Zadie and stuff

This morning, I put Z's rhinestone sandals on. She whips them off and says "I want my sparkle shoes on." I said "But those have sparkles." She says "Well, they're the wrong kind of sparkles." I say "But you used to love those shoes!" She says "Well, I did, but now I growed up and I like these sparkle shoes."



Last night she agreed to try riding her bike for the first time in a long time. She is finally tall enough! She walked, straddling the sissy bar, most of the time, but for a brief period she did actually sit on the seat. A couple times she stopped briefly, and I looked at her questioningly. She said "Oh, I just tooted for a minute. Did you hear it?"

We went about 3/4 of the way down the block, but she was so excited about our destination that eventually she hopped off and ran. We were going to meet the new/old neighbors. They moved out of their duplex just before they had a baby a little over three years ago. But then they had to walk away from their mortgage on the house they had moved into in Folsom, so they came back here. I've talked many times to the husband, but the wife worked nights, so I didn't really know her. They're really nice people, though, and they have a daughter named Olivia who is about 9 months older than Zadie. Sometimes Zadie can be a little shy or weird around new kids, so I was watching carefully for signs of we-should-go-now, but they got on like gangbusters. They were giggling and sharing toys in no time. Olivia has a purple jeep that apparently she doesn't usually like to ride. They got it out to see if Zadie would ride it. She loved it!


I had a couple poetic moments yesterday. When I headed out for the gym at 5, it was dark, but I could see that the very large doormat in front of the funeral home by my house was bunched up oddly. I looked more closely, and there was a homeless man sleeping under it, using it as a blanket. The doormat is inscribed with one word in large font: dignity.

Recently, we went to my friend Guitargirl's (soon to be Nursegirl!) birthday party. It had a "Jesus and Tacos" theme (don't ask). Zadie got a small bible out of the pinata, and I haven't quite known what to do with it. I mean, I'm not religious, but you can't recycle a bible, right? Anyway, it's been on a shelf, and yesterday Zadie picked it up, tucked it carefully into my work bag, and said, "In case you get lost."

Our bathroom/plumbing wasn't-a-remodel-but-is-sort-of-becoming-a-big-deal project is going swimmingly. The water pressure is better. The new dual flush toilet is installed and works great. The tankless water heater is installed and is, I think, faster than the old one (although all we had heard, except from my mom, was that they were slower). The first few rows of tile have been installed. I cleaned up the area that had been covered by the old toilet for, oh, 60 years, but is now exposed (there was quite a crust buildup). It looks like we're going to have to have a sewer cleanout installed. I don't know why we don't seem to have one, but we don't. And that made the sewage emergency we had last weekend rather difficult to deal with. Luckily, we've got my cousin Brian doing work for us, and he works pretty cheaply. I really haven't had him do much for us before, and I think I had the impression that he was kind of an unskilled worker, but in fact, he really seems to know his shit. Of course, my prevailing image of him is still from his first birthday, and he's almost 30...

I became a union rep for a couple reasons -- to help protect my colleagues, both individually and collectively, and to increase communication between our site and the union. What I didn't realize is how totally one-sided the union leadership wants that communication to be. On every meeting agenda, they schedule "rep concerns" last, and I don't think I've attended a single meeting where they've gotten to it before about 5:55 (and yes, the meeting is supposed to be over at 6). Today the message seemed to be "here is what we want you to know, here are the things we want you to do, here are the ways we need your help, here is some information we want to convey, and, yes, Damian? Oh, rep concerns? Oh, it's 5:58? Okay, well, go ahead." I'm not looking forward to sending out this week's meeting notes, which will essentially consist of "Hey, remember that giant pay cut you took? Well, they're hiring 28 new teachers and giving teachers at five schools about $20,000 extra over the next two years. Oh, and could you pretty please come phone bank for the election? After all, we're working for you, and the union represents all of us."

That's the main stuff on my mind right now. I'm invited to band practice tonight, but I am SO TIRED. Plus, if I have any energy tonight, I'm inclined to tidy up a little. It seems like if I don't clean a little each day, the house just turns into total chaos.

Take care.
CM