I was going to hold off until my usual Random Tuesday to do this one, but I just loved it too much.

Let me just say, I LOOOOOOOOVE Battlestar Galactica. Probably more than is healthy. It’s coming back in April. If you’ve never watched, enjoy sci fi and are looking for something during the long summer of repeats (or writer’s strike draught), do get the season 1 dvd and start from there.

I Am Fairly Normal

I scored 35% normal on this quizLike most people I am normal in some ways… But I’m not a completely normal person. I am a little weird too!Why I am Normal: I’d rather have rats than cockroaches in myhome I would eat meat from a cloned animal I eat the frosting first If I had to, I’d rather live without music and still have laughter I prefer ruffled potato chips Why I’m Not Normal: I prefer a good nap to a good meal I would rather be a movie star than an astronaut I would rather be tan than pale When I’m in a car, I prefer to be the passenger I prefer my family to my friends

See, now this one is way off, I think. I am way weirder than this portrays. How about you?

Congratulations to Temperance Animal Hospital for 30 years in business. They held an open house today. I may have mentioned this before, but my daughter is a bit of a horse/puppy freak and has insisted (for about 2 years now), that she’s going to be a horsie vet. I get that we’re a long way off from those types of decisions, but she’s steadfast for now. While driving to the car wash, I decided to take her over.

She had a WONDERFUL time. The highlight was peforming Teddy Bear surgery.  With the help of one of the real live veterinarians, she selected a wounded stuffed puppy from a basket and got to assist in sewing it back up. Meanwhile, whoever’s running around Temperance slicing up stuffed animals needs to be stopped She hasn’t put the thing down since. Our new stuffed puppy’s name is Sugar Creme Cakes (catchy). Here she is feeling much better.

 (Er…and in case you think I’m trying to be like Michael Jackson…I get that a lot…They gave all of the kids surgical masks and hats to wear).

Sooo, I of course polled some of the experts regarding what type of doggie might be best for us (recall, low shedding, medium to small sized, good with kids are our current parameters). I mostly got a “good luck with that.” Kidding. Poodle mix still seems to be the advice of choice.

Anyway, kudos again to the great folks at T.A.H. We never did make it to the car wash.

Ugh. I didn’t want to leave my last post. Truly, I wanted to leave it up forever, but it’s time to move on. There will be more stories of my grandparents to come. For today, I’m going in a “whole nother” direction.

My daughter….bored on a rainy Sunday asked if she could draw me some pretty pictures. It sounded like a marvelous plan to me. I gave her her tablet of colored paper, pencils and crayons and busied myself with laundry.

A few minutes later. She gave me her latest masterpiece and asked me to hang it on the fridge. This is what she drew.

   What does it look like to you?

Give up?

Here is the answer key:

Yeah. That’s what I thought too.

Also, yesterday, I overheard the following exchange between my children:

Daughter (to her brother): I’m hungry, I want a banana. Will you go get me one?

Son: Uh. No. I’m not your slave.

Daughter: (whines) I’m not trying to treat you like a slave. I just want you to go get it!

Um, according to my husband, I use the same logic on him all the time. I think he is mistaken.

Ninety years ago, some pretty remarkable things happened in the world. The country was on the verge of a devastating influenza pandemic, the waning months of World War I, and in the middle of Woodrow Wilson’s presidency. But, in the predominantly Polish north end of Toledo, something else happened in the dead of winter on February 17, 1918. Stanislaw (Stanley) Kordowski, my grandfather, was born. Just a few years before that, his parents–Roman and Rosalia Kordowski–emigrated from Poland with the hopes of a better life for themselves and their family. In the end, they achieved that, but the path they travelled was harder than they ever could have wanted. If they’d known what was to come, they might well have stayed home.

Just a few years after Stanley’s birth, Roman was dead of a heart attack. I don’t think he’d even reached his 40th birthday. In the midst of the Great Depression, he left behind a wife who was still learning English and five young children of whom Stanley was the first. But…Rosalia was strong (her fashion sense, not so much, see below) and her son learned well from her. By the age of seven, Stanley was working to help provide for his family, his mother, his younger brother and three sisters. He grew up proud and loved with a strong work ethic and unwavering sense of duty. Stanley was a survivor. He was unbelievably stubborn, just like his mother.  Neither of them had a choice. He took advantage of Roosevelt’s New Deal and went to work for the Civilian Conservation Corps. He’d later count that among one of the best times of his life. He got paid. He got to see different parts of the country. He learned. He probably also enjoyed being away from a house full of women

When war broke out again, he joined the Navy with his brother, Chet. 

As did many, he saw the world and unspeakable horrors serving on the U.S.S. Colorado. He provided naval support at the Battle of Tarawa. One day, from the deck of the Colorado, he watched another Navy ship take a devastating torpedo blast. It was most certainly not the first time he’d ever seen such a thing, but this time, on this ship, his baby brother was on board.

For months, in the fog of war, Stanley had no idea whether Chet had lived or died.  He must have agonized over what he would eventually have to tell their mother. Then later, while on leave in a bar, he ran into Chet. He was alive and well though recovering from serious wounds. Again, Stan and his brother survived. They would later return home safely to their families.

In 1944, Stanley married the love of his life, Cecelia Minor. She was from the right side of town, beautiful, vibrant, and the catch of the county (a real tomato!). I will tell her story another day, but they had 3 children together and continued their life in Toledo.

Stanley worked for Chrysler as a tool and die maker. His pride, faith and work ethic never left him and he expected nothing less from his own family. He could build anything with his hands and taught all of it to his own son. (That contraption project my sister wrote about? Next Generation Kordowski ingenuity right there!)

Until I grew up, I knew very little of those things about him. He was Grandpa Kordowski. He was quick and funny, proud and neat. He was a terrible driver. ;) He would let me sit on his lap for hours watching mostly wildlife documentaries. He would snore and laugh heartily whenever I teased him about his big nose. It was a strong Polish nose and one that later sprouted on my own face (karma). I have less hair in mine than he did, so at least there’s that. He gave crushing bear hugs and wouldn’t stop until I laughed (or peed). We took walks to the ice cream shop and the library a few blocks from their house (in Trenton, MI by then). On the way there, he took me to a playground that will always be Grandpa’s Park to me.  He loved to dance with his wife. He taught me to sing songs in Polish. I never understood why he would laugh so hard when I repeated what he told me. I was sixteen before my grandmother finally threw a roll at him and told me I was singing something about a cow having large breasts.

He came to my school plays, my recitals, later the wrestling meets where all I did was cheer. It didn’t matter, he came. He was there the day I graduated from college in 1993. I only wish I’d known how little time we had left after that. Less than a year. He gave my future husband a ringing endorsement that day, after watching him eat nearly his entire weight in crablegs at a celebratory seafood buffet. “You’re all right kid,” he whispered, his eyes twinkling.

You were all right too Grandpa. We all turned out okay and it’s in large part because of the lessons you taught us about hard work, integrity and family. Busia and Dzia Dzia Kordowski made the right choice (ok, maybe not about the pink shower cap).

 I love you and miss you everyday.

This is how I most remember my grandparents.

Some of these are hoo-larious to me!)

Hug someone you love today

 Robin

You Are Most Like Richard Nixon

Oh sure, you give people plenty of reasons to call you “Tricky Dick.” But you’re actually quite diplomatic, even though you secretly hate your enemies.

At the risk of getting in to a mildly political discussion…there’s a thing I’ve noticed. Until this year, my kids knew very little about current events or politics. They’re still on the young end of grade school. Up until now, they could both tell you who the President was, but that’s about it. With the election coverage, that’s vastly changing and I know that this year is the first year they will remember a presidential election and what it means. Mine was Nixon and it wasn’t an election, it was a resignation. But…I definitely remember a time when the correct answer to “Who’s the President?” was Richard Nixon. He left office when I was just shy of four. I also remember being able to correctly answer who the vice president and secretary of state were.

 The thing is….I’m not any smarter than my kids. Probably far less so It is my theory that cable TV is the difference (and I suppose, to a lesser extent, computers and video games…though I do limit their time). When we were little, you could basically watch what, 3 channels? We saw the news. We heard those names and titles all of the time (even if we didn’t understand it, we constantly heard “Henry Kissinger, Secretary of State etc.). My kids don’t see as much news as I did. If the TV is on, it’s Nickelodeon, Noggin, PBS Kids etc.

I’m not saying it’s a good or bad thing, just interesting. Anyway…what got me to thinking of this (and you’ll see…my train of thought is always pretty serpentine) is a phenomenon I’ve noticed in both my husband and me. We’ll turn on the TV (Nickelodeon etc, when the kids are there). The kids will watch 5 minutes of whatever it is, then go off about their business. We, on the other hand, in kind of a mindless fog, will sit and watch Spongebob in its entirety before realizing…Hey, the kids left, put on Fox or CNN!

Sooooo, anyway, I think Spongebob would make a great President. He has charm and charisma and represents change. Squidward is too negative and too much of a Bikini Bottom insider for my liking. Patrick Star, being a starfish, is way too much of a flip flopper.

P.S. How weird is it that “Spongebob” showed up as a word on my spellchecker???

I may have mentioned this, but one of our big Christmas surprises was a Wii gaming system. We’ve really been enjoying it and my son, turns out, is a freakishly good Wii bowler. One of the cool things about this system is that you can create your own “character” or avatar called your “Mii.” (I realize my teenage nephews…assuming they even read this…are probably cringing ‘cuz I’m sure I’m not getting the terminology right. Plus also, they probably cringe anyway. They’re teenage boys.) Well, my son didn’t stop at creating his own image.

This is his Wii interpretation of me (or Mii).

It’s pretty close, actually.

This is my husband…

This is my mother… My daughter says, “This looks just like Busia. Except the Mii Busia’s skin is kind of little bit smoother.” Harsh!

This is my father… (Beeps is short for Beepa. My daughter couldn’t say Grandpa when she was teeny and it kind of stuck.)

He’s been a little bit obsessed creating a Wii village of everyone we know. The kids keep running back and forth asking, “How do you spell Tyler, Kyle, Sara, Mrs. So-and-so.” Yes, to my friends, family, neighbors, school teachers, we have a Mii version of you in our game system! Be afraid Bedford, be very afraid.

I Am Most Like Ronald Reagan

People tend to think I’m a god - or that I almost ruined the country. But even if people do disagree with me, they still fall victim to my charms!

Awesome!

http://www.blogthings.com/whatmodernuspresidentareyoumostlikequiz/

I am also officially tired of the election coverage. But…in honor of Super Tuesday, we have polling results from my household. Of indepedent non-voters under five feet tall, the breakdown is as follows (margin of error +/- eleventy billion because we asked them repeatedly over the course of two days).

Clinton - 25%

McCain - 25%

That Guy w/ the Red Nose - 0% (Honey, he’s not running anymore. And his nose isn’t red. It’s just his name is Rudy, yes, like the reindeer…)

Spongebob  - 25%

There you have it. Better than Drudge!

As a parent with smallish children, I’m always looking for ways to entertain them that don’t involve huge outlays of cash or substances that will stain the carpet. Not so easy. Well, yesterday–being a snow day–required me to work for it! As I said, I’m not crafty, but that doesn’t mean I’m not creative. Also, I’ve long since learned that everyone in my household is better off if we simply just do whatever my daughter tells us to.

She asks a lot of questions. “What does ‘usual’ mean? What does ’popular’ mean?” Eh. Stuff that generally requires me to dig deep in to the recesses of my cerebral cortex and come up with a five-year-old friendly answer. Luckily, lots of the time, she just wants to see pictures of stuff. Sooo…long story short, she likes to “youtube.” (Yes, it’s now a verb in our household.) 

We’ll sit in front of my laptop, fire up youtube and she’ll tell me what she wants to see. If I let her, she’d sit and do this w/ me for an hour or more. She’ll ask for things like hamsters running in a wheel, baby foals taking their first steps, jumping frogs (my son’s go-to request), baby elephants, really cute puppies. A caveat: you MUST closely supervise what pulls up when running any search on youtube with your five year old. A surprising number of people will upload videos tagged as “really cute puppies” that… in fact…have disturbingly nothing to do with puppies!

Well, today it was all about the Groundhogs in honor of Groundhog’s Day. She asked me to find her a groundhog looking at its shadow. Lo and behold, look here. These little guys are so cute, I want ‘em to get in mah belly!!

Then we found this one. We both thought it was a bit disturbing and yet strangely compelling (kind of like driving by a car wreck….no worries though, it’s safe to click, this is a family blog!) After this one, frankly, I hope never to have to seek medical treatment in Pennsylvania.

Go G-Hog! Go G-Hog!