What is This Word "Budget" of Which You Speak?

We're pretty good with household finance around here. We pay off the credit cards every month, we know how much we spend on the usual bills every month, and we squirrel a little money away for unexpected expenses. But after this week, I'm thinking we vastly underestimated the latter category this year.

Last weekend we picked out new carpet for our living and toy rooms. That's all well and good, since we had budgeted for it. It ran a bit over our estimate, but didn't knock too much of a dent in the emergency/unexpected expense fund.

We have two of those famous bald ferrets here at the moment. Both Houdini and Jeremy have adrenal disease, and they were both scheduled for surgery this week. The estimate for each surgery was around $1000. Houdini had her adrenalectomy on Tuesday, and it came to $1200. Then Jeremy went in on Wednesday, and the poor guy went into respiratory arrest on the table. The vet resuscitated him, and then began unexpected expense Number 1. A cardiology consult, which came to $500. (Jeremy's fine, by the way. He aspirated some saliva, but after a few days of antibiotics, he should be back to normal. The vet and I still have jangled nerves.) And he'll have surgery next month, but it will probably be closer to $1500 dollars since the vet will have to work around some medical issues. But still, all was well money-wise. Pretty good-sized dent in the slush fund, but still doable.

My car went in for a routine oil change this afternoon. Kevin and I were saying on the way home that everything looked fine, and we had a couple of thousand dollars in the slush fund in case of a major expense, like the death of our creaky old refrigerator. And then arrived the Big Unexpected Expense. We were home not thirty minutes when the Saturn dealership called. Apparently my car needs new brake pads, new calipers, and new tires. And some miscellaneous other things. To the tune of $1200!!! That there sound? It's the sound of a slush fund imploding.

And now I'm mad. The ferrets are one thing since we've been through these adrenal issues with many of our ferrets, and we knew it might happen, and we want them to be as healthy as possible. We owe it to them. The car? Is two months past warranty, I just put $600 into it two months ago, and we've got just over a year of payments left on it. It has a questionable mechanical history, and my gut is not predicting good things for the future with this beast.

It just cheeses me off to no end when machines break down right after warranty expiration. And now I'm wondering which path would be financially more prudent - do I put all this money into the car now and hope it doesn't give up the ghost before it's paid off, or do we just get a new, more reliable vehicle and hope we can get enough of a trade to take care of the remaining loan balance? And should I get another Saturn? I've loved their cars since they came out, but lately the dealership is getting all Pushy-Pushy about expensive services, and the repair prices seem to have risen inordinately. I'm not feeling the love with Saturn these days.

Ugh. But still, it's a holiday weekend, and fun things are in store. Houdini is back to her normal cuddlebug nippy self, and after such a scare, Jeremy is fine. I don't have to worry about the ferrets now, which is a relief. So, here's to potato salad and fireworks. Have a Happy 4th, everyone!

Breakfast Conversations

I was fixing Liam some breakfast this morning. He was playing in the toy room. A series of thumps occurred...

Thump 1:

Imagine the sound of a thirty pound boy tumbling onto the floor...
"Mommy, come here! I fell backwards. You need to kiss my backside!!"

Thump 2:

Large thump followed by the sound of things rolling around on the floor...
"Mommy, come here! I lost my marbles. I need help collecting them all!"

Thump 3:

A loud thump, origin mysterious...
"Mommy, come here! Something happened. But I won't say what!"

Oh, the day is shaping up to be very, very, really long...

Channeling Oz

The weather, she is a bit spooky today. I grew up in the Midwest, and even though I haven't lived there in years, apparently I've still got a sixth sense about tornadic activity. Although the weather forecast involved nothing but rain and more rain this morning, I stepped out the door and the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. Why?

Well, it's like this. It was warm and extremely humid today. But instead of being still as a mouse, the air was stirring with a constant breeze of 15-25 miles per hour. Looking upward, I saw towers of cumulous clouds speeding by overhead. The clouds were scooting by from south to north, while the wind on my cheeks was clearly coming from the west to southwest. This is not good. Not good at all. These are the conditions that give rise to rotating thunderstorms, which in turn spawn tornados.

I went about my business today trying to console myself with the fact that this is not Illinois. It's New Jersey, and tornados are rare beasts here. The ones that form tend to be weak and short-lived. We made it to dinnertime without even a clap of thunder, despite the heavy feel of the day. Still, things felt unsettled to me.

I checked this and this and what do you know? It seems a tropical disturbance is headed right over our heads tonight. Then I found Special Weather Statement in my inbox:

...VERY HEAVY FLOOD PRODUCING RAINS, AND NOW THE THREAT OF SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS...

THE REGION HAS BEEN UNDER A FLOOD THREAT FOR SEVERAL DAYS, AND NOW THERE IS A THREAT OF SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS, AND POSSIBLY ISOLATED TORNADOES.

PERSONS LIVING ALONG STREAMS AND CREEKS SHOULD CONTINUE TO PAY VERY CLOSE ATTENTION TO RAPIDLY CHANGING WEATHER CONDITIONS AND LISTEN FOR THE POSSIBLE ISSUANCE OF ADDITIONAL WARNINGS AND/OR ADVISORIES. MOTORISTS ARE REMINDED TO REFRAIN FROM DRIVING INTO FLOOD WATERS. FLOWING WATER CAN CARRY VEHICLES AWAY OR TURN THEM OVER, OR EVEN WASH ROADS AWAY. NEVER DRIVE THROUGH FLOOD WATERS.
BE SAFE AND TURN AROUND, DON'T DROWN.

SOME OF THE SMALLER STREAMS MAY BEGIN TO FLOOD DURING THE NIGHTTIME HOURS SO IT IS SUGGESTED THAT YOU INSURE THAT YOUR VEHICLE IS AWAY FROM A QUICKLY RISING STREAM.

A TROPICAL FEED OF MOISTURE HAS BEEN STREAMING NORTHWEST FROM THE BAHAMA ISLANDS RESULTING IN FLOODING ALONG FLASHY STREAMS AND IS EXPECTED TO BEGIN AFFECTING THE LARGER RIVERS OVER THE NEXT TWO DAYS. ADDING TO THE POTENTIAL OF MORE HEAVY RAIN, AND SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS IS AN AREA OF LOW PRESSURE OFF THE SOUTHERN NORTH CAROLINA COAST.
THIS LOW WILL MOVE NORTH DURING THE DAY AND UP THROUGH THE DEALWARE VALLEY BY TOMORROW AFTERNOON.

THE ATMOSPHERE WILL BECOME INCREASINGLY MORE UNSTABLE AND SUPPORT THE DEVELOPMENT OF STRONG STORMS AND POSSIBLY EVEN TORNADOES LATE THIS EVENING INTO THE MORNING HOURS ON WEDNESDAY.

At least I'm not imagining things. I guess I'll have to keep thinking dry basement thoughts. And I'll keep reminding myself that New Jersey doesn't get strong tornados.

The Clouds, They Pour

Apparently our entire state was recently relocated to another hemisphere, and I never got the memo. Yes folks, the weather is less like New Jersey in summer than New Delhi in monsoon season. It has rained. And thundered. And rained. And poured. And drizzled. For three or four straight days now. And it's not supposed to let up anytime soon. We are stuck between a trough in the Midwest and a ridge over the Atlantic. This is so not a good thing during tropical weather season, but I will try to push thoughts of flooded basements out of my head for now, since, so far, the basement is not under water.

We drove down to Suzanne's house this morning for a playdate. At several points I thought about pulling over and waiting out the downpour, but the thought of semi trucks whizzing by me at close range was more frightening than driving with the trucks in low visibility. As a result Liam learned some words that I would prefer he not know, although Kevin swears those same words are in fact necessary to the vocabulary of any competent New Jersey motorist.

Ahem.

Liam put together this scene tonight:



According to him, this represents "The Turnpike in rain. And rush hour. It's a mess. The frogs swim there so they can watch the loud trucks." Now, I did not see any upside-down sheep or tigers on the roads this morning, but I am pretty sure I saw some frogs and ducks. And one "sideways truck." Give the kid a little leeway for artistic effect, and you've got the basic idea of our drive.

However, we did make it down in one piece, and were only a few minutes late. Despite being quieter than the proverbial clam, Liam obviously had a great time. And so did I. I picked up some summer reading ideas, and found out I'm not the only person feeling guilty about shopping at discount stores after reading this. The kids amused themselves with trains and cars, and Liam learned the names of several planets from Sean, who has a way cool solar system floor puzzle. I may have to buy one of those. Perhaps I'll let my son play with it...

The rain let up a bit on the way home, which was good since Liam insisted we had to look for trucks that had letters spelling "Sean and Allie" on their back doors. Amazingly, we saw two of those trucks I conveniently misspelled "Penske" and "Ryder" a couple of times. This afternoon Liam made up a song about Sean and Allie, along with full percussion line best performed on an empty oatmeal box.



The Sean and Allie Anthem - sung to the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star

Sean and Allie are my friends,
Sean and Allie are my friends,
They have trucks,
And they have cars,
They have trucks!
And lots of cars!
They have a fun puzzle,
And a fire engine, too!

Suzanne is their Mommy,
Suzanne is their Mommy,
She is nice,
She is nice,
She is very really fun!
Suzanne is their Mommy,
Suzanne is their Mommy!

And there you have it - a fun playdate described in a meter-challenged but heartfelt song. Thanks for the playdate, Mimilou family!

So That's Why My Kid Won't Listen to Me

Apparently, I am not scary enough....

You Are Not Scary

Everyone loves you. Isn't that sweet?

How Scary Are You?

Now what is scary is the cold I have. I would whine, except there is one benefit here. Despite the heat and humidity today, I have enough of a fever that it actually feels good to be outside.

Say Bye-Bye to Baby Duck

There's a new kid in town, and his name is Little Toad. We've found several of these cute little Fowler's toads in our yard recently, and Liam is quite taken with them:



Liam identifies with small animals (that's what you get growing up with lots of pets, I guess), and much of his imaginary play is about him pretending to be various critters. Accordingly, when I called him Baby Duck yesterday, he told me in no uncertain terms, "I'm not! Not Liam. Not Baby Duck! I'm Little Toad."

Fortunately Little Toad is not terrified of Casey, who has pushed several of the real toads to near cardiac arrest by sniffing them.

I'm Punting Here

I've got a bad case of writer's block here. (Blogger block?? I dunno.) Accordingly, I'm punting with a topic Kevin suggested - why does bathtime take so darn long in the Menagerie House?

The answer is that Liam, like most toddlers, is a creature of routine and repetition. A couple of months ago Liam decided baths were Just Too Terrifying. Kevin managed to lure him back into the water by bringing some of Liam's favorite Disney figurines in the tub and giving them "baths" complete with shampoo and rinsing and drying and the whole nine yards. This was a truly inspired idea on his part. Truly.

The only hitch is that the game has grown to include just about any plastic animal known to exist in our house. And multiple shampoos, and, on occasion, conditioner. Take a look at the picture below, figure a minute or two for each animal, and you'll get the idea.



About a half hour for the bath, not counting the undressing and putting pajamas on and brushing teeth parts. My husband has the patience of a saint. I, on the other hand, do not, which is why I'm thanking my lucky stars Kevin is the bath guy.

Phantom has some posts detailing why her husband should be cloned. (And truly he should! Mr. Blue is terrific!) I'm thinking she's onto a great idea, and if anyone starts a husband cloning business, I've got another wonderful candidate here. Thank you, Kevin!

Helicopter Parenting

You've probably heard about helicopter parenting in the press. It's a phenomenon in which anxious parents of college kids call professors to discuss grades, roommate problems, and things of that nature. It's not the best for professors or students, at least in my book, since by college age, students should be approaching professors on their own to discuss these issues. It's not a new phenomenon, either; I can remember dealing with parents as a teaching assistant in grad school, and that was ten years ago. However, as of 7:00 AM today, I have a story that absolutely takes the cake.

My phone rang bright and early this morning, and the lady on the other end, let's call her Mrs. Smith, identified herself as the mother of a student who took one of my organic chemistry sections in the summer of 1998. It seems her daughter now wants to apply to medical school, and the C she earned in my class eight years ago is not the grade she needs to be accepted to medical school. In this mother's estimation, the situation needs to be remedied, promptly, by my changing the grade to at least a C+, and preferably a B. Now I'm not one to swear, but I have to admit my first thought is, WTF???

I told her, as politely and coherently as I could at that unseemly hour, that eight years out is past the statute of limitations on grade changes, and also, I don't change grades on parental whim. I only change grades when I've made a mistake in calculations, which is not the case here. And I also pointed out that Student Smith is now something like 26 or 27 years of age, and really should be having this discussion with me herself. Not that the answer would have been different, but sheesh, she's a bit old to have her mother fight these types of battles. At some point, kids have to grow up and ask the hard questions on their own.

Mrs. Smith was not amused. Apparently her daughter is poised to be a future Surgeon General, and I am posing a bit of a problem what with my uncooperative nature and all. So she asked if I knew when the Dean's office opens this morning. I don't, but I told her to try around 9:00 AM. I'm waiting for the Dean to call, because what I want to know is whether his head will explode from the ridiculousness of this request, or whether his guts will burst from the hilarity of the situation.

Also??? If I ever write a post saying that I've had it up to my eyeteeth with toddler tantrums and am planning to return to teaching full-time, will someone please remind me of this story? Please and Thank You!

Now, if you all will excuse me, my son has dumped a quart of soapy water on the dog...

Update: The Dean called me this afternoon. It was fairly anticlimactic, if truth be told. Apparently I'm not the first person to get this sort of request from Mrs. Smith. It seems she has put in similar requests for her daughter's grade elevation with members of the physics and phys ed departments. (Kinda makes me wonder who's really behind the med school idea, the kid or the mom.) At any rate, those requests will not be honored, so at least I've got administration backup on this one. Phew!

A Little Light Yardwork

Kevin is setting out to build a big sandbox for Liam and his pals. He started out yesterday by removing two bushes to make room. Liam was into it for, oh, five minutes or so, but quickly lost interest. See the highlights below, with actual Baby Duck commentary.


"Daddy's using his shovel again. It's funny! He will not use the saw again. The saw makes funny loud noises and it scares me."



"I'm thinking about throwing branches back in the hole. That's the plan. YEAH!"



"I'm thinking about tackling Casey. That's the plan, actually. Um?? Where's Casey?"



"Hey, Casey! Come get your ball!"



"I got him! Hey, Casey, you were tackled by a Baby Duck!"



"Casey is my best friend!"

By the way, Liam picked his own outfit yesterday, can you tell? It's very Hanna Anderson meets Lands' End, don't you think? I predict that all the cool tots will soon be dressing this way.

For Family and Friends in Florida

Welcome to Hurricane Season 2006! The first storm has formed, and it seems to want to visit Florida early next week. We're sending storm-deterring thoughts your way, y'all.

Lost in Translation

Ever buy an appliance or a piece of gardening equipment that comes with one of those owners' manuals that has been translated one too many times? You know, with English that started out as Japanese and was translated by way of Croation and Farsi? Where you try to assemble the item in question and are left to drop your jaw on the floor when instructed, "Use a glue gun to insert Screw A into Slot 10 and then tighten with a hammer?"

I've got that feeling going on when reading Liam's latest library selection. It's a very cute book that was originally, as far as I can tell, written in French. The version we have is in Gujarati with English subtext, and that subtext is, well, funny. It's a flip-the-tab book about vehicles. One one side of the page is a riddle about the vehicle that one is supposed to solve to figure out what the picture will show. When the flap is lifted, a finger painting of the vehicle is shown, along the answer in English and Gujarati. I'm having fun figuring out what is an obvious mistranslation/misspelling, and what is just a corruption of British English.

In the former category, we have:

Riddle: "In the fields, the earth yields to my blade."
Answer: "A plough."

or

Riddle: "I'm ace at exploring lunar space."
Answer: "A moon buggy."

In the latter category:

Riddle: "Tuck teddy (bear) in and take him for a spin."
Answer: "A (baby) buggy."

Riddle: "I'm better than a basket at the supermarket."
Answer: "A (shopping) trolley."

But then, there's the following, which is clearly in a category by itself:

Riddle: "I go like the clappers to catch all the robbers."
Answer: "A police car."

That last riddle definitely merits a bit of editing by Mommy. I'm glad my son can't actually read right now.

New Jersey Botany - Beware of Vines

The previous owners of our house did extensive landscaping to the yard. It's a lot of work to keep up with all the weeding, and if we had three or so hours during the day, every day, we just might be able to keep up with the weeding and trimming. We don't, and we haven't. As a consequence, the side section of our backyard has become overgrown with vines of various types. It is actually pretty to have some of this wild growth around, and it makes our bird feeders very popular as the vines and shrubs provide lots of protective cover for birds. However, our fence is in danger of collapse due to the sheer weight of vegetation growing up over it.

There's been a running joke in our marriage about vines. Being from the Upper Midwest, I never had a lot of experience with vines as a kid. I guess the winters are too harsh for viny-type plants out there. New Jersey is full of vines, and I always wanted to plants some vines in the garden because they are so pretty. Kevin has always been adamant that that was not one of my better ideas, since vines here tend to be very aggressive and destroy whatever they grow upon. He was right, and I only had to look out the back door to see his point.

Over the weekend, Kevin received a Home Depot gift card as a birthday present from his parents, and he used part of it to buy me a hoe. (I know, I know, so romantic!) I don't at all fancy the idea of spraying chemicals willy-nilly about the yard, and a hoe and a little muscle power will remove even deeply-rooted weeds, so I set out this weekend to rid the gardens of weeds. All was well for a time. I weeded the rose garden, the side yard, ad the front garden. Then, Monday, I set to work on the aforementioned vine garden.

I cleared out some wild strawberries.


I cleared out some Virginia creeper.


And then there was this:


We found a large patch of it by the back fence. Being that you can take the girl out of the Midwest, but you can't take the Midwest out of the girl, I assumed that poison ivy grows as a bush, because, well, in the Midwest, it does. Apparently on the Eastern Seaboard, it's a vine. Kevin removed the large patch of it himself.

It seems that I missed the take-home point of the "Vines are aggressive" argument. There must have been some poison ivy trailing in with the Virginia creeper, because I have the telltale rash on my lower legs. Also, the telltale itching.

So, to recap, vines will take over a yard in short order. Some vines are not friendly. A hoe will remove ground-growing vines very well, at least until they grow back in a week or two. And most importantly, "Leaves of three, let them be." Or at least, let one's husband, who knows how to handle evil vines, deal with poison ivy.

Allow My Son to Demonstrate My Lack of Cooking Skills

Liam was exploring the kitchen this morning....

(Pointing to stove knob): "Mommy turns this to use the stove."

(Pointing to oven knob): "Mommy uses this to turn on the oven."

(Pointing to timer knob): "This timer bings when dinner is done."

(Pointing to smoke detector): "And if Mommy forgets the timer, this goes off to tell us dinner is really, really, very done!"

'Nuff said!

Those Pesky Squirrels

If you have birdfeeders, like us, you have no doubt tried your share of "squirrel-proof" feeders. After much trial and error, we finally settled on one of these and one of these. They are not the easiest things to clean, but the birds love them, and the squirrels are left to gather the seeds that fall to the ground.

Even so, every morning there are a few hopeful squirrels who try to invade the feeders. They hang by the top of the feeder with their hind feet, paws desperately scrabbling just inside the caging in the hopes that today will be the day that they reach the seed-containing tube inside. It hasn't worked yet, but they keep on trying.

Our intrepid mutt, Casey, fancies himself quite the mighty squirrel hunter. Every morning as the squirrels gather, he begs to go out and begin the hunt. The squirrels are wise to him, and as he shoots out the door, they jump to the trees a few feet above his head, wait for him to fly off the deck, and then they go back to the feeders. There is one squirrel (nicknamed Bluto) we know by sight because he is huge. He's a gray squirrel, and he looks like he's taking growth hormones and working out at the gym when he's not assaulting the feeders. He's not particularly fast or nimble, so his tactic concerning Casey is to shriek at him in a rather shrill tone of voice. Casey has been known to get close enough to Bluto that he could conceivably catch the squirrel, but he hasn't really tried. Instead, Casey growls, Bluto shrieks, and the two retreat to opposite corners of the deck to stare at each other until one or the other gets bored and wanders off.

I've often wondered what would happen if Casey met up with a more aggressive gray squirrel like this guy. After contemplating the issue, I've decided it's best I don't find out. We're in and out of the vet's office often enough with strange ferret maladies. I don't need to come in with a 70 pound dog who was bested by a two pound squirrel.