Capital P - Big Mama

Hair is what we’ve been up to

January 26, 2012

Well this week hasn’t really gone as planned.

I kept Caroline home from school on Monday because she seemed tired and congested and just wasn’t acting like herself. Which is to say that she was content to just lay in bed and do absolutely nothing. And then Tuesday morning she woke up and announced that her throat still felt “googly” and “scritchy” and so she stayed home again.

On Wednesday morning she was still complaining of a sore throat but didn’t have fever and I was a little suspicious that she might just be enjoying her ill-health and repeated viewings of Mr. Popper’s Penguins while I waited on her hand and foot and fetched her additional ice cubes because “this orange juice isn’t quite as cold as I like it, Mama”. So I sent her to school but told her she could go to the nurse if she didn’t feel good.

Which is why my phone rang at 9:24. It was the school nurse. And so I went and picked Caroline up from school and immediately called the pediatrician to make an appointment to find out if she had strep.

The strep test came back negative but she was diagnosed with a sinus infection and we left with a prescription for an antibiotic.

And so that’s what we’ve been doing for the last three days.

In fact, I’ll go ahead and admit that I hadn’t worn anything but pajama pants until I had to go to school and pick her up yesterday. Three days in pajama pants might be some kind of record. But if you combine the fact that I’m trying to meet a book deadline with a sick child and rainy weather? Well, that’s just a pure laziness trifecta.

P ended up being home most of the day Tuesday because the weather was wet and rainy. (It’s so odd how rain is wet. Wet and rainy? Lamest description ever. I blame too many viewings of Mr. Popper’s Penguins.) We spent some of the day reading a few chapters of Harry Potter and ate a lot of soup.

(We could talk or not talk for hours and we both enjoy soup.)

(So many bowls of soup have been consumed at our house over the last three days that I went to serve chili tonight and discovered we’d completely run out of clean bowls.)

(I ate my chili in a plastic Tony the Tiger bowl.)

(None of that is important. I don’t know why I’m talking about our bowl shortage.)

Anyway, we were all slightly stir crazy by late afternoon and sitting in the kitchen when P called to reschedule an appointment he had to get his hair cut.

He hung up the phone and lamented changing the appointment and said he couldn’t stand one more day with his hair so long. (He’s been growing it out since early December at Caroline’s request. It was a mass of gray cowlicks.) I jokingly said, “I’ll cut it for you.” And Caroline piped in and said, “Me too! Let me cut it, Daddy!”.

And he said, “Okay”.

Really?

You’re going to let our eight year old cut your hair?

Yes. Yes he was.

And so Caroline began to cut his hair while she occasionally said things like, “OOOH! HERE’S A BIG PIECE RIGHT HERE, DADDY! I’M GOING TO CHOP IT!” with just a little too much enthusiasm in her voice.

His reasoning in allowing her to do it was that you can’t really screw up his hair.

But he was wrong.

It seems that the person who was supposed to be supervising the haircut got caught up in the new Boden spring catalog and might have forgotten to pay attention to the child with the scissors.

The good news is it looked pretty good from the front. Good being a relative term. And assuming you’re nearsighted.

The best news is he got it cut by a professional yesterday. And she managed to even the whole thing up. Although he said there were a few times she would remark, “Oh, you’re kind of missing a chunk right here.”

Of course the lesson I’ve learned from all this is I have two people in my house who should never be left alone with scissors when they’re bored.

Or maybe the lesson is the Boden catalog can wait until after your daughter finishes cutting your husband’s hair.

The birthday boy

October 6, 2011

Happy Birthday, P. Your girls love you!

By the way, eating fried chicken is totally optional. I’m not sure how that applies to the birthday song.

I’ll go back for more. Back being the key word.

October 5, 2011

Well I think it’s safe to say the majority of us all believe the world would be a better place if we eliminated the word “moist” from the English language. There was also a loud cry to get rid of “literally”, “panties”, and “epic”. Especially considering that epic is never used to describe anything that’s actually epic.

I especially appreciated your strong feelings toward the phrases “My bad” and “I know, right?” Both of these make me feel angry. Of course I’m at a point in the month where air makes me feel irritated.

The comments have also made me very aware of every word I’m typing right now because I am so scared I’m going to throw in one of the offenders. But I feel like it won’t be too hard to stay away from the vast majority of them because I have never read comments that made me cringe so frequently. It’s bad enough to hear some of those words but to see them typed out? Painful.

So thank you for all your contributions. They made me so happy. Fingers crossed that the Webster dictionary folks consult the blog before they finalize next year’s edition.

Yesterday morning P and I dropped Caroline off at school and then drove out to the middle of nowhere to pick up his truck from the mechanic’s shop. P’s truck is over ten years old so we have the occasional pleasure of dropping an amount of money on it that makes me sad just to keep it up and running. Somehow it always seems to involve the fuel pump. Or maybe I just quit listening after I hear the words “fuel pump”. I don’t really know.

After P was reunited with his truck he planned to go straight to a job site and I decided it was an opportune time to drive through Chick-Fil-A for a chicken biscuit because there are few things better in life than that. Years ago before we had Caroline or a Chick-Fil-A anywhere near us, P had back surgery. It was supposed to be day surgery but there were some complications and he had to stay overnight.

I went home to spend the night and arrived early the next morning to pick him up. As we drove away from the hospital I noticed there was a Chick-Fil-A and asked P if he minded if I stopped and got a chicken biscuit. He was a little irritated that I was putting my chicken biscuit needs before the nausea he was feeling from the pain medication but told me to go ahead and get one if I needed it that bad. In retrospect I think he was begin sarcastic. He also may have said a bad word. I’m sure it was just from being disoriented from the medication. And the pain.

Then, in my excitement over the chicken biscuit, I forgot to pay attention to where I was driving and jumped a curb in my Ford Taurus. Which doesn’t really make for a comfortable ride for someone who had back surgery with complications mere hours before. But I pressed on to take hold of the chicken biscuit for which I had been called, only to discover that I was five minutes too late to order one.

So I looked over at P and asked, “Who’s in pain now?”

If there is ever a time that we have to see any sort of marriage counselor, I guarantee this story will come up. I put my chicken biscuit needs ahead of my husband’s well-being.

I feel so much better now that it’s out in the open even though I hadn’t planned on airing all that dirty chicken laundry. What I really wanted to share is that I strayed from the chicken biscuit yesterday morning in favor of the chicken minis. And it was a revelation. Some might even say it was epic.

(I couldn’t help myself.)

The chicken minis are superior to the chicken biscuit. I know this is a strong statement but I will stand by it. I had no idea what I’ve been missing all these years. I think the key to their perfection is the perfect chicken to bread ratio. And I’m big on proper ratios when I mix my ingredients. It’s why I can’t eat any type of holiday Reeses cups. They screw up the chocolate to peanut butter ratio.

But only you can decide if they would be worth a trip through the drive-through right after your husband has back surgery and is in pain.

I think we probably all know where I stand.

Lucky number fourteen

August 16, 2011

If you’ve read this blog for any significant amount of time (and God bless you for that) you might remember that I managed to cram all my significant life events into the month of August. Of course, I didn’t have anything to do with my birthday. And, ultimately, I didn’t really have anything to do with Caroline’s birthday. I mean, yes, I did but I didn’t have a specific plan about the month of conception and how it related to a good birth month.

However, I could have chosen a different date for P and me to get married. But I was all giddy with love and we wanted a short engagement and he made it pretty clear he’d like to get married before hunting season like all true romantics. And that’s why we chose August 16th, 1997.

For those of you doing the math at home, that means today is our fourteenth wedding anniversary. Not our fifteenth like P thought until I corrected him yesterday. I explained it just FEELS like fifteen.

On Caroline’s birthday, she requested that P fry fish for all her friends. I watched him in the kitchen that night battering all those fish and laughing with the kids and thoroughly enjoying himself. And I thought to myself this is one of the things you don’t really know about someone before you marry them.

Actually, it’s probably one of the things you don’t think about because you’re focused on how cute and funny they are and how good they look in their jeans and boots. Hypothetically speaking of course.

And so you don’t focus on questions like will he happily cook fish for a group of kids on his daughter’s birthday?

Or will he be a good, loving daddy who adores his little girl?

Will he be a good provider and work hard without complaining?

Will he try to understand me even when I don’t understand myself?

Will he hold my hand in the delivery room while I’m in labor?

Will he throw all the kids at the neighborhood pool even after a long day?

Will it drive me crazy when he leaves half a paper towel on the kitchen counter every day?

Will there be times he asks me what’s for dinner before 8:00 a.m.?

Will he bring home a large antelope of the Lord and hang it on my wall without asking?

As it turns out, the answer to all these questions is yes.

And will he still make me laugh after fourteen years of marriage?

Yes. Yes he will.

I love you, P. Happy 14th (not 15th) Anniversary!

And who can forget “The Legend of Muy Grande”?

June 28, 2011

Well, this is a sad day.

I feel like I’ve forgotten how to construct sentences over the last three days and, therefore, actual paragraphs may be entirely out of my reach. I’m not sure what has happened, but it would appear my brain has officially gone over to the summer side.

My point is this may officially be the blog post that describes how I did my laundry and separated the whites from the darks and, OH, did I mention that I washed a tube of Chapstick and a Kit Kat?

(Just so you know, the Chapstick washed fairly well. The Kit Kat? Not so much.)

So it’s been a busy few days around here. On Friday night, P went hog hunting because a group from our church is heading to Joplin, MO this week and wanted to provide some meals while they are there. And P is always willing to shoot something for a good cause. Or even no cause. He’s not really particular.

While he was out hunting and gathering, Caroline and I went to eat Mexican food with Mimi and Bops and my sister and her family. And then we came home and watched some truly terrible animated movie that she found at Redbox. I can’t even remember the name and, trust me, you don’t want to know. I guarantee you haven’t seen it. And if you have you don’t want to be reminded.

Saturday morning we all slept late. Which means P slept until 7:30 and Caroline and I slept until 9:45. We had a lazy morning around the house and ended up at the pool later that afternoon. We didn’t order any food, but we did get popsicles since they are pretty hard to screw up. Later that night, we went to a post-wedding party for our friends Stewart and Hannah who got married two weeks ago. We had the best time hanging out with friends we haven’t seen in a long time.

(Also, total side note but Stewart and Hannah got married by the river, flew off to Greece for two weeks for their honeymoon and then came home and had a reception. THAT is how you get married.)

I totally overslept and missed church on Sunday morning which is totally worthless but I’m being honest. We’d been out until midnight the night before and I had to take out my dentures and tend to my rheumatism and I was tired. It’s not easy having all that carefree fun.

Caroline was invited to a birthday party at the roller skate rink on Sunday that was supposed to be a drop off party. However, once I walked in and realized half of San Antonio was also at the skating rink, I didn’t feel like I could just leave her there with minimal supervision. Especially because there seemed to be an inordinate number of older men there by themselves who were very eager to participate in the ADULTS ONLY backwards skate.

(It would have been good to know I was staying at the party because then I might have chosen attire other than my rattiest running shorts and slightly holey t-shirt. Also, the bun on top of my head was a nice touch.)

First of all, I don’t feel like we really need to have an ADULTS ONLY backwards skate on a Sunday afternoon. And, secondly, it made me feel like some of them might have a white, paneled creeper van out in the parking lot filled with candy.

Call me paranoid but I am just suspicious about grown men at the skating rink with no children. P would never go to the skating rink alone and participate in the ADULTS ONLY backwards skate. The fast skate FOR SURE, but not the backwards skate.

(I’m just kidding. I’ve never seen P roller skate. Although I’m sure he did back in the days of junior high to impress the ladies.)

Anyway, I ended up staying at the skating rink for the entire party and listened to more than my fill of Lady Ga-Ga until it was time for us to head home so we could get ready for a dinner party with some friends. And so we went to dinner with friends, came home and put Caroline to bed because she started a week of day camp yesterday and we didn’t want her to frighten the counselors with the DON’T ANGER IT thing she can get going if she’s overtired.

Yesterday morning I dropped her off at camp and then tried to remember what I do when I have free time. Ultimately, I threw caution to the wind and went to the grocery store AND the bank. I know. I am the wind beneath your wings.

After I ran all my errands, I came home and discovered that P had thrown down the chandelier gauntlet. You probably don’t know what I mean by that because I don’t know what I mean by that. But he had hung the chandelier I bought for Caroline’s room. Granted, I bought the chandelier at a garage sale back in September so he’s had a full nine and a half months but, still, it made me feel like I needed to do something productive.

(I realize this isn’t a great picture of the chandelier, but I couldn’t get a picture with it actually on because THE BRIGHTNESS WAS VERY BRIGHT.)

(Also, if you have any thoughts on how I could make that chain more attractive, feel free to share them. I realize we could hardwire it, but let’s not pretend that will happen in the next five years.)

I felt like I should do something productive around the house, yet I didn’t want it to involve actual cleaning products. So I decided to organize Caroline’s Wii games and movies that are all just piled in the bottom of our armoire. Which is how I discovered a long-forgotten stockpile of VHS tapes in the armoire drawers.

All of which belonged to P.

And had been there for the last twelve or so years after he assured me they were very important and he would continue to enjoy his “movie library” for many years to come.

Here’s a look at his extensive collection.

Obviously, “The Buck Stops Here” is a classic. As is “Monster Bucks VI” which everyone knows was SO MUCH BETTER than “Monster Bucks V”.

But it felt like it was time to let them go. Especially in light of the fact that we haven’t owned a VCR in five years.

Oh, and “Hope Floats” may have been mine because P doesn’t really watch a lot of chick movies.

He’s way too busy practicing his fast skate for the roller rink.

Hair is what we’ve been up to

The birthday boy

I’ll go back for more. Back being the key word.

Lucky number fourteen

And who can forget “The Legend of Muy Grande”?

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