When in Rome (or at BWW)...

My husband works at BWW so it feels like we are BWW royalty once a store knows "corporate" is present.  I never have found anything eatworthy on their menu and we hate chains, but....I took the advice of many (including BWW) and now stick with wings, sports, and beer.  Or is it beer, sports and wings?  Anyway...we leave a happy family.  Darnit.  BWW rocks!

But...my wonder is...why does being at BWW bring out the BWW in me? For example, I privately name called my husband (in his ear so our squeak couldn't hear) for not manning up and just finishing the last wing.  What a ___!  As he said, you wouldn't say that if we were at Cafe Latte.  Why is that?!  It probably wouldn't have even come to mind.

So, then, after a free tasting if a Blue Moon seasonal (roy-al-ty along with all the other patrons), we got a free tasting of mozzarella sticks and I recalled why my husband holds my heart.  I was pregnant with #2 or maybe #3 and had a hankering for mozzarella sticks but we were driving #1 around for his "nap."  My love had me covered and swung into Arby's for a side kicker order of mozzie sticks.   Who knew that Arby's had them and was on our nap route?!  Geez, I live mozzie sticks.  Are they gluten-free?  Hmmmm...

Now...time to get back to the task at hand: wings, sports and beer.

Tween to Teen

My oldest is amidst his final year as a tween.  While we have had some tween issues, most have been resolved with some good humor, open communications (even if a little later in the day or a day or so later), and non-tween times.  Lately, though, we have experienced a few things that make me fear the teen years....and how easy it is to fall into that parent-teen trap.  After a lost boot (not pair, just one), lost baseball glove (someone must have stolen it...after I left it on that shelf in that room at school for a couple of days), homework left at home (with calls to me at work asking if I could leave to go get it), projects that are suddenly due tomorrow (which he has been talking about for a month), soccer balls left at the field...will he (we) get through these years?  How hard is it to remember your soccer ball when you leave the field?  Or the flip flops you left in the parking lot when you were getting into the car and decided to flip them off (apparently onto the ground) as you got in?  I feel that angst of letting him learn on his own and wanting to keep my first born cocooned (and go back to hunt for the $30 flip flops he had to have last year).  We are close.  Will that change?  Will our eyes still meet with a click of understanding without words through these years?  Will we reconnect if we get lost?  Will I pause to take the time to think about how to be the best us we can be through these years?  I hope so.  I hope we can, most days, still laugh at ourselves, at whichever one was having the outburst.  I hope we know when to respond with the sparkling eyes, a bit of sarcasm, or a look of non-judgmental disgust to simply shape up but I still love you anyway.  I hope we go out for breakfast, too, before school once or twice again before he graduates (in six years) even though he doesn't like bacon so much.

Breakfast Out BEFORE School

We went to the Copper Dome this morning before school, a local breakfast joint.  We sometimes go in the summer on a day when I am not working, but never have during school.  I can't figure out why this seemed so extreme, but it was super fun and did feel a bit crazy!  The kids stole my bacon.

I was running errands this afternoon and nearly broke my (not exactly small) nose.  After filling up the car with some E85 to accommodate tomorrow's various suburban soccer games, I opened my door to get back in the car but apparently did not adjust appropriately as I didn't just bump my nose, I knocked the wind out of it swinging the car door open.  It really hurt.  I teared.  Thanks Dad for the snout.  I hope no one saw...

I also gave in, even though being a top notch clutterer, and picked up the pile that was growing on the end of the kitchen table.  It was so high, how couldn't someone have wanted to make its sprawling nature into the boys' dinner spots disappear?  I refuse, however, to put away the one remaining bag from our spring break trip (two months ago) of airplane fun after packing and unpacking round trip for myself and the kids.  I asked for help...with just this final bag.  How long will it sit on the landing?

Maybe we should go out for breakfast tomorrow...if only there was a money tree out back.

Celebrating the Nameless

I was disappointed on the way to the busstop this morning as no bacon was cooking.  Aside from trying to carve out some time for pause, I do really love bacon. 

The other little girl that comes to our busstop was not there today and hasn't been all week.  My three kids and I wondered if she was sick and, if so, hoped she would get better.  I am horrible with names so never can retain the names of her parents (and many others).  That is one thing I like and appreciate...knowing so many people...not by name...but only by community.  As I walked past a house and its owner stepped out to grab the morning paper today, I saw he was the judge that sits a few rows in front of us in the right trancept at church.  I never knew.  He lives only a block away.  I also heard that one of the dog walking ladies is a retired judge - the one with the young retriever- the one with the stunning Statue of Liberty carved into the dead tree trunk in the front of her yard.  As I passed the busstop for one of the other schools in the neighborhood, as I do daily on my 8 block walk, I waved to our friends whose names I know and also the dad I saw at soccer last night who had his team on the wrong "home" field (our organization has many home fields...) and had to scoot back towards the home he lives in to meet up with an out of town team who was at the correct "home" field (I asked and he did make the game).  Then there was the former newscaster, too, at the busstop with her children (no more early morning shows).  How lucky I am to walk these dogs and have community with my neighbors, some whose names are known and others not.  It is this idea of these community relationships that makes me adore living in an urban setting. While some may have careers where I perceive a bit of local celebrityness (judges, newscasters, senators, soccer dad coaches), all are simply neighbors with real lives.  Yup.  Real lives.  And I get to see it now and then.  It is hard to imagine sometimes...especially when appearing before some of these judges.  And it was odd that time I saw a now former US Senator down the block with bedhead, but that reality does warm me about our community.

I was relieved to see both dog walking ladies, today, looking lovely.  I love my nameless neighbors.   Here's to celebrating the nameless in our lives! 

"This"

(Half way down the next block to the busstop, the kids and I smell bacon cooking in a neighbors's home)

Malin: Someone doesn't know it's a school day, Moooom.

That bacon sure smelled good. On my usual 8 block walk of the dogs after the bus picks up the kids, I got lost. I turned a block too soon. The dogs had pulled another way and I wondered why. I was lost in my thoughts of bacon and taking the time to smell it. Why can't I cook bacon on a school day? Wouldn't that be good? We had decided after smelling it that we might go out for breakfast before school on Friday...for the first time EVER. Crazy? Yup, I know. Back to getting lost. I look up as I don't see the two regular older ladies walking their dogs. That's weird.  Hey, there is our house. Oops. I turned a block too soon. We retraced our steps and got back on track as I chuckled at myself for this major dog walking faux pas (nope, I won't pun and point it out, but may pun now and then for those paying attention)...

Back to today's opening story, as I was walking up the correct block (because some apparently are incorrect when walking dogs in the morning), I got to thinking about humor and how without it, I'd have no persepctive, or at least no joyous perspective. I love joking and humor...even if only to myself. I get a kick out of humor. I was then wondering about people who have seemingly lost their sense of humor or just haven't laughed in a while as life gets too busy (to smell the bacon). What if I didn't have time to laugh at/with myself anymore?  That is when I will know I have the kids in too many activities, I decided.  But will I...will I know?

In my head, I am so honest....like right at that moment I was thinking...there she is...the Dog Walker (even my husband knew exactly who I meant when I recently admitted my disdain for this Dog Walker I have never really met)...damn the Dog Walker who ALWAYS is in my way. Only if today I hadn't gotten lost on the 8 block walk, I'd have beaten her to this corner and not had her be ahead of me carefully turning around with that vacant look she has while she just stops...right there a few paces in front of me with her little fluffy dog...requiring all other dog walkers to stop or create a dog jam of snarling yippers (for the record, I later on this very walk watched another dog walker having to do the same for the Dog Walker on another corner). At least she wasn't wearing that sun hat today...the one like a visor....with no top and a wide brim. What the heck is that kind of hat? Will I wear one walking my dog one day? Where are the two lovely older ladies with their dogs, by the way? One walks two and is followed by one walking a young, golden retriever who almost pulls her down (and sometimes does). I hope they are OK. I worry when I don't see them.

Wait...joy....bacon...smelling bacon...that's right...that is the goal of "this." For me, "this" is about reminding my inner self, the one who curses the Dog Walker, to stop and smell the bacon....even on a school day. "This" is working to be sure I keep my sense of humor touchable and perhaps touching a few others with it who may have found theirs out of reach. 

This...is my blog...Time to Smell the Bacon.