Composed at dinner time tonight
To the tune of the nautical chanty, "A Sailor Went to Sea, Sea, Sea:"

I think if it were not for carbs
My picky children both would starve!
Rice, noodles, rolls, and bread galore
They'll eat -- and other food ignore.

They scoff at beef, turkey, and ham
Reject potatoes, squash, and yam
Offer them soup and they will weep
( Read more... )

The most important reason to stay slim, as tales both ancient and modern teach, is to be as unappetizing as possible to man-eaters ( Read more... )

Yesterday I walked into Walgreens with the cheerful countenance of a convict bound for the firing squad ( Read more... )

These are getting faster! We'll see how people react to this one, haha.

Weekly Encouragement Letter #3: Go to the AntI know life can be stressful. I know sometimes it feels like we’re juggling a dozen flaming balls of death and if a single one drops it’ll burn the house down around our ears. Times like that, well-meaning people often say things ( Read more... )

Somewhere along the line, I have failed as a parent.

I just showed a clip of "Under the Sea from Little Mermaid to my children. Who doesn't love Little Mermaid?

Me (afterwards): "What did you think?"
Charlotte: ". . ."
Elise: "That was a scary one."
Me: 🙁
Charlotte: "Can we watch 'Do You Want to Build a Snowman?' now?"
Me: "No ( Read more... )

Charlotte and Elise, curled up on the couch with Auntie Deborah's dog Flora on a quiet Friday evening. They are petting her; she is enduring it in silent terror ( Read more... )

This whole GameStop thing . . . at first I laughed in delight at the sheer awesomeness of it, but now, I dunno. It seems like a lot of the motivation behind it is mean-spirited rather than "let's see what we can do!" and is targeted toward hurting other people. I know that the current fad is to abominate unpopular rich people, but that doesn't make ( Read more... )

After she hit me, I put Charlotte in her room for a time-out. She was crying and screaming. Usually I wait a few minutes and then go in and talk things out with her, but today Elise beat me to it ( Read more... )

". . . red maple, black maple, striped maple, dwarf maple, silver maple -- nine different kinds besides sugar maple. Canada is the Land of the Maple Leaf. The maple leaf and the beaver are in her national emblem . . . . Probably the silver fox or the mink that ( Read more... )