it's all about the self-esteem

Life is about growing, changing, trying new things. Learning doesn't stop at the classroom door. Right, right. So I'm taking a class. It's not an ordinary class; it's a dance class. I do a little homework ahead of time. Find out what to wear, a little of what to expect. Read bios about the instructors. I leave my wedding ring at home, for safety reasons. I'm thinking ahead. I'm prepared. I can do this, right?

I am not prepared. I actually arrive a bit late; honestly it really was the traffic. So the instructor has already begun when I have to sneak through the back of the class to find my own space. That in itself is a bit difficult because it seems almost everyone is stationed along the back wall. Right where I want to be. Where no one can see how badly I dance. But the purpose of taking a class is to become better at something, to acheive or master a skill in the process of learning. Boy, do I need help in here.

The lights are dimmed. Lenny Kravitz's cover of "American Woman" pulses through the room. I feel so out of place. I also feel like the oldest woman in the room. Someone who shouldn't be there, even though the dance company touts that this class is for all women of all ages and all shapes. I see my friend across the room and giggle nervously at her as she follows the instructions from the teacher.

"That's right ladies, play a little now and stand up nice and slow. The only way to stand up in this class is with your feet apart and your tushie in the air. Show 'em what you've got. Trace yourself out here and play with your hair a little. Show 'em your moneymaker. Sexy strut around your pole. Now let's have a smack and I want to hear it, ladies. Nice. We're going to do some stretches now to warm up and then well start learning some spins. Everyone stand on the right side, get a good grip on your pole and lean out. Let gravity do the work; you should feel the pull all along your ribcage..."

That's right, I said pole. I went to pole dancing class. It was a unique experience and a killer workout. I have a new and profound respect for the women who do this kind of work 8-12 hours a day. They certainly do earn their money. For 24 hours afterwards, I am in excruciating pain from the muscle strain of learning the proper way to jump, as well as the Catch Spin, Fireman Spin, Pike Spin, and a "Showcase." I have several bruises and contact burns on my ankles and shins from spinning improperly. But I've got that Fireman Spin down pat! I was doing all this barefoot. Some of my more experienced classmates were taking their instruction wearing six-inch platform heels or those huge black patent leather boots. Talk about coordination!

The thing I would like to change about this experience is that I would like to actually be able to dance afterwards. You know, hold a rhythm and feel confident about my *ahem* moves. I have to say, I will most likely go back. Next time I'll wear something a little more form fitting so I don't look as frumpy. My abs are feeling better and the pain in my arms is getting less noticable. I haven't taken Tylenol all day today! I just hope I can find a class going on while the kids are in school.

bouncy

Copied directly from the Editorial page of Sunday's Baltimore Sun, 8*27*06:

"On a jag

A new study shows that if you're thirsty, tea is just as good for you as water - in fact, it's better, because it has chemicals in it that promote long-term health. Same goes for coffee. Diuretics they may be, but you'd have to drink an impossibly strong cup of either to lose more fluid than you take in.
Researchers have been busy on the hot stimulant front. One group found that eight cups of coffee a day significantly reduces the risk of cirrhosis of the liver. Another, which looked into the effects of coffee on elderly men in Finland, Italy and the Netherlands, found that those who drank three cups a day experienced less than half the cognitive decline seen in men who didn't drink coffee at all. And in research just reported in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, there was "clear evidence" that drinking three or more cups of tea a day reduces the risk of coronary heart disease. Not-quite-as-clear evidence suggests that tea drinkers are also at a lower risk of colon cancer.
Our favorite finding is that tea naturally contains fluoride - so even while it stains your teeth, it makes them stronger. It gives you good, brown teeth.
The question is, can you manage all this tea and coffee? Does the world need more stimulation? Does it need to be bouncing up and down? Do-we-have-to-be-in-a-permanent-headlong-state-to-be-healthy-
and-are-we-going-to-be-able-to-concentrate-on-anything-at-all-
what-with-all-this-caffeine-and-fluid-running-through-us?
Sure. Just go easy on the cream and sugar."

I'm sure they don't mean for us to stock up on Maxwell House during the next heat wave, because water is best during the summer heat. But I sure am glad to have some scientific studies to back up my addiction. Turn here; I wanna go through the Starbucks drive-thru.

checking up

I had taken to studying outside on my front porch. It is wide, airy and relatively quiet. And I could keep an eye on the neighborhood, Nosy Nancy that I am. While reading the days of the week aloud in Arabic one beautiful afternoon, a woman came into my front yard to speak to me. She was concerned about a man who had approached her young daughter on this very street and wanted to know if I knew who it might be so she could check it out.

This had apparently happened during the 5 minutes it took me to make a cup of coffee and come back outside. An older gentleman had been standing in his front yard and asked this girl to come into his house to listen to his machine for him. She apologized and refused, then headed straight home. What a level-headed girl. That mother should be proud. After hearing this chain of events, I knew exactly who it was and I was immediately saddened, knowing that the old man meant no harm and most likely did need help. I reassured the mother that I would check it out for her and get back to her.

The 80+ year old man who lived two doors down is one of the sweetest old men alive. His wife was taken to the hospital two, maybe three days prior. I was curious if he was stopping passers-by for conversation because he was lonely or if he genuinely needed help. So I got neighborly and paid him a visit. He is very hard of hearing, so when he didn't answer the front door, I walked around to the back. He was sitting on his porch, watching the birds in the back yard, as I often saw him doing this time of day. I asked him if there was anything he needed and he jumped up (as well as an 80 year-old man can) and grinned at me, leading me into his sunroom.

"Why yes! How? How did you know that I was needing your help? Thank you so very much for coming down here. I can't hear my message machine." He tapped his gnarled old finger on a yellow tablet of paper and said, "Could you please write down that message? I missed the call and I can't hardly hear anymore and my wife is in the hospital and can't do my hearing for me."

It wasn't the call he was waiting for, but he was glad to get the message nonetheless. It was from someone else calling to check in on him.

They moved soon after. They sold their house to move to a care facility close to one of their sons' families. As many times as I've seen an ambulance parked out there, I am glad they are now under close watch.

In today's world, it stinks that an old man must sit alone and wait for someone to guess that he needs help because there aren't any real "neighbors" anymore. It stinks that when he does venture out to seek help, he is immediately suspicioned of harming children. It stinks that I hadn't thought to go check on him. In my neighborhood, where the young families are slowly moving in as the older couples move out to care facilities, we ought to take it upon ourselves to check on our elders. After all, it's only neighborly.

excuse my circus...

I hate shopping with four kids. The biggest basket I can find (with the big plastic bus on the front) will seat three of them. Inevitably, there's some lady with a five-year-old walking next to the basket holding one jug of milk, and she has the only one in the store. I no longer shoot daggers at those women. I just let my monkeys jump on her basket and say in my syrupy sweet voice, "Oh, sorry, I couldn't find a big basket like your big empty basket there, so my kids are going nuts. Excuse my circus - coming through."

So I head to the store, list in hand, with four kids in tow. The Bear is in charge of the list and - miracle of miracles - I got the big basket! No running down the aisles! No knocking boxes onto the floor! No hanging off the side of the cart! Usually I have to re-arrange seating because of hitting and squishing and touching, but all is remarkably quiet on that front. I breeze through the store halfway done in record time when I notice the dialogue. So I pretend to look at the oatmeal and really pay attention to their words.

My Princess, not yet four years old, is hanging out of the plastic bus (not really yelling because that would have gotten my attention much sooner), "Mayday-mayday! Cease fire! There are children aboard! I repeat, cease fire! Abort abort abort abort!!!!"

The elderly people who were looking at Corn Flakes are now looking at me like I'm insane. The boys are repeating their baby sister's litany, punctuated with whistling bombs and close-range shrapnel. I only have the frozen food left. We need to get out of this store. Now.

There are just some things you can't make up.

i swear it was just a muffin...

i have an issue. i am not picking on a particular religion, because honestly, i don't even know which religion(s) i would be picking on. (dangling paticiple again...)

we are a nation based on basic freedoms. some of those basic freedoms involve being able to worship whenever and however we choose, so long as the worshipping does not violate any of the local laws. (i mean like sacrificing virgins and stuff.) i get that. some of those basic freedoms guarantee that we should not be perscuted nor forced to participate in anything that may violate our religious beliefs. i get that, too. what i don't get: parties - more specifically the lack thereof.

i am a room parent. i have the responsibility of planning events that correspond with the calendar year, in various forms. for example, valentine's day, cinco de mayo, memorial day, martin luther king day, and of course the much-talked-about plethora of winter religious holidays. oh, and birthdays. there are some children in class with my children who practice a faith that does not allow them to celebrate anything. nothing. not even groundhog's day. not the passing of the seasons. not even birthdays. birthdays????

we, as room parents, try very hard to work around the "not celebrating thing" so the kids don't feel left out. we have friendship celebrations instead of thanksgiving parties - even instead of valentine's parties. we had a book parade where we each dressed as a character from a book, then we did fall activities instead of halloween. we are not "allowed" to sing happy birthday to a child when these special religious children are in the room, so do you know what happens? they have to leave the room. their parents tell the school to make them leave the room. they have to sit in the hall and color a boring old picture, while listening to their friends sing songs and eat cupcakes and do crafts. how the hell do you justify taking away a little fun from a child? four- and five-year olds are brought to tears when they know it's someone's birthday.

whose god hates birthdays anyway? and WHY????? i am inspired to write tonight because i was trying to be extra sensitive today. my ds2 had a birthday over the weekend. when i asked him what treat he'd like me to make to bring to class, my boy asked for me to bring muffins. apple muffins. no frosting. no candles, no sprinkles. brown-colored, apple streusel muffins.

when i arrived to pass out snack, one of the two special religious children in the class asked, "are they for a birthday?"

i replied, "no, his birthday was yesterday. these are just for a treat."

she stood up and walked to the other side of the room and told the teacher, "i can't have birthday muffins, and neither can he," pointing to the other special religious child. they took their snacks (one had a little debbie and the other had fruit gummies and they both had juice boxes) and went into the hall. they were just muffins. aren't special religious children kids too? or are they not really children, they just look that way?

people who don't allow their kids to have fun: please...you don't come into the classroom and see your babies faces when they have to leave the room. is their god punishing them for something? please explain what the deal is. i like to share and it breaks my heart to exclude them!

i just wanted to share muffins with everyone!!

arese over teakettle

Many of you (some not so much) are aware that the eastern seaboard was hit with a mighty Nor'easter this week. Our neighborhood escaped relatively unscathed. We were not among the 107,000 without power for 2-3 days in temps with windchills below zero. We didn't get a whole lot of ice, so we didn't lose any trees either. With school and work cancelled, Tad & I spent our Valentine's day lounging in pajamas until we decided to shovel the walks after lunch.

We bundled up the kiddies and ourselves and headed outside for our midwinter gym membership supplement. Nothing like a good snow to show you how out of shape you are. At some point, I lifted a shovel too full of show and some sort of ligament or tendon in my pelvic area let me know. It was one of the ones damaged by carrying my 9-pound Lartian in 2001. Yeah - one of those. Amid the cries of our young, "Can we go in yet?? It's too cold. You don't have to shovel the whole neighborhood. C'mon! Please can we go in??" we were satisfied with the drying pavement in the driveway and decided against cleaning off the cars. We left them with their windshields completely covered with about six inches of snow and icepack. Wow. What a horrifyingly stupid idea.

The next morning, I lay in my bed groaning, next to Tad, who happened to be lying in my bed groaning too. Schools were cancelled again and he called out "sore" for the half-day he was scheduled to work. I could barely walk upright, due to that special tendon of mine. I kind of half-shuffled, stooped-over like Gollom from LOTR. By noon, however, the Aleve had kicked in and Tad & I were feeling good. No work, no school, the sun is out...this is a pretty good day. Our neighbors had watched us cautiously through their windows the day before. Now they were cursing themselves and us for getting the work done yesterday when it was less windy, warmer, and not re-frozen; they were having one hell of a time finding their own driveways. Nobody even touched the sidewalks. The hard-packed snow and sleet, with a fine layer of powder on top, was crappy for shoveling, making snowmen, snow forts, and snow balls, but would make for some awesome sledding! So we bundled up the kiddies once again, and headed for the park.

The park is far enough away that we decided to drive, in case of an injury or someone just too cold to walk all the way home. Which meant we had to chip out our windshields. I wish we’d thought to do that yesterday!! We had to do both cars because Tad was parked behind me and he had to see to move his car out of the way….. Twenty minutes later, I could no longer feel my thumbs. We managed to clear the windows, swap cars and were on our way. I had the camera and the cell phone in the deep pockets of my Air Force issued field jacket. The first trip down the hill, the girls wiped out and Princess ended up with a scraped face, similar to road rash. It wasn’t serious, but she then insisted that we all go home. Not a chance. I cleaned her up in the car and then proceeded to teach my stumble-bunnies how to steer the sleds. Lots of fun, belly laughs, and screams followed. For some reason we were the only people at the park, even though these were some wicked sledding slopes.

We stayed out for a whole hour, which was better than I expected, despite the biting wind. We were all able to stand on the snowpack without breaking through, so it was just like sledding on solid ice. I have about 20 or so great shots for the scrapbook. We had a couple more minor injuries. the Lartian insisted on sledding down the hill repeatedly without a sled, causing him to skin his chin and Tad foolishly went down on his belly and demonstrated why we don’t sled on our stomachs on ice. He didn’t knock out his tooth, but it might be a bit loosened. When we all decided it was cocoa-time, I carried the littlest to the car and Tad proceeded to sled the kids – downhill – to the car. Not such a bright idea. I managed to get the Princess into the car and get behind the car just in time to make a snap decision. Either Schmoo was going face-first into the tailpipe of the car, or into my tailpipe. I chose mine.

I’m sure it was an America’s Funniest Home Videos moment; Tad assures me that I looked awesome going arse over teakettle in the parking lot. I remember a roller-coaster sensation and managed in mid-air to grab Schmoo by the scruff of his neck before landing squarely on the cell phone; my shoulder (injured in 1998) took some damage as well. My son’s sled stopped less than a foot from the car’s rear bumper. My work here was done.

Between the horrific rectangular bruise that will soon appear on my left hip joint, the searing pain underneath my shoulder blade, the bruised knuckles courtesy of my windshield, and the general malaise felt by one who has shoveled snow for the first time this season, I feel about 97 years old right now. My hands were curled into almost arthritic claws this morning, and I am no longer hobbling, but it will be a while before I say, “Yay! Let’s go sledding!”

Oh, and I just discovered that our heat is out for real this time. Apparently last week was just a practice run. Joy.

Queen's English

Everyone knows you need a passport and special documents and airport tax fees when you visit merry “oulde” England, but how about an English dictionary? Most of the differences in our two versions of English (basic American and the Queen’s) are minor, but some of them are so dramatic, hilarious and even hostile, I had to document them, for humour’s sake. That’s the British spelling, by the way. Besides the dreamy accent in Hollywood, most differences wouldn’t even be noticed until you actually set foot on the white cliffs of Dover, or the nearest Tesco.

I give you: An Introduction to the Queen’s English, part I, Vocabulary (and a hand gesture).

When we say…. They say...

hood (of a car) - bonnet

trunk (of a car) - hood

Chevrolet - Vauxhall

bike/biking - cycling

stroller - pram/pushchair

biscuit - scone, with or without fruit

cookie - biscuit

Snack before lunch -elevenses

salad dressing - salad cream (tastes like mayo)

french fries, julienne fries - chips

potato or corn chips - crisps

snack (around 4 pm) - high tea

popsicles - ice lollies

clear soda (7Up, Sprite, etc) - lemonade

lemonade - fresh-squeezed lemon juice

carbonated non-alcoholic drinks - fizzy drinks

go out to a coffeshop/café - have a cuppa (i still say that)

stovetop - cooker

vacuuming - hoovering

mail - post

on vacation/school break - on holiday

sidewalk - pavement

yard, outside play area - garden

garden (veg, flower, etc) - veg/flower patch

ranch-style home - bungalow

2-3 story home - house

duplex = semi-detached house

apartment - flat

smart - clever

well-kempt, neat, clean - smart

grumpy - mardy

sweetie, honey, darling - duck ("Hello, Duck!")

bachelorettes - hens (Hen Night Out at the clubs)

pacifier - dummy

diapers - nappies

panties (girls) - knickers

underwear (boys) - pants

pants, slacks - trousers

sweater - jumper

jeans - dungarees

running shoes - trainers

special shoes required for gym - plimsolls (don't even know the spelling)

boots, galoshes - wellingtons, wellies

WalMart - Asda

butt - bum

private parts - bits

You'll never hear of anyone wearing a fanny pack, not because it's out of fashion, but because fanny is vulgar slang for women's bits. They call it a bum pack instead. Kids never bonk their heads, because bonking is what the parents do with their bits after bedtime.

You can't properly get mad at someone and give them the finger, without knowing which ones to hold up. That's right, plural. Hold up your first two fingers, (index and middle) with the back of your hand to the victim, give them a little wiggle or a sharp upward thrust, and you've got it. Those first two fingers were (as it was explained to me), used to pull the bowstring back in the day. A punishment for some serious crimes was having those two fingers lopped off. Men who managed to escape with out such punishment waggled those two fingers triumphantly at his assailant, and we have today's rude gesture.

This is all I can come up with for now. I think I'll try and come up with some for baking, driving and child-rearing as I experienced it. Ta!