Pink Prickly Pear

Friday's full of Yays! and Boos!

Another reason to road trip though lovely Oregon?  Free coffee courtesy of the Methodists!  I don't know if the coffee came with strings attached as I'd already had a small clandestine coffee much earlier that morning.  I'll also have to admit that after witnessing the horror of the rest room stalls at this stop, I studiously avoided any subsequent "Free Coffee" stops.  Just in case, you know, the free coffee was in lieu of a generous scrubbing of the facilities.  It certainly seemed so at this particular stop.

Onto Yays! (and Boos!)

Yay! Swimming this morning!  Floating in the sun feels so very good!

Boo!  We stayed at the pool long enough to hear a swim instructor bring not just one, but three successive students to tears with her constant haranguing and "Be Brave!"  and "You HAVE to do this!"  So, it's bad enough that she basically sucks, for lack of a better word, but I can't imagine what possessed three successive parental units to sit poolside and allow this woman to bring their children to tears. 

Boo!  Hey Fax Machine!  Why you try and call me at 6:38 this morning?  Hmmmm?  And why you try and call me again ten minutes later?  I was sleeping!

Yay!  Quiet time with a cup of tea and my book before anyone else woke up (although, to be perfectly honest, I'd have appreciated the sleep a little more).

Yay!  I think our dog learned some manners at her fancy pants doggie dude ranch!  Yesterday I chatted on the driveway with my friend, not realizing that the front door was open.  When I headed back inside the dog was attentively laying down on the door mat and did not get up until I told her she could!  And she was much calmer on our walk today (longtime readers know she's a beast on her leash).  And when we returned from the pool she greeted us in the hall by calmly laying down and wagging her tail (as opposed to punching us in the groin and frolicking excitedly underfoot). 

Yay!  Sleepover for Mini-Pear with one of her best friends.  Most uneventful!  They get on with their play and work out their issues on their own!  Little Friend is polite and not in the habit of wandering off opening drawers and nosing in closets (like Mini-Pear's other little friend, Mary Lennox*).

Boo!  Who will fill the void left by the impending move of Little Friend?  Please, not Mary Lennox!!!!!

Yay!  I read on the couch for an hour this afternoon and ate lots and lots and lots of cherries.  Here on the left coast, cherries are well within my grocery budget for months on end!

Yay!  We got to karate this afternoon for the first time in too long!  Mini-Pear had a great class and I got my knit on.

Boo! It's seven o'clock.  Where's Mr. Pear?  It's time to get this weekend party started!

^{* Uh, Mary Lennox is not her real name.  I wouldn't be all stealthy and avoid using our own real names on the internets and then out some poor kid due to her inherent disagreeable-ness.  Ever read The Secret Garden?  She's just like that Mary Lennox, only without garden tools and her ensuing sense of purpose.}

We're home!  Did you even know we were gone?  I'm slightly paranoid about making our vacation plans known to the internet at large, particularly since one online acquaintance came home from a happily anticipated summer holiday to find their home emptied out of a good deal of their belongings. 

We drove up to the LIFE is Good conference in Vancouver, WA to hang out with over 500 other folks who've decided to eschew school in favor of something that feels a little more authentic and sensible (I'm thinking about real life).

I wasn't sure what to expect from my quiet little family, but we all managed to enjoy ourselves immensely.  Mr. Pear and I got to hear some inspiring speakers, and mini-pear took in more than a few funshops, sometimes with one of us in tow, but for the most part on her own or with a friend.   It was a very busy, fun-filled long weekend, with loads of planned activities and opportunities to just hang out and get to know our people.  Occasionally, mini-pear retired back to our room with a book to get away from it all, and I'll admit to having needed to pop back in there to collect myself and take a much needed nap;)  Mr. Pear totally surprised me, preferring to hang out in the lobby, taking in the scenery and chatting with new friends.

I think we overwhelmed the hotel staff at first, but they appeared to mellow out considerably once they realized that despite the multitudes of children of all ages overrunning the place, that noise was all (extremely) happy noise and those kids were all very respectful of the space and each other.   To the left is a shot of the cardboard fort the kids built in the game room just off the main lobby.  (On all photos, click to make big!) It was like a giant hamster Habitrail for kids - all you could hear were squeals of glee from deep inside the maze.  Occasionally, a little head would pop out one of the windows up top, but never long enough to pose for a photo, of course! 

Overall, it was an excellent opportunity to re-assess the decisions we've made as a family and come away feeling both energized and more secure with the path we've chosen.  I found it particularly helpful to talk with teenagers and parents of older children (some now in their 30s) who embarked on this journey long before I ever even considered it.  Getting to meet these well adjusted, happy individuals was nothing less than inspiring;)

It was a very long drive (there's Mount Shasta in the background of the highway shot on the right).  We'd intended on saving a little money by camping out along the way with friends, but once we reached Oregon, rain and cold temperatures foiled those plans.  Plus, our camping equipment, plus everything else one needs for a week away from home doesn't really fit in our aging Saturn (which I didn't want to test with another long journey) so we rented a car with a little more room and a much larger gas tank.  I don't even want to tot up all the receipts, but I think we spent close to $80 a day on gas alone;(

We did manage to have a lot of fun along the way.  Our destination the first night was Monterey, CA.  After we passed through Los Angeles, we cut over to the coast for some driving of the white-knuckled variety.  In many places along the Pacific Coast Highway, there's no guard rail to stop one from plunging down the rocky cliffs to certain death.  As an added bonus, we ended up driving at dusk (and beyond) in some thick fog.  Whee!

We stopped to check out Elephant Seal Beach and found we were just in time for mating season.  The males were all in an uproar (literally) defending their harems by hurling their massive bulks at their opponents.  Lots of bellowing and bared teeth!  Of course, nobody wanted to come near Big Daddy over there on the right. 

The next morning, we checked out Monterey Bay (the top photo is of the Mr. and Mini seal-watching off the pier) a little before heading to our first campsite north of San Francisco.  We drove through the Santa Cruz mountains (ready to move there now!) and into Silicon Valley.  Wanting to get to the campsite early enough to pitch our tent while it was still daylight, and not wanting to experience San Francisco's legendary rush hour, we didn't manage much more than a windshield driving tour and a quick sandwich in one of my favorite cities (I'd like to move there too, please!).

Our drive home was much faster and not quite as interesting.  We jumped on Interstate 5 a block from our hotel in Vancouver and aside from rest stops and one hotel stay, we pretty much stayed on it until our exit back in Southern California.  We did make excellent time though, breezing past our initial destination on our first day's driving, yet still arriving early enough for a sunny family swim at a hotel about 45 miles south of Sacramento (no desire to move there, ever).  We were back here in time for lunch on day 2 and picked up our very tired and slightly miffed dog from her fancy pants doggie dude ranch a whole day early.

Today was the perfect beach day...

...so we stayed home with the curtains pulled over all the windows, trying to stave off the heat.

Actually, we spent yesterday afternoon at the beach as it was my mum's last afternoon here.  I thought I'd judiciously applied my sunscreen, but woke up this morning to find I'd missed a spot.  A very tender spot indeed - the previously "innie" part of my belly button which is slowly popping into something that looks a little more like an "outie".  I do have a maternity tankini thing I could wear, but it's black and the idea of wearing something destined to warm up in the sun against my tender little red spot didn't appeal.  Besides, I'd previously made some wacky pact with myself not to wear anything other than a bikini to the beach, no matter how much I morph into a hippo this summer.  The tankini I purchased strictly for the pool.

Plus Mini-pear was feeling a little sick-ish.  Her nose is streaming, so she's continually sniffing, and coughing.  No karate this evening and no going to see her friends in Midsummer Night's Dream.  There's one last performance tomorrow evening, which will mean missing the roller derby.  Pout. 

We did nip out to pick up some supplies for an upcoming camping trip.  One of the friends who is accompanying us forwarded a very comprehensive packing list, which is making my preparations so easy.  The list is actually a little too comprehensive.  It lists "dish soap" and then, later on in the same category of "cooking supplies" it also specifies "dish soap for the outside of pots and pans".  Am I missing something?  Have I been using the same old dish soap for everything when I shouldn't be?  Do I need a separate sponge as well?

At any rate, packing is something that usually has me pulling my hair out and second guessing everything.  This time around I have the very comprehensive list and the clothing limitations of my burgeoning belly to make it all a doddle.

Technologically speaking...

...this week's been an annoying one.

I tried to burn a CD only to have the drive on my computer decide to stop recognizing CDs.  Then it decided to recognize a Netflix DVD as a recordable CD.  After much cajoling I was able to persuade my computer to eject!  Eject! Eject!  and not record a play list over a film I don't own - but it's not supposed to be able to do that, right?

Now I can't even watch films on there;(  Lugging my iMac to the Apple store is a chore I don't need to add to my list.

Then computer also failed to recognize my iPod!  This on a night when I could not sleep and badly needed someone to talk me to sleep in the dark of my bedroom.  I'm reading a couple of really interesting books this week and I knew turning on the light for a little put-me-to-sleep reading was not going to work.  And then my little iPod radio/speaker thingy in my room refused to recognize my iPod and then my iPod decided it wasn't going to turn on or respond to me in any meaningful fashion.  The following morning, it inexplicably turned on with no explanation for its extremely bad behavior.  It's been acting up and I'll be so sad if this is the end.  Having an ancient vehicle with no CD player (let's not even talk about having a little mps docking station or whatever they call them), I rely on my iPod being hooked up to one of those little magnetic cassette thingies to save me from our backwater NPR station and commercial radio while driving all over the place (yes, we do spend a lot of time in the car here in SoCal).  Plus, all those nights when I can't sleep!  And all those classes I sit and wait outside, knitting, but needing someone to whisper news of the outside world into my ears!  Sometimes when I go to the podcast menu, it just turns off and I have to start it up all over again and scroll through the menus 2 or 3 times before it will actually let me listen to what I want to;(  iPod drama.  How ridiculous to get this bent out of shape about something I totally didn't need a couple of years ago.

I also needed to scan in some photos - something I've done on numerous occasions with no problem.  And nothing worked.  The programs that normally just capture the scanned image wouldn't do so.  Since at this point I was ready to rip my sleek little computer from the wall and hurl it at the wall, I decided to take the dog for a walk instead.

Then yesterday something happened to the internets.  Was it the wireless router?  Maybe, because I wasn't able to print my transposed knitting instructions out on our wireless printer.  Mr. Pear had to come home and wrangle with it.  It's a mystery to me.  The internet is back...somehow...and now the printer is hooked up the old fashioned way.  Knitting instructions printed.

I have knitty picks to share (teeny tiny little boy baby cardigan to make you say "Awwwww," and just for braggin', the beginnings of my very delicate lacy shawl), but I'm loathe to hook up my camera because you know something would happen and my pictures would all delete themselves from my camera card or my fancy new camera would explode.

I think I will just ignore all this stuff that supposedly makes my life easier and go sit on the beach today. 

Who's legs are those?

Having finally recently mastered the art of riding a bicycle, Mini-Pear discovered this pair of hand-me-down skates in the dwindling box of "clothes to be grown into".  It seems we've hit some point where we're not on anyone's radar anymore with regard to outgrown clothing.  Actually, I take that back.  We're not getting any clothing for Mini-Pear, but Mr. Pear's co-worker's wife is pregnant with her third child (first girl), so she sent Mr. Pear home with enough baby boy clothes for this baby* to wear a different outfit every single day for the first year of his life at least.  Very handy, since you all know how much I hate the shopping.

You know, it's not so much how I hate the shopping as how inept I am.  I wrote recently about a disappointing search for maternity clothes.  My mother, who needs no excuse to shop, immediately took this on as a project.  She arrived with a complete summer wardrobe for me.  Would you believe that everything fit, with the exception of one pair of shorts which felt just slightly too snug around the waist?  I mean, here I go into a shop, with the actual body in need of clothing, try a million and one things on and none of it fits, and all my mother seems to need to do is hold it up on the hanger and squint at it.  It's been years since clothing me was her responsibility and as I've waxed and waned considerably in this time, I find this no small feat.

But this is about Mini-Pear and skating, isn't it?  She started out awkwardly clomping around the back patio large before discovering that concrete paving stones separated by 2" wide avenues of pebbles are not the best surface for skating.  Now she awkwardly clomps along the sidewalk - decidedly less awkward when someone (in this case, it's her granddaddy) agrees to pull her along.  I made the mistake of telling her how fast one can go down a hill when all tucked up like a little egg.  She immediately crouched into the position and shot down the driveway towards the street.  I saved the day by shoving her into the flower bed.  She probably has a different opinion about that one...

* Oh hey, yeah, it's a boy!

Buckets of blood!

I was awakened this morning by a nosebleed.  Despite Mr. Pear's sleepy assurance that "everyone gets them," I don't think I actually have.  I seem to have some recollection of laying down on our old blue couch with one, but the more I delve back into my extremely fuzzy memory, I think it wasn't me, but Mini-Pear.

I was ever so slightly aware of some post-nasal drip situation which suddenly exploded into the cavity of my mouth.  I staggered to the bathroom to spit out this horrific chunk of blood.  It wasn't so much as a nosebleed, but a need to continually spit blood that was clearly generated from somewhere above as opposed to below my mouth.  So not tasty.  And so boring (and cold) standing over the bathroom sink waiting for it to all finish! 

Anyway, now I'm all alone at home (don't read anything pathetic into that statement - I just had the last truffle and am very much looking forward to my day devoid of a plan).  Mr. Pear has gone off to work, Mini-Pear and my mother have absconded to Disneyland.  They just called to say they've arrived and that the overcast weather apparently hasn't put a damper on everyone else's plans to visit the park.

Maybe I lost some sense along with all that blood this morning, for I am just now feeling slightly horrified that I wrote my mother's cell phone number on my child's arm with a sharpie marker just in case they get separated.  Surely I could have pinned a little note to the bottom of her shirt or something instead.  Apparently I am one of those wacky paranoid mothers. 

Despite my plans to do absolutely nothing today, I did take the dog for a walk to drop off some mail.  There is nowhere to leave it for the carrier at our house, as they shove all incoming mail through a slot in the garage door.  Occasionally, I'll leave an outgoing envelope or two affixed to the flap with a bulldog clip, but now that the ne'er-do-wells from across the road have started parking their car right in front of our house, I am loathe to leave the bright red Netflix envelopes hanging around waiting to be stolen.  I thought I'd listen to a podcast and do a longish loop.  Podcasts and walking are fine, but I really need to stop listening to This American Life.  Something is usually guaranteed to make me laugh and so I either end up chortling along to myself like some sort of easily amused buffoon, or I attempt to quell my laughter which usually results in my face contorting in such a manner that I've been stopped and asked if I'm okay. 

I never know how to answer that one.

I can do better than a post a week, can't I?

Mum and dad are visiting.  Sitting in the corner writing to an imaginary audience on the internet feels anti-social (maybe because it is).

We went to the desert.  I refused to relinquish control of the driver's seat.  Nobody liked that, but damn if I was going to sit in the back and breathe through the hairpin turns and whoops-you're-dead steep drops off the side of the two lane roads.  We stopped at the top of Mount Palomar so dad could drool at the bikes.  I think the bikers were drooling over my dusty old Saturn - that really makes the mountain roads a bucket of fun.

Yesterday I was down at the library looking for a book on the latest crackpot educational theory to capture my interest.  For the first time, I noticed that literature on incarceration/corporal punishment/prisons happen to be shelved right next to the books on educational theory.

Just something to consider...