Grad Lab Adventures - Now with less Grad Lab!

Attention, Subscribers

2008-01-28T13:08:00.000-05:00

If any of you are reading this through a feed reader and have forgotten that I moved because you couldn't figure out how to subscribe to the new blog, Dr. Maureen, go over to www.docmaureen.com. I figured out how to add the subscription link, and it's one of the tabs on the header image.

Graduation

2007-12-31T19:48:00.000-05:00

As I have pretty much used up all of my stories about grad school – well, at least those that are safe for publishing – I have finally decided to move my blog. I haven’t gone far, but the title no longer ties me into any particular theme. I won’t be tied down, man!

Come join me at www.docmaureen.com!

Babies are weird, man

2007-12-17T14:28:00.000-05:00

From the age of 12 to about 16, babysitting was my main source of income. I have also been an aunt since the age of 14. As such, I have had my fair share of putting babies and kids to bed. In my experience, babies who cry themselves to sleep start off with gusto and then taper off over the next 10-15 minutes with maybe one last, pathetic “Eh!” before finally settling down to sleep for the night.

Not my baby.

My baby doesn’t cry himself to sleep at all… or so we thought. Lately, he has been protesting his naps and bedtime about fifty percent of the time. When he does cry, instead of the 10-15 minutes of winding down exhibited by typical babies, Jack does this:

“AAAAHHHHHH!” (breath) “AAAAHHHHHH!” (breath) “AAAAHHHHHH!” (breath) “AAAAHHHHHH!” (breath) “AAAAHHHHHH!” (breath) “AAAAHHHHHH!” (breath)
“AAAAHHHHHH!” (silence)

You think that last silence is just him taking a breath for the next yell, but… nope! He’s done! The whole process takes maybe 2-3 minutes. On a bad night, it takes 15. It’s at these times that I wish we had a video monitor just so I could see what the heck he’s doing in there. Does he fall asleep mid cry? Does he just decide he’s too tired for all that effort? He’s usually standing up when I leave, so at what point does he lie down?

On nights like these, this is what I imagine is happening in his head:

Why are you leaving me in here all alone? I want another story! I don’t want this stupid bink, I want a story! (snatches bink from mouth, throws it on floor) STORY STORY STORY STORY STORY! (looks around crib, finds second bink, picks it up for the express purpose of throwing it on the floor) I can’t BELIEVE they left me in here all alone! And with no binks! I’m in my bed, I get to have a bink! That’s the rule! How am I supposed to go to sleep with no bink? WHERE IS MY BIN-- (notices third and fourth spare binks in the crib) Oh, wait. There’s one. (puts bink in mouth, ceases crying, lies down, strokes blankie, goes to sleep.)

But of course, I don’t know. All I know is that we have to listen carefully to hear the difference between angry, “I don’t WANNA go to sleep” yells and scared “I want my mommy and where is my bink*?” cries which don’t end, but just get louder.

So, yeah. Babies are weird.

*All four of your binks are on the FLOOR WHERE YOU THREW THEM. Sigh.

Some firsts I'd rather skip

2007-12-10T20:33:00.001-05:00

The first year of your child's life is just a series of milestones, one after the other. The first smile. The first word. The first steps. The first trip to the emergency room.

Yes, last Sunday, The Husband and I had the delightful pleasure of taking our baby to the ER to make sure he had not jammed his teeth back up into his head possibly embedding them in his brain. (Short version: He hadn't.) It had happened very suddenly. We had just gotten back from church and The Husband was making grilled cheese sandwiches while I searched for a recipe for cranberry bread and Jack played in the cabinet with the pots and pans. The next thing we knew, he had fallen on his face and blood was pouring from his mouth. Mouths bleed a lot, people.

This was not our first experience with this phenomenon, because Jack has fallen on his mouth at least four other times this year. This was more blood than I had seen, however, and I find bleeding from the mouth particularly troubling, as it is very difficult to see the extent of the damage what with all the crying and wailing and blood pouring out and all. Does he need stitches? Who can tell? At any rate, I held Jack upside down to try and look in there and in the brief flashes I could get, it looked to me like Jack's two front teeth had receded into his gums by at least 50%. I said, "That's it, we're going to the emergency room," and off we went.

I should take a moment here to tell The Husband's side of the story, which is that I "panic" every time Jack gets hurt. He bases this claim on the way I say, "Oh! He's bleeding! Oh! Oh! The blood! Does he need stitches? Should we take him to the ER? How do we clean it? Oh, he's swollen! His lip is swollen! The blood! The blood!" and things along those lines. But it is my position that I do not panic, it's just that I let The Husband be the one in charge of determining the extent of the damage while I take over the job of comforting the screaming, bleeding baby. I do this because I can let him be the one in charge. He's right there, all ready to take charge with his cool, calm, former lifeguard head. If he were not there, however, I would be quite capable of cleaning up the blood and driving to the ER all by myself, because I'd have to be. So no, I don't panic.

So. The ER. The Husband and I were pretty sure that Jack's teeth were probably fine, because he wasn't even crying anymore by the time we were packing him into his car seat, but we weren't going to take any chances with his teeth. He was triaged and registered within 20 minutes of our arrival, and then we had to settle down to wait. The Husband bought Jack a muffin because none of us had had lunch, and Jack had no problems chomping away at it. By the time we were finally seen by the nurse practitioner, Jack was biting a paper cup and pulling on it with his hands, further convincing us that his teeth were fine.

When the NP took a look, he told us that Jack had split his funiculus (that piece of skin that connects the top lip to the gums), but that his teeth looked fine to him. His gums had just swollen up, and that was what made me think his teeth had been jammed. The NP did suggest that we get a dentist to take an x-ray to make sure there was no root damage, and we did that on Saturday. Actually, we didn't. We took him to the dentist, but the dentist said an x-ray wasn't really necessary since Jack's teeth weren't even chipped.

And so it all ended well. Jack's teeth are fine, his funiculus appears to have healed, and we've all agreed that he has filled his quota of accidents for the next year and there will be no more falling on his mouth. We've AGREED.

It won't... stop... beeping...

2007-11-30T22:39:00.000-05:00

There was a period of time when I was in high school that I slept in the attic. During this time, I also worked at a small convenience store as a cashier, and occasionally I had to work the 6am-11am shift on Saturdays which required that I get up at 5:30. Now, I am not one who rises easily, so this was, to put it mildly, a challenge. I typically set my alarm - which was always set to the horrible screeching buzzer and never to the music that stood no chance of awakening me - for 5:00 so that I could hit snooze several times before being late. Since I usually had no memory at all of the first and sometimes second times I hit snooze, I felt this 30 minute cushion was a necessity.

My brother, who slept in the room at the bottom of the attic stairs, felt differently.

"Mo," he said to me one Friday night. "If your alarm goes off more than once tomorrow morning, I am going to have to kill you." He was very polite about it, but he really felt he had no alternative. So that night I set the alarm for 5:20 with great trepidation, but also with the full intention of getting up as soon as it went off to spare my brother the morning Chinese alarm torture.

HONK! HONK! HONK!

I awoke with a start, leapt to my alarm and started hammering the snooze button. I wasn't going to use the snooze button, at least, not in the way God intended it to be used. I just wanted to silence the alarm until I had enough coordination to turn it off permanently. But the noise didn't stop! I pushed the snooze button. I pushed it again. I tried tapping it really quickly, and then I tried holding it down really hard. Nothing.

I finally remembered that to turn the alarm off, I had to turn the dial to the left two notches. I turned the dial. No change. In desperation, I turned the dial all the way to the left, then all the way to the right. To the left! To the right! Left right left right left! It was still honking! Wait! Unplug the clock! UNPLUG IT!

I unplugged it.

HONK! HONK! HONK!

Frantically, I looked around the room. Ever so slowly, my powers of deductive reasoning were returning to me, and I was able to determine that the noise was not coming from my alarm clock. It was coming from the window. What was in the window? A fan. I ran to the fan. "I have to turn off the fan," I thought to myself. "That will make the noise stop." But the fan wasn't on. No problem! I just turned on the fan. That way, I could turn it off and make the noise stop.

Astoundingly, this did not work.

I considered the situation. Assuming there was some sort of short circuit causing the on/off switch to fail, I decided to unplug the fan. Hey, it didn't work for the alarm clock because the alarm clock wasn't honking. The fan was honking. So I unplugged the fan.

HONK! HONK! HONK!

"It didn't take!" I thought to myself desperately, and plugged the fan back in so I could try it again. I unplugged and replugged the fan a few more times until a tiny shred of reason managed to penetrate my sleep fogged brain. "Wait," I thought, and held still, plug in my hand. "FANS DON'T HONK."

My father found me a few minutes later, with the window fan on the floor and my face and hands pressed tightly against the screen. I had finally deduced that the honking was coming from outside, but I couldn't shake the feeling of responsibility for the noise and I was trying my best to stop it using only the sheer force of my will. Unfortunately, I had made so much noise storming around my room trying to track down the source of the noise that I woke everyone up. My father gently assured me that the neighbors' malfunctioning car horn was not under my purview, and, thusly relieved, I went back to bed.

I did get up with the first alarm, though.

***

And so I have reached November 30, the last day of NaBloPoMo. I did it! Technically! OK, I totally cheated. Remember this entry? And this one? So I'm not going to put an icon on here that says I did it, because I don't feel like I did it. Well, that and because I don't really know how to make changes to my template. Nevertheless, I wrote a lot more often than usual this month, and that's got to count for something.

But, being incredibly lazy, I will probably slide back into my habit of writing when only I feel like it in December. Plus, I'm going to work on a super secret exciting blog development that I hope to reveal by January, and that will eat up some of my computer time. The rest will be taken up by my mindlessly clicking "Refresh" in my Gmail window.

Why don't people email me as often as I click "refresh"? You should all email me more.

Hi, Honey, I've reentered the domestic habitat!

2007-11-29T20:57:00.001-05:00

The following conversation is a near word-perfect transcription of a typical conversation between me and The Husband as we discuss our days.

THE HUSBAND: You know antifreeze?
MO: Uh... yeah?
TH: I froze it today.
MO: Well, everything freezes eventually.*
TH: We had to run a test at -40 Celsius --
MO: Which is also -40 Fahrenheit!
TH: I know! One time I tried to convert -40C to Fahrenheit in my calculator, and it came back as -40! I did it three times before I realized.
MO: Well, the lines aren't parallel! They have to intersect at some point, right?
TH: Yeah. So anyway, antifreeze freezes at -50F, and we had cooled it so quickly that we overshot -40F, and it froze.
MO: That's pretty cold.
TH: So we're going to run it with ethanol instead, since that freezes below -120C.
MO: Ethanol or ethylene glycol?
TH: Ethanol.

*The Husband helped me remember this conversation, and he maintains that not everything freezes. I said that even hydrogen freezes at absolute zero, and he said no it doesn't. I still think it does, but I suppose he might be right, now that I'm typing this, because I guess that freezing is not the same thing as a cessation of molecular vibration. And yes, I'm typing this footnote as an excuse to write the phrase "cessation of molecular vibration," because I like to show off sometimes.

Hi, Honey, I've reentered the domestic habitat

2007-11-29T20:57:00.000-05:00

Uh oh, it's magic!

2007-11-28T20:49:00.000-05:00

Nanoposting is almost over, and I am desperately trying to hold my head above water over here. I had no idea posting every day would be so taxing. Well, that's not true. I did foresee difficulties which is why I wasn't going to sign up, and I knew that if I did sign up that I would moan and whine about it, because that's what I do. I'm a complainer. Still, it's been really hard! Did you know that Thanksgiving is in November? And our anniversary? And that I am nursing a cold I've had for over a week and am considering taking Mucinex even though the commercials for Mucinex are the most disgusting commercials ever and I wish not to support them? But still, here I am, slaving away at the keyboard. And it's all for you, Internet! All for you!

Last night, The Husband and I watched Night at the Museum. We thoroughly enjoyed it, despite getting a little over-invested in the plot. (Warning: Extremely minor spoilers ahead. Well, not technically minor in that I sort of give away the end, but if you couldn't have guessed how it ended you have never seen a movie before. Or read a book. Or interacted with humans.) We were both incredibly concerned that the T-Rex and the other museum displays would get stuck outside at sunrise. It seemed impossible to us that Ben Stiller would be able to round them all up. How could he do it? There were too many! Ah, but there was one thing we had forgotten. We had neglected to account for the possibility that magic could solve everything in this story about museum displays magically coming to life. Crisis averted!

I would like to think that it is because the movie was so well done that The Husband and I were so worried. Yes. That must be the reason. Because the only other explanation is that we are both idiots.

At least it's recyclable

2007-11-27T20:15:00.000-05:00

In an ironic twist, today Jack and I played with an old cardboard box for about twenty minutes.

I have yet to order the book from yesterday, but rest assured I will, and I will get organized with my plan. People left some great links in my comments, so I recommend you check them out.

Not so fresh air

2007-11-26T21:27:00.000-05:00

Today on Fresh Air, Terry Gross interviewed Mark Schapiro who has written a book called Exposed: The Toxic Chemistry of Everyday Products and What's at Stake for American Power. Because I was driving, I didn’t get to listen to the whole show, I didn’t get to listen as carefully as I would have liked, and I am unable to find a transcript online, so what I’m about to say must be taken with a grain of salt. Nevertheless, I learned two particularly horrible things from this interview.

First, there is a family of toxic industrial chemicals called phthalates that are used as softeners in PVC plastics. Products made out of these plastics range from dashboards to toys to IV tubes. The E.U. has banned these products, but the U.S. has not. According to Schapiro, companies have had absolutely no problems conforming to the E.U. ban on phthalates. Toy sales have not decreased, and European children are not condemned to play with nothing but old cardboard boxes. And yet these same companies continue to manufacture toys and other products containing phthalates to sell in the U.S.

Second, and according to Schapiro, the E.U. has also banned carcinogens, mutagens, and compounds which affect the reproductive system from all cosmetics. The U.S. has not. Once again, the same companies which are carefully finding replacements for toxic cosmetics ingredients are simultaneously lobbying the U.S. government to stop legislation requiring the disclosure of the ingredients of cosmetics.

It’s getting to the point that I am seeing everything I own, everything manufactured, as a threat to the health of my family. I’m starting to feel like I should get rid of all of Jack’s toys and give him some old cardboard boxes instead. So here’s what I’m proposing: Let’s all send emails and actual, hand-written letters to our representatives, Senators, the president, toy companies, and cosmetic companies calling for a U.S. ban on the same toxic chemicals that the E.U. is banning. This should be a no-brainer; companies are already finding alternatives to comply with the E.U. law, so they should just make the same safer products available to us here. And I’m also asking all of my readers who have their own blogs, especially those of you with more than the 20 readers I have – I’m talking to you, Emily, Arwen, and Maggie – to put the call out to your readers as well.

I need a day or two to get a list of names and addresses of where these letters should be sent, and I need to buy Schapiro’s book to make sure my facts are right. But once I have the information, I’ll post it here.

I know it doesn’t seem like much, but if we could just raise awareness, maybe the American consumer would start to demand better choices, and better choices would become available. Maybe our own children won’t be doomed to a toy box full of old cardboard boxes.

Today's teatime was long and dark

2007-11-25T20:17:00.001-05:00

For the first Sunday in weeks, The Husband, Jack and I went to church together as a family. Normally, The Husband goes to the 9:00 Mass and I go to the 11:15 and sing with the choir. Jack is usually napping at 9:00, so and The Husband has a hard time wrangling him all alone at the 11:15, so this is what has been working for us lately. But today Jack slept until almost 8:15 which meant no nap for him at 9:00, and I have laryngitis which meant no singing for me at 11:15. Thus, the family went to mass together.

As much as I like singing with the choir, today was actually quite nice. We only live about a quarter mile from the church, so we always walk and today was a beautiful sunny morning. We left the stroller at the back of the church and as Jack and I walked down the aisle together, I reveled in the expressions of the churchgoers admiring my adorable child. There was a minor kerfuffle when I accidentally chose the only pew with an electrical outlet at the end of it, but overall, Jack was pretty well behaved. I can't say I remember an awful lot of the homily (that's "sermon" to you non-Catholics) thanks to my reading "Little Duck" while the priest was speaking, but we didn't have to take Jack outside or anything. He hit his nap wall just about when Mass was ending, but that worked out pretty nicely for us.

And that is how we found ourselves at home at 10:15 on a Sunday morning with a sleepy baby and a whole day stretching out ahead of us with nothing to do. At first it was fantastic. I read the whole paper. The whole paper! We had coffee and doughnuts. I tried to do the Sudoku. Jack woke up from his nap and had some lunch, and then... it was Sunday afternoon. With nothing to do.

The day just stretched interminably. If Jack were older, I would have suggested a movie, but alas, that was no option. We brought Jack outside for some fresh air, and he had a great time throwing the leaves around. When he started to get cranky I said, "Let's go inside and have some supper," only to discover that it was merely 4:15. There were at least thirty more minutes to endure before we could reasonably give Jack his dinner.

Thank goodness Jack thoughtfully was ready for bed by 6:30 ending our Sunday afternoon ordeal. The hours between 4:00 and 6:30 are usually difficult, but today 4:00 seemed to start around 2:30 or so. And now I've reread this and feel like an enormous jerk for complaining about having a lazy Sunday with a basically well-behaved adorable baby. Man, I have such problems.

I don't know how he likes his martinis

2007-11-24T20:27:00.000-05:00

Today we got to have lunch with Professor The Doctor and Mr. Professor The Doctor* and their son, who is 2 1/2. After lunch, Professor The Doctor had some tea, and it reminded me of the time they were visiting and I offered them tea. Mr. Professor accepted, but he asked me how I prepare tea. "Do you add the tea to the water or do you add the water to the tea?" was his question.

Coming from a strong tea-drinking background, I was a mite offended that he thought I might not know how tea should be made. "I add the water to the tea of course," I replied.

"Oh, no no no!" he said. "You're never supposed to add the water to the tea. Everyone always does that, but it beats the crap out of the teabag! You're supposed to add the tea to the water, to gently release the essence of the tea."

Well. I didn't know where he was getting this information, but he was clearly insane. The water is added to the tea. Everyone always does that because that is how tea is made. Tea that has been brewed by dipping a teabag into a cup of hot water tastes like old dishwater. In fact, 90% of the reason I learned to like coffee is that tea takes too long to prepare correctly at coffee shops and that so many restaurants bring you a cup of hot water - water that is not even boiling - and a teabag after supper. So I was not about to take any lip from someone who was clearly a tea-drinking troglodyte. Besides, he was acting incredibly snooty for someone who was so very very wrong.

I turned on my laptop and looked up tea on the internet. (Whatever did we do before the internet? How were bar bets settled?) I pulled up site after site supporting my tea position, but he would not be dissuaded. "An English person told me that you're supposed to add the tea to the water," he kept insisting.

"No English person told you that," I said, but prepared his "tea" as he requested it.

About a year and a half later, I heard an interview with Giles Hinton, a certified Tea Master, who said the following: "...And then pour it [the water] almost still bubbling onto your tea bag or onto the leaves." He further noted that the boiling water is "... full of oxygen, full of life, full of brightness. And it has a great effect on the tea. It brings it back to life, it brings out the flavor efficiently." Naturally, I emailed the transcript of this interview to Mr. The Professor immediately, because I am always the bigger person and know when to let things go. I also may, possibly, have gloated just a little bit.

Mr. The Professor scrabbled around for a day or so trying to gather evidence supporting his tea recipe, but was finally forced to concede the argument. I mean, come on, I had the direct quote of a TEA MASTER. If he doesn't know how to make tea, who does?

Lest you think I am totally innocent in this relationship, I should tell you that Mr. The Professor are both Scrabble enthusiasts and have played against each other quite a few times. Each of these bouts were preceded by weeks of trash talk in which I proclaimed my Scrabble greatness and promised to reduce Mr. The Professor to a tiny pile of quivering, vowel-less goo.

I think I won once.

*At some point in the past I wrote and entry about these two and let them approve their nicknames, but now I can't remember what they were. After a half-hearted attempt to find that post in my archives I'm going with these, because I have no idea when I wrote it and I have no idea what it was about. Professor The Doctor was in my class in undergrad, and now she, like many of my friends, has become a Professor. You know, quite a lot of my friends grew up to become professors. You might say that's not all that strange given that I went to grad school, but I knew three of them in undergrad. I would be jealous of their exciting careers except that if I were a professor I'd have to kill myself. I think I might be jealous that they want to be professors because I'm jealous of anyone who has a cool job they like, but as far as the actual job goes, they can keep it.

Incidentally, Mr. The Professor reads this blog just about every day, so everyone say hi. Hi, Mr. The Professor!

23 rounds down to 20

2007-11-23T22:18:00.000-05:00

So Thanksgiving was yesterday, and we hosted the family dinner this year. This may have been mentioned on this website at some point. Claims may have also been made that The Husband and I were preparing a turkey dinner for 30 people, but these claims, as it turns out, were a bit inflated.

First of all, yes, we prepared a turkey dinner insofar as we roasted a turkey. We also roasted some sweet potatoes, I made a pumpkin pie and a cheesecake, and we bought a couple of appetizers. But that’s it. We farmed the rest of the food out to various family members.

Speaking of family members, did I say there were 30 of them? Because there aren’t. The total number of people requiring a place setting at the table was actually only 23. Adding in the three babies under two and the one adult who couldn’t make it brought the total to 27. This was the number I was carrying around in my head and rounding up to 30. Thirty people! We were going to have 30 people for dinner! Except we weren’t!

As it turned out, 23 people fit quite comfortably around our borrowed tables, and no one had to use plastic utensils. The turkey wasn’t dry at all, despite being done an hour and a half early. Jack, who is quite fond of cranberry sauce, only hollered a little bit during dinner. (The other babies made not a peep.) (Also, the other babies did not throw 90% of their dinners on the floor.) (Note: none of Jack’s cranberry sauce was thrown on the floor.) We also got my parents to bring over their Nintendo Wii, and The Husband set it up in the attic after supper. Strangely, that is just about when the teenagers disappeared.

All in all, it was a good day. If you’ll pardon me for a moment of cheesiness, The Husband and I are blessed with an incredible family, and have a lot to be thankful for. More than most, I’d say.

When Engineers Cook

2007-11-22T22:59:00.000-05:00

Sometimes, we improvise. Like when I couldn't find any "turkey laces" so we had to make do with what was in the pantry.

(In case you can't tell, that there is a gingerbread man cookie cutter.)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Communication

2007-11-21T21:23:00.000-05:00

Today, Jack slept until 8:00, so I didn't even try to put him down for a nap until 11:00. He went down easily, but started complaining about five minutes after I left the room. I went back in to soothe him back down, but he was having none of it. He was talking, joking, pointing out my ears... the whole nine yards. Since I have a policy of not killing myself getting him to take a nap if he doesn't want to, I gave up and said, "OK, but if you aren't going to take a nap, you have to give me the bink."

I'll be damned if he didn't hand it over!

Tagged

2007-11-20T22:31:00.000-05:00

On my last day ever at the house I grew up in, Big Sister #4 and I took our kids for a walk. My parents' house was on the border between two towns, and the town line marker that was across the street. As we approached it, I called Elfin Nephew over to show him the initials of the two towns. "Look," I said to him. "See? There's an 'M' on this side, and an 'S' on the other!" My sister looked at the post, then looked at me, shocked and horrified.

"When did you do that?" she cried. My initials, you see, used to be "M.S." She had never known that the post was a town line marker, she just thought it was an old granite fence post or something. But that's not the funny part. I can't fault her; I didn't discover its true purpose until I was an adult either.

No, the funny part is the idea that I had somehow, at some point, perhaps in the dead of night, sneaked out of my house and carved my initials into city property. I, the rule follower, the teacher's pet, the bookworm. I, who never so much as dropped an apple core on the street. The worst thing I ever did was to lie to my mother about watching an R-rated movie when I was naught but 14, but I was so torn up by the guilt that I confessed it to her, through choking, shame-ridden sobs, that very night. She didn't even punish me, I was so pathetic. So to imagine that I would have dared to graffiti at all, never mind graffiti that required a hammer and chisel, is so ridiculous as to be laughable.

And my tag would have been way cooler than that.

Blog fodder

2007-11-19T20:54:00.000-05:00

Today Big Sister #4 came over with her two kids, Elfin Nephew and The Spitfire. They came to take Jack off my hands for a few hours and give me time to get the place ready for Thursday. When she first arrived, I took the opportunity to vacuum while there was another pair of adult eyes around to make sure Jack wasn’t sticking his hands in it while I used the attachments. Then she offered to take all three kids to the park, so we spent fifteen or so minutes bundling them up and then we all trooped outside. I was with them only to get Jack’s stroller out of my car; as such, I brought my car keys but not my house keys.

While I was unloading the stroller, I heard Elfin Nephew say, “How come the door is open?”

“Oh, because I’m just going right back inside,” I told him. You see, normally when I run outside for a quick thing like this, I check the door handle to make sure it’s not locked, leave it hanging ajar, and do my thing.

I’m sure you can see where this is going.

Today, I did not check the door handle, and today, Elfin Nephew helpfully closed the door while I was unloading the stroller. So there I was, in the freezing cold wearing naught but my thin cotton 3/4 –length sleeve sweater, locked out of my house.

It could have been worse. I might have left the oven on, or Jack might have still been inside, or my sister and I might have left our car keys and cell phones in the house. Fortunately, none of these things were the case, so we were able to put Jack’s car seat in my sister’s car and drive up to meet The Husband to get his key. Still, it put a bit of a damper on my grand plans for the day.

Sigh.

Incidentally, it turns out that the kitchen hutch lock may not have been designed to withstand professional thieves, but it could withstand two engineers unwilling to damage the hutch, and we couldn’t pick it. But in a stroke of luck, The Husband discovered the key tonight inside a postal box that he was breaking down for recycling. So… score!

Bad timing

2007-11-18T18:49:00.000-05:00

I knew it was a bad idea to let Jack play with the key that goes to our kitchen hutch, but I did it anyway, and now it's gone and all of our serving dishes and teapots are safely locked away. There they will remain for Thanksgiving, which is at our house. Have I mentioned that?

OK, I'm exaggerating for comedic effect, because it's not like the lock to our kitchen hutch is designed to keep out Nicky Holiday and his gang of burgling models. he Husband is picking it as I type. But still.

One legged pants

2007-11-17T20:42:00.001-05:00

This post is only being posted because I made the insane commitment to ~~NanoBlo...~~ blog every day this month. See, I spent the day today purchasing an outfit for Thanksgiving as I thought it might be nice to wear something that fit next Thursday. And then I spent the evening mildly panicking about the fact that we are hosting our family Thanksgiving and approximately 30 people are coming to my house next week to eat roast turkey which neither The Husband nor I has ever cooked before. Fortunately, these people are all related to me and must therefore love me even if the turkey is dry. And now I have to finish I still haven't finished hemming my new jeans. (The first leg came out pretty good; it is a nice straight, tiny stitch for awhile, and then it goes a little wonky. Apparently, I had enough energy only for 7/8 around.)

Check back tomorrow; maybe I'll think of something by then.

Cloth Diapering Manifesto: Part IV

2007-11-16T21:54:00.000-05:00

OK. Now you know why we use cloth diapers, you know about all the different kinds of cloth diapers available, and you know how to wash them. So what else do you need? Accessories!

Here’s what you need:
diaper pail
2 pail liners
2 wet bags
diaper sprayer
rubbing alcohol
rubber gloves

And, if you’re going to use pocket diapers:
Trader Joe’s bar towels

For a diaper pail, all you need is a trash barrel of some sort. The Husband and I splurged a bit here and bought this Simple Human can. Yes. It’s quite expensive. But we wanted something that would last and that would hold the smell in, and this can delivers. We smell nothing until that lid is up, and then…. wooooeeeee! Not having tried any other pail, I can’t say that a cheaper one would not have sufficed, because the liners do a good job of keeping in the smell. But in my experience, cheap trash cans fall apart. So we got the fancy one.

As for pail liners, there are a myriad of choices out there, and they probably all work just fine. We use Wahmies pail liners are quite happy with them. I told you that you need two of them so you are never without when one is in the wash. I should also mention here that there are hanging diaper bags available if space is an issue; in this case, you don’t need the pail at all, just the bag.

You will also need something to carry the dirty diapers when you are out and about. This is called a wet bag. I recommend getting a small wet bag for shorter outings and a larger one for longer trips. Again, lots of choices abound here, and I’m sure they’re all great. We have a Dinkerdoodles bag that holds about 10 or so diapers. The pull string kind of broke so now it doesn’t really close properly, but that doesn’t matter as far as you are concerned because Dinkerdoodles bags are no longer available. We also have a small Bummis tote bag; it can hold about 4 diapers and is ideal for a typical day’s outing. It also seems to be impermeable to odor.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have finally arrived at what you have all been anxiously awaiting: the explanation of the diaper sprayer. A diaper sprayer is a fixture that you attach to your toilet and works just like the sprayer on your sink. You use it to spray the diapers clean, saving yourself from having to dunk and swish the messy diapers. Because although the diaper websites tell you that you don’t have to rinse the diapers because the poop just rolls right off the fleece, they are lying. Yes, sometimes you don’t have to rinse, but, as Kerflop notes, sometimes you do. Trust me, you’ll be able to tell the difference.

Technically, you don’t actually need the diaper sprayer because you can just dunk and swish, but you will probably want the diaper sprayer because, ew. I have been places with no diaper sprayer at critical times, and boy, do I miss it. When you tell your mother (or possibly your grandmother) you are going to use cloth diapers, watch how her skeptical expression changes to amazement when you tell her about the diaper sprayer. My diaper sprayer has impressed cloth diaper veterans far more than my fancy designer pocket diapers.

The diaper sprayer we use is no longer offered at Cotton Babies; instead they have this one and they claim that it does not splash or drip. I hope they are correct, because ours splashes and drips. We have solved the dripping problem by closing the valve when we’re not using it, and I actually recommend getting one with a valve you can shut off if only to thwart your eventual curious toddler. The splashing remains a problem, but we always wipe down the toilet with toilet paper soaked in rubbing alcohol and then flush it, so it’s no big deal.

As for the rubber gloves, we just leave a pair by the toilet and use them when we need to. It’s not totally necessary because you can just wash your hands, but we are squeamish. Again, I have dunked and swished when out somewhere without gloves and I’m still alive, but it’s nice to have the gloves.

I also listed cloth wipes as a needed accessory. While not actually a requirement, I like using cloth wipes when he’s really messy, just to get the bulk so that I can rinse the wipe in the toilet and not have smelly disposable wipes stinking up my bathroom. Diapering sites usually sell special washcloths designed to be wipes, but you can just use a regular baby washcloth. I also keep my Peri bottle from the hospital filled with water to rinse him off if necessary. I always end by wiping with a disposable wipe, though, because I can’t seem to maneuver the cloth ones into all his cracks and crevices.

Last but not least, I would be doing you a disservice if I did not tell you about the Trader Joe’s bar towels. (Trader Joe’s does not have them on their website, so I can’t give you a link.) We ran into a problem with the bumGenius One Size pocket diapers when Jack was about 5 months old or and starting to sleep through the night, because the diapers could not contain a full night’s worth of pee. We tried stuffing them with two inserts, but that made them too tight. In desperation, I emailed Moxie, and she suggested I get some bar towels from Trader Joe’s. They are made of viscose which is thin but highly absorbent, and they CHANGED OUR LIVES. The combination of the insert plus bar towel is enough to keep Jack comfortable all night. We still have occasional leaks, but they don’t wake him up and we are all much happier.

If you don’t live near a Trader Joe’s and you run into this problem with a pocket diaper, check the online diaper stores for “doublers.” Or consider going with a different type of diaper for overnight. Tallulah Baby, for example, offers “Simply Nights” diapers; maybe they’ll work. And you would only need two or three of them, because the diapers should be washed every two or three days anyway.

So that’s it! That’s cloth diapering! It may seem overwhelming at first, but once you actually start experimenting, you will find that it is not nearly as complicated as this four-part dissertation makes it seem. And remember, you are allowed to buy things for your baby even after he’s born! So if you try a few diapers but don’t like them, you can try a few others until you find the system that works for you. You can start with one wet bag and then add another later. You can even decide not to buy the diaper sprayer and then change your mind!

Good luck, and feel free to email me with any questions.

Manifesto Part I: Why cloth?
Manifesto Part II: Diaper types
Manifesto Part III: Washing the diapers

Cloth Diapering Manifesto: Part III

2007-11-15T21:23:00.000-05:00

If you’ve done any kind of internet research on how to wash cloth diapers, you are probably extremely confused. When I was looking into it, it seemed to me that every site said something different, but no matter what they said, washing diapers sounded very complex. Detergent, not soap! No fabric softener! Baking soda! Vinegar! Pre-soak! Wet pail! Dry pail!

In actuality, it’s no big deal. You just wash them. OK, yes, soap and fabric softener leave residue on the diapers which makes them water resistant, so you have to use detergent and skip the dryer sheets. But good news! Detergent is what you already use! Laundry soap is stuff like Ivory Snow and I think Dreft. Don’t use those. As for vinegar and baking soda – I have never figured out what they’re for, and I don’t use them.

Here’s what we do. We have an LG front loading washing machine, and when we wash diapers, we turn the pail liner inside out inside the washer. We add Tide Free HE and about an eighth of a cup of bleach and run the cotton cycle on hot, heavy soil, with a pre-wash and an extra rinse. After they’re done, we run a quick cycle just to make sure all of the detergent is rinsed out. (Just for the record, our washer actually has a cycle called “quick cycle.”) We run all those extra rinse cycles because front loaders use a lot less water, and we were noticing suds in the water even at the end of the cycle when we didn’t include the extra rinse and the quick cycle. Detergent on the diapers is bad, because it decreases their absorbancy. But because they use more water, I would expect that top loaders need less rinsing cycles.

Now, you might have noticed that we wash the diapers on hot, with bleach. “Noooooo!” you are crying out right now. “All the sites say not to use hot water or bleach!” I know. But washing diapers on cold squicks me. And we tried leaving off the bleach, but without it, the diapers smell terrible. I believe there are oils you can add to the wash to take care of the smell, but I’ve been wary because Jack broke out in a rash after using Burt’s Bees lotion. So we use bleach. And finally, we occasionally “strip” the diapers by running them through a couple of cycles with no detergent. This is just to make sure all the detergent is really gone. We do this when the mood strikes us, or else when the diapers seem to be not holding as much as they used to.

We usually hang our diapers to dry because it saves energy, they last longer, and because we think that residual from the dryer sheets in the dryer may get onto the diapers. But sometimes I tumble them dry if I’m in a hurry.

OK. That wraps up Part III. It’s a lot of words to describe a pretty simply process. Washing the diapers is like doing any other load of laundry, but without having to sort. It’s really, truly, not a big deal.

Tomorrow will bring Part IV, in which I explain all the remaining diapering accessories, including that holiest of holies: the diaper sprayer.

Manifesto Part I: Why cloth?
Manifesto Part II: Diaper types
Manifesto Part IV: Accessorize!

Edited to add:
Sources in the know have informed me that I, in fact, wore disposable diapers, as did at least two of my older sisters. I really thought I was born when disposable diapers were not any good, but apparently I was misinformed.

Cloth Diapering Manifesto: Part II

2007-11-14T23:34:00.000-05:00

Modern cloth diapers are not your mama’s cloth diapers. If you are pregnant and mention to someone that you’re planning to use cloth diapers, there’s a good chance you’ll get a condescending, pitying smile at your naiveté. “Oh, sure,” they think. “She says that now, but she’s not going to want to deal with the hard work of cloth diapers when she’s faced with an actual infant instead of hypothetical dream baby who never poops.” But this sort of attitude just makes using cloth diapers all the more sweet, because you can rub your success in their faces. Not that I am the sort of person who would do that.

So what makes today’s cloth diapers so much better? First of all, no pins. Second of all, one-step diapering. And third and holiest of all, the diaper sprayer. But I’m getting ahead of myself, so let’s just start with the different types of diapers.

Prefolds

Prefolds are the old-fashioned diapers your parents used on you, back in the day. (Please don’t tell me that you are old enough to have worn modern disposable diapers and are now considering cloth for your own children. Let’s all pretend that you are the same age as me. Or older! Older is fine.) They come in two flavors*: Indian and Chinese. Frankly, I only just discovered the difference between them. It seems that Indian prefolds are softer, but therefore less durable than Chinese prefolds. Both kinds cost somewhere around $1 each.

Prefolds must be used in conjunction with a diaper cover. They can be fastened with a pin, a Snappi, or you can just use the diaper cover to hold the diaper in place. Snappis are rubbery little things with teeth that hold the diapers in place by tension. Here, just look at one. They are hard to describe in words, but easy to use.

Prefold Pros: Cheap cheap cheapity cheap cheap. Remember how I said in Part I that cloth diapering costs $400-$500 at the start? Not if you use prefolds. Also, these are easy to rinse because there is no elastic to trap the… uh… particles.

Prefold Cons: Fancy diaper covers and Snappis aside, these are kind of tricky to put on a squirmy baby. Probably not as tricky as you think, but certainly much more difficult than disposables. Also, the prefold-plus-diaper cover is very bulky.

Fitted or Contoured Diapers

Contoured diapers are, well, contoured. There is no messing around with folding a square diaper into the correct shape because they are already shaped like a diaper. Fitted diapers are contoured diapers with elastic legs so that they… fit. Both fitted and contours usually also have snaps or other fastener built into the construction, so they are pretty easy to put on; they work pretty much like disposable. They are still made of only cloth, though, so just like prefolds, they must be used in conjunction with a diaper cover.

There are a lot of different brands of fitted diapers. The ones I am aware of off the top of my head are Mother-ease, Kissluvs, and Swaddlebees. They all look adorable to me, but I can’t be bothered with a diaper cover, so I’ve never used them.

Fitted and Contour Pros: These are much easier to put on a baby than a prefold. They can be made of natural (and even organic) fibers. Um. Have I mentioned I don’t use them?

Fitted and Contour Cons: They are easier to use than a prefold, but also more expensive. A quick look online gave me a range of price from about $7 - $15 each, depending on the brand. They still require a separate diaper cover, which is an extra step.

Pocket diapers

Pocket diapers are kind of like a diaper cover but with a cloth lining that makes a pocket against the waterproof material into which you stuff something absorbent. The fasteners are built in as either snaps or Velcro tabs. No diaper cover is required, but you do have to take the diapers apart to wash them.

Pocket Diaper Pros: These are very easy to use because they go on just like disposables. Absorbency can be adjusted by stuffing them with more or less material, depending on your baby’s needs. They dry very quickly.

Pocket Diaper Cons: These babies ain’t cheap. The brand I use costs $18 new. That is the only con I have though, because I love these diapers.

All-in-ones

AIO diapers are just like pocket diapers except without the pocket. There is no stuffing with absorbent material, and no diaper cover. The fasteners are built in as snaps or Velcro. Basically, these work exactly like disposables in every way except that you wash them instead of throwing them out.

All-in-one Pros: Easy easy easy easy easy. No stuffing, no diaper covers, just wash and wear. They’re also pretty trim and take up relatively little space in a diaper bag.

All-in-one Cons: These are just as pricey as pocket diapers, but they dry more slowly. The absorbency cannot be adjusted.

My reviews

We have a stash of Chinese prefolds seeing as how they are so cheap, and there have been occasions when we have used them as something other than a changing pad. They work just fine. We use Snappis, but sometimes I just let the diaper cover hold the diaper on. As for diaper covers, we have three each of the small, medium and large Bummis Super Whisper Wraps. I also tried a Pro-Wrap, but I hated it. I think the Bummis are worth the extra money because they stay in place much better and because there are places to fasten the Velcro tabs while washing them. My advice is to just buy a bunch of prefolds and a couple of diaper covers even if you’re planning to use one of the other types. They are cheap and come in very handy in an emergency.

As I said above, I love our pocket diapers. Currently, we use bumGenius One Size, and yes, the “One Size” does mean that they fit babies for their whole diaper-wearing life. I know that Maggie had issues putting them on her SMALL BABY back in the day, but I secretly think that they probably would have worked even if they did look ridiculous. And so far, Jack has not outgrown them. So that is another benefit of these particular pocket diapers: they are three times as cheap as diapers that come in three sizes.

We also used FuzziBunz pocket diapers when Jack was a newborn. I liked them well enough, but I had two complaints. First, they fasten with discrete snaps instead of the continuum that is Velcro, and sometimes Jack was in between snap settings. I also think the snaps would be harder to fasten on squirmy one-year-old Jack, but that wasn’t an issue for newborn Jack who lacked the gross motor skills to squirm. Second, they come in small, medium and large and are therefore three times as expensive as the BGOSes. Otherwise I liked them.

I can’t tell you a thing about fitted or contour diapers. I think I have one Mother-ease One Size that I bought on Ebay in Jack’s closet, but it seemed ridiculously huge when he was new, and then we got into a rhythm with the bumGeniuses, so I have still never tried it.

We also have five bumGenius AIOs in medium and five in large. (We didn’t need any smalls because of the FuzziBunzes**.) I like using the AIOs when I’m out and about, because they take up less room in the bag, but also because it is kind of gross to take apart the pocket diapers when they are wet and cold. I don’t know why wet and warm is less disgusting, but there you go.

There are plenty of other brands of pocket diapers and AIOs out there, but I was drowning in a sea of diapering choices, so I just picked one. Well, I picked a few. What I actually did was buy a few each of the different kinds and try them out before ordering a whole supply, and that is my advice to you. Unless you are going to use prefolds, the best diaper for your baby is going to depend on what shape your baby is, as some diapers are better for chubby little pudgy legs, and others are best for skinny little chicken legs.

I should also mention that there are mysterious wool diaper covers available for people who use diapers that require covers. Apparently, wool is waterproof, but only if you treat it with lanolin? Or something? I don’t really understand the wool diaper covers, but they are an option for those of you interested in natural fibers. The BG diapers have PUL on the outside, which is a synthetic waterproof material.

For reviews of diapers all the other diaper brands out there that I haven’t tried, check out diaperpin.com. It is a fantastic resource.

Places I have bought cloth diapering stuff (in no way a complete list of places out there):
Cotton Babies
Zannadu
Jillian’s Drawers
Wildflower Diapers
Ebay***

Coming tomorrow: Part III in which I explain how to wash the diapers. (Short version: Rinse poop into toilet. Put in washing machine. Wash.)

*In proofing this post, it occurs to me that maybe “flavor” is not the best word choice when describing diapers.

**The brand names are a benefit of cloth diapering that I have so far neglected to mention.

***Gently used bumGenius and FuzziBunz diapers sell for almost full price on Ebay, so be careful if you’re buying. If you’re selling, more power to you!

Manifesto Part I: Why cloth?
Manifesto Part III: Washing the diapers
Manifesto Part IV: Accessorize!

Cloth Diapering Manifesto: Part I

2007-11-13T20:57:00.000-05:00

When people hear that we use cloth diapers, they assume that The Husband and I are either crazy tree-hugging hippies, saintly all-suffering martyrs, or both. Neither is actually the case. Sure, there’s a little bit of tree-hugger in both of us, and, who am I to deny sainthood when it is bestowed upon me? But the truth is that using cloth diapers is not a big deal. Honest.

I’m not going to go into the pros and cons of cloth diapers here because it has been done, but I will tell you that The Husband and I chose to use cloth mainly because of their reduced environmental impact compared to disposable. We consider the cost benefit and the promised quickening of potty training to be happy bonuses.

When I first started researching cloth diapers however, I was completely and totally overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of different types of diapers out there. I was also quite stunned by the prices, because the initial outlay of money, assuming you purchase fancy diapers instead of old-fashioned prefolds, is about $400 - $500. So although cloth saves money in the long run – especially if the diapers are used for more than one kid – it sort of hurts to start up.

But once we got used to the idea of them costing about eighteen times as much as the prefolds, The Husband and I decided that the fancy diapers were worth it. This is The Husband and I are lazy lazy lazy, and the fancy diapers are at least eighteen times easier to use.

So endeth Part I. In Part II, I will explain the different types of diapers and give you my mini-reviews. But right now, I have to hem my jeans. This is because I bought a new pair of jeans on Sunday. They seemed to fit in the store, bringing the grand total of pants that fit me to a thrilling 1. But I discovered today after that after two wearings the jeans stretch a bit which causes them to sag a bit and, lo, they are way too long. I did not notice they were too long in the dressing room because I was just so excited that they fit at the top, but I can’t wear them like this unless I wear heels every day. Don’t think I didn’t consider that.

Why don’t I take them to a tailor you ask? Well, because the tailor is closed on Wednesdays, and I work on Thursdays and Fridays, and I just can’t wait until next Tuesday to have pants that fit. One pair! I just want one pair of pants that fit!*

Wish me Godspeed, because I don’t have a sewing machine and I’ve never done this before.

*This is a lie. I want at least three pairs.

Manifesto Part II: Diaper types
Manifesto Part III: Washing the diapers
Manifesto Part IV: Accessorize!

Blink blink blink…

2007-11-12T21:21:00.000-05:00

Damn you, cursor. Why must you blink at me so persistently?

Check back tomorrow for the first installment of my cloth diapering manifesto.

Not just geek humor, bad geek humor

2007-11-11T22:02:00.000-05:00

Every time I try to type or say "NaBloPoMo," it comes out as "NanoBloPoMo." In noting this, I said, "That's when you have to write really tiny entries every day for a month!" The Husband replied, "Yeah! And it's held in February, because February is the shortest month!"

And oh, our sides. They were splitting.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day

2007-11-10T21:49:00.000-05:00

Dear Jack,

Every single morning for your entire life, you have started the day by getting your pants changed and THEN having some milk. Every morning! You always get the milk. Have we ever denied you the milk?

So why, then, do you insist upon moaning and wailing and gnashing your teeth as though waiting two extra minutes for the milk is causing you to waste away before our very eyes?

Love,
Mama (the one with the milk)

PS While I have your attention, if you don't want the banana disks I offer you, there is no need to snatch them up and throw them on the floor. Just don't take the banana disks! You're killing me!

Some things

2007-11-09T23:20:00.000-05:00

So I signed up for NaBloPoMo at the last possible minute, and now I have to post every day. Every day! Even though I am tired! And a wee bit tipsy! Because The Husband and I went out for a fancy dinner for our 4 year anniversary! And I just spelled that "anniversrary" which means I am actually slurring my typed words. So here I am, posting. But if you think I am going to post something coherent, you have another think coming. (I said "another think" on purpose, because it is funny to me.)

***

When I'm driving and let someone cross the street in front of my car, and out of courtesy the person runs so as to minimize the amount of time I have to wait, it amuses me to think to myself, "Yeah, you BETTER run."

***

Emily asked for some help finding shoes that "might be cute for upcoming holiday parties and a date night or two," and I recommended these, and she wants to get them in gray! Instead of red! So you should all leave her comments telling her that she is crazy, because I am way too emotionally invested in her shoe purchase, and I need her to get the red ones.

***

Speaking of shoes, I have been commissioned to find Maggie a pair of black heels, because Maggie has no black heels! I know! And although the implication there is that Maggie asked me to help her find shoes, the truth is that she admitted to having no black heels and I very pushily started taking over because I like telling people what to do. And also because it would appear that I have a bizarre interest in other people's footwear.

***

Arwen linked to me yesterday, but this time she was complaining about a post of mine in which I expressed my concerns that I was creating a monster baby, addicted to being rocked to sleep. She said that when she read that post, she sort of wanted to smack me. But I am not offended, because, as I reread that post, I also sort of wanted to smack me. When I think of the energy I wasted worrying about things that were not problems, energy I could have spent on researching shoe purchases for other people, I could weep.

***

And that is all for tonight, my friends. Tomorrow I have to go to a baby shower in Maine, but I will try to put together something a bit better than this for my post. One can always hope.

It's one of those posts again

2007-11-08T22:08:00.000-05:00

Jack is teething again, and it’s having an effect on his digestion. Yesterday, I asked The Husband if Jack’s morning diaper was poopy or not, because the best days are the days that Jack poops once, and The Husband cleans it up. The Husband may not agree with me here, but he’s wrong.

“Yes, of course it was,” said The Husband.

“Was it all gross?” I asked, because for the past several days it’s been… not normal.

“Yes, it was gross and sticky like it has been lately,” he said. Then he added, “But I don’t want to have a conversation about the consistency of Jack’s poop.”

“I hate to break it to you, but we just did.”

***

On a completely unrelated note, The Husband is currently playing pinball on the computer, and I feel the need to tell you all that I once scored over nine million on computer pinball. Nine million! And when you get a score that high, the gravity goes wonky. It’s very cool.

Of clocks and snakes and zombies

2007-11-07T22:37:00.000-05:00

Today Jack and I went to The Christmas Tree Shop to buy some Thanksgiving decorations, and there was a display of about twenty or thirty clocks on the wall. Knowing his love for clocks, I turned the cart around so he could see them and said, “Look, Jack! Clocks!”

He looked at the clocks, and then turned back to me with an expression that clearly said, “And your point is?” I shrugged and we headed off to the registers which were located in front of the store’s own clock, a sad solitary, lonely one on the wall. And what do you think I heard but an excited “Cok!” complete with vigorous pointing.

Jack has also been saying “cok” every time the clock in the dining room chimes for many days now, but it was not until dinner tonight that I realized he is also humming the chime song. I will pause now while the adorableness of that sinks in.

In other news, yesterday I taught him what Eskimo kisses are and he gave them to me all day whenever I asked. Tragically, he won’t any more. I think I wore it out. He also now knows what snakes and gorillas say, so I can add those to the list.

I’m really enjoying Jack’s newfound communication skills. He quite clearly understands the bulk of what we say to him; we have had to spell “cookie” for weeks now. When I call his name after he’s been quiet for awhile, he toddles over and looks at me as if to say, “Yeah?” The other night, The Husband told him to go get his blanket and come over to him, and he did! And at dinner we had an entire conversation about the clock and how it chimes. Granted, the conversation was basically, “Clock! Doo doo doo dooo! Clock!” but still. It was a conversation. He’s like an actual person now!

Next up: What a zombie says. (Braainnnssss!)

His own daughter does not even blink at his scary booming voice

2007-11-06T21:58:00.000-05:00

My brother has five sisters and no brothers. (Pause while the internet says, “Oh, the poor guy!” with a sort of bemused smile on its face.) And now I say to you: Poor guy – schmoor guy. His childhood was just fine. We are not all that difficult to live with, and now my sister-in-law is blessed with a husband who has shared a single bathroom with five sisters, three of whom were teenagers, and therefore, no matter how much time she spends in the bathroom it seems like no time at all to my brother.

Growing up, I, as the youngest, had an advantage over my brother. I got to start trouble with near-immunity, because he was six years older than me and was supposed to know better than to respond to my provocations. He got back at me for this, however, by doing that thing where he would mock me while holding me at bay with his hand on my head so that I could not reach him. Those of you out there who have older brothers know just how infuriating this is, I am sure. And those of you out there who are older brothers are probably smiling and nodding at your fond memories.

Oh, who am I kidding; there are no older brothers reading this site. I lost any remaining male readers when I posted the video.

Anyway. My brother had a special relationship with Big Sister #3, one year his junior. He could not resist teasing her at any and every opportunity. He knew exactly what to do and say to get a rise out of her, and she never failed to take the bait.

There was one time, for example, when my brother was sitting at on the floor at the coffee table, ostensibly doing his homework. Big Sister #3 was in the chair, and my mother was in the dining room. I was probably watching TV, because I watched a lot of TV. All was peaceful, until Big Brother cried out, “Mo-om! Big Sister #3 sat on my legs!”

“I DID NOT!” yelled Big Sister #3, and everyone looked over at Big Brother only to find that he had taken off his tube socks, flattened them out, and arranged his shoes to look like his feet were still in them.

While I’m telling stories about my brother, I would like to take this opportunity to record the existence of ATAL for the sake of posterity. ATAL stood for “All-terrain attack lemon.” ATAL came into being one night when we were having fish for dinner, and the lemon juice that comes in a plastic lemon was out on the table. For some reason unknown to mere mortals, Big Brother was inspired to drive the lemon around the table – and over Big Sister #3’s plate – making “vroom vroom” and “beep beep” noises. He also attempted to fire lemon juice at Big Sister #3, and she, of course, was annoyed by this.

I’ve had these recollections rattling around in my head for some time now, but I was finally spurred to post them here after my brother called me tonight to apologize for something. On Saturday, The Husband and I were visiting my brother and his family. They have a gas fireplace which can be turned on with a switch, so when Big Brother saw Jack wandering towards it, he shouted, “NO!” in a scary booming voice. Jack, of course, burst into tears and was inconsolable until we gave him a cider doughnut. (You try crying while eating a cider doughnut. It’s impossible.)

Neither The Husband nor I thought anything further about the incident, unless you count our being amused by it on the way home. Of course Big Brother shouted “No!” at Jack. Jack was heading towards the fireplace, and Jack is most certainly not allowed to touch fireplaces. Big Brother, however, has apparently been losing sleep over the fact that he made Jack cry, and had to call to apologize to me again.

I always knew my brother was a softie, but I had no idea he had such a sensitive soul.

(Insert clever title here)

2007-11-05T22:04:00.001-05:00

Tonight I went to a Tae Kwon Do class for the first time in over four years.

Ouch.

The Husband and I used to practice Tae Kwon Do; we’re both blue belts, but I’ll be honest, he could wipe the floor with me. (I win at air hockey though, lest you forget.) He used to take classes at a studio in the town where he lived, and I practiced with a club at the university. My classes were free. Sadly, we had to stop when we got married because we couldn’t afford to pay for both of us to go to classes. We miss it.

So last week I decided to call the academy near our house to find out how much the classes cost. The master didn’t tell me, though; instead he offered to let us each take a class and see how we like it. And that brings us to the reason I’m typing this incredibly dull entry whilst lying on the couch nursing my aching back. I went to my free class tonight, and I loved it, but four years off from TKD didn’t do me any favors.

Unfortunately, The Husband and I realized when I got home from class that this is not going to work, not if we hope to see each other for more than fifteen minutes a day. So when we finally discover that the classes will be too expensive for us, it will not be a terrible blow.

Polly want a go-kuh?

2007-11-04T21:39:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, Jack asked me for a cracker. It was actually pretty cool. Although “cracker” has been a part of his vocabulary for a few weeks now, but usually he just says it when he’s pointing out the cracker. But this time we were in the living room and there were no crackers in sight. So we went into the kitchen and I got him a cracker. It was lucky for him, though, that he asked me for the cracker, because Jack has a fairly unique pronunciation of the word. It’s sort of “go-kuh,” and I am the only person in the world who understands what he’s saying.

Jack’s vocabulary is growing by leaps and bounds these days. Today I discovered that our hard work on what a gorilla says has paid off when he waved his arms around in the general vicinity of his chest and said, “Aaaa!” He also has his own word for water; it’s “Ahhhhhh!” because that’s what you say after you’ve had a refreshing sip of water. He still says “clock,” and we still talk about clocks quite a lot. We point out all the clocks in the house. We comment on the clock when it chimes. We find clocks in other houses and at the doctor’s office and wherever we go. And today, when The Husband took the clock off the wall to change the time, he completely blew Jack’s mind. The clock! The clock! Clockclockclockclockclock!

I just reread the last paragraph to see if I liked the way it turned out, and I would like to take a moment to comment on a strange phenomenon. What is it about babies that makes people say things like, “Are we tired?” or “We have to go to the pediatrician today to get our shots,” or “We finally learned what a gorilla says!” Seriously, what has happened to me? When did I develop the speech patterns of a pushy nurse from a bad sitcom?

Jack says lots of other words too, and because it’s getting late and I only have a few minutes left of working brain cells due to the fact that we seem to be getting a new tooth and we are therefore feeling cranky and clingy and tiring out our mama, I am going to wind this entry up with a list of words Jack currently says. You don’t have to read this part.

clock (cok)
No (noooo)
water (ahhhh!)
duck (da)
What is that, please? (da?)
May I have some of that? (da!) (“da” is tonal)
Balloon (boon) (technically, he’s only said this on one day)

Animal sounds Jack makes
Moo (mmmm)
Meow (owww)
Tweet (weeweeweewee!)
Woof (woo)
Quack (dadada! With hand gestures from “5 Little Ducks” song)
Bunny face
Elephant trumpeting
Gorilla chest thumping

A shot in the dark

2007-11-03T22:04:00.000-04:00

On a trip to Cape May in 2003, The Husband and I played some skee ball, because I have a general rule to play skee ball whenever given the opportunity. It is similar to my rule of playing air hockey whenever possible. The difference is that, while I just play skee ball for fun, I play air hockey to WIN. I am really good at air hockey.

But, as there were no air hockey tables to be found in Cape May, we were forced to stick to skee ball. We decided to save up our tickets for the whole week and get a good prize. Maybe even a back scratcher! On our last night, we pooled our tickets and scanned the prize counter to see what we could afford. Five minutes later, we were the proud owners of a superball and a shot glass silkscreened with the words “Cape May” and a picture of a lighthouse.

That shot glass inspired us, and we decided to start a collection of shot glasses from every place we visited. It seemed like a great idea; shot glasses were small, cheap, and useful! About fourteen trips later, I started to have second thoughts about our plan. We had just moved into our new house, and displaying twenty shot glasses in our formal dining room didn’t quite achieve the look I was going for. I was trying to go for “classic contemporary,” not so much “frat house.”

So it’s just as well that the collection has stagnated, as we no longer go anywhere. I relocated the shot glasses to the more casual china hutch in the kitchen, and they made fabulous practice cups for Jack. The whiskey really seems to calm him down.

Dosage

2007-11-02T21:58:00.001-04:00

So. Jack turned one last Wednesday. I made a little movie about it, in case you haven’t seen it yet.

What I’m trying, but failing to do here, is segue smoothly into mentioning that my video was Dosed by Amalah. For those of you unaware of who Amalah is, trust me when I tell you that this was big deal. Very big. I checked my stats about every 30 seconds after she dosed me, and by the day’s end, I had easily tentupled my average daily pageloads. Tentupled! And that’s not even a real word! I’m still kind of reeling from the excitement of it all.

But what’s that you say? I haven’t told you anything about Jack’s birthday party? Let me remedy that immediately.

It was a low-key party. Just my and The Husband’s immediate families and their children came, so there were only about 30 people. You know, just a small gathering. The theme of the party was “Hey! Let’s all have some cake!” Plus hats.

Jack got to experience a few new things as well, and based on his newfound love of potato chips, pizza, cake and ice cream, I think we can all rest assured that he is truly my son.

Why have you kept pizza from me for so long?

I made two cakes because 30 people eat more than one cake, especially when those 30 people are from my family. We are a dessert people. When my mother-in-law saw the layer cake, she asked, quite innocently, “What kind of frosting is that with the brown speckles in it?” Sadly, that frosting was plain vanilla with pieces of ripped up chocolate cake spread throughout. Tell me, internet, what is the secret to frosting a cake so that it does not get all torn up? I always thought this problem was due to my not letting the cake cool properly, but I baked the cakes on Friday night and didn’t frost them till Saturday morning, so I’m at a loss.

Nevertheless, the layer cake appeared to be a success.

What is this you are bringing to me?

I find it to be acceptable.

Yes! Let's all have some cake!

The party was not actually Jack’s first taste of ice cream, but it was the first time he got to do this with it:

Ice cream is a very complex fluid you know. I believe it is non-Newtonian.

Everyone was very generous, and Jack received some lovely presents. Big Sister #2, for example, bought him two books, one of which was the same book she bought him for his baptism*. It is a really good book, though. His paternal grandparents, in typical fashion, bought him about fifty gazillion things. He hasn’t had a chance to play with all of them yet, but he certainly enjoys being pulled around in the sled. He equally enjoys the two corn popper push toys he got. He doesn’t push them, though, he just likes to stand them up so they balance. He also got a toy drill that talks, and he wants to like it, but he really prefers that someone else hold it while it’s making all that noise.

But mostly, he likes to carry around his socks from one room to another. Or a wooden spoon.

Wooden spoons rock.

*This incident reminded Big Sister #1 of the year she bought Big Sister #3 the People MagazinePeople, board game. It was a perfect gift in theory, because Big Sister #3's idea of nirvana is a Diet Coke, a People, and E! on in the background. Unfortunately, we discovered that the game was really awful when we tried to play it, and we never tried again. That’s probably why Big Sister #1 forgot about it and bought it for her again the next year.

Objection! Hearsay!

2007-11-01T22:05:00.000-04:00

I often catch myself making sweeping statements about legal procedure before realizing that, in fact, all of my legal knowledge comes from watching episodes of Law and Order.

Searching for Mr. Pickles

2007-10-28T20:53:00.002-04:00

This is Mr. Pickles.

This is Mr. Pickles's brother, Mr. Pickles.

This is Mr. Pickles, and Mr. Pickles's brother, Mr. Pickles.

Mr. Pickles entered my life on Easter, 1998. My mother had placed a few of these tiny yellow chickens in the Easter lily, and, because I kept talking about how adorable they were, she sent one of them back to college with me. At the time, I was sharing a house with four of my friends. Somehow, a game evolved in which one of us would hide the chicken somewhere unexpected, say a cereal box, and let the owner of said cereal box discover the chicken later. Sometimes, it would be several days before the unsuspecting owner of the cereal box would find the chicken - maybe she had bagels for breakfast instead - but it was absolutely crucial to avoid any and all questions about the chicken, even seemingly innocent questions such as, "So... have you had any cereal lately? Don't you want to have some now?" The Chicken Game relied on the element of surprise.

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, "What a stupid game." But see, you're only thinking that because you've never experienced the joys of finding a small yellow chicken peeking up out of your cereal, or hiding in the medicine chest, or secreted away in your coat pocket. The Chicken Game is awesome.

I brought The Chicken Game with me to grad school and played it with my roommate during my first year. Then, once I joined the lab, I started playing it with my lab mates. That's when Mr. Pickles earned his name. By that point, my mother - a big fan of The Chicken Game - had given me lots of new chickens, and I had two of them on my shelf in the lab. "They need names," said The Doktah, (of course it was The Doktah) and she came up with "Mr. Pickles," for the simple reason that "pickles" is an inherently funny word. Pickles pickles pickles. See? As for Mr. Pickles's brother, Mr. Pickles, I outright stole his name from the Sesame Street characters "Mr. Noodle and Mr. Noodle's brother, Mr. Noodle" because that is comic genius, my friends. Comic genius.

So. Now you know who Mr. Pickles is. And every Easter, I stock up on packages of Mr. Pickleses so that I can continue to play The Chicken Game with my friends and family. Currently, there are two wine glasses full of Mr. Pickleses in my china hutch*. As long as I have extra Mr. Pickleses, I am free to leave Mr. Pickleses here and there as I go through life, in places like a friend's bathroom, or Muffet Niece's pillow. With a stockpile of Mr. Pickleses, I can also mail a Mr. Pickles to one of my college housemates or to The Doktah, if the mood strikes me.

If you're lucky, maybe I'll mail one to you.

*Where do you suggest I keep them?

One year

2007-10-24T11:20:00.000-04:00

A lot can happen in a year. Heck, a lot can happen in six months, as evidenced by my experiences from July to December, 2003, when I had my appendix out, got evicted, moved twice, wrote my thesis, got married, moved again, and defended my thesis to earn my Ph.D.

But the events of 2003 do not hold a candle to what has happened to our family since October 24, 2006, because that was the day Jack joined me and The Husband here on the outside. It's almost impossible to understand that the toddler currently doing laps around the dining room table is the same being that lay his little head down on my chest that October night. He wasn't crying, he was just gazing up at me with his huge blue eyes as if to say, "Hi. Who are you? I'm hungry." And life hasn't been the same since.

So happy birthday, Jack. You're going to love cake.

Jack: Year One from Maureen on Vimeo.

Music: "Somewhere Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World" by Israel Kamakawiwo'ole
Idea for video: Stolen from Amalah

We interrupt this broadcast for a Muppet News Flash

2007-10-21T20:22:00.000-04:00

I have two items of fantastic news. First, Desitin does, in fact, come out. I think we can all breathe a sigh of relief there. Of course, if this bizarre 75-80 degree October weather keeps up, the fact that I have only 3 long-sleeved shirts will not matter.

Second, and, I'm sure we will all agree, no less important, The Doktah has given birth to a beautiful, if slim, baby girl! She's 6 pounds something and 20 inches long! (The baby, not The Doktah.) Everyone is doing as well as can be expected, which is to say that The Doktah sounded a bit weepy on the phone. But all reports agree that the baby is adorable.

The bad news here is that the Moby wrap I bought for The Doktah as a baby gift is currently sitting on my dining room table. But, in my defense, the baby is one week early.

Yes, I'll be mailing it toute suite.

Congratulations, The Doktah and Mr. The Doktah!

And we've moved this box at least twice.

2007-10-18T20:18:00.000-04:00

The Husband was looking for a ruler, any ruler, any one of our several rulers, but they have apparently all disappeared into the ether. Maybe they've slipped through a wormhole and are living on a planet in a dimension uniquely suited to the ruler lifestyle, somewhere near the Byro planet.

At any rate, I tried to help him and decided to look in the cabinet of the desk. The cabinet which I had completely forgotten existed. An although I found no rulers, I found all kinds of interesting stuff. What was it? Well, I'm glad you asked!

1. Our film camera. That's where that is!
2. About fifty 3.5 inch floppy disks. Clearly these contain critical data. I bet one of them is my Engineering 101 project from freshman year in college.
3. A plastic stand-alone drawer full of receipts from 2003 from a short-lived bout of determined organization combined with an obsessive-compulsive urge to save all receipts for a month.
4. About thirty zip disks. Remember zip disks?
5. A box labeled "knick-knacks" which is itself a treasure trove of hilarious artifacts. Namely:

a. A jewelers box containing a cheap shell necklace that was clearly a free gift from the airline that took us to Hawaii in 2004.
b. A baggie of nails and mysterious little wooden dowel caps.
c. A pink paper bag of new buttons for my black trenchcoat that I bought in Nantucket on our honeymoon in 2003.
d. Directions on how to grow a Plumeria.
e. Harry Potter glasses.
f. The "Doc" pin (Doc of the Seven Dwarfs) that I received as a gift from The Professor and Mr. The Professor.
g. A key chain with the meaning of our last name.
h. A cork.
i. A lanyard that is clearly supposed to go to something specific.
j. A broken watch.
k. Black thread.
l. White thread.
m. A tealight.
n. Seven Mr. Pickleses, which are small little chickens made out of pipe cleaner material that I have never explained on this blog, but now I will have to.
o. Two packets of extra buttons.
p. 6 drinks umbrellas from Hawaii.
q. Two drinks swords from Hawaii.
r. A small crucifix. Naturally.
s. A ridiculously out of date collection of business cards which I will not go through.
t. Look! More receipts!
u. Plane ticket stubs.
v. Store cards.
w. A "buy 10 get one free" card from the smoothie place at the food court at grad school. One hole has been punched.
x. A St. Andrew medal.
y. A pen cap.

And last but not least,
z. Three capacitors.

What? Where do you keep YOUR capacitors?

Toddling

2007-10-17T10:10:00.000-04:00

Today I will be taking Jack to the fancy schmancy photography studio to get his one-year portrait done. This session is the last in the "baby panel" series, after which I will not be returning to the fancy schmancy photography studio. It is nothing against the pictures; the pictures are gorgeous. It is more the cost of said pictures. You see, the "baby panel" is a promotion run by this studio that includes sittings at 3, 6, 9 and 12 months and one 5x7 from each session, all for $79. Now, this is quite a deal, I have to say, even though I didn't find out about this studio until after I had already missed the 3-month session. So it is not the $79 that is the problem. It is more the cost of prints above and beyond the 5x7s that are included with the promotion.

At the 6-month portrait sitting which took place at 7-months for reasons I will discuss momentarily, I received a booklet of their package prices and I almost dropped dead from the shock. That was when I discovered that by choosing one of their packages, I could save $1700 over the cost of buying that many prints individually. I could SAVE $1700. Saving money is all well and good, but trust me, buying the prints a la carte would not come to a total of $1800.

I also found out that in order to choose the prints, The Husband and I would have to come back to a formal "viewing" where we would be shown a slide show of each picture from the session and anything we didn't choose that day would be deleted. The pressure! We tried to harden our hearts before the viewing and decided to choose only one pose for the cheapest option, 24 wallets, but naturally, we caved and bought two poses divided among one 8x10, one 5x7 and 8 wallets, because adding the 5x7 to the wallets was only $50 more and adding a second pose and the 8x10 was only $50 more on top of that, and that's practically the same price, really, when you think about it, I mean, the 8x10 is practically free, and how could we possibly be expected to choose just one pose of our adorable child?

But why was the 6-month session a month late, you ask? Well the studio has a lot of rules. The "baby panel" is designed to be a series of photos of the baby lying down (3 months), sitting up (6 months), standing holding on (9 months) and standing unassisted (12 months). Jack, naturally, was not able to sit up unassisted at 6 months. About a week before his appointment, I called the studio to tell them he could not yet sit up, as they had requested me to do. "Oh, no," said the guy who makes the appointments. "Well, when will he be able to?" Since Jack had not informed me of his schedule, I had to tell him that I really didn't know. "Well, let's just schedule for next month and hope," said the man at the studio, and we did. Fortunately, Jack got his act together in time and, although he was a little tippy the day of the session, we were spared having to wait until he was almost 9-months to take the 6-month shots.

After the 9-month portrait, the photographer asked me to call as soon as he could stand up unassisted, since she did not like to take portraits of toddlers if she could avoid it. I assumed that this would not be a problem, because Jack was up on all fours rocking back and forth for at least 5 weeks before he actually managed to crawl. I figured we'd have plenty of time.

I called the studio on a Friday and left a message that Jack could stand unassisted, and we should schedule the 12-month session. They did not return my call for 3 days by which point Jack was already teetering around the house pretty skillfully. "Yeah, he's walking," I said. "Sorry. He's pretty wobbly now, but this is happening really really fast, so I imagine he'll be running by next week." The studio panicked and gave me the next available appointment, which was for last Wednesday. But once again, Jack refused to cooperate and instead came down with a cold, so we had to reschedule. That turned out to be a very good thing, however, because the morning of the original appointment, Jack fell on his face and scratched the heck out of his nose. Not something I was anxious to memorialize for eternity.

So the photographer is going to have a little adventure trying to catch Jack standing still for long enough to snap some pictures. We'll schedule the viewing, spend a bit more money than we really want to, and go to Sears or someplace for his next portrait. Because I just don't have $1700 to save.

In the meantime

2007-10-16T16:31:00.000-04:00

I'm working on a real post, honest. It's just been difficult to keep up with the blog lately, because, and this may come as a huge shock, raising a baby is hard work! I know! No one told me either. And lately I've had to do actual work stuff at night, and I'm trying to make a year-in-review video of Jack a la Amalah, so my computer time has been accounted for. Also we've been having internet issues. (The Husband tried to explain what he did to fix it, and there was something about the router and the modem and a direct connection which bypasses the electronic whoozywhatsis and blah blah blah, and my eyes glazed over and I said, "Um, I don't actually understand any of the things you are saying. Does the internet work? Yes? Does the wireless connection? No? OK.") Also I am TIRED. Also, Jack skipped his morning nap today. SKIPPED. And then he tried to only sleep for 40 minutes in the afternoon, but I was having NONE OF THAT and rocked his little self back to sleep. One nap a day? I AM NOT READY FOR ONE NAP A DAY.

That being said, I am very sad that I have wasted the linkage from Arwen whom I was lucky enough to meet last week. Because she is not a slacker like me, she actually wrote about this meeting and linked to me twice! Arwen is an internet rockstar, so this shot the number of pageloads for those to days from my average of 30 to a record high 8 billion.* And what did all of these new readers find? The most boring page in existence. And now they'll never come back.

But now I am posting this, so if they do come back, they will find this bizarre stream-of-consciousness post about nothing in particular. Right. This is much better.

Edited to add
Also also, today I got a huge glob of Desitin on my shirt, and I ONLY HAVE THREE SHIRTS. Does Desitin come out? It probably never comes out. (This is true if the word "shirt" implies a shirt that is not a sad sack of faded, shapeless cotton. If you count the sad sacks of faded, shapeless cotton, I have at least six shirts.)

*I was going to quote the actual numbers here, but Statcounter won't load up. Did Statcounter go out of business or something? Why won't Statcounter load up? How am I supposed to keep track of the 7 people who read my blog?

And he wears them for a long time

2007-10-07T20:58:00.000-04:00

If putting your baby's red sweatpants on his head like a hat for your own amusement is wrong, then I don't want to be right.

They give you 10 blank ones every time you send one out

2007-10-04T21:36:00.000-04:00

If my mom had a blog, she’d use it to tell you what happened when she and my dad packed up and moved out of the house they’d lived in for the past 37 years. At least, she’d start to tell you about it, but then she’d get distracted by the overwhelmingness* of unpacking 37 years’ worth of stuff and instead tell you who it was that gave her that tiny silver milk pitcher.

But my mom doesn’t have a blog, so it is left to me to tell you all what The Charmer, now five years old, said at his first visit to my parents’ new home. He said, “You sure have a lot of Jesus stuff.”

I suppose it does seem like a lot when it’s all piled together, but the Jesus stuff pales in comparison to what the movers saw. My parents hired experienced movers who are trained not to have opinions about other people’s stuff. Still, the mover had a hard time keeping a straight face when he lugged a huge box into the house, glanced down at the label, and asked, “Where do you want these… mass cards?”

*Don’t I have as much right as anyone to coin a word?

Breaking news

2007-10-03T23:24:00.001-04:00

I thought you should know, dear Internet, that today I took Jack to the shoe store to buy him his first pair of shoes. He needs them because he spends much more time walking than crawling these days.

Let that sink in.

Also let sink in the fact that his shoes cost me forty-six dollars, and they are only going to fit him for five minutes. It's a crying shame that the hand-me-down sneakers from Elfin Nephew make Jack fall down.

In an unrelated note, today is apparently delurking day. I am late, very late, to the party with this, but if you're lurking, come out and leave a comment!

But... she doesn't even know the words to "Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ra!"

2007-10-02T10:40:00.000-04:00

Two weeks ago, The Husband and I went on a date. As in, just he and I. Out. Together. Alone. With cocktails. It was pretty nice, yeah. It was, in fact, the first time we had been on a date since I gave birth. Actually, I should say it was the first time we had been on a date since The Bathroom Remodel, because Lord knows there was no time for romance when there were walls to put up and cabinets to rehang.

This date was the first of our attempts to follow the "One Date A Month" rule we established for ourselves in, oh, April. But the months, they fly by! And the babysitters, they get busy! You have to book early with these babysitters. They have social lives too, you know. But we finally managed it two weeks ago. We called the babysitter a whole week in advance. We located the restaurant gift card we received as a baby gift from my choir. We checked to see what movies were playing. Because we were going to do this date thing right. Dinner AND a movie. We were going to live the life, baby.

The babysitter, a delightful high school sophomore, arrived promptly at 6:30. The Husband and I were dressed, Jack was fed and pajama-ed. So The Husband ran through the emergency numbers and then hilariously tried to make small talk with the 15-year-old girl in our kitchen while I nursed Jack. ("Why, yes, that is a large mixer. They sure are heavier than they look, those mixers.") After Jack was done, I went over the bedtime routine, kissed Jack goodnight, handed him over and... we left.

Now, both The Husband and I are relaxed parents. This was not even the first time we had left Jack with this babysitter; we had had her over twice before to make sure Jack knew her. But this did not stop us from feeling, albeit ever so slightly, as though we were abandoning our baby in his time of need. It's bedtime! No one but us had ever put him to bed before! What if she forgets to read Barnyard Dance last? And, oh heavens, I forgot to tell her that I always say, "Now we get comfy cozy and we sing our good-night song," after we turn out the light! Oh nooooooooo! But we stifled these feelings and focused on the promise of a dinner with cocktails, a dinner blessedly free of the command, "No shrieking."

We thoroughly enjoyed our dinner, heroically resisting all temptations to call and check in on the babysitter. Afterwards, we headed over to the movie theater and bought tickets for The Bourne Ultimatum. The reviews for Bourne were full of phrases like "pounding, pulsating thriller" and "constant adrenaline surge," so I was looking forward to an exciting movie. And according to The Husband, it was very exciting. His adrenaline: It surged. You will have to take his word for it though, because I fell asleep. It seems that 10:00 pm is 10:00 pm, no matter where I am, and that, my friends, is what time I fall asleep.

At any rate, we came back home to a nice, peaceful house. There had been no problems at bedtime whatsoever. Naturally, I was thrilled by this. Someone else successfully put Jack to bed with no issues! I am free! Free to leave the house before 7:00 pm if I so desire. Free to fall asleep on my friend's couch at 10:00 pm if I want to. But even as I reveled in my freedom, I could feel a twinge of... what was that? Offense? Hurt feelings?

You mean he didn't miss me at all?

It's a look

2007-10-02T10:03:00.000-04:00

Why is it that the day my friend is coming to videotape Jack for a class is the same day Jack decides to find out what it feels like to carefully place sliced (and sticky) banana discs on his head? Banana discs: The mousse for the baby set. And while we're on the subject of breakfast, why does food that is rejected when sitting in the high chair suddenly become delicious when picked off the floor? It's like a race after every meal to see who can pick up the food first. I don't always win.

Look out for that milestone!

2007-09-25T23:17:00.000-04:00

Well.

Babies sure change fast, huh? I mean, I know it's a cliche to say that it seems like just last week Jack was crawling and babbling and this week he's walking and talking, using a spoon and holding his own cup, but, in my defense, JUST LAST WEEK he was only crawling and babbling and had no idea that the spoon functioned as a tool of any kind and thought that the best way to get water was to lower his head to the cup and bite like hell on the spout.

I guess that the walking technically started in the middle of last week, and the cup thing was on Saturday, but today was like a milestone EXPLOSION. He started the day when he saw Peter Rabbit on his breakfast plate and told me what a bunny says. (It scrunches up its nose and makes a little huffing noise, in case you were not aware. You have not seen adorable until you've seen a baby do this.) Later, I caught him trying to play with the air conditioner's power cord, and we had a little conversation about that, with me saying, "No, no. Don't touch," and him shaking his finger at it and then confirming with me that he had it right. He followed up by identifying his toes and my toes and his ear and fingers (but not my ear or fingers), and then we spent some time looking out the window, watching the "caaaaaaaaahhhhhhhs" drive by. The mystery of how to get the ball popper to pop was unraveled after lunch. He still knows what an elephant says, and at suppertime, just when I had finished regaling The Husband with all of Jack's accomplishments, he blew my mind by using his spoon to eat applesauce instead of using it to wave at air molecules like he usually does. (I mean that Jack used the spoon, not The Husband. The Husband has been able to use his spoon to eat applesauce for months now.) I think meals are going to be a bit messier for awhile.

Sometime during the past week, he started pointing out all of the clocks in the house. He has always loved himself a good clock - the difference now is that he consistently identifies them as "cok" because he's been practicing the "k" sound for days now. At the In-Laws', Jack knows where the bird with the wings that spin is in the garden, and he knows where the birds are that hang from the chandelier and the china closet door in the dining room. He tweets when he wants to play with them. He also knows which round things with hands and words are clocks and which one is the barometer. Why tell a baby what a barometer is, you say? Well, he asked me. What, I'm supposed to lie and say it's a clock?

Jack's current favorite game is "Where's The Duck?" in which I hide his rubber duckie in some clever spot such as the middle of his bedroom floor and he finds it. Sometimes I can hide it under a blanket, but only if he watches me put it there, and only if I put it close to the blanket's edge. "Where's The Duck?" is so popular, in fact, that it could be used to distract Jack from the fact that his mother whacked his face and head on the door, if such a thing were ever to happen which of course it never would. Ahem. But Jack also enjoys a good round of "Crawling Around On The Floor While Holding Random Household Items Such As A Post-It Or A Tupperware Lid Or A Scrap Of Ripped Up Tissue If I Can Get It." I think he likes the way the different things slide along as he goes.

It's really been an incredible week. Some of the things that he's learned we've been practicing, like what a bunny says, but some of them he seems to have picked up osmotically, like the fingers, or the spoon. I think he asked once me last week what fingers were, but, honestly, I'd been focusing on toes and noses.

Jack is at a stage now where he plays happily by himself when he's awake and when he's tired, he snuggles up to his blanket and says, "Mmmmmmmm!" He gives hugs freely and giggles with abandon. OK, sure, sometimes he shrieks just to hear how it sounds (bad), and he hasn't entirely given up on biting. But I am so in love with him that I want to freeze him here forever, except then I wouldn't find out what he'll be like tomorrow.

Happy eleven month birthday, one day late, Jack. You're pretty awesome.

Aragog junior

2007-09-18T13:42:00.000-04:00

We have had a spider living essentially on our back door for the better part of the summer. The web stretched across the topmost corner of the door and didn't really get in the way of anyone trying to go in or out. And since spiders are known to eat other, peskier bugs, The Husband and I were more than willing to allow this spider tenancy on our back door.

Now, the back door is not one I use very often, but The Husband uses it once a week when he takes out the trash. For the past several weeks, he has been returning from the trash duty with reports that the spider was getting larger and the web more intrusive.

"Pish tosh!" I always retorted, because The Husband is well known to have a thing about spiders. "How big can it be?"

I found out yesterday when I had to bring our trash down to the garbage bins outside and was very nearly killed by the biggest spider I have ever seen. Its web stretched across the top third of the doorway, and when I opened the door, I apparently caused the web to shake and the spider scuttled down extremely close to my head to find out what tasty treat it had snared. Naturally, I screamed and slammed the door shut, because I am well known to keep a cool head in these sorts of circumstances.

I could not bring myself to pass under that web, so I found an old stick (the back entryway is where we store our leftover wood from our never ending home improvement projects) and attempted to swat the spider off. Unfortunately, I was only able to manage to knock of bits of the web in between ducking behind the door to protect myself from the giant spider who was rebuilding the web even as I destroyed it. I could actually see the silk coming out of the spider's butt. I ended up taking an old stick and going out through the front door and around to the back so that I could knock the spider off from a safe distance, because I could not bring myself to walk under that web. What if the spider had landed on my head? WHAT THEN?

This post is brought to you by Emily who inspired me to write about my own spider incident. Sadly, I do not have a picture of my spider, but it was almost as big as Emily's and a sort of speckled tan. Emily definitely wins, however, since her spider was black and hairy and IN HER KITCHEN.

Words and phrases Jack understands or at least reacts appropriately to

2007-09-11T13:25:00.000-04:00

Fan
Clock
Light
Daddy
Grammy
Papa
Grampa
Gram
Dog
Dover (in-laws' dog's name)
Duck
Elephant
Flower
Want a cookie?
What does an elephant say? (sometimes)
Who's the best baby? (sometimes)

The lack of "Mama," "Mom," Mommy," "Mother," "Ma," "Mum," "Maman," or any other permutation of the word is not an oversight as he has absolutely no idea what these sounds indicate, previous claims to the contrary notwithstanding. Also unrepresented: All the words I sign except for "Daddy." He sort of understands signs, but he tends to use the sign for "more" to mean both "more" and "all done." This can prove to be a mite frustrating.

Still in all, my baby is currently tons o' fun, and I wouldn't trade him for the world. If he'd just stop biting me when he nurses, I would have not one complaint. Knock on wood. KNOCK ON WOOD.

I know this isn't a terribly original idea for a topic

2007-09-10T19:28:00.000-04:00

My dinner conversations of late:

"Ah-sat?"

"A clock."

"Ah-sat?"

"A clock."

"Ah-sat?"

"A clock."

"Ah-sat?"

"A clock."

"Ah-sat?"

"A clock."

"Ah-sat?"

"A clock."

"Ah-sat?"

"A clock."

"Ah-sat?"

"A clock."

"Ah-sat?"

"The china closet."

"Ah-sat?"

"A clock."

She does notice when the sink is dirty though, unlike SOME PARTIES I COULD MENTION

2007-09-09T09:07:00.001-04:00

Big Sister #4's faucets leak. They've leaked for as long as they've owned the house, as far as I can remember, and she and Brother-in-law #4 have decided that enough is enough, they are going to replace the leaky faucets. So they've asked The Husband to do it. The Husband is kind of the go-to guy for technical support and home repair in my family. I know, technical support AND home repair. And he's not into sports! I hit the jackpot with this one, my friends. He does like anime, though, so you can't have everything.

Anyway.

So I informed The Husband that he would be installing a new kitchen faucet and a new bathroom faucets at Big Sister #4's house as soon as she got around to actually purchasing the new hardware. "That's an easy job, though, right?" I asked The Husband.

"Sure," he said, "as long as whoever put in the old one didn't do anything stupid, like solder the pipes together."

"Oh, yeah, that would stink," I replied. "I hope they didn't."

"Well, Big Sister #4 would have noticed, right?" asked The Husband. I gave him a puzzled look. "But wasn't she shutting the water off under the sink?" he said. "She would have seen if the pipes were soldered together."

"Um," I said, wondering how to break this to him. Frankly, I was impressed that Big Sister #4 even knew how to turn the water off under the sink.

"Oh, I understand," he said, the light dawning. "I guess she was too busy thinking about SportsCenter to notice the pipes, huh."

The five most horrifying sounds in the world

2007-09-09T08:53:00.000-04:00

5. A cat fight. (With actual cats, mind you.)
4. The sound that a knife makes when scraped sideways on a plate.
3. The sound you hear when you call a fax machine.
2. Nails on a chalkboard.
1. Jack grinding his top two teeth against his bottom two teeth.

Didn't he just start crawling two minutes ago?

2007-09-04T17:39:00.001-04:00

JUST THIS SECOND, Jack took two tentative steps all on his own with no furniture or Mama Legs anywhere in sight to grab onto. Thank heavens for peripheral vision, because I almost missed it.

We're in for it.

Just call me Tim Rice

2007-09-04T10:20:00.000-04:00

I like to sing, and, as such, I sing to Jack quite a lot. His favorite songs are "Five Little Ducks," "The Itsy Bitsy Spider," "Shake Your Sillies Out," and "Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ra." He also likes a few songs of my own creation: "Clean Pants" (to the tune of "My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean;" just substitute "clean pants" for "bonnie"), "Darlin' Angel," which is just "Earth Angel with one word changed, and "Stinky Butt."

In fact, "Stinky Butt" may just be his favorite song of all, and I came up with the lyrics entirely by myself, thank you very much. It goes like this:

Stinky, stinky, stinky butt!
Stinky, stinky, stinky butt!
Stinky, stinky, stinky, stinky,
Stinky, stinky, stinky butt!

It's a little bit better with the tune. But not much.

The times, they are a-changin'

2007-08-28T20:38:00.001-04:00

Well, lots of things have been happening 'round these parts, Internet. My parents, for example, finally, finally sold their house. It had been on the market for THREE YEARS, people. That, my friends, is a long time to live in an open-house-ready home. A looooong time. We (meaning my sisters, brother, sister-in-law, and brothers-in-law) are all thrilled for my parents, but that doesn't change the fact that my parents are moving out of the home they have lived in for 37 years, the house that was my home for the first 24 years of my life, and I went there for the last time ever last Wednesday. That evening, as I was bundling Jack into his car seat, I felt like there should be some sort of grand ceremony marking the the last time I was ever to set foot in my childhood home, but there was only my own shouting through the kitchen windows for someone to come move Big Sister #4's car. So while I am filled with relief on my parents' behalf that their three-year ordeal is over, I can't help but feel a little sad. This is because I am against change. All change. Even change for the better. Back in my day, we didn't HAVE change, and we LIKED it.

I am, of course, lying, because there is another change occurring right now that I am in love with. I am a little bit afraid to discuss it because I don't want to jinx* anything, but Jack has undergone a Sleep Renaissance. About three weeks ago, Jack started waking up every night and requiring two hours of holding and rocking before going back to sleep. Then he started taking longer and longer to go to sleep at bedtime, keeping me stuck in his room rocking and singing for an hour or more. And finally, in exhausted desperation at 10:00 one Tuesday night, I decided to let him cry for 15 minutes so I could lie down for just a little while. Then I gave him 15 more because he was tapering off. At the 31-minute mark, just as I was swinging my legs out of bed, he fell silent and made nary a peep until 6:30 the next morning.

Well.

The next time we had to use this technique was in the wee sma's the following Wednesday, after The Husband and I had each taken a turn rocking him for an hour. I set the timer for 31 minutes, and he yelled angrily for 11 of them, rested for 4, then let us know he was still mad, but FINE, he'd go to sleep. And he did. Until the next morning.

The night after that, he took two minutes. TWO MINUTES. I'm positive. I timed it.

Despite these obvious signals from Jack that he no longer required me to rock him to sleep, The Husband and I still planned to ease him into this new routine, probably because I hate change. Jack, on the other hand, is all for change, and over the last week I have come around to his point of view. He's just too big to be comfortable in my arms when I rock him; he needs his bed. So now for naps, bedtime, and any night-wakings, I rock and sing for a few minutes, then I put him in his crib and shut the door on my way out. He usually yells for a minute or two, and that's it.

The part I can't stop discussing with The Husband is how sometimes he falls silent mid-yell. I'm used to babies whose cries slowly taper off as they settle down to bed, but about 25% of the time, Jack says, "Aaaaaaauuuuggghhhh! Aaaaaaauuuuggghhhh! Aaaaaaauuuuggghhhh! Aaaaa-..... (silence)." It is extremely bizarre. The other part I can't stop discussing with The Husband is how unbelievably awesome this new system is. I know how long it is going to take to put him to bed for the night! Where I used to have only about 75% assurance that I'd be out of his room in 40 minutes or so, I'm now positive. And of course I realize that sometimes he'll wake back up or have a bad night or whatever, but this life is so much better than before. The odds that I will be stuck in his room for hours are next to nothing, because whatever the case, I'm going to have at least 31 minutes off.

Even better, Jack is obviously much happier. There was one morning during the weeks of bad sleep where I found him in the morning with dark, dark circles under his eyes. The poor child looked like he'd been up all night chasing No-Doz with shots of espresso. There are few things sadder to see. But these days, he's active, alert, chatty, and smiley**. And he knows the right answer to "Where's Mama?" even though he refuses to prove it for an audience. Ah, yes, life is good.

Dear God, I hope I didn't jinx it.

*My belief in jinxes is an interesting little idiosyncrasy, because I am not superstitious, and I am very disdainful of people who are. I'm a scientist! Superstitions aren't real! I am the type of person who demands to see a data set tracking the number of odd occurrences at different times of the month when someone attributes weird behavior to a full moon. I will always point out that people just count to three and then start over in response to the claim that bad things happen in threes. I walk laughingly under ladders in the house with my umbrella up while smashing mirrors and spilling salt, but when someone says, "Well, at least it can't get any worse," I cry out, "Shut up! Do you want to jinx it?" Because, apparently, I am also the type of person who is a hypocrite.

**And his smiles involve four teeth! Yes! The top two teeth I've been talking about for months have finally broken through! In an unrelated note, I find that a cool washcloth is wonderfully soothing to tiny teeth marks on my nipples.

He and I lead different lives

2007-08-20T14:40:00.000-04:00

Things Jack is afraid of: The hairdryer, the vacuum

Things that The Husband is unaware Jack is afraid of: The hairdryer, the vacuum

(In defense of The Husband) Things Jack is probably afraid of but I wouldn't know: The table saw, the router

Things I sort of wish Jack were afraid of because then I'd have an excuse: Paintbrushes

We have learned NOTHING

2007-08-17T19:14:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow, someone is coming to our house. This person is bringing a contract for us to sign. This contract will say that we are hiring this person to knock down our horsehair plaster kitchen walls and replace them with drywall and wainscoting. (Yes! We're finally getting the wainscoting!)

Somebody hold me.

Pros:
1. When it is over, our disgusting kitchen walls will be gone and we will have shiny new walls that are not covered in grease stains.
2. I am not pregnant.
3. There is no plumbing involved.
4. We are hiring professionals who will work during the day and will not have a full time job doing something else.

Cons:
1. For "three weeks*," kitchen cabinets will once again be scattered around the house.
2. I have a mobile baby who will probably be walking by the time this actually takes place.
3. Electric work is involved.
4. We are hiring professionals who cost a hell of a lot more than The Husband and my brother.

All in all, the pros outweigh the cons, because the kitchen, it is awful. It makes me cry. I actually hated the kitchen more than I hated the old bathroom, and remember the old bathroom? With the gross crumbly grout and the ugly wallpaper and the soap dispenser?

The kitchen is worse.

So, new walls! Yay! But weeks of construction on our kitchen with a baby in the house! Boo! And also, we have to choose a paint color or else figure out whether we should paint the cabinets to go with the yellow that we already picked out but which, if we are honest with ourselves, we must admit does not actually complement the cabinets. Should we do that? Should we paint them? I think we should do that, but what color?

Next year, we plan to refinish our floors. Because apparently, we enjoy suffering.

*Or so they claim at the moment. I expect six weeks, because we have learned a few things after all.

Mama? I know not this, "Mama."

2007-08-13T14:50:00.000-04:00

Attention, Internet! Achtung! Achtung!*

Jack can say "clock." Granted, it is a distorted version of "clock" that is closer to "cok" and occasionally just "kuh," but he consistently identified the kitchen clock as a "kuh" or "cok" many times this afternoon. And I successfully recorded it as proof. He also unfailingly pointed to the clock when asked where the clock was. Whether this will continue after he wakes up from his nap is unknown, because he no longer raises his hand and squeals when I ask him who the best baby is even though he seemed to have that down last week.

This clock thing is interesting for a couple of reasons. The most significant is that I feel like I've only told him what the clock is a few times, whereas I am constantly telling him what the fan is, but he can't say fan and is also unsure of the proper response when I ask him where it is. The other interesting reason is that he knows where the clock is, and he knows where daddy is (provided he's in the room), and he recognizes the SIGN for "daddy," but the syllables "mama" have no meaning for him WHATSOEVER.

Here's how it goes in our house. "Jack, where's the clock?" (points to clock, possibly says "cok.")

"Where's daddy?" (looks over at The Husband)

"Where's the fan?" (gets expression on his face indicating that he feels he should know this one, the fan, the fan, it's somewhere in the room...)

"Where's mama?" (blank stare)

Sigh.

*As I was writing this entry, I had a flashback to the summer I interned at a chemical company in Germany even though I don't speak German. Every Friday there was a test of the emergency alert system, and there would be a alarm followed by a woman's voice calmly saying, "Achtung, achtung. Sprechen ziety scmesty oiken. Blah blah blahbitten blechen." Except the part after "Achtung" probably wasn't spelled like that and didn't even sound like that and was apparently some sort of instruction about how to get out of the building**. Or something.

**In an orderly manner, undoubtedly. I was in Germany.

I particulary disliked U-571

2007-08-09T17:25:00.000-04:00

Before I had a baby, I considered myself to be a pretty empathetic person. I couldn’t stand to watch war movies, for example, not even war movies about fictional people, because those things have happened to someone, somewhere, at some point, and why can’t we all just get along? Most significantly, when I used to hear news items about children being harmed in some way, I would of course be appalled and make “tsk” noises to myself while feeling terribly sorry for the victims and their parents. But then I would forget about it an go make dinner. Or, more likely, eat the dinner The Husband had made for me.

It’s different now.

I knew, of course, that having a baby would change the way I saw things, but I was unprepared for how I felt upon learning, to take one recent example, that some children had died after their parents administered medicine tainted with glycerin. I immediately – and involuntarily – imagined how I would feel had I given my child medicine that turned out to be poisonous, and I almost threw up.

It’s not as though I obsessively worry over every horrifying thing that might happen to Jack; on the contrary, I consider myself to be a pretty relaxed mom, willing to roll with the punches, and able to stay calm when he falls down and bonks his head. But when I am confronted with true-life stories about babies hurt despite the best efforts of their parents, my stomach clenches up and I have a little trouble breathing for a second or two. It really is like having a piece of myself out there crawling around, and the thought of him being seriously harmed, especially at my own hands as in the case of the tainted medicine, is so horrifying as to be unbearable.

I know that The Husband feels the same way. While we were watching the news recently, a story about a sick baby came on, and we both fell silent. “You’re imaging how it would be if that were Jack, aren’t you?” I asked him, and he nodded, a sick look on his face.

So is this the rest of my life? I guess so, right? I suppose I’ll eventually have the relief of knowing that we are no longer 100% responsible for his health, nutrition, safety and development, but that will bring with it the problem that we will no longer be 100% in control of his health, nutrition, safety and development. Eventually, he’ll be responsible for his own self, and he’ll even have the right to fly in an Ultra-light Trike if he wants to. Or – frightening thought – a hang glider.

I do not mean to imply that parenthood is a depressing downward spiral of worry. Not at all. Just that the joys of parenthood come packaged with a slew of very surprising, very intense emotions. Intense emotions and the unexpected ability to act as a jungle gym, should the need arise. Which it does. Often.

Save the milk! The MILLLLLKKKKK!

2007-08-08T10:59:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, when I took my nightly "sip" of The Husband's daily Coke, I noticed that it was not really all that cold. This was odd, because he had just removed it from our only two-year-old Maytag refrigerator. You know, the brand of appliances that portrays the really bored repair guy on the commercials? Because he has no work to do? Because their appliances so rarely break down?

I commented on its lack of coldness. "Well, it was in the door, closest to the part that opens, and you've been going in and out of the fridge and it's hot out," he replied. So I didn't worry about it.

Those of you smart enough to pick up on my incredibly subtle foreshadowing probably know that I should have worried about it, because this morning we discovered that the fridge is not so much keeping things cold. Nothing beats throwing the baby into the car to make an ice run at 7 in the morning! But I did get to the store and moved the daily-use stuff into the cooler with some ice, and called my friendly neighbors to ask if they had space in their fridge for the rest of it. Luckily, they have an extra fridge, and Mr. Neighbor even came over to help me transport all the condiments and beer. He would have done so even if I had not told him he could drink the beer if he wanted, because he's a good neighbor.

"Is that everything?" he asked.

"Yeah," I answered. "The freezer still seems to be working, so I just needed a place for our refrigerated stuff."

Then I called Sears to get an appointment with their repair service. The first available was for Friday, which is two days from now. Two hot, summer days. Fortunately, they were able to narrow the scheduling window down to "sometime between 9 and 5," so, you know, there was that to console me.

I hung up the phone and glared at the traitorous refrigerator. "At least the freezer still works," I thought. And then I thought again. What if the freezer doesn't work? What if it just takes longer to warm up because it's starting from a colder temperature? I thought about the four days' worth of breast milk I had stored in there. And then I packed it all up along with the frozen pot roast and chicken drumsticks and hustled it right over to the neighbors. Happily, they also have an extra freezer. Apparently, they need to keep lots of things cold.

When I got back, I tried calling Maytag directly to see if they could come earlier than Sears, and the oh-so-helpful automated voice menu guided me through the scheduling steps. After several painstaking, clearly enunciated menu choices, Maytag asked me for my model number, "one digit at a time." Since I am incapable of speaking all of the digits simultaneously, I assumed this meant I should pause between each digit. I assumed wrong. I got as far as "M... F..." when the phone robot interrupted me to say, "I'm sorry, I need you to give me your model number, one digit at a time. If you don't know your mode number, say 'I don't know.'" Heaving a sigh, I said, "M...F..." and the phone robot broke in again to say, "Thanks! Let me check for the next available appointment."

Needless to say, there are many more digits in the model number after "MF." And then the next available appointment was for Saturday. So I hung up on the phone robot and called a local place to see if they could come today to repair the fridge, and of course they could not. They could, however, come tomorrow, and they gave me three two-hour windows from which to choose.

Suck on that, phone robot! In your face, Sears!

To sum up: Maytag and Sears are on notice; but my neighbors are awesome. And it is too muggy to come up with a clever ending.

P.S. Can babies have nightmares? I'm pretty sure mine did last night.

JACOB! Jacob and sons!

2007-08-01T10:07:00.000-04:00

My cell phone recently died. As long as the battery is charged it works just fine, but it can no longer charge the battery. And since the phone is about three years old and has a rotten battery life, this flaw basically renders the phone useless. The Husband and looked into switching carriers and getting new, cooler phones, but it turns out that our current plan costs less than any plan out there and it also turns out that The Husband and I are cheap. So. No new plan.

This meant I had to get a new phone, but buying a phone without signing up for a new contract is surprisingly difficult, even if you are willing to pay the non-contract "retail" price. So, to make a long, boring story short (too late!), I ended up buying a pre-paid phone which came with 104 minutes which I decided to spend downloading ringtones and wallpapers, something I've never done before (see above, re: cheap).

Now, every time my phone rings, I find myself singing "Your Racist Friend" by They Might Be Giants a few minutes later. Not because my ringtone is "Your Racist Friend." No, it's because "Your Racist Friend" comes after "Dead" on the TMBG album Flood, and "Dead" is the track after "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)," and that is my ringtone. To sum up: My phone rings to the tune of "Istanbul." I answer it, have a conversation, hang up, and start singing "I returned a bag of groceries, accidentally taken off the shelf before the expiration date!" without consciously realizing it. I finish singing "Dead" in its entirety to myself and transition into the next song: "This is where the party ends, I can't stand here listening to you! And your racist friend!" Unfortunately, I don't quite know all of the lyrics to "Your Racist Friend" and get stuck in a loop of singing the first verse to myself and only then do I realize what I am doing.

It took me about a week to realize why "Dead" was getting stuck in my head so frequently. When I finally figured it out, I was reminded of the summer I spent temping in Boston and somehow ended up singing songs from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat to myself during my commute. For weeks, I could not understand where these songs were coming from every single day, but then I noticed that there was a billboard advertising the show on my route. Although I never consciously registered seeing the billboard, it was obviously having a subliminal effect on me, dooming me to a drive time ritual of singing "AND IT WAS red and yellow and ruby and gold and scarlet and peach and asher and rose and something and something and pink and orange and BLUE!"

Where does this leave me? It leaves me with the somewhat embarrassing admission that I know all the lyrics to almost every They Might Be Giants song out there as well as most of the lyrics to most Andrew Lloyd Weber musicals (not Cats, though). See, I had a recent revelation when Emily and I were having an IM session. I was telling her how I've never heard of [fill in the blank with pretty much any current musical performer], because all I ever listen to is NPR, and I added that my pop musical education has always been a bit stunted, as I "discovered" Pearl Jam in college. She asked me what I listened to in high school, and I typed, "Pretty much They Might be Giants and musicals."

Then I stared at that sentence and thought, "That can't be right. Is that right? I must have listened to something else. TMBG and musicals? That was it? Really?" and I ran through what I could recall of my tape collection in high school. Let's see, there was They Might Be Giants, Miss Saigon, Les Miserables (both French and London original cast recordings), Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Jesus Christ, Superstar, an all a capella compilation...

Oh, Merlin's beard.

This new practice of using swears from Harry Potter is not helping my case any, is it?

Neither do I bungee jump

2007-07-31T10:07:00.000-04:00

While we were driving up to Maine, The Husband and I spotted a flying contraption. Yes, contraption. "Merlin's pants!*" I exclaimed, pointing at the contraption. "What the heck is that?" There seemed to be one person in the "cockpit" which was not enclosed in any way, and, to my untrained eye, appeared to be powered by pedals a la Leonardo da Vinci. The Husband, however, was familiar with the flying contraption in question and told me it was called an "ultralight trike" or something, and that it was a perfectly legitimate air vehicle**.

"Legitimate nothing!" I cried. "You would not catch me in one of those things! It's completely open! It doesn't have an INSIDE! I require an inside on any vehicle that will be transporting me through the air."

"Oh, come on," replied The Husband. "It's no worse than a hang glider."

A hang glider. Right. Good argument, The Husband. Because, of course, hang gliding is a perfectly reasonable pastime. I go hang gliding all the time. Why, I was just out hang gliding this morning.

Look, I'm sure that both hang gliding and the ultralight trike are thrilling. I bet it feels just like you're flying on your own without mechanical assistance. The sights, the sounds, the feel of the wind in your face... all wonderful I am sure. But that is only if you can get yourself past the blind terror of knowing that there is nothing but a few straps and buckles preventing you from experiencing the sights, sounds, and wind in your face caused by plummeting one thousand feet to the earth. And, given that I am the chicken who refused to go down a water slide for about five years after that one time when I was seven and I accidentally turned around backwards en route, I think that I will pass on the flying contraptions.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to put the training wheels back on my bike.

*The Husband and I are trying to clean up our language before Jack is old enough to start repeating things back to us, and I'm attempting to replace my naughty phrases with wizarding curses. The funny looks will all be worth it if we can get Jack to imitate these phrases.

**Apparently, this is one of those products that emits guy particles.

These eyes!*

2007-07-28T11:04:00.000-04:00

I don’t post pictures of Jack on this blog. This is because the internet, while fantastic, is full of scary, freaky people, and I have no way of filtering those people out. The unfortunate result of this is that you, my friendly blog audience don’t get to see how adorable Jack is, and I, your friendly blog author, don’t get to read all of the comments from you telling me how adorable Jack is.

So I have decided to share with you Jack’s best feature. Why, yes, I do get a lot of comments on his eyes! In fact, it has gotten to the point that if we meet someone new and that person does not admire his eyes, I feel vaguely insulted.

Wouldn’t you?

In other news, I am considering moving my blog to Wordpress. I either want to do that, or figure out how to change my Blogger template from this boring, standard one, but I have no idea how to do that. What do you guys think? Are there Blogger and Wordpress users out there? Has anyone used both? Which do you prefer? Also, if you have a Blogger account but use your own template, can you tell me how you did that?

*Shout out to The Doktah. THESE EYEEEES!

The boy (or mom) who cried, "Tooth!"

2007-07-25T16:24:00.001-04:00

Remember those teeth I claimed were coming in? Twice? No sign of them yet. Unless, that is, you count crankiness, neediness, a slight fever, and very bad sleeping habits a sign of teeth. And maybe they are! I certainly hope they are. But the very best sign of teeth I could have right now would be an actual tooth, because I would be immensely relieved if there were a clear reason for the recent behavior. Especially for the poor sleeping behavior.

I have an easy, easy baby. I realize this. In fact, I often find myself thinking, "Man, I'm glad Jack doesn't do that," when I hear or read the horror stories moms tell about their crying, screaming, tantrum-throwing babies. Unfortunately, my comfortable smugness never lasts long, because I always follow up that thought with, "Moron! You mean you're glad Jack doesn't do that yet." It is true; Jack does not throw toys at my head, scream, "NO!" and fling himself on the floor, kicking and wailing. But he is only 9 months old. He doesn't yet have the coordination to throw toys at my head, scream, "NO!" or fling himself on the floor, kicking and wailing. He does have the wailing part down, though. He's been practicing.

So these past three or four days have been my first real wake-up call that Jack is not going to stay relaxed and easy forever and ever. We're going to have some tough times. I understand that molars won't come in till he's one? At any rate, today I am in a funk. I'm having one of those days where I'm lonely but I don't want to talk to anyone, it's too hot to go for a walk, Harry Potter is all done, and there are ninety more minutes till The Husband gets home to keep me company. I have therefore decided that instead of cleaning up the kitchen from lunch, I am going to make a list of the top ten things that are impressive, but only if a baby does them.

Top Ten Things That Are Impressive If Done By A Baby

1. Using hand gestures to reveal the fact that that thing up there, that ceiling fan thing? It goes 'round and 'round.

2. Using a similar hand gesture to explain that the washer and dryer also go 'round and 'round.

3. Possibly using a similar hand gesture to say goodbye, but then again, maybe just waving your arm around at random.

4. Asking for a book by pointing.

5. After five minutes of playing with a completely different toy, remembering that there is a decorative bird hanging from the china closet when someone says, "Tweet tweet!"

6. Snuggling your face into a blanket.

7. Drinking from a cup.*

8. Self-serve breastfeeding.

9. Rolling a plastic circle across the floor.

10. Discovering the Grand Unification Theory.**

*This would be even more impressive if it happened more than once.

**Technically, this would be impressive if done by anyone.

Done and done

2007-07-24T10:36:00.000-04:00

Attention, Internet:

I have finished the book. You may commence discussion.

What? You mean people have already been discussing it? But I told you not to!

Muffliato!

2007-07-21T13:09:00.000-04:00

At least, that's the spell I'd like to use on myself until I get a chance to finish HP7. The Husband and I got to go see Order of the Phoenix last Monday night*, and during the movie I realized that I have forgotten many things and must re-read HP6 before I can read HP7. I'm only a quarter of the way through it. (If I could hold it open with one hand, I'd be much farther along because I'd be able to read it while nursing, but such is life.)

So I'm asking the internet as a whole to please refrain from posting anything about the last book before I have time to finish it. That would be great, thanks.

*At first we couldn't find a babysitter, but then Father-in-law volunteered to drive to our house after work and sit for free while The Husband and I went to the movies with Leah Lar and D and then went for ice cream afterwards. Jack was awake when we left, asleep when we got home, and stayed asleep until 6 the next morning. It was AWESOME.

Things to look forward to

2007-07-17T10:18:00.000-04:00

So as you are aware, or at least should be aware, I have a lot of nieces and nephews. (Jack, however, has no nieces or nephews, despite recent reports to the contrary.) And as you should be equally aware, they are pretty darn adorable. For example, while in Maine, I discovered that Elfin Nephew, 3.5 years old, has taken to channeling a Jewish mother. "Mama," he said at the table, "I am very hungry, but this corn is so hot!" Turns out he wanted some of those corn-on-the-cob shaped corn holders. At the next meal, he was heard to say, "Mama, do you see how low I am?" He wanted to sit in the old-fashioned high chair, you see.

His little sister, the two-year-old Spitfire, was doing some channeling of her own, but in her case she was copying her own mother. "Elfin Nephew, stop whining," she said.

"Spitfire," said her mom, "you mind your own business. You are not the boss of Elfin Nephew. If you tell him to stop whining again, you're going to get a time-out." Meanwhile, Elfin Nephew continued to whine.

"Mama, I just want to tell him, 'It's OK, Elfin Nephew, it's OK.' Can I just tell him it's OK?" asked The Spitfire. She got permission, and then turned to Elfin Nephew. "Elfin Nephew, stop whining." Into time-out she went.

I will leave you with another heart-melter. The five-year-old Charmer said to his mother yesterday, "Mommy, sometimes I feel like you love me so much, I get heart bubbles."

Non sequitur

2007-07-12T07:08:00.000-04:00

This is a bit out of left field, but I just felt the need to tell the world that I cannot believe that "bling" has become an acceptable word for non-ironic use. It reminds me of how I used to jokingly give people a thumbs-up which slowly transitioned from being an ironic hand gesture into a way for me to genuinely tell people I thought something was well done. It had just become a habit! And while an ironic thumbs-up does not detract from a person's cool quotient, an earnest one most certainly does.

Vacation, had to get away!

2007-07-11T11:14:00.000-04:00

A couple of months ago, I signed up for weekly newsletters from BabyCenter.com. They often provide helpful quick tips targeted for moms with babies exactly Jack's age. Just yesterday, in fact, I learned that eight-month-olds like to play tug of war, and it turns out they are right! Since that is not a game I would have thought to play, I have to hand it to BabyCenter.com.

Nevertheless, sometimes BabyCenter.com thinks I am a complete moron. For example, at the start of the summer travel season, there was an article on "Seven secrets to successful travel with a young child." Seeing as how The Husband and I were planning a trip to Maine, I clicked on the link to learn these seven mysterious secrets that would make my life easier. Except as it turned out, they weren't particularly mysterious after all. Take secret number 2: "Pick a family-friendly destination." Really? A family-friendly destination? Not a couples' resort? Not a hike through the rain forest? You don't say.

The final "secret" was to take practice trips; that is to say, start out with a short one or two night trip to see how your kid travels before you head across the country for three weeks. Once again, this seemed obvious to me, and is actually what we were already planning. My sister had invited us up to her family beach cottage in Maine, and we went for one night. This past Sunday night, in fact. We had been slightly anxious about how Jack would do sleeping in a strange place, but we needed to get the heck out of our house for a while, and a beach house complete with free babysitters in the form of cousins seemed perfect to us.

Our plan was to drive up during Jack's morning nap, but of course we couldn't pack everything he needed until Sunday morning because he was still using a lot of it on Saturday night. This meant that we had to use Jack's two hours between his getting up and his going down for his first nap to feed him, dress him, pack all his stuff, and get all the stuff to the car. Oh, and The Husband also had to go to Home Depot to buy brackets or some such for the new porch railings we had to put in on the downstairs apartment. (These railings need to be painted, by the by. Someone kill me.)

Do you realize how much stuff babies need? Even for one night? The Husband and I had one suitcase between us; Jack had a suitcase of clothes and diapers, a suitcase of blankets, toys, and books, a Pack 'n' Play, a booster seat, and a bag of groceries. And we still managed to forget some stuff.

Happily, the trip was fun. Not as relaxing as a trip without a baby, but Jack napped just fine in the afternoon and went to bed without complaint. He did wake up again when The Husband and I went to bed four hours later and he naturally had a leak. That was when we discovered that we forgot to bring extra overnight stuffers for our diapers and we that had only brought one pair of pj's. But eventually he went back to sleep and we did well until morning.

Unhappily, Jack woke up at 5:00, the worst possible time for a baby to wake up. At 5:00, the baby has had lots of sleep, so he is less tired and takes longer to go back to sleep, if he ever does. You know what doesn't help matters? Moronic parents. Because a travel tip that BabyCenter.com left out was that if your normally contented baby is crying and fussing after 6 hours in the same diaper, his diaper just might need to be changed. I tried to get Jack back to sleep for an hour, and The Husband and simply I could not understand what could be wrong! "What is the matter, Jack?" we kept saying. "Just go to sleep! Why won't you go to sleep? We can see you are tired! What could possibly be making you uncomfortable? WHAT COULD IT BE?" Eventually, The Husband got up to take Jack away somewhere and give me another twenty minutes or so, and lo and behold, he had leaked through again. And was also poopy.

But still, Jack - and therefore we - had a great time. The weather cleared for an hour or two on Monday, allowing us to go to the beach. Although we put Jack in his retro bathing suit for the sheer adorableness of it, neither The Husband nor I wore our bathing suits. This is because the water in Maine is cold. Very very cold. Bone-chillingly, painfully cold, and we are getting older. Besides, we figured we would only be able to stay at the beach for an hour or so before Jack got hungry for lunch.

Of course, I neglected to consider that Jack would try to eat sand for lunch. And then, after tasting it the first time, try to keep eating it. In fact, we spent a lot of time this weekend fishing foreign items out of Jack's mouth. One in particular that he was loathe to relinquish turned out to be a mysterious black slimy thing that we didn't even want to think about until someone realized it must have been a piece of Oreo dropped by his two-year-old niece. Hey, I would also be mad if someone held me down and took the Oreo out of my mouth.

But all in all, it was a successful "practice trip." We now know that Jack will sleep in the Pack 'n' Play in a strange house and that we should always bring extra pajamas. We know that sand and Oreos are equally delicious and that it is not possible to stay clean at the beach with a mobile infant.

Oh, and we know that sometimes, he needs his diaper changed.

Signs you're getting older

2007-07-03T14:51:00.000-04:00

1. Bridal shower gifts are no longer dull; in fact, you sort of covet those hand towels.
2. You know what wainscoting is.
3. You care what wainscoting is.
4. You really wish you had wainscoting in your kitchen.
5. Conversations about mulch are now interesting.
6. As are conversations about wainscoting.
7. After falling down the stairs and skinning your knee, you find that your entire body is sore and achy, not just your knee.
8. You think staying up till 11:00 is crazy.
9. Kids you used to babysit are getting married.
10. Married, people! You remember when they were BORN.
11. You no longer want to go swimming if the water is too cold.
12. Although you can still sit on the floor with your legs bent under you, you really really wish you hadn't when you try to stand up.
13. All you ask for in life - besides wainscoting - is to get your hardwood floors refinished.
14. And to get the rest of your woodwork painted.
15. And your yard landscaped.
16. With mulch.

Teeth

2007-06-25T21:08:00.000-04:00

Remember how I claimed that five new teeth came in? It turns out that was not exactly true. First of all, I did not actually mean to suggest that five new teeth were coming in all at once; I meant that three new teeth were trying to join their two brethren. But even if I had made clear the actual number of teeth making an appearance and had not inadvertently implied that I am rearing some kind of mutant five-tooth-spurting… uh… tooth spurter, I still would have been misleading you. Because as it turns out, there weren’t any new teeth.

There are now, though. We have a confirmed new tooth sighting on the upper gum area. It looks like a canine is erupting, and I just now suddenly realized that this will make Jack look like a small vampire.

I hope the other canine is the next tooth to show up.

Some of my best friends are flakes

2007-06-21T09:07:00.002-04:00

My recent post about my stellar memory evoked a first-time comment from Big Sister #4. I am not surprised by this. In fact, I think that most of my family will enjoy that particular post. Why? Well, I'm glad you asked.

There is a famous anecdote in my family about me in the first grade. You see, my teacher had been trying to teach the class something, and we were not getting it. "Why are you guys acting like such flakes?" she finally said in exasperation. This caused the class some confusion, because no one understood what she meant. Seeing this, my teacher asked "Don't any of you know what a flake is?"

Good student that I was, I shot my little arm high into the air. "I do!" I shouted. "My family calls me that all the time!"

War paint

2007-06-20T10:34:00.000-04:00

This weekend was a productive one, in that we finally finished painting the landing. Of course, I am using the word "finished" in the Grad Lab Household sense of "not actually finished but with only smallish things left to do which will probably take us the next five years to complete." Still, the horrifying blue with white patches is gone. Gone I say!

Recall what the paint looked like when we moved in:

Lovely, no? And this is the very first room visitors see when they enter our home. (To answer your question, that filled in doorway in the first picture used to lead out to a second floor porch which is no longer there. Now, if it were not filled in, it would lead out to a doozy of a first step.)

Now the room looks like this:

So far, I've hung the mirror over the radiator and brought down my diploma and two frames of flower pictures from the attic. I figured I'd post the pictures now, though, because Emily has been pestering me for pictures of the new color, and if I wait until we finish hanging all the pictures and getting furniture that is not ugly and figure out a way to organize the office area so it doesn't look like a bomb went off, we'd all be dead of old age. Still the color is much improved, and I no longer have to force people to enter our home with their eyes closed.

Finally, I present you with a parting photo. We are doing some completely un-fun renovation work in the basement, so we had to take all the stuff out of there for the week. What follows, my friends, is the reason that I never ever ever ever ever want to paint anything ever ever ever ever again.

Cleverness in babies is overrated

2007-06-19T13:38:00.000-04:00

Guess who figured out how to undo his diaper? Through his onesie?

Two thousand what now?

2007-06-18T19:49:00.000-04:00

A couple of weeks ago, one of the moms in my playgroup asked me how long The Husband and I have been living in our house. This question always stumps me, because I have absolutely no concept of the passage of time. It was not until I had been dating The Husband for about three years (then again, who knows how many years?) that I figured out the main reason I was always late to everything: You have to account for the time it takes to get somewhere. For example, if a movie starts at nine, you can't plan to leave at nine. The Husband is a very punctual person, and those three years were very long for him. (Side note: The Husband was early for our first date. He was very early. He was a half hour early. I had wet hair and was still wearing sweatpants, and no one else was home to answer the door.)

But I was talking about my concept of the passage of time and how I don't have any. If something didn't happen within the past week, I have absolutely no idea when it happened. Two weeks ago? Two months ago? Who knows? Sometimes I can date events by where I was living at the time, but sometimes that only narrows the date range down to a certain window. I lived in the same place for about three of my five years in grad school, for example.

So when my friend asked me how long we'd been in our house, I didn't know what to say. "Um, two years? I think?" I tried to do the math, but that's when I ran into my second problem. Sometimes - not always, but sometimes - I sort of forget what year it is. I did not realize that I was somewhat unique in this until this conversation with my friend. "I think it's two years, but I always have trouble remembering. You know how sometimes you forget what year it is?" I said.

"Uh, no. I always remember what year it is," she replied. And she also gave me a very funny look.

I have been doing some thinking about this since the conversation, and I decided that this happens to me because I am always surprised that things that seem so fresh and recent in my mind happened so long ago. It can't be 2007, because that would mean I got my Ph.D. three years ago, and I only just graduated! Still, that's not really a good excuse for forgetting what year it is. So let's all hope I never hit my head, because the doctors will think I have a concussion.

"What year is it, you ask? Wait! I know this one! It starts with a '2', right?"

Bring me the soft one who sings!

2007-06-08T07:00:00.000-04:00

A while ago, The Husband put Jack to bed, a job that is usually mine. Meanwhile, I went to Target, all by myself. Par-tay.

I came home to a house that was, to my immense relief, blissfully quiet and full of sleeping baby. I asked The Husband if Jack cried before he fell asleep. “Yeah,” came the answer. “It was rough going for a little while there. I kept telling him it was OK, and he would look at me and it was as though he was saying, ‘I believe you, but I am not comforted by you. BRING ME THE WOMAN!’”

“Tough beans” is a legitimate expression

2007-06-04T14:30:00.000-04:00

I know that it is considered gauche to post an excuse about lack of posts. Tough beans.

Top three reasons I have not been posting much lately and won’t be posting much until two weeks from now:

1. I suddenly have to prepare a talk on the stuff I did in grad school. And I have to start by finding out what, exactly, I did in grad school. I haven’t looked at that stuff in three years, and I swear someone else wrote it. Did I really know all of that? Man, I used to be smart.

2. For reasons that remain unclear, The Husband decided last week that the entryway landing needed to painted right now. I am not complaining about this, as our entryway is so ugly that I feel embarrassed when people see it for the first time, but I do have to wonder, why now? Really? Right now? When I have a presentation to work on? It’s been hideously ugly for two and a half years, we couldn’t have waited another two weeks?

At any rate, my free time that is not occupied by relearning what I used to know has to be spent – God help me – painting, because I will not live for weeks with furniture scattered all over the apartment. I’ve done that before, and it is not fun. The good news is that the paint, which we chose and bought two years ago, is quite lovely. The lesson here is that I should not be allowed to choose paint by myself but together, The Husband and I can pick a good color.

3. Five new teeth. The end.

The world may never know

2007-06-04T14:19:00.001-04:00

It’s raining, and this morning I saw a couple of birds fly to the shelter of a nearby tree. This reminded me of a picture book I once read in elementary school, called, Where does the butterfly go when it rains? When I saw that book in the classroom library, my curiosity was piqued. “Where does a butterfly go when it rains?” I thought to myself. It seemed to me that a butterfly is fragile enough that a heavy rainstorm could easily kill it, but they must do something, or they would not have survived. So where did they go? I eagerly sat down with the book and looked for the answer.

“Where does a butterfly go when it rains?” it began. I turned the page and read, “A bird covers its head with its wing, but where does a butterfly go when it rains?” I turned the page again. “An ant hides under a leaf, but where does a butterfly go when it rains?”

The book continued on in this fashion for several more pages. I found out where a caterpillar, a mouse, a bumblebee, and a squirrel go when it rains. That was all well and good, but I was not reading for information on squirrels. The book had posed a question, and now I wanted to know the answer.

Well, too bad for me, because the book never explained where a butterfly goes when it rains. Although the question was raised on every page, the answer was not forthcoming. And if that isn't false advertising, I don't know what is.

So does anyone know where a butterfly goes? Anyone? Anyone?

Bueller?

Lessons in probability

2007-05-30T15:10:00.000-04:00

Area of my kitchen floor: 209 square feet
Area of a Cheerio: 1 square centimeter
Probability that I will step on the single Cheerio on the kitchen floor and grind it into fine powder: 100%

Science magazine comes out weekly, too

2007-05-22T22:11:00.000-04:00

Am I the only one who is consistently surprised that I have to buy groceries every week? And clean the bathroom? And vacuum? (Not that I vacuum every week. Ha.) It just always seems impossible to me that I have to do any of these tasks when I clearly just did them last week.

And by way of explanation for my non sciency readers, Science magazine is just about the most prestigious journal to publish in, and it comes out every week. Every single week. So if you stick your copy in a pile to get to later, you will quickly have a small pile of backlogged issues to read. And then you will have a large pile. And then you will have a large lump that used to be a pile, but the pile got too big and all the magazines slipped and you won't even bother to try to straighten it up because you know they will all just slip again. And then you'll let your dues lapse for AAAS because it will be the only way to get them to STOP SENDING THE MAGAZINES.

Life in this, the 21st century

2007-05-21T21:02:00.000-04:00

This is madness.

How The Husband Very Nearly Ruined Mother’s Day

2007-05-16T21:06:00.000-04:00

I’m an easy going person. You don’t get much more low maintenance than me. Take my birthday, for example. All I ask is that my mother calls me The Husband gets me a card. No one else even has to remember it. And I even remind The Husband when it is coming up!

Valentine’s Day? Whatever. A card would be nice, but if he forgets (which has been known to happen), I don’t really mind. Hey, he brings me flowers for no reason all the time, so who am I to complain if he doesn’t bring them that specific day?

And yes, I’d be pretty upset if he forgot Christmas, but only because that would mean he’d had some sort of major head injury.

So for my very first Mother’s Day, I had fairly low expectations. It’s not like I thought I’d have the day off – I’m still a major food source after all. But still, even I have my limits.

See, the night before Mother’s Day, Jack had a rough go of it. Of course, I’m talking about “rough” for Jack; basically, he woke up just when we were about to go to bed and required holding and rocking for about ninety minutes. And because Jack prefers me in the night, The Husband was frustrated in his attempt to give me a break and get Jack back to sleep, and I had to stay up a bit later than I would have liked.

Then, the next morning, Jack woke up earlier than usual, around 5:30 or so. Given that it was Mother’s Day, I asked The Husband if he would go get the baby and bring him to me to nurse in bed. Somewhat grudgingly, he did so. And wooo-eee, but did that baby stink. So I nursed him, and then said, “Do you think you could change his diaper?”

The Husband groaned and said, “I’m really really tired. Couldn’t you do it?”

So I did. And with only the teensiest bit of martyrdom, because, honestly, The Husband looked much more exhausted than I felt. I actually felt like I’d had a reasonable amount of sleep. And naturally, there was a little stinky Mother’s Day gift in the diaper for me. So I had to deposit the baby back in bed with The Husband and then deposit the gift into the toilet and clean up the diaper. (Remember, we use cloth.) Chore done, I returned to bed for what I thought would be an hour or so more of comfy family dozing.

Yeah, no. Jack was UP. He was awake. He was kicking. He was poking me really hard in the eye. And, as far as I could tell, The Husband was oblivious, sleeping away on his side of the bed. Finally, I gave up, got out of bed, and started to get dressed.

See, this is where my line is. I didn’t mind that I got less sleep than The Husband did the night before my very first Mother’s Day*. I didn’t mind having to get up and start my day an hour earlier than I had expected. I didn’t mind – much – having to change a poopy diaper first thing in the morning.

But I did mind The Husband’s sleeping in while I got up to take care of the baby on my very first Mother’s Day ever.

Any other day, I would have happily let him stay in bed, because he was clearly exhausted. But on Mother’s Day? So there I stood next to the bed, looking down at my comfy family, and feeling the prickly little feeling of self-pity and resentment. Should I ask him to get up? Should I let him sleep? I didn’t really want to ask him to get up, because, somehow, that ruined it. I wanted him to offer. And even though I knew he was tired, I really didn’t want to let him sleep in.

But apparently, The Husband’s guardian angel was on duty, because he had a prickly little feeling of his own. Opening one eye, he asked me, “Do you want me to get up with you?”

“Yes,” I said. And he did. And he fed the baby while I steamed some plums for later. Then he surprised me with a card that he put on the flowers he had brought home the day before. And then he acted in the exact same way as he does on every other Saturday and Sunday, and made me breakfast to order.

He makes it so easy to be low maintenance.

*The Husband claims that he was awake the whole time I was in Jack’s room. Since I was actually dozing, I must have gotten more sleep than he did after all. But I did not know this at the time.

I know not these “early sixties sitcoms” of which you speak

2007-05-11T08:32:00.000-04:00

On Monday, I was feeding Jack on the couch, watching some Gilmore Girls, and I spotted something out of the corner of my eye. I glanced over to the dining room, and what should I see but a mouse, casually walking along the baseboard behind the radiator, bold as brass. In the middle of the day! This mouse didn’t even have the common decency to be nocturnal.

I heroically refrained from screaming out loud into Jack’s ear. No, instead I just gasped and then got up to try to see where the mouse went so that I could catch it. Or, more accurately, try to catch it, but actually just to scream and flinch and let it get away.

Unfortunately, I lost a line of sight with the mouse for a second and it disappeared. Secretly relieved that I wouldn’t have to go through the charade of trying to catch it, I put Jack down in his crib and called The Husband in a panic. He did his best to reassure me and said he thought we had some mousetraps by the attic. We did not. So I was left wondering whether I should cancel my fun plans for the afternoon in order to buy mousetraps, or whether we would be OK without a mousetrap for a few hours. And that was when I saw the mouse again.

This time I did scream. And Jack cried. And the mouse ran. I screamed again and the mouse took up a position under the table by the window, and I began looking for a bucket or something to put over it and leave as a little present for The Husband. I know what you are thinking. You are thinking, “Oh, come on! Your big plan was to leave it trapped under a bucket for five hours until your husband got home?”

Well you know what I say to you? I say yes. Yes, that was my plan. Except you forgot about the part where I was also going to leave the house in the interim.

At any rate, by the time I got the bucket, the mouse was gone again. So I went to get Jack and try to soothe him, and of course I saw the mouse make a break for the linen closet and screamed into poor Jack’s ear and put him back down in the crib, scared to death that his mother had gone mad. And as much as I wanted to scoop up the baby and make a break for it, I couldn’t stomach the thought of that mouse having the run of the house, so I went to get the bucket again.

But then I looked at the bucket and realized that the likelihood of my actually trapping the mouse was next to nothing, what with the flinching and screaming and all, and I was suddenly struck with the memory of the time my father made me help him catch a bat.

I know what you’re thinking. You’ve just finished reading about how I completely fall to pieces when faced with a loose rodent, and you’re wondering why my dad thought I would be any help in catching a rodent that flies. I cannot answer that question. To this day, I wonder what my dad was thinking. Had he not met me before? My entire life I have been a pointer, as in, “There’s the bug! There it is! There! There!” I do not squish the bugs. Other people squish the bugs.

So when my dad handed me a tennis racket and told me to follow him to the room containing the bat, I can’t imagine what he thought I would do with it. It would appear that he thought I would use the tennis racket to hit the bat, but he must have known that I would be incapable of this. What I did do with the tennis racket was to use it as a shield for my head whenever the bat made any sort of motion that could be interpreted as possibly flying into my general vicinity. I may also have waved the tennis racket ineffectually at the air with my eyes closed a few times when the bat was safely across the room, but, trust me, I was no threat to that bat.

But what does this have to do with the vacuum and the mouse in my linen closet? Well, once my father managed to stun the bat with his own tennis racket he used the vacuum cleaner attachment to suck it up. I very distinctly remember the ssscchhhhhllloooommp sound as the bat disappeared into dusty oblivion. And what is a bat but a flying mouse? So I thought that, while there was no way I’d be able to stifle the flinching for long enough to trap the mouse under a bucket, I would be able to stick a vacuum cleaner attachment near it.

So I got the vacuum out, set up the attachments, plugged it in, and, with one finger on the “On” button, I opened the closet door.

No mouse. But I did find a giant hole in the wall.

I put in a call to the exterminator, and my neighbor, who was out in his backyard, kindly came over and set a trap for me in case the mouse came back while I was out. I figured the mouse was coming in through the giant hole, so a trap in the closet would be sure to catch him.

But that very night, while The Husband and I were watching Heroes, I heard a soft rustling sound behind the bookcase in the living room. THE LIVING ROOM. What kind of mouse walks around in the day and then hangs out in the living room? The food is in the kitchen! Fortunately, The Husband was home to catch the mouse this time, which he did by trapping it behind the other bookcase and then, on my suggestion, sucking it up with the vacuum cleaner. I heard the familiar ssscchhhhhlllooooommp that let me know the mouse was no longer a threat to me, and then I made him change the bag.

During this process, I stood on a chair.

Shut up.

Incidentally, you get extra super bonus points if you know how this post got its title.

Congratulations, Maggie and Phillip!

2007-05-10T12:39:00.000-04:00

Even though Maggie didn't get her week off between work and the baby, we're all very happy to see Jackson!

Congratulations, Cheungs!

Tupperware

2007-05-07T11:36:00.000-04:00

We have a cabinet for Tupperware and non-brand Tupperware in our kitchen. It is chock full of containers and lids of a wide variety of sizes and shapes. We have tiny 3-tablespoon size containers and large 2-gallon containers.

Unfortunately, the number, size and shape of the lids bears no relation whatsoever to the number, size and shape of the containers.

Cringeworthy: Part deux

2007-05-02T16:20:00.000-04:00

When I wrote the original “Cringeworthy,” I had lost the scrap of paper containing my cringeworthy memories. But I knew, I just knew, there were three of them. And I finally remembered the third one.

***
While in college, I once attended a classical guitar recital with an acquaintance of mine. He had to go to it for his music appreciation class; I went for the joy of hearing the music. I had never been to a classical guitar recital before, and this one was not very well-attended. Still there were maybe forty people in the audience.

I enjoyed myself, and at the end of the first song I started to clap, but no one else was clapping. “Oh, it must only be the end of the first movement or something,” I thought, and hastily stopped my boorish clapping. I had been embarrassed in the past by clapping at the wrong moment during an orchestral concert, and didn’t want to repeat that error.

So each time the musician appeared to finish a piece, I readied myself for applause, but waited for someone more knowledgeable in the way of classical guitar music to start us off. No one did. “I guess you just don’t clap till the end at a classical guitar recital,” I thought, and joined in the smattering of applause when the guitarist finally finished his last piece.

But now, looking back on it, I realize that the poor guitarist was actually getting more and more upset as he finished each song and not a single person in the audience clapped. Not one clap. Nothing. Silence. I don’t know if everyone in the audience was also waiting for someone else to start it, but I do know that the guitarist had a very, very bad night.

I'm probably doomed if we have a second one

2007-05-02T15:20:00.002-04:00

Jack and I were at my sister's house on Monday, visiting. When brother-in-law #4 came home from work, we were all hanging out in the living room, and Jack was sitting on my lap, quietly observing the scene.

"Mo, is he always that quiet?" Brother-in-law #4 asked me.

I should probably take a moment here to mention that Elfin Nephew, Big Sister and Brother-in-law #4's eldest child, was a "difficult" baby. Not colicky, exactly, but he was a crier. He cried a lot. He cried whenever things were not precisely as he wished them to be. Whereas Jack cries... pretty much never. OK, sure, yesterday he got his 6-month shots, and he cried during the actual poking, but I gave him a bink and he settled right down. He also cried for a second when I accidentally stuck my finger in his eye today, but only for a second. And he was tired at the time. He's the easiest baby I have ever met.

So getting back to the scene in progress, Brother-in-law #4 asked me if Jack is always so quiet.

"Well, yeah," I told him.

Brother-in-law #4 considered this. Then he said, "I think I'm upset about that."

Cringeworthy

2007-04-28T21:38:00.000-04:00

There are a few – OK, many – events in my life that still make me cringe when I think of them. Here are two.

***

The first and only time I have ever played Laser Tag was with Professor Lapp during our sophomore year in college. She invited me to go with her and a bunch of her friends, and I thought it sounded like fun. It was fun, too. It was fun right up until the point where I accidentally slammed my laser gun into Professor Lapp’s face as she rounded a corner. She tried to tell me that it was O.K., and not to feel bad. But it was hard for her to get the words out through the blinding pain.

Do you remember that, Professor Lapp? I imagine you do, as you probably still have a scar.

***

This one time in college, my friend Leah Lar and I were wandering the dormitory halls when we heard someone strumming a guitar out on the balcony. So we wandered on out to the balcony and struck up a conversation with him. The topic eventually turned to theater.

“Whatever you do, don’t go to any plays put on by the University Circle Players,” I told him.

“Oh, yeah?” he said. “What makes you say that?”

“I went to see their version of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead last semester, and it was just about the worst thing I had ever seen. That is until I went to see them do Waiting for Godot. I didn’t know it was the University Circle Players until after it started, but damn! Trust me, you do not want to see a badly done Waiting for Godot. And boy howdy! Those University Circle Players couldn’t act their way out of a paper bag.”

At first thought the balcony guy was just chuckling at my clever witticisms, but then something struck me as off. He seemed to be just a wee bit too amused. “What is it?” I asked him.

“I’m a member of University Circle Players,” he said. “In fact, I founded them. I actually directed Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead.”

“Oh. Uh… oh,” I said.

***

Grad Lab Adventures: Where are they now?

2007-04-21T11:40:00.000-04:00

A couple of weekends ago, we had a blast from the past at the Grad Lab Household. Grouchy Guy came to brunch! He has completed his post doc in Switzerland and is now a professor at my undergrad alma mater. Incidentally, it is also his undergrad alma mater. By crazy coincidence, Grouchy Guy and I actually went to the same college and grad school, and ended up in the same lab in grad school. It's funny, because I don't think we exchanged more than three sentences in undergrad. Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure those sentences were, "Hey, Grouchy Guy! I heard you are going to Ivy League Grad School." "Yeah." "So am I!" Grouchy Guy was kind of reserved in undergrad. I didn't even know he was grouchy. (For the record, he also sported a hilarious moustache while an undergrad. I have our class picture, and this moustache* caused The Doktah great merriment indeed.)

But that is not the point. The point is that I got to hang out with Grouchy Guy for the first time in about three years. Living abroad must have been good for him, because Grouchy Guy is not particularly grouchy anymore. We had a very nice time at brunch. The Husband made omelettes to order, and I made a cheesecake and sangria. Also in attendance was Grouchy Guy's German girlfriend, whom I had never met, and my friend from high school, Loud & Cheerful. At one point, I had to excuse myself to feed Jack, and through the closed door I overheard the following conversation:

L&C (speaking to German Girlfriend): So are you planning to move to the States?
German Girlfriend: [inaudible]
L&C: Oh? What kind of visa issues?
Grouchy Guy: [inaudible]
L&C: What? Oh, I didn't realize! Well that's great!

There is a reason I nicknamed her "Loud & Cheerful."

At any rate, I didn't really give the conversation much further thought until I was walking L&C to the front door. "Why did you tell me German Girlfriend is Grouchy Guy's girlfriend?" she asked me.

"Huh? What do you mean?" I replied.

"They're married!" she told me.

"What? Grouchy Guy is married? But he told me she was his girlfriend!" I exclaimed.

"Oh! No, they got married. I guess it must have been recently." said L&C.

When I returned to the dining room, I confronted Grouchy Guy with this news. "Why didn't you tell me you were married?" I asked him.

"Oh, right," he replied. "Uh, we got married on Monday."

I offered my congratulations of course, but that Grouchy Guy sure is inscrutable. Because if I got married suddenly, I would probably lead off with that news. Maybe in response to, "How've you been?"

So, congratulations Grouchy Guy Who Is No Longer Grouchy and German Girlfriend Who Is No Longer A Girlfriend. I guess we know why the grouchiness has faded away!

*Confidential to Grouchy Guy: It is only hilarious in retrospect. It was perfectly normal at the time.

Overheard at the Grad Lab household every single damn day it seems

2007-04-18T19:50:00.000-04:00

But I JUST CUT your fingernails!

Double standards

2007-04-16T21:24:00.000-04:00

I remember once seeing a newsmagazine show about how teachers favor boys over girls in school, usually without even realizing it. They filmed a fifth grade teacher for a few days and then showed her the tape. She was appalled to discover that she called on the boys far more often than the girls, and that, while she would usually give girls only cursory comments like, “Good work,” she tended to spend a few minutes helping boys with their work.

I also remember thinking, “That never happened to me.” Not once in my long academic career did I feel like the boys got more attention. I never even noticed favored male status during my many years as a engineering student. This could be because all of my teachers treated everyone equally, or it could be because I was a pushy student who asked millions of questions and constantly raised her hand. I pretty much demanded attention. I WON’T BE IGNORED.

So I never noticed a boy/girl double standard as a student, but as a mom? It’s hard to miss. Every Sunday, The Husband takes care of Jack during Mass while I sing with the choir. And because he usually sits in the same pew, he and Jack have developed a small fan club. On several occasions, some of Jack’s friends have told me what a fantastic job The Husband does with Jack every Sunday.

The Husband also told me about a recent errand he ran on his day with Jack. He had an appointment at the bank, so he popped Jack in the sling. A little girl in the bank spotted Jack and pointed him out to her mom. “Yes, dear,” said her mom, “that’s a baby! And that’s a great daddy!”

Now, I don’t mean to dismiss The Husband’s parenting skills in any way. He actually is a fantastic father. But do you think that if The Husband were in the choir and I were holding Jack during Mass that anyone would be particularly impressed?

The habit of sleep

2007-04-06T19:24:00.000-04:00

The Husband and I have been spending the past few weeks or so worrying about how Jack sleeps. He is now five months old, well over twelve pounds, and supposedly ready to sleep through the night. And as far as going to bed is concerned, we have been doing our utmost to put him down awake pretty much since he was born because we are very paranoid about his getting “addicted” to being rocked to sleep. We have been regaled with horror story upon horror story of two-year-olds who will not go to sleep on their own, and we wanted to avoid that particular problem.

And it was working! With hard work and patience, we got him to fall asleep in the bassinet, and then in the crib. I instituted and then lengthened a solid bedtime routine, and he was going to bed four out of five nights with no drama whatsoever. (That’s a batting average of 0.800, and any baby or child who goes to bed with no drama 100% of the time has parents who lie.) Better yet, he was starting to sleep for longer and longer stretches at night and was typically waking up only once after I went to bed. The husband and I congratulated ourselves on our superior parenting prowess. We rocked.

I imagine you can see where this is going. All of a sudden, about a week ago, he stopped sleeping well. He wouldn’t go to bed unless I rocked him to sleep, and he started waking up three or four times a night once again. Worst of all, he stopped going back to sleep easily after nursing in the night, and instead kept me trapped in his room for upwards of an hour shhing and re-binking over and over. It was a very hard to resist picking him up, given that he’d fall asleep in about five minutes if I just rocked him. Usually, I’d give in anyway.

And then the naps! He had been napping like a champ for weeks – a story, a few songs, into bed awake, and boom. Five minutes later he’d be asleep. But all of a sudden he required the rocking chair or the sling to get to sleep during the day. What had happened? Where had our easy baby gone?

Needless to say, The Husband and I were concerned. Were we instilling horrible sleep habits? Were we dooming ourselves to a lifetime of middle-of-the-night feedings? Were we going to have to rock him to sleep until college?

But we could tell that something was going on in that little head of his. He was undergoing the four-month sleep regression, or teething or working on a developmental milestone of some kind, because the kid has been atypically cranky, clingy, and oh, so very tired. The other day, he took two ninety-minute naps and woke up after each one with bags under his eyes. So clearly, we were dealing with something unusual here. But we were still unsure of how much we should cater to his rocking habit. It’s not that we were actually worried we’d be rocking him to sleep at sixteen. It was not for his sake that we were worried. It was for ours. We were trying to avoid that two-year-old rocking addict horror story we had be warned about.

So last night, after rocking him to sleep at bedtime, I called my sister, Big Sister #1. “I need someone with kids to tell me to relax,” I said.

“Relax,” she told me. “Relax, relax, relax, relax.” And then she told me that of her three daughters, her youngest was the easiest to handle simply because she was too exhausted by that point to spend any energy wondering about things like sleep regressions. “If she was hungry, I fed her. If she was tired, I let her sleep. If she cried, I picked her up. I remember nothing about her babyhood; and believe me, if she had screamed for hours all the time I would remember.”

“I’m just worried that we are setting ourselves up for a horrible time later,” I said.

And then she said something that changed my and The Husband’s entire outlook. “Look, he’s either going to cry now or later. So why not just rock him now and worry about it later?”

My sister is clearly a genius. He’s teething or something now, so now is when he needs to be rocked and held. And even if we do decide to fight the inevitable and try to get him to sleep without rocking, that is no guarantee that he will not cry later as well. And since he only needs about five minutes of rocking to get to sleep now, and since I secretly love to rock him to sleep because few things thrill me more than watching him fall asleep in my arms, what the heck are we killing ourselves for? I can spend 45 painful minutes in his room hanging over his crib shhing and re-binking, or I can spend 10 lovely minutes singing and rocking in a comfy chair. So we’re rocking him for now.

You know what else Big Sister #1 said? She said “You probably will have to work at getting him to sleep at some point. You’ll get him into a routine, but then he’ll be sick and you’ll rock him, and then he will want that the next night too. Parenthood is a job, and even though sometimes the job description isn’t exactly what you want it to be, you still have to do it. So just relax and accept it.”

For the record, last night he slept from 8:30 to 5:00.

Life is good.

I thought this only happened with women's clothes

2007-03-28T15:02:00.000-04:00

Two shirts. Both size 6-9 months. Both Carter's brand.

Dignity, thy name is not "Mother"

2007-03-28T15:01:00.001-04:00

Last week, I took Jack to “Wiggle Words” at a local library, which is basically a sing-a-long session for kids from 0-23 months. My cousin has a son two months younger than Jack, and we took our babies in order to meet other moms in the area. We didn’t really expect the boys to get much out of the session, but Jack surprised me and spent the whole time with big wide eyes, thoroughly enraptured. And we also met some play group organizers, so success on both fronts!

After the class, my cousin and I went to get bagels from the Bruegger’s across the street. Because I had to nurse Jack, we chose a table in the back section of the restaurant where there were no people. I am still far from expert at nursing in public. I can’t figure out how to get him started while under the blanket because I need to see what’s going on. Add to this the fact that he pops off frequently for a little look-see and a chat, and I end up spending most of the time with the blanket hanging uselessly from my shoulder or, more likely, pooled on the floor.

So when Jack popped off for the tenth time that session, I gave up and stopped pretending that the blanket was in any way assisting me in keeping my modesty. “It’s a good thing this room is empty,” I said to my cousin, as I helped Jack re-latch. At that exact moment, two construction workers walked by our table on their way to the back door. Two male construction workers.

“Don’t worry about it,” one of them said to me. “Seen one, seen ‘em all.” And they went merrily on their way. (And no, they did not seem extra merry.)

Those of you without children probably think that I was terribly embarrassed by this incident, but the moms out there know that, oddly enough, I wasn’t. Something about giving birth strips a person of any normal sense of personal modesty and dignity. I am reminded of an anecdote Erma Bombeck once wrote about after she gave birth to her first child. She was worried about the way something looked, so she went out into the hall and opened up her shirt to the first official looking person she found. “Does this look normal to you?” she said.

Unfortunately, he was a janitor.

A few things I have learned as a mom:

2007-03-24T10:11:00.000-04:00

1. Breastmilk poop and solid food poop are two entirely different beasts. An important difference: solid food poop is not announced by a loud "pbbbttthhh" sound, and instead appears as a little surprise upon opening up the diaper.

2. At no other time in my life will the frequency of another person's bowel movements be so hugely important to me. I certainly hope.

3. If there is a chance I will fall asleep while nursing, I must make sure to lean my head back.

4. It takes about an hour to regain normal motion in my neck after falling asleep with my head hanging down.

5. If there is a chance I will fall asleep while nursing, I must make sure my legs are not crossed.

6. My mothering instincts are sound and will make me protect the baby should I happen to fall right down on the floor thanks to a complete loss of blood flow to my left foot.

7. It really hurts when a small person grabs the loose skin on my neck and gives it a little tug and a squeeze.

8. I have loose skin on my neck.

9. Baby kisses are slobbery, but very fun.

To sleep, perchance to dream

2007-03-16T10:27:00.000-04:00

I remember this one time back in college, my friends and I were waiting for an exam to start and were using the time to discuss our preparedness. One of my friends made the statement “I only studied for five hours,” and I was struck by the dramatic difference between college and high school. In high school, the phrase “I studied for five hours” would not be qualified by the word “only.” In high school that comment would sound more like, “Oh my God! I studied for, like, five hours!” And so it is for relative amounts of sleep before and after having a baby. Where the childless complain, “I only got six hours of sleep last night,” a new parent will cry out with joy, “I got six hours of sleep last night! In a row!”

Ah, yes. Last night, I got six hours of blessed, blessed sleep. In a row. I think I may have even entered REM cycle. And without leaks! We have been having issues with our diapers of late. We use cloth, and they all of a sudden started leaking like anything overnight. We figured out that they had some detergent residue which made them less absorbent, but last night we doubled up the regular pocket insert with a Trader Joe’s bar towel (credit: Moxie). He wore a single diaper from 7pm to 6am with no leaks. It was very very exciting.

Speaking of cloth diapers, let me take this opportunity to say that, although I am very happy with the cloth diapering system The Husband and I have developed, I am not very happy with the effect the cloth diapers have on my getting myself to work. You see, cloth diapers are much, much bulkier than disposables, and I can’t possibly fit all 8 diapers and the requisite changes of clothes into one diaper bag. So on the days I take Jack with me in the morning, I have to bring the following items:
1. my work bag
2. breast pump
3. diaper bag containing clothes, wipes, vitamins, bottles, etc.
4. diaper bag containing diapers
5. plastic bag containing the enormous amount of food I have to bring for my own lunch (my word, but I get hungry these days)
6. usually another plastic bag containing the clean Tupperware my mother-in-law sent home the previous week full of food
7. Jack

When all of these items are piled up for transport to my car, it looks like a family of four is going away for the weekend. And it’s even worse on the way home because the items somehow get spread out among more plastic bags that my father-in-law hustles to the car before I get a chance to consolidate them, and then there are additional items because The Husband and I find it difficult to leave my in-laws’ house without food and gifts. I realize this is not a terrible problem to have, but Lord a’mighty, I’m schlepping a lot of stuff around.

So now you can understand why I don’t bring a change of clothes for myself. I’ll just stick to black pants.

Also, don't pour acid directly into your eyes

2007-03-08T16:32:00.000-05:00

I'm currently working on a presentation for my company's annual safety training. In every lab safety training I've ever undergone, the trainer or pamphlet always makes a point of saying, "No mouth pipetting." (For the non-sciencey out there, "mouth pipetting" is when you take a little glass or plastic tube, insert one end into a sample of, say, bacterial cell suspension, insert the other end into your mouth, and suck some of the bacterial cell suspension into the tube in order to transfer it to another container.)

And every time I come across that rule written out explicitly, I think to myself, "Who would do that?"

And Where "Drying Your Hair" Is the Stuff of Dreams

2007-03-07T21:48:00.000-05:00

My cousin had a baby about two months after Jack was born, and I remember talking to her when Luke was a few weeks old. Naturally, our conversation was mainly about sleep: how much sleep was had, and when the sleep happened. This is because sleep quickly becomes the most precious thing in a new mom's life after the baby. It goes: Baby, Sleep, Food, Husband. (Note: for nursing moms, it goes: Baby, Sleep, Food, More Food, A Little More Food, Husband, Food.)

"Luke frequently takes long naps, but I never know which nap will be the long one," said my cousin. "So sometimes I sleep when he sleeps, but sometimes I use his naps to get things done. This morning, for example, I took a shower."

Ah, motherhood. Where "Taking a shower" qualifies as "Getting something done."

I have more to say on the subject of sleep, because my darling baby, who for the past month and a half has gone easily and happily to bed at 7:00 almost every night, has suddenly decided that our putting him to bed at 7:00 is the worst thing that we could ever do to him. Why don't we just abandon him on the side of the road already? IT'S THE SAME THING. We have been resorting to either my standing at the side of his crib with my hand on his chest until he falls asleep, or The Husband's bouncing him to sleep on the exercise ball. (It's a core workout at the same time!) I know that we are probably setting ourselves up for some nasty habit breaking down the road, but we can only take on one sleep thing at a time, and we are currently attempting to get him to at least take STEPS towards sleeping through the night. Progress is being made on that front, but it involves my sleeping on the floor of his room. And I have to be the one to do it, because The Husband remains resolute in his refusal to nurse the baby.

Men.

Stupid apple

2007-03-02T20:38:00.001-05:00

Last week, Jack and I visited Big Sister #4. While we were there, Elfin Nephew had to do a time out because he refused to wash his hands after using the bathroom. Normally, his time outs have a time limit, but this time he had to sit on the step until he washed his hands. And because he can be a stubborn little bugger sometimes, he was there for quite a little while.

He passed the time first by trying on his mother's ankle boots, and then by playing with the apple his little sister had left on the floor by the stairs. She's one, and she prefers her apples peeled.

"Mom," came the plaintive cry from the step. "This apple is making my foot all yucky."

"Well, stop rolling it with your bare foot, then!"

This is not the number you are looking for

2007-03-02T20:27:00.000-05:00

Ring. Ring.

"Target baby department, may I help you?"

"Yes, I'm trying to find a Fisher-Price high chair that the Fi-"

"Hold on, I'll check and see if we have one."

...

"Yes, we have a few in stock."

"But you left before I could tell you which model I was looking for."

"Oh, OK. Which model?"

"I'm looking for the 'Easy Clean' high chair. The Fisher-Price website says they make one of the patterns exclusively for Target, but I can't find it on the Target website."

"Do you have the model number?"

"Yes, it's 'J24-'"

"No, it should start with three numbers, like '002.'"

"I don't have a number like that. The model number starts with 'J.'"

"No, it should start with a '002.' It usually at the bottom of the item description on the website."

"But I said I can't find it on the Target website; I can only find it on the Fisher-Price website."

"Oh. Well, if you add it to your cart, the number I need should be right next to the description."

"No, you don't understand. I can't find it on the Target website. I only have the Fisher-Price model number, and I just wanted to know if you have it in the store even if it's not on the website."

"OK, I just need a '002' number to check the stock. Do you have a '002' number?"

"No, I don't have that number. You see, I'm just trying to find out if you have this specific model because the Fisher-Price website says that they make it exclusively for Target."

"Well I can check the stockroom if you give me the item number. It should start with a '002.'"

"But I don't have - OK. I guess you don't carry it. Thank you."

"Thanks for calling Target."

Ring. Ring.

"Fisher-Price, can I help you?"