Hahahahahahahahaha!

Oh god. *gasp* can't. stop. laughing!

Best music video ever!

Link thanks to Davezilla!

AAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHH!

There's a mysterious beeping in my house. It's been going on for a couple of weeks now. Every now and then at random moments I'll hear an electronic beep. Sometimes it repeats itself, sometimes it doesn't. And sometimes it goes crazy and beeps frantically- until the moment when I come running in the door and then it stops. Some days I feel like I'm on Candid Camera!

I've narrowed it down to the kids toy cabinet chaos, which I've torn asunder on more than one occasion, but I cannot for the life of me figure out what's making that noise.

And it's kind of like Chinese water torture-- each drop in itself may seem harmless, but THE COMBINED EFFECT IS ENOUGH TO DRIVE A PERSON TO DISTRACTION!

Just passing through...

	We're back! Trip went well- we've dumped our bags and are doing a load of laundry. Then tomorrow we're off to NL to celebrate Easter. Will post again soon. Realized that I haven't posted any photos in a while-- here's a new installment...

We interrupt this program for an important announcement

OK, so the announcement is not that important but the occasion is. We're off to Stuttgart for a week to explore and look at houses / schools / etc. This should go a long way to making me feel more comfortable with the whole situation.

Back next week with stories, pictures, etc...

(Thanks to Carthalia for this very tasteful postcard...)

I am the early bird's worm

This morning the kids were up bright and early and dove into bed with me. "MAM! WAKE UP! IT'S TIME TO GO DOWNSTAIRS AND WATCH TV!"

I was completely groggy and tried to buy some time with "OK, but please give me two minutes to wake up."

So S flopped down next to me and began counting happily: one one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand....

(and yes, he actually counted up every single one of the one hundred and twenty seconds. every. single. one...)

Dialup hell

I'm in Holland at my inlaws'. In general it's a great diversion but they've got dialup.

Need I say more?

I'm like one of those trapped coyotes-- I would probably gnaw off my own arm if it would free me from dialup hell.

Sometimes I forget what an addiction broadband is. The neighbors have a wireless connection and I catch myself sometimes staring forlornly at the icon and salivating...

Last night I was daydreaming about planting myself outside their livingroom window and waving 20 euros with a pleading gesture. They don't know me from Adam but I'm hoping they're compassionate people...

Formal acknowledgement of lunacy

Open letter to those present at the Kinderparadijs playground 02 April

Dear fellow parents:

I'm sure you'll remember me from the playground yesterday. Or rather, you probably won't have noticed me, but my children will definitely not have escaped your attention. I feel compelled to offer up an explanation.

My sons were the ones running around looking like third-world refugees. And yes, I realize that they broke every fashion rule ever written and that they probably offended your sensibilities.

I don't know what I was thinking when I sent them upstairs yesterday with the request to dress themselves.

Chalk it up to exhaustion. Chalk it up to distraction. In any case, I formally apologise.

It seems that my oldest son dressed himself in some sort of nostalgic haze. Don't ask me where he found those sweatpants, and yes, I do realize they were two sizes too small and that they didn't match his teeny tiny sweatshirt.

I can only assume the lights were off and that my youngest has been nipping at our vodka. Why else would he have chosen to wear a light blue shirt with orange sweatpants and rainbow colored Bob the Builder socks?

Oh yeah, and I can explain the bloody nose as well. See, I just turned my head for a second and one of them got a little too enthusiastic pushing the other one on the see saw.

When you contact children's services please be sure to tell them I actually remembered to brush their teeth that morning. And that they may have looked like loonies but that they had a great time.

I'm thinking it's their mother that might need to be placed in a foster home...

What a difference a day makes!

Finished up with my job on Friday and have been caught up in a maelstrom of self pity the last few days. Not necessarily because I'll be missing the director's frequent tantrums or the catty politics around the office, but I'm having a hard time turning in my identity of "webmaster extraordinaire". ;-)

Funny, I wasn't at all enthusiastic when I went back to work after a 3 1/2 year study / pregnancy / international move-induced-hiatus. We needed the money and I needed the web experience, but I really enjoyed my little microcosm and was not looking forward to flinging myself headfirst into the rat race.

But I did. Made some friends, learned some new web tricks, traveled a little, and settled into a groove and now BAM! Have hit a wall going about 200 km / hour and now have to relearn simplicity. Relearn contentment. Relearn solitude. Which will happen, but I'm afraid it's going to take some time...

Started to pull out of my funk this afternoon and then a friend showed up with a bottle of good wine, some cheese, and best of all, her kids! One would think this is not conducive to relaxation, but they ended up keeping my boys busy for more than an hour so that I could sit and talk and really enjoy some one-on-one adult company for the first time in days.

If it wasn't for streaming media I might not have otherwise heard an adult voice in this house before Saturday!!! (THANK GOD FOR INTERNET!!!!!!) I actually just spent time talking to a real human who doesn't shreik or burp between sentences! Amazing!

Note to self 2 & 3

NTS 2: It doesn't matter if you're busy-- trust that little niggling instinct that tells you not to give in and let B rollerskate in his brand new $25 pair of jeans.

NTS 3: Buy patches.

Note to self.

It doesn't matter how late you are getting out the door for work! Do not open that bottle of black shoe polish above your creme colored duvet! When are you ever going to learn?! Sheesh!

Taffy was a Welshman

The boys have finally reached the age that they can really enjoy chapter books. I've been waiting for this moment for so long, and despite an initial bumpy start we've really started working our way through the bookshelves.

At the moment we're reading an anthology of children's classics that S inherited from a neighbor. I was really enthusiastic when we got it because it includes many stories that I enjoyed as a child.

This book was published back in 1966 and they obviously had different ideas back then about appropriate material for small children. I have been really shocked by the violence, desperation and outright racism in these stories and nursery rhymes!

We read an excerpt from the original Pinocchio yesterday evening and I was completely floored. The guy who sells the wood to Gepetto is a drunk, and they get into a knock-down drag out fight and call each other all sorts of names.

Gepetto carves out Pinocchio and then beats him and gets arrested by the police for disturbing the peace and child endangerment.

Pinocchio is a completely unsympathetic character: kicks people, teases them mercilessly and steals things. And then he squashes Jiminy Cricket with his shoe!

I was surprised that my first reaction was to censor the baser parts of the story. But the rational side of me realizes that kids need to learn at a young age that people are often horrible to each other-- I wouldn't do them any favors by sheltering them.

So now S and B are getting the unedited, unDisney-fied introduction to children's literature; warts and all.

Would be interested to hear other people's experiences and how you've reacted to this issue.

Time to install a hidden camera

Saturday is my set day to clean the bathrooms. And now Saturday has also become my set day to be stumped and amazed.

I'm sure there has got to be a completely rational explanation.

Can someone please tell me the story behind those small dark footprints that I keep finding on the toilet seat!?

Need to find a 12 step program

I see it in her eyes as soon as I walk in the door. Most people would miss the subtle cues but I sense it immediately because I know her so well. I suspect it even before I find the telltale detritus of her habit hidden carefully in various nooks and crannies.

She's using again. Caught up in that cycle of abuse and withdrawal. the deception. the desperation. the shame. the craving.

My name is Betsy and my dog has an incorrigible kitchen sponge addiction...

Not exactly "My First Reader" material

OK, so as usual I am my own paradox. The last post was about meditation and mindfulness, this one is about a gory pulp novel I'm reading. Go figure.

The sun was shining and the kids and I went to hang out in the yard to soak up the warmth and putter around. While they were playing I sat on the front steps and took a few minutes break to read a Patricia Cornwall novel-- I don't usually like detective stories, but have been in the mood for something fast-paced and light.

S still isn't feeling 100% and has been very clingy. At one point he came over and snuggled up in my lap. I was sitting there with my thoughts turned inward, enjoying the warmth of the sun and the weight of his small body when I suddenly became aware of his voice as he started reading without hesitation:

"Blood seeps from the gaping wound on her left knee..."

Mindfulness and concentration

I've been spinning my wheels this last week, completely consumed by bouts of frustration and anxiety over small things which are out of my control. And I realized that I've fallen into a vicious cycle of stress and my negative reaction toward it. The ironic thing is that as a fitness freak I've been compulsively taking care of my physical body but have allowed my psyche to become flabby.

Pre-kids I went through phases when I meditated regularly and really felt a difference in my ability to cope with stressful situations. Obviously I have less free time now, but I've also got more stress. And I've been feeling so out of sorts lately it's really time to get disciplined and try to regain my balance.

I ordered a new Vipassana meditation workbook with CDs and they arrived yesterday. Have done a couple of sessions so far and am amazed at how much more grounded I already feel! Plan to make a concerted effort to keep it up and hope to be back to my old cheerful self very soon...

Through the looking glass

Composed a post in my head on the drive home from work today. But it turned out to be unusable because it was such a reflection of my state of mind lately: disjointed and messy. I derived a lot of satisfaction, though, by coming up with great adjectives like "putrid" and "repugnant".

There are three major events going on at work at the moment, and they're bringing out the worst sides of human nature. I've got six days left at the office and on days like today this is a happy realization.

I'm a bit worried about S. He had a virus over the weekend which seems to have wiped him out. He's complaining that his legs hurt and then fell asleep at 4:30 this afternoon and hasn't been up since.

He might just not be fully recovered yet-- he's had gymnastics and swimming with school and soccer practice in the span of two days. Perhaps we've let him do too much too soon? Which in hindsight seems stupid but he usually bounces back so quickly!

Soccer practice was held indoors yesterday evening. B and I sat in the pub with a couple of other parents and watched the boys go through their drills. At one point the burly coach comes in with one of the seven-year-olds and dumps him off: he's fallen, says his arm is hurt, take care of him, will you?

It becomes pretty obvious that the boy is not faking. He's pale and quiet and withdrawn-- luckily he knew his dad's GSM number. I got some ice from the bar and we kept talking to him, trying to distract him.

Dad arrives, and the coach magically reappears. There were several testosterone-laden statements exchanged. A couple of proud comments about the fact that the kid hadn't cried. And then the father took him home.

I am absolutely convinced his arm was broken.

The image of his small pale face haunted me all night long...

Dr. Jekyll back to set the record straight

Obviously I realize that at four B has no clue how offensive he was being. He was just mimicking something he's heard at school and in the big picture this is no worse than his thug impersonation a few months ago.

I sent him upstairs, took away dessert and somehow managed to stay sane enough to explain that his behavior was unacceptable.

It was so difficult to remain calm, especially after having such a crappy day-- I'm still adjusting to life without M around to act as relief pitcher when I need to step back and take a break.

I'm sure I'll probably laugh about the whole incident later but have to admit that the old head explosion scenario seemed like the most natural reaction at the time. I'm doing my best to keep the hot lava eruptions to a minimum, but it's not always easy...

Update from Ms. Hyde

My mood hasn't improved. And, in fact, it didn't exactly ratchet up a notch on the happy-meter when I asked B to put his shoes away and he responded with a "What are you, stupid? I'm busy right now." (!!!???)

There are still scorch marks on the wall from where my head exploded...

Looking for trouble!

I suppose I should start off this post with a small warning: I am evil this morning, people, EVIL!

This could be partly due to brain damage sustained after breathing in the chemicals we used to refinish our kitchen floor this weekend. Or the possible permanent disfigurement sustained during a facial waxing incident yesterday. Maybe I have eaten too little and my blood sugar is plummeting. Whatever the reason my patience is thin and my tolerance is zero.

And of course, as luck will have it I was late getting my brood out the door. I could pretend that this was due to outside influences, but in reality I was just slow and spacey, which only made me more irritable. S and B were walking out the door, jackets and backpacks on when they both realized they had to poop. It's been that kind of morning.

Got caught behind a diabolically slow horse trailer in my mad rush to school. What the heck is the point of driving horses from point A to point B at a pace slower than a mild canter???!!!

So I finally dragged my sorry self in to work. Made a cup of tea and set to the task of deleting the hundreds of spam mails that pollute my inbox every day.

Was just starting to feel half human when our office manager ran up to me with a concerned look on her face: You aren't drinking tea, are you? Because I was just using some chemicals to clean the lime deposits out of the teapot and someone has put the top back on and boiled it up like normal water!

I was already halfway through my mug.

So this might be the last post you see from me for a while. At least if I have to have my stomach pumped I won't have to sift through any more spam...

Signs of spring

Spring is definitely on its way. I know this not by a rise in temperature or increased daylight hours. No, I've got a much more reliable barometer: the men with the wheelbarrows are starting to crawl out of the woodwork.

I stopped not once, but twice yesterday on my way home to let them trundle past carrying manure or whatever it is they are using on their farming plots. (On one occasion last year I peeked into a particularly noisy wheelbarrow to find it was filled with crates of live chicks!)

Some days I feel claustrophobic in our picturesque little village but on sunny days like this I love it!