<p>georgiamom, maybe you should have a Bailey’s and coffee, with lots of whipped cream. The caffeine will help you to stay alert, the Bailey’s will calm your nerves, and whipped cream always makes everything all better!</p>
<p>I hope you don’t really feel guilty! Both of my kids broke their arms when they were 4 and 6 years old, while I was watching. I felt like the worst mom in the world, but I didn’t really think that letting S2 run in the cul de sac while wearing sneakers was all that dangerous! S1 fell off of a play structure and had a very nasty break, requiring surgery. AAAH! Mother’s guilt is something else – maybe you should have another Bailey’s as a chaser.</p>
<p>georgiamom, give that stoic D of yours whatever she’s allowed to sip and see if she’ll agree to bottle some of her stamina for others! You could set up a nice trust fund with the proceeds. (My S#1 had an emergency appendectomy when he was 9. We learned when he was 13 that it wasn’t his appendix at all, it was his kidney, which needed emergency surgery by then. Sigh.)</p>
<p>Alu, re: S playing sax horribly: I posted a short video clip on youtube of TSFH’s jazz band spring concert, mostly because of his wailing drum solo. Various horn sections were featured, and they weren’t all exactly, um, strong and in tune. Which prompted an anonymous comment from someone saying, “Is it illegal to shoot trumpet players? It shouldn’t be.” Yeeeah, they were a bit… um… ouch. But the drums were kickin’!</p>
<p>Just got an update on TSFH’s status re: graduating – we still won’t know until tomorrow afternoon, but if he’s telling me the truth, it’s going to happen. I can’t even begin to express how much my stomach has been tied in knots this week, I’ve slept no more than 3 or 4 hours a night, and I’m constantly worried about technological disasters. If overnight something happens to… no. I’m not saying it. I’m just knocking on my wood desk and hoping I can let go of some of this anxiety tomorrow. So far, he hasn’t broken anything… but this is the guy who’s fallen out of a chairlift, and who broke his collarbone twice as a little kid, once while jumping on my bed and smiling at me and once “while dancing the high angle in math-dancing in gym” in kindergarten. (And no, I have no idea what that means either.) Accidents follow him around. (And oh yeah, that motorcycle thing. Oh man I need a stiff one, I’m getting all stomach-tied again.)</p>
<p>p2n, good thing we’re meeting for dinner tomorrow, I really need to let off some steam!!</p>
<p>In stark contrast to Gmom (kisses! sympathy! & LOL!) I’ll amble in, scarf a few peanuts at the bar saying howdy to all, then grab a dark back booth where I’ll settle down for some languid but determined booze drinking. </p>
<p>I have been working all day long (notwithstanding that I have been doing so in my bathrobe) and now it’s TGI-5pm!</p>
<p>PS LOL about certain band members being horrible. Hey-- try listening to a grammar school band. It takes at least 8 measures to discern that they are playing, indeed, something classic-- like Old McDonald. </p>
<p>But a funny story about that. </p>
<p>The first grammar school music festival we’d attended at my kids’ school… Cute singing, cute dancing, cute cute cute. </p>
<p>Then the band starts in-- and they are just classically AWFUL. Cute, yes, but truly atonal… ear-splitingly so. It goes on and on. Piece after piece. Gradually my H and I begin shaking with suppressed laughter; you know where you can’t even meet each other’s eyes or you will surely howl out loud? </p>
<p>The screetching and blasting FINALLY ends, to polite applause. My daughter, aged about 6 looks up at me with huge eyes and says “Wow. They’re good!”</p>
<p>(from the Angel by the Sea - Cape May, NJ cookbook!)</p>
<p>Ingredients
1 loaf firm bread
8 ounces cream cheese
1/4 cup maple syrup
10 eggs
1-1/2 cups half & half
8 Tablespoons melted butter
Cube bread and layer half in a 13 x 9-inch pan. Cut the cream cheese into small pieces and scatter it across the bread. Cover with remaining bread cubes. Mix the eggs, half & half, syrup, and melted butter together. Pour the egg mixture over the bread cubes. Press the bread cubes down to absorb the mixture. Refrigerate overnight. </p>
<p>In the morning, bake at 350 degrees for 40 to 50 minutes. Serve with syrup, jelly, or powdered sugar.</p>
Lots of stomach viruses last more than six hours - stop feeling guilty! Take a stiff drink and best wishes for a speedy recovery for your daughter.</p>
<p>And, why is it that mom guilt occurs so much more frequently than dad guilt? BTW, mikksmom, that recipe sounds yummy.</p>
<p>Re: Grade school/middle school bands… When D2 was in grade school and middle school, she sang in the chorus, and they always did the combined concerts. Of course I was way interested in the chorus, and had significant difficulty in sitting through the band sections without groaning in agony, or erupting in laughter a la SBmom. Way back when, I was in band from 6th grade to high school, and even then, I generally found some of the performances excruciatingly bad. I always thought that bad clarinet “music” sounded like someone repeatedly stepping on a Canadian goose. </p>
<p>Now, at the high school level, I am amazed at how talented these kids are!</p>
<p>I’m reeling from the combo of appendicitis, stomach viruses, and that french toast which sounds delicious but like after two bites my eyes would roll backward into my head:)</p>
<p>Let’s put the CD of band performances we have smothered laughter at on the jukebox and sit in the back having a single malt taste test…in our bathrobes…</p>
<p>Wait. I don’t have a bathrobe. I call sweat pants, D’s sweatshirt, and old fleece slipons.</p>
<p>This statement threatens to spin the world of its axis. No bathrobe?!! I sputter with disbelief. You have slippers; you get “slippers,” but you don’t have robe? May I suggest: this is like eating oreos without milk or perhaps tonic without gin. In short, it is a sin and a crime against your own humanity and hedonistic self. </p>
<p>I have 5 bathrobes!! I am a bathrobe conoisseur. </p>
<p>They are: </p>
<p>The warm red fleece bathrobe (winter)
The heavy <em>vintage</em> glossy silk gold-lined Hugh Hefner/Marlene Deitrich type men’s bathrobe/smoking jacket (bought at high end vintage store; ooh la la)
The crisp light cotton-sheeting preppy striped kimono-esque Tommy Hilfiger bathrobe (so Japanese Spa; summer)
The asian-style very light short black silk bathrobe (kind of Victoria’s Secret esque; seasonless)
The waffle weave cotton absorbent-but-yet-not-a-terry-cloth after bath spa type bathrobe (best one, wearing it now, suitable for perpetual wear.)</p>
<p>I think we need to do an immediate bathrobe intervention on you. Believe me slippers take on a whole new dimension MIT ROBE. You haven’t LIVED!</p>
<p>(Or as someone here used to say, “… pictures?”)</p>
<p>(sorry… punch-drunk… too many nights with too little sleep… check in with me noontime tomorrow, I’ll be ready for a nice looooooong nap… oh, and keep those good vibes comin’ for TSFH, tomorrow morning is the Big Reckoning…)</p>
<p>TSFH - I’m been rolling that one around in my mind and I suddenly got it! hahahahahaha Sorry, slow motion here. </p>
<p>Gmom - you didn’t MAKE her dance. Besides those pesky little appendixes have quite the reputation for acting up out of the blue. Hope she is feeling better soon.</p>
<p>My last child, a d, is still in grade school and we still have to sit through those twice a year concerts in hard seats that cut off all circulation to your butt. Every year I think the band sounds like they are castrating pigs. LOVE the stepping on a Canadian goose - sounds like that too!!</p>
<p>Alu, a geat bathrobe is the cure for alot of things…especially with a hot toddy in hand.</p>
<p>Welcome to the alley, glad that DD is on the mend.</p>
<p>Mikksmom </p>
<p>that french toast sounds great. It always seems like it is night time here on the alley regardless of what time it is in real life. Do ya think that we could get dodds and curmie to serve us up some breakfast every now and then? You would think that they would want to keep their customer base happy (but hell, they know we aren’t going any where).</p>
<p>mootie,</p>
<p>Tell TSFH, to don’t make me come out there this morning:). Looking forward to hearing the good news that he will be taking the walk. I remember when my D graduated from h.s. and all of the girls were beautifully dresses while the boys wore shorts, flip flops and sneakers. There was one lone fella who actually had on a real shirt, tie and shoes. </p>
<p>Yeah, I am getting old and no I don’t know where my bath robe is (I have a couple of nice ones but I am a t- shirt and sweat pants person too).</p>
<p>mathmom,
I’m with you on this one! The elementary band could be “tolerated,” but the orchestra? Oh my! Like 50 sets of fingernails on one blackboard.</p>
<p>Mikksmom-
Is there a lo-cal version of that recipe? It sounds great, but like a gazillion calories!
Hang in there everyone (georgiamom, astrophysicsmom, mootie, and anyone else I missed). Thoughts are with you.</p>
<p>Going to s#2’s honors banquet tonight. Please cross your fingers that he can pull out a B in Physics! (Depends on a test today, which he has to get an A+ in!!!) Oh puleeze… Don’t want his first C on the transcript to be his second semseter jr yr. That would be bad.</p>
<p>Alu, I am with you, sweatpants. Now about that french toast, just add some grand manier when you bake it, sooo yummy!! We could add champaign and strawberries and have brunch:D</p>
<p>S2 played bongos in school concert, very cute! but then again at 9 everything about them is still cute.</p>
<p>astro- dads don’t come with guilt gene, thats why we have to give them some of ours:D</p>
<p>For dads, the guilt gene is often replaced by the clueless gene. </p>
<p>Regarding lack of a guilt gene: a catholic intervention was attempted when I was younger, but it didn’t take, athough it did do a decent job of it at the time.</p>