Where Can I Buy Cheap Tanning Lotion? I Have Some Science To Fake.

These Are Random Words Formed Into Paragraphs To Create The Necessary Backstory:

So, a couple months ago as Katie, Ellie and I were walking home from school in the crisp fall air (that darkly foreshadowed the gloom and doom of Januaries to come*) Katie told me about an assembly they had all about allergies. Her story about the assembly prompted me to tell a story about a friend, who also had allergies. And, who, in respect to their Internets privacy I will hence forth in this post refer to strictly as "they" or "their" or "one" or "whom" or possibly "thou". Because online anonymity should be respected by everyone. Facebook.  

On a side note: Everyone who got to this post through my personal Facebook account, "HI!" (Waves excitedly, like a bit of an idiot, but just a bit, because, sometimes it's more responsible to lie on the Internets than tell the truth.) And everyone who got here through my blogs Facebook account?

--------

 Yep. Those be crickets.

Anyway, as I was saying, I have a friend, One Whom when They were a baby was allergic to just about everything.  I'm talking bread, chocolate, milk, nuts, strawberries, oranges, basically if normal people ate it, Thou was allergic to it. Except for carrots. So Their parents fed Them a safe diet of pureed carrots. Until Thee, Ye Friend, turned orange. For reals.

Except I've never seen a picture of my Friend as an orange baby. So, maybe not for reals. However, except for a weird distrust of my use of a vegetarian broth powder that one time They came over for dinner, has never proved to be anything but perfectly trustworthy and has yet to lead me astray in the realm of personal remembrances. So I can only assume, like Peeta and Katniss's love, Thee Thou's story is for totes real.

End of Necessary Backstory Which, Upon Reflection, May Not Have Been All That Necessary But Did Allow Me To Use The Words "Thou" And "Totes" In The Same Sentence Which Shakespeare Would Totes Appreciate, Obvi.

So, last night, when Katie and Ellie excitedly ran into the kitchen, their eyes shining with the twin lights of imagination and scientific inquiry (one for each eyeball, obvi), and asked if they could have some carrots and oranges for snack so they could turn themselves orange, like any good mother, I said no.

BECAUSE! Dinner was supposed to be in like 45 minutes, and, I couldn't have them ruining their appetites with carro-

Ok. Yeah. I eventually got there too.

So after I handed them each a carrot to "eat like a rabbit" I made them dinner:

Because I care about the quest for knowledge by young scientific inquirerous minds.

Plus I have, like, a whole box of nasty orange flavored Emergen-C to use up.

Which of course meant I spent all of dinner time reasoning with Katie and Ellie that drinking the whole glass of orange flavored Emergen-C was vital to the bond the ions of the beta carotene in the vegetables needed to make with the electrons of the manganese gluconate in order to achieve the perfect shade of orange skin. Which, considering the grades I got in Chem class in high school, might be true?

But then, Katie looked at me with her Mom-Used-Too-Many-Science-Words-In-A-Row-She's-Probably-Making-This-Up eyes, which meant I had two options; 1) confess I was full of scientific bravado or 2) own it.

----------(this is the part where)--------------

----------(I pretended to weigh)-------------

----------(both my options)------------

And that night, the kids were in bed half an hour early in order to allow their bodies to lie in an extended, relaxed and, obvi, prone stasis so that the process of carotenosis could develop fully on their skin.

Because beta carotene is a terpenoid that derives from isoprene units. So it's very lipophilic. Which means, in order for carotenemia to establish itself, it needs 8-10 hours in a dark, cozily warm environment that doesn't keep coming downstairs asking Mommy for a drink of water... or a special stuffed animal... or if they can read just one more chapter of their book...or if....

And then? (deep sigh) All through the house not a creature was stirring because the children were too busy trying to turn into human carrots and I was watching the newest episode of Sherlock. Blissfully uninterrupted.



*She said in her best Alferd Packer imitation. Which also comes in song form.

Apparently The Seahawks Are A Big Deal? Huh. I Wonder What Benjamin Franklin Thinks About That.

Progression of a Football Fan
Specifically, On Friday, January 17, 2014

Now With All! New! Time! Stamps!

3:04:58

Arrive at Katie's school. Wonder why the kids are all shouting about "peacocks". Because, from where I stand in the parent pick up amoeba mob, I saw, like, zero teachers dressed in peacock costumes running around the playground being chased by students who had racked up 100+ hours of independent reading time. Which was disappointing, because that would have been awesome.

3:05:15

Realize that they kids are actually chanting about the Seahawks after spotting a teacher dressed in a football costume wearing a 12th man cape. (Note to self: Ask the Internets why only 11 people are allowed to play football. Plus: What's the historical football symbolism behind the quantity "12"?) 

3:05:47

Pat myself on the back for remembering that the Seahawks is the name of our professional football team. That play in a stadium. With a ball. And helmets. On a field of green. 

3:06:55

Search the Internets on my phone to see when the "Big Game" that everyone seems excited about is going to be aired. 

3:07:09

Notice that the game is scheduled to be performed on Sunday, at the same time the Family Folk Dance is supposed to be at the local community center. Think, "Dude! No wonder Jon isn't excited about going to the dance! He probably just wants to watch the football game!" 

3:08:01

Consider not only letting Jon off the hook about the Family Folk Dance but also staying home with the girls, making popcorn, and watching the game. As a family! Because maybe we should support our team? Plus there'd be popcorn....

3:08:39

Smile, in sportsman like solidarity, at one of the other mom's in Katie's class. Go Hawks!

3:08:52

Eyes brighten as she tells me, a FELLOW FOOTBALL ENTHUSIAST, about how she got a 12 cent coffee just for wearing blue and green to Starbucks.

3:10:11

Look down at my pants and wonder if the random Crayola marker swirls Ellie "accidentally" got all over my jeans would count as wearing our teams colors.  

3:10:45

Discard idea as silly and, really, an insult to our helmeted warriors in blue and green. Come up with a better idea. 

3:11:03

Map all the Starbucks on my phone because, Dude! $0.12 COFFEE!!! And, obviously because THE SEAHAWKS ARE BEASTLY AWESOME!

3:12:13

Plan a run for tomorrow morning in which I deck myself out in neon green compression socks and blue running shirt, and, with my running belt full of change, stop at each and every single Starbucks within a five mile radius, like my own caffeinated version of a pub run. But way cooler because eventually I'd buy myself a scone. Because they look like little pastry footballs. Of sugary goodness. Start chanting SEA! HAWKS! SEA! HAWKS! Silently. In my own head. Hopefully.

3:13:00

Casually ask fellow mom and, obviously, rabid Seahawk fan, if the 12 cent coffee deal goes on all weekend. Which, yes, I could look up on my phone, but, obviously, the Seahawks fandom is all about TOGETHERNESS and TEAMWORK!

3:13:29

Incredulously, indignantly and with thoroughness I douse my newly ignited Seahawk fan spark with a carafe of home brewed coffee. Literally. By which I mean figuratively. Because, according to the strangely overly enthusiastic football fan I was standing next to at parent pick up, the 12 cent coffee is a one day deal.

And now, on Superbowl Sunday Saturday Fri- Sunday (probably), when the Seahawks charge onto that field of green, I will be there, raising my home brewed cup of coffee high, in symbolic paraphrase of Benjamin Franklin's famous proverb:

For want of a 12 cent cup of coffee the fan was lost, 

for want of a fan the team was lost;

and for want of a team the game was lost; 

being overtaken and slain by the enemy,

all for want of care about a 12 cent cup of coffee.

            -The Way to Wealth (1758)

And then I will drink my coffee. While staring down the Seahawks fandom through the whole nine innings.

And that's a promise.

Well, you know, unless I'm at the community center folk dancing my boots off. Because there's no way you could combine the awesomeness of folk-

Wait a minute.

google google youtube internets

DUDES! I'M BACK IN!

January and Me? We're Like Hamilton and Burr, Elizabeth and Mary, Ahab and Moby, Milli Vanilli and That Skipping Recording; One Of Us Is Goin' Down

This morning? I finally pulled my lazy butt out of bed in the wee hours of the pre-dawn darkness to do one of the "gosh darn it just make your fat jiggle workouts" "good enough workouts" I had pinned on PinINterest. Which was completely necessary, because, it's January and I'm in a funk and my running has squeaked to a standstill. Again. And, doing a sequence of jumping jacks, crunches, squats and Russian twists in my cold, dank, windowless basement was the best way to raise my spirits, obviously. Except, it was still all overcast, cold and rainy when I was done.

Stupid January.

So, if you see me about the neighborhood later today, head low, rain boot shod feet slogging through the puddles, Ellie skipping ahead under her clown fish umbrella, feel free to join me, because it's likely that I'm totally playing this game I made up after my two week visit to the southwest entitled, "You Don't Need This In Arizona!"

But, I have to warn you, Ellie is quite good at it.

Me: (mumbling, scowling, sighing... being all around cantankerous, about to yell at some kids to "GET OFF MY LAWN!" in a minute.) Umbrellas. You don't need stupid umbrellas in Arizona. Or stupid raincoats. Or stupid rain boots. Or-
Ellie: (her perpetually happy three year old voice fluttering up from underneath her umbrella) Oh! I know Mommy!
Me: (pausing my scowling but continuing to shiver inside my wool sweater and raincoat) Yeah?
Ellie: I know something you don't need in Arizona!
Me: What?
Ellie: (triumphantly) PANTS! (and then she danced down the sidewalk, her sparkly purple tutu swinging cheerfully over her pink rain pants, while singing a song she just made up about raindrops)

Dude, it's like she doesn't even appreciate a good curmudgeony wallow when she sees one.