A very unusual week

So here's the main thing that was strange... my husband and mom were BOTH out of town last week. Zadie spent three days with Grandpa John, and by all accounts, everyone there had a good time. I was on half-days, which was awesome, but obviously Z's routine was ALL jacked up. At about the end of the day each day, she'd have a mini-meltdown. One night she had to put her feelings of missing Daddy into her piggy bank after a brief miscommunication where she thought I was giving my missing-Daddy feelings to her.

We did a bunch of fun stuff, though. We went to Mighty Kong Cafe for lunch one day and had a milkshake and a nice talk about Godzilla vs. King Kong. On another day we went to Bertha Henschel park in the evening. On another, we went there for a concert and she ended up in the wading pool in her underpants (so were half the other kids). We made dinners together and went to the gym together. We had a few treats like popsicles. We hung out in the hammock. It was odd but nice.

Our long, long, cold, gray spring suddenly turned to summer. It was actually a little reassuring: I always say that I'm not bothered by the heat until it hits 100, and yesterday it was 93. I was fine. Today it was over 100, so we sat in the air conditioning after noon and enjoyed the wonders of TV.

Father's Day was super-fun. I bought Sweetie some DVDs of Dr. Who, but I also made him fresh sriracha hot sauce. Then I made my dad a pineapple upside down cake. My stepdad was out of town, but when he came back, I made him a Portuguese marinade which is spelled Vinho d'alhos and which is pronounced vinya dazh or something. I don't get Portuguese.

I met with a personal trainer at the gym. I felt kind of awful saying it, but she was like "And what's your main fitness goal?" and I responded, "I just want to lose weight." I know that's not supposed to be your goal -- you're supposed to want to be healthy and fit and have low cholesterol or whatever, but the truth is, except for being overweight, I have all those things. I rarely get sick, I have lots of energy, I have low cholesterol, low blood pressure, a healthy resting heart rate... I'm just fat. And although I sort of believe in "health at any size," I don't want to be any size. I want to be smaller and not have a big fat gut and back fat. So she said I was doing things right, but thought I should add some circuit training, so I am, starting tomorrow morning. Wish me luck.

On the cat front, the cats are finally getting along. Luther pretends to be super Beta -- Mina and he get close and he flops onto his back -- but when food is delivered, he throws himself bodily in front of her to get it. He's very sweet and cuddly and loving, but he pisses everywhere, which is going to be a problem. I think once we have him unmanned, perhaps that will get better, too. Also, I could do without his middle-of-the-light love-fests with my face.

Zadie is taking swimming lessons, which I'm glad about. I really want her to know how and to feel more comfortable around the water. She likes it, but she clings to me and won't even hold onto the wall. But in two lessons, she's already made progress. She is kicking and blowing bubbles, and will easily go up to about her nose in the water. She absolutely cracks me up, though: the instructor puts these shark-shaped weights on the stairs and encourages the girls to pick them up. I think he's getting them used to going a little deeper in the water. Well today, Z was sitting on the right side of the stairs and he kept moving the shark farther left so she would have to reach farther, therefore getting deeper in the water. Well he got to a point that she was like "okay," and stood up, walked up two steps, scooted to the left side, walked down two steps, and picked up the shark. I love her problem-solving, but I'm not sure his pedagogical goal was met. I have a feeling we're seeing the very early stages of "But why do I HAVE to show my work?" and various other school-rule-related minor rebellions.

The other girl in class is the most stone-faced kid I've ever seen. She NEVER smiles. And when he floats her along and tells her to kick, she just does a dead-body float. Zadie, on the other hand, is kicking wildly and yelling "WHEE!" The other girl has burst into tears once each day, and Zadie has been fine. About ten minutes before class got out today, she told me she wanted to get out, and climbed out on her own. I thought she was asking to leave, but then she announced "I have to go potty." I took her, still not really thinking she had to go, since we'd gone only about 25 minutes earlier, but she promptly peed and went back to her lesson. So she's kicking ass, basically.

My writing group is tomorrow and I haven't written a thing. I should have done it tonight, but I just didn't have it in me. Anyway, I have to get going to feed the cats and go to bed so I can go "circuit train" in the morning.

I hope you're all well, and I know life is good today, because everyone I love that lives here is here, and it's really summer time, and I don't have to work.