Entrepreneur

Overheard around 10 pm, between Lola and her father:

Greg: Hey, do you have any candy?

Lola: I might. But I'm not gonna GIVE you any.

Greg: I was planning to pay you. What do you have?

Lola: M&M's, Hershey's Kisses, Rollos, Swedish Fish, and those things that have the caramel inside and chocolate on the outside...oh, yeah--Werthers!

Greg: I'll give you a dollar for the M&M's.

Lola: A dollar! I'd rather eat 'em myself. It'll cost you 2.



Afternoon:

Lola: We have a new vending machine at school with "healthy" snacks in it. It has apple juice, orange juice, Powerade, and some weird lemon water. There were only six lemon waters, so everyone was fighting over it. Of course, I got one. It cost a dollar. I sold it for two.

Open House

A home at the end of our street is for sale. Tragic story that I won't exploit here. Sunday is Open House Day, as everyone who's ever seen a brick knows. Yesterday morning:

Lo: I can't WAIT for 2-5!

TR: Why? What's going on from 2 until 5?

Lo: Open House. I'm gonna be a stalker. I'm going to put up a lawn chair in Austin's yard and watch everyone who comes and goes.

TR: The point of that?

Lo: There are AT LEAST 8 little kids in the neighborhood now, who all play together. We don't need any more elementary school kids. I need another 7th grader.

TR: How do you think watching the comings and goings will facilitate getting one?

Lo: If I see any old people, or couples with younger children, I'll ride my go-kart up and down the street the whole time they're there.

TR: Go with God.

From the Lolarchives

She was about seven when this took place. <----Click link.

Geniuss

This morning, after I fixed Lo's waffles, I left her at the breakfast table and went to take a shower. When I came back downstairs, I found this note on the counter in the sunroom.

"Hey, Genius," I said, "you forgot to put the cap back on the marker." Then a half-beat later, I noticed the spelling and made yet another mental note to go get myself a brain scan. I didn't bother to ask her what it was about, because Lo tells me she's a genius about ten times a day. I figured it was just a variation on the theme. Later, we were on the way to her early-morning Math help session, because Genius is having trouble with Geometry, and she asked me what I use my iPad for at work. I told her I check my Conley Center email on it and look at Pinterest. She then launched into her routine lecture about what a waste it is for me to even have one, because I don't use it enough or properly, and how selfish I am not to let her play on it. This, too, I hear at least ten times per, so I tuned her out.

I got the iPad for graduation in May, and I don't want anyone's grubby fingers on it. I've been generous with my laptop for the past few years and, as a result, it's the color of Cheetos and so crumb-encrusted I have to hammer the 'return' key. I have very few things in the world that are mine alone, and this has been a complaint for a long, long time--since I reached, then passed, the age where I thought I could finally have have a nice bed spread or my own underwear. NO ONE has the password to my iPad, except for Georgia. Giving it to her is like giving it to myself. And the password is something NO ONE would figure out in a million years. Just ask Georgia.

So...I dropped Lo off at school, hit Duncan Donuts for coffee, and headed to my counseling office. When I got here, I took out my iPad and set it up on my desk. Here is what I saw:

And where my wallpaper was the Apple-supplied Tiki motif last night when I went to bed, it had been changed to this:

Mamoo Also Has Tattoos

Mamoo's birthday was Wednesday, the 12th, so we met last night to do the family dinner at Taco Tsunami on "The Square." As I mentioned before, Lola spent the weekend with her grandmother, so they were coming together. When we (her father and I) arrived, Georgia (sister, 23) was already there, holding a bright pink birdhouse. It was sprinkled with glue-gunned silk flowers and had a flamingo dancing on the front porch. She and Sadie (sister, 25) had found that treasure at an art festival in Augusta on Saturday, and it easily trumped the pelican-themed resin necklace I'd purchased for my mother here at an Atlanta festival on the same day. Georgia and Sadie live by the rule "Go big or go home," and on the rare occasions I forget that, I regret that. Glitter-paint fuschia background notwithstanding, my little pendant paled in comparison. If Eddie's Trick Shop next-door had been open, I'd have snuck over and bought my mother a tu-tu.

We grabbed a table and wondered why Mamoo was late, because she and Lola are usually quite punctual when there's a menu. I was trying to figure out whether Mom's route would require any left turns, because that could add significant time to the trip. In a bit, Greg's cell phone rang and he reported that Mamoo was having difficulty finding a parking spot but was in the area. About ten minutes later, Lola came into the restaurant alone, looking like a combination of cat-who-ate-the-canary and someone-who'd-seen-a-ghost. Before we could even ask, she answered, "I can't tell you."

"What happened...where's Mamoo?" I insisted.

"Really. I can't say." The color was slowly crawling back into her face.

"Did Mamoo hit somebody's car? Did you call the police?"

"No, she's coming. She'll be here in a minute."

Right about then, Mamoo beelined it through the door, glaring at Lola, silently warning her not to talk. I made a mental note to ask if she was off her meds. "What did you DO?" I demanded. "Did you traumatize my child?" She looked at Lola as if to determine whether or not she had.

"It was bad," she told us. Lola nodded in agreement. Mom continued, "I asked her if y'all ever use that word, and she just laughed."

"What word? Did you drop the F bomb?" I turned to Lo, who raised one eyebrow.

"I had already circled the square once--"

"No, you hadn't," Lola interrupted. "It was the first time around."

"OK, but I was almost all the way around and couldn't find a spot. A group of people were in the street, rolling up tents from some event earlier today. They had cones blocking most of the lanes, but not the turn lane. I figured it was all right to go on through to turn---"

Lo again: "She was motioning for you to stop. She kept waving you away."

Mom: "Yes, there was a woman holding up her hands, but I didn't know where else to go, so I rolled down my window. She told me I needed to turn around, but there was plenty of room..."

The story went on for a couple more sentences, but I lost track of what was being said. I kept looking at Lola, who appeared to be bracing herself. I knew what was coming, and cut to the chase, asking my mom, "Did you say FU?" A half-nod confirmed. But Lola was about to reveal the worst part:

"She had a baby in a pouch."

"Well, I didn't see THAT," my mother said in her own defense, "and she was just so...so...smug."

"But she had a baby. In a pouch."

By now, Georgia was sunk as low in the booth as she could get, I was circling the ceiling in a dissociative state, and Greg was tallying up the My Family vs. Your Family list he keeps in his head.

Then Lola asked if we could get Queso as an appetizer.

Lolarchives

I've decided that on Sundays I'll post an old link from The Stone's Colossal Dream, so new readers can get caught up and the rest of us can relive the glory.

Here, she was six.

Will Work for Food

Lola is spending the weekend with my mother, Mamoo. They've got a cruise booked for the Thanksgiving holiday, so instead of watching Cops, they're holding a big ol' yard sale to raise money for "excursions." If I've heard Lo use the word "excursions" once, I've heard it a gajillion times. Evidently, excursions are those extracurriculars such as jet-skiing, rock wall-climbing, and snorkeling that you resort to once you get tired of eating and shopping.

The blue jar pictured is Lo's piggy bank for the trip. She doesn't trust herself not to spend the money if she knows how much is in there, so she painted it (ocean-themed) to hide it from herself. Of course, this required a visit to Michael's and me spending my money on spray paint. She's putting most of her allowance away and looking for other sources of income. She actually washed my car one weekend after I'd offered the job to Broke-Jack but he was watching the Godfather marathon. No matter that she can't see it, I have no doubt Lo knows to the penny the amount she has saved. She can tell you how much cash is in my purse right this second, and she hasn't seen me since Friday morning.

I have never been on a cruise, have never wanted to, and am pretty confident my opinion on that will never change. I imagine cruises are like being stuck at The Mall of Georgia, but set adrift in the middle of the ocean. All the food tastes like Ruby Tuesdays, and the decor is Vegas lite. I picture a panorama of Tommy Bahama shirts and Oprah-endorsed Carol Wior Slimsuits. I envision family-style dinner seating with couples who look like Mr. and Mrs. Roper. I'll pass.

The worst part about cruises for me, though, is that they seem so food-centric. Everyone talks about how much there is to eat and how you can eat as often and as much as you want. I'm not a big fan of trough food. Or anything, really, that requires a sneeze guard. Mamoo, however, is Cheerleader A for the Chinese Buffet or Shoney's, and that would make Lola the B. I could be making a giant assumption, but I get the impression that people who love cruises love to eat.

Once, I went to a baby shower for one of my best friends from college. Her mom and aunts were there, and they were a hoot. They told a story about a recent cruise they'd gone on and how much planning and trouble went into buying new wardrobes. It was very important to these ladies that they dress like the divas they were, and crucial that they shine while traveling. They were Old School proper, so none of the flannel pj bottoms or comfy drawstring pants you so often see at the airport. They wore their second-best outfits on the flight down to Florida and saved their very best for the trip home. Only, after a week of chocolate infinity fountain, they couldn't squeeze into their new outfits. They had to wear sweats on the plane and be humiliated.

That shouldn't be a problem for Lola, though, since all of her clothes look like this:

Let's Begin By Name-Calling

Lola is in Chorus. Don't know how that happened, because she is genetically indisposed to carrying a tune. In my opinion, she'd be better suited to playing flugelhorn in the concert band, being that she has the requisite red hair and freckles, as well as the large frame that supports massive volumes of hot air. In any event, they let her in Chorus for the second year. Maybe it's because the child can sell some cheesecake, which is the focus of their fundraising activities each Fall.

I think the combination of her competitive nature and her obsession for sweets is what makes her so successful, or perhaps it's her own special Turf War. We heard the other day that the parents of a younger kid in the neighborhood, a sixth-grade chorus student, had complained to the director that Lo had beaten the girl to the door of every house within the three-mile radius of our subdivision. Said parents argued that it's against the rules to sell to people you don't know. My response on Lola's behalf: You snooze, you lose. If the buyers didn't know her before, they know her now. No one meets Lola and forgets her. Besides, she's lived here for almost 13 years, since before she was old enough to ask "Whassup?"(her first word) to anyone who approached her or passed by us when I had her out in the jogging stroller.

So she sold $425 in cheesecake products and was anticipating huge rewards in the way of prizes and fame. On the morning the money was due, we sat down and figured everything up again, filled out the forms, etc., and had everything ready to go. This was a big deal, because she didn't tell me it was due until 7 a.m. the day of, and I HATE to add anything to my morning routine that already includes making her three frozen waffles with peanut butter and syrup and fixing her lunch. Yes, I know she's old enough to do these things herself, but she's convinced that "You'd do it for Jack" (her 20-yr-old brother), something I cannot deny, so I feel obligated. I do do everything Jack asks me to due to the residual divorce guilt from 17 years ago. Ever since he was three and said, "I know Dad's coming back; you still have two pillows on your bed," I have been at his beck and call. All that to say I squeezed the record-checking in between packing her lunch and looking at Pinterest and did a lot of yelling to make me feel better about it.

Anyway, she left to walk to the bus stop about two minutes ahead of me, and as I gathered my purse and laptop, I noticed she'd left that important giant envelope on the railing by the front door. I grabbed it and ran after her, yelling her name. She jalked back to meet me halfway.

"You're an idiot," I said.

"I might be," she replied. "But I'm your idiot."