Wearing them out
So, like I sed on Sunday, babysitting the littles this past Saturday nite, during Mike's big-deal "look @ me" party @ Weed's, had me thinking of that other time I sat an' it didn't go so well. But thinking abt that gave me sum ideas on how it cd go better this time.
I started with sum running and chasing Merrie an' Robin around the house, as Merrie was all, "SHRIEK! Can't catch me, can't catch me!" Then I swooped Robin up into the air as Merrie reached up @ me like she wanted 2 have her turn next. Then I got down on the living room floor and balanced Merrie on my shins (gr8 resistance 4 yr lower abs, BTW). And we did a buncha stuff like that until the littles were totally conked an' ready 2 snooze.
After all that, I was sprawled out on the couch thinking, "The secret 2 successful babysitting is 2 wear the kids out." Of course, I also wore myself out, which mite B sum kinda "irony" thing that makes 60-yr-old ladies cluck-cluck and shake their heads an' stuff.
More on this Saturday story in 2morrow's entry.
Apes
I started with sum running and chasing Merrie an' Robin around the house, as Merrie was all, "SHRIEK! Can't catch me, can't catch me!" Then I swooped Robin up into the air as Merrie reached up @ me like she wanted 2 have her turn next. Then I got down on the living room floor and balanced Merrie on my shins (gr8 resistance 4 yr lower abs, BTW). And we did a buncha stuff like that until the littles were totally conked an' ready 2 snooze.
After all that, I was sprawled out on the couch thinking, "The secret 2 successful babysitting is 2 wear the kids out." Of course, I also wore myself out, which mite B sum kinda "irony" thing that makes 60-yr-old ladies cluck-cluck and shake their heads an' stuff.
More on this Saturday story in 2morrow's entry.
Apes
Labels: crowded house, Merrie, Mike, Mike's literary pretensions, Robin
posted by April Patterson @ 6:24 AM
8 Comments:
At 4:09 PM,
Anonymous said…
april, anothah day of detention w/bianca, miriam, & moe hawk. it wuz rilly dull, xxcept 4 the tyme wen the detection teacher left the room & moe started chasing miriam & bianca ‘round the room while they yelled, “SHRIEK! can't catch me, can't catch me!" i nevah am sure y girls like to yell “SHRIEK!” wen they shriek. neway, it ended badly, when moe tried 2 pick up miriam & she kinda dropped 2 the floor. silhouette peeps, i mean lighted-challenged peeps (moe str8ened me out ‘bout that) r not that substantial. i think miriam & bianca both still like moe neway. they’re kinda avoidin’ me, cuz i have the rep of b-ing evil, az u know.
b-ing evil didn’t help me w/goin’ home 2day & avoidin’ the special needs kids who r aftah me. i went out a diff exit frum skool & they still caught me. i think sum1 musta pimped up their motorized wheel chairs, cuz they went a lot faster than i can run, & i evn went ovah snow. they held me down on the ground & wouldn’t let me up till i talked w/ellipses. i hadda say the words 2 the germy wormy jeremy jones song & everytyme i said a complete word w/o an ellipse, i hadda start ovah. i think i passed out frum lack of oxygen, cuz stoppin’ ur breath 2 do those ellipses iz hard. i woke up & went home & mom wuz rilly mad i had mud all ovah me.
the weirdest part ‘bout it wuz while i wuz knocked out, i had this strange dream ‘bout me & zandra larson. i wuz walkin’ zandra 2 the front door of sum place. this this is wut happed:
Me: That was a fun party Zandra. I'm glad you invited me.
Zandra: I am too. I had a nice time.
Me: (I grabbed Zandra's shoulder and leaned into her face) We're going to get together again... aren't we?
Zandra: I like you Jeremy, I really do. Let's just see what happens, OK?
Me: I'll be cycling out tomorrow from visiting my sister, but I'll be back in a week. I'll see you then. Tell me you'll see me in a week! I'm not leaving until you say you'll see me! Say yes!
Zandra: Yes.
Me: (I’m leaping into the air with my arms outstretched) I'm not gonna wait till tomorrow... I'm cycling NOW!!!
i can’t b-lieve i hadda dream where i acted so pathetic. now here’s the rilly weird part. aftah i got home, my future sis called up & told my mom she wuz accepted n2 trinity college @u of t. weird. i wondah if my dream iz sum kind premonition of the future & i am gonna turn n2 sum kinda pathetic loser. ‘course i am gettin’ beat up by special needs kids, so it might b an improvement.
At 5:57 PM,
April Patterson said…
weird, jeremy, when i read that description about yr dream? i had this v. weird feeling that sumthing v. similar was gonna happen, i'm not sure w/whom but that it wd b sum1 i'd write abt here @ my blog. ::shudder::
apes
At 7:02 PM,
howard said…
April,
Our first review of the new Portrait Magazine.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul Hewson
Toronto National Star Globe Sun
Paul's Picks
Watch out, Toronto! There's a new magazine in town! Actually, it’s the same old Portrait Magazine, but with a twist. Get this readers! It has “portraits” of famous people again. My earliest memories of this publication are from the days when it was a quarterly. It focused on prominent Canadians and was almost a “biography”, filling a space on the newsstand covered by no other magazine. I loved the Portrait Magazine of old.
Magazines change with the times, and I remember with great regret when Portrait Magazine started doing exposés in 2003, starting with the fashion designer, Divala. After that the magazine took a serious turn for the worse, trying to reach the youth market by covering the exploits of certain youthful and outrageous performers who have been making the headlines on the music scene, in art and in film, a niche covered by so many other magazines so much better.
Not only that, but the articles themselves were often incomprehensible. One article on Avril Lavigne in particular, I remember, started referring to her as “Avril the Martian teenager” for reasons never made clear, as if an editor had gone mad and made random insertions because he didn’t like Avril Lavigne. And who can forget the chapter by chapter serialization of the adventures of Sheilagh Shaughnessy, which began last summer and abruptly stopped last December, just as the heroine had murdered her abusive husband by leaving him to die from exposure to the elements.
After last month’s issue featuring portraits of “Canadian Idol Contestants, Season One: Where Are They Now?”, my gentle readers, I thought the magazine could not get any lower with copies of 10th place Richie Wilcox’s motivational speeches to youth and 9th place Candida Clauseri talking about how she has been working since 2004 to get her debut album done and all the reasons why it is still not ready to be released to the public after 3 years.
But this month, dear readers, Portrait Magazine, returned with portraits of Stephen Harper, Belinda Stronach, Tony Clement, and Paul Martin; and shockingly in depth looks at each of these Canadian political figures. I can tell you, gentle readers, thanks to Portrait Magazine, I will never look at these people the same again. After all, who would have thought Stephen Harper was the type of man who would have a tattoo on a certain private area of his body? Not this writer.
When I talked to the publisher, Mr. Gluteous Gluttson, about the reasons for the change, he told me, “Paul. As the publisher, I’ve been cognizant of the bottom line, and despite indications of reasonable growth, I saw room for further ‘economizing.’ I wanted my publication to be more profitable and so I asked for help from my senior editor at the time. He responded by quitting without notice and leaving a resignation letter with his assistant, the contents of which stated basically, he was quitting so the gain of his salary would give me the profit I wanted, while preserving the jobs of the persons who worked for him. It was a wake-up call, Paul, if there ever was one. I suddenly realized my senior editor, who had been guiding the development of my magazine for the last 4 years, was an idiot with a severe martyr complex. It was time to clean house and put Portrait Magazine back to doing “Portraits” again. No more slogans around the office saying, ‘The secret to successful writing is to wear the readers out.’”
There you have it. Portrait Magazine is back to where it once was. And not a moment too soon! That’s why it’s Paul’s Pick for this week. Check it out!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Needless to say, Mr. Gluttson was quite happy with the review and he immediately gave Morrie Saltzman, my co-editor a raise. I didn’t get a raise, because I don’t get paid as a part of my prison work release program. Nevertheless, it is good to get some positive recognition for something I have done for a change.
Howard Bunt
At 7:15 PM,
Anonymous said…
April,
Little sis. I am so glad you had a good time baby-sitting my children and we didn’t have any of that, “I’m couldn’t be paid to have children” negativity which permeated your Blog entry on Sunday. When we left for the party in my honour last Saturday, Deanna and I both knew we were leaving our children in safe hands. That’s why we waved to you farewell a safe distance from the door.
To be honest, we were trying to get out of the house before mom and dad decided they wanted to ride with us. I hate to say it, but they are not late evening people, and since Josef’s party was likely to run late into the evening, we didn’t want to have to leave a party in my honour, just because mom wanted to go home early to check to make sure you didn’t have any boys over. I am afraid that rush to leave, did take away the time I had planned for writing a speech for the occasion, in case anyone asked for one.
My lovely Deanna said a long speech would not be appropriate for a BYOB party. As she phrased it, “Mike. When have you ever heard a Patterson speak for longer than you could fit in the word balloons of a 4-panel comic strip?” I had to admit, we Pattersons are notoriously short-winded when it comes to public speaking. It must be why we like to write instead. Given our quick departure, I decided to wing it, if a request for a speech came up, which it did. Maybe I will tell you about it tomorrow or later tonight.
Love,
Michael Patterson
At 7:30 PM,
Anonymous said…
april, shared dreams/weird feelingz r like sum powerful force outside of us iz tryin’ 2 send us a message. only i dunno wut the message iz: “boyz who r d8in’, like 2 act like idiots?”
At 8:00 PM,
April Patterson said…
howard, congrats on the gr8 review! guess what, my school librarian read that article and decided 2 resubscribe 2 portrait 4 the library. she had canceled the subscription not long ago cuz she d-cided the mag had become "inappropriate" 4 a school library.
mike, u an' dee really did seem 2 b in a s00per-big hurry 2 get away saturday nite.
jeremy, i dunno what the message is supposta b. but i have this odd feeling that in, like, 11 days, we'll have this whole diff understanding of it.
apes
At 8:23 PM,
howard said…
April,
I am glad to hear about your school librarian. Thanks to recent changes, you can now resubscribe to Portrait Magazine on-line. My co-senior editor, Morrie Saltzman found a "mensch who can do websites, like a moyl does a bris.”
Mr. Gluttson was afraid of hiring someone, after he had fired so many; but the website subscriptions have already offset their cost, the web designer's salary, and significantly increased the sales of Portrait Magazine subscriptions. Mr. Gluttson was so impressed he gave Morrie another raise. I hate to say it, but if your brother had been more technology-savvy, Mr. Gluttson might not have ever asked for those layoffs. Good thing for me and Morrie, your brother never pursued the on-line aspects of a magazine.
Howard Bunt
At 9:27 PM,
April Patterson said…
howard, the web page loox gr8! it's so much better than what they usta have, one of thoze lame "under construction, please check back soon" with a little construction-worker clipart pic. that thing was up there 4evs!
apes
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