Points For You and Me

Here's the lineup of tonight's discussion:

Charlie and the dentist
Paul gone
Bonus plane money
Polyp
Date at the museum
Voting tears
Ju-seok
Car battery
Pork chops

They say you should take your kids to the dentist when they're young.  Peter and Reuben were older than the dentist preferred, like fiveish.  They've always had a good time at the dentist though.  But Charlie, being fully two, wanted to keep his teeth to himself.  He clamped his mouth shut and fought with great might.  So much for bringing them in young to ease into the dental experience.  I brought him in at this younger age because we're moving soon and I wanted his formerly cleft lip checked out.  And I wanted the dentist to explain what she saw in English, you know, so I could understand what she was saying.  She said the something something arch looked good and all of his teeth are in the right place.  Ten points to Dr. Rucker.

Paul is not here.  Maybe he is with you.  Just go ahead and give him a big ole kiss for me.  If you have any extra pity sitting around you could share it with Paul, poor guy.  He's out in California where it's all sunny and warm and filled with people he likes to hang out with. It's really sad.  Whereas I, I get to take the trash out to the street tomorrow morning in the 28 degree cloudiness after being woken up by a Charlie telling me he's "All done."  Negative 50 points to jealous me.

But Senor Paul did scored us -ME- some bonus airplane dollars by volunteering to take a later flight.  He said I can use them this winter when my annual I Must Go To California Right Now urge appears.  Sweet man.  One million points to Paul.

Okay, so what if your doctor found a pretty small little growth attached to your insides?  And what if he wanted to remove it?  Would you let him?  Me neither.  Thanks for your input.  I feel better about it now.  Zero points to impending doom.

What's next?  Oh, our date.  We spent a lot of hours at the art museum last Friday.  We went on three docent-led tours discussing American impressionists, Flemish painters, and Islamic art.  We were really nerdy and very romantic.  It was so nice to do something that WE wanted to do without having to manage our dear, but needy, children.  A thousand hundred thank yous to Debbie who fulfilled all the needs of our children that day.  75 points to educational dates in the city.

Did you cry when you tried to vote yesterday?  Me too.  I just looked at that ballot and those two names and implored God to tell me which one to pick, because I didn't want to mark either of their names.  And ultimately, I didn't.  Then I fought back my tears of frustration that there were not suitable men listed to lead our country.  It felt odd to deposit an empty ballot, but perhaps I am not the only one who did.  Negative a lot of points to man's sinful nature.

This is to formally notify The World that the child formally known as Reuben would, from this point on, prefer to be called Ju-seok.  He will remind you if you forget.  Cute points to the Korean.

Last week our car failed to start, so our friends at Bradley Tire tested our battery for us.  The little machine said it was fine.  And then Paul went out of town.  Which leads us to this afternoon when I loaded the kids in car to take them to piano lessons and... nothing.  Not even that little clicking sound.  Everybody out, call to cancel piano, and call to Bradley Tire to come rescue little me.  And they totally did.  An hour later they returned my car with a new battery.  They brought it to me.  And before that they came to my house to jump my car (after pushing it out of the garage) and take it to their shop.  This is small town love.  And I'm going to miss it.  So I baked those boys some of my favorite brownies and cookies and brought them to  the shop, which I could do because when I turned the key, my car started.  600 points to small town America.

Since my car stopped working, my crockpot followed suit.  Porkchops and stuffing and sauce all laying nicely in there all afternoon.  Cold.  It was plugged in and turned on, yes.  So I microwaved them.  Isn't that silly?  And then I hoped really hard that we would not get sick from eating meat that sat on the counter and may or may not have been fully cooked.  It's been five hours and we're okay so far.  Negative 6 points to my crockpot that let me down.

Let's end with a positive score board.  I am now going to read my Perspectives book and attempt to complete the homework.  200 points to this fantastic class.  And 4973 points for me because I earned 18 out of 20 on my last two assignments!  And the crowd went wild...