sugar as a staple

it's odd to me that sugar is considered a staple. i have never quite understood that. why is it essential to have sugar?

when the weather is predicted to be snowy and stormy, nobody runs out and buys sugar. they run out and buy milk. and beer. but not sugar. they also run out and buy clorox which, i guess if you're gonna get cabin fever, you might as well have a clean cabin.

the other day, one of my client's mothers told me that they were out of "everything" and she absolutely had to get to the store. "we don't have milk," she said,"and we don't have any bread. but what's really bad is, we don't have sugar. we can't last a day around here without sugar."

"we can't last a day around here without wine" i get. but, "we can't last a day around here without sugar?" what?????? - you bake brownies everyday?

i could go my whole life without brownies, but go my whole life without anchovies?

now, there's a staple.

dinner for 12 in a space that can barely accomodate it

extremely fun times last night, but wow......do we ever create a commotion wherever we go. and by we, i mean abby, eli, charlie, olivia, jack, luke, wendy, mom, dad, my niece, lauren, her boyrfriend, jason, and me. and the triple stroller. and the diaper bag.

lauren and jason were in town from chicago, visiting my parents, and the whole motley crew of us got together last night for dinner at a restaurant about a half-block from my place. because there was no room at my place for a mob like that. nor, really, was there room at the restaurant for a mob like that. 


(there is no restaurant on the face of the earth for a mob like that.)


but the "columbus brewing company" was especially tricky. not that i didn't know it - i mean, come on, the restaurant is a half-block from my house. i've been there a million times. but never with a motley crew.


first of all, CBC, as it is more commonly known, has zero waiting room. zero.  zee-roe. so, picture that.


second, CBC is a small restaurant. not tiny, but small.


third, the tables at CBC are pretty smushed together. maybe someone ought to call the fire marshall.


fourth.......well........isn't three enough?


so, there we were, on top of everyone's laps, breathing down everyone's entrees, and schlepping ourselves to the back of the restaurant (and then, at the end, back up to the front) and several remarkable things happened. actually, one remarkable thing happened:


no one complained.


the other patrons were, if not doting (and many of them were), at least cordial. and accomodating. i have never seen so much scooting of chairs in my life.


abby and eli were their usual "ha ha, this is how we roll, ain't it fun" selves.


lauren and jason, who live independent, childless, upwardly mobile lives in chicago, jumped into the fray like it was their job. which, actually, it was.....we pawned the kids off on them so the rest of us could eat.  :)


mom and dad were their usual "do we have the best daughter and grand kids and son-in-law and granddaughter's boyfriend and great-grandchildren in the whole wide world or what" selves.


and i sorta looked around and thought.....


yes, mom and dad. yes.


we do.

the mother of mothers

abby amazes me. 

if you were the mother of 3-year old twins and 7-month old triplets, would you spend their blessed nap times going through all of their outgrown clothing, toys, equipment, etc., organize it all into separate bins, label each item for sale, haul the whole shebang downtown to vets memorial for the annual "mother of twins club" sale, schlep it all from the van into the building, set it all up, go home and feed your kids, come back to the sale a few hours later, with your husband in tow, whose job it is to work the sale while you now shop it - without benefit of shopping cart or anything else (how you carry all of this stuff is your problem) - then go home late at night and collapse - and then come back the next day and tear it all down? and haul back home whatever didn't sell?  

and then say, "that was pretty easy."


neither would i.

dog bites/flea bites

tuesday i came home with dog bites - albeit superficial - on my ankles. thanks to a client's dog.

yesterday i came home with flea bites - all over - also thanks to a client's dog.

so, the question is: do i a.) get a new job, b.) get a new job, or c.) get a new job.

Leave it to Better

abby and eli have old "leave it to beaver" episodes (season 1!) on their netflix and last night, i watched some of the episodes. and no, leaving it to beaver was not better. but leaving it to june and ward (and miss canfield and mrs. rayburn and gus at the fire station and all of the neighbors up and down the street who gave a damn) certainly was.

beaver - and to a lesser extent, wally - got into all sorts of mischief that wouldn't come close to making it on the radar screen today. the "mischief" that they got into is laughable now. and, i guess, it must have been laughable then, too. or else it wouldn't have been a hit t.v. show.

but despite the benign nature of their problems, the village that it took to raise them handled the mischief as if the boys' moral compasses, whole futures, and eternal souls depended on it.

because it did.

these days, parents don't give a rip about anything. 

how kids dress or how kids talk, especially to their elders (kids don't even know what an "elder" is anymore) or how they comport themselves (comport?) at school and elsewhere in public is laughed at. it is laughed at. and that's on a good day -  when how kids do these things even registers.

whereas, back in beaver's day, these behaviors not only made for a wildly popular half-hour show, they could get a kid grounded. for what felt like life. because it was good for him.

and for the rest of society.


if you think things are better today.......then i don't want to leave anything to you. 
 

happy halloween!

halloween in april.......woot!


i live next door to a huge, old, abandoned brewery and every halloween, they turn part of into what has been heralded as one of the best haunted houses in the country. not county........country.

starting every thursday after labor day and running every weekend through the first one in november, thousands of folks line up for hours in the cold and the rain just for the pleasure of being scared out of their minds. which totally cracks me up........because starting every april, i get to sit in the comfort of my own home and watch as the workers start setting everything up. and when you see what goes on behind the scenes, there's nothing scary about it.

every year about this time, it crosses my mind to bribe (or is it blackmail?) the haunted house workers..........if you pay me to keep my mouth shut, i won't tell anybody that the chain saws are plastic.

or that you guys dropped the "bloody mummy" - which is made out of newspaper -  4 times just trying to get "him" off the truck. and that one of you took a leak on the "mummy" while trying.

the way i figure it, if i bribed (blackmailed?) these guys, they'd be the ones who'd be scared. just think of all the business they'd lose.


on the other hand, just think of all the fun-loving, beer bottle-throwing, littering, trash-talking company i'd miss out on while everybody's waiting in line.


so, yeah. ima blow their cover.


:)

why aren't saddle shoes back in style?

saddle shoes could be so cool. if only they'd give 'em another chance.

back in the day, saddle shoes were kinda dorky. i mean, even though the cheerleaders wore them, they were still kinda dorky. i think the only dorky thing that any cheerleader in the history of the world ever did was wear saddle shoes.

but, if you think about it, saddle shoes could be totally cool. like, if they were in lime green and pink, for instance.

or tan and baby blue.

red and polka-dotted purple.

if they made them into platforms, they'd be killer.

flip-flop saddles? a.dor.a.ble.

saddles with the tommy hilfiger logo? a hundred and fifty bucks. easy.

but for some reason, designers don't want to bring back the saddle shoe. i really don't know why not.


maybe vera wang was cut from the cheer squad? 

spa day

abby had a spa day yesterday. very well deserved, i might add.


i'm not a "spa day" kind of girl. i'm more of a "crash on the couch while you bring me my wine" kind of girl.

i wouldn't want anybody messing with my feet. eeewwww! i also don't want anyone mooshing and pushing my muscles. in this day and age of everyone feeling "violated," massages make literally NO SENSE.

as for manicures........if God wants us to have black fingernails or blue ones, He'll make sure we shut our hands in the door.  

as for the haircut, actually, yes. as a person who gets her hair cut every three weeks, i can totally see the joy of seeing someone with sharps coming towards my head. 
 
but as for the rest of "spa day," it's just not my thing. my thing, as i said, is more along the lines of stretching cozily on my nice soft couch at home and having somebody do my bidding. and my bidding always includes a nice cabernet.


the other thing that my thing is is having somebody pick up that little piece of dust bunny over there so i don't have to get up off this couch and do it myself.

babysittin' fee's goin' up

last night, olivia says, "gammy?" and i say, "yes?" and she says, "you look kinda old."

on top of that.........abby and eli's t.v.?? GGGGGGRRRRRR!!!!!!!! 

once upon a time, what you did with a t.v. was, you turned it on and then you turned it off. in between times, you turned it up.

also once upon a time, what you did with a t.v. was, you went into the kitchen and made jiffy pop.

but those days are over. now you gotta stand on your head and clap three times if you wanna turn on your t.v. provided, of course, the UB port and the IBS port are compatible with the little thingie on the remote that looks like two blue "Vs" trying to fly.


and then, if you think you hear one of the babies crying and you try to turn down the t.v. so you can be sure, you're out of luck. 


so, yeah. my babysitting fee is going up.


and then you tiptoe into the babies' room to check for yourself if one of the babies is crying and you see that none of them are but wendy's clutching her little bear in her little fist and her little butt's in the air.


so, yeah. my babysitting fee is going down.

hey kids, rock and roll, rock on, oh my soul.

my family is a religious smorgasbord.

my parents are presbyterian and raised me to be one. i converted to catholicism in 1992, got marrried the second time by an episcopalian pastor, joined the lutheran church, floundered back and forth and back and forth from the catholic, the lutheran, and the episcopalian church, and then finally settled down and became a serious catholic. 

my daughter and son-in-law are mormon. my son-in-law's mother? she's mormon. but her dad was jewish.

and my paternal grandfather was fiercely prejudiced against catholics.


so, yeah. i know a thing or two about WTF???


all of this religious checkerboarding came up for discussion at the dinner table today. my parents are sure of their protestant faith. abby and eli are sure of theirs, and i am sure of mine (now that i finally know what it is). no one was trying to convert the other and nobody's eyes rolled.


but a rock rolled. a very big, important rock rolled.


a rock that unites us all.




rock and roll. 

funny........

it all comes down to that.

hallelujah!

whether it's the whole chorus or just one voice, it means the same wonderful thing.

happy Easter, everyone.

:)

tiptoe through what tulips???

is tiny tim still alive? cuz i need some tulips.

actually, i already have some tulips, but these suckers are shot. i bought them only yesterday and already, they've given up. personally, i think it's kinda rude not to even show up for Easter.

speaking of showing up for Easter, tomorrow's the day when we really need to show up for Easter in the middle of the night tonight in order to get a place to sit in the morning because of everybody who never shows up showing up. not that i mind that. i don't.

i don't complain when people who never show up all year long show up on Easter (and Christmas). the way i look at it, at least they're there on Easter (and Christmas).


which is more'n i can say for these stupid tulips.

because i feel at home there

it dawned on me this week that one of the reasons i like my job is that i feel at home with my clients.

i feel at home with them because when you get right down to it, i am them. i am them because when you get right down to it........they're sinners.


for the most part, i think most of us - myself included - think that we are not like the "kind" of people who comes to the attention of social workers. 

we think that we manage our lives better. we manage our finances better. we manage our relationships better. we make better choices. we take responsibility better. we don't act out. we don't stand in the front yard, cussing out our next-door neighbor.


we take daily baths.


we buy lysol........ and we use it.

we drink higher class beer and wine. and we don't throw the bottles in the yard.

and yes. it's true. most of us don't do those things. i, for one, have never once in my life thrown a beer bottle on the ground. well, except for maybe once. in college.

which, by the way, none of my clients ever goes to college.

how many chairs do you have around your dining table?

every Lent for i don't know how many Lents now, catholic relief services has sponsored "operation rice bowl" as an opportunity for charitable giving to people in various forms of need throughout the world, including here in the u.s. i love "operation rice bowl." here's why:

• "operation rice bowl" is clever. for example, they'll ask you to give to the hungry of the world by donating "x" amount of money for each dining table chair you have in your house. 
• they'll ask you to donate "y" amount of money for every faucet you have in your house - inside and out - as a way of helping folks who don't have any running water.
• you might want to give "z" amount for every grade of schooling you have completed so that catholic relief services can build schools in places (plenty) that don't have schools.

the other thing i love about "operation rice bowl" is, and i know half of you are gonna hate for me this but oh well, the other thing i like about "operation rice bowl" is that i donate the money in this little box and turn it into my church at the end of Lent (also known as the day i can finally eat pasta again!) and never see the first receipt. 

i love donating without getting receipts and then not turning around next year and asking uncle sam to donate back to me. 

i just think that's how charitable giving always ought to be.


i also just think i ought to find out how many Lents catholic relief services has been sponsoring "operation rice bowl" and  give "x, y, and z" for each one.