patrice's baby attack

austin wrap up

2009-01-17T23:55:00.003-05:00

the best laid plans. I did have every intention of blogging austin as it happened, but...well....

so day 2. and this sucks because now I have to remember. okaaayyyyy, did I tell you about the alamo?? I had to actually look back. nope. okay, here's the deal. it's a movie theater where every other row is removed and replaced with a long table with menus underneath. before the show and during the show, up until the final 45 mins, you can order anything you want. the menu ranges from bar food kind of stuff like pizza, to comfort food like grilled cheese and mac and cheese, to restaurant food like steak and salads. and a full bar, which I did not partake. I did have a tall frosty dr. pepper. I saw the wrestler, and it was seriously fantastic. I didn't know much about it and wasn't thrilled that it was the only movie playing, but I couldn't really pass it up. and it was great. I watched some of the scenes through my fingers (the extreme wrestling was, well, extreme) and I didn't understand the reasoning for the extended strip club scenes (I rarely do, I consider them the price of getting asses in the seats) but mickey rourke...I hated him before this and seeing pictures of him at the golden globes makes me think I still hate him but he was perfect in this role. anyways, that was a big highlight.

going back to the earlier part of the day, I woke up and went over to a local salon and had a massage. it was only a half an hour and I told nicole that massages actually can make me tense up. I am so freaked out about being relaxed - wait, my shoulders are tensed! I'm clenching my jaw! I'm thinking about the rest of the day and I missed like 5 minutes of backrub! - that I can't enjoy it. then I got a haircut and...surprise. I didn't like it. why do so many people think that the answer for coarse hair is layers? no! I should tell stylists that the only tool I want them to use to cut my hair is a razor. you cannot cut into it like it's a pumpkin. oh well. I only just lost 3 months of my life with that. well, 6 if you count the 3 more months it'll take to grow these layers out.

then it was a walk around town, then the alamo.

wait. the massage and haircut was day 3.

whatever, these are the things I did in austin. I did more walking and taking pictures at some point, I took a bus to what I thought would be the shopping district which turned out to be just a mall, and it was the worst bus ride I have had since elementary school, I ate brisket at stubb's, and I got a tattoo.

all in all, I loved the city. it would have been better with a car, I can tell you that most definitely. while I liked downtown, I would have loved to see some of the sights that weren't walkable, and some of straight up texas. I guess in that way, taking that hideous bus ride at least afforded me the chance to see more rural and less city areas. it's like the part of vegas that rebecca and her clan took me to when they came down to visit... it was not typical vegas. not that I love strip malls and fast food, but it's neat to see how the real folks live. what the names of their supermarkets are, what style most of the buildings are, the signs for their roads and their names. I find that stuff interesting.

I'm glad to be home. of course, I returned to a car that wouldn't start and had to be towed, but whattayagonnado. (and I was informed that for my inspection, that expires at the end of february, I will need front and rear brakes and a new windshield. total cost, just shy of $600. nice, right?)

[the tattoo is of a nautical star, red and black, on my left inside forearm. there are stars on everything, it seemed, in texas, and it seemed very fitting.]

austin day 2

2009-01-13T01:10:00.002-05:00

first off, here's the pics. I'll be adding to it.

second. I am drunk.

third, I am tiiiiirrrreeeddddddd. I have so much to tell you about today.

fourth, I'll tell you tomorrow.

blogging austin

2009-01-11T20:28:00.002-05:00

I'm on one of my solo vacations - this time, austin texas. everyone asks why...well, because it was cheap. and it seemed cool. cool people have gone to austin. and now I have too.

so, got up extremely early to catch a ride with jarrett to the airport. he left today too, only for las vegas. this is a trip we've taken together since we started dating. it has not sat well with me that he's going alone this time. to stop myself from sinking into a well of self-pity, and because it's been a while, I decided to go on a vacation too. I had already saved up money for vegas and taken the time off, so I figured what the hell. and roundrip airfare plus 3 nights' stay plus some extras (shuttle, interweb, etc) came out around $330. yeah. so I'm here till wednesday.

already I am homesick. I miss my kids. I really am enjoying being here but it's a bit of a...I don't even know how to finish the thought. it's always good for me to get away, because I'm the kind of person who needs a reset every few months. my head gets too crowded and I have to be alone and have to be completely independent so I get back to center. these are usually vacations where I am deeply introspective...but the last trip and this one have been a little less helpful because I'm introspective every week thanks to therapy. but I'm here, I can't leave, so I will make the most of it.

as I twittered, my first impression of texas was brown. I had a layover in chicago (I know, right? kinda out of the way.) and there was at least 6 inches of snow on the ground. something like 12 degrees. everything was white - cirrus clouds, as it was still snowing, and snow on the ground as we approached. dipping below the clouds in texas, everything was brown, taupe, cream, beige. austin texans have no accent. well, a little - it comes out sounding more valley girl than twang.

my hotel is not really a hotel - it's efficiency suites. so I have a kitchen and a table and a desk and a bed and a comfortable chair. a little habitat. I asked the girl at the front desk about a store and places to eat. and if it's safe to be out at night. flashbacks of the toe guy. she said it's safe to be out at night but not past 6pm. not sure if that even qualifies as night. it was 5:15 at the time, and the store was 5 blocks away, but I threw caution to the wind (her explanation was that there are alot of homeless people around so it makes it scary...grain of salt) and went to eat at someplace called opal's. was a shiner brewery at one point. everyone there looked like me or my friends. refreshing to be at a night spot with no tbp and excess skin. (tits be poppin.) very hipster but not pretentious.

I had poblano pepper stuffed chicken breast, spanish rice, roasted peppers. and a shirley temple. tipped extra well. then I went on to the store - a mammoth whole foods. hotel didn't have complimentary shampoo - or they did, but you had to ask - so I figured I'd buy some. organic shampoo is fucking expensive. got some milk, cereal, noodles for lunch tomorrow, cookies, vegetable straws. alotta $, but still cheaper than eating out.

now it's 7:41 local time and I'm already indoors for the night. well, that's the thing about being on vacation alone. it's never for the night if I don't want it to be. but my body is tired - I only got 4 hrs of sleep - or slept for 4 hours in 20 min increments. and catnapped on the planes. so my body's tired.

mission is to keep busy and/or pass out so I am not wondering what is going on in vegas. it's a battle I probably won't win. but, as my tattoo says, I have to let it go. but it still hurts.

more tomorrow. I didn't bring my camera with, wasn't sure of the lay of the land - too bad, there was tons of stuff I wanted to take pictures of. tomorrow. I brought my stuff to upload everything so it'll be on flickr.

wish me well.

christmas cheer

2008-12-06T18:15:00.002-05:00

the kids - both of em - and I put up decorations today, including the tree. and the meds must be working because it was the most enjoyable tree putting up and decorating that I can remember EVER. seriously. oh and look at this...bella just came in the kitchen playing with the princess coach that was her big present last year. this marks the second time that she's played with it, the first being last christmas morning. it's a before-christmas miracle!

aaaaanyway, things are going well in the milliceccobach household. which I'm always afraid to say.

what do you want most for christmas? and I don't want these "world peace, the love of my children, actor X naked on my bed" answers. I mean really truly. like what you'd want someone to get you if you had the balls to ask. ready, go!

pasquale j colancecco in pictures

2008-11-09T09:08:00.003-05:00

I have my brother's computer in my kitchen. his screensaver is a slideshow of all of his pictures. I thought I'd list out what he had. it gives you a feel for what was important to him and what he liked. all of these pictures are different.

pink triangle
60s mod girl
snowy park
geno's steaks
city hall
bridge in philadelphia
telephone operator
obama "hope"
phila skyline
william penn
phila skyline at night
art museum at night
telephone operators
logo for blondie (the comic)
telephone operator
phila skyline at night
independence hall
love statue
phila skyline at dusk
obama "hope" small
little rascals
art museum in the early morning
outer space
little rascals
aids ribbon
old picture of city hall (1800s)
frozen bridges in perkasie
80 celebrate
red ribbons marching
musical notes
little rascals
little rascals
little rascals
telephone operators
outer space
american flag peace sign
wm penn at night
aerial view of phila
house on warnock street
milky way galaxy
cobblestone street in phila
aerial view of phila
computer
ben franklin bridge
art museum at night
laptop computer
aids ribbon
pink triangle silence = death

I'm sorry they taught me to hate you, and that I listened to them.

world series of election birthday, rip

2008-11-05T08:55:00.003-05:00

so much groundbreaking lately. the phillies won the world series and although there are people who don't understand why that's important to alot of people, it just is. and it was fantastic to see the city be so united and excited. there were enough aspects of it that didn't go my way personally to make it bittersweet in some cases, but overall, I was thrilled. then we had the parade, bella's birthday, trick or treating, and a grown up halloween party all in the same day. overwhelming. I learned of a death in my family on sunday, one that was shocking and upsetting and ultimately thought provoking and full of guilt, and then election day was yesterday. I feel like everything is different and I'm a little overwhelmed again.

of course, bella turning 4 was the least surprising and most special. she was very proud of herself for being 4, and is loving her presents. she helped me vote yesterday, too, pushing the "cast vote" button. she wanted me to vote for balack kobama, marock co bama, and then finally ba-rack-o-ba-ma. she says it very slowly.

so I did want to say because I'm annoyed right now. I turned on the radio to listen to stuff about the election, and instead, I'm hearing about the station's new calendar and all the mostly naked girls in it. really? oh and miss february was also the winner of philly's hottest underboob. I hate society sometimes. barack, save us from female objectification!!

from bella:

I love you. cookies are my favorite snack. peanuts are like fruit and cantaloupe. trees come from pineapple trees and apple trees, giggle. my dollies have ponytails and sometimes have tutus.

because I felt compelled.

2008-09-11T12:54:00.002-05:00

this morning, I woke up and started doing my thing. it wasn't until I was driving into work that I realized it was 9/11. and, as I had in the past 2 years or so, I didn't really give it alot of thought. as the day progressed, I forgot about it. nothing about the day was different. but I had to drive home around lunchtime and while I was in the car, there was a block of songs on a local radio station that were a tribute to the victims of 9/11. in between songs, there were brief snippets of accounts of the day. so I listened. and I found myself getting emotional and getting goosebumps.

that day, that block of time - weeks? months? - after that day, I do have to remind myself to remember. it feels like a long time ago. there are plenty of things that happened around the same time that I have no trouble recalling. I don't know why remembering this takes a tribute from a radio station. so I feel like I want to put this out there today.

my friend tracey emailed a distribution list at cdnow, where we worked. a plane hit the WTC. I figured like a prop plane, something small. then people started going into the caf, where we had tvs. seeing everything, it was horrible. being at work, it was numbing. my sister was stuck in orlando and planes weren't flying. it was the only help I felt like I could give to a horrible situation. so I went about it with gusto. I got her and her family onto a train the next day to get back to philadelphia. you had to call over and over to get through on a cell phone. that was all I was able to do, and when I was done, I went back to feeling totally useless. everyone wanted to help - we gave supplies and shirts and water, almost none of which made it to where it needed to go and little of which were ultimately used. we had vigils and prayer meetings and we all came together like a family. political cartoons showed lady liberty crying. I listened to the local news radio station constantly, listening to stories and news. I cried alot. I helped trent understand. it consumed me for a long time.

I cried the next year, when compilations of stories and footage were released.

I felt sadness the next year after that, when those compilations were re-released.

this year, I forgot.

when I do remember, I remember how sad everyone was, how sorrowful the situation was. and how horrifying. women shouting at tv cameras to ask if anyone had seen their husbands, their daughters, their sons, or their friends. the compilation movie that pointed out that the thuds you were hearing during the footage of firefighters in the lobby were actually bodies hitting metal and concrete from people who felt it was better to jump than to burn. the people in rural PA, and washington, who were overshadowed but still hurting just as much. the mothers whose children were being cared for and now were gone. the firefighters and volunteers who were trying so hard to find survivors who weren't there.

maybe that's why we can forget, maybe the reality of the situation is too hard to hold onto for very long. there are people whose lives were touched personally by 9/11 that will never forget, and I'm sure that there are others who for whatever reason will never forget, but I will forget.

I just have to remember to remember.

oh, and the foot fetishist

2008-09-01T07:57:00.002-05:00

double post day...

I have to tell you about my run in with the aggressive foot fetishist, here in words for posterity. picture it, south philly, 2008. (RIP estelle.) I left a party at todd and theresa's at about 3:35 to go to my car to go home. I get to 4th and queen and a dude asks me for the time. so I give it to him and start to cross the street. he follows me and catches up and kind of jumps in my way and says "I didn't know it was that late". I keep walking. he kind of tugs on my arm and asks me if I ever heard that if a woman's second toe is bigger than her big toe, it's a sign of intelligence. now, the way he's talking to me, I thought there was something wrong with him. like, he was shifty and looking down and kind of rocking back and forth a little. so I just said that was interesting and started walking again. I only took a step or so when he tugged my arm again. that's when the alarm bells really started ringing. we were all the way across the street now, out of the street light, in front of an alley. so then he asks me if I was leaving a club, or a party, or what. I said I was leaving a party and again started to walk away. a more urgent tug, more of a firm one, and he asked if I really thought the toe thing was interesting, and wasn't I glad that I knew that now? it was something I didn't know before that, right? then he reaches down and strokes my second toe, saying "and I saw you have a toe ring and..." which is when I couldn't really concentrate. then he grabbed my foot. and it wasn't for an extremely long period of time, but it was a firm grip, and I looked at that alley, and I realized I was off balance, and I was just scared shitless. I thought, oh my god, I'm going to be...foot raped? whatever, this dude's gonna whip it out and chop my foot off for a souvenir. I had my keys in my hand and put the points in my knuckles, but here's where the instinct diverges between men and women, I think. all the dudes asked me why I didn't sock him or just tell him to leave me the fuck alone. and here's what they didn't understand - if a dude starts fondling me, I'm not going to provoke him. I piss him off, I may take him to the next level. like, if he was only thinking of chopping my foot off, now he's gonna. or if he already planned to be violent, now it's gonna be worse. and if I punch him in the face but only manage a glancing blow, he's going to be pissed no matter what his intentions were. so I pulled my foot away, and he started following me again, but I was not stopping. I wasn't running, I didn't want to piss him off, and he was yelling after me stuff about did I leave the party because no one would tickle my feet, and was it because I hated it? (which, that was creepy too because wouldn't you want to know if it were because I really wanted to be tickled? it just kinda reinforces the idea that he wanted to do something against my will.) anyways, as soon as I was out of reach, I got my cell phone out (it was in my back pocket but I didn't pull it out because I didn't want him to potentially grab it out of my hands) and called jon and asked him to meet me at my car. and my voice was shaking alot by then. so he calls me a few minutes later, when I was crouched down in my car, and asked what happened. as I was telling him, I see todd run up the other side of the street. so I beep my horn and get out, and here comes nadav at full speed. and then jon and lester. calvary. they looked for the dude (late 30s, 40s, bleached jeans, white reeboks, yellow fake silk button down shirt, brillo hair. basically john oates from hall and oates without the mustache) and then made me call the cops. I gave that description over the phone and they said they'd send someone out, which after almost a half hour, they didn't.

so there I am, with 4 guys that came to my rescue, and now I have to tell them that what got me so freaked out was...a foot fetishist. an aggressive foot fetishist. I am actually giggling now as I write it. I mean, at the time, it was scary as hell, but now, I mean...a foot fetishist? who the hell does that happen to?? what are the fucking chances???? the guys were so nice about it though. I would have probably laughed at me. and they probably did when they left. oh well, what are you gonna do?

but now I know how intelligent I am. I mean, my second toe is totally longer than my big toe. so thank you, john oates foot dude, for showing me the way.

it. is. almost. FALL.

2008-09-01T07:41:00.002-05:00

it's pretty much no secret that the last couple years of my life have been rife with me having mental issues or being afraid to have mental issues. I can't always tell what is making me feel the way I do, but I know one thing that nearly always makes me feel better. fall. autumn. between uncomfortable summer and dreary winter.

lots of people love fall and for alot of the same reasons - cool weather, changing leaves, good smells, coziness - but I think my main reason is new possibilities. most people, I think, feel this in the spring, when stuff starts growing. and not necessarily in the fall, when stuff starts dying. I think it goes back to the clean slate feeling I always got when a new school year started. and I guess it's stuck with me.

of course, fall contains my favorite holiday. it's so amazing to me that bella's birthday, without planning, fell on halloween. it's just another indication to me that I am done having kids. it's like the lottery - I may have told this story so I'll keep it brief. a few things happened during a workday that all had the same number, 111. I had to make the court runs for work and I passed by a convenience store, and my coworker urged me to buy a ticket. I did (asking for 111 "straight and boxed" as I had heard others doing, heh) and put the ticket in my pocket. the next day, my coworker greeted me saying "I can't believe it, you won!!!!" apparently 111 had come up the previous day. and I never played again. what a way to go out, you know? same with the game washers. I haven't played since I got a washer around the bolt in the can in the box. perfect throw. it's not that I'm superstitious or just lazy or anything. it's just that those moments are so good, I feel no need to top them. so bella is like that too. I already know I don't want more kids and what a way to go out, you know?

in other news, things continue along the same lines in other areas of my life but I'm ready for a change. mostly in attitude but hopefully more - with the fall clean slate.

siiiiighhhh

2008-08-29T07:29:00.003-05:00

trent's high school orientation was yesterday. and we again had the grounding discussion. he was grounded most of the summer because he didn't get a job, and now he's cramming in all his summer homework in time for tuesday when school starts. it's tough to make sure that you're parenting the right way when they're older. it's fairly cut an dried when they're little, for the most part. you have a sense of what you want them to learn from you and what's acceptable and what's not. this is a giant gray area. frustrating for all of us.

bella is suddenly very into spelling. she spells everything she sees. (meaning, says the letters.) her hair is getting so long and I love it. I don't want to cut it. she's more allowing of pony tails, too, so that's helpful. she's also getting really into playing basketball outside. which I love. I got her a princess basketball so it is even more compelling for her.

I took an "empowering" step today to challenge my diagnosis with my psychologist. we're going to go to my psychiatrist on tuesday with a new recommendation. means new meds, which means weaning from old and dealing with new side effects, but if it ultimately makes me less uncomfortable in my own skin, then fantastic. bring it the fuck on.

happy labor day to all the moms out there. get it? heh.

back to our intended storyline

2008-08-17T20:47:00.002-05:00

I have been so absolutely wrapped up in my own sick mind that I haven't talked enough about what this blog is all about - my kids. I get so caught up in things...I haven't slept for more than a few hours at a time in days. addled. the things that are important, the ones that are permanent. my family may decide they hate me, my boyfriend may decide that he really does have feelings for someone else, my friends may get sick of me like I think they will. the only things that are permanent and that really matter are my kids.

my sweet boy, trent. he just got back from europe. and even though we've had some rough times over the past 2 months or so, when he seemed like he was getting further and further out of reach, he came back with more love for me than I thought and was receptive to the love I had to give. he had a great time. all the way home from the airport, he told me about all of his exploits. he told me berlin was too americanized and dresden was the most beautiful city he's ever seen. he said beautiful, not cool. he's growing. but he's still my teenager - he took a steep train ride up a mountain in the swiss alps and when he got to the top, he and his friends all peed off the top, just to say they did. I love him so much. I'm so glad he's home.

bella's been giving me a run for my money. stubborn, saying no alot. but still saying the cutest things. she asked me today if the soda I got had caffeine, because caffeine makes you not tired, and you have to let your muscles sleep. and then in the morning, your muscles can get all waked up. she asked brett for some coupons from his salad and then proceeded to eat every single crouton he had. I drop something and she tells me it's okay, we all have accidents. she asks me to come up to the potty with her because she doesn't want to get lonely. she tells me she's getting bigger and then comes out to show me, which consists of her standing there looking proud. she saw worms today and said that the worms were her best friends, and she's so glad to see them. we got her a basketball net because she seemed to like the one we saw at a friend's, and I want her to be as athletic as she is comfortable with, because sports can really give a girl confidence. and I never, ever want her to be like me.

I got stung by a wasp today. there are dangers around, you know they're there. you do what you have to do anyway. and sometimes you get stung by a wasp. and it hurts, and you wonder what's going to happen next. will you have a horrible allergic reaction? will it get infected? how badly will it itch? when will the hurt go away? you didn't want to get stung, you just did. and then what. you go to webmd and find out about the odds of each thing happening. you read about home remedies. you read about how people died from a single sting. you read about how it could be absolutely nothing. and you sit and look at your wrist where you were stung, and you have no idea how it's going to go. no control over how it's going to go. and you just wait to see. and you realize the anxiety over it might have been worse than the sting. but you never really know that until it's over.

my kids may just save me.

now I take pictures

2008-07-19T16:04:00.005-05:00

a hobby of mine that I've never taken seriously or even really gave any attention to even as a hobby is photography. I always felt that my pictures were trying too hard to be artsy and that everything I ever photographed had already been done before - not just done, but done to death. you know when you go to like disneyworld and they have the "kodak spots" where you're sure to have a really great backdrop of cinderella's castle or whatever? can you imagine how many people have taken pictures of that very same spot? I go to a public garden (longwood gardens in delaware county pa) and the conservatory installations are pretty much the same all year round - lotus outside, orchids and roses in their area, etc. and I always, ALWAYS see people leaning down to take pictures of the flowers and they're all basically the same. the same pictures I take, too. there's nothing special and no real artistic nature in them.

well, now I have a new camera. jarrett bought me a digital SLR (the canon rebel) and the pictures are fantastic. now my pedestrian and rehashed pictures look better than ever because of the quality of this camera. I find I take pictures of the same kinds of things often. I like repeating patterns and ordinary objects and I only really do well with natural light. anyways, my pictures are on flickr. I'm trying to give this more attention in my life because it's something only for me. we'll see how it goes. I'm trying to find a class to take that's not digital cameras 101 and not So You Want To Become A Professional Photographer!

thanks for reading.

objects
bella
general

the rest of the story

2008-07-10T11:54:00.002-05:00

First off, I want to say that I feel totally lame for even writing all this, as if I am some sort of martyr or something. so please, if you comment, don't tell me how horrible it all sounds because it really wasn't as bad as it sounds.

I don't feel as overwhelmed as I did when I posted last. in fact, I'm kind of indifferent. but I guess for posterity, and because I know some of you might be at least a little interested, I am setting out to give a timeline of my stay at horsham clinic.

I arrived with jarrett around 5pm ish, I think. I think he told them who I was, and I was asked for some info, I think. I remember having to go into this sun porch kind of thing to smoke cigarettes. I cried most of the time. I was allowed one bag and so I stuffed my cdnow messenger bag full of stuff I thought I'd need. time passed, people came and went in the large waiting room (there was a fuzzy tv, thankfully) and eventually I told jarrett to go home because he had been there so long and I felt bad. and I felt worse because he took me up on it. I was scared because as the night wore on, more freaks started to come in. like a dude in a hospital gown with cuts on every visible part of his body except his face. cutter cuts. how did he get there? they had ambulances coming in with people but they had a special door.

shortly after midnight, (7ish hours later), I was seen by an intake doctor. I had my picture taken and my history taken, none of which I remember, but which I now have as part of my documentation I took home with me. I was escorted, I guess, to the ward where I'd be staying. I remember the nurse saying that I was going to be in the dual diagnosis ward because they had no beds available in the psych section. it took me a while to learn what dual diagnosis is - it's part crazies, part rehab. mostly rehab. so alot of detoxing addicts. most there against their will.

I was strip searched and had blood drawn. I was wearing drawstring pants - the drawstring was sewn in the back so that it wouldn't come out. it had to be cut - no strings, shoelaces, belts. I was given these weird velcro strips to hold my pants up. they went through my bag and took out all of my makeup except my mascara (eyeliner was pointy) and confiscated my razor, my wallet, my jewelry, a few items of clothing that weren't allowed (no short shorts - and my shorts aren't too short, but it was nothing even remotely provocative "because of the offenders", and nothing that could easily be used to commit suicide) and my lighter. probably a good idea anyways given what I had done. and they did finally re-dress my burns.

I was taken to my room, which I shared with 3 other women. I had a dorm sized bed, a wardrobe, and a nightstand. the wardrobe had no doors. there also was a non-lockable bathroom. I was told to keep my cigarettes and my coins under my pillow while I sleep because there were many thefts. I was given medicine - later I found out it was klonopin - and told to go to sleep.

I spent about 36 more hours in that unit before I was moved and it was horrible. they have daily blood tests even for the people not there for drugs. you had to check in in the morning and the evening so they could make sure you didn't escape or whatever (the doors are locked so I don't know how they figured you'd leave, but whatever.) their group sessions were scary. everyone goes to group and gets a paper to fill out (with a marker or crayon, no pencils or pens) that's sort of like a survey. on a scale of 1 to 10, how depressed do you feel? how hopeful do you feel? how anxious do you feel? how suicidal do you feel? how homicidal do you feel? then some fill in the blank questions like what is the thing that is making you the most anxious? do you feel better today than yesterday or worse? then you basically go around and each give your stats. the groups there were like 15 people so it took forever and you had group twice a day. and people did have something besides a 1 on the homicidal scale. then you got released to either go hang out in the common room or go outside and smoke (there is a lineup outside to get a light from the nurse who held the lighter) and the people that had the homicidal thoughts were mostly the ones going around and bullying people into giving them cigarettes. I lost about a pack of them while there. luckily, jarrett had brought me a carton as well as $20 in quarters for the payphone. (yes, I slept on rolls of quarters under my pillow and carried them around with me during the day.)

the third day I was there, I got moved to the psych building. it was so much calmer. I was still in the same kind of room with 2 other women. one was a long haired hippie looking woman in her 40s and one was a younger black woman with a Jamaican accent who brought no clothes and slept without a blanket, just in her jeans and red fleece, and barely got out of bed. she did tell me that she had no family here and few friends, that her family were back home wherever she was from, that they would disown her, and that she moved here to work for Merck (a big pharmaceutical firm in our area.) oh and the hippie lady didn't have alot of clothes to wear so she slept naked (which seemed odd because of the modesty rules) and she totally had a big tattoo of a butterfly on her cooter.

wakeup calls in the morning were fairly optional. everything was fairly optional, except meds. they could be forced on you. things worked on a restrictions basis. if you didn't go to group or get up on time, or showed any signs of trying to get better, you were on meal restrictions and outing restrictions and you didn't get to pick your food or go to the cafeteria at the main house (which required going outside). you got whatever food they delivered. you weren't eligible to get off restrictions till your 3rd day. I got off restrictions easily, I totally did whatever they wanted. I wanted to leave so badly. so I got to walk, escorted, up to the main house. I saw lots of other patients including lots and lots of kids. little kids. 6 and 7 year olds all the way up to teenagers. I asked the nurse how the hell 6 year olds were there and she said that they are very disturbed. she said she once had a 6 year old who had tried to commit suicide come in, get released, and eventually jumped out of a window and succeeded where he failed before. I have no answers for you if you ask how that can happen. it was haunting.

our group sessions were much calmer than the ones in the dual diagnosis. and the people were more friendly and I didn't have to sleep with my quarters. (I did find, however, that there was at least one pair of pants and a pair of underwear that were stolen from me but I don't know from which unit.) we still had to rate ourselves but no one was homicidal. and it was smaller and mostly women. I befriended the hippie lady and one other woman, we would hang out together as much as we were allowed. (they discouraged cliques, which I think is smart.) the hippie woman told me she occasionally had seizures but that they had been getting worse and more often. by the time I left, she had them about once every half hour. she'd just start vibrating with her eyes staring at you for like a minute then just keep talking. she often wanted me to hold her hand and I did but it really freaked me out.

I was going to have visitors so I wanted to try to clean up a little. I wanted to shave my armpits and legs to feel more human. I hadn't shaved in like a week at that point, since before any of this had happened. I had to sign up for a chaperone and she had to stand outside the shower while I used a cheap disposable razor in the time I was alloted to shave. I had to have the curtain open so that she could see me doing my legs.

my mom, my sister, my dad, brett, sean, and jarrett visited me. I was never so happy to see people in my whole life.

this whole time, I was totally drugged up. I was on klonopin every night and xanax every day. they took me off the lexapro I was on cold turkey which is probably why I wasn't doing so well, and they started me immediately on zoloft. so I had the withdrawal from one and the initial side effects from the other. plus the anti psychotics. you saw the "doctor" every other day if you could, at least every 3rd day (I wasn't even there that long, it was the 6th day that I went home) and he was the only one who could allow you to go home. the first time I saw him was for about 5 minutes when he asked me if I felt better, and I was so sluggish that I don't remember what I said. by the 5th day, I had asked the nurses over and over and over to see if I could get time with him, and my mom was calling too to get me out. finally I saw him and he said I seemed better and my insurance company was wondering why I was still there and might not pay so I was let out. jarrett and my mom picked me up.

it wasn't the worst thing in the world to happen and people have had much, much, much worse experiences than I had. but this was something so outside of my comfort zone and so outside of my real life that it really had a profound effect on me. my therapist (you couldn't leave until you secured an appointment with an approved therapist) said that she felt I had post traumatic stress syndrome, which I think is bull pucky, but I do think it really, really affected me, and for a long time afterwards. a long time after people wanted to hear about it. (btw, I no longer see that therapist and my therapist today is 10x better.)

there are certain parts that are really vivid - the nurses yelling "smoke break!!" and the weird trays that they used for food - and some I only just remembered now in writing all of this. I'm glad it's over and I never, ever want to be in that position again. luckily I can't, really, because in order to get more approved therapy visits from my insurance company, I had to trade in my covered inpatient days. ha. love it.

Last published on Feb 5, 2008

2008-06-25T13:18:00.004-05:00

Hello. I seem to start every sporadic post with "I'm sorry I haven't been writing" but it gets on my nerves so I can only imagine what someone reading would think. though I think all of my readership, meager as it was, has dropped off.

in 3 days, it will be the 1 year anniversary of what I've come to refer to as "the incident" but has been categorized by my doctors as a mental breakdown. june 28th, I came home from work and began crying uncontrollably. brett and trent were there and brett was alarmed enough to call my family doctor and then take me over there. my family doctor, who had already prescribed lexapro and xanax in the lowest dose, told brett to take me home, stay with me for the night, and make sure I take 4 of the xanax every 6 hours. the next 24 hours were a blur. I know that brett called jarrett, jarrett stayed the night, and then brett took off work the next day to stay with me. in that time, in what my current psychologist has told me was a dissociative state, I burned myself with a cigarette lighter on my left wrist about 40 times. brett took me back to my family doctor after seeing what I'd done (and me having cried all day without stopping didn't help) and jarrett came, and between the 3 of them, they decided I should go to a local inpatient center called Horsham Clinic, whose website is a bunch of lies. "Take a walk on our 55-acre campus where mature trees, gardens, fountains, and an abundance of greenery provide a safe, tranquil environment to promote healing." by the way, you're locked in your building and you can only go out with the nurse and only about 4 feet away from the door. no one walks around the grounds, no one is allowed. you have to earn "priviledges" just to get to eat at the world class cafeteria in the main house.

maybe one day I will blog about my time at horsham. all I'll say here is that it was the worst 5 days of my life. overmedicated, stolen from, stripped of my shoelaces, my belt, and anything that could be used as a weapon, on "suicide watch" for no reason, and to top it off - gross food. the rest could be forgivable if I had a decent hamburger and maybe a brownie.

anyway. I tried very hard to get released from horsham and my mom was instrumental in getting me out by barraging my doctor with calls (and the fact that my insurance was about to give out helped) and when I got out, I felt lost. everything seemed different. and my whole life became about fixing myself as quickly as possible. it was all medication, therapy, people checking on me, bandages on my arm, it was my whole world for a while there. there are still some songs that I hear that make me instantly panicky because they were on during that time. I really think that the time after the incident was much worse than the time before it. maybe even during it.

and as hard as it is to say it, I didn't even find enough joy in my children to make things seem better. though it helped, it really helped. nothing was enough.

I am so glad that those days are behind me. I've ripped through all of my allotted outpatient sessions covered by insurance and it's been presented to me that I can either trade in some of my inpatient days for outpatient appts (1 inpatient = 4 outpatient) or I can use my official diagnosis to earn 50 outpatient appts but run the risk of it becoming a pre-existing condition and therefore not eligible for benefits in future policies. the natural choice is the inpatient/outpatient switch, but there's that little voice in the back of my head that says "what if it happens again??" I really don't think it will but I guess anything is possible.

anyway, I'd been pretty open about my meds and therapy but not about what got me there. by the way, I'm on 300 mg of lithium now and 300 mg of lamictal and nothing else. and it's great, and has been for about 2 months now. I have a fantastic new therapist who I see faithfully every week, and feel like things are definitely moving in the right direction now.

here's to a much better year.

funk be gone

2008-02-05T13:38:00.000-05:00

being mentally unstable is exhausting.

I hate spending so much time inside my head, but it's so hard not to. I'm trying now to expand my social circle so I have more in my life besides the things that cause me to be anxious. it's slow going.

so let's talk kids. everyone likes kids.

bella is home sick today. well today she's not as sick as she was yesterday. and it's easier to work from home when she's more sick, which is sad but true. today she's feeling better and she wants to play wif me, sit wif me, and save my seat if I get up to do something. she's adorable but it's hard to get anything done. she has a runny nose and is getting over a 2 day fever. I don't know exactly what's wrong, but I knew I couldn't take her to daycare.

trent is a loving kid, I'm so lucky. he loves coming home and playing with bella. and believe it or not, he wants to kiss and hug her and she doesn't want him to. you'd think it was the other way around. they love each other and love to play. it's so helpful that he's able to keep her entertained. sometimes though they go and play and I'm just an observer...but I think it's good that they have that relationship. I just feel a little left out sometimes. but that's when I get alot of stuff done, so it's not so terrible.

there's not much else to say. I feel like I'm coming out of a profoundly depressed time, and I'm grateful to be out of that phase, but I'm afraid to say it's over for fear that tomorrow will be horrible again. we'll see.

I miss all of you.

putting it out to the universe....

2008-01-22T13:44:00.000-05:00

this is what I want:

Oh, why you look so sad?
Tears are in your eyes
Come on and come to me now
Dont be ashamed to cry
Let me see you through
cause Ive seen the dark side too
When the night falls on you
You dont know what to do
Nothing you confess
Could make me love you less
Ill stand by youIll stand by you
Wont let nobody hurt you
Ill stand by you
So if youre mad, get mad
Dont hold it all inside
Come on and talk to me now
Hey, what you got to hide?
I get angry too
Well Im a lot like you
When youre standing at the crossroads
And dont know which path to choose
Let me come along
cause even if youre wrong
Ill stand by you
Ill stand by you
Wont let nobody hurt you
Ill stand by you
Take me in, into your darkest hour
And Ill never desert you
Ill stand by you
And when...
When the night falls on you, baby
Youre feeling all alone
You wont be on your own
Ill stand by you
Ill stand by you
Wont let nobody hurt you
Ill stand by you
Take me in, into your darkest hour
And Ill never desert you
Ill stand by you
Ill stand by you
Wont let nobody hurt you
Ill stand by you
Wont let nobody hurt you
Ill stand by you

sorry

2008-01-02T04:28:00.000-05:00

okay, sorry about that.

the holidays were okay. bella loves santa. she got alot of princesses...which is exactly (alot of princesses) what she asked for. trent got my continued payment for his europe trip, which I never mentioned. it's in august. paris, germany, austria, lichtenstein, switzerland. he's excited. I also got him a playstation psp because I couldn't not get him anything, and that will be a lifesaver on the plane.

it may be short but it's all I have in me today. please don't listen to me rant, it's self indulgent and repetitive. seriously. I only leave the post up to remind me not to be so dramatic, because it is embarrassing to have it up and hopefully seeing it when I come here makes me remember to keep my self pity in check.

obvs-servation

2007-12-23T01:04:00.000-05:00

you push away the people who do support you. you keep making excuses for the people who don't. and the people in between, it changes from minute to minute.

I spent today just like I spent yesterday and the way I'll spend tomorrow. who said what did I say what did I mean and did I do it the way I wanted to because of this or that or does she think I'm too dramatic or when is he going to leave me and when will I feel like myself and what if I do feel like myself and why doesn't anyone help what's help who helps why don't I help myself and I'll buy this and horrible parent.

my hobbies include smoking, overanalyzing, breaking phones, self therapy, crying, being melodramatic, and hating myself.

merry christmas merry fucking christmas and a happy new year of 365 more chances to fuck everything up.

so what's up with you?

2007-10-15T14:08:00.000-05:00

I told rebecca that she shouldn't get upset with herself for not posting regularly because she doesn't owe her blog anything, it's hers to do with what she pleases. and I've been procrastinating writing on my own because of the same damn issues, like I didn't do my homework for a week and have to face the teacher.

bella's birthday party is this saturday, at mcdonald's. I'm sure all the parents are aghast at this, but the kid loves mcdonalds and it's her birthday. she's so excited. she's decided to be a princess for halloween (me: "well, what about a SCARY princess??") and she's psyched about having her little daycare friends at her party. should be cute.

trent is still being a very good kid. so good, for so long, that I fear that he's hiding something from me. like he's been expelled but I don't know it yet. is that bad? of course it is. I should be happy he's being so good. god.

in the past few weeks, I have totally gained a ton of weight. I didn't work really hard to lose it, it just kind of happened, but I got rid of all my old clothes and I felt good about it. I just can't seem to stop eating. it can't be the zoloft, i've been on that for quite some time. well, it could be because I accidentally stopped taking all my meds and had to start up on the lamictal again. even though I didn't want to start on it again - I guess it's too risky (and things were dicey, I had to admit) to be on an anti depressant without a mood stabilizer. so I'm back on everything. just not the xanax xr, because seriously it makes me feel a little suicidal. I used to laugh when hearing that a drug could make you suicidal if you weren't already, but for whatever reason, that stuff makes me think that driving my car into a tree really is the best way to deal with everything.

anyway, other than getting fat, not much is different from the last time I posted here. just trying to do the same things. open the mail, pay the bills, keep the house clean. why it's always a struggle, I don't know if I'll ever know. and yes, I still see my therapist and my psychiatrist...I don't know when I'm supposed to see progress. I guess it depends on how you view progress. if you view it as not making people hate me and not constantly wanting to run away to a remote island, I suppose I've made some progress. in terms of feeling like I'm progressing as a human? meh. maybe this is one of those journeys where you don't know that you've gotten far until you're done and you look back.

and hello again

2007-09-06T12:05:00.000-05:00

sorry. the vacation was fantastic. 8 days was just enough - by day 6, I missed the kids more terribly than I ever thought I could, and by day 7, I couldn't wait to pull back into port. I had a scooter incident in bermuda that left me scraped and bruised. I saw beautiful water and a stingray that kept following me. I saw many virgin islands, none of which seemed to be made of actual virgins. I also did not get seasick. and jarrett was wonderful, as were our shipmates cara and pete. food was hit or miss - misses included weird fish sticks and buffet food, hits were the best steak I ever had and pumpkin spice gnocchi, which was weird at first but I now crave.

I hate my meds. I have no idea if they're working. I take them every day, put up with the side effects (did you know one of them is crazy sweating?) and I am not sure what they're helping. but ask me again tomorrow, I may love them.

I like my new job (did I tell you I had one?) and love taking the train every day instead of driving. though the part about not being able to be late (the train waits for no one) is kind of a bummer. and I had qdoba for lunch today - there are no qdobas near me. nicole is probably appalled right now but it's right around the corner and it was very good. of course, I've also had lots of non-chain food, but most of it is expensive (that is in walking distance - I don't really take a lunch because I have to leave early to get to daycare on time, so it has to be close.)

bella is exploding with cuteness. she's very into scooby doo right now and we have a ton of movies and episodes (45% of my dvr capacity) saved. the problem is that if I'm not right there to fast forward through commercials, she winds up asking me for stuff that she sees. she loves singing "I wanna be a teen top model - BE whatchoo wanna BE!" which is, I think, a new barbie. she also sings "splish splash" alot due to a toy she has that plays it (thankfully this is at sean's, as I would lose my mind) and she sings it with total inflection. and not to boast, but girlfriend has great pitch and rhythm, already. that makes me happy, as one of the things I love doing the most in this world is singing. (only in private or in a choir.)

trent is being really great lately, too. he started 9th grade this week and has been loving and kind, even though he's let his chores sort of slip. he doesn't stay pissed at me as long. I think he senses the issues I'm having (though I try to be proactively honest when I know things are bad) and wants to make sure he's not a contributing factor. which makes me immensely sad.

I still am not paying my bills. drowning in debt.

hello, goodbye

2007-08-15T14:44:00.000-05:00

so I asked for someone to swoop in and take care of my bills, and I am happy to report that that's exactly what happened. through the magic of something called "trust", which I have dabbled in in the past, I asked jarrett to help and he has. in fact, he just balanced my checkbook again today, and that's like the 5th time he's done it. that I know of - it may have been more.

to add to how wonderful jarrett is, and to make you all either go "awww" or [vomit], we're going on a cruise. we leave on saturday and jarrett paid for my ticket. our deal is that I pay for incidentals on the trip, but there's no way that incidentals are going to cost as much as the ticket itself. just wish us luck, as there's a tropical storm or whatever near where we're going (bermuda, which is safe, tortola and st thomas, which would be in the storm's path).

regarding all the other shit. it's been mostly up and some down. the down has been pretty far down, which I suppose is concerning. I just try to ride it out. it's not easy on everyone around me - family, jarrett, friends that I keep at a safe distance (specifically nicole and betsy - I'm sorry) - and I hate that it's difficult, but I'm trying as hard as I can to improve.

anyways, wish me bon voyage and I'll talk to you when I get back.

I need help.

2007-08-01T07:51:00.000-05:00

so things aren't going so well. I have always had a problem with paying bills on time. the thing is, I do really well for a long time and then one thing is late and then it snowballs. that's happening right now. it's not pretty. and then I get paralyzed. I wish someone would swoop in and just take control of my bank account until it's stable again.

I have had a rough few months. but, on the plus side, sort of, I start yet another new job on monday. this one better be a keeper. my contract at my current place was up yesterday, but they offered me a full time position. this other job pays alot more and has a better title, so I went with it. I hope I like it because I don't want to change jobs again for many many years.

on the meds front, I was taken off the lexapro after a, um, incident. my psychiatrist says that I am going through withdrawal from that now, even though I'm on zoloft now. and something called lamictal, which is actually an anti convulsant that works to stabilize moods. it's one of those things where the medicine was made for one thing and they realized it worked on something else. I had an appointment yesterday again and now I have to get a prescription filled for an extended release xanax to replace my as-needed xanax and nighttime klonopin. have I mentioned that I hate taking medicines? I hate not feeling like myself. it's one of the reasons I never liked drinking.

anyways, my stress level is ultra high about the money thing. I don't know what to do.

also - hi. I know, it's been a while.

and hubbard wins...

2007-07-17T09:08:00.000-05:00

man, I was only 2 days off, too.

baby ray has arrived. and I can tell you on good authority that he's cute, pink, and soft. and noah loves him. he was petting his head and kissing him over and over. and nicole looks great and is super tan. they both (her and mark) totally had it together, too. no stressed out faces, no freakedoutedness. unless they're hiding it well. they are taking it all in stride. they're total pros.

hopefully soon I'll take bella to see RayKon - she's dying to meet him. (though she knows she can't till they're out of the hopsital and back at home.)

The Great Eggerts Baby Pool - UPDATE

2007-07-09T08:19:00.000-05:00

...come wade.

we already know it's a boy - Ray Konrad. now we just need to know when, and how big.

your window is now till the end of july. go!

I'll go first:

july 16, 8 lbs 4 oz

**
super crazy update:

just like with noah, nicole had protein in her urine and was sent to the hospital earlier this week (read her blog for more, I'm too excited/lazy to link) and just like with noah, her first sign of labor was her water breaking a few hours ago. and she's on her way to the hospital now to birth baby Ray. can you believe it???

and 13 is my lucky number

2007-06-13T15:11:00.000-05:00

I am 33.

for real?

2007-06-07T08:11:00.001-05:00

just a short rant. I'll tell you why later.

so I'm on a website and because of my profession, I pay attention to the ads that I see on pages. this one was for these chips, I forget already what they're called. flat earth? anyways, I've seen these ads in parenting magazines and on websites geared toward women, and the ads say something like "get your kids to like vegetables" or something and show that the chip, which is supposed to be delicious, has vegetables in it. fine, I get it, kids don't like to eat well, it's a mom's job to do whatever she has to do to get kids to eat well. (it's just that, and maintaining a perfect fake tan. master those two things, and you're golden. literally.)

I saw the ad again today, only this time, the headline was "disguise an apple so that even your husband will eat it."

okay. even though I'm only half of the parental unit, I understand that social mores dictate that I am responsible for getting my kids to eat nutritiously, while daddy is there to throw them up in the air and stay late at work. but getting my HUSBAND to eat an apple? dude. if you are relating to disguising fruit so your husband will eat it, both you and your husband have ISSUES. the ad conjures up images of the husband on the couch eating the chips voraciously while the wife stands in the kitchen doorway smiling knowingly and nodding her head, like "that crazy geoffrey, he has no idea that it's good for him! but I do, because that's my job!" when I was married, I was sure to stock the house with good food for sean and I when we were trying to eat well, but because I wanted both of us to have choices. okay, I may, perhaps, maybe give you the benefit of the doubt if you're suggesting I urge geoffrey to eat an apple. but to disguise it? like he's 4? fuck that. fuck that whole notion. fuck the people who thought it up, fuck the guys that thought it was clever and fuck the women that allowed it to happen. fuck them all, and fuck whatever the fuck product that is.

this rant is made possible by me taking a break from continuous birth control to have my once-a-quarter period.

shut up already

2007-05-29T09:42:00.001-05:00

sorry about that last post. it's been about 6 weeks now, and the lexapro is finally starting to work. I struggled with telling anyone about being on it because a) it felt way too "poor me" and b) it made things, for me, seem more real.

the thing about lexapro, for me, was that it really made things a whole bunch worse before it made anything better. then, when things got better, it only brought me up to where I was when I started, not better overall. I started with half a 10mg pill for about a week, which was rife with side effects (mostly nausea) and then up to a whole 10mg pill for about a week and a half. that's when things started getting bad. lexapro is an anti-anxiety and anti-depressant. the anti-anxiety part is supposed to kick in by the end of the first week, and the anti-depressant kicks in after a month. my anxiety level shot up and my emotions shot down and I was actually scared there for a while. things happened - not great things, not things I want to mention.

anyways, now I'm on 20mg and things are looking up. I still have some bad moments - hours, maybe a day at a time - but I feel like I am making better decisions. the emotions I'm having issues with are still there, but they don't plague me and I don't obsess about them as much anymore. I'm able to dismiss thoughts easier than I was before, which makes things much better for me. I'm not sure if that's the purpose of this medicine or not, but it makes me feel alot better about myself. the problem is that I'm not really hitting alot of highs, either. while I don't feel as down as I did before, I'm not feeling as happy, either. I guess that's the tradeoff.

anyways, sorry about being lame before.

same old

2007-05-11T14:31:00.000-05:00

I'm so tired of feeling awful.
I'm so tired of feeling awful.
I'm so tired of feeling awful.
I'm so tired of feeling awful.
I'm so tired of feeling awful.
I'm so tired of feeling awful.
I'm so tired of feeling awful.

day whatever

2007-05-09T12:55:00.000-05:00

not feeling all that great. tired. I feel really cut off from everything and lonely but I have no desire to change anything. mostly because it would take effort and I don't have any. I just don't. I only hope there will be people around when I snap out of it.

let's talk about bella. she's cute. she gets so excited when she sees people she knows now. especially her "big brudder". she can let the dog out by herself and then give her a treat, so she feels quite accomplished. and it's nice to say "bella, can you let the doggie go out?" and have her do it. that's really the best reason to have kids - to get them to do stuff for you.

her hair is growing alot, and while I'm allowed to put it in a clip or ponytails, it does not stay for very long as she likes to rip that stuff out of her hair. she's still doing the twirling (though she asks first now for some reason, "mommy, can I twirl my hair?") and it still looks cute to have one giant corkscrew curl on top of her head, but soon the front is going to get in her eyes. we'll see how it goes, but I know I don't want to do what my mother did to me, which was just to keep my hair short. all the time. and I didn't like dresses so everyone called me a boy, which really was upsetting at the time.

anyway. the other day, someone told me a story about their 14 year old nephew (or something) that was just caught smoking weed. so I can't really complain too much about trent, even though he just served 3 detentions for the episode that preceeded his stitches a few weeks ago. it could be worse. but he's still grounded.

work update: I need more to do. but I know to be careful what I wish for.

update: day 4

2007-05-03T15:25:00.000-05:00

status: almost ready to leave for the day

of note: ping pong table in the cafeteria

milestone: had actual conversation with 2 people that had nothing to do with work

mood: optimistic but lonely

will be going: on vacation starting tomorrow, returning next tues.

miss: you all.

update - day 3

2007-05-02T15:06:00.000-05:00

status: trying to do something in photoshop

of note: wednesdays are bagel days

of special note: the burger king near here has no drive through, which I thought was impossible

mood: optimistic yet cautious

2007-05-01T11:09:00.000-05:00

new job

day 2

status: just ate lunch

of note: red bull available in the vending machines

do not, under any circumstances: flush tampons down the toilet. they are very clear on this.

so far: so good.

endings and beginnings

2007-04-26T14:22:00.000-05:00

tomorrow is my last day at my current job. you'd think it would be a joyous occasion, but really, I've gotten fairly good at this and don't feel anywhere near the pressure I had before. it's not that I don't want to leave, because I do (as I hate the industry), but I feel like I am going to be starting all over again not knowing what the hell I'm doing. which is exactly what's going to happen, obviously. I hope I pick it up quickly.

in other news, not that this is pressing, but it's on my mind: I got my roots done yesterday and I'm annoyed. to back up, a few weeks ago, I got my hair professionally colored for the second time in my life (as I usually do it myself.) I wanted a golden brown with blonde highlights but apparently I can't do that for some reason. I'm not sure why, as they seem to do whatever the hell they want on america's next top model and stuff, but I had to settle for a darker brown with red tones and blonde highlights. and it cost me alot of money. probably not alot of money to people who do this regularly, but I'm used to $10 feria or whatever's on sale.

so my roots were growing in big time, and I went back to get them done yesterday. the lady who did them originally wasn't there, and this dude did it instead. he said that you only do the highlights like every 3rd time...okay. my hair grows sort of fast, but he's the expert. so he does the color and it takes 400 years. he left me sitting with sopping wet hair while he went and did something else for 15 minutes. then he asked if I wanted him to trim up my hair. now they asked me this last time, and I said just the very ends...so I said that again. and here's where I am really pissed now - he cut way too much off and I am only just barely able to get my hair in a pony tail. and the pony tail is vital, as anyone with longer hair knows. how else can I get away with not showering??? and the entire process ended at 7:40, for my 6pm appointment.

so there's that.

trent hit his head on the corner of a table in science class earlier this week and had to be taken to the ER to see if he needed stitches. after waiting there for over 2 hours, we did find out that he'd need either about 4 stitches (if we wanted it to heal without much scarring) or skin glue...we opted for the glue. the cut is behind his ear, right near his hair, so no one will really see it. but we were in that hospital for over 3 hours.

I've done alot of waiting in the last week. I hate waiting.

wish me luck in my new job. I will tell you how it goes as soon as I can. I am grateful for all the feedback you guys give me. thank you, interweb....

quarterly blogging - it's all the rage

2007-04-17T13:58:00.000-05:00

first: I got a new job. so I won't be as fried anymore and maybe I'll even have more time to blog. I start on 4/30.

second: bella and trent are good kids, as usual. I have alot to say about them but confronted with a new blog entry, I feel like I don't even know where to start.

well, I will say that bella's getting a little attytude (as my dad would say) to her. when I ask her to do something more than once, she says "aw-WIGHT." she also is very concerned about who is going with her to do things. I'll tell her that daddy is picking her up and she'll say "how bout you? how bout trentle?" which tears me up with guilt.

she's into brushing my hair with puzzle pieces and taking care of each of her baby sisters, all named baby lucy. she likes to read me books and to watch movies - we just got a vcr again finally and all my old disney movies are resurfacing. she's currently in love with lion king and booty anna beast.

and I can either stop here and try to post more later, or not do this at all...

I'm sorry

2007-02-26T20:25:00.000-05:00

I never really recounted the amazing time I had in Utah with the jorgensons... it's not because I didn't have a fantastic time, it's because, well, I just got caught up in life and work and didn't acknowledge it.

when I landed in vegas, it was already fairly late - like 10 something vegas time. erik picked me up and we got in the car and that's when I found out that the drive back to their house is over 2 hours and crosses a time zone. we didn't roll in until like 4, which was like 6 eastern. I slept like a piece of furniture. my bed was already made up and it was nice and cozy.

a couple of quick notes about utah. a) it is cold. b) it is quaint. c) it is mountainous. d) when you're not in a town, it's alot of vast stretches of unspoiled wilderness. e) it is cold.

we hadn't yet had snow in PA, so seeing the snow in Utah was pretty crazy. the mountains were insane. becca took me to the cowboy breakfast hangout and we hung with soph all day. I got to take naps, see all kinds of crazy mountain scenery, get to see ranger kodi at work, see some dude who supposedly is famous, go to the local grocery store (which I love, because I like seeing normal life in different towns. like, what aisle is the bread in, and where can you get tampons?) and see where everyone I know in utah blogville lives. we visited katy's new apartment (cute) and I saw kodi's house and where becca works and sophie's montessori school. it was fantastic.

I played crazy dominos (and won - thrice) and uno with new rules. it was so much fun to see everyone - kodi, paul, jen, katy - and just relax and have fun.

I knew I would get along famously with becca and that was true. I didn't expect to get along so well with erik - that was a pleasant surprise. not that I didn't think I would, but I thought it might be weird. but he's a really great guy and he and becca are really well suited for each other.

and of course the kids. sophie is darling and janz reminds me so much of trent it's not even funny.

so thank you to all my utah homeys...belated, but thank you for treating me to an excellent mountainous time.

need calgon

2007-02-18T18:30:00.000-05:00

hi. I know. I have a good excuse. it's my new job.

I changed careers when I took this new job and I knew that part wouldn't be easy, but I really had NO idea what I was in for. I used to be an internet marketing manager for a business credit card company, and what I mostly did was run an affiliate marketing program for them and help with search engine marketing and media buying. internally, I kept up on all the products that our area supported, like making sure all the tracking codes were updated and putting new applications live and stuff like that. I kept our area running smoothly internally and did internet marketing. and it was not challenging. I had a good handle on most of my job from the first few months, and I worked there first as a contractor and then as a real employee for over 2 years. I wanted to be a project manager but they wouldn't hire me into that position where I was.

so when I saw a headhunter looking for project managers, I gave him my resume not even thinking I'd get an email response. not only did he respond, but he set up a phone interview. and at the end of that, I got a real interview. and a few days later, I got a job offer to start in exactly 2 weeks. it all happened so fast. it was a pay raise and a job title that I had wanted since I was laid off from cdnow in 2001 and hadn't had since then. so I was excited.

people. I have never had a job experience like this in my life. and I've been around the block several dozen times. I'm 32, I started working full time when I was 20, it's not like I was never challenged before. this goes beyond any comprehension. I don't just cry at work due to being completely overwhelmed, I sob. I share a "pod" with a girl who happens to live near me and we work on alot of things together, and she and I both feel like the weight of the world is crushing us. the workload is insane. I go to work early about 2 - 3 times a week and stay late as often as I'm able. I have worked every weekend save for a few in the beginning before I had any projects of my own to manage. I haven't gone out to lunch since I started, and there were 2 days this week where I was so busy that I FORGOT to eat lunch. I am scheduled in meetings usually pretty steadily from 10 to 4, including over what should be lunchtime. I miss deadlines, I still don't do about 25% of my job (I just ignore it and hope no one notices) and I always feel like I'm forgetting something.

I haven't slept right, I haven't eaten well, I have been smoking like a chimney. (that is, when I find time to smoke at work, which is maybe twice a week, but that's alot for me.) this job consumes my dreams, it is on my mind from the moment I wake up until the moment I go to sleep. I've woken up in a panic in the middle of the night after work dreams and have gone into panic modes while driving when I suddenly remember what I forgot.

I don't read email. I don't read blog posts. I watch tv sporadically. I haven't been happy for weeks now.

people keep telling me to find something else, but by the time I get home during the week and make dinner and sit down, it's usually around 8pm, and I go to bed around 9, 9:30 so I can wake up early to get to work early (plus, my commute is double what it used to be.) I don't have time or inclination to work on my resume. it sounds dumb but it's true...and I am paralyzed with fear at possibly going to work somewhere else and it being even worse. plus, part of me wants to conquer this beast - though I don't know what shape I'd be in afterwards.

so. it's been a while since I posted and that's why. I have cried every day this week. I have been thisclose to walking off the job 3 times this week. I have said I hated my job every day that I've had it so far.

I know, it seems dumb to keep going on, but there are brief glimpses of feeling very accomplished, and I really want to be a project manager.

anyway, in bella news, she's cute. real cute. my camera's been acting up but I have pictures. she wears ponytails and it's adorable. here's a snippet of conversation from this week:

me: what's your favorite color?
bella: red, blue, lellow, poupow...
me: poupow?
bella: no, POUPOW.
me: poupow?
bella: no, mommy, POUPOW.
me: purple?
bella: yes.

she's also taken to calling things awesome. this is a testament to the power of daycare. though I don't care if others use it, I never use the word awesome and neither does trent. sean throws one in occasionally but for the most part, it's not a word you hear in our houses. but she says it all the time, and I'm guessing it's because the girls who run her daycare room say it. it's cute...sort of. though I guess it's nice to hear "mommy! you makin broccoli! THAT'S AWESOME!"

someday I will post more about her because I really ought to. brett hadn't seen her since before christmas and we got together last weekend and he said that she probably knows about 10k more words than the last time he saw her, and that she was talking like crazy. I know her vocab is exploding but it's different to hear it from someone who doesn't see her every day.

I just shaved trent's head yesterday. he had hair to his shoulders - longer than mine - and it was all dyed blond. he decided to ask sean to bring over his clippers and in about 15 mins he went from long blond to buzzed brown. I think he looks older. and, as I told nicole and some of our friends, HE NEEDS TO SHAVE. yes, he's got a noticeable, albeit fairly fine (though dark) moustache. he's gotten taller and if it's possible, his voice is even lower now.

I love seeing him interact with bella. he's easily her favorite plaything and I think favorite person. she loves trentle. and he really loves her too. he's been indoctrinated into babysitting by changing his first poopy diaper alone while I was food shopping. this opens doors for all of us - for him, he'll start making money babysitting; for me, I have a babysitter that's not my stepmother; and for bella, it's more time with her favorite person.

he'll have even more time to babysit now that he's grounded for getting in trouble last week, getting a report written up in the office, getting detention, and NOT TELLING ME. he was hoping I'd never find out but alas, they send home a copy of the report. I give him credit for being honest, though - he told me he didn't tell me when he got it because the long weekend (they had off on friday and have off tomorrow) was coming up and he didn't want to be grounded. I was like, did you really just say that? but his plan worked, because I couldn't be mad at him for being honest.

anyway. I hope to write more often but I really don't know.

oh, ps, skiing. I did FANTASTIC. I didn't fall through my whole lesson and afterwards, I went on about 10 runs. the next day, I was out on the slopes with jarrett and his dad going on greens and blues. I fell once legitimately, due to a really ugly blue run that was icy and scary, and once while just standing there, which was dumb. but I think I kept up pretty well and I had a fucking blast. I can't wait to go again. and you guys said I'd never be able to do it. ha!

u is for u are gonna see me, t is for tomorrow's when I leave...a is for absolutely frigid, h is for ha ha ha ha heeeeeee

2007-01-17T12:43:00.000-05:00

put it together, it spells UTAH.

tomorrow I leave for vegas, and get picked up by erik and driven to the frozen tundra of cedar, utah, to chill with the westerly folks. I can't wait! and the best part is that they're excited, too. not like "oh, we have to entertain this girl who imposed herself on us."

so sophie's choice already laid it all out, but I get there late on thursday and stay till dinnerish time on saturday. not a long visit, but a good first visit, I think. and I'd like to do it every year.

I haven't packed yet. I may want to do that tonight since I leave directly from work tomorrow.

in other news, you all already know that nicole is pregnant again! I'm so excited for her, though hearing about it so long after they found out made me realize that I'm too out of touch with the eggerts' clan and I have to do something about it.

also, thanks for all your skiing suggestions. erik, you know I'm totally going to hit you up for some like fake lessons in your living room. like stances and stuff. please, you have to help me. I got some ski pants from ebay and jarrett's splitting the cost of a coat (not too major of a coat, like $60 coat) and already bought me insanely expensive gloves and a cute hat. he has goggles I can use (goggles? christ.) and I will rent everything else. now that that's all out of the way, I'm clear to just worry incessantly about the actual skiing part.

work sucks.

that's all! if you haven't already, make sure you tell nicole how fantastic it is that she's preggers again!!

skiing. SKIING.

2007-01-08T14:22:00.000-05:00

it doesn't even look right when you spell it, that's how scary it is.

first of all, hi. how are you? really? you look like you lost weight. no, I didn't, I just colored it, but it does seem to make it look longer, thanks!

so back to skiiiiing. I'm one of those people who doesn't really like to do things I can't naturally do well. and I'm not sure that anyone is naturally good at skiing. it's something you have to learn. I realize everyone was a beginner at one point but they are no longer at that point and I am. and I'm not like 8 years old.

where I'm going with this is that I am going on a ski trip to vermont, where people go because the skiing is so good. not like going to spring mountain that's like 20 mins away from my house where people go to try on long skinny boards and throw themselves down a mountain for a day. no, the vermont people are there because it's better than everywhere else except colorado or utah and they just can't take time out to fly there instead. they are hard core.

know what else is hard core? staying at a chalet that you SKI UP TO. that's on the mountain and where you take your skis (skiis?) off and walk into your living room, sighing after a thrilling ride or 12 down the mountain.

the last time I skiiii'd was when I was about 15. and I wasn't very good at it then. and now I'm going for 5 days. in vermont. with the hard core skiers.

first off. I don't even OWN a sporty winter jacket, let alone one where it was made specifically for skiing. the sportiest jacket I own is a waist length plaid wool pea coat. I have no fleece liners, nothing with goretex, nothing that wicks moisture away from me. my gloves are knit. I don't own goggles. people, I don't even have a real winter hat - just a crocheted beanie. so not only am I going to make a fool out of myself because I can't actually ski, I'm going to do it in completely inappropriate outerwear. unless I go broke buying a coat and pants. do you know you need a neck warmer when you ski? I do have one of those - I call it "staying indoors by the fire."

I'm so distraught. on one hand, I'm kind of excited to go skiing. but on the other hand, I'm freaking the fuck out. the expense, the humiliation, and how about if I break something? because that's totally a distinct possibility.

are any of you ski-ers? (skiers? skiiiiers?) if so, got any tips?

on the home front - bella had some weird fever for 3 days that broke on sunday morning and she is now fine. however, she did throw temper tantrums, which she never does usually, in the middle of the night. about every 2 hours. it was odd. and trent is home today with "diarrhea" but I think he's just not feeling great about school these days. I didn't have time to investigate further so we'll see how it goes tomorrow. maybe he really is sick.

on the work front - things are okay, still slow. I long to be useful. I know it'll pick up soon, but it hasn't picked up yet, so I'm nostalgic for my old job where at least I knew the answers to most questions.

so please, ski tips. anything. thanks!

so so sorry.

2006-12-22T10:11:00.000-05:00

things have just been nuts. I'm sorry. today is day 3 of my new job.

yes. I have a new job. I didn't really see a whole lot of forward motion in my last job, not to mention that I work with my boyfriend and it looked like our boss may resign, meaning one of us would be in the position to be promoted. if it were either one of us, the other would likely have to find a new job anyways (because though it's okay for us to be dating, it's not okay for us to be dating and reporting to one another) so I figured I'd go. plus, I got a killer job description from a recruiter doing something pretty much totally different than I did before. and the money is better. and I can move up. so it's good all around. only thing is, I had to start dec 20...just days before xmas. and now I have to work a few days next week. but it's working out so far, I suppose.

it's hard starting a new job. makes me feel for trent when school starts. it's scary. everyone here seems nice though so I'm not feeling as nervous as I was before I started.

in other news, bella LOVES santa, but not enough to get close to him. we stood in line for over an hour to see santa a few weekends ago and trent and I coached bella on what to say when she got up there. you know, "santa's going to ask what you want for christmas. what are you going to say?" she wanted to ask for a baby doll, the barney movie, happy birthday, and presents. hey, I wasn't going to correct her, she was adamant. so we wait, and wait, through lunch and a diaper emergency, and get up to santa. she won't sit with him. so she makes me hold her and positions me so that I'm between her and santa before reaching her head over my shoulder and shouting to santa, "A BABY DOLL! BARNEY MOVIE! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" see, she wanted santa to make sure he knew what she wanted, but she didn't want to get too close. we got a picture with her on my lap and me next to santa.

so she's very excited about santa. in fact, at home, she dons her santa hat and tries to get the dog and cat to sit on her lap and tell what they want for christmas. and the first time she saw our tree decorated, she said, "mommy! it's christmas ALL OVER THE PLACE!" so she's into christmas.

she's been a little sick lately, and I hope that it goes away before sunday and monday. she's been cranky, but a sinus infection will do that to you. the medicine is giving her horrible diarrhea, too, so she's got a sore butt.

trent and I have been butting heads alot lately but I think we're okay. after the holidays, it's time to worry about his birthday. not so much his birthday but the party. I think I told you last year how he hates having a party for himself. I hope he wants one this year.

well, happy holidays to you all. I hope santa gets you happy birthday and presents. I won't be back online until next thursday, but I think I've trained everyone not to look for an update from me until several weeks have gone by, so we should be good.

love, peace, happiness
-patrice

I'm sorry.

2006-12-01T11:33:00.000-05:00

I write ridiculous posts, don't open them to comments, and then don't bother to come and resolve anything. I'm sorry.

things aren't really that bad. they never are. it's all relative, of course, but there are worse things in the world, I know.

bella is wonderful. she's actually currently a little sick, she's got this weird fever but no other symptoms (and it's ripping through daycare like wildfire) but she should be fine soon. she's very interested in all things "kissmiss" and we're going to decorate the house on saturday morning. yesterday, she decided to put a pull-up on her head like a hat. yes, I took pictures, and yes, someday, I will download them. she's a little jokester like that. she loves singing baa baa black sheep but lately she's been asking "have you any pizzas?" instead of wool.

she got alot of neat toys for her birthday, but her favorite things to play with right now are babies (or other dolls, like mickey mouse) and "blwankwets". and her stwrowler. she's using alot of extraneous w's in her speech, but I know that will go away. she takes her babies (or her dora the explora doll, which she loves because it has REAL HAIR) in and out of the stroller and gives them a little loving pat before dropping them back in the plastic stroller bassinette head first with an audible clunk and then throwing at least 2 blankets over their heads, and then pushing the stroller at top speed into a wall or door. she's a loving child.

she loves everything lately. I took her to the grocery store with me (which I typically don't do - it's just easier to do it when she's not around) and had to break open the couscous (blue's clues) fruit snacks when we had only gotten to aisle 4. she takes the pack and says "thanks, mom. I yov it. I yov it so much!" when we pass by kissmiss lights, she says "kissmiss! I yov it." but oddly, when you say "bella, I love you..." and think she'll say "I yov you too", she just says "okay."

and she loves to call me by my first name. mateese. mateese and sahn. and then she giggles and falls into a heap and says "I mean, mommy!"

trent...well...he's a good boy. I've realized that the reason he's been acting out in school (his study hall teacher had to call me and ask me to help with his behavior problem - one that landed him a detention yesterday) is because he doesn't socialize outside of school. he rarely goes to his friends' houses and never has friends over. not for my lack of trying. I'm always asking if he wants to go to the movies and take a friend. he never wants to. he's a homebody. but the problem is, he uses school as his social outlet (and he's quite social at school - his teacher could not believe that he's a homebody) and therefore cannot control himself. not that this helps solve the problem, but at least it helps to understand.

sean's 30th birthday is next thursday. last year, we both thought that it would be a big celebration for us, but things obviously have changed. though I am helping throw him a party, albeit very much after the fact (late january). if you have his email address, be sure to say something to him on dec 7, the day that will live in infamy as his 30th birthday.

sorry again for being so distant and mopey.

same old

2006-11-20T09:58:00.000-05:00

my friends,

I again find myself lost. completely and totally lost. this was probably the worst weekend I've had in many years. I wish I could elaborate but I can't, and I don't know if I want to relive it anyways. on the other side of it, finally, now I find myself questioning everything. all I really think I am doing these days is just existing for the time being. I feel like a piece of driftwood. not in control of my own destiny and not tethered to anything tangible.

there are some things that I have to change about myself. stuff like not expecting that people will treat me the way I treat them just because I treat them that way. if I do something nice for someone, it's supposed to be because I want to do something nice, not because down the line I want to be able to expect to be treated in kind. I have to work on that, because it's not something that everyone can live up to and it's not fair to them to have to live up to it without having signed up for that responsibility. that's hard for me, though, because I get a great deal of personal satisfaction from making others happy. which is probably not a good thing. not in the amounts that I do it.

and there are some things that I feel like I have to change about my surroundings. I have to take charge. I just am so afraid of missing out on things, of not being included, of not being liked and not being as wanted as someone else. it's time to grow up and realize that I am not going to be included every time and that not everyone will like me. I have to be more true to myself. and that means that some people might not like it and things might change. but ultimately, the only person I can rely on is myself. so I have to be true to myself first, because no one else is going to put me first.

this is truly probably the lowest I've felt in this entire ordeal. I feel like I'm in a hole and might not be able to climb out, not for a while and not after the hole gets just a little bit deeper.

2006-11-17T11:20:00.000-05:00

stealing from katy and generally doing something I hate, which is a meme thingie, and also is sort of a cop out from real blogging. whatev, I don't care.

In a word...
Yourself: thinking
Your partner: challenging
Your hair: dry
Your mother: distant
Your father: nicer
Your favorite item: backscratcher (which is now one word)
Your dream last night: bad
Your favorite drink: aquafina
Your dream car: runs
Your dream home: old
The room you are in: cube
Your ex: nice
Your fear: torture
Where you want to be in ten years: happier
Who you hung out with last night: bella
What you're not: happy
Muffins: okay
One of your wish list items: flooring
Time: limited
The last thing you did: typed
What you are wearing: black
Your favorite weather: fall
Your favorite book: short
Last thing you ate: bread
Your life: uncontrollable
Your mood: defeated
Your best friends: bloggers
What are you thinking about right now: money
Your car: broken
What are you doing at the moment: duh
Your summer: chaos
Relationship status: yes
What is on your tv: fingerprints
What is the weather like: rainy
When is the last time you laughed: forever

hi.

2006-11-08T15:16:00.000-05:00

it's been a busy few days. week. whatev. I find myself just not equipped to deal. shocking. all I do here is bitch and moan, bitch and moan.

not everyone is supportive of my decision to begin dating. and to call a spade a spade, we're talking about jarrett. after both of us decided that we needed to get out of our marriages, we found that we...I'm not even going to finish the sentence. I don't feel like justifying anything. I wanted to say "I was never unfaithful to my husband" but I don't have to say that, do I?

jarrett came to bella's party where he met some of my friends for the first time. for the most part, it went well, with most of my friends. I was concerned about my friend kristen. we'd been friends since first grade and have seen each other through alot. I think I've mentioned her here before. anyway, sean and I set her up with sean's first college roommate, brian. they hit it off. that was a few years ago, and thus they came to bella's party with their new son, mason. but since brian is a good friend of sean's, I wasn't sure what would happen. they both were gracious and kind at the party, and afterwards via email, I asked kristen if she were upset or disappointed in me. and she said "of course I'm not. I'm totally happy for you. I just want you to be happy and jarrett seems like a really nice guy." that was it. nothing more than a genuine want to see me happy, no matter what choices I make.

sean's been very supportive, as well. we've talked about it for a few weeks now. he's comfortable with jarrett, likes him, and thinks he'll treat me well. he's a big man, sean. he and I sat down to talk last week about where we are. he knows I'm serious about jarrett and he told me how he's been on quite a few dates, dating back to about 2 months or more ago. (shows me that I shouldn't worry so much - I was dreading telling him about my situation and he was dating already anyways.) he's less successful than he'd like, but he's ready to be out there and dating and trying to "get something going" as he says.

I was invited to noah's birthday party at nicole's mom's house in quakertown over the weekend, and I talked with sean beforehand about bringing jarrett. and then I talked to jarrett about going and seeing people he's never met in a somewhat awkward situation. both of them were okay with jarrett coming, so he accompanied me to the party. I think it went well, but I haven't had alot of feedback. sean thought it went fine and so did jarrett. it was very stressful for all of us but I guess you have to get through these things.

it's important for me to start being more open about things. I find that I am very closed off from alot of my friends and family lately because I don't feel like I can share everything with everyone. now, I feel like just about everyone is up to speed with me, more or less, and my relationship with both sean and jarrett. I try to think that the people this impacts the most - my kids, sean, and jarrett - all are supportive and are fine with it. I just wish everyone was. it's cost me dearly, following this path, and I thought there was a way back from that. it doesn't seem there is. but I've learned some things about myself and about other people and I guess I'm growing because of it. or something.

bellaween in pictures

2006-11-02T13:49:00.000-05:00

this is what she wanted to wear on the day of her party.

she didn't get the whole "blow out the candles" thing.

trent helped her open her presents.

she got to play with her playdoh (or "paydoh" as she calls it) on sunday.

she was initially in love with her costume, then afraid of it, and then loved it again.

after trick or treating and eating birthday tastykakes, she wanted a kiss.

happy bellaween!

2006-10-31T15:56:00.000-05:00

thanks, everyone, for the kind words.

today, baby bella is 2. she was the impetus for this blog in the first place - her, and the juxtaposition of her and trent.

today, she's dressed as eddie, minus the gloves and mask that came with the skeleton costume. so she's just running around in a nylon bodysuit screenprinted on the front with skeleton bones. she looks like a little kid angel with her curly blond hair and chubby cheeks, only dressed as a skeleton.

the one thing I can say with certainty is that I don't regret having put sean through everything I put him through because I can see that he LOVES being a dad. just loves it. I hope that he feels the same - and I'm fairly certain that he does. (not regret it because of bella, I mean.)

today, we're going trick or treating on the other side of the tracks (away from our neighborhood) where legend has it that the folks give out full sized candy bars. then we're going home to have tastykakes and sing happy birthday, for the 3rd time. (she's already had a birthday party on saturday with my family and sunday with sean's.)

when you ask bella how old she is today, she says "two!" and holds up 3 fingers proudly. she's a lil baby sweetness, that girl.

Dear World,

2006-10-30T14:13:00.000-05:00

I have something to tell you. I have been afraid to tell you because I'm afraid of what you might think of me. but it's been a long 3 months and it's been difficult to pretend nothing is going on.

I am seeing someone. it is difficult for me to say that for 2 reasons. one, I don't want you to think I left my husband for someone, because that's just not what happened. two, I feel like it's something that should either be happy or sad, but not happy AND sad, which it kind of is. sad because my marriage is ending. happy because I'm seeing someone I enjoy spending time with.

it's all very complicated, but I can't go on pretending that I'm not dating. because that has its inherent ups and downs, and this is supposed to be a place to air things out and get some perspective.

I'm very nervous about how you perceive me. because I know that this isn't the most ideal situation...ideally, I would have waited until my divorce was final, and then another arbitrary amount of time for decorum's sake. but sometimes things just don't work out that way.

I know that it seems like I rush things. and I know no one will take me serious if I say that this is something that is serious. so I don't tell you for fear that you'll judge me. and it hurts to know that you think I don't know what I'm doing or that I did something wrong.

I know you only want the best for me and that you want me to be happy. I guess I can't always live up to your expectations and that both makes me sad and a little angry. because on one hand, I don't want to disappoint you. and on the other hand, I feel like this is my life and my choices shouldn't be held up to anyone's standards. unless I'm like committing a crime or something. which I don't think I am.

all I want is for you to just accept my life for what it is and to let me live it the best way I know how, and to be there to listen and even though the choices aren't what you'd make, that you can allow me to make them anyway without judgement. I know that's a very big request and that not everyone can accommodate that. but I think that's what friends are for, aren't they? I like to think I'd do the same for you, should the tables be turned.

so now it's out in the open. I guess I can't stop you from being upset with me or thinking I'm doing the wrong thing. but at the very least, I'm being truthful about my life, like it or not.

I'm sorry.

and I couldn't help but cry

2006-10-20T09:58:00.000-05:00

today, in conversation, I called sean my ex husband for the first time.

down a few pegs

2006-10-18T13:13:00.000-05:00

so for the last few weeks, I've been feeling pretty good about myself. I've been steadily decreasing in pants size, which is pretty huge for me. granted, most of that is stress, but however it happened, it happened. so I've been feeling pretty hot-mama lately. and then...

so I'm in the pharmacy yesterday. it was right after work, and I was dressed nicely with my black dress coat on. I was looking at ponytail holders and a woman who works at the pharmacy comes up to me and asks if I need help finding anything. I say no. she then says, "oh, so you're expecting?"

flashes through my mind:

expecting what, to win the lottery?
expecting to KICK YOUR ASS
why, yes, yes I am.
how do you even get the nerve up to ask something like that?
FUCK. YOU.

what I actually say:

then she says, "oh, sorry." and I say, because I am a big fat wuss, "oh, that's okay!"

dude. DUDE. how do you even say that to someone? and?? HOW FAT AM I, REALLY??

edited to add: I was nowhere near anything that is remotely pregnancy related, and she looked me up and down before asking. also...montreal is this weekend.

car wars

2006-10-11T14:47:00.000-05:00

got the estimate for the car today. $3,000.

that is all.

oh, except for I'm skipping town next weekend. I have no money and no car to drive, but I am leaving. the country. driving to montreal. fuck everything.

go away, then, damn you

2006-10-03T12:51:00.000-05:00

go on and do as you please.

deep breath.

as I may have stated before, it is always my first inclination to run when things get too overwhelming. not far, just far enough so that I feel like I'm away from the tentacles of the problem at hand. not long, just long enough so that I feel like I'm not drowning. nothing crazy, just crazy enough to feel accomplished. it's necessary for me to feel like I've done something on my own, to prove to myself that I can. it also gives me good perspective on the things that drove me out to begin with. and, I get as close to relaxing as I possibly can get when I'm away and alone.

we found out recently that our car is leased. I'm not paying a car payment, I'm paying a lease payment. and the lease expires in march. I drive alot. I enjoy driving. when I can't get away to someplace far enough, I drive. and drive. and drive. it clears my head and helps me to calm down. my lease allows for 12k miles a year. I've had the car since march 2003. I have 59k miles currently. that's 17k+ miles over my allotment. the rate for overage is $.15/mile. if I were to stop driving today, I'd owe over $2500 just to get out of the lease...only for mileage. that would entail me finding rides to everywhere for the next 5 months. I have front end damage from that fender bender I had a few weeks ago and the car is just not holding up well, so I'd either have to go through the expense of fixing everything or be assessed wear and tear on the car and pay that amount as well as the overage.

the other option is to buy the car for $8k in march. that would mean a new loan, new rate, possible increase in car payment. the car's blue book value as of today, with no additional miles, is $7300.

sometimes it's just the idea of getting away that helps me to cope. that I could move a few things around and have the kids watched and go somewhere. now, there's no one to pick up the slack with babysitting, there's no money to spend on this, and to top it off, I can't in good conscience drive my car to the local 7-11 let alone to montreal. this makes me feel trapped and panicked. and resentful. and sad. and closed off.

one by one, I've watched people and opportunities fall out of my life. I feel like I have very little outlets anymore. and now one less.

in other news, vastly more important news, bella peed on the potty for the first time. at daycare. bittersweet, both for the deed to be done at daycare and for it to be done at all. my baby is growing up. but I am proud of her and excited for her. it was more a right-place-right-time kind of thing, but she was still very happy for herself. but I think going to the 3-d movies (the imax movie was 3-d, though we didn't know it when we bought the tickets) trumps all still. when I asked her about peeing on the potty, she said "yeah! and I go to the move-it!" (she calls movies move-its, getting it confused with her favorite movie, which she calls move-it because of the theme song...the movie is madagascar.)

and in trent news, vastly more important than me going wherever, he has been invited to apply to be in the national junior honor society. he had to write a short essay, get 3 recommendations from teachers, and fill out a form. he has to hand it in today. of course, he waited till the last minute to ask the teachers for the recommendations so it all hinges on whether or not they remembered to bring them in today...but I hope they did, because (after a long lecture) he really did put alot of himself in the application and I hope he at least gets to hand it in, if not make the society itself.

and thus ends my pathetic pity party.

the hills are alive with the sounds of bella

2006-09-30T19:40:00.000-05:00

wherein I try to get bella to sing her ABCs.

hi, yeah, I know

2006-09-29T13:47:00.000-05:00

sorry.

the project - it is launched! thank god. my life is a whirlwind of worry and overanalyzation. I've been driving myself nuts. and I haven't been back to see Therapist George yet, and he's getting angry with me. I don't blame him. I don't always follow through well.

not much to report thus far, really. like I said, I'm still driving myself nuts and hating myself for being so stupid about things. bella is adorable as always. I took her into work the other day and she charmed everyone. she was wearing all black, her black and pink skull shoes, and her pink tutu skirt. how can you not love that?? she and I are going with jarrett and ethan (our new buddies) to see a movie at the king of prussia imax theater. (didn't I once go on a tangent about how there are places around here that are steeped in revolutionary history and how cool that is when I stop to think about it? was king of prussia the town I was talking about then? it might have been valley forge, I don't remember.) should be fun, I hope, unless she wants to get down and run around like she usually does in movies.

trent....well, I try to remember that trent is 13 and that things can't always be smooth. did I tell you about the phone fiasco? he was grounded for a while for that. (if I didn't, it was that he went to a friend's house and didn't keep his phone on him and therefore I was forced to freak out not being able to get ahold of him for hours on end.)

yesterday, he told me at 10 minutes to 6, and while I was trying to make dinner for bella and get ready to take him to soccer practice at 6:30 (after having just arrived home and not even taken off my coat yet) that oh yeah, tonight is parent's night at his school. yeah, and it's at 7. I have never missed a parent's night until this year. I was so pissed. he knew for a week and just didn't bother mentioning it. today, his only job is to take his 3 teacher recommendation forms he has to get filled out in order for him to be in the junior honor society and give them to 3 teachers that are willing to fill them out. the paperwork has to be in by tuesday so I wanted him to take them today so they have the weekend to fill it out (though he got it early this week). now, I told him that if he doesn't get it done, I'm going to be more mad at him than I've been in a really long time because I was taking the time to tell him how important it was. so...we'll see.

it's been a lot of little things with him. I think most of you with kids might not be able to relate just yet cause yours are little (old mother hubbard and rebecca may get it though) but it's just so frustrating to...

wait

I'm going to sound just like my mother, I think. fuck.

well, I'll say it anyways. it's frustrating to say the same thing over and over to trent and have him just not listen. I get where he's coming from, because to him, these things are stupid, but to me, it's like - dude, I know you think it's dumb, but just do me a favor and TAKE NOTICE IF THE THINGIE IN THE SINK IS BLOCKING THE DRAIN AND IT'S FILLING UP WITH DIRTY WATER WHEN YOU'RE "RINSING" YOUR DISHES. not hard. he said "I thought it would just go down eventually." well, no, when you pour out your chocolate ice cream and a half can of orange soda into my white porcelain sink and it doesn't go anywhere for 30 seconds, it's not going to anytime soon. and by the way? I didn't find it till THE NEXT DAY. it's just little stuff like that. it's especially annoying now that I'm running that house by myself. it's not a big house, but with a shedding cat and drooling dog and a toddler and a man-child, it's tough to keep up. so when I find a white sink filled with a brownish orange goo in it and then rinse it out and see that it's stained and now I have to bleach it, in addition to making dinner and trying to make things seem like they're fine, just fine....it's aggravating.

anyway.

I hope you all have a great weekend...

slow down, you move too fast

2006-09-21T09:56:00.000-05:00

(definitely NOT feeling groovy.)

and ps, my favorite line from that song is "I've got no deeds to do, no promise to keep." those moments in my life are rare, and when I stop and think about it when that does happen, I really do feel groovy.

work is kicking my everlovin ASSSSSSSS. I have a big project that goes live next friday. major major. and it's down to the wire and I've procrastinated on some things and some things are just going wrong and there's alot of work. hence...blogging. ah, some things never change. it's like sunday night with a term paper due 2nd period on monday.

anyway, I've set myself up for audioblogger so that I can record bella cuteness. I hope to be able to do it tonight sometime. hopefully, she'll cooperate.

regarding the potty training...my only concern is they way they talk about it in the brochure and the extreme importance they place on it. it's like a constant. the brochure says something to the effect of "diaper changing is disruptive and inhibits learning by interrupting the flow of information" blah blah. like 5 different ways, it says this. and potty stuff is everywhere. they have a giant chart where they say who is potty trained (smiley face, stars) and who isn't (blank). there's stories about potty training, going potty every hour or so...talk about disruptive. god forbid they learn anything BESIDES how great it is to go on the potty.

and the kicker is that they cannot move on to the 3 year old room until they are trained. so there's an endgame there. a finite deadline. it just feels like total pressure, and I'm not even the one being potty trained. she's gone from just having a potty laying around in our bathroom to being on that potty 5 times a day, being confronted with others going potty, reading about it, learning about it, watching others go...it's been a little overwhelming. well, for me, anyway.

anyways.

trent and brett are off to san francisco tomorrow morning. every year, brett and a big group of his buddies go see an eagles game in a different state. last year was denver, and they've been to chicago, new york, and carolina. maybe a few others. anyway, this is trent's first year going and his first trip to california, or anywhere on the west coast. he misses school tomorrow and monday. he's excited, and I'm excited for him.

in other news, I have a wedding to attend on saturday and not one stitch of clothing suitable for it. I do have a fall-ish dress, but sean (who is my date) is wearing grey and black and I want to match because I am a weirdo. I have no money to spend but I will try to find a dress anyway. I hate money.

that is all.

potty time, excellent

2006-09-19T09:13:00.000-05:00

so bella is now in the two's room at daycare. she's the littlest peanut in there, but since they are getting more kids in the toddler room, and since she has the skills down that are required for a move up (namely, able to sit at a table and eat, can drink from a regular cup, can use a fork and spoon to feed herself well, and I don't know if there's others) she's moved up. on her first day, which was the same day as trent's first day of school, and so all of this might be moot because I said it already (oh well, whatev)...anyways, on that first day, they sent home a paper and a brochure about moving to the two's room. we never got a paper or a brochure about moving up into any room. the brochure is from the company itself (as it is a chain). both the paper and the brochure are devoted almost singularly to the notion that KIDS GET POTTY TRAINED IN THE TWO'S ROOM. no ifs, ands, or butts.

they've always had a strict schedule for diaper changes. kids get their diapers changed whether they need it or not in regular intervals. I think it's somewhere around every 2 hours. they write on a daily chart if their diaper was wet or if they had a bowel movement (the illustrious "BM") and what time they changed the diaper. only in the two's room, it's required - REQUIRED - that the kids sit on the potty at every diaper change. they have to try. their goal, the brochure says, is that the kids will be potty trained during their year in the two's room. so by the time they're 3. hey, it's not like it's hella early, but still. really? my 23 month old is sitting on the potty 4 times a day now. I just feel like potty training is a personal thing. like maybe I don't want her to feel pressured, you know? I mean, it's great that they take that initiative. but what if I didn't want her potty trained now? would I have to drop that daycare or what??

I can't remember what age trent was potty trained. I think it was after his 3rd birthday. jarrett's son is in the middle of potty training and he turned 3 in june. I guess I just feel like potty training isn't something you say starts at this particular age and lasts until this particular age - it's something you say starts when the kid is ready and ends when the kid no longer pees her pants. you know? I mean I guess I should feel lucky that they are helping, but I really hate being on some arbitrary time line.

bella is cute. trent is sweet.

2006-09-18T10:39:00.000-05:00

I have had a hard time figuring out how to start blogging again. I figure I'll go with my kids because that's easy.

bella is cute. she's very interested in being polite, saying please and thank you and you're welcome often. the other day, she set her water cup on the table and said to the cup, "you're welcome!" she's not been sleeping too well, though, unfortunately. we're managing.

trent was challenging this weekend. friday was a bad day. he asked to go to a friend's house after school and I said yes on the condition that he have his phone in his pocket. for a frantic hour, I couldn't get ahold of him. I didn't know where the friend lived and trent wasn't answering his phone. brett finally picked him up (as he knew where the friend lived) and now trent is grounded. his excuse? I forgot.

that's all.

it's a brand new day

2006-09-06T15:24:00.000-05:00

and yet I feel much the same.

you all are so good to me. I know that I write this drivel because I need to, but to have all of you care what's going on, that's so meaningful to me. thank you.

yeah, it's not much better today. I'm handling it better, but it's not much better today. I did have my first meeting with a new therapist. I'm actually planning to see her husband, but the woman did the intake because she's a doctor and he isn't. she was great, though, and if he's anything like her, I'll be fine talking to him. I need to work out this shit, seriously. I'm not in 8th grade anymore. I'm not dating jamie davis. I don't need to worry about all the other women on the planet. I don't have to walk around and be looking at everyone and everything and scrutinizing it all as if it all has something to do with me personally.

I do, however, have to suppress this urge to just get the fuck out of here. I am planning some retail therapy tonight which is probably not ideal in terms of finances. but ideal in terms of at least bringing me somewhere close to feeling better about myself physically so maybe I can deal with the other shit instead. I don't know.

but when I say get the fuck out of here, I mean get in the car, drive far away, and not return for quite some time. it's childish really, I know. it's the only way I know how to distance myself from a problem and come up with a solution. that, or get some sort of body alteration or like color my hair or do something to reclaim my life as my own.

now I'm just rambling.

let's talk about bella. she's so adorable. last night, she was in her PJs, just hanging out, watching dora and boos coos and playing with an empty water bottle and a cup of milk. it was a little messy but she was having so much fun. the other day, she was on the phone with sean and he said he'd take her to the taydown, and she said, "promise?" where does the kid learn this stuff??

trent started 8th grade yesterday. that means next year, he's a freshman. in high school. I remember when first days of school were traumatic, and he needed the encouragement of mom. he denied being nervous this year, instead running to the bathroom and saying that the night before, he thought he was going to throw up. but he insists it's because he's sick, not because he's nervous.

I see so much of myself in him. and so much of brett. I hope he is doing okay, because he won't really open up to me too much to tell me about school other than who is in his class, when he has lunch, and whether he can open his locker. I hated middle school and high school was a little traumatic for me as well and I desperately want him to have a better experience than I had. but he won't tell me if he's happy or if he feels pressure or what.

he's going to be 14 and in 9th grade next year, the same age and grade I was in when I was forceably deflowered by the aforementioned jamie davis. the same age that I was when I really started worrying about how I fared next to other girls because of his incessant comparisons and jokes about how I never could and never would measure up to all the girls he COULD be dating. I never want trent to feel like he's not as good as the other kids in school and the fact that he might feel this way already terrifies me.

dude. I can't even go on about this. I need a fucking vacation, I think.

one of those days. again.

2006-09-05T08:44:00.000-05:00

oh, you've heard it before. sometimes I get tired of saying it.

you know those days? where you feel like everything you're doing is just a little off? I'm misinterpreting everything, my intuition feels off, I know in my rational mind what's going on but not in my emotional mind. I'm overthinking.

some people meditate. the idea is to clear your mind of everything and focus on one thing, be it a sound like "om" or what light might look like if it were somehow stuck in your belly. or, more commonly, I think, is focusing on exactly what part of your body you'd get plastic surgery on if you actually had the money and didn't feel like such a shallow bitch. any of that is impossible for me. I simply cannot turn off my thoughts. I never have been able to. in many ways, it's an asset - I think it's what makes me good at my job and good at parenting. but it is so exhausting to worry about every possible scenario and every possible thought pattern behind each little word or look...so fucking exhausting.

I like being a girl for the most part. I like that there are certain double standards I can get away with, and that I have a much more generous wardrobe selection than most men. I like that I can decide to get a manicure if I wanted (which, no) but still learn to change my oil (which, someday). just the wide range of options available to me, you know? but what I hate, what I really hate, is the competition. the endless comparisons. I am as guilty as the next lady. and I know there are men out there that say that it's just as bad for them...I have to say that's total bullpucky, and I'm sorry if that sounds sweeping. I know there are men out there with bulemia and viagra wouldn't be as popular if men weren't worried about their dicks. but still. I think really, it's nothing compared to women.

so. to sum it all up, I'm feeling not up to par, like my thoughts are just multiplying and making things worse, and that I'm just off all the way around. I hate days like this. I had a few of these last week, too. what is up with this?? it can't be hormones - I'm back on the pill and that shit's supposed to regulate, right? RIGHT?

at any rate. here I sit. wondering if I should just suck it up, or what.

like old times

2006-08-31T16:17:00.000-05:00

it's 5:11 and I am leaving at 5:30 on the dot. or earlier.

yesterday:

I didn't go to the shore for the entire week as planned. instead, sean took trent and bella on sunday night and stayed until today (thursday). I had said I'd join them for the day on wednesday. so I got in the car ready to drive to ocean city, and I got about 3 blocks until I realized that my brake pads must have gone completely and that there was no way I could get to the shore in my car. panic ensued.

I decided to rent a car for the day. I had been waiting to see the kids at the shore and the reason I didn't go for the week itself was already weighing on me, so I just drove right to the rental car place near my house. as I was pulling up, I noticed that 3 doors down was a meineke muffler place. it said "BRAKES" on the outside, so I figured what the hell. I stopped there first to ask if they could fit me in today, knowing that otherwise it would probably have to wait for my mechanic until at least monday. so they said yes. I left the keys and my cell number and walked to the rental car place.

cheapest car they had to rent me was $50. a mercury milan. not exactly an economy car. whatever. so after all the talk about insurance (I didn't opt for it) I was finally on the road.

I was worried about my car and the inevitable expense and missed my exit on the turnpike. let me tell you that I ALWAYS take that exit, it's like auto pilot for me. and I've never missed an exit on the turnpike. whatev, I kept going. I went over the wrong bridge (thanks, fucking GOOGLE MAPS and MAPQUEST, who both had wrong info) and found myself on a business road. all of this was taking place in the rain.

my original eta was 11am. I arrived shortly before 1.

it rained nearly all day. I had my bathing suit on but was wearing pants, a tank top, a long sleeved shirt, and a jean jacket overtop. and I didn't take any of it off. even when we tried to brave the weather and go to the beach. I was going to see bella play in the sand, dammit.

stayed for a while, ate, had an IBS attack on the ride pier, drove home shortly before 8.

got a speeding ticket after nearly making it home. $155. plus, I was surrounded by 4 policemen because I think there was a problem with the registration of the rental car.

sometimes I wish I came standard with wheels on my feet so I could just get around on my own without a car. don't you?

go taydown, tay?

2006-08-24T10:11:00.000-05:00

borrowing from the bean spot.

bella knows so many words that I often wonder where she heard some of the things she says and what else she might have learned that she's not saying. (she still says "oh shit" when something goes wrong, and has added "fuckin" to her vernacular....that is totally my fault.)

she's been saying for days "go taydown. taydown, tay? o tay. less go! bye bye!" I could not figure it out. we've gotten a new, non-related-to-us babysitter - one of the daycare workers at bella's daycare, named crystal, who loves bella - and she couldn't figure it out either. yesterday, I finally got it: playground. duh. she LOVES the taydown. we went last night at her insistence (in the slogler, or stroller) and she had a meltdown when it was time to go. when she is upset or doesn't want to do something, the phrase is "no! I don yike it! I don want it!"

she's also doing well with colors. she doesn't have to have the teletubbies in front of her to be able to tell you what color they all are. she has a book of colors and her markers and she's got them all memorized - black, white, pink, red, orange, yellow, blue, purple, green. (or bak, vite, peenk, orng, yeyow, blue, purpol, and geen.) she has some trouble with brown. I switch them up to make sure she's not just learning them in order from the book, and she's able to identify them in other places, so I feel like she really does know what they are. they tell me at daycare that she's good with shapes, too, but we haven't done much of that at home. at home, she just likes "colorininin" with markers or crayons.

every day, I ask her what we should have for dinner. she always says BOKLI! I ask her what else and I get answers anywhere from breakfast to macawoni cheese to bokli again. she loves her broccoli. she also has a constant running commentary on pretty much everything. "big truck oushied...big doggie! I see it! I wanna touch it. I wanna pet it. bye bye, doggie. look! look! choochoo!! it's runnin fast. bye bye, choochoo."

sean got a baby bike seat on the back of his newly-tuned-up bike, and bella loves riding in it. when he goes fast, she says "runnin! runnin!" which I guess means that they're going fast. he said that when he goes up a hill and is going slow, she says "where'd runnin go?"

there's not much she's not saying, and she says most things pretty well. she'll say when she's hurt and where, if she's tired or sleepy, if she wants to "yay down" for a minute, and she's very into taking care of her teletubbies. the other day, it was too quiet, and I found her with about 15 wipes she had taken out and was washing each of the bubbies. she said tinky winky was dirty (damn conservatives putting ideas in her head) and needed to be washed. ("tinky winky, he's all dirty. I wash him.") and shout out to sophie, bella asks for a paper towel almost every day. she uses it to wash things off, and then puts it on her head and dances around with it until finally she rips it into a million pieces and then throws it in the trash. she loves paper towels.

I guess that's it for now. the kids and sean are getting ready to go to the beach and they are so excited. I have that wedding on saturday and I'm hoping that when it's over, I will have more time to think and sort things out.

fuschia prom queen

2006-08-21T13:00:00.000-05:00

so it's the countdown to my niece nichole's wedding...she gets married at my sister denise's house on saturday. this weekend was the bachelorette party, as I think I may have mentioned. we had a rough start, since my other niece melissa, who lives in daytona, had a hard time getting to PA. her flight was either delayed or she missed it (I think she missed it) and the airline lost her luggage. she was in tears by the time my cousin jackie picked her up from the airport and got her up to denise's in quakertown. she had 4 minutes to get ready, as our limo had already been sitting outside for over an hour. by the time we got on the road, it was after 9 - our original start time was 7:30.

we got to copabanana on south street and jackie, who is the maid of honor, realized that it was really not the place we wanted to hang out, so we walked a block down to jon's, which I'd never actually been to before. we ate on the upper deck, near people who were all pissed off that they had to be in the presence of a bachelorette party. nichole was wearing a veil and a sash...she was a good sport about it. personally, I would have ripped that shit off the second it was put on me. but we were pretty sedate, so we didn't make any of the pissed off people more pissed off by living up to the stereotype.

but then, we lived up to the stereotype. it was nearly 11 by the time we were done dinner, and I figured that if we tried to go to more than one bar at this point, we'd be pretty much stuck there. the plan was to go to a number of places before eventually settling in at the cave, which is a male strip club on delaware ave (pronounced "delaware av" and not "avenue"). delaware ave, for those of you not from philadelphia, doesn't technically exist anymore as it was renamed "columbus boulevard" but the delaware ave moniker remains and is synonymous with "cheesy mile of cheesy clubs". the cheesiest of those clubs, especially for bachelorette parties, is the cave. I'd actually never been there before this weekend, even though 3 people I know had bachelorette parties there. I'd escaped it every time before this weekend.

we walked in and saw nothing but women. scantily clad, very drunk women. and one man on stage, fully dressed, with a microphone. I guess he was the emcee. there was a throng of women by the stage, where the current featured performer was grabbing dollar bills out of women's tits and mouths. I could only see the top of his head. a few minutes later, he was back up on stage collecting crumpled up dollar bills, stuffing them into his banana hammock (which is why those things look so big) and walking offstage. all the men wear black briefs with a ruched seam in the ass and extra big pouch in front. all the performances feature one small fluffing session while the pants are still on so that they can better fill out the pouch. and I needed only wait 10 minutes or so to figure out why the backdrop to the stage was a big black scuffed piece of plywood - that's so that they can do handstands on the floor and rest their feet on the wall and dryhump the air.

they also had some dudes walking around just groping women looking for dollar bills. it is so unlike a female strip club, because there is alot more touching involved. a guy came over to our little group and I grabbed him by the arm and directed him to nichole, into whose bra I had put a dollar bill. he first grazed my neck before turning to her and taking the dollar out of her bra, hands on her hips, just really in her face. women were grabbing these men by the ass, sticking their money way into the briefs, and in turn, the men were grabbing tits, asses, giving kisses on the neck and sometimes on the thighs...it was insane. if you tried to pull that shit in a regular strip club, you'd be thrown out in a heartbeat. by a very big man who wouldn't worry about hurting you.

at the end of the night, after all the men have done their performances (which consist of coming out on stage with 2 other men, all clothed, doing about a minute of a dance routine, then a strip tease that involves the aforementioned fluffing, then various humping motions, followed by a walk along the front of the stage collecting money) they have these "hot seats" - I've never been to a strip club for a bachelor party so I've never seen this before. it may be old hat to you people. you pay $25 (which I thought sounded like a bargain) for the priviledge to sit on a chair on stage, choose the man you'd like to pretend to be interested in you, and he then dances all over you. eventually, your chair gets pushed to the wall so he can do that handstand thing and pretend to 69 you. yes, I paid for nichole to have one such "hot seat" experience. yes, I took pictures.

it was great people watching. some of these women really took it quite seriously. and some of these women were quite lecherous. I'd say 90% of the women there were there for bachelorette parties. some women were obviously wasted, but alot of them seemed with it. many were wearing headbands with little penises on them. again, you'd have to hold me at gunpoint to wear that shit. but hey, if this is how they want to commemorate the fact that they're already in a monogamous relationship that they plan to make legal therefore making the bachelorette party just a frivolous excuse to act crazy, more power to them.

we closed the cave and drove the hour plus back to quakertown in the limo. by the time we got home, it was 3:30 am. I had to be at trent's soccer game, after having picked up bella at kkkathy's, at 9am. the field is an hour away. so basically, I had to get up at 7. I arrived home at 4:30. surprisingly, I wasn't as tired as I was the day before, when I had to stop on the way back from the tournament to take a 10 minute nap on the side of the turnpike with both kids in the car. the sleep, it has been lacking the last few weeks.

so that was the weekend. this week, I have to get trent's outfit together, pick up my dress from the tailor, go tanning (I know, I know), get shoes for trent, go help make rice bags for favors, and then rehearsal dinner friday night and wedding saturday. wish me luck.

hi, yes, I know.

2006-08-18T13:30:00.000-05:00

I'm so sorry. there's really no good excuse.

let's talk about san francisco. the trip out was kinda lame. I had a stopover in houston. it rained torrentially for about 15 minutes, which resulted in a nearly-hour-long tarmac delay. I could see out the window that there were about 8 planes in my field of vision that were ahead of us in line - turns out it was actually 15 and we had to wait our turn. jarrett had a direct flight that left 3 or 4 hours after mine and he got there before I did. so that was a long day.

it was about 9:30ish pacific (after midnight eastern - and it really felt like it) when we got to the rental car counter. jarrett decided to upgrade our car from a premium (which was already nice) to a convertible. 06 silver mustang convertible. fuck yeah.

so we drove the 40 mins or so to the hilton in san jose. it was okay. not great. we both had rooms that had 2 full beds instead of kings, which we had a "guaranteed" reservation for, so we made do for the night (actually, I wouldn't have cared too much but jarrett did) so they changed both our rooms the next day. the conference was kinda blah and it's more jarrett's thing than mine, so I took the afternoon on monday to drive to san francisco and look around. (I also needed to pick up our tickets for alcatraz on tuesday night.)

I'll tell you, driving on a freeway in central california is really not all that different from driving a freeway in pennsylvania. only the grass was all brown. unless it's supposed to be that color. but driving on a freeway in a convertible v6? I would have driven that thing all day long. and good thing, too, because after sending a few pictures to jarrett via camera phone, he wanted to have dinner there and I drove the hour back to pick him up and then went out again. we had alot of fun there.

tuesday, we saw alcatraz in the evening. it's one of those self-guided tours where you wear a headset. interesting, for sure. it's really windy up there and cold. I had to wear a fleece and was glad I wore long pants. wednesday, I dragged jarrett to the winchester mystery house. for those of you who don't know or don't care to click on any links, the house was built by the heiress to the winchester rifle fortune around an existing farmhouse. she was a lil bit freaky when it came to ghosts so when a psychic told her that in order for her not to be plagued by spirits of those who died at the hands of winchesters, she had to continually build onto her house and never stop. so she did. for over 30 years. 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. you get to tour 140-ish of the 160 rooms. most are fairly small, but it still is quite a journey. I had seen so many documentaries on her and her house, so I was totally psyched to see it for myself. I didn't feel any eery presences, unfortunately. or fortunately.

the big terrorist plot thingie happened on weds/thurs, so by the time my flight went out on thursday afternoon, chaos had broken out. I had to check my bag, which I don't ever do, because it contained my "liquids" - and I couldn't use my new $25 lorac lip stain because I was afraid that trying to sneak it on board would cost me both my freedom and the $25 I blew on it. and the lines? crazy. of course, my flight was delayed, partially because of the clogging of the runways and partially because other airports' runways were clogged, causing our plane to be delayed in even getting to the terminal. by the time I got home, it was 10:30. I got my luggage (45 mins later) and mark was nice enough to pick me up and take me back to his place where I had left my car.

so home free, right? not so much. 3 separate traffic jams on the schuylkill expressway. (for those of you not familiar with philadelphia roadways, this is one of the most infamous of highways getting out of the city - it's very narrow, curves alot, and is always clogged.) I got home to pick up bella at sean's (as he had to work the next morning) at about 2am.

bella had a fever. so I gave her medicine and she was up until about 3 or 3:30. took her to daycare at 8:30am and was on my way back home to get more sleep when I rear ended a lady who had stopped short in front of me, I think for a bird. I can't blame her, I would have done the same. but still. I clocked her. lucky for me, though, she only wanted to know if her brake lights still worked, and since they did, she wanted to take off. so I made her take my phone number and name (why?? stupid.) and then I went back home.

there were 2 bolts sticking out from the fender that was pushed in that made it nearly impossible to turn right or left without damaging the tires, and jarrett was nice enough to come by and take a look and help me fix it. we bent it out as much as we could and then took it to his house where he used a mini sledge hammer (!!!!!) to pop the fender back out. it's working pretty well. I can drive it (have been for a week now) and the immediacy of it being fixed is no longer freaking me the fuck out. so that's good.

later that day, daycare called and said bella needed to be picked up because of her fever. I took her right to the doctor's and they said she had hand foot and mouth - which is highly contagious. luckily it cleared up fast (by monday) and neither sean nor I had to take off work.

so that was my trip. pictures forthcoming. figure in about 5 weeks.

and for those of you who know my gmail address and have seen my status as "inked" - yes, I got a new tattoo on monday night. spur of the moment. it's a skull and crossbones on my left hip. pictures of that too when I get a chance. it's healing nicely.

I promise not to wait so long to post again.

it's me

2006-08-14T09:37:00.000-05:00

oh my god, people. so much to discuss. so little time.

in a nutshell, and I will expand:

san jose is boring but san francisco is great.
I hate flying still.
flying last thursday? craziness. lines, delays, no gels or liquids...
we saw alcatraz and the winchester mystery house - both interesting
drove a convertible mustang on california highways and byways

but the real insanity started when I got home. late. to traffic. and a baby with a fever. took her to daycare and about 3 seconds away from my house, got into a minor accident. my fender is busted up. (I am fine...physically.) found out bella has hand, foot & mouth "disease". came home to a house that needed alot of attention.

and...now I am working on something fairly big at work...I will try really hard to get back here later and tell you all about the wonderous trip.

missed you all, my fake friends!

the 7th day adventists say "I'm glad you were born"

2006-08-02T13:15:00.000-05:00

okay. you know how when chat rooms first started, and people would totally fall in love over chat and people would make fun of them? well that's never really gone away. if you tell someone you met your new boyfriend on the internet, people just assume that you're destined for failure.

the same holds true for friends you make online. I think it's ~a~ that calls us blog friends "fake friends" because the dynamic is odd, as much as I hate to say it.

but that doesn't mean that the friends I've made through blogging are any less important to me than my "real" friends. and that brings me to missuz j.

nicole found her blog. so she started commenting on nicole's and then I was like, who is this person? then I started reading her. faithfully. and then emailing her. and telling her all kinds of things about my life, and she reciprocated. and then I met her sisters via blog. and then we timidly asked each other if, when I was out to vegas, we wanted to meet, both of us thinking the other would find them nuts. and then we all met. and then we emailed more. and chatted. and now, I am in the midst of scheduling a trip to utah to stay with her as my own personal vacation.

happy birthday, boobecca - the fact that I met you on the interweb doesn't mean that I don't consider you a true, real, close friend.

the "hot" diatribe, or why women don't think like men

2006-07-25T14:50:00.001-05:00

double post day. I have been stewing over this for a little while, though, so here it is.

in case I haven't mentioned it before, I work with alot of men. men who think of me as a non-woman. which is fine; they are less guarded, they talk freely, I feel like I'm accepted as one of their own - the jane goodall to their ape-icity. the unfortunate byproduct is knowing who they think is hot. or what parts of who they think are hot parts. and for the most part, I'm okay with that. every once in a while, though, I think about it too much and I start comparing. I guess it's human nature - or at least female nature. and that really gets me nowhere. I sit here worrying about that flat fruit I just ate or the fact that I had french toast sticks for breakfast, when no amount of dieting is going to make my boobs bigger or make me taller or otherwise transform me into someone they consider "smokin hot". and the feminist in me says "I don't want that anyways" but who doesn't like it when they're told they are beautiful? even if it's in a more base way, like "smokin hot".

the thing about it is that it's a complete double standard. I mentioned to one of my coworkers that I thought one of the other men here in a different department had really beautiful eyes. in fact, he is known to have pretty eyes - other women have described him in this way. the dude I was talking to perked up his ears, asking if women here say anything else about men. which men? what do they say? and the unasked question - "do they say anything about ME?? cause I'm pretty hot, if you haven't noticed." and really, they don't. and even when they talk about the one guy's eyes (anyone would say it - he has dark hair, light complexion, and piercing blue eyes) it's in a context of appreciation and not objectification. but the double standard comes in when I was talking about mr. blue eyes to my coworker, he started getting all antsy, wondering what women were saying about him, about other men, whether he stacked up. yeah, how does that feel, anyways?

the real crux of my entry here is, of course, focused on me. because this is my blog. sorry. anyway, I need to figure out what my boundaries are. on one hand, I want people to be as frank with me as possible. I hate thinking that someone's holding back. on the other hand - I try really hard to be as above-it-all as possible but I'd be lying if I said it doesn't give my self esteem a few hits. I think about this more often as the reality of my being single again sets in. the thing I hated about dating was the endless critique I and others gave to my physical being. there are all kinds of beautiful in the world - which, by the way, is something MOST women understand far better than MOST men - but if you don't think there's one kind, the smokin hot kind, that is the apex that women feel they should at least try to meet, then you're kidding yourself.

the interesting part of this is how men and women react to the same kind of critique. men feel comfortable talking about women in this fashion no matter how they themselves feel they look. there is something about the way some men can reconcile within themselves that looking at women is one thing, and doesn't mean that whomever they're with is not, in their own right, beautiful in a way that no other woman on earth can rival. I am so not wired to think that way and I do, in a weird way, admire that quality in men. I could sit here and wonder if it's social conditioning that doesn't allow me to understand that, or if it's hardwired into the X chromosomes. doesn't matter. I know it's being stated in english, yet I can't understand a word of it.

what I'm left with is trying to reconcile all of this within myself. I know I am a pretty kick-ass lady. I have confidence, I can rise above, I have charisma, and I am definitely not ugly. I'm never going to be the girl that makes men stop in their tracks, but there's nothing I can do about that. so when these men around me make these comments, for the most part, I'm okay with it. it's just sometimes...well...us normal girls need some compliments, too. and that makes me kind of ashamed, that I need some sort of outside validation. but...I'm human. right? right??

where has the time gone?

2006-07-25T09:35:00.000-05:00

hi. remember me? sorry.

let's start with the weekend. friday night - debacle. I was to go see my friend kristen (who is due tomorrow with her first child) for dinner and then go slightly late to trent's baseball game. while at kristen's house (about 5 miles from where the game was to be held), the skies opened up and all the water left in heaven spilled out. I called brett at 7, game start time, to find out if it was cancelled or what. no answer. we ate dinner and had conversation, I saw their basement mid-remodel and the new nursery. I called about every 15 mins to brett's cell. nothing. the rain came harder. I called sean - confirmed it was raining in lansdale. I figured there was no way that they were playing (the lightning alone) so I stayed a while, calling brett over and over. I left shortly before 9 and finally got brett on the phone. I asked where the hell he'd been. he said "I was coaching a baseball game - DID YOU FORGET??" and I said no, I didn't forget, it is raining like crazy and I figured the game was called. and since I had told trent 3 times that I was coming to the game late, the last time being at 5pm, I figured he knew I was coming and hadn't "forgot". I don't forget my child's gametimes. brett and I argued for a while, him insinuating I had better things to do and that I neglected my son's game, which turned out to be the last game of the season since it was the loss that booted them out of the final tournament. trent was listening, so when I got home, he pretty much said the same exact thing as brett did, crying because he wasn't trying to make me feel bad like brett was - he was feeling like I really did forget him. he stormed to his bedroom and called brett from his cell phone and asked if he could stay at his house because he "really didn't feel like being here". I'm not even going to defend myself anymore. I give up.

saturday. I got trent to a soccer teammate's house so he could go to day 1 of his soccer tournament at fort dix. I kept bella home with me because I figured it would be difficult to wrangle her without brett, who also wasn't going because he had a wedding to attend. bella and I did random stuff and I watched jarhead.

sunday. sean offered to take bella so I could go to the second day of the soccer tournament without worrying about her. we got there around 9:30am and it was freezing. he played 2 games and I got into a minor altercation with an old man from the opposing team. what an asswipe that dude was. I love old men - have a penchant for them - but this guy...this guy, I wanted to pummel. luckily, it didn't come to fisticuffs.

monday. that's yesterday already. sean had bella, I made dinner for friends.

today. I just balanced my checkbook for the first time. yes, I'm 32 years old and I never balanced my checkbook before. it's because I am a wimp. I also paid all the bills that were due before I get paid next. feeling pretty good about that.

in divorce news, sean read over the agreement and had no problems or questions. so we go to sign it and the divorce petition on thursday. the agreement goes into effect immediately, and we wait the 90 days for the divorce. I'm not sure how I feel about it. it's quick - to be sure - but I'm more comfortable with the idea of it. I'm starting to allow myself to feel good again without feeling too guilty. here and there.

today, bella counted to 10 while I took her to daycare. she skipped 5. I still think it's pretty good. she's been talking up a storm lately, surprising everyone with her vocabulary. I'm always saying "where did she learn THAT?" I think it's because me and sean and trent talk so much.

last night, after I picked her up from sean's, I put her in her bed. she climbed up into mine to give me a hug and a "tiss". she asked where daddy was. then she said "sean." as I tried to formulate an answer that wouldn't make me cry, she said "daddy's house. daddy's at home." so I just hugged her and we went to sleep.

so fresh and so clean

2006-07-20T13:52:00.000-05:00

taking nicole's advice, I took a half day yesterday and set to work. first - grocery shopping. we were running low on a few things, mainly: everything. including cleaning supplies, so I sort of had to go first. after trent helped me unpack everything, I set to work. there were a few things I didn't get to (like the kitchen floor, scrubbing the tub) but the house looked relatively put together. I felt better about things. my wash is under control and the front room isn't in so much of a shambles. though it fucking reeks of cat in there. I really have to do something about that cat but nothing seems like it's going to work out. I even let her outside in the back yesterday to see if maybe I could make her an outdoor cat (best of both worlds - she can pee outside and I can still have a cat) but she hung out right on the step and ran in when I opened the door. I may try again.

anyways, I then had a dentist appointment (temporary crown on a back molar) and afterwards, my friend kelly had thought she might have a few of us over to her house. unfortunately, work ate up her time and so since jarrett and I both didn't have our kids (yesterday started our new schedule - sean gets all weds and fridays, which is actually only till 9:30 or 10 and not overnight, and then has every other "weekend" starting on saturday afternoon when he gets home from work and extending into monday night) he came over and we had chinese and watched dvr'd tv. so it was good that the house was relatively clean.

going to bed last night was great, though, because I did spend time putting on my new sheets and new comforter. and that was good because I'm having trouble adjusting to sleeping alone in my giant bed. the price you pay.

we review the property settlement agreement this week and sign it and the divorce petition next thursday. that starts our 90 days and so in the weeks between our anniversary and bella's birthday (which is the anniversary of us purchasing our house) we'll be divorced.

I know all there is to know about the crying game

2006-07-18T12:41:00.000-05:00

I'm not going to lie. friday was terrible. it was my intention to get out of the house so that I wasn't there as sean moved. I knew he'd be okay because he gets into what he calls "get shit done mode" and there's no time for feelings. plus, it was about 8,000 degrees here and it was too hot to be upset. except for me. my sister was in atlantic city so I didn't have an opportunity to go there, and I didn't want to drive into the city. I really didn't have motivation to do anything, to tell you the truth. so I went back home and just helped where I could and did alot of crying. alot. but it was cathartic. nicole said it best when she likened it to a viewing for a funeral. closure, a hard kind of closure that hurts, but closure.

going to sean's new home was a little surreal. here were things that I was used to seeing in my house, all over. plus, this apartment is exactly the same as the apartment he had for about 9 months before we moved in together. it almost feels the time in between never happened. I spent time there last night since sean's brother billy was in from where he's living now in south carolina (he is now out of the air force) and had the kids, and they wanted some time alone with just the two of them and many beers, so I watched billy's kids and bella at sean's. (sean has central air, lucky.) I'm glad things are going well for him, he seems happy. my house is in shambles, with pieces of furniture gone and alot to clean up. and my yard - forget about it. but it's so hot and I've been so busy, I don't know when I'll get to clean it all up. and that has me in sort of a funk, because I had worked hard to keep everything clean and now it's not anymore. I don't feel on top of it any longer and I hope that doesn't propel me into a downward slide.

day by day.

looooong day

2006-07-14T11:23:00.000-05:00

it's friday.

I realize I have no room to talk because this is all happening because of me. I know I'm making my bed and I have to lie in it. I know that acting like I'm the one hurt here is stupid because I'm the one doing the hurting. yet I can't stop crying today and feeling like I just want someone to tell me things are going to be okay. (not that I'm asking you to do that. you realize what I mean.)

brett was nice enough to call me a few minutes ago to tell me that he thinks us putting trent in premier soccer, which costs over $1000 for the year, was a mistake. he hasn't had one game yet. brett knows this from going to 4 practices. last night he tried to talk to me about it but I had just had a breakdown so I asked if we could talk about it another time. like, when my husband isn't in the process of moving out. so he was a darling and waited - till today. then he said we should take him out because he doesn't pay $1000 to have him touch the ball twice in practice. a) he hasn't paid for ANYTHING yet - I am waiting for him to tell me how much baseball was so I can deduct it from the $500 I've already shelled out; 2) how about he HAS A GAME first before we determine he never plays? and III) dude. today? really?

it all feels like a bad dream. I called trent and he said verbatim what brett said, which means that he's just going with what his dad says. fine. I can't fight this battle. I called brett back (after he hung up on me saying "just go deal with your stupid divorce") and said fine, I give, just let me know if I get any money back.

time ticks by so slowly and time can do so much.

endings and beginnings

2006-07-12T15:19:00.000-05:00

sean moves on friday. I know I've mentioned it like 4 thousand times but friday is the day after tomorrow. his stuff is all piled in the front room of the house. while I am loathe to say that I'm thrilled he is moving out (it's more of a resignation of a situation, not something to be happy about) I will say that I'll be happy when that big pile of stuff is out of the front room. for one, that room was already a cat haven, and now with all the distractions, I think kitchen is just peeing anywhere she pleases. and it's just hard to walk into a house I've been trying to keep clean for 2 weeks just to see mass chaos. but the day after tomorrow, all of that will be gone and then I'll deal with it.

last night, sean came over and packed. I came home with bella and made dinner for all of us. we all went out for chocolate milkshakes at dairy queen (and how ridiculous - we'd been going to friendly's for our milkshakes, sometimes 4 times a week when I was pregnant, and dq's milkshakes are like 1/4 of the price. duh.) and bella attempted to play in their playland. it wasn't much of a playland and some family let their 2 very large children play there unsupervised and they railroaded right over poor bella, so we had to leave. when we got back, I set up bella's crib to be a toddler bed, next to my bed. she loved it. she hopped right in, asked for a blanket (she loves blankets) and said "night night". when it was time to go to bed, I put her in her bed, she covered herself with her blanket, drank her bottle, and went right to sleep. it seemed too easy.

she fell out of that bed 4 times last night. the first 3 times, she was so tired that she went right back to bed. but the 4th time, she was pretty upset and wouldn't go back into the bed. I have to find a rail for it, but I don't even know if they make rails for toddler beds. I have to check. anyways, I hope that falling out won't deter her from wanting to sleep in her own bed. I plan to get her used to her bed in my room, and then transition her to her room. I know, I can't believe it either. I do realize that having her in my bed is way more for my comfort than it is for her, and I don't want her to get used to it and then be her problem as well as mine. so I'm trying to let go a little. we'll see how long it lasts.

tonight, it's bella and I all by ourselves. I pick her up from daycare and we'll go home and have dinner and then maybe go for a walk. if it's not too soupy out. the weather here sucks lately. hot, wet, muggy, humid, and any other synonym for crappy july weather you can think up. I love all of you dearly, but it makes me chuckle when one of you has central air problems and you have to open windows and sweat to death...that's my life every night. unless I want to hang out in my bedroom, which has no TV or room for movement of any kind.

anyway, the clock ticks closer to the end. I'm trying not to be too emotional about it because it's driving me crazy. it's all I can do not to get in my car and drive far away. I'm not even talking in hyperbole, I really have to tell myself that I have to go wherever it is that I'm driving to. I'm nervous because I'm the kind of person who deals fairly well with stressful situations (fairly well, I said) until they are over, and then I break down. so we'll see how saturday shapes up.

hope you're all having wonderfully busy and productive and happy lives.

the hell?

2006-07-10T14:20:00.000-05:00

head: spinning
hormones: raging
uterus: leaking
house: emptying

the weekend began with a half day on friday. I met with a lawyer to figure out the legal aspects of where we're going. I have to remind myself here that this is my blog and this is my life and the decisions I'm making are mine - not that I don't value your opinions, because I do - but unfortunately I'm the only one besides sean who really understands what's going on here and so I have to be the one who decides whether I'm doing the right thing. I will make myself crazy if I try to justify more than I already am and try to live up to everyone's expectations. okay, did that sound exceedingly bitchy?

well, I may as well put it out there - I have had an anonymous commenter who seems to know me and is making sure I know that he or she is not pleased with my actions. so hi, anonymous, and fuck you very much for sharing your opinions.

anyway. I met with a lawyer and our agreement is being drawn up that discusses what happens with the house and outlines that we will be administering our own custody and support rules. and our divorce proceeding will begin our mandatory 90 day waiting period where we decide if this is what we really want. at the end of the 90 days, if we are in agreement, we can get officially divorced. I think that's a fair amount of time to make sure.

so after shelling out an inordinate amount of money for the lawyer to get started, I went to jarrett's house to help him move. sean had movie night with bella (and trent) at the house while I helped jarrett pack up what's left of his life with his soon to be ex wife. the differences between my marriage dissolving and his are so stark. he and his wife are constantly at odds with each other, but you can tell that there once was a fire there that probably engulfed the two of them. the bonds of friendship and respect that sean and I have won't soon be broken, and the contrast of intensity between jarrett's situation and mine is amazing. it's been really helpful for me to have a friend going through something similar (even as it's so dissimilar) because it reminds me that other people make mistakes, too.

anyways, after a long night of moving with jarrett and our friends kelly and ben, and having the uhaul truck break down on the road at midnight (and having to wait an hour and a half until we just left the damn thing on the road and went home) it was saturday. after helping brett put his house together for his very first actual soiree since he moved almost a year ago, bellisima and I headed over to my father's side family reunion at my cousin's house in remote green lane, in a marshy and huge estate. I didn't remember that they had a pool and came completely unprepared. no swimmer diapers and no earplugs. of course, bella wanted to get in and almost walked directly into the deep end of the pool. after one diaper got severely full, threatening with explosion, I finally put her in without clothes or diapers. (with the admonishment of "no pooping. hear me? no pooping!!) she had fun for about 10 minutes before trying to weasel her way onto the second step of the pool, which put her at chin level with the water. I wasn't having it and so I grabbed her slippery body by the waist, until she leaned forward and went head first into the pool. I grabbed her immediately and pulled her out and commenced a freakout, all while she laughed and said "do den? do den?" (do again?)

we went on the swingset (made of really old, splintery wood) and the trampoline (which she was mildly afraid of - finally, something that kid is afraid of) before saying goodbye to the unfortunate death trap that is my cousin's house. she fell asleep on the way home for a while, and by the time we got ourselves together, it was dinner time and playtime and then time for bed. sunday, we had a birthday party to attend for my stepbrother's son aidan's 2nd birthday. I was in the shower, having gated bells in as usual. she loves to see what I'm doing in there, so I expect her to open the shower curtain and check it out. this time, though, she decided to try flipping over the edge of the tub. she landed on her head inside the tub at my feet. again, no earplugs, with diaper and a shirt. I took the diaper and the shirt off and let her play in the tub at the other end while I finished up. without earplugs, since I couldn't reach them. so we may have a few ear infections coming up.

after the birthday party (where bella decided to take a walk off the back patio and a good 500' to the next door neighbor's house before I could catch her) we came home and sean met us at the house, ready to take bella to his niece brigid's christening. I went to trent's baseball game (where his coach got thrown out of the game - luckily, not brett) and then home with trent. we had chinese (at his request) and then he played playstation while I cleaned the hell out of our bathroom and our - I guess my - room. then we watched skeleton key and as we went to bed, trent's A/C tripped the circuit and we were plunged into darkness, which was kinda fun after being spooked a little.

and that brings me to today. there's nothing that happened this weekend that was bad, per se. it's just that my life is chaotic from an emotional standpoint. add to that that I began trying to alleviate my womanly crampular issues by going back on the pill, and that I am breakthrough-bleeding, and that it has my mood set to Roller Coaster, and I'm just a mess. for no good reason.

things will get easier and they will get harder. maybe being set to roller coaster is a good thing, it'll get me used to it. I don't know.

shakespeare said that the course of true love never did run smooth. the love I'm looking for is just me, loving my life. I feel like I'm stepping on shards of glass to get there but I will get there. and if I don't, and this was all a giant mistake, I'll be the one accountable and I won't have anyone to blame. which also means that if I am happy, I have myself to thank. I like being the one accountable for my own happiness. my ipod is engraved with siddartha gautama's famous line "be a light unto thyself" which is exactly what I'm trying to do.

anyway. hope you all had a great weekend.

poor me

2006-07-07T10:36:00.000-05:00

thank you all for your cat feedback. I'm going to follow up with CC - that's very cool of you. so last night, I did the bills for the first time by myself. it was payday and I was pleased to see how much money I take home in my check. see, I have been so completely hands off with money that I didn't even know how much my check was, when it was payday, nothing. so I was like, damn, nice! it's been several years since I knew what I make so it seemed large.

until I started writing the checks.

holy shit, guys. I have like $4 to my name to last 2 weeks.

dealing with money gives me serious agita and I took some of that out on sean (sorry sean) and I just couldn't wait to be done with that mess. though I have very little cash till next paycheck, I am glad I have 2 weeks to recover from the bills.

I am meeting with a lawyer today to discuss how to move forward legally with our situation. we've decided that it's best to get on the way to divorce and if we decide differently, we can always pull back. this way, nothing is drawn out longer than it has to be and both of us can move on with our lives.

wish us both luck. and again, thank you for listening. (especially you, "anonymous"! so glad you're reading and commenting on old entries.)

together, apart

2006-07-06T09:39:00.000-05:00

the fourth of july weekend was good. I feel guilty having any kind of good time but I have to admit that spending time with my friends does make me feel better. sean is actually holding up much better than I am, which is odd under the circumstances. he's packed up alot of his stuff and the house is looking more empty. I'm going to use the opportunity to get rid of things I know I shouldn't hold onto (like that chair in the front room that no one can sit in - it's cool looking, for sure, and it totally matches our retro wallpaper, but it is ripped in so many places that it spills foam every time someone walks past it. I'll take a picture of it and then let it go.) and try to make a few improvements.

one thing I am considering, which sean is all for, is...and I feel guilty even typing it...finding a new home for our cat. I love her very much, but she's taken to using the entire front room as her litter box. we have 4 litter boxes in there and have spent countless hours and hundreds (literally) of dollars trying to break the habit. when she's at my sister's house, she only goes in the litter box. ditto for the vet's office, where she once stayed for a few days when we couldn't get her medicine for her bladder infection (which started it all). she just seems to have a mental block or something. and she pees right NEXT to the litter box. sometimes in it, but often just next to it. so we need new carpet in there (especially since we're planning to move the tv into that room) and I don't want to do that if the cat is just going to pee all over it again. the cat seems like a metaphor for how I feel about what's going on with sean and I. not that sean's peeing in the front room. but I made a committment when I got this cat and I feel like I have to see it through. but we've used cleaners, comfort measures, switched litters, used different litter boxes, bought and tried everything we could. nothing seems to work. I'm not sure what to do. what do you think?

throughout this whole debacle, bella's been just adorable as can be. she's begun talking in sentences, which is so cute. it's great to hear what's on her mind. and I'm getting to know alot more of her likes and dislikes - as in, she says "I don't like this cackers" or "I like this ice keem" or "I don't wanna go sleepy". I'm still trying to break her of the "mine" habit and I think it's finally working. this morning, we found out that we won a raffle at daycare. we got a pretty big mickey mouse doll that talks (which has been sitting in the lobby for a few weeks, and bella says hello to it every morning) and a gift certificate for toys r us. so I gave her the mickey doll today as we went into her classroom and when giovanna tried to see it, she screamed "MINE!" I told her that wasn't nice, and she looked at me, then walked to giovanna, gave her the mickey, and said "you can see it." awww. I told her she is a good girl.

oh, and over this weekend, I did take bella to see her very first movie in the movie theater - cars. not recommended for the toddler set. it is heavy on the dialog. cute, though. bella fell asleep about 3/4 of the way through. she did have popcorn for the first time (though I watched her like a hawk - CHOKING HAZARD, CHOKING HAZARD) and loved it. it was a nice time. before the movie, we had gone to chik fil a and nicole is right about the playland being wonderful. there was only one other little boy in there when we went in. he had braces on his legs but was getting around okay. he was very inquisitive - his name is aaron. he tried to help bella, but she was too little for the part he was playing in, so I said I'd put her in the toddler area. he wanted to come too but needed my help - because he is blind. I had no idea. so I helped him into the toddler area and he and bella had fun together. she did everything he was doing. and I helped him through everything. he kept asking questions about me and bella and what we were doing...he was so cute, with such a sweet face. I kept wondering where his mother was. she finally came in and he went to go eat. I noticed through the window that his family consisted of one caretaker and 4 special needs children. we said goodbye to aaron on our way out and he seemed happy. what a neat little man.

today is payday. my first go-round with the bills. wish me luck.

alone again, naturally

2006-07-02T12:17:00.000-05:00

yesterday, I took bella to nicole and mark's to watch fireworks with noah and janette and jules and tracey. it was all planned, of course, but the underlying reasoning for my going was so that I didn't have to be home when sean packed his things and left.

it's amazing how different things can be. mary's moving in with her almost-husband, and the man I pledged a promise to love and cherish forever is moving out of my house. before it sounds too poor-me, I know I asked him to. it's just that the magnitude of the situation sometimes knocks the wind out of me. I know that better things are on the horizon for both of us but it's sometimes so difficult to let go of something that feels comfortable and safe. not to mention the fact that sean is, as I've always said, a good man - smart, funny, caring, just all around wonderful. in fact, he was the first all-around genuinely nice man I'd ever dated. which, I think I mentioned, was my downfall.

the fireworks over the water were nice, the company was nice, the food was good, bella had a great time. I just felt like I was watching myself going through the motions.

I contacted lawyers on friday. we're planning to use one lawyer to just draw up all the papers. we've decided it's not going to behoove either of us to wait. I'll soon make sean a single dad and a divorced man.

heavy

2006-06-29T19:42:00.000-05:00

I just got back from a trip to walmart where I felt like my chest was going to explode and all of my insides would have to be put into my cart and wheeled out to my car with my limp body. everyone gets to a certain point, I guess, where things all hit them at once and they feel like they're going to become unglued. that was me, in walmart. as I waded through the aisles buying sean new things for his apartment. an iron, pots and pans, a trash can, knives, silverware. I think it was one of the hardest things I've done in this whole process.

double post day

2006-06-28T21:48:00.000-05:00

so yeah, I had a root canal today. and after I posted about it, I went out to do some errands and go see my new therapist. want to know how it went? what? did you just scream "YES!"? I thought so. (shhhh. let me believe it.)

I opened a checking and savings account for myself. I've been bad with money my whole life, and this time I have to be good with it. I'm alot older than the last time I did this on my own, and in a better place. I think alot of why I wasn't good at managing my money had to do with the fact that I had very little of it. not that I'm swimming in dough, but I do have more than I used to. I hope that helps.

after the bank, I went to repierce my nose. I had had a nosering for about 8 years prior to the last 18 months or so, when I took out my stud. or actually, bella ripped it out and I figured it was best I leave it out for a while. then I just got used to it and left it out. when I tried to put it back in, it was just not happening. I feel like it is a part of me that's gotten lost, so I wanted to get it repierced for my birthday. a little belated, but still. know how much it costs to get one's nose repierced by a professional - ie, not by a gun? with a nice tip, $120. at least it includes a nosering. the ones I have are either not very nice, missing stones, or corkscrews, which I really don't like. this one has a removable gem, which I kind of hate, but they had no small steel ball studs like I am used to. this will do for now. it's very small, like my old ones were. if I could get away with it at work, though, I'd wear a tight hoop. maybe someday.

the interesting thing was that even though it was a repierce and the front, outer-facing hole was open, I still had the same sensations that I had the first time. it's on the right side (which I've found is the opposite of what most people have) and so the entire right side of my face twitched uncontrollably as the needle went in. then, as she put in the jewelry, it twitched again. all the while, my right eye was tearing copious amounts of liquid. just the right eye. the first time I got it done, I was afraid I was doing permanent nerve damage or I was having a stroke. it's only temporary though. and I'll tell you, I'm not good with pain, but it does give you a certain rush. I'm not big on drugs but I imagine it's what your first bump of coke feels like, at least for a split second. it's like you're elevated to a higher plane, things speed up, and you feel transcendent. but then it just hurts.

so after the bank and the peircing thingie, I had about 2 hours to kill before my therapist appointment, so I took myself out to dinner in doylestown. I found a small italian place and had myself some linguine with vodka gravy. still an hour to kill. so I walked around, until I thought I was going to die from humidity. see, the past 4 days or so, it's been crazy raining. enough that my roof is leaking and brett's basement flooded and my boss couldn't get into work today after trying for 3 hours. but today, it was hot and sunny. and all the moisture was burning off back into the atmosphere. I was sweating buckets, so I wound up driving around in the air conditioning and parking and catching up on phone calls.

then, the therapist. it's a new guy. the husband of the lady I had gone to before. did I mention that, the woman I was seeing? she was my father's therapist back in the day? anyway, it was too awkward with her so I asked for a referral and what do you know. she referred her husband, who shares a practice with her. the man is, I'm afraid, old. old fashioned, even. I have only ever seen women before and it felt like I was communicating with my dad. not good. not to mention he had made several judgements about what I was doing only a few minutes into our conversation. I don't like people who are quick to judge like that. he dismissed some real feelings I have. or I think they're real. I would examine that and maybe take under advisement that they are not real if he took the time to really get to know me before he stated that I wasn't doing the right thing. so...I think I need to find someone new. preferably someone closer to home, too. but I don't feel right calling him up and asking him who I should see. I think I will just leave a message and say I am cancelling my appointment and leave it at that. is that the coward's way out? probably.

so sean is moving in with friends of ours starting saturday. now that we got it over with, I'm actually not sure how I feel about it. sad, a little nervous, very guilty. not happy, and not relieved, as I had felt when I found out he was getting his apartment on the 15th. the one thing I did get from my therapy session is that my reasoning for doing this seems sound to dr. tony. not that it gives me great comfort, actually. but you know how I am with validation.

in closing, I drank a caffeinated beverage which is prohibiting me from being tired. plus, my tooth and nose hurt. and I think I am getting a cold. and I am a little bit dreading tomorrow, but I don't know why. there are things about this whole situation that have me so conflicted right now. most of which are dr. tony's doing, and for that, I think I'm actually a little mad at him. I suppose introspection is good, but second-guessing yourself is something else entirely. and for someone who just met me, saying all he said was not suggesting introspection as much as it was making me second guess. I don't know.

what do you think, blogiverse? should you always trust a therapist's opinion more than your own?

ever danced with the devil by the pale moon light?

2006-06-28T13:24:00.000-05:00

ever touched a piece of your own nerve? I have.

it was about 3/4 of an inch long, red at the tip but whitish gray, looked like angel hair pasta - maybe a little thinner. rubbery. my dentist was able to pull it out whole. the other 3 didn't survive the ripping out process.

2 hours, 8 shots of novocaine (2 coming midway through since the others wore off), 4 holes, and $500 later, I have completed one more root canal. hold your applause.

sean found out that his apartment will be ready by july 15. the guilt I feel over my relief is palpable. if guilt can be palpable. he's also said that based on my horrid behavior last night, maybe it's best that he move out until then. I was a bitch - snippy, short, curt. I was in a very bad mood and it was not something I was hiding. while I feel like his moving out is probably for the best, the way it went down makes me upset. I guess I'm not very good at hiding my feelings. I wish it hadn't happened this way.

I have to go open a checking account today. as some of you may know, sean controls all of the money in our house, by my choice. I don't know how much I make, when payday is, or how much any of our bills are. I will have to learn quick. I also have no credit of my own but need to get myself established with a credit card - we'll see how that goes. we've packed up alot of his stuff already. I don't think I'll be able to be here when he moves. knowing the date is earlier makes it more real and sad even if I am relieved.

thank you all for your support.

the road ahead looks hard

2006-06-27T08:48:00.000-05:00

now that I have said what I have to say, and really accepted it for myself, it's been difficult to continue to share a house with sean. that's not to say that he's been anything less than his normal wonderful self, it's just that once you make a decision like this, it's hard to stare the next step in the face and not be able to move forward and take it. it's like you're preparing to do something awful, and not being able to just get it over with. anyone who knows me well knows I am not a patient person by nature anyway, but this is excruciating. from the moment I leave work until the moment I leave the house in the morning the next day, I feel completely tense. and the guilt hangs over me at home like nothing I've ever imagined. I think I just need to schedule myself to be out of the house as much as possible in the next month.

the next month. it feels like it's going to be forever. I understand why sean wants to stay - it would be exceedingly difficult for him. he's very much a man of routine. he doesn't like change and relishes his comfort zone. he wants to trade our home for his own home, and doesn't want to live anywhere in between. since I'm the one that instigated all of this, I suppose I have to be the one to be as flexible as possible and allow him to transition only once, instead of asking him to stay with someone else until the apartment he chose is ready for him at the end of july.

that's what my rational mind says, and that's what I'm doing. inside, in the part of my brain that is both very emotional and seemingly very selfish, I just want him to go. yes, it's going to be hard for him and I feel bad that he won't be comfortable, but I can't understand why he'd be comfortable in our house. I'm not. I feel like nothing is the same, everything is different, and it's all in limbo. but he can just chill on the couch or sleep in our bed and be just fine with it. I can't. it feels fake and pretend and it hurts. I feel guilty every second that I'm in there and knowing I'm making the situation worse is just, well, worse.

so I'm doing what I can to keep myself sane and not cause more hurt to sean than I need to. it's a really fine line and it's not easy, but I didn't think it would be.

in other news, bella and sean and I had a conversation yesterday. sean and I were at the dinner table talking about doctors, and bella says "doctor?" and I said "yes, we're talking about the doctor." and she looks at us for a minute and says "medicine?" sean and I looked at each other like holy shit, and I said "yes, the doctor gives you medicine but only when you're sick. you're not sick - you're healthy." "helfy?" "yes, bella is healthy." "mommy helfy?" "yes, mommy's healthy. daddy's healthy too." "madgy helfy?" "yes, maggie's healthy." "chair helfy?" "yes, the chair is healthy." boy do I love that kid.

that's all for now. thank you all for being so supportive, it means more than you realize.

the time has come, the walrus said, to talk of many things...

2006-06-25T01:29:00.000-05:00

enough beating around the bush. it's hard to keep it a secret - maybe almost as hard as it is to say it out loud. sean and I are separating.

he didn't want me blogging about it at first because it's private. but though I love everyone who reads and comments, this blog is about me. it's cathartic. it's where I vent. so he agreed and here I am.

I've done many awful things in my life. things that I regret. hurting sean is probably one of the things I regret the most. if I could have forseen how things would turn out I would never have let this happen. the truth is that I am not in love with him and haven't been for a very long time. and because of the lack of affection - affection I couldn't give him - he's no longer in love with me either.

it's hard to look at the people who love us and tell them that I've failed. all the people who stood around in that crazy room at the FOP building at broad and spring garden who sat and watched while I held sean's hand and trent's hand and promised to spend my life being married to sean - I am letting all of them down. the woman who presided over the ceremony, a lovely lesbian named donnamarie, even instructed the guests to be there to help us stay together. and even if those people complied - there's nothing that can be done.

a marriage can have alot of components - mutual respect, friendship, consideration, love, affection - but if one of those is lacking, it just doesn't work. it's so much easier to explain to people when the thing that's lacking is respect, or consideration. when it's something so intangible as "being in love", it's much harder to explain.

as we go through the painful process of figuring out whose stuff is whose, waiting for the end of july when sean moves out of our house, I hope this blog will be my outlet. I need one, that's for sure. maybe you'll choose not to read - maybe you're upset that I am not upholding my commitment. or you may think that sean is the best thing to ever happen to me and that I'm crazy. I will understand if that's how you feel. I am taking a stab at this whole "do what you have to do" thing and hope that when I come out on the other side, there are still people there waiting to see me.

sean, if you're reading this, I'm sorry. I wish I could have been a better wife to you and I wish that I could have spared you all of this to begin with. I hope you take solace in the fact that we created a beautiful child and that you helped shape the young man that trent is today. I hope that when this is over, we can continue to rely on each other as much as possible. most of all, I hope that someday, you'll find someone who will love you the same way you've loved me. because I had never felt so safe and secure and I always knew I was loved. that's what I want for you - and I don't know when I'll forgive myself for not being that person. I hope you realize that all the LYSM that I spoke were from the heart and that I didn't try to deceive you. as I realized what was going on, I tried to let you know. but the truth hurts sometimes and that is the worst thing of all. I just hope that you can forgive me.

long in the tooth

2006-06-20T10:30:00.000-05:00

okay, this is going to be very difficult for me to tell you. and you have to promise me that the next time you see me, you're not going to zero in on my mouth, okay? promise? PROMISE??

I have always hated my teeth. I try to remember to cover my mouth when possible, stand far away from people when I do smile, or don't show them when I am close enough that they may be able to see them. I hate them. I have had several root canals, tons of cavities, just badness in there. I brush them - oh how I brush them - and yet they don't seem to care, choosing to decay any old time they want to.

so I broke a tooth the other day - part losing a filling, part breaking it - and had to go to the dentist unexpectedly. now, this dentist and I had a great rapport a few years ago when I was in crisis mode with these things before. and then I never went back. so I was taking a chance in going to him again. he might hate me. but he didn't.

there is one tooth in particular (if I had to choose just one - there are many) that I hate more than the others. when I was on welfare back when trent was an infant, I went to a horrible dentist who, instead of treating a cavity I had in my front incisor, went ahead and just slapped a bunch of horribly miscolored tooth-like substance overtop of it and it just has been awful ever since. god, I can't believe I'm telling you this. anyways, I've always been horribly ashamed of it. and trent's 13 - so it's been a while.

so my dentist wanted to treat me for the broken tooth, but since it is holding up okay, and since dental work is, and I can't exaggerate enough to even have it be exaggerating, REALLY FUCKING EXPENSIVE - like, I could easily buy a car with the amount of money I have to give them to really fix everything - he wanted to make an impact first. so he took care of that tooth that I hate. not only that, he fixed another tooth next to it for free and is bleaching my teeth for free, too. when I saw my smile after the temporary was in place (the crown will be purchased when my teeth are the color I want) I didn't just cry, I sobbed. and he teared up. it was that dramatic.

I don't have much to smile about these days, but I am trying really hard to smile as wide as I feel like, not having to worry about covering that tooth up or feeling like a total WT degenerate. I can't tell you how liberating it feels and how much more confidence it gives me.

anyways, that was how I spent 3.5 hours of my life yesterday.

and now, I will be going to new york for work until late thursday, so I will see you all again friday. have a great week.

potstickers and falafel

2006-06-15T21:39:00.000-05:00

I went out after work to see nicole and mark and lil baby no-no downtown.

sidenote: I am trying to put stuff on my ipod and I really really hate itunes. you can't put it on my ipod because I'm not allowed? I just put in a fucking CD! isn't that what you WANT me to do, only download shit that I OWN?? mother fucker!

anyways. it was great to see them all. noah was so animated and fun. he's so smart - so much retention. he started saying my name constantly - pateece - without being prompted at all. and he has signs for everything, he doesn't just talk. it's amazing. he's so sweet.

nicole and I went out for just a little while (she was afraid noah wasn't feeling well) to johnny brenda's for dinner. I had a little falafel sandwich and some fried (!) potstickers. nicole had a grilled vegetable sandwich that burnt the roof of her mouth. I also, as per usual, had a shirley temple to drink. ah, the hard stuff. it was really good, all of it.

we talked about some of the stuff that's going on with me. I wish I didn't let people down so often. I could tell that she was disappointed in me (sorry nicole) and that felt awful.

anyways, we'll all get through this. and yes, at some point I will be less vague with everyone.

much love to the blogosphere...

it's my birthday.

2006-06-13T12:11:00.000-05:00

hi. I'm 32.

stop me oh ho ho stop me, stop me if you think that you've heard this one before

2006-06-10T23:21:00.000-05:00

(stealing the title from ellis's mom, the magic that is katie...her fault, though, that I've had that song stuck in my head since last week.) (particlar song lyric stuck in my head: nothing's changed, I still love you, oh I still love you. only slightly, only slightly less than I used to, my love. painful.)

anyway. remember when I had that flat tire? and that other flat tire?

so it's like 6 o'clock and I'm running 40 thousand errands. as a birthday present, brett is going to put down my new linoleum in my kitchen, only I don't actually have it yet, so I have to go get it plus some patchy stuff for the damage to the existing stuff. plus, I have a birthday party for jarrett's son ethan next saturday followed immediately by a baby shower. and kkkathy sent me a birthday card and her birthday is 5 days after mine and usually that means you have to reciprocate. plus, next sunday is father's day. so I have 2 kids stuff to buy for, massive amounts of cards, and linoleum. usual list, you know. because I want the stuff I buy for the kiddies to be as unique as any clothing mass produced and sold in chains of stores that span not only the country, but across europe as well, I have to buy the clothing I am planning to purchase at H&M. which means a drive down the northeast extension of the turnpike, because it's the easiest and quickest way to plymouth meeting.

sidenote: so I'm talking last night to rebecca and she's all "you watch big love? there's compounds near here." and I'm all "no way!" and she's all "yeah, near the grand canyon." and screw the polygamists for a second (ba dum bum) but it must be so cool to throw out a casual 'oh yeah, it's near the grand canyon. second giant rock formation that is usually pictured on postcards about the west on the left.' and I was just amazed. but then again, I live about 40 mins away from the liberty bell and never go to it. philadelphia is the birthplace of our country, and there's all kinds of old shit around here, and while I think I do a fairly good job of being grateful for it by trying to soak alot of it in, sometimes I have to remind myself that saying that I have to go to a place called 'plymouth meeting' and having it actually be where settlers hung out and stuff, that's kind of kick ass. much like living near the grand canyon.

anyways. so I'm on my way to plymouth meeting on the turnpike. keane is on the cd player and I am singing my heart out. then I hear this weird thumping noise and wonder, as I always do, if I have a flat. because of my shitty luck with flat tires (not just with Ole Pete, with all of the cars I've ever had) I am hypersensitive to the idea that I could have one. I check all the time. so I pull over, ready to feel stupid. and...not so much. the right front tire? it is pancaked.

fuck. so I call the house FOUR TIMES and no one answers (where's sean? upstairs giving bella a bath. and I unplugged the upstairs phone. my fault. but where's trent? sitting exactly one room away from the phone downstairs. except he's playing playstation so he doesn't care to answer the phone at all. which means he's no longer playing playstation this weekend or perhaps ever.) and then I call AAA. and thank god for it, you know? because the area I'm pulled over onto is a very small shoulder. I'm barely past the side rumble strips. there's an embankment at a startling angle on the side, so I can't pull over any further - and the entire embankment is filled with poison ivy. I am so allergic to that stuff that I think I can get it just by picturing myself standing in proximity to it yet not touching it. and there's no better place to pull up to, and I'm right around a nice bend so no one can see I'm there.

so I call AAA, and they have to transport me to the turnpike authority since they have to be the ones to dispatch someone. dude, I already pay a fucking toll. how much more money do you want from us all? (and btw, they are thinking of allowing exits to be sponsored, like arenas are.) so I wait the 5 or 8 mins it takes to be transferred to the turnpike authority, as a cop rolls up behind me. a state cop. I don't want to hang up because I've been holding a long time and don't want to hold longer, so I've got the cell to my ear as he strolls over to the passenger side (through the poison ivy) and asks why I've stopped. dude, why so accusing? what is up with that? what does he think I'm doing?? anyways, I point to the front of the car and tell him I have a flat and he asks if I'm calling someone to fix it. um...yeah. I say lightheartedly that it's a bad spot to have one, he agrees. then I tell the guy who's finally on the line from the turnpike that I have a flat, and he says he'll dispatch someone and it'll take a half hour to 45 mins. I tell the cop and he says "okay, good luck!" and leaves. well thank you, sir, because we just established that I'm in a dangerous area to be pulled over and I will be here for the next half hour to 45 mins.

I passed the time by returning some phone calls. 45 mins come and go. it's 7:30, and the AAA guy finally shows up. he says that the paperwork for AAA actually takes longer than changing the tire. oh, silly man, how I envy your naiive ways. after trying to jam his jack under my car a few times, he realizes he has to use mine because the car sits too low to the ground. so there's the trying to find where the jack is, the trying to actually get the jack to work, the infinity amount of time it takes to actually jack up the car with so little leverage, the infinity infinity amount of time it takes to try to free the spare tire from under the car (yeah, it's under the car) and then actually put it on. I'd say it was 1/12th the amount of time it took to do the AAA paperwork. sorry, buddy. anyways, as he runs into snag after snag, the amount of money I'm planning to give as tip grows and grows. it got to $30 before I realized it and then off I went. it was now 8ish.

so I got no linoleum (I'll pick it up in the morning) but I did manage to get all the gifts and all 5k cards I needed. (from trent to sean, from bella to sean, from me to sean, from trent to brett, from me to brett, from me to my dad, from bella to my dad, from trent to my dad, from me to kkkathy, from all of us to ethan, from me to kristen.) and at 9:30, as I got lost taking the back roads home (since I can't go over 45 mph with the donut tire) I realized...maybe I ought to have eaten dinner.

and here it is, almost 1am, and I'm wide awake.

so how are you?

noga

2006-06-09T12:50:00.000-05:00

I had my first yoga class last night, not having gone since I was pregnant. of course, I had high hopes, because the yoga studio I went to before was really nice and very professional. just so you know where this post is going, that was what we call "foreshadowing."

these classes were being offered through the local high school adult studies whatever thingies, and were being held in the basement of a church that is within walking distance from me. and the cost is $10 a class. sounds pretty good so far.

so I get there, and as I had been told by a baseball mother who was the one to clue me into the whole thing, the instructor is a very new agey lady. what she didn't mention is that she is about 4 thousand years old. I got there 3 mins early, which apparently is late. the room was as full as a bingo hall at 5pm on a tuesday. I took a spot in the front row all the way to the side. it was BYOM (bring your own mat) and I didn't know that, so I improvised with a thick blanket we use for soccer and baseball games. I carry that and a folding chair at all times in my car.

so the deal is that she puts on music and we all sit on our mats and she turns off the lights and you do all the moves with your eyes closed. okay, right there, I should have realized that this might not be the yoga I am used to. no having her show you how to do the moves? she doesn't come and correct your form?

so the music is less ethereal and more...how you say...muzak-y. in fact, I think it's a slow version of tin man by america, done on the vibraphone. she's telling us to get on our backs and relax. relax your toes. relax the top knuckle of your toes. relax the top of your toes. relax the joint that attaches your toes to your foot. relax the ball of your foot. relax the spot where you always get a callous on your foot. relax your callous. relax your bunions. and so on.

we finally get to the head/face (relax your cheeks. relax your lower cheeks. relax your top lip. relax your tongue.) and then we do some stretching. which consists of holding your arms up in the air and slowly raising them above your head, all while seated.

this goes on for another 20 minutes. then we do one cat pose...just the one...and then finally we are on our feet.

she does tell us we can open our eyes just to make sure we get the next pose right. and if you can't handle any of these poses (like lying prone on the floor) just imagine yourself doing them! so we go into warrior pose. really, really slowly. I open my eyes to look around...warrior pose has you with your legs a good distance apart, your back foot planted perpendicular to you while your front foot faces forward, and you raise your arms to shoulder level and lean forward so you kind of look like you're surfing on your yoga mat. or blanket, as the case may be. anyways, I look around, and I am the only person doing that. everyone else has their arms up meekly, feet shoulder width apart, feet akimbo, looking like they cannot wait until we are done with this stupid pose and are back to raising one leg in the air, and then putting it back down, and switching.

and that concludes the standing poses. for real. immediately after that, we touch our toes, and then sit back down. then lay down. and for another 15-20 mins, we float on a cloud.

not that there's anything wrong with meditating. I probably could use it. but my back gets so sore lying on the floor like that. my tailbone aches. (who is the old fogey now??) so I couldn't wait to get up.

the end was a little difficult for me. the yoga teacher told us to look inside ourselves at the light we have within us. to know that we are perfect in every way, despite any of our flaws or troubles. that we can keep the light within us shining no matter what. and that we are all good people with good things to share. that is the antithesis of what I've been feeling lately and having someone tell me that I could possibly be good inside, when all I feel is like I am a horrible person, was too much. luckily, the rest of the old ladies still had their eyes closed and I'm sure none of them can see in dim light anyways.

brought to you by bella

2006-06-06T11:09:00.000-05:00

hi!

where doggie? where'd doggie go? heyo. heyo doggie. googiiiiirl. googiiiiiirl.

'mere! 'mere, mommy! oushied! oushied! where shoes? where shoes go? here it is! 'mon, mommy. 'mon, shoes. go oushied?

snack! snack? cackers? mokey moke. where jush? where cuppa jush? I donlike it. I donlike dat. mo mo cackers?

babies, where are you? here it is! okay, sit, baby. tinkle, tinkle yi yi stah, oh I wan eh eh are. upabuba wor so hi...double you esh, teeyou vee...

mommy! seepy. go night night?

hi.

2006-06-05T08:47:00.000-05:00

I...well I wish I could say things are going so well that I don't have time to post. but unfortunately, that isn't entirely true. nobody is sick or hurt or anything, it's just grownup stupid bullshit.

bella is doing excellent. she's been singing her abc's in an endless loop. in fact, the other day, she was walking in a circle around one of our chairs, singing abc's, for 10 minutes. she was stuck here: eminemoh pee, koo r esh, tee you vee, double you esh, eh ah no mah -- eminemoh pee, koo r esh...

she's such a joy to have around and I thank the gods for her every day. if things happen for a reason, which I think they do, I was meant to be this little girl's mother and she was meant to be born to sean and I and just meant to be, period. I love her and trent so much sometimes I can't even stand it.

I managed to get her on video this weekend coloring and naming the colors. she's having some trouble with blue and red, but she's got yellow down pat (of course) and green and pink are her next favorites. I should have kept the tape running because she then proceeded to read a picture board book and name every single thing in it, including boy and girl and orange and apple (which are confusing) - and we'd only read that book maybe 3 or 4 times in the last 2 months. she's an impressive little girl.

we also went to the nearby playground where she totally tested boundaries by trying to go down the slides I specifically told her she couldn't go down because they had puddles at the bottoms. and then she insisted on walking by herself, in the street. I carried her tantrum-ing body back to home where she wanted to play with the neighbor's pit bull. so that part wasn't so fun.

I don't know how many of you are left after my sporadic posting, but know that blogging is still an important part of my life. I just don't feel like I can share as much as I'd like right now.

and how are you?

punchdrunk lovesick singalong

2006-05-30T14:46:00.000-05:00

it was a long weekend in so many ways. bella does not have mono, trent's field trip was dumb and long. I wish I had the energy to expand on those things, but today I don't. sean and I were up talking late, and I only got 2 hours of sleep. maybe tomorrow?

I will say this. bella is crazy talking. like saying everything. and she's in love with the color yellow. I am trying hard to find some yellow shoes, since each time I ask what shoes she wants to wear, she says 'yayow shoes. pees.' where does one find yellow toddler shoes?

also, I am sorry about both my own blogslacking and my commentslacking. I'm emotionally wrung out. I will return to my usual bitchy self soon, I promise.

I much prefer stereo

2006-05-24T13:43:00.000-05:00

hi. wow. it's been a long couple of days. tying up some loose ends, da vinci code was good. I enjoyed it. it may have been because I finally got out of the house, too...

see, on thursday, bella came home from daycare with a fever. which only got worse overnight. I stayed home from work and didn't have the opportunity to take that half day after all, so I postponed my movie visit (which I had already purchased tickets for...at least it was matinee pricing) to friday night at quarter to nine. friday, bella was feverish despite taking infant ibuprofen, listless, and cranky. I took her to the doctor fully expecting another ear infection, but not this time. this time she had "sores" on her tonsils. the doctor did a quick strep test that came back negative, and a more thorough strep test that took overnight. of course, labs are closed on the weekend, so we waited until monday for that result, which was negative. so it was off to the hospital for a blood test for, of all things, mono. and let me tell you, I had a stern talking-to with ms. bella, as I had no idea that she was even into boys let alone into kissing. who? where? when??

all weekend, her fever waxed and waned and finally went away on sunday. monday, the day of the blood test, she was fever-free and off tylenol (which the doctor had us switch to due to bella throwing up and ibuprofen being rough on the belly) and seemed fine. of course, when your doctor is testing for mono, you don't rush to send the kid back to school. so sean stayed with her on monday, and I stayed with her on tuesday, since the results don't come back for 3 days.

here's where it got weird. I was waiting for the doctor to call back (what is the PROBLEM with them CALLING THE FUCK BACK??? I had to call 3 times!) and let me know exactly what I was in for, how much time I'd be taking off, etc. but of course I didn't get through to the doctor. the nurse, who couldn't have known who I was talking about (I said "I'm calling about bella milligan" and she just said "yes?" and didn't go get her chart or anything) said that as long as she was fever- free for 24 hrs, I could take her back to daycare. then I got a voicemail from the doctor on my cell phone (oh, so you'll call back, but only to one number - when I was right next to my home phone, which is the number I left for callback, all day) way after the office closed saying that the test results that she did get back say that bella does have an active infection.

so quandary - take bella to daycare because she has no fever, or keep her home because she could have mono and give it to other kids?

this is where it's tough to be a working mom, because I had to let my work dictate what I did. I took her back to daycare. she has no sign of being ill at all, and I just couldn't take another day off. I mean, I could, but I preferred not to...which I feel very guilty about. in fact, I feel horrible.

the situation was made worse by my having to take tomorrow off because of what I'm calling a severe case of stupidity. in filling out a permission slip for trent for a class outing, I inadvertently signed up to be chaperone. I found out yesterday and by the time I protested, the teacher said it was pretty much locked in, so tomorrow, I'm going on a field trip. it wouldn't be so bad if it were something really cool or at least mildly educational, but I'll be going on a bus with a bunch of 13 year olds to a town 30 mins away (passing at least 3 movie theaters) to see "over the hedge" and then to lunch at the nearby mall foodcourt. no franklin institute, no longwood gardens, not even a local museum. a stupid movie. I can't tell you how annoyed I am at myself. it did give trent a chuckle, as I am constantly telling him to pay attention to what he's doing.

so...I'll be out tomorrow and friday is a toss up, as we get the mono test results tomorrow. and if she has mono, I have no business taking her back to daycare. not knowing is bad, but knowing is worse...so I may not be around for a while. wish us luck.

hap eh uhhh uhhh uh maaaadgy....

2006-05-18T09:03:00.000-05:00

bella hums alot while she plays, but she's recently become very interested in singing. alot of the things she sings, we can figure out - from the first song she sang weeks ago (ring around the rosie) to her current second favorite ("tinkle, tinkle, yi yi dah"). but there was one she kept singing and giggling at that we couldn't figure out right away.

hap eh uhhh uhhhh uh...DAAAADDDYYYY! (giggle) hap eh uhhh uhhhh uh MOOOOMMMMY! (giggle) hap eh uhhhh uhhh uh TEEEEEEENT! (giggle)

finally, I figured it out. she's singing happy birthday to everyone.

so now it's all birthday all the time. the baby dolls have birthdays, the chair has birthdays, the kitty has birthdays...at least she hasn't connected it to coke-cokes (cupcakes) yet.

in other news, bella has been requesting something accompany her to daycare every day. not always the same thing, though both baby dolls and one particular receiving blanket are her usuals. once it was her sweater even when she didn't want to wear it, once it was a teletubbies dvd case, once it was a necklace of mine, but the oddest one was a bottle of aquafina water. she would not go to daycare without it. and it had to sit next to her while she had breakfast. I think she more or less forgets about whatever she brings shortly after I leave, but for the short time I'm there, she's very adamant that she has something with her, and no one else can touch it. (to that end, another favorite phrase of hers is "mine" - uh oh.)

tomorrow I am leaving work early to go see the da vinci code. I feel like a star wars dork. at least if I dress up as one of the characters, it could be audrey tautou and maybe everyone would just think I'm stylish and european. I am quite sure no one in the movie is dressed all in white plastic or in head to toe fur, so maybe I won't be seen as quite so much a dork as star wars people. I'm looking forward to it, of course, but not because I think it's the best movie of the year or anything. I'm looking forward to an enjoyable diversion from the everyday, a series of puzzles that gets solved by actors, and a well-told story. I by no means think a work of fiction or a movie based on a work of fiction is a threat to the world as we know it by attacking organized religion, nor do I think that dan brown or the dudes he ripped off are geniuses ready to pull back the curtain on life as we know it. it's just a fucking movie...that I am excited to enjoy.

bella m. and all the other bellas

2006-05-15T15:40:00.000-05:00

well, it already happened. you know how you agonize over finding that perfect name for your baby, one that isn't so far out that she's ostracized but one that isn't going to be one of 15 kids in her class with the same name? we did that. we had all kinds of names on the list - hazel (a family name), dahlia, sofia - and we chose bella. sean loved it, it was very italian, and I didn't know anyone named bella so I had no negative connotations with it. then I used this thingie and it said that the name was on the rise. still not too bad, though...until I had her, and everyone asked me if she was named isabella. turns out isabella is one hell of a popular name.

bella has 4 classmates at daycare: kaylie, giovanna, connor, and ISABELLA. who is called bella. 2 out of 5?? wtf?

at any rate, here are some things that MY bella does that I bet that other one doesn't do. she's currently on an "eeeeeewwwww" kick. everything she sees that isn't quite right is met with "eeeeeeeewwww!!!!" something spilled on the floor? eeeeewwww! her shoe is untied? eeeeeeewwww! her peach is touching her ravioli? eeeewwwwww! (I admit, that's my fault.) she was 'watching' (sitting down, twirling her hair, drinking mokey moke) big love (not this week's show, last week's) with sean and he said that after the line "go get your kids, margeane, they're eating bugs" bella said "eeeeeeewwwww!! eat bugs!" so everything is eeeeeewwwww at home right now.

she is in love with the outdoors. she loves "blowers" - dandelions ready to be blown to the wind - but has trouble blowing them. she gets it too close to her mouth and winds up with little seeds all over her lips. which, of course, is met with eeeeewwwww. she loves walking alone - without holding hands or walking alongside me. she's so independent that I can, without a doubt, see directly into our future where we will battle over who opens the box of cereal, who puts on her shoes, and how she learns how to drive.

she also loves to climb. she likes climbing all over the furniture and getting up and down from chairs by herself. needless to say, this makes me slightly freaked out and I'm waiting to blog about Bella's First Stitches or Bella's Giant Scab or whatever. so far we're doing okay but I'm not sure how long it'll last.

shifting gears a bit, trent went to a combined tryout for both the travel soccer team and this thing called "premier", which is more expensive but the kids play at a way higher skill level. even though I had noted on trent's signup form that we are only interested in travel (which is already kind of steep) the premier coach pulled me aside after tryouts on saturday (which bella and I spent blowing blowers, racing matchbox cars down the sloped sidewalk, and exploring the front seat of the car) to ask me if I was interested in putting trent in premier, because they think he's good enough for the team. it was a big compliment for trent (and by transitive property, for me) but I just hope we are able to do it financially. more than that, actually, I hope we are able to do it timewise. it's a big committment. we'll see how it shakes out.

what I did on my mother's day vacation

2006-05-14T18:54:00.000-05:00

we went to longwood gardens. it was really fun.

it was the orchid festival.

the flowers were really pretty.

bella liked seeing birdies.

we even saw cacti.

there were lots of flowers...

...but I enjoyed spending time with the kiddies the most.

bella got tired out from walking all over...

...she certainly wore sean out.

must've been the stairs she climbed about 40 times.

longwood is my favorite place to visit.

but I was most happy that I got my mother's day wish.

picture pages: easter and brett's birthday

2006-05-14T18:31:00.000-05:00

here are some pictures from a long time ago and not so long ago.

yesterday - bella picking a blower (dandelion)

yesterday - bella before her bath

a week or so ago - bella napping in the living room

yesterday - bella before her bath

easter - bella finds an egg

easter - bella finds her melmo basket

trent's dad brett's 32nd birthday - doesn't he look exactly like trent?

brett, smiling - he didn't know I was taking a picture

everything in moderation

2006-05-12T13:18:00.000-05:00

I am so glad it's friday. otherwise, I may just explode. work has really got me feeling like I need to play the lottery way more often.

I bought myself an ipod as a mother's day present to myself, but I haven't been successful in getting it to work. not that I don't know how to use an ipod, because I use (and upload music to) sean's all the time. part of the problem is that we both have ipods and we both use the same itunes on our home computer. so his playlists are constantly trying to upload to my ipod, and vice versa. I think we have to have our own, but his itunes is in my profile...it's just annoying. so I have it and it's sitting idly on our (antique - because I don't sew) sewing machine at home. just waiting to be used.

I have been eating really nonstop for a few days now. so hungry. I don't know what the problem is, but my defenses are way down and my ability to rationalize is at an all time high - like "the day I had today? I DESERVE 3 sodas" and "I already had 3 sodas, I may as well have this bag of milanos." moderation. I have to get back to it.

the only thing I don't want in moderation is my kids. it's mother's day and I am not really that close with my mother, and I definitely do not have the touchy-feely kind of relationship with her that I have with my own kids. maybe I did once - if so, I sincerely do not remember. we were not a huggy family. well, my dad was, and is. actually, memories are coming to me of me and my dad sitting on the couch, me wondering when I could get up and play and my dad sitting and hugging me so tightly that it almost hurt.

anyway, I won't be spending time with my mom on mother's day, simply because I never really do. but I will be spending time with the universe's two most perfect children, bella and trent. (as you mothers will be spending time with the universe's most perfect children, your own.) the two of them together, when they interact, is the most precious thing I have ever witnessed. for so long, it's been me and trent and I wasn't sure how another child would really fit in, since my heart was always so full with him. I know I've talked about this before, but it bears repeating. people kept telling me your heart just gets bigger, and I couldn't fathom it until I had bella. sometimes I love the two of them so much that I feel like I'm going to burst. I do like my career and I am glad I am working, and I love sean and I'm glad I'm a wife, but my children are my best accomplishment and what gives me the biggest amount of satisfaction.

so this weekend is mother's day and I plan to look at it as a day I get to revel in being a mother, to marvel at it all, to relive the days when they were born, and just enjoy them as much as possible for this moment in time - because they'll never be exactly like this again - instead of planning some epic dinner or opening any presents. I just want my family together, happy, (hopefully at longwood gardens) and content.

I will tell you on monday all about all the temper tantrums, snags, and aggravations that happen. hey, I can pontificate about the beauty and tranquility of motherhood all I want, but I am a realist. I will enjoy it all, though. that's what makes me who I am, and I am a mom.

weekend update

2006-05-08T16:05:00.000-05:00

I had a pretty good weekend. I got to be an independent grown up on friday night and hang out with friends from work until after midnight. saturday, I took bells to ikea, where she was too afraid to play in the ball pit, but where we did manage to spend 45 mins eating goldfish in the cafe (and limited our spending to less than $100, which is unheard of.) sunday, sean took bella to the goat races at slyfox brewery, where a friend of his had his goat win the race and subsequently had a beer named after it. I, in turn, did some retail therapy, buying stuff from stores I clearly shouldn't have been in past 1998. (but the pants are cute.) then came home to a big mac pizza (it's exactly what you think) and a slightly cranky bella while sean went to the phillies game with his friends (as his independent grown up activity for the weekend.)

the only thing missing from the weekend, and it's a recurring theme, is time with sean. these days, even when we do hang out together, I am too irritated with this or that to really enjoy it, we're both distracted, one of us is tired, or the time we do have is limited. I think it's taking a toll on us. it is on me, anyways. we really have to get away for a while together to remember why we are together beyond bella.

speaking of, bella is speaking of everything. she talks, sings, hums...she's always vocalizing. she's been scolding me lately by saying something that sounds like BEEE TEEE DAA DOUGH! DA DOUGH!! I have no idea what she is saying. she means business, though. I was in the shower on saturday when she opened the shower curtain and said "I color" while pointing to the floor, which now has orange crayon scribble on it. (well hopefully not - since sean is supposed to be cleaning today.) I was amazed that she said it enough that I didn't care so much that she did it. though I did tell her to get a piece of paper, which she did. she understands alot, this kid. but the cutest thing she's doing lately is saying "ummmmmmm" when you ask her a question. "bella, what do you want for snack?" "ummmmmmmmmmmmm...cackers." "bella, where's the doggie?" "ummmmmmmmmm...ah dunno!" so cute.

tomorrow, I get to be an independent grown up again and have dinner with nicole and a mutual friend of ours...woo! I always have a tough time when I go to the house of eggerts because I want to spend time with everyone and there never seems to be enough time. I really want one on one time with noah so I can get to know him better, and I also miss talking to mark and nicole (about things other than babies - though what, I have no idea), and of course I miss talking to nicole about everything under the sun. and then I also need more time to spend with sean, and with all of us as a family, and with brett, and with my dad.....

excuse me while my head explodes.

2 milestones

2006-05-03T14:49:00.000-05:00

not for bella, for me.

well, this one is sort of for bella. I am done breastfeeding. it happened kind of gradually, over the last few weeks, but I was not ready to say for certain that it was over in case I'd jinx myself. bella still asks for nigh-nigh (her word for nursing) but can be consoled with mokey-moke (milky-milk, her word for milk) instead. it's been about 10 days or so since I've nursed her last, and actually it could be more than that. I don't have any engorgement because I weaned her so gradually, and also because during my cold, I was taking decongestants that dry you up. I thought I'd be really more emotional over it, like I was with her walking, but strangely, I'm not. not really. because she still lets me cuddle and hold her, and she's still drinking milk from a bottle and not a cup. I'm sure I'll curse myself for that soon, but for right now, as long as it isn't attached to me by skin, I'm cool with it. now I'm free to do things that I wouldn't do because of bella - namely, get a new tattoo. silly, huh? I am not a drinker nor a smoker nor a partaker of drugs, so there's not much else that I needed to stay away from. other than medicines - thank god I can take sudafed again.

I want to get bella's name added to my back, where I already have trent's name. but more than that, I want to get something more intricate, something on a bigger scale than the tattoos I already have. why? well, it probably sounds silly, but it ties in with the other milestone - my name.

when I married sean, I took his name on a few things and kept my maiden name on some other things. which I would not recommend, by the way, because it's really gotten me into trouble. at work, they know me by my maiden name in the HR and payroll departments, but my email and all of my colleagues know me by my married name. that's because my license and soc sec # are in my maiden name - I never made a move to change them. my credit cards and bank accounts are in my married name, but my personal email addresses are in my maiden name. but the biggest snafu right now is that the deed to our house is in my married name, which the mortgage company (also in my married name) now realizes isn't official, and they need us to change it poste haste.

anyway, so I have to settle on a name. either go forward with changing everything to milligan, or go back to being patrice colancecco. and I finally, after 3 years, decided - I'm going back to colancecco. it's who I've always been, it's who I relate to, it means something to me. not that milligan doesn't, and not that everyone should make this decision. but it's right for me. and I'm lucky to have a husband that understands that and supports it. I spent 29 years of my life (28? whichever) being a colancecco and it always felt fake to pretend I was someone else.

so, with my newly dried up boobs, I am...

patrice colancecco.

update in 4 mins or less

2006-05-02T16:28:00.000-05:00

here we go.

bella - ears are now fine. off meds. had 18 mo checkup - 50th percentile for height, but 5th for weight. is cute. likes to say "shaba" - we have no idea what it means but we find it hilarious.

trent - belligerent but still better than some 13 year olds. baseball seems to be overtaking life - just in time for soccer tryouts sunday.

sean - no idea.

work - dumb.

me - still sneezy. ears are starting to hurt. perhaps I'll go to doctor.

wow. and I still have 2 mins left. I am glad nicole and mark and noah are home. their pictures of jamaica are beautiful. I came into some found money recently and am thinking about whisking away with sean to some sort of similar retreat, if only for a weekend. where should we go? ideas?

one minute left. I finished landscaping the front yard over the weekend and we got bella a sandbox and a slide for the back yard. I am pleased with the results of both endeavors. though I wish bella would stop taking the sand from the box and dumping it on the grass because a) it took me a long time to grow that damn grass and b) it's deceiving to buy play sand because it's only $5 a bag - but you need 6 bags to fill up the sandbox. it's as much to get the sand as it is to get the box...so I want to keep the sand in it.

time's up...

25 or 6 to 4

2006-04-28T13:30:00.000-05:00

does anybody really know what time it is? does anybody really care?

today, I'd like to discuss what the hell is going on with pops. I am an avid cereal eater, and I have started buying boxes for work and eating that instead of a bagel or toast or whatever. anyways, so my m.o. with eating cereal is that I can't eat too much of any one cereal or I get bored, so I never buy the same kind in back to back purchases, or even in the same month if I can help it. having gone through cocoa pebbles, vanilla creme (how I hate that spelling) mini wheats, froot loops, golden grahams, frosted chex, chocolate lucky charms, and cracklin oat bran, I was looking for the next logical cereal step. I was at target buying flat fruit and I noticed a span of yellow pops boxes. I had already put a box of cocoa puffs in my cart, but I like to have choices in the morning, so I figured I'd pick up a box of pops, too. so I go to pick one out, and there are 3 different boxes. one was the old fashioned (aka, circa 2005) yellow box, and 2 were these pops-wallpapered monstrosities with POPS emblazoned on them in different typefaces. wtf is this?

naturally, the box selection, if there is more than one style of box, comes down to which one has the better games/prize/offer. but now with these pops boxes, there's also a question of typeface. so I chose the 80s looking one with the ice age 2 prize. (meanwhile, it says "FREE FLYER by mail" - which, I know they mean frisbee, but to say it like that, it sounds so fucking cheap. a flyer? aka a scaled down poster? what kind of prize is that? and by mail no less.) anyways, so I get the box to work and open it, and notice on the side of the box, it says:

Welcome
to the bold, new look of
Kellogg's POPS.
3 unique boxes that
reflect YOUR bold,
individual style &
attitude. We are PROUD
of our look, but more
importantly
we are proud of our....
"Big Yellow Taste"
....Enjoy!

followed by pictures of 4 boxes (one is coming soon - I cannot wait) of pops. the first one looks sort of early 90s red typeface, and it is captioned "gaming". the second is a little more jazzy, with arrow heads on the loopy part of the P's, and I suppose looks sort of like graffiti. it is captioned "hip hop". the third, which is the one I actually have, is 80s-inspired early pong-graphic-y letters, and is inexplicably called "snow". the fourth, which I mentioned is coming soon, (one has to wonder exactly what the hold up was with this one - maybe the others were just so good they wanted to get them out there as quickly as possible) is more of an angular graffiti-like font and is called "skate". you can see them all on the kellogg's website here. you'll have to click on each category, though, to see the changed font.

the short version of my question is WHY? the longer version is much more complicated. sugared cereal is usually marketed to kids under 14, though lately, some general mills branded sugared cereals, like cinnamon toast crunch, are trying to capitalize on the largely underrepresented segment of adult consumers. (there are lots of us sugared cereal eaters that are over 14.) no one has really been marketing to teens - not really, anyways. you see some teens in commercials for cereal, but I think that's more of a "eat this cereal, just like this older cool kid that you want to be like" kind of thing. it's not really targeted to teens. but hip hop, gaming, and skate clearly are. I have no idea about snow - maybe they are also trying to access the untapped teen cocaine user market, or maybe canadians. weird, but whatever, I have to guess that they did market research and this is what it told them to do: market to teen boys.

but then simultaneously, the language they're using here - "bold", "style", "attitude" - while clearly not for the under 14 set, isn't really for the teen set either. it's kind of for the adults. and it seems so desperate. "we are PROUD of our look." it's like they got the focus group results back and found out everyone thinks the new boxes are stupid but they are so in love with their great branding idea that they do it anyway and now feel they have to justify it. let's not even get into what "big yellow taste" means, because that's even beyond this crazy targetting thing they have going on.

layer that on top of the aforementioned ice age 2 "free flyer" (by mail) - a KIDS movie - and it's like...dude. you're just cereal. no one expects you to be all things to all ages, especially just on your box. pick a demo and run with it. I loved you back when you told me, with a burst of pops from the O, that I gotta get....pops. I know times change, but this is ridiculous. and fucking with the logo of a brand, especially in 4 iterations (and even moreso when fucking with it in 4 iterations isn't part of a stupid contest) is like cereal shark-jumping. I hate it.

that aside, and that's alot to put aside...who the HELL did they use to write that copy? first, they want me to believe that my choice of cereal is an extension of who I am. okay, that's what they do, assign some sort of grandiose meaning to what I decide to stick in my shopping cart. but to further assess my choice in box as a unique way to reflect my bold, individual style? and my attitude? and then to actually write that out and print it on the box? when all I fucking want is to eat my cereal and maybe do a fun maze??

christ, these pops. anyways, they were good.

have a great weekend. nicole and mark and noah return tonight!

because you're all wondering, I'm sure

2006-04-26T15:04:00.000-05:00

just how are the members of the milliceccobach household doing today?

well, since you're dying to know:

sean: well, I guess he's fine. we see each other rarely anymore. and when we are together, we're dividing and conquering. we really need to get a sitter or something or just make time to start talking to each other again.

trent: developing an attitude. yesterday, he didn't have school baseball practice, but he DID have connie mack league practice. he left his baseball stuff in his homeroom and didn't bother to mention it until 4pm. so sean had to drive him back to school, and luckily the janitor was there to let him into the room. he acted like it was no big deal. I tried to tell him that if that were me, my mother would have said "tough beans" and I wouldn't have gotten to go to practice, let alone go get my stuff. that happened often with books I left at school - if I left them, it was my problem. of course I don't want to do that to trent, but on the other hand, it pisses me off when he acts so entitled to one of us jumping up to rescue him. that's the tough part of parenting an older child...the balance of teaching without leaving him to twist in the wind.

bella: completely and utterly cranky. the dog bumps into her, she crumbles to the floor in a teary heap. you tell her she can't watch bubbies, she crumbles to the floor in a teary heap. you put the wrong piece of broccoli on her plate (not that one, THAT one) and she crumbles to the floor in a teary heap. and once she's on the floor, forget trying to pick her up. then she goes into kick and scream mode. I realize she doesn't feel well, but it's ridiculous. other than that, she's taken to being the boss of our dog, maggie. she tells maggie where to go and when to stop, which is often. maggie won't be doing anything at all and bella will say "NO, maggie!" she's also taken to saying "come here" to anyone she wants to follow her. so the conversation with maggie goes thusly:

bella: comere, madgy!
maggie: [slowly comes over]
bella: GOOGIRL! GOOGIRL! (good girl)
maggie: [tail sort of wags]
bella: NO, POOSH! NO!
maggie: [looks at me wearily]

that poor dog.

me: I am a mess. I thought it was allergies but I think I have a spring cold. which sucks big time. I went through an entire box of tissues yesterday. it's just neverending snot.

and that, my friends, is all. how about you? what are you up to?

I am meekly waving hi

2006-04-24T15:55:00.000-05:00

oh god. I'm so sorry. I'm such a slacker.

here's a few reasons why: work is picking up both in terms of work itself and drama, and...well that's all.

guess what? bella's got a double ear infection. what's that you say? didn't she get tubes to stop that from happening? why yes! yes, she did. so, 10 days of antibiotics via mouth that will screw up her digestion, give her diaper rash, and cause her to be very unhappy. not to mention trying to actually give her the medicine. seriously, when I heard that she had them and has to take medicine, I just about cried myself. I just can't believe we have to go through it again. what's it been, a month?

ay yi yi. well, on the plus side, she's been doing alot of cute stuff. like fake sneezing ("ah-CHOO!") and then blessing herself ("bleshu!"). it started out as imitating me, as I sneeze on average about 10 times a day, more when it's allergy season. which is every season, but it waxes and wanes.

what I have also been noticing is that she is not a snuggler. it's amazing to me how different she is from trent. trent still likes to snuggle up, give me hugs, hold him when he's upset. for the most part, anyways. but bella? she doesn't snuggle in bed (which is one of my fondest memories of trent's baby and toddlerhood - our snuggling at night) and she doesn't like having anyone's arm around her uninvited. she doesn't always give hugs or kisses and she prefers to rub her own head, not have you rub it for her. she even started kissing her own boo-boos. not to say that she's not a loving child - she is, as witnessed by her bubbies and the two baby dolls she cares for every day - she just isn't a touchy feely kid. I'm a little disappointed, because as trent gets older and the snuggling gets more infrequent, I thought I'd have the snuggles with bella to ease that loss. who knows, maybe she'll become a snuggler..but I should get used to the idea that maybe she's just not like that.

anyway. gotta run. time's up!

it's so quiet...

2006-04-21T12:46:00.000-05:00

I'll try to post more later, but I'm a little blue. nicole's going away to jamaica for a week, and both of my work friends are out today. jarrett will be out all week next week too. so much of a bummer. I rely on these people to get me through the week! lucky for me, I have the blogosphere. so you'll probably see more of me next week.

I'm also helping to throw 2 different showers - one baby, one wedding - so I've been pretty busy. sorry for slackin.

talk to you real soon, promise.

I wanna easta egg, I wanna easta egg, I wanna easta egg

2006-04-17T14:42:00.000-05:00

which reminds me, I want the dvd of the "golden years" of looney toons.

10 minutes to post.

it was a good weekend, for the most part. saturday, I helped trent's dad plant stuff in his "front yard" - which is really a large flower bed. we planted creeping evergreen thingies and some red pansies. he just has to mulch and it'll look great. of course, my house looks like shit. but I scratched his back and so my turn is coming.

saturday afternoon was...I love sean's family and all but...horrendous. first of all, we got there early and it was more obvious than usual that sean's sister in law's family doesn't care about sean's side of the family at all. in fact, when sean went outside at one point to get trent and bella, and he had to walk through a tables of her family, not only did they not say a word in response to him saying hello to them, it got dead silent. like they couldn't speak AT ALL if he were there, let alone to answer his polite question. but the biggest pain in the ass was that we found out that jo-anne didn't come and didn't give a reason. the consensus is that it was because we were there. which may or may not be true. but if it is...man. missing your grandchild's birthday party because your son, who got mad at you for asking to return a christmas present, is there...that's insanity. so I feel like I have to stop the insanity, because I don't think it's fair for anyone to feel like they have to either invite us to things or invite her. it's ridiculous.

so anyways, after that atrocity, we went to franklin mills and then to find plastic eggs on easter eve. needless to say, it didn't go well. we got a bunch of oddly-shaped yellow eggs with various kinds of smiley faces on them. luckily, sean found our original egg stash, so we had plenty to hide.

on easter, bella did a phenomenal job of finding eggs. she even found eggs that I had hidden for trent, inside baskets and on shelves. we had to hide eggs several times that morning. she loved it. dinner was okay - a bit expensive, as trent decided (and we allowed him) to have surf & turf at market price, not knowing what market price is. (it's $52.) bella had the run of the 200-year-old inn, and she's lucky she's cute, because she was really running. she looked darling in a white pinafore dress, green crocheted (at first I typed "crotched") sweater, and pink leggings and these shoes. trent looked so much like a little man - he was wearing dress pants and a yellow pinstriped oxford. my kids. so cute.

in other news, I have horrible cramps and I guess I have to clear the air with jo-anne. so..wish me luck. time's up.