Why My Mom Was Awesome.

Reason #1

We always got a real Christmas to decorate when I was younger, even
though with 2 cats and a dog, it was kind of dangerous. My cat, Chewy,
who was appropriately named by accident (Chewy was short for Chouette,
which meant cute in French) would constantly chew on the wires of the
lights. My brother's cat Tiger would bat at the ornaments until they
fell and usually broke. And the dog would invariably chase one of the
cats right into the tree at least a few times per season. It's a
miracle they all made it through each holiday season!

So it was no suprise when my mother decided against buying a Christmas
tree shortly after my brother and I had left for college. But since we
still came home for Christmas, mom didn't want to lose the feeling of
Christmas. An avid gardner, she had many plants strewn about her
house. Sheu found the next best thing to a dangerous traditional tree,
and thus began her holiday tradition of decorating the tropical banana
tree with ornaments and lights and putting the presents under it, just
beside its pot.

Merry christmas!

Test

Test...just activated mobile phone blogging. Testing to see if it works.

My new yoga socks. Hot? Yes. Do these socks make my ankles look big?

In Denial

So I guess I've been in denial for a while, but it's finally time for me to admit it. I'm getting old.

A few months ago I turned 31. By most people's standards, that's not too incredibly old. But it seems like in the past few months, my body's age has increased by at least a decade. I wake up every morning in pain with a stiff back. I've been nursing all kinds of minor injuries, like low back pain, muscle cramps, and now I have knee pain.

Knee pain? I'm not active enough yet to have knee pain. I only really started working out seriously about a month ago. I'm still running 3 miles at a pop, at best, a few days per week, and the exercise classes I teach/take aren't brutal enough to justify knee pain. I think I might have twisted something on Tuesday night in ballet...since I'm so hard core in class. But I can't think of what I could have done. Turnout occurs at the hip, and my hips are fine.

My feet even hurt, like I've been running on the treadmill at top speed barefoot. I've never had achy feet before. And I even got new shoes last month!!

I used to make fun of my coworker because he would hobble in every morning, complaining of back pain and sore legs, pop a few Pain Aids, and get on with his day, but this morning I found myself at the medicine cabinet at work, looking for the Pain Aid just to get through the morning!!

I took a quiz on Facebook a while back that was supposed to estimate your "real" age. Since Facebook quizzes are widely known for their accuracy, I was surprised to see that my "real" age was 0. Might explain me, mentally, but physically? Add a one and another zero in front.

I've really got it in my head that I'm a runner. Or I should be. So I'm having a hard time accepting that it might not be the best thing for my pathetic crumbling body. I'm trying a different path these days. This weekend I'm attending a workshop to become certified as a Yogafit instructor. Then in February I will attend a similar workshop to become certified to teach Pilates. Since I have zero time at home to practice these things, I thought teaching would not only make me more marketable, but allow me to get in some good workouts on the clock.

On a completely unrelated note, I brought Pearl in for her 4-month checkup this week. Apparently this beast of a child is 16 lbs 5 oz already, which puts her in the 90th percentile for both height and weight. I'm not sure where the Amazon woman gene comes from, but the doctor couldn't have been happier.

Dance Star

I've had some really lousy luck the past few months, and my method of dealing with these heavy situations and emotions is to take full advantage of the effects of retail therapy. Since the idea of trying on clothes depresses me, I got a kickass cool phone with a data plan, GPS and unlimited texting, a new car with bluetooth and satellite radio (didn't have much of a choice with the car since I totaled my last one, but the addons were optional), and splurged on a couple of workout DVDs and some other stuff.

One of my splurges was to enroll my ungraceful self in ballet lessons.

Are you finished laughing yet? No? It's ok, I'll wait.

Now? Good. I took ballet for many years as a youth. We moved around a lot, but I pretty much took lessons on and off between moves from the time I was 3 until I was 16. At that point, I begged my mother to let me continue jazz and tap but drop ballet. I likened myself to the dancing hippos from Fantasia's Dance of the Hours.

But I chose to enroll in this class for several reasons:

• As a working mother of 2 young-uns, I need some alone time


• I could use some flexibility


• I could use some gracw and poise


• I'm in love with SB's dance teacher and she teaches the adult ballet class on the one evening that I could actually take it!


• Dancers are hot.

Nuff said.

So I've gone twice so far. I'm doing pretty well in the class, but holy moly, let me tell you that those mirrors are HELLACIOUS. Now, I'm no hot mama quite yet, but I thought I was doing pretty well in the get back to a normal human female non-whale shape department. That confidence was completely shattered when I glanced in the mirrors in class. The person I saw staring back at me was a short, squat, butternut squash with a ponytail and legs. Short, stubby legs. That jiggled a lot.

The good thing is that I didn't have to look in the mirror long, because my barre was at the opposite end of the room and we do a lot of stuff facing the barre so my back was to the mirror. But then one of the last things we do are sautes (jumps) right in front of the mirror.

I almost cried. The butternut squash was made of Jell-o!! OMG. I have never seen anything so disgusting in my entire life. Well, maybe this. Actually, that's kind of what I looked like, only less scantily clad. Well actually, not really since I was in dance class. OK that's really video from my dance class.

Anyway.

So yeah. Now I'm really motivated to buckle down and lose the rest of my Pearl whale weight. I started the plan by consuming only half a panini at lunch today instead of a whole one! Not that it was by choice...but it's a start!

Here's hoping that by the time I go to the Grammies, I'm back to the normal flounder of a person I was before.

Hint, hint.

You know who you are.

Call me.

Peace out.

Awkward...

On Sunday night, my husband got a really bad flare up of gout on his foot. It helps to soak the foot in epsom salt, and we were out, so he sent me to the Rite Aid around the corner to pick some up. Now it's impossible for me to go to Rite Aid and only get one thing, especially when those first few rows are filled with Christmas goodies. So of course on my way back to the first aid area I picked up a Cinderella toothbrush holder, a Barbie and the Three Musketeers book (for SB), a couple of Reese Christmas Trees (for TB- they're his favorite), and some Reese/Oreo-type cookies (we were out of treats for SB's lunch the next day). I grabbed a huge bag of the salt and headed to the checkout.

There was this guy standing there, kind of back from the line, but kind of in line at the same time. Rather than stand behind someone who was just waiting for a bus or cut in front of someone waiting in line, I asked if he was in line- he was not. As I was asking him, a woman came up and took her place in line in front of us. Since there were 2 cashiers working, I didn't care, I just took my place in the other line. No big deal.

My cashier finished first, and without even glancing in my direction, motioned for the lady in the line next to me to approach her. The other lady refused, saying she was in her own line and we had gotten there at the same time so I should go up. (How polite!!) During this entire exchange, I was just observing. No expression on my face whatsoever, except mild interest in what was going on. I hadn't made any movement towards the counter, I wasn't getting angry or even confused, though I should have been.

After hearing the other lady, my cashier looked at me and put her hands up in the air and said "I'm not trying to start anything, I just wanted whoever was next...it doesn't make any difference at all to me...don't get upset at me."

Like I was about to tell her off. Honestly? Technically that lady was there before me. Sure, she was in another line and it was a little weird for the cashier to try to get her to go first- I mean in my opinion, you choose the wrong line and you're just screwed. It's one of those things you just accept. I ALWAYS choose the wrong line. But I wouldn't have made a peep if the lady had in fact gone ahead of me in my own line.

So why the heck was this cashier acting like I had just read her the riot act? To make matters worse- and I don't know if she did this because she was trying to butter me up, or because she's just socially inept, but she made a point of commenting on every. single. item I was purchasing. "Oh, these look good...and these are sooooooo delicious" (about the cookies and Reese trees), "Someone was in here earlier and got the same thing but in Spiderman" (about the toothbrush holder), "Someone has a daughter who likes Barbie" (about the book- and how does she know it's my daughter? I could totally be a Barbie fan...who reads picture books that come with paper dolls), "Wow, this is a heavy bag! What do you need all this salt for? I'm not putting anything else in the bag with this"...and on and on.

Keep in mind this was RITE AID. Thank goodness I wasn't buying condoms or tampons or hemorrhoid cream! What would she have said then?!?!

Know What?

I changed my mind. I want to keep Bmore Mama. Mostly because I forgot my password to that other blog, but also because I'm lacking the creativity to enhance the new one. So I'll stick around here for a while. I'm not going with the 2-year contract here but I'll do the monthly thing. If you'll have me back.

Anyway.

So lots of news that I'm sure I'll get into as I go but I really don't feel like recapping the last few months. Obviously Pearl made her apearance into this world. I realized earlier this week that she looks kind of like Emeril. BAM! No seriously...see the resemblance?




Clearly Pearl is a heck of a lot cuter. And it's a strange coincidence that we were in NOLA (which I think is where he lives) just before I got pregnant.....



Moving on.





It's good to be back!

Reality Check from TB

This post is an email my husband sent out yesterday.


Life is short...

....so don't take a minute for granted!

Exactly one week ago my almost 4-year old daughter, SB, woke up at 12:30 w/an acute croup attack (1st one). For a minute or so she really couldn't breathe......we thought we were going to lose her. Then it gradually went away. 911-ambulance-emergency room...the whole nine yards.

Today, my pregnant wife, due in August, was in a car accident on rt. 70 (major highway). While avoiding an accident in front of her, she was forced into a lane where the side of her car was hit by a pickup truck and threw her spinning across the 3 or 4 lane highway. This highway is normally packed w/tractor trailers, etc... She came away with only a stiff neck...and an eight hour, precautionary stay at Howard General.

The last few years I've been trying to appreciate what I have and always keep the big picture in mind. Events like this just make me try to live every day like it's my last.

Everyone who knows me KNOWS that the last thing I am looking for is pity. I'm sharing this so everyone can do a little reality check and remember what is really important.

See pictures below......

TB

Say What?

When I was pregnant with SB, and I mean very pregnant- like 8 months pregnant, I got on the elevator at work along with 2 other women. Once the door closed, one woman glanced around and said "Wow...on the elevator with 2 pregnant women. I hope we don't get stuck!" I kind of laughed, but after a minute's pause, the third lady said, very quietly, "I'm not pregnant."

The remainder of the ride was very quiet.

It's amazing to me what people have the balls to say to total strangers. And I seem to be on the receiving end of a lot of uncouth comments lately.

One of the members at my gym commented the other day, as she was walking by me, that I was getting bigger (duh, that's usually the idea with pregnancy). I smiled (phony) and mumbled out some unremarkable reply, mostly in agreement. This prompted her to stop to have a full-blown conversation with me. Which I regret taking part in.

Her: Actually, you look kind of gassy. Do you have gas?

Me: No, I'm pretty sure it's just a baby in there. No gas.

Her: Funny, because you look like those people in the commercials who have gas.

Me: Yeah...no gas.

Her: Has anyone else told you that?

Me: That I look like I have gas? No.

Her: Yeah, well who else would really say that to you but me?

Me (thinking): I think you're on to something there.

Since I've been very irritable these past few days...weeks...months?...I have since not made any effort to initiate conversations with this particular lady. But I can't avoid her, she's one of the lunchtime class regulars. One morning she called in to sign up for class, and felt the need to further irritate me.

Her: I can't make the 12:15 class so sign me up for the 11:30 class. Are you teaching that?

Me: No, The Intern's teaching it.

Her: What are you teaching today?

Me: Nothing.

Her: But you're there...

Me: Yes I am...but I'm not teaching anything.

Why do people assume that just because I show up to work that I have to teach a class? And the weirdest thing is that a few weeks ago, she was giving me a hard time because I was still actively teaching classes...so now that I'm 8 months along as opposed to 6 months, it's all of a sudden unacceptable for me to lighten my teaching load? Or show up without having a class to teach?

I don't get it.

Anyway, even total strangers are taking part in this whole crossing the line with comments. I brought SB to the pool tonight (not the one with Rick James, this is the outdoor family pool). Since I feel too obese to squeeze into my bathing suit, and too sick and tired with a sore crotch to get into the pool myself, the plan was to just let SB splash around the wading pool. That way I could just sit on the side of the pool and not really exert myself, but SB could wear her little self out.

There were 2 little boys in the pool when we arrived, and one grandmother. At one point, Grandmother yelled at the lifeguard on duty because he had picked up her noodle that she had left at the edge of the big pool, and was smacking the water with it while on the phone. Personally, I didn't really think he was hurting anything by being on the phone because there was NO ONE in the big pool. Every single person there was in the wading pool area.

But that's not my business. I tend to keep to myself.

But out of the blue, Grandmother looked over at me and said "It must be 4:30." I had just checked my phone for messages so I knew that it was actually closer to 5:30, so I told her that.

Her response: Oh, because usually at 4:30 the pool changes color.

It took me a minute to digest that and figure out what she meant by that. Honestly, my first thought was that she was implying that someone peed in the pool every day at 4:30. But after glancing at the big pool, which had by this time become a little more populated, I realized she was referring to the color of the people enjoying the pool.

I didn't respond to that. It's one thing to warn me there aren't any Jews in Manchester, or to tell me I look gassy, but I was raised to be pretty much oblivious to color.

You Snooze...

...you lose.

At least, that's my motto.

For some reason I've started to get very irritated lately whenever TB falls asleep on the couch. At first, I would just get grumpy. Then, I started making SB pound on his chest and yell "WAKE UP, DADDY!!" Then I resorted to taking photos of him with my cell phone and sending them to all my friends, including him.

But now that's not enough.

So be aware. If you do this:

Then I will do this.

Where To Begin?

So....I've been busy lately. My husband calls it nesting. I call it making sure the baby has a bed to sleep in and clean clothes to wear. In addition to all the work around the house that I've been doing, it's also the end of the year for dance class, the start of the family fun season, and the start of the busy season for my husband. So here's a recap, in no particular order, of what we've been up to.

A few weeks ago, we went to Cascade Lake. This is a big smelly lake in Hampstead. We paddle boated around for all of 15 minutes then headed off to the "splash pad" to let SB get wet and wild. Which she did. TB even joined in the fun.


Our next adventure was a trip to some farm who took all the scenes from what used to be the Enchanted Forest. It was here that I got to take a creepy photo of my child peering out from the eye socket of a giant face.


Then last Monday we took a trip to Dutch Wonderland. This was exciting.
First, SB entertained us all with an interpretive dance in her "kini".


Then, TB knocked over all of the blocks that were sitting on a platform, and won SB a giant banana, who was subsequently named Mr. Banana. SB insisted on carrying him around the park herself. He now spends his days in the living room and his nights in the corner of SB's bedroom.


Then, being the awesome mom/wife that I am, I made my family do this. You can tell by the look on TB's face that he was thrilled to take part.


Since I am about the size of a whale who just ate another whale, and is bloated as a result, the number of rides/attractions I could take part in was limited. They actually had signs posted in front of a lot of rides that looked a lot like this. Except there was only one pregnant lady, and she wasn't quite as naked...or droopy.

Coincidentally, I stole that photo off the internet, but I can tell you that it was a photo of the back of a packet of Accutane tablets. I went on Accutane twice and am a total slob, so there were little "no pregnant women" labels everywhere in my apartment. I found it quite amusing.

Anyway, since I was pretty much forced to stand around a lot while TB and SB were on rides, I made friends with this guy. We spent a lot of time together. I felt that we got pretty close, but he would never tell me exactly what he was doing with his left hand.


Next we headed over to the Howard County Relay For Life event, where The Band was playing. Here, SB got her face painted.


After they finished playing, SB went up on stage to help her dad pack up, which I thought was cute, so I took some photos. Later, as I was going through them, noticed this one with some random dude in a sequined dress standing in front of them. Only in Baltimore.


Then was SB's dance recital. This will probably be its own post later on, but I had to throw up a couple of really cute photos.
My little ballerina.


And a not-so-great shot of the Father-Daughter dance. There will be video coming, but not for another month or so. I'm not sure why the little girl in the middle doesn't have a father at this point.


The last of our exciting couple of weeks was me getting a flat tire on the way home from the Bay Cafe on Sunday night. We (me & SB) waited on the side of 83 for about 15-20 minutes until TB could get there to change the flat. A police officer in an unmarked Infiniti had pulled over with me (he was the one who told me, because at this point I still was just thinking I was having problems driving straight) but couldn't stay. Something about a gun shot victim he needed to tend to.

Once TB got there, he put the donut on for us, which was no easy feat considering he had lost a contact lens on the way. With nothing better to do with myself, I decided to take a photo to chronicle the event.

Like you would expect any less at this point.

So of course, I sent that picture to several of my girlfriends, thinking they would reply with concerned comments about us being stuck with a flat late on a Sunday night with a 3-1/2 year old. But all they did was comment on his ass.

I think that pretty much brings you up to date with me. This weekend looks promising as well, with 2 gigs in DC, one in Catonsville, and my father and his crew coming to visit.

Rick James, See-Through Bathing Suits and My Water Breaking

Yes, you can see all three of these at my new gym!

Let me explain.

I joined a local commercial gym because I decided that, as I enter the final 10 weeks of pregnancy, doing things like walking and teaching step classes hurt my peepee. To the extent that it feels like someone spent a good 30 minutes roundhousing me in the crotch. And I mean that not in a kinky way, but in a martial arts way. So I decided to spend a few sessions a week swimming, which would ideally provide me with a good cardiovascular workout (trying not to drown) without all the wear and tear on my poor lady parts. Because they'll be going through enough in 9.5 weeks anyway.

The whole bathing suit ordeal is another post altogether. So fast forward to me, doing my best whale in a skirted one-piece imitation at the pool. I decided this time around not to worry too much about coordinating my breathing with everything else, because the last thing I need to be doing is hyperventilating or drowning. So I just grab a kickboard and kick away, back and forth.

I was kicking away last night, when the door from the men's locker room opened up and slap me with a trout if that wasn't Rick James standing there in his tight swimming briefs. Well, ok, maybe Rick James is dead and this wasn't exactly him. But it was his long lost twin brother, at best.

Maybe just a little shorter. And almost naked.

And with more of a long fro than jheri curl. But it still looked just like him!

Anyway, I went back to kicking up and down my lane. Both Rick and I were not in the best of shape, swimming-wise (at least I have an excuse), and we both stopped kind of frequently at the shallow end to catch our breath.

During one break, I looked around and noticed a few of the older ladies (by "older" I mean anywhere from late 40's to early 70's) who had been in the whirlpool when I first got there were now chatting on a bench near the entrance. One older lady in particular (who was on the younger end of the older lady age spectrum noted above) was wearing a lima bean colored one-piece bathing suit. Which, in and of itself, was not notable.

But the fact that when she dropped her towel, I saw that it was COMPLETELY SEE THROUGH, was. Since she was sitting, I didn't see anything below her waist (thank goodness) but I could completely make out what her entire breast looked like, including how big and how dark her nipple was.

Waaaaaaaaay tmi.

I tried very hard not to look in her general direction for the remainder of my workout. After I left, I wandered into the locker room to change into dry clothes (I was going to shower at home). As I was reaching into my locker to pull out my bag of clothes, I felt something dripping down my leg.

Now, I know I was wet from the pool, but this was a more forceful drip. Almost like I was peeing on myself. But I knew I wasn't peeing. And it wasn't letting up! Immediately I freaked out, thinking my water broke while I was in the pool and I didn't notice it.

I looked down and eventually realized that the water was coming from the stupid little skirt they put on the ugly maternity bathing suit. Somehow it had collected there, and was dripping down my leg.

It was an interesting night at the pool, I look forward to more "Stories from the Gym".

Happy? Mother's Day

I'm pretty sure I'm going to quit celebrating Mother's Day. I can't remember last year's Mother's Day too well (which is probably a good thing) but I remember I was Pissed. Off.

I think it was because both the MIL and my mother were at my house that morning making my life miserable by bossing me around and taking over my house. I remember being mad at TB for some reason but I'm not sure what that reason was. Again, this is probably for the better.

I think the bottom line was that it was my day, or supposed to be my day, but not a single part of it was fun or special for me.

This year, the original plan was for the three of us to meet up with my mom and my brother at Chili's (my all-time favorite restaurant) for lunch.

Simple and effective.

But nothing is simple with my family. Technically, this was our celebrating Mother's Day for my mom, not for me. And she refused to make any decisions. It took me forever to get her to decide on Chili's (it was only a coincidence it's my favorite- I swear!!) and then she wouldn't decide on a time. She told me to call my brother and figure it out.

Because I take the words "call your brother" as a personal insult (I know, I'm messed up in the head), that made me mad and I told her it was in HER honor we were going out so she needs to tell us where and when.

This indecisiveness went on for a few days until she finally said something to the effect of "just forget it, then". She goes for the guilt. In desperation, I texted my brother and asked him to call her and figure her out. He handles her a lot better than I do. Somehow he got her to agree to 1:30 at Chilis.

Fine. Done.

BUT then for some reason, the MIL decides she wants to come visit. I'm not sure where that came from, but after a few days of indecisiveness regarding what day she would come (she lives 2.5 hours away, so she usually spends at least one night when she visits), she decided she would get here at 1pm on Sunday.

Which would mean she would basically have to turn around and leave right away to go to lunch. But that was her decision, and SB was excited to have lunch with both grandmothers and her uncle. Plus, she would be around to watch SB so TB and I could go out on a date, which we never do, and would have pretty much been my present, so it was all good.

Until Saturday night, when I came down with the cold from HELL. It actually started on the way home from the Cambridge gig on Saturday (which is why I totally blame Vagrant Girl) and got progressively worse until I found myself awake all night with the most painful sore throat I'd had in my entire life. It hurt to sniffle.

When SB came into the bedroom with her usual cheery "Good morning, Mommy!", clutching her Curious George, Cat in the Hat and Cow stuffed animals she sleeps with, it usually melts my heart into waking up to accompany her into the living room. But I was so grumpy, tired and in pain that I quickly deferred her to TB even though I knew he hadn't gotten to bed until very late (since I was awake all night). Thankfully he dutifully got up with her.

An hour or so later, when I finally rolled out of bed, I felt like death. I couldn't hear out of an ear and my throat was on fire. I couldn't breathe through my nose, so there were all these nasty lumps of mucous on my tongue from dozing with my mouth wide open all night. It was not a pretty sight.

After some convincing from TB, I hauled my nasty pregnant self to Patient First to make sure I wasn't seriously ill or contagious. Almost 2 hours later, I was on my way home clutching a prescription for antibiotics and a fact sheet on upper respiratory infections.

Lucky me.

I spent the remainder of the day trying to avoid my own daughter (yes, they said I was most likely contagious) and drifting in and out of consciousness. I didn't make lunch and got even more pissed when TB came back without any food for me. Sure I never asked, but he KNOWS how much I adore those southwestern eggrolls. There should have been no question. Of course, I wouldn't have been able to taste it, but whatever.

It turned out to be a blessing that the MIL had decided to come, because her presence made SB not care about her nonexistent mom so much. But it was still an incredibly miserable day for me. I never got my present (date night) or any other present. I couldn't even kiss my own daughter because I didn't want to get her sick. Let's hope next year breaks the spell.

Why I Hate Other People's Kids

Or I guess, more accurately and fairly, why some people shouldn't have kids.

The Man's busy season has started. Festivals, fairs, wine tastings and parties galore coming up in the next few months. Saturday he played in Cambridge, MD at a blues festival. We had attended this last year, and despite the long drive, it's not a bad gig. They only play for slightly over an hour, it's not incredibly crowded, and there's a courtesy tent for the band (and family) behind the stage.

Saturday was gorgeous- 80 degrees and sunny, without the typical Maryland humidity. SB and I chose a spot and settled down. We didn't even really care that we put the blanket down on what was probably the only spot on the entire field that was wet. Someone must have emptied a cooler or several camel bladders on the spot just before we got there.

Just as we settled in, a little girl about SB's age came up to us and plopped herself down on SB's princess chair, which was set up on our blanket. She put one leg over the arm of the chair and sat there eating a slice of pizza. SB and I looked at each other in surprise then SB started to cry, saying that was her chair and she wanted to sit in it.

I looked around for the girl's mom, but didn't see anyone anywhere that seemed to be a parent whose child was on my blanket. I tried to calm SB down by telling her she wasn't sitting in the chair and that she should share it. But secretly, I kind of got why she was upset.

Then the little girl reached down and took one of SB's toys that we had brought to keep her occupied. This set SB into a whole new wave of tears. This time I told the little girl that SB was playing with that and could she please give it back. She stared at me for a full minute then threw it at SB.

Yes, she threw my child's toy at her.

TB came up to us at this time to see if we needed anything and saw SB in tears. I explained this girl was sitting in her chair and playing with her toys then throwing them at her, and I didn't know who she belonged to. He asked her to get up so they could go find her mommy or whoever she was there with, but she just sat there. She wouldn't budge. TB wasn't about to pick her up and carry her off to find her family, not in this day and age, so he just left to go get ready to play.

SB was still whining about her chair, so finally I told the girl that SB had brought this chair so she could sit on it, and she really wanted to so could she please get up. Finally, she got up and left. I watched her go a few blankets up and sit in a lawn chair that I had seen an old lady occupying a few minutes before. Something told me she was chair squatting again. But not my chair, not my concern.

This girl came and went a few times. Sometimes she would sit on the princess chair and sometimes she would try to go through my bag. I kept asking her where her family was and she kept ignoring me. On one particularly long visit, she and SB were playing with SB's bubble blowing stuff, and SB asked the girl about 20 times (no joke0 kids are persistent) what her name was. But she refused to answer. I was nervous about her playing with the bubble toys because some of them require you to put your mouth up to the toy and, not knowing this girl, I didn't want them sharing. One by one I took those toys away.

After the bubble visit, once the girl had gone, SB announced she was hungry. I pulled out the crackers, cheese and turkey I had brought for her and immediately the girl appeared. She said she was hungry.

There was no way I was sharing food with this girl, for several reasons. First off, she was obviously not interested in being friends with SB, she was only coming to play with her toys and sit in her chair. Secondly, I didn't know this girl from Adam and I wasn't about to give her food, risking her having an allergic reaction, without a parent to confirm it was ok first.

So I stood my ground. I told her no, if she wanted food she needed to get it from her mom. She said she didn't want her mom's food, but she was hungry. I told her she was eating pizza when we first saw her so she couldn't be too hungry. But either way, we only brought enough food for SB and myself, so she needed to go ask her mom for some food.

Then she tried to sit in my lap. This was too much for me. I'm very lovey with SB but I'm not touchy-feely with other kids. At all. Especially bratty vagrant kids whose parents let them run around unattended at festivals.

So I pushed her off my lap. I said that I didn't know her, and that I didn't know if her mother would want her sitting in a stranger's lap.

Just at that moment, I looked up and saw another girl, about 7 or 8 years old, standing at the edge of our blanket. She didn't say anything but just stared at me. I was really starting to get creeped out with all these freaky kids being attracted to our blanket.

Eventually I found out that this was Vagrant Girl's sister. Still no hint of parents, mind you. Vagrant Girl started putting her shoes on (which had somehow appeared in front of our blanket- maybe Vagrant Sister brought them? VG had been barefoot the entire time I saw her). I told her she was putting them on the wrong feet and she ignored me. Oh well.

VS announced that she would be right back and left. VG finished putting on her shoes, then left a minute later. I saw her wandering around some other blankets, and at one point, watched a mom wrestle a bottle of apple juice away from her to give to her own son. Then I never saw her again.

Thankfully.

Although a little while later, like maybe a half hour, VS reappeared and asked where VG had gone. I told her I had no idea, I hadn't seen her for a good half hour.

Crazy stuff. I'm the kind of person who, at these festivals, likes to be left alone. I'll interact with the people next to me to tell them their baby is cute or warn them that their dog wrangled off the leash and is humping the bass player's leg. And I'm all for SB making friends with kids her age and running around and playing with them. But VG was too much for me.

It's Relative. And Full of Ass.

I've been crazy busy lately trying to keep busy. All I want to do is sleep, sleep, sleep, wake up, eat, then sleep some more. In fact, if I could figure out a way to eat without waking up, I'd be a happy girl. But because the brat my daughter doesn't nap anymore, and I'm more or less a single mom during the week, and I have to be at work at 6am 3 days per week, I don't get nearly enough sleep.

I fell asleep the other night while SB and I were parked on the couch watching some Disney movie involving a princess. I think I zonked out around 7:30, and woke up around 8:30 to find SB had passed out as well. I tried to wake her up to bathe her, put her in her pj's or at least brush her teeth, but she went all Exorcist on me, with her eyes rolling back into her skull and muttering phrases I couldn't even begin to decipher. So I gave up and put her to bed fully dressed, skank-mouthed and dirty, praying that when she woke up at 3am all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, TB would take pity on me and wake up with her. Turns out she slept straight through until the morning. I, on the other hand, was up until well after midnight, thanks to my little nap.

So because I'm terrified of falling asleep on SB again (not literally on her, although I'd be lying if I said that's never happened), I've been dragging her to all sorts of pointless places just so I stay awake. Plus I want her to remember that we actually paid attention to her at some point in her life, since when the new baby comes, she'll probably not get as much attention.

Last week I picked her up from school and took her to Spring Meadows Farm. It's about 15 minutes from our house, and mostly a garden center, but has some animals like geese, goats, ponies and guinea hens you can feed. There was a donkey there, who was very happy to see me.

Is that your leg or are you just happy to see me? Luckily SB did not notice the Hornball Donkey's 5th appendage and question it.

This past weekend, I dragged my family to the Catoctin Zoo, which was waaaaaaay overpriced for what it was. But, in keeping with the Ass Theme, we met another interesting donkey. He was not quite as happy to see me as the other one, but he was a special donkey. Instead of 5 appendages, he only had 3.

You're probably wondering if something happened or if he was born that way. I had the perfect opportunity to ask, since the zoo lady who takes care of the donkey (and the lioness) was standing right next to me, but I couldn't bring myself to ask because I was worried the answer might depress me. So we will probably never know.

The Catoctin Zoo had plaques at each station with facts about the animal- its natural habitat, where it comes from, what it eats, etc. So it was a learning experience. And I'm bringing that learning experience to you. Here's what a fat pregnant woman who had to bring her daughter to the Port-a-Potty (which is a feat in and of itself, trying not to get her to touch anything at all with any part of her body whatsoever) looks like when she leaves the Port-a-Potty and walks right into her caring, obviously suicidal husband taking a picture of her.

The lesson? Don't ever take a photo of someone in that situation. Ever.

After the Zoo, TB had to head to Winchester for a gig so SB and I stopped at my mom's, because I was out of ideas as to how to entertain her for the remainder of the day. Another learning experience.

Remember the creepy balls of hair I found in a box of stuff my mom had brought me? I've discovered it's her hair. And I know this because while we were in the basement, my mom and SB disappeared into the storage section and SB came running out a moment later and threw this braid of hair at me.

A braid. Of human hair. Of MY hair.

Gross.

My hair was always very thick and very curly, and extremely long. Like down to my butt long. If I left it down, my back got very hot, plus it would end up extremely tangled, so my mom always put it in a braid. I got it cut right before 7th grade, up to my shoulders and my mom, being a sentimental freak with an obsession with headless human hair, kept the hair. In a braid. In her basement.

And my daughter found it and thought it was absolutely hysterical to throw this hair at me and laugh maniacally at my reaction, which was absolute disgust. I'd gingerly pick it up and throw it back at her.

This morbid game went on for a good 10 minutes before I got really grossed out and threw The Braid behind a bookshelf.

Game over.

The Good, the Bad and the Smelly

We all know how I feel about my job. It has its perks, but is ultimately incredibly boring and lacking in challenge and opportunity for growth and professional/personal development. After much contemplation, I have effectively whittled down the personalities of three staff members who work at my fitness center (myself included) into a witty Clint Eastwood movie title spinoff.

How clever am I?

The Good? Well, duh. Obviously me. I come to work on time, I know my stuff and I follow the rules. Can you say model employee? Sure I surf the net and harass the innocent employees of the company whose fitness center I run staff via email and beg them to accompany me to the cafeteria since apparently I'm incapable of walking there by myself. But when the day's over, my work's all done and my ducks are happily sitting in a row. I meet my (few) deadlines, errors in print media I put out are minimal (if existent) and my stuff makes sense (for the most part) to anyone capable of reading at or above a second grade level. I also have the neatest handwriting of my colleagues, and smell the second prettiest (BS takes first place on that one after he douses himself in Axe).

The Bad is also a no-brainer. Blank Stare has obviously lost interest (if there ever was any) in maintaining a respectable display of what we adults call work ethic. He shows up for work late consistently. This wouldn't be a big deal if we lived in Cube Land where each person is responsible for his own crap. But when I get there 10 minutes before the center is scheduled to open so that by opening time, all the equipment is turned on and all opening duties have been completed, and BS strolls in 5 or 10 minutes AFTER opening ALL THE TIME, it starts to irk me. And that's putting it mildly. He surfs the net all day (big deal, we all do) but he has the audacity to search and apply for jobs online on company time. This is, of course, after he spends the first hour and a half of his day working out, but before his first shower of the day. In which he takes longer than I do because, according to my sources, he takes the time to flex in front of the mirror. (And people wonder why I have so many guy friends at work...the information they give me is priceless!)

Again- would this all be a really big deal if he carried his weight in terms of getting crap done? Not at all! But he does bare minimum. He has very few responsibilities, and they are rarely completed on time. When they are completed, the fliers and posters are riddled with typos and errors and sentences that either don't make sense, or aren't true. Seriously, how can strength training take years off your life? And I'd like to know what resource he found that documented that there are actual carbohydrate-laden foods that lower your blood sugar levels (as opposed to just resulting in less of a spike)?

I could go on forever. But to save you the agony of reading my rants about BS, I'll move on to the final part of the Work Trinity.

The Smelly. Oh Lord, where do I begin? The Bossman is a great person and a wonderful director. We get along well and I absolutely love my work time with him. Unlike BS, he gets his work done, but is able to laugh and joke and have fun while doing it. But he has one flaw. He takes his sweaty, smelly shoes off while sitting INCHES from my chair.

Seriously, that is one nasty funk. It's not the typical foul male shoe/sock/sweat odor. This is the ultrastank that is produced only by the sweat glands of someone on a very unhealthy diet, who works out incessantly and never washes his shoes or socks. Or showers.

Not to say Bossman doesn't shower, or wears dirty socks, but the stench that emanates from his feet is nasty at best.

Yet he keeps taking off his shoes right in front of me. And, lucky me, today he even peeled down the back of his sock to reveal a smelly old nasty dry cracked peeling heel because he's been complaining of pain there.

Then, get this, he asks me to RUB IT.

Who the HELL deserves to be subjected to that kind of abuse at work?

I tried the pregnancy card, saying I was more sensitive to smells and couldn't take it. I think I even gagged a little today. But he's in denial and told me it wasn't that bad. NOT THAT BAD? His sense of smell must be as bad as his hearing, because it was a lethal odor.

Anyway, so there we are. A motley crew at best.

But you gotta love us.

At least The Good and The Smelly.

Treated Like a Stepchild

One of my all-time favorite things to do is ponder the dysfunction that is my family. Holidays provide the perfect opportunity to sit back and watch said dysfunction in action.

Yesterday, for Easter, my mom, brother and sister-in-law came over to watch SB hunt for eggs, then have a family meal together. They were actually all on pretty good behavior, aside from the normal freakishness. My mother, who was only supposed to bring a turkey (because I absolutely refuse to stick my hands inside a turkey carcass to get the stuff they stick in there out. You know, the giblets and all that crap), brought 3 boxfuls of food, specifically JUNK food, including: 4 chocolate bunnies, an unnaturally yellow chocolate duck that looked like it belonged in the bath tub, 4 bags of different flavored potato chips, a jar of salsa, a tub of nacho cheese dip, a tub of onion dip, 2 trays of baklava (her specialty), 3 unopened bottles of salad dressing (even though no one had prepared a salad) and a cherry cheese cake. Plus boiled asparagus. My brother arrived in his typical fashion- about 20 minutes late. His wife, as usual, knew everything about everything.

It's inevitable that at some point, argument (albeit good-humored and judgment-free) ensues. This time, my mother and brother were arguing about when my brother acquired his first computer. My mom announced that it was a first communion present, so age 7. My brother Joe disagreed, claiming that he already had a computer before she bought the Commodore 64 that was his first communion present.

As they went back and forth, recalling completely unrelated events that occurred in relative proximity to the first communion, I wondered what I had received for my first communion. If Joe got his own brand new computer, then I must have gotten something really special too! I remember getting ready for the big day, my mom dragged out her curling iron that I was only allowed to use for special events, to straighten my curly bangs (seriously, Mom, who gives a kid with curly hair bangs? That's just cruel.). I remember the dress I wore- a white frilly number with a red velvet belt. But I didn't remember any present.

So I asked. And was answered with a blank stare (and believe me, if anyone recognizes a blank stare, it's me after working for nearly 2 years with the master of blank stares). Then the following conversation commenced:

"OH MY GOD, MOM, YOU NEVER GOT ME A FIRST COMMUNION PRESENT, DID YOU?"

"Well, you had your first communion in Illinois, they let you come back for it."

(Ignoring that her last statements made no sense whatsoever)"WHO CARES WHERE I HAD IT, YOU NEVER GOT ME ANYTHING! AND YOU GOT JOE HIS OWN COMPUTER!"

"We moved to Maryland right afterwards." This was said in a tone of voice that implied that it was supposed to make me feel better.

"SO THAT WAS MY PRESENT? MOVING TO MARYLAND? BEING WHIPPED AWAY FROM MY SCHOOL AND ALL MY FRIENDS TO SOME STRANGE PLACE? WHILE JOE GOT A FREAKING COMPUTER? NO FAIR!"

By this time, my mother, completely unaffected by her blatant lack of fairness, was laughing too hard to formulate a response. I'm glad that the double standard that she called parenting was funny to her.

"You owe me a computer."

Technically, she owes me a lot more, because this was 23 years ago, so some kind of interest should apply. She better pay up. Or else.

It's a Dangerous Life

Yesterday was a loooong day. After work I grabbed The Intern and headed down to my old stomping grounds Towson University to give the Exercise Science majors in the practicum class a piece of my mind. Actually, I had been invited to talk with them about life in corporate fitness.

Last year I spoke with the class about my career in general, since I'm fairly unique in that I've worked in a lot of different settings within the fitness industry. Unfortunately, out of all of my experiences, corporate fitness seems to be my least favorite, as it's the least challenging. And the pay sucks compared to other settings.

So it was hard work to be honest about my feelings about it while trying to provide invaluable advice to the youngsters, and at the same time trying to promote our internship program.

After monologuing for an hour and 15 minutes to a sea of blank faces, The Intern and I sat and spoke with The Professor for a little while. I was hoping that The Professor could serve as a resource for The Intern, who is looking for more opportunities to gain experience in the industry, now that her time here is pretty much finished.

The Professor was a great help and we looked over job opportunities that she had been contacted about, and discussed the possibility of The Intern playing a role in the much-needed promotional efforts of the Towson University Wellness Center. This is something I personally would have been interested in, had I been on speaking terms with the Department Head who is also in charge of the Wellness Center. But that's a whole nother story!

While sitting in The Professor's office, we suddenly became aware of a loud recorded voice advising us to evacuate the building. We stared at each other with saucers for eyes before The Professor casually shut the door of her office, explaining to us that the alarm was fake and that they'd been doing them all day.

Relieved, The Intern and I ignored the alarm and went back to looking at job postings and discussing what opportunities were available for her to gain experience without committing herself, since she was kind of hoping for a job with the company for which I work.

About a half hour later, we wrapped up our meeting and mosied out to my car. As we exited the building, I noticed about 4 fire trucks, 2 ambulances and a smattering of police cars, lights flashing, parked in the drive just in front of the building. My eyes came to rest on three policemen who were standing directly in front of the mess, glaring at the three women who had just exited the building a good half hour after the alarms started going off.

We made our way delicately through the front lawn of the building and intentionally off to the side (to avoid the glaring cops) where a group of teachers/staff were gathered. Nonchalantly, we turned and glanced up at the building from which we had just emerged, to see if there was smoke emanating from it, or blazing fires pouring out of windows. Thank goodness, we saw nothing of the sort.

The gaggle of teachers made some comments about who was the last person to exit the building while The Professor defended her near-murder (by locking me and The Intern in her office, claiming the alarms were false) by attesting that the alarms had been going on all day, how was she supposed to know it was real?

The Intern and I said our goodbyes, made our way through the random crowds of students and faculty gathered around the perimeter of the building, and left the premises before we could get reprimanded by the angry-looking cops who, in our defense, were not doing anything but standing there staring at the building with their arms crossed.

But before I left, I snapped the following photo. Just because I'm a big nerd and had a feeling I might be blogging about it.

I Get Around

I don't mean it like I'm a slut.

I mean I've moved a lot in my life. I was born in Hindsdale, IL. Shortly after I was born, we moved to Springfield, IL. I attended kindergarten at Blessed Sacrament, then we moved from Illinois to Maryland (because of my dad's job- he worked for the Department of Energy).

In MD, we settled down in a house on Natic Court in Silver Spring until I had completed the second grade. Then we moved back to Springfield to live in a townhouse-type thing for my first half of third grade. Coincidentally, I attended Blessed Sacrament again, and had the exact same teacher I had in kindergarten, Mrs. Russell. Freaky.

Halfway through my third grade year, we moved back to MD, where we lived in a high rise apartment somewhere near Silver Spring, just off Georgia Ave. I completed my third grade year there before we moved to Gaithersburg, MD. This was a brand new school, my fourth grade year was the first year it was open. I went there for 4th, 5th and 6th grade before being whisked off to Frederick, MD.

Once in Frederick, my family didn't move again. I completed middle and high school, and graduated from CowTown High in 1996. I stayed at home and went to community college for a year, then moved to Towson so I could attend Towson University. I graduated from Towson in 1999. During my time there, I lived in 2 different apartments- one in Towson and one in Cockeysville.

Just before my last semester in college, I moved in with TB, who lived in a duplex in Hamilton. Then in 2001 we bought our house in Reisterstown.

And now we're trying to move again.

So when I moved into my current house, I was 22 years old (I moved in spring and my birthday is closer to the end of the year) and had lived in 12 homes. Since we're doing the math, by the time I graduated from high school, I had attended 8 schools (if you count preschool - which I did because apparently I started early because I was pottytrained early - and the fact that once in CowTown, I went to CowTown Middle, then CowTown High).

And people wonder why I have such a hard time making and keeping friends...every time I made one I was whisked away to another state!!

Anyway.

So we're trying to make our house super pretty for the appraiser who's coming next week so we can get tons of money for our house and be able to buy one with 3 floors and a garage.

This prettifying involved me cleaning out my closet the other day. This is another post in and of itself, but as I lay in bed that night, admiring the fact that I could actually see the floor in my closet, a memory surfaced that I had completely forgotten.

Which I will now share with you.

In the Natic Court house (1st and 2nd grade), my brother's room and my room were back to back, in such a way that our closets lined up. Somehow, we got the bright idea that it would be cool to carve a tunnel from his closet to mine, I guess so we could visit each other without having to walk out the doors of our rooms. Nevermind that he was two years older than me and we rarely got along, and even more rarely visited each other's bedrooms. I can't even remember now what his bedroom looked like at the time. But that's all beside the point.

We wanted this tunnel. So, armed with- and I might be remembering this wrong, but I'm pretty sure that's what it was- a plastic knife, we each started carving out a large square in our closet walls. If I had to guess now, I'd bet that our holes didn't even line up. But again, beside the point.

I don't remember how far Joe got, but I know I got at least 2 sides of the square carved out. I think. Knowing now what a naked wall looks like, I'm not sure what I did about studs...perhaps I worked around them and ended up with more of a dotted line? Or maybe I just carved through the wall in front of them. I don't know.

I also don't remember ever getting into trouble for it, but I can't imagine that my mom never found out about it. I'm sure when she went around before we moved, or when she was ready to put the house on the market, that she saw the damage either in my closet or Joe's. And had to repair it.

Thank goodness that now that we're preparing to move, I don't have to deal with 2 elementary school aged brats who have no respect for other people's things...or houses!

I Should Start Taking Inventory

In order to kind of sort of pretend that we still maintain a somewhat normal life, TB and I hired a sitter the past 2 Sundays in a row to watch SB for a few hours while we go out and eat/run errands. TB has taught both Alec and Erika (brother and sister) for many years and knows both of them, and their family, very well. Their parents are very strict and they both seem to be smart kids. Alec has watched SB in the past and we've been very happy with him, but Erika has recently expressed an interest in watching her, so we decided to let her have a go.

Last weekend was the first time I met her. She came in and started talking immediately- not a shy kid. She asked about SB's allergies, habits, food preferences, and all sorts of stuff, so I felt pretty good about things. While making small talk, she asked me what TB and I were planning on doing. I replied that we were probably just going to get a bite to eat, then run some errands if time permits. She advised me that I should go to Sephora because they had really good body butters. That threw me off, partly because I wasn't sure if she was trying to tell me that I smelled, and partly because what 30-year old goes on a rare date with her husband and drags him to the mall to hit Sephora?

Whatever. The day went on without incident and we decided to ask her back this weekend so TB and I could get a bite to eat and go look at curtains for the bedroom, without bringing SB with us. We totally could have done that with SB, but TB was painting most of the day on Saturday, and prepping most of the day on Friday, so we both knew I would welcome a break from having her attached to my hip all weekend. Since we sometimes hire Alec to help TB do some work around the house, he came with Erika to make our landscaping pretty for when we put the house on the market.

I was alone when they got there, so Alec went right to work and Erika and I hung around the backyard with SB. We commented on the weather, since it was a beautiful day, and I told Erika that we had gone to the zoo the day before, when it was really windy. She told me that she did some pilgrimage with her church. Then she asked me what I did yesterday. She got a blank look from me for 2 reasons: 1- Didn't I just tell her we went to the zoo?, and 2- Who asks some random 30-year old mom what she did the day before? I felt like she thought I was 16 and she was trying to be my bff.

Anyway, she then told me that I should go to Sephora. Major deja-vu. I laughed and said that she had told me the exact same thing last week. She said it's a cool store, and did I ever go? I told her we didn't make it over to the mall, and I didn't think the mall near me had a Sephora. I didn't mention that I wasn't exactly in the market for body butter. She said I should definitely go when I had the chance. I dropped the subject.

SB decided that she wanted to go inside so we both followed her in. TB was at Home Depot and I was just killing time until he got home so we could leave together. As soon as we walked in the door, SB asked me to get the Candy Land game out and Erika asked me for lunch because she was starving.

Huh? I had told her outside that SB had already eaten. By this time it was 2:30 pm- why would someone come to a babysitting job (which was only for 3 hours) starving? Usually we tell the sitters that they are welcome to anything in our fridge, but I don't expect them to come in asking for a full meal! If they are sitting for extended periods of time around a meal, I'll usually bake a pizza and tell them to split it with SB. I'm certainly not against feeding the sitter. But this was from 2-5!! After lunch, before dinner!

I told her there was sandwich stuff in the fridge. She made a sandwich, then went right into our snack cabinet and grabbed a handful of these pretzel chips that my mom had brought for SB (we don't usually buy chips- I'm not even sure how Erika knew to look there for them). I set up the game and retired to my office to start looking at curtains online.

While in my office, I heard Erika help herself to another serving of chips, then heard her ask SB if she wanted some "gummies", which I refer to as fruit snacks. There were 3 packages left (which I know because just that morning I had transferred them from the box to the cabinet to make room for other stuff). SB ate 1/2 of one. When I checked later that night, there were 0 left. You do the math. A few minutes after the gummies, I heard Erika rooting around the snack cabinet again and she came into my office to ask if it was ok if she had the last little box of yogurt-covered raisins.

Upon returning from dinner (we didn't have time to get the curtains because we had gotten a late start) we saw that one of the Lunchables we recently started buying for SB had been attacked. I have yet to see her eat an entire Lunchable, but this one was gone. And somehow, there were 2 juice boxes open (we don't buy juice boxes separately, and each Lunchable only comes with one, so......).

After Erika left and I cleaned the 3 yogurt-covered raisins off the counter (wtf- the girl is like 16 or so- can't she clean up her own raisins?), tossed her juice box and drained her glass of apple juice that she had left on the floor in the living room, TB and I joked about how much the girl ate. We compared her to her brother, who was doing physical labor around the house on a warm day, yet had to be told 3 times before he took a bottle of water from us.

But the kicker came later that night.

I was getting ready to take my prenatal vitamins, and as you may know from previous posts, I need pudding in order to get them down. We had just gone shopping on Friday, and knowing that I was on my last cup of pudding, I had purchased a new 6-pack. I took one cup on Friday to use. Since getting pills down is the only reason I eat the pudding, one cup usually lasts me 2-3 days. So as I reach in to get a new pudding, I realize that there are 2 cups of pudding left. Hm. That's not right.
6(in the pack) - 1 (Friday night) = 2 5.

She ate 3 cups of pudding. SB prefers yogurt over pudding, and TB never touches my pudding because it's practically considered medicine, considering its purpose.

I couldn't believe this. I went downstairs and asked TB if he had been eating my pudding- just to give her the benefit of the doubt. His response was "Don't tell me she ate all your pudding too?!" I told him it was just 3 cups. He put his hand on his head and muttered something about living on a deserted island because we can't find any normal people to watch our child.

So just to reiterate- in the course of about 2.5 hours, this girl consumed (of our food PLUS got paid to watch our child):
a sandwich
chips
more chips
the last box of yogurt covered raisins
2-1/2 packages of fruit snacks
a Lunchables
apple juice
3 cups of pudding

And this is just the food we know about. There was lots more food that she could have eaten that I just haven't come across the evidence yet. We should have guessed something like this would happen when SB informed us last week when we got home that Erika had eaten all of the frozen dinner that I had bought for SB to see if she liked it. Erika said SB had liked it, but SB later told us she hadn't eaten any of it. In this case, I tend to believe SB.

Taking It Easy

My intentions were to keep all the pregnancy mumbo jumbo to the other blog, but that blog bores me so I'm sticking with this one. Maybe that will change later and I can update the other blog with fun pregnancy stuff like "I peed myself a bit when I sneezed today" and "Wow, my hemorrhoids are really acting up". Then after the baby's born I can have a spit-up ticker to track every time I'm covered in baby puke, and maybe offer prizes for every time I find dried puke under the couch, and have post titles like "My Vag Is Healing Quite Nicely". We'll see.

But I feel like venting about my newest pregnancy obstacle here. As I complained about before, I was recently on my death bed ill. My doctor told me no working out/teaching group exercise classes for a week. So I obeyed, because I was pretty miserable and felt I could use the rest. Despite the fact that doing absolutely no physical activity for a week does NOT constitute keeping the same relaxed diet I've been on since high school starting to try to conceive finding out I was pregnant, I didn't do much to alter my eating habits. Being in the middle of my second trimester, to say I am constantly hungry would be an understatement.

But I was still doing ok. I wasn't going crazy with my eating. But I still find myself feeling more and more like a blob every day. And the most frustrating part is not how I look (although that's frustrating enough in and of itself), it's how I feel. Especially now that my restriction has been lifted and I'm allowed to work out again.

Monday's step class was brutal. I was sweating before even finishing the warm up, and could feel my heart beating in my throat. I ran out in the middle of class (I was team-teaching) to strap on my heart rate monitor, and discovered that I was hanging around 180 bpm.

Not good.

My OB had advised me to keep working out (this was before I was sick) but keep my heart rate under 160 bpm. I tried to tone down my workout as much as possible, but still teach the class. The class ended at noon, and it was a little after 2pm until my heart rate dropped below 100 bpm.

I was a little worried, but not out of my head, since when I was pregnant with SB, my heart rate was 166 at rest. Not that that was good, but everything turned out ok, so I figured I'm not killing the baby or myself. Tuesday night, the heart rate only went up to 170 during class. Better, but not great.

So now I'm terrified that my heart rate is going to remain high and I won't be able to work out hard enough to counteract my uncontrolled eating (which isn't that bad, have I mentioned that?) and I'll keep gaining weight and turn into the Blob and never lose it because it's easier to lose it with one kid running around than with 2 and I'll have to quit my job, because who really wants to get workout advice from the Blob?

Pensive Family

OK So I don't have the cold from hell. I have a horrible sinus infection, complete with massive congestion, bronchitis and even a touch of cojunctivitis. I feel like SpongeBob in the episode where he got the Ick and was basically a walking ball of green gook.

Anyway, given the circumstances, I feel like I've been a trooper. I might have complained a bit, but I've been working every day, being a mom every day, and doing stuff around the house whenever I have the energy.

Despite all this, I couldn't let a comment made by my dearest husband yesterday go un-blogged. He said to me,

"The only thing worse than a pregnant wife is a sick pregnant wife."

Such compassion.

Anyway, after I gave him a Look, he quickly said that's not how he meant it. Which I believe. He knows better.

But it should still go up there in our book of awesome parenting quotes by SB's Mom and Dad, along with "Suck! Lick! Don't bite!", the contradicting "Big girls don't suck," and my favorite, "If you want to get high, ask Mommy or Daddy."'

We are definitely a family that thinks before we speak.

Some like it hot...this one does not.

I've been battling the cold from hell for the past 2 weeks (and 1 day). My immune system is more or less nonexistent these days, so anything floating around within a one-mile radios of me ends up all up in my system. I've been sick more times this winter than I was all through my 20's. Right now I'm dealing with a chronic headache that worsens with every cough, a nagging cough that comes in spurts and sometimes leads to gagging, and total congestion with mucous EVERYWHERE- not just limited to my nose, but I have found booger-like junk in my mouth and I woke up with it gluing my left eye shut this morning.

It's snot pretty.

Anyway, on a completely unrelated note, my appetite has been very unusual lately. I'd like to blame it on the pregnancy but sadly I don't really think I can because I'm not really craving anything per se. It's just my taste has changed. For example yesterday I had a bagel for breakfast, another for lunch and one for dinner. And they were onion bagels. I couldn't really smell anything because of the congestion, but I'm sure my breath smelled like a rose garden by the end of the day.

I've also been kind of obsessed with Giant's salad bar lately. I've never been much of a salad person, unless by salad you mean drenched in mayo, as in chicken salad, or potato salad. But in the past 2 or 3 weeks, I've attacked Giant's salad bar at least 6 times. I pile my foil bowl with romaine lettuce (only enough so that I can still call it a "salad"), shredded carrots, peas, chopped onions, baby corn, diced turkey, tomatoes, and croutons. Then I add 3 big beets to the side and plop a generous spoonful of potato salad on the top, squeeze the lid on, hoping nothing pours out the side of my overfilled container, and head home to enjoy.

Really? It's not too bad. The only really unhealthy thing is the potato salad, and it's only maybe a quarter of a cup at most so I don't feel too guilty about it. I add lowfat peppercorn ranch salad dressing to the bottom part (since the potato salad and beets take care of "dressing" the top part) once I get there, and I'm in heaven. The whole thing is inhaled in a matter of minutes.

I got my heavenly salad tonight (sans the onions- they were out) and settled down to eat it. SB was busy munching on her dinosaur chicken nuggets and fruit salad. I was eating really fast, but being congested, I wasn't easily able to breathe and eat at the same time. So I found myself quickly out of breath. But I didn't care. I finished off the potato salad and beets and all the affected parts of my salad. Then I poured some of my dressing on and took a huge bite.

A second later my entire mouth was on FIRE. I couldn't figure out what was going on- one minute I was eating my salad, then the next minute I was literally spitting out a mouthful of lettuce and baby corn because something was biting me or stabbing me in the mouth. WTF??

I ran to the kitchen and drank an entire bottle of water in almost one gulp. It would have been even worse, but for the first time in weeks, my sinuses felt almost completely clear...they had been burned out, I guess. My nose was running and my eyes were watering.

I wandered back to my salad to find the culprit, and realized that instead of my usual peppercorn ranch salad dressing, I had picked up (and drenched my salad in) JALAPENO RANCH dressing.

Why the HELL do we have jalapeno ranch dressing? No one in the family does jalapeno stuff. Then it hit me. My mom.

She and my brother are jalapeno/hot/spicy freaks. My brother eats wasabi straight off the plate with his fork. But he would never think to bring dressing to my house, so I ruled him out immediately. My mom, on the other hand, has a tendency to hoard salad dressings, keeping them until loooooong after they expire- until my brother or I raid my mom's fridge and throw all the dressings over 5 years past the expiration date away. She also has a habit of making salads on holidays, and bringing about 47 different dressings with them, then leaving them in my fridge.

For me to later almost kill myself eating by accident. Jalapeno is bad when you don't do spicy. But it's worse when you're not expecting it!!

SO here was my dilemma: awesome salad covered in death dressing. There was too much salad left to justify throwing it away. Plus I really wanted that salad. So I just poured myself a huge glass of water, covered the poison sauce with peppercorn ranch, and dug in.

By the end, my eyes and nose were running like faucets, and my mouth was completely on fire.

But it was totally worth it.

Beethoven Crap

A few weeks ago I got a new phone. This one is pretty cool, it has a touch screen on top (never mind that my pocket has mistakenly called at least a dozen people...some of which I haven't spoken to in months!), and opens up for quick texting (have I mentioned I'm a texting fiend? Although now I feel like I have manhands because I'm always pressing the wrong keys).

Anyway. My old phone was very personalized. Because I have large pockets of time when I'm supposed to be watching SB, and she has large pockets of time where she doesn't want anything to do with me, but gets upset the minute I leave, I play with my phone a lot.

My old "default" ring was Flo Rida's "Low". If TB called, it was James Brown's "Get Up Offa That Thing", because that's totally something he would say, and has said, to me. If Bucky called, it was They Might Be Giants' "Snail Shell" (I was mad at her the day I assigned it and this was the closest thing to mean I could find or liked to hear 20 times a day when she calls). Maggie's ring tone was "My Humps" by the Black Eyed Peas.

Bucky and TB had their own text message alerts too. If anyone but them texted me, I would hear someone say "Is that a text message or are you just happy to see me?" It cracked me up every time. If TB texted me, it was a recording of a kid's monotone voice from Sesame Street saying "Dorothy, this is how I walk my dog.......come on, girl" only the last part was said in a very depressed manner, like the girl was leading the dog straight to the grave. Kind of an inside joke. And texts from Bucky were announced with her own voice saying "Whatever, you don't know".

I rarely had to even look at my phone in order to know who was trying to reach me. Oh- and my picture message alerts went back and forth between a really annoying trumpet call and my dog barking.

One day Bucky visited me at work. I was in the main office and away from my desk, leaving Bucky alone with some really annoying woman we refer to as The Intern. She has since accepted a position working for the same company, but she will forever be The Intern in my mind. Anyway, she was sitting at my desk and I got a text message, so my phone said either "Is that a text message or are you just happy to see me?" or "Dorothy, this is how I wwwalk my dwwooooog" in a thick Brooklyn accent. Regardless, Bucky watched as The Intern picked up my phone and opened it up!!

OMG!! Bucky confronted her, and The Intern said something about us having the same phone so she thought it was hers. HELLO?? Her phone talks to her? No! Most phones have a beep or something. Admittedly, we did have the same phone, but she also had some retarded cover on hers. So it's not like they even really looked alike. Plus hers wasn't even on MY desk, it was somewhere in her bag. Besides, she was annoying, who'd be texting her, anyway?

That was all beside the point. And what was the point? Oh yeah, my phone is very unique in its noises, and I spend much time making it that way.

This new phone hasn't been as easy to customize. So far, my default ring is Iko Iko. No one has personalized rings yet. I did find the "Is that a text message...." text alert, so that's back on it. But TB and Bucky don't have personalized text alerts yet. So I'm still in the process.

The night I added those two tones, I was just sitting there at home minding my own business when my phone rang. I got up to get it, but it immediately stopped ringing. So I sat back down. A minute later it rings again. This time it keeps going.

Upon answering, I was immediately greeted by Bucky yelling "WHAT THE F IS THAT?" I had no idea what she was talking about.

"THAT MUSIC...WHAT THE F IS IT, IT'S HORRIBLE"

I stammered around for a minute before assuming she meant my new Iko Iko ring tone, and started to defend Iko Iko since it's such a happy song. But she kept yelling something about classical music and I realized at the same time that she was calling me from her car, and therefore could not hear my phone ring.

After several moments of confusion, during which Bucky was ranting nonstop about the
"Beethoven crap" my phone was spitting out at her, I hung up. I texted TB and asked him to call my cell phone (because apparently I'm incapable of picking up my house phone and dialing out) and tell me what he hears. I hear Iko Iko and ignore it, then a minute later I get a text saying it's Vivaldi. Specifically, the Four Seasons.

Apparently at some point I somehow not only got a ring back attached to my phone, but I also, of all things, got all or part of the Four Seasons. From what TB sang to me later, it was Spring, which is my favorite anyway.

But still! I don't know how it got there, or how to get rid of it. I'm too lazy to contact Verizon regarding this, and too apathetic to care what people hear when they call me. The only time I call my own phone is when I check my messages from work, and the phone is turned off anyway so it goes right to voice mail.

Bucky has told me that the Beethoven Crap makes her want to call me less. So far she hasn't really followed through with that threat.

Oh well.

The Great Unwashed

I hate other people's kids. It's not the kids' fault, not at all. I completely blame the parents. But because of the parents, I hate the kids. Mostly, en masse. Individual kids can be ok, but when you get them all together in a place like a park or a bounce house, I don't like them very much.

Not to say that my kid is perfect. She can tantrum, yell, scream and stamp her foot with the best of them. But that's only to us. When in public, she is polite to others and is careful not to step on or hurt other kids when playing.

On Monday, SB was a perfect angel. Well, as close to an angel as we could hope these days. She dressed herself in the morning, went to school without a fuss, and was just a happy, whine-free, obedient child for the remainder of the day. So I decided to reward her with some positive reinforcement and bring her to an Ultimate Playzone in nearby Timonium.

This place was crowded, but big, so she had plenty of room to run around and burn off some energy (yes, I also wanted to ensure a good night's sleep, so there might have been an ulterior motive in bringing her there). Of course, she went into the one moon bounce where she tends to get stuck and make her pregnantly fat mom squeeze in through the birth canal that is the entrance to the bounce, climb up a ladder, slide down a slide, and lift SB up over the wall that she was unable to scale. Luckily it only happened once. Unluckily, I was now in a moon bounce, feeling like a sea cow out of water. Can't wait to figure out how I'm going to squeeze out of that place.

I also re-injured my injured toe. I guess I bounced funny, because the purple swollen toe that had just recently returned to normal color and size was now throbbing, and upon inspection later at home, appeared to be purple and swollen again. The things we do for our kids.

Anyway, we moved on to a moon bounce with a more adult-friendly opening. This one had a sort of ladder to climb in order to reach a slide. This "ladder" was composed of raised blocks about the size of bricks on an otherwise smooth incline. One was supposed to use the raised blocks to support their feet, and had the option of hanging on to ropes on each side of the "ladder". The blocks were a little too far apart for SB at first, so I followed her up and down about 10 times until she got the hang of it. She was still slow, but was able to climb on her own. Satisfied that she was safe and able, I gave my body and toe a break by resting on a bench about 4 feet in front of her moon bounce.

At some point during her gallivants, SB had befriended a little girl who appeared to be around her age, maybe a little older. So this girl was about 3-4 years old. She had originally begged me to let her go down a slide while sitting on my lap, but I politely declined. She said it was "ok with her mom," but since I didn't see said "mom" anywhere around, and wasn't really interested in some weirdo pressing charges against me for touching her kid, plus I didn't really want to have to lift up some 35 lb kid that wasn't my own, seeing as how I'm on a 20 lb lifting restriction, I told her to go down the slide and hold hands with SB. Which they did, and promptly became BFFs.

So now BFF and SB wanted to go up this rock climbing ladder that I described above. No problem there, but BFF decided she wanted to take along this little wooden lady bug thing that was there for kids to ride around the floor. It looked kind of like this:



Actually, it looked exactly like that. Only older and rattier.

So BFF holds it in her hand while climbing this rock ladder. SB follows. BFF is a little quicker climbing the ladder and ends up slightly ahead of SB. I am not comfortable with BFF bringing the ladybug onto the moon bounce, and her parents are still nonexistent. I stand up and approach the moon bounce to take the bug away from BFF. Just before I get there, she loses her grip on the ladybug and......you guessed it.

It falls and hits SB right on the head. SB starts BAWLING. This thing is not small or light, and the wooden part at the bottom is what hits her. I felt horrible. I tell SB to make her way down the ladder and come to me, since there are kids in the entrance and I can't make it to her. As she makes her way down, crying HARD, I reach in and take the ladybug out. BFF holds her hand out to me like she wants me to give it to her. I tell her she's not getting it, and place it on the floor where it belongs. As I do, BFF screams at me "It's ok, I'm allowed to have it!" Like HELL you are!

I STILL don't see any parents. I'm not one to go around reprimanding other people's kids, but there was no way this girl was getting that ladybug back to drop on another kid's head. I told her that those toys were meant to be on the ground, she's not supposed to have it on the moon bounce because it could hurt other kids. By this time, SB was in my arms, and I pointed out to the girl, in case she missed it, that she had just dropped it on SB's head and it hurt her.

BFF was not happy but I didn't care. I brought SB to the bench and comforted her, but she wouldn't stop crying. I felt bad that she was being so loud, and worried that she was bothering the fat little old lady parked next to me at the bench. Not that I really blamed her. I'd be crying too if that happened to me. But I offered to bring her to the water fountain as a distraction.

We walked out to the hallway, and as I helped SB up onto the stool in front of the fountain, I realized that BFF was right behind us, with the little old fat granny from the bench. Which I assumed was her grandmother. Who had witnessed the WHOLE THING yet never reprimanded the child or apologized to SB. OMG.

As this is sinking in (I'm kind of slow sometimes), another lady brushed past me with her son on their way into the restroom. She seemed concerned about SB, who was still crying pretty hard, and asked what had happened. I was touched that she cared, and eager to call out BFF in front of her grandmother. Just in case the GM was blind and didn't really see what happened. So I told the lady that someone had climbed onto a moon bounce with one of the roller ladybugs and dropped it on SB's head.

I hadn't even gotten through the entire sentence when this lady interrupted me to say "Oh, good, I was worried that this one had done something to her", and rushed into the restroom. WTF?? So she wasn't concerned at all about a hurt child, she just wanted to make sure her devil son wasn't responsible? And I couldn't even finish my sentence that was in response to HER question? I hated her almost as much as I now hated the GM and BFF.

As they passed behind me, GM said that was a shame, and she hopes SB feels better. WTF??? Am I in the Twilight Zone? Doesn't she realize that her own freaking grandchild, or at least the child she was supposed to be SUPERVISING had INJURED another child because she did something incredibly stupid and against the rules by bringing heavy piece of wood with wheels onto a freaking MOON BOUNCE and DROPPED IT ON SOMEONE'S HEAD???? Shouldn't she at least be scolded for this?

Poor SB. Luckily the injury wasn't too bad, I think it was more the shock of it than anything else. It hit her right behind her ear, pretty much just at her hair line, so you can't really see the bruise.

I'm not too mad at BFF. She didn't know any better. What upsets me is that she still doesn't know any better, because her GM is completely oblivious. Not only to the fact that she did something stupid, but to everything. I kept a close eye on SB the entire time she was on a moon bounce. I was only a foot away by the time the accident happened- trying to get there to take the ladybug away and avoid the accident altogether, and saw the whole thing. Obviously this GM did not keep an eye on her charge. It saddens me because without a grownup telling her what's appropriate and what's not, BFF is going to go through life not considering the consequences of her actions.

It also makes me mad that I spent $7 and got very little besides a bruised daughter and a re-injured toe.

Getting High and Sucking Things

SB has been a royal pain in my tucchus lately. I'm not sure if she's nervous because we're putting furniture into storage left and right in the hopes of making our house appear larger so we're more likely to sell it quickly and get a good price, or if she's not feeling well because we both seem to have caught a cold, or if she's just going through a difficult spurt.

She's been blatantly ignoring us, throwing temper tantrums, screaming for effect, and rebelling against her punishments. It's been a trying time, but I probably don't make things any better with my obviously not thought-out comments and advice.

SB sometimes sucks her thumb in her bed, which we can't really do anything about. But we have strict rules about not sucking her thumb when she's out and about, or sitting on the couch, or anywhere except in her bed. Sometimes she really wants to suck her thumb, and says "Mommy, I need something in my mouth." I usually try to distract her by getting her to do something with her hands, like draw or paint.

The other day, she told me "Mommy, I need to suck on something." I was in the middle of doing something so I couldn't really distract her at that point so I had to use another Mom Tactic: the Big Girl argument. Every 3-year old wants to be a Big Girl. So when I want SB to do something, or not do something, I liken her desired actions to whether a Big Girl would do it.

Unfortunately, in this case, my telling her that "Big Girls don't suck on things" was not the best, or most honest approach to getting her behavior to change.

Fast forward to yesterday, when SB took me into her room to show me/brag about how she moved a chair (ROCKING CHAIR) over to in front of her book case and climbed on both to try to reach a doll on a high shelf on the wall. The only reason she was telling me all this was because she still wasn't able to reach the doll.

Of course, my first reaction was to warn her how dangerous it was to climb onto her bookshelf like that, and that she could fall and get "big booboos" (I'm totally into the Mommy Talk these days).

During my lecture, TB entered the room just in time to hear me explain to SB that she shouldn't do that, and "if you want to get high, ask Mommy or Daddy."

Yeah. I guess my Mommy Talk needs some work.