Snow snow snow

If Miss Murray looks miserable straining against her green leash, then you can imagine how unhappy many of my fellow New Yorkers were this Christmas weekend. People didn't have leashes exactly but there were plenty of peopling wanting unsuccessfully to go places and being totally unable to move. Kate and I have been travelling -- we spent a weekend in Nashville and then went back to New York and flew out from New York to Columbus, Ga for our annual Christmas caper. It's always wonderful with our cousins and this year was no exception. Arnie picked us up from the Atlanta airport and we arrived in Colmbus just in time for dinner -- good chili -- and lots of conversation. Next day was the required shopping trip with Lucy that I so look forward to at Target to check out their fleece collection and also buy goodies for Kate's stocking. A new tradition was born: the Christmas eve brunch and then midnight service with the best Christmas music ever brought us to Christmas Day! A joyful Christnas day and then Arnie drove to Nashville and Kate and I started home from Atlanta but this time we ended up in beautiful downtown Harrisburg, Pa because of the incredible blizzard that closed LaGuardia Airport. I am not the most relaxed traveller but Kate, bless her heart, is calm or seems to be calm which makes her a great travelling companion. We could have been in much worse quarters -- sleeping at the Atlanta airport -- but American put us up in a Sherton Hotel which had a good restaurant, flat screen TV and fluffy quilts. Girls night with movies and room service. But the next day we made the executive decision to take the train to New York which really worked out. Especially when I got an e-mail from American saying that they had cancelled our flight totally so we would have been on one line after another trying to rebook our flight. Kste had never taken a train trip longer than 1 hour so she announced that this was a better way to travel and that the seats were more comfortable. Besides which we had tickets for the Christmas show at Radio City music Hall so there was no way that we weren't going to be back in time for that or go down trying. We rolled into Penn Station at about noon and then Kate and I rolled our suitcases home over mountains of snow.

Free at last....

Caffeine

It's my drug of choice that I have been trying almost successfully to kick for many months. I radically cut down my caffeine intake without really realizing it by drinking decaf coffee which was labeled BIG and then turned out to be LITTLE in terms of buzz.

But today: watch out world. I'm really flying. I've had many cups o coffee most notably sitting in Starbucks this afternoon with a friend to revise my Linkedin page. I am quite superior and amazing. Officially. And, if you don't beleive me, just check out my revised Linked in page. Amazing. Almost walking on air because this is the kind of detailed writing that I hate but need.

Bring on the caffeine she said rapidly.

statistics

I'm trying to make sense out of some of these numbers: 3 boxes of kleenex used in a day and a half, 1 pound of beef fat found and purchased for a plum pudding, 4 miles of travelling in this freezing day....$5 spent on lunch...1 hour spent walking the dog...I think it's the 3 boxes of kleenex that really astounded me. If each one has 80 tissues in it, how can Kate have blown her nose 240 times.

This skewed picture of my life was capped last night with a manicure and pedicure to make sure that I have devine ruby nails on my hands and feet.

Single Parenting

when Kate was little I would categorize my mornings as those of a proud parent which meant that all went well from 6:00 am until about 9:00 am. Or I would call them single parent mornings which meant that the dog had thrown up on the white rug, Kate had melt down and I lost my temper. Haven't had so many of those days since Arnie and I've been married but now since he's mostly based in Nashville, those classifications came into my head.

Late Wednesday night Kate got slammed with doing more work on a project as part of a cooperative student project which in my mind more often than not goes severely wrong. Kids don't start those projects until 9 ish and then often something is missing. that was the case with one of her co-conspirators alledging that her computer crashed. Curious that she could still send e-mail. But anyway, Kate was furious because she had to stay up and write the first act of a play. She went to bed at 10 something and I got her up at 5:30 to continue with this idiocy. I walked the dog, went to the gym and when I came back to the house realized that a letter of explanation was surely in Kate's best interest for her very demanding English teachers.

So at 7:00 am I sat at the computer stark naked, swearing a blue streak, trying to craft a sensible, compelling and short letter for Kate to take into her teacher. Kate kept asking me why I hadn't used any commas -- because I do't take a breath when I talk -- and why I kept freezing her computer screen. I was almost finished when I discovered that I had spelled his name wrong.

So this time while the dog was perfect both of us had a melt down before we got out of the house. I'm not sure if we have made any progress at all.

Girls Weekend BlowOut

I flew out to Chicago for a fabulous girls weekend with Spooky who has been there working on a soderbergh movie since October. We walked a good half hour through Chicago, down Michigan Avenue by the Wrigley building and across the river
to get to a hoppin' restaurant on fRiday night. when we got home to her 33rd floor apartment we watched a huge snow storm come in and blanket the city. All very kool.

Saturday it was still snowing when we went out for breakfast and then a tour of Michigan Avenue's best. We had Gineen do our makeup while we dawdled in the cosmetics department at Saks, did a little Christmas shopping for our loved ones, checked out some old haunts and had a coffee at the Drake. A perfect day in a city which we both love. I've always thought that everybody in Chicago looked big and healthy and while that's true they certainly look big and fat to me now.

We went out to the North Pond for dinner on Saturday which was like dining in a small Frank Lloyd Wright cabin on a lake. All fabulous untilI had to come back to New York so that I could go to work....

thanksgiving redux

It came and went pretty smoothly. Kate and I finished reading Girl in Translation together and it is my new must read book for this season. Consequently I was able to deal with my mantra God is In the Details and I was organized like a german field marshall which was all to the good with a pre Thanksgiving dinner party for the Sheftalls who had just driven up from Georgia and other guests totalling 16 people and then Thanksgiving for 11 people. This was after Kate and her cousins went up to the Museum to watch the parade from a VIP vantage point that I had been able to wangle for them. Kate has turned into an amazing hostess and was a real champ about helping with the details of the Wednesday night dinner. Arnie came into town on Thanksgiving morning and did all the things that husbands do like reaching those bowls and vases that live on the tallest shelves, setting up the bar and being charming. On Friday I had to go into the office and pretend to work. No self respecting journalist worth their salt was working but I was there on the off chance that they might be struck by immediate interest in the Museum. Off to dinner with the Sheftalls again at our favorite New York restaurant Bar Pitti and then they went off to the theatre and we prtty much collapsed. The Sheftalls left on Saturday and Arnie flew out on Sunday. Actually the adrenaline was pretty much flowing for everybody until Monday night when Kate and I both went to bed at 9:00 am and woke up at 6:00am. what an indulgence.

Took Kate to school this morning who exhibited true New York City street smarts. As we got on the bus I noted to Kate that the back of the bus seemed crowded with very few people sitting near the driver. "Probably a crazy person is sitting up front...."

September/October/November Song

The weather is curiously warm even as Thanksgiving approaches. I have a favorite early morning walk with Miss Murray where the sun has a halo effect as it shines through the leaves of several still lush yellow trees. Then I can scuff my feet through the fallen leaves like a kid. Somehow it's very therapeutic.

Kate and I are in a new evening pattern where we have dinner -- or not -- depending on whether or not one or both of us are hungry and then we are reading a book outloud. In Translation is a book that I started and then we started to read it outloud and together. It's just a great way to spend an evening. Tonight of course nothing stands in the way of NCIS...and I'm also kinda cooking for Thanksgiving which will take up some time. But with some help from my friends I've managed to pare down the number of items I'm actually cooking. Now on my to do list is a cake and the stuffing. Don't ask what I had originally thought about preparing! The Sheftalls are coming to town tomorrow and will be staying in an available New York apartment and then having dinner with us on Wed & Thursday. Great fun.

Jubilation

Somehow I forgot to mention that we have a new toilet. Now it may sound like a gross and unsuitable topic to you, but to me....We had been having trouble with the aforementioned piece of equipment and relocated the plunger to the bathroom in an effort to forestall any trouble. And even so, we had trouble. It took several trips to Home Depot -- hate them -- to buy a toilet, special order and then to get it delivered and then installed without I might add quickly breaking the tile on the floor which was one of my major concerns. So now we have a toilet that works! Bravo for us.

Free Time

I had a day off on Thursday -- Veterans Day you know -- and it was exquisite for this veteran of life. On my way up 6th avenue to the dentist I passed a string of 3 camels parading along. Sensational. A trip to the dentist which was mercifully quite quick although Pam, my hygenist and I, have become good friends exchanging ribal life commentaries and bad jokes by e-mail. Time for a coffee and a chance to read the paper as I watched other people scurrying to work. A stroll along Central Park West to do some limited food shopping and then home for nap...why not. Girls lunch at home without Kate who was safely tucked away at school. Another nap because after all it's exhuasting to be at leisure and then cook a new recipe for a friend who ultimately cancelled dinner because of ill health. That was just fine too.

More days like that and less like today which is the second day of the frenzied week surrounding the opening of the Museum's block buster exhibition on the Brain. Kate and several of her classmates saw it on Friday and pronounced it both kool and interesting. What else can you ask for?

Arnie was in for the weekend and we did all the normal family things from taking Miss Murray to the Park on what I fear is one of the last really beautiful fall days with the maples in Central Park practically shimmering in the sunlight to soccer for Kate. I was given a pass because I cooked dinner and they had gone from an indifferent sushi restaurant to the soccer fields...Sunday was the date for Kate's interview at the Beacon school, one of the better high schools here in the city which required providing a portfolio of 7th grade grades, a sample of work from last year and an essay about soemthing they had a passion for. After some grumbling Kate developed a very sophisticated outline for a piece about soccer and the importance of geometry. An immediate grabber. And she also included poetry in her portfolion rather than some earnest English paper. So of course this was the topic of her interview because it's interesting. And then she had to write a paper about her favorite character in a book so Kate chose cryptologist Victoria in Dan Brown's Angels & Demons...great choice especially since Beacon has a cryptology course....

This school business seems never to end and keeps growing tentacles in its free time...

Nashville Stories

Big Adventure to go to this fabled American city famous for Lo-retta Lynn, horses and Garth Brooks...

My first impression was good. I ducked into the ladies room in the Nashville airport and found 5 Dyson hand dryers. Wow. I am crazy about the Dyson vacuum cleaner and think Dyson's designs for everything from wheel barrows up and down are amazing so a city that can +afford to both appreciate good design and and buy it for a public space definitely has something going for it. Nashville is a town with money and the restaurants are crowded and the tourists keep on buying cow boy boots...In all other respects it seems very normal city of a mid size where people voted democrat in a republican state.

We visited schools, saw good book stores, ate tomato basil soup, drank beer and walked the streets with the locals, visited diverse neighborhood real estate and experienced some very, very chilly weather. We also met some nice people, ate shrimp and grits but no biscuits, alas, and plan on going back in December to do the whole thing over again. But this time Kate will be visiting Nashville, too.

Arnie has a nice apartment with several flat screen tvs. Now that is a good example the out of town luxury thing! And he bought a car. A grey car. I realized afterwards that I should have asked about the brand of the car but city girls like yellow taxis and cars of color.

Bedbugs

New York is in the middle of bedbug paranoia and some of the anxiety is well placed according to the experts and amount of press coverage that one of the Museum's bedbug experts is receiving...Everybody in the office has sat through these interview where our resident expert intones mournfully about how to avoid bringing bedbugs home with you from a trip or explains how high heat that you use to kill them just might destroy everything in your apartment from melting the glue in your furniture to buckling the floor.

So in New York bedbugs have taken over from headlice as the #1 public enemy. This morning it was my turn to sit in Lou's overstuffed and skeezy office as he did a telephone interview with two major outlets about the prevalence of bedbugs, how he feeds them -- on his arm so they drink his blood - which always grosses me out and then began to hear the crunch of what sounded like paper or lettuce.

Oh, said a researcher, as she popped her head around the test tubes and stacks of books, I'm just making my lunch. And then she was eating it, too.

Double gross in that lab....

More transistions

So, what's the most important thing this morning? It's about Me and the fact that I'm wearing shoes for the first time in 6 weeks. Beautiful black slides in fact. I don't count sneakers as shoes so this experiment is all good news for as long as it lasts.

Arnie came into town from Nashville and we all had a great weekend with a full schedule of Cactivities from Chinese lessons, soccer and bat mitzvah plus unexpected outings to buy contact lenses for Kate and a new toilet for our bathroom. Both very much needed. I had really hesitated about getting lenses for Kate but discovered that she really hadn't been able to see. She was reading everything from street signs to ads as we walked home with the sense of pleasurable discovery that a blind person might have on regaining their sight. I guess that if you have glasses but don't wear them then the blackboard will always remain a mystery to you! Egads. Of course I should be sympathetic to this because my parents discovered I couldn't see when I kept saying "What fish are you talking about?" Or have I already told that story?

And the new toilet? I don't know that I have time for a full fledged rant about how much I detest Home Depot...We made 2 trips to buy the damn toilet and came back empty handed both times because it's never as simple as people would have you beleive. We finally had to special order the thing and that it was done at Home Depot was only due to the efficiency of Richard, salesperson in training. Well, that already put me into a quandry because what can traineees do? Well, this one followed through even when I had to blow him off because I was in the middle of the chaotic Museum Halloween celebration on Sunday. It all got done. But I still hate Home Depot. I have time to be right because I won't have the toilet until the end of the week.

New York finally got very chilly Autumn weather this weekend and on Saturday as we dropped Kate off for a bat mitzvah, Arnie and I went on a very New York date. We went to a movie in Yorkville and stopped at the revamped Papaya King for a swell dinner of hot dogs. Cost to the local host: $7

Halloween trick or treaters came to the apartment on Sunday -- they were there and then they were gone like a summer storm -- and this year Kate had the good sense not to go out with them because they were all 4 & 5 years old. She will regret not haing a stash of candy but so be it.

Next set of Mountains to Cross

After more than 6 months of tutoring and general nail biting, the day of THE TEST finally arrived. Our entry ticket for Saturday's SHSAT test which is mandatory if you have any thoughts of going to one of New York's 8 very very selective high schools including Stuyvestant and Bronx Science, was for 12 noon. So Kate and approximately 10 to 15,000 other teens with their parents dutifully made our way to Chambers Street causing a major traffic jam which required extra cops to direct traffic both ambulatory and vehicular. We took the test. I say we advisedly because by that time I felt as if I had taken it too. Only I was able to go reeling off into the sunny afternoon to Oldeon which is one of my favorite restaurants to order wine and have lunch. I had company which made it all wonderful and just about the appointed hour of 4 went back to Stuyvesant to pick Kate up.

You have to know that there was an 8 o'clock test on Saturday and an 8 o'clock test on Sunday....

OK next life hurdle.

Oh, the results? We don't get those until February.

Morning sighting

Miss Murray and I saw fully dressed man who seemed office bound with his briefcase clutched firmly in his hand doing walking lunges down 37th street at 6:00 am. After 4or 5 steps he would turn around to see if anybody had seen him.

I saw you dude!

Days of Our Lives

It is my very real consideration that our lives these days reflect the kind of story arcs that you might see on Days of our Lives. Job arc: Arnie is safely and very happily, I might add, settled into a great 2-bedroom apartment with a working fireplace in Brentwood, TN. Living conditions are always better outside of the city which at its worst is like living in Deckensian London. But my comment is that after you enjoy the big rooms, sunlight and mod cons, you are still there not here. Ok, so I'm hopelessly parochial.

School arc: Kate is counting down the days to her test for the specialized high schools. let me say here again that finding a decent high school, public high school that is, in New York can be daunting to say the least. So we are just pawns moving through the mass of good citizens looking for the brass ring. Saturday is the day she takes the test for admission to one of the 8 specialized high schools. You can be a double slacker, ne'er do well, never even go to school and be chronically late but if you score in the high numbers, these schools will take you. forget charm, character, good will. Nothing counts but the numbers. I must add that Kate is really paying attention now and went to Brooklyn Tech last night which is now #1 on her list.

Health arc: I have graduated from wearing the awful orthopedic boot to real shoes. and one of my first outings was to buy shoes...OMG What fun. and then of course after I had this euphoric time with David, the very smoothest salesman from Harry's Shoes on Broadway, I realized that I need sneakers not exquisite slides...so then I had to go buy big white clunky sneakers. But oh so comfortable. I am a style statement about what not to wear.

.

Transistions

I want to change the name of this blog to something more dramatic but I'm having some trouble with just the right label...It could be Road Trips...Actually I came up with something sensational this morning on the subway but since I didn't write it down....nothing happened.

But in any case we are in the middle of a celebratory transistion which means that Arnie got a job!!!!!very exciting and he will be working out of Brentwood, TN which according to me is really Nashville. And everybody I've talked with has positive things to say about Nashville. Kate and I will go out in early November and see what's what and whose who. More later after our fact finding mission.

And from that one event which happened on Thursday at 10:00 am in the morning, everything has changed. Our vistas have opened up, vacations are no longer forbidden topics and there may be some very cofortable and uncomfortable moments. Nothing is static any longer. One immediate postive benefit for Kate is that she and her Dad went out yesterday to buy a new computer....Then an immediate and positive consequence for us was that Kate cooked a terrific dinner of spare ribs because she wants to earn raise money so that she can buy some electronic gadget or another. Not only did she cook but she cleaned up too.

Cheers.

Name change

I'm changing mine to Sartorius Johnson. Isn't that great?

School Days - Golden Rule Days

I love September because it marks the beginning of the year with new clothes for school, untouched notebooks and new text books. But that's just stage 1. This year there is a Stage 2 which is the long twisty road to finding a high school for Kate. We could continue to send her to her excellent school but we also have to send her to college and since I don't think she will thrive at Bob's college in Podunk, USA, we are making some mid course corrections. So here we are as minor but intense players in an annual New York ritual called find the right high school and figure out how to get your child in and forget the other 200,000 kids who want the same 125 places. It totally reminds me of Suzanne Collins' book The Hunger Games.

Got the picture? It's pure Marat Sade plus crowd control. Education is hardly even on the table. It's numbers, metrics, open houses, screening tests and being in District 2! Luckily I have a number of friends who are veterans of these education games and we've had great support and tips all around. We got Kate some tutoring, signed her up for the Critical Test which is part of an endurance spectacle. We will list our favorite schools based on a wish and a prayer and then hope like crazy. We've been to many of the fabled NYC schools and I discovered that Brooklyn Tech which I had no thoughts about is really a good school. Who knew. And my favorite even though I haven't seen it yet is Brooklyn Latin.

Yesterday we visited Baruch High School -- affiliated but not part of Baruch College -- which occupies a brand spanking new building in our neighborhood and then in the evening we went to Bard -- affiliated but not really part of Bard College -- which sits inconviently in the middle of no where. None of these schools have elevators and most people climb up and down the stairs which has become soemthing of a problem for me with my post operation big shoe. By the time I got home last night I was exhausted.

Today it's all about Eleanor Roosvelt which is also district 2.

Lets see if they have elevators...

Clothes Make the Man or Woman

Monsoon rain all night. Monsoon rain all this morming. And the TV weather reporters were whipping up hysteria for what seems to be our last days on earth before we all succumb to this rain which is chasing up Interstate 95. It's all a bit much. The Doppler 4000 that ate everybody's common sense but in reality I was drenched in 10 minutes from walking the dog across the street so I carefully chose a practical costume to take me on my morning path from from the house to Kate's school and then to work. I donned my current favorite outfit of Cargo pants because they dry quickly and stuffed a pair of black tailored pants in my bag so that I could transform myself into a grown up at work. Only I didn't get my pants wet, and then I felt no pressing need to transform myself. So I wore cargo pants all day in the office.

As my farewell gesture on my last day as the director of public relations at a local but well known college, I wore what I thought at the time was a very daring outfit of black slacks and a purple blouse. It was my last day and so what were they going to say to me when i showed my rebellious side. Of course everybody commented on my apparel. Thirty years ago Women just didn't wear pants that much and purple was an unusual and bold color.

Now I wear pants almost all the time and since purple is good enough for Barney, it must be good for me too.

Shazam

You go Mr. Byrne

Kate was fully dressed with a bowl of half eaten cocoa puffs on her desk when I staggered into her room at 6:30 to say good morning and announce my departure on the Dog Walking Tour. She was also listening to music. Really loud and unrecognizable music. But that's because I am a parent. And
I wondered if my parents felt the same thing when I was a teenager constantly listening to Evis etc. But my thought is that we need a day of silence in our house when there is no television, computer, texting, blackberries. You name. It is banished. I'm working on it.

Last night Kate got slammed with homework but the majority of her evening's labors were a punishment assignment from her English teacher who noticed that Kate failed a vocab test and hadn't done the proper flash cards for it. You go Mr. Byrne because you certainly got Kate's attention and she will never do that again. Kate rated that experience a Grrr. If it were less tough she would have characterized it as Pitouwie. But the 4 page essay was Grr.

My day so far is approaching a Grr.

The Michael Jackson ploy

It's all about the Michael Jackson drug Protosomething which I not only can't spell or pronounce. but I've had! For me it's really a miracle drug. Not that I'm such an expert on these drugs but I've had this one twice for recent surgeries or almost surgeries and the plus for me is that I don't wake up and immediately throw up. This time I felt like the star of the tv program ER with people swirling around and large pieces of lighting equipment focusing on me and I was deliciously witty and all of a sudden it's several hours later and you're waking up. Michael Jackson used this drug to sleep but everytime I've had it the result is that I am there chatting up a storm and all of a sudden I'm out and not around for some kind of operation. You're there, you're out and then you wake UP. No, I said, I want to sleep more. But no these people are ruthless and turf you out of your cocoon to struggle home so that you can re-cocoon yourself.

But of course I was hungry. So Arnie and I had a picnic in bed and dined on absolutely delicious fried chicken from the new Hill Country take out place. Yum. They've had some bad blogger reviews but for me it was all good, greasy and tasty. It's all been down hill from there because that dinner in bed was just a harbinger of no mobility, boring and nutritionally PC meals, no swanning around the city or even walking around the apartment. Nada.

Thursday was my last day of full mobility but since I couldn't eat or drink for the 8hours prior to the operation, I was unable to indulge one of my great pastimes which is LUNCH. But this day I had a fake lunch. They ate and I watched. Carefully.

We are in the middle of researching high schools for Kate and in New York it ain't simple. You don't simply walk your child to the high school on the corner and enroll them. This system has more bells and whistles than a cammel auction. I am consulting with parents who have been through this process and so we swapped tales of getting into high school over a small cafe tables at Union Square. Actually this woman I met with works in PR at the New School so it was thoroughly enjoyable on several levels.

Home and then off to the doctors for this dreaded bunion/hammer toe operation. It was fine. A big success and my foot is still attached to my leg and I am back at work and feel tired. I'm not taking the subway to work at all because of the distances and stairs and so it's all about Taxis.

It;s fall

I went off to work today dressed in my palette of winter colors. Black, grey and more black. Gone are the days of pink and green skirts and pink shoes. How did this happen so quickly? And why do the grey/black days seem to last forever.

I am facing foot surgery and feel that I have to take full advantage of every day and do as much as I can because after my Thursday operation I will be outfitted with the dreaded boot and lose alot of freedom to go about when and where I want. Nobody really understands how time consuming the recovery is for these foot operations....ok,I'm whining.

Sunday we went to see the new Mario Batali food halls as I like to call them and had a great time. Amazing food in a spectacular setting that seemed to stretch for miles. We all want to go back every week.

The New Beginning

I love September because it always means new beginnings. It's my birthday but it's also the start of the school year and we're off on a totally new adventure. I must have been 3 or 4years old but I can still remember having breakfast with my Grandfather in Roanoke, Va one bright September morning and hearing the Jay birds calling to each other as groups of children walked down the hill from Avenham Avenue on their way to school. The air was crisp, the sense of anticipation was palpable and it was all so new. It's the new year with new classmates, new shoes, more grown up clothes bought just for school, pristine notebooks and textbooks.

Kate started school this morning and so for me, too, it was the end of a somewhat laidbck summer when i could just go straight to the office. But now I am into the routine where I take Kate to school and then circle back uptown to the office. We hauled all her new notebooks and stuff down to school and then I had time to walk through the Union Square Greenmarket on my way to the subway. But I became very emotional about beginnings and endings because we've done this same routine now for 9 years since 2002 when Kate started in kindergarten at Friends.

Labor Day Weekend

Monday was Kate's birthday so I took that day off making this a very short work week for me which made the whole re-entry process far less painful. Friday night Kate and I went off to the local Sephora make up shop with a gift certificate burning a hole in Kate's pocket. I think the reality of all those products with a squad of heavily made up young woman threading their way through the aisles was a show stopper for Kate. She suddenly looked like she wanted to escape and so after we made a comprehensive but quick tour of the entire store, we found a wandering make up artist to advise us about what the best kind of eye liner and mascera to buy. Apparently blue and green eye liner were what the make up doctor ordered and that plus a mascera constituted our ill gotten gains that night. I have to say that it was rite de passage of me going with my daughter to explore the world of make up. Several years ago after watching me put on my make up, Kate finally figured out that she doesn't have to wear same kind of make up. I think that was a big relief to her. And it was a big relief to me to say No make up at school and have her nod a quick assent.

Saturday was my birthday -- I am 105 years old -- and so I didn't have to do the first dog walk this morning although we did take her to Central Park for a fast romp through the glades. I consider that trip an investment in keeping her occupied so she doesn't eat this carpet too. Then I got to read until my afternoon massage at Tiger Lilly in Chinatown and dinner with Kate and Arnie at David Bouley's Bowery restaurant. While have always liked the food there, I have always hated the staff who are unbelievable difficult. This time I may have worked my way out of loving that restaurant. I mean, why do people try and seat you practically on top of the kitchen. I know someone has to sit there but it's not going to be me.

Kate went on an outing that afternoon with Dyan which included some new and very pretty earrings for her as well as a trip to the Guggenheim. I could never have persuaded Kate to set one dainty toe in an art Museum but that is what friends are for, I'm thinking.

Sunday we rented bikes in Central Park and spent about an hour making the loop from Columbus Circle up to 110 Street and back and then took Kate to see Jersey Boys which was just as wonderful as it was when we first saw it 4 years ago. A quick dinner at a Chinese restaurant capped off the day and Monday we had a traditional lunch at Bar Pitti with John and Lucy Sheftall who had just driven McKay and Lucy from Georgia to their respective institutions of higher learning. That's quite a road trip.

How I Spent My Summer Vacation

Well, the good news is that I can talk about how I spent my summer vacation because I actually had one. We've had a surprisingly good summer with a kick off trip to Mexico. Who knew that a return trip to Mexico would be on next year's wish list. We bookended the June trip to Mexico with an August trip to Maine.

We drove home Sunday from our annual family trip to an island in the Casco Bay, where for the second year family was defined as our wonderful dog Miss Murray, Kate, her friend Lile, Grandma Dot, Arnie and me. The weather was a little iffy at the beginning but then turned gorgeous which in Maine terms means hot enough to go without a sweater but not so hot, for me anyway, that I feel compelled to brave the incredibly cold water.

Our car trip up took a record breaking 5 hours and had plenty of time for an unrestrained shopping spree through Whole Foods which just sets up the entire vacation mood for me. I play house and mostly do all the cooking. Then onto the Standard Bakery which is a devine local bakery run by aggressive vegan types who seem to really resent their customers plelasure in their delectable brioche bread and gingerbread cakes. At this point we stagger gratefully onto the Casco Bay Line for the last leg of our journey. The boat makes stops at Cliff Island, Diamond Head and Long island before it docks at Chebeague and we pile into the Island Taxi. Home please.

And suddenly we are there with Miss Murray running around the grass looking for the perfect place to pee.

Spaghetti Bolognese is always the de rigeur first dinner and this year we had a real reason to light a fire. No flies at all but plenty of September-like weather. The next day we went out to get our bikes which on this island means a trip to the Byccyle Man who lends bikes to one and all but you have to be very, very polite and also manage to get there when he is open. One year we had to make several trips just to get our hands on bikes which is our only transportation. The girls love these bikes and from the moment that they have a bike, they are gone. It's a wonderfully independent moment for them and I feel super safe with their biking all over the island. Because this a super small island, everybody knows what is going on and we heard about sightings of the girls every day which makes me feel very secure.

Our big discovery was the outdoor shower. Oh my gosh. The plumbing would only allow a very stingy trickle of water in the one shower so when I siddled up to the outdoor shower and thought that I would just quietly try the water...I was stunned when it gushed out immediately with full force and plenty of hot water. So I jumped in. And was ebullient when I jumped out. The girls and Arnie all snickered about my new obsession until they too tried it. Lets hear it for outdoor showers.

And my second BIG discovery was that 5 people are quite capable of eating 15 small gingerbread cakes in 5 days.

Need I say more?

Ode to Children's Books

When I was a child, I just loved books and reading which took me into different worlds and, in Kate's words, the book is a special friend who becomes your guide. My father was a voracious reader of both fiction and Civil War history and he would sink into one of the two large leather armchairs in our den and read. Good role model. As an adult, I rediscovered children's books and thought they were terrific. One of my favorites used to be the Snark Out Boys & Avacado of Death by Daniel Pinkwater. I'm not sure I actually remember much more than the title which always made me laugh. And when Kate outgrew some of her early books, we sat down together and went through them with me not wanting her to throw out anything, esp The Little Pig about a pig who falls in love with a painting at the Louvre or the Composer, I think that's the title....not tried and true kids books but also favorites. But the other day the New York Times ran a story about adults reading teen books and so I felt totally empowered to go out and get a book that I had been thinking Kate would like. Even though Kate has specifically warned me off buying her any books at al. So I thought I can read this by myself. It's the the first book, The Hunger Games in Suzanne Collins trilogy and so I started this morning while I waiting for my friend Anne to arrive at breakfast which by the way was a blueberry pancake extravaganza and so good. But this book was so dark and grim about a new world order and how the kids struggle. It sounds from page 7 -- I don't really know anything -- like a cross between Bladerunner and what? I don't know. But I am pushing on with the book.

The Chinatown Adventure

Long lazy hot weekends make you yearn for icy drinks, cold air conditioning, good books and what else? Well, after a while even with all these mod cons, or modern conveniences, I want to get the hell out of town. It's enough all this sitting around and debating whether it's too hot to even go out for a quick walk. So we kicked off the weekend by walking home from the Museum through Central Park with the changing lights. It's always iteresting to me how many pop events go on that park; impromptu tutorials about biology, plays, dog training, it's all there. Then on Saturday morning we took off for Philadelphia and the Late Renoir show at the Philadelphia Museum of Art via the 8:30 am Chinatown bus. It cost us $10 to get from New York to Philadelphia on a low frills bus which was certainly clean and had the identifying plastic bags hanging from the seats. No hostess, no snacks but everything worked and we go to Philadelphia's Chinatown by 10:30am. These cheap, no frills buses have been in place since the late 1990s to ferry immigrants to their jobs along the east coast and went to washington, Philadelphia, Boston and New York. Actually I think we are late catching on these buses which gave me a sense of enormous freedom because now we can actually discuss going to Boston and the Isabella Stewart Gardiner Museum.

A Woman in a Tutu

It's been an incredibly busy week for me at work with a major feature film unit setting up shop in front of the Museum with all the last minute questions and problems that they bring. Hot, hot weather...a hamster to worry about. I go in and turn on the damn air conditioningevery morning so that what Arnie calls "it's just a rodent" won't keel over with heat stroke. Explain that to your daughter, please. Yeah, I know it rachets up the bills.

And Arnie has been cleaning the bedroom out and moving stacks of stuff such as books, clothing, shoes into the Living Room so that on Monday a couple of burly guys can come in, take up the old carpet and laydown new carpet. Of course somewhere in there the furniture and the bed also has to come out of that room and be disassembled....god. Allthat will be a relief and, at the same time almost, we are having the bedroom painted! The real trouble comes when you have to put stuff back. I hate that part.

And this weekend because we are short a couple of adventures....we are taking the chinatown bus to Philadelphia to go see a Renoir exhibition. I'm actually looking forward to that because it willg get us out of town and into new territory. It's an adventure.

But then just walking the streets here is an adventure. This morning as Miss Murray and I are stumbling along I saw a mad looking woman, not a child, sprinting down Park Avenue in a white tutu.

Loved her. Glad she was running away from me and not toward me.

More grown up weekends

Friday night Arnie met me on the upper west side so that we could grab a quick burger at an outdoor cafe on steamy Broadway and watch the unending parade of people. Then we walked home through Central park and it was just exquisite with amazing light. I need to remind myself to bring my camera because it all looks so different at twilight than it does at 8:00 am with Miss Murray.

We got our first letter from Kate happily and busily in Maine having amazing amounts of fun, according to her. But there is this wonderful line in her note: "I'm having so much fun. You guys cannot possibly be having as much fun without me as I am without you!" then she asked if her hamster was stilla live. I must have said this before but sending Kate to camp -- and this is her 5th year at camp -- made me realize what a blessing that must have been for my parents. I could wreck havoc with any family outing, especially when I was around 13,or 14. I would not want to go, pick fights with people and general act out like a bad seed. I am always sad to see Kate go to camp, miss her madly but appreciate the one on one time with Arnie and then am thrilled to have her home again.

How can it be august?

It's not exactly a sleepy summer day in say Georgia but it is a relatively relaxed friday in the office. Most people didn't even bother to come in and the phones have been very quiet. We've just come off of 3 weeks of intense work and pressure to turn out more than 100 journalists to cover the launch of the Museum's new trendsetting, extraordinary, amazing -- anymore superlatives? -- hand held navigational device, the Explorer. Everything went off without a hitch and was considered by all a success. Lots of press, lots of hoopla and soon on to the next must do. But the day after is just a little down time. Makes you understand why rock stars take drugs to help them stay permanently up and on.

This week we plowed ahead with researching high schools for Kate and went to a seminar at Stuyvesant about large high schools, although not about stuyvesant exactly. The whole thing gives me the whim whams. how do I know whether kate would do better in a large school or a small school. Actually I think most people do better in smaller schools rather than these behemoths of 4,000 kids. If not, why do they split everything up into LC. all this jargon which in this case means learning communities. The education people are famous for this kind of junk. Have a reasonable class size of no more than 28 kids, find a teacher with personality who can teach and get on with it. However those two things seem to be impossible. I know it will all work out in the end, won't it?

Away We Go

Dinner on the lower east side in extreme heat...aaagh. Then on Saturday we took Kate with her two new duffle bags off to meet the bus to Hidden Valley Camp with maybe 100 other kids and tons of gear. She and Lydia are in the same cabin this summer and they both left town with a healthy stack of books to read. Kate also insisted on taking Chinese dried noodles and a thermos of hot water as her picnic lunch for the 8hour bus ride. We waved our only child a fond adieu and took off for Union Square and the stands of farm fresh corn. We ctually didn't stay out very long because it was stll hot. off to an air conditioned space which was the movies and saw Salt. But almost more interesting to me was the hand dryers in the ladies room which are manufactured by Dyson and they are brilliant and they actually dry your hands. Instead of holding your hands under a stream of erratic hair, you hold your hands between two blowers that do the job. Amazing. I'm going to see if Dyson has a design camp and then send Kate. His stuff, including our vacuum cleaner is beautiful and functional.

Nothing more to report because it continued to be hot.And although we ran Miss Murray in the Park, it was still hot at 8:00 am! More air conditioning time until there was a great thunderstorm and the heat broke. At that point we took off for dinner at Tabla where we can sit outside, take Murray and feel totally luxurious.

Private dinners, name tapes and of course camp

Bravo to the chefs! Kate and her friend Lydia spent all day on Wednesday slaving away in a hot kitchen and prepared a sensational dinner for the assembled hordes. That would actually be two sets of parents and one baseball playing brother. Lydia was the inspiration behind this great experience and Lydia's mother was the enabler that made it all come together. Seared tuna on sushi rice or proscuitto wrapped figs were the starters with a nice bottle of Prozecco as the pouring wine. Then beautifully plated dishes on the buffet included chicken roulades with an accompanying pesto sauce, steamed stringbeans and farfalle with a fresh tomatoe sauce. More prosecco or a Rose Malbec for drinks. Dinner was capped by fresh fruit and baklava. We were all thrilled by the high level of professionalism exhibited the girls and their follow through on a very ambitious menu. Three cheers to the girls and Amy, the cooking teacher.

Kate's been on a role because the following night she and her Dad went out for Japanese food while I had dinner at a French restaurant with a friend. And tonight, we are all going out for a celebratory send off at: a french restaurant. Tomorrow she goes to camp for a month and I must start to write notes, letters and e-mail at a furious pace. And we'ver just about managed to identify most of her camp stuff with name tags but the rest of it is probably never coming home with her. I'll just keep my fingers crossed. The first year Kate went to camp she camp home with everybody's clothing but her own....last year wasn't so bad and she assures me that this year will be stellar. The original order of 100 name tapes lasted through 3 years and 3 summer of camp. Not a bad investment. Stellar.

Baby sitting

But this time it was Kate as the baby sitter not the baby sittee. We went out for dinner with friends and Kate baby sat their adorable daughter Emma who is 5, maybe 6 years old and just as smart as a whip. She really keeps Kate on her toes. When we came back from dinner they were curled on the top bunk and playing Vet with Kate having to give a diagnosis and treament plan for all of Emma's many many stuffed animals.

Our regular weekend routine includes a trip up to Central Park to try and run Miss Murray ragged, shopping for my favorite tomatoes at Whole Foods and then this particular Saturday I went off for a transformative hair cut before I met Kate and Arnie at the Cooper Hewitt Museum of Design which was an inspired stop. The Carnegie Mansion built for the Carnegia family is beautiful beyond belief with amazing architectural details and it has had many incarnations from a private home to the center for Columbia University School of Social work and now it is the best: A design Museum. The exhibitions were amazing and appealing to adults and children alike with a stunning light fixture that changed shape like a jelly fish, a grain thresher built out of an old bycycle and a chair made of packing materials. Kate was enthralled and then because it was family day there were activities in the garden and stuff just specially for kids including story telling which is always my favorite.

Arnie and I went to the movies to see the second of the Stiegg Larsson triology which was very violent but good! And then Sunday was really too hot to do too much and so we didn't do too much.

And then it was Bastille Day

We had a large extended family party on Tuesday to acknowledge the ten years since I picked Kate up in China. I remember it all quite clearly from my utter terror at actually coming face to face with this child that I had fought so hard to adopt to understanding exactly how my life was changing. And it's still changing. But even though I always want to lug everything up to the roof for dinner...this night was different; hot, hot and airless evening and so even I had a case of the vapers thinking about heavy the air on the roof might be, so we made what I always call a mis course correction and simply stayed inside, very close to the air conditioner . and drank Rose.

The following day, July 14th, was Bastille Day which really went by in a blur for me. No frites, no champagne, no dancing in the streets because I was much more focused on our plan to paint the foyer in our house after at least 7 years and then to decide on the best time to have new carpet laid down in our bedroom. That step we are postponing until Kate goes off to camp at the end of next week. And then the summer is practically over. OMG But the foyer looks great and all those finger prints and smudges are a thig of the past.

Kate had her last day of soccer camp and now poor darling she will just have to chill out.

Mid Course Correction

Grandma Dot arrived for dinner last night a little late because like many New Yorkers she was the victim of incredible traffic. However she had escaped from a slow moving bus and probably thought herself quite clever --this is a manoeuver that I've done too -- to find a cab until she then became stuck in more expensive traffic with a cab meter clicking over relentlessly. So we decided against the Shake Shack and its almost mandatory long wait and order chinese food and then spent much of the evening looking at the pictures from china and exclaiming over all of them and each of us, Dorthy and I, contributing our own memories from that time. Kate was thoroughly content with this evening and went to bed with a huge smile on her face.

Tonight my hopes of a roof top summer party are dashed because of the torrential tropical rain but we will all make merry in the house and eat and drink well.

The Psychic Octopus

Do you think that the amazing psychic octopus might have been part of Kate's Evolution Institute camp? It should certainly get its own TV program. I dont know if she actually saw the Museum's Octopus which is enormous and living in a private formaldhyde bath. But even if she didn't she had a wonderful two weeks and during a good part of our jitney trip out to East Hampton, regaled me with the song that the class had made up which talks about Darwin and fishes and then goes on to say" Evolution taught by revolutionaries....I thought it was very funny.

So kate ping ponged from Drawin and his theories to the psychic octopus and lot of energy spent in the household we visited on the soccer matches to her first viewing of Eclipse or whatever the movie is called. Cheesy, she called the first one. But I need to see the other one so that I can be part of the conversation...Oh, yeah, what conversation. Ok. lets see the other one. Now of course she avers that she cares nothing about vampires and wolves but must see the 3rd movie. I feel the same way about the Stieg Larsson movie so I guess I can't push back too much. We swam this weekend, took walks and runs on the beach, ate well, drank wonderful Rose and just enjoyed being out of the city.

Arnie comes back today from Vail today and then tomorrow we all celebrate with friends the day we picked up Kate. Although actually Kate, Grandma Dot and I are going to the Shake Shack with Miss Murray tonight to have a pre celebration of the celebration.

And Now, a Word (or more) from the OTHER...from Vail

As this is the Slate-Katz FAMILY blog, I thought I might contribute a bit of my own fluff to the effort. I'm visiting my daughters, sons-in-law and grand kids in Colorado for several days, and having a great time. As a quid pro quo, Sallie gets space and private time.

Got to fly there solo...what a freeing experience...and it's always nice to see family. The kids have all grown (as they're wont to do when fed), and Fletcher, the youngest, is a cute handful. We're stuffing as much fun as possible into four days: tubing down Gore Creek; riding bikes in Glenwood Canyon; eating the least nutritious food we can find; downing beers and tequila at the Friday night Vail Mountain Top party.

Today, I headed out with Glenn, Ali and Fletch on their boat...3 hours between getting to the lake and putting the boat in. Glen got to wakeboard for about 20 minutes before thunder and lightning cut the boat trip short. Best part of the day, and totally serendipitous...we took a dirt side road home to an out-of-the-way campgrounds and Glen introduced us to KK's, a fabulous hole-in-the-wall outdoor barbecue joint run by KK, a fireball of an old lady who's been running the place for 20 years. Four huge ribs and a home made brownie with home made vanilla bean ice cream, in sight of the Colorado River...a perfect day.

The kids are running in a triathalon event tomorrow, and I'll be there to root them on. Of course, there's no place like home, and I'll be back Monday evening.

With apologies to our main writer, I've inserted a few pics from the trip.

I was Right

For this New Yorker it will always be LeBron Who? So, lets pay much more attention to the important people like Georgio and Michael...

Last night Kate and I hosted a small dinner party on the roof for friends and were able to stay until the lights of the building started sparkling around 9:00 pm. It was hot as hell during the day but the roof was magical at night. and of course the home made mayonnaise that I served with the cold boned rolled stuffed chicken was pretty good, too. Strawberries and cookies rounded off the dinner nicely.

Today Kate finishes her second and final week of Evolution Institute camp and so I lose my travelling companion to the Museum. She has enjoyed getting to know my work family and is still surprised by how many people I speak to every morning as I wend my way from the subway to the staff cafe for coffee and then up to my office. She says that she has enjoyed the experience although she thinks the "camp is boring but the kids are really nice." I'll take that any day rather than her hating both...next week is a mini kind of soccer camp and then in two weeks she goes off to Maine for a full month. When I was at camp, I remember getting wonderful hand written letters from my father on heavy embossed CBS stationary. They rarely said much other than "we're having a heat wave, I'm working hard," but it was a connection that came on a very regular basis. I would never tax anybody with my handwriting but I do try and send Kate notes every day or every other day. This is my reminder to get into that head set.

LeBron Who?

OK OK I admit that now after all the hoopla in the sports media I do indeed know who this person is. I am hoping that he stays in that midwestern city by the sea otherwise I will never hear the end of his ridiculous made up name.

Today continues to be record breaking hot and I am moved to sport sleeveless dresses that skim my body. Anything tight or that smacks of a fashion detail has been marked verboten so that means no belts, chunky necklaces or even rayon outfits. I realized this morning that my "I am a kool but chic New Yorker" costume is the black Michael Kors dress that I wore to my consular interview with the US immigration folks in Guanxjo - sp -- ten years ago almost to the date. This was the final stop in a 10 day marathon adoption tour in China. That morning we all arrived in our special for the occasion grown up clothes to spend time in a children's romper room until each of us were called into cubicles for our one on one interviews with some beaurocrat. The most important document I had with me on that trip was not all the identifying documents such as birth certificates, etc. but a simple notarized paper that said I had the power to effect Kate's adoption even without the physical presence of my husband. After successfully negotiating that fateful meeting, Kate, Grandma Dot and I all repaired to the beautiful air conditioned bar at the White Swan Hotel that looked out on all the boat traffic on the Yangtze River. I had a celebratory gin & tonic, I don't remember what Dorothy had but Kate had what was clearly her first ice cream cone which she tried quite politely to eat with a knife and fork. Eventually expedience overcame manners as she saw this treasure melting on her plate faster that she could parce it into bite size piece and balance them on a fok.

All this memory because of a dress. Maybe the name for me is Michael Kors and I shall continue to say LeBron who.

Mango madness

Arnie trekked off to Grand Central this afteroon in the high 90 heat
to catch a train for Westport, CT to retreive Kate who had spent
this July 4th weekend with her friend Melanie and according to her mother, all was going so swimmingly that she was invited back for next weekend and to Jamaica for Christmas. Apparently my lessons about how to be a good guest must have taken, this time anyway.

I got to stay home with Miss Murray and enjoy the silence of the apartment and of the city which is still empty as the weekend warriors dragging their suitcases and carrying large bunches of flowers have not made their appearance back on city streets. And so I walked around the apartrment enjoying the space and noting areas which might require some maintenance or help. I don't want to pretend that I did a Rebecca thing walking through Mandalay but it's always nice to reclaim your space. Then I made one of my favorite pilgrimages to my cookbook collection which lives --along with most of my other books -- in Kate's room . Just browsing to see what's doing, who is cooking what and how I might shift our dinners around to be more interesting to me, most of all. Kate could probably subsist very happily on mac n cheese for the next 352 days. I have some time to think about this new direction because Arnie will be going to Vail on Wednesday and Kate and I already have a pretty full dance card.

We kicked the weekend off with a terrible movie. God I hate stupid women in life and certainly in the movies and books. The character that Cameron Diaz played in Knight and Day had me talking back to the screen before the movie had been on for fully 10 minutes. Yikes. So we left. It's all over for me when I don't cre what happens to the chracters.

Brunch with friends, short walks between air conditioned oases, workout at the gym, trip to Chinatown which I love because it's crowded and smelly are feats of endurance for Kate and Arnie because it's crowded and smelly. More walks with Miss Murray and soccer, tennis and books. That's pretty much it.

Ola: Family Road Trip

We're back! We took a road trip, flying 3,000 miles to Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula for a family celebration of life. It is my new opinion that none of us celebrate enough, hence this trip. Apparently this is the safe part of Mexico without the drug trafickers and terrorists because we are all safe and sound with only some itchy sunburns to show for it. Actually I have the itchy sunburn and Kate has an amazing tan. It's as if someone just poured chocolate over her entire body. Gorgeous.

But while I do so love to travel, getting there ain't such fun these days. I remember the old, oh so old slogan that Dinah Shore used to sing, See the USA in Chevrolet.....well there are times when I would really like to hope in the car and drive rather than getting up at 4:30 am to get dressed, walk the dog, in order to be able to get a taxi to the airport so that we arrive by 6 am to check in for an 8:30 am flight. However our direct flight on Mexicana Air was much nicer than our return flight on American Airlines which occasioned a serious letter of complaint to them.

But lets move along with the good stuff. After a 3 1/2 hour flight we arrived at the Cancun airport at about 1 pm -- hot and humid with swirling cab drivers, touts and generally clueless tourists including us -- and at the end of what seemed like an endless bus trip we arrived at our hotel just in time to hit the pool and explore the hotel which was one of 4 on an enormous piece of property. Devine. I say. The hotels are all owned by a Spanish hotel chain which meant that most of the guests were also spanish and gave it a wonderfully foreign feel. No families from Brooklyn for the most part and incredibly nice and polite staff who spoke Spanish and then english which gave us all a chance to try out my non existent spanish. In fact this was something I do recommend because Mexico has a sense of place and culture. Far different than the hotel we went to in the Dominican Republic a couple of years ago which seemed more like an airport to me. I could have been anywhere in the world with palm trees.

We quickly discovered Loas Roccas, a salt water swimming pool which seemed more like an infinity pool with a wonderful view of the ocean. That was it for me. Apparently it is the trend in hotels for adults, not just at Disney, to have the pools no deeper than 4 to 5 feet. Which makes for a warm puddle in the afternoon but wonderfully cool swimming in the morning. I would often forget to read and just stare into space. That's my idea of a vacation activity.

We got Kate squared away with the Teen Club and there really were Teens there so that was a win win. But I was certainly aware that Kate was talking to me in that way that teenagers perfect: Oh My god, No way....She expressed disbeleif that I could actually find my way around the property and get from lobby to restaurant back to our room and swimming pools. So who am I to disagree with superior knowledge? It's easier to let her sound authoritative.

We swam, and Kate and Arnie were in 7th heaven when they discovered a black jack set up in the hotel during the evening. So fun to watch both of them concentrate so hard on winning a bottle of TEquilla. It's also good for Kate's math to become a junior card counter ad one night they let her play. No money changes hands in these inclusive resorts so the play is just with chips. Not like braving the tables in Las Vegas where they would have thrown her out.

My takeway from more than 5 days of indolence was the wonderful sun, gracious hotel staff, amazing Mexican mangoes which taste like they have been creamed and yet again the importance of vacation. We also saw a crocodile which lived at the hotel, too.

My first day back at work I ran into a Mexican trio panhandling on the subway which was was an omen, I'm sure.

Changes

Hmm, boring household problems seem to be very ala mode for us. The toilet overlfowed over the weekend and Miss Murray continued to chew the carpet as her clear expression of boredom.

But Arnie and I are resourceful types and so we are plunging the toilet and ordering a new carpet for Miss Murray to eat. Wrong. We are replacing the carpet and about to embark on some behavior modification. Amelia the hamster nibbled away on one of Kate's favorite dresses so it is possible that the four legged animals in our menagerie have aural fixations.

Facebook

You've read about it, heard about their security problems and general policy of outing people's personal data and most probably, even signed up so that you have a Facebook page.

I guess Kate is in good company with the more than untold millions of strangers who also have facebook pages.

Steak Frites

I took Friday off to attend Kate's graduation from 7th grade to 8th Grade. Although ext year will be the big transistion from Middle School to High School, all of these ceremonies with their comforting rituals are important to attend. After 8 years at Friends, I am now comfortable with the austerity of the Meeting House which is very Quaker in its simplicity. Some songs, silence when people spontaneously spoke about their appreciation of the community in which they study and a few songs. The most important words are "With the authority vested in me by the State of New York, I now promote you to: whatever the next grade is." Most of the kids were in jeans with their shirts out, the headmaster who isn't even given such an exalted title wore a white suit with a bowtie and top siders without socks.

Quick, easy and simple. We then took off by taxi for a luncheon destination that I had been mulling over in my mind for several days and weighing the pros and cons: Pork buns or french food and Rose. That was the choice. And then I decided as the Matriarch of this family I could, with the authority vested in me, decide to go for french food and Rose at Lucien, a french restaurant that Grandma Dot recommended.

"Where are we?" asked the graduate. why are we here. I don't want to be here. I want to go to Bar Pitti and I can't read this menu. No, I know they've translated it but I can't read the script."

Menu goes down on the table. "No, I'm not hungry."

Our lunch was an early one and the restaurant was virtually empty except for the Ukrainian waitress still in training and Lucien, the owner, sporting a pork pie hat, shorts and a T shirt so that he looked more like the owner of a Bodega than a French restaurant. He and I began talking in French and soon Kate was offered several special lunch choices and when she continued to refuse everything, he shrugged his shoulders and went off, only to return soon after our lunches arrived with French fries to die for. The conversation touched on a variety of subjects including life in New York, food, his son and schools, and soon Kate began to eat my French fries. She graduated to another order of fries and chocolate cake so by the time we left she was feeling very special and thoroughly enjoying the experience of meeting Lucien and seeing first hand how another language could enhance an experience.

Lucien bought us dessert, offered us Cognac and told Kate to come back in a year when he might have a job for her.

The School Search

I cried when Kate was accepted at Friends and swore that I would never change her school until it was time to apply for College. So 'never' isn't always a good word to use since here we are looking casually, not frantically, but consistently at a range of high schools that Kate might go to instead of Friends. Right now we are looking at the top ranked public high schools and last night we went to an open house at Bronx High School of Science where one of the Museum's top scientists went. Of course I have to say that everybody said that you didn't have to be obsessed with science or math to have a happy time there. What to beleive and who to beleive. I grew up believing my government until they lied to me one too many times and so I think it was around the rheteric Viet Nam that I became concerned with lying. But certainly Weapons of Mass Destruction was a rallying call to people who beleive that their government has fudged the facts one too many times. And after so many events kept piling up, one after another, I became a big skeptic about institutional lying. You may think I've gone far afield of my topic but what I am saying is that it's hard to know who is lying and why. Because I now think that people/institutions/especially government lie all the time.

But the folks at Bronx Science seem to present the facts in a charming way and maybe they don't know that they are lying. We sat in on several clesses including a debate class, an after school legal class conducting an interview with Goldilocks and an English class where I saw a young woman who looked so familiar to me. I asked Kate who didn't recognize her until she identified herself as a graduate of the Salk Middle School in Gramercy Park and then I knew. Last year Kate and I took the bus with her and her twin sister down third Avenue. i think she recognized us too. and the winner was a robotics class -- also extra curricular too -- but they had won first prize for their found up creation of a robot that kicked soccer balls.

The only drawback with Bronx Science is not academic of course but is location, location, location. It is way the hell and gone in the Bronx. Not a bad subway trip but I am hoping we can find a school, suitable to all, in our own neighborhood. I realize that I am a Manhattan provincial but so be it. that's the truth

I'm not lying.

Fitting the Profile

So, a page from our New York Social Diary would include an appointment for a manicure/pedicure, attendance at the Coop Board meeting, outing for Kate with our friend Michelle to the annual openhouse for all the 5th avenue Museums, and a twitter class for Arnie. All on one day.

Now we will fall back to normal\. except that we are off tonight to the Bronx for an open house at Bronx HS for Science. Just checking out our options...

Vacation

We are planning a vacation and I'm thrilled to be saying it. We are going away for a real vacation. No staycation business but a real one with suitcases, airport agida and the possibility of true adventures. Of course there is plenty of time before we go away but I'm already stock piling books, thinking about my clothes and considering the very real pleasure of not having to think about anything in an organized or responsible way. This is a time where my most significant decision of the day will be what to have for breakfast that I don't have to cook, where to sit on or near the beach and what time to leisurely stroll over to a table cooled by tropical breezes and let someone serve me lunch. Oh, yum. This is all wonderful which is why I mention it way ahead of time because I wanna enjoy the pre vacation glow as much as the I'm away from home immediacy and the oh my god, did I really have to come home so soon thoughts. .

Of course I am wishing away my life. Kate has exams to finish even before the end of this week which will signals the end of the school year. Exams and summer reading lists and new shorts. Just about in that order.

Life Lessons

It's long been one of my favorite phrases along with the rolodex of Life. Life Lessons are wonderful and one of my consistent life lessons is that you charge your phone the night before and never go out without money. My mother used to call it mad money and it was a dime to make a phone call. 50 years of inflation later, it should be $20. So yesterday not only did Kate get herself To school but she got herself home from school and was knocking around an empty house. She was a latchkey kid for the afternoon and I had originally suggested that she come up to the Museum by herself. Later in the afternoon after alot of doing nothing I think, she called to say that she changed her mind and she would come up to the Museum solo. It's a long trip with a couple of changes but nothing daunted Kate thought she would take the subway. Shiver my timbers...ugh. But ok. She had a metro card she said. Telephone call from the subway station with a really disappointed daughter, "There is no money on the Metro Card but I really want to come!Oh, no I didn't bring any money so I can't buy a new Metro Card.

The Life Lesson? never go out of the house without money.

Now it's summer

Now it's summer and only now can I liberate my white shoes and my patent leather pumps from various boxes and bags because when I was growing up it was only dummies from California who didn't know those essential dress rules and flouted the conventions. White only after memorial day just in case any of us are also from California and don't know the rules. So I finally dug out my summer clothes which is just another variant of shopping in my closet and this time I found my favorite Hawaiian shirt which I thought had been whipped by the robber who likes Hawaiian shirts. Every Hawaiian shirt I've ever had has gone missing. But this one I bought when Arnie and I went out to Hawaii to watch his daughter run in the Iron Man Marathon. Buried treasure.

Today was kind of a watershed day for the household. Arnie and I both had to be out of the house early and so Kate went to school by herself. It's me, it's all me and my reluctance to have her swan around New York totally unsupervised. She is quite competent and needs to learn how to navigate her home town but I'm just having some trouble letting go. Besides I like taking kate to school. Arnie is in Philadelphia on a series of interviews and I was managing a science breakfast for journalists at the Museum interested in knowing how evolutionary biology affects human health. One of the direct applications of this bench science is software that will help track the path of contageous diseases, such as malaria or avian flu. My most favorite factoid was that stomach cancer was the biggest killer at the turn of the century and now it isn't such a big problem. My other observtion was that two of the journalists were wearing stockings with seams. Ok sounds shallow but really how
1930's.

The Power of Duh

Like fossils that keep on surfacing out of the rich Siberian mud, "Duh" has made a comeback in my life. It is as ripe an expression for Kate as it was for me when I was a teenager. From about 13 to 16 years of age, I used
'Duh" all the time to express annoyance or incredulity that the person in front of me could be so incredibly stupid and/or clueless. And now that my daughter is a teenager she too uses it to express all those same emotions. "Have you brushed your teeth,?" Duh. That could mean yes, of course or I'm gob smacked because I hadn't really thought about running some twigs across my teeth. Another variant of this is "Oh, Mom, duh." That is often used as a response to such diverse questions as Did you do your homework, write your grandmother and clean up your room. Or even, I'm going to go walk the dog, how's the weather?

Duh

What else is so all purpose and satisfying?

High Heels

I am wearing high heels today which sounds like a simple statement but for someone who probably hasn't worn heels for months and months except maybe occasional boots, this is a big deal! Big deal i repeat. And I might be able to finish the day in them! That's quite a success story considering that I always used to wear high heel slingbacks.

Ok enough of my story.

Kate seems to be feeling better and certainly has more energy, thank god.

Maybe Mono Again

Kate's been tired, too tired for a normal high energy kid. The other night she was too tired to chew and finally stretched out on the foyer floor because she liked the way the wood felt.

Yesterday she fell asleep in school twice and when she came home took a 5 hour nap. I know how that is going to play with her friends. "I took The longest nap ever." No, I took a long nap too. these girls seem to be stuck in an endless game of one upsmanship....But the point none the less is that with a break for a quick dinner Kate slept through until the morning. We are thinking that this is a relapse of her mono. or a return in a more powerful way. Of course exams are coming up so the timing, while never good when it comes to being sick, is really awful. Let's see.

But now it's Friday. I resolved my angst with my new boss about a run in we had yesterday and so now I can breathe more easily It's amazing how pervasive problems with work can become. It's part of life and a pretty nasty part. So, all is good, and it's Friday.

Celebration

Kate was jubilant last night when she finished her assignment to write about paper her Community Service Project which she had just barely started over this past weekend. It was a very good paper and she was so proud of it that she thought she could and or should celebrate. Far be it for me to say don't celebrate but as we were talking about what shape this celebration might take, she began to recount a conversation she had with her friend Jessica from school. This 7th grader said that she just wants to be smart. But what about having a sense of humor, kate asked her. Not important. Just important to be smart. How will you get along with people? Not important because if I'm really smart they'll have to put up with me. What about being happy Kate asked. Not important, it's just important to be smart.

I think she's crazy Kate reported.

Now that conversation and the inherent life philosophy is worth a celebration.

Shoes

It's not about feet my friends, it's about shoes. And yesterday I received an advance notice about new shoes from Christian Louboutin at Saks. So, I casually clicked the button which took me immediately to dominatrix boots. Holy cow. They would hurt. But I kept on going and suddenly there were some 50 new shoes with 5inch heels. But they were all so beautiful and well made. I kept flipping back and forth between the pictures of pink shoes, green shoes, cork shoes and the descriptions of the heel heights. Finally I found the perfect pair of snake skin shoes and I am drooling over these pieces of art. 3 inch heels should be a piece of cake for me even thought I have been wearing sneakers and flats almost exclusively for the last year. I can do it. 3 inch heels and the price was a mere $1,097.

I decided to share my anticipatory pleasure so I sent out the Saks ad to almost everyone I know. If I'm generous then maybe the shoes will come to me. OMG. Or, maybe I will have to go visit them in their temporary home.

Signs of summer

One of the most reliable signs of summer is the first night we can have dinner on the roof. Sunday was the night. Kate and I had spent our morning in the park with Miss Murray running and watching folks, some 45,000 folks to be exact, stream into Central Park for a massive AIDS walk. So it was a beautiful day! Homework, lunch and a swim with Grandma Dot, bang, it's all gone.

After dinner Kate went off to deliver fresh salad which she had made along with a vinaigrette to the Friends shelter as part of her community service assignment for school. An assignment she almost forgot and really wanted to blow off! My opinion. In the early afternoon we went to the super market near Grandma Dot to buy various salad greens and to my horror the total bill was $25. No wonder they wanted salad and not cookies. But then to Kate's horror I insisted that we deliver them in a pillow case which keeps everything crisp. I also discovered that Kate had no idea how to make salad. She has a good grip on a vinaigrette but actually getting the greens together was a new trick for her. She took a head of lettuce and put the entire thing in the salad spinner. Ok, time for a life lesson about how to make salad.

Arnie heard today that he is out of the running for what would have been a very exotic job in Abu Dhabi. I think we're both sad but it was going to be a very two edged opportunity with some great ups but also numerous other attendant problems. This morning as I walked to work I kept hearing an old Rosemary Clooney song in my head, "Whatever will be, will be."

Bob Hutchinson's famous quote about exercise

The Hutchinson quote about exercise goes something like this, "Whenever I feel the urge to exercise, I sit down until it passes." Well, that not my feeling about exercise but it is definitely my feeling about PC eating. i went on this diet with protein powder which repeated on me and egg whites which are slimey even when cooked and general felt like hell. Could have also been my stress level for that week, the moon in the wrong position or the pollan count. But basically I felt like hell. Even so I soldiered on and made spaghetti Bolognese everybody's favorite dinner with Turkey. Kate took one look at her dinner and put her fork down. Isn't it good, I asked? No, she said, and besides when did Spaghetti Bolognese have white lumps in it?
Oh, thats the turkey.

Ok moving back to my unhealthy but delicious eating habits. And I am going to be making real sauce Bolognese tonight.

A perfect September Day

I'm right. It is a perfect cool but sunny september day and I'm wearing a tweed jacket and big boots so that I look like a dominatrix for a variety of meetings today! It's working and everyone seems to be falling in line.

This crazy weather follows a brillant weekend with very little humidity. We had an abortive outing with some friends on Friday night to try a new hot chic french restaurant in tribeca that I had been reading about. They just forgot to tell me when I made the reservation that they didn't have a liquor license. Nothing to drink on a Friday night? 4 crestfallen adults. Who soon took to their phones and moved on to a fabulous Italian restaurant that I had known nothing about. Alays great to go to a new place.

Saturday was a whirlwind of the usual of taking Miss Murray to Park and then taking Kate to what I think is the last of the mitzvahs. Besides which we've run out of clothes -- repetition appears to be a big sin -- or so I've been told. Off to dinner with friends and Kate baby sat for their daughter. They were both eager for us to leave and let them play and we obliged and went down the street to a french restaurant. Finally.

And then the fabled mother's day when I'm often surprised that I'm part of this club. But it was a lovely day because everybody in the family was fooded out and so we didn'thave to go out at all. I was able to take naps all day, on and off, and gather for dinner at some reasonable hour and watch an old movie with Clark Gable and Sophia Loren made in the 1960's and filmed in Capri. Wonderful.

Time for a trip to Italy. Actually when is it not time for a trip to Italy?

A kindler gentler Friday

Kate and I bought Alice an aquarium with all the fixtures and fittings as a farewell salute to some 10 years with us. It was Kate's idea and much better than my suggestion of a scarf. All this I think I've recounted before. But Alice was thrilled with the aquarium, she just needs to add fish and enjoy...It took us well over a month to get it together but I'm really glad that we did.

Kate and I left Alice standing in front of the builidng looking for a taxi to go to Brooklyn in the middle of rush hour which made me somewhat nervous that she would still be standing there when we got home from our impromptu dinner in the Park. All good. No Alice. Good dinner of Chinese takeout as we watched the yogo class stretch and om.

Ice cream capped a perfect evening.

Rants

I've decided to make Thursdays my rant days and just take off. Today's vitriole is saved for The today Show that never broadcasts any news and the story about the Lacross player in Virginia who was murdered by her boyfriend who was known to all her friends to be abusive.

Women do not have to be treated badly and should not tolerate that behavior. Nor should they tolerate it for their friends. If the guy isn't nice, then get out. Fast.

That's my Thursday rant.

Proper Eating

I am not a believer in proper eating as its currently defined. I subscribe totally to the French ideal of eating which is to sit down and respect your food which should be good.

I'm not sure how I got to that point except that my mother was a nutritional nazi who endlessly pointed out that carrots were good for your eyes -- clearly not mine -- and fish was brain food -- jury still out on that -- eggplant had potassium, wheat was toxic...you get the point. And of course she didn't really give a damn about food. Her favorite meal as I remember it from my far off youth was two boiled eggs on white rice.

So I was determined not to make dinner a power struggle with Kate and also determined not to have those conversations, like eat your strawberries because they are good for you. I positively exploded at some of our friends once when they said that to Kate and I asked why they didn't talk about the color of the strawberries, the aroma and the taste.

But recently, although I am still hanging on to my principles which include food is love and food is pleasure, I have taken on a new eating plan which includes egg white omlettes, protein powder shakes and time and measured infusions of protein. It's working I think. I am slimmer but certainly not happier...

This morning after I dropped Kate at school I strolled through the Farmers Market looking for Mache but what I found was far more fabulous. Three kinds of radishes, lettuces and fabulous whole wheat bread.

More from this semi reformed eater later...

Round Up

We all dressed up on Friday in our best bib and tucker for a celebratory dinner at the Cos Club with Grandma Dot to mark our 5 years as a family. I had bought Kate a really pretty pink sundress with tigers several weeks ago and exhorted her not to crumple it in a ball and step on it. At least not until after this dinner. After all why hang things up? Actually I think I did the simply dropping of clothes on the floor and stepping on them for many years until I had to pay for my own dry cleaning and laundry. Deprivation is the mother of innovation. I'm sure thats not how that saying goes. Kate looked gorgeous and to my mind appropriate. Arnie looked very handsome and since I had just been to my high school reunion -- not telling how many years ago that was -- I looked as good as I possibly could. After all when you haven't seen people in years, you want to stun them with how good you look. Don't you? But my high school reunion was great and I was reminded of how important these sub groups are in one's life. I have kept up with many of these women over the years and see right now that Kate keeps in touch with nobody. Arnie either. I am the super duper track 'em down and keep in touch. Important. So we all gathered for dinner with Grandma Dot and were able to sit outside for drinks and then have dinner on the porch of the Club which made me think that I was in Italy. How great is that?

Then Saturday night after we picked Kate up from a bat mitzvah she didn't want to go out -- again a sensational night to pass amongst them -- we went out alone. Tamarind Margharitas and Indian Food. That did me in quite happily.

Made a presentation today for the office on social networking. Always fun to sound authoritative...maybe not accurate....

more scatalogical talk

One of Kate's classmates kept asking her if she ate rice, if all the chinese in the world ate rice and how much rice did the Chinese eat. Finally Kate said that she was a spokesperson for the x#billion chinese in the world. Good answer. Puts closed to one episode of racial bullying.

But I just read another example of how to deal with this in which you make the example to your kids that bullies equate to poop. and what do you do when you see poop? Or smell poop? You walk away. So you walk away from bullies of any stripe. Even when the bullies are black, too.

Reminds me of how we dealt with nightmares when Kate was much younger and that was to shout: Get out of my Dreams. And at anytime she felt threatened she would say that: Get out of My dreams. We used to walk the dogs at night and kick all the garbage bags lined up on the street for the trash guys and shout: Get Out of My Dreams.

worked like a charm. That and pretending your mind is like a television channel and when you have a nightmare, you just change the channel.

But how would you do that if you lived in a society where you could be challenged at any moment about who and what you are. What police state might you be living in. We've talked alot recently about this new Arizona law and feel that illegal immigration is illegal. But just walking down the street in casual clothes with a darker skin should not qualify you for a show of identification.

The Art of Blogging, tweeting, facebooking, etc.

I am expert now, you know. Well, almost an expert. Well, in fact if there is a group gathering and it breaks down along the lines of tweeters and non tweeters, you know where I am. I have twitter followers and very recently I began to get regular messages in Japanese everytime I blogged. Very exciting. so I put the message into a translation and guess what? It's porn.

Why should the republicans be the only ones to publicly mess with porn. I, too, have been visited by the scourge of foreign porn. Ok, ok. Actually it made me laugh.

I've finished my course up at the Columbia Journalism school on tweeting which is why I now proclaim my brand as champion tweeter. in fact I am no longer a private person, I am a brand. Buy me.

The Heat of Summer

I feel the heat of summer. I may even begin to haul out my summer clothes because my winter clothes are so over for me. And we're planning trips and activities for the summer which is always a good thing. New persective and new interests.

Kate taught us both how to fence last night as we were standing around in the kitchen waiting for dinner to heat up. We lunged and parried with a death grip on our long wooden spoons. success dinner was ready so we weren't faced with any more ignominious foot faults.

A computer? I'd rather have a butler...

I read that quote this weekend in the wedding announcements and just choked. Made me really laugh out loud. I, like many other professionals I know, are struggling valiantly to get with the program and harness their skills which they have finely honed over the years with the new world of social media. Here is a woman who couldn't give a damn about anything that has happened, or so it would seem, in the last 20 years. But then me, too, I'd like a butler. But i'm happy to say I'd like also to be connected to the larger and ever larger world.

Kate went to a bat mitzvah on Saturday at Central Synogogue which is just drop dead gorgeous with brightly colored mosaaics, intricate tile work and turrets. It's all very moorish and a landmark here in the City. I had never been in the building before and i8t immediately brought me to tears. Beautiful things just affect me like that. So Kate said, "You should cry everytime you look at me."

Indeed.

Taking Care of Myself

I took Kate downtown to school and then turned right around and came uptown to the doctor's office and as I strode through the shiny lobby, I caught a look at myself in the mirror and said, "Who is that woman? That woman looks incredibly pulled together with her good hair cut, chic green quilty jacket, appropriate heavy silk scarf and carrying only two small bags. Efficient and intimidating.

OMG that must be me. But I started my day at 5:15 am this morning taking the dog out in my dog walking costume which is a nightgown hidden under a coat and hoping that I have on two shoes of the same kind. I no longer use an alarm clock because mostly I can wake up without that sudden jolt of noise and start my day. But then i fixed Kate her breakfast and she didn't like the taste of the milk and so i had to do it again because maybe the milk was spoiled. And then got shot down when i suggested a quick dinner of spaghetti before her Chinese lesson when she pointed out that she has been eating spaghetti bolognese for breakast for several days. and then mys most severe critic volunteered that she didn't think I did a good job with time management.

Frankly I didn't have time to kill her -- bad planning of my time -- and so I was able to arrive at the dreaded mammogram appointment looking totally like this other woman I described...Who was she" ME! ME! ME!

The Mammogram mill was crowded as usual. I arrived at 8:00 am to get a jump on my own appointment. Please don't get me wrong because these doctors are very very efficient but it takes for ever. Please fill out the same forms you filled out last year, park your coat in a closet, allow yourself to be herded to another area when you swap your clothes for that pink robes -- open in the front, dear -- and when you are finally able to leave, they say: Checking out? Hell yes. I left at 10:00 am a full two hours after I arrived.

This year the form has a new another question in addition to the the normal age, birth date address, anything different, etc. It asks how would you like to be addressed. This year I ran into a group of 4 friends who schedule a reunion to have mammograms/sonograms/whatevergrams on the same day every year. One of them asked to be addressed as Queen. Love that. These friends have time to talk, dish about their husbands, their portfolios, their children and wait for each other to finish this marathon medical adventure. Then they all go to see Stuart.

That would be Stuart Weitzman, the shoe shop, down the street.

Meditation

Arnie and I have been meditating when we can find a short block of time to sit quietly without having Miss Murray or Kate interrupt us. For good causes though these interruptions may be....Well it sounds as if we've become serial meditators when actually we've just done it together twice. The first time I relaxed enough to take myself off on a bike trip to Eastern Long Island on a very sunny and hot summer day when the bees were busy and the flowers along the road kept hitting me in the face. One of my favorite rides. And yesterday I decided to mix it up alittle and so Aladdin and I took off on a small red turkish carpet and flew over the trees in Africa so that we could watch the elephant migrations. It was a great trip.

I'm a little jet lagged now and have to restrict some of my travels to my office.

The following day

Well, forty lashes because I neglected to say that yesterday was Arnie's birthday. Not telling how many years old he is because those of you with a need to know know.
Some small celebratory noices, cards, presents and those all important cross country telephone calls from his children on the West Coast.

Today I had to boogie on downtown to Friends during lunch for a parent teacher meeting to hear how Kate is doing in school and: she is doing splendidly. She is doing so well, in fact, that I will be going out after work to buy myself a present I'm thinking I, too, need to make a statement and the red wedgie shoes she selected are definitely making a statement for her. Maybe they will help me too.

Went up to Columbia last night for class #3 about social media and finally I think I'm getting it. I can now almost twitter in style. It's hard and you have to think about it rather than just writing any old thing which will not drive traffic to your site or to you. Ok, that's enough channeling Sree, my Columbia teacher,.

Rutherford Square

Kate and I took a moment to really enjoy Rutherford Square this morning with its variety of old and stately trees, vivid tulip plantings and sparkling fountain right in the middle as a focal point. It is such a hidden gem.

While it's still cool I am looking for more tranquil spots and think the Cooper Hewitt Design Museum may be my next stop for this kind of calm. But that's the weekend.

going up to Columbia for class # 3. I now know enough to know how little I really knew at the beginning. All clear?

The Day After

Finally all the hoopla about the Museum dance and the tension that it carried is over. And everybody in my office was just slammed. However I did get a new cell phone that could probably fly me to the moon it has so many gadgets embedded in it.

What did we do this weekend? We bought a new vacuum cleaner after the relatively new vacuum cleaner quit. Just up and stopped. It's all about being able to clean Miss Murray's hair because she sheds quite a bit. And that last vacuum we had was described as being for Pets. So this one is a Dyson and it's really quite a machine with some very strategic engineering that enthralled Kate. She says now that she wants to be an architect but I'm thinking that in her brain lurks a very good industrial designer....She broke the machine out of its box, put it together and demosntrated it to everybody including one of our neighbors.

Then she and I came up to the Museum because I was minus some essential hardware for my new phone -- the right plug -- and had lunch up here and then went over to Lilly Pulitzer because I want her to have a dress for a dinnr we are having with Grandma Dot in a couple of weeks at the Cos Club. Lilly Pulitizer is all pink, green, blue and yellow which caught Kate's eye until she kept seeing small bows attached to everything which she denounced as being kiddish and good only for running in the grass. Suddenly the sales woman found a really vibrant pink dress with tigers on it that seemed to fit the bill. Kate liked it, I liked it and we could afford it. Of course Kate poor darling just happened to see a dress that she liked better as we were almost out of the door and when she tried it on declared it a triumph. I declared it too expensive and something I would try to find when the sales came along. But I felt so sorry for her because who hasn't been there. You see it, you want it and how can it be that you can't have it! Zounds.

Well that was our Mommy daughter day which we capped off by watching Auntie Mame and we all loved it. Brought back alot of memories for me.

A Mad Hatter Kind of Day

Busy, very busy. Somehow it is a Mad Hatter day with friends writing to ask how to take care of bed bug infestations, concentrating on how to twitter 15 times from a Museum event for my social media homework and just dealing.

Last night was the Museum Dance which is a pretty flossy fund raiser and it was sponsored in part by Lilly Pulitzer which meant the ration of pink/green/yellow was very very high. Many attendees dug out their Lillies and showed up. But there were also many many really pretty, really thin model types in long dresses that skimmed their bodies perched on the god damn highest 4 & 5 inch heels. Then there was me in my "I am a prada saleswoman black pants suit with low heel boots" wandering through the crowd shadowing NYTimes photog Bill Cunningham who arrives at these events on his Schwinn. His entrance while quiet always sets up a little buzz with people wanting him to take their picture but he is his very own person and so I do little herding. And this time of course I was totally focused on my blackberry out so that I could twitter on for 15 tweets. Actually I realize now how difficult it can be if you don't pick your words carefully because then you have no story. Just misspellings. I'll have to go back and see if I can edit them into something compelling.

Doubtful.

Twitter

Ok, so I tweeted up a storm> it's hard for me to realize that the mutterings of my mind would make interesting reading for anybody!

Yesterday was like a spa day for me topped off by dinner with Arnie at a downtown French restaurant which was nice, relaxed but not worth a repeat visit I'm thinking. Then while we were turfing the baby sitters out -- they sometimes come in matched pairs -- they began a conversation about this 7 year old Russian child who was sent back to Russia like a misplaced fed Ex package by his adoptive parent. Hard to know what was really going on. My take is that the parent was an idiot. 7 months hardly allows you any time to do anything with a child and the referring agency in russia lied like crazy about what the child was really like. But the entire story makes me unhappy and I was trying to ignore it so that kate heard nothing about it. Not possible and perhaps all to the good that i could interpret it for her. It has nothing to do with her life but we both feel very very strongly about issues like this. It's hard enough when you don't have control over your life to have something so damn dumb happen...