The zoo is for the birds

There used to be a tiny water park called Wyandot Lake across from the Columbus Zoo. For a very cheap price, you could enjoy the water slides and the kid friendly dry rides such as the scrambler, spider ride, merry-go-round, and even a small roller coaster that brought squeals from the kids as they felt the thrill of their first trip down a steep hill. We bought season passes there for several years and have wonderful memories of that great little park.

Several years ago, the zoo purchased (and ruined) Wyandot Lake. They named it Zoombezi Bay and the price to get in is $24.99......if you're under the age of 10. If you're unlucky enough to be 10 years or older, the price is a whopping $29.99. And don't forget the $5 to park your car. That means it costs a small fortune for a family of any size to go to this park. Granted, those prices are comparable to Kings Island and Cedar Point, but here's what you might not know.....the price of admission to Zoombezi Bay does not include any of the dry rides! Thanks to Jack Hanna, you're now required to buy individual ride tokens or an all-day ride pass at exorbitant prices. That's not a theme park. That's a county fair. And that's ridiculous.

So why can we be found at Zoombezi Bay for one day in August every year? Because we get free tickets. Which brings me to how we spent our Saturday......

As we pulled out of our driveway, A said, "Let's try to make it through one day without it turning into a blog for mom." (But nobody knocked on wood.) Therefore, when my husband tried to use leftover tickets from 2009 "just to see if it would work" and he got scolded by the gate attendant and then tried to blame K, none of us were surprised. When we were having a family picture taken in the Lazy River and K's nose spouted blood like a geyser, nobody was shocked. (PS. I now understand where they get the saying that blood is thicker than water.....her blood floated along the current for quite awhile.) When we exited the river, we were followed by a tiny deeply tanned man who was wearing two pairs of sweatpants and had goggles on his head. Nothing out of the ordinary, right? While sitting in his lawn chair, my husband crossed his leg and kicked the headrest out from under the kid who was sitting in the chair in front of him. He didn't realize what he had done until the very angry father of the kid turned his very angry glares toward him......and I laughed so hard I peed my bathing suit. At lunch K lost her tooth eating cheese puffs and proceeded to vomit in the parking lot beside our van and quickly dove back in when we realized that seagulls have zero standards when it comes to what they're willing to eat. K's tooth is either flying somewhere over Columbus or on someone's windshield by now. Just another day in our world.

We're not big fans of the zoo section. Not because we believe that animals should be free to roam the wild or anything. Frankly, I think they've got it pretty good in the zoo. My dislike of the zoo stems from my dislike of crowds. Stick me on a path on a hot day with hundreds of people stampeding from exhibit to exhibit and I'm not a happy momma. Throw in the occasional slow moving scooter or heaven forbid a newlywed couple who refuses to drop hands and I have flashbacks of our nightmare trip to Disney World and I become enraged. But the zoo recently added a polar bear exhibit and the boys in our family were bouncing around with excitement to see them. So we girls tagged along to see what the big fuss was about.

The only thing worse than those crowds of tourists, slow scooters, and lovebirds crowding down a hot path, is when that same group is trying to fit down a crowded ramp, but we forged ahead to please the boys. We ended up underneath a giant glass wall & ceiling of water that was full of fish happily swimming and mocking the stupid humans who were choosing to stand in a hot hole underground and watch them. I waited about a minute before angrily asking where the infamous polar bear was and was answered with a lot of excited people pointing their fingers and saying, "There's his foot!" (Are you freakin kidding me?) I decided that bear had exactly 5 minutes to dazzle us or we were heading back to the bay to bleed in the Lazy River some more.

Finally, the bear plunged into the fishy water to the delighted gasps of his underground fans, chased a few fish, mooned us with a giant spread of his legs, and climbed back out. Admittedly, it was kind of cool and I found myself smiling in spite of myself. My husband turned around and asked if I took a picture. I looked down at the camera that was hanging around my neck (speaking of tourist, right?) and I realized I hadn't gotten one single shot. Oops. He looked like a little boy whose balloon had just popped. (Take it easy, Chuckles.) He told me I'd just missed getting a once in a lifetime picture. (Drama runs deep in our family. Notice the picture posted at the top right? It's called 'Google' so please calm down.)

Having seen a bear we were ready to go back to the water side of the park where we belong. Having fought the crowds to get to the bear, I was running short on patience to get out. I finally decided to enact my personal motto that was pretty effective in Disney World and equally as effective at the zoo. It goes something like this: "She who has the stroller, has the right of way." And it works, too......

Husband giveth, and Husband taketh away......

One summer afternoon back in 2001, my husband arrived home from work having cleared out our savings account and towing 2 jet skis behind his car. All without my knowledge. His explanation was that a buddy from work was selling them and he had to make a decision quick because another guy was also interested in them. (If you haven't figured it out yet, my husband is the type of guy who telemarketers and used car salesman dream of.) Needless to say, this was followed by a fight. Savings account aside, our 3 kids at the time ranged in age from 2 to 7, so from a mom's perspective, this didn't seem like an appropriate 'jet ski' phase of life. But it was done and we were the (angry) owners of 2 pieces of water craft that neither of us had ever ridden, much less owned before. This could only spell disaster......

The first time we took them out to the local reservoir we opted to go without the kids. (The less people injured in this process the better, right?) We got them into the water, got em started up, and we slowly journeyed out of the no wake zone into the wide open water.....and then we let those suckers rip. And as much as I hated to admit it, I was having a blast! But I turned around and noticed my husband sitting in the middle of the water not moving so I headed back in his direction. Just as I got close enough to ask him what was wrong, his jet ski (with him on it) silently and slowly rolled upside down and he disappeared under the water. I'd like to say that the first thing that crossed my mind at that point was concern but I couldn't get past the fact that I'd seen manatees at the zoo roll over exactly like that. (You can't help what goes through your mind, people.) His head, topped with his Ohio State hat all askew, popped out of the water and he was pissed. It turns out his engine sucked up his tow rope and that thing was dead. He managed to roll it back over and was trying to get it restarted while I circled him with my jet ski so that he didn't get hit by a passing boat. I thought I was doing a nice thing so I was stunned when he suddenly screamed, "QUIT CIRCLING ME LIKE A D*** SHARK!!!!" (Yikes.) That left me with only one option.....I rode to some open water nearby and enjoyed my jet ski.

He wasn't having any luck getting it fixed so he started trying to swim it in. He'd push it, swim till he caught up with it, push it again, and swim some more. From where I was, this didn't look like the best idea, but I wasn't about to say a word. Finally a passing boat took pity on him. He got on his jet ski and held onto a rope while they slowly towed him in. I was following behind and began to notice that his jet ski was slowly starting to sink. It was getting lower and lower into the water as they pulled him along. By the time they reached the dock, all you saw of my husband was his shoulders and head being pulled behind a boat while he used his legs to desperately cling to his jet ski that was completely immersed under the water. Just when you think things couldn't get any worse, as the boat pulled alongside the dock, he and his jet ski floated straight under it......um, that could have gone better......

He didn't say anything on the ride home and I tried not to glow from my newly discovered love of a jet ski. We took them out several more times and each time, without fail, I had a blast and he didn't. Maybe someone should have discussed this purchase with me first, hmmm? Maybe someone learned their lesson about first talking to me about major decisions.....or maybe not. I came home one day to find that the jet skis weren't in our driveway anymore. I ran inside thinking someone had stolen them only to have him tell me that he donated them.....to Amvets. (Insert another fight here.)

Don't get me wrong, it's not just the jet skis. This is our pattern. He gets excited about something that I don't want, buys it despite my protests, I end up falling in love with it, he ends up hating it, and he gets rid of it. (ie; the Bow Flex machine that was going to get him a "beach body by June of 2006"......I ended up using it every day only to come home and find it in our garage sale.)

I'd like to say he's learned his lesson but I'd be lying. So for my own protection, I'm the one that learned the lesson. Last year he wanted to buy a used weight lifting machine. The enormous kind that you should only find in your local YMCA. The game played out......I told him we didn't have room for it; he promised himself a beach body and dreams of an increased batting average in softball......it's sitting in our rec room. He's used it twice. He has no idea that I've been using it 5 days a week for over a year. I complain to him often how much I hate it and beg him to get rid of it. That assures me that it won't end up at Goodwill.

I'd love to tell you that I have a beach body as a result of that machine. No such luck, although I did lose 25 lbs with its help. (I wish I could thank him.) But he was right about one thing. I've never hit softballs so far in all my life......

Lessons I learned from a pool full of algae

We have an in-ground pool. It took us several years to master the art of caring for an in-ground pool but I like to think we did it. This year in particular has gone very smoothly because we chose to open it in April, which is extremely early, but by doing so we were able to get the chemicals balanced before any algae had time to develop when the warm weather hit. Algae is a pool owner's worst enemy. Green water is our nightmare. To stay ahead of the algae is always the goal.

Two weeks ago I spotted some green shading in our deep end. (Uh oh.) I quickly checked my chemical levels and realized that due to the humidity and lots of extra swimming, the chlorine was practically non-existent so I quickly added some. Unfortunately, the following day, the deep end looked like a swamp. After attempting our own chlorine treatments with no success, my husband headed to Classic Pools where he bought a chemical called Yellow Out. Magically, the following day the pool was cleaner and bluer than it had been all season! So I started calling that the Magic Chemical. (I'm pretty clever that way.)

All was well until the following weekend when I noticed that darn color green again and by Sunday the entire pool was a full blown swamp complete with a lizard, I kid you not. This time, we took a water sample to Knickerbocker. They tested the water, said everything was fine, and told us to dump 6 gallons of chlorine in and the problem would magically go away. We did as we were told and the pool actually looked worse the next day so back to Classic Pools I went with a water sample and a request for some more Magic Chemical. When she tested the water she said, "You have a zero alkalinity level. If you don't address that problem, it won't matter how much Chlorine or Magic Chemical you pour into your pool. Your problem will continue to get worse until you deal with the root issue."

Over the next several days, I was forced to face my inner struggle with impatience as I drove back and forth, 30 minutes each way, to Classic Pools once and sometimes twice a day as I worked on slowly increasing our alkaline. In the meantime, the swamp remained in our backyard on one of the hottest most humid weeks of the summer. Three days later I finally got the go ahead to purchase and add the Magic Chemical, but this time I read the instructions on the bottle and realized I'd skipped a couple of important steps. So I carefully followed every step this time and voila, the pool is blue again.

I couldn't miss some very obvious correlations between my dealings with my algae pool and my spiritual life. I'm no Beth Moore and I'm actually quite nervous about even attempting to explain what God showed me, so please forgive me if it comes across muddled and confusing. Here goes......

"Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him." John 7:38

Those words were spoken by Jesus. I am a believer and a follower of Jesus Christ, therefore, according to this verse, streams of living water flow from within me. But I'm a human being. I'm not perfect and my life is full of sin.

So indulge me for just a second while in my simple-minded way of thinking I compare myself to a swimming pool:

1. It only takes a tiny spore of sin to give Satan a foothold allowing him to spread it wildly through me to where I'm green, cloudy, and unattractive, therefore I require regular maintenance. I need to be in communication with my Savior on a daily basis.

2. Extreme conditions require an extra amount of maintenance to stay ahead of a problem. During particularly stressful times in my life or when I'm feeling especially vulnerable, attacked or tempted, I need to increase my connection with the Lord.

3. You have to treat the root of the problem and make sure your foundation is secure on the inside before you'll notice a visible difference on the outside. There are plenty of people and places out there who claim to have the Magic Chemical and are willing to fill your ears with what you want to hear to get a quick fix of happiness, success, financial gain, and a stress free life. But those will leave you feeling disappointed, empty, continually searching, and constantly frustrated because until you deal with the real issue and secure your foundation, those attempts will be temporary and ineffective.

4. Read and follow all of the directions, not just the ones that appeal to your immediate need. God gave us the instruction manual. It's the Bible. It's hard, it's scary, and it makes us uncomfortable at times. It hits me where it hurts and it requires me to change from within. It's difficult and it's painful and sometimes I don't like to do it. That's just the truth. But I don't read it because it makes me feel good. I read it because I need it.

5. Our pool gets a regular stream of visitors on a weekly basis. I love sitting outside, visiting with other moms while our kids play together, and weekend cookouts typically happen at our house during the summer so as to enjoy the cool refreshing fun of our pool and share it with others. But over the course of this algae problem I've been unable to invite anyone over. It's not that algae is particularly dangerous. Haven't we all swam in a lake or two in our time? So why didn't we continue to swim and invite others to join us? Partly out of embarrassment. Nobody wants to display their ugly green pool. But I can't imagine someone's reaction if we invited them to a cookout at our house and they walked into our backyard and saw the giant swamp while we pretend that it's perfectly healthy and beautiful. You can't hide algae and pretend that it isn't there even if you choose to ignore it. Sin has the same effect. It will cause us to withdraw from our source of strength out of embarrassment, shame, or even denial that it exists.

6. Through this entire process we loved our pool and never once wished we didn't have it. We knew this was a natural part of the risk of pool ownership and as frustrating as it was we knew we could get it turned around again. My friends didn't stop loving me because my pool had algae and they were there for me as I vented to them my frustrations at the length of time it took to clean it up. When I fail and find myself wallowing in my own sin, God never once regrets creating me or stops loving me. He surrounds me with family and friends who love me in spite of my sin and support me during my cleaning up process no matter how long it may take.

Thank you for bearing with me as I compared my life with Jesus to my swimming pool. I have no idea if I articulated it well or if it had any impact whatsoever, but I truly believe that God wanted me to type this post so there must have been a reason behind it. My prayer is that God took over my typing fingers and put what He wanted on the screen and left me completely out of it.

So with that in mind, please refer any negative comments to Him...... (Okay, that one was all me.)

The "NO!" Zone

A few days ago, my husband and I took the kids to a small water park with his parents and two of our nieces who are visiting from out of state. When I say small water park, I'm talking three slides, a small lazy river, a main pool complete with a diving board, and a couple of nice toddler areas. The park is called "The Splash Zone" and since we're huge fans of any sized body of water, and our home pool is currently fighting an algae problem, my husband took 1/2 day off work and we were ready for a day of fun in the water.

We found lounge chairs to park our towels and headed off in different directions. The older kids ran off to get in line for the slides while my in-laws joined my husband and me with C in her toddler area. I glanced over to check on the older bunch and saw my A with her arms over her head and turning in circles as a lifeguard inspected her. (What in the world?) Then I noticed Z and K heading our way and they were soon joined by A. Their suits had been denied. (You've got to be kidding me.) Z's trunks had a pocket. (Gasp!) And A and K's suits were held together in the back by a tiny plastic clip. They either couldn't ride or had to go to the concession stand and get them cut out of their suits with a pair of scissors. Despite my mother-in-law's ingenious efforts at disguising these 'flaws', my kids suits were denied three more times before we reluctantly headed to the hot dog / scissor stand. By the time the suits were 'acceptable under Splash Zone law', Z's suit looked like he'd been attacked by a small cougar and the girls suits were awkwardly tied behind their necks regardless of the fact that they weren't made to do that. But they passed inspection each and every time the entire day long.....and let me assure you, they were inspected each and every time, the entire day long.

At the top of each hour the kids had to take a break and only adults could swim. At 1pm, while the kids took their break, my husband and I headed to the lazy river with his parents and opted to walk laps rather than ride in a tube. We were the only ones in there and it was great. At 2pm an announcement came over the loud speaker that the use of tubes in the lazy river was mandatory during break. (Wonder who they were talking to?) They also announced at each break that parents needed to check their kids diapers and that was followed with the rule that you have to use the bathrooms because you're not allowed to change their diapers in the public area and they topped it off with the threat to shut the park down for the rest of the day if there were any accidents. (I'm totally serious here.) My husband said, "This park has to be owned by __________ or ___________." (I won't repeat what he said but I have to say I totally agree with his prediction.)

My husband swims in trunks, a tank top, and his baseball cap. He always has, he always will. A couple hours into the day, he was approached by a manager and she asked him what his tank top was made of. After several seconds of awkward silence while he stood there staring at her, she clarified by asking if it was cotton. He answered yes. She then informed him that he would have to remove it before getting in the water. After a short argument that ended with him dramatically rolling his eyes at her and an under the breath mumble that included the word idiot, we added yet another ridiculous rule to their list of ridiculous rules. Cotton tank tops are not allowed.....as opposed to polyester, I guess.

Z and his cousin, a fellow gymnast, got lots of angry tweets from the lifeguard's whistle with their stunts off the diving board but that happens everywhere so we're pretty used to it. That's why he always saves his impressive handstand move till the end of the day when it's pretty useless to kick him out. And seeing as a pocket on his trunks caused such an uproar, a handstand might be grounds for corporal punishment or something.

I saved the best for last. The park has a round pool area. When you enter, a jet stream of water causes a current that pushes everyone around the circle. (Looking at it from above, it looks like a big pot of children at full boil.) It's fun but obviously has some potential for danger and/or injury therefore, a lifeguard is posted right by the pot. Suddenly we heard the Lifeguard stationed there yell at a child, "Hey! Keep your head above the water!" (Now there's a new Lifeguard approach. If you see someone drowning, yell at them. It's called tough love, people.)

So on a scale of 1-10, I rate "The Splash Zone" in Springfield a 4. Why so high, you might ask? Because if you enjoy pissing people off, this is the place for you. All you have to do is wear pockets or cotton, have the nerve to walk around the lazy river, check your child's diaper in public, or heaven forbid not check it at the top of each hour. And you certainly better not drown. But whatever you do, they better not catch you having fun......you might get kicked out for that. But on the upside, it wasn't crowded at all. Gee, I can't imagine why.......

So much time, so little to do.

I suck as a house keeper. That felt good to get off my chest. I'd like to believe that I'm a little better than what I grew up with and more than likely my kids will be a little better than me. (Assuming that clutter falls away little by little with each generation.) Don't get me wrong, I really try, but I get so accustomed to the way something looks that it eventually seems normal. It usually takes me getting burned (aka; embarrassed) by a situation before it gets added to my 'to-do' list.

For example; 3 years ago I had a client show up unexpectedly for a massage because she had the wrong date written down. Not a problem since I almost always have my massage room up and ready for last minute calls. The problem arose when she asked if she could use the bathroom first, (CRAP!!!!), and I found myself racing her down the hallway to get there first. To this day, my bathroom gets completely straightened every morning.

We've had a terrible time getting our satellite service installed properly. The 4th service man was here last week and he informed me that he had to enter the closet in our downstairs level to reach some cables. (Yikes.) When he opened the door he said, "Wow, is this where the other 3 repairmen ended up?" I said, "No. They're under our new concrete patio and I'd suggest you keep your comments to yourself because I could always use another patio."

For the most part, I like a straightened house. My cleaning day is Monday. (It used to be Friday but by Monday mornings my house takes on a 'Frat' look after a weekend with my family so I switched.) What cleaning means to me is a big time straightening of everything, scouring bathroom and kitchen counter tops, the toilet (of course), and dusting & vacuuming. (Not sure why I waste my time with the dusting thing since that returns by Tuesday.)

Wednesday is my laundry day. The kids know to have their baskets downstairs or it doesn't get done until the following Wednesday. (I refuse to live in my laundry room.)

And every other Tuesday I mop and launder the towels & bathmats. You might notice in my little nutshell of a cleaning schedule that washing the sheets wasn't mentioned. Let me assure you that between vomit, urine, un-capped markers, and nose bleeds, everyone's sheets get washed eventually.

My husband, who hardly ever shaves and refuses to keep track of my mopping schedule, has the habit of shaving shortly after I mop, leaving tons of tiny whiskers all over the floor. It never fails. Last month in a fit of rage I yelled, "I MOP EVERY OTHER TUESDAY! PICK A TIME TO SHAVE RIGHT NOW!" He calmly said, "I choose every other Tuesday evening." (I guess I asked for that.) So I've come to accept that my family looks at a freshly mopped floor as an artist looks at an empty canvas.

Don't expect my house to pass a white glove test. There are things I'd love to change but I'm simply not motivated enough to do it. You might find dishes downstairs from where we eat in front of the television. I realize that goes against everything you read in 'the books' but the day C stood up in her high chair, announced that she was done, removed her underwear and tossed them onto my husband's plate , eating at the table became less appealing.

So you might be wondering how I spend my days as a full time stay at home mom. That's easy.....I spend it with my husband and my kids. I try to have dinner ready when my husband gets home from work. I love to date him even if that just means cups of coffee on the patio or a private dinner for 2 upstairs while the kids eat downstairs. We love family time. We swim. We play a ridiculous amount of Cornhole in the backyard. We love to have drive-in movies and bonfires outside at night. In the winter we can be found in front of the fireplace playing board games that have been known to turn violent. In June, I began a tradition of 2am Wii golf tournaments with Z and K and if you can't find me, I'm probably reading with A up in her bed. (And I frequently fall asleep there, too.) In my opinion, all of these things are time well spent. In a home that includes children ranging in age from toddler to teenagers, I realize that kids don't need less attention the older they get. They just need a different kind.

So here I sit on my 'mopping' Tuesday with un-mopped floors. Know why? Because my husband is coming home from work early and we're taking the kids to a water park which means that 'mopping Tuesday' probably won't happen till Wednesday this time and I'm okay with that. Because someday, (hopefully many years from now), when I'm lying on my death bed I don't predict that I'll be wishing that I'd had a cleaner house. I do predict, however, that I won't regret not playing Cornhole with my kids when they ask.....because I always do.

Spare me

Z enrolled our family in the 'Kids Bowl Free' summer program....the idea being, that kids bowl free...just in case you couldn't follow. For an added $25, 4 adults can bowl "free" too. Of course it wasn't until after we signed up and paid on-line that we realized shoe rental wasn't included and with 4 kids this quickly turned into our most expensive free summer program to date.

He found a bowling alley in a neighboring town nearby. (And by 'nearby' I mean 25 minutes because we can't get anywhere in under 25 minutes and we're getting used to that fact.) Yesterday the kids and I headed out for some bowling bonding time on a rainy afternoon. Z drove and with the help of our handy GPS, we found it pretty easily. We pulled up to a tiny windowless building and sat there staring in confusion as to how a bowling alley fit in there. And if this neighboring town has a 'bad part', this bowling alley was in it. Just as I was about to voice my concern Z mentioned that the building reminded him of something out of the holocaust. (He makes occasional holocaust references thanks entirely to the obsession of his screwed up 8th grade Language Arts teacher, but that's another story. We're getting used to it by now.)

We nervously headed inside to find what is probably the cutest bowling alley ever. I think it had 10 lanes, one of which was being used by a group of 4 kids, another by a small family, and an elderly woman working behind the counter. There was even a 'sports bar' in the far corner which consisted of a tiny bar with about 3 stools, complete with a television. Along the far wall was a series of racks full of balls that were organized by color. Nice.

We approached the friendly looking Grandma behind the counter and in an effort to save 2 bucks I gave her my sweetest face and asked if C could just bowl in her socks. She shot me down. When I pointed out that her feet are so little, she magically produced a tiny pair of size 7 that fit C perfectly. (Sigh.) Then she said, "Let me see which lane is open." Confused, I turned to look behind me and it was very obvious to me that 8 of the 10 were 'open' but what do I know? She hooked us up on Lane 7 and we started to bowl. When the family next to us noticed C struggling with the weight of her ball, and the tantrums that would accompany our attempts to help her, the mom tipped me off that 'Grandma behind the counter' has a toddler ball. When I asked about it, 'Grandma' shot me down again and said she doesn't like to get that out. So much for the 'friendly' Grandma. I informed 'Grandma' that C's heavy ball is going to bang pretty hard when she throws it and she recommended that I help her bowl.....hmmm.....maybe if she were allowed to bowl in her socks, that would be an option, but I paid for shoes, damn it. Clearly, Grandma and I were about to butt heads.

We spent the next 3 hours bowling 2 games.....that's right, 3 hours to bowl 2 games. Mainly thanks to C's balls rolling a whopping point 9 miles an hour. (I didn't know a speed under one could even register.) Sometimes her ball would stop part way down and slowly roll back to her, causing her to squeel with delight that she got 'another turn.' Sometimes the ball would stop dead in it's tracks right in the middle of the lane and as it turns out, when I stepped out onto the greased lane to get it, I received more un-wanted one on one attention from Grandma. But occasionally her ball would actually make it to the pins and in one rare moment, she bowled herself a spare. And we loudly cheered in the dead quiet of the tiny bowling alley, causing the one man sitting at the 'sports bar' to turn and glare. No apology, dude, we paid for her shoes. (I can't seem to get past that.....)

But at the end of the day, the kids and I had a blast together and tons of memories were made, and as an added bonus, they got to see the inner workings of a small town bowling alley. In the 3 hours we spent there observing, we realized that Grandma was the Jack of all trades. She not only signed people in and forced their shoes on them, but she was also the cook, (microwaved fries, anyone?), the waitress, (fries were accompanied by a high five from Grandma, for a small fee, I'm sure), she was the DJ and kept the juke box hopping, and she was even the bar maid. (Her creepiest job by far.) Surprisingly, the lanes were automatic and we didn't see Grandma setting the pins back up or rolling our balls back to us. Unfortunately, the little blower to dry my bowling fingers didn't work.....maybe that was Grandma's job too.....um, never mind.

Couch to 5k...and back to the couch....

There's a program out there called 'Couch to 5k.' The general idea seems to be that with the help of this website, you can not only get your butt off the couch, but that you'll soon be able to run a 5k.

A friend recently mentioned that she's utilizing this system to attempt to run one. I didn't know what a 'k' was or why in the world anyone would want to run 5 of them, but as it turns out it's 3 miles. (I guess 5k sounds more impressive than 3m.) She's one of my few friends that lives in our vicinity, which is to say that she also lives out in the middle of nowhere. She asked me if I'd like to join her on a training run around her block. (Her 3-mile block compared to my 5-mile block would probably classify her as living in an actual neighborhood.)

Although I wouldn't say that I'm in shape, I also don't consider myself an exercise virgin. According to a medical chart I could probably stand to lose 30 lbs. According to my standard I would like to lose 20, but in reality I'm only motivated to try to lose 10 and I'm not holding my breath about those.

My routine involves working out 6 days a week. Three of those days are spent circuit training with my elliptical machine and an upper body weight workout. Two days include circuit training with my treadmill and a lower body weight workout. And on Saturday I do some form of cardio and I try to vary that up to keep it interesting. Add onto all of that swimming laps several days a week, occasionally riding my bike, playing for our co-ed softball team, and sometimes when I'm in the mood to completely humiliate myself and my children, I put on my roller blades and push C in her stroller......up and down our driveway.....it's a real treat for passing motorists. Looking at this list of activities and admitting that I still can't lose 10 lbs can bring me to only one conclusion.....I love to eat. I love to eat. I love to eat. Did I mention how much I love to eat?

Anyway, I agreed to train with Mandi one day. She emailed me the Couch to 5k program, but I didn't read it. I'm not a runner, but how hard could it be, right? We began with a 5 minute warm up walk and the plan was to run until we reached the first stop sign. (Approximately 3 minutes.) No problem. Let's go. I immediately became aware of why I don't run. There isn't a sports bra out there that could keep me from bouncing, there just isn't. And do they make a sports bra for your butt cheeks? Not to my knowledge. So I found myself painfully bouncing alongside my very fit friend and the blasted stop sign we were aiming for seemed to get further and further away. I can't imagine what I sounded like clomping along beside her, but at one point she recommended I try breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth which leads me to believe I may have been gasping for air. Probably a safe assumption since my throat was burning after about a minute. In a state of complete embarrassment, I had to go back to walking.

During my second lame attempt at running I realized that my bladder was bouncing as hard as the rest of me and finally admitted to her that I had to pee.....bad. You know you have a true friend when she helps you find a secluded patch of trees and stands watch for cars while you drop trou and relieve yourself. There she was out in the middle of her 5k and stuck with an out-of-shape-bouncy-heavy-breather who couldn't make it from here to there without having to urinate.

We attempted one more run but when she warned me of the on-coming car and I was tempted to dive into it's path, I realized that running wasn't for me and we walked the rest of the way. Now that was enjoyable. We walked pretty fast, or so I think, and we could actually hold a conversation.

When I got home I decided that I could utilize our country block too and began walking each evening with my husband and A and occasionally K and Z join us on bikes with C in her carrier on the back. (There's even a cornfield on the back stretch of secluded country road for those times I have to pee.) I apologized to Mandi for wrecking one of her training days but in the end it motivated us to exercise as a family and spend some wonderful quality time together.

I'm committed to my continued attempt to lose 10 of my pounds, I'm committed to spending time with my family, and most important of all, I'm committed to never never ever ever ever running a 5k......and it's all about commitment, am I right?