When was the last time you listened to an LP? Real vinyl? I hooked up the turntable tonight to listen to some old music, my goal is to digitize some albums and transfer them to the iPod library. It wasn't really working to connect the turntable directly to the computer or even through a pre-amp. So instead of bringing the turntable to the computer, I took the computer to the stereo. Sheesh, it hasn't been used in so long it's probably in shock to have its circuits going.

I have another goal, too. Blue October, an alternative group, has a song "Hate Me," that's played on my mainstream pop station for middle-aged women. Everytime I've heard it play, it sucked my mind back to my college years, to my friends, then to Harry Chapin. I finally figured out the melody of the verses of "Hate Me" is the same as a Harry Chapin song, but I can't remember which one.

This means research. Down into the basement to find eight, yes, eight embarassing albums. I didn't think I had that many, but you know how crazy college girls can be. I may not ever figure this out, but it's fun to go back to 1980 for a while.

Forget what I said about the pants that fit and not stressing about my weight. Any day the Mendoza line looks back at you from your scale is a day to stress about your weight.

It's like when your age changes from 39 to 40. You're not really older than you were the day before, but it's that first number that looks so bad.

I finished! I had about a foot of binding left to sew down on a quilt I've had forEVER and I finally got it done last night. The quilt is an Irish Chain quilt made from blocks from an exchange online probably 8 or 10 years ago. I made two tops, one in green and one in blue. The blue one is for my son so I made the border and backing of train and truck fabric. It's machine quilted. The green one is for Fern. I'm hand quilting it and it'll be another 5 years to complete....

The blue one needs more quilting in the blank squares between the chains, but the binding is done and I can add more quilting whenever I'm moved to do so.


This is a picture I found of the blue chain in progress.

Most people who look at me think I'm slim and don't need to lose any weight. Even though I'm 5'7" and on the slender side, I still have a big butt in ratio to my waist. I'm pear-shaped, albeit a tall pear; my blouse size is two sizes smaller than my hips. There's always a huge gap at the small of my back in the waistband of my pants, sometimes more than four inches extra.

I'm not happy with my weight because I can't fit into many of the pants I own. If my weight drops just two pounds, my wardrobe shifts to a different size. Same if I gain two pounds: different size. Oh, and my legs are long, 33" inseam. So finding pants to fit well is always a challenge. Pants have been worn lower on the torso in recent fashion years too. I hate that because my belly flops over the top and is uncomfortable and looks and feels larger than it is, especially when it could be nicely contained inside a higher rise garment. So low rise pants are out.

So I stress about my weight, so I can fit into comfortable pants I already have in my closet, I don't want to be buying a larger size.

Saturday, my daughter and her friend went to the mall to find a first-day-of-school outfit. While she shopped, I went into Hechts to look around. Macy's bought Hechts so they are doing the makeover in the store, getting rid of the non Macy's brands and bringing in new ones.

Over ten years ago another area department store went out of business and Macy's took them over. All of the locations except for those in Prince George's county. They sited economic reasons, but many of us believed it was because the county is 62% black. It really ticked me off Macy's wouldn't come in and be a presence in the county. Seven-hundred-thousand residents here with money to spend. Why is that bad economics? So I've boycotted other Macy's since then.

Now Macy's is taking over a store I patronize frequently and I have a dilemma whether I should continue to shop there or not. I'm looking around on Saturday and I notice a brand of clothes I'm not familiar with, Charter Club. I continue on over to the clearance racks and I see a pair of Charter Club pants. Hmm. I try them on. A size smaller than most of the stuff that's fitting me now. And they fit great! Long enough. No gap in the waist band. They were a pair of lined dress trousers, much too fancy for my office. But they have a tag inside indicating the fit: Katherine Fit. Whoohoo! Jackpot. This pair did not have a clearance sticker on them, so I scanned the price. $90. Yikes. I went back over to the Charter Club section and found a less pricey, less fancy pair of pants, and they fit too.

I now have 4 pairs of new pants, they all fit, all long enough, and I don't have to stress about my weight for a while. Oh happy day.

Today is the first day of school here in Prince George's County, Maryland. My son's special-ed bus came right on time and he was ready for it. He's starting a new after care program for special needs teens at one of the local community centers. I hope he adjusts well. He should, he does pretty well in situations like that.

My daughter starts middle school today, bus pick-up at 8:59. She was just getting dressed when I left for work. Darn, I forgot to tell her to eat breakfast. shoot.

She's going to be very busy this fall. Saxophone lessons, Girl Scounts, play practice for Into The Woods. School runs 9:30 to 4:10 so she'll be getting home late, and I hope her honors classes don't overload her with homework. I'm just not sure when she can fit it in.

I created a blog for my dad over the weekend. I want him to post pictures. He lives a couple hours away so it's not always easy to visit and look at his work. I'm trying to convince him to blog. He's in his 70's so blogging is new technology for him to grasp. I'll post a link for it when he gets more pictures up.

It was my turn to golf last night. I got nine holes in at Glenn Dale before dark, which is a lot earlier now than it was in June. When I left the kitchen was neat, when I returned there was a peach pie on the stove. And all the evidence of preparation on the counter.

I thought I'd made progress the day before during the chicken salad creation.

Spirit Air had $16 flights on sale yesterday. I could have gotten to San Juan and back for $64 +tax (one stop in Ft. Lauderdale) departing 9/19 returning 9/24. Sure, hurricane season, but golf! whoohoo! And no dishes...

The pie was very good, by the way.

Fern and I made chicken salad last night while my husband went out to play golf. We had a good time cooking together. It was also a nice quiet time to tell her we're not getting another cleaning service. We've had one since before she was born.

When you get a service, your house gets cleaned on a regular basis, but there is an attitude that goes along with it that you don't have clean up after yourself, someone else will. And it's not just the kids, I've spilled something on the floor before and thought "the cleaning people are coming tomorrow, they'll mop it up."

As Fern and I are chopping up our ingredients, I explain all this. And she seems to be getting it. She made regular chicken salad with celery and I made curried with champaign grapes, apple and pecans. After we ate while we watched reruns of "Whose Line" I reminded her we had to clean up the kitchen. Before I know it, she's SWEEPING the FLOOR! I didn't say anything about the floor.

I'm trying to start maintaining the house myself by coming up with chores I can remember easily and that are not daunting. Like on payday-mondays, I'll change the sheets. Friday is trash day so Thursday night the wastepaper baskets should get emptied.

A new school year starts Monday. Fern rode the bus to orientation today. It's time for new beginnings, and I want to get control of my house.

This is my first attempt at adding a photo to my blog. This picture of Fern and my dad was one of the first picutes I took with a digital camera. The date stamp is December 2, 2002. I'm now on my third camera (first one stolen, second died in July, a whole nother blog) and if this works, I'll be trying to do the photo thing more often.

Fern is 7 here and Dad is pre-stoke. He recovered very well, just some vision issues and hearing loss in one ear now. I should get him to blog his photos, they're great.

I hate Six Flags. It's practically in my backyard, about 20 minutes down the road, yet we hardly ever go. If you've ever been to Hershey Park, you'll never want to go back to SF. SF is to Hershey like the Motel 6 in Cancun is to Caneel Bay on Saint John. It's a different class of place.

Each of my kids spent two weeks at camp overlapping a week in the middle when my husband and I got away for a few days. We took my son to the Water Park in Chesapeake Beach and my daughter opted for an evening at SF. We tried to go last Wednesday, got there at 6:30 thinking it closed at 10. We had discount tickets, but when we got there, there was a sign saying the park was closing at 8. We decided not to spend $80 for 90 minutes of waiting in line.

The discount coupons expired on Sunday so we went after we got Kev from camp. After about an hour of rides we decided to get some dinner. I took Kev and got a cheesesteak with fries, while my husband took Fern to get Chinese. They got their food and were done quickly and headed off to Two-Face while we ate. They were next in line on the ride when we arrived (thanks to cell phones, what did we do without them?) Kev sat at some tables and I stood by the fence to the ride and waited. He and I were about 30 feet apart. He was very content just sitting there.

While I watched Fern and her dad take their seats a discussion started between two guys in the open space between me and Kev. I wasn't really paying any attention to them until punches started to fly. I'm not in harm's way, nor is Kev. But more people join in, women too, and people are getting thrown into the fence I'm standing by. Security arrives and tried to break it up but as the fight continues, it migrates over to the area where Kev is sitting who is completely oblivious to what's going on. One of the blessings (or curses) of Autism. I pull him out of there just as a young women gets decked. Kev objects to having to move, but I explain to him I wanted him away from the fight.

A few moments later Fern and my husband get off the ride and he immediately wanted to know if we're ok. He then filled me in on what happened on the ride. It seems several riders wanted off because their friends were in the fight and wanted to join in.

Did I mention I hate Six Flags?

Why? I've been asking myself. Is it a race issue? It seemed about 5% of the patrons were white, the rest were black and Hispanic. The fighters were black. I don't think race is the problem. I hated SF before I took note of the demography of the park guests and before the fight.

I think it really boils down to park cleanliness, broken rides and the $15 they charge for parking. Every coaster I went on had broken seats or seatbelts. The drop ride had just gotten stuck and they were closing it. The water flume ride didn't even have water in it and was closed. There is just a grungy feel about the place all around. Hershey Park is such a pleasant place, too bad it's 2 hours away.

I'm below the Mendoza line. In baseball it's the batting average of .200 that separates the bad from adequate players.

In my life, it's my weight, the number that separated a bad weight from an adequate one. I'm "happy" if I'm below it and very frustrated and unhappy if I'm above it. I really like it if my Mendoza line was 5 pounds less, but that's hard considering I'm closer to 50 than to 40 and I've had 2 kids. The more I want to get rid of a few pounds, the more I crave things that will add a few pounds. I walk with CG (Miss Kingsfield) almost every morning, which helps a lot. I've seen her Mendoza line go down in the last year and a half by our daily morning tour of the neighborhood; mine hasn't moved.

I got on the scale yesterday and I saw Mendoza-2 after struggling for the past several months (Mendoza +1.5). This morning the same number stared back at me again. yay! I ate OK today so hopefully I'll see that number again tomorrow. Or less.

Do you have a Mendoza line?

OK, I did the martini quiz CG and Greeny mentioned in their blogs. It seems I"m not to drink with them. Here are my results:

You Are a Chocolate Martini

You're an elegant drunk, who only likes the best bars and the most expensive drinks. A bit of a cheapskate, you're likely to mooch ten dollar drinks off both friends and strangers. You should never: Drink and dash. You're gonna get caught leaving someone with the tab! Your ideal party: A posh celebrity party you crash, with an open bar. Your drinking soulmates: those with a Classic Martini personality Your drinking rivals: those with a Blueberry Martini personality

What Flavor Martini Are You?

Wednesday night I am at Strathmore Hall for their free outdoor concert series with my husband and son. Headliner: Trout Fishing in America. We find a place on the lawn and while he and Kev fetched over-priced BBQ and hotdogs, I took note of the picnic spreads of other families brought in paper (not plastic) bags emblazoned with "Whole Foods Market," "Trader Joe's," and "Balducci's" containing clusters of mini grapes and gourmet chips. Campaign workers for the Democratic candidate for county exec handed out fans. Really? at a Kids concert? This might be going too far?

I had never been to Strathmore Hall before and didn't know what to expect, but my first impression was this Montgomery County crowd might be a bit snooty and not "get" Trout. When Keith and Ezra took the stage I quit making crowd observations and just enjoyed the show. Most of their repetoire are songs for kids, but not the Insy Weensy kind, they do songs like "My hair had a Party Last Night" and "Alien in my Nose," songs kids (and adults) can really identify with and enjoy. (We have 8 of their albums :)
Have a listen here.

My husband and I took our son to Chesapeake Beach Water Park last night. Kev loves water parks and we use them as leverage, "Do you want to go to the water park? You need to go to bed... You need to get up... You have to brush your teeth." It's hard to negotiate with a autistic child without a solid prize involved. We never actually take the prize away, he always complied with our requests. We can usually milk about a months good behavior out of a trip to a water park.

Chesapeake Beach Maryland is in "Southern Maryland," land of big hair, and definitely out of the direct influences of the big city. Therefore it was quite easy to pick my bald-headed boy out of the crowd, since he cut his own hair again over the weekend and to salvage it, I had to buzz it down to the nubbins. In neighborhoods closer to the Beltway, you will often see boys with the close-trimmed look. But not so in CB.

He had cut his hair with kid scissors while under the watchful eye of my parents while my husband and I played golf with my brothers on Saturday. My daughter, Fern, was quite upset. I think because, 1. Grandma and Grandpa should have been watching him better, and 2. Having an older autistic sibling is hard enough, but one with self-cut hair is very hard to deal with and embarrassing.

She's away at camp for two weeks and when she gets back, she'll have a week without her brother around.

Number 8 at Glenn Dale is a par 5 485 yard hole, 395 from the red tees. I came up about 10 yards short of making the green in regulation. A nice wedge shot put me close for a possible par, but then I 2-putted it. argh! The hole before is 159 yard par 3. I was on the green from the tee (yay!) but then proceeded to 4-putt (boo).

I started off by myself last night and by the time I rounded the dogleg on 4 I could see a foursome ahead of me. They had finished 5 when I was ready to start it, but 6 was a long hole so I still hadn't completely caught up with them. I wasn't hurrying, though. They were on the tee at 7 when I aapproached the green on 6. One says to the other, "Should we ask her?" My mind just goes crazy, ask me what? Why do I continue to golf when I'm that bad? Am I available for dinner? What time was it?

"Do you want to join us on the next hole?" Ah. "Although she may not want to." They were a loud but nice group of guys. I had already heard them earlier from 3 holes away and told them so, we got along just fine. By the time I finished 6, they were on the green of 7 so I joined them on 8, the par 5. I was just thrilled I hit 3 good shots in a row in front of these guys and come that close to the green. I'm still smiling. I got a 7 on the last hole and so did one of them, so I guess I'm not completely out of my league. And I'm having fun, and that is what counts.

The funny snippet for the day:

The Health Unit here at work has their suite on the same wing as my office. Across the hall from their door is an alcove with a scale in it so it's not uncommon to see someone with their shoes off weighing themselves. This morning as I walked past, there was someone there and on the floor next to them were two dozen-sized boxes of Dunkin Donuts.

I keep seeing little snippets of life that are funny, but only mildly so, and therefore don't stand on their own well.

Like the guy I saw at the pool the other day with a towel wrapped around his middle. The towel was a Chutes and Ladders game board. If I were a guy I don't think Chutes and Ladders would be my first towel choice for drying off. We have that same towel, and it get put into rotation a lot when we grab a stack for the pool bag. We got a mini golf towel the same day.

Does anyone ever play the games on their towels? Even when it comes with all the game pieces? The pieces just get lost in my house and when I come across a stray foam child game piece months later, it always takes me a while to remember where it came from. Does anyone really keep track of stuff like that?

Today is Fern's 11th birthday. She woke to the noise of an incessant ringing next to her ear this morning. It was a new cell phone in its box wrapped in tissue paper. I was standing in the hall listening to her trying to figure out what was going on, then ripping into the paper. The phone stops ringing and the call rolls over to voice mail. Darn. I dial again, she's still ripping. I hear this quiet chirp of excitement; she can't get the paper open fast enough. Finally she answers.

I caved. She wanted one, I got her the phone. What kind of parent am I? I wavered on it for a long time. She's been riding her bike to the pool where we're members which is about a mile away crossing a 4-lane road (with fast traffic), so having her a phone call away if there were an emergency was good. But on the other hand my parents didn't worry about me when I was her age, I didn't need a phone, why does she? She can use the land line to call her friends. I guess it came down to $10/month is an OK price for knowing your kid is alright.

What do you think?

Gold-star parenting day!

This morning I dropped off Fern at skating daycamp. She'll be 11 on Friday and I'm trying to be aware of that "don't embarrass me, Mom" stage so I'm not really affectionate in public with her anymore unless she takes the lead. She's sitting with some friends and I whisper in her ear that I'd put some money on her tab at the snack bar for lunches. She says thanks and I turn to leave. She calls me back and I see she's blowing a kiss to me. We have this game where blown kisses are like arrows. When it lands on you, it hurts, so the receiver will make a funny face of pain, and may even say "Ow!" So, here comes this kiss from across the room and I have to play along, right? I catch the kiss with the appropriate act of pain and send one back. She catches hers with a loud "Ow!" and I get a round of approving smiles and giggles from her friends and a smile from my daughter that says, "Isn't my mom cool!"

Friday was our 16th anniversary. My husband and I celebrated on Saturday by playing golf and having dinner. We chose the 9-hole White Course at East Potomac Park in Washington DC. We both played horribly because the course was in such bad condition. Standing water everywhere, the bunkers doubled as ponds. In dry conditions you'd expect a bounce and a nice roll, but the ground as wet as it was, the balls just stuck in the muck.

On to dinner. We ate at Zola at 8th and F street. The food was very good. And the bathroom scale is still telling me I ate too much. That the and 4 pairs of pants I tried on this morning before I found one that fit.

There were 92 pairs of underwear in a recent load of laundry I did. Then I found another basket of socks I never matched and found enough underwear in there to bring the total up to 120 fresh clean pairs in my house.

Why on earth did I count them? I don't know. Once I saw those stacks growing... I guess I just felt compelled to count.

I will not count the matched socks.

I won't.