I don’t enjoy ‘kid’ movies and I don’t enjoy pretending that I do. When Dennis decided that he and the boys would go to see Monsters U at the local theater, that was my cue to decide how to spend my 2 solitary hours (and solitary hours are hard-to-come-by and highly coveted right now).

I picked a carrot cake and very loud music. Did I mention that I have a Bose speaker?

The cake was complicated and it required my total attention. There was sifting of ingredients and finely grating carrots and zesting an entire lemon. I got to use my microplane. It called for perfectly greased pans lined with circle-cut parchment paper and for the batter to be divided equally into three pans. The icing was an equally time consuming and attention sucking endeavor. Turns out that it’s just what I needed.

With the likes of Eminem, Kid Rock, Pink and Waylon Jennings crooning – very loudly and without ‘radio edits’ – I could not think about whether bathing suits were dry for swim lessons, who needed camp supplies or the fact they all need dentist appointments. I was not able to concentrate on the cake and the music AND my children at the same time. The cake and music won – and that’s exactly what I needed.