Filling In Each Other's Paint-By-Numbers

Tonight Damonn and I are getting a little adult time out on the town and as an early anniversary gift to each other, we are heading downtown to the Schnitz to take in a Jackson Browne concert. We both love his music and although Damonn has been to a couple of concerts of his before, this is the first time going together. And there is no better place to see an artist than the Schnitz. It is small, intimate and has great acoustics. It really is the next best thing to having a private concert.

I’ve embedded this video of his song, The Pretender (from his 1976 album of the same name). It is one of our favorites and to Damonn and me this has become kind of a theme song of life. Managing hopes, dreams and the daily grind and doing it all with a person you love.

Damonn – Thank you for being the person who fills in the colors of my paint-by-number. There is no other person I’d want painting this family portrait with me more than you. Happy 9th anniversary, I love you!

Quotable Quotes

From this week:

Pirates aren't bad, they're just like regular people. Except for their skin's peeled off. - Adam

Dat's dingerous! My poop is dingerous! Don touch it! - Jamie

Mom, what do our skidney's do again? - Adam

Drink 'Er Down, Nee-Ner-Nee

Okay everyone, it's been a long week. What with the economy on the brink of disaster, WaMu going tits up as their newly-appointed President floats away on a $18 million parachute, Sarah Palin falling face first in her own pile of BS while talking to Katie Couric and McCain suspending his campaign and ditching David Letterman so he could rush to Washington and play the Greatest American Hero only to end up sitting there looking like a wannabe presidential bobble-head doll. And let's not forget that the Mississippi White Knights have decided to join the crowd at the first Presidential debate tonight. Which makes me feel like someone just punched me in the stomach. What must Michelle Obama be feeling?

I don't know about you, but I could use a drink. Many. So what better time to play the Presidential Debate Drinking Game! The rules are simple: You and at least one opponent pick a different word (one that is certain to be heard - but not too often) and everytime you hear the word spoken during the debates you must take a shot. How about, "My Friends, "Iran", "Bush", "Nuclear", "Maverick", "Allies". Just don't make it the word, "Change" or you'll be drunk before the first round of questioning ends. Then again, if we all pass out we already know who won. At least according to him.

Thanks But No Thanks. . .

Get your shovels ready, people. I'm spoutin' off.

I know my writing ability sometimes limits me to put to paper what is so fervently and passionately swimming in my head, which is one reason I have restrained myself from writing about this topic thus far. I wanted to be able to portray my feelings on Sarah Palin accurately. This morning I came across this article in Newsweek by Sam Harris that does just that.

"The next administration must immediately confront issues like nuclear proliferation, ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (and covert wars elsewhere), global climate change, a convulsing economy, Russian belligerence, the rise of China, emerging epidemics, Islamism on a hundred fronts, a defunct United Nations, the deterioration of American schools, failures of energy, infrastructure and Internet security … the list is long, and Sarah Palin does not seem competent even to rank these items in order of importance, much less address any one of them."

What I wrote below started as a simple introduction to the article in Newsweek, but as my family can attest, when I start spewing about something I feel so passionately about, I sometimes find it hard to stop. Hey, I warned you to get a shovel.

Nothing in this race for the White House scares me more than the thought of Sarah Palin sitting to the right hand of John McCain. But other than the brief reference to her unique choice in baby names, I have held my tongue in regards to my opinion of her. Until now.

I feel that I have given her a fair chance. I listened to her acceptance speech at the RNC and did my best to keep in mind that it was her job as potential VP to recite a speech written to blast Obama and his campaign with such tired and obvious cliches. And that her shrill, but god-given voice should not be held against her, although the snarky tone she tends to use should be well within her control. I have researched her stand on policy and even agree on some points. And in the beginning I gave her the benefit of the doubt concerning “Troopergate” and the investigation into her abuse of power. Hell, I can’t even say I wouldn’t be tempted to use the same influence to play havoc with the life of someone hurting my sister. But the way that the McCain campaign has sealed up that investigation is just plain scary. I have read articles and blogs on both sides of this surprising VP pick doing my best to understand who Sarah Palin is, and how and where she plans to lead our country, each time reserving judgment as to what I would find. What I have found is amusing at best and at worst, disturbing.

In opinions against her I have read of limited education, potential censorship, mounds of debt left behind from her time as mayor of Wasilla, extreme pro-life attitudes and the all too familiar, “with me or against me” attitude that our country and the world has had to endure for the past eight years under President Bush. The many pro-Palin websites that have popped up over the last month are just as disturbing to me. Many don’t so much talk about any positive achievements of her career, but boast of stands against global warming and wildlife preservation and of pushes for creationism in schools that leave me shivering. But what is most bewildering is how they put her on a pedestal for being an every-day woman, or as www.hockeymomsformccain-palin.com proudly announces as part of their homepage header, “Sarah Palin shares our early-rising, butt-freezing, glass-pounding commitment to our children and communities”. It’s as if she is running for president of the PTA and they are ecstatic they have found someone that understands the chaos of the afternoon pick-up in the school parking lot. DO YOU PEOPLE NOT GET IT? WE ARE TALKING ABOUT THE CHAOS OF THE WORLD!

They love her because she is just like them. Just like their gutsy neighbor who took on town hall. Just like their mother who raised five kids. Just like their sister who worked her way through college little by little. These are all people to be admired, but not one of them is qualified to be Vice President of the United States. And no, I haven’t forgotten about her time as Governor of Alaska. But that is what’s so scary about much of the demographic following her. They aren’t even spouting such credentials. They are rejoicing in her commonalities to their mediocrity! I don’t want someone like me running the country. I barely manage to pull together a birthday party and still can’t pronounce the name of Iran’s President (Mahmoud Ahmadinejad). I want someone that excelled in school, possibly even attended, I don’t know. . . . . HARVARD? Someone that has traveled to, even lived in, other parts of the world, is familiar with and respects more than one religion, that is willing to talk first and shoot later and is ready to acknowledge responsibility for how we are affecting the Earth.

I don’t believe Sarah Palin is a bad person. In fact, in some ways I feel sorry for her. I believe she is a pawn to garner the votes McCain was lacking and that she had no idea what she was getting into when she jumped down the rabbit hole of Rovian-Republican politics. I don’t even have much to go on that she is a particularly bad Governor. She seems qualified for that position. But there is a huge jump between Governor of a state of 600,000 people and being second chair on the world stage. A jump I don’t believe Sarah Palin and her limited world experience is qualified to make.

Please read the entire Newsweek article.

Pictures of anti-Palin rally in Anchorge courtesy www.mudflats.com.

Wanderlust

After having a real, adult, no-kid vacation for the first time in over five years, the travel bug has me itching for more. So what kind of getaway destinations are on my list for the next five years?

Austin/San Antonio, TX
New York City, NY
Nashville/Memphis, TN
Alaska (Cruise?)
Caribbean
The Kentucky Derby

Where would you like to go?

I Don't Think This Is The Image He Was Going For. . .

Whenever Damonn goes out of town for business, I treat the kids to dinner at McDonald's. They get Happy Meals and play on the indoor play structure and I don't have to make dinner. Win-Win. Last night while waiting in line for our food Adam was browsing movies in the Red Box movie dispenser when he spied a well-known celebrity. . . . .

"Hey Mommy, it's Barack Obama!"

Classic Rewind

Today marks the anniversary of Tales of Suburban Reality. Two years and twelve readers later, I'm on track to beat my personal best of 15 posts in a month. Look out, Dooce!

In case you're one of my newbies, here's a few of the oldie but goodies that got this blog started. Enjoy!

Stop! Just Stop!

Lyrical Genius

All Drains Lead To The Ocean

Passing On The Knowledge. . .

So Adam, what kinda fun things did you do in Kindergarten today?

We went to music class!

Oh, wow! That sounds like a lot of fun. What did you do in music class?

We learned what rhythm is.

That's so cool. Do you think you can teach Daddy?

aka Falter Locust Palin

As many of us following the political circus have noticed, Sarah Palin is keen on unique names. Her children's names are as follows: Track, Bristol, Willow, Piper and Trig. Most of them coming from places or things she frequented at the time. Yes, the word is she was very much into running when her first was born. Sigh.

So what would you have been named if you were to have been born into the Palin clan? Click HERE to find out. C'mon, I know you want to know.


Here is my family:

Me - Falter Locust Palin

Damonn - Meat Notgay Palin

Adam - Ammo Canal Palin

Jamie - Stockyard Mudslide Palin

Speaking of Knotting A Noose

The other day while waiting in the doctor's office for the infamous "kindergarten shots" to arrive, Adam was looking through a little tablet of games our pediatrician gave him as a prize for being such a good patient.

"Why does this man have a sad face?" he asked, holding up this picture.



"Ummm. . . uh. . . because he doesn't feel good."

Which got me thinking. . . . . who in the world thought this was a good idea? "Yeah, I don't know, little Billie is having such a time remembering if i goes before e maybe I could come up with a game for him to practice his spelling. Oh, I know, I'll have him guess the letters of the words and each time he misses we'll add a body part to this here gallow drawing until he's spelled the word or has a whole dead body hanging up there. Oh, this will be such fun. We could even teach it in all the schools across the country so everyone can practice spelling by drawing dismembered body parts. It'll be a sensation!

Why didn't we think this was creepy when we were kids?

Because We Could All Use A Laugh Today. . .

With the way this has spread like wildfire across the internet since Saturday night, you've probably already had a chance to see it, but just in case you've been too busy knotting your own noose while watching your 401k accounts go down the drain, I'll post it here. Because nobody does politics and humor better than SNL and this one is spot on.

Back In Captivity

Well, for those of you that don't know already, I am back from DC. And every night I've been meaning to write, but between loads of laundry, sorting through my pictures and the first cold of the season that Jamie has already brought home, there has been some delay.

The trip was wonderful and just the break from everyday life that I was needing. I toured all the monuments on Thursday battling 95 degree heat and extremely high humidity. I now know what it would be like to walk around in those big puffy clouds in the sky. Utterly suffocating. And being the stupid sun-deprived Oregonian I am, I forgot my sunscreen. Yeah. One side of my neck looks like a big, peeling hickey.

But seeing the monuments was amazing. The somber stare of Abraham Lincoln. The views from the top of the Washington Monument. The endless list of names etched on the Vietnam Memorial wall. More than once I found myself suddenly tearing. Especially at The Wall -as the Vietnam Memorial is simply referred to. As I stood mesmerized by the sea of one-inch names etched on a wall that towered over my head and over 200ft to each side of me, I overheard a tour guide explaining that this one row in front of us, a full three-by-ten foot section of granite held the names of soldiers killed in just one four-month period. Simply unimaginable.

By Saturday, the weather had changed completely. Well, almost. The humidity was still hanging around but Tropical Storm Hanna decide to drop by as well. You would think being a native Oregonian I would know about rain. I know not of rain like this. There is no weapon against such a downpour. Not umbrella, not poncho, perhaps not even shelter. Thank goodness I had checked the weather before I left and planned to be indoors at museums for the entire day. First stop - National Archives.

Most of the museums in DC don't open until 10am so I was there waiting when they opened huddled under a small vestibule with a handful of other brave hearts. When the doors opened we all scattered to different sections of the museum, myself heading straight to the rotunda that houses our country's most coveted documents. And because of my eagerness, except for the guards, I actually had the room to myself. I stood there for just a moment surrounded by grand paintings of our Founding Fathers and overcome by the same grandeur and deafening silence you find in an empty church. Yes, a church. A church of brilliance and truth and honor and determination and sacrifice. The moment took my breath away. And then, there in front of me it stood: The Declaration of Independence. The Declaration of Independence. Faded, yet those unequivocal words and many of the signatures still legible and declarative. And to it's right, one of the most brilliant, forward-thinking and withstanding documents ever created: The Constitution of the United States of America. I know, I know I'm on history geek overload. Tell me something my husband hasn't.

The rest of the day was spent dashing from building to cab to building, submerging my feet each time in the five or so inches of water that was running down the streets. After a quick visit to the Air & Space museum including a rather disturbing IMAX film on black holes, I was ready to call it a day and find some dry socks.

I'd love to go back again someday, hopefully with the kids in tow. Especially Adam, my little pint-sized politico. And then he can see for himself, that "big house that's white".

I'm Sorry I Asked

Yesterday at Costco. . . .

Damonn: Jamie, what are you eating?

Jamie: My boogers.

Let Freedom Ring

Well, I'm off to Washington, D.C. this morning. And honestly, I think it takes more work to leave the kids behind than it does to bring them along. Several days of planning and four pages of notes later, I think my sister will have the information she needs to stave off any attempts of mutiny.


As for posting while I'm gone, unfortunately, my cell phone cannot be set up for mobile blogging, but I can, and will be sending in Twitters through out the trip. So keep your eye to the right of the screen to see what I'm doing now in our nation's great capitol. I'll have pictures and more details when I return, but for now, I'm free! I'm free! I'M FREE!

5 Years Minus 4 Days =

This morning Adam stood tall with all the other bright and shiny 5-year old faces for Kindergarten orientation. This moment was a culmination of a six month battle with the school district to allow him to start this year rather than next. Actually, if you want to get technical, this all started 4 years and 362 days ago when Adam decided to make his entrance into the world nine days past his due date putting him four days past the school district’s deadline for kindergarten acceptance. And as Damonn and I have said many times over the last few months, if we had known the hassle that awaited us over a mere four days we would have pushed for the induction of labor a week earlier. Then we would have had the option of telling Ms. Principle to blow it out her ass rather than having to wait politely to talk to her while she took phone calls on the other side of her desk during our appointment. But such is life. Instead we had to endure her insulting insinuations of bad parenting because we did not want to hold Adam back a year as “most parents in this district prefer to do”. When we asked why parents make that choice she responded with, “Because they prefer that their children succeed”. Well la-di-effin-dah! And when I asked to see the curriculum of the kindergarten classes to see how it compared to what he was learning in pre-school she said that "it’s better for the parents to leave the ‘three R’s’ to the school and for parents to focus on the ‘three D’s’ – drugs, dating and discipline”. It was at this point that Damonn began to kick me under the table in a rather feeble attempt to squash the snide remarks he was sure were about to start rolling off my tongue. I heeded his warning and made it out the front doors before every thoughtful, revengeful, explicit retort that was rolling around in my head came spewing out of my mouth into a vulgar puddle at my feet.

And although the next few months were not as insulting, they were often times just as frustrating as each time we needed to make an appointment or get any information it took multiple calls to the district, to the school, to the secretaries, just to get a response. So long in fact that even though we started this process in February, they were not able, or willing, to schedule Adam to take the necessary admittance exam until June. Which meant that Adam was the only kid in his pre-school class left behind when all of his friends loaded the bus for Kindergarten Round-up in May. This was the night I thought about filling Ms. Principle’s mailbox with rice pudding. But decided on horse shit instead.

Finally that day in June came and I took yet another day off work and Adam and I met up with the district psychologist. He was to take a two-hour exam covering academics, psychology, reasoning and physical capabilities. And when the test started off by asking Adam to identify his colors – colors he’s known since he was 18mos old – I couldn’t help but groan at the $400 we were shelling out to prove that he was as smart and capable as someone four days older. Overall, Adam did very well on the exam. He tested extremely high on reading and above average on reasoning and writing. His only trouble came during the questions on math. He understands the logic that if you have five things and take two things away you are left with three things, but since his pre-school has not broached the subject of written equations he had no idea what “1+1=___” means. The psychologist tried to help, pointing to each part of the equation, “If you have one and you add another one to it what do you get?” “An Eleven!” Adam announced proudly.

And because of this inexperience in mathematics, Adam did not get the required 97% on the exam. (Since when is an A+ required for a passing grade?) But our moment of grace came when Ms. Principle retired and a much more reasonable, likeable and pleasant man became principle in July. After (one more) meeting with Adam and a review of his test he said that he thought Adam would do just fine in Kindergarten and that we could review his progress at the October conferences. Finally!

So after catching up on information about forms and vaccinations and school supplies that we missed out on during the May Kindergarten roundup, Adam was ready, willing and accepted for Kindergarten Orientation this morning. And as I watched him color and cut his teddy bear art project along with all his new- found classmates, I thought about the journey that brought us here, knowing that it was all worth it. But that he’s on his own getting into college.

You're Not As Stupid As You Look. . .

As you may have gathered I am a frequent reader of CNN.com and of their political ticker. Not so much because I think they are the end-all-be-all of political reporting, but because it is an easy place to stop and gather the news on a daily basis. My morning newspaper if you will. I recently came across a commentary written by Ruben Navarrette, one of their regular contributers. I have read many of his articles. He seems to be an intelligent man and his commentaries have pushed me towards deeper thinking and research on several topics and even had me nodding my head in agreement on a few, but this one. . . . Well, I think he really missed his mark on this one. (Read the entire article HERE)

"Obama (in his acceptance speech) settled on a hybrid of left-right economic theory that sounded like a bundle of contradictions. Obama talked about "America's promise," the belief that "through hard work and sacrifice, each of us can pursue our individual dreams but still come together as one American family, to ensure that the next generation can pursue their dreams as well."

He explained it as "the idea that we are responsible for ourselves, but that we also rise and fall as one nation" and described it as blending "individual responsibility and mutual responsibility." Simply put: You have to do what you can for yourself, but that you also have to do for others.

There is the rub: If everyone were to adhere to the first part, there will be no need for the second. Besides, even if we buy the idea that, as Obama said, "I am my brother's keeper, I am my sister's keeper," there is still the question of whether government should do the keeping."

Mr. Navarrette, nothing irritates me more than when a person feigns stupidity to defend an argument. And that is exactly what you're doing. I find it impossible to believe - being that you attended graduate school - that you cannot understand the concept put forth by Senator Obama that there is, and that we need, a balance between personal, government and community responsibility. Yes, parents need to be responsible for making sure their children attend school and complete their homework. And yes, the government needs to supply adequate funding and a framework for a 21st century education. And yes, as citizens of a community we need to step up fill in the gaps between parental and government support by volunteering in the classrooms, on the soccer fields and as leaders of extracurricular activities. It needs to be a joint venture. A joint venture that goes beyond education and extends to areas of the environment and the economy and energy and disaster preparedness for threats from both mother nature and our enemies. Perhaps your time in David Gergen's classroom did not provide you the competency to understand the simple premise of teamwork. That's okay, Mr. Navarrette, because Senator Obama is a professor in his own right. And after Nov. 4th class will be in session.