Lifelong resident of the Baltimore area (except for that four-year stint whenI studied abroad in Washington, DC). Aspiring writer. Wife. Mother. Stalwart wearer of glasses.
...but that's a tall order when you get e-mails with headers like this:
I knew when I elected to join the ranks of motherhood that I would be responsible for the health and welfare of a small person. But the realities of it -- like making sure your kid has the proper cloacal evacuative capabilities -- are fresh every day, courtesy of bulletins from BabyCenter.com, among others.
My apologies for disappearing on you, dear readers. Both of you. The holidays pounced on me and my opportunities for blogging have been few and far between. Add some dodgy connectivity in a Cleveland suburb, and voila! A paucity of posts. Besides, what am I going to tell you? That I thoroughly enjoyed my visit with my in-laws, and further enjoyed the in-laws who visited us in our tiny manse? Oh, and that it's a mortal lock that I'll be stressed out by my blood relatives' get-together this Sunday? Pah. Boring.
Here's what we need to talk about:
The BabyKeeper. WHY DID I NOT KNOW ABOUT THIS WHEN I HAD MY FIRST BORN? Clearly, this is the responsible and caring way to handle your kids when your hands are busy.
I just realized that all of my favorite holiday tunes are secularized romantic celebrations of the solstice. None of this "Come All Ye Faithful" bidness. I mean, I enjoy those selections when I'm ensconced in a pew and tapping my foot along with the churchie choral music. But my seasonal Top 3 are:
1) Winter Wonderland 2) Baby It's Cold Outside 3) Let It Snow
You might think that these aural preferences are a result of a heightened sense of couplehood around the holidays. That might be. But...my faves might also be due to the fact that Super Ninja and I are both incredible homebodies, and snow mandates that we stay home or we'll end up in a horrific car smash. At least, that's what the local news anchors tell us if there's more than a passing chance of chilled precipitation.
This is all very fascinating to you, isn't it? Well, while we're on fascinating topics, let me tell you what I had for dinner last night (Chick-fil-A). And which types of cookies I baked for my kids' daycare-mates (chocolate chip, and sugar cookies cut out into shapes resembling those in the opening sequence to Edward Scissorhands). And the reams of lists comprising things I need to do before Christmas.
Ugh. I'm boring myself with all of this tedium. It's a good thing we're heading up to Cleveland to hang with Super Ninja's family. I usually get a couple of good stories out of that. We're meeting Super Ninja's best friend's daughter for the first time, so I'm fairly certain the Boy will have yet another arranged marriage proposal. (I have two friends with daughters, whom, I kid you not, have put in a reservation for the Boy. We may start ciphering a stud fee.)
Okay, off to the office holiday party I go! That will be a wasteland as far as stories go. It will be tasteful and tasty, with zero booze, so there won't be anything fun to write about.
Last night was bath night chez nous. We're on an every-other-night routine with the kiddies. On Friday, Super Ninja went out with friends to catch a flick, which meant I was alone with a toddler and a preschooler. Instead of individual tub time, I tossed 'em both in the bath at once, and they had a lovely time. The Boy washed the Girl's hair, she giggled, and there was no crying.
Since they had such a good time in the tub together the last time, we decided to repeat the fun. But, just as we were nearing bath time, a college pal called me. Super Ninja said he was going to go ahead and start the kids' bath, I nodded, and up he went with a child tucked under each arm.
Oh, poor Super Ninja. About five minutes after they went upstairs, I heard the Girl start to wail. This is not unusual, as she loves being nude or dressed, but hates the transition. Then Super Ninja called to me very grumpily, so I hung up with my pal and skittered upstairs. There, I encountered a naked boy sitting on a potty, an upset husband, and a bleeding girl.
Turns out that the Boy hopped into the tub and, to put it delicately, let one loose in the water. A, ahem, solid one. This is the first time he's ever done this, so it would be an understatement to say that he surprised his father. Super Ninja yanked him out of the tub, and the Boy promptly whizzed on Super Ninja's shirt. What with the emergency clean-up and the horror of having just been used as a urinal, Super Ninja was understandably a little distracted, which is when he heard the "ka-thunk" of the Girl knocking her face against the tub. She bit her lip, hence the bleeding.
She's absolutely okay -- nothing two popsicles couldn't cure -- but Super Ninja was rattled for the rest of the evening. After the kids went to bed and we were enjoying a quiet moment, he turned to me and said, "How come when you give them a bath it's all bubbles and splashing, and when I give them a bath it's sh*t and blood?"
I just realized that I'll be celebrating the 15th anniversary of my high school graduation. Fifteen years ago? FIFTEEN YEARS? There are many reasons that this can't be. But mostly it's because I still act like a high schooler about a lot of things.
I tell you what, though. If the reunion planning committee tries to cram us into a military auxiliary hoojiwhatsis hall again, I'm definitely getting drunk beforehand. On wine coolers, in honor of the occasion.
There are a ton of Orioles on the list, which is disappointing. But it's disappointing in the way that it's disappointing when I find out my favorite rockers shoot up (or shot up, as the case may be). I might wish they didn't, but I don't know them personally, so I just kind of shrug. Yeah, drugs aren't such a good idea, and no, I don't want my kids admiring anyone engaged in illicit activities (don't worry, I intend to instill the difference between role models and celebrities).
Mostly, though, I'm wondering why the O's haven't won the World Series since 1983 if there's been this much juice on the team.
Scratch that. I'm mostly wondering why people aren't talking more about "Operation Equine" on page 89. That's the best title of any operation, covert or otherwise, that I've ever heard. It conjures all sorts of images. Were they sneaking steroids over the border in horses? Were they big fans of Equus? Was there some kind of Pony Express for steroids? I almost don't want to read the section and spoil all of the fun.
Don't get me wrong. I own CDs by every single one of those artists/groups. But it's all so...safe. I'm not exactly a poster child for musical edginess, but it'd be nice of those that Bleed Hoya Blue didn't exclusively favor BMG darlings.
Seriously. What's up with that plot device? Is it just a way to get fictitious right side/wrong side of the tracks kids to mix in a public-ish space? Let me present the evidence:
Brandon leaves a sweet gig at the Peach Pit to earn some extra summertime dough at the local sun spot for the zip code's hoi polloi. Makes sense. Loves Nat, loves the Pit, loves his job. Why not give that up for a chance to be a cabana boy?
Clearly, the Saved by the Bell writers went into hyperdrive when they saw the preceding summer's Beverly Hills 90210. Bell upped the ante, though, by having Zack, Kelly, AND Slater get jobs at the club. Kelly, if memory serves, was a lifeguard in a ridiculously small one piece. The lifeguard flotation thingamajig she hauled around was bigger than her torso. I'm sure she saved many, many lives that summer.
I've searched in vain for any kind of clips or stills from any of the Season 4 episodes, but, just so's you know, Joey gets a job at the Yacht Club's restaurant and mixes it up with an uppity uppercrust fella. The only (free) clips available were stunning examples of Kevin Williamson's hyperarticulate banter between Joey and Pacey. Oh, the banter, the unbelievable, unbelievable banter.
I haven't seen this little phenomenon yet, but I have nieces who are nuts for it. Anyway, this sounds like Bayside all over again. Main male hottie gets a job, then make sure everyone else gets a job, and a tiny girl is a lifeguard. I mean, I know suspension of disbelief is necessary, especially for musicals, but could we just acknowledge that an ninety pound girl is not going to be able to accomplish these feats?
So, anyway Hollywood, enough with the teenagers-in-country-clubs-theme!
Due to an unfortunate confluence of timing and location, I had to purchase a box o'tampons from a young fella of Middle Eastern persuasion who happened to be jockeying the till at a gas station. I'm sure he was just thrilled.
Lemme 'splain that the point of the story is that I only had a brief "Oh, jeez," moment. In the B.C. (Before Children) era, I might've actually left without purchasing les produits feminins. Or I might've gone on a convenience store shopping spree to camouflage my needs with pencils, gum, a gossip magazine, and one of those horoscope scrolls. But not yesterday! I sucked it up and acknowledged that I'm not always going to find a brick and mortar establishment peopled by earthy wise women. So, I plunked my lonely purchase on the counter, handed over some cash, and walked out. Without a bag, thank you very much.
This may have made you dudes uncomfortable. Oops. But this situation is the woman's equivalent to handing over a box of condoms to an avian, grandmotherly cashier. You know, the kind who wears chains on her glasses and calls you "dear."
Anyway, I'm excited that at 32, I'm officially starting not to care about that stuff.
I'm such a child. I'm thrilling at the sight of delicious little flakes of snow sifting down from a thick gray sky. Old habits die hard. Up until I was 22-years-old, snow meant a break from the norm. A delay, or, best of all, and honest-to-God day off without penalties. Snow days equal spontenaity, which I don't get enough of these days.
I wonder when I'll cross the fulcrum and find myself on the "Dammit, snow is a pain in the arse" side of things. It could happen if I moved to Minnesota, like somepeople. But chillin' in Maryland, we only get this stuff a couple of times of year. And most of the time, it melts about 2 hours after it lays. So, I'll enjoy it while it's here.
Have I told you about my advice column addiction? Dunno why I read them so often. I think I'm looking for some kind of blueprint for wacky life situations. Or I'm insecure about the way I handle emotional issues, and I look for reassurance/reinforcement from these columns. That's to be decided another day, I suppose.
Today I read a column in which a mother wanted to know if she was being too controlling since she required her 14-year-old daughter to supply her with the first and last names of the friends with whom she was hanging out after school. There's more to the tale, but I kind of stopped there...
When I was thirteen years old, I stayed over at my best friend's house for New Year's. Colleen and I met in sixth grade, but we became really good friends in seventh, and so by then, eighth grade, were were thick as thieves. I stayed over at her house often. We went to see movies and sundry other events often. I spoke of her often. You see the common thread here: OFTEN.
So, that first night of 1989, a blizzard struck the suburbs of Baltimore. Very picturesque. Colleen's family dropped me off at my house the next afternoon on their way to eat a Chinese restaurant. I slip-slided up the driveway, and blustered through the back door, my cheeks red from the cold.
"MCV!" my parents and my older sister shouted. Not in anger, but in a, "Oh, there you are" kind of way.
"Yeah?"
"What is Colleen's last name?"
I raised an eyebrow, "Jones*. "
They all erupted into laughter.
"What's so funny?" I asked.
"We wanted to call to see if you needed a ride home, and Little Bro said her name was Warglick, so we've been looking for her parents' phone number in the directory! And there aren't any Warglicks in Baltimore! Where on earth did Little Bro get that name? Ha ha ha!"
Ha ha ha! Ha ha... Ha?
WHY would they have let me spend the night at the house of a family whose last name they didn't know? WHY didn't they know the last name of my best friend of two years? AND WHY DIDN'T THEY DEMAND A PHONE NUMBER SO THAT THEY COULD CONTACT THEIR PRECIOUS, PRECIOUS DAUGHTER IN CASE OF AN EMERGENCY LIKE A BLIZZARD WITH POTENTIAL POWER OUTAGE CONSEQUENCES?
My parents were, shall we say, somewhat hands-off by the time I ventured into my teen years. I still had an eleven o'clock curfew and good grades were high on the agenda, but if I operated within those parameters, I'm fairly certain I could have been boozing it up with a panoply of shady characters and my parents would've been just fine with that.
I believe firmly that if Super Ninja and I can blend our upbringings together, we'll have a shot at a modicum of normalcy. Either that, or we'll really, really screw up our children. I don't really see much of a middle ground here, though.
*Her last name isn't Jones, but something roughly as common.
