From the Glad It's Not Me file...

Thor is camping this weekend. In a snow cave. Well, tonight he is "camping" in a cabin, but tomorrow morning he will be building a snow cave to sleep in. He was looking forward to it, especially since a couple of his good friends are in the same troop and camping too.

Me, no. I am not thrilled with the idea of snow caves. Not thrilled with the idea of shoveling up a huge pile of snow and then tunneling into it. Especially not thrilled with peeing in the woods at night in Alaska in February. It's been in the high 30's this week, so I have been scraping the snow and ice off the driveway. That is enough of the great outdoors for me at the mo, although I think Tess and I might go to Potter Marsh tomorrow just to check it out.

The car is again filthy. Can't tell what color it is filthy. Headlights barely seen filthy. Because the entire world (or at least the roads) are all slush and muck and gravel and dirt and bleh.

Tomorrow if it is still heatwaving, I will be opening windows in every room in the house to get some fresh air, especially after the Mojo fart incident the other day. Nobody is evil enough to deserve to live in Mojo funk.

Mostly I spent today driving to Eagle River and back home...I had a meeting at my friend's house this morning, then dropped Thor at the Lion's Club for his Boy Scout trip, then finally to Eagle River one last time because Tess was playing the drum for her middle school's opening song in their play. We only stuck around for about 20 minutes to watch the play (Something about Juliet -- it's a Romeo and Juliet parody, I think), but it was a long week and we just wanted to get home. There was one last piece of pizza sitting on the counter waiting for me (yeah, I totally love courting food poisoning by leaving food laying around for an hour on the counters...), I thought there was one last piece of pizza waiting. Nope. What was waiting for us was the pizza cutting board and the pizza cutter on the kitchen floor. Apparently one of the dogs decided it was his slice o' pizza. Probably Moj. He has been kinda pushing the counter surfing idea lately. I am chasing him out of the kitchen ALOT lately...

Oh, well. I really didn't need that last slice of pizza...I just hope this doesn't trigger a repeat of the tasty Mojo farts...

My cell phone is missing...

And has been missing for over a week. This is pathetic. Where the hell did I put the stupid thing? Of course it was almost out o' battery, so calling it was useless. I am sure I will eventually find it somewhere stupid. Until then, I swipe the kids' phones or just go crazy, and step out of the giant communication bubble.

Actually I don't really care if people can call me or not -- and we still have the landline, so it's not a big cone of silence around me or anything -- but I don't like that the kids' schools can't get in touch with me instantly, since Mark is oh, yeah. In another country.

I have been watching the Olympics -- I love men's short track speed skating. That is my favorite this year. My least favorite? NBC's coverage. Dudes. I really don't need all the freaking "ooh, look how cute or terrible or tough or determined" various athletes have been. I really just want to see a bunch of athletes doing their thing.

I wonder if they have any speed skating around here...probably not. This is a big hockey town, and I am not big on hockey. I used to love it, but I get really bored with the need for violence on the ice.

Plus yesterday there were six crashes on women's downhill yesterday, and you only showed three of them. It's like NASCAR. We watch for the crashes and spills. Don't want anyone hurt, but seriously. Skiers bounce. No serious injuries yesterday, so c'mon. Show us the "agony of defeat" moments.

I got nothing else at the mo. I haven't had coffee yet today. I got up so late I didn't even have the four minutes it takes to use my Keurig coffee maker. By the way, if you lick the top of a used KCup, you get grounds in your mouth. I don't know, I was trying to figure out if I had used the cup that was in the coffeemaker. yeah yeah yeah. Everything you are thinking at the moment, I was thinking to myself in the immediate aftermath of the licking. Bad idea. Kinda dumb. What was I thinking. However, this gives you an out for the rest of the day. No matter what you do, you can think, at least I don't have a tongue full of coffee grounds through my own utter stupidity. Although toungueful is pushing it, bud. It was more like a teeny little bit, right in the middle.

I should stop typing now.

Yeah.

I am back. Stop giggling and mocking. Yes, there is a very good chance I will be back again in another two months, but maybe maybe maybe I will stick around a little this time...

But. I am tired of thinking of others and pulling punches and making sure I am not offensive, so at least for today I am going to be blunt and me. Liberal liberal liberal me. Cranky me, sometimes swearing, occasionally a tiny bit well, obscene? profane? dirty? whatever you want to call it...

Like this is me. I burst into Thor's room -- his door was closed -- but I burst in and as I am, I think I should knock, he is a teenage boy after all, what the hell am I thinking? And of course, because I am me and not able to stop myself around my kids, I say something along the lines of, but slightly, a teeny bit, just a little less direct than this: "I should knock and wait, you could be, um, enjoying yourself in here..." (C'mon. He's 17. I have to bug him about sex and stuff.) I did not actually say the m word, but I was about to, when I realized he was on Skype with four friends. His mike was open and right there. I whipped around and closed the door, not waiting to find out if his friends heard that or not...

Zach's friends would totally not be shocked by this, because this kind of thing is what I do sometimes.

In other news, I found on Huffingtonpost.com, a perfect description of Sarah Palin.

I will miss you when you're gone. Your entertainment-value quotient is off the charts, especially for "over educated", cultural-elitist snobs like me. There's the maddening little sing-song delivery of your speeches, with those weird, unmotivated upticks and misplaced emphases that suggest you are literally reading "your own words" for the very first time. For anyone who appreciates real oratorical skills, like those of Churchill, MLK or Pliny the Elder (you can google all these names, sweetie), it's like having knitting-needles kicked into one's ears over and over again. There's your matchless ability to grind grammar and syntax into a non-intelligible word-pulp containing the odd sharp, indigestible fragment of John Birch ("Bomb Iran!") or Jesus-Freak ("More Divine Intervention!") insanity, the frequent cheap slurs against your political enemies -- who, I can't help noticing, are sprouting up even in the madder precincts at your own end of the political spectrum -- and the usual genuflections towards Boy Jesus and Saint Ronnie (who I bet wouldn't touch your ass with a forty-foot pole).

Thank you to Kara Vallow, who has written exactly what I feel when I hear Gov. Palin speak. I didn't like her as governor before she was chosen by McCain, I didn't like her when she was running for VP, and nothing I have seen of her since then has changed my mind. I am putting this here because I love the wording..."the odd sharp, indigestible fragment of John Birch ("Bomb Iran")..." It captures what I have struggled to explain.

Changing the subject again...dang. Mojo is farting up a storm, like I said on FB, it's like bad lasagna and I can taste it. I can't get away from it, because I can't put him outside -- too cold for my short-haired, thin-coated baby to stay outside long -- and because no matter where I go in the house, Moj follows. I am sitting here with a vanilla scented candle almost singe-ing (how do you "ing" singe without making it sing?) my nose hairs...

Merry Christmas!!

The news is much more hopeful this morning. Mom is doing better, awake and talking. All the vitals are looking better. Still a very long way to go, still not out of the woods, but much better news than we dared to hope for.

The kids are playing video games, the sun will come up in another hour and a half or so (it's only 8:30, so it's still dark as night out there, but each day is getting a whopping 6 or 8 seconds longer!!! Unlike in the summer, when days lengthen or shorten by 5 minutes. Weird place to live. Just weird.). It seems very quiet without the dogs around. We had to drop both of them off yesterday since we are flying tonight. I am thinking a shower sounds wonderful, some more coffee, maybe making some muffins. We also have fresh pears (thank you Jollies!!!!) so we can have a great breakfast, laze around for a while, pick up the rest of wrapping paper, and pack. And eat meatloaf, Zachary wants to make a meatloaf for our Christmas dinner. Works for me!

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Merry Christmas!

November and December were tough months for us. Mark deployed for a year, Thor and Zach were dealing with lots of school work and tests and big projects in high school and college respectively, and in the last two weeks my Mom has gotten progressively worse health-wise. She's in the hospital now, we are alternating between hope and not, and the kids and I are flying into Minneapolis on Saturday. We have to wait until Saturday (and hope we make it then) because there is a HUGE storm hitting Minnesota. So not the most festive Christmas ever. Sigh.

But there was bright spot tonight -- we open presents on Christmas Eve, it's a Scandinavian upper Midwest Lutheran thing, I guess -- and while we were opening presents, Mark called on Skype! From over there somewhere! So we talked to him and opened presents while he watched and told us a little tiny bit about his life there. I was feeling kinda terrible that Mark wasn't there to join us, but then he was!

It was tough for a minute. Mom and Dad visited us this summer, and Mom bought me the reissue of the 1950 original Betty Crocker Cookbook, and then she and Tess wrapped it up and Tess slid it under the tree a week or so ago. I had very much been looking forward to my cookbook, but with Mom being in such a precarious and fail state it was really hard to open.

But I did, and I love all the crazy illustrations and photographs and recipes. When life is a little calmer I will post a couple pictures of my favorites. And of the kids talking to their dad on the computer.

Tess made me a really awesome shelf -- another photo to post -- and Thor had pottery he made in pottery class this past semester. More photos to take and post.

So I hope you all are having a calm and peaceful and wonderful holiday, whatever and however you decide to celebrate!