Quickie

No, not that kind.

School vacation, snow days, and a child not feeling well have not left me enough time to keep up here – obviously!

Hopefully I’ll be back soon!

For disappearing acts, it’s hard to beat what happens to the eight hours supposedly left after eight of sleep and eight of work. ~Doug Larson

Shopaholic

No, not me. The Postman.

I used to think I liked to shop. It turns out I don’t.

The Postman is that unusual male who really likes shopping. He likes to walk through stores, just browsing and looking at the merchandise. When we go to Sam’s Club or the grocery store together, he strolls up and down every single aisle. Me, I like to be in and out as quickly as possible. Get what I need and get out. So this has been somewhat of a compromise in our relationship. I try to only grocery shop during the week when he is at work, and he’s caught on to that little trick. However, Sam’s is about 1/2 an hour away and we usually go every other week after we’ve dropped the kids off with their dad. So in exchange for going to the grocery store without him, I endure aisle after aisle at Sam’s. That’s the compromise.

He also researches every major purchase he makes. In Consumer Reports. Online. In the stores. Talking with friends/coworkers/his brother. Sometimes (and he knows this), it makes me want to take away all his access to the outside world and scream “Just buy it already!”

This is how I spent a good part of last weekend:

Saturday: Bi-weekly trip to Sam’s. Today is the day. He’s going to buy the TV of his dreams. Except they don’t have one in stock. So we walk around and around and around the TVs. As if one will magically appear. Finally, he’s done looking/sulking, and we go on with our shopping (actual items we NEED). When our cart is full, we head toward the check out. Except…what’s this?…He’s headed BACK over to the TVs. What the…? And around he goes. Looking at all of them again. At this point I tell him I am going to go stand on line at the registers. He starts sulking more and follows me over. I tell him he is welcome to keep looking while I check out, but I really don’t think it is going to appear. Now he starts POUTING, and says he was looking at other ones instead. AFTER he has researched THIS ONE incessantly and has decided it is the best one for us. Please tell me we are not going to start the process all over again just because they don’t have the tv today. They WILL have them, he just needs patience. It’s already been a several month process for god’s sake, what’s another week or two?

When we get home, he gets online. I wasn’t sure what he was doing until he asked if I would go with him to the OTHER Sam’s Club (about an hour away) on Sunday – because they have them in stock! I said I would but he’d have to feed me first.

Sunday: We get up and hit the road fairly early. After a stop for breakfast, we arrive at Sam’s. He spots the tv he wants immediately, we load it on to a cart, and head for the checkout. This is a new record! I am more than thrilled! Until we get to the checkout. P-Man whips out the debit card and runs it through the machine. It rejects. There is a daily limit on how much you can use your debit card for. Duh. Although we knew that, it didn’t even occur to us. But that’s ok he says to the clerk, just run it through as a credit card. Except that Sam’s doesn’t take Visa credit cards. Um, what?

I seriously thought he might cry now. So we head out to the car to brainstorm. I count my cash, he counts his cash. I know what our limits are on ATM withdrawals, and I’m adding it all together trying to avoid what I know his suggestion will be. It’s not even close. There’s no way to scrape it all together. We drive home ( an hour) to get the checkbook and drive back to Sam’s (another freakin’ hour – because we need to have this tv NOW!). So much for getting up early so as to not waste the whole day on this little adventure. Heh.

But he is so happy with his new tv. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard “Honey, c’mere…look at this!” (Although between you and me…I don’t really see all that much of a difference….). And I realize that really, in the whole scheme of things, if that’s all I have to complain about, then I’m a very lucky woman.

I can’t complain, but sometimes I still do. ~Joe Walsh

Can you hear me now?

The Postman helped me set up my new Bluetooth headset for my cell phone yesterday. (Let’s be clear – I could have done it…the box came from UPS and I set it on my desk because I had too much going on and just didn’t feel like opneing it and dealing with ir right then. But, there was a NEW ELECTRONIC TOY in the house and he couldn’t help himself….)

Here is our conversation:

Him: I got it all set up. Let’s try it out. (He calls my cell as I tuck the thing behind my ear)
Him: Can you hear me? (after I answer the phone but don’t say anything)
Me: You’re standing two feet away from me.
Him: (HUGE eyeroll as he walks through the house away from me) Can you hear me now? (he asks from our bathroom.)
Me: Yup. Thanks. (click the phone off)

Um, seriously? Why did I get the eyeroll? I’m not the moron that called from two feet away.

So, ironically….Happy Valentine’s Day!

When love is not madness, it is not love. ~Pedro Calderon de la Barca

Gratefulness

I’ve been kinda in my mid-winter funk lately so I decided to write a few things I’m thankful for to remind myself that it ain’t all so bad. Here we go!

1. My kids
2. The Postman
3. Hot coffee
4. Spaceheaters
5. Tax returns
6. Fleece socks and blankets (anyone see a trend? It’s cold here today!)
7. Vaseline Intensive Care Cocoa Butter Oil Gel
8. Yummy smelling shower gel
9. Washers and dryers
10. Crockpots
11. My friend Jen who “prettifies” me
12. Heart Shaped frosted sugar cookies
13. The library
14. Allergy medication
15. Someone that plows our driveway for us
16. Being able to work from home
17. iPods
18. Freedom
19. Sunny days (even if they are COLD!)
20. Swiffer vacuums

Gratitude is the memory of the heart. ~Jean Baptiste Massieu, translated from French

Pieces of me

Marie Tasy, executive director of New Jersey Right to Life, said she and a coalition of other opponents would continue to fight the legislation. “This is not a compassionate choice at all.”

Good afternoon,

I ran across this quote on nj.com this morning while I was searching for articles regarding opening records for New Jersey adoptees.

I am writing to ask for some clarification. What exactly is not “a compassionate choice at all”? The choice of allowing adoptees the right to know their heritage and medical history? I find it amazing that an organization, such as yours, can make broad based conclusions such as that. Your mission, dedication to protecting and fostering human life, apparently ends with birth.

I am a 38 year old woman who was adopted in New Jersey in 1969. Over the last 38 years of my life, I have been fortunate enough to be relatively healthy. I get migraines, I have difficult monthly cycles, I am very near sighted. I also have a thyroid condition. All of these issues are easily managed with the help of physicians, medications, and contact lenses. They are not life threatening nor earth shattering illnesses.

In 1998, my son was born with a thyroid condition more serious than my own. His father and I spent several anxious weeks with specialists, watching our tiny newborn son go through blood draw after blood draw to figure out what was wrong with him. I was urged time and time again to find out my medical history – the doctors were sure with my history of thyroid illness that something genetic was occurring. Eventually, his condition was diagnosed, even without a medical history. We were lucky.

What right do you have to tell me I can’t know my medical history? What right do you have to tell my children they can’t know their medical history? Organizations struggled so hard to bring me into this world (RIGHT TO LIFE! ABORTION IS MURDER!), handed me an “amended” birth certificate, and now say “Sorry, you can’t know any of your history”.

The bill presented in the New Jersey legislature has conditions that allow for birth mothers to retain their anonymity. Yes, they will have to provide a medical history in lieu of an original birth certificate being issued. Is that really so much to ask? I for one, (along with many others, I am sure), would be happy just to have that piece of history. I would like to know what I might face, medically, in the future. I also want my children to have access to that same information.

I know you are worried about the birth mothers who bore children out of violent circumstances then gave them up for adoption. They want to forget that period of their life. I would be interested to know what the exact percentage is of children adopted under those conditions. Because, truly, being born in 1969…after the 1968 Summer of Love, Woodstock, and thousands of young men being shipped off to Vietnam, I doubt I, or too many others, were born of violent circumstance. Maybe those birth mothers regret that time in their life, but that does not mean I should be denied my rights now.

I have a right to life. Just no rights beyond that.

Sincerely,

NJ adoptee, 1969

My friends rock

I am not good at keeping in touch. I want to be better at it, and I have no excuse for not being better at it but the fact still remains that I’m not good at communicationg with friends. Yet, when I need them , for whatever reason, there they are. This is the text that went on the other day with a friend I haven’t spoken to in probably 10 months.

Me: Hey…did we ever eat @ Kelly’s diner in Somerville with Tamara? Weird ? I know – humor me.

Her: Um…likely, yes. I think you mean Tamarleigh.

Yeah…so I got her friends name wrong, but the point is that at 11:00PM when I absolutely had to know if we ate at that particular diner (that’s the OCD shining through), she answered like we had just gotten off the phone a few minutes before. It’s nice to have friends like that…friends that understand and accept.

You can always tell a real friend: when you’ve made a fool of yourself he doesn’t feel you’ve done a permanent job. ~Laurence J. Peter