Friday, March 23, 2012

7 Quick Takes

Thank goodness it's Friday.   I've been out of the house for a different reason every day this week, and I realized how unaccustomed I am to doing so much running around.

My household chores also showed me how seldom I have a week like this past one.  Funny how those dishes won't just leap into the dishwasher themselves.  And am I the only one who hates to finally make it back home after a long day and see 3 baskets of laundry waiting to be folded?

Anyway, I'm home now and still not doing chores so I guess I've made my peace with the laundry.   Let's forget about all that and do some quick takes.

One

Sally told me she had a secret.  When I asked if she would tell me, she whispered in my ear:  "Mommy, I REALLY want to be a cheerleader."

Oh darling, that isn't so much a secret as a forgone conclusion.   If ever there was a child fashioned of the the stuff of cheerleaders, it's Sally.

Two

I have just started reading "The Hunger Games."  I am only about 40 pages in, but so far it's good.  It's definitely an interesting concept for a story with some eerie parallels to a few things that depress me about our culture.

Although I have been hearing rave reviews about the books from just about everyone (the cashier at Target, the nurses at Rob's office, my niece, my friends), I hadn't really planned on reading them.  But all that goes out the window when you have a middle schooler who is desperate to read them and see the movie.

A mom's got to have the inside scoop these days.

Three

Since I mentioned that it is depressing to me, can I just mention how increasingly bizarre and cruel I find our society to be?

Marriage not going the way you want?  Dump your spouse.  Better yet, just marry yourself.  I'm sure your "inner-groom" will never leave his underwear on the bedroom floor.

Did you get a result that shows the baby you're carrying might be ill or less than perfect?  Well, you know what you can do about that.  Did you miss that window of opportunity?  No worries, you can kill the baby after it's born.  Babies aren't really real people after all.

And neither are old, sick people, so don't get any uppity ideas about your worth, Grandma.

How did we get here?  When did we become a society that just throws everything away?

Anything that is worth having takes blood, sweat, and tears, but our culture is so averse to anything that remotely looks like suffering that we would rather kill it or, better yet, not even conceive in the first place.

Why are the parts of life that are the most sacred and redemptive seen as the very things that need to be rejected and rooted out?   As a nation, we will reap the whirlwind for this.

Lord, have mercy on us.

Four

I wanted to go to one of the Stand Up For Religious Freedom rallies being held today, but in the end I didn't go.  I was too much of a wimp, I guess, to take the smaller set into the city at lunch/nap time by myself.

Did anyone go to a rally?

Five

Continuing my trend of things that depress me  (although this depresses me considerably less than abortion and infanticide), I have about had it with my ongoing saga of trying to lose weight.

I have been doing all the right things, all the things that every doctor says when you need to lose weight.  I have been eating fresh, nutrient dense foods, I have been exercising every day, I have stayed away from all kinds of (delicious) goodies.  I have been very strict with myself, and even enlisted Rob to make sure I wasn't cheating.

And I'm still fat.  So there you go.  Actually, I technically am losing weight, but I am losing it at an absolutely glacial pace.

I know, I know, I should focus on feeling healthier and being stronger, not just weight loss.  But let's be real, I can't see the inside of my body, so I have no idea if my organs are happier now than they used to be.

All I can say is, they better be the happiest little organs ever, because I'm about ready to sell one of them for a chocolate cake.

Six






In decidedly non-depressing news, this pixie will be 2 next weekend! How did that happen?

I clearly remember being hugely pregnant at her first birthday, and trying to imagine her second birthday with an almost one year old sibling in attendance.  I just couldn't do it.

And thank God for that, because Mopsy and Baby are better than anything I could imagine.



Seven

I was watching the old BBC version of Pride and Prejudice while I was on the treadmill this week (Colin! Firth!) since it is a great story with nothing objectionable for the small guys who are my constant companions.

Mopsy's real name is the same as one of the prominent characters in the film, and every time someone called that character, Mopsy would turn around and look to see who was calling her.  She was getting very annoyed until she finally started giving the television dirty looks.  That kid is a real pip.

(and ten points to the person who can guess Mopsy's name.  No prize, just ten points.)

Happy Friday, my friends!


6 comments:

  1. GeeGee2:48 PM

    Oh how my Mopsy and Baby make us so happy! I can't imagine life without them! And how our Mopsy has grown this last year. She now has long locks and a very authoritative "babble" going on, especially with the "hairy eyeballs" she has mastered! And speaking of eyeballs, Baby has quite a set herself! Love, love, love the furrowed brow which is softened by the most gorgeous curly cowlick! I can't wait to see a full head of ringlets. I see them peeking out already! I know these last 2 years have been trying for you Aimee, but I am so proud to have such a brave and loving daughter as you...look how your selflessness has enriched our family and this cruel world. This world is losing sight of what love is. God help us indeed....

    ReplyDelete
  2. I read all the Hunger Games series late last year. Excellent books--for teens. As I advised my neighbor yesterday, you know your middle-schooler best. If she wigs out at "intense" violence in movie previews, these books are not for her. There's not much sexual content--a little suggestion here and there but it's quite rare--but the violence, and the mindset behind the violence, can be disturbing. I'm sure the movie is worse because the violence will have to be portrayed graphically. The book is very much about a mind game with violent consequences, so when you spell that out in pictures...

    ReplyDelete
  3. I'm going to see Hunger Games Thursday. I can't wait! I read the books a couple of years ago, it seems. I'm rereading the first one right now and noticing some poor writing (sentence structure and stuff) but I am still enthralled by the story. Ultimately there is a lot of hope in the story, although the 3rd book has some plot elements that I hated and thought didn't make sense with the whole story. All that to also say, apparently a lot of my 4th grade daughter's peers are seeing the movie! I would never let Taylor see it at only 10 years old! There is a lot of good content for discussion, but she is not ready for it, in my opinion, and so we will wait and I will hope her peers don't give her a hard time about it. I haven't even let my kids read HP yet and there at least I can say most of it is so fantastical as to be unbelievable (with some discussion about inviting evil into our lives). Not so with Hunger Games, where it is easy to imagine our society arriving at that scenario at some point.

    Don't be depressed! While I sometimes take a blissfully optimistic look at life because I don't want to acknowledge the crap that is happening, I do believe there is real reason to have hope. I believe our generation and those younger are starting to wake up to how disposable we have tried to make life. It will be hard to get through these days, but I believe hope is rising.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I can understand how you feel about all those depressing subjects. It's hard not to get down about it all. I wonder all the time where we are headed as a people, and I'm afraid I already know the answer. Just 50 years ago, those things would have never crossed the majority of societies minds but today I'm afraid that we are the minority :(
    I'm sorry about the weight. I know exactly how you feel. And I've seen you (in pictures only but still...) and you are not fat. But I get the frustration.
    I have not read the Hunger Games but my friend swears it's awesome. Happy reading!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Just got the Hunger Games trilogy on my ereader, due to pressure from ~everyone~ but haven't started them yet. I'm really not into sci-fi or fantasy or whatever they are, but our son wanted to read them, and I will get nearly whatever he wants to read, if only he will read!!

    Also with you on the "depressed" thing. Having the same thoughts lately. Lent, maybe??

    Oh, and your mom made me cry. Just sayin'.

    ReplyDelete
  6. THe hunger games series was the first set of books I read when working at the book store- WOW! I loved them, but they are unique. Champ and I are hoping to sneak out the the movie some day.

    I have those thoughts around this time too and I do wonder if like Scratching in the dirt mentioned, its a bit more intenst because of Lent?

    ReplyDelete

Go ahead and say it. You know you want to.