Tackle that Streaker!

At a Columbus Crew game recently a semi-streaker (well he still had his pants on) ran onto the pitch during the game and got tackled by my friend Brett.

The glorious moment is at 2 minutes and 40 seconds:

Housing Conundrum

We live in a ranch house, which in England would be called a bungalow, except that this is America, so it's HUGE.

The 3 bedrooms are right next to each other and there have been times when we've had overnight guests & it's been an issue. Many a time I've had a few glasses of plonk before bedtime, got up in the middle of the night to go to the loo, then realised as I'm washing my hands that I'm naked and must perform the 3-yard dash back to my room praying that I won't slip on the wood floors, wake up guests and have to lie there naked with broken legs while the ambulance comes.

Anyway, Jack is 2 doors down from us, and the guests sleep in the middle right now, but that will be the new baby's room.

So where will our vistors sleep? Well, we can either (1) sell the house and buy a 4 bedroom (2) convert our finished basement into a cool little "granny flat".

Shopping for a 4-bedroom house sounds like fun but selling our current house sounds like hell. The market is awful right now and we went though all that stress just 3 years ago. UGH.

Decorating a granny flat sounds like fun but building it sounds like hell. Building walls, drywall dust, moving drains, running electric. UGH.

Of course I could just tell vistors to bugger off and get a motel. Or offer them the smelly basement couch that my 2 cats have ruined (damn their furry backsides). Or maybe pitch our tent in the back garden and tell them to pee in the bushes. Only kidding mum - we'd let you in to use the toilet.

Introducing ...

Jack's sibling, due 2009.

I have been a tad queezy this time, ravenously hungry (there goes the weight loss) and dead tired. But really so far a breeze.

Seeing the heartbeat this morning was the nicest thing in the world. Craig was squeezing my hand so tight I thought he might cripple me.

The Missing

A few months ago the TV remote went missing. At the time I had my suspicions that a certain little boy that lives here had squirreled it away somewhere. We have searched everywhere with no luck.

Last week I noticed that my new lovely Birkenstock sandals were quite singular in nature. In other words, one is missing. Maybe having met the same doomed fate as the remote.

I'm used to odd socks and missing puzzle pieces. I'm not surpised when I find blocks in the washing machine and water cups under the sofa, grapes in my knicker drawer and coins in his pockets.

But not knowing where the remote and my sandal is is driving me nuts.

I could try and ask him but that would be as fruitless as asking my dog why he eats cat poo.

One day in the distant future, when we're retired and loading up the RV to go cross-country touring with our 3 cats, I'll find them stuffed in a sleeping bag and I'll smile.

Weekend Best Wishes

• Happy 24th Anniversary to my mum & Tom
• Happy Birthday to my dad
• Happy 4th Birthday to Noah
• Congratulations to Delina on her wedding - have a blast in Vegas!

Wish I could have been in England for each celebration

Happy Birthday Jack!

Our little boy turned two today. As I'm typing this he's crashed out in his bedroom exhausted, with a belly full of ice cream and a front room full of wrapping paper and cards from people that love him.

We took him to the zoo last night for a picnic with friends and to have pony rides - his most favourite thing in the world. Today, all his daycare friends made him cards and sung happy birthday to him and tonight we took him to an American Diner for a hamburger (his first) and ice cream.

We're off work tomorrow for the July 4th holiday and we've got lots of fireworks and parades to go to - so more on that later.

What a birthday he's had! I'm sure he's had fun and just been overwhelmed with all the excitement, which seems like it's more for our benefit than his!

Anyway, here's a few pictures & a short video from the last two days......

Bits & Bobs

We had another busy weekend, which seems par for the course these days. I'm dying to just potter about in my garden one weekend but it won't be for a while yet.

We went to the cabin yesterday but it was very strange being there without Char & Jan. We had planned to stay over but with more thunder storms forecast I chickened out and we came home. Call me a wimp if you will but the thought of being in a wood cabin surrounded by 100 ft. trees and a lake during a severe storm scares me to death. I think Craig's mum and dad were secretly pleased that I wanted to come home. Craig appears to have no fear about these things.

Craig and Harry caught lots of fish, mostly sunfish and Harry got a trout. Craig also fished out a turtle for Jack to say hello to.

Today we went to Comfest for a couple of hours. I love this festival! Lots of music and good food and a relaxed, liberal crowd. Dot kept saying "I think I smell Marijuana!" and of course she had. This festival is the mirror image of the flea market we went to last weekend, in terms of people and their politics and views on life. This is the place you can get your breasts painted or have your palm read. I was most disappointed that I didn't get to have mine done (palm that is, c'mon people, I've had a child!)

It's Jack's birthday this week. Two already! We got him this gift off CraigsList and we set it up so the slide feeds into his garden pool. He loved playing on it tonight. Still, the swing and everything about it just seems too young for him. I think it would be great for a 1-2 year old and I already have buyer's remorse. He catches his feet on the bottom when he swings, bangs his head on the bar, only gets half-way down the slide and his feet touch the bottom. It's too small isn't it? Bugger.

We very nearly bought him a new bike from Target instead. It was a cool, shiny red little thing and he loved it but I reigned myself in with the thought that we'll get him one when he can peddle his tricycle my mum got him last year. So we took him out again tonight to see how he might grasp the concept of peddling. He did great but I think he needs to practice a lot more on this before he gets his red shiny wheels!

TV Not Dead - Hurrah!

Good news. The TV is not dead. Craig unplugged it from the surge protector , plugged it back in another socket and viola! Good as new.
Looks like the surge protector did it's job and took one in the chest for the TV.

Tomatoes Killed our Telly

We had a scary night last night. I got woken up by the tornado sirens at midnight & woke Craig up - the poor man would have slept through the whole thing if his mental wife wasn't so scared. We watched the local news reporting a tornado warning and severe thunderstorm coming right for us.

We left it as long as we could but when our trusty weatherman said "seek shelter", I thought "alright mate, I don't need telling twice!" I got Jack, all sleepy and cradled around my body, and Craig got his mum and dad and we went to the basement. Cody & the cats came too (animal instinct is a marvelous thing). I took my big bag that has all my work stuff and Jack's stuff in and I felt good - we were safe and warm and could watch progress on the telly in the basement. Then .......

After a loud boom and a weird popping noise, our electric went off and our big screen TV got zapped. Capputt. Dead as a dodo. As Craig said, it is now a big expensive paper-weight. Next came the thunder, lightning and rain. Tons and tons of rain, like I have never seen before. It was actually pretty impressive.

After about an hour they gave the all-clear for tornados and we went to bed, but the thunder was still ferocious for a while and kept me awake.

This morning, we discovered that the basement was wet. The laundry room has about 0.5 water on the floor and the family room carpet is soaked. So Craig's at home right now doing his best with a wet vac. My big bag and all its contents which was sat on the floor is ruined. The only thing that upset me is that my weight-watcher book was in there. The one that gets officially stamped and the one where I stick all my "well done you!" stickers. In the whole scheme of things it's not a big deal though is it.

I did learn that I can wake Jack up at midnight and he'll go back to sleep quickly when I put him back down at 1.30. So that's a bonus.

So, no tornados folks, everyone's fine. It was scary at the time but as always, once the sun comes up you feel 100% okay. The daylight does wonders for your outlook on life doesn't it? I could never live in Alaska.

One last funny thing - I heard that one of the little boys at day care got scared last night and was saying to his mum "let's hide - the tomatoes are coming, the tomatoes are coming!"

MUST nibble

At my last Weight-Watchers meeting I got my 40lbs, which is just a tad less than 3 stone. I'm very happy but a bit sad too as we don't have enough people to carry our group on over the summer. This means I've got to discipline myself not to eat crap, all the time knowing I don't have to weigh in each week. I've already put a lb on this week, although that's not entirely my fault......

You see, it started several months ago when my mum sent a huge box of English sweets and chocolate. I put them in the fridge and rationed them out to Jack. A month later, another big box arrived. Then another. I have been really good and not eaten any but finally buckled and had to get them out of the fridge so I scooped it all up and took it to work for my colleagues. How good I was!

Craig's mum and dad got here a couple of weeks ago and brought more sweets/chocolate. Then yesterday a box arrived for Jack, with more. So my fridge is full again.

Now there's only so much temptation a person can take. I can look solid chocolate bars in the eye and not flinch, but if I see certain sweety things in there then my resolve is as solid as jelly on a plate.

What certain sweety things do I mean? Well here are my top 5:

1. Licorice
2. Aniseed balls
3. Curly Wurlys
4. Fudge bars
5. Pickled Onion flavoured Monster Munch

If I could only take 5 things to a desert island, I might ditch the curly wurlys for a toothbrush.

What would your 5 "must nibble" include?

Cowboys & Dancing Monkeys

Craig's mum & dad like to have a mooch at flea markets when they come to the states so today we took them to Caesar's Creek Flea Market.
It has tons of vendors with old and new stuff, food stalls and even entertainment. It has to be said though that it's a redneck paradise with eyebrow-raising merchandise like hats that say "Come to my country? Speak English!". I think the most outrageous thing I saw was a badge calling Jane Fonda "a traitorous, terrorist b****". How nice. So, if you can ignore the few (and it is just a few) stalls with obnoxious wares, then it's an interesting place to visit for an afternoon.

I did pick up an almost-new Radio Flyer Wagon for Jack that I've wanted for a while. Got it for $40 which is fab as they are normally $150. He also got to have a couple of pony rides. He LOVES pony rides and my only misgiving about letting him on is knowing he's going to cry when he has to come off. Sure enough, he did, very loudly and he was most upset for a while after. He's been having pony rides since he was one year old and he seems to really enjoy it, so looks like I have a little cowboy in the making.

I know my friend Sue in England won't be happy with the picture of this horse shackled-up for kiddie rides. I even tried to crop out the chains the horse had on to make it look less like animal cruelty. Sorry Sue. If it's any consolation, I didn't buy any of the baby chicks in boxes, or give money to the man with the dancing monkey (I'm not kidding).