7 Things And A Show Review

Sean here, and even though I don't like doing these things (honestly, I just don't like spending so much time thinking of myself...not that you do if did this...I just take a while), I'll do it anyway to satisfy your curiosity:

7 things I plan to do before I die:

Visit all desired international destinations (i.e. Japan, Prague, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Eastern Europe, Russia, Egypt, South America, Scandanavia, etc.)
Learn a form of Martial arts
Appear on a CD (audio or visual) with a metal band (real or fake)
Learn a second language
Live in another country
Visit all 50 U.S. states (19 down; 31 to go)
Write a screenplay good enough to be made into a movie

7 things I can do:

Care for a baby on my own
Be fooled easily be tricks, illusions, and lies
Sit through the rape scene in Irreversible
Curse
Get along with my stepson's father
Drive while sleeping (never intentional and not recommended)
Tell the difference between Coke and Pepsi

7 things I cannot do:

Make beer
Make music (this includes singing)
Juggle
Lie, cheat, or steal and feel okay about it
Dance
Stay awake while reading
Understand the correct song lyrics

7 things that attract me to the opposite sex:

Nice-smelling hair
Honest eyes
Selflessness
Self-confidence
Intelligence
Curves
Mean blow jobs

7 things that I say most often:

Boba
Chun chun chun chun (imitating a metal guitar)
Wanna watch a movie?
What the fuck?
I can't stand (Yuengling) Lager
I gotta do dishes
You gotta be kiddin' me

7 celebrities crushes (this part serves no purpose but to cause trouble and hurt feelings, and because I spent too much time carefully thinking about what to say, I'm just not going to list anyone since I have no crushes on any celebrities. Even though I may find many celebrities unrealistically attractive [men and women alike], I do not wish to have sexual relations with them nor do I have fantasies about them. However, I am a big fan of celebrity gossip, and I do find celebrities intriguing. I am interested in celebrity dirt, and I am a huge supporter of celebrities who make more $$$$ in a game, show, gameshow, or movie than I'll make in my entire life.)

7 people I want to do this:

Nobody who has a blog site since you all did this already (if not, feel free). My list includes:

Bella (if she could communicate)
Trent
My dad
My brother Billy
My brother Brion
My brother Vinnie
My grandmom, Mojam

Now that that is out of the way, I want share a review that I wrote about a show that I attended two Thursdays ago at the Catholic Center (of all places) at Drexel University:

Horsing Around

Basically, I attended what turned out to be one of the craziest and best shows I ever been to. Knowing about Horse The Band is one thing, but seeing Horse The Band is a WAY different story. It needs to be seen to be believed, which is why I picked up their DVD after their performance. Outstanding and hands down one of the best bands I have ever seen live. They are instantly one of my favorites with the way they performed.
My main draw was Curl Up And Die from Las Vegas, NV, who were one of the openers. They are one of my favorites, and it's usually impossible to see them since they are a west coast band. With them being in town for the cancelled Hellfest of Trenton, NJ, I had to take advantage and check them out. They were really good and crazy (except when the vocalist ripped the cross off of the wall and smashed it to bits due to microphone problems...that's just disrespectful), but Horse The Band blew me away with their psychotic "Nintendo core". I heard OF their "Nintendo core" before (heavy metal laced with a Nintendo-sounding organ), but I never imagined that they would be able to play it live so well. I never heard their music previously (only heard about it), so that was also a pleasant surprise. The guy playing the Nintendo organ blew me away. He plays so fast during the speed metal parts that I thought that he was going to explode. The battery operated red-eyed bat hanging from the ceiling was definitely a good stage prop that went well with their music. Unfortunately, the convulsing guitar player smacked it with the head of his guitar, and the bat blew into a million pieces before the set was over.
Another band that blew me away was Shark! Shark!, which reminded me of a mix
between Agoraphobic Nosebleed, Mr. Bungle, Ministry, and Refused. No drummer
(2 guitarists, 1 bassist, 1 vocalist), so they pulled the drum machine off live extremely well. Unfortunately, they didn't have a CD, but be on the lookout for them. Good catchy techno metal.
Even an indie rock band blew me away with an impressive performance (Detroit, MI's Bear Vs. Shark). There were marachas and cowbells and other sorts of alternate percussion, and the singer played a little piano, which I dug. The music was spastic, but you can tell it was thinking man's rock. The singer talked about sail boats and Waterworld and other interesting topics...sometimes while preaching from the top of a ping pong table. Good stuff. Reminded me of a mix between At The Drive In and These Arms Are Snakes.
4 solid performances and 2 mediocre performances (Life In Pictures and Philly's The Grand Finals were the other two bands) made for a very entertaining night. But there was more. After Horse played, these three guys got on stage and performed some sort of drum machine induced Viking metal tribute. This guy as skinny as Napoleon Dynamite was dressed in nothing but bear skins, a viking helmet, and a sword holster. He even had a real sword, and his vocals
ranged between death metal and falsetto and Slayer's Tom Araya screams. The 2nd guy
played a mix between Scandanavian and death metal guitar riffs, and the third guy worked the drum machine. They also had a fog machine. I have no idea who they were and who authorized them to play their 1 song/10 minute set. Obviously done in jest, it capped off what was one of the best shows I ever witnessed. The crowd energy was definitely alive and moshiing heavily during the music but dead and pretentious as usual in between sets (must have been that angsty age I can no longer relate to [I was one of the oldest people there at 28]). The lack of stage made it a group huddle type of gathering. It was almost ritualistic the way everyone was circled around the bands going crazy with the crazy music. You can tell a lot of people were friends, so they were doing these rehearsed motions in unison that looked funny (like imitation group buttfucking and passing around the viking helmet). I wish someone was there to experience it with me, but sometimes, it's the shows you go to by yourself that turn out to be
the best.

As always, sorry for the ultra-long post, but as always, it was long overdue.

slackity slack!

okay, to my defense, I am trying to hurry up and finish stuff at work because next week, we're...tadaaaa...going on vacation with the lovely nicole, her tall and manly husband mark, their wee peewee noah, and nicole's wonderful mother carol. we're going to the seashore (she sells sea shells by the sea shore 3x fast) - specifically to ocean city, which should be called You-Might-As-Well-Live-Vicariously-Through-Your-Kids Land Because This Is A Dry County - Yes, That Means No Bars Or Nightlife. not that it matters. we'll all be in bed by 10pm anyways, dead tired. but think of all the pictures we'll be posting.

so ho-anne. sigh. we asked her a little while back (a few weeks ago) if she could watch our dog maggie while we go on said vacation. (we usually ask my dad and KKKathy, but they were already planning on going away themselves, right after they killed wally.) anyways, she said she would do it, which was very nice of her. so this past tuesday, less than one week before we were to go away on the vacation that we needed her help, she informed us that, well, it's just bad timing for her, and she can't watch the dog. you see, she's getting her kitchen redone and the kitchen floor is all messy and the appliances aren't hooked up and there may be men coming in and out of the house. and I know I'm going to sound like an ungrateful bitch, but hear me out. (and then just validate my anger, don't try to get me to see her side, because I can already see her side and don't care.)

she knew when we were going on vacation. I know she shouldn't plan her major kitchen renovations around our plans, I wouldn't ask her to. but if we only asked her a few weeks ago, did she not envision that this might be a problem? how about 2 weeks ago? 3 weeks ago? you know, enough time to actually find someone else to watch the dog????? and then there's the stupid reason. was she planning to cook maggie a gourmet meal, but now can't bear to think of having her eat just plain old dog food since the new stove isn't hooked up? did she think that the opening and closing of doors for workmen would send maggie into a panic whereby she'd run outside and into the delaware river? (she lives in jersey.) was she worried that her messy floor would put off maggie, making the dog feel uncomfortable staying in such a filthy place??

lastly, and confirming my suspicion that she just simply doesn't want to watch the dog, never wanted to watch the dog, and is grasping at straws to make a coherent reason to not watch the dog so that she doesn't feel guilty just saying no, which I wish she would have done....she sent us this information via email. to my non-work address and to sean's work address. on a tuesday. knowing that sean doesn't get his work email until friday and that I may not check my email from work. how lame is THAT?

anyways, brett is going to watch maggie, thank god. but for a day or so, we didn't know what we were going to do. our dog is somewhat sensitive, and even if we felt comfortable leaving her at a kennel, I would expect to pee rainbows before finding somewhere that could take her on such short notice.

and the flat tire - so I take my work friend jarrett to chik-fil-a as a thank you for having him bail me out not once, but twice, when I had no lunch money for our cafeteria. (sounds like high school? you betcha.) chik-fil-a is at the mall, and I offer to drive. no problem when we got in the car. no problem driving the car. as we exit the car, I hear a loud hissing noise. at first, I was worried that it was my radiator cap - perhaps my car was beginning to overheat. I realized it was the tire as I saw it RAPIDLY deflating. we moved the car to a more flat area of the parking lot, thinking that maybe I had run over a screw or nail or glass, but it just kept deflating until it was totally flat - which was only a few seconds later. jarrett, who has my eternal gratitude, changed the tire even while he was in dress clothes for work. when sean took the tire in to our mechanic the next day, he told us that it was a bad valve, and that it was highly unusual for that type of problem to happen to a tire. unless you're me, because in addition to every normal reason for having a flat tire (bad tire, screws, nails, glass, hitting a bad pothole) I have also had a flat due to running over A FANCY TOOTHPICK. you know, the ones with the little plastic thingies on the end that you use to keep a club sandwich together. who runs over a fucking toothpick? I do.

my theory, though, is that ho-anne, wanting to twist the knife, sent the email and then quickly drove to pennsylvania, found me, followed me to the mall, and broke the valve. on purpose.

7 deadly sins

we all pretend we don't really like doing these things where we get to talk about ourselves and show off all of our endearingly quirky quirks, but we love it. admit it.

here's mine, at the bequest of nicole:

7 things I plan to do before I die, which fyi is a tad morbid.

1. travel overseas
2. go back to school
3. become a jogger, if only for a year
4. join a team sport or choir (to me, they are related. don't ask.)
5. I'm hesitant to commit to it, but adopt a child
6. drive across the US
7. try crack. just kidding. learn to cook, for real.

7 things I can do

1. blog
2. lactate
3. whistle really loudly
4. play rudimentary songs on any instrument I have ever picked up within minutes
5. hold my own in a conversation with higher ups
6. give a mean blow job
7. change a flat tire and other manly things

7 things I cannot do

1. remain patient
2. eat fish
3. look through a telescope
4. put my left shoe on first
5. be photographed well
6. wear a bikini
7. keep a secret from everyone (from most people, yes. but not every single person on earth)

7 things that attract me to the opposite sex

1. sense of humor
2. intelligence
3. eyes
4. um...sense of humor again?
5. earlobes
6. uh...
7. pedigree

7 things that I say most often

1. totally
2. like
3. what?
4. you know, the thing/thingie
5. fucker
6. fuck
7. what the fuck

7 celebrity crushes

I don't really have any. seriously. if I had to name one, I'd probably say johnny depp, but that's if there were like a gun pointed to my head.

7 people I want to do this, ONLY if you feel like it

1. jen
2. kodi
3. lonna
4. ethan - ha!! like ethan would do this
5. jo-dee
6. sean!!!
7. kelly

tomorrow: hear about ho-anne and the flat tire...

that comment thingie

I'm doing that comment thingie where you have to type in the word. I took a look at it to make sure it was working, and this was the word it wanted me to type:



fokhl, indeed. perhaps this thing is also a comment unto itself.

the dawning of the age of aquarium (tm)

well, I finally snapped. this could mean so many things, but in this case it means 2 - I finally snapped and pleaded with sean to call out sick on sunday, and I finally snapped out of my funk.

the two are, of course, related.

after a grueling day of doing absolutely nothing on saturday, when sean came home, I asked him feebly if he felt sick. of course, he didn't catch on right away, not until my tears came, anyways. he did call out, but being the honest guy that he is, he told his manager (the night before, even) that he needed to take a personal day for his family, not because he wasn't feeling well. he told his manager it was for me. and that was the truth.

so on sunday, we slept "late" - ie, like 9am - and then trekked off to the aquarium. trent was already planning to go to the phillies game with brett, so it was just me and sean and bella. as we cruised through camden (could be so nice, if only they had less bail bond shops and more, well, anything) we looked at the philly skyline and decided we'd call camden "East Philly" from now on.

when you have a 9 month old baby, a trip to the aquarium is little more than a quick tour of various fish. you can't really read the signs or watch any of the little movies. or even stand and watch the fish. you have to kind of keep moving. but we had fun anyway. bella was totally enthralled with the fish that she could see at her level - the bigger fish in the tanks that reached to nearly the ground. she wasn't as thrilled after about an hour, though, unfortunately. and her arms weren't long enough to touch a shark or a ray. but we had a great time, except for the one thing that always spoils stuff for us - other people and their extremely selfish, crabby-ass stupidity. but we looked past it.

we got home around 2pm and I was really not ready for our day to end, even though sean was tired and so was bella. if I only get one day, dammit, I'm going to make the most of it. so I corralled everyone back into the car and we drove up to the quakertown public pool, which is right across the street from the playground that nicole was marvelling over. their pool is seriously the best public pool I have ever, ever, ever been to. it has a large swirly water-park quality water slide, a big giant mushroom fountain in the kiddie pool, smaller fountains that the kids are allowed to touch and sit on and play in, and a gradually sloped entrance to the kiddie part that allowed bella to splash and play in a small amount of water. but the best part was that the entire bottom and sides of the pool were covered in soft padding. not grody soft padding that harbors mold and other creatures, but soothing, clean padding that saves your feet from getting scraped and is soft on the knees so you can follow your crawling baby around without leaving a trail of blood and skin. it was great.

bella was so thrilled at finally not being hot that she fell asleep in sean's arms in the deeper part of the pool where he walked her back and forth between walls. and she stayed asleep for 2 hours - we actually had to wake her up to leave. if only I had brought a magazine, I would have been in heaven. (I dare not even say "start a book" because I might just evaporate on the spot.)

if only we'd done this sooner. the pool closes on labor day and nicole can't even join us for a day. next year, we're going to buy a membership even though it's 20 mins away from us, it's THAT nice. and they didn't give me a hard time about not living there or having a membership or any of that nonsense. and the snack bar has FANTA!!! god, I love me some orange sodey pop.

we came home refreshed and recharged, in time to be totally dragged down by the season finale of six feet under. I didn't care, though, because I was so happy to have spent the day sharing the parenting burden (I mean priviledge) with sean.

ahhhh. with this, I can carry on through the next 3 weeks until sean has EVERY sunday off.

sounds like an STD

functioning on 2 hrs sleep. hershey good. long. sunburn. had tiny bit of chocolate while there, bought $75 worth to bring home. rode rides. got wet. had altercation with camp teens from brooklyn re: linejumping. ate at 50s style diner in hershey (the town). good trip.

came home to a cranky, feverish baby. the crankiness reached literal fever pitch at about 2am, when I finally told sean to call the pediatrician. the fever wouldn't go down, she was screaming, and she wouldn't nurse, which is odd for her. we took turns quieting her down. sean took her to the doctor today, and it turns out that she has coxsackie virus, which is also called hand foot and mouth disease. the kind she has is the herpangina variation - luckily (I guess) not the kind that gives you blisters on your hands and feet. (lord knows I've had enough of that myself.) this kind is blisters in the back of your throat. babycenter.com describes them, and I'm going to say this verbatim, as "truly horrific to look at." she's just miserable. she insists on being held, is whiny, has a ton of snot pouring from her nose, refuses medicine, and is just generally extremely cranky. want to know what to do for a baby that has coxsackie? nothing. or, more specifically, wait. it takes about 10 days for all symptoms to go away. just in time for the weekend!!

we had to get a doctor's note saying she's not contagious anymore to allow her to go to daycare tomorrow. though they will have to post that a child in the infant room contracted coxsackie, and notes will have to go to all the children. so bella's got a scarlet C. though I'm sure it's daycare that gave her the fucking virus, but whatever. kids get stuff. they get over it. it's life. it won't be the last thing she gets from daycare, and plenty of kids not in daycare get it too.

anyway...it may be allergies or sympathy pain, but I have a headache and a sore throat.

I swear, sometimes I'm totally one with the universe and I display a positive attitude. seriously. please believe me.

riding the hershey highway while surfing the crimson tide

ethan just sent this link out to some of my old high school buddies, who will probably be appalled by the above headline and ensuing story. to you guys, first off, hi! and second, I swear it's not always this vulgar and it doesn't always go into this amount of detail. but sometimes it does. I'm sorry in advance. please continue to visit anyway.

anyway. tomorrow, sean and I are taking trent (but not bella, she will be staying with KKKathy, who will also be watching our dog, meaning I have to restrain myself from asking her very sweetly and politely to please don't put the dog to sleep without asking me first) to hershey park.

as the name implies, hershey park is a theme park centered around hershey's line of chocolate. and today's irony is that I have my period, and when I do, I want copious amounts of chocolate. which isn't ironic. but not being able to have chocolate lest I trigger a horrible ibs bout with all the pain and the tethering to the stanza da bagno, that is ironic. I'll be literally in the world of chocolate, where they pipe in chocolate smell, give out samples, and make even the street lights look like hershey kisses, and not be able to EAT any of it.

weekend at tricey's

or more aptly, better off dead.

did you ever have one of those weekends where you're actually counting down till monday morning when you can go back to work? I have. oh, I have. and this was one of em. actually this was YET ANOTHER one of em.

before I get more in depth, let me just give you an overview. friday night - mother in law visits. saturday - insanely hot day capped by slightly surreal impromptu high school reunion. saturday night/sunday morning - incredibly painful IBS bout. sunday - annoying 7 hour visit to my mother's house.

I realize that I've been bitching about weekends pretty much since I realized that sean would be moving to the weekday shift. it's like when you have to go to the bathroom really bad, and you see the toilet, and that makes you have to go that much more because you know it's thisclose. but seriously, some of these weekends are just way too much for me to handle.

first off, it's been 99F here for days. with humidity, they say it's like 110F. apologies to texans and/or floridians and/or anyone else who deals with this heat all the time. I love all of you, but I live in pennsylvania and we are only supposed to have short heat waves that are tempered by the gloriousness of being the birthplace of independence. the rest of the time, it's supposed to be pretty nice and we forget about all that liberty bell nonsense because we don't have to remind ourselves about why do we live in this burning pit of liquid hot magma again?

second, as sean said, we don't have air conditioning except for a window unit in our bedroom. which makes the first off part that much more of a factor.

and third, I'M ALL ALONE. yes, yes, I did it with trent for years, but for some reason, it's worse when you could have help but don't because of something like a stupid job for stupid money.

adding a fourth, I have my period. so you can all suck eggs if you don't feel like hearing me bitch. you heard me. SUCK GODDAMN EGGS.

so this doesn't end up as an extra long post, I'm just going to run the highlight reel.

jo-anne's (my mother in law) visits are just annoying off the bat because she constantly works into conversation that she never sees bella, as if we have to ask her if she wants to see her. last time I checked, phones and cars worked both ways. plus, she's always got some notion about how things work that is usually so far removed from reality that it really should be comical, but instead it's just frustrating. this time, it was how dvd players work, I think. it could have been cable. I tuned out.

saturday was so unbearably hot by 8am when I had to be at trent's soccer field that I had to leave with bella. so I missed the team's only goal of the day over 2 games, which of course was scored by trent. I fucking hate the heat.

then saturday night was nice, seeing some old high school friends, but I felt a bit disconnected at times when people were talking mass spectrometers and basal ganglia and whether their offices had windows. it had nothing to do with the company I was keeping, it had to do with what every single reunion situation deals with - having to take personal stock in where you are in life. plus, it was still fucking hot.

saturday night into sunday morning, I had one of the worst bouts of IBS that I've ever had in my life. and for the first time in HISTORY, I allowed someone into the bathroom with me so that I didn't a) burn up from the heat, and b) pass out. sean came in to help me even though he was already tired and had to get up at 4am. and we were in there for hours. at one point, he had to go in to make sure bella wouldn't wake up and instead of us having the transmitter for the baby monitor in the bathroom, we had to put the receiver in the bathroom so that he could be in the bed with bella listening for if I was still alive. I may have gotten transmitter and receiver wrong but you know what I'm saying. it was a long, horrible ordeal and I almost considered going to the hospital.

sunday, I had to drive an hour and a half to my mother's so that we could use her pool, only to find out that they don't allow babies anywhere but the baby pool, which was broken. hours later, we found out that they would allow bella in the pool if she had a swimmer diaper, which I had forgotten to bring. robert e lee went to 2 stores to get swimmer diapers but because he isn't very good at locating anything that he doesn't use regularly, he couldn't find them. so he came back, after about an hour, and then I had to go out and find some. and people, my mother lives in the middle of NOWHERE. the town is called bath, to give you some indication. there are only 2 traffic lights in the town, the center of which is about 5 blocks long. so anywhere you have to drive to get something is guaranteed to take at least a half hour. we finally got in the pool, but by that time it was naptime and bella was cranky and miserable. we didn't get home until about 15 minutes before six feet under, which did cheer me up a bit, but my stomach was still not right from the night before and I didn't wind up enjoying it as much as I wanted to.

and then, blissfully, the weekend was over. and every weekend that comes between now and mid september is going to likely be as excruciating, but each one that goes by gets us closer and closer to having sean be a part of things. and that will be HEAVEN.

Summer Home Stretch

Sean here feelin' the heat. Summer and heat go together like "steak and bacon". There's nothing wrong with a little sizzlin' if you're equipped to handle it. When you lack central air in your home, it makes you feel less equipped for coping with the heat (including simple things like breathing easy) unless you have a pool, and sorry folks. The Nemo pool isn't going to cut it for me. Although, it does feel nice to put my feet in along side Bella, but that can only last so long until the pruning takes effect so much that Darwin sends us back to our fishy origins from beyond the grave.

The heat has felt so bad lately that I actually look forward to coming to work to bask in the a/c. I was in such a hurry yesterday that, after merely WALKING down the stairs and breaking a sweat, I vacated the house quickly without breakfast, packed lunch, or my cell phone. At least I had a chance to be cool at work for 12 hours, but Patrice cannot say the same. I'm sure she'll tell you about it tomorrow. Hopefully, she'll have better luck today as she trucks up to Bath, PA with Bella to her mother's house, which has an air conditioner and a non-kid friendly pool.

All of this heat really has me looking forward to The Fall, which is, by far, my favorite season and even more special this year with the birth celebration of a very special daughter o' mine (Strangeafeet and Marksthespot can probably share the same enthusiasm about the upcoming Autumn). To get ready for the big shindig, I've been busy organizing the guest list and tweaking it so that our overall cost can somehow get submerged below the $1000 mark. Right now, staying above this mark seems inevitable, but I think it's a worthy cause because A) She's only going to turn 1 once in her life; and B) Our heathen tendencies steered us away from having a Christening, so we're already one behind on the list of big family occasions to have for baby.

Another facet I'm working on is the song list, which besides The Beatles "Birthday Song" will consist of all Halloween and other spooky/creepy/ghoulish songs I can think of. The list is long so far as I have plenty to work with, but if you have an obscure suggestion for a song that you think would go well at a child's Halloween-themed birthday party, please let me hear it.

As far as the diet goes (not going the distance or for speed right now), I have cheated in two ways this week. A) I have totally disregarded it in favor of eating out and snacking unnecessarily. B) I completely ignored the scale this morning, so I have no idea about the damage of said eating. This is compounded by the fact that Trent has been on vacation with Brett this week, and I haven't played Frisbee in a week. All of this bad eating and lack of exercise has me thinking that all positive steps forward have been followed by two steps back. So, I have nothing to report on that subject this week except that I'll try harder this week. Only a few more weeks until the beach!

Finally, I gave thought to posting the concert list on this site, but seriously. Patrice would kill me for A) Bringing up too many bad memories; B) Taking up too much space on this site; and C) Taking too much emphasis away from the topics that really matter. But, I'd like to honor the request of those of you who would be interested in checking out my 10 and 1/2 pages of former excessive show addiction. If you want to see it, send me an email at seanmilligan31@hotmail.com , and I'll send you the attachment . And, if you have your own list or are interested in compiling your own and need my help, or if you just want to trip down memory lane about more of your experiences, I look forward to hearing from you.

It's too bad for Marksthespot that he saw Pink Floyd and Roger Waters a month apart. If only someone purposely booked both acts on the same day in the same venue so that Waters unknowingly showed up and was forced to play the great gig with Gilmore and his old mates. It's hard to believe that such a treat wasn't made public again until the quartet breathed at this past July's Live 8 in London.

Shine on you crazy diamonds! Stay cool, and if you spend too much time and money keeping yourselves cool, and you still get brain damage, run like hell!

good news, bad news

and the good is really good and the bad is really bad.

the bad news: my stepmother and father put down my childhood dog, wally. without telling me. granted, it's not like they removed wally from my house and had him put to sleep - wally lives with them and has lived with them since I was 18. I got wally for my 16th birthday, so I spent 2 years caring for him while my dad and KKKathy had him for 12 years. kathy was the one who taught him all the tricks he knew, and took him for walks, and groomed him, and fed him, and later in life she would carefully wash him and clean up after him as his entire back end was paralyzed from arthritis. so it's not like they had to consult with me. clearly wally was kathy's dog after all this time. but I loved that dog, too, and I would have liked to know that they were going to do it - or at least that they had. I found out by sean telling me after kathy had mentioned it IN PASSING on the phone regarding something else entirely.

the last time I saw wally was this past sunday. kathy said that this could possibly be the last time I saw him, and I said I knew. he was gray, and old, and deaf, and blind, and couldn't walk. my dad had wanted to put him out of his misery a few months ago, but kathy firmly said she wasn't ready for that yet. and as of sunday, kathy still wasn't ready. in fact, she said she wasn't sure that they could go on vacation at the end of august because she didn't want anyone else watching wally. so you can imagine how I felt finding out the way I did that it was this past tuesday, 48 hours after her telling me she wasn't ready, that wally was put down.

like I said, it wasn't my decision. he was hardly my dog. but I told sean - I think it would be evident by the way I cried when my dad told me that they were even considering doing this; that when I was finally able to, I bought a dog EXACTLY LIKE WALLY, same breed, same coloring, same goddamn BREEDER as wally, because I loved wally so much; it would be evident that I did, in fact, love wally and would care deeply when he was gone.

I took pictures of wally on that last day, and I'll post them here when I download them. wally is much grayer and broader and has bigger paws than maggie, but when wally was a younger dog, he was almost indistinguishable from maggie:


it's not the greatest picture, but it's one where I think maggie resembles wally really closely. from what we know of our breeder, it's entirely possible that maggie is actually related to wally.

I haven't talked to kathy or my dad yet. I don't know what I'll say. they had no obligation to me, and I'm angry, and they're probably very sad, so I don't know what's appropriate. for now, I'm going the avoidance route.

the good news, and I wish it were timed better: bella can crawl. she crawled clear across the room for sean yesterday, and again for me when I got home. she pushes herself up to sitting and can get up and down while holding onto furniture like it's no thang. gone are the days when we could plop her on the floor and quick let the dog out, or keep a fan on the floor, or put her in the middle of our bed while we get dressed. now more than ever, we have to get stuff done with our house. babyproofing, but more importantly - new carpet, new pergo in the front room, and a new kitchen floor.

put on your yarmulke, it's time for lonnica...

(so no one is confused, I'm tipping my hat to an overused but still slightly funny SNL/adam sandler song and "yarmulke" is pronounced "YA-ma-ca" and I'm simultaneously giving an unbidden and unauthorized nickname to lonna.)

yesterday, our living room was bursting with childy goodness. there were babies all over the place. nicole and noah came up first and had some tasty pizza in a somewhat clandestine manner, since mark wasn't there (so they got the white pizza with all the cheese he won't eat) and lonna and ethan weren't there yet (as they are vegans). not judging at all. just saying.

the babies played poker while the adults (sean and nicole) played peekaboo and rolled a ball back and forth between them. I came home around 6, and lonna and ethan came in around 6:30. and then it began!

dermot.
is.
adorable.

I couldn't ever imagine ethan with a child, just because I think he was born a grown up. you know what I mean? but he was so gentle and patient with dermot. lonna is totally confident and a great conversationalist. we all talked while dermot tried to pet and/or rip the hair off our dog and cat, and occasionally noah would try to escape to the kitchen to play with the pets' water bowl. bella, being fairly immobile, just sat there watching everyone.

we all nursed our kids at various times, soothed cries from time to time, and shared alot about birth experiences. that, and sean and ethan talked about hell fest, crazy fest, slaughter fest, metal fest, gore fest, and rock till your ears bleed fest. (only three of those are actual events.)

it was so great to see lonna, ethan, and dermot, especially since they live in iowa now and only get here once a year or so to see ethan's parents. I am sorry to anyone who lives in iowa (and likes it) but I have to say that I would be getting the fuck out of iowa more often than once a year if I could swing it, from what they tell me about it. (and what I've seen on children of the corn.)

someday when I download the pictures, I'll post them so you can see the cuteness that is dermot.

let's talk trent

because I was reminded this morning, while commenting on blogs, of 2 distinct trent incidents, I thought I'd do a post dedicated to the little man we love named trent.

some of the more vivid memories, some not so great and some okay:

the alarm clock incident that I shared on rebecca's blog. trent was about 9 or 10. I was so angry at him for not going to sleep hours after his bedtime that I picked up trent's alarm clock, screamed at him "DO YOU SEE WHAT TIME IT IS??" and then threw the clock against the wall by his head, where it broke. we were both speechless. and then we both cried. I still keep that clock under my side of the bed to remind me to never lose control like that again.

the slurpee incident. I recently told nicole aobut this. an 11ish year old trent and I took our dog maggie for a walk to the local 7-11. I stayed outside with maggie while trent went in to get a slurpee. the slurpee machine went wild and spilled slurpee all over trent and the floor and everything else. trent tried not to cry but a few girls were nearby and laughed at him, and the store manager yelled at him. I watched through the window, unable to do anything because I couldn't take the dog in the store. it was heart wrenching. I knocked on the window and had him stay with the dog while I cleaned up and got him a fresh slurpee, which he no longer wanted.

when trent was about 3, and brett and I were broken up but not yet on completely unfriendly terms, we went to see our friend dave fryling's wedding in poughkeepsie NY and left trent with brett's mother. when we came home, brett's mother came running out, her shirt covered in blood. the first thing she said was "trent's okay." but one look at that shirt, and I could feel my own blood draining from my face. this was one of those times, like amanda said, where you have to be calm so you don't freak out your kid. trent was lying on the couch, face swollen and covered in blood. it seems brett's much younger brother, who was probably 8 at the time, had been swinging a wooden baseball bat in the back yard and trent had walked up behind him and got caught in the face with the bat on a full swing. he still has a scar from the stitches on his cheek - it was right on the cheekbone. the doctors said he was lucky he didn't break it.

I have a thousand more memories, like when trent started to learn to walk while in full leg plaster casts because of his surgery for clubbed feet, and how he ate dog shit and got upset not because it tasted bad but because I made him stop (and the ensuing embarrassing phone call to the pediatrician to ask what to do - fyi, if your kid eats dog shit, just let him drink alot of milk), and all the times he was a sweet boy who would do things for kids who the other kids wouldn't talk to...

but I'll end with one that most of my friends know. when trent was about 5, he created a one man band which he called Trent's Pants. he had been making up "songs" that lasted about 30 seconds each, but he had amassed like 30 of them. one day maybe a year or so later, when he was bored, I told him to draw a poster promoting his new album, because we had set out to tape record his songs and distribute them. which unfortunately never happened, though trent remembers all of the songs to this day. anyway, he wanted to come up with a catchy slogan for his album release, so this is what he came up with, emblazoned on a red poster with a very child-like picture of a pair of pants, in his uneven 1st grade script:

TAKE A TRIP INSIDE TRENT'S PANTS

he thought it was genius. I wasn't going to burst his bubble, so when our friends would come over and ask how the band was coming along, he'd tell them all about his slogan. of course, we all giggled. people wanted me to make shirts, and trent was all for it, but I was afraid of being arrested for corrupting a minor. I still may make those shirts, as trent is on the cusp of puberty and in a few years, unfortunately, it may be something he still wants the female public to do.

the amazing chocolatier

this weekend was both a success and a failure. sunday was a throwaway day, but let's focus on the positive, shall we?

friday - got gigantic ice cream cones. nuff said.

saturday - we gave birth to the BEEF HEAD and saw C&TCF.

sunday - shhhhh.

so saturday. we had plans to drop off bella with brett, and meet sean in frazer, which is exactly as small and obscure as it sounds. it's just outside of west chester, which is totally not the west chester that hillary clinton is from, but is still nice. sean works in west chester and had gone to this place in frazer called Cheeburger Cheeburger, in homage to the SNL skit. they had a burger that is 20 oz, and if you eat it all, they take your picture and put it up on the wall. what we didn't know is that if you're 12 and under and eat a 10 oz burger, you also get your picture taken and have it up on the wall.

of course, we encouraged trent to be a total glutton and do the 10 oz. in fact, I appalled myself by coaching him not to eat the fries that came out and not to drink any of his chocolate milkshake so he would have room for the whole burger. and he came through with flying colors (as I'm sure the burger itself did sometime yesterday). he ate the burger, got his picture taken, was introduced to the whole restaurant, and is now famous.

but the best part? nicole had gotten him a t shirt from old navy that said "BEEF HEAD" on it with a picture of a steak and a little flag stuck into it that says "Prime". and trent happened to be wearing it, completely coincidentally. so he is immortalized on the Cheeburger Cheeburger bulletin board in frazer with his BEEF HEAD shirt. life doesn't get much better than that.

after dinner, we saw charlie and the chocolate factory, and I loved it. I even loved (and laughed at) the oompa loompa songs. I thought it was clever, didn't take itself too seriously, and did enough tips of the hat to the original to set itself apart but not too apart.

and then sunday came crashing down, but sunday is over. amen.

Irish Eyes Are Smiling

Great leprechauns on ice! Sean here, and I SO wasn't expecting to see the green background replacing the pink. Goes to show you how often I frequent this place (or infrequent, if you will). Sorry I've been away so long. I don't think I legitimately posted since before I left for Atlanta (except for those bitchin' test results). That's alright, though, because Patrice is so damn fine (growlllll....) at keeping everyone up to date, and I value that, and I'm glad that you all do too. In fact, I'm overwhelmed with the amount of blog-love being passed around lately, so I just want to say that I appreciate everyone too, and it's wonderful to meet everyone's acquaintance like this on a daily (or in my case, weekly/monthly/whenever I get around to it) basis. I'll fill you in on details about me lately that Patrice may have missed.

Indicated by the subject line, I'm pretty happy right now. I'm looking forward to going down the shore soon, and much like a topic already discussed, I'm so far from how I want to look on the beach, but at this point, I don't care because at least I'm doing something about it. I get comfort out of knowing that I'm trying hard regardless of the outcome. If I sat back and did nothing, then I would have nothing to blame but my own lack of effort. I'm still at 224 lbs., which is still about 30 lbs. more than I want to be, but I've been feeling good regardless. I'm eating well for the most part. I usually don't go out of my way to eat badly, but if bad (meaning tasty goodness) food comes my way, I have a hard time passing it up. This IT guy (Information Technology...not Pennywise from "It") just came over and offered leftover chicken fingers and popcorn chicken. After working 11 straight hours, my will was weak, so you know the outcome. I've been good for the most part, but tripped up a little by doing a bit of celebrating upon passing the test (beers and going out to eat several times), but I rebounded from that successfully with no weight gained. Although, I try not to think of the progress I may have undone.

The X factor lately has been Trent who, since our recent purchase of a cool Frisbee from Toys 'R' Us, wants to do nothing but run around with me and throw the disc, so I do. A) It's a lot of fun. B) It's good bonding time for the two of us. C) I sweat hella buckets indicating that I'm working out legitimately (or that I'm severely out of shape [a little from column A and a little from column B]). Along with the sweat, I feel my heart rate increasing, and my muscles tightening (like toy-ger). So, the exercise is making me feel better about myself. A few more weeks of this, and I should start seeing more results as I move away from this 224 plateau that I've been stuck on for a month.

Other than that, I've just been savoring the cuteness of Bella. I do this especially with the thought in mind that she will not be like this forever, which kills me, but I'm making the best of it. It's too hot for the walks that we were taking up until two weeks ago, but at least we have that Finding Nemo baby pool to dip ourselves into to compensate for our lack of A/C. If you look at the pool upside down, "Nemo" looks like "Owen".

Movie-wise, we saw Charlie and the Chocolate Factory last night, and it's safe to say that we all loved it. I can't wait until Bella is old enough to see great movies like this one with us. I also look forward to her being big enough to run around the field with Trent and I as we hurl the Frisbee at each other. Then again, I can wait because she is such a darling at this point, and she will continue to be (fate willing), but in different, more grown-up forms. I like this form for now, and I never want to forget how wonderful she is at the present time. Ah, the value of a video camera!
Since my iPod has plenty of music on it for now, I found something else to occupy my time, and it' s not reading (despite being stuck in the middle of Goblet Of Fire for the past two years and being 5 months behind on my Decibel Magazine reading). I sat down this time last week and started composed a list of every musical performance (a.k.a. show) I have ever been to. It started back in 1994 at Hershey Park when I saw Bob Dylan, and it brings me all the way to April '05 when I went to Worcester. It was very difficult to tally 'em all, but I think I have succeeded. Then again, I thought that yesterday, and I remembered two more today, so the list will probably continue to grow in increments. I used the Interent (amazing how much archived info you can pull from there), concert promoters (Sean Agnew from R5 productions), and friends (WB and Storm to name a few) for reference, and it's coming along pretty well. Patrice asked me why I'm doing this. Well, A) It will free up some of the space in my mind so that I don't have to waste grey matter for fear of forgetting these great experiences and occassional horrible annoyances. B) I'm sentimental. I like looking back on my life so far and appreciating how far I have come. C) It's a reflection of my personality. Looking at the list shows me how I have grown. For example, I don't go to nearly as many shows as I used to (went to 36 in the year 2001 alone compared to 2 this year). Another example is how the list shows how my musical tastes have changed. Finally, I like to think about the bands I was seeing and who went with me to see them, and if either are even still around or a part of my life. I can recall going to shows with friends and family members who I don't even talk to anymore, and I've seen bands that broke up soon after I saw them (some timely and some deservingly). Reflecting and compiling this info helps me admire the bands that are still around even more so (that is, if they are still around for the right reasons), and I make a special note of the people with whom I still have a strong friendship (most importantly, a marriage with a special author of this blogsite). Thinking back helps me gain massive appreciation for the ones that have made it through all of these years with me. It's not like I was born in 1994 or anything (that would be 1976), but my life definitely did start over that year when I broke out of my NE Philly bubble/cave/vacuum and started tasting flavors of life that I never had exposure to in the one-track mindset from where I came. But, that's a whole different story for another time. I may have gone on too long, but it was overdue. I hope you enjoyed my tangent.

to all the blogs I've loved before

let's talk about blogs.

I started this thing last march, shortly after finding out I was pregnant. it was basically to just talk about what it's like to be pregnant, because at the time, I was the only person out of my group of closest friends to be pregnant, and they wanted blow by blow info. and it was sort of like my diary. shortly after, nicole got pregnant, but I blogged on anyway. my friends, one by one, started blogging, and it was such a great way to keep in touch with all of them. even the ones I talk to several thousand times a day.

then our little network got bigger - either by being nextblogged or nextblogging ourselves. my blogroll (which someday I hope returns to its rightful position over there --> ) is full of people who have contributed something to my day to day life, either by coming here and introducing themselves, or having been introduced elsewhere. now, I have a blogiverse full of people who I keep track of, and who, in turn, keep track of me.

most of you already know where this is going. I would be heartbroken if one of my bloggy friends stopped blogging. and so, I am heartbroken. no excuses are necessary, no explanations needed - but boobecca, please...even if it's a totally new blog, please return to us. and the rest of you, don't stop blogging. it doesn't matter if you have 2 readers or 200, there are those among us who wonder where you go when you're gone. when kodi went to the boy scout jamboree, and we heard about accidents that happened there, I told my husband "I have a friend there! I hope she's okay." and when recently talking about Real World Austin, I told someone "I have a friend who lives in austin, and she loves it." that sums up how I feel about everyone I connect with through this medium - we're all friends. friends who never actually met each other, friends we'd pass by on the street if we saw them unless they were dressed and posed exactly like their little icon, friends who know more about us in some cases than some of our own family.

I guess the theme here, besides convincing missuz j to blog again, is to thank all of you who come here and everyone who I've visited for creating something bigger than bits and bytes on an intangible superhighway.

birthdays and monthaversaries

everyone seems to be getting older all of a sudden.

first off, I'd like to say happy birthday to missuz j, and thank you to nicole for finding her blog and leading me to it. I hear sophie gene's birthday is upcoming as well, and her husband erik just had his own birthday. I wonder if sophie will grow up thinking that all families have their birthdays in the same 4 week span.

second, I'd like to say happy 9 months to noah mccormack eggerts, who is a sweet, sweet boy. noah, without your mom, I'd be insane by now. please do what you can to make her not have a heart attack anytime soon by worrying about you. yes, yes, I know, most of that is completely out of your hands, but I'm just saying. like running with scissors or climbing the baby gate, just don't do it, okay? for me.

third, noah's proud papa is going to be something like 48 thousand hundred years old soon, so in preparation, I want to say happy birthday to mark.

fourth, tracey the scuttleslut is going t be 48 thousand hundred and 3 years old at the end of this month, and even though she'll remind us all 50 times, I wanted to say happy birthday to her as well.

last, but not least, happy 9 months to baby bella, whose 9 month anniversary of being thrust from my womb I did not acknowledge on the 31st when I was supposed to. sweetheart, I love you so much, even though you've already learned how to throw a temper tantrum by screeching and going stiff as a nail when you don't get your way.

so hats off to all of you who are getting older by the second...that means you, too!

EDITED TO ADD:

happy belated to the guy I apparently got into alot of trouble in high school, ethan, and happy 18 months to his wonderful little cherub dermot. (thanks lonna!!) (ps, I don't have the url to a dermot picture - care to hook a sista up?) I can't wait to see dermot in person and to see all of you again! (sidenote: ever google ethan? holy shit! I remember when he was just a kid with glasses who laughed at our english teacher.)

oh yes, weight a minute mr. postman (weight!)

the reality of going to the shore is starting to crash down on me like a wave from the atlantic filled with dead jellyfish. I got my bathing suits from lands end and returned two of them - leaving me with one suit. which sean thinks is completely appropriate, but I am not to be expected to spend 4.5 days at the shore wearing the same suit every day, am I? ladies, back me up here. so I went ahead and ordered 4 more suits from spiegel.com that were, amazingly, $20 apiece. again, whichever ones I don't like, I'll return. I am not holding up high hopes for them, though, because I've been brainwashed by the materialistic consumerism society we live in that if it's not expensive, it's crap.

so about the weight thing, because I haven't been very diligent about my progress or lack thereof. I have weighed myself twice since that original post a while back. and both times, the scale hovered around 2 lbs shy of my original 140. but my clothes have been fitting alot better lately, and I've been complimented by people who aren't quick with the compliments (and some who are very quick with the compliments) saying that I look like I've lost weight. so I consider that a success.

sean, on the other hand, seems to be lacking direction in this area and I think he needs something way more structured. though I think he looks fine, he is disgusted with himself and wants to change so badly. I feel terrible for him because I know exactly how that feels and I want to support him. it's just that I can't put myself through the counting points thing again.

I am definitely not where I'd choose to be, especially given the rear look on my bathing suits, but it doesn't seem to matter as much to me, either. (though, ask me again when our beach blankets are next to some young, nubile bikini wearers - or worse, a mother who is older than me who is wearing a bikini but has 5 young children.)

oh - and a word to the wise about using jergen's natural glow, the stuff I had to buy for $10 a bottle on ebay (but that I saw at walmart the other day for $2.50 a bottle, and there were 40 thousand of them): do not use on creasy places, like ankles or that space where your leg meets your torso. and do not use on skin that's previously used crappy self tanner - it seems to reactivate it. but when I use it on the leggier part of my legs, it seems to be doing a good job making me look less pasty. it does help if you're using it on top of skin that is less pallor than maybe ever so slightly sunkissed. I noticed it looked alot more natural once I had actually let the sun touch my legs for more than a few minutes.

so now all I have to worry about for the beach is the mother with the bikini, the dead jellyfish, and probably bella eating sand. I can't wait!

swingin for the fences

when people today have asked me what I did this weekend, I just look at them with tired, red eyes, over the ridge of my sunburned nose, and say one word.

baseball.

trent's last ever little league tournament started on thursday. they were playing deep run, which is the sports complex that I used to play soccer at. (dangle, you preposition.) I haven't been back to deep run since I was 17, and returning was a little surreal. it's a lot bigger now, and the soccer fields are new and in the expanded area. most of trent's games were played on what used to be the field I played on while in the teen years.

deep run's little league team made it so far up the ladder to the little league world series last year that they were on ESPN. it's not hard to imagine that they were whipping the butts of most of the other local teams, which begs the question of why they were even playing in them. it was more than a little unfair. think of the kids who were on the losing end of a 31 - 1 game. thirty-one to one. and that was in the 4th inning.

so deep run had been crushing opponents this year at most of the tournaments that trent has played. it seemed to be a foregone conclusion that whoever they played, they'd win. so we had low expectations for trent's team, even though they had won their first two games. it was hot, sunny, and dry on saturday when the teams faced off. I had to leave early to get ready for nicole and beth, who were coming to my house later. when I left, it was 4 to 1 in the 4th inning, which was, to me, a total win, since we weren't getting crushed. we were holding our own.

apparently I left the single most incredible game in lansdale little league history, as not only did we hold them to the 4 runs they had scored, but the kid who batted after trent scored a walk-off grand slam to win the game. and trent was on first at the time, so he scored the tying run.

the team's outlook had changed dramatically after the thick-headed coach finally decided to put both trent and the kid who would later hit that grand slam into the game a few weeks ago. I think you remember me saying that trent was benched most of the time, simply for playing the same position as the coach's son. the coach put trent in, finally, not because he was doing well - because he was - but because while the other kids had gotten complacent (because they were hardly ever taken out - only for the requisite 1 at bat or 3 consecutive outs required for the benched players) and trent was still full of hustle, even though he was hardly playing. so as a token gesture, and not because he felt trent deserved it, he started trent at center field and let him be the leadoff hitter.

the rest, as they say, is history. not only did trent keep up the hustle, but he did so well that they kept him at his position, moving him to second base to switch things up instead of moving him to the bench. and he remained as the leadoff hitter for the rest of the season. I'm so proud of him. and the kid who hit the home run got put in, too, because of his good attitude, and they beat the smug, complacent, well-funded deep run team because of it.



in non-baseball news, I had a great time reminiscing about high school with beth and nicole and brett on saturday afternoon. check out beth's son joseph. isn't he the cutest thing you ever saw???

cheerio!

93.2

A very quick post from Sean to y'all since my shift is almost over, and I have to pickup Bella. The results are in. I am offically an Information Analyst I after passing my analyst test with a 93.2 (second highest score in department history). Consider me offically promoted with a 7% raise and more respect around here. Plus, Information Analyst I sounds a lot more useful and important than Computer Operator, doesn't it? Just wanted everyone to know. Next thing to hope for is to get off of this dang weekend shift. One step at a time!

Have a great weekend, everyone! Take care.

check in, check up

today was bella's 9 month checkup, though she's not technically 9 months until the 31st. dr. jayraj checked her out again, and again asked if she was in daycare. swallowing my rage, I answered "just 2 days a week, as always" and he noted it, again, on her chart.

here's the gist: at first, she was in the 90th percentile for height and weight. meaning she was heavier and taller than 90% of her tiny baby peers. she's steadily decreased to 50% during her 6 month checkup. or 7th. whichever. now, though, she's at 25%. I don't really care about her being at the average, but it's just so crazy how she started off like a mammoth and is now a petite little lima bean. seeing her next to noah, who started off like a petite little lima bean, really drove the point home, though. noah looks like he could begin walking any time he wants. which is so cute, because his little babble sounds like a boy, he looks like a boy (whereas some babies can totally pass for asexual), and so his size just fits along with the rest of his personality. and I guess bella is the stereotypical girl baby at this point - little and dainty.

she got her hepatitis shot, which she was NOT happy about, and we learned that the patches of rough skin on her back and belly are, in fact, baby eczema. poor thing. it doesn't really seem to bother her - it more bothers me because I have a version of it and hate it and I am afraid hers will get worse.

the other interesting thing is that dr. jayraj told us to basically start giving her table food. which, okay, really? and of course last night we went grocery shopping and bought 80 kinds of baby food jars for her. I guess though that I can stop feeling guilty for letting her taste my food all the time. (I can still feel guilty for letting her have some of my crybaby sour cherry water ice, since it made her forcefully vomit. the face she made eating it was just too cute not to keep feeding it to her until then, though.) and he said she should be eating solid food 3 times a day and nursing about 4 times a day. I guess we can expect her to rise up from the 25th percentile then.

he did say that we should continue giving her her vitamin drops as we have been since they were prescribed at 3 months old. as in 2/3 of her lifetime ago. and sean and I looked at each other and said "okay, will do." uh - we kinda forgot about those. we gave them to her at first, but that was in her not-wanting-anything-in-her-mouth phase. and then, I guess we just stopped. and never...quite...started again. oops.

so all in all it went well. and tonight, we are giving bella a steak and a baked potato for dinner. I hope she can use the knife okay.

bathing beauties

after completely embarrassing myself at the hatfield public pool this weekend because I was wearing a maternity bathing suit top with a pair of mismatched bottoms, I decided to bite the bullet and order up some bathing suits from Middle Aged Yachting White People's Clothing Company, ie Land's End. I had gone to sears over the weekend looking for the land's end bathing suits I saw in their catalog, and had gotten nothing, as I had forgotten that no one needs a bathing suit in the dead heat of july. no, we all buy them in march, when it's too cold to wear short sleeves. in july, when no one is going to the beach, or has lost weight, or decided they hated their current suit, or just hasn't gotten around to buying a suit yet, no one needs or wants bathing suits. that is why there are only 4 of them on the rack. because no one wants them. (thank you, sarcasm italics.)

because you can't try on bathing suits when you're buying them online, I had to take some drastic measures and treat it as if I were in the store. even though the bathing suits are an astonishingly expensive $80 apiece, I ordered 3 of them, with the intention of trying them on and returning the ones I don't like. so sean, if you see a charge on the statement for like a hundred skillion dollars, don't worry - I'm taking care of it.

so swimming. it is hot as hell here in eastern PA lately, and this weekend was no exception. I went to our local pool for the first time and was very impressed by what I saw as I drove up - a kiddie pool that had a ramp in it so the water got gradually higher so bella could sit in it, a mushroom shaped fountain, a nice looking snack stand - and so I was pretty psyched that this pool trip would be okay. because generally, I hate public pools. having been a spoiled brat and growing up with my own pool in my back yard, I had a mild disdain for having to share to begin with, but when you think about all the organisms and hygiene habits of people....I should stop. I'm freaking myself out.

anyways, so I get to our local pool and go inside. a couple of kids who look like they are about 10 are at the desk. no other adults in sight. I ask how much for the day, and they just look at each other like I'm speaking yiddish. finally, one looks down so as not to have to make eye contact and tells me "you gotta be a member." I was like "you mean to tell me I can't just pay to come in?" and he tells me that a member has to sign me in for me to be allowed in for the day. a member has to sign me in. what is this, a fucking country club? it's the local goddamn pool!! I mean, yeah, it looks nice, but sweet shit on a stick, it's still a local pool! since I wasn't getting anywhere with these little asswipes, I left and went over to a pool I knew would accept payment for the day - hatfield. a pool that I knew was one of the reasons I hold the stereotype of public pool that I do. one with band-aids floating in the water and people who smell badly.

so we went in and bella loved it. like seriously loved it. she showed no signs of getting bored, even after a half hour of walking in circles. hell, *I* was bored. she could have stayed there all day.

of course, it's the end of july, and I'll be damned if I pay $150 to be allowed to go to my local pool (I PAY TAXES, YOU LITTLE SHITS, LET ME INTO THE GODDAMN POOL) so I guess it's either hatfield or our little baby pool until next year.

why can't one of my friends put a pool in at their house?? jen, tracey, nicole, theresa - I'm looking at you guys.

odds n ends - picture edition

I tend to store up lots of pictures in my camera and then download them all at once. hence.

from three separate swimming instances:

one - sean, his ipod-toting dad, and bella


two - bella and noah and the aftermath




three - hatfield community pool, I have to tell you about that


and here's a picture for theresa as a thank you for the pretty dress.


more later...

the scream machine

just look what we did to noah. or rather, what bella did to noah.

as nicole said, every time noah started really having fun with bells, she started having a little too much fun and squealed, and noah would look like she just brandished a shiv she retrieved from her diaper and was planning to cut him.

it was cute in a way, and very sad. I felt bad for noah, I felt bad for bella, and I really felt bad for nicole, because clearly can't be expected to have control over our kids' emotions but it is hard to watch your baby cry. it was great to see nicole, though. but when I saw her, I wanted to run over and type all over her. I think we're a little too used to email.

a source of frustration for me yesterday is my pork roast's pop up timer. this happens to us all the time - we get something that has a pop up timer and it never fucking pops up. I love the idea of the pop up timer because I have a phobia of uncooked meat. I am constantly asking sean and trent if the meat looks too pink, or if it's done. I've been that way for many years now, with nothing to really back up my claims that I'm always eating undercooked meat. however, a few weeks ago, I had a chicken finger from the snack stand at the lansdale little league field, and after biting into it without looking for 3 bites, I looked down to see slimy, pink, uncooked chicken. it seriously was all I could do not to throw up.

anyway. so the idea of a pop up timer is infinitely appealing - having something tell you "I'm done!" is excellent - but they never. fucking. work.

case in point. our little pork roast was in the oven for an hour and 15 minutes, the oven was turned off for about an hour (so it was in there with the oven still hot), and then cooked again for another 15 minutes. and the timer never popped. the overall cooking time according to the directions was one hour, 10 minutes. it was in the oven turned on for an hour and a half, and had an extra hour of cooking time in a hot oven in a hot kitchen. lucky for us, it was not a hockey puck and had some juices left in it when we ate it. but that damn pop up timer never popped up. what's the friggin point??

I seriously can't remember a pop up timer I've had that has EVER worked. now, you'll all say that they work for you, things pop up all the time, it's great - but come cook in my kitchen. maybe it's a vortex of tainted meat timers, I don't know, but I seem to be cooking in the bermuda triangle of pop up timers.

so, nicole, I'm sorry if the meat was a little rubbery.

sometimes I feel I've got to bomp bomp run away

theresa has me thinking.

a couple times a year, I tend to fly the coop. I would classify myself as a pretty social person, but I really value my alone time. I love to go to movies alone, I love to vacation alone, I love to just sit in silence for hours doing nothing but thinking.

sean is very understanding about this and always gives me the space I need. before bella was born, - actually the week before she was conceived, I think, or shortly afterwards - I was looking for cruises or cheap airfare to a warm city, since it was cold, and sean didn't bat an eyelash to either the fact that I was getting away and he wasn't, and that I was spending alot of money doing so. we wound up agreeing that I'd drive up to montreal instead, which was wonderful. but sometimes it's just a day trip to jim thorpe or philly or the shore or centralia.

once, on a day trip to jim thorpe, I came back with a better frame of mind and a tattoo. montreal saw me come back with a renewed spirit and some excellent pictures. I just need the time away to be myself, beholden to no one for a while, with no one asking me anything or needing me. not that I'm always put upon at home, but I look at it like sort of an ashtray, for lack of a better analogy. you can take the butts out of an ashtray and even dump it out, but every once in a while you have to send it through the dishwasher so the last little bits of ash get cleaned out and it's like new again.

this is similar to what theresa talks about as pondering - to me, anyway. I like to get my life in order while I'm gone. think about what we need to do to move ourselves forward. this is how I got myself ready to buy a house, to get married - to have bella. and it's a time to take personal stock in myself.

enough. you get the idea.

the problem is, now that I am, as I stated to theresa, tethered, I can't really get away. and I know if I did, I would feel quite guilty, and I'd have two giant engorged reminders that I was, for all intents and purposes, shirking some of my duties.

I dream of going to a tropical island, and spending whole days on the beach reading, alone. making a cocoon for myself so I can emerge as something new.

angel bella

I have had a trying couple of days and I'm exceedingly annoyed at the moment. so here is a picture of bella in lieu of a post. tomorrow is another day.

toofer one

bella's got her first tooth. it came without alot of fanfare - she was a tad cranky, a little more drooly, but nothing that was earth shattering. it's still just a lil nub of a tooth, but yesterday, she was drinking water from a glass (something she loves to do - unfortunately, most of the water runs down her chin) and sean and I both heard the distinctive clink of her tooth against the glass.

speaking of sean, he's taking that giant killer test this week. he did half yesterday and the other half will be friday. don't even get me started on how ridiculous it is to base a promotion on taking a goddamn test...but whatev, he's taking it, he's going to do marvelous, and we're going to be rolling in all the extra pennies.

and he found out that he has the opportunity to go to a better tues - sat work schedule. right now, he works fridays from 6a - 2:30p, saturdays and sundays from 6a - 6p, and mondays from 6a - 2:30p. which means I never, EVER see him. and neither do our families. but bella (and trent, as this is summer vacation) totally benefit. if he moves to tues - sat, he'll be working from 6a - 2:30p those days. and we'll have sunday to do stuff together. and he'll have monday with bells.

I already have a mental list in my head of all the stuff I want to do on the weekends - zoo, please touch museum, sleeping in for chrissakes - but the real exciting part, for me, is that sean will be able to watch the baby at the same time as I have off work. I think this makes me a bad person. a selfish person, if you will.

I want to have an afternoon on a sunday to read. (fyi, I did get the harry potter on saturday and finally started reading it last night, but only for like a half hour, since that's all sean could muster with bella.) I want to be able to cut the grass and weed the flower beds early sunday morning and not late on tuesday night. I want to be able to go to a movie. maybe even with sean.

it's no secret that I've felt more like a single parent lately than I've felt comfortable with. though sean is a loving, dedicated, very involved father, both of us interact with bella (and our home) on our own schedules, which only overlap on weeknights, and only for about 3 or 4 hours a night. most times less. so this is a good thing for us.

bella likes her daycare. they are good to her. she likes being around other babies and I think this gives her more socialization with adults, too, which is good. it's going to cost more - almost double - and mornings are going to be more difficult. and sean has a wonderful routine with bella that I can't get at any daycare.

this is just one of many of life's crossroads. I'm not sure which road we're definitely going to take, but one is looking alot more rosy than the other. what do you guys think?

friends are relatives you make for yourself

so today I want to say happy birthday to someone I consider just like a sister. from the first time we met in 9th grade, I knew we'd be lifelong friends.

actually, that's totally not true. the knowing we'd be lifelong friends part, I mean. see, back then, we were all over the place. at first, nicole was a little unsure of her place in the world, a little worried that her boobs weren't big enough, and a little too reliant on turtleneck/vest combos. you see how things have changed so dramatically?? I, on the other hand, was oblivious to most things, yet nosy, and a worry wart. so some things never change. but over the years, especially the last 6 or 8 of them, we've grown immensely closer together. it's so nice to have a friend that can remember last weekend with you and remember 10th grade english with you. who can understand a stupid reference to a nailpolish color you used to use when you were 15. who knows what you mean when you say "as squeaky clean as beth conrad."

this year, she turns 31. and I'm proud to say that I knew her when she turned 16 (with the mustangs) and 18 (getting ready for pitt) and 21 (when we'd lost touch) and 30 (when she knew she was pregnant finally). and I hope to know her when she turns 40 (with the spontaneous shrinking of her rack) and 65 (with a few kids to throw her a big party) and 120 (when she's just a brain in a jar attached to a computer, just like me.)

So, without further ado, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, NICOLE!!

honk honk

my drive to work in the morning is always slightly harrowing at best. fridays and mondays are even better, since I get to drop bella off at daycare and get ready without the help of sean. usually, though, trent's at least home to hang with bella while she sleeps and I'm in the shower. however, today, trent is staying at brett's new house - a house of wonder and contentment, a house where breakfast doesn't have to be eaten and frozen pizza abounds. a house where hawaiian punch flows like water and water flows like molasses.

so I was on my own this morning. first, bella woke up early. so I had her sitting on the bathroom floor while I took a shower. and, as usual, her toys are no longer interesting so she was playing with box of tampons that I accidentally left out. after a very quick shower, I sat her on the bed with her usual favorite toys - a tube of pantene leave-in conditioner, a back scratcher, and her foam toy remote courtesy of comcast. however, she was not in the mood for playing. only for holding.

we managed to get through my morning routine (with her grabbing the mascara tube only once, and me getting her to the sink to wash her hands before she was able to smear it all over anything) and got out the door and into the car. getting to daycare wasn't bad. getting into daycare wasn't bad. but leaving? that was bad. apparently, along with uh oh and waving bye bye, bella has learned to cry when mommy leaves. excellent.

so after a tearful goodbye, I got back in the car for the rest of my commute. I, um, accidentally very slightly cut a guy off (I had to get over, there was room - but it was close) and he wound up circumventing my shortcut with a shortcut of his own, and bing bam boom, he found himself in front of me. and he snickered. so I did what any person with slight road rage would do - I blew him a kiss. he nearly stopped the car. I thought he was going to punch me. he drove about 15 miles an hour through the parking lot that I cut through and made me miss a light. I blew him another kiss. (it's actually more effective than flipping the bird.) he continued to drive slowly. I think I was responsible for the backup on 63 going east today, sorry everyone.

I got in, on time (whew), played What's Encrusted On My Shirt Today, and settled in for another wonderful day on the Interweb.

good morning, everyone!

uh oh

first off, I am so excited that noah is crawling!! I love these baby milestones. and I have one myself, I'm proud to say.

bella said "uh oh" 2 days ago for the first time. when she drops something, which is all the time, I say "uh oh!" and give the item back to her. so when she dropped something 2 days ago, I said "uh oh" and there was little bella's voice (which is the same key as mine - so both of my children have deep voices) saying "uh oh!" I couldn't believe it, so I said it again. and she said it again. and I said it again. and she said it again. then I ran and grabbed the phone, called sean, and said it again. and she said it again.

and then - nothing. until once yesterday, and she said it to trent after he said it to her.

and then - nothing. until today. sean just called and said that she said it again. but not when he said it. I thought the whole thing was mimicry, as she tends to do that with alot of noises. but this time, she was playing with the dish towel (yeah, I know) and dropped it on the floor. and looked at sean and said "uh oh!" and when sean didn't get it right away, she said "uh oh!" again.

it's so crazy that she is on the verge of being able to understand what we're all talking about. it's a whole new ball game then - just like crawling is a whole new ball game for casa de eggerts. our worlds are going to change again, and then again, and again. it's exciting and a little scary and definitely exhilirating.

on a completely unrelated note: please, when in an area that serves rita's water ice, do yourselves a favor. never, EVER get a misto shake. it's all wrong. just - all wrong.

thank you, and good night!

as the cart turns

in response to nicole's request for our shopping cart contents, I offer the following:

I do occasionally make lists. if I have forgotten to get something a few times, or I have a recipe that requires something specific, I will make a list. sometimes, I'll make a list just because I'm trying to act more organized. quite often, my trips to the grocery store are spur of the moment, when I had gotten out of work a little early or trent is at practice and things are quiet. I don't have a day that I do shopping, nor do I have a set amount of time that goes by before I go shopping. if we are low on more than one genre of thing, I figure it's time. so if there are very little snacks and I'm having trouble finding things to make for dinner that night, it's time to go shopping. this happens probably every 10 days or so. sometimes more, sometimes less. I tend to spend between $150 and $175 each time I go.

for the most part, I browse each aisle looking for things that are new, seem good, and are on sale. I do have some staples that I buy each time. and sean tends to eat the same things for lunch every day, too, and those I get every time. (sidenote: I arrange my cart so that things fit nicely and exactly, and I arrange things in the cart, and then on the checkout conveyor, by where they go in our kitchen. I physically can't continue shopping if my cart is in disarray. it's kind of freaky.)

stuff I buy each time, usually without fail:
(in order of the aisles at the giant I shop at)

bananas
vidalia onion
plums/peaches/whatever looks good
jarred pineapple
applesauce
pickles
meat marinade (as we try to never have meat that hasn't been marinated)
tuna fish
bran flakes (for sean)
some sort of semi-sugary cereal (for me)
pop tarts (for trent)
granola bars
fruit roll ups
rice krispy treats
red gravy
ragu double cheddar sauce (it's better for you than boxed mac and cheese and you can make it with wheat pasta)
yellow rice
2 or 3 boxes of cous cous
white rice
fat free brown gravy in the jar
boxed scalloped potatoes
egg noodles
canned green beans - several cans
canned sweet corn - del monte
canned garbanzo beans
baked beans - vegetarian, bush's
chunky soup (trent's lunch)
fat free refried beans
salsa
barilla pasta in the yellow box - it's like extra fortified or something, sort of like wheat-y
saffron risotto
cookies - usually rotate between fat free chips ahoy, fat free oreos, and fat free fudge stripes
crackers - rotate between various kinds
a bag or two of pepperidge farm cookies if I am feeling even the least bit depressed or hungry or pmsy
rold gold pretzels - rotate between cheddar, honey mustard, and honey wheat braids
baked lays - rotate between plain, bbq, and sour cream cheddar
apple juice (100%)
fruit juice (100%)
hummus
some sort of beef substance
some sort of pork substance
ground turkey
ham steaks
fat free kielbasa or turkey kielbasa
healthy choice variety pack pre sliced lunchmeat (sean's lunch)
ball park fat free franks
morningstar farms parmesan ranch chik patties
a zillion lean cuisine or smart ones (my lunch)
lean pockets (trent's lunch)
waffles
breyer's chocolate ice cream (full on fat)
weight watchers choc chip cookie dough desserts
no pudge brownie cones
skinny cow ice cream sandwiches
minute maid frozen lemonade
4 or 5 bags of frozen broccoli
2 bags of frozen broccoli/cauliflower/carrots (I use these in casseroles)
1 bag frozen asparagus (the fresh stuff isn't always available or good-looking)
1 bag frozen cauliflower
1 bag frozen carrots
a quart of skim milk
a pack of various flavors of fat free pudding
a pack of various flavors of sugar free jello
light yogurt
I can totally believe it's not butter spread
arnold light wheat or 12 grain bread (sean's lunch)
stove top stuffing
wheat pita bread

and then there's always stuff that I don't plan on buying, like treats or meats that are on sale, or some ingredients for a recipe or something.

I tend to make alot of casseroles using rice or noodles or something. I have perfected what we call "meat pie" (you asked for it, nicole) which is a pie crust, a mixture of browned ground turkey, rice or potatoes, cream of mushroom soup, garlic, and mixed vegetables, with another pie crust on top and some fat free grated cheddar. I don't write down most of my creations and they taste different each time I make them, it seems.

on weeks where trent is at brett's, though, I tend to cook lighter. like just cous cous and garbanzo beans with some vegetables. depends on what sean feels like doing. oh, and sean grills almost all of our meats in the summer. which is great, because I don't touch meat when it's not cooked and when he grills, I don't have to do my usual knife and two forks dance to get meat out of its packaging and into whatever is going to cook it.

I hope this is what you're looking for. it's pretty bland, actually.

THE DAY

you're all just waiting on the edge of your seat to hear how it went on friday, aren't you. yeah. you are.

here's a little teaser for you: I woke up on friday morning, almost giddy to all the possibilities of the day before me, and found that I had gotten my period.

yes.

it was going to be THAT kind of day.

I am not going to bore you with all the details. suffice it to say that I did get my hair dyed, thank god. and I did go shopping and get a couple of things for myself from gap's incredible sale. and I did use up a $50 gift card to H&M.

the highlight of my day, which is really the only other thing besides what I already said, is that I took a 20 minute nap. of course, it was peppered with pokings from trent asking me if he could have cookies, or if he could watch a movie, or whatever - I mostly mumbled "YES, NOW GO AWAY" so I very well could have allowed him to throw knives and watch porn and I wouldn't have cared.

at 4:30, I woke up from my nap, and that, my friends, was that. hair dye, 4 shirts, 1 skirt, a nap, and a whole bunch of tampons. not exactly the stellar day I had envisioned.

I did get to have a wonderful night, though, at jen's house, playing trivial pursuit pop culture edition. I dragged trent and bella with me and we all had a wonderful time. of course, bella can't bear to go to bed when we go out, so she was up until midnight. but having trent with me was helpful, as were nicole and mark. we had fun, kicked ass, and took names.

the rest of the weekend - tiring. hot. and filled with baseball. I'm glad it's monday, and I'm glad that sean comes home from atlanta today. though he just called me from the road (from wawa - I talked to him as he walked from the atm to the bathroom to the urinal to the sink and back to the register - drips, flushes and all) and he's below richmond, VA right now and still hopes to be back in PA by 7pm, which is, how you say, impossible? I guess anything is possible though, as my period decided to come on a day that I was trying really hard to be carefree - get it? Carefree? I was going to say something about Playing Tex. maybe Tamming Pax. oh, man. I think I need some sugar.

anyway, one other thing about the weekend - I got 2 really great things. one was a set of (sort of expensive, but I rationalized it by saying that it was what I really wanted, and instead of getting something I didn't really want, and then replacing it later with something else that I didn't want, and then finally giving in and getting what I really want, I saved time and money) porch rocking chairs. sean doesn't know yet and I hope it's a pleasant surprise when he gets home. the other was a mysterious package sent to me by theresa, which contained a weird powdery substance. just kidding, it contained an adorable dress for bella, and she wore it to jen's on friday. thank you, theresa!!

I still want to get a massage and facial. I think I deserve it for living through this weekend, don't you?

vacation, all I ever wanted

what a slacker I've been these last few days. you know? sure, monday was a holiday and yesterday I "posted" pictures, but where's the beef?

here's the beef.

tomorrow I am taking a day off from life. really, it's only going to amount to a few hours away from life, but it is something, at least. sean is going to atlanta to see a college friend for the weekend, and I took off work. bella is going to daycare. trent will be home but I'm giving him strict instructions that if I am in the house, to pretend I don't exist. which, for a 12 year old boy, is not that difficult.

but...I have no idea what to do with myself. I know I have to dye my hair. it's getting quite necessary. and not just from the gray standpoint. the last stupid hair dye I used I think I mentioned - it was this washes-out-in-4-minutes red, which has long since washed out and left my hair a very faded strawberries and mud color. it's not pretty. in fact, a guy at work today stared at it while I was talking to him. now, women tend to do that when my roots are a little, shall we say, noticeable, but men? men don't usually care one lick about that stuff. especially the man who was looking at it. so it's gotta be pretty bad.

other than dyeing my hair, though, I have no clue what to do. it's gotta be something that I can do in a few hours, that will make me feel COMPLETELY different about my life, that I could never do with my kids in tow, and that can justify taking a precious day off work to do. in short, absolutely nothing will fit this bill. there are plenty of things I'd like to do that fill most of these requirements, but not all. some of the things I'm considering are also illegal, so I guess we should add to the list "must be legal." that narrows it down.

part of me wants to just stay in bed and sleep. or read. nicole suggested I get a pedicure, but I'm really not into people touching my toes, as I have this freaky skin thing that happens sometimes and I almost always have an ingrown toenail that I don't want anyone messing with. but that's the kind of thing I'm thinking of.

maybe a facial. I had one before but it did, really, nothing for me. maybe it was just a bad facial? can one make a facial appointment on such short notice and actually have it be good? what constitutes a good facial? (I am sure it's nothing like the "facial" that I have been receiving from bella lately, as she's perfected spraying the contents of her dinner at me by blowing what I can only describe as gigantic raspberries with full on tongue engagement while her mouth is full of baby food. is that even a raspberry then? it should definitely have a better name, as raspberry sounds cute. this isn't exactly cute. it's like she's sharting with her mouth. how's that for a mental picture?? ew, I know, I know.)

this is my prediction: in an effort to find the perfect thing to do, I will squander the entire day sitting around, moving stuff from one area of the house to another. perhaps I will just break down and clean out my car in an effort to actually have something to say when people ask what I did all day. at least I weeded the front garden yesterday so that's not an option. I would feel like the biggest jackass if I was like "oh, yes, on my lovely day off from life, I weeded the garden. yeah. weeded. the 'garden'. as in the 5 plants in front of our tiny house. all day. that's what I did."

anyway. let's talk bella. she's a little faker, that one. she can totally roll over. she rolled from one direction to the other so quickly the other day - and then looked at me like "oh shit, did you see that? pretend you didn't see that." why would she hide this talent from me? I think it's because she knows that if I catch on that she can move all over the place, I'll watch her more closely. which, no I won't.

she also is waving more often. before, I wasn't sure if she was waving on purpose or just moving her arms around. I think she's doing it on purpose. but, of course, she won't do it all the time. and she is babbling constantly. screaming at baseball games (she likes when everyone yells and wants to join in) and singing to herself in the grocery store, just gabbing away all the time. it's cute. I have to drag out our video camera at some point to save it - because I don't want to forget what it all sounds like.

so - you won't hear from me tomorrow. and sean's gone for the weekend. we will see you next week and I'll tell you all about my day off and all the wonderful weeding and car cleaning that got done.

peekin

peekin,
originally uploaded by patrice108.

bella had fun on the 4th of july...click the picture to see the entire photo stream. including pictures of my dad and fireworks.

Typos

What's a "Fireword" anyway? I meant "Fireworks"! Duhhhhhh....

And so, I feel the revenge of the ignored preview function. At least I didn't try to play it off like I meant "fireword" by bringing Donald Trump into it somehow.

Firewords on the Horizon

Happy 4th of July, everyone! Sean here at work (as usual on a weekend) this holiday weekend dropping you a post when I should be gathering more information to ace my test. That's in two weeks, and next week, I'm off to Atlanta, GA with friends. So, this is the last work week I have before I'm REALLY feeling the flames of test pressure. I know. I'll do fine, but it's the anticipation that Carly Simon sang about and the waiting being the hardest part as mentioned by Tom Petty that is killing me. I just want it behind me so that I can just get on with being an analyst instead of an operator. What will be the difference? Cha-ching!

A few things.

First, since Patrice set me up to tell the story, I have to tell it. When Bella was at the bottom end of her constipation mountain last week, I was feeding her her lunch bottle. She gave me zero indication that she was having a bowel movement. Instead, she drank her bottle with no grunting, squirming, or other signs of a fecal-related struggle. When she finished her bottle, I let her crawl all over me, which she likes to do lately. We call it climbing "Mt. St. Mommy" or "Mt. St. Daddy". Anyway, having no idea that she blew out her diaper, I knew that she was due for a change, so I picked her up and laid her on the changing table. While doing so, I noticed a dark brown paste on the inside of my right elbow. At first, I was worried that it might have been blood. Using my sense of smell, I deducted that it came from Bells nether region. Then, my sense of sight picked up on smeared poo on my shorts and shirt. The locations: right leg, right pectoral, left rib cage. Trails left behind on her Mt. St. Daddy expedition. Unfortunately, I was wearing a powder blue Cave In t-shirt which is now permanently stained after two consecutive washing cycles. I guess it's permanent now. The evidence goes along with the memory.

Don't hate me. It seems that guys just lose weight faster than girls. I think it's because guys generally eat more, so naturally, if they cut back, they will lose weight faster. Anyway, in accordance with the documentation of my attempt to lose weight (I'm stalling, aren't I?), I lost 5 pounds in a week, which floored me because I don't look different. I definitely feel better, and that's what's important. It's the whole point of why I'm doing this, and it seems to be working. So, as of July 3, I am now 225 instead of 230, which makes me happy.

I won't have a post next weekend because I'll be away (probably drinking beers and eating southern BBQ), so I don't expect the same weight loss results. Well, we'll see how it goes.

8 months under our belts

bella turned 8 months somewhere between yesterday and today (since there isn't a 31st to really mark it) and I am overwhelmed by how much she's made our lives better. I love watching her interact with trent, sean, and anyone else who visits. she's a happy, loving baby, vocal - I swear, I'm going to realize the full potential of this at some point around age 10 - and sweet.

when I place her in my lap, she fills the whole area up...when she was just a newborn, I remember thinking that it wouldn't be long until she was up and running around and here we are, 8 months later, and it's gone by in a blink of an eye.

a short time before bella was born, sean's coworker and his wife had twin boys, who were born too early. it was touch and go for a while, and then little connor got to come home. he thrived. he's passing all the same milestones as bella - and is nearly the correct weight for his age. but poor ryan was not able to leave the hospital and had to have more surgery. he didn't gain weight. he didn't thrive. and yesterday, he finally let go.

the significance to us of his passing on bella's 8 month birthday was that we went numb. only now am I really allowing the emotion of what it would be like to lose this part of our life to creep into my head. and I am swatting it away as quickly as possible because I don't want to ever imagine my life without either of my kids.

we are sending flowers for ryan. we don't know what else to do. but we're going to cherish our children no matter if they are crying, pooping all over us, forgetting to feed the pets, eating too much junk food, or anything else. and I hope in some way, that honors ryan's memory.