Socal Mom by Donna Schwartz Mills

How I Spent My Blogging Vacation

This has been one of those weeks when I've neglected my blog -- not for lack of interest, but because life keeps getting in the way.

My VA client's business is heating up, which is a good thing, because I really need the money -- not least of all because of the home renovations resulting from our poria infestation. My husband has used this as an excuse to take a sledge hammer to all the things that have bugged him about the house these 13 years... beginning with the mirrored facade that was above our fireplace. He has a plan to make it all look pretty... but everything has to be done in steps and we're not up to that one yet.

I don't like being at home these days... the rooms that once resembled the Pottery Barn catalog now look more like our local Pep Boys. The rest of the place is so crammed full of stuff that used to be contained elsewhere that it's hard to find anything and it's hard to move.

I've been out and about, researching various aspects of the renovation project. I worked with a nice kitchen designer at Home Depot, purchased a new range and microwave hood at Lowe's... and stopped short of ordering new cabinets because my husband and I cannot agree on how to finish our floor, which -- thanks to the poria -- was stripped down to its concrete foundation.

The floor has to be done before the kitchen, because we are planning to install the new cabinets ourselves, which won't be done in the course of just one weekend. Until we're ready to go, they'll have to be stored in our dining room, so we need to have the floor done first.

The problem is the foundation itself. Our house was built in 1961 and has endured two major earthquakes and a burst water main, which was repaired in a rather sloppy manner. There are some huge cracks in the slab, which is how the wood-eating fungus got into our home in the first place. These have now been sealed with epoxy to keep the poria from getting back in...

...but the slab can crack again and the house can get re-infected and I don't want to ever again be surprised by the sight of mushrooms growing in my cabinets. So instead of covering the whole thing up with carpet and tile (which would have been the least expensive, easiest thing to do after being forced to remove my beautiful cherry floor), we're considering just dressing up the concrete slab with polish and veneer. This is a very trendy, high-end type of finish these days (go figure!), which is a lot more modern than my 1961 ranch house... but I think with area rugs, we can still make it comfortable and cozy. We can even choose a stain that emulates the cherry wood we lost, so at least we'd have the same colors.

But first, we need to find out if we can actually AFFORD this. I've been trying to collect bids from three local contractors, and explaining to them why we're thinking of concrete, why we had to remove our wood floors and why our slab is now covered in the ugly blue-gray epoxy designed for garages. And my husband and I have been driving all over the Valley, looking at stores with floors done by these guys' companies (we've not been able to see their work in residences; I guess it's not surprising that most homeowners aren't willing to let strangers come in and look at their floors).

Regarding the kitchen: The Thomasville cabinets I picked out at Home Depot might not be the best fit with a concrete floor; we may want to go back to the drawing board and select something more modern - with cleaner lines. So this week, I drove out to Ikea to see what they had to offer.

And I liked what I saw --  especially the price tag, which is so cheap that we could let THEM do the install.

Of course, there are some quality trade-offs. The Thomasville cabinets are made of wood, while Ikea's are all MDF, and that didn't sound too appealing to me. But once I saw the cabinets in the store's model kitchens, I had to admit that they looked really nice. And I know of some people who have put in Ikea kitchens and have been very happy with them. So I've got their third-party contractor coming to the house next week to measure us for an Ikea kitchen... just in case.

But there's a third option: I have a REALTOR® friend who has done a lot of home renovations over the years, and he's referred me to a carpenter who does all his custom kitchens ("for not much more than Ikea with an install"). So I'm calling him, too.

So that's just one of the things I've been dealing with this week. I'll save my dealings with my teenage daughter for another post... maybe next week.

A Little Progress on the Home Front

Between the ongoing work on my home and the demands of my virtual assistant client, I've been extremely busy. Fortunately, I've been able to handle the pace. This is a big improvement over what I faced in April, when I was dealing with a Bat Mitzvah, a mother-in-law and uncertainty about my health.

In the last week, I've been approached by two more potential clients for my VA business. This is a good thing, because the home improvements are costing us a bundle, and my husband has been pushing me to find "real" employment -- something I am reluctant to pursue.

It's not that I didn't enjoy working in an office environment. My last job as a meeting and convention planner was challenging and mostly enjoyable, and the thought of once again being part of an organization and working community is kind of exciting -- especially when I remember what it was like to have a consistent, weekly paycheck and benefits.

But the minute my daughter was born, my stress level went sky-high. I no longer had the luxury of working overtime until my to-do list was done; the time I could devote to work was dictated by the hours our daycare was open. And every time the baby came down with an infection (which was often in those first few years), I had to scramble to cancel meetings and re-work deadlines because I was usually the parent who had to stay home with her.

(That is why I support the goals of MomsRising, the group that has been working diligently to improve the lot of working parents and their families -- especially regarding issues like healthcare and sick leave. I feel that our leaders and corporations like to talk a lot about family values - but few actually put them into practice. And I don't see that much has changed in the decade since I left the work force.)

I have thanked God every day for the last 10 years that I've been a stay-at-home mom. I do not know if I could have kept working outside the home with my sanity intact, and I have nothing but admiration for working moms (and even more for working single moms). I don't know how you all do it.

And when I really contemplate the prospect of once again donning work clothes and women's shoes and commuting to an office, it scares the you-know-what out of me. I don't know if I could handle being someone's formal assistant after being independent and flexible for all these years. Right now, if my daughter needs a parent to go on a field trip, or if a friend wants to meet me for coffee, or if I have some errands to do -- I can shift my schedule around to accommodate it. I don't know if I can give up that freedom... especially NOW.

You see, in addition to my VA clients, there is my husband, who sometimes treats me like I'm HIS secretary. We still have a lot of legwork to do while we put our house back together again and every day, he leaves me with a list of stuff I have to do (i.e., consult with the kitchen designer, interview contractors, etc.)

We are still undecided on what to do with our floor. I've been having second thoughts about using tile for the entry/dining room/kitchen area. You see, the poria got into our house through cracks in our concrete foundation. These have now been sealed -- but what happens when new cracks form (as is likely to happen the next time we have an earthquake)?

So I am currently toying with the idea of leaving the floor more or less bare by polishing the concrete -- so I can keep on eye on any future cracks in the foundation. My husband is not yet convinced this is the way to go -- and we have yet to get an estimate on what it would cost. But that is my thinking right now.

In the meantime, we've been plowing ahead: Over the weekend, the husband took down the facade atop our brick fireplace (which he has always hated). He also patched the holes the poria people made in our walls while they were checking for fungus damage (thankfully, they did not find any there).

We will soon be removing the wall that separates the dining room and kitchen, which will really open it up. We will be replacing the cabinets there with a new kitchen peninsula (as well as other cabinets). I have someone coming over to measure later this week, which means we needed to figure out what to do about appliances.

Over the last few years, we replaced our ugly old fridge and dishwasher with sleek stainless models -- and so we decided to finish the job by getting rid of our cooktop and wall oven. Yesterday, we purchased a nice range and microwave hood.

I have never been happy with my kitchen; its configuration is awkward and the tiled countertops weren't built with a lot of care - the grout started cracking and separating soon after we  moved in. I've groused for years that I wanted to remodel... so you would think I'd be happy about this, right?

But it's freaking me out. I agonize over all the decisions. I hate spending the money. And it's not as much fun as I thought it would be. In fact, it's not much fun at all.

"You'll feel better when it's all done," my sister assures me.

I certainly hope so.

The "Shtupper-ware Party"

We'd been talking about having a Girls Night Out for a while, so the Evite from my friend (she asks that I call her "Roxy") was not a surprise.

The occasion was:

GET YOUR WILD ON!

A wild and wicked evening with friends!!! You are invited to bring a friend along- please let me know if you will be doing so!  Drinks, Nibbles and entertainment provided.  The Love Boutique will be here.

Gulp.

I guess this is the time I have to come out and confess that I am something of a prude. Oh, I was young and single once (in the 1970's! and '80's), so I wasn't always a Victorian.

And I'd been to one of these parties before: Thirty years ago, while still in college, my younger sister was a rep for one of the first companies selling sex toys and related products via the party plan. My mom volunteered to be her first hostess, and of course, I was invited. It was a command performance.

And it was weird. There was my kid sister, standing in the middle of our living room, passing around dildos and vibrators to my mom and her pals -- all of whom were hooting and hollering and giggling over the wares. And over on the other side of the room, I sat with a couple of my friends, feeling  creeped out about the whole thing.

"When you're our age, you'll understand," laughed my mother's friend Stella (who once took me for walks in my baby carriage). Shudder.

That experience was horrifying. But what's more horrifying is that I am now 10 years older than my mom and her friends were back then. And I DO understand.

But it still creeps me out. And this is one area where I prefer to be private. It probably doesn't help that I'm married to a Brit, who has very definite ideas about what is appropriate and what is not in polite company.

Of course, my girlfriends are not the type of people you'd describe as "polite company." They're fun. And this event had all the markings of an evening that would be fun...

...for everyone but Monica, the hapless young woman who came to Roxy's suburban home to sell sex toys to a group of mommys, teachers and Brownie leaders.

Roxy is a terrific hostess. True to her word, there were plenty of yummy "nibbly bits" ... and alcohol, which was something of a double-edged sword. I do the same thing when I'm hosting a sales party. Likkering up your guests loosens their purse strings. It also loosens them up in other ways.

The party got off to a raucous start when one of Roxy's friends brought her a novelty store gift she'd purchased especially for the occasion: penis-shaped drinking straws, which were plopped into each of our cocktails, resulting in lots of cell phone snapshots and dirty giggling from the guests. 

The phallus motif was carried on by Monica, who handed out pencils w/similarly shaped erasers.

For young Monica, it was all downhill from there, because my friends and I behaved much as my mom's generation did in 1979. Monica estimated that her presentation would take about 40 minutes. An hour and a half later, she was begging us all to settle down because she wanted to go home.

Some of the merchandise was pretty benign: products you find every day at the supermarket: shaving cream, bubble bath, shower gel. Even some of the more intimate items are advertised routinely on television: like K-Y's new line of lubricants -- which was a hot item at last year's Johnson & Johnson Camp Baby conference. (Monica tried to make a case for why her company's products were superior.)

Some of the products were exactly the same as the ones my sister showed back in 1979 (notably, the Kama Sutra flavored powder with feather applicator - the packaging is even the same).

Then we got into "the good stuff': The "Crystal Wand,"  described by Monica as a "tool that penetrates your G-spot" (I dunno - the word "penetrate" sounded a bit inaccurate to me). BenWa balls. The "Vaginal Work Out Egg." The Magic Sleeve. The Rabbit. The Dolphin. (All I can tell you is that I can never look at these innocent-seeming animals in the same way again.)

Throughout the presentation, Monica peppered us with little quiz questions for points (the one with the most would get a free prize). At the beginning, they were easy: 50 points if you've ever taken a bubble bath. 200 points if you ever lit a candle in the bathroom for your bath. 200 points if you ever made love in a body of water.

When we got to the toy part of the presentation, Monica told us to give ourselves 200 points for every toy we owned. This was the end of the quiz for me - I don't have any.

But another of the guests announced that she collects them. This is the one who brought us the interesting cocktail straws. It turns out that she -- and the two co-workers she brought to the party -- works behind in the scenes in the porn industry. In fact, all three women once worked in front of the cameras.

Now, I've always heard that the San Fernando Valley is the pornography capital of the world, and I've been vaguely aware that people I meet through school and kids' activities might be a part of that -- but this was the first time I ever met anyone who was a part of it and talked about it. It turned out that these ladies were a lot more expert about the products than Monica was, and the conversation grew into a lively discussion of the merits of one item over another. These women had informed opinions -- which I would listen to, if I was in the market for any of it.

But I'm not. I really studied the order form, trying to figure out what I was willing to drop some money on... and was relieved when Roxy told me she didn't expect everyone to buy: this was just an opportunity for a Girls Night Out.

By this time, it was after 11:00 (I'd been there for over four hours). With a sigh of relief, I said good-bye and snuck out the door.

NOTE: "Roxy" doesn't think it sounds like I had fun at her party. I want to make it clear that I did!

Blissful Homemaking - Part Two

Recovering from yet another busy weekend.

I could be blogging today about the "Shabbaton" our synagogue held on Saturday for all the families of kids who will be Bar and Bat Mitzvah between now and June.

I could be telling you about our Robert Burns Night celebration yesterday (which was not so much about Scotland as it was about single-malt Scotch).

And maybe I will find the time to write about those events.

But this is going to be a follow-up to my last post. You know, the one about how much I hate doing housework.

I can feel your eyes rolling upwards. If there is one thing more boring than doing housework, it's someone who is always complaining about having to do housework.

I am ashamed to say this, but it took me TEN HOURS (spread out over three days) to get my house to a point where I wasn't embarrassed to allow visitors in.

That's THREE HOURS dusting, vacuuming, and cleaning the hardwood floor in the living room.

THREE HOURS dusting, vacuuming and cleaning the hardwood floor in the dining room.

FOUR FULL HOURS cleaning the kitchen.

You will note that I do not mention our home's three bedrooms or two bathrooms. That's because I didn't even get to those. My daughter did clean her own room, and my husband took care of the guest bathroom (but only because we had friends coming over and we were running out of time).

Actually, I think I spent half that time just de-cluttering the place, as every single surface of my house was covered with STUFF: Books, magazines, toys, pens, pencils, notices from school... Christmas and Chanukah decorations that somehow didn't make it back into storage when we originally put that stuff away... Material that I've been meaning to write about but still haven't gotten to.

Well, you get the picture.

I got rid of a lot of crap -- but I confess that a good portion of it was moved inside the armoire that is supposed to be my workstation but instead hides a lot of um, crap. Hey, at least now it's all out of sight.

I had finally finished re-mopping the living room floor (because someone had tracked dirt on it, which is one of the reasons I hate cleaning the house in the first place -- it's downright Sisyphean because you keep having to do it over and over again) when the first of our friends pulled up in front of our house. So I literally WAS cleaning right up to the last minute.

That was yesterday.

This morning, I awoke to a house that was STILL CLEAN and uncluttered and... really kind of lovely.

"Do you want to bet how long this will last?" I asked my daughter.

"A week?" she guessed.

"I think it will be a mess again in two days," I sighed... because I know myself and my family and I'm a realist.

Ten years ago - when I gave up my job as a meeting planner and began my life as a stay-at-home mom, I actually sort of enjoyed cleaning the house.

Then I got over my burn-out at trying to excel at a demanding job AND being a mother -- which was a good thing, because living on just one salary wasn't really working for us. I needed to bring in at least a little extra cash.

That's when I started working from home, on the web. And I no longer had the time or the energy to keep up with the housework.

During this period, I joined the FlyLady's email list, and for a couple of weeks, I obeyed.

But it didn't take long for me to slide. The emails reminding me to put the laundry in the dryer became too easy to ignore. I got tired of "shining my sink."

So I know what I'm talking about.

But this morning, when I returned home after dropping her at school, I wondered why not? Why CAN'T I keep it up? Why do I have to allow the clutter and dirt to build up?

Why can't I live my life the way it's suggested in that Home Comforts book? Why can't I be a Fly Lady?

So I spent about an hour this morning putting away the throw blankets that had been left on the couch, throwing out the food wrappers the kid had left on the coffee table and putting away the photography and computer magazines my husband had left on the chair. (Just as the Fly Lady orders.)

I did a quick round through the house with a dust rag and half-assed vacuum (i.e., did not move the furniture).

I wiped down the kitchen counters and the bathroom sink. I mopped the kitchen floor.

The house still looks good, and it only took about 30 minutes out of my day.

Maybe this time I'll surprise myself. Maybe I can change.

I didn't think I could ever lose weight, but I did -- and I've kept 50 pounds off for nearly a year.

So maybe I CAN do this. Maybe I can finally feel comfortable inviting friends over on a whim.

Check back here in a week.

Drama Mama

It's been kind of a crazy week. OK, crazier than usual.

Am hoping to finish a post I started earlier about our wine tasting adventures when we were visiting family in Sacramento over the holiday...

But I've been sidetracked by events in my daughter's life: Changes at her gym, tears over a missed homework assignment (and subsequent talk with one of her teachers)... and now, what might be strep throat. (She's been home with sore throat and fever for two days and I would like her doctor to check because if it's strep, I want to get her on an antibiotic NOW instead of living with it through the weekend and having to take her to the doctor anyway on Monday to get the antibiotic... well, you parents have all been through that dance and you know what I mean).

Needless to say... We've already gone through the three bottles of wine we brought back from our trip last week!

Before I go: I forgot to mention that I was featured on MomLogic on Monday! Yes, it was another piece about my weight loss earlier this year, and its publication felt ironic, because I got back from Thanksgiving weekend SIX POUNDS heavier than I was when I started maintenance.

Watching my stupid weight has become an overwhelmingly large part of my life, and there is no end in sight. I am trying my darndest to get through the holidays without having to start all over again - and am writing up this obsession almost daily on my new diet blog. If this is something that interests you, please visit me there, comment, and send me your own diet blog links.

What's On My Mind Today

I have 250 messages in my Inbox - and that's AFTER I pared down everything that came in overnight.

Can you say "over-stimulated"?

I'm taking the day to go through my messages, follow up on those that need a response and delete the ones that are no longer relevant.

One reason it's so full is that we had a gymnastics meet over the weekend that required an overnight stay.

Correction: We COULD have driven back home afterwards (in fact, most of the other families did that). But the meet ended around 6:30 and Megan was famished - as she usually is after four hours of physical activity. Actually, the entire family is hungry after these events, and I've learned the hard way that when it's over, we need to have a meal AS SOON AS POSSIBLE - or I'll get battered in the ensuing battle of low blood sugar between my husband and daughter.

We had a nice dinner with one of the other families (who decided to eat before they embarked on their own long drive home) and a good night's sleep in our hotel.

But here's the part that I can't shake. I had been shocked at booking the room that even a two-star hotel in this community was going for over $150 a night. I thought about that yesterday morning, while watching Treasury Secretary Henry Poulson on Meet the Press. Our economic sky is falling, and we shelled out $150+ to stay overnight in a community two hours away; living our lives as if nothing is happening.

And we're doing the same thing next week.

I have very real fears about the future. This is bound to impact the lifestyle of our family and that of everyone we know. It already has impacted us; my husband works for a geotech firm which, until this year, was working on a huge slate of housing developments, all of which have dried up. I am even worried for my wealthier friends; I have no idea what kind of investments are in their portfolios or how leveraged they might be.

I'm afraid to sign the catering contract for my daughter's Bat Mitzvah in April. I'm afraid that after all this hard work to keep her in gymnastics, that in the near future we might have to eliminate it from our budget. I worry that our wonderful new gym might go out of business in the near future; not because of any mistakes the owners make but just as fallout from the mess on Wall Street.

But worrying about every possible bad outcome isn't going to prevent it and all it can really do is make ME crazy. If there is one thing I've learned in my 52 years, it's that it is better and healthier to go through life with a positive attitude.

So I'm going to try to put the storm clouds out of my mind. I'm going to continue to live my life. And I'm going to continue doing what I think I can to make the world a better place.

That's why last night's Emmy broadcast was such a welcome diversion. Even though the five reality hosts bit didn't really work, I think the show was a lot better than last year's disaster-in-the-round. I love the look of the Nokia Theatre LA Live (it seems way nicer than Pasadena Civic, the site of the Emmy telecasts I used to attend, back in the day). I loved the way they evoked the sets from the classic programs of the past. And I even liked Josh Groban's manic medley of classic TV theme songs.

And I agreed with the Academy on many of the winners this year (for a change). I was disappointed that Jeremy Piven won again for "Entourage" - NOT that he doesn't deserve all the awards he's received for his work as Ari Gold - I think he's brilliant. But it would have been nice to see Kevin Dillon win for the same show. Or Rainn Wilson for "The Office." Or Neil Patrick Harris for his legendary work on "How I Met Your Mother." And as much as I dislike "Two and a Half Men," I've always been a fan of Jon Cryer. So they are all winners in my book.

I was pleased to see both "The Colbert Report" and "The Daily Show" honored with Emmys. I swear, Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert and their staffs are doing a better job of reporting the news than the news organizations themselves.

I especially enjoyed tributes to some of my favorite programs of my youth: "Laugh In" was a must-see when I was Megan's age, as was "The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour." I don't think I got what was happening in Viet Nam back then until Tom and Dick Smothers used the war in their edgy comedy bits on that show. They were brilliant, and it really was a big deal when CBS abruptly pulled the plug on them. For years afterwards, there was a billboard across the street from Television City that translated the network's acronym as "Cancelled Brothers Smothers."

I got a little bit teary seeing Tommy accept his delayed award from 40 years ago. He's a funny guy - when I worked at the Tonight Show in the 1980's, I watched him backstage as he did a perfect impression of Johnny doing his monologue.

I got teary again when Mary Tyler Moore introduced Betty White. Again, in my Tonight Show days, the staff would rejoice whenever we booked her for a guest spot (she sometimes participated in sketches, too). Everyone loved her because she was such a delight to work with. She deserves all the recognition of her peers.

Finally, hooray for Tina Fey! I think Alec Baldwin got it right when he compared her with Elaine May. Tina is brilliant and I'm so happy NBC allowed "30 Rock" to stay on the air. Did you notice that most of SNL's nominations were for the episode Fey hosted - which was one of the few really FUNNY ones from last season? Or that nearly all of the guest performance nominations for a comedy were from episodes of "30 Rock"? Baldwin's own Best Actor win was gratifying too - he may have issues in his personal life, but the man is a brilliant actor, in both drama and comedy.

Finally - I'm jazzed that Mad Men was named Best Drama. Although it was a disappointment to discover that last night AMC aired a rerun (I guess they didn't want to compete for Emmy viewers).

All in all, a good night for the TV Academy. And a decent distraction for me, as I'm already feeling better by thinking about something so frivolous. As if nothing has happened.

The California Games

I can't believe I began the summer lamenting that I wouldn't be taking any vacations this year.

Instead, I ended up planning several short road trips. The result: Plenty to write about -- but little time to do it!

I just got back from watching Megan compete in the California State Games, which is a kind of youth Olympics event, complete with young athletes marching in to witness the lighting of the torch. As the march-in was Friday night and her meet was Sunday afternoon -- and the event was in beautiful San Diego -- we made a weekend of it. My sister and her family planned a short stay in Mission Bay to coincide with it, so it was a full family affair...

...which means that breaking away to write was a near-impossibility. Hell, my husband and sister complained every time I glanced at the steady stream of email I was receiving on my Blackberry. You have no idea how much trouble they would have given me if I had gone hunting for a hotspot so I could write.

This is why I have not been online since Thursday afternoon (when the Internet in my home went down for several hours). As of this time last week, I was putting the finishing touches on part 1 of my post about our Las Vegas trip -- and promising to finish the half-done draft recounting our experiences in Palm Springs the previous week.

Those posts remain half-done drafts. And in three days, I am flying up to San Francisco for BlogHer.

Can you say "over extended"?

So... this blog will be taking a non-linear turn this week, as I jump around in time so I can catch up before BlogHer.

We'll start with the trip we just finished: San Diego.

I wish I had photos to show you of the opening ceremony for the California State Games. It really felt like the real deal. For one thing, it took place at Qualcomm Stadium. For another, there must have been thousands of youthful participants, as the march in to the stadium seemed to go on FOREVER. The really cool thing is that the entire proceeding was broadcast onto the stadium's jumbotron -- so I got to see the joyful expressions on the faces of my daughter and her teammates as they entered the field.

The reason I don't have photos is that I almost didn't make it to the Stadium on time, having opted to stay at a four-star Priceline-booked downtown hotel instead of the cheap Mission Valley inn on the trolley line, with the rest of the team. I had dropped Megan off with her coach so I knew she would arrive along with them -- but I wanted to have my own car so I could boogie when the whole thing was over.

The road leading to Qualcomm was bumper-to-bumper, and just as I got there, my cell phone froze on me. This put me into a panic: How was I going to find the other parents? How was I going to find my kid? I managed to get the phone working again by removing and replacing the battery -- but I was shaken. I was already at the ticket booth when I realized I'd left my camera in the car. I had no desire to run back to fetch it.

After what seemed like hours (I had NO IDEA there were so many kids who play softball - I don't think there was an empty field in all of San Diego last weekend!), the ceremony began with a drop-in by about a dozen Navy Seals... who literally parachuted onto the field, ending with one holding an American flag for the Star Spangled Banner. Yeah, it was kind of hokey -- but really cool at the same time. That was followed by some speeches about the value of youth athletic programs and some Gong-show ready entertainment.

The program ended with a pretty nice fireworks show.

Then came the ordeal of catching back up with our kids. As much time as it took for them to march IN to the stadium, finding them after the event took even longer. At least, it felt that way. It was nearly 10:00 p.m. by the time I had my daughter back -- neither one of us had eaten dinner. Fortunately, my sister and husband (who had driven down after work and was already relaxing with the family at their hotel in Mission Bay) were waiting for us. We phoned them a room service order and found a late dinner waiting for us when we caught up with them -- just in time to catch our second fireworks show of the night, emanating from nearby Sea World.

Saturday was our time to kick back, and we decided to do so at my sister's hotel. She and her family stayed at the Mission Bay Hilton, which is right on the bay, so it boasts a small beach, a dock where you can rent boats and jetskis, tennis courts, a spa -- and a fabulous pool (which was adjacent to a fabulous bar that serves truly fabulous pina coladas).

We figured we could get the best of both San Diego worlds by moving our party downtown for the evening. We dined on excellent tapas at Cafe Sevilla in the Gaslamp Quarter (which was within walking distance from our downtown hotel). The food was plentiful...and reasonably priced.

Sunday's gymnastics meet was a lot like any other... except that our team rocked! Megan and her friend Wesley both took first place All-Around prizes for their ages -- and the top three for most events featured at least one of our girls.

I would have pictures of this but for a nasty surprise when I turned my camera on: I must have dropped it somewhere, because I could not access any of the menus. Instead, all I could see was something that looked like a crack on the screen INSIDE the camera.

"Just go to the store where you bought it and get it fixed," my husband suggested.

The last time I tried that with a digital camera I was told it would cost nearly as much to fix as it would to buy a new one. It is also extremely unlikely that, should it be reparable, I could have it back before I go to BlogHer on Thursday. At any rate, future posts will be without photos for the foreseeable future.

It's a good thing I got some in on the half-finished posts that will be going up BEFORE I get to San Francisco.

One Drama Ends, Another Begins

(Are you hitting the road this summer? Don't leave home without entering SoCal Mom's Summer Travel Getaway Contest...)

I just got back from dropping Megan off for her last day of school.

Boy, do I feel relieved.

For someone with an aversion to drama, I cannot seem to escape it. In previous years (when I was embroiled in all the politics of her elementary school PTA), this day meant getting a three-month break from petty arguments over fundraising and organizing and brouhahas other people made over how the teachers were teaching. (I was always very happy with my daughter's teachers, which I suppose makes me lucky. We just didn't perceive any problems for us there.)

I've managed to avoid all of that since she started middle school (mainly by steering as far away as possible from the PTA). The only school-related drama this year was our struggle with the homework load, which dissipated after I had my conference with Megan's teachers. Next year, I resolve to be more pro-active and will set up a teacher conference earlier in the semester.

But just as I'm feeling good about how easy a school year we had, I am finding it harder and harder to avoid craziness at Megan's gym.

I guess that makes sense: Running for a position on the gym's board was a stupid move. I don't know; I had this weird idea that by working on the inside, I could affect improvements to the problems I saw.

It hasn't worked out that way.

If anything, I now have too much information. I was much happier living in trusting ignorance. Plus, as a board member, I am now a target for any gym parent who wants to see conspiracies in how his/her child is being treated (and there are lots of gym parents who would rather blame gym politics for a child's poor score than objectively evaluate the child's performance).

The result is that I have limited my time watching my daughter at gym, because I do not want to be accosted by parents who are angry about coaches, safety, equipment, judging, the cleaning crew, the adults who come in at night for workouts, the food at the snack bar, other parents, other kids, uniforms, meets, etc., etc., etc.

But we live in an age when you can run, but you cannot hide -- especially if people have your email address. Over the weekend, I found myself in the center of yet another gym drama, thanks to a message that was sent to all the parents of Megan's team, asserting that the girls are not being protected well enough while they learn new tricks on the balance beam. I might also add that the parent who sent this email has been at the center of nearly every gym controversy that has sprung up over the last three years.

I replied to all that I, for one, was not unhappy and did not see any reason to be alarmed by the way the girls are being coached. But I am not an expert on gymnastics coaching, and in case there really was an issue that had to be explored (and this parent raised safety issues), I felt this should be on the record, so I cc'd the president of the Board.

That's when all hell broke loose.

The parent who started the email chain retorted back (to all - except the Board president) that I had no right to put what was essentially a private message onto the agenda of the gym's management. When I pointed out that as a board member, it was actually my duty to alert the board when a question has been raised about our kids' safety, I received a particularly nasty and accusatory email back, asking me if I wanted to take responsibility from any flack the child might receive from the head coach.

I was upset. I knew in my heart I had done the right thing, but I knew I had gone about it in a passive-aggressive way, which I'm afraid is how I learned to survive a childhood that was fraught with all kinds of unneccessary drama. I am not capable of being confrontational. But at least, I felt I'd done something right by being transparent. Which means that I ended up being confronted.

The whole thing made me angry, but since I don't do anger well, I internalized it until it formed a knot in my stomach. I wanted to throw up. Instead, I drove Megan to gym and (confident that the parent in question would not be there, because they always skip the Saturday trainings - yes, I am a coward) talked it out with a mom I knew would be sympathetic to me.

But the stomach ache did not dissipate until another parent sent an email to the group in support of my action, agreeing with what I'd said -- that as a member of the gym board, I was duty-bound to report the allegations... and pointing out that a group email to six people is NOT a private conversation. If you don't want something to get out, you don't send it by email...

Monday rolled around and I dropped Megan off at gym and skedaddled to the nearest Starbucks, because I did not want to run into the parent who had sent the email. (Coward, remember?) I need not have bothered, because they did not show up at all.

I returned to gym about 15 minutes before Megan's workout had ended. The girls were finishing up with conditioning exercises. Megan was doing handstands on the beam... and you can guess what happened...

...she lost her grip on her dismount and kicked her foot under the beam - really hard...

... and was injured. The pain was so bad that I suspected she'd broken her toe.

And I could not help but think of the email brouhaha about safety on the beam.

Of course, that email was not about routine dismounts that the girls have done for years. And, as far as possible gymnastics injuries go, a broken toe is NOTHING. Gymnastics can be a dangerous sport. Megan's friends have broken wrists, arms, feet... there have been back injuries, and hip displacements.

But guess what? Kids get hurt playing sports. Hell, I once broke my toe by bumping into a cabinet in my bedroom. This is our first injury after four years of competition -- I figured we were ahead of the game.

And, as it turned out, her toe wasn't broken- just badly bruised. So we are WAY ahead of the game.

Too bad I can't say the same about gym drama. Our June board meeting is tonight...

Last Week of School - On with the Hectic Summer

In four more days, my daughter will be finished with this crazy, stressful, transitional first year of middle school.

No one is more excited about this than I.

We will have about two weeks before she gets right into her crazy, stressful, transitional ummer of gymnastics. This will be her fourth summer of training for Fall competition... but when her level 6 "compulsory" season ends in November, she will be moving right on to level 7, which is the first of the "optional" levels.

Explanation: Compulsory gymnasts all perform the same routines with the same skills on the four women's events - vault, bars, beam and floor. When they hit the optional levels, they create their own routines and can pick and choose among the skills -- it is their option.

So for the last three summers, Megan has trained for 25 hours per week. But because she will need to be ready to go in January with her brand new optional routines, the head coach wants her to work for an additional 10 hours each week during the summer. I know - that's like having a full time job. And she's not exactly thrilled with the idea of having so little time this summer for play...

...so we are doing what we can do have some fun. We are leaving next week on not just one, but TWO road trips. We will also be returning to San Diego for a rare summer gymnastics meet. All of these trips will be chronicled here on the blog. YES! Travel posts again!!

And to kick off all this summer travel in style, I am holding a contest over at SoCal Stuff: First prize is a Crosswords DS game -- and a spanking new Nintendo DS to play it on! I am also giving away a road trip kit with products that will help make your drive go smoothly. Click here for contest details and to enter.

False Economies

$4.29.

That's what I paid for a gallon of gas on Monday.

I don't have to tell any of the readers of this blog that times are tough all over.

For the last few months, I've found myself in the unaccustomed position of the person who rains all over everyone's parade. I have been trying my darndest to cut fat out of our budget: I cancelled our cable premium channels, cut down on the money I spend on grooming (no more acrylic nails; am now getting hair colored and styled by beauty school trainees), and have changed my grocery shopping habits.

I no longer drive home after dropping Megan off at school. Now, I just hole up at a nearby coffee place with wi-fi and work there. This saves me 10 to 20 miles of driving per day. I would love to reduce my driving to under 200 miles per week. I'm not there yet, but I'm working on it.

I figure I have cut a good $400 a month out of our budget. Unfortunately, that's about equal to the increase in our gas and grocery spending.

Whenever someone in the family wants to buy something, I'm the bad cop who says "No."

I'm so not good at this.

Today, I discovered that my daughter had subscribed to some kind of ringtone download service on her cell phone. I should have been tipped off to that by a conversation the two of us had a few weeks ago. I don't remember how it came up, but she seemed surprised to find out that we could be charged a lot of money to download ringtones. Sure enough, there was an unexplained $9.95 third-party charge on our bill this month, and when I called T-Mobile to find out what it was for, I discovered that she had agreed to pay that charge every month. I'm pretty sure she had no idea... and that's why, by law, children her age have no legal right to enter into those agreements. I had the charges (because it had already been charged again for this month!) reversed and arranged to have third-party sites blocked from her phone.

I also discovered an annual recurring charge from Consumer Reports that I had forgotten to cancel (they refunded the money without argument), and a monthly charge for an identity security service on my husband's card that he doesn't remember signing up for (they canceled the membership but not the charge; I'm feeling too tired right now to fight that one). I saved $40 today, which doesn't even pay for an extra tank of gas.

I am really hating living in Los Angeles right now. I've been complaining for years that I felt imprisoned in my little neck of the San Fernando Valley by all the traffic I would face if I tried to go over the hill and come back before school pickup. Now, I don't want to drive because it's so darned expensive.

When Megan was invited by friends to spend a day at Magic Mountain on Sunday, my husband suggested we go for a drive, and I told him NO. I ended up having a change of heart; staying close to home all the time was likely to stress the two of us even more than money worries. So we dropped her off and took a drive to Ventura, stopping halfway at the Giessinger winery in Fillmore (which offered some surprisingly nice vintages). We lunched on the Ventura Pier and drove home in time to shop for groceries at Costco.

That little drive probably cost us $200 (between the gas, the food and the two bottles of wine we bought), but my husband and I were more relaxed than we've been in months. We had a very good day.

That's good; because the way the economy is going, that might be the last long drive we take for fun for a very long time.