Too much

Wednesday evening, Drew, Duncan, my Mom and I were all hanging out at home when the power went out. Drew and Duncan were downstairs in the family room and my Mom and I were upstairs in the laundry/craft room. There were no exclamations from the basement, however. I felt my way down the hallway and down the stairs to discover a glowing light in the room. It was Hunter's laptop, and it was running on battery power, bathing the otherwise dark room in a comfy glow of light.

We grabbed some candles and I found the little box of matches I keep at my desk. No emergency-type candles here! They were all cute smelly things. If you're going to have a power outage, why not have it smell good, right? About five minutes later the power came back on.

My mom thought the event was the result of a storm coming in. No one else could come up with an explanation, but we were glad to have electricity in the house again. It's so handy.

This morning, the three kids and I were all sitting in the family room. Five computers were running and the lights were on. Duncan had also turned on the space heater, which I got out and used for a while last night. I was giving myself a pedicure next to the space heater. Then the lights went out again. It was like a repeat of the other night, except this time there was daylight coming in the windows and there were still lights on in the hallway.

The breaker! But what were we doing differently with the electricity than every other day? I turned off the lights and unplugged the space heater. Then I found the switchplate in the furnace room and discovered the switch labeled "family room" was halfway between "on" and "off", so I flipped it all the way off and then on again. This time I heard exclamations. The power had come back on.

Could the little space heater have been enough to pop the breaker? I was using it last night, but at that time my computer was the only one on. The heater had been running for at least an hour this morning with all the computers on, but it wasn't until that moment that the system overloaded.

Sometimes my life feels like that. I feel as though I'm running with every computer and every light on at all times, but I can feel my own breaker screaming to go off when my physical surroundings begin to get cluttered. I can handle a lot of busyness, but I can't handle the stress of visual and auditory busyness all around me. Lots of people, lots of stuff, lots of noise, and I lose it.

Sometimes I don't realize that the busyness has already popped my internal breaker until I stop and notice that the laundry isn't getting done, the house isn't getting cleaned, my inbox is stacked full of papers, and there are dirty dishes all over the table. These are the overwhelming visual clues that should have shut me down long before. Sometimes I just get too self-absorbed and miss the exclamations when my own power goes out and I somehow keep going. Battery power maybe? I suppose we all have some reserves we don't realize we're running on until they start to go out, as well.

Today I'm going to reset all the visual overwhelm around me, and get busy with the activities that are teetering on total overwhelm. I see the cues. I need to do something about it now. It's Friday, but it's also my work-schedule Monday so this is my last chance. If I don't start unplugging things now, I can tell already that breakers are going to be going off all over the place very soon.

That was easy!

This morning I had a meeting at the high school to create a 504 plan for my oldest son, who has dyslexia and dysgraphia. I went in with almost no idea what to expect. Would there be some battle over it? Would it be no big deal? I have purposefully avoided the public schools for years and years because of the dyslexia, but this school has been very welcoming so I was actually a bit surprised when I was told right off that they didn't think they could do a 504 for a student who only has one class there. Then I was surprised again when, after explaining what school he is attending full-time - the Open High School of Utah, the "we can't help you" line was immediately reversed and we were able to simply hand over the list of accommodations from the dyslexia testing and everything was accepted without another question. Boom!

So today I have to say I am impressed and thankful that Open High School has already managed to build a good reputation and that East High School is so welcoming! I'm also grateful to Nanci Ross for preparing such a wonderful report of his dyslexia testing so I could go in and simply hand over the list of accommodations without having to fight over anything. Hooray!

And now I have to go assist with some geography homework before that same son gets any more annoyed at me for sitting here writing on my blog instead of helping him.

Edited for content

I wrote up and was all ready to post a rather angry description of what I did today - taser training - but decided that it was not appropriate to put on my blog. As much as the whole thing made me angry about some aspects of my job, I do like my job and I want to keep it. For now. Until something that doesn't involve being expected to know police training - or any training, really - without ever having received it comes along.

Alas, I still feel like ranting today. Let's make a list about what I could rant about!

1. I could rant about how my youngest son is still not doing what he's supposed to do, and how my daughter is now slipping into similar behavior. Maybe if I yelled at her in Russian? Sadly, she knows far more Russian than I do.
2. I could rant about how my should-be-ex-husband insists on coming into my house every time he picks up the kids, even though I think that is clearly violating personal space and I have never stepped one foot into his house. I think I'm going to have to be blunt and ask him to please stay the hell out. Maybe I'll say it more nicely than that. Maybe not.
3. I could rant about how I have about 100 tomatoes and no one else in the family will eat them.
   
4. I could rant about how I always seem to get photo orders on weekends when I have no reason to be driving all the way to Davis County, and yet don't get them on the days when I do have to drive up there.
5. I could rant about how I was informed today that I have to attend a meeting for Nutcracker volunteers which, by the way, happens to be tomorrow at 5:30. No need for advance notice or anything. My life is so boring I welcome the addition to my otherwise-lazy Saturday afternoon. It's not like I had promised to be somewhere else at 5:45 because I had nothing on my schedule. No problem.
6. I could rant about how my daughter is never going to get the bedroom cleaned up. Aren't girls supposed to be tidier than boys? I mean, my boys are slovenly but at least they leave room to walk around most of the time.

I could rant about those things, but instead I think I'll eat pie and play video games until I feel better. It would be in your best interest not to disturb me. I don't have a taser but I do have a whole bunch of tomatoes sitting right here...

Today as a list #26

1. I was thinking today that I should start writing more on my blog again. I don't want it to be a chore, but I miss the record it leaves behind. Sometimes our life here is very boring, but most of the time there is some wacky story to tell pretty much every day. If nothing else there's always the diary aspect. And the lists! I miss making lists.
2. This morning we went to the Hansen Planetarium with the Washington Online School, Duncan's new school. We got to meet his teacher and the school director in real life. They aren't just email addresses after all! We also got to see the IMAX movie "Magnificent Desolation" in 3D. It was fun and interesting, and I think we all learned something about the Apollo moon landings. Drew was miffed that we didn't go to the dome theater so I gave her an assignment to plan a trip to see the show about Saturn. We'll see if that ever actually happens. She'll get around to it... right after she finishes cleaning the bedroom.
   
3. Duncan lost his retainer on Halloween so yesterday we went to have a new impression made and today he went - on his own - to pick up the new retainer. Between that and dance and clogging my bank account that was just barely refilled yesterday is now empty again. Grrrrrr! I should make him work to pay me back somehow.
4. One cool thing that Duncan did yesterday - but which in no way makes up for losing his retainer - was make cookies for the neighbors. He made the chocolate chip cookie dough almost all by himself, then baked them all, portioned them out, and took them around the neighborhood. Two of the families he had intended to take them to missed out because he happened to trip and fall, and some of the cookies fell in the dirt. He was sad about that and decided there weren't enough dirt-free cookies left to take to those families. None of us complained because it meant we got to eat the rest of them.
5. Now I'm fat. I blame Duncan. Must find slave labor for that boy to do as recompense...
   
6. I had a great idea today about what to do for birthday parties this year. We're going to make movies! I'll have to work out all the details so we have a couple of digital video cameras with confident people running them, costumes, and a fun storyline that's not too difficult to execute in two-hour's time, but I think that would be so much fun! Then everyone who comes can decorate an envelope with their address on it and we can send them a copy of the finished project. Parents who freak out at the idea of their children being put on YouTube may choose to opt out. Poor things.
   
7. I'm working on my Harry Potter scarves again. The winter will not end before I have them finished!
   

Letter to Duncan

Dear Duncan,

You love dancing, and I think that's great! You could be really good at it if you keep working hard. One thing, though. I think you need to seriously reconsider taking hip-hop and breakdancing. I know you feel like you're the "little kid" in those classes, but the reality is that the other kids there have started too late and should have been learning it when they were your age. You are at a distinct advantage if you learn to dance like that now! And here's why. You really need to be able to dance like these guys:

YouTube video of Michael Jackson's "Bad"

Check out the dance sequence at 2:50. These guys can obviously dance more than just "pop and lock", too. There's evidence of classical dance education in there, but you can't learn all that stuff in ballet class.

I'm restraining myself and not embedding my all-time favorite Michael Jackson video here. You're welcome.

Instead, you have to watch these guys. These are the "now" reasons to learn this stuff:

Flawless, from Britain's Got Talent, 2009

And the guys who actually won this year:

Diversity

Wouldn't it be awesome to be able to dance like that, too?

Love, Mom

Chicken coop progress

Say hello to the hen formerly known as "Odd", and who shall hereafter be known as "Peaches." Duncan gave up on naming her "Kalimdor" because, as he said, "It's kind of official now because Nama already started calling her Peaches."

Today we moved the chicken coop and pen so that they are put together as originally intended. We ran out of time to finish the most important part, however: the door into the pen. So until I can get that done, we're going to have to pull the pen back away from the coop in order to get inside and get to the chickens' food and water - a task requiring at least two people every time. Ah well! That should provide some incentive to get the door done! I doubt we're going to have any time during the week, but maybe by Thursday, Friday, and Saturday we can eek out a few hours here and there and get this project finished. Then we'll be set until springtime, when we have to move it all aside again so we can build a new, bigger, and definitely nicer coop and pen. I'm saving my pennies already. It's going to cost a lot of them.

Chicken mystery - solved?

This past Wednesday we lost our little Easter Egg Chicken. The two hens were lounging about happily in the back yard around noon, but when Duncan went out to put them in their pen at 3:30, Azzie was missing. This was not terribly unusual, but Duncan searched everywhere he knew to look and couldn't find her. I had just left to take Hunter and Drew to some classes so we were gone until 6:30 and I think he cried the entire time. He was teary-eyed the rest of the evening, too. Poor guy!

As soon as we got home we started searching, and it didn't take long to find a couple of piles of chicken feathers on the neighbor's lawn. Oh no! I was pretty sure it was a dog who got her because I didn't think a cat would be brave enough to take on a bird bigger than itself, and with big wings to boot. Also, I figured a cat would have left a trail of feathers instead of just a pile on the lawn. Hunter maintained that since we didn't find a body there was still a chance she would just be hiding somewhere, scared, and reappear. But she didn't.

Friday morning I went to the classifieds at ksl.com and found an ad for one little Easter Egg Chicken in Lehi. The family was wanting to give her away because they keep their chickens free-range in their yard, and this one had a habit of hiding her eggs all over the place, instead of laying them in the nesting box like the other hens. A rebel! They didn't even know if she were still laying because they couldn't find any eggs, and they were tired of hunting for them.

Well, I don't care if she doesn't lay eggs. We just need a companion for this other very lonely little hen who has never before been without her friend. So I drove down this morning and brought home a "new" hen.

I'll have to get pictures later, after I take a nap (1.5 hours of sleep just doesn't cut it), but suffice it to say she is peach-colored, essentially the same age as the other hen, and seems very sweet. I creatively wanted to name her "Peach", but Duncan said he had hoped to get to name her Kalimdor. Oh. My. Gosh. Another chicken named for a fictional continent in a computer game! I may compromise if he agrees to call her "Kallie". We shall see. In the meantime, she seems to get alone fine with Rosie. They flapped their wings at each other one time and that was that. When I went to put them away, she followed Rosie right into the pen and they are now pecking around in there, happily ever after.

But wait! There is more! While I was standing in the back yard watching the chickens get to know each other, suddenly a pair of falcons swept down from the sky - right at Rosie! She was trotting across the yard at the time, and luckily went under a tree right as they swept down, so they had to fly back up into a tree, minus their prey. I was shocked! SHOCKED! Birds of prey, in our back yard! Not that that is so unusual, but I hadn't actually seen them up close before. I suspect they regularly prey on the many squirrels we have in our yard and in the field behind us (and probably on the golf course behind that, too.)

So my new-improved theory of Azzie's disappearance is that a falcon got her, and that they've been watching and waiting for the past three days for us to let the other chicken out of her pen so they could come back for seconds. Not so fast! I'd already planned to spend time this afternoon rearranging and setting up the pen and coop so the chickens can just stay in there all winter, and come and go within that protected area as they please. Now I have an even better reason to do that! (But first, a nap. Zzzzzzz)