Too Much Time on My Hands

When you’re stuck in bed– a hoarse, sniffly shell of what used to be a loud, exuberant human being– you find the time to do things that don’t really need to be done. Nevertheless, you do them. Because you CAN.

Thus… BEHOLD. My new DWM header.

Fancy, eh?

Quiet Introspection

Doctor’s diagnosis: Tonsillitis and laryngitis.

Doctor’s prescription: Bed rest, no talking, hot teas and salt water gargles, no talking, and lots of lovely meds. And no talking.

See! Told you I was sick! Told you! TOLD YOU! HA HA HA!… HA! Woooo! FACE!

Also? Turns out, I have no absolutely no idea how to communicate without the ability to yell and interrupt.

I’m not much liking this time of quiet repose.

Still sick.

Just thought I’d share.

The Lambson Family Newsletter- Holiday Edition 2008

Click on the image below for this year’s Lambson Family Newsletter: Holiday Edition 2008. (Or download the PDF. Whichev.) Because I want to save a tree, that’s why! Also, I am disorganized and often quite lazy.

Happy freaking HOLIDAYS!

DWM Rewind: A Snaking Tutorial and Other Horrifying Stuff

Okay, I just found the best, most embarrassing video EVER! It involves a “Snaking Dance Tutorial” (not to be confused with the The Axl Rose, as seen on Sweet Child Of Mine and other Guns & Roses late-eighties videos) recorded in a moment of insanity, which I now believe was brought on by sleep deprivation coupled with extraordinary amounts of caffeine in my system, and… well, no shame whatsoever. I cannot stress ENOUGH that I was triple-dog-dared by Charlotte in PA (FYI: I think this may be a private blog now…), so it is ALL HER FAULT.

I was pleasantly surprised (read: horrified beyond belief, yet secretly pleased, but mostly just HORRIFIED) to find this gem of cinematographic goodness while looking back over some old posts. The following is the post that linked me to the video; it captures so well how I have been feeling lately about what of importance I have in me to pass down to my kiddos, that I decided to do a little DWM Rewind and post it in its entirety. Enjoy.

Or not. Whatev.

__________________________

Live Your Life With Arms Wide Open

Sometimes I look at my children, who are growing up so quickly right before my eyes, and I am at a loss as to what of importance I have in me to pass down to them. What? My love of books? My inner Drama Queen? My freckles? My Loud Talk/Loud Laugh gene? My charming wit and sparkling personality? My humilty? The list goes on and on… Then, this weekend, in the most roundabout way possible, I discovered one of the most powerful aspects of myself that I have to pass down to my progeny.

You see, nostalgia struck this weekend. One minute I’m downloading Sway by the Perishers, and the next thing I know I’m downloading music I remember listening to as I spent rainy afternoons in my parents’ bedroom thumbing through my parents’ old 45’s, jamming out to Purple People Eater, Charlie Brown, Shimmy Shimmy Ko-Ko Bop, Shoop Shoop Song, My Boyfriend’s Back, Rescue Me, oh, and this really catchy song about sitting in my a la-la waiting for my ya-ya (uh-huh… uh-huh…), amongst others.

So I went online to iTunes and legally downloaded Sixteen Tons by Tennessee Ernie Ford. I know, right? Me? Obtaining music on the up-and-up? All legal-like and shizz? Recognizing that creative works online are protected by copyright law? Not contributing to the illegal music trade which is destroying artistic creativity and innovation, eliminating jobs, and more than likely bankrolling organized crime?! I KNOW!

(Whatever. You’d think these people would be flattered that someone wants to listen to their stupid music, but noooooo. Money money money! That’s all any of these guys– singers, musicians, managers, producers– care about! I mean, honestly. It’s not as if I couldn’t do what I used to do when I was a teenager… which was to keep a cassette at the ready in my boombox and push RECORD whenever a song I liked came on the airwaves? Oh, the mixed tapes I used to make! At absolutely no cost to myself whatsoever! Well, except for the cassette, of course, but did you know that with a little tape and a tad of ingenuity, you can tape the new songs over old albums that you totally don’t want anymore anyway?… Anyhoos, no one was coming after me then, confiscating my Tainted Love Breakup Tunes or Hair Band Heaven Mix, no sir! Now it’s all about the money. Freaking selfish bastards.)

Um, okay. I had a point when I began…

Ah, yes! Sixteen Tons! Of course, of course… So I dragged my kiddos into my bedroom and forced them listen to the song. I watched delightedly as they fell in love with it, Ernie’s impromptu snaps setting a tempo like a coal-mining crew axing into a brick-solid wall, effectively sucking them into the hammer-like rhythm of the song. Alli snapped in time (fine, almost in time), Hannah bopped her head, TD attempted to look bored, but failed miserably– and as I was swept back to a time when I would giggle madly as my dad would bring this song on home: “I OWE my SOOOOOOUUUUUUU-OOUUUU-OOOUUULLL!… to the company store…” I realized that I was passing on a history. A legacy of music, if you will.

Which… scary thought.

This realization brought to mind my fourth grade end-of-the-year party, when my absolute favoritest teacher EVER gave us permission to bring in some of our own music to play for the class. Stoked, I rushed home and told my mother I simply HAD to bring her album– The New Christy Minstrels’ Sing and Play Cowboys and Indians – to school or I would absolutely DIE. So the next day, armed with my uber-cool album and a sure knowledge of my Cool Factor totally skyrocketing as soon as my classmates heard the opening strains of this kickass song called Navajo, I rushed to the front of the line, bypassing The Police, Air Supply, a few Blondies, Irene Cara (Fame, naturally), and– if I recall correctly– one Captain and Tenille album.

Needless to say, my classmates did not appreciate the music as much as I thought they would and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why. I mean, this was GOOD STUFF, right? What the hell was wrong with these people?! But it strikes me now that they did not enjoy my music for many of the same reasons that my daughter’s 2nd grade classmates probably wouldn’t appreciate the phenomenal music from The Phantom of the Opera or Les Miserables. Perhaps my classmates’ mothers hadn’t yet instilled in them a love for the The New Christy Minstrels’ minstrely goodness by playing Lily Langtree or Betsy From Pike– or, oooooh! this super funny song called Three Wheels on My Wagon!– over and over again.

And perhaps their dads didn’t stand at the door “singing” (note my use of sarcastic quote marks) Nelson Eddy as he’d leave the house for work: “I’ll find you in the mornin’ sun and when the night is new… I’ll be looking at the moon… but I’ll be seeing… (*deep breath* *mom joins in*) YOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!” And my mom would be all, “Oh , JIM,” and we’d laugh and shout, “Kiss her, Daddy!” and my mom would blush and be all, “Oh, you! Go to work!” and we were like, “Aww!”

Although, come to think of it, I don’t much like Nelson Eddy. Okay, I don’t even KNOW Nelson Eddy. But I love that memory! See how that works? It’s tricky. But that is beside the point.

The point is that as I sat there playing music for my children, I began to imagine my daughters or son sitting down with their own children, playing my music, perhaps songs from U2’s The Joshua Tree album or The Offspring’s hit single Pretty Fly for a White Guy, music that perhaps my grandchildren would take to THEIR fourth-grade end-of-the-year parties. And maybe my kids will teach their kids to Snake or Axl Rose, and maybe, just maybe!, they’ll even gather ’round the karaoke machine and belt out the oldies from their great-grandma’s and grandpa’s generation, perhaps Sixteen Tons or Rescue Me, and they will all laugh at how crazy life was back in the day, and maybe they will videotape it and send it to me, and TGIM and I will laugh and probably bust a tear or two due to the whole Empty Nest Syndrome, and, oh, how glorious that will be.

Yes! I thought. I shall pass down the music!

Of course, I began to panic. I mean, the pressure I suddenly felt to produce the quintessential 21st century mixed CD– representative of the most influential music from 2001 through today– was crushing, but I calmed myself with the knowledge that, hey, I’m totally up to the challenge. I watch American Idol. I pay attention to the music of Veronica Mars. I’m hip to the pop culture, fo’ rizzle, my shizzle.

Gosh. I tell you what… my kids are SO lucky to have me.

In truth, however, around the seventh time I played Sixteen Tons the nostalgia faded with the final strains of the flute and clarinet. I came to my senses and realized that my children, though influenced by my taste in music now, will grow into teenagers and will develop their own tastes, just as I eventually did, and they will call my music stupid and tell me I’m way out of touch and be all, “Ooooh, my music is so much cooler than yours, Momma! Ooooh!”

I must admit to a few moments of frustration and despair. Because if not my love of good music, what?

Then Natasha Bedingfield’s sassy song Unwritten came on my iPod and I was immediately struck– struck, I say!– by the words:

I am unwritten,
Can’t read my mind
I’m undefined
I’m just beginning
The pen’s in my hand
Ending unplanned

Staring at the blank page before you
Open up the dirty window
Let the sun illuminate the words
That you could not find
Reaching for something in the distance
So close you can almost taste it
Release your inhibitions

Feel the rain on your skin
No one else can feel it for you
Only you can let it in
No one else, no one else
Can speak the words on your lips
Drench yourself in words unspoken
Live your life with arms wide open
Today is where your book begins

The rest is still unwritten.

Good LORD! That was it! The part of myself I absolutely MUST pass down to my children! Because if nothing else, I want to them to learn from me how to take life as it comes– grab it by the balls, if they must– and freaking OWN it.

I can DO that. I just know it.

And the fact that I am instilling this lesson in their minds not only by example, but covertly, as we dance and laugh and sing this song together while cooking dinner, cleaning our rooms, even folding the laundry?

Well, that’s just gravy.

Performance Anxiety

I’m off my game.

It’s not my fault! I have the iPhone Game-Playing skillz! MAD skillz, I tell you! It’s just… well, the only time I really have to play games like Solitaire or Bejeweled or Critter Crunch or Wurdle on my iPhone is while commuting to and from work on the Metro. It sounds ideal, right? I mean, woo! That’s twenty-five minutes of solid gaming goodness right there! Each way! Depending on whether or not I snag a seat, which of course I always DO because I’m so small and absolutely wily in my seat-snagging ways!

But no.

Because when the train starts to get crowded (which it always does) and people smoosh up next to me (which they always do), all up in my bidness, I can’t concentrate. It’s not the noise or even the smells– although you wouldn’t BELIEVE how many people INHALE the garlic during cold season, apparently– it’s that I can feel their eyes on me. Watching me play. Judging me.

Oh, not judging me FOR playing. No. That wouldn’t bother me. I mean, I judge commuters all the time! With their primping and their loud cellphone talking and their selfish seat-hogging way of feigning sleep when the elderly or blind board the train. Whatever. What I meant to say is they judge my PLAYING.

Are you there yet?

And honestly, how am I supposed to concentrate on beating my high scores on Wurdle or Solitaire when I can feel the guy next to me armchair-quarterbacking my game?!

“Wow, I can’t believe she threw away that card… No, you CAN’T cover your Jack of Spades with a black ten, duh!… Where’d this joker learn to play?!… Heh, I said ‘joker’… Good GOD, woman! Play your five! Play the FIVE!”

So I spend the majority of my time shifting around to position myself and my game away from any prying eyes, all the while worrying some fed-up gamer is going to rip my phone right out of my hands and scream, “No, FOOL! THIS is how you play Critter Crunch! Now pay attention! ARE YOU WATCHING OR WHAT?!” and everyone else will applaud and pump their fists and say things like, “Right on!” and “You go!” and “Show her how to get ‘er done!” Because that could totally happen! You don’t know! It could! Or maybe I’m projecting… No, no, it could happen.

So… like I said, I’m off my game.

*sigh*

Suggestions?

Twitterpated, but not in the GOOD way.

Lately, Twitter Tweets have been giving me that desperate feeling usually reserved for those times when I walk into a room mid-conversation and I’m forced to go into Obnoxious Question-Asker mode, all, “Wait. What are we talking about?” and “WHO stepped on WHAT?! Gum? Your last nerve?  Huh?!” and “Congratulations for what?! Thank you for WHAT?!”, or when I’m late for a movie and I’m like, “Who’s that guy?” and “Wait. Why is that chick dressed like a hooker?” and “But how do you KNOW she’s a hooker? Did someone say?” and everyone is all, “SHUT UP!” and I’m like, “But I just want to know what the HELL is going ON HERE!”

Don’t get me wrong. I have no issues with the bombardment of the minutiae of my friends’ lives. It’s fun to see what people can squeeze into 140 characters! I’m all about the 140 character challenge! Go brevity! BRING IT! No, it’s the @ replies that are killing me. Softly.

In moderation, fine. If I see “@bff You wish! Tell her she can STEP OFF me!” I can scroll down or follow a link to find the beginning of the conversation. I’m not high maintenance! I can roll with it! Honestly. If I am totally curious as to WHY a certain person is thanking another person for… something, or why another person is passionately defending… someone, for, you know… something, I can take a moment to backtrack. I know it isn’t all about me! I can be flexible! But lately? I’m seeing half a conversation EVERY OTHER TWEET–I kid you not!–which is TAXING on my latent Obnoxious Question-Asker tendencies! TAXING, I tell you! Because I just want to know what the HELL is going ON THERE! And where’s the fun in THAT?! It’s like listening in on someone’s phone conversation, except without the giddy, naughty, voyeuristically satisfying part! Which, hello? No fun? At ALL?!

In my humble, yet totally valid opinion, if people feel as if they need to have an open, involved, and generally LOOOOONG conversation with a particular user, especially when the conversation grows cryptic or, oh, let’s say ACRIMONIOUS, well, that is what the DM option is for. Or, you know, EMAIL. I’m only saying.

“Well, now that you mention it…”

Tanner says, “You know? In this picture? Uncle Jon looks kind of like Jesus.”

Dreamy Eyes and Broken Hearts on 34th Street

While watching The Miracle on 34th Street– not the TOTALLY awesome 1947 version starring Natalie Wood and Maureen O’Hara, but the disappointing 1994 remake with Richard Attenborough, who, BTW, I cannot watch without remembering his turn as Jacob in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and shouting– er, singing, “Jacob! Jacob and sons!” because AWESOME MUSICAL?!– the ever romantical Allison rushed to the defense of Bryan Bedford, played prettily by Dylan McDermott, after he proposed to Dorey Walker and she freaking SHOT HIM DOWN in the street like Atticus did to rabid old Tim Johnson, except not with a gun or bullets, but figuratively, or the show would have ended WAY differently, you know what I’m saying?

In response to Dorey’s unbelievably harsh “Have I ever done anything to give you the impression I wanted to marry you?” speech– which, Dorey, have you met Dylan McDermott?! Good LORD, woman! Are you INSANE?! He has, like, the DREAMIEST EYES ever! And the HAIR?! Hello?!– Allison turned to me, her misty eyes glittering behind her glasses.

“What?!” she cried. “She DID give him the impression she wanted to marry him! She DID! I mean, she kissed him”– she paused for emphasis– “ON! THE! LIPS! Like, mmmwah, mwahmm!”– here she made out with her hand a bit, which was a little disconcerting, let me tell you– “and she held his HAND, and… and… she went on a DATE with him!” She threw her arms in the air, obviously disgusted with Dorey’s loose moral standards. “Right, Momma? Right?!” she asked– rhetorically, I hope, because I was too busy trying not to giggle to answer– then she folded her arms across her chest with a little “hmmph!” and turned back to the movie.

Granted, the Dorey character does lose a little in translation, making this scene even harder to take, because, again, woman, do you not see the DREAMY EYES?! Come on! Plus, a single mom– not a widow, but a *gasp* divorcee!– trying to make it in the 1940’s business world was playing in an entirely different ballgame than today’s single working mom. Where Maureen O’Hara’s Doris was sympathetic as a realist trying to raise her daughter to accept the hard facts of life that would have been relevant to a single working mom at that time, modern Dorey’s mopeyness and glacial heart made me think, “Dude, a little Lexapro would be a Miracle on 34th Street for THAT lady, I tell you what.”

So, for a second I wasn’t sure if I should explain to my nine-year-old daughter that, in all honesty, smooching and hand-holding and dating aren’t quite the binding evidence of True Love she apparently thinks them to be, so TECHNICALLY the spurned luvah’s proposal was both arrogant and presumptuous (but, dreamy eyes?!), or if I should just let it go.

“I know, right?” I agreed, folding my arms across my chest in solidarity and cross disapproval. “Shocking.”

Snap!

Why?!

No, really. It’s like she has Fate by the short hairs and is all, “Oh, yeah. I’m doing this! WHILE WE ARE MOVING. Consequences and/or permanent blindness be damned! Because I have mad liquid eyelining skillz, biznitches! What up?! Now step off! I shall now floss and shave my legs before the next stop.”

Sure, it could be worse. I mean, at least she isn’t DRIVING. But whatever. Personally, I prefer to apply cosmetics when the ground isn’t shaking. Call it my wacky personal preference.