1. The Plain Truth by Jodi Picoult
2. Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain
3. Technical Communication by Mike Markel
4. The Nasty Bits by Anthony Bourdain
5. Twilight- Stephenie Meyer (again)
6. Midnight Sun- Stephenie Meyer (again)
7. Odd Thomas- Dean Koontz
8. Forever Odd- Dean Koontz
10.  Brother Odd- Dean Koontz
11. Watchmen- Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons
12. PS I Love You by Cecilia Ahern
13.  Confessions of a Slacker Mom by Muffy Mead-Ferro
14.  New Moon- Stephenie Meyer (again) 
15. Eclipse- Stephenie Meyer (again) 
16. Breaking Dawn- Stephenie Meyer (again) 
17. Always Looking Up: The Adventures of an Incurable Optimist- Michael J Fox
18.  Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince- JK Rowling
19. Speak Up! -Fraleigh and Tuman
20. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows- JK Rowling
21. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn- Bettie Smith
22. Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
23. The Legends and Myths of Hawai'i by His Hawaiian Majesty Kalakaua

It feels like it's been raining here for weeks!  I can't take these gray miserable days cooped up in the house. 

The boys were/are sick-- just like me and Wayne.  They coughing is horrible but at least my nose is free and clear again.  Both boys have had slight fevers but no other flu symptoms.  Too many people I know right now have H1N1 and it's freaking me out.  It doesn't help that I've been eyeball deep in zombies lately-- things like I am Legend full of "infected humans."  I keep thinking about Stephen King's The Stand and how most of the human populace was wiped out by a super flu.  I'm so optimistic and full of sunshine, aren't I? 

Tomorrow is supposed to be trick or treat night here.  I really don't understand the whole idea of scheduling trick or treating on a day that isn't Halloween and for only two hours.  On a work/school night.  When Halloween is on a Saturday.  Pennsylvania is so weird.  I'm sure it has some kind of bizarre religious reasoning behind it.  Can you feel my rolling my eyes? I still don't have costumes or candy for the munchkins either.  Joey wants to be a ghost and that's easy enough.  Andy wants to be Lightning McQueen.  Of course, when I asked him a month ago, he said it was okay for me to give his LMQ costume to one of my friends.  Now, he'll hear nothing of being something else.  So I am in a bit of a bind.

Saturday, they'll be at Steve's for trick-or-treating there.

I'm tired and feeling down because of the weather.  It's tough to get motivated for anything.  

The past few days, I've been working on making ornaments for the Christmas tree at Andy's school.  I have a Cricut cartridge with script school subjects and icons.  I've been cutting them out and mounting them on a white background then totally glittering the word.  They're cute on the table.  I hope they look cute as an ornament.   I need to go over to the school and straighten the tree out.  It is looking a little bent and beat up in the storage space.

Bleh.

Oh the grossness that was me on Saturday.  Wayne too.  

We attended the first annual Zombie Walk in Harrisburg along with 250 or so other people.  I fully believe that had it not been a rainy, gray day there would have been more zombies.  

The preparations began the night before by zombifying our clothes.  I took an old bridesmaid's dress out of the back of my closet and "distressed" it.  Wayne destroyed some scrubs that we had from the school where we used to work.  We cut stuff, rubbed scissors along cuffs, sprayed the clothes with paint and water (for a nifty moldy effect), threw blood on them and literally dragged them through the mud.  

On Saturday morning we had to go to Wayne's parents' house first to pick up an old dresser they were giving us.  It was getting pretty late so I started doing my latex prothetic pieces in the car.  I had to spread the liquid latex on my face and then lay tissue over it to build up the layers to create realistic looking wounds.  Then the latex has to cure before you can makeup over it.  I was getting many interesting looks from the people driving on the road next to us.  Hee hee.  For the walk, I did a big gash from each side of my mouth and a little slash on my forehead.  
We met Niki and drove over to her friend Mel's house in Harrisburg and I did Wayne's makeup there but he was sweaty and had gotten a little rained on so I had a really hard time getting the latex to stick to him.  In the end, the uncured latex looked remarkably like decaying flesh so that was a good thing.   Once we were all zombified, we walked over to City Island and did the walk around town.  

It was a very, very cool thing.  There were tons of people with cameras- both still and video--all over.  People were laughing and having a good time watching all of these bizarre people lumbering around the city.  There were far too many cries of "BRAINS!" going on though.  Zombies don't talk! My only disappointment was that there was not a single Michael Jackson zombie.  

( Clicky, clicky for gross pictures )

I guess I didn't write a post about it when it happened.  Sometime in June or July Steve asked me to make sure I was early for our Tuesday exchange of the boys.  Something special was going on at Sesame Place involving the Food Network.  I kept thinking about it and thinking about it and guessed correctly before Steve told me--- The Food Network was filming an episode of Dinner Impossible with Chef Robert Irvine at the park!

Lucky boys that I have, they were invited to attend the meal along with their dad! 

That particular day, the boys wanted to play in the wave pool area.  Fine by me!  I stood at the top of the stairs and got to watch the chef at work, running around the picnic pavilion.  Of course, that's the day that somehow my stupid camera got turned on in my bag and the battery died.  So I tried taking pictures with my cell phone and they didn't turn out at all.  Grrrr. 

They had the chef there to celebrate Sesame Place's 40th birthday.  Maria (from Sesame Street) was there, helping to cook.  THat woman does not age!  Elmo and Cookie Monster were there.  I wanted to see Kevin Clash, the puppeteer who does Elmo in the worst way but those darned kids kept needing me to be their mother when I was busy trying to be nosy.  :) 

Steve and the boys got to eat the meal!!!  He said it was things that started with the letter B. 

I've been waiting ever since then for the episode to air.  It was on Food Network this past Wednesday night.  You can see Steve and Joey, very blurry in the background at the very end of the show.

Andy is sitting at the kids' computer desk that we assembled yesterday so that I don't have to fight for computer time.  He is playing JumpStart Kindergarten and out of nowhere, he just recited the Pledge of Allegiance.

Yesterday, he was singing the Days of the Week song.

And oddly, yesterday at the dinner table, he was humming the theme from 2001: A Space Odyssey. 

He's such a little sponge and so, so, so, so cute.  Kindergarten is awesome.

Below is a list of 100 things that every omnivore should try at least once. Some of these things are pretty tame, others…well…not so much. l

Here are the instructions if you’d like to participate:

1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Cross out any items that you would never consider eating.

The Omnivore’s Hundred:

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart

( the rest of the list )

 

Thank you, John Hughes, for your endlessly quotable, highly entertaining films.  You made high school bearable.  You made me want to live in Shermer, Illinois.




'80s teen flick director John Hughes dies in NYC
Aug. 6, 2009, 4:08 PM EST

NEW YORK (AP) -- Writer-director John Hughes, Hollywood's youth impresario of the 1980s and '90s who captured and cornered the teen and pre-teen market with such favorites as "Home Alone," "The Breakfast Club" and "Ferris Bueller's Day Off," died Thursday, a spokeswoman said. He was 59.

Hughes died of a heart attack during a morning walk in Manhattan, Michelle Bega said. He was in New York to visit family.

A native of Lansing, Mich., who later moved to suburban Chicago and set much of his work there, Hughes rose from ad writer to comedy writer to silver screen champ with his affectionate and idealized portraits of teens, whether the romantic and sexual insecurity of "Sixteen Candles," or the J.D. Salinger-esque rebellion against conformity in "The Breakfast Club."

Hughes' ensemble comedies helped make stars out of Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, Ally Sheedy and many other young performers. He also scripted the phenomenally popular "Home Alone," which made little-known Macaulay Culkin a sensation as the 8-year-old accidentally abandoned by his vacationing family, and wrote or directed such hits as "National Lampoon's Vacation," "Pretty in Pink," "Planes, Trains & Automobiles" and "Uncle Buck."

Other actors who got early breaks from Hughes included John Cusack ("Sixteen Candles"), Judd Nelson ("The Breakfast Club"), Steve Carrell ("Curly Sue") and Lili Taylor ("She's Having a Baby").

Devin Ratray, best known for playing Buzz McCallister in the "Home Alone" films, said he remained close to Hughes over the years.

"He changed my life forever," Ratray said. "Nineteen years later, people from all over the world contact me telling me how much 'Home Alone' meant to them, their families, and their children."

Actor Matthew Broderick worked with Hughes in 1986 when he played the title character in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off."

"I am truly shocked and saddened by the news about my old friend John Hughes. He was a wonderful, very talented guy and my heart goes out to his family," Broderick said.

As Hughes advanced into middle age, his commercial touch faded and, in Salinger style, he increasingly withdrew from public life. His last directing credit was in 1991, for "Curly Sue," and he wrote just a handful of scripts over the past decade. He was rarely interviewed or photographed.

Checking Facebook, I see a post from the friend who babysits the boys on Mondays.  Her status update was posted at around 9 am, about an hour and a half after the boys were dropped off.

Her update:  Person's Name Hates Mondays!!!

Now, Monday is the only day she has Andy and Joey.  They'd been there for a little while when she made that post.  I am assuming it has something to do with my kids.  It's an assumption, sure, but she's also commented to Wayne that if she didn't need the money, she wouldn't be babysitting. 

Argh.  Why does this have to suck so much? 

Recent things said that had Wayne and I rolling...

In the car with the boys on the way to the babysitter...
Joey:  I not a Joey, I a Obot

Mommy:  What kind of Obot are you, Joey? 

Joey: On the ground.

Mommy:  What do you do?

Joey:  I make garbage squares.



In the car on the way to see their dad:

Andy:  Mommy, is money an object? 

Mommy:  Sure, I guess.

Andy:  NO!  Money is no object!

(have no idea where *that* came from...) 

Argh!

When I dropped the boys off at Steve's on Tuesday, I noticed a gigantic bruise on Andy's lower stomach.  When I leaned in close to get a better look, I noticed two little punctures, like some kind of bite in the middle.  It's was purple and red, maybe two inches across.  

When Steve brought them home last night, I checked out the bruise.  It was a little faded but Andy still flinched when I touched it.  Steve said it could be a hernia, so of course I had to look up hernias online and see if I could find pictures.  Definitely not a hernia.  I thought it could be a spider bite so I had to look up pictures of those too.  

Whatever, I ended up taking him in to the pediatrician today just to be safe.  

When I got there, there was a new note taped to the glass--- "Any copay not made at the visit will incur a $10 fee."  Great... I'd been hoping to get them to bill me the copay.  When the MA brought out our file, she said there was already a $20 charge on our account.  Apparently our copay went up and I didn't know it.  Grrr.

This is in addition to the $20 they made me pay to fill out Andy's kindergarten registration papers.  And it took them a week to do it! 

They charge a "premium" for evening and weekend appointments.

Does anyone else's pedi do this stuff? 

Oh, and the bruise?  Just a bruise.

meme ganked from belleatrix 

YOU'RE ON MY FRIENDS LIST, I want to know 28 things about you. I don't care if we've never talked, never really clicked, or if we already know everything about each other. I really don't. You are obviously on my flist, so let me know with whom I'm friends!

01. Your Middle Name, or explain your Chosen Name:
02. Mental Age:
03. Single or Taken:
04. Favorite Book:
05. Favorite Song or Album:
06. What do you believe is your calling in life? Your greatest passion?
07. What's your worst recurring nightmare/biggest fear?
08. Faith, has you any? And if so, what, and if not, why not?:
09. Do we know each other outside of LJ? Do we want to?
10. What's your philosophy on life?
11. Is the bottle half-full or half-empty?
12. Would you tell me something painful if it was in my best interest?
13. What is your favorite memory of us?
14. What is your favorite guilty pleasure?
15. Tell me one odd/interesting fact about you:
16. You can have three wishes what are they?
17. What is your favorite food?
18. Which country is your spiritual home?
19. What is your big weakness?
20. Do you think I'm a good person?
21. What was your best/favorite subject at school?
22. Describe your accent:
23. If you could change anything about me, would you?
24. What do you wear to sleep?
25. Gender identity?
26. Affectionate/sexual orientation?
27. If I only had one day to live, what would we do together? (If you have no idea, just say something crazy, it'll entertain me!)
28. Will you repost this so I can fill it out for you?

Friday I got to do a little bit of socializing with some of the people I work with on Friday.  There was this "mandatory" seminar thing with the guy who wrote one of the books we use.  Wayne got out of going because he had to watch the kids. The other female teacher in my department was away on vacation.  The crotchety old evening teacher who never has anything nice to say doesn't go to anything in the day time.  So from my department, it was my boss, two of the other instructors that I like and me.  We also had the Director of Education (my boss's boss) at our table.  Despite the touchy-feely nature of the seminar (it focused on stress management) I had a really good time.  It was nice to be able to dress down and have time to talk about other things beside students and their issues.

Wayne and I took all four kids to the Philly Zoo on Saturday.  We had tickets I bought last year with the mom's group and they were about to expire.  I was nervous about having all four in a crowded place and managing to have a good time but we did!  The kids all stayed together and we oohed and ahhed over the animals with minimal hassle and yelling.  The only problem was tired kids and a lot of sun. 

The week has been pretty crazy.  We had to bring two cars to school on Monday because I (grumble grumble grumble) said that I'd cover someone's evening classes.  One of the med teachers who is nice to me said that I was her last hope for going on vacation because no one else would cover these two evening classes.  I had vowed never to deal with night classes but I thought it would be one of those demonstrations of goodwill and pitching in to help so I said yes.  It was torture trying to entertain myself for 5 hours in the mostly empty school on Monday night. I have to do it again tonight for an hour but since I don't normally teach on Thursdays this term, I'm going in just for the class.

It's Fourth of July weeekend. I was trying to explain to Andy that the 4th is our country's birthday and that this year our country is going to be 233 years old and that every year we celebrate with barbecues and fireworks.  He seemed excited.  Andy loves a good birthday party. He wanted to know if we'd have cake.  We're going to Wayne's parents for the day.  I hope they have cake.  Maybe I'll make some patriotic cupcakes? 

Dear Kenny,
I don't really know how to tell you this, but our socks don't match. I think I realized it when I quoted Forrest Gump in a clown suit and I saw you bite off the elephant in the corner. I'm sure you're masochistic enough to understand the middle east is planning revenge on you. I'm returning your Hannah Montana underwear to you, but I'll keep your left ear as a memory. You should also know that I will not tell the authorities that you stole the whale from the backyard and I’m off to lead a new life as a lemon.

With tears of sadness,
Juli
xxx


( How you do it! )

There are four children here.

One is sitting nicely on the couch watching a DVRed episode of Yo Gabba Gabba.

One is in timeout in his room, screaming.

One is reluctantly cleaning something up after complaining about it loudly.

One is counting.  I don't know why.

The amount of screaming in the house is unbearable- both from kids and from the adults.

If they would only listen and do what we ask.

Why, oh why, must it be a rainy day?
 

I have been staring at the computer screen for too long tonight and yet, I can't stop myself from wasting hours playing stupid games on Facebook.  It's a freaking curse.

I made myself a couple of mini Cuban sandwiches for dinner around 9 and I'm hungry again now.  There's a tiny bit of leftover coconut flan from the party I could polish off.  I'd feel guilty for 15 minutes but it's so good and unless i eat it, it will go in the trash.

The boys got home pretty early tonight.  I was so excited to see them.  That effectively ended my housework and chores for the evening.  I sat on the couch and watched Special Agent Oso with Joey.  It's their new favorite show and it's based on James Bond movies.  Each 15 minute sub-episode has a title that's a parody of a 007 movie.  

Three Wheels are not Enough

Dr.  On

Carousel Royale

It cracks me up.  And when all the kids are here and they're watching the show, they sing along with the show.  I really need to have my video camera handy tomorrow to record it for posterity.

In that line of thinking.  I also need to record Andy reading/performing Where the Wild Things Are at bedtime.   It's precious.
 

Miss my boys and can't wait until they get home tonight.

Stayed up too late last night and as a result I rolled out of bed at 11 am today. 

Bunch of stuff I need to accomplish:

1. Grading school work.  I am behind.  Need to log my grades in the online system I use to calculate the weighted stuff.

2. Put the plants that were started in my aerogarden into their appropriate outdoor containers.

3.  Laundry. Always laundry.  DOING

4. Pull winter clothes from Andy & Joey's dressers.  See what wardrobe adjustments need to be made for warmer weather.

5.  Water change and algae scrape of the fish tanks. DONE

6.  Water houseplants. DONE

7.  Change and wash all the sheets in  the house. DONE (but still have to re-make all the beds) 

By Dennis McLellan
May 21, 2009

( Click for more )</div> In 1947, Disney turned the job over to Macdonald, the studio's sound-effects wizard. Allwine was hired for the job in late 1976 while working in sound effects under Macdonald and continued to supply Mickey's voice until his death.

Allwine made his debut voicing the world's most famous mouse on "The New Mickey Mouse Club" (1977-78) and went on to supply Mickey's voice for Disney movies, TV specials, theme parks, records, toys and video games.

Among his credits as the voice of Disney's top animated star: “Mickey’s Christmas Carol” (1983), “The Prince and the Pauper” (1990) and "Mickey, Donald, Goofy: The Three Musketeers" (2004) and TV series "Mickey MouseWorks," "House of Mouse" and "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse."

Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Robert A. Iger described a "profound sense of loss and sadness throughout our company" over the death of the man who gave voice to Disney's most beloved character.

"Wayne's great talent, deep compassion, kindness and gentle way, all of which shone brightly through his alter ego, will be greatly missed," Iger said in a statement.

Roy E. Disney, Walt's nephew, director emeritus of the Walt Disney Co., said in a statement: "Wayne not only gave voice to the character of Mickey but gave him a heart and soul as well."

Allwine, who launched his Disney Studios career in the mail room a few months before Disney died in 1966, had been working in sound effects under Macdonald for more than seven years when he was sent to an open audition for Mickey's voice after an actor failed to show up.

The Glendale native had watched "The Mickey Mouse Club" on TV as a youngster in the 1950s and simply conjured up Mickey's voice from memory.

Allwine later said, however, that doing the famed falsetto of the perennially optimistic Mickey was easy for him.

"Actually, I was accustomed to doing vocal stuff," he told United Press International in 1997. "My father was a barbershop quartet singer. He was a high tenor with an odd voice and could go from lower range to upper range without cracking his voice. I inherited that."

Allwine always remembered what Macdonald told him after Allwine took over the voice of Disney's top animated star: "Just remember, kid, you're only filling in for the boss."

Allwine later acknowledged that in an interview for a “Walt Disney Treasures” box DVD set.

"It's really not about me; it's about Mickey, and Mickey is Walt's," he said. "So what I do is I get to take this wonderful American icon and keep it alive until the next Mickey comes along, and it will one day. And that's also one of the heartbreaks of the character, of doing the job, because, you know, I'm three; there's going to be a four."

It was, he said, "a great honor to represent what Walt loved so dearly and what Jimmy kept alive so well."

Allwine was born in Glendale on Feb. 7, 1947. While a student at John Burroughs High School in Burbank, he acted in school plays and formed his own music group, the International Singers, which performed in clubs and at colleges throughout the state.

He later formed other bands and had a stint with Davie Allan & the Arrows, for which he played rhythm guitar on the hit "Blues' Theme."

Among Allwine's credits as a sound effects editor are "The Black Hole," "Something Wicked This Way Comes," "Mickey's Christmas Carol," "The Black Cauldron," "Splash," "Three Men and a Baby" and "Star Trek V: The Final Frontier."

In 1986, he shared an Emmy Award for outstanding sound editing for a series for Steven Spielberg's "Amazing Stories."

As a married couple, Allwine and Taylor received similar reactions whenever people discovered that they were the voices of Mickey and Minnie.

"Everybody goes, 'Oh, that's so sweet,' " Taylor said. "When we got married, we kind of kept it quiet because everybody was saying, 'Oh, Mickey and Minnie got married.' It wasn't Mickey and Minnie; it was Wayne and Russi. We wanted to keep it about us and not about the characters."

In addition to his wife, Allwine is survived by his children from previous marriages, Erin, Alison, Peter, Christopher and Joshua; and a grandson, Isaac.

Funeral arrangements are pending.</div>

Last Saturday, Wayne and I took the whole posse of kids to Opening Day at Sesame Place.  It was rainy and miserable but we had a good time.  While in one of the gift shops I noticed a tiny corner with scrapbooking supplies.  OOH!  They had a Sesame Street themed album and a bunch of stickers and papers.  I wanted it.  We go to Sesame Place a LOT.  Still, I told Wayne I'd get it another day and walked out of the store.  Later on, Wayne disappeared for a long time to take Lexi to get some cotton candy before the parade.  He returned holding a suspicious, flat, squarish bag.  Happy Mothers' Day for me!

On Wednesday, while Wayne and I were painting the living room, I saw the UPS truck stop in front of the house and pull out a big, green Proflowers box.  I glared at Wayne because I told him no flowers for Mothers' Day.  He shrugged as the UPS man walked up the driveway.  I was so confused.

Inside the box was like 100 small, multicolored lilies.  The bouquet was so big, i had to break it into two vases to really show off the blooms.  the card said:


Steve ordered flowers for me from the boys.  I was very touched. 

Yesterday, before Lexi and Nahan left to go back to their mom's house, all the kids came out with a card, they'd signed themselves, a bouquet of daisies and a digital photo keychain for me.

This morning, I slept in until 9:30 and woke up to a bacon and egg breakfast on the table, waiting for me. 

This Mothers' Day, I am feeling very loved and very spoiled.

Right now, Joey and Wayne are napping.  Andy is playing games at Sprout.com and I'm about to go outside and get the newspaper.  Later on, I think we may go play mini-golf or head to a park so the boys can run around and I can look at them and get all weepy over how much I adore them.

Forty years from now people will look back on the gay rights movement and wonder what the hell was wrong with some people that they beat on their bibles citing Leviticus as God's ordinance that homosexuality is an abomination when in the same chapter so many other things are labeled as equally abominable.  Like eating shellfish, shaving, planting two crops in one field and combining fibers in woven cloth. 

It will be just like the way we look at segregation in the south and the civil rights movement of the 60s.  What the hell was wrong with people that because of the color of another person's skin, they had to sit in the back of the bus or use a different water fountain.

I find myself falling neatly into that neat little trend recently in the news about my generation largely moving toward atheism.  When I look at the fundamentalist Christian churches, it makes me sick to my stomach to think about what these people cherry-pick to support or oppose in the name of Christ; a man who hung around with lepers and prostitutes.

So Miss California is enjoying her 15 minutes, I'm sure, but in the end she's just a bigoted punchline who looks more and more ridiculous with each passing hypocritical moment.

Today was opening day at Sesame Place and we were there, rain and all, with all four kids.  It is seriously difficult to do anything with all four kids.  If it weren't for the sit-and-stand stroller, we couldn't have done it.

Nathan is a runner.  I must have said it ten or more times today, "We need one of those baby leash things for him."

Joey was in and out of the back seat. 

Andy is dealing with allergies and sinus stuff and was just not himself today.  He wouldn't go on any rides.  He wanted to go into the water but it was just too cold.  

Lexi wanted to hang out with my sister and niece all day.

The kids, minus Andy, rode the Vapor Trail roller coaster, Elmo's Flying Fish (fish shaped flying cars, spins around in a circle), this bouncy thing called Blast Off and the carousel.  We also saw the Elmo's World show and the parade.  Doesn't seem like all that much but we were there all day. 

We had a picnic lunch in the parking lot.  In the afternoon there was ice cream and right before the parade: cotton candy.  

Going through pictures now.  I look horrible in all of them.  I had a lazy, sloppy pony tail leaving the house and the rain didn't help matters much.  I need some sun on my face. Argh.

Spent all day yesterday at my mom's group's charity crop knowing there was gorgeous weather outside and that Wayne had the boys at a playground.  I imagined that today we would go out in the yard and start sprucing it up for spring, killing and pulling weeds, mowing, enjoying the sunshine, throwing a frisbee or football around.

Not so much.  I started doing laundry right after breakfast and hanging it outside in the sun.  The boys followed me out, presumably to play, and instead went on a whining, screaming rampage about every single thing I said or did.  So after arguing and cajoling and laying in their darkened rooms for an hour, they both finally went to sleep and I've been sitting here at the computer reading Huffington Post.

Maybe when they wake up (and I hear Joey now) I can have my happy fantasy? 

Every day I put a little note in Andy's lunchbox.  Often it's a reminder to listen to his teachers.  Sometimes it's a goofy poem.  I always tell him I love him and that I'm proud of him.

Tonight I was sitting on the couch and Andy came in from the kitchen and said, "Mommy, I have a dinner note for you," and he handed me this.



I am going to save it forever.

I really need to start eating in the morning before I leave the house.  I am so hungry.

My class just ordered three pizzas and unfortunately since I don't often carry cash, I can't go in. 

Wonder what I should make for dinner tonight.