Burn Ban Shmurn Ban

No, actually, I was aware of the burn ban, but wasn't thinking about grilling being considered burning. I thought it was no burning of dead leaves and no burning off your fields before you plow them under like a lot of farmers do around here. But, with my perfected art of eavesdropping, I overheard someone at church talking about not being able to grill because of the burn ban. Oops, my bad! Ya'll will be glad to know that our house is still standing, the ground around our house and our grill remains unburned. The only thing burnt around here apparently was Mike's two burgers.

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I had a nice night away from home. We ate at Taco Cabana Friday night, which was just as I was hoping for. I love that place. The workshop was really good. Back when spanking started being the "wrong" way to discipline children and time out was being incorporated in schools and child care centers, I thought it was a bunch of hooey. I won't apologize, time out does not teach children a thing! The only thing I think it does provide is a time for parents or care givers to calm down themselves without the child right there in their face. But, now, "experts" are saying that time out is not the answer. Now, it's "inclusion". Ho, boy, just spank the kid already, is what I want to say. I wonder if in another 20 years, spanking might come back around in style. People who claim that spanking is only teaching a child violence, has never seen spanking done properly, or seen it's results on a grown adult.

But, enough with that, I did hear a wonderful statement. "Punishment is the consequences of never being disciplined" I learned a few things, got encouraged in a few areas where I felt like I've been doing well and had an overall good time. And I got 6 hours!

I also bought a book that I thought might help my family with my nephew. I told my sister in law that I wanted to read it first, then she could have it. It was about how to deal with children who have behavior problems due to ADD/ADHD, Bipolar, Autism, and several other areas. My brother and his wife are having a hard time dealing with her son and have really tried all they know how to do. He starts at the Day Care tomorrow after being expelled from his pre school. My friend, Val, is going to be his teacher and I asked her if she thought she could handle him. I told her any time she needed help not to hesitate to come get me. I think he will be much better at a smaller institution where he will get lots of individual attention. He is one smart cookie, he knows how to manipulate unlike any other 4 year old child I have ever seen. So, we'll see how that turns out. I must admit I'm somewhat nervous. I want him so much to succeed. I feel like the pre school should not have given up on him, yet I can see their side of the story with being at a loss of what else they could do for him. I just hate that he didn't make the final nine weeks. He made it 3/4 of the way through and they kick him out. What a waste. But, we'll take good care of him. I feel like what he needs now is some TLC and lots of one on one attention. I know that won't solve all his problems, heavens, no! I only wish that's all it took, but how could it hurt any? We'll see.

While I'm on the subject of the day care. This child, whom I'll call David (not his real name, is that better hillbilly Mom? I don't want Fitty coming after me, either!) started having this odor coming from him about 3 weeks ago, maybe longer than that, I'm not sure. But the week before last it was so bad I could hardly take it. We kept the windows open when it wasn't very warm outside. The poor baby had lots of bloody noses. He's almost 3. I knew back then, and I told his teacher to tell his grandma that he had something up his nose, like a bean or something. Maybe a piece of macaroni from the sensory table? I didn't know, but I knew something foreign was up there. The Friday before last, I took off early and went on that motorcycle ride with Mike and I was telling him about it. I told him that the smell was even worse and now it smelled like a dead dog in the middle of July by about 10 feet away from him and to get closer was just asking to throw up. Then Monday came along and the poor kid STILL hadn't been taken to the doctor. Every day last week he had a bloody nose. Every Day. And it wasn't just blood, but puss. *wretch* Increase that 10 feet to 20 feet and to be near him, well, I don't even want to think about it. The other kids had been complaining for 3 weeks saying that he smelled bad and no one would play with him or want to sit by him during lunch or snack. Who could blame them? I didn't want to be near him. Going outside only made it worse because when he'd come back in his nose would be running and the smell. Oh, God, the smell. Like a hundred dead opossums on the side of the road. Finally, Friday, he wasn't at school (what we affectionately call day care) and around noon his grandma called us and let us know that she had taken him to the doctor that day. My stars and garters, it's about time. Anyway, the doctor pulled out a chunk of sponge that David had stuffed up his nose no telling how long ago. It was embedded up there and had created a severe sinus infection. A red sponge. Oh, gag. At least we knew it hadn't come from the day care. We don't have any sponges there except some yellow ones with green scratch pads on the backs of them in the kitchen where children aren't allowed to go.

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I caught a glance of myself in a big mirror in my motel room the other night. I forgot to mention that I was naked and getting ready to get into the shower. I glanced over, started to get in the shower and then my head snapped back. OMG, is that me? I don't have any mirrors in my house that go below boob level. Familiar with Humpty Dumpty, anyone? My goodness, 'nuff said.

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Bra shopping. It should not be such an ordeal, or should it? There's this store in Tulsa called The Bust Shop. I've wanted to go in there for years and yesterday I finally got the chance. They professionally fit you for a bra then bring in some for you to try on to see if you like. I went in thinking I was not going to be like my Mother and refuse to admit that my size was that big. I got in the dressing room with my blouse off and my bra on, waiting for the woman to come in to measure me. She walks in and measures under my boobs and says "Ah, it looks like a 44", which I was happy to hear, well, as happy as I can be about being a size 44, because that's the size I was currently wearing. I'd gotten something right. Then she puts that measuring tape around my boobs and says "Okay, let's see....A, B, C, D, DD, E, EE, F. You need a 44 F." I nearly fell over! I'd walked in wearing a 44C. She goes off to measure some other poor unsuspecting woman while another gal goes searching for an underwire in a 44F. A few minutes later she brings one back to me (ugly as home made sin, I might add, when I told her I wanted "pretty" bras because I was sick of old lady ugly serviceable looking bras) and it's HUGE! I looked at it for a few seconds in utter unbelief that my boobs were really that big. I held it in front of my face, I'm sure my eyes were big as saucers, even put it on top of my head because I just knew it was the same size as my favorite green hat I brought back from Honduras. Sure enough, there was enough fabric there to make a nice rain bonnet, none of my hair would get wet wearing that thing out in a down pour. Then I put it on. Oy! I did not like it. It was so high I was sure if I put my blouse back on it would have shown. The woman came back in and asked me what I thought. I told her I didn't like it and it was the most uncomfortable contraption I'd ever had on my body. Well, maybe not the most uncomfortable, but I won't go there. She tugged and pulled and made it basically feel like I had on a corset, then, to my great relief, said "I think the cup size is too big, let's try a DD" I could hear the heavenly host singing it's praises right then and there. She sent the bra fetcher on a quest for a DD and when she brought it back I tried it on, too. I didn't like it either. Then she suggested trying a soft cup, forego the underwire. Hmmm. Something I haven't tried in ions. Bra fetcher came back with 5 soft cup bras, size 44DD. I briefly thought of the cough medicine Formula 44D. Formula 44DD must be strong enough to make the person sitting next to the cougher quit coughing. Anyway, I tried on those soft cups. Not going to happen. They had these weird looking things attached down below the cup that I could think of no other name for other than sweat soppers. Gross. Finally, after waiting and waiting and waiting for the lady to come back, I had an epiphany. Why the heck was I waiting for her? I wasn't going to buy any of these bras, I didn't like them, why was I waiting to show her how much I didn't like them? So, I took off the offending bra, put my own worn out 44C, and got dressed. Oh, putting on my own bra felt like coming home and finding my best friend still there and unchanged. Maybe she wasn't as supportive as my new friends could be, but she would never make me feel uncomfortable, unless I'd used her too much in one day. She, after all, is not an 18 hour friend. I walked out of that dressing room and stopped to tell the woman "I'm sorry, but I've run out of time and patience, but thank you very much for yours" and walked out. I couldn't wait to be outside and breath fresh air.

We went straight to Woodland Hills mall and eventually, after being detained for 30 minutes by a movie preview survey type thing, found ourselves in our destination...Lane Bryant. That's right, I'm a big mamma, I'll admit it. I'm a little big mamma because I'm only 5 feet tall. Both Valerie and I tried on lots of clothes. Mostly jeans and bras. We were there a couple hours. I finally decided on a nice soft bra, underwire of course, in a very pretty blue. Guess what size I ended up getting? I tried on 6 bras there and five of which were 44DD. I finally decided that I needed to downsize even more because they were all way too big in the cup. I left there with a size 44D. Only one cup size bigger than what I was originally wearing. Hmm..imagine that. I also got me a nice pair of jeans that don't look like a whole family moved out the seat of them. I found me some fat lady petites...lol.

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Man, we just got back from picking up Shael. When we got over there I saw 5 baby goldfish in a half gallon juice bottle. I asked her if she got some new fishies and she said that they were Shael's. Given to her by a friend whose goldfish kept having babies and Shael told her we had a tank to take them. Let me tell you what kind of tank we have. A small 1/2 gallon tank with just a piece of tubing bringing air down to the water. It only supports one fish at a time and Shael thinks we can bring home 5 more? I felt bad, but we had to drive all the way to Fairland to take the fish back to their home. Mike was not happy, he suggested we set them "free" in the river on our way home, but Shael didn't want to and frankly, I didn't want to do that in front of her. She wanted those fish. But, the fish made it back to their home and the woman apologized all over herself for giving Shael fish without asking us first if it was okay. Wasn't her fault, Shael told her we had a tank. Any time we get more than one fish, they all die or all but one dies. It's just big enough to support one little gold fishy.

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Back to the old grind tomorrow. I should go to bed. It's past 9:30, goodness, what am I still doing up?