the car wasn’t really in dire need of cleaning but on the way to the petrol station, he decided to give it a quick wash. “give me two bucks and i’ll clean it in 2 minutes,” he said.

i rummaged for some coins in my wallet, skeptical but unwilling to pass up on a good challenge especially if i’m just a mere spectator in it. “seriously? two minutes? you’re on, buddy!”

forget how squeaky clean the car looked after. as far as i was concerned, jeff never looked as hot as he did in those two minutes! it was definitely a wife’s ultimate fantasy. i wouldn’t mind watching the same scene over and over again.

maybe we can even extend the action in the kitchen. get that dishwasher going hey, jeff? wink, wink.

so there he was trying to put on a good show, grinding and cavorting with the friggin’ water hose. wasted about 10 seconds but we had a good laugh. he can be quite a performer, jeff. he loves attention. i swear, if he took my advice to be a male stripper, i would’ve been a real housewife by now. jetsetting around the world in style while he corners the adult shows for the aged which, i reckon, is where the money is. grandmas want some fun too.

no offense to the grandmas but he’s pretty averse to the idea of taking their dead husband’s money away from them. or worse, their pension money. fair enough.

but then i’m like, “ah, so you want the younger market then, is that it?” and i say it in a threatening way that at this point, anything he says can, and will be used against him as i see fit so he shuts up.

smart boy. but the conversation isn’t over. i need my million.

of course, a quick stop at A1 bakery was in order because we wouldn’t wanna break our near-weekly tradition, do we? i’m not much into coffee but i always order one from there anyway. for some reason, cappuccino goes very well with my spinach and feta triangle. for $8, i’m a happy date.

which is exactly why jeff loves taking me there. and then we sit and reminisce about his campaign period the early days when he used to take me out to fancy restaurants in the city. and then when we got married, he got comfortable so he started taking me to springvale to this restaurant there where you get to choose 3 kinds of dishes, all for $10. (the eggplant and squid combo was heaven!)

and then we sit some more and talk about the future although it’s mostly me doing the forecast. and based on my statistical analysis of our dining trends, i have this apocalyptic fear that one day it’s gonna be dumpster diving for us, a term i didn’t even know existed until i saw an episode of extreme cheapskates, this reality tv show where people go to unbelievable lengths just to save a few dollars. it’s crazy.

and i’m scared.

he tells me i’m being ridiculous. every time.

fair enough. even if we do scavenge a cabbage that has been thrown into the bin, he’d still be too lazy to cook it so chances are, we’d still end up ordering jessie’s pizza. the doveton one, because it’s the best!!!

yep, exclamation points and all.

one of the advantages of the bakery is its close proximity to the library where i usually take raven after while jeff does his thing (read: skating.). i’m glad this kid likes books. i reckon she’s gonna be a cool nerd one day. sit in the cafeteria with her nerd buddies, doing their own thing. pursuing their geeky passions and finding their own happiness even if it’s not the coolest thing to do.

she doesn’t have to be popular or be a cheerleader, although with her height, she’d make a good topper for the human pyramid and she’d be easy to toss around. i don’t have anything against cheerleaders or the popular kids at school but if how they are portrayed in the movies is what actually happens in real life, then no, i don’t want that for her.

but then again, those who bullied me in high school didn’t belong to those two categories so i guess anything goes, hey?

in the end, i just want her to be nice. but not too nice where people step all over her. she’ll find her own strength as a person someday but for now, i’m happy to hold her hand and infuse some of my strength in her while praying for more for mine when she’s crying and whining loudly as i peel her away from the shelves because it’s time to go home.

i always carry a book with me around for those special down times that never seem to happen so you would think i can finally do that when we’re at the library but, no. i try, but more often than not, i feel like i need to give her 90% of my attention, especially when she’s climbing up and down these terraces that they have in there. also, i start to panic when she ducks in between shelves or when i can’t see her anymore. my heart races as videos i saw of kids being forcefully abducted race through my brain. that’s the kind of hell i go through in 3 seconds. so not looking forward to when she becomes a teenager and those 3 seconds become 3 hours past her curfew.

we were lucky to have been given the chance to gatecrash this playgroup in the library that day. apparently, you needed to register for it. i thought it was an activity open for everyone so we popped in and i asked if raven could join. the moderator would’ve said no but as it was, majority of the families who were supposed to show up didn’t so she let us in. at least raven got to play with other kids as well. sort of.  and i got to take shoefies to pass the time.

this kid still needs to learn the concept of sharing. as a mother, it’s tough for me to teach her where to draw the line between sharing and being a pushover. sometimes, i tell her to share a toy so she can win a friend in the process. other times, when she seems really upset about another kid grabbing it, i teach her to say “no, please.” and then it’s up to the other kid if they want to respect her wishes.

trying to raise a good kid is hard. especially when you know that the real world might not be as nice in return.

last but definitely not the least, my red shoes. which i was so obsessed about because they looked so happy. i like to think of them as my tap dancing shoes.  looking at them made me giddy it made me wanna do a happy dance.

you know what else made me giddy this day?

watching nirvana’s in bloom video being played on harmony square’s outdoor screen. all of a sudden, i was in high school again and crushing on kurt cobain big time.

“quick, jeff, take a picture of me but make sure that you get kurt in the background and make sure i look splendid, not stoned. okay?”

i think jeff secretly hates taking my photos. i’m one of those people who’s pretty hard to please because there would always be something wrong with my face. always. and i’m not shy to tell him that because the line between him being my husband and my photographer somehow gets blurred in between.

speaking of blurred, not to brag but those are the ones where i look really hot. true story.

*raven at 2 years old