I hate cooties!

Not the kind from which we run on the playground when we're eight years old, but the kind that the grown man gets at this time of year. Wives and girlfriends, you know what I mean. I just get cranky. I don't mind bringing him tea or running to the store to get tomato soup and Kleenex. I start getting annoyed after the tenth sneeze that comes out like a lion's roar, causing windows to shake and neighbors' car alarms to start honking wildly. I believe the cat's whiskers were blown from their faces with the force of the sound waves alone. Good god! I suggested to him in a less-than-sensitive tone that I doubted very seriously that he would sneeze like that in a board meeting. He looked wounded, as if I questioned the degree to which he is suffering, at deaths door. With a cold. OK, he's diabetic and his numbers run higher which makes him more tired, but sheesh - that's why he has the harpoon. It's just a cold. Not the plague, and certainly not an excuse to holler/sneeze such that the neighbor's consider the need to call 911 for the banshee that is surely being brutalized in our house.

No artwork done today. Ah well.

What to blog...

Paranoid that I might be a snoozer of a blogger, I spent some time this morning (one day after creating my blog) with a cup of cooling coffee (yuckers) to cruise through other blogs. I've decided I'm much more entertaining and feel ever so much better! There are some very odd blogs out there. Not all of them. There was one I found intriguing in that the author leads an out of the ordinary life, involved in both domestic and foreign politics while living abroad. Alas, I can only be amused by photos of people I don't know and places I can't identify (language barriers, I fear) for so long before I zip along to the next blog. I read one about a very young teen mother and new wife and am glad it isn't me. There are a lot of "artists" online. I found another site - I believe it was in Italian - with a lot of photos of garbage lining the streets and a Socialist Party gathering.

I won't be posting photos of garbage, political gatherings or my cats. I have cats, but no one outside of our immediate family cares, so I'll spare blog surfers the pics.

Today's topic of thought is the wicked, evil bathroom scale. Not all of them are wicked, but mine is at the top of the list. I quit my office job a couple of months ago to pursue art. I'm not fabulous, but I do ok. Since leaving work, I'm eating better and working my butt off renovating rooms of the house so that I have a real studio again. I think I sweat off about two pounds a day. I have that and then some to spare. So I toss on a shirt that has been a little snug since I bought it (it's amazing what really tight underwear can do to make it fit just a little better) and was thrilled to find it a little flowy, not so snug around the hips. I race to the scale, sure I'm going to see that I've lost at least five pounds since I started having Lean Cuisine's for lunch every day instead of burgers, giant salads or chicken strips, and the freakin' piece of crap says I weigh two pounds more. Bull crap! So now I'm pissed. And I'm hungry, and my coffee is cold, and I feel like I can't go get my fewer-than-five-times-a-year Starbucks spiced pumpkin latte that is finally back in season. Argh! I think my scale will be joining the garbage stack.

Transitions

I got married right out of high school and just three months after I turned 18. I have been a working wife and eventually mother for most of these years. I put my husband through graduate school, the benefits of which we reap together and for which I have no regrets. I took a few chunks of time to step out of the suit world and played Betty Crocker - I was a Girl Scout leader and camped (camping is dirty and has bugs!) because my daughter wanted to be a Girl Scout, I followed trains (it took the engineer a couple of intersections before he realized he was being followed) because my son loves trains, decorated the house like crazy for the holidays and put an end to celebrating major holidays away from home so the kids could enjoy them more, and I have always tried to make the kids' (and husband's) friends feel welcome in our house. I'm not sure the kids see history through the same coloured glasses that I do. I think I've been a hard parent, always the disciplinarian while Dad got to be the friend. I view my job of teaching them to be fully functioning and independent adults as my primary job and my methods, having had such a glorious example of what NOT to do growing up, have not always been wise or helpful. How I wish I could turn back the clock and do it again, better...

So I'm starting off with a blog while I work through my demons. How many times will I backspace and edit before I'm bold enough to select "Publish Post?"

Step one.