Theme from the Lone Ranger

Bill Cosby had this sketch in which he describes the mammoth go-cart races that he and his friends participated in. In one, there are 500 cop cars waiting for them at the bottom of the hill. I'm sure we've all had days like that. The funniest part of the sketch for me is where he explains that each go-cart operator had a theme song that they sang or hummed as they flew down the hill--even Weird Harold.

It is Sunday evening now and I am safe at home. I picked up the living room, ran the carpet machine, and tried to ignore everything else. Today we made it to church where people complained nicely that I was overdue for another food order, the Bishop reminded me that I'm teaching the 5th Sunday lesson this month, and all my kids were given new Sunday school teachers (because in the LDS church, the kids travel together in a group up the Sunday school ladder, changing in January -- every kid turning 8 this year is in the same class, every kid turning 9, etc.). I HATE this and completely block it out of my mind because inevitably I'm unprepared to hear what year my kids are turning this year. Today was particularly unkind as I had to face the unreasonable FACT that my BABY is turning double digits in June and my other babies are turning 5 which is just not very baby-ish. Scott, a friend from church, saw my horrified expression as Ben sat down in a CTR5 chair and said, "It's not till November, Alaska." That's easy for him to say. His son (who turns 5 the day after mine do) is only his MIDDLE child. He still HAS a baby left. SHE just went into nursery and will stay there another year. And anyway, he's a man. They never seem to mind the aging process in their children.

We didn't stay for the third hour of church as we have a church/basketball game conflict for the next 6 weeks or so. So after the first hour of Sunday school, I gathered the boys and we ran home to get Max to his game on time.

The game was at the elementary school downtown, which is good, because it's the only one I know where to park around. They used 10-minute quarters or something, because the time flew by. Max did just fine and I really LOVED how his coaches interacted with his team. They were the warm-fuzziest men I've ever seen and their young team of nine-year-olds would do ANYTHING for them. Including win by more than 20 points. It was soon clear to me that Max had landed on a team with a bunch of kids who really already knew the game very well. The other team was much more mixed. What this meant is that Max, who is the only kid on his team who has never played before, only looked goofy compared to his own team members. It also meant that the other coach soon pulled the super-tall kid off Max (well, that is, he pulled the only kid he had who is also Max's height) and replaced him with a younger, shorter kid. This left the boys pretty evenly matched. Max's height is no substitute for skill at this stage of the game.

The best part? Max kept up. He ran for the whole game, ran back and forth and wasn't the last kid at the other end (he was the second last, but that's moving up for Max), and I was happy to see that we seem to have lost little ground in the battle to keep Max fit and healthy. He still has a ways to go, but he didn't lose ground.

Anyway, since the rest of the kids were doing just fine, both coaches coached Max plenty -- but not so much that he started to feel picked on. Like I said, these guys had coached LITTLE kids before. They were great.

So we went back home and I walked the dogs and started dinner and the piano teacher called and we set a lesson up for tomorrow and I wrote it on the calendar and . . .

Dy, what happens after the paint dries is that you get more and more involved with life. You get piano lessons and sporting events and vet visits and it's January 9 and the calendar is soooo full!

It's wonderful -- and occasionally panic inducing.

Tomorrow I need to find a short story for first graders involving dogs, some poems about penguins, and write a chapter of math problems. I need to take Max to a piano lesson and get him to the elementary school at 5 of 3:00 so he can get on the intramural bus to go skiing with the other 4th and 5th graders in the area. I have to remember to pick him up from the ski place at 7pm.

We have thank you cards to write and I'm really hoping to find a check in the mailbox in the morning so I can deposit it and pay the rest of my bills for the month. I need to get the Y to walk off the Ben and Jerry's ice cream Chris brought me yesterday and oh yeah -- Max needs to do a regular Monday's worth of school work. We did school last week but I've been afraid to look and see what, if anything, he got done the two days I was gone.

Tuesday the twins start swim lessons and Thursday will be their swim lessons and Max's piano theory class and then Friday is Max's regular piano private lesson plus basketball practice and Sunday is church and another game again.

So I'm sitting here tonight playing financial guru so that when that check does arrive I can put cash in the food and gas envelopes and send checks off to the people who get checks and be done with that.

And I am loudly humming the theme to the Lone Ranger (AKA the William Tell Overature) as I sit here, piloting my go-cart down that steep slope that is 2006.

I can only hope that at the bottom of the hill there is Victory! -- and not 500 cop cars.