Generation Exhausted

Another Year Over

And a new one just begun. It was hopping here in the Haggert Home, as we enjoyed Chinese food with the two youngest children, and bonus - TWO grandfathers in attendance as the New Year crept in.  The evening's excitement also included a visit at Grandma's house and several Friends reruns. (oh, the joys of satellite TV)

Revelation today - I can no longer lift my middle child. However, she can lift me.  Does this make me old, or merely small?

I also spent part of the last day of the year in the return line at WalMart, along with 400 other people. Sadly, Funk Out Cade could not be exchanged for Funk Out Dylan, and we had to settle for Winter Wonderland Dana. However, the little one, after much thought, had decided to pool her Christmas and birthday money and spent $129 on the Bratz Bus.  Which is more than I spent on my first car, I think. Unlike my first car, the Bratz Bus has a working radio. And disco lights. And a Jacuzzi.

And oh look, my mother was right - it would have been cheaper to go across the river.

I repeat - my mother was right. What a way to start the year, eh?

No need for lectures about the Bratz - I agree, they're horrible looking, but they sure are keeping the child entertained.

So now I get to enjoy 24 or so laundry-free hours, because years ago, my great grandmother told me it was bad luck to do the wash on New Year's Day, and I believe her.

Perhaps I will spend my laundry-free time catching up on all the things I STILL HAVEN"T DONE.

But I bought a 2005 calendar, so now I can get organized.

Happy New Year everyone!

Time is running out

Couldn't I have one more day? Maybe two? Please?

In spite of the fact that it's Christmas break, and my children are HOME, I still wish I could have another day or two to do all the "catching up" I hoped to do. Because I didn't. Catch up. At all.

But next week - heck, next YEAR, for that matter - looms large, as I've already agreed to do the morning show on Monday, and have a school lunch day to arrange for the end of next week.  My work load for the holiday was so light I shouldn't have had any problem accomplishing it all, but there you go - the clock has run out.

I'll blame it on the head cold from hell. Hopefully, my thinking will have cleared enough by tomorrow that I can make a mad dash for the finish line, and get the most important things done.

Knocked on my a**

There was a time when I could power through a cold - go to work, school, whatever, and "tough it out."

That time has apparently passed. I struggled to sleep all night, slept all morning instead, and stayed in my jammies until 3 this afternoon. I am whiny, and want only chicken soup and Sunny D, plus my box of Kleenex with lotion. Perhaps tomorrow will be better.

I leave you with this darling little snow person, built by my own littlest darling, during the "mild spell" we had today. (three degrees above freezing, whoohoo!)

A milestone

Proving that Generation Xhausted has international appeal, the lovely Amber from AmberBamberBoo became my 1000th commentor last night.  Amber lives "across the pond" somewhere, Belgium, I think, but don't quote me on that.  I've been reading her blog for a while - she seems very sweet, and witty and fun. Go visit her!

And to answer Amber's question, the new John Grisham novel may not be "new", but it's one I hadn't read yet - The Last Juror.

And now, since I hab a code and a ruddy nose, I'b going to bed. (sniff)

You know what they say about good intentions

Since I am neither a postal worker, bank employee or government hack, I considered today a "work" day, the first day to begin execution of my Grand Plan To Not Piss Away The Entire Two Week Period Around Christmas. You see, it's pretty much a "down" time in the biz, and ideally, I should make the most of it by tending to maintenance-type stuff - filing, tieing up loose ends on projects, installing the new keyboard tray Santa brought me, etc.  But history has shown that when I've latched on to the idea that I have TWO WHOLE WEEKS, then I put things off and put things off, and get none of the things done that I wanted to get done. Hence the Grand Plan.

Plus, in the back of my mind is the thought that although it's horrible that I'm eight months late in filing a 2003 income tax return, it would be REALLY REALLY BAD if 2004 ended before I accomplished that. (no lectures please - I do a fine job of beating up on myself, no need for anyone to help out with that)

So Day One was designated Clean The Office day. I would empty drawers, I would turn piles into files, I would find a place for everything and put everything in its place.

But then the rest of the family went ice skating and left me all alone with a new John Grisham novel and a can of Lays Snak Stax and a box of Turtles. And Mappy, for when reading got tiresome. (Shelley's current high score - 84,940)

And, well, you can guess what happened. I got started way late in the day, and only finished the purging part of the process - filing will have to wait until tomorrow.  And that will be delayed while I make arrangements to have my van towed to the garage and examined to see why it got as far as the store parking lot and refused to take me home again. I suspect the alternator - I haven't owned a vehicle in my entire life that didn't need the alternator replaced at least once, and all the symptoms fit. The bright side is that it died today, several blocks from home instead of last weekend, several hundred miles from home.

Meanwhile, the New Year looms, and I have to finish taking care of the detritus of the Old. And I want to use my new keyboard tray!

Open for business...maybe

To those who tuned in yesterday hoping to find something new, I apologize. Between visits, presents, and food, the day was busy, and the tryptophan kicked in as soon as I sat down last night, allowing me a three hour nap before going to bed.

But I'm back!

Today is an official holiday here - Boxing Day. However, it is also a Sunday, and in the grand Canadian tradition of how to handle holidays that fall on weekends, this means that tomorrow is sort of a holiday too. Actually, since Christmas fell on a Saturday, some of the holiday closings last through Tuesday. So for the next 72 hours, we'll be playing the game of who's open/who's not/who's on reduced hours.

The mall is open, however, and I can only imagine the traffic. If you are out and about, and your kids didn't get one of these or one of these , go get one. Now.

I've had my digital camera two years, and can barely remember how the zoom works. My teen had her new digital camera ten minutes and had already figured out how to use the timer to do family pictures. Scoring 76,000 on Mappy while the kids struggled to accept that PacMan doesn't have a pause button made me feel pretty vindicated.

More family dinners today, but I slept very well in my new pajamas, so I'm ready for anything!

Merry Christmas to all...

...and to all, a good night. However you're spending this holiday season, best wishes to you and yours.  And tune in for sporadic Christmas Day posting - you can read blogs in between basting the turkey.

God bless!

Tales from the Mall

Braved the sudden winter weather today, and made my way to the Mall, to finish the Christmas shopping. Which I did. Finish. I'm done.

However, it seems the newspapers have failed to report The Great Men's Pajama Shortage Of 2004.  Seriously, if your man is a size medium (oh god, the Googles I'll get from that!) you might want to suggest he lose ten pounds or gain ten pounds over the holidays. I scoured the mall in search of sleep pants, or pajamas, to no avail.  Price was not the issue - there were, quite simply, 10,000 pairs of men's sleep SHORTS available, but no pants, size medium. This is Canada people - who wants sleep shorts in December?

No one, apparently, which is why there are 10,000 pairs available.  I finally found one pair of sleep pants, size medium, hiding on a rack. While waiting in line, no fewer than three women acosted me, demanding to know, "Where did you find those pajamas??" It's an epidemic. Here we all were, preparing for the snow by stocking up on bread and milk, when we should have been hoarding pajamas.

The crowds were lighter than usual, no doubt because we in Southwestern Ontario panic and go to ground when faced with six inches of snow.

So the shopping is done, and I plan to sleep in tomorrow, before beginning WrapFest 2004. Think good thoughts.

Trade off

My poor deprived children went behind my back and asked Some Other Mother if she would spend an afternoon baking cookies with them. So today, that's what they did.

And I feel not one shred of guilt for it, even though it's likely to earn me serious points in my quest for Mother of the Yearrrr.  You see, there are some things I do well, and some things I don't.

Baking, I don't. Especially when there are children in the vicinity. While others see cozy scenes of Mama and Little One measuring flour and sugar (and learning fractions as they go!) or imagine tiny hands carefully placing sprinkles just so, I see floors that will need major sweeping and every dish I own piled in the sink. Not to mention icing in the hair and hair in the batter. So I don't bake with my children. Luckily, other people are willing.

I create a mean Christmas newsletter though. That's the trade off. I believe in working to my strengths, don't you?

Last night and today, I went out to finish off the Christmas shopping. I will likely be finishing the Christmas shopping until Friday afternoon. For those of you just getting started, be warned that there are no men's pajamas in a size medium anywhere on the PLANET.  Also, that aisle full of Bratz dolls that was there last week? Empty.

And buying Tim Horton's gift certificates is going to be more difficult than getting a Tim Horton's chicken salad sandwich. I went to three Tims today before finding some. I only needed two books of $5, but when the girl said she only had four left, I bought them all, figuring maybe I could sell the extra on eBay or something.

Three more days!

The weekend that was winter

We're back from our adventure "up North." There are those who will scoff, since "up North" is still significantly south of most of the rest of the country, but for Banana Belt folks like us, it was north enough, thankyouverymuch.

Jesus god, it was cold. We set out Friday afternoon, and made good time, arriving in Winter in the early evening. It's odd to wake up the next morning and see snow-covered hills when your usual view is dead-grass flatland with nary a flake in sight. The kids had a blast playing in the snow at the cousins yesterday, and were looking forward to learning to cross-country ski today.

However...

This morning's news brought word of an impending deep freeze, and the trip across the parking lot for our morning Tim's brought tears to my eyes.  The Weather Channel was red screens all over the place, talking about snow squalls and whiteouts and windchills. Since I am not fond of cold, snow, OR highway driving, we decided to bolt while we could, and hit the highway a day early.

Ironically, the worst of the weather hit within two hours of home. I ended up between two snow plows, and couldn't see 20 feet in front of the van, so we abandoned the main freeway and headed for roads less travelled. Which meant, on the one hand, more snow, but no traffic.

I don't know about you, but if I'm in danger of sliding all over the road, I'd prefer to be the only car for miles.

And if you're one of the drivers that zips by at 30 km/h over the speed limit in those kind of conditions, well, I'll say a prayer for you. It's only a matter of time, I'm sure of it.

Then we passed that invisible shield at the county line that prevents real winter from encroaching, and the roads went from four inches of snow covering them to bare pavement. It's like one of those racing video games - I felt like I'd passed Level One and was being allowed to move on.

So, three days, a thousand kilometres, 40 cups of Tim's and way too many drive-thru meals, and we are home again, to sleep in our own beds. The nice thing about it is that no one expects us home until tomorrow night, so it should be an easy day.

Shh...don't tell anyone we're back.

And no, we did not come home early just so I could check my email.