Is anyone even out there?

A lot can happen in two months. One thing that has not happened is I have not moved to New York. I remain envious that other states not only GET snow, but are already getting snow. Plus, it was 74 degrees today here in central Oklahoma and I think that is ridiculous in NOVEMBER and I hereby lodge a complaint with the Department of Nothing is Going to Change in this State. Also, mowing. In November. Seriously.

So in the past month, my eldest child moved in with her father temporarily and enjoyed the benefit of having her own bedroom. We only have three bedrooms you see and NO ONE wants to share a bedroom with anyone else, least of all me. M and D, they have personality clashes (which I think are amusing, and they do not). Needless to say, it has been time for a new house for quite awhile, but I LOVE my small mortgage payment, I enjoy my large yard, and I stay here primarily to irritate the crap out of each and every one of my neighbors. I have also remodeled this house from top to bottom and who wants to do all of that work for someone else? Not me.

Irregardless is not a word.

I have sold my house. And I got a good price for it. Tomorrow I find out if the appraiser agrees with said price.

In other news, my eldest daughter's step mother has inspired me to cook more. From scratch. I haven't put this into practice, yet, but I am totally going to. I will, of course, require said step mother's recipes. I will also need a bottle of bourbon. Per evening. But whatever it takes, right?

Last of all, I found and moved to a new office. And now my back hurts.

Entrance Only: Do Not Enter

Tonight I went to a super cool networking event, referred to as the OKC Tweet Up, and this cool guy named Hector was doing caricatures. Needless to say, I'm hot. I know, none of you is the least bit surprised. You should totally check out his awesomeness at www.hectorlopezart.com.

My daughter just asked me which bill Abraham Lincoln was on. I don't know. I know he is on pennies. I should know more about paper money I think, and less about pennies.

My son asked me yesterday while driving, "So what happens if you run over a Ninja?" Crap, my kids are totally stumping me. Also, I hope I don't run over a Ninja. Cats yes, Ninjas no.

Read on MLIA today about how a little girl wanted to play Cinderella and the mom put her to work, scrubbing floors and such. TOTALLY going to try this with one of my kids. I will let you know how that works out.

Looking for bigger office space, and still not happy at all with Oklahoma, but knowing here is it for a spell. Except it was cooler today and drizzled and was over cast, and so that was completely and utterly okay with me. I think maybe upstate New York is less my style and Seattle is more my style. But I still heart upstate New York a bunch and a bunch.

I'm from Kalamazoo

My son insists on making sound effects for EVERYTHING. I wish sometimes that he could just walk without sound effects. Or just breathe without sound effects.

In other news, I saw the movie Julie and Julia this weekend. All I have to say about that is BUTTER. Next up I saw Inglorious Basterds. Primarily because when it is hot outside, I have no desire to BE outside. And this weekend was no different than most in what I consider yet another quite miserable Oklahoma summer weekend.

Back to Inglorious Basterds. Rated R, for good reason. The violence in and of itself wasn't over the top, it was the fact that they showed EVERYTHING that made it so disgusting. Scalping people? Showing how that works? Really? I don't need a visual. I totally understand the concept. Still, bravo to Brad Pitt, who is not my favorite actor per se, but who was an absolute hit in this movie.

Finally, my son has decided he hates my job. That's right, the law one I spent three years in school for and studied for the bar and took the bar and cried and wailed and what not. That job. Not sure what on earth he expects me to do about this, er, problem.

M to the A yo

I'm warning you now. I posted surgery pics. BEWARE. Okay, they aren't that bad, but the drama and build up, man, I totally had you going....

M recently had surgery on her defective foot. When she was born, we tried to return the foot, but guess what, totally can't do that kind of thing. We scheduled her surgery for the soonest possible date, which ended up being the first week of school. BUT, I don't want her in a cast come ice storm 2010, so we got it done the most soonest because it needed to be done. She was back and forth about actually showing up for the surgery, but I explained about the surgeon's time and how much we might still get to pay if she no showed and so she better decide ASAP (because the surgery will help in the long run, but if she is adamant she doesn't want it, it will be a no-go.)

She was pretty optimistic, particularly when she figured out she didn't have to be awake or aware when the IV went in. Unfortunately, this option is not available for grown ups. Just look at her. YAY for surgery. This is a breeze, right?

After surgery, not so great. Turns out, my little M doesn't respond well to anesthesia, despite receiving anti-nausea meds. Not so YAY over surgery afterwards.

AND, I present to you, the foot.... Just be glad I couldn't get close enough to snap shots of the incisions. Those were totally eweth.

She's still having some swelling, but since I had this surgery myself when I was a teenager, I know in the long run she is far better off.

Maybe next time, you should do it yourself.

I remember when I was a little girl, one of my most favorite things was for my mommy to tickle my back. I would have let her tickle my back for hours without a thought that it might make her tired. I doubt it ever lasted for hours, but the moments in my child hood that stand out as favorites include the times my back got tickled.

My children inherited that selfish vibe from me. I mean, they inherited the tickle back desires from me, without a thought about how tired mommy's arm might become, or how tired mommy might be as a whole. My son, in particular, loves to have his back tickled. He also loves it when I draw pictures and he guesses what I drew, or I draw letters or numbers and he guesses what I wrote.

The other night, I must confess, I was extremely tired when he asked. Extremely tired is the equivalent for me of being extremely delirious. As a result, my son got far more than he bargained for when he asked me for the umpteenth millionth time to draw pictures on his back so he could guess what I was drawing....

I have volunteered my fantastical back drawing skills twice now since then, but he has declined....

I think you've spun off your axis a little

I haven't written about the rest of our road trip because there is little to write. Won't be making that mistake again. Many of my two lovely readers know my children's full names. We have embarked on a quest to visit cities of the same names as my children and it turns out, those cities exist. So part of our road trip was visiting Wisconsin, where the lovely city of Madison is located. The Capitol of Wisconsin is Madison, and here is the state capitol itself. It is absolutely spectacular. It was like this on all 4 sides. On Saturday, they had a farmer's market that nearly surrounded it. It was interested because it was shaded almost the entire way around it.

Look, it is Madison. All Welcome to Madison and stuff....

Courthouse in Madison, Wisconsin. The epitome of modern and super cool if you ask me.

The highlight of our trip was the drive down to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Particularly, the drive up and down the coast of Lake Michigan. It rained off and on. And the water in Lake Michigan was on the cool side. It was spectacular. Just breath taking.

Evan riding a crazy log in Lake Michigan.

M enjoying the ultimate cool that is Lake Michigan.

D, who ran into Lake Michigan with her iPod in her pocket. Things did not end well for the iPod.

Look what else we found as headed home.... a town called Darien. We visited Darien, CT back in January.

I got you babe!

My son, of late, has been something of a little naughtykin. That's like ten times worse than just naughty, when you add the -kin suffix to it. Like BAD, BAD, BAD. Okay, he isn't a juvie candidate, but he could be if the stars don't align and also if he doesn't start minding me NOW. So I told him about the home schooling option, where he has to attend day care during the day, and with the babies, because all of the school age kids are where? Where? At school. I told him all about military school. I even considered taking him to see the jail. Because jails are frightening, and smelly, and rather loud, but mainly frightening. I have lectured the boy for three days straight, and I think he may have finally been listening.

This morning, on the very first day of school, I dropped off my high schooler at the high school, my middle schooler at the middle school, and my elementary student, E, at the elementary school. Elementary school starts at 9:00 AM. At a whopping 9:02 AM, I get a call on my cell phone. It is a saved number, the one for the elementary school. I have ONE student from my household at that school and I went through a multitude of thoughts before answering that call, most of which involved me spanking E's butt until he couldn't sit down, and then some. I answered the phone, and was advised they were holding Evan in the office. What in the WORLD could he have possibly done in 2 minutes? Really? So my blood pressure rose a billion whatevers, and they then informed me they were holding him in the office because I hadn't enrolled him. Unfortunately for them, I am worn out, I was already mad because I thought he had screwed up so quickly, and so, I let them know that he was indeed enrolled and frankly, I am not certain I was very nice about it. All this over a utility bill, that they indeed copied and had on file? Needless to say, my son's butt was spared. However, right hands and left hands, they should definitely be chatting.

**No children or children's bottoms have been harmed. YET.