Take me to your leader!

I am so sick of listening to Beethoven's Wig, I am breaking out in hives. I'll be driving along, with all the girls singing in the back, "Beethoven's Wig, it's very big..." and I start shuddering. Of course, at the same time, I love these CDs. For those who aren't familiar, there are now four CDs by Richard Perlmutter that take classical music and set it to very funny and bizarre lyrics. So this time, with Beethoven's 9th symphony playing in your head, read "Beethoven's wig, it's very big" again -- see! Very catchy - and you won't ever hear the song the same again.

My very favorite of all is what he did to Moonlight Sonata (which I loved before and now will never be able to listen to it again without hearing the words). You really have to listen to it to get it, but it is all about a car sitting in the middle of nowhere at a red light that never changes. First one car, then another, and another line up behind him, honking, "beep, beep beep." For kids it is fun, for grown-ups it is delightful because the singer says he doesn't know why they are honking at the light, but he joins in the fray. So delightfully clueless. Really, maybe you have to be there?

My next favorite is the theme from 2001 -imagine the big drums set to, "take me to your leader, take me to your leader." Perlmutter has quite the sense of humor. But I have hives.

Oh - one final note - don't you all run out and buy these - we plan to get them for all our friends with children this year for Christmas. (If you would like to opt out, just send me a note!)

Not losing my mind

So, we got back from vacationing in Santa Cruz for four days to discover that the hose in the backyard was left on.  We are now probably home to a few dozen frogs and thousands of mosquito larvae, all in the swamp that is our grass.  

Now, it is not unheard of for me to do something like this - especially since I was in charge of getting us all packed up, house closed up, AC off, windows locked, etc.  We were picking up my husband on the way over in Sacramento, where he flew in from a business trip.  But I just know I didn't even go in the backyard the morning we left.  I even specifically thought about giving the garden a bit extra water, but was just too busy.   But, last night at 11:00 p.m. when my husband and I discovered this, I eventually concluded that I must have done it, even though I have no memory of it.  

This conclusion was very disheartening for someone who really tries to be organized and together. In fact, I dare say I pride myself on my organizational skills.  So I've been feeling a bit off this morning, wondering what other bizarre things I have done that I have no earthly memory of.  

After breakfast, my eldest, Queen Bee, went outside to survey our new swamp.  After about 10 minutes she comes in and nonchalantly says, "Oh, mom, I must have left that on when I went out to water your tree before we left."  That's it . . . no drama, just stating the facts.  

So, my sanity is intact for now.  Although 20 minutes ago, upon putting my dad's birthday cake in the oven, I discovered I had forgotten 1 cup of milk (that's a whole lot of liquid!) and ran around frantically taking the pans out, scraping the batter back into the mixer, adding milk, re-greasing and flouring the pans....sigh....  I'll let you know how the cake turns out.  

Early Dementia?

So, I'm cooking dinner - following a recipe from my in-laws - and I realized that I don't have 3 things out of the 10 in the recipe.  Not that note-worthy, except that I had read the recipe over at least 2 times, made a grocery list, and went shopping.  And now have no onion, not enough ketchup, and no Worcestershire sauce.  A few substitutions later, we will still have edible sloppy-joes.  But still, it makes me wonder....

This past week we have been looking into buying a new car -- my first brand new car!  We were so close to putting down a deposit to get them to bring in the van in the right color, but there was a feature wrong on the car they had found.  Thank god - because, what I had been hearing as "fully refundable" deposit to see the color, etc., was actually a non-refundable deposit!  At least 3 times I had heard wrong!!  Perhaps it was just wishful thinking, or maybe the salesman had not been totally forthcoming earlier?  But, yikes...make me wonder....