Accustomed to the veneer of noise, to the shibboleths of promotion, PR, & market research, society is suspicious of those who value silence.

OK here it is noon, and I feel like I am holding it together pretty well today, for me, considering the following (again taking into consideration the source…):

I woke up this morning with Jude in my bed (feet in my face) and Si sleeping on my floor. WTF? Would it be just wrong to lock my bedroom door?

The duplex next door to us is for sale. The owner had a good offer on it but during the inspection they found a rusted support beam. The buyer withdrew his offer. We were seriously bummed, as the ideal situation (for us the neighbors) would be to have the owner living in one side while renting the other, which was the buyer-to-be’s plan. So the owner, instead of funneling a ton of cash into fixing the real problem, the deal-breaking problem, is apparently fixing that by propping it up and instead spending thousands on landscaping. Yessirree, who cares if your house is falling down if you have green grass and pretty shrubs? The guys who are doing the work have been running the chainsaw and rototiller nonstop since eight this morning. I am going nuts. My Zoloft dose is just not high enough to cope with this constant assault on my ears.

We went to story time at the local library today. I find their children’s librarian a tad cloying and patronizing, but the kids seem to like her and I give her credit just for being a children’s librarian. (There’s good reason why I actively sought out collegiate surroundings for my library career…) At any rate we read a few stories, sang a few songs – well, “we” might be a misstatement. All the other children did this. My boys stubbornly sat on the floor while the others shook their sillies out, yawned their sleepies out, clapped their crazies out (I wonder if that would work for me?). Simon threw a fit during the Marching Around the Alphabet song and sulked in a chair while the rest of us pointed out letters and marched in circles. I don’t really know why I care – Si was actively participating in the story reading and question-and-answers; he just didn’t want to dance and sing. (And really, who does?) But I felt very self-conscious that my kids were the only ones not participating – and it made me feel like I had to haul my ass up off the floor where I was very comfortable, thank you very much, and participate, to try to convince them to do so. Otherwise I’d happily have sat and read my book. But noooooo…..

We picked up yet more library books – mostly Arthur Lobel, Mouse Soup in particular. At the visit to the ped yesterday, Si discovered this book and fell in love. He tried to convince me to go to the bookstore to buy it, “so I can have it forever,” but I held him off for a library copy. I have to have something to buy the kid for Christmas, for Pete’s sake. I also tried to find Kage Baker’s In the Garden of Iden but the library copy appears to have disappeared.

I am a third of the way through The Sparrow and I like it. It’s sci-fi without being so sci-fi as to be off-putting; the characters are intriguing, the plot is curious, and I like the set-up of the timeline of the book. (David, I think you would really enjoy it. If my opinion changes after I finish it, I’ll let you know. )

We had to go to the ped because Si’s, ahem, member hurts. I think it is due to all the pulling and tugging the thing’s undergoing lately, but Dan was worrying and once again second-guessing the circumcision decision, so I obligingly hauled him (Si, not Dan) off to the doc. (Although that second option appeals for many reasons as well.) Fret not, everything is fine. Trying to get a four-year-old to give a decent urine specimen might just have been the highlight of my day. The ped’s diagnosis, and I quote: it “could be sore due to all the yanking around.” I do the best I can but how many times a day do I really have to repeat, “Si, get your hands out of your pants.” It’s replaced boogey-mining as the favored hand activity. Last winter Dan worried himself sick about the chin-licking (don’t ask); this summer it’s penis-pulling and nose-picking. We would definitely have a gold medal contender in the Disgusting Bodily Habits Olympics, were such a thing to exist.

I feel as if I should comment on Rock Star INXS, but with the only singer left that I simply hate being Swiss Miss, what’s the point? Who wants to comment if you can’t be snarky? Although I will say this: she appears older every week. That saggy-boobed dress on Tuesday clinched the age thing for me: she’s got to be close to fifty by now.