Possumblog

Not in the clamor of the crowded street, not in the shouts and plaudits of the throng, but in ourselves, are triumph and defeat.--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

REDIRECT ALERT! (Scroll down past this mess if you're trying to read an archived post. Thanks. No, really, thanks.)

Due to my inability to control my temper and complacently accept continued silliness with not-quite-as-reliable-as-it-ought-to-be Blogger/Blogspot, your beloved Possumblog will now waddle across the Information Dirt Road and park its prehensile tail at http://possumblog.mu.nu.

This site will remain in place as a backup in case Munuvia gets hit by a bus or something, but I don't think they have as much trouble with this as some places do. ::cough::blogspot::cough:: So click here and adjust your links. I apologize for the inconvenience, but it's one of those things.


Monday, January 12, 2004

And now…SATURDAY!! Well, this being us, and we being we, Saturday was the normal combination of trying to be everywhere at once, so that we could do everything at once.

Up early, and after high-level consultations figured we were going to have to take both vehicles, since I was going to have to haul Soccer Girl back across the county to the soccer park before the rest of the kids were through with their other activity--scrapbook.

Finally got them all dressed in something warmer than tee shirts and shorts or nightgowns and headed out the door right at 9:00, and was met by some guy in a beat-up truck. Ahhhh--a PAINTER!!

Stood there and jabbered with him for a few minutes to let him know what all sorts of things he would promptly forget about the moment we drove away, then hopped in the vans and off we went. Got to the building, which was freezing, and while Reba and the older two had their respective study sessions for Bible Bowl, I did my Wednesday evening lesson and kept Boy and Tiny Girl occupied with some stacks of scrap paper and colored pencils.

Thankfully, it was quiet, and they pretty much stayed in one place patiently being creative--until everyone started coming out of the classrooms for break, which was just too exciting to sit still for. You know, you would figure after living with me for so long, Cat would know just how much of a control freak I am, and just how much I would prefer it if she would sit down and not run up and down among the folding chairs, happily screaming about princesses. Go figure.

Anyway, it finally got close enough to time for me to leave with Bec--nearly noon, and nearly lunchtime. One of the guys had cooked hamburgers, so Rebecca had gotten a plate and was about to chow down on one, before she was stopped by her cruel father intent on keeping her from puking all over Trussville. I tried to get her to eat something lighter, but she just pouted. ::sigh:: The story of my weekend.

Got her out to the van, stopped at the store to get her some Gatorade, kept trying to get her to eat some fruit or something else, but she just shook her head sadly and pouted more. You know how Andy Griffith would get exasperated at Barney or Goober or a mob of angry old women, and just fuss and shake his head. That’s what I felt like.

Got to the park, let her out, talked to the concession stand guy for a while, then turned the hoity-toity opera music up, laid the seat back flat, and promptly started drooling and having really bad dreams. Which were stopped when I heard a tiny tap at the window and nearly killed myself jumping up in fright. It was just Reba--they had gotten finished and she swung by on the way home to see what all was going on. I was still sort of bleary--she leaned on the window and chatted for a very long time about all the latest gossip.

This is my downfall, you know.

Like the old Far Side cartoon about what dogs hear when you talk to them, with the guy who’s going on and on, ‘Oh, Ginger, what a GOOD dog you are, aren’t you! You want to go play ball, Ginger? Maybe go to the store, Ginger?’ And all the dog hears is ‘blah blah blah Ginger blah blah blah Ginger blah blah blah Ginger.’ Well, on occasion, that is me.

Normally, this is a benign sort of tendency, but just to make my life interesting and justify monthly purchases of expensive medications designed to keep me from keeling over, in the midst of these streams of consciousness, actual, important, information is occasionally transmitted. It wouldn’t be a problem if there was one of those staticky warning buzzes like when they interrupt the radio for important weather information, but it comes through with the same pitch and tempo and gesticulations as everything else and just runs RIGHT BY my cerebral cortex and goes right there beside my brain stem. It’s the verbal equivalent of steganography.

As I have mentioned before, after several years of such, you would think everyone would get the idea that Terry’s brain is very much like an earthworm’s, and that one shouldn’t burden it with complexly-coded hidden message things. And get angry with him if he happens to ask about something that had just been presented to him only five minutes previous. Hey! I’m a planarian!! Cut me some slack.

After using my defense mechanisms of feigned mental defect and loud flatulence, I managed to extricate myself from harm’s way. And yes, it would probably be safer just to listen better in the first place--you never know when there might be an open flame, or some guy hovering around with a straitjacket. But hey, such is life on the edge.

Miss Reba went on back toward home while I continued to wait for practice to get over--I flopped the seat back and went back to fevered dreams and angry French opry music. Sometime later I roused up and saw that the girls were standing around drinking hot chocolate, so I assumed, rightly, that practice was over. She got in the van and said that they had gone on a cross-country jog along the multitude of nature trails, all the way over to the old elementary school. And that she saw Mommy while they were running along the road, and that she slowed down and rolled down the window and started talking to them. (In case you haven’t figured it out yet, Reba talks as much as I blog.)

Stopped by the library for a moment or two, then on to the house for a moment or two before getting us all into one vehicle for our trip to Wal-Mart. Tiny Girl needed some more school supplies, BUT before that, we had a side trip to make to the bookstore to return a gift and to let the kids use their gift certificates from my mom, BUT before THAT, we all took Boy in for a haircut.

He spends most of his days with unkempt hair. The odd thing is that he LIKES for his hair to be neat and short, and gets flustered when it won’t do right. But most of the time it still looks like a cat sucked it. At least when it’s short, it’s not quite so bothersome to him, so, a haircut and he was just fine.

On to the bookstore, which is never fun when you have to play zone defense. Too many aisles, too many tearable things, one little girl who likes to wander the aisles tearing things. GAAH! They gathered up their purchases, and I allowed myself a purty half-price wall calendar for the new year--365 Days in Italy. 365 architectural and artsy still-life pictures from all over Italy--beautiful stuff, even if it doesn’t have any pictures of girls or cars. Checked out, then on to Sam Walton’s Emporium, where I stayed in the van with the kids--much less stressful, believe it or not, than it is to try and ride herd on them in a place with yet more aisle and yet more tearable things. Catherine is now loaded up with some new crayons and pencils and glue and a pink-and-purple plastic box to keep it all in. She was very impressed.

Home then for some supper, then time for Most Thorough Saturday Evening Toilet, consisting of baths, hair scrubbing, blow drying, ear wax gouging, nail clipping, and various made-up tales of wonder. Then to bed. Then up once again Sunday for some good ol’ churching up!


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