Saturday Retrospective: The Passing of a Generation

The Heinz sisters (left to right): Junie, Esther, Marie (in lap), and Ruth. Ruth died very young. Marie was my Granny Pinkie.


Esther, Marie, and Esther's husband Fred.


My Granny Pinkie, my Great-Uncle Frank, and my Great-Aunt Barbara Hope. Aunt Barbie Hope was my grandfather's sister, and Frank was her husband.


My Granny Rabbit and Pop-Pop. These were my father's parents. I don't currently have any photos of my grandmother's sisters, Tressa and Pauline (my grandmother was Mary).


The grown Heinz sisters: Junie, Marie, and Esther.


We are unsure who the adults are in this photo, but I suspect they are my grandmother's grandparents (the Heinzes). If I am correct, we have: my great-great grandmother Annie Krug Heinz, my great-great grandfather Evan A. Heinz, my grandmother Marie, my great-uncle Evan (he died when my mom was young), my great-aunt Esther, my great-aunt Junie, and my great-aunt Ruth.


This is the Perrygo clan. I know who some of these people are, but not all of them- and though I know the names, which face does the name belong to? I can say my grandfather had a lot of brothers and sisters, and I think this photo has most of them. Clint, Annette, Margaret, Edgar, Maurice, Elmer, Percy, Watson, and my grandfather, Leroy. It is likely that his parents, Elmer and Rosa, are also shown here.


My Pop-Pop Conway, the real Santa Claus (Mr. King), my Granny Pinkie, and the real Mrs. Claus (Mrs. King). I grew up with these people being Mr. and Mrs. Claus... period.


My grandmother, my grandfather, my great-aunt Betty, and my great-uncle Bob. Bob was my grandfather's brother. Betty was his wife, and she died this morning.

They are all gone now.

Meltdown in 3... 2...

And unfortunately, I am not referring to my children.

Its a rainy day. I've been trying to engage my children in an activity that does not involve the television or the computer to no avail. No interest in making bead-chains, decorations, water-colors. Joey briefly got interested in drawing cupcakes and coloring them and cutting them out, but then he wanted to take them to a friend. Great.

So I give up, put them in shoes and coats to go for a walk in the lull of the rain. We are out to collect leaves and other now-wet items, and Joey had put his paper cupcakes in his bucket, so I offered to hold them. I take the cupcakes and store them in a safe pocket- to be left also holding the bucket. "No, Joey," I hand him back his bucket. "You have to carry this."

And then the "I have to be first" game starts. Joey runs screaming down the street because Andy is ahead of him. And then he gets ahead of Andy, and Andy starts to run to get ahead of Joey. And they are both screaming. And no one is looking at leaves, or acorns, or even where they are going. We live in the town, you have to watch for things like cars.

So I call them back, and try to explain that we are trying to have a nice walk and... Joey starts chewing on his bucket, wandering away down the street, paying not one nevermind to me at all... actually, he's just avoiding me. Right into the street.

So I recall him, and take the bucket so he will pay attention to what I am saying, and he starts emptying his lungs.

We gather ourselves together, and we start to continue the walk...

And it starts to pour. We need to go home. So I say, "It's raining, we have to go home." And Joey commences screaming again, now a good tantrum- how frustrating to be told everything is fine, only to it suddenly not be fine for an entirely different reason.

I melted down on the spot.

I manage to get hold of hands and half-drag my children back to the house, with Joey screeching the whole block home.

************************************
Edited a couple of hours later: JOey is in front of the computer Andy is watching his beloved new favorite, Max and Ruby. All quiet on the eastern front.

LRE Catch-22

A couple Falls ago, we- that is, my sons and I- started attending church. We gave a couple of churches around a try, and had a lot of trouble the minute the word “autism” was uttered- local churches, particularly Sunday School teachers- wanted no parts of it. Some of you may want to drawl on about how Sunday School teachers are volunteers, they have no special education training, they aren’t prepared to deal with special needs, yadda, yadda, yadda. And I say to you: this is supposed to be a Christian community. Joey is part of that community. I’m happy to help and talk with you and even be in the classroom to support him; but you have to welcome him in. We were turned away.

So we ended up in one of the big downtown churches, mostly because when I mentioned that Joey was autistic, the Sunday School supervisor said “OK.” And when I asked to meet with her and with his teachers, they all said, “Wonderful.” And then we met, and talked, and it may not have been a perfect world of support and understanding, but everyone did their best and the teachers loved Joey just as they loved all the other kids in their class, and stressed that we’re all God’s children and He loves us all just as we are- including Joey. Some of the kids liked him, and were friendly; some of the kids didn’t, and weren’t, and it was funny how this was mirrored in their parents’ reaction to meeting him or seeing him. We were glad to have a place where Joey could be an active participant in his community among his peers.

Then we moved on a year, and the next teacher wasn’t interested in meeting, and it was a little less successful a year, and the supervisor that was so willing to listen left. That’s the way Sunday Schools go. Some people stick it out forever, some folks come and go. Andy’s Sunday School teachers had been at it for fifty years.

And then we signed up for Vacation Bible School. I would call that moderate success. We had some incidents, but overall, he had a good time, and all was OK, even though I had to be there with him instead of letting him be on his own a little. The new supervisor of Sunday School mentioned there were plans for a special needs class in the Sunday school, and would I like to get into the discussions about it? There was a problem where the upper-levels (second grade and up) do “Rotation Sunday School.” This means that the kids have rotating themes throughout the year- and they move from room to room for different activities. We had a couple of the older set that couldn’t handle all that change so quickly (Sunday School is only about an hour, remember). So I said I’d be glad to help, and heard nothing more about it.

I’ve been working on a lot of Sundays. The Fall is the busy season for one of my jobs, and as it also has a slow season, I like to try to build up some cash now to tide over the slower months (although it usually ends up making money to play catch-up from being through the slower months). We finally got a chance to go to Sunday School last week, as my work was cancelled for the day. So we went to introduce the guys to their new rooms: Andy to the preschool-4’s (the teachers Joey had his first year), and Joey to the First Grade room.

So I arrive and take Andy to his room, and one of the ladies pulls me aside and asks me about Joey. How is he doing? Where am I taking him?

We got guided not to the First Grade room, but to a new class- the Disabilities class, which currently consists of those two older kids, and now Joey. They have two people who “alternate” covering the class, and they are both special educators in their real lives. (How is “alternating” the teacher going to help kids with trouble with transitions and change?)

In other words, for Sunday School, Joey just got put in the self-contained classroom. And I find myself in a bit of a Catch-22.

Apparently, the first grade teacher doesn’t want Joey in her room, because she had one of the now-older kids, and didn’t know what to do with him. In other words, she was not properly supported before, and has no desire to be left in the cold twice. That may be reasonable enough, but where does that leave Joey? Isolated and closeted in a self-contained environment- a class that I am being given the strong impression was created specifically for him and these two other kids, one of which isn’t showing up regularly, either. He will get one-on-one (or nearly so, if the other kid shows up) attention for reading the little weekly reader things and the week’s Bible lesson. But he’ll be shut away from his friends, from his peers, and they are shut away from him.

I appreciate the effort and thought of trying to support people with special needs, but what about supporting them in the least restrictive environment?

What is more important? Learning Bible stories, or being included in the community of his peers? You probably have figured out my answer to that. If you haven’t, please note nowhere else in this post have I said anything about Bible stories.

That may seem strange to some folks, but we’re Methodists. The Bible stories themselves aren’t nearly as important as the lessons they teach- love, acceptance, honor, respect, living a life that spreads God’s grace in love through positive action and attitude. What good is memorizing The Good Samaritan if you keep passing by on the other side of the road every time you see someone in need? Teach the kid to help the person in need. They can read the Bible story later.

So we are left with a Sunday dilemma. Do we go back? Do we leave Joey in the self-contained room, or do we fight to have him in a room where the teacher doesn’t want to deal with him? Should we be looking for a new church home?

To the pumpkin patch!

We went to the pumpkin patch this afternoon. It is supposed to rain tomorrow, Andy has Harvest Day on Sunday, Halloween is Friday, so today was the day. We were pleased to see lots of other folks at Snead's Farm, because that means Snead's made money today, and we like them. We got to pick out pumpkins, play in the hay in the barn, check out the goats, llamas, and chickens, and have a great time. Yay, Fall!

Joey loves pumpkins. This year he's been into odd-colored pumpkins. He has a white one he bought with Grandma, and today he picked out this green one. He spent a good part of the afternoon cradling it in his arms, patting it lovingly, and referring to it as his "baby pumpkin." Which, it is- a baby, unripe pumpkin. Smart boy.

Andy picked out this little tiny pumpkin. Now, when I was a mere lass, my brother and I picked out a pair of pumpkins together. His was very tall and thin, and mine was tiny. We called them "Laurel and Hardly." Andy would have been in love with Hardly.
Then we went for a good chicken chase. Andy likes pretending to be a T. Rex and run after the chickens, roaring. He scared the bejeebus out of some chickens today. Sorry Myrtle May.

Joey preferred to chase the chickens while crowing like a rooster. Or just crowing. He sounded remarkably like a real rooster. Maddy's son would be so proud of him.

Yummy chocolate for Andy's school

Andy's school is having a fundraiser selling Gertrude Hawk chocolates. Very yummy yummy chocolate. If you are interested, you can order online (just click here), and they just ship it to you. Yummy yummy chocolate. To your door. And Andy's school gets money. Yummy.

Dismissed

For almost two years now- or is it longer?- Joey has insisted that someone sit in his room with him while he drifts off to sleep. Trying to leave before the child was fully asleep meant starting over in the whole 30-40 minute process. JoeyAndyDad has taken on the task the vast majority of evenings, sitting in the chair that was once my grandfather's, turning on his iPod to listen to a book once Joey was calm and quiet and just dropping off. Sometimes Joey likes to watch his aquarium light for a while before really going to sleep.

Every once in a while, we get a glimmer of possibility that this ritual may be ending.

Last night, Joey dismissed his dad after story time. I was still reading to Andy and making up our latest T-Rex and the Lizards installment, so when Andy was all tucked in, I wandered over to Joey's room to check on him. He has his fish light on.

I was also dismissed after a good squishing.

He went to the bathroom once, and spent the rest of time in his own room, being quiet. And then he fell asleep all by himself.

I think my baby is growing up.

Never Forget

"In Germany, they came first for the Communists,
And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist;
And then they came for the trade unionists,
And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist;
And then they came for the Jews,
And I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew;
And then . . . they came for me . . .
And by that time there was no one left to speak up."
-Martin Niemöller

There are many times when someone said or did something ignorant and mean, and I have spoken up. Every time I do so, I of course get my share of folks who support and folks who just plain don't get why I'm unhappy. Such is the way of the world; ignorance is hard to admit to and give up.

And there are plenty of moments when I have been reminded of my own ignorance, bias, and thoughtlessness. Thinking and changing is part of growing, and may I never stop growing until I'm dead. There is always more to learn.

But it remains hard to realize that there are some lessons people should have long ago learned and generalized, and yet the mistakes remain part of our society, even praised. Being"politically correct" once meant you showed respect to others and engaged in constructive dialogue using constructive language; somewhere along the way, that got lost in a frenzy of semantics and bulldog attitudes that insisted the point was more than to not offend. Is it really more respectful to say "disabled" instead of "handicapped"? The idea of asking a disabled or handicapped person- particularly the person standing in front of you- got lost in the war of folks on one side or the other. So much for being politically correct. The phrase got picked up and bashed by those who only wanted to think of themselves, which is so much easier, anyway.

Why is it is still "funny" to laugh at people, instead of with people? Most of us recoil at the idea of blackface being funny, but still laugh at the "retard." We fail to see the difference between Bill Cosby talking about having to kiss his aunts or dropping his ice cream and Topsy jokes. Do you know the difference? Why is latter offensive, and the former not? Why do people still think it funny to laugh at other people, when it is well-known that laughing at someone because of their race or religion is unacceptable?

There is a huge difference between laughing at someone, and laughing with someone. Laughing at people is mean. I refuse to condone it.

Wordless Wednesday: Today's accomplishment

Eep. Or, What's happening here.

Sorry for the post lag. I am grading the worst set of midterms I have ever gotten. We are trying to figure out what is going on with Joey in math. I had to put away the boys' big pool-slide today before it starts to really freeze around here. And I've been working like the Little Beaver Who Could.

Joey read Green Eggs and Ham to me last night, entirely by himself. He had his first box of 64 Crayolas today, which are right now his greatest treasure- all those colors, including "macaroni and cheese"! He was having some tummy distress in the car- the return of car sickness is not a good sign for sensory integration (here comes another sensory shift! AAAA!)

Andy's after-school mood is consistently Crabby. We took him for pizza yesterday because he positively would NOT go into the Olive Garden (where we normally have lunch when we go out with Grandma). He still likes dinosaurs. We're now making up the Adventures of T-Rex and the Lizard Brothers regularly at bedtime (maybe I should write them down and start a new classic children's story series). We've added Spider, Fox, Frog, Spooky, and Pumpkin to our list of characters this week. They tend to like to blow bubbles and play Hide-and-Seek.

I have two hours off tomorrow. I would dearly love to spend it curled up in my living room watching Time Bandits whilst stitching up something pretty from mom for Christmas in front of a small, comfy fire in the fireplace. Maybe if I feel energetic, I could arrange the mantel for Halloween. But I'm placing my money on the two hours being spent mulching the garden, digging through the guest room to even try to get to the Halloween decorations, and maybe some random cleaning-type activities. Because i suck.

But I will ltry for a few minutes of blogging. Really.

Fly on the ceiling of my car.

"aaEEEE{snort} onmyGREEshur aasisma anj aaEEEE{snort} onmyGREEshur aasisma anj ..."
"We found dinosaurs! Mommy! Dinosaurs!"

"Well, they didn't do too bad. It was a pretty long service, we couldn't have stayed for the whole thing anyway."
"Andy was asleep through most of it."
"That helped."

"aaEEEE{snort} onmyGREEshur aasisma anj aaEEEE{snort} onmyGREEshur aasisma anj ..."
"Dinosaur bites the babies. They get in the water splash and crocodiles eat them. They dead."

"The people behind us seemed very nice. They didn't even complain about Joey telling the church to be quiet."
"Yes, they were very patient."
'And the folks in front of us were nice about the kicking."
"Very."

"aaEEEE{snort} onmyGREEshur aasisma anj aaEEEE{snort} onmyGREEshur aasisma anj ..."
"AAAARRRRRGGGG! T-Rex eats the crocodile!"

"Considering how loud it was, they did really well."
"Yes, I'm very proud of them."

"aaEEEE{snort} onmyGREEshur aasisma anj Look at the pretty leaves! onmyGREEshur aasisma anj ..."

Sunday Retrospective: In Memory of Love Lost II

Just sayin'

I can hardly wait for the series of ads about the word "retard." Mean is such a huge part of human culture and experience. Want to solve some global problems? Start with using respectful and appropriate language. Be specific and clear. Randomly insulting others to make your point only displays your own ignorance and lack of language fluency. Don't like the little chef figure? It's dumb, it's ugly, it's weird to you. Say that. "Look at that chef, man- it's so stupid! Those pants are too wild! Check it out!"

Being disrespectful is just that. All we need is a little Golden Rule: treat others as you would want to be treated. This shouldn't be a revolutionary concept in human society anymore- it is thousands of years old now.

Bloggie Love

To my great surprise and delight, abfh gave me a beautiful new award! Surprised, because we often go head-to-head on important issues, delighted because I always learn something new when we do.

Now I get to pass this on to my eclectic taste in blogs.

First and foremost, this absolutely must go to Maddy at Whitterer on Autism, always good for a new insight into life with people who think about the world in a very different way from you do- and live in the same house. And not just the autistic people. I also recommend her blog Sandwiched Genes, which includes more of the old-style Maddy posts about conversations in her house, as if you were a fly on the wall. I'd get swatted, of course, because the room would hear me giggling.

This also must go to Stimey at Stimeyland, who embiggens us all. One of these days I'm getting up there for a playdate, Stimey. Really. I think our kids would have a blast. Discover her adventures in having sons, with and without autism.

Here is to Miss Kitty at Educated and Poor, and her adventures in academia. Miss Kitty taught an awesome class about country music over the summer- how cool is that for a comp lit prof? Better yet, she has a chicken named Myrtle May, and lots and lots of kitties at the Happy Kitty Cottage!

Please go visit Ambulance Driver at A Day In the Life of an Ambulance Driver. The evil Sumdood lurks in the corners of a world of coffee, midnight ambulance runs, hurricanes, and a beautiful little girl named KatyBeth. AD addresses issues of entitlement, disability, compassion, and trying to make sense of complete nonsense in the medical world.

One of the new blogs I'm following- and finding really interesting- is Jen at I'm Going Coconuts. I'm kind of lurking there, but I think it is worth a look at her life with her beautiful children, including a child with Asperger's Syndrome. She's starting to navigate through the special ed world.

Here's one for Kristina at Autism Vox, where we discover the larger issues of disability rights and experience, combined with personal notes abotu her family and experience close-at-hand with autism.

And then everybody ought to go say hello to kristi at Autism, Blessings, Challenges her her wonderful TC. It's a straight forward blog about day-to-day living in a world that includes autism.


abfh already awarded it to Niksmom at Maternal Instincts, but I thought I'd let her know I'd give it to her, too, But it doesnt' count to give it to somebody who already just got it, right?


There are a few other blogs I could pass this to, but most of them don't care about awards and stuff, and I'm only supposed to give seven, and wow, this was hard to choose. Thanks everybody for your fabulous blogs and insights!

Why it isn't funny

Club 166 has drawn our attention to an offensive skit put on by Saturday Night Live, and now showcased on NBC's website. The fact that people find this funny is very disturbing. This isn't laughing with someone (such as The Birdcage might be to the gay community). This SNL skit is nothing but pure mean. 100% pure mean. If you think something this mean is funny, all I can say is, wait until this kind of meanness is directed at you.

Even though Joey stayed home from school today with his cough, we went ahead and had OT. It's amazing how much work my boys have done in the last few years. Andy's OT saw us there, so she fetched the results from his latest eval and sat down with me to look at it. He's gone from moderate deficits in motor control and sensory integration, to being fully functional in the classroom and displaying normal-range motor skills in our year of OT. We have a number of strategies for dealing with the remaining sensory issues. We are considering having him in a group OT setting over the summer, but for all intents and purposes, he's discharged. How's them apples?

Around the corner came a friend of ours from school. His mom is big in the disability community around here. He's in middle school now. He's come a long way; he asks and answers questions now, even though his speech pattern consists of rises and falls of inflection that give his speech and eerie, sing-song sound, he does speak with good control of language. He flapped his hands happily to see his mom in the waiting room. He had come out to get some water, and the OT aide came with him to guide him over to the sink, where he got his own water, though it took some prompting and a few tries. A sing-song stream of talk on his favorite subject accompanied the process, then stopped abruptly when it was time to return to the session.

I thought of that SNL skit, and realized, with a deep sense of grief and anger, that people who think that skit is funny, probably will think this child is funny. And stupid. And not worth knowing.

And how wrong they are. The child has problems with social behavior and cues, but his ability to read and do math are amazing. Listening to his knowledge on his favorite topics is like listening to a living dissertation. He tells jokes- good ones. He has his own way of doing things, many very inventive ways of getting around his own motor skill difficulties. He's a good, smart, hard-working kid. To think of him as the butt of jokes because of his challenges just makes me see red.

Joey comes out, and I know he will also be facing those people who think mean is funny. He tilts his head, smiling as he jogs in a tight circle while his OT tells me about the session. He shows me the pumpkin he drew, a beautiful orange jack-o-lantern, with "Jack-o-lantern" written in his blocky letters on the back. I have a first grader who can spell "headphones" and "smudge" and "cheeseburger", who can read on a third-grade level, who can add three numbers together- but he is still considered by some people to be a joke. Something to be scorned, laughed at, put down.

Then they tell me to "get over it."

I don't think so.

Wordless Wednesday (On Thursday- oops): Craft Project

What would you want to do?

So Joey comes home, and Andy is at Grandma's. He can do anything he wants. I make some suggestions, but finally ask: what do you want to do?

And what he wants to do is sit on the comfy couch with goldfish pretzels and 7-Up, wearing Daddy's hat, watching A Charlie Brown Christmas.

Ah, the comforts of home.

Homework strategies

Now, granted, Joey has a cough and isn't tippy-top, but why does homework time have to be a disaster?

All year, there has been nary a word of homework. This week? We have three worksheets, each with attached reading, to complete tonight. So to the kitchen table we go!

I set the first sheet in front of him- a paragraph on sea turtles, with a half-page of fill-in-the-blank questions. We've been doing these kinds of sheets on our own- we did one on insects and one on spiders while visiting the Bug Box, and we just did one on bats last week. No problems. But now that it is an actual assignment?

Screaming. Crying. Gnashing of teeth. He read the paragraph. Then he started putting random words into the blanks, with his old fist grip and the worst handwriting I've seen him produce in months. What the...?

I finally gave up and sent him to sit in his room (and hopefully calm down and rest a little), and his dad is wrestling with the worksheets now. Why is it such a big deal that the sheets are for school, rather than for me? Am I going to have to set up a homework cubicle?

Yikes!

A New Story

For bedtime, we often read a story, and lately, Andy and I have been making up a story about T-Rex and the Blue Lizard. The story usually begins, "Once Upon a Time, T-Rex Andy was stomping through the woods..." and then we have Mommy make up a little adventure, then Andy takes up the thread (when I say, "The End", Andy then says, "Then..." and starts his own story). Joey can hear us doing this in Andy's room while he is having his own ritual in his own room with JoeyAndyDad.

Joey decided tonight that he wanted to make up a story, too.

With a little help from JoeyAndyDad, Joey made up his own story. He wanted to talk about Hopkins (from Signing Time) and Blue (from Blue's Clues... he's been on a bit of a Blue's Clues kick), so Dad suggested Blue could Skidoo into Signing Time to play with Hopkins. So Joey made up his own adventure, where Blue was trying to tell everyone she wanted to learn to sign! (Blue in the Treehouse was the first clue, Blue's paws were the second clue, and a frog was the third clue!)

How cool is THAT?

Autumn Evenings

We were outside, enjoying the warm autumn evening. I miss the trees that used to be in the yards around us; the fall isn't the same without the changing red leaves of the dogwood or the brilliant yellow of the old Tree of Heaven trees and mulberries. They all went down with Isabel. The neighbors used to have cherry trees, but when they also went with Isabel, they planted pear trees- not as nice, either.

But the roses are having their fall bloom, and I am working on getting things cleared out and mulched in. I know you shouldn't mulch before first frost, but I have to do what I can when I can, or it doesn't get done at all. I picked some zinnias to take into the house. The boys were playing- Andy in sandbox, Joey with his hulahoop. He likes to pretend he is a car, with the hoop around his waist. Andy's dinosaurs were rescuing each other. Joey was zooming around the yard. I took a break from yardwork to sit on my bench- which could use a good coat of paint.

Then Joey sits next to me.

"Let's have two seats," he says. "Let's go!"
"You're driving," I smile to my left at him. He grins and vrooms.
"Where are we going?" I ask casually.
"We're taking Grandma home. Then we go to the store."
I watch him pretending to drive, happy as a clam. Vroom!
"What do we need at the store?" I ask.
"Cookies! We need cookies. Better go to the store!"

And he's off, the hula hoop around his waist.

How far we have come.

Dead cars

Yes, I was supposed to work this morning. That is what I was supposed to do. But sometimes life has other plans.

This morning we awoke to Andy hacking his lungs out and Joey bouncing at our feet. So we dragged ourselves out of bed to deal with morning madness. We decided try tuck Andy back into his bed with some cough meds and try to get him to rest. JoeyAndyDad hopped into the car with Joey to get some doughnuts. I got my work corner ready for the day. I thought about calling in to work only half the day, as Andy looked pretty rough and might need a trip to the doctor; at the very least, JoeyAndyDad might need some help (having the boys on two different levels of the house is a bit of a challenge).

The phone rang. Who calls the house at 8 in the morning?

JoeyAndyDad does, when the car just cuts off while driving. Again. I get a premonition that it would be a good idea to call and cancel my work session, which I do before carrying Andy as-is to the car to go get Joey, while JoeyAndyDad calls for a tow truck. I grab Joey, then go get the doughnuts (We love Krispy Kreme!) and come back to lighten up the wait for the tow truck with warm, sugary, doughnutty goodness. The plan is to take the car over to Jeff's (our mechanic), and pick up the car we left there to be winterized (the Jeep). But then. what if the other car isn't ready enough to be driven? I didn't want to strand JoeyAndyDad out there, so I waited to go over with him.

Sure enough, the Jeep isn't ready. So we leave the green car and the red car and head home. By this time, Andy is looking positively perky, Joey is beside himself, and things are generally going crazy. I make an executive decision to take the boys to the Bug Box, which is having a special event today.

We had a fabulous time. i didn't take the camera, because I left JoeyAndyDad home to recover from his morning. We looked at bugs, and played at the various tables, and made thank-you cards and ornaments for wounded veterans, and a good time was had by all. Then we got thirsty and tired, so we headed back to the car to go get some lunch and drinks. I got everybody strapped in, plopped tiredly into my seat, and turned the key.

And nothing happened.

And when I say nothing, I mean nothing. No power at all. The door locks were not even working now. Nada. Silence.

Fortunately, there is an auto parts store right behind the Bug Box, and we were parked right in front of it. Even more fortunately, there is a very nice man working there. Several other ladies who were loading up their tired, thirsty children suggested I run in there for help, and they kept an eye on my guys while I did so. It took a few minutes to get their attention and ask, and then a few more minutes for them to finish up what they were doing to come out and help- long enough that one of the nice ladies came in to check and make sure they were going to help. And they took so long coming out that she had turned her car around to help jump my car, as I already had cables.

I would like to take this opportunity to say, thank you, very nice ladies who took their time to help me, to watch my kids, and to offer their battery, when they all had better things to do and tired, thirsty kids of their own. I don't think those ladies have any idea how grateful I am.

We were about to hook up the cables when the guy came out of the shop with a jump machine, so I rather flusteredly thanked the nice lady and sent her on her way (I hope she wasn't insulted... I was pretty flustered). Turns out it was a good thing I did. Apparently, my battery was super-duper hot- something was overcharging it. Our first attempt to jump it with the machine was a failure, not enough power. The guy then went and drove his big truck around and connected up my cables.

And they melted.

So I was glad the nice lady who stayed got to go home instead of using her battery, it could have been a huge disaster, and someone could have been hurt. Instead, the guy fetched his industrial cables, and got a surface charge going so I could get the car started. I was fine- as long as I didn't turn the car off. Oh, and the jump blew the fuse for my radio (or shorted it out).

So I drove the guys home, tossed them to their Dad, left instructions for my mother to be called to pick me up, and off I drove back to Jeff's. He wasn't there, but I left a note.

That's right. All three cars were now in his tender care.

Mom is letting me borrow the truck so I can get Joey to his swim lesson in the morning and Andy to school on Monday. We're working on how to get JoeyAndyDad to work on Monday. I stopped to grab a child seat, and Jeff had returned. We both laughed hard, but he also promised to get us a working car ASAP, probably Monday night (the Jeep just needs an inspection to be in working order- but what if the stations are closed for Columbus Day?)

We are eagerly awaiting the call.