I do not understand how normal people go to bed at a reasonable hour. Honestly. It’s now 10:30 at night. The dishwasher needs to be loaded. (I hear you thinking: skip the dishes! Who cares? Except I will need clean spoons for breakfast in the morning, so the dishwasher’s got to run.) I haven’t showered yet. And I need to spend a little more time revising an essay before I get into bed tonight.

So what have I been doing since the kids fell asleep? Well, making and eating a(nother) meal (yes, I already ate, I wanted to eat AGAIN). Checking and sending email. Did I mention the eating?

So which of these things do I forego in order to get more of the shut-eye? Anyone? Anyone?

Maybe I should forget about the sleep thing. Learn to brew coffee instead.

My kids aren’t quite checking books out of the “young adult” section of the library yet, but they are precocious readers, and I like to keep up with what’s out there. So when offered a chance to review the latest in the bestselling Maximum Ride series, I thought I’d check it out.

Maximum Ride: Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports is the third installment in the story of fourteen-year-old Max, who has escaped from and is now battling the evil scientists who created her (she’s 98% human, 2% bird). She’s joined by a cohort of mostly younger bird-kids and a talking dog, for good measure.

The book reads very much like a teen action film, with minimal plot and plenty of violence against robotic bad guys. Max is out to stop the mad scientists, who plan to make the world a better place by killing off most of the population. There’s also a flimsy discussion of environmentalism (along the lines of: The grownups have ruined the world! No fair! Let’s take over!) without any explanation of what Max and company might do to green up the planet. And then we’re back to battling the robot army and other genetically-engineered enemies.

As for the boring details I always wonder about when choosing a book for my kids:

AHEM, ROMANCE: There’s a bit of kissing and a drooling description of scantily-clad women on a beach, but everyone stays clothed throughout.

LANGUAGE: A handful of “Good Lord”s and “God”s, but nothing in the way of excess profanity.

VIOLENCE: Well, yes. About on par with what they’d catch on television, if they watch such things: main characters suffer only minor injuries while defeating hordes of bad guys. The bird kids are protected by a fictional street gang at one point, and the gang helps them battle the droves of enemy droids.

This one wouldn’t fly with my kids, but there’s clearly an audience for it, seeing as the series sells and sells. Consider it for reluctant readers, especially those who might otherwise prefer to catch their entertainment on a screen.

Visit MotherTalk for dozens more opinions on Maximum Ride: Saving the World and Other Extreme Sports.

Full disclosure: I received a free review copy of this book, as well as a small honorarium from MotherTalk for participating in this blog book tour.

This week’s awards for Best Attempt to Get Out of Bedtime go to:

Abigail, for “Too many books…”

ME: Time for bed! Put down your book, turn out your lights, and go to sleep!
ABIGAIL: There are too many books on my bed. I’ll have to leave the lights on and read them.

…and to Owen, for “No thank you”

ME: Time for bed!
OWEN: No thanks.
ME: I don’t believe I asked whether you WANTED to go to bed.
OWEN: But if you had asked, I would have told you. I don’t. No thank you.

Why do we go to the library? Why? If the kids like the books they check out, there is sobbing and misery at the prospect of returning them. If they don’t like the books they check out, the books sit and gather dust, enriching no one’s lives or décor.

And now that the summer reading program is over, every time we head to the library we must sadly review the details of exactly how much each of us misses the book reporting. (Abigail: quite a lot. Owen: only when reminded. Audrey, Dane, Melissa: good heavens, not at all.)

Besides which, we never manage to keep track of when anything is due. We must have paid the library twenty dollars in late fees this summer. And we don’t even check out movies (with their dollar per day late fee), just books (ten cents for every day late). Way to go us!

But I don’t suppose we’re likely to get Borders or Barnes and Noble to let us read dozens of titles a week before we decide what to buy. And sometimes we need to look at books without the interference of flashy-blinky-noisy push-button “books,” or shelf after shelf of character-based activity books.

So I guess we’re stuck with the library, flawed though it may be. (Or may not be; for all my griping, we’re there twice a week.)

Audrey is seventeen months old, going on three years. She’s just sure she is one of the “big kids.”

She’s been trying to figure out how to jump for the last week or two. Today she kept bending her knees and hollering, “HOP!” as she propelled herself forward with all the upward momentum she could muster. Once she even made it off the ground with both feet, but she couldn’t figure out how she did it. Much sadness and frustration ensued.

And that may have been the highlight of our hot, hot day. Does no one else feel like their internal organs are being slowly melted by the summer heat? I keep trying to get my kids to run in the sprinklers, but apparently they’re not especially uncomfortable. I do not understand this. It has been suggested to me that my particular discomfort may be in some way related to the whole pregnancy thing. I suppose that’s possible.

It was definitely the pregnancy that caused me to send Dane to the grocery store this evening, “mostly for cookies.” I actually said that. And he still went. Good man.

And now I’m off to eat the cookies, without making any sort of point or drawing any conclusions whatsoever. I guess that’s what you get when the heat melts my brain.

We all went to church this morning, which involved me throwing on a stretchy, knee-length skirt and a sleeveless v-neck before running out the door to get there on time. I thought about asking Dane whether the skirt made my butt look big(ger), but since there isn’t a single article of clothing in my closet that doesn’t, I decided to let him off the hook. (Though if you know of a garment that will slim my hips and/or backside, send it on over. I’ll wear it every day for the next few weeks until the baby arrives.)

For some reason, this little dressing adventure reminded me of Susan’s advice about never, ever wearing shorts to church. Our church is… hmm, laid back? That would be one way to describe it. It’s an Evangelical Free church. The pastor often wears Hawaiian print shirts and khakis. And there are shorts on Sunday. Mostly on the men, though—the women tend toward capris or cotton skirts.

Today Abigail and Audrey both chose to wear sundresses; Owen wore shorts and a tee shirt. (The rule for Owen is: shorts with a button and zipper, shirts with no pictures or words. Otherwise he’d be in sweat shorts and last year’s library summer reading program shirt every week.)

Abigail came home singing a new worship song over and over, while Owen came home retelling the Sunday School lesson. Dane and I found this rather surprising—usually Owen knows every lyric, and Abigail has memorized not only the lesson and related Bible story, but two or three new Bible verses as well.

And then Owen explained: “Moses and his people were running away. And then God parted the fruit leather—which was actually being the Red Sea—and Moses and his people walked through the fruit leather! And then the other guys came along to capture Moses, and they got smooshed in the fruit leather! And Moses and his people were safe!”

Turns out? The key to Owen’s memory? Snack food.

We went to a party this weekend, which involved driving out of the suburbs, through the next county, and into the suburbs of an Actual Big City.

Amazingly, we made the drive without requiring a bathroom break. Not even for me. (There was one false alarm on the way home involving a certain four-year-old insisting that he had to go potty, so couldn’t we go back to the party? But when assured that we would not be turning around—half an hour from home at nearly ten o’clock on a Sunday night—he decided he didn’t need to go after all.)

Important factoids gleaned on this trip:

- There are 951 Starbucks-peddling locations between our San Diego suburb and the Los Angeles suburb that was our destination, including the three we passed before getting on the freeway and the two we passed after exiting but before finding the house where we were headed. We didn’t keep count, we actually looked that up ahead of time. Because there are bathrooms at Starbucks. And usually coffee and junk food, which one never knows when one may require.

- Raspberry sorbet is even more exciting with colored sprinkles on top. (I suppose we could have guessed that.)

- When jumping in an inflatable bounce-house outdoors in 95 degree weather, my children turn very very pink. Pinker than the raspberry sorbet.

- Drinking cold water will not restore their original color, but air conditioning will.

- A book will keep Abigail content for a three-hour drive. A book will not keep Owen content for any amount of drive. And nothing will keep Audrey content for a three-hour drive. (Again, probably could have guessed… and maybe already knew that…)

- It is possible to contradict anything I say. (KID: “I want to get out of the car!” ME: “I’ll let you know when it’s time to get out.” KID: “No! Don’t tell me!” ME: “Alrighty then.”)

And that about sums it up. Important stuff, I know.

ME: I just put fresh pillowcases on our pillows again.

DANE: Why—

ME (interrupting): Because I love you, I’m not going to tell you why it was necessary. But you can rest assured that when you get in bed, you will put your face on clean linen.

DANE: Um… Thanks?

ME: You’re welcome.

It has been Telemarketer Week at our house. The phone rings every half hour or so, mostly with recorded messages trying to sell me satellite TV, new mortgage products, a condo in foreclosure forty miles away, a vacation cruise, or service with a new phone company. Or maybe they’d like me to donate to save the children/whales/spotted owls/people who shop at thrift stores (really, they keep calling and asking for my thrifty goods. If I had some to give away, I wouldn’t wait around for a call).

But my favorite of all is the recorded nasally voice offering me an extended warranty on my car. We get this one every single day lately; at first, they were warning messages: “Your car warranty is about to expire! We’ll sell you a special, unofficial extended warranty—if you act now!”

Then they turned chastising: “You have let your car warranty expire! What kind of irresponsible car owner lets the warranty run out? We’ll reinstate warranty coverage if you call today!”

And now they’re dire: “This is a warning! You are driving a car without a warranty! Act now to remedy this serious failing!”

Except. Except! I’m not driving a car without a warranty (and we’ll ignore the issue of why I would want their off-label warranty product when I have insurance).

That car? The one they keep calling about? It has gone on to a better place. Or to the auto wrecking place. Whatever. It’s gone. And there wasn’t an unofficial extended warranty in the world that could have saved that sucker.

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