The *real* reason I haven't sketched out the outline for my next manuscript is because I'm a bit kerfunkled. I've decided to slow things down in this next manuscript and only kill off one person. Seems fair. I killed off so many in the last one that I can't remember exactly how many ended up dead by the end. But that's more of a memory problem than a killing off people problem. Easy for me to say, I'm not one of the people I killed off at the end. Whew! So whilst manuscript number 3 is percolating, I'm procrastinating by doing such things like binge watching Netflix tv shows and eating chocolate by the pound. Just don't tell my kids.
But alas, for the last few days I had company, and I had to actually do something. Otherwise he'd sit around and play Minecraft all day. And he might just actually think I don't do things all day. Which, let's be honest, he probably doesn't think about because which little kids actually sit around and wonder what their parents do all.day.long whilst they're at school?
So we decided to tackle his Valentine's Day Box crafty project. Each student in his class has been asked to decorate a box in which the other students will place their Valentine's Day cards to one another. It's all very "fair" and "even" and "nice," compared to when I was a kid. Back then, in my day, a million, billion years ago, we'd spend the entire day at school decorating our boxes. Then the teacher would turn off the lights, and we'd all stand up, pick up our lovingly made Valentine's Day cards (mine were always home made, usually by folding a piece of red construction paper in half and cutting an arc, so that the heart would be evenly shaped), and we'd walk slowly up and down the aisles between the desks, and secretly try to put our Valentine's into other children's boxes and envelopes without anyone else seeing whose envelope or box we were putting our Valentine's Day card into.
Only those really good friends who were worthy of our Valentine's received them. I'm sure the teachers envisioned equal quantities of Valentine's Day cards in every box and envelope, with love shared around, and all of us holding hands and smiling with pinked cheeks, ducking our heads to the ground, looking a bit like the cupid cherubs from Disney's "Fantasia." What happened in reality was that all the pretty girls got scads and loads and tons of Valentines, their boxes and envelopes filled to the brim, stuffed to the gills. The popular boys also received Valentine's. They responded in one of three ways: (a) they either strutted around like puffed up, proud peacocks, bragging about how many they received. Or, (2) they faked an embarrassed look, but then strutted around like a puffed up, proud peacocks. Or (c), or they tried to hide, because they were mortified that someone had demonstrated some sort of affection toward them. So all the pretty little girls and all the popular boys had a wonderful and delightful Valentine's Day.
The rest of us, well, it wasn't so great. We did, in fact, receive a few Valentine's. Sometimes three. Maybe four. But it was quite clear who was popular and well loved, and who wasn't. The haves and the have nots. Too bad I didn't have Glinda (aka GaLinda) to help me be Popular! I wanted to be Pop-You-Lar! She could have sung me the song, like she sang to Elphaba, and I, too, could have a "personality dialysis." Alas, such was not the life for me.
Things eventually changed over the course of my elementary school years, and eventually we were all "required" to provide a Valentine for each and every one of our classmates, and not just to the pretty and popular kids. We bought a small box of Valentine's Day cards at the drug store with nifty and neato little catch phrases. We signed each card, and then we folded them on the perforated cardboard lines, tore them apart, and then voila, 30 identical Valentine's Day cards. Now was that so hard? No one spent more than $1.59 at the local drug store. No one bought chocolates, or added candy, or attached fun-sized candy bars with their loving sentiments.
But I digress.
So my son and I set to task making his Valentine's Day box. In my head, I had visions of sweet heart-covered shoeboxes, construction paper hearts folded in half and lovingly cut out to make even-shaped hearts, pink and white construction paper, the works. Alas, he had a different vision in mind. I think his idea may have been Pinterest inspired. However he got the idea, I think it turned out wonderfully well.
So here is the Jackness Monster. The sign on the left says, "The Jackness Monster." The sign on the right says, "Please Feed the Monster." (That is, in case you were curious.)
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| The Jackness Monster |
Then here is a picture of the Valentine's gifts he's giving to his friends. He poured over all the Pinterest ideas for at least seven minutes (a lifetime for him!) and chose this one. The mouse is made out of two Hershey's kisses, two googlie eyes, a pink piece of paper cut into ears, and a pink ribbon tail. The "swiss cheese" has heart shaped holes, and he wanted me write, "It's 'mice' to know you." Cute. Even if I do say so myself. He asked me if I would please be so kind as to put them together for him. As I was, at the time, recovering from surgery, it seemed easy enough of a task for me to accomplish whilst being completely blitzed out of my mind on pain meds. Er, um, I mean, I was gently coddled into comfort by the medicinal effects of prescribed pain medication. Probably not a great idea to be using a hot glue gun while heavily medicated, but hey, I suffered no burns, and the mice all turned out okay.
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| It's "mice" to know you. |
So that's it for today's blog. Must go buy milk and bread and brace for the stormageddon. (Not to be confused by Stormageddon, Dark Lord of All, the little baby from Doctor Who.) They're closing down the schools early in anticipation of the Big Storm, and now I'm going to miss the Toad the Wet Sprocket intimate concert for which we won tickets! Boo!
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