The Queen's Rambles

This picture cracks me up. The look on his face! The camo! The purple beads! It all combines for hilarity, at least in my mommy heart. You can see the finished jack-o-lantern on flickr, if you are so inclined.

My mom bought him a whole camo wardrobe since he says it’s his favorite color. Someone hold me. I need reassurances.

Someone tell me that he is not going to turn into a drunken deer hunter who has a spit bottle in his front seat and a rifle in his gun rack. Some camo people are clean cut military men, out saving the world. Not that I like the idea of my son toting a gun in middle of a war. It would be better than the drunken alternative, though. I think.

Better thoughts. . .

When we went to the pumpkin patch, the farmer told the kids we could roast the seeds and eat them. Erik was all over that, but didn’t like my recipe (salty). He and grandma wanted something with cinnamon and sugar, so I found a recipe and told them how to make them.

Too bad they burned them to a crisp. No tasty pumpkin seeds for us, unless you like the taste of charcoal in your mouth.

Who cares about burnt pumpkin seeds, when you get alone time with your husband.

Mike and I went on a date last night! Wonders never cease!

Mike’s been wanting to try a Moroccan restaurant down in one of the big, fancy retail areas, so that’s just what we did.

It was an incredibly surreal experience. The tables were all squished together, so you couldn’t help but overhear everything your neighbors said. I guess it must be a very “cozy” family experience because it seemed like a lot of the people were regulars and they just started talking to us, like we were all one big happy family. To be fair, I’ve sat farther away from people at my own personal dinner table so it did feel awkward not to be friendly with these people who were 12 inches away, but it was still strange.

The owner was a really nice guy who was extremely upset because Yelp had his restaurant listed as closed. I’d be upset too. The table next to us was giving him advice, but he didn’t really seem to understand. I hope he gets it worked out soon. I liked him, so I really wanted to like his restaurant. Really, really badly. But. . . Well. . No.

Overall the food was hit or miss. We were having an adventure so we ordered The Royal Feast. We thought it would be sample sized bits of everything, but it was HUGE portions of tons of different foods so we were totally stuffed by the end of the evening. It was a very good way to find out what we liked and what we didn’t like. Basically, I think I like Moroccan food, but I think I would like it a lot better somewhere else. Mike said the lamb was amazing, but I couldn’t try it. My brain wouldn’t let me. Lamb. Baby sheep. Baaaaaaaaaaa.

They had this really weird chicken pie thing that was like baklava, only with chicken in the middle. I’ve never had chicken covered with cinnamon and sugar before. At first I hated it, but by the end I kind of liked it. They had some really good chicken kebobs, some really bad beef kebabs, hummus with various meats, and tea that looked like urine.

We were there for two hours. I don’t think I’ve ever had such a long meal in my life.

We had a pretty bad seat because the live entertainment sat right next to us and brought their friends. They were probably in their 70s, but I’m not really sure about that. The man was having a birthday, so we had to listen to everyone go on and on about that and take a ton of pictures and get up and down and up and down and up and down to congratulate him. This wouldn’t have mattered, but we were so close together that we kept having fat old lady butts land on our table. The music was pretty good, and he was a fun entertainer, but it was pretty weird when the old lady got up and started belly dancing. She didn’t have a costume on or anything and didn’t even take her purse off. She was good at it, but it was just weird.

Then she sat down AGAIN and brushed her butt up on our table and my face AGAIN.

Later, people brought him some balloons, but they let go and the balloons flew up to the top of the restaurant and no one could reach them. It was a whole ordeal to get them down with a broomstick and tape and luck. The restaurant exploded with applause when the balloons were saved.

Did I mention there were three young couples (I’m including ourselves in this category) and then a bunch of 70-80 year olds? Not that I have anything against old people, but it was definitely not the hippest place on earth. But when have I ever been hip? And these weren’t the fancy old ladies that you often see around here. As you know, we live near the DC area so a lot of the people around here are very well heeled. These people had on what amounted to clown clothes. I’ve never seen the likes of it in this little shopping area we were at. It is usually a little rich for our blood, but not at this place.

Overall it was an interesting adventure, but I doubt we’ll go back to that particular restaurant. Next weekend I want Mike to take me someplace nice in downtown DC (Maybe Co Co Sala, a restaurant and chocolate boutique). My mom goes back on November 5th, so we need to take advantage of free babysitting while we have the chance.

Today was all about productivity. Mike scared the crap out of my mom by calling an all hands meeting and then listing out the chores that needed to be done. For some reason she finds Mike scary, which is completely bizarre. Mike is the most mild mannered, patient, kind man that you’re likely to meet. I think that’s what scares her. She’s used to loud, aggressive, violent, drunk men. Mike is an unknown. She’s scared of what will happen if he blows. Does she think he’s going to spank her?

You’d think he had threatened her with a beating, the way she hopped to the job she was given. I cleaned out the fridge, she vacuumed the whole house and he cleaned up all the dining room clutter. The dining room is our clutter magnet and I can’t stand it. I need an office. How do you create an office in a townhouse that you can’t add on to? I guess I need to put a storage shed on the deck and call it my office. I’m not sure that would meet HOA standards.

Something’s gotta give, though. I can’t believe the amount of paperwork that we get from kindergarten. I try to take care of it the moment Erik hits the door. I pull out his folders, read everything and take care of it immediately (assuming I have cash on hand. You need a lot of dollar bills on hand when you have a kindergartner. They always need money for something), but things still pile up.

I usually love to have my mom come visit because she cleans and organizes my whole house. I can never find anything when she leaves, but it’s refreshing to have the house deep cleaned and everything put away somewhere. This time she has been so depressed that she’s just been napping and eating popcorn (and getting it everywhere). Not that I expect my mom to be my free housekeeper, but it is very disconcerting to see her acting so different from her normal self. She was telling me that she feels totally alone in the world because she can’t burden myself or my sister with her problems. It wouldn’t be fair to us because we have our own lives to live. Now she doesn’t have a husband, mother or best friend. They’ve all died in the past three years.

It makes me so sad for her and so angry on her behalf. She is such a great woman that she deserved a life of love, happiness and harmony. She chose to stay with an abusive alcoholic. I have no idea why. Now she can’t move on.

She’s only 62, but she is not interested in developing any further romance or relationships in her life. I think she could still have a lot of fun in life, but only if she is open to it. I don’t know if that will ever happen, or if she will just bury herself in my sister’s troubles and continue to let chaos reign supreme. I just want my mommy to be happy, but I know I can’t create happiness for her.

Btw, I don’t really know why my sister is in counseling but I believe it is court ordered. Something to do with a gun, maybe? I think they must have figured out that I blab all their business all over the internet and decided to shut down the info train. Wise move on their part, but it makes my internet blabbing much less entertaining. She’s been sober since July and is really in to her new church. I personally hate the idea of a person needing church to behave in a moral way. The god of the Bible is anything but moral (can we say genocide, anyone?), but if it gives her something to focus on and keeps her out of trouble, I guess that’s good. This church seems a lot more innocuous than the place she was going before. The other church had a control freak charlatan for a preacher, which is never good in any situation. At least this new church seems to want to do good and doesn’t seem scammy, even if I personally don’t agree with their message.

Ok, I better scurry up to bed. Back to the grind tomorrow. Ugh.