Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Second grade homework strikes again

Growing up I hated math.  HATED it.  I clearly remember saying "why do I need to do this stuff, I'm never going to use it again in my whole life".  Well, life proved me wrong as I basically do math for a living.  Algebra and all. 

Math has changed a lot since I was in the second grade.  They have this newfangled NEW math now.  The schools really should have night school for us parents who use "olden days" math.  Case in point:

Tommy brings home this math homework before Thanksgiving.  It was called "Ballpark Estimations".  First of all, why do we need this?  If they want a ballpark estimation for 59 + 63 why don't they just add the two together and have the correct answer instead of a close enough answer?  Anyway, I read the instructions on the back of the worksheet and we went to work on it.

Yesterday the homework came home.  They were ALL wrong.  All of them.  I consider myself a fairly intelligent person so I was slightly offended that none of them were right.  And here is the kicker...I'm not sure WHY they were wrong!!!!

I'm volunteering in Tommy's class on Friday and asked his teacher if I could stay after and have her show me what the !@#$%^&*!!! I did wrong.  Stay tuned.

Monday, November 28, 2011

Black Friday

I never participated in Black Friday until I had a child.  Sure, we used to go with our mom the day after Thanksgiving, but that was back in the olden days when stores still opened at a normal time. 

Two years ago the furnace went out and it was FREEZING in our house, so I got up and went to Walmart at 5am.  What a disaster and I proudly claimed that I would NEVER do that again.  The next year I got up at 4am and went to Kohl's.  I was in such a fuzzy state I'm still trying to figure out who I bought all of that stuff for, and yes, I claimed NEVER AGAIN.

Of course I got lured in again this year by a video game that Tommy wanted that was nearly half off at Target this year, so I planned to go.  I convinced my friend, Leslie to go with me, and then on Thanksgiving we recruited Lexi and Ally to go as well.  To kill time I took the girls to a movie but first we needed coffee so we hit the McDonalds Drive Thru.  TWENTY FIVE minutes later we had our coffee, which we had to guzzle down (my throat is still in pain) and went to the movie.  We swung by and picked up Leslie and went to Target.

For some reason I had it in my head that they opened at 10.  Nope.  Midnight.  Crap.  Now we have 90 minutes to kill.  Went and got some gas, thought about going to Walmart, even got so far as the bank across the street to park and then nixed it.  So we went to the other Target and the line was wrapped around the building.  We sat in the car where it was warm and Leslie and the girls played trivia on her phone.  A few minutes before midnight we made our way to the front of the store realizing we would have to wait until the entire line was inside first.

We saw lots of people we knew, everyone was in a happy, cheerful mood.  No pepper spray or stampeding, so that was a plus.  About 1220 the line was inside so the rest of us were allowed in.  We decided it was too difficult to drive a cart, we would just carry our purchases...good thing I brought my elves with me. 

I sent elf #1 (Leslie) off on a secret mission.  Lexi had to make a pit stop so Ally and I headed to electronics where there was a huge line.  I stuck her in the line and headed to the video games.  Luckily I found what I was after right away and I went to rescue Ally from the line.

Then we headed off to housewares.  Their uncle just moved back here from Taiwan and he's setting up a household, so we got a coffee maker, toaster, etc.  This is where the elves came in handy.  We all carried boxes to the front and checked out.  We were out of there by 1245.

The next day after sleeping in I headed up to Evergreen to my friend, Larae's store, Marmalade.  She sells the best jewelry, really unique and beautiful.  I knocked off some gifts from my list all while supporting small business, and headed back home. 

Then after dinner with my hubby, we hit the mall.  My sister was at the mall at Midnight and said it was crazy but she got some good deals.  The place was still busy at 7 o'clock that night, especially the Apple store.  They had a good system though, an express check out.  You basically walked in, said what you wanted and paid.  Of course we got behind the people who were asking a million questions and taking forever, which didn't go over real well with Adrian.  But another checker outer showed up to rescue us.  I don't mind that store, but seriously, turn on some A/C...it was about a thousand degrees in there.

All in all, Black Friday was pretty fun.  I can't believe I'm saying it, but I probably will go Black Friday shopping again next year, as long as my elves are available!

Sunday, November 6, 2011

I'm pretty sure my husband's car is out to get me

I have had nothing but trouble with that car since the day it arrived.  I took a day off of work to take delivery of that car.  From this point on I will refer to the car as Black Widow, or BW for short.

The guy off loaded BW into the street and parked her kind of crooked.  After he drove away with his load of cars, I tried to put BW into the driveway, but it would not start.  Turns out, it was out of gas.  I was nice and went to the gas station, bought some gas, put it in the car, and pulled it into the driveway.  Later that day Adrian discovers it has no dashboard, none of the gauges are working. 

So while he was out of town I dropped BW off at the shop and went to pick her up a few days later.  But the place was CLOSED, in the middle of the day!  My friend Susan had to take me to get Tommy at school and drop us off at home, only to head back up there an hour or so later to get the car.

Those were just minor things, right?  Well, I have been pretty vocal that BW is going to get pulled over because the windows are tinted too dark for Colorado law, and there is nowhere on the front of the car for a license plate, also a Colorado law.  Well, BW is pissed at me for talking smack about her.

Friday night as the three of us are going to dinner, I get inside the car and RRRIIIIPPPP something tore in my lower back.  I literally could not get out of the car.  Adrian had to help me out and up to the bed, where I have been the most of the weekend.  This morning we ventured out for some breakfast and as I walked past BW in the garage, I swear, she snickered at me as I hobbled by.

Adrian leaves for a road trip tomorrow and he's taking Christine, I mean, Black Widow, to the airport.  I get a few days of reprieve from Adrian's killer car.  In the meantime, feel free to bring over any pain killers you may have squandered away, I can put them to good use!