Hodge Podge Blog: Presidents’ Day Edition

It’s strange that I feel like I’m on vacation, especially considering the fact that three of the four citizens of this household are having an extra long weekend. Although I am the unfortunate number four, I’ve got that vacation feeling. This is undoubtedly due to the fact that it’s been a weekend of glorious beach weather, nothing but fun obligations, and the escape of an extremely fat book. It’s also pretty great to only be responsible for my own wee self on Friday and Monday mornings. No rousing of grumps, no packing of lunch, no carpool, no rush, no worries.

I got to spend time at the beach with the lovely Beth this weekend and her bevy of beautiful girls. I brought along a husband, a son and one extra boy, but the menfolk mostly kept to the periphery of our little island o-grrrlz. At one point our two oldest girls ran up from a play posse to fill us in on the story we were to tell if that weird kid in the wetsuit happened to ask: they were twins, but not identical, and all the kids belonged to Beth, including the boys who were down at Secret Beach. Bill and I were just good friends of Beth’s. We high fived at our good fortune and headed off for drinks while Beth bravely single-parented her five kids.  

After the beach I dropped boys in various places and then met more friends at a crazy place that served enormous spigoted beakers of cold Japanese beer, then went with Desiree to check out the karaoke place next door. It reminded me of the scene from Lost in Translation when Bill Murray sang Peace, Love, and Understanding, but it wasn’t in a windowed high rise. It was in a strip mall. But still. They had those little rooms where small or big parties could sit around a big booth and enjoy their own karaoke party. We did not partake on this night, but oh did we ever make plans. We also enjoyed cocktails called “mind erasers” that I can hardly wait to reconstruct: absolute vanilia and café patron served in a short glass with ice and strict instructions not to stir. Yum. After a couple of rounds I had no choice but to point out to my lovely friend that I was sitting at the bar in my bathing suit and yoga pants with my hair in a crazy beach knot at 10 pm on a Saturday night. We left begrudgingly. We’ll be back.

The best news of all is that I’ve finally mostly recovered from the plague that has summarily kicked my ass for the last month. Yes, I’m still coughing and yes, I still get winded during rigorous exercise, but I’m back  healed  so much better.  

Happy Presidents’ Day, peeps. I’m happy for you if you have the day off today, I only hate you a little bit.

I mustache....

...you to be my valentine!

I hope everyone enjoyed their V-day. Love it or hate it, it's history for another year.

Thanks to Kendra and her girl for the fun yesterday. What a creative, home-made valentine, eh? Very clever. Almost as clever as the store-bought sweet-tart valentines I sent my girls off to school with. cough.  (There's always next year, right?)

Much love to everyone.

xoxo,
Beth

A Blizzard Doesn't Just Mean Shoveling Snow.....

No, a blizzard also means taking cool, arty photos . . .

. . . Mistah is the Mastah of weird, arty photos . . .

. . . clearly.

I mean, just look at the subject matter he has on hand.

A blizzard also means a tablecloth dinner . . .

. . . and monitoring the snowfall outside.

A blizzard means taking photos of seltzer bubbles . . .

. . . and taking weird, arty photos. Oh, wait. Have I already mentioned that?

But mostly, a blizzard means celebrating with yellow tulips, and when the storm is finally over . . .

. . . a blizzard means bringing the newest member of the household home for good.

lost

I did not want to be right. Although it was frustrating to be so casually dismissed when I offered guidelines and enforced rules, I definitely did not want her to learn this lesson the hard way. She refrained from rolling her eyes when I could see her, but I could tell by her expression that my words were as affecting as the adult voices from Peanuts cartoons when I told her not to bring the ipod touch to school, and not to put it in her back pocket. She bought it with her own money, accumulated from birthday and holiday gifts.  The purchase cleaned her out, my little saver has no more money saved.  

It’s hard to resist running over to the school and physically going to all of her classes to look. It’s hard to put my faith in a community of middle school kids, one of whom is having the best day of his or her life. It’s hard to comfort her without being really pissed at her for letting this happen. It’s hard to be right.

You’d think my boy would be the one to lose his stuff, he who can’t ever find two socks.  He’s never been the one in hysterics over the location of an electronic device.  His phone and his ipod have remained firmly entrenched in his back pocket for years without incident. 

My girl bought this ipod less than a month ago, and *poof*

I’m sure it’s due to the fact that her pants don’t sag, her body is in motion, and she has no time for details. Girlfriend is on the move, she did not notice her empty back pocket until the very end of the day, probably because math got boring. She is soooooo sad. We  posted a notice on the community facebook page and she made some signs to hang up today. She is offering a $20 reward for its safe return.

I guess we will soon find out if the lesson will be good things happen to good people; someone must have needed it more than you did; or karma will soon kick that asshole squarely in the butt. I'm just so pissed that she didn't listen to me about taking care of it.

I was feeling very unhappy about this yesterday. It's just not fair, she's such a good kid. Why did she bring it to school? Why didn't she at least put it in her backpack? Who took it and is going to pretend it's theirs? Don't their stupid parents see that there's a new expensive toy in the house? Jerks. I hate everyone.

I called her from work late in the day, just to say that I was sorry this had happened. She sighed. "It's not like life or death though, mom. It's just an ipod. I have lots of other stuff. I'll save more money."

I'm so glad there is at least one mature, grounded person in our family. I'm listening to her.

I stink

I stink. And that's not my low self-esteem talking.

It's a fact.

I really stink sometimes.

My theory is that because I have been going to hot yoga classes regularly for a decade my body is really, really good at sweating. It is so adept at sweating that when I don't make it to the studio for a good sweat, I'm done for. I stink. Seriously.

I typically practice in the late afternoon or evening so, low and behold, come about 4 pm, my body is ready to go. It starts to get its funk on. It wants its daily cleanse.

 "Go Ask Alice!" tells me, however, that only a minimal amount of toxins are released via sweat, that instead detoxification is really mostly the job of the liver (uh oh) and kidneys, not the sweat glands, and that sweating it out in the heat is simply a means of thermoregulation, not an effective  means of ridding the body of its bad juju.

Whatever.

Alice is pretty much a bitch, don't you think?

Who cares what she thinks. I don't. I think it's good for you. I love getting dripping wet, I almost always feel cleansed and detoxified after a good sweaty class.

I mean, case in point, who hasn't forced themselves to workout when hungover and not felt better afterward (assuming you made it through the work out)? Your body wants that shit out of your system. That liver of yours needs some assistance sometimes.

Aunt Yoga, not nearly as much of a harpy as Alice, concurs. She tells me that "Small amounts of alcohol can be eliminated in perspiration, so if it feels good for you to sweat buckets with a hangover, go ahead."

Thanks, auntie. I agree, yoga sweat IS magic.

But, still, what to do?

It's not always convenient, this stank. Sometimes I want to go out straight from work. Lord help me if I'm wearing wool. Funky sweat and wool fabric -- not a winning combination.

I carry a Mennen Speed Stick around with me in my purse. I shit you not. It kind-of helps.

Laugh if you must, but just try to find a woman's deodorant that is at all effective. Every single big-brand, box-store woman's brand is an antiperspirant, not a deodorant. Look next time, I triple-cat dare you to. I just don't jive with trying to stop my body from sweating (duh, see above), and my crystal and natural deodorants (not antiperspirants) don't seem to work at all.

My recent Google search has informed me that women are turned on by men's BO, but it didn't uncover that this scent attraction works the other way. This hardly seems fair.

It does say that using natural astringents such as tea tree oil and witch hazel can help as can upping your vegetables, especially greens high in chlorophyll like wheatgrass and cilantro. Cutting out alcohol and red meat and garlic can help too. But a garlicky smell is not my problem.

What is my funk? What's yours? Let's take a look at the Stinky Wheel, shall we?

Luckily I can say with some confidence that my tang is not goaty, wet dog, or boar taint (ew!). Nor is it rancid butter or passion fruit. No, if I had to pick, I'd say I'm in the chemical group. How enticing! I mean, mint would be kinda nice wouldn't it? Grapefruit would be fine option too. Vinegar and alcohol? Less alluring.

Is anyone out there chicken broth? Lol.

Long, stench-filled story short, I stink. So if you see me out doing shots of wheat grass instead of Patron, munching on parsley florettes instead of beef carpaccio, you'll know why.

Or maybe I'll just up my hours at the yoga studio.

A Winter Wallop

Now that was a self-respecting snow storm.

It snowed all day Friday and when it finally started accumulating in the late afternoon, well, as you might have heard . . .

. . . we woke up to bucketloads on Saturday morning.
Bucketloads full of bucketloads.

We also heard the news we were soon going to have a refugee deposited at our door, so Mistah got out there to shovel a path from the street to the house for The Mumsie . . .

(The snow on the railing is my favorite storm image. 
Well, that and the Subie out there in the street.)

. . . The street hadn't been plowed yet but do you think that would stop Mumsie? Not a chance.

Nice work, Mistha!

And although we certainly weren't going to be driving anywhere anytime soon, I got out there to uncover the car during the beautiful warm afternoon, before everything got encased in ice overnight.

Shoveling snow off the top of a car helps if you have a good hairdo.

There is just so much snow out there . . .

. . . so very much snow.

. . . and it's stuck to trees and wires and railings so oddly, what with the crazy swirling wind and thunder and lightning Friday night.

The bright bright sun on Saturday combined with the feet of snow covering every surface made it a blindingly bright day, and also showed us just how repulsively dirty our window was . . .

. . . until Mistah once again came to the rescue . . .

Nice work, Mistah!

. . . the better through which to see our lovely visitors . . . 

. . . and I do mean lovely.

Sunday afternoon Mistah took a walk through the 'hood . . .

. . . he beheld plowed streets, and The Lone Traveler . . .

. . .  and the sunset on The Winter Wallop, 2013 version.

shower the people

This week has been unusual in terms of showering. It’s not a thing I even think about ordinarily, I just shower after I work out, and I work out most every day so I easily maintain my rosy glow and sweet scent.  Take away my work outs, and I lose my sense of timing. At night it’s so cold and I loathe the idea of getting all wet when I’m not even sweaty.  In the morning, I don’t want to wake up early. If I do, the children will simply go back to sleep and then my boy and I will have to fight for shower time and dry towels. I’m not one of those people who needs to shower to get my day going. I’m good with strong coffee and brushes for my teeth and hair. My husband showers every morning, my son showers at least twice a day. Ahem. My girl bitches and moans about being forced to shower, then spends 45 minutes in there.  No matter who showers or does not shower when or where or for how long, there is never ever ever ever a dry towel handing within my reach when I emerge. Never. It is the bane of my very existence.

Is that too much info? Do you not want to hear about our toileting habits next?

Sky, earth, and sea

So I introduced you to Sebastian last week and left you at Victoria House on Monday. Today we're going to venture off property, to the rest of Belize....

All the images below come from  the nifty CD-ROM that my mom received at the end of her "Ancient Sites, Rain Forests, and Coral Reefs" trip. So, thank you to Travel Dynamics International.

There were so many great photographs, Mistah-quality photographs, that I decided to cut it down to my very favorite in three categories: sky, earth, and sea.

After re-looking I guess my birdies are actually mostly not in the sky, but I'm sticking with sky, earth and sea, as birdies, earth, and sea just doesn't do it for me.

SKY

 EARTH

SEA