Quickie

Friday night in the coffee shop = bliss.

I have to finish the outline for my new script by Tuesday, a comedy about punk rocker chicks with children.

Q: When's the last time you saw *that* in a movie?

A: Never!

Nothing goes better with a double nonfat latte than a Topo Chico. And a bellyful of vegetarian (not vegan) nachos.

School starts the day after Labor Day.

Last week I wasn't ready. This week? Closer to ready.

Am I regretting my decision to keep the boy-child out of public school for now, to send him to a half homeschool half community school instead?

Not yet.

But I have been a bad and lazy parent this Summer. Instead of playing in our sprinkler or going to the pool, when it's 100+ degrees outside, we stay in and watch "Garfield." "The Wildkratts." And now, those little ponies and unicorns.

He told me that he learns about wildlife from "Wildkratts." Thus I need to let him watch.

That is true, wise child. That is true.

We haven't been to the Nature Center all Summer, either.

I'm going to let myself off the hook for this one, though, y'all. Since I spent a significant chunk of my Summer vacation at the state capitol building.  And since B took swim class every week, and martial arts, and did a week of theatre camp that he loved.

I did get a rather nasty shock about two weeks ago, when I found out that the state facility where my mentally disabled sister has lived for 40 years is moving her to a group home. WHAT?! As I sat in on a barely-intelligible conference call (patched in by the social worker as a desperate last minute effort to have a family member present and accounted for at the meeting that would determine my sister's fate) with my heart racing and my palms sweating I had little impact on the proceedings. Plus they only called me because they were looking for my mother, who was supposed to be there.

Fast forward to the phone calls I made after the meeting ended, only to find out that my mother is in dire straits as well.

I so don't love being a grown up sometimes.

I guess this is part of that whole, "you're almost fifty and you have a five year old" thing. End of Life Issues as well as Beginning of Life Issues.

I wonder if anyone else out there has dealt with moving a disabled family member into a community setting, or a disabled parent...all while raising their little one(s)?

See you at the Oscars...or at least Sundance.