so i started my new job today, as a nanny for this family that just moved here from france. for $10 per hour i get to care for a three-year-old and an eighteen-month-old on what can only be described as a sprawling... manor.

maybe not. but christ. apparently the people whose kids i am caring for are staying with the mother's father. and the doors are 20 feet high. and there's a bus. and a tennis court. and a pool. and two donkeys that run around where they please. dogs everywhere. a guest house with two bedrooms. a gardener. a maid. a playground. two very well-adjusted younger daughters. why is it that if you have lots of money, you either tend to be extremely spoiled, or very kind and polite? maybe because you haven't known the harshness of the world (manifesting itself in things like alternators breaking down, being overdrawn, dogs getting sick just as you have to make rent, etc. etc. etc.?) mind you, i'm not entirely white trash, but the house my father, sister and I share is very nearly the size of their guesthouse.

ahem.

anyway, i was nervous as hell this morning when i went over there, but the kids, emille (?) and eti�nne, both boys, napped for a couple of hours and then got up and behaved themselves quite nicely. it set their mother at ease, as she was worried about me being an axe murderer or something. i go in tomorrow at three. there will be cash in my hand. i am unsure what to think about that. the entire money thing is very uncomfortable. i don't feel like i deserved $10 per hour today. all i did was read magazines while the kids napped, then gave them a snack and watched them play on the playground.

it must be something, growing up with all that.

i kept fearing i'd break something.

tomorrow i am getting up VERY early to haul matt to the tres rios wetland restoration project here in avondale, to see the birds. when i went for my biology field trip, the guide said the best time to see the birds was in the early morning, so up at six it is. there are owls, cormorants, egrets, herons, blackbirds and a few others. beavers. etcetera. i hope matt will enjoy it, despite being up at the obscene hour.

hopefully i will be quitting red robin soon and as soon as i do, the hair is coming off. the new employer has no problem with it.

for now, i have to pee.

the coolest song in the world right now is:only the lonely - roy orbison
if i were an emoticon i'd be:crossing my legs in agony?