Melonade

You will all be able to sleep soundly with the knowledge that the terrible twos weren't so terrible yesterday. It was adventures in babysitting part two, and I am happy to report a huge improvement on part one. I was assigned to the toddler nursery and helped wrangle 15 two- and three-year olds for an hour and a half. I'm not sure if kids are just happier on Tuesdays, but things were quite pleasant in the nursery.

Best moments of the evening:
1. Reading stories. The kids pull books off the shelf and bring them to you with a pleading look. Who could say no (or want to)? And so, while resting comfortably on the honeybee-shaped bean bag (the honeybean bag, if you will), I had no fewer than six children perched on me or near me while we read about the zany adventures of Bob and Larry. (Side note: children are very helpful page-turners.)

2. Movie time! At the end of the evening we took them to the video room where they could get another dose of Veggie Tales. (I don't know how we ever made it without those veggies.) One little girl who had been clinging to me for most of the night climbed in my lap, snuggled up, and fell asleep. She may not have enjoyed the video much, but I was very amused.

At the end of the evening, some of the volunteers still pledged never to have children of their own, so I'm thankful for my trauma-less evening. If yesterday's story has you signing up for permanent childlessness, remember that they can be good as long as you have a sufficient amount of cartoon vegetables.

I’ve been working in the nursery at church this month. I love being around kids. I love the way they are fascinated by the smallest things (I too am easily amazed). I love their ability to be affectionate. Since I don’t have any kids and don’t spend much time around kids, I like to get in a little nursery duty every once in a while to keep myself prepared. Who knows when I might come home and find a basket outside my front door. And hey, there’s nothing like a roomful of toddlers to give you an excuse to play.

Here’s what I've learned this week: small children will cry about anything. These precious, powdery tots can turn into hoodlums and terrorize all the other kids in the nursery over the smallest things. Ways to avoid conflict: make sure the number of cool toys is equal to or greater than the number of children. The nursery has one of those fancy train sets with the tracks and sounds that make most adults cringe but fascinate every person under the age of 4. When there are 12 children and only 3 train engines, you can be certain to have some conflict that can include but not be limited to crying, yelling, pushing, throwing, and biting. The other popular toy is the dollhouse. In it there is a mother, father, baby, and puppy. Both baby and puppy are crowd favorites; the mother and father will suffice but not satisfy kids in the same way. No matter how much we try to encourage sharing, the kids want to hoarde all the dolls and scream at any other child who shows interest in them.

Kids will also cry for no visible reason. I was helping with childcare last night for a church function. One child was crying when I got there and did not stop for at least half an hour. It’s hard not to feel bad for the kid at the same time that you’re completely frustrated with him for being so upset. His face was the same color as his miniature Sooner jersey, and both face and jersey were covered in a sticky mixture of tears and snot. None of the shiny or musical toys made him calm. He didn’t want to be held, rocked, walked, or left alone. We almost had him excited about the bubbles, but he was determined to be unhappy. We finally paged his mother to rescue him. It seemed that was all he wanted in the first place.

You might think that experience would make a girl wish to be sterile, but I've signed up for another round of babysitting tonight. If anything exciting happens, you shall be the first to know.

I have always been fond of words of the day. They increase your vocabulary skills in ways that nothing else can. A couple of my favorite WOTD ever are "hoosegow" and "superflous." That may sound crazy, but it probably doesn't seem too weird if you know that I also occassionally read the dictionary just for fun. And so, in honor of those enlightening but oft' neglected words, I present today's entry.

Mowability- n. the ease with which something, especially one's lawn, can be mowed

Doesn't it just roll of the tongue? Mowability. And there are so many sentences in which you can use it. Her balcony has very low mowability, although her shag carpet has high mowability. Okay, I'm probably getting carried away, so before you run to the nearest dictionary for consultation, I'll admit that it's not really a word. I read it in a memo someone sent to my office today, and I think it's a good example of the fact that anybody can add to our collective lexicon with just a little imagination or total disregard for real words.

Enjoy your day and your words.

*Warning- What follows probably qualifies as a rant, and if you aren’t in the mood to read rantings or if you fear you might find yourself the culprit of things I will discuss, please breeze past this post and have a wonderful, rantless day.


I’m a huge fan of correct spelling and proper grammar. English was always my favorite subject in school; for a long time I assumed I'd be an English teacher. I'm not sure why I can recognize the minute details of grammatical structure but sometimes struggle to do simple math in my head. Call it a blessing or a curse, but if I didn't know the differences in they're, their, and there, all the engineers in my office would probably use the wrong one every time. I know that casual conversation, whether spoken or written, often ignores the rules in these areas, and even I have been known to forego a rule or two. Even so, I still believe that knowing the rules and applying them show some intelligence. Frequent spellcheckers, I applaud your efforts to maintain grammatical correctness.

There is a restaurant near my apartment that boasts a large illuminated sign with advertisements like “NOW OPEN MONDAYS” and “SPEND VALENTINES DAY WITH US” (Yes, Valentine’s requires an apostrophe, but most places seem to have given up using this crucial punctuation mark.) For the last month or so, it has had the following plea: “BOOK YOUR PARTYS HERE.” Okay. Who sees the problem? Wait for it…wait for it…that’s right, my friends, the signkeeper has committed one of the big errors of spelling. He/she has forgotten to change the singular Y to the plural IES. Yikes.

Every time I drive past this sign, I feel the need to go to my neighborhood eatery and ask if they would kindly correct their error. In my head, I think that anyone who sees the error will make a judgment about a) food quality, or b) employee intelligence. I also wonder if I am the only person who has noticed the problem, which makes me wonder about the state of our education system. Sadly, I’m sure the friendly waitstaff who greet patrons have nothing to do with the outdoor signage, and so I drive on home.

I would like to believe that there is a rational explanation for this problem. Perhaps they had run out of the letters I or E. (This wouldn’t have happened if not for the Valentine’s advertisement on the other side of the sign, and once again we can blame that icky holiday for society’s downfall.) If that is the case, though, the sensible thing to do is simply replace it with a word not requiring the missing letters. Anyone can book a party, but it takes a special person to book a blowout.

I spent most of my weekend at this gynormous arts and crafts/antiques/home show. For a mere $5, I got to walk through six fairground buildings full of stuff. A lot of it was great, and I could have blown my whole paycheck there, but I often wonder about the sanity of some people who frequent these kinds of events. I mean, who in the world really needs an apron for a dish soap bottle? I am not making this up—it is possible that you’ve never seen a tiny gingham apron with lace trim made to fit your dish soap bottle, but I tell you now that they do exist, and I guess someone out there is buying them. Those people are probably the same ones who will pay good money for a river rat puppet.

Vendors from all over the county come to these shows, and I noticed that a lot of them were from Texas. The friend who accompanied me on Saturday is a Texas transplant, and she observed that the nicest people at the show were the ones from Texas. (I didn’t get close enough to the aprons to see if they had also traveled north, but that would be one small way to balance out the Texas greatness.)

I know that the Texas/Oklahoma rivalry is a touchy subject among those of us in this part of the country. But before you leap to conclusions about what I might say, I must warn you that a) A lot of my favorite people are from Texas, and b) Although I have lived in Oklahoma for most of my life, I am actually a Texan by birth. This being said, I will not blindly bash all things Texan, and I dread those conversations in which Texans and Okies try to proclaim their greatness to each other, whether in college sports, driving abilities, or pure aesthetic qualities of their respective states.

Let’s face it—Texas is great. I haven’t actually been there in a while, but what I remember was pretty cool. It’s BIG, they have real sports teams, and they have Six Flags (all qualities I remember from childhood summer vacations). What does Oklahoma have? Only two major cities (and I have never liked Tulsa), no big pro sports teams, and a lot less space. Although Oklahoma is not the barren wasteland that people try to make it out to be (that’s why we have Kansas), I don’t think our southern neighbor is that bad, either.

And really, is it fair for us to snub people because of their home states? Sure, they may have acquired bizarre accents, strange tastes in music, or a penchant for wild game, but they cannot be blamed for their parents’ residential choices. You might as well exclude me because I’m a brunette. Oh, and while at the craft show, I bought three antique croquette balls. If you’re going to dislike me for anything, you can dislike me for that.

I am single. I’ve never been married or engaged or even had a real relationship, come to think of it. And hey, it’s not so bad most of the time. I can spend all the money I make on myself and take long showers without worrying about using all the hot water. I have sole choice of what I watch on tv, and if I want to have a ham and cheese omelette for dinner, I don’t have to check in with anybody else. Yep, it’s great. Except for that pesky mid-February holiday when Mylar bouquets remind me that I don’t have anyone, singlehood is fabulous.

Being single is so fantastic that we even have an entire class at church dedicated to those of us who are unattached. It gives me hope. If there are 120 other young, interesting people who are in the Singles class, singlehood can’t be the stigma we are taught that it is. (Or perhaps the class exists to erase said stigma, because we don’t fill up our time with speed dating courses or lessons on how to snag the perfect mate.) I say celebrate your singleness! When people at family reunions ask about my dating status, those disappointed looks I get shouldn’t phase me at all.

I should be honest. Just because I am single and can be satisfied by it doesn’t mean that I want to be single forever. I have been known on one or two occassions to date unsuccessfully, and there were even times when I admitted feelings to someone who did not reciprocate them. I don't want to end up as the neighborhood crazy cat lady. For a person like me who tries to avoid rejection in any form, such failure is very painful, but those are the times when I’m thankful that while I can only have one husband, I can have a dozen good friends who support me.

There is a time for everything, and I do hope there is a time when I will find someone with which I can share the remote control (as long as he doesn’t want to watch Sports Center all day—that’s going a bit too far). And so I defy you, Valentine’s Day, and all of you who try to express a year’s worth of feelings in 24 hours. Don’t think you have to be mushy just for the sake of the holiday.

Here are my observations, readers:
1) If you are in a good relationship, I congratulate you. I hope that you can appreciate what you have found.
2) If you are not single but still find yourself dating someone who makes you miserable, please do not use your hope of a nice Valentine’s gift as an excuse for staying in the relationship.
3) If you don’t fall into categories 1 or 2, don’t believe that singlehood means you’re all alone! I can say this because I have been guilty of such a belief and my friends have made me see that boys aren’t everything in life. May I suggest an anti-Valentine’s celebration? Gather your single friends together, eat good food, and watch a movie with absolutely no romantic themes. Do not under any circumstances purchase a gigantic heart-shaped box of chocolate and consume the whole thing while sitting alone and watching the sappy chick flick of your choice.

Okay, say it with me, “Boys aren’t everything.” There, don’t you feel better? Repeat as necessary until you believe it.

If you're expecting to be blown away by the contents of this first post, you should probably stop reading right now. I mean it. Go on. Just click the little red "x" and take a walk, or, if you don't think you can break away from the computer just yet, go play online poker or catch up on the news. You'll be better off, I promise.

I probably shouldn't throw everything out there at once. To do so would be dangerous, both to you as a reader and me as a writer. Although I have been drafting entries in my head while driving, cleaning, etc., I have not yet put fingers to keys, so I'll save the deep thoughts and insight into meaningless things for another time.

And finally, thanks to the friend who introduced me to the wonders of all things blogish. She gives me something to look forward to, and that's all anyone could ask for.