<p>jmmom–post #7600! </p>
<p>Small milestone, for those keeping track…</p>
<p>I’m catching up here in Sinner’s Alley after alternating working outside sweating to death and flopping down inside in a vegetative state to cool off…walking upstairs to the computer has been way, way too much work. (And our network router went belly-up, so my flashy new laptop is still sitting dormant). AstroD has been way too busy after returning from Germany, spending every last waking moment with bf–soon to be hundreds of miles away from her—I gave her the “fix the router” assignment, which still remains on her “to do” list. H and D2 are hiking the Incan Trail in Peru at the moment. No one else I can pawn it off on. What a wild summer.</p>
<p>So, slugg…I’m surprised that no one else has asked this question about the silverware…you mean they actually put their dirty dishes in the dishwasher at your house? I’d be thrilled if they’d take the effort to put any silverware in there, rinsed off or not!!! The best is when one of the crew (H, D1, and D2 combined) leave a bowl with oatmeal residue on the counter. Dried-on oatmeal is somewhere between concrete and diamonds on the “hardness” scale. After my last tirade on that, at least they are filling their empty bowl with water and leaving it in the sink. L-l-load the dishwasher? Say what?</p>
<p>I’m thrilled with the wedding plans. I’ve got a priceless mental picture of a marmot choir with a lovely rendition of “Ave Maria”. Now, do marmots sound like Chipmunks (Simon/Theodore/Alvin) or do they have a deeper tone? Then, they could follow it up with Rod Stewart’s “Tonight’s the Night”??? Whadya think?</p>
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<p>Hey, Sluggbug, my kid lives in a hovel in Berkeley!! And we just moved his crap from his old hovel to his new one, using our Escape. No U-haul, just 5,000 trips in the Escape. Which, I’m proud to say, fit his bed and his particle board desk from Ikea, without needing to be broken down. Getting the desk up three flights of stairs, on the other hand, was dicey since S didn’t think to take the thumbtacks and assorted office supplies out of it and the tape that held the drawers in broke and there was some cursing from H while we were stuck turning a staircase corner while looking down at a two-story drop from the open window. So, yeah, tell your kid welcome to Berkeley. Is he attending school there? Playing music? (By the way, D is applying to UC Santa Cruz this year… so lots in common twixt us!)</p>
<p>Okay, pour my son a grande. I don’t give a flying fig or marmot that he’s still underage. He needs one! I owe him!!</p>
<p>I frequently cut DS’ hair, a buzz cut to be precise. Two days ago, I gave him the requested #6 buzz. So far, so good. Today he asked me to get out the clippers as he wanted it neatened up in a couple of spots. No problema. I powered up the clippers, planted them at the nape of his neck, plowed up 3 inches toward his crown.</p>
<p>Then, THEN, THEN I noticed that I hadn’t put the #6 attachment on. I had shaved a 1" by 3" path up the back of his head. OMG. Can you spell I-D-I-O-T!?!??!!! There is, of course, no going back. </p>
<p>So, you have noticed: I am still alive. </p>
<p>As I told him 15 minutes after the disaster, he is a bigger man than I. He is, how do we say, taking it like a man.</p>
<p>I have, at his request, hidden the evidence to the extent possible by taking him down to a #2 buzz. Shaving his head totally would be an option. But he didn’t choose it. I ran to the local CVS and bought about 5 colors of eyebrow pencil to see if that would disguise the problem a tad. Not too much help.</p>
<p>I have, also at his request, copped to paying for professional haircuts until he is age 30 and will sign the contract in blood. (He had me cut his hair as a young teen because it was more convenient than going to the shop; now he does it as part of his frugal persona).</p>
<p>At this moment, I’m looking with wist ful eyes at the house painting job he could have had along with his friends. Instead, he has to show up at his internship tomorrow in this Bad Hair Day mode. </p>
<p>Jeez o man. Like I said, pour the boy a drink. His mom? Well, she’s hopeless.</p>
<p>Hey, it’s been about 3 hours. Do ya think it’s grown in much yet? :o</p>
<p>hahahaha</p>
<p>Laughing out loud in Shanghai.</p>
<p>My daughter’s I Didn’t Get Your Message is this:</p>
<p>Sorry Mom, but someone stole my cellphone from the coat closet of my <em>mom edits</em>VERY EXPENSIVE EXCLUSIVE UNIVERSITY’S ELITIST EATING <em>mom edits</em> club…</p>
<p>jmmom…LOL. You’re going to owe him for a long, long time.</p>
<p>jmmom,
Old Saturday night live saying, “I hate when that happens!” Ouch, and you’ve got a great kid 'cause it certainly sounds like he took it with a stiff upper lip. (Good thing he didn’t have a mustache for you to shave.)</p>
<p>cringe cringe cringe!!! Poor jmmom! Sistah!</p>
<p>Jmmom, this would be a time for tough love in my case. I have learned from my Chinese colleagues and their stories of their mothers. Whenever I do something that would put me in my kids’ debt, I turn the tables. Just start reminding him of how you gave birth to him, how you woke up with him the middle of the night, how you sacrificed. If you want to get really authentic, start the sentence this way: " I spilled my blood for you!" </p>
<p>My children by now just say yeah mom sure. But it worked once or twice…</p>
<p>:) Alumother! Funny (and true!)</p>
<p>jmmom–LOL!
Fortunately, today’s hairstyles run the gamut from long to almost shaven. Like your son’s. </p>
<p>I sincerely hope he has a nicely shaped dome, anyway!</p>
<p>Alu–I could tell my daughter “I was in labor 2 days for you!” and it would be true, but I haven’t needed to drag that one out for her. For my sons, however…maybe I could lie and say it was one of them. I am getting forgetful, after all…</p>
<p>Hey, in the area of old dogs learning new tricks–today I learned to rewire a lamp! I had a lamp from the attic of “the old home place” where my mother grew up that was quite inoperative and dirty. I salvaged the good parts, rewired it, (learned how to tie an “Underwriter’s knot”) and VOILA! I am pleased.</p>
<p>I would be tempted to start turning all sorts of things into lamps now, with my newfound knowledge, but as one web site pointed out, “Anything can be turned into a lamp, but that does not mean everything <em>should</em> be turned into a lamp.” 
:D</p>
<p>mommusic in my book even one hour of unmedicated labor makes up for shaving a stripe in the offspring’s head:).</p>
<p>Rescue from page 2…</p>
<p>medicate labor, I had one morphin dose…yeah, that was fun…
anyway, what are we talking about, feel like I walked into a bad play reading ;)</p>
<p>I am killing time waiting to go to airport, Ds flight is an hour late, so she lands at 1145…sigh</p>
<p>Awww, jmmom, your son sounds wonderful! I hope my D ends up with someone like him someday :)</p>
<p>citygirlsmom - we are talking about Michelangelo - as we come and go.</p>
<p>(see The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock)</p>
<p><a href=“http://209.10.134.179/198/1.html[/url]”>http://209.10.134.179/198/1.html</a></p>
<p>Because, after all, the borogroves are rather mimsy:).</p>
<p>Jmmom–How’s the hair today? :)</p>
<p>I have a picture of one of my sons I did that
to once when trying out the clippers. Only difference is he was 7 or 8. I gave up on using those things after that. Never have been much good with hair, though I have to keep trying with the girls every once in awhile. I did manage to braid my daughter’s hair for her latest show. No cutting though.</p>
<p>LOL, jmmom. Oh, yeah – pour that boy a tall one. 
Next time you stop by the Alley, ask one of us to give you a haircut. I specialize in bangs. Then, you’ll be even. hehehehe</p>
<p>momof2inca: HAHAHAHA, uh huh…More tall ones for the moving crew. 
When Matt Damon’s first kid is old enough to move into his/her own apartment, he’ll have plenty of material here in CC for his latest sequel to the Bourne movies. Hauling a desk up 3 flights of stairs and around the corner next to a 2-story drop from an open window while dodging a hail of thumbtacks and being pummeled by flying drawers…equals a baseball bat, a razor, a broken sink, and a bad guy who gets strangled with a towel. Sounds like a typical moving day to me. </p>
<p>SBmom, I was relieved to know that the Urbandictionary’s definition of “sidebuttoning” did not involve any orifices! :D</p>
<p>Astro, it takes approximately 2-1/2 weeks for a dried oatmeal bowl to soak before you can begin the next step of de-oatmealification, which is to start throwing whatever toxic chemicals you happen to have under the sink into the bowl and hope that it doesn’t dissolve the drain or the finish on your sink. 
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<p>Moominmama, thank you for explaining the complex process of rinsing off forks, knives, and spoons. My follow-up question is this:</p>
<p>Is the inability to rinse things off hereditary? I am once again, pondering… ;)</p>