all the good people hate shrimp

so I have food issues. most of my friends know this. I don't believe in cheesecake because cheese does not belong in cake. neither do carrots. and zucchini doesn't belong in bread. I don't like my food to touch on the plate and I eat one thing at a time. I think cow's milk is for calfs only. if I eat yogurt, I can't look at the part of the container that says "active culture". [sidenote: I am eating yogurt for breakfast this morning. I couldn't remember the exact phrase on the yogurt container that I was thinking of, because I try not to look at the container, but in order to get it right I looked at the container. and now I cannot finish my yogurt.] I can't eat chicken if it has bones. for the most part, I only like hotdogs in retrospect out of a sense of nostalgia. basically, I can't think too much about food at all or I can't seem to eat it. unless it's cookies or candy, because I can't find anything wrong with them whatsoever.

the one group of food that I really cannot seem to understand even more than cheesecake is seafood. the fishy type fish, like salmon, I can't stomach because I can't seem to eat something that is in the same basic shape as it was when it was alive. fish are small enough that you can tell exactly what it looked like when it was swimming around. and the eyes bug me out, even if they aren't on the fish when it's served. I picture them on the fish and I can't do it. and that's not even talking about the black/brown parts you often find in fish. what the hell is that, anyways.

and then there are shellfish. shellfish are the most insane foodstuffs that I can think of, besides creepy areas where they eat dogs and stuff. they are pointy and hard and freaky. oysters - what kind of darwinian throwback is that?? what would you do if you saw a lobster crawling on you in the middle of the night, throw on a bib and melt some butter?? I wouldn't find the biggest spider possible and crack open its legs, so I can't understand king crab legs. and shrimp? people, it's a centipede that has adapted to water.

so my friend jen found this site and sent it to me. and it's all the ammunition I need for when people try to ARGUE with me that seafood (especially shrimp) is good and I should like it. (this is infinitely better than my standard "I'm allergic to shrimp" line.) in fact, I think I will get this url printed on a business card and hand it out. if only they'd branch out into cheesecake territory and lose the gay thing. oh, and not be so sarcastic about it.

sweet potatoes

so bella's ears are probably doing okay, but she is totally cranky. she hates the medicine. and hates us for giving it to her. nicole said that she thought that in some weird way, noah wouldn't trust her anymore for leaving him behind, and I feel the same way about bella not trusting me to take good care of her and not bring her harm. I mean, she seriously tenses up her whole body, her eyes bug out, and she shakes when we try to give her the medicine. it's like we're feeding her shards of glass. it's gotten to the point that I can't be in the room (or on the same floor) when sean and trent give her the medicine. (ps, thank god for sean and trent.)

so I have ruined her trust in me. and to make it more official, we pissed her off some more when trying to get her to at least try eating solid food again. this time, it was sweet potatoes. she had seemed kind of interested in what we were eating at dinner last night, so we broke out the rubber-tipped spoons again. and this time she took to it like a fish to water!!

just kidding.

she did open her mouth once. the rest of the time she pursed her lips like a little old biddy and scowled at us.

all this is taking a toll on my confidence. I know it'll pass, so it's not like I need pep talks or anything, but I do feel pretty down in general. but my good friend TV helped salve the wounds yesterday. though I felt unfulfilled by a eliminationless mat on TAR, and had a sense of "and here I am at 30 sitting on my couch" while the AI contestants sang songs from the year of their birth that I distinctly remember as coming out during my prime rollerskating years and well into my sullen teenager years...though the ROCKERS bob ice and constantine the greek are only a year or two younger than me, so that's nice.

so I'm just going to try to lay low today. we'll see how that goes.

babies.

thanks, theresa, for introducing me to photobucket by way of your blog.

the hair.

I love my hair stylist/hair cutter person/"hair strand manipulator" - as a person. Larry has excellent hair, dresses the way I'd probably dress if I were a guy, and is, in general, a nice person. and he even cuts my hair well. (and larry is, against stereotypes, hetero, fyi.)

but the styling? uh uh. I would tell him to just leave it air dry (lord knows I'm going to go home and do it myself anyways, so why waste product) but he seems to really enjoy styling my hair. like he gets to run around me in circles spritzing, ironing, curling...maybe he thinks to himself "she dresses the way I'd dress if I were a girl" and just runs with that. but he styles with such abandon that I feel badly telling him not to bother with the control paste for today. so off he goes, gleefully scrunching and plugging things in and spritzing.

I have had the same basic hair cut for the past 5 months. I come in to get it tweaked and trimmed, but each time I leave, I look like a different maniac. (and I do look like a maniac when I get out of there.) once, he decided to flatiron the whole thing. but I'm not sure if he were sick on the day they learned about flatirons at jean madeline, because he ironed my hair in such a way that it looked like I had stuck a finger in the light socket. seriously.

the next time, in an effort to keep him away from the flatiron, I said I liked it curly. now, my hair is long on the sides, but short in the back. (just go with me here.) instead of curling the pieces that naturally curl in my hair (so why curl them at all? the mind boggles) he decided to curl all of it. even the pieces that are roughly an inch long. in all different directions. so I left the salon looking like a deranged remake of "whatever happened to baby jane" featuring shirley temple instead of baby jane hudson.

this wouldn't be such a problem if I went to a normal salon. leave the building, get in car, walk in house, get in shower, problem solved. instead, my salon is located in the plymouth meeting mall, along with my most favorite store, h&m. there is also an h&m in the mall closer to my house, but it doesn't have baby clothes. so I always make the hair appointment coincide with a shopping run. in order to get back in time for TV, er, family time, I usually have larry cut my hair around 6ish, then hit h&m before leaving. so what happens is I leave the salon looking garish and walking through the mall scaring people. or at least soliciting many, many stares.

I guess I should be somewhat happy about the situation, though, because it's really difficult to spend alot of money on clothes for myself when the stress of trying things on in front of a full length mirror with harsh lighting is compounded by catching stray glimpses of the inconvenience on top of my head.

but last night, after getting my hair cut, it was more than an idle stroll through the racks at h&m that I was planning - I seriously need clothing, since none of my old stuff fits right post-bella. and let's face it, I want new clothes. but I think last night's haircut took the prize for all-time worst styling...and this time, it wasn't all larry's fault.

this time, it was the cut AND the styling. and I am the one who told him to cut it that way.

now, when larry gets done styling my hair, even he looks a little skeptical at the results. but short of washing it and starting all over again, there's not much to be done. however, this time, larry was more than just a little skeptical. and my usual poker face was crumbling, too. people, this hair cut is BAAAAAD.

let's just say this - 2 different sizes of flatirons AND a curling iron AND about 6 different styling products on top of my bad haircut. okay? the possibilities in your mind...picture the worst and that is what I looked like, about to embark on serious spring wardrobe choices.

I left the mall with 2 shirts that were the same as ones I already own, only in different colors. because those were the only things I *didn't* try on. and I got home at 9pm. do the math. that's alot of clothes having been tried on.

I came back to sean and trent, who just stared at me for a few long moments. and when those two can realize that my hair is bad, it's reaaaal bad.

I'm wondering if I have to divorce larry. in divorcing larry, I am divorcing the entire salon. I'm not sure if I am ready for that step yet...we'll have to see what happens next time.

stream of unconsciousness

bella woke up on saturday with a burning-hot fever. I called the doctor and got an appointment that morning. she was seemingly fine except she was burning up - not really too cranky, she was still eating, she just didn't seem sick except she was hot. turns out she has her very first ear infection. trent went through many of them when he was a baby - so many, in fact, that he had to have tubes in his ears. I myself had tubes twice when I was a baby. so it wasn't unfamiliar territory to hear about it. she is on antibiotics and her fever went down after about a day. she hates taking the medicine and it's all I can do to get it in her.

though hearing about the issue wasn't unfamiliar, dealing with it felt alien. I remember clips of trent's ear infections - driving around for hours at night, having him sleep in his infant seat, pushing him around in circles in his stroller in the living room at 2am - but I didn't remember much else.

like most people, there are 2 places where I find myself free-associating and doing the majority of my thinking: the shower, and my car. I usually listen to the radio in the shower and in the car, always the news station, but lately, I've been listening to music at least in the car, and this makes for more "meaningful" head banter. this is what I thought about on my car ride this morning from daycare to work.

bella. the crying. I hate giving her medicine. it wasn't that hard with trent. I don't think it was that hard with trent.

I hate giving her medicine. I have to squeeze her cheeks so she'll open her mouth enough to get a drop or two of the medicine in and then open wide to scream in frustration, then I can squirt more in the back of her throat so that she has to swallow - but not too much or she'll choke and throw up. I know I didn't have to do that with trent, because I never had a medicine syringe before.

did I just forget more about trent? it's crazy how I had less, was younger, had less patience, and in a way, cared less, but I'm thrown into a total tailspin when I should be saying "this, THIS is easy. wait till she poops her pants in public and I have no spare clothes."

I thought it would be much easier this time, because I have experience, because I have the wisdom of 11 years of parenting under my belt, and because I have someone to help me. but I increasingly feel that it's harder. and bella's not a harder baby - she's very well behaved. so it's me. and it makes me sad.

I passed a dead possum on the road and a dead something else that had golden fur. I hate to think it was someone's dog so I looked away. I saw all the cars driving around and felt the weight of the world pressing down on me as everyone else lived their own lives and went their own ways. I felt alone. I feel alone.

part of me wanted to flee back to the daycare, scoop up bella, and just take her home and be with her, whether she was cranky or not - and pick up trent on the way and just sit with them both and hug them till we all fell asleep. and the other part, a smaller part of course, wanted to drive on past my work campus...past the town, the city, the state line...as far as I could get.

it sounds like somebody's got a case of the mondays.

a halls moment

to update you on the sleeping arrangement - still not good. it's seriously about 10 degrees warmer in our bedroom than in the hallway...and our window is wide open and there are no windows in the hallway. we're not used to having a neighbor on the other side of our house (it was vacant up until like october of last year) and while it was fantastic in the winter - witness our $7 gas bill every month - it is going to be hellish in the summer, I gather. so we have already opened the windows wide, plugged in the fan, and have bella sleeping in her onesie. and she's still hot. probably because she's sleeping between me and The Heater, monsignor milligan himself. (yes. she sleeps in our bed. bad, bad, bad. yes, she'll be 28 years old and still sleeping with us, we know, we know.)

so anyway. bella's new thing, it's so funny. coughing. now, when babies learn something new, they do it over and over again. it's mostly because they don't have alot of material to work with. it's either scream, ba-ba-ba, or whatever is new. in this case, coughing. the most fake, artificial cough you ever heard. and it doesn't help that she does it while smiling. I tell her all the time, "bells, you are fooling NOONE. you are a total faker." which makes her giggle and cough some more.

I hope I remember these days when she's older.

Cause I'm the Tax Man...

got our taxes done last night. panic ensued. last year, I was a 1099 contractor for the entire year, and while sean, the wonderful person that he is, kept enough money aside to pay our taxes, I just was not prepared for the amount of money they said we owed. so much so that on the way home, instead of driving to our house, I drove to our old apartment.

I thought that would be the highlight of the evening, but bella stole the show. she (and I) had been pretty tired due to both poorly sleeping and the daylight savings time change, but last night was not a night of peaceful rest. at about 2:30am, she woke up and vomited. I don't mean spit up...I mean heaving, forceful, reverse peristalsis. with dry heaves. she was clammy, pale, and wide eyed. and I was frantic, freaked out, and wide eyed. we think it was because she was too hot and drank too much...but who knows. [drank too much MILK, people.]

we called the pediatrician this morning who said that it could be nothing or it could be any one of about 60 things...but if she only did it once, there's not much to either do or worry about. and they said she'd have to take it easy today.

so no jogging or aerobics for bella today, and no running errands to the store, I guess. and we'll have to excuse her from doing her chores, even though the house is mighty dusty. the doc says take it easy, so today bella has to live the leisurely life.

I hope I get some sleep tonight.

murphy's law

a bad weekend. is it any surprise? I seem to be the walking embodiment of murphy's law. like william h. macy in "the cooler," shit seems to go wrong just by me being in the immediate vicinity.

I will say this though. friday was a good day. went to ross because trent informed me that suddenly none of his pants fit anymore. found crippety crap there. but then I went to kohl's on the off chance that something would be on sale (which is so stupid. they never NOT have a sale. I don't even know how they stay in business.) and of course everything was on sale. stuff was on sale for like 99% off. I got 2 pairs of shoes for $5 each. so friday was more or less a success...when you take away the part where I was at work.

saturday. janette's shower. at a bar. in chinatown. a baby shower in the balcony bar at the trocadero. (sidenote: when telling my dad about the shower, he and Kathy said "the old burlesque place???") so, bella's first bar. but before we even get to the shower, there's the whole fiasco of getting trent and bella and me ready, and dropping trent off at my dad's so he can stay over and go to cabela's on sunday with him and my nephew albert. blah blah blah we were late. and it was raining to end all rains. seriously like flood weather.

drop off trent and get to nicole's. instead of 40 leisurely minutes to spend preparing, I get there less than 10 minutes before we were supposed to leave. and they lock their door and could not hear me knocking 4 times and they have no awning so I was wet even before we started. foreshadowing anyone?

we try to take one car and put bella's carseat in their saturn. no dice - mark's legs are too long. so as we stand in the rain figuring out what to do, I say screw it and decide to take my car too. drive to the troc at 10th and arch. for some reason, everyone on earth is driving in chinatown. why?? was there something at the convention center we didn't know about???? because it wasn't supposed to be that hard. nicole calls my cell from her car right in front of me. how far do we want to walk? dammit, we gotta get in a paid lot, that's the only way. so we do. one that charges $18 if you're anywhere over 90 minutes. still, the walk is long enough that it's annoying. noah's in the bjorn but bella is in the stroller. I try to navigate a stroller with one hand (they are not meant to be steered by one hand) and with the other I try to both shelter bella from the rain with my umbrella and try to get under it myself. like that'll work.

we get to the troc at 2 like the invite said. I never realized that there are 4 million steps to the balcony. mark took the baby carrier and I folded up the stroller and we trekked up. all 4 people already at the venue looked at us as we entered looking like drowned rats. okay, I lie, it was 8 people.

so we sit at the highboy tables on bar stools. mark gets beers for him and nicole and a soda for me. wouldn't it be funny to take a picture with the babies pretending they are holding beers? and guess what happens next. luckily, no one was in the way of the spilled beer, except one of bella's toys. (sidenote: I just remembered that I had clipped that toy to her carseat and it reeks of beer. where is the carseat now? at daycare. in a very enclosed space that I'm sure is not used to smelling like beer.) ha ha, noah spilled a beer. we're in a bar. no biggie.

about 5 minutes later, bella's all "noah always gets to spill things and I NEVER do. no fair." and proceeds to spill my full soda. but to outdo noah, she made sure to spill it on someone. me. as nicole says, it's lucky I was wearing black pants so no one really knew but me that my entire right leg was completely soaked. wet, cold, and sticky, I tried to just smile about it. even as the ice in my sock melted.

so I said we got there at 2. I think janette and perry got there around a day later. I say that to make the actual time they got there seem sooner. now I'm not saying that to be mean - hell, if I had to drive from reading in that awful rain and was pregnant, I'd be telling people they're lucky they saw me at all. so I say THEY WERE REALLY LATE with love and respect and total understanding. but they were late. reallllly late.

so after janette mingled and several hours had gone by, and we finally watched her open presents, we were ready to leave. it seriously was raining cats and dogs. the thuds...they were awful. so much blood. so we decide to leave nicole in the lobby with the babies and go get our two separate cars from the parking garage and double park outside so the babies have minimal wetness. mark and I charge out to the parking garage. halfway there, I remember...I need the ticket to get out of the garage. I tell mark to keep going and I run back. I get the ticket. I set out again. I get halfway again and remember that they also ask for money. I run back to get money. by this time, I am so soaked that it no longer matters if I use my (crappy) umbrella or not.

I finally get my car, navigate to the troc, and park about a car's length away from the corner directly in front of a fire hydrant, put on my flashers, and become a fucking genius, in that I run into the lobby and get bella FIRST, put her in the car, which is running, and THEN go to get my stroller. this is where the story could have been really bad but I guess proves that I am somewhat lucky...because no one stole my car and baby. so thank you, gods. so there I am, soaked, I get in my car, and someone swings around the corner and parks about 2 inches behind me. I mean, I'm already illegally parked, but to park behind someone illegally parked? idiot!!! and of course it was some emo thrift-chic asshole checking to see what stupid band was playing next at the troc. and he left some passengers in his car. so I went forwardbackforwardbackforwardback a million times trying to get out of the spot and then I finally tapped his car. because it was 2 fucking inches behind me!!! what were my options, people? I gave his friends ample time to write down my license plate number so I guess I'll get to tell them in person that they are complete fools.

nicole had to lend me new pants and socks and I couldn't wear my coat home because it was too wet, even after letting it dry for 2 or so hours while the eggerts fed me and listened to my lunatic ravings.

got home, went to bed. looked forward to not getting out of pajamas all day on sunday because my dad was dropping trent off later in the day.

woke up the next morning to kathy calling me to tell me that the kids were NOT going to cabela's because the whole lot of them had spent the night bailing water out of my dad's basement. and could I come down to pick him up? what am I going to say, "no, sorry, I had a bad day yesterday and don't feel like travelling - sorry, you have to bring him to me even though you're 65 and stayed up all night doing bucket brigade." so I dressed myself and bella and went to get him. and helped with the bucket brigade. and took a sleepy trent and overtired bella to our next nightmare: costco.

I have never been to costco. do you know it costs $45 to be able to shop there? and I had to get a "business" account. because even though I could not find anyone remotely looking like a businessperson in there, apparently all the women with kids and old men in there were businesses. and everyone on earth had decided to go to costco yesterday. do you know you have to go in the exit to get a membership? seems like they might have signs there to tell you that BEFORE you get your cart and fight through literally throngs of people only to have someone yell "CARD!!!! WHERE'S YOUR CARD??????" before you find out you need some sort of card to get in.

you oughta see the picture that's on my costco card. a picture of a woman about to break. and I'll hand that over every single time I go to costco. so all 4 more times.

came home exhausted, waited impatiently for sean, ate expensive italian takeout that then had me in the bathroom for a half hour doubled over in pain, watched nancy drew the series season one (seriously) and then took a tossing and turning bella to bed. she woke up like clockwork every hour until my alarm went off. got to daycare late (with beer soaked toy) and rushed to work to get to my 9:30am meeting, which I found out minutes before it was to happen that it was cancelled.

welcome to my life, folks. it seems to only get better and better.

this one is about clothes.

since 2 things that happened this morning that involved fashion struck me as new and major differences between Old Life (pre bella) and New Life (post bella), I figured I'd write about them.

Thing 1. I am wearing Lands End jeans. my zipper is like 8 inches long. the wash on them is something circa 1991, a creamy blue faded denim. they have an enormous amount of stretch in the fabric. they have small pockets in the front. and though they are "boot cut", they are suspiciously straight legged, almost as if they are trying to become tapered somehow. why am I wearing them? it's not because I have no other jeans to wear. (though that's true, the rest ARE in the laundry.) it's because they are the ones that look the best on me. because they are high waisted. this is what I've become, folks. someone who needs high waisted pants.

if I don't wear high waisted pants, I have a couple of options. let the pouch hang over, or try to hike up the pants higher so the pouch can be tucked in. hiking up the pants gives a very serious probability of camel toe. letting the pouch hang over requires a good deal of thought on the shirt options, as I'll need something that will not allow the pouch to either be seen from underneath or be tight enough to show the ripley, mottled, roll-y lunar surface of my belly skin.

so instead of putting myself through that agony, I chose today to just go ahead and embrace middle age and just wear the high waisted lands end jeans already. but god help me, I will NOT wear the pants with the elastic on the back waistband. (though...and I say this in confidence, so don't tell...I do own a pair of those.)

Thing 2. I was reading nicole's blog and theresa asked about snaps on her bra. like do you have snaps on your bra instead of the little hook and eye clips that all other bras have. and it made me chuckle because there's a whole world of bras out there that women who don't breastfeed or have children don't know about. which is good for them. all of you ladies who don't have kids - these snappy bras are nursing bras. the cups fold down so that you can pull the girls out to nourish the baby. actually, and I've said this to sean before, I'm surprised that all bras aren't like this because it does lend some very handy accessibility for non-nourishment purposes. but regular women would never wear these nursing bras. why not? because they fit like the black leather glove on OJ's hand. I have purchased 40 thousand nursing bras and not ONE of them fits me correctly. short of getting some made for me, which they actually do (!!!) because none of the others ever fit, you just have to live with some area of the bra not fitting right. (and I'm not even that large in the chesticular area. poor nicole's giant rack literally busts out of her bras.)

there's more to not fitting than just the annoyance of the not fitting. there's the whole what bra could I possibly wear with this shirt dilemma. because some cups are not completely filled out until I'm seriously engorged with milk. (that's a whole nother post.) so they look wrinkly. which looks awful under shirts. and then there's the clips - they poke out of your shirt like misplaced nipples. like "why are patrice's nipples way up on her clavicles??" and then there's the nursing pads. people, imagine trying to get away with wearing a stayfree if you were forced to wear lycra workout tights every day. I have to stuff these stupid circle-shaped pads in my bra every day so that if milk decides to spontaneously come out (which does happen from time to time) there's something to soak it up. so not only do I have misplace nipple-looking clips, it looks like I'm stuffing my bra.

now, I am not saying all of this to scare anyone. I'm just telling it like it is. and this is true for me and some of my mom-friends. (okay, I only have one mom-friend.) but not all mothers have either or both of these issues. my sister can wear the lowest-rise jeans imaginable, the kind where they're more or less giant denim legwarmers that happen to be joined at the top by a small strip of waistband. and she's had 3 kids. granted, she's addicted to exercise, but anyway. and there are women I know who were back to their size 6 pants within 4 months of having a baby, with no discernable bulging. and there are breastfeeders who somehow manage to have nice bras.

I'm just telling you the view from my closet.

and this is why I suck sometimes.

because meanwhile I'm all "time for the little things" and IT IS BELLA'S FIFTH MONTH BIRTHDAY. today, bella is officially five months old.

a lifetime and a blink of an eye, all at the same time.

all quiet on the eastern front

there's not much going on, actually. I haven't done anything stupid KNOCK ON WOOD KNOCK ON WOOD that has aggravated me, bella hasn't started regressing OR playing piano or speaking in full sentences in french, trent hasn't forgotten to do anything at the last minute...even my clothes are not breaking.

but that does remind me - cute easter outfit whose skirt zipper broke? replaced it. wore it today. looks totally stupid. it's too long and flouncy and I feel like a 50s housewife who did some sort of freaky friday move and is at her husband's work instead of home vacuuming in pearls. this is the skirt, from target. cute enough in the picture, cute enough on the rack. not cute on patrice.

maybe it would be cuter if I weren't in 2.5" heels. doesn't sound like alot but it really is. and the white non-whore fishnets. but a softer green cardigan (yeah, flouncy skirt and cardigan - all I need is a quaaludes smile and a pink plastic mixer and I'm totally a 1956 life magazine ad) and these heels are really not cutting it - not for work, anyways.

anyway. this gives me time to reflect on life's little mysteries. like why we still make clothing that wrinkles when the wind blows the wrong way. or why some people can't appreciate a good hardy boys tv show episode. or why bad food tastes so good. or why corn is shaped that way.

I could go on. couldn't you?

On becoming baby wiser

so everyone who is everyone knows you're supposed to read to your babies. otherwise they will grow up really dumb. well, I guess we were really busy and all, because we totally forgot. we play with bella, we stick her on her stomach so she can flail around and get frustrated, and we put her in a baby einstein saucer, even, in an effort to make her smarter. (side note: at what age is she supposed to get the funny implication that the boingy mr. sun is next to the rattle replica of the globe? because she's already almost 5 months old and STILL doesn't get it.) we even let her watch american idol on tv so she can see how horrible some of the singers are and learn not to go to auditions unless she really is that good. but we've forgotten to read to her.

when reminded, sean and I both looked at each other like, oh shit. our friend nicole reads to noah all the time, because she is smart (her mother must have read to her) and a good mother. she even buys books for him. and not just to put on the shelf to make it look like she reads to him, she really actually does it.

to be fair, sean does read decibel magazine to bella, but that's only once a month. she seems to enjoy the tales about Lamb of God (formerly Burn the Priest) and Cephalic Carnage. sean said she'll appreciate this month's interview with Failure conducted by Cave In. (okay, even I like those bands, but still.) but that's still only once-the-month, and that is Not Enough.

so when we were no longer able to pretend the problem doesn't exist, I sort of broke down. "we're retarding our baby." sean gently reminded me that she's still young, we can still start reading to her, but I was not so sure. she's almost 5 months, as I said. considering that some women strap walkmans (walkmen?) to their baby pouches that play mozart and books on tape, we are clearly very very far behind.

I read her a book soon after, and so did sean. we read the book nicole gave us - on the day you were born - and bella was not interested. she stared off into space, she blew raspberries, she pounded at the pages, she even tried to eat the book. I varied my tempo, I acted like each word was more wonderous than the next, I even let my eyes get really wide while reading. bella was like "whatEVER." so it's evident to me that we've waited too long and now bella is going to grow up really dumb.

we've failed.

sean's still trying though. today he's reading a book my mom gave us called "the meaning of life." (meanwhile, the book's prologue says that it doesn't really give you the meaning of life. I wonder if my mom noticed that before purchasing it. my guess is no.) I am sure that any wisdom in this book will be lost on bella because we didn't start reading to her earlier.

but on the bright side, I can say anything I want about her childhood in this blog because even in the off chance that it survives until she's older, she'll never be able to read it because we started reading to her too late. LABOR WAS A TOTAL FUCKING BITCH AND IT HURT LIKE HELL AND I NEVER WANT TO GO THROUGH IT AGAIN. there.

if she could read this, though, I'd want her to read that I am sorry that we've retarded her. baby bubblegum, little boba fett, I am sorry!

this one has to do with EASTER.

let me just start by saying that my intention in having this new baby was to have more of the, how you say, "normal" parenting experience. like mommy and daddy and baby and when one parent has had enough, the other comes in to help. or they tag team. or whatever. but with sean working 12 hour days on weekends and me working during the week, we never see each other, and I am often reminded of how freaking difficult it is to take care of a baby alone with no respite. to wit: easter sunday.

it started out okay. trent was with his dad, sean went off to work at 5am as usual. we woke up around 8ish, bella was in a good mood. I put her tights in with some wash so they'd shrink enough so that she didn't have such bad elephant legs. we lounged. I knew I had to be at the (really really far away) restaurant to meet my sister and my mom and the people that go with them at 4pm. figuring since denise decided to pick a restaurant in freakin easton, which is like an hour or more away (and not like in the city an hour away, it's in the middle of nowhere an hour away, which is decidedly longer), and having to pick trent up at his grandparents, I should leave around 2. that gets me to trent around 2:30, his grandmother oohs and ahhs at bella for a few minutes, and we're on the road by 2:50ish. stop for money at an atm, we're in bumblefuck by 4 no problem.

working backwards, as I always do, having to get out the door by 2 means having to get in the shower by like 1ish, probably a bit earlier. I had an advantage in knowing what I was wearing and what bella was wearing, so I could cut out time to find outfits for the 2 of us.

so around noon, I went down to get bella's tights out of the dryer. the dryer is in the basement. I, being the bad parent I am, had put bella in the baby einstein saucer thing (which sean calls "the command center") while I went to the basement. she looked really happy to be in there, even though she'd been in there for about 20 mins already. I literally thought, and I kid you not, "she looks as happy as a pig in shit." seriously.

so I go to pick her up out of the command center, and as she leans forward, I see a HUGE amount of mustard looking stain on her back. that's right. BLOWOUT. of gigantic proportions. the command center seat was compromised. I take her upstairs, attempt to change her diaper, smear shit all over her and me, and then proceed to take her, naked, into the bathroom to give her a not-anticipated bath. it's about 12:30 by the time I get her in there. as it was a rush job, I had just taken the towel she had already used and put it on the floor for when I take her out of the bath.

as soon as I put her in the water, she peed. so I bathed her in pee pee diluted water. some bath. when I picked up her wet, wriggly body to put her on the towel I had laid out, I noticed that maggie, our dog, had picked up the towel and taken it into the corner of the bathroom and was laying on it like it was her personal bedding. so I have a cold, wet, wriggling baby and no where to dry her off. I took her in and put her on the bed and used our blanket to dry her off.

I got her all changed, and I was a little behind schedule, but things were still okay. I put her in the travel swing in the bathroom while I embarked on what would become a marathon shower. because, and I haven't told anyone but sean this, I have not shaved my legs since bella was born. I've worn plenty of skirts, but always with black stockings. if you looked really closely at my legs with the stockings on, you could have seen hairs poking through, but no one looks that closely. easter, however, called for white fishnets, naturally. (they look less trashy than they sound.) so I had to break out the razor. and it took FOREVER. the razor kept getting clogged. this is seriously disgusting but hey, you're the one still reading.

and to make matters worse, we have what I like to call a Shath. I've been shedding like a dog in july but even though I clean out the drain after every shower, I guess enough hair goes down (or other stuff, I don't know what's down in those pipes) that the shower tends to get clogged early on in the shower experience, causing the showeree to have both a bath and a shower at the same time. a Shath. so I'm in the Shath, bits of leg hair swirling around in the water.

(sidenote: during my shower, I was listening to the radio and of course, they were talking about politics and/or the pope and/or terry shiavo. I can't remember which story I was thinking about when I thought of what I say quite often about things: "I'd rather eat glass than...." and then I had another one of those "what if a serial killer kidnapped me" moments where I wondered if I ever got captured by a serial killer and he actually did make me eat glass, what would that be like? and maybe I shouldn't say that in case a serial killer were stalking me and was planning to make me literally eat my words. but anyway.)

so now that bella and I were both "clean", I started to get dressed. I had purchased an outfit specifically for easter from target - a cute pleated skirt, the white non-whore fishnets, an existing black shirt, and one of those trendy shrugs that ties under your boobs. I donned the fishnets and the shirt, and waited until all makeup and hair had been done before I put on the skirt, so as not to wrinkle it. and...the zipper broke. and I spent about a half hour trying to fix it. it's now 1:40. and my target leave time is 2. of course, I tried on every combination of the pieces that were left of the specifically purchased outfit with existing clothing and everything looked dumb. I wound up wearing the white fishnets (signifying spring) with a teal pleated corduroy skirt (signifying fall) and a black cardigan (signifying winter) that had bejeweled buttons (signifying simple bad taste) with red flat mary janes (signifying long-gone youth.) I looked sufficiently stupid as I left the house at 2:25. (after screaming at sean about directions that made no sense. sean, I am sorry.)

we got trent, we let his grandmother ooh and ahh over bella, and actually made it to the middle of nowhere a half hour early. how do these things work out? because though it may seem like "whew, she got there early" it was more like "what the hell am I supposed to do for 30 minutes out in the middle of nowhere??"

the whole time all of this was going on, I kept feeling like - hey, I am married this time, I have a loving husband and father to my child. why on earth do I still feel like a goddamn single parent??????

in the plus column, however, the place we ate at was beautiful. like right on the delaware, with the delaware canal on the other side of the restaurant. our table faced new jersey (in a good way) and we saw ducks and floating debris. beautiful.

nuts.

I just found a small piece of nut in my sock. like inside the sock next to my foot. so it had to come from my house. we don't really eat nuts. so this baffles me. perhaps it is a sign - but of what? impending insanity? messy floors? a stranger eating a drumstik in our bedroom?

I think I am worried.

you put the lime in the coke, you nut.

I can't get that out of my mind. anyways.

so the kitchen is done. well, as done as it can be now without us having ordered countertops or found someone cheap enough to install them. and the floor isn't done, either. but the painting and hardware and all that is done. and it looks fantastic. though it makes the countertops look like ass, not to mention the shitty floor looks even shittier. so there's still work to do. but overall? love it.

so today seems to be a day where I can take a breath. just a short one. it's been hectic lately. I will feel better when I go home tonight and sean has put the kitchen back together. we've decided we need a new microwave to match the kitchen. (though I'm not sold on it, but I do like the idea because it would mean we won't have to try to clean the one we have now - which, if anyone from some important health agency saw it, they'd totally take our children away.)

oh! and the stupid avant garde knobs-as-handles idea? BRILLIANT. seriously. not just because I thought of it. it looks really cool. when the cabinets are closed, the knobs look like this
:: instead of this [ ] and it's excellent. I can't believe I thought of something that actually works.

now we have to work on the upstairs. we need carpet, stat. trent had a friend over the other day (!!!) and they were playing basketball in trent's room and....it is paining me to even type this...I am squirming all over in my chair but I have to do it...so the kids are in their socks, and....oh god...oh sweet jesus....the friend pulls his foot back and....gaahhhhhh....GOT THE BIGGEST SPLINTER I EVER SAW IN HIS BIG TOE AND IT WAS SO BIG THAT IT DISAPPEARED INTO THE MEAT OF HIS TOE AND IT WAS LIKE A HALF INCH LONG AND IT LOOKED HELLA PAINFUL AND OH GOD OH GOD OH GOD

okay. took a little break there. we got out the....OH GOD OH GOD OH GOD

okay. we took out the splinter and that is the last we shall speak of that part. so now we know we need carpet. or something. in all rooms up there. so that's our next big thing to tackle. because if I ever have to see anything like that again, I may just go into shock.

thank god it's tuesday

I'm so glad last week is over. that was hellish. this week seems to be a little better...knock on wood. saturday we had nicole and mark and master noah over (check the site for a crazy conjoined baby head picture), and that was fun. we just kind of lounged around aimlessly and looked at each other's babies. a little later, my most favorite mother in law (what do you mean, I only have one?) came over to watch bella for the first time ever while we went to the sixers game. again, fun (sixers game, that is). but when sean mentioned how cute bella is, I had to shush him, because I can't start thinking about her when I'm away or I get freaked out. june, and our trip to vegas, is rapidly approaching and just thinking about it makes me feel like I'm going to hyperventilate.

so the "workers" are coming over again today to "finish" our "kitchen". "it" "should" "be" "great". workers really mean rhonda, finish really means put on yet another coat of paint, and kitchen really means...well...kitchen. and of course we are totally prepared for our company tonight of joe and sandrine, and for tomorrow's guests kristen, brian, julie and josh. completely prepared! thank you, sarcasm-implying italics!

but here's the real news. hang onto your hats for this one. so our neighbor apparently has some, um, special pets. once when he moved in, he accused our other neighbor of stealing an aquarium he had out in his back yard, and "now the alligator has to be in the tub!" yeah. so apparently he also has something that eats small rodents. how do we know? because they escaped into our house, where, unbeknownst to them, our attack kat was lying in wait.

(sidenote: while I was typing, I totally just choked on my own saliva. like my saliva went down the wrong pipe. I wouldn't have believed that is possible if it didn't just happen to me. seriously. choked. on my own saliva.)

anyways, for about a week, we heard the mice in the radiators and watched as one by one, the cat found them, mutilated them, and played with their half-dead bodies. and how did we know that they were from next door? well, I have seen a few mice in my day, and they are sort of smallish, brown, and have actual instincts that lead them to run away from cats. these were miniscule, white, and had no idea what the hell they were doing.

so we know that the neighbor has mice that get out. we recently heard another mouse in our wall, and the cat was on patrol by one of our radiators again. she didn't pull it out (though she ripped up the carpet something fierce) but after a while, we heard no more scratching. the optimist in me (a small, little part of me) thought it had escaped into the wilderness where mice can run free without fear of being eaten. but a few days later...the stench started. the stench of death. we changed the baby's diapers repeatedly and looked for dog or cat poop but that was just a ruse - it was not shit we smelled. it was the aroma of decay. decay behind the wall.

I called my dad, who is supposed to know everything about everything (and usually does), and he said that there is nothing we can do short of cutting a hole in the wall to remove the carcass. not gonna happen. so we wait - he said about a month or so. in the meantime, we have alot of candles burning. highly scented candles.

I'm desperately trying not to think about the fact that if the mice can get out, it's possible that whatever is supposed to be eating the mice can get out. now THAT would be an interesting thing to have in the walls. as sean said "this isn't the fucking chamber of secrets!"

stay tuned.

commence eye clawing.

today? throwaway. yesterday? need to forget. this whole week? we never have to revisit.

one good thing to say - the kitchen looks FANTASTIC so far. (at least until you walk into it and turn to face the other wall, which they cannot get any of the contact paper backing that has been GLUED to the wall using some adhesive not of this earth...they have to come back with some sort of laser or magician's wand or something to take care of that.) one other good thing to say: I bought bella a j-lo esque velour jogging suit and it looks fabulous on her.

that concludes the good things.

yesterday was the day that would never die. after a gruelling day of crap, I forgot that I was supposed to get home on time because sean had a hair appt with my hairdresser. I love you sean, but you were entering michael bolton status with what was going on on top of your head. so I tried to double park outside our house and let trent, bella, and sean jump in. that didn't work. honking, beeping....anyways, so we get there (on time, amazingly) and sean gets a great hair cut, I get to feed bella in the bathroom, and we decide (loosely using the word) to get dinner at PJ O'Wheelihans or something equally irish sounding. which was totally not my idea - going to an irish pub? for dinner? with a baby? ON SAINT PATRICK'S DAY?

so we begin the journey to the irish place when brett calls - back up to 2 days ago. brett had called and asked if I could go to the baseball field to pick up the team equipment. it had to be done either that day or the next (yesterday.) I was like, I'll do it tomorrow, and brett was all "are you sure you'll remember" and I got totally high and mighty and said "*I* am not the one who forgets things...you do."

so brett calls, "did you get the equipment okay?" GREAT. we have 25 minutes to get there before the deadline, and I guess after that the team has to use broomhandles and old rugs. and meanwhile me with the "I don't forget things" routine. so we decide we are going to get the baseball stuff and then go to a more local irish place (Finn McCools - I swear, all of these places should be called "Irish McDrinkey's") for dinner. it's nearly 8pm now.

so we get the equipment (with 2 mins to spare - think of that when you're swinging that bat, trent) and we go to Finn's. even before we get there, we see the cars lined up on the side of the road. which really drove my point to sean home about not going to an irish place for dinner on st. patrick's day. but then, why else would you go? but anyway. so I make an executive decision (which is easy to do when you're driving) and said there is no way on god's irish green earth we are going there. and we turned the car around and went to mcdonalds to get burgers and shamrock shakes.

afterwards, I said to sean, "well, you wanted to go to an irish restaurant, and we did."

ba dum bum.

everything's craptapulous, till it ain't.

monday: trent's project. tuesday: museum night. wednesday: ikea. thursday: full fucking moon or something, who the hell knows. friday will not come fast enough and I'm sure will be just as eye-clawing as the rest of this week.

thursday: ikea. it's simple enough. we need 17 cabinet handles and 7 drawer pulls. 24 handles in all. ikea has cheap handles that are nice. the blahgskt version (or whatever the hell) looks sort of 50s. have I mentioned we're redoing the kitchen? no, I've just blabbed on about the kids. yeah. so we have no kitchen right now because it's all being painted and whatever. so we have to get new handles and we had to get them last night, so they can start putting them on.

3 inch handles. 24 of them. not hard. and what do they have? 3 3/4". 5". 8 fucking inches for a handle, who has hands that big?????? 3 inch? no. no. no no no.

you know what we're using? two knobs on each door. instead of a handle, we, like the fucking idiots we are, will be using two knobs on each door. maybe it will look avant garde.

NEWSFLASH.

bella rolled over by herself for the first time today. noah's been doing it for like years, but it's bella's first time unassisted.

actually, I'm surprised that she hasn't done this sooner. she absolutely hates being on her stomach and I would think she'd try as hard as possible to flip onto her back. instead, before today, she'd just let her head plop face first into the carpet and cry. poor thing.

and to everyone who gave me funny looks when I said she couldn't roll over yet - I TOLD YOU SHE'D BE ABLE TO DO IT SOONER OR LATER. we weren't worried that she'd be a 38-year-old woman who would panic if she found herself on her stomach for some reason - "but I can't roll over! I never learned!!!!"

ps: yes, the triangle tango IS a "Trent's Pants" production.

it's the triangle tango....

so last night was museum night. I got home and we had to leave 10 minutes later - always love that. through the drive thru at wendy's and then over to some other school. turns out we were supposed to bring a dessert...so off to weis market (worst. supermarket. ever.) goes sean and returns with doughnuts.

trent's project was about the bermuda triangle. and honestly, from all his procrastination and freakout came a really cool presentation. at the last minute, he decided to dress up like a marooned victim of a shipwreck (didn't even get a "thanks, ma" for that one) and so we took an old t shirt and ripped it up, along with pants that probably fit trent about 2 years ago. added sandals that still had sand in them from visiting the shore with nicole last year, and voila! he really did look good, and his presentation board was nice, too. and he had a tape of him singing his bermuda triangle song - and I gotta give the kid credit for putting that out there. it's trent, a capella, singing:

deep in the ocean blue
found dead is the captain and his crew
they thought they could handle it
but they fell into an endless pit
they thought it would be all the rave
now they float in their watery grave

it's the triangle tango, it's sweeter than mango
it's the triangle....tango!

there's a second verse, too, which I can't seem to remember, but we had it on a loop playing over and over and over again.

I took alot of pictures and trent (along with most of the other kids) was taped for the local educational programming station. but the best part, which moved me to tears, was watching him talk to the judges about his presentation. he was so poised, so articulate, and he really knew his stuff. it was great to watch. he's growing up...he's growing up. they seem to do that.

I'm proud of my little man.

it occurred to me that my blog is now a year old. that is all.

I just wanted to do the damn puzzle

I had to leave early yesterday to get home in time for sean to take maggie to the vet. he didn't want to have to take bella with him, hence me getting home early. of course, that didn't happen - so I called him and told him to just bring trent with him - trent could watch the dog while sean watches the baby. seems logical. so he did it. and then I realized that I was going home to a house with almost no responsibility. no husband, no children, no dog - no one wanting to speak to me, no one wanting to be held, no one wanting me to throw a ball. it was just me...and the cat. no big deal. I had been on the phone in the car (yes, I know) with nicole and I told her about my luck and she asked me what I was planning to DO. had it been a few hours that they'd all be gone, I would have opted to sleep. unhindered, not worrying about smothering anyone, with nothing farting at me (be it human or dog) and no one usurping either covers or bed space. AND WITH THE LIGHT OFF. (nicole totally agreed with me there - neither of us has slept with the light off since our babies were born. and I was one of those people who needed complete darkness to sleep.)

but since they were not going to be gone for hours, I had to pick something else. now, trent and I had been doing puzzles on the kitchen table for a while now. because trent is 12 now, doing anything with him is sometimes hit or miss. if he's in a good mood, it's totally fun. if he's not, and that's like 80% of the time lately, then it's horrible. so we have this puzzle going on the kitchen table - a mystery puzzle, you don't know what it is; plus, this particular one was 2 separate 500 piece puzzles, a before and after scene, so it is pretty challenging - and every time I try to do it, I either have to make someone dinner from the stove or from my boobs, or pet something, or entertain someone, or whatever. so I told nicole that I was going to just sit, quietly, and do the puzzle completely unhindered for whatever amount of time they'd be gone - likely 20 mins. we agreed that it was going to be wonderful.

here's what really happened.

I got off the phone with nicole and found I had a voicemail. I listened to it and it was sean, panicked, saying they couldn't find maggie's collar and could I call them immediately? I don't know where maggie's collar is, and I'm heading into the house, but they aren't there. apparently they found it. a call to sean confirms it. so I put away all the crap I have to schlep to and from work, go up and change out of the hideous outfit I had decided looked good that morning for whatever reason, and come down and start my glorious puzzling. then -- the cat.

a word or two about my cat: she is pretty aloof. in fact, sean is often upset about the fact that no one can just sit and pet her. (namely him.) she comes in and says hello once in a while and then finds somewhere to lay and sleep, usually upstairs or in the basement.

back to our story. the cat, our aloof cat who spends her days burrowed in god knows what god knows where, decides that it's the perfect time for a purr session. she jumps up on the table and sssppprrraaaawwwwllllssss out on top of the puzzle. pieces flying everywhere. stuff that was already put together breaks apart. and then she roooollllllssss over, purr purr purr, don't you just want to pet the shit out of me now??

I tried everything - I put her favorite treats all over the floor to lure her down, I blew on her, I ignored her, I put out a bowl of milk on the counter - she would not leave.

and of course, the moment she jumped down was the moment the door opened and in bounded all the responsibility I was dreaming about shirking. score one for the universe that is against patrice.

and I'd tell you about the rest of the night - because this was just a precursor to what was coming - but I just don't have the energy right now. in a nutshell - trent confesses to having an after-school affair to show off his not-finished project, we realize we cannot make a tape of him singing something and sean has to make a mad dash to walmart, sean buys the wrong thing and it doesn't work, trent has a nervous breakdown when he realizes he has procrastinated (and side note, the kid actually waited until 10pm to be upset about the fact that he waited until the last day to finish his project -- he even procrastinates about being upset!!) and I stay up until almost 11pm finishing his project for him.

tonight's episode: trent's "museum night" featuring his project on the bermuda triangle and the people who have been lost forever inside it. some people have all the luck.

wild weekend. flower show with brett, trent, and bella. even though we went at 4pm, it was still very crowded. and trent was being more pre-teen than usual. but the thing I hate most about going out to events like that is Other People. Other People are annoying, rude, stop in the middle of foot traffic to talk about what coffee to get, stop to talk about how their rhododendrons look nicer than these do, and look at you funny if you ask them to please excuse you as you attempt to roll a stroller around them. yeah, I know strollers are annoying at these events, but you know what? it's my only option. you, Other People, have slightly more options as you plop your giant quilted coat on the floor on top of your 15 bags full of useless information that will wind up in a landfill next to your moldy 15 foot pussywillows that you insist on not only purchasing at the flower show, but bringing aboard the train home. you have more options. so I won't apologize for my stroller.

and then I watched The Color Purple for the first time. yes, I realize it's been out for like 40 years and blah blah, but I never saw it. and I watched it alone with bella on sunday. then I watched Delores Claiborne on tbs. and then I had this awful epiphany that I'm sure every mother has had...that I probably had already with trent, too: I looked at her, dressed in her 5th outfit of the day due to diaper blowout madness, all drooling and smiles and farts, and knew that someday, someone would hurt her. someone is going to hurt this innocent baby. someone is going to break her heart, someone is going to ignore her, someone is going to threaten to punch her, and someone is going to betray her confidence. someone is going to talk behind her back, and someone is going to tell her something she doesn't want to hear. and there could be more hurt -- deeper hurt, things that I dare not even pretend to think about. and there is nothing I can do about it. as she giggled at me, looking to me to protect her from gravity and hunger, knowing nothing awful in the world other than a dirty diaper and an empty belly, I just had to cry for all the things that I will never be able to protect her from.

this is motherhood. and though I write it down today and it's still fresh enough in my memory to bring tears to my eyes today, I probably won't remember this day - not this specific day, not this specific time...not the way she looked in her pink sleeper, not the way she crinkled up her eyes or the exact babble that she spoke on the changing table. this piece of my life, this specific day in our lives, because it is so ordinary, will blend into the background and eventually it will no longer be available to call back to mind. I look at trent and I know I went through the same things, and I have glimpses of him, but it's all short clips in a too-short montage of his babyhood. and it makes me sad for her, and sad for him, and sad for myself.

today is picture day at bella's daycare, so she's all decked out in her cute silver silk asian H&M dress that has never been washed because before I bought it I didn't notice the tag said "dry clean only" and if anyone thinks I'm going to dry clean a newborn's outfit then they have not only smoked the dope, but inhaled. what we do is just put it on her for short spurts, keep a bib on her as much as possible, blot off any spittage, and then let it air out between wearings. please, my skin is sensitive around my wrists - please use regular cuffs and not those plastic things.

that also meant I had to get up super early, as pictures started at 8, and I normally get to daycare sometime around 8:45. I usually use trent to watch bella while I get a shower (that is exactly why I waited until trent was 11 to have a baby - the babysitter factor) but he hadn't been dropped off yet. bella was still sleeping. but she normally wakes up shortly after I do because her heat source and the aroma of milk is no longer there, so conundrum. I used the baby monitor and got into the shower, all the while thinking that she's going to suddenly learn how to turn over, and fall off the bed, dying before I could get to her, all because I needed to finish rinsing the shampoo out of my hair. and would it look even worse because I would have stopped to put on my robe? would sean ever forgive me? would I be in the shower later on, listening to KYW and hearing my own story on the news? maybe I'd be able to heal by going on tour not blasting the perils of cosleeping, no, because that really wasn't the problem. it was leaving your baby unattended, that's what I'd speak about. and I'd go on line and join a support group of women whose babies have died. but they wouldn't accept me when they found out that the reason I lost mine was because I needed to take a shower and left her on the bed. they'd be cruel, but I'd deserve it. but maybe there was an online community for women who were careless and caused their own child's demise? if so, I could join that. even though it would be depressing. and I'd probably tell my doctor just to prescribe me antidepressants right off the bat. I'd probably become addicted to them and die myself. which would really be better. and would I be able to hear her on the monitor if she did really fall? I should have turned on the radio in there so I could hear it through the monitor. even though the wall of the shower faces into our bedroom and even when sean just farts, I can hear him, but maybe I won't hear her. did I turn it up or down before I got in the shower?? I thought I turned it up but now I don't know. and it would be my luck that I turned it down. why did I leave her in there???

and then I was done, so I got out of the shower and found bella sleeping peacefully on the bed. at least it's friday.

my friend jen made me 2 cds of soft-rock from the 70s - stuff you used to hear when you were riding around in your mom's car. ever since then, I've had various songs from them stuck in my head, and corresponding flashback glimpses into my childhood. right now it's "think of me" with flashbacks of driving on 95 and going under the blue steel arches of the ben franklin bridge. thank you, jen - not only do I love the songs, but I love remembering.

so after reading theresa's blog, I am reminding myself to HANG UP THE FREAKING SMOKE DETECTORS, ALREADY that I bought a few weeks ago after having a bad dream about our house being on fire. this leads us to a problem I have: assuming that since nothing bad is happening in my life right now, something is lurking just around the corner that is going to blindside me. I know alot of people have this problem, just not knowing how to be happy. I can't sit here and enjoy the life I have right now - babies, kids, husbands, friends, houses, jobs - because I am afraid that at any moment, and most likely as soon as I do let my guard down, something horrible will happen. and the more happy I am, the bigger the something horrible will be.

of course, I know that it's silly to think this way, but I am unable to change it. so I guess I'm convinced that our house will now burn to the ground. (another issue - feeling like if I say it, or even joke about it, it will happen. somehow, it doesn't work when saying or joking about winning the lottery.)

so until something bad does happen, I'll be sleeping with one eye open. at least I'll have good cds to listen to while I am fetalized in my bed, rocking back and forth, my eyes darting around the room looking for smoke. "think of me" indeed.

update on trent's math situation: no dice. she was very nice, but firm. (unlike my boobs.) the best we can hope for is that trent's math teacher next year sees his potential and refers him to the new class. so what did I do? I turned brett loose on her. one of two things will happen: she'll be like "holy shit, I'm not dealing with this maniac" and give us her supervisor's name, or we'll be banished from middle school altogether. stay tuned.

apparently, just READING about noah's night sleeping tribulations in nicole's emails has made bella decide that it's a good idea to follow suit. so last night was a blur of whimpering, popped out binkies (one time, sean helpfully pointed out that I had actually put hers in upside down, which is possible to do because we use the NUK kind), and kicking. lots of kicking. what didn't help is that the dog was sprawled on my side of the bed, the cat had decided to join in because it was cold and she couldn't find the mouse that is lodging in the downstairs radiator, and sean had eaten the most garlicky white pizza I have ever encountered. I love sean so much, but he doesn't always smell good on a NORMAL day. he smelled like he had stuck a clove of garlic in his cheek 3 weeks ago and finally decided to start exhaling. so there I am trying to maneuver myself between the cat and dog, have one hand on the binky, watch that we don't smother bella, and try to roll away from the garlic breath and the kicky baby.

anyways. so I'm tired today. it's about 4 degrees outside and my body aches from having to walk a quarter mile from my parking space to the front door all clenched up against the cold.

goddamn, everyone's blogging! it's exciting, though, to read everyone's trials and tribulations. when electronic advances make us more disconnected and less personal, blogs seem to bring some personal connection back to the Interweb. so yeah. blogs. check out theresa's blog about getting ready to run a goddamn marathon. file that under INSANE. and then jen's a Get In Shape, Girl! too.

okay. anyway. so bella's starting on foods, right? only she hates them, right? right. so as a mother, it is my duty to make her realize that she likes food. get her to try different foods. and get her to eat them. and later in her life, she'll want to learn to diet. and then she'll have to learn to eat healthy. then she'll find out about hot pockets and start bingeing. and then she'll diet again. so I'm really starting her off on her first rollercoaster ride. a rite of passage as a female. here you go, honey, welcome to the hell that is socially-imposed weight issues.

I'm also wrestling trent's middle school math coordinator, who is trying to tell me that even though trent is a math genius, that because ONE TEST he took was 2 points below the minimum, he cannot go into the highest level of math classes in 7th grade. which means he can't in 8th grade because he didn't in 7th. which means he can't in 9th because he didn't in 8th. which means...blah blah blah. so yeah. it's important. meanwhile, I've been warned that this woman has been doing this for 20 years and doesn't let anyone through, no matter how much you bitch. makes me feel good that she looks at students as individuals with different needs.

(When nicole and I email each other and need to convey sarcasm, we italicize.)

AND I think I'm getting sick. AND work sucks. AND it's snowing today when it was fucking 68 degrees out yesterday. AND it's only tuesday.

so. piss off. in a good way.

so we're having family over tonight to celebrate trent's 12th birthday. which was on feb 23. which officially makes me a horrible person. poor trent - having to bow to the whim of his mommy for his birthday cake. to be fair, we did take him out to dinner (red lobster - obviously his choice) and had a cake there. and we were kind of waiting for my mother, who works 3rd shift at a nursing home, to have a night off so she could join us. but the reason why we didn't have it sooner in the week is because...and here's where it gets awful...there were too many good tv shows on. and here's where it gets even worse....we have comcast DVR so we totally could have recorded said shows. but we didn't feel like it.

trent, if you ever wind up reading this or meet someone who has read this, please know that I love you so much and here's $50, go buy yourself a new ps2 game or some therapy.

I'm so glad I have a new little baby to screw up. she already watches tv like a crotchety old lady. american idol is her favorite. lock me up now, please, AAP.

I figured I had to revive the ole blog since I decided to do the self portrait day project - http://www.selfportraitday.com - so here's what's happened since whenever I last posted here, in a nutshell:

I grew over 2 shoe sizes.
I looked like a big, fat cow.
I had 2 showers - one from my mother in law for my husband's side of the family, and one from my sister and best friend for everyone else.
We painted the nursery green.
We hired a doula. Man, I gotta tell you that story sometime.
We went 8 days over our due date.
We went into labor in the wee hours of Halloween.
We had a baby girl on Oct 31, 2004, at 10:50am.
She weighed 8 lbs 10 oz. and was 19.5" long.
We named her Bella.
We took her home.
I freaked out.
My best friend went into labor 15 days early.
They had a boy named Noah.
I freaked out some more.
Sean went back to work and I had a breakdown of sorts.
I felt better.
Bella got bigger.
Trent got protective of his baby sister.
Our pets liked her.
I went back to work.
Bella went to daycare 2 days a week.
I got up this morning.
I came into work.
I looked at my email.
I went to Blogger.com.
I signed in.
I started typing this post.

That brings us up to date.

long time no see. not much new is going on - but I guess that's the story of the second trimester. smuuuuuuuuuth sailing. I guess if I had to say what the worst thing going on is now, it would be sleeping. I have a complex pillow diagram I have to follow each night, and I still get up at least once and usually twice to go to the bathroom, and about 3 times or more to change sides. and the pillows have to be rearranged each time I move. so that's alot of pillow arrangement. there are two under my head, one between my legs, one small one under my stomach, and one behind my back. so when I flip over, I have to move the small one to the front and the big one to the back. after doing this for a week or two, I broke down and bought the most mammoth pillow you have ever seen in your entire life. it has shipped and should arrive at my home within 3 to 7 business days. in the meantime, we're figuring out where sean's going to sleep, as there is no way in hell he'll fit on the bed with me and this pillow. unless he spoons it.

feet are a little bloated, but since I saw the doctor last and he said not to worry, I'm not worrying. I try to cut back on the salty foods, but they're soooo good. I haven't been too moody or too weepy or anything, so in that respect, I feel pretty normal. in fact, when I get mad at myself for not feeling a certain way, I have to remind myself that I'm pregnant. I think sean's pretty appreciative of that.

coming up soon is that glucose test where you have to drink a huge amount of flat, syrupy "soda" like liquid, wait an hour, and then have blood drawn. I do remember that from when I had trent, and I hated it. it was all I could do to hold it down. I am totally not looking forward to it. and I hope I don't have gestational diabetes because I can't live without ice cream in the evenings.

the baby is moving around, kicking (ha, it just did just when I typed that) but not too hard and not too often. I try not to overanalyze it. I did have a dream last week that I had the baby out for a second to inspect it to see if it was normal, then did a test run on breast feeding. in looking down at the baby, I realized I was still holding the baby and our dog was the one breast feeding, which seemed natural in the dream. when I realized all was okay, I put the baby back in the womb to finish cooking. in the dream, it was a boy.

I'd be happy if the weeks to come are as boring as these last few have been.

hi, remember me?

anyways, it's been a crazy few weeks. trent finished school, I've been working myself ragged, we've had shower troubles (not the water kind) and I turned 30 in the middle of it all.

the hot weather is returning, and with it, giant, giant feet. hugely giant feet. flip flops aren't even cutting it anymore. well, they are "cutting it" - cutting into my flesh, that is. ankles? what ankles? and I have been drinking water like whatever the opposite of a camel is. and I have the toilet-seat marks on my ass to prove it. it doesn't help that Baby Whatever is kicking my bladder right now, either. I have a permanent indentation on my wrist from my previously-loose watch. it's total insanity.

I asked my sister how she managed to get through pregnancy and give birth in august to her first baby, with all the water weight bloating stuff that happens. she said she was literally barefoot and pregnant. it also helped that she was at home and we had a pool, and she didn't have what I like to pretend is a career. I have no such luck. and my cottage cheese thighs and puffed up calves are not going to make going to the local pool a pleasant experience.

so I read something on babycenter about what do to if you're not feeling that "pregnancy glow" or whatever. and it has to do with not exercising enough. bah. it's hot! I'm tired! I'm perpetually in transition for work! I'm really fat! and now I'm supposed to take a half hour to exercise daily? hm. well maybe I can walk. a little. if I can get shoes on.

but this isn't the place to bask in the glow of pregnancy anyways. much to the chagrin of people who read this to get an accurate depiction of what pregnancy is like. (hi, theresa!) it's a place for me to bitch and moan about the shite all the hippie and stepford mothers pretend doesn't happen. there is a rosy side, for sure. it's wonderful. it makes you feel like you're really doing your role as a female human. it's exciting. it makes you so satisfied when you see other babies. but no one wants to hear about all the bad crap when they say, incessantly, "so how are you feeling?" so it's gotta come out somewhere. and blogspot is the place.

so take all of these posts with a grain of salt. since there are alot of posts, that's alot of salt. perhaps you'll start to look like me.

babies. so harrowing.

had a little run-in with a big husky at the dog park last week, and when she jumped up on me landing square on my stomach, I thought it was no big deal. though it hurt for a while afterwards. the next morning, I felt crampy but dismissed it. then came the spotting. I knew in my head that it probably was not a big deal, but my heart didn't care. I cried and cried and cried and cried. then I called sean, who called the doctor. then I cried. then I called nicole. then sean called back and said the doctor wanted to see me that afternoon. then I cried. then I called nicole back. then I cried. then sean said he'd come home from work. then I cried. then I called my mom, oddly enough, and she talked to me up until sean got home an hour later. then we cried. then we sat around like zombies, picking things up and putting them down again without really knowing what we were doing. then we went to the doctor.

I put on the paper gown, the nurse checked my blood pressure, and it seemed like a normal visit. before the doctor came in, the nurse came back and said he wanted to be able to do a special test and got the stuff ready. then we waited for what was probably about 10 minutes but obviously was much more excruciating than that. when the doctor came in, he didn't ask what happened, he just felt my belly, listened to the heartbeat with the doppler, said brusquely to sean, "you hear that okay?", and then told us we should move up our ultrasound and he'd get us a new appointment. and that's it. no internal nothing, no test, no need for the giant pink swab thingie that the nurse put out, nothing. we got a new appointment for the following wednesday for our ultrasound. and I was told to take it easy for 72 hours.

no explanation for the spotting. it was very put-offish and I was mad at myself later for not asking more questions and making him tell us what had happened - was it normal? was it something to worry about? should I look for any other signs of anything? should I stay away from the goddam dog park??

so I "took it easy" for the weekend, and then wednesday came. the sheet they gave us for the ultrasound said "drink 32 oz of clear liquid 1 hour before your appointment and do not void your bladder. bladder should be URGENTLY full." so I drank 2 pint glasses of water at 6:45, as our appointment was for 7:45. I got to about 7:20 before I thought I was going to pee myself. so I went to the bathroom (in the toilet, not on myself) and then quick drank another 1 1/2 pint glasses of water. as we drove on the stony parking lot to trent's baseball field to pick him up to take with us, I felt like I was going to let loose again. I made it to the doctor's office, and at the appointment window I told the nurse that I had about 2 minutes before I wet myself, and she told me to go to the bathroom, let out my bladder for 10 seconds, and then stop. RIGHT. so I went for 10 seconds, tried to stop, and then said eff it and went for a full 32 seconds. I figured water goes through me quickly so I'd just drink more if I had to. (though what the heck does water have to do with ultrasounds? and why clear liquids? would milk have clouded up the womb?) so we waited to be called in, and as soon as we were...I had to go again. I figured that was good, as I was URGENTLY full again. but the whole business of the ultrasound is pushing a thing that looks sort of like a computer mouse up against your abdomen - where your bladder is. so I found myself wanting the ultrasound to be over so I wouldn't pee myself again. so annoying.

okay, so the ultrasound. the first thing she honed in on was the placenta. though she didn't say that. so I am looking at the screen at this sponge looking mass coiled over on itself and I am freaking out because I figured the worst had come true, and I really was just carrying around a sack of tumor cells disguised as a baby. as the moments creep past, I am getting more and more freaked out. then the tech says in her monotone, "that's the placenta." well jesus kriest, you may want to mention that upfront!! so then we get to the baby. sean's like "oh, that must be the head and that's the eyes" and I'm all "no, that's the top of the head" and the tech says "actually, we're looking at the bottom of the baby." which just goes to show you that ultrasounds are totally guesswork. we did see the baby moving, which made it easier to tell what was what. it waved at us, so we could figure out what was the arm and what was probably a leg or something. so to spare us agony, the baby was not in a position to show us its gender - so even if we wanted to know, which we didn't, not really anyways, we couldn't have found out. then the ultrasound tech did some measurements and printed out two pictures for us. we can't figure out quite what they are. though she did type FACE on one of them.

ultrasound techs aren't supposed to give you any indication of things going right or wrong, since they are not doctors. so the doctor has to analyze the info and tell you if things are okay. so I'm thinking that is why the tech said nothing when sean asked if the baby looked healthy. stay tuned. our next appt is june 18. then, when the doctor says the baby is healthy and fine, I will find something new to obsess about.

let the stretching begin. each day, I feel my stomach getting a little bigger, a little longer, and a little less jiggly. which is good in a way, I suppose. now I can start filling out some of my larger maternity shirts. get my money's worth.

people have been asking me if I feel the baby move yet. well, I'm not quite sure. it might be my imagination. but I think it is movement. it's something I can't think about too hard or I get wigged out. alot of people say "oh, there's a life inside you, it's so precious and special" and that's true if you think about it just on the surface. but think about that statement - there is a life inside you. something that is not you is alive and inside your body. if it weren't a baby - if it were, say, some sort of weird parasitic worm - you'd be pretty freaked out. so you have no control over this other being that is moving around inside you and living off of what you eat and produce inside your body. yes, it's a miracle and I can't believe this is how people actually reproduce, but it can also be pretty odd if you think about it. so, the answer is, don't think about it. until it MOVES.....

so anyways, I was at my friend's wedding shower over the weekend, and there were 4 people in the room with me that were also pregnant and several who are trying. I come to work, and there are at least 4 people I see often that are pregnant. I go out, and see tons of giant bellies. I don't know if the whole world decided to get pregnant all at once, like a post-war baby boom or what, or if it's just like when you buy a honda civic and start noticing honda civics wherever you go. like that's hard. alright, stick in the car of your choice then. pt cruisers, like mine. anyways. you get the point.

maybe it is an estrogen revolution. or rather a progesterone revolution. hcg revolution. whatever. all I'm saying is that WE'RE TAKING OVER, AND WE HAVE BEINGS LIVING INSIDE US.

big day yesterday. doctor visit. the one that I thought we were going to get our ultrasound appointment at. and we did. the ultrasound is scheduled for...wait for it.......june 16. june 16! jesis kriest! what is wrong with these people???? they've strung me along for 2 months now! at least I actually have an appointment now, though. and the nurse last month had said they only do them on saturdays, but thankfully, they do them at night during the week too, since sean works saturdays. so it's a wednesday. and trent will be coming, and it happens to be his last day of school, too. so he will be pretty excited. I hope.

otherwise, I had no sugar in my urine, my belly looks good, I have gained a total of 11 lbs so far, which is good, and the heartbeat sounds normal. I thought it was alot slower than last time, but the doctor says it's okay. 145 beats per min. sounded like alot less than that, but that's what his little dohickey said.

then I had to go immediately to get the blood tests done for all the birth defects, because it has to be done before 18 weeks and I am like 2 days away from 18 weeks. of course they could have done it LAST month but they never gave me paperwork, so they asked if I could go immediately after my appointment. so I did, and I was lucky, I went right before a big rush of people. of course, I warned the lady that I tend to faint - not at the needle or the pain, but at the sight of my own blood. I am not sure exactly when that started happening. oh, I guess I do. when trent was very young (9 mos) and he had to have his first surgery on his clubbed feet - the one to lenghthen his achilles tendon - they had to draw blood from him for tests. I was fine with blood before that but I fainted dead away at the sight of my child's blood being drawn from his little body. then, little by little, that got transferred to my own blood. not so much when he or I get cut, but more when they draw it out of us. makes giving blood a little difficult.

anyways, I did well. I did get a little woozy at the end. I had told the lady that I faint at the sight of my own blood, and she was really good about distracting me and stuff. until the end, when she said she couldn't read the name on my lab sheet, and asked me to spell it so she could write it down...ON THE VIAL OF MY BLOOD. and she asked if it were spelled right and showed it to me. I quickly said yes and ran out and drove home and took a nap.

anyway, that was my momentous doctor visit. now, the countdown begins to june 16. not that we're finding out the sex - cause we're not - but just to see that it is in there and whether it has 3 arms or just one or a pointy head.

so jen had a dream about me and nicole having our babies. it's here, I think. anyways, I haven't had dreams either way about me having a boy or a girl, and so far, I haven't dreamed about any other people but myself. which makes my dreams lonely, because often, even sean or trent only have brief appearances. sometimes that's how I feel, a little - lonely. even though this time I have a friend who is pregnant, too, and I go to prenatal yoga with a bunch of pregnant women. I probably still have baggage from the first time.

I can't decide if I really am feeling the baby move (at night, when resting) or if it is my digestive system. or imagination. or wishful thinking. we go back to the doctor's on the 20th, what's that? thursday? so we go thursday. I know I get bloodwork done and I hope they finally let me have a freaking ultrasound, since they said they'd do it last month. I guess I should feel lucky since they usually give only one ultrasound when they feel the baby is safe and it's not a risky pregnancy, but I'm annoyed at reading and hearing about people having their first of obviously more than one ultrasound at 8 weeks or 10 weeks.

my, um, step sister in law? I don't know, kkkathy's daughter in law, anyways, is having her baby shower the day before my birthday. I just bought her stuff from her registry at babiesrus - some boy onesies, and a wipes warmer. wipes warmer! trent would have loved that when he was a baby. he'd catch his breath when I would use the wipes on him and he'd scream. partially because they had alot of alcohol and he did alot of pooping, but I know initially it was because they are cold, cold, cold. and he was already cold from me taking his pants and diaper off. when you think about how crappy life must be as an infant - not being able to communicate, getting teeth, pooping yourself and then having your pants yanked down and having cold wipes - a wipes warmer seems like a very humane thing. but as an adult, a wipes warmer seems extravagant and luxurious. both of those views are why I am putting a wipes warmer on my registry.

for the last few weeks, I had been amazed that I had a belly button again. it had been lost in extra folds of skin for so long that I forgot what it was like to have a hole there where stuff could accumulate. but now I don't think it will be too much longer before, like a purdue chicken, it pops out. I don't have that dark line yet, but I don't think that happens until later.

I think in my mind things are going slow because I remember looking at WTEWYE and doing a sort of checklist and it went very fast. but I remember now that I did that because I got the book later in pregnancy and I went back through the months I had already passed and checked to see if I had all the right signs. anyway, I can feel my ligaments stretching and sometimes it hurts. I think this baby is going through a growth spurt or something.

I'm trying out a jen oliver type post and putting pictures in stuff to illustrate my points. tip o the hat, jen o!

Add fainting to the list of stuff that is crappy about pregnancy. I'm still waiting for the rosy glow of pregnancy to wash over me and take away all the vomit and stuffiness and sleeplessness and aches of pregnancy. The sad part is that I should have known better. It's not my first pregnancy, yet I must have revisioned alot more than I thought about being pregnant with trent. I couldn't wait to get pregnant again. Now I want to adopt a child after this one because I don't want to go through it ever again.

Maybe last time I was just blissfully unaware. Or maybe I blocked out all the bad stuff. All I know is now I am fainting, nearly burning my house down (I found out I left a gas burner running at full flame for 4 hours while everyone was out - except for the first 45 minutes when my son was in the house alone waiting for his dad) and spending alot of time whining and complaining about things I can't change. WHERE IS THE FLUFFY WONDERFULNESS OF PREGNANCY?

Okay, it's not all that bad. I don't have to carry anything anymore, people do it for me. More people hold the door open for me. More people look at me as just sad instead of insane when I faint in a department store. And it's sort of okay to have thunder thighs and demand milkshakes at all hours of the night.

But for the most part, I will be happy when it's over. And when it is over, I will be sad that it's over and ready to do it again, because I can't enjoy things when they're happening, only when I can't have them anymore.

One of the things I miss most about not being pregnant is ibuprofen. Advil, I miss you. Not like a friend misses a friend, but how a lover misses her lover. I want you inside me, making me feel good when I otherwise feel awful. I want to feel you in my mouth knowing that soon I'll feel a release and the pain will be gone, for 4 hours or so. I can't wait until we can be together again, and until then, I will dream about you.

Scalloped potatoes. Slushies. Milkshakes. Ruby red grapefruit lemonade. Cheeseburgers. This is the short list of what I am surviving on.

I have good days. But I still have bad days. I'm waiting for that magic week when everything is fine and I just coast through the second trimester.

My body is in a weird place now. Most people know I'm pregnant by looking, but some are still shocked when I tell them. Like did they think I just had a really round, fat stomach? Then I get all self conscious. Then I think it's just not worth it and screw everyone. Then I get hungry.

I get hot easily now, I have alot more bad dreams, and the heartburn is awful. But on the plus side...um...well, at least it's no longer a question of whether or not I'm going to wear maternity clothes yet. But now that I have to go into an office every weekday, I do have to actually change my clothes every day, which is a chore. AND I have to look nice. It's a challenge.

Earlier, I wanted to hear the baby's heartbeat to prove it was really in there. Now that I have, twice, I want to feel it moving to prove it is really in there. After that, I am sure I will want to have it come out to prove it was really in there.

I already long for non pregnant days. I remember really liking being pregnant before, for some reason. What was I thinking?