Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Oh heck no we are not going out tonight


Today is New Year's Eve. We are spending the day watching it snow - we are supposed to get up to 9 inches possibly, having a play date with the twins next door which went nicely, and then going to an open house at a neighbors' house. We will likely be home by 7pm because that will be when Cooper will begin his self destruct count down and need to go to bed. Since I seem constitutionally incapable of staying awake past 10pm, we will most likely not be celebrating the new year until we wake up the next morning. The Bob says he is going to try to get coffee in me all day in an effort to keep me awake, but then I will just be very tired, caffeinated and cranky.

And speaking of cranky, Cranky Fitness has a great post about New Years being annoying. I am not a big New Years' celebrant. I have never really understood the fascination with the new year, or at least the new year as celebrated on the standard Gregorian calendar, which was a reform of the Julien calendar which was terribly inaccurate. It seems a bit ridiculous to me that we get all hung up on the number of the year, when we only began counting on this particular calendar 2008 years ago. There is a WHOLE lot of history that happened before the implementation of this calendar.

I am not Chinese, but I prefer the Chinese calendar. First of all, it follows the lunar cycle. While it also was implemented after a lot of history had happened, it has been in use much longer. This year the Chinese New Year will begin on January 26th and it will be celebrating the year 4707. I also dig the Chinese zodiac - we will be going into the year of the Ox. I like that the celebration lasts two weeks, and ends with the Lantern Festival. I have a thing for lanterns. During the two weeks there are celebrations that are family oriented, food oriented, gift giving of items that are designed to bestow good luck. One tradition is for families to clean their houses to get rid of the bad luck and welcome good luck in. If nothing else, you might get your house cleaned out once a year.

I am not Jewish either, but I can get behind that calendar too - they are up to 5768 right now. The new year is celebrated usually in September or October. But this goes to my point - why do we get all hung up on this year vs. that year - cast your minds back to the whole millenium Y2K hullaballoo that came to NOTHING - when the number of the year we are in theory celebrating is so out of sync with the actual age of mankind?

All of this is to say that I don't mind that we don't have big plans to freeze our butts off (it is currently 19 degrees at 2pm in the afternoon and will only get colder) during First Night in Boston, and I don't do resolutions. I like to review and adjust things as they come up, not just once a year. If you want to do it once a year, it almost seems more appropriate to do it on your birthday - the day you entered the world, and the day that you advance another year in your life. It is truly a new year for each person on that day.

The one thing I will do tomorrow, besides have a friend over for dinner, is take the tree down. It is time. It has been lovely, but I am ready to reclaim that corner of the living room. We will also find out if we can live without the grey fencing we have been using to keep Cooper from touching the TV and electronics. The first time I see him near the TV with a crayon though, back it goes!

Monday, December 29, 2008

And I have my brother to thank...

I am a somewhat critical movie viewer when it comes to movie adaptations of comic books. I grew up reading my brothers' comic books. Many of the superheros were represented in this collection, but I have very clear memories of the X Men, Superman, Batman and that whiney Spiderman.

Here is my Spiderman rant: Grow a set. You have SUPER POWERS dude. Get over being guilty about Uncle Ben, let MaryJane make her own choices, she is afterall, a grown up who can decide if she wants to be with a dude who can shoot webs out of his wrists. I do not have issues that the more geeky Spiderman fans have - like if he really did experience a merge of his DNA with a spider, he would most likely shoot webs out of his butt instead of his wrists, or that he would have grown 16 eyes. I just want him to be a SUPER-HERO. And to stop whining. I liked the first Spiderman movie from an adaptation perspective, but still hated Spiderman. The third movie was so bad we turned it off and sent it back without ever seeing the end. The song and dance bit in the bar was more than I could handle.

But on to the real reason for this post - Iron Man. I gave this movie to the Bob as a stocking stuffer and we watched it the other night. It is a GREAT movie. I am partial to movies that have redemption as a story line, and this is true of this movie. And Robert Downey Jr. totally finds his groove in it. The character is such an unlikely person to become a superhero, but then puts those crazy genius brains of his to work and the rest is just fun. I even didn't mind Gwenyth Paltrow in the role of Pepper Potts. She bugged me before she went and named her daughter Apple. But she was a nice addition to the movie.

So if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. Stan Lee, comic book artist extraordinaire, is an executive producer so it would have been hard to get it wrong.

Sunday, December 28, 2008

Things I learned today

Today I did actually perform two songs at Ryles Jazz Club during their jazz brunch. My friend Harvey and his trio were performing and he had invited me to join them. I sang "How High the Moon" and "Take the A Train". The Bob and my friend TR came along, and the Bob was in charge of taking the video. Only one song was actually documented because he couldn't figure out the camera right away. Which is fine because during the other one I screwed up the lyrics a bit. I am still debating putting the video on the blog.

Things I Learned Today:

1. I need a new pair of jeans that fit. The pair I was wearing are too BIG and I look horrible. Yes, that sounds silly but there it is. Now, this is not the worst thing to have happen, they could have been too small.

2. I need to figure out what to do with my hands while performing. One had was holding the mic, but what to do with the other hand...or either hand or my entire self while waiting to sing again during the instrumental solos.

3. I can survive doing things that absolutely terrify me. This was a very terrifying experience. I haven't performed like that in a veeeeeerrrrry long time and never by myself in front of a jazz trio. While this is not actually a reason to put the video on the blog or not, it is something I learned. It is a lesson I keep learning actually. Like after delivering Cooper, which was more terrifying than I expected because my health issues were making it necessary to deliver him early and while we were in great hands in a great hospital, there was the risk of death for both of us. Or when we tried scuba diving on our honeymoon. TERRIFYING. But thankfully I survived all of those experiences.

4. Now that I have done it, I know the next time I do this I won't be as terrified and it will go better. I am talking about singing, not giving birth. If my doctor did her job, I will not experience that again. However, Harvey said I can join him anytime he is there, and I will do THAT! And it didn't go badly, other than screwing up the lyrics, it went really well actually. Total strangers who didn't have to say anything complimented me. And TR is not known for holding back with the criticism, on ANYTHING, and she was complimentary too.

5. I learned that even though I think I am singing really loudly, I am not as loud as I think I am out in the audience. More volume will help a great deal.

6. It is hard to be louder the lower in my range I go. Will have to work that out.

7. Ultimately, it was REALLY FUN.

Thursday, December 25, 2008

I guess I have to learn to bake a pie now.



Merry Christmas! Ours has been nice and quiet. A few years ago I figured out I hate traveling at this time of year, so I avoid it, especially since now it would involve a toddler and a 10 hour flight. Since my family lives in Oregon, which has been getting more snow in a few weeks' time than in the last 40 or so years combined, it is a good thing we were not trying to get there. One college student who was in some new story Bob caught, has been trying to get from Boston to Oregon since last Friday. Yesterday she had gotten as far as Chicago. UGH.

Yesterday we went to the mall to take a shot at getting a picture of Cooper with Santa. Once the Bob has scanned it I will post it. I wasn't paying the extra $20 for the CD. It belongs on that "Scared of Santa" website. He actually was not scared of Santa, he was just on his last leg. It had take about an hour to get through the line, which wasn't so bad since I did the waiting while the Bob chased Cooper around the mall. Cooper only had to stand in line for about 10 minutes. But it was the 10 minutes before melt down. I looked at Santa, who was the same Santa as last year, and is a really GOOD Santa, with a real beard and a very authentic look, and said "This is going to be a crier." "Hit me" he said. So I put Coop in his lap, stepped back and told the lady to take the picture. There was no point in waiting for him to smile, because THAT was NOT happening. It is an awesome Bad Santa photo. Of course I have ordered a ceramic ornament with it on it.

Last night I baked a lasagna, and since I bake an AWESOME lasagna, the Bob decided that should be one of our holiday traditions - a Christmas Eve lasagna. Okay, I can handle that. After Cooper went to bed, the presents were produced for under the tree. This morning he was up around 6:30, and once we were down stairs, he was wholely uninterested in the presents. We could have made the present thing last all day, because each time he opened a present, that was the only thing he wanted to play with. That won't be true in another few years.

The Bob and I decided not to do major presents for each other. We don't have the fundage for it, and it seemed more appropriate to focus on Cooper. We filled each others' stockings instead. But with a price limit! Jewelry would fit in a stocking, but that was not the point. We focused on fun stuff, or useful stuff. I am now the proud owner of a desk top Zen garden and make your own Stonehenge kit. Excellent!



Cooper got more tools. He is VERY into tools. As trades go, carpentry is a good one.



He also got a Mack, from the movie Cars. He LOVES his Mack.



My brother sent me a pie plate. An Emile Henry pie plate. My sister-in-law is a master pie maker. I have NEVER made a pie with my own crust. I actually prefer pie to cake, all that fruity goodness inside a flaky yummy crust. Now I will have to learn to bake a pie.



And in closing, I present you with Buster doing beagle angels. This was taken on Sunday as we were getting another foot of snow. Buster loves rolling in and making beagle angels in snow almost as much as eating. It is beagle joy, pure and simple.

Merry Christmas to all and may your life be full of Beagle Joy.

Monday, December 22, 2008

Introducing Birchy M. Birchfield

Two weeks ago the Bob calls me at work and says "What did you order from Crate and Barrel?". I ordered nothing, I assumed it was from my mother. A few years ago my parents and I agreed that for Christmas, instead of trying to buy things for each other we would exchange Christmas decorations. Ornaments, things like that. She had told me that the thing she bought would be arriving soon. Bob says it is HUGE whatever it is. The box was rather large. Inside was another large box, and inside that box was a smaller box, and two decorative holiday kitchen towels. Inside the smaller box was this:



He is about 10 inches tall, and 12 inches long. He is covered in birch bark. Cooper keeps calling him a cow. Gus, one of the schnauzers, wants to eat him. But there he is, a very bizarre but oddly festive Christmas moose. And all I sent them was a set of three ornaments from Pottery Barn.

Sunday, December 21, 2008

It is STILL snowing...

It stopped briefly, but started again around 7am this morning and it is near to white out conditions right now. The temperature has risen from 17 degrees to 32 since then as well, so the snow that is falling now is that great, wet snowman snow. Earlier it was like styrofoam. That is when Cooper and I went out and shoveled and made snow angels. I am thinking that with his final words on this video he got himself into the will!



And as my mother pointed out in the comments on yesterday's post, I did not like the snow much at Cooper's age either. I have a very clear memory of trying to go down a slide into the snow. Do you know what happens when you get to the end of the slide and hit two feet of snow? Your feet hit the snow and you stop dead. But the top of you obeys some other laws of physics and keeps moving forward, so you end up face planting right into the cold, hard, snow. Take it from me, that hurts.


Cooper is obsessed with Bob's boots. He was trying to walk around in them earlier.


They are hard to see, but these are our snow angels. And this other picture is our house this morning. Since then another 2 inches of snow have fallen. Where does it stop??

Saturday, December 20, 2008

Snowy Saturday

It is 12:10pm on Saturday and it is still snowing. It stopped during the night supposedly, but it has been snowing steadily since we got up.


This is Cooper expressing some displeasure with being up to his hips in snow. He got over it when we went out front and he discovered the joys of shoveling. I can only hope that when he is old enough to REALLY help shoveling, he will still want to. He was desperate to get out and join dad outside. Once out there he just kept saying No no no no. However, the lure of using a miniature shovel and hanging out with Fletcher up the street was too overwhelming.


This is the chair on my deck. I won't be sitting there anytime soon.


This is the japanese maple in our front yard.


This is the morning snow measurement - 8 inches, give or take. Since it has been snowing steadily for hours now, we are probably up to 10 inches. Now the snow is the big fluffy flakes that make New England so charming during the winter. Until you have to drive in it. Bob got to break out the snowblower. Our driveway is really short, but there is almost nowhere to put the snow when shoveling. The blower allows him to launch the bulk of it into the yard.

I like snow up until the first of the year. Then I am done with it. I like the Currier and Ives version of Christmas, but after that, I am ready for spring.

Friday, December 19, 2008

4 inches and counting

I am talking about snow. It began around 1:30pm today, and by 5:30 we had 4 inches, by my very scientific method of calculating, which is to take the yard stick out to the table on the deck and measure the snow piling up on it. If it were not pitch black out I would get a picture for you all. It is still blizzarding out.

I went to work this morning, and decided to stop at the grocery store on the way to work to pick up a few things. Me and 100 of my nearest and dearest comrads. Everyone was freaking out about the snow. Cooper's day care follows the Newton school system schedule, and they closed at 11am today. The college closed at noon. I think everyone is still feeling the pain of last year's snow storm and for many, the snow storm of 1978 where cars were just abandoned on the highways for days because the snow fell so fast is still a real and painful memory.

And more snow is due on Sunday morning. My big Ryles debut may be delayed. Harvey is performing there on the 28th too, so worse case scenario I could delay it a week.

But it looks like we will have a white Christmas. They are talking about another storm coming in on Christmas Eve. And this is why I don't like traveling this time of year. The chance of being trapped in Chicago's O'Hare airport for 12 hours waiting for a flight is just too real. That is not my idea of a great way to spend Christmas.

Oh the weather outside is frightful....

Thursday, December 18, 2008

Let it snow...

We received our first real snow of the season yesterday, but not enough for the Bob to break out the snowblower. Tomorrow will most likely provide that opportunity. We are anticipating 10 inches of snow, possibly more, over the course of the day and into the evening. Of course we are at the end of finals week here at the college, so all sorts of plans have been put in place for holding the finals as early in the day as possible, but we haven't figured out Saturday's schedule. We are a primarily residential campus, so the students are a captive audience, but the faculty are the ones who would have a hard time getting here, or getting home again. Last year right around this time we got wholloped with a storm that dumped a foot of snow in a few hours on the region, and it was taking people 5 or 6 hours to make what would normally be a 30 minute commute. My commute normally takes 10 minutes and it took me 30 that day. I was one of the lucky ones and got out early. 5 hours in the car with Cooper would have been baaaaad.

My plan is to go home at noon with Cooper so we get home before the weather gets bad and before his nap. We will stock up on the essentials, like milk and wine and duraflame logs and be ready for hunkering down.

Cooper is not a fan of snow. If his little bare hand touches it, he holds his hand up and makes a grimace. He also hates wearing mittens, so this puts him a difficult space.

And finally, I have noticed a positive side effect to the economic crisis: I am not getting a bajillion credit card offers in the mail each week. A few trees are living a little longer in the world now. I imagine this also makes identity theft a little more difficult too. If no one can get credit approved under a real name, I expect it is that much harder to do so pretending to be someone else. So trees are living longer, I don't have as much shredding to do and people with nefarious intentions in their hearts have to find other ways to steal. Bonus.

Monday, December 15, 2008

New developments

So, Cooper has strep. I kept him home today because he had a cough and runny nose and has been fussy about eating. I figured a day off would do him some good. This afternoon after only taking a 2 hour nap - shut up, he usually takes 3 hour naps and I LOVE HIM FOR IT - anyway - he complained about his peepee hurting. He was grabbing at his Mr. Happy and saying "oooow peepee, ooooww peepee". Upon inspection there was nothing visually wrong with said peepee, but he definitely was complaining. So, since he was refusing to eat or drink much and his peepee was bothering him, I called the doctor. One quickie strep test later, he has his first case of strep.

In addition to that, when I reported that both he and I had dealt with a stomach bug over the weekend, the doctor said that strep can actually cuase those symptoms, and that I should probably get checked for strep too. So I will try to do that tomorrow. But that might also explain the complete lack of stomach bug in the Bob. I mean, it is either that or he has some super human anti-stomach bug super power.

Our next door neighbors' kids have been dealing with strep for something like 3 months. They cannot get rid of it. We were at a birthday party with them last weekend, which is likely where Cooper got it. We see the same pediatrician, who said it is unlikely we will have the same experience they are having regarding not being able to get rid of the strep infection. I hope not. That is CRAZY. They have been on some form of antibiotic for months. They are probably brewing some super strain of resistant strep over there.

Anyway, I DID win the Timex Ironman heart monitor thing. They gave me an extension on meeting the deadline for responding because of the whole vomiting thing. Which I greatly appreciate! I never win anything, but now I have!

Sunday, December 14, 2008

Another fallen soldier

Well, two down, one to go. Cooper came down with the bug last night, at 6:45pm. By midnight he seemed over it and was asking to eat. Huh... a 5 hour bug?

The Bob has not fallen victim yet, but I seem to be over it, and so does Coop. He was decidedly UNHAPPY with the vomiting thing. So we are on Bob Watch, 2008. I imagine if he gets it, it will happen in the next 12 hours.

My sister in law, the ever so funny Cathy, wanted to know if I was sure I wasn't pregnant. HAHA. Soooo funny. NO, I am not pregnant. And it wasn't food poisoning either. It was a stomach bug. My neighbor has also been battling it in her house. Without a functioning washing machine. GROSS. At least we could take all articles of clothing etc. right down to the basement and deal with it. Fortunately I think we saw a delivery of a new machine to her house last night. I don't know who you can buy from that delivers on a Saturday night, but thank little baby Jesus and the three wise men you CAN from somewhere. I am pretty sure that dealing with a stomach bug without a functioning washing machine might just put most marriages right over the edge. At least here in the US.

Enough about being ill. The other thing I did this morning was go rehearse with Harvey Finstein, the guy in charge of our jazz ensemble. He has invited me to sing two songs with him when he performs at a jazz club here in Boston next Sunday. He has a trio he will be performing with and is being very generous. He must think I am capable of this or he wouldn't invite me, right? OY. It will be very fun and very nauseating all at the same time. Back to nausea again. But in a good way this time.

I will let you know how it goes. In the meantime, I have to go see if I still won the Timex Ironman trainer thing. The one time I win something and I may miss out due to vomit.

Friday, December 12, 2008

And so it begins...

Erg. I came home today from work around 11:30 and by 2 was becoming one with my toilet. The BUG has hit. So far neither Cooper or Bob have it. I wouldn't mind if neither of them did. I am happy to be the one taking it for the team. What is the hardest part of being sick with the stomach bug for me is the waiting and feeling sooooo crappy. The aching and freezing. I eventually managed to keep some Pepto and advil down, so I am feeling MUCHO much better. I managed to sleep a little. The best is that I wasn't up in the middle of the night feeling this bad.

This means I missed the holiday party that the president of our college hosts each year. Oh well. I had a good excuse.

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

On swearing or not

I admit to swearing. The Bob swears too. We of course try VERY hard not to in front of Cooper, although I have acknowledged that my child will most likely be the first to curse in school, and teach others naughty words because there are just moments when it gets away from you.

Like the morning I nearly killed one of the other kids in the class and myself because he snuck up behind me and when I took a step back I almost stepped on him, knocking him to the ground. In my attempts to not step on him further, I was flailing around like I was on roller skates in a Popeye cartoon and let at least one 'oh shit' pop out of my mouth. Which made the teachers kind of laugh and be horrified all at the same time. Bygones.

So the question is, if you are trying not to swear, as in say the actual swear words, is it acceptable to replace them with either other real words, like 'sugar' instead of 'shit' or fake words like 'fragadooch' instead of F***. I don't find swear words in themselves all that offensive, mostly because they are just words. Why is shit worse than shoot? It is usually the intent behind them or the force with which they are said that disturbs me. So just substituting another word, but still having the same intention or emotion behind them may not really change the dynamic.

But it certainly would go a long way toward NOT teaching Cooper the words that might get him sent home with a note from his teachers. I am not naive enough to think he won't learn them from someone else. Please. During the summer when all the windows are open, sailors could learn to swear by listening to my neighbor. Her kids will be able to give lessons to the other kids in the neighborhood on proper use and syntax of swearing. Not that she is a bad mom. She is a very good one, she just swears a lot.

Side note: The one and only time the Bob has visited my parents home, the summer I was pregnant with Cooper, he laid a challenge at my feet: Work the word 'nads' into a sentence while talking to my mother. I had commented on the fact that I was pretty sure my mother had never said that word. It isn't technically a swear, it is more of a nickname, if you will, for the longer and actually anatomically correct term 'gonads'. But it is usually used in a colorful way, like the Bob saying 'Ouch, stop stepping on my nads' to one of the dogs and I found it difficult to conceive of a conversation in which my mother would use the term. I didn't actually use it out of the blue, I just told her about the challenge. She thought it was funny. I think. It was over 2 years ago now.

But back to my original thought - should one just try to replace the swear, or should one attempt a much larger exercise, and that is to respond verbally in a way that would not include an expletive at all? When I was flailing around trying not to squash a certain toddler, had I been in training for not swearing at all, I might have resorted to saying 'OH NO' or simply 'AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHGGGGGGGGGGG'.

Do you swear? Do you try not to and what do you say instead?

Friday, December 5, 2008

Sunflower Valley


Is it weird that after watching 33,567 hours of Bob the Builder in the last year, I have come to the conclusion that I want to live in Sunflower Valley?

For those not in the know, at least in the Americanized versions of BtB, the gang starts out in Bobsville, which BtB's dad, Robert (are you seeing a trend?) build, hence the name Bobsville. After awhile someone decides that a location nearby should be developed, a location called Sunflower Valley. It has sunflowers EVERYWHERE. And rolling hills, and rivers, and pastures. They hold a contest for who will be the designer of the new development, and Bob decides he will enter the contest after he sees that the design of the person considered most likely to win includes a giant mall and housing developments and lost of concrete and metal.

Bob's design is GREEN. He wants to have the development work with the natural beauty and resources of Sunflower Valley. All the houses are solar powered, or in the case of Mr. Sabotini's house, is wind powered since he lives in a windmill. There is a sunflower factory, also solar and wind powered, that processes sunflower oil. There is a seaweed farm, where they grow and dry sea weed that is used both in the valley and back in Bobsville. Mr. Sabotini runs a cafe, and is a baker and grows all his herbs on the roof of a building and makes his bread from sunflower flour. There is a Scottish woman named Meg who owns goats and makes yarn from their wool and cheese from their milk. Quite unexpectedly, there is also a pineapple farm. They eventually build a hotel, all solar powered, so new people can come and visit Sunflower Valley.

I love this place. It is the kind of place that would have grabbed my attention and inspired my imagination as a child, and I am having fun watching with Cooper as an adult. It is idealistic to be sure, but these are not bad lessons to be learning. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle is Bob's mantra, along with "Can we build it, yes we can". Despite that fact that I am always questioning things like how do the machines experience cold, why do they wear "talkie talkies" like they have ears, and how do they keep running when they never eat or seem to need to be refueled, I still enjoy the show for its utopian ideals and earthy crunchy sensibilities. I want to find a place like Sunflower Valley for my kid to grow up in, where people are nice to each other and think about sustainability and grow herbs on their roof. Oh, and has the internet, otherwise how would I read all my favorite blogs?

Thursday, December 4, 2008

No barfing yet, and another new blog

Barf watch: 12-04-2008 8:56am No barfing or inordinate amount of poop yet. We are on our normal routine, going to work and daycare. Of course we got there this morning to find two more kids have succumbed to the bug. There are only three soldiers left standing who have not caught it, Cooper being one of them. We just have to wait and see I guess. One of his classmates' parents pulled the kid out on Wednesday when they first heard about the bug, because they are going away next week to visit family. Last year the kid infected the whole family with the bug that rampaged through the school. I seriously considered doing the same with Cooper, but then decided to play YATZEE with it all.

New blog alert: While reading I Am Bossy's entry for the day, I found a link to this blog: Cranky Fitness. I wandered over there and found a funny well written blog mostly about how to approach exercise and nutrition from a healthy point of view. I say nutrition, not D.I.E.T because I choose not to diet but be healthy about how I eat. I like her 90% rule: try to a good job 90% of the time with your exercise and eating habits. Don't try for perfection. I pretty much apply that approach to all of my life. I work with someone who thinks perfection is not only attainable, but required. This would be why he never ever ever turns in any report, any project, responds to any request by anyone including our boss, on time. And by that I mean he was 3 months late turning over his part for the annual report because he needed it to be "perfect". Can you say IRONY?

I digress. Check out the blog. Linky link to the left. My own fitness goals are moving along. I am at a 20lb weight loss, and focusing on the next 5lb goal. During the holidays that can be hard, but it is afterall, just a goal. I give myself no absolute timeline on it. More than anything I am excited about how my clothes fit. Even if the weight doesn't drop if I am getting healthier and turning fat into muscle, or at least firmer fat, and I am in the next size down, YIPPEE for me!

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Oh the dread

There is a stomach bug going around on the infant and toddler floor of Cooper's schoool. Oooooh goody. This was one of the top reasons I didn't want to have kids. I hate vomiting and kids are petri dishes. I am not someone who could ever be bulimic, I just HATE throwing up. I don't understand people who say they can make themselves do it. Even when I feel like I want to die, am curled up on the floor of the bathroom, knowing it would feel better if I could just get it out, my body fights it every step of the way.

I was a very lucky person in that I never had one day, not even one minute, of morning sickness when pregnant. I had other issues, but that was not one of them. I could handle not feeling my thumbs or first two fingers on each hand for three months when the pregnancy induced carpal tunnel syndrome kicked in, just keep away with the yakking.

It has been a year since Cooper had a stomach bug. At least that time neither Bob nor I caught it. But you just don't know with this stuff. I don't know how he will be if he gets this again. Listen to me, IF. HA. I guess I will go home and clean the toilets so that they are nice and clean in the event one or all of us is getting up close and personal with them real soon.

And why does it seem that they get more sick at night? Can't a 12 hour bug last from 7 am to 7pm? Why is it from 2am to 2pm? Why do we have to be up in the middle of the night with the yakking and fevers? It is just wrong.

On top of it all, the Bob's mother is coming to visit this weekend. She is a very nice person, I have almost no bad MIL stories to tell. She has her quirks, like she is the slowest person I have ever met, and the Bob agrees. What takes me 30 minutes to accomplish in the bathroom is a 2 hour event for her. But that doesn't mean I would wish on her catching a stomach bug by visiting. We shall see how it goes. She gets on the train to come down Saturday morning. If Cooper is going to get it, I imagine it will be before then.

There I go again, with that overly optimistic IF. Sigh.

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

MidLifeMama - A Change of Life

Send your own ElfYourself eCards


Oh Happy Holidays. Another fabulous tradition is born. HA!

Monday, December 1, 2008

The beat goes on...

Well, tonight was the big debut performance of the group we will probably call the Latitudes. Hopefully you will see embedded here the snippet which is A Train by Duke Ellington. We were minus one female vocalist, Jane, who woke up with a fever, laryngitis, an eye infection and bubonic plague. OK, the last one I made up.





Be kind.