Rowan and Grier

Well, I'm back from my spring break trip. For the second year in a row my dear friend and I took our children to a water park, leaving our husbands behind to have Chex Mix and bourbon for dinner. We rented a condo in a fabulous water park resort in the Wisconsin Dells which is an entire town in Wisconsin dedicated to indoor and outdoor water parks. I am so totally not kidding about that. The town is the Water park Capital of the World. That title alone should tell you how cheesy the town is and what kind of people it attracts. I'm telling you, all the people in the Midwest who frequent carnivals in the summer spend their spring breaks in the Wisconsin Dells. Although my friend did point out that the place we were staying seemed to have a "higher class clientele" which I think she based on the number of tattoos per body. (First of all, let me just point out that I have a tattoo for those of you that think I am denigrating all the fine people out there with body ink. However, I have ONE tattoo and it is small and cute and I got it when I was sober. I am talking about women with tattoos of Disney characters up and down their calves. Secondly, saying that this water park resort had a higher class of people in it is sort of a backward compliment. It is like saying, "Well, she doesn't sweat much for a fat girl.")

Anyway, our condo had two bedrooms and we decided that we would put the kids in one room and we would sleep in the other. That way the kids could watch Spongebob Squarepants all night and we could do our Bible Study. (I am not kidding you about this. We are both in Bible Studies--different ones---and we brought our Bibles and everything. As it turns out, we read Shape magazine and took naps instead.) Anyway, our room had only one bed so we slept together. I have come to the conclusion that it is much easier to sleep with a woman than it is with my husband. First of all, the first night we were there I woke up at 1:00 a.m. feeling sick. Get this! My friend actually woke up and came out into the living room to see if I was okay. My husband wouldn't have even noticed I was gone. Even when I went into labor in the middle of the night I had a hard time waking him up. I think when I told him my water broke he groggily asked me, "Are you sure?" Okay...the other thing that was so great about sleeping in the same bed with my friend was the pre-sleep conversation. My husband always picks the time right before bed to talk about schedules and bills and stuff like that. Do you know what my friend and I talked about? Celebrity babies. Who has the cuter baby...Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner or Courtney Cox and that freak she married? This conversation went on for about 15 minutes, no kidding. We knew who had kids with whom and what the kid's names are and everything. It was brilliant! My husband never wants to talk about celebrity babies! I am still amazed that we knew enough about celebrity offspring to sustain this conversation for 15 minutes. Plus, we were both very serious about it. Tony would have been like, "What the hell do I care about Brooke Shields kids for? You know their names too? Why?"

In any case, let me tell you that we had enough fun in the Dells to fill at least 5 more blog entries. Next time I will tell you all about the Ripley's Believe It or Not museum which made Bronte say the word "creepy" about five thousand times, Brenna back away from things shaking her head and hands spasmodically like she'd just touched something really disgusting and my friend to say "Believe it or Not....eeeeww!" a few times a day for the remainder of the trip. My friend's son, on the other hand, found the whole museum completely fascinating and wanted a stuffed two-headed cow from the gift shop to commemorate the whole thing. He's a 3rd grader. His 8th grade sister, on the other hand, was just on the look-out for cute boys. I'm telling you, I never had more fun at a museum than I did with this bunch.

Smite me, oh mighty smiter

I know that I have said this before, but today it bears repeating...the problem with organized religion is that it is organized by people. You know why this is a problem? Because people aren't perfect. I know that may come as a shock to those of you who think you're perfect, but we just aren't. Ordinarily this lack of perfection isn't a problem, but for some reason the people who are involved in organized religion are held to a higher standard. I mean, we rarely blink at hypocrisy when it happens within the confines of politics because we expect it. Heck, we don't even really look for examples of hypocrisy in politics because it is so prevalent that it has become the norm. But, those folks who are involved in a church of any kind...well, they are crucified (that just seemed like an appropriate word) when they do anything wrong. Here is the truly shitty part...the first person to throw the proverbial stone is usually someone from within. In other words (and this is hypothetical because we all know that I am above reproach) if I were to, say, mention on my blog that something was happening in my church and this blog was read by one of my friends who is a church member. Now, let's say that this friend mentioned this thing happening in our church to another church member who wanted to know how she got this information. And then, let's pretend that my friend says that she read it on my blog. OK, are you with me so far?
Now, I would never post anything on my blog that I felt was privileged information. But, I do vent a bit about situations. Whatever. It's my blog and I'll vent if I want to.
Back to the hypothetical situation...let's pretend that the church member who finds out that I have a blog and that I posted information about our church on it decides that she doesn't think that is appropriate. Keep in mind that this woman hypothetically knows me and is friendly with me--has been to my house, served on committees with me, etc. So, do you think she would suggest that maybe I might want to not post that kind of stuff on my blog and that she might call me or something and ask me about it? Gosh. What a great idea...go right to the source and nip the old problem right in the bud. But, odds are this person would rather stir up trouble for me and decide I should be reported to the higher-ups in the church. And you know what the really funny part is? I might not have even done anything wrong! Luckily my friend who had actually READ my blog said she wouldn't do that to me and that she would talk to me first. (I mean, that is what she would have done if this were a real situation and not a hypothetical one...)
I have furthermore decided that the reason churches have parking lots is so that people can stand around in them after church functions and gossip and bitch about church stuff. I can't tell you the number of times I have stood, shivering in the church parking lot listening (and, yes, joining in) while someone tells me what the church is doing wrong. The problem with a lot of these people is that they are like people who bitch about the government but don't vote. If you want things to change you need to be proactive! In the church changing things isn't someone else's job...it's YOUR job. The church is the people! The poor, misguided, less-than-perfect people.
Have you ever heard of Euodia and Syntyche? They are mentioned in the Bible, once. Paul writes about them in the book of Philippians. (For those of you who don't know, Philippians is a letter that Paul wrote to the church in Philippi. He wrote to them to thank them for a gift they sent him while he was in prison in Rome. As a matter of fact, Paul wrote this from prison.) Paul mentions these two women because they are members (so to speak) of the church in Philippi who are fighting. Now, how out of control was this fight that Paul would have heard about it when he was in PRISON??! Paul's point was this: Why are the members of the church fighting amongst themselves? Don't we Christians come up against enough opposition? Can't we find enough OTHER people to fight with---do we have to fight within the church too?

All I know is, if I write something on my blog that is my opinion--that's all it is. My opinion. I did rethink that blog entry which said some critical things about some of the past leaders in the church...but not because I thought I was leaking secret information about something happening in my church but because I was casting that first stone!! I am not and have not ever been perfect and I am critical and bitchy and lots of other not so flattering things. However, I do try not to be mean spirited. So, down came the post, even though it was really, really funny.

In the end, God is the one who will have the final judgement on me, right? So...if you don't like what I write on my blog, don't read it. I am flawed, the church is flawed, my blog is flawed and you are flawed. However, I am also reasonable.

Are you?

Sick kids and Bible study

Well, I haven't been to my Bible study in two weeks. The week before last Bronte was really sick. High fever, crabby, lethargic, weepy...you know, the way I feel every day. So, I decided not to send her to school (don't act like this was a no brainer!! I went to Bronte's classroom to help one day and this little boy kept wiping his nose on his sleeve, over and over and over. I was sitting on the floor reading books with the kids and he came over and sat in my lap. I'm not kidding you when I say that he had a high enough fever that I could feel the heat from his little body the second his butt touched my lap. I said, "You feel kind of warm sweetie. How do you feel?" and he replied, "Well, I had a fever this morning, but my mom gave me Tylenol and told me to go to school." What do you know...this kid sits next to Bronte and the next day she gets sick.) and I skipped my Bible Study. It made me kind of sad because I was all ready to go and discuss 2 verses in the book of Romans for 2 hours. I'm not kidding. The entire lesson was about 2 lines out of the book of Romans.
Last week I was all ready to walk out the door and the phone rang. The caller i.d. said it was my other daughter, Brenna's, school so I picked it up. Of course it was the nurse who told me that Brenna had a rash on one side of her face. Although I secretly thought they were over-reacting by making me come and get her (because she was just itchy for goodness sake...so what??) I did go pick her up. Once I saw her though, I immediately called the pediatrician. It looked like I had dipped the right side of her face in red paint. All I had to do was paint the other side of her face white and she would have looked like a Wisconsin college student at a Badgers game. However, since she felt ok and I needed to go pick up the lesson for this week's Bible study I headed to the church to pick it up. So, I went up to the desk and told them I couldn't stay for the study today because of a sick child so could I please have next week's lesson. The uptight lady behind the desk queried, "Do you mean this week's lesson?" I said, "No. I already did this week's lesson but I can't stay so I need the one for next week." She said, "Oh. Well we call the lesson for next Thursday "this week's lesson", so do you want this week's lesson?"
What the...? Who cares what I called it, she knew what I meant...why didn't she just give it to me? Being the smart ass that I am I said, "So do you call the lesson we are doing today "last week's lesson"?" And she said, "No. That's today's lesson." Remembering that Brenna was still scratching in the car, I let it go. I had to sign a paper to get the lesson and once I had it in my hands the woman said, "Now, don't look at it until you are out of the building."
What? Why?
So I asked her, "Why?" and she told me it was because they didn't want anyone to see this week's lesson in advance. I was going to ask her why but I just couldn't take it anymore so I left. The funny thing is, if anyone was really curious about what was going to happen next...all they would have to do is read the rest of the book of Romans, right? I mean, Romans is near the end of the Bible, so all the good stuff had already happened; creation, the Ten Commandments, the big flood, plagues, birth-life-death-resurrection of Jesus. There wasn't a lot of suspense in Romans, so I didn't really see the point in keeping "this week's" lesson a big secret. So, of course I turned away, opened the lesson and starting reading it while muttering, "That Paul..." and shaking my head.
Just kidding. I just left. On the way out I saw someone in my discussion group. I stopped her and asked her if she would let everyone know that I had to go take Brenna to the doctor because she had a rash on her face. Do you know what this woman said? She said, "Oh. So I guess you need someone to take attendance then, right? Too bad you have to miss ANOTHER week." Does that seem like a weird response to you? She didn't ask about Brenna or anything. She just lamented the fact that I was going to miss another week of taking their stupid attendance.

Strangely enough, this stupid little incident just might be the straw that breaks my back. This week's lesson is only on a couple of verses from Romans too, and I just don't think I can discuss them for 2 hours with women who are more concerned with my secretarial duties than my poor daughter who had creeping crud.
I think I will go this week, however, because I just got a new t-shirt that says "Reggae is Vile". I just wonder what they will make of that!

Safety pins are the key

Somebody asked me last week what I was getting Brenna for 6th grade graduation. I looked at her and kind of laughed and then she said, "No. Really." I said,"For sixth grade graduation? I don't know. How about a Trapper Keeper?" She then said, "Really? That's what you're getting her? I'm getting my daughter a charm bracelet with a mortar board on it." I cocked my head at her and said, "You know, she's not really graduating from anything. She's just moving on to Junior High. Unless you home-school, it's the law." She just shrugged her shoulders and changed the subject. But, I couldn't let it go. I kept saying things like, "What exactly are you celebrating with this 'graduation'? Did you doubt she was going to make it this far?"

Suffice it to say, she was not amused and soon left my company. Whatever. Who wants to talk to someone who thinks finishing sixth grade is worthy of jewelry? If her kid really earned her bracelet then she's a moron and I don't want my daughter hanging around with dummies.

However, there is this feeling around town that leaving 6th grade is somehow worthy of celebration. I recently joined a committee at school that is in charge of the sixth grade end of the year celebration. Like an idiot, I thought the kids would have a picnic on the playground of the school while all the other kids sat inside with their noses pressed to the windows watching the 6th graders skip a day of school. That would satisfy two objectives; making the 6th graders feel special, as well as allowing them to visibly rub it in their school-mates faces that they are special. But, I was wrong about this committee. They wanted to plan an "outing" for the kids...like a day at Laser Quest or a train-ride to Chicago and then a boat tour! Then the kids would have a pizza lunch and then come back to school where there would be a bunch of those rental bouncy-houses on the playground for them to jump in. Not ONE bouncy-house, but a BUNCH of them so no one would have to wait for a turn! Now, there were PTA funds designated for this party, but the consensus was that it was not enough and we needed to do some fund raising. One of the ideas was a car-wash run by and manned with the parents of sixth graders! I was like, "Huh? I'm not going to get to go to Laser Quest or bounce in a jumping thing. Let the stupid kids wash the cars. I went to college, for God's sake. I'm not washing cars so my stupid spoiled kid can cavort around Laser Quest!"

Well, I was outnumbered. Plus, I didn't actually say any of this out loud because everyone else was really serious. After a while I stopped listening anyway because I was terribly distracted by one of the other mothers. She was skinny, had a diamond ring worthy of Elizabeth Taylor, was really tan and wore a low-cut shirt so we could all see her perfectly rounded fake boobs. The funny part to me was that she had this really huge nose and I kept thinking that she should have spent her plastic surgery money on rhinoplasty instead of implants. I mean, she looked like a toothpick with two miniature marshmallows glued on it. Then I kept trying to picture what her husband must look like. By the time I started paying attention again the meeting was over and the fund raiser had been agreed upon.

OK. So the fund raiser was a coat check at the school Fun Fair. There was to be no fee for this, just a big donation jar so people could give what they felt was fair. The coat check was going to be run by two women who have daughters in Brenna's class so I thought I would go ahead and volunteer to help out. Since I was on the committee I thought it would be really lame if I didn't volunteer for something and these two women are fun so it made perfect sense.

When I got to the coat check area on Fun Fair night I was ready. We were all there early so we would be ready for the first arrivals. My friends had all the logistics figured out...the kids would take the coats, give the person a ticket and we (the grown-ups) would take the other half of the ticket, attach it to the coat (or coats, because we encouraged families to take one ticket for all their coats) and hang it/them up in numerical order on coat racks in the teacher's lounge. Sounds easy enough. I was looking forward to just relaxing and hanging up a few coats and talking to the other mothers. It wasn't that I wasn't taking the whole thing seriously but I wasn't too uptight either. Well, the minute the coats started to show up one of the mothers, who is about 5 feet tall and is from Wales so she has this delightful accent, turned into the "coat closet Nazi". She was telling us we were falling behind, she was standing guard at the door to the teacher's lounge and if anyone tried to get in she would say, "Where do you think you're going?" She told us all that when people came to pick up their coats at the end of the night we were to take the tickets off the coats and save the safety pins we used to attach the tickets so they could be used again next year. It was hilarious. I even offered her five bucks to replace the safety pins so we wouldn't have to bother taking the tickets off and she looked at me and said, "I'm cheap." Keep in mind that this woman lives in a beautiful huge house. Her laundry room has the same square footage as my entire house. (You know why she has that great house and I live in a little house? Because she saves safety pins. I just know it.) She was cracking me up all night . Now, when I say that she was barking orders and such, I don't mean that she was being ridiculous or unreasonable. (Just to show you how fun she really is...when our kids won that energy contest and we all went to Washington D.C. one of the cool things we got to do was go on a dinner cruise. The boat was really big, with multiple decks and the kids were all dressed up and excited. We filed on the boat and entered the room where the dinner was taking place and her first words were, "Is that a BAR over there in the corner? Look!! There's a bar!!") She kept smiling and laughing the whole time, but she was really serious about this too. There weren't going to be ANY LOST COATS!! Not on her watch. She had a system, man, and we were not to mess it up! Even my other friend, who was the co-leader of the coat check, just followed directions. (Although at one point when the Nazi said we needed to keep all the safety pins, I think she muttered, "I brought the safety pins and I don't care if we keep them or not.")

Looking back, I am very glad she was in charge. If I would have been in charge we would have just thrown all the coats in a big pile and sat around complaining about our husbands all night. Then when people came back to pick up their coats we would have been screwed. Thanks to her, the coat closet was a big success and raised a zillion dollars so now our kids can go to Game Works and eat steak and get a commemorative charm bracelet for "sixth grade ditch day". Yippee!!

Rice Krispie treats and Skittles for Everyone!!

My daughter is going into Jr. High next year. I can't believe it. She is going to be in 7th grade. She brought home all the stuff about her "electives" and had to have me sign off on her choices for a foreign language and her Science and Math electives. I'm still a little fuzzy on how Science and Math are electives, or how classes that are "elective" could have anything to do with Science and Math, but what do I know!!?? When I went to Jr. High you chose a foreign language and the other elective track was either sewing/home ec. or shop/drafting. All the girls took sewing and all the boys took shop. I don't even know why they gave us a choice since that was always the way it went. The only girl I ever knew that took shop was this HUGE girl named Beth. No one even batted an eye when she signed up for shop because we all thought she was a guy anyway...like her family was in the witness protection program and this was really a boy pretending to be a girl but doing a crappy job of it. In any case, the shop teacher was so shitty to Beth from day one that in a couple of weeks she switched to the sewing/home ec. track. I think she failed.

Anyway, I guess they don't offer shop or home ec. anymore. The new electives are things like "Forensic Science" and "Global Warming Trends" and "Personal Finance". Isn't that weird? Brenna's idea of personal finance is my wallet. I think it will come as a big shock to her that someday she will actually have to earn money. I imagine that it will take the first 6 weeks of that class for the kids to realize that their parents actually still have to PAY for the things they put on credit cards. As far as global warming trends go, they probably will watch Al Gore's fabulous Academy Award winning documentary....ooops. Sorry. I fell asleep. Al Gore is so personality-void and dull that I nodded off just typing his name. I bet that documentary is fascinating, as long as he doesn't appear in it.

Brenna picked German for her foreign language. I don't know why. She came home with her sheet for me to sign and I saw that she circled German for her language. I asked her, "Why German? You had 2 years of Spanish in 1st and 2nd grade and French in 3rd and 4th grade. Why not continue with one of those?" She said, "I don't know. I just thought it sounded like fun." Whatever. I could care less. But you know who was pissed off over her choice? My ex-husband! I called him about something completely unrelated to her language choice and he brought it up. He asked me, "Why is she taking German?" I said, "She thought it sounded like fun." He said, "Well, I know it's part of her heritage because I'm part German, but in high school I am going to have to put my foot down and insist that she take Spanish."

Please.

So, Brenna will be taking German for the next 6 years, needless to say.

My big question is---what ever happened to home ec. and shop classes? I personally thought that sewing was a big waste of time, and I'm sure that drafting was pretty lame too. But I think all kids should still have to take home ec. and shop. In home ec. we learned how to make cinnamon rolls and how to read a recipe. We learned how to grocery shop and measure wet and dry ingredients. Most kids will never learn this stuff at home. Once they get to college and move out of the dorms (where meals are provided) they are all going to live on Rice Krispie treats and Skittles because none of them will be able to cook a damn thing. And I think every kid needs to know how to make bookshelves (which is what the boys did in shop class). The way things are in school now we are going to end up with a generation of really smart but helpless adults. When I was a kid we learned how to write a proper thank you note in school. Brenna can't even write her name in cursive properly because they don't have time for handwriting practice in class. They are too busy preparing for their stupid 2 week long National Test of Basic Skills (thank you George Bush and No Child Left Behind). Her teacher is encouraging the class to read Barack Obama's book The Audacity of Hope which I think is great, but they are 6th graders and most of them haven't even read some real classic books, like Black Beauty or Swiss Family Robinson!

In any case, it is nice for our kids to have so many educational choices. And since my daughter is wicked smart and in the gifted program she will have more choices than most. But because of all the educational pressure to do well she will have very little time to learn how to live on her own. I hate to pull her away from her hours and hours of homework to teach her how to run the washing machine or make Alfredo sauce. Not because I don't think she needs to know that, but because she really does have hours and hours of homework and when she isn't doing homework she needs to PLAY!! That's why I think they ought to teach the kids (all the kids, not just the girls because I am going to teach my daughter that men should do their own damn laundry) how to separate lights from darks and how to make a pork roast (well, except the Jewish kids. How stringent are those pork rules now, Alan?) and they should call this class Real Life Skills. And it would not be an elective.