Departmental thoughts

Another flashback to childhood, courtesy of my own child: the site of Sarah making a bracelet out of gimp at summer camp. Her first day was yesterday. She seems to like it and said she made some friends and enjoyed swimming, all of which makes me feel a tiny bit less guilty about stashing her in camp all day five days a week so I can sit here at my desk and play with web pages and worry about the kids but I have to work so I can earn money. For camp. And other things, I suppose.

Evil Uses for Photoshop.

Recently Overheard Department:

• "Nine is the last number of a little. Ten is the first number of a lot." (Sarah)
  
• "It smells like balloons out there!" (Becky, on her way to preschool with me this morning)
  
• "I heard everything! The ear tube really hits the spot!" (Sarah -- the ENT would be beaming with pride in a job well done)
  
• "These feather pillows definitely have a down side." (Ben, brushing off yet another feather from his body upon awakening, and then being puzzled at my snort of laughter at his totally unintentional pun)

Recent Purchases and What Do They Say About Us? Department:

• Three six-packs. Not beer, don't I wish, but Intuition shaver refills. They're much cheaper on drugstore.com and it's one of those cool new technologies I just can't live without.
  
  
• A carrying case for Ben's new Palm Treo. I have one too, of course. We wanted to switch carriers bercause Cingular's coverage sucks in the two towns we spend the most time in. Plus our phones were several years old. Plus Ben kep pestering me for phone numbers of family and friends which he refuses to store for himself in any way except on random scraps of paper. We got a wicked deal on Amazon and now he's downloaded all our contacts into his Treo and I can read in peace. Though Verizon's coverage on up-to-date phones still sucks. People, get over yourselves and put up a cell tower disguised as a pine tree like everyone else.
  
  
• Summahtime, summhatime, sum sum summahtime -- sandals, bathing suits, water shoes and lunchbox ice packs for the kids. Sarah got a "tankini" which is shaped like a pair of underpants plus a camisole, so it's a two-piece only in name (no Jon-Benet Ramsay itsy-bitsy, brightly colored triangles up top until they have something to put in it, I say). The reason I started down this dangerous fashion slope that can end only with thongs, belly shirts and multiple body piercings? Try getting a wet one-piece bathing suit off a child who has to pee in the very near future. Sort of like peeling an underripe banana, or removing a wetsuit from Shelley Winters in you know what movie.
  
  
• A pair of sea-to-shore sport shoes for me, because I got some for Becky a while back and they looked like so much fun that I just had to have them, and I'm damned if I'm going to have pangs of fashion envy for own kids, even though it's inevitable because clothes and shoes are so not my thing and the girls (especially Sarah) already have excellent taste in what's cute to wear and how to accessorize, now that they've been told in no uncertain terms by their mother that clothing with sparkly stuff on it is totally bogus.
  
  
• Used copies of Katy Lied because I haven't heard it since I owned the LP in college, and Job Hopper: The Checkered Career of a Down-Market Dilettante because Finslippy I read said this author was cool, but mostly because it sounds like there may be some echoes of my own early working life, which included prestigious positions as a burger counter waitress, a horse stall cleaner and a Stop & Shop meat room worker. Which is all pretty amusing in retrospect except that people try to make a living doing this stuff and usually can't, and the Repooplicans refuses to raise the minimum wage, don't get me started (see Barbara Ehrenreich's excellent Nickeled and Dimed.)