YOU'RE GOING DOWN BUSTER

Some weeks I really look forward to the weekend and some weekends I really look forward to the week. This depends on how work is going and how much the kids are driving me crazy. Work is wearing me out so I’m looking forward to the weekend.

The weekend before Halloween we went to a 1 year old birthday party. Sometimes it’s the small things… they had homemade refried beans (made in a crock pot) and homemade guacamole so I was in heaven. The host even packed up some of the beans to go for me which I ate the next day with my scrambled eggs. Yum.

We carved pumpkins on Sunday and then Monday evening I went to Tami’s house for pumpkin carving. I socialized more than anything else. Halloween was awesome. Jack and Ty were super cute as Tigger and a bear. I took Ty to a few houses but he didn’t really get it and wanted me to carry him. I dropped Ty off with Brian and took Jack to a lot of houses. Jack loves trick-or-treating. The first few houses he asked for suckers and I had to tell him that you don’t get to request a certain kind of candy at the houses. Then after he got the candy he would say “thank you” and then things like “See you Sunday!” which was funny since he wouldn’t see most of these neighbors until we are trick-or-treating next year. I got a chance to do a lot of socializing throughout the neighborhood. After his bucket got full, we went back home and gave out candy and beer. We always give out candy to the kids and beer to the adults. People call us the people who give out beer on Halloween. That makes Brian happy. Jack got to eat two things of candy and the rest of it went into the pantry and he hasn’t asked for it since then. This means that Brian and I have been eating little Almond Joy’s and Milky Way’s for the past two weeks. Just what we need.

On Friday night Brian and I got a sitter and we went to one of my favorite restaurants called La Stalla. We got a bottle of wine, salads and of course my favorite veal dish with mozzarella and prosciutto. For dessert we ordered a chocolate soufflé. It was a really nice meal. Brian and I spent most of Saturday trying to figure out the election and what health insurance to get next year. There are several good options that we have. I am working on a spreadsheet that goes through several cost scenarios based on a best case year or worst case year (if we’re all in a big accident and all in the ICU). It’s kind of morbid to do stuff like that but with some of these plans, we could save about $2000/year.

I found out a neighbor sells Gold Canyon candles and so she brought over her suitcase full of samples and I smelled all of them. I gave her my order for a few new scents. For dinner we went to ZTejas house where they have one of the best desserts you can buy at a restaurant—their Ancho Chili Pie which is like a chocolate pie. After dinner we went to Cost Plus and had a good time there with the boys.

On Sunday Jill M came over with Connor and Luke and the boys played together for a while. I left to go to Kathleen’s baby shower. This was a very elegant shower. The house was over 7000+ square feet and very charming because it was older and wasn’t cavernous like some big houses. The weather was perfect and we had lunch outside on the patio. We had croissants and chicken salad which is my #1 comfort food. The company was also great since it was mostly my book club. You can’t go wrong with that crowd. And we all got a little gift bag to take with us. Very nice. We have three pregnant women in the book club so we will have a few more showers coming up.

Brian and I talked about the election on Sunday and Monday night. There were so many propositions that it took a lot of work to understand them and figure out what to do. Lots of them were hard on smokers and illegal immigrants. Neither are a protected minority in this country. I filled out the sample ballot and set my alarm for 5:45 AM. I rolled out of bed, threw on some sweats and headed down to the polls. There was a line out the door and everyone was dressed for work. After 10 minutes someone mentioned that there were two lines—and fortunately I belonged in the shorter line. I sat in some pews to fill out my ballot (the polling place was a church). I accidentally double voted for one judge and tried to pass off my ballot because really I didn’t care but they made me fill out another one. ARGH. After work I did Pilates and then met Sarah and Mike for happy hour where we had a heated discussion about the propositions and various other things. Mike and I really like to argue and Sarah was concerned that Mike and I were mad at each other but we do this every time and walk away not thinking anything of it. I had a really crappy day at work on Wednesday. For the first time in 10 years, I hung up on a phone call with some other people because they were insulting me, my boss and my organization. I was furious. I was working from home and so I went to play with Ty for a while to calm down. I told my nanny what I had done and she was surprised but I assured her you don’t get fired for doing things like that where I work. I talked to my boss about it and he was furious and he told his boss. So I had to explain it a few times to some people today. I’m waiting for the guy who insulted me (by the way, I was right and he was wrong—confirmed by his boss and about 12 other people) to apologize but I have heard nothing. When are people going to realize that you don’t make me mad? Ha ha.

So of course, to make myself feel better I decided that I had to go to Nordstrom’s for their women’s sale and so we went to Wildflower for dinner and Brian took the kids to Pottery Barn Kids while I did a little shopping. I didn’t buy anything but it did make me feel better.

Thursday night was my volleyball tournament. Brian brought Jack and Ty out to cheer us on which was nice. It made me laugh to hear Jack yell, “Side out, MAMA!” and “YOU”RE GOING DOWN BUSTER!” We lost our first match so we consoled ourselves over a beer afterwards.