Strawberry fiends forever:
50,000 at Strawberry Festival in Cedarburg…
Makes me glad I don’t live in Cedarburg anymore. I love people. In small doses, not 50,00 at a time. Em & Big Ed were thinking of driving up…50,002 sounds like it would have been way too cozy.
I had a very exciting week-end. Alicia of Fructus Ventris fame was passing through the area and we had a chance to get together for a visit with her and her charming husband. I suggested that we meet at Marytown because it was big, easy to find and much cleaner than my house. I only wish that I had checked to see if anything was going on there. The chapel was taken up with some sort of Polish music concert. But we did get a chance to visit the Kolbe Museum and find a quiet corner for a nice chat.
I had to reassure Fran more than once that I was not on my way to a rendezvous with an internet predator. Someone has taken all those Dateline programs to heart…

You're Pitiful
For anyone who is getting a tad tired of the musical stylings of James Blunt.
Not that I am....but still...

At the Ellyn von Huben Center For Children Who Can't Walk Good And Wanna Learn To Do Other Stuff Good Too, we teach you that there's more to life than being really, really snarky...
Not ready for bed yet. Waiting for the ibuprofen to kick in. Needless to say, I won’t be kneeling to pray my rosary. Can’t wait to see how I feel in the morning. It wouldn’t be a good day to take off of work. And why stay home when I don’t feel like doing anything? My unctuous phone persona is intact, so I am work-worthy.

I have some writing I want to do, but everything comes out nasty and sarcastic. Maybe just sleep would be better. I can rest easy knowing the crap journalism category is being ably covered by Christopher Hitchens. Vanity Fair pays him to write what? I don’t even want to discuss his latest column. Not here. Not now. Probably never.

...And whether you can hear it or not
The universe is laughing behind your back.
What was today about?
Here is a Catholic koan for you:
"If a church lady falls in the sactuary and no one is around to hear her, does she make a sound?"

I cannot answer that with certitude. Because when I fell down, there were about 60 CCD summer intensive students taking a tour of the church. I had to verify measurements of the mensa of the altar. That done I turned to walk away, completely forgetting the step down. Landing on my knees on the marble, banging my face into the processional cross, which hit the wall and and caught the attention of all the students who were supposed to be looking at the icon at the back of the church. Ouch. Double ouch. I made as graceful an exit as possible (“I’m OK kids!) and went back to the rectory to ice knees and face. It wasn’t until then I realized how lucky I was. My hip was not worse for the fall. (In fact, I was able to get up quite easily from the kneeling position with nothing to hold onto. It has only been in the past week or so that I’ve been able to kneel on a kneeler.) And I didn’t chip a tooth or do any damage of consequence. Just a few days ago I was talking about how cute Owen Wilson is, what with the wry crooked nose. But I don’t want one for myself.

Basically, it was my dignity that took a hit. I have this feeling that I was being mentioned tonight - if not by name - at more than a few dinner tables throughout the parish. And I was reminded that a manuever that I must have done innumerable times while ice skating back in the day is now quite painful.

It will be a long time (let us hope by Christmas) before I hear the phrase “Fall on your knees...” without a pang of fear.

But wait...it doesn’t end there. My bank called and left a cryptic message. I knew I wasn’t overdrawn, but I also knew I wasn’t a big time customer whom they would call to schmooze. What I found out was that their fraud detection department had caught a check, with a different name, from a different city and totally out of sequence that was imprinted with my routing and account numbers. So they had to close the account, temporarily freeze my assets, pitiable as they may be, and I had to hobble into the bank after work the thrash out with my personal banker what checks were still outstanding and should be honored. Like the checks for the car insurance and cable. The real pain for me was that I had my account number memorized and I didn’t want to have to learn a new one. I rely on calling the automated bank phone line to check my liquidity. On the other hand, this should be good for the budget, since I have new unprinted checks which I can’t use for much other than paying utility bills or whatever. No recreational - or necessary - Target shopping in the interim.

I’m packing it in early tonight. I’ll let someone else do the dishes. My knees are killing me. And, in an ill augury, I almost poked a knife in my eye while unloading the dishwasher this morning. Bed is the safest place at this point.

And reflect that whatever misfortune may be your lot
It could only be worse in Milwaukee.
Not necessarily....

Chuck’s New Do
This week-end’s big news is Chuck’s haircut. Up until now the big news has been his lack thereof. It’s been well over a year since his last haircut. He was going to get a trim for Emily’s wedding, but that detail was lost in the chaos. His hair was (is) beautiful - abundant, curly, healthy. Blessed with luck in this area of the genetic crapshoot, he also left his hair alone. That means very little combing and certainly none of the coloring, straightening, flattening and other types of abuse that his sisters heap upon their tresses. Chuck said he was growing it for charity - and we began to kid him about “Dreadlocks of Love.” But seriously, folks, his hair was longer than 10 inches when pulled straight, making it eligible for donation to Locks of Love. Emily was visiting yesterday and Chuck consented to allowing her to do the snipping. Multiple bunches were harvested, which are now collected into one long ponytail which I have to put in the mail tomorrow. (Would it be strange if I snipped one little curl to keep for myself? His hair didn’t curl like that when he was little. I think I have a tiny bit tucked away - awaiting placement in his yet to be created baby book - a small sample that Rick brought home from the barbershop to which he took Chuch for his first haircut. I think it was also the same place where Rick had his first haircut. By the time Eddie was shorn of his golden curls the barbershop was closed.) Chuck looks good with the short hair. It may take some getting used to. He walked out of the east door at church this morning and was blinded by the light.

Help me out here...
Am I shrinking or is the Stanley Cup getting bigger?

There are some things you can't cover up with lipstick and powder
Thought I heard you mention my name, can't you talk any louder
Don't come any closer, don't come any nearer
My vision of you, can it come any clearer...

I live in the best of many worlds. I love my family and our quirky home (even though I truly do want someone to want to do the dishes) and I have an outside job that I still enjoy immensely after five years. (Hey, it’s my first real paying gig since 1978...and probably my longest extended commitment outside of elementary school and marriage.)

What I’m lacking is perspective of a what work life should be like. As a fresh out of college newlywed, I worked as a secretarial temp until Embot was born. That was it, never staying in any one job to get a feel for what work should be like. I have it on the best authority that the office atmosphere I am in is not totally like the rest of the work world.

Outside of the priests and the youth minister, everybody at work (I’m not counting the maintenance men since they don’t have perform most of their work in the confines of the estrogen saturated office that rest of us ladies occupy...do you see where this is going?) is female. And though we are all of a ‘certain’ age (to put it delicately, I’m the baby of the group) the atmosphere often has all the gravitas of a seventh- grade girls locker room. And it often makes me want to wretch. I can’t imagine how the priests can stand having what amounts to a bag of cats in their house. Except that they are men and there are vibes that men don’t pick up on. But I also know a man (let’s call him my husband) who is oblivious to a certain amount of hysteria in four daughters, their girl friends and his wife until it reaches a toxic limit. If I’m glad to get away from the can-I pour-you-another-saucer-of-milk and would-you-kindly-retract-your-claws atmosphere, how much happier must the priests be to see us go?

I get along with everyone. Really. But I just can’t take the girly fluff/back-stabby stuff. I have a few work friends who are tres cool and fun to be with. They, too, enjoy the company of men. But with everyone else it can dissolve into just so much....girl talk. And girl talk often turns nasty. Stupifyingly nasty. How much “she said that she said you are like so...” can an adult woman take? I mean, really, a recording of the women chatting in the rectory would be almost identical with that of the junior high girls on the playground. Well, you’d have to delete the stuff about hot flashes and arthritis, but otherwise very little difference.

Yes, I heard that someone thought I spent too much time talking to the priests. (How did I hear it? Girls talk!) Well, yeah. I work for them. And they also have better things to talk about. They talk about interesting stuff - not about shopping, feeling guilty about what they ate or are about to eat or what new conditioner they found. This sounds so much like I don’t like the company of other women, so let me interject that some of my best friends are women. I am a woman. And I have long been a proponent of gender segregated education. But there is something about being around too many women for too long. It just shakes my nerves.

My mother once told me that she found herself gravitating to groups of men at social functions. She found that talking with women could make her crazy. There are women with whom you bond immediately; soul-sisters - and you can talk with them like you’ve known them all your lives. And then there are the girls that you make girl talk with. Insubstantial at best...like eating cotton candy. At worst...imagine a diet of multi-colored cotton candy.

It's a more or less situation inspired by girls talk
But I can't say, the words you want to hear
I suppose you're going to have to play it by ear,
right here and now girls talk...

It depends...
on which job I'm thinking of. Mom job or church job? With either I would, depending on the time of day, rate my job dissatisfaction at anywhere between 5% to 95%. But, while I may not be the problem, neither is the "company." So I'll just stay put.

Your Job Dissatisfaction Level is 59%

Well, you don't have the worst job in the world, but it's not great. And don't worry, you're not the problem - your company is. Start looking around for another job, even if you're not totally fed up. Because in time, you're going to be dying to quit!

Should You Quit Your Job?

Call me unsympathetic....
or cranky and up past my bedtime. Whatever. I can’t believe the newlywed couple that I just saw on the news. They are unhappy with their wedding pictures. Yes, there was an unexpected technical problem with pics after their first dance that the photographer was unaware of. And I believe the photographer has attempted to work out a pro-ration of the bill or some such thing. But the couple wants about $35,000 to re-do the reception and $100,000 in punitive damages for destroying their dreams or some such nonsense.

Oh, maybe it’s June, my time of year of marital introspection. So folks, my message is....if that’s the worst thing that happens to you in married life, you’re lucky. Get over it. If you are going to weep on TV because you don’t have professional pics of the midnight balloon drop at your reception, you may find the rest of life difficult.

As for the money to restage the reception? There are some things in life that you just don’t get do-overs. That’s one of them. (The birth of your sixth child is another. And did you see me melt down at the camera counter when all the pics were blank? Nooo. OK, so I cussed a blue streak when I got back to the car. But baby Eddie was preverbal, so I don’t think it did him any damage.) Go ahead, have a short private outburst and move on. Televised apoplexy will not bring that magical night back. God gave us memories. Use them. You don’t have pics to show your future children? A lot of civilization has gotten by with the ‘oral history.’

Pictures are important to newlyweds. But the fascination wears off. I didn’t even know where our wedding album was for the past eight years. And it would most likely still be missing if I hadn’t torn the closet apart looking for Emily’s baby book.

Loss is part of life. Get a grip.
(If any local relocated Katrina survivors who have lost everything saw these whiny cry babies, I wouldn’t be surprised if their first inclination was to hurl a brick through the telly. It was mine....and my lifetime losses thus far have been minimal compared to many.)

Someday... when I'm awfully low
when the world is cold
I will feel a glow just thinking of you
and the way you look tonight!
You just have to think. I don't need those pictures of baby Eddie. Every time I hear that song, I think of the night he was born. I can see him....just thinking of him, and the way he looked that night.

World Naked BIke Ride - That’s Gotta Hurt
"We don't expect everyone to be OK with this," said Danai, a 26-year-old Bucktown resident. "We're just trying to have a good time and raise awareness." (...and when I heard that it was for awareness, that sealed the deal!)

My “self-image” is fine and, yeah, I’m concerned with energy issues. Rick is really into energy issues, but I don’t think he is going to drop trou and hop on his recumbant bicycle and ride around Chicago.

“The Chicago ride will take place at night, Danai said, out of respect for parents who do not want their children exposed to adult nudity.”
I fear my children would also be horrified by the adult stupidity.

OCP Ringtones?
Another reason I’m happy to not have a cell phone. If I had to choose between an OCP ringtone and something really dreadful, let’s say like the Black Eyed Pea’s My Humps, I would still have to think about it.

Life must be looking up....
now our fabulous emails are no longer limited to Nigeria. Some fine folks in Togo now think we are fabulously prosperous, too. And eager to expand our wealth. Right....

It's weird to see two people so committed to destroying typical family structures and stereotypes.
Profound truths in the funniest places. (Skip the comments, they're well...vulgar)

About the tattoos with the coordinates of Angelina's kids' birthplaces. I love my kids, but....
Well, maybe I could commit to the longitude. I think longitudinally, all six are about the same. Give or take.
Of course, I don't have Billy Bob's name on my shoulder that I need to cover with something else. So we could just let the whole thing go. I'll do anything necessary for my children. Bone marrow, kidney, time, money. Whatever it might take. The tatt is superfluous. Superfluous...yet uncomfortably permanent.

Long ago...
in some college humanities class, I did a short paper on the blues. Can’t recall what the thrust of the paper was, but I still remember my amazement to find out that a massive amount of early blues records were made just a mile or two from my home...a town even more white-bread and boring than the one I was living in. Grafton, Wisconsin went up a whole lot in my estimation with that nugget of info. (I believe Port Washington, aka the town of my birth, also hosted some recording operations.) I was blown away that when my mother was a little girl, the same same interurban rail line that she would ride to high school etc. was travelled by some of the greatest figures in American musical history. The very path I had walked home from school everyday was the torn up interurban tracks. The synchronicity boggled my mind. Not that I was destined for a career in the blues. But still...

Skimming the Milwaukee area news this morning I found this:
”So as part of a "History Detectives" episode on the history Paramount Records that is expected to air in August, four scuba divers were hired to scour the river's bottom for the master recordings and records. The divers work for the Deep Blue diving center in Milwaukee.

From 1922 until 1932, Paramount made roughly one-fourth of all blues recordings produced in the United States at the Wisconsin Chair Company factory in Grafton.But would the dumped records be playable after more than 70 years in the Milwaukee River?

"You just don't know how well the shellac will hold up on the 78 records," she said. "But we hope to find out." *

The PBS show has found a specialist who has equipment to listen to master recordings if any are found, she said.

The August episode also will tell viewers what happened to Paramount Records and will share something about some of the African-American musicians who came to Grafton, said Tukufu Zuberi, who will host the show.”

*Rick and I were discussing the shellac thing. We have our doubts. Most of my experience with old records is limited to handing the load of Edison Diamond discs - which play at 80rpm, by the way - that I inherited from my mother’s family. Those babies are delicate. Then again, maybe the waters of the Milwaukee River will have had some miraculous preservative property.

I wonder if the Raloff family investment in records that played at 80 rpm was a portent of descendants who keep big boxes of BETA tapes...

Blackbird sitting on a HOSPITAL sign...
Wednesday's trip home from Chicago took forever. (Or so the the three girls in the back seat would say.) I called it quality time with my girls. *

One cool moment was when I looked out and saw a red-winged blackbird sitting on a big blue "H" hospital sign (don't remember the last time I saw a red-winged blackbird outside of a book) And, unlike trying to point out a bird among a bunch of trees or bushes - with a whisper lest it fly away - it was so easy to draw everyone's attention to the big blue H. A bird sitting along the Kennedy Expressway isn't particularly sensitive to noise, either.

*Bridget, thinking all of Chicago is compressed into a small area thought we should take a detour to Resurrection Cemetery
to look for Resurrection Mary. So much for giving her those Weird... books. Should have given her maps so she could see how far the far North Shore is from the southwest suburbs. As it was, Emily was so tired of the kvetching from the backseat that she was ready to leave us all on the side of the road.

Hail Satin
or
Attack of the Morons
Some idiots desecrated the shrines at Holy Hill, home of the143-year-old National Shrine of Mary, Help of Christians, just west of Milwaukee. One of the slogans read "Hail Satin," which attests either to the vandals' fondness for a fabric or to their intellectual capacity. The perps have been caught...and they don’t look or sound like they escaped from a Mensa meeting.

Graffiti removal experts are already on the job...
Contributions to help pay costs of the graffiti removal are being accepted. Checks payable to Holy Hill can be sent to:
Holy Hill
1525 Carmel Road
Hubertus, WI 53033
Attention: Father Cyril

We were just talking about Holy Hill the other day. I think the last time we were there was right before Rick’s big pheo surgery about 10 years ago. It’s time for another field trip...as soon as we have a vehicle that can safely leave the county. Fall would be good...it is so beautiful there in fall. My immediate plans are finding a way into the city for King Tut and the new frog exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry. I take that back. Those are short term plans. My immediate plan is to find the Field Museum membership card that is most likely in one of the free-floating stacks of mail all around the house.

And our next contestant is a homeschooling mother of six and part-time church secretary....
Well, one can hope. I just returned from my mini-vacation in the city with all four of my girls. After a cake and presents with our own family Omen, we hopped a late train* and were picked up by Embot to spend the night Chez Cheng. Pizza and more presents - by eleven Bridget had pretty much decided that the world wouldn’t end on her birthday - almost like a slumber party. Big Ed was quite gracious and patient with the five giggling, gabbing von Huben girls.

No longer used to city noises - and not acclimated to a futon - I didn’t get to sleep until about 2:00am. Then we were up early. My entourage had one last discussion of my wardrobe. (I know it lacks....something. So I was hardly offended when Fran did a hilarious piece by piece commentary on my closet on Monday night. I was sitting in an old T-shirt with L’Oreal’s 6RB - Light Reddish Brown applied to my head, so what could I do? Storm out in protest? Just so nobody sends my name into What Not to Wear.) The pink dress I wore last time was given to charity last year. It was still quite servicable. But it had that taint of failure for me. Maybe it will work better for someone else.

Attempted to curl my eyelashes. Brushed on a little mascara and a tad of some magical mineral powder to make me look like me...only better. And then I was wisked into the ‘bot’s car for a quick ride over to Navy Pier for an audition for a well-known game show. Another accomplishment I can brag about - I have a daughter who is absolutely unintimidated by rush hour Chicago traffic. (That must be a latent gene from her father’s side. I still consider driving in Milwaukee to be ‘big city’ driving.)

I was amazed to be there at all. The notification, with attendant 48 hour to RSVP, arrived in my work e-mail the day after my hip surgery. When I returned to work some two weeks later, what could I do but email back with the details of how I had to take the online test at work because it was done at 8:00pm and it was done on a night that I worked until 8:00. And then I didn’t expect to hear back from them so soon. Etc. Well, they did work me into their schedule.

So away I went. And I think I did OK. This isn’t the first time I’ve auditioned. But the last time - about 8 years ago - I think I exuded no personality. So that’s what I’ve been working on. Charm. Personality. Letting the “real me” shine through, as my late mother would have admonished. Everything but Vaseline on the teeth. I think it worked. We’ll see. There’s just a certain amount of luck involved. Many pass the audtion. Relatively few are chosen.

The girls took me to Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. for lunch. Bubba Gump was our fall back restaurant the last time I went to New Orleans. Just a block from where we were, if the weather was nasty or we were short on time, that is where we headed for food. (Yeah, drinks, too....) For a “chain type touristy theme restaurant” it is pretty decent. So that was my request today. We had a blast. Sometimes I forget how much fun my girls can be - just as ladies who lunch. Becoming friends with your grown children is a treat after years of being just “the mom.” I’ll always be Mom - but now we can relax and be friends, too.

What a week it has been. Martha’s done with school (more about that later. And maybe pictures, too, if Em can give me a new tutorial.) Bridget made it to 24 withouth the world ending. Time for some sleep. On a relatively regular mattress in a relatively quiet ‘burb.)

* I know it's been a long time since I took a train all the way into the city. The station has a different name. (Any Chicagoans remember when it was called Northwestern Station - not Ogilvy?) And it looks like it has been totally rebuilt. Very glam - very trendy. I would have been totally lost without the girls.

The blog...
my 21st century replacement for "I think I'll eat some worms."
*Leg hurts. Doctor says I'm way ahead of the recovery curve. Co-worker says I still have a limp - I should work on it. Thanks.

*My sister calls to have me answer a trivia question. "What is your middle name?" Mary. Thanks.

*Still smarting from watching the National Geographic Bee, (what, I don't get partial credit for identifying Ayres Rock as 'that big red rock in Australia?') I am humbled watching the finals of the National Spelling Bee. Those kids are amazing. Nice antidote for weltschmerz - one of the few words I could spell. To say I've lost my edge would be understatement. And why haven't I driven any of my children to the heights of academic competition? Why?

*A busy day at work, short-handed for part of the time. And with a disproportionate number of stupid calls. Calls like "How do you spell Lucifer?" and "Where's the hack saw? We need to cut the bolts from the old toilet seat." You can guess the origination of those calls. Thanks.

*And I'm just so freakin' tired...I fell asleep during JEOPARDY again. When I excused myself to bed on Sunday evening, Emily said, "But, Mother, it's only 8:30" with the same intonation as if she had caught me making a martini at 8:30 in the morning.
This, too, shall pass. I can only hope too much of the world doesn't pass me by as I absorb sleep like a big, absorbent, porous SpongeEllyn Sleepy Pants.

*Still don't have my license back. But as soon as the BBV passes its emissions test...then I'm off. Having to be totally dependent on Rick for rides was touching and humbling when I was unable to drive. Now it is annoying...for both of us.
I would like to get back into my habit of daily Mass a couple days a week...but right now it doesn't agree with the transportation schedule. (Having to arrange a ride to go to confession on Saturday was bad enough. And I've been a little skittish with abandonment issues since I was 'left behind' after the Passion Service on Good Friday afternoon. Nothing makes a parish look good like a lady with a cane sitting woefully in the back parking lot. As for why Rick didn't just join me, instead of going to his parents' house to bring in their newspaper, mail and watch Loony Tunes, I won't even go there....except to say I'm working on it.)