Hurray! The summer is over!

Yeah, I know that there are many people out there that are sad that the summer is over but I am ready!

The kids are making me crazy!  I am tired of nagging about picking up after themselves, keeping track where everyone is, if all the summer books are read, having to feel like I need to be having “summer fun” all the time.

We didn’t take any real vacation this year.  No week down the shore.  No flying off to an exotic location. Nah, the several months long writer’s strike earlier in the year took care of that. We made sure that the kids had fun. Each had a week at an overnight camp (Girl Scout and wrestling) and we were able to get away to visit family on OH and PA for a week but overall if was a quiet summer.

Now they are bored with their summer friends and are anxious to see their school friends. We got all the school supplies, clothes and shoes over the last week or so and the backpacks are packed.  I am anxious to get back into the school schedule, too.  I like getting up early and getting a “whole” day in rather than nag kids to get up and then hearing the “I’m bored” whine.

I would like to see the summer break about one month less.  That last month is a killer.  Many activities are done by the end of July. Yeah, yeah, the football parents are involved with practice but everyone else is looking for things to do that won’t cost an arm and a leg. Back in the day, when I had a very demanding full-time job with travel, I was always beside myself with the expenses of full time day camp.

There is no need for this three month hiatus. The kids don’t have to go out and work the fields on the family farm. That is why this break evolved this way.  You needed those kids out working the back 40 so the family could eat the rest of the year. Now when I was in college I needed those three/four months so I could work like crazy to pay for the tuition for the upcoming semester.

I would love to see a trimester that many school districts have adopted. You still get breaks but they are not so incredibly long that school needs to spend the first month of school reviewing what the kids have forgotten.

Back to routine!  I am so glad!

Alive and Well

Yes, I know.  It’s been a few months since my last posts.  The reason why? None really. Just busy with life in general between my family, town stuff and now a new p/t job I recently got.

The time off has also allowed me to step back a bit and look at the big picture of this blog and my life.

I decided that I will still write as much as time permits.  A little about life in HH, politics, life in New Jersey. So I hope you will start coming back again and  help inspire me by adding your comments when you have something to say.

Congratulations!!!

Misdirected…

I live on a street off Burton.  Every year, with the exception of this one, the streets get “creamed” literally. Showers of toilet paper, eggs, shaving cream on Burton and the side streets. This year, no. And you know why? The First Reformed Church on the corner of Burton and Washington had a special “detail”.  They had several men volunteers that lined the property and just kept an eye on their church that evening.  I drove by a couple of times that night and there they were chatting, drinking coffee, watching.

Because of their presence and watchfulness the church wasn’t touched and Burton and the connecting streets had minimal “mischief”  this year. It appears, though, that the kids moved to the Blvd when they saw they were being “watched”.  I was on the Blvd that evening at the Republican headquarters and I watched the the gaggles of kids roving up and down.  The police were out and questioned kids, took eggs away, etc. but it seems that what is more effective is being “watched”.

How about instead on “Mischief” night, on the Blvd, the owners of the retail, restaurant and offices Turn the Lights on and stay open until 10:00 p.m. Hang around. Have “sales” tied into the evening. The more people out, the less likely for damage.   The First Reformed “posse” showed that.  This is a more logical answer than having a curfew that is extreme and possibly push kids to do their mischief on Halloween instead. 

“Everyone will get their wiggly eyes.”

 

That is the phrase of the day, I decided.

Where I heard it:

I went to a crafts store to pick up some picture frames.  In order to check out there is one line and a couple of registers.  Unless you know this system in the store it is a little confusing. As I was standing there an older couple went right to the register rather than stand in the waiting line. They had to have been 80+. She was using a walker and her husband was holding her purse and pushing their cart. I was the next in line. No big deal. They didn’t know. When they were finished,  I went to the register. The clerk turns to me and says, “Thank you.” I was confused. “For what?”, I ask. She says for letting the couple go ahead of you.  She then went on to say that she has seen crazy, screaming people ready to take it to the mat when other people have made the same error. She then said that she has tried to calm the people in the line by saying, “Please be calm.  Everyone will get their wiggly eyes“.  For those that don’t do kid’s crafts, those are the little plastic eyes that you glue to projects.

I know here in NJ we are known for our brusque, no nonsense way of living life. Alot of it has to do with the amount of people that are squeezed in our small state.  But our lack of patience with our fellow man spills into every aspect of our lives.  Blood pressure meds are at an all time high. Our children don’t have the ability to sit quietly and read a book or slowly hike through the woods and enjoy the quiet.

How much more pleasant our world would be if we started with the little things first and just calmed down.  How about letting a car into a traffic line? Or stop tapping your feet when a new sales clerk at Shop Rite is learning the system and is a little slower than the other clerks. How about not hitting the car horn a nanosecond after the light turns green?

Life is too short to revolve your life around those “wiggly eyes”.

Thank you to the voters!!!

Thank you to all for their support of the Hasbrouck Heights Republican Ticket!  We did it!

Dem Fiction

Lest we forget…

Dem Fiction

I just found this funny…

http://mklasing.wordpress.com/2007/11/02/christmas-traditions-treeing-someones-home-is-a-bad-idea/

Bus Stop Campaigning

Someone told me in the last couple of days that the Saccomano Group has been instructed by the Bergen County Dems to campaign at Bus Stops.  That would make sense as I saw them at 8:30 this a.m. on the Blvd. the three of them! 

Gee, can you imagine? When I used to commute by bus, waiting half-asleep at the stop, thinking about my schedule for the coming day, wishing I was back in bed, the LAST THING I WOULD EVER WANT TO SEE IS A DESPERATE POLITICIAN! And to make it worse? You can’t escape!!!

And this is why school uniforms are a wonderful thing

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119326834963770540.html?mod=todays_us_nonsub_pj

I was one of those kids in middle school that couldn’t even think of being with the “cool” kids. I learned how to make “something from nothing” for dinner to feed my younger siblings while my mother worked the late shift.  I owned 2 pairs of Sears jeans and I had to wash them out every other day so I could at least have jeans to wear. I had K-Mart sneakers. Keds? Too much money.  And then when they got holes in the bottoms I waited as long as I could to tell my mom as I knew there was sometimes no money to replace them. Cool clothes? Please. I remember learning to sew just so I could make some tops to go with the jeans and fix tears in seams.

My kids wear uniforms. I love it. It levels the playing field to some degree. Could my husband and I afford the “so-called” designer clothes now? Yeah, we can.  We have a nice home, nice cars. The kids do activities that cost $$ along with their education. Do I buy my daughter and son “designer” clothes for their off times? No. If they would like to use birthday money and such to do it, they do.  But they don’t.  We walk into the mall with a $50 gift card and my 6th grader realizes that she can only afford one shirt with that money. She doesn’t like that. She is lucky though as she is smaller than her friends and when they grow out of the Hollister shirts in 2 months, my daughter ends up with them. My son? He is into comfort.  He has to wear a shirt and tie to school so when he comes home, sweats are it for him.

Your children will emulate the values you set for them.  If you put the importance on how you look to the outside world and not work on being happy with what is on the inside and what is truly valuable to function as a member of society (compassion, generosity, faith), you will end up with another generation strung out on anti-anxiety medication.