Rain, Rain, Go Away...

For years, I've battled my kids' predilection to put ketchup on all comestibles. I've read Mrs. Pig's Bulk Buy to the little savages any number of times. To this day I refuse to help them put ketchup on their hotdogs, as I have no wish to aid and abet a culinary crime. And I blame my husband for not nipping this ketchup thing in the bud. If it were up to me, their virgin mouths would never have tasted anything but mustard on their frankfurters.

Anyway, dinner yesterday - baked beans, cauliflower, and salad. No meat, since I'm raising a bunch of Catholics who must be penitent on Fridays in Lent. This restriction makes them more whiny than remorseful, however, as they are used to having hotdogs with their baked beans. Susie, trying to make the best of a bad situation, asked for ketchup for her cauliflower. And, in a moment of weakness, I gave it to her.

You know what? She ate that cauliflower. She said it was, and I quote, "Yum." So, cauliflower and ketchup - go ahead and try it. It's the cuisine du jour. Yum.

I slept on the couch last night. There is only so much snoring one woman can take. I can sleep with regular, rhythmic snoring. It's listening to the "Snore....hold your breath for 15 seconds....loud SNORT....hold your breath...." routine that destroys sleep for me. Call me fussy, but when the person in the bed next to me isn't breathing? I don't find that restful.

It's Saturday, the day we either run around and get a lot of stuff done or else do something fun with the kids. And guess what? We're doing neither. Larry's sick, I've got some lousy head cold that is giving me a bad attitude, and it is pouring rain (cold rain) outside. Luckily, the teens are out of the house all day working a fundraiser (in the rain) for workcamp. I hate having them around on a bad day, because they make me feel worse.

Of course, having the little kids going stir-crazy in the house is no picnic, either. I just bribed them - if they would please leave me alone for 20 minutes, I would play UNO with them. Now they are all sitting at the dining room table (i.e., within earshot) bickering over how to deal out the cards. Good Lord, just kill me now.

I have to pull myself together. I was reminded last night that I am supposed to talk about homeschooling math materials at the curricula meeting today. I don't know what was going through my head when I promised to do that. Maybe I thought the weather would be springlike and none of us would be sick and that I would actually be able to find my math curricula materials in time. Wrong, wrong, and wrong. So I'm showing up with a headache and doped up on Sudafed and Tylenol, with nothing but my son's 6th-grade math workbook in my hands.

Hey, these new homeschooling moms need a dose of reality anyway. Let them see what being home with the kids every day can do to a person. That way they can go into this homeschooling thing with their eyes wide open. With terror. It gets their adrenaline pumping.