Soccer update

On the bright side, Alex's team won yesterday. NO TIE. Excellent. But of course, I was at Samantha's game, so I missed it. The Firecats (Sam's team) played a team who practices twice a week and scrimmages boys' teams. WTF. I consider myself lucky if I can get 20 solid minutes of practice out of my girls. ALTHF. Why not just have your girls play up a year? Seriously? GU7 soccer, and you think it's essential that you have your team practice twice a week and scrimmage boys. Whatever. We lost, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it might be. They had a coach on our side of the field, as well as their side, yelling to the girls. One girl, I noticed, several times stopped playing to give him the stink eye. I was kind of surprised, but then not so much when I saw her leaving with the head coach and I think the assistant was her dad. She obviously loves all the extra time she is putting into her U7 soccer career.

My girls started out the game looking EXTREMELY clueless. Maybe they were just putting on an act for the other team, because while they LOOKED clueless, they were actually doing more of what they were supposed to be doing than in the past. So they are learning. It wasn't half bad. Maybe not worth missing Alex's win, but oh, well.

Ten years ago...

I was reading some random blog, and they had posted a question about, "What were you doing ten years ago?" And I kind of chuckled because I remember, shortly after Alex was born, a good friend of mind from college, Jill, also had a baby, Drew. We met at the mall one day and were moseying down the mall with our newborns in their strollers. I can't totally remember the conversation, but the point that came out of it was that, very likely, ten years ago to that minute of mall-moseying with newborns, we were in college and most probably were drunk, exactly ten years earlier. And while I'm not totally proud, but only sort of, we did have a really good run there for awhile.

Now I can say that ten years ago today, I was probably busy playing some form of Chick Tickle (of which there were several: Reach Chick Tickle, Area Chick Tickle, etc.) because Alex and I did that A LOT. For those of you wondering, she was the chick, and I did the tickling -- Good Times! But no, all that Chick Tickle did not cause her to stutter or give her bladder problems or trust issues. So there!

Bronchiectasis (Not Really)

Well, I lost my voice Saturday and it's Thursday and it still isn't back all the way yet. Which is totally not the norm. I usually lose my voice once every fall, and it's usually back in two days, tops. Plus, I just haven't felt great. When I lose my voice, my family runs around telling everyone I'm sick, when in reality, I feel FINE. So when I do try and talk, it's usually to tell them I'm not SICK. But Tuesday I finally gave up and went to bed for the day around 11:00, and I'm thinking that maybe ought to be what I should be doing right now. Plus, it doesn't help that the dep I was working on this week was about this woman and her chronic bronchitis and her bronchiectasis (which is a new word I just learned) and all her symptoms. Ugh.

Text Messages

From Jana:

What a positive influence you are.

Good thing you do not own any guns.

God bless ya, Ted, you're reading my blog! (How I Met Your Mother)

How about ICU81MI for my license plate? (30 Rock)

I like when a woman has ambition. It's like seeing a dog wearing clothes. (30 Rock)

Superhills me. (The Soup)

Suck on that, stupid tattletale parents!

How long have you known the plaintiff? I haven't actually seen it, but I have seen the Firm, and I plan on renting The Pelican Brief. (Michael Scott - The Office)

For once I am not going to be Jan Brady. I am going to be Marcia. Oh, my nose! See, it's starting already! (30 Rock)

A drinking contest? What am I, twelve and at my boyfriend's frat party? (30 Rock)

FROM ME:

I don't know how, but you're going to get me a sandwich or I'm going to cut your face so bad you'll have a chin. You'll all have chins. (30 Rock)

You love Monday T.V.

That commercial where the lady cleans the kitchen with a piece of raw chicken grosses me out.

HIMYM is hysterical.

I know that message, and I know that tone. Every one of my sisters got that message junior year in high school. You're pregnant! (Dennis Duffy - 30 Rock)

Prenatal vitamins. Yeah, I know what prenatal means. Pre, before, natal, ruined. (30 Rock)

Hmm. I have already used the phrase, "No fighting on Mother's Day". Not a good sign.

The Bret Michaels Band is not coming here this summer.

Run, Hannah! (Endurance)

Quit having fun without us.

Why do you suppose a man would be ashamed of having a loofah? You know, I myself prefer to have my excess epithelial cells slough off naturally, but I don't condone those who seek to accelerate the process. (Big Bang Theory)

My Weekend of Meaningful Glances

Well, not the entire weekend...

Friday night Eric and I worked the Cheap Trick/Heart/Journey concert. A good time was had by all, as usual, and Eric finally got to work and see that it really is a good time. Cheap Trick was first. They had a bunch of songs I had forgotten they played, so that was kind of cool. During most of the other shows I worked, I never cared much if I got to actually see the band or not, so I didn't bother walking through the amphitheater. Eric really wanted to see Heart, so he walked through a few times, and I did see Heart and Journey. They both sounded brilliant.

The next morning I woke up with maybe an eighth of my voice left. I could feel I was maybe losing it before the concert, but the varied secondhand smoke at the concert probably didn't help. So I told Alex she'd have to do most of the yelling at the Firecats during the soccer game. Well, no, I yelled myself pretty much the rest of the way hoarse. We actually played well. I'm guessing we lost maybe 8 - 4 or so, with one of those goals being scored by one of their girls going the wrong way, but oh, well.

Then we headed up to Everett for Alex's game. The traffic was TERRIBLE. Apparently, there were even signs that said to avoid 405, which is the freeway we took. The other people who went the I-5 way actually had it worse, though. Alex was in a panic when she realized she was going to be late (as usual), but thankfully she wasn't the only one. Once again, we ended up with a tie. UGH.

Then we went to dinner with Grandma Dorothy and Grandpa Bob. At this point, my entire voice was GONE, so I kind of had to whisper whenever I tried to talk. All night long I would think, Hey, I was going to call Cathy, or Hey, I should call my mom, only to pick up my phone and realize I couldn't talk. My family kept telling people I was sick, which simply wasn't the case. I lose my voice, but I feel fine. It's just after trying to squeeze out a few words every hour, you just get worn out. I had to make a few phone calls, so I had them on speakerphone and Alex had to do the talking. I got out of working the Maroon 5/Counting Crows concert, which I actually volunteered for because I wanted to see them. But they had enough people, so it was no big whoop.

So I didn't get any more My Coke Rewards caps tonight, but I figure I have enough to be entering caps until well into next year. I don't know if it will be worth it in the end, but who knows what I'll end up with? And apparently it must make me happy, because I keep doing it.

Hopefully my voice will simply come back and not a bunch of other cold/flu symptoms, although I do fancy I sound a lot like Stevie Nicks with my raspy voice...

Old Boyzone

Good times! My sister posted one of Boyzone's older videos, a song called No Matter What, which pretty much was the reason we both loved Boyzone. I had never actually seen the "official" video until she posted it recently. I actually was really disappointed. I think they should totally just have used the footage I've posted here, from Andrew Lloyd Weber's birthday celebration.

New Boyzone

I am totally hooked on this song. Oh, and I think the dancing is adorable. I know that a lot of the comments on youtube have been critical of the dancing, but Boyzone was never known for their dancing in the first place, like, say, N'Sync. Plus they've aged really well, especially Stephen.

T.V. So Far

Before this fall T.V. season started, I borrowed Supernatural seasons 1 and 2 from my sister to try to catch up on. I also started watching Bones on hulu.com, which is a great site to watch all kinds of T.V. series. I haven't even checked out the movies yet, but they seriously have TONS of series that you can watch, and they don't need to be downloaded. So I'm somewhere in the middle of season 2 of both Bones and Supernatural, both really good shows. I think this may be the reason I feel like the fall T.V. shows kind of snuck up on me. I just don't feel prepared! Under no circumstances, though, can I put down in print on this blog all the shows I plan to try out. It would make some people question my ability to parent and/or exist in this society, due to the fact that I must have NO time on my hands, what with all the T.V. I watch or am planning to watch. TiVo has helped immensely because now an hour-long show is only 45 minutes. It doesn't take long for a show to fall off the radar for me, and once it's gone, it's gone for good, usually, (except it is REALLY hard to give up shows that have turned to CRAP, i.e., Grey's Anatomy, when they keep hiring people I want to watch.)

TERMINATOR - SARAH CONNOR CHRONICLES -- I still love this show. Of course, I can come up with one or two scenes in every episode that I think are lame, but overall, this is a great, usually action-packed series. Brian Austin Greene is the next Patrick Dempsey, I think. How fair is that, that a geek can grow up so good-looking and actually get better and better?

PRIVILEGED -- I really like this show, mostly because we are big Reba fans here, and the girl who played Cheyenne on Reba plays the main character Megan. Plus I think she's a pretty strong character and usually doesn't follow what I consider are the usual T.V. cliches. I am afraid, though, that it might not hold my interest enough to go, Oh, no, Privileged is on and I forgot to TiVo it, which usually does not bode well.

FRINGE -- I really liked the first episode - totally creepy. I think I've TiVo'd the second ep., I just haven't watched it yet. But I will, because J.J. Abrams is behind it and the first one was so good.

GREY'S ANATOMY -- I know this hasn't started yet, but right after I decided NOT to watch it this season, they hired Kevin McKidd, so I hate to say it, but I will be checking it out.

DANCING WITH THE STARS -- The main reason I am NOT planning on watching DWTS is because the premiere week is planning three nights of it. I don't have time, and it really makes me mad that they think that I do. Plus, we've hit the point where the professional dancers are the stars, instead of the "celebrities". The dancing last time wasn't good enough, either. Kristi Yamaguchi was technically good, but there was no WOW factor, I felt. So I think I'll leave that show to my daughter and I'll pick it up again somewhere around week 6.

CRUSOE -- Alex and I are totally excited about this show, but I'm probably the one that will end up watching it. She has a bit of a pirate obsession, and in one of the previews, someone said the word "pirate". But she's 13 and I still see her choosing dog shows on Animal Planet or cartoons before other stuff.

THE SITCOMS -- 30 Rock (hysterical and great quotes), Big Bang Theory (ditto), How I Met Your Mother, and The Office. I am going to give Kath & Kim a try because of the buzz, and Worst Week because it's a British import and British T.V. RULES.

That's all for now...

Samantha the Great

Oh, also, our soccer team, the Firecats, didn't win yesterday, but we did score five goals. Samantha scored two of them. Alex's team tied, which, of course, half-sucks. Then Samantha passed her first Medium Guitar Hero song, Barracuda.

The church we went to this morning is the one her teacher goes to. During the first 20-minute songfest deal, I thought, Absolutely no way will we be going to this church again. Then the pastor started to speak, and he was great, funny, full of pop culture references for all ages, lots of football metaphors. He would be worth coming for, I think. Then I picked up Samantha after Sunday school, and the first thing she said was, I LOVE church. So while I would like to try the Presbyterian church in town which is way more traditional, I like that she's so excited about Sunday school. We will probably keep going to this church for awhile and just suck up the mini Christian rock concert for the first half. At least there wasn't the old, stand-up, sit-down, stand-up, sit-down, stand-up again vibe going on. We stood for all the singing, sat for the sermon and were done. She loved Sunday school even though there were only two kids from her class there, both kindergartners. I think my main goal in finding a church right now is for her anyway. So I guess I should let her pick!

Dealing with the Teenager Issues

So Friday night Alex got invited to go to the football game with a group of kids. I could tell she didn't want to go, and as much as I wanted to MAKE her go, I guess I knew the feeling and told her that if she didn't go, she needed to make a real effort to go next time. She agreed. Fast forward to Saturday after her soccer game. She has tentative plans to spend the night with a friend when her friend is done babysitting around 9:00. While I don't think that's necessarily ideal, it's okay with me. I like her friend a lot and trust her family. While she's hanging around watching T.V., two of her soccer friends call and say they are riding their bikes to visit at our house. That's cool. Then Alex invites the neighbor down to hang out with them, also. Again, cool.

Then it's starting to get to dinnertime, and while I don't mind that she has friends over, I actually wasn't planning on feeding three extra teenagers. While I'm trying to decide how to handle this, our neighbor invites the girls to go swimming with him and his friends that night. Alex calls me while I'm at the grocery store, after having finally given in and deciding to buy pizza for everyone, and asks if I can "swing by" one of the girls' house and pick up her swim stuff. Um, no, I'm at the opposite side of town. Also, what are they going to do with their bikes? If her mom could bring her stuff and pick up her bikes, I will take them home after the swimming. Good plan. Her mom comes over and gets the bikes and everyone is ready to go swimming. I hand Alex $10 bucks and tell her to bring home change. Uh, well, the other two girls need money, also. FINE. I took back the ten and gave her a twenty, the whole time telling myself that I will take them home at 9:30.

9:20 and they are home. They run in the door past me arguing about who gets the first shower. Wait a minute, I'm taking the girls home. Oh, no, we called their moms and they're going to stay here. See, I guess because I am usually so cool about that stuff that I always let her, she almost feels like she doesn't need to ask. I didn't want to make a scene, but I made a mini one anyway. I told her I was kind of mad because she knew we were going to try a new church on Sunday.

Anyway, the kids spend the night. They hang out at the local grade school until 11:00, when I made them come home. Then they hung out on the trampoline until midnight when I made them come in. It's all fine. She's done it before. We've never had a neighbor complaint or anything. I do like being the "hanging-out" house, somewhat. I mean, I'd rather see what she's doing here than wonder (or not) what she's doing somewhere else. But I just felt totally railroaded with this incident.

This morning I told her I'd be taking the girls home after church. When I got home, I was told Alex had done her soccer homework and her other homework already and that the girls had called their moms and were going to stay longer. Part of me wants to pull her aside and tell her, No, this time I'm taking the kids home. Part of me is fine that they're here, because they're outside again, hanging out with the neighbor. If she was here alone, she'd be on the computer or watching T.V. on the couch. Plus I like that she's gotten to be friends with our neighbor, a really nice GUY. I know she's not nearly ready to date or talk boyfriends, but I do want her to know that she can be friends with guys. I'm sure if she were home alone, she wouldn't be hanging out with him by herself.

So we need to have a TALK. I'm not mad, I just don't want to be taken advantage of like that again, not that any of them thought they were doing that. I guess, after watching The Secret Life of the American Teenager, it could be worse.

Friday night

So the Firecats had a practice tonight. I swear they have an approximate 20-minute attention span. But it went okay. At least they had fun. I guess that's probably what I'll be telling myself all through this season, "At least they had fun". ALTHF. We can have that put on a shirt or something. But I don't think the team we play tomorrow is as good as either of the teams we lost to, so maybe that's a bonus. We'll see.

Alex's team, naturally, plays also at noon. So once again, she won't be there to help me, and I won't get to watch her, which I've actually been looking forward to more and more this year. Someone was explaining that her team last year was this good (raising his hand about a foot off the table), and her team this year started down here at this good (raising his hand about a quarter of that high). Therefore, her team this year can improve about 9 inches, while her team last year has to work equally as hard to only improve a couple of inches. Which totally makes sense, and it's way more impressive when you SEE what he was talking about. But I really feel like they have been improving, and I'm excited to see what happens for them this season.

I worked a deposition on Thursday in my kitchen over the phone. For some reason, I was WAY more nervous than actually getting dressed and driving to some attorney's office. In the end it went fine, but I did sit and worry about some neighbor ringing the doorbell or my husband and daughter coming home and yelling something. Then I realized I really wanted to turn on the air conditioner and so I had to sneak over and do it, trying not to make any noise.

We are going to try a new church on Sunday. This is the church Samantha's teacher goes to. My only issue is that I'd like to go to the 10:30 service, while Eric wants to go early to "get it out of the way", I'm assuming. But I guess since it's right there in Enumclaw and we can leave ten minutes before it starts, maybe 9:00 will be okay.

I've started going back to Curves again after taking most of the summer off. It feels good to get back at it. My shoulders still hurt from the awesome header I took off the raft on Bonecrusher Rapid this summer in Montana, so I am being careful there. Here I am, working out to feel better, and then there Eric is, working out and losing 12 pounds in about a week and a half. It's so not fair...

Weekend Update

Well, the Firecats (Samantha's soccer team that Alex and I coach) had their first two games this weekend in the soccer jamboree. We got creamed both times. Alex couldn't be there because she had a game in Redmond at noon, so it was just me. Not sure how much I'm going to like coaching, especially because I don't feel like I can help them much. It might have been a little different if Alex had been there. One of the other coaches was yelling stuff to his team, and I had NO idea what the hell he was talking about. Samantha might even be the star, except for the drama. She had to come out of the second game with a "CONCUSSION". Actually, she had stayed home from school with what seemed to be a horrible cold the day before. So I'm not surprised it caught up to her on the soccer field. However, I'm pretty sure she meant she was congested, not that she had a concussion. Anyway, we'll see how the season goes. I'm pretty sure this will be my last foray into the world of coaching.

Saturday night I worked at the Santana concert. Way different, older crowd, equally as nice as the nicest metal fans. One of the bonuses was that we didn't have to keep their caps. I guess the powers that be don't think of Santana fans as any sort of threat. You would think this might upset me, seeing as how I've been faithfully entering codes from the last concert I worked in my My Coke Rewards. I even actually purchased two $25 gift cards from eBags, one for me and one for my sister. Anyway, it was SO nice not to have to try and explain that stupid rule time and time again that I didn't even mind not getting any caps from that show. I actually came home with two bags of caps from the last show, so it was all good. And there are two more concerts!

Sorry Jana...

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First Day of School '08

So it seems like everyone was in a dither all weekend worrying about the first day of school. Seeing as how Alex was the only one with an actual "bad" experience last school year, I don't know what Samantha's problem was. She woke up an hour early this morning and told me that at 4:30 this morning she almost threw up and then was awake all night. Uh, I don't think so. She doesn't even have a clock in her room. How would she know what time it is? But the thing is, I know how her twisted little mind works and what she is thinking. While she's eating breakfast, she tells me she might throw up. I told her to come have some milk of magnesia and hurry and puke, if she's going to, so she can get ready for school. I even told her that if she didn't go to school at Southwood this year, that I would march her across the street to Elk Ridge. So on the way to school, she seems fine. As we're approaching the drop-off, we see ALL these classmates AND THEIR PARENTS on their way to class. I kind of said, Oh, I wonder if I should go in with you. Uh, yeah. So I walked her in. She marched around the room doing all the things you are supposed to do when you first get there. Her teacher from last year is doing a kindergarten/first grade split, so she has the same room, same teacher. She must have kissed me good-bye four times before I finally left. Little turd.

Alex's morning went pretty smoothly. She was pretty nervous, but she was texting a friend of hers while getting ready, which seemed to help. I have to admit, though, I forgot to get a picture of her before school, which I'll have to do when she gets home. After I got home (I decided I should get the whole day off today and not do a lick of work, make a great lunch, and take an awesome nap) I remembered I had told her I'd call the school to see if she could get her P.E. teacher changed. While I didn't hold out ANY hope that it would happen, I tried. The lady I was talking to said she'd put Alex on the list. Then she asked who was the teacher she wanted instead of the one she got. When I told her, she said, Wait a minute, it looks like she was already moved into that class. So I don't know if Alex made it to the right class today, but she should be thrilled with the move.

The one thing I forgot about school is how early I have to get up. Pretty much the whole rest of the family, including the cats, goes to bed around 9:30. I go pretty much at 11:30. Then I have to get up at 6:30 with Alex. The last couple of weeks, I had been thinking how I never nap anymore and I must have finally kicked that habit. Then I realized that the last two weeks, the girls and I have been sleeping in until about 9:30 every day. Quite a difference.

Children of the Corn

This is the field right next to our house. Alex doesn't seem to appreciate it whenever we pull into the driveway and I say, "Heh-heh-heh, Children of the Corn" and laugh maniacally. I don't think I've ever actually even seen that movie.

On a sad note, we knew when we moved in that the plan was to develop this field into more houses. Friday an engineering firm spent the whole day surveying. Ugh.

What do you think?

YAY!! My sister is teaching a blogging class and, while she was really good at doing stuff to her blog before, she's now a PROFESSIONAL (no Olympics participation = ( for Jana). So she fixed my blog/Fall problem. I love it -- THANK YOU. Although I'm assuming due to my summer spent working the concerts at the White River Amphitheater, I sort of think the leaves in the first picture look like marijuana... But hey, marijuana leaves turn colors, too, right? Pretty, pretty. Now one day I'm either going to have to get her to show me how to do stuff or she's going to have to just do the changes all the time. It will be like I have my own personal (FREE) web designer!

Random

I'm not thrilled with the look of my blog. I want it to feel FALL, but I'm just not sure...

I went shopping for school clothes for Eric today. I decided, since I found him two pairs of pants at Penney's, that I didn't have to get him some more pants at Costco, so I could spent the $30 on what I wanted. I hadn't planned to spend more than $100. I spent $171. Watch Robyn stand there smiling, trying not to hyperventilate, and acting like she routinely spends $171 on stuff at Costco.

Eric and I have had several conversations on how we think Alex should behave towards people when school starts up, mainly the two girls that basically shunned her last year, her "friends". I told her that if they spoke to her, she could be polite and speak back, but if they tried to be friends again and act like nothing happened, I wanted her to say something. Eric thinks she should move on and not say anything, but he's also thinking they won't try and be friends again. I agree she doesn't want any friction, but I don't want these girls to think they can walk on her one year and she'll forget about it and let them be her friend again later. Anyway, it's highly doubtful anything will happen. I know she's already seen the one who decided not to speak to her anymore first, and they didn't speak. But she was better friends with the other one, so I wonder.

After about 45 minutes and TWO sales clerks at Famous Footwear finally figured out how to order Alex's Converse shoes and have them shipped to our house, they came today, IN THE WRONG SIZE. Luckily, we had a brand new store open up in Bonney Lake, so I won't have to go far to get them exchanged. Now my question is do I wait for Samantha's shoes to come first? Or do I go ahead and switch Alex's tomorrow? We'll see. I've got a ton of proofreading to do for Shari before she leaves on vacation. I may not even have a chance to leave the house tomorrow.

End of the Summer Update

Man, my posts have been few and far between here lately! It should get better once everyone is back in school and all is right with the world again...

Alex's soccer team did okay, for a team that plays at the P-4 level being put in a bracket of all P-1 teams. We actually beat the first team and held the other two to I think five goals between them. The two teams we lost to came in #1 and #2, so we had nothing to feel bad about! Her team from last year even lost to the eventual #2 team. But both Alex and Samantha had a blast.

I think this year, for Alex, may end up being even harder than last year. She had a really bad experience with her two "friends" turning against her the last few months of the last school year. She started hanging out with some new friends this summer and even told me that she was having more fun in the couple of weeks she hung out with them than she had in the year and a half with her other friends. But she's really emotional and always kind of on egg shells, thinking if she has one misstep, they may not like her, either. It's really hard to watch. When she's with her new friends, she's like a different person, and I know she has a lot of fun. But like tonight, she was supposed to spend the night with a few of the girls, kind of a slumber party, but she had soccer. The girls went to a movie, thinking they'd be home by 8:30. They ended up getting home around 9:45. She didn't feel great after soccer and truly just wanted to go to bed early, but felt like she needed to go so they'd still like her. I just hate seeing her feel that way. I finally made the executive decision that she should stay home. We were sitting in the car in the driveway talking about it and she started crying. It's like she can't even put her finger on why she thinks she feels miserable. I asked her if she wished we hadn't moved, and she said yes, which makes me feel bad all over again. Anyway, it's going to be some kind of journey, I'm afraid. All I can do is be there. At least she talks to me.

I worked two more concerts this past week, Radiohead and the Pain in the Grass, which was mainly Queensryche. I liked the fans from both concerts and got two more bags of bottle caps. Very different crowds, though. Radiohead fans were more hippie-ish, kind of stoner-ish, but equally as nice as the metal fans I've run into. But the marijuana smell from that concert I was afraid would still be there when I woke up the next day, even after showering with my smelliest Bath and Body Works shower gel.

We went to Olympia to celebrate my father-in-law's birthday yesterday. My mother-in-law bought him an iPod nano, which I'm sorry to say , is WAY too much iPod for him to handle. But I think I got him on the right track. I told him he should buy one song a day until his gift card is used up, so he would have to practice with it once a day. I also told him to call me any time he had questions. He actually called today after he bought a song, and I walked him through the next steps, so I think he's going to take my advice!

We are getting the grandkids together this Saturday for a portrait for my mother-in-law's birthday in November. What started out as a nice idea seemingly has evolved into this nightmare. First it was scheduled the Saturday of the Bigfoot tournament. My sister-in-law emailed me to see if we could just "swing by" for a half an hour for the photo shoot. Well, if by "swing by" you mean drive the two and a half hours down from Snohomish to take the pictures and then back two and a half hours for Alex's next game. So then it was rescheduled to this Saturday. All systems were go until my sister-in-law asked if Eric was coming. Um, no, this is a grandkids picture, why does he need to come? Plus, he had prior plans to go to a football game with a former coaching friend. Fine. Then tonight his brother calls and I don't know if he didn't know what he was supposed to guilt Eric into or what, but Eric told him he'd talk to me and call him back. Five minutes later, his brother had called back, so I grabbed the phone. I had just reread the email from my sister-in-law which said, "Dorothy would be beyond thrilled with a picture of her g-kids, so I really hope we can make this happen." Not a single word about us being in the picture anywhere. Turns out they decided it would be cool to get a picture of the three brothers as well, which it would, BUT he can't "swing by" for a 10:00 photo shoot when he is supposed to be leaving Enumclaw at 10:15 with his buddies. At one point my sister-in-law had suggested Thanksgiving weekend for the pictures, which I thought was a great idea. Then Eric's brother decided that weekend was too busy. It really seems like things can never just go smoothly. I finally just told her that we would have to concentrate this weekend on just getting the grandkids, as per the original plan, and if they wanted family photos to go along with it, our family would have to make it in another time.

So this weekend I was hoping Alex would get to hang out with her friend from Federal Way, but even if that happens, I'll have to steal her for a Saturday morning photo shoot!

More August News

Well, we made it back from Montana in one piece. That was NOT a relaxing vacation. It was a ton of fun, don't get me wrong, but relaxing - NOT. So we've had a couple of semi-boring days and now we're off again.

We leave tomorrow for Alex's soccer tournament in Snohomish. Snohomish is like two hours away, short enough that we could just drive it every day. But we're staying in the hotel with the rest of the team. Spending money on another hotel room makes me sick thinking about it, but then with gas prices, it's probably kind of a wash.

Then I find out the other night that when we registered for the tourney, they asked us some random questions, and when the brackets came out, we got stuck in a bracket with all P-1 teams. That means Premier 1 league teams, one of them being the team Alex was on last year. We are a P-4 team. So the coaches pulled the parents together to let us know that they were working on trying to get to another bracket, but if not, it's up to us to keep the girls up and ready to play. I just want to, you guessed it, VOMIT. Everyone else is all, Oh, it would be great to play them; we can kick their butts. When I was growing up, I played tennis for years and years. My whole summer was organized around tennis tournaments all over the state (which was a BLAST, by the way). But I remember people always saying, You can beat anyone if you just believe you can. Well, I did then and I do now call bull*$#@. I remember thinking, So you people honestly believe that if I put my mind to it, I could beat Rainey Lamey (the #1 girl in the state from Billings, who had an indoor court and played year-round) or Berrit Burton (the girl who came up every summer from Nicaragua and kicked all our asses) or, for that matter, Chris Evert. So I've always been skeptical of that, Believe it and you can mentality. I don't think we'll actually end up playing them, but we will be playing at least one team that beat us last year 10-0.

Tonight is my Girls U7 soccer team's first practice. For the love of god, I'm not sure what I was thinking when I volunteered to coach. It's not that I don't think I can do it. I'm just not sure I want to or have the patience. Yesterday Eric kept asking me if I had a plan and what I was going to do. Well, yeah, at that point my plan was just to show up, hand out soccer balls and have the girls kick up and down the grass for a while. Finally, his constant bugging me got to me and I got out the drills my friend gave me to work on. Then I called Alex down and we actually planned out practice. She's even sort of excited. I think she'll be great. We already know four of the five girls. It might even be fun.

My sister gets to house a 21-year-old Scottish soccer coach for a week. I mean, unless he's a total dog, the accent alone is worth it. I told her that I'm sure any sort of sexual activity with any of the people housing them is probably seriously frowned upon. I don't know, some of those soccer bodies (i.e., David Beckham - how can you argue that), boom chicka wah wah.

Also, my sister, after seeing Samantha pass songs on Easy on Guitar Hero, finally got into it. I told her that if she ever gets up to Hard songs, she has to let me know so I can come out of retirement because I can't have my little sister beating me at GH. She posted this morning on her blog that she hit Raining Blood, which I'm not even sure should count as a song. I know a lot of the good people that make up heavy metal fans would argue with me, but I don't get it. And I think I'm fairly open-minded. But if there's no discernible beat anywhere, how is that a song? I've passed it, but I'm not a fan of Raining Blood!

Montana in August

Well, it's been awhile since I've posted, I know... We are actually in Montana again, second time this summer, which is pretty normal for us. It really is our vacation destination. We stopped in Spokane last Friday for my cousin Drew's wedding, which was an awesome time, and then headed here on Saturday. This trip has been a little different because we are staying down the road at my sister's because my sister-in-law and her two kids are here, also, and they are staying at mom's. So far it's working out fine, except for the usual sibling squabbles and Samantha "I'm SOOO FRAKKING SENSITIVE" Fiedler getting her feelings hurt. But she is the littlest cousin and takes everything VERY literally. I'm working with her...

Everyone went rafting on Sunday, with the exception of my parents who were picking up their new puppy, Tinker (Tink). Scott and Jana's friend Doug and his girlfriend Lynette came as well and brought their raft. I ended up on the "kid" raft with Scott. Except for the lack of sunshine, it was a great day of rafting -- oh, and also the falling out of the raft on the biggest rapids part, which I did exceptionally well, I'm told. I was also told by several people that the "lady" got a TON of pictures of my spectacular trip, which I can't wait to see. I'm sure it's going to remind me of the time in the Bridget Jones movie where she slides down the fire pole with her thong underwear and her big ass showing on national television when her skirt flies up. At least almost immediately after me, a whole raft flipped over. Possibly some people might find that more interesting than the girl who flipped out over the back of the raft in a back somersault. I was pretty proud that I managed to hold onto the rope, which was about the only thing I was thinking, that and how the river had just absolutely hydro-douched my nose. I think I still feel river water sloshing around up there.

My Alex was amazing during the trip. When we stopped at some little cliffs and Scott and Doug and Lynette all jumped off, Alex went ahead and joined them, which I thought was pretty cool. I think Carter and Zac also went off the cliff, which was also pretty cool. Then Alex did this:




She not only looked adorable, she was a STUD.