Full Snow Moon on Sunday

February's full moon falls on Sunday. It is named the Snow Moon by the Native Americans because of the heaviest snow falling this time of year. Seems especially true this year, doesn't it?

A couple of weeks ago my kids told me that all 50 states had snow on some part of the ground. I had never thought of that before. I just Googled it and learned that this month even the mountaintops in Hawaii had some snow. So it is the Snow Month indeed. And I love learning new facts from my kids.

Fragments on the Last Friday of February

Freezing—Is winter almost over? Not to complain, but these mornings and evenings in the 20’s are getting old. Last night was a typical day. Work all day, get home and 15 minutes later dash back out to watch middle son at a roller hockey game, outdoors. Hubs and I were both there. And it was his last game so I didn't even sneak in the car once. Oh, and take it from me. If you ever have to change your clothes quickly and grab the jeans you left on the bathroom floor, doublecheck that a small item of clothing is not still stuck in the pant leg. Thank goodness it was a sock and not underwear.

Fair Feedback?—Watched American Idol for the third night in a row this week. Tyler Grady was one of the Four eliminated. I feel bad and his comments to the judges afterwards were spot on (about not getting much Feedback during the process). Wed night they told him they were bored with his 70’s persona. But when he was told he was in the top 24, Ellen D. told him they wanted to see more of him like that.

Follow-Up—In my last post I talked about a classmate I Felt was mean in second grade and I loved the comments left for me. (Jenni said “Eff that girl! Loved it!). As predicted, Hubs told some Female coworkers about my obsession at the dinner table with this story and how he Found me in the closet later, not letting go shoving photos in his Face of that class and defending my story that she was indeed a mean girl and not just being playful. Here’s the reaction from 3 of them:

(from 20-something not married): “Hmmm. I don’t know, I can see both sides, not sure…

(from 20-something and married): “That girl was mean and I would have killed her plant too”

(from 50-something, married with grown daughters): “Hubs, you and the boys need to leave your poor wife alone”. (Loved those words of wisdom).

Full Moon—It is coming Saturday night! Again, on a weekend.

Feminine Pad—Have you read about my adventures with Pass the Pad? We spent time together and I hear the Pad made it to New Zealand!

TGIF. I am about to hit the road for a 5 hour round trip drive for a meeting. I don’t mind, really. It’s Me Time. It beats Flying. Which I have to do next week.

Have some Fun on your Friday.

It’s Not Like I Went All Stephen King’s “Carrie” On Her

Last week I was thinking about something that happened in second grade. I keep having all these childhood memories pop up. Perhaps it’s a combination of my age, having a blog, and having school age kids that has caused certain memories to surface.

In the spring of second grade I was on the school bus in the morning and I was in the back with several classmates. I was wearing a culottes romper type of outfit with a long zipper in the front. The zipper was white and had a ring shape the size of a nickel you’d pull to zip it up. I wasn’t wearing anything underneath.

There was a girl in my class who was really popular and the elderly teacher’s pet. I was standing on the bus, as were several others, and she pulled my zipper down to my mid-section. I may have had a seven year old body, but all 51 pounds of me were pissed off. I was so embarrassed. Boys were there and everyone laughed.

In the classroom we had been growing our own Styrofoam cup of wheat grass seed for a few weeks. This mean-girl-in-the-making happened to have her grass that had grown the fullest and tallest. A ledge in the classroom had all of our cups lined up like this:

I can’t remember if it was the same day she pulled my zipper down or not, but it was very close to that day that I retaliated. It must have been a recess or bathroom break that I was able to get into the classroom alone. I took the teacher’s scissors, went over to this girl’s grass, and Whoosh—I gave that grass a blunt cut and lopped off about 3 inches. And then went on my way back to wherever I was supposed to be.

Well, this old teacher was horrified along with meany girl when the class saw what had been done. Of course no one confessed. And no one ever asked me and no one ever knew. The teacher assumed it was someone who was jealous of her growing grass.

So a couple nights ago at dinner I shared this story with my Hubs and the boys. The boys were kind of shocked but they laughed. And I saw my Hubs staring at me and kind of joking about “Wow, this is a side of you I never knew”. And I’m all like, “Bwaaaahaaahaaa. What!?! She deserved it!” (plus it's not like I ripped the grass out. It will still grow. Gosh). And he actually asked if she was just playing around during the zipper situation and I vehemently described how I had Nothing on underneath even though just my sternum showed I was pissed. And I reminded him of the fact that although I was seven years old and in second grade, I had once again started a new school in a new state (Texas) a couple months prior, which made it my FOURTH school in my life (Calif, then FL, then Calif, then Texas and BTW back to Calif for 5th school) and not to mention once having a horrible experience in the spring of first grade.

And then my Hubs said, “Well as a teacher I have a problem with that behavior even though you had a hard time, that was very mean to her.” Can you believe this? So then I am all, “Well as my husband you have to understand where I was coming from, and guess what—there is not one ounce of regret. None!” And then we were all laughing at the kids each trying to be a comedian such as, "You should have said 'uh, uh oh no you dih-INT with the fingers snapping in a Z formation" and I said it wasn’t like I hurt her like in the movie Carrie for goodness sakes. Of course telling a bus driver or a teacher immediately would have been best. But I was the new outcast and I'm telling you these teachers were sooo biased.

Later that evening he found me in my closet rifling through a box of photos and I found the class picture. For all the schools I went to, it is amazing that I have these photos. I actually had a hard time identifying the mean girl, but then it came back to me. BTW, it was Hunters Creek Elementary in Houston, TX (Spring Branch School District).

I will be providing an update because I know he will mention this to all the women he works with. And I know the women will be behind me. Like that time years ago he got all crabby because I had several bottles of shampoo and conditioner in the shower (this was before kids) and he asked his coworkers how many items they had in the shower. He came home admitting that my pile of shower goodies was much smaller than others'.

I can’t think of any other time I needed revenge like that. Who’s with me? Or who was I too mean to the mean girl?

The Snowy Friday I Hijacked My Kids Off the Bus

Just as it was predicted, the snow began to fall in Georgia around 1:30 p.m. on Friday. I was thrilled to be able to leave work at about 3:30. After I stopped by the grocery store it occurred to me that my two middle schoolers would be on the bus near home in a few minutes. Perhaps I could intervene and get them off the bus before their actual stop.

One of the fights I have not yet fought is why this bus route goes within a mile of our neighborhood, but continues on for a few miles to take two sisters home who live out of the way compared to the rest. In fact one day my 8th grader was motivated to get home prior to 5:00 so he hopped off the bus (did tell the bus driver) at another neighborhood and borrowed a bike from a friend who lives near that stop and beat his 6th grade brother by 30 minutes.

So I had the idea to wait in this other neighborhood, I'd see the bus, the boys would see me and tell the driver they had to get off and they'd get home sooner to play in the snow. The boys don’t have cell phones.

As I am waiting in the neighborhood I called my Hubs and told him my plan and he said he’d be some soon with the Youngest son. It suddenly occurred to me that there was no snow build up on the busier road I had just been on, but in the neighborhood (which has hills) the street could no longer be seen. Well, here comes the bus but I was not in a good spot to be seen and I thought about hopping out and running over to the bus’s door but knew the boys would die of embarrassment so after its first stop I followed the bus in my car. And followed it. And followed it all through this curving, hilly neighborhood. And it keeps stopping and other kids -- but not mine -- are exiting.

We do have an SUV but it stays home M-F and gets taken out when the 5 of us are together on weekends. By this time my 8th grader is waving out the window and I am waving back. Actually I am yelling loudly inside my car, “Get off the bus”! And my anti-lock brakes are making noises. As the bus is about to leave the neighborhood my phone rings and it is my oldest (using a friend’s phone) and I ask if he wanted to get off the bus with his brother to get home sooner. Actually I kind of yelled it. He says OK but it’ll be the next neighborhood as the bus is now pulling out to the main street again. We see a small SUV that is in a ditch.

So now we pull into another neighborhood (farther from our home) and the bus doesn’t stop until we are well into it. My boys tell the bus driver that their mom is behind him in a car and he says “OK, yes, I know someone has been following me”. Next thing I know there are 5 boys walking over to my car. Apparently there are others who want to get home sooner rather than later (all live in our neighborhood and they know me). They squished into my Honda sedan.

Back out onto the main road I am going about 5 miles an hour because we are slipping around. One boy says, “Don’t brake!” (I knew not to). I stopped in front of one boys house and my brakes made crazy noises. Another boy lives down a steep hill so he got dropped off about a block away. Our driveway is a no-big-deal hill, you would think, but I slipped just going up it. I was done. Called the Hubs who was a couple minutes down the road and told him I was done being in my car and that he could pull it further up our driveway and into the garage. Turns out we have a snow shovel left behind by the older couple who used to own our house.
Last year when it snowed all day on a Saturday I stayed inside and cooked. That was fine, but I swore next time it snowed enough to do a snowman that I was going to play. And I am not sure why I took those boys home because all of them and more came over to our house to play. We made a snowman but then it was crushed to death by boys. I made snowballs. I made butt prints by sitting on a bench. I took pictures. Notice I say "I" because middle schoolers are not playing with a mom, and Youngest is playing with the middle schoolers. Another mom came out and she had a fussy 2 yr old in a stroller and in her arms and a 6 yr old hanging out with the middle school gang and after a little bit they all went back inside. She commented to the Hubs and I we must like being past the strollers and diapers stage. That was a good reminder for me.

And then I went inside and cooked meatloaf and mashed potatoes and we ate at 8:30 p.m. Last week I picked the kids up one early afternoon for one of those early release days. e were having a good time at lunch and I asked my 8th grader if he wished I had been a stay at home mom. He said "Yeah, and then I could be a car rider every day". On Friday he was a bus rider and a car rider.

We’re Gonna Need a Bigger Algae Eater

Looking at our fish tank makes me think of the movie "Finding Nemo". I easpecially love the scenes that take place in the aquarium in the dentist’s office. Maybe we should buy a different type of aquarium, to help this algae situation, but honestly our fish seem pretty happy. We have that largish algae eater that is on the back of the aquarium in this photo. He is so shy that once he realizes we are looking at him (her?) he scurries away. There are also two very small algae eaters in here somewhere. I was assured last year that they earn their keep eating algae, but as you can see it is very green in this tank. Other algae eaters have gone belly up after a few days but the tank seems to work out for the six fish and three algae eaters that live here.

I have to say that Finding Nemo is my favorite animated film. I laugh loud every single time I watch the part where the dentist’s niece arrives and the ensuing chaos when the fish are flopping everywhere—don’t they play Psycho music when she appears?

I asked my youngest son what his most recommended animated film dvd would be and he says hands down “A Bug’s Life”. Ever see it? I love that line where the bugs stare at the electrocuting bug device and his friends say “Stop looking at the light!” and the bug says, “I can’t help it, it’s soo beautiful!”……zap.

My middle son says that a more recent dvd--Surf’s Up is his favorite. It is a great Father/Son movie. We never saw it out at the movie theater, but one of my SIL’s told me that my BIL and their son love watching it (and they are ages 56 and 22).

My oldest son can’t decide when I asked him which animated film is his favorite. I can tell you that when he was one year old the first video watched (in the vcr) was “Jungle Book”. I enjoyed it and knew that it was going to be the beginning of many movies to come. (We watched the Fox and the Hound too. Too sad about the Mommy Fox in the beginning!)

Which is your family's favorite animated film?

(Update this a.m..: Did I mention that I forgot to ask my Oldest his favorite animated movie until after he went to bed...so I woke him up. And that's when he said he couldn't think of one.

This morning he and his middle brother were laughing about my waking him up to ask him that. But for the integrity of the blog he has advised that his favorites are the Toy Story movies).