what goes on around here?

Okay. Today was a quiet day, overcast and cold. I worked a while and wandered home, grabbed a cold leftover taco from the fridge and came in here to the computer to read the news.

What's happened in the old world so far today?

I clicked the mouse, so the screen turned on, and suddenly I was looking at a picture of an enormous man in nothing but a towel. He had to be well over 600 pounds. God bless him, I don't even care about that--people are people at every size--but what's he doing on my computer? I don't know him, have never seen his picture before.

Shortly I ran into James in the dining room and asked him if he'd been using the computer. Yeah, for Facebook. I said, "Tell me about the picture of the tremendously fat guy." He had no idea what I meant, and it seemed true. He has a pretty good dumb act, but this was excellent acting.

Okay.

Kari! Lydia!

"Tell me about the picture of the really fat man. It was on my computer and somebody here knows why."

A foolish look came over her face. She rubbed her eyes and stalled.

"It was??? Well. I googled 'World's Fattest Dog.' Did you see the dog? (no.) And then a click came up to 'World's Fattest Cat.'"

Okay, right. But this was a human being.

"Yeah, it was 'World's Fattest Man.'"

I asked, "Did you do any other weird google searches?" She said no.

Julia was close by, and put her hand next to her mouth and in a specially secret voice said, "She googled Cat Cars too! Yeah, some of the cars were AWESOME."

Oh, I'm sure they were. Probably need to check those out and see what the on earth that's about.

I'm thinking we need some kind of blocker, but what kind? I'm stumped. What would block a kid from World's Fattest Dog? Or Cat Cars? Sigh. Should everything be blocked? Ei-yi-yi.

Later on, it was awful quiet so I made a trip upstairs and found kids playing a video game they said is Wii Fit. Like fitness, not a fit like a tantrum. Okay. Wii Tantrum--we would not want that.


Tim was playing and the guy who was him on the screen was running and running and running, and there were other characters on the track. Tim said, "I'm passing you, Mother!"

Passing me? Never. I would never be running like that except in an emergency.

Then he laughed, "There's r.t.'s dad!"

r.t.'s dad? (He runs about as much as I do.)

In a minute he said, "Hi, Grandma!" (My MOTHER? Or are we talking my mother in law? Both equally implausible.)

A guy in a beard was going the other way and Julia said, "How did Dad get all the way around again that fast?"

Turns out they can name all the characters and they did. Everyone we know is running on that track.


Every now and then a message would come up on the screen warning Tim about how the controller might fall out of his pocket. About the third time I asked why they keep mentioning this. The controller is in his HAND. Turns out you can either put the thing in your pocket and jog, which Tim demonstrated, or if you're tired or unambitious, you can just sprawl in a chair and shake the controller.


See, kids is smart. They frighten me a little.

Later Kirsten and I went shopping for the last couple Christmas presents, for her Man-Brothers, as she put it. We went to a swanky suburb south of here, to an indoor mall.

Some lunatic had the idea that we'd want an outdoor mall in this climate, so the mall closer to us is a nightmare. Parking is far, you gotta stomp around in the vicious cold, can't tell where the stores are because there is no map.

I hate it.

At the indoor mall, everyone was so warm and relaxed. And the prices were so shocking. Sixty dollars for a men's dress shirt? Never. Absolutely never.

Sweaters for $125. No. I can get sweaters like this at the thrift store for ten dollars. A tube of bath gel for $15? Please. It should be $15 for a CASE. We ended up at the sale rack at Gap. Boring, predictable, drab Gap. Yep. We are who we are.

Kirsten and I picked up Maria and James from pep band, and we dropped her off. The lights were yellow in the windows of her house, and when the door opened, I could see her roommate laughing in the living room. Christmas lights were on in all the windows as we drove home, including our own candlestick ones in the windows. (Way easier than stringing lights on the eaves two stories up, and maybe even prettier.)

I found Jay in the office bottling his wine next to the heap of gifts I must wrap tomorrow.

Oh yeah, we always knew that plumbing office was good for something.

Peaceful, beautiful Friday. love always, Val