Now...what are you waiting for? Come see me at the new place!

Of course, you ought to drop by the new digs just once to check it out: http://www.mywhimislaw.com (yes, I know it's a little slow - that's what happens when you have an idiot savant at the CSS wheel...)

Instead, come find me over here at My Whim is Law instead.

Warning - the place is a mess, the boxes are all askew, and the decorating's only half complete. But I didn't want to leave you in limbo much longer.

Come on over and say hello, will you?

But I'm still on a 'clean it up, clear it out, get it taken care of already ' tear. So expect some changes here shortly - my blog's getting a makeover, including some liposuction and possible plastic surgery.

(Hey, it's a far less painful task than tackling the kids' rooms...!)

Update: Please don't comment to any of these posts any more - I have the boxes packed and sealed already; I'd hate to leave your words of wisdom behind!

Or, in other words, comments made after 11:54 am on January 7th don't get to go to the new house, okay? Stay tuned...

Actually, I just disabled comments. Yes, I'm authoritarian - but you knew that already, right?

* I think The Mogul's been spending too much time watching Judge Judy, Judge Joe Brown and the like...

Technorati Tags: divorce, divorce+with+kids, stealing+chocolate

To be honest, I probably wouldn't have noticed, but she left a shining trail of evidence behind her.

Evidence as in the wrappers that used to surround the coins of chocolate gelt that I'd stashed in my bedroom - supposedly far away from my candy fanatic.

Drama Mama's long had this annoying habit of leaving discards in her wake. Apple cores? Left in the living room. Candy wrappers? Hit the ground seconds after unwrapping said candy. And let's not even start about shoes, socks, gloves or coats - I'll start crying otherwise.

I beg. I plead. I cajole. I set up clear 'shoes by the front door ONLY' rules. I send her back over her trail to regularly and routinely clean up her own messes. Yet the habit persists.

So when I spotted the gleaming shards of foil on the floor, it wasn't hard to figure out what had happened here - or who to roust out of bed. And I'm betting that after her rude awakening this morning expressly so she could go clean up her mess - with the extra added bonus of an early-morning lecture (with special consequences for stealing my stuff, yay!) - she might just figure out that she would be better served if she stops incrimininating herself this way.

I'd forgotten all about the gelt, you see. She would have totally gotten away with it. I can't tell her this, of course. (SsssHHHHhhh - don't you either, please!) It's important to be seen as omnipotent and all-knowing - at least for a little while longer.

Even though I don't quite know where I can find gelt now to teach the obligatory 'replace what you stole' lesson...

Technorati Tags: drama+mama, candy, gelt

Why? Today, after a long, meandering journey, The Father and I were the 382nd couple to petition Multnomah County for a divorce this year.

But - before you drag out the hankies (or assume that's why I laid in a stock of whiskey lately) - it's totally fine. Even amusing, in parts. Including the fact that I've had Chapel of Love stuck in my head as an endless loop earworm (with slightly different lyrics, of course) since I woke up this morning.

Because we took such a long time to get around to this, we'd done all of the heavy lifting already - from disposing of joint assets to dissolving joint debts to duking it out with the IRS to hammering out a flexible yet responsible parenting plan.

Since we have the same kind of snarky sense of humor, he mourned the fact that we'd not been able to pull this off in symmetrically bookended fashion by filing on the 3rd, and laughed when I told him of the earworm (and yep, he's okay with the fact that I'm blogging about all of this.) And I kept asking people if they handled out awards for 'most cooperative couple filing for divorce' - and if so, could someone nominate us, please?

(The whole "What works well for your schedule?" back and forth when it came time to register for the mandatory parenting class had the registrar shaking her head in amazement.)

And the final irony? It looks as if we'll be done with the whole process - just in time for Valentine's Day.

Technorati Tags: divorce, parenting+with+divorce

My daughter, in particular, is a toucher. When I'm in her classroom, she has to be on my lap. She'll take my arm and wrap it around her when we're sitting next to each other, and she will come squinch down next to me in the easy chair, knocking my newspapers out onto the floor to make room for herself.

Her latest trick? She frequently bounds in the room, grabs my face in her hands, and moves my head from side to side so she can kiss each cheek. And of course, she tells me she loves me about fifty zillion times a day, it seems.

I should adore her adoration? Uh, not so much, if I'm being honest. Sure, I love the fact that she's so expressive - but other times, it feels cloying. And while I know she'll grow to hate me in five years or so (when I'll not-coincidentally become the stupidest parent ever to walk the face of the earth) - well, I still can't bring myself to just store all this affection up for later.

And then I read Scott's tribute to the mother he never stopped saying "I love you" to, even at the end - and, well, I feel like an ungrateful, uncaring heel.

If you'll excuse me, I need to go hug and kiss and tell a little girl that I love her for the next hour or so. I think it might just be the best way to honor the memory of Scott's mom, don't you?

And I think Drama Mama's new song might just be a fitting tribute as well...

Here it is: I never participated in the festivities because I have the bladder the size of an eight year old child. (It's documented! I swear!) I could never figure out where I'd be able to pee.

Where could people use a restroom, anyway? And if you dwell on that subject for more than a second or two, you'll have Compelling Reason Number Two explaining just why Times Square and I don't mix. Sure, I put up with the urine clouds on hot days every time I descended into the subway - but willingly subjecting myself to that in the name of Entertainment? I think not...

And then there was the noise. The god-awful noise. My first Manhattan apartment was in Hells Kitchen, just north of Times Square. And I remember hearing the hordes of restless people with their farookin' noisemakers, yelling and screaming at 4 pm in the afternoon. While I was in my apartment, behind closed doors, with the stereo on, no less. After an hour or so of that, I'd developed a nasty eye twitch and bailed for a calmer neighborhood.

I don't 'do' noise well, I'm afraid. Or crowds, for that matter. There's not enough alcohol in the world that could induce me into celebrating the new year's arrival with a huge mass of noisy, smelly, drunken people. And if there were? I'd be stumbling around, wetting myself as I frantically looked for an available bathroom. Rinse and repeat that scenario several times throughout the evening (yep, I'm teeny bladder girl, remember?) and it's not exactly my idea of a fun time.

Then there's the other excuse you might understand, Young Son. See, spending New Year's in Times Square isn't cool if you're an aspiring New York resident. At. ALL. In fact, I can't remember knowing anyone who ever voluntarily went there (or at least admitted it publicly.) (I know, I know - you're scoffing at the notion that your old and decrepit mother was ever cool.)

Now, I can heartily endorse the notion of spending NYE in New York proper - I have fond memories of both public and private events tied to that day. But Times Square? On NYE? Only over my even older and incontinent body - when I'll no longer care about the availability of bathrooms and you'll be keeping your dear old mother in Depends.

- It's 10:15 am and both kids are sleeping. Now, I know that one should never, EVER wake a sleeping child if one doesn't have to. But what'll happen tonight when they need to get to bed at a decent hour in order to get up for school tomorrow morning, hmmmm?

- Is it totally decadent and/or indulgent to be drinking leftover champagne in mimosa form this morning? It's just going to go bad if I don't make good use of it, right? (I talk a good game about irish whiskey this and Maker's Mark that, but fell asleep after 1/2 a drink on NYE; couldn't manage to put a dent in a bottle of champagne yesterday despite hours of trying.)

- One 20 pound ham. Only four people (two of them kids) eating dinner. Hope no one's going to be tired of ham any time soon...! (Yeah, I froze a bunch, and am using the bone to make soup stock now. But there's still a LOT left over...)

- I sent a long, logistically-filled email to several extended family members last week. Checked to make sure I was being clear and informative, yet not overly verbose. Included accurate links to sites of interest. And still managed to spell my son's last name WRONG - in the subject line, no less. (It's also my last name, so I really have no excuse here...)

After she finished peeling eight potatoes, she moved along to slicing said potatoes for au gratin. And once that job was finished, she still wasn't satisfied - after a brief break, she eagerly volunteered to cut the apples for crisp. All seven of them.

Last week, it was anything involving water. This week, it's apparently anything involving knives or paring implements. And next week? Maybe she can graduate to folding clothes.

Hey, it's a brand new year. I can dream, can't I...?

Wha...you were with me until the apple cider, you say? Yep, the kids and I are living it up (although I've already called dibs on the alcohol in the house. Can you imagine the combination of Drama Mama and Maker's Mark? It brings tears to my eyes, frankly...) They love appetizers - although I've not been able to talk them into my childhood favorite 'fancy appetizer': crabmeat on a hunk of cream cheese with cocktail sauce on top.

They both adore crab - that's not the problem. But one hates cream cheese, while the other recoils at the very sight of cocktail sauce. So we compromise on shrimp (even though The Mogul offered to dismember a Dungeness crab, I just wasn't into the mess this year...)

So, now that Drama Mama and I got our disco dancing out of our system already at an early-evening party (complete with spinning balls and thumpin' 70's rhythms, no less), it's time to get out of the fancy duds, crawl into the jammies, and settle down for our own NYE rituals.

I'll probably fall asleep before midnight, and get woken up by my son for the Times Square festivities (he's still stunned and amazed that I never went there for NYE when I lived in NYC - ah, the innocence of youth) - only to fall back asleep seconds after the ball drops. Then I'll be summoned out of dreamland a bit later for a second, more private celebration.

But in the brief shining moments while I'm awake? We're going to Par-Tay. After all, we have Li'l Smokies! And shrimp!

Happy New Years, y'all. Here's hoping your festivities were even more exciting. And if you had that crab dip with the cocktail sauce? Don't tell me it's no longer All That now that we're older and much more 'sophisticated.'

Some memories ought to remain impervious to the ravages of time, right?

I'm in my pajamas still, with my comfy sheepskin-lined slippers. And I'm waiting patiently for my groceries to be delivered.

The refrigerator has already been cleaned out - all those Tupperware containers got emptied of their fragrant innards, stuff got shifted around in preparation for the food that's to arrive soon (a 16 pound ham, among other things), AND I even wiped down the shelves. And with the time I'd have otherwise spent grocery shopping, I rearranged the freezer as well, unearthing some stuff that had to be past its prime.

The vegetable scraps I'd been hoarding for the last week or so are now simmering into stock in the crockpot.

Time to run - my groceries are here! This is the life....

Groceries? Ordered; will be delivered tomorrow am. Whoops, forgot something - let me just go back and update the order while I'm thinking of it...

Phone bill? Just paid it. Other bills? Paid those too.

Checked over next week's produce box from Pioneer Organics; made some adjustments (we're not really a kiwi family; last week's 10 pounds of potatoes purchased pre-latke fest is still holding strong.)

Stuff needed for festivities tomorrow night? It's in the grocery order.

The one thing I can't (yet) do online - the trip to the liquor store. I slogged out in the rain for that, though...

Once I can do that online as well, it'll be just as good as wrinkling my nose, won't it?

Over the weekend, some (if not all) of these will be copied over to my desktop computer's hard drive instead (many already have been.) They will be accessible from either laptop, and easily burned into mix CDs. They will eventually be used as the base for my digital music system in the house (once I upgrade hardware and the like.)

Then, those 121 CDs will be shipped off to a music store in South Carolina, where they will be magically turned into credits towards an iPod.

And then I'll offload my tall ugly black plastic CD holder as well.

So I'll still have the music I paid for. I'll get rid of stuff I no longer listen to. I'll create more room in my house, plus offload unsightly objects. And at the end of it all? I'll end up with a new iPod.

Sounds like a win-win to me!