Status Report

1. I am pig headed and unable to learn from past experience, so I have decided to try the December NaBloPoMo.  Please don't feel obligated to read my posts every day, although I can almost guarantee that the day everyone decides to give me a miss, I will finally write something very, very funny.  This is consistent with the Cleaning Lady Principle, which states that the cleaning lady will only show up on a day that I have not prepared the house for her.  On all other days--especially those on which the dreaded pre-cleaning takes an extra dose of time and energy that would have been much better spent on paid work-- she will call to reschedule.*

2.  I still have not finished the evil pink cotton sweater.  I did finish the edging around one arm and I did pick up the stitches for the edging around the second arm, so I'm ready to roll just in case I find a little knitting time today.  And, as predicted I stayed up past my bed time last night and was too tired to get up at 5:30 to exercise.  To compensate, I have eaten a healthy dose of mood boosting chocolate chips.  Not regular Nestle chips either; these are the fair trade cocoa of kindness and global responsibility chips that cost over $7 per pound, since Isabel is on strike against regular chocolate and I feel duty bound to support her budding socially conscious instincts, even if it means paying a lot more money for chocolate that I don't like as much.

3. I should be working today, but instead I'm looking for things to do that are not work.  So far, I have finished a book (Behind the Scenes at the Museum; enjoyed it very much, but I have a thing for Kate Atkinson, so this is not surprising), taken my child-who-is-recovering-slowly-from-wisdom-tooth-extraction out to get a chocolate chip muffin (she swears it is the only possible thing she can eat right now) and some movies and books from the library (she also swears there is absolutely nothing to read or watch in the entire house; eye-rolling is involved in the making of this pronouncement, so I know it is no use arguing and pointing to one of the 8 fully loaded bookcases we have), and made spicy lentil curry with rice. I will probably start work as soon as I finish this post, though, because the alternative is to get into the serious avoidance tasks (exercising, uncluttering the boys' room or the basement), and the whole problem today is that I just don't have that kind of motivation.

4.  The Helpful Writing Prompt from a few days ago inquired about the most disappointing gift I ever received.  My answer:  every gift I received between the ages of 7 and 12 that wasn't a pony.  It's no good pointing out that I grew up in house on a suburban lot that could not have been more than .25 acres; we had a two car garage and I don't see any reason that we couldn't have fit the pony, or "Misty" as I still like to think of her, in there. Please don't ask why I didn't just mention the pony to my parents, either.  You're not supposed to have to ask for your heart's desire.  People --especially parents-- are just supposed to know.   (My kids, thank goodness, beg for everything they see; it makes the gift giving a little easier)  There were also some odd moments involving dolls as gifts since I wasn't really a doll kind of kid.  I knew my mother understood this kind of thinking because she told me more than once about the bitter disappointment of receiving a doll instead of the bicycle her that heart truly desired when she was younger.  Or maybe --and I'm just realizing this now-- the  story was really meant to prepare me for the moment when my mother would be forced, under the laws governing parental gifts to young girls, to give me a doll, along with several carefully coordinated doll outfits. Not wanting to fully break with tradition, I have also given my kids dolls (including my older son--mountainous doses of Free To Be You And Me in the 70s taught me not to be sexist in this regard), but only because they asked for them (including, again, my older son, who asked for an American Girl doll during a time when his sister was very active with her AG dolls, because he hoped she would want to play with him more; I still wonder how I can possibly protect this sweet child from the mean people of the world).

5. My lentil curry must be ready by now, and even if it is not, I'm going to eat it anyway so I can get past lunch and move on with my day. Tomorrow I will post a picture of the evil pink cotton sweater whether it is done or not.


*She is here now.   I cleaned up this morning, which might lead you to dismiss the entire principle as bunk, but because she was running late, I decided  to cook lunch (I almost never cook lunch, but I was cold today) and in doing so I made a mess of the kitchen; this is clearly what caused her to come today rather than calling to reschedule, which she was considering doing.  It's good to know that I have some sort of power to influence events; I just wish I could use it to my advantage.