It's a good thing Halloween only happens once a year. The girls love this holiday and why not? From my perspective, too much candy I shouldn't eat comes into the house, we are always in danger of having a peanut item slip by, with all its attendant allergens, and my younger daughter already needs to be extra vigilant about her teeth given pre-natal nutritional deficiences. All right, now that the spoilsport issues are on the table, let me report that my younger daughter and her friend declared this "the best Halloween ever". Last night each of them got to do what she wanted: the older one went to a friend's party in her neighborhood and then trick-or-treating, while the younger one went with friends to a party in our neighborhood and then trick or treating in a group, without her own parents. The younger one was arrayed in beautiful pink ballerina garb, complete with tiara. The older one went as Goth Girl, with handcuff earrings, a studded choker, and dressed in black down to her toenails. At 10 p.m., then, when R collected the younger one from the dorm, where she was hanging out with me awaiting his return, we had potential double melt-down from costume excitement and sugar overload in the works. Double meltdown factor multiplied by 2 very strong personalities. Let's just say that I, in my craven fashion, was glad the task of getting them to bed was in R's hands and not mine.
One of our local LYSes is having a big 25th anniversary sale this weekend. Since D#1 had no school yesterday, we sneaked down there in the middle of the day when I had a break in my classes. She bought some Louisa Harding ribbon yarn in pinks and purples which she declares she'll use for a scarf for her sister, we bought 2 different skeins of ONLine Linie Spot, which I think is also destined for scarves, I found a great yarn for the Outlander swap (I had despaired of finding this item in my partner's colors but there it was), and I was forced to buy a skein of Knit One Crochet Too sock yarn in the most amazing bird of paradise colorway. I have no idea what the colorway is called, but it practically sang to me. D#1 says I am not allowed to make it into anything other than socks for myself. Somehow we also ended up with a skein of Malabrigo worsted in gorgeous dark greens. It just leapt into our basket while I wasn't looking. Yum.
Today is another gorgeous autumn day -- we had frost earlier in the week but have now had 2 consecutive days in the 5os. My garden is kaput, but still, it's nice that we haven't vaulted right into unremitting November-ness despite the calendar. D#1's soccer team won this morning, which is a nice reward for the hysteria we had getting her off to the game (the athlete in question having left her cleats & shinguards --required for town soccer events-- at school). I left D#2 busily working on her "Star of the Week" poster (she has been so anxious to be chosen, and knew exactly what she wanted to include several weeks ago. I'm trying not to obsess over the fact that her current career goal is "waitres girl" since 4 months ago she wanted to teach swim classes and I fully expect the reality to involve high fashion).
I'm thinking about the election (who isn't) and Jocelyn's thoughtful analysis of the real issues at stake. I'm wondering about the ways tv influences voters in all constituencies (my spouse used to opine that "West Wing" viewers were the crux of the problem in 2000, as we were all living in a fantasy world with Jed Bartlet as president and failed to take the real election seriously enough that there would have been no doubt about the results). One of my most scholarly students did a presentation in class last Thursday designed to give some of the younger students a drive-by look at the history of woman suffrage in this country, because as you might expect they don't know ANYTHING, and she did a wonderful job. Her starting hook, though, was a scene from the movie "Mary Poppins." You know the one, I'm sure: Mrs. Banks comes home all fired up from a rally at which one of her co-activists chained herself to the Prime Minister's carriage and there's a rousing musical number complete with Mrs. Banks showing her bloomers. "This is how I first learned about woman suffrage," she said. You don't know it? Here you go:
Never mind that the real message here is that Mrs. Banks would be better served to pay attention to her own family. Happy Saturday. Rabbit rabbit.
1 comment:
The yarn store trip sounds spectacularly successful (and I particularly like the way that D#1 is looking out for you with the sock yarn), as does Halloween. Thanks for the shout-out on the issues; I love R's analysis of the role (or not) of West Wing viewer. As someone who loved that show, there is something to be said about fans' desire for a Jed Bartlett presidency. This year, though, no fantasy -- just a real, solid win, right?
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