11D

Weekend Journal

We're busy checking off items from "Things We Must Do Before Summer Is Over" list. We're having a hard time getting Yankee tickets, so we headed down the shore instead.

Weekend Journal

You spend half your life saving up to buy a house. Then you spend the rest of your life working to keeping the house from falling down. 

Weekend Journal

Earlier in the summer, Steve and I made a list of fun things that we had to do this summer. Looking over the list, many of the items weren't necessarily my kind of fun. But the law frowns on bringing the kids along to bars on Bleeker Street, and I haven't yet convinced the children that an afternoon of antiquing followed by a nice salad of arugula and walnuts is a rip roaring good time, so compromises were made.

Today, we crossed one item off the summer fun list. We went to a killer water park.

Mr. Tired

Weekend Journal

What are the three best parts of being a professor? June, July, and August.

It's an old saw, but it is true. To a point. If you don't really organize yourself, that time can fly by and you return to the classroom in September with the queasy feeling of wasted time.

I submitted grades four weeks ago. I needed two weeks to recover my mental health. Then I needed two weeks to catch up on the housewifey stuff that piles up during the semester - scheduling doctor's appointments, sorting through clothes, scrubbing the bathroom. Still, I have two months until my next lecture. What's happening with that time?

Garden Party

Lots of good personal posts about gardens lately. Like Wendy, I'm planning on rubbing out the suburban green puff balls in front of the house. I'm too chicken to pull out all of the shrubbery in one shot. I can't quite bring myself to do a Godfather-like rub out of all the bushes at one time, so instead I'm using a silencer on one shrub at a time. Here are some pictures of the green things in our yard.

Midweek Journal

As I served up a round of Eggo Waffles for the kids, I treated them to my version of the songs from Singing in the Rain. Usually, I go with the Oklahoma catalog in the morning, but the Singing in the Rain songs offer the opportunity for a little tap dance as well. I was in the mood for some Gene Kelly action.

This was too much for Ian, who can barely handle "The Farmer and The Cowman Should Be Friends" on a good day. So, as I sang "Broadway Rhythm" and danced, Ian chased me around the house trying to give me a karate kick.

Jonah watched on amused and embarrassed. Maybe I should sing it to him when he and his friends get off the school bus today. I am really looking forward to embarrassing the crap out of him when he's a teenager.

Weekend Journal, Part 2

Jonah had his first sleepover party on Saturday night. We kept it simple. Just four of his friends -- Hyper, Bored, Squeaky, and Moose. They arrived at 6. We had pizza ready for them. Steve walked them over to Friendly's for an ice-cream. There was a game of kickball in the street and the first Indiana Jones movie waiting for them.

Weekend Journal, Part 1

Jonah turned nine today.

PMS and Soft Deadlines

I spent the first hour of the prime working part of my day being neurotic. The books are stacked up for my summer writing project. I have to sit on the porch and plow through them, but I don't have the pressure of a conference deadline to force me to get it done. I've got a very soft deadline of the end of the summer or so. I should never have vague deadlines like that. It just opens the door for major procrastination.

After the kids went off to school, I worried about their various bumps in the road. I tried to go to the gym to work off the bad energy, but I didn't have the attention span for it. PMS has to be fueling these neurotic fits.

Thank God I have a job, because I don't have the freedom to be neurotic during the school year. It's probably best for my kids, too.