live from sublurbia

It’s like a zen internet garden in here. Us grownups are clacking away on our soft-touch keyboards in our little online worlds. The children are snuggled in their beds, clutching cats and babies, imagined and real. Somewhere in the distance meditative music plays in a loop and sleep begins to roll over our neighborhood.

Wolfie thrives on routine. We somehow got him hooked on music as he went to sleep, and this ended up being the compromise for all-night music. He’s not up every time a CD shuts off to turn it back on, and we don’t get woken up at 1, 2, 3 and 4 to turn it on for him or have him complain that we won’t. He sleeps better with a little noise, it’s reassuring, and we get to sleep through the night. Everyone wins.

But hearing the music from what sounds like a wooden xylophone makes me thirsty for a pot of tea. I suppose it’s only a matter of time before it’s the latest pop wonder instead, so I should enjoy the serenity now …

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Think of a Something Thursday!

One of the tips I’ve picked up from daycare, summer camp, and other mommies is a focal point for herding children around. One kid, four kids, or more (especially if they are a leetle bit older). I used it just the other day herding a few five year olds and a two/three year old to the movies and park. I parked the car next to a tree that occupied a median, and had each get next to the tree and hug it once they left the car as I unbuckled them individually.

It worked in reverse, too - they stayed there as I unlocked the car and buckled them all back in, one by one by one.

But I’ve had the darnedest time getting them to stay back from the TV. It’s like herding cats as they get more drawn in to Signing Time or Dora or Magic School Bus and inch back. Until I invented the “no zone”.

The hub was suspicious when I abandoned my pursuit of our usual decorating style: late college years, early messy childhood. I asked to buy a rug for the living room. “Whyyyy …” he he trailed off cautiously. Continue Reading »

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Works for me wednesday!

I wrote earlier in the week about the use it or lose it aspect of gift cards as more and more retail establishments fall into bankruptcy. In keeping with this theme - something I learned the hard way with gift cards and vouchers is definitely “use it or lose it”.

Or at least be careful in how you use it.

I’m a listener to Public Radio; a contributor, too. “Back in the day” as my parents would say, you could get a real deal as a contributor to your local station. There are some decent gifts now, too, and you can also decide to not accept a gift and increase your donation to the station by that much more.

Sometimes they run contests. One year, I won. Two round-trip plane tickets, whooohooo! I had plans to be married within a year or so, and figured I’d use the tickets then. My letter came in the mail and I filed it carefully away (mumble mumble big pile of papers here or there). I called the airline a few months later only to find they’d gone out of business.

Another time I was given two unlimited day passes on the local commuter rail system. Not bad at all. I offered them to a co-worker as a free way to try the system. Thankfully, he turned me down, and I ended up using them myself on a couple of occasions when I forgot my wallet. Even more thankfully, there were no ticket checks on those days. Looking more closely at the stubs I realized the tickets had expired a few years earlier. The station was digging back pretty deep into that prize closet.

Got a gift card? Won a prize? Use it or lose it, man. Use it or lose it.

_{For this and other Works for me Wednesday ideas, check out the mothership of WFMW: rocksinmydryer.net.}

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One of Wolfie’s favorite books lately has been a drawing book. How to draw a present, a house, a cake, and more, in three or four steps. It comes with its own magnetic drawing pad and stylus, and amuses him to no end because of the power he’s found in drawing a picture and telling its story.

His imagination has been cranking in high gear lately, and the 1000 words of a picture are his treasured launch pad.

Sometimes it’s a large fire, flambeing the cake. We have to blow out the fire before it burns away the cake, then feast on crispy chocolate cake. Sometimes it’s a house turning into a rocket ship, blasting away to outer space. Continue Reading »

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Normally, I am a huge fan of gift cards. This is teacher appreciation week, and I’m racking my brain looking for a little something to contribute. I hadn’t planned on gift cards, but I’ve not yet come up with something. Probably baked goods and/or a veggie/fruit plate for them to nosh on.

However, considering the way things are kind of going a bit off of the deep end economy wise, that gift card in your wallet may just turn to dust:

Brian Riley, senior analyst at research firm The TowerGroup, estimates [Linens’n'Things filing for bankruptcy protection] will freeze about $42 million in consumer gift cards, affecting about 400,000 customers. Gift cards become valueless when a company files for bankruptcy protection.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/business/20080502-1211-linensnthings-bankruptcy.html

Go find something you need, need to replace, or need a backup for. And don’t buy gift cards off of people that they “aren’t going to use” unless you’re sure the store is still accepting cards.

I know this is saturday, but I may repeat it for WFMW. It qualifies as something I probably will learn the hard way. I’m sure I’ve gotten short changed on these cards before … I’ll just link this.

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So I had a night out with the girls recently. Partying down on Miami Beach, us mild-aged gals looking for some variety of food and scenery. Despite getting a little lost a couple of times in downtown Miami (putting my love of public transportation in perspective when I realized I work banker’s hours and normally wouldn’t have to stand around at 11pm at night waiting for the last bus), it was a blast.

We were looking for Cuban food but ended up at a great little restaurant named Tap Tap. Sat out on the porch, and tried a little bit of everything: A goat stew, a roasted chicken, and some grilled conch. Yumm. One of the reviews for the restaurant calls it great and cheap but I must have a skewed view of cheap; it was still decent pricing for a delicious meal.

Got a few pictures walking around looking for food, too: a great fishy building, and a lot of for sale signs. The buildings are being kept up well, despite the economic downturn and property bubble implosion. Nice to get out and about with the ladies, too. I’ll have to remember Tap Tap next time we’re in the area (and keep looking for Cuban @ Miami Beach, too). The next day’s activity plan included hitting up the Maurice Gibb Memorial; if I’d realized at the time we were so close I would have joined them for that outing as well. Maybe next time.

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Carrell was off duty Monday and driving his patrol car back to the station. About 9 a.m., he noticed a car stopped on the westbound highway’s left lane near Interstate 5. Carrell saw a mama duck and about 10 ducklings near the median.

The other car drove off, and Carrell positioned his vehicle to shield the ducks. Eventually, the family began its trek across three lanes of traffic.

http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/local/story/349134.html

There’s video, too. If you watch the SUV driver directly behind the cop, he or she hit the hazards and helped block traffic for the cop car and protected his entry back to his own official vehicle. Many many officers are hurt every year when vehicles moving too fast and too close strike or clip rescue or enforcement vehicles.

A few months ago, while driving through Palm Beach county, I came upon a similar scene. A uniformed State Trooper, car blocking a lane, shooing/escorting a bald eagle out of harms way in some kind of “special speed penalty zone”. No pictures, but it tickled me. Except for one that flew 20 feet over me during a vacation trip to New Mexico, I think that’s the closest I’ve been to a free bald eagle.

There’s adventures everywhere. :)

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Think of a Something Thursday!

I have never had to label things so much as since I’ve had kids.

My last year of junior high, I needed a new coat and I found a lovely hot pink one (ah … the hot colored eighties; quite a change from the autumnal seventies). It included a zip-out black and pink fleece check-pattern inner jacket/mini jacket/liner. Mom told me to put my name on it, but I didn’t want to. I assured her I would be careful, and keep track of it; putting my name it in was so grade schoool.

I see you nodding along there on the other side of the computer. And the answer is, I’d be surprised if I had it all for even two weeks. The outer coat was “too hot” one Friday afternoon so I hung it up on the rack at my after school hangout. Sure enough, by the next Monday it was gone.

I think I still have the inner jacket - stashed somewhere in the Garage of Doom^TM.

My first trick of labeling things as a mobile pumper was the use of Post It flags. I had a TON of them from a previous co-worker who stuck them on every page to mark every change. I labeled the bottles simply, with numbers. The day-mommies fed the bottles to the kid in the order they were labeled. This was important because I’d send some fresh milk and some frozen milk, and I wanted the frozen milk to be served first. These durable, reusable labels were also great for home use and babysitters. Continue Reading »

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