The World According to Jen

There's No Place Like Gnome

2008-08-10T21:56:00.000-07:00

G, in his infinite wisdom, decided that we needed our very own garden gnome. And to make sure that the gnome, named Winklebottom, made it home safely from the store, the gnome took a ride in Bug's carseat. Bug was at school at the time, so she wasn't displaced.

Then there was research to determine the proper placement of said garden gnome. He currently lives under a rose bush in our backyard.

Bug thinks he's quite fabulous and regularly asks to go outside to see Winklebottom. They have bonded. Last week, she made sure to introduce him to the gardener.

In other news, there really isn't much to report. I am making more of an effort to knit these days and just completed my first decrease section of my Clapotis, which is by far the largest thing I have ever knit. After that, it will be back to small projects.

And while I am obsessed with the Olympics, I am more obsessed with slee p, so I have been watching things well after they air in their first run live for the east coast, tape delayed for the west coast showings on NBC.

And I'm already going through withdrawal from So You Think You Can Dance. At least we still have Project Runway.

Spaghetti

2008-07-01T22:28:00.000-07:00

This was Bug after dinner last night:

I think she ate as much as she wore, but one can never really know.

Bug's Thoughts on Kobe Bryant

2008-06-17T22:04:00.001-07:00

We filmed this last summer, but G just posted it to youtube. Go Celtics!

In other news, Uncle Jeff has joined our household, Doof has decided to go to public school for high school, and I need to start going to the gym and eating better. Ben and Jerry have found me. And so has Haagen Dazs.

The cupcake taste test was great fun. My boss had cupcakes from Teacake, Creekside (a bakery near the office), and Safeway. She also made Pillsbury from a box. She made the store-bought cupcakes look less pretty, cut them up, and served them to about 25 people, who all voted for their favorites. Pillsbury won. Teacake only got one vote. While not very popular with the office set, it is very popular with my Thursday night knitting group. I definitely need to go on a Sunday for the raspberry buttercream frosting. Yum!

The Child Is Strange

2008-06-02T21:45:00.000-07:00

Tonight's chosen item for bedtime snuggles: a bottle of bubbles. Not something snuggly like a puppy or a bear. No, bubbles. That started to leak. She's odd. She must have gotten that from her father.

The cable for the camera is missing. I'm sure it would turn up if I bothered to actually look for it. But free time is at such a premium these days, that I seem to find other things to do (read: sack out on the sofa and watch various recorded programs).

What else to tell? I had done an amazing job with watching what I ate and lost 11 pounds since the beginning of the year. Alas, life has gone rather topsy turvy and I seem to be self-medicating with snacks. So some of the 11 have come back. But they will go away again. I just need to buckle down and eat properly again. But it will have to wait until after tomorrow's cupcake taste test at work.

Bug Is 3

2008-03-27T10:09:00.000-07:00

I am at a loss. Last night, we watched video of the first time we fed her "solid" food. She was so tiny.

Where did the time go?

Nothing in Particular

2008-03-21T22:25:00.000-07:00

Bug turns 3 next week and it's killing me. We have tickets to see the Wiggles and her party is at this place next weekend. I promise there will be pictures (assuming I can find the camera). It should all be fun, but it's making me kind of sad to realize that my little girl isn't so little anymore. Her vocabulary is growing daily, she does engage in a bit of creative counting (... 15, 17, 18, 19, 100), and she has mastered the alphabet. It won't be long before she's a teenager and decides that her parents are idiots. It's all just happening way too fast.

But she does provide fodder for great stories:

Last week, we took her to song and story time at a bookstore in our old town. There, the guy broke into a song that went something like this -

Alligator pie, alligator pie

If I don't get some, I think I'll cry

Take away the green grass, take away the sky

But don't take away my alligator pie

He then took requests for other types of pie and sang about lamby pie and bunny pie and dolly pie. Then, my not shy Bug chimed in with "A COWWWWWWWWWWWWWW." Yep, that's my kid, asking for cow pie. I'm so proud.

To totally change the subject, riddle me this - While reading Crazy Aunt Purl's blog I saw a picture of someone I thought looked familiar. So I clicked over to her blog and read and read (she's looks to be an incredibly fabulous person), it turns out I was right. We knew each other back in elementary school and junior high, but went to different high schools and lost touch. So do I pop on over and say howdy, remember me? Or do I just let it all go? Suggestions?

How Did it Get to Be December So Fast?

2007-12-05T19:15:00.000-08:00

Halloween

This pretty much sums her up

How to make mommy's shoes look large

Really, it boggles the mind. In any event, there really hasn't been much to report lately.

I survived yet another birthday. Ice cream cake really helps. I strongly recommend it.

I somehow ended up hosting Thanksgiving for G's family this year. Having never really thrown a dinner party of any kind, making turkey for 18 was a bit overwhelming. I was responsible for the turkey (thank you, Alton Brown), the stuffing (Ham on the Street - cornbread and Italian stuffing), and the vegetables. And no one got sick. And I had more than a little to drink. It all seemed to turn out ok and I had more than a little stuffing left over. As one friend would say, that's a high quality problem to have.

And now we are in the holidays, which is terrible for my waistline, what with all the snacks that seem to show up at work, a place where I spend far too much time seated and eating. Bad, bad Jen. Last night was the Christmas concert at Doof's school (she goes to parochial school by her mom's choice). They were most emphatic about saying it was a Christmas concert and not a holiday concert. Why people get their panties in a twist over being wished "happy holidays" I'll never know. I was so tempted to wish everyone a Happy Hanukkah. In any event, I knit through most of it, so I could tune out the prayer stuff. And we left right after her part of the program (one measly song), which meant we missed the sermon. Woo hoo!

Bug amazes me with what she says these days. She's getting pretty good at telling us what she wants, often loudly if we don't get it the first time or don't jump to respond to her demands. She knows her colors, her letters, and her numbers, adores Curious George, shares my love of bacon, bleu cheese, potatoes, and mint chip ice cream, still refuses vegetables, will watch Blue's Clues all day long, and positively melts my heart every time she comes over and demands "a snuggles".

The most exciting thing going on for me, other than my Bug constantly keeping me on my toes, is that I got my Ravelry invitation and I can spend hours looking at what other people are knitting. I tried my first fingerless glove (Fetching from Knitty) and, while it turned out pretty well, I think the Cascade 220 I used was a bit itchy. So I'll try something else.

OK, Tel, Here Goes

2007-08-11T15:24:00.002-07:00

Since Tel tagged me, I guess I had better get cracking with the answers.

The Rules:
1. We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.
2. Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3. People who are tagged write their own blog post about their eight things and include these rules.
4. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged and that they should read your blog.
5. 8 is a magic number. Not three.

1. I had far too much dental work done as a child. I'm fairly certain that we sent the dentist's kids to college. The sadist convinced my parents that I needed braces at age 6 to correct my two front teeth and that my baby teeth all needed to be pulled. Well, not all, just all but three. And he yelled at me if I cried.

2. I am far more fascinated with popping out blackheads than I should be. I'm not sure what that says about me other than I still have the teenage acne one should outgrow by the time she is 36. I guess my skin didn't get the memo.

3. The Frank Sinatra song, "The Way You Look Tonight" is likely to make me burst into tears wherever I am. It happened at Starbucks last week.

4. For normal people, after nursing, their boobs tend to get smaller. Not mine. They stayed the same. God only knows what will happen should I end up having and nursing another baby. Scary.

5. I have moments when I am convinced that I will not live to see age 61, but then that's probably not that crazy since both of my parents died at age 60.

6. If George of the Jungle with Brendan Fraser is on television, I will watch it. Anytime, anywhere. That movie has gotten me through some tough times, including the bar exam.

7. I am terrified of being trapped in an elevator. That fear is only surpassed by the fear of being trapped in an elevator while needing to pee.

8. I loathe ketchup. Unless it's on an In n Out burger, which I order without the sauce. And the tomato and the cheese. Whatever. I want it how I want it.

Since I don't really know 8 people to send this to who haven't already been tagged, I'm changing the rules. Here, in no particular order are 8 random things about Bug:

1. This is Bug's favorite song. She asks for it by name. Repeatedly.
2. Her favorite color is red.
3. Her love of the Wiggles seems to be declining. Sesame Street is pretty high on the list these days. And Jack's Big Music Show.
4. She just had her third haircut, not because her hair is too long, but because, like her mommy, she needs it thinned out regularly. Otherwise, it's most unruly.
5. Her favorite foods are macaroni and cheese and bacon.
6. She does not have a lovey. Instead, it really depends on the day as to what she wants to snuggle with at bedtime. Last night, it was mommy's slippers, a toy soda bottle from her shopping cart, and a stuffed puppy. The night before, it was a book, a scarf, and some beads.
7. She currently has an aversion to wearing pants.
8. She knows more things than I knew. She can count to ten in English without assistance and Spanish (with coaching). She knows her shapes. And she finally identifies colors by their names rather than their corresponding Wiggle character.

Picture Day

2007-07-13T09:50:00.001-07:00

I love that Bug's day care does school pictures. And the person they use every year is amazing. I haven't any idea how he got her to sit so still and smile on cue. I'm in awe. And someone from school gets credit for the cute hair. The rest is all Bug.

I'm playing hooky from work today to see the new Potter movie with the family. Uncle Jeff is in town, so we are all going together.

The house is coming together. I have an unreasonable amount of love for our new carpeting. I guess I really have no excuse not to get busy unpacking. I just don't feel like it. But I need to find some things. The foosball table is built and gracing the dining room, since the dining room table is in the eat in kitchen. It all seems to work pretty well. Foosball at our house is a bit unusual since not only are we trying to score goals, we have to dodge the fast-moving hands of our Bug when she tries to steal the ball off the table. She's quite proud of herself when she can grab "my soccer ball", which becomes known as "MYYYYY SOCCER BALL" if she thinks it takes too long to catch (or if we play keep away).

Oh and happy birthday, mom. Today, she would have been 63.

An Update

2007-06-06T19:30:00.000-07:00

Yes, I'm still alive. And I will post pictures of Bug as soon as I figure out which moving box has the cord for the camera and get the necessary software on my new laptop (Mother's Day present).

Life has pretty much been taken over by the move. It is so amazing to be in my own house. We have been here for exactly 12 days. The movers did the bulk of the heavy lifting, but there were loads of things for us to do. G took the week before the move off work so that he could bring stuff up on his own. With movers charging by the hour, we wanted to make things as easy as possible. Besides, it was his turn to be the person doing the work before the move. I did it last time and I was 9 months pregnant with Bug at the time.

Anyway, everything went fine. We devoted Memorial Day weekend to the move and managed to get the kitchen unpacked. I love love love love LOVE my new kitchen. I actually have empty cupboards and more counter space than I could have imagined. It's lovely.

I could say the rest of the house is coming together, but I would be lying. Oh my god, this is my house. Sorry, that happens to me a lot. I need to get back in the swing of this unpacking business. In the meantime, we are settling in. Bug seems to be fine with the move. I think she likes having the room to move around. We went from a 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath townhouse with a tiny kitchen and one main room downstairs to a 4 bedroom, 2.5 bath house with a large, eat in kitchen, and more than one other room downstairs, so that I can, if necessary for my sanity, avoid watching episodes of The Wiggles over and over and over and over again. Of course, we will be in debt for eleventeen thousand years, but it's so worth it.

And, if I'm lucky, I'm never moving again.

Other than that, we took a trip to New York in April. Pretty much everything revolves around the house. And I'm pretty ok with that. You can often find me at my alternate address, Home Depot, where I spend far too much time and money.

The big mission these days is to figure where all of the important things are in our new town. We do have an In n Out Burger, 5 Starbucks, a Whole Foods, and a yarn store. I will probably check it out this weekend, but I don't imagine I will give up on my dealer anytime soon. I figure, if someone teaches you how to knit and solves your sock knitting crises, a mere 20 miles won't make you change permanently.

So that's the skinny. I'll try to post more often now that we have our DSL up and running.

TWO!!!!!!!

2007-03-29T22:06:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday, Bug!

In other news, we are in escrow. It only took offers on 4 different houses to get one to stick. We close in mid May. Very scary. But cool. I guess I really am a grown up.

A Bit Much?

2007-03-20T19:00:00.000-07:00

This is what happens when dress codes run amok. Methinks I need to buy my very own pair of Tigger socks.

What to Tell?

2007-03-14T18:19:00.000-07:00

When last I posted, we had made an offer on a house. We received a counter offer, countered the counter, and were informed that the seller had gotten another offer and wanted to pursue that. They are in escrow now. So back to stage one. We bid on another house that was more of a fixer-upper (i.e. it needed a brand new backyard since it was all rocks and shrubs, with not a blade of grass to be found) and we asked that they remove their eyesore of a dog run. Their response, "no, we won't lower the price and we won't get rid of the dog run." Talk about a big F You. We would have preferred that they just send a photocopy of their middle fingers instead.

We are now in the negotiation process over a third house, so we shall see what happens. While sending over the offer doesn't make me want to vomit anymore, I'm not nearly as hopeful that this would be easy.

We just got back on Sunday from our annual pilgrimage to Arizona in pursuit of spring training baseball games. G has now been to every ballpark there and I have one to go. Our favorite is still the Milwaukee Brewers park since the bratwursts rock our worlds. Bug enjoyed running around the stadiums, meeting other little kids, and trying to steal their toys. The only real drama that happened on the trip was another example of yours truly's grace and elegance. While carrying Bug, I fell going up a flight of stairs on the way to dinner on Saturday night. I blame my shoes. It's their fault. Bug is fine. She was pretty shaken up but not injured. I didn't fair quite so well, having scrapes and bruises to show for my trouble. Of course, I decided to break my fall with my hand. My left hand, of course, which is less than fantastic given that I am a left-handed freak. I had x-rays this afternoon and it's a "soft tissue injury," which is good since there is no cast involved. The doctor said it should get better in about two weeks, but I should rest it and take ibuprofen.

Alas, no narcotics. I could really use them, not for the pain in my wrist (which can be major) but instead to ease the pain of the doctor-imposed knitting hiatus. And my sock class is this weekend. Perhaps I will go anyway, just to pet the yarn. And have an excuse to stop at my favorite pastry place on the way.

Oh, and, if you happen to be near Tucson, check out the local tv stations in hopes of seeing an ad for Purl's, the only knitting store I have heard of that advertises on television. How cool is that!

Yikes!

2007-03-03T15:33:00.000-08:00

After about 6 weeks of house hunting, we made an offer on a house on Thursday. The counteroffer came back yesterday and we sent off our counter counter offer today.

Scary. I'll keep you posted.

More Bug

2007-02-10T22:15:00.000-08:00

Because I have to show her off:

If only I could fall asleep so easily...

Elmo had just arrived from Amazon that afternoon.

Perhaps a Bit Excessive?

2007-02-10T22:08:00.000-08:00

This must have been some meal. I was glad to read that profits would go to charity, but still. Picky eater that I am, I probably would have preferred the $0.75 pad thai.

CJ's Birthday Party

2007-02-04T14:35:00.000-08:00

Bug's pal from daycare just turned 2. His birthday was at a local gymnastics studio and everyone, including yours truly, got to play on the trampolines and in the foam pit and so forth. I think Bug was a little nervous when we first got there, but she got the hang of everything and ran all over the place. It certainly wasn't like the gym I used to go to when I was a kid. It was a great place for a party.

Seventh Grade and Other Stuff

2007-02-04T09:31:00.000-08:00

I apologize in advance for how disjointed this is going to be.

It turns out that I wouldn't have had much of a chance to knit at jury duty. They brought in enough people to select juries for two cases and, luckily, one settled almost immediately. So I was out of there by 10:45. The good news was that I didn't have to sit there all day not knitting (I brought 3 books and the jury holding tank had internet access, but still). The bad news, of course, was that I couldn't really rationalize not going into the office. Oh well.

Oh and in my mission to finish UFOs, I finished up a scarf that I started in November 2005. Once I find the cable for our camera, I'll post pictures. Of course, Bug will be my model.

I also decided to sign on for Project Spectrum, so I will have to cast on something in the appropriate colors. The scarf I just finished would have worked colorwise, but since I started it forever ago and finished in January, I'll have to do something else. I do have the yarn for a navy and cream hat in Cashsoft, so that could work. The reason I signed on for this at all is because I have a hank of green, yellow, and pink Schaeffer Anne sock yarn that was just waiting for the right project.

Ok, so now for the seventh grade portion of the program. Doof is a seventh grader (I still can't believe she's that old) and she and her friends have some interesting ways of saying things. And when like isn't every third word, it can be pretty funny. For example, every girl I have ever met has a certain euphemism for that less than fun week every month. Doof and her friends call it "TOM" as in time of the month. Yeah, I was slow and she had to explain her acronym And when Doof realized she didn't have sufficient supplies, she said that she had forgotten "TOM's luggage." Hee.

Doof has been at the same school since kindergarten, so she has spent a lot of time with the same kids.* As far back as I can remember, she has had something of a love hate (well, mostly hate hate) relationship with Icky Vicky. Lately, things have been rather chilly between them, to the point where Doof didn't invite Icky Vicky to her birthday party and Icky Vicky wanted to know why. And then she started grilling Doof about whether Doof or any other girl had problems with her. Doof, being the diplomat and unwilling to speak for her friends (even if she knew what they thought), said no. Well, it sort of came out that one of the other girls was more than willing to tell Icky Vicky that they don't enjoy inviting her to parties because she always creates drama. Sidenote: Boy do I not miss seventh grade.

Next thing you know, Icky Vicky starts yelling at Doof out by their lockers, calling her a liar and a brat and so forth. She made my Doof cry. But another student saved the day, by telling Icky Vicky very clearly:

You aren't being very nice. You should go away.

Icky Vicky had no comeback. I don't know that I would either. That could be the crane technique of middle school insults.

* While I could go on for hours about why I am not a fan of that school, I'll save that for later.

Are You Kidding?

2007-01-29T22:39:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow, I get to go to jury duty. And, until today, I figured that I would have a lot of free time to knit until they told me it was time to go home.

After listening to the recording about how my group needs to show up tomorrow at 9:30 (I get to sleep in), the recorded voice launched into a speech about the new security measures at the county courthouse and listed the things we can't bring into the courtroom. No knives of any size. Ok, sharp, makes sense. No tools for cutting or scissors. Sharp again. No guns. Doy. No explosives and no mace. I don't own either, so no problem.

Then she said this:

Knitting needles will be confiscated.

What? That couldn't be right. I listened to the whole message again. And again with the confiscated. Imagine my horror. I understand that my size 0 Addi turbos that I use for magic loop could possibly be deemed a weapon if someone were really desperate. But all knitting needles? Honestly. Even the double points? Are they really more dangerous than a pencil?

I guess I just can't see the threat there. Do they really expect a posse of crazed knitters to go postal in the courtroom and start attacking people. It's absurd.

Alas, the knitting will stay at home and I'll bring books. But I won't be happy about it.

2007-01-16T00:17:00.000-08:00

The Best Laugh Ever

You will understand why I posted this once the comic puts the microphone in front of they guy in the middle.

Really.

Happy New New

2007-01-01T18:22:00.000-08:00

After I permanently moved to Northern California, my dad would call me on January 1 and wish me a "Happy New New." He thought he was being cute and now that I don't get that call with the silly wish for the coming year, I miss it. A lot. So I thought I would reinstate it and use it myself.

In any event. G and I had the last week off work, which was lovely but for the fact that we all got sick. Bug got an ear infection, G got a sinus infection, and I just got the delight of bronchitis. I now have a cool purple inhaler to show for it. And we just found out that Doof has strep. Swell. At least everyone went to the doctor and is on the mend. Hurray for antibiotics and cough syrup with codeine.

Anyway, Uncle Jeff stayed here until Friday, which was fun. He's a very good guest.

We spent a quiet New Year's Eve at home, doing a whole lot of nothing. It was lovely. Alas, there was no champagne, but there was some wine and spaghetti. Bug entertained herself either by demanding that we watch the Wiggles (again) or by playing with a roll of Christmas wrapping paper. Who needs Tickle Me Elmo and 85 other new toys when there is giftwrap?

To start the new year off, I have decided on some goals for the year:

1. Eat healthier and exercise more: After standing on the scale at the doctor's office on Friday, it became very clear that there is more of me to love than I would like for there to be. I'm thinking that going on a modified version of the food plan I used while pregnant should do it. Essentially, more small meals and less sugar.

2. Watch less television: I spend far too much time watching crap when I could be doing more productive things.

3. Be more organized: Anyone who has ever been to my place knows that anything would be an improvement at this point. What I really need to do is go through all of my junk and get rid of things. For example, it's time to part with the size 4 dress I wore to the Law Prom eleven million years ago. I don't need to keep the dress to remember how people responded to it.

4. Finish knitting projects that I have started: I have decided to take part in this because there are just too many things sitting and waiting to be completed. I don't know that I have that many projects currently on the needles, but if I add in the things I promised to make and bought the supplies for, that should keep me plenty busy. And it would cut into the ever-growing stash, which would end my self-imposed yarn-buying hiatus.

5. Be more positive: Heck, it can't hurt, right? So, to start that off right, I want to send out positive thoughts to everyone for a better 2007 than 2006. Here's to health and happiness and love and no drama in the coming year. Life is too short to be unhappy.

6. Post more pictures: Because Bug is too cute for words and will only be this young for a short while longer. I can't believe she's almost 2. I would post now, but the battery in the camera is dead. Once it has charged, look out.

Again?

2006-12-25T22:05:00.000-08:00

This was our contribution to holiday cheer. Bug sat in my lap, watched it, and demanded that I play it again. And again. And again. I think we watched it at least 12 times in a row. And that was only the first day. But it's pretty funny and I could watch it over and over.

It's way better than the video of the new Tickle Me Elmo, which Bug also wanted to watch over and over. Too bad she didn't react so well to the real life one. It frightened her some, but I have no doubt that someday she will love it enough that it will drive me positively insane.

We survived the holiday festivities with the in-laws. That's not to say that it wasn't tense. I made an effort to be friendly and engaging and we shall see how well it was received. I at least know that I tried. The nieces and nephew were delightful and grandma and grandpa spoiled our Bug rotten. But that's their job.

Possibly the nicest part of the day was spending some time with some friends of G's family. G has a good friend who is the eldest of three brothers and G's parents are very close with the parents. The younger two brothers live out of town and don't get home all that often. But, for the first time in forever, all three brothers were in town for Christmas with their parents. And the two from out of town (Oregon and Japan) and their families came for a visit. I don't think we had seen any of them since our wedding. It was lovely to see them and meet their wee ones.

Oh and G got me this for Christmas. And it wasn't even on my list. Thank you, G!

Nothing to Report

2006-12-18T22:15:00.000-08:00

Bug, my little petri dish, brought home a cold from day care, so G and I were sick all weekend. No fun. And it kept us from doing all of the Christmas shopping we haven't bothered to do yet.

So every night this week, I'll be ducking out of work and braving the stores. Tonight, it was Borders and Toys R Us. Tomorrow, Macy's. And Safeway, where, rumor has it, they have giftcards to almost anywhere.

I can't believe it's only one week until Christmas. There has been no progress on the family drama front, so next Monday with the in-laws could be interesting.

Since I am not feeling all that amusing, what with the coughing and the sneezing, I will share this little story. At first, I was amused, but then I thought about it a little and the idea of sharing sounds rather icky. I wonder if Safeway sells an appropriate gift card.

Knit Knit Knit

2006-12-14T19:37:00.000-08:00

I wish I could say I had been doing a lot of knitting lately, but I haven't. I just don't have a lot of free time lately. But that should change, at least briefly since I have the week off after Christmas. Hurray!

I did finish knitting slippers for G's mom. All I need to do is sew them up. Woo hoo! Hopefully, she will like them.

But my inability to knit has not stopped me from stalking all things knitting. Or buying three skeins of Blue Sky Alpacas royal alpaca in a lovely pale pink. Now all I need is a pattern. Suggestions? Of course, it's not my fault. My dealer sent out a newsletter about his current sale. Blue Sky Alpaca yarn for 40% off. How could I not buy it? I just want to snuggle with it for hours.

Saturday I get to go to my monthly sock club meeting, which will give me a chance to work on my latest sock project. The goal is to make some progress since I have started the darn thing 6 times and still haven't finished the toe. How annoying. And I can get advice on sewing up the slippers.

The most fascinating knit-related thing I have seen lately is this. How cool.

Hee

2006-12-05T20:56:00.000-08:00

This is quite possibly the funniest headline ever.

Yes, it's true. Sometimes, I'm 12.

2006-12-04T21:41:00.000-08:00

The Rock sings to Sacramento

Thanks to G for finding this for me. I don't have any problems with Sacramento, but the song makes me giggle every time.

Unbelievable

2006-11-29T21:57:00.000-08:00

Some things just boggle the mind. Case in point: this article from USA Today. Are they serious?

And then the state of New Hampshire restores a little bit of order to my universe. This is why I read the news.

Little Miss Tantrum

2006-11-26T20:00:00.000-08:00

Alas, Bug has entered the era of the tantrum. The most recent one happened when I decided that perhaps she shouldn't try to drink the bathwater. Earlier, she had one because I wouldn't let her bang on the computer monitor with a spoon. I know, I'm totally unreasonable.

She's also picking up new words every day, which so far has been incredibly entertaining. Lately, her favorites are the names of her friends at daycare, CJ and Kai. Lucky for us that she hasn't decided to mimic our more coarse language, but it's bound to happen sooner or later. And since G has a unique collection of curse words and phrases, it should be interesting.

In other news, Turkey day was quite nice. My cooking experiments sent no one to the hospital or made anyone ill. And I have discovered what might be the world's best stuffing. So tasty. I plan to make it regularly.

And I survived my birthday with no major meltdowns or drama. I just can't get all that excited about my birthday anymore. It must be a function of being old. And every year it's very strange to not get the phone call complete with bad singing from my dad or the card and call from my mom. But, given that, it was quite lovely. Uncle Jeff gave me yarn and a sockknitting book. My aunt sent a gift card to Macy's. And G gave me this. Alas, no card from BIL/W. How will I survive? Hee.

And on Tuesday I get to go see BNL, my very favorite band in the entire world, in concert in SF.

Life is pretty ok.

Power?

2006-11-09T21:48:00.000-08:00

Apparently, it's all my fault. So, if you need someone to blame for something, no matter who small, blame me. Makes sense, right?

In an effort to smooth things over with the family, G spoke with BIL's W and learned that she seemed to have lots of issues with me. So I called her yesterday and spent a delightful 56 minutes on the cell phone with her for the pleasure of hearing how much I suck. She aired all of her grievances and every perceived offense and I apologized for ever hurting her feelings, if I had done so. How it must be my fault that G and his brother aren't close. How they would be close if only we lived near them because of course proximity always means closeness. How things were so much better before I showed up. Better for them, perhaps.

If only I would use my power for good...

But the thought that I would ever deliberately try to come between G and his family is not only absurd, but really offensive. Like I would ever do something like that? And that someone would think that of me? I guess someone has to be to blame and if they don't blame the newest person in the family, they might just have to accept that just because people are related doesn't mean they will be the best of buddies.

The more I thought about it, the more upset I got. I know it shouldn't matter to me, but it does. I hate that she could make me cry. I went out of my way to be nice and she just let me have it, but not directly. All passive aggressive all the time.

At least G doesn't think I ruined his life.

Halloween - Then and Now

2006-11-01T21:28:00.000-08:00

It's astounding how much Bug has changed in a year. I posted last year's Halloween picture last year, but I'm going to show it again. Because it's cute. And because I can.

Halloween 2005

Halloween 2006

They had a parade and a party at day care yesterday and I can't wait to see the pictures. By the time we got there to pick her up for the day, all of the kids were dressed in their regular clothes. I guess they had grown tired of their costumes.

I tried to take her out trick or treating, but our neighborhood is full of old people, so there wasn't much going on. We did take a nice walk, which tired her out for the evening.

Things are plugging along here. Work has been busy, which is fine since I like being busy. That being said, I certainly don't mind the lull we will have for the next week or so. It means more time for knitting. I have finished knitting the half of a pair of slippers for my mother-in-law's Christmas present. I'm putting off the sewing. I'm not really a fan of the sewing part. The yarn is delicious -- Lorna's Laces Shepherd Worsted in cranberry. After I finish the slippers, it will be back to socks. Or the sweater I started for Bug last year and never finished. Of course, it's probably too small already.

Oh and any advice on roasting a turkey is more than welcome.

I'm Still Here

2006-10-28T11:19:00.000-07:00

Really, I am. There hasn't been a whole lot to tell lately. Just work. And snuggles with my Bug. I will post pictures soon.

The biggest news is we are having some drama with BIL. The long and short of it is that BIL is bent that we won't take his "good advice" and buy a house that we can't afford near him, 40 miles north of here. It means nothing to him that we don't want to move north. And we wouldn't be that excited about the traffic we would get stuck in to drive to work. What is particularly ridiculous is that BIL moved north because he didn't want to commute to work anymore (and his commute was against traffic). Of course, it's perfectly fine for us to have to commute and deal with traffic. I think not.

So anyway, G told his brother that we didn't want to move and that he didn't mind driving north the few times a year that we all get together. BIL took this as meaning that G was content to see his family only a few times a year. As BIL has these romanticized notions about being a very close knit family spending lots of time together, he didn't take this well.

This has been going on for awhile. A few weeks ago, I called BIL's wife to ask after what the kids might want for Christmas. We made some small talk and then she said this:

So we are hosting Thanksgiving this year. We didn't know if you were going to be out of town or doing something with your family or just planning on seeing everyone at Christmas, but you are welcome to come. It will be pretty low key.

She kept sort of talking around things and her half-hearted invitation. I said thank you very much for extending the invitation but I would have to check with G. Then we talked about Bug for awhile and got off the phone.

According to G's mom, who spoke to BIL's wife the following day, the invitation wasn't really an invitation. Rather, it was her attempt to invite me into a heart to heart about the disagreement between G and BIL. It would have been nice of her to tell me this. In any event, we are not going to their house for Thanksgiving and I will making my very first turkey for myself, G, Bug, and Uncle Jeff.

G is going to start a dialogue with BIL's wife in an attempt to clear things up so things aren't too tense at Christmas. It should be interesting.

Tuesday at Bug's House

2006-10-10T22:03:00.000-07:00

These are things that happened today, in no particular order:

The guy at Jiffy Lube thought it was hilarious that my car had 66,665 miles on it. I half expected him to ask me to do laps in the parking lot until it reached 66,666.

Bug threw a temper tantrum because I wouldn't let her play with the toilet brush.

She ate grilled salmon and rice for dinner.

She tried to fit herself in the cupboard with the pots and pans.

None of the pants at The Gap fit me.

I drank wine from a box (from Target) out of a pint glass because it can go in the dishwasher and the crystal can't.

I still haven't finished XT's birthday present. Maybe tomorrow.

I went to the mall and somehow resisted the urge to buy chocolatey snacks. This was a big victory. Perhaps it was the lingering effect of the pants not fitting.

I bought nothing at all at the mall.

I went to work and got out of going to a meeting because I had to do busywork on a deadline.

I'm Baaaack!

2006-10-08T21:31:00.000-07:00

Thanks to our ISP, we had no dsl at home for nearly two weeks, so I couldn't post anything.

But now, things are up and running and I can share photos of my Bug (that shirt always makes me giggle) and tales of things that annoy me. Or strange adventures on the way to weddings.

Two weeks ago, GW (of the group norms) and CS got married. Bug was to be the flower girl. Unfortunately, two days before the wedding she came down with a fever and, while it had broken the night before the wedding, we expected that she would be rather moody. But I am getting ahead of myself.

Yours truly, having realized that there is more of me to love than there was the last time I had purchased a dress to wear to a wedding, went shopping earlier in the week and found something that I didn't hate. G, made his shopping trip the day of the wedding. We were to meet up with the bride at 3:30 for Bug participate in pictures. The wedding was about 15 minutes from our house. So we were going to leave, fetch G's new suit, and take pictures.

Of course, we left a little late. G's suit was great and we pulled out of our parking space. And then, the van died. We ran out of gas. Swell. There was much cursing. Luckily, we were about 1.5 blocks from a gas station, so G headed over there in pursuit of a gas can, complaining about how I hadn't filled up the tank.

So there I am, in the middle of the aisle at a parking lot, gussied up for a wedding, and hanging out with the two kids. I told Doof that it wasn't my fault we ran out of gas and explained why. See, G had stayed home with Bug the day of her fever, so he had the van. And he was the one who drove north to fetch Doof. And he was the one who drove us all to fetch the suit. So it wasn't my fault.

He came stalking back, cursing. The gas station didn't sell gas cans. Luckily, the world's most helpful guy was also in the parking lot, so he and G pushed the van while I steered. Let me just say that steering a minivan without power steering is hard work. Probably not as hard as pushing it, but still. There was lots of yelling and screaming at me, which I tried to tune out, but it still stressed me out.

We called GW and told him we wouldn't make it for pictures, but we would be there for the wedding. We changed Bug into her dress at the church, at which point she began screaming and was basically inconsolable. So much for her walking down the aisle with the ring bearer (age 3) and his mom (the matron of honor). Instead, I ended up carrying the crying child down the aisle, walking around the pews and right back outside, where she stayed with G for the length of the ceremony.

We ceremony was lovely. The bride and groom looked fabulous. And it all took about 30 minutes. Then it was off to the reception site, where there was an open bar (hurray!), a chocolate fountain with lots of goodies to dunk in it (hurray again!), and lots of passed appetizers. Alas, Bug was still Miss Crankypants and dinner ended up being a little late for us, so we had to leave well before cake and dancing.

G apologized profusely the next day, recognizing that the gas situation was his responsibility and it was wrong to blame me.

Other than that, there isn't much to report. Bug is now 18 months and has finally hit the 20 pound mark. She's eating well and growing. She's picking up words. Everything is "mine". I think she picked that up at day care. She has a best pal there name CJ and they are apparently inseparable. She likes to say "eye" and then poke me in mine. Oh and she has taken to pulling up my shirt, poking my belly and saying "baby." No, there is no baby there. Not even close.

On the knitting front, I have finished my second pair of socks and am finishing up XT's birthday present (only about 6 weeks late).

Group Norms

2006-09-10T21:17:00.000-07:00

My pal, GW, wanted me to post this story to my blog so that he would never forget it. Hopefully, I will get it all right. So here goes.

GW, smart man that he is, decided that being a lawyer sucked. A lot. So he went back to school and is now working as a high school math teacher. So anyway, during the first week of school, he tells his students that they will be working in groups and that they would need to sort of set the ground rules for the groups would work. But he didn't want to call them rules. Instead, he wanted to discuss group norms. He asked for suggestions for some of the group norms. He got silence from his pack of ninth graders. Again he asked for suggestions. No one gave into her inner Hermione Granger and volunteered anything. Finally, one kid in the class started to mumble something, but GW didn't really catch it and asked the kid to speak up. The kid's question was "aren't those the things people put in their yards?"

GW laughed and then corrected the poor kid, telling him that, no, norms and gnomes are not the same thing. I he wasn't supposed to laugh, but how could he help himself?

Then someone else yelled out the obligatory "NORM" a la Cheers.

I'm not sure what happened next or if they ever set up their norms.

All I know is that I wish the gnomes would stay put in the front lawns and stop stealing the baby's socks from the dryer.

Good News, Flash!

2006-08-26T15:28:00.000-07:00

I got the job! Basically, it's the job I currently have, but I will be a real employee, rather than a temp. It will be so nice to have benefits again.

Bug is working on words these days. She's very into singing and dancing. And twirling. And eating spaghetti.

A Little Slice of Heaven

2006-08-12T10:46:00.000-07:00

Thursday after work, I went to the nail salon near my house and spent a lovely hour sitting in a massage chair, getting a pedicure, and knitting. It was glorious. My toes are now painted a fabulous shade of purple. And I am making some great progress on my latest sock, toe up this time. The hope is to have it done by Tuesday night so I can cast on the other one at knitting class (it requires a provisional cast on, a crochet hook, and a lot more dexterity than I possess -- hence the need for help).

Oh and I had a job interview earlier that day. I'll keep you posted.

Just Plugging Along

2006-07-31T20:11:00.000-07:00

There's not a whole lot to post here at Bug's house. I'm still job hunting, Bug is still being cute, Doof is at summer camp for a week, and G is unreasonably happy, having downloaded the long version of the theme from The People's Court.

We survived a family shindig at BIL/W's house. It was my niece's eighth birthday. Only, the invitation wasn't pitched as a "let's celebrate her birthday" party. Instead, we got an e-vite that invited us to a party celebrating all the family's summer birthdays and summer anniversaries. Swell. I would have preferred to have attended a child's birthday party, thanks. And then I was asked if we could include my birthday. Given that my birthday is in November, that seemed pretty dumb to me, so I didn't bother to answer that question. It turns out, they thought I was a summer birthday too. Given that G and I have been together for 7 years, you would think they would know this by now. But then again, BIL/W are pretty oblivious.

So we went swimming and had burgers and birthday cake from scratch (which tasted a bit off, perhaps because W made it with soy milk and soy butter) and all was fine. Yeah, G's dad told off-color jokes in front of the eight year old. And yeah, G's parents smoked a lot near us (we were all outside so they figure it won't bug us). They were wrong. But whatever. We knew it was time to leave when BIL decided to announce in front of everyone that he thought we probably had enough money to buy a house near them. What he doesn't understand is that we don't want to live near them. We were pretty happy when they moved. Now they can't call us at the last minute to ask us to do favors for them. He just wants to run the family and take some credit for when they do well. He's the sort that were he to help me find a job, he would take credit for it for the rest of my life and never let anyone forget it that I was indebted to him. Thanks, but I'll pass.

In other news, I finished this scarf, which I think I will give to my aunt. I knit it with Be Sweet Magic Ball yarn on size 13 needles. I rather enjoyed how it kept changing textures, but it was a bit difficult to work with. It sheds. A lot.

Too Darn Hot

2006-07-23T23:07:00.000-07:00

I'd like to sup with my baby tonight
and play the pup with my baby tonight
I'd like to sup with my baby tonight
and play the pup with my baby tonight
but I ain't up to my baby tonight
cause it's too darn hot
It's too darn hot
It's too darn hot ...

We spent a chunk of the last two days out by the pool because the condo we went doesn't have air conditioning and there is no fan in the attic to get the hot air out of the house. Oh and it hit well over 100. Luckily, Doof and I went to see Pirates of the Caribbean before braving the heat.

Today, I got a sunburn. But that was better than sitting in the sauna that is my home. So we drove to the city so that we could have cooler weather for dinner. It was a joy. And a tasty meal.

Speaking of dinner, here is a list of things that Bug has eaten in the last week or so (in no particular order):

Chips and salsa with cheese
Edamame
Tofu from my miso soup
Steamed rice
Turkey chili
Prime rib (with and without mild horseradish)
Creamed spinach
Yorkshire pudding
Lemonade
Mashed Potatoes
Burger
Fries
Bread with a fabulous tomato and garlic dip sort of thing
Gorgonzola
Ravioli stuffed with fish and ricotta
Pappardelle with sausage
and Animal crackers because everything goes with animal crackers.

July 14, 2006

2006-07-14T16:43:00.000-07:00

Today is the second anniversary of the day Mom died. And yesterday would have been her 62nd birthday. Together, those two dates make July a tough month. But I am doing ok. It helps that Uncle Jeff is here for a visit, the weather is beautiful, and my Bug is too cute for words.

See for yourselves:

Tonight, we will go out for Mom's favorite meal -- sushi -- and toast her, not with cocktails, but with Pepsi from a can, over ice. And we will miss her a lot, but go on.

Then, tomorrow I can get cracking on buying G his card and birthday present. I'm not going to go too crazy since I bought him an Ipod for Father's Day.

I got my Mother's Day gift on Tuesday. He offered me a spa day, but I chose this instead. It gets me knitting, sock yarn, and a few hours of Jen time. Thanks, G! Picking out your own gift can be a very good thing. A little guilt thrown in doesn't hurt.

Oh and for a good giggle, check this out. Bug enjoys it.

Socks!

2006-07-10T17:58:00.000-07:00

Woo hoo! Behold my first, completed pair of socks. I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out. And no one but me will know about all of the mistakes or the fact that they might not be exactly the same length. They are socks -- they'll stretch. Tomorrow, at knitting class, I get to start working on my next pair and I can't wait. It's not often that I actually complete a knitting project, so this is big stuff.

In other news, I came home from work to the smell of smoke and the sight of firemen. Everything if fine. Some dumbass, probably a teenager, set a fire behind the baseball field near our house (read: across the street). A bit unnerving. And the firemen weren't that compelling. Honestly, if you are going to drive home to firemen, the least they could do is be hot.

On the Shelf

2006-07-03T21:28:00.000-07:00

After emptying the bookshelf, I guess she figured she would try it on for size. She's seems pretty comfortable.

Fear of Heights

2006-07-02T14:36:00.000-07:00

So we have recovered from family camp. I think I enjoyed it, but I am not likely to repeat the experience. I never went to sleepaway camp as a kid, but I imagine that this is what it probably would have been like. We had a room up at the lodge more than big enough for the whole family. Doof chose to sleep in the upper bunk and Bug slept in pher portable crib. We had air conditioning, a refrigerator, and a sink. But we did not have our own bathroom. No, we had to go outside and a walk a short way. It could have been worse -- we could have been in one of the other sets of cabins where we would have had to walk through woods to get to the bathroom. It was bad enough having to take a flashlight.

The other main problem was that meals were at very specific times and there was no flexibility. If you didn't get to the dining hall by 9 am, no breakfast for you. Doof wasn't whelmed by the food choices, but then she is 12 and picky. I didn't mind so much. We hiked and swam and went tubing (Bug slept on the boat) and read a lot. It was nice to be away from it all. Part of the appeal of the place was that it had day care for little ones, which we used a fair amount, particularly on our last full day there when G and I tackled the high ropes course. After a short hike, we crossed a creek and got to try to conquer our fear of heights. They call it the Leap of Faith. Essentially, after you put on the very attractive harness and helmet, you climp a series of pegs up a tree until you get to a platform. From the platform, you jump, hoping to catch a trapeze before they lower your harnessed-in self to the ground. I went first. The climb wasn't too bad. I think having small feet helped a lot since I never felt like my footing was unstable. After awhile, it seemed like I ran out of pegs, so I yelled down for advice and was told to use the tree branches. Okey dokey fine. Somehow, I made it to the top. 65 feet up.

And on the count of three, I jumped, having promised myself that, if I lived, I would lose 20 pounds. I missed the trapeze. Oh well. I was never very good at the standing broad jump. I can't say it was fun, but I'm glad I did it.

G went next and did great. Of course, he figured that after I did it, he couldn't not make the climb.

The other big thing that happened on our trip was that Bug figured out this walking business. Oh and she learned how to climb the ladder up to the top bunk. While I applaud how clever she is in figuring things out, I'm not all that excited about her climbing ladders.

I'll add pictures as soon as Blogger stops being so ornery.

Know Your Audience

2006-06-18T08:20:00.000-07:00

Well, kiddies, in a few hours, we will be leaving for a week at family camp. It will be like a week at sleepaway camp, with more amenities. But not room service. Or my own bathroom. Or cable. It should be fun, though, since we will be, once again, getting away from it all, including the cube farm and the people I might run into there.

For example, when I worked at this place the last time (when I was pregnant with Bug), there was a group of us that all did the same thing. The group has since been divided in two, so I do not work directly with the people I worked with back then. Anyway, because I went on vacation, someone from the other group did some of my work. When I got back, I was told that This Person helped out. So then I met him and said "so you're the mythical This Person." It was then that I got a lecture on how he's not This Person, he's This Hyphenated-Person and how much it pisses him off when people get his name wrong. So I apologized and figured it would end. Nope. He kept going for ten minutes about how it was his idea to hyphenate, how he thinks it's wrong for women to change their names when they marry because they are abandoning their families for their husband's families, and blah blah blah. I was stunned. This Hyphenated-Person and I had maybe exchanged 4 words before this diatribe. For all he knew, I was some very conservative person or someone who wanted to abandon her own family, as opposed to someone who, even if she wanted to, chose not to hyphenate her name with the new name because the two of them together are so horrible that it would never have worked. I held my tongue. Of course, I nearly slapped him later when I walked back through his and my good pal's work area to hear him continue to blather on about how he chewed out his mother-in-law for getting the name wrong and then apologized later. His commentary on the subject, "well, I'm fairly sure most women would not have apologized the way I did."

That could be taken two ways:

1. They wouldn't have apologized at all (which is what I think he meant). OR
2. They wouldn't have given his lame-ass excuse for an apology.

So perhaps Mr. Ladies Don't Give Up Your Name When You Marry might be something of a misogynist. Nice.

On Friday, there was a meeting at work, and afterwards, rather than get in a crowded elevator, I ended up taking the stairs with Mr. Hyphen. He insisted on talking and said that he took the stairs because he didn't want to be like "all of the fatties that work here." Again, I was dumbstruck. How incredibly insensitive. He clearly thinks he's better than people who are not thin, which includes me. He kept blathering on and I just tried to tune him out. Boy was I glad when we got to our floor and could go our separate directions.

Any thoughts on how I should respond the next time the guy invariably says something out of line?

The Sofa Ate My Baby

2006-06-15T22:19:00.000-07:00

She doesn't seem to mind, though.

There's not too much to report around here. I'm not enjoying my life in the cubicle farm. There are just too many people around to annoy me and I can't shut a door to block them out. It sucks. And since I have been honing my eavesdropping skills for many years, I can't not listen to them, whether it's some guy chewing out his coworkers or blathering on about how he met his wife on match.com or whatever. I don't care. Of course, I just don't really want to be there at all when I could be home in my jammies reading and eating bon bons all day. Alas, I haven't found someone to pay me to read and eat bon bons. So I muddle through and create a lot of spreadsheets. And miss my Bug, who, after a long day at day care, just might do something like this:

Home

2006-05-31T17:54:00.000-07:00

There is nothing like going on vacation to remind a girl how much she likes her home. Don't get me wrong; we had a lovely time. I just like being at home, surrounded by my stuff, and able to sleep in my bed. I love my bed.

So anyway, we drove down to LA for a few days with at my aunt and uncle's house, which was nice. It's funny watching them play at being grandparents and go all gooey over Bug. Can't say that I blame them about that. Being in LA gave us time to hang out with Uncle Jeff, who we saw on Friday after we into town, on Saturday for dim sum in the Valley, on Monday night for dinner, and Tuesday when he drove us to the airport. On Saturday, Bug and I also got to meet the fabulous Miss Kendra and had a great time peoplewatching.

Sunday, we went to the LA Zoo because my aunt wanted to see the baby giraffe. He was pretty cute, but not as cute as Bug is. See for yourself:

Bug could not have cared less about the zoo, but she did enjoy the park inside the zoo. She was happy to sit in the grass and play. She also wanted to eat the the leaves near her, so we distracted her with one of her favorite toys.

After the zoo, we pretty much just sat around and relaxed. We did introduce Bug to my aunt's pool and she seemed to enjoy swimming, which was good because we expected to spend a lot of time at the pool in Puerto Vallarta.

Here she is swimming with Daddy:

Tuesday, it was off to Mexico. We arrived at our hotel in time for dinner, which we learned was far from compelling. We stayed at an all-inclusive resort, not because we cared about it being all-inclusive, but because they offered all day childcare as part of the package. They had a great, toy-filled room for little ones and some very nice day care providers, so we felt comfortable leaving her there for a few hours each day. It was nice to have just a bit of time alone together. That doesn't happen very often these days. So I did some reading and some knitting and just generally relaxed. The big downside (aside from a not particularly comfortable bed) was the food. Breakfast was fine, but that's the best I can say. Lunch was either a dreadful buffet or burgers and dogs from the snack bar. And while it was all you could drink, a girl can only tolerate so many watered down margaritas. A nice thing about Puerto Vallarta is that the water at all of the hotels and restaurants is purified, so the risk of illness was pretty minor. The resort did a dinner buffet every night, but, as part of the package, we got to eat at the three other restaurants, supposedly an improvement. Except not. One of them might have served the worst meal I ever ate. So, to preserve our sanity and our tastebuds, we chose to go to dinner outside our hotel. So much better. Dinner on the beach one night, the equivalent of Benihana another. Bug's favorite restaurant had strolling musicians:

That's about all there is to tell. I even have a bit of a tan (well, for me anyway) since I spent lots of time outside. Uncle Jeff fetched us from the airport and, because he is an awesome human being, he brought Winchell's donuts. Woo hoo! I definitely lucked out in the brother department. We spent the night at my aunt's and drove home the next day.

It was really nice to go away, but it was even better to come home.

I Miss My Mommy

2006-05-14T19:56:00.000-07:00

It's Mother's Day and, for the second year, I'm a mommy. And that's great. But, my mommy isn't here to share it with me and that really sucks.

Otherwise, today was a pretty ok day. We went to the zoo and checked out the animals. Other than Bug, there isn't much cuter than a five week old giraffe. Later, we took Bug swimming and she loved it. She's so very cute in her swim suit and hat. I'll post pictures after we get home.

In two days, I will be in Puerto Vallarta. I guess I can't complain too much. Of course, I would have less to complain about if G had wished me a Happy Mother's Day without my telling him to do so. Oh well.

The Powers That Be Are Laughing At Me

2006-05-08T17:46:00.000-07:00

A lot.

I have been looking for a real job for like forever. But then you knew that. So that fabulous place that is Craigslist had an ad that seemed perfect for me. I applied. I didn't immediately get an interview out of it. Instead, I got a 12 part questionnaire. I guess it's a way to weed people out. Me, I sat down at the computer and detailed all the experience I had that made me great for this job. Apparently, they bought it because they called me in for interview. Of course, I had to follow up on the thing because the HR guy with whom I was corresponding had been on vacation and forgot about the job posting.

So anyway, I went in for the interview about ten days ago and it went really well. You know an interview has gone well when they tell you right then and there that they want you back for a second interview and to think about which people you might want to me.

The callback was scheduled for 10am this morning. I dug up a different suit to wear because I can't wear the same one to both interviews. No, I don't think anyone would notice, but I would know. I arrange for G to take Bug to day care so I can be sure to get on the road early, because stress bunny that I am, I insist on making sure there is no way I can be late. Translation, I'm there god awful early.

I check in with the receptionist and ask for the person I'm supposed to meet with first. She says, actually, you will be meeting with HR guy first. Ok, fine. He's a good guy. We had a nice chat last time. I just go with it.

We get into his office and he gives me the news -- I won't be meeting with the two interviewers because over the weekend, someone bought the company. Swell. It would have been nice if they had called me to let me know not to come in, but HR guy said that he didn't know until he saw it in the paper this morning. Then he was in meetings to talk about it. My guess is that the HR department there will be going bananas until things shake out.

I took the news in stride. What choice did I have? He thanked me for not getting mad about it and tried to assure me that he thought the job would still exist post merger. But no one knows for sure. So I made my pitch that I want the job, but that if things happen that the job doesn't happen (it's a brand new position), to keep me in mind for other things. I guess I tried to earn more good karma points. But dang. I'm tired of this crap.

Then we talked about our kids for awhile. And I told him that I would be on vacation for two weeks beginning on Friday. And I left.

Perhaps while I am basking in the sun in Puerto Vallarta, under sunscreen number 50, of course, they will get their shit in order and offer me some good news. I have earned at least that much.

The Key to a Better Burrito

2006-04-25T12:34:00.000-07:00

I just found this on Yahoo. I really have nothing to add.

Size Matters

2006-04-22T14:32:00.000-07:00

After several weeks of trying to learn how to knit socks, turning the heel, knitting the gusset, and getting back to my original number of stitches, I have to scrap the sock and start over. Why, you ask? Because it turns out that the sock that I have been knitting is big enough to fit an NBA center. Or Frankenstein. Or me 9 months pregnant with incredibly swollen feet.

This stinks. I even wasted time doing a gauge swatch. The pattern called for size 3 needles and 7 stitches per inch. Well, I am a tight knitter, so I used size 4s. The result, lilac socks that will fit no one I know.

So I am paying Doof to rewind the yarn and I'll start over. I'll either switch to smaller needles or use the same needles and cast on fewer stitches. I am not pleased. It sucks to have figured this all out when I am about 4 inches away from being done.

I am almost ready to start the sleeves on Bug's sweater, so at least that's going ok. But now I am beginning to doubt that it will be the right size too. The good news is that even if it is too big, she will grow into it.

Ham

2006-04-17T17:20:00.000-07:00

Bug used to be camera shy, but not so much anymore. The minute she she's the camera, she's big with the smiles.

Right now, it's snack time. She's sitting in her portable highchair eating, get this, smoked salmon and crackers. I couldn't make this up. I wouldn't have thought to have her try smoked salmon, but there we were at the farmers' market and one of the booths was handing out samples. When I took mine, Bug gave me a look that said, in no uncertain terms, "where's mine?" So I shared. And then I bought some.

Other things she likes to eat: vanilla soft serve, yogurt, spinach, green beans, animal crackers, bleu cheese, turkey, mashed potatoes, business letters, the telephone book, cardboard boxes, macaroni and cheese, and squash.

Things she doesn't much like: chocolate cake, milk, and avocados.

She's a strange kid. She must have gotten that from her dad.

Quiet Time

2006-04-12T23:42:00.000-07:00

I had planned to blog about Bug's strange ideas of things that are tasty and things that are not, but that will have to wait. Right now, I'm basking in the fact that I am the only one awake in the house and I'm enjoying having just a bit of time that I own. I don't have to tend to anyone and I don't have to do chores. I should be doing chores, but instead, I am blogging and watching Black.White. It's nice to have a chance to just listen to the crickets outside. And the frogs. There's a stream behind our place and, during the spring, there are frogs. It took a bit to get used to the noise, but now I really like it.

And when I do have quiet time like this, it gets me thinking. Who am I? What do I want to be when I grow up? Why won't someone take a chance and give me a job? I'm growing ever so tired of the constant flow of ding letters when the powers that be, the ones that have jobs to give, deign to even send a ding letter. It's just so very frustrating. Today, I sent off a resume for a non-lawyer position that required expertise in an area of law that I did practice. My resume is fairly specific about what I have done and my cover letter highlighted how, for four years, I focused on that one discrete area of law. I got an e-mail response, which was clearly a form, because it asked me if I have any experience with that very area of law. For goodness sake, people, read the darn letter that I took so much time crafting so that they would respond. I suppose I shouldn't complain. After all, they did respond. So now it's on me to get back to them. I guess that's on the to do list for tomorrow, among several all job hunting-related things.

Did I mention that I hate job hunting? Only dating has ever had the same effect of making me feel totally worthless.

So if you know anyone in the Bay Area hiring overeducated chicks who happen to be moms, let me know.

I'm Floored

2006-04-05T15:33:00.000-07:00

I just read this in the Chronicle and I can't believe it. Some people have a lot of nerve.

Happy Birthday, Bug!

2006-03-28T22:27:00.000-08:00

Bug with Doof

Mmmmm cake

Yesterday was Bug's first birthday. This was quite possibly the fastest year of my life. I'm just waiting for her to sleep through the night.

In honor of her birthday, we had some family and friends over for cake. It was lovely. I think Bug was a bit overwhelmed and a lot overtired, but she did enjoy herself and became quite the ham for the camera.

Her actual birthday brought a trip to the doctor for a check up and shots. She weighs 17 pounds, 1 ounce and is 28.75 inches tall. She's a wee little thing. Her iron level was just fine. And she handled the shots as best she could. Then it was off to the city for dim sum with Uncle Jeff and some errands.

Today, she wasn't feeling well. I think it was probably a reaction to the shots. Poor Bug. Hopefully, she will feel better tomorrow.

I did make it to my knitting class tonight and worked some on the sweater for Bug and some socks (I'm working on the first sock) for me. I'll post pictures when they are done. I'm finally getting used to the double pointed needles. I am knitting the sweater in Lana Grossa Cool Wool 2000 shade 483 and the socks in Nature's Palette by Hand Jive Knits in Lilacs.

Per Your Request

2006-03-23T12:43:00.000-08:00

Look Ma, no hands!

Sleepy Bug

Bathtub mowhawk, courtesy of Doof.

If You're Looking for Trouble

2006-03-22T15:40:00.000-08:00

You came to the right place
If you’re looking for trouble
Just look right in my face
I was born standing up
And talking back
My daddy was a green-eyed mountain jack
Because I’m evil, my middle name is misery
Well I’m evil, so don’t you mess around with me

You Are 32% Evil

A bit of evil lurks in your heart, but you hide it well.
In some ways, you are the most dangerous kind of evil.

How Evil Are You?

Hurray for Books

2006-03-20T22:07:00.000-08:00

I found this while wandering through knitting blogs and thought it would be fun to try out:

Instructions: Look at the list of books below. Bold the ones you've read, italicize the ones you might read, cross out the ones you won't, underline the ones on your book shelf, and place (parentheses) around the ones you've never even heard of.

The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy - Douglas Adams
The Great Gatsby - F.Scott Fitzgerald
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee (I read about halfway through and got sidetracked)
The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
(His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman)
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - J. K. Rowling
Life of Pi - Yann Martel
Animal Farm: A Fairy Story - George Orwell
Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
(The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon)
Lord of the Flies - William Golding
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen (One of my very favorites ever)
1984 - George Orwell
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - J. K. Rowling (My favorite Potter book)
One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Try as I might, I just can't get through this one)
Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
(The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini)
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
Slaughterhouse 5 - Kurt Vonnegut
Angels and Demons - Dan Brown
Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk
(Neuromancer - William Gibson)
(Cryptonomicon - Neal Stephenson)
(The Secret History - Donna Tartt)
A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess
Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C. S. Lewis
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
(Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell)
The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
(Good Omens - Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman)
(Atonement - Ian McEwan)
(The Shadow Of The Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon)
The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemingway
The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood (Another of my favorites)
The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
Dune - Frank Herbert

Since I couldn't figure out how to cross things out, I just left those book titles alone.

Thanks, XT!

2006-03-20T10:57:00.000-08:00

You should already know this, but XT is an incredibly fabulous human being. I have known this for years, but she totally went over and above the call of duty (AGAIN -- see very pregnant XT driving to L.A. for my mom's funeral and helping us clean out mom's apartment) when she came over on Saturday and cleaned my house. I had been panicking over getting everything done in time for a bunch of people coming over next weekend to celebrate Bug's First Birthday. So she offered to come over and help.

Oh my god! She scrubbed my kitchen. She introduced us to the Mr. Clean sponge thingy to get black spots off the wall. My kitchen has not been this clean since we moved in. She organized my books. And she made me go through the piles of crap that have accumulated in the mere year since we moved here.

It's so lovely, I could cry. G said he considered sleeping in the kitchen because he was so happy it was so clean.

XT also got us through Bug's first fever and kept me from freaking out. Bug woke up just fine on Sunday with no fever.

AND she arrived with donuts, wine, and cheese. After the cleaning ended, we all went to E&O for corn fritters and some other things. You know the fritters are good when the ahi tartare is one of the "other things." Bug seemed to like the fritters too.

Then we stayed up watching The Princess Bride and eating m&ms.

So XT, thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you.

And G said that if you ever need to take out someone's kneecaps, he will gladly be a Jeff Gillooly for you.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

2006-03-17T10:38:00.000-08:00

It's March Madness, baby! All college basketball all the time. Upsets galore. Unfortunately, for purposes of my pool bracket, I picked the wrong ones. Oh well. It was just for fun anyway. Now, what really matters is that my boys from Cal do well.

In other news, thanks for reading while I got all melancholy and such. It's rather cathartic to talk about deep, sad things every so often. But I don't plan to make a habit of it.

Besides, with my smiling, almost one-year-old Bug (oh my god how did that happen?), I can't be too sad. I ordered her birthday cake yesterday -- all chocolate, all the time, with some pink and purple flowers and such. G voted for chocolate frosting because he thought that would be more fun for the pictures of her wearing the cake.

And now, because I have to:

GO BEARS!

Happy Birthday, Dad.

2006-03-14T13:54:00.000-08:00

I started this post months ago and finally decided to finish it today, the day my dad would have turned 64.

When my dad died a little over three years ago, Al helped ease my entry into the club and for that (and many other things) I will be eternally grateful. It wasn't a surprise that it would happen, that's for sure. Dad had had many close calls. A lifetime smoker, he had his first heart attack at age 47. It was the day I was coming home from my first year of college. A buddy of mine had picked me up in Berkeley and we drove down to Northridge. About a block away from home, we, thinking we were so clever, called my mom to say we were almost there. She sounded funny, but I didn't understand why. As we made the last turn to my house, I saw a fire truck and an ambulance and remarked "that's not my house" because there was no way that could be happening there. But it was my house and it did happen there.

He quit smoking for about 9 months before he started up again. Heart attack number 2 was about 2 years later. And heart attack number 3, which led to triple bypass surgery was on Halloween 1993. Again, he stopped smoking for awhile, but started up again. I think once he passed the 2 year mark, he figured he was in the clear and could smoke all he liked. And I guess he did. I don't really know, since I lived at least 400 miles away (I was in Massachusetts for heart attack 3) and it's not like he would give me an accounting every day of what he smoked.

Heart attack number 4 was in December 2001, followed by a diagnosis of congestive heart failure a few months later, at which point he finally gave up smoking for good. It was the right doctor that got him in line. Essentially, the doctor said something along the lines of "do what you want, I don't care. But if you want to be around for your daughter's wedding, you had better give up the smokes." So he did. But it was too late. 2002 saw him hospitalized at least once a month, once to get this fancy, schmancy pacemaker that was to make his heart pump more efficiently. Unfortunately, it was too little too late. He did muster the strength to walk me down the aisle at my wedding. I bought travel insurance for my honeymoon because there was always the chance he would end up back in the hospital at any time. He slowly deteriorated. By October, a trip to the supermarket was too much for him.

It was also in October that my mom was diagnosed with colon cancer. After surgery to remove a chunk of her innards, she went to stay at my aunt's house because my dad was too frail to take care of her. And he was too embarrassed by that fact that he didn't go visit her at all during the week or so she stayed at my aunt's. He also started to lose weight. A lot of weight. His doctor told him to have protein shakes, but to make them with ice cream instead of milk. It didn't work. He was tired all the time and he aged. A lot.

He went into the hospital the first week of December. I had called my mom after a job interview and she told me that she thought this would be his final stay there and that I should head to LA asap. I tied up some ends and jumped in the car, begging the powers that be to not let him die before I got there. That was a Thursday. I remember offering to go out and get him a hot fudge sundae and for the first time ever, my dad, the chocoholic that chocoholics look up to, declined. He wasn't hungry. Since my brother was staying with my mom, I crashed at my aunt's house that night and went straight to the hospital on Friday morning. By this point his heart was working too hard to get blood circulating and it basically didn't get everywhere it needed to go. Essentially, what happens with congestive heart failure is that when the blood doesn't get where it needs to go, it just pools and basically the person drowns in his or her own body. It was clear that he was beginning to not get enough oxygen to his brain and my incredibly smart dad stopped being lucid. He would sort of switch between saying lucid things and gibberish. It was terrifying. My dad's best friend left the hospital in tears telling me how hard it was for him because, while I was losing my dad, he was losing his best friend.

Except for a quick trip to the mall to buy some clothes (since I had gone straight from work), I didn't leave the hospital. I stayed all night, listening to him struggle to breathe and gasp in what sounded like pain. But they assured me that he had sufficient morphine to be comfortable. Gradually, they increased the dosage overnight. His amazing doctor called several times to check on how things were going and to alter the medication. Hospitals are incredibly noisy overnight. You wouldn't think so, but they are what with the nurses going in and out of the rooms to check things and the sound of alarms going off to notify nurses that they need to switch IV bags or some such thing. Dad gasped and struggled for breath all night long. I think I finally fell asleep at around 3.

At 4am, my dad's sister from Michigan called in a panic, wanting to know what was going on. So they woke me to tell her. I don't think I went back to sleep and I was afraid to even take a short walk because I didn't want him to die alone. That's why I stayed over. Gradually the time between painful breaths got longer and longer.

On Saturday morning, my mom came over. Then my cousin and my dad's other sister (who had flown in from New Jersey) arrived. I can't remember if my brother arrived before or after they did. All I know is we were yapping about something and he just died.

I thought I would be writing this as an advisory to smokers about how ugly death from smoking can be. I listened to my Dad gasp for breath. I heard him speak and make no sense and not remember who was there or what he had said to them. I saw him wither away. My formerly 200+ pound father weighed maybe 160 pounds at the end. And the fancy pacemaker, a small rectangular thing about the size of a pack of cigarettes, stuck out from his body, almost as a reminder of how he had gotten this sick in the first place. At the end, he looked like he was in terrible paid, his mouth was open, his eyes were closed, and when he died he turned a horrible shade of yellow. I don't know the exact moment he died, but mom did. All I know is that it got quiet. Scarily quiet. He was wasn't making noise and we stopped talking. We called a nurse and she confirmed he was gone. I was the first one out of the room. I just couldn't be there anymore.

Then we all left. And my cell phone rang. The aunt from Michigan called in a panic. I guess she called every cell phone she could think of and I was the idiot who answered and got to tell her that her baby brother had died. Somehow, I had to be the one to console her. Swell. Not exactly what I had in mind. I honestly have no idea what happened next. I probably called G tell him to come to LA for the funeral and to take care of me.

I guess that's about all I have to say about that. I'll try to be more cheery next time.

Lucky

2006-03-13T09:58:00.000-08:00

Why can't this happen to me? Of course, I would vote for Anchor Steam.

This Makes Me So Mad

2006-03-08T09:20:00.000-08:00

I just read this article and it makes me very angry. My mom was one of those people who didn't get tested at 50. She said it was because her insurance company didn't authorize colonoscopies at 50. I think she had a sigmoidoscopy, which said all was ok. When she finally did, it was too late. She had an aggressive form of cancer that didn't respond to any treatment. Age 60 is way too young to die.

And I realize that there are days when I am very angry with her for not fighting for the right test sooner -- maybe they could have prevented things from happening. Maybe they could have caught it earlier and treated it earlier and it wouldn't have spread. Maybe not.

And I am angry at her insurance carrier (and any other insurance carrier) that doesn't specifically and proactively advise every patient to celebrate his or her 50th birthday by getting his or her plumbing snaked. Yes, it's unpleasant, but last time I checked, cancer and dying are much worse.

So please, please, PLEASE do this for me: if you know and love anyone age 50 or over, make them get checked out. And if their insurance carrier is being stingy about it, make them fight for the test. In the long run, the test is much cheaper for the insurance carrier than four types of chemo, repeated MRIs, catscans, and petscans, two surgeries on the abdomen, major reconstructive surgery after the cancer spreads to her leg and breaks her femur, a month in a skilled nursing facility after the surgery, and more drugs than I can ever imagine.

I hadn't planned on getting all soapboxy today. Oh well. Just wait until next week when I discuss the evils of smoking.

Ballpark Food and Other Snacks

2006-03-07T14:16:00.000-08:00

We spent Thursday through Saturday in Phoenix for a little bit of Spring Training. Doof had a class with her girl scout troop (and she's not wild about baseball anyway), so she did not join us. We went from the airport to our first game (with a quick stop at our hotel to check in and drop off our luggage). G was in charge of planning our trip and buying our game tickets. Our mission was to go to some parks we hadn't seen before, so our first stop was in Maryvale for a Milwaukee Brewers home game. The parks are small and nice and you can get really great seats for not a lot of money. Here is the view from our seats:

The perk of going to a game there is that they bring their ballpark food from Milwaukee, so the bratwursts were fantastic. And then we got to see the famous sausage race, which was not quite as amusing as we had hoped.

Dinner that evening was at a place called the Salt Cellar and it was terrific. The only downside was that they didn't have highchairs. Who doesn't have highchairs? So we had to hold Bug the entire time, a fact complicated by the fact that G decided to order the cracked crab. Oh well. Seared ahi will always make me happy, so I can't complain.

On Friday, we went to see the Angels play at their park in Tempe. The food wasn't great, but we had a nice time. And the Angels won 10-1. Dinner was at a place called Don & Charlie's, which has an amazing collection of sports, particularly baseball memorabilia. The food was good, but the one thing I will remember most from that meal was the garlic cheese toast. Oh my god! We almost got a second order to go. Bug liked it quite a lot too.

On Saturday, we drove to Surprise to see a Rangers Royals game. Given that we don't care much about either team, we still had a good time, partly because a series of walks and hit batters nearly sent the game to extra innings and partly because of the chocolate ice cream, which led to this:

I had not intended to share my ice cream with her, but she looked so jealous. Besides, I figured the fact that it was cold would freak her out and she wouldn't want any more. I was wrong. She loved it. She's definitely my child.

After the game, it was off to the airport and then home. Yay for home. It was a nice trip, but I think Bug had had enough of being confined, so she was more than happy to spend the rest of the weekend crawling through the living room.

But it was quite a culinary adventure because she got to partake of the following (in no particular order):
Various jarred stage 2 baby food
Mommy milk
Water from a bottle with a sports top
Lettuce with salad dressing
Baked potato with butter
Bread
Zucchini
Garlic cheese toast
Au gratin potatoes
Home fries
Bagel chips (which turned out to be spicy, but she didn't mind)
Rye bread (mommy picked out the seeds)
Chocolate ice cream

She liked everything.

A Quick Giggle

2006-02-27T15:02:00.000-08:00

Since the weather is crummy and I'm in one of those mad at people sort of moods, I decided to attach this link because it's funny.

I think Farfrompoopen Road should have won.

Cheerios

2006-02-15T21:52:00.000-08:00

Thank you, General Mills, for creating Cheerios. If we put some on Bug's tray, she will be so entertained that we will get a chance to eat dinner. She even manages to eat the ones she doesn't put in her hair. From across the room, it looked like she was sporting an earring.

Monsters Inc.

2006-02-14T17:35:00.000-08:00

Your Monster Profile

Merciless Ogre
You Feast On: Jack and Coke
You Lurk Around In: Closets
You Especially Like to Torment: Boys Who Wear Make-up

What's" Your Monster Name?

Going to the Dogs

2006-02-13T18:38:00.000-08:00

The Westminster Kennel Club dog show is on tv tonight! I love the dog show. However, I will not be watching it because, as much as I love it, it will be trumped by ice skating both Olympic and with celebrity. The good news is that USA Network will be showing it again tomorrow morning, so I can Tivo it.

In the meantime, here's a quiz to try. I was a Siberian Husky.

Nothing to Report

2006-02-12T17:22:00.000-08:00

There just isn't much going on here. I had sort of an informal interview for a job because my headhunter called in a favor. Since my resume has some holes for the last three years, most firms will just sort of ignore me, thinking I'm a big flake or too lame to hold down a real job. So she called her buddy to meet me and, if he didn't think I was a huge dolt, pitch me to the muckety mucks who are actually doing the hiring. I guess it went ok. It was a fairly short meeting, but things are moving along and now I have to submit some writing samples and references and an explanation of my strange work history (left job when dad was dying and mom was sick, took a temp gig that I held until they closed the SF site, took a brief job in Santa Rosa until they chose someone else, then took another temp gig until it was time to have Bug). Since I don't have any more parents, the firm can rest assured that I won't be leaving a job for that reason.

Did I mention that I adore my new headhunter? She's an incredibly cool chick. Hopefully, she will be able to find my sorry ass (and the rest of me) a job I don't hate.

Oh and in honor of Uncle Jeff, I will now share a true story of poetic justice. We (G, Bug, Uncle Jeff, and I) were driving to a friend's house in the city for dinner. As we were heading up the hill toward the Golden Gate Bridge, this crazy person started speeding and weaving and generally playing Pole Position (yay, Atari 2600). After that person cut us off, we all pretty much agreed that there's never a cop around when you need one. Well, son of a gun, we heard a siren. We got a bit nervous because, like everyone else on the road, we were not going under the speed limit. But the cop wasn't interested in us. Instead, he pulled over Mr. Pole Position. Sometimes the little things can restore order to my universe.

Happy Monday!

2006-01-30T16:40:00.000-08:00

So it was a good weekend. XT and I went to see Brokeback Mountain on Saturday. Wow, that was an excellent movie, but boy did I feel sad afterwards. I have to say that it was fantastic to see XT since it had been like forever. Of course, we referred to the movie as Gay Cowboys Eating Pudding (tm Cartman). How could we not? Then I got to go home and be alone in my house. It was delicious. I accomplished nothing and felt no guilt about not doing chores. G had taken the girls to the Cal basketball game so I had some free hours. I need to plan for more.

Yesterday, I went to see my dealer and came home with new goodies. There was a sale. I'm going to be ambitious and try to knit this sweater for my little Bug. Of course, I'm currently in the middle of a hat and a scarf and have the yarn for my next project after that. I think the sweater might move up in the rotation, though. We shall see.

Bug has learned to pull herself up to stand. And she's crawling everywhere. It's so nice to see her crawling down the hallway when someone gets home. But it also means I really had better babyproof the house.

Apparently, I Live in the Wrong Place

2006-01-29T18:02:00.000-08:00

I guess there was a reason I took two years of Italian in college.

You Belong in Rome

You're a big city girl with a small town heart
Which is why you're attracted to the romance of Rome
Strolling down picture perfect streets, cappuccino in hand
And gorgeous Italian men - could life get any better?

What City Do You Belong In?

Yet Another Reason Why I Hate People

2006-01-05T07:45:00.000-08:00

I have been following this story in the San Francisco Chronicle for the last few days and it makes me physically ill. They got a sitter for the dogs, but didn't get one for their children? Are you kidding me? Those children are way too young to be home alone, even for a short while. Doof just turned 12 (I can't believe I am stepmom to a 12 year old) and I would NEVER think to leave her home alone overnight that young.

It just kills me to read stories of people who don't understand how lucky they are to have little ones.

Christmas 2005

2005-12-30T14:30:00.000-08:00

Well we survived. Of course, we didn't manage to decorate our tree until yesterday, but who's counting?

Christmas Eve took us to JD's house for prime rib (yummy), lots of sides, and the chocolate port wine cake I bought for my brother's birthday (yummy again).

Christmas morning was pretty mellow. Bug was most interested in chewing on the wrapping paper, but seeing as how she is 9 months old, that makes sense. Santa brought me what I asked for (t shirts and knitting books). After that, we drove to Doof's house to fetch her Christmas dinner. No more toys for her. This year, at age almost 12, we got her ipod accessories. Three hours of Christmas at BIL/W's house felt more like thirty, but that's pretty typical. Then it was off to Grandma's to exchange gifties and then home. G's sister gave me the equivalent of crack for Christmas -- a cookie jar full of small peanut butter cookies, each topped with a Hershey kiss. Yummy. They are gone now. I didn't even have to share because G doesn't like peanut butter cookies. Also gone is the Uncle Jeff famous chocolate chip banana bread. It made for quite a few tasty breakfasts.

It only got really awkward when various people decided to ask my brother and me fairly ridiculous questions since we were, as always, the only people there who grew up Jewish. For example, "if you hang blue lights outside your house, does that mean you are Jewish?" Perhaps the people with the lights just like the color blue. Perhaps the blue lights were on sale. If only we had thought to respond with, "I don't know. If you spell out your initials in contrasting tile in your bathroom, are you an idiot?" Yes, they did that in one of their upstairs bathrooms.

Otherwise, there's not much to report. We made it through the holidays and no one got hurt, unless you count G spraining his ankle at basketball on Wednesday night.

Oh and on a totally unrelated note, here is a story from today's paper that amused me.

I Don't Understand People

2005-12-20T11:02:00.000-08:00

I really don't. While feeding the child, I turned on the television and watched in horror as Tammi Menendez told the whole world how much she loves her husband, Erik (you know the guy who, with his brother, murdered his parents) and how she thinks it's perfectly ok to bring her daughter to see him in prison every weekend. She couldn't say enough how she saw this as death to us part stuff and so forth. Yikes. Then there was this model talking about how her modeling agency told her (when she was 14) that she would be a great model if she would lose 50 pounds. So she did. And they told her she looked great when she was 5'9" and about 96 pounds. Good for her that she figured it out on her own that this wasn't a good thing and she has put on some weight and is now a plus-size model. When asked what size a plus-size model wears, she said 10-12 or bigger. Yikes again. Last time I checked, 10-12 sounds like the size of a regular, human girl. But what do I know?

But the news that bothered me most this morning was this. Who could possibly think that would be a good idea? It's just cruel.

Oh and please send warm thoughts to Wayne Gretzky because his mommy passed away last night.

Gollum Drives a Lexus

2005-12-19T22:30:00.000-08:00

It's true. And I don't even mean my brother-in-law, although he drives one too and is apparently in the market for a new one. But I digress.

Bug and I drove north to fetch Doof on Friday so she could spend the weekend with us like she usually does. Doof and her mom live 40 miles north of us. The drive north was unremarkable. As promised, I had Doof call her dad to let him know we were on our way home. She was telling him about the party her class had thrown that day when I screamed at her to give me the phone.

Why did I do this? Because the license plate and frame on the car in front of us read:

My own...My
THE1RNG
Preciousssssss

And her dad needed to know about it. Immediately.

It's times like those when I really wish I had a camera phone.

Job Hunting Sucks

2005-12-13T17:25:00.000-08:00

On Friday, I had an interview with a small law firm in the city. It was pretty clear that it was not the job for me. The firm agreed, because yesterday I got the ding letter, dated Friday. Well, I will give them this, they are prompt and at least they bothered to send the letter. I'm still waiting to hear from a firm with which I interviewed about six weeks ago.

So why am I annoyed? Well, this was the letter they sent:

"Dear Ms. L____.: (Please note the extra period before the colon.)

Thank you for your recent application for our associate position. Although I was impressed with your credentials, attitude, and professionalism, I believe another individual would more closely match our needs. (How nice to know that my attitude impresses people. This is not the "we chose someone else for the job" language. Rather, it's much more the "you suck and we are going to keep looking" language, as he made it clear that they had just started their search.)

I wish you all the best in your future endeavors, and success in your job hunt. (And to think that I am usually the one accused of using too many commas.)

Sincerely,
Joe A. Lawyer, Esq." (Impressed with your own title much? Most attorneys I know don't waste their time signing letters with "esq." after their names.)

Jerk.

Sometimes, I Really Hate People

2005-12-07T17:05:00.000-08:00

Following in the footsteps of the Angry Piper, this is my effort to complain about people. I'm just having one of those days. Given that today is the third anniversary of the day my dad died, I'm not in the greatest mood. I had thought I might blog about the evils and dangers of smoking, but I'll save that for later. Instead, I'll just honor my dad in the way I have the last couple of years -- by partaking of the most disgustingly decadent chocolate dessert I can find. Or a hot fudge sundae, but I'll have to eat it the way he did. He was known for eating the ice cream first (i.e. out from under the hot fudge). I also have the head cold that won't die and I'm currently in the process of coughing up my left lung. So not fun for me.

Since I still don't have a job, I am playing stay at home mommy and watching far too much television. Today, it's a marathon of Project Runway. In the last episode, the contestants were charged with redesigning the uniforms for postal workers. While watching it, I think to myself, the mail should be here, so I'll go out and fetch. Wouldn't you know, there was the lady delivering the mail. So I tried to wait for her to just take it from her, rather than make her dodge Aragog the spider's web, squeeze through past the minivan, and get to the mailbox. See, I was trying to be helpful. Her response, dripping with disdain was "could you please try to stay away from me with your cold, ma'am." Gee, now the postal workers are talking down to me. Boy, I must be a real loser. So I went back inside, muttered some non-g rated words under my breath, and sat down to blog.

There was nothing compelling in today's mail. Drat.

Ok, off to fetch some chocolatey goodness.

My Baby Is Clearly Insane

2005-12-02T21:07:00.000-08:00

...but that is to be expected with me as her mom. She is learning how to roll to get from one place to another. This is not necessarily crazy behavior, but it is a bit strange to find her hanging out under the coffee table. And her favorite toys as of late are my watch, an empty plastic water bottle, and a bag of potato chips. She's not interested in the chips. She just likes the sounds the bag makes when she grabs it. Or chews on it. Apparently, we don't need the living room full of toys.

But she's incredibly cute, so I can't complain too much.

She's Going to Hate Me for This

2005-11-22T16:49:00.000-08:00

This is Bug the first time we fed her oatmeal. She actually liked it, although she apparently decided that it would also serve as an excellent shampoo.

Because she's just so darned cute, I had to share this picture. And to show off her More Cowbell onesie, courtesy of Uncle Jeff.

Someday, I will manage to catch her smiling for a picture. She has a sixth sense about the camera and the minute I grab it, she forgets how to grin. Maybe next week.

It's My Birthday and I'll Complain If I Want To

2005-11-16T14:30:00.000-08:00

I'm old. I don't know why, but 35 seems really old. I didn't have an issue with 30, so the fact that this bugs me is a bit surprising. The first thing I thought when I looked in the mirror was "do I really look that old?" Oh well.

I'm still waiting on the results of two job interviews. That would so be the best present if I got a call today with good news. I'm trying to be optimistic about it all, but I have never been very good at that. I just hate waiting. Particularly for something like this. And particularly when one of the interviewers said I would hear from her at the beginning of this week. It's all I can do to not call her and find out where things stand.

In other news, G bought me a cashmere sweater (that didn't have a red dot on it) and a book I wanted, so I clearly can't complain about that. And his card made me laugh out loud. He's pretty terrific. I think I'll keep him.

And I get to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire in two days. Woo Hoo!!!!!

Ok, so maybe I really don't have too much to complain about.

This Stuff Just Annoys Me

2005-11-12T19:45:00.000-08:00

Today is November 12. Why is the date relevant? Because this San Francisco radio station decided that playing Christmas music all day was a good idea.* Honestly. It's not even Thanksgiving yet. It's not as if I don't get totally sick of the songs when they don't start until the day after Turkey Day. And where are the Hanukkah songs?

And the Christmas ads have already started to show up on television. Each year it seems that the marketing of Christmas starts earlier and earlier. Perhaps next year it will start in October. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of Christmas (even if it does usually involve a family dinner at BIL/W's house and they always get lame gifts for Doof, assuming they don't just give her something one of their kids didn't like, but that's for another entry), but this is getting ridiculous.

In other news, my boys from Cal got their heads handed to them by USC in football today. At least I knew it was going to happen.

*I don't actually listen to that station, I was just channel surfing. That's my story and I'm sticking with it.

Meet Yoda

2005-11-08T17:12:00.000-08:00

This is Bug in her Halloween costume. I just had to show her off because she's entirely too cute. Thank you, Uncle Jeff for finding the costume. Too bad no trick or treaters came by to see her.

Of course, no trick or treaters meant that I got dibs on all 3 bags of candy that I purchased that afternoon. I'm not sure how good of a thing that is. Wait, that's excellent. It means I still have some Reese's peanut butter cups in the freezer. Gotta go fetch a snack.

Yet Another Stupid Idea

2005-11-06T18:14:00.000-08:00

BIL is at it again. He is full of stupid ideas that he likes to share with anyone who will listen. This time, it has to do with Christmas. While we like to choose Christmas presents for people that we know they will like, he selects presents that he thinks they should have.

For example, for Father's Day, BIL asked what his dad wanted and was told of a specific shirt, in a specific size, in a specific color. BIL bought a shirt from the same company. Of course, the one he bought was the wrong style, wrong size, and wrong color. Whoops. Upon hearing this, G told his mom that we would buy the correct shirt and joked about how funny it would be to get it monogrammed with something silly like "World's Greatest Dad," knowing it would be a dig at BIL for buying the wrong thing. So G heads to his mom's office in the back of the house to order the shirt. He then comes back to the front of the house, giggling like a crazy person because he found out that he could, in fact, have the shirt monogrammed. So he did.

If only we could have seen the look on BIL's face the day he saw the shirt we bought...

Fast forward to this past week. BIL calls G at work where G doesn't have caller ID and can't screen his calls. BIL has decided that we should all chip in and buy this for G's mom (she's BIL's stepmom) and have the grandkids' names embroidered on it. In the immortal words of Al Borland, "I don't think so, Tim." When G told me about this, I channeled my best Capital One commercial voice and said "NO!" Repeatedly. Why, no? Because the last thing we want to do is go in on a gift with BIL. And because we don't want to. And because we doubted that G's mom would want it. We were right. Besides, it leaves G's sister out since she doesn't have kids. Although, I suppose we could put her dog's name on the thing.

G called and asked her how she felt about quilts. Her response was a very suspicious why. So he told her. And as we expected, she wasn't interested.

I don't imagine that BIL actually thinks G's mom is the world's greatest grandma. I suspect that it has a lot more to do with sucking up. I think BIL is one of those people who always wants to be everyone's favorite person and tries way too hard. And he keeps score. So anytime he "does someone a favor," he sort of logs it so he can bring it up later. It's a pissing contest that G and I have no interest in entering.

So we opted out and BIL took it just fine. I'm sure he'll tuck it back in his memory to use as ammunition at a later date. He may very well buy the quilt on his own and try to show us up with it later. Whatever. We will be the ones who bought G's mom something she actually wants for Christmas (dvds and a posed picture of Doof and Bug). And that's good enough for us.

In other news, I had two job interviews this past week. I'll keep you posted as news develops.

Caustic Brownies

2005-10-31T16:59:00.000-08:00

We went to BIL/W's (G's bro and sis in law's) new house last night for dinner because we couldn't find a good way to get out of it. This was the second time they invited us. We couldn't go to the first shindig because we were already going to Miss Ali's first birthday party and told them so. I don't think they believed us because they made some snarky comments to G's mom about our not bending over backwards to see their monument to excess, I mean, their new house. Whatever. Then there was the debate about why it's not exactly convenient for us to go up there.

The seem to like the idea of Sunday night dinners. Swell. There are lots of problems with this plan of theirs. First, they live 40 miles north of us and we have no reason to make the drive on Sunday nights. Second, we would just as soon stay home on Sunday evenings unless there is something we really want to do or someone we really want to see. Third, I don't always enjoy their company. Despite all of this, we went, even though we knew we would have our noses rubbed in how they own a house and we don't. It's a beautiful house, but it's not very warm and seems to act like there aren't small kids living there.

It was the whole family: BIL/W and 4 of their 5 kids (the eldest lives out of town with her fiance), G's parents, and G's sister (who has the same name as I do -- which makes things like sending e-mail to G's mom a bit confusing for her). It was fine. Dinner was fine. Conversation was fine, notwithstanding people's efforts to one up each other. I ducked out of that, choosing instead to discuss soap operas with W. It could have been way worse.

Then it was time for dessert. W made brownies: caramel/pecan topped ones for the grown ups and plain ones for the kids. I took a bite and it was pretty tasty, but then I felt this weird burning in the back of my throat. One doesn't expect that from baked goods. Did someone accidentally spill in some bleach? Or cayenne pepper? G's sister finally asks about the burning in her throat. I finally went and asked W about the burning issue, after first complimenting her cooking because I'm all about making nice with the in-laws. She said she used spiced pecans. Hmmmm. Chocolate and spicy.* It might have been nice to have been warned about this, rather than worrying that I had been poisoned. But then W is a big fan of mixing things up, like the Thanksgiving she made "savory stuffing" with too many ingredients or last year when she hosted Christmas dinner and neglected to remove the string from the roast beef. I guess she thought we needed some fiber...

The benefit of dinner on a Sunday night was that it was a short evening. On the way home, we stopped at In n Out Burger for shakes and fries because he thought I needed a treat. God, I love him.

*Alton Brown puts some cayenne in his hot cocoa mix, but only a pinch. Of course, he also explains why. And he's just cool. W, not so much.

Oh My Eyes

2005-10-27T21:21:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, G and I went to lunch at a place that could never be mistaken for a health food restaurant given that they make buffalo wings, cheesesteaks, fish and chips, and homemade potato chips. Yum on all accounts. So anyway, we were finishing up when this young lady comes into the place to grab a soda and G says to me "Jen, look at her outfit."

She was fairly tall and was probably a size 8, but I guess she doesn't like to wear the correct size. I present you with her outfit: pink cropped turtleneck sweater (long-sleeved) and a lace-trimmed, denim mini skirt.

What is the problem, you ask. Well, I'll tell you. I think the skirt was about two sizes two small. As a result, whatever extra amounts there were of her were squished up above the waistband into the space left vacant by the short sweater. It made me think of the chiffon-covered sausage casing that Anonymous Coworker described a few days a go. In fact, I was so mesmerized by the lumpy midriff, that I forgot to check out her shoes and I always check out the shoes. What's particularly sad is that had her clothes actually fit, we wouldn't have noticed her at all.

Is That a Malfoy in Your Pocket?

2005-10-24T16:34:00.000-07:00

Or are you just happy to see me?

Uncle Jeff sent me this today. I can't wait until November 18.

Because I Am Still 12

2005-10-20T14:47:00.000-07:00

This makes me unreasonably happy:

GH LOVES THE '80S Here's a blast from the past: "Jessie's Girl" rocker Rick Springfield returns to General Hospital as Dr. Noah Drake on Dec. 2. Last seen in 1983, Noah returns for about four episodes to help Dr. Robin Scorpio (Kimberly McCullough) treat her ex-boyfriend Jason's (Steve Burton) brain damage. No doubt he'll also reminisce with Nurse Bobbie (Jackie Zeman) about their long-ago romance. “I guess there was a reason why they didn't kill Noah off in the ‘80s," Springfield cracks. "This should be fun. I’m looking forward to it.”

--tvguide.com

Of course, if the powers that be are good to me, I will have to tivo those episodes because some kindhearted soul will actually see fit to give my sorry ass (and the rest of me) a job.

The Second Funniest Thing My Mom Ever Said

2005-10-19T19:54:00.000-07:00

I was chatting with my brother this afternoon, when he reminded me of yet another funny quote from my mom. Strangely enough, she said it maybe an hour after my dad died and it was totally unintentional, but I guess we needed a good giggle.

So anyway, we were leaving the hospital since we had all been there to say goodbye and as we were walking out we passed this woman. There she was in all her glory: overly teased and peroxided blond hair and ginormous, surgically enhanced boobs. They were pushed up higher than any wonderbra could ever think of putting them. So anyway, because I am 12, I exclaimed "oh my god, look at her boobs!" My poor mom apparently wasn't paying attention because she said "well, you should ask her where she got them."

Mom thought I had said boots.

The Funniest Thing My Mom Ever Said

2005-10-19T11:52:00.000-07:00

This is a true story.

About six weeks before my dad died, my mom was diagnosed with colon cancer and had surgery to remove part of her colon. Once she recovered from surgery, she began chemotherapy. She was 58 at the time.

I promise, I'll get to the funny part. I just wanted to give some context.

So anyway, I went down to LA to be with my dad when he passed and then to help my mom go through and clean out their apartment. A few days after he died, my mom and I were sitting in her living room, taking a break from looking for insurance policies and other important papers when she looked at me and said the following:

Now that your father is gone, I just want to let you know that I'm not going to take this as an opportunity to be come promiscuous.

I fell off my chair laughing. I guess is was the outlet I needed. I think she was surprised that I found it so funny, but at least my hysterical laughter made her laugh, so that's not a bad thing, right?

Call Me Suzie Homemaker

2005-10-18T09:47:00.000-07:00

Well, not really. That would suggest that my house is neat and anyone who has ever seen where I live knows that I am not good with the neat.

But since I am still doing the stay at home mom thing, I have a lot of time on my hands, but not as much as you would think. I basically have to fit things in between times Bug eats, complains because she's stuck on her tummy and can't roll over, wants attention, and falls asleep on me. Don't get me wrong, I love it when she falls asleep on me -- it's so very cozy. But it also means that I can't move for fear of waking her.

Yesterday, I made pot roast. The solution for entertaining Bug -- bring her bouncy seat into the kitchen and let her watch. Ok, so what is she had to endure the cursing during the onion chopping portion of the program (I hate chopping onions and the resulting burning of the eyes). The resulting dinner was worth it, though. Mmmm pot roast. It was nice to have something that was outside of the regular rotation.

I think my George Foreman grill died. Yes, I own one, deal with it. The upshot, of course, is that now I can go out and get the one with grill plates that go in the dishwasher. Woo hoo. This is a very good thing because I think this one died from drowning in the sink.

There is still no progress on the job front. I finally got the last of the outstanding ding letters. Interestingly enough, they said they didn't want me because I had "too much legal experience." A girl just can't win. So I keep looking. It really shouldn't be this hard to find a job, should it?

In other news, Bug's second tooth has popped through (ouch for mommy) and I think she has figured out she's ticklish. This means that I have a guaranteed way to make her giggle, which is the best sound in the entire world.

Home From Paradise

2005-10-13T20:01:00.000-07:00

Bug and I spent a lovely 2 days on Kauai for XT's wedding. She couldn't have picked a more stunning spot for the festivities -- sunset on the beach in Princeville, with Bali Hai in the background. And she looked exquisite. It's so wonderful to see her so happy. She has earned it.

Tel was there and Al flew in from New York, so we all got to hang out together. It was loads of fun. I only wish that Bug and I could have stayed longer, but we had a budget, so there you go. Bug was an incredibly good sport for the flights and for everything, actually. I don't really recommend traveling alone with an infant, but it's definitely something I could do. And I wasn't about to miss XT's wedding. I even got to walk down to the wedding carrying Bug (there wasn't really anyone else there to hold her for me), so she got to participate as well in her very cute orange and pink Hawaiian print dress.

The only downside of traveling to Hawaii is coming home covered in insect bites. But it was so worth it.

Please Stop Already

2005-10-06T17:36:00.000-07:00

Like Tel, I can't stand Rachael Ray and her never-ending perkiness. First, she hosts some 4 different shows on the Food Network. Then, I read that she's getting her own magazine. And now this? Per tvguide.com, she's getting her own talk show. Thanks for nothing, Oprah.

Overexposed much?

Scary Stuff

2005-10-01T13:54:00.000-07:00

G sent this to me yesterday. If someone did this in my house, I think I would have a heart attack and die. But that's just me. And G.

Too Stupid to Pump Gas

2005-09-26T19:10:00.000-07:00

This is a true story. It happened today after Bug and I picked up G to fetch lunch. That evil dashboard light that tells me that it's time to spend another $50 at the gas pump came on. There's an ARCO near G's office that is under $3/gallon so we went. Like other Japanese cars, our gas tank is on the left, which means that we have to get in line and wait for a vacant pump, whereas a car with a tank on the right could just pull right in, pay the exorbitant sum and hit the road.

There is one entrance to get to the two lines of pumps (there are two pumps on each side of each line of pumps). We chose the line closer to the street because there was only one car in it. Of course, that car was at the rear pump and the one in front was not being used. Could it be that the driver was all done and ready to pull out? Or might she notice that there is a big blue van behind her so she would think to pull up to the forward pump? No and no. She ignored the world around her, took her own sweet time at the credit card machine to pay for her gas, and then couldn't figure out how to get the pump to work. I kid you not. She must have been in her mid 60's and apparently she had never pumped gas before. Ultimately, G popped out of the van to try to help her and then got someone from the gas station to get things working.

By this time, G and I are rolling our eyes and waiting. So she pumps her gas. And hops back into her car. And nothing happens. She just sits there and probably wonders why her car isn't moving. Well, perhaps it had something to do with that little old gas cap sitting on the trunk of her car. I finally hopped out, knocked on her back window, told her to turn off the car, and put the gas cap in place. Had I not helped her, who knows how long she would have sat there. And how lucky was she that the van behind her contained an old married couple with a baby rather than some hostile teenagers. Eventually, she left. And we got our gas and had a good laugh.

As it turned out, choosing the other line would not have helped as that driver of the truck at the rear pump waited until after his car was full of gas to wash the windows. Man, I hate it when people do that.

I swear this was actually funny when it happened, but I guess you had to be there.

Thanks, Mom

2005-09-25T00:24:00.000-07:00

Be warned, this is a long one.

G and I decided sometime in April 2003 that we should try to have a baby. We had been married for almost a year and we were ready.

After I got home from spending the day in Golden Gate Park to see Duran Duran (and giggling like a 14 year old) with G's sis, I decided to break out a pregnancy test and, woo hoo, there was that extra line. I was beside myself, I was so happy. I wonder if that was why I steered away from beer during the concert. Nah, it's probably because it was about eleven million degrees that day. But it does explain why earlier in the week the smell of apple cinammon oatmeal made me want to barf. I told my mom immediately because she needed to hear some good news. She had been diagnosed with colon cancer the previous October and my dad had died in December. She was so excited to be a grandma.

I called the doctor the next day to schedule my first prenatal appointment. Everything seemed to be fine until the afternoon of October 22 when I found blood during one of my many trips to the little girls' room. In a panic, I called Al to find out if this was normal. She said it probably was, but that I should call my doctor for peace of mind. The doctor said to come in immediately for an ultrasound. I told my supervisor that I wasn't feeling well and that I was running to the doctor. No one other than some close friends and family knew I was pregnant and I wasn't about to tell the office.

The doctor I saw was a very no nonsense woman who could never be described as warm. Her comment during the ultrasound was "this does not look good." I was 9 weeks 3 days pregnant, but the baby had stopped developing a few weeks back. I was to go back the following day for a d&c. I wanted to die.

They took me to a room where I could collect myself and make phone calls. I called my mom first. I guess I needed her to tell me everything would be ok. I needed my mommy. Then I called G and drove home. I don't remember much of the rest of the day other than making phone calls to untell the people with whom we had shared our good news. We had not told Doof, so at least we didn't have to untell her. And I called the headhunter through whom I had gotten my job (it was a long term temp gig) to tell her I would be having surgery and would be out the rest of the week.

I woke up the next morning and checked my e-mail. The first thing I saw was a snarky message from the headhunter wanting to know why I hadn't given more notice that I would be out for two days. Shocked and horrified and then a bit numb, I called her. She asked if I meant this week and, when I said yes, started to give me grief about lack of notice. It was all I could do not to scream at her, but I simply said that I was sorry and that I had suffered a miscarriage and was going in for a medical procedure. Well that shut her up pretty good. When I told, G, he was furious, called her nasty names and ultimately sent her a fax telling how unreasonable she was and that she owed me an apology for giving me a hard time. God, I love him.

G took the day off to take me to the doctor. The doctor doing the procedure greeted me with a hug and a valium. I think all doctors should greet me this way. I was conscious for and cried through the whole thing, with G at my side. Then we went home and made more phone calls and cried a lot more until I finally ran out of tears for the night. My mom called all of our family members, but was instructed by one of my aunts not to tell one of my cousins (who was then pregnant) because it would be too stressful for her to hear my news. Whatever.

The following day was worse because G had to work. The lone bright spot was the delivery of sunflowers from XT and Bab because they understand that sunflowers are incredibly cheery. I don't think I thanked them enough. XT then sent some books on miscarriage and a tracking number for another package. When I checked it out to find out when it might arrive, I saw that whatever it was weighed 8 pounds. Given my frame of mind, is it any wonder that my first thought was "but you can't order a baby from Amazon"?

Things plugged along and I went on with my life as best I could. I suffered a bit of a setback and a whole lot of poor me when XT told me she was pregnant with Ali. I didn't handle the news very well. I felt terrible about not being a particularly good friend to her on hearing her announcement since I felt that I was the one who was supposed to be pregnant. I later called her back to tell her that I was happy for her, apologize for freaking out, and ask she was feeling. We talked about how hard it was for her to tell me and I sure didn't make it any easier. But it was my job to be happy for my friend. And I was.

We finally got the go ahead to try again later in the spring of 2004, but wouldn't you know it my system went wonky with the hormones. At this same time, my mom started getting sicker. In March, she broke her leg. It turned out that her cancer had spread and tumor growing in her leg broke the bone. And then it spread to her brain. Perhaps it was the stress that caused things to go crazy with my body. All I know is that I stopped ovulating.

So there I was 33 years old, desperately wanting a baby, and watching my mom deteriorate. And my baby would have been due at the end of May. Because her cancer had spread so much, my mom had to stop working. She had worked at UCLA for 40 years, so her office decided to throw her a retirement party near the end of June. The plan was to have it on campus, but she wasn't up to the travel, so they brought it to the nursing home where she was staying after a Memorial Day fall and the resulting blackout. She wasn't the same afterwards and she didn't get those missing days back. Her short term memory was gone. But interestingly enough, her long term memory was all there. We know this because her boss had brought her personnel file to the party and when asked how much she made when she started working there, my mom was able to state her weekly salary for 1964. Some thirty people from her office came to the home with gifts and food and good wishes. They went around the room telling how long they had known her and providing anecdotes about how she had helped them at work or made them laugh. She was the belle of the ball and she was on. It was great. And bittersweet. And strangely difficult for me because my cousin came with her 6 week old baby. He was just about 10 days older than mine would have been. And my aunt who had said not to tell my cousin what had happened back in October made stupid comments about how natural I looked with the baby and that I should try to have one of my own. She's an idiot and G wanted to kill her.

My mom passed away a few weeks later, the day after her 60th birthday. Shortly before she died, I learned from the oncology department social worker, with whom she had met during the course of her treatment, that my mom blamed herself for my miscarriage. She was concerned that the stress of her illness caused it to happen. She couldn't have been more wrong. But she never told me and by the time I found out, it was really too late to tell her that it was not her fault and that I didn't blame her. I would never have blamed her. I blamed myself because, clearly, there had to be something wrong with me. Or else sometimes things just happen.

After we got back home from the funeral and cleaning out my mom's apartment and a previously planned vacation at a cabin by a lake, I met with my doctor to discuss why my body had gone wonky. I started a medication to treat a hormonal imbalance and was scheduled to start a fertility medication in the fall. About 10 days later, I woke up with a migraine and called in sick to work. During the afternoon, I was feeling better, but was bored. I found a pregnancy test under the cupboard. And you are thinking why would she think of a pregnancy test at this point in time. I'll tell you why. Since I hadn't had a cycle in a few months, I took a pregnancy test maybe once a week just to see if perhaps that was why I hadn't had a visit from Aunt Flo. So I was due for a test. And I took it. There was that extra line again. I called the doctor to see if perhaps the new medication caused false positives. She said no and that I should come in the following Monday to find out when the heck this happened. G showed up with lunch about 30 minutes later and the minute he entered the apartment I handed him the test. To say we were shocked would be an understatement. After lunch, I took one of those digital tests and it immediately read PREGNANT.

We decided we wouldn't tell anyone before I saw the doctor on Monday. And I really tried to keep it quiet. But I couldn't. I told XT at her baby shower because I just couldn't not tell her. And then I told Al. But that's it.

I was a nervous wreck on Sunday night before my appointment. I didn't want more bad news. I didn't think I would be able to handle it. After all, in just 19 months, I had lost both parents and a baby. I got to the doctor's office, hoping that I would see the doctor with the hugs (and the valium). But no. I got to see the warm one that had told me I had miscarried. I tried to breathe and tried not to panic. She showed me the screen and there she was, my little Bug. No visible heartbeat yet, but that's ok, it was too early. She then told me my due date was April 7, 2005, based on Bug's size, since they couldn't determine the date based on my last period (the usual way to determine a due date). So, of course, I asked, "so when did this happen?" "Oh, around July 14." I nearly fainted. July 14 was the day my mom died.

I have to think that my mom had something to do with this. How could she not? I wasn't supposed to get pregnant without some medical assistance. But I did. And Bug is here and will be six months old on Tuesday.

So, thank you, Mom, so so very much. I miss you and Dad every day, but having Bug here makes it a little easier.

Quite Possibly the Most Disturbing Thing I Have Ever Seen

2005-09-21T17:11:00.000-07:00

Bug and I were heading out in our van to fetch some lunch, waiting to make the right turn off our road onto the road that would take us to the freeway. At the time, I had no idea where we would be going, but it didn't much matter since what I really wanted was to be out of the house. And while we were waiting, I saw something that defied description, but I'll try.*

I have seen this person before; usually he's waiting at the nearest bus stop. Today he had a companion. There he was in all his glory -- fairly tall, fairly old, maybe 300 pounds, wearing old, mismatched army fatigues. And the pants were clearly too big. How do I know this? Because he saw something on the ground and decided to bend over to check it out. And smell it. Ick. Very ick. Amid the bending and smelling was, shockingly, a display of crack that would put the finest of plumbers to shame. There must have been something wrong with his companion because she didn't run away screaming "oh my eyes," which is certainly what I would have done.

I figure that since I had to endure the actual visual, the least I could do is share.

It took awhile before I was able to even consider eating lunch.

*It's at times like these when I wish I owned a camera phone.

The Club

2005-09-20T02:56:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure when we started calling it "the club" or even why, and it's not something I ever wanted to join. To get into the club, you have to have lost a parent. I think it applies to those of us who are of an age where you would expect to still have parents. Al was the first of my close friends to join and my brother and I were next. It's hard to believe it has been five years since her mom died. We all adored her mom and salute her with little Cokes and think fondly of the time she said, "you just don't see that in Ardmore." It makes us smile.

My dad died in December 2002 and I looked to Al for guidance because she "got it". She knew the drill. More importantly, she had been through the loss of a parent and lived through it. She told me that everything I was feeling was ok and that I would survive. And she was right. It's such a strange process to go through. I can't really explain it. I just know that I was glad I wasn't going through it alone. And then Steve's mom died a few months later and I got to help him into the club the way Al had helped me. I think it probably helped me more than it did him. I was the one who "got it" and could do something productive because of that. Then another friend lost a parent and I got to tell him all the things I had learned. It let me continue to grieve the loss of my dad, but it also helped me get beyond the grief, concentrating on the good memories and silly misadventures, often involving cake, and being thankful for what I had.

Last July, my mother died, so my brother and I got to start a new chapter within the club. This was reserved for those of us who had lost both parents. No one had started it for us. If I didn't want to join the club, I certainly didn't want to be here. I'm so thankful that my brother and I were close to begin with so that I at least had someone who understood what I felt. Steve joined us in this chapter a few months later. Thankfully, no one else has.

When I lost my dad, I felt strangely untethered, like there was some structure missing that was supposed to keep me in my place. It was as if part of the ceiling was missing and I could move up a level. When I had parents, I didn't feel that I had to be "the grown up" in the family. I had them for that. I would still be someone's kid. When my dad died, I leveled up and had to do some of the things that the grown ups do. I became sort of a peer for my mom. And then when she died, the tethers were gone. There was no structure holding me in my proper place and I sure didn't and I don't like it any more now. I'm not the kid anymore and no one is around to treat me like a kid. I think my brother and I sort of expected that my parents' peers, who for thirty plus years had treated us as kids would continue to do so, looking out for us since our parents no longer could. And strangely enough, I wanted that (at least for a little while). It didn't happen. Instead, we found ourselves fitting into roles my parents had played with their friends. My brother now has the task of calling my dad's best friend to tell him when certain movies are on tv or to talk about certain sporting events. The gossip I used to get from my mom I now have to get directly from the source.

So here I am. An orphan at 33 and a mom at 34. I wish everyday I could call my folks for advice on various baby-related things or comparisons of what Bug is like to how I was as an infant. Instead, I have box full of mementos like my baby book and my baby blanket and so many pictures, all of which I cherish, but it doesn't tell me everything I want to know. And as a parent, I have the fear of leaving my little one too soon. My parents both died at age 60 and will miss out on so many things. It just goes to show me that life is short and that I had better make the most of it. That's really all anyone can do.

And my fondest hope at this point is that I won't be welcoming anyone to the club for a very long time. But if someone does join the club, I will be there for them however much they need me, bearing little Cokes in honor of Al's mom, Pepsi in a can to be poured over ice in honor of my mom, and the most disgustingly chocolate thing I can find in honor of my dad.

Call Me Crankypants

2005-09-16T14:34:00.000-07:00

I'm finding that things are annoying me a whole heck of a lot more lately. Maybe I am just getting cranky in my old age. I'm not sure. Anywhere, here is a list of things that have bugged me in the last few days.

I ended up being the one to go out and buy the Gatorade and Benadryl last night. Yay me. Of course, I didn't write a shopping list before heading off to Safeway, so I forgot the Benadryl. G gives me shit about this (the not writing the list), which made me glare at him on the way out the door. Just for that, I made him cook dinner.
This is the kind of Benadryl I wanted, but now I can't seem to find it. Rather than head back over the freeway to the Safeway, I tried the local 7 11, but they didn't have it. Then I went to the local little market, but they didn't have it either, so I bought the children's version and came home. Today, we found out that the closest Walgreens doesn't have it either. Is it wrong to want what I want when I want it?
Why is it that total strangers feel compelled to touch my child? I don't mind when people come up and look at her and tell me how beautiful she is (because she is), but don't start sticking your grubby fingers on her without asking me. Case in point: G and I went out for lunch today because we needed hot and sour soup. We usually get take out, so it's not like the people who work there know us. So here comes our waitress to get a closer look. Then she's grabbing Bug's toes and touching her hair. Then she says that she washed her hands and asked if she could hold Bug. So we said fine and next thing you know she starts walking away toward the kitchen because she wants to show my baby to her sister. Had she gotten more than 15 feet away from us, I probably would have run after her and tackled her. After we have Bug back in her carseat, waitress comes by again to fawn some more, even though G is entertaining Bug. She actually had the nerve to tell G to get out of the way so she could play with Bug. G showed incredible restraint because I would have kicked her had I not been across the table. G simply moved waitress' arm off our child and that was it. She left us alone after that.
The dirty dishes in my house seem to multiply overnight. I'm not sure how this happens. They just won't go away.
My nose is still stuffy, but at least I don't still feel like I am swallowing glass.
XT's ex-asshole, because I have learned just how much of a dickhead he is. Since I didn't kick the waitress, perhaps I should go kick him.
F/X is supposed to show Buffy reruns at 1 and 2pm and today they didn't. Grrrr.

I'm sure I could come up with more, but that's enough for now.

My Kingdom for Gatorade

2005-09-15T12:02:00.000-07:00

When S (aka Doof) came to our house, she brought along with her a head cold. Swell. See the minute cold germs come anywhere near me, they know they will have a home. They decided to stop off with G first to pick up some strength before finding their way to me. Doof is over her cold and G and I are on the mend. Of course, all I want when I have a cold is lemon lime Gatorade and won ton soup. And we are out of Gatorade. And Benadryl. Clearly, someone needs to go to the market tonight and it better not be me.

The bonus to all of this is that I have to be careful with my cold medication intake since I'm nursing. It seems they might all be fine for the baby, but they could cut my milk supply. By half. Eeeeek. After how hard it was get this nursing thing to work properly, I'll be damned if I will take something that will screw it all up. So I'll suffer, at least during the day.

The good news is that Bug hasn't caught it yet.

Here is a totally unrelated note. I told you all that Doof's mom went to New Orleans to help out in a hospital. She sent Doof an e-mail, care of G telling Doof the following things:

She got to meet Dr. Phil.
She took a helicopter ride over the city.
She wanted Doof to know that "the bad men with guns were taken to a small room with bars on it in Baton Rouge."

Given the way number 3 was written, as opposed to "those gun-toting people you heard about on the news are now in jail", how old would you think Doof is? She is 11. But Doof's mom often talks to her like she's a little kid. It's sad.

Breastfeeding for Dummies

2005-09-09T22:55:00.000-07:00

Yes, that is a real book. And boy do I wish I had known about it about six months ago. Perhaps it would have helped. See, I figured that this nursing thing would be pretty simple. People have been doing it for years. Simply insert tab A into slot B. Be a breastaurant.* But nope, not so easy.

After Bug was born, I tried to nurse her as soon as I could, but she would have none of that. I tried and tried and tried. I called in the nurses. I called in the lactation consultants. But nothing doing. By the time I left the hospital, I would estimate that at least 10 different people had manhandled the bosoms in an effort to get the kid to eat. I have never been so groped in all of my life. The overnight nurses were way worse than the lactation consultants. There was one who was relentless in her quest to get Bug to eat straight from the tap. My little Bug, stubborn girl that she is (just like her mama) refused. The nurse just kept wrestling with Bug until I finally had to tell that nurse to piss off and stop making my baby scream. The goal was to feed the child and formula would have to do, at least until I could figure out whether breastfeeding would work for us.

Now seeing as how I was a buxom lass to begin with and the Titty Fairy that arrives during pregnancy came to visit a few times, I was determined to do this nursing thing. Since I had to carry the boobs around anyway, I figured I should put them to good use.

There were reasons why she didn't nurse in the hospital. It turns out, there was an issue with her frenulum -- the thing that attaches your tongue to the bottom of your mouth -- that prevented her from latching. So we had that fixed. Then there was a problem with the amount of milk that I had for her. I rented a breast pump from the hospital to try to get the milk flowing and started taking this herb called fenugreek to help increase production. Fenugreek doesn't taste all that great, even in capsule form, and apparently will make a person smell like maple syrup she sweats if she takes it enough. Thank god the smell thing didn't happen because I loathe maple syrup.

So here I am, a new mom who is feeding her child every three hours or so. Only it wasn't that simple. It meant mixing up formula with whatever breastmilk I had pumped, feeding Bug, putting her back to bed, then pumping for 20 minutes, then trying to fall asleep so I could maybe get in an hour before Bug woke up. Not exactly the best way to get some rest. I nearly gave up because it was so goddamn stressful. But as I said, I'm stubborn. I ultimately bought my own pump and I would be damned if I would spend $300 on the thing and then not get my money's worth. I passed the shopping test.** And it has worked. I was able make enough milk to bottle-feed Bug.

I was a breastaurant with a take out window.

And then one day, Bug miraculously learned how to latch. She still goes to the take out window when she's being stubborn. Or if it's too hot. Or if she's too lazy. Or if mama doesn't feel like yanking out the boobs in public.

It has all been worth it. She's healthy and she's growing and she's the cutest thing I have ever seen, so I really can't complain.

*Breastaurant was coined by a former coworker's husband and it just makes me giggle. When that coworker ended up getting braces, another coworker referred to her as a breastaurant with a grill.

** My mom came up with the shopping test. When making a purchase, you have to ask yourself will I get x dollars (the cost of the item) use out of it. If the answer is yes, then go ahead and buy it. If the answer is no, you are not allowed. It works pretty well, but does not apply to shiny goodies one might find at Tiffany.

Problem Solved

2005-09-08T22:27:00.000-07:00

The crib is gone! Woo hoo! And I didn't have to do anything except talk to my brother in law on the phone. It was worth the sacrifice.

He called this morning from work. Of course, when I saw his number on the caller id, I accidentally on purpose missed the call and waited for the inevitable voice mail. I should know better. He never ever says what he wants on the voicemail. It's always, "Hi Jen, it's BIL. Give me a call back at the office." Why? Who knows? And he never calls just to say hi. So I sucked it up and called back.

Anyway, he had called to say that we was going to be in town to deliver some things to a friend who was collecting items to send to the gulf states and would I like him to take the crib off my hands. Abso-fuckin-lutely. He had popped by over the weekend with his family since they hadn't seen Bug in awhile and he must have noticed that we still had the crib. Even better was the fact that he was only able to come by my place at a time when I wouldn't be home. So all I had to do was leave it outside and he would pick it up. It was annoying that he insisted on knowing why I wouldn't be home, but whatever. I didn't have to expend any effort to dispose of the damn crib and there was no possibility of family strife.

It was so lovely to come home from the farmer's market to no stale smoke smelling crib cluttering up the landing before the stairs.

A Whole Lot of Random Thoughts

2005-09-07T18:08:00.000-07:00

I couldn't come up with a single topic, so here is a collection of the things that have been going through my brain.

1) I have found myself strangely obsessed with watching tennis on tv. It's not the most thrilling thing to watch, particularly since I have never played the game, but I can't get enough. And I don't watch it the same way I watch golf. The golf channel is often my favorite channel, particularly at 3am when I can't fall asleep. It's so god awful boring that it puts me right out. No, tennis I find fascinating and think that I should give it a go. Never mind the fact that I have no hand eye coordination whatsoever. But if anything could make me skinnier, it could be running around like a crazy person while carrying a racket. And safer for me than racquetball because there are no walls for me to run into. Oh and I think I love James Blake.

2) I have a new nickname for Bug -- it's Ptera, short for pterodactyl. Why, you ask? Because not only has she learned how to shriek, she also makes this sound that I can only attribute to pterodactyls in movies. It's high-pitched, like the shriek, and boy is it loud. I'm not a fan.

3) I feel compelled to say something nice about S's mom. As the evil stepmom, I don't have to, but since the mom is flying to New Orleans for a week to help out (she's a nurse), I have to give her kudos. I'm not wild about her or some of the decisions she makes with regard to S or some of the things she says or does (my mom would have said "she means well"), but good for her for doing something.

4) I have finally stopped obsessively watching everything I can about the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. And since I can't go down to the affected states, the best I can do right now is contribute what I can. A gal who posts on a Babycenter board with me (she miscarried the same month I did) lived in Metairie and pretty much lost everything. She and her family evacuated and are fine, thank goodness. I have never met her and probably never will, but I feel bound to send her something. Or lots of somethings.

5) Bug's (I mean Ptera's) middle name is Katrina. It makes me wonder if, had she been born after the hurricane, would we have chosen a different name.

6) Today's to do list:

write and mail thank you notes for job interview
buy more fenugreek (herb that helps milk production)
buy wine because G bought me some cambozola yesterday (yummy)

I admit it, it's a strange list. But thinking of the wine and cheese has made me hungry. Time for a snack and tennis on tv.