How to exercise

Running is inherently a boring activity for me. But it gets me the most aerobic bang for my babysitter buck so I do it anyway. And when I discovered those treadmills that have a TV built into the dashboard, it changed everything. Suddenly I was doubling and tripling the time I spent on the treadmill because I just had to finish the Daily Show, or stumbled upon an awful reality show more engaging than staring at the person in front of me.

The goldmine of TV-running was the fateful day I was flipping through the stations, sweat beading on my brow, and suddenly found a show chronicling a woman giving birth. No seriously, there she was lying in a hospital bed pushing the proverbial piano across the room. Thank you, TLC ("A Baby Story").

That was the best work out of my life (except for the couple of times I’ve actually given birth, of course). I forgot all about my running time or pace or even that I was IN A GYM WITH OTHER PEOPLE. I laughed at the terrible jokes her husband was making, I not-so-silently cheered her on, and then when she finally gave birth to the baby, I started crying. On my treadmill. With my earphones in. Sandwiched by other joggers, I'm running in place and crying my eyes out. If you're looking for a killer workout, take my advice and run alongside a birthing woman.

The Complaining Box

My brother and sister-in-law just returned from a trip to China. While browsing through their photos, I came across this one:

Is that not the most brilliant idea? Why don't we have these things in the US? I'm going to install one in our kitchen so whenever the kids start whining I just can direct them to the box. Or hand them a phone and tell them to call China about it.

Spring Break is not for parents

My daughter is on Spring Break this week. It couldn't be a better one in terms of the weather. Like the rest of the country, we're basking in 70 degree sunshine, contentedly awaiting the 80s forecasted to arrive mid-week. We've been to the park, gone out for ice cream, and dug out our sandals and sunscreen. Our mornings are suddenly devoid of alarms and rushing and packing lunch. So why does this feel like an anti-break? I think it's because school is out. Routine is shot. And without routine, I slowly dissolve into a puddle on the floor.

I met a friend at the park yesterday. Since it basically felt like the middle of summer out there, the place was packed with kids. What was intended to be a relaxing morning, letting the kids run off some energy while catching up with another mom, turned into The Great Kid Hunt. Keeping your eye on one was hard enough, but two? Nearly impossible without neon flagging attached to their foreheads. My friend and I were lucky to get 5 minutes of talking in before we each had to run in opposite directions to prevent our 2-year-olds from trying out the fire pole or running into the swings.

I see the point of spring break for kids, but for parents I think it serves more as a warning to get your summer plans in line fast, or else risk 12 back-to-back weeks of spring break repeated.

Not fruitcake

Almost anything is better than fruitcake, but one thing is worse. I discovered exactly what this one thing was many, many years ago during the holiday season. I may have been around 9 years old, which would my brother 6 years old, and we were both totally hopped up on the excitement of Christmas. One day, my mom sent us over to our next-door neighbor's house to deliver a little gift. Now that I'm on the other side of childhood I can't imagine anything better than answering the doorbell and finding two giddy children delivering a wrapped present. Especially because that neighbor was an elderly woman who lived alone.

She immediately invited us inside the foyer where she kept this mind-blowing bowl of candies. At least that's how I remember it. They were those strawberry hard candies that have the chewy insides. You know the kind.

Good god, do I want one of those now. Or maybe even a mouthful of them. But I will push them out of my head and continue to write this story.

So while my brother and I are figuring out how to carry ten pieces of candy in each fist, she disappears into her kitchen and comes back with a bakery box for us to bring home. A holiday gift of her own. We thanked her with our mouths full of strawberry candy and stepped out onto her porch.

What could be inside the box? We carefully brought it home and begged my mom to open it right away. When she cut the strings and opened the box, we found a delicious-looking cake with white frosting inside.

Whatever happened after that has been permanently blurred in my memory.

I think the basic gist is that my mom cut into the cake and as soon as we recognized what we were looking at, we were forever scarred. In fact, if someone even mentions the words "sandwich" and "loaf" together I find myself fighting an urge to stuff my face with those strawberry candies at once. Just to get the memory off my taste buds.

From Wikipedia:

A sandwich loaf is a stacked party entrée that looks like a cake. While rare today, the food was quite popular during the mid 20th century in the United States. To create a sandwich loaf, bread is cut horizontally and spread with layers of filling. Common fillings include egg salad, chicken salad, ham salad, tuna salad, and Cheez Whiz, but other fillings are possible, including peanut butter and jelly and mock egg salad made from tofu. After the layers are assembled the entire loaf is coated with whipped cream cheese, which may be tinted with food coloring.

Bon Appétit!

Threat

All I'm saying is, there's a reason why this is a threat. And it's not so much about the caffeine.

Related.

Cultivating Nordic Appreciation

You know how you can grow up thinking everyone talks the same way that your parents do? Like my dad will usually substitute the word "pry" for "probably". Don't ask me why, it's just his thing. "I think we'll pry be there in, oh, 17 minutes." I thought that's what everyone said for a while. Maybe too long of a while.

So I just realized that I might be doing the same thing to my kids except instead of shortening a word by a few syllables, I'm replacing the names of different types of furniture with IKEA product names. Here are a few examples.

Daughter: Mom, can I have some tape?

Me: Yes, it's in one of the NORDEN drawers.

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Daughter: Where is your chapstick?

Me: On top of the HEMNES next to the stack of laundry.

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Husband: What do you think about switching the EKTORPs?

Me: Or we could just move the white EKTORP over there instead?

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I guess only time will tell whether our kids will start calling side tables, dressers, and sofas by their nordic names. Our kid could very well be at a friend's house someday and proclaim, "This is the most comfortable EKTORP I've ever sat on!". Of course the difference between this situation and my situation with "pry" is that the couch she'll be sitting on actually has a chance of being just that. Nobody I know besides my dad uses the word "pry".

By the way, I only just found out that there's actually a method to the naming madness over at IKEA. Check this out (compliments of Wikipedia):

IKEA products are identified by single word names. Most of the names are Swedish in origin. Although there are some notable exceptions, most product names are based on a special naming system developed by IKEA.

• Upholstered furniture, coffee tables, rattan furniture, bookshelves, media storage, doorknobs: Swedish placenames (for example: Klippan)
• Beds, wardrobes, hall furniture: Norwegian place names
• Dining tables and chairs: Finnish place names
• Bookcase ranges: Occupations
• Bathroom articles: Scandinavian lakes, rivers and bays
• Kitchens: grammatical terms, sometimes also other names
• Chairs, desks: men's names
• Fabrics, curtains: women's names
• Garden furniture: Swedish islands
• Carpets: Danish place names
• Lighting: terms from music, chemistry, meteorology, measures, weights, seasons, months, days, boats, nautical terms
• Bedlinen, bed covers, pillows/cushions: flowers, plants, precious stones
• Children's items: mammals, birds, adjectives
• Curtain accessories: mathematical and geometrical terms
• Kitchen utensils: foreign words, spices, herbs, fish, mushrooms, fruits or berries, functional descriptions
• Boxes, wall decoration, pictures and frames, clocks: colloquial expressions, also Swedish place names

WHO KNEW?!? I love that place.

The future of dog

I frequently find myself running errands in a cluster of stores that also happens to contain PetSmart. Since my youngest is nearing 2, and therefore not the easiest shopping companion, I will often take him into PetSmart between errands as an offering to the toddler gods. It's great, we check out the rows of aquariums, visit the rodent cages, stroll by the birds, and then inevitably end up at their so-called "doggy day camp". This part is his favorite.

He's fascinated with dogs of all varieties and has no problem approaching them on his own. I can see that of my two kids, he's going to be one begging for a dog. And the problem is that neither me nor my husband want a dog. It's not that I don't like dogs, I grew up with one and had a fine experience. But I just can't even begin to comprehend adding the doggie responsibilities to my already-towering list of things to do and people to take care of. Is it not enough that I'm already changing tons of diapers - let's add the pooper scooper to the repertoire! And how much money do they eat up in specially formulated kibbles and health care? I'll admit it would be nice to have the dog under our kitchen table for scrap clean up, but that doesn't even begin to cancel out the shedding or the smell. I guess I'm just not enough of a dog person to accept all those other duties that go along with one. And certainly not while we're overrun by small kids. So, given my strong feelings about the matter, why does something about this whole business seem slightly out of my control? Famous last words.