8 out of 9!

8 out of 9 kids in my Monday 10am are returning students! How awesome! They like me! They really like me!

I better get some extra-fun new material. Seriously. Anybody know any kickass fingerplays?

Yippee! I can't wait to see them all again tomorrow!

And speaking of "I can't wait": Jana. You should totally get into law school in Chicago. It would be so awesome. Beers, bikes, harmony-- we'd be unstoppable.

Note: Jana is my karaoke-hosting, bike-riding, choir and Tap-After-Tape friend from Macalester. Janna on the other hand is my former roommate who now lives in Seattle and who came to Milwaukee for Easter. Jenna is a Chicago coworker and friend whose job at the OTS is to set me up with sweet gigs.

Like the birthday party I did yesterday morning. I do a ton of these things. They're fun! And pay a pretty penny. I am a gigging musician. In the past 8 months, gigs have been almost 14% of my income. For serious!

I had the party yesterday morning and then last night I worked my other job, sitting for Finn. It was a late and I didn't get home until 2:30; had to be at work this morning at 9. I've been sitting for Finn a whole lot lately, and I feel like the two of us have come to a really great point of mutual understanding. Maybe that sounds silly to say about a five year old, but we're connecting and having fun and it's really nice. I've been picking him up from school some days; his dad bought a booster seat for our car. On Friday the two of us took the bus down to Navy Pier and we walked around the "Winter Wonderfest" and saw the sights. I always try to take him out somewhere fun. Public transportation is one of his favorite things (no joke) and it's fun to find neat places to go together. And usually I just come up with the place, and he'll have the route all figured out. Eg: "Hey Finn, there's this free kids thing at Navy Pier." "Oh! We could take the Chicago bus to Navy Pier! And then on the way back we can take the Grand bus to the Red Line and then transfer to the Brown Line to get to my mom's apartment!"

Finn's favorite things:

1. El Train/Metra Train/Amtrak train/toy train
2. Real cars/toy cars
3. Asking about time/Checking the time/Telling you what time it is/Figuring out how many minutes until ______ happens
4. Running errands
5. "Coffee and a cookie" at Starbucks. ("We could go to the Starbucks on Addison! Or there's another Starbucks on Ashland that we could go to if we are taking Ashland!") The grownup gets the coffee, Finn gets the milk chocolate covered grahams. He ceremoniously unfolds a napkin, breaks the cookies into 8 squares, arranges them on the napkin, and eats one piece at a time.
6. Holding doors open for people
7. Elevators/escalators
8. Pooping cow keychain/talking about poop
9. Toy sets with tracks: Marble maze, Brio trains, Matchbox cars
10. Listening to music (and changing the song immediately if I start to sing along)
11. Putting his hands over his ears in anticipation of hearing any loud noise (walking under train tracks, standing on train platform, walking down hallway to apartment-- once an alarm went off there)
12. Making REALLY silly faces and taking cell phone pictures of them

Finn is a sweet boy.

I am nursing my sleepiness with a big ol' coffee from Starbucks. I've been spending a lot of time in Starbuckses, thanks to a couple of giftcards and coffeeandacookie outings. I'm torn about Starbucks. It creeps me out a little bit. Everyone talking in weird code language: "venti half-cap soy no foam skim lattechino"-- people really say those things! It sounds like a Saturday Night Live sketch of itself! I always just order a "large coffee," and the barista usually hands it back to me saying, "Here is your VENTI coffee." I don't want to be a jerk about it, and in other cases I'm irritated when people refuse to use correct terminology. This usually refers to a class title (most folks will call it "that workshop on Saturday" instead of saying "I want to sign up for Lead Guitar for Compete Idiots"), or a word in a foreign language. But Starbucks just made up a weird secret code and I feel like I'm giving myself over to their tyrannical empire if I start to use their language. I will always be a supporter of independent coffee shops, but I can feel the Bucks worming its way into my favor as I drink my way through these giftcards. They have a really yummy multigrain bagel, and also a tasty 5-fruit muffin. I am embarrassed to like the CDs they have on sale there. The Decemberists CD at the top of my Christmas list is on the rack at Starbucks now. The people there are always really nice too. Probably because they aren't worrying about having insurance.

The axe fell yesterday when I went to renew my prescription at Walgreens. "Do you have your new insurance card?" the pharmacist asked me, and my heart dropped into my stomach. No, I don't have a new insurance card. "It looks like something in your policy has changed since the first of the year." Not a surprise, because I wasn't really entitled to it anyway. So it looks like as of now, I am officially uninsured. I can't get covered at work. Even though I work full time for and get one paycheck from one company, I have multiple jobs there and thus do not count as a full time employee. I'm going to try to explore loopholes or ask if anyone is willing to create one for me, but last time I tried the HR guy told me I was out of luck. Though I do have dental insurance! Thank God I won't have to worry about my winning smile if I get run over by a car.

Julie, who quite suddenly had to have her appendix out this year, says I should marry Ben to get on his insurance. A tempting proposition except that we're trying to get Ben OUT of his current job and I don't want to be another reason he's stuck there.

I've been riding along on my parents' health insurance plan for a while. Officially, I could still be covered until some point in my 20s as long as they provide 50% of my income (ahem). Unofficially, nobody's ever asked, my name has stayed on the plan, and while I didn't feel I was allowed into the doctor's office, I've only had to pay $5 for prescriptions. I went to the doctor once or twice in Milwaukee since college, kind of pretending I lived there. We didn't want to arouse any suspicion, so I never went anywhere in Chicago. Still, I sort of had insurance in case of an emergency. On the other hand, it was weird fake-insurance where they probably weren't going to check it out unless there was some expensive emergency or something, which is of course when I would need the insurance, and they would probably not cover me.

Well in any case, my time of hazy insurance coverage is totally over. I feel vulnerable.

Damn!

And now I have a case of heart-in-the-stomach that I can't even get checked out.

Miscellaneous: I have seen many movies lately. They all get thumbs ups.

Pan's Labyrinth: gorgeous, excellent, heart-wrenching, intense. Do not see this movie on Sad Tuesday, but see it.
Coal Miner's Daughter: super good! Have your local video store's number on speed dial in case you are in the middle of the movie and your Netflix DVD scratches out on you five minutes before they close.
Me and You and Everyone We Know: Real quirky. Liked it a whole lot.
Sarah Silverman- Jesus is Magic: I appreciated it but fell asleep in parts.

Ooh.. falling asleep..... Mmmm..... venti.