Just Heather

2009-06-206_595For Christmas last year, we received a membership to the Children’s Museum. I was very excited as we had actually never taken the children. I am such a horrible mother. Indianapolis is actually home to the number one children’s museum in the country. We have been several times now that we are members, and we will never be without a membership again.

Their current feature is The Power of Children. We’ve been through the exhibit twice and I hadn’t even seen a third of it. It looked incredibly fascinating and powerful (thus, the name). However, it’s not so much for children. My girls just couldn’t care at all. I joked that I wanted to visit the museum one day without them so we could finally spend some time with the things we enjoy. Our next date, C=Children’s Museum, was born.
2009-06-202
We dropped the kidlets with MFJ and headed downtown. With the construction they still have going on at the museum, we ended up in the basement to start. We bypassed the dinosaurs—been there, done that. On our way up to The Power of Children, we stumbled on the 2nd reason for our no kids allowed trip, The Clone Wars exhibit. I’m sure Lorelai will love it, but she wouldn’t be as interested in the details and we would have missed a lot chasing her down in a dash towards the train exhibit.

The Power of Children exhibit was definitely worth the trip. We sat through all 3 presentations and while I’m not sure Spencer was all that into it, I thoroughly enjoyed them all. The Diary of Anne Frank is the only assigned book from junior high that I actually read cover to cover. Clearly, we learned no lessons as the hatred and racism continued in our country. The story of Ruby Bridges fascinates me. I just can’t get over how recently it was. I would love to think we’re beyond that, but 50 years later I still see it regularly. Ryan White’s story was familiar. I was young so I think I remember the movie about his story more than the actual news. I grew up here in Indiana, though, so it was a pretty big deal.

2009-06-203Our next stop was for the geeks in us (okay, mostly him). The games through the years exhibit is fun even with the whole family, but we never get to play when the girls are around. Someone is always taking over my joystick and losing my last life. It was a bit crowded so I still haven’t had the opportunity to play Giant Connect 4, but beating Spencer at Pac-Man was worth it. Since we were already there, I insisted that we ride the carousel. Without children to wrangle, I was able to read all the cute tidbits on the history of the carousel. It’s amazing how educational even the fun & games exhibit can be, but we really had a lot of fun being kids.

We capped off our date with a few minutes of relaxation in the basement. Of course, remember we’re at the children’s museum so that isn’t even remotely dirty! They have this rotating couch-like thing that looks up at the bottom of the Fireworks of Glass sculpture pictured above, which, by the way, was apparently created by a pirate. See? Educational.

img_1779-largeHubby got an iPhone last fall and I, of course, have wanted one ever since. I don’t usually require much in a cell phone. I need it to call, text and survive the occasional fall. That means the iPhone was out for me, until I heard about the hard-shelled cases people use to take their iPhone mountain biking. Perhaps, with a hard-shelled case, an iPhone could survive even me.

Of course, we don’t have an extra $200 to get another one. Enter the new iPhone 3GS with the resulting price drop in the plain, old model that’s good enough for me. We have one contract up for renewal now and another in October, but still lack the funds to pay even the reduced price. Then I saw a Tweet from Planet Green about recycling your old phone if you plan to get a the new iPhone. My savings-oriented, scheming brain kicked into over drive.

I headed to my favorite gadget recycling site and checked the value on the current iPhone. $249—more than enough to buy the new one when it is released later this month. By the time I convinced hubby that being without his precious iPhone for 2 weeks would be worthwhile if it means he gets the updated model for nothing,  the value had dropped to $229. That is still more than enough to pay for the updated model with our contract-renewal discount.

We thought he’d be using my seriously jank phone until June 19th, but it looks like the buy offer is good through 7/9 so he’ll be keeping the iPhone until his free Father’s Day present arrives. It means the purchase goes on a credit card, but it will be paid off as soon as our inexpensively” target=”top”>Gazelle check arrives. If you have an AT&T plan up for renewal and a current iPhone, I’d try it out before the values drop even more.

As for my phone, I’ll still have to wait. I’m such a good wife.

Baby, my hometown cat

Baby, my hometown cat

I have had cats for most of my life.  It started when I was 4 and my dad told me absolutely, never ever are we getting that cat. Then I cried. Her name was Sweetheart and she went on to have 5 kittens, most of whom we kept.  Her last kitten lived until I was in high school. About a year after she passed, I started in on wanting another cat.  My dad said no way, absolutely not. We are never getting another cat. Then, I may or may not have cried. His name is Baby and he still lives with my parents.

Tommy the Cat, 1997-2008

Tommy the Cat, 1997-2008

When Spencer and I were getting married, we already had a dog.  Indy was almost one and tons of fun, but I still wanted a cat.  He said no, but finally relented (even without the tears!) and got me a kitten as a wedding gift.  Tommy was the greatest cat ever, even if Spencer never quite saw it that way. He was sweet, playful and never, ever cross with the kids (though each went through their toddler stage of torturing him constantly).

When he passed away, I always knew I’d eventually get a cat but it takes some time to heal. Apparently, for me, that time is always about one year.  I’ve been making noises for a month or so about getting another cat. In April, Brenia’s Girl Scout troop visited PetSmart, and their on location pet rescue. I, of course, wanted to take them all home with me. He said no, but announced on Mother’s Day that my present was getting a cat. I had my heart set on a kitten, but I also felt tugged to rescue one of the cats.

Captain Nemo

Captain Nemo


Earlier this week, my friend let me know that PetSmart’s rescue shelter had new kittens. We stopped by “just to look” and came home with two.  We picked out one of the baby kittens, but Captain Nemo’s soulful eyes kept calling to us so we had to bring him home. Both cats are affectionate, playful (a little too playful for my tastes at 4am) and good with the kids.  The youngest is not quite sure about Indy, but Nemo seems to have made his peace. He does hide from Lorelai, but that’s just common sense.

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"We named the dog Indiana."


When we adopt a pet, we would ordinarily change his name. Indy was once Snoop, but he didn’t really seem to know it. That happens when a dog spends 22 hours a day in a crate. Nemo seems to have stuck, though. Partly, because Finding Nemo is Spencer’s very favorite children’s movie, partly because it was rather funny to be looking for Nemo all evening when he hid and partly because he seems to come when you call. Bogey, however, is not our baby kitten’s name.

8-bit

8-bit

The problem is, we weren’t sure what was. We kicked around quite a few names but nothing really seemed to fit him yet. The girls suggested cliches like Shadow and Midnight, but I’m not really into that sort of thing. We’ve named most of our animals from movies or television shows (kids too!) so we kicked around Cat Kirk for awhile. The girls hated it and even though I loved the idea it just didn’t feel right. I liked Pixel, suggested by Spencer, but it was a blatant ripoff from some Twitter guy’s bunny. Somewhat related to Pixel, I suggested 8-bit. I think it stuck.