11:07 a.m. - January 18, 2006
Through The Haze Of A Cold Pill, Come These Random Thoughts
I was trying to get out of my daze of whine and neurosis, so I just started thinking of some random stuff.
Friday night, Liz and I had an adult dinner. Yes, a dinner without the kids. Liz got some steaks; we had salad and baked potato and wine. The dinner was timed to occur after Katie went to sleep, and we put Kristin to bed soon after (we�re in the stage of putting her down and letting her self-soothe herself to sleep, which breaks your heart for 10 minutes but you have to be Nurse Ratched with a heart of steel and just let her whimper � it�s good for her, really).
It felt good to sit down and have an adult conversation without the children around. So what did we talk about?
The kids.
Of course.
(Sure, we talked about other things, but you know that�s just the way it works, you try not to talk about the kids, but it always come right around to them, again).
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
With Kristin now going to be on a semi-regular schedule (whether she likes it or not), I actually got to watch the entire Indiana � Illinois college basketball game last night, and that brightened my spirits a bit.
You sacrifice a lot for your kids. We�re not going to be taking many vacations like we used to for a while, of course. Before, we went to Maine, we went on a cruise, I drove to Alaska, and we also took trips to Boston, Chicago and Pittsburgh with friends. Last year, we got to go to Colorado thanks to some judicious trip planning. But with a little one, again, and the money it takes to raise two kids on one income, we�re going to be staying put for a while.
However much you sacrifice, it�s all worth it in the end, with the smiles, hugs and laughs. But it�s a relief when you get to do something you used to take for granted.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Dear God,
Some of us are getting over colds.
Could you kindly stop with the random weather generator?
It�s snowing today.
Tomorrow it will be 50 degrees.
Thanks,
Smed
++++++++++++++++++++++++
I dug out my old �Bloom County� books, and I marveled on how witty, funny, snarky and entertaining those old comic strips were.
For those of you who are youngsters, �Bloom County� was a comic strip that first featured Opus the Penguin, plus a wacky list of other characters, like Steve Dallas and Bill the Cat. It mainly focused on politics and the current events of the day but was always an entertaining and fun read.
The author, Berke Breathed, shut the strip down at the end of the 80�s to do a Sunday only feature, �Outland� which was OK and now �Opus� has his own strip on Sundays. The magic, though, was in the daily strips.
Much like �Calvin and Hobbes�, �Bloom County� was definitely a refreshing comic strip to read, because it made you think and there was always a laugh. With �Doonesbury� limping along, and the �Boondocks� being halfway funny, but at times being too heavy-handed, comics are in a fallow period, I�m afraid.
Oop! Ack!
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
And on that note, I bid you adieu, gentle reader. My brain is slowly turning to mush thanks to the cold pills. Do cold pills have a secret ingredient of Algernon?
