Grinch?

Normally I really LOVE decorating my home for Christmas, inside and out. We're talking icicle lights, family decorating the tree to Christmas tunes and finding cool places to place my Christmas doodads collected over the past 2 decades. I love that excitement and that Christmas smell my goodies emit after being in storage for 11 months. Usually within 2 days after Thanksgiving we've got the goods out and I've got B assembling our tree, then I help him string the lights outside. This year I'm not so enthusiastic. After Thanksgiving dinner with some friends I drove home and noticed people hanging their lights and houses already lit- including 1 or more trees inside! I wondered where they got the motivation, because after dinner and "fun" with the kidz, I was totally beat (not even including my insomnia, being around people makes me tired). Indeed, my friends were hanging their own lights (which are very pretty BTW, in case you somehow find me out Angela hee hee). We went home and crashed. Black Friday we have a family tradition to see a movie together. Since I'm the mom and I have all power (my own micro democratic dictatorship- the kidz get a vote but I have the power to discount the votes) we went to see the new Muppet movie (which is a scream, BTW). I almost didn't survive the drive there, but even Z LOL'ed. He prefers the usual "man" stuff with lots of violence, car chases, etc. Since we got back after dark, I noticed even MORE lights on. Even these painful red-blue-green affairs that make my eyes bleed (seriously, whose twisted idea was that?!?!?!). I started feeling grinchy, because there's no way I was going to hang my icicle lights by myself. Now I know what you're thinking: "But AJ, you've got that strapping 5'11" son to press into labor!" Yes, that's true, but he's also over 170 pounds and I literally can't drag him off the couch for ANYTHING unless it involves cake. So Saturday dawns and I said to myself, "Self, today we're gonna do it! We're gonna drag that tree out and decorate that sucker!" So did I do that? Nope. My mojo fell off worse that the NYSE on a bad day (Z was copping attitude, N didn't get his meds and H was driving me nuts). Sunday was a repeat. Little punks. Monday rolls around and I'd had it with myself. But did I did that tree out? No, BUT I asked Z very nicely if he'd get it in here for me and he rudely refused (hey, he's big enough to bench press 2 or 3 or those suckers). So I foist the chore onto N (who is still smaller than me, for a couple more years, maybe). He surprises me by going and getting the tree AND the ornaments. I instruct him how to assemble the tree- hey, he's good at putting together puzzles and wacko Lego creations. To his credit, he does a great job, and even manages to connect the lights correctly (it's a pre-lit tree). Do then I get up and crank up the DVD player with tunes while lovingly drawing my kidz close for family decorating time? Nope. N and H decorate and every few minutes invite me to join them. I couldn't muster the energy to even do that. So it's my fault the tree has bent/unfluffy limbs and only the front 3 feet decorated. So now I'm thinking that I am such a bad mommy! A flippin' Grinch! What kind of mom doesn't even care to decorate the tree? What kind of mom has left all the other decorations out in the garage? What kind of mom hasn't even loaded the 5-CD-changer with Christmas tunes yet? A geographically-single mom, that's what! Without my right-hand man I just don't have the energy or motivation to get Christmas off the ground. For sure no cookie baking is going to get done. So here I am staring at all the little Whos in Who-ville and thinking I'd like their stuff. Or at least I'd like to borrow their man to take care of MY stuff, grrrr . . . I'm on 2 antidepressants for crying out loud, shouldn't I feel normal? Fortunately I have my own Cindy-Lou Who, the same friend who invited me over for Thanksgiving dinner (hi again Angela!). She set me free when she mentioned to me that when her hubbster was deployed last year (left last year right before Christmas, to Florida, but still) she didn't decorate her house at all. I was dumbfounded. I didn't know! So my head started getting back together and that inner Grinch is starting to get beat down. Do I feel like singing "fa-la-la-la-la" and decking the halls? No, but I'm going to make a better effort because I've still got a kiddo who believes in Santa Claus and, dang it, the elf's gonna make it right even if Santa's stuck downrange.

My New Nemesis

Recently there have been new cosmetic additions to my neighborhood. They were added by the local housing authority to slow drivers down, because this is California- speed limits are, after all, merely suggestions here.

Speed bumps. And not normal ones either. ("normal" being one that is slightly rounded and thus easier to travel over and gentler on your tires, shocks, etc.) These are neon yellow, not wide and super hard on you if you travel 5 mph+ over them. They insult my intelligence and slow me down on my breakneck trip to get the kidz to school/bus stop on time when I didn't get up on time to help them because I stayed up too late to read my riveting new book . . .

 Anyhow, what blows my mind is they didn't try something more subtle, like, oh I don't know, A NEW SPEED LIMIT?!?!! I've lived in housing like this most of my married life, and speed limits were never over 15 mph. In this housing, the speed limit is 25. I mean, there are KIDZ living here and playing in the streets because the backyards are so microscopic. It really makes me wonder if they even thought of that. Even though it is California and people don't follow the speed limits, they probably would decrease their speed in proportion to the new speed limit. Ya think?