Archives for September 2007

Because I stayed up too late last night, when Hubby nudged me to get up with Pumpkin at 6:30, I was NOT ready. Nor was I ready for The Princess puking all over the living room carpet by 7:30. Then The Princess not quite making it to the toilet to puke again.

I really try not to work too hard before 8 a.m. on a Saturday, but I’ve already washed some floors, given a kid a bath, and have started service of 7Up to my little sicky. She had a slight fever yesterday (which the doc assured me via phone was most likely NOT related to getting zonked on the head), along with a sore throat and cough and tummy ache. Now that she’s thrown up, her tummy is feelin’ fine.

But I’m tired.

I used to write a lot. I wrote poems. Short stories. Essays. I wrote letters – long letters, and not just e-mailed notes to say “hey”. Actual LETTERS.

I don’t anymore.

Lately, I’ve been thinking about that a lot. Last weekend, I found my writing portfolio from college, along with my peer feedback and my instructors’ comments. Reading some of my old works was like visiting the person I used to be. The poetry I wrote, particularly, was nearly always autobiographical, and nearly always just basically opening up my head, pouring it on the page and telling people, “This is who I am.”

The other day, I opened a new document in Word and tried to write, and I couldn’t. I don’t know if I’m just more guarded, or if I’ve forgotten how to connect my feelings with the place in my brain that puts it into words. I would type a few words and then rest my finger on the Backspace key until the words vanished and the page was blank again.

I think my new goal is to remember how to express myself. I want to be able to create again – even if just for myself. I have gone far too long without using the part of my brain that I love the most, and I need to find a way to make it work again…

Tonight, after making a wildly unpopular dinner (homemade chicken noodle soup – The Princess requested it, then stubbornly refused to eat anything except the noodles… um, I could have saved time and made a pot of pasta instead of doing the whole soup dealy – and no, I didn’t realize it was supposed to be 80 degrees when I planned to make soup for dinner tonight), I put the small cookbook away in the pantry and shut the door. Less than an hour later, I hear a loud boom, and The Princess started yelling and crying.

That cookbook? It fell on her head when she opened the door. At first, I thought she was being dramatic for nothing. I checked her head out and realized there was a big goose egg on it. A big pointy goose egg (she must have gotten hit with the corner of the book?).

Poor kid.

Needless to say, after some crying, and a good deal of time with an ice pack on her head, she was pretty subdued tonight. I feel rotten for not putting the book away well enough – feel horrible that she got clunked with it. It’s weird though – she has always seemed older than she is – and sometimes, it takes a boo-boo to remind me that she’s really just a kid. Sometimes it seems like when she’s hurt is the only time she really NEEDS me. Feels weird to say that about her, because she’s just five. She’s a fiercely independent five year old, though. One of my friends describes her as a little “diva” and it is true. It’s not uncommon for me to say she’s five going on 15 (she always corrects me – because, duh, six comes after five). She’s really an incredibly articulate kid, and she acts quite a bit older than she is.

And sometimes a book falls on her head (or she gets in a fight with her friends, or she gets tired) and she reminds me that she’s just a kid. And she does need me. And that sometimes a hug and a kiss from mom, or a boo-boo pack on the noggin are the answers to all the problems in her world.

The other day at the library, I checked out a children’s book by Jamie Lee Curtis. I’m not a huge Jamie Lee fan, but because it was called “It’s Hard to Be Five”, I thought The Princess would dig it, seeing as how she’s five and all.

I read her the book, which was cute enough, I suppose. When I was done, The Princess told me, “That’s silly. It’s not hard to be five. It’s easy. All you have to do is be yourself.”

Sometimes she blows me away.

Eh, just so the post about my stinky living room isn’t front and center, here’s an MP3 Shuffle meme from October… New iPod, new tunes.

Opening – “Guys Do It All the Time” (Mindy McCready)
So I had some beers with the girls last night
Guys do it all the time

Wake Up – “Walkaways” (Counting Crows)
And someday I’m gonna stay
but not today

Average Day – “Tainted Love” (Soft Cell)
To make things right
you need someone to hold you tight

First Date – “Baby Can I Hold You” (Tracy Chapman)
But you can say baby, baby can I hold you tonight?

Falling in Love – “The Boy From New York City” (The AdLibs)
Today I hope to make him mine all mine

Fight Scene – “Mr. Jones” (Counting Crows)
And we stare at the beautiful women
She’s looking at you, oh no no she’s lookin’ at me

Break Up Scene – “32 Flavors” (Ani DiFranco)
Squint your eyes and look a bit closer
I’m not between you and your ambition
I am a poster girl with no poster
I’m 32 flavors and then some

Secret Love – “To Make You Feel My Love” (Billy Joel)
I know you haven’t made your mind up yet
But I could never do you wrong
I’ve known it from the moment that we met,
no doubt in my mind where you belong

Life’s Okay – “Hey Jealousy” (GinBlossoms)
The past is gone but something might be found
to take its place

Mental Breakdown – “Closer to Free” (The BoDeans)
Every body wants respect, just a little bit
Everybody needs a chance once in awhile

Deep Thought – “You Keep Me Hanging On” (Kim Wilde)
Set me free, why don’t ya babe
Get out of my life, why don’t ya babe
You don’t really love me – you just keep me hangin’ on

Flashback – “Help!” (The Beatles)
When I was younger, so much younger than today
I never needed anyone’s help in any way

Partying – “I Like It” (The Blackout Allstarts)
Yeah, baby, I like it like that
I like it like that
*This song is real deep like that.

Happy Dance – “Winter” (Tori Amos)
Get a little warm in my heart when I think of winter

Regretting – “Holiday” (Madonna)

Long Night Alone – “Northern Lad” (Tori Amos)
He don’t show much these days
It gets so f—ing cold
I love his secret places
but I can’t go anymore

Death Scene – “The End of the Innocence” (Don Henley)
So lay your head back on the ground
Let your hair fall all around you
Offer up your best defense
This is the end, this is the end of the innocence

Closing Credits – “Daughter” (Pearl Jam)
She will rise.

I haven’t wanted to post about this problem until the problem was solved and it was no longer a problem, because, well, yeeeeeeeeeuch.

My house, specifically my living room, was seriously stinky yesterday. It was an odd smell I couldn’t place, but by god did it hurt my nose, make my eyes water, and annoy the bejeebers out of me. Yesterday, I searched high and low for forgotten cups with milk (I have young kids, it could happen) – no cups. I searched for dirty diapers that didn’t make it to the trash (didn’t expect to find one, and gladly, I didn’t). I looked for misplaced snacks, trash, you name it.

Of course, none of these things were anywhere to be found. I may not be a super-neat-freak, but I’m not a slob. Today, I pulled all the cushions off the couch and vacuumed underneath. That didn’t get rid of the smell, but it probably needed to happen. I pulled the heating vents out and vacuumed any crumbs trapped in there. Again, that didn’t get rid of the smell, but… I hosed off Pumpkin’s booster seat. It’s now shiny but it still didn’t get rid of the stink.

I was getting seriously peeved (which prompted The Princess to tell me, “Mom – Attitude is EVERYTHING!”) and was sitting on the floor folding laundry, when it hit me. The stench? It was Hubby’s workout shirts. Yes, they had been washed. In hot. With detergent. And fabric softener. BUT they still stunk that bad. So so so nasty. I took the whole load of laundry, popped in back into the washer, and voila. My living room smells fine. I emailed Hubby at work, “The culprit? YOU and your STINKY CLOTHES!” His response, “Guess I’ll stop working out, then.”

Of course, all the magical cleaning I did in search of the stench has been cancelled out by the girls pulling every book out of their basket, and making a carpet out of blankets, and emptying the toy bin, and dropping socks and shoes wherever they felt like it.

But at least it doesn’t stink.

Looks as though my laptop arrived just in time – the home PC shut off the other day while Hubby was working, and now is stubbornly refusing to do anything (even to turn on). I have consulted my great computer gurus and the general concensus is that it needs a new power supply, which I have been assured is a fairly easy fix. I have a feeling that I will be performing computer surgery, rather than Hubby, because as he was telling me about the computer struggles last night, he was pouting, “I should have been alive 50 years ago when you didn’t NEED a computer to do every thing!”

Poor Hubby.

I, on the other hand, love the digital age – would be LOST if my computer spontaneously went kaput, and would be up all night with whoever I needed to be talking at in order to fix it. Yeah, we know who wears the pocket protector in this family, don’t we? The thing is, I’m not even that technologically-savvy. I would just be lost without my email, my instant messaging, all my favorite blog-reads, and the snarky posts at Go Fug Yourself. I might even be going through withdrawal. I guess, to that point, I have to say, Better him than me, right?

Last weekend my dad called and in the midst of a chat, he said some things that evolved into me saying some things, and before I knew it, I was in tears, feeling liked I’d been sucker punched. The thing is, dad may well have meant every word he said, and I didn’t say anything that I wouldn’t have said at any other time (although, I may have changed my tone a bit, had this conversation occurred under any other circumstance).

We exchanged very nasty words, and then I passed the phone off to The Princess to talk to her Grandpa. And I went to lick my wounds.

All week, I’ve been marinating on the things he said, the things I said, and I have been avoiding my father, to be honest. The Princess wanted to call him at several points during the week and I would distract her, not wanting to call him, not wanting to talk about it, not wanting to deal with it – I guess the hurt was still too… too much. I had to tell my dad something the other day, and I emailed his wife instead. Just not ready.

This afternoon, the phone rang. I looked at the Caller ID and saw dad’s cell number, and instantly this feeling flooded me of, Do I want to answer? Should I screen? Should I just suck it up and talk to him? In the end, I did answer the phone, and gave a curt “Hello” and dad started talking and sounded somewhat apprehensive himself. I thought he would address it. I even thought he might tell me he was sorry, but instead we talked over it, moving into safe territory: music, magazines, his trip to Vegas.

And, it was fine.

Am I hurt that he didn’t apologize? Yeah, I am, kind of. But… I don’t know if he knows how. I don’t know if he thinks he needs to. I don’t know.

#1. As you may have noticed, I have a monster sweet tooth (you read my answer to the convience store question), so, if you could only have one kind of candy for the rest of your life, what would it be?
Oh, how to pick. I can’t pick one. I’ll narrow it down to three: Twix, Peanut M&M’s or Snickers. Oooh, or Heath bars. I love those, but I almost never never have those. I really like Twix or M&Ms, though – those are the top 2. Yeah. (I’m hungry now).

#2. How did you pick your children’s names? Do they have stories behind them?
The Princess’s name was easy to pick. We were tossing names around, before I was even pregnant, and we picked it. To be honest, I think there was a girl somewhere along the way with the same name that Hubby was crushing on back in the day, but, whatever. I wanted to name her Julia. Hubby hated it. He liked the name Montana. I didn’t want to doom her to a life of being a stripper.
With Pumpkin, it wasn’t nearly as easy. We each emailed each other a huge list, then I picked my top five favorite of those, and he did the same. We took the names that were common on both of our lists, and then we kept whittling it down. We ended up with Alexa Jordan. Which was her name in utero for a few weeks, and then I decided I didn’t like that. And I’m glad we didn’t go there, because she’s not an Alexa (though she probably woulda been AJ).

#3. If salary were no object, and it in no way interfered with child rearing duties, what would your dream job be?
You know, there are a lot of things I would love to do. I have considered going to get certified to be a doula (the process doesn’t sound easy, that’s for sure… but it shouldn’t be). I’d love to be an editor and read books all day, too. Or to be a trainer and work in a gym. That’d be awesome too – getting paid to workout?! I’d love it.

#4. What is one thing people would never susupect about you?
This is an interesting question because I think there are a lot of things people would never suspect about me, even close friends. I don’t tend to talk a whole bunch about me, and I think that different people from different points of my life know me in different ways. I was a different person in high school that I was in college, and I was a different person in college than I am now, and I think that if people from those different areas of my life were to get together and swap stories, there might be a lot of surprised people. That didn’t really answer the question though. I think people would be surprised at a lot of things, though. It would be hard to pick just one.

#5. If you had to be stuck on an island with Lindsey Lohan, Paris Hilton, or Brittany Spears, which one would you choose and why?
Pick a trainwreck, any trainwreck, eh? I don’t suppose there is any good answer to this one – but I think I would pick Britney. Given her tendency for going out commando and getting her hooha photographed and blasted all over the internet, I certainly feel like I know her already… Seriously, because she’s the one of the three with kids I would love to know why on earth she’s acting like such a whackadoo. And I want to know why she was wearing her underpants on the outside of her jeans in the “Slave 4 U” video. That was weird.

The Princess played her first soccer game tonight. The final score was 2 – 2 (I’m sure it was no accident that they stopped it at a tie).

My girl scored a goal!

(Don’t get me started on Hubby yelling directions and demanding five year olds be yellow carded. It was freakin’ insane. I’m sure he’s gonna be the dad that the other parents hate. It annoyed me, and I’m married to him!)