Reclaiming Democracy

Don't zone out because you think you hate politics. I used to say I hated politics when I didn't know anything about anything as an excuse for not knowing anything. As if somehow hating politics made my ignorance acceptable...but that was in high school.
Some of you may be following as excitedly as I am, but for those of you who aren't, I'll make it real easy for you. I am going to put some quick facts on Barack Obama in bullet form. If you so choose to be informed, read on and refer to the links to follow. As a bonus, it will make you feel respectable in adult circles to at least know SOMETHING about the inception of perhaps the most monumental revolution in not only our modern political world, but the world as we know it.

• Barack Obama is a down to earth, natural, good human being who strives to see the best in everyone. Just read "The Audacity of Hope".
• He grew up in modest conditions in Hawaii--his wife, Michelle, grew up in modest conditions in south side Chicago. They have two daughters, ages 5 and 9.
• He made his political start as a community organizer in south side Chicago. From there he realized that he needed to be involved in politics to make any lasting change.
• His education is extensive and impressive, finally graduating at the top of his class from Harvard Law School.
• He's not about mud-slinging. He's about collaborating for the common good. Our universal wants and needs as human beings on this earth are his top priorities. Healthcare, Education, Safety for our families.
• His ideas spawn from his grassroots experience. Never before have I heard a candidate for the presidency speak the cold truth--he says "we" must change the state of our nation. No promises like "If you vote for me, I'm going to..." In fact, I don't think I even heard him use the word "I" in that context in his announcement on Saturday (see below). He states that if change will happen it will need to come from us, the people.
• For all of this and more relevant information see the following links:

http://www.barackobama.com/ - watch his announcement speech, the little clip by his wife and his Jay Leno spot to get a good feeling for who he is as a person.

http://obama.senate.gov/

http://climatecrisis.org/

http://www.littlehouseonasmallplanet.com/

In all areas from the environment to healthcare to our impoverished neighbors we all need to change a little, give a little, think a little.
Please register to vote and support someone who will help your children and grandchildren live in a better world than we know. Okay, that's all I need to say because I know once you hear more about this guy that you will not need my persuasive rhetoric to want to support him. OBAMA FOR PREZ!

Snakey

So these are the cupcakes I made for Benson's birthday party back in December...I was immediatley struck by the amazingly realistic appearance of these plastic reptiles. Particulary, the one featured below...he has been the sole survivor and I will now explain how and why.

It all started later that evening when Ryan decided to hide the snake under my pillow...I was not amused. So, the next day I decided to hide it in his shoe. And for some months now, we have been continuing on like this. Some have been very successful in conjuring my signature "haaaa" gasp, and some have not. But, I have to admit, this morning's snake incident was pure genius. I put on my sweat pants this morning as I was going to stay home and do some laundry today--I have zipper pockets on these particular pants. As you may know, we don't have laundry in our condo, so I have a key to the laundry room. I went to place my keys in my right pocket as I always do...the zipper was zipped up...strange, because I never do that, but whatever, I throw the keys in my pocket. Standing in front of the laundry room door with my basket in one arm and our laundry bag stuffed full of clothes slung over my shoulder, I reach for my keys...I pull them out and what pops out of my pocket and falls onto the ground? "Haaaaa"--"stupid..." I believe were the exact words out of my mouth.

So, I need your suggestions...ball's in my court and I am fresh out of new ideas. Shoes, done it, bedstand drawer, done it, book, done it, backpack, done it,... I need something evil and original.

There's no time contraint, I will await the perfect moment to strike.

Goopy Eyes

You may have noted that I have not posted anything for 2 weeks now--there is a reason for that. The kids have been sick for the last 2 weeks. Not just sick, but sick with complications, as is usually the case with our asthmatic and allergy ridden stock. I'll admit it, it comes from my side of the family--but, while we may be ill, at least we're dominant.
So anyways, it all started when Benson got a cough on Friday the 12th. Kayla came down with it on Sunday. Then about a week in, when normal children would have started to get better, things took a turn for the worse. Kayla woke up with "goopy eyes", more commonly known as "conjunctivitis" or in layman's terms "pink eye". The only way I could get her to let me clean the green bugars expelling from her tear ducts was to tell her that worms would grow in her eyes if she didn't let me. Since this worked for her eyes, I told her if she didn't also blow her nose that the same consequences applied. Then of course, Benson got the goop too. There is nothing more disgusting or more horrifying to a germ-o-phobe like me than goopy eyes. My hands are now dry and crackley from the 100 washings a day.
As if this weren't bad enough, Benson spent two nights screaming bloody murder and was totally inconsolable. Ear infection. We got him on antibiotics on Friday and he is morphing back into my chubby smiling ball.
Kayla meanwhile is on a new treatment from her homeopathic doctor which includes no foods with artificial colors or preservatives, everything organic, fresh produce only, soy milk when she has a cold, and Pulsatilla (a homeopathic remedy for her goopiness). Of course, the first night she was on this treatment she woke up and puked up a ball of phlegm. The doctor said that was a good sign, it was doing it's job of expelling the phlegm from her system--that it was...
Both kids are on crazy allergy and asthma drugs. I say "crazy" mostly because it makes them "crazy", and in turn makes me "crazy". The goal, with the help of our homeopathic doctor, Meenakshi Bhargava (but we call her Meena), is to wean them off of these poison drugs and let their systems heal themselves naturally. It all makes perfect sense really--it does make me a little bit sick when I think about all the crap we consume daily without a thought. We've all heard Dr. Oz say it--"if you can't pronounce it, you shouldn't eat it". However, Ryan is wincing at the cost of the new lifestyle as "Meena" is not covered by insurance and we now shop at Whole Foods.
Today is Sunday--it's been 2 weeks and 2 days since I have had any more than 2 hours of uninterrupted sleep. I didn't know that it was possible for a human to function with this little sleep...

Glorious Water

Oh how we take delicous, cleansing and almighty water for granted... Our water was shut off for 32 hours this week--26 of them were consecutive. Yes, I said it: CONSECUTIVE. Makes it hard to wash your hands, do dishes, flush the toilet, and of course showering, forget about it. As you know, we live in a condo, so we were definitely not alone in our duress. Over 150 of us folks here in the Tradewinds were without such luxuries. Emotions were running high. Luckily, the water main that had the leak was located just a stone's throw from our balcony so that we were able to monitor the gaping man-size boobee trap hole in the lawn and the progress of the morons trying to fix it. Naturally, Ryan was down there watching, as if plumbing were a spectator sport. He would try and act heroic as he threw on his beanie and said, "I'm gonna go see what these monkeys are doing!" when really we all knew that he was thoroughly enjoying himself down there with the dirt, tools and Bobcat Excavator. Sometimes it took him up to an hour to "see what those monkeys were doing". As he left me in the home with the two children, rotting dishes in the sink and a toilet full of stinkie pee.

The water was shut off without warning on Wednesday...all day. It returned by 5, but the problem had only been diagnosed. They sent out a bulletin that it would be shut off on Thursday from 9 to 5. Translation: they were supposed to get the water working by 5 on Thursday...well, 6, 7, 8,...all went by without a drop from the tap. Finally around midnight we looked out our window and what to our wondering eyes did appear?

Something that looked a lot like this. The monkeys obviously weren't doing much of anything down there. I went to bed dirty and constipated. It wasn't until noon on Friday that I was finally able to wash my hands. That is, AFTER we spent the afternoon purging the taps of the brownness that was plaguing our pipes and then scrubbing the tub, toilet and sinks to a respectable shine.
Meanwhile, we had Kayla's dental procedure on Friday morning, on which I will blog at a later date when I can find the exact words to describe the ordeal. For now, I am going to do some dishes and enjoy my tap water (that is PS still spewing microscopic bits of sediment, shard if you will. Last week I might have minded washing my hair in water with bits of dirt in it...today I just remind myself not to open my mouth).

Job Satisfaction

It's the little jewels of motherhood, like this grazing rhinocerous, that remind me what a priceless sense of humor my "co-workers" have. I found this little guy on my kitchen table about an hour after I had put Kayla to bed the other night. When or why she had placed him just so, I know not--I suppose she thought if she wasn't going to finish her carrots that someone should, or perhaps she just thought that he needed to eat in solitude...maybe just a short attention span--what I wouldn't give to witness the thought process of a 3-year old... At any rate, I had a good laugh and was brought out of my "Ryan's going back to work tomorrow and I'm alone again with the savages" slump.

And the children were nestled all snug in their...carseats

This would be us on Christmas Eve. Yes, the evening of Eve...driving home from Santa Barbara. We should've been cozy in our jammies, sitting by the fireplace, sipping homemade egg nog. However, an unfortunate turn of events dashed all of our holiday hopes and dreams...

We were supposed to spend two fun filled weeks in beautiful, sunny Santa Barbara, but shortly after arriving Benson appeared to be having some sort of allergy--was it something he ate? was there an unusually high pollen count? No, as it turns out, Benson is pretty severely allergic to pets--it just so happens that Ryan's parents have 2 cats and a dog. We didn't figure it out until it had been about 24 hours and Benson had a bright red rash covering his face, bloodshot and slightly puffy eyes, a runny nose, and a cough! So, we tried to remedy the situation by first giving Benson a hefty dose of Benadryl and removing him from the house for the day, and then cleaning the house and keeping the pets contained...just hours after returning to Ryan's parents' house he broke out all over again. So, we had no choice--I called my friend Sarah and asked if we could stay at her parents' house for the night (Sarah calls it "the compound", we assumed they would have room for us). Benson cleared up again. We decided that we couldn't go back to my in-laws house obviously, so we got a hotel room.

Saturday before Christmas we checked into the stately Sandpiper Inn--no, really it wasn't stately...it was a handicapped room, therefore there was no division between the shower and the rest of the bathroom, the sheets were like sandpaper, and the cable didn't even work. Oh, and it smelled like pee. Kayla nicknamed it the "Happiness Hotel" (for those of you who haven't seen the Great Muppet Caper, that's what they call the local dirty hostile). We stayed one night and decided to call it quits as Benson broke out into hives even in the presence of Ryan's parents and little brother as their clothes were covered in pet dander, and Kayla would cry everytime we had to return and say "But I don't like this house". So alas, Christmas Eve morning we took Benson to the Urgent Care clinic to get his bark-like cough checked out, we opened all of our presents in the Happiness Hotel, packed up the Westy and headed home.

Next morning, back in San Jose, Ryan went surfing...Christmas morning, not another soul in the water...apparently it was "epic" and he said he got "tubed". The kids and I stayed home, did laundry, just another day in paradise as they say. Now Benson has developed croup as a result of the allergic reaction--poor guy can't get a break. Merry Christmas Young family!

Japanese Fun

One thing you should know about me: I LOVE Japanese humor. It is just pure entertainment--so freakishly delightful. One of my favorite pasttimes is to look up funny Japanese things...here is one of my favorites straight off of kawaiigifts.com (you should check it out)...

"Relax Bear loves pancakes, cookies and tissues. He makes a mess sometimes, and he's not very good at cleaning up after himself. And sometimes his little feathered friend nags him and gives him a hard time, like biting his tail. He's not selfish, he's just not very good at sharing his cookies. Relax Bear like to wear bear suits with a zipper on the back, and he has many of them. Altho he still is a bear underneath the bear suit, sometimes you see his blue polka dot garment when the zipper is down. Relax Bear also owns a graber for times when he doesn't feel like getting up. But he's not lazy, he is just Relax Bear.
Relax bear now has a Little Bear buddy! The Little Bear is kinda mischevious, likes music, dancing, pancakes (of course!) and drawing. Sometimes, the Little Bear draws on Relax Bear's face (and his butt too) when Relax Bear is taking a nap."

Now tell me you're not smiling! So, whenever you're down, just do me a little favor, think about our lazy friend, Relax Bear, and you are sure to forget all your troubles...