Alabaster Mom

I switched gyms about three years ago. After considering several options and touring a few, I chose the one that is absolutely the closest to my house. I'm just being practical, ya'll.  As part of that gym membership, I was supposed to receive a complimentary session with one of their many trainers. I think the fine print underneath must have said something like, "Ha ha! Good luck collecting on that!" Every time I stopped at the front desk and asked about it, I was told that the only sessions available were at times like 10:00 a.m. It didn't seem feasible for me to quit my job just to learn how to use leg press machine, so I gave up. When I go to the gym, I usually just hit the cardio equipment that I already know how to use. I sometimes attend yoga classes there, too.  (I prefer to go to my regular yoga studio for yoga classes, though - it just depends on which option is more convenient on any given day).  I have free weights at home, but seldom use them. A cou...

Today I had one of those "count your blessings" types of days that are probably too few and far between. As you know, I am not independently wealthy and therefore must work for a living. What are you gonna do, right?  I'm part of a team that builds websites and other tech-y things. This morning, I met with a new client. My co-worker and I (he's the sales guy, I'm the project manager) drove to the client's location to kick off this new project.  They run a large food bank and are in need of a new website. Our meeting was scheduled for 9:00 a.m. We got stuck in traffic, so we pulled up right at 9. We could see a line forming outside the building.  It quickly became clear that the food bank was just opening for the day. We filed in through the door with the rest of the folks and then let a receptionist know that we had arrived to meet with the director. She was running a bit late, it seemed, so we stood in the lobby and waited. More people filed in. They w...

My husband got me a FitBit for my birthday back in February. I love the thing. I love how it counts my steps and tells me what a shitty night's sleep I had. I did have one problem with it, though, which was that I could not get it to synch with my iPhone for love nor money. I could get it to synch with my PC, but that was somewhat inconvenient. When I was out east a few weeks ago, my FitBit reflected the wrong time (off by one hour) for the entire trip because I could not synch it. It was slightly maddening. Finally, in desperation, I called FitBit and talked to Jose. Jose walked me through the same instructions I'd Googled a dozen times. Despite his best efforts, the FitBit and my phone simply could not find a way to get along. Friendly Jose told me that they would send me a new one at no charge. Every other FitBit user I know has had theirs replaced at least once so that makes me wonder about just how sturdy this technology really is. But, I didn't complain. I received ...

My daughter is currently enrolled in a two-week summer program at the middle school she will be attending in the fall. It's a good chance for her to learn her way around the school, and it gives her something to do. Every morning, she rides her bike to her old elementary school and then catches a bus to the middle school. There is a span of three hours or so between when she gets home and when her dad and I get home from work. The rules for that brief span are pretty basic. In fact, there is only one main rule, which is: "no friends over while Mom and Dad are at work." The other rule is more of a goes-without-saying sort of thing: "don't use the stove."  She wouldn't really use the stove anyway, because she prefers to have meals prepared for her so that she can reject them on sight. I keep telling her that she's 11 and is perfectly capable of planning and preparing a meal (something that she would like to eat), but whenever I make that suggestion...

Last Saturday, my daughter and I volunteered at an annual Pride celebration held in a local park. Our church had signed up to have a table at this shindig, so we volunteered with our church friends.  I hadn't been to our local Pride party in a few years because I am usually on vacation that week. However, this year we went on vacation a week early so the dates worked out just right.  I have to tell you: it was the most fun I've had in a while. All of the people were so friendly and it was just a really vibrant, fun atmosphere. There were more vendors this year than I remembered seeing in the past. There were other churches in addition to our UU fellowship. Other vendors included Avon, a henna shop, a lamp shop (the kid talked me into buying her a custom lamp for her bedroom), a meditation group, and lots of vendors selling rainbow-themed gear. One booth was giving away rainbow flags.  There were a couple of booths that were definitely not appropriate for my daughter to ...

Over the past eight years or so, I've successfully dodged a couple of invitations to serve on the board of trustees at my church. I was so involved in rescue at the time that I couldn't fathom having time for much else. Plus, and I say this with full awareness that it sounds pretty douche-y: I am not a huge fan of meetings. I have a short attention span and really struggle to make it to the end, no matter how brief the meeting. I mean, you could invite me to a meeting to talk about giving me my own tropical island and I would still be like, "Ugh. How long do you think the meeting will take?" About a month ago, I attended the annual meeting at church. Elections were held. It quickly became clear that no one was dying to take the Vice President spot. The former VP had the audacity to move away. Not having any nominees or volunteers, they decided to table the discussion until later. The church's fiscal year began on July 1st. The monthly newsletter hit my in-b...

Other than acquiring THE HAT, we did manage to squeeze in a few other activities at the beach. We went to the beach (as in, actually got in the water) a couple of times. My uncle and his family (minus one kid) showed up on Saturday so we all went to the beach together. It was 4th of July weekend. It was insanely crowded, as you can imagine. Traffic was pretty brutal and parking spaces were hard to come by. As we were bobbing around in the ocean waves, one of those message planes flew across: "Jesus is coming." Without missing a beat my uncle said, "I sure hope he didn't drive." We also drove Go-Karts (or at least the kid did). She tackled a climbing wall, too. We walked on the boardwalk and played games at Marty's Playland. We had delicious Mexican food at Tequila Mockingbird. We spent a few hours at the outlet malls in Delaware (no sales tax, ya'll!) but only came back with stuff for the kid. We also had dinner at a place where I was able to get vegan...

My daughter is at an age where nothing is funny and everything is embarrassing. However, she is also at an age where she wants to express herself. While we were at the beach, she spotted a rather colorful chapeau at a Sunsations beach store. "Mom, can I get this hat?" I tried to glance briefly at the hat but it was too late - it had already damaged my corneas with its explosion of color and over-the-top-ness. "Sure, but only with your own money," I said. I was banking on her not having any cash. However, she did have money and all but ran to the register to buy the thing.  She has been wearing it every day since then. She thinks that if she wears the hat, no one can tell that she hasn't combed her hair. While at the beach, we went mini-golfing one day. There were a lot of people there, so we had to wait a bit at each hole. Her dad and I started photographing the hat on various decorative animals on the course. The kid was getting seriously angry. So, we had ...

I must chronicle every moment of my vacation or it didn't happen! After settling in at my sister's house on Sunday, we made plans to go to Great Falls National Park on Monday the 27th. We were meeting a friend of mine and her kids (my sister and her kids came, too). I really enjoyed the beautiful, leafy drive to Great Falls.  We took a picnic lunch along. After lunch, we checked out the falls and walked on a path through the woods. We spotted a deer (a doe, a deer, a female deer, ray, a drop of golden suuuuuun ) nursing her baby - it was the sweetest thing ever. They were pretty well hidden in the foliage but we could just see the spots on the little fawn. The mama was looking at us as if to say, "You mofo's better stay on that trail where you belong." Moments later, they were gone. We probably would have done more hiking/walking, but it was hot and the kids were complaining pretty loudly. So, we called it a day.  That evening, we went to see Finding Dory (in air-...

After leaving Ohio in our rear view mirror, we drove to Pittsburgh for a planned detour. Neither of us had ever been to Pittsburgh. So, we added an extra day to our vacation in order to check it out. The main reason for the excursion was that my other half had been dying to visit a place called Eide's Entertainment . Eide's features several floors of comics, toys, and other geeky stuff. We had decided that I would drop him off and then find other stuff to do on my own. The GPS guided me to my husband's mecca and I dropped him off so that he could go and be with his people. My guy does not get outwardly excited about things. However, he was about as excited as I've ever seen him. He keeps a hard copy inventory of all of his comics, and he had that tucked under his arm as he hopped out of the car. If we had more room in the car, I know he would have brought along an empty comic box to fill, too. Took a photo for my mom. She was a big fan of Divine. I drove to the ...

Please bear with me as I chronicle our most recent vacation.  We shipped our kid to my sister's house five days before we left, so it was just me and the mister on the long, long car ride out east. We hit a snag before we even left town on Friday the 24th. Mr. M's car broke down. It used its last bit of power to roll into the garage (we were glad for that so that we didn't need to order a tow). We decided to pretend we didn't know the car was kaput and just enjoy our vacation.  We dropped our dogs off (Grover with a friend, Gretchen at our vet clinic), and hit the road at about 1 p.m. We encountered some traffic within the first two hours, but nothing too traumatic. Then came Chicago. If you've ever had to drive through Chicago, you probably know that there's no good time to do it. We attempted to hit Chicago before rush hour in hopes that the Windy City would have mercy on us. Nope. Getting through Chicago took hours. No exaggeration. We lost the will to liv...