aaaaahhhhhhhh....screeeeeeccccccchhhhhhh.........crunnnnnccccchhhhhhhhh

Today was not a good day. I was in a car accident and it was my fault. No one was hurt, thank goodness, but my car is in pretty bad shape. Luckily, we have good insurance - that I'm sure my rates will skyrocket on immediately.

Rebekah was in the car with me - in the front seat. She screamed for me to watch out. I slammed on the brakes, but I just didn't have the space. Yes, I was following too closely.

No airbags deployed which is both a cause of concern and joy. Concern because I rear ended someone and was going about 30mph when we hit. Shouldn't they have come bouncing out of the steering wheel and dash? Joy, however, because I could drive it under its own power to the body shop. Deployed airbags would have prevented that.

I called 911. And then we waited....and waited....and waited. 15 minutes. That's a long time to stand on the side of the road with a stranger trying to make small talk when you've just hit her car. The car with her child in it. Yeah, and it gets worse. Her child was both physically and mentally handicapped. He was very concerned and scared. I felt like a real loser.

Now for a funny moment. We were waiting on the police to arrive when Rebekah looks down and gasps. I look down to see what she is gasping at. I don't see a thing. She points to my feet, and then says with horror, "You are wearing pink fuzzy socks! Those are not outside socks. Mom! Oh, I hope no one sees your socks." So, here I stood, with my hood all scrunched up and lights hanging by cords and my daughter is worried about my socks!

For those interested, the car is awaiting an adjuster. We are down to one car. This should make life interesting for a while.

In other news: Our governor is not running for election again. Wow. Her rating is so low, she knew she couldn't win a primary and there was going to be a primary. How sad is that?

Rebekah is singing with the Temple Teens at a black tie affair and needs a black or red dress. That is what we were going to do today before the...uh...incident.

Kimberly gave blood for the second time today. Her phlebotomist has a child that could be part of the program at her summer camp. It is called Camp Kaleidoscope and is for kids who have been sick with cancer or heart problems or things that keep them from being able to attend a camp without medical supervision. He saw her tshirt and knew the name because the children's hospital has talked to him about it. He never thought about it because he was afraid. After talking with Kimberly, he is going to check into it for his daughter this summer. I feel she was meant to be there today, just for this father.

Katherine is with a friend, primping for photos. My daughter...primping. I'm finding this hard to fathom, but it is happening as we speak.

Keith has had a political victory today. We have a commissioner that is mean, abuses his power, and is sneaky. Keith was able to uncover a story that showed this to be true. The newspaper took it up and now the whole commissioner's race this spring and fall will have a new flavor. I'm very proud of him for sticking up for the community and living by his principles.

24 Hours is a LONG Time

As you know, Keith and I are doing a communication course. Wednesday was our second lesson. We had been using content communication all week. I found that I am a big hint dropper, but realized that Keith is as well. He tends to ask me a question like "Are you hungry?" actually meaning "I am hungry, will you fix me some lunch." It's been interesting.

Well, one of Wednesday's challenges was to go 24 hours without being critical of anyone. Absolutely anyone. Even those I don't know. So, let's say I see something on TV that is just whacko, I can't talk to the TV and complain about what I see by calling someone an idiot. Or, I can't talk about the stupid drivers. Or, I can't make some snide remark about my husband.

The first try lasted 11 hours. The second try lasted 17 hours. Today, I made it! However, within 30 minutes of meeting my goal, I was critical of someone I didn't know. They were cheating on a photo assignment. I complained that they had NOT taken that photo today and therefore the photo simply didn't count. I said it with disgust. Sigh. It isn't easy to do. And poor Keith - he is involved in a bitter conflict with politics. He doesn't make it from phone call to phone call! He wants to know if he can exclude politics from his 24 hour assignment. I told him, "It's up to you." And it is, but secretly, I have my own opinion!

Other things that have struck me lately:

Gmail has an advertisement for spam quiche. The idea makes me squirm.

I have decided to take a 365 day photo challenge. So has Kimberly. Feel free to join the site and see what we put up! https://www.facebook.com/pages/365-day-photo-challenge/336655936358297  Here is today's post - I call it "Dress Up"

I can't play blues music on the piano without keeping the beat with my body. It must be hysterical to watch. I guess I'll have to get a video and see for myself.

My step granddaughter, Claudia, emailed us today. Grandpa had written to her about how he likes politics and asked her if she knew who her Governor and mayor were. She was proud to tell us that her Governor was Jerry Brown and her mayor was Scott Nelson. Keith just loved the email!

Rebekah is finally signed up for Driver's Ed. We also signed her up for the SAT on May 5th. And she plans to do the Winter Conservatory  - 12th Night by Shakespeare. Busy, busy.

Katherine is in the throes of picking a summer camp for GS. I think she has decided on the "Immunity Challenge."

Word of the Day

Remember how I said that I get too much email because I surf and sign up? You may also recall that I signed up to Squidoo of the Day. Its a lens, which is kind of like a blog, which is not really catching on. Anyway, as they do every day, they sent me the title of the day's squidoo. It caught my attention: Musical Earworms.

My first thought was ewwwwwwwwwww. I could just picture some horrid, nasty worms squiggling around in my ear. And I immediately wondered how a person got them and how they got rid of them. Of course, I had to look at the lens. I was relieved to find out that musical earworms is the name for the problem of having a tune stuck in your head. Why anyone would name that phenomenon any kind of worm is your guess.

I have a song stuck in my head today. It is Sound of Music. I am learning to play this on my piano. I can play to the first break, but I play it over and over and over, trying to get it good enough that someone could sing to it with me. The hills are alive with the sound of musical earworms!

I swear I don't see any worms.

Other News of the day: Kimberly started back to college today. She has 2nd level English, College Algebra, Spanish 1, 2nd level Psychology, and .....weight lifting. Yes, my girl will be in with all the jocks!

Keith is steeped up to his eyeballs in local politics. He has so many irons in the fire that he doesn't know which way to turn and the phone is ringing all the time. He loves every minute of it.

Katherine is writing her own fan fiction. She loves to do it. I love that she is writing!

Rebekah is spending the week babysitting. She does her schoolwork while the baby sleeps. SATs are coming - anybody have a good idea for a practice essay? Today's was "Should they allow the Pledge of Allegiance in schools?"

Me - I've been on a cleaning kick. My filing cabinet has been updated. I've hung a few pictures. The hall and stairs are vacuumed. My room and bathroom, which always take the back seat to other cleaning, are spotless today. Everything smells like scrubbing bubbles. I am now a convert to that stuff. Talk about making cleaning easy! The soap scum on my shower door is completely gone. I just sprayed it on, waited 5 minutes, and wiped it down. Gone. I know, I could be a commercial!

Oops. I think I over did it!

I Said It - I Must Mean It

From reading my last post, you know that I didn't make any New Year's resolutions. I probably won't. I think they are overrated.However, this does not mean that I don't try to improve myself and set goals.

So, where, you might ask, do I feel the need to improve? I'm an author - I write a lot. I'm a mom and a wife and a teacher - I talk a lot. I am a FB junkie - I comment a lot. You'd think I'd have the whole communication thing down. Not. Particularly with my family.

Keith and I are listening to a series on communication. I've realized a few things. For instance, I am a hint dropper. Hint dropper, you might ask? Let me give you a scenario. I walk into the kitchen. I stare into the sink. I stare at my daughter Katherine. I stare back into the sink and put my hands on my hips. I give one more withering look to Katherine. Seems pretty straight forward to me. I see dirty dishes in the sink, Katherine is in charge of the kitchen, I want her to clean up the mess. According to this series, I did not communicate effectively. Wow.

I guess that leads me to ask the question, What is effective? I mean, she understands the look and scurries over to the sink and does the dishes. Seems effective to me.

Let me give you another scenario. I walk into the kitchen and announce - there are two coats in the kitchen. Once again, seems obvious to me. I want the owners of the coats to hang them up or at least get them out of my way. Once again, it is effective in that the coats get out of my way.

Apparently, not everyone gets the hints, especially husbands that have not grown up with the best hint dropper of them all (hi mom!). So, according to this series, we should practice something called content communication. This means that what I say is what I mean - no matter what my tone of voice or no matter how I gesture. So, if I announce that there are 2 coats in my kitchen, the appropriate response could be - yes, there are 2 coats in there. Does this smack of smart a&& to anyone else?

Keith and I have decided to try content communication for a week and see how it goes. We often get upset with one another over tone of voice or over a hint that didn't go over well. This is supposed to solve that problem.

How am I doing, you ask? Please, I'm doing great! (Oh, sarcasm doesn't work well online, nor is it allowed in content communication....sorry). I'm failing miserably. And that's the truth.