Do I have patience? I'm the essence of patience.

  All right. I'm not famous for my patience. But I feel that this is due more because of the definition for patience most individuals choose to use. For instance, if I have a clear objective in which I am determined to succeed, and there are certain requirements that must be accomplished in order to meet my objective, even if these requirements take me years of incessant, unrelenting, hard work, doing things I truly dislike on a molecular level, I will in fact do them, in a constant cloud of irritation, but still giving 150% all the time.

  However, there are other things that I cannot endure for 45 seconds. Take for instance the classmate who desires my assistance with some difficulty he is experiencing in grasping the concepts and executing the homework requirements of a course. Should this individual begin, after my inquiry as to the specificities of his confusion, by spending 1-5 minutes describing his emotional state as a result of being unable to "get" the material--within about 10 seconds, steam will begin to come out of my nose...followed speedily by steam escaping from my ears and eyes, my eyes turn red, horns begin emerging from my skull, and by minute 2, steam is escaping from every pore of my body with the exuberant abandon of a steam locomotive having arrived joyfully at the station, think circa 1890.

  But what is remarkable is that I do not lash out verbally enlightening the student as to his insurmountable state of idiocy in wasting precious time examining his emotional state rather than fixing the actual problem, but instead I put in my imaginary ear plugs, turn away from the noise box, open my text, and resume my work. This is a feat of amazing patience! (As an aside, what is truly impressive is that 9 times out of 8 this individual will continue talking as if he were paying me $200 an hour to lie on the sofa and tell me about his problems and will eventually drift into the consciousness and attention of a fellow student who makes the mistake of looking interested, at which point the aforementioned dullard carries on with the new student as if a transition never took place).

  However, if a student, in response to my query, explains precisely the point of confusion, I will take an extensive amount of time in carefully going through the problems, sharing my notes, giving clues as to short cuts and helpful supplemental instruction, and providing support not only in that moment but ongoing throughout the remainder of the course.

  In dealing with my children, I can only say that I could never be an adoptive parent. I need the absolute assurance when dealing with the ineptitude of small humans, that I am entirely responsible for all the bad traits, illogical habits, and the genetic composition that produces a catastrophe on this level which I have to deal with on a second by second basis.

  The other day, when I would have done better to put in my ear plugs, apply duct tape to my mouth, and continue on with my own homework rather than overseeing the work of the resident humans, Oliver asked," Mom, do you even have a fuse today? Because I'm sensing there is only the bomb." To which I responded," I have a very long fuse when I'm not dealing with complete idiots." At this juncture four people exploded in laughter and Oliver voiced the opinion of the whole with the words," Yeah, that means you have no fuse today."

  Mmm. Perhaps the lack of fuse is the reason that these people have the epidermis of a rhino hide. Just a thought.

An Open Letter to all Female Adventurers in Dieting (and those who wish to laugh with/at us)...

Dear Fellow Diet-"er,"

  I have been in the process of removing the 10-15 lbs I have acquired as to my lack of exercise and my bounty in chocolate cake over the past several years in school...With these preliminaries...on to the adventure...

  A most dreadful thing happened to me this morning, due to my horrific optimism. I had noticed that my feet are getting smaller as a result of my diet. This unfortunately led me to believe that the rest of me was getting smaller also. One dilemma I have is that the arm holes, also known as sleeves, in my short sleeved blouses, are too small for my big, fat, chunky arms. By too small, I do not mean a slight degree of discomfort. I mean, so tight that you couldn't possibly undo the button with my arm encased. 

Back to this morning, being in slight haste thanks to a 9am class 45 minutes away, I chose a pink skirt, A line, which means it fits for about 6 sizes, and then couldn't find a white top beyond a massage school t-shirt. I rummaged through my white blouses and found a cute one-- size medium, not extra small. I figured I had lost enough weight for a medium, made sure the side zip was open along with the buttons, enthusiastically pulled it over my head, past my bosom (which should have been a glaring clue that enough weight loss had not occurred if I was in possession of a bosom)...and then I was at the point of no return...my arms had become one with the sleeves, and by one, I do in fact mean one. I immediately broke out into a sweat, which was a bummer since not only was the blouse clean, having been laundered and ironed several years back, but I was freshly showered, and also sweat doesn't generally aid the process of removing apparel. Or putting it on, for that matter. 

I could see my email to my professor:

  Dear Professor,

  I would have preferred being at stats this morning, but instead I had to wrestle my way out of a blouse with arm holes so tight, that it cut the circulation off in both limbs, and I had to get my children to cut me out of the damn thing with a pair of scissors. That may have been the most terrifying part of the process. AND I had to bribe them all not to tell ANYONE about this, which cost me a fortune, as you can well imagine....

  My imaginary letter never became reality because my frantic requests that ascended into the heavens were answered! I was able to extricate my self from the blouse, my poor fat arms didn't appear to be bruised from the assault, and a much wiser me, hung the blouse back in the closet, with the other forsaken for the sake of fat, blouses. 

  I then donned the white t-shirt with massage school lettering, whose arm holes were plenty big, and took my much humbled self to school. 

  ~Jenny

P.S. There is simply no justice in the world when after weeks of dieting, your feet are so small that you have to walk funny to keep your shoes on when you walk, and all your clothes are still too small. 

P.P.S. My dad sent me a Valentine card yesterday which contained a $100 bill. Random valentine cards with $100 are very pleasant.

P.P.P.S. I therefore took my plump body and skinny feet to DSW where I bought two pair of the world's most comfortable shoes. It cost $98.67. 

P.P.P.P.S. Heretofore, I had concluded that I simply love myself too much to take up some obscene habit like jogging. I may be forced to reconsider. The universe is a mean place.