What's on your mind today?

[McQ]

No, McQ, I haven't seen them yet this year, but I have seen them.  That little guy sure is funny!  There are five weekends left this season, so I should be going back for more some time soon.  Yup, I'm a crazy Rennie!  

We're going to take our girls to their first Renaissance the weekend after next. Next weekend is the zoo

Yep. That's him. Typical pose.

I've yet to see Terry Foy. There are a lot of very good acts that play these gigs. I'm always amazed at how enduring vaudeville-humor is. I love it.

[MommaSquid]

I saw part of Don Juan and Miguel's "Weird Show" the other weekend.  It lived up to it's name.  

I love Zilch the Tory Steller!  You know why he doesn't do the story of "Robin Hood"?   Because of Friar Tuck.  Triar F....hey, this is a family show!



I'll be going back to faire again in a week or two...yippeee!

[Seosamh]

Rennie atheists! Yay!

[rlrose328]

The countdown is on... 7 weeks until I spend a MONTH with my mom and my son, two people on this earth who test my patience with humanity.  My son is 8 and doesn't do it on purpose.  My mom is a religious conservative and doesn't do it on purpose.  But I won't be able to sit there at night, blaring "I'm Not Ready to Make Nice" or "Dear God" while I play solitaire, as I'm doing right now.  <sigh>

I love my family and I love my mom... I miss her, I really do.  And she's very lonely without my dad around (will it really be 3 years this July that he died?)... she needs us around for awhile and I didn't go last summer.

Then the kid has a week's sleep away camp in early August, which will be a nice respite for the hubby and I to do whatever we want, whenever we want     so we're really looking forward to that.  (now playing:  On with the Song, by Mary Chapin Carpenter)

Finally, the first week of September, we're heading off on a cruise for Alaska, again... our third.  We LOVE that route... affordable, relaxing, fun, kid play club for the kid, cold for the hubby, no cooking or cleaning for me.  

So... anyone else made plans for the summer?

[jrosebud]

Kerri, I'm going to visit my parents with my kiddo (she's 6 and a firecracker) at about the same time.  Luckily, I don't have to undure country gawd music, but I will be staring at crucifixes when I go to sleep.  Ugg.

I'm looking forward to the trip, though.  I somehow managed to convince my hubby and my employer that I should take the summer off to be with my girlie and I can't wait!

[rlrose328]

Great that you convinced them of that, even if it is to gaze upon crucifixes.  LOL!

My mom isn't into country gawd music, thank Pikachu.      But she is a music director at a Catholic church, so there's lots of church music playing, lots of classical music.  Luckily, she stays in a back bedroom with her computer, tv and craft stuff while I stay in the front room most of the time.  I'm also taking my med trans class stuff with me so I can keep up with my course, so I'll do that for 4 hours a day while the kid plays.  We've also got a weekend side-trip to see Weird Al in concert (hubby got us VIP tickets... a meet and greet and second row seats!!), a trip to SF to visit the Exploratorium and the Academy of Sciences, another trip just to ride BART under the bay... so we'll do lots of non-Grandma stuff exploring the state of my son's birth.

(now playing:  Free Will by RUSH... LOVE that song!)

Anyway, do you have stuff planned while you're there or is it a sit around and visit type thing?

[jrosebud]

Dude, I love Wierd Al!  Hope you guys have a blast!

We don't really have plans, but we'll end up being crazy busy once we're there, I'm sure.  We always have to eat at our favorite restaurants and go to various shops we had to leave behind when we moved.  And we'll visit friends/relatives (which means that we'll travel to at least seven different cities while in Kansas).

My mom drives me a bit crazy, but I do love spending time with her.  

One thing I'm really looking forward to is going to the Cosmosphere.  It's a space museum in my hometown.  My mom works there, so we get free tickets to the Omnimax and Planetarium shows.  My daughter has really been getting into constellations lately, so she's stoked about going to see the a show on the summer sky.

[SteveS]

Hey jrosebud - that Cosmosphere sounds really cool.  I love astronomy-type stuff.  I'm teaching my 6yo daughter the phases of the moon, and she's starting to get them down pat.  A couple of days a go she said "That looks like a 1st quarter moon", which I found pleasantly surprising.  I said "how do you know its first quarter and not last quarter?".  She said "Because its round on the right side".  Sweet!  Its gratifying when they actually listen to you!  Now that the weather is warming, we might be able to get out in the yard to see some constellations again - she loves those as well.  Anyway - enjoy the Cosmosphere!

[rlrose328]

That Cosmophere sounds EXCELLENT!!!  We have OMSI here in Portland (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry) with a hands on Chemistry Lab and Biology labs, lots of hands on exhibits, and a planetarium (my favorite thing there).  Right now, there's a Dinosaur exhibit there.  That's where I saw Body Worlds last year.  Awesome!  We have a membership there so we can get in free to the Exploratorium and Academy of Sciences in SF thank goodness because it's not cheap to get in there.  The Exploratorium is a HUGE open warehouse type of place with nothing but hands on science stuff.  I haven't been there since my honeymoon 16 years ago so I'm psyched to go there again with the kid.

We saw Weird Al last year during the summer, same place we're going this year and same place Joe and I saw him in 1999 when I was pregnant but didn't know it.  Al is the kid's favorite singer of all time.  We have the entire anthology on his MP3 and he's either playing Al or Styx.  LOL!  I've loved Al since Another One Rides the Bus, so this will be very special this year.  I can't wait!

Steve, cool about teaching your daughter about the moon.  While my son loves space and such, he doesn't see to be interested in actually LEARNING about it.  He only wants to learn how to program video games.  <sigh>  Oh well.

[myleviathan]

"But I won't be able to sit there at night, blaring "I'm Not Ready to Make Nice" or "Dear God" while I play solitaire, as I'm doing right now. "

When I visit my mom she makes absololutely sure to have the sweet, sweet sounds of contemporary praise arranged for soprano sax. Like a bad Kenny G knockoff only praise music. I just shut up and drink my wine. Thank god(s) my mom likes wine.

On another topic - I went to Portland back in 2006 and visited the Louis and Clark museum, which I found to be really cool. I have such mixed feelings over our nation's history concerning manifest destiny. It was such an accomplishment, but so sad for the native people. Louis and Clark and their crew learned how to use common symbolism and empty promises to gain alliances with certain tribes. What an awesome journey, though...

As an aside - I was just reading the sex advice post - I think it would be fun to try and make a little love to the instrumental version of God is an Awesome God. It's kind of an intense song. The whole thing is like a climax... anyway...

[jrosebud]

Steve, it's the most amazing feeling, isn't it?  To watch your kiddo discover something and be awestruck about it.

I think phases of the moon sound like a good topic for us, too.  

Miss Jessie's thing right now is Orion and that beautiful belt of his.  And his shoulder, Betelgeuse (which translates to "the armpit of the mighty one" - great comic fodder for a six-year-old).

[rlrose328]

Steve, I asked my son at breakfast this morning (after reading your post) about the phases of the moon.  What do you know, he does know them and he drew them for me, identifying each one and why they appear like they do.  What do you know... he DOES know everything.

myleviathan, funny about the KennyG comparison.  Luckily, my mom is very much the organ/piano type, unless it's fully orchestrated classical, the stuff she grew.  She's now 69 and I never knew until two years ago that she wanted to be a classical concert pianist.  I sure do wish she'd been able to live that dream.  Her life might have turned out quite differently.

[rlrose328]

Hi, me again... just want some conversation today.

We spent the morning at IKEA.  I resisted that place for years, going for the first time in November to find a cheap bookcase for my Med Trans books (all 14 of them, plus 4 binders and software) and I needed one that is tall and skinny for the space I have.  I checked Target, Walmart, Kmart, a few local bookstores and furniture stores and found nothing useful.  A friend suggested IKEA and grudgingly, we headed over to the one in Portland.

WOW.

We were amazed at the prices and quality of their products!  Granted, some of the furniture looked cheaply made (the less expensive stuff) but there was a LOT of stuff that was economically priced and good quality.  We got hangers for the kid, storage stuff for the kitchen, a NICE sturdy step stool for the kid, and we found the perfect bookcase... a metal 4-shelf narrow red bookshelf, perfect for all of my class books, for only $15.

Today, we needed a new torchiere lamp for the den and again, can't find anything we like except those that cost over $100 and we just don't care about lighting that much.  Lo and behold, the perfect lamp at IKEA, along with a nifty napkin holder (with a weight suspended on a cable from the corner to keep napkins on the base) for only 4.95, a BIG plastic storage box to take my books to my mom's house this summer for $5.00, a bag of 20 clips to use on chip and other food bags for $2.99, 2 timers for the lights when we go on vacation (2 pack for $4.95), a wheeled stool for my son's bedroom for $12, and 2 white twin fitted sheets (to make a toga for my son's Roman culture presentation at school) for $1.99 each.  AND... we got there in time for breakfast so I got a nice breakfast of eggs, bacon, french toast sticks and potatoes for $1.99!  And it was TASTY!

Now I kick myself for avoiding IKEA for so long... I could have gotten a desk and bedding and dishes and wow, everything.

Anyone else an IKEA addict?

[SteveS]

Hey rlrose - that's cool about your son and the moon phases.  Its like a link to our past, when we were more observational about our surroundings.  And hey,

He only wants to learn how to program video games.

Could end up making a decent living doing that, so don't despair!

jrosebud --- Orion is truly the most wonderful constellation!

[rlrose328]

Steve, depending on when you ask him, the kid will say he wants to be an astronaut, a video game programmer (and work with Dad) or a martial arts master with his own dojang.  LOL!  But the space thing is a constant... it's usually an astronaut AND video game programmer or an astronaut AND a martial arts master ("the first astronaut to do Taekwondo on the moon").

We'd just be happy if he picked SOMETHING to be excited about.  He does something for 2 minutes and is an "expert" in it, though when he has to do it for real (draw for a school project, for example), he'll procrastinate like crazy... I think he KNOWS he's not an expert and doesn't want to fail, so he just won't try.

Being a parent is the hardest thing I've ever done.  I trained and motivated hundreds of people as a manager in my former career, but motivating my son is a hopeless cause.