Totally Random

"It's Random Man".....to quote Kidd Kraddick.
-----------------------------------------
I have a whole bunch of nothing to mention here today.
-----------------------------------------
I swear I saw a (or an?) UFO this morning on the way to work. Could have been a low flying slow airplane, but it's more fun to imagine it was a UFO.
-----------------------------------------
Light of my life has her dance recital tomorrow night. Thank goodness that's over for now. She loves dance and has been taking it since she was 2. As long as she wants to take classes, I'll keep signing her up. It's good exercise after all, but I hate the whole dance recital part. All the costumes and changes and hair and make-up (yes, I put a bit of make-up on her, not Jon-Benet, crazy rouge-hot pink lipstick-blue eyeshadow-pancake makeup base crazy, just a little color on her lips and that's about it). Drives me crazy.
-----------------------------------------
We got our new stove delivered Tuesday. We call him "Bernie"........for obvious reasons. Hopefully he won't burn in the same way as the old one.
-----------------------------------------
Light of my life and my mom made peanut butter cookies yesterday afternoon in the new stove. Boy, are they tasty. Just perfect.
-----------------------------------------
I had to go to Wal-Mart yesterday to get some stuff. Yeah, nothing I really needed (except for light of my life's tights for her dance recital) but I had been hearing advertisements for a Coca-Cola t-shirt that Wal-Mart was selling. See, I'm a Coke collector. Not so much lately, but I have some good stuff that I've collected over the years. It matches perfectly with my yellow, white, red and black kitchen. Anyway, the advertisement was for a recycled t-shirt. They make the t-shirt out of the 20 oz plastic Coke bottles. The t-shirt I got was made from approximately 4 Coke bottles (says so right on the shirt in the tag area!). It's pretty cool. Feels softer than regular cotton tees. I like it.
----------------------------------------
When my tax refund arrives, I'm thinking of buying a picnic table. So I can entertain and stuff.
----------------------------------------
Did I tell you guys I had to ground light of my life? Only 8 years old and she's had her first grounding. I'm probably being a bitch, but I had just had it.

On Monday, the day after the big exciting fire, we had to get take out because we couldn't cook. Yes, I know, we could have microwaved something, but really, we just wanted to take advantage of the no stove to get take out. Anyway, light of my life's friend, M, was over playing. I went outside and asked if she had to be home at a certain time (if she didn't, I was going to see if she wanted to eat with us) and she said, "No, mama will get me when the hamburgers are done". They were having hamburgers that night and that's what we were getting for take-out as well. Anyway, light of my life did the big puppy dog eyes and begged to let me eat with them. I've been trying to teach her that you don't invite yourself to dinner at someones house but that you have to wait to be invited. I explained to her that, no, you can't eat over there, I'm already ordering you dinner and you haven't been invited. She got upset but seemed to get over it quickly.

I left to go get the food and when I got back, mom said that light of my life had gone over to M's house. I gave her a knowing look and said, "I bet she ate over there". Sure enough, when I got over to B's house, she said that light of my life ate dinner over there. I informed B that light of my life wasn't supposed to do that and that she had specifically been told not to do exactly what she did. B was apologetic but it wasn't her fault at all. She didn't know. Light of my life is old enough to retain the information I told her about NOT EATING AT THEIR HOUSE! I had already BOUGHT her dinner. Light of my life has a way of conveniently "forgetting" to tell people that she can't or isn't supposed to do something I SPECIFICALLY told her not to do. This is not the first time it's happened.

Anyway, to make a long story....well, not so long.....on the walk home from their house, I informed light of my life that she was grounded for the rest of the week. That meant she couldn't play at M's house and M couldn't come over to play at our house. The first time she could play again would be on Saturday. Boy, was she pissed. I also informed her that she had to eat her hamburger and tater tots I bought her on Tuesday night no matter what. She was so upset.

This was the perfect week to ground her though. She had dance class on Tuesday night, she was over at my grandmother's last night, tonight she has full dress rehearsal and tomorrow night is her recital. It's not like she had time to play anyway. Of course, she doesn't realize that. This morning she said "I'm so glad this week's almost over. My grounding ends Saturday". At least it weighs on her mind.

Was I too harsh or was that just right? I don't want her growing up taking advantage of other people and she needs to learn to do what I tell her. I figured this was an appropriate gesture and figured she was old enough to grasp the implications and consequences that a grounding brings. What do y'all think?

Anyway, that's all I got for today.

Later,

Mama Dawg