Write From Karen

Having a (cute) place to put my nifty purple hard drive.

Throwing old school stuff away to make room for the shiny new stuff.

Taking Jazz to band camp and knowing that soon, I’ll be one of the proud mommas watching him perform from the stands.

Having plump, juicy, ripe tomatoes to cut into for tonight’s dinner.

Catching Dude’s half amused, half annoyed expressions whenever I dare to venture into his room to see what he’s up to.

We pick a subject, and your job is to interpret it anyway you want. Write about it on your blog… simple as that. Maybe you can interpret it as a picture – we don’t care!

1. Why do they ask you to get on the plane? Shouldn’t you get in it? When was your last flight?

Last summer. We flew to Miami to catch our boat to the Western Caribbean.

2. Why do they call two planes getting too close a near miss? Shouldn’t it be a near hit? Have you ever been on a plane that was in trouble?

Yes. It was one of my very first flights (naturally). Kevin and I were coming home from a cruise (we really don’t cruise that often – in fact, we’ve only been twice) from our tenth-year anniversary trip and we were on a little plane flying from St. Louis to Springfield.

We reached Springfield and had to circle around several times because the landing gear wouldn’t come down. One of the flight attendants had to open a trap door, in the floor and right next to where I was sitting and HAND CRANK the sucker down.

Yeah. That was one wild ride.

3. If a mute swears, does his mother wash his hands with soap? What have you done when your child sweared?

Um. Blushed? I’m about 99% certain that my kids learned curse words from none other than ME. Um. I sort of curse, a lot. Well, actually, before you go and think badly of me, I go in spurts. I can go for MONTHS without one curse word and then *POW*, it’s like I’m channeling a sailor or something. It gets pretty bad.

So bad, in fact, that my boys actually have to ask me to stop cursing.

I know.

So when they curse? I just give them a dirty look and say something along the lines of, “Hey now. Watch the language.” Other than that? What can I do? It’s like calling the kettle black.

4. How about a restaurant for anorexics? What would you call it? The Empty Plate? When was the last time you went out to a fancy restaurant?

Uh ………………. I honestly don’t remember. I hate spending money on food, especially “fancy” food, so we avoid fancy restaurants at all costs.

HOWEVER, our 20th anniversary is coming up next month so I’m betting we bite the bullet and actually go to one.

5. Where do forest rangers go to ‘get away from it all’? What do you do to get away from it all?

I grab a book. It’s cheap and effective.

6. Why do people who know the least know it the loudest? What do you do to get a know-it-all to shut up?

Prove him/her wrong. Know-it-alls are usually blow hards, meaning, they bluff their way through life and most times have no idea what they’re talking about. It’s pretty easy to trip them up, it’s even more entertaining to see them try and recover.

(Yes I know – I’m mean).

7. If a man speaks in the forest and there is no woman to hear him, is he still wrong? Men: does your woman (or most recent) think that you are always wrong? Women: Do you believe that men are always wrong?

Always wrong? No. Usually wrong? Yes.

8. If a turtle loses his shell, is it naked or homeless? Tell us about a time when you were caught naked.

Uh … never? I have been known to walk by a window or two in just my underwear though.

That can’t be proven of course *cough*, but I believe it’s been rumored a time or two.

9. Would a fly that loses it wings be called a walk? How badly do flies annoy you?

On a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the worst? A 17.

NOTHING annoys me more than trying to go to sleep and having a disoriented fly buzz by me a gazillon times getting so close that I can feel the tickle of it’s wings against my cheeks.

Flies must die.

10. Why do they report power outages on TV? When was the last time that you went without power?

Voluntarily? Because I’ll be honest. I’m not a green-sort of person – I like my modern conveniences, the least of them being electricity.

The last time I remember losing electricity was during an ice storm in 2007. We were without electricity for ELEVEN days.

I was Laura-freakin’-Ingalls.

It was not a fun experience, let me tell you.

11. If vegetarians eat vegetables, what do humanitarians eat? Have you ever been or considered to be a vegetarian?

Actually, I could probably easily become a vegetarian. I’m not a big meat lover, though I do enjoy chicken and fish.

I could probably adopt the lifestyle – but I live with three guys who REQUIRE meat and potatoes at every meal, so I don’t see that happening any time soon.

12. If the cops arrest a mime, do they tell him he has the right to remain silent? Tell us about a time when either you were arrested or came close.

Well………………… there was that time I was nearly arrested for shop lifting. Luckily, I was able to sweet talk my way out of it (and forced to promise to go out with the officer’s brother).

What did I try and shop lift?

Nothing. I’m totally scamming you. *grin*

13. Why isn’t there mouse-flavored cat food? Have you ever owned a cat?

We did. When Kevin and I lived in our apartment, we had a kitten. Her name was Roxy. And things were good, until Kevin got a wild hair up his butt and thought it would be funny to spin her round and round really fast on the kitchen floor and it was if her sweet personality was jarred loose releasing a feline from hell in it’s place.

She was MEAN after that. She would claw our furniture and hiss at us. We finally had to give her up.

Kevin is really not mean and I bring the Roxy story up to him ALL the time, so trust me when I say, he is sorry and he’s been punished a lot over the years.

Parental Punishments (What you Endured, Hated, But Would Use Now!)

This post is in no way meant to spark a debate or incite anger, it’s simply an informative post to let you know what I did, and how I handle, disciplining my children. I’m not suggesting that my way is best for YOUR family – everyone is different. All I’m saying is that it worked for OUR family and considering our boys are pretty decent, respectful human beings and have stayed out of trouble thus far (knock on wood), I’d like to think our discipline methods have been successful.

Either that, or I’m completely delusional and my boys have in fact, completely and totally pulled the wool over my eyes.

I’ll stick to my version – ignorance is bliss, yaddayaddayadda.

I grew up with the “spare the rod, spoil the child” mentality. My mom used a fly swatter on us when we misbehaved. My dad didn’t have to do anything, I was terrified of him. All he had to do was raise his voice and that caught my attention.

Kevin said his mom used a coat hanger on him (ouch! I bet that hurt), and his dad used a belt.

Neither one of us really remember getting spanked very often when we were kids. (Which is really weird for me, considering what a brat I was. Seriously. It’s amazing my folks didn’t ship me off to Antarctica. I would have. They probably WISHED they had).

We used a wooden spoon on our boys. I remember reading, in one of the HUNDREDS of parenting books that I devoured in the boys’ early years, that using an instrument, other than your hand, would help make the discipline a little less … personal? I’m not sure that’s the word I want, but it seems right.

Whenever I had to get the wooden spoon out, I would only give them one or two swats on the leg, not the diaper (it was like swatting a pillow, they didn’t feel it) and that’s all it took to get their attention to show them that I meant business.

I always gave them one warning. And if they continued with the behavior after that warning, I simply got the spoon out and swatted them.

I was consistent. And I think that’s CRUCIAL when you’re disciplining your children. Kids are smart little buggers. And they will push your buttons and see how far they can push you – it’s human nature to stretch boundaries like that.

I honestly don’t remember having to swat them very often. Again, I was consistent with them, so they knew I meant business and I wouldn’t hesitate to take out the wooden spoon. I didn’t put up with nonsense – period. They knew the rules. They knew what was expected of them. Period.

It’s so important to make sure kids KNOW what the rules are to begin with. You would be surprised how many parents I’ve observed that didn’t tell/teach their children what the boundaries were to begin with and just sort of dived into a disciplinary action. (Speaking about my experience with play groups.)

“Tommy. If you leave the yard, you will get into trouble.” And then walk little Tommy around the yard and SHOW him where the boundaries were so he would know what constituted punishment if he didn’t comply.

I also made very sure that my boys understood WHY they got into trouble. After they calmed down (and I calmed down), I sat them down and asked them why they got into trouble. I was shocked that there were times when they didn’t know. We would then talk about why they got into trouble and what they could have done differently to avoid getting into trouble in the future.

I think, all too often, parents (myself included), just assumed the kids knew what they did wrong. That wasn’t always the case.

When the boys started school, and were too old to be swatted (I knew this by the smirk on their faces, which only served to make me even more angry – and they knew that), I started sending them to their rooms. I know experts say you really shouldn’t do that because then they associate their rooms with punishment, but I had to get them out of my sight. I have a pretty hot temper, and I found the best thing for both of us, was separation. Out of sight, out of the crosshairs.

They found something in their rooms to calm them down and I had the silence needed to get myself under control. Again, after we both calmed down, I would talk with them about what made me angry and what they did to get into trouble.

Sometimes (and more often than I would like to admit), it was a misunderstanding on MY part. I jumped to conclusions and jumped down their throats when they didn’t deserve it. When those times happened, I owned up and apologized. I think it was important for them to see that I was human and made mistakes, too. I also learned to cool my jets and not jump to conclusions.

Too often.

When they reached middle school, (and even now), the most effective way to get their attention was to take their computers / video games away from them. They have both put that punishment to the test.

And it wasn’t because they misbehaved, per se, but rather because they started blowing off school.

School, in our household, is number one priority with us. It’s their job. And we fully expect them to give 110% of their attention and efforts into doing the best they can. (Which I’ve learned, the hard way, doesn’t necessarily mean straight A’s. Some subjects … well, we can’t all be experts at everything, right?)

When they started middle school, they blew off assignments. This lowered their grade. And because they blew off their assignments, they didn’t know enough to do well on the tests, so they flunked tests and that made their overall grades go down even further.

They tried to use the whole, “but my teacher stinks at his/her job!” and various other excuses and though that may have been the case (in fact, it was a few times), it was no excuse. There would be times when they would be forced to work with someone who didn’t explain it well enough. Or wasn’t knowledgeable enough or … whatever. They had a brain, they could figure it out on their own. They just had to take the initiative and do it. AND ask for help when needed.

“Life is hard. Get used to it, kid. No one is going to hold your hand through this stuff.”

Harsh? Perhaps. But it’s reality. And we’re nothing if not realistic.

Dude’s grades got so bad, that simply banning him from playing wasn’t enough. I suspected he was sneaking onto his computer at night, so Kevin and I removed his computer from his room. We took the whole thing out.

He was without a computer and wasn’t allowed to play video games, (he wasn’t even allowed to watch TV, our rationale being, now he had plenty of time to study and bring his grades up) for eight weeks. That’s the amount of time it took him to get his grades back to an acceptable level.

And that was the ONLY time we’ve had to physically take his stuff away from him. He’s been grounded from the computer and video games a few times since then, but not very often. That eight weeks were HELL for him – he’s been an excellent student ever since.

We’ve had to ground Jazz from the computer and video games a few times, but he saw what Dude went through and didn’t want the same thing to happen to him, so he never allowed himself to reach that level.

But again. We were consistent. The computer and video games were meant to be entertainment – NOT their life. They were more than welcome to use them when their real life work was done.

And we still hold true to that mantra now.

One last bit of advice – watch the yelling. When you yell all the time, the kids simply ignore you. Try and keep your voice at an easy, normal level (I know, easier said than done) so that when you do yell at them, it really gets their attention. It also shows that you mean business.

Again. All of this is meant to inform you. I’m not suggesting you do what I did, I’m simply saying these methods have worked for us. Children are different; kids respond to different tactics. The challenge, of course, as a parent, is to find the method that works for you, and your child.

Good luck.

Oh HO BOY, do I have pet peeves.

Ready?

People who don’t know the difference between LOSE and LOOSE.

People who really don’t know the difference between:

You’re going to have to work harder at your grammar if your goal is to impress me:

It takes a lot to get me riled up but this error could get me started:

In addition: people who curse WAAAAAY too much on either their blogs and/or Twitter.

Created by Oatmeal

I mean come on, why? Is it to impress us? Are you trying to a bad ass? Do you think people like a lot of cursing? Seriously, WHY?

MY theory? Because you may not be all that interesting without the colorful language?

Hey, it’s just a theory. *shrug*

And finally …

Even though I’m a writer, that I graduated with a professional writing degree, DOESN’T mean I don’t make mistakes. I will, occasionally, let a word slip by me and NOT fix it. (Though it’s unconscious because I’m pretty anal when it comes to editing myself … and others, apparently).

And I’ll prove it by taking this quiz:

Created by Oatmeal

See? Told you.

So please, take a few minutes and make sure you’re typing the correct word/usage because when you don’t? People think you’re an idiot.

Or at least, I do.

(And by the way, this whole post was meant to be taken with tongue-in-cheek – however, if it applies, well ……….)

(Oh, and you can find the comics above, and many more, at The Oatmeal. Hat tip to Jen from Momma Blogs A Lot for pointing these out).

Yes, this is late. Hush. Balloon boy distracted me, the little stinker.

You say crafts, and I actually shudder.

It’s not that I hate crafts, I don’t, in fact, I enjoy looking at them quite a bit, but to actually get in there and DO crafts?

Um, no.

And I’ve tried. There was a time period when I worked on crafts and put my work in my mother’s craft booths. My mom used to participate in Wal-Mart’s craft fair every year (they’ve since discontinued it), and I would put some of my piddly/pathetic stuff in to try and sell something.

I did worked mainly in plastic canvas – which, no offense to those of you out there that like plastic canvas, but I think is totally cheesy.

I really enjoy cross-stitching and it’s really relaxing to me, but I haven’t actually picked up any sort of cross-stitching project oh wow, five/six years?

The only reason I got into crafts at all was because of my mother. I was hoping to use that common ground to get closer to my mom and we certainly had some fun times. In fact, I remember making some Y2K bugs in 1999 when everyone was convinced that our digital age as we knew it was going to come crashing down around our ankles. (Remember the panic?!) They were made out of clay and the bugs hugged small pieces of old, smashed up motherboards within their wire arms and legs.

They sold like hot cakes in our craft booth that year. I wish I had a picture of those bugs. I probably do somewhere, but I haven’t been able to find it.

No, I’m afraid my mother is the real crafter in our family, though my sister is also really talented, especially in paints.

But that particular craft gene passed me by – I’m all thumbs when it comes to working with my hands.

The only thing I can do with my hands is type and even that is questionable at times.

I think it’s fascinating that people can create something out of nothing – that they can take random elements and somehow tie them together and make something beautiful and memorable.

Me? I’m not that literal. I prefer to string a bunch of words together and weave an imaginary world.

I wish I were crafty in the literal sense. I’m afraid my level of craftiness comes in other forms.

And that’s not necessarily a good thing.

Today, we’re talking about roommates.

ME: I lived with three other girls for a short time period in my early twenties.

There was a black-haired woman, a blonde, a red head and me, the brunette.

The black-haired woman was the no-nonsense, smart one in our group. She also played referree a lot because when you have that many women under one roof, the amount of estrogen is bound to explode from time to time.

The red-haired woman was the good little Christian girl. And by that I mean, she was our voice of reason whenever the rest of us got out of hand.

Which was often.

The blond-haired woman was the party slut in our group. She had no problem sleeping with anything that possessed an ounce of testosterone. She lived to shock us and shock us, she did.

Then, there was me. I was often the hot head in the bunch. I went along with a lot of what the other girls wanted to do, but I was often the one who quit the activity first.

Together, we were quite intimidating. We all had different, and very strong personalities and we got into a lot of fights – girly fights, not knock down and drag ‘em by the hair fights.

The red-haired woman got on my nerves a lot. Her holier than thou attitude was really annoying. But I butt heads mostly with the blond-haired woman. Her and I … never saw eye-to-eye on anything. Ever. And I suspect, now, that she was jealous of me.

We only lived together for one year before we had had enough. The black-haired woman and me moved out on our own – the blond-haired woman moved out and got pregnant (big shocker) and the red-haired woman moved back home with her parents.

In a lot of ways, the girls in the Sex in the City show reminds me of me and my three roommates. We had a lot of drama in our lives but unfortunately, we didn’t get along as well as the women in that show.

That was one experience I vowed never to repeat. It also reinforced why I don’t have a lot of women friends to this day — women totally get on my nerves.

______________________________

ME AND KEVIN: Kevin and I lived together for two years before we got married.

I’ll wait for the collective gasps of horror to subside.

I’m not sure how his family felt about the arrangement, but my family was not happy. My parents thoroughly disapproved of the arrangement.

And quite frankly, I never gave it much thought. Kevin and I worked together at a bank and he was six months out of his divorce from his first wife and sort of needing a place to stay. He had been renting an apartment at the time, but he had just moved in and the complex was rough — he was often woken up by yelling and fighting neighbors.

He was on the verge of moving back home with his folks when we met. My own roommate (the black-haired woman had gotten married and moved out and my new roommate was a liar and a thief and I thoroughly disliked her), was getting ready to go into the military and had one foot on the threshold when Kevin moved in.

It was a strange arrangement at first. B continued to live there until her arrangements had been finalized and it was cramped and … awkward. But we settled into a comfortable routine after she left.

I think, looking back, living together was the best thing for us. It was a trial “marriage” if you will, though neither of discussed getting married for quite some time. Living with Kevin convinced me that I could put up with him, even at his worst. (Because you don’t truly know someone until you live with them, in my opinion).

We were compatible on so many levels. I could see myself living with him for the rest of my life.

After about 18 months of living together, the practical side of my personality took over and I gave the man an ultimatum – either we got married soon or we would go our separate ways.

That sounds cold, right? But here’s the thing – I’m a realist. And I know that if men can take the easy road, they will. Why would he want to get married when he had everything but the ring?

I wanted more. And I didn’t want to waste any more time on the man if he didn’t feel the same way.

Lucky for me, he felt the same way and proposed.

I’ve thought long and hard about whether or not I would encourage my boys to live with their girlfriends before marrying them. Kevin looks horrified when I suggest it, but when I point out how well it worked out for us, he has second thoughts.

I still haven’t decided if I should encourage them to live with their girlfriends when the time is right, but if it helps them pick a better mate in the long run, wouldn’t it be worth it?

______________________________

THE BOYS: We talk about the future a lot. Well, I talk to the boys about their future a lot. I want them to know, in no uncertain terms, that they are more than welcome to continue to live in our house after they graduate provided they either

A. have a job and are actively saving for their own apartment

and/or

B. they have a job, and/or are going to school and saving for their own apartment.

I will not have 30 year old sons living at home playing video games all day.

Newp. It ain’t gonna happen. Again, I’m a realist.

This makes it sound like I’m being harsh, and I suppose I am, to a certain extent. Kevin and I are more than happy to help our sons start an independent life but we’re not going to support them, at least not financially.

And the boys know this.

Sometimes, when I “casually” remind them about our open invitation to live with us (with stipulations, of course), the boys will mention something about rooming together in their own apartment after they move out.

This really warms my heart. I can’t tell you how important it is to me to know they LIKE each other enough to even consider this as an option.

I hope it happens. I honestly do. Not only will it be good for them, but it’ll help me handle the fact that they are out in the cold, hard world, that they will be together and that they will look after each other.

I’m so blessed to have children who get along with each other, who consider each other best friends and who aren’t repulsed by the idea of sharing an apartment together when they become full-fledged, responsible adults.

I don’t know, it makes me feel like I’m doing something right, you know?