Upgrading

So, it turns out that my car accident was mostly a blessing after all. State Farm paid for this lovely upgrade to my poor old Honda. It's 3 years newer, has 60,000 less miles, leather seats, sunroof, and is an EX model (top of the line). My old car was an LX which is the middle model (say "middle model" ten times really fast!) Now if I can just get them to forget about the rate hike . . .

Bye Bye Poor Honda

It's with a heavy heart that I said goodbye to my faithful Honda Accord last month. We almost made it to 200,000 miles. What you see here is the result of me rear-ending a Pathfinder with a U-haul bar on it. I had just changed lanes only to look up and see brake lights. The girl in the Pathfinder decided to suddenly stop for a light that had just turned yellow which gave my car a broken nose, black eye and smooshed insides. Her car was completely unscathed (of course) and I was the lucky winner of a "failure to stop within an assured distance" ticket and higher insurance rates. Yay. Happy Birthday to me.

My Ashlee

I love having a daughter. It has given me the chance to take a peek into what I might have been like growing up. Ashlee has such a great little personality and there are so many things I love about her. She's very sensitive to other people's feelings (and animals, too). The other day, I came downstairs and found her in the laundry room with Frankie. She had decided that he was bored and quickly provided him with entertainment and toys.


In this picture, she has put out her VideoNow player (in case Frankie wanted to watch a movie) and a rubber chicken and a toy helicopter, in case he'd like some toys to play with. It's all neatly placed on top of his dog chow bag for added convenience.


Here she has provided the poor bored puppy (who is supposed to be spending his time eating breakfast) with a very chic silver ribbon around his neck, a bouncy ball, and a tupperware lid full of an assortment of toys. One of the toys in the lid is a tiny little plastic armchair. Ashlee explained that Frankie needed some furniture to sit on.


She was very pleased with herself. And Frankie enjoyed the pampering (I think.) I love this sweet, adorable, kind, loving, dimpled little girl.

Parents Say the Darndest Things

A couple of nights ago, Ashlee was running around the living room on all fours. By 'all fours' I mean on both hands and both feet (not knees). She'll do this kind of thing often, especially if she is pretending to be some sort of animal, usually a dog. Well, this particular evening, we were all watching a movie together. Ashlee took off at full speed in her little animal way and decided that she wanted the light off. We kept telling her to turn it back on, but then she would turn it off again and laugh like we were playing a game. I kept telling her that she was a naughty monkey (especially since she looked so much like one.) As she ran back and forth, I would say, "OK, cheeky monkey, that's enough. Leave the light on please." After many episodes of turning off the light, I was starting to lose my patience. So I said, "I'm going to count to three and then I'm going to have to spank the . . ." I realized what I was saying just before I said "monkey."

The One That Started It All

A little addendum to my Making Up My Own Song post . . . today I was reminded how slow I can be sometimes. You know that old song by Genesis, Invisible Touch? It came on the radio today so I started singing along with it. There's a line in it that goes, "She seems to have an invisible touch yeah." Here is the line that I have sung for years, "She sees a hat and invisible touch it." I know. My version makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. It just added to my idea (while I was growing up, not now, of course) that most songs don't make much sense. Jere just shakes his head and tries to make himself believe that one day I will think these things through a bit more thoroughly . . .

I'm Almost a Runner

Today I had a breakthrough in my running. I finally did the first 8 minutes of my run without even breathing hard! This is a big accomplishment for me. For the past five weeks, I've been following a training program that teaches one how to run a 5K and every single run has been on the same level of torture as having my fingernails pulled off one by one. I know, I was grossly out of shape, but apparently, my sluggish body has finally achieved some stamina. I was so excited about it that I did the rest of my run around the neighborhood with a big grin on my face! Call me a big nerd, but at least I'm a big nerd who can RUN! Yippee!!

Making Up My Own Song!

I am terrible at learning the lyrics to songs. It's funny how long I can go with a lyric in my head that makes absolutely no sense to me, but I'll keep singing it that way until Jere looks at me and says, "What are you singing?" Like that U2 song called One there's a line that I thought said,"Have you come here to play cheeses?" In my strange little world, I just figured that there was a game in Ireland called Cheeses that I'd never heard of. Turns out (as Jere corrected me through fits of laughter) that it says, "Have you come here to play Jesus. . ." AND it makes even more sense with the next line which goes, ". . .to the lepers in your head?" So apparently, there's no Irish game called Cheeses. Go figure!

There's another song called Voices Carry by an eighties band called 'Til Tuesday (I only know the name of the band thanks to Google.) For as long as I can remember, I have always sang, "Oh hush. Keep it down now. This is scary." After Jere stopped laughing, he explained that it's, "Hush hush. Keep it down now. Voices carry." I was SO sure that my version was the correct one even after he told me what the words really are. My version kind of makes sense, but I guess it does make a little more sense with "voices carry." I still sing "this is scary." I just can't unwire my brain on that one.

Remember that show, The Jeffersons from forever ago with the Movin' on Up theme song? Well, this one really puzzles me because I could swear that the lady singing it says, "Well, we're movin' on up, to the top, to a deluxe apartment . . ." My sister Sarah and I have sung it this way since the beginning of time, therefore that's how everyone else should sing it. Both her husband and mine said that it's actually, "Well, we're movin' on up, to the east side, to a deluxe . . ." Say what??? We had a big argument over the correct words, girls against guys, and for the first time since Adam and Eve were thrown out of the Garden of Eden, we girls were . . . well, we were . . . ughhh! I just can't say it. OK, we were wrong. There I said it. But you have to admit, our way fits better and just plain makes more sense. So again, I'm hardwired to sing this one wrong. You can't teach an old dog new tricks.

Now this next line of lyrics from James Blunt's Tears and Rain I actually had gotten right for once. It goes, "All pleasure's the same, it just keeps me from trouble, Hides my true shape, like Dorian Gray." So whenever it came on, Jere and I couldn't figure out what the "Dorian Gray" part was all about. Jere thought it was the name of some English tea. At least that was an intelligent guess. I said that I thought it might be a specific shade of the color gray, like the color of the Dorian car on Back to the Future (wasn't it a silvery gray color?) There was a pause and then Jere laughed so hard I thought he'd wet his pants. He said, "Beck, it's called a De Lorean car!" Oh! Woops!

And just for your information, I found out that Dorian Gray is a character in a book by Oscar Wilde called The Picture of Dorian Gray. When you find out what the book is about, the lyric really works. Who knew that songwriters were so smart?