In Which I Totally Lose My Mind

Apparently I'm running a 5k in November. How in the world did this happen? Anybody who knows me, even those who are barely acquainted with me, knows I abhor exercise. I am perfectly content to sit on the couch and eat my Hostess donuts while my disgustingly healthy husband runs marathons or spends a week pretending to be Lance Armstrong and riding his bike for 500 miles around Oregon. My experience with exercise has generally been attending his races and cheering for him. I don't mind as long as someone promises me a good meal. I have also been known to compare running to sticking a fork in my eye, only I'd opt for the fork over running because it wouldn't hurt any less, but it would be over much more quickly.

And yet a race is looming in my future. I would ask what the heck was I thinking, but it is obvious my brain has been surgically removed and there was no thought process involved. I have two months to go from sedentary sloth to runner. Fasten your seatbelts and hang on to your hats, people. This is going to get ugly.

Names Have Been Changed to Protect the Innocent, or, More Likely, the Storyteller

Lysol: Ewwww! I can't believe you're doing that! Why? Why? That is so disgusting! STOP THAT! AND MAKE SURE YOU WASH YOUR HANDS!!!

Formula 409: You can stop shouting at me any time now.

Lysol: But did you see what you were doing? GROSS!!! THAT MAKES ME WANT TO BARF!

Formula 409: STOP SHOUTING AT ME!

Father: What's going on here?

Lysol: Dad, Formula 409 is SO GROSS!!

Formula 409: I AM NOT!

Lysol: You were brushing your teeth while you were going to the bathroom!! I can't believe you're related to me.

Father: Lysol, you need to stop being the hygiene police.

Lysol: There have to be standards!! I CAN'T LIVE LIKE THIS!

Father: There is no need to shout at Formula 409, or me for that matter.

Lysol: Nobody cares about my feelings.

Father: Your feelings aren't really the issue here. It's more about treating people with respect.

Lysol: Did you see what Formula 409 did?

Father: Yes. But as long as it wasn't your toothbrush Formula 409 was using what do you care?

Lysol: I can't believe you're taking Formula 409's side!

Father: I'm not. I'm just asking you to use the Golden Rule. Treat others the way you want to be treated. There's a reason it's called the Golden Rule and not the Rusty Tin Rule. It's because it's a valuable tenet to live by.

Lysol: Well, excuse me. I just happen to care about hygiene.

Father: I can see that by the way you just threw your underwear on the floor of the bathroom. Right there. Isn't that yours?

Lysol: That's totally different!

Father: How?

Lysol: Because there aren't germs in my underwear!

It's a Cruel, Cruel World

Calvin's cousin Andrew is visiting us this week. He's an only child playing with a third child. The poor kid is getting a crash course in sibling relationships, and the learning curve is steep.

Andrew: Calvin, let's play Wii.

Calvin: Okay.

(time passes)

A: Calvin, this isn't fair.

C: Why?

A: You're shooting down all my planes.

C: And?

A: You should let me shoot down some of yours.

C: No.

A: This isn't fair. You should let me win.

C: Hoping I'll let you shoot down my planes and win is like hoping gravity will stop working.

Run, Pig, Run

Oops. Too slow.

Where's a House Elf When You Need One?

Sabrina: Mom, can I make a cake today?

Me: Sure, once the kitchen is clean.

Sabrina: Okay, let me know when that's done.

Hoarders

I'm a thrower. Always have been. I don't get sentimental over stuff. I throw things out like nobody's business. And then I married a non-thrower. To a saver like David, everything has value. Nothing should be thrown out. You might need that 25-year-old map that charts roads that are no longer there, so for God's sake, don't throw it out. My pack rat also has a special filing system called the floor. We don't fight over money, we don't fight over our kids, but we've fought over whether things should be thrown out.

I learned early in our marriage that if I was cleaning and wanted to throw things away, I better do it (a) while he was gone, and (b) make sure the garbage truck picked up the remains before he came home. True story: David came home to find his special filing system of piles of paper on the floor stacked neatly on the desk and two big bags of garbage lined up next to the door. He went through the bags to make sure I hadn't thrown out anything important and/or valuable. By the time he was done, I no longer had my floor, and there was only one bag of garbage left.

He has mellowed over the years. Living in a 500 square foot space for two years in Japan changed both of our perspectives on what was actually necessary. But our son has picked up the cause. Calvin has taken David's pack rat mentality and raised it to near hoarder status. Even true garbage might have value, and I've seen him agonize over whether he should really throw out the used and crumpled post-it notes. It's enough to make me tear my hair out.

Mostly I try to ignore it by closing my eyes when I walk by his room. But since I've injured myself every night tucking him in this week, I decided enough was enough. Calvin was gone all day, so I dove in, taking my phone with me in case I got lost, and letting the girls know to come find me if I wasn't back in a couple hours. Here is what I started with.

And this.

One 33-gallon bag of garbage, one box of books, one bag of clothes, two boxes of toys, and five hours later, this is the result.

Throwers: 1
Hoarders: 0

Summer Vacation

Having finished my first year as a music instructor, I found myself looking forward to summer vacation. With all that time on my hands, who knows what I could accomplish? I had visions of planting a garden, refinishing the cabinets in my kitchen, learning to play a new instrument, and preparing healthy and delicious meals for my family. Those tasks would definitely take up the first week. After that I could go wherever my whims took me.

The reality? Weeks of extreme slothful indulgence where I have convinced myself that simply bringing one load of clean laundry upstairs for my children to truffle through was actually a task that required a lot of effort resulting in the need for a nap and/or a drink to recover. Who knew summer vacation could be so tiring?

Today, I woke up and felt strange. What was that alien feeling? Deciding not to waste too much time on the problem, I started my day. Here is what I accomplished.

1. A three-mile walk with a friend.
2. Wrote down an extensive list of household chores for my children to do and assigned them in random order.
3. Sat on the couch while watching my children do said tasks.
4. Felt guilty for sitting and watching and not helping out.
5. Started cleaning my bathroom.
6. Stopped cleaning when my sink started to back up.
7. Spent some time debating whether this was a clear sign that I should stop cleaning and wait for my husband to come home and clean the drain, or if I should tackle that job myself.
8. Decided that marital harmony was more important than my gag reflex and started cleaning the drain.
9. Spent some time gagging over the horrible slime I had to extract from said drain and cursing my need for marital harmony.
10. Finished cleaning the bathroom.
11. Sent children off to zoo with their grandparents.
12. Had lunch with a friend.
13. Did some light shopping and had to contend with some snotty salespeople.
14. Spent some time wishing I could pull a Pretty Woman on said snotty people, minus the prostitute part.
15. Made dinner for my family.
16. Revived my husband as he had dropped in a dead faint when he came home to find dinner on the table.
17. Cleaned the kitchen.
18. Read a book and a half.
19. Wrote my first blog entry in months.

Who knows what I'll do next summer?