How The Other Half Lives

About two years ago I began swimming laps at the local YMCA/YWCA. It’s the only indoor pool in my area that is open year round.  The pool is very nice and I have found swimming to be a fantastic workout and very relaxing.  As Martha says, “It’s a good thing.”  Though I dread going to work out, I’m always glad I did it and I feel good for days afterward.

Over the past six months I began really looking around the women’s locker room noticing how neglected it’s become.  The ceiling needs painted, the air intakes are furry with years of dust, the showers are icky and many things need replaced like benches that have water damage.  Every time I shower I wish there was a hook to hang a towel and a shelf for shampoo.  There are absolutely no frills.  There are dispensers of horrid body wash in showers, some hand dryers hung high on the wall for drying hair, which I’m so thankful for, but as far as feeling comfort there, I don’t.  I do my business trying not to touch many surfaces, then I leave.  I never walk without flips, just too icky.  The layout is pretty unfriendly also, you enter into one big area with lockers and when changing, anyone entering the room can see you, even a male who wanders in by mistake.

Today when I went to swim I had an amazing experience.  Upon entering the locker room I noticed yellow hazzard tape across shower area to indicate construction of some sort. There was a big sign posted which read, “Please use other locker room for changing and showering.”  HUH?  What OTHER locker room?  It took me a minute to realize the sign meant the ‘Women’s Guest Services’ locker room.  The one you have to pay a few hundred dollars more a year to use.  Surely they don’t mean that one, I thought.  Are they nuts?  All us lowly people scumming up their special locker room?  Hmmm, I had to go check it out.  I strolled in there and immediately noticed how clean it was.  It also had carpet in the changing area.  There were cushy high back chairs arranged in a conversation-friendly way, magazines on a coffee table, a cable television on the wall, a phone, huge counters at the sinks for make-up application and other primping, a hot tub, sauna, towels for guest use, totally clean showers with nice racks for soaps and such, hooks for swimsuits in the showers, many towel hooks outside showers, there was even shampoo and body wash in every stall.  Good shampoo.  The best part: the layout is divided by lockers so that you can undress and only a few can see you.   In addition, parentless kids are not allowed in this locker room.  I was so blown away by it all I was in shock most of the day (after I sat in the hot tub, of course).  How could all that be just down the hall from the scummy locker room I normally use and I never even knew it???  It felt like the scene in Shrek 2 when Shrek finds the annoying white Bichon dog in Fiona’s room after arriving at the in-laws castle.  “All I got was shampoo in my room!”  No doubt.

I’m all pissed off.  I’ve been putting up with the filthy, pathetic locker room and saying nothing because I figured it’d do no good to complain since I’m only there once a week anyway, yet down the hall is the Y exclusive spa for the rich and famous.   WTF??? 

On my way out I inquired at the desk about the cost for the use of the newly discovered gem.  It’s only about $13 more per month including the smallest locker rental,  I figured it was much more.  Though I’d never been in it before today, I knew it was there and was content thinking it couldn’t be that great to justify the extra expense.  It is that great and it is that clean.  Now I’m contemplating forking over the extra money so I won’t have to deal with the yuck anymore.  Heck, I might even look forward to my weekly swim workout if I don’t have to deal with the filth and inconveniences of the locker room.  My practical side says to complain to the Y management about the conditions of the locker room and keep my money and go on with life.  I don’t need a fancy pants locker room to swim.  All I do is shower, change and leave once a week.  But it’s about much more than that.  Our society has become so about ‘the experience’ of everything that we can’t just have a shower and go home.  I’m tempted to stick with my crummy locker room just because I’m so not into having everything be over-the-top fabulous.  I don’t have to hang with the rich and famous, and I don’t mind seeing kids in the locker room and other people like me.   I think I will definitely complain about the conditions, and I’ll wait a bit and think about the rest.  I’m too pissed to decide right now.

After my whining to DH he said, “You’d better go swim Friday so you can enjoy it one more time.”   Isn’t he so supportive?

The swim today was fabulous, and isn’t that what it’s really about??? 

My Quiet House

Yesterday I enjoyed a small slice of what heaven must be like.  It was my first day to myself while kidlets were off at school.  I blogged a bit, cleaned a bit, had many pleasant uninterrupted thoughts, but mostly I spent the day listening to the utter quiet in my house. I suppose if I’d listened carefully I’d noticed the little noises the house makes: refrigerator, A/C kicking on and off, ding-dong of the clock, dog noises, etc.  I paid no attention to those.  I was entirely enjoying the lack of the usual noises in the house; kidlets yelling, “Stop! That’s MINE! MOOOOM!!!”, the door slamming shut and flinging open a second later, toilets flushing every 10 minutes, and kitchen cabinets being rifled through as my son ,who’s nearly my height and eats nearly twice my body weight in food daily, complains there’s ‘nothing good to eat’.  I’d planned to spend the entire time knitting, but the filth of things got to me.  ‘I can better enjoy my knitting time in a clean space’ I thought.  Except that I got on a roll and before I knew it I was scrubbing a toilet.  Yikes, on my day off even, I have no clue what got into me.  Then DH came home for lunch as usual and we enjoyed adult conversation without any spilled milk and then because of an early out from school, I had to go retrieve the kidlets.  It was a short day, but truly a glorious glimpse of things to come.  This is what grown-ups do.  Wow!   I. AM. SO. READY.  Bring it on.

In work related news:

As I’ve mentioned before here, my job is pretty laid back.  As a tutor I have much free time when students don’t show, which is prime knit time as far as I’m concerned.  Today I had free time and was knitting on the Really Red Socks.   The phone rang and I overheard my boss talking to one of my students, who was due to come in two hours later.  Apparantly the student was calling to say she couldn’t make it in today for classes or tutor sessions because she was awaiting the results of her pregnancy test.  Sigh.  There are so many sad stories in our department.  I have no idea how they juggle their lives the way they do.  I’d be a basketcase.  Okay, I’d be MORE of a basketcase.  So the moral of the story is that it’s good to get out of work early so that you can dash to the store, pick up kids and make a dinner that does not come from a box.  Yay!

For Those About To Rock

A funny thing is happening in my house.  Everyone seems to be joining a rock band.  DH bought this movie recently and now there’s all sorts of rockin’ in my house.  {I totally love Jack Black.  In fact, I’m sure we knew each other in college.  Wasn’t he that friend of my roommate who insisted on sleeping half naked on our couch night after night without paying rent?  The resemblance is uncanny.} 

As I was saying, the kidlets now have a band.  The first band argument was over the band name (Crossrockers).  I laughed to myself when they told me because it sounds like a group of rockin’ crossdressers.  Kids are a riot.  The second argument tied into a toy fight over a walkie talkie.  When Miss Moodle wouldn’t give it up, they tossed her out of the band for being a bratty sister.  She’s still whining about it.  Tho they let her play on some ’songs’, she’s not officially in the band.  At five years old, she’s devastated by this.  They have spent about 8 hours over the past two days ‘rehearsing’ all over the house.  They made a drum kit from miscellaneous pillows and Lincoln logs.  They dragged out all the kiddie keyboards we own, the child size acoustic guitar, and are also using the piano.  Well, at least they’re determined and making fabulous use of a crappy, rainy weekend.  I cannot believe the amount of time they’re spending practicing.  Why don’t they practice like that for their piano lessons?? 

The pinnace of our most rockin’ weekend was seeing a real rock show, small town Iowa style.  My brother in law

 

is in this band and we hadn’t seen them play before.  It was about what I expected, a bunch of 50 yr old guys doing mostly bad 80’s tunes.  Though it wasn’t my cup of tea, I gotta say how good they were.  For a bunch of geezers, they were great.  I’ve never heard a band sound so much like Steely Dan, Foreigner, and The Doobie Brothers.  Sheesh. 

The stinker was that after all the rockin of their own the kids had done, once we got there all they wanted to do was play with other kids they knew and then complain about how bored they were.  DH and I agreed that a babysitter is order for the next rockin’ outing. 

The really funsy part was that the show was on the site of our local Harley shop and we wandered around drooling over bikes.  DH wants one someday, I’m not so sure as I know I couldn’t knit on it, therefore what’s the point?  I’d probably pop a tire with a knitting needle and never hear the end of it.  Or picture this: my sock dangling from behind the bike at 50 mph while the rest of the yarn is wrapped tightly around my neck.  Death by sock knitting.  I told him I’d go for a bike if he got me an enclosed side car.  But I suppose that’d take all the fun out of the entire thing.  No wind in my hair, no bugs in my teeth.  But oh the places we’d go and the socks I could knit!

Smoothie Friday

I have nothing witty or clever to blab about today because my head is swimming from the start of the school year and all it entails. To celebrate the start of school I offer up this new yummy smoothie recipe (from this book ) which we enjoyed after school today. 

Batido Lindo

 1 1/2 C. strawberries (i used frozen), 1 C. sweetened condensed milk, 12 ice cubes, 2 T. Key Lime juice (could use lemon, or regular lime, fresh or bottled), 1 banana (my addition) blend and enjoy.  And after I realized how great it was I splashed some Captain Morgan’s Spiced Rum in mine (when kidlets weren’t lookin ‘acourse) and Yowza! It was so rockin! Enjoy!!

FOAD Thursday

 (Haven’t heard of FOAD Thursdays??)

As an independent Creative Memories consultant I will probably lose my sapphire Cadillac for posting this.  There’s the disclaimer.  (It’s also a joke.  I’m on the bottom rung, no caddy in my present or future.)

I love CM products.  I will continue to use them forevermore, even if I quit as a consultant.  They are absolutely the best scrapbooking products on the market, hands down.  They are the Lexus in their field and they stand behind their products.  I have no beef about the quality, price, etc.  My beef is this: as a consultant I am required to purchase a certain amount of product to remain an active consultant.  I understand the reasoning behind it – I’m sure it boosts their sales and it makes their sales predictable for their bean counters.  Also, they want consultants selling for them who are really selling, not working it as a hobby.   I get all that. 

The amount I’m required to order is $500 (retail amount) four times per year.  Most times I can do it easily with orders from customers.  But summertime is a total bitch.  No one is thinking about their photos in the summer.  No one is thinking about Christmas album gifts.  No one wants to sit at a crop when it’s lovely outside. No one even wants to hear from me during the summer when I do customer calls.  I don’t even want to think CM in the summer.  Why the hell do I do this to myself???

For about 8 months this CM gig has become a total chore.  I’m sick of the ordering, sick of the crops, sick of the customers whining at me because I’m not doing enough, sick, sick, sick.  My higher up advised I spend time just working on my own album to get inspired again.  I can’t seem to find my way to my scrap table for all the yarn in my life.  My first love is knitting, what can I say? 

I used to love being a consultant and helping people with their projects and I’m having trouble grasping the idea of quitting.  Every time I’ve thought of quitting in the past and haven’t I’ve been so glad that I stuck it out and did not quit.  Will I feel that way again?  I started this post as a FOAD toward CM for their policy.  It’s really about this big annoying thing in my life I am not willing to put time into anymore.  I have to make a decision I do not want to make.  There are a couple complicating factors involved I haven’t mentioned involving another higher up.  I feel I would be letting her down by quitting.  We agreed to work on some projects together and now I’m considering quitting.  I suppose she’d get over it.  Also, a recent event has caused me to have a different “up-line” (person directly above me in the business).  She’s ultra motivating and very good at her job, and a good person.  I’ve wished for this for years and now it’s happened.  I hate to quit now before I can even enjoy it! But if I ever regret it I could sign up again under her and nothing would be lost.

I’ve put out a plea and a bribe for free product to my loyal customers that will hopefully bring in some orders.  I have to have the order placed before Sept. 1 or I’m automatically de-activated.  I absolutely refuse to order product without the orders behind it.  I have a small inventory already and don’t wish to add to it.  So if I don’t get the orders I guess I’m hanging it up.  I have no choice.  Creative Memories is a wonderful Christian company with a great mission.  I’ve helped countless women create priceless albums from shoeboxes of photos.   I’ve met many wonderful women because of CM and I’ve created a dozen albums and learned family history I never would have without our family CM crops.  But maybe it’s time to move on.  Why are these decisions so difficult?  (Because my mother told me as a child that it’s not good to be a ‘quitter’.  I’ll never forgive her for that.  When all else fails, blame mother.)

A very wise woman told me once when I was stressing about having people over to my messy home, “Life is about relationships.”  I remind myself of that every time I’m planning a gathering or when I’m feeling stressed about stupid things.  It’s a simple phrase, but it helps me focus.  My CM business isn’t adding huge income to my life.  It is providing a discount on product but I’m quite certain I have enough product for my personal needs to last through the decade.  I want to focus on the people in my life, not cluttery stuff I feel obliged to do.

I’ve stressed over this business enough and am exhausted. Put a fork in me, I’m done.

WTF Wednesday!

Can someone please tell me where the summer went?  I’m sure it was the day before yesterday I started this blog the week school let out.  I was whining profusely that my kidlets would be testing my sanity this summer and worried I wouldn’t survive.  Now it’s done.  I lived to tell about it and they’re back to school day after tomorrow.  School supplies are bought, clothes and shoes are purchased.  Kids were in bed by 8:30 tonight in preparation of getting up for school by 7:30.   And btw, it gets dark so entirely EARLY now!  I can’t see to knit on my porch.  Which could be good because the neighbors can’t see me drinking beer and fumbling with yarn. 

In other WTF news: can anyone out there believe I’m employed???  How weird is that?  Someone is actually giving me money to sit on my bum and talk to people.  And when the person I’m supposed to be talking to doesn’t show up, my boss said it’s perfectly okay to read a book, or do whatever I choose (i.e. knit).  And when my kids need me?  I LEAVE to take care of them.  The very coolest part: my boss and everyone else in the department does the same thing.  Is this country great or what?  It’s quite possible I’ve found the perfect job.

Role Reversal

Today is my first day of work.  I’ve been dreading it.  Yes, it’s a good thing overall, and I’m dealing with it.  Nuff of that. So here’s the kicker.  DH is with the kidlets today and I’m strutting off to work.  How bizarre is that?  After 11 years of the other way around!  I feel a bit guilty; the house is a wreck from my migraine yesterday.  Hopefully when I get home it won’t be.  (insert canned sitcom laughter here) 

Today I woke up with backlash of yesterday’s migraine.  Hard to decide if I need a pill or not.  I have to evaluate carefully as insurance only pays for 6 per month.  I pay $35 per 6 but regular price is $144 if have to buy more than 6.  Dear drug manufacturers: please make generic relpax and imitrix, thankyou.  No, there’s no guarantee that it won’t make me ill as the generic allegra did, but I’m willing to give it a try.

Gotta dash, I’m a working girl now.  Whadda ya think I can just spend my whole day bloggin’ like a loser?  Gotta chase that paycheck.  Wish me luck!

Sweet Anticipation

On Saturday I got my elann baby silk yarn.  It surpassed my expectations by leaps and bounds.  I was regretting my Moroccan olive color choice but when it arrived it was the most gorgeous, deepest olive I’ve ever seen.  And the alpaca/silk combination is so wonderful to the touch.  Now if the damned needles would arrive I’d get down to business of making myself a shawl.  I’m still doubting my chart-reading abilities but I’m determined and since I found the Icarus knitalong at Fiber Fool’s blog I feel much better.  It’s a collection of photos and comments from knitters who have finished Icarus.  

As I type this my boys are out on the driveway with a magnifying glass trying to burn the world.  They have strict rules not to burn each other or living things.  I freak when I hear of them killing things, not because I’m an animal lover but  because the statistics scare me.  It’s something like 147% of people who enjoyed killing things as children grow up to be mass murderers.  I’ve got my hands full as it is with normal children, I don’t need the agony of prison visits and lawyer bills.  And besides, killing things isn’t nice. 

The neighbor’s granddaughter Ashley just ran over to play with Miss Moodle.  They’re the same age, but she is always putting little Miss up to things and stirring up trouble.  Two months ago they were playing in the backyard and the boys were out with them.  My oldest comes in and says that Miss Moodle is cursing.  I went out and after getting denial after denial I asked Ashley’s 9 yr. old older brother to come and explain what he heard.  He said he heard bad words from her mouth. I said, “repeat them.”  He said, without missing a beat, ”Fuckyoubitchasshole.”  I nearly fell over with shock.  I said, “We don’t use those words in our house and I don’t think she even knows those words. Does your sister know those words?”  He said, “Yes, our dad says them all the time.”  AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!  This is why is parenting is so hard!  So I went out and gave a group mini-lecture on profanity and that it’s unacceptable in our house and yard.  And since it was only a visiting child and no parentage/grandparentage were around, that was all I could do.  The grandmother wandered over toward the end of my lecture and I glossed it all over.  I knew she wouldn’t believe it came from Ashley’s mouth and I wasn’t about to repeat the evil curse words to this sweet grandmother.  Now when Ashley’s over I make myself more visible.  She’s fine when I’m around, and sneaky when I’m not.  The part that totally peeved me is that Miss Moodle didn’t know what she said was bad and until then she’d never heard those words.  So she got in trouble because her friend put her up to it and she didn’t have a clue what was going on.  My worry was that she’d start using these new exciting words, but apparently my freaking out was enough to let her know that wasn’t a good idea. 

I know my old college friend is probably laughing herself silly reading this since we never missed a day without using some combination of all the above mentioned curse words.  Children are truly little sponges and I was sure if they heard those words at home they’d haunt me with them at church and the grocery store, and worse, school!  Don’t let anyone fool you, parenting is the hardest job in the world, and I’m not even to the really hard part yet.  I won’t have a teenager for two more years.  I can hardly wait.

Foiled Again

I had a swell post done and ready to post.  I hit the ’save and continue editing’ button and for some reason I said ‘no’ instead of hitting the ‘back’ key when prompted ‘do you really want to edit this?’ and POOF, all was gone forever.  Does anyone else hate the new changes to wordpress?  No matter whether I say yes or no to their prompt it sometimes sends my post to an irretrievable place.  Yet sometimes it works fine.  I cannot figure it out.  I refuse to attempt to recreate my incredibly clever post.  You’ll just have to believe me that it was my best one ever.  Sorry you missed it.

Chop Suey Friday

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Okay, Since I missed WTF Wednesday, , and in honor of  I offer up this ugly pick-up truck that we apparantly now own.

Though we discussed finances just last night DH thinks we need a fourth vehicle for our family of two drivers.  Did I mention he didn’t discuss it with me first?  He didn’t.  I clearly remember only two of the many words I said to him: “Spinning. Wheel.”  Peeps, I tell ya, marriage is a tricky thing, like walking a tight rope while holding on to two pissed off pit bulls.  I’m basically over being a bitch about it, but I have no more guilt about the wheel.  As soon as I have the money, that baby is mine.  Guilt no more.