Ow

Mister C and I stayed up way too late last night playing Rock Band. I was the drummer and my arms are killing me today. I could barely lift them this morning when I got up. The worst part was trying to avoid the animals. ADHD Girl spent several minutes attempting to catch the drumsticks. Not to be outdone, the Antagonizer spent most of her time attacking either the cord or my left hand. In addition to Rock Band, we did some boxing. Mister C beat me the first time. Barely. I maintain that the only reason he was able to do so was because the ever helpful Antagonizer was hanging from the hem of my jeans. Her lard butt was laying between my feet, her front feet wrapped around my leg and her teeth imbedded in my pantleg. It made it just a touch difficult to box properly, but I gave it a good shot. Considering the unfairness of the match, I made Mister C do a rematch and cleaned his clock. He seemed shocked by my aggressive insistence on winning. He shouldn't have been. We've been together for over 14 years and married for over 11, he should know by now that I don't like to lose. I am probably way too competitive for my own good. Sometimes the only reason I accomplish something is because I just refuse to give up. This was the case when I had the "opportunity" to climb a rock wall at a friend's wedding (most awesome wedding ever btw) and also on several of the lesser mountains nearby. Anyway, the main point here is that during the trouncing of my husband I think I pushed myself a teensy bit too far. I've been gimping around here all day today. Our afternoon walk did help to loosen things up a bit, but it did absolutely nothing for my arms, which feel like noodles. Really painful noodles. If noodles could hurt.

Peace on earth

Or at least in my house. Finally. Master J just went to bed. He got up at 4:20 this morning to inform us that Santa had indeed showed up. We sent him back to bed until 6:30. Mrs. Claus was trying to be less commercially this year and hadn't purchased any huge gifts for under the tree. Mr. Claus evidently disagreed with this and went out on his own to get it done right. He left a Wii gaming system and RockBand II under the tree. We spent the day playing the different games. We even got my dad to play. I have to say that I totally rock at bowling. And I am a killer in the boxing ring. I completely suck at baseball though. Anyway, it was a great day overall and we had a blast. But goodness gracious was it loud and chaotic around here for the better part of the day. It ended up being a day full of family and fun. Maybe Mr. Claus knew what he was doing after all.

Because there's nothing like bad timing...

Now my tooth hurts. One of my back molars has/had a filling that I can feel the edge of. And I can clearly see (with the use of a flash light and mirror) that it's coming up. Just in time to avoid enjoying any part of the two Christmas dinners coming within the next 24 hours. And there's not a dentist around that is actually answering their phones this morning. Bah. Humbug.

The day before the day before Christmas...

I've had kind of a tough day. It started out okay. Master J was at my parent's house over night so I got to sleep in. I got up and the coffee was made, my newspaper ready. Looks good so far. I jumped in my car and hit the mall right around 10:00 to pick up two last items for Christmas and the mall was pretty calm. I got in and out in under 30 minutes. Then I went and met my mom and Master J for lunch at our favorite Chinese place. I took Master J home to Mister C and went back out to the grocery store for a few last minute things Christmas dinner. Then I went home. By this time it was about 12:30. After I got home, out of habit, I checked my fish. And I see that one of my loaches is acting "off". He's laying on his side, panting. Yeah, that's not good. So I went online to try and figure out what the problem is. Only before I finish looking, I get hit with a killer headache. I haven't had one like this in awhile. I tried taking aspirin and laying down for about an hour, but it didn't go away. So I took some Tylenol and lay back down. Not long after this, Mister C took Master J out shopping (I suspect to get him out of the house more than anything). I was in and out of sleep until 7:00 when I took some more Tylenol. Currently, my headache is a low throb in my right eye. Not pleasant, but bearable. So now that I can see straight, I check in on my fish. And I can clearly see that one of my loaches has ich. Nice. Evidently, my brand new loaches brought it with them. So now I'm treating my tank for that and hoping against hope that I can get on top of it before it wipes everyone out. In the meantime, Mister C and Master J got back home, bearing gifts of already fried chicken and baked potatoes. Maybe there's some hope for this day after all.

Have I updated you lately?

I don't think I've updated lately about all the goings on in our life. Here goes...

First of all, we got the rent check from our new tenant on time for the December rent. He included the check for January's rent as well so that seems to be working out okay. We did have a minor glitch in that he hadn't actually moved one of the utilities into his name. We figured this out when we got a bill. I called him and he said he would take care of it but two days later he still hadn't. So Chris called him and (hopefully) straightened it out.

I filled my new (used) bookcase with all of my books and it looks great. I am thrilled to get all of my books off the floor and in order. I hung up 85% of my pictures and know where most of the remaining ones are going. We ended up buying a beautiful entertainment center from our neighbors for about 1/4 of what it would cost new. It's gorgeous and it holds my important items so now my dining room table is clear as well.

I finally found some clown loaches to add to my tank. It took several weeks of repeatedly visiting all the nearby fish places to find them. Evidently they've become very popular lately because people figured out they could put them in a variety of environments and they're pretty fun to watch. When I finally found them, I bought all five that they had in the tank. They were absolutely TINY! I mean, about 3/4 of an inch long and they can get up to 12 inches. In the week that they've been here, they've already grown noticeably. I also had my first tank death when one of my plecos went belly up. Even in death though, nobody tried to eat him (which is rare, fish are pretty cannibalistic). I pulled him out and exchanged his body for a live one since I'd only had him for a few days at the time. So far, so good.

We got a letter from the school confirming what we pretty much knew about Master J and that is that he qualifies for gifted services. They tested him on his sixth day in his new school. Unlike Loser Elementary, they actually included his test results with the letter. I still am not completely convinced that Loser Elementary actually tested Master J. I know they said they did, and they certainly sent a letter saying that he didn't qualify, but all things considered I'm not convinced.

I finished all of my Christmas shopping and got most of it wrapped. I'm still waiting on several packages to arrive from Amazon. I wrote my Christmas letter, but I'm not sure I'm going to get around to sending it out. I have the cards sitting on the counter, but I haven't even started to put together a list of who I would send them to. I also managed to make one batch of fudge so far. I thought I had enough ingredients to make more, but I forgot I had given my big bottle of vanilla to Brandy before moving out here so I could only make one batch. I have the supplies for gingerbread cookies sitting on my island, but haven't gotten around to making them either.

Mister C is done traveling for the year and I'm looking forward to not going anywhere for Christmas. The farthest we're going this year is over to my parent's home for Christmas Eve dinner. That will be the only place I can get a proper ham dinner. Mister C believes that Christmas dinner is turkey. I disagree wholeheartedly. I was raised (properly) with a Christmas ham. Mister C and I have had a long running battle about this particular topic. With our three year rotation schedule (1 year with each set of parents, 1 year at our home) we're each guaranteed what we want once every three years. The year we do at home is the one we fuss the most over. The compromise we've come to this year is that my mom makes a ham dinner for Christmas Eve and I make a turkey dinner on Christmas day. We can both live with that.

I think that wraps up everything that's recently gone on. With Master J home from school for the next few weeks, I'm sure I'll have something more to write about sooner than later.

I wasn't sure I was going to publish this one...

I finished "shopping" for my older sister and her four teenagers yesterday. I ended up getting her and her girls gift cards to a favorite store. As much as I love my sister and adore my nieces, I struggle with what to do with them for Christmas. When they were younger, I went in with my mom and younger sister on complete sets of bedding for each of them. The shipping that year was horrible. One year I put together "spa treatment" kits for them. There was the year of books and the time I sent them each their own little tree with packages of decorating items so they could each decorate their own. Last year, I shopped for a long time to carefully pick out cool clothing for each of them. But every year, after they open their gifts 2000 miles away, they never take 30 seconds to call and let me know if it fit, if they liked it, if they even got it. Never mind a phone call, we're all "friends" on Myspace, I'd be thrilled with a two word note that said "Got it!". It's not that they ask for anything (because they don't). It's not that I expect great kudos and outpourings of eternal gratitude (because I don't). It's that somewhere along the line, they didn't get the memo about common courtesy. They've had a tough life, being raised primarily by a single mom that sometimes acts more like their friend than their mom. But being gracious and acknowledging other people is a required skill in this world. And I worry that without that skill, they're not going to get as far in life as they could have. My sister is a good person who has done the best she can and I love her dearly, but I worry about what she's instilled in her daughters for skills to get through life. When I started this post, I wasn't sure I was going to publish it because I didn't want to come across as being judgmental towards my family. It seems like such a stupid thing to be worried about. But I am.

And the word of the day is...

Steak Butt! Followed by uproarious laughter. Yeah, this is what I get for taking the child shopping with me today. Evidently he found it the last time he went shopping with Mister C and he really wanted to show me. He could hardly contain himself and was sorely disappointed when he couldn't find it. Ah, yes, I am the mother of a boy.

As a side note, I'm fairly certain he was looking for butt steak, but that's not nearly so funny now is it?