rock and roll

Eight years of apathy and missed chances are all catching up with me today in a big way. Ever since we've moved here my kids have periodically expressed an interest in going to the great big Six Flags type amusement park an hour away. Every summer I say we will and then about July when they ask when specifically I say it's too hot and we'll go in the Fall when it isn't a hundred percent humidity outside.

In the Fall when I'm finally ready to bite the bullet and go, I head to their website for info and do my very best Homer Simpson D'OH sound. Because we're not in California anymore and amusement parks aren't open year round and I suddenly realize that I've promised on my motherly honor (tarnished tho it is) to take my kids somewhere this weekend only to find out it's closed until April. In my continuing ineptitude I've extended this streak for eight years. It's ending today.

In an idea (mine) that I'd like to chalk up to drugs but can't, we're combining Halloween Haunted Houses with roller coasters at the great big Six Flags type amusement park. That's right folks, it's haunted amusement park time and we'll be there in all our glory. God help me. I'm picking the kids up as soon as they get out of school and we're heading out. The plan is to stay until they close at midnight.We're meeting up with some friends there (for parental moral support if nothing else). Last I heard the Film Geek, in all his vertigo prone glory is going too.

Speaking of vertigo, here is a video clip of one of the top attractions on my kid's list.




So for the sake of fun, lets take a closer look at all the participants, shall we? The Film Geek and his problem with spinning rides has been well documented. The man practically pukes at a picture of a merry go round. However, he's alright with heights. The Rotten Correspondent can be quite happily spun around like romaine in a salad spinner, but doesn't like to be any higher than the first step on a ladder. Surfer Dude is positive that the roller coaster hasn't been built that can faze him, but as he's never been on one before that's a matter for debate. He's refusing to go in the Haunted Houses on general principle. Gumby is positive that the Haunted House hasn't been built that can faze him, but as he's never been in one before that's a matter for debate. He's refusing to go on the roller coasters on general principle. And Sasquatch, who is pretty much afraid of everything, will be wandering the park with at least one and possibly two of his friends who will insist on doing everything, and rather than look like a wuss he'll go along until he cracks like an egg and calls me frantically on my cell to come and (discretely) rescue him.

Doesn't this sound like fun? How about if I add this - it's supposed to be in the low 50's with a strong chance for rain. Or this - it's the last weekend of the year they're open. Or even this - have I ever mentioned how claustrophobic I am and how much I hate crowds?

But it'll all be worth it when I don't have to listen to stories all winter that start like this - "Do you remember how mom forgot her promise again to take us to the amusement park..."

I can only imagine the stories they will be telling.

I hear you talking...

No
one
in
my
house
ever
listens
to
me.





Not the Film Geek...

RC: What do you want for dinner?
FG: What do we have?
RC: I have a pound of hamburger and it needs to be used. You can have burgers or tacos or meatloaf or spaghetti and meatballs. Your choice, I just have to use the hamburger.
FG: Chicken would be good.


Not Sasquatch...

SQ: Can I stay home from school the day Halo 3 comes out?
RC: No.
SQ: Please? A bunch of my friends might be.
RC: No.
SQ: I don't see why I can't. This is stupid. What's the problem with missing one day of school?
RC: No.
Irate phone call from my friend Stacey, mother of one of SQ's friends: Jules, what's this I hear about you letting Sasquatch stay home from school the day Halo 3 comes out?


Not Gumby...

RC: WHY is there a half eaten plate of food on your bookshelf?
Gumby: Uh....
RC: Have we not talked about that you aren't allowed to eat upstairs?
Gumby: Uh...
RC: How many times do I have to say it? No. Eating. Food. Upstairs.
Gumby: Well, it wasn't really food for us. We weren't eating it.We were just trying to see how many bugs we could catch.


Not Surfer Dude...

RC (watching him practice his "knife skills" on a basket of strawberries): Please don't use that entire basket of strawberries.
SD: Okay.
RC: And please don't load the whole bowl of strawberries up with the powdered sugar.
SD: Okay.
RC (on being presented with the whole basket of cut strawberries completely covered in sugar): Did I tell you not to do this?
SD (holding up a lone mushy uncut strawberry): I didn't use the whole basket, and besides that's brown sugar, not powdered.


Not the dogs...

RC (ready to go to sleep, walks in to find three dogs sprawled on bed)

RC: You all need to move.
Dogs: snore
RC: You all need to move now.
Dogs: snore louder. feign deafness.
RC: YOU ALL NEED TO MOVE.
Dogs (wounded, disbelieving, lazy): get up and move about three inches each before flopping back down again, exhausted from the effort.
RC (slides into six inch space between a dog butt and the edge of the bed, but still can't get the covers away from them): Damn.


And people wonder why I blog.

the last week

My husband blew into town today for a grand total of three hours and twenty minutes, bearing gifts of steaming piles of fetid laundry and a shooting schedule that has, yet again, changed for the worse. Today was his one day off this week and even though the intelligent thing for him to do would be to hang out at the hotel and get some rest, he couldn't . That silly little job he's trying to hold down here keeps getting in the way.

The location on this film is in the middle of absolutely nowhere, somewhere on a prairie somewhere in the middle of Kansas. They have no internet access. I didn't know hotels even existed anymore with no internet. The upshot, of course, is that he can't really get anything done there for his "real job" and has had to make the long haul home to get caught up on his "day off."

The shoot is having more than it's share of problems. Five weeks into a six week schedule tempers tend to run a little hot. Problems that were small three weeks ago do not look not quite as small anymore. Six days a week of sixteen to eighteen hour days has taken it's toll on everyone. The Film Geek sounds ragged, homesick, wanting this damned thing to be done. Seven more days. The countdown has begun.

It's hard to say exactly why this is such a pain. The reason it's a pain for him is pretty clear, but it's starting to wear on us at home, too. I've finally realized tonight that not only does it not help when he's here for a matter of hours, it almost makes it worse. The kids and I are in a routine when he's gone, and things go really smoothly. When he's home for this brief a time it just gets the kids all worked up. I don't have any problems with him traveling so much, as he's always done it. I manage just fine on my own, thank you very much. We've never had the kind of marriage where we're joined at the hip and feel we have to do everything together. Thank god. I see people like that where they obviously have good marriages and I think (for about six seconds) how nice it would be to do everything with your spouse and spend all your free time together and I get carried away on this train of thought until I remember that if we did that we'd be divorced. And then the whole thing would be moot.

So here I am for another week with a constant background noise of video games and arguing and people saying things like heymomcanihaveasleepoverandareweoutofchipsandithinkthedogpukedonyourbedwhycan't
wehavechinesebuffetfordinnerit'sbeenfourmonthsandallwe'vehadtoeatiscerealdoyouknowwhere
mycleatsaredidyouhearmeohnoiforgotmyhomeworkatschoolithinkihavedogcraponmyshoesidon't
knowhowthatgotbrokenididn'tdoititmusthavebeenmybrotheryouknowhowheisit'snotmyfaultatall


and my husband is off to The Little Film Shoot on the Prairie with clean clothes and a goodie bag full of home baked chocolate chip cookies and poppyseed bread and even a handmade card that the kids made to brighten up his hotel room. Of course he's not supposed to eat any of this so if he drops dead this week I'm going to feel really bad. I would've sent steamed broccoli but it would have made his room smell really bad by Wednesday or Thursday.


On the other hand the smell might have reminded him of home.

must love kids

I should have stuck with dogs.

Seriously. If my stupid husband hadn't thought he was allergic and if we hadn't been renting and not allowed to have animals and if my asinine biological clock hadn't started making crazy little alarm noises, I wouldn't be sitting here now in need of either a valium or a padded cell. Preferably both.

On paper it should be relatively calm around here. The Film Geek is on location for the next couple of weeks and his work environment has smoothed down considerably. I'm off work for a long stretch, which is always peaceful. Once I get the kids to school I get to come home and putter. Puttering is just about my favorite thing. Of course it would be better if I could do some productive puttering and get some projects in the house done, but it hasn't worked out that way. At the last Bunco someone asked me to switch my September for her November and I'm still not sure if or when my mother in law is coming, so my September deadline to get stuff done in the house has been extended. I seem to be a little deficient in the motivation department.


I might have more energy if it weren't for the kid drama. I am a limp dishrag from kid drama. It's like the Duracell bunny...it just keeps going and going and going...and I'm like Everready....takes a licking and keeps on ticking. (I'll stop advertising batteries now).


Wednesday night Sasquatch asked me where we might have some free weights. And turned down biscuits with his soup at dinner. I found him some weights out in the studio and casually asked why he'd passed on the biscuits, which are one of his favorite things. Oh, no reason, he said, just didn't feel like having them. A little while later he came to me and asked if I would help him try to lose a little weight. So we had a long discussion about ways to go about this and that I would be more than happy to do what I could. Again, I casually asked why. Oh, no reason, he said, just feel like doing it.


The faint ding of an alarm in my head was getting louder by the second. But they don't call me the Queen of Denial for nothing. I was doing an admirable job blocking it out entirely when the FG called to say goodnight. I told him what had happened. There was a moment of silence, a sharp intake of breath and then


"Oh. My. God. There's a girl."

And I said (hands over ears)

lalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalalala


at the top of my lungs. It didn't work. I still heard him.


Later, I casually asked Sasquatch if he were starting to consider the whole girl thing. He casually asked me why I casually asked. I casually said oh no particular reason and he casually told me that this wasn't a subject he was comfortable talking about. I casually mentioned that if and when he felt like talking he should know that he could always talk to me about whatever he wanted to. He casually said he knew that and we both casually went on to our respective rooms.


I didn't hyperventilate until I closed my door. This is not going to be pretty. It almost makes me long for the Terrible Two's. (Note I said almost). This is not a kid who takes any kind of personal interaction well unless it always goes entirely his way. As I've said before, he makes cinder blocks look flexible. He can be a big exposed nerve ending at times, just waiting to erupt over a slight - real or imagined. He does not deal with rejection well. And he's sensitive as hell and takes everything personally even (or especially) when he shouldn't.


Oh. My. God. Is there a girl?


lalalalala...oh hell.


The next morning Surfer Dude took the baton for his leg of the relay. As he and Gumby were getting ready to go to school he decided, for reasons known only to himself, to teepee his brother. There was toilet paper everywhere. Then he gave him an atomic wedgie. So here comes Gumby, with toilet paper wrapped around his head and the waistband of his boxers up past his ribs, into the kitchen to show me what his brother had done. As he's pointing out various atrocities, Surfer Dude comes in to admire his handiwork. I'm not sure if this is common knowledge, but it's very hard to talk seriously to someone who has his underwear migrating that far north. I was trying very hard not to laugh, because at this point even though it was annoying it was still slightly amusing.


Then SD upped the stakes. When I told them both to knock it off, he developed an attitude as big as my laundry pile and said that I always blame him for everything. He went on, clearly itching for a battle. Evidently, I never blame Gumby for anything and only see what I want to see and always jump on people without having my facts straight and if I were any kind of a mother at all I would be able to see that things are not always what they seem. Gumby, toilet paper mummy mask and migrating boxer band still evident, stood listening.


I said that I'm quite aware that Gumby can be an instigator and that he certainly didn't need to stand still long enough for SD to teepee him and that I'm sure that there are two sides to every story, and that's why I told them both to knock it off. Not just one. Both. He claimed I never said that. Claimed I jumped in with both feet and laid all the blame at his feet. Stood there in all his Taurus bullishness and said that he was sick and tired of being blamed for everything that happens in this house and that I need to "stop talking and listen for a change."


The sound you might have heard Thursday morning was not, in fact, a sonic boom. It was me. Telling my youngest child in no uncertain terms that, in my mother's infamous words THIS WOULD NOT DO. At all. And then, so help me, the kid stuck his fingers in his ears while I was talking to him and I went ballistic. Before I knew it we were having a knock down drag out argument right there in the kitchen. And it was barely eight in the morning, for the love of god. He stomped off upstairs and refused to speak to me the rest of the morning.
It didn't bother me. I didn't much want to talk to him either.

On the way out to school I noticed he'd forgotten his planner on the kitchen counter. You know, the one that his rotten mother always reminds him to put in his backpack? Not today, buddy. You're on your own. And you'd better not even think about calling to see if I'll drop it off either.


Grrrrr.....


My dogs, on the other hand, were angelic during this entire exchange. I barely even noticed them sneaking the remains of the kid's breakfast off their plates while we went nine rounds in the kitchen. Great. Something tells me there's waffle puke in my future.


Feel better, laurie??

dragon breath blues

I stumbled downstairs in the dark Sunday morning to get ready for work. I am not a morning person. Not even close. A T-shirt I saw once said


To say I'm not a morning person doesn't even begin to cover it.


And that about covers it.

Anyway, I got into the bathroom to brush my teeth, but couldn't find my toothbrush anywhere. I looked all over the place, with no luck. It had been there the night before and had now vanished into thin air. I was running a little late and stood at the sink weighing my options. Realizing that I didn't have any, I said eenie meenie minie moe and grabbed a kid's toothbrush. It didn't really matter which kids' it was, since I didn't want any of them in my mouth. I think I've said before that I have spit issues and this grossed me out more than I can tell you. But it was that or go to work with swamp breath, so I bit the bullet and brushed.


When I went into the kitchen to get a cup of coffee (to cancel out my newly fresh, if slightly grossed out breath) I noticed a whole pile of model parts drying on a towel on the counter. My Film Geek, Model Building Geek husband had obviously been working on his beloved hobby last night after everyone else went to sleep. (I have to mention that he also filled the house with fresh flowers yesterday while I was at work. Just to be nice. This is the only reason he's still alive). He had meticulously done whatever it is he does with tiny little pieces of plastic for hours on end - painting them and polishing them and...


...washing them? My toothbrush was in the sink. With model goop on it. Next to model geek debris. My toothbrush. Not his, which was safely in the upstairs bathroom. He came downstairs and I said...


"Why? Why did you use my toothbrush to clean your models?"


and he said...


"Oh. Was that your toothbrush? I thought it was a junky old one."


and I said...


"If it were a junky old one, do you think it would be in the TOOTHBRUSH HOLDER in the bathroom?"


and he said...


(wait for it...)


"Well, I didn't think it was yours. You weren't using it."


and I said...


"I WAS ASLEEP!!"


and he said...


"Oh. Well, you could still use it, you know. I was just cleaning dirt off the models. It wasn't anything bad."


and I said...


never mind what I said.

diary of a short order cook

This is your brain.


This is your brain in my kitchen.


Any questions?



Let's move on then.


Or not.




I'm pretty sure that you're all more than ready for me to move on topic-wise, but I'm going to have to stay on this one for one more day. The care of my family is not an issue at the moment but the feeding of my family is huge. And as much as I would like to say that it's on the right side of the course - it isn't. Far from it. Every day I slide a little further down the hill into a big puddle of...well, it isn't brown gravy. Not even close. I spend more of my waking days than I care to admit mulling over this whole food thing, so today I'll mull for the masses. Allow me to apologize in advance. I know that none of you signed up for this. The exit is to your right. And I do promise this will be the end of the food saga. For now anyway.


To set the record straight I'm having a hell of a time coming up with meals lately, but it really isn't because people are picky. Well, not unduly picky. All of my children will eat any vegetable you put in front of them with the exception of brussel sprouts and mushrooms, which I'm okay with because it's just more for me. They are adventurous in their eating and will eat Mexican, Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Middle Eastern and any form of Italian you can conjure up. They all like spicy, highly seasoned foods, which they get from both of their parents. I firmly hold that pain is a flavor and have been known to put enough red pepper flakes on pizza to kill the delivery man. And me about twelve hours later.


It isn't what they will eat. It's what they won't eat. Or can't eat. This is where all my problems start. Here is a little chart to help explain...


The Film Geek - is a joy to cook for because he will eat virtually anything you put in front of him. His mama raised him right. He doesn't turn his nose up at leftovers and is perfectly comfortable rustling up meals all on his own. Granted he has a repertoire of about four dishes, but still. The problem with him is what he shouldn't eat. Thanks to a genetic cholesterol level that is literally through the roof, he's supposed to follow a low-carb, low-fat, low glycemic index diet. Minimal pasta, minimal rice, mostly protein and veggies. Do I need to tell you that this is not how he wants to eat? He'll freely admit that he doesn't really want to figure it out so he just leaves it all to me. You could even say dumps it on me. Thanks...


Sasquatch - channels my father in his die-hard carnivorous ways. Every day after school when he asks what we're having for dinner his next question is always "Is there meat in it?"And is a bottomless pit of a teenager to boot. If he had his way he would eat triple Whoppers with cheese and extra mayo, king sized fries and a large coke every day of the week. The fact that I don't buy into the whole fast food thing ruins his life, to hear him tell it. He's slimmed down a lot as he's cracked six feet something, but he's not a twig. I was sure, based on his build, that he was going to lose the genetic cholesterol crapshoot, but he didn't. Thankfully. Because he feels so deprived in the meat stakes, whenever there is some he feels he has to inhale as much of it as possible to make up for his earlier deficit. Imagine starved lions tearing into a gazelle. It's an ugly sight, people. Don't try and picture it for too long.


Gumby - decided about a year ago to stop eating meat. He will eat fish, so when we say he's a vegetarian we're being kind of loosey goosey with it. The kid is almost as tall as me and he's eleven. (I'm five ten). His ten year old brother, who is shorter, outweighs him by I don't even want to know how much. (And he's not heavy). Gumby's what we used to call a string bean. The kid is evidently as healthy as a very skinny horse, so I'm not complaining. I was built very much the same way as a kid and I clearly outgrew it. I'm betting he will too. If not, I'll just keep repeating the words "basketball scholarship" over and over again. Except he's a klutz. Anyhow...he's not a big eater at any one time, but he grazes all day. Other than meat he'll eat almost anything, but could live on cheese. Any kind of cheese. And beans. Any kind of beans. He's the pickiest of the three in terms of vegetables, but happily takes a salad to school every day in his lunch box. It's his lunch of choice.


Surfer Dude - my little foodie. He'll eat a good assortment of food, but for him it's all about the preparation and presentation. He once told me his dinner tasted fine but my plating needed work. Imagine a cross between Anthony Bourdain and Dennis the Menace. Without the cowlick or the heroin habit. No food is safe in my house, as he will empty the the contents of the fridge onto the island to "work on knife skills" for awhile. When I get all over him for wasting food, he mixes up these concoctions that are designed to use up whatever it is he's just diced or minced or chiffonaded but are not, often, designed to be edible. Then he plates it beautifully and sometimes even garnishes it. This is all very sweet until he presents it to me with the words I have come to dread. "Try some and tell me what you think." For some inexplicable reason he's decided to give up pork. Only pork. We're not observant Jews. We're not Jewish at all. We never ate much pork to start with due a pork trauma from my past. This has made my easiest last minute dinner - Bacon Lettuce and Tomato Sandwiches - way more problematic.



Let me walk you through why making any meal is such a pain in my house. BLT's are a perfect example. The easiest bacon is the already made in a box stuff that you just nuke, but Sasquatch doesn't like that kind and wants the kind you actually have to cook. Surfer Dude won't eat regular bacon because "it's pork, mom" so he has to have turkey bacon. Gumby gets a soy bacon that is actually quite good unless you overcook it by a second or two and then it resembles roofing tiles in the Sahara. The Film Geek shouldn't be having any part of this except for the lettuce and the tomato, but that's not really a balanced meal in my book. And I'm so disgusted by this point that I'm opening a bottle of Chardonnay.


Okay, let's try pasta. Everyone in my house loves pasta. Sasquatch wants meat in the sauce, but this of course means that Gumby won't eat it. I make meatballs and bake them separately so whoever wants them can have them, but I despise making meatballs and always have. Once again, my husband shouldn't be anywhere near this meal. Even though I do whole wheat pasta (which my kids will all eat) he still shouldn't eat it.


We do a lot of "bar" things for dinner. Taco bars are very popular, as are salad bars and stir fry bars. Everyone gets what they want and doesn't have to have whatever bothers them. I've turned into the stir fry queen, but even with people helping me chop stuff up it's still time consuming to make five separate stir fries. But virtually every other meal has some element that someone can't or shouldn't eat. It's not often "won't", interestingly enough. Except for Sasquatch with the whole meat issue, no one is trying to deliberately throw their weight around.


And where do I fit in this sick little equation? I'll eat almost anything, but I'm with Gumby on the meat front. It's not for any moral, health or humanitarian reasons, I just read something a few years ago that made me physically unable to put meat in my mouth. Gagging isn't an appetite enhancement device. I've never been a big meat eater anyway, due to the aforementioned pork trauma. I'm sure I passed this on to Gumby, although god knows I never intended anyone else to follow along. We do eat fish and we all love it, but how much fish can you eat?


I do a lot of meals where I'll bake chicken and make a couple of nice sides and people can eat what they want. My whole family loves soups and chilis, but the meat eaters start raising their hackles at some point if they're all veggie. Gumby and I have been talking because I'm about at the point of starting to eat chicken again just for the sake of the greater good. I'm pretty sure I could do that now. If we were all on the same page with just that one thing it would help enormously. He allows as to how he has thought the same thing. I guess we'll see. I certainly won't make him do anything he doesn't want to do.



My first comment on yesterday's post was from laurie, who said that in her family growing up you ate what you were served or didn't leave the table until you did. laurie (and others) wondered what happened to this approach and why it seems like so many kids are calling the shots these days. I don't have an answer for this, although I wish I did. I think a lot of children are still being raised with a firmer hand, just as I'm sure there are kids who run their parents ragged with demands. I myself never had to finish eating at the table when I was growing up, but the FG did and has the stories to prove it. His mother noticed a particularly foul stench in the dining room one day only to find last week's brussel sprouts ground into a mush and hidden under the throw rug. No one in the house would accept responsibility for this, but the kids all knew who did it, and much blackmailing ensued. (God, the things I've missed basically being an only child). But as an adult, my husband is way pickier than me and I'm way more adventurous than him, so what does this mean?

What do you think?

A five gallon bucket of lard

I was reading Jen's post yesterday about churches in Georgia and while I don't want to copycat, it got me thinking. As someone who has spent quite a lot of time in the South (Alabama to be exact), I'm fully aware that it takes some getting used to. I was lucky, I guess, in that my time in the South started practically at birth, so even though I can see how different things are I'm so used to it that it doesn't even phase me. Not everyone is this lucky though, and this is what I started thinking about yesterday.

I was born in Michigan and lived in the Detroit suburbs until I was eight. That was when my parents divorced and my mom and I moved to Southern California, the place I consider "home". My grandparents on my mom's side also lived in Michigan, but they were both from Alabama and went back several times a year to see their family. When my grandfather retired they moved back to the house they owned there. When I was growing up I spent summers in Michigan with my dad and my grandparents and always made at least one trip to Alabama with them. My love of road trips started with these journeys and I always had a great time on the way. It was when we arrived that my troubles started.

I always felt a little Bipolar (Tripolar?) with this Michigan/Alabama/California hat trick, but was usually able to fit in somehow. Alabama challenged me. I had family there I loved and it was certainly familiar, but I was always the odd duck out. The family home was down a dirt road in the middle of frickin' nowhere and there was not a bathroom in the place until I was about twelve. The last time I forced myself to go into the godforsaken outhouse something in the corner rattled. Standing in the middle of the yard with my panties around my ankles I swore "Never again". I spent my days trying to talk people into driving me to the gas station in town so I could pee. I would come up with all kinds of fictional errands that always went right by the Sinclair station. I developed the largest bladder in three counties.

Then there was the fact that I was terrified of bugs. (One day I woke up with a spider in my mouth and now, all these years later when I sleep I cover my mouth with a sheet). And I'm not a big meat eater. And there aren't any tornado sirens. Or basements. And I hated the fact that every time you went to the Piggly Wiggly or the Jitney Jungle you ran into twenty people you knew who all had to ask you which you liked better - Alabama or California. I was a mess. And my family, who loved me, made excuses for my eccentricities and wrote me off as a bona fide city girl. To be fair it was my own teenage inflexibility that made it such a problem. My family just thought I was a whack job and went on with their lives.

By the time I took The Film Geek to my grandparent's house for the first time I had made peace with the whole situation. I was finally able to see the good and tolerate the bad with fairly good humor. I was comfortable there. I fully expected, forgetting entirely where I was and who I was married to, that he would fit right in and have a great time.

As Humphrey Bogart says in Casablanca, I was misinformed. It was, plainly put, a train wreck, more aptly a train wreck driven by Homer Simpson. It took me a long, long time to laugh, but it was worth the wait.

FG is from a military family and had lived in California, Hawaii and Arizona. He was used to moving around but he was mostly in the Western US. He had, to be fair, spent time at his dad's house in Dallas, but by his own admission usually stayed inside in the air conditioning to read a book. And his dad was in the city, not the country.

I was already in Alabama with the infant Sasquatch when FG arrived, fresh off a job that had fallen through at the last minute. At some point during that first day my grandmother, not sure what to feed him, suggested we go to the Piggly Wiggly to buy some food. It was summer, which means hot and humid. He was extremely cranky about the world at that point. When we got into the store he told me he was going to go get some sparkling water and walked off. I called after him to let him down gently.

"You can't buy sparkling water here," I said.

"Whattya mean you can't get sparkling water here?" Mr. LA asked. "Of course they have sparkling water. It's not like it's caviar or anything." And then he stomped off.

Five minutes later he came back empty handed.

"You can't buy sparkling water here," he said accusingly.

"I know", I replied. "They don't carry it. If you want water you have to take a container to the gas station." ( See? I worked the gas station into everything).


He took a deep breath.


"Are you trying to tell me that you can buy a five gallon bucket of lard but you can't buy a bottle of sparkling water?"


Bingo.


The next day he got a little cabin fever and decided to go out for a walk. Well, you don't really walk in the ultra polite South. He lost count of how many cars pulled over on the road to ask him if he'd had car trouble and needed a ride. He was gone for hours, but I wasn't a bit concerned, because every few minutes someone would call and say to my grandmother, "Bill (her nickname), I think I just saw Julie's husband walk by on the road. Isn't he wearing a blue t-shirt?" We tracked him for hours and knew when he was headed home because one of my cousins saw him turn onto the road, so she called from the Dairy Dip to let us know he was coming so we could warm supper up for him. Riiiight.

He walked in smiling and in a mood fit to live with again. Walking eight miles on dirt roads will do that to you. As he got a glass of water he said I'd never guess where all he'd been.

I didn't have the heart to tell him.

The Film/English Dictionary

Have you ever watched the credits at the end of a film and wondered what language they were written in and what in the world it all meant? Not everyone watches credits of course, but I'm always surprised at how many people do. The Film Geek and I knew we were on the same page on our first movie date when we both stayed in our seats at the end of the movie to watch the credits without even asking the other first if they wanted to. I weeded out quite a few potential boyfriends with this little trick.


As he has been in the thick of pre-production for months and is three weeks into principal photography on his latest feature, I've brushed off my language skills so I know what the heck he's talking about all the time. I've never worked in film, I was always in television. Some of the jargon is the same, but film really is a language of it's own. So as a public service (and to annoy your friends no end) I've put together a FilmSpeak Primer. Now you too will be able to decipher those pesky credits.

Oddly named crew positions...

Gaffer - Department head for the Electrical area. The term came about one of two ways, depending on which story you want to believe. First is from the stick they used to use to adjust the lights, called a gaff stick. Second is from the term "old gaffer" which came about as a way of defining seniority. Whoever had survived the longest without electrocuting himself got the job as the top electrical guy - the gaffer.

Best boy - the next step down in the Electrical department. If female can be called Best babe.

Rigging electricians - do a lot of the grunt work, laying camera runs and other cables.



Key Grip - head of the department that handles all the non-electrical equipment on set that relates to lighting and camera. The name "Grip" comes from the name of the equipment cases they carry, which are called grips.

Best boy (or babe) grip - next step down in this department. They are below the key grip but higher in rank than the plain old grips.

Rigging grips - the ones who build the trusses for the overhead light grids.

Strike grips - the ones who "strike" or tear down the set when the crew is finished.

Swing grip - someone who goes back and forth between grip and electrical.

Grips have a reputation, deserved or not, as being a little rough around the edges, you could even say coarse. Some of the most astounding things can come out of their mouths. (To be fair, this could be said about anyone on the set at any given time). And there can often be friction between the grip and electrical departments.

Film Geek joke - What's the difference between a grip and an electrician? An electrician will take the dishes out of the sink before he pees in it.




So those are two of the key positions - the gaffer and the key grip. The third (and last) key position is in the Camera Department and is the camera operator. All of these positions report to the DP, the Director of Photography, also known as a cinematographer. The DP is in charge of all the technical aspects that create the "look" of the film, such as designing the lighting. They work closely with the director to create this look.


The Film Geek is a Director of Photography. However, he has worked in both grip and electric, so when he tells me stories about these two groups I tend to believe him. He's usually too tired to make things up. Here's another one of his tales...

A few years ago one of his classes was getting practical experience by working on one of his shoots in assistant type jobs. He introduced a couple of the female students to the grips and then, out of earshot of the students, said ( not totally joking) "Please don't sleep with my students." "Okay," the key replied agreeably. "Whose students can we sleep with?"


The Assistant Director is responsible for keeping the production on schedule and on time. This can be a very thankless task. The AD runs herd on everyone from crew to talent to pokey directors. Weather delays, transportation hold-ups, equipment malfunctions all combine to make the AD a very high strung individual indeed.

Film Geek joke - How can you tell the AD's kids on the playground? They're the ones running around telling the other kids they only have fifteen minutes left to play. How can you tell the Teamster's kids on the playground? They're the ones watching all the other kids playing.




Now we come to the Camera Department positions.

First Assistant Camera (AC) - the First AC is surgically attached to both the camera and the DP at all times. They clean lenses and filters and load film magazines on and off of the camera. The First AC works with the Second AC to move the camera into position for each shot.

Second Assistant Camera (AC) - the second AC is known for their leg strength. They need it. They are permanently attached to the First AC and when the DP calls for an item such as a film magazine or lenses and filters, the First AC tells the Second AC to go and get it. It's an unwritten rule that you never run on a film set, you "walk with purpose." The Second AC walks with purpose all day long. They also do the slate at the beginning of each shot and keep the camera reports up to date, noting how much footage has been shot, what shots are on each roll, etc. This information is invaluable to the editors during post-production.

clapper/loader - this is the second lowest person on the camera team. It is typical of the idiocy that is film hierarchy that this position is usually filled by the least experienced person on the team, but that they are given the most delicate and potentially disastrous job. The clapper/loader loads the magazines, the film containing device that clamps on the back of the camera. This job, threading film into a magazine that looks like a convoluted pinball game, is done entirely in the dark, completely by feel. Imagine an oversized sewing machine bobbin crossed with a rat maze. It's usually done in a camera bag but can be done in a completely dark camera truck. Either way they can't see a thing. And film is expensive. If it's loaded wrong or exposed to light in any way...see ya. Game over. They don't often get a second chance if they screw up. And they get paid crap.

Production Assistants - this is the true grunt position on the crew, speaking of getting paid crap. They do everything from making copies to getting coffee for the talent to taking the director's dog to the vet. (Sometimes they even babysit the DP's kids when the shooting schedule changes unexpectedly and his wife has to work). Eighteen to twenty hour days are not unheard of. Film is a business that is very big on "paying your dues" and PA' s are at the very bottom of the ladder. One of the Film Geek's friends had a t-shirt that said "I've overpayed my dues and I want a refund." I'm pretty sure everyone who saw it wanted that shirt.




These positions, with the exception of the DP are all called "below the line" positions. I'm not really sure what the "line " part of it means, although I think it's an accounting thing that shows up on the budget above or below a certain line item. The "above the line" positions are the producers, director and DP. The title Producer can mean many, many things, ranging from someone who puts up the money because they've "always wanted to be in film" to the very hands on producer who has their finger on the pulse of everything. The director is the one directly responsible for bringing the film in on time, on budget and looking good, and is the one who is made a hero if things work out or a schmuck if it flops.

Okay, class over for today. Aren't you sorry you asked? (Whattya mean, you didn't ask?) Doesn't it make you want to see a movie right now so you can begin translating for your friends? Study hard, because soon we'll have a lesson on film lingo on the set. I'm still figuring out how to put the funniest, completely unprintable lines in. It may be awhile.

Touchstones

There's one in every family and my family is no exception. One person is the emotional stabilizer, the one who pulls rabbits out of their hat and keeps everything going, the one who listens to everyone and solves everyone else's problems or goes down trying. This is the person who has their nervous breakdowns in private so no one else freaks out. The person who everyone else feels secure enough with to totally unload on. One person is always the touchstone.

That person is me.

And right about now I'm going down.

Maybe I need a good nights sleep. Maybe I need the weather to drop below 150 degrees. Possibly I need a bottle of Chardonnay, a bowl of pesto (and a spoon) and every Hugh Grant film I can dig up. I might try it, with a few exceptions. First off I have no wine, so I'll substitute lemonade. There' s not a drop of pesto in the house so I'll swap for some gorgeous farmer's market tomatoes with a hunk of fresh mozzarella. There is no substitute for Hugh Grant, so that part gets left alone. It's a crucial part in my recovery and I'm not taking any chances.

Maybe I just need to have a minute to myself to sort things out. There's a lot going on...

The Film Geek's shoot is not going well. This is unsurprising for several reasons, but still a problem. The shoot got pushed back several weeks to accomodate an actor and in the process inconvenienced absolutely everyone else. The new semester started today, so he's trying to work fourteen hour days (on an open prairie in the heat) and somehow get his students up to speed at the same time. One of the guys on his crew is trying to undermine his position just to be a shit. Their schedule keeps changing, thanks to the same actor. The in town and location shooting just got flip flopped, so all the days I arranged to work while he had days off are now moot and I am without child care while he is out of town. Sasquatch has done a good job for me lately, but I'm just not confident of the dynamics of leaving an older dictatorial brother in charge for a twelve hour shift.

FG's exhausted, hot, feeling underappreciated and overworked. Feeling like he's only giving half of himself to each of the two jobs he's now trying to juggle. He takes his students very seriously, but this feature is a big deal professionally. If this goes well an even bigger project will follow. And we could really use the money. We don't call this house The Money Pit for nothing. His stress level is palpable and we are two weeks into a six week shoot. He feels like he can't breath and he says his chest hurts. Yesterday he just snapped and told me he was walking away from the film. This is a first. In twenty years the man has not ever walked away from a job, even when he should have. For an hour in the car on the way to the set he examined all the angles, all the reasons he should throw in the towel. I was driving him basically to be a good wife and also to give him a chance to vent. He ranted and raged and for one awful moment I thought he was going to cry. And then, I knew this was coming, he said, "What do you think I should do?"

Now we all know there is no right answer for this, so I pointed out the pros, cons and possible repercussions of each side of the fence. I never mentioned the words money or heart attack. I told him that ultimately he was the one who would have to live with his choice, so it stood to reason it shoud be his decision. As I dropped him off I crossed my fingers that he could live with whatever he decided. It was all I could really do.

Next up is Sasquatch who is having a semi-stressful entrance to High School. Believe me when I say that it could be worse, but it's still tricky. He can't sleep at night so the mornings are pure hell. He's disorganized and defiant about it, so something as simple as carrying a backpack becomes a power struggle. He simply cannot understand why I want him to have all of his stuff together and contained. Because he's so tired he's particularly short tempered, especially with me. I'm his safety zone, you see, the person who gets to experience all of his teenage glory. The homework level has really been kicked up as well, so he's feeling some pressure himself.

I was preoccupied with the Film Geek and wondering what the final outcome would be when Sasquatch came into the room to tell me that he had just realized that he had left tonight's homework at school. When I asked how that happened he got furious and accused me of "attacking" him. This is his favorite spiel. When I ask him a question I'm "attacking" him. When he goes balllistic on me he's "explaining" himself. Evidently there's a difference somehow. He raged at me that I never listen to a word he says and that he's tired of me always being "the victim". Then he slammed into his room.

Imagine a sitcom where when one character exits from one door another enters from the other side. Exit Sasquatch, enter Gumby, who has just realized that one of his pet rats has a lump on it's back. As I was walking into the room to look, I pointed out that this rat is over two years old and that we might need to keep that in mind. At that point he collapsed in tears and hysterically started making lists of all the things we needed to do to keep the rat alive. This list thing is evidently genetic.He had heard Sasquatch yelling at me, so he pulled himself together quickly so as not to upset me. This, of course, upset me more. Just because your brother is a teenage drama queen doesn't mean that your feelings aren't legitimate. I held him and he cried and then we plotted out Operation Rat Rescue. He went back into his room to try to go to sleep.

Cue sitcom timing. The phone rang and it was my husband telling me that he and the director had had a come to jesus talk and he was staying on the film. They basically told him to do whatever he needed to do about teaching and they would work around him. They told him they had his back. The guy giving him so much grief will be looking for a new job very shortly unless things change fast. He sounded calm. He sounded relieved. He sounded tired. Nothing hurt. He was on his way home for the night. And tomorrow he'd go back.

Every unpleasant day in my life has some surreal element in it, just a little drop kick to keep you awake. Mine was supplied by Surfer Dude, who had to appear in our little soap opera somehow. He's all fired up for this next Kid's Top Chef competition he's planning and keeps fiddling with things in the kitchen as he prepares. (This event is weeks away, BTW). Whenever I walked into my kitchen there was a pile of all different kinds of peppers and jars of spices artistically stacked up. Except the position kept changing. First it was on the table. Then it was piled on the counter. It made its final appearance on the island before I said if he didn't put the peppers away I would feed him nothing but Pop Tarts until he went away to college. Foodies evidently don't eat Pop Tarts, even ten year old foodies, because the pepper pastiche went away.

So I sat on the computer (writing this) and felt absolutely drained. I could really use just one day where people take their problems elsewhere. Let someone else be the touchstone for a change.Usually I call a friend and vent. Last night it was just me and the keyboard, practicing the ancient art of internet venting. Some might even call it whining. Hell, I might even call it whining. Still...

I'm feeling better. Maybe I don't need Hugh after all.

But why take chances?

The Meme Game

My brain seems to have gone walkabout this morning, so I'm going to jump on the meme bandwagon. This one is from Akelamalu and is

Eight Facts about the Film Geek and Yours Truly.

As I understand it, this meme is open to all who choose to use it. You just have to let the person you took it from know so we can satisfy our curiosity factor about you and your SO.

1. The first time we met was when I volunteered for a student film he was directing because I thought he was cute. The first thing he asked me to do was carry a fifty pound lighting kit up about 1oo stairs (nicknamed Cardiac Hill). He failed to notice that I was on crutches at the time from a torn ligament in my foot. I've never let him forget it.

2. He comes from a pretty conservative Catholic military family and I come from a musician flower child ultra liberal type upbringing. As adults he's way more loosey goosey and I'm way more structured. We're both still ultra liberals - whatever that means.

3. We both have terrible sweet tooths. And we are both stress eaters.

4. I'm always five minutes early and he's always way late. When we were first married this scared me to death, as I always imagined him dead on the side of the road. Now I automatically add an hour to anything he tells me. If he's really stressed I add two. He hasn't been dead on the side of the road yet.

5. We're both avid readers, but we read totally different things. He likes science fiction and I like mysteries. He likes fiction and I like non-fiction. We're both magazine junkies. He hasn't read Harry Potter (except for the last twenty pages). What else can I say?

6. We have a horrible time doing projects together. Our styles drive each other crazy. He thinks I'm sloppy and I think he's bossy. (BTW - I'm right and he's wrong).

7. He and my mother are the only two people in the world who can talk me down from an anxiety attack. (Although it's been years - knock wood - since I had one).

8. Before we moved here he took a teaching job in another state for a year. This wasn't by choice, it was by financial necessity. I stayed in LA with three kids (ages 6, 2 and 1) and he rented a room in someone's house. We both secretly believed the other one got the better part of the deal. When he came home we then moved halfway across country to yet another state. It took us a long time to recover from that year.

And there you have it. Are you still awake?

Imponderables

Why is it that...

The amount of time my husband takes to get off of the only computer in the house I can use to post my blog is directly proportional to the number of times Surfer Dude will then stand behind me and say, "hey, mom" every fifteen seconds?

There is a tube of toothpaste in my car and a full shampoo bottle in the upstairs library but neither one is to be found in a bathroom and miraculously both appear to have walked to their current positions unaided?

Neither Surfer Dude nor Gumby will go into the upstairs bathroom by themselves claiming that there's a ghost in there but anxiously await the television show "The Haunting" and watch it avidly when they think I'm pre-occupied?

There is a badminton racket that moves freely from room to room no matter how many times I put it away? Let's not even ask why a badminton racket is in the house in the first place. All I know is it was in every room downstairs yesterday and yet no one seems to have touched it. It's now in the back of the dining room closet and I anxiously await its jailbreak. Shouldn't take long.

Sasquatch is desperately interested in what we're having for dinner and will grill me on this all afternoon and then, after I've made concessions I didn't necessarily want to, will ask me if he can meet his friends downtown and have pizza?


Every one of my kids will obsess over a TV show they're waiting for (sometimes for weeks) and then talk through the entire thing?


Or that The Film Geek will hear a song on the car radio and exclaim about how long it's been since he's heard this most loved song and then immediately turn the volume off to tell me all about the last time he heard it?


A long lost object (in this case Surfer Dude's collection of plastic bugs) must become the subject of a frantic and increasingly belligerent search the minute my butt hits the computer chair? Or that my husband, with me standing behind him to get on the computer, accidentally turns it off instead of logging off so I have to restart the whole thing?


I officially give up. You heard it here first.

Color My World

Sitting out on my fabulous, newly screened porch, I was thinking about paint. I absolutley adore paint. It's one of my Very Favorite Things, so I probably spend a lot more time thinking about it than I should. My paint chip collection is world class in its scope. I am continually amazed at what you can do with just one gallon of the stuff. It's like magic as far as I'm concerned - the good kind. Let other people redecorate or wallpaper or move around furniture, I just head for the paint store. It's the closest thing to a quick fix I have. (Short of a big cold bottle of Diet Coke with Lime, anyway).

I'm pretty sure my paint fetish started during all those years we rented in South Pas and always had to have white walls. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against white walls, I just hate not having options. Personally I'm very big on options, and if this is some latent demonstration of my inner control freak I don't want to know about it. I'm sure it also has a lot to do with hating being told what to do, but if I get any more off subject here I'm not sure how I'll recover.

Paint. We were discussing paint. (Effective segue, although lacking in finesse). I have paint on the brain partly because we just had a small episode involving our kitchen and a series of very bad moves on my part. When the kids and I were in California in January, the Film Geek painted the kitchen for me. This was a very big deal and took a lot of time, because our kitchen is pretty large and had a whole slew of stuff that needed to be prepped and taped off. Before we left I gave him the paint chip we had decided on and didn't give it another thought. The night we came home he proudly led me into the kitchen and flipped the light on so I could check out his latest production. Drumroll, please...

I hated it. Not the painting. The painting was fine. It was the color. The color that I had chosen and now made me feel like I was inside a truck full of frozen salmon filets. And the sheer size of the room made it worse. I felt like I was inside a big truck full of frozen salmon filets. I had expected a very soft kind of peachy melon color and I got this. It was not good, but I didn't want to say anything to this man who was so proudly showing me what he had done. So I put on a smiley face and told him (very honestly) how much I appreciated that he had done it for me. And I did, I really did. It wasn't his fault I hated the color.

It was time for Plan B, which in this case stands for Botched. I lived with the walls for months while I tried to figure out what to do. Every time one of our friends would walk through to check on the house redo progress I would offer the same disclaimer for the kitchen - "Okay, you can look, but it isn't DONE yet". Around Spring Break I started to really look at my options, but of course first I had to fess up to my husband just how much I really hated the kitchen. In a heroic display of restraint he simply shook his head, said "well, it's your kitchen" and walked away. One of these days I'll tell you about how this is the second time I've done this to him, but he reads this too, and I don't want to give him any more ammunition than I have to.


On to solutions. First I got the idea to take a color I had on hand and mix it with a little glaze to make a color wash to apply over the paint and mute it a little. The color was really pretty and looked good on the frozen fish walls, but no matter what I did the application was blotchy. It was so bad that I called the Film Geek and told him casually that when he got home from work late that night he might not want to look at the kitchen walls until I was awake and could explain. No matter what I did, I couldn't fix it, so now my frozen fish walls looked like they had a bad case of poison ivy. I finally threw in the towel and conceded that I needed to buy a new color and simply repaint the one big wall something totally different.



I had originally wanted a red wall in there, so I went to the paint store and came home with a bunch of red chips in my very favorite brand. I love this paint so much I could happily do my own commercial for them, never mind that it would put me in the poorhouse if it wasn't for the online coupons. Even then...it's like a bad love affair. I wish sometimes I'd never even laid eyes on this paint.



So the Film Geek and I look at colors and he picks his favorite two (which were not my favorite two) and we haggle a little and I finally agree with his number two choice. I head back to buy the paint and on the way decide to give in and go with his number one choice, because I still feel bad about painting over all his hard work. It takes a while for the paint guy to come over and help me so I drift back over to the paint chips and see a red that I had somehow missed earlier. I pick it up and look at it next to the one we've decided on, thinking that it really is quite pretty, but most likely too dark. I'm still wandering around when the paint guy comes over to see what I want to get. I give him my order and am five minutes into my wait while he mixes the paint when I look down and realize that I gave him the wrong paint chip. And this is custom mix paint - no refunds once it's mixed. I imagined my husband's face and my life flashed in front of my eyes. And for all of you pessimists out there, let's just leave Freud out of it, okay?



By the time I got home I was in the if life gives you lemons make lemonade mode, and started painting. When the Film Geek got home from work his immediate response was "Is this the color I picked??" (He said this right before he took the roller out of my hand because he didn't like the way I was painting, by the way). I babbled well no it isn't the same color and it's really kind of a funny story if you just think about it. Honey? Honey? We finished the two walls in relative silence and then looked around the room.



I absolutely loved it. The color was just drop dead gorgeous and looked great with the two frozen fish walls we had left alone. The red muted the other walls and they complemented each other really well. The Film Geek wasn't too sure, but said he trusted my judgement and that he figured the color would grow on him. He hasn't griped since, so I figure either it has or he's just given up the fight. As for me, it makes me happy every time I walk in, and that has to count for something, right?


Like he said. It's my kitchen.

Home Improvement

The stars aligned and the heavens smiled last night as The Film Geek and I actually worked together on a home project and didn't kill each other. The sound you hear is angels singing in astonishment and pure joy. We do not have a good track record, you see, although we've really been making an effort to get better. We know why we work so badly together, we just haven't been able to do much about it. I'll explain it all and then maybe someone can provide some words of wisdom. God knows we need help.

First off is the good news. We managed to do most of the work to rescreen the sun porch last night, just in time for the storms we're expecting today. The sun porch is reached through a sliding glass door in the kitchen, so when the slider is open the air flow is wonderful. Since most of these storms come with high winds, it really cools off the house fast, besides just feeling good. The problem we had is the the college boys who lived here before had torn the screens, so bugs and animals and such would get on the sun porch. Obviously we didn't want them in the kitchen so the slider had to stay closed. And said bugs and small animals made sitting on the sun porch less than desirable. The dogs didn't help matters, since they would just use the holes in the screens as a shortcut to the back yard. Dee Dee in particular, being built like a walrus, is always up for a shortcut.

So The Film Geek took off the old screens and pieces of wood holding them on, and then we hung new screening and staple gunned it in and replaced the wood. I pounded nails out of wood and held screening and fetched things he needed while he was up on the ladder. It went without a hitch, really. Well, one hitch. While I was in the kitchen finishing dinner, I heard my husband yell "Oh, no she did NOT!!", while chasing walrus dog around the yard. Seems she had seen or heard a dog walking by and headed out to the yard to stake her turf - straight through the eight foot screen panel we had just hung. Dear lord, this dog is dumber then dirt, and if the kids didn't love her so much I'd arrange an accident for her. If she goes through the screen again I just may anyway. I don't suppose anyone is in the market for a two hundred pound black lab with more than a touch of borderline personality disorder and an insatiable need to lick the furniture? She's good with kids - really. First one to email me can have her. Or better still, for faster delivery, just call me. Please. I'm begging.

The problem my husband and I have is that we have very different styles in terms of home projects. Take painting for instance. He can happily spend a week prepping a room to paint. He patches, putties, sands, scrapes, takes a peek, fondles the walls, repatches, reputties, resands, rescrapes and then repeeks and refondles. Repeat this loop a minimum of three times. Then we get to the actual painting part. We start with freshly washed walls (the only part of this whole process that he feels I'm competent to handle, but he still watches to make sure I put the proper amount of TSP in the water). Then he tapes, retapes, sleeps on it for a night or two and then finally begins to put the actual paint on the wall. Gimme an A, gimme an N, gimme an A, gimme an L - what's that spell? Film Geek!

His complaint with me is that he considers me sloppy in my work. That I can paint a room in an afternoon worries him deeply, since it obviously means I've done a half-assed job. I have literally had the man take the roller out of my hand to "fix" one of my "mistakes" to his satisfaction. I defy anyone to look at any of our rooms and tell me who painted which one. He does not see it this way and that's all I'm going to say about that. While he's gone this weekend I'm planning on painting the computer room and he knows it. He's got a little twitch right above his left eye and I don't care. I'd like this room painted before Christmas. 2009.

Stay tuned for updates as they unfold. And I really am serious about the dog. Call me. Please.

Countdown

It's the time of year when things speed up a lot before they slow down, and I think my family is feeling the wear and tear. I know most of you reading this still have a month of school to go, so forgive me my ramblings. And keep in mind that mid-August when we're in school prep mode, you'll have a month of vacation left. All good things to those who wait, right? I'm sure I'm mis-quoting, but you get the idea.



Let's start with the Film Geek. His classes are done and finals complete. I think he's even got some grading finished. He has two beasts on his back at the moment, one related to work and one not. The work beast is the end of the semester student screenings. Not just any screenings, but the ones the students themselves have submitted for awards. This is a huge deal for everyone in the department, but the work load doesn't appear to be evenly distributed, if you know what I mean. He has been frantically editing until the wee hours every night this week to get the whole thing put together for the Awards presentation tonight, which is opened to the entire community. As I said, this is a huge deal for the department in a lot of ways. The film department as a whole has been steadily moving up in national rankings, based strongly on the basis of the production aspect. By a lot of standards, it has become the film school in the midwest. Up until this year, the Film Geek was the only production professor on staff, so you do the math. There's a lot of pressure on him in times like this and he's muddling through as best as he can.



His second beast is his modelling convention next weekend. For those not familiar with this aspect of the man, he's actually earned a dual geek degree, one in film and one in scratch built science fiction models. He painstakingly builds these things and then enters them in competitions, both in person and on the model geek website that he regularly frequents. He has built up a worldwide group of friends with the same hobby, and even worked out a way to get a grant to film the conventions as part of a project on how the internet has replaced the back fence or the garage in terms of people coming together over a shared interest. (Wow, that's a long sentence, even for me!) His problem is that he's really behind on his model and he leaves in less than a week. Something tells me this is about to become my problem as well.



Sasquatch has four days, counting today, of junior high left. All of his biology work has been turned in (finally) and we've climbed out of the "F" category. Last night there was a 9th grade awards ceremony that seemed to come out of nowhere. I have the 9th grade recognition on my calendar for next Thursday and have already had him tell me he doesn't want to go because it's "stupid". I wouldn't have even known about the awards if Laurie hadn't said something. When I asked Sasquatch about it he said anyone who was getting an award already knew about it. All of his friends concurred, and said they weren't going either. Laurie said she didn't think that was the case, and that the Red Headed StepChild was looking forward to it. For reasons that remain unclear, I accepted my child's version over my friend's version. What the hell was I thinking? This morning at elementary school drop-off I had a parent ask where we were last night, since Sasquatch won several awards. Laurie diplomatically didn't say "What the hell were you thinking?", but she should have. After everything this kid has put me through in junior high, I could have stood to see him get a couple of awards. Any guesses on my blood pressure right about now? Anyone?



Gumby stayed home yesterday because his tick bite turned into a systemic infection. The kid's lymph nodes are the size of grapes. I took him to the doctor Wednesday after school and got a prescription for an antibiotic, which as it turns out, he wasn't able to swallow. I begged, I pleaded, I crushed it up and put it in ice cream - no go. When his fever started to climb and he got all flushed, I started to worry. So there I was on the phone with our doctor at 10:30 at night, all ready to take him in to the ER for some IV antibiotics. I knew full well I'd never live it down with my colleagues, because surely it could wait until tomorrow, right? Honestly though, I didn't care at that point. Our doctor told me to leave the kid alone and let him sleep, and get the med in an elixir form the next morning. I trust this doctor hugely, so I did. He was better after the first dose and he's back at school today. The 5th graders are having a fundraiser bake sale for the town in Kansas that was destroyed by the tornado a couple of weeks ago, so I have poppyseed bread in the oven as I speak.



Surfer Dude had a good birthday all around. He took in homemade ice cream sandwiches for a treat and they were very well received. This is the second year in a row he's taken in the same thing, and it's funny how it came about. Last year we were in the middle of our demonic move during his birthday. For his classroom treat he wanted to take cupcakes, but our oven was broken. This will give you an idea of my state of mind a year ago. I said honey we can't do cupcakes because the oven isn't working. Why don't we do cookies instead? Got everything together to make the cookies, went to pre-heat the oven and said oh dear lord, I'm losing my mind, aren't I ? Because clearly you don't need to bake cookies the way you do cupcakes. I ran to the store and bought already baked cookies (from a working oven and everything). We filled them with ice cream and rolled them in chocolate chips and sprinkles and they were a huge hit, thank goodness. He got a lot of athletic stuff for his birthday and money from Nana and Grampa Stu. We had to go to Target immediately to spend his birthday bucks, but he didn't find anything he felt he had to have, so he's pondering his options. He has his second soccer game of the tournament tonight (they won the first) and he and Gumby each have two games tomorrow.

As I'm writing this my doorbell rang and it was Sasquatch, waving a pass from his AP English teacher to allow him to go home and print out the homework he had evidently forgotten. He said she offered to drive him but he told her we only live a few blocks away. Do you see how many people are trying to get this kid through?? Any guess on my blood pressure right about now? Anyone?

It's only May!

Everyone in my house seems to already be in summer mode and it's killing me. I'm not kidding. I've been up for an hour and forty five minutes and I honestly believe I've been screaming the entire time. At least my raw throat thinks so. There are two weeks of school left and nobody seems to care about doing anything they need to do to get through them properly. All three of the kids are like little zombies, counting down the days. I'm about to blow sky high.

For starters, Sasquatach is pathologically incapable of getting to school on time. Here is a typical routine for the boy. My alarm goes off at 7 and I go into his room to give him a first call, so to speak. I fully understand the need to smack the snooze alarm a few times, so I give him the same consideration. He can't get himself up to his own alarm because he sleeps straight through it. We will be in our bed, one room over, wide awake and listening to his alarm going off for twenty straight minutes and he'll still be sound asleep. He's my father all over again. Once, when I was very small, I took a stick of butter out of the fridge and smeared it on my dad when he was asleep. I can't begin to tell you what posessed me, but the bottom line is that the man slept right through it. This is what I'm talking about.

When the kid finally gets up (at 7:36) it takes him twenty minutes in the shower and fifteen to dress, which adds up to it being 8:11 as I'm continuing to scream up the stairs for him to move his butt. The final bell is at 8:08. He could care less about detention because all the do is stick you in a room with a book. This is punishment? Then on the way to school he picks a fight because he wants me to write a note excusing his tardy. My comment basically boiled down to Excuse THIS, buddy. Note that I'm driving him, for starters. From the corner of our front yard you can see the junior high and I'm driving him??

The other two have it more together in the morning time wise. Their specialty is the early morning rumble. They fight over the most absurd things as a little morning pick me up. Adults have caffeine, they have brother brawls. For full impact you need the sound effects too. Surfer Dude bounces a soccer ball on the hardwood floor for the entire argument`just because it irritates everyone. Gumby smacks his breakfast as loud as he can while he debates his brother, simply because it's gross. By the time we leave they're in full out battle mode over something so stupid I don't even remember what it was and it was only thirty minutes ago. We head out to the car and have to make a minor pitstop at the wooden gate, which is stuck. It is so swollen from all the rain that the bottom is sticking. Getting through this gate looks like the DEA making a drug bust because you have to kick the bottom of it as hard as you can while somehow managing not to fall over.

Once we get in the car, I go into lecture mode, which makes them both so mad they get out of the car without a word. I'm pulling away as Surfer Dude comes running frantically back. Today he is student of the day and he's forgotten all of his stuff to put in the display case. The kids get to bring all their treasures from home and show them off to the other students. Not only has he forgotten his stuff, he's forgotten to even put it together. And the two Parents Of The Year have forgotten it too. I race back home (coming in the front door this time and avoiding the gate) and the Film Geek and I go into hyperdrive to collect anything we think he might consider a treasure. My husband hops back in the car and zips back to school to set up the display case. He gets back home and we both plop our already weary selves down.

Come to think of it, summer is looking pretty good.

Dirty Dancing (with Extended Features)

Last week my friend Stacey had some very exciting news. She had found out that Dirty Dancing was going to be in a theater near us for two nights. Stacey is one of the women I talked about in the chick flick piece who can quote huge chunks of the movie off the top of her head. My friend Laurie is another. To look at the three of us this wouldn’t be the obsession movie you’d think of. The Terminator, maybe, or Psycho. Maybe even Aliens. But not Dirty Dancing. I have the movie on DVD, but the thought of seeing it on a big screen as part of an audience was thrilling. And there were even extended scenes thrown in, too! Not that we really thought anyone else would be there. How many wackos like us could there be, anyway?

To say we were excited is to damn us with faint praise. We arranged our schedules and child care. We put our husbands on alert. We stocked up on Jujubes. We were pathetic we were so excited. The day we were set to go was this past Tuesday, and it was a rough day all around. On my end I had two kids come home with end of the semester projects that had been put off and were due the next day. They both had to be done partially on-line and my internet crashed. I still had my leg of the soccer carpool to drive. I seriously thought about bailing, but I just couldn’t. I didn’t want to let my friends down and I also really wanted to go. So we went, leaving the Film Geek to wrangle with homework and Laurie’s husband John to deal with their kids and Stacey’s kids, since her husband was out of town. We pulled into the theater parking lot feeling giddy with anticipation.

It was sold out. Not a ticket to be had. The harassed guy in the ticket booth was repeating himself incessantly as every group approaching the booth wanted tickets for this movie. This complex has thirty theaters, and everyone wanted seats in this one. Not only was the single show tonight sold out, but the one show the next night was already sold out as well. It was a toss-up as to which one of us cried first, and we wouldn’t have been alone. The sidewalk was filled with knots of women who all looked a little weepy. Every now and then a group would arrive and go to the will call booth to pick up the tickets they had ordered on-line. You can only imagine the hostility we tossed their way. Laurie went in and tried to sweet talk the manager while Stacey and I stayed outside trying to scam some tickets somehow. We considered holding up a little sign that stated our willingness to be scalped. We thought about buying tickets for another movie and then sneaking in. We watched as people gave up and left. We were waiting for a miracle.

We didn’t get it. As the rain started pounding, we climbed back in the car for the thirty minute drive back. I called home to have the Film Geek check to see if it was playing anywhere else. It was. And the only show had started six minutes ago. We were silent until Stacey said “$&*%%!, I HAVE to see this movie tonight. I just have to!!” Well, as fate would have it, my sweet husband had gotten me a new DVD copy (with extended features) as a surprise for getting through my killer class last weekend. He had the movie in one hand and tulips in the other. What a guy. You know what the wife of the year’s response was? “How much did you spend on that??” were, I believe, my exact words. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Twenty year old movies don’t cost much.” So Stacey suggested getting my DVD and taking it back to her house, where she had the theater surround system and ginormous screen. We had a Plan B.

Laurie called John to tell him about the change of plans. He couldn’t believe the show had been sold out. He asked if they had put a car chase or something in the middle to make it interesting. He actually called us freaks for being so upset. We were all yelling at him at once while Laurie held the phone up in the air. She told him he looked pretty bad, since my sweet husband had come through with the DVD and here he was just laughing at us and calling us names. We said a lot of things I can’t repeat on a family blog. He won’t be walking down a dark alley in front of us anytime soon.

We got the movie, picked up some take-out and headed back to Stacey’s. We plopped on her couch with food in laps and got comfortable. It’s Showtime…

The movie was fabulous and cheesy, like it is every single time I watch it. We recited great chunks of dialogue along with the characters and jeered at the people we didn’t like. We let the world know (loudly and in unison) that nobody puts Baby in the corner. And at the end, at the start of the great pay-off dance scene, we all had tears in our eyes and goose bumps on our bodies. Just like always. It was perfect, even if it wasn’t in a theater and on a big screen.

Until…

When the movie was over Stacey asked where all the extra scenes had been. Good question, since they obviously weren’t in what we had just watched. I said maybe they were on the second “Extras” disc. We all thought that was the answer, so we looked for them. They weren’t there. There was a moment of silence, before Stacey, in her Baltimore brogue, said “Hon, where exactly did your husband get this disc?” The upshot, of course, is that it wasn’t the new, commemorative version with the extended scenes. It was the old version that he had gotten at Half Price Books, with not an extended scene in sight. Straight off the clearance rack, so to speak. Now, all of a sudden, scorn was being heaped on the Film Geek’s head. “Wait a cotton pickin’minute,” I said. “Why is my husband turning into the schmuck here?” It was a valid and logical point, if I do say so myself, and the overheated ladies calmed down a tad. Women with husbands in the dog house or on business trips should never watch Patrick Swayze dance shirtless. It messes with the wiring in your brain somehow. I know it messes with mine, and I don’t even particularly like Patrick Swayze. Except in this movie, of course.

We can only hope that this movie goes back into some kind of re-release, if only briefly. This time you can bet we’ll buy our tickets in advance. Those extended features are hanging over our heads.

A Cast of (real) Characters

A couple of months ago I got the idea to start this project. Now, you can easily take what I know about blogging and fit it on the end of a knitting needle, so I decided to get an expert opinion. Enter my internet savvy husband. His immediate response was how careful you have to be in cyberspace to not give out any specific information about your life. You know, things that could lead to all sorts of unpleasantness and allow undesirable characters into your reality. (More undesirable than the ones I’m inviting in, anyway).

Considering the amount of time he spends each day catching up with his must read blogs, I figured this must be something he was on solid ground about. So in the interest of cyber safety (and to jazz things up a little bit), I’d like to introduce you all to my cyber family. The names have been changed, but you’ll recognize them, perhaps too well.

First off is my husband. Let’s just call him The Film Geek, because he is. And he knows it. The master of all matters cinematic, digital, or electronic, with total recall for every song lyric he’s ever heard, yet shockingly unable to locate his own wallet on a regular basis. Don’t get me started on his keys.


Next is the eldest, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Sasquatch. Shambling, short-tempered and caring about not much beyond his next meal and some pocket money. Don’t put your fingers in the cage, kids! It’s a teenager! And he bites!

Following on his heels is Gumby. This is the boy who looks like the character in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory who ends up on the stretching machine until he’s ten feet tall and weighs 47 pounds. The child never stops eating, but no one believes me. For thrills he sometimes lifts up his shirt at school and dares people to count his ribs. And they can.

Much of the household comic relief starts (and often ends) in the mouth of our youngest, Surfer Dude. Born with an impeccable sense of timing and the scruples of a celebrity photographer, he has an uncanny ability to say exactly the wrong thing at exactly the right time.

See, I knew you’d recognize them!