The Romantic Lives of Fifth Graders

Leila has a friend over today, no one you know, and she was very open with me about her love life.

She's 10.

Leila tried to stop her from saying something, but she said, "Who cares?  Its over!"  I was cool as a cucumber, hoping for lots of details.  It went a little something like this: (names have been changed to protect the little animals.)

Girl: Yeah, me and Boy A were dating.

Leila: You weren't dating!

Girl: Yes!  We went to Lucky's after school sometimes.

Me: Did Boy A know you were dating?  Did you talk about it?

Girl: Oh yeah.  He would text me and ask "Do you love me" and would be all "yes." But its over now.

Me: Does he know its over?

Girl.  Sure.

Me: How did it end?

Girl: Well, Girl B starting spreading rumors about us, and I didn't want to be, like, rumor girl, so I ended it. 

Me: Were the rumors that you were dating?  Weren't they true?

Girl: Yeah, but she was saying that we were kissing and stuff, and that wasn't true.

Me: So no kissing.

Girl: Well, not really.

Me: So, kissing? 

Girl: Well, once I pressed my teeth to his knee.

Me: You kissed his knee?

Girl: No, he just kicked me in the hot tub. 

Me: Ah.

Basketball

Leila had a basketball game today.  It was a massacre. Her team lost 20 - 2.  That is not a typo.  Our two best shooters weren't at the game, and our girls looked like lumbering dinosaurs compared to these tiny, fast Mt. Carmel girls.  One of our girls would go to pass, and there would be no one to pass to because the team seemed kind of spaced out, and the opposing team would just swoop in and grab the ball.  They should have thanked us every time.  My whole family came to see the game, even my brother, and it was just depressing.  The one high light was that the one, lonely basket we did get was shot by Leila.  I think she was more surprised than anyone else.  In fact, she always looks somewhat shocked when the ball ends up in her hands.  Like she's never seen a basketball before, and she's not quite sure whether to dribble it or eat it. 

The other girls have their own problems, like the one who can dribble and run like a madwoman, but once she gets to the end of the court she loses all control and falls down and the ball goes out of bounds.  Or the kid who keeps dribbling right on her own feet and the ball ends up rolling into the hands of the opposing team.  Or the girl that shoots baskets from anywhere on the court that the mood strikes her; 30 feet from the basket, and she's launching the ball over the heads of the other players who can only watch as it bounces off the backboard.  She never makes those shots.  They also keep dribbling and passing away from the basket once they get near it, rather than shooting.  Like they're thinking that the opposing team hasn't had enough opportunity to get the ball from them, and needs a few more chances. 

Then there's the wrestling over the ball.  Two, sometimes three girls clutching the ball and falling on the floor, rolling around until the ref blows the whistle.  Its comedy. 

We won our last game, but we just looked like keystone cops out there today.  Woof.  Really.  It was brutal.

Fancy Free-throw Footwork

Blitz Update

Its Saturday night as I write this.  I have been doing so good on the blitz this week.  Seems like the week after my period is as good as the week of my period is bad.  I had no booze, only a few cookies, and I found the self control I needed to get the job done was in ample supply.  Its like my body presses a reset button after my period, and the closer I get to the next period, the more I'll eat.  I ending this week 1600 calories under budget for the week, and by the time dinner rolled around, I had 1035 calories left for the day.  I decided to go for it.

I had a cheeseburger, fries, a coke, and frozen yogurt in a waffle cone with strawberries and kit kat pieces.  I'm not topping it off with a glass of wine.

EATING IS SO FUN.

I'll continue this post on Monday after the weigh in.  There better be a pay off.

It is now Tuesday, and I weighed myself this morning.  The scale said I was up two lbs.  Fuck you, scale!  I did not accept that.  I wasn't hungry for breakfast, so a few hours later I weighed myself again.  This time it said that I was up 3 lbs.  You asshole!  So I weighed myself again, and finally - FINALLY! - it came to its senses: I was down one lb.  One measly lb. after my week of perfection.  Bastard.

I think I should weigh myself on Fridays, before the debauchery of the weekend starts.  I went to an Oscar party on Sunday where I drank a ton of wine and had a lot of crab rangoon and cookies.

I am starting to see changes, though, and my neighbor asked me if I'd lost weight.  I was wearing my suck-it-in pants, but I'll take all the positive reinforcement I can get.  

I'm going to try again tomorrow.  This will not stand.

The Great Tomatillo Search of 2013

I got this slow cooker cook book for my birthday in November, and the beauty part is I don't own a slow cooker, but this book has instructions for slow cooker and dutch ovens, which I do have.  Everything I've made from this book has been outstanding.  The one thing that I wasn't super excited about was the Italian braised short ribs, and that was because Rob got some meat with a big marrow bone in it instead of short ribs, and the result was way too rich.  The leftovers are still in the freezer and there they will stay until we no longer feel guilty and we throw them out.

Last week, I had a plan to make chili verde.  The recipe calls for 2 12 oz cans of whole tomatillos.  I started at Whole foods, where I like to buy meat. I got the pork shoulder, but they didn't have the tomatillos.  I went to 5 more supermarkets to get tomatillos, and the closest I got was a label on a shelf in the ethnic food aisle of Safeway.  I had already spent a small Whole-Foods-fortune on the pork shoulder, so I couldn't shit can the whole idea, which is what I desperately wanted to do. 

Store number 6 was a large, Latino market two towns over.  I thought this was a sure thing.  After a fruitless search (pun somewhat intentional) I grabbed the manager who told me that whole, prepared tomatillos were kind of rare. 

Why, Williams Sonoma, do you include an ingredient in your recipe that does not exist?  Why would you do this to me?  To the world? 

The manager said I should just use fresh tomatillos, and lead me over to them since I didn't know what they looked like.  He instructed me how to peel them, wash them, blanch them, and put them in a blender.  Then he loaded me up with a pound and a half of them and sent me on my way. 

I guess its too late to make a long story short, but I followed his instructions, and you know what?  So easy, no problem, and the chili verde was fantastic. 

I'm not sure this whole thing was worth writing about.  Its not really that interesting.  It seemed like it would be when I was driving all over the place looking for tomatillos, but now that I'm reading over, meh.  Can't win 'em all.

Sick Day

Miss Leila is home sick today.  She has been feeling crappy all weekend, but her fever is gone now, and she just has a sore throat and a cough and a stuffy nose.  General malaise.  She felt well enough today that she wanted to make cookies for Daddy.  Chocolate chip bacon cookies.  I went to the store this morning and got bacon and chocolate chips, and she did the whole thing until it was time to put the lumps of dough on the pans.  She hit that wall you hit when you've been sick and you're starting to feel better, but you're not quite there. 

So now she's in bed listening to a Harry Potter audiobook, and I'm stuck babysitting the cookies.  This is my least favorite part of the cookie baking process.  You're up, you're down, you can't settle in to watch anything because BING! you have to get the cookies out of the oven and load up a new pan. 

By the way, you read right: these are chocolate chip bacon cookies.  Its an experiment.  I'll let you know.  Although, I'm not feeling that great either and have absolutely no appetite for cookies or bacon, let alone together in one cookie. 

BING! hold on a sec', gotta get the cookies...

I'm back.  The Blitz was not overly blitzy last week.  I'm only down .4 lbs.  Better than a kick in the head, but nothing to crow about.  This week will be a different story.  Less wine, more starving.  My overwhelming sugar cravings should be mostly gone for another three weeks, so let's see what I can accomplish.  I have very little appetite right now.  I may be coming down with something.  Let's hope its something that makes me want very little to eat, but doesn't make me feel too bad.  I'll win this thing yet!

BING!  Alright, alright I'm coming!

Before and During. After is going to take a While

My baby is growing up.  She's entered the awkward phase.  Luckily, so far, its not that awkward.  She's still beautiful (at least her mother thinks she is) and she's charming and smart and funny, but now she comes with accessories:

Before:

And now:

 

We are calling her Metal Mouth, Brace Face, and Woo Woo Train Tracks.  She has a good sense of humor about it.  She was so excited to get braces, like it was the best day of her life, and now, two days later, not so much...  She's sore, her cheeks hurt, she's whiny, and I'm trying to be sensitive.  

Note the pimples on the forehead.  Poor thing: its only just beginning.  To add insult to injury, she has her 11 year check up today where she will be seen mostly naked by her male doctor (gasp!) and she will get two shots.  Minimum.  Adolescence is sucks.

She'd want me to add the following photo.  Actually, she probably wouldn't want me to add any photos, but I'm gonna anyway.  I just plunked down a small fortune for those braces, they're mine, I can do what I want with them.

PUBERTY!

Do you know what Time it Is?

You know what time it is?  Its Girl Scout Cookie time.  A time of year I used to look forward to, indulge in, salivate over.  But now there's the Blitz.  The stupid, ruining-my-life Blitz. 

Because I like to support local girl scouts, having been a scout myself, and because I have no self control and freakin' love girl scout cookies so much, I just bought six boxes of cookies.  Two boxes of thin mints, for the purists in this house, and because they're the best deal, and four boxes of Tagalongs, those wonderful shortbreads with a dollop of peanut butter covered in chocolate.  My favorites

They are now sitting on the dining table, taunting me.  Mocking me.  I'm extra hungry, too, because I didn't have a proper lunch.  Mostly because I drank extra wine last night. 

For the first time, I checked the calories on these Tagalongs.  These little fuckers have 140 calories per serving, and a serving is two cookies.  I have easily eaten an entire box of them in one day before, so almost 1000 calories worth of cookies.  Is it any wonder I'm such a cow?

They are so delicious, though.  Its breaking me heart to sit here and not eat any.  I wished I loved exercise as much as I love food.  I said this wouldn't become a weight loss blog, and I'm sorry to bore you with talk of calories and longing, but fucking Girl Scout Cookies?  During period week??  Did you ever see Kung Fu Panda?  Remember the part where he is up in the rafters eating Monkey's almond cookies, and he's just stuffing them in his face and crumbs are flying everywhere?  That's who I want to be right now.  The universe is testing me...