I went online this morning to look up how to beat Pneumonia, but apparently it isn’t on the top of Google’s list…

But WHY NOT?  Because, Will is currently moaning after every Pneumonic cough. Josephine is coughing as well, but with only a cold we hope. And I — well let’s just say that I’m attempting to keep my head above the sea of mucus that I’m currently drowning in. Gross, I know… And apparently — Google doesn’t really know anything about priorities, although deleting Facebook might find us a healthier society… you know, one that doesn’t obsess over Superbowl commercials staring Clint Eastwood.

I’d say that I’m going to do something about this… get angry and mad that it always seems to be ME searching for the answers when there are so few. But no. I’m tired… SO VERY TIRED. So, here… while we’re getting better, this is what we looked like last week — when life was fair and noses were simply running and Dirty Harry was, well…. DIRTY.

Currently accepting love and sympathy at an arms distance.

Some days just can’t be duplicated…On our way to school today….

“Mom. Why do the clouds move?”

“Well…. the wind blows them around. Look at the clouds today — don’t they look like the comforter on your bed?”

“Yes, they… They look like a big mattress!”

“Yes, you’re right — all puffy…”

“And COMFY! I bet they’re bouncy. I bet the man that drives the sun is laying on them.”

“The man that drives the sun?”

“Yes — he’s friends with the man in the moon. He sleeps ALL THE TIME.”

“Really…”

“Yes, but the sun is too hot. Like the radiator in the little bathroom.”

“I know. That radiator is hot …. but the sun is a million times warmer…”

“MOM. I touched that radiator last night and it was really hot.”

“You shouldn’t touch it.”

(after a minute of thought while driving past McDonald’s)

“Mom. Did you need to go into Old McDonald’s today?”

“No…. Dad bought me a coffee this morning.”

“Oh. Well. MOM.”

Yes.

“If you need a coffee sometime and Dad doesn’t get you one, you can just go to the Old McDonald’s drive-thru.”

“That’s true, Will.”

“If Dunkin’ Dounuts had a drive-thru, then you would go there, right?”

“Probably.”

“Maybe tomorrow Dad won’t bring you coffee?”

“Maybe.”

I’m using a writing prompt today from Studio30+ — a site for bloggers that are over 30 years old. It’s kind of like that show that used to be on in the late 80′s — Thirtysomething. Remember? NO? Why, how old ARE YOU? I guess you can tell that I’m over 30. On the other side of 35, but not yet half way to 40. I’m hoping to stay here for like ten more years by completely avoiding reality. And if you don’t remember, Thirtysomething was really annoying. It was a bunch of thirty something people mulling about in their own lives complaining about being thirty something… and other stuff. Because that’s the total opposite of what bloggers do, right? Not that Studio30+ is annoying…. it’s actually quite nice, and if you’re a blogger over 30 — I highly recommend.

The writing prompt for this week is MOMENT OF TRUTH (truth truth truth). Kind of like an ‘Eyes Wide Shut’ moment, but you know, without an orgy. And while I’ve had plenty of these moments in my life, I can only think of one really appropriate truth-be-told thing to focus on, and that is WORDS WITH FRIENDS. Because, dear friends, it’s time for me to PUT THE CRACK DOWN.

And I know. This is supposed to be serious. But while I was playing the other night I completely missed Obama’s speech about…. stuff. I did, however, look up from my iPad long enough to notice the orange toned pancake makeup that all three — Obama, Boehner, and Biden were wearing… making them all the same color and therefore, PERHAPS the same race. Is that what the speech was about? I took the time to jump over to Facebook to acknowledge this discovery, but that was it. Within seconds I was back losing to like 20 different games — mostly being played with people I don’t know. Dammit.

But I’m beginning to think that this is kind of a serious condition. I mean I haven’t played a lot of games… ever, and I think the last time I played Scrabble (which is really what ‘Words with Friends’ is), I was just out of college on a train headed to a town on the Mediterranean called Sète. And, ooooo, I can here you now. She’s so CULTURED. But no, Sète, although beautiful, totally sucked and everyone there was mean. MEAN. Never go there.

Because, you see, I just downloaded Words With Friends a few days ago, and in that time I have successfully ignored everything and everyone around me. Not to mention, I think Mr. Sal said something about burning the iPad in a massive fire pit he started constructing the very second I downloaded the game. And also, I hate to say it, but even the nine-month old seems to squeal in opposition when I start to glance over to where I keep the mobile devices. Earlier, I became frustrated when I hit the game limit on how many you can play at once, and I just got up to go check to see where we are with over using the word ZA. Which, apparently is allowed because it’s slang for pizza….and now I’m hungry.

But something has to end the madness. So as soon as I finish playing these last 27 games, I might think about stopping. And that, my friends, is a serious Moment of Truth.

In other news, my good friend Sue has published a brilliant post about bullying entitled “Don’t try to Bully Me”. Sue, who agrees that the pancake usage on our WORLD LEADERS was a bit off last night, is/was a professional model. I know she won’t mind my posting some of here pictures here:

Go there and read her post, and maybe… JUST MAYBE, she’ll make out with you.

Do you lie to your kids?

No really. Do you? I mean… just LOOK at Ann Curry’s face.

You’re lying RIGHT NOW. And she T-O-T-A-L-L-Y knows.

Because, according to the Today Show and some rather swarmy ladies from Todaymoms.com, you are just oozing with lies. LIES.

YOU BIG, FAT LIAR.

Personally, I try not to lie to Will — but not because lying isn’t fun (because it totally is!), no. Will is way to smart and tends to figure things out… He spends a lot of time and asks A LOT of QUESTIONS…. taking the fun completely OUT OF THE LIE. Santa Claus was suspect for weeks before Christmas. There was a lot of concern over how he gets onto the roof… “He doesn’t use a ladder, he doesn’t NEED a ladder.” We were three steps to polishing off the liquor cabinet with his series of investigations, but it all ended when Mr. Claus paid off big time Christmas morning. Thank you VERY much, John Deere.

And, didn’t you know, this is a heated topic. Why, it was just a few months back that I was perusing Facebook when I came across a post from fellow blogger, Jaime Lee, who had written a nice little HONEST post about ’6 lies moms tell kids’. For the most part, these 6 categories of dishonesty are all based in keeping a child happy and protected. You know — ‘The Tooth Fairy’, ‘Let’s not talk about sex yet, the baby came from a stork’, ‘GYPSIES’.  All rather harmless, and in all honesty, easy enough for a child to understand and quickly get over once the real truth is unveiled. But as I read on to the comments section, I found myself all stressed out and twisted up in the world of someone that DOES NOT LIE….

“As Life Gets Better says:

I can’t seem to take any of it seriously.

Almost like the movie Red Dawn. I mean, I know that was the Russians taking over the Pacific Northwest and not political unrest, but along those same lines of seriousness, it really was terrible what happened to those kids.

It could be that I’m purposely turning a blind eye to all of the protesting, the people yelling “THE WHOLE WORLD IS WATCHING” while they are driven off, handcuffed in paddywagons. It all makes me feel so tired. Of course we’re watching — nothing else is on. And it was REALLY funny the other day when a good friend commented on Facebook about the silliness surrounding the Occupy Hamptons movement. Because, as you can imagine, it really is JUST as ridiculous as it sounds. Occupy. Hamptons. Movement (ew). Paddywagons, by the way, were once upon a time called Black Marias. Add that to today’s list of useless knowledge.

And I’m reaching for a time when it was DAMN RIGHT to be extreme. When screaming your cause, while not showering and camping out in rat infested parks was maybe a good idea to get the point across… There were my bumper stickers. The anti-domestic abuse and pro-choice banners… paired with peace signs and ying yangs. Social unrest was exciting — Rage Against the Machine and Alice in Chains. Those guys are dead now, at least most of them are… And I remember when Lane Staley died — the New York Times dignified his overdose with a nice little “what took him so long” article about grunge, angst and how silly it is to take yourself so seriously. Because, just like it’s tongue in cheek to pick on the dead drug abuser, let’s all damn the man by smelling really bad. Right?

But that isn’t what’s happening here. With Occupy the Hamptons. Because when you’re really angry that the cost of living is so high.. the schools are mediocre and the middle class deems it unnecessary to vote, making a nice “End the War” sign and repeating “Throw the Bums Out” is really going to make people take you seriously. Here. In the Hamptons. And, okay — MAYBE, I’m making light of what others take personally — but isn’t enough, enough? And don’t you want to not be homeless, much less pretend that you are in an effort to get some point across? What was that point again? Maybe that here, just like there and that other place out there — HERE is somewhat, okay-maybe-not-so-much, like everywhere else, AND THAT is why Occupy the Hamptons exists. To protest that we are just like everyone else… but we have really expensive taste. Is that so WRONG? Why don’t we get to protest — JUST LIKE EVERYONE ELSE? It just isn’t fair that movie stars live here and expect you NOT to recognize them. Or that they make TV shows based here — just as long as they aren’t actually filmed here. People pick up after their dogs… who cares if they then leave the baggy of poop on the sidewalk for someone else to pick up… And, since I haven’t mentioned it but MY GOODNESS people are angry — plastic bags have officially been banned from the local grocery stores. WHOSE TO SAY WE DON’T HAVE PROBLEMS! But really. Am I really that far off the mark when I suggest that Occupy the Hamptons might just be taken a little more seriously if it didn’t exist? Can’t they just call themselves what they really are — a bunch of peaceful organizers with sharpies, and a little too much off-season time on their hands. OR do I have to go get a bongo and start MAKING SOME NOISE… at a perfectly reasonable decibel, of course.

I’ve entered into this kind of surreal place, and it’s not just because they remade Footloose.

And I wasn’t really going to talk about it, but now that I’m here…. Because you see, I started this blog a million years ago (3 years ago) and a lot can change in that time. Just about everything was different then — although I’m very much the same person give or take a few changes in interest. But when I started this blog, it wasn’t intended to be personal — it just happened. AND I think I told five people about it… my husband, my then-employees and my parents. Okay, six. I told six people. Then I told my sisters, equaling eight and my now-brother-in-law (nine). A few months into it, I told Facebook — and then Twitter…That’s when I lost count and started blathering on about it to complete strangers on the internet…. Lovely people, mind you — with teeth and clean hair, but strangers, nonetheless. And now it’s all out there, and that’s okay… Because it HAS to be, unlike the entertainment industry that thought it would be a good idea to remake Footloose.

But that isn’t all.

It is during this time of blindly yapping around the internet, sharing my life and thoughts with anyone that cares, that I have also taken time off from being a public person. Not that I was ever very public to begin with… hanging back at the events, leaving before anyone else arrives, driving around and around the block (again) in order to avoid having to run into anyone that might know me… sending others in lieu. But those fun days of attempting to be an extroverted introvert happily ended when I closed the doors to my design studio and had kids. I settled in, became a homebody… and remarkably, calmed the F down while also losing touch with my local contacts and business associates. Not to mention, do you know what happens to the brain of a pregnant mother of a three year old? No? Yes? Maybe? I’d tell you but I forgot. Indecision, complete and total memory loss, and the inability to respond to emails. So if I met you once and I don’t remember, let’s just blame Kevin Bacon for allowing them to remake Footloose.

But it hit me the other day, when speaking with another parent from Will’s preschool class, that suddenly there is a whole group of people that are in the process of getting to know me, and vice verse, that may already “know me” through this blog. Some are people that I barely know, because of geographic proximity — which is, DUH, inevitable (thanks Elly, still cooking?), others that I have met briefly and sadly forgot, and then the ones that know me because of this blog, and I’m only meeting now, which leaves me speechless. Because what did I think was going to happen!?

Where we live is incredibly small…. A thin strip of sand jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean being held together by dunes that are tormented daily. And it’s bizarre. Talking to someone that already knows you… Not because they heard about you from someone else, but because you told them yourself. ON THE INTERNET. In your own voice, with your own words, opinions, and (oh no don’t say it) FEELINGS. But what did I think was going to happen (repeated on purpose)!? It isn’t exactly a bad thing… it’s just, I don’t know — ALREADY OUT THERE, kind of like the ORIGINAL VERSION OF FOOTLOOSE. Right?

And if you’re you, Hi! I’m Me! I’m glad you stopped in to read…
Me? I’m good, just taking advantage of the fact that you already read this blog…
Because as corny as it may sound, I’m kind of glad that everything that you’ve read ahead of this point is over with, and you ALREADY KNOW….
It’s like getting it all out of the way! Now we can just fall into a conversation like we’ve known each other for years… and years…
Like 30 years when unaffected small towns in the mid-west banned music and dancing….

She turns 19 tomorrow. The birth child of Grunge.

(image via stylecaster)

And NO. Whatever. I’m not some obsessed lunatic or frantic Nirvana fan trying to hold onto something… ANYTHING. No. I’m not. I’M NOT. I actually prefer Foo Fighters. (GASP!)

In fact — I haven’t thought about Frances Bean or her parents, Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love, in a very very long time. It was the New York Times Style Section that so gracefully reminded me… As I gulped my coffee down in an effort to suppress the memories of the day that Kurt took his own life. NOT a laughing matter, but one that makes me cry from giggling too hard—Thinking about my then-on but usually off boyfriend, driving around with his headlights on in some sort of funeralistic recognition, before the days when car manufacturers suggested leaving them on all the time…. Like if he hadn’t been driving he would have been standing somewhere, silent and holding up one of his many lighters in some twisted early 20s grunge angst… while passers by would have been all  — “Dude, this isn’t The Breakfast Club”… Instead everyone was all “Why are your headlights on, the sun is shining”. And I explained, in all seriousness, CAN’T YOU SEE HE’S IN MOURNING, as we hugged and cried together… Friends that weren’t fans looked at us like we were alien…which we TOTALLY WERE. WHY KURT, WHY?! Our CD collections became shrines to what could have been and no one else existed. It was all very Say Anything. The New York Times, by the way, owes me some serious bank on the number of times I’ve linked to their website… But isn’t it fun that I can find humor in even the darkest of caves!

But now Frances is here… and gorgeous. Talented, apparently already an accomplished artist under another name, and I happily suspect — beyond cool in her own right. She looks like Kurt, but has the same kick ass beat as her lovely mother, Courtney. I’d throw her a giant Facebook “HB!”, but really? She’s never even glanced at Facebook and I fear any response would include a giant “FY!”. We can only hope that a life of twisted fame combined with admirable secrecy will see her through to a future filled with smiles and love… We can only hope.

Yes.

And it could be that I don’t have anything to write about lately — I mean I don’t want to drag on endlessly about the daily goings on of my kids (plural!). Because, while I’m not going to deny how awesome today’s trip to the library was — they seem to have disabled the fire alarm trigger on the side door of the Children’s Section, much to Will’s chagrin….Or how tomorrow’s trip to the deli-counter might compare itself to that of any world traveler — “1/2 pound of smoked turkey and 1/2 pound of black forest ham. SLICED THIN. Please.”… I just don’t want to be as boring as I could be…. and Dudes, that is no joke.

I could change things up…. Make a set routine for myself and blog about things regularly — but haven’t I tried that several times already? From list links, guest writers to product reviews to OMG whatever, blah blah blah. Is any of it really all that interesting? Do I sound like I’m complaining? REALLY? Because I was, and now I am… ABOUT MYSELF. Because I’ve tried and I can’t commit to anything regular — at least not here, inside the scandal ridden internet that was once a gorgeous infrastructure with clean lines hinted with the scent of peonies and chocolate chip cookies (dairy free, of course), and the known division of heaven and hell. Now it’s just your typical inner city sewage pipe — walls dripping with all kinds of sordid behavior… also linked to pipes from churches, playgrounds and PBS. And look at me now.. Sharing the SAME PIPE. And who knows what creepshow is just WAITING to abuse something, ANYTHING,  right around the corner. Committing here just doesn’t feel good (enough) anymore.

And then there’s the IT factor. The technology that boggles me almost every day from technicalities as simple as download this so no one STEALS anything from you to I HATE MY BLOG DESIGN. Because I do. I hate it. I can’t even look at it anymore without wanting to beat the shit out of it. But then there’s the fact that I don’t have the time OR the patience to learn a new internet language in order to fix things myself… a personality trait brought on by, once upon a time, having employees that DID THINGS FOR ME. And, while crying and whining about the IT, the not-so-sudden realization that people aren’t really even reading anymore… so what’s the point? While there was a time when I was eager to hit the pavement and drive traffic to myself — I now ween myself away from it… NOT joining the new sites that MIGHT increase the interest of others. Coming full circle, perhaps — from once not wanting anyone to know… to telling everyone… back to when will I ever just SHUT THE HELL UP? Kind of like NOT being online is the NEW online. And who am I to bend towards the trend?

But then, no.

Because I like being here. And even though I don’t have anything to say… I mean, not really, I might later on.

Natural disasters really put me in a terrible mood…. not to be selfish or anything.

The feelings of helplessness are overwhelming. Send money. Donate goods. Do anything. Pray. Think. And then I turn around and go back to my life… waiting for the weather to improve, plans for the new baby, what will we make for dinner tonight… While others are desperately attempting to piece their lives back together. There’s just something so nonadhesive about this part of humanity which makes me wish that there was a way to help more — and really feel like I’m helping rather than sitting back and watching others really help.

And of course there is the media egg — once cracked that sends us all scrambling… OMG, Japan — WHO DO WE KNOW THERE? OMG, Okay — They are okay. OMG, HAWAII… WHO DO WE KNOW THERE? OMG, Okay, thanks to Facebook, we know they are alright. OMG – THE WEST COAST… As we hold our breath, waiting for the water to recede, wave and then slam into the land masses that are so far away from our lives that they may as well be on the moon. THE MOON, OMG. THE EARTH — WHO DO WE KNOW THERE?!? Did they say they were EVACUATING MEXICO? And then the catastrophic likely hood that this natural wave comes full circle… to not only point fingers toward the, ahem, MAN MADE — but also to the elimination of such via RADIOACTIVE MELTDOWN. I’d like a little naturally grown sugarcane with my pseudoscience, please.

Just turn the TV off. The radio. The computers. The iPad. The Blackberry. The iphone. And, for the love of Gawd, if you pick up the paper — skip to the IGNORANCE IS BLISS section. And just in case you haven’t felt normal since Friday either — blame the axis, of which the Earth is now OFF.

But this is life… Right? The Earth rolling around, off of its axis like some random SPACEBALL. Just as we calm down from OMG – EGYPT, WHO DO WE KNOW THERE? Wasn’t so-in-such’s stepson teaching English there for a semester? And what about the neighbor’s daughter — she’s in Turkey — WHAT’S GOING ON THERE?!?! And back to to the norm of OMG – THE 3 YEAR OLD PEE’D ON THE FLOOR. Flip flopping from horror stories of local bus crashes to OH THANK HEAVENS… Sid the Science Kid is on in ten minutes… and back again, trying to even out the guilt — Thousands are dead, but thank goodness Japan was diligent in preparedness…

But really.
The feelings of helplessness are overwhelming. Send money. Donate goods. Do anything. Pray. Think. And then I turn around and go back to my life…

[How you can help.]

Okay. okay.

So word has it that some huge library of knowledge out there is now collecting and logging every TWEET ever made. Mr. Sal informed me of this the other night — probably in an attempt to pull me away from THE TWITTER — you know, scaring me that my tweets about pajama pants and FDA warnings were a sure sign that THEY ARE ONTO ME. I was cooking or reading off of my iPad at the time and therefore was only half listening to the warnings about how someone out there… with A JOB (emphasis on A JOB, because you know — all I do is half listen while attempting to come up with something new and thoughtless to blog about). But before I continue — This is NOT a post complaining about Mr. Sal… Or Twitter… Or the Library where someone has a JOB.

Since what I half heard was that a library out there (could be the one of Congress, but it could also be the tiddly wink one down the street where Will likes to pull the fire alarm — we hope to be asked back soon) thinks that Tweets now equal 140 characters of important historical significance, of WHICH could be used in a court of law someday… Or when the screenplay I’m thinking about ‘Makes It’ someone can say  – YEAH — But did you READ her Tweet about Eating POTATO CHIPS?! Or when the book I’m illustrating finally becomes an award winning HBO Short — replayed on YouTube, I could be vilified for my constant raggings on Facebook. In thinking about the possibilities, I became oddly flattered that someone out there (with a job) is archiving these little morsels of what could never be considered genius.  Someone out there cares.

So, after taking an entire 20 minutes or so to digest this information, along with just about all of the other food within reach, I turned to the local news website for something real…

“Police Still Searching For Woman Who Tried To Rob Water Mill Bank”

I know – CATCHY!

I love a good heist, so I was hooked immediately… knowing full well that every glance I took at the 27east.com website was making me more and more suspect to all of those website trackers out there… Right? I envision a whole team of investigators, each assigned to half a dozen million website viewers a day — just following there every click… where are they going? what are they reading… and more importantly – ARE THEY BUYING ANYTHING!??! And while I was reading this news brief on how investigators were failing to catch the mystery woman… my eyes landed on this sentence: “A police report of the incident says the teller told police that the would-be robber approached her, hands inside the woman’s pockets, and gave her a note that read: “Give me all your money.” When the teller asked the woman if she had a gun, the woman said she did not, but would get one and return.”

And that, my friends, is when I decided that I’ve been going about this whole ‘living life’ thing the wrong way.

PS. Follow me on Twitter.

Oh – and on a completely unrelated, yet somehow related topic, this rose is frozen outside my bedroom window… I didn’t have to ask it to wait while I went to get my camera…