Pink Prickly Pear

"Grey day. Everything is grey. I watch, but nothing moves today."

We had absolutely nothing planned, and it rained on and off all day long. In short, a welcome break from our increasingly busy schedule.  

At some point, a big gust of wind blew a gutter off the roof.  Sometimes (okay, most of the time) I yearn to own my own house, and I wouldn't have a lick of wall to wall carpet and I could build in shelves and plan out my garden in earnest and paint the walls mustard and olive and orange, but sometimes, it's nice to have a landlord to call,  "Hey, can you do something about this gutter the Queen Palm is propping up?"

We listened to new music (lately I stream Eclectic 24 all day long!), and relieved the fridge of its leftovers, and the boy (and sometimes his sister, and sometimes his mother) played with trains, and I got dirty (and the kitchen got mighty clean), and Mini-Pear finished her latest book, and I discovered some new TV worth streaming (Book Club?), and the boy napped and I got to read more of my library book (Rose Tremain's Restoration, hot on the heels of Rose Tremain's The Road Home) and then...

Somewhere in between 4 and 5, the rain held off long enough for me to walk the dog.  There was this torn stretch of bright blue sky overhead, but behind me, low slate blue clouds promised more rain, and looking out at the water, rain was falling steadily, blurring the horizon line.  I think I most appreciate the ocean when the sun isn't shining.  When it is, it can be blinding and I'm so damn photo sensitive, I have to turn away.  But the light this afternoon, it was gorgeous.  Just enough sun peeping out, everything to the east of me was green-gold...

The girl rabbits are just for mating!

Nine.

Nine is when it really might start to hit you that your kid is going to be smarter than you ever were, or could hope to be.  

In addition to sharing a childhood favorite, I had an ulterior motive in picking Watership Down for us to read together; I was hoping I might wean her off that awful Warrior Cats series.  In the interests of full disclosure, I have not read more than a couple of isolated chapters in the series.  Initially, I was just irritated with the names and what a pain in the ass mouthful they were when reading aloud.  My disdain really kicked in to high gear when we discovered that Erin Hunter is not one person, but rather three women hired by Harper Collins to push out a seemingly endless series about semi-feral cats.

I thought the plight of a rag tag band of anthropomorphic rabbits would draw her in, and away, from those damned cats.

I was wrong.  My sweet little riot grrrl immediately noticed what I had never even picked up on.  

"Why are all the main characters male?" It having been a while since I'd read Watership Down, I responded that I was pretty sure there would be some female characters.  After all, we were only a couple of chapters into the story.

"But they've already mentioned the does.  They are just for mating, and digging burrows.  I doubt there's going to be lead female character in this."

Um...she's right.  I sort of feebly protested that it was still a pretty good story and maybe we should just, you know finish it?  It being a classic and all?

"Mom," said gravely, and with an inflection that suggested it pained her to have to educate me on this matter, "I really don't think...as a girl...that I will enjoy this book."

"Oh, uh...okay"  

Crap.  What a total FAIL.  On the other hand, feminist nine year old, WIN.  Too bad I didn't have much, if anything, to do with it.

I want to make you moan by collecting lots of spiders and again leaving them all inside the house in the corners Daddy Long Legs hanging in the cobwebs like they're dead important...

I heard this band on Huw Stephens this morning (channeling my inner teenager, laying in bed with my headphones on instead of changing a diaper, walking a dog, making breakfast or anything not entirely selfish).  Came downstairs to chase them down online (still firmly ignoring any and all responsibilities) and couldn't find them.  Dad called.  He hadn't heard of them, so no help there.  

Finally, here they are.  How much easier would it have been if they could spell properly?  At any rate, IDRchitecture.  I've chased them down for you. Give them a listen. Start with Nurishment (sic).

Pop culture commentary?  England's answer to The Postal Service?  Easy on the ears, that's for sure.

Babies, babies and more babies...

My baby cannot stop watching this.  

Keepin' it superficial since 1973*

 

I'm going to grow out my hair again.

Except, my method for the awkward stage involves a headband, but the boy wears a headband.  That is too matchy-matchy for my taste.

Yesterday I wore a baseball hat, but I only have one and I can't remember how I acquired it.  It's not to my taste and after wearing it out all day, Mr. Pear had this to say, once we got home:

We're home now, so you can take off your hat and Cagney or Lacey out...

To which I thought:

No nookie for you Mr. Pear!  Even if it is Saturday night!**

Anyway, he may make fun of my most awkward of stages, but I will keep him around because today I went out for lunch with my ladies and didn't come home until 5 0'clock (again with the birthday thing!) and he still did umpteen loads of laundry and vacuumed and made us dinner and cleaned up the kitchen afterward*** as well.

Oh!  And this too!  I was looking for some fun baby game on the internet this afternoon ( I ran out of creative finger plays and the kitchen was hot! hot! hot!) and found this.  D'anjou enjoyed it muchly, but I suspect I enjoyed it more.  It's not the little Roland 303 I always wanted, but I can play pretend with the best of them.

^{* In which I reference the 20th anniversary of my 16th birthday.  Except it was last Sunday, not this one.}

^{** In which I pretend to only have sex on Saturday nights, to great comedic effect.} 

^{*** Spellcheck sez that "afterwards" doesn't have an "s" at the end of it.  I'm not so sure, but my spelling mojo sure has been off lately, so I will acquiesce.}

So I bought new running shoes.  Yawn.  Not news.  But running shoes made in the USA?  That's some news.  Some good news.  I took them out for an inaugural run this morning and my feet are very, very happy indeed.  And no, they weren't outrageously expensive or hideous or anything like that.  Thank you, New Balance. 

Last night I watched enough of The Future of Food to thoroughly freak myself out a bit regarding genetic engineering.  I fell asleep at about the halfway point, so I'll try and finish it tonight, but I somehow doubt I missed the happy ending.  And then this morning, while D'anjou napped, Mini-Pear and I watched King Corn about High Fructose Corn Syrup.  Having watched the stuff about genetically modified foods made the information about the pervasiveness of HFCS even more alarming.

Afterwards, I guiltily ransacked our kitchen cabinets.  HFCS is in everything, isn't it?  Well, maybe it is in a ton of stuff, but happily, I didn't find any at our house.  MSG made a surprise appearance in a package of Planters peanuts (we also had a bag of peanuts from Trader Joes with three ingredients - peanuts, peanut oil and salt), but no HFCS!  I even checked things that seemed like the perfect candidates for a little hidden sweetener - bread, barbeque sauce, a box of crackers...nada.  It's reassuring to see that we weren't going to have to make any big changes to our diets or shopping habits.  I mean, I wasn't a total rube...we're former vegans at our house, but I've certainly become a lot more relaxed about our food and I had suspicions that my new (over the past couple of years) mantra of "everything in moderation" might have let some unsavory ingredients in the back door. 

I do think I will exercise a little more moderation in the meals I eat outside of the house though. 

Confession:  I quite enjoy reality television.  Well, not Survivor or shows like that...it's the shows about people with more money than sense (Hulu, please stream more of the Real Housewives of Atlanta, New Jersey, Orange County, etc...) that suck me in.

However, after watching two My Super Sweet Sixteens in a row last night, I think my appetite for shows about spoiled teenage girls is quelled.  I think that show I watched last week about NYC prep school kids pushed me to the outer limits and last night, it all just spilled over.  From my pinned in position on the bed, sleep'n'spin D'anjou on one side, laptop balancing Mr. Pear on the other, I just about managed to squeak out a "Make it stop..."

For what it's worth, I did attempt a little politics of food last night, but I just cannot get into The Omnivore's Dilemma.  I'm not getting enough sleep lately, and the place I'm noticing it the most is my brain's capacity to absorb all but the fluffiest information.  Hey!  I think yours would too if first and foremost it was continually scanning all surfaces for choking hazards and scalable eights, not to mention the ever present "Where's the boy?" alarm.

But I've got to get into The Omnivore's Dilemma, if only because it's what my in-laws (they of the Splenda and the South Beach Diet) were reading on their visit.  Amusingly, they seemed quite horrified by my consumption of organic instant oatmeal for breakfast.  Not that pulverized grains in a little paper sack is my first choice, but after the boy's sucked me dry all night long, I am famished and instant organic oatmeal fills me up...and fast. 

"It's the cars that won't fit in the parking lot!"

I can't get this unauthorized Trader Joe's jingle out of my head.

And, while we're on the subject, I had the occasion to visit a brand new Trader Joe's in a neighboring town recently.  It's located in one of those insta-town-centers in the middle of what was agricultural country.  Lots of...space.  And yet, the parking lot was as tight and ridiculously small as any urban Trader Joe's I've ever visited!  What gives?  Must be a thing.

Rockstars and their parents.

I love these photographs.

Oh, what a beautiful morning! Oh, what a beautiful day!