I'm a good mom...I'm a good mom...I'm a good mom...

The 14-yr-old and I have been down at the beach this week while I take some time off of work and the 11-year-old is at camp.

In an effort to spend some quality time with him, we exhausted lots of "together" activities: gin rummy, Rummikub, take-out sushi, running together, sailing a catamaran in the bay (a teeny weeny one), dipping in the ocean...

A couple of nights ago, we were tired of gin and tired of Rummikub, and he loathes backgammon.

"Okay," I said. I'll teach you how to play poker.

I'm a good mom I'm a good mom I'm a good mom.

It seemed innocent enough. We used plastic chips and I taught him that a full house beats 3 of a kind. We played 5-card draw. He caught on quickly but his luck couldn't match mine - I'm EXTREMELY lucky in cards and parking spots. I got tired of winning. He had no chips left. The most important lesson I tried to impart was the "poker face" concept. When I couldn't stand winning anymore, I quit. I told him I had had enough. The 14-year-old, however, had become obsessed.

With my withdrawal from the game, he desperately considered his options. I picked up a book. He dealt a hand to Sophie (the German Shepherd) and doled out some chips to her. He played with Sophie.

Sophie kept winning. "She's really good," he joked.

The next morning he was still sleeping at 11:45 when I went down to the beach. He finally came down around 1:00 pm. "Whatcha been doin'?" I asked him.

"Playing poker with Sophie," he answered. "She keeps winning."

We need to find him another good book...

This is not a pie chart

Last week I just had to go to Barcelona for an International Sales Meeting for work. Yeah, my job sucks sometimes.... I did get to explore part of the town for the first jet-lagged afternoon after my flight arrived and before the meeting started. The rest of the time was spent in a conference room doing and watching power point presentations.

My favorite part of the presentations was watching one done by a French colleague, who put a pie chart up on a slide and explained his "camembert" chart. This got me giggling pretty hard. I guess that makes more sense if you're French... I mean - how much more sophisticated is a "camembert" chart than a "pie" chart. The semantics alone give it an eloquent credibility....

It also got me craving a nice glass of Cab and a slice of camembert...

On the way home I had settled into my economy class seat for the 9-hour plane ride home. I had just gotten all of my books and laptop organized where I could reach them easily, had my seat belt on, and was all set to go, when the German flight attendant from Lufthansa walked the aisle toward me, stopped, looked at me, and questioned my identity.

Um yeah, I nodded, that's my name.

"We would like to invite you to join us in Business class," she chirped.

Ahhh. The eye-darts from the people all around me felt stupendous. "Sucks for you all," I thought, actually feeling kind of guilty. The guilt lasted until I sat down in business class and was offered a glass of champagne.

This all made up for their having lost my luggage on the way home and delivering it to me 72 hours later....