Reading list for Winter 2008

It is tough to be realistic about how much I will read in the next three months, especially when there are so many books I want to read! But after much agonizing, I have come up with the following list:

Rebels of Ireland--Alert readers will recognize this from the Fall list. I was about halfway through it when I got derailed by Stephenie Meyer's vampire books. And then company. And then Christmas. Time to dust it off (literally) and finish it.

How the Irish Saved Civilization--Also from the Fall list. See excuses above.

The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Last Week in Jerusalem--This is by the same authors as The First Christmas, and I am looking forward to reading it during Lent. I also want to read the four Gospels between now and Easter.

The Golden Compass--EM really enjoyed the trilogy that starts with this book. And I'm always interested in a book that gets people up in arms.

Twelfth Night--It's been a while since I've read any Shakespeare, and this is one I have never read or seen. Reading it before Epiphany would be ideal, but I don't think that's going to happen.

Cocaine Blues--This is the first book in a series of mysteries I've been hearing a lot about lately. And every book list needs something lighter.

Michael took the older kids out skiing, LW is down for his nap, the guests are all out and about, so I think I'll settle in on the couch with a book right now.

The First Christmas

Subtitled "What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Birth," this book looks at the birth stories in Matthew and Luke in the context of first-century Christianity and as a prologue to the rest of that particular gospel.

There are many similarities in the birth stories of Jesus and the Roman emperor. Borg and Crossan (the authors of The First Christmas) argue that the similarities are used to illustrate the contrast between the Roman Peace (peace through victory) and the message of peace Jesus brings (peace through justice).

In terms of prologue, one of the main themes in the Gospel of Matthew is that Jesus is the new Moses. Matthew includes elements in his birth story that emphasize the similarities between Jesus and Moses. Likewise, Luke's gospel emphasizes women, the marginalized, and the Holy Spirit, and all three of these elements are prominent in Luke's birth story as well.

I enjoyed this book very much and anticipate reading it again during future Advent seasons.

Early morning phone call

I was awakened from a dream this morning by the phone. As I reached to answer it, Michael mumbled sleepily, "Just so you know, it's ten minutes to six."

The voice on the phone was unbelievably perky. "Yes, I wanted to book a room for tonight and tomorrow. We've stayed with you before."

We don't have any room for tonight, but we do have a room for tomorrow.

"Do you know of anyplace that has a room for tonight? Then we could stay with you tomorrow."

The office is closed right now (hint, hint), but I know as of last night there were no rooms left in the Valley for tonight.

"Well, could you put our name down for tomorrow night?"

The office is closed, but you can call back after 7:30 and I can take a reservation.

"Oh. OK."

She didn't call back, but her fiancé did. I took their reservation for tomorrow night.

Then he said, "Can you call us if you have a cancellation for tonight? Because otherwise we'll be scrambling around for a room when we get done skiing this afternoon."

I don't know of anyplace in the Valley that has a room for tonight.

"No place in the whole valley? Oh."

I'm pretty sure he didn't believe me.

The Joys of Innkeeping

Today was a great illustration of why I love, love, love having housekeeping help: because it frees me up to deal with all the other guest issues.

Last night, the new guests checking into room 14 told us the phone had no dial tone. I went to check. Sure enough, no dial tone. So I swapped out the phone, just in case we were in luck and it was an easy fix. No luck. They were gracious about it. I added "Call phone repairman" to my list for today.

The phone repairman diagnosed the problem relatively quickly: while rerouting the sewer lines last week to avoid the freezing sewer pipes issue (a real fun one, that), the plumber cut one of the phone lines. This, of course, is easy to do because the lines are just strung willy-nilly under the deck. Grr. The nice man fixes the phone line and I add "Fix phone lines to lodge" to my list of long-term projects.

While he is diagnosing the phone line issue, one of the housekeeper comes to tell Michael there's something wrong with the toilet in room 14. Michael takes a look, decides we need to fix the flow valve tower, hands me a bunch of parts and an instruction sheet, and heads off to the hardware store to get a piece we are missing, instructing me to follow the directions.

I'm pretty good at following directions, and these were actually written at my knowledge level (which is to say, very basic). It would have been a perfectly pleasant way to spend an afternoon, if not for my fear that the guests would check in early and if not for needing to still answer the phone. (I do understand that this week seems like a great time for people to plan their January and February ski vacations. But really, I'm just trying to survive this week.) Which brings me back to my original point--our first year here, we'd have been doing all this plus cleaning all the rooms.

It took us an hour and a half and another trip to the hardware store (turns out we had to replace the handle assembly as well) but the toilet now flushes and fills without running constantly.

Yea us.

Fifth time's the charm

This is our fifth Christmas at the inn--and for the first time, we slept through the night on Christmas Eve without any middle-of-the-night guest interruptions!

Just a recap for those of you who missed the previous Christmases:

• First Christmas--Guests can't figure out thermostat in their room on Christmas Eve and so, because they are too hot, shut off the gas to the heater. When they wake up cold at 4:00 in the morning and have trouble relighting the pilot light, they call us. It turns out they have discovered a problem with the heater. As long as the pilot light stayed on, all was well, but once turned off, it won't relight. We give them several space heaters, and try in vain to get a few more hours of sleep. The gas company is able to send out a repairman in the morning, at the lovely rate they charge for coming on a holiday. (We have since completely replaced that heater.)
• Second Christmas--Take a reservation on Christmas Eve from a travel agent for a group of three men already in route to the Valley. We only have one space that will work for them (they need three beds), and we make arrangements to leave the key out, as they will be arriving late. We are awakened at 2:00 in the morning by these men, talking loudly as they walk around outside, tromping up and down the stairs to their room. Michael goes out to ask them to keep it down. They are not happy with the room. It quickly becomes obvious that they are unfamiliar with the area and are looking for a more up-scale resort. They ask if we can call any of our friends in the area to get them another room. We explain that around here, most places don't answer their phones in the middle of the night. We point them in the direction of the nearest city and feel glad to be rid of them.
• Third Christmas--The father of our student worker from Ecuador calls us at 12:30 to wish us Merry Christmas and thank us for hiring his daughter for the season. It turns out, in South America, everyone stays up until midnight on Christmas Eve and then opens presents, calls relatives, etc. I don't think he realizes he woke us up, but his daughter is mortified the next day when he tells her he called us.
• Fourth Christmas--We get a call at 3:00 in the morning from guests saying that water is leaking into their room from the ceiling. Michael goes to investigate. Sure enough, water is pouring in at a good clip. He goes to the room above theirs and discovers that the men staying there plugged up the bathroom sink and left the water running when they went to bed. Eventually it overflowed and soaked through the floor into the room below. The guests who caused the problem were unapologetic. The guests who were dripped on were remarkably cheerful and understanding. We refunded part of their stay.
• Fifth Christmas--Aaahhh. Sleep. Of course, as Michael pointed out, we only had two rooms staying last night--our busy time starts Thursday this year--and so made less money than in Christmases past. Still, every five years or so, it's nice to have a quiet Christmas.

The Gnostic Gospels

I finished this book weeks ago, but just realized I never posted about it.

This is an interesting look at the discovery of the Gnostic Gospels and a discussion of why they may not have been included in the New Testament canon. One of Pagels's main arguments is that gnosticism did not demand an organized church and so its gospels were excluded from the New Testament in favor of gospels that supported a church structure. I found her argument convincing.

In general, I like to see diversity of religious thought, and I am wary of creedal faiths. But after reading this book, I wonder if Christianity would have survived in the early centuries if it hadn't stamped out the diversity by persecuting the "heretics." Was a strong central church necessary to the continuation of the faith? And would a strong church have been possible if the heretics had been left alone to promote their version of the faith? I don't know.

The one thing I found disconcerting about the book were the actual excerpts from the various Gnostic Gospels. I found many of them difficult. As I told my mom, they made me feel stupid. I don't know if it is just because the canonical gospels are so much more familiar to me, or because I was reading excerpts instead of the full text, or because my mind just doesn't think like a gnostic, but whatever it was, it was very frustrating. I alternate between wanting to read more (Pagels has a book about the Gospel of Thomas that I've been eying) and wanting to never read them again.

Pack order

LW and Sammy (our golden retriever) have been scuffling over pack order lately. Sammy's been a bit rough with LW, but LW has discovered his trump card. "Crate, Sammy!" It's a funny sight to see our 35-pound two year old crating our 80-pound dog.

We usually only crate Sammy for extremely naughty behavior or when he gets too rambunctious. LW, however, apparently believes in preventative crating. We find ourselves releasing Sammy from his crate multiple times a day.

Owl sighting

When I was walking the kids to the bus stop this morning, I noticed a large shape in one of the trees along the creek. Is that an owl? I asked the kids. As we were staring at it and debating the question, it turned its head and looked right at us. Apparently our excitement was a little too noisy, because a minute later it took off and flew along the creek into the woods on our property.

I am not great at bird identification, but after eliminating the New England owls that don't live in our area, I think it's a barred owl.

Me drink juice. Me naughty!

Yesterday I had to step outside for a bit to listen to Michael and the plumber explain their theory on the septic system. I left LW inside eating a pretzel to which he had helped himself while I was on the phone taking a reservation.

We returned to the house to find him finishing off a juice box, one my brother's family didn't finish while they were here and nicely left for us. We don't usually have juice boxes, and we've been doling them out for field trips and special occasions. To the best of my knowledge, the juice box was in the fridge. LW appears to have opened the fridge, unwrapped the straw from the plastic wrap, and stuck it through the little hole on the top of the box. I know able-bodied adults who can't manage that. But my two-year-old can do it unassisted.

He looked up at us, grinned cheekily, and said, "Me drink juice. Me naughty!"

Stormchasers

Our guests this weekend are largely of a variety Michael and I affectionately call "stormchasers." They raced up here yesterday to take advantage of the big storm today. (We are already on our second shoveling of the decks, with many more anticipated.)

Stormchasers are almost always males between the ages of 20 and 50. They travel alone or with one or possibly two friends. They want a bed, possibly a television, and breakfast. They are almost never picky. They check in, they sleep, they eat breakfast with one eye on the road to the slopes, they chat with the other stormchasers, shower us with compliments, and leave. If they stay more than one day, they frequently don't want housekeeping. They are dream guests.

There is only one niggling worry in the back of my mind: will Sarah make it in to work this morning (I think she lives at the end of a dirt road), or will I end up cleaning all the rooms?

Peanut brittle and other homemade gifts

We received a Christmas package from Michael's parents yesterday, and when I opened it today to move the presents into our present storage place (aka my closet)*, I discovered a bag of homemade peanut brittle. Yum! I am trying really hard to not eat it all before Michael and the big kids get back from skiing.

Seeing the peanut brittle reminded me of the Christmas I decided I would make Dad some peanut brittle for Christmas. It would have that homemade touch and be a nice change from the usual coffee mug or pair of wool socks. I was in high school, or perhaps college, but I really didn't have much experience in the kitchen and had never made candy before. Mom offered to help. Alas, not even her skill could make up for my lack of it.

I'm still not sure exactly what went wrong, but when the dust had settled we ended up throwing out the pan and wooden spoon, after determining that no, we weren't ever going to be able to scrub the hardened candy mixture off them. I believe Dad got a box of store-bought peanut brittle that year.

Of course, at least he got something. I still owe Kristi a scarf from the year her present didn't quite get finished.

* We can't leave wrapped presents out in the open because LW will unwrap them for us.

Back seat driving

The problem with putting the toddler's car seat in the middle of the row is that he has a great view for back seat driving. If only he were reliable. Some recent quotes:

• Light is red! Light is red! Except it isn't.
• Go really fast! Said on a day with slushy, yucky roads.
  
• Watch out! Woman crossing street was two blocks away.
  

Random thoughts while shopping

Tuesday afternoon I went to the mall to wrap up the Christmas shopping. Shopping is not my favorite thing, and tends to bring out the snark in me. Here are this week's thoughts:

• Did you know you can buy the complete Full House on DVD? The box even looks like the row of houses. First of all, I can't imagine anyone liking that show enough to want to watch every episode. Second, is there somewhere that doesn't get this show on reruns multiple times a day? It's almost as ubiquitous as Law & Order.
  
• Who decided that kids need help sassing their parents and created clothing that does it for them? And who are the adults who keep buying this stuff? If we all stop, maybe they will get the point. This week's example: a bib that said, "I'm cute. Buy me something." Right. Because my toddler doesn't already think the world revolves exclusively around him and his needs and isn't fully capable of expressing that opinion. Loudly.
• What is the deal with making everything electronic? Don't get me wrong; we buy plenty of electronic games and gadgets in this house. But why mess with games that have been non-electronic for generations? Did the world really need an electronic Uno?

You may now return to your regularly scheduled holiday cheer.

An 18-wheeler full of puppies

Last night, just after midnight, I had the most bizarre phone call of our four years at the inn.

It was a man looking for a room. Pretty standard. I asked if he was calling from the phone on the front deck. No. He was several hours away.

Yes, we have a room, I said. I told him the rate and mentioned that it included breakfast. He asked about breakfast, so I mentioned the menu for today would be eggs or French toast. He asked if we had an omelet station where he could point to the different meats and we would make the omelet right there. No, I said. We don't have an omelet station. We are one of the budget accommodations in the valley.

He asked if I could recommend somewhere that did have an omelet station. Because his wife used to cook him really good breakfasts but she isn't with him any longer. "I know the owners probably don't want you to tell me, but maybe you could while they aren't looking." I said I didn't know who had an omelet station, but he might try the inn owned by the ski resort. I mentioned that he might not find a lot of places that would answer their phone at this hour, that we answer ours only in case it is an emergency. *hint, hint*

I told him to call us when he got in and we would come give him a key. He asked if we had rooms that accepted pets. Yes, some, I said.

Good, he said, because I have an 18-wheeler carrying puppies I am driving to Maine. Maybe we could arrange a barter. I have labs, golden retrievers, Saint Bernards . . .

At this point, I began to seriously consider whether this was a prank call. But the voice didn't sound at all familiar, and it sounded too old to be teenagers.

I focused on what I thought was the critical piece of information. We don't have room for an 18-wheeler, I said. You won't be able to park it here.

It's a small 18-wheeler. It is heated and everything for the puppies. (Is that supposed to make it better? That means he'll want to run the diesel engine all night long, annoying the other rooms of guests.) I'm sorry, I said. We don't have parking for an 18-wheeler. No, I don't know anywhere nearby where you could park it.

Do you have a dog? he asked. I reiterated that we were not interested in trading lodging for a dog. I am creeping you out? he asked. No, I said, leaving unspoken but you are annoying the @#%^ out of me.

I said I was sorry, but we couldn't offer him parking, so he should probably find somewhere else to stay. Do you have a dog? he asked. "You aren't going to answer me, are you?"

And then I did what I have never before done to a guest or potential guest. I hung up.

Home Sweet Home

I arrived back home yesterday afternoon after five days in Waltham for work. It's always a little shocking to adjust to the energy level of a small home with four kids after I've been away for a few days. Life in Waltham is very calm and quiet. During the day, I interact with developers and fellow technical writers, both groups not known for their exuberance. In the evening, I eat a quiet dinner while reading or working on the day's Sudoku and then spend the evening reading or watching TV in my very nice hotel room. Other than working at my writing job (which I love) and taking care of myself, I have nothing else I have to do. No bills to pay. No housework. No errands. No schedules to manage. It's extremely relaxing.

But I miss Michael and the kiddos and it's nice to come home to hugs and kisses and snuggles on the couch. LW has already introduced me to his new favorite book. NB shared a new fact he learned about marsupials. IM told me about the field trip that got rescheduled due to their snow day last week. And EM reported on the culmination of a project he's been working on at school.

After we got the kids to bed, Michael and I lay in the dark and talked and talked and talked. It's amazing to me how much we have to say after only five days apart, especially since we talked on the phone every day I was gone.

It's good to be home.

Five things I love about my new oven

1. It's not mustard yellow.
2. The oven door opens.
3. It's self-cleaning.
4. The right rear burner works.
5. The drawer under the oven opens. Trust me, in our living quarters any gain in storage space is a blessed event.
   

Thanksgiving

Here are the highlights and lowlights of Thanksgiving:

• Surprising my parents--My siblings and I have been planning a surprise family reunion for a year now, and we managed to pull it off without anyone spilling the beans to my parents. My brother, S, arrived with his family the Friday before Thanksgiving. When my parents arrived on Tuesday night, they were shocked to see him here. After they recovered somewhat, my dad asked, "So is K [my sister] arriving tomorrow morning?" "'Fraid not," I said, which was technically true because she wasn't arriving until Wednesday night. Of course, I slipped up Wednesday morning while talking to my SIL in the same room as my mom. I was worried that my mom had heard and would only pretend to be surprised when K showed up. But she was just as stunned to see K as she had been to see S, and I'm pretty sure she can't fake the tears. (By the way, this is the reason I've been so silent on the blog this month. I was paranoid about inadvertantly saying something about the reunion.)
• Spending time with my family--It has been seven years since I've been together with both of my siblings at the same time, although I have seen them individually more recently. It's been 10 years since all of us, including Michael, have been together. They're a pretty good group, if I do say so myself.
• Getting a family picture taken--We found a professional photographer willing to take on such a large group for such a small job. He worked very quickly, so I was worried about the quality, but when he dropped off the CD of pictures, I was impressed.
  
• Baking pies with Mom and my SIL--We all like our desserts, so we ended up making 15 pies. For 19 people. I do still have one apple pie in the freezer, but only because of the next item (and only lowlight).
  
• Oven dying on Wednesday night--Actually, the oven heats fine. The door just won't open. (We had to pry the door off the oven to get out the meatloaf before it burned.) This isn't quite as bad as it sounds, because we put K and her family in the apartment, which has an oven. But instead of being able to use two ovens, we had to make due with cooking Thanksgiving dinner for 19 people in one oven. It was a little more hectic than I had planned. (On a positive note, my new, non-mustard-yellow oven is arriving tomorrow!)

It was my best Thanksgiving ever, and I'm so glad my family members were able to make the trip out here. Thanks, guys!

Fun with pot lids

LW and I spent a good portion of the evening yesterday playing with two pot lids he'd liberated from the kitchen cabinet.

In no particular order, he pretended that they were

• ice cream cones we had to lick
• bowls of soup we had to slurp
• shields to protect us as we went to "find the creatures"
• ears
• "school bus" cake we had to eat
• flowers we had to sniff
  

I have a bone to pick with you people

OK, so not all of you. ;-) Just whoever recommended those vampire books.

Starting in August, I've been hearing people talking about the Stephenie Meyer vampire books. The first person was Michael's mom, who mentioned to Michael that she was thinking of getting me one of them for my birthday. Michael--after asking me if I'd heard of them, which I hadn't--discouraged her, saying he didn't think I was into vampire books. (I enjoy watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but I wouldn't say I'm into vampire stories as a genre.)

Then, people started raving about them on message boards I frequent. People who usually recommend the latest literary novel and intelligently discuss Shakespeare. Once I was aware of them, it seemed that everyone was talking about them.

So when I talked to my sister this week and she mentioned she had read them and enjoyed them, I decided that maybe I wouldn't wait until January to read them. I have been in a funk this week with Michael gone, a good fluffy book might be just the ticket.

I was in luck. The first book had just been returned to the library and I was able to check it out on Wednesday while waiting for EM to finish his trumpet lesson. It has about 500 pages; I stayed awake until 2:30 reading.

Thankfully, the library is closed on Thursdays. When I picked the kids up from school on Friday, I stopped at the library to drop off the first book and see if the other two were still in. They were, so I checked them both out. The librarian commented on my "heavy reading." Heh. I was quick to disabuse her of that notion. True, the books have 500 pages each, but they are fluff. Pure fluff. Literary candy corn.

And just as addictive.

I finished book two at 9:00 that night, and decided that I would start, just start, book three. Heh. Seven and a half hours later, I finished the last page and turned out the light.

But here is my real complaint. I thought this was a trilogy. Three books. Read and enjoyed. But book three doesn't have the sort of finality one expects from the conclusion to a trilogy, so looked at the covers more closely. Just as I feared. It's a series. One cover even used the term saga.

And the next book isn't due out until October 2008.

*sigh* I don't like series. Rather, I love series once they are all finished. I hate waiting for authors to finish series. For one thing, they tend to want, you know, a life. Sometimes they get fickle about finishing, or, heaven forbid, die before they finish. And I'm convinced that the longer an author works on a series, the more likely he or she is to make changes to the characters that I don't like.

It's going to be a long year.

(And no, I'm really not mad. And yes, in spite of the series thing, I'm glad I read them now.)

IM 1, Branson MC 0

While we were in Branson, we attended a dinner at the condo development that was designed to give us a sampling of the different shows we could attend that week. While we ate, different acts stopped by to do a number or two from their show and pass out fliers about show times and prices. Holding the show together and entertaining us in between acts was a singer/MC.

We were sitting front and center, and there were very few kids, so when the MC wanted to tell a joke, he asked, "Why did the turkey cross the road?" and pointed the microphone at IM. She blinked and said, "Because the chicken was on strike."

Not the answer he was expecting. The crowd laughed and he asked IM if she thought that up on the spot or had heard the joke already. She admitted it was the latter, and as he turned away, she said to me, "Anyone who's read Jokelopedia: The Biggest, Best, Silliest, Dumbest Joke Book Ever would know the answer to that!" The MC saw that she was talking, so he asked her to repeat what she'd just said. So she did.

The crowd roared. The MC gave her two CDs of his music. IM buried her head in my lap.

*sigh* And I wonder why I have a hard time teaching her when she's being funny and when she's being sassy.

Preschool side-effects

Now that LW has settled into preschool, I'm noticing some unexpected side effects:

• He is showing some (small) progress in picking up after himself. Specifically, when I go to get him, he says, "Pack up" and puts what's left of his lunch either back in his lunch box or in the garbage can. We are still working on tranferring this behavior to home.
  
• He is obsessed with the toilet. "Me use toilet!" he insists several times a day. Of course, he is almost never able to perform, so it's largely wasted time.
• He is slightly more willing to walk on his own instead of being carried. My back appreciates this. (Those of you with light babies, take a moment to be thankful.)
• He knows songs I don't know. Actually, I might know them, but I don't recognize them from his descriptions. He finds this more than a little frustrating. (Note to self: Ask the teachers if they know which song is the "Garbage Truck Song.")
  

Trick-or-treat memories

For some reason, all the best Halloween stories involve NB.

The first year he went trick-or-treating, he was almost three. (The year he was almost one, he got sick on Halloween. The next year, he refused to put on his costume. His very cute, handmade costume. No, I'm not still disappointed. Whatever gave you that idea?) He and IM picked out matching pumpkin costumes. They were very cute.

Walking away from his first house, he beamed at me and said, "Mommy, it's beautiful! I say 'trick-or-treat' and they give me CANDY!"

When the Vietnam vet amputee opened the door, instead of saying "Trick-or-Treat" NB said, "What happened to your leg?" I cringed, because this guy always struck me as being a bit rough and cranky, but he was actually very good with NB.

At the next door, the woman said, "Oh, what cute pumpkins." NB leaned toward her and stage whispered, "I have something to tell you. I'm not actually a pumpkin. I'm a little boy, dressed as a pumpkin."

The next year, he picked out a Batman costume. It took some talking to get him to put it on, but when it came time to go to bed that night, he didn't want to take it off. "But I'm the real Batman!"

Driving me somewhere

Tonight, while getting ready for dinner.

Me: LW, you are driving Mommy crazy!
LW: Me driving Mommy happy!

Well, maybe he didn't get it wrong after all.

Books, books, books

Here is the run-down on October's reading.

Pope Joan
This is a novel based on the life of Pope Joan, who legend has it was pope in the 9th century. It's a well-written novel, with interesting insight into life in medieval France and Italy, especially in monasteries and the Vatican, and a strong female character (obviously). In the back of the book, the author includes a chapter on the evidence for and against Pope Joan's existence. My mother-in-law introduced me to this book. Thanks, Mom.

Austenland
This is a quick read about a single woman who is bequeathed a vacation to an English manor where everyone pretends they are in a Jane Austen novel. The book is entertaining, but there is nothing here to dwell on.

Becoming Jane Austen
I bought this book after seeing the movie in the theater because I was intrigued by how much evidence there was to support the assertion that Jane and Thomas LeFroy had a serious relationship. The author does a good job of supporting his claim. I thought he gave too much weight to the fact that all of Austen's novels include characters who share names with characters in Tom Jones (Thomas LeFroy's favorite book). But I do think he did a good job showing how Austen's letters and the rememberances of relatives of both Austen and LeFroy point to a relationship.

In addition to answering that question, the book provides an interesting look at how Austen's novels reflect situations in her own life and the lives of her friends and relatives and at how her publishing career developed.

End of the soccer season

Yesterday was the final day of the fall soccer season. I was really looking forward to watching the games, since we missed the last two Saturdays due to our Branson trip.

NB and IM's team won their game, making them undefeated for the season. IM had an especially good game, with lots of contact with the ball and good mental focus. She's come a long way from kindergarten, when my parents got footage of her laying on the ground with her feet in the air in the middle of the game. Or from the beginning of this year, when she told me, "The job of defense is to tell jokes and wait for the ball to come to you."

The team had a post-game party in the pavillion at the park. One of the coaches handed out medals for each of the kids. LW really wanted a medal, but of course there weren't enough for siblings. Another younger sibling was busy explaining it to LW--"The medals are only for the kids on the team"--when NB walked up and put his medal around LW's neck, "For being the best baby brother in the world." The other little boy frowned, and left in search of his brother.

It was a great team in so many ways. Great coaches, great kids. Everyone was from the same school, so they knew each other well and really enjoyed being together. It feels like the end of an era. In third grade, the teams are split by sex and they try to mix up the towns more.

EM was scheduled to play in the afternoon. The last week of the season is a special jamboree, and he had two half-hour games. It was drizzling during the twins' game, but by 11:00 it was pouring. We were assured that the games were still on, and so at 12:45 we set out for the field, which is about a half-hour drive from us in rainy weather. Just as we pulled up, the organizers made the decision to cancel all remaining games. EM was pretty disappointed. Sixth grade is the last grade for the recreational soccer program. Except for second grade (the year we moved), he has played on a soccer team every year since he was four. It felt very anticlimatic to not have the games.

Costume woes

Two nights ago, I explained to the kids that Halloween was a week away and if they wanted costumes, we needed to reach some decisions now.

NB told me a week ago that he wants to be Dracula. He needs teeth, a cape, and some make up and he'll be good to go.

IM dissolved into tears because I had already told her that her first idea (a grim from Harry Potter) would not work. I don't have time or skill enough to make a big black dog costume that would be recognizable as a grim to anyone. I also vetoed her next suggestion (a ninja mouse). One or the other, possibly. But not the combination. She vetoed all of my suggestions. She kicked things. She stormed upstairs to complain to Michael. I finally told her that she would not go trick-or-treating without a costume and I was going into town to buy costumes one day this week. If she wanted Halloween, she needed to come up with an acceptable costume now. She suggested a bat. Google helped me find a no-sew bat costume with a reasonable list of materials.

EM couldn't decide on anything either, and said he was fine with not trick-or-treating. (He's feeling that he might be a little too old for it anyway.) My conversation with him was calm and friendly, without the tears and drama of IM. Thank goodness.

Now I just had the little guy to outfit. I figured I'd pick up something from Wal*Mart--either from the costume section or the dress-up section. Silly me. The dress-up section was gone. It seems to have been eaten by the Christmas decorations section. There were only a few costumes left. I help up a dragon and Batman. LW wanted to be Batman. We picked up what we needed for the twins (except for vampire teeth, which I couldn't find), grabbed a cheap Grim Reaper outfit for EM, and headed for the cashier.

LW was so desperate to try on his costume that he pulled the cardbord off the hanger, so I handed it to the cashier and she scanned it first. "Sale not allowed." What? She scanned it again. "Sale not allowed." The supervisor came over. "Oh, that costume has been recalled." I mentioned she might want to pull the three other identical costumes on the rack.

Grrr. No, I don't really wish they'd sold it to me anyway. (Although the thought did cross my mind.) But LW really, really wanted to be Batman. And when he's sad, he's very, very sad.

But I must say, he makes an awfully cute dragon.

Bye, Mommy

I was a little nervous today when I dropped LW off at preschool. Michael said LW was pretty upset about going last week, and he felt we should give the preschool our two weeks' notice.

LW seemed fine when we walked into preschool, so I set him down and asked him to walk with me as I went into the other room to sign him in and put his lunch in the fridge. Partway there, he got distracted by a train that he wanted to show me. As we walked back into the larger room, he turned to me, waved, and said, "Bye, Mommy." I just managed to hand him his bottle before he headed off to explore some toys at the other end of the room. My departure was entirely anticlimatic.

He was fine when Michael went to pick him up after lunch. This afternoon on our walk, he was insisting "Play Lily, James, 'morrow!"

I'm guessing he was just anxious last week because the other kids and I were in Branson and because Michael dropped him off instead of me.

Traveling light

Yesterday morning, halfway to the airport to board a plane with my three oldest kids for a week's vacation with my in-laws, I realized I didn't have my purse.

I didn't have my purse. Driver's license, credit card, iPod, cell phone.

We were too far away to make it back home and get to the airport on time. Michael quickly helped me take stock.

Fortunately, I had the ticket confirmation in the backpack I was using as a carry on. And for some reason, when I grabbed the kids' passports to use as ID (I know they don't usually ask for it for kids, but I like to have it just in case), I picked up mine as well. And they were also in the backpack. So I could get on the plane.

I was supposed to rent a car so the twins and I could go visit friends in St. Louis on Monday. Maybe the car rental place would accept a faxed copy of my license and credit card since I had my passport? If not, maybe I could visit later in the week, so Michael would have time to mail the ID to me.

In the meantime, how to pay for our expenses? The big costs were being picked up by Michael's generous parents, but I would need to buy food at the airport and cover some expenses during the week. Michael selflessly handed over his ATM card, credit card, and all the cash in his wallet.

So far, it has all worked out surprisingly well, aside from the humiliation. The airline worker who wanted me to use the self-checkin kiosk did give me quite the look when I said I did not have any credit card on me that was in my name. And the car rental place confirmed that they could not accept a faxed copy of my license and credit card.

But we made it here. And Jessica said it's ok if I come on Wednesday instead. And my in-laws are being gracious about rearranging things to accommodate us being gone later in the week instead of earlier. And I just sent Michael the mailing address for the resort.

Whew.

But I'm going to be neurotic about checking that I have every thing on my next trip.

You can take the girl out of Oregon . . .

It's a beautiful day today--gray and rainy. I can hear the drumming of the rain on the roof. Rainy days are so cozy. I want to curl up on the couch and finish Pope Joan. Instead, I'm sipping my coffee and listening to "Walking in Memphis" on the iPod before returning to work.

Of course, rain is not good for business at any time of the year, but I'm going to ignore that for the moment.

Any chance you could make me some tea?

I was in the breakfast room, sneaking some of my granola for an afternoon snack, when the door opens and a man walks in.

Me: May I help you?
Man with British accent: Cup of coffee?
Me: Excuse me?
Man: Could I get a cup of coffee?
Me: I'm sorry, we didn't have anyone in for breakfast this morning, so I'm afraid we don't have any coffee made.
Man: Could I get a cup of tea?
Me: I'm sorry, which room are you in? I could have sworn we were empty both last night and tonight, so who is this guy?
Man: Oh, we're not guests. We're just thirsty travelers driving by.
Me: I'm sorry. We only serve to guests.

Finn

I finished Finn by Jon Clinch this week. Eh.

It was certainly well written, and the premise--the story of Huckleberry Finn's father--is interesting, but when it comes right down to it, Huck's father is not a pleasant man, and I didn't enjoy spending time with him. Nor do I feel there was really anything to take away from the book.

If you do decide to read it, I'd recommend reading Huckleberry Finn first. It's been many years since I've read it, and I think I would have enjoyed the moments of overlap between the two stories more if Twain's story had been fresher in my mind.

You snooze, you lose

Columbus Day weekend is a busy time for New England. Yesterday, we filled our two remaining rooms pretty early in the day with referrals from one of hotels in the city and directed callers to other inns in the Valley that were still showing availability. Pretty soon, we were getting calls from people at the city hotels saying, "We know you are full, but we heard you know of someone who has a room?"

When Michael checked in the foreign couple who had taken our last room, he recommended they go ahead and make reservations for wherever they wanted to stay tonight, as places were filling up fast. They looked dubious. After all, hadn't they found a room with us?

This morning, in the middle of an insanely busy breakfast, the man told me, "Yes, we'd like to stay another night." I told him I was sorry but we were all full. He looked confused, so I added (in case my wording was hard for him to understand) that we had no more rooms. He said, "But the man yesterday told me you had a room for tonight."

Well, yes. Yesterday afternoon at 3:00 we still had one room left for Saturday night. Oddly enough, we filled it later yesterday afternoon.

Here is some unsolicited traveling advice if you want to go leaf-peeping in New England: On the weekend, most inns have two-night minimum stays. And they fill up early. Honest. It is possible for there to be no rooms left.

Room service?

This morning, I received a call at 7:35 from one of the rooms asking me what time breakfast was. I said our normal hours for midweek are 8:00-9:30 but we had actually opened at 7:30 this morning. She asked if it was at all possible to get coffee before breakfast. I said no, but we were open now and would be opening at 7:30 on the weekend.

Later, the same guest came to get ice. As I handed her the ice bucket she said, "So you don't deliver coffee to the rooms in the morning?"

Nope.

Of course, she's here for five nights. Up for a wedding. Apparently she was expecting a more high-end establishment. (Which means she didn't do much research, because that is not how we market--or price--ourselves.)

Sigh. I wish people would mention expectations like room service when they make the reservation. I would much rather steer them to a place that has room service than put up with dissatisfied guests for the weekend.

Tissue shirt

LW has a cold, and in the time-honored tradition of kids everywhere (or at least my kids) he likes to wipe his nose on my shirt. In fact, if he sees me reaching for a tissue, he will hurriedly wipe the mucus on my shirt before I have time to wipe it off his face.

When I scolded him this morning, "That is not a tissue; that is my shirt," he grinned cheekily at me, patted my shoulder and said, "Tissue shirt."

Problems I can't solve

Usually unhappy guests are very clear about what they want me to do to solve their problem. Sometimes, however, I am at a loss. Take the phone call I received tonight:

Guest: Yes, I'm trying to charge my cell phone.
Me: Is there a problem?
Guest: The charger doesn't seem to be working with the outlets.
Me: Are you having trouble getting the plug to fit?
Guest: No, it fits. But the green light on the charger goes on and then turns off right away. The phone isn't charging.
Me: *puzzled silence* What does he expect me to do about this?
Guest: I thought maybe you had a control on the outlets.
Me: No. One of the outlets is controlled by a switch, but if your bedside lamp is on, the outlet is working.
Guest: No. The outlets are all working. They just don't work with the charger.
Me: Well, I'm not sure what I can do if the outlets are working.
Guest: Well, my charger works! I might have to change hotels because of this.
Me: You could bring your phone down to the lobby and try using one of the outlets here . . .
Guest: Maybe I'll try that. *click*

He called back in a few moments, sounding somewhat sheepish, and said, "The problem has been fixed."

I'm mildly curious about what he did to solve the problem. I'm much more curious about what he wanted me to do to solve it. He admitted that the outlets were working. Does he really think I have a switch that could prevent his cell phone from charging even with power going to the outlet? Or does he think our power isn't of a high enough quality to operate his charger?

And he's here for four nights. Lovely.

What the kids are saying

Overheard last weekend as IM and NB were on the porch, making potions out of bubble solution, salt, and grass:
IM: Our potion is going to make us invisible. I am very good at making potions. NB--
NB: My name is Toby.
IM: No, NB, we're not playing pretend!

From the backseat, while I was driving through town:
LW: Mommy, 'lado [helado, Spanish for ice cream] mouth me yum yum. [Then, apparently thinking we had a translation problem because I wasn't pulling into the ice cream place.] Mommy, ice cream me mouth lick lick.

People are people

One of the things I like least about this job is confronting people who have been less than honest about the composition of their group. For example, we have a family staying here this weekend that booked two rooms for a total of four people. (A woman and her daughter in one room, her elderly parents in another.) Lo and behold, five people showed up for breakfast this morning. (The fifth seems to be an aide for the elderly parents.) Because of other people in the breakfast room, and because I was handling breakfast by myself this morning while Michael is on a one-night trip to Boston, I haven't had a chance to explain that there is an additional $15 charge per night for having a third person in the room. I am not looking forward to that. People usually get a bit snitty over it.

I also had a walk-in last night who, when asked how many people would be in the room, answered, "Just one. Just me." Then, when it looked like I might give him a room with one bed, said, "Well, I do have my daughter with me." I never saw the daughter, so I'm not sure how old she is.

The situations that really frustrate me are the ones where I'm almost positive the parents are lying about the age of the children--but of course I can't be sure, so I can't say anything. We don't charge for kids six and under, and I've seen some awfully large six-year-old kids. A lot of times, people hedge on the ages of the kids, so I've learned to get an exact age before I quote them a price. The "tiny" or "very young" children mentioned when they make the reservation frequently turn out to have hit puberty by the time the family shows up to stay.

Then there are the parents who are worried that we don't take young children (some places up here don't) and are trying to make their kids old enough for us to let them stay and young enough not to be charged. It's always tough trying to decide which lie to tell . . .

Things you shouldn't have to say

I've been paying more attention to food labels lately, for a couple of reasons. This week is the annual challenge in the Valley to eat only local food, so I'm paying attention to where my food comes from. I'm trying to reduce my consumption of high fructose corn syrup, which turns up in some surprising places. And NB and IM have a classmate with peanut allergies this year, so I have to make sure that the snacks they take to school are peanut free.

It's nice that the labels come right out and say clearly whether the food contains peanuts or was made in a plant that also makes products containing peanuts. But I did laugh out loud when I read on my jar of organic peanut butter "CONTAINS PEANUTS."

Some things you just shouldn't have to say.

Some parenting decisions are just easy

Michael and I haven't always agreed on parenting issues.

Which movies/games/books should the kids be allowed to watch/play/read? Should one of us get up with the baby in the middle of the night? And if so, who? When are kids old enough to pick their own hair style and length? How cold does it have to get before we prohibit EM from wearing shorts to school? We have had energetic discussion on all of these topics.

Some decisions, though, are easy.

Michael is up running errands in the big city today and he called me from Wal*Mart. "Can we agree right now that when IM is old enough to wear a training bra, we will not allow her to get one that has 'Hottie' across the front?" Uhm . . . yeah. No real thought needed on that one.

If only it was always that simple.

Deer

Monday night, driving back from EM's soccer game, I saw three deer--a group of two deer grazing in a meadow just north of town, and one poised on the edge of the road up the mountain.

"Look! Deer!" I said both times. The boys (EM and his teammate) were unimpressed, but animal sightings are one of the things I enjoy most about living here. You can't plan them or guarantee them, so they always seem like a gift.

Surprise!

In our kitchen this afternoon . . .

EM: Mom, does H_____ (our junior high and high school) have a football team?
Me: I'm pretty sure they do. Why?
EM: 'Cause I think I'd like to try out for the team next year.

Football? He wants to play football? Whatever gave him that idea?

It turns out that the boys have been playing football during recess, and EM has quite the interception streak going (five in three days). He thinks he's a pretty good player. Which he may very well be, but football just isn't the sport I thought he'd choose.

Soccer? Sure. He's been playing on the rec teams since he was four. Basketball? Why not? That's what Michael played for fun when he was growing up and EM has the long, lean look I associate with basketball players. But football? Is that even safe?

It's just one more example of what I've been pondering lately--life's endless ability to surprise me. Time and again, I've been walking along, enjoying the trip when BAM! out of nowhere comes something completely unexpected. An exciting opportunity drops in my lap. A business endeavor turns rocky. Someone I thought I knew very well turns out to have a side I never would have guessed.

Who could have known? And would I want to? My life has turned out so differently--in both good and challenging ways--from anything I imagined. I think I'm learning to accept that. And I'm thankful every day for the wonderful people with whom I share the journey.

(And on a completely unrelated note: If you were a toddler, where would you put the rubber sealant ring for the blender?)

Complications

This book is subtitled A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science. It is imminently readable, with lots of anecdotes of patients he has seen (names changed, of course). My favorite chapters were the one that dealt with the difficulty of training surgeons without compromising patient care and the one that dealt with the difficulty of patient autonomy.

What do you do when initially switching to a new type of surgery to fix a heart defect in children leads to far more deaths, but once the doctors get used to doing the surgery the result is far fewer deaths and longer life spans? Did you know that although 64 percent of Americans say they would want to pick their cancer treatment, only 12 percent of cancer patients wanted to pick their treatment?

The Sparrow

Wow. Just wow. Michael is passionate about his dissatisfaction with the book's ending, but I wouldn't change a thing.

I spent every spare minute of Saturday and Sunday reading this book. Saturday night, my sleep was restless, and all my dreams involved the book. Four days later, I'm still thinking it over in the shower, while driving, while snuggling with the kids.

The Sparrow is the tale of a Jesuit priest who is the only survivor of the first human envoy to the planet Rakhat. It wrestles with some big theological questions, including, what does it mean when you feel you are following the direction of God only to end up in a horrible, horrible place?

The author was raised Catholic and converted to Judaism. She said, "When you convert to Judaism in a post-Holocaust world, you know two things for sure: one is that being Jewish can get you killed; the other is that God won't rescue you."

Beaver family

LW and I went for a walk along the beaver pond after dinner last night. It was a little later than we usually go--it was quite dark in the woods at the end of the walk--and we saw the whole beaver family. Dad, mom, and two young beavers. We got quite close to the parents. They were no more than 12 feet away, chewing on a tree branch we watched them pull through the water. The babies stayed further out in the pond, although one was practicing slapping the water with his tail.

Living in rural New England does have its advantages.

The best laid plans...

Just a note--letting your baby cry it out is only effective if he doesn't learn how to climb out of his crib!! Oh, I'm sorry. Was I shouting?

*sigh*

The first time he got out, I put him back in. (Granted I did hold him for a minute first while my tired, tired brain tried to figure out what to do.) He was out within minutes--in fact, he managed to knock the entire crib over on its side. I caught up with him halfway down the stairs. Who knows what mischief he was planning?

I know they make crib tents, but unfortunately, he has a non-standard-size crib. And our tired brains have yet to come up with a plan to keep him in his bed tonight. Well, that's not entirely true. I contemplated using bungee cords to fix a sheet of plywood to the top of the crib. For some reason, Michael thinks that's a bad idea.

All suggestions are welcome, but please express them in words of no more than one syllable.

How long until bedtime?

Not for the kids. For me.

It has really been a pleasant weekend. We've been full or almost full every night, but the guests have been cheerful, mostly self-sufficient, and polite. I haven't had to kick anyone out of the hot tub at midnight. No one has had friends calling them in the middle of the night. No one has smoked in a non-smoking room.

We did have a shoving match in the parking lot Friday morning, but one of the guys involved was checking out that morning anyway, so that put an end to it. And there was a clogged drain on Saturday that required a visit from the plumber, but the guests were low-key about it. Other than that we just had requests for more ice (easy to accommodate) and laundry service (no, sorry).

But Michael and I are both wrung out and ready for bed. Why, you ask? Well, he's about three feet tall with curly, blond hair and big, blue eyes. And he woke up four times last night. And two times the night before. Have I ever mentioned how much cuter he is when the sun is up?

For reasons I do not understand, LW needs to cry it out about once a fortnight. If you don't let him cry it out, but instead sit with him until he falls back asleep (even if you don't get him a bottle or talk to him), he wakes up more and more often every night until you do let him cry it out. However, I worry too much about the guests in room 1 being able to hear him scream to let him cry it out when that room is occupied. So, we've been getting up with him this weekend.

Michael has guests written into room 1 for the next three nights, but I'm hoping to put them in room 8 instead. I really need to sleep.*

In the meantime, my lofty goal for the day is to not scream at Michael or the kids.

* iPods with noise-cancelling headphones are a great asset to parents who are letting their kids cry it out. The headphones don't completely block out the crying, but they definitely take the edge off.

Oops

Last night I was just finishing up the breakfast prep and sitting down to read The Sparrow until it was time to close the office, when the front door creaked.

Oh, good, I thought. Our last room is checking in.

Sort of. It was someone here to check in, but not the person we were expecting. She claimed to have a confirmation number, which immediately raised flags because we don't give confirmation numbers. Turns out, she had filled out a reservation request online and somehow failed to notice the bold text saying, Your reservation is not confirmed until you have heard from us directly. She also didn't see the email we sent--she had indicated on the request that email was her preferred contact method--explaining that we had a three-night minimum for this weekend, and so were unable to book her a room for two nights. (We, fortunately, still had a copy of the email to show her.)

Thankfully, we were eventually able to find her a room that wasn't over a bar, that was in her budget, and that would take a toddler. I anticipate they will enjoy their stay at that B&B very much.

But dealing with the situation gave me quite an adrenaline rush and ate up all of my reading time.

Sorry, we don't serve lunch

I'm working at my telecommuting job this morning, when the bell on the front desk dings. The dinger is one of the guests still in the breakfast room. (They technically arrived ten minutes after we stopped serving breakfast, but we went ahead and cooked something for them anyway.) These guests, like most of our guests this weekend, are up for a bike race.

Guest: I have a favor to ask you. We need to eat something light before the race. Like chicken soup. Could you cook it for us? We'll pay you.

I'm sure he thought I wasn't very accommodating when I explained that we only serve breakfast and that I don't have any chicken soup on hand.

Here's the kicker--these guests are staying in the apartment with a full kitchen. They have nicer countertops and appliances than I do!

Maybe it's a cultural thing. They have the same native language as a set of guests last year (also staying in the apartment) who came in one evening and asked if I could make them some hamburgers.

Breakfast, folks. We serve breakfast.

First day of school

Gotta love the nonchalant sixth-grader pose.

Growing like a weed

Michael measured EM today. He has grown 2 and 3/8 inches since the middle of April. I guess it's nice to know all the food he's been eating hasn't gone to waste. Three more inches and he'll be as tall as I am.

Fall Reading List

As I've been wrapping up my summer reading, I've been thinking of what I want to read this fall. I'm currently looking at reading the following between now and the beginning of Advent:

• Finn: A Novel by Jon Clinch. Michael read it this summer and had nothing but good things to say about it. I believe he knows the author slightly through an online community and met him at a book signing in our area. (But I might be confusing this author with someone else.)
• The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell. I've been meaning to read this book for years. It comes highly recommended from many sources and I finally bought a copy with some Christmas money this year. Now is finally the time to read it. I started it today, in fact.
• Pope Joan by Donna Woolfolk Cross. Michael's parents gave me this book when they were visiting last week. I'm intrigued.
• The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels. Another book that, like The Sparrow, has been sitting on my shelves for quite a while. I see from my bookmark that I read the first half at one point, but I will need to start over. This will be my Sunday reading. I noticed that Amazon's book has more pages than mine and a different copyright, so I'm wondering if I have the latest version . . .
• Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science by Atul Gawande. This was recommended by someone on a message board I frequent when I asked for good nonfiction suggestions.
• Becoming Jane Austen by Jon Spence. I saw the movie with Michael's parents and I'm intrigued about the evidence behind the story.
• The Rebels of Ireland by Edward Rutherfurd. A continuation of the Dublin Saga.

I'd also really like to read these:

• Austenland: A Novel by Shannon Hale.
• How the Irish Saved Civilization by Thomas Cahill.

But I'm worried that eight books is too many to commit to reading. How sad is that?

A Tale of Two Cities

EM and I finished reading A Tale of Two Cities today. Yes, finally. You'd never guess, from how long it took us to make our way to the end, how much I enjoyed reading it. I'm actually thinking of picking up another Dickens book just for my own enjoyment. I don't think I'll read this one aloud, though.

A Darkness More Than Night

I spent almost the entire day* reading A Darkness More Than Night by Michael Connelly. I started reading it on the plane home from France, but in the chaos of unpacking and getting back to normal life, I misplaced the book. By the time I found it, I had lost my place and forgotten so much that I had to start at the beginning again.

I enjoyed it. It's not every police thriller that ties in a Northern Renaissance painter. I wasn't so interested that I will search out another book by Connelly, but next time I'm looking for a book in an airport, I'll definitely pick up a book by him over most other authors.

* This is why I don't read as much fiction as I used to. If the book is good, I have a really hard time putting it down, and if I spend a day or two doing nothing but reading, I end up feeling slightly sick. It will do me good to get back to work tomorrow.

At least he asks...

LW, like his brothers, has a very large head.* A very large, hard head. And he likes to bonk heads. You'll be sitting on the couch, talking to him or singing a song with him, and next thing you know, he's pulled back and smashed his forehead into yours. Not my favorite sign of affection.

Today, while sitting on the couch, we had the following conversation.

LW (pointing to my head): Mommy head?
Me: Yes, that's Mommy's head.
LW (pointing to his head): Me, head?
Me: Yes, that's your head.
LW (hopefully): Bonk?

* IM, in contrast, has a normal-size head. When she and NB were babies, she looked almost microcephalic in comparison. I was relieved when I saw her with other children and realized that yes, her head is normal. Her brothers just have really big heads.

The Princes of Ireland

Yesterday, I finished The Princes of Ireland, the first book in the Dublin Saga by Edward Rutherfurd. I enjoyed this book even more than Sarum, the first of his books I read. Perhaps it's in part because I now expect to jump through time from one set of characters to the next. It's always a little sad to leave the characters in whom I've grown interested.

Although I know historical fiction has limits, I did learn a fair bit about Irish history. To whit:

1. Vikings settled in Ireland and intermarried with the Celtic people. (Yes, I know, this should have been obvious to me, but I'd just never thought about it.)
2. The English came to Ireland in the first place because a vassal of the English king went to Ireland as a mercenary to fight for one of the Celtic kings who was trying to take the position of High King. When the vassal ended up marrying the Celtic king's daughter, inheriting his position and eventually becoming High King himself, King Henry II went to Ireland to assert his authority over his vassal (and therefore over Ireland).
3. The Irish church had some curious traditions, including priests who married and monasteries that were associated with prominent families (the position of abbot was passed from father to son).
4. In medieval times, your rights depended on whether you were considered Irish or English, but that designation was not as straightforward as you might think. Sometimes if you were prominent enough and wealthy enough, the rulers would overlook your actual ancestry.

This book covered from 430 A.D. to the reign of Henry VIII. I'm looking forward to reading the second book, which will take me to 1922.

Ginger Pye

Much to everyone's relief, the kids and I finished Ginger Pye today. How, how, did this book win the Newberry Medal? Nineteen fifty-two must have been a bad year for children's literature.

There was not enough plot for 306 pages, and the characters were not compelling. All of us figured out the big mystery about 150 pages sooner than Jerry and Rachel, which makes them look more than a little stupid.

Michael has pointed out numerous times that we should have just stopped reading, but NB wanted to finish and I hate to abandon a book, so we kept plugging along. But it sure does feel good to be done.

Three strikes and you're out?

How many calls can you make to Poison Control before they send out Child Protective Services? Anyone know?

To date we've called three times:

1. LW drinks EM's trumpet valve oil. Poison Control says to watch for signs of a cold, as sometimes kids aspirate some of the liquid and it can lead to pneumonia. LW is fine. (LW actuall drank the valve oil a second time--opening the bedroom door, the closet door, and the trumpet case to reach it--but we didn't call the second time because we knew the drill.)
2. Two weeks ago, LW eats diaper rash creme (the Wal-Mart brand). Our call to Poison Control is the third call within a half hour for the same thing. You'll be glad to know diaper rash creme is not toxic. (Must not come from China.)
3. This morning, LW opens a bottle of Extra-Strength Tylenol and chews up and spits out one tablet. "Gum," he said, but it was more bitter than he expected. For future reference, a child his size can consume four 500 mg tablets "safely." Why do I think I might need to know that in the future? (Oh, and just a warning. They make Tylenol bottles without child-proof lids. It does say, "Not for homes with young children" but somehow I missed that when I was staring at the bizillion varieties of Tylenol on the store shelves. And somehow it didn't even register that the bottle was easy to open. We have since thrown the bottle out.)

Sigh. Will this child survive his childhood? Will I?

No Blueberries?!?

Every summer we pick blueberries at a farm about a 45-minute drive from the inn. Two evenings each week they have live music in the blueberry fields so you can enjoy the concert while you pick. We take a picnic dinner, pick a ton of blueberries, and then gorge ourselves on blueberry pie, Belgian waffles, and other treats for a week before freezing the rest. A blueberry pie made from berries you picked yourself is a wonderful reminder of summer in the middle of a cold New England winter.

Blueberry picking is one of the highlights of our summer.

This year, we put off picking until Michael's parents were here. We figured we might not get quite the number of quantity of berries we usually get, but the farm had scheduled concerts for a full week after his parents' visit, so we felt confident there would still be berries, and we wanted to share the experience with them. I checked the web site last week, and all looked good. We planned to pick tomorrow.

I logged on this morning to confirm the hours, and discovered that the season is over! Yesterday was their final picking day. They didn't even have last Thursday's evening music.

Does it count as summer if we didn't go blueberry picking?

Have you thanked your neck today?

You don't appreciate body parts until they stop working on you. If you can turn your neck from side to side or swallow without pain, take a moment now to be grateful.

I think I slept wrong Wednesday night, and the kink hasn't gotten any better yet. A double dose of Advil takes the edge off, but I am getting pretty sick and tired of the whole chronic pain thing. Yes, I'm a wimp.

On the plus side, I have a great excuse for getting a massage...

Tomatoes!

Michael's parents arrived last night from Utah and brought with them an entire suitcase of produce fresh from their garden. We have green beans, nectarines, green peppers and . . . one whole box of ripe, delicious tomatoes! This is allowing me to indulge in fresh tomatoes, sliced and lightly salted. Or tiny tomatoes just popped straight in the mouth. I am in heaven.

Store-bought tomatoes taste like styrofoam balls compared to tomatoes straight from the farm or garden. And we don't get enough tomatoes from the CSA for me to selfishly eat an entire tomato myself. They must be doled out in salads they whole family can enjoy. But right now we have so many I can be greedy.

I think I'm going to sneak off to the store today to pick up good mozzarella and basil so we can have tomato, basil, and mozzarella salad and panini. Yummy.

CSA Report

This week, we brought home the following:

• 2 artichokes
• 4 tomatoes
• 2 jalopenos
• 1 waxy green pepper (hot)
• 3 yellow squash
• 2 big handfuls of mesclun
• 1 big handful of green beans
• 5 potatoes
• 3 patty pan squash
• 2 cucumbers

Brothers

EM and LW


All three boys


LW and NB

Pictures!

LW (aka "Lemmy"), 22 months


NB, age 7


IM, age 7


EM, age 11

La Belle France

I finally finished reading La Belle France: A Short History. (Short is a relative term; the book is 441 pages.) Let me tell you, there is a lot I didn't know about French history. Sadly, I didn't retain it all as well as I would have liked.

Alistair Horne's writing style is pretty dense, although he includes lots of witty asides and humorous quotes. (For example, "Francois Mauriac's famous witticism that he loved Germany so much that he was always 'delighted there were two of them.'") He does use French quite a bit, with no thought to translate. He's clearly writing to a British audience that reached a certain level of French proficiency in school. When Michael was in the room, he could usually translate the French for me, but when he was not here, I just shrugged and kept reading. My lack of French definitely detracted from the reading experience.

It was also an interesting experience to read a book written by a Brit for Brits. The frame of reference was different. Comparisons were made to situations and people I was completely ignorant of or knew only vaguely.

When I studied world history in school, I came away with the impression that France was slightly unstable for much of its history, an impression that was only reinforced by this book. I knew the students and workers had barricaded the streets of Paris during the French Revolution. What I hadn't realized is that blocking the streets of Paris was a common component of an uprising. Did you know that France had 20 governments between 1945 and 1954? I have a new appreciate for regularly scheduled elections that happen regardless of whether or not one likes the current government.

Talk Gamma?

Yesterday, LW picked up the cordless phone, pushed Talk to get a dial tone, looked at me and said, "Talk Gamma?"

I tried calling you, Mom, but Dad said you were out shopping.

Happy Birthday!

Random Thoughts from the Inn

Last night was another bad sleep night. About half an hour after I fell asleep, I got a call.

Man: "Hi. I know it's late but I'm here to check in."
Me: "What's the last name?"
Man: "A____"
Me: "There's an envelope on the office door with your name on it and your room key inside."
Man: "I don't see it...oh, here it is." click

Grrr. His was the only envelope I left out last night. Somehow he could read the sign on the left side of the double door that said to dial 0 on the phone to reach me but couldn't see the envelope with his name on it on the right side of the double door.

LW woke up shortly after that. Following our usual nightly routine, we came down to sit on the couch in the living room. While I was waiting for him to fall back asleep, I heard noise on the deck. Sure enough, someone's in the hot tub. Put sleeping baby down, go back downstairs and kick guest out of hot tub.

Blech.

Fortunately, breakfast this morning was a breeze. I had to open early for the racers, but I prepped everything I possibly could last night, so I had no trouble opening by the promised time this morning, and the guests paced themselves very nicely. I even had time to give touring advice to several people and try to call ahead to arrange a room for tonight for our British guests. (As it turned out, the Rough Guide to New England was 0 for 2 on getting the correct phone numbers for the listed hotels--one number connected me to a Catholic parish--so I directed the guests to the welcome center off of the interstate.)

Oh, and four days of patience paid off. I caught an r-a-t last night. You know, I hate the thought of killing most things, but I am remarkably hard-hearted when it comes to rats. As long as Michael isn't home, that is. He has a habit of making up a story about, for example, the baby rats waiting for their mother to come home, and next thing I know I'm crying over the rat.

The CSA Haul This Week

The CSA is getting better and better. This week, our single share entitled us to the following:

• Two heads of lettuce
• One handful of green beans and one of yellow beans
• Three parsley sprigs
• Three basil sprigs
• Six beets
• Three lemon cucumbers
• Four regular cucumbers
• Two red tomatoes
• Eight potatoes
• One bunch of kale

And I get the vague feeling I'm missing something.

Quote of the Day

I just read this quote in my French history book and had to share it.

What a beautiful life I've had. It's a pity I didn't notice it sooner. --Colette (towards the end of her life)

Did We Dodge the Train?

I'm actually feeling better this morning than I did yesterday or last night. The guests have all had breakfast, and most of them have gone home, so if I do get sick we should be able to cope.

This morning for breakfast, we had a choice of scrambled eggs with sausage and toast or pancakes. One woman came in with her husband and asked, "Is there any way I could get a waffle? I haven't had a waffle yet." Apparently she ordered eggs two days ago when waffles were on the menu. I said that I was sorry but unfortunately we were set up for pancakes this morning. She turned away and walked out of the breakfast room, muttering under her breath. Her husband ordered pancakes, and I saw that she joined him with some cereal and soy milk she had brought from her room.

I'm sure she thinks I am not very responsive to her needs, but we do not have a commercial kitchen. It's just a normal, small-to-medium-sized family kitchen. I don't have counter space for both the griddle and a waffle iron. Not to mention that I would have needed to mix up waffle batter. And since Michael is gone and the inn is completely full...

Sorry. I have my limits.

The Headlight of the Oncoming Train

I can see a train coming, otherwise known as the 24-hour Stomach Bug. *sigh*

IM threw up on Friday morning shortly after breakfast, but kept lunch down and was fine the rest of the day. Michael optimistically declared that she must have eaten something funny. (What it was, since she'd eaten the same food as the rest of us, he didn't say.)

Michael left last night to drive to his writing retreat in Canada. They (he's carpooling with his cousin) got a late start last night because his passenger got caught up in bad traffic on her way to us. I got a call this morning saying that he was throwing up and could I please call the car company and add L as an authorized driver of the rental car?

So now I'm feeling a touch queer in the stomach and somewhat feverish, and I don't know if it's just psychosomatic or if I am in fact coming down with the bug. I'm operating on a sleep deficit because the guests were not nice to me last night--I couldn't shut down until 11 due to a lost guest calling repeatedly from the road, I had to kick the same guest out of the hot tub at midnight, and another group of guests were being noisy on the back deck and woke me up at 1:00. Plus, the convention group needed breakfast at 7:00.

I've been resting as much as I can--yes, the kids are watching too much TV--and trying to eat small amounts and keep well-hydrated. I'm trying to stay on top of dishes, laundry, etc., so we are in good shape if I'm out of it for a day or so. I hope if I do get sick, it doesn't happen during breakfast tomorrow. I'm really not sure EM is up to cooking for guests.

Things to Be Thankful for Today

1. When the microwave died, it died at 2:00 in the afternoon when I was warming LW's bottle and not in the middle of serving breakfast to our full house or right as I was going to bed tonight.
2. I mixed up tomorrow's applesauce coffee cake tonight, so when I discovered that the seal was broken on my applesauce (and it was growing mold), I had time to run to the convenience store and buy another jar.
3. The river. It was almost 90 today, and playing in the river with the kids this afternoon sure felt good. I usually just go down in shorts and sit at the edge with my feet in the river, but today I wore my swimming suit and went all the way in. I'm especially glad that unlike the popular swimming hole down the road, which is in full sun, our river stretch is nicely shaded in the afternoon.
4. I got caught up on some paperwork and filing. In addition to the lovely virtuous feeling I get from doing unpleasant things I have to do but dread doing, I discovered...
   
5. One of our business CDs does actually mature before our property taxes are late, so even if the rest of the summer and the fall prove to be as so-so as the rest of the year, we can pay all our bills without having to loan the business money.

So all in all, it was a good day.

The Ghosts Have Left the Building

Or so I was informed by one of the guests in room two. The ghosts were apparently in room three last night. Supposedly, they are the second owners of the inn and were here about 15 years. They have stuck around to help us, but did agree last night to leave if the guest they were talking to cleansed the inn of the negative energy. Which she was nice enough to do. So, we should be all nice and ghost-free now.

(Silly us, we thought we already were.)

What I didn't tell the guest was that we know quite a bit about the former owners of the inn, and there is really no one who matches that description (here about 15 years and now dead). Even if you say, here as a ghost for 15 years, it doesn't match.

We are the fifth owners of the inn. The first owners were the parents of the man who built the place. (He was very young, which explains a lot, and his parents are still alive, or were last summer when he dropped by to meet us.) Then there was a couple who sold it shortly after they moved in, because one of them had a health crisis. (They are the best bet for being dead, but I can't imagine they were here long enough to still be haunting the place 20+ years later.) Then there was a woman who got the inn in her divorce settlement but didn't really want it. (Husband apparently bought it for her without really consulting her. From what we've heard she hated it here, so again, I can't see her being too concerned about helping us.) Then there is the owner who sold it to us. She was here about 17 years (some of that time with her ex-husband), but she is still alive and well and cashing the checks we send her every month. (Her ex-husband died recently, but again, from what we heard, they got divorced largely because he was tired of running the inn and wanted to move, so I doubt he'd choose to hang out here.)

So, nope, no one really fits.

Just when I think the guests can't surprise me any more...

We Got Tomatoes!

Today was our CSA vegetable pick-up day, and we got tomatoes!! Tomatoes are hands-down my favorite fresh-grown vegetable. Sadly, we don't have enough sun to grow tomatoes. We've tried. But today I brought home two fresh tomatoes--one red and one black. Well, ok, black is pushing it, but the variety is named Black Prince.

We also got six potatoes, 6 garlic scapes, one head of cauliflower, one head of lettuce, twelve carrots (a mix of purple and yellow), four yellow squash, a bunch of scallions, two cucumbers, and three sprigs of basil (each sprig has about 4 leaves on it). Yummy! I'm not crazy about the garlic scapes now that they are maturing, but Michael can use garlic in any form.

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

The state health inspector came for our annual inspection today. I feel somewhat sorry for him--all day long he drops in to visit people who aren't happy to see him. He's a nice guy and we've always passed our inspections, but I still dread him coming. And since the inspections have to be a surprise, you never know exactly when he'll show up.

Still, he's come and gone and we passed.

Why Aren't We Sleeping?

Nancy Kress wrote a science fiction novel called Beggers in Spain that I read many years ago. The key conflict involves tensions between regular people and people who were genetically engineered to never need sleep. I think about the parents of the sleepless children a lot lately.

It's 9:28 and it appears that my attempt to put LW to bed has failed. Last night we got him down at 10:00. And he's once again getting up in the middle of the night, usually around 3:00.

And Michael leaves for Canada on Saturday. Blech.

In the Beginning

Last night I finished reading In the Beginning: The Story of the King James Bible and How It Changed a Nation, a Language, and a Culture by Alister McGrath.

The three most interesting things I learned:

• The creation and popularity of the KJV was primarily politically motivated. King James I didn't like the most popular Bible of the day (it had lots of commentary that argued against the divine right of kings) and that led to him authorizing a new translation. Once it was finished, it wasn't very popular until after the Puritan Commonwealth (Cromwell et al.) had fallen and the people returned the monarchy (Charles II) to the throne. People turned to the KJV and rejected the Geneva Bible because the KJV was associated with the monarchy and stability and the Geneva Bible was associated with the Puritans and the instability of the Commonwealth.
• (Going along with the first item) The KJV was not immediately popular. Although it eventually came to be considered "a great work of religious literature," this view did not become generally accepted until about 1750.
  
• The KJV was written in old-fashioned language even for the time. The instructions to the translators told them to use the language in the Bishop's Bible unless they had a compelling reason to translate it differently. The translators of the Bishop's Bible, likewise, had used the language of Tyndale's translation of 1525 whenever possible. So, the language of the KJV (1611) is largely the language of Tyndale (1525) and includes several ways of speaking that were already dying out in English at the start of the 1600s, among them: thou and the "eth" and "est" verb endings.
  

Vacation Bible School

This week the twins had vacation bible school. It's a joint program with almost all the churches in the valley, held at our church. On Wednesday I was in charge of the snack--packing it up, loading it on the bus (it was field trip day), setting it up, and cleaning up afterwards. LW got to come with me and was very excited about getting to ride on a school bus to the field trip. (He's been wanting to follow the older kids onto the bus every morning this school year.)

The first half hour of VBS each day is a singing time, where the kids learn the songs that go along with the theme. (This year's theme was "Soaring to New Heights with God" and they did a lot of discussions and experiments involving hot air balloons.) Now, our congregation is a casual, friendly, and yet pretty staid group of New Englanders. We have some peppy hymns and sometimes there is a skit as part of the sermon, but we don't have any drums or electric guitars during the service. We stand to sing hymns, but we don't raise our hands above our heads or get really emotional while singing.

But VBS is different. The music is peppier, the background CD has electric instruments, there are hand motions. There is a lot more singing and a lot less talking. LW was in heaven. As soon as the kids stood up to sing the first song, he wiggled out of my arms and raced down the aisle to front and center. He mimicked every hand motion. He danced around. At the end of every song he clapped. At the beginning of every new song, he jumped up and down. The other adults found him very entertaining.

My whirling dervish toddler, who can barely make it through the announcements on Sunday, lasted the entire half hour. He even sat relatively still and quiet during the talking time. (Although even then, he elicited chuckles. The leader had asked the kids to be quiet for a minute or two so they could listen to the silence. Right in the middle of the quiet time, the bus that was taking us to the field trip pulled up. LW, who at the time was sitting in between two of EM's friends, piped up clearly into the silence, "Bus!")

For the first time ever, I find myself wishing we attended a peppy evangelical church, at least for the next couple of years. Let's see--peppy evangelical church with a progressive, non-creedal theology in New England?

Yes, I know. Not going to happen. Oh well. It was a nice thought.

Getting Back to Real Life

I spent last week in Boston for my job. I drove down on Sunday afternoon and drove home Friday night. It was really fun to be in the office for a week--and very relaxing to have only myself to worry about--but I missed Michael and the kids. It was good to see them again.

EM and I spent Saturday and Sunday taking turns reading the new Harry Potter book. We both finished it within half an hour of each other. I want to re-read a couple of scenes, but NB started reading it today, so I'll have to wait.

Yesterday was a crazy day. Drop the kids off at VBS, two hours of phone meetings, take 5 required water samples, pick kids up at VBS, drive an hour to car dealership to fix back door (parts have been backordered), another hour-long meeting on my cell phone in bagel store parking lot, get bagels, drop off water samples at testing lab, big shopping trip at Costco, drive hour home. Whew.

Believe it or not, tomorrow will be almost that crazy.

I've lost my mind

Once, I was sane and organized. I have vague memories of being able to find keys, checkbooks, and shoes. There was a time when I remembered appointments.

No more.

This week I have:

• Finally, after days of searching, found the checkbook I've been missing since July 2. The sad thing about this is that the checkbook belongs in a specific file folder in the filing cabinet, and I am usually very good at returning it there. Where did I finally find it? Two file folders over. Did I get distracted while putting it away and stick it in the wrong folder? Did LW get into the filing cabinet again and helpfully move the checkbook for me? I'll never know.
• Forgotten to pick EM up from his Tale of Two Cities class. The class normally meets in the afternoon, but one day this week they needed to meet from 6-8 in the evening instead. No problem. I dropped him off at 6 and returned home to dishes, supervising baths, entertaining a fussy baby. At 8:20 I was sitting on the couch with Michael when he asked IM to go get EM. I said automatically, "EM isn't here. He's at Gabe's . . . and I should have picked him up 20 minutes ago!" *sigh* Way to reward my friends for organizing and teaching this fun, free class for my kid.
• Completely spaced the twins' make-up swimming class today. (The thunder and lightening yesterday afternoon ended their swimming class before it even started, so Michael rescheduled it for today.) He told me. Heck, he even wrote it on the calendar (not normal behavior). But it wasn't until the swimming instructor called to ask why we weren't there that I even thought about the swimming lessons. (No, Flylady, I didn't check my calendar this morning.)

The twins have a sleepover party tomorrow. Anyone want to place a bet on whether or not I'll remember to buy a present and take them? Or remember to pick them up on Saturday morning?