nothing like you've gone after before

there is something comforting in the smell of vicks vapo-rub, it reminds me of childhood.  i used to spend a great deal of time at my grandparents home on the weekends and i usually had a stuffy nose due to seasonal and pet dander allergies.  my incessant sniffing drove my grandfather insane and with the first sniffle he was there with the vicks to put under each nostril.  ben-gay was another comfort smell.  my great-grandmother used to rub it on her joints before going to bed.  we would snuggle up under the covers in her bed and watch “MASH” or “barney miller”.

apparently i keep putting too many “t”s in gewurztraminer.  german never has been my strong suit.  i would never have spelled bordeaux incorrectly.

i need to find a babysitter for tomorrow morning and possibly saturday afternoon.  yeesh.

i have noticed that the amount of junk mail and phone solicitations i receive rises exponentially every time i respond to an ad on craigslist.  hmmm…coincidence?

i am sending sylvie to preschool today.  we have been fever free since monday and her cough is dry and she isn’t coughing as much anymore.  as long as i can get her to take some hyland’s syrup before we leave.  i am assuming she is no longer contagious.

i am really looking forward to this weekend.

i cannot believe i am sitting her watching isabel and jason play super mario brothers on a vintage nintendo on a wednesday night.  wednesday is martini and “mad men” night.

i made my first entree out of mastering the art of french cooking. i made caneton roti a l’alsacienne…which is a fancy way of saying duck roasted with apple and sausage stuffing.  i served it with latkes and sauteed apples, and a chilled gewurztraminer.  it was delicious.  it was my first time ever making duck.  my dad has been hunting for years, but i have never attempted to prepare it.

i need a change in appearance.  my hair is so long and it is coming out in handfuls.  i feel dragged down.  i was thinking something like this. 

i am tired of looking like…i don’t know.  but i cannot take another day in a ponytail and mousy hair.

i am going to turn jason’s studio into a meditation room.

i am so looking forward to this weekend…chock full of most of my good friends.

okay…i need to round everyone up.

the most frustrating thing so far today has been my internet browser repeatedly not responding.  that and my three year old coughing so hard she almost gags after she refuses to take a drink.  the question is, do i keep badgering her for a drink or let her learn her lesson?  although, learning her lesson may involve her vomiting on my duvet cover.

i stayed home from work yesterday, per my husband’s decree.  he felt that sylvie would recover faster if she didn’t have to spend the day at my grandfather’s house.  i can see his point.  plus, my grandfather really does not need to deal with a whiny, coughing three year old.  now, however, i have to find a day to go in to work and make up my hours.  this is far more complicated than you can imagine.  i need to find someone willing to watch a coughing, whiny three year old from 8 am until 5:30pm or later, who is also willing to pick isabel up from school and help with homework…and if aforementioned three year old is no longer coughing, take care of preschool drop off and pick up.  the phone calls and negotiations of making these arrangements are worth more than the measly hourly wage i earn for being the whipping post of our unhappy patients.  alas, i don’t make these arrangements for them.  i make them so i can not leave my coworker at the front desk in the lurch.  she has other duties at the office besides front desk nonsense; as do i.  we each do the jobs of two people, but only get paid for one.  and not very well, either. well at least, i’m not.  i suppose in these times, a job is better than no job, n’est-ce pas?

keep your fingers crossed i can pick up some proofreading jobs for some extra chicago and christmas cash, would you?  i need to do what m. does, put it out in the universe and if it is meant to be it will come.

i am feeling defeated and fatigued.  i know it is mostly hormones and being home with a sick child since friday evening.  i am just afraid i am getting sick now.   i have been pumping myself full of vitamins, tea, water, and juice.  i have a busy weekend ahead of me, no time to get sick.

i have two fresh ducks in my freezer, care of my father.  i have a roast duck recipe i have been dying to try out of my julia child cookbook and he was kind enough to provide me with free canards.  have you ever seen how much domesticated duck costs in the store?  i can tweak the recipe to complement wild duck just to save twenty dollars.

it is time to pull myself together.  get dressed, get sylvie dressed, get out the door and run errands before the full on whininess commences.

i woke up in a fine mood this morning.  i went through the usual routine, the only thing different was that we had to pick katie up  on our way to school, so that meant we had to leave five minutes earlier than usual.  who knew that the added stress of five minutes could send my morning into a spiral of yelling?  it wasn’t really a stress to leave five minutes early, the stress came from sylvie stripping out of her clothes five minutes before we needed to leave because she thought her outfit looked like pajamas.  and then she picked out a skirt, short sleeve shirt, and no tights.  seriously.  the first day so far this school year that we had to drive someone in the morning and she pulled this crap.  so instead of leaving five minutes early as planned, we left ten minutes later than our normal time out the door.  my throat is still scratchy from the tirade i launched into.

that is what i get for bragging to jason last night that i really thought i had mastered the art of getting out the door in the morning.

i hope i do not have to go to a funeral again for a long time.

we closed up the beehive yesterday.  sigh.  now how am i going to waste time if the bees are all in the hive?  they were enjoying the weather yesterday.  after jason put the hive top feeder in and inspected some of the frames, we sat outside for a while.  he had sugar water and propolis on his hands, so one of the bees was flying all around him and then landed on his hand.  she was sucking the water and propolis off of him.  all summer they were flying in and out of the yard and you would have never known they were there, but yesterday they were flying into us.  with the cooler weather, they stay closer to the hive when they are foraging and then they are all over the grass by the hive.

i need to reorganize the basement.  again.  i don’t know how it gets destroyed so easily.  i don’t know why it is so difficult for my children to pick up after themselves.  i have given up on isabel’s room.  i am tired of berating her for letting it get to this point.  i am hoping that she can just keep the clothes off the floor and in their proper places.

sylvie stripped down again.  sigh.

i have really let myself go.  i cannot remember the last time i went running.  i became absorbed in the start of the school year and have not found a good time of day to go.  i could go while sylvie is at preschool, but there are things around here that are best done when she isn’t home. hmmm…exercise or clean?

halloween plans are still up in the air.  we have our costumes almost ready, but we cannot decide what we want to do after the girls trick or treat.

okay, time to see what outfit sylvie has decided to put on now.

it has been a long time, faithful reader.  for that, i apologize.

i have insufferable allergies this time of year.  i took some clarinex last night before bed.  not one of my best ideas.  i passed out cold at about 9:30ish, but was wide awake at 1 am.  of course it could have been my very overcrowded bed.  by this time, sylvie had crawled in and the cat was sleeping between her and jason.  it was the most adorable thing i had seen in quite some time.  i wanted to take a picture, but that would have required turning the light on.

needless to say the clarinex has left me jittery.  and as i reach for what is my third cup of coffee this morning, my hands are shaking.  maybe i should stop with the coffee.

the drain in our basement is backing up again.  this has put a major damper on my saturday plans since i cannot leave the house without a shower.   in fact, i do believe the plumber has arrived.  woo hoo!  i shall return later.

as in boehner…what a douche.

so, i was watching the presidential address to congress in regards to health care reform this evening.  it was both uplifting and disappointing.

let us commence with happiness, since i am so much more eloquent with negativity.

that was the president that i voted for.  i don’t know about you, but i actually smiled and felt reassured.  after all the pandering nonsense of the past few days, i was reminded that the president is in office because I voted for him and what he said he believed in.  and what he was speaking about this evening, he seemed to believe in.

as a married middle class mother of two, i am of the opinion that his plan for health care reform is the best plan.  no, it isn’t socialized medicine, but have you looked around?  we are not canadians.  we are americans who do not like anyone telling us what to do, how long we have to wait for it, and that eventually it will be taken out of our paychecks.  well, we don’t like being told what to do by people we have democratically elected, we leave the bossing around to that fat piece of poo, rush limbaugh.

as for you leftward leaning liberals, how feasible is socialized public health insurance in this country?  if you are honest with yourself, you know it is a bureacratic clusterfuck waiting to happen.

republicans need to pull their heads out of their asses and realize that people who watch nascar can’t afford to pay for private insurance, so maybe they should get on board.

and how rude was that arse who shouted out during the clarification that illegal immigrants would not receive benefits?  last i checked, you need a social security number to get health insurance.

douchebags, the lot of them.  republicans, not immigrants.  in case you were confused.

crap.  i think sylv fell out of her bed.

maybe not.

so, i think people who have never had to worry about medical bills or how to pay for health insurance, or be concerned because they have kids or preexisting conditions should keep their comments to themselves about how wonderful private insurance is.  do you know how much i pay just for myself bimonthly?  do you?  $350.  yup.

so go with it people.

i forgot “glee” was on tonight.  we had my father-in-law over for dinner.  i am watching “glee”, but i noticed that they are featuring dalton trumbo on pbs’ “american masters” and feel like i would benefit more from that.

why is even my tv viewing a source of competition?

we started watching season one of “mad men”. i like it well enough, but jason really likes it.

oh man, this kid is singing “leaving on a jet plane”, that song gets me every single time.  i will weep by the end of the song.  wait, not a kid, the awesome cool departing glee teacher is singing.  hmmm.

i am having a crisis of conscience.

not going to talk about it right now.

i started my period.  finally, after over three months.  hallelujah!

that’s all.

carry on.

all i am hearing is the water running in the toilet, some crickets, a pair of house sparrows debating outside the window, and the river of cars on 696.  the television is not on, no one is yelling out “mommy”, and i just jinxed myself because the phone just rang.

once.  hmmm.

i am sure that if i dragged myself out of bed before isabel and sylvie got up then every morning could be like this.  alas, the only reason the house sounds like this is because they are not here and no matter how early i awoke, they have a sixth sense of feeling that i am up, so they need to wake up.

except on school days.  then none of us are able to wake ourselves up.

i have been operating on a major sleep deficit.  i went to bed early last night, read for awhile, and then finally went to sleep after 11:30 some time.  i cannot get comfortable in my bed.  more than likely it is something as simple as a new pillow.

for not having the children home last night, it was relatively uneventful.  jason cleaned up after dinner while i checked my email.  the television was not turned on until after 8 pm and i acquiesced to watching “the road show”, even though i wanted to watch a movie.  we followed up “the road show” with “history detectives” and then it was off to bed.  and that is to bed with no “wink, wink, nudge, nudge”.

other than the movie, the evening was exactly the way i wanted.  no fighting, yelling, no baths to deal with, no bedtime dilemmas.  ah.

today i have a couple of errands, but other than that.  it should be a good day.  not sure what to make for dinner.  i’m sure jason is going to want to grill.

i need to figure out what day we are going to do isabel’s family birthday.  a. and e. are coming in friday the 11th, but i have to work all day and am not up for hosting that evening.  saturday evening, jason is having a birthday bonfire…i could do food and cake and ice cream beforehand, or we could do an early afternoon thing on sunday, but then i would have to clean the house twice since the bonfire crowd usually destroys my floor.  ack.

but i need to get this figured out asap.

okay, faithful reader, i need to get moving.  i have an eight week old to go visit!