Hello and welcome! An introduction for you: I'm a mom, wife, friend, animal-lover, and lacrosse parent who also happens to write, edit and manage a publishing company for a living. So why not start a blog, I thought? And here ya go...

July 29, 2009

Carny Thrills Now Available


I have exciting news. On my visit to the local grocery store last night, I saw a fantastic scene: guess what's popped in to my little neck of the woods? Hint: lights, rides, food on a stick, Velcro shoes. That's right. The carnival is a'comin' to town!

You know these little gypsy mini-fairs--they slink into town in the dead of night, and the following day, where there previously stood only a plot of dirt, some sparse grass and enough dust to put Arizona to shame, is now a world of garish lights, obnoxious carousel music and a passel of workers each sporting shoes with a slap-down-strap and one full set of teeth between them. None of this is meant to be derogatory, of course. I myself have Carny blood that stems back to when I hawked the games at Six Flags over Georgia as the first step in my illustrious career as a professional hawker--the written word having replaced the days of bellowing to overeager kids about the ease of winning these impossible-to-win games while their parents gave me the stink eye for doing so.

For all the cheap thrills and dusty paths created in this gaudy world, I actually love these little carnivals. I don't know if it's the food on a stick, the cotton candy (I'm a sucker for cotton candy), the atmosphere, or the 30 second thrill of taking your life in your hands as you perch atop a ride that could come tumbling down like a Jinga game any second that enchants me most. I do find myself scrutinizing the nuts and bolts that hold these rides together each time I'm in line, however. Is there some sort of Carnival safety department approving the abilities and knowledge of these Carny Ride Engineers who put these things together with just a flashlight and a Leatherman tool? I'm thinking probably so.

So we'll be trotting up to the exposition soon, I feel sure, with $107 for ride tickets, my sweet tooth, and the desire to place my life in the capable hands of my Carny brethren. Bring on the fun!

July 24, 2009

One Mean Wave


In the interest of maintaining myself as someone who will admit when I've made a mistake, I want to own up to one now so I'm not misleading anyone considering travel to the Orlando area, my current locale. (Interesting side note as I jot this from my hotel room: I'm subjected to listening to a future virtuoso practicing very wobbly scales on some type of brass instrument...over and over and over and over. What a perk!)


My previous entry was a big old rant about the outrageous cost to get into one of Disney's water parks. I discovered this price through the Disney website and found that it was $75/adult (of which 10 year olds and up were considered adults--that's still ridiculous). However, I have learned that I was incorrect. While this steep fare is accurate for the standard parks--Epcot, Magic Kingdom, etc--the cost for the water parks is actually $45/adult. I didn't realize the water parks had different pricing so I just wanted to say, in all fairness, that I misrepresented the water park cost. So while still not cheap, and still not any lower than it was when times were booming, it is $30 less than I'd have had you believe. If you're thinking of going to the non-water variety parks, still plan to shell out a portion of your life savings.

Anyway, we did go to Typhoon Lagoon yesterday and had a good time. It's a very neat water park and one of the most unique aspects of it is a gigantic wave pool that sends the most enormous wave throughout the pool every 5 minutes or so. I've seen many a wave pool but they consist of rolling waves that go on for a few minutes every 20 minutes or so. Not so here. This wave takes the cake. Starting from perfectly calm water, you hear a buzzer and then everyone in the pool screams their fool heads off. And from nowhere, you see a mass of water created that's about six feet high and comes marching through masses of people who are all screaming and losing their minds in general.


Folks body surf on this water monster and that part is pretty cool to watch except that they're body surfing into hordes of other people. Not so cool whether you're the surfer or the obstacle. Lots of chaos going on.

So in the interest of protecting life and limb, we chose not to venture out farther than about waist deep. (My cousin actually just tore her rotator cuff in said-wave-pool.) And what do you know...later in the afternoon, Chase was playing in the pool at the shallow end, body surfing in the wave that's left at about 2-3 feet deep and the thing still had so much power, it flipped him over and proceeded to drag him along the extremely rough bottom of the pool. Next thing I know, he's stumbling toward me, crying, his back covered in "road rash," bleeding in the worst spot. He also received a terrible scrape on his knee and his elbow. He looked like he'd tangled with a stretch of asphalt and most decidedly lost.

After some Anti-Sting Bactine and bandaids and a very pricey cup of ice cream, I snapped this picture, although it doesn't do the damage justice:

You can see I bribed a smile out of him with some ice cream. Ah well...what's a trip to an amusement park without also stopping into the First Aid stand? If you visit the Happiest Place on Earth and check out the monster wave, wear body armor.








July 19, 2009

Theme Park Delusions


If there was one thing I was sure of these days, it's that the economy is in the tank. You know it, I know it, you'd have to live under a rock
not to know it. So you can imagine my surprise to learn there apparently is one entity with their heads in the sand about the financial struggles going on.

Let me preface: My family reunion is next weekend so me, my favorite husband and favorite son will be heading south to Orlando. Are we flying? Nope. Train? Don't make me laugh. We have to cruise south more efficiently than that. We're hitchhiking. Going old school--schlepping luggage down the highway in 100 degree heat with our thumbs stuck out. It'll be an adventure! Alright, maybe it's not that bad. We're driving. But trust me when I say our budget isn't thrilled with the idea of a vacation right now. But it's a family reunion and I cannot let my grandmother down by missing it. So the whole trip is going to be, lets say, "on the cheap."

And then we got to thinking, since we'll be in the capital of all mega vacation spots and it's the last summer fling for my 11 year old, maybe we'd surprise our son and do something we never do during the many times we've visited Orlando to see family: go to a theme park.


Since we don't frequent these places, I had no idea what it costs to get in. Our neighborhood theme park, Six Flags, is about $40 admission usually but there are so many "offers" out there for discounted tickets, if you pay more than about $10 to get in, you got ripped off. The park clearly realizes that folks' pocketbooks are pinched tight and if they hope to have any visitors, they better make it cost effective for the people who'd like some roller coaster thrills but only if they're reasonably priced. With this as my reference, I checked online to see what the cost is for one of Disney's water parks. And here's where the delusion comes in. A one day adult admission to one of Disney's water parks costs a whopping $75. That's an awful lot of smackers and mysteriously reminiscent of the cost to get in while we all lived in economic bliss.

And look, I'm a big fat fan of Capitalism. It's why America is great--companies can make pot loads of money if they offer a great service/product people are willing to pay for. But you would also think that a company whose success comes from its patrons, there might be some slack cut when said-patrons are struggling but still want a little love, fun and It's a Small World After All in their lives. Alas, no. And get this, if you're 10 or over, you're an adult and get to pay the adult price. That's right, Chase. Go register to vote, pay your own bills, start supporting your mom, you're an adult now! Seriously? $75 to get in is ridiculous and then to slap that kind of fee on a child's admission is even worse.


It was disappointing to learn The Happiest Place on Earth continues to charge an ultra-premium price, though most folks' finances are mere fractions of what they used to be. Let me give credit where credit is due, however. If you buy more than one day's admission, you do get a discount. We don't have the funds or desire to go more than a day but if we were looking for a two day Mouseketeer excursion, we could save big bucks: 50 cents a person per day. 50 cents. For us three, $1.50. Maybe that'd buy lunch at the park.

July 14, 2009

River Tubing: Brrrrrr!


I hit the river this past weekend. My girlfriend Tracy called to see if me, my husband and son would be interested in going to North Ga with her, her husband Tom and their two boys to tube the Chestatee River. In a moment of delirium, I said Yes.

See, it's not the tubing of the river that I don't like. It's the temperature of the water that I have a strong aversion to. My river experiences consist of three trips that all have one common denominator: ridiculously cold water. First was when I was a junior in high school and our church group took a trip to Tennessee to raft the Nantahala River, a feat you should definitely be impressed by. I know I am. We wore helmets and everything. We even had a made-for-movies moment where my friend Jenny nearly fell out of the raft. After all the warnings we received about what to do if you go overboard and how you have to lay on your back and make sure you're heading downriver feet first otherwise you risk hitting your head on a rock and dying...or at the very least receiving a nice gash for which no 80s hair style would cover, we were petrified of said-falling overboard. But sure enough, we hit a rough rapid and next thing we know, I'm watching Jenny beside me, her eyes as wide as saucers, getting thrown so far out of the side of the raft, her body weight was more out than in. I reached out and grabbed her flailing hand that was straining toward me like I was the last pair of lacy white bobby socks in the store during the Madonna socks-with-heels fad. I yanked her back in and we huffed and puffed until our heart rate returned to normal.

It wasn't 20 minutes later that the one man in our boat of 6 (lucky him stuck with 5 screaming teenage girls) actually did fall out of the boat. Luckily, he kept one hand on our raft and was able to climb back in on his own. Good thing since I'm not sure all of us combined weighed as much as he did.

When white water rafting, a lot of water gets into the boat so you're supposed to pull over in the more docile areas and empty your raft. We attempted this once. We pulled to the side and everyone began to climb out. I stepped knee deep into the water and my leg immediately began to burn from the frigid water, it was that cold. Redefined "cold," actually. With a few words you probably shouldn't use on a church trip spoken at a level thankfully drowned out by the rushing water, I scrambled back in the raft faster than Tony Stewart throws a punch. We decided that a little water in the boat never hurt anything and proceeded on down the river. I'm sure the trip itself was a fun one but the cold water just spoils it for me. I'm too thin-skinned. Literally.

That's my only white water rafting experience. There is a Class 5 on the Nantahala. Take one guess whether I went down it or not. I have, however, also tubed down the Itchetucknee River in north Florida. This is a very cool thing to do and if you have good balance, I learned you can perch atop the tube, not touching the freezing water at all for the entire 4 hour trip.

Another river experience: Cave tubing in Belize. We strolled through a rain forest until we reached a point in the river that we could hop in and float down partially uncovered and then partially through caves that hung pretty low in places. Which meant no perching on the tube; I was in the actual water. Lovely. We wore hard hats that held spotlights on the front like coal miners. There were bats hanging in the caves--nearly as scary as watching Jenny's brush with river death. And of course, the water was unpleasantly cold...the part I remember most.

So now you understand why my acceptance of a trip tubing down the Chestatee River in North Ga was out of character for me. You'd think I'd have learned my lesson. But it always sounds like a neat idea and though I have 20 more years on me now, I did think I could probably still pull off my Itchetucknee balancing act, if push came to shove.

So we headed off. And I'm happy to say that the water didn't compare to Belize or the Nantahala. It wasn't balmy by any stretch but my legs weren't minutes from hypothermia while in the water either. It was a fun day--we coasted the river about three times (you could hop out at a certain point and walk a nature path back up and repeat the excursion as often as you wanted). There were a few points you had to navigate the rocks but it make for a fun challenge. Somehow most of my trips down the river, I got caught up in just the right current that I spun around and around in circles like a teacup on the Mad Hatter ride at Disney. But really, what adds more fun to a day than the possibility of vomiting? At least the water wasn't too cold this time!

July 10, 2009

Beating Down the Flames: Wild West Style


It's a good news day today--it's Friday, I'm alive, employed, and Mother Nature is clearly in a good mood. And it all kicked off swimmingly last night, thanks to an uneventful...dare I say...successful grilling episode.

Just when the outside gas grill thought it had successfully taunted me enough to keep me at a distance (the bastard), I boldly walked up, ignited that baby and cooked six--that's right, cooked, not charred--six hamburgers for the family. There were a couple stressful moments where the flames burst out and rose high thanks to remnants of grease still clinging to the grate (mmm, healthy) but luckily the oxygen mask and handy-dandy fire extinguisher strapped to my belt like a Colt 45 gave me the confidence to boldly fight the flames down. With my water bottle. I'm a beast.

Really, it went well which was a feat for me and I'm feeling particularly proud. What's the big deal, you're thinking? Check out the last episode of Megan's Back Yard Catastrophes: Charred Life Lessons

July 6, 2009

Celebrating the Red, White & Blue...in English


You know what bugs me? Ok, lots of things but I recognize you don't have that much time to read my whining so lets just focus on what's bugging me today.

The past three day weekend was marvelous. We celebrated America's birthday and heritage with good friends, good food, and good times. But as Monday marches on, I'm faced with an irritant that's struck me as particularly...well...irritating just after cheering the Red, White and Blue all weekend. And this is it: I hate when I call up a customer service number (to any company--phone company, satellite, Internet provider, etc) and the first option is "For English, press 1."

Really? Since we are living in America, can't we just assume that English is the language spoken and then give an Option to press 1 for other language choices? Spanish, Hungarian, Russian, Pig Latin...

We all know America is the melting pot of the world, and lots of folks living here came from other lands and speak other languages. I am very proud to be an American and know that living here means that we welcome non-native citizens with open arms (except when they arrive via the sea with 20 of their closest friends clinging to a makeshift raft, or running under the cover of night across someone's pasture in Texas). But whether immigrants stepped ashore legally or they snuck in, newsflash: our native language is English. That should at least be the automatic default for...well...anyone or any company. You shouldn't have to request English be the language you receive service in.

The need to be politically correct these days is taken to ridiculous extremes. American companies (or Americans) should not need to worry about offending someone because we have the audacity (gasp!) to think they should be able to speak English. Welcome to America--enjoy what we have to offer but follow the rules and speak the language. If you don't like it, the makeshift raft goes both ways.

July 2, 2009

The Longest Night Ever


As a general rule, I do not watch scary movies. I have friends and family who love scary flicks but I cannot stand that "on the edge of your seat" feeling, followed by something that startles five years off your life. But somehow, I began watching the television show "Harper's Island" when it first aired last Spring. Maybe it was the incredible amount of advertising they did for the show beforehand. Huh...power of advertising. Go figure.

Anyway, when the show began, we were in Florida at my cousins' house and the entire clan ended up watching it, including my son. And what I discovered was that my 11 year old hates scary stuff as much as I do. But because his similarly aged cousins were there, unafraid and engrossed, he wasn't about to walk away.

As Spring and the end of the school year consumed our time, the episodes of Harper's Island stacked up on our Tivo. That was ok because the Summer re-run time would give us an opportunity to catch up at our convenience. And last weekend, we decided to tune in to a few of the episodes. I wasn't even going to tell Chase we were watching because I didn't think he really liked the show. But he strolled into the living room about 15 minutes into the first one we watched and sat down with us. "What's the big deal," I thought. "He's old enough to understand it's fake, and a TV show isn't bound to be as intense as a movie."

Turns out, they've done a pretty darn good job with this show and making it pretty realistic and very scary. We watched three episodes back to back (the hook they give you at the end of each really compels you to keep watching if you have the next show lined up). All the while, I was whispering to Chase: It's not real. I mean, look at that blood...fake! No one would walk in the woods alone if a madman was really on the loose. Get out of town! As if a girl that pretty would be with a dufus like that. All clearly pretend.

At 11:30, it was time to hit the hay. I stood up laughing about the fakeness of it all, looked at Chase and knew instantly from the ghost while pallor of his face that he wasn't as convinced. I'd be laying down with him at least until he was firmly in Dreamland. This is a rarity for us because I believed all my friends who told me 11 years prior that it was a colossal error to ever let your child sleep in your bed. They'd never leave. So I didn't go the sleep-with-me route. Once, when he was a year old and pretty sick, I took a chance and laid him down in my bed. Two hours, several elbows to the ribs, kicks to my knees and two full counterclockwise turns in the bed (by him, not me) later and I picked his fanny up and deposited him back in his crib. There was no way I could sleep side by side with the non-stop mover.

But he's older now and was clearly not buying my "The show's not real" proclamations. So we laid down side by side in the double bed, bottom portion of his bunk beds. And here's how the night went:

Me: Remember, the show's a fake, ok? None of that stuff happened, no one can get in our house, just close your eyes and go to sleep.
Chase: Are you sure? I think I see someone in the hallway.
Me: There's no one in the hallway. I'm right here. Close your eyes.

Fast forward one hour and Chase has most decidedly closed the gap between us and was on me like white on rice.

Chase: Mommy, are you sleeping?
Me: What? Oh, um, I was. Are you ok?
Chase: I think I hear something.
Me: You don't. I promise. Remember: fake. All fake. Now please go to sleep.

Fast forward 30 minutes. I'm pretty sure he's drifted off and I'm trying to fit myself comfortably in about 8" of space he's left me on the bed. I gently roll off the bed, check to be sure he's undisturbed and tip-toe to my room and my big Tempur-pedic mattress. Lay down and am out within 5 minutes.

Screaming. Someone is screaming bloody murder. I jump up and stumble back to Chase's room where he is sitting up and howling hysterically.

Me: I'm here. I'm here. It's ok. Lay back down. I told you, nobody is in the house but us. You're fine. I'll stay in here all night.

We lay back down and after awhile, eventually settle back in.

Chase: Mom?
Me: Yes?
Chase: I'm not sure I can sleep. I really don't like that show.
Me: I know it. You won't watch any more of it but still, please remember it's not real. That was fake blood, no such actual place, all a story. Please try and go to sleep.
Chase: I'm hot. Are you hot?
Me: You're bundled up with a shirt on, socks, under a blanket. Take off all that stuff, Parka-boy. No wonder you're hot.
Chase: I gotta leave the blanket on.

Apparently, the blanket was going to keep him safer from the boogey man than I could. I was too tired to be offended. Fast forward an hour.

Chase: Mom? Are you sleeping? I hear something in the hall.
Me: Chase, I told you. There's no one here. That show wasn't real. Those people are all actors and none of them are actually killed, ok? I can find you a magazine tomorrow that will show those people cavorting in Miami at a nightclub, half clothed or walking down Wilshire Blvd drinking a half-caf, soy milk latte or exiting the local gym because working out is what they do.
Chase: What's cavorting?
Me: Go to sleep.
Chase: I'll try.

Another hour.

Chase: What time is it?
Me: Three...forty...five.
Chase: This is the longest night ever.
Me: Yes (sigh). It most certainly is.

I think he might have actually fallen asleep at that point as I also did but not before the last thought went through my head: He'll never, ever (ever) watch Harper's Island again. Ever.