thursday in things

watching my amazon.com shopping cart is more gripping than the final of american idol (which i havent watch since Clay Aiken was robbed (ROBBED i tell you!) of his crown and sash. the contents shift in price and go in and out of stock so many times.... it's fascinating and maddening all at the same time.

i ache. not for anything in particular, i just ache.

the smell of chicken noodle soup in the morning is the reason i cannot ever have a baby again... it regurgitates awful memories of morning sickness and terrible aversions to smells. but Sam always wants soup to take for lunch and it is the reason our family simply cannot grow. sob.

oh man. why does my coffee taste like fricking lavender today? WHY?

and as usual, my cats smell like they've been chainsmoking woodbines. my sense of smell drives me absolutely nuts somedays......

pics from yesterday... i pretended to be a mother of three for the day and i survived! but did not have enough energy to left blog....



dear cape cod, i miss you

foolproof ways to win a mommy's heart on mother's day

stop by Jo Malone (second floor, South Coast Plaza) for her orange blossom perfume
... or nutmeg and ginger
... or red roses
... or grapefruit
... or sweet lime and cedar
basically anything at all... it's all that good in Jo Malone :)

a perfect little seashell charm chosen very carefully, while Mummy wasn't watching, in a little souvenir shop in Cape Cod (sentimental value=priceless)

any kind of card/letter with spelling mistakes, stick figure people and huge badly drawn hearts in it

brownies (mommies are easily pleased... but always use eggs, never eggbeaters :)

susie's red velvet cupcakes are perfectly acceptable too if you only have eggbeaters....

blueberry pancakes at Norma's, the Parker Palm Springs. they always give me champagne, i never drink it

listening to Frank Sinatra on the car ride there, with no questions from the back row

finding a dusty open road and convincing little boys in western shirts to pose for Mummy

putting a new camera into her hands at that very moment :)

stopping by the Crate and Barrel outlet on the ride home to pick out pointless kitchen tchotchkes

letting Mummy watch anything she likes - that means Dr Phil and NO EYE-ROLLING - that day ;)

it's that easy.........................

i love..........

the house being completely still and silent except for a quiet new song, freshly downloaded, playing on repeat

the cooler days here that are warm enough that you still don't need socks

the boys' little herb/vegetable garden

waiting for my hubbie to come home with whatever dinner he chooses (... he always chooses right)

i love how my boys' eyes are the colors of the ocean - so beautiful and pure and an endless source of photoshopping zen

the huge tight hug Sam gave me for buying him Hotel for Dogs on the day it was released

the stillness that will fall over the house when the boys watch it tonight :)

laying with my head on Aaron's chest at the end of a busy day

finding a new place to hang out with the boys and take pictures

dogs and dinosaurs and snakes (and poop)

Romeo is sitting beside me salivating like a pavlov's dog. his tail is wagging at 100mph watching me eat a very burnt piece of french bread. i am sorry but i cannot possibly share... i just held this mofo up to the flames almost torching my arm to get it this black. grrr.... ohhhhhh ok then!! urgh, i think he has me trained to give up the food when he drools :|

speaking of dogs... why do men always insist on driving on the freeway with their dogs just standing in the bed of their trucks, ready to catapult out at any moment? do they think dogs actually enjoy it? because they may appear to be smiling but they are actually terrified - dogs smile like that to ease their stress not because they are having the time of their lives! do they realize that even the smartest dog is only as smart as the dumbest toddler? would they put a dumb toddler in the back of their truck? do they think it makes them macho and rusticated and cowboy-esque? well i have a bone to pick with the real men of Orange County - you can't be a tough guy hardass, if you wax your chest, cry at the Holiday and bawl into your soy macciatto if the barista messes it up... argh, help me, i am in HELL!

we just returned from an emergency visit to Build-A-Bear, or Make-a-Polar-Bear as Danny calls it :) his T Rex refused to roar so we had to take him for a new voicebox. the nice lady put a brand new one in AND gave Mister T.Rex's friend, Mister Snake (the bad influence) a voice too! aww, and he wasn't even from Build A Bear so she had to do some vigorous nipping and tucking to get it in (snakes are too slender for implants) but now Mister Snake has been renamed Crawlie and hisses as he pounces! all the excitement was too much for Mr T.Rex and Crawlie and they ran outside to take an imaginary poop in the bushes :)

tuesday

i have vertigo. wicked vertigo in fact, that makes walking to the kitchen for another cup of coffee almost impossible (almost). i'm not even that tall, i just don't understand it...

yesterday in starbucks, i noticed they keep sea salt behind the counter... after pondering for hours about it, i realized salted caramel is most likely just caramel with salt on it... and here i was looking for salted caramel recipes for the past 2 weeks :|

i hate hibiscus flowers with a passion. when i see little boys (and big boys) dressed in hibiscus patterns, it makes me so sad for them because i just know their mommy really wanted a girl and the hibiscus pattern is her getting her own back for not having a little girl to dress up :(

why are 4 year old boys obsessed with poop, farts and butts? i am assuming it's just a boy thing? i've never seen a little girl insisting you check out her big snakelike poop, announcing the fart before it happens in a fancy restaurant or mooning her parents. i'm not complaining, just saying....

must get some aleve and gummivites before another day in paradise officially begins. gummivites can cure vertigo, right???

rebel without a cause

i can't follow recipes, they bore me to death. so i improvise the hell out of them, using whatever i find in the pantry and change out things that sound gross, like crisco, for yummy butter and instead of walnuts, another handful of m&ms and a scoop of peanut butter for extra creaminess. i figure my inability to follow recipes stems from the typical 30something mid-life crisis that every woman around me seems to be suffering through. never one to never pierce my nose, nor tattoo a bible-reading owl on my lower back, my attempt to shock others is refusing to use a cup to measure out flour and making recipe 'mash-ups' of lyonnaise potatoes with an au gratin sauce. it's easier than stressing out about trying to wash bright blue bad idea streaks out of my hair too :)

i am worried that Danny is in training to become a serial killer. he has a toy snake... they are thick as thieves and go everywhere together. and do you know what that snake was plotting to do with Danny today? go hunting and catch and eat a toy cat! i once saw on Dr Phil that some little kid killed the family's puppy and was sent straight to the loony bin after being branded a future serial killer by the good doc. must arrange to wash mister snake and mysteriously 'lose' him.... he is a very bad influence on my son

we sat next to the most fascinating/terrifying Spanglish family yesterday in mcdonalds (yes i am obsessed with their french fries). the woman took hooooours to order her food in an attempt to avoid bad things (it's mcdonalds, lady...) then freaked out when the soda machine had no sugar free drinks for her organic children, shrieking "they'll be wild if we give them sugar, honey!!" to her beaten-down husband. then she had a total fit when her kids dared to touch their food without going through a 5 step hand washing process. my husband is SO LUCKY i am me, that is all i can say ;) (right??? right!)

at target with mister snake

hanging out in starbucks


he takes hanging out literally

this is what kind of day tomorrow is :)

monday whys

why does this blog thing never ever remember me...? even when i say 'remember me'...? over and over and over i check that box. sob, i feel so insignificant and instantly forgettable

why won't my garden grow? i am giving up on impatiens and simply throwing down wildflowers and walking away, completely carefree (she lied). the cashier in target said a trained monkey can grow wildflowers, they are so easy. and i KNOW i am smarter than a trained monkey, i know i am!

and why do i find museums so deathly boring? the natural history museum was by far, bar none, the worst museum ever. since the Getty. i know people love these places... but i cannot for the life of me see what's to love.... they are SO DULL, restrictive and schooltrippy... counting parquet tiles for 3 hours is NOT what i call a fun day out

on the other hand... the california science center was completely awesome! and completely free... but we of course gave a generous donation :) you could build an earthquake-proof house and shake it to bits in a pretend earthquake. they had en entire CSI exhibit complete with the little miniature sets that the 'i've got a pain in my sawdust' girlie built. you could pretend to be a corpse being examined by Grissom (now that's HOT!). and this museum even had a mcdonald's... chicken soup for the museum-hating parent's soul.

back with pics...... you know i got some of my very favorite miniature - Sara Sidle car crash, right?

there's only one thing more grim than museums... and that's museums with zero natural light


he flatly refused to pet the Tricewatops after waiting 30 minutes for it to arrive

random thoughts

must must must must must buy soup tomorrow at costco. MUST.

fffee0 not ffeee0 - no, fffee0 fffee0 (doesn't everyone have photoshop color codes permantely adhered to their brain?)

is it even humanly possible to have real breakfast, vacuum, mop, dust and get to the Natural History Museum by 9:30am?

why does Mimi's serve carrot cake before dinner? it makes absolutely no sense (so i wrap it up and take it home to eat later with coffee)

must send my letter to George Michael... Elton is quitting Caesars in Vegas and sooooo i want him to take over his slot...

i've played automatic for the people by REM 250,000 times in the past 17 years and i still absolutely love it more than any album ever made (and predict i will forever more). it's like peace potion/aleve/diet coke/big sur/cool breezes/great moments with Mr Obama in musical form

i wonder what happened in the end of slumdog millionaire.......


scenes from a random kind of day
planting fennel, pumpkins, onions and peas (the perfect meal:)

he swam - even though it was a frosty 66 degrees

sam's award assembly yesterday
we're petsitting

we made the world's best jelly donuts today (i am not even slightly kidding) out of cans of biscuit dough and a cupcake frosting thingie, who knew.... )

marching his pb&j soldiers

pop-ups

ohhhhh mannn! i wanted to take Danny to the natural history museum tomorrow but as i feverishly opened the site to check it out, some message popped up and, me being me, i didn't read it - i just immediately closed it. but as it disappeared i read the words 'closed' and 'tomorrow'.... so i looked everywhere on the site to find out if it IS closed tomorrow and not some random day such as 20 november 2008, but there is not another word about it. and can i get that pop-up to pop back up? no i cannot.

but for some mysterious reason, an advertisement enticing me to buy a $5.5 million house at the Montage in Laguna Beach popped up instead. "seven stickley place" - i don't like that address... so i am not buying it :)

after the dinosaur museum (if i ever find out when it is open/closed) i want to go to PINK'S! i've never been and i LOVE hotdogs! but i checked their menu and i am outraged at how expensive their hotdogs are! in New York effing City one can get 2 hotdogs and be served by multinational chefs from around the world all for $1.50!! but at Pink's the cheapest hotdog is $3.10! all i can say is... it BETTER be good!

duran duran are performing at the OC fair this summer! now i used to love duran duran and was duranie 21063 for many years but now i am old. very old. and the thought of spending $100 on tickets is making me think twice. especially since the fair is full of 'fair' people with their sizzling tattooed skin and almost torn earlobes, carrying plastic cups of beer. that $100 would buy filet mignon at Ruth's Chris in a perfectly serene leather booth with my honey - yup, i'm that old (blush)

back later..............

it's a hoot and a half

all the things i love most - tattoos, owls and discreet religious messages - in one terrifying fascinating can't-look-away place


i have been trying to make head-or-tail of the above picture for a long time. is this someone's front or back? if it's their front (as the collarbone suggests)... where are their nipples?

today it was 55 bonechilling degrees cold. of course it had to be freezing today after days on end of 95 degree weather, because today we were going to Disneyland to play in the sprinklers : instead we rode the mad hatter's tea party, ate some nutritious pink cotton candy and hung out with some wonderful friends. inclement weather, you are NOT the boss of me!



this is Danny the boy, standing in front of Danny the horse. apparently you cannot pet or talk to Danny the horse because he is on a break so don't even THINK about touching him. so says the very crabby owner of the hand on the left, who Danny the boy was terrified of ;)

Monsters Inc - their first time being allowed to ride together as 'big kids' :)

Danny's friend - they've been friends since they were in diapers :)

wednesday in pixels

this will be his kindergarten - someday, but not this year :)

our old license plate

he is so so so handsome

yawn

dear facebook's 2 bazillion members - if your facebook status update takes longer to think up than read/write, imagine how much duller your next update will be with that chunk of your life gone, devoted to looking up meaningful quotes to share with others. sigh. status updates should be word burps and nothing more... word vomits are not as fun/funny

tomorrow we are going to disneyland. in the baking hot sun. it's spring break for half the country i am sure. we are absolutely nuts. but it's actually only supposed to be 71 degrees and we can park forever at downtown disney for free - why not? cotton candy is technically slimming, at 113 calories per serving (and 3 servings per huge pink cloud, so worst case scenario 336:)

i love white house custom color and believe they could take over the world. but i hate the templates they use. oh gawd, i don't just hate them... they are so ugly i want to HEAVE the lining of my stomach up when i look at them. they are soooo square state and ugly and lame and... shit. it's the only word that works. they remind me of quacker factory long dresses, boys with bad haircuts in polo shirts and men with ill-fitting suits going to church in ford windstars via cracker barrel. please do better, whcc! on the coasts we are all contemporary, fabulous, tanned, awesome and we don't do ovals and sepia tones, nor flocked prints and scruffy borders.

i wrote myself a note excusing myself from the 1pm walk today to let my heels heal, they are bleeding and ripped to shreds by walking 7.5 miles yesterday. so i'm going to garden with Danny, make twice baked potatoes for dinner and pick up Sam in the car with McDonald's sundaes.... but, boy do i feel guilty skipping the walk (even though i have a note)

our day so far...

help me!!

i'm stuck in a red box vicious circle and i cannot get out! my kids LOVE the red box (i sure wish it was more of a big red box than a vending machine - think of the fun picture ops and free advertising they're missing out on). they can use the machine themselves with their big sticky paws and we cannot - simply CANNOT - return a DVD without renting another one : and i am me - i cannot keep anything and get 'fined' $1 for keeping it an extra night so we return a DVD every single day. red box people - you are tricky (but seriously big red boxes would be so much cuter :)

my mission for the day (i have no option but to accept it) is to find dollar coins for Sam. he is the king of wild goose chases and seeing me scramble (i always scramble, i love him to pieces). a while ago it was to find a miniature South West jet. before that a very rare out of print book on JFK (that i found for a dollar and he is actually reading it all by himself!!) today dollar coins : i have walked to Albertsons, the post office, CVS, Sprouts so far this morning : no dollar coins. next round is McDonalds, Big Lots (eww i know) and another post office - this one with stamp vending machine that everyone assures me will yield more dollar coins in my change than i'll know what to do with. you watch... it will give quarters : and if i wanted quarters for laundry purposes, it would give dimes. that's my life in a nutshell. but i'm not complaining (she lied)

back later with pictures and more gripping details about the dollar coin search.....

tuesday

it's 'turn off the tv' week at school. so they have given us a list of stuff we can do to dull the pain - tonight it's bingo night :| last night they wanted everyone to watch a movie - but... isn't that tv? i am no stickler for rules (especially entirely pointless ones about living tv-less) but doesn't watching a movie involve turning ON the tv???!

our pool is officially closed for the evening. so say all the signs stuck on the sliding doors in Sam's best handwriting :) also:

• do not jump
• no nude people!
• don't pee in it
• don't drink the water
• don't put sharp things in it
• be kind to the other people
• no spiting (his spelling NOT mine:)
• do not put leavs in it
• NO CRING (exclamation points and sad face)
• enjoy (exclamation points and happy face)

i love that boy!

oh dear oh dear. i just read that some people actually put black beans in their brownies??? that is WRONG to the power of 10! but in all fairness, i bet these are the same people who enjoy farmers markets and whole foods, so clearly we are from different planets. i am sure black beans are good for you or whatever, but the very thought of them cancels out the desire for chocolate! and some other person says apple sauce makes them 'yummy and healthy'. healthy, maybe... but deeply fudgy and delicious, i just refuse to believe :| i've tried the no pudge brownies - i much prefer the stodgy ones that leave your teeth imprint in them :|

and that.... is why i walk!!!!!!!! off to shower and catch up on some housewives :)

our afternoon