Craziness Cont'd

Well not much has changed since summer vacation started, things are still crazy busy and hectic. We head to the doctor early Monday morning for Cast Removal and then straight to the pool (the kids want to bring their bathing suits to the doctor's office and change there) to make up for lost time.

We are still in limbo over possible new job/possible move/possibly no job/possibly precarious future, but either that will resolve soon or that will continue, either way it will get boring to blog about until something is known. So enough of that.

In other news, we decided to leave for our annual Tour of the South/family vacation two weeks early, which means that I now have three days to get ready, and full plans for activities all three of those days.

I'm a little bit nuts.

This year's trip will include a family reunion in South Carolina, a few days in my favorite Charleston, a day at the beach, and lots of lazy days at my parents' lake house in Georgia where I will wait on a floatie for my relatives and friends to come out and visit me. I can't wait. Perhaps I will wait on a hammock for some of the time. I'm open.

Meanwhile, here is a story. I took my car in to get some work done the other day. Actually, Greg had promised to take it in for me, but I had an epiphany: if I take the car in, I get several hours of uninterrupted reading time while he plays with the kids. So of course I took the car in. As I was sitting on the L-shaped couch reading a magazine and listening to Spanish lessons on MP3, a lady came in with her 4 year old daughter.

P.S. I seem to be unable to learn Spanish on an MP3 player. Apparently without visually seeing a word's spelling, I am unable to comprehend and retain it. I was really good at French in high school and college, so I thought I could pick up Spanish easily, but every time I try to think of a word in Spanish, the French word pops into my brain and will not leave. Knowing Spanish is a valuable job skill for anyone working in the social services field in Texas. I rue the day I chose to take French in high school. Rue it.

Anyway, this lady comes in and sits next to me with her little girl, and then takes out a pair of nail clippers and starts clipping the child's nails. Then she removes the child's shoes and socks and trims her toenails. Then she pulls out nail polish and starts polishing the girl's toenails.

I found it very strange.

I also had to move my purse to ensure no stray nail clippings were flying into it.

To make matters worse, she was one of these people who constantly narrates everything she is doing, ostensibly to her child, but is actually using this narration to indirectly explain her actions to the people around her. For instance: "I'm going to cut your toenails now, sweetie, since we're having such a rushed day and I needed something to do while we were waiting and we won't have time to do it after we get home from here."

I find the Mommy Narrations of Explanation even more annoying than the toenail clipping. Here is what I think: if you're going to do something and you're not certain how the strangers who are sharing a space with you are going to react, either don't do it (probably for the best), or just own it. Walk into a room full of strangers and shower them with fingernail clippings and make no apologies. Then walk out ten minutes later with your head held high.