Day off

I am dealing with the fact that I am still the worst mom ever…well, maybe not Ever, as most studies these days are showing the inability of parents today to tell their children ‘NO’ and mean it.

The Bitsy has been walking around with the container of cookie dough that The Mom bought while she was here for Christmas, beating on it like a drum, even though I have continually told her that she Could Not have any until after lunch.

I come back into the kitchen to find her grabbing a spoon from the drawer and give in to one spoonful.

Which prompts Mr. Boo to come out complaining that the Bits gets cookie dough.

Which prompts me to explain that I am the worst mom ever, but I have given in because the Bits, yesterday morning, had a tonsillectomy/adenoidectomy and therefore, getting some form of food into her is just slightly more important than worrying about what Kind of food she’s getting into her.  (She’s gonna milk this for all it’s worth.  She is my daughter, after all.)

Yes.  We got up yesterday in the -15 cold to get to the ‘hospital’ at 6:15am for 7:15am surgery.  By 9:00am, I was in the recovery room where we watched “Lion King” and ate a cup of ice and three freeze pops before being discharged.

After driving around to find all of the medicines the Bits will need and procuring Chicken with Stars soup, freeze pops (because I had obtained sherbet and ice cream and hadn’t even Thought about freeze pops), and Princess fruit snacks (because if you want Princess fruit snacks and you just had your tonsils out, you get Princess fruit snacks), we head back to the house, where the Bits immediately threw up and then proceeded to eat three bites of Chicken with Stars soup and decided that she would rather eat Sun Chips and parts of my hot dog.  (After having a bite of the soup?  Good God.  I Loved that stuff as a kid.  Progresso is SO worth an extra buck.  Oi.)

So today is a stay home with both urchins day that has so far consisted of my super-special french toast (that was requested by the Bits, and then exactly two squares were eaten and the rest went to the evil rat mutt), doing puzzles on-line (my newest ‘this can’t be bad for the urchins, as it’s Puzzles, Right?), doing dishes and debating whether to take a shower and how to get Mr. Boo away from the television.

Fairly exciting stuff.

I’m having some issues getting back into the swing of things at work, as apparently once the adrenaline of working too much with too much stuff to possibly accomplish wears off, I go back to the inherently lazy self and have a hard time motivating myself to do even the most basic work, let alone taking the opportunity to try to get myself ahead.  Taking yesterday and today off just reinforces the fact that there needs to be Someone in that company that has a clue of what I do and can handle my job in my absence.  Because I gotta tell ya…The losing of who knows how much vacation time last year isn’t going to carry over into 2008.  I will not be guilted into not taking time off just because no one else can do my job.

Just sayin’.

*****

Did you know that on a porch with no heat that, when the temperature falls to fifteen below zero, cans of Diet Coke EXPLODE?

I knew that, below freezing, cans of Dew would burst (generally right at the tab) and made a relative mess in one’s car.

However, yesterday I went out to the porch to bring in a bottle of water so that it would thaw and was wondering why there were pellets of ice on the floor.  I figured it was from the disposing of the Christmas tree until I walked over to the case of water and noticed more.  And the fact that it looked dirty.  And the fact that there was a Ton.

And then, in that surreal moment of the brain working overtime to process stuff that it’s not accustomed to (or the fact that I’m getting old), I put one and one and one and one together and realized that there were two cans of Diet Coke by each other with the bottoms nearby.  And one can of Diet Coke that looked like some kid had set off a firecracker in it.  And then I noticed the frozen slush on the coffee table.  And the couch.  And the plastic bins with summer clothes in them that I haven’t managed to get downstairs yet.

And the ceiling.

(Don’t tell me that I wasn’t going for a math minor and can’t put all those things together to come up with an answer!)

I haven’t quite been able to muster the strength to go out there and tackle that particular clean-up at this point.

But I’d better come up with something before it hits 40 tomorrow.

*****

And on that note, I have a Bits with a freeze pop on my lap who is whimpering (more for attention as opposed to true pain, I Think) and a boy who needs to be removed from the tv, so I’d better go start playing mom again.

Rah.

ak

Ok, Ok!!!

I hereby interrupt my game of Chuzzle (which interrupted my game of jigsaw puzzles, which interrupted dishes, which interrupted laundry, which has yet to interfere with sweeping and other general cleaning which hasn’t been started after going to church and stopping by the office and going to Target and…)

Whew.

That’s pretty  much been the story of life.

How long has it been?

Damn.

Oct. 22nd.

Wow.

Let’s see.

Nothing much has changed, with the exception that I’m fairly over the horrific cough (but not totally the sinus crap).

I spent most of November and December working six days a week, just to allow myself some sleep and loss of panic attacks.  At the peak, there were 495 outstanding catalog orders (mostly unfilled) from the Major Department Store/Catalog account.  This did not include the Other catalog accounts, nor the thorn-in-my-side little tiny account from the southwest that felt like since They could turn these items around in a couple of days themselves, then why couldn’t We??  (Ahem. If you can do it, then Do It and leave me Alone!)

I could be in a much better position if our finishers hadn’t decided to go ahead and close between Christmas and New Year’s (although it did give me an excuse to just calm down, as I couldn’t affect anything, anyway), and now we’re just finishing up inventory, (which is just another reason why I may Never get caught up), so the orders are again stacking up.

I still love the VP, but I can’t seem to take the time to teach other people (who are supposedly going to be helping me) How to help me, as I’m spending most of my time trying to appease folks who are wondering why they aren’t receiving their orders in four weeks, (let alone the seven days that are promised) and the special orders aren’t shipping in the six week lead time (that the reps are telling four weeks, if not less) and it just won’t seem to STOP.

I did manage to take the second off to get a two-hour massage (I may never get another one-hour massage again, although the therapist commented, “You’re sore Everywhere!”  Yes.  You had a point?) and get a filter for the humidifier that I have asked the Ba to pick up for weeks and took the Critterbug to the ENT to find out that we will be having surgery for removal of tonsils and adenoids on Jan 24 (which I have now been fretting about, as to whether it’s Really Necessary, although her tonsils are basically touching).  Add a cut and color…The color I appreciate.  The cut I am less than thrilled with, so I supposed it’s time to grow it out into the adorable Katie bob that the stylist was sporting, just in time for it to be Out.

Mom has come and gone.  The Ba has been out of town all week, prompting me to be at the end of my rope with two urchins who are beginning to press all the wrong buttons.

As I stated, the house is a disaster, as Christmas was a total success.  So there is constant changing of the toy selection, as well as where those toys will show up.  And I have yet to be able to teach the urchins the importance of cleaning up one area before attacking a new set of chaos.

There are only so many times I can clean (as you know how I feel about that) and with the Ba being gone, there have been approximately four thousand loads of dishes to wash.  (those of you who no longer have to wash tippy cups, you may thank whatever diety you feel like.  Cuz, Really.)

I’m doing my best to keep up the appearance of getting myself together (forced by the chaos at work), so the tree is still up (with lights that I really want to take down today), but all the ornaments were packed away on New Year’s Day and one bin in the too-full storage closet is empty and removed.  The built-ins are organized (for my tastes), although I still haven’t actually thrown anything away.

I need to attack my closets again, (as I am in a disposing mood and we all know that’s the only time to actually go through closets), but considering I need to finish thank you notes for the urchins, transfer my inventory to the sheets that I forgot to bring home and had to go pick up after church, go to the club to bitch about swimming lessons which we apparently Again are not signed up for even though we’ve been taking them for five years and the woman running them is a Complete idiot, take out the trash and get the cans to the curb for trash day tomorrow, finish the laundry…And clean the house.

And you people wonder why I don’t write here anymore?

I’m planning on doing my normal resolution of getting together with folks I haven’t seen for a year again.  So Logic and Lap?  Stop commenting and let’s find a date to get together!!!  I’m trying to fit in Mitzi this week, although I have to go to a kindergarten immersion meeting on Tuesday.  I’ve waffled back and forth, from Definitely doing it to definitely Not doing it, so I figure I’d better at least go and hear what they have to say.  I’m again pretty much leaning towards not doing it under the guise that it’s just the latest yuppie fad, so unless they come up with some serious information to persuade me, I’ll just be bucking the trend, hurrah.

Both urchins keep going back and forth from being the best children on the planet to the worst.  Mr. Boo is in serious defiant mode as of late and is Way too into Cartoon Network.  So I’ve taken away cartoons today (although I did cave and let him watch some Tom & Jerry just now).  Bitsy is suddenly in terrible two stage and is falling into crying/screaming fits for no apparent reason.  I think they’re both tired and haven’t gotten around to getting back into their school routine yet.  Mr. Boo has been putting himself to bed by 7:30 every night for the past week.  It’s quite lovely.  (Except Bitsy doesn’t like going to bed that early, so she wanders around until after 8:00, helping me with my ‘homework’.)

Bossie-poo came through with a bonus, so I bought myself a new camera, which I totally hate.  The old camera took the world’s best pictures and although I researched and researched and went with the world favorite Canon Powershot S3, I have to take a magnificent picture.  Every single one seems to be slightly blurry and it’s Killing me.  I want a camera that I can point and shoot, but can fiddle with if I feel like it.  And there’s a part of me that’s wondering if it’s the Camera, or if I need to actually take a class to figure out what I’m doing wrong.  I don’t care if I need some help taking magnificent pictures, but I would think that if the thing is on auto, it should take as good pictures as my old camera.  (Even after it was dropped, SIGH)

I’m sure more Really, Very, Exciting Stuff has happened over the past two months, but that’s just going to have to do for now.  I’d like to say I’ll be here more often, but given that I have yet to catch up, I tend to spend work doing Work.  Whether it was the lack of working out or the fact that lunch (when I made time for it) was so rushed, I lost three pounds during December.  I’m thinking it’s just not working out, as nothing fits any differently than it has and the weight seems to be back in line now.  Whatever.

If I can manage to slow things down a bit, I will do my best to spend the lunch hour popping in here. 

We’ll just see.

So nice to see you popping in, though.  I do think about everyone and even managed to find some time to do some reading.  (Nice to know that you’re back, Lap!  And to know where you are now, Lisele!  Now I can get over to see what you’ve been up to!)

In the meantime, know that things are plugging along and that I’ve just been taking my job Way too seriously and will do my best to fix that as soon as possible. 

Now it’s off for more laundry, taking out the trash and keeping myself from beating the urchins!

ak