Datebook: Thursday, January 25th ~ 2007

Here is the thing with good luck charms (as previously discussed during Lake Placid), they probably have an expiration date or a shelf life. Unfortunately, there are no reminder notices sent out or notices that upgrades are needed or available.

Several years ago, my daughter found a tiny die (one of a pair of dice). Looking at it now, that doesn’t seem the type of word that would really bring good luck and fortune, but when you get these signs you just go with it. Anyway, it was cute, miniscule, and we marveled at it and then threw it in the cup holder of the minivan, where it lived for months, unnoticed and unloved. Some time later, we went to Indianapolis for the summer dance competition. It was a beautiful location—ice rink attached to the mall---a young girl’s dream, but there was horrible weather—tornadoes all around the city. Our luggage did not arrive on the plane due to the turmoil with flights being diverted.

So here is how this comes back to the die.

We took my husband’s car to the airport so our luggage was never in the minivan. When the luggage was delivered to the hotel, the bell captain brought it to our room and placed it on our bed (I know, you don’t get service like that everyday!). We returned (from the mall) joyous to find our clothes—these were the days when you could carry your skates on board the plane. After unpacking, I picked up the suitcase and guess what was on the bed?

Seriously, this was like finding a burnt etching of the Virgin Mary on your toast.


The die.


Goosebumps time.


Yes, it was.


Impossible as it was.


True, I have always hoped to have a miracle or impossibility bestowed on me in other ways, like winning the MegaMillions, or being able to sing like Whitney Houston (pre Bobby Brown days), but we don’t get to pick apparently.

So there it was, this tiny little orange die.

And so we have kept this as our good luck symbol.

But, we expanded like people who collect spoons or magnets from the states they visit. I bought other die, and dice. I have a die necklace. My daughter has a die necklace (that she doesn’t wear of course). We have purchased other little dice, and large dice sets.

At any competition, I could supply some serious material for alley or hallway craps.

I didn’t realize that I had perhaps gone overboard until yesterday. I handed out small colored die to several other people connected to my daughter and partner. They humored me by accepting them, but looked a bit worried, like maybe I wanted them to swallow them, when I just said, “you have to keep them close to your heart. I keep mine in my bra.”

And I do. I didn’t receive instructions on this, like with the candles and cinnamon, but it seems a logical assumption.

Hours after the competition, as a group of us were walking back to the hotel from the bus stop, I commented on the die’s seemingly weakened power.

“Perhaps you need to upgrade lucky charms, like cars. Maybe we need to find a sign each year, or each level. I’ve been using these since they were at juvenile.”

With this I pulled the two die from my bra, one was a tiny, blue cube, the other was the size of a quarter—all sides.

For some reason this was funny to my companions and they preceded to laugh and fall in the snow. The fact that I was willing to go the distance for my team and suffer a possible permanent indentation on my chest should have been applauded.

But as I held the warm squares in my hand I had an epiphany.

“Oh my God,” I said, “I had the wrong numbers facing up!”

Mombo

Datebook: Tuesday, January 23rd ~ 2007

There is something eerie about waking up each morning at 3:00 am in a hotel room you are sharing with a sleeping athlete who needs to rest for several more hours. I patrol the room in darkness, using my cell phone as a beacon in the night to navigate around the thirty pair of shoes (not mine) and six school books (not being used). I am still on East Coast time and will be for the entire trip I am sure.

As I forage around, at first dismissing the half eaten bag of M& Ms, and the overripe banana from the competitor lounge from the first day, until by four I am eating bananas dipped into blue coated candies—the whole time replaying the day’s events like a bad marathon TV day of “The Christmas Story”.

If only there were do-overs in life, or at least in the life of skating.

In life, I would never have bought that Dodge Caravan mini-van fifteen years ago, or at least I would have held out for a better color. (Who started that craze?)

I would never have collected Beanie Babies because this led to collecting the Teeny Beanies at McDonalds and added to the extra pounds I seem to have kept on due to the “clean your plate there are starving children in the world” phrase our mother’s told us, which of course extends to Happy Meal bags...

I would have waited a few years to buy a camcorder because mine looks like I work for a local news station and is not so easily held in the palm of the hand.—there is strap around mine larger than a seatbelt.

In skating—what would I change?

I think of those first group lessons, when we wandered in with skates we had ordered from the JC Penney catalog for 29.95 (on sale) and were told the molded plastic rental skates would be better—why didn’t I drive two more blocks to the cheerleading camp down the streets where pom-poms were and are still, less than fifty dollars.

I think of her first competition dress, where her highest jump was a waltz jump, and the price tag was 143.00. I thought it looked a little plain…

I think of all the times I’ve sat in the stands and watched that first pose, where my heart did a double beat and my eyes watered—probably from the cold.

I dismiss the idea of the beach house I could have purchased, although this is a bit harder than just hitting the delete button.

At the end of the day, good or bad, this is what she loves to do. This is what she does. I guess I wouldn’t change much—maybe a few judges marks.

Well, maybe I should have bought better wheeled luggage too—at least matching steamer trunks.

PS. Ahhh, the “CW meets the room mate” plan has run into another unforeseen debacle—it seems that many of the readers now plan to throw CW plush animals with messages. They will need to double their sweeper patrol. So we may now try the delivered white rose with the hint of her perfume sprayed on the card. He could then spend the evening of the competitor’s party sniffing the air until he finds the right girl—a modern adaptation of the Cinderella story.

Mombo

Datebook: Monday, January 22nd ~ 2007

Yesterday, through the kindness of a friend and her Xanex, I was able to watch Compulsories. I am one who gets sleepy from an Advil so I turned to her in the stands and said “are you sure this will work?”

“Trust me’, she consoled, “The only thing that changes is that you will have a heightened sense of emotions, but it will just make you teary, not anxious.”

Teary eyed.

I started crying during the preview trailer from last year’s nationals before the event. When the National anthem came on and the 5000 spectators started singing I began to sob along.

“Are you sure this is better?” I cried to her.

“Yes, you’re just crying, but how do you really feel. Are you sad?”

“No!” I blubbered. “This is a miracle drug.”

This continued to be tested when I dropped my purse and my daughter’s purse, (I was holding for safe-keeping) down the cavernous darkness below our bleachers to a 35 foot landing.) I just waved to them—bye-bye. (Eventually a kind man returned them and I didn’t even wonder about the cell phones and cameras inside that might be in pieces, I just said, “Hey guys, I really missed you!)

The skating began.

Eventually our team came out. Typically after the starting pose, I close my eyes and do “spot peeking”, but today, with the miracle bestowed upon me, I was able to watch. It did get a little blurry when I started crying—there was a point when the light caught the beading on my daughter’s dress, and those tiny crystals, those hundreds of dollars of shiny marvels merged into this beam of brightness that could have been a rainbow, or an aura.

“They’re so beautiful,” I sobbed to the mother of daughter’s partner and the stranger sitting in front of me.

“That was amazing,” she agreed.

Later, I was going to try to work on my CW meets and greets the room mate mission, when I saw a curly blonde head in front of me. Just as I was going to call out to him, another skater came up and congratulated him.

“Great job, Evan!”

I decided I needed a coffee, maybe double expresso, until my visual acuity returned to normal.

And so my courage was restored to me, like the lion in Oz. My friend told me she’d meet me a hour before OD today.

“We’re going to need to take two for the OD,” she said.

“Two? I’ll be crying at the water label”

“This is the OD remember. Mid-line, twizzles…”

“Oh, Right.”

And two it shall be. Dorothy, we aren’t in Kansas anymore. We’re in Spokane.

Mombo

Datebook: Sunday, January 21st ~ 2007 (part 2--during the night)

Because we were planning to take the shuttle to the hotel from the airport and not rent a car I did not peruse a Washington state map so perhaps it is understandable that I missed the portal to the Twilight Zone. Or maybe, as I am such a literary buff, I missed the exit to Dante’s Inferno.

The competition has not started yet and I find myself trapped in some skating reality game show I have given a working title of “What Fresh Hell Is This”.

Let’s just say practices have been a bit nerve-whacking.

Today in fact, I had to administer CPR to myself. My chest is still a little sore actually.

I have also, let me review the list, made several deals that so far include going to church on a regular basis, adopting a pet from the pound, being more sympathetic to my students who tell me they don’t like to read, and being kinder to all I encounter. There is also something about walking on coals but I may have to wait until the grill comes back out in April to fulfill.

And I have been rendered now without courage. I am courageless.

Yes, I am now the Lion from the Wizard of Oz.

I have struggled with this for several years. It manifests itself in the ability, or lack of ability, to watch my daughter and her partner compete. I have fought this by closing my eyes when their music comes on with very few people aware of my self imposed visual restriction.

But due to our initial round in WFHIT, where I envisioned medivacs and iron lungs, I have come to the realization that I cannot watch at ALL. I mean, not even sit in the stands or HEAR the music.

I am aware that this is a bit of a paradox, as I would take a booster shot, a bullet, or a fatal disease for either of my children, like any mom, but as the song says, “I can’t do that”—watch those twizzles, lifts, or my gosh, even cross-overs.

So for today, Mombo will probably be sitting in FanFest with the balloon skating sculpture listening to my daughter’s Ipod to drown out the sounds of compulsory dance.

And that’s how it will have to be until someone can locate some Ruby slippers or find the Wizard.

Mombo

Datebook: Sunday, January 21st ~ 2007 (part 1)

Well as exciting as this event is going to be, it will not have you sitting on the edge of your seat—if it did you would plummet to what looks like thirty stories, to the concrete below.

Spokane is such a wonderful town. It is clean, it is friendly—probably the most cordial group of people in one zip code that I have ever met, there are plenty of great restaurants and shops, and it is beautiful. This event has been planned for years and the media and the spectators have embraced the skating community.

In their zest to get the bid for the competition they pulled out all the stops. Including putting in a temporary rink for the competition that was not there Thursday night and will be gone next Monday. This shows great motivation and initiative.

The problem is in the seating. The problem is in a venue that is sold-out and the majority of events are seated on temporary Junior High bleachers.

I don’t think you are getting the visual of this.

Today at the Novice Compulsory Dance event a record was set. There was a crowd of spectators that eventually went to standing room only. Those that found a seat on the 2 by 8 boards screwed metal poles were trapped because of three forces.

The first factor was that there are no assigned seats so it was scrunch time.

The second factor was that the term “open seating” takes on a whole new meaning when you are sitting 40 rows in the air with open space under your feet and under your seat. If you drop your coat, purse, or phone, it goes into the “dark hole”. Because you are allotted eight inches for your bottom and eight inches for your feet there is no room to maneuver if someone wants to sit to the right or left. So you sit there in fear while the seat sways if someone takes a sip of water, or chews on gum.

The third factor I must admit, might not apply to everyone. But after 2 hours of watching waltzes and pasos on a wooden bench that seemed to sway and bow in the middle, one of my body parts became rather numb and seemed to render my spine to and hip to a twisted mass of spastic in-action

It has been six hours and I am just starting to get feeling back to that area of my body and now I have to go back over to watch the Junior CD practice.


No progress has been made on the CW and my daughter’s room mate because of the hereforementioned posterior pain. Said daughter and room mate did mention that I needed to clarify that this is not a “stalking”. Of course not I said. It is an opportunity for two like-minded individuals to meet and greet at the end of the competition.

I thought I would plan an meeting place, like “Sleepless in Seattle”, where both could meet out of the eye of the skating public. I would just post, “CW please meet the X girl in the 5th booth of Spencers on Saturday night at 7:00”

“That would never work”, my daughter said, “There would be 50 girls there pretending they were the X girl. Plus that is pretty lame, you have to come up with something better than that.”

“Maybe we’ll throw him a stuffed animal with a coded message”

“Mom, you really need to get a hobby” she pauses, “It would have to be a pretty cool animal. Not a bear or something typical.”

No problem. I can shop and avoid the bleachers.

Mombo

Datebook: Saturday, January 20th ~ 2007

We come from a state that has an annual snow accumulation of about 10 inches. But we have an army of snow removal soldiers. I call them soldiers because if there is a hint of a “dusting” they are out in mass. They sit at the overpasses and bridges in their gold trucks waiting for the frozen chaos to begin. If we have an accumulation they send for reinforcements and within hours we have salted, bare pavements. Seriously, if there is a terrorist attack we need to send for the snow troopers along with the National Guard.

So perhaps you will understand my surprise when we arrived in Spokane to a winter wonderland of old snow. This was what I expected. What was the birthday present type of surprise was waking up yesterday to an expected 5 inches of snow and a city in turmoil. Yes. No snow plows swept the streets, no salt or sand spewed from spreaders, instead the news reporters and weather oracles let their voices chime several octaves higher as they warned residents of the “dicey conditions.” Isn’t this the Northwest where this happens all the time?

So we stumbled through the slush, ice and snow to the big arena for practices. These went as well as can be expected for kids who just got off planes and were letting the balance of nerves and excitement decide what format to take.

What worked well for parents was the fact that Chili's is right across the street and they have a special drink called the “El Nino”. This is in lieu of the fact that the USFSA team doctor cannot actually give the parents medication so that they can watch their children perform.

This becomes apparent during doctor visits at home when I fill out questionnaires that ask about alcohol consumption. The doctor asks if I drink and I reply twice a year—one week in early August and a week in January.

“Oh, you take two vacations a year,” she nods.

“NO,” I answer so loudly my doctor immediately orders a hearing test, “they are not vacations.’

Anyway, to keep myself from carrying a silver flash to the rink I have to find another focus and so, as a fall back, it must be Charlie White. As I have mentioned before, he is the Johnny Depp of skating, or at least ice dancing.

My daughter is off the market so to speak with her own Orlando Bloom type of guy, so I am going to work on fixing up her room mate with Charlie White by the end of the week. This has a slight twist since I don’t actually know Charlie White and how to accomplish this and my daughter’s room mate knows nothing about my project. This should make this quite a challenge but, you have to admit, quite a diversion.

I’ll keep you informed of my progress.

Mombo.

Datebook: Friday, January 19th ~ 2007

The Travel Day.

There are moments in our lives that are filled with foreshadowing.

Our traveling party consisted of two moms and two skating “girls”. The moms had one large bag (with some empty room for last minute items from the daughters) and the “girls”, well, it was difficult to count—they each had two bags to be checked, several carry-on bags that had to be stuffed inside of other bags, and a proxy carry-on bag for their mom to carry on.

No problem. Until you get to the ticket window.

Ticket windows have evolved over the years so that now there are several ticket agents that stand behind the counter. In front of the counter are little machines that dispense “self-serve” boarding passes. This actually takes three times longer and an occasional glance at the ticket agent makes one think of pit bosses in Las Vegas—there is a definite look of superiority as they gaze at the masses. They have eliminated that question, “did you pack these bags yourself” which keeps you from starting off the trip with a lie, in retrospect I’m not sure if this is a comforting feeling, except perhaps the realization that the TSA has finally acknowledged that someone who might want to blow up a plane is not going to be quelled and stopped with that riveting question.

No questions about bag packing, no assistance with boarding passes and computer snafus until it is time to tag the bags. Then the strong arm of Northwest descends and pushes the button on the weight machine, and just like at home, you hold your breath while the scale of injustice decides your fate.

One overweight bag.

We’ve been here before.

“You can take some items out and repack them in another suitcase,” the deadpan ticket agent states. We turn and look at the line behind us that resembles those panned on television of American Idol try-out lines, well, maybe the line that has already been skewered by Simon Cowell.

“That’s okay,” we all say together like a well-trained quartet. The ticket agent pauses with that little sticky label in hand, like maybe she has to report this as suspicious behavior. “We don’t want to hold up the line,” we say, trying to win her over. She gives a slight shake of her head as if we are poster children for the decadence of this country. She does not understand that we could never open our bags and expose bras, bears, and tambourines to the awaiting crowd.

She accepts our money for being overweight with distain, like we just used our entire paycheck to buy lottery tickets, and we ask the skating muses to make sure the destination tags that read “GEG” somehow really means Spokane and not “Greater East Gesus”

My adult traveling companion mom warned me that she gets a trifle nervous when flying. This turned out to be as much of an understatement as saying “skating is expensive.”

I was forewarned when she grabbed my arm during boarding and asked, “What was that?”

“It’s okay, it was just the flight attendant closing an overhead compartment.”

When the pilot announced they were going to de-ice the plane I realized my seatmate could subsidize her daughter’s skating with voice-overs for horror movies. Luckily the flight attendants were not related to the counter agents and sold my friend 2 Skye vodka’s before take off and those four shots made the rest of the trip amusing and several other rows actually joined her in a sing-a-long as we soared along at 38,000 feet.

As we waited at baggage claim it was apparent that there was a pattern. The male passengers waited for luggage that eventually turned out to be small leather carriers the size of shaving kits, and the female skating crowd waited, adding to their stacks of baggage until it appeared they were all changing their zip-codes and not just visiting for the week.

Our shuttle driver told us he had been at his job for twenty years and had never had a bus that full or with as much luggage.

He wasn’t complaining of course, since the dollar per bag rule probably meant we were making his mortgage payment for the month.

Regardless, we are all here and so are the shoes.

Mombo

Datebook: Thursday, January 18th ~ 2007

* Editor's Note: Mombo will be blogging from US Nationals!

People tell me that after your children leave home there is a turning point, and they come back around to where you can enjoy them—almost like friends.

Well, 202 days is not long enough apparently.

Yesterday I went to have my hair trimmed and get my eyebrows “shaped”. While doing my eyebrows the technician asked, “Is that all we are getting done today?”

I replied, “Yes.” although there must have been a question in my voice.

So all through my hair treatment I could not enjoy the double head massage of the shampoo and conditioner, or the brushing, and combing of my locks. I kept thinking, “What else should I have done” in the hair removal department?

When I got home my husband didn’t even notice my stylish coiffure, let alone the high set arch of my brow. I certainly couldn’t ask him a question as sensitive as wondering when too much facial hair is well, too much.

My son was even worse. “Oh, did you just get in, I thought you were reading in the library.”

So, I called my daughter for what I though would be a tender probing into the possibility of facial fur.

“Hey, sweetie” was met with “Can I call you back, I’m right in the middle of trying on clothes.”

The music in the background confirmed this wasn’t in her bedroom, but probably a place with 95.00 a square foot of carpet and sales associates who wear their hair in buns.

No problem, I said. I’ll just sit here seemingly until I can braid the hairs on my chin. Take your time.

She did call back in ten minutes and told me she was trying on skating pants. I just shrugged it off in my mental obsession of pending werewolfism. (Later I would realize how odd that she would be trying on skating pants right before Nationals—she won’t wear skating pants at Nationals, in fact the girls have to have “practice” costumes that are almost as grand as competition costumes).

I tell her my saga but she doesn’t hear it the first time because she is talking to her room mate, making plans of where to meet the rest of the posse for dinner at a trendy eatery. I don’t even blink that I had the third night of leftovers of sausage, green peppers, and pasta—envy is one of the seven deadly sins afterall.

I am forced to repeat it.

I thought I heard a yelp but it was probably the phone. Surely, this sweet child of mine did not just burst out in laughter at my pending follicle nightmare. Surely she wasn’t savoring the moment when she could blurt this out at a table of skaters eating spring rolls and Chicken Caesar salads.

“So what are you asking?” she queried with all the diplomacy of Donald Trump appearing on The View.

“I’m asking you if I have facial hair I can’t see, or chin hair, or some type of hair that the technician thinks I should maybe take care of.”

“You mean like a mustache?’

I gulp. I hadn’t really thought of a mustache. In fact, I try not to think of mustaches on women since an incident in third grade where I drew, what I still consider a fabulous, detailed still life of the gym teacher. Apparently everyone thinks they are an art critic.

“No, I didn’t specifically mean a mustache, but,--why did you bring it up? Did you notice something?

“No. I haven’t noticed, but don’t most woman get those when they get older?”

Ah, out of the mouths of the babes—those twentyish young ladies who cannot envision grey hair, stretch marks, things that droop, and cellulite.

“Some woman perhaps….” I pause to regroup. This was almost a Freaky Friday scenario. “Did you find pants you liked?

“I think so, I’m going to go back after we eat and decide.”

“Good planning. But, sweetheart, maybe you should buy them in small instead of extra small. You know, so you have some breathing room.”

I envision her unblemished face turning a shade paler at the thought. “Why? Why would I do that?”

“Well, most people put on a few pounds the older they get…it might be more practical.”

So anyway, that whole friends thing, there must be a five year warranty or something. It’s obviously way too soon or just a urban legend to begin with.

Mombo

Datebook: Monday, January 15th ~ 2007

This is usually our recovery day. In previous years, this is the day after returning from Nationals when we could wash all of our travel clothes and wear sweat pants all day.

This year, we are still in launch mode.

Now we are at four days and counting until we leave.

These are the “getting primed” days where we get the nails polished, hair cuts, and eyebrows waxed. The suitcases come back out of storage, and we buy those travel tubes of Crest Whitening toothpaste.

People say this is the time for making lists. And herein lays the problem-- because, well, I am not a list maker. Everyone around me is however.

My husband creates elaborate shopping lists when he goes to the store: “Tide fresh scent, 128 ounce no-drip spout; Cheerios, 20 ounce, no race car drivers on package. Milk, back of the rack for the freshest date.”

My daughter’s list for last week looked a bit Paris Hiltonish: “Get hair cut at new salon-Voted Best Blow-Out in City, eyebrow wax at The Red Door, pick up Fiji water, decide on S. Madden shoes—do I wear enough brown or should I just go with the Cheetah print because it really goes with black?”

My son’s list is very neat and in perfect 13 font handwritten script. “Complete Physics homework. Plan swim workout for next week (500 f/s, 20 50s, 2 mile rotation) including dry land circuits. Brush teeth for five minutes using counter revolutions”. I know, it is a cry for intervention where he is forced to watch MTV or Road Rules until he stops doing Calculus equations in his head for the fun of it.

I can’t do this.

My shopping list says, ‘Get stuff we need at the store” and I rarely refer to it while negotiating the aisles at Safeway. I like not having the encumbrance of a pen and pencil and making all those cross-outs as I place salad dressing and pasta in my cart.

My daughter’s room mate is the ultimate list maker. She actually makes a list of all the lists she has to make the next day. It must look like she has “list” wallpaper this week with all those lavender and pink note papers stuck to the wall and refrigerator. She is very precise with her packing requirements: 12 bobby pins, 4 hair ties, 48 pair of shoes, twelve purses.

She even makes a list of what she will eat the next day.

This would never work for me. Lists are really like little diaries to yourself, or contracts. There is a degree of honor and truth that must be established. If I made a list of what I would eat the next day I would have to honest and realistic. I would have to start out with good intentions.

Then I would have to acknowledge that I planned to eat a package of Tandy Takes and several cookies before dinner. Maybe even put on line eight that I was going to eat the last piece of cold pizza sitting on the refrigerator shelf.

I cannot make a list for my packing either. It would seem exotic to actually write that I need to pack 9 pair of socks and underwear sets, four pair of pants, a pair of jeans, two skirts, assorted matching tops and three pair of pajamas. It sounds adventurous—most vacations are only seven days, the truly elaborate take more time, weeks, so the traveler can view the Orient or negotiate the Nile to view the pyramids.

We are going to Spokane, a lovely city to be sure, but one I won’t see much of if the past holds true. We will spend the days sitting in ice rinks watching practices and competitions. Or waiting to watch practices or competitions. And on busses, or waiting for the busses to take us to watch the practices or competitions.

If we wanted to be trendy or stylish we would actually pack nine coats and scarves for each day. But this would be too bulky.

So, I’m just going to wing it. I’m flying listless. It’s true that I’ll probably forget to pack those headphones I have to buy each trip and have to spend another five dollars to watch the movie on the plane, or I’ll forget a safety pin or TicTacs.

(Whoa, did some of you just add these to your lists?)

That becomes my adventure--seeking out the CVS or Walgreens that is nearest to the hotel. Usually they sell postcards there also and you can send these back home to friends and family.

You know, to people who think you are on vacation.

Mombo

Datebook: Thursday, January 11th ~ 2007

In eight days we will be leaving for Nationals. Yes, on the 19th, although the official singing of the anthem does not take place until the 21st. Some of you would ask, “Why” and others will only nod because they are making the same travel plans.

The “why” is as simple as everything is in skating. The coaches. The coaches told us to get there early so we can register, practice, and “get acclimated”. Two months ago I must confess, I probably did a little “eye roll” on that. I have to miss another day of work, skaters miss another day of school; it seemed a bit like going to Lake Placid on the Saturday before the event.

But, okay, we bought the air tickets for Friday.

Now getting to Spokane is an adventure that I think they could feature on “The Amazing Race.” No airline flies there directly except for those who live in Seattle and they are taking the local shuttle across the state. The rest of us had to decide “the lesser of two evils”---did we want to spend eleven hours in the air with various lay-overs, or travel through some winter worry spots.

That’s right, do we sit on the plane with restless leg syndrome as the earth completes a revolution and go through Phoenix or San Francisco, or do we chance a Chicago or Denver snow down? I’m not sure, but I think there may still be passengers at the Denver airport waiting stand-by from the December 19th storm—I can’t imagine where their luggage landed.

This wouldn’t seem such a calamity to those on the eastern half of the states if Nationals occasionally ventured across the Mississippi River. But it hasn’t, and doesn’t intend to for at least two years. I’m sure the powers that be have identified that the term “National” was meant to include the entire country and will make adjustments in the future, perhaps holding the event in Kansas City so it is at least on the east side of the fold in the Rand McNally. Seriously, I’m sure they will fund 100 dollar stipends for the teams from the east who always have to spend more, and that they will change the times of the competition events to Eastern standard time every third day so that all skaters are treated the same.

Really, keep your eyes open for the announcement.

Another timing issue this year is that Nationals is held two weeks later. And that makes a big difference. We are now no longer getting off the plane on the return trip to the comfort of an additional day off due to Martin Luther King’s birthday. And seriously, taking into consideration his proclamation that “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”, this should be another factor when deciding the time, venue, and setting of future Nationals.

If it takes 11 hours to get to Spokane, via various airports and sled dog teams, it will take the same to get home. But. And this is the big “But”. When your plane touches down at an east coast time zone airport, you turn your watch ahead 3 hours. Cell phones do this automatically, which is a bit freaky I must say. And then you have to pick up luggage, drive home, and get up for work or school in about five hours.

This allows for little time to prepare for the questions that wait.

“How was it?”

“Are they going to the Olympics?”

I’ve decided it will be easier if I just answer “Great” and “Yes, yes they are!”

Yes, indeed. Instead of answering all of those questions, I’ll just plan to get another job in three years. A fresh start. Maybe I’ll just tell my new co-workers that my daughter does something on the ice.

Maybe they’ll think it is curling.

Mombo

Datebook: Monday, January 8th ~ 2007

I am a person who likes the unusual. I tend to believe in miracles and the power of one.

Several years ago I clipped three news stories from the local paper and their confirming wire service reports in the New York Times. The first was about a woman who tried to cash a one million dollar bill at the local 7-11 while buying a pack of cigarettes—she was annoyed they didn’t have 999,997.00 in change for Menthol Lights and seemingly astounded to learn she passed a counterfeit note. She got the bill in a birthday card from her uncle.

The second was about a man in England who kept a pet goldfish alive for 54 years—I know, either he is an artist of animal husbandry or he was able to find about 300 exact match replacements through the years.

The final story will make the hair stand up on your arm.

In Ethiopia, during the worst part of the drought, starving people were given miracle food when the heavens opened up and rained 4 pound fish into the waiting arms of the masses. This seems unbelievable, but it was actually scientifically explained --it seems water spouts formed in the sea, sucking up mackerel and sea bass as it moved westward, and then traveled inland for fifty miles before dissipating and dropping the catch of the day to the hungry.

So with these as my template I think you will understand why I am just a little skeptical of religious icon Pat Robertson’s report of recent conversation with the lord.

Now I know there are several things that civil people should not discuss—one being politics and the second being religion.

So, don’t be alarmed, this is not about religion. This is about communication.

Although there are probably millions who speak to the lord daily, there are few who actually say he talks back to them, at least not in an audible fashion. Everyone probably gets a sign here or there.

But Pat Robertson relayed that God told him the U.S. only feigns friendship with Israel and that U.S. policies are pushing Israel toward “National Suicide.”

Wow.

I guess I didn’t expect God to be so attuned to our political issues. Next Pat will tell us he had a French accent or was smoking a Cuban cigar.

And, in the tradition of prognostications, he also advised that God told him there would be a terrorist attack on the United States and although God didn’t mention the word nuclear, he felt it would be something like that.

I’m not sure how many states have a regulation against yelling “Fire” in a theatre but it seems to me that perhaps announcing that God said there will be a mass attack in the U.S. in 2007 falls into the same category. Both could produce panic and human suffering.

Well, they could if Robertson were really perceived as the great oracle of modern times. In May, Robertson said God told him that storms or a Tsunami were to crash into America’s coastline in 2006. When this didn’t happen, Robertson said, “Sometimes I miss.”

So, of course, there is a call out to anyone who might get a few more details if they are having two-way conversations with a deity of any kind, so we can all be a bit more pro-active. Anyway, I hope we don’t have too much to worry about since we have time to get the facts in case this is true.

Perhaps Barbara Walters could intervene with one of her intense interviews. Well, through an interpreter of course.

Mombo

Datebook: Thursday, January 4, 2007

Editor's Note: My apologies for not posting this Mombo on time. Mombo's blog will return to its regular schedule of Monday/Thursday posts starting January 8th.

Some of the problems with the day after New Year’s Day-- what about all of that food that is still sitting in the refrigerator and in the cookie jar?

We still have a vat-like quantity of eggnog and more cookies than the Keebler elves could make without violating elfin labor laws. Additionally, the holiday chocolates haven’t depleted much—okay I ate most of the miniature Mr. Goodbars in those festive gold wrappers but I was just trying to do my part.

I still have half of a ham left over from the open house and a quart of sweet potatoes. I know, the orange spuds are history but my mother keeps trying to talk to me about recycling the ham. Apparently there are 480 ways you can use a ham remnant and/or bone to create soup or stew culinary treats, but unfortunately most of these Betty Crocker cooking cards also have some large type of bean that needs to be inserted into the pot. I still have nightmares about wax beans and I won’t bore you with the details except to say that same mother did hold out longer than a seven-year girl who refused to put another mushy, sour, beige seed in her mouth.

There are still vials of olives and containers of hummus, cartons of crackers, wedges of brie, and a few packages of dinner rolls.

I have to purge the pantry of these morsels of temptation.

Yes, I know I mentioned that Bob Greene said you only need to increase your activity for the first phase but I only read to page 10. On the next page he actually instructed those diet-savvy followers to only buy foods with less than 4 grams of sugar. Except for the ham bone this would eliminate my entire larder.

I thought I would focus on breakfast and went to the store with this less than 4 grams of sugar and more than 4 grams of fiber criteria. A bit of sticker shock resulted. No more Captain Crunch or Frosted Cheerios. X-nay on the Coco-Puffs.

In fact, the only cereals I could find with this criterion were Fiber One, which looks like petrified macaroni noodles, and Total, which looks like the poor desert relatives of Corn Flakes.

I tried to eat the Fiber One this morning. I put it in a bowl where it bounced out like Tigger on a Mountain Dew. When I tried to pour milk on it, it repelled it as if I had doused it in Rain-X.

I know, I know. I said I wasn’t going to start “Eating for Life” until after Nationals but my daughter came to visit for 12 hours over the weekend and dared to mention that she might have gained a “pound over the holidays”.

A pound.

Really.

A pound to someone in my weight class is much like spotting a penny on the ground in the parking lot. I’m not going to stoop and pick it up and add it to my growing wealth and quest for economic stability. It would be lost at sea so to speak.

A pound to me is one fruit drink, two Hershey kisses, or three macadamia cookies. Please, the list is endless but never in my life have I worried that I put on ONE pound.

I looked at her size zero body with buns of steel and felt a momentary comprehension of the concept of a love/hate relationship.

This intensified when her brother asked what my New Year resolutions would be.

“Well, this year I am really going to eat healthier and get in better shape.”

“ “.

That was what I got. Nothing. Silence. No comment. No raised eyebrows or smirks.

In fact, they didn’t even look at me. They looked at each other with perfectly blank expressions, like they were standing for inspection at the Naval academy or something. And yet I knew they were sending each other secret decoder messages.

“Uh-Oh, not again. May-Day, May-Day.”

I could have held them there for hours, like my mother held me over that plate of wax beans, but they would have held out, collapsing hours later on the stairs in laughter once out of my sight.

So as a mother, it is my duty to prove them wrong and wipe off those smirks that were not on their faces.

I have two and half weeks to lose a few pounds, realistically realizing I may re-gain a few at Nationals-- from nervous tension and my annual need of Cosmopolitans between rounds, I mean between events.

Or maybe I’ll be lucky like my daughter and only gain back a pound.

I’ll use the luggage scale at the airport on the trip home to confirm. I’m sure she won’t be embarrassed.

Mombo