Socal Mom by Donna Schwartz Mills

The Never Ending Home Renovation

We are coming to the end of of our home renovation nightmare.

On Monday, we ordered tile for the entryway, dining room and kitchen, and carpet for the living room and hallway. I was hopeful we'd be able to put our furniture back by Chanukah (December 11) -- but my husband insists that we (meaning I) finish painting the rest of the house before the floor is installed. And I can't do that until he finishes the drywall patches.

We're having family over for a holiday dinner on December 23. That is, if we do have our dining room table and china cabinet back up by then. And that can't happen until the floor has been installed.

My life since this renovation is like an Escher drawing. No matter how close I feel to the end of this journey, it isn't actually in sight.

There's still a lot of fine-tuning to be done to the kitchen: the microwave hood needs to be installed, the cabinets look like they need another round of protective coating, there's hardware waiting to be stuck to the drawers and doors, etc. But we're no longer on a steady diet of Lean Cuisine and takeout. I've been cooking again, and it feels great.

However, the near-completion of the kitchen just reminded me of what a time-suck this renovation has been. I have been telling myself that the reason I've not been able to complete tasks as quickly as I expect has been that hours I would have been working have been spent dealing with the details of living in a house that's been torn apart -- and the energy it is taking to put it back together again.

I expected that getting the kitchen to this point would give me back more of my personal time, but it just increased the urge to get this thing FINISHED so we could get our lives back. And so I was saddled with more tasks  -- some pleasant and some not as much fun as you would think:

• I had to unpack and replace all the kitchen stuff that had been sitting in cartons for several months. (You have NO IDEA how good that felt. Pleasant.)
• The packing gave me an opportunity to do some necessary cleaning out of old canned goods, herbs and spices... so now every grocery excursion turns into a quest to re-stock the pantry. (Mundane. And costly.) 
• The new cabinet configuration gives me less storage near the stove for items I need at hand when cooking. I purchased a new spice rack that can be displayed attractively on the counter. (Pleasant, but I spent more than I'd planned.)
• While I was at it, I got rid of our old knives and bought a new set of Henckels that was on sale at Costco. (Very pleasant. And I spent less than I'd planned.)

We designed the kitchen with the idea that family and friends could sit at the peninsula and socialize while I'm cooking -- even the earliest renderings included three stools. With the dining room table (my usual workspace) still disassembled in our garage, I had been looking forward to setting up shop at the counter. However, in all our planning, I'd never thought to actually price the cost of barstools. I figured I'd just find something appropriate at Cost Plus or Pier One and call it a day. I budgeted $150 for three stools.

Someone should have told me that I could expect to pay $80-$120 per stool. Or that they come in two heights. We purchased three $99 models at Cost Plus, brought them home and assembled the first one, only to discover that it was too tall. That's when I realized that I needed to look at chairs described as counter stools, or with a specified height of 24". 

I managed to move my workspace from the coffee table and couch to the new counter, but had to work standing up. It was better for my back, but hell on my feet. What followed was a 10-day quest to find counter stools that didn't cost an arm and a leg.

Every store I visited cost more than the previous one. Pottery Barn's stools are $220. There were beautiful ones at Crate and Barrel that started around $300. I drove up to Santa Clarita, where there is a store that sells nothing but barstools and billiard tables -- their huge selection ran between $200-$400.

Costco sells an attractive counterstool in a two-pack for around $200, but then we would be stuck with either two stools or four (and we had space for three). My Twitter friend @Trianglman referred me to a site with a ton of stools -- but none of the ones I liked came in that 24" height.

Then I remembered a store called Urban Home, which carries furniture similar to Pottery Barn and Crate & Barrel but costs quite a bit less. That's where I found a discontinued 24" stool that had the right look... and a sale price of just $60. Victory.

So there's another little detail out of the way, and only slightly over my original budget. I have yet to add in the cost of all the time I spent looking for it.

I should feel less stressed... but just as I feel the pressure to get the house done before Christmas, I have clients who have patiently held onto work while I've been sorting through all of this. They also want their projects done so they can relax and enjoy their holidays.

Normal life will have to wait.

Christmas Spirit - SoCal Style

I'm in a cantankerous mood over at Los Angeles and 50-Something Moms Blogs today. The topic: the ever-earlier beginning of the holiday season.

It's a short post that only touches upon my very mixed feelings about the December holidays. It's short because -- as usual -- I spent Thanksgiving at my sister's home in the Sacramento area, and she doesn't look kindly on it when I hover over my computer when I should be socializing with the family. So the post was dashed off very quickly on Saturday (while she was in the shower).

In that post, I remarked on the fact that the soundtrack of our Thanksgiving meal was a selection of Christmas carols, and this struck me as a little bit strange. For one thing, I don't take my Christmas stuff out of storage until AFTER Thanksgiving. But that brings us to the other thing: We're Jewish.

As a Jewish American, I have always had a strange relationship with the Christmas season. When we were kids, it felt like the entire country was having a party and we weren't invited.

Of course, that's not really how it went. We had our own celebration: Chanukah, which is a nice little holiday. But even a fully lit menorah doesn't hold a candle to the seductive glitz and glitter of an American Christmas, with its shiny ornaments and lights and holly and wreaths and bells and Santa Claus... and all those presents.

It is possible to enjoy the holiday season in America when you're not a Christian - but sometimes you're walking a very fine line. We were not one of those families that put up a tree and called it a "Chanukah Bush." However, we fully participated in our schools' holiday programs (which were allowed to be all about Christmas back then). And while that's where I learned to love Christmas carols, I never felt quite right singing some of them in school choir. My 9-year-old self was so afraid G-d would strike me down if I actually sang all the words in "O Come All Ye Faithful" that I would merely lip sync "Christ the Lord" at the end. 

We opened presents on Chanukah from my parents and grandparents, but there was still the matter of Christmas Day, which can be kind of lonely if you're not invited to enjoy a meal with your friends or neighbors. Most years, my parents would look for some way to distract us: A trip to Disneyland.

The "Magic Kingdom" was even more magical during the holidays. A gigantic tree dominated the Main Street entrance with the most beautiful Disney-themed decorations you could imagine, and all the shops on the street were decked with boughs of holly and lights. There were holiday parades, special holiday shows and fireworks. Best of all, in those days, the park was fairly empty and lines for the rides were short. 

Now that I have a family of my own, I don't need to run to Disneyland to enjoy the Christmas spirit. I married outside my faith, and we honor my husband's traditions with a tree, decorations, gifts and all the trimmings. But December remains my favorite time of year to visit the park (something I've written about in the past).

So I made an exception to my "no holiday music before Thanksgiving" rule and accepted an invitation to the park's Parent Blogger Holiday event last month. On top of that, I laid down the law with my husband (who professes to HATE all things Disney) and informed him he was coming with us. After all, this is one of the ways MY family always celebrated the season.

I do understand where my guy is coming from. He gets anxious on rides that go really fast or have an awful lot of ups and downs (like roller coasters). It's not much fun for him to sit on the sidelines while the rest of us do Space Mountain.

My husband quickly discovered that visiting the park is a different experience with children who are teenagers (like my daughter and the friend we brought along with us). We arrived early and discovered there was no wait for the Indiana Jones ride. So Gareth and I grabbed some coffee while the girls went without us. Thanks to cell phones, we easily reunited when the ride was over.

It was helpful that the event invitation was also extended to one of my readers and her family. As it turned out, the winner of the random drawing for the tickets was a friend who regularly reads the blog. Her husband is also a reluctant Disneyland guest... and we figured the two of them could keep each other company while we women enjoyed the attractions.

Thus, I was able to keep both my daughter and my husband entertained while he only rode on the attractions he likes: Pirates of the Caribbean, the Haunted House, Soaring over California, Mickey's Big Wheel and the Toy Story ride (the latter three at California Adventure).

Before we arrived, the Disney folks asked me if I wanted to test drive "Mobile Magic," a new phone application that helps you navigate the parks. Now, I've been visiting Disneyland for something like 50 years and I know the place pretty well. But I'm always game to try out a new tech toy... and I was surprised at how useful this one turned out to be.

Mobile Magic uses GPS to help you map out your visit. It also connects with Disney's own computers to give you up-to-the-minute information on wait times and FastPass schedules for all the attractions. Hungry? Mobile Magic will offer you a list of all the restaurants in your vicinity and the type of food they offer. You can use the app to find out where and when the different shows are scheduled in both Disneyland and California Adventure. It will even help you find the nearest rest room.

We found ourselves checking Mobile Magic throughout the day, and even got a second pass at "Pirates" because we knew it was only a 15-minute wait. It was incredibly useful.

My only gripe with the app is that it is only available to Verizon customers as part of an exclusive deal between the wireless provider and the Disney company. However, I'm told that if you have a smartphone with a different carrier, you can access much of the same information on Disneyland's mobile website.

This year, the Disney parks are celebrating the debut of Princess Tiana, the star of the studio's animated feature, The Princess and the Frog. Much has been written already about Disney's first African-American princess, so I'm not going to go into that (at least, until I've seen the movie). But we did catch the park's Princess Tiana Showboat Jubilee, which features actors and singers in character costume and some of the Randy Newman-penned songs.

Disneyland has always employed an army of professional entertainers, from musicians to singers to actors to dancers. This show was no exception. The cast member playing Tiana was not only beautiful, she had an exceptional voice.

While we parents all enjoyed the show, our bored teenagers were looking for bigger thrills. Their days of carrying an autograph book for Mickey Mouse and friends are long gone. At the end of the show, we let them go off on their own with instructions to meet us at 6:00 for dinner.

They ended up back at California Adventure, where they rode the Tower of Terror three times. They may be almost all grown up, but there's still plenty for them to enjoy.

In the meantime, my husband and I selected the much tamer "It's a Small World," which undergoes a holiday transformation every December. The ride is not only adorned with Christmas lights and decorations, but it gets a mash-up of "Jingle Bells" and "Deck the Halls" along with its dangerously catchy theme tune. The result is a ride that truly celebrates the seasonal theme of "Peace on Earth." 

The evening ended with Disney's celebrated fireworks show above Sleeping Beauty's castle. The spectacular effects were choreographed perfectly to some of the most beloved music of the season. We Jewish visitors were delighted that they had even slipped in The Dreidel song.

The show concluded with "snow," which fell along the entire length of the Plaza and Main Street.

In the end, Gareth told me he actually had FUN on our holiday visit to Disneyland. That's a good thing... because he's going to have to take me there, even after our daughter is grown up and gone. It's one of the ways I like to celebrate the season.

DISCLOSURE: The opinions and recollections in this post are my own. I received no monetary compensation for this post, nor did I promise that it would be a positive one. We did receive four free one-day park-hopper tickets to Disneyland and a buffet dinner as part of the event (as did my reader and her family). We were lent a Verizon phone with the Mobile Magic app for the day.

Giving Thanks

We spent Saturday enjoying the company of my reader, Deena, who won the drawing to attend the Disneyland holiday blogger event I wrote about last month, which got me into the holiday spirit.

I woke up Sunday feeling hung over - not because I'd been drinking, but I was exhausted from a full day of amusement park excitement. I don't bounce back all that quickly any more; I was still moving slowly yesterday. So this morning has been my first opportunity to focus on business. It's also my only one. Tuesdays are short at LA area schools and I have to pick Megan up in about an hour - then off to another dreaded dental appointment.

And tomorrow, I'm chaperoning an 8th grade field trip to the California Science Center. Once upon a time, my daughter loved it when I participated in class activities. It's been a while since I've been able to do it, and I thought she would be pleased. Silly me. She has been begging me to renege on my obligation. She thinks having me around will cramp her style! Maybe it will. And maybe that's not a bad thing.

At any rate, I won't be getting any more work done before the Thanksgiving holiday. So I figure this is my best opportunity to share with you all that I'm thankful for. I know I've spent most of the year complaining about how awful things have been. But it could have been worse...

• As 2009 comes to an end, we have a lot fewer dollars in the bank. But my husband still has a job. I am so very grateful for that.
• The poria infestation that caused our home renovation has been a nightmare. But I am so thankful that we had enough in our savings account to pay for the repairs.
• I am very thankful for my new kitchen and have re-discovered the joy of cooking in it.
• I am thankful that we are healthy. I am thankful that my own bout with medical issues this year was pretty minor. And I am thankful that my good friend Maggie, who has been dealing with breast cancer, has not allowed it to get her down. I am so thankful to have her.
• In fact, I'm thankful that I have a bevy of wonderful friends who all offered to help when we were dealing with all our craziness this year. 
• I'm thankful for readers and virtual friends - many of whom have become REAL friends - who offer insight and understanding when I vent too much here.
• I'm so glad my sense of humor is intact. For a while, I worried I'd lost it.
• I'm thankful for my husband and daughter, who is the light of my life. I'm thankful that I have a family I can turn to in times of need.

Most of all, I'm thankful that 2009 is coming to an end. I hope it is not tempting fate to wish for better times ahead.

A Tale of Two High Schools

This is not a good time to be a student in my state.

The University of California is jacking up tuition by 20% (in addition to the rate hike students and their families absorbed earlier this year) while cutting classes and services.

And it was announced yesterday that our budget woes continue to worsen: we're back to a $21 billion deficit.

The beleaguered Los Angeles Unified School District held a meeting last week where they told their employees to expect even more job losses in 2010. Class sizes are escalating to silly proportions, and although the District has made gains in test scores recently, all of this bad news does not bode well for continued improvement.

What's a mother to do?

It is a sad state of affairs that Los Angeles can boast of some of the state's best public schools...and many of its worst. If you live in an affluent neighborhood, you've got some pretty good choices. If you don't, you're basically screwed. It is a situation that endures after decades of hand-wringing and reforms that never seem to do the trick.

Complaining about LAUSD is something of a local sport -- no one ever gets hurt by dissing the District, and some people benefit from it. Pointing out the flaws in the school system is a sure way to sell a lot of papers, garner good ratings, and get yourself elected.

And yet...

Test scores are not truly indicative of a school's quality, or the effectiveness of any given teacher. Yes, some teachers should be forced to retire and some administrators are ineffective. But most of the people I've met at LAUSD are sincere in their desire to help our children reach the heights of their potential... they are just hamstrung by bureaucracy, politics, red tape, history and budget woes.

This is on my mind today because Megan starts high school next fall, and we need to figure out where she will go. Our neighborhood high school is not a viable option. Despite what I said above about test scores, I don't want to send her to a poorly performing school when there are "better" ones nearby. And even if I did, it would be like moving to a new town and starting fresh. She's been attending school outside our neighborhood since kindergarten, so she doesn't know anybody who will be going there.

So we've been shopping around.

A couple of weeks ago, we visited the other high school in our zip code, which went charter several years ago and so doesn't have to answer to most of LAUSD's arcane rules. It also doesn't share the district's budget problems. I've heard through the grapevine that this school began the year with a $2.5 million surplus. Class sizes are smaller than the District average, equipment is new and maintained, and nobody is talking about teacher cuts.

When we got to the campus, we were impressed by how clean and well organized it was. It has the feel of an exclusive prep school. The teaching staff (at least, the ones we were able to observe) are young, enthusiastic and engaged. The students (at least, the ones we met) were neat, polite and articulate. The word that came to mind was "disciplined." They reminded me a bit of the scene in "The Sound of Music," when Maria has her first meeting with the regimented Von Trapp children.

We were given an informational packet that ran down the school's graduation requirements (which echo the prerequisites for getting into the CSU and UC systems), explained the summer transition academy (MANDATORY for all incoming freshmen - "Do not schedule any vacations during this time!"), stats on test scores and college admission rates (a whopping 96% of the students go on to higher education), and an explanation of the three ways an out-of-neighborhood student can apply.

One of these is a magnet. LAUSD instituted this program 30 years ago after years of turmoil over Federally imposed busing and massive white flight to private schools.The idea was that high quality, smaller specialty programs within a school would attract students from all over the District, including those from more affluent (i.e., white) families who might otherwise opt out of the system. As the purpose of the program is to achieve racial balance, the magnets receive Federal funding that has allowed them to thrive despite the budgetary problems of the rest of the District.

The program has been wildly successful - so much, that as my friend Marsha (@sweatpantsmom) asserts, they have resulted in a further decline of neighborhood schools, as the best and brightest students are drained away to magnets. 

She's right. She's also right when she says that a small group of dedicated parents can do wonders to turn around an under-performing school. That said, it's not an easy task and I'm not willing to gamble my daughter's future on the proposition that I could make a huge difference at our neighborhood school.

Some Los Angeles magnet schools have developed into the state's best. Balboa Gifted Magnet in Northridge consistently shows up as one of the top public elementary schools in all of California. It's very difficult to get into. According to this year's "Choices" brochure (sent to every LAUSD family so they have an opportunity to apply to the program), in 2008 there were 1789 applications for a school that has 267 openings in 2010-11.

Popular magnet schools select their applicants through a complicated points and lottery system. As they need to achieve racial balance, there are quotas established for the different major ethnic groups in the city, and they change each year as the school population changes. Specialized magnets for gifted or highly gifted children have additional testing and grade requirements that must be met before a student can be accepted.

Many of Megan's friends transferred to Balboa when they were eligible in first and second grade. We applied, but never won the lottery. Fortunately, LAUSD has another program for high achieving students who (for whatever reason) do not attend a gifted magnet. It's called School for Advanced Studies (SAS), and is a kind of honors program within a campus. The SAS kids pretty much stick together throughout their academic career. Unlike the magnet program, there is no mandate that it be racially balanced. It receives little, if any, Federal funding and so is at the mercy of the LAUSD budget.

We were not impressed with our little neighborhood elementary school the year our daughter entered kindergarten. The playground was unkempt and the PTA lady who showed us around the school was very negative about everything. There was no SAS program. We were afraid to send her there.

We ended up in an SAS at a school three miles west, and aside from the fact that every time Megan established a best friend she transferred to Balboa, these were happy and productive years. Even so, we continued to send in our Choices application each December. That was so we could rack up points for the transition to middle school.

In the spring, we were informed we were waitlisted for the magnet of our choice, which had accepted Megan's current best friend. Fortunately, the middle school just up the street from our home does have an SAS program, and we felt comfortable sending her there. The only thing I stressed about was the fact that only a couple of kids she knew would also be attending.

When your children are little, you have a lot of control over who they hang out with. If there's something you don't like about a kid or her parents, you simply don't schedule a playdate there. By the time your kid starts middle school, that power is long gone. You just have to hope that the kids your child chooses to spend time with are nice. And if you like their parents too, that's a bonus.

A couple of weeks into the summer of '07, we got a call from the magnet middle school informing us that they had an opening for Megan, if she wanted it. She was away at gymnastics camp at the time (with her friend Maggie), so I had to wait until evening to ask her how I should respond. The squealing on the other end of the phone said it all. She's been at the magnet ever since, and couldn't be happier.

Which brings us back to the tour of the charter high school, which is just a couple of blocks away from the SAS elementary school we attended through fifth grade. Most of our friends live within that school's boundaries, so they are assured a spot there... and Megan would go in already having lots of friends.

The charter school has both an SAS program and a rigorous math and science magnet. Their students are required to take four years of both subjects (while the District only asks for three years of math and two years of lab science). "Do not apply to this magnet if your child doesn't LOVE math and science," the counselors warned us.

Megan is strong in these subjects, but I don't think they make her heart sing. We will not be wasting our one magnet application by applying there. The good news is that we can try to get in through both an SAS application and open enrollment.

The bad news: The charter school has approximately 100 openings in each of the three programs, each of which historically receives about 1,000 applications. Selection is by lottery. So we have a 1 in 10 chance of getting in -- not too good.

We embarked on a second high school magnet tour yesterday. This school is about five miles from home, in a neighborhood that's seen better days. Test scores for the school as a whole are not so good... but the magnet, which offers a humanities curriculum, has an excellent track record.

If the charter school was like the Von Trapp household before Maria, the humanities magnet reminded me of the kids in play clothes made from floral draperies. This magnet takes an interdisciplinary approach to teaching. According to the brochure contained in the parent packet, 9th grade requirements include "an innovative science course...that demonstrates the connection between biology, geography, and the development of civilization."

In most classes, they don't use the state textbooks. Classrooms are arranged with desks facing the middle, to encourage active participation and debate. Again, I was impressed by the enthusiasm and energy of all the teachers we observed.

We sat in on a class that combined the study of art and religion. One teacher came out to tell us how his students are examining the nature of humanity through the lenses of Stendhal, Freud and Marx. The magnet coordinator boasted that his school's kids consistently outscore the charter school (with the math and science magnet) on the AP Calculus exam. The classroom walls are decorated with fanciful student-designed murals and pop art sculptures.

I LOVED this school, as did some of the other parents I knew on the tour. Megan and her friends did, too - although they're a bit worried about the strong writing requirements, which include 10-page essays at the end of each teaching module and more homework than I ever thought possible (four hours or more per night). I have a different attitude about this now that gymnastics is no longer a part of our lives. It's high school and college prep. They can bring it on.

Best of all - the magnet coordinator practically guaranteed acceptance."If you truly want truly want to go here, you'll get in," he said.

For the first time in a while, I'm feeling good about our prospects. I hope that lasts.

This month's Yahoo! Motherboard theme is the state of public education in an era of huge budget cuts. Here are some other posts on the topic:

• Hormone Colored Days: Parenting Gifted Children. Advocating for Gifted Children
• It's All About Balance: Arts in Education

Glee for Steaz Teaz - and a Sample for Free

Until I had my little traffic incident, it had been a wonderful day. An esthetician friend had given me a free waxing service ("So you don't have to worry about that when you go into the hospital")...

...and I'd enjoyed a lovely brunch with two of my favorite LA blogging friends: Cynthia Liu (@Cyn3matic) and Liz Dwyer (@losangelista)... and Eric Schnell, one of the founders of the natural beverage company that makes Steaz Teaz. 

To be perfectly honest, I'd never before heard of the product... but I was dreading my hospital visit and the meeting was the perfect excuse to have a little fun before I submitted myself to the UFE procedure. Besides, it was set up by the fabulous Kim Moldofsky, who works with several food companies. She's the one who hooked us up with the diet-busting Eli's cheesecake we enjoyed at our Inaugural viewing party back in January -- so if she says a product is good, I tend to believe her. Besides, she assured me that "lunch with [Eric] would be quite interesting."

And he was:

Eric and his staff told me that Steaz has been available for some time in Whole Foods Markets and locally at high end stores like Gelson's. These are places I shop regularly, so I wondered why they weren't on my radar. Then I looked at the tea labels and saw that most of the flavors are sweetened with pure cane sugar. That's a wonderful thing for taste -- but it was a no-no when I was on my weight-loss regimen and I still shy away from any beverage that isn't labeled "diet." And Whole Foods doesn't sell beverages containing NutraSweet or Splenda.

Then I was handed a new Steaz product: a zero calorie sparkling tea drink that's sweetened with natural Stevia. And it was good.

Now, I've never been particularly picky about food. I have always seen the virtues of buying healthy/organic, but was skeptical about claims that natural foods are necessarily superior. I have never been shy about using packaged shortcuts. Most of the time, I'm just happy to get dinner on the table.

But after six months without a kitchen, I may have developed a new attitude. I am sick of pre-packaged, frozen, and take-out meals. I long to be part of the slow food movement, even though I realize I'm too time-constrained for that to ever happen. While biding my time during our home renovation, I've been busy plotting new meal strategies that rely on visits to farmer's markets. I'm even planning to do more vegetarian/vegan meals. I don't think I'd ever go that route completely, but intellectually, I understand why vegan makes sense for the planet. If I cut down on meat consumption just once a week, it's a contribution. A small one, but a start.

As for meat, the one kind of home-cooked meal we have allowed ourselves these last six months is chicken cooked on the outdoor grill, and I recently came to the conclusion that free-range organic DOES taste better than Foster Farms.

So I'm coming around.

Eric described Steaz as a "triple bottom-line company." By that, he means their long-term objective goes beyond mere Profits. They aspire to benefit People by only purchasing commodities that are Fair Trade (and providing the farmers who grow their tea with a living wage), and they have created manufacturing and distribution systems that are carbon-neutral, thereby helping the Planet.  I find this business philosophy very appealing, and would like to see more companies try it. That will only happen if the business model proves to be profitable.

And Steaz is on its way: They've gone big-time this month with a national distribution deal at Target.

We left the brunch with a little goodie bag of Steaz samples. I enjoyed the unsweetened tea drink so much that I made my husband buy me more while I was recuperating from my hospital stay. And my daughter really loved the sugar-sweetened drinks.

I'm now a Steaz believer, and I liked the product so much that I asked Kim if I could do a giveaway here on the blog. So here are the details: I'm going to keep comments open on this post for the rest of the week, and on Monday, I'll select one commenter at random to receive a Steaz gift box and a $10 gift card you can use to buy more Steaz at Target.

In the meantime, Steaz is running a buy one, get one free promotion. Download the coupon here.

DISCLOSURE: I did not receive any monetary compensation for this post. I did receive about a dozen cans of beverage products. I made no promises or guarantees about the content of this post, nor did I promise anyone to expect a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are my own.

NOVEMBER 24: WE HAVE A WINNER! CONGRATULATIONS, COMMENTER MARY ELLEN. A STEAZ GIFT PACK IS COMING YOUR WAY.

To Whom It May Concern

Dear Friends, Colleagues and Clients:

My husband decided that yesterday was the day that I HAD to upgrade to Windows 7.

He has been nagging me about this since the summer, when he started using a Beta pre-release version. Now that we have the new home theater system that allows us to put the TV and other components on the computer network, he is determined to have EVERYTHING there.

He did not tell me that doing a “clean install” instead of a mere upgrade would mean I would not have access to my computer ALL DAY yesterday. Nor did he explain that I would then have to re-install all of my programs.

It’s like getting a new computer – without the benefit of actually getting a new computer.

I am confident I am going to love the new system once it's up and running with all the tools I am used to using, but right now I am still missing some of those and the ones I do have need to be tweaked.

I am woefully behind on everything, including the work I promised you by today.

Thank you for the confidence you have placed in me.

At Last...

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Friday the 13th

I hadn't noted yesterday's date until I was buying groceries that morning. I chuckled silently to myself as the checker and the shopper in front of me talked about the perils of leaving the house.

When I look back at 2009, I'm going to think of it as the year when EVERY day was Friday the 13th.

Of course, that's an exaggeration. The Mills family has had some good days this year -- even some that could be described as "fun."

But I had a really hard time finding happy posts to link to in the last sentence. I struggle with keeping a positive attitude in the best of times, and thanks to the triple whammy of problems with health and home and recession, 2009 could not even remotely be described as a good year.

Megan was feeling the same way on Thursday. For one thing, I had to get her out of school a little early to go the dentist. But her sad mood was deeper than dental dread.

"You're going to be mad at me," she said.

That got me worried.

"My new shoes were stolen," she said, nearly choking back tears.

She loved those shoes. We spent a lot of time shopping, and when we couldn't find the pair she wanted, she went online to the Converse website and created a custom pair that was just her own. It cost about twice what I would have paid at Target.

Our middle school has a uniform requirement, which is one of the things we parents like about it. I feel we've had an easy time of school shopping because of it. But Megan is finally starting to think about expressing herself through clothes. I know that will sound funny to moms of kindergarteners who always want to dress up in fairy princess costumes, but my daughter never went through that phase. She wasn't the kind of kid who cared for wearing fancy dresses; she never played with makeup. (Although she did love to make a mess in the bathroom, creating new "perfumes" by mixing together all the scented shampoo/bath oil/body wash/etc. she could get her hands on.)

I think all that time she spent in gymnastics left her with little energy to contemplate the image she was projecting to the world. Now, she's got plenty of time -- but little opportunity. The only items where the school allows her some creativity are in her choice of backpack... and shoes. So I gave in.

It took about three weeks for the shoes to arrive. Thursday was only the second day she wore them. When she finished PE class, she discovered that someone had taken them out of her locker. No, it was not locked.

"I never lock it. No one ever takes anything," she said. She knows now that some people do, if you come to school with something they want.

"It doesn't matter if they lock it up," our dental hygienist said sympathetically. "My niece has had two cellphones and an iPod lifted from her locked locker. These kids are criminals. They know exactly what to take and how to take it."

We're shopping for shoes again. This time, she's going to settle for whatever is on sale.

Driving Blind

Did I mention that I had a "fender bender" the night before I went into the hospital?

Drivers tend to go freeway speeds on the busy street that borders my hillside neighborhood. I used to do it too, until the police realized that it was easy pickings there to write speeding tickets... and I got one myself. Now, I cruise down that street right at the speed limit, and pay little attention to the assholes hurried drivers who swoosh past me.

But last Tuesday's incident occurred when I wasn't even moving: I was stationary ,in an intersection less than a mile from home, waiting for the traffic to clear so I could turn left onto a residential street that leads into my neighborhood. And as I watched the cars rushing past me on the other side of the road, I noticed that one of them looked awfully close...

...and a split second later - before I'd finished that thought - it made contact with my car, tearing off my driver's side view mirror. I turned around to see if the driver would stop, but no one did. All I saw was my mirror, bouncing down the street behind me.

I was shaking. The light changed, I made my turn and I parked the car. I thought maybe one of the vehicles that had been behind me would stop, but no one did. Maybe no one saw it but me. I confess that I sat in my car with the windows rolled up and screamed. I walked back to the corner to see -- I don't know what.

Then I drove home and called my insurance company to find out if it was even worth it to make a claim. It's not. We have a $500 deductible, and even though getting anything fixed on a Volvo is expensive, the side view mirror will likely cost around $300.

"That's ridiculous," my husband sniffed. He did an online search and discovered that the replacement part is only $50. He is going to try to do it himself.

That's great... but between his job and the ongoing home renovation, he's overworked and over-extended, and I've learned from experience that whatever is on MY list tends to go to the bottom of his. Right now, I am driving blind. If I want to switch lanes, I have to open my window and stick my head out to see if it's clear. That's okay, for now... as long as I don't need to get on the freeway. Or until it rains.

I don't want to be a nag, but I don't feel safe driving this way and I can't stop driving because I live in Los Angeles. And it's not just me: It's our daughter, and sometimes, it's our friends' daughters, too.

A Good Decision

Choosing the UFE over the hysterectomy was the right thing to do. I did so well following the surgery that I was released from the hospital on Thursday night -- one day sooner than expected.

The pain and nausea were pretty much manageable through Friday morning... until about one hour after I visited my primary care doctor to check for infection (none so far).

Then the last trace of morphine coursing through my body must have been eliminated, because I was in agony and had to reach for the vicodin the doctors prescribed.

The drug must have worn off around 3:40 a.m. Saturday morning, because I woke up in pain. I was a big baby the rest of the day, only leaving my bed to use the bathroom. I swallowed another tablet and slept as much as I could because then it didn't hurt. 

I continued taking it easy yesterday, although I did make my husband drive me to Ralph's to do some grocery shopping (because just giving him a list doesn't really work that well). I think I made him a little nuts by forcing him to move at a snail's pace with the cart, while I shuffled down the aisles looking for the items we need to get through the week.

I made him put the groceries away while I parked myself in front of our new living room television (which I insist on calling the "Big Ass TV". He installed the previous weekend, insisting he was doing it for ME, anticipating my recovery from surgery).

I am sad to say that the high point of my weekend was finally "making number two" after days of trying (and switching to a diet of raisin bran and Activia).

But... it's Monday, and I'm operating on nothing but Motrin. I drove my daughter to school and I'm presently sitting in my usual spot at my local Starbucks, drinking a latte... as if this entire episode never happened.

I would not be saying that if I'd had my uterus removed. I'd likely still be in bed and complaining about pain, and I would have to depend on others to drive my daughter to and from school.

It remains to be seen if the surgery did the trick, shrinking the fibroids, elevating my iron levels and giving me new energy. But for now, I'm really happy I went this route.

By the way -- As some friends advised me to have the thing done at a different hospital, I thought I should mention this: I could not be happier with the staff at Holy Cross Hospital in Mission Hills. I was treated really well by everyone, from the admissions people to my radiologist to the nurses who took care of me.