Sunday, May 29, 2011

SuperIma Sunday Check-In: Petty Larceny Edition

Somebody stole my bike. 

You know, my brand-new, beautiful bike that I got only one month ago?  The one that I tricked out with a cushioned gel seat and a handlebar bag that contained $10-$15? 

The crazy part is that the thief came into my garage while my garage was open, which meant I was home and lurking about doing some sort of outdoor project. 

"The helmet's still here," Nathan pointed out.

"Good, I hope the thief gets a head injury," I said. 

However, in light of the recent tragic tornadoes, I'm glad bike theft is the worst thing that has happened to me lately.

Moving on ...

I had a pretty good week.  Right after I wrote last week's check-in, Nathan and I had our first beach trip of the season.  It was so pleasantly warm, which was good because the water was still so cold.  The lake wasn't quite ready for people to swim in it, because I think the last of the ice had thawed the night before our visit.  But the beach was gorgeous, and put me in a positive state of mind the way only the beach can.  (BTW for people who live near oceans and are feeling sorry for our "lake beach," let me note that the Great Lakes look exactly like oceans, and sound like oceans, and have all the qualities of oceans except the saltwater.) 

Continuing with my lake theme, Tuesday I went to the boat party. Wednesday I baked pies, and Thursday was Nathan's last day of preschool.  Friday was my first rehearsal for The Beatles tribute show, wherein I am the emcee, which meant I was trying to sneak in time here and there to write my script.  (In the interests of accuracy, I will say that I have only written half, but my "Beatles vs. Justin Bieber Comparison Chart" is, if I may say so myself, pure gold.) 

Anyway, at the first rehearsal, it was fun to see the kids again.  They were like, "Yay, Shannon, are you writing the script again?"  And then, "Shannon's here!  Shannon's here!"  I really need to hire adorably exuberant children to announce my presence everywhere I go.  And the kids wanted to know if I had brought "Batman" with me, which is what they call Nathan because of the time he came to Snow White rehearsal in his Batman pajamas with the cape, and proceeded to run across the stage at random times. 

Also one of the kids asked me if Elton John was a member of The Beatles. 

All fun aside, I'm not sure I did a very good job on my SuperIma goals this week.  The weather did not cooperate for my "30 minutes outside each day" goal.  In fact, I think maybe the only time I spent outdoors was when I was waiting to get on the boat, and we were all freezing then.  It was definitely an indoor week.

Which means you'd think I would have gotten more reading done, but I didn't achieve my "finish two light, fluffy books" goal either.  I did finish Jen Lancaster's If You Were Here, which was mostly good but went on too long, such that I dragged my feet on finishing it.  And now I'm almost halfway through Water For Elephants, and I acknowledge that, yes, I am the last person in the world to read it.  And now thanks to the movie version I have to picture the characters as Robert Pattinson and Reese Witherspoon, and I have a problem with the fact that R-Patz's character is named Jacob, when he basically made a name for himself playing a character whose rival is named Jacob.  But that's okay because R-Patz is hot. 

I think I did do a good job with my goal to keep my general areas clear of physical clutter.  Daily straightening up of the kitchen and my bedroom seems to make upkeep easier.  (And I know, there is no greater "duh" than the revelation expressed in the previous sentence.)

This upcoming week will be a bit different than normal.  For one thing, it's the first of a two-week hiatus between school and camp, wherein I have no away-from-Nathan time.  The challenge is that I have some writing to do, and it's hard to do it with Nathan around.  Nathan is okay at entertaining himself, until I have to get some kind of task done where his presence is not wanted.  Like, the other day I was trying to do my super-accurate-Wikipedia-based research for my Beatles script, and I went up in my bedroom to get some peace and quiet, and it was at that instant that Nathan came in and argued that he just had to watch TV in the bedroom, he just had to.  

Anyway, what I'm trying to get at here is, I think I need some sort of daytime babysitting arrangement so I can have some dedicated time to write scripts and do errands.  Also, this is by no means definite, but I might (might) have some actual paying freelance work this summer, so it would be good to have some kind of babysitting arrangement in place.  So, I guess my goal this week is to sort of flesh out what I want, childcare-wise, and figure something out. 

My other goal is to spend more time petting Leia.  For those of you who have pets, you know they are a very calming presence, and I could use some calming this week.  Besides the stress of having to be with my kid 24/7, I also have rehearsals three nights this week and then two shows next weekend.  I realize none of these activities actually constitutes a legitimate stressor, at least not by life-and-death standards, but sometimes I find it challenging to be out of the house and away from my control-freak tasks three nights in a row.  I don't want to make it sound like I'm so important that chaos immediately erupts in my absence, but it is amazing how quickly my kitchen can go from relatively clean to "possible condemnation by the health department" when I'm out for one evening. 

So, that's it.  Babysitter and pet Leia. 

Have a good week, everyone!

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