Have Water, Will Travel

Water is my favorite drink.  I can't live without water, not that anyone can, but I need water all the time.  I know some people who get by with drinking soda all day long.  When I do that, I feel toxic and yucky, so I always have a water bottle on hand. 

The other day at the gym, this lady was talking about how when she first moved here from Colorado, she thought we were all so silly with our water bottles.  She was in shock to know that we actually spend money on water.  Lots of money.  Now that she has lived here for a while, she's tethered to a water bottle as well.  Welcome to the desert!    

Every time I go to the gym, I stop at a convenience store for water, and at $1.50 a pop, it adds up.  My sister buys Fiji water which is $2.00 a bottle (no wonder she's broke all the time).    Sure, buying a case at Costco is a good idea, but who has the fridge space?  I certainly don't.   

My solution?  Buy the prettiest water bottle  ever, and use it over and over again.  I always have my own bottle, but the last one was from Starbucks, and someone took it from the "cyber cafe" at work.  Which is fine with me now, because its replacement is so much better.

This bottle is from SIGG.   They have so many designs, it was hard to choose.  I'm now attached to this bottle, kinda like Linus is with his blankey.  The best part.  It's aluminum, so when filled with very cold water, it makes a great cold compress for my headache. 

High Self-Esteem or Vanity?

"Mom, do you think that I think I'm hot"?

"Ummm... yeah"

"You're right. I do think I'm hot. I'm a little vain".

This got me to thinking; is there such a thing as too much self esteem? While establishing self esteem in children is important, are we creating narcissist. Children are often praised regardless of whether or not praise is warranted. We're all guilty of it. I remember when the boys were toddlers and just learning to draw. They'd run up to me, so excited by their creation. I couldn't tell the head from the tail. So, I'd smile and tell them what a great job they did.

Self esteem seems to be the core of a well adjusted individual. And well adjusted is what we all strive for, right? There's even a National Association for Self Esteem.

This article by Lauren Slater for the NY Times confirms my fears. Too much self esteem can sometimes be harmful.

The article goes on to ask if self-control should replace self-esteem and suggests that we should instead advocate self-appraisal. "If our lives are stories in the making, then we must be able to edit as well as advertise the text."

As parents, how do we find the right balance. How do we know the difference between high self-regard and high self esteem? How do we even begin to teach them about self-appraisal.  Should I hold back from telling my kids how handsome and smart I think they are? My 8 year old thinks he's "hot". Where he got that, I'm not sure. I'm worried that I'm creating a little narcissistic monster. Who likes to quote Paris Hilton, none the less. Not that he knows who she is, but when he said that, I couldn't help but think of her and what a brat she seems to be. And my son, no matter how vain, is no brat.

''There is absolutely no evidence that low self-esteem is particularly harmful,'' Emler says. ''It's not at all a cause of poor academic performance; people with low self-esteem seem to do just as well in life as people with high self-esteem. In fact, they may do better, because they often try harder.'' Baumeister takes Emler's findings a bit further, claiming not only that low self-esteem is in most cases a socially benign if not beneficent condition but also that its opposite, high self-regard, can maim and even kill.

Go With the Flow?

My son watched a show on the Discovery channel about the coming of a second ice age.  When I was a kid and heard anything like that, I was scared.  So in an attempt to alleviate his fears, I've been telling him that it's not really going to happen, we don't know when or how it will happen, and that's not something he should worry about right now.  I've been meaning to have him watch An Inconvenient Truth so that he gets the full picture of what's going on with the environment and how it affects our future. 

The funny thing is that my son's not frightened by that type of news.  He's very scientific about the whole thing.

So tonight when I checked my e-mail, I had this message from him:

Don't be afraid that a second ice age is coming in ten years and there will be no eltricity, just go with the flow.

My 10 year old son is telling me to go with the flow.  He's also been using the words discombobulated and narcissist.  You've got to stay sharp to keep up with kids these days.  They're too smart for their own good, or should I say for my own good.

I Hate War

I have seen war. I have seen war on land and sea. I have seen blood running from the wounded. I have seen the dead in the mud. I have seen cities destroyed. I have seen children starving. I have seen the agony of mothers and wives. I hate war.

            Franklin Delano Roosevelt

I once heard someone say that it goes against nature for a parent to bury their child. I don't remember where I heard that, but with war going on, so many mother's are having to bury their children. And if that's not going against nature, then I don't know what is.

Yesterday, we found out that one of my mom's best friend's son was killed in Iraq. We've known Kelly since he was about 9 years old. When he was about 10, he borrowed Travis' old Army uniform for Halloween. He knew he wanted to be a soldier way back then.

He graduated from basic training not too long ago, and had been in Iraq for 17 days. 17 freakin' days. I think that the idiotic powers that be are rushing these kids to war before they've even had a chance to be properly trained. He hadn't even been in the Army for a year, and already his career is over. Sometimes, it's a shitty world we live in.

I can't fathom what his mother must be going through, or how she will recover from such a blow.

Kelly was only 19 years old and I can't believe that such a young life is gone, wasted. I'm still trying to figure out what it was all for.

Kelly was such a nice kid, and this world will be a sadder place without him in it.

I'm Addicted to Soduku and Lily Allen

  I honestly cannot believe that it's been 6 days since my last post. Where does the time go?

Since my last post, I have done nothing worth writing about. What I have done in the past 6 days is; celebrate my mom's birthday, eat lots of food, worked a few times, gone to the gym a few times, lots and lots of laundry, baked 3 frozen pizzas, cooked 2 meals, changed my bed sheets, cleaned out my pantry, gathered stuff for a yard sale, picked up dog poop, went to the book store, and I got high lights. The high lights were the ahem, high light of my week.  I'm channeling J Lo with the honey hues. 

And if my life didn't sound boring and pathetic enough, I I've also become addicted to Soduku.  Which is probably why I've neglected the blogosphere.  I cannot get enough Soduku.  I play it on Tristan's Nintendo DS Lite.  Poor kids has to share his video game with his mom.  And when he doesn't want to share, I can always remind him who bought it for him.  And who has the power to ground him.  So, I've been hogging the DS Lite, and I'm happy as a clam.  I'm like a teenager sitting in the corner listening to my Nano while playing video games.  Help me, I'm regressing.

Another new addiction is Lily Allen (pictured above). I can't stop listening to or singing her songs.  Her songs are so chipper on the surface, but if you listen to the words, she's a little morbid.  And that's what I love about her.   So, go listen to Lily Allen.  My favorite song is "LDN", where she sings; "The sun is in the sky oh why oh why would I want to be anywhere else".  I can't those words out of my head.

I'm at a loss for words.  It's not that I was a big fan of Ana Nicole's, but there's something unsettling about her death.  It always freaks me out a little when someone so close to my own age dies.  She was only 39 years old.

A lot of people have been fascinated with her life.  People, you can't deny that you were fascinated too.  Our fascination with her dysfunction made her a pop culture icon.  We will never forget her and her shenanigans, her slurred words, her tragic life.  Her tragic, untimely death. 

We can only hope for the best for her daughter who's future is in question and has already lost so much.  That right there is the tragedy.  Her baby girl is all alone and I wonder if the people who are fighting over her will want her even more now that she might have millions of dollars attached to her.

The story is not over, it's only just begun.  I have a feeling that we'll be hearing a lot about Anna Nicole in the year to come.   I just hope it all works out in her daughter's favor.

Chuy the Impregnator

Cant. Resist. PIZZA, originally uploaded by Meemo.

Yesterday when I posted about my little stud muffin I was having problems uploading a picture. So, here's Chuy. The ahem, impregnator. The 3 pound impregnator.

It will be funny if it turns out that he's not the father, but in the meantime we're having too much fun with the whole situation.

Tristan had some girls in his class making pom poms or something for the puppies. I wonder if they'd be just as excited about a humanoid baby. Probably not. Kids love dogs, and my kids all love this little dog so much. Even Naia gave Chuy a little lecture about his naughty ways. It was cute and made me laugh.

If this obsession continues, we might have to demand shared custody.

Innocence Lost

We've got some big new around here. Before you get too excited, the big news involves one of my dogs. It seems that our 3 pound Chihuahua has impregnated the neighbor's dog. They were just born yesterday afternoon, so it's hard to tell what they look like, but all evidence points to our dog as the guilty one.

It came as a complete surprise as our neighbor never told us that Lady Bug was pregnant. About 2 months ago, I'm not sure of the exact time frame, but Chuy was obsessed with getting over in their yard. He found a little hole and would low crawl under the fence. He did this several times and we joked about how Chuy was over there having his way with their dog. Little did we know that we were right.

We still aren't exactly sure if Chuy is the dad. There's a couple of possibilities, Lady Bug is a TRAMP. Not to mention that she out weighs him buy about 5 pounds and he's a lot shorter, so it's hard to imagine.

Chuy's probably the dad for several reasons. First of all, Travis told me today that he saw Chuy doing the "dance" with their dog. Second, the neighbor said that she had to bury one of the puppies and he was black and white, just like Chuy. Of course, it will be good to see what they puppies look like as they get older. I'm still not too sure. Travis asked if there's some kind of test. "Yeah, Travis, let's demand a DNA".

The boys are obsessed with the fact that Chuy might be a father, and we have had fun with the countless jokes about how Chuy has been irresponsible. We'll never look at our little boy the same way again. I suppose that we as owners were not very responsible to have let it happen. But hey, the dog got it on and had fun. He's always practicing on his brother, so how fun for him to get the real thing.

Negative Exposure

I'm so over Paris Hilton. Actually, I've never been into her. I'm a celebrity gossip whore I'll admit, but she's one celebrity I've never been interested in reading about. The whole Paris "exposed" thing is getting old too. But one thing that interested me is the interview I heard on Howard Stern this morning.

He was talking to Joe Francis. The guy was pretty wasted and out of it, but he used to date Paris Hilton, so he had some insight. It was the worst telephone interview ever.  They kept on having to wake him up.  What he had to say made me feel a little sorry for her. A little. 

Howard asked him how someone like her doesn't pay a bill. Joe said something about her not wanting the storage in her name, so she had some girl put it in her name. He seems to think there was a conspiracy with the whole thing. Which made me wonder why Paris wouldn't have her manager or someone like that take care of her business.

I thought it was kind of sad when Joe Francis said that he was relieved that the herpes medication was dated after they stopped dating, but the miscarriage paperwork was dated around the time they were together, so he was a little concerned about that.

Paris Hilton has truly been exposed. Her dirty laundry is being aired, and boy is it dirty. There is some controversy as to whether or not Paris leaked the stuff from the storage in order to gain more publicity. Do you think she's responsible for it? It's a pathetic situation either way. And it's even more pathetic that I'm writing about her. But I was just thinking about how crappy life must be for her right now if she didn't leak the stuff. She's victimized and people assume she's the guilty one, and now she has no secrets. The world knows that she has herpes. And that is not hot (sorry, I couldn't help myself).