will oona's hair ever grow?

Why did I think it would be less stressful to stay at home for the holidays? Granted we don't need to drive all over Pennsylvania and I don't need to panic about being on the highways in the snow but now I get to panic about everyone coming over here for Christmas dinner. I've already bought paper plates, cups and napkins - completely tacky I know but my dishpan hands, which at this point are so rough I snagged the silk on a couple of ties I was looking at for Toby (didn't purchase those) and we don't have a dishwasher, aside from me, so paper it is. We still have to figure out what to cook, Toby's was thinking of cooking a goose but since he's the only gourmand in the crowd I think that would be a bit of a waste. I didn't order enough holiday cards to send out so I've got to figure out something for the remaining dozen people on my list - aghhh.

I went to meet with Owen's teacher last week for another parent teacher conference. The first conference was a home visit where Miss S- and her assistant, the kindly but unhelpful, Mr. G- came over and I proceeded to go on about Toby playing Grand Theft Auto on the Xbox... don't even ask. Toby was like, are you trying to make me out to be a total gangster parent? Did you tell him I also studied Philosophy? Yes, I did because I felt so bad of the picture I portrayed of him at the Xbox. Oh well... So at this more recent conference, Miss S- mentioned that Owen told Mr. G- he believed in God out of the blue and I tried to explain why he said that. I mentioned that Toby's an atheist and his parents are religious, his Mom, in particular, is pretty conservative on her religious views. So one day Owen & I drove by a church and he asked me about 'the building with the Xes on it' and me, being me, I totally over-explained it and got into other religions as well, but was trying to impress upon him a very open-minded view of God and religion. Basically that no one religion is better than another and the concept of what God is can be unique to each person. But then I mentioned that Toby wanted to get him a t-shirt that said ‘God is dead’ and Miss S- just looked at me, thinking no doubt that poor Owen is doomed with parents like us. I don’t mean to make Toby out to be an Xbox playing, God hating heathen I think what happens is I start talking about things Toby has done or said that I think are funny- like he wanted to get Owen a t shirt saying ‘God is dead– Nietzsche, Nietzsche is dead – God’ which is funny and totally understandable coming from an atheist and a philosopher, but midway into explaining something I realize that what I’m about to say probably isn’t appropriate for the audience I’m talking to and I cut myself off but then whatever I’ve said so far just sounds awful.

I'll sign off with my heathen moment... not when I was experiencing maternal brain fog and corrected Toby by saying that Jesus was Santa's son, but when I went to Owen's school. They were having a holiday gift sale at his school in order to raise money for field trips and I went over with Oona to help him pick out some gifts for the family. Well, Oona has reached a stage of development where she screeches and arches her back wildly if she's in any area that she believes she should be allowed to walk in, so I put her down and within two seconds she yanked a tiny glass ball off the decorative tree in front of the cashier. I muttered Christ under my breath while trying to get the decoration out of her tight fist and let's just say that the cashier was none too pleased that I just said Christ in front of a bunch of 4 year olds.