Calvin asks, "Have you been naughty or nice?"

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It's That Kind of Day

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Only Tomatoes in the Academic Sense

Would someone please explain to me why, when fresh, local tomatoes are in season and taste amazing any restaurant would use, to quote Garrison Keillor, "those tomatoes they strip mine down in Texas" (see the pitiful white slice, which I removed from a grilled chicken sandwich from Wendy's) rather than a real tomato (see the red slices from one of my garden tomatoes which I used to replace the aforementioned imitation tomato slice)?

I call that very feeble.

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Shipping Sins

When I was in 7th grade science class we did a project called the Egg Drop, in which each student had to independently design and create some sort of packaging that would protect a raw egg from breaking when dropped from the top of the bleachers onto the hard gym floor. You were graded first on whether or not your egg broke, but you also got more points the smaller your packaging was. I remember mine was part of a large sponge that I had sliced in half and out of which I carved a snug place for my egg. The whole sponge was then put inside a box and taped shut. I think I got an A on that project.

Some time after that activity we did the Naked Egg Drop, in which you dropped your egg into or onto something that cushioned the fall. Again, points were awarded for how small your target was, and from the top of the bleachers it was not always easy to judge if you were on the mark. I think my cushion was my mom's largest Tupperware bowl filled with Ziploc bags full of water. And I'm pretty sure my egg broke that time. I seem to recall it hitting the rim of the bowl.

Today I think of the Egg Drop project when I see the way things are packaged for shipping. Case in point: the Chumby.

A Chumby is a wireless internet media device we recently purchased to easily enjoy Pandora Radio in any room of the house, along with many, many other apps, like weather reports, photo slideshows from Flickr and Picasa, Facebook, daily Bible verses, Spanish word of the day, This Day in History, etc. We mainly got it for the many internet radio stations, podcasts, and Pandora. I love being able to listen to my customized radio stations in any room easily without using my laptop. So I'm a big fan of the Chumby.

I'm not a big fan of how this little device was packaged for shipping. The shipping folks got the protection factor right, as our Chumby came to us in full working order. But I give them an F minus on the size factor.

The device is about the size of my fist and yet our son could fit in that box. And what was filling in the blank space in the box? Biogdegradable cardboard? Bags of air?

No.

Polystyrene. That will never decompose.

Idiots.

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An Eventful Weekend

Where to start . . .

I was going to do a series of blog posts on my Friday visit to Greenfield Village, but Saturday I was watching my son most of the day and didn't feel like blogging. The sun was shining and we wanted to get outside. Then Sunday we had a most eventful day. In a bad way.

It started when my son threw up all over himself and the pew we were sitting in at church. Luckily Grandma and Grandpa were there and I rushed off to get towels while Grandma took Calvin to get him cleaned up. His clothes were soaked. Miraculously, Grandma's clothes were unscathed despite the fact that Calvin had been on her lap when it happened.

I had no change of clothes for him, so I was just going to call it a morning and take him and Grandma back to the house to get him changed. We were about to pull out of the parking lot when Grandpa and a friend of mine ran up to the car and said that Zach had just collapsed at the pulpit while he was preaching. We rushed back in and were followed by firemen from the station across the street. We moved Zach (well, he moved himself with help as he was again conscious) away from the congregation's eyes and the medics gave him oxygen and questioned him. From what we can figure out, he was simply ill and should have been home in bed.

So, once everyone was fairly stable and another friend had returned from my house with new clothes for poor Calvin (who was sitting in his pull-up this entire time) I drove off with Zach and Calvin while Grandma and Grandpa followed. We had gotten about a third of the way home when Calvin projectile vomited and we had to pull over and clean him and the car up. We managed to get home without further incident, but Calvin remained sick, throwing up about every 20-30 minutes for the next five hours. His stomach finally settled down enough to have some Pedialyte and go to bed.

Zach also seemed to improve during the day, though even today he still feels foggy. Today the boy was back to normal and I guess whatever he had, he's over it. If Dad is suffering from the same thing, I think I can officially say that we have entered that phase of life where we just don't bounce back like we used to when we were kids.

I don't know how I would have held up on Sunday if it was just me and both my boys were in such dire straits. I'm so very thankful that Zach's parents happened to be visiting that day (though, it was a less than stellar visit, as you can imagine). They cleaned up puke, emptied buckets, gathered dirty towels, offered good medical advice (Zach's mother is an RN), and kept a cheerful attitude durng the whole ordeal.

So, later this week I'll post about Greenfield Village and how the kitchen garden project is coming (hint: it's going to be awesome!) and someday I'll get around to some sewing posts again. It's just gotten to that busy outdoor time of year and sewing is sort of on the back burner. Oh, plus Calvin's 3rd birthday party is Saturday and the next day I'm starting a pretty intense diet. So lots going on and lots to share in the next couple weeks.

Sorry no photos for this post. But trust me. You wouldn't have wanted to see what I saw.

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Short Hair

If you've known me long or read this blog for any length of time you know that I sport many different lengths of hair. I've never settled on a forever style like some people seem to. I love to mix it up. And there's a certain point at which I feel I must get a haircut. That point is usually when my hair reaches my shoulders and can be put in a pony tail. Then it must go.

When I have longer hair, I always see women with short hair and think "That's so cute!" and when I have short hair I see women with long wavy hair and I think "That's so cute!" and so I cut it off or grow it out. But I really do realize that I look better with short hair. And my husband loves me with short hair. And short hair is easy.

So, my hair is short. No more falling in my face when I'm bent over gardening or washing my face. No more brushing. And drying will take all of one minute.

Do you tend to stick with one hairstyle? Or are you as schizophrenic as I am?

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The Literate Lutherans

A few weeks ago I was talking to my mother on the phone when she told me that the wife of my former pastor asked her to be on her spelling bee team. I laughed out loud, partially at the idea of an adult spelling bee, but mostly because I know my mom.

"I told her I was in remedial reading in high school," my mom said, "but she said that didn't matter."

Somehow Tracy convinced my mother to join her and another woman from their church (Linda) in this venture, which I later found out was an event to benefit the Literacy Council of Bay City. Their team, the Literate Lutherans (can you get more Lake Wobegon?), had never lost this event (granted, it's only run for a few years).

I decided during that phone call that I had to go to see this momentous occasion, my mother spelling words on a stage. Imagine my disappointment when I found that only one person on the team actually spells a word at any given time, and that the honor did not have to rotate among team members. So the teams pick the person who does the best job spelling out loud (which is harder than it sounds) and that person could be the only one who speaks.

The event was held at the State Theatre, which was recently renovated to look more like it did in the 1930s, is decorated as that decade's vision of what a Mayan temple looked like. Read a very short history of the theatre here.

Before it started, the spellers and attendees had great hors d'oeuvres (that word was not on the list of words to be spelled) that included a yummy satay (also not on the list). It was a light crowd, which is too bad since it was a benefit. But it was a fun time nonetheless (also not on the list).

Here Linda, Tracy, and Donna (Mom) confer about the rules before going up onto the stage.

So serious and studious-looking, aren't they? But is was actually a lighthearted event. The judges were funny and charming and the other teams were not overly serious either.

You can tell by the way these women sit on stage that they grew up going to church. Their knees are together, their hands are folded demurely (not on the list), their chins are held up, and they are paying close attention. No fidgeting. After a practice round in which the words related to the organizations that the teams represented (pastor, return, smiling, interest), the real list began. And the words were easier than I'd anticipated (though I suppose they would be easy during the first few rounds).

Here's the list of words they got through before a winner was declared:

cherub
horizon
marine
privacy
stinger
tremor
wobble (at which the first disqualification occurred because the women spelled it "wabble")
carom (at which the Literate Lutherans were out because none of them knew the word, perhaps none of them had heard the word [at least, that's what their stunned expressions would have indicated], which is more frequently used as a sports term than anything else)
unique
trilogy
wholly
gyrate
mustache (which I would have spelled wrong because I thought it was "moustache" but according to Merriam Webster, it is a varient, so perhaps they would have accepted it)
sieve
risque
wrangle
counterfeit (at which the third team was disqualified, accidentally spelling it "countrfeit")
coquette

The team called the Spell Binders won, which was nice because they'd apparently been runners up to the Literate Lutherans in the past few years. The whole contest took just 14 minutes (probably about the same length of time it took to explain the rules) becaue there were only four teams and two were disqualified one right after the other.

I hope they can publicize this event better next year so they can make more money and have more teams participating. It was fun even if it was short.

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