Thoughts I Love

"There is no such thing as 'fun for the whole family.'" (Jerry Seinfeld)

"Some people drink from the fountain of knowledge, others just gargle." (Robert Anthony)

"Education is when you read the fine print. Experience is what you get if you don't." (Pete Seeger)

"It is necessary for us to learn from others' mistakes. You will not live long enough to make them all yourself." (Hyman G. Rickover)

"Seize the moment. Remember all those women on the Titanic who waved off the dessert cart." (Erma Bombeck)

"Women now have choices. They can be married, not married, have a job, not have a job, be married with children, unmarried with children. Men have the same choice we've always had: work or prison." (Tim Allen)

"The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life." (Muhammed Ali)

"Nobody will ever win the battle of the sexes. There's too much fraternizing with the enemy." (Henry Kissinger)

"The first duty of love is to listen." (Paul Tillich)

"You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take." (Wayne Gretzky)

"In every marriage more than a week old, there are grounds for divorce. The trick is to find, and to continue to find, grounds for marriage." (Robert Anderson)

"Ask your child what he wants for dinner only if he's buying." (Fran Lebowitz)

"If you have never been hated by your child, you have never been a parent." (Bette Davis)

"I have found the best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise them to do it." (Harry S Truman)

"Old age is like everything else. To make a success of it, you've got to start young." (Fred Astaire)

"Stick with optimists. It's going to be tough enough even if they're right." (James Reston)

"If you see ten troubles coming down the road, you can be sure that nine will run into the ditch before they reach you." (Calvin Coolidge)

"Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself." (Leo Tolstoy)

"The true test of character is not how much we know how to do, but how we behave when we don't know what to do." (John Holt)

"Experience is that marvelous thing that enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again." (Franklin P. Jones)

"It's easy to make a buck. It's a lot tougher to make a difference." (Tom Brokaw)

"Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt." (Abraham Lincoln)

"Don't talk unless you can improve the silence." (Jorge Luis Borges)

"No one has a finer command of language than the person who keeps his mouth shut." (Sam Rayburn)

"Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there." (Will Rogers)

"I would rather live my life as if there is a God and die to find out there isn't, than live my life as if there isn't and die to find out there is." (Albert Camus)

You've Served Me Well

Over the years I've learned a few "tricks" of the motherhood trade that have served me well, so to speak. I'm happy to share what I've learned. Feel free to use any or all or take them with a grain of salt. Keep in mind that I make no guarantees to their effectiveness with YOUR children. (Sometimes they weren't/aren't even effective with my own offspring,)

*The poker face. (A non-reaction almost always beats a reaction.)
*The time-out. (For kids and parents.)
*The bribe. (Forget what the parenting books say about this; but use it with caution.)
*The non-committal answer. (Use sparingly.)
*Make few, if any, promises. (They can and will be used against you.)
*Always take a change of clothes. (For the kids--if they're under the age of 5.)
*Keep a container in the car that can be used for sudden emesis. (Emesis=a proper word for "vomit.")
*"Moistened towelettes" are indispensible.
*Listen first; talk later. (Unless, of course, you're in the midst of an emergency.)
*"Hmmmm," is often the best response.
*Write down the amusing things your kids say and do. (These anecdotes can be used against them when they're teenagers if need be.)
*Teenage boys really do like kisses from their moms. (Not to be given in public, though.)
*Head rubs will calm an out-of-control child (and mom).

I could go on, but I won't.

A "Little" Thing Can Be A "Big" Deal!

While running errands yesterday afternoon, I heard something hit the car and then it sounded like something was dragging underneath it. I was just a few yards from my first destination, so when I got there, I looked underneath and could see nothing. As I proceeded to my next destination, the noise became louder and the car became more difficult to drive--like something was preventing the wheels from revolving properly. I pulled off on a side street and again checked under the car. I saw nothing. I knew it would drive no further so I called Lance and we decided to contact AAA. I was a little anxious about how the rest of my errands and evening plans would unfold due to this unforseen complication. Because I was blocking the driveway to a house, I had to move the car a few feet forward. I put it in gear and proceeded to inch forward when I heard a pop. Suddenly the car seemed like it was back to a normal driveable condition. I again got out and again checked underneath. I saw a very small rock and picked it up. It was hot to the touch. Aha! I found the culprit. A very small rock had become lodged somewhere in an important place and caused me a great deal of trouble--at least temporarily. Is there a life lesson here?

"It Was Horrifying!"

Yesterday Mark received a score of 3+ out of 4 on his animal report. His teacher called the students one by one up to his desk to chat with them about their reports. Mr. M. told Mark that now that he knows he can "write this well," he expects the same standard of writing on all of his assignments. "It was horrifying!" Mark exclaimed.

Some of the teacher's comments were:
*Very informative w/ a lot of facts!
*When you elaborate, don't go off on a tangent!
*Great word choice
*Humor=good
*Awesome sentence fluency
*Very good attention getter
*Good word choice--can describe words
*Really interesting
*Lots of information

Here are a few excerpts from Mark's cougar report:
*If you have heard the phrase "life is tough" then you will know that is the phrase for the mountain lion.
*Because of all the rocks surrounding the puma, they probably have a type of music named "rock and stone" (hee, hee; WHICH IS IMPOSSIBLE).
*Have you ever heard someone tell you that "the world would be better off without you"? Well that might be true for some people (like the Nazi's) . . .
*Have you ever heard the phrase, "You wouldn't last ten minutes"? Well if you made that same bet with a cougar then you will receive more than you bargained for.
*The mountain lion is something that should not be trifled with, and if you made that bet with it, well let's just say its best you have good life insurance."
*Have you ever heard the phrase "pushing up daisies"? Well, if you were to suddenly die and you were left alone then the term "pushing up daisies" would be appropriate.
*If you were to get killed and left alone, then . . . the florists would have a few more flowers in their collections.
*You know those protesters outside fur stores shouting things; well they have a good cause because over-hunting does hurt the environment and the cougar.
*"Going green" isn't such a bad thing after all and I would like you to consider "going green" just make sure it's not the kind of green when you're about to throw-up.
*I hope that the importance of cougars may have reached you now.
*The cougar is a wonderful animal that needs to be protected, for it is important. If you cross paths with one, then do not harm it and just back away.

Never A Dull Moment . . .

. . . and I'm beginning to crave "dull moments!" I'm freezing cold right now! It's in the 30-degree range outside but we have to have our windows wide open to air out all the smoke in our house. Zachary put a bag of popcorn in the microwave and it caught fire. What alerted us was our usually annoying kitchen smoke alarm. The alarm started blaring and rather than checking to see WHY it was making noise, Zachary tried to stop the alarm instead of checking for the source of the fire. Lance came to the rescue, put out the fire and turned off the alarm. Now he's coughing and our house is smoke-filled.

This incident reminds me of another time my house was smoke-filled. It happened over 25 years ago and it involved one of my roommates and her boyfriend. I'll leave it at that in case the offending party (whom I love dearly) reads this blog.

Things That Go Bump in the Night

Around 9:00 this evening we heard a loud bang, so a few of us rushed outside to see what had happened. One of Rachelle's former classmates who lives up the street was driving down our street, grazed our next-door neighbor's Jeep and then smashed into another of the same neighbor's cars, and that car bumped into the front of our red van (the same red van that slid on black ice and into a pole 2 weeks ago). There was very little, if any, damage to our van, more damage to the car that was grazed, and lots of damage to the second car and the driver's car. The owner of the second car has no insurance, so it's a good thing that he wasn't the one who caused the accident. (He's doubly fortunate in that he might not be a legal resident of our country either.) The poor driver that caused the accident was, of course, embarrassed and called her parents to come to the scene. We helped our next-door neighbors obtain the insurance information as they aren't too familiar with the intricacies of those details in our country. (I would suspect that there are many U.S. citizens who aren't either.)

While I surveyed the accident scene I recalled another such accident that occurred in nearly the same spot a few years ago. The "victim" in that accident was our Ford Ranger, and the driver of the car that hit our truck was the boyfriend of another neighbor who lives up the street. (That boyfriend had hit another car parked along our street just the week before.)

Then I remembered another "accident" (which was NOT an accident) that occurred last summer. I heard a loud crash at 3:00 am and then heard a car alarm a few seconds later. A delinquent had hurled a rock through the rear window of a Ford Expedition that belongs to our neighbors directly across the street. The police responded to that incident.

Many years ago we were awakened by yelling, so Lance went outside to investigate. A bunch of teenage boys were engaged in a fist fight in the middle of the road, so Lance turned the hose on them. The fight broke up and the boys left.

Shall I go on? There's more. I think I'll stop, but suffice it to say that we've had plenty of action in the 22 years we've lived on our street. I prefer quiet evenings and nights any day (or night).