leah wants her mommy and screams if Mommy doesn’t oblige.

I’m going to be cleaning up my blog sidebar in the new year.  If your blog hasn’t been updated in the past month, I plan to remove it unless it would seriously upset you/hurt your feelings.  Let me know.  I have also decided NOT to post 80 Plates on this blog anymore—it’s really an excuse not to blog about things on this blog and just let the cooking do the talking.  So from here out, you will have to go to the 80 Plates blog if you want to see what’s cooking. 

For now, it’s over and out!  Hope everyone is enjoying the December holidays!

Book Club Adventures

Last night was the latest Lit Chicks meeting, and for our dinner theme we were tasked with bringing food that was associated with a happy memory. One of my happiest memory foods is chicken cordon bleu. I have 2 great memories of it.

1. When I was 15, I went to Europe for 3 weeks with the Girl Scouts. On the Germany leg of our trip, we took a trip to see a portion of the Berlin Wall that was still standing. (This was 1991) It was July, it was warm, and we had to do a LOT of walking to get out to where the wall was. On our way back, we were all hot and tired and wanted to just find someplace to get a cold drink and eat something. So we happened upon a little cafe out there in the middle of nowhere and we decided to go into the courtyard. The people who owned it came out and they did not speak English, and we did not speak German. So they took the whole group of us into the kitchen, opened up the freezer, and we all pointed to the same thing, which they prepared. And it turned out to be chicken cordon bleu. And it was delicious!

2. When I was living in Arkansas, The General came to visit me for Columbus Day. I wanted to cook him a really special dinner for his last night there, and I'm not sure why, but chicken cordon bleu popped into my head. I came up with my own way of putting it altogether and frying it up, and I have to say, it was DELICIOUS. And after dinner, he proposed. :-) Awwww... I feel all smiley and mushy just thinking about it.

So, my plan was that after work (I was working with one of my high school students yesterday until 5pm) I would go to the grocery store and buy the little frozen chicken cordon bleus. The General and I have been eating them for a long time and we love them--although at something crazy like 20 points, they are no longer on our menu selection. But we've never had any trouble buying them.

Well, apparently in Alexandria, they are unavailable. I went to three different grocery stores and the closest I came up with was chicken stuffed with broccoli and cheese. Not going to do it. So I stopped and thought for a minute and decided to improvise and make a chicken cordon bleu casserole. The idea kind of came at me from my mother-in-law, who when I hosted a book club meeting here at my house last fall taught me a chicken casserole recipe that was very good. So I decided I'd make a go of it with chicken cordon bleu.

I picked up a package of those little chicken pieces that you can buy already cooked. I got the honey roasted chicken for that. Then I got 2 packages of sliced swiss cheese, a ham steak, 2 cans of Healthy Request cream of chicken soup, and a bag of medium width No Yolk egg noodles.

I went back to Judy's, cooked up the noodles, threw in everything except one package of cheese which I actually used to cover the whole thing and baked it at 375 for 20 minutes. It was smelling darned good.

Meanwhile, Judy had baked The Cake That Ate Washington. She had gotten the recipe from the Sweet Potato Queens book and this thing was MASSIVE. Four layers, with a filling that consisted of cream cheese, Cool Whip, peanut butter cups, and sweetened condensed milk. We were so nervous about it that she stuck some skewers in it to keep it from falling over. We gingerly made our way to the car and then the fun began.

I have a GPS for the car. She speaks with a proper British accent. Her name is Jane, and she does not like to be disobeyed. I fear her, if I'm being honest.

Well, Jane was unhappy. She'd been stashed in the glove compartment for approximately 2 months, as I hadn't had any new clients and I'd known where book club was, and I hadn't required her services. She intended to teach me a lesson.

So I figured to get from Alexandria to Arlington, we should probably get on 395, but I didn't want to take Van Dorn with all the potholes and traffic lights. I was envisioning this cake splattering all over my dashboard. So I made my way for the Beltway, thinking we could take it to 395 and it would be a little less apt to cause us problems.

Jane did not like this. Jane wanted us to take the Beltway in the other direction. I decided maybe she knew a shortcut, so I would heed her sage advice. We got up into Alexandria towards Old Town, and she told us to take the exit right, where the highway splits into Express and Local lanes. I did so. Once we got over there, she told us to "Bear Left". Well, by bearing left, what she actually meant was keep right. It was a test to see how much power she could lord over us. Because, you see, when I bore left, it shot me back onto the main part of the highway, and in short order, I was traversing the new Wilson Bridge (which is lovely, by the way, just not what I wanted to see at that point).

I could hear Jane shaking her head and chuckling inside her plastic case. By now, we were heading for parts unknown in Maryland, Judy clutching a cake, the chicken cordon bleu casserole smelling heavenly in the back seat, me screaming at Jane, "WTF?! I'm putting the eye on you!" Because you see, I do not like to be late. Ever. I am always early. This drives my sister and husband crazy, because I also do not like to be the first one at our destination and so I sit outside in the car until 'someone else goes in first'. This also saves me the embarrassment of being in the wrong place--if someone I know goes in, then I know I'm in the right spot.

Anyway, this is all to say that fortunately we had left early. Because I can't be late. My sister once was reading Mapquest directions to go to Reston pre-Jane and sent us to Dulles Airport. We showed up at book club 45 minutes late. I was having an absolute panic attack. I was determined that this was not going to happen.

However, there was the small matter of us actually getting back to Arlington. Jane suggested we take 295. We had no choice but to follow her sage advice. We went past Bolling AFB, site of the General's former place of employment. I waved at it. We were heading north, on a collision course with Maryland. And mind you, on account of the cake, I'd been the least popular person on the Beltway, driving a stately 45MPH. I was at this point pushing the needle to 55.

Then Jane dumped us out on 395 and shot us straight through the District. May I just say, the Capitol is lovely in the evening, as are the Jefferson and Lincoln Memorials. We got off the highway and took a bunch of meandering roads around back into Virginia, and then she spit us off on Spout Run Parkway, which I have affectionately dubbed Serial Killer Highway as it's dark, there are tons of trees and it looks like the perfect place to hide bodies. The road is also very twisty, and I suspect that Jane was aware we were trying to keep the cake upright. I should also say that we were blasting the air conditioning to keep from the cake from melting, and we were both freezing.

In any event, very shortly, we were at Carrie's house, and someone had graciously left us a spot right in front of her house. Fortunately, I am a champion parallel parker, amongst my other great talents, so I pulled in and extricated my sister and the cake from the front seat before getting the casserole and going inside.

I think we set a new landspeed record: we left Alexandria at 6:50 and arrived in Arlington at 7:26. And we were only about the 4th or 5th people there.

But now, I'm gunning for Jane. She will be punished. Well, probably not because next time I'll probably go to book club via Tennessee.

VICTORY!

I have defeated The Lace Reader. My New Year's resolution to finish all book club books ahead of the meeting was severely tested by The Lace Reader. It wasn't because I hated it or loved it or anything else. It just was the kind of book that takes forever to read, and typically I just don't have that kind of patience for books like that and give up. Last night at the party I announced I was throwing in the towel. Everyone ridiculed me for giving up on a resolution by January 10th, which I must say spurred me to read hard this afternoon after the house was picked up and put back together. That and Plum Spooky staring at me and begging me to read it.

So I'm glad I did it. The book was OK, but the fact that I've made it to 3 meetings having read all 3 books this year makes me happy snappy.

Late Blogging

Well, courtesy of a nasty Trojan that got on my computer somehow over the holidays (which one of you bastards downloaded what, Family!?), I have been extremely limited in what I could do. As in, Twitter worked and nothing else. I could get on the main page of Facebook about 50% of the time, but couldn't do anything, including change my status, once I got there. Thus do I owe many of you comments and notes back and I will try to get to them this week.

Anyway, I wanted to do some blogging on New Year's Eve/Day, but had to wait until my new computer arrived from the Stan Clan, which it did last night. And then we were up till 11:30 tweaking the settings, so I was too stinkin' tired to do anything but crawl into bed.

Alrighty. Well, it was a race to the finish, but I managed to finish the year at approximately 105 books read. Considering that by the time my book club met on December 8th, I had broken 100, this is not much of an accomplishment. However, I do say approximately because I noted that I had forgotten to post many of the things I'd read on GoodReads this year, so there may have been some I forgot about.

This leads me to my first 2009 Plan (I refuse to use the word resolution, as I can't be sure what the heck might happen this year after what I endured in '08, so no sense resolving to do things I'm not sure I can keep up with): to be better about logging and blogging my book reads throughout the year. Mostly this will take place on my GoodReads profile, so if you're interested in what I've read, then feel free to head over there and friend me. However, notable books will still be blogged about over here. After I finish off this post, I'll be starting a new one about the last 3 books I read, all of which I think are worth mentioning.

I have four other reading goals for 2009:

1. To read all my book club books in time for the meetings, regardless of whether or not I like them. This presented an extreme challenge already with finishing off The Shipping News in time for the December meeting, because I absolutely hated it. And this month, although I LOVE our book, I am struggling to finish The Lace Reader, as thus far it's not a terribly festive little book and it's a rather festive time of year. But I will have it done in time for our meeting in a week and a half.

Yes, girls, confession time, I haven't read every single book. Bad Susan! I have tried to read every book, but frankly, I never used to force myself to read books I couldn't get into after 50 pages, so it's a whole new world for me out there.

I noted that I haven't posted this year's reading list for the Lit Chicks, so here's what we'll be reading so far:

* The View from Mt. Joy by Lorna Landvik
* What Was Lost by Catherine Flynn
* Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
* Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
* The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Annie Barrows and Mary Ann Schaffer
* The Year of Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs

Obviously, several people haven't yet selected their books, but already we have an intriguing and eclectic mix of books here. I'm excited about this year's reading list!

2. This year, I will read Gone With the Wind. Sound familiar? That's because I pledged to read it last year, but I didn't. Since visiting Mike and Lesley in Atlanta, I have really wanted to read it, but oddly enough, putting it on my wish list at Paperback Swap hasn't garnered me a single copy! So I'm going to have to go and pick up a copy at either the library or the store.

3. Jacalyn and I were sitting around talking the other night and her hubby mentioned reading Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell and how tedious it was. For some reason, this led to the two of us deciding that we must embark upon reading it together. She's got it on audio and is going to make me a copy for when I finish The Lady Elizabeth. The good thing about listening in the car is that I'm essentially trapped, so I feel confident that I can finish it within about 2 weeks' time.

4. My sister told me about the Alphabet Challenge. I don't know where she heard about it, but apparently the goal is to read one book with a title corresponding to each letter of the alphabet. I will complete this, though as far as I know, Sue Grafton hasn't gotten to X yet, so I'm slightly concerned...

So those are my reading plans for the year. I expect I will probably break 100 again this year, for a perfect trifecta. At least, I hope to! I'm about halfway through my first book, You Can't Curl Your Hair With Holy Rollers, which is very entertaining. It should be a rather quick read, but I've been so exhausted at the end of each day that I haven't gotten done with it like I thought I would. Today, perhaps.

So 2008 was a year I was only too happy to say "good riddance" to, although I am the only one in my family who feels that way. Michael listed off the good things about the year, many of which I agreed with, but overall, I spent a year in a lot of unhappiness, which led to a number of poor choices, and a few good outcomes as well.

I don't want to get too deeply personal here, as for the most part I try to keep this as a day-to-day blog of just the basics of my life. But 2008 will be remembered as the year I decided to basically eat myself into an early grave. I was so despondant with the way things were turning out, with relationships with my family, with our inability to start a family of our own, that I just started eating. And I didn't stop for two months. At the end of that little orgy, I'd gained 20 pounds, I looked and felt even more miserable than I already had, and it was in danger of becoming a downward spiral until only one conclusion could be reached.

But fortunately, there was a glimmer of hope shining at me, and not only was I able to work through some of the issues that I was having with the family--though they are by no means fully resolved--I was able to take strength from Annette, Russell, and Amy having the courage to join Weight Watchers, and decided to do the same. I will never forget the feeling of dread that first meeting-stepping on the scale with a total stranger. It was humiliating. While my leader didn't care a whit--I guess after a while numbers are numbers to them--to me it was proof of just how far I had allowed myself to go. I resolved then that if I could just get it together and put myself back into the driver seat of my own life, I would never let that happen again. Will I be successful? I don't honestly know. I do know that I have lost 56 pounds in 7 months. I weigh less now than I did at our wedding. I feel better, I am exercising, and I am working hard to conquer my personal demons one day at a time. I fell off the wagon this past week, so I'm somewhat dreading the scales tomorrow, but having not gained any weight at all over Christmas, I'm willing to give myself a little leeway. But I'll be back on the horse on Saturday, and won't look back.

So, I do resolve to continue with my Weight Watchers efforts and with working hard at being an honest person and saying what I need to say, even if that might be hurtful at times to others. I can't go back to how things were in March of last year. And I won't let my real self be covered under thick layers for the sake of others any more.

Additionally disappointing was not being able to see Mike and Lesley last year for the first time since we've become friends. We have selected Mike and Lesley to be our children's guardians, should we ever have children and then die a sudden and definitely most tragic death. I picture something painless yet dramatic. Still, we didn't get to Atlanta this year, and with Lesley's crazy work schedule, they weren't able to get to Virginia either. Hopefully next year the four of us can take a nice beach vacation somewhere, even if only for a long weekend. We all deserve it, and Lesley and I have to go parasailing together. So I plan for that to happen.

On the bright side, we did get to finally meet Russell and Amy and see Annette again--thank you, Annette, for bringing us all together as friends! :-) It was a wonderful trip and I have such happy memories of our time in Savannah. Hopefully we will be able to do it again sometime or get you all up to Fredericksburg! ;-)

The final thing I hope to keep up with this year is a daily gratitude journal. My book club gift this year for the gift exchange was a The Reading Woman engagement calendar. Starting yesterday, I jotted down a few things I was grateful for that happened during the day--things like The Stan Clan's friendship, snuggling with my niece, and one of the games on my Wii that I enjoy playing. I've got the calendar here by my computer, since this is where I typically end my days, checking my e-mail "one last time", and I can jot a few words down and remember the things I have to be thankful for. By the end of 2009, I should have a lovely momento of the wonderful things about my life, as I definitely don't remember much about the good things of 2008--though the General can rattle off a steady stream of them. Mainly I remember the warmth and comfort of friends and friendship and that is what I'm most grateful for in 2008.

So, those are my goals and plans for '09: reading, gratitude journal, Weight Watchers. I've learned not to expect too much, not to promise too much, not to plan for too much, because you certainly never know what curveballs life is going to throw your way. I hope 2009 is gracious and good to all of you and to all of me :-)

Thank you for reading and being a part of my life. Who knows where this blog may lead us next!

Just Another Manic Monday

So, I go into work yesterday at 7:15am. I've been going in early on Mondays so I can leave early so I can try to beat some of the rush. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. It was a moot point yesterday because I had book club and it was pointless to go in early, except that Judy and Lucas were up at 6:15 and I might as well be too.

So, I no sooner walk in than my co-worker is there. He is absolutely hopeless at the computer, bless his heart, and he had forgotten his laptop at home, so he was working on a reception area computer. I no sooner sit down then he's asking me to come help him find files and stuff on the new computer. Ok, fine.

Then my officemate, Kris, comes in and reminds me that we have to take down the Christmas tree. But we also get an email from our boss that we have to take terrorism awareness training--and I had lost the original emailing detailing exactly how to take terrorism training, to which I got a reply back that the email had been sent in December. Fortunately, I was able to recover my deleted items, find that email, and I figured I'd work on it after I got the tree down.

So, Kris and I take down the tree, while at the same time James is sitting there next to me, asking for computer help. Get done with all that, and Kris and I decide to polish off this terrorism training.

Now, the training requires that you create a log in on some state employees "university" thing, and then you take the modules. Only, we had gotten the handbook for the thing attached to our emails and were under the impression that all we had to do was read it and we'd be done. Surprise!

So, I read part 2 of the email which said about the logging in and crap, and I was like, "Hey, Kris! We have to log in and do the modules." Well, I followed the easy to read instructions about the whole thing--how to get to the website, how to log in, where to go after you log in, and how to take the tests. So I'm sailing merrily along when all of a sudden, a string of curses comes like a blue streak from the other corner of the office. Kris can't figure it out.

So I go to her desk and walk her through it and we're both ready to take the test. So, lo and behold, we start. And it's audio. And we haven't started at the same time, and we can't seem to synch up the sound on each slide, despite a hilarious "1...2...3..." countdown system we try. Finally, I shut down my sound and she plays hers loud and we're sitting there learning about terrorist groups and how to recognize pipe bombs and such. Well, in walks Alex. And he's coming to inform us that he doesn't have to take the class because it's not accessible. "Ok, fine, get the hell out." Then Candace walks by. "Are you guys taking the terrorism test?" "Yes, but it's not accessible to JAWS users, so just send the boss an email and tell him you can't take it and he'll tell you how to get credit for it." Then Shelley comes in. "Susan, are you taking the terrorism test?" Ummm, we're trying to. I'm missing half the slides and I'm going to fail the quizzes if this keeps up... "Because I can't figure out how to log in." So I tell her to read the email from Bob and just follow the directions, it's all laid out very simply, one two three, and come and let me know if she has any problems. Then Debbie the Secretary, who I LOVE, strolls in and asks if I'll help her put a new shelf together. "Yes, as soon as I'm done." Then James walks back in and asks if I can help him find the forms he needs from the intranet.

I'm really losing it at this point. Then Shelley walks back in and asks if I can help her log on, she doesn't know what she's doing.

So, I tell her to hold on till we finish the section we're on and Kris and I shut the door and soldier through, by which point she has to use the bathroom. I go down to Shelley's office and walk her through the log in same as I did Kris. James is straightened around, Debbie's in a holding pattern, so Kris and I go back to taking the modules and quizzes. We JUST finish and it takes us both 20 minutes to figure out how to print out the transcripts and the certificates that we completed the damned things. I take them down to my boss who tells me "I don't need this, you just need to take the classes." AUGH! So, we basically could have just said we took it without all that nonsense.

So I'm settling in, I'm going to listen to my phone messages, when Kris comes strolling back in and says, "You have to go help Debbie now." So I go out and get Debbie and she has a 6 foot tall shelving unit she needs built. And it weighs about 600 pounds.

So we drag that into the back room and Alex, who is still strolling around trying to find things to do that don't involve working, comes running with the tool kit. The file room we are working in is about 8'x8' and already has a copier and 4 shelving units in it. so now there's all that, plus me, Debbie, Alex, and the pieces of the shelving. Finally I tell Alex that if we need him, we'll come get him and he leaves, his place taken by one of the mobility instructors. The three of us women are trying to put these shelves together and one of the VR counselors comes in and starts stepping over us, and it has to be the one who is pregnant and has told us we all have to be very careful around her per her doctor's orders. I'm pounding away with a hammer, there are pieces of shelving all over the place, and she's buzzing in and out. We get the shelving half put together when Debbie and Vijaya decide they don't like the spacing on the shelving, so we take it all apart again. I'm on the floor on my hands and knees hammering the shelving up when Shelley buzzes in and says, "Susan, I know what your'e doing is probably important, but my computer has just frozen up and I really need you to help me RIGHT NOW."

So I say, "Shelley, I'm not really in a good place to help you right now, but if you give me 5 minutes to finish this, I will be happy to help you." So this pisses her off and she turns to Debbie and says, "Debbie, you can help me, right?" So just to keep her quiet, Debbie goes to help her.

We get the shelves back on, and we're turning our attention to the finishing pieces when Kris walks in and announces she HAS TO USE THE COPIER RIGHT THIS MINUTE. So we were using the copier as our kind of workbench--the tools were on it, the instructions. Finally, I say, "Kris, give us two more minutes and we'll be out of here." I just wanted to cry at this point. But now. She insists it has to be done NOW. So I'm like "Fine, give me the papers and I'll copy them."

Well, for some reason, the copier doesn't believe me that there is paper in it, and Kris accuses me of jamming the damned copier. I said, "Kris, it's not jammed, it doesn't think it has paper in it!" So she's yelling, "Turn it off and put it back on." This doesn't help. So I try again and it still doesn't believe me. Finally, she says I'm doing it wrong, so I say, "Fine, go ahead and copy" and take everything off the copier. Well, she has it copying fine, but it's copying the wrong way on the wrong size paper, and she starts cussing a blue streak again. Meanwhile, I'm hammering the final shelf on, and the shelves are metal mind you and it's loud as hell in there, and she starts yelling at me to stop pounding on the shelves.

By the time it was over, it was nearly noon. I finally checked my voice mail, everyone was eating lunch, so I decide I'll go over to BOA, deposit my sister's money, and then get lunch and go eat with everyone. I need to cool down, so I walk. I get to BOA, and guess what!? NO FREAKIN' CASH DEPOSITS! I was so pissed off. So I stormed back over to work, got a salad and sat there and ate.

All this in about 6 hours, mind you.

So, last night was also book club night, and of all nights, the girls chose last night to give me a thank you gift for being the fearless leader of the book club. It was a night I really, really needed a little lovin', and they all chipped in and bought me gas cards since I have so far to travel for book club, and they all signed a beautiful card for me. Ladies, you rock!!

At the end of such a crazy day, it was just what I needed. It took all the fight right out of me... I got home last night and all I was thinkin' about was LOVE. :-)

But my brilliant husband, at one point I asked him yesterday, "is this ever going to stop?!" and he emailed me back and said, "It will when you say 'no.'"

Hello, wake up call!

Next week, I'm going in, shutting the door, and doing MY work. What a concept!

Weekend Update

Not too much to report.

The great dog experiment has failed... Michael once said, "Susan, we're not camping people" and I have now said to him, "Honey, we're not dog people."

Thursday night we brought home 2 darling Italian greyhounds. I had desperately wanted iggies since my own died in 2001. We saw a lovely family on Craig's List DC and met with them in person, and all was well, and we picked up the dogs and brought them home. But sadly, it did not pan out. They developed a taste for hassenpfeffer, so we had to return them this morning. All 3 bunnies are fine, but I think TomTom in particular is glad to have his kingdom return to some normalcy.

We went up to the St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox Church today for their Bazaar Rus. We all ate way too much delicious Russian food (the beef stroganoff was out of this world), and enjoyed looking at some greatly overpriced Russian handicrafts. Seriously, Christmas ornaments that the Orthodox Church near Boston used to sell for $5 were on sale at this church for roughly 6 times that amount. It was shocking. So we didn't buy anything other than our food.

I have a new addiction that is slowly overtaking MySpace in my world: YouTube. I've started getting addicted to people's video blogs, and it's all getting a bit too serious... But I can't quit watching. The old men talking about the war, the drunks, the satirists, hell I'm even addicted to LonelyGirl15. I thought I'd post my viewing list... For a good laugh, you've got to check out KarlDaly81 at http://www.youtube.com/karldaly81 The guy is an absolute genius. I've probably watched all of his videos 10 times. Sadly he only puts up new videos every week or so, so in the mean time, I watch all the old ones... I also LOVE Geriatric1927 at http://www.youtube.com/user/geriatric1927 He also is only putting up one or two a week, but they're so full of wonderful memories about growing up during WWII that each one needs to be rehashed several times anyway to really get the full experience out of them. I also love to watch BradThunder at http://www.youtube.com/user/BradThunder He's got the most soothing persona ever, and shows some great stuff. He's pretty new, but I would expect that he'll have great things to say about life in general. He's got a beautiful accent and just really relaxes me. The video he just posted of him walking his dog was awesome.

I am plugging away at "Ragtime" for the book club. My mom is reading the selections that we read for Lit Chicks, and I was thinking that since she wants to participate, it might be interesting to start my own book club on Yahoo Groups to have a sort of "on line Lit chicks" as well as the real life one. Anyone interested? We could select books and discuss them via email just like a real book club. Distance would be no barrier. It would be cool!

Well, I guess that's about all from here. I need to vacuum the house and put the dishes in the dishwasher. I will now be here for Thanksgiving, since, sadly, too many factors were stacked against me to go to my mom's house for the holiday. I'm now planning to go to Florida in December and we'll go meet Paula Deen at a booksigning in my mom's new town. It'll be pretty cool. So, my dad is coming to spend time with Judy and me, so if anyone is lonely and in DC for Thanksgiving, come on over for the most incredible turkey you've ever had... :) Saturday, we're all loading up and heading for my dad's alma mater, Rutgers, to take in a football game with his beloved Scarlet Knights (who are now, according to his euphoric phone call last night, 6-0 and Bowl Game eligible). Go 'gers!!!

Book Club Selections So Far...

We had our meeting on Monday, October 2nd, and I'm only just getting to the point where I'm sitting down to write out what we selected to date... Granted, I've been at the computer loads, I just haven't felt like blogging until today... Bad Susan. :)

Well, to start off with, I selected The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde. The minute I read the description after Lesley recommended it, I was tremendously excited to read it, but never quite got around to it. Now I will have the chance, but not until June next year. (I'll probably read it before that, however!)

We will be reading Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow for our November book. I've started it, and it's pretty good, but I do seem to fall asleep a fair amount when reading it, which is funny because I'm enjoying the vignettes. It's my sister's FAVORITE BOOK EVER, she wrote a 25 page thesis on it, so I'm hoping that she will get some favorable reviews from the girls. I'm not sure if they'll love it or hate it.

After that, we'll be reading Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons, which is quite funny since Melissa gave me that book for my birthday. I've been reading it more than Ragtime, I must confess, and I'm really enjoying it. The women in it are fascinating.

The other 3 books that have been selected thus far are Hannah's Daughters by Marianne Fredriksson, March by Geraldine Brooks and The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri. Everyone else has been not quite sure about their book choices for the year. So I'll post them as we get them! :)

My mom is interested in joining as a cybermember of the Lit Chicks, and I'm mulling over how to make that happen. I considered setting up an online Yahoo Groups kind of book club. Don't know if it's been done before, but we'll see...

Normal Life

Life has returned more or less to normal since my crazy August... I'm glad the fall is here--the weather has turned from hot to cool (being in the 70's mind you) in no time and we're experiencing some beautiful weather. Very overcast, but who cares?

Last night was our next-to-the-last book club of year 2... It's hard to believe. We lost two more members, so we're down to 10 now with two openings, but I've decided not to recruit until after the 1st of the year. We are having all our year-end parties and stuff, so it's not really fair to ask someone to come in and promptly drop $50 on stuff when they haven't participated for the first 11 months. I did put up a cool MySpace for the book club at http://www.myspace.com/novalitchicks and our final book of the year was chosen as The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. I already read it, so I get a free pass for the month. I am looking forward to hammering out the next set of books in October, since I've been looking for a good book to chew on. Last night we discussed Wuthering Heights and it was a great discussion. Sometimes these things come out of nowhere--lesson learned: quit sweating it and just pick a book. Things flow.

Speaking of MySpace, I've started finding family members on it and it's been fun to see what my crazy cousins have been up to. The only thing I miss about our family being spread apart is that I am not close to my cousins--and so many people are. I'm lucky to have my sister nearby. It would be interesting to be a part of one of those families that never moves away from each other--at least for a while. I'm sure it'd get old after a while.

The big news: Judy has, mercifully, been offered and accepted a new job!!!!! She will now be working for the Firefly Children's Network, which works to help Russian orphans with real or perceived disabilities by educating caregivers and reducing institutionalization. The job has real promotion potential and she'll be helping them set up a DC office. The hilarious part? Her old job, which she is leaving in less than 2 weeks now(!), is hiring two people to replace her. Those bastards should have done that ages ago. I hope she'll keep in touch with some of her friends from there so we can find out how they are managing without her.

Continuing to read and see movies and watch Project Runway... And I'm freakin' addicted to MySpace... It's sick, truly. When I start finding ex-boyfriends on there, look out. (I've looked, but they must not be registered!) We saw "Little Miss Sunshine" over Labor Day weekend and LOVED IT. I also LOVED The Memory Keeper's Daughter. I'll blog a better review later, but suffice it to say, it was the best book I've read this year.

So now I'll be contemplating yardwork now that the weather is better, and our next home improvement projects... The beach room is complete now that there is furniture in there--I'm so proud of the room, but sad it's done!!! It's a beautiful room and the furniture is perfect. Looking forward, we are considering remodeling the General's bathroom, which looks every one of its 32 years, but I don't know how to go about it... So I'll start looking into what it takes to replace vanities, medicine chests, lighting, etc. We also desperately need to replace windows and carpet and to install a railing on the front porch and stairs before winter... FUN! Damned houses are expensive.

In bunny news, Rambo is back and Rocky's adoption fell through, so we've still got 3 babies. Rambo was traumatized by whatever his experience was and has been an absolute basket case since. He is now litter trained again, but is systematically destroying his cage, and when he gets out, he just lays by his mother's cage (he's staying at Judy's) and stares at her. He doesn't move or run around. He just lays there. Poor baby. So we'll be even more selective than before about placing these guys... I'm probably going to wind up building a cube cage for the girls, and separating them soon, as they've started ripping out each other's fur, which is not good. I've found some plans on line that look good and I'm excited to get that project underway.

I've also nearly completed the chair refinishing project. My mom brought some butt ugly, but comfortable, dining room chairs up from Florida, and I've removed the seats and spray painted them; now I just need to charge up the staple gun and recover the seats themselves. The only hold up is that I lost our iron during our move last year (it's probably in the storage closet from hell), and can't iron the fabric. I meant to grab Joe's iron yesterday, but forgot. So I'll probably get a cheapie one at Walmart and complete them this weekend. Then they'll be done for when my mom gets here next week--I know she'll be impressed. They are really nice and look totally different.

That's about it!!! I'm looking forward to the coming weeks--they are chock full of stuff to do, but look very, very interesting. Thursday is my first Survivors of Suicide (SOS) support group. I'm hosting a MyPC event, another presidential field trip, on Saturday to Chatham Manor here in Fredericksburg on Saturday. Sunday is my mother-in-law's birthday. Next week is our ladies only supper club and then my mom will be arriving... I have a CD exchange, tickets to see a lecture or show or something about Second City at the Natural History Museum, my dad's birthday, and the National Book Festival. Not to mention trying to find time to catch up with friends--our little posse has all been going in different directions all month and we've all been missing each other, so we're hoping to catch up soon... I'm exhausted just thinking about it! :-)

Kris Radish Rocks!

The Lit Chicks had another evening with Kris Radish last night, and it was absolutely spectacular. She talked to us for the better part of 2 hours, and answered everyone's questions. This time, we read Annie Freeman's Fabulous Traveling Funeral, which was a complete tearjerker, if I hadn't mentioned it already. I really did prefer The Elegant Gathering of White Snows more than I did Annie Freeman, but still in all, I thoroughly loved it and the discussion more than made up for what the book may have lacked.

It's funny, when the club meets in these small groups (there were only 5 of us), the small groups draw closer and closer together and we really get to know each other so well and I really, really love that. The club is becoming everything I envisioned when I started it.

I was looking at jobs to apply for on line the other night, and found a great one at the library at UMW, for which I was eminently qualified. The hours were 3-11, however, and my first thought was, "Not gonna happen, it'd mess up my Lit Chicks night."

So I guess even my job search will be hampered by these girls... But there are far, far worse things, and they're 100% worth it.

Bait and Switch

The girls met last night to discuss Barbara Ehrenreich's Bait and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream.

I'm not sure what I was excpecting, but it wasn't what was in that book! She wrote solely about her job search as an average unemployed professional middle class worker trying to find a job and getting taken advantage of by every scheister on the east coast.

Well, first of all, when your average white-collar worker loses his or her job, he doesn't have thousands of dollars to throw down on plane tickets to go not to job interviews, but to networking events and image consultations in far off cities. Now, I understand why she did it, to prove there are a bunch of people out there who will take your money and you will have nothing to show for it.

HOWEVER! What might have been more realistic would have been if she would have sat around in her house, day in and day out, combing job sites, making phone calls, mailing resumes, and eating. Perhaps occasionally, she could have gone out in her own home city and the neighboring areas, rather than jetting off to Atlanta and Boston.

Ultimately, the end result was that she did not find a decent job in nearly a year of searching. (She was offered a couple of direct sales jobs--think Mary Kay.)

What she never quite managed to dig into was the loss of benefits, the elimination of pensions, the extension of the workday and work week, quality of life losses, loss of family, and the poor corporate culture that is created by huge corporations who could honestly care less about you and just work you until you're no good to them any more.

Frankly, this was the book I was hoping to read. It was truly a shame that she never quite got that far.

FUG Book Club

Today I attended a new book club meeting in town. It is run by the folks on the Fredericksburg.com website and it was a great time. There were only 4 of us there, but it was nice to jump into a small group.

They read "A Million Little Pieces"... The book that duped Oprah. I only decided to go the other day, so did not have time to pick it up and read it. Their chief complaints about the book, however, seemed to be the grammar and poor punctuation. The story itself was found to be compelling.

Next month we will be reading Kate Chopin's "The Awakening." I am truly looking forward to it. I read it first in high school and again in college, but I'm interested to see what I think of it now that I am a married woman. I am also kind of curious about reading "The Bridges of Madison County" again now that I'm married. I wonder if I'll have a different reaction and different feelings about these books. As a young, romantic-at-heart, and immature-in-the-ways-of-amour girl, I thought their adultery was justified, as these women were meeting with the loves of their lives and their husbands were dull, colorless, humorless, or otherwise lacking.

It certainly bears re-reading and recontemplation. Adultery is not for me. I married my husband, the man I love, and can't imagine cheating. I can't imagine him cheating either. But will I see these heroines of my youth as somewhat less than the women I previously thought, now that I'm looking through the lens of marriage? I'm certainly interested to find out the answer.

Lit Chicks Book Report

This month, we had an amazing Lit Chicks meeting. We read a compilation of non-fiction short stories called The Friend Who Got Away: Twenty Women's True Life Tales of Friendships that Blew Up, Burned Out or Faded Away. It was the first book of short stories I've read in quite a while, and I found that I really liked it. If one of the stories was not to my liking, I could skip over it and just go to the next one.

I have to confess, I sat down and made a list of my own "friends who got away" after reading the book. I came up with 10 or 15, only 5 or 6 of whom I genuinely wanted to hear from again. Kerriann was one of them. Vicki, Margaret, Anna, Christina, Stefanie, if you're out there, drop me a line! (Yes, sorry, no men made the cut--our fizzling out was just too complicated, confusing, and/or painful for me to want to talk to ex-male friends again.)

Each of the stories was unique, from the obligatory "I slept with my best friend's boyfriend" to "I was the only black girl in my school till the second one moved in and invaded my turf and then moved out"... There were also stories from when the women were children to when they were adults, and one was very tongue-in-cheek (when you become my best friend, don't worry about cancelling till the morning of, I can always find something to do with myself when you bail on me, etc. etc.)

The book led to fantastic discussion about our friends who got away, and even a few tears. We discussed how applicable it was, how screwed up some of these authors must be (!), each of the stories, and each of the friendships. One of the best sets of stories, in my opinion, was that they published one from each of two friends whose friendship fizzled.

If you're interested in non-fiction or short stories and want to ease your ladies' book club into it, this is a definite contender. I wouldn't recommend it for clubs that are just starting out where people don't feel comfortable sharing their personal lives. But if you all know each other, it can be a sort of catharsis to talk about those relationships in the course of the book discussion.

Book Club: Elegant Gathering of White Snows

Last night my book club and I was able to present my first book since I started the club back in November '04! (We pick one book each per year and then draw randomly to decide when we're going to read that book.)

I had selected Kris Radish's The Elegant Gathering of White Snows and had contacted Kris to call in and talk with the club, which she did.

It was an amazing night, probably one of our best book clubs ever.

The book is about 8 women living in rural Wisconsin who decide in a moment that they will get up and just start walking to rid themselves of their demons. Their walk becomes an international phenomenon and they are able to move on with their lives and take the steps they need to take to improve their lives from that point forward.

Ms. Radish is an amazing speaker, probably the best call in we've had, and was willing to answer any questions we asked, plus a few of her own invention. She discussed her new books as well, and her work as a feminist, a columnist, and a mom.

I will definitely be reading some of her other books, and she mentioned her latest "Annie Freeman's Fabulous Travelling Funeral" has been optioned for a movie.

If you're interested in her books or learning more about her, go to her website at http://www.krisradish.com

If you run a book club, many authors will be happy to call in and sometimes visit your club in person. So far, we've had Phillip Gulley, Leah Stewart, and Kris Radish call in, and Patrick Sanchez actually came. It's a lot of fun to get the author's background stories and points of view and to ask questions to things you hash over and can't quite come up with the answers to yourselves.

Also, we'll be featured in the May issue of Washingtonian Magazine as one of the featured book clubs. Look for the Lit Chicks. :-) I was interviewed for it right after my accident. Hope I sounded coherent. hehe

Lit Chicks

My book club met tonight.

I have the most fantastic book club. I absolutely adore these women, they have truly come to mean so much in my life. We haven't had book club since December 9th, and it has been absolute ages, it seems like!

We sit around and talk and gossip and have the most lively conversations about the books. It's a real sense of sisterhood, and it's magic that it all came together.

Back in 2004, I was feeling sorry for myself since I didn't know anyone in DC. So I decided to start a book club and posted an ad on Craig's List. I got roughly 30 responses back and invited everyone over to the house. 11 girls showed up, and it was serendipity.

It was a WONDERFUL evening. We got the whole thing organized and it's been full steam ahead ever since. A few members have dropped out, some new folks have come in, and it's just been absolutely fantastic.

This month we read "Wicked" by Gregory Maguire, which a lot of people seem to be reading right now for some reason. I read it somewhere around 5 years ago, and there was no way in hell I was reading it again--I hated it. But it was a good kind of hate, it was the kind of hate that led me to say "THIS BOOK WILL NOT DEFEAT ME!" and I plowed through to the bitter end.

Consequently I didn't have much to say about the discussion--I couldn't much remember the whole thing. But it didn't matter, we had a great time anyway, and I've read the book for next week, "The Myth of You and Me" by Leah Stewart. Great book until the end, but I won't ruin the ending for those of you who might read it.

Anyway, my main point here is that the book club was and is the kind of miracle I need in my life. The once in a lifetime moment where you need something amazing to happen and all the pieces just fall into place and great things happen. We've had 3 author events, we've seen each other through losses and triumphs (right now we've got 2 brides and a mom-to-be in the club!), and just become great friends.

Thanks, girls!!!!!!!!!!!