My landlord’s son advised us not to put our jack-o-lanterns out too soon in October because the squirrels in the neighborhood were known to attack them. I believe it – the squirrels in this area are some of the biggest, fattest squirrels I’ve ever seen. I totally believe that they would attack a pumpkin. I’ll bet they go down the street tipping over garbage cans on trash night too.

I wouldn’t be surprised if a gang of them ambushed a kid on the way home from the corner store for his or her junk food. Surely they can’t get so plump just eating acorns??

I’ve never seen a raccoon here but if they are around I’ll bet 1) the squirrels give them a run for their money and 2) the raccoons must be giants!

We have gray squirrels, red squirrels, and even a few black squirrels. But I looked out of my kitchen window yesterday and saw a squirrel like no other I’ve ever seen. Of course I had to get a picture.

Check out that red tail!

He was quite shy and it took me a while of standing very quietly to get his picture. Do you think the other squirrels tease him? Do squirrels have litters? I wonder if he has any brothers or sisters who have the same coloring or if he was the oddball? I haven’t seen any others with this coloring and I’m sure I would have noticed!

Mother Nature really does have a sense of humor.

I had to take my son to the doctor for a second time when he was since last month (where did January go, by the way??) We went to an urgent care facility because it was a weekend and ended up sitting in the waiting room for about an hour before we got in to see the doctor. Many other people were also waiting, including a young couple with a toddler. The toddler was not pleased by the waiting and was alternately running around and wailing. My son was watching the toddler and getting irritated by the crying. He made a few comments about the child and what he thought the parents ought to do, none of which were helpful or practical. Then he asked me “Where do babies come from anyway? I mean, do you just like get them randomly?”

I paused for a moment before I answered and in that short moment thought oh my god he wants to talk about that now and I want to tell him myself so he has good information and not whatever nonsense his friends might tell him but honestly I didn’t want to start that conversation at that time and place because I was sure that it would lead to more questions and possibly some strange faces. So, I calmly said, “I don’t really want to have that conversation here, in this waiting room.” He nodded, without protest, and then asked, “What’s your favorite food?” All that private panic because the boy was bored! (I haven’t heard a word about babies since.)

Over this weekend we had a family movie night and watched Freaky Friday with Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan (before she went nuts). The movie was cute and the kids enjoyed it. Afterwards, my daughter looked at me and said, “It would be easy being you – all I’d have to do is clean!” Um… I guess she hasn’t looked in that room full of boxes lately! If “all” I had to do was clean, that room wouldn’t look like that!

(I on the other hand wouldn’t go back to 6th grade for any amount of money – the girl drama this week has been insane and heart-wrenching to watch.)

Last night I made a stir fry for dinner and decided to try and entice my son into eating it (not his favorite dinner) by including fortune cookies at the end. We all chose our cookies and read our fortunes out loud. My daughter’s fortune was “You will soon discover your hidden talent.” My son looked at her and said, “You have a hidden talent?!?” The tone of his voice was so indignant, like she’d been keeping secrets from him.

In other news, the children have been such slobs in their “kid zone” downstairs, openly disregarding my absolutely no food downstairs rule that I took drastic action. After I had threatened to cancel the cable TV downstairs and then spent two hours cleaning up their space and still found food wrappers and bottles under the furniture and in the corners, I decided I could be sneaky too. I found their floor, organized all their things so they could actually find and use them, and then unplugged the cable wire and told them I’d cancelled service. They were fairly contrite and resigned when they came home from school and discovered the TV no longer worked. Their only question was for how long.

Frankly, they don’t seem to miss it much and I’m enjoying the silence. I might just cancel it for real. Having no TV has very effectively put a stop to the food smuggling too.

As much as I love yoga, I rarely do it at home on my own. I need a class to keep me going. When I was in Cairo, I even had an instructor who would send me texts if I missed a class! Going to class is great because 1) there is variety and feedback in a class that you don’t get from a DVD, 2) I work out for longer and do positions that I might avoid if I were working out alone, and 3) I always push myself harder in class.

A lot of people profess they love yoga because it’s so relaxing, and it is. I’ll admit that I go to yoga class and compete with the others in class.

I know it’s not a very yogic attitude, but I want to be the best yogi in the room. I am not always the most flexible because of my lower back issues, but I want to be the strongest, hold my balance the longest, and do the most challenging of the pose options available. My approach does not exactly promote my inner peace and harmony quotient but it does usually end up giving me a heck of a workout.

Just in case you think I’m the only sick puppy comparing myself to others, a couple of times I have had people come up after class and compliment me and ask me how long I’ve been doing yoga because they’ve obviously been checking me out too. One of my proudest moments was when I inspired yoga-envy in a couple of young women in their mid-twenties by holding the plank pose for longer than they could.

I could claim that I was giving them something to aspire to, but in fact I realize that I’m slightly twisted. Slightly twisted and fairly strong.

And very, very competitive…

My advancing age has been catching up to me in the last few years of course, but it was also easier to eat what I wanted and to keep up with it in Egypt. Not only was I doing an hour and a half of power yoga twice a week but I was keeping up with our home in one of the dirtiest cities on earth. Add to that the four flights of stairs up to our apartment, the stairs in our apartment, and the fact that my feet were my primary source of getting around and maintaining the status quo was not really a problem.

It’s a different story these days.

I came to the US with a bit of a deficit – I don’t eat in times of stress so I lost a few pounds during the evacuation process. I have since gained it back plus a few more. This wouldn’t worry me overly much except that I’m about to go and stay with my father and step-mother for the summer. My step-mother may look innocent and sweet but she’s the devil in disguise in the kitchen. I haven’t once stayed with her and been able to resist her nearly every night desserts, the ice cream treats she buys because they are my favorite, or anything else to speak of. I’m putty in her hands.

And my butt is turning to putty as well.

Now that the weather is warming up a bit here in Ohio and my books are all but finished being formatted (stay tuned!) I am trying to get back to being more active. My only hope of surviving the summer without blimping out is to go into it a bit light, build myself a margin for error. Five pounds ought to do it – eight would be better.

I know where my major weakness lies – in liquid calories – but I decided that maybe a food journal might be handy as well. Just to keep things really in my face and invoke my competitive streak. There is an online site I’ve been looking at this last week called Lose it! It’s nice because you just plug in your current height and weight and then your goal. It lets you pick a daily caloric intake and then projects how long it will take you to reach your goal. During the course of a day you input your food intake and your activity and it tells you how many calories you have left to consume.

I haven’t counted calories in a very long time. How is it at all fair that a medium sized banana has about 100 calories in it, but vacuuming for 1/2 hour only burns about 60 calories? A tortilla has between 100-200 calories depending on the size but taking a half and hour walk at a moderate pace only burns about 70 calories – and since no one is going to eat an empty tortilla you can guess how long you’d have to walk to burn off a burrito, nevermind the beer you know you want to have along with it!

Go snoop around there for restaurant entrees and you may never eat out again! Sigh…

Just so you know, my step-mother isn’t all bad. She did buy an extra kayak so we can go out together this summer. Maybe if I paddle to Canada and back I can afford to indulge in some fried fish and fresh pie!

One thing that has certainly changed since I was a child, lo those many years ago, is the prices.

(Click image to enlarge)

I used to go out to the ice cream truck with $.50 and have a hard time choosing. The least expensive thing on this menu is $1 and if I had a time machine (how cool would that be???) I’m sure I could prove that the treats I bought were both cheaper and larger. What kind of chump pays $2 for a ice cream sandwich you could eat in five bites when you can get a box of them in the store for not so much more?

(Who are you looking at??)

I got the children their treats, then went *way back over* to my chair in the shade of a tree probably 200 feet from where the truck was parked. I zoomed in to get a picture of the menu and in the process got this picture too:

Does he look like a poster boy for America’s Most Wanted or what? I hadn’t given him much thought until I saw this picture later. Makes me wonder what – or who – he has in the back of that truck! Or maybe he’s just shy – he left in what seemed like a hurry

The children in the meantime finished their treats in a flash and went back to whining, fighting, and bickering again – which they had been doing on and off for about two hours. I had had enough of that behavior so I packed up my chair and took them home, where I made them pay me back for their ice cream. No treats for bad behavior! I’ve probably put them off ice cream trucks for life – which is just as well since I’ve since seen that particular truck circling the block around our temporary home!

The children have been asking for a pet for a long time and I have been resisting. I had two cats before I had children and I loved them dearly. The problem was that the cats did not love the children. By the time we were preparing to move to Egypt the situation had gotten so bad that I had to keep one of cats secluded in my bedroom and run a happy-cat phermone plug-in just to keep her from marking all of my things (guess who she blamed for bringing the children into the house??) I was at my wits end with what to do with the cats. They were clearly not happy with us and they were aging to boot – and Egypt does not have very good veterinary care for house pets. I was extremely lucky that at just about the same time a friend from North Carolina wrote me an email and told me her cats had just died and she wanted to adopt two older cats. Is that good timing or what? We went back and forth a few more times to iron out details and then I shipped her two aging cats. It was harder than I would have thought to let them go, but it was for the best. That was nearly six years ago and the cats have been restored to their former spoiled status and are living out their golden years in style. I still get status reports from time to time.

So no more cats. I’ve also vetoed dogs. Not only don’t I want to be stuck with the responsibility of walking a dog several times a day while the children are in school, but can you imagine having a dog with what has been my lifestyle for the last decade? How could I leave a dog for nearly two months every summer? I would go broke with kennel fees and the dog would go nuts. I have friends who bring their dogs with them when they travel but I have enough to keep track of with two children and six suitcases thank-you-very-much.

I have also nixed birds, rodents, and fish. I don’t think that birds belong in cages and there is the same problem with the vacation schedule. Also, who do you think would ultimately be stuck cleaning out the cage / tank? No thanks. I have many better things to do with my time!

Last weekend, my son found a pet that I could find no immediate objection to: a Venus Flytrap. It’s inexpensive, quiet, does not require walking, and eats bugs. What’s not to like? We’ll see how it goes. If there is one pitfall it is the frequency with which my son wants to feed it. If Venus Flytraps can become obese, ours will. It’s a good thing the new pot I found for it it is roomy…

This year has gone nothing like I hoped or expected it to. I tried to start it right, by throwing myself a birthday party for a milestone age that I wasn’t particularly thrilled about reaching, but it has pretty much been downhill since then.

Since I’m hanging out in the US right now, I decided to use this time to do all the necessary doctor appointments, one of which was for an eye exam. I’ve never worn glasses, but in the last couple of years I’ve noticed my left eye is definitely weaker than my right. Not only that, but it waters constantly. I thought at first it was allergies but then realized it was more likely eye strain. Duh. I have reading glasses for computer use, but had never gotten in the habit of using them since I can actually see.

The eye doctor did a thorough exam and gave me the verdict: not only glasses, but bifocals. First I have my face peeled off and now this. I think I’d have rather he diagnosed a cataract – at least they could remove that!

I’d more easily accept this if I couldn’t actually see pretty well anyway. I can even read tiny print without (too much) difficulty. My weepy left eye tells another story though so I guess I’ll have to suck it up, like all the rest. At least I don’t have to wear them all the time.

Homeless, precancerous skin damage, bifocals. I love the sunroof in my “new” car, but it does highlight all the white hairs colonizing the top of my head. I’m planning to go to the dentist soon. What’s next, dentures??

May the 4th be with you… because the year is still young…

I’ve had this song in my head for a few weeks now – I think chorus is somewhat inspiring for my current circumstances.

I get knocked down
But I get up again
You’re never going to keep me down

When I looked up the rest of the lyrics, I found it strangely fitting for the way I spent my Saturday night – on a neighborhood roaming cocktail party which ended with karaoke!

Pissing the night away
Pissing the night away

“Oh Danny Boy
Danny Boy
Danny Boy…”

I’m happy to say that I didn’t actually get knocked down on Saturday night, though there were some others who didn’t look so steady on their feet by the end of the night! And I sang my first karaoke song – Wham! “Wake Me Up (Before You Go Go)”. Thank goodness there isn’t a video of that scary and not very musical moment!

There are plenty of ways in which I am very, very different than she was. My mother would never have moved out of the country – she was very impressed when I moved from Louisiana to Ohio after college on my own, but incredibly distressed when I moved overseas. She never understood my love of travel, particularly to the sort of places I like to go – she thought my trekking trip to Thailand last January was insane. Her health wasn’t good in the last few years of her life, but she once told me that there was more than enough to see in America to fulfill all of her travel wishes.

I love to listen to people speak English with different accents, particularly Irish and Scottish, where my mother had some sort of irrational dislike of English accents. I love many different international cuisines, especially Thai and sushi. My mother’s favorite food was mainstream American. I once bought her a Cracker Barrel gift certificate for Christmas which was very well received as were gift boxes from Omaha Steaks and Hickory Farms. (It’s much harder to ship sushi!)

The older I get however, the more I can see some of the similarities. The face I see in the mirror is still my own, but my hair is darkening and beginning to frost itself in the same way my mother’s hair did. I have my mother’s hands and I learned much of my snarky, sarcastic sense of humor from her.

There is one significant and striking way in which I am becoming my mother however. My mother hated to go out after she got home from work, and particularly after dark. If I ever told her I needed to go back to school for some special event or to the store for some school supply, she would do her best to either arrange alternate transportation for me or to convince me I could wait til the weekend for new pens / glue / paper. God forbid I should want to run an errand if it was both evening and raining.

As a child, I didn’t understand her aversion to going out again at all. Now? Once the sun goes down I have no interest in being out and about. Funny thing is that I often have fun once I am out – it’s just a hurdle to convince me to leave my house. I may like to travel but I’m a homebody at heart.

I’ve also noticed that just lately my taste for exotic cuisine is on the wane and I’ve developed a real craving for old favorites from my childhood. Chinese Hotdish, anyone?