Friday, February 28, 2003

want to know why I'm sitting in front of the computer, at a quarter to three, still in pyjamas, greasy and smelly, and have been for most of the day?
well, I had one of those dawn migraines, and slept off and on from about 8-11. I got up at 11 extremely queasy, brushed my teeth and got on the computer to make some contact, and do some work. from about 1:30 - 2 I was rocking and singing lullabyes to my three year old. I'm achey and nauseous and my five year old is hoarse and feverish. so there you have it.
and now, for a little levity:


Made by the fine folks at
daylighttwilight.com



trixie has written a beautiful homage to the man. my pbs station showed the episode on remembering people today.
"What really matters is whether the alphabet is used for the declaration of war or for the description of a sunrise."
~ Mr. Rogers

my friend lotusbeans posted that on her journal, and I felt moved to snag it. to fred rogers, peace pilgrim.

Thursday, February 27, 2003

showing my age

I'm sure I'm not the only 34 year old sitting here grieving for mister rogers today. I have always felt baffled by anyone who did not "get" how wonderful and important he was, to young children and to their parents. last october, I heard betty jo middleton, a great unitarian universalist religious educator, speak about her life and work, and she talked of how as a struggling young parent, she was ministered to every afternoon by a man who told her that she was good enough just the way she was.
I remember where I was when I heard that Kurt Cobain has passed. I will never forget this morning, sitting in front my computer with the tears coming down, and the good neighbor song in my head.

Tuesday, February 25, 2003

a music quiz from traci jean

1. what are your top 5 albums of all time?
01. Elvis Costello "My Aim Is True"
02. Robyn Hitchcock "Queen Elvis"
03. REM "Murmur"
04. The Beatles (aka the white album)
05. The Pixies "Surfer Rosa"

2. what's the first album that you remember listening to or being aware of and how old were you?
Simon & Garfunkel, I don't know for sure what album. my parents had them all and I was allowed to put the records on by myself. this is when I was 3. my favorite song was Cecelia. I still love that song.

3. what were you listening to the year that you were 13?
Cream, the Who, Led Zeppelin, Styx, Journey (!), David Bowie...

4. would you say a record ever changed you deeply?
EC's first album, My Aim is True. it shifted my perceptions and got me out of classic/arena rock and into new wave & punk rock.

5. what is in your cd player right now?
Aimee Mann - I'm With Stupid. it's addictive.
parades so far:
*krewe of confetti kids: our neighborhood children's parade, featured some pretty awe inspiring wagon & stroller floats and tons of recycled throws. I give it an 8.
*shangri-la: pretty fun, with lots of toys, but too many unenthusiastic dance troupes. a 7.
*krewe of barkus: fabulous! the very best in marching jazz, and absolutely astoundingly clever floats and costumes, plus great throws and toys. a definite 10.
*oshun: small yet kind of blah, with a too high band:float ratio, and not enough throws, but I did like their floats. I give them a 6.
*pygmalian: eh. not so thrilling. I loved how the "russia" float had a disclaimer sign about supoorting our troops. gack. 3.
the friday five on tuesday...

1. What is your most prized material possession?

my photographs. especially the ones of my parents with their own parents, and my photobooth collection.

2. What item, that you currently own, have you had the longest?

I wonder. some of these vintage dresses I've had since I was 13. oh! my jukebox I won in a contest when I was ten! that may be it. although somewhere I have a little jewelry box and one thing in it is the little amber horse my aunt gave me at age 7. oh and I have some baby blankets that were mine as a baby. so there you go.

3. Are you a packrat?

Yes I am.

4. Do you prefer a spic-and-span clean house? Or is some clutter necessary to avoid the appearance of a museum?

well I want it to be CLEAN but I also love my stuff. filth I can't stand, but clutter is okay. I prefer organized clutter.

5. Do the rooms in your house have a theme? Or is it a mixture of knick-knacks here and there?

Theme? har har. perhaps our theme is Every Room A Playroom. or Every Day is Mardi Gras.
this makes me so happy.

The WeatherPixie

Monday, February 24, 2003

"mama, I dreamed that I fixed a broken van with two eggs, one piece of paper, and one play structure. and one instructions."
liam, age 3, monday, february 24, 2003, 6:30 AM

Wednesday, February 19, 2003

I am eating week old evil jungle prince, over 5 day old rice. mbd thinks this is insanely risky, but it doesn't worry me.
it reminds me, though, of when I ate week old chicken and then got so horrifically ill, with laboresque pains in my back and side, vomiting literally all night, lying on the bathroom floor crying and moaning and going from atheist to agnostic for one night only, praying to any deity that might be out there to please, please let me live and I swear I'll never eat week old chicken again!
but after two more days of the sickness, I learned that it was nothing to do with my immediate eating habits, that it was not about the chicken at all, but instead was a massive gallbladder attack and the onset of pancreatitis...
meanwhile, nearly three and a half years later, I'm eating week old chicken with abandon. anything with this much hot pepper can't be bad. and it smells and tastes great. it's fine. trust me.

Monday, February 17, 2003

one last thing for tonight:
we had a banner mail week last week. we got
the new edgycatin' mama (excellent as always)
esperanza #2 (awesome! the first issue was good, yes, but with this one she has really found her voice and it ROCKS)
and
all round: the magic issue (gorgeous as always, and features a zine by bee lavender's son!)
I was robbed!
seriously. how wrong is it that on the night when I have a) a babysitter, b) a cool parade and d) even a party to go to, I instead spend the entire evening at home being puked and shat upon by my children?
there is no justice in this world.
when I called my neighbor to let her know that I didn't feel like I could bring the plague over to her house, she said, well, I figured you'd cancel anyway because of the rain.. but no! I woulda gone. certainly I would not have dressed as well as I'd originally intended, but I woulda gone and had a blast in the pouring rain.
I did go to the peace march & rally in the afternoon, and it was alright, I mean, GREAT compared to new orleans rallies so far. we really need to do better, though... my favorite monent during the march was when an older guy with purple hair responded to some frat boys heckling with, "go home, tourists, we don't need you." imagine new orleans with no tourists. or at least no frat boy tourists! once we reorganized the economy, we'd have a really nice place here.
anyhow, I had to get home and I was starved, so I picked up some chinese food at canal place. I ate my greasy chicken & fried rice on the ferry and then went home to chaos, where liam had not had a nap and nash went from "my belly hurts" to totally hurling all over the (carpeted) staircase in a matter of 30 seconds or less. and so I called sandy and cancelled babysitting and called kami and cancelled debauchery, and managed to get liam to sleep after a dinner of leftover pancakes with jam, and rub nash's back and keep him company while we watched scooby universe on the cartoon network and I don't recall what else. I figured well, at least I would be fresh for the children at work as a result of having had to stay in. I figured I'd get dropped off by mbd and the kids and then find a way home from church with some friends.
nash finally passed out around 11 and then I started nodding off in front of my book... fell asleep just before 12 and then was jolted awake by the sound of liam puking all over himself. you know, he puked some and then fell back into it, then stood up and continued, etc., etc. I held on to him til he finished and then took him downstairs and washed him in the tub. back in bed a vomitous odor told me I'd missed a spot in his hair somewhere, but I couldn't deal with going back to the tub. we watched Square Pegs, Barney Miller, My Favorite Martian, whatevr came on TVland with him popping up every 20 or so minutes to puke, until sometime after 4 when he finally fell completely asleep again. he would heave into a bowl for a few minutes, red faced and dripping sweat, and then croak, "I'm fine, I'm FINE!" and collapse back on the bed.
I got up at 8 feeling shaky and sweaty and called one of steady teachers to fill in for me. liam added to my credibility by waking up howling while I was on the phone and shitting in his pants. I got mbd up and asked him to drive down to the church to deliver the supplies, the origami paper, the sadako story...
meanwhile, I changed bedding again and cleaned the carpet as best I could.
that was sunday morning. now it is monday evening and the kids seem almost totally recovered. I am pretty sick. but at least there is an Oliver's Twist marathon on the food network today! by the way, I loved matthew broderick as the music man last night. lord, I hate the thought of being sick without access to a tv.

Friday, February 14, 2003

one time I had a tape from a friend of mine, it had this song on it that went:
one two stupid
three four dumb
five six idiotic...
and then the chorus was:
stupid, very stupid!
I have no idea who it was, but it was very perky and certainly devo-esque.
anyhow, I bring it up because my exhaustion right now seems to be rendering me just short of brainless... stupid, very stupid.
maybe it's all the chocolate. or maybe it's not enough.
liam went to bed at 6:30 after a fit of candy induced insanity. nash spent over an hour signing a whole box full of store bought dinosaur themed valentines in preparation for next year. me, I just sat here.
"everybody's got a bomb, we could all die any day; but before I let that happen, I'll dance my life away."
with prince's words in mind, I'll be going out tomorrow, to march for peace in the afternoon, and then to party down at night. I wish everyone else the opportunity to do the same.

Wednesday, February 12, 2003

Monday, February 10, 2003

okay, so here is the thing, I got "forrest gump" as my result and then by changing ONE answer got "crossroads" instead. the thing is, the answer I changed was under occupation. I changed from mother to music industry... who knew forrest was considered maternal? I mean, I guess...
crossroads
"Crossroads"! I bet you're diein' at this
one, hehe. Although the movie was a flop, your
lifestyle isn't. You are fun and adventurous!


What movie best reflects your lifestyle?
brought to you by Quizilla

Thursday, February 06, 2003

ah, but the friday five is not on central time, so here it is at 11 PM:

1. What did you have for breakfast this morning? If you didn't have breakfast, why not?
I had one piece of veggie sausage and one pancake, hastily grabbed because I was running late, and a big glass of emergen-C.

2. What's your favorite cereal?
I love a good granola. I mean it. with vanilla edensoy, mmmm...

3. How often do you eat out? Do you want that to change?
way too often. I'm actually fine with eating out often, but I wish I could go to higher quality restaurants. I get fast food out of necessity (running late but with just a little cash) way too often, like more than once a week. it sucks.

4. What do you plan on having for dinner tonight? Got a recipe for that?
tonight? we had a totally half-assed dinner. PB & J for the kids, and popcorn, and I had reheated quinoa from a box (far east brand) with leftover sauce on top from Evil Jungle Prince (see the east village inky for the recipe - it's issue 2 or 3 I think...) that we had on monday, and then some leftover bread pudding for dessert.

5. What's your favorite restaurant? Why?
there is this Italian place in Coral Gables, FLA, that has sauces that make me want to cry. it's called Cafe Itallia and I wish I could eat there more often than every few years. I've been there a total of three times but it made a huge impression on me. they were sweet to my baby, too, and the cannoli... mmm! a very good reason for visiting florida.

Wednesday, February 05, 2003

today I sat down with my datebook and the parade guide and wrote down all of the stuff I don't want to miss. I feel like that is sort of a weird thing to do, but dammit, if I screwed up and missed krewe of barkus I'd be crushed. ditto muses and krewe du vieux.
yesterday we went to city park to work on building the new wheelchair accessible playground. a mass email went out to everyone in our unschool group, telling us to come and bring the kids... but when we got there, it turned out that the kids weren't allowed to help with any of the work, so it was kind of logistically awkward. I did some breaking up of clumps of dirt and shoveling for about half an hour and then took care of my kids the rest of the time. and tried not to feel guilty about sharing in the free food.
the best of the food: this amazing little treat that was like a cannoli except that they used praline for the cookie part. absolutely amazing!
they also let us into storyland for free. storyland is a partof city park that has storybook themed play structures and usually costs a dollar or so to get in. it was my first time in there. I found it a bit scary. big, creepy characters, too steep slides... Nash hurt himself right away, he cut his finger on a sharp edge on the slide. weird place.

Sunday, February 02, 2003

Forever Knight
You are: Forever Knight.
(www.scifi.com/fknight/) Your vampire cop
who wants make amends has garnered more than
his share of admirers. Your die-hard fans are
known for lobbying for a DVD release and
organizing charity drives.



Which Vampire TV Show Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

I LOVE this show. the last time I saw it was 1996 - july, as a matter of fact, while staying with my friend heather just outside of boston, getting ready for camp and adjusting to the news that what I'd thought was the worst PMS ever was actually early pregnancy. I was fatigued and cranky and generally weirded out, and would lie awake nights watching the canadian vampire cop...
I comes on my tv actually, nowadays, but they show it at something crazy like 10 AM, and I can't be exposing young children to that crazy vampire cop stuff, even if it is canadian.
cabbage
You're Cabbage!


What is your lettuce personality?
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ah ha ha! hooray! this makes my night. pathetic, I know. but between this and ER theater, I'm all set for a de-stressing sunday night. see, sunday night is the END of my "work week"... monday is my easiest day, the "breathing out" you know? now I'm just wired-tired and unwinding. I'm really glad, by the way, that ER theater comes on earlier here than it did when I lived in mississippi... I could never stay up for it then. just barely related: in 1989/1990, the highlight of my sunday nights was a show called Night Music, hosted by david sanborn. the chili peppers, sonic youth, pretty fat, the indigo girls, pere ubu... it was so amazing.
monday night and I'm dead tired. so tired that I just typed monday and it's actually sunday. oy. but here, this is entertaining (for me, anyway):
I'm an apparently intelligent, liberal, not-too-generous, not-too-selfish, relatively well adjusted human being!
See how compatible you are with me!
Brought to you by Rum and Monkey