If you love Mad Men....

PLEASE CLICK ON MY LINK TO "STUFF WHITE PEOPLE LIKE." #123/March 11. I snorted.

YOU PEOPLE CAN'T HAVE IT ALL

Okay, so I posted. Good grief. I posted! Sorry! Sheesh.

Katie, babe. Genie. Sharon. Mom. Tim. I posted. Chill out.

See that kid over there? He's down to an hour nap. You think I can blog while he's up and about? See that? Constant.

I read The Host since my last post. That's at least 5 days worth of reading and two days of recovery. Really. There is a mourning period, don't you think?

And... now I'm trying to do the exercise thing. That means at least an hour and a half out of the house. And, well, honestly, another hour for napping as a result of the actual exercising. Yeah.... energizing schmenergizing. I need a nap.

So here's your post. Two, actually. I'll try to be more interesting over the next week or two.

My Brother, The Elephant Man

You know, there are no real celebrities in our family, so any moment in the limelight is a pretty big deal. But come on, the circus????? Tim was going to be in the circus!?!?!?! We all decided this was worthy of our attendance. Mom and Dad came down. We brought Grant with us. Everyone was on hand.

So at dinner before the circus, Tim was clearly nervous. We asked if he was nervous because the whole town was on hand to watch or because he was about to ride an elephant. His response: I'm nervous because I'm replaying every single episode of "When Animals Attack" in my head right now. (Yeah, I had to admit I was worried that we might be assembling the entire family to watch my brother helplessly strapped to a rampaging elephant...)

So we get there, and we are all expecting pretty much exactly what we see. A single circus tent in an empty lot. A small fairway. We go in and Nora gets her face painted. She's thrilled.... and then I notice that the man painting her face is wearing a robe that says, "The Flying Fernandez" under which I notice are tights. The trapeze guy face paints! Pretty cool.

We sit down and immediately you notice two cages holding two tigers each. Hmmmm. They are inside a cage that surrounds the ring. Dave and Mom and I are eyeballing this cage set-up. Me: "Dave, do you think that cage would actually hold in a tiger if it wanted out?" Dave: "Absolutely not." Great. Mom agrees. So I spend the next fifteen minutes planning escape routes. Dave is instructed to grab two kids. I'll grab one. But, he's arguing that he's staying put while the mayhem breaks out because he's sure the tigers will go for moving targets instead. Yeah.... but eventually all the moving targets will no longer be moving.... and then he'd be a sitting duck. Alek this whole time repeats over and over, "What are you guys talking about? Why do we have to escape? What are you guys talking about?" Excellent parenting skills.

So then the actual tiger act starts. Ummmmm.... they looked drugged..... but... ummmm... they were NOT happy tigers. Ears back, hissing, growling. Yeah.... it was quite an act. And I can honestly say that I have never been so relieved as when it ended.

The rest of the show was surprisingly awesome. I will never go to a huge three ring circus in the Astrodome again. This is where it's at, folks. Hula-hooping, dogs, cool trapeze family, whip drumming, twin Brazillian brothers juggling, this cool balancing guy, some pretty good clowns, a horse-riding act in which a "member of the audience" lost her pants, and of course cotton candy, cracker jacks, pop corn, caramel apples, and soda pop. COME ON - when have you ever had a better time that that??!?! It was terrific. Walter and the rest of the kids watched every second. Tim was set for intermission, and before the circus started, Dave and I agreed we'd leave after that - it's a long drive home. But about half way through the first half, we agreed we weren't going anywhere.

But then it was time. The Dog Act. Tim's cue. Off he went to be put upon an elephant. Intermission was next. They announced a member of the community was the honorary ring master, and the lights dimmed.... AND TIM RODE OUT ON AN ELEPHANT!!!!!! WE CHEERED!!!! HE WAVED AT THE CROWD!!! WE WAITED FOR HIM TO HEAD ACROSS THE RING AND AROUND THE TENT. And they led him to the right 40 feet........and that was that. Wow. Alas. But hey - TIM RODE AN ELEPHANT IN THE CIRCUS! How many of you can say that???????? We loved it. And there was no rampaging. Not one little bit.

Which Came First... The Tree or the Wood?

Tonight in the car, Nora was pondering the origin of trees....

"How do you think Jesus made the first tree? Maybe he just grew it. But maybe he made it with wood. Maybe he got some wood and made it into a tree shape and stuck it in the ground. And then maybe he got some mulch and glued it to the wood for the bark. For the leaves I wonder how he made them? Oh, I know. I bet he cut out leaf shapes with paper. And he glued them to sticks and then glued them or stapled them on the wood and the mulch. And then maybe he painted them. Or maybe he just used green paper. Or maybe Jesus is just magic."

Nora says things backwards a lot. "Stick lip..... hawk mosquito.... monk chip....." Really.... maybe the stick did come before the lip, and the monk before the chip.... and the wood before the tree.

And, if Jesus really did manage to acquire wood, mulch, paper, AND sticks prior to the appearance of the first tree, well, then how can one argue that he's NOT magic?

The Week in Review

(Yes, I know this is not in chronological order, but I'm too lazy to rearrange it. So, love it or leave it.)
Alek's team, The Starz, won it's first game on Sunday! Yee haw! It's been a little while. Alek is playing pitcher and right fielder these days and loving every minute of it.

On Friday night, we had movie night. VERY big news. HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL THREE is out on DVD! Watched it, loved it, put the kids in bed. Thirty minutes later, "Sharpay" appeared downstairs.

Today we went to the zoo! Woo wee! Walt is the perfect age for this. Very interested in everything, but still pretty willing to sit in the stroller most of the time. He posed on the carousel, but as soon as it moved, he was done. I had to hold him next to his havelina. Alas.

He was, however, very impressed with the goats and really enjoyed this. I don't know that he's ever been to a petting zoo. So it was a big deal!

This is what it looks like when Mommy is ready to leave the zoo playground before Walter is.

I love going to the zoo with a little herd of kids. I only had two with me today, so I'm glad Caroline and four of hers and Katie and three of hers could come, too!

Oh yeah.... and the tree is DOWN! FINALLY! WOO HOO! Ike is over.