In the week or two ahead of Christmas I do my best to cut back on errands that require me to go out in public so as to avoid the chaos. It’s bad enough dealing with the occasional distracted driver or the one who drives across parking lots like a bat out of hell or the people who bump into others without apologizing on a normal day in the spring; the second half of December is the worst. Years like this one when Hanukkah arrived and ended a little early are my favorite because it helps the cause, the cause being my sanity. Unfortunately, Jim and I do need to…
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They Blinded Me With Science Humor
When I was researching my Chicago family travel book (Wait. You didn’t know I wrote this book? Huh.), I found all kinds of places around the Chicago area that my family had never experienced before. One of my (and my boys’!) very favorites was American Science & Surplus. This is not a sponsored post, by the way. The store contains what you would expect: science stuff and odds and ends. Lots of it is VERY odd, in fact. You can get test tubes and bottles, but you can also get little motors and paper and maps and crime scene tape and marbles and lava lamps and frames and military stuff…
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Pee Pee Chicken
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How Can You Argue With Logic Like That?
D’s affinity for taking showers that use every last drop of hot water in the house has been well-documented (Okay, in one post, but it was a very thorough documentation). When he went away to college, our water bill went down by about $750 per month* and the whole family got used to having enough hot water for our own showers again. Whenever he comes home, there’s always a “re-acquaintance period” during which we all forget that we need to do anything we can to take our showers before he wakes up each day. Yesterday was Christmas, which in our house means that we just laze around in the family…
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It’s A Mother’s Responsibility To Laugh When Her Sons Prank Each Other. (Isn’t It?)
It’s worked out pretty well that D and J are nearly three years apart. They aren’t too close together where constant comparisons would probably be in the air, and they aren’t so far apart that they don’t have anything in common. Even though they have had their little beefs with each other over the years and, back in the day, each used to respond “No, not really!” when people would ask if they got along, they really have treated each other better than many other sets of brothers do. (I don’t think they realize how poor some brotherly relationships are!) Now that D goes to college they get along even…