Category Archives: working mom

Celebration: It’s Been One Year!

Posted on February 23, 2012 | 19 comments

Good morning everyone!

This week marks the one year anniversary of this blog so today is the first day of the New Blogging Year.  From my first post, My Unintended Exercise, through my latest post, A Touch of Spring, it has been an exciting journey, and I just can’t tell you how much I appreciate your taking time out of your day over this past year to share this journey with me.

I will start off this New Blogging Year with a conversation Kayla and I had yesterday.  She was sick, and Mark was staying home with her since he also was sick.  Once we decided that she needed to stay home, both of us reinforced the idea that if you stayed home sick, you needed to rest and be quiet, not play and watch TV.  She willingly went back to bed, and when I was ready to leave I went in to her bedroom to tell her good-bye.  She rolled over, gave me a sleepy hug, then said, “Mom, can I ask you a question?”  I said, creatively, “Yes.”  She then asked “Is food included?”  I smothered a laugh, told her yes, food was included in a stay at home day, and then beat a fast track out to the car where I could laugh in safety.

During this past year, we have shared a lot of laughs, traveled together and even learned a few things.  You have been kind enough to read some of my poetry, read my posts about the history of the Ugg Cave Clan and listen to some of my whining thoughts on contemporary technology and other things.

Some of the posts that both you and I agree were pretty funny include my thoughts on The Perils of Absent-Mindedness, my one post that was Freshly Pressed, Rules I Never Thought I’d Need, Cheese Grits:  The Sequel, Please stop Improving My Life, Part I and Part II, Fibber McGee’s Closet and Drunken Puppies.

Together, we have traveled to many places, including Key West, the Smoky Mountains, Destin Florida, Oak Mountain in Birmingham, Pensacola and Callaway Gardens.  We also got to visit two fantastic restaurants, Lambert’s Cafe in Foley, Alabama and Captain Anderson’s in Panama City.

You shared the recently discovered history of the Ugg Clan with me in A Highly Biased History of Washing Machines, A Highly Biased History of Bowling, and A Highly Biased History of Bowling, Part II.  Research into the Ugg Clan continues, and I suspect that more of it will be revealed as time goes on.

Kayla, my daughter, has featured prominently in posts – the title of the blog is Tales from the Mom-Side.  Some of your favorite Kayla stories include Conversations with my Ten-Year-Old, Inappropriate O’Fences, The Art of Gentle Satire and the Vegetarian Veterinarian Veteran .

I had the chance to talk to you about our three extraordinary dogs, Tyra, Mandy and Darwin, aka Bad Dog and No-No, as well as tell you about our first dog, Shadow.

You and I also got to share some of the sweeter aspects of small town life in The 214th Comes Home and Homecoming Parade.

You have thought along with me in a few reflective posts, such as A Day of Thanks and Books:  Adventure of a Thousand Lives, as well as been kind enough to read some of my poetry in the posts A Poem for Memorial Day, A Poem for the Fourth of July, Praise, With Apologies to Samuel Clemens Moore and Christina Rossetti and in a funny remake of a popular Christmas carol, The Twelve Days Pre-Christmas.

A couple of other interesting posts including the history of the Thanksgiving Holiday (not the Pilgrims and Indians, but after that) and a discussion of one of the underappreciated tasks in the modern world: garbage collection – go without it for three weeks, and you will never take it for granted again!

Do I know where I’m going in this next year?  Absolutely not, but then that’s at least half of the fun!

Thank you for sharing these posts along with me, and here’s to a wonderful second year!

Have a great day!

Nancy

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A Touch of Spring

Posted on February 20, 2012 | 5 comments

Good morning Everyone!

Today we are going to switch gears just a little bit, and take a moment to share some of the early signs of a Southern spring.

A patch of daffodils, also called jonquils, in full bloom

These pictures are extraordinary, not just because of the beauty of the flowering plants involved, but also because I took them the first week in February!

Tulip Tree in full bloom in central Alabama the first week of February - extraordinary!

Normally, the yellow bells and daffodils start their show towards the end of February in the third or fourth week, and the tulip trees in late February/early March, but not this year!

Yellow Bell (aka fuchsia) Bush

It is easy to miss the beauty of the yellow bells, and very hard to capture it on camera, but this close-up may help:

Camellias are a bit different; each bush seems to bloom on its own schedule.  The small camellia bush by our front door likes to bloom in December, but these pictures are from a bush in our town square that has decided to put on a bit of a show this year.

Camellia bush in full bloom

The camellia is the state flower of Alabama, and here you might be able to see why.

Camellia in full bloom

I think it would be fun to sketch that bloom in watercolor pencil, one medium I haven’t tried yet.

Here are some buds in various stages of bloom.

Camellia buds

The problem, of course, with blooming this early is that a frost is almost certain to occur sometime in February and early March, if not later, and this year was no exception – a week after I took these pictures, we had a night where the temperatures got down into the 20’s.

One last look at the tulip tree before the frost took care of the flowers

That finished off every tulip tree that was blooming, but the daffodils/jonquils survived, as did the yellow bells (also called fuchsia.)  Yellow bells are amazingly cold-resistant; I have seen the blossoms survive and flourish after experiencing temperatures down into the low 20’s.

A branch from the amazingly cold-hardy yellow bell bush

I heard another sign of spring this weekend – somewhere in the woods, one of the woodpeckers was back and active.  The “tat-tat-tat-tat-tat” sound of a woodpecker pecking is pretty unmistakable, even with the other birds’ songs thrown in.  I learned the rhythm involved last year, when we had a pretty, but very confused, woodpecker who sat on top of the street-light across from our house and kept trying to peck into its top.  It was a persistent bird; he or she kept at it for about three days before going to search for more malleable wood.  I like to think that it was that same bird, older and wiser now, that I heard Saturday.

Have a great day!

Nancy

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Posted in Just stuff..., On the Home Front, working mom

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Modern Inconveniences: Electronics Cords

Posted on February 17, 2012 | 13 comments

Good morning everyone!

I intended to upload some pictures today and discuss the unusually early harbingers of spring that appeared the last week in January, but in the wild scramble to find the camera, along with the correct cord for downloading pictures to the computer, I got sidetracked.

Standard Electrical Outlet

Once upon a time, in a galaxy far, far away…..  Sorry – wrong story.  Still, a long time ago, we had both electrical appliances/machines, and enough electrical outlets to match them.  Things that you plugged into the electrical outlets were fairly simple – in the bedroom, you plugged in the television, if you had one for it, and lights; in the den, you plugged in the television , possibly the radio/stereo and lights, and in the kitchen, without counting the major electrical appliances such as the refrigerator and the stove, you would plug in a toaster or a toaster oven.   Throughout the house, you needed enough strategically placed outlets in order to be able to run the vacuum cleaner.

And that was about it.  It was fairly simple to match the outlets to the required gizmos.

There are seven things in this picture that must be plugged in to an electrical outlet - Can you find them all?

But then, electrical equipment began to multiply.  Looking back, I think it was the television equipment that started everything.  Someone invented cable, and the cable box and about the same time, someone else invented the VCR.  Ergo, instantly, two more cords were needed.  One of the very earliest home computers was a Commodore 64.  The Commodore 64 worked by using the television as your monitor, so if you had a Commodore, you needed another plug for the Commodore unit.  Video games were born, such as Pong – a green screen, two white lines for paddles and a white dot that you and the other player (or you and the computer if you didn’t have anyone to play it with) hit back and forth across the screen – and another plug was required.  At first, most of us just plugged various articles in and out as needed – after all, there was no reason to leave the Commodore or the video game plugged in all of the time – but a few brave souls ventured out and discovered the power strip.

By the time the electrical equipment revolving around the television had a good running start, the electronics revolution had also started, and home computers and car phones arrived on the scene.  Home computers required at least three separate outlets – one for the monitor, one for the processing unit and one for the printer.  Because the computer industry did a good job of warning us about what would happen to the (then very expensive) computer equipment with one good lightning stroke in the area of your house, we all felt the need to buy surge protectors, which were conveniently designed with many additional plugs so that you could plug in as many as 16 separate items through one plug on a two plug wall outlet.

All of this was still manageable, however, because once things were set up, they rarely needed to be unplugged and moved around, unless you were rearranging furniture.  Some creative use of power strips and surge protectors might be required, but once you got everything plugged in, the power cord stayed right where you left.  Until…..

The Cell Phone

The mobile electronics revolution began.  Car phones started this round.  When Mark and I were first married, car phones were basically unheard of.  You called from a land line when you could, and otherwise you had to wait until you and whomever you wanted to speak to were in the same place.  The first car phone I can remember having was known as a “bag phone,” which was a handset about the same size as a regular phone contained in a bag about the size of a lunchbox.  It could be charged by plugging it into the wall, or, if you had the adapter, by plugging it into the cigarette lighter in your car.  It still wasn’t too hard to lose this cord, since everything coiled into the bag.

But with the advent of the car phone, the mobile electronics revolution accelerated, and now my life is saturated with electrical cords – cords for the laptop, cords for the digital cameras, cords for each cell phone, mine and Mark’s, cords for various PDA’s that we have used and discarded over time, cords for my Kindle (Mark had once of the first hand-held Hewlett-Packard computers back in the early 90’s, and I can remember using something called a Sony Clie once upon a time), cords for the laptop(s) and probably some I have forgotten somewhere.

Our Graveyard for Obsolete Electronics Cords

For the disorganized individual who loves electronics (and I just can’t be the only one out there) it is a disaster waiting to happen.  To go back to the search that started this post, I spent five minutes going through 10 different cords before I found the one that I needed.

A few things have helped.  I have discovered that the Amazon Kindle cord works well for recharging the cell phones Mark and I have, and one or two of our cameras, so when we’re traveling, as long as I remember to pack the Kindle cord (and since it involves reading, I probably will remember to pack the Kindle cord) we are covered for most of the electronic gizmos and gadgets we will have with us, except for the laptop cords.  Mark found  a charging station for the cell phones, also, that sits on the kitchen counter, so the cell phones recharge in a predictable place.  (Don’t, however, ask me to find the cord that is supposed to sync my phone to my computer; once I started getting error messages every time I tried, that cord faded into oblivion.  Some archeologist is going to find it two thousand years from now and conclude that our civilization practiced ritual strangulation with strong black cords with funny ends.)  Camera cords are a bit dicey, though, because cameras are portable and need to be recharged as well as access a computer for downloading photos, which gives me three different points at which I can lose the cords.  That’s too many for the organizationally challenged like me.

The power strip by my bedside table - the one empty slot is reserved for my laptop.

There really is no point to this lament – I’m going to continue to use, and lose, and find these cords no matter what difficulties are involved, because I am hopelessly addicted to anything that makes beeping sounds, gives me messages and has flashing blue lights anywhere on it as long as I don’t reach the blue or black screen of death – unless someone out there gets the bright idea from this post to design the universal cord – one cord that meets all your needs for any electronic gizmo no matter what it is or when it was made.  I’d have to have about fifty of them to be sure I had one available when I needed it, but I think it would be an improvement.  I think.

Have a great day and weekend!

Nancy

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Conversations with My Ten-Year-Old

Posted on February 15, 2012 | 11 comments

Good morning everyone!

I thought you would enjoy sharing some conversations we have had at our house lately.

I.  While backing out of the garage to drive Kayla to school:

Kayla:  Mom, don’t hit the basketball goal.

Mom:  Why?  Am I about to?

Kayla, grinning:  No, not yet, but you just backed into the garbage can.

Mandy

II.   After school, Kayla working on homework looks down at Mandy:

Kayla:  Mandy, why do you chase your tail when you know it’s going to hurt when you catch it?

Mom:  Kayla, why do you leave your stuff all over the house when you know it drives me and Dad crazy?

Kayla:  I don’t know.

Thoughtful silence.

Kayla:  I’m sorry, Mandy.

III.  Driving Kayla to school while she’s slouched in the seat yawning and looking sleepy:

Mom:  Sings “You are sleepy, you are sleepy, you are sleepy right now” to the tune of the immortal “Kill the wabbit, Kill the wabbit, etc.” from one of the great Looney Tunes cartoons starring Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny.

Kayla stays slouched in the seat yawning and looking sleepy, but gives Mom one of her “You’re crazy but you’re mine” looks.

Mom:  How about I sing that song in the hallway at your school while we’re delivering this Valentine stuff.

Kayla immediately sits up straight in her seat, forces her eyes wide open and announces:  I am a bright and happy child.

IV.  Dad, Kayla and Mom are looking for a DVD to watch.

Dad:  How about “The Patriot”?

Kayla, immediately:  No.  I’m not up for football.

Mom, helpfully:  No, Kayla, it’s not about the Patriots but is called The Patriot.

Kayla:  Why would I want to watch a movie about some football guy?

Mom collapses in laughter on the couch, leaving Dad to sort out the historical and sports references properly.

Sunrise at my house, April 28, 2011

Have a great day everyone!

Nancy

11 Comments

Posted in Out of the mouths of babes...., working mom

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Confessions of a Recovering Misovalentinist

Posted on February 14, 2012 | 6 comments

Good morning Everyone!

It may have escaped the notice of some of you, although I scarcely know how given Madison Avenue’s best attempt to thoroughly cover the airways with advertisements about the darn thing, but today is Valentine’s Day.  So, to get the obligatory greeting over with, Happy Valentine’s Day!

I do sincerely hope that each of you has a good day today, but I have a confession to make – I used to really hate Valentine’s Day. FN.

For me, it started once I went from elementary school to junior high and up, which was when we stopped filling out little Valentines that we brought to school for our entire class.  This fun and kind tradition was replaced with fundraisers by various clubs in school where you could purchase a carnation to be sent to a special someone, and the club would deliver the carnation to whoever it was during the school day.  (Carnations must have been very inexpensive, as I went to junior high and high school in three different states across two coasts – California, Virginia (the D.C. area) and Alabama – and carnations were used every time.)   If you weren’t going to get a carnation – and in grades 7 through 12 I got a total of two – one from my Mom [Thanks Mom!] and one from my best friend in grade 11 [thank you Debbie Gronich; I only wish you hadn’t had to move before the next year!] – it was a form of water torture to creep through an entire day watching some people get dozens of carnations and knowing I wasn’t going to get one but sort of hoping I would get one still.  I have to admit that left deep bruises on my soul I didn’t think would ever heal.  (However, at those ages, lots of things seem to leave deep bruises we have a hard time recovering from.) Until…

1) I was old enough to appreciate the fact that my grandparents and aunt and uncle always sent me a card and a little something and I realized that important love isn’t solely romantic love.  (You manage to lose sight of that during junior school and high school when you are not part of the “in” crowd.)

2) Mark and I fell in love after my second year in college and I realized how strong, solid and deep his love for me is.  I don’t have to worry about Valentine’s Day anymore; I know he loves me.  Just for the record, his gifts are much better than silly carnations!

3) Kayla came to live with us and she and I filled out little Valentines for every member of her classes together.  I hate that this year (next year in 5th grade she moves on to the middle school where they may not do this) may be the last year we do it.

4) I decided that at least some of those people must have sent the carnations to themselves so they would look more popular.  It’s probably not true, but it makes me feel better.

5) I was old enough to appreciate the scene at any grocery store in America at 5:30 p.m. on Valentine’s Day evening.  Try it this evening if you need a laugh; you will see men (and some women) desperately wandering the aisles trying to decide which of the leftover, slightly wilted flower arrangements would best disguise the fact that they forgot to get something for their special someone on this day, whether a bag of Reese’s cups counts as Valentine’s chocolate, if a one day old cookie cake or a new Swiffer sweeper would do the trick.  (Hint:  Nix the Swiffer sweeper; a gift of nothing for Valentine’s Day is better than a cleaning utensil, unless the cleaning utensil is a subscription to a weekly cleaning service for a year.)

So, today, while I am not exactly a fan of the “holiday,” I at least no longer hate Valentine’s Day – although as I schlep into Kayla’s school this morning in the rain with 40 Capri Suns, 64 Rice Krispies treats (yes, of course, I bought them at the store – you thought I made them at home?), 23 paper plates for the afterschool care party, a box of 24 Valentines with Nerds carefully tucked into them, a book bag and a 10-year-old, I may have to work hard to keep from falling into old thought habits!

Have a great day everyone!

Nancy

FN.  A misanthropist is someone who hates men, a misogynist is someone who hates women, so hence the word misovalentinist – someone who hates Valentine’s Day.  Spell check is having a fit!

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Mondays

Posted on February 13, 2012 | 4 comments

Good morning everyone!

I may have already had a full Monday type Monday morning (you know, the type where everything is discombobulated around you, none of the material you need for everyone to get out of the house in an orderly fashion such as notes for school, book bags, and other such paraphernalia was in the right place, including the precious doctor’s note explaining that Kayla missed Friday at school because she was running a fever and you end up slamming cupboard and closet doors – at least they’re closed!  See, On Cupboard Doors and Closet Shelves ), but the birds outside are completely oblivious.

In the trees at the edge of the court, there is a symphony of song birds greeting the sun.  (I’d be greeting it, too, if I had to sleep outdoors last night; it got down in the 20’s!)  The volume of sound is really astonishing, and if I had more time and it was about 40 more degrees warmer, I’d love to sit down and just listen for a while.

There even is one brave bird sitting on the fence chirping at intermittent intervals.  I think he or she is part of the brave family of birds that nests in the huge rosebush in the back.  Most of the hatchlings, at least three, didn’t make it three years ago, because Mandy and Darwin found them, thought they were really interesting chew toys that squeaked, and Kayla and I couldn’t get out there in time.  After one more year of growth, though, the rose bush was out of the dogs’ reach and some member of the same family (I assume) comes back every year to build its nest.  I really wonder if the principles of natural selection shouldn’t weed this family out (after all, building your nest in the middle of a yard with three dogs who are very interested in sounds, sights and smells is not the safest place) but I’m glad those principles haven’t done so so far.  I like the idea of the sheer stubbornness it takes to come back to a place to claim it as your own even after someone much bigger and larger has tried to chase you away from it.  Now, of course, with the bigger rose bush with corresponding bigger thorns and better height, I believe the nest will be quite safe.

Is there a moral there somewhere?  Probably, but I’m too busy hunting my shoes and my cell phone so I can get out of the door to think through it more deeply – maybe you can come up with one?

Have a great Monday, everyone, or at least a better one than I am having so far!

Nancy

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The Perils of Absent-Mindedness

Posted on February 8, 2012 | 6 comments

Good morning!

After I sat in the drive-through lane at Wendy’s for five minutes only to discover that I was sitting behind a parked car, which explained why the line wasn’t moving, I decided to reflect upon the perils of absent-mindedness.

From Print Shop Professional 2.0

1) Traffic stoppage.  I have sat at a four-way stop sign waiting for the light to change, wondering why the people behind me were so impatient.  (Note to self:  Stop signs won’t change to green.)

2) Unnecessary car repairs.  Mark and I had to swap cars one day.  I was in the Ford Escape, and became quite annoyed when it wouldn’t start – only to realize that I had been pressing the air conditioning on/off button in a vain attempt to get the car to start, rather than putting the key in the ignition.  (My Hyundai has a push button start.)  I was grateful to have discovered this before I called for a wrecker.

3)  Retracing steps.  I work in an office building with three flights of stairs, and I am on the top floor.  It can be quite inconvenient to leave my office, travel down to the basement, forget what I came for, and have to travel back up again three flights to the point of beginning to remember what I needed.  Good exercise though!

4) Retracing steps, part deux.  I have been known to walk through the house repeating over and over again the item that I need to carry back to a particular room just to be sure I don’t forget.

5) Retracing steps, part trois.  (Ha!  And you thought I didn’t know French.  Actually, I don’t; I’m just guessing that “trois” means “three” in French – it could be the French version of Troy for all I know.)  I also have had to turn the car around at various points along various routes because I forgot to stop at the one place that I had intended to travel to when I left my point of origin.

From Print Shop Professional 2.0

6) Taking extra trips to the store.  I have been known to leave the house for one specific item from the grocery store, return back 30 minutes later with $100 worth of groceries, and realize that I never did get the one thing that I really needed.

7) Finding food in odd places.  I have found the peanut butter, and various non-refrigerated items in the refrigerator; I have found the ice cream in the refrigerator and not the freezer; I have found the milk in the cupboard once or twice.

8) Voice overuse.  My family has become very patient about repeating their menu choices – I ask in the den, take the ten steps to the kitchen, and realize that I have forgotten what they said, and have to call out the question again from the kitchen.

From Print Shop 2.0 Professional

9) Poor wardrobe choices.  Wearing your night-clothes to work is normally not recommended.  Wait – that’s just a dream I had!  I have, however, discovered that I was wearing mis-matched shoes.

10) Giving adult responsibility to a 10-year-old.  My daughter has learned quickly to remind me to stop somewhere when she sees that I am about to miss a turn.  I am very grateful that she has not learned to comment upon the phenomenon.

11)  Having something to laugh about – Priceless!

Have a great day!

Nancy

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Super Bowl, Dog Delivery, and Helping the Local Humane Shelter

Posted on February 7, 2012 | 6 comments

Hi Everyone!

I hope each of you had a chance to enjoy the Super Bowl Sunday night; it was one of the great ones – down to the wire, with plenty of excitement and great plays.  Some of the commercials were pretty funny, too.

Given my affinity for Volkswagen Beetles, it will not surprise you that the Volkswagen commercial where the golden retriever decided he needed to lose weight so he could chase the Beetle driving down the street was one of my favorites.  The E-trade Baby came through with his usual panache, too.  And for those of us who grew up with “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” the Honda CR-V commercial with Matthew Broderick was pretty funny too.  I’d love to know if any of you had favorite commercials from the game.

In other news, Darwin was falsely accused of chewing last night.  He walked into the den with a piece of paper in his mouth, and Mark was about to scold him for chewing, when Kayla called out from her bedroom that Darwin had been given a note and been bidden to take it to Mark.  Now, I am curious to know if Darwin actually knew to bring it to Mark, or if it was just an accident that the next place he went from Kayla’s room was to Mark.  I may never know, since I am not inclined to tempt Darwin with another such piece of paper.

I got a chance to go back by one of my favorite animal shelters the other day and walk a dog at lunch.  This is a really fun way to help out your local shelter and exercise at the same time.  The dogs that are in the runs waiting to be adopted love the chance to get to stretch their legs, and also the extra attention and petting they get (at least from me) as their walker, and the walker gets exercise while feeling that for that one day he or she has made a difference, at least for that one dog.  It also may help to make more energetic dogs more adoptable by allowing them a chance to burn off a little energy so that they are not quite as hyper when people come to choose a dog from the shelter.  Yesterday, I walked a dog named Blackjack, who answers to the name of Jack.  Jack was the biggest dog I have ever walked, and from the owner of Darwin, who often resembles a small horse, that is saying something.  Jack was not nearly as tall as Darwin, but imagine a cross between a lab and a Newfoundland, and you might begin to get an idea of his size.  Jack was solid muscle, which could have been a problem but wasn’t because he had obedience training and walked like a dream, never pulling on the leash and always listening to me when I told him to come or to keep up.  Quite unlike the twins, Darwin and Mandy, in my house, who make me feel like a crazed Hittite charioteer whenever I have them on the leash and try to exit the house.  Jack hasn’t been there long, though, so it was hard to get him to wag his tail, but he finally started to once I was taking him back to his pen.  I hope to be able to go back tomorrow (Wednesday) and then I will walk someone else.

Well, that’s about all for now.  I hope each of you has a great day!

Nancy

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Posted in dogs, Football, Pets, working mom

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Preparing for the Super Bowl – Home Edition

Posted on February 3, 2012 | 4 comments

Good morning everyone!

The biggest football game of the year, the Super Bowl,  is played this coming Sunday.  Here are some tips to be sure that you are ready for the big game.

1)  Pick the team you will root for in advance.

For some people, of course, this is a no brainer – they have been Giants or Patriots fans their whole lives.  Others may have decided long ago that it would be a cold day in a very, very hot place before they ever cheered for the Giants (or the Patriots) as the case may be, so their choice is easy also.  For some fans, though, choosing sides may be more difficult.  Even if your favorite team didn’t reach the Super Bowl, find some reason to pick one team over the other, even if it is as trivial as the color of the jerseys.

2) Carefully plan your menu for the big game.

It has been scientifically proven that any foods consumed between the hours of 5 p.m. CT and 9:00 p.m. CT on Super Bowl Sunday have no fat or caloric content, so go for it!  A heavy dose of appetizers and finger foods is strongly recommended, including chips and dip, cheese fries, potato skins, nachos, fried cheese and anything else you can get away with.

3) Educate small children in advance.

Carefully explain to small children that their behavior during this last game will need to be exemplary.  Help them understand that they can jump up and down and scream when the adults do, but otherwise they will have to find quiet ways to occupy their time while the game is on.

4)  Females, strongly encourage male counterparts to leave the remote control alone during the commercials for this one game.

Watching the commercials during the Super Bowl is as much a tradition as watching the game itself.  If you live in a household where the male of the house watches two programs at a time – the main show and the “commercial” show that he flips to when the main show has a commercial break – and you don’t think he can break himself of the habit, it is perfectly acceptable to hide the remote where only you can find it once the game begins.

5) Don’t forget to stock up on the beverages of your choice, so no one will have to leave the house during the game on a diet coke (or other beverage) run.

6) For “mixed” families – where members of the family are die-hard fans of opposing teams – separated by long distances, make sure the phone lines stay clear so that each side can call the other at key moments throughout the game to gloat explain the importance of crucial plays.  Unplugging your phone to prevent the other side from calling you when the game is over and your team lost is considered poor sportsmanship.

7) For the more technologically advanced, it is acceptable to tweet or text such updates rather than delivering them by phone.

8) The five hours of pre-game shows are optional, although the flag football game between former players, if they do it again this year, is worth watching.  Who wouldn’t want to see Joe Montana and Jerry Rice connect one more time for a touch down?

9) The half-time show is not optional.  A great deal of water cooler conversation the next day can revolve around the half-time show (ie., the entry into the English lexicon of the phrase “wardrobe malfunction.”)

10) Enjoy the game!  There really is nothing else like it.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Nancy

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Cars I Have Known – George I and George II

Posted on January 31, 2012 | 3 comments

Good morning Everyone!

Most Americans spend a lot of time in their cars.  At least, most Americans in the mid- to small size cities without subways and good bus systems do, as do most of us in the rural areas.  In the rural/small town areas of this country, in fact, cars are essential to reach the bigger cities when we need doctors whose specialities aren’t present in our community, more advanced hospital treatment than our solid, dependable and beloved local hospitals can provide or we need to buy various items that we can’t find in our towns.  In small towns and rural areas, our cars are also essential just so we can get to our jobs, which often are located somewhere other than our town or community (trust me, there isn’t bus service between two small towns such as, for example, Rockford, Alabama and Goodwater, Alabama).   My commute is about a 45 minute commute (35 miles) and I am lucky to have such a short one. 

For whatever reason, some cars stay just cars the entire time they are with us, while we each have other cars that rank as “special” cars – cars that somehow were not “things” but personalities and that, beyond all reason or explanation, we learned to love.  My first car and its later successor were such cars. 

George I was “my” car until I graduated from high school and went to college, leaving him in the worthy hands of my sister.  He was a 1960’s something light blue Volkswagen Bug.  (The official name of the Bug was the Beetle, but somehow Bug stuck in the imagination of the American populace.)  George II was a gift from Mark for our anniversary years ago.  Mark found an old Volkswagen Bug for sale, and in secret renovated the car to look exactly like George I.  It was a wonderful gift!   (Both cars were in our possession before the age of the digital camera and so unfortunately I don’t have pictures of them to share with you, but combing the internet I have been able to find pictures that come very close to what George I and II were like). 

The Back Seat - Note how the driver's side front seat is folded back to give you access to it.

George I stayed in my family from the time I was in about 2nd grade until after I was married, a span of almost 20 years.  For those of you who never got the chance to meet a Volkswagen Bug, it was a very basic vehicle.  It only had two doors, and to reach the back seat you had to pull a lever that would allow the front seat to pull forward.  George I and II’s interiors were black.

A Bug Engine in the back of the car

The engine of the Bug was essentially air-cooled, although there is some sort of a thing-a-ma-bob-er in the engine that was normally packed with oil – maybe the air filter???  (Mark, help me here if you read this!)  The most unique characteristic about the engine of the Bug was that it was in the back of the car, while the trunk was in the front.

Bug Trunk in Front

When I was about Kayla’s age, our family was stationed in Taiwan as part of Dad’s job in the Navy, and during that time period George was the family car.   George’s back seat could comfortably fit three small girls, and if you threw in the boot, we could squeeze in a few more children at least.  One time, George managed to transport four adults and five children on a trip outside of the capital city, Taipei.

The space between the back blue seat and the grey fabric on the wall that you can see if you look closely was the boot.

What was the boot?  I haven’t been able to find a good picture of it yet, but the boot was basically a space in the back of the Bug between the back seat and the back metal part of the car about 12 – 18 inches wide and four feet deep and as long as the body of the car, which wasn’t nearly as expansive as it sounds.  Still, it was big enough to fit small children (hush – this was before mandatory seat belt laws and air bags) and a bag or two of luggage. 

Sample front interior of the original Bug. Ours didn't have a basket.

The interior of the Bug was unique also.  The steering wheel was narrow, and had the then Volkswagen symbol, an outline of a castle, in its center where the horn was.  The Bug was solely a manual transmission car, so the gear shift was the lever in the center hump of the floor board.  The Bug had no air conditioning, beyond what I called 4 – 55 air conditioning (4 windows open at 55 miles an hour), which made driving in Alabama in the summertime once the Bug became my chariot in high school interesting, to saw the least.  The Bug had a heater though.  The heater was in the floor board and powerful enough that you would have to move your ankles out of the air flow every so often if you didn’t wish them to be burned.  (Why didn’t I just turn the heater off?  Because the heat, as plentiful as it was on the floorboard, hadn’t quite risen to the top of the car yet.) 

Note the Castle symbol on the steering wheel - and no, we never had fuzzy dice on our rearview mirror.

Both George I and George II were faithful, uncomplaining, dependable and in spite of their idiosyncracies incredibly fun to drive, and I miss them even while I am grateful for my current vehicles and the modern comforts they provide. 

Oh – and the battery was under the back seat, and you had to remember to add water to it periodically. 

What about you?  Do you have a car in your past or present that has been more than just a mode of transportation for you?  I’d love to hear about it if you do!

Have a great day!

Nancy

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