seriously

My son told my aunt and me, out of the blue, the other day, that his dead robot pees in a hat, but he is teaching him to pee in the toilet.
How cool is that, I mean the things we can teach robots these days.

I have been thinking about this alot, maybe it's code. Maybe he is CIA, just in case I won't tell Scooter Libby.

My husband thinks that RadioShack is a front for the CIA (got this idea long before the show Chuck). He originally got the idea from my mother, their evidence is that there is never anyone in the stores, and when there is, they buy a $2 adapter, yet, they can afford to have stores in just about every neighborhood. That is the less detailed argument, but gives you the general idea. It is very well thought out. I wonder where my son gets his robot ideas.

not all of their fingerpaintings are picasso's

Today I spent the entire day at my kids school going to various honor roll assemblies. I expect my kids to be on the honor roll. There is no reason for them not to be, they are smart and they don't put nearly enough time into their school work for me to settle for less. If they have that much free time then they better have it down. I get annoyed by these school gatherings, I don't want my kids to think that they deserve a standing ovation every time they do their job. I believe we are supposed to do certain things because they are ours to do, school being one of those things. I don't remember getting much more than a, "good job honey" when I got a good grade, although there was a point when my parents were so desperate to get a good grade out of me that they offered me $50 every 'A'.
My problem, I guess isn't so much with the accolades, but with the fact they call 3/4 of every class up to the stage between the 'A' honor roll, and 'B' honor roll, and there are always a few left in their seats because they didn't quite make it, I hate that. The thing is that C's are supposed to be the average grade, so if 75-85% of the class is getting A's and B's, then the work has gotten too easy. I love my kids and that they do well in school, but they don't earn their grades. Emma gets great grades when she isn't too lazy to do the work, and Katie can get straight A's through osmosis alone.

My nephew is a really smart kid with some big learning disabilities, he just has a hard time with everything that school has to offer. Joe works harder at school than any kid that I have ever seen, his schedule is rigid. During the summer he travelled an hour each way, five days a week to get to school to try and help overcome the problems that he has had, and maintaining a great demeanor throughout the whole time. So, with all of the time he puts into school, with the working and trying and getting frustrated, Joe would still be left in his seat. As much as I am happy for my girls good grades, it's hard to well up with pride for something they have put very little of themselves into, I am far more proud of those grades that Joe struggled for.

There is a big push for building kids self-esteem these days, but if we are the ones building it for them, whether by blowing the little things up to gigantic proportions or dumbing things down so they can't fail, is it really self-esteem. Self-esteem is built by overcoming challenges and working hard for something, failing and getting back up to try again, it can't be served up on a platter. They have to know that everything they touch is not gold, every finger painting is not a Picasso.

dinosaurs

You know, for my entire life I have heard that dinosaurs were extinct, and I am here to say it's all a lie. Dinosaurs are alive and well, and reside in my shower. They are smaller than believed to be, and very quiet (stealth like), but manage to get under my foot every time I step in.The only thing that hurts worse than stepping on a dinosaur (triceratops are the worst) is stepping on a Lego, either way both make me question whether parenthood was the right choice.

So, this is my blog, if anyone actually reads it I will be floored, but this is it. I am moving my myspace posts over here too, and I guess either something or nothing will come of it.

stuff i found under the couch

2 cars from the movie cars (lightning and the king), 2 dimes, 3 pennies, and a quarter, 2 pencils and a hot pink gel pen, 1 copy of Jack and the Beanstalk, with pop-ups, 4 dirty socks belonging to various children, only 2 matched ,1 pirate dagger that I got at the 99 cent store with patty one night after dinner and we sat in my van for an hour stabbing ourselves with it, 1 transformer (optimus prime), 1 game cube controller, 1 jedi action figure, a purple rubber centipede, a plastic dinosaur (triceratop), the cover to my calculator, 2 dog bones, 1 otter pop, and 1 snickers wrapper, 2 things unrecognizable from being chewed by maggie the dog, 1 thomas the tank engine, 1 dirty undershirt belonging to Billy, a nerf dart gun,a marble and a remote control.
Stay tuned for the sequel..."stuff i found in the couch" coming when I finally work up the courage to look under the cushions.

i wonder...

I just read that "I'll be back" is the most quoted movie line. Now I wonder if it only counts if you are saying it like the governator, or if they are counting every time someone uses the words 'I'll be back." I say it all the time, if I walk out of a room and plan to return right away, if I'm going to pick up something from the store, if I want someone to save my seat (you get the picture). So I think it can only count if you say it with an Austrian accent, I might even let it slide with an Australian accent, it is just an extra syllable.
The bottom line is that there are so many great movie lines out there, that we need to popularize some of the cooler ones, I can think of about 20 from Casablanca alone.
Here are some thoughts, let's see if we can work them into our vernacular:
"I remember every detail. The Germans wore gray, you wore blue."
"Snakes. Why'd it have to be snakes?"
"Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker."
" I am a nice shark, not a mindless eating machine. If I am to change this image, I must first change myself. Fish are friends, not food."
"Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries."
"Seven years of college down the drain. Might as well join the fucking Peace Corps."
"This whole world's wild at heart and weird on top."
"It rubs the lotion on its skin. It does this whenever it is told." (maybe not this one)
"This is my corn. You people are guests in my corn."
"Leave the gun. Take the cannoli."
Well, there is a start, but you get the idea, "I'll be back" is a lame most popular movie quote, let's do better.

scary

So, ever since Halloween my boys have been obsessed with all things scary. Billy draws picture of skeletons and zombies and monsters, all of which are really good, by the way. They wear masks and hide behind things so they can jump out at me. They are not very good because they can't stop giggling the entire time they are hiding. My job is to scream, "AGHHHHH!!!!!" at just the right moment. I am really good at it and the boys believe that I was actually scared every time. They walk away laughing hysterically and boasting about how they "got' me. It's cool, and fun is had by all.
The other night I was up late studying, and went upstairs to collapse in my bed, and laying there I came face to face with biggest, ugliest spider that I have ever seen, and I FREAKED!!! I jumped out of bed, heart racing, driven by pure panic, and about to pick up Mike's laptop to kill it, when I realized it was plastic. One of my kids was screwing with me, and it totally worked. My only salvation was that nobody saw my hysteria.
The next day Billy asked me if I said, "AUGHHHHH!!" when I saw the spider, and I laughed and told him that I did. He told me that next time I should do it to him. He wants me to put the spider in his bed and scare him. I don't understand boys. Jack and Billy are going to grow up to be like those guys in the movie 'Summer School' that were so into horror movies, and put on the chainsaw massacre display in the classroom to freak out the substitute.
Oh well, hope we can afford the therapy.

the most wonderful time of the year

Today I went shopping and started to get excited, as my favorite time of year is approaching. I love the year from the week before Thanksgiving when we go to Disneyland straight through to Christmas morning. I like people better, I like the weather being colder (even if it is SoCal cold), I like turkey and buying and decorating the tree, I love listening to friends talk about their plans. I love watching Mike put the lights on the house, and having the kids home from school. I like that we spend an entire month sneaking around, that concludes with an all nighter of wrapping, putting things together and watching the Christmas Story marathon, just so that our kids can have the 4 1/2 minutes of magic that it takes to tear through all of the paper we spent all night putting on..
I'm not so much a Christmas person, after the morning the day itself (other than the tamales) is never great, probably due to exhaustion, but I love the build up. People are nicer, I'm nicer. I put forth an extra effort, that maybe I wish I did more of throughout the year. I think it's the lights, colorful lights make me high.
Katie and the boys just came in from skateboarding, and their hands and faces are cold, and they are dirty and loud, and I love that too.
If anyone actually reads this, and wants to throw up from all this sugar, go right ahead.

annoying moms

Ok, I have never blogged before, honestly even the word doesn't sound all that appealing, but I was annoyed and needed to vent and figured why not go public.
Everyday I take my son to kindergarten (and I get that I don't totally fit in with the suburban housewives-I'm cool with that), but there is a woman that everyday I see her she goes off on a rant about how awful her kids are and how basically rotten motherhood is--blah,blah, whatever. Now I guess I bring this relentless diatribe on myself when I say casually to her, "Hey, how's it goin'?" (I'm really going to have to try harder to stop that), but come on.
I am so tired of listening to people complain about how nobody ever told them it would be so hard, they feel duped. My question is did anyone say it was going to be easy? I mean we're turning out people here, did you really think that everyday was going to be an idyllic Christmas morning?....and has anyone ever had an idyllic Christmas morning? Frankly, I think the generations before us didn't mention parenthood was hard because they assumed we knew.
I am not saying that bad days don't happen, I've had my share, but it is sad to me that for alot of people they have become norm. Jackson used to go to the back door first thing every morning, and no matter what it looked like outside (lighting could have actually been forming the word 'DOOM') and he would say, "Look Mommy, it sure is a beautiful day out." He chose it, it was that easy. I think we need a new perspective, our days are what we make them. There are smoke and fires all around us, and today all I see is a beautiful day.
Preachy and sappy, but I feel better.