The Living Dead

When we were in San Diego this past weekend we went to the Rueben H. Fleet Science Museum.  

They had this thing where you could get your picture taken and then have it age you to 70 years old. 

Here are our results:

Oh my freakiness.

If Shane and I look like this at age 70 would somebody please just shoot me? (and him too while you're at it so he can be with me.  Hopefully he's not mad at me for requesting his demise, but it's for a good cause).

I'm pretty sure I might get mistaken for a zombie on the street, so perhaps I'll get taken out by some stranger anyway.

Seriously, have I failed to notice that all 70 year olds have gray skin and sunken eyes?

Yikes!

Parenting Gone Awry

Shane and I try hard to instill good values, standards and manners in the kids.

It has recently been brought to our attention that we have failed horribly in certain departments.

Case in point:  Owen has been making himself burp at the table all the time lately.  Then he laughs and says, "Oh, excuse me." with this sheepish grin on his face.  

Shane got a little fed up at this and tried to explain that if you are burping on purpose that you can't really say 'excuse me' because you did it on purpose.  

He explained this to Owen on several different occasions in a fairly stern tone.

A few days later Morgan made herself burp.  She laughed and said, "Excuse me!"

Owen looked at her with a furrowed brow and in a very authoritative tone said, "No Morgan, you have to say it was on purpose!"

Oops. :)

The next fau pax is all my fault though.

For the past month or two every time I say "something stinks" or "what's the smell?" Morgan will chime in and say, "I fink it's dog poop."  

Every time.

I thought that was pretty funny and I told a few people "Morgan always says 'I think it's dog poop.' "

Now she doesn't say it anymore, instead she says:

"I fink it's dog poop.  I always say that."  And then she gives me a big smile.

Good thing we are doing such a good job teaching!

Do You Smell That?

Today Livy came home from school to tell me that it was so hot that she was sweating!

I said, "Oh no, not sweating?!"

So she rewarding me for my sarcasm by saying this, "Yeah, and I smelled like you when you get home from the gym.  I could smell myself and I didn't like it.  It was stinky."

OUCH!!!!

Okay, it's no secret that I smell like the depths of hell after working out.

I can't help it, I work hard and I sweat buckets.

But come on, where is the love?

Moral Dilemma

Question.

If somebody in your household got a speeding ticket and then waited 2 1/2 weeks to tell you about said speeding ticket would you be:

A.  Grateful that they didn't burden you with it until you were "in a good place"?

B.  Angry that they didn't tell you right away?

C.  Suspicious that they are hiding stuff from you?

D.  Who cares?  Speeding tickets happen.  You don't really need to say anything.

Cast your vote. 

I'm very curious.

The "After I..." Trick

Here is a little trick I like to use when I'm trying to eat better.

After lunch and dinner I often want to eat something sweet.  Often. :)

I have found that if I can just stave it off, sometimes I can get it to go away by using the "after I" trick.

I will tell myself, "After I finish the laundry I can have a cookie."  So I do the laundry and see how I'm feeling.  

Then I'll think, "Well, I've made it this far just fine, after I finish cleaning the kitchen I'll have the cookie."  So I clean the kitchen.

Often by this time I don't feel like I really need the cookie anymore and I go on with my day.

Sometimes I do still want it, and I have it.  But at least by then I have allowed my lunch or dinner to digest some and my metabolism is running more efficiently to be able to deal with the cookie.

Next time you think you have to have something try the "after I" trick.  Get your mind busy and focused on something else besides food.

You'll be surprised.

Ghetto Surprise!

One of the "benefits" of living in the Ghetto is that we have a lot of pets without owning any pets.

We have lizards all over our back fence that I watch as I do the dishes.  They are fun to watch.

I recently discovered we have gophers in our back yard and I just saw one poking his head out as I was doing the dishes the other day.  More fun!

As you may recall we had a wounded bird that Shane attempted to nurse back to health for a night.  All kinds of excitement.

Well, our latest "friend" is a mangey orange, black & white cat.

You may or may not know that I am NOT a fan of cats.  At all. (Morgan adores them).

This mangey cat has been hanging around here for awhile.  

I have shooed it off many times. 

A few weeks ago it was on top or our shed and I had a stare down with it. (It was intimidating).

Usually, I can get it to go away, but yesterday, no luck.

The dang cat sat outside my back door and meowed ALL day.  

It went back and forth between my back door and my shed.  It kept looking in my shed and peering through the crack, but it would not go away.

I had laundry to do and needed to get in the back yard to do it, but I was afraid of the cat. (I know that sounds dumb, but you should see the looks this cat gives).

I looked at it and it looked really skinny.  I started to feel bad and think maybe it was hungry, but I didn't want to feed it because I didn't want it to stick around.

Finally Shane came home from work and he went out back to scare the cat off again.

The kids were watching intently from the kitchen window.

It hissed and barred it's teeth at Shane.  Totally freaky.

He came in the back door with big eyes and said, "Dixie, no wonder the cat won't go away.  She had kittens in our shed!"

WHAT?!?!  How is that even possible?

Well, we figured it out.

Shane had left the shed open on Sunday after taking my bike rack off the car and putting it back in the shed.  In that time the mom cat found her way in and dropped a litter.  Sometime on tuesday or early wednesday I closed the shed while the mommy cat must have been off somewhere.  When she came back she couldn't get to her kittens and she was TICKED!

It's amazing what this did to me.  As soon as I knew she had kittens in there I felt sick for her.  I told Shane to hurry and open the shed so she could get to them and feed them.  I just hoped that they hadn't been stuck in there away from her for too long.  

Immediately one kitten came out and started nursing.  A little while later another one came out.  We've only seen 2 so far and don't know if there are more.  We also put out a bowl of milk for her so she would have enough food to produce milk for her babies.

While she nursed she kept her paws out in front of her kittens and starred at us with intense eyes, letting us know we'd better not mess.

My heart went out to this poor cat and I couldn't believe I was relating to a freaking cat!  But I was.  She wasn't just a cat, she was a mommy and I know how it feels to want to protect your babies from everything.

As I watched my babies look at her with her babies it was an interesting moment.  I realized that our instincts are the same.  This cat and I have more in common that I ever would have guessed.  I admired her for doing her best to take care of her babies in a scary situation.

I suddenly became quite protective of her and her situation.  I wanted to make sure she was safe and that she had enough to eat and that her babies were okay.

Who would have guessed that a mangey stray cat could have such an impact on me?

To me, that was the real surprise.

p.s.  Anybody want a kitten?

sheROX 2009 Triathlon--COMPLETED!

Did you wonder if they would really do it?

I didn't.

There has been blood, sweat and tears, but on Saturday, May 9th, 2009 Dana Rodgers, Allyson Van Patten, Jenny Crandell and Wendy Daw completed their first triathlon.

And they did well.

Saturday morning dawned and we made our way to Tempe Beach Park to set up our transition areas.

Temperatures were the hottest all year...topping out around 103 or 104 degrees. (I had no idea how much this heat would play into the race.  I foolishly didn't bring a water bottle for my bike and had a mishap in transition between my swim and bike so I didn't drink anything before my bike ride.  Can we say dehydration?)

There were about 450 women participating in this event--that's a lot of estrogen in the air. :)  

The race consisted of a 750 meter open water swim, a 13.5 mile bike (with a lot of hills), and a 3.1 mile run.

The heat definitely made this the hardest triathlon I've ever done, so I was doubly impressed that each one of them finished.

They have trained hard and it paid off.

I can't tell you how proud I was to watch each one of them cross that finish line.  To know where they came from and to see what they have accomplished.  

It was the best birthday I could have had.

Allyson even got 2 flat tires, causing about a 35-40 minute delay in her time, and she still pressed on to finish.

This was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.

Here are the stats for everyone:  (the number next to our name is the place we got in our group/how many people in our group.  Click here to go to the official results site.)

**click on their names to see their own blog reports of their experience.

35/46  DANA RODGERS     

swim 25:18.9

bike 1:04:11.0  

run 0:50:22.3  

TOTAL:  2:25:43.4

 

43/46  ALLYSON VAN PATTEN      

swim 21:03.7

bike 1:35:41.2  

run 0:51:12.1  

TOTAL: 2:54:08.6

 

14/81  DIXIE DIXON              

swim 16:22.1

bike 0:45:27.0  

run 0:29:45.5  

TOTAL: 1:34:10.6

 

52/81  WENDY DAW               

swim 19:38.8

bike 0:54:10.6  

run 0:37:17.4  

TOTAL: 1:54:36.2

 

46/75  JENNY CRANDELL

swim 18:04.9

bike 0:55:06.6  

run 0:37:45.8  

TOTAL: 1:55:15.6

Here is a quick video of our adventure together.

It's been awesome girls.  I love you and can't wait to do it again!

Now it's YOUR turn to realize your potential!!!

Did You Forget?

Did you forget about these ladies?

Did you forget that they've been training for a triathlon?

Did you forget that the triathlon is THIS Saturday?

They haven't. 

Stay tuned.... :)