Sooz’s Neighborhood

Cormac McCarthy's The Road is quite a read. I think I remember Oprah recommend it . . . I think she interviewed him. She called it a coup because he never does interviews and he did so for her. Whatever.

It has zero chapters. Just chunks of content. It's easy to read because of the way it is broken up, but sometimes I prefer an end of a chapter rather than some horizontal rule made up of dots. I'm still not quite sure what happened and where the main characters -- a dad and his son -- are travelling, but it's a road. Actually, they spend little time on the road. They hide a lot and try to make it south to the beach. I believe it is some post-nuclear war setting. They are always looking for food and supplies. Both are sick. Throughout, you can infer the dad will die or the son will die.

The son preciously calls his dad, "Papa." He's scared quite often and asks his dad never to leave him alone. When the father looked for food and supplies, he asked the boy to maintain a fire. He could then find him.

At one point, they come across an apparently old man, who states his name to be Ely, but later retracts because he doesn't want to be known. The conversation between the father and Ely centers around the planning that took place before. (I know, you are wondering before what. Who knows?). Ely profoundly states "People were always getting ready for tomorrow . . . Tomorrow wasn't getting ready for them. It didn't even know they were there."

I've always heard this same sentiment framed in more familiar language such as carpe diem, live for the day, live each day to the fullest, etc. But, yeah, tomorrow doesn't know me. Today does. Is today pleased?

Today was my second chemical peel. The first was in April.

The price of aging while still hanging on to pimples!

Since the last go round didn't seem to create the peel effect, this time they gooped me up big time. Boy I felt those chemicals at work.

So the face is tight right now and I can't wash off the stuff until tomorrow a.m.

Tonight I'll dream of smooth skin, no pimples, no wrinkles . . .

Christopher asked Jesus to be his Savior and come into his heart -- last week at the Harvest Fellowship Sports Camp.
He didn't talk about it last week -- I think because I was out of town Wednesday -- which is the day he thinks he remembers walking down.

We received a letter from Harvest today that said he had in fact prayed the prayer.

So tonight he was full of question. How could the devil be an angel and not be in Heaven? If God planned your life before you were born how do you know if you are making the right choice when there are two -- like go to one college or another. When God planned your life, did he know what you would be doing each day?

We told him this was the most important decision he will ever make. Gervais and I had been praying about this and talking about this so much. We knew he got it, we just knew he needed to take the step.

Wow . . talk about blessings. Because of the Celtics basketball team, we got to know Tom and Kim Bault. They were organizers of the camp and told us about it. And, so Christopher went.

He's guaranteed eternal life. Boy, I hope Grandmother and Granddad heard his prayer.

I've been out of town so I've missed out on the bus the past couple of days. I did take an 'urban spin' by stopping at Aveda for hair color, but Gervais picked me up because the appointment took 2 1/2 hours.

I started A Mighty Heart -- the story about Danny Pearl. A bit complicated in that Marianne Pearl attempts to describe the confusing search -- I guess it's successful in that I'm confused and I wasn't there in the middle of it. So far, there's one quote that hit me:

"Hope is a remarkable muscle."

That's all she had.

Those Sand Hill Road folks pay more for gas than anyone I've seen.

good thing they can afford it

What lesson did your father teach you that still helps you in life?

Vote. Vote in all elections for which you are eligible.

My dad mailed absentee ballots to me while I was in college.

Of course, I don't vote like he wants me to, but I vote.

He exit polls my sisters and I after each election -- even water board -- to find out how we voted.

Vote.

A frequent rider of the no. 10 afternoon bus is blind with a seeing eye dog. He gets on downtown and gets off at Broadway and Josephine. On the dog's collar is a sign that reads, 'Don't pet me. I'm working.' The man sits in the front in one of the sider-rows.

Today, someone didn't read the sign.

A man drinking something other than what should be in a can of Arizona Iced Tea stumbled toward the dog and drunkedly (is that a word) bent over to pet the dog. The dog owner said 'Please don't pet my dog. He's working.' Mr. Arizona Iced Tea ignored the man and continued to pet the dog. Dog owner repeated his statement. Iced Tea said 'I'm just being friendly' or something along those lines. Ah, yes, a doozy about to go down on no. 10.

Owner: 'Do not pet him. I've asked you nicely.'

Iced Tea: 'I can do whatever I want.'

Owner: 'Leave me alone.'

Iced Tea, now seated: 'explicit, explicit, bad word.'

Driver casually glances in the rearview mirror.

Owner speaking in to his headpiece for his phone: 'Police Department. I'm on the no. 10 bus on Broadway and a man is harassing me and my dog. . . If something happens, I can't guarantee I can control myself.'

Thankfully, Broadway and Josephine arrived before something happened.

As for Iced Tea, he dropped the can upon finishing it and then watched it roll up and down the aisle a few times. At his stop, way down Nacogdoches, like five stops from my stop, he stumbles down the aisle, bends over to grab the can almost falling into an environmentally-safe Sun Harvest shopper and gets off. Off for some more iced tea, I guess.

My husband, the world traveler, left for Vegas late this afternoon. Yes, his brother's wedding is tomorrow. In Vegas.

I've bitterly kept a running total of the cost of this wedding. Money we really don't have to spend on a wedding for his brother who just happens to like Vegas and thinks it's no problem for his family to come to Vegas in the middle of the week in the middle of the summer for his wedding.

Flight to Vegas: No out-of-pocket cost. My husband traded a Southwest ticket for training. $300 we won't be seeing. 'It's a free flight.'

Tux to wear for one hour in Vegas: $110

Hotel in Vegas: Allegedly $79 a night. Two nights split between my husband and Bo. So roughly $80 before taxes. I'm counting this as $100.

Transportation in Vegas: Shuttles, taxis, etc., will probably add up to around $25. He'll split with Bo.

Food in Vegas: He's thinking all his meals will be comped. What? Are you a big-time gambler . . if so, that's another cost. If meals aren't comped, we've got two dinners, two lunches, two breakfasts for on average and I'm shooting low here $15 a meal. That's $90.

Gambling in Vegas: I believe he will limit himself to $100.

Total spent in Vegas by a person without a full-time job: $425.

Lost income because of trip to Vegas: $300

Out of pocket plus lost income for trip to Vegas: $725

Hope his brother isn't expecting a gift.

As the end of the school year draws near, I am looking forward to one thing in particular: I expect the number of exposure notices to drop significantly. We all know about the lice notices, it seemed like I was receiving one (or causing one to be received by others) every few days for months. But I didn't tell you about the others that have been regularly rolling in: pink eye (which she got), scabies (which she didn't), strep throat, hand, foot and mouth disease (isn't that for farm animals?), impetigo and scarlett fever. Just so you know how grossly misinformed I am, I thought scarlett fever was a serious disease. It's not. It seems that I'm confusing the colors of my fevers.

When Cassandre was little I shrugged off these notices. She almost never got sick and over time I just chalked them up to cya on the part of the school. Recently, however, I've developed a fear of the little white notes and the maladies they represent. Our battles with lice (won, I think, she said knocking on wood) and encounter with pink eye, and having met the classmate with scarlett (not yellow) fever, have resulted in me not being able to shake the warnings off the way I could before.

I expect the number of notices to drop, but not to stop. You see, I'm sending them to french camp, at the french school and the same rug rats they hang out with today are the ones they'll be running around with tomorrow. Except that since it's "camp" (and I don't mean that the way the Nazis did even though it is at school and some of you might not think that is very camp like...) anyway, I was saying that since it's camp she'll also get exposed (ha ha) to a whole new set of mystery dates. Kids who come in for two weeks and never come back.

It seems that not everyone needs day care the way I do and many parents actually keep their kids home during the summer. Or send them to real camp, or even sleep-away camp. I loved sleep-away camp. It was my first experience getting away from home and tasting independence. Of course I was horribly shy and it took me practically the whole summer to warm up to people (yes, I was that girl, the one you think is a total bitch until you realize she's just shy) but sleep-away camp is where I learned to ride a minibike, flirt with boys and steer a canoe - all very valuable life skills.

But I digress.

My girls are too young for sleep-away camp and they need to keep up with their French language skills over the summer so they don't fall behind. Plus, french camp is fun. No really. It's just like regular day camp but in another language, full of games, field trips, pools and running around. I wish I could go.

Really I wish I could go to sleep-away camp.

I got another notice today, this one for Roseola Infantum: here is what it said, italics are all mine.

What are the symptoms? Fever (often high) and a red, raised rash.
How is it spread? Direct contact with the mucous or saliva from the nose or throat of an infected person. And this is how you know we're dealing with kids. No matter how much I love you, if you are over five feet tall there is just no freaking way I am coming into contact with your sickly mucous membranes. 
When do symptoms start? 5 to 15 days after exposure to the virus. Good, because there's nothing I enjoy more than waiting for fever and a red, raised rash.
Need to keep the child home? No. Unless child is unable to participate in activies. Hello ground control, are you kidding me? I mean isn't that why you're sending this freaking notice home to me in the first place? Because some kid got sick and got dropped at school anyway?
Return to school/childcare? Children may return to school/childcare after fever disappears. Or when you have given them so much motrin that no one can tell that they're sick anymore.

Oh right, like you've never done that.

Remember when I said that the ESPN crew took some footage of Xav and me fly fishing in Chile? Look! We made the promo! Best part is that we don't talk. ;-)