Did You Ever Wonder . . .

Why do hard boiled eggs stink like an old man's pruny poots, but scrambled eggs smell savory and delicious?

You probably haven't wondered, but I just thought I'd ask.

Dream Home Doldrums

HGTV is running their annual dream home sweepstakes. And of course it fits right in with my fantasy of making an abrupt left turn and veering off on a new adventure.

Not that anything is really wrong with my current adventure. Most days present me with something completely unexpected, like one of my kids telling me at 9 p.m. that he needs a poster board for a project due THE NEXT DAY, or one of them vomiting in a paper bag in the back seat on the way to school after he looked perfectly fine at breakfast, or me walking out of the mirrored YMCA door and slipping and falling down in the parking lot, spilling the contents of my purse on the asphalt, five lipsticks rapidly rolling toward the storm drain.

Yes, my life is definitely high adventure. But sometimes I do get carried away thinking about up and doing something completely different, out of the blue. A move-in ready home in the middle of the Arizona desert sounds like it could satisfy my wanderlust.

So I filled out the form and entered the random drawing. As soon as I clicked the SUBMIT button, panic seized me by the throat and kneed me in the gut. It shook me like a rag doll, shouting, "You fool! What if you win! What will you do then?"

"It comes with a car," I sputtered. "A 2010 GMC Terrain."

"How will you ever get the car back to Georgia?" panic pried.

"It comes with $500,000 dollars," I countered.

"Just enough to pay the property taxes and take one round-trip flight out to see your prize," panic pointed out.

By this time my eyes were bugging out of my head, but I didn't give in. "I could have fun there, being somebody different than I am here. That house is sleek and contemporary, up to date and new. Plus, no one would dare throw-up in the back seat of my new Terrain."

Panic tsk-tsked me, wrapping itself tight around my chest. "You're a southerner right down to your double helix," it said. "You have absolutely no idea what to do with yourself in a desert with no humidity."

I fought back panic, held it down and instructed it to cry mercy, and I entered again, to show it who's boss. But it refuses to say uncle and as the February 19 entry deadline approaches, I can feel it rising to its feet again. How will it treat me if I win?

The Singing Fingers

A window into the secret world of a bored child with a video camera. Never let 'em tell you they have "nothing to do."

Girls in the Bathroom

Thursday, between afternoon activities, too far from home to make a pit-stop there, my boys and I had about an hour to kill. Because I am a good, good mother, a virtual Queen of the Mamas, I took them to a sports bar & grill. Every inch of wall space was covered with televisions, all tuned into different channels, none of which was HGTV. While I found myself over-stimulated, they found themselves in boy heaven.

We ordered a couple of greasy appetizers in the food categories that will someday be life-threatening to them, when they are in their 40s. They scarfed it so fast it was a wonder the waitress had any fingers on her right hand after setting down the plates and retracting her arm. She looked scared, like she had reached into the gorilla enclosure at the zoo without thinking.

Before piling into the car, again, to drive to our next destination, I told the boys to go to the restroom. I did the same. I'm pretty sure they didn't wash their hands because they all three were impatiently waiting for me when I exited the Ladies' Room. "Mama," gasped my 10 year-old, "there were girls in our bathroom." Using his hands to indicate an enormous amount, he repeated, "Lots of girls! Everywhere!"

Hearing this made me momentarily panic. Did I go in the wrong bathroom? How mortifying. I would do something like that, too. I glanced at the doors, to check my attention to detail. Nope, I entered the correct lavatory. "What were girls doing in the Men's Room?"

Excitedly, he said, "They were in their cheerleader uniforms and stuff like that."

Seeing my look of consternation - although he wouldn't have used that word to describe it, he would have said SHOCK - my 12 year-old explained, "Just pictures of girls, Mama," which sent my head reeling in another sordid direction. But before I could address that thought, he added, "and there're two flat-screen TVs in there, too! I love this place." Then he sighed.

"It's a wonder y'all ever came out," I responded.

The worst part of the whole scene, was that I felt jilted; not just for myself, but for all women everywhere who have ever been to a sports bar & grill. Because all I had in my bathroom was a baby changing station and a dusty, plastic palm, sure signs of discrimination. No wonder there weren't any girls in my bathroom.

Why Does Gray Matter?

How do you answer that question? Does gray matter because it's that vague place between two definites? Does gray matter because it's what we get when mixing black and white? Or does gray matter because it's what makes a rainy day cozy?

No. Gray matters because its what we think with. It's that slimy stuff inside our skulls that enables us to do calculus, tie our shoes, dream about dancing pop tarts, and make a decision to either walk on the wild side or to walk the straight and narrow. And gray matters because it's what Roger Day sings about on his new CD, aptly titled, Why Does Gray Matter?

The CD is a collection of 14 songs all about the brain. It's perfect for the science classroom. Introduce a lesson on the parts of the brain with Sara Bellum, the Brainy Girl. Motivate students to get ready to do their best work with Get Your Brain in Gear. Make them giggle with a sing-a-long to Monkey Brains. Inspire kids to feed their brains with nutritious foods with Brain Food - Eat it Up!

And by all means, play my favorite track to emphasize the difference between the duties of the left and right brain with the highly entertaining tune The Left Brain/Right Brain Song.

Elementary school science teachers need this CD in their collection. As an extra bonus, the CD comes with a copy of all the words to each song so that children can engage with the music, even the first time they hear it.

Sing a-long. Dance a-long. Learn a-long. Visit Roger Day's web site to listen to song samples from the Why Does Gray Matter CD and to buy your own copy today.

Get Ready. Get Set. Get Groovin'.

Get ready. Get set. Get groovin' with the new Bari Koral Family Rock Band CD, Rock and Roll Garden, scheduled for release on January 14th. Featuring twists on old favorites with songs like Hey Ducky, plus songs like Uh Oh, certain to be childhood favorites, kids and adults alike can't help but sing along.

Listening to Rock and Roll Garden transported me back to the days when my children and I listened to kiddie music together in the car and in the kitchen and while they were taking baths and just about any time they requested it. Some of my best memories are of listening to their four sweet voices singing in the backseat while we ran errands around town. Music like this takes families places, both literally and metaphorically.

The interactive nature of tunes such as Clap It!, Dance All Day, Big Sounds, Boom Boom, and others engages children with the music. It gets them up and moving, improves listening skills, and gives them confidence in their ability to operate on and in their environments. Rock and Roll Garden is a perfect addition to play group activities, family nights, library story times, and the preschool through kindergarten classroom. Any parent would be smart, as well, to leave a babysitter armed with it in her bag of tricks.

All that said, kids will enjoy Rock and Roll Garden long after their kindergarten years. As proof, I give you my 8 year-old daughter, who is, as I write this, singing along to Hey Ducky in the next room. I guess hearing my children's sweet voices singing in the backseat doesn't necessarily have to be a memory yet.

Nothing

On New Year's Eve, shortly before the bell tolled and the ball fell, my husband asked me, "So, what's your resolution for the new year?"

"You know what my resolution is," I said. "I'm going to embrace the routine, instead of fighting it and complaining about it; instead of trying to have great expectations of making some fabulous, momentous change and then being disappointed at the end of the year because the routine got in the way of me doing anything adventurous. I can't fail if I stick with the routine. Plus, the routine is good. It means everything in life is clicking along as it should. We need the routine and my goal for the new year is to make sure we've got it."

"Oh," he replied. "So you're doing nothing."

"Yeah," I conceded. "Nothing."