June 13, 2006 by Amy

A bully, shower gunkies and a birthday

So, after much thought, and pondering, and wondering, and seeking of advice, I have come to this conclusion: the way to beat a bully is simply to refuse to play.

That’s what I’m currently doing now. Refusing to play with a bully. I will have to do this all morning and part of the afternoon, while waiting for a meeting with the school principal.

Dodging people takes a lot of effort, more than you realize until you’re actually doing the dodging. And it’s not fun, because it’s not like there is the James Bond soundtrack running in the background and you have cool electronic gadgets to use. Nope. It’s pretty exhausting, and quite stressful, actually.

Last night was a fine evening of playing with the Zo and just hanging out. I started reading Mark Twain’s “Innocents Abroad,” but quickly realized that it’s one of those books I actually have to pay attention to while reading, and not one that can be read easily while also keeping one eye on the now very-mobile Bug. It’s been awhile since I’ve read any Mark Twain, so I’m looking forward to it.

M came home from walleyball and played with Zozo a bit before we fed her and put her down for the night. He tested our shower, and decided to use the hall bathroom’s shower, because ours has been experiencing a bit of a clog issue. We’ve put stuff down it the last couple of days, hoping to clear it up, but near as we can tell, we dislodged enough gunk to completely stop up what little hole was left. Result: major backflow in the shower.

Next step was to try the good ol’ plunger. Ugh. It’s absolutely disgusting what black stuff you can pull out of the shower drain. I mean black. And not light black, either. Dark black. Photo black. (see previous post on the differences of black) We’re not sure exactly what it is, nor do we really want to know. This morning M got a little snake/gripper thingy from Grandpa and we’re gonna try manually pulling out whatever is in there. Ewwwwww. We could be talking a substance fit for biological warfare here. Blech.

Have to leave work early this afternoon (after the meeting with the principal), to take Zoe to the ortho. Hoping and praying that her hips check out okay and that we’ll just have to bring her back for a quick check-up after she’s walking. The mother in me gets pretty worked up just thinking about the alternatives (surgery, therapy), so I’m going to not write anything about that right now and we’ll just see how the appointment goes.

Dinner out tonight for Mom & Dad Z’s anniversary, courtesy of Grandma S. She chose Rich & Charlie’s, because, in her words, “That’s one of Mike’s favorite places to eat.” We called Dad for confirmation, but all we got was, “No comment.” ‘Nuf said.

A great big giant Happy Birthday to Uncle Steve!!!! We hope your day is filled with lots of laughter and cheer and good company. “Happy birthday to you…happy birthday to you…happy birthday Uncle Steeeeeeve, happy birthday to youuuuuu!” That’s in lieu of our actually singing, which is a birthday present in and of itself, because trust me, we ain’t the next American Idols. We’ll be bringing your gift to Cinci in a few weeks, and that’s when you’ll get your birthday hugs and kisses, too. We miss you and love you!

Must get to work, and outline my thoughts about my meeting with the school principal later. They don’t still use paddles, do they?!