Knocked Up

Books Read in 2011

2012-01-03T07:28:00.000-08:00

I used to keep my book list in a Word doc. Earlier last year I transferred the whole thing to Excel. I guess it finally hit me that this many years’ of books needed to be in a better format. It’s been fun to be able to filter the list and I’ve even created a couple of flags for myself. But how did 2011 stack up? Actually not too shabby! I’m down a few from 2010’s record high but I’m surprised I still hit such a big number. I started a new job in September, requiring me to drive to work instead of take the bus, and that’s seriously depleted my reading time. I guess it helps when I’m rarely tackling such dense tomes that require a month to slog through…

I killed some time last week with an end of year meme over on my LiveJournal. One of the questions was “What was the best book you read?” I can never just pick one. I reread Celestial Matters by Richard Garfinkle, which is a personal favorite and something I think any ancient history nerd should read. Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi was recommended for fans of the Hunger Games and was a fun and exciting young adult story, set in a ruined near future, an original story not requiring vampires or sequels. Matched by Ally Condie was a chilling young adult story that I found to be extremely prescient and could easily see that world happening if we keep on our current path. I recommended that one frequently. A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness – finally! A supernatural tale written for adults that don’t want stupid love triangles *or* explicit sex! And I fell in love with three new serieses: the Trylle trilogy by Amanda Hocking, the Alpha and Omega spin-off series by Patricia Briggs, and the October Daye series by Seanan McGuire.

I also read a lot of non-fiction. I’m not sure if it was intentional but I definitely fell into the habit of checking out odd memoirs that caught my eye when I read reviews of them. These ranged from celebrities with interesting lives to regular people with interesting lives. Stuntman! by Hal Needham is a must for any fan of Burt Reynolds and American on Purpose is perfect for fans of comedy, Anglophiles, and punk rockers. I think Concierge Confidential by Michael Fazio was probably the best of the non-famous people memoirs, and I didn’t even know most of the subjects he dished about while discussing how he essentially invented the modern concierge industry.

Book club had mostly good to excellent selections this year (in italics below), although I did give up on the November pick, Assassination Vacation, despite liking the subject matter because I was completely put off by the author’s voice. My favorites were the Steinbeck, the Gaiman, and the Greene titles. I can’t count the most excellent Down and Out in Paris and London because that was actually for 2009 and it just took me that long to get around to buying a copy and finishing it! I also read my usual dozen and a half or so graphic novels. The standouts there were Batwoman: Elegy, truly an amazing tale and incredible artwork, and The Griff, a unique riff on the apocalypse, told by Christopher Moore.

I don’t think I have any book related resolutions again. Last year I said I was going to sew more. That did not happen. At all. This year I’m going to try to bake something every week. I’m still getting a handle on gluten free eating and baking is definitely the area I’ve been most scared of. I’ve had some successes and some failures and mostly just middle of the road good-enough results. So even if it’s just a mix of gf Brownies from a box, I’m going to bake. And I’m going to get back my confidence. And buy xanthum gum and figure out what the hell it does.

1 Celestial Matters Richard Garfinkle
2 Palo Alto James Franco
3 Down and Out in Paris and London George Orwell
4 The Hound of the Baskervilles Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
5 Batwoman: Elegy Greg Rucka & J. H. Williams III
6 I Am Number Four Pittacus Lore
7 Library Wars: Love & War, Vol. 3 Hiro Arikawa & Kiiro Yumi
8 Ship Breaker Paolo Bacigalupi
9 Star Island Carl Hiassen
10 About a Boy Nick Hornby
11 Children of God Go Bowling Shannon Olson
12 Magic Bites Ilona Andrews
13 Bloody Valentine Melissa de la Cruz
14 Matched Ally Condie
15 The Help Kathryn Stockett
16 Something From the Nightside Simon R. Green
17 Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 Volume 7 Twilight Brad Meltzer & Georges Jeanty
18 Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files Storm Front Vol. 2 Maelstrom Mark Powers & Ardian Syaf
19 Agents of Light and Darkness Simon R. Green
20 Nightingale's Lament Simon R. Green
21 Library Wars: Love & War, Vol. 4 Hiro Arikawa & Kiiro Yumi
22 East of Eden John Steinbeck
23 Angel: After the Fall Vol. 1 Brian Lynch & Franco Urru
24 Hex and the City Simon R. Green
25 Huntress Christine Warren, Marjorie M. Liu, Caitlin Kittredge, Jenna Maclaine
26 Concierge Confidential Michael Fazio
27 Farscape: Scorpius Vol 1 Let Sleeping Dogs Lie David Alan Mack & Mike Ruiz
28 The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists Gideon Defoe
29 Street Magic Caitlin Kittredge
30 Battle Royale Vol. 1 Koushun Takami & Masayuki Taguchi
31 Demon Bound Caitlin Kittredge
32 Ego & Hubris: The Michael Malice Story Harvey Pekar
33 Paths Not Taken Simon R. Green
34 Mister Wonderful Daniel Clowes
35 Dead Reckoning Charlaine Harris
36 Sharper Than a Serpent's Tooth Simon R. Green
37 On the Edge Richard Hammond
38 The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie Alan Bradley
39 Bone Gods Caitlin Kittredge
40 The Girls are Coming Peggie Carlson
41 Hit List Laurell K. Hamilton
42 Switched Amanda Hocking
43 The Wreck of the Waleship Essex Owen Chase
44 Torn Amanda Hocking
45 A Discovery of Witches Deborah Harkness
46 Ascend Amanda Hocking
47 Library Wars: Love & War, Vol. 5 Hiro Arikawa & Kiiro Yumi
48 Stuntman! My Car-Crashing, Plane-Jumping, Bone-Breaking, Death-Defying Hollywood Life Hal Needham
49 Hell to Pay Simon R. Green
50 The Graveyard Book Neil Gaiman
51 Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 Volume 8 Last Gleaming Joss Whedon & Georges Jeanty
52 Ghost Story Jim Butcher
53 Serenity: The Shepherd's Tale Joss and Zack Whedon & Chris Samnee
54 Naked City: Tales of Urban Fantasy Edited by Ellen Datlow
55 Kabul Beauty School: An American Woman Goes Behind the Veil Deborah Rodriguez
56 The Witches of East End Melissa de la Cruz
57 The City of Ember Jeannne DePrau
58 The Member of the Wedding Carson McCullers
59 The People of Sparks Jeannne DePrau
60 Home Improvement: Undead Edition Edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L.P. Kelner
61 American on Purpose Craig Ferguson
62 The Prophet of Yonwood Jeannne DePrau
63 On the Prowl Patricia Briggs, Eileen Wilks, Karen Chance, Sunny
64 Cry Wolf Patricia Briggs
65 The Diamond of Darkhold Jeannne DePrau
66 Hunting Ground Patricia Briggs
67 The Florist's Daughter Patricia Hampl
68 Cowboys & Aliens Fred Van Lente
69 Hexed Ilona Andrews, Yasmine Galenorn, Allyson James, Jeanne C. Stein
70 Nerd Do Well Simon Pegg
71 The Sookie Stackhouse Companion Charlaine Harris
72 Library Wars: Love & War, Vol. 6 Hiro Arikawa & Kiiro Yumi
73 Travels with My Aunt Graham Greene
74 Devil's Business Caitlin Kittredge
75 Rosemary and Rue Seanan McGuire
76 Farscape: Tangled Roots Keith R.A. DeCandido
77 A Local Habitation Seanan McGuire
78 Farscape: Red Sky at Morning Keith R.A. DeCandido
79 The Grace of Silence Michele Norris
80 An Artificial Night Seanan McGuire
81 The Griff Christopher Moore & Ian Corson
82 Late Eclipses Seanan McGuire

Halloween 2011

2011-11-02T12:46:00.000-07:00

It was a very piratey year! Three in our own trick-or-treating party plus the neighbor kid and at least a dozen other random people out that night.

Kirk was Captain Jack Sparrow.

Cousin A2 was Elizabeth Swann.

Mama was Anamaria. And Ronnie was Princess Leia. (Who of course likes pirates and scoundels.)

Mr. b really got into character as gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson.

He was quoting Fear and Loathing lines all night.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

The Quest for Bread

2011-07-27T12:44:00.000-07:00

Here are some things I’ve learned about gluten-free products:

Pasta - I like the quinoa and corn better than the rice-based noodles. Ancient Harvest spaghetti is my favorite so far. They don’t have too many shapes so I haven’t been able to try the other varieties. I have elbow noodles in my cupboard but haven’t used them yet. The next best is Annie’s macaroni and cheese. It’s nearly as good as regular boxed mac-n-cheese, despite being rice-based noodles. They’re much larger in size than the typical blue box but they taste great and hold their texture as leftovers. My least favorite is Tinkyada. Maybe it’s just their asinine “energy-saving” cooking method (boil for 2 minutes then let sit, covered, for 20) but the texture was awful, they fell apart when mixed with other ingredients, they were mushy in the casserole, and worse as leftovers. We threw out half a pan.

Snacks & Desserts - I haven’t actually tried that many crackers. The Glutino table crackers are underwhelming so I’ve been sticking with Nut Thins. I genuinely like them and I keep trying new flavors. They’re really great with spreadable cheeses like port wine and cream cheese. Tortilla chips are of course a standard, as they have been all along. Frito Lay has a marvelous list of all their GF snacks, which include Cheetos! Unfortunately not Nacho Cheese Doritos; Cool Ranch just aren’t as good. I’ve also tried a few different bars. Bakery on Main has some nice granola bars and I like that you can actually buy a whole box. KIND bars and Lärabars are individual only. I was underwhelmed with the one flavor of KIND bar I’ve tried but plan to sample others. So far I like the chocolate coconut Lärabar best but it’s only the second flavor I’ve gotten around to sampling. I made some homemade Monster Cookies using a recipe from General Mills’ glutenfreely.com. They used a box mix for Betty Crocker GF chocolate chip cookies. The finished product was OK, not great. They were actually better the second day but then got quite dry as they aged. I do like the idea of using more baking mixes though, instead of having to have 80 different weird flours on hand. A co-worker brought in a French Meadow GF brownie and a GF chocolate chip cookie for me earlier this week. They were both good but the cookie was actually pretty great. I’ve also had the local co-op’s GF brownie, which I liked though it was day old and so a bit stale.

Breakfast - Mostly I’ve been eating Corn Chex or Rice Chex. Or combining them into the same bowl for “Crispix”. I’ve tried one actual GF cereal, Sunrise Harvest, and it was good but weird. There were like six different shapes of things in there so it was like eating suicide cereal. Seriously. Like if someone poured Kix and Rice Krispies and Wheaties and Grape Nuts and Special K into the same bowl and mixed it all together. Odd. I’ve also gone through a box of Glutenfreeda instant oatmeal. I tried the variety pack which had apple-cinnamon, maple-raisin, and maple-banana. The maple-banana is best. But I would like to find just regular instant oats. Like a big container that I can choose how much to pour and flavor myself instead of the packets. I’m also curious about the quinoa flakes (like Malt-o-Meal?) but haven’t tried them yet. I have some actual quinoa that I used to make a delicious pilaf the other night. I think I have a recipe to make a hearty breakfast bowl with quinoa that I’ll have to dig up. I’ve also been buying Amy’s frozen GF burritos, which are awesome, and having those for brekkie. But that gets spendy.

Pizza - Pizza has been tricky. Mr. b found an Amy’s frozen rice crust pizza and it was awful. The flavor was ok I guess but the texture was all kinds of wrong. We threw out the leftovers. Since that disaster, I tried an Udi’s frozen pizza crust. It was great. Good texture, good flavor, and really only a little bit more effort to have to spread my own sauce and toppings. It was a two-pack so I’ve got a second one to decorate. They’re fairly small crusts though so I can eat like 2/3 myself. Something for a night when the kids are having Spaghettios. We had a pizza lunch at work the other day and the admin was kind enough to order several GF along with the massive order she called in from Pizza Luce. It was great. I even got to snatch the leftovers so I’ve had some leftover pizza for breakfast. There are a couple of other pizza joints I want to try that have GF crusts. It’s nice living in such a hippie organic bean sprout city because there really are a lot of restaurant options. I just need to remember all the places we used to go back in the 90s…

Bread - This is the biggie. I haven’t found anything that’s *that* good yet. Udi’s plain bagels were fine. They weren’t great but they were acceptable. I’m a bagel snob and nothing is ever going to compare to Bruegger’s for me so I just have to accept that. Udi’s were as good as non-Bruegger’s and that’s as good as it’s going to get. I also tried some brown rice tortillas. They were pretty passable as naan for scooping up Indian food. But they didn’t wrap well for burritos. I haven’t tried them as quesadillas yet but my fingers are crossed. Corn tortillas, though good for pretty much anything (seriously, I eat most leftovers in them; you can make anything into a taco), just don’t work for quesadillas. Regular bread though, haven’t hit on it yet. First I tried a loaf of Schär. The first two sandwiches I made for Mr. b and I – grilled ham and cheese – were excellent. But small. The loaf is little. But after it was frozen and I had to defrost in the microwave I was completely disillusioned. I choked down my grilled cheese and figured I’d have to try another brand. So next up was French Meadow. They’re local and their tag line is that it’s so good you won’t miss the wheat. Bullshit. I missed the wheat. It was not good. I choked down the tuna melt but was very unhappy. Then I decided to try toasting the old frozen Schär in the oven. It’s a bit weird and slow but it was good! I had it with cream cheese and it was better than the bagel. I tried the same oven technique with the French Meadow and again, it totally worked! My salami and provolone sandwich was dry but delicious. So I guess toasting is the key. I still want to try Udi’s and see if that’s universal but I suspect it is. I covet the soft pillowy direct-from-the bag slices when I make the kids’ PBJs. And croissants. I haven’t even attempted a hunt for GF croissants.

It's Genetic

2011-07-22T12:56:00.000-07:00

Good News Everyone! Kirk and Veronica do NOT have celiac disease.

I took them in last week to have blood taken for testing. Since it's genetic, they say that anyone with a confirmed-by-endoscopy diagnosis (me!) should have their first degree relatives tested. My parents and my siblings will have to take care of themselves. My kids are cleared. And they were so well-behaved at the lab that they got taken off grounding for the running away from home incident.

It’s a big relief to know they don’t have it. I mean, I know it must be easier to deal with than parents of young kids that aren’t actually celiac themselves. I already am learning the ways of gluten-free living. But this way they don’t have to worry about getting contaminated out there in the world, at daycare or school or birthday parties or hell, even taking samples in the grocery store. It’s just simpler. And I was worried. Not about Kirk. I was quite confident he’d be cleared. But Ronnie’s always had a poopie butt. She has blows outs even still and her poo just isn’t as solidified as her brother’s was coming into potty training age. So it’s good to know that’s just her system, and not an underlying issue.

My mom and I wonder if perhaps her father didn’t have celiac. He died when I was less than a year old so I don’t have any memory of him. But Mom says that Grandpa was always, her entire life, experimenting with his diet to try to solve his constant digestive issues. And since gluten wasn’t determined as the cause of celiac disease until WWII, and even then it wasn’t common knowledge outside of specialists in Europe, I can see it being highly unlikely that he would have stumbled upon eliminating wheat from his diet as a cure. I must admit, it’s kind of neat having a speculative link to a man I’ll never know.

Poison!

2011-07-12T08:43:00.000-07:00

Saturday we took Kirk to see the King Tut exhibit at the Science Museum. He loved it. Of course. We looked at some of the other permanent exhibits, mainly the dinosaurs, and played out in the Big Backyard and by that time, it was nearly 7 o’clock. The snacks I had packed us all were quickly devoured in the car so Mr. b and I thought we’d hit a drive-thru. Taco Bell seemed easiest. Little did I know it was about to be a gluten fiesta.

Taco Bell has gluten in everything. I am not making this up. There’s wheat in the Fire sauce. In the meat for the corn shell tacos. Even the frickin’ mango strawberry Fruitista Freeze has it! I was shocked. And...had already started eating by the time I made this discovery. I said fuck it and kept eating. Mr. b figures it was my chance to say good bye to Taco Bell. But then I had to wait for the sick to kick in. I knew it would be about a day and a half delay to get deep enough into my guts to do damage.

I knew it would take that long because last week I got “poisoned” by toaster crumbs. I made myself a gluten-free bagel and used our regular toaster, not thinking anything of it. I met with the dietician that afternoon and found out: Bad Idea. Apparently I need to get my own toaster. I’ve been toasting my bagels in a dry frying pan in the meantime. Now that the gluten is out of my system and my intestines are beginning to heal, even the smallest amount will make me sick. But it took about 30 hours to hit. It wasn’t until following afternoon that I started to feel icky and needed to run to the bathroom repeatedly. I guess each instance will be different though because the Taco Bell fiasco manifested as gas and bloating instead. I’m keeping up my food log so at least I’ll be able to track the culprits now that I have a general timeline. Hopefully that’ll help me fine tune this radical diet change.

Naughty

2011-07-11T08:12:00.000-07:00

Even when I was in high school I knew the line from The Little Mermaid "Betcha on land they understand that they don’t reprimand their daughters" was hilarious. It’s even funnier now with a daughter of my own. Who needs to be reprimanded quite frequently in fact. For instance last night, when she and her brother ran away from home. At bedtime. In their jammies. To the neighbor’s house.

I’m not entirely sure what they thought they were doing. We had been over to the neighbor’s that evening, splashing around in their wading pool in the backyard. Neither Kirk nor Veronica wanted to leave, despite it being bedtime. Thankfully the neighbor helped get them out of there by deflating the pool and dumping out the water. We all went home, got dried off, and into pajamas. While I was gathering wet clothes for the laundry I realized they had gone outside. Which, strictly speaking, was enough to get them into trouble but I was going to let it slide, thinking they were just in the backyard. I stepped outside to shoo them in and realized they weren’t actually in our yard. I started calling for them and noticed they were two houses over, about to go through the back gate to the neighbor’s that we had just left. They hustled over so fast when they saw and heard how mad I was. Mr. b yelled at them big time and Kirk blamed Ronnie, of course, and Ronnie was in tears and they were sent straight to bed and they’re grounded from TV. Kirk tried to suggest they get grounded from going outside. Yeah right. Nice try buddy.

The ironic thing is that just that afternoon, we got set up with cameras to record Ronnie’s temper tantrums. When the kids were born I signed each of them up to be participants in various child development studies with the University. Kirk’s gone in a few times to do various cognitive development tests, like play with blocks and look at pictures. Simple stuff, quick and easy and fun. A couple of months ago they called about one for Veronica. Initially it was just a survey about how she reacts during a tantrum and how frequently they happen and how long they last. I knew she’d get picked for the larger study and sure enough, she did. They’re researching aggression and using toddlers as their human baseline, because they don’t yet have societal pressure altering their behavior. Obviously they need a lot of raw data for such a complicated statistical model so they’re taping 100 toddlers having three tantrums each. The research assistant came by yesterday and got the cameras in place and walked us through the paperwork. I already have a tantrum for her to come and download. Ronnie freaked out about a) fruit snacks [she’s only allowed one packet a day] and b) not coming to the grocery store with Mama. It’s not even the biggest, baddest one she’s ever had. But it certainly had many of the unique behaviors they’re cataloging – stomping, crying, hitting, yelling, walking away, reaching for comfort – so it definitely qualifies. I think we’re going to get our allotted three tantrums filled up in a hurry. I wonder what’s the fastest any family has completed the inventory? We’re just excited to have witnesses.

I Miss Carbs

2011-07-05T11:44:00.000-07:00

I’m having a hard time adjusting to the lack of carbohydrates in my diet. I’m a carb kind of gal and I’m noticing an increase in dizziness, floaters in my vision, headaches, and other things like that. Things that I’ve long associated with low blood sugar. That I used to be able to take care of by just eating a granola bar or some peanut butter toast. Now I’m filling myself with cheap carbs like soda and potato chips. Just to try to feel full for a minute. But it never lasts. No matter how much protein I try to add. My meeting with the medical nutritionist is tomorrow.

Yes, the celiac diagnosis is official. I briefly met with the GI docs again last week. Basically the diagnosis is two-fold: outright celiac disease and a bunch of medical bullshit that boils down to “manifestation of celiac disease”. I’ve been doing the gluten-free thing, more or less, for two weeks now and I’ve definitely noticed a difference…in my poop. I’m very excited that I’m no longer having daily diarrhea. I keep joking that the only time you’re excited about poop is with your infant, or if you’ve had diarrhea for four months.

I haven’t noticed any other differences yet. I’m exhausted but that’s likely from a non-stop weekend of Kirk’s birthday party, my dad’s BBQ reunion, and blowing shit up with neighbors in the alley. I’m supposed to keep taking my daily iron supplement for the next couple of months before trying to cut that off and see if I still need it. Other than that, I don’t know what else to look for.

I’m trying to keep track of what I’m eating so I can tell what makes me sick. Apparently very small amounts of gluten will have a big effect once I’ve fully transitioned. I had icky poo again two mornings in a row, once after Red Lobster and once after homemade gluten-free macaroni and cheese. Initially I thought maybe there was cross-contamination in my steak and baked potato. I tried to be careful with what I ordered at the restaurant. But then when I felt icky the second morning I looked to rum as the potential culprit – I had a Bahama Mama while out and a glass of homemade rum punch the following night. Mr. b told me to try rum a third time before cutting it out and sure enough, that wasn’t a problem. So now I’m back to wondering about cross-contamination and reviewing my food log to see what might have been the issue the second time.

Meanwhile, I’m not sure I like gluten-free bread. We bought a loaf of Schär multi-grain last week and I made us some grilled ham and cheese sandwiches. Both Mr. b and I liked them a lot. But when I made myself a grilled cheese this weekend, it wasn’t very good. The bread has to be used very quickly or else frozen so I’m thinking the defrosting and then grilling was the problem. We’ll see if I can come up with another method of cooking it. I found a double corn tortilla to be a very excellent substitute for a hot dog bun!

Gluten-Free

2011-06-27T10:25:00.000-07:00

My wrist is bruised from where the IV was in. It was really sore yesterday. I have my follow-up with the GI docs tomorrow so I’ll ask them about that. I never did get a call about the biopsy results so theoretically I’ll find that out tomorrow, too.

We’re starting slow with the gluten-free foods. Our usual grocery store has a small section in the hippie aisle. We taste-tested two different spaghettis, one was quinoa/corn and the other was corn/rice. The whole family liked both, which was a relief. It definitely cooked differently than regular semolina wheat spaghetti, and the texture of the leftover noodles is different, but in both cases it wasn’t bad, merely not what I’m used to.

I’m not ready to dive headlong into gluten-free baking. The idea that I’m going to need a half dozen different flours and combine them in various ways with xanthum gum and other stuff is just too daunting. I’ve got a loaf of gf bread and we’ll see how that tastes. I’m planning on mostly rice and potatoes for starches for meals this week. And there’s always corn tortillas.

So far, I’m just winging it. Cutting out the obvious wheat/rye/barley. And I’m staying away from oats until my system is cleared, then I’ll try them to see if they affect me or not. I’m not worrying about the celluloses and glutamates and dextroses and maltoses and whatnot. I know some are wheat based and some are corn based and frankly the internet is just overwhelming. I’m meeting with a nutritionist next week. I’ll ask for a list of what’s OK and what’s bad then. I figure the trace amounts of gluten in various derivatives isn’t going to be enough to set me off since I’m not 100% gluten-free yet. I know some people can get sick from one crumb but I haven’t been at this for even a full week yet. And I cheated last Friday, having one last sandwich from the deli at work, just to say goodbye. *sniff* I’ll miss you, delicious deli sammiches.

Celiac

2011-06-23T12:59:00.000-07:00

Last week I had my first appointment with the GI specialist. The doctor was handsome, very smart, and eager. He put together my history, like the flu in February and unexplained anemia since I was a teenager. The senior fellow came in (it’s the University so it’s a teaching hospital; I just thought it was funny that the “learner” himself is a full-fledged MD) and praised handsome doc for the job he did with the background analysis. Essentially they think I’ve pretty much always been celiac. In 10-15% of cases the only symptom that ever manifests is anemia so if I hadn’t had the triggering event of the viral infection, I possibly would never have known. Senior doc thought it was irresponsible of my past doctors to not look deeper but hey, it was over 20 years ago and they assumed it was puberty and starting to menstruate and all that and I’ve been taking iron for so long I just never think about it. He thinks that the mal-absorption of iron will go away with the other dietary changes, so that’ll be interesting. I wasn’t supposed to eliminate gluten yet though; they wanted me to wait until after the endoscopy. They expect that I’ll notice improvement in things I never noticed were affecting me before, like energy levels. When he asked if I’m often tired I joked that I have young kids, of course I’m tired!

I had my endoscopy yesterday. Because of a series of stupid events, I was over two hours early. (And hungry. I couldn’t eat anything after 7am.) I was fine in the waiting room but when they took me in to the prep room I started to freak out. The prep nurse explained to me step by step everything they were going to do and when she left to let me change into my hospital gown, I started crying. Yes, it’s PMS week so my emotions are nuts but I was still in tears. She came in and tried to help soothe me a bit and put in the IV shunt, which never felt right the entire time. I don’t remember it being so uncomfortable when I had them in for labor. But then again, I was in labor so a bit distracted. I had some time to read and text so that helped to keep my mind off of it but not completely.

Then they came to get me to the procedure room. There was a different nurse for that one and she was amazing. She tried to re-settle my IV and wrapped me up in hot blankets and did a fantastic job of helping to calm me. But I was still on the verge of bawling the whole time. They had warned me that the same senior doctor was always 15 minutes late. He ended up being an hour late. I just tried to close my eyes and doze off. It’s hard to actually sleep when there’s so much hustling and bustling in the hall outside and when your nerves are so on edge. Doctor finally got there and he’s a Tasmanian devil of humor and activity so I didn’t have time to freak out. He went through what they were going to do again and then he sprayed the back of my throat with basically just that lidocaine stuff the dentist uses; I had to swallow it though to get it down as far as possible. Meanwhile the nurse was injecting the narcotics and something else into my IV shunt. They hit me so fast. I felt woozy, like that spot *just before* you get the spins when you’re lying down after too many drinks. But it never got to the spins thankfully. I got another dose of the spray and another dose of the hippie drugs and they had me lying on my left side. Then I had to bite onto this circular bite guard thing and the doctor stuck the hose in my mouth. I had my eyes closed so I wouldn’t accidentally see it or the view screens from the camera. I had to swallow it and that was the hardest part. My gag reflex was tamed from the numbing spray but I still had to swallow three times to get it past. Then it was basically like being at the dentist, with the doctor giving the nurse instructions that meant nothing to me and she was doing stuff I couldn’t see and also rubbing my back and telling me how good I was doing and reminding me to breathe through my nose. Then the doctor said he was done and pulled the thing out. It took about 4 minutes. Then I had to spit out all the collected spittle (which obviously I couldn’t swallow with the thing down my throat) and they wheeled me to the recovery area to come down from the drugs.

My sister came in and I could barely follow along with her usual pace of things. The recovery nurse had me drink some water to make sure I could swallow. I was super loopy from the “conscious sedation”, which they do because otherwise they’d have to have you on the breathing machine if you were knocked out fully. All I cared about was getting the dang IV thing removed because it was so uncomfortable. I can definitely understand why they don’t want you driving but I would have been able to take the bus by myself. But they don’t have any way of knowing that I’m an expert bus taker. So. I was mostly down from the drugs by the time we got home and then I was just starving and tired. I went to bed at 8:30 last night.

The doctor came in while I was in recovery to talk about what he saw. He took biopsies of a couple different spots, in my stomach and duodenum, and will call me tomorrow with the results. But he said that if it’s not positive for celiac then he’s a liar. Which is why I have to start my new diet right away. I have to make an appointment with the nutritionist, too. We haven’t done any gluten-free shopping yet, and can’t until pay day, so I’m making due with what’s on hand. Which is mainly corn tortillas.

Butt Update

2011-05-16T11:27:00.000-07:00

Last week Ronnie started wearing underpants. Now, this does not mean she is fully potty trained. In fact, I would say instead that she is merely in the process of potty training. She still has accidents. Lots and lots of accidents. But for her, just wearing panties is enough to make her remember to use the potty and she really, really hates having to wear a diaper at all now.

It’s amazing how different the potty training experience is with Veronica compared to her brother. Kirk was just uninterested in it at all. Pure laziness. He would have kept going in a diaper forever if we would have let him. Which is why we started the sticker charts. Potty candy was all well and good but ultimately, he needed a bigger reward. Earning stickers to save up for a toy prize mattered a whole lot more to him than the personal pride of a pair of underpants. I guess that’s why Ronnie’s moving forward so much quicker and at such a younger age. I’m not sure if it’s the younger sibling thing or the girls-train-earlier-than-boys thing or personality differences or some combination of all of that. But it’s definitely been unique.

Kirk always used the actual potty chair. He didn’t switch to the potty ring until he had been using the little chair for quite some time. We’d always have to clean it out and it was gross. Ronnie has never used anything but the toilet seat ring insert. When she was first showing interest many months ago, I pulled the potty chair out and she would sit on it but it was basically just a toy. She didn’t start actually going until I set her on the ring. That’s what she uses at daycare, too.

So now I make sure she goes every morning when she first gets up. She’s really good at morning pee. The rest of the day is hit or miss. She’s been going to daycare in underpants but always ends up coming home in a diaper. She still needs one while sleeping so she needs one while taking a nap. Miss Ronica likes to then have her panties on top of her diaper, so she’s still wearing them. Sort of. I must say, size 2T Hello Kitty panties are just about the cutest thing ever.

Mama’s also been having increased potty focus the past few months. The entire family got hit with a nasty bout of stomach flu back in February. All four of us were down for several days with repeated puking and diarrhea. It was not fun. But after we all got well, my butt never went back to normal. Essentially, I’ve had intermittent diarrhea for months now. I thought maybe it was red meat so cut that out. I cut out alcohol and caffeine and dairy. None of that made any difference. I tried adding lactobacillus to my water. Nope. So I finally went to the doctor a couple of weeks ago and had blood taken and had to provide a stool sample. That was a real joy to collect.

Last week I got the results of the tests back. “Your blood tests for Celiac disease (gluten sensitivity) were both quite elevated. This makes the diagnosis quite likely.” Awesome. I have an appointment with a gastrointestinal specialist set up for next month. But in the meantime, I get to speculate on life with a possible celiac diagnosis. There is no cure. The only way to fix my butt issues would be to change my diet. Radically change my diet. Wheat gluten is in *everything*. Seriously. It’s used to thicken even ice cream! I love pasta and bread and crackers and cereal. Sure, my favorite grains have long been corn and oats but there’s wheat flour in corn bread and dieticians are divided on whether or not oat gluten is also bad. Basically it’s at the point now where every time I eat a sandwich or a plate of spaghetti I find myself thinking, “Is this the last time I’ll ever be able to eat it?” I’m not supposed to modify my diet on my own before additional testing or else I’d have to eat a bunch of gluten specifically for tests. So in the meantime, I’m keeping on keeping on.

But what will this mean for my family? I already have a massively picky eater in Kirk. Dinner is a fight more often than not. I don’t want to have to make special meals for myself but I also don’t want to have to force them to eat weird grains and bizarre recipes when they don’t have to. There are just so many factors and such a potential for ripple effects. I’m trying not to worry. But being celiac would certainly help to make sense of certain things my whole life so part of me would be happy just to have the answers. Even if that means knowing that I’ll pay later for that sandwich on delicious whole grain bread.

Libraries Rule

2011-05-09T08:08:00.000-07:00

Never apologize for your reading taste.
-- Betty Rosenberg, Library Science educator

I’ve always loved this quote. I think it’s an important thing to keep in mind whether you’re a voracious reader or only read a handful of books a year. But it’s especially important when you find yourself “stuck in a rut”. Genreflecting is a legitimate way to find your next read and it’s OK to stick with what you already know you like.

Something else that’s important? Quitting a book that you don’t like. This is a tricky one. My aunt has been extremely influential on me with this one. She’s a professional librarian and so reads a lot. Like, a LOT a lot. And obviously even when you’re surrounded by books day in and day out, there’s still a limit to how much you can actually get read. So if it’s not making you happy, don’t waste your time. I’ve found it rather freeing to know that I *can* put down a book unfinished. But it took a long time to get to the point where I was comfortable actually doing so. And I still don’t do it often. Usually once or twice a year the book club selection will just plain not appeal to me but I’ll try it out for a few chapters, if only to get a feel for the writing and be able to explain why I didn’t like it and didn’t continue. Rarely will I quit a book that I picked out for myself.

Over the past year and a half or so I’ve tried to stay on top of modern publications by requesting books from the library as I read an intriguing sounding review in a magazine. Yes, usually they’re something I would normally be drawn to anyway but it’s a trick that has pulled me into new directions, too. Sometimes I don’t remember exactly why I was interested in the title and by the time it becomes available on the wait list it will be a complete surprise me to me. Typically a pleasant surprise. But sometimes I’ll take a look at the cover art and read the flap and find that for some reason, I don’t want to read it. So I return the book unread. That’s been a shock to me and it’s also been incredibly liberating. Still, it’s not the usual event. More often than not I’ll read the book anyway and be very glad I did.

Sometimes it’s not that I don’t want to read the book at all. It’s instead that I don’t feel like reading it right at that moment. Tastes change and like with movies, sometimes you just aren’t up to the in depth historical drama or the intricate character study. You just want a comedy or a thriller or explosions and action. So in those instances I’ve returned the book unread, but then re-requested it, putting myself to the back of the queue but still getting it again at a later date.

Now. Here’s where these habits are all starting to intersect. I’m starting to have repeat returns. My Shelfari shelf of I Plan To Read has several books that I’ve checked out and returned unread and re-requested more than twice. Which is silly. I’m trying to be realistic. I know I’m never going to finish Game of Thrones in time, especially with new interest due to the TV show; it’s just always going to have a wait on it making it impossible to renew. The Book Thief is ridiculously popular right now and I’m not entirely sure I’ll ever be “in the mood” for a YA Holocaust tale. But I’m sure it’s as good as they say. I’ve been meaning to read His Majesty’s Dragon for several years now but my library only has a single copy and for no apparent reason, it seems to have a lot of requests on it at all times. It’ll be interesting to see if I do give up on any of them. I finally realized I was never going to actually read The Kraken after the second time I checked it out and I haven’t requested it again since.

What am I reading mostly these days? Supernatural mysteries and YA dystopian futures. So books that fall into those bailiwicks I’m eating up with no problem. I picked out Journal of a UFO Investigator strictly based on that awesome title. All I knew is it was YA and had a great cover. What I’m finding is that it’s a somber coming of age story. And it’s really good. But I don’t know that I want to keep going with it. I haven’t decided yet if I’ll return it unfinished and request it again, or just give it up for lost. I think I would ultimately be satisfied with the read. But it’s hard and it hasn’t really grabbed me yet. And I have the next Nightside, as well as the next Black London, sitting on my bedside table. And I think I’d rather find out how John Taylor is going to track his mythical mother through alternate universes, or watch Pete Caldecott grow closer to Jack Winter as she learns how to control her newfound magicks and try to balance that with her mundane day job of a detective inspector.

And I’m not going to apologize for that.

East of Eden

2011-04-18T07:43:00.000-07:00

It took over a month, and I read two novels and three graphic novels and one short story on top of it, but I finally finished all 601 pages of John Steinbeck’s epic East of Eden.

I’ve been slowly rediscovering Steinbeck thanks to book club. I guess “re”discovering is a bit of a misnomer. I read some in high school. For sure Grapes of Wrath, which I didn’t care for at all. Possibly also Of Mice and Men which left no impression. I never really understood what the big deal was. Then last year we read Cannery Row and I fell in love.

East of Eden is a big book. Much bigger in tone and reach than just page count. It covers three generations of two families, one being Steinbeck’s own maternal grandfather. The main family focus is the Trask family; I don’t know if they are entirely fictional or somewhat based in local legend and frankly I don’t know if it matters. As we follow these characters through time we also cross the continent, to the Salinas Valley of California, which is where the author grew up. His grasp of the land itself, not just the geography, is gorgeous and visceral. His narration of the lives of these families is occasionally interrupted by musings on humanity, which to me seemed to point the reader in the direction of that section’s theme and enhance and enrich the reading experience. And his characters themselves, while usually larger than life, still seemed real, even when clearly they were archetypes filling a role on an epic stage.

Essentially, East of Eden is a retelling of the Book of Genesis. The players change roles as they age and mature. The plot doesn’t follow the Bible’s order specifically. But there is sacrifice and love and hatred and betrayal and choice and learning. At times I felt like I was being hit over the head with allegory, “Look at me! I’m playing with Cain and Abel! Aren’t I clever!” But then the characters would actually discuss and dissect the actual verses of Cain and Abel and fascinating things would come of that. The writing felt extremely modern as did the handling of various social issues from Chinese immigrants (the reveal of manservant Lee’s innate intelligence was both hilarious and telling) to sexuality (Kate the evil whore’s brilliant blackmail scheme after she took over as madam).

In that way I both liked the book immensely and couldn’t love it entirely. It is clearly The Great American Novel. It’s beautiful and moving and brilliant and amazing. But it’s a little *too* good. It’s a little *too* perfect. It’s not lived in the way that Cannery Row was. Yet I was crying at the end. I would put the book down at points and be just completely exasperated by the characters, usually Cathy. There was never any question of me not finishing it. But it took time and I didn’t just fly through it. I wanted to digest the story. And I decided that the public school system is doing a disservice by making kids read Steinbeck so young. I think you need age and experience to fully appreciate these stories and this style of writing. I plan to go back and reread Grapes of Wrath and I expect to adore it.

Veronica at Large

2011-03-22T10:56:00.000-07:00

It’s been two weeks since Ronnie had her second birthday. Since it fell on a Monday this year, we had her party the Sunday before. She had a great time opening her presents.

Brother got her a stuffed Olivia, but she still wouldn’t put down the Puffle.

The Easter hat was a hit, but the Jessie doll stole the show. Boy howdy does that girl love Toy Story 3.

We had cake and visited with friends and relatives and it was a lovely afternoon.

Miss Veronica seemed to get extra naughty following her birthday. I mean, even more naughty than she already was. And the crowning achievement of said naughty? Taking off her poopie diapers in her crib. Or in her nap bed at daycare. Basically, just wherever she happens to be. She still won’t poop in the potty more than the occasional shart when she’s already sitting there, but she refuses to stay in a soiled diaper for one second longer than she deems necessary. Which means that she’s getting crap everywhere. Rare are the days she comes home from daycare with the same outfit on. Or if she is, it’s because she already had that one washed, ruined the second one, and got switched back into the first one. We’re going through crib sheets like mad, too, changing them sometimes twice a day – after naps and after night – on the weekends.

But at least she has finally adjusted to daycare. Ronnie is happy to go now, willing to say goodbye to me without tears or clinging on. She even will occasionally be having too much fun to want to leave when I pick her up! But even if I do get her settled into the car without a fight, we then have to go to school to pick up Brother from Adventure Club. And that’s where the trouble usually takes place. Kirk is a master staller, always has been, and he loves Adventure Club and rarely is ready to leave when we get there. Which feeds back into his sister. So a typical evening now involves me forcibly hauling Ronronica to the car from the school, sometimes carrying her boots or coat that she ripped off in a fit of pique, and trying to get the two of them to not fight over the remains of Kirk’s bag lunch in the back seat. I’ve gotten into the habit of bringing snacks with to pass out for the drive home from school. Even with them eating something in the car, they are still famished when we get home. I have to fix them a second snack before I can even start on supper.

We had a brand new development last night. Something that Kirk never did. Ronnie climbed out of her crib. Twice! She was fighting going to bed and screamed so I went in there to hold her for a few seconds. I opened the door and saw her dangling by her fingertips over the side of the crib and then she let go and dropped the remaining few inches to the ground. My jaw dropped and I turned to Kirk, “Oh my god did you see that?!” Mr. b couldn’t believe it. But when we thought we had her calmed down and back in bed, we heard more clunking around sounds. Sure enough, she was out of the crib and making a beeline for the bedroom door. Apparently we’ll be buying a toddler bed this week.

Raise Your Hand if You Like Lists

2011-02-02T12:08:00.000-08:00

I joined a Mom’s Group at the UU church and we meet about once a month. It’s been nice to get to know the other ladies there, especially since we’ve been so crap about actually going to service every week this winter. I still find it kind of unsettling to be attending any kind of organized religious anything but I think it’s important for the kids to get the experience. Going to church of any kind is a normalizing experience in the US and there are so many young kids in the small congregation. It’s really great seeing how much fun they have.

The common ground for all us moms is that we seem to all be big readers. So we decided that for our next meeting, we’d share our top fives. Obviously I couldn’t come up with just five...

Favorite Standalone Novels
Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien
I think this one is self-explanatory. Anyone that’s followed me over to LJ and read my various Farscape and Babylon 5 posts knows how much I love this book. I’ve probably read it at least a dozen times. It’s been a few years and I really need to delve into it again. I always find something new.
Celestial Matters by Richard Garfinkle
Possibly my favorite book of all time. Recently re-reading it again really cemented for me why this is such a tough one to recommend though. I'm pretty much the perfect audience: comparative religion. Ancient Western and Ancient Eastern history. Hard science. Speculative fiction. Lots of hand to hand combat. Space. I mean, who else fits that specific intersections of loves? No really, are you out there? Who else loves this book as much as I do?
The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson
Speaking of comparative religion, Ancient Eastern history, and speculative fiction…this is the pinnacle of alternative histories as far as I’m concerned. Let’s say that the Black Death killed 90% of Europe instead of “merely” 30%. That changes everything. And the way we get to travel through multiple eras in this new timeline is by following the same souls as they reincarnate into different characters in each period. It’s incredibly thought-provoking as well as a wonderful story.
Superfudge by Judy Blume
Sure, her other titles get more acclaim. But come on. “Eat it or wear it” is clearly the funniest scene of all time!
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
This is the first book I started re-reading on a regular basis, back in junior high. I haven’t been through it in a number of years but it’s still as vivid in my head as if I just finished it yesterday.

Favorite Series
Harry Potter by JK Rowling
Again, do I really have to explain myself? Long before I had even head of TWoP I joined the HPforGrown-Ups egroup, just for speculation. It was my first online fandom and I still love over-analyzing every aspect of it.
Dragonriders of Pern by Anne McCaffrey
I discovered this series back in the mid-90s thanks to a sort of unofficial book club with my field crew at the time. Someone loaned me the first trilogy and I was hooked. The dragons were awesome enough but then there are fire lizards, too? And everyone can have one? WANT! They’re like kitties, but psychic, and with teleportation. What’s not to like? Plus then the series turned out to have a sci-fi explanation for all the fantasy elements? LOVE!
Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson
This is hard science fiction at its best. There’s a good reason this series is much loved by actual rocket scientists: this is what colonizing Mars would *actually* be like. But on top of the factual basis are some of the most compelling characters and exciting adventures. I wanted to sign up for a Mars mission for a very long time after finishing this.
Anne of Green Gables by LM Montgomery
Long before I ever knew what “shipping” was, I used to daydream about Anne and Gilbert finally getting together and living happily ever after. Thanks to a recent complete re-read, I can honestly say this series hold ups to your girlhood memories.
Dresden Files by Jim Butcher
Harry Dresden is a wizard for hire. No seriously. Look him up in the Chicago phone book. He’ll find your lost items but he doesn’t do love potions. Of course each book finds his seemingly innocuous case leading him into something much bigger and more deadly. The world building continues to grow and the sideline characters are being fleshed out in ways not often seen in such a long-running series. The most recently published title, punnily enough, changes everything, and I suspect the series is going to take a rather much more muchier epic tone as Butcher builds to his promised finale trilogy. The publication date of the next book cannot possibly get here fast enough.

Favorite Graphic Novels
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen by Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill
Don’t give me any of that “But I don’t like comic books” crap. This is illustrated story-telling for literature nerds. Every single panel has a reference to something brilliant from some other source. Every single character is taken from a Victorian novel and set free from the constraints of their native pages to have adventures of their own. Mina Harker, Captain Nemo, the Invisible Man, Mr. Hyde, and Alan Quatermaine join together under the direction of Mycroft Holmes to fight steampunk baddies. It’s sheer brilliance.
Superman: Red Son by Mark Millar
Tremendously inventive reimagining of the Superman mythos: what if baby Kal-El landed in Soviet Russian instead of Kansas? All the usual suspects show up, from Wonder Woman to Lex Luthor and Lois Lane. Plus a twist ending that will make you gasp.
Hellboy by Mike Mignola
This is dark humor at its best. Hellboy is everything great about film noir and hard boiled detectives, all while also being the actual literal demon of the apocalypse. His personal story arc is moving and compelling and the side characters get their own focus in the continuation spin-off BPRD.
Mixed Vegetables by Ayumi Komura
Don’t let the “backwards” manga format scare you. These characters jump off the page. Hana and Hayato are students at a Toyko culinary high school. Hana dreams of being a sushi chef but her father expects her to take over his pastry shop. Hayato dreams of being a pastry chef but his father expects him to take over his sushi shop. Star-crossed lover antics ensue, along with lots of great follow-your-dreams messages and yes, a happy ending. Yay!
Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
The book that made the general public pay attention to comics. Every superhero trope ever set to page is turned on its head. The alternate 80s setting still resonates today. And the characters have as many flaws as we regularly expect from our serialized television dramas. Plus superpowers and aliens and world domination plots.

And now I find myself wondering what other sorts of categories I should do top fives for. Alternate Histories? Non-Fiction? Young Adult? Eighteenth Century Sailing Adventures?

BOOKS READ IN 2010

2011-01-03T14:00:00.000-08:00

It looks like it’s time for my annual book list! Hard to believe another year has passed already. It’s also hard to believe just how many titles I have on here! Wow. I’m astounded at my 87 completed in 2010. Granted many of these were super quick; I read my usual dozen-ish graphic novels and manga. The Superman alt-history blew my mind and Library Wars managed to do the impossible and be even better than Mixed Vegetables. I caught up with the authors for three series (Anita Blake, Sookie Stackhouse, and Harry Dresden), including their various short stories, and now have to wait for new publications. I only re-read two books – Mostly Harmless and Around the World in 80 Days – until the end of the year when I did my typical pre-movie Harry Potter re-read.

The majority of my reading outside of those three series has been either Young Adult fantasy or non-fiction and memoirs. I find that an interesting dichotomy. My favorite of the latter was Cities of Gold, one of the trio of Spanish Colonialism books I read. The most all-consuming YA books were the Hunger Games trilogy. I still spend every night with thoughts of those characters and events occupying my thoughts as I fall asleep.

I only skipped a single month’s title for book club this year, which I think is a record. I put the book club selections in italics (exception is Holes which was a selection the year before I joined) just to see how they space out through the year. I’m trying to pick a favorite of those and can’t narrow it down, which I think is a good thing! The top of the pile is Changed Man, Kim, Cannery Row, and Babbit. Ooh, I never noticed that only one of those is a modern selection; the rest are all Classics! Well, they’re Classics for a reason I guess.

My reading resolution last year was to read more books that are already on my shelf, already in my collection. I failed. Only about a half-dozen were books that had been sitting around, waiting to be read. About the same number were books I bought to be read immediately or were re-reads. Clearly I need to cull the stuff I haven’t read yet because it’s just not happening. Instead, I got into the habit of immediately requesting books from the library if I read a review of them that I found compelling. About 8 or 10 were based on reviews. Most were varying degrees of hits but These Children Who Come at You with Knives was my second most hated read of the entire year (Blood Lite getting the dubious honor of being the hands-down worst thing I read). I allowed my current read to direct my next read for another handful of titles (for instance I read both Astrid Lingrens because of Dragon Tattoo). I haven’t let that happen in a couple of years and I forgot how pleasant it can be and how many fun surprises it can dig up.

I’m not making a reading resolution this year. I’ve decided to make a sewing resolution instead: Sew More. Or, more specifically, Finish Existing Sewing Projects Before Starting New Ones. We’ll see what happens…

1. Mostly Harmless Douglas Adams
2. Mixed Vegetables, Vol. 5 Ayumi Komura
3. Incubus Dreams Laurell K. Hamilton
4. Around the World in 80 Days Jules Verne
5. Artemis Fowl Eoin Colfer
6. Blood Rites Jim Butcher
7. Micah Laurell K. Hamilton
8. Strange Brew Edited by P.N. Elrod
9. Trouble with Lichen John Wyndham
10. Holes Louis Sachar
11. Danse Macabre Laurell K. Hamilton
12. Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 Volume 5 Predators and Prey Joss Whedon
13. And Another Thing… Douglas Adams’s Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: Part Six of Three Eoin Colfer
14. Mixed Vegetables, Vol. 6 Ayumi Komura
15. The Harlequin Laurell K. Hamilton
16. A Changed Man Francine Prose
17. Must Love Hellhounds Charlaine Harris, Nalini Singh, Ilona Andrews, Meljean Brooks
18. Blood Noir Laurell K. Hamilton
19. Dead Beat Jim Butcher
20. Kim Rudyard Kipling
21. Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle Jim Butcher
22. Farscape Uncharted Tales: D’Argo’s Lament Keith R.A. DeCandido
23. Proven Guilty Jim Butcher
24. Skin Trade Laurell K. Hamilton
25. Farscape: The Beginning of the End of the Beginning Keith R.A. DeCandido
26. White Night Jim Butcher
27. Farscape Strange Detractors Keith R.A. DeCandido
28. Small Favor Jim Butcher
29. My Big Fat Supernatural Honeymoon Edited by P.N. Elrod
30. Year of Wonders Geraldine Brooks
31. Backup Jim Butcher
32. Flirt Laurell K. Hamilton
33. Turn Coat Jim Butcher
34. Mean Streets Jim Butcher, Simon R. Green, Kat Richardson, Thomas E. Sniegoski
35. Bite Me Christopher Moore
36. Changes Jim Butcher
37. Dead in the Family Charlaine Harris
38. The Horror Writers Association Presents Blood Lite: An Anthology of Humorous Horror Stories Edited by Kevin J. Anderson
39. Mixed Vegetables, Vol. 7 Ayumi Komura
40. Cannery Row John Steinbeck
41. Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 Volume 6 Retreat Jane Espenson
42. Crimes by Moonlight: Mysteries from the Dark Side Edited by Charlaine Harris
43. Highlander: An Evening at Joe’s Edited by Gillian Horvath
44. Bullet Laurell K. Hamilton
45. Bitter Grounds Sandra Benítez
46. A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World Tony Horwitz
47. Farscape: Gone and Back Keith R. A. DeCandido
48. B is for Beer Tom Robbins
49. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Stieg Larsson
50. Ivanhoe Sir Walter Scott
51. Star Wars Infinities: A New Hope Chris Warner
52. Pippi Longstocking Astrid Lindgren
53. Superman: Red Son Mark Millar
54. Cities of Gold: A Journey Across the American Southwest Douglas Preston
55. Bill Bergson, Master Detective Astrid Lindgren
56. Mixed Vegetables, Vol. 8 Ayumi Komura
57. Orange is the New Black: My Year in a Women’s Prison Piper Kerman
58. Library Wars: Love & War, Vol. 1 Hiro Arikawa & Kiiro Yumi
59. Because of Winn-Dixie Kate DiCamillo
60. Nim’s Island Wendy Orr
61. Cities of Gold: A Novel of the Ancient and Modern Southwest William K. Hartmann
62. One Day David Nicholls
63. Dark and Stormy Knights Edited by P.N. Elrod
64. Keys to the Repository Melissa de la Cruz
65. The Freddy Anniversary Collection Walter R. Brooks
66. The Windows of Brimnes Bill Holm
67. These Children Who Come at You with Knives Jim Knipfel
68. Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files Storm Front Vol. 1 Mark Powers
69. The Hunt for Red October Tom Clancy
70. Library Wars: Love & War, Vol. 2 Hiro Arikawa & Kiiro Yumi
71. Death’s Excellent Vacation Edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L.P. Kelner
72. Rules of Engagement Peter Morwood
73. Babbitt Sinclair Lewis
74. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix JK Rowling
75. Side Jobs: Stories from the Dresden Files Jim Butcher
76. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince JK Rowling
77. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows JK Rowling
78. The Hunger Games Suzanne Collins
79. Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food Anthony Bourdain
80. Nightshade Laurell K. Hamilton
81. Firelight Sophie Jordan
82. Catching Fire Suzanne Collins
83. Gunn’s Golden Rules: Life’s Little Lessons for Making it Work Tim Gunn
84. The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise Julia Stuart
85. Misguided Angel Melissa de la Cruz
86. Mockingjay Suzanne Collins
87. Star Wars: Tag and Bink Were Here Kevin Rubio

This Week in Menace

2010-12-15T08:57:00.000-08:00

We’ve been re-crib training Ronnie the past week. She’s been refusing to go to bed at night. I’m not really sure what happened. Mr. b thinks our Thanksgiving travels “broke” her. I admit, the timing is suspect, but I don’t know that staying at her great-aunt’s house is the actual culprit. Still, it has sucked since we got back. First she would go to sleep quite quickly in one of our laps while we were watching TV, so it didn’t really strike us as any big deal. But then we realized we were totally getting played. Still, if you put her into her crib, she’d stiffen and stand up and start screaming. And that’s hardly fair to her brother who has to actually go to school and learn and stuff.

Back to crib-training methodology. Since late last week I’ve refused to bring Ronnie out of their bedroom, instead holding her while sitting on the edge of Brother’s bed. She’ll quiet down right away but then stiffen and stand and scream when I set her down again. Thankfully Kirk seems to be able to fall asleep during this circus. Some nights it has taken over an hour of letting her cry for five minutes, hold for five minutes, cry for five minutes, before she’ll fall asleep in my arms and I have to carefully lay her down lest she wake up and start the whole process over again. Sunday night it was taking so many trips into their room that I caved and brought her into the living room to sit with us. And she got all rowdy, having “won”. We ended up bringing her to bed with us and all had a fitful night’s sleep. I think she knows she lost the war though. Monday night she still fought but last night I only went in there once before she fell asleep. We’ll see if this keeps up or if it’s only a lull.

I’m not sure if this is a reversion signaling a new development or not. She gets into everything. Not just the usual menacing that we’ve been dealing with. We have child-proofed cabinets and drawers but Mr. b has resorted to taping the refrigerator closed. Otherwise she’s always in there, helping herself or bringing us sandwich meat or pickle jars, demanding that we get her some of whatever she’s carrying. He told me he just taped shut the craft drawer that contains the crayons as well. We hardly have any crayons left; she chews them all into nothing.

I think this new round of destruction actually coincides with her burgeoning language skills. My dear friends Hot Stuff and Keith Moon are adopting an adorable little man from China. He’s just a couple of weeks older than Veronica and I told them they should learn her vocabulary in Chinese so they have a starting point with communication. Of course he’ll have a toddler accent so maybe that won’t help anyways... Here’s Miss Ron-Ronica’s list of current words – keeping in mind that “current” means two weeks ago when I compiled this list. She’s already got new ones and keeps adding something nearly everyday. Context is clearly everything.

No
No – Nose
No – Snow
Dek – Yes
Mine
Mama
Daddio
Bubba – Brother
Biss – Please
Hi
Bye
Go
This
Ow
Uh-oh
Ball
Bus
Bess – Mess
Bat – Bath
Poohn – Spoon
Knee
Eye
Sss – Juice
Oose – Shoes
Baby
Baby – Blankie
Nake – Snake
Ut – Hook
Hot
Butt
Buht – Book

Nightshade

2010-12-03T12:44:00.000-08:00

My friend Peachy Keen discovered that Laurell K. Hamilton wrote a Star Trek novel! Naturally we were aghast and titillated, imagining vampire sex orgies on the Enterprise. Since she doesn’t have decent library access, I was tasked with tracking down a copy of Nightshade (Star Trek The Next Generation No 24).

Nightshade takes place largely on planet Oriana where Picard, Troi, and Worf make up the ambassadorial team sent to help end a 200 year civil war. The fighting has so thoroughly destroyed the planet the opposing forces are willing to meet for peace talks simply because their self-annihilation is imminent. Naturally Picard gets accused of murder and Worf has to take over as Federation Ambassador. The B story takes place on an alien vessel where the Enterprise has been called on a rescue mission. Geordi, Crusher, and Data are working to repair the damage and save the crew.

At first, I found myself paying far closer attention to the writing style than the story itself. I was fascinated with trying to get a glimpse of Anita Blake in the text of this book published in 1992, a full year before Guilty Pleasures came out. This novel switched perspective too many times for my taste. Certain of the characters were much weaker but thankfully Troi, Geordi, and Worf were written very well. Perhaps because they got the most “screentime”. Troi in particular was fully formed right from the start. Hamilton is always great at showing how being so short and small affect Anita’s view of the world and that came through for Deanna. I never particularly connected with that character on the show but here she seemed much more than a drinking game “I can sense his anger, Captain” joke. Hamilton also excels at describing what altered states look and feel like and how various powers affect the users and those around them. Again, this seemed perfectly suited to Troi and her Betazed empath abilities. I thoroughly enjoyed all the passages where she was sensing the emotions of those around her, whereas that shit bugged hard on the show. Unexpectedly, the ability to clearly show other mindsets worked well for Worf and Geordi as well. Worf’s Klingon-ness and Geordi’s VISOR sight were relevant in ways I would not have expected but they were absolutely perfect for the story.

I did find some of the Trekkie jargon to be jarring. It was as though Hamilton was given a dossier and checked off character and episode references as she worked them into the narrative. I suppose it might have been some sort of fan-service but knowing that this was an actual novel-for-hire project makes the check list scenario more likely. And the alien names were definitely unwieldy. I glossed over “Orianian” because it just never flowed off my mental tongue. Some of the alien character names too were just silly. But that’s a minor quibble. The biggest Trek issue I had was the heavy-handed moralizing and allegory. But again, that seemed to me like part of the assignment and not any kind of message from the author. And it certainly fits in with Star Trek’s MO from the very start.

There were some very gruesome moments and Hamilton’s panache for gore really served the story well. Without being explicit, she was able to imbue a sense of dread and horror into the places it was most needed.

Hamilton’s ability to write about how characters rely on each other without having to discuss it aloud was also a strength in this story. Because it was underscored throughout by Troi’s and Worf’s relationship. Since the book was published a full year before my beloved “Parallels” even aired, I have to wonder if that was her own decision or part of the franchise mandate to set up the shipping to come. I loved everything about their interactions with each other, their complete trust and reliance on each other, the care and affection they showed each other. Yes, a part of me would have loved to read Incubus Dreams-era Hamilton’s take on a raunchy Troi/Worf sex scene. But I know it was better this way.

Ultimately, Nightshade served to remind me of what Hamilton can do when she actually tries. Oh, the writing wasn’t perfect. She used some of the phrases that drive me nuts in the Anita Blake series (Riker relaxed a muscle he didn’t know he was tensing / Anita let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding) and as I mentioned above, the switching between perspectives was neither successful nor consistent. But it did make me put the new Blake novel Hit List on my library wait queue for when it’s published next year. It should be interesting to see if my opinion of that series changes for having read this foray into sci-fi.

Halloween 2010

2010-11-02T17:41:00.000-07:00

It will come as no surprise that Kirk went as Indiana Jones for Halloween this year.

Continuing the apparent new tradition of father-son costumes, Mr. b was Henry Jones Senior.

They looked great!

Ronnie was not happy about being a Sith baby, which is weird because she was loving the cloak as I was trying to put finishing touches on it earlier in the day. She'd try to grab it out of my hand and shout "Mine!"

I went as a Doctor Who character, River Song, which of course no one recognized, as expected. It was fun playing with spongey rollers and ringlets in preparation.

I think it turned out great!

Once again my sister and A2 and A3 joined us and we all had a great time trick-or-treating.

The Hunt for Red October

2010-10-18T13:30:00.001-07:00

The Hunt for Red October is possibly the most successful book-to-screen adaptation I’ve ever witnessed, and it is precisely because of the myriad changes from the page that make it work so well.

Anybody that knows me knows I’m a big fan of reading books that I know have or will have movie versions made. I delight in anticipating the changes that will have to take place to move the action along, predicting which characters will be condensed or eliminated, guessing which sections of dialogue will be lifted wholly from the source. Usually I like to read the book first. Not because of some high-brow “the book is always better” attitude but just because I like playing the mental script-writing game so well. Sometimes it’s hard for me to concentrate on the page if I know the movie version particularly well, like when I read Auntie Mame, after having watched the movie probably at least 50 times from the point where I discovered it in junior high.

I think the first time I really relished the difference between the book and film was with Howard’s End. I saw the Merchant Ivory adaptation first and then read the EM Forster book. I was enchanted with how the story came alive in front of me on the page. Over the years I’ve sought out many kinds of adaptations, successful and wretched, and enjoyed comparing them to the source. I think I’ve done a pretty good job of keeping an open mind when things are wildly changed for the screen. As disappointing as it was to not see the super soldier suits, Starship Troopers got the world right; the feel for the politics and the military was spot on. The only one in recent memory that was a complete and utter failure was League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

Which brings me back to Sean Connery. I think Marko Ramius is one of his best roles. It seems like he’s playing it over the top and yet there are moments where the character is just so real it’s palpable. His shock when he receives the morse code message – he quickly closes the periscope and you can see his thoughts flying through his head as he processes what he just read and how he will react. It’s spectacular. I also think that Alec Baldwin’s is the best of the movie Jack Ryans. He nails the out of his depth manner while still proving competent and capable.

There are certain character short cuts that the movie took for the two leads. I liked that Ryan was made into a Ramius expert. It worked better to have him be confident about the defection specifically because of his knowledge of the man. I also liked how we got to see Ramius’ amazing captaining skills, instead of just being told about them second-hand. It was very exciting to be onboard Red October, in the sea trench, evading their own navy’s torpedo.

And yet the expanded story in the book works just as well. Clancy details how the intelligence is gathered and processed and analyzed and I got a real sense of the actual pace. We get to spend much more time in Ramius’ head and learn details about his past and his motivation for defecting that of necessity had to be put into shorthand for the movie. I loved the moving of all the chess pieces into place in the Atlantic – on both sides of the Cold War. It gave a very full picture of just how unusual the Soviet fleet deployment was, how the US and UK countered the movements, and how both sides used the interactions as a chance to mess with each other, coming up just this side of actually starting a firing war, while still showing off what they were capable of. There were so many small tales that all fit into the big picture. But you’d never be able to include that in a movie and it was smart to concatenate it. To eliminate the British carrier entirely. To eliminate the other US submarine entirely. To eliminate the other Soviet submarine entirely. And especially to change around Skip Tyler’s role so that it included the rescue sub.

The movie expanded on the story in as many wonderful ways as it streamlined it. I loved Sam Neill’s XO and his desire to live in Montana. That small bit of humanizing made his character so much more real than he had been in the book. The aforementioned time spent running the trench past Thor’s Twins. Giving Jonesy an ensign to teach and thereby download sonar exposition to the audience while still keeping things tense and exciting.

I find myself unable to pick which version I liked best, and I think that’s proof of a wonderful adaptation. The movie contained the essence of the story, with all the pacing necessary to an action movie, while the book was able to spend time on detail and still be an intense political thriller. I’ve found myself enthralled with the Ryanverse and intend to read more of Clancy’s books. I doubt any of the subsequent film versions will be as successful as this first one. I certainly don’t remember any of them being something I needed to see more than just the once.

Walter

2010-09-21T11:52:00.000-07:00

One week ago today our lives changed. Mr. b and Veronica got in a car accident. He called me from the scene and I could tell from his voice that he was in shock. He claimed they were both fine but that he was sore. But “sore” can mean just about anything. I immediately left for the bus and met them at the hospital. It was the longest bus ride of my life. Just seeing them both made me feel so much better. I held onto Ronnie so tight. She had been such a good girl for her daddy, who was laid up on an ER triage bed, too sore to move around much. Drugs took the edge off and an x-ray showed he didn’t have internal injuries so we were sent home.

The bruises got worse. Ronnie had a fierce one on her shoulder that started to fade right away. But the two on her thighs deepened to a dark purple. I guess it’s proof that the carseat was installed correctly but it was still brutal to see on my sweet bundle. Mr. b’s bruises are still going strong. The one across his stomach from the lap belt was darkest at first, along with his side and upper thigh. But it’s the sash diagonally across his chest that has proven to be the most painful. He is still tender to the touch and his skin is a sickly green color where the seatbelt crossed his torso.

Life can change in an instant. Every time I hold Ronnie, I find myself thinking that it’s precious time that could have been taken from me. Even when she’s being brutal and hitting me in the head, pulling my hair, ripping my nose ring out, I’m just so glad to have her here. Yesterday was our 13th wedding anniversary and it took on increased importance to me because I nearly didn’t get to celebrate.

But the bureaucracy of life is already doing its damnedest to diminish the lucky and blessed feeling. We still don’t have a car. We have a loaner pick-up from my dad but it’s unwieldy and just a poor fit for us and our lifestyle. Our insurance will cover the medical bills and the car loan but then what? We won’t have a trade-in vehicle and we won’t have a down payment and we only have one full-time salary. I miss Walter. Ensign Walter Pontiac bravely gave his life to save my family. RIP.

Morning

2010-09-13T08:24:00.000-07:00

I think we’ll settle into a new getting-ready-in-the-morning routine pretty quickly. So far it seems to be that I’ll get Ronnie out of bed and change her pants while Mr. b is making Kirk’s lunch. Ronnie wakes up as soon as I open the bedroom door but Kirk wants to lay in bed and pretend he can avoid getting up. At first I thought that I’d eat breakfast with them but my appetite has completely changed since having the second baby. I’ve been eating breakfast at work because I’m just not interested in food for an hour or so after I get up. That’s radically different from how I’ve been my entire life previously. Kirk so far doesn’t seem very hungry either but it’s hard to guess how much of that is just dragging his feet and how much is for real. Either way, he has to eat because I’m not sending my kid to school on an empty stomach.

I leave for my bus stop about 15 or 20 minutes before Kirk has to be at his so I’m not part of actually getting them out the door. But already I feel like I get to spend more time with my family. I have less of that sadness of not being able to see my kids, particularly Ronnie, as much as I’d like. I hadn’t realized that the pain in the ass of getting the kids up and off to daycare at least gave me a half hour with them I wasn’t getting with me sneaking off before anybody was even up for the day. Yeah, it’s not much but it’s something and I like getting to snuggle my sweet bundle for a minute before starting my day.

First Day

2010-09-07T09:16:00.000-07:00

I find myself grinning as I walk down the hall. My son is at kindergarten! I keep wondering what he’s doing right at this moment. Did he put his lunch bag into the basket and get a clothespin with his name on it clipped to the handle? I bet he totally forgot and left it in his backpack. But he’s got his lunch with so he’ll figure it out. Will they go down to the lunchroom to eat? I guess because some of the kids will buy hot lunch. Kirk’s got a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, an apple, some carrots, a box of raisins, a granola bar, a cookie, and a juice box. Yes, that’s too much food for one kid. But it’s all stuff he likes and he can pick how many things he’s going to eat. Hopefully he understands he can just bring home the rest.

I’ve said hopefully he ______ a lot the past week.

The bus stop went well. We rushed out of the house, entire family heading the block and a half to his assigned corner. I wouldn’t say that Kirk was excited but he wasn’t terrified either. We’d been talking about school and busing for quite some time now so it’s not like it was a surprise. I guess I’d say he was resigned to his fate. And he was the first one on! Maybe he just wanted to get it over with? He took a seat nearly at the back of the bus and then waved to us out the window.

Then Mr. b and Ronnie and I raced home and hopped in the car. Mr. b drove like a bat outta hell, totally freaked that the bus was going to get to school before us. I think Kirk’s is the last stop on the route. We caught up with it no problem, and pulled into the school lot at the same time the bus was turning around to get into drop-off position. So we were able to watch Kirk actually get off the bus. I’m not sure what he thought when he saw us standing there. He walked inside on his own though and we hung back. Supposedly there were going to be PTO helpers holding balloons so the kids could get assistance finding their classrooms. Not a balloon in sight. We watched Kirk wander down the hall and then slowly went inside after him.

We caught up to Kirk when he happened to be almost to his classroom, still on his own. He said he remembered the directions the principal gave us at open house last week! And when we dropped off his remaining paperwork in the office, we discovered the balloon helpers were only at the front door for the parental drop-offs. That makes zero sense to me. We lurked about in the halls, waiting for the bell to ring. Kirk quietly sat in line outside his classroom door, along with all the other kids in his class. We peeked around the corner at him several times and he was stoic and slightly bored looking.

I put a note in his pocket with his bus number on it. Apparently the teachers take the kids down to their buses at the end of the day but still. He needs to remember which one is his and get on the right one. Mr. b and Ronnie will be there to meet him when he gets off. I can’t wait to get home and hear all about his day.

Conquistadores

2010-08-27T12:57:00.000-07:00

Recently I’ve found myself obsessed with learning about the Spanish exploration of America. As a holder of an Anthropology BA and former professional archaeologist, I like to think of myself as reasonably well rounded in my Western Hemisphere history. Obviously I know the broad strokes of the conquest of the Aztecs and the Incas and it’s really colored my impression of the Spanish. I hated them. For breaking so many truly amazing civilizations with their stupid Catholicism and never-ending quest for gold. Fuck the Spanish! You could get me to go off on the Spanish at the drop of a hat.

But as I’ve gotten older I’ve seen the other side of the argument. The one that remembers that to the Spanish of the time, the empires they destroyed were EVIL. It’s hard to think of another religion that indulged in as much institutionalized human sacrifice as the Aztecs. And the Mexica had themselves conquered the previous empire as had those that came before as had those that came before. It was not a long-lived regime. The Mayan empire was already in collapse long before Tenochtitlan was even built.

The start of my new conquistador fixation came from reading Tony Horwitz’s A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World. I’ve read all of his books and love how he mixes travelogue with historical information. In this one, he visits the sites of all the pre-Pilgrim explorations into America, starting with the Vikings in Newfoundland. It was reading the chapters on the various Spanish expeditions, such as De Soto in Georgia, that I learned about the Black Legend of the Spanish. The slanderous one that said that *all* the Spaniards did was torture and maim and rape and burn alive and enslave and desecrate. Oh sure, that happened. A lot. Especially in Peru. But that was more the minority than I had in my head. As I kept reading I found myself thoroughly engrossed by the chapters about the American Southwest. Specifically about Cabeza de Vaca and about Coronado. Horwitz had two books in the suggested reading that caught my eye, both called Cities of Gold.

Cabeza de Vaca was one of four ultimate survivors of a shipwreck on the Gulf coast of Florida in 1527. Originally a large number of the crew survived, made rafts, and made their way to Texas. There, separated from the others now lost at sea, their raft and one other shipwrecked again, on Galveston Island, where they were enslaved by the Indians. Cabeza de Vaca, Dorantes, his slave Esteban, and Castillo escaped, and then wandered their way back west and south to Spanish territories. Wandered for years. Upon their return, they were heralded not only for the extraordinary tale of their survival but also for bringing back news of an even greater empire to the north. This empire was what Coronado then attempted to locate and annex for the Kingdom of Spain.

I’ve previously read a couple of books by Douglas Preston but they were both fiction. Cities of Gold: A Journey Across the American Southwest was non-fiction. Preston moved to New Mexico from the east coast, got interested in the Spanish explanation, and in the late 1980s, decided to go check it out for himself. So the author and his weirdo artist buddy actually retraced a section of Coronado’s route, from the Mexico/Arizona border to Pecos, on horseback. Very intrepid. He gave lots of great historical information – cowboy, Spanish, and Native – in between the amazing tale of his adventure. I actually would have liked to learn more about the Spanish themselves but the book was truly fascinating and it was great getting such a grab bag of historical anecdotes related to each point along the trail. Preston has a very engaging voice and struck just the right tone when bringing up sensitive issues, with land use or Indians or whatever.

The fabled Seven Cities of Gold turned out to be Zuni Pueblo, then called Cíbola. Vázquez de Coronado had been following a route scouted for him the year before, 1539, by a Franciscan friar from Nice, Fray Marcos de Niza. Marcos didn’t actually make it all the way to Cíbola. And he himself had been following behind none other than Cabeza de Vaca’s fellow survivor, the black Moor Esteban. Esteban was killed and Marcos turned around within sight of the pueblo to report back that it existed and was just as awesome as described by Indians. Ever since, there’s been non-stop controversy. The lush route Marcos described was not what Coronado’s army encountered. And the city was hardly the rich capital he had been promised. Coronado had invested much of his personal wealth, not to mention all of his political clout, in this mission and wasn’t about to go back to Mexico City empty handed. He continued his expedition all the way into Kansas, still chasing after a prize worth the effort of his army’s travels.

Currently I’m reading Cities of Gold: A Novel of the Ancient and Modern Southwest by William K. Hartmann. As the subtitle implies, it’s fiction and Hartmann switches between a modern narrator and historical narrative. The first person narrator in 1998 is telling the story about his own past as an urban planner in Tucson in the late 1980s. He’s caught up in the mystery of attempting to unravel the motivation behind Fray Marcos’ supposed deception in his reports back to New Spain about the Seven Cities of Cíbola. The historical chapters follow Marcos on his mission to both scout a route to the fabled Cities as well as report back to the viceroy on the location of the west coast. The author is obviously sympathetic to the Franciscan, finding his reputation as a liar and fraud undeserving. Thankfully it doesn’t come across as heavy handed by using the device of having the narrator believe that Marcos was wronged. And it’s definitely an engaging tale. I am very curious to see how the ultimate descriptive discrepancy is explained away in the end. Hartmann has quoted a lot of primary sources from the 1500s and onward the narrative which help to accentuate the changing opinions of scholars from many eras. I do find it a bit jarring each time the perspective switches and yet I am engaged with both the modern and ancient stories.

Unfortunately, Esteban himself never wrote down any account of his travels. He was killed before Marcos managed to catch up to him on their scouting trip so yet another mystery remains unsolved regarding just exactly what happened. I find it poetic irony that the first “European” to explore into the future US was an African slave. Esteban was said to be quite the dandy and was definitely a hit with the ladies. He had been the main translator for Cabeza de Vaca’s group. They survived their wanderings by becoming, essentially, rock stars. They were considered great healers and developed a literal following. Hundreds of people roamed with them as they made their way across the continent. The four survivors became quite sympathetic to the Indians’ way of life and were horrified when their followers were captured as they entered Spanish territory. Cabeza de Vaca wrote a detailed account of their experience which I intend to read as I continue my exploration of Spanish exploration.

The other one I would like to read was written by Pedro de Castaneda. He was one of the soldiers in Coronado’s army and wrote an account of the exploration after the fact. It came to be considered a key anthropological record of the native peoples they encountered. Castaneda went beyond just a sympathy to the Indians and instead developed what is now called cultural relativity when describing differences of customs and practices. His is often the only record of Pre-Colombian life as many of the tribes and cities and villages were wiped out thanks to the germs that came along with the Spaniards. When later settlement took place en masse, there were vast empty spaces where there once lived flourishing peoples.

Biking Battles

2010-07-27T10:26:00.000-07:00

No, do. Or do not. There is no try.
--Yoda

Unless you’re a five year old, then there is most certainly try. Kirk was grounded all weekend. Grounded from television and movies, grounded from video games, grounded from Star Wars. And he lost his blankie. His infraction? Refusal to try.

We bought Kirk a new big boy bike with training wheels for his 5th birthday. He was so excited about it; he rode it all over the store as we secretly picked out other presents and passed them back and forth behind his back. We brought it home and he rode it all over the neighborhood with his daddy and around the block on a walk with his mama and sister. And then he stopped. For some reason he got scared of it and we can’t figure it out. “I don’t know how.” So we told him he had to ride it every single night so he could learn and practice. But even then he’d freak out. “I can’t.” Both of us lost our tempers on several occasions.

I decided to try getting him used to the bike slowly. We explored how it rocks between the training wheels and how that lessens when he sits on it and his weight lowers them. We explored how the front and back brakes grab the front and back wheels. We explored how far you can turn the handle bars to the right and the left and how it will make the bike tip over if you go too far. We even explored standing on the front pegs while I anchored the bike. Kirk will sit on it and cheerfully put his feet on the pedals. But actually pedal the bike? “I can’t.” And then he said, “I quit.”

Mr. b realized that there must be something else going on and did a little bit of online child psychology research. Apparently there are several reasons why a child might refuse to try and the one that seems to make the most sense with Kirk is perfectionism. He’s good at riding his trike. He’s not an expert at riding his bike and doesn’t know all the ins and outs of it yet. So we put too much pressure on him and made it worse, which just sucks and makes us both feel horrible. But we also can’t let him win and had to figure out a way for him to earn back his privileges without making him ride the damn bike. So he had to try new food.

Trying new foods has always been a battle with Kirk. ALWAYS. It’s ridiculous how often we fight over him eating, or rather not eating. But this time it’s like he knew that this was the best compromise for all parties. Sunday supper, he ate a half a hamburger for the first time ever and had an entire ear of corn. And got his blankie and TV and video games and Star Wars back.

Now, thinking back on it, we’ve had this same issue with bikes before. When Kirk switched from the little sit-down scooter thingie to the Thomas big wheel, he was extremely reticent to learn how to pedal. I remember being so frustrated as he scooted with his feet instead of pedaling. And then when he switched from the big wheel to the tricycle it was the same thing. He was so good at the low to the ground pedaling and suddenly being upright on a trike was a major change. He liked the concept of the trike but was hesitant and rarely used it. Which drove me nuts. So I guess this isn’t new behavior. I just need to remember it for when the time comes to take the training wheels off. Hooboy that’s going to be tough.

Melancholy Musings

2010-07-20T06:58:00.000-07:00

Sometime around 15 years ago my dad had a tumor removed. It had been growing inside his sinus cavity and was the size of a grapefruit. It was benign. But it was so weird and fucked up that the surgeon requested to have students and other staff witness the operation and went on to write a paper about it. I’m sure the tumor itself resides in a jar somewhere.

On Friday I noticed a strange solid lump under my nostril, deep within my lip tissue. Naturally I immediately went to the paranoid place and thought of my dad’s tumor. Yesterday the doctor assured me it was either another staph outbreak or, more likely, a zit or cold sore type thing that is simply too deep to actually erupt. That would certainly explain the swollen feeling. He called it a furuncle, wrote me up a prescription, and I at least psychologically feel better.

Over the weekend I found myself thinking about my own untimely demise. After the sudden death of a coworker this year I find myself less and less afraid of death itself, which has always been too horrifying for me to even contemplate. It still quickens my pulse to think about too realistically but I’ve come to realize that I won’t actually care when it happens. It’ll be those that are left behind that matter. And that’s made me worry about being remembered by my children.

Luke Skywalker asks Princess Leia if she remembers her mother. She claims that yes, she does. Now obviously, if she means Padme, this is a bunch of bullshit. I can retcon/fanwank it that hey, she’s probably teaming with the Force, too, and so maybe she actually does have a vague recollection of that one image of her mother’s face, minutes after being born. But that’s seems like crossing into Dune territory and Leia is no Alia. It’s far more likely that Leia is talking about her adopted mother, Bail Organa’s wife, who apparently must have died when Leia was still quite young. Now the fact that Luke knows he’s adopted and Leia seems to be unaware is a separate issue that I’ve also spent far too much time pondering.

Kirk is five. He remembers things that I don’t remember. He brings up incidents in his past that once he’s jogged my memory I can recall but I never would have given them a second thought if he hadn’t called attention to them. What about Veronica? She’s 16 months. Even if she was teaming with the Force, would she remember more than a vague impression?

Ronnie and I have been missing each other a lot lately. We somehow came to the mutual realization that we really don’t spend all that much time together. I get home from work, we have dinner, we go for a walk or play outside, then it’s bath, jammies, bottle, bed. I see her only for a couple of hours every day. That’s not enough time and yet I don’t know how to make it more. We’ve spent some long weekends together recently and that’s helped. But I still long for her and she still immediately defers to me once I come home, no matter how much she loves spending the day with her daddy. What would happen to her if she grew up without a mother?

I’ve been keeping this blog since I found out I was pregnant with Kirk, nearly 6 years ago now. In some ways I consider it a text for his future, a record of his early years that’s almost certainly filled with too much information. I don’t think the same can be said for his sister. I write less and less often of late and though I try to give equal time to both kids, there’s just no way to include as much detail about Ronnie because she’s younger and she’s not an only child. She has to deal with being the second kid in so many ways. I haven’t written word one in her baby book. We haven’t gotten portraits of her to send to all her extended family. She has virtually no toys of her own, playing instead with cars and action figures that her brother already acquired. I know she’ll never know any different and so won’t have an issue with that. I know she’ll come into her own with language development and we will get her separate things as she gets older. But will she have a record of what her mama thought? I hope so. I hope she’ll be able to ask me directly. If not, I hope she’ll have as many years of blog entries as her brother. And yet I feel like I’m just about ready to retire this whole blog endeavor. What comes next?

Stories

2010-06-25T07:08:00.000-07:00

Despite the ongoing video gaming in our house (Mr. b and his son purchased Crystal Skull yesterday; then again I may or may not have downloaded the free Batman demo the night before), Ronnie is more and more interested in books. And not just to destroy them. I’ve already removed all the books with actual paper pages from their bedroom because I was sick of the carnage. I need to go through the drawers of board books and see what’s salvageable and come up with some kind of a creative art project to use the rest. At any rate, she’ll toddle up to me with a book in her hand and demand that it be read to her. She’s getting better about actually listening, too, and not just trying to turn pages at her own incredibly fast and completely random pace. She seems to have a few favorites picked out, though that might be just because they’re the least damaged…

One of Kirk’s favorite activities (besides playing Lego video games, yes) is to listen to stories of his parents’ childhoods. He truly revels in the tales of us getting hurt, getting into trouble, or just having something interesting happen. Obviously Mr. b is a better storyteller than I am and he also has a way better and more clear memory than I do. So the bulk of the narration ends up being about growing up in SoDak. Kirk will appropriate anything from any of our stories into his own stories about himself. My dad was telling him about a taco eating contest with my uncles before I was born and soon Kirk had a story about a taco eating contest with his best friend E. The trouble with all the story telling is that now nothing can be just a short little anecdote anymore. If I have a quick snippet about something I wanted to share at the dinner table Kirk’s response is, “Tell the rest.” If Mr. b is filling me in on something I missed Kirk’s response is, “Tell the rest.” No matter how mundane and pointless: “Tell the rest.” “There is no rest.” “Tell the rest.” “The end.” “Tell the rest.”

I’ve been reading a lot of short story collections again the past two years (seriously, it’s not all video games, that’s a new development). It’s because I was being a completist about both the Sookie Stackhouse and the Dresden Files series. I had forgotten just how much I enjoy a well crafted short story. But it can be incredibly tricky to achieve the right balance when you’re writing for a series of novels. You have to give just enough background knowledge so that a reader understands the world you’ve already built but not so much that it overwhelms the story you’re trying to write and yet not so little that you’re making assumptions the reader is coming in already knowing everything. Because of that I found that I generally preferred the stories written by authors that were either telling a one-off tale or using tertiary or unique characters set in the world of their main series characters. The absolute best were the straight mystery authors cajoled into contributing to a supernatural collection; they always ended up with a delicious Twilight Zone vibe. I’ve dipped my toe into a lot of supernatural, fantasy, and mystery series now by sampling so many different authors in so many different anthologies. I actually have a couple of full blown series that I think I’d like to check out. But for now, my self-imposed vampire hiatus continues. Nothing new until I take a nice long cleansing break, even if that means I’m missing out on something.

Addendum 2b

2010-06-10T12:34:00.000-07:00

When I was a kid and I played dress up it was only for that particular session of playtime. The outfits or costume pieces would go on for the game or the play we were putting on or whatever and that was it. I was never the little girl wearing a tutu out to the store or a tiara to piano lessons. And maybe being in dance and having actual sequined costumes that were more dazzling than anything out of a dress up box helped me to avoid doing that.

Kirk, however, likes to dress like a favorite character All. The. Time. To the point where he actually gets mad if his ability to dress that way is somehow impeded by little things like being in the laundry. Obviously the current favorite character is Indiana Jones. He’s got two main outfits that he switches between: short sleeves and short pants for Young Indy

And long sleeves and long pants for Teacher Indy.

But thankfully he doesn’t have to wear the entire get-up every moment of every day. He mixes up the elements and includes other favorite pieces like his vest

Or one of his ties.

I was thinking about this and realized it’s hardly a phase. Oh, the choice of Henry Jones Jr. might be a phase but not dressing up like a particular character. He was David Tennant’s Doctor from Doctor Who and ran around in a suit jacket and button down shirt, carrying a sonic screw driver everywhere he went. He was Ringo Starr and wore garish rings and carried drum sticks. He was Dave Gahan and wore a black cowboy hat like in Depeche Mode’s “Personal Jesus” video. It does seem that as he gets older he demands more completion to his outfits as each one is more involved and has more required pieces than the previous one.

But I’ve also noticed that Kirk doesn’t try to wear actual literal costumes. Even when he was into Superman he wouldn’t try to wear either his be-caped pajamas or his Halloween costume outside the house. He would put on a sport coat and tie and be Clark Kent instead. When he was into Buzz Lightyear he would ask to wear the Halloween costume as pajamas but again, wasn’t trying to wear it outside of the house. I’m not sure what that means but I think it’s a good thing. Even though Kirk has a very healthy imagination and is constantly exercising his creativity, he’s got a handle on reality and knows what will fly in public. Right?

Addendum 2a

2010-06-08T07:33:00.000-07:00

We are collectively obsessed with these Lego video games. Memorial Day weekend we finished the Indiana Jones one. And by “finished” I don’t just mean 100% completion. No. Apparently the game stops calculating your points at the four billion mark. Good to know. So while we’re waiting for the Crystal Skull game to come down in price, we bought the discounted complete Star Wars. All six movies, together at last. And it’s awesome. Favorite level so far: Mos Espa Pod Race. Kicked Sebulba’s ass.

Kirk is starting to think of other things in terms of video games. It’s not just typical little kid playing outside stuff. Like when we’re on a walk and he’s pretending to be Indy and he jumps across a sidewalk crack and talks about the level that he’s playing. No. He’s been telling me about other video games that he’s going to play. Like the Annie video game where you get to play Sandy the dog to stop the naughty kids or the boss battle where Punjab fights Rooster. Or like the Great Mouse Detective video game where you get to pick up the gun that the bad guys drop and then you can carry it until you run out of bullets.

It’s fascinating watching both kids become so used to video games so quickly. I guess it’s like how easily we all played Atari games (or Commodore 64 or Texas Instruments or Apple II) and transitioned into Nintendo (or Sega or…) without batting an eye. Mr. b cut the cord off a useless old PS1 controller and now Bundle can “play”. She totally holds it facing the TV and tries to push buttons and make it do stuff. But she did that with remote controls, too, and I can remember Kirk doing the same thing with remotes. We have a baby LeapFrog that Kirk never played with that I want to hook up and see if Ronnie likes. She’s got more experience with this type of thing so I think it will make sense to her in a way her brother just never grasped at that age.

Addendum 1

2010-06-07T11:20:00.000-07:00

Since Ronnie has been fully weaned we’ve also been trying to slowly switch her over to sippy cups. We’re not going particularly fast on that front. She is drinking juice out of a sippy cup and that’s progress. But we haven’t regularly changed any of her milk bottles to sippies. She typically has three regular bottles of milk – in the morning, before nap, before bed – and then however many others throughout the day. We need to start giving her those irregularly scheduled ones in cups. I’ve tried giving her milk with a straw in a restaurant but she just makes a mess. She enjoys drinking water with a straw though.

The only thing about the sippy cups is that she’s rather violent with them. I don’t let her wander the house with her bottle, though she can hold it herself in her carseat or in my lap, but I’ll let her walk around with her juice cup. And she swings it viciously. She’s really strong. Three Saturdays ago, Ronnie was sitting on my lap, drinking from her sippy cup. She then, with no warning, backhanded it into my face. Into my eye socket. This picture does no justice to how bad it looked or how much it hurt.

I still have a very faint spot of red where the blood pooled under my eye but it’s only visible if you’re looking for it.

Bums & Whores

2010-06-01T13:46:00.000-07:00

Like most kids in the US, I read Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men in high school. They were fine. I mean yeah, they were obviously Good Books, deserving of the awards and lauds, but they didn’t really grab me. I remember learning in college about how the Beat Poets collectively adored John Steinbeck and I just didn’t get it. I couldn’t see an obvious disconnect so I chalked it up to a generational thing, a different era.

This weekend I finished reading Cannery Row. I loved it. When I saw we had a Steinbeck on deck for book club this year I wasn’t particularly enthused. But this book was amazing. I finally understand the Beat love. This book made me want to go back and reread Big Sur. It made me want to go and pull the more obscure authors that I never got around to reading in college. I have a Brautigan title on extended loan from a friend I plan to dig up presently. And more than that, I intend to read everything else by Steinbeck set in Monterey.

This book was hyper real. The imagery was such a beautiful ode to the mundane, like calling mess left in a frying pan “fried egg lace”. The characters were fleshed out in a way you just don’t get anymore, and yet it felt brilliantly modern while obviously set in the past. I got a better feel for life in the 30s than anything I’ve ever seen or read previously. There was a simple plot about throwing a party for a central character and yet there would be frequent interludes focusing on a different person never heard from again. And instead of being jarring and taking me out of the moment, it only made the story richer, building the world and turning the inhabitants from sketches to living, breathing, heavily drinking kooks, lay-abouts, madams, shop owners, and friends that genuinely cared for each other.

I had no idea this book was part of a loose series. A collection of titles with cross over characters, all in the same universe. It’s what Christopher Moore does and I love that. So much of my experience reading Cannery Row was a sequence of revelations. Doc invented beer milkshakes! I guess that means the creators of “Red Dwarf” must be fans. Hazel intentionally lost a fight just to see how it felt. I guess Chuck Palahniuk must be a fan. And then I found out that my father-in-law is a huge fan and that Mr. b himself loves the 1982 movie version. Yep, it’s been added to my Netflix queue.

Fun for the Whole Family

2010-05-25T13:20:00.000-07:00

Kirk is thoroughly obsessed with Indiana Jones. He’s seen all four movies. He has a couple of Lego sets and has fished out pieces and people from unrelated sets to fill gaps in his play time requirements. He has a cheap cowboy set that came with a cloth whip that he hauls around. He’s been freaking out about it being too hot to wear long sleeves and long pants because Indy does not wear short pants and short sleeves. His father came home from his trip to LA this weekend bearing a brown felt fedora for Young Indy to wear, even if he has to acquiesce to t-shirts and shorts. And we downloaded both of the Lego Indiana Jones free game demos on our new PS3.

Mr. b found a copy of the first Lego Indy video game on sale so he picked that up a couple of weeks ago. Has it really only been a couple of weeks? I feel like we’ve had it forever. That game is awesome. Seriously. Kirk never really got into the LeapFrog and other educational baby game systems. He would enjoy watching his father occasionally play Galaga or Destroy All Humans but that’s about it. We’re not really a gaming family. The new PS3 is for media first and foremost. So getting this game was something really just for Kirk’s enjoyment. He’s learned how to use the controller and really does a pretty good job navigating the screens and can do quite a bit before asking for help. He also remembers the pathways through the levels incredibly clearly.

What I didn’t expect is that the rest of us would become so enamored with the game as well! It started out simply enough. Mr. b needed help finding his way through a new level. I found a fabulous guide online and walked him through it. Then Kirk wanted to play the same level but his father wasn’t home so I took over the main driving duties whenever he needed help. Ronnie gets so excited when she hears the start-up music and squeals in delight when she sees the disc case. She stands in front of the tv and chatters at the little Lego dudes as they smash stuff. So gradually we’ve fallen into a routine where Kirk picks the level and starts it out. Depending on which parent is at home or available, we’ll help him and eventually he’ll get bored or it will be too complicated and we’ll finish it off. And now that we have the guide to follow we’re being totally completist about collecting all the various items to unlock characters and bonus levels. And last night I found myself playing it when both the kids were in bed and Mr. b was at band practice.

Bye Bye Boobie

2010-05-11T12:33:00.000-07:00

I guess Ronnie is officially weaned. I didn’t really notice it happening, which is probably a good thing. I didn’t need to make some big pronouncement or anything. At some point last week, not even sure which day, she had her last nigh-nigh boobie.

It’s not like she was even actively nursing. But for the last month or six weeks she’d have her bedtime bottle and then still fall asleep on the boob. It was just easier that way. And if she woke up in the middle of the night I was still bringing her into bed with me. I started to give her a bottle in the middle of the night and put her back into her crib. I mean, her father had always been doing that if he was the one the get up with her but I was the slacker hold out.

During the day Mr. b had started laying Miss Ronica down in her crib for naps before she was even fully asleep. This was radical news to me. We never were able to quite crib train her the way we did with Kirk. We couldn’t let her just “cry it out” with him in the room with her! It wouldn’t be fair to disturb his sleeping. Hence the nursing her to sleep and putting her away already passed out. But if she was able to fall asleep on her own for naptime then that meant I needed to jump on her new skill set and let her fall asleep on her own for bedtime.

It didn’t work every time but for the past couple of weeks I’ve been able to put the Bundle to bed with her still awake. She might fuss a little bit but she’d rustle about and then be asleep by the time her brother and I tiptoed in a half hour or hour later for his bedtime. But the nights it didn’t work, it really didn’t work and I would give up and stick a boob in her mouth. I noticed the last few times that nursing her felt weird. Like, physically it didn’t feel the same. Probably because there really isn’t anything in there for her to actually eat anymore! There was a great line in Kim by Rudyard Kipling. The old high caste widow was convinced that mothers shouldn’t be allowed to raise children, only grandmothers, because mothers are too close to the pain of childbirth and the pleasure of nursing. That really resonated with me. The pleasure of nursing. It really was a pleasure. I’m so glad I had the chance to experience that fully. But it was time to end it.

So now I have to really start watching what I eat. It would be bad to unconsciously keep ingesting nursing calories when I clearly no longer need them.

You Can Help

2010-04-29T08:45:00.000-07:00

My mom was first diagnosed with MS in 1986. I was 11. I grew up knowing that at any time, with no waning whatsoever, she could suddenly be struck blind or become paralyze and *this time*, it might be permanent. So far, she’s one of the lucky ones. She hasn’t had an exacerbation in many years. Her medication keeps things under control and she rarely needs to use a cane to walk, though she wears an ankle brace every day. Research into the disease has come a long way. But there’s still no cure and there’s still much that isn’t understood. You can help. Please donate to the MS Society to support me in the walk this coming Sunday. I truly appreciate any help you feel willing to give.

Please consider a pledge to create a world free of multiple sclerosis and support me during Walk MS: Cambridge Walk 2010. MS stops people from moving. The National MS Society exists to make sure it doesn’t. Please help by making a donation — large or small — to move closer to a cure for MS. You can also join me on the day of the event. Become a participant and side by side we will move together to raise funds that make a difference.
Whatever you can give will help. I greatly appreciate your support and will keep you posted on my progress. Imagine a world free of multiple sclerosis. We’re almost there.

Click here to visit my personal page and make a secure, online donation.

http://main.nationalmssociety.org/site/TR?px=3531245&pg=personal&fr_id=13782

Bring out cher dead!

2010-04-26T13:05:00.000-07:00

I really thought that when I stopped pumping at work that my reading habit would go down. But I seem to be ahead of my pace for even last year’s record haul. I just started title #33 this morning, which is exactly half of my total last year. And, true to form, I totally fell down on book reviews, last discussing a single volume over twenty titles ago.

My book club selection for this month was Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks. I haven’t read anything of hers before but I have read nearly all of her husband’s books – my favorite travel writer Tony Horwitz. I hadn’t put together that she was *that* Geraldine until I read the dedication at the start of her book! I really enjoyed her writing style and I think I’ll read more of her books.

This book was historical fiction dealing with the imagined events in a real village in England, Eyam, that really did close its own borders in 1665-1666 to try to contain an outbreak of the Plague. The story follows a young woman, Anna, as she grows as a result of this crucible of change. I found it fabulous. Oh, I couldn’t take it out of the house to read in public until I was well over halfway through because I knew I would be bawling. But it was wonderful.

The book club ladies universally enjoyed the book as well except for the last chapter and the epilogue. I found the location of the epilogue to be unsurprising, knowing the background of the author. There was one element that was perhaps a bit deus ex machina, but not so much that it took me out of the story. In fact, there was a nice bit of symmetry with the protagonist’s ending as compared to Anna’s beginning. The last chapter didn’t bother me either. I was expecting the pat happy ending we seemed to be getting – and I would have been very fine with that! – so I was completely blindsided by the turn things took. In a good way. It perhaps retroactively altered my opinion of another character but not so much that I was disgusted by wasted time or anything of the sort.

The other complaint I’ve read is that the book is anachronistic. I actually found it to be extremely well researched and accurate. At least according to my memory of my college course on women’s life in Medieval Europe! Anna had some very modern ideas and thoughts and yet to me they seemed to follow naturally based on her experiences and observations. This was, after all, a time of great changes in philosophy and politics. Nature gained popularity over Fate as Science started to gain over Religion. I found it to be a very thoughtful way to explore that paradigm shift in a manner that made such a heady topic accessible to the average reader.

Hear Me Moan

2010-04-23T11:30:00.000-07:00

Extreme TMI and Whining Warning: Continue Reading At Your Own Peril

This has been a very bad week for belsum’s nethers. It started off with just a bump. I found a bump on my delicate girl parts last week. Figured it was just a zit. Last weekend was the big Ronnie’s Naming Ceremony weekend with my in-laws flying up from Texas and lots of evening fires in our backyard with family and good friends. So I figured if the bump wasn’t gone by Monday, I’d go have it checked out just to be sure. Got the results yesterday from the culture they took: staph. Great. But it so far doesn’t seem to be as virulent as the staph infections Mr. b was dealing with in succession a few years ago. They just prescribed me a topical ointment to apply to the affected area. So far so good.

Monday evening I started feeling all rumbly in my tumbly. Lord knows I ate like a madwoman during all the festivities of the weekend so I didn’t give it much thought. I slept fitfully when I went to bed and then woke up about 1:30 am and spent the next two hours in the bathroom. And then made return trips at far too frequent intervals. Obviously frequent wiping, causing chafing and chapping, is just the thing to help prevent the spread of a staph infection! Oh wait, no it’s not. I was completely wrecked all day Tuesday and still extremely weak Wednesday. Started to come out of it Thursday but still tired. And yeah, when you’re averaging 900 calories on top of violently excreting every shred of food from your bowels, that’s gonna take its toll.

I really thought that was the end of it. But instead…my period has come back. For the first time since I got knocked up with Ronnie I’m menstruating. I spotted a little bit when I went on the nursing pill. And there was the lochia flow after giving birth. But those don’t count. This is actual monthly visitor action. It started out spotty on Monday but was really dark. Like my body was cleaning everything out after not being used for a long time. Which, come to think of it, was probably exactly what was happening. But by yesterday the flow became normal. Everything else? Is so not what I’m used to. Granted I’m out of practice. But I never had bloating this bad. I never had PMS this harsh. I was never ready to call it a sick day just for my stupid period before. And I’m just ridiculous amounts of uncomfortable. Food makes me ill. I’m scared to frickin’ fart. Nothing I’ve tried has brought me any relief. This had better just be part of the system overload of all this happening at once. As my friend put it, a bug sneaking in while PMS had my shields down. I just don’t know how I’m going to adapt if this will be my new monthly reality. Oh, I know there are plenty of women out there that are used to big-time horrible symptoms. But I never used to be one of them. Then again, I do remember a slight worsening after I had Kirk. That’s when the day of icky poo as a late PMS indicator started happening. Well great. So I guess this is the thanks I get for having another baby. It’s like it’s exponentially getting more extreme. Blerg.

Blanket

2010-04-12T12:45:00.000-07:00

When Kirk was a baby he got a lot of blankets. Hospital blankets, receiving blankets, homemade blankets, store-bought blankets, flannel, fleece, jersey, cotton, quilted, doubled, lined, trimmed, he must have had at least a dozen. When he was about a year old he picked out a favorite. It was a cream colored blanket with a satin back, satin border, and deeply plush front. There was a satin panel on the front in the center of the plush with an embroidered Winnie the Pooh. He carried it around everywhere. It was about that time that he stopped going to Auntie Daycare and started going to K’s house. So we went to the store and bought a duplicate of that blankie. It seemed smart to have a second one to leave at K’s house rather than cart the same one back and forth every day, risking leaving it there overnight or, gods forbid, over the weekend.

Then Kirk’s cousin visited. He declared that Kirk’s official blankie of choice was instead a blue one, matching the color of his own Uh-Oh (a cotton Sleep-Sack) that he carried around everywhere. This blankie was similar in style to the cream colored Pooh one, satin backing and trim with a velveteen plush front, but without the center embroidery. And this one was a shower gift with no receipt so we had no way of knowing where it came from in order to purchase a duplicate.

Flash forward to today. Ronnie has just three blankies, one fleece and two handmade and flannel. That’s plenty and lord knows we don’t have space to store any others. She’s also recently chosen her official favorite. The same cream Pooh blanket of her brother’s! She can’t tell a difference between the two so far – one is noticeably more worn than the other – but she carries one or the other around often. When she gets tired she’ll lay her head down on it in the middle of the floor. She cuddles with it while fighting sleep in my lap at night. She’s starting to hold onto it when she stands up in her crib, crying to be picked up.

Mr. b wants to get her her own blanket. I’m worried if he buys something similar she might not like it as well. But is it bad for your child’s lovey object to be essentially a hand-me-down? Kirk wants to “dial” it (don’t try to tell him it’s actually “dye” because he ain’t buying that line) purple. I’m totally down with purchasing some Rit and coloring it lavender so it’s “new” to Ronnie. But is it bad to not get one of her own? To let her carry around her brother’s cast-off?

Noise Makers

2010-04-08T13:38:00.000-07:00

Ronnie’s been a complete pain in the ass the last couple weeks. She’s super hard to put to bed at night. She wakes up the second you lay her in her crib and stares up at you in dismay and then starts to wah. She’s been clingy and whiny for her father during the day. When I get home from work she demands my attention non-stop. I spend more time sitting on the floor than on the furniture. She doesn’t necessarily even need me to pay attention to her, just be down there so that she can throw herself at me in-between menacing. She rips toys off the white shelf in the corner and flings them everywhere. She pulls books out of the tv consol drawer and destroys them. She climbs up on the couch and throws all the pillows off. She tears great hunks of fur off the cats. She is a total menace.

But she’s also frickin’ smart and has been cataloguing everything in that little developing brain of hers. She points and says, “This” nearly constantly. Half the time I don’t know which this she even means. I’ve taken to keeping a running commentary while I’m holding her so that whichever this she’s interested in will hopefully be covered. I remember Kirk asking, “What’s that” while pointing so I guess it’s a pretty common phase for babies to go through.

Ronnie’s got another noise that she makes when she’s not asking, “This.” I’m not sure how to describe it. It’s like a Spanish rolled r but it’s a th sound instead. It’s pretty hard to duplicate. I don’t know of any language that actually uses that phoneme. It took me a while to realize which sound was being trilled. I experimented with tongue placement at the back of teeth, top of palate, and front of palate before I figured it out. It doesn’t sound quite the same way when I do it as when she does but I think it’s because I have more and larger teeth. Hers sounds more like the brrrrr you make when you make the motor boat noise with your lips – only no vocalization, air flow only. Kirk had a repeat noise, too, but his was definitely a vocalization. I guess I’d transliterate it as “nngink!” and he repeated it frequently enough that we still remember it. Interesting that both of their noises incorporated sounds not found in English.

Obligatory Shakespeare "Rose" Quote

2010-04-01T12:24:00.000-07:00

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about names as I’ve been getting everything in order for Ronnie’s upcoming naming ceremony. Specifically, how pet names and nicknames change. I find it amusing that the diminutive form of Kirk’s name, Kirkie, is actually longer. And yet it’s obviously the little kid version. Going with Ronnie for Veronica is more of a true nickname than an actual diminutive but we could have chosen V or Vera or Nic or any of a good half dozen other possibilities. We always knew that Ronnie would be the one we’d use.

But what about Bundle? I find that I’ve been using it less and less in public. I used to refer to her as Bundle almost exclusively and now I rarely even use it at home as a title. I’ll ask her “How’s my sweet bundle” but that’s not the same. Kirk still calls his sister Bundle and I’ve noticed that grandparents and family friends do as well. But none of them ever called Kirk Peepers Pie. And for the first…year or so of his life he was nearly exclusively Peepers Pie to both Mr. b and I. But did we call him that outside of the home? I guess we must not have. We used “Pie” as shorthand for babies his same age and knew if one said, “I saw a pie at the store” that it meant there was a baby the same current size as our little Pie Man. I still sometimes call Kirk Kirkie Pie but it’s definitely less common. When did it stop? I know I call him Buddy or Honey or Sweetheart more frequently than Pie now.

Hunny is Mr. b though. I mentally see and hear the difference in how I use that particular pet name.

There’s a lot of power in names. I like the old traditions of having a temporary name and then a young child earning their name once they got older. Partly that was to deal with high infant mortality rates. But there’s something compelling about the idea that a child has lived long enough to earn their place in the universe. To be recognized as an independent being and not just a baby attached to her mother. I think that’s why I waited until both my children were a year old to have their namings take place. Sure, they already had those names on their birth certificates but the ceremony is a chance to present them to the community of human beings they live amongst. To share their existence with the rest of us and acknowledge that someday they’ll be out there with their place confirmed.

What's next? Trees?

2010-03-18T07:39:00.001-07:00

Ronnie is climbing the furniture. Literally. It happened quite suddenly to my mind. I was home sick last Tuesday and not being particularly observant of either of the kids and I realized that she was hauling herself up onto the couch. She seems to do better in the corner of the sectional, probably because she can get a better grip having an angle instead of a straight line. She has been quicker and quicker and has been trying – so far unsuccessfully – to climb the ottoman as well.

Last Monday was her One Year Well Baby (90% height! 85% weight!) and Doc B warned us she would be a climber if she was as much of a menace as we were describing. I just didn’t expect his prediction to come true the very next day.

ONE!!

2010-03-10T07:16:00.000-08:00

We all have summer birthdays so it was weird trying to prep for an indoor party. Moving the ottoman to the side opened things up nicely.

Ronnie menaced plenty while we were trying to get organized.

I think we put out a pretty decent spread of food!

Mr. b picked out a separate slice of cake for Ronnie to menace. I was surprised that he got chocolate since he hates messes!

This mess was a doozy.

We had to strip her bare and give her a bath in the middle of everything in order to clean her up!

She wore her third outfit for the day to open presents. She got tons of cute clothes and some really great toys.

She was definitely overwhelmed by it all.

Two by Two

2010-03-05T07:09:00.000-08:00

My appetite has been reduced greatly in the last week or two. I think I’m on the last leg of the weaning process. Ronnie has been more and more frustrated with the lack of milk when she does nurse and I usually end up giving her a bottle even if I do put her at the boob first. I’m basically down to three times a day: when I get home from work, before bed, and in the middle of the night. And all of those are hit or miss now. Just holding her and carrying her around when I get home seems to be enough mama attention. She’s starting to fall asleep sitting in my lap before bed on more than just the rare occasion. And she usually just wants to be held in the middle of the night, not really wanting anything to actually drink.

So now I have to figure out if I should switch my pills to the regular hormones or stay on the “nursing pill” for one more month as a buffer period. I’m leaning towards the latter, just so there’s a little more time for us to gradually get used to it. Veronica has her 1 year well baby visit on Monday so I need to decide before then and make sure I get a prescription.

I also need to remember that I don’t need as many calories as I’ve been ingesting. I don’t think I’m going to have the problem I had with my failed attempts nursing Kirk where I gained weight because of how much I was eating. I’m actually physically getting full but still ordering/taking proportions for nursing calories. I can think of at least three instances in the last four or so days where I had just plain too much food in front of me. Even a month ago I wouldn’t have hesitated to eat it all. Which means now I need to get back to an exercise regimen.

Coming upon Bundle’s one year birthday has also made me realize that I think I am happy with “just” two kids. Sure, three seems “right”. But there were also so many problems with three. It was always two against one. Times where all three of us were happy together were so rare that I can’t come up with more than one or two specific examples. Even now there’s always one of us as the odd man out. I want Kirk and Ronnie to enjoy spending time together. I don’t want sibling politics to be involved anymore than simple older brother versus little sister. I want them to have closeness because they have each other. And frankly, the idea of being pregnant again sounds terrible to me. I really, really, really don’t want to do that again.

C is for Cooperation

2010-03-01T07:10:00.000-08:00

Kirk spent nearly all of Saturday in time out. He had a dentist appointment Saturday morning and wanted his daddy to take him. Fine by me, I got to sleep in longer and not get dressed. But while I was chilling with Ronnie, they got home much earlier than I expected. Kirk was so naughty and uncooperative that ultimately the hygienist was unable to do anything. Mr. b was pissed and frog-marched the man into his bedroom for an all-day grounding.

Now, we happened to be quite busy that afternoon so Kirk got let out for stuff like going to book club with Mama, but he knew he was in Big Trouble. We decided that this behavior needs to be treated as a symptom of him getting away with baby stuff that we just haven’t bothered to fight yet. So since he is now big enough to have appointments – doctor, optometrist, dentist – he has to act like he’s a Big Boy. And Big Boys don’t use sippy cups. Yep, we finally got rid of the damn sippies.

Kirk was pretty distraught when he heard the announcement his precious sippy cups were going away. He tried arguing but knew he wasn’t going to get away with jack shit this time round. In fact, by the time lunch was over he had turned it around and was excited to participate in the tossing of the hateful plastic bastards into the recycling bin. And he’s been proudly requesting his drinks “in a Big Boy Cup” all weekend, as though he had any other choice.

One nice side-effect of this all was good behavior in church yesterday. He sat quietly until the children were dismissed, and drew and didn’t make noise or screw around, even as his best friend was decidedly not behaving himself sitting next to him on the pew. And during the social hour after service, his Sunday school teacher came up to me and told me about how well behaved Kirk was and what a great sense of humor he has. The lesson she was teaching? Cooperation. HA!!

I’m not sure how long we can milk this. Kirk knows his blue blankie is the next on the line. For now though, I’m enjoying having so much space in the cupboard, now that the sippies are gone!

So Five Minutes Ago

2010-02-25T11:44:00.000-08:00

I’ve decided that I need to take a break from vampire serieses. I’ve been reading through so many of them my brain can’t really process it anymore. First I’ll finish out the series that I’m on. And there are a couple of due-to-be-published titles coming out this year I’ll read. But then that’s it.

Since I’ve read so many of these damn things I’ve inevitably started comparing them all. I think everyone in the world knows about my disdain for Twilight, despite my initial love and addiction. I found that the Sookie Stackhouse series, while enjoyable, wasn’t as good as the television series based upon it. By the end I was reading them more to expand my understanding of True Blood than anything. Anita Blake I initially started reading after stumbling across this webcomic. That sounded too hilarious and titillating to pass up! I haven’t quite finished that series yet but so far it’s the one I like best. Even with all the sex. Or not just because of all the sex?

If these serieses were schools, then Twilight is Junior High, Sookie is High School, and Anita is College.

Anita Blake’s an urban fantasy series. It’s set in St. Louis. Unlike the True Blood-verse, where vamps have just made themselves known, in this universe vamps (and shifters and witches and whatnot) have always been known. Vampires recently were made legal in the US and there’s a big Church of Eternal Life as well as all kinds of strips clubs and other businesses. Anita is a licensed vampire executioner and works with the police department and FBI on all sorts of freaky supernatural monster crime. She’s totally badass. She’s also a zombie animator, a natural talent she’s had since she was little. She works at a business specifically to raise zombies, so lawyers can double check wills or loved ones can say good bye or whatever else may be required.

Awesomely, nearly every title in the series is also the name of a place of business that Anita visits during the course of that book’s case, which makes it a nice shorthand to remember what exactly happened. I can never remember which book is which out of the Sookie Stackhouse titles. This series has a bad rap but I think that’s a little bit unfair. Anita’s powers develop very naturally as a result of the events of each book, her interactions with the bad guys or supes, and are fully explained within the confines of the world that has been built. It just plain makes sense. And besides the preternatural stuff, there’s just so much heart-pounding action!

But nevermind the guns and the gore and the terror. Nearly everyone focuses on the sex so I thought I’d make a little guide. Books 1 through 5, Guilty Pleasures through Bloody Bones, are nearly completely chaste. Book 6, The Killing Dance, has one single sex scene. Book 7, Burnt Offerings, is back to being sex-free. Though Anita is no longer celibate, we just don’t read it on the page. Book 8, Blue Moon, again has one single sex scene. Book 9, Obsidian Butterfly? That’s right, nada. So far, no reason to get bent out of shape. And that’s over half of the currently published titles! Books 10 and 11, Narcissus in Chains and Cerulean Sins, both have a handful of sex scenes. Maybe 3 or 4 each. But again, nothing that I found excessive and certainly nothing outside of the norm established for the characters involved. Then we have book 12, Incubus Dreams. Hooboy. I completely lost track. This one definitely fits the “all sex and no plot” profile. It was kind of a mess. But then along comes book 13, Micah, and it dials everything back down. There’s only one single sex scene and more than that, it’s a return to the “simpler” bad guys of the earlier books, instead of a demi-god or a lunatic shapeshifter. Books 14 and 15, Danse Macabre and The Harlequin, seem to have found their way back to the handful of scenes level, though the former also included group sex instead of just one-on-one. And that’s as far as I’ve read.

I think the reason the dirty stuff doesn’t bother me is that while it may be complicated to explain, the series is truly about Anita’s relationships with her men. There is a lot of introspection and self-analysis going on that fits with all the characters developing in a believable manner. I don’t know that I’d recommend them for everyone I know but I definitely think they’re better than those dismissing the series as smut and nothing else.

Flotsam and Jetsam

2010-02-19T10:28:00.000-08:00

Kirk’s taken to making proclamations of “I’m gonna buy you something” to both me and his father. The items he’s going to purchase vary from the simple to the extravagant. It’s very sweet. He totally doesn’t understand money yet. Heh.

Veronica has all but broken the television remote. Every time it’s left in her reach she has chewed it to the point where the buttons simply don’t work anymore. One evening earlier this week she managed to chew it into a feedback loop of scanning for channels!

Kirk is becoming quite the master builder. He loves regular sized Legos the most, though he’ll also use Duplos or bristle blocks or anything else handy. He has created everything from pirate ships to Lightning McQueen to the Incredible Hulk. It’s fabulous to watch his creativity in such a concrete manner.

Ronnie still won’t take steps unless you trick her. If her destination is at standing height then she might step once or twice but usually she’ll just speed-crawl over. The strange thing, however, is that she is now nearly perfectly balanced (relative to a baby learning to walk) and will spend most of her time standing once she’s reached her new location.

I’ve been going through my wardrobe and culling items. I discovered I had a box of goal weight clothes I set aside before Kirk was born. Some of them fit! Our scale has been broken since the clogged toilet disaster so that was an exciting discovery. I’ve also stopped wearing nursing bras exclusively. Boy, I need new bras.

In the ongoing attempt to make sure Kirk has good manners, I’ve been trying to impress upon him the difference between an empty “I’m sorry” to get out of trouble and a truly meaningful apology. I haven’t decided yet if we’re making any progress.

On the topic of manners, what about chivalry? I’m not sure at what point, or even if, I should start with the holding the door for a lady, letting a lady go first, that sort of thing. Respect Your Elders probably needs to come next anyway. We’re still working on Wait Your Turn If Someone Else Is Speaking.

Bundle takes showers with me now. I gave up even trying to keep her out. She loves hanging out and splashing when her brother or her dad is in the bathtub and if I’m in the shower she will lean over the edge to try to play with the water spray. She is just about tall enough to climb in. Rather than fight it, I now let her hang out below me, cheerfully splashing shampoo bubbles and sliding around in the tub.

Sunday Social

2010-02-16T10:32:00.000-08:00

I’ve been feeling very disconnected lately. At the same time, I’ve been going through a self-analytical phase triggered by required career development exercises. On top of this has been all the family drama swirling about for several months. In the midst of it I realized that I need to start going to church.

Now, to those that know me that probably sounds radical. I am an avowed critic of organized religion. I do not believe in Christian dogma. I formally and officially quit the church in 9th grade after getting confirmed just to please my mother. However, there were good elements to churchgoing and that’s what I want to pursue. I need a sense of community. I need a support network. All my closest relationships are online, even with friends that are physically living in town. I go from work to home and don’t see anyone but co-workers and my kids because of the split-shifting Mr. b and I are doing right now. And that’s fine and it’s temporary, but I do need to retain my sanity during this phase of our lives.

I also want Kirk to grow up with the fun of youth group and having “church friends” distinct from “school friends”. He’s getting old enough to Ask Questions and while we can provide plenty of answers, I also want him to have a framework to find his own answers. I want him to gain the tools to live an ethical life and be intellectually curious and open to change and differences.

So this Sunday we went to service at the local Unitarian Universalist society. And it was great. It’s so refreshing to listen to a minister talk about the Bible, MLK Jr, Greek philosophy, Buddhism, and pan-theistic deities, all while making actually funny pop song lyric references. My friend morrigan grew up in this church so of course I was there for lock-ins and stuff but I never actually went to services. Kirk had his naming ceremony at this church but I never actually went to services. Then I discovered that K had started going. Somehow knowing that someone else was going to be there was just the little push I needed.

The look on Kirk’s face when he saw his best friend in the universe at the church Sunday morning was better than priceless. Now I just need to remember that going is part of our new routine each weekend. I’m in the midst of planning out Ronnie’s naming so that will help. And I know that my blue funk won’t last. The world isn’t actually taking me for granted, though it feels that way these days. There’s a lot of potential for change happening in my life right now and once directions are decided, I suspect a feeling of calm will return. Until then, I look forward to another thought provoking Sunday morning.

Three is the new Two?

2010-02-08T07:55:00.000-08:00

Last night Mr. b and I talked about vasectomies. He’s apparently been doing some research about them and is not at all encouraged by what he’s read. He doesn’t want one. And honestly, that’s fine. I don’t mind taking the pill. I’ve been on it for nearly 20 years now. I take iron pills every day anyway so it’s not really any big deal to take two pills at night instead of just one. I told him that if we just keep going like we have been, there’s always a chance of an Oops, though we never had so much as a scare before I was off the pill. But more than that, I warned him that I might want to have another kid at some point in the next 7 or so years.

I’m the oldest of three kids so there’s always going to be something in the back of my head that tells me that’s the “right” number of kids to have. When Ronnie was first born I felt very strongly that I was going to want another one. I’m not sure why but now, not nearly as much. Yet it’s not faded completely so I can’t discount the notion that the nagging could resurface someday. Mr. b was quite appalled by the possibility and just went with the idea that he’ll “say no” and that is that. I don’t know that it would be so simple.

Alongside the experience of being one of three is a more primal, genetic, animal, base desire to propagate the species, ensure the continuation of my line, immortality through my progeny. There’s a collective memory of high infant mortality and the need for more hands to help sustain the subsistence. Is that a real issue? We’re probably not going to actually have an apocalypse in my lifetime, much to Mr. b’s despair. And possibly my time in the field – where I excavated infant remains that were in the trash midden, treated with the respect of being put in a nice jar at least – colors my impression of it more than someone that has only academic knowledge of the changes modern health technology has wrought. I feel quite strongly Kirk would not have survived even a century ago. So all of this adds up to something inside me akin to the Royal saying of “an heir and a spare”.

I don’t know how I would go on if I lost one of my kids. But I especially don’t know how I would go on if I lost both of my kids. So having another one I guess would be insurance of a sick sort. But even understanding my psyche in all of this, do I really want to go through it all again? The pregnancy and the birth and the sleepless nights. I don’t know. But I’m not ready to give up the option.

Almost 11 Months

2010-02-05T12:49:00.000-08:00

It felt kind of strange to get on the bus this morning and not be carrying my pump. I’ve become so accustomed to having two things with me in the seat; it felt so roomy without it! So far I’m feeling OK. Not too full or too achy, though obviously a little of each. However, I’m sure I’m going to put Veronica straight to the boob the second I get home and get my coat off. I picked Friday to be my first day without pumping knowing the weekend would be right there in case it sucks. But I really don’t want to have to spend money on more milk storage bags and honestly, I don’t think pumping is worth the trouble anymore.

So now that Ronica is on the homestretch of weaning – whether she knows it or not is a different matter – I’m looking forward to seeing how this affects our sleeping patterns. She continues to be extremely difficult to get to bed at night, requiring multiple tries to get her to stay asleep. She continues to wake up between 2am and 4am and sometimes even earlier. (She often wakes up the second her father gets home from school or band practice or work, like she can sense his presence.) I have noticed that she’s less demanding of food when she wakes up and is more interested in being held. But since I’m so used to sleep nursing, I still just give her a boob so I can lay back down. And she still doesn’t really know how to fuss herself to sleep since we don’t leave her in her crib to cry and disturb her brother. I’m hoping that’ll work itself out as she gets older but it’s definitely something I’m wary of.

I think we’ll probably try to find a free or cheap toddler bed before jumping straight to bunk beds for the two of them. My guess is that once she can climb out of bed herself she’ll end up climbing in with her brother, again just needing the comfort of someone next to her in the middle of the night.

Ronnie is still not quite walking. Rather, she can walk and has taken a few steps, but she chooses not to. She is so incredibly fast at crawling that it would be inconvenient to walk instead. She does let go and free stand more and more often so I’m sure she’ll start doing more than just moving between the couch and ottoman before long. She’s learning to get down from the couch feet first and that’s a skill she’ll need for getting out of her bed and invading her brother’s.

Lichenin

2010-02-04T06:53:00.001-08:00

Good science fiction should be thought provoking. You should be presented with ideas that make you really consider the way the world around you works currently. Allegory isn’t necessary but is often useful to use as a prism, to focus on something you might not have noticed around you. Too often today we think science fiction means robots and space and aliens and rockets. Instead, I hold to the old Scientific Romance definition, where you expound and expand upon a technological breakthrough and explore what that would mean for society.

Trouble with Lichen by John Wyndham was one of the most thought provoking books I’ve read in a long time. It took a long, hard look at the ramifications of extreme longevity. Robert A. Heinlein touched on some of those ideas in his Lazarus Long books but Lazarus is primarily an action figure so the same depths are not achieved. I enjoyed the thought experiment of how people really would react when offered the chance to double or treble their lifespan.

There was a feminist aspect to the book, too, which I found fascinating because of several inherent disparities. First of all, it was published in 1960. So even though the female protagonist was rather radical and wanted women to break free of their domestic routines if only they had enough time to live up to their potentials, it was all cast with the pall of the woman being a mere appendage to a man, whether her father or her husband. Like watching original series Star Trek now and being appalled at the sexism while trying to remember that it was actually ground breaking at the time. Another disparity was the fact that the author is a man. I often found myself wondering if he was poking fun or being serious about all the second-gen suffragetting about the place. I have to believe that he thought he was serious. However, I was reminded that in his The Day of the Triffids, which I read six years ago, the independent female character by the end was just happy to have a man. Maybe the fact that it was published almost a decade earlier made the difference? Or maybe Wyndam truly believes that even if a woman is smart and strong she still is “just” a woman. But I’m not offended by that possibility and instead relished the chance to really examine the current state of my gender in society at large.

The narrative started a little slowly but it continued to build and the last forty or fifty pages were definitely exciting. The climax had me tearing up with hope for humanity and righteous pride in womankind. And the twist in the dénouement I didn’t see coming until it was right on top of me.

Back Pack & Baby Toy

2010-02-01T11:56:00.001-08:00

I had a burst of creative energy a few weekends ago and put it to good use. Mr. b had a pair of old khakis with the knees torn out that I hemmed into shorts for him. But what to do with the legs? I am too much of a fabric hoarder to just toss them into the rag pile. Instead, I made Kirk a back pack! I had a lot of fun thinking it through. Putting in a circular bottom seemed obvious but coming up with the fold-over button front took me a while.

I think I set the straps a bit too wide but Kirk doesn't seem to mind and I suppose he'll grow into them this way.

There was still a bit of fabric left after that so I decided to make Bundle a chew toy. I deliberated for a while on its shape and size and finally decided to go with a triangular block because it seemed like the easiest for her to grab onto. I added the buttons for her to pick at, hold onto, and crew on. It's "educational" because I did 1, 2, 3 on each side! She loves it and it's always covered with slobber now. Especially on the 2 side. Not sure if it's the red, the style of buttons, or coincedence...

Drama

2010-01-29T08:17:00.000-08:00

A son is a son till he takes him a wife, a daughter is a daughter all of her life.
~Irish Saying

I find myself thinking of this old adage whenever I deal with my brother. He has become the embodiment of the Old Testament directive to “cleave unto” your wife, to the exclusion of your birth family. And when I remember how close we used to be, and how unbearably awful things are now, it makes me worry about what the future may hold for Kirk. I don’t want to loose him just because he’s married.

It’s strange because I used to worry about ending up having the same kind of relationship Mr. b has with his mother. They love each other and get along with each other and get drunk with each other and are close emotionally, if not geographically. But they also have a time limit and with snip and snipe at each other if the visit is too long. Kirk and I definitely fit that pattern. We can already push each other’s buttons and already need to take breaks from each other and already just get annoyed with each other. But we also aren’t completely dismissive of each other’s thoughts and feelings.

Maybe it’s my lifelong fight against conformity that’s making the latest round of bullshit with my brother hurt so much? I truly don’t know when he became so judgmental. It’s frustrating to see someone’s previously open mind close so completely. I don’t think Kirk is capable of that kind of lack of empathy but I wouldn’t have guessed it of my brother either.

Here’s the thing. I think my kids are happy and well adjusted and I take joy in the little things in life. I let the annoyances roll off me more often than not because I’m too lazy to waste energy on them. I live in the present because I can’t change the past. I like to have fun. I used to have, hooboy, a different kind of fun before kids but that was before kids. Yet I’m not going to just close the book on fun simply because of being a parent. I make sure my children are healthy and safe and I include them in as many activities as I can because I want them to know what’s out there and I don’t want to shelter them unnecessarily. I do not believe that is irresponsible. I do not believe that makes me a bad parent. I do not believe that my doing things differently from how someone else might is cause for disgust and revulsion. And I do not want to be around someone that I know is going to watch and analyze and judge my every move.

Two Transitions

2010-01-25T12:52:00.000-08:00

When I got home from work last Friday I was thinking that it might have been my last day of pumping at work. Doing it just once a day has really reduced my milk supply nicely and I can definitely feel that I’m on the right track. But then over the weekend I started doing math and realized I will be going eleven to twelve hours between feedings if I skip pumping at work. I think it’ll be fine but I’m definitely putting it off a little longer. I only have ten or so bags left from the last milk storage purchase so that’ll be my cut-off.

I think it’s obvious that the real trick to finalizing weaning will be suckling for comfort – and I mean for both Ronnie and me! She doesn’t actually need the boobie calories anymore, especially as we’re introducing whole milk into her formula bottles. But it’s still great bonding time for us and I still like snuggling with her when she comes into bed with me at whatever point at night.

In the meantime, Mr. b and I are putting out collective foot down on Kirk regarding sippy cups at bedtime and wearing overnight diapers. Mr. b was over 5 years old before he was having constant, regular dry nights so it’s not surprising to me that we’ve been keeping Kirk in overnights. But he’s been getting lazy with them. Over the last month or so, he’s woken up maybe three or four mornings a week with a poopie diaper. That’s ridiculous. So he’s cut off. He has to make sure he’s pooped at least once that day or else I make him sit on the pot before tucking him in for the night.

Since he’s wearing underpants in bed I’m also not allowing him to bring his sippy to bed with him anymore. It’s irked me for quite some time but Mr. b didn’t care and it just didn’t seem worth the fight. I would only fill the cup with maybe an inch of beverage so it’s not like he was getting a big huge drink. But now even that it over. I’m hoping a nice side effect will be lessening Kirk’s reliance on the damn sippies in the first place! It’s not like he’s going to be allowed to have them in kindergarten…

Vision Quest

2010-01-14T12:48:00.000-08:00

Kirk has his appointment with the eye specialist on Wednesday morning. His regular ophthalmologist suggested we see this guy for a second opinion on if the glasses are fixing his strabismus or if he’ll need patching or surgery or something else. Being that it’s the University, it’s a teaching hospital and clinic and the first doctor we saw was a resident. She was really good with Kirk, running through all the various tests, but definitely seemed flustered with some of his refusal to cooperate. She brought another woman in who I thought must have been an instructor but it wasn’t clear. This second woman was fabulous. She took no guff from Kirk but was also cheerful, brusque but friendly. She whipped through the final couple of exams in no time. They did some really interesting stereoscopic tests that I assumed were for eye alignment.

It’s amazing how much I know about eye exams now considering I’ve only ever had one in my lifetime – outside of school checks – and have never needed corrective lenses. There’s so much more than just how far you can see. Depth and clarity and binocularity and it’s really a truly amazing discipline.

And of course I knew that there was no way Kirk was going to be able to avoid getting his eyes dilated. He hates that. It’s not just the eye drops themselves, though he really despises that process as well. He truly can’t stand the effect of having his pupils opened so wide. He complained about the exam lights blinding him even! Not that I blame him. It’s very trippy. He was extremely concerned, knowing we were going to the eye doctor, and had been freaking out about getting shots and “magic eye drops”. I assured him he would not be getting shots but kept my mouth shut on the other. I counseled him to let the doctor know right away that he didn’t want those things and sure enough, when they walked in he announced his preferences. Alas, he did not avoid getting eye drops.

There is, however, a lot more stuff to do when you’re on campus and have to kill time waiting for the drops to take effect.

Then we finally saw the doctor himself. He was amazing. I really, really liked him. He was great with Kirk and explained everything to us very clearly. Apparently the middle woman that was so fabulously nonsense-free is an orthoptist. They specialize in vision alignment. The U graduates one per year and there are only ten programs in the country. The doctor has three on staff. So it really makes sense for us to go there. The doctor explained that while to us it looks like the glasses are correcting his cross, it’s actually still 6 or 7 degrees off. It has to be a larger degree to be noticed by the naked eye and they consider it parallel when it’s down to about 3 degrees. So he’s getting there! Since the glasses do seem to be making a difference, he wanted to try a new prescription for Kirk. In two months then he’ll check to see if that’s helping enough.

Basically there are three options: the glasses will correct it completely, the glasses won’t correct it at all, the glasses will correct it partially. Our next steps will depend on which of those three things happens. I feel positive that we’re not being pushed towards surgery and that if it ends up being necessary, it will be because all other options were explored fully. In the meantime, I guess we’ll have to go to the glasses store this weekend…

KINDERGARTEN!

2010-01-12T12:22:00.000-08:00

Kirk has his kindergarten registration last night. It was a lot of fun but I was exhausted by the end of it.

We got to the school and headed into the gym. None of us had ever been inside it before but there were teachers and PTA parents stationed all around, pointing the way. Immediately we recognized someone: angelmamma! I had no idea she had decided to hold M back a year. I’m very excited that he and Kirk will be in the same grade, though they didn’t really remember each other. It’s been several years since they were at daycare together. We didn’t get to hang out much because we were in different nametag color groups.

Our group traipsed off up the stairs to go meet with some teachers in one of the classrooms. They happened to have the same floor rug that used to be in Kirk’s bedroom and so instead of sitting with the kids for storytime, he laid down upon it and refused to move. When he did move he came over to where I was sitting with his sister and wanted to play with the Duplos that were there. Nuh uh. Mr. b inched forward to the point where he was sitting just behind the kids and eventually Kirk got the point and joined him. The teachers were great and ignored the misbehavior, letting him adjust to his surroundings on his own terms, but still calling him up to participate in the interactive portion after most of the other kids had gotten a turn. I was impressed.

After the story, our group went out to ride the bus. Kirk was much better behaved here. He listened carefully to the rules for bus riding and was one of the very first to start singing “The Wheels on the Bus” when the teacher asked if anyone knew any songs about buses. He seemed by excited by the whole thing.

Finally our group went to another classroom and this time Kirk was right in with the kids, no prompting necessary. When they asked for volunteers, his hand went up but he didn’t spazz out like some of the others so he got picked. They sang and he played his role and seemed to be having a great time.

Meanwhile, I found someone I knew! Before our groups split up I heard my name called and saw someone I haven’t seen in over ten years! She and I were friends through the girl I went to Mexico with and stayed friends after she moved out of the state. But we had lost touch and though I thought of her from time to time, she certainly never crossed my mind as a possible mother of my son’s school mate! Her son and Kirk got along really, really well and played together the entire time we were back at the cafeteria filling out paperwork. I’m glad he’ll have someone he knows, even if they’re not in the same classroom. Now we just have to find time for playdates!

Everything went really smoothly and I think Kirk’s genuinely excited about starting school. I am, too. But now the worries are setting in. He’s going to be taking the bus thanks to some incredibly strangely drawn district borders. Waiting for the bus I’m not worried about. Riding the bus I’m not worried about. Getting off the bus and finding his way to his classroom I’m worried about. Which is stupid because it’s not like they won’t have teachers and PTA parents there to guide kids again.

Two Front Teeth

2010-01-11T09:16:00.000-08:00

Ronnie still hasn’t gotten any new teeth. Her bottom two cut through on Halloween weekend so it’s been well over two months. I don’t remember Kirk having such a long gap between the first teeth and new ones. I could be making this up but I seem to recall that once they started coming in, it was slow but steady. It’s sort of weird that the little girl is just holding constant like this.

It’s not actually a problem in any way except eating. She wants to feed herself. Badly. It’s become nearly impossible to feed her any kind of spoon food. Doesn’t matter if it’s baby cereal or applesauce she Does. Not. Want. But there are only so many things you can give her that she can mash with her hard gums! The foods have to be firm enough that she can pick them up with her fingers but soft enough that she can still “chew” it. And we can’t just give her puffs and other baby snacks all the time.

Apple slices are actually out. Veronica has figured out how to take bites using just her bottom teeth and then she ends up gagging on too big chunks. But most everything else we’ve given her seems to be working quite well. She loves bread, either slices or rolls, because she can menace it at her own pace. We’ve been going through pretzel rods at a mad pace. She’s down with cheese and scrambled eggs and halved grapes and she’s even been eating her brother’s dinties off his pizza slices! Her aim and accuracy is increasing at a rapid pace and there’s less and less mess in her seat when we pull her out of her high chair. Except, of course, for the times when she doesn’t actually feel like eating and instead just wants to menace…

H2G2

2010-01-08T13:26:00.000-08:00

I love the Hitchhiker’s Guide. The books, the newest movie, the BBC mini-series, everything. I love the way that each version is different from the other and it doesn’t matter. Douglas Adams himself didn’t worry about contradicting anything he wrote previously so why should I? I love that it’s all canon.

This December lis and I decided to do a complete reread of the entire series. I started out strong. Obviously Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is the one I know best, since that’s the one that was more or less adapted for screen. I found myself visualizing Mos Def as Ford Prefect but still had the BBC actor in my head for Arthur. I had a hard time remembering what happened next as I got into Restaurant at the End of the Universe. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen the mini and I just didn’t remember all the stuff that happened after they actually left Milliways. Life, the Universe, and Everything was even more of a blank for me. I would remember things as I got to them but I wouldn’t have been able to come up with any of the plot on my own. The sad thing is, as I was posting my earliest book list for posterity, I realized I had reread them only as far back as 2005!

It wasn’t just that I couldn’t remember enough to distinguish one book’s plot from the other. I also didn’t find them to be that funny. Which is odd because they are known as some of the funniest writing there is. I’m honestly not sure what’s the blame for the lack of humor. Maybe I’ve read them too many times? Maybe they seem funnier in retrospect than when you actually revisit them? Maybe you need to hear them and I should get audio books? I really don’t know. So by the time I got to So Long, And Thanks for All the Fish I was considerably less impressed. It didn’t help that I found that book to be rather extraneous. I was happy with Arthur living on Krikkit and flying. I didn’t need any more. OK great, he finally got some action with Fenchurch and he finally found his way back to Earth but it all seemed just superfluous. And the space travel scenes with Ford struck me as intentionally obtuse. I feel like the only point of the whole thing was to kill off Marvin.

Now, the volume that we own doesn’t have the fifth book of the “trilogy” so I had to check Mostly Harmless out of the library. I was completely certain I had never read it until I kept being plagued by déjà vu while reading. Mr. b convinced me I read it once, back in the late summer of 1993. And this book felt even more egregiously unnecessary. Fenchurch was unceremoniously removed so that Arthur was back to being lost and alone. Ford was on a futile quest to save the Guide. And suddenly Trillian came back, only rather out of character and there was also another version even more out of character than the original. What was the point? To erase them all from history? I didn’t need that ending. It made me wonder if the publishers had demanded yet another sequel and Adams had been contractually obliged but didn’t want to have to do it ever again. I don’t actually know any backstory gossip but it really didn’t feel like his heart was in it.

Still, I put myself on the library waitlist for book six, just published and written by Eoin Colfer. I’ve never read anything of his (hers?) so I don’t know what to expect. I have no idea if Adams had left notes for another book or had even started one before his sudden death. And even though I’m somewhat soured on the stories at the moment, I still love them and am curious to find out just what could possibly happen next.

Pink Overload

2010-01-06T12:41:00.001-08:00

I am officially over pink.

I’m not really sure how it happened. Hell, I like pink and wear it myself! Oh, I was never a particularly girlie girl growing up but I didn’t shun the color either. So I certainly wasn’t dreading pink outfits for my daughter. She has some unbelievably adorable clothes, like the awesome shirt sbf just got her for Christmas with a gold tree and birdie on the front. And I’ve bought some of them myself! Sure maybe I wouldn’t have picked out *all* of the hand-me-downs I’ve acquired but I can usually make them work.

But when I was folding laundry the other night I just couldn’t believe how much pink there was in her drawers. Too much pink. I mean, wow. I try to avoid putting pink tops with pink bottoms but I felt like that’s all that was left the last couple of times I dressed Ronnie. And yet her father always manages to get her into other colors. Hmm...

BOOKS READ IN 2009

2010-01-05T07:27:00.000-08:00

For the third year running, I managed to read more books than the previous year. And last year I was astounded at the increase over 2007! (Which was itself double 2006. Hmm, I should backdate a post with my lists for earlier years. You know, for posterity.) I don’t think I’ll be able to keep up the trend. Heh. It helps that I continued to not read anything “hard”. I thought my reading would dwindle once the baby had been born but titles 11 through 17 were read while on maternity leave. I guess that might be the key to my ridiculous output: I had a lot of time to sit since I was nursing. And pumping! I was pumping twice a day at work for most of the year which gave me nearly an extra hour of reading on top of my bus commute every day.

I also read a lot of series this year. Some I completely finished and others I’m still working on. Several I caught up to the author and now have to wait for new titles to be published. Regardless, it was easy for me to pick out my next book when I was in the middle of a series. I used to try and wait a couple months between series titles, just as a palate cleanser I guess. But I found myself waiting sometimes only one or two books before returning to whatever series – and not even that when I was finishing off Sookie Stackhouse. Essentially I spent the year just switching off between Katie Chandler, Schuyler Van Alen, Hanayu Ashitaba, Sookie, Anita Blake, and Harry Dresden.

I did make some good discoveries this year though. Pete Hautman was a new find thanks to book club and I read several of his other young adult titles as well. I do hope to finish going through his work because I think he’s a fabulous author and really captures the essence of being a teenager. There weren’t any duds in our book club selections this year. I’d have to pick Guernsey as my favorite but I really enjoyed Birchbark House and Latest Grievance as well.

My reading resolution for this year is to read the books that are already in my house. I have several shelves filled with To Be Read titles. Some I’ve bought used. Some I’ve bought new. Some people have loaned to me and probably forgot where they got to since I’ve had them so long. Some people have just given to me because I can’t say no to books and then they can clear off their own shelves. There’s lot of good stuff for me to discover. But first I need to finish Anita and Harry.

1. Mixed Vegetables, Vol. 1 Ayumi Komura
2. The Tales of Beedle the Bard J.K. Rowling
3. The Birchbark House Louise Erdrich
4. California Demon: The Secret Life of a Demon-Hunting Soccer Mom Julie Kenner
5. Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 Volume 3 Wolves at the Gate Joss Whedon
6. Blue Bloods Melissa de la Cruz
7. Mixed Vegetables, Vol. 2 Ayumi Komura
8. Dead Until Dark Charlaine Harris
9. Grave Peril Jim Butcher
10. Masquerade Melissa de la Cruz
11. The Laughing Corpse Laurell K. Hamilton
12. Revelations Melissa de la Cruz
13. Leaving Home Anita Brookner
14. Living Dead in Dallas Charlaine Harris
15. The Optimist’s Daughter Eudora Welty
16. Circus of the Damned Laurell K. Hamilton
17. Rainbow Valley L.M. Montgomery
18. Godless Pete Hautman
19. Club Dead Charlaine Harris
20. The Lunatic Café Laurell K. Hamilton
21. Wyrd Sisters Terry Pratchett
22. Fool Christopher Moore
23. Sweetblood Pete Hautman
24. Bloody Bones Laurell K. Hamilton
25. Summer Knight Jim Butcher
26. Once Upon Stilettos Shanna Swendson
27. Dead to the World Charlaine Harris
28. Witches Abroad Terry Pratchett
29. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince J.K. Rowling
30. Damsel Under Stress Shanna Swendson
31. All Rivers Flow to the Sea Alison McGhee
32. Mixed Vegetables, Vol. 3 Ayumi Komura
33. Rilla of Ingleside L.M. Montgomery
34. Bite Laurell K. Hamilton, Charlaine Harris, MaryJanice Davidson, Angela Knight, Vickie Taylor
35. Don’t Hex with Texas Shanna Swendson
36. Dead as a Doornail Charlaine Harris
37. Powers of Detection: Stories of Mystery & Fantasy Edited by Dana Stabenow
38. The Killing Dance Laurell K. Hamilton
39. Many Bloody Returns Edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L.P. Kelner
40. All-in Pete Hautman
41. Three Men in a Boat, to Say Nothing of the Dog Jerome K. Jerome
42. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
43. Definitely Dead Charlaine Harris
44. Mixed Vegetables, Vol. 4 Ayumi Komura
45. Night’s Edge Charlaine Harris, Maggie Shayne, Barbara Hambly
46. Burnt Offerings Laurell K. Hamilton
47. FlashForward Robert J. Sawyer
48. My Big Fat Supernatural Wedding Edited by P.N. Elrod
49. No Limit Pete Hautman
50. The Van Alen Legacy Melissa de la Cruz
51. All Together Dead Charlaine Harris
52. Blue Moon Laurell K. Hamilton
53. How Green Was My Valley Richard Llewellyn
54. My Latest Grievance Elinor Lipman
55. From Dead to Worse Charlaine Harris
56. Unusual Suspects: Stories of Mystery & Fantasy Edited by Dana Stabenow
57. Dead and Gone Charlaine Harris
58. Obsidian Butterfly Laurell K. Hamilton
59. The Lost Symbol Dan Brown
60. Wolfsbane and Mistletoe Edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L.P. Kelner
61. Death Masks Jim Butcher
62. Narcissus in Chains Laurell K. Hamilton
63. Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8 Volume 4 Time of Your Life Joss Whedon
64. The More Than Complete Hitchhiker’s Guide Douglas Adams
65. Cerulean Sins Laurell K. Hamilton
66. Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal Christopher Moore

Epistle to Nicky

2009-12-17T08:38:00.001-08:00

Dear Santa,
I would like you to know that I have been very good this year. I am trying to listen & not talk back, & I am willing to try new things to eat.

For Christmas this year I would like:
1. McQueen racing set
2. Blue Nerf sword & a yellow Nerf blaster
3. Lego Indiana Jones video game
4. Drum chair
5. New cube
6. New kitchen set
7. New bracelet - a purple one
8. A suitcase
9. A new toy Smoe kitty pet

Those are my ideas. I would appreciate anything you bring me. Merry Christmas to you and Mrs. Claus.
Love,
Kirk

Fear the Reaper

2009-12-15T06:21:00.000-08:00

Kirk is mildly obsessed with death at the moment. I’m not really sure if this is typical at age four and a half or what. I don’t think he truly understands the concept of mortality, but he definitely knows that people and things die and it freaks him out. So he talks about it. A lot.

I’m not entirely sure what started it all. My sole remaining grandmother has been on a steep and steady decline for the past ten months so there’s definitely been frequent conversation about aging. At one point a few months ago Kirk told me that he wants to be a dad (his standard answer to “What do you want to be when you grow up?” is “A Daddy.”) but he doesn’t want to be a grandpa because he doesn’t want to get old. And then he invented the dying machine.

We were flabbergasted when he first came up with this concept. He announced out of nowhere that you need to take a rock and smash your dying machine so you can’t die. Apparently everybody has their own dying machine, though there’s still some confusion on the subject. He’s worked through the mythology pretty thoroughly with his dad, dictating the drawing to his father, so you’d have to ask Mr. b for more details but I believe the dying machine is in the center of the Earth. I’m not sure why more people haven’t smashed theirs. Maybe you forget about it as you get older and smashing it just no longer seems to be a top priority?

Teeny Weany

2009-12-04T11:02:00.000-08:00

Nearly everyone I’ve asked about weaning has said to go slowly and start by just skipping one nursing session a day. That seems logical but which one do I skip? If Ronnie doesn’t wake up in the middle of the night – which is very rare – then I’m ready to burst when I get up in the morning. So I’d have to pump if I didn’t pull her out of her crib before I left for work. When I get home we both want to spend time together. I have already been avoiding going straight into nursing mode the second I walk in the door so maybe that was me unconsciously skipping a session. But I do feed her as soon as we’re both done with supper. And then she nurses on and off all evening long, well into bedtime. It’s not a case of actual “sessions” but rather a continuous switching from Boob One to Boob Two and back again until she’s in her crib for the night.

Yesterday it dawned on me: skip one of my daytime pumpings. I pump twice a day at work, once mid-morning and once in the afternoon. But I’ve been noticing a slow decline in my milk supply in the last few months since Ronica has been on solid foods. I’m bringing home maybe two or even three ounces less each day compared to how much I brought home when I first came back from maternity leave. Now, I’ve never been one that tries to supply enough breast milk for all daytime feedings when I’m away. That’s just too much work and literally unnecessary. Ronnie’s had formula at daycare since she started and when Mr. b started staying home with the kids one of the first things we did was buy formula for him to use during the day. So I’m not at all concerned about how much milk I’m pumping. Which makes this the perfect first (conscious) step towards gradual weaning. I pumped only one time today, just after lunch. I felt a bit full but not as uncomfortable as I have been after lengthier periods of time. I think this should be a nice way to ease into it. I don’t plan to even consider more active weaning until at least after the New Year.

The Amazing Bundle

2009-11-24T10:28:00.000-08:00

I think the biggest adjustment I have to make to Mr. b staying home with the kids is when to feed Bundle in the morning. So far I’ve been able to sneak out of the house in the dark before anyone even gets up. I have my alarm set for extra early so I can go pick the little girl out of her crib and nurse her in bed before I start getting ready. Then I just leave her in bed with her daddy. This works even if she wakes up at 4 or 5 am, too. And then I don’t have to try to pump before I leave or when I first get to work or something else ridiculous like that.

We’re also working on a new bedtime plan. Now that Ronnie is home all day her naps are definitely being curtailed. I think she is fine on only one a day already instead of two still. She takes boobie snoozes with me in the evening when she’s nursing post-dinner. So then when her brother is in bed and she’s still not going to sleep I hand her off to her daddy. Generally I can get her down but she won’t stay down. She’ll sleep in her crib in their bedroom for maybe 30 minutes and then wake up and want more Mama. It’s a fine line but I’m starting to figure out when she’s *actually* still hungry and when she just wants to be held. Since just holding her without sticking a boob in her mouth is not an option in her mind, and I don’t want to be a pacifier, then it’s Daddy’s turn. I make myself scarce and he pat-pats her back to sleep. It’s working pretty well. And getting her used to falling asleep without a boob is good since weaning is looming ever closer.

Veronica’s definitely in a Mama Phase though. As soon as I get home from work she demands that I hold her. Doesn’t matter what she’s doing, eating or menacing, she wants me to pick her up. She race-crawls over to me if she’s not in her high chair and hauls herself up on my leg, begging to be picked up.

It’s just crazy how much she’s grown. I’ve completely failed to keep updating her new accomplishments. Maybe about three (four?) months ago we took down the changing table because we were changing her on the floor more often anyway. She sits up on her own since late September, about 6 and a half months. Just after 7 months she started crawling properly, on her knees with her belly off the ground. From there it’s been exponential. At first she’d pull herself up on furniture to her knees.

And then a week later on to her feet.

She can now easily transfer her weight well enough that she moves along the edges of furniture or can go back and forth between the couch and ottoman or our knees and the chair or whatever. Her bottom two teeth cut through simultaneously Halloween weekend, just a week before the 8 month mark. I haven’t figured out which teeth are coming next but there’s definite movement going on in there again. It’s just been a constant stream of new developments. I don’t remember them coming this rapid-fire with Kirk. There was more of a sense of ebb and flow. He’d have a new trick and then that would last for a while. Then we’d get a slight step back to warn us something new was coming up. I don’t know if this is a girl thing or a second child thing but it’s rather amazing to witness. I had Mr. b lower the mattress in her crib so she couldn’t launch herself over the bar (I’m seriously expecting her to hoist herself into the bathtub while she’s “supervising” her brother’s bath one of these days…) but we’re already talking about getting her a big girl bed. Time to start looking for bunk beds.

I can’t decide if Ronnie is starting to pick up on sign language or not. I haven’t been using it as much with her as I did with Kirk. And I know her father isn’t using it at all. But she keeps doing certain motions with her hands that seem a bit more deliberate than just “Hey cool! These things are attached!” I also don’t remember when Kirk started obviously responding. But it seems like we’ve always been able to communicate with him so it must have been early. I guess it’s time for me to start reviewing archive posts and see how their timing really does compare.

Blended

2009-11-17T09:07:00.000-08:00

My blender got a work out this weekend. I was on a roll making stuff out of the borderline questionable produce on the counter and in the fridge. I’ve always been pretty good about either using or freezing the overripe bananas. I want to get better at finding things to do with the other fruits and vegetables before they just have to be tossed.

First I used up the pumpkin puree I had made for the Bundle at Halloween. I’m not sure why she didn’t like it. She likes squash. She likes zucchini. But she definitely did not like pumpkin. Her brother has been getting some serious mileage out of the fact that he ate an entire pumpkin when he was on baby food his first Halloween. I had pumpkin in the freezer for ages and he ate every last bit. Anyway, I also had a bunch of baby carrots way past their prime so I made pumpkin and carrot and ginger (leftover from Mr. b’s fad diet earlier this fall) soup and it was simply divine. Definitely going into my regular rotation. Really easy and utterly delicious.

I had another giant zucchini on the counter that our neighbors gave me and unlike the first one they had passed on, I had just zero inspiration for what to do with it. So it kept sitting there. Finally I realized I had to use it so I just made puree. Ronnie liked it the last time I pureed the leftover zucchini after I made bread and I figure hey, I can always make carrot and zucchini soup, right? HA!

My aunt recently sent me this article - featuring a picture of her granddaughter, my cousin’s daughter - so I’ve been thinking about baby food for a while. I’m not really a baby food making machine. I don’t have any philosophy behind doing it. I’m not trying to control the food my child intakes. I don’t have to work around any allergies or dietary restrictions. I’m definitely not brainwashed by the hippie organic bullshit. (Because I hate the bastardization of that word. We are all carbon based life forms. Period.) I don’t necessarily think it saves *that* much money, though it certain saves some. Mostly I do it for two reasons: 1) I like to cook and so it scratches that itch if I don’t have time for a big fancy meal and 2) I can introduce Ronnie to foods that aren’t available from Gerber.

But that doesn’t really explain the third puree I made this weekend. We had a half a sack of bulk dried apricots (again, left over from the mister’s weird diet fad) and they weren’t really getting eaten and were taking up space in the cupboard. So even though I can buy baby food apricots, I decided this was the best thing do to with them. I boiled them up to rehydrate them and then blended them and then I fell in love. Seriously. The frickin’ best tasting thing ever to come out of that blender. I want to have puree of dried apricots in my fridge at all times. I think it could possibly be the most versatile food product of all time. It would make a great sauce for pork. It would make a great ice cream topping. It’s delicious just plain as it. It would be great in a jelly roll. Or a pin wheel. Or a tart. I can’t stop thinking of ways to use it.

And of course after all that industry I ordered pizza for supper.

Paradigm Shift

2009-11-13T12:21:00.001-08:00

I’ve always known that I do not have the temperament to be a stay at home mom. Conversely, I’ve always known that Mr. b does have the temperament to be a stay at home dad. And now he is.

This is going to be a big change for our family but I think it’s going to be a good one. He’s over the halfway mark now with his schooling and his projects have been demanding more and more of his time. Since he has spent his days at work, this meant that he would have to go meet partners even on nights with no class, or leave early to meet before class. It was getting to be very hard on Kirk to have so little time with his daddy. It was getting to be very hard on Daddy to have so little time with his son. And Ronnie really hasn’t gotten to have much alone time with her daddy at all. As soon as she sees me it’s all mama, all the time.

Next week is the last official week of daycare. I don’t think it’s sunk it to Kirk yet. I think he thinks he’s just having a random free day where he managed to con his dad into keeping him at home today. But the way I figure it, he’ll be home with his father until he starts kindergarten in the fall. By the time Mr. b is done with school and looking for jobs, we should be back down to only one child in daycare. That will be a helluva thing.

And really, the financial part is the only con that I can see to this whole thing. Because even not paying for double daycare, that’s still not quite as much as his entire month’s wages. But once you add in the money saved in all the other little areas – from buying lunches to having someone focused on the household budget – it should be close. And hey, the whole world is fucked right now so what difference will it make?

A big difference emotionally and mentally. I’m already looking forward to not having to get three people ready in the morning. I genuinely prefer taking the bus to driving. I think Bundle will get more nurturing care with her father. I think Kirk will be more accepting of the time his dad does have to spend away if he has him around all day. I think my husband will have significantly lowered stress levels from being able to spend time with his kids, from being able to meet school partners during the day, from not having to focus any time or energy on a job that has no relevance to his chosen career. We’ve grown complacent in our lower middle class lifestyle and having someone at home all day will allow both of us to examine what can change and what needs to change. The long-term cleaning and organizing projects that never get bumped up on the To Do list from nice-to-have status will actually get done.

Mr. b has renamed his blog to Ad Dad and plans to chronicle this transition. I’m very excited that after so much discussion and “can we really do this” hemming and hawing, the day is finally here. This is going to be great.

Put Some Toilet Water On It

2009-11-10T07:11:00.000-08:00

Sunday night Kirk killed the toilet. Daddy was at the Steely Dan concert and Mama was busy with Bundle and Kirk used about 2/3 of a roll of toilet paper. I had been talking to him down the hall, concerned something was Going On but didn’t actually put the baby down and go investigate. I told him explicitly not to use too much paper, not to take big pieces, and to flush in the middle if he thought he might need more. Kirk didn’t listen to Mama.

I attempted to plunge the toilet but couldn’t get it cleared. I figured I was a wuss. But then Mr. b tried the toilet snake yesterday morning and that didn’t work either. So I guess that explains why the plunger wasn’t good enough. After work we tried the Depot and checked out our other options. We had a longer pipe snake from the basement floor drain issues of a couple years ago. But that proved to be too flexible and would just bunch up at the clog.

Mr. b started investigating options online. Dawn: didn’t work. Shop-Vac: seemed to be helping until it stopped sucking and started blowing. Toilet water was being sprayed all over the hallway wall. At the same time the toilet started running uncontrollably and the bowl began to overflow. I tried to soak up the mess with towels but instead ran to the neighbors to borrow their wet-dry vac. The hallway was flooded and it was flowing into the bedrooms and the linen closet. It dripped down into the furnace room downstairs. As the menfolk were investigating – opening the evacuation pipe further along will entail tearing into the wall because the geniuses who refinished the already finished basement closed everything off – I tried to keep the kids away from the mess and clean up at least a little bit.

So now we still don’t have a working toilet. If we didn’t have the downstairs bathroom we’d have had to call a plumber or stay at a hotel. Kirk was sent to bed early last night. He is contrite if flippant. His biggest worry is that buying a new toilet will cut into the Christmas presents budget. We’ve been trying to impress on him that the lesson is not Don’t Use Too Much Toilet Paper but rather Always Listen To Mama. Because he didn’t and he should have.

Hallowe'en

2009-11-03T06:13:00.000-08:00

Kirk decided early on this year that he wanted to be Superman for Halloween.

Naturally Mr. b then realized Jor-El would be the perfect costume for him.

I wanted to get a hot dog bunting for Bundle, because that’s hilarious, but didn’t want to spend twenty bucks when she doesn’t care yet. Thankfully we still had the baby demon costume that A3 wore last year and Kirk wore three years ago.

I couldn’t find the horned hood thingie though but found the Santa hat to be even funnier. She was Satan Claus! I was out of inspiration and so just wore festive black and had green hair.

My folks and my sister came over with A2 and A3 to trick or treat with us while my dad passed out candy.

Food Fight

2009-10-22T07:48:00.000-07:00

Kirk fights with us over trying new foods. It’s gotten to be quite brutal. He didn’t start out as a picky eater and I’m really not sure how it even happened. We have spaghetti once a week because it’s cheap and easy, yes, but also because we know he will eat it. We always have fish sticks in the house and have had many meals of frozen fish filets along side his breaded minced fish sticks. I won’t cook him his own separate meal but I also don’t want him to starve.

We’ve tried so many different methods to get him to just try things. Mr. b is right that we don’t want to make eating an unpleasant experience so I especially have to keep my temper in check and make sure I’m not punishing him unduly. But it’s also gotten to the point where Kirk has requested time out in his room in lieu of trying the one bite we’re requiring. And that is not going to fly.

Typically we’ll insist on One Single Bite of whatever the new food item is, and then he can have a peanut butter sandwich or something else. Occasionally Kirk will find that he actually likes it and then eat a normal dinner with us. Usually, however, there are tears and screams and yelling and threats and he’ll get his blanket or other precious item put on top of the refrigerator and I’ll end up throwing up my hands before I get physical and then Mr. b leaves for class and I’m stuck with a child in revolt. I’ve attempted a new rule: you don’t want to try that new thing? Fine. But you have to try *some other* new thing of your choice. So far that’s worked a grand total of One Time.

I know that it can take kids up to 10 tries before they develop a taste for something new to their palates. I know that just providing the options and eating by example are all supposed to be the “correct” action. But frankly, I don’t see it working. I guess we’ll move on to the smother-it-in-ketchup option next. I don’t really know what else to try. I do know that fighting with Kirk about his eating habits brings out the absolute worst in me and I hate that. I hate that I have such violence inside me and I hate that it’s my own child that activates it.

Sleep Study

2009-10-16T11:15:00.000-07:00

Sleep, or lack thereof, continues to be the subject of much consternation in our house. At first I thought I had figured it out. Mr. b was home on Thursday last week so I made Bundle a doctor’s appointment for that afternoon. Her cold has been hanging on for a couple of weeks now and I always feel better after getting confirmation that yes, indeed, it is just a cold. And yes, indeed, it is just a cold. But since her cough is so rattling and has been the key feature of said cold for a while now and her daddy has asthma, she came home with her very own personal nebulizer.

I’ve heard all about Mr. b’s visits to the emergency room as a kid. Heck, I’ve even had to take him once! (We left our own engagement party because he couldn’t breathe. Amazing how they don’t make you wait your turn then. Heh.) The nebulizers are so easy and small and portable now.

It really seemed to make a big difference. We had been holding Ronnie in the bathroom with the shower running to try to loosen up the phlegm via steam and that had helped but this was even better.

All weekend I over-thought sleep patterns for both kids. When was Kirk napping, how long, what time did he get up in the morning, when did he finally go to sleep after going to bed? When was Ronnie napping, how long, what time did she get up in the morning, when did she finally go to sleep after repeatedly not going to bed? Again, it didn’t seem to match up with what was happening at daycare. After receiving such fantastic advice, I broached the topic with C on Friday at pick-up but only for Kirk. I told her I was researching why they don’t fall asleep and that I think Kirk needs to be made to get up after 2 hours, even if he was only previously just lounging for the rest of the time listed on his nap chart. I do still think they feed off each other’s restlessness but I admit I was using that as an excuse.

It seemed to go well the first part of this week. Kirk was gone Sunday night, sleeping over with his cousins, and Veronica went to bed very easily and earlier than we’re used to. Then Monday night Kirk was wrecked from sleeping over with his cousins so he went to bed very easily and his sister wasn’t disturbed by his squirming around. But by the end of the week I don’t know that much of anything has changed.

I asked C about Bundle’s naps earlier this week, trying to find out if she’s actually asleep during the times that are listed. So the feedback I’ve been getting has been more specific, stating when she was making noise and when she was quiet. But it still seems long. And this morning C mentioned she didn’t know that Ronnie was sitting up on her own until I had set her down like that the other morning. I find that strange because she will sit up now even from crawling, and not just have to be placed that way. And maybe it’s because we have hardwood floors at home and there’s carpeting at daycare but frankly, I feel like it’s just another indicator that my poor baby isn’t getting very much attention during the day. And *that’s* what freaks me out more than anything.

So for now it seems like Miss V will either not go to bed and then when I finally get her down late, like around 11, she’ll at least sleep through the night. Or else she’ll go down fairly well but then wake up in the midnight-thirty range and come to bed with me the rest of the night. I prefer the former if I have to choose so that’s what I’m going to work on. But at this point, the daycare concerns are enough to make me root for Mr. b quitting his job and staying home with the kids even harder than I already was.

Cascade

2009-10-14T10:33:00.000-07:00

Today is the release date for the new Mercurial Rage album on Susstones titled Cascade! It's available at all the finest local indie retailers, on iTunes, Amazon, eMusic and other digital retailers, and of course, direct from The Susstones Shop!

Sandman on Strike

2009-10-08T11:42:00.000-07:00

I think my kids sleep too much at daycare. Every day we get the slips recording their activities, what they ate, and when they slept. And every day it shows that Kirk had a 3 hour nap and that Veronica napped for a total of 5 or 6 hours. That just seems ridiculous to me.

Ronnie is a tricky baby to get to sleep at night. She’s been that way almost since the beginning but hey, every kid is different. She is very easy during the day and very difficult at night. At least once a week for the past few months she will quite simply not go to sleep, causing me to give in and take her to bed with me at midnight when I couldn’t take it anymore. I was starting to really worry about it until superbadfriend sent me this link to 31 Ways to get Your Baby to go to Sleep. Sure, most of that is just common sense stuff that we’re already doing. But I needed the reminder and it was good to see some things in writing that related to specific actions of my naughty bundle, like thinking that the snack bar is open all night if she’s in bed with me.

Typically Ronnie will nurse herself to sleep, I’ll put her into her crib, then she’ll wake up an hour or so later, we’ll repeat, and then she’ll stay in her crib for the rest of the night. Or at least until about 5am at which point I don’t have a problem bringing her in bed with me for the remaining hour and a half until my alarm goes off. So the inability to get her to stay asleep, or go back to sleep after the initial pre-bedtime snooze, has been very frustrating. I’ve ascribed countless theories to try to explain it. She’s got a cold right now and a nasty sounding cough and I’m sure that’s affecting things. Mr. b says it’s just a phase. And lord knows having her brother up and rattling around in the bed next to her isn’t doing anything to help.

That’s why I’m starting to wonder if it might be the amount of sleeping during the day. Kirk just will not go to sleep at night either. Sure, he goes to bed with a relative minimum of fuss. But then he stays up for sometimes two or more hours, “reading” books by flashlight or talking to himself or his easily awakened sister. Then in the morning he’ll complain of being “so tired” and I’m sure he really does need the nap at daycare to recover from his late night. And the cycle continues.

At home on the weekends Kirk usually doesn’t nap, though I still enforce Quiet Time if we’re not out and about. If he got up extra early then I’ll make him lay down or if he’s particularly cranky but he’s four and doesn’t necessarily *need* the nap every single day. When he does nap at home, I wake him up if it’s been two hours. That’s his limit; anything longer and he won’t go to bed. So it’s kind of dismaying to see such a long time written on his “report card”. Maybe it’s not actually sleep that entire time. I know that C makes all the kids, regardless of their ages, lay on their cots, so maybe a good portion of that time is resting not sleeping. But I suspect there’s more sleeping than not.

Which brings me back to Bundle. At home on the weekends she’ll usually sleep in with me until around 9 or 10. That’s when she would be waking up from her morning nap at daycare according to the take home slips. And that’s fine. Babies need multiple naps a day. Even though it looks like she goes down for her morning nap sometimes less than a half hour after we drop her off. But what concerns me is that it then looks like she’s up for a measly two hours and then spends the rest of the day napping again. Another four hours. She’ll be up when we pick her up but generally only long enough to have an afternoon bottle. But again, what portion of that time is spent actually napping and what is time laying by herself, alone in her crib in the other room? At home she’ll typically do her afternoon nap on the boob but if I put her in her crib it’s about an hour tops of solid sack time. I’m afraid to ask about it because I don’t know how to bring it up and I don’t want to learn that she’s just a crib baby at daycare. She’s always creeping around on the floor when we pick her up, and in good spirits, but is that because she’s finally getting some attention for the first time since before Noon?

Maybe Mr. b is right and it’s just a phase. For both of them. But it seems like they’re feeding off each other with the no sleep thing at night. I haven’t changed anything about their night time routines. So I feel like daycare is the only logical option left to investigate. But how do I approach it?

Chewbacca

2009-09-30T13:42:00.000-07:00

Miss Bundle is chewing on everything these days. Nothing is safe from her reaches. And while she doesn’t “properly” crawl, instead swimming across the floor at amazing rates, she has a vast range and gets into everything. Her favorite is paper at the moment. Newspapers, Daddy’s homework, Brother’s art, anything. Straight into the mouth. Chomp chomp.

This has led to the introduction of foodstuffs that maybe would have waited a bit longer. Ronnie still doesn’t have teeth so I don’t have to worry about her actually biting off bits and choking, which makes it easier. I figure if she wants to gnaw on something, a carrot has got to be better than a nasty, germ covered whatever. I’m sure that contributes to the fact she’s currently got a cold with a truly dreadful sounding cough. Our favorite thing to give her right now is a pickle spear. First of all, she makes a funny face as the vinegar hits her tongue. But then she’ll suck out the pickle juice just like she’s drinking a bottle, leaving not much more than just the rind when she’s finally done with it.

I did dig up one of Kirk’s old pacifiers for her to chew on. She hasn’t been interested in using one before, instead thinking that Mama ought to provide a boobie whenever she wants, but as a chomping object it seems to be doing the trick. I wonder how long before she actually cuts a tooth? I can’t remember how long it was for Kirk and besides, every kid is different.

Man of Steel

2009-09-28T12:06:00.000-07:00

Kirk is all about Superman right now. Mr. b got the idea into his head that he’d enjoy the original 1978 Superman. Which he most definitely did. So we’ve been slowly Netflixing them all, and some Justice Leagues thrown in for good measure, just watching Superman III this weekend. Kirk is dead set on being Superman for Halloween and has already scoped out the costumes at Target. But I won’t even consider buying one until it’s at least October. Which means that everyday Kirk has asked, “Is it still September? Is next day October? Then I’m gonna get my Superman costume!” (Complete with fist pump into the air.) Yeah, like I’m running down there on the First to buy it for him.

Mr. b, being the genius/sucker that he is, figured we could buy some time if we got Kirk some Superman pajamas. Obviously Kirk was totally down with that idea. And honestly, he needs new jammies anyways. While we were picking them out last night we also checked the DVD aisle. Because Daddy remembered seeing a special DVD set of all 4 movies for a mere $9.99 and sure enough, we went ahead and bought that, too. Supergirl is coming next from Netflix.

Clearly some Superman had to be watched before bed, while wearing brand new pjs. Kirk wanted to see “baby Superman, his hair is so funny” so the first movie it was. During which time he announced to us that “Jor-El is a really great name for a daddy. When I’m a daddy I’m gonna name my son Jor-El.” I don’t really have a problem with that. I mean, my son is named Kirk.

Karate Kid

2009-09-25T11:48:00.001-07:00

Kirk had his very first karate class last night! It’s through the city recreation department. All the parents were sitting along the wall in the room as the 3 to 6 year olds sort of listened and sort of followed directions. Mr. b had predicted that Kirk would go all shy and cling to his legs at first. If he had put money on it, he would have won. But after not too much persuasion, Kirk got in line with the other kids and paid attention about as well as I could expect from him. Hell, I remember my first year of dance when I was 4 and we did a crap job of learning our steps and staying in formation and whatever. We had a tap dance with baby dolls. I’m sure it was precious.

Anyway, first the teacher had them warm up. They ran in a giant circle around the perimeter of the room. Hilarious. Then she had them learn how to fall. She explained to us parents that it was important for kids to know how to fall for when they get into school if they get pushed down they won’t bang their head on the pavement. Great. Basically she had them do backward and forward shoulder rolls down a padded incline, onto a mat. Then the kids got to crawl through a little canvas tunnel and get back in line. It took a few tries but we finally got Kirk to let us hold onto his glasses. He was the only glasses kid there. The final activity was a little weird. Each kid picked a color out of four options, then the teacher spread a bunch of short soccer cones out on the floor in the various colors and the kids had to go collect only their chosen color. And that was it! A half hour goes very fast.

Since Mr. b has to leave for his own class when Kirk’s gets done, I walked home with the kids. Kirk was very excited and talked about how much fun he had and what he’s going to do “next day” and how he’s “so tough”. Even though Thursday nights are my nights for choir, I think I might want to get Kirk signed up for the next session already. Mr. b can take them and I can meet them there after practice. I’m just glad that the boy didn’t fight it and seemed to genuinely enjoy himself.

Eye Cee Ewe

2009-09-21T11:16:00.000-07:00

Kirk had another eye appointment on Friday. He was…less well behaved than the first time. The optometrist’s assistant asked if he knew letters and started out showing him letters. He named them clearly for a while and then started in with the lunatic babbling. I hate when he does that. He totally sounds like Billy Madison. It’s sort of a corollary to him acting extra weird around kids he doesn’t know well. He is so smart and well spoken at home but then when there are adults he doesn’t know well he just switches into gibberish. He thinks it’s funny of course and I just want to bash my head against the wall. So she started showing him pictures instead of letters and he was mildly more clear with his responses, but only up to a point. I honestly don’t know how she was able to glean anything from it at all.

And then it was time for the eye drops. I knew it was going to be a problem. I mean, Kirk remembered them vividly from his first appointment. His father took him to his second appointment but that was just a muscle check so no dilation necessary. I actually had to hold him arms down so she could get the drops in his eyes. It was pretty ridiculous.

The nice thing is that then you have to wait a while for the drops to take effect and that break really helped to reset Kirk’s behavior. We played in both of the waiting rooms at the clinic so he could check out the varying toys. He even made friends with a couple of other kids in for whatever check-ups that day. So by the time he was seen by the actual doctor himself, he was reasonably cooperative.

The doctor wants Kirk to see a specialist. A specialist in eye surgery. I think I did a good job of not freaking out but also not being meek. I wanted to make sure that by seeing a specialist we weren’t passively agreeing to any surgery without further discussion. As I understand it, Kirk’s got a more unusual form of the strabismus than is typical for a kid. His vision in his right eye is equal to the vision in his left eye. They are both farsighted the same amount. So when he’s wearing his glasses, the right eye is straight. However, the muscle in the right eye is still weaker so it hasn’t been corrected by the workout of wearing glasses. In this instance that means that giving him an eye patch, to force the right eye to work overtime, wouldn’t actually make a difference because his sight isn’t the issue. (I wonder if this would work? Heh.) The doctor doesn’t know if this is something that Kirk will just grow out of and that’s why he wants a second opinion. I guess that makes sense, though I’m still completely freaked by the idea of my child needing surgery. But it’ll take a while before we find out since the specialist likely won’t be able to get us in for many months. In the meantime, Kirk’s glasses prescription remains the same and no other changes need to take place so that’s good.

Cry Babies

2009-09-10T06:19:00.000-07:00

Ronnie had her 6 month well baby check on Tuesday afternoon. Kirk actually came with! It was the first time Doc B had met him, though obviously he had heard all about him throughout my pregnancy. The up side of having Kirk with is that he’s excited about his next shots, because he wants to prove that he’s “so tough” and not cry during them. But of course he’ll forget all about that by the time next summer rolls around…

Young Miss V remains huge. She’s currently rated at 89% for height and 74% for weight. Kirk definitely didn’t hit those spots on the growth chart, staying around 50-50, like he is now. The girl got a mostly clean bill of health. However, I do need to go pick up a prescription for some cooter cream. She’s got something called a labial adhesion. Basically, the fine, thin skin of the inner labia has glued itself together. Doc said it’s really common and can happen to circumcised boys, too. I remember it happening with Kirk. Doc P just pulled the skin back, Kirk cried once, then it was fine. But that’s not the way to deal with it with girls apparently. She’s going to have an estrogen cream that we just need to apply once a day and the hormones will take care of it. Doc B said that she’s at the crossroads right now and it could separate on its own, especially since she’s such a kicky, kicky bundle. But it could also continue up to the urethra, potentially blocking up her pee and causing a bladder infection. Definitely don’t want that. So cream it is!

But speaking of Kirk and crying, man alive is he an emo kid these days. It’s both really sweet and really annoying. I’m glad he loves his cousins and his friends and his daycare ladies and his grandparents. It’s darling when he leaves someone and immediately says that he misses them, or when he announces that he misses someone he hasn’t seen in months. But when he starts bawling because I returned a Netflix disc? That makes me roll my eyes. I’m sure it’s just a phase, further developing emotions and whatnot. But part of me thinks this could be an actual part of his personality, too. His Daddy is sensitive. His Papa is totally sentimental. It’s not like it would come out of nowhere.

Epicurion Queries

2009-09-04T13:02:00.000-07:00

There’s been a minor rash of milk related food poisoning incidents in the Midwest lately. From drinking unpasteurized milk. And I just think, who drinks that? I mean, if you aren’t a dairy farmer, how would you even have access to it? Isn’t that illegal?

But of course Veronica drinks unpasteurized milk. It’s just mama milk, not cow milk. And it’s not homogenized so it separates as it sits in the fridge, waiting to be used. It’s easy enough to recombine the milk fats with the rest of the milk. Generally just the shaking and sloshing that gets done while heating the milk up under the faucet will do the trick. But it’s got me wondering: can you make cheese or butter from breast milk?

I’m not going to try. Don’t you worry your pretty little head. Mainly because I’m way too lazy for that kind of thing. But the scientist that lives in my head is definitely curious. I mean, it’s milk. You should be able to make milk products. But then who would use them? Ronnie’s not up to cottage cheese or even yogurt yet since she’s under a year. But would those things be OK for her to have since they wouldn’t be cow milk, which as I understand is the reason you need to wait a year before switching to whole milk from breast or formula? And if you have other kids, would they be fine eating breast milk ice cream? Or is the whole thing just too squicky and overly hippie dippie freaky to even consider?

People do some freaky-ass shit with their maternal by-products. Of course there’s the whole eating the placenta deal, which while fascinating is just far too gross to even consider. I don’t care if placenta pills ward off post-partum depression. I’m not living in the wild, nursing my litter of babies in a cave for weeks on end, needing the iron richness of my placenta to provide the only nourishment I’m going to get until they’re old enough for me to leave them and go hunting again. Therefore I’m not eating my placenta. End of story.

I did remember to ask to see it this time though. I can’t remember why I didn’t after I had Kirk. I know I was worried that birthing the afterbirth would somehow hurt which…yeah right. You can’t feel that after a whole damn baby just went through there! And I don’t remember watching while Mr. b cut the cord. I still didn’t see the cord be cut this time but I did ask to see the stuff before it got sent to disposal. It was all dark and weird and organy (duh) and there was a tiny little hole in the sack the nurse pointed out which would have accounted for the slow leak that was my water breaking. The umbilical cord is sort of whitish grey. Again, interesting from a scientific perspective, but I don’t need to save it for posterity.

Frankly I was far too jittery, literally, after having Ronnie to even consider anything more than satisfying intellectual curiosity. Apparently it was the pitocin. I had the shakes big time once she was out. They put her freshly born unwashed bundleness on my chest and I held her and loved her and tried not to vibrate her off of me I was shivering so hard. It took quite a while to get back to normal.

Bundletonia

2009-08-31T11:31:00.000-07:00

Veronica has earned herself a new nickname: Menace. This is because she grabs everything that comes within her reach. It’s unbelievable. And it all goes straight to her mouth. Of course. It’s both cute and extremely frustrating.

She’s even becoming more of a menace on the floor because she’s developed a circular version of the army man crawl. She’ll deliberately spin herself 360 degrees in order to get at whatever toys are within her sphere of reach. She hasn’t yet gone in a straight line but it’s really not going to be much longer before she adds her legs to the mix.

On top of all of this movement, she continues to be huge. I foolishly bought a pack of onesies a couple weeks ago in the 6-9 month size and they’re already too snug. I already went through hand-me-downs to pull out the 9 months for her but realized this weekend that I need to pull out the 12 months as well. I have no idea how this happened. She wore NB for nearly three full months and now is practically skipping over sizes!

Socializing

2009-08-25T13:38:00.000-07:00

Kirk is destined to be The Weird Kid in school. I mean, I suppose it was sort of inevitable with us as his parents. He could have rebelled by becoming a football jock or something but that’s already seeming incredibly unlikely. I’ve noticed that he even increases his weirdness quotient when he’s around other kids he’s not very familiar with. We were at a company softball game last week and he was off playing with random stranger kids that were attached to the game at the adjacent diamond. And he was totally upping the bizarre behavior, strange voices, calling things by the wrong names, deliberately subverting the rules of their impromptu game, that kind of thing. After some tattling to us they ended up finding a rhythm and playing together nicely but it definitely took a while.

I’ve noticed that older kids tend to exclude Kirk when there’s a group of kids playing together. At daycare there’s a 5 year old boy that he just idolizes and this boy is generally nice to Kirk. Except when all the other kids are gone for the day and the only other one left besides them is the 7 year old Mean Girl. Then they are rude and mean and call him names and don’t let him play with them. I’ve even seen this happen with Kirk’s alley friend who is about to turn 6. They play together so nicely and are really great friends, running over to each other’s houses and playing in each other’s yards. But whenever any of the other neighborhood kids are involved, again Kirk ends up being left behind.

I’m trying to not get too involved in child politics. Obviously he’s going to have to learn how to fend for himself because he’ll be starting school in a year and lord knows he’ll be interacting with all kinds then. But I am also trying to make sure that we go to as many family friendly artistic and intellectual type events as possible. Like the iron pour back in July. Going to Art-a-Whirl. We’re meeting my sister for a community theater production of the Jungle Book this Thursday. We bring both kids with to drop Daddy off at gigs. I bring them to book club once a month. Basically I want him to know that there are other weirdos out there. Musicians and artists and comic book readers and sci-fi fans and boys that wear pink dresses. He may be called “nerd” already (which I think is solely due to wearing glasses) but being a nerd is a good thing.

We do need to help Kirk to understand fandom. He gets so obsessive over something and expects everybody to automatically know what he’s talking about every single time. Not everyone has seen exactly what movie or book he’s referencing. Hell, not everybody has even heard of things like Doctor Who. Most kids can’t name a single rock drummer from the 60s, much less choose a favorite one.

I’ve decided that one thing I can do is get Kirk involved in activities. Nothing major. Just community offerings like swimming lessons and karate. I’ve been talking about signing him up for something for a year now and haven’t gotten around to doing it yet. I don’t think I can put it off anymore. I certainly don’t expect or even want him to be “normal” but I do think having some “normal” interests will help to normalize him around other kids.

Latest Developments

2009-08-19T06:26:00.000-07:00

Kirk had his Four Year Well Child Check last week. When do they start calling them annual physicals? It seemed sort of anticlimactic because he didn’t get shots. Doc P said she likes to save them up for the pre-kindergarten visit so it’s like a rite of passage. That makes sense. She was impressed with his intelligence (he was prattling on and on about dinosaur extinction) but also gave us literature on dealing with a kid that demands constant attention. Because…yeah. It’s definitely getting ridiculous with that kid. Doc was able to ease our minds on a couple of issues. Kirk often complains of a sore knee. But since there doesn’t seem to be any consistency, it’s likely just growing pains. I’ve also noticed he complains of being “so tired” or seems almost depressed at times. As long as he is easily snapped out of it, it’s just normal emotional development. So that’s a relief. We also brought Miss V with just to show her off, heh.

Sweet Bundle is back to a more normal sleep schedule finally. Having her wake up as early as 1am was getting rough, since I’m too lazy to return her to her crib. She was draining me dry before I would even get up in the morning! As I suspected, her step back was a prelude to a new trick: she’s rolling every which way now. I set her down on the floor blanket and she’s off before I even realize it. She can roll both directions and genuinely likes tummy time so she uses it as a method of locomotion more than anything. I find her under the rocking chair or under her swing, playing with furniture from below. She’s also starting to sort of side-crawl. She’ll get into half-roll position and push with her foot instead of roll over, scooting herself forward an inch. I predicted that she’ll be actually crawling in a week. Maybe that’s an underestimate but it’s going to be real soon. Quicker than her brother, that’s for sure.

Kirk’s on the last stages of night-time potty training. He was sleeping in underpants for a week or two and staying dry but after a couple of nights of peeing the bed he wanted to go back to wearing Overnights. He hasn’t been willing to try underpants again yet, even though his diaper has been dry most mornings. Mr. b has been great in producing this project. I think it’s close to his heart because he was a bedwetter into his elementary school years. I personally would have gone the lazy route and let the boy wear Overnights without thinking about it but I admit it’s been nice to give him praise and encouragement for such a Big Boy achievement.

Veronica likes carrots. Or else she just has no choice because when her daddy feeds her he means business. HA! I hadn’t made it to the grocery store yet last weekend so just pureed up a bunch of carrots for her. They’re not as silky smooth as purchased baby food but like I said, she seems to like them. We’ve also been mixing a little bit of apple juice into her rice cereal on occasion for a couple of weeks now. Which means that Ronnie officially eats three food groups!

Boobies

2009-08-05T11:54:00.000-07:00

I was looking through my old posts about Kirk at about the same age as Ronnie is now. The nursing ones especially. It’s truly amazing to me just how much effort I put into getting that boy to eat boobie. And I kept it up, too! There were so many setbacks, from him not latching on to not having a pump once I had to return the hospital rental. Sweet Bundle got it figured out before we even left the delivery room at the hospital!

I managed to keep up the attempt for a good four months before calling it quits. Kirk was definitely ready since he didn’t really care in the first place. Ronnie is five months and I am only just now starting to even contemplate weaning eventually, much less make plans for it. Neither of us are anywhere near ready for it. Kirk was formula fed with breast milk supplement and Ronnie is breast fed with formula supplement. Completely opposite situations. Plus, I can pump at work easily thanks to my sister passing on her Medela.

I’ve developed a pumping routine that seems to work nicely. I go twice a day and pump for 15 minutes each time. It takes about 25 minutes total because of set-up and clean-up. I tried going three times a day but it didn’t make any difference to my milk supply and was too hard to fit into my work schedule. I’ve definitely had days where a meeting gets scheduled during one of my usual pumping times, generally about 10am and 2pm, and I have fidgeted and watched the clock, waiting to get out so I could release the pressure. I guess it’s sort of like having to pee really badly. It doesn’t hurt, but it’s certainly uncomfortable. I had a programming class a few weeks ago and had to ask the guard at the building if there was a lactation room. That was an interesting experience.

The milk I pump generally gets used within a day or two at home. I was freezing it if the bag hit the one week mark but all of the frozen milk has since been used. There seems to be a sort of macho competition between women about how much milk they produce. The more and you “win”. Well, I loose apparently. I bring home about 7 ounces of milk a day, combined after two pumpings. Sometimes maybe a half ounce more and sometimes maybe a half ounce less but it’s really been pretty consistent. That’s not enough to feed the world and definitely not enough to feed chowhound Bundle at daycare so I never bothered even trying to send milk with her each morning. It’s easier to use it at home.

Now that Miss V is eating rice cereal the milk gets mixed into that and then she finishes whatever was left as a post-cereal bottle. That seems to be working for both of us as it gives me a chance to fill up again after the usual just-got-home-from-daycare feeding. Even if she just had a bottle before I picked her up, she still wants to nurse and that’s fine with me. It’s cuddling, bonding time for us. Same with co-sleeping. Veronica hasn’t really settled into a new schedule yet since the introduction of cereal into her diet. I think she’s also undergoing a pre-new-development regression, causing her to sleep fewer hours in a row at night. I remember Kirk doing that before each new trick. So I bring the girl into bed with me to sleep-nurse when she wakes up and since I fall back to sleep, she never makes it back into her crib.

I did read that Kirk got the go-ahead for apple juice, cut with water, after his four-month well-baby visit. I hadn’t even thought of that for his sister. She hasn’t had anything since the prune juice lattes of her constipated early weeks. I’m going to have to ask about that at her six-month well-baby. It seems the rules change all the time and vary from doctor to doctor. One thing at a time I guess. We’re still getting used to balancing Daddy playing with Brother while Mama feeds Sister.

Chow Time

2009-07-27T07:19:00.000-07:00

Ronnie’s eating patterns changed somewhat over the last few days. She’s been waking up earlier and earlier at night and eating nearly constantly for those few hours she’s in bed with me. So we decided to try cereal last night. She seemed to really like it! Obviously she has to learn to swallow the different consistency but she didn’t get mad like Kirk did on his first go. Maybe that’s because we’ve got some experience in the matter and maybe it’s just because she’s proving to be an all-around easier baby than he was. I did feel a slight twinge of “my baby is growing up” melancholy but only slight.

Awesomely, I managed to get a dinty conversation in this video. Kirk loves pizza but won’t eat the dinties. That’s the toppings. I don’t have a clue where he came up with that word but we’ve been using it for several years now so it’s just part of the family vocabulary.

Gifts

2009-07-24T09:27:00.000-07:00

I love hand-made gifts. I’ve just always been a fan. The time and effort and creativity that goes into them makes them so meaningful and precious. Kirk had several fantastic gifts of that sort. Of course there was the Enterprise sweater but he also had some awesome onesies that were hand decorated, a Tintin quilt that’s hanging on his wall, and I knitted him a little white hat and matching booties. I have done nothing of the sort for Veronica.

Thankfully, other people are picking up my slack. A couple of my aunts have made her some blankets, bibs, and a crocheted cube toy. Just this week we received this awesome TARDIS sweater, once again made by the inimitable akg!

The Trekkies sent around a card again, too. Lovely folks, one and all!

Bundle got this adorable hat from the fabulous monkeypants. It’s still a bit big but should fit perfectly for the fall.

And superbadfriend was super badass and painted Ronnie her very own orangedotstickbutt. And hand delivered it!!!

We hung that sucker up in the kids’ room right away.

Transportation

2009-07-22T09:18:00.000-07:00

I think Bundle has officially outgrown the Bjorn. I noticed the last time I had her in it, just for a neighborhood walk, that it seemed rather snug. She’s been facing forward for quite some time now, with the top folded down, so it’s not like there’s even another transformation we can make to eek out a bit more time. This weekend Mr. b had her in the Bjorn at a local art event and he noticed it was tight, too. In fact, once she was taken out to be passed around between friends, we never bothered to put her in it.

So I pulled the old umbrella stroller out of the coat closet. I think we have a “younger” stroller somewhere but hell if I know where. This umbrella stroller has definitely seen better days. It’s stained and the plastic latch to keep it folded is busted off and yeah, it’s been used. They’re cheap so I should just pick up a new one. Regardless, Ronnie fit in it just fine. She and Kirk and I went on a long walk and she really, really enjoyed it.

Veronica may have to deal with hand-me-downs with her baby equipment but at least clothes are one area where not everything is second hand from her brother. Yes, I’ve gone through his old bins and pulled out everything reasonably gender neutral. But that doesn’t add up to much. And there are so many cute little girl clothes to choose from! I love that brown seems to be the It color for girls this season. I happen to already be a fan and brown and pink is just a fantastic combination.

Veronica's Post

2009-07-07T06:48:00.000-07:00

Ronnie had her 4 month check up yesterday. Nothing exciting to report, which is as it should be. She’s getting huge, now weighing 14 pounds 1 ounce (65%) and is a tall girl at 25 and a half inches (90%). All physical development is on track and we can start her in on cereal in the next few weeks or so.

She’s starting to hold on to toys so I added some plastic links to her carseat.

She brings toys up to her mouth but doesn’t necessarily chew on them yet.

She continues to be a drool machine however. Doc said no teeth are immanent.

For some reason, I can’t get her to smile on camera. She has the most beautiful smile. Such an enormous, genuine grin. My dad was tickling her and I ran to get the camera, but once she saw me with it she went back into serious mode.

She’s got some awesome clothes. I love these legwarmers.

Kirk's Post

2009-07-07T06:35:00.001-07:00

Naturally Mr. b let Kirk open one of his presents from us a couple days early.

They spent quite a lot of time putting together “the courthouse what’s on fire” and playing with all the other Cars.

The main attraction, however, was saved for Kirk’s actual birthday: the drum set!

We had it set up in the basement and brought him downstairs, unawares.

Kirk requested that it be moved into his bedroom, understanding that meant the vast majority of his toys had to go downstairs. Now he and his daddy have band practice.

FOUR!

2009-06-29T06:53:00.000-07:00

We had Kirk’s birthday party this weekend. I was impressed that he understands it wasn’t his “real” birthday. I had explained that people have to work on his birthday this year so we were having his party on the weekend so people could come and bring him presents. Lots of presents.

I’m never organized enough to make actual goodie bags for the kids but I did pick up some random crap stuff for them to play with during the party. Mini-frisbees, bubbles, and candy necklaces.

We actually planned ahead and got a Star Trek cake. How cool is it that they have Star Trek cakes standard at the Target bakery right now? Love it when there’s a new movie out and kicking box office ass.

Apparently it was exceptionally tasty cake.

Young Miss V had fun being passed around.

But she crapped out hard when we all had quiet time after the party.

My sister and her family stuck around and that evening we walked up to the local Jamboree for fireworks and carnival rides. Mr. b was the best Drunk Uncle of all time and bought the kids shitloads of glow-in-the-dark bullshit. By the time we all got back home, my sister decided to give in to her girls’s constant begging to sleep over. So the tent went up in the backyard and Mr. b, Kirk, A1, and A2 all spent the night out there. I think Kirk’s still wrecked even today.

Current Events

2009-06-19T08:42:00.000-07:00

No means no. No I’m serious. It really does. When I tell you to stop jumping next to your sister, you need to stop. When I tell you to stop climbing the side of the couch, that doesn’t mean you should do it again. One more time is not an option. You need to quit.

Bundle slept basically through the night. I got her down about 10pm and she didn’t start to stir until nearly 5am. I don’t expect it to last but it was a pleasant surprise!

I’m really overthinking party times for Kirk’s Fourth Birthday Party.

The little girl is rolling over. It’s largely unintentional but it’s also pretty regular. She’ll be startled by her sudden back position after having just been propped up on her tummy and it’ll freak her out. Ronnie also likes to curl up on her side when lying on her back and is starting to move into tummy time from there. So both ways. Time to dig out the baby gate. And make sure the floors are cleaner. Ugh.

Kirk has a workaround for hate speech. He is not allowed to shout, “I don’t like you Mama” or Daddy or anyone else. So when he’s pissed he’ll bust out with, “I don’t like everyone.” It’s kind of hilarious. And who hasn’t had those moments of extreme misanthropy?

When I leave my nursing pads out they end up of the floor by morning. I figured one of the cats was playing with them but I wasn’t sure which one. Last night I saw Squeakers Squirrel sniffing at them. I guess it makes sense she’d be interested in the sweet smell of dried on boobie milk.

The kids are usually the last ones there when I drop them off at daycare. All the others gather around Veronica in her carseat while I help Kirk get his shoes, and hoodie if he’s wearing one, off and put away. Then he gives me at least one of the following: a hug, a kiss, a high five, a fist bump (blow it up), a nose rub. Sometimes I get all five. Then I give the Bundle a kiss and I’m off.

Kirk is starting to sometimes claim he “had a bad dream”, about twenty seconds after he’s been put to bed. Not falling for it.

Sleeping Arrangements

2009-06-17T13:35:00.000-07:00

Last night was Bundle’s second night in her crib in her brother’s room. So far, so good. I mean, it’s a work in progress, obviously, but we’re getting there. Kirk’s got a set bedtime ritual and once the routine is completed, he’s done. It’s easy to move bedtime up when necessary, just by starting procedures earlier. Ronnie, however, just eats and eats and eats and eats and then passes out. There’s no real adjustments possible. She’s generally sacked by 10:30, though it can happen earlier. So basically, I just sneak into the sleeping boy’s room, put the sleeping baby in her crib, and sneak back out. We’ve got the monitor set up so I’ll go fetch her when she wakes up in the 2am-4am range to eat again. Theoretically she could then go back but since we’ve mastered the laying down nursing position I generally just keep her in bed with me until I have to get up anyways.

I think the trick is going to be those nights where she falls asleep earlier and he’s wound up and talking to himself in his bed for two hours. We’ll see what happens.

Eye Boogers

2009-06-10T12:21:00.000-07:00

Ronnie had her first non-weight check or well baby related doctor’s visit yesterday. She woke up with her right eye crusted shut. It had been sort of boogery/mucusy on and off for the previous two days but never really that bad. She hasn’t had a fever or any other signs of sickness, other than a slight cough, so I hadn’t been worried about her. But even though having your eye that crusty is a pretty legitimate reason to go in to the doctor, I still wondered if I was just being an alarmist parent.

Doc didn’t seem to think I brought her in unnecessarily. He prescribed some eye drops, which I suck at administering. Babies have such immature sinuses that mucus can only really escape through the tear ducts and that in turn can cause an eye infection. I’m just glad that her first sickness is an easy one.

Science!

2009-06-05T11:53:00.000-07:00

Last night Kirk stepped on his sister. On her chest. The thing is, he wasn’t being malicious. But it also wasn’t an accident. He was experimenting. I was in the kitchen and I heard Bundle scream out in pain. When I turned around I saw him bent down and giving her kisses. It took a second to register that he had done something before I started in with the accusations. “What did you do to her?!”

When he admitted he stepped on her I had to ask where and he rubbed her chest. So then I had to check to make sure everything felt OK before I picked her up to comfort her. I asked if it was an accident and I could see the wheels turning before he answered no. Yeah right. If it had been a foot or hand I could buy accident. Hell, even arm or leg. But not chest.

After Mr. b got home from school I found out that Kirk had been testing the waters earlier. He had apparently been lightly resting his foot on her, removing it quickly when his father saw what he was doing. So clearly it had been on his mind for a while. That helps explain why he didn’t seem very remorseful. But he knew he was in trouble and he brushed his teeth extra good last night as a peace offering.

This is only the beginning of the sibling fun.

Dead TV

2009-05-28T17:33:00.000-07:00

I’ve always been a fan of reading the source material for movies. Not just sci-fi and fantasy but anything really. I think I first developed the habit after seeing “Howard’s End” and then equally adoring the book. I enjoy rereading each Harry Potter before its movie comes out and trying to guess the changes that the screenwriters had to make. It’s gotten to the point where I will read something I’ve been vaguely aware of or “meaning to” get to and once I hear that an adaptation is in the works then I’ll hurry up and check it out of the library.

I’ve been stuck in a vampire fiction rut for a good year now. It’s easy. And there are so many series to choose from that once I start one I don’t have to think very hard about what my next book will be. Check out the next one in the list!

Well, now it seems these two things are converging on me. Only not movie adaptions but rather television. The only television series that I’ve also read the source books from is The Dresden Files. I saw the show before I started reading the books and I haven’t gone back to rewatch the episodes to see how closely they hewed to the novels. I am aware of some character changes but I’ve got the two mentally categorized as fairly separate entities so it doesn’t really bother me. Plus, since I am already in the habit of doing mental script adaptations, I think I’m much more accepting of necessary alterations than the typical rabid fanatic.

I started reading the Southern Vampire Mysteries, also known as the Sookie Stackhouse series, once I found out that HBO’s show True Blood was based on them. The DVDs of the first season just came out and I’m excited to start watching. I’m hesitant, however, because I don’t wait to spoil myself – for the show or for the books! I’ve only read the first three and I don’t know how much the show has deviated from the plots. This should be my first experiment. The next series to be adapted is Anita Blake. I’ve gotten through the first four of those and the mini-series-as-series-pilot hasn’t even been filmed yet. So I should be quite a ways into it by the time it airs. The final series, however, I think I’ll skip entirely. I think I might be past the suggested read-by age for The Vampire Diaries. Sure, I devoured Twilight but then I turned into an LOLfan after that ghastly fourth offering. And the CW show they’re basing on the books seems just too…Twilight angst times Gossip Girl teens and I don’t know that I can take it. Boone on Lost did nothing for me so having him cast as a vamp is just not enough of a draw. Should be interesting to see if it makes as big of a splash in the zeitgeist as Twilight did.

Role Playing

2009-05-22T08:55:00.000-07:00

Kirk likes to act out movies and TV shows. Sometimes he’ll play the roles, like when he’s the Doctor, and sometimes he’ll use props, like his millions of Cars vehicles. If he doesn’t have any proper merch then he’ll use whatever he can find. He managed to gather together stand-ins for all the characters from the Brave Little Toaster, and plays with them in the kitchen because that’s where the toaster is.

Most frequently he’ll want to play musicians. This has been going on for a good couple of years now. He used to wear a gaudy plastic ring so he could be Ringo Starr. He used to wear a crapped out cowboy hat so he could be Dave Gahan. He’s got his own kid-sized guitar and sings along to videos and has great rock stance. But he always comes back to the drummers. He always wants to know who the drummer is when he’s introduced to a new band. He always wants to be able to see the drummer whether we’re watching American Idol or the Rolling Stone’s Rock n Roll Circus.

Since his only drums are a plastic baby toy set he got for like his first birthday (shhhh, we’re pricing out proper mini-kits), he likes to use anything and everything available. I’m not sure if the old diaper genie was promoted to drum status or if that’s a demotion since it was previously playing the role of a Dalek…

Poor Ringo has most definitely lost out on Favorite Drummer status. That honor now belongs to Nick Mason of Pink Floyd. Kirk’s fascination with volcanoes gets to crossover with his rock knowledge thanks to Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii. He loves watching Roger Waters slowly walk over to the gong during the prog madness. And he quite literally plays Saucerful of Secrets: The Game. He’s Nick of course. He’ll even make Mr. b sit down on the ground and use a busted off piece of lightsaber as a slide to properly portray David Gilmore.

Bathing Beauty

2009-05-17T12:45:00.000-07:00

I have never given my daughter a bath. I'm not sure how it's ended up that way but there you go. They've all been administered by her daddy. In fact, Ronnie has graduated from the sink to the bathtub and I still haven't bathed her myself.

The End of an Era

2009-05-12T13:10:00.000-07:00

Well, it’s over now. I’m nearing the end of Day Two back at work.

Last Friday Bundle had her Two Month well baby appointment. Everything looks good. She’s now at 10 pounds 3 ounces (over 4 pounds gained!) and 23 inches long (nearly 5 inches!) and has a little head (in the tenth percentile). Doc reiterated that he thinks her sporadic pooping is just her own preference. He asked lots of questions about it and thinks it sounds normal, though not common. Her belly button sticks out super far and that’s due to a small hernia; again normal and should heal itself without any intervention from us. She got her first shots, complete with Real Tears, and that’s about it. Oh, and she does seem like being a redhead is a real possibility. Especially in the sunlight there is definite auburn hair going on.

Grandma and Grandpa stayed with us until Sunday before flying back to Texas. It seemed like little Ronnie underwent an emotional growth while they were here: she smiles for real now! I love that part. Nothing like an infant’s genuine pleasure. I love it when she’s suckling away and then suddenly grins on the boob. But it also means that she’s moving into the part where she doesn’t think it exists if she can’t see it and so separation anxiety begins. Which makes my going back to work even harder.

Drop off yesterday morning went well. Of course she didn’t know what was coming. C said she ate well and didn’t need the breast milk I had sent with as comfort food just in case. So I’ll be freezing the milk I pump during the day at work. So far I’m pumping twice a day and getting quite a lot. I have a little picture of my bundle on the pump case and a snippet of her fussing saved on my phone so I can trigger the mental impulses to start the milk flowing. I should bring some of her used laundry to smell, too, but that seems like work. But even with the pressure relieved mechanically, I was still desperate for her to get back on the breast as soon as we got home. Mr. b and Kirk were heading to the store and after looking at us nursing on the couch just chuckled and said, “You two have fun.” Still, it took some time before she seemed like “mine” again. She just didn’t look at me the same way when I picked her up in the afternoon.

To just get it all over with at once I’ve also begun crib training. Well, not precisely. I don’t want to disturb her brother’s sleep in their room so instead it’s technically bassinet training. Same method we used with Kirk though: put the Bundle in her bundle bin rolled into our darkened bedroom, let her cry for X number of minutes, go in and comfort her, put her back down, wait for a longer period, go back in, and so on. It only took a few tries and then she slept soundly for a good solid four hours. She’s been a very noisy sleeper all along and prone to only sleeping on the boob or resting on one of our chests so I think this is a great first try. Hopefully when she’s too big for the bin she’ll already be used to sleeping by herself and the transition to the crib will be relatively easy.

I do feel kind of like I’m betraying her trust though. Leaving her with a stranger all day and then not even holding her all night. But hey, I still keep her in bed with me once she wakes up to nurse. Now that we’ve got the laying down position figured out good enough it’s easier to just roll over and switch her from side to side as she wants more boobie. And she was in a good mood this morning, even falling asleep on the “lengthy” five block drive to daycare, so I guess she’ll forgive me eventually. One day at a time.

Three Things

2009-05-07T09:18:00.000-07:00

1) Kirk started his new daycare on Monday. Things seem to be going well. It's definitely more structured than his old daycare but I think that's a good thing. It also feels somehow more "official" because there were forms to fill out. We walked there this morning and yesterday morning. I love that it's walking distance! Kirk still talks about his old gang when confabulating but I'm sure the new kids will start getting mentions after he's been there a while.

2) We bought a new car Monday night. It's a 2009 Pontiac Vibe. Our '99 Jetta, Otto Rodriguez, had been dying a slow death for the past year or so. If it was just Mr. b and I we probably would have continued to limp him along for a while yet. But we're a one car family and we need something 100% reliable now that there are kids in the picture. It's just slightly bigger but enough to make a difference with two carseats in the back.

3) Mr. b's parents are flying up from Texas this afternoon! They haven't met their new granddaughter yet. We're all very excited to see them. Kirk is looking forward to taking them to Target and pointing out everything that he wants that his mean mama and daddy won't buy for him. They're only here through Sunday so the visit is going to go way too fast. And then when they're gone it means I have to go back to work.

Child Garden

2009-05-04T10:54:00.000-07:00

Friday morning we took Kirk in for his Kindergarten pre-screening testing. It's required by the state of Minnesota for all children attending public schools. There were three parts to the screening: mental development, physical development, and bureaucracy.

We had a lot of paperwork to fill out, some of it immediately identified by Mr. b as remnants of the "progressive" programs instituted by New Dealers. Then we all went in to meet with the first of three ladies. She had Kirk build small towers of blocks, do some counting, pick the correct opposites, match shapes, do simple drawing, things like that. As a parent it was incredibly difficult to keep my mouth shut. I wanted to nudge him in the right direction, give him hints, or simply laugh at his hilarious attempts or failures. There were several instances where he got something wrong that he knows perfectly well how to do. But I suppose having the patience to go through this process is part of the whole "readiness" idea.

Next we went to get his eyes checked. That seemed silly to me since obviously Kirk wears glasses. He wasn't interested in their old school vision chart and the lack of friendliness on the part of the woman administering this portion of the exam certainly didn't help. We gave up on that and tried to do the hearing test. But she accidentally stepped on Kirk's foot and he cried and cried and cried and we gave up on that, too. I have two forms for medical professionals to fill out now. He's got his eye check-up next week but the hearing one will have to wait for his next physical in July. I remember doing all these tests in elementary school and really enjoying the hearing one especially. Mr. b says he remembers them, too.

Lastly we met with a lady to review all the results. Kirk's age bracket, 3.8-3.9 years, needed to score an 18 out of 48 on the mental stuff. He got a 32. So no worries there. Basically, everything is on track and there are no areas of concern. We found out which elementary school he'll attend - and that he'll ride the bus - and that's about it. It was an interesting process and definitely a milestone. It's hard to believe I'll have a "school aged" child soon but he'll start Kindergarten next year!

Yay Poop!

2009-04-30T18:30:00.000-07:00

Tonight Bundle finally pooped. It had been six days. A couple of weeks ago she stopped going several times a day - or even every day. After three days she had a major blow out and things have been irregular ever since. This was the longest wait, however, and I had actually called the doctor earlier this week. We were advised to mix in one ounce of prune juice with three ounces of formula or milk, once a day. It totally looked like cappucino. Thankfully it only took two of them. If she hadn't pooped by today I would have had to call Doc back.

I have no idea what caused this though. I've heard the theory that the baby is growing and using up every last bit of caloric energy and therefore not having anything to excrete. That seemed reasonable to me when it was just once. My dad loves telling the story of me being constipated as an infant and "popping like a cork". But that doesn't really match Ronnie's issue. I think we're going to be doomed to repeat nqllisi's experience with her daughter: a month of repeated poo strikes and prune juice treatments. I'll ask Doc for his insight at her two month appointment next week. And...I guess we'll just have to see what tomorrow's diaper holds.

A Family Matter

2009-04-28T08:51:00.000-07:00

When my mom was first diagnosed with MS in 1986 no one knew what it was. Very few people had even heard of it, much less knew what it stood for. At age 11, I quickly developed a short speech to explain it to my friends. Since then we've come a long way. It seems like everyone knows of someone with MS - when it used to be somewhat kept under wraps. Celebrities with MS have come out and advocated for understanding and continued research. You can help. I'm a notorious procrastinator and once again, the walk is this coming Sunday! I apologize for the short notice but donations will be taken until May 29th. I appreciate any help you feel willing to give.
Thanks in advance!

Consider a pledge to end multiple sclerosis and support me during Walk MS: Twin Cities Walk 2009.

MS stops people from moving. The National MS Society exists to make sure it doesn’t. Please help by making a donation — large or small — to move closer to a cure for MS. Or, why not join me on the day of the event? Become a participant and side by side, as teammates, we will move together to raise the funds that make a difference.

Whatever you can give will help. I greatly appreciate your support and will keep you posted on my progress.

Click here to visit my personal page and make a secure, online donation.

If the text above does not appear as a clickable link, you can visit the web address:
http://main.nationalmssociety.org/site/TR?px=3531245&pg=personal&fr_id=9611

Me and Bundle McGee

2009-04-27T13:58:00.000-07:00

Friday night Mr. b's band played the fashion show in the Twin Cities. We had planned on me attending this event since he first got the gig, sometime last fall. I've been out a couple of times since having Ronnie, once with the mister and once with the girls, but this was going to be major. We arranged to have the kids sleep over at my sister's house. We took the bus so we could both drink without concern. And it was a ton of fun.

But sometime during the second or third band (each band had two designer's lines shown during their set, here's the first during Mercurial Rage and here are some clips of the entire evening) I got a text from my sister. "What time do you think you will be done? Bundle really needs her mom." Well shit. That put a bit of a damper on things. But what was I supposed to do? I replied that there was still several bands left and that neither of us would be able to drive anyway. So she offered to come and get us.

Ultimately it was no big deal. We stayed until the end of the music and fashion and got a chance to talk to nearly all of our friends in attendance while waiting for my sister to show up. I had stopped drinking - and had only had three at that point anyway - once I first got the word from her so I could safely nurse Veronica once we got home. But it also made me think and I had a bit of a revelation: I am not ready to go back to work.

This was supposed to be my last week of leave. Eight weeks is not enough. So I talked to my manager and I'm taking one more. Sure, nine weeks isn't really *that* much more but I think it's going to make all the difference in the world. I'm still going to have a much harder time going back than after my leave with Kirk. I had 12 or 13 weeks then and he went to Auntie Daycare so I was able to convince myself he was merely hanging out with his cousins. This will feel much more painful and final. I am going to bawl my eyes out on the way to work that first morning.

Free Music!

2009-04-21T08:02:00.001-07:00

Mr. b's fantastic band, Mercurial Rage, has a new single out today!

Mercurial Rage have been raising the roof around here for the last couple years with their uniquely infectious, ultra danceable sounds. Taking inﬂuence from the ﬁnest exponents of electronic pop’s ﬁrst Golden Age (think Depeche Mode, The Cure, and dance-rock bands like Happy Mondays and Primal Scream), The Rage add their own totally unique lyrical stamp and jaunty melodic personality.

Download their awesome three-sided-single here!

Recovery

2009-04-16T06:52:00.000-07:00

Well, now I can go back to work. I don't want to but I have my doctor's OK. How the hell did I afford such a long leave with Kirk?

My post-partum check-up went smoothly. Everything's healing as it should be. I guess there are still some stitches that haven't fully dissolved but they're the inner most ones. I'm pretty sure I tore during delivery - 5 minutes of pushing goes extremely fast and I don't remember them making me pause for an episiotomy like last time. I noticed that Doc was referring to some notes in my file throughout my visit and I finally got a glimpse: it was a summary from the on-call doctor at the maternity ward! I don't know that I even said a single word to her. Doc showed up about 10 minutes after Ronnie was born and while he checked her over, basically all he did was congratulate Mr. b and I and shake our hands.

Since we're absolutely determined not to have an "oops" I definitely wanted to get on birth control right away. Supposedly nursing is about 90% effective, at least until your first period. And the no estrogen mini pill is also about 90% (and won't dry up your milk supply), but combined the two are as good as the regular pill. Doc said I should give the pill a couple of weeks to get into my system and double up on contraception until then. As much as we'd like to get back to normal marital relations, Mr. b and I are both a bit hesitant. I don't remember how long after Kirk's birth we waited.

It seems I had gained a total of 15 pounds from the time of my first ob visit until my final one. And now I'm officially 16 pounds less than that final weigh in. Doc was worried that such rapid weight loss might mean I was too busy taking care of the kids first and forgetting about myself. I assured him I'm eatin' like an eatin' fool. I actually need to make sure I don't go overboard with that. I gained weight after Kirk's birth because while I was nursing some, I wasn't nursing much. But I was ingesting enough calories for full time milk production. I suppose for the moment (the barnacle is attached to my boob as I type this one-handed) I don't really need to be concerned. Everything will change when I go back to work.