Last night Alex discovered some leftover Easter candy in the pantry. He asked me if he could have it, and since I knew it was the not-so-great stuff, I said, “Sure – you can have it!” knowing full well that he wouldn’t finish even one piece of it.

First he opened some Smarties. After about two bites, he looked at me, grinned, and said, “Here, Mama. You can have them.” Lucky me, huh?

Then he found some jelly beans, sniffed them, and said, “Yucky, Mama!”

After a couple of more minutes, way down deep in the bag, he discovered a lone bite-size Milky Way. He held it up to my face and said, “What’s that, Mama?” And when I said, “It’s a candy bar,” he said, “OH, IT’S SO EXCITING! I’M SO EXCITED, MAMA!”

I unwrapped it, and for a full five minutes he sat quietly, nibbling on his little nougat treasure. Then he rummaged through the bag again, came up with a Starburst, and brought it to me.

“Alex,” I warned him, “you’re not going to like this. It’s fruity. You don’t like fruity candy.”

“No, I’ll try it, Mama”- so I unwrapped it for him.

His teeth had barely hit the little lemon square when he scrunched up his nose, smiled, and said, “YUCKY!”

I took the Starburst away from him and said, “I told you, buddy – you don’t really like fruit candy.”

And he looked at me very seriously, tilted that sweet head, and said, “Yeah. Yes ma’am. I like chocolate. In my mouth.”

I do, too, little man. I do, too.

Last night when I was going through Site Meter to see if anyone had actually visited the blog while I wasn’t writing (and y’all did! You did!), I noticed that several people had reached my blog via queries on a search engine. It was the first time this has happened…and totally entertaining to me.

Now I completely understand why one search led the Googler here:

I mean, I have made my admiration for Mr. Giglio known a time or nine over the last two or three months. I’m sort of flattered, actually, that my blog is forever linked to his name.

And since Wes over there in the sidebar sings for the Gaithers, I understand why I got this one:

By the way, I have no idea why Candy left. Maybe Candy got tired of life on the road. I dunno. Fingers crossed that there were no hurt feelings.

This next one was no mystery at all, and I almost wish that the searcher had stuck around so that I could have provided an answer:

The truth is, the dog’s name is Gertie, but she’s not Paula’s dog (scandalous, isn’t it?). In one of the issues of Paula’s magazine, she confesses that Gertie belongs to her producer, and get this: the old set wasn’t her real kitchen in Savannah. It was her producer’s kitchen in upstate New York. Can y’all believe that? I felt that I’d somehow been deceived, because everything on television is real, right? :-)

See, that searcher was at the right place and didn’t even know it.

And this one? Oh, it did tickle me:

If I had caught the searcher in time, I would have directed him / her here. Or here. I’m not really a Trace Adkins fan, but since David did see him in Dairy Queen a few months ago, well, we’re practically cousins.

So to you Louie / Candy / Paula / Trace seekers out there, I hope you found what you were looking for.

Y’all come back real soon, ya hear?

Is all my sidebar stuff showing up on your computer?

Because it’s completely missing from mine, and I can’t figure out why.

Let the troubleshooting begin…. :-)

Bev tagged me to write about a few things that help me manage my time. At first I laughed a little bit because I can be a total procrastinator and some days waste time as if I were trying to win some form of Time Wasting Competition (that would be a terribly original name for such a contest, wouldn’t it?).

But there are several things I do around here that make life easier and more efficient.

1. I keep one of those dry erase board calendars on my refrigerator. Every month I take Alex’s Mother’s Day Out calendar and list everything on my calendar…due dates, picture days, birthday parties, etc. I list everything that we have going on at church, everything D. and I have happening, and bascially put our entire month’s schedule on there. It keeps me sane.

2. I catch up on phone calls when I’m sitting in traffic. There’s been all kinds of construction on the road that leads to our house, and inevitably I’ll pick A. up from Mother’s Day Out and end up sitting in traffic for 30 minutes trying to get up the mountain. It’s a great time to return calls, check in on friends, etc., especially considering that Alex is typically sound asleep in the backseat within five minutes of picking him up.

And yes, I’m very, very careful when I use the phone in the car. I hold the phone at the 10 and 2 position, plus I dial and hang up with the same foot – none of that two footed dialing in my car. No ma’am.

3. I make my grocery list in order of the aisles in the store [now I’m ducking so that I’m not hit by the objects y’all are hurling at your computer screens]. But it helps me so much…time is of the essence when grocery shopping with a toddler who considers it his life’s mission to become close, personal friends with all the Publix customers and employees.

Now that I’ve written this post, it feels a little like the Works For Me Wednesday that Shannon does, so just consider it Works For Me Wednesday, two days late – which is very much in keeping with my procrastinatory* tendencies – as well as Time Management 101, which is what Bev asked me to do in the fist place. Killing two birds with one stone, if you will. Though I’m certainly not advocating the stoning of birds.

*And I totally just made up that word. At first I thought it really was a word, then I realized no, no it isn’t, but I’m leaving it because it’s my blog and I can.

A few pictures from this week’s Adventures of Alex…

Best part about a trip to the zoo? The carousel. But NOT when the carousel stops. Carousel stopping is obviously the work of the devil.

And here’s the thing with chickens. To fully understand them, you really have to get down on their level.

All the classes at A.’s Mothers’ Day Out made these hats. He’s very proud that he painted the dots, by the way. He would tell you ALL about the dots if you asked him. Very proud.

I’m proud that we convinced him to keep the hat on his head for more than four seconds because, well, with a hat this big, you’ve gotta get a picture.

He gets bigger every day, it seems.

Sigh.

Alex is in quite the “Finding Nemo” phase…he wants to watch it every night before he goes to bed, and he talks about it first thing every morning. He especially loves the part where Nemo disobeys his daddy and swims out past the drop-off – inevitably Alex looks at me with great seriousness in his eyes and says, “Mama. Nemo touched the boat. Nemo gets time out. He’s disobedient, Mama.”

And at that moment, at least inside my head, I high-five myself, just a little bit.

Anyway, David and I are in the midst of an ongoing debate regarding the end of the movie. I’m hoping that the internet can resolve it.

Here is the issue:

In the final scenes of the movie, what exactly is the nature of the relationship between the daddy, Marlin, and Dory, the fish who helped him to find Nemo?

The first time I asked David this question, he looked at me like I had horns growing out of my head and said, “They’re FRIENDS.”

But I am a woman, and with women relationships are rarely, if ever, that simple. Especially when single people are involved.

I personally believe that Marlin and Dory may be, well, dating.

Here’s why.

When Marlin and Dory are trapped inside the whale, Dory tells Marlin she never wants to forget what it’s like to be with him, because being with him feels like home. Those aren’t “just friends” words, people.

Then, when Nemo goes back to school towards the end of the movie, Dory is there when Mr. Ray picks him up, and she says, “See you after school, Nemo!” Which implies that she’s around a lot.

I’m just sayin’.

Two single fish…both funny…bonded together by adventure…sounds like a recipe for love, if you ask me.

p.s. – Yes. Insane. Yes. :-)