They're Around Here Somewhere

3:00--Guest calls to say she and her family are coming up for a wedding today and staying with us. (Someone else booked, and is paying for, their room.) Do we know where the wedding is? Michael says we can give her directions if she knows the name of the venue. She doesn't. She hangs up.

6:00--Guest arrives with her family right as we are sitting down to dinner. She still doesn't know where the wedding is and seems to think this is our problem. Michael's calls to the person who booked the room go unanswered. The guest says it has something to do with a farm, so Michael calls around. The X Barn has a wedding, but it's the wrong one. The X Barn mentions that the Y Barn also has a wedding today. Michael calls the Y Barn, but no one answers. Since it is only a 15 minute drive, he circles our location and the Y Barn on the map. Guests seem a little confused about the idea of a map, but after many repetitions of the directions, they set off. Shortly after, Michael takes a call from someone with the wedding, who confirms that it is at the Y Barn.

7:50--Man calls from the wedding asking if we have seen the guests, since they have not arrived yet. I forward him through to their room just in case, although I think it unlikely that they would return here without coming to ask for something.

So the question is, where are they? And will we see them again?

What the kids are saying today

LW is trying to communicate with me without using words. It's frustrating for both of us.

IM: Why did I have to get Mauritius for my report? It's the only African country with no problems and [teacher] expects half the report to be about problems!

NB: I've figured out a way for telepathy to be scientifically possible. You know how your brain communicates with your body electronically? Well . . .

EM is saying precious little today, although he did divulge that they are studying the Opium Wars in history and that his mouth feels slightly better than it did yesterday.

New York City by the Numbers

1.5
Number of hours it took me to fly to NYC.

7
Number of nights I slept in NYC.

8.5
Number of hours it took me to ride the train home.

3
Number of people (my mom, my sister, and my sister-in-law) who joined me on my adventure.

4
Number of shows we saw: a comedy show, Black Angels Over Tuskegee, Wicked, and Memphis.

2
Number of art museums we visited: Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Frick Collection.

8?
Number of motorcades we saw. (It was opening week of the United Nations.)

6
Number of buttons on the spiffy Japanese toilet in the sashimi restaurant: lid up, lid down, flush, wash front, wash back, and dry. There was no button for heating the seat. That happened automatically.

354
Number of steps to the crown of the Statue of Liberty.

5'5"
Maximum height to escape hitting your head during the climb to the crown. (I'm guessing a bit here. I'm not quite 5'5" and I was bump free. My sister is slightly taller and was not so lucky.)

956
Approximate number of times I laughed during the week.

Death by Hugging

LW is a very affectionate kid. Hands down the most physically loving of any of my kids, and also full of compliments about how wonderful I am and how much he loves me.

It's very sweet. Really.

And I know I will miss this terribly in another year or two when adoring your mom isn't cool anymore.

But this weekend I find myself craving a few hours in an isolation tank. Who knew being the object of adoration could be so wearing?

Too bad I can't bottle this up to sprinkle through his teen years.

First Day of School

The kids started school last Wednesday. This is the last year they will all have the same first day of school, because next year EM will start one day later. (The freshmen have the run of the high school the first day.)

EM is starting 9th grade, NB and IM are starting 5th, and LW is starting P4.

Sadly, the last group first day of school pictures didn't turn out that well.



This is what the bus stop wait typically looks like. The three younger kids chatting together:

While EM does the cool teenager act off to the side:

Library Basket

This morning, we had that rare library trip where the kids were actually quiet and well-behaved, and I got to browse. (My trick: I took them for a walk through the woods first.)

Want to see what I got? There is no way these will all end up on my Books Read list.

• Childhood's End--I picked up this one in the children's section, where it had been mistakenly shelved. I assume because it has "childhood" in the title. I decided this was as good a time to read it as any.
• The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen--A novel purporting to tell the tale of Jane Austen's secret love affair. I don't have high expectations, but I'll give it a chance.
• Waiting on a Train--The abysmal state of America's rail system is a favorite rant of Michael's, so I had to get this book for him when I saw it. I'll probably give it a skim as well.
  
• The Well-Tended Perennial Garden--The flowerbeds around the inn are getting overgrown and need some sort of drastic revival, but I'm a bit flummoxed about where to begin and how to proceed. I'm hoping to get a pointer or two from this book, which promises "planting and pruning techniques."
• Losing Moses on the Freeway: The 10 Commandments in America--I'm partway through the first chapter and beginning to think that the title is the best part of the book.
• Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography--I've seen video clips of Crossan speak and read quotations from him in other books, but I've never read one of his books. It should be an interesting juxtaposition with A Marginal Jew, which I read during Lent.
• The Town that Food Saved: How One Community Found Vitality in Local Food--I'm pretty sure I'll finish this one. It's a quick read about a favorite subject.
• Full Moon Feast--I should have looked at this one a bit more. I was hoping for lots of seasonal recipes (I need some new pot-luck recipes for the fall), but this has more musings on food and fewer recipes than I wanted. I haven't yet determined if the musings are interesting.
• bon appetit (August edition)--I was seduced by the blackberry, lemon, and gingersnap cheesecake pudding on the cover. Since I haven't been responsible for day-to-day cooking in almost seven years, this falls under the category Michael and I call "food porn," much like my Food Network viewing. (Just so no one gets the wrong idea--Michael is an excellent cook and spends a lot of time serving up tasty meals. I just really like to eat and like to pretend to myself that I like to cook.)

The kids also loaded up on books, and as I type this, everyone has his or her nose in a book.

Appointment August

I am officially declaring this month Appointment August.

So far, we have the following scheduled between today and August 25, when the kids go back to school:

• Three eye exams (on three different days)*
• Four doctor visits (two on one day and two on another)
• One orthodontist appointment
• Four dentist visits (thankfully, all on the same day)

I'm hoping to squeeze in haircuts for IM and EM as well. (Michael normally cuts the kids' hair, but these two like the occasional professional cut.)

And, since EM's orthodontist appointment is the official "Yes, we are going ahead with braces" visit, there's a good chance he'll have another appointment to actually install them sometime this month.

Thankfully, Michael is a modern dad and does his fair share of appointment driving.

* Yes, really. Could I have done a worse job of planning? The initial appointment time (set up last year) turns out to conflict with IM's theater camp. And it is also 17 days too early for the insurance to cover EM's visit. The health insurance pays for one eye exam every two years and they figure it down to the day. Really. So EM's visit, in order to be covered, could be no earlier than August 19. And by the time I figured that out, there was no way to get all three kids seen at the same time before school started.