Blow Me
Doldrums: a belt of calms and light baffling winds north of the equator between the northern and southern trade winds in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
When sailing, the consequence of "being in the doldrums" is that you, and your boat, don't move much. Your sails luff pathetically at best, and mostly you sit, rocked by the sleepy currents, waiting for some action to jolt you out of your stupor.
The other definitions of doldrums tend towards the "depressed, listless" variety, but the nautical definition sums up where I am at the moment pretty well.
I am in between vacations, summer camp is over, swimming lessons are finished, pool test passed (hallelujah),
w--k is still far enough off that I haven't begun to hyperventilate, and (although I did have my traditional July 31st first day of school anxiety nightmares - what fun) I don't really know what to do with myself.
I don't make lists of the things I want to accomplish during summer vacation anymore because my learning curve is not entirely flat. If I had made a list of things to accomplish during summer vacation, however, it would look something like this:
spackle kitchen walls
sand kitchen walls
paint kitchen walls
paint kitchen ceiling
buy chairs for kitchen
buy light fixtures for kitchen
tile kitchen backsplash
hunt down floor guy to finish kitchen floor
organize attic
get rid of embarrassing quantity of plastic kid toys in playroom
get haircut
plan short story unit
organize curriculum materials
write weekly lesson schedules
take children to museums and cultural events
bury the two FROZEN DEAL FISH FROM FISHTANK currently taking up real estate in basement freezer
write every day
figure out how to get to Montana, Germany, and San Diego to see friend, friend, and grandma
Here's how I did:
sort of
sort of
primed one of them
no
no
no
no
no
no
no
yes!!!
no
not even close
dream on
does Kung Fu Panda count?
Am I not married??!! Did I not extract promise upon promise from the adult male in the household that he, and not I, would be responsible for all things fishtank???!!!
HA!
Uh, no. But I did buy some lottery tickets.
In the absence of a cool breeze to blow me in any particular direction, I can't even figure out what to have for breakfast these days. Seriously! This morning I ended up eating a chocolate cat cookie from Trader Joe's and a handful of walnuts. Just because they were there. That sounds as though I ate a cookie intended for a cat, but please take note that the cookie was merely shaped like a cat. Which, come to think of it, may or may not be better.
Politics hold no appeal ("You stink." "You stink." "You stink more and you are a stupid head"), the news seems surreal (Constitution, what constitution?), and I am so freaked out by the schizophrenic and disjointed nation that is China that I can't even get too worked up about the Olympics (doping, pyrotechnics, Matt Lauer).
My children, on the other hand, are so happy to have unstructured time that they haven't even noticed that I'm not letting them watch t.v. or eat anything including high fructose corn syrup (Ask me how much I love Dr. Oz. Really. Ask me. Answer: So, so much). Because their mother is so apathetic, they managed to fill the entire bathtub with lukewarm water, grass, legos and torn up styrofoam "snow" yesterday before I'd noticed, and at the moment they are playing "animal rescue" which involves every stuffed animal they can find and lots of rope. I'm pretty sure, also, that I just heard my 4 year old daughter tell her brother that she'd taken a picture of me while I was in the shower. What?!
How did I miss that?
Remember the cutting edge, awesome television show Shazam and Isis? If you don't, it means that you are much younger than I am, so please don't respond.
Isis, the first female superhero, was better looking than Wonder Woman and had this ritual invocation of her superpower, "Oh zephyr winds which blow on high, lift me now so I can fly."
I know what I need to do!
"Oh piles of work and unfinished kitchen, kick my ass so I'll stop bitchin'"
Uh oh, you know what this means? The WRH needs to go find a good book to read, and it must be time to have a dinner party.
When sailing, the consequence of "being in the doldrums" is that you, and your boat, don't move much. Your sails luff pathetically at best, and mostly you sit, rocked by the sleepy currents, waiting for some action to jolt you out of your stupor.
The other definitions of doldrums tend towards the "depressed, listless" variety, but the nautical definition sums up where I am at the moment pretty well.
I am in between vacations, summer camp is over, swimming lessons are finished, pool test passed (hallelujah),
w--k is still far enough off that I haven't begun to hyperventilate, and (although I did have my traditional July 31st first day of school anxiety nightmares - what fun) I don't really know what to do with myself.
I don't make lists of the things I want to accomplish during summer vacation anymore because my learning curve is not entirely flat. If I had made a list of things to accomplish during summer vacation, however, it would look something like this:
spackle kitchen walls
sand kitchen walls
paint kitchen walls
paint kitchen ceiling
buy chairs for kitchen
buy light fixtures for kitchen
tile kitchen backsplash
hunt down floor guy to finish kitchen floor
organize attic
get rid of embarrassing quantity of plastic kid toys in playroom
get haircut
plan short story unit
organize curriculum materials
write weekly lesson schedules
take children to museums and cultural events
bury the two FROZEN DEAL FISH FROM FISHTANK currently taking up real estate in basement freezer
write every day
figure out how to get to Montana, Germany, and San Diego to see friend, friend, and grandma
Here's how I did:
sort of
sort of
primed one of them
no
no
no
no
no
no
no
yes!!!
no
not even close
dream on
does Kung Fu Panda count?
Am I not married??!! Did I not extract promise upon promise from the adult male in the household that he, and not I, would be responsible for all things fishtank???!!!
HA!
Uh, no. But I did buy some lottery tickets.
In the absence of a cool breeze to blow me in any particular direction, I can't even figure out what to have for breakfast these days. Seriously! This morning I ended up eating a chocolate cat cookie from Trader Joe's and a handful of walnuts. Just because they were there. That sounds as though I ate a cookie intended for a cat, but please take note that the cookie was merely shaped like a cat. Which, come to think of it, may or may not be better.
Politics hold no appeal ("You stink." "You stink." "You stink more and you are a stupid head"), the news seems surreal (Constitution, what constitution?), and I am so freaked out by the schizophrenic and disjointed nation that is China that I can't even get too worked up about the Olympics (doping, pyrotechnics, Matt Lauer).
My children, on the other hand, are so happy to have unstructured time that they haven't even noticed that I'm not letting them watch t.v. or eat anything including high fructose corn syrup (Ask me how much I love Dr. Oz. Really. Ask me. Answer: So, so much). Because their mother is so apathetic, they managed to fill the entire bathtub with lukewarm water, grass, legos and torn up styrofoam "snow" yesterday before I'd noticed, and at the moment they are playing "animal rescue" which involves every stuffed animal they can find and lots of rope. I'm pretty sure, also, that I just heard my 4 year old daughter tell her brother that she'd taken a picture of me while I was in the shower. What?!
How did I miss that?
Remember the cutting edge, awesome television show Shazam and Isis? If you don't, it means that you are much younger than I am, so please don't respond.
Isis, the first female superhero, was better looking than Wonder Woman and had this ritual invocation of her superpower, "Oh zephyr winds which blow on high, lift me now so I can fly."
I know what I need to do!
"Oh piles of work and unfinished kitchen, kick my ass so I'll stop bitchin'"
Uh oh, you know what this means? The WRH needs to go find a good book to read, and it must be time to have a dinner party.
Because their mother is so apathetic, they managed to fill the entire bathtub with lukewarm water, grass, legos and torn up styrofoam "snow" yesterday before I'd noticed, and at the moment they are playing "animal rescue" which involves every stuffed animal they can find and lots of rope. I'm pretty sure, also, that I just heard my 4 year old daughter tell her brother that she'd taken a picture of me while I was in the shower.
This is gold and what every mommyblog should be but isn't.
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I can't begin to count the number of dinner parties I have planned in order to chase the doldrums and kick into gear.
Discovered the method in college and still use it now that I'm receiving social insecurity.
What durability as a life rescuer!
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You are being featured on Five Star Friday:
http://www.fivestarfriday.com/2008/08/five-star-friday-edition-18.html
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This is brilliant and I love the title! Hope you have found a good book to read; sounds like just the thing. I'm kind of there too. Tons to do and absolutely no motivation. Blech.
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