cindy's world

This is the latest installment in the ongoing saga that is Mr. W’s life with his kids. They gave him a folded-up piece of scratch paper yesterday with this written on it:

HAPPY FATHERS DAY!
Since we were in Vegas we didn’t really have time to get you anything, but when we come back we are going to spend some time together and give you our gift. We love you. Thank you for this weekend.

And then there’s a heart and the son and daughter’s names under that.

I said, “Aww, they THANKED you for the WEEKEND in Vegas!”

I think I may have been more excited about this than Mr. W was.

I had an amazing weekend! Because my gym trainee was coming over to my house (for the first time) to help me clean out my closets, I was embarrassed to have her see my house as the mess it was, so I spent all Saturday morning before she got there cleaning, scrubbing, vacuuming (never could spell that word), Windexing, disinfecting, sorting, disposing, decluttering. My house is SO spic and span right now that I loved being in it all weekend. We spent 3 hours digging through four closets, and I’m donating 3 large trash bags full of clothes, plus one packing box full of undergarments. Man. I can’t believe what an ugly fashion period the 80s and early 90s were. There were some things I had no problems parting with, but there were many more that I had to look to her. “This still fits. What do you think?”
“That is OUT. I don’t see you wearing that now.”
“Really? Is it the box cut [with drawsting on the bottom], or is it the flannel plaid pattern?”
“It’s BOTH!!”
“Oh.”
All the oversized t-shirts, sweatshirts and sweaters caused her to exclaim over and over again, “I don’t understand. Who were you buying clothes FOR back then?! Some fat…man? If a guy today fit in that shirt, I wouldn’t date him!”
This made me examine my old wardrobe thoughtfully. “I wonder why my parents let me buy all this masculine, oversized stuff when I was in high school. They’re all really unflattering.”
“They were probably just happy cuz the less feminine you looked, the less they had to worry about.”
Funny thing is that I told my parents today about all the closet cleaning, and they even brought up that my clothes back 10 years ago were big and menswear, and my dad reminded me accusingly of the flannel shirts and sweatshirts I’d taken from him. Oops.

(as usual, rest mouse pointer over photos for captions)

After my gym trainee left, I took off to Dwaine’s house. We went to buy lasagne ingredients at the grocery store, and then went back to his place to cook it. He was an avid student, very hands-on, wanting to do a bit of most things himself so that he’d know how to do it again later on without me. The lasagne turned out very well, except that he was so exhausted by then from the earlier San Diego mud run catching up with him that I had a really hard time getting him to slunk from the couch over to the kitchen to take out and cut the lasagne. (The reason why he had to do this instead of me, was because he wanted photos of him doing the impossible — cooking and pulling homemade food that he’d made out of the oven.) As we ate dinner we watched puppet sex on a Comedy Central show “Team America: World Police”, by the creators of “South Park.” Its antics were laugh-out-loud funny in their ludicrousness. And lewdness. It was a fun night. I even got a surprise phone call from Mr. W in Vegas, at a bar with his brothers while waiting to see the topless show “Bite.” It was a surprise cuz Mr. W doesn’t typically think to call me when he’s on a trip. He called me once the entire 2 weeks he was in Alaska last year. I was so glad to hear they were getting some good quality brother time in, and also that they were seeing “Bite”, as I know Mr. W had been wanting to see it every time we’d gone to Vegas recently, but the timing never worked out. Plus, I wasn’t particularly interested in the show so in a selfish way, it worked out for me. Hee hee. Altho I don’t think one of the brother’s wives was too pleased that they had gone to a topless revue when she found out about it afterwards.

Sunday (today), guilt from having eaten like a pig but not worked out at the gym since Wednesday roused me from slumber, and I got up and hit the gym for 2.5 hours. I did about 1.5 hrs of warmups and weight-training, and a full hour of cardio. I would’ve done less on cardio because the boredom always kills me, but “American Pie” was playing on one of the TVs. That easily killed the hour. I’d forgotten how funny the first movie in the series was. Strangely, it turned out my weight’s lower than it had been in a long time, at 125 (rattlesnakes be damned!) and my fat percentage dropped 2% as well. After the gym, I showered up and went to my parents’ house, picked them up, and we went to get fitted for shoes at A Snail’s Pace. I got reconfirmed that I overpronate, my dad was diagnosed as an overpronator as well, and my mom’s gait was neutral. “HAHA!” she laughed at us. “I’m neutral!”
“That doesn’t mean anything!” I told her.
“I’m normal,” she insisted.
My mom got nice Asics, my dad got a newly engineered pair of Sauconys, and I got a brand I’d never heard of until now, Brooks. My parents were excited to go on their hilly neighborhood walk tonight to try out their new shoes. It’s so cute, they never acknowledged the importance of really good shoes so my dad was stunned walking around in his corrective, supportive stability shoes. “It’s like walking on air! So light!” he exclaimed. My mom was a bit perturbed at the orange-colored accents on her shoes because she’s the fashion queen, and kept migrating toward the “cute” or sale shoes that aren’t even neutral and being disappointed that they felt funny on her feet. I left them with their new birthday (mom) and Father’s Day presents after dinner.

After spending more quality time with the DodoCat, I took Mr. W up on his invitation to hang out with him at his house. And that’s where I am right now! Blogging to my readers instead of catching up with the newly returned Mr. W. Oh well. 😀

Happy Friday! All’s quiet on the Western Front. I came back today to find that our trial is over; the jurors returned their verdict yesterday while I was at graduation. Unfortunately, the floater court reporter took the original verdict home with her. Who does that?! But according to the floater clerk, he’d already tracked her down and she’s going to mail it back to us.

I may join my coworkers for happy hour tonite at Outback Steakhouse. Tomorrow, my gym trainee volunteered to come to my house for a much-needed closet cleaning. After that, if Dwaine doesn’t poop out after his San Diego 10K Mud Run on Saturday, we’re gonna hang out and cook. “You can come over and prod what’s left of me with a stick after the mud run,” was how he put it.

Mr. W is already in Vegas with his kidlets. They’ll be back Sunday. I’d planned to give his son this cool gadget as his graduation gift, but it turned out you can only get this online, so I ordered it today. Now it’s gonna end up being more of a birthday present than a graduation present, his birthday being only 2 days before my own. Oh yeah. Mr. W, if you’re reading this before I give your son his graduation gadget, don’t tell him what it is! I figure this’ll come in really handy when he’s deciding whether to drive from school all the way to his mom’s house after class, or to wait out traffic at Mr. W’s house or in school. Or to take an alternate route. Here’s a review on the product.

Kids are great, aren’t they? Here’re some anecdotes my dad email-forwarded me:
WHEN MY THREE-YEAR-OLD SON OPENED THE BIRTHDAY GIFT FROM HIS GRANDMOTHER, HE DISCOVERED A WATER PISTOL.. HE SQUEALED WITH DELIGHT AND HEADED FOR THE NEAREST SINK. I WAS NOT SO PLEASED. I TURNED TO MOM AND SAID, “I’M SURPRISED AT YOU. DON’T YOU REMEMBER HOW WE USED TO DRIVE YOU CRAZY WITH WATER GUNS?”
MOM SMILED AND THEN REPLIED….. “I REMEMBER!!”

A new teacher was trying to make use of her psychology courses. She started
her class by saying, “Everyone who thinks they’re stupid, stand up!”
After a few seconds, Little Davie stood up. The teacher said, “Do you think
you’re stupid, Little Davie?”
“No, ma’am, but I hate to see you standing there all by yourself!”

I got today off (yeah, it was a huge shocker to me, too) so that I could attend Mr. W’s son’s graduation. It was a historical moment — Mr. W’s kids attend a new school, only 3 years old, and this graduating class is the school’s first ever, as the school opened up accepting only freshmen and sophomores.

To the graduation, I wore this outfit that had an unusual back, as so:

The graduation being outdoors from 3p-4p, I ended up this interesting tanline despite the sunblock I’d slathered on (you can also see my bikini string tanline toward the bottom of the photo; I got that when I hung out with Vanessa):

Speaking of Vanessa, thanks to her Boot Camp workout, I still have these mosquito bite war wounds:

Sleep doesn’t come at a time like this if I really do love someone. Twilight used to be reassuring. The mistily veiled rose hues before dawn used to wake a sleepy but excited 6 year old and adhere her to the window, embracing some unidentifiable feeling that I now know is nostalgia.
You’re right next to me
But I need an airplane
I can feel the distance
Getting close
Solid. Beautiful. Detour.
It really was.

I’m sitting at Mr. W’s desk in his bedroom chatting online, and then I overhear from the living room Son’s voice saying something, and then Daughter’s voice, “Yeah, I’m going to Vegas, too.” TOO? Did she say TOO?

I ran out. “[Son]!” I called. “You’re going to Vegas?”
“Yeah, I am,” he said very good-naturedly.
“I am so proud of you!” I burst. “Don’t forget when you get up there to thank your grandparents for all the money they gave you last Christmas cuz you hadn’t seen them,” I couldn’t help rubbing in.
“Yeah, I know,” he laughed.

Whoooo! *running around the cyber blog room high-ten-ing everyone*

I got to play Benevolent Big Sister today. I’d stayed over at Mr. W’s last nite, and he left earlier than usual this morning to work. This is finals week for Mr. W’s sophomore daughter so she didn’t have zero period, or she’d have normally left to school with her carpool before I was out of bed. Her older brother is a senior so school’s over for him. Just awaiting graduation, he was unconscious in his room.

I walked by Daughter’s bedroom as I was getting ready to leave and asked if she needed a ride to school. She said no, she was calling friends to come get her. But as I noticed she was calling and text messaging rather frantically, I said I’d stick around just to make sure she got her ride situation figured out before I left. Turned out that the girl whose turn it is to have her mother drive the carpool had text messaged Daughter in the morning saying something to the effect that she was going to her aunt’s house and that hopefully Mr. W can give Daughter and 3rd Carpool Girl a ride to school this morning. Seeing that none of Daughter’s friends are responding, I asked what her last resort game plan is. She said pensively she’d call her ex-boyfriend Brian to come get her. I wasn’t going to have her ex-boyfriend come by and rub in that he played hero for her today, so I asked her if she’s ready to go to school now (7:25a). She said it was too early; school started at 8a. I said, “It’s better for you to be there early and study for your final than to be there late cuz you can’t get a ride.” “That’s true,” she admitted. She got a final call-back from a friend she’d been counting on. The friend said she was already on her way to school with her mom. Daughter made plans to meet this friend at school early to study together before classes opened. Then we were off.

Driving out of the neighborhood, Daughter exclaimed, “[3rd Carpool Girl]’s standing on the corner!” Turned out 3rd Carpool Girl’s mom freaked out on her and had her phone shut off, so she never got the text message from 1st Carpool Girl, whose mom was supposed to drive, that they weren’t coming. So we picked up 3rd Carpool Girl and I dropped them off at school at 7:40a. They were very grateful. “You totally saved us! Thanks so much!” they said.

I did so little, and ended up feeling like a superhero. Neat!

My reward was that somehow, despite leaving totally late from Mr. W’s house, I magically ended up at work 10 minutes earlier than usual.

So I was listening to the radio this morning and Danny Bonaduce said that statistically, 99.9% of people who get bitten by a rattlesnake survive if the person is over 125 lbs. Well heck, I’M over 125 lbs (just barely), but my goal is to get way under that. And apparently it’s now rattlesnake season, as dogs are being rattlesnake trained so they don’t come yelping home with two puncture wounds on their nose. Maybe I should just maintain the weight I am now, you know, for life and death reasons. Heh.

This coming weekend is Father’s Day weekend. I’d made plans with my parents for all of us to get fitted with and purchase good running shoes at A Snail’s Pace Running Shop. I have a gift certificate from my judge that I hadn’t redeemed from last Christmas, and I wanted to purchase good shoes for my parents (who are walking hills around their neighborhood for exercise) for Father’s Day and for my mother’s birthday the week after that. Turns out, Mr. W’s brother and his family, whom he hadn’t seen in years, are flying from Chicago to Las Vegas to visit their parents that same weekend. It’s going to be a huge family reunion as Mr. W plans to drive out there, and his other two brothers already live there with their families. Mr. W hopes to get his two kids out there with him as well. Even if I didn’t already have plans with my own family I would’ve found it a good time to step back and let Mr. W and his family do their thing as family.

Mr. W’s 17 year old son hadn’t been out to Vegas to see his grandparents and family out there for the entire 2 years I’d been around, so it may have been even longer than that. When Mr. W brought up the trip to him last night, the teenager was less than enthused. “It’s my summer before college, I wanna party,” he protested. After some seemingly ineffective convincing, Mr. W gave up and went into his bedroom. I stayed sitting at the dining room table tapping away at my computer as Son played a baseball video game in the adjoining living room.

And I had a mental war with myself. I wanted so badly to say something to him about his waving his grandparents off, yet again. But he and I aren’t close, and I’ve never talked to him about personal things before. To top it off, all of this is none of my business. I also don’t want him to feel weird around me, especially since I feel he already does as any keep-to-himself teenage boy would feel around his father’s girlfriend. If it had been his daughter, she probably would’ve come to me for a sounding board, but she’s different. Plus, I really do understand, so regretfully, how it is to be a teenager and really, really not want to hang out with your family and relatives when you could be hanging out with your friends.

I shut down my laptop, unplugged the cord, and waited only seconds for an opportune time to pop up in his game (the game was loading the next level), and I walked to him and said as gently as I could, “Not that my opinion should be the end-all to anything, but I really think you should go with your dad to Vegas this weekend.” He looked at me in surprise. I continued, “Your grandparents are getting older, and I don’t know if your dad told you this, but your grandmother had two eye surgeries in the last few months. I go there with him, and I’ve seen them look disappointed when they see that we don’t have you kids there with us. They try to stay in your life, they’re driving out here for your graduation next week, they send you cards… I know you won’t regret going to 9 parties instead of 10 this summer, but if something happens to your grandparents, you might regret not going over to see your family back when you had the chances to.” I paused. He, sensing that I was perhaps waiting for a response from him, said, “Uh-huh” and paused his game. “I’m not trying to tell you what to do, but just, you know…[he nodded]…I’ve just seen them look sad when you’re not with us, is all. Good night,” I said and turned away. He said after me, “Thanks. Good night to you, too.”

Life is all about choices. Some choices are about weighing what you would and would not regret. As intrusive as I felt that my hands were practically shaking as I walked away from him, I’d made the choice that the possible awkward moment I’d create with him was worth the possibility that he grow up just a little bit and sacrifice 3 days to spend with his family before he goes and plays the rest of the summer away. I don’t know what he’s going to do, but I know I won’t regret putting in my 2 cents.

I’d been recommended to watch Fast Food Nation by a few different people now, and these are people I trust who are close to me. So this weekend, Mr. W and I did just that. I thought it’d be similar to Supersize Me, a documentary about one man’s health deterioration as he put himself through a month-long McDonald’s-only diet experiment. Instead, it’s a mock documentary about a hypothetical fast-food chain called “Mickey’s”, has characters played by real actors like Ethan Hawke and Bruce Willis, and seems more like a socio-political commentary on illegal immigration and big industries. I thought it like a modern-day version of Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle“, down to the details of the ankle-deep blood swept across the floors of the slaughterhouse. The plot opens with a marketing executive of Mickey’s being sent to investigate a Colorado meat processing plant, to figure out why some meat patties of their burgers are contaminated with manure. The movie audience is stripped of their American naivete along with the executive on his eye-opening journey.

At the gym today, I spent a good hour at the end of my weight-lifting training by watching the news as I pedaled away on the elliptical trainer. Coincidentally (or not), there is a current recall on ground beef that was packaged between a certain recent time frame, due to e.coli contamination. My mind went back to the movie, how the big meat-packing industry has untrained illegal immigrants from Mexico working as cheap labor on their meat processing line, and how these workers don’t understand the instructions given to them, and don’t work fast enough to keep up with the conveyor belt of meat, how they sometimes don’t pull out the intestines as completely or cleanly as they should when the meat glides by them, how intestines burst and drop manure all over the meat. How, in the movie, the executive was told that this happens “every day.” I’m glad I haven’t had ground beef for months, and haven’t had fast food in years. It’s enough to turn a girl vegetarian.