Aren't baby ducks so dang cute that you could just pop them in your mouth?

I think I am officially old. (No comments from the peanut gallery, thank-you.) I would rather go hang out with my sister and have a "nice dinner" than go to a Dead show. The seats are "eh". There's that whole pesky "Dead Jerry" issue. And I'm tired. I'd rather just shoot the breeze with my sibling. A Dead show is a whole event. I have a birthday party for a 5 yr. old that morning. I think that's all the event I can take nowadays.Plus, there's not nearly enough time between now and then to fully grow-out my armpit hair and I have standards to uphold. I can't go bursting back onto the scene like a novice, you know.

That smell-I love it. The smell of outside, the smell of dirt and grass and flowers and air heavy with moisture. It feels so fresh and clean, it feels like towels rough from drying on the clothesline, it feels like the sunroof open and a good tune playing on a  winding country  back road. It feels like lying on a sheet in the front yard with my sister in the middle of the night, trying to escape the heat of the house, watching the bats' graceful swoop amongst the  insects  dancing in the street light. It smells like birdsong and the distant rumble of trucks and the warm air being pushed grudgingly by a fan.

 Around 5 pm, I shall loathe the heat with every fiber of my being, but with the morning dew still sparkling on the lawn, it is delicious.

Overnight my seedlings have been reaching towards the window like gangly adolescents, like rearing king cobras ready to strike. It seems as if I sit here long enough,if I am very very still, i will witness the turning of their heads to best catch the rays of the sun.

"What happens in the garden stays in the garden"--AP

All of my friends have their They Might Be Giants "birdhouse in my soul". 

Once upon a round robin flurry of e-mails, my brilliant friend S tossed out the idea of communal gardening. Everyone in our circle is planting a garden this year. We all have little kids who are only interested in gardening for 11 minutes or until a butterfly flutters through their field of vision. And we all gather together at least once a week. Why not join forces and tools and help a sista out?

And I will tell you what, it has been pretty darn fun. When there are that many hands and that much laughing and gabbing going on, suddenly all the weeds are pulled and the ground is cleared and it's time for lunch. 

Today my nose is sunburnt and my back is sore, but my heart is full.

 

Three minutes of complaints

Today marks day six of antibiotics, day nine of fever, aka day nine of feeling like ass. My doctor thinks I should wait it out a couple more days. Not exactly sure for what I am waiting. I guess I'll know when it happens. It's not like I've ever had a sinus infection before, so it's not like I know when an antibiotic is working. Is it time for the sinus surgery? Ugh. Probably. I am juggling working from home with my sahm work. I only slept four hours last night. My dog pees on her bed the minute I place it, freshly washed , upon the floor. I am congested to the point that I have to keep reminding myself to breathe because it's easier to hold my breath. Oh, and my new prescription from the eye doctor is off, so I have the choice of squinting or seeing through a tunnel. Good thing I'm not staring at a computer or looking things up in the 17 reference books piled amongst my Kleenex,coffee mugs, unwritten thank-you notes, germinating seedlings, and Star Wars coloring books. Oh, except that I am!

Damn you, Derek Zoolander!

Mort just asked me which belly I was in when I was a baby.

I am fairly certain that it is in the contract of the trash men (I'm not being politically incorrect. Our trash people happen to be men. I'm not saying they couldn't be women. In our house, for instance, the trash person is female 50 percent of the time.) to leave the lid open if it's a rainy day. "It's raining, Hugh! Don't forget to keep that lid up or else that trash can will not fill with water and keep us chuckling the rest of the day!" 

I don't know how closely you follow celebrity news, but I heard perhaps the single greatest thing ever on the radio the other day. I believe I was driving home from the eye doctor. Anyway, Woody Harrelson (He was on Cheers. I'm pretty sure he played someone named Woody.) attacked someone who took his picture. And his rationale for attacking the person was that he thought the photographer was a zombie. I mean, seriously, you would have to forgive someone if that was their excuse. And think of all the occasions on which you could use it! All of the following problems could be solved by replying, "I'm sorry, I thought you were a zombie." Excuse me, I was next in line! Our newspaper wasn't delivered this morning. You left the lid open on the trash can in the pouring rain!

sinusitis fever

am editing anyway

i like getting paid

p.s. obviously too feverish to be able to properly count syllables

I'm not Andy Rooney, I just play him on TV

I have so many plants and seedlings on my window sills in everything from proper containers to salsa bowls to Dixie cups that my house looks like a second grade classroom.

I don't know why people seem to think bluebirds are so rare. Our yard is littered with 'em.

Have you ever been thanked for something you've done but didn't do for that person? Say, bought whole wheat tortillas for a dinner you were making, for instance , but were thanked as though you had bought them for someone's lunch? Is it best to just smile and nod?

Sometimes I renew my library books because I'm too lazy to return them.

My eyesight has reached the point where there is just no seeing that bedside clock, no matter how hard I squint.

I like to eat less dinner so that I can have more dessert.

I had a nightmare about working in retail. Although at least nowdays there's no such thing as customer service. 

I try on heels all the time.I wore them  consistently for so long that wearing flat shoes used to cause me to trip and make my legs and feet hurt.  I thought I would return to them when Jay was too big to carry and my back didn't cause me such grief. But now I am a sucker for comfort and even the best 4 inch heel in the world can't compete with Birkenstocks. It's like wearing make-up. Now that I've reached an age where I  really,truly, no getting around it, look better with it than without, I really can't be bothered to wear it. My mom used to tell me I didn't need to wear all that make-up. And surprise, surprise, she was right again.

Did you ever see the episode of South Park where it is revealed that Earth is just a reality show? Our world is comprised of creatures that have been plucked from their respective planets all over the universe and thrown together for the amusement and viewing pleasure of a dominant alien species. Some days, that explanation is the only one that makes any sense.

I feel compelled to remove the 927 weeds that have hijacked my garden, despite the fact that I will need to wear my ski jacket and snow pants to do so. Okay, it's not actually snowing today. But it did snow yesterday.

I had hoped for a brief spell that the weeds were really some unknown vegetable I had planted, but as they are all over the garden and in spots that I have not yet planted, I guess I need to let that thought go. Aside from the weeds, things seem to be steadily progressing in GardenWorld. Arugula is up. Broccoli rabe is up. Spinach is up. Strawberries are growing. My housebound plants are making progress: four tomato plants, two jalapeno plants and three yellow pepper plants.

This whole growing thing just doesn't get old. Each little shoot of unfurling green is as thrilling as the one before it. It's a good spot to focus my hope. Especially as there is seemingly no rhyme or reason to it. They all have the same soil, the same amount of sunlight, the same amount of water. Who is to say why four tomato plants are reaching for the sky while six remain locked in the dirt?

I hope that when the Easter Bunny arrives, it is unable to sneak under the staked fence barricade in the garden over which Mortslaved. I am fairly certain that everything within that fence is frozen at this point, but you never know. And while I have little doubt that the Eater (ha! I meant to type Easter, but instead I typed Eater. That, my friends, is a good 'ol Freudian slip.) Bunny could chew its way through the fence, I do not think it would have time to chew a hole large enough for its basket of goodies. I also hope that it is not 31 degrees on Easter. Because that will probably make it chilly for the Easter egg hunt I have planned. Oh, I'll be fine, because I can watch from the window. But it might be tricky for Mort. Especially as I have already put away the winter coats.

Well, I am not going to lie. Things have been a little crazy around here. Or I've been a little crazy around here. Either/or. Take your pick. I won't be offended.

I tried to cram in a week's worth of stuff into yesterday. Why? Yeah, I don't really know. Probably because I spent the earlier part of the week mindlessly washing the kitchen floor over and over again in a vain attempt to eradicate the sticky spots that emerged post-Monday dinner. Oh, and I was able to sucker Mort into gardening with me by pretending I didn't want him to. I can't believe I didn't think of that earlier! Lately our conversations have been a broken record:

Me, "Want to work in the garden with me?"

Mort, "No."

Me, "Please?"

Mort, "No, thank-you."

Me, "C'mon, it will be fun!"

Mort, "No thanks."

Me, "Well, you have to come outside because it's a nice day and you need fresh air and you aren't sitting inside all day and I'm going outside and so are you."

However, this week I have merely pulled on my Wellies and announced, "I''ll be in the garden if you need anything."

Darn if I barely unearth my trowel before he marches outside with his Wellies and gardening tools announcing that he came to help. And help he does! He pulls weeds and digs holes and pounds in fence stakes and spreads seeds and looks for any gaps where the rabbits might slip in and then he goes and plays with his friends. Win/win.

And my yellow peppers are up! Things are really trucking along.

What was my point? Oh, yes, so yesterday I tried to get going on preliminary plans for two bridal showers, send out the invitations to Mort's birthday party, buy all the ingredients for Duke's birthday dinner and cake, wash eight loads of laundry, wash the dog (third time this week, but I'll get to that in a minute), clean the bathrooms, organize Mort's stuff for consignment, schedule Mort's physical, look at houses for our annual mommy beach week, seek out a new safe-for -Earth-humans-and-pets floor cleaner since the kitchen floor was still sticky(Ecover Floor Soap did the trick!) and make a complicated dinner that I will not again make. If something has that many steps, it should be super good. But it was only okay. Yeah.

So, Stella. Oh, Stella. Stella has been suffering from some type of allergy for at least six months at this point. Probably longer. It feels like longer. We have been to the vet so often they now know our voice on the telephone. Just like the pizza place. The vet has been through many trial and tribulations over the ill-bred mess that is Stella, but this one has really taken the cake. He finally decided to go to our last resort : a round of steroids. He was trying to avoid this as it would trigger one of her other issues we had finally cleared--her leaky bladder. And I am not exaggerating when I say I have been scrubbing the carpet at least 20 times a day. Not including the scrubbing M does.

One of my friends suggested doggie diapers. They are eco-friendly ones that you just wash. Aren't friends wonderful? My hands were starting to cramp between all the scrubbing and gardening. And God love that little dog, because she did submit to wearing them. She was fairly horrified, but she did it. However, she was

laying on M's legs later that evening and peed all over him. But, it was worth a try. And it's not like she peed on me. Another unfortunate side effect of her steroid use is Stella's insatiable appetite. I do believe I was just singing her praises about how great she is around food that is not hers. Now she has become a bottomless pit. Yesterday she tried to choke down the crust from Mort's pb &j that was ON HIS PLATE. ON THE TABLE. She refused to give-up even when I caught her. Luckily, her sheer greed in attempting to swallow it whole without chewing gave me the time to yank it from her mouth. Later on, she was quicker and snatched and swallowed an entire organic turkey sandwich on whole wheat. I mean, the dog is nine years old and she has never even sniffed hopefully around our people food. Duke is convinced it's some type of roid rage. Maybe she's eating to ease the shame of the diaper.

And Duke had an excellent point regarding Madonna's failed adoption attempt. If you are a child who will be raised in an orphanage, how pissed will you be upon learning that one of the wealthiest women in the world wanted to adopt you and make you her heir and someone decided stamp a big red "NO" on that? Granted you can't watch television if you're one of Madonna's kids. But you could probably get some pretty decent meals and learn yoga. And have access to clean water. I'm just sayin'.

I see that Japan has plans for a robot to walk on the moon. Can we maybe get cracking on that library book returning robot I'm hoping for?

Being privy to all these blots of green emerging from hibernation just does my soul good. It's so darn exciting. The arugula is up, the roma tomatoes have sprouted, the magnolia is moments away from unfurling its petals. The strawberries with which I blindly stumbled and dismissed as an error on the trial and error part of gardening appear determined to prove me wrong, are sending out runners and making their way through the wet earth. I never cease to be amazed at the miracles of Spring.

Movie Review Monday on Wednesday

I did not like Marley & Me , Sam I am. I love dogs. I like Jennifer Aniston. I like Owen Wilson. I did not get the hoopla over this movie.

The main problem was THERE WAS NO PLOT. There was no actual story being unfolded. It was not the tale of a marriage. It was not the tale of a boy and his dog. So in order to make up for the whole lack of reason to make this movie, the viewer is made to watch two bumbling idiots who have no business being a dog's human pals. Who fail on their whole use of birth control, not once, but twice. Who somehow manage to buy a crazy five or six million dollar estate outside of Philadelphia on a reporter's salary where it is ALWAYS fall. Except for one perfect snowy day. And then it's fall again. And then there's a montage of scenes with the 72 yellow labs who look nothing like each other that played Marley. Yep, that about sums it up.

That whole adage of there are no bad dogs, only bad owners? Yeah, I buy into that. I'm sure that there are cases where genetics prevail and there are canines who have dismal personalities. In fact, I have lived with a couple. Mookie, I'm thinking of you. But for the most part, if a dog is a jerk, it's because its people aren't giving it what it needs.

Dogs can be trained. Dogs want to be a part of the pack. It is not always easy. It takes time and endless repetition. Dogs need exercise. Dogs need consistency. Dogs need proper outlets for their desire to chew. Dogs need attention and stimulation. I do not have a perfect dog. She isn't one of those amazing creatures who does my bidding at the smallest twitch of my pinkie or who knows to never leave my side. She is convinced the UPS man is a serial killer that only she can outwit. She has a thyroid condition and more allergies than I. She has a weak bladder. She like to roll in dead stuff. She likes to bark and is in constant fight or flight mode.

However, she is a truly great dog. We very rarely have to kennel her because she is so well-behaved that she is welcome in everyone's home. She is housebroken (and we make certain to take her out like clockwork). She does not jump on the furniture (and we always bring her bed with us wherever we go). She does not chew inappropriate items (and we always have a nylabone on hand for her to gnaw). She comes when she is called and knows to sit, stay, shake, roll over and play dead (and that took two separate rounds of training sessions with a trainer--Puppy Kindergarten and Basic Manners-- and 30 minutes of practice time per day for weeks on end). She is gentle with children(and we make damn sure children are respectful of her). She doesn't get bored and trash the house (and we make sure she has daily exercise). She doesn't snatch food from the table or beg when we eat(and we never feed her table scraps.) Honest, I do have an actual point.

None of these are occurrences that happen in Marley & Me. The dog is a terror. Because its humans are sucky dog friends. And what's more, no other sides to the dog are shown. There are a couple mentions and/or scenes where the dog has his head in a human lap, but there is nothing given to the viewer to find the dog endearing despite its lack of training.

I may be the only person who saw this movie and didn't find it heartwrenching. Yes, I cried A LITTLE. But I also cry if someone flashes their lights at me on the road to warn me of a speedtrap. The fact that I shed only three stingy tears is proof that the movie was a dud. The End.