10/3/12 Gettin' Our Bounce On

Last week Groupon had a deal for 4 passes to a place not far from us called Bounce USA.  It's basically a warehouse full of moon bounces and other inflatable games, and since ZB likes those kinds of things, I said yes please to the groupon and today we went for the first of our bouncy house adventures.  I call the following Dark Side of the Moon Bounce: A Bouncy Adventure in Picture Form

This is the special toddler area...age 2 and under only.  Not even adults allowed.   Tiny tyranny at its best. 

It has a ball pit!  We love ball pits!

Look Mom!  Ball pit angels!  (Seriously, it was a good 30 minutes of ball pit! Ball pit! Ball pit!)

I was finally able to drag ZB away from the ball pit and into a bouncy house.   She's a great bouncer...

except for times like this.  Face plant!

There's a toddler slide.  We very carefully climb to the top...

Eye of the tiger, baby.  Eye of the tiger.

Ready! Set! Go!

Wheeeeeee!

Back to the ball pit! Did I mention that we love the ball pit?
(So much so that I think I'm going to have to break down and put the at-home version on our Christmas list.  My poor living room will never be the same).  

Once we mastered the toddler slide, we took on the giant slide together!  Here's Mommy and ZB at the veeeeeeeery tippy top!

Action shot!

Zb was all, "Oh my gosh that totally blew my mind!  My whole short life flashed before my eyes!  
It was awesome but I never want to do that again".

Quick bouncy time-out to ride this rockin' (literally) Harley.

There was an inflatable batter's box where the ball floated on top of a jet of air.  ZB thought this was magic.

And finally, ZB's favorite part of the whole trip.  Inflatable bouncy houses and ball pits are fun, but nothing beats pushing a button and watching the water shoot out of the water fountain!

8/16/12 Sharks, Playgroups, Pheromones and Stumps

Hello Internets, It's been a few weeks, so I thought I'd pop on and tell you what I've been up to here at the House of Quirk.

And the answer to that is not very much.

I spent most of the last two weeks watching the Olympics and most of this week watching Shark Week on Discovery. (I hear you out there. You're like, "Whoa, three straight weeks of nothing but watching tv? Is that even possible?" And normally I would say no, not for your average person. But it just so happens that I am a TV watching gold medalist, so I can marathon tv watch with less strain and tearing than your average recreational watcher).

But even I am tired of myself watching TV, because basically I spent the Olympics saying things like, "Wow, he's fast!" and "Look how high he can jump!" and "I'm tired of watching stupid swimming all the time!" to Shark Week, where I say things like "Wow, he's fast!" and "Look how high he can jump!" and "I'm tired of watching stupid swimming all the time!" Same tune, different channel. So in the spirit of non-tv related news, here's a meager offering of what else is going on in my life. And in list format no less! (Betcha didn't see that one coming!)

1. I have recently decided that ZB needs to interact more with kids of her own age. She is great with adults. The life of the party when it comes to adults, but she has no idea how to interact with other kids. It's like she considers herself a short adult, and what the heck is she supposed to say to this kid over here? They have nothing in common.  So I'm looking into Mother's Day Out programs so that she can have some supervised interaction with her fellow short ones. And since this is our first attempt at a daycare-related institution, I'm not sure how it's going to go for either of us. Anybody have any advice for us on making the transition smoother?

2. Speaking of new things, I'm trying something new with the cats that may prove interesting. Long time readers will know that due to Tony's crazy cat-lady tendencies and my inability to say no to a homeless kitten, we are the keepers of five Siamese cats. (Yes, five. Don't judge me). Anyway, with five cats in the house, you can imagine that there are some battles over who gets to be reining alpha cat. And while normally I don't mind a racing, hissing, madcap dash about the house at 2am, I draw the line at territorial marking, which Magellan has recently gotten into his tiny evil cat brain to try. Now, we've tried those cat pheromone diffusers before with some success, but they are basically limited to one room, and trying to outfit an entire house with them runs roughly the same out-of-pocket expense as trying to purchase a black-market kidney. So instead, I'm trying something new. Pheromone cat collars. Same great kitty pheromones, but now mobile! And at a cost of $8 a month as opposed to $20 for the diffuser refill. While it's only been a week and I don't want to jinx it, they seem to be working for us. No one is spraying or having passive-aggressive "accidents" outside of the litter box, and the number of all night cat fits has been reduced by about 95%. So yeah. If you have a nervous, stressed out or free-peeing kitty cat, I recommend the pheromone collar. It makes a difference.  (PS-They also have them for dogs, but I can't speak to their effectiveness for the canine persuasion.)

3. There isn't really a three.  I mean, I was going to tell you about how I'm trying to get rid of a tree stump in the front yard by drilling holes in it and pouring powdery stuff called STUMP OUT! on it, but STUMP OUT! takes 4 to 6 weeks to work and it's only been on my stump for a week, so I feel like telling you about it now would be a little premature.  Although I did get my big drill bit stuck in the stump while I was drilling, so that was kinda exciting, if by exciting you mean annoying.  (I don't know how it happened.  The bit went in, but then when I put it in reverse to pull it back out, nothing happened.  The motor goes "GRRRRRRR!" and smoke starts coming out of the back of my drill, but the bit doesn't move.  Stuck, stuck, stuck. So now I have a lovely powder-covered stump riddled with holes and holding my 5/8" drill bit hostage.  I'm hoping it becomes the latest rage in abstract lawn decor.)  I'm guessing that my drill bit will come out when the STUMP OUT! starts breaking down the wood fibers around it, but until then I'm just using it as a conversation piece with the neighbors.  I call it EXCALIBIT!

Okay, on that really bad joke, I'm outta here.  Sister-in-law Mary recorded a totally awesome video of ZB petting some goats at the petting zoo, so I'll try to get that up later this week because ZB is adorable and you deserve it after reading this far.  I just hope that her excitement over the goats in the video doesn't persuade Tony to try to bring one home.  I don't think they make goat pheromone collars.

7/19/12 Hair Today, Gone...Well, Today

When the weather gets tough, the tough...chop off all their hair.  Well, maybe not the tough- they probably don't even sweat when it gets hot.  But the quirky do, so this Quirk went straight to the salon and went, "It's 100 degrees outside! Get it off my neck! Get it off! Get it off!" and hoo boy did they ever!

Jared, the most awesomely awesome stylist ever (and available at StudioVisage in Market Square for my fellow Knoxvegas peeps) was all, "Ohmigod honey, with your cheekbones you are just going to loooooove this haircut!"  (And before you think I'm stereotyping male hair stylists, know that that is exactly how Jared is and exactly what he said and I love him for it). And then he cut off all my hair. But in a good way.


It's the first time I've had bangs since I was six, and I have no idea what it will do if I let it air dry and go curly (although Jared assures me that it will look "just fahhhhhbulous" curly) but I like it. It's fun, it's kicky, and it's off my neck for the summer.


And now the big reveal:


(Oh but first, ignore the horrible photography.  It was one of those hold-the-camera-up-at-arms-length-and-click self portraits.  And I'm standing by the front door because that's where the natural light was and I have no makeup on and apparently I really need to get a better night's sleep because the dark under eye circles are like zombie apocalypse much? But you don't care about any of that because you're supposed to be admiring the hair anyway).

So yeah, the hair:

The side view.

The back view.  Notice no hair on the neck.

The front view.  Remember that you're ignoring the no makeup and looking at the hair.

So that's my hair (if anyone has made it this far because I know the topic of my hair is just RIVETING and all).  But if you are interested in a new look and if you have cheekbones like mine (at least, according to Jared) then you might want to look him up and let him have a go with your locks.  I promise you'll look faaahhhbulous!

(Just, you know, make sure you get a good night's sleep before you take the picture).

7/5/12 More American than Apple Pie, Stars and Stripes, and Freaky Robot Fire Dogs

Well hey there Internets!  I hope everyone had a wonderful July 4th yesterday!  Personally, we had an absolute blast!  Mom and Dad's neighborhood had a parade (and being on a golf course, everyone decorated their golf carts), and then a big cookout, band, demonstrations from the local fire and police K9 unit, and finally swimming in the neighborhood pool.  ZB loved loved LOVED every single second of it.  In fact, we only took her home after she was so exhausted that she fell asleep (although she managed to hold out for an hour and a half past her usual nap time) and when she woke up (three hours later) she was mad that she was at home instead of still at the party.  She is a little party animal, that one!

First, the parade.  Mom stayed up until 3am the night before in order to decorate the golf cart.  Ya'll, these people take this parade seriously.  There were 26 golf carts in the "Best Decorated Golf Cart" Competition, and you've never seen so many flags, streamers and balloons in your life.  Here's our cart:

And ours was one of the more subtle ones. 

On the cart: Mom, ZB, myself, two Yorkies, and one sweaty Uncle Sam
who was just forced to run up a big steep hill behind us.

Here we are in the parade.  That's my Dad in the giant Uncle Sam hat, hanging off the back.  He and Tony were originally supposed to walk behind the cart with the two dogs, but after the first big hill, the dogs rode on my lap, Dad spent most of the time hanging off the back, and Tony raced ahead to the cart in front of us who was handing out Popsicles to the people watching and snagged a couple for himself.  Still, we are quite the patriotic sight, no?

Tony and Dad, post golf cart chasing but still looking patriotic.

And me, having actually been smart enough to ride in the golf cart from the beginning.
(Hey, it was 97 degrees out...I'm no dummy).

Anyway, we all had a lot of fun waving and yelling to the people lining the streets, and ZB clapped and cheered because everyone else was and she loves it when people clap with her.  Sadly, we did not win Best Dressed Cart (there was actually a tie for first between the cart that recreated the Statue of Liberty on the back and the cart that transformed itself into a rocket, complete with smoke trails), but that is okay, because we actually did win both Best Dressed Kid and Best Dressed Pet!

Note the cuteness just oozing out
of her.

Here we have ZB sporting her lovely Hello Kitty Patriotic shirt, a custom-made white skirt with netting overlay and red, white and blue stars at the bottom.  She has accessorized this with her sparkly red shoes and red sparkle hair clip.  (Actually, Mom also made a hat for her to wear, but it was so hot that the poor kid's head was drenched in sweat every time we put it on her).  Now, I may be a little biased, but Internets, that kid stole the entire show.  She was so adorable and happy and excited about the whole thing that everyone who saw her loved her.  In fact, the local paper took her picture and put her on the front page!  Her cuteness is a force, people!  It is not to be denied!

And now I have a trophy that reads "Best Kid 2012" to prove it.

Speaking of cuteness, may I also present the winners of this year's Best Dressed Pet!  Mom and Dad's Yorkies, Brutus and Brandi, are each sporting doggie T-shirts, reading "Patriotic to the Bone" and "I love the USA", respectively.  Brandi is also wearing red, white and blue stars in her hair.  But I think the kicker was the little tiny sequined Uncle Sam hat that Brutus was modeling.

Because is there anything more adorable than a tiny dog in a tiny top hat?  I think not. 

After the parade ZB hightailed it over to the local fire department's truck where the firemen immediately made her their chief (complete with hat and everything!).  They also had an animatronic talking Fire Dog named Sparky that kinda freaked me out (no doubt due to repressed childhood nightmares about our Teddy Ruxpin trying to kill us) but had ZB totally mesmerized.  The other kids would come up and look at it for a while, maybe talk to it or touch it and then move on, but for ZB, the world outside Sparky the Fire Dog ceased to exist.  She'd probably still be there, rooted to the same spot, had the fire department not eventually packed Sparky up and headed out for his next engagement.  (Let's just hope she forgets about him before Christmas.  Something tells me that Sparkies may be hard to come by for the private consumer). 

Mommy, can we have a freaky robot dog with a grating mechanical voice and weird blinky eyes please please please please PLEASE?!?

Finally, after stuffing ourselves with hot dogs and hamburgers and (I kid you not) 38 different types of baked beans, pasta salads, potato salads, chips, corn on the cob, watermelon, and enough cookies, brownies and cupcakes to put a diabetic into a coma just by looking at it, we decided to hit the pool.  And it's a good thing that ZB has such fun grandparents because by this point I was ready for a nap in the sunshine, but ZB was still going strong.  She splashed, she played, she climbed everyone's swim suit like she was a spider monkey.   The entire day was like ZB's personal version of heaven.  (Think about it: A parade, a trophy, a hot dog, a cupcake, a creepy talking robot dog and a pool.  Nothing else could compare.  It is a one year old dream come true). 

So yeah, I suppose you could say that we had a pretty great day.  It was good to see such a nice turnout for the parade and picnic, and it was a great way to honor not only our active service men and women, but also our veterans that were in the crowd.  Not to mention make it into ZB's top 5 favorite days of her life EVER.

America, we love you and salute you.

6/11/12 Our Very Classy Pop-Up Picnic, or Alternatively, The Time We Were Almost Eaten By A Bear

So I trust that everyone had a good weekend, right?

We here in the House of Quirk actually did something other than our usual weekend routine, ie spend the evening watching tv in our pjs.  We actually got all dressed up and attended a pop-up picnic at World's Fair Park on Saturday night.  (I know! With other people and everything!  And some people that we didn't even know!  Which would technically make them strangers!  For several hours!  Over dinner!)

(It's like we were body-snatched by party-going extroverts!)

(Extroverts that use a lot of exclamation points!)

Anyway, the downtown YMCA was doing a fundraiser by hosting a "dinner in white" pop-up picnic. (What makes it a pop-up picnic instead of just a regular picnic is that no one knows the exact location of the event until about an hour before.  Then a mass text or email or whatever goes out and everyone converges on this secret location all at once. It makes it more spontaneous that way, hence the popping up part).  Like I said, ours was a dinner in white too, which means that in addition to eating dinner outdoors with people he did not know, Tony also had to wear a nice white button up shirt and khakis instead of his regular Saturday night pjs.  So yeah, happy camper there.  But he's a trooper, and more importantly he had no choice, so we all dressed up in our fancy white finery and packed up our picnic basket and headed out to the secret location.

(Ya'll, Tony grumbling about his shirt notwithstanding, we were so cute in our matching white outfits!  ZB wore her Easter dress, and Tony wore a short sleeved button up white summer shirt, and I wore a white gauzy dress that Mom and Dad picked up for me on their last trip to Mexico.  Pair that with our authentic picnic basket that someone bought us ages ago as a wedding present, and we looked like one of those families in the J Crew catalog.  Just add giant oak tree and tire swing.)

It turns out that the secret location was on a picturesque bridge in the 1982 World's Fair Park in downtown Knoxville.  And while there wasn't an oak tree or tire swing, there was a big fountain and a rocky stream and pretty lights everywhere, so it was quite lovely anyway.  And the tables!  The tables were all set up and decorated with pretty china and real silverware and candlesticks and flowers and whatnot, and I turned to Tony and was like, "We are in a J Crew catalog!  I always thought picnics that looked like that were just make-believe to make the rest of us feel like we weren't classy enough!"

The secret location for our picnic at dusk.

We had a good sized crowd there, and festivities kicked off just before sunset.  Each table had a different menu, and ours had ham and grilled chicken and broccoli rice casserole and bread and fancy cheese and cold peach soup (which in my opinion is more like a dessert than a soup because it is sooooo tasty).  I'd spent the previous 3 hours carving up a giant watermelon and making hundreds of melon balls and shapes with cookie cutters, but I think the effort was well worth it since it seemed to be a big hit with the guests.
ZB stuffed down some bread and cheese (she's partial to Gouda), but was really too excited to eat much.  (Bless her heart, she's a natural party person.  She spent most of her time running from table to table, greeting people and charming them with her bubbly cuteness.  I have no idea where that outgoing personality came from).  Add in the lights and the water and the fountain and the little boy that was roughly the same age and the party was a total hit in her book.

ZB and her Grandpa, goofing around at the picnic.

So we were very sophisticated and elegant with our picnic party...and it wasn't until we got back home later that night that we found out that a 300 lb black bear had been roughly a block away the whole time.  (Yes, you read that correctly.  Somehow a fully grown black bear wandered down from his mountain home and into downtown Knoxville where he sauntered around the UT campus A BLOCK AWAY FROM OUR PICNIC FULL OF EASILY ACCESSIBLE AND POORLY DEFENDED FOOD.  Who knows?  Maybe he was on his way to the picnic when animal control caught up with him.  It's like somehow we fell out of our J Crew catalog and into a Yogi Bear cartoon.

And I'm the idiot holding the picnic basket.

But!  The bear, despite being within sniffing distance of our culinary delights, did not crash our picnic, and we did have a lovely time, and we all looked very classy doing it, and the food was delicious, and we were able to raise money for a good cause.  I look forward to doing the whole thing again next year.

Just maybe without Yogi and/or Boo Boo this time.

5/28/12 Rollin' on the River

Well.

I trust everyone survived their Memorial Day weekend?  It was a balmy 95 degrees here all weekend, so Tony, ZB and I celebrated the sacrifices of our armed forces by spending as much time as possible submerged in water.  ZB and Tony did so in her baby pool on the back deck, and I did so in an inner tube while riding down a mountain river in the Smokies*.  

See, my friend Erin had her brother and sister-in-law in town to visit for the weekend, and Drew (the guy Erin is dating) had his family in to visit, so they were all, "What should we do to entertain all this family when it is blazing hot outside?".  And I, being the helpful friend that I am, was all, "I dunno...Charades?" and Erin (who is a much better event planner than I am, although possibly not as good at charades) was like, "Actually, I think we're all going to go up to the mountains and go tubing".  And I was like, "Sounds fun! Where should I meet you guys?"

Which is how I ended up inviting myself along on Erin and Drew's family (and me) outing.  

So on Saturday at the crack of noon, Erin, Drew, Erin's SIL Virginia, Drew's sister Anna and yours truly piled into Erin's car for a scenic jaunt to the mountains.  I say scenic because normally the drive from Knoxville to the Smokey Mountain National Park takes about an hour, but Erin thought she remembered a shortcut to avoid the always crowded Pigeon Forge area.  Alas, the fates were against us, because between the "shortcut" (which did take us right through Pigeon Forge after all), the police detour due to an accident, the mandatory Dunkin Doughnuts stop, a brief rest stop pause to look at a map and figure out where the heck we were, and my insistence that we not do more than 25mph on the curvy mountain roads (due to my tendency to get all green and barfy from motion sickness), we finally made it to the tub rental place about 3 hours after we set out.  

Still, the company was nice, I scored permanent dibs on shotgun (the one advantage to the above-mentioned green and barfy), and I brought road snacks, so the drive wasn't bad at all.  

Once you get to Townsend (the town about 2 miles outside the National Park Entrance), you can rent tubes for roughly $6 a day.  For another $2 the tube rental places will shuttle you and your inner tube up to the river and drop you off.  But we are locals, not some newbie tubing tourists, so we eschewed the shuttle bus and decided to drive ourselves up to a more fun, more energetic part of the river where we could partake of some white-water rapids.  So we tied our tubes down all over the car with what basically amounted to dental floss that we found in the trunk of Erin's car and took off for our river adventure.  

From Left to Right: Anna, Erin, Virginia, Drew and Me ready for some tubin'. 

If you head into the SMNP (that's Smokey Mountain National Park for ya'll who have trouble with acronyms) by way of the Townsend side, you'll come across the famous "Y" where the river splits into, you guessed it, a Y shape.  This is a popular destination spot for swimming, picnicking, and tubing (if you rode the shuttle bus).  And it is very nice.  But! If you go up the river another mile or so, you will hit a less crowded, much faster, much more fun section of river.  

And really, who wouldn't want that?

Ya'll, the river did not disappoint.  We were a little worried about having enough water volume when we first went up there, but the rains that we've had recently more than guaranteed lots of white-water rapids for us to bounce, slide and sometimes downright fly though.  

Pay no attention to my sexy sexy mesh water shoes.  What they lack in fashion, they make up for with traction on the slippery river rocks.  The hat I have no excuse for.

It was hard to for me to grasp that there's no "right" way to go down the river.  You have to be vigilant about submerged rocks and trees and such, but other than that, left of the rock, right of the rock...it doesn't matter.  If you get stuck, just paddle your tube back out into the current and do it again.  It wasn't designed by a team of engineers or theme park designers. It is nature at its finest, unstructured, untamed, and unapologetically beautiful.  That said, there was one memorable chute where nature got a little more up close and personal than I bargained for.  See, I was caught in a bit of an eddy while facing backwards.  I was wearing a very fetching nylon swim skirt (see the first picture if you need a visual refresher) and I was just maneuvering my tube away from the one current into another when something bumped up against my thigh.  

(Yes, there are fish in the river.  It's not something I like to think about a lot, and for the most part they stay away from the people, and the people never even know they're there.  Kinda of a nature don't ask don't tell policy.)  But this particular little fish decided that he was going down the same current that I just had, and was most surprised to find me still at the bottom of the chute.  Worse, the water ballooned my skirt out so that it was acting as a giant fishing net, and Mr. Fish flew right past the rocks and right up my skirt.  

(This is the part of the day where I re-enacted Jesus walking on water, because as soon as Mr. Fish's tail went fwap! fwap! fwap! against my thighs, I shot straight up out of the water and hovered six inches above it  while screaming and beating myself about hips and buttocks).  

(Of course, this delightful little moment was witnessed by our entire group, several random hikers and all the fish's buddies, who were no doubt laughing uproariously at my expense).  

I'd like to at least be able to say that the fish that assaulted me was huge- a 15 pounder or something like that, but the truth is that I never saw him.  He slipped away unnoticed while I was trying to explain to my group that no, those screams were not me being eaten by a bear...I just had a run-in with a cross-dressing fish who wanted to try on my skirt.  

But fish cooties aside, the outing was simply wonderful, and a lot of fun.  (Totally worth the carsickness to get up here and back).  We ran some sections of the river three or four times if we liked the rapids, and drifted through the calm parts, just enjoying the scenery and the sunshine.  I met some lovely people, had a lot of laughs, and got thoroughly and refreshingly soaked.  

And while our veterans and active duty soldiers might not have envisioned this exact scene (fish attack included) while they fought to keep our country free, I appreciate their sacrifice in order for me to do so anyway.  Happy Memorial Day, ya'll.

* Why didn't ZB and Tony come, you ask?  Because you have to be 2 years old to ride in the tubes, and ZB isn't there yet.  (And Tony is an anti-social hermit who hates group outings).  But next year!  Oh yes!  The fun will be had by all next year!

5/21/12 The Pipes, The Pipes Are Calling

The Scottish Highland games were in town this weekend, so Tony, ZB and I went to check it out.  (I happen to be able to claim some Scottish blood since my ancestors hail from Aberdeen, and I wanted to share the heritage with ZB since that blood runs through her also, but mostly I just enjoy watching big beefy guys in kilts throw heavy things in the air.)

(Although can I just say that not everyone is built to wear a kilt.  They're one of those items of clothing that look really really good if you have the legs to pull it off or really really bad if you don't.  And I don't care how far you can throw a rock- if you insist on wearing a kilt you should at least slap some self-tanner on those milky white chicken legs of yours.  Yikes, man.)

Anyway.  We had a lot of fun.  We watched the caber toss (that's the one where these big burly guys try to flip what basically amounts to a telephone pole end over end) and the hammer throw, and one competition whose name I don't recall where people use a pitchfork to flip a bean bag the size of a carry-on suitcase over a bar twenty feet in the air.

Suffice it to say there was a lot of grunting.

(And probably hernias, but I can't really say for sure as I personally only witnessed the grunting).

Tony and ZB by the cabers. Bigger and heavier than they look.

We also had a very un-authentic lunch of chicken tenders and french fries (because who wants haggis when it's 90 degrees out? well, who wants haggis period?), watched a sheep dog demonstration where I lost major points with Tony-the-zookeeper by mistaking the herd for goats when CLEARLY they were sheared sheep, and took in the pipe and drum band competition.

Looks like goats to me, but that just proves I'm not a sheep dog.

Not sheep or goats, but still running around on a field. 

Also, we saw a Scottish Rock Band called Albannach who were FANTASTIC.  I mean it. You've never heard pipes and drums quite like this before.  Zoe loved them.  She and I danced with the crowd in front of the stage, and she never took her eyes off the band.  Totally mesmerized...so much so that I'm afraid she may want to take up the drums and the bagpipes and oh boy won't that be fun!

So to recap: cabers, pipes, sheep dogs, drums, skinny white legs in kilts. No haggis. A good time had by all.

2/21/12 Phineas and Ferb, Part Deux

I know I just posted about us being addicted to Phineas and Ferb (the cartoon on Disney), but at the risk of sounding REALLY geeky, I'm going to post about it again. I promise I'm not as weird as this makes me sound.

See, shortly after the first Phineas and Ferb post, the official Disney Phineas and Ferb Live show came to the Knoxville Coliseum, and my work had some free tickets, so I said sure! That'll be fun! (Plus, you know, bonus points for being such an awesome Mom, right?) So on Saturday afternoon, Tony, ZB and I headed out to discover exactly how you turn an animated cartoon into a live show. (Answer: costumes. Which I suppose makes sense, but I was really disappointed that they didn't teach a real platypus to wear a fedora and do round-house fighting kicks).

I dunno. It was weird. This is the first time that I've ever been to a show specifically for kids, and it was slightly unnerving seeing them EVERYWHERE. I mean, they had the adults outnumbered probably 4 to 1. It was just rows and rows of keyed-up, sugar-fueled, running, screaming, jumping children...a riot mob all under three feet tall. AND there were cotton-candy hawkers every two feet, which is just tossing spun sugar fuel on the munchkin land fire. As soon as we walked in, Tony leaned over and whispered, "I don't know how wild these things get, but if the natives get out of control, head to that security guard over there. He's got a billy club at we can beat them back with while we make our escape".

The scary part was I don't think he was entirely joking.

But I gotta give Disney credit; they really know how to work the crowd to get the kids excited but not too excited. Cheering, yes. Widespread looting and tipping over cars, no. (Of course, they also made sure that each child walked through a maze of vendors before getting to their seats, so it's also possible that the kids were bought off by the various t-shirts, hats, pendents, stuffed plush dolls, light-up doodads and commemorative platypus cups. It's hard to riot when carrying all that overpriced loot).

The show itself was very cute. Lots of singing and dancing and acrobatics. Lots of flashing lights, t-shirt guns, confetti cannons, fog machines and elaborate set pieces. (In short, everything a 12 and under would love to spend an hour and a half looking at). Zb stood on Tony's knees and danced though all of it. She couldn't follow the plot, of course, but she really loved the singing and dancing.

It did take me a while to get used to the "live" characters though. For some reason, I am really uncomfortable with people in costumes with giant heads, (i.e. mascots, roaming Disney characters, and the Easter bunny-which I will still go out of my way to avoid whenever I'm at the mall, by the way) and some of the characters had really trippy eyes that will probably pop up again in my nightmares, but none of the kids seemed to mind, so maybe it's just me.

But all in all, lots of fun. ZB liked it, it was entertaining enough that it wasn't torture for parents to sit through, and I may or may not be the proud new owner of a Perry the Platypus t-shirt.

Plus I figure that knowing all the words to the theme show will allow me some leniency if the sugar high ever wears off and the munchkin mobs take over.

7/27/11 Surfing on Brain Waves in the Baby Pool

It's official! ZB has brain waves! This is the EEG cap that she wore today during a psych research experiment at the University of Tennessee's Neuroscience Lab. We were asked to be part of an experiment to study infant recognition, and I thought, Why not? It isn't every day you get to have your brain waves measured. (Well, we don't anyway...I can't really speak for what goes on at your crazy cocktail parties).

Anyway, they put the cap on ZB and showed her a video clip of a woman talking. Then they showed the same clip over and over and over. When she would get bored or distracted and look away, they'd cut to clips of Sesame street until she looked back at the screen, then go back to the clip of the woman. (I'm not sure what ZB's brain waves were doing during all of this, but after listening to the same 3 second clip of the woman for the 1000th time, my brain waves shut down completely). I was actually giddy with relief whenever ZB would turn her head and trigger a clip of Ernie singing "Rubber Ducky, you're the one".

Honestly, I think ZB was most interested in the tiny cape (think the ones that salons put on you for hair cuts) that they made her wear so that she wouldn't reach up and mess with the sensor wires. Woman on the screen? Pah. Dancing puppets? Eh. Momma bleeding from the ears after listening to the same clip over and over again? Nada. But a little black cape that covers her arms? Baby jackpot!

So that was our fun outing for the day. We made some grad students happy, and ZB got to play with a cape. And I got this hysterical picture:
More ammunition to mortify her with when she decides to start dating...

12/19/10 Tony, the Blahs, and the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra

Oooooh ya'll, I had the best time yesterday. We went to the Christmas show that the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra puts on, and it was just beautiful and magical and lovely, and I just had the best time!

Of course, the day didn't start out like that. You ever just wake up in a cranky blah mood for no particular reason? Well, that was me. Color me blah. And the closest reason that I could come up with was that I needed some excitement. My previous week was blah, my errands were blah, and we had absolutely no Saturday plans, which was blah cherry on top of my blah cake.

I think you get the picture.

Now normally, Tony (being of the male persuasion and all), can be somewhat blind to my blahs. On any given Saturday, the list of items that gets Tony's attention is 1) the sporting event currently playing on TV, 2) what is available to eat in the kitchen, and 3) the upcoming sporting event that will come on after the current sporting event is concluded. Whether or not his wife is emitting deep theatrical sighs falls somewhere around 4,783 on the Tony attention-o-meter. (Unless I cry. Sudden bursting into tears gets me up into the top 5, but only for as long as it takes me to tell him what it wrong. Lack of a specific reason drops me back down to around 28...high enough to make him pat me awkwardly on the leg while I sniff uncontrollably, but not enough to actually remove his eyes from the Bears/New England game. Like I said, he's a man).

But Tony must have been on especially on his game yesterday (or else it was halftime), because he picked up on my blahs without even a sniffle to clue him. And then he did the best thing. He gave me a hug. A good long bear hug. And then the second best thing...he asked if I wanted to go to dinner and the symphony.

To which I replied, "Oh my word, you've got some kind of terminal disease you aren't telling me about, don't you?"

See, I love the symphony. Love it love it love it. But this is a small miracle in terms of how Tony is usually willing to spend his Saturday nights. And just so you understand the full and total scale of this miraculous miracle, you should know that also playing at the Civic auditorium, at the very same time, in the very same venue as a the symphony orchestra, was a hockey game. So not only was Tony willing to sit through the symphony, but he was doing it instead of watching a hockey game.

And nothing says I love you like Tony skipping the chance to see a hockey game in order to sit through Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies.

(In fact, I'm still not sure the terminal disease thing is entirely off the table).

But we went, and it was fabulous. I got all gussied up in my finest giant blob maternity going-to-the-symphony clothes, and we had a lovely dinner at the new hibachi Japanese place (my choice...I was jonesing for some stir fry zucchini), and then we went to the Christmas show, which not only had the orchestra, but also the Knoxville Choral Society and a ballet dance troupe.

(I know! The symphony AND ballet! Not only is he terminal, but he's probably lost the house in a poker game and isn't telling me).

But you know what? I think he liked it. Maybe not enough to get season tickets, but enough that he didn't fall asleep or sneak off to catch the hockey score during intermission. And I loved it. The music was fabulous, the singing was fabulous, the dancing actually made me cry at one point. (Happy crying though, not blah crying. Apparently pregnancy hormones REALLY enjoy the Waltz of the Flowers. Go figure.) In fact, the one and only thing I'd change was the guy with the 2 year old girl that sat next to us. Don't get me wrong. The 2 year old was perfect...she never made a peep. The man, however, sang along with the orchestra on some of the songs. I did not come to the symphony to listen to you warble along to Little Drummer Boy, sir. Especially since you do not know all of the correct words.

But other than that? Fabulous Saturday night date. My own personal Prince Charming rode in, battled the blah monster, whisked me away for a magical night of music and dance, and then returned me safely home (where he promptly checked the game highlights, because he SWEARS he isn't dying).

So I guess the moral of the story is that my hubby is the best hubby ever. (Sorry ladies. He's all mine). And also, it's impossible to have the blahs when listening to the KSO do their Christmas show. And if you get a chance, go see it, because it is awesome.

You don't even have to have to be on your death bed.

10/25/10 What Football, Zombies and Jungle Babies Have in Common

Wooboy, what a weekend! Our weekends seem to gravitate to either "we sat on the couch like sloths and did not move for 48 hours" or "we ran around doing all kinds of stuff every moment of the day until Monday rolled around and we needed a weekend to recover from the weekend".

(We're extremists. What can I say?)

This weekend I went with option number 2. My oldest and bestest buddy Nicole came in to visit, and having her in is always a hoot. I've known her since the 7th grade or so, and she was my college roommate freshman year, and even though we only get to see each other 4 or 5 times a year now, she's one of those friends where you can just pick up again where you left off without missing a beat. Those kinds of friends are worth their weight in gold.

Anyway, Nicole came in and we laughed and chatted and ate chili and I took her to Walmart, because that's just how rock star I am. (Come visit me, and I'll show you a time you'll never forget...buying a gallon of milk and some bar soap at the local walmart!) Actually, shopping with someone else (even for the mundane) turns out to be pretty entertaining. Nicole and I were standing in the middle of the aisle, sniffing body wash to find the best smelling soap for Tony (you know how you do), and I almost died laughing when Nicole sniffed too close to the bottle and got body wash all over her nose. Of course then I immediately squeezed my bottle too hard and ended up with a soap bubble up my nostril too, but what would have been a little embarrassing alone was absolutely hysterical with a friend. Plus we both were able to spend the rest of the day with our faces smelling like Dove soap for Men. (Whatever floats your boat, right?)

After walmart we headed down to Market Square for the world record attempt of having the most people dancing to Thriller at one time. I never pass up an attempt to dance like a zombie if I can possibly help it, and Nicole admitted that this has always been a life goal for her also, so of course we had to attend. When we arrived, there was a square full of zombies industriously learning the steps to the Thriller dance. Big zombies, little zombies, Grandma zombies, 4 year old zombies, bride zombies, boy band zombies, gruesome zombies and adorable zombies. Even dog zombies. They also had a booth set up where they would paint on your zombie makeup for you, and all around us I kept hearing snatches of conversation like, "I brought some extra boils...would you like some?" and "Here. Some of your bloody wound has smeared. I have some extra blood right here...let me touch that up for you". It was a hoot and a half to watch. Unfortunately, the website I checked said that the dance was at 5pm, but when we arrived at 5, they had changed the time to 7pm. (Bummer zombie). 5:00 we could have done, but the UT game was set to kick off at 7pm, so sadly we were not able to partake in the official zombie festival. (Oh, but definitely next year!) Still, we were able to stand around and watch the practice dancing for a while, and Nicole did accidentally get some zombie blood on her hand, so all was not lost.
After scouting out the undead, we headed down to the stadium to witness our beloved Volunteers take on Alabama. And while we were under no illusions about who was going to win (Alabama being ranked number 7 and Tennessee being ranked...well, in a rebuilding year), we still had a really good time. We had excellent seats, and our boys played well for the first half, so there really was something to cheer about even if we got thoroughly trounced in the second half. (In fact, we cheered so much that my throat is still a little sore today). All in all, it was fun being back there together again and cheering for the old alma mater. And win or lose, 105,000 screaming fans in orange is something to behold. (Besides, just you wait SEC. We may have a team full of inexperienced freshmen this year, but in another year or two (or three), we'll be someone to contend with once again).

On Sunday, Nicole headed back to her homestead for some annual quality Pumpkin Patch time with her son, and Tony and I dismantled the guest bed (for at least the next four or five years anyway) to make room for the crib and various other baby paraphernalia. The guest room has officially become the nursery. Guests are still welcome, of course, but you'll be sleeping on an air bed or the couch from now on (or at least until I have an epiphany and find a way to stash guests in the office or laundry room). I'm thinking maybe a murphy bed somewhere. We'll see how that works out.

Anyway, the nursery is A.DOR.A.BLE. The crib is beautiful, and we're doing a Jungle Babies theme. (I'll do a separate post on a nursery tour so that you can see several pictures). My mom did all the sewing, so she made absolutely every Jungle Babies thing in the room. (Mom is awesome. She's like, master seamstress. She's been sewing all night for weeks now, and she did everything from crib sheets to the diaper stacker to decopaged knobs for the drawers. Trust me, I'll show you, and you will be BLOWN AWAY). It's my favorite room in the house now.


So that was my weekend. Walmart, Zombies, Football, Jungle Babies. It felt a lot busier than it sounds, but it was also a lot more fun. I always enjoy a weekend where I spend most of my waking hours laughing. How was your weekend?

9/14/10 The Boys of Fall And Streaking

You may have seen the highlights from this weekend's game between my beloved Tennessee Vols and the Oregon ducks. The first quarter was very good for us. The other three? Not so much. But the best part of the entire thing was the part that they didn't even show on television.

It all started innocently enough. The Seester happened to be in town this weekend, so the whole family went to the game. (Mom and Dad have season tickets and usually go to all the home games anyway, and the Seester likes to catch them whenever she's in town, and I just figured what the heck, so off we went with 105,000 other people to watch grown men crash into each other and chase a little oblong ball around). Your typical Saturday night in the south.

Anyway, we get there to the game and get all settled in our seats for some good old fashioned collegiate pigskin (we're up 6-0 within minutes! woot!), and the crowd is singing Rocky Top, and our boys are playing well for once, and the old guy behind the Seester is making a special point to give her high fives FOR EVERY LITTLE PLAY, so I suppose it was only natural that no one really noticed that the sky behind us was getting really dark.

I mean, really REALLY dark.

And sure, the wind picked up a bit, but when you're packed into a stadium with 100,000 other people on a humid night in September, you welcome the breeze. And I suppose that that rumbling noise could have been thunder, but who can hear it over the cheering of the fans? So it was really a bit of a surprise when the rain started to fall. But we are the mighty SEC! We scoff at a little rain! Scoff! Scoff! Wait-was that a giant bolt of lightning?

It turns out that it isn't the smartest thing in the world to be outdoors, 7 or 8 stories in the air and sitting on metal bleachers when a major thunderstorm comes up. And this sucker was a humdinger! (Or a gully washer, as my grandparents would say). So the game was stopped, the players were herded back into their locker rooms, you at home broke away to a panel of old sportscasters talking about who knows what, and 105,000 people tried to cram themselves under the little covered awning next to the concession stands. And when the rain started blowing, they crammed in even more. It was like training for the world's greatest clown car.

But even that wasn't the best part.

The Seester and I, having had enough of pretending to be sardines, decided to head over to Mom and Dad's seats in the fancy alumni covered section (also, their seats are plastic and not metal, so bonus points for not being a lightning rod). There we all sat quite comfortably and watched the lightning and the wind and the rain come slashing down on an empty stadium.

Did I say empty? I meant almost empty.

Because the student section stayed in their seats. Every single one of them. And not only did they stand there through the entire storm, but the harder it rained, the louder the students cheered. (Ah to be in college again. So young, so adventurous, so stupid not to have the sense to get in out of the rain). And the storm crashed, and the announcer kept advising people to take cover over the PA system, and the students stayed right where they were and got absolutely soaked to the skin. And they cheered.

But still not the best part.

The best part was when some of the drowned rat college students got tired of simply screaming at the storm and decided to increase their chances of being struck by lightning by hopping the barrier and running around on the open field. (Which as we all know is the number one, cardinal no-no of college football, punishable by immediate arrest. Paint yourself colors, scream all you want, insult the other team's mamas, but stay off the field!) But out they went, 30 or 40 of them, whooping and running and more of them getting ready to follow suit at a moment's notice.

And that was about the time that the streakers joined in. Because what's more fun than running around on a football field during a thunderstorm? That's right! Doing it naked!

You could almost hear the collected "oh crap!" rise up out of the game security guards. Because not only are they now going to have to also run out onto the field and get soaked to the skin while dodging lightning bolts, but they're going to have to tackle slippery, probably intoxicated naked guys while doing so.

(Aren't you sad that you at home spent the time watching the old guys discuss running games vs passing games while all this was going on?)

But out they went, because they are good security guards, huffing and puffing their way around the field after the students. (Interestingly enough from our elevated view up in the covered section, escaping naked students fleeing campus security instinctively take up the swarming pattern of birds trying to escape a predator. You've seen how a flock of birds all swoop and change direction together? So do drunken frat guys! Only it works better for the birds).

Some of the college students managed to swarm back into the stands to escape. Some were spectacularly tacked in a torrent of rain and security guard. One guy, (and this was my favorite) started out running in just his low-hanging basketball shorts, but the combination of the rain and the fact that he was wearing them about 6 sizes too big caused them to slip down around his ankles, tripping him up and making him body surf on his face (and other naked parts) for about 15 feet across grass and sand and gravel in front of the Oregon bench. When he stood up, his front was so bright red it could be seen from space. (Something tells me he won't be sleeping on his stomach for a while).

This whole spectacle went on for quite a while. Every time the field would clear, some other idiot would jump out and go racing across the grass. At first, everyone was cheering for the streakers, but pretty soon public sentiment turned and we were all cheering for the security guards instead. (I think it really pumped them up too. There were some pretty dramatic WWF tackles going on there towards the end. Don't tell me that crowd noise isn't a factor in a football game).

Sadly, the storm petered out after about 45 minutes, and with it, our rain delay entertainment. Annnnd shortly after that the game resumed and the Ducks kicked our butts from one end of the field to the other. But I gotta admit, it was one of the more interesting college games I've seen in a while.

I can't wait to check the weather for the Florida game.

5/5/10 Table Talk

The American Cancer Society's Relay for Life had their Trash to Treasure garage sale this weekend, and because I'm a helpful sort, I volunteered to load up Tony's truck and be official treasure transporter over to the church where the sale was taking place. They had a great turnout and ended up raising about $4600.00, which exceeded their goal of $4000.00 from last year. Which is, you know, bad for cancer, but awesome for the rest of us.

What's also awesome is that even though I had every intention of only dropping off, I happened to spy with my little eye a most bee-uuuu-ti-ful glass and metal table with matching chairs over in the corner. (Okay, so it wasn't quite bee-uuuu-ti-ful yet, but it had potential. And there's nothing I love more than potential). And wouldn't you know that I had just very recently decided that we needed a new kitchen table set? Specifically a glass and metal one? One veeeery similar to that one over in the corner, waiting to go to a good home?

(I must admit that I do not usually shop at garage/yard/rummage sales because who has room for other people's junk with all my own junk sitting around? That and Tony tends to frown on all of my "potential objects with potential". But it doesn't count as junk if you were already planning to buy one anyway, right? Right?)

And wouldn't you know it? Just as soon as I finished unpacking my last truck load, that very same table and chair set jumped into the back of my truck and begged to go home with me. (Oh Interpeeps, I got it for a song. A song I tell ya. Truthfully, I probably could have gotten it for half a song, but it was for a good cause, and I figured that ripping off the American Cancer Society would be wicked bad karma, so I paid them a song's worth and then my table and I went tearing out of there before rival potential-spotters could catch on and start a bidding war).

So now I am the proud owner of an ugly table and chairs, albeit with potential, which is what I tried to tell Tony when I arrived home and he was all, "What the heck is this!?" Actually, it isn't really that bad. It just needs new paint and upholstery. So that's exactly what I did.

Well, tried to do anyway.

Sometimes when I see things, I know exactly what I want it to look like. Other times, the image is more fuzzy, and I have to just jump in and follow my gut. This was one of those gut times. So I started with a shiny aluminum (or as the British say it, awl-you-mini-uhm) spray paint because I have a dark blue wall as the backdrop of the kitchen, and I thought silver would really pop against it. And I painted, and I painted, and it did pop all right, but I didn't love it. Honestly, it looked more like one of those folding aluminum beach chairs (which, while I love the beach, wasn't really a look I was going for in the kitchen).

So then I started over with a lovely satin nickel paint to cut the shine somewhat. And I sprayed and sprayed and sprayed, but it still wasn't quite right. The sheen was right, but the color was wrong. Plus when I showed it to Tony, he said it looked like "old people". (Not sure what that means exactly, but as "old people" is not exactly the motif I was shooting for, it was back to the store for more spray paint).

This time I called my mom over to ponder the great mysteries of spray paint, and eventually we settled on a dark dark metallic-y black that I am calling graphite. And we sprayed and sprayed and sprayed, and FINALLY I was like, "This is what I'm talking about!"

Of course, as is the way with 80 bajillion different cans of spray paint, by the time everything was said and done, I had painted not only the table and chairs but the cardboard I had the furniture resting on, the floor of the garage, three fingers, half of my right foot, my jeans, the end of my hair (not so much spray painted as just drug through wet paint as I was leaning over the table), and the inside of my lungs...which just goes to prove that you really aren't supposed to breathe that stuff.

And then I repeated it all again three more times.

Speaking of my gilded lungs, they aren't kidding about using that stuff in a well ventilated place. I had the garage door open, but apparently it wasn't enough because when I first started spraying, I was thinking things like, the leaf detail on the table is really intricate. When I finished, I was thinking, "That design in the middle looks like sperm getting together for a meeting...I wonder what they're talking about?"

Oh braincells. How I miss you. And how I wish that every time I sit down to dinner now, I'm not going to be thinking about sperm pow-wows.

I also recovered the seat cushions. The cushion itself was still in really good shape, but the fabric covering had definitely seen better days. No problem. I just channeled my inner decorator and ended up with a neutral tan fabric that is popular in my house because it does an excellent job of hiding cat hair. (With our brood, cat hair is a given. Therefore all out furniture was specifically picked out to blend with cat hair...sad, but practical). A couple of hits with a staple gun, and viola! new chairs.The glass top was in pretty much perfect shape already, so all I had to do with it was just wipe it down with some glass cleaner.

And there you have it. A new kitchen table and chairs. And it came out really really well if I do say so myself. I'm just tickled graphite about it. I invite you all over to sit and brunch with me at my pretty new table.
Of course, with all the spray paint that I've inhaled over the past 4 days, I'm probably a shoo-in for lung cancer, so hopefully buying this set helps the Relay for Life find a cure soon.