Road Trip

I've been travelling to Portland a lot recently. The trip from Coquille to Portland takes approximately four and a half hours, unless you follow the speed limit exactly, which I do as far as everyone reading this is concerned. There's nothing like travelling in a car for extended periods of time with your children to really make you think about why you have children. In addition, we live in an age where children seem to need continuous electronic stimulation, which would be fine if said stimulation could include shock collars, which, according to my lawyer, it can not. Instead, children need continuous electronic video stimulation, in the form of handheld video games, DVD movies and episodes of inane cartoons that are not nearly as good as the cartoons we used to watch. Kids, of course, supplement the electronics with various irritation-stimulating activities, such as staring at each other for the express purpose of annoyance, attempting to NOT touch each other (as in, "MOM! SHE'S NOT TOUCHING MEEEEE!" while the offending child is, in fact, so close that scientific instruments would be necessary to measure the distance between finger and face) and playing the ever-popular "copy your sister" game.


During my last car trip, which was the second consecutive trip I had to take WITHOUT my husband, who was off in places like Rhode Island and Portland "working," and for which I will forgive him eventually, I started thinking about how we used to travel when I was a child. We did a lot of car travelling when I was a kid. You see, I grew up in Alaska. Alaska is a large state where places of interest are often separated by vast sectors of tundra, which is an extremely boring form of scenery, and your typical car trip to go camping could take upwards of 6 hours if the car didn't break down or you weren't slowed by a herd of moose obstructing the highway.


For example, my family, in an attempt to experience the miracle of nature, would routinely travel to a location called the Tangle Lakes. According to the modern miracle that is MapQuest, this trip should take about five and a half hours. In practice, however, it takes much, MUCH longer. First of all, we were travelling in an International Scout with a travel trailer attached to it which weighed significantly more than your modern travel trailer, which meant that we weren't exactly speeding down the highway. Also, our progress was impeded by potholes the size of water buffaloes. Finally, my mother would helpfully read the Milepost guide, which is a travel guide which only true Alaskans know how to read because it is written in code presumably so that non-Alaskans can't stumble upon oil fields or something. She would tell my father where various points of interest were along the way ("Look honey! A tundra museum at milepost 265!"). This would prompt my brother and I to whine about stopping at these points of interest because we needed to stretch our legs, go to the bathroom, eat and explore opportunities to irritate each other outside of the car, so that what should have taken five and a half hours ended up taking about nine hours.

Granted, we were measuring our trip in Kid Time, which is an extremely boring form of time. Back in the late 70's and early 80's, we didn't have portable dvd players, hand held video games and iPods. Most of our electronic devices weighed almost as much as Orson Welles and were not at all portable. The only portable device we had was a transistor radio, which was unhelpful inasmuch as it only had one earphone and it stopped receiving signals just outside of Anchorage. Therefore, my brother and I were forced to look out the windows, read books and listen to extremely non-cool music such as Anne Murray and Helen Reddy which my father taped from his extensive collection of sleep-inducing albums which we were never allowed to touch, presumably because he knew we would scratch them on purpose if given the opportunity.

After approximately 10 minutes of actual time (equalling seven and a half hours of Kid Time) we grew tired of reading and looking out windows, and instead resorted to pestering each other for the remaining trip, pausing only to pester our parents for food and water, which they were probably withholding in an attempt to weaken us in the hopes that we would become unable to move or speak.

It's good to know that almost nothing has changed in the last 30 years. Now, instead of being forced to look out the windows, read books and listen to Anne Murray, I force my children to look out the windows, read books and listen to 80's music. The view from our van windows on I-5 is no more exciting than the view I had in the International Scout; it's just less moose-intensive. And while I do allow the younger kids to play educational games on their Leapsters and Maggie to play extraordinarily non-educational games on her Nintendo DS, I've stopped bringing the DVD players because the bulk of our four hour drive to Portland would be spent arguing about who got to pick the movie. Also, I grew alarmed when my kids started measuring time in the number of SpongeBobs it took to get to where we were going:

Kids: MOM! Are we there yet?
Me: We're on the freeway. We're surrounded by fields. Does it look like we're there?
Kids: How many more SpongeBobs til' we're there?
Me: 15.
Kids: (after one SpongeBob) MOM! Are we there now?

So now, rather than allowing my children to watch videos, I instead spend the entire trip ranting about how I used to have to spend all my available vacation time listening to worse music than I am forcing on them and that they are lucky that they can play video games because all I ever got to do was look out the window and if they don't stop not touching each other I might have to pull the car over and give their video games away to the first person I see on the street. When my husband is in the car, I have backup; backup capable of launching himself from the front seat of the van all the way to the back seat in two seconds flat without touching the middle seat at all, and inserting himself between Luke and Maggie who at this point are too stunned to continue whining or almost not touching each other. When I'm on my own, however, all I can do is issue empty threats from afar. I realize that I'm making this much harder on myself than I need to, but I'm going to fall back on the time-honored tradition of forcing my children to be miserable because it builds character.

So, in about two weeks I will once again be making a trip to Portland, and once again my husband will be "working," this time in San Diego, for which I plan to forgive him eventually. I'm starting to think he's planning these trips on purpose. And my children, despite my many attempts to explain how good they have it, will begin asking if we are there yet 30 seconds after getting in the car.

I can't wait.

This won't hurt a bit

If the U.S. Government is looking for new methods of extracting information from terrorists now that Nancy Pelosi has expressed her concerns over waterboarding, they should consider threatening the suspects with being sent to their class reunions.

I'm fairly certain we could obtain all sorts of valuable intelligence, based on my reaction to the thought of my own class reunion. Let me first say that I am voluntarily subjecting myself to this event, and I would be happy to gather data for the government in exchange for being allowed to deduct all trip-related expenses from my tax return this year. I will be sure to collect all necessary receipts and submit them along with whatever form the IRS requires in such a situation. I should probably call Tim Geithner for some guidance on the subject.

I remember high school as being the most traumatic experience of my life. I did not enjoy high school, which makes me wonder why I want to go to my reunion at all. Why am I willing to fork over large amounts of money for a trip which instills fears in my gut so disabling that I haven't even been able to pack because I am afraid that all of my nice clothes will magically transform themselves into horrible 80's fashion and when I get to the reunion all I'll have to wear is a pair of high-waisted acid wash jeans and a "Frankie Say Relax" t-shirt? Or, worse yet, parachute pants?

I think we all have fears about seeing people we have not seen in 20 years. What will they think of me? Will they even remember me? I'm glad that I may not be recognizable, since my hair is no longer permed and large to the point where my coiff took up enough space to be subjected to property taxes. I'm also not sporting five pounds of aluminum on my teeth. But there is a significant part of my brain devoted specifically to convincing myself that I am the same gangly, awkward teenager who never really seemed to fit in. Try as I might, I cannot convince myself that I am a woman who has successfully completed college, law school and a bar exam, that I have a wonderful husband and three beautiful children, and a brown belt in tae kwon do, which has alleviated most of those pesky coordination problems.

Oh, I tried to fit in. I remember going out for cheerleading once. Somehow I had convinced myself that, despite all evidence to the contrary, I was coordinated enough to perform choreographed dance moves and yell at the same time. I was clearly misinformed. My parents, when I was younger, enrolled me in dance classes in the hopes that I would learn to walk without tripping on curbs, sidewalks, lint, etc. They were told by my instructor, in no uncertain terms, that their money would be better spent elsewhere. So, I went to the tryouts, lurched around the gym floor and tried my best to look like a person who was not suffering from some sort of nerve disorder. As you may have guessed, I was not invited to be a part of the team. After the cheerleading tryout debacle, I avoided sports altogether. After I regained some semblance of self esteem, I settled on choir, which was better suited for me inasmuch as I was never required to move and sing at the same time. It had the added benefit of occupying at least two class periods a day, sometimes three, so that I could limit my exposure to other more dangerous activities, such as walking in the hallways.

In order to calm my nerves prior to the reunion, I am trying to reassure myself that no one will remember me anyway. I certainly don't remember many people. What was the name of that guy I had a huge crush on, to the point where I thought I could not go on living if he didn't smile at me in the hallway? I have no clue. I'm fairly certain it started with a P, but beyond that, I'm drawing a blank. What was the name of the girl I was good friends with for two years, and then suddenly was in a note-conducted war with for some reason which I cannot exactly remember, but which consumed me for the better part of the last two years of high school? No clue. The amazing thing is that these long-forgotten people took up vast sectors of my available brain matter at the time, to the point of excluding important information such as how to do algebra. Now I have an easier time remembering the lyrics to an obscure Duran Duran song I haven't heard in 20 years.

I am fortunate that I DO remember a certain group of girls from high school, girls who I did spend lots of time with and I am very excited to see. It's been a long time, and I know that we will have lots to catch up on. That is what I'm looking forward to. Those girls were the ones who made coming to school bearable, even on those days that I didn't think I could put on my electric blue mascara and drag myself to school. Those were the friends who shared the same likes and dislikes as I did, who loved to get together once a month and have a movie night at each other's houses, and who sat together at prom. If it wasn't for them, I wouldn't have made it through.

I'm sure I'm stressing out over nothing. I'm very sure I'm going to come home after my reunion and will nothing but wonderful memories to share with my friends. Now if I could just convince my brain of that fact, I'll be golden. And, I had better get packing.

Ol' McMuenchrath Has a Cow...

I don't think I'm cut out for this.

When my husband and I got married, we discussed everything a responsible couple should discuss about the future. We talked about our careers, we talked about whether we wanted a family and how big a family it would be, and we talked about where we wanted to live eventually. One subject that never came up, however, was livestock. We never had any sort of discussion about whether we would or would not own cows, chickens or goats. I realize now that every couple should have this discussion, unless they live in a high rise apartment in a large city, where owning livestock would be logistically impossible, not to mention highly stinky. Women and men should be required to sign some sort of livestock release form prior to getting their wedding license, or else they could find themselves in the situation I find myself in now, which is owning several animals I am woefully unequipped to take care of.

You see, I grew up in a family which was rather anti-pet. I petitioned unsuccessfully for years for a dog or a cat. Eventually, after much sniveling and whining, I was granted permission to get a gerbil, I presume to shut me up. I named my gerbil Sammy, and Sammy lived a happy but uneventful life scampering playfully around his cage, running on his little wheel and periodically escaping and causing my mother to leap to high places and shriek when he would unexpectedly scamper playfully through the family room.

My pet experience ended rather abruptly when I took his cage out to the garage to clean it, became distracted by something shiny (as most 10-year-olds do) and accidentally left it in the unheated garage overnight. In Alaska. Needless to say, Sammy made his way to the giant rodent-wheel in the sky, and when the ground thawed later that spring, I held a memorial service in the backyard.

Once I escaped from under the anti-pet thumb of my parents, I adopted a dog in college. I loved that dog. Rosie was my girl. We did everything together. I was so upset when I found out that my apartment in law school wouldn't allow pets, and I didn't know what to do, other than beg my parents to take my dog. It was a long shot, I knew. But, in a decision that still stuns me to this day, my parents decided to adopt Rosie. They then proceeded to turn into the most deranged people I have ever met. These people, the people who told my brother and I that they didn't want pets, that they HATED even the idea of having pets, began treating this dog like a spoiled grandchild. If they were going to get a hamburger, the dog needed a hamburger too. If they went to get ice cream, they had to get an ice cream cone for the dog too. I knew they had really gone off the deep end when they would make special trips out for hamburgers and ice cream for the dog and THEY DIDN'T GET ANYTHING FOR THEMSELVES.

So, my animal ownership experiences are limited at best, which is why it is extremely stunning that I now find myself in an ownership position of a menagerie of animals, and a backyard that looks like the Clampett's house before they struck oil and moved to Beverly Hills. At my husband's behest, we began collecting various livestock and chickens when we moved to the country. He never has any idea how to take care of the animals when we get them. We are always woefully unprepared to take care of them. He simply acquires first and asks questions later. This is why we wound up with two cows but no barn, water supply or any way to transport food to them. Standard operating procedure in our house, after getting a batch of animals, is for my husband to run around in a panic trying to come up with housing, food and a containment system for them. He then gleefully hops on a plane and leaves for a couple of weeks, thereby leaving me in charge of our ever-growing brood. It's quite the system.

This is how I wound up in charge of two cows that have demonstrated an amazing ability to pass, ghost-like, through fencing and disappear for a week and a half. They wandered all around our neighborhood, committing minor acts of bovine vandalism. I actually found myself having to call the sheriff's office and report a "Cow at Large." That was a phone call I never, in my wildest dreams, ever thought I would make.

I grew up in the city. I do not "wrangle" animals. Therefore, I was shocked to find myself and two of my very good and very, very forgiving friends roaming in a pasture, mooing and shaking a can of grain in a vain attempt to lure my escapee cows into a trailer. The cows, being much smarter than I give them credit for, realized that I was offering them grain under false pretenses and refused to cooperate. They just stood there, chewing their cud and silently mocking us.

All of this happened while my husband was in Hawaii. He had been gone no more than 24 hours. I'm adding this information to the file I'm keeping for when I have to enter therapy. Granted, he had a legitimate reason for being in Hawaii, and it was non-surfing related. That didn't make me feel any better, however.

The happy ending to this story is that I did indeed get my cows back, and after establishing how they got out (apparently cows can actually go UNDER fences, especially if the fence builder didn't actually attach the fencing to anything in his rush to hop a plane to tropical locales) I was able to mend the fence, re-contain the cows and restrain myself from filling my freezer with assorted steaks and 300 pounds of hamburger. My husband is now back on cow patrol, at least until he decides to fly off to Aruba or somewhere else where he doesn't have to worry about cow retrieval.

And I'm currently looking for a nice house in the city, where cow ownership is frowned upon.

On Death and Taxes

It's good to hear that the President has a plan to reduce the deficit. Since he has almost single-handedly tripled it in a matter of three months, I'm glad to know that he has a secret plan to reduce it by half sometime in the next century or so. It'll still be larger than when he got his hands on it, but anyone who points that out will soon be getting mysterious calls featuring menacing heavy breathing courtesy of Barney Frank.

I, for one, would like to propose my own solution to the deficit problem. I'm at least as qualified as any current member of the government, based on the fact that I once forgot to declare $150 in babysitting income on my federal tax return when I was 14. Let me take this opportunity to sincerely apologize, and point out that I'm only human, by which I mean I'm just like anyone else who would like to be able to cheat on my taxes and get away with it in the form of being nominated for a cabinet position. Plus, I have demonstrated my superiority in that I have never been involved in an ethics scandal. (The United States Senate: Scandal Free since 5:38 am today!)

I have a three-pronged proposal. Prong one is based on reducing federal spending. I realize this is a drastic move, one which should not be tried unless we can't think of any other way to reduce the amount of money we owe to China. For example, instead of increasing spending on programs such as the Commission to Name "National" things such as the National Insect, National Root Vegetable, and National Embarrassment (Joe Biden) by 50% over last year's bare-bones spending on such activities, they should only raise it by 25%. Actually, none of us should stand around idly while the government slashes spending in this way! We should demand they slash it more! They should slash it down to a mere 10% increase! Of course that would mean we would only have enough funding to complete the naming of our National Embarrassment, but if that's the price we have to pay to get our deficit under control, then it's "time to be patriotic ... time to jump in, time to be part of the deal, time to help get America out of the rut."

Now I know that many non-patriotic namby-pamby members of Congress would argue that cutting spending is too drastic in times such as these, when the only thing currently keeping our economy afloat is lunch meeting expenditures made by government employees at Hooters. Come to think of it, it's probably racist, too, but it will take time and a special Blue Ribbon Commission to determine whether cutting spending is racist, or at least instigated by Rush Limbaugh, which is just as bad.

Which leads me to prong two of my plan to reduce the deficit: Selling government owned SUVs.

You see, while we normal Americans are increasingly encouraged to give up our gas-guzzling modes of transport in favor of cramming a family of five into a SMART car , I see many government SUVs cruising around our freeways (Note: I know SMART Cars only have two seats. In times like these we are all forced to make sacrifices. You can purchase a SMART car modification pack from the US Department of Transportation containing all the parts you need to successfully strap your spare children to the roof).

Most of the time, these government SUVs are being used to move one person around from useless meeting to useless meeting. Valet charges alone eat up almost half our national expense account funds. We all know that nothing good comes from these meetings, especially when you consider that any gathering of government officials usually results in increased regulations, higher taxes, and proposals to name sewage treatment plants after sitting US Presidents. The US government should take its cue from successful businesses (wait...I'm sure one will come to me eventually) and use one of those online meeting services like Tom Cruise did in that movie Tropic Thunder.

Therefore, I propose we sell all government SUVs to the Chinese, since they are currently the only nation on earth purchasing cars at the moment (except perhaps India). Unfortunately this would also give the United States government a sudden influx of cash, which we should immediately impound until they can prove they won't spend it immediately on non-deficit reducing items like a professional make-up artist for the first lady and a new neck-mounted teleprompter for the President for those tough situations where he needs to walk and speak extemporaneously at the same time. I realize that this will also mean the President may have to modify his motorcade somewhat, but being that his administration is looking more and more like a circus every day, it won't seem too strange to see the President and his cabinet officials emerging, clown-car like, from a fleet of 1992 Geo Metros.

We also need to take away Nancy Pelosi's ability to travel via airplane. That really won't have an effect on the deficit, but it would certainly make me feel better.

Prong three of my plan involves exporting Al Gore to someplace like Siberia, where he can sit in his warm, dung-heated hut and weave sustainable clothing from sedge grass while writing his manifesto. By doing this, we will reduce the yearly energy usage of the city of Nashville, TN (mainly the sector occupied by Al Gore's compound) by 99%. Energy costs all over the nation will drop, due to the unexpected fall in demand. The benefits of lower energy costs will "trickle down", allowing more people to be able to afford to do things like open businesses, manufacture products and employ people. With steady increases in our gross domestic product, and the resulting boost in our economy, we may be able to pay down the deficit even more!

On second thought, maybe I only need a one-prong approach.

I have to go now. My phone is ringing. I think it's Barney Frank.

Merry January!

I'll admit it. I'm a slacker. Ms. Manners would be mortified.



I haven't sent out Christmas cards in about 10 years.


The last time I sent out Christmas cards roughly coincides with the birth of my first child. I sent them out that year, complete with lovely personal hand-written notes to all of our friends and relatives. Then, Wham-O...Maggie was born. Every Christmas since she arrived, I have dutifully gone out and purchased Christmas cards, special stamps and various labels, printed paper, rubber stamps and other accouterments designed to send holiday greetings which would make Martha Stewart weep into her organic cranberry martini due to feelings of inadequacy. Unfortunately, I have never actually produced any Christmas cards.


Well, I did get some made about four years ago, but due to the birth of my third child, I forgot to send them, and when I realized that I had missed Christmas by several days, I was too mortified to send them out for fear of being outed as the shameless procrastinator I am.


This year, I decided to send out Christmas greetings, deadlines be damned. I laughed recklessly as I tucked my cards and other items aside and waited for the day when all of the holiday hullabaloo was over. And, about five days after 2009 blew in, I sat down and wrote

a letter to everyone who kept sending cards to us, even though we clearly didn't deserve them.

Then, one evening about seven days after 2009 arrived, I sat down at my computer and began addressing envelopes, folding letters and writing on the cards. My husband looked at me as if I had sprouted another head. "Christmas cards?" he questioned. "It's January!"

Me: "What's your point?"

Matt: "Well, shouldn't you have sent them out in December?"

Me: "Hey, according to my Catholic Life calendar, Christmas doesn't officially end until January 10th. I'm golden."

So, I sent them out. I haven't received any mocking emails or other scathing replies, so I figure everyone enjoyed getting their holiday greetings after the holidays. After all, they certainly stand out from the rest of the crowd.

I think next year I'll send my cards out in February. Groundhogs day is completely overlooked, greeting card-wise. I'd better get started on my letter, or I'll never get it done on time.