That's Not the Ticket

Driving home the other day I spotted a billboard for “Menopause, the Musical.” So, here’s my feeling on this: if menopause is so much fun, why do they have to make a musical about it? It’s like all those “You’re a Young Lady Now” filmstrips pushing Kotex pads that they used to show back in the dinosaur age in elementary school. Another words, I think they doth protest too much.

So listen up, big shot producers. Here are some other entertainment extravaganzas that the ticket-buying public is not anxious to part with their hard-earned cash to see:

“Loving Those Labor Pains: A Lifetime Movie”

“Don’t Cramp My Style: The Period Podcast”

“Those Terrific Temper Tantrums: The TV Show”

"You Are So Ruining My Life: The Sweet 16 Soap Opera"

“What Did I Come into This Room Again For? A Senior Moments Musical”

PS: What couldn't they pay you to see?

The Fix-It Follies

How many bloggers does it take to change a light bulb? In my case, none. I was absent the day they were passing out repair genes, so count me in the legions of the repair-impaired. (Fortunately, as I remind my other half of the male persuasion on a fairly regular basis, I have plenty of other redeeming skills and qualities.)

I mean, it’s not as if the hubby is so handy around the house. He does try to tackle the basics (albeit always with much muttering about the thing he’s putting together having come without a critical piece). But he’s not exactly slapping a new deck on the house or patching a leaky roof; we’re talking hanging a picture on the wall, jiggling a runaway toilet, or reattaching a kitchen cabinet door. Still, next to me, he looks like he could co-host “This Old House.”

So yes, I am on the receiving end of a fair amount of ribbing about being repair-challenged. That’s why when my handy man/husband was out of town the other day and one of the recessed lighting bulbs just up and expired in our kitchen, I debated pretending I hadn’t noticed, before deciding to show him that hey, I wasn’t all that helpless with the repair thing after all.

I dragged out the stepladder, hunted down the (sort of right) bulb, remembered to turn off the light switch, and proceeded to screw the bulb out of the socket. Piece of cake, I’m thinking – until I realize that the whole thing is firmly stuck up there and isn’t going anywhere fast. So I did the only thing any self-respecting suburban resident would do. I asked the tile man who happened to be working in our bathroom to give it a whirl. Oh, yea, he says. This happens all the time with these old fixtures. Just try to jiggle it next time before you unscrew it.

Next time? I don’t think so. Next time I plan to resort to my time-honored method of home maintenance: selective sight. (What burned out light bulb?)

Bidding Adieu to the Big Schlep

One thing I don’t miss now that those younger people who share my DNA have both been granted permission to navigate two-ton hunks of metal on the road? All the schlepping. My fellow suburban sisters in maternal servitude know just the tiresome trekking I mean.

Of course, in addition to the other carpool moms, some babysitters, and occasional grandmas pressed into service, my husband did do a lap or two behind the wheel. But by the time I counted down the minutes to take-off, assembled and cleaned up the appropriate passengers, provisions and assorted gear, and had hand-drawn – to scale – a detailed map of the best route (highlighting any super-sized home improvement stores along the way), it would be, I’d discover, easier to just drive to say, Helsinki, and back, all by myself.

Indeed, why is it that Y-chromosomed individuals always seem to need assistants – someone to find the missing picture hook, hold the picture they’re attempting to hang on the wall so they can see if it’s centered, steady the step ladder, etc.? Those of us with X-chromosomes just seem to take the task and run with it, whether it’s whipping up that holiday family meal for 20 or unearthing the AWOL permission slip from the archeological dig otherwise known as the kitchen table.

Our other halves? They’re the ones that can’t find the corkscrew without a map – preferably one that shows the location of the nearest Home Depot.

Runway Fashionista

I’ve had the dubious pleasure of traveling on a lot of airplanes recently and one thing I’ve noticed is just how low our collective standards for travel attire have sunk. In the old days, people used to dress up for the occasion. Nowadays – and I am the worst offender here – we’ve thrown any pretense of grooming standards out the emergency exit hatch.

Me? I’m the one clad in comfy sweats (think a step up from PJs) and sneakers (the easier to slip out of at security). I’m usually sporting overgrown eyebrows and ragged nails (I know you’re supposed to pack those tweezers and nail files in the checked baggage but somehow I never remember), and I’m often wringing my wet hands after a visit to the ladies room (c’mon, those air blower things SO do not work). To top off the effect, picture me loaded down like a sherpa with my cell phone, laptop, iPod, and carry-on chicken Caesar salad from McDonalds.

All those 50s era stewardesses would be appalled. But hey, it’s a look. I’ll leave the dress up to Naomi C. for the next time she has to do a stint at the NYC Sanitation Department.

On-Line at the Inn: Clicking for Quaint Stuff

Last weekend, the hubby and I headed for an overnight at a little bed-and-breakfast in a scenic part of the country known for its host of cultural activities, where my favorite cultural activity turned out to be the following: lolling around on the feather bed while reading the papers, sipping coffee from a cup actually not made of styrofoam, and munching fresh-baked scones slathered with homemade apricot marmalade.

We did venture out a bit of course, and I even succeeded in dragging my travel companion with me to poke around in a big antique market. But after 10 minutes, he started making those pained looks – you know, the ones that say “I am allergic to all these little frou frou old things that someone’s grandma threw out,” so, alas, I left empty-handed.

Back at the inn, however, it occurred to me that I could remedy my lack of souvenirs and bring a bit of atmosphere back home at the same time. What better way, I thought, than duplicating some of the charming accessories in our room, like the botanical-theme decoupaged wastebasket, the yummy body lotion, and even the long-handled wood carved shoehorn that the hubby admired? So thanks to the combined miracle of the Internet and the little labels sewn into or stuck onto the bottom of just about everything, I proceeded to order a slew of stuff on-line without ever having to leave our room.

Some people pick up kitschy keepsakes to remind them of their excursions through the countryside. Others of us choose to soak up the ambiance by shopping via wireless service on a laptop while lounging on a pillow-laden bed with gazillion thread count sheets. (I did draw the line with the sheets; the mathaphobe in me has never gotten the hang of the whole thread count concept). But hey, my packages arrived just as the “I’m so-o-o-o relaxed” glow had worn off. My only regret? Not being able to find a web site that sold those scones.

Touching Home Base

The phone rings at 12:35 am last night (okay, technically early this morning). The hubby has long since gone to bed but being the insomniac/bibliophile I am, I am still up, engrossed in A. M. Holmes's latest book, “The Mistress’s Daughter,” a memoir about her experience in getting to know her biological parents (I literally can not put it down). It’s not unheard of for the phone to ring at this late hour around here; my husband does get emergency calls in his line of work, but the ring is shrill and jarring nonetheless.

“Wow, we haven’t heard from our Freshman recently. I guess he hasn't run out of money,” my husband had remarked earlier in the evening. “Shh, don’t even go there,” I say. (I’m the superstitious parent.)

Sure enough, it was him. And because the modus operandi in our family is “No news is good news,” our son rarely calls home. So when he does, my greeting is invariably some version of “Oh my God, are you okay? What’s wrong?” Nothing and everything was wrong. Turns out my son was just fine, though shaken; he had just come back from a candlelight vigil. “You heard about the terrible things that happened this morning?” he asked. “It’s been awhile since we talked so I just wanted to touch base with you guys.”

Like all people everywhere, with kids or not, I am still reeling from the unbearable tragedy that unfolded yesterday on a seemingly bucolic campus in Virginia. But as the mother of a first-year college student ensconced on a similar picture postcard campus, I am fixated on what these students’ parents must be going through. You pack up your child for this next step in the journey of becoming an independent young man or woman. You make sure he has the right jacket (warm enough but not dorky-looking), alarm clock (loud enough but with all the latest cool features), and desk lamp (bright enough but not likely to burn the dorm down), and then you worry about whether he’ll actually use them. You worry about whether he’ll be able to balance writing papers with partying. You worry about whether he’ll make the right decisions. But what you don’t think to worry about is his being gunned down by a fellow student.

My heart goes out to the victims, their families, and their friends, but especially to the parents. I know they’d do anything to receive a late night call from their children – even one just asking for a little extra cash.

Say What?

I’ve been thinking that it’s time for all those worn-out phrases we still use to catch up to the 21st century. You know: the ones we all say and don’t necessarily mean, like that old standby: “The check is in the mail.” Or what about: ”Oh, I tried you but the line was busy!” (Let's see: there’s call waiting, and voice mail, and text-messaging, and e-mail, etc., etc., so if you really want to connect with someone you know you can.)

Then again, lots of new, no one really means ‘em annoying phrases continue to pop up every day. Take “Listen carefully as our menu options have changed.” Oh, come on, get real: every phone tree in corporate America is changing every day? (Note to my kids: in the olden days, real live human beings actually answered all the phones; weird, huh?) Another too-often-used saying I could do without? “This call may be monitored for quality assurance purposes.”

So what “we hear ‘em/say ‘em all the time” (but don’t really believe and/or mean) phrases bug you?

I'll start us off:
1. "Your call is important to us. Please hold the line and someone will be with you shortly." (Translation: go watch paint dry.)

School Project Purgatory

My cell phone rings. It’s my college Freshperson, who rarely, if ever, calls home. “I need your advice,” he says. Wow. I am flattered. A question about choosing a major, maybe? Picking a course? The meaning of life? Nope. “What do you think about using blue-colored oak tag for my marine biology project – you know, blue like the ocean?”

Whoa. Hang on a minute, I’m thinking. Did he actually just say project? Weren’t we all done with arts and craftsy homework assignments (the bane of many a mom’s existence) by college?

Personally, I think to-be-done-at-home (read: with mom’s “help”) projects should be illegal. But surely by high school, wouldn’t you think that these kinds of artsy assignments would have gone the way of “circle time” and “show and tell?” If so, you would be wrong. One of my kids actually had to create a storyboard with drawings for 11th grade English. But college?

Anyway, the good news was: 1) he had already bought the blue oak tag, and 2) almost finished the poster, and thus 3) there was no need for me to be involved whatsoever. The bad news? I thought the days of annoying school projects – the dinosaur diorama, the sugar cube igloo, the solar system-on-a-wire-hanger mobile – were far, far behind us. Apparently not. My son’s talking about going to grad school eventually (and not for anything remotely related to art, either). Just please tell me he won’t have to pack the colored pencils.

PS: What was your child’s most annoying school project? (Mine was the three-dimensional human cell for 9th grade biology (!) for which we had to cut a rubber ball in half with a meat cleaver – don’t even ask.)

The Big "O" (as in "Oh My Goodness")

I can’t stop thinking about something I saw awhile back when I was in the car wash (it’s like the suburban Internet cafe without the wireless, background jazz, and decaf soy lattes). I was killing time as my car went through the automatic thing, and idly watching the TV mounted up on the wall. A reality show was on. Now I came in during the middle here, so I am not quite sure what the whole deal was, but it was something about five hot bikini-clad young things vying for the attention of one lucky hunky guy. They each got to spend some quality one-on-one time with him doing such culturally enriching activities as racing tadpoles and going down a slip-and-slide.

At the end of one “date,” in an effort, I guess, to get to know her a bit better, the guy asked one girl what adjective she’d use to describe herself. Hmm, I thought, trying to guess what it would be – Fun-loving? Outgoing? Okay, maybe sexy?

Nope. “One word that I use a lot to describe myself,” she said smiling her blindingly bleached teeth into the camera, “is orgasmic.” O-k-a-a-a-a-a-y. I could see the guy trying to figure out what was up with that, too. Cause I know what I’m thinking to myself: “What the heck does that mean? Does she give a lot of them? Get a lot of them? Or just like them a lot?”

Yup, the times they are a'changing. In the hook up era, is "orgasmic" just the new word for "friendly?" Am I alone on this one? Help me out here. Please.

Maternal Mysteries

Some miscellaneous maternal mysteries to ponder:

1. Where’d all those other socks go?

2. How come all the other parents said it was okay?

3. Why am I the only one in my family who can see the present the dog left on the living room rug?

4. If I don't know anything, why do my offspring still ask for my advice?

5. Who ate the last chocolate chip cookie?

Any thoughts?

At the Sound of the Drone

Why do so many of us (I’m including my household here, too, natch) have the same tired old message on our phone answering machines? You know, the “We can’t get to the phone right now…”

C’mon, we all know what that really means – some version of: “Mom’s getting a manicure, Dad’s picking up a “gotta have it” gizmo at Home Depot, Madison’s cruising the mall, and Dylan is losing his shirt at on-line poker.”

Why don’t we just cut to the chase with a simple: “Hey robbers, come on over?”

PS: If you have a better alternative, please, please share it with us, as long as it doesn’t involve talking Chihuahuas or two-month-olds, no matter how talented or gifted.

Drooling Dog on Board

I pick up my Freshman, home for spring break, from the train station. His greeting? “Where’s the dog?”

Oops. My bad. “The dog” (in this case, our yellow Lab, Maggie; our other dog gets carsick) was a permanent fixture in the car as I schlepped my children through their suburban childhood. Indeed, it was the rare vehicle on the carpool pick-up line that didn’t sport its own panting pet slobbering out the back window.

In my case, it started out innocently enough. The dog would hurl herself at the car and barrel her way past me to get into the back seat when I would try to leave the house. It was easier not to wrestle 85 pounds of panting Lab flesh, so pretty soon, Maggie became my de facto permanent passenger/carpooling companion. (She was good company, too. Not once did she hiss at me not to sing along to the radio 'cause I was embarrassing her in front of her friends.)

Of course, the Freshman’s been driving himself around for quite awhile now. And because my boss frowns on my showing up with a colleague, no matter how cute, who spends her day napping on the floor and not, say, doing any work, I had gotten out of the habit of taking Maggie with me every time I got into the car. But no sooner had my son deposited his dirty laundry at our house, he was out again, to cruise around his old stomping grounds. And yep, you-know-who was riding shotgun.