Choices, choices . . .

Oops!

I did it again. I saw a mom walk into the gym during my son's basketball game and noticed she was carrying a baby. I had seen her a couple times this fall and noticed she had put on some weight. Putting 2 and 2 together, I assumed the weight gain was due to pregnancy and that the baby was hers.

That's when I said it. "Hi! Look at him! I was wondering when your baby was due."

I was informed that the baby was her nephew and she is not pregnant.

Why do I keep doing this?

Glenn Beck

Never heard of him. But his book was funny. It also made me a bit paranoid. That's not funny. Maybe I can't recommend this book.

Transmission

How many times can one person read the Harry Potter series? I don't know. I'll have to ask Rachel. BTW, the black glasses are painted on her face!

Her new book love is The Series of Unfortunate Events. Dark humor for grade schoolers. I think she's on her sixth book.

Speaking of unfortunate events, the body shop can't get the van in until Monday and while driving it around town, I think I hear the gears shifting funny and there's an occasional vibrating sound around 30 mph. Is this a result of the dear deer impact or an unfortunate coincidence? I'll keep you posted.

Over the River

. . . through the woods, two barren fields, and across the ditch and into oncoming traffic. Poor Bambi.

"Not Bambi," said Mr. Rellim, "Bambi's mother."

"Not Bambi," said the police officer, "Bambi's pregnant mother."

The police officer asked that I sit in his vehicle while he wrote up the incident report using a computer with many drop-down lists for filling in the blanks. Among many other things, he asked, "How would you describe yourself? Normal?"

"What are the choices?" I asked.

He didn't laugh.

I tried not to laugh as he struggled to transform his arm rest into a printer. It was my first ride in a police cruiser. I wanted to remain in the front.

Oh, Happy Day!

Happy Easter!

We celebrated the resurrection a bit early at a worship service this evening. The next few weeks we will be studying fear and how with Jesus they can be conquered. We were invited to write our biggest fear on a card. My son wrote about his fear of an animated Disney character and "girls (not my mom) sometimes."

Double Digits

Quinn is proud to be ten years old. He missed St. Patrick's Day as a birthday by a few hours. Here he is ready to eat homemade chocolate molten lava cake. He says that when they studied volcanoes in school that no one told them how much lava tastes like chocolate.

You'll get those information gaps in some classrooms.

Eggstravaganza

Our church hosted an Easter party this afternoon. The grand prize for each grade level was a new bicycle. Mr. I-never-win-anything hauled in a brand new Roadmaster bicycle. On the way home, he said, "Mom, what do you think of my new Roadmasher?"

Basketball

Quinn's third and fourth grade team made almost three baskets tonight. WOO HOO! At one point, Quinn dove for a missed pass and fell hard to the floor. The ball bounced out of bounds and the referee asked him if he was OK. Quinn yelled with annoyance, "NOOOO!!!" and then his face said (but thankfully his mouth did not) - Didn't you just watch me fall flat on my shoulder and get my face smashed with the ball??!!

He was fine.

On a lighter note, Saturday at practice the boys were encouraged to get each other's attention with a sound or short word instead of a longer phrase. One boy chose to clap, another to say, "right here!" Quinn decided to make a loud cat-hiss noise. Nice.

When Mama's Away . . .

. . . Daddy puts them to work cleaning the gutters on the house. As I was driving closer to our home, I had one of those "Sound of Music" moments. You know, when the Captain was bringing the Baronness home to meet his children, and he saw them all climbing in the trees lining the road? Well, I saw my two kids marching around all over the roof wielding brooms as weapons. I don't know how much glutter-cleaning was really happening and I think Mr. Rellim was trying to control them by spraying them with the hose.

And still, our neighbors remain.

EWWW!!

Can you see it? There is a short, black hair sealed INSIDE my container of mandarin oranges! I realize this isn't as sensational as the lady who found a finger in her chili, but my story is REAL!

Crying Wolf

I might have believed that she hurt herself when falling off the bed this evening if she hadn't used a red sharpie to create fake bloo d on her toe earlier today, feigning a toe injury. I might have even felt sorry for her if she hadn't been hiding out in her brother's room to avoid doing supper dishes. Quinn said, "Well, Rachel, stupid is as stupid does!"

Ah, thank you, Forrest Gump!

Cabin Fever

Not sure which was more entertaining today - (1)watching my children painstakingly fill out savings deposit slips at the bank, while complaining that the money should be theirs to spend NOW or (2) listening to them test drive each and every whoopie cushion at the new Walgreens store.

Yes, that was me hiding in the other aisle, waiting for it to end.

OK, I decided. The whoopie cushion thing was the funniest.

Witlag

The delay between reception and comprehension of a joke.

This same source notes that gross ignorance is, like, 144 times worse than normal ignorance and that karaoke is a Japanese word for "tone deaf."

Also, in case you haven't heard, gravity is not just a good idea, it's the law!

Forgery

-A new word Quinn learned today when he signed my name to a permission slip because I forgot. Ironically, it was permission to join a special committee that will be teaching others about integrity and tolerance. Quinn just asked if he could get a list of all the laws because, "How was I supposed to know what forgery is?"

UPDATE: His teacher just emailed me about this and told me that if he hadn't spelled my name wrong, she might have missed it. I don't think I'll let him in on that little tidbit.

ISATS

How difficult it is to administer standardized tests to kids with emotional, behavioral and/or learning disabilities. I'd like to see the sample from which the national normative data was taken. Did anyone sit in a room with a third grader, who insisted he was Charmander from Pokemon and could not touch the testing materials for fear that they would catch fire? Did any of those test reviewers listen to cognitively impaired fourth graders with obsessive-compulsive tendencies try to pronounce "onomatopoeia" for three minutes straight? I think not.

The Garter Toss

Mr. Rellim's youngest brother got married yesterday. It was a beautiful ceremony and tremendous celebration. Quinn's attention to detail was markedly improved from the last family wedding, when at the end of the ceremony, he looked my way and whispered, "Mom! Did you see that lady in the big white dress?! What was she doing standing up there?"

Last night, Quinn's questions stemmed from his participation in the garter toss portion of the reception. With a shocked expression and astonishment in his voice, he used his arms to mimic swimming and said, "Mom! Did you see that?! Uncle Marc just . . . well . . . he . . . like . . . went INSIDE Alicia's dress, pulled something out from in there AND THREW IT AT US!!!! Ewwww! Then some guys were fighting over it and . . . and . . . WHAT WAS THAT?!