In the Disney movie, Lilo and Stitch, when the social worker Cobra Bubbles asks Lilo, “Are you… happy?”, the little girl responds with an awkward open-mouthed smile. Lately, baby Angie and I have been enjoying a private joke in which one of us smiles like awkward Lilo, and the other responds in kind. Sometimes we stand in front of the mirror and make the face together. It’s our secret handshake.

For months, the fish tank in the kids’ room has been empty except for a Golden Mystery Snail, which has grown alarmingly large. The other day I bought 2 Red Clawed Crabs to keep the snail company. Little animal lover Ana has been faithfully feeding them each one shrimp pellet every night. I think the snail wishes they would just go away, but I’m sure it can take care of itself.

Alex and I have been watching episodes of Gilmore Girls together on DVD. He finds Lorelei Gilmore hilarious and runs out of the room during the makeout scenes. I wish I were a Lorelei, but unfortunately I’m more of a Paris Gellar.

Have you seen the order form for Star Trek t-shirts on select boxes of cereal and cracker products at the grocery store? I’ve got enough tokens to order Kevin and Alex each a shirt. They both want blue.

With only 1 week left until I return to the office, I’m finally making some headway on the work I brought home with me at the start of summer. I would allow myself to exhale, but with the amount of knocking on wood I’d have to do, I’d rub my knuckles bloody.

Categories: TV, angie, kids and parenting, pets, work-life balance
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My to-do list is a mile long, but I can’t cross anything off it. Whenever Angie isn’t crying for my attention, she’s doing something else to make me regret turning my back, even for a second. Today she drew all over her arms and legs with dry-erase markers. Then she spilled a bottle of milk on the kitchen floor and sat down in the middle of the giant puddle. ARGH!!!

At least she didn’t spill the bottle on the nice new flooring in the living room that Kevin spent the past week installing. No more awful, allergy-inducing, 30+year-old carpet, finally! I’ll leave the details for Kevin to blog about.

Last week Kevin and I went to the final show of 311‘s summer tour. I had a great time. Once in a while, when I’m inhaling second-hand pot smoke and surrounded by sweaty, half-dressed bodies, I wonder if I’m getting too old for this, but the thought is always promptly pushed out of my mind by the sight of fellow concert-goers who are my parents’ age, rocking out and having a great time. Life is much too short to worry about appearing dignified.

Last week I also finally underwent Lasik surgery. This is something I’ve been planning for years. I have nothing to complain about; it all went very smoothly. But for the morbidly curious, here are the few bumps along the way:

• I was given a Xanax to help calm me down during the surgery. I was also given numbing drops in my eyes. Neither worked as well as I would have liked. While the procedure did not hurt, I did feel the instruments touching my eyeballs. UGH!!!!! The only reason I didn’t panic was because over the past couple of decades I’ve developed some excellent coping skills for dealing with crazy anxiety-inducing situations just like this one, and they worked perfectly.
• Afterwards it felt as if there was something in my eyes that I couldn’t flush out. This continued for 24 hours. The various medicinal eyedrops I was prescribed helped eased the discomfort a little, but the only thing that really helped was sleep, which I got plenty of when the Xanax finally kicked in after the surgery was all over
• The surgery is really, really expensive. The place I chose charged me a month’s salary. Add to that the cost of all the different eyedrops, and I feel positively poor.

But was it all worth it? Oh heck yeah! I can see! I CAN SEE!!! XD

Another highly anticipated event in my little life was the new film adaptation of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince that opened July 15. Last Friday, Kevin and I took Alex to see it in the theater. We had a great time!

If all goes well with the construction of the Harry Potter theme park in Florida, that’s where we’ll be going for our next family vacation. According to the latest news, it’s going to have some cool rides and at least one awesome eatery. I can’t wait!

While cleaning the kids’ room I found a little black rubber ball under one of their beds. Alex said it reminded him of what the Earth would look like if we continued to misuse our natural resources. I promptly promised to start composting the next day. So far I haven’t lived up to my promise, mainly because Angie keeps doing things like pouring entire bottles of milk on the kitchen floor.

Speaking of weird environmental things, did you hear the news about the big mysterious blob floating in the ocean off the coast of Alaska? Watch the video here!

Categories: allergies, angie, environment, harry potter, home improvement, music
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So far this summer, I have done the following:

• Invited friends over for a High School Musical movie marathon!
• Invited friends over to gab and watch our kids play together
• Attended a retirement reception for an ex-coworker.
• Cleaned the house. This is the best it’s looked in MONTHS.
• Packed up most of the stuff in the living room in preparation for flooring installation. Can’t wait to be done with this!
• Conducted science experiments with the kids using a Harry Potter potions kit. Major Mom Win.
• Re-read about half of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince so far in anticipation of watching the movie next week.
• Gone to the beach for the first time in YEARS.
• Eaten a lot of oatmeal. I’m strangely proud of myself about this.
• Wrote a big progress report for a committee I’m chairing. Our work doesn’t halt over the summer, unfortunately.
• Wrote various other reports for work. Still have a few more to write. Blah.
• Made the decision to go back to school. Nervous but SO EXCITED.
• Turned one year older. And wiser.

Categories: food, harry potter, home improvement, kids and parenting, movies, work-life balance
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Friday night I stopped by our neighborhood Blockbuster and rented Marley and Me. What’s not to love about a movie with an overly rambunctious dog named after Bob Marley?

This was my favorite quote from the movie:

Arnie: Take a vacation. Go away for a couple of weeks. Take a month off.

John: Go where?

Arnie: I don’t know.

John: I live in a vacation spot.

Arnie: Then go some place where it’s painful and sad.

Having lived most of my life in sunny So Cal, I’ve had this same exact thought many, many times.

Categories: movies, pets, travel
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Categories: entertainment
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