And We're Out

By this time tomorrow, I will be searching for my lost shaker of salt down in the Keys. So we will check you losers on Tuesday...enjoy the cold. And we'll drink a cold one for ya!!

Halloween

Here are the kids in their Halloween costumes. Ryan was Jeff Hardy, who is one of his favorite wrestlers. Sam was Scooby Doo. He was Scooby two or three years ago, as well, and for some reason wanted to be it again. The costume still fit (sort of) and it was another use out of a $50 costume, so it was cool with me.

Now onto my annual Halloween candy rant. Scott has to hear this every year, and now I share with you all. This neighborhood absolutely kills me with the quality of its Halloween candy. People, Smarties and Tootsie Rolls are not acceptable as Halloween candy. They are filler, to be given in conjunction with a candy bar!!! And my kids got an abundance of flavored toffee and peppermints...the kind that come with your bill at a restaurant. Come on now, if that is the best you can do than please don't participate in Halloween. If the quality of the candy in this neigborhood is a direct correlation to the financial status of the folks that live here, than we are in sad shape. Thank you all for listening.

Seriously!!!

So Sam presented his Social Studies project today. This was the one I posted about earlier, where they were to select a culture from their ethnic background and do a presentation on the way that culture has influences in the community. BTW, we found an Italian cookie without nuts. I don't know what they are called, they're those thin, ice cream cone like cookies. They have them at our Church's Italian Festival every year (thanks, Jodi!). Anyway, so Sam and a few others did their presentations today and when he got home I asked him what the other kids did theirs on. He tells me "The South" and "Appalachia". SERIOUSLY people!!! Your ethnic background is SOUTHERN!!WTF! The kid did, however, bring in Krispy Kreme doughnuts as his presentation aid which rates an "A" in my book.

Scarowinds

So last night, against my better parental judgment, we took the boys to Scarowinds. And it scared the wind (and other things) right out of Ryan. I knew he would not like it, but he kept insisting he really wanted to go, so rather than have the fight, I thought we would go and let him learn the hard way. Now I am not a big fan of Halloween. I'm not one of those adults that enjoys dressing up and all that. And I don't like haunted houses and people jumping out at you. And that pretty much sums up Scarowinds. We did one haunted house and Ryan said "Next stop, the parking lot!"
Him and I shuffled through that house so fast, I think we left another trail of Smoke. Sam seemed okay with it, although he did not argue about leaving. Later that night Ryan told me that it was my job to make sure that he did not do things that were inappropriate for his age. I swear, he used those exact words. Live and Learn, Boys, Live and Learn.

You can check out what Ryan thought on his very own blog. Click on the side bar for my profile and than go to Ryan Rocks. It is also www.lockwoodkid.blogspot.com


So this is our "Ghost in the Graveyard Brownies" that we made for the Cub Scout Cake Auction. Your cake had to be Halloween themed, and the money they earn goes to a charity. I thought we did pretty well, but these people take this way seriously, so who knows.

RIP Mike (the crab)

This post will probably only be amusing (albeit in a sick way) to my immediate family, but for those who choose to continue reading, I offer this background info. My brother's name is Mike and he has a 5 year old daughter named Lilly. Lilly is a little spitfire, and I see the potential for her to be a major handful in coming years. Now, onto the story.

Ryan had two hermit crabs as his class pets. The class named them Mike and Lilly. Ryan had nothing to do with this, he would never honor his cousin in any way. Yesterday, the children arrived in class to find that Mike had passed on to that great hermit heaven in the sky. The class concluded that there had been a fight and Lilly had killed Mike, as his limbs were strewn about the cage. Foreshadowing anyone? I did tell you the story was amusing, but sick.

Onto another subject, Sam is doing a project on his family heritage for school. He had to pick a culture from his ethnic background and write about it, as well as provide an item to present to the class. Sam chose Italy. He wants to bring a food item for the class to try. My dilemma is that the food has to be store bought (system requirement) and cannot contain peanuts or tree nuts. We thought of Italian Wedding cookies, biscotti, and Nutella spread, but can't find any in stores without nuts. Anyone have any ideas. Please leave a comment on this post to help us out (c'mon Aunt Betty, I know your out there!)

More Random Musings

I got this new phone about a few months back. It has all the bells and whistles, none of which I want or need, but it is this hybrid phone that has better service at our house than the Nextel alone. I have this pain in the neck boss that seems to think I need to be able to be reached even when not at the office. :( Anyway, I kept getting these jokes text messaged to me everyday. Since I am about 15 years too old to actually use texting, I couldn't figure out how to stop it, so I called Sprint. This nice young man explained to me that the jokes were coming because I had subscribed to a monthly service for them, at $9.99 a month. WTF!!! I explained that I had not, and he kept saying "Are you sure"? I told him that not only did I not know how to access the Internet from the phone to get this stupid service, but I didn't even know how to text, and couldn't he just block texting on my phone, because I didn't want it as an option. Now let me explain that at the time I was speaking with him, I had a huge canker sore on the underside of my tongue, thus swelling it and impairing my ability to speak properly. I sounded either drunk or mentally disabled. There was this pause on his end, and I know he wanted to suggest that I start texting, since this whole speaking thing didn't seem to be working out for me. But alas, he did not, he simply discontinued the service and refunded the three months of charges (yes, three months, I'm really on top of things). I did find it strange that Sprint could cancel the service and refund the money for me, yet they insisted that this was a third party service that they had nothing to do with. HMMM? My main point of this long rambling post, was that if people pay $10/month to have stupid jokes sent to them on their phone, do we really need global conferences on why our economy is in the crapper?

My boys have recently started reading The Hardy Boys Mystery books, and they both seem to really enjoy them. I have to read to Ryan and I, however, am having a hard time with the books. They are just so old fashioned. Not in a bad way, I just have to stop about every other page to explain something that doesn't exist anymore. Like getting a message by telegraph, having to call an operator to place a call, party lines, and having the ability to get on an unscheduled airline flight 5 minutes after getting to the airport. And we are only on chapter 2. The Hardy's are also friends with guys named Biff and call each other "Fella" and for some reason this really gets under my skin. At the library, I did find that there is an updated series, and I got one for Sam. It was about roller coasters, and they call each other "Dude" and play x-box. He didn't enjoy it nearly as much as the original,so go figure. It must just be me.

Strangely enough, Scott and I are having a similar experience with a new show that we are watching. Life on Mars is about a NYC cop in 2008 that gets transported back to 1973 after getting hit by a car. The whole time we watch we are saying "Do you remember those" or "when was the last time you saw one of those". It's pretty cool, but I have my doubts as to how long the show may last, since if you were born anytime after about 1970, you probably wouldn't get the subtleties, and without them, it is just another cop show.

So today I went and did early voting. I usually just go on Election Day, but this year we will be out of town. Early voting is fine (although the line was way too long, I can't remember ever waiting like that on Election Day). I do, however, have an issue with this "One Stop" voting. I don't think that registering to vote should be made that easy. If anything, make it more difficult, and weed out the slackers. You should have to put some kind of effort into figuring out how to register. If you don't care enough to put in the time and effort, you don't get to vote. And the no ID required thing, don't even get me started on that.

Boo

I wanted to share something that the boys did for their teachers that I thought was kind of cool. It is a take off on the "Boo'ing" your neighbor thing that goes around some neighborhoods this time of year. Anyway, they Boo'd their teachers. We decorated and filled two boxes with candy and attached this poem, which we modified to fit the teacher scenario:

YOU have been “Boo’d !!!

The air is cool, the season fall
Soon Halloween will come to all
Ghosts and goblins, spooks galore
Tricky witches at your door
Little ghosts are after things to do
A special one brought these treats to you
Which one is was you might never find
But someone thinks your cool and kind
So enjoy this sweet and tasty food
And the fact that you got Boo’d

And they snuck them onto their teachers desks. Ryan got found out, I don't think he was able to keep from giggling about it. Sam's teacher has yet to say anything at all, which is driving him crazy. I have a parent/teacher conference coming up next week and I may mention it. Frankly, I want the suck up points. I just hope that she isn't one of those that thinks Halloween is a devil holiday or we may be in trouble.

Updates

I sometimes get follow up questions regarding things that I have posted, so I am going to use this post the keep you updated on the progress in our lives. Here goes:

1. Sam's bike is fixed. The chain didn't break, it was just off the track, and he and I managed to figure out how to get it back on. So he is back on the road. Thank you all for your concern.

2. When I said I was getting rid of stuff in our garage I never intended to imply that the garage would ever in any way be neat and orderly. I have just come to accept the fact that my actually parking in a garage is not going to happen in my lifetime.

3. My sister, Stephanie, would like me to pass on the fact that she was given powdered milk, as well. God forbid anyone think that she has led a pampered existence. As her husband Todd would say "La-De-Freakin-Da" (that was cleaned up for the purposes of this post). Although she did remind me that my mother stored the powder milk box under the sink. Yes, that's right, under the sink with the cleaning products. Now, if a food item can be stored next to the Mr. Clean doesn't that tell you something?

4. While on the topic of milk, so many of you have told me that although you don't like milk, you do eat it in cereal. Apparently when combined with a favorite cereal, milk becomes more palatable. I may have to try a bowl someday soon.

5. In my post about Ryan's sign language, I made a reference to him sometimes being lazy. In listening to my Mom retell the story to my Dad she described Ryan as "just being Ryan in his own world," which I interpret as Grandparent PC for lazy!

6. I have added one new show from this television season to my viewing list. If you haven't checked out "Life On Mars" it is a pretty good show.

7. To our new friend in China, the boys are loving your comments, and are enjoying learning about the differences in our two cultures (like the fact that you can't get Wii). Please keep them coming.

8. And now to our most frequently asked about topic....the dog. Please understand that the poll we set up was for informational purposes only, and in no way was it binding, thus obligating me to get this child a dog. That being said, Ryan and I have come to an agreement that we will wait until after the holidays, and at a time closer to his 7th birthday we will revisit and reevaluate his desire for a pet. Until that time, please stop asking Ryan when he is getting the dog, since he won the vote (yes, Grandpa, this means you!).

Happy Birthday Donnie

Last night I went to a party for my brother-in-law, Donnie. He turned 50 and my sister, Staci, had planned a party for him at a little bar in Gastonia. Now let me set the scene for you. Don is a member of The Southern Gentlemen motorcycle club, so this was an interesting crowd to say the least. I felt as if I was on a set for some type of biker movie. Our table might as well of had a neon sign with the words "Family" and an arrow pointing down at us, with my Dad in his yellow dress shirt, my other brother-in-law Todd, in his dark pink polo shirt, and my sister, Stephanie, in her silk halter. I at least had on black so I more or less blended in. Every time we would see Staci speaking with someone, and they would turn and look at us my Dad would say "She's explaining us." I didn't take pictures because I think some of the guests may be wanted in certain jurisdictions, and may not appreciate their pictures being posted on the Internet. I'm just joking (somewhat), everyone was very nice and polite. HAPPY 50th DONNIE, WE LOVE YOU! (and we'd love you even more if you had let us have some cake).

Now That's Wierd

I don't know if any of you have ever noticed, but along the side of this blog there is a map which records the number of hits and locations every time someone looks at our blog. Normally there are 3 or 4 hits a day, and one of them is usually mine. After yesterdays post about Ryan's sign, the blog received 105 hits from all around the world. There must have been something in the post that was showing up in a popular google search. Now folks on every continent (except Antarctica) have seen my sweet baby basically giving the finger.

Here's Your Sign

Last night Ryan was telling me that his teacher is teaching them some sign language, and he was showing me some of the signs he learned. One of them was the sign for Thank You, which is two hands coming outward from under your chin. However, he kept doing it with one hand, and sort of flicking his fingers outward. Now, as a person of Italian heritage, I am acutely aware that these have two very different meanings. For those of you who are not familiar (or have never seen an episode of The Sopranos) I will illustrate below:

THANK YOU




F*** YOU

Do you get the difference? I couldn't understand why he kept doing it with one hand, and then he explained that it was easier (LAZY!) I told him that others might not like that particular sign, so use two hands.

Ever since Ryan was born, I have had this feeling that he is the reincarnation of my paternal grandfather a/k/a PopPop. Any Italian DNA in me that hasn't been smothered by the Irish, was passed on to him in looks, mannerisms, everything (and he is determined to give me agita what with the schoolwork, but that is for another post). Anyway, this latest "sign" from above just confirms it for me. Got to run, he's demanding his pasta!

It's Genetic

My plan for this weekend was to purge the house of all of the "stuff" that we have acquired that nobody ever uses. This is easier said than done. My children only part with things under the threat that "NOTHING NEW WILL COME INTO THIS HOUSE UNTIL SOMETHING ELSE LEAVES." Toys that they haven't looked at in years suddenly become their most cherished possession when you want to get rid of it. I have developed a theory that our family has a sort of pack-rat gene somewhere within our DNA. Both of our mothers have the gene. Our children are playing with toys and books that are over 30 years old (I know I should have written "close to 40 years old" but I can't quite go there yet). The stuff that they deemed worthy of keeping and storing for this long boggles my mind. Scott's dad has a version of the gene, although I'm not sure if his is more a form of cheapness than nostalgia (and I say that with love). I thought that the gene had maybe skipped a generation, as I do not posses it. I am all for getting rid of things that have no use. Purge, simplify, and ridding your life of clutter is what I am about these days. Scott's sister, Susan, has no trace of this anywhere in her DNA. In fact, when she went on vacation recently, she had a box built for her 19 year old cat in case he died while she was away. She wanted her buried and gone before she even got home. I wanted to warn the cat not to take a nap until after someone came to feed her, because if she was sleeping it might not end well! And I thought that Scott didn't have the gene until I ventured into our garage yesterday, otherwise know as the place where crap goes not to die, but to live in perpetuity. There is a truck, motorcycle, and dirt bike that have not seen the light of day in almost a decade. I dug through the truck bed, which has become a storage unit, and found an old gas tank (not a gas can, mind you, but a gas tank) a big exhaust fan that had a purpose at a house we haven't lived in for ten years, a chain saw that I didn't even know we owned (you never know, one of the TWO trees in our yard might need to come down someday), and parts for cars that I don't think we even own anymore. So my conclusion was that Scott does possess this genetic flaw and has passed it along to our boys, as every bike, scooter, and riding toy they ever owned was still in that garage. So alas, I am attempting to break the cycle and all of this "stuff" is being shipped off to the Goodwill or the recycling center, so in 30 years if any of it is pulled out of an attic for some kid to play with, they won't be related to me.

Random Musings

Yesterday something happened to me on our way home from school that made me realize that I no longer had babies, but I now had full-blown kids. As I was walking home, while attempting to carry a bookbag with one hand, navigate the bike that Ryan decided he didn't want to ride, and watch Sam trying to do some type of x-games move over a drainage ditch, I stepped into a hole on the side of the walking path and fell. Yes, that's right, I flat out fell. Both of my children acted as if they did not know me and walked right by. Oh, the love was overwhelming. The lesson learned is that children should carry their own damn stuff!!

I read an article today about the average person's love for cereal, and how it has become this affordable comfort food in these tough times. All of my boys love cereal. Sometimes it is all Ryan will eat in a day, and there are many nights when Scott gets home late and eats it for dinner. I hate cereal, and I began to wonder how I could dislike something that so many people love. My sister, Staci, does not like cereal either, yet my younger sister and brother do, so I came up with this hypothesis...POWDERED MILK. Yes, that's right, I was fed powdered milk as a child, and my conclusion is that this had some sort of traumatizing affect on my sister and I. Apparently times got better, because the younger siblings got real milk. Scott says he doesn't even know what powdered milk is (so a big thumbs up to you Margie!). I don't even know if they make powdered milk anymore, but until I read about a big surge in the demand for it, I refuse to believe that times are that bad!

Today Ryan learned one of the big secrets of childhood. He finally realized that if you are sick, you get to stay home from school. He has had a fever on and off since Friday, but had adamantly refused to admit that he was sick. This morning he woke up with a slight fever and said that his throat hurt. I told him he could go back to sleep, and I could literally see a light bulb go off over his head when he realized that admitting to being sick gets you a day off from school. I may have created a monster. Of course, 20 minutes after taking Motrin he was fine, thus proving my theory that if you pump them full of medicine they are good for a 6 hour school day. Sorry, Darnell, as a teacher I know you take offense to that (but admit it, you know you've done it!).

Birthday Party Fun

Yesterday we all went to my sister Staci's house for my nephew Trace's 6th birthday. In typical Separ fashion, it was an over indulgent, glutenous, free-for-all. I mean, what kid's birthday party doesn't need a fajita bar and margarita's? I kid, Stace, we had a great time. I ate way too much, and the kid's ate nothing but junk. What can I say, it's just the way we Separs roll. The kids all had a great time jumping in the air castle, painting pumpkins, smashing the pinata, and playing Wii.