Retop Redux

Last year we joyfully signed up for a marriage encounter weekend reunion at Red Top Mountain which provided fun activities such as Mia screaming for three hours before bedtime two days in a row, spending several quality family hours together bonding through scream therapy on I-75 due to a road closure, having only a tub of tapioca to eat for dinner the first night with the end of a plastic knife and Aidan and I having to enter our hotel room boot camp style, bellies to the multi-colored carpeting that had begun its life as a solid beige but had morphed into an abstract pattern of different colors for reasons we thought best not to consider. Of course, the sneak attack was our attempt to not wake Mia and it worked well except for the part where we got stuck in the bathroom.

Having not learned our lesson from either last years' excursion to Red Top Mountain or my contracting Lyme disease there 1987, we again eagerly signed up to go again this year. We figured the third time would be the charm.

This time, we shared a cabin with a very patient and very understanding couple and their two children. We did not bring tapioca as that would be tempting the fates. Instead, we brought a bag of chips for the potluck figuring we could easily dole them out should we again get stuck on the road. Given the fact that the other attendees actually cooked family specialties, our contribution could have been considered a tad gauche as the chips were in their original bag, so we carefully snuck them onto the table. I considered finding a kid I didn't know and then giving him a quarter to put the lovely chips on the table but I didn't have a quarter and since his parents were also there, I figured I'd get nailed on this one. Next year, the chips will go into Tupperware and will be presented as the product of my slaving over hot grease to deliver the best kettle cooked chips anywhere in America.

Our first activity included decorating the cabin so all the kids there could trick or treat from cabin to cabin the next day. Because it was raining, an additional element of fun was added. It's not every day that you get to stomp around in mud while trying to not freeze. Now, for the trick or treating, some of the folks in other cabins apparently considered the decoration a matter of contest with huge inflatables, a fully decked out haunted house and more orange lights than you would need to light New York City and half of Sydney, Australia. We went for a post-modern, minimalist look which was clearly not understood and appreciated apprpriately as the words "pitiful" and "did you guys forget your decorations" just seemed to keep coming up. Clearly they were part of the miscreants that skipped school on art appreciation day and could not identify the minimalist genre. Heck, we had some yellow tape from the Dollar Store that clearly warned of the danger of not "turning back now", a 8" bat that made a "genuine bat laughing noise" if you clapped, and approximately three feet of purple lights. Given that purple seems to be the color for the year, we really thought that extra points should have been awarded for that and as our "turning back now" tape didn't quite run the length of the porch, we clearly "did more with less", an admirable accomplishment given the economy. We also provided proof that a "genuine bat laugh" sounds amazingly like Santa Claus which gave our display the educational component that the others sorely lacked.

The second big activity included the kids decorating "blood" cakes made from red velvet mix. The decorations generally included icing that was a bit over one pound for each cake and those gosh awful sprinkles which apparently contain some drug given the universal kid response to seeing them. As everyone knows, the screaming for sprinkles on ice cream, cakes, waffles, pancakes and the occassional meatloaf just cuts across all cultures and continents. The other decorations included some Hersey kisses that looked strikingly like nipples. Perhaps Hersey was going for orange and white but were economizing on their dye. In any event, after all the kids were done and the cakes were placed on one table, it looked like udders of cows staring back at you. Udders with spinkles, but udders nonetheless.

And then we moved on to the renewal of our wedding vows.....

Americans Are Broad

I find it quite interesting to see how Americans are perceived in other countries. For example, here, are a couple of well meant homages to the American Woman. Exhibit A is on Shamian Island, Guangdong Province, PRC. This portrayal, although well meant, is clearly incorrect. In the traveling adoptive families, Dad carried the new baby while mom carried the money to pay for whatever it was and a third party was pressed into service to carry the camcorder. In fact, it seems to be an unwritten rule that it must be so and the Dads in our group, being quite an advanced and well educated bunch, even devised a manner to contort themselves to pee while still having their new child strapped on to their chest in the carrier. Just wouldn't be appropriate to post a photo of that but it involved learning to aim while leaning over backwards in an arc while also making sure not to fall over in to who knows what. I'm not sure if they awarded a gold medal for the best aim or not. All I know is that my darling husband didn't mention his winning any such award, which, of course, could be for a number of reasons that it would be best not for me to ponder. "Peeing while having a child strapped to your chest" would make an amusing Olympic Sport and should have been debuted in Bejing.

Next, is Exhibit B, Costa Rica. Not much to be said here other than that sure is a lot of bronze and it is nice to see that we are appreciated for our many, many assets. And, damn, I feel like an midget athlete by comparison and that feels good.

Clear to me - the rest of the world has the perception that N American woman can't find a good bra to save her soul.

Oreos for Unemployement

Now that it looks like I might have a valid job offer very soon, I'm thinking some realistic advice for the unemployed or soon to be unemployed is in order. This is in contrast to that given by by the currently employed folks who write for the newspaper. For example, they had one of those articles today that gave 71 ways to survive in a tough economy or through unemployment. Now, I understand how they are trying to be helpful and need to fill newsprint but most of their suggestions are along the lines of "find a time machine, go back 10 years and save everything you make," which is one of those ideas that, although good on paper, might be best described as "freaking nuts."

Yet another great proposal was along the lines of getting rid of your home phone if you have a cell phone. Now, perhaps this is a great idea for anyone under 30, but how in the heck am I going to make a cell call if the first step for me to make a cell call is to first locate the cell by calling it from the home phone? Unless I tie it to the wall with one of those phone cords, which as I think of it does seem like a rather good and doable idea, no one will ever hear from me again. This high technology did work for the television remote control in the bedroom which seemed to go missing daily. The remote that is, not the bedroom. Anyway, after I tied that remote to the bed with a very long piece of yarn, I could just reel it in when I couldn't find it. Technology at its best. Until the cat managed to take off with the yarn, bumping along as he went.

So, here are a couple ideas not mentioned in the article that I think are most helpful:

1. Put the kids to work. After all, they have more energy anyway. As you can see, Aidan opened his Oreos for Unemployment Store soon after the great lay off. Now, as any responsible parent would do, I made sure that he also got to understand economics and getting screwed by "the man" by first making him pay me back for his cost of goods sold before counting his profits. And, because I bought the Oreos at CVS which apparently only stocks Oreos that are made of solid gold, the cost of goods sold was roughly twice that which it would have been had the supply been purchased at the local Walmart. And, I would have ended up with a good payback had Walmart not had such a prominent display of their $2.50 Oreo's right at the entrance and a child smart enough to know that the $4.59 he had been charged was something like highway robbery or in his vernacular, "unfair." After explaining to him the art of negotiating before sealing a deal and how wonderful it was that he learned this lesson early, I relented and gave him the difference between the two so as not to be put in some type of SEC jail for price gouging. Heck, the kid even went door to door so I had to at least give him some credit for his energy useage.

2. Go on the unemployment diet. This diet consists of buying 3 sandwiches for $2.49 at BP for breakfast, 4 hotdogs/corndogs for $4 at QT for lunch and 4 tostidos for $4 at QT for dinner. Buy refills for the adult drinks. Get the kids the "free sample" cups filled with some bright red stuff while at BP, all the while pointing out that they shouldn't be drinking high fructose corn syrup junk which is why having them drink from a thimble is just one of mom's many, many ways of showing them just how much they are loved. Add a copious amount of relish to the food, daily vegetable requirements will be met and you'll feed a family of four for $75 a week, excluding weekends where you arrange to be fed by the parents or find a potluck, church picnic or large family reunion where you can just blend in and tell them you know "Ann" or "John". We have discoverd that ever reunion or family has one member with that name.

3. Steal. Now, although it is an idea, it must be pointed out that very serious negative karma will occur should one choose this path. In our case, we have done this without intention and we are going back to both stores in question but we discovered that you can a. walk out of a store with a huge box of baby butt wipes under the buggy and not find it on your receipt and b. walk out of a different store with a big bag of flower bulbs in your buggy even through the clerks personally walked over to both buggies in question and supposedly scanned all items. Who knew it was that easy other than CVS as they are clearly charging for this shrinkage when they sell Oreos?

The Bennetton Effect

So, as I'm working through this job search thing which I believe is called "Hades for Dummies", I come to a brilliant realization of just how well the Benetton Effect has helped my family in the past and could be of benefit now. I can go to work doing darn near anything and if they don't feel comfortable acknowledging me when I drive the school bus up on the curb a couple of times accidentally which is wont to happen when I drive almost anything, they have plausible deniability.

In fact, the set up is almost perfect. First, the kids on the bus will probably applaud the curb driving which will sooth my mangled, unemployed ego. Second, no matter what I do, the husband and kids can just look at me and give a good old shrug and exclaim loudly, "no idea who she is". If I dare protest, they can then launch that gesture where one uses their index finger to make circles around their temple while looking knowingly at the other party and mouthing "crazy". After all, I am the only one in the household that has blue eyes and blindingly white skin that screams if it even sees the sun. They, on the other hand, don't.

Now, the husband has clearly used this in the past. When I crashed the motorized vehicle designed to assist the handicap into Walmart's wall at high speed and reported this to him when I got home, he was quick to let me know that if he had been with me, he and his son to be would have just quietly left the store and waited in the car to see if 1. an ambulance came or 2. I eventually came driving on out on the vehicle, albeit now with rounded bumpers in the front.

He also tried to avoid any familial connection several years ago in Hawaii. I thought it would just be a fabulous idea to send a couple of whole coconuts home to several of my brothers. After all, how often do you get to do that? Probably a reason for the lack of opportunity to do so but, in fact, the small island of Molokai, Hawaii, encourages it. They even have a post office that lets you do this. They keep a box of coconuts and you address the coconut on the outside green part and then they weigh and stamp it and off it goes. So, I thought it would be sort of fun for my brother who had a very, very small mailbox to get a notice to go to the post office to pick up his mail and get handed my unique gift. Figured the other would have his delivered which he did. The carrier stuffed my gift into into his mailbox and fortunately his wife did not call the bomb squad upon its discovery although that probably would have enhanced the experience, especially for the kids and also deepened their love for me to a heretofore unseen level.

So, we go to the post office. Turns out it is the wrong one - this island has two and only one has a bin of coconuts. The other one. The gal lets us know where we can go and get some free coconuts and off we go, the husband at this point so enthralled with the experience that he is sharing it vocally and with great enthusiasm, especially since we were to go run into some private property and get two suitable coconuts without getting hit by those falling from trees or running into the owner. After executing this move, back we go to the post office and that is when the husband decides it is a very good time to stay in the car as he wanted to maintain whatever modicum of dignity he had left.

Now, had I been going into the post office naked, I could understand the dignity part of it but because I was only going in to mail the biggest darn coconuts I could find and giggling about it, I could not agree that any loss of dignity could or would be involved. The husband quickly invoked the Peruvian clause which generally sounds something like, "Peruvian's don't do things like that you know and if we were in Peru, I think you'd be thrown in a mental asylum and then what would my family think considering,,,,,, I generally don't always get much beyond this point in the clause to hear either the conditions or disclaimers as closing the car/garage/house door generally muffles out that part of the drill.

So, I go in and the process begins. We weigh, we stamp. And as we do, the husband silently slips into the back of the post office to see what is taking so long, obviously forgetting that we are in Molokai, Hawaii, where life just doesn't move all that fast. Out of love for him, I just didn't want him to miss out and starting waving both of my arms like I'm trying to land a plane while exclaiming quite loudly, "That's my husband Robert - Hey honey, come over here to help me mail these coconuts, especially since it was your idea and I don't want you to miss out on any of the full experience."

So, the kids have the Bennetton Advantage of not looking a bit like mom and the husband has the Bennetton Advantage of me not looking like anyone he would hang with much less marry. Unless, of course, any of them forget the tip that perhaps they might not want to get trapped into a closed room with me where I can wave my arms and call them by name to acknowledge our association.

And that leaves almost any job possibility open for me. Just sort of lightens my heart and puts a spring in my step although it probably has some street engineers a bit concerned.

Passed it this Time

Here he is - Cody Coyote right after he recognized that he will be permanently sharing his abode with these two little people. Actually, he is the most laid back cat you could ever find. Has a bit of a love for the catnip though which could account for his laid back demeanor. Could also explain why he entertains himself by batting at doorstops made with springs and can't bear not to watch the water going down in the toilet. Comes running for that so fast he sometimes slides around the corners.
As to the doorstops - Middle of the night - Ziiiiiiiing, Ziiiiing, Ziiiing .

I Failed the Home Study. Really.

So we go to get a new cat to be a companion animal to our family. When we started out, we were erroneously saying we were going to get a new pet but then were quickly educated that most rescue groups don't call them "pets" anymore. Apparently, the word "pet" offends the dignity of most cats and dogs. Who knew, other than the rescue groups in question? Perhaps the pet protests were held the week I got laid off and I just missed the news. After all, my head was still spinning too much to enjoy watching as they just kept having these pesky reports that the economy was clearly approaching the Apocalypse for the unemployed.

In any event, to deal with the rescue groups, I quickly discovered that I had to "have a deep respect for the animal rescue culture and be interested in learning more about it." Also had to express a "knowledge of the animal rescue people and the care they take for abandoned animals." Given I pulled this off for a Chinese person, figured I could nail that one without much effort.

So, our mission to adopt a fifth member of our family was launched with gusto. We designed a very scientific plan and companion search strategy and set out to tactically implement it. First, the kids and I traveled to the abandoned companion animal center and expressed our deep respect for the companion animals and the culture they came from. Second, we got permission to go into the feline housing block. Third, we sat in the middle of the room and had the little Chinese girl practice the Chinese opera screams that are apt to come out when she recognizes a feline being, especially one that resembled her lost Beluga if Beluga had been on Jenny Craig for a month.

After our well planned tactics were executed with great verve and at high volume, we decided that the only feline not hiding on the top shelf was, by default or bad luck, our new family member. We figured he was either deaf or lame but were assured he was not. So, off we went out to fill out our home study to adopt Sammy - a beautiful white cat that had just enough Siamese in him to be appropriately Asian.

We checked one more center but didn't find any waiting companions that were clearly lacking the sense to not be at least 10 feet off the ground or frantically banging on the door to get away from the little screaming person.

So, it's prayers at night for Sammy, the new addition to the Anchaya household. The older one prays that he is having a good night and that he doesn't mind the screaming to come all that much.

The next day, I call the center to see when we can pick him up. I get put on hold. For a while. A long while. Then, I get referred to a supervisor who told me that , "you can not adopt Sammy. Your home study was not approved." I explained that I had been approved by both the US and China to adopt a person and that I figured the animal center most certainly was mistaken. Nope, she says, your application states you intend to torture Sammy. I let her know that although our parenting methods may be a bit unique, none include water boarding. I did, however, concede that we do have a bit of sleep deprivation when the little one makes the decision that she needs a good night of screaming instead of a good night's sleep.

Nope, she still says. Your home study states you might declaw Sammy if he starts tearing up the house and that is considered torture under some United Nations convention or at least by the rescue group. I ask what I need to do to redeem myself to reenter polite society and become eligible for a companion animal named Sammy.

The answer, not much. I'd been identified and labeled. Even though I could clearly show that I still had the little Chinese person and that she clearly had all of her fingernails although she does, at times, tear up the house, it was a "no". And not just a "no". It was a "no way, no how, why don't you move to Gitmo and work there as that is where you clearly belong type of "no".

Lovely experience. The older was really upset and I had to explain how I thought that maybe Sammy's parents apparently came and reclaimed him so he could be with his siblings.

Another day, another search began.