My hump

I've been swimming a lot at the Y lately. Yesterday I did 2000 yards, which is about a mile and a quarter. Impressive huh? I loved it so much that I didn't want to get out but I knew if I didn't my arms would be like noodles shortly after, so I got out. I decided to get myself a new swim suit so I don't have to wear the mom-cut flowered suit that I got for 10 dollars at K-mart last summer.

I went to a sporting goods shop and got a super cute practice suit. I was debating about the size and I decided on a size bigger than I wore in high school. That should work, right? Sure. I got it home and tried it on. I had to check the tag to make sure of the size when it got stuck at mid thigh. The size was right, it must just be a little snug. Right..... I got it all the way up and looked in the mirror. My back looked like a ham under the cross-straps, and my butt was so very very compressed that the design on the suit was stretched to the point of turning a little white-ish. I have decidedly more junk in my trunk, as they say, than I did when I was 17. Who knew? (shut up, Mitch)

I was so disgusted with myself that I returned it today and bought a new purse instead. My ass will never be too big for a new purse.

To all my bitches at the Y: You're just going to have to keep getting your asses kicked by me in my mom-cut suit, and if a boob falls out, too bad.

NOW I get why there's a skirt on those suits!

Mitch just told me:

"Ventriloquism is the lowest form of puppeteering."

Ha ha, Edgar Bergen, you wasted your life!

Oh yeah, it's winter

We woke up this morning and guess what?! It was snowing! How wonderful! It's a winter goddamn wonderland! Yahoo!

Anyway, the kids and Mitch decided to make the best of it and make a snowman. Kira went out first and rolled the bottom ball until it was so big she couldn't move it anymore and needed help.


You can't really tell from this picture, but the ball is way bigger than you think. It is so heavy that most of it is underground, but they had to move it to a better spot so they got into position:

That's Sam and Mitch pushing this enormous ball up hill and that little black spot by their legs is Kira. Her job was "door stop." She was to prevent the ball from rolling back downhill by putting her body in the way and heaving with her legs.

Next they put on the torso ball which must have been hard. I don't know how they did it and I was busy scrubbing the toilet so I didn't get to watch.

Next was the head ball and the finishing touches.

And here's the finished product. Mitch made the snow arm on the right and the kids wanted to make the left one but gave up and just shoved in a branch instead. I like his hair. The stick in the back is his sword. This is a horrible picture because there is too much white. You can't even make out the little tiny snowman on the big snowman's shoulder.

I have a new nemesis

A person should always have a good nemesis don't you think? I hardly ever see my previous nemesis because our kids go to different schools now. She became my nemesis when Sam and her kid were in kindergarten and I ran into her at the grocery store and she asked why Sam wasn't in the all-day class because she thought all the slow-learners were in the all day class. She didn't actually say it that bluntly, but almost. Since then she was my nemesis. We actually became sort-of friends through the years. Turns out she is just a bit of a social moron, but otherwise pretty nice. So I have been without a nemesis for a while and when a person is without a nemesis, the universe just isn't balanced.

I have actually mentioned my newest nemesis before in the post Sports Fan, but in it you thought she was a fictitious combination of all obnoxious hockey parents. You were wrong. It's one person and she's very very real. I shall from now on call her "Emesis." (What? It's because it rhymes with nemesis, get it?)

She reached official nemesis status today when I went to pick Sam up at the arena where he was working at a high school event. He wasn't waiting for me so I was going to go in and pick him up. Emesis was working the entrance which wasn't really even an entrance, it was just a caution-tape-barricade in the parking lot, and she stopped me and told me I couldn't go any further without a ticket. I told her I was looking for Sam. She said it didn't matter, I still couldn't pass without a ticket. She said she would go in and have a look around and tell him I was waiting, presumably because she didn't want me stealing any hockey joy when everyone else paid for a ticket. Then she never came back.

Now Emesis is my nemesis and I am going to think VERY bad thoughts about her, and blog about her, and talk about her behind her back. She'll never know what hit her. (Seriously, she'll never know.)

Who's your nemesis and how did you get together?

Jill's Inconvenient Labor

I had the weirdest, most vivid dream last night. I was with my friend Jill (Hi Jill!) and we were shopping at the dollar store in Virginia, MN. She was immensely pregnant and ready to pop any second. We went up to the checkout to pay for our stuff, Jill went first, and after she was rung up, but before she paid, her water broke and she ran out of the store to the car. The cashier looked at me like, "Well, are you going to pay for her stuff?" and I told her I would pay half because I was sure Jill would be right back to pay because how inconsiderate of her to run out after she was rung up but before she paid. Strangely, this was fine with the cashier and after I paid (half) I went to the car to check on Jill.

It was her car, a suburban and she was in the back panting. At that point I was a little bit mad at myself for letting her drive because now, obviously, I was stuck with her until the baby was born and I had other stuff I had to get done. I told her to move over so I could put our packages in and then she told me to drive her to my house. Yeah, that's right MY house. (WTF, Jill, ever hear of a hospital?) But she said that her husband/father (who was neither her real-life husband or father) was waiting for her at my house. So we went to my house and the guy was there. In the dream he was mostly her father, but sometimes he was her husband, (you know how dreams are.) So anyway, she was uncomfortable and her father kept checking her cervix, which even in the dream I thought was a little weird. Eventually she wanted to go lay on a bed so she went to my room. I was happy to see her go because with all the panting and moaning I couldn't hear the TV.

Shortly after she went to my room and I was finally able to hear my TV show, her father ran downstairs all worried and panicked and said, "Oh no, Jill is bleeding! Is that normal?" I thought a man who was comfortable with checking his daughter's cervix constantly should know if bleeding during labor is normal or not, and why does he have to bother me about it? Then I decided to go up and check on her myself because she was in my bed and I didn't want her bleeding all over everything. I was going to put some garbage bags down underneath her but she wasn't bleeding all that bad. I thought she and her father were being a little melodramatic about the whole thing and I was just about to confront her about her rudeness when the baby was born. It was her son Ethan (who has been born for 5 years) and he was a baby, but he had his five-year-old head. Jill and her father/husband were really happy and relieved. I was happy because now that it was over they could go home. Then I said, "Jill, you owe me $57.00 from the dollar store."

I'm a real bitch in my dreams.

I'm officially done caring about politics

Did you hear the big news? No, not the Nutella news, that's old news. The new news is that supreme court rolled back campaign finance laws so now corporations can give unlimited funds to political candidates! Finally! I was so upset that Walmart and AIG weren't getting a fair shake in American politics.

Now I can't wait for Blue Cross or Aetna to buy up congressional seats so I will be forced to pay through the nose for substandard health insurance under a mangled health care bill. That will be SWEET.

I think I might be done voting. Doesn't seem to make any difference. I'll start getting involved again when the good old guillotines get dusted off.

The French had the right idea.

The big news

Today Mitch and I went out to lunch and out of the clear blue sky he said to me:

"There's a new spread on the scene. It's called Nutella."


Just thought you should know.

Eagle vs. Shark

I saw the movie Eagle vs. Shark last night. It was so good that I decided to write a movie review about it. I got it because I am a fan of Jemaine Clement (the eagle in the picture). He is part of Flight of the Conchords, the 4th most popular folk comedy duo in New Zealand. He's also a rapper and his rap name is the Hip-hopopotamus. He raps with his partner, the Rhymnocerous.

The movie is about Lily (the shark in the picture) and Jarrod (the eagle). Lily is a quiet weirdo who is one of the sweetest characters ever. She's got a huge crush on Jarrod and crashes his dress-like-your-favorite-animal party to get close to him. They hook up and then start seeing each other, but Jarrod is kind of a loser. He makes Napoleon Dynamite look like a charismatic stud. He wants to go back to his home town because the boy who used to beat him up in high school is coming back and Jarrod wants to fight him. He's been training for years. He needs a ride and Lily talks her brother into taking them both.

When they get to Jarrod's hometown, Lily meets Jarrod's family who is still devastated by the suicide of Jarrod's brother.

I'm not going to say anything else about the movie other than it's really sweet and very good. It's not as good as Avatar, but it's better than Wolverine. Actually I think the story might be a little better than Avatar but only because that story has been told a million times because it is a good story (i.e. Pocahontas/Fern Gully). Eagle vs. Shark is an original story and the characters are fantastic. What Eagle vs. Shark is missing is 12 foot tall blue people or mutants. If it had those, it would be the perfect movie.

Crafty

My sister-in-law, Marne gave me a Ped Egg for Christmas because she says I need to do a little "hoof maintenance."

She's so thoughtful. So I thought I would be thoughtful as well and not just tell her how much I appreciate her thoughtfulness, but show her with a craft project that's so easy anyone can do it! Here's what you'll need:

A piece of black construction paper, some glue and your Ped Egg foot shavings.

The Ped Egg is nice because there is a foot-shaving reservoir that they say is for easy cleanup, but can also be for easy foot-shaving storage. The first thing you have to do is see how much foot shavings you have on hand. Just give your Ped Egg a little shake and listen.



If you don't have enough, then you might have to give your heels a little scrape. Easy!


Then take your black paper and write a message with the glue. Next, sprinkle your foot shavings on the glue and shake it around (preferably over a garbage can, or you could save the foot shavings that come off for a future project. Just shake them back into the Ped Egg!)


If your project has a deadline and you don't have enough foot shavings, have your family scrape their rough parts and contribute. If they are unavailable or unwilling, you can cut it with some grated parmesan cheese. It looks like foot scrapings and also has an authentic footy smell.

Then you let it dry and you are done! I hope Marne likes it!


p.s. To all of you who gave me a gift for Christmas, this is how I'm doing all my thank-yous so you might have to wait until my feet get rough again until I can do more. I only had enough scrapings to do 6 thank-you cards today. Don't worry though, it's winter and my feet dry out fast!

Mitch had his hockey picture taken

Kira's hockey association had pictures the other night. They had a professional photographer that meticulously placed every girl for the picture according to height which took a while. Then she said, "Okay, Coach Mitch, you get in the picture too," and this is where he stood. The photographer, knowing how restless 60 hockey-playing girls can be, wanted him to move his ass over where he was supposed to go, but he wouldn't move until he got a picture taken. Unfortunately he had to settle for someone taking a picture with their phone because the photographer was NOT going to take the picture with him in the front.

Apparently she doesn't know that girl's hockey is all about him. I like how happy he is with his little joke, and how unfazed all the girls are at how obnoxious he is. Also, his feet look like potatoes. Click on the pic for a closer look and see for yourself.

Sports fan

The weirdest thing happened at hockey tonite. First of all, let me preface this story by saying that today was the 650th consecutive day of hockey. (It's getting a little tiresome.) So anyway, one of the team dads was hitting people up to buy raffle tickets for a team fundraiser, so everyone got some. Then one of the team moms went around told everyone that "we" were throwing a little party after the scrimmage tomorrow night (consecutive day #651) and everyone owes her $10 for the food. Annoying. So I gave up the only cash I have had in weeks. Then I watched as she moved along to the next parent and I actually saw the straw that broke the camel's back.

Super-duper hockey Mom (SDHM): Hi! We're hosting a party for the kids after the scrimmage tomorrow night and I'm asking everyone to pitch in ten dollars for the food!

Sick-to-death-of-goddamn-hockey Mom (STDOGDHM): I just bought raffle tickets!

SDHM: Yeah! The party is going to be really fun. We're having taco in a bag! And do you think you'd have time to make brownies tomorrow? We'll need about six pans so if you could make two pans that would be great!

STDOGDHM: Taco in a bag and brownies huh? Sounds GREAT! I can't wait! Let me get you your money. Hey, on second thought why don't you just take my debit card, my PIN is 5780, just take out what "the team" needs whenever. Then you won't have to ask me for something every goddamn night and I won't have to look at your perky goddamn face and fight the urge to rip your hair out.

Then SDHM started crying and ran out of the arena.


Just kidding. That didn't really happen. But it would be so great if it did.

The scooper

Mitch made dinner tonite and he served us peas with this scooper. It's a nice scooper but we never use it because we used to have one just like when the kids were really little. That scooper was used primarily for scooping turds out of the tub when the kids had accidents in the bath.

There's nothing as surprisingly traumatic as accidentally pooping in the tub, wouldn't you agree? It hasn't happened to me in a quite a while, but when it happened to Sam, Kira was a baby and I was holding her in the water until I saw the little brown floater and then I yanked her out as fast as I could. Sam was panicked. I didn't know what to do! Do I take Sam out even though he's obviously been contaminated? Do I drain the water before I get it out or after? And above all,

HOW THE HELL WAS I GOING TO GET THAT LITTLE TURD OUT!?!

I yelled for Mitch to come and watch Sam while I looked for something utterly disposable to get it out with. I ran into the kitchen and saw the scooper. PERFECT! I ran back into the bathroom where Sam was screaming his head off, begging to get away from the dreaded turd. I yanked him out, put him on a towel, scooped up the little poop, drained the tub, scrubbed it and then threw Sam (who by this time was traumatized, poop-contaminated, and shivering) back in the tub for a Silkwood shower.

Over the next few years that little scooper served us well. We kept it in the bathroom for the occasional accident. When the kids were finally old enough that they weren't pooping in the tub anymore (last year)(Just kidding, Kids! Ha ha!), I threw the scooper away.

Shortly after that, Mitch bought the new one pictured above, partly because he thought it was funny, and partly because it is a useful little tool. We can't use it. Every once in a while we tell ourselves to stop being so childish and just use it already, and then we do and we're grossed out for the rest of the night.

This poop phobia seems a little over-the-top considering we (as in people, not just Mitch and me) probably end up inadvertently eating pounds of it during a lifetime.

Gross.

Mental Picture of the Day

Today Mitch and I were talking and he asked me, "In your shower room at the Y, where are your soap dishes?"

"On the wall, almost at shoulder height. Why?" I replied.

He said, "So are ours, and today I saw a man rest his foot on a soap dish while he was washing. And he wasn't a very tall man."

There's your mental picture of the day. Enjoy!

Super Athlete*

When I was in high school I was the captain of the swim team. Technically I was a tri-captain because there were three of us. We were the only three seniors on the team and I always thought it was weird that during the team vote, all three of the eligible captains got the exact same number of votes. I never saw the actual ballots, but that's what our coach, Mr Reed, said. I have a feeling one of us got hardly any votes but he didn't want to have only two captains because then the loser would feel bad and it would be bad for the team, right? No, I'm sure we all got the exact same number of votes.

The choice for captain was totally based on popularity, which was good because if it was based on skill and accomplishment, I would have obviously been the odd man out. I don't think I ever won a race unless it was in a huge meet and the swimmers were organized into different heats based on their previous times. I won some heats, but I was usually racing against people that weighed 300 pounds or people missing some limbs. (It kind of upset me when I won my heat against the amputee and everyone cheered for her when she finished (last), but totally ignored me. So what if you finished a 500 yard race with only one and a half arms? I won! [the heat])

People used to try to comfort me by telling me that I was a late bloomer and it didn't make me feel any better. But now I know what they were talking about! I have been racing at the Y and I have yet to lose. Nobody even comes close. I've really come into my own! Finally!

Today, when I first got to the pool, there was only one woman ready to race, but she wasn't much of a competitor. She was ancient, and was swimming a breast-stroke/dog paddle so as not to get her hair wet. I have to say I admire how high she can hold her body out of the water to avoid having her hairdo mussed. I don't think the water ever got above her armpits. That must be hard all on its own, but that's not my style. I'm all about the speed. So I just practiced for a while until some real competitors came.

I looked up "1989 International Falls Broncos Girls Swim Team" on Google images. They didn't have anything, so I put this up instead.
Close enough.

Eventually I raced and beat a man in the lane next to me in a hard-won two hundred yard race. There was a woman in the lane on my other side, but she was out of contention early on I think partly because of the weird shorts she was wearing over her suit, and partly because she didn't seem to be able to swim a lap without apparently getting a LOT of water in her nose and had to stop at the wall after every length and blow it out (gross, and forfeit.) The man and I, however, had a good race. I applaud him for his skill and sportsmanship, (although he didn't congratulate me for winning.) Sure, he was about 65 years old, about 75 pounds overweight, didn't once kick his legs, and didn't know he was racing me, but so what? I knew we were racing and more importantly, I won.

.....................................................

*props to Kady and her blog called Super Athlete

Hey Punk, do you feel lucky?

Sam got some Nerf guns for his birthday. When he opened them up I couldn't stop myself from thinking "Oh no, someone is going to get shot in the eye." I immediately told Sam that he is not to shoot at people, which of course, takes all the fun out of it, but it came with a target so I didn't think I was being unreasonable.

A couple days later I was sitting downstairs watching TV with Sam and one of the guns was on the table next to me. I picked it up to look at it and then for the first time in my life I felt the undeniable urge to shoot another person. I couldn't help myself, I HAD to shoot Sam because he was the only other person in the room. Sure, the target that came with the guns was sitting right across the room, but what fun is shooting a target when there is a real live person who can feel the sting? My aiming arm automatically aimed and I couldn't do anything about it except fire my foamy bullet right to his guts. I tried to fight it because I'm his mother, after all, but after the initial shock and confusion that his mother, who strictly forbid him to shoot other people was shooting him, he immediately hopped on board and we had a full-on gun fight. I was in a haze of adrenaline until I ran out of bullets and then it was like I was seeing Sam for the first time, crouching on the floor behind the couch in a tiny ball saying, "I don't have any bullets! Mom! I don't have any bullets! This isn't fair! You said not to shoot in the head! Mom, Please!"

Poor boy.

Needless to say, that opened the door to nonstop dangerous fun. Right at this very minute, Sam, Kira and Mitch are having a relaxed sniper fight as we watch the Simpsons. (Parenting at its best.)

Kira has the biggest gun and she's hoarding bullets. When things get hairy she takes cover behind my chair.

Sam and Mitch have the little one-shooters. I don't have a gun so I'm mainly dodging and scolding and trying to look busy and important on my computer.

Here's Mitch crouching to avoid a shot in the face from Kira. Why is it so fun to make someone do that?

I know what I want for Mother's Day:

DIE! DIE! DIE!

One year ago today...

One of the nice things about having a blog is that I can go back and see what I was doing on this very day one year ago. This is what was happening on January 9, 2009:


This is what I came home to today. This is the snowbank next to our driveway. If you can't tell, it's "Mitch J" written in pee. I can't be sure, but I think I know who did it. But why would he do it? I don't really know and I haven't seen him yet to ask him. I'm wondering how awkward it will be if any actual grownups come to our house and see it.

I found myself standing out in the cold admiring his work and I think he must have been holding it for a long time today, perhaps planning it. He should have had more Diet Coke and then he would have had enough for the "ohnson" if that is, in fact, who wrote it.

................................................

Nothing that exciting happened today. The "Mitch J" urine writer hasn't been around (yet) this winter. Or else he's peeing in someone else's snowbank.

YMCA

We got a family membership to the YMCA for Christmas. What a great gift. It never occurred to me to get a membership.

The whole family went the other night together for a few hours. Kira swam the whole time, and when I went to check on her (yeah, I can just leave her there! Isn't that great! You gotta love lifeguards.) she had made friends with a girl and they were making huge bubbles of their suits together. Sam did about 10 minutes on the treadmill and then a little on the elliptical machine, and toured the weight room and everything else with Mitch.

Today Mitch and I went back together while the kids were at school. I started things on the elliptical machine, telling myself I would do 15 minutes on that, 15 minutes on the treadmill and then swim laps the rest of the time. About one minute into the elliptical machine I had a series of small heart attacks. The reason why is because I was on a machine between two really skinny, marathoner-type men and I was unconsciously keeping pace with them. I slowed down to a reasonable pace for someone who gets sore from playing video games, and watched their form. One guy was in a sitting position the entire time so it was like he was doing one long squat forever. I looked at his time and he'd been on for almost an hour. How could he do that? I tried it and I don't think I could do it for more than a minute or two. The other guy was going super fast. I looked at his calorie burner and it was ticking off a calorie about every second. Mine was ticking off a calorie about every thirty seconds. I did manage to stay on for 15 whole minutes, and then I did the treadmill which is no prob unless you lose your balance and get shot into the windows behind you going 4.2 miles per hour. That would be embarrassing! Then I did laps in the pool and had a secret race with the woman in the lane next to me. I kicked her ass!

Now I just have to get a little more efficient about what to pack and what not to pack, and get used to the public showering thing. Other than that, I love it! Those Village People, they really knew what they were talking about!

Guess what? Winter sucks

This is a fantasy

Hey! It's January so it's time for me to write a blog post about how much I hate winter! How original for someone who lives in Minnesota, eh?

This morning I was heading to work, driving on the rutted ice rink that is every single road in Duluth, and I noticed my gas gage pointer was almost below the E and the light was on, "OH GOOD!" I said outloud to nobody, and pulled into a gas station. I usually leave my car running while it gasses up in the winter because I'd rather blow up in a gassy fireball than shiver. Today when I was putting the nozzle in the car I noticed a sign on flourescent pink paper on the pump that said, "This pump does not stop automatically, please watch!" so I had to stand out there, in the air and freeze my ass off and watch the gas nozzle. I was tempted to just put $2.00 in and drive to another gas station, but I didn't. I stood out there until my cute little earrings were causing my earlobes to freeze in an excruciatingly painful way, so I pulled up my fleece-lined, fur covered hood. When I got back in the car I pushed my hood off to notice that my carefully blowdried hair was completely matted to my head with static. "OH GOOD!" I said again to nobody and then had to lick my palms and pat my hair down.

Then when I got to work there was no place to park so I had to invent a space in the very back of the parking lot about 50 miles from the school building, walk the stupid I'm-walking-on-ice walk with the 2 inch strides until I finally got indoors where I had to again lick my palms and pat my hair down, and stand still long enough for the ice to melt off the soles of my shoes so I didn't slip, fall down and crack my head open on the tile floors.

Then I noticed that one entire side of my brown parka was dirty with salt and car filth from my disgustingly filthy car. "OH GOOD!" I must have brushed up against it. I can't get the car washed because then the doors will freeze shut and it would just get filthy on the ride home anyway.

So if any of you reading this are in an area that doesn't have snow or ice or sub zero temperatures (Amy) thank your lucky stars and go for a walk outside because "winter wonderland" is a crock of shit.

Hard, cold reality

I'm back in the groove...

...And it's a good place to be. I worked today for the first time since before the break, subbing in a fourth grade room at my favorite school. I have some work to do in my life to get things back to pre-holiday status, for example, the pants I put on this morning (*work* pants) were a little snug. And when I say *a little snug*, I mean so tight that my back started to cramp up. It seems Chex mix does have calories after all. Crap.

I also noticed that my muscles are sore from playing Wii. Turns out playing video games is taxing physical labor for my holiday-atrophied carcass. My bowling leg is sore. How sad, huh? And my shoulders are a little sore too, I think from Wii tennis, but maybe from folding the ten loads of clothes I washed yesterday. Yes, folding clothes makes me sore. Time to start exercising. The family is going to the YMCA tomorrow to start our new membership. I plan on swimming laps for a few hours every day after the kids go to school. (stop laughing.... oh, that was me laughing). I might sign up for a few exercise classes too. Sam is going to bulk up by lifting weights so his hands and elbow joints aren't the widest things on his arms, and Kira is dying to swim. Mitch is really looking forward to shirtless, sweaty games of basketball like in the movie Teen Wolf. (That wolf was an awesome basketball player, for a werewolf.)



I've also returned to eating food that isn't factory molded to look like some other food. You know, like actual fruit instead of fruit snacks, and vegetables instead of vegetable flavored Chicken in a Biscuit crackers. Tomatoes really taste good after weeks and weeks of garbage.

So I'm working, I'm eating better, and I'm (thinking about) exercising. Good for me. Tomorrow is time to look at the bank account (shudder). Do you have a lot of post-holiday damage control to do?

Kira is a Wii savant

We got a Wii player for Christmas and already Kira is a pro. We have Wii sports and today she (says) she got a 300 in bowling. I didn't see it with my own eyes, but I don't doubt it because while she was bowling against me tonite she got five strikes in a row, and when it's her turn, she sometimes doesn't even bother standing up. One time she was just fooling around because she was about 150 points ahead of me, and she said, "I want to try something," and she casually dangled the controller from her wrist with her eyes closed and she still beat me. Believe it or not, she's not a gracious winner.

She's also an expert at tennis, baseball, and boxing. She sucks at golf though. I mean really sucks. That's the only thing that keeps me playing with her.

Sam is pretty good at Wii, but it just so happens that if a person is a hilariously awful bowler in real life, he isn't much better in virtual life. This link is a good comparison of Sam's temperament and skill when he bowls. Hilarious.

Resolutions?

I usually don't make resolutions because why start the year disappointing yourself, am I right? I'm not going to start exercising and eating right on January 1 because I've still got bags of chips and tubs of dip to take care of and it would be abusive to let my kids eat all that crap by themselves. But I suppose resolutions are something I could try out.

1. I will study another language. (I originally wrote "I will learn another language" but that's setting the bar a bit high.) It might be Spanish, it might be Na'vi. Probably Na'vi, although I did take 6 years of Spanish and it is an actual language used by millions of humans, so it might be more practical and more useful.

2. I will stop being so practical.

3. I will continue teaching myself to play the guitar. I got a guitar a few years ago and I taught myself quite a bit, and this year I will practice and learn more stuff. Watch out B7 chord, this year you're mine.

4. I will be more social...... JUST KIDDING! Ha ha.. I really make myself laugh sometimes!

5. I'll get a real job. Plan A: NASA. If that doesn't work out, Plan B: Hollywood. If not at NASA or Hollywood then nowhere. Sorry, Mitch.

6. I'll wash that gray right out of my hair.

7. I'll make a goal during the mother/daughter hockey game in March, and I'll do it wearing figure skates. (real resolution: I will not get permanently injured during the mother/daughter game.)(Note to self: start being nicer to Kira.)

8. I will make ten different edible dishes in a bundt pan. I'm counting last week's meatloaf as one even thought it was technically last year, and I'm also counting cake as one. Eight more to go. Next week: Jello mold.

9. I will get the crumb of food out from under the F key on my keyboard, and I won't eat over my computer anymore.

10. I will not be disappointed with myself when I don't do any of the previous nine things on this list.

Do you have any resolutions this year?

Happy New Year!

It's New Year's eve and we had a little party. Rich and Julie came over with 6 cousins. The kids had a blast and partied like it was 1999.

Look out, ladies!

They went sledding, played games, had a dance party, ate a ton of junk. A fun time was had by all. What did the adults do?

Ohhhhhh.....

Happy 2010!