We're not in Kansas Anymore, Toto.

Riding in cars with boys.

Last weekend we drove down to Alabama in the family minivan, rented a small Budget truck, cleaned out my in-laws house of furniture and things we wanted, and then drove back to Kansas City. This all happened between Thursday evening to Monday afternoon. My husband drove the truck back, and I drove the minivan, with both boys and the dog. It's a twelve hour drive, each way.

This was not a vacation. Well, I guess it sort of was for the boys, as they got to spend time with their cousins, whom they adore, for the first time since last 4th of July weekend. And despite loading fantastically heavy sofas and bed frames into a moving truck in the drizzling rain and Alabama humidity, it was kind of nice just to get out of town. The physical stress was actually kind of a nice, cathartic change of pace from the usual mental stress. Although there was plenty of mental stress to be had in the situation.

Cleaning out someone's home is a very weird thing. It feels like you're looting. When you're trying to take a detached, non-emotional look at whether or not someone else's things have value to you - Do we have a place for that? Would that fetch a decent price? - knowing that those things have/had emotional value to someone else, it is...weird. And exhausting. But that's really all I have to say about it.

On the way home we drove through some of the toughest weather I have ever had the displeasure of driving in.  Although I've made that trip several times, usually my husband is driving or we take turns. I've never had to do it by myself before, much less with a carload of cranky little boys who are very tired of the DVD selection you have on hand.  But we made it it, and we returned to our home in time to enjoy a drink with neighbors during Monday evening's Memorial Day culdesac party, and then start another crazy week.  School is out, summer break is here. Work is crazy busy. Life goes on.

Friday wine goodness: bundle up, sucker.

Given that last weekend was officially the beginning of Spring, the Kansas weather leading up to it was really freaking beautiful, and oh how we rejoiced in the 80 degree weather on St. Patrick's Day by drinking Margaritas in the culdesac with the neighbors.  Spring Break wrapped up and we've had one entire week of school. But much like the banks cannot be closed for two business days in a row, our school district apparently cannot allow two full weeks of school being in session every day, and next week my kindergartner only has school on Monday and is out for the rest of the week, and my third grader is out Thursday and Friday. They claim this is for "parent/teacher conferences" which is funny, because most of the parents have their conference appointments scheduled in the evening, but whatever. Thanks for making me have to scramble for daycare so I can work a full week twice within 30 days, Blue Valley ISD. 

Anyway, I think I started off talking about how awesome the weather was. Well, that's now a memory, too, as today we have freezing temperatures and a winter storm warning and may get 5-8 inches of snow on Saturday, the first day of soccer games.  Which we probably won't have. And which I wasn't going to be able to attend anyway, because I'll be downtown with my youth group kids at an all day community service project, raking leaves and picking up trash and brush, now with 200% more snow and bone-chilling wind. Awesome.  Unlike soccer games, this event will not be canceled, but they may try and come up with some things for us to do indoors, like mopping floors and wiping baseboards. In case you didn't know, this is EXACTLY the kind of community service teenagers love to waste their time doing.

If you've been watching me on Twitter you know that I lost all of my calendar items and contacts on my Treo on Wednesday night, during a process most people call "syncing" but which apparently for me became "deleting" instead.  I finally got a Palm customer service rep on live chat, who walked me through changing a random setting that was preventing me from reinstalling my backup from the laptop, so now I at least have everything that was in my last backup, that's the good news. The bad news is I am that typical person that never takes the time to do the backup and the last one was in January.

To celebrate getting back at least most of my contacts and about half of my calendar items, the boys and I went over to my friend's house for dinner and socializing, where socializing means the boys played the Wii and us two mommies drank two entire bottles of wine.  This wine, to be exact, which is really good and under $10 a bottle.  Yes, I know, two bottles of wine for a Thursday night is perhaps a bit much, but when the topic of conversation turns toward friends who committed suicide and husbands who were murdered, you really do need to open that second bottle.

So this morning, I'm dragging a bit. Right now I'm sitting on the bed with both the laptop and the dog's head keeping me warm, watching the weather channel talk about tornadoes in Florida and flooding in Fargo and the winter storm warning here in Kansas and trying not to think of all this as the coming of the apocalypse.  Because now is not a good time for the apocalypse to come. I'm out of wine.

*edited to add: Ah, yes, they did indeed cancel the service project. We will go service the community on another, hopefully more weather stable, day in April.

In the words of Dave Chappelle, I'm back, beyatch!

Ohhhh, feeling so much better. Still get a little dizzy if I bend over or swivel my head around too fast, but otherwise, all systems normal.  SO NORMAL, in fact, that I thought I'd share with you what went down at my house after the kids got off the bus, in the span of about one hour.

1. I realize at 3:35 that I am still at work, in a meeting that has gone late, and the bus drops the kids off at my driveway at about 3:45. I am at least 20 minutes away. Call neighbor in panic.
2. 3:55 - arrive home, just as my brother and Sister-in-law show up to pick up the old, perfectly fine dishwasher that we had replaced with a nice, new, shiny, stainless steel one. I am taking out the dog. Dog trips me with his leash to get to my SIL, whom he loves because she works for Petco and smells like it. (to him, not to like, everyone.)
3. Drew comes over from neighbor's house, upon seeing all the action in our driveway, freaking out and nearly in tears, because he's been reminded he has a book report due the very next day, that he should have been working on over the winter break. He forgot. He is panicking, big time.
4. Will  comes into the house and begins showing my brother the Nerf gun he got for Christmas. I remind him of the rule: Do not shoot dogs, people, or lighting fixtures.
5. After getting the boys all worked up with the Nerf guns, Bro and SIL leave.
6. Will starts chasing the dog through the kitchen, and then shoots him in the ass with a Nerf bullet. Dog freaks so badly he skates across the hardwood, falls over on his side and slides into my new sofa table like he's sliding into homebase. Table comes crashing down while I scream, and move in slow motion toward the entire scene. I manage to catch the lamp before it hits the floor, but the table is down. It is fine, slightly scratched.
7. Will runs to his room crying and screaming and yelling "I hate you Mommy!"  Because, of course, the whole event was totally my fault.

So yeah, back to normal.  And I'm still posting over at Being Savvy KC, where today I talk about dealing with toddlers and preschoolers, something I am actually quite GOOD AT, because I had lots of TRAINING, but no longer have much use for, and am now flying totally blind with grade schoolers.

Welcome back to the Nut House. Grab an acorn and have a seat.

Dog Gone (it).

I am a sucker for stray dogs, I always have been. I know I've posted about it here several times, but for some reason can't find the links today.  I'm always the person who pulls over and tries to get close to a random, wayward dog on the street and lure them into my car so that I can get a look at the tag (if there is one) and call the owner or take him home with me (not my husband's favorite trait of mine, natch).  I generally find that dogs that are okay with people are easy to catch, and are usually so scared and freaked out because they are lost they are more than happy to hop in your car and let you love on them a little. Dogs who are not as sociable generally run away. I've never been bitten or even growled at by a dog who sat still while I approached. 

So it was not an unknown situation that this morning on my way out of my neighborhood I noticed two medium sized dogs loose, running back and forth across the main street over by our pool.  One, the black and white Heinz 57 mutt, was running in circles so fast I knew there was no way I could catch him. I pulled over anyway, and tried to call out to him. He bolted like his tail was on fire.

The other one, a little blond fluffy lab/chow/terrier mix, stood her ground in the grass and just barked at me.  As I approached her, talking softly and holding out my hand, open but knuckles facing her, she continued to bark, ascared and slightly aggressive bark. As I got within distance of grabbing her collar, though, she sat down, and then rolled over and showed me her belly, for to be rubbed.

The black and white one lapped around again behind me, not even slowing down. 
I figured out that we were standing in their own yard, so they had gotten loose but not very far.  The blond female walked by my side up to the front door and scratched at the bottom of the screen as I rang the bell. She was not all that excited about being out, she was scared.  Nobody answered. The black and white dog lapped around one more time, then ducked into the backyard through the broken slat in the fence, content with his dance of freedom and looking for some water.

I pushed the blond dog back through the same hole in the fence, and then looked around for something I could jam in there to keep them from getting out again.  A long piece of the neighbor's raingutter had wiggled loose in the windy morning and was laying nearby, so I stuck it through the slats hoping that if they bumped up against it the sound of the aluminum would freak them out and they'd stay away from it.  And then I went back to my car and called the number I had gotten off the blond dog's tag.

The guy who answered on the other end was downright annoyed that I was bothering him while he was at work.  I introduced myself, said your dogs were out, you have two dogs, right? He said, "What? Dogs?" which made me think I had the wrong number. I said, "Do you live right here on the corner, and have two dogs? A blond one and a black and white mix?" He said, "Yeah, what about them again?" I said, "They were out - running loose on the street. Your fence is broken, over on the north side? Where I see you've already replaced several slats recently? They found a new spot to push out apparently, and one of them was a quarter mile away when I saw him first. But he came back and I put them both in back in the yard."  I paused for a response. A thank you, an Oh No, are they okay, anything. I got...nothing.

I said, "Hello?"
He said, "so, they're back in the yard then? What do you want me to do?"
A little taken aback, I said, "Well, I don't think they'll stay there. I mean, the fence is still broken. I stuffed a piece of aluminum raingutter that was rolling around into the hole, so they might leave it alone, but there's really nothing stopping them from getting out again."

Again, nothing. WTF?
Finally, he said, "Well, I'll see if I can get someone to go over there and put them in the house. Thanks for calling." And then he hung up on me.

Okay, here's the thing.  I think that was a pretty nice, neighborly thing of me to do. I could have kept on driving and ignored them running wild. I could have called animal control. But I didn't. I took twenty minutes out of my morning and tried to catch them, and then put them back in their own yard.  I'm not looking for a reward or anything, but a little thanks would be nice.  Nevermind he's the one who put his cellphone number on the dog tag in the first place, which would lead one to believe he WANTED TO BE CALLED, right?   When he said, "Well, what do you want me to do?" I almost shot back, Um, I don't know asshole, fix your damn fence?

***************
In other news, I'm so excited about Barack Obama being our next POTUS I can't even begin to tell you. I'm so relieved. I'm relieved it's over, relieved my candidate won, and relieved that we can begin building a better country for the future.  Even though George Bush wasn't really an active part of this election, just under the radar but on everyone's minds, I think we sent a pretty clear message to him and his cronies:  Get. the fuck. Out. Bring in the new world order, folks. It's a brand new day. 

Tales from IM: Priorities, Priorities, Priorities.

Cadykansas: if you doubt how crazy the leawood apple store will be tomorrow, summize "leawood"

T: k...

T: u want to see something big... summize iPhone, then wait to see how many "updates" pop up at the top of the screen in less than a minute.  It is crazy

Cadykansas: i mean just about that store opening

T: y i know

T: that same email went out to everyone in the KC metro who has an itunes account

Cadykansas: they know what they're doing

T: thats like, ummmm their entire addressable market

Cadykansas: you should be keep track of this stuff

T: y

T: random question

T: u talked with L lately?

Cadykansas: a few weeks ago she im'd me

Cadykansas: thing's seem to be fine

Cadykansas: y?

T: k

T: just wondering... if they would move back to KC if the stars were aligned and all

Cadykansas: over her dead body I think

T: really...

Cadykansas: she has no fam here anymore

T: well ok then

T: oh

Cadykansas: and she pretty much told him when they went out there this was the last move

Cadykansas: and his fam makes her have to load up on pscripts

T: lol

T: I may have to get up earlier than I thought to get a phone

Cadykansas: *eyeroll*

T: first 1000 people get a T-shirt--- woo hoo!

T: google image search Tokyo  iPhone it's crazy how many peeps are in line there

Cadykansas: I don't know, but we are leaving for the lake around 5:30 with or without you.

Cadykansas: so hope you get in by then.

T: y i know

Cadykansas: your iPhone craving does not supercede my relax on the dock with a drink craving. sorry.

T: wtfe

T: listen what ru doing with Max

T: helloooo?

Cadykansas:Sydney's Price Gouge - I mean Pet Spa

T: what they charge per day?  $ARM ?

Cadykansas: +Leg

T: 35?

Cadykansas: uhhhh

Cadykansas: one moment please

Cadykansas: no

Cadykansas: 22

T: oh thats not bad... 85 for a trim is bad

Cadykansas: that was not a trim

Cadykansas: it was a full boat shave, incl tip

T: oh, yeah, right,... sorry.  A shave. right.

Cadykansas: W

Cadykansas: you're the one who demanded a poodle for a dog

How to survive your 4th of July vacation.

Chapter One: Don't take one.

Moving On.

I don't know if you can tell, but that is not a river.  That is a flood plain, flooded to the max, very near the Mississippi River.  We saw a lot of this.

Seriously, I guess the only amazing thing about our quick and dirty trip to inner depths of the state of Alabama is that nothing really eventful happened.  Nobody puked in the car on the 12 hour ride down or back, not even the dog.  No one blew off part of their body playing with fireworks, although the dog did have to tolerate little boys throwing those little pop rock things at him to try and get a reaction.  They were frustratedly not successful as he was too busy panting his little tongue off laying at my feet. (My Uncle-In-Law: "What, is that dog on Quaaludes or something? Dang."

It was also quite amazing that apparently it was actually hotter in Kansas while we were gone than it was in Alabama.  Not more humid, but hotter.  It doesn't get anymore humid than Birmingham, Alabama in July.  And don't say Florida does! Because Florida has a beach and that's where normal people go on vacations, and I don't want to hear about it.

These are flowers from my MIL's garden, that my SIL planted for her which got her some kind of fabulous gardens of Birmingham garden tour award or something. Am jeluz of my SIL's mad gardening skills, but I guess she deserves it since she actually studied and took a test and earned a Master Gardener status, like, God. Over-achieve much? (I already said I'm jealous.)

Southern flower garden, with poodle.  Watch out for the bees, poodle!

Also to be found in Birmingham, is a life size chess game.  My 9 year old nephew totally schooled me on the rules of chess.  Me: Wait, what is that a rook? No, the knight! He moves diagonally, right? What's the horse guy called? Geez it's been a long freakin' time since I played chess. (That's me and my fat leg trying to escape the picture.)

Max would like you to know he's been very, very fucking patient with those kids dropping toys and food on him for the last 12 hours, and when are we going to be home so he can sleep in peace? *Yawn*


Will falls asleep just as we reach the outskirts of Kansas City. Perfect.

Proof is in the pictures.

This is my sideyard before:

I know, right?  totally ugly, foundation concrete and weird fireplace box sticking out.  Yuck.  We know there was enough room to make a daylight basement here, the builder just didn't to save money (house was a spec, not sold before build out...)  Eventually we may add daylight windows if we finish the basement.

Anyway.  Moving On!

And now. Yes, I rock, I know. Literally. Its better - you can still see the foundation and all, but the garden and wall distracts the eye, at least.

(Too be fair, the first pic was taken before spring had kicked in so things look much less lushy than now, with all the rain)
I'm rather proud of myself.  In other news, Look!  A poodle, playing in an unfenced yard, without a leash!

A rather tired poodle, I might add, since I'd been throwing the tennis ball in the 80% humidity until he couldn't run anymore and just laid down.  He's such a wuss.  Anyway, POINT IS, he hung out with us in the yard, and didn't bolt.  I'm a big proponent of remote control shock collars now, people.  I have the dog I wanted - one who obeys.  Its wonderful.  By the way, Max had his one year Vet check up while I was off last week.  He weighs 65 lbs.  He was supposed to be no more than 55lbs.  Oops.  Monster Poodle!

Also, the tennis ball throwing?  If you don't have one of these, you are totally working too hard. Genius.

And finally:

Drew and Will saying cheese from World's of Fun/Camp Snoopy.  This picture snapped shortly before daddy (behind them) was asked to exit the ride. "You're supposed to have a child riding with you, sir."  That's right, my husband got kicked off a kiddie coaster.  He rawks.

(Company employee day at WoF, everyone had matching corporate logo shirts, if you're wondering why everyone is yellow.  The logo itself I will not show you.  Remember, I toljoo no blogging about new job.  Am a good girl.)

Anyway, I tend to dress my kids alike when we venture out into such a sea of humanity, because it makes them easier to spot and also if I lose one, I can show the police "he looks just like this one right here!"  But as I knew everyone in the entire company got a yellow t-shirt, which did sort of make me hyperventilate, I made them wear red hats for higher visibility.  I also quizzed them on my cellphone number the entire walk into the park from the car.  Am a spaz, I'm aware.  But, its happened before, It could happen again.

Pop and Circle Stands.

I always kind of thought graduation for little kids is rather silly, but cute, and some days, I'll take cute.  It reminds me that I love being a mother to these two little monsters.  And occasionally, I need such reminders, like when they've been driving me to the crazy like a semi truck shifting up.

So last night we went to Will's little pre-k/kindergarten graduation.  He's been in a private kindergarten program this year, but will be doing kindergarten again in public school next fall, because he's a September birthday and his misses the August 31 cutoff for this year.  If we still lived in California, where the cutoff is December 2, he'd be going to first grade next year and my boys would be two years apart in school.  I kind of would have preferred this, as now I fear he'll be hitting milestones so far ahead of his class that he'll be difficult to challenge, and when little boys are hard to challenge academically, they become a challenge overall.  But, it is what it is.

So square hats and official graduation song, which if you didn't know is called Pop and Circle Stands, they marched up the the risors and proceeded to charm us with singing a song and counting, literally, to 100.

Generally, Will pretty much goes with the flow of these things, but a couple of the kids were absolutely terrified to be up in front of a mass of parent paparazzi, as you can see:

Funny enough, little guy to Will's right is normally the loud, wild and talkative one in class, but apparently suffers a mean case of stage fright.  He didn't look up the entire time.

This is Will's teacher, whom I like to call "The Boy Whisperer", Ms. Nicole.  She has three boys of her own, her husband is a trainer with the Kansas City Chiefs, and she has like five brothers or something.  She knows how to communicate through the testoserone, and she was a Godsend this winter and spring after we moved him to this school in January.  He had a rough fall semester at his other school, to the point where he was so overwhelmed, he was hiding under tables and in corners to escape the chaos of 22 kids and a revolving door of teachers, and she got him back on track. She gave him the award for Most Kinesthetic Learner, which is a really generous way of saying He Who's Body Never Stops Being in Motion.  Good Luck with that, Ms. Public School Teacher of Next Year.


Oh, and not to leave out my other charmer, Drew had his Cub Scout pack's Raingutter Regatta Monday night. 

"Hi Mom!"

Here they are receiving instructions on the rules of the boat race:

"WTF? Is this making any sense to you?"

 

Also, not to be left out, Max would like you all to know that he understands the rules now, if we'd been clearer earlier none of this would have happened, it's not his fault we didn't know how to properly communicate.  But he's willing to move on, and when we're all playing in the backyard and Mommy whistles and says "Max, go home" he gets his ass up on the deck, pronto, thanks for playing, please don't push that button. 

Good Boy.

To catch a poodle, part I'veFinallyHadIt.

Dear Max,
Love you baby, I really do.  I'm sorry that I yelled at you after Will tripped and fell forward, face-down the stairs this morning and you pounced on his back like a trampoline as you raced to beat him down.  I realize that probably put you a bit on edge.  But you need to learn that when the door doesn't slam all the way shut and bounces back open and a child is simultaneously pressing the garage door button is not an invitation for you to go cavorting around the neighborhood in rain-soaked yards and flowerbeds.  It is not a game, despite my best efforts to get your attention on your tennis ball in order to catch you. 

So here's the deal, babycakes.  Next time the UPS man stops by, you and I are going to have a little come-to-Jesus meeting out in the backyard.  You're a smart boy, it won't hurt much.

To catch a poodle.

Now that Spring is here and icicles don't form on the tip when he pees, Max has discovered the joy of bolting out a door accidentally left ajar by absentminded children.  Normally, he wears a 15 foot leash at all times when out of his crate, but recently, as in the last few days, he's been going not only leash-less, but also collar-less, and there's a very good reason.  The short version is I've been too lazy busy to go to Petco and buy him a new collar after his broke.  The longer version is maybe a tad more interesting.
Sunday morning when I walked him down through the garage in my bathrobe to hook him to the tie-out line for his morning wee, he walked out the door nonchalantly sniffing and and then suddenly froze, and stood motionless, staring at the neighbor's house.  Now, Max is a bit, shall we say, bladder shy, if there are kids or dogs or other random noises, so I figured he saw some neighbor off in the distance collecting their Sunday paper off the driveway.  But he kept standing there, barely even breathing.  Finally I stepped far enough out the door that I could see what he saw: a rabbit, also sitting motionless in the grass, not six feet away. 
A f*&^*g rabbit.  Its only end of March and they are already here, starting to nibble on my just breaking through flowers.  It continued to sit there as if cryogenic-ally frozen to its spot while I pleaded with Max to just ignore it, hurry up and pee already, I need some coffee.  Finally, thinking if the rabbit would just leave, Max would go back to sniffing out the perfect spot and get his business over with, I decided a little prompting on my part might help.  So, I reached over to the shelf next to the back door and grabbed a role of masking tape, and chucked it as hard as I could at that damn rabbit. 
Again, I'd had no coffee.  Not. Thinking. Clearly.
When the rabbit bolted, Max leaped after it as if I'd just driven a spike up his ass, and he barely flinched as he reached the end of the rope and it snapped the collar off his neck into pieces.  A plastic clip style collar, not a steel belt-style collar.  Guess which kind I will be buying in the future.
He never even looked back until he was four houses down and had lost the rabbit in some bushes.  And then, as I trudged through the wet grass in my bare feet and holding up the hem of my bathrobe like a freaking princess, I saw the wheels turning in his head - "Hey - I'm free! She'll never catch me!" And he bolted further down the yards.  I had no way to catch him, collar-less and leash-less.  Although I had grabbed his 15-foot leash as I ran out the door, what to clip it to? 
I finally caught up to him when he ran up a neighbors back deck looking for their dog to play.  As I walked up their stairs and trapped him, I saw them in their kitchen, milling around getting breakfast ready.  The dad saw me, in my bathrobe and bedhead, with my stupid, panting loose dog on his back deck at eight in the morning, waved and quickly turned and walked to the front room of his house, out of the line of sight.  Thank you my friend, for offering me a little humility.
I lassoed the leash around Max and we walked home together quietly.  Once he's caught, he doesn't fight, he just walks next to you like he's supposed to.  Its when he knows he's free that he runs.
So that's the story of how his leash broke.  The second story happened yesterday evening, after I left for yoga and my husband was left to manage both boys, the dog, and a scout meeting that started in an hour.  Don't hate on me - you'd have hightailed it to yoga, too.
Anyway, apparently the door through the garage didn't shut completely when slammed, and bounced back open, enough for the dog to escape.  Its a game, he thinks, to run out the door and have his people chase him.  What better fun could there be than tag, except he never has to be It?
So today on the way home I am stopping at Petco and getting him a new collar.  A belt-style one.  And I'm considering maybe an electric collar, too.  That way, when he bolts out the door I can send a significant wattage through his veins by remote control, and he will learn pretty damn fast that when mommy says Max stop! Its in his best interest to do so.