Gosh I feel young!

Last night I went to a book discussion group at the library, the first in a series discussing religion. The book this month was Huston Smith's Why Religion Matters.

There were fourteen people there, and only two of us under the age of 40. Probably 50. Possibly even 60. (The one woman whose age I know for sure is 90.) The discussion was interesting, even feisty at times, and I'm interested in the upcoming books so I'll probably go next month.

Still, it would have been nice to have a few more people within shouting distance of my age.

* In case you were wondering, the general consensus of the group was that while we could come up with various reasons why religion did or did not matter, Smith didn't make a very clear case for why it did. I was late picking up the book (Wednesday at 2:30, to be exact) and only read the first third, so I can't judge myself. Reaction from the group was negative enough that I'm not planning to finish it at this time.

Waiting for the crash

LW slept poorly the last two nights. (The first night he was running a fever; I'm not sure what the issue was last night.) He didn't nap today. His behavior is as pleasant as you might imagine an exhausted two-year-old's behavior to be.

Michael and I are waiting for the inevitable crash, when even the frenetic energy reserve is burned up. The question is, will we crash first?

CSA Week 2

Today's was a lighter haul than last week's.

• One whole chicken
• One pound of ground beef
• Two heads of leaf lettuce
• Two big handfuls of braising greens
• One large bunch of garlic scapes (we still have some left from last week)
• One large bunch of parsley
• One dwarf sunflower plant (IM is in charge of finding a place to plant it)

After getting our stuff, LW sat on one of the tractors and then we all walked back to see the pigs and cows and talk to the other moms and kids. Rumor has it that the piglets have arrived but are not yet old enough for public display. Soon.

Summer reading list

Since I've already finished one book on my summer reading list, I figured I should post the list. Here are the books I'm planning to read before the end of September:

• Say Goodbye--This is my friend Lisa's latest, due out this summer. Her books are always a suspenseful read.
• Living the Sabbath: Discovering the Rythms of Rest and Delight--This one was recommended by an online acquaintance. It's part of the Christian Practice of Everyday Life series.
• Les Miserables--I'm slowly trying to work my way through the very long list of classics I've never read. This is definitely a book I should buy, as I see it taking me a long time to read.
• Breaking Dawn--The final book in a delightfully fluffy YA vampire series. It's being released at the beginning of August, and I plan on saving it for the weekend Michael is in Toronto and the kids are in Massachusetts on vacation with Michael's parents.
• Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo--Another attempt to broaden my science reading. I'm expecting this to be an easier read than Six Easy Pieces, because my biology background is more robust than my (pretty much non-existent) physics background. This is another recommendation from an online acquaintance.
• The Book Thief--This is a YA novel that I've seen recommended several places. EM didn't like it, but I think I will. (Maybe because everyone who has recommended it to me has also been an adult woman.) It's set in WWII-era Germany.
• Animal, Vegetable, Miracle--This is a birthday gift from Michael's parents, and I'm looking forward to it. I'm very interested in the issue of locally grown food and healthy eating, so I think this will be an enjoyable read that will reinforce those opinions. And hopefully motivate me to act more in keeping with my beliefs.
• A Thousand Splended Suns--Another birthday gift from Michael's parents. I was hesitant about this book, because I feared it would be too depressing, but I finished it last night and really enjoyed it. True, it's depressing at times. And I got very, very angry at some of the characters and situations. But it really expanded my knowledge of Afghan history in my lifetime, and the ending was positive enough that it didn't send me into a funk. I am very glad I received it.
• The Untold Story of the New Testament Church--This is a holdover from the spring list, as I expected it to be. I'm reading it in conjunction with Acts and the epistles, so I anticipate it taking me a while to finish.

In the middle of writing this post, I just received a $50 Amazon gift certificate from work, and I know just how to spend it!

Guests

Michael's cousin and her boyfriend are up visiting. She wanted to see the fireflies, and this is the season for them.

They arrived yesterday afternoon, and LW and I took them to tour the local ice cream factory. They have changed the movie since I was last there in September, which is nice for those of us who visit whenever we have guests. And the sample (a new flavor) was as tasty as ever. LW did a pretty good job staying quiet during the tour, and ate his ice cream relatively neatly.

Of course, he melted down as soon as we got in the car to go home, and stayed fussy for most of the evening.

We went to the local pizza place for dinner. We sat outside, so the kids could play in the field while we waited for the pizza. It was a nice evening. We got four pizzas--cheese and herb for the two younger boys (our non-adventurous eaters), one sausage pizza, and two of the bacon and rhubarb pizza. The bacon and rhubarb was my favorite.

Once it got dark, the adults sat outside and watched the fireflies. They seemed especially fond of the strawberry patch.

Fun with airlines

Yesterday morning there was a message in the In box from Orbitz telling us that AirTran had changed our itinerary for our November trip to Orlando and we now had a 28-minute layover in Baltimore instead of a 2.5-hour layover. On the advice on an Internet acquaintance, I checked the AirTran airline to see if our itinerary was available for purchase. If it was, I figured the airline thought that length of layover was do-able.

Not only was the changed itinerary not available, our flight to Baltimore was not listed at all.

So I called AirTran. It turns out the short layover was the least of our worries. AirTran had cancelled our flight to Baltimore and our return flight out of Orlando without bothering to rebook us on any alternate flights. Somehow I doubt they were planning on refunding our money either.

The good news is, we are now booked on alternate flights . . . and we even get to Orlando a few hours earlier. And the reservation agent did not even suggest that we needed to pay more money. The bad news is, our new flight leaves Orlando at 9:45 a.m., instead of 4:00 p.m., so we lose a whole morning to spend in the parks.

I did verify that AirTran now has our email address in their system, so we should be notified of any further changes. We'll see. They have a lot of time to mess things up between now and November.

CSA Week 1

Today was the first week of our Community Support Agriculture program with the farm up the road. This is our second year doing the vegetable share and our first year doing the meat share.

Today's loot:

• two heads of lettuce (I picked green leaf and bibb)
• one bunch of green garlic
• one bunch of Easter egg radishes (I could have picked salad turnips instead)
• one bunch of Swiss chard (I could have picked kale or spinach instead)
• a six-pack of pansies
• one pound of ground beef
• one pound of country-style pork ribs

Happy Father's Day, Dad!

In honor of Father's Day, here are five of my dad's top parenting moments, not necessarily in order:

1. One night when I was little, I was afraid to go to sleep because I was worried I would be attacked by vampires. (Specifically, the Count from Sesame Street.) When all the usual methods for calming a frightened child failed, Dad hit on the brilliant idea of making a sign that said "Vampires Go Home" and hanging it in my bedroom. I went right to sleep.
2. When I was about 8, I got a hula hoop for my birthday. I remember I had to go on a treasure hunt to find my presents, and it was the final one, the big prize. I loved that hula hoop. One day, I discovered that S had cut it open with a butter knife "to see what made the noise." I was furious. First, it was obvious it was a ball bearing inside. Second, even after we taped it together with duck tape, the hula hoop was ruined. Dad decided to use some Old Testament philosophy (eye for an eye and all that) and told me that in relatiation I could smash S's favorite toy, a plastic red caboose. With a hammer. I felt vindicated for a host of little-brother annoyances. For once, my parents had taken my side.*
3. Dad attended all my orchestra and choir concerts. Even the ones that conflicted with the Blazers' NBA playoff games. This is something I appreciate more and more the older my kids get. Even with multiple kids in the school, there are still a lot of musical numbers featuring only other people's kids.
4. Dad helped me with calculus. I have new appreciation for how quickly advanced math concept fade from memory when you're not using them. Dad devised a clever and very effective strategy. He asked questions about the problem, and in the process of answering them, I usually figured out the answer. It's a strategy I'm going to need to dust off soon.
5. Dad supported my summer in Switzerland after my sophomore year in college. Mom had enough reservations that I wouldn't have been able to convince her on my own. It was a fantastic experience, and real turning point for me in terms of my belief in my own capabilities.

* Important disclaimer: I understand this experience looks very different from my brother's perspective. And I learned much, much later that my dad actually didn't expect me to go through with it. He thought I would feel bad for my brother, spare his toy, and forgive him. Oops. I didn't exactly live up to his expectations. And yet, although I am a little ashamed about that, even now, almost 30 years later, I still feel a thrill when I think of smashing that caboose. Sorry, S! I am also sure that my parents took my side many, many times. I just tended to focus on the times they didn't. But we all grew up, and I am happy to be the middle sibling and glad S and I grew so close in high school. So don't worry, Mom!

Those pesky prepositions

LW is struggling a bit with prepositions. Two recent examples:

When watching the Red Sox: Let's go Red Sox! Strike him up! Strike him up!

On seeing me in my reclining chair down by the river: Mommy! You're up side over!

Eventually, he'll figure it out. But it sure is cute in the meantime.

Thunderstorm 1, Motherboard 0

I think that pretty much says it all, don't you?

The stupid powerstrip and surge protector protected everything that is a) old, b) cheap, or c) both of the above, and failed to protect the computer with the inn's financials on it. We took it in to Geek Squad at Best Buy hoping it was just the power supply (we've lost those to thunderstorms before), but no such luck. Hopefully they will finish the data transfer to the new computer tomorrow.

Tonight's lessons

Michael is having a massive allergy attack, so for the first time ever I attended the school concert without him. But, because of the aforementioned allergy attack, I took LW so Michael could rest.

Usually, attending concerts is a two-person job. One of us chases LW and the other one listens to the big kids. (The older kids can't help with LW because they all on mats up front with their classes.)

Which brings us to . . . Five Things I Learned Tonight:

1. A two-year-old will be good if you promise him one M&M at the end of each song. As long as you generously define good as behavior that does not require removal from the gym and allow a fair amount of wiggling and talking.
2. You need more than one sippy cup of water for a single-serving bag of M&Ms.
3. When bribing a two-year-old with M&Ms, bring wet wipes. Or napkins. Or at least tissue. Barring that, sit close enough to the two-year-old's sibling to send said sibling to the bathroom for paper towels.
4. After 3/4 of a bag of M&Ms, the desire to play with the army ant helmets of the class in front of you is greater than the desire for another piece of candy. Fortunately, by then the first- and second-graders are tired of the hats and glad to loan them to the two-year-old.
5. A toddler fed M&Ms from 7:00 to 8:30 stays awake for half an hour trashing his room, instead of going to sleep.

Mosquito banquet

Mosquitoes love me. I currently have 26 bites. Michael has 2 or 3.

Not dead yet

Lack of blogging to the contrary, I am still here.

How was my week, you ask?

I worked ten-and-a-half hours yesterday. After working 48 hours Monday through Friday. Funny looking part-time job.

I actually have time to blog, while waiting . . . waiting . . . waiting for the XML content server. But since work is taking up so much of my time and mental energy, I don't have any thoughts that you would want to read. Unless you like hearing me gripe about server speed and co-workers. And take it from Michael, it's not that interesting.

It's like the book LW and I have been reading this week:

Oh, no! A swamp!
Can't go over it
Can't go under it
Can't go around it
Have to go through it.

See you on the other side.

Sticks and stones

This morning, the younger kids and I dropped Michael and EM off at a trailhead for a day hike. They're planning to hike about 12 miles today.



The trailhead was about a mile and a half up a dirt road that followed a brook. There was a primitive campground, with a little path down to the brook. I let the younger kids play for a few minutes before we left for home. They each claimed a big stone and found a stick sword to use to defend their territory.



They declared a temporary truce to take this picture on IM's stone.