Disconnected Thoughts on a Busy Day

This morning I drove behind a car with a license plate cover that said "Happiness is... calling Bingo!" I can't say that I agree, but I appreciate the enthusiasm.

I think that American English gets singulars and plurals completely confused. For instance, in England you would say "my bank are really lousy at customer service," which makes sense because you would be referring to the customer service skills of a group of people. Here, obviously, we endow entire corporations with the same properties as a single human being, both legally and linguistically. Bah! As if that weren't irritating enough, we get it all ass-backwards when referring to individuals and constantly use "they" when we are, in fact, talking about one person. To be fair to American English we do get the pronunciation of aluminum correct where the British fail horribly.

Do you ever have one of those days where the person you see in the mirror is exactly the person you think you are? Today I looked like myself. It didn't matter that it wasn't my "best." It felt really nice.

Tomorrow is Geneva Lynn's first birthday, and I am absurdly proud of the little person she has become in the last 364 days. I was playing the "one year ago today" game in my head-- those of you who know me will know that I don't reserve this game for special occasions or anniversaries-- and realized that there is a significant blank spot on June 8th. I remember distinctly what I was doing a year ago yesterday: having dinner with the family to celebrate Jordan's graduation from college. I remember what I was doing a year ago tomorrow: converting a fetus into a newborn through the clever use of uterine contractions. I have no idea what I was doing a year ago today. Probably wallowing in self-pity.

This Sunday I got to meet my neighbors' seven-year-old daughter and she is a delight! She is articulate and thoughtful and handles my over-friendliness very well. I think I will see if she wants to bake a cake with Geneva and me tomorrow.

I admit with some embarrassment that I have watched Jon and Kate Plus Eight more than once, and in many ways I honestly do not think all that highly of Jon and Kate Gosselin. It seems that they have made a lot of choices that I would not have made in the same situation. As parents and as a couple (well, ex-couple) they do not appear to be the greatest role models. But I will say this: they are raising sextuplets. Sextuplets. I take care of eight-month-old Lucas for about ten hours each week and I basically do not get anything accomplished during those ten hours. Two babies pretty much maxes me out. Today I took them to Inkling's and Starbucks and it was a Big Deal; the outing literally lasted for hours and had all three of us exhausted by the end. So for all their apparent shortcomings, Jon and Kate have me beat in this regard. They might be mediocre parents, but they are mediocre at an extremely difficult job.

When Geneva was sick last week I was willing to do pretty much anything to help her get to sleep. This included playing human pacifier for an entire hour. When I mentioned this to Avery he said, without a trace of sarcasm in his voice, "oh fun!" That, sir, is a gross misuse of the adjective.

I spent the morning outside in the sunshine, watering the garden and feeding the chickens and playing with the girlie. We wore our nice skirts and sat in the dirt. It was absolute bliss. If I could put that on a license plate cover, I would.