CurrentMom

Stranger Danger: When Do YOU Open the Door?

Family Friday

On a lazy Saturday morning a few weeks ago, I was blow-drying my hair while my husband tooled around on the computer.  My five-year-old daughter, who had been downstairs with her brothers watching the usual weekend cartoons, suddenly padded into our room. She handed me a piece of paper and chirped in her Munchkin-esque voice, "Some strangers told me to give you this."  

Whaaaat???

"What strangers?" I gasped.

"The strangers at the door."

"You opened the front door?"

"Uh-huh."

"You’re not supposed to do that!" I sputtered.

"Sorry," she shrugged.

With the hair dryer on, I didn’t hear any doorbell.  My husband said he did, but didn't feel like answering it and assumed no one else would either.

Heart pounding, I grabbed the piece of paper.  Oh, thank God – Jehovah’s Witnesses, promising a beautiful, peaceful new world.  I'm sure they're trained not to come inside – they might end up meeting their Maker sooner than planned.

"Were they boys or girls?" I demanded.  I'm pretty sure they travel in same-sex pairs.  Why am I asking this?  Does it really matter?

"Boys."  Oh, great.

"How old were they?  Were they more like teenagers, or more like Grandma's age?"  Dumb question – they're always young.

"I don’t know," she shrugged again.  Twenty, seventy, what's the difference?

"Well, don't open the door again unless you're with one of us!"

"Oh-kay!"

The Last Throes of Cable Television?

Image via Wikipedia

Technology Thursday

In the age of Netflix and Tivo, who watches real-time cable television anymore? My husband and I were very early adopters of the Tivo. We got a free Tivo back in 2000 or 2001 for sending in a poem about why we thought Tivo was cool. (Something like that; the details are lost to history now.) We still have that Tivo although a few years later we bought a second one with more capacity. Ironically, both Tivos are now useless because earlier this year we canceled our cable television and gave away one of the two tvs. These days, we figure we'll watch "tv" by waiting for episodic television that we're interested in to be released on DVD, and then we'll Netflix it. This summer, though, we even paused our Netflix subscription for a few months because we simply were not spending any time watching anything.

Our schedules haven't lightened up any, really, but we're both so worn out that we re-activated Netflix a few weeks ago just to give ourselves some mindless downtime watching movies or tv now and then. Netflix is but one of many examples of new technologies and new business models trumping old ones, and potentially eventually killing off an entire industry.

A Working Mom's Unexpected Reward

 Work Wednesday

Just this week, as the reality of back-to-school and my new schedule set in, I started to feel frazzled about work. It's the busy season in my office, and, somehow, all of those projects I said I would do in September - after vacation, after my daughter started kindergarten, after our late-summer company went home - came due. And figuring out how to do them all on what I've called my "less-than-full-time but not-exactly part-time mommy-friendly schedule" stretched even my multitasking abilities. 

The result was not pretty.  Several days closeted in my office pretending I wasn't there while I typed in the dark. One incredibly late night (perhaps it was morning?) at the home computer. And a trail of crumpled drafts, coffee cups, yellow stickies and what can only be described as decaying matter all over, under, and around my desk. (Another outcome. This shorter-than-usual blog post.)

So, I was surprised and thrilled to receive an award yesterday at my agency's annual awards ceremony.  The award - for excellence in supervision - came with an engraved plaque, some extremely kind (and clearly puffed up) words about my accomplishments, and a promise of cash in my next paycheck. 

Now, before you get excited, the cash is nothing like the kinds of bonuses Wall Street types continue, still, to pocket.  I work for the government, after all.  (But wait, didn't a lot of that big bonus money come from the government too?) 

Let's just say that it's enough to splurge on a very nice present and a special date with my husband.  But not enough to fund early retirement.  (Not that I'd want to retire.  Or opt-out.  For the blog topic I was going to write about this week but didn't, see Friday's New York Times article declaring the end of the opt-out revolution among affluent, educated women, Recession Drives Women Back to the Work Force.)

Travel Morocco...

Travel Tuesday; Travel Morocco

 

Only yesterday I received an email, from a New Zealand based address, asking the following:

“Hi there – this is a bit cheeky I know, but I am trying to organise a trip to Spain and Morocco for myself and my two daughters and I came across an itinerary that looks startlingly similar to the one I was planning, and it happens to be yours…”

It then went on to ask for recommendations etc.

 

How flattering? How unexpected? And just how I like it!

 

My response therefore was that I was happy to oblige.

(I do appreciate a bit of boldness!)

 

My response was, in case there are any others of you that would be keen on sourcing the same information…

“Here is a blog entry that will help you on your way.... click

http://www.theentrepreneurialmother.com.au/blog/index.php?m=20090324 for the itinerary. In fact, if you start from the entry on 24 March and work onwards, you'll be able to follow all of our adventure; what worked and what didn't. If you want to ask something specific, feel free.”

 

Interestingly enough, I had just provided the same information to a mother I know through Daughters swimming club. She had decided enough was enough; and went off on a three-week adventure with her travel buddy. The 4 children and husband stayed at home, fending for themselves and each other beautifully. The three weeks came and went without a hitch. I greatly suspect though that said mother was far more appreciated upon her return than she was before she left…

 

I’m also very pleased to say that one of our particular escapades has made it to the “Arrivals + Departures” magazine, July/August edition. Once you get past  “Now Boarding”, locate the story noted on the front cover “Fez – Lost in the Medina”. It’s a fabulous story, which was created (as were the photos) by the father of our travel buddies. In fact Daughter and I were quite chuffed to see it there (NB the “Denise” mentioned in the story is yours truly).

 

Morocco is such a wonderful, mysterious, colourful, fragrant, lively, and exotic place that any of the words written about it really only scratch the surface. You’re just going to have to go and find out for yourself!

 

Happy Travels

the entrepreneurial mother™

School Night Recipe: Best Black Bean Soup

Meal Monday

It's actually kind of cold today. I'm wearing long pants and a hoodie and socks. OMG, summer is over! Cedar has started preschool -- which is bittersweet, of course -- and the days are getting shorter. Leisurely meals on the deck are behind us; we have to focus on how to get easy, nutritious meals on the table stat. Time to pull out my black bean soup recipe! 
 
In these times of lean economics and fatty bums, a lot of us could do with incorporating more beans into the weekly menu. They are cheap (99 cents a can, wow!), easy (especially if you are slack like me and only use canned beans), and super nutritious. A single cup of black beans has almost 15 grams each of protein and fiber, and only 1 gram of fat. They are also as rich in cancer-preventing flavonoids as the lauded red wines (although without the fun side effects). Remember, to form a complete protein, pair beans with a grain of some sort.
 
If you have difficulty at the bottom end of things, soaking and rinsing beans (this means using dried) or using beano can assuage some of the issues. Definitely worth the trouble to keep beans in the dietary mix.

So now that I've reminded you of the black bean's status as a super food, here is my super easy and delicious black bean soup recipe. My very non-vegetarian family loves this stuff, and my very non-Martha stepmom actually makes it on a regular basis. What other convincing do you need?