George Carlin died yesterday.

From the 7 Words to his stint on Thomas the Tank Engine, this man never ceased to amaze me. I felt like I was getting away with something during the brief times that I was allowed to watch his stand-up when I was younger.

Pretty much, his wikipedia entry covers everything that I remember and more.

You’ll be missed, and I hope that you’re now up on the roof just like you thought you’d be.

While the Insane Mommy Brain™ jumps to the forefront of my thoughts more often than not as Elizabeth gets older, I’m always a little freaked out by hearing that parents are getting shit from other parents because they’re allowing their kids to be independent.

Seriously, what in the hell is wrong with us? What happened to the old axiom that I heard far too many times as a kid of “Let ‘em learn on their own”? What kind of grown adults are our kids going to be if they can’t wipe their own asses and buy their own things?

In the interest of full disclosure, I drive Elizabeth to school and drop her off at the front doors, and she’s in the after school program simply because she’s 6. The bus isn’t an option because we’re in an odd location for the district we’re in, and there’s not enough grade school kids for them to send a bus out (Yes, I still live in Buckhead, and I’ve already argued this point to death with the bus people). Elizabeth pushed and prodded me to walk her into class for the first bit of the school year, but after a little time, we came to an agreement for me to just drop her off at the front doors of the school. After starting that, I noticed some of the parents who I would walk from the parking area to Elizabeth’s classroom giving me dirty looks as I let my child off at the front. It’s not like I’m making her walk to school, 3 miles away and crossing some of the busiest roads in Buckhead, I’m Dropping. Her. Off. At. The. School.

I don’t really think that Elizabeth’s old enough to be completely on her own at age 6, but I caught myself having a touch of Helicopter Parent when I got a little freaked at the idea of her playing outside in the yard by herself. When I was younger than her, I spent most of my days outside in the acre of garden and such in my back yard, my grandmother not caring unless I didn’t come when she called me. Yet, I had an issue with her being in the driveway by herself. Yes, we live in Atlanta, which is completely disparate from Gloucester Point, Virginia, but I kicked myself when I realized that I didn’t trust my kid enough to be able to make decisions on her own at all.

I don’t think I’ve done or will be doing a shitty job in raising and teaching Elizabeth how to survive in the world. I know she’s got a lot still to learn, and I’ve got a lot that I wish she didn’t have to ever learn, but I hope I have and can prepare her for both the good and the bad things out there. It killed me to realize that I didn’t trust my kid… does that mean that I don’t think I’ve taught her well or that I just don’t want her to grow up?

Maybe Suebob’s right… this is just another moment in the saga of the Mommy Wars, or in her words, Insecurity on Parade. I have enough insecurity in myself for a small country… and that’s one thing I know that I don’t want to hand off to my child.

It’s just shy of a week without Elizabeth in the house and off having fun in Alien-land.

The house, she is Sooooo Quiet.

Since my parents showed up back at the beginning of the month, I’ve gotten to see three movies, two of which I saw this weekend (Caspian and Hulk, for those who care). We even got to go over to a friend’s house and hang out without waiting for the inevitable tears and screams that happen whenever you get children around each other… oh, they still happened at our friends’, but I didn’t have to go running for once to see if it was my child in tears or causing another child to cry for once.

All that being said, though… I still miss coming home and getting a hug and a cry of “Mommy!” every day. At times I look at the calendar and curse that we have so little “grown-up” time left, and in the same instance, look forward to her getting back more than anything.

Bob Asprin, originally uploaded by dene foye.

While aged, this is a perfect representation of how I remember Bob Asprin from when I was a child. Sitting around, guitar in hand, though the Irish Whiskey isn’t in the shot, from my memories, it was close at hand.

As I got older, and as we moved around, I found his books, and could finally put an amazing story to the songs I grew up with. The Thieves World Musical is one of those things that seemed to finally make sense to me, outside of the fact that I loved those songs simply because I wouldn’t get in trouble for swearing if I was singing along to “Hell Hounds”.

Later, running into him at a con as a teenager, he pissed me off royally, just being himself.

“You’re too old to be Dinah’s Daughter.” Exit, Stage Left.

Yeah, and you’re looking not-so-hot yourself, Bob, thanks.

Come to think of it, that was the last time I spoke to him. I know that he was at Dragoncon last year, but I never did run into him unlike my party because of my commitments. Now I wish I had, because while he could get under your skin without much effort on his part, he was still a good person. And a damned great writer.

Rest in peace, Bob. I’m off to TimeGate this weekend, and I’ll make sure to have a drink for you.

EDIT:

While I’m seeing all kinds of Memoriams out on the Great and Powerful Interwebs, Patty sums it up pretty nicely and reminded me of things I’d forgotten here.

If anyone wonders where I’m at for at least the next 24 hours, here’s your answer. I know that my stepfather over in Alien-land is doing the same thing as I am. I’ve usually been waiting until the books come in a set and getting them off of Zooba.com, but I really couldn’t wait until this one came out to be that cheap.

And, yes, I’m just enough of a super-geek to be working on a Dresden filk, as well.

Blah, blah, blah… whine, whine, whine… bitch, bitch, bitch.

Ok, I’ve got that out of my system now. I just actually read through my front page, and realized that I completely suck. Outside of the whole Moleskine thing, which I’m doing everything in my power not to purchase 12 of them at once.

Let’s sum up, shall we?

1. BabyDaddy is still out of work. And that’s a post in and of itself for another time.
2. I’ve started writing again. Well, I’ve started opening up my doc files and writing a couple paragraphs.
3. I’m trying to get off my ass and actually plan (I know, fucking scary) out things for my contributions to the Apocalypse Rising track at Dragoncon.
4. I’m also planning on going to TimeGate, since it is just up the road from me, literally. Google Maps says it’s about 7 miles away, so I’m having a hard time justifying the cost of a hotel room. But it’s a con… I feel the need to have a hotel room.
5. The PTA ladies really scare me. Again, another full post for another time that I can think outside of an ordered list.
6. My birthday back on the 18th was good but completely un-blog-worthy. I’m officially old now.
7. Work is trying to kill me, by handing me way too much to do and I’m still a damned contractor.
8. I’m working on another design for this blog, but #7 is keeping me from finishing it.

I’m trying to get up the funds and time to be able to head down to the Island sometime at the end of April or beginning of May, but we’ll see.

Remind me again why the hell I moved to Atlanta?

Cabbagetown, originally uploaded by Lance McCord.

Nope, that’s not some war-torn third world country, that’s Cabbagetown in Downtown Atlanta, taken last night after a tornado tore through there. Cabbagetown seems to be hit the worse, partially because it was the main residential area to be hit (The Dome/CNN Center got hit hard as well - during a basketball game at the Dome).

Up here in Buckhead got some tree debris thrown around, but nothing other than that, thankfully. I feel for the people in Cabbagetown, especially from the old Cotton Mill lofts down there who had entire floors collapsing on them. My thoughts are with them.

This is the first year that I have to get an emissions test on the Equinox, and man, the day I’ve had…

Yes, I’m the slacker that waited until the week prior to my birthday to remember that I needed an emissions test, but I didn’t know that it would take me going to four different emissions stations to be able to finally have the certificate saying that I passed. See, there’s this software update for particular cars (while that article only talks about the Prius problems, this effects my ‘05 Equinox and some new Explorers as well) that won’t be issued by the state to all of the emissions testing facilities until June or July of this year. I went to three places before breaking down and calling the Clean Air Force Commission and asking if they had any facility in my general area that would be able to take my car, and found a place off of Cheshire Bridge Road (Precision Tune Autocare, if you’re interested) that they said could handle it. I call them up and they said that they could give it a try, though they didn’t think that they had this software update yet. I get there, and the place is great to me. The woman behind the counter wouldn’t enter me into the system until the tech hooked up my car, and the tech himself was wonderful, explaining the software update, and letting me know before he began the test that if his system couldn’t handle it, the other Precision Tune up on Buford Hwy usually could handle the cars that they couldn’t.

Thank Gawd, it worked… though it wasn’t because of the computer, it’s because he did the Two Speed Idle Emission Test instead, which got me a certificate and got me out the door without wanting to kill someone.

So, my tags should be good to go, not for the State of Georgia in their infinite wisdom  not making sure that their software be readily available for these 2005 vehicles which are screwed until that update comes out.

I seem to only be able to post here when Elizabeth’s sick lately, and I’m not sure why.

The Flu has invaded Elizabeth’s Kindergarten class, and she’s been out of school since Monday afternoon when we were asked to come and get her. When I spoke to the lady in the office, she said that there were already 6 other kids out in just Elizabeth’s class that day.

What sucks about this whole thing was that yesterday was her class’s field trip to go and see Seussical that Musical, which Elizabeth’s been so excited about. Instead of going to see that, though, she got to sit in the waiting room for the doctor. And today is their Smart Start program finale, which she’s missing as well.

She is getting better, though if you ask her, she’s not and will never feel better again. Of course, she’s my child, so Drama Queen is a little easy to fall into. She’ll probably be going to school tomorrow, and then have Friday off for a teacher workday, a birthday party for a friend’s 5-year-old on Saturday, and lastly a party for BabyDaddy and I on Sunday at my grandmother’s house for our upcoming birthdays.

At least she got sick at the beginning of the week than the end of the week.

The Bad - Elizabeth is home from school today because she woke up in the middle of the night with some stomach bug, which is currently wreaking havoc on her system.

The Good - BabyDaddy gets to stay home with her and I get to go to work, missing out on all the puke-tastic fun.

The Good - I got my delicious Green LG enV yesterday.

The Bad - I went to call Elizabeth’s school to let them know that she wasn’t going to be in today, and had to deal with Verizon tech support because it wouldn’t let me call out this morning.

The Mildly Irritating - The enV doesn’t have a place for a phone charm to hang, which means I can’t have my Tardis charm on my phone any longer.

The Bad - I opened up my ticket queue this morning after getting to work to see in excess of 20+ tickets assigned to myself, and under 10 assigned to the other webmaster.

The Good - With the overtime moratorium, they’ll get their fixes when they get their fixes, and I really can’t care.

The Bad - The rental house that I fell in love with (again) is off the market, again.

The Good - We’re going to sign a new lease on Monday for Current House, which while mildly irritating in some respects, means at least we’ll have a roof over our heads.

The Bad - I didn’t win the Mega Millions Lottery

The Good - I did win $7 from my ticket, and it rolled, so maybe next time.

How’s this week been treating y’all?