Weekend Update... Flashback... Whatever...

Howdy bloggy people! I'm just back from the park with Sundance... we had a very long, very drippy walk. I love walking in the rain! Oh, and I discovered that if I wear a baseball cap, it eliminates the need for little windshield wipers for my glasses! Too bad it took me 35 years and hundreds of Monet-inspired, watercolor-y walks to figure it out. Yeah, I'm quick.

I hope those of you in the US of A enjoyed your 4th of July! Ours was nice... we had a neighborhood cook-out, which was fun (no politics were discussed!), followed by marshmallows toasted around the firepit. Then we watched the Pigsnuckle fireworks from the front lawn and our neighbor shot off a few of his own, too, which the kids loved. It didn't start to rain until the festivities were just winding down, so all in all, a great day!

OK, so what else has been going on since my last post? Let's see...

Well, my hair and I have reconciled. Sort of. We've called a relatively amicable truce, anyway. I still don't like it but others seem to (or they're lying through their teeth... which is entirely possible because really, how many people are going to say, "Oh Diane, your hair looks like shit!"? Am I right?). Anyway, I can live with it for a while so I've stopped bitching about it. Mostly. OK, now I've stopped.

I went out on Thursday night with that social networking club I told you about. It was fun. We went to 'salsa night' at a little club downtown. I was hoping they meant chips and salsa... but no. You know I don't dance, right? Well, I discovered that an awful lot other of people in Pigsknuckle don't dance either. Lordy. My Mussolini heel was acting up pretty badly, though, so I sat and watched (and by 'watched', I mean 'drank beer and laughed at everyone'). But it was fun and I met a couple of nice people. One of the swim dads, who is also in my man-book club, was there, too, so I didn't feel like I was walking into an intimidating social situation all by myself. I do well once I'm in it, but actually forcing myself to do something like that alone is really, really hard for me. Seeing a familiar face made it a lot easier.

Oh, this was good... We have a small grocery store just on the outskirts of our neighborhood and they let various church and school organizations raise money by selling hotdogs out front, in this little shed they had built. It's nice, really, as every week a different organization signs up to man the shed and they get to keep all the proceeds from the sale of the (very cheap) hot dogs and drinks. Ryan likes to walk down there with her friends every now and then and get a dog for lunch. So, yesterday I had to go to the store for ice. Ryan came with me, and, as it was lunchtime, she asked if she could get a hot dog. We waited in line and when the woman at the counter was giving Ryan her food, she asked if she was from New York. I didn't understand why she would ask such a (seemingly) random question, and neither did Ryan, so I said, "Sorry?" She looked at Ryan and said, "Oh, there are a couple of churches in town sponsoring a bunch of kids from New York this week, so I thought you might be one of them." I just looked at her for a minute and said, "No. She's mine and she lives here."

Grrrrr.

This is the 5th or 6th time now since Ryan was a baby that someone has assumed she was either adopted or not mine. Even though there are loads of brown-skinned kids running all over Pigsknuckle, I guess this woman is used to seeing them with brown-skinned mothers. Because I'm Casper-the-Ghost white, she made the assumption that Ryan didn't belong to me and was, in fact, a 'fresh-air' kid from the Bronx.

The first time it happened, Ryan was an infant. It was summer then, too, so she was all brown like she is now, and this woman came up to us in the grocery store. She said, "Oh, your baby is just beautiful! Where did you get her?" I didn't understand what she meant. Seeing my completely confused look, she realized what she'd done and apologized for assuming Ryan was adopted. Several months later, when we were out with my friend Rae, who is half-Japanese, a waiter assumed Ryan was Rae's baby and not mine. It's happened several other times since.

I don't mind if someone asks her ethnicity. I really don't. But I seriously hate it when people assume she's not my kid. But, there are worse things, I guess. She doesn't seem to care and all that really matters to me is how she feels about it.

So... that's about it, I think. Hope you've all had a wonderful weekend!!!