Just one good stomach flu away from my goal weight...

Yeah. That plague I casually mentioned in my last post re: Phook and vomit? You guessed it, Big W was not spared. Not spared in the least. Still in the process of being unspared, actually. Let's discuss. (Note: Disclaimer from previous post applies here as well.)

So it was Saturday night, I think. Big K and I were casually playing Guitar Hero III, a recent Christmas gift from Auntie Hode. I suggested we go get some food. We were at a local eatery, and I found myself oddly unable to eat. Bad omen, right there. We came home, Phook went to bed. I went to bed. It was 7 p.m. I was really trying to sleep, but I was too busy involuntarily playing Guitar Hero in my mind and attempting to stave off intense waves of nausea. A couple hours in, I abandon my denial and set up residence on the bathroom floor. At 9 p.m., I vomit ferociously for the first time since 1999. I remember at the first intense heave why I hold such extreme prejudice towards ralphing. Holy, holy balls. I camp on the freezing tile floor for the next several hours, taking breaks only to water the toilet with my hind end. I decide the freezing floor is not acceptable around midnight and go back upstairs. I promptly heave into a bucket. I go back to the bathroom floor and continue to repeat the above processes. At this point, my lips are cracking open and I am so intensely thirsty I want to die. I drink a little water. It stays down. I have a little more every few minutes for the next hour or so. At 5 a.m., it all comes back up with extreme prejudice. I am dying on this bathroom floor. I am positive I will actually die. It was bad. Big K kept reassuring me that this thing will only last 12 hours, as it had for him and for Phook. I'm ticking down the hours I have left. Unfortunately, my personal bout with Satan has been more unkind.

So then it was yesterday. I was so weak, achy, and freezing all day long I was quite certain that an entire army of diseases was taking me down. I spent half the day in my bathtub, because that was the only place I could get warm and ward off the aches a little bit. Unfortunately, I was too weak to cleanse myself, so I had Big K shampoo my hair. He got all confused about how to do such a thing, but when I informed him it was just like washing Phook's hair, he did a lot better. Except the part where he threw a couple cups full of water at me and yelled "One-two-three-wheeeee!" (You think I'm making that up for effect, but I am not.) During the day, I ate about a half a cup of applesauce and half a cup of jello. I was so dehydrated, I could have shaken my wedding rings right off my finger. When I went to bed at 9 p.m., my fever was 102.5. Hmm. I was concerned for the unborn, but Dr. Google informed us that such a fever has only been proven dangerous to first trimesterers, so I took some tylenol, applied a cold washcloth to my forehead, and hoped for the best. (I hope Dr. Google was correct.)

Today I am weak and winded upon walking from one room to the next. My fever was 100 at last check after initially having been normal when I woke up today, so I'm back on the tylenol. I have successfully eaten an apple, a yogurt, a little bit of Stove-top stuffing, and a little plate of buttered macaroni today. It's weird because I am feeling regular pregnancy hunger pangs in my belly, but my desire to actually put something in my mouth is nonexistent. What a quandary. What a bitch.

I am telling you, people, this is bad sick. I don't know why I am on hour 48 after being promised 12. What a crock. I wonder if being preoccupied with gestating has my body too busy to do a little thing like defend my own best interests. For reals. So we were going to go out with some pals for New Year's Eve (not that I'd make it to midnight even in good health, but still...), but that is off. And--get your Kleenex--it is the 9th anniversary of the K Family love. Yes, we are a New Year's love story. It involved him filling my beer cup from the half barrel and then nervously leaning in and saying, "Hey, aren't you supposed to kiss somebody at midnight?" but I still get a little misty-eyed thinking about it. Ah, Big K.

So it is a good thing he has been off work for this whole fiasco. Poor little Phook has been basically well since the end of the day of onset, with the exception of her butt. She has been pooping frequently and loosely since yesterday, which has resulted in a serious case of raw hamburger ass. She cries upon pooping, upon being wiped, upon being creamed up, and for 5 minutes after. Her worst case of diaper rash to date. I feel so bad for the poor little schmo. Even in my weakened state, I'd give her my relatively well butt if it were possible.

So there you go. The Big K work break bonanza has turned into something of an exercise in bodily fluid management. I would really like for us all to be well. I would really like for my holiday fantasy of us all bundling up and pulling Phook around on a sled to have happened. But mostly, I would really like us all to be well. Happy New Year, kiddos.

Now that's a stocking stuffer for ya

Fair warning: This post is rife with descriptions of repulsive bodily functions. Carry on at your own risk.

My child turned 15 months old yesterday. In that time, she has been to the doctor only for well baby checkups. Not a single sick visit. I called once about her being constipated a little while after she started on baby food, but other than that we have had no health issues with this child. She's had 3-4 mild colds, but never even anything that disrupted her sleep more than a little bit or required anything beyond some nasal saline and a humidifier in her room.

In short, we have been spared a tremendous amount of mayhem in this home. Furthermore, I only know how to parent the healthy. Until today.

Well, Big K had experienced some highly uncomfortable gastrointestinal distress and body aches the day after Christmas, but despite his theory that he'd be dead by dinnertime that day, he recovered quickly. He knew that his symptoms had been contracted from an ill-fated jovial toot on a recorder that his godson had been playing during some Christmas Eve festivities, after which he learned said godson had been sick as a dog the previous day.

This morning, Phook sounded her standard alarm at the fairly typical hour of 7:20 a.m. Big K went to fetch her. I hear him cry, "Big W, I need you!" followed by a highly pathetic and seriously saddened, "Phooker's sick..." Um, yeah, I guess that what you'd call it if you were the type to mince words. The child was crusted in an exoskeleton of vomit. Eyelashes, hair, face, ears, nose, pajamas, blanket, sheet, Sleep Guy (her lovey), floor...all festooned in ralph. We have no idea when she actually chuffed it, as there was nothing amiss on the baby monitor all night long, but there was a large quantity of completely undigested dinner involved in this vomit comet. Big K, who had been up gaming with his brother until nearly 3:00 a.m., reported there was nothing amiss when he checked on her at that ungodly hour. But whatever, there was apple peel, pineapple, ham, and much, much more on display in that crib by 7:20, that much I know.

Now I need to state here that I do not do well with vomit. Not that anyone is a big fan, but I get really squirrelly when someone even mentions that they are nauseous. I am not one of those ladies who was skilled in the art of holding back the hair of others during college. No. I nursed Big K through one alcohol-induced barf-o-rama before he got on the wagon back in '01, and it nearly ended our romance. As I contemplated my labor with Phook, my number one fear was that I'd chuck during the birth, as it is reportedly common to do. That's right, not the passing of a human through my she-bits, but the chance that I'd vomit. With each contraction, I was worrying I'd puke (which I did not, I'll note). So that's my mindset on vomit. Not good. Not good at all.

Back to this morning. Big K brings Phook down and puts her straight in the tub to go about the business of removing the bushel of hork from her hair. She started crying in the saddest little scared way I've ever seen. Big K does his business. I stood there like a dick, not knowing exactly what to do. I asked him if it would be reasonable for me to go remove the soiled linens from her room and he agrees this is a reasonable thing to do. I do this. While I'm doing this, my stomach a) remembers it is supposed to be morning sick and b) notices it is dealing with vomit. I start gagging accordingly. So I get that in the washer. I call my sister and cancel our breakfast date. I consult with Grandma J about next steps. She says to withhold food, give her Pedialyte or whatever in small quantities.

So we give her some Pedialyte and I get her dressed. She starts to look squeamish. And then she barfs the Pedialyte projectile-style all over a passing Uncle Growler, who luckily is the same shade of orange as the vomit in question. Then out comes her lower lip and she starts bawling. I have never been so sad for a little Phook as right then and there. Oh what a sad little dude she was. So we removed that barfed upon outfit and redressed her. At this point, I call the doctor because she was coincidentally scheduled for her well baby checkup today. They said to still bring her in since those appointments are impossible to schedule with our doctor. They said to continue to offer her the beverage at least every 15 minutes, regardless of her vomiting. Ok. At this point it was time for another sip of Pedialyte, which she immediately ralphed. Another outfit (at this point I'm just swapping onesies over a t-shirt, not redressing her in full). We then try water. Puke. Okay, shit. At this point it is time for Phook's nap and she takes it. We woke her up to go to the doctor. She held down some water for about 20 minutes, but then sneezed and ralphed in the car all over Sleep Guy. Oh my.

So we roll up to the doctor as the Family that Smells Like Puke. On account of Phook's complete dehydration (and possibly on account of her constant running), she weighs in at 22 lbs. 4 oz., exactly 1 pound larger than at her 12 month checkup. Her typically round and puffed out belly is utterly deflated. She actually has loose skin around her midsection...normally her belly is so giantly full of her last meal that I am concerned her skin will burst. She's like a natural casing wiener. So doc checks out her business and deems her good and gives us further advice on the flu management. We forgo her shots for today; she will get them when I tote her along for my next prenatal visit in a couple of weeks. We ride home in a fairly treacherous snowstorm, Phook holding onto her vomit-covered Sleep Guy and looking utterly spent. She is pale/green and purplish around the eyes. She is not my kid. Poor little chap.

We get her home and give her a little Pedialyte, which she holds down for 15 minutes, at which point we decide she is safe to be napped. But before she naps, she poops, and blows pood out her dipe and up her back. I handle it, turning myself into a shitmobile in the process. Lovely. She then napped and woke up very hungry. Big K gave her some banana, which stayed down. This was followed by some Pedialyte, a graham cracker, and some Cheerios. She's held it for about an hour and a half now. I'd call us out of the woods if I wasn't positive those words wouldn't activate nuclear vomiting. She has had an additional pood. She is roaming about the place chatterboxing. I don't know, man. I don't know.

I guess the moral of the story is that I'm really glad Big K is off of work. And I'm really thinking that parents of children who are oft ill are quite tired. And vomit = laundry. And holy shit do I hope I don't get this plague. And boy is a sick little Phooker the saddest little thing I've ever seen.

Work Product of the Unwell

Since I got all weird on you the other day with my crazy and yapped about all my baking, I'm gonna show you fools what I was up to. Here is the collective work product, mostly contained in freezer bags, since the stuff lives in the freezer until consumption is nigh:

And here is the first tray of the season, all made up for Big K's work party this past Friday:

Now, here's the thing. Despite me hitting rock bottom in the midst of my holiday preparations and potentially tearing my rotator cuff in an act of unnecessary domesticity in the process, I have to tell you that I experience deep personal satisfaction when I see the fruits of my labor all pimped out and ready to be enjoyed. When I put that tray together, I achieved nirvana. And that is why I do all this shit that I don't have to do. I am really, really happy when it's done. And it doesn't feel like wasted time. It feels like a job well done. And Big W needs her jobs well done, or else she wouldn't be Big W.

So do you want to know what is on the tray? I'm going to tell you either way.

• In the upper lefthand corner we have Cherry Almond Chews. These are my personal favorite. I undercook them by a minute or so because then they stay softer and nice.
• To their right are Mexican Wedding Cakes. Big K made these with his mom when he was little so they are his sentimental favorite.
• Next over are Hint-of-Berry Bon Bons. These little bastards rule. I use homemade strawberry jam for the "hint of berry" and I'm telling you it is killer.
• Then we have Cookie Dough Truffles. To be honest, these aren't as awesome as I wanted them to be. The thing is, despite my love for actual cookie dough, I don't really like things that are flavored like cookie dough, such as the ice cream. Perhaps it is sacrilegious to admit to that, but there you have it.
• Hiding underneath those in the upper righthand corner are Orange Pecan Cookies. They are a simple but delightful treat.
• Below those are Chocolate Raspberry Cookies. They are excellent. I happened to acquire some raspberry-flavored chocolate chips at a nearby Amish grocery store, so I substituted those for the regular chocolate chips the recipe called for, and I think it was not unwise.
• In the lower righthand corner are Chocolate Pretzel Cookies. These were a tremendous bitch. The dough did not want to be pretzeled. And to be honest, Big K made them while I sat there and drooled and made bon bons by his side. Big K bakes with me on occasion for the holidays. It's really one of the more lovely things about him. When we were discussing our baking plans for this year, he casually suggested we "frost Phook." What's not to love about a guy like that?
• Coming around the bend in the 6 o'clock position we have Terrific Truffles. And the name isn't merely a catchy moniker. Oh no, these bastards are terrific. Now, the recipe I've linked to will tell you you can coat these in crushed candy, coconut, etc. But I have found that the ground pecans are just the best, so now I only do them that way.
• In the lower lefthand corner we have classic cut-out cookies. Now, this is my shortcut of the holiday season. I despise making cut-outs in real life. So I purchase these cut-outs pre-made from a weird nearby store that sells primarily processed chicken, but also stocks frozen cut-out cookies around the holidays. You just bake and frost. We did make the frosting from scratch though, so that has to count for something.
• Just north of the cut-outs we have Pistachio Cranberry Bark. If you want to make something that is candy-like in nature without tearing your hair out, I highly recommend this shit. It is easy as pie and seriously good. My own momma's favorite of the annual Big W offerings.
• To the right of that with the Hershey's kisses on top are the Chocolate Thumbprints. These are another of my personal favorites. Mmmm.
• In the center of the tray you see Dairy State Fudge. How fitting. Chocolate chocolate fudge kind of makes me uncomfortable sometimes, and I like white chocolate. So this is what we made. Not in error, I'll note.
• Finally, there is my crown jewel, which sadly you can barely see in the photo. The Elegant Dipped Cherries. They are just north of the fudge and just south of the bon bons. These are a time-intensive ridiculous bastard of a project. But I've been making them for years. Anything involving a maraschino cherry is worth the effort. (I actually would like a kiddie cocktail right now...). These rule.

Now, if any of you cats clicked on my recipe links, you may have noticed that the vast majority of them are from the Taste of Home website. I'm kind of embarrassed about this, but I have to admit that I am a consumer of the bi-monthly Taste of Home magazine and I am the owner of several of their cookbooks. The reason this is embarrassing is because it might possibly be the cheesiest publication in the history of humankind. There are features on kitchen makeovers...and the "after" picture will make you vomit, such is the quantity of collectible train sets and gingham barstool covers in these homes. There are not-so-subtle religious overtones to all the profiles of the home cooks within the magazines, as in, "I spend the long hours it takes to mill my own flour talking to Jesus." (Okay, people, that was a joke. I'm not trying to mock religion here. It's just that things can get a bit sappy for a cooking magazine.) So anyhow, this is not Le Cordon Bleu. And I get kind of embarrassed about that sometimes. My mom pimps me out to everyone like I am some kind of fancy chef, but really I'm just cooking with Jesus and I happen to be familiar with ingredients about as exotic as a shallot and a caper. So the cat is out of the bag. Nothing fancy here. (Puts tail between her legs in shame and sulks off in search of snack...)

So there you go. I hope you've enjoyed this edition of "Work Product of the Unwell." Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.

Ode to Hode Part Deux

So yesterday was Auntie Hode's 26th birthday. To commemorate her 25th, I wrote this little tribute. Unfortunately, I mentioned her pink car in one of my statements, and then this went and happened on her actual birthday. But she's home safely now, so I think I can try this again.

So, in honor of her 26 years, here are 26 reasons Hode is the coolest person ever.

1) Hode is committed to her fiber consumption. Hode takes fiber chewables, and she liberally sprinkles beans of assorted varieties into her every meal. Hode puts colonic health in its' rightful place.

2) Hode takes up interesting hobbies. This year she got involved in paper crafts, which largely manifested itself as some seriously gorgeous handmade cards. Given that she currently resides in the sort of place where this is a reasonable option, she's seriously considering giving snow-shoeing a go. How 'bout that?

3) Hode's hair gets stuck in her pants. The girl is 5'10" and her hair is long enough to peskily get wedged in her drawers. Do you have any idea how much hair that is? So, she sort of looks like a follower of a rare and very serious religion, but what's wrong with that?

4) Hode is a great aunt. If it weren't for Hode, well, Phook wouldn't have an aunt. Nor would she have winter coats, a Christmas dress, a wagon, or a lot of other things that sure are nice. Phook is lucky to have an Auntie Hode.

5) Hode is obsessed with wildlife in her area. She has a fox, an opossum, several birds of prey, and many other animals that she feels she has a personal relationship with and whom she sees regularly on her "commute" to work. She should be a satellite location for Wendell's Critter Corner.

6) Hode is the mistress of extracurricular activities at the high school where she teaches. I don't even know what all she does, but it's a lot. She's a class advisor. She does stuff for mock trial. She's going to be head softball coach this year after only one year as an assistant coach. I don't know, there's a lot of stuff. She's the teacher who goes to the choir concert because she's asked around and knows no other teachers are going, and that will not stand. She calls me regularly to ask questions about multiplying recipes into army sizes because she's in charge of concessions at yet another event. She is committed to the kids. We need more of her.

7) Hode lives in a premier Wisconsin vacation destination. Big K and I vacationed there quite happily long before she got a job there. But now she lives there. Which means we can "vacation" for like a dollar. Plus, she knows which restaurants the locals favor, because she is one. And she knows all the little tucked in nooks and crannies that the tourists aren't onto yet. It's like an all-access pass to the rad.

8) Hode's iPod contains a rather embarrassing music collection. I'm not going to get into it, but suffice it to say that no one scrolls through her playlists without a chuckle. Then again, it might be because she has a R.O.W.Y.C.O. playlist, which is a Big K invention she co-opted that may or may not stand for "Rock out with your cock out."

9) Hode is environmentally friendly. She does not use paper plates. She does not use extraneous paper or plastic goods of other kinds. Hode is interested in obtaining green products whenever possible. She strives to improve the planet.

10) As a young child, Hode was once sitting in the truck with our father, presumably waiting for me to tear myself away from the mirror to go to church or something. A neighbor kid was hanging out by the shed in our yard. And then he was gone. And a young, innocent Hode looked at my father and said, "That kid must be god damned magic."

11) Hode hates cake. Now, this is a source of some serious angst for me, as I am a cake lover and a cake baker. I have spent unholy amounts of time working on cakes in my day. But Hode, she hates cake. Some discussion of this feature is embedded in this blog post of hers. She will scream and rage at the suggestion she eat cake. She hates the texture. And everything else about cake. So while I can't really support this wholeheartedly myself, I can at least say that she makes up her mind and sticks to it.

12) Hode lies for sport. Not in harmful ways, but in amusing ways. Our dad does this too. Now, me, it never even occurs to me to lie. I just never think of saying anything other than the truth. But Hode, Hode lies to strangers to keep things interesting. For example, she's at the grocery store and the checker making conversation asks if she has any big weekend plans. And Hode will tell the checker that she is going to a concert in Milwaukee, even if she's not. You see, it's not even outlandish lies. It's just not the truth. She does this all the time. She's always encouraging me to "try out lying." I'm working on it.

13) Hode paints my toenails. Hode is skilled with the nail polish. She can make my unnaturally small toenails look quite lovely. She gives me a little pedicure every time she comes home. Man, that's the best.

14) Hode laments the loss of Phook's smallness just like I do. She always talks about how when Phook was little, she'd just curl up and sleep on her chest. And man, was that awesome. Yes, it was. It only lasted like 4 hours, according to my recollection, but we both miss it.

15) Hode was a major outcast as a child. I was an alpha-kid. Hode was short and round. I was tall and un-round. Hode hung out in her room. I hung out with the neighborhood. I was a major, major, major, major dickhead to Hode during our childhood. I led a pack of wolves who mocked her as hobby. When I was a senior in high school and she was a freshman, something shifted and I realized she was the greatest. And I've spent the time since then routinely losing sleep over some of the shit I did to her. And yet, she forgives it all. I don't know how this occurred, but I treated her worse than I've ever treated another human being, and she is today my best friend when she could justifiably be sitting around plotting my death instead.

16) Hode knows quite a bit about girl products. Despite my proclamations of sloth in terms of my personal appearance, I'm actually not a total moron in this area myself, but Hode is a savant. If you need a moisturizer recommendation fine-tuned to your skin type or a forecast on whether or not you'll be able to see your blush by 3 p.m., Hode is your gal.

17) Hode wraps presents in a very attractive manner. I remember once when I was in college, Hode gave me a Christmas gift wrapped between two paper plates held together with tape. (This being prior to the onset of #9.) She was a god-awful wrapper. It was the source of much snort-laughing. But something odd occurred a few years ago. She started acquiring really attractive shiny wrapping papers and started affixing elaborate bows to them. And not even just bows...she uses shit like matching glass ball ornaments and other decorative flourishes. It's really quite lovely to receive a Hode gift that is Hode wrapped and topped with a Hode-made card.

18) Hode gets seriously agitated while playing games. I don't know if you all are familiar with the game Catch Phrase, but it's really fun. Basically you have this little handheld thing that gives you a word you have to get your partner to guess, and you're of course racing the clock. Like that old game show Super Password or whatever it was. Now, Hode is in general a peace-loving individual who will not aggress even under circumstances that would make a nun attack. But when she is playing games such as Catch Phrase, it unleashes her inner demons. If I don't get her clues, she starts screaming, "You are an idiot! You idiot! You idiot! What's wrong with you! I hate you!" and then she'll throw the game thing. Perhaps that sounds more disturbing than anything else to those of you who don't know Hode, but trust me when I say it is hilarious. And she always apologizes when it's over. You gotta love it.

19) Hode, in general, is attracted to the unattractive. Her current boyfriend is a nice-looking chap. But in general, she is drawn to the dog-faced and snaggle-toothed. I'm not going to get specific here since I've recently learned that apparently everyone within a 4-hour radius of The Woods is secretly reading this blog, but Hode is a beautiful girl and she tends to appreciate the beast. That's all.

20) Hode is a big tipper. What I mean by that is that Hode encourages hefty tips without leaving them herself. Back when I was dripping in discretionary income and Hode was in college/student teaching/leaching off society, I frequently took us out to dinner. Sometimes at nice places. And Hode would always say, "He was a good waiter. We should leave him a big tip," knowing all the while that she would not be personally doing any tipping. Of course, the tables have turned and she now occasionally takes me out to dinner. I think we should tip big.

21) Speaking of turned tables, Hode is taking me, just me, to San Diego during her spring break in March. Back when I was better funded, I financed a couple of vacations for the two of us. Once we went to Hilton Head, SC, and once we went to Punxsutawney, PA to see the widely revered groundhog. Now that she has some modest extra income, she is taking me on a trip! She is hauling my pregnant ass to the zoo! Seriously, what could be awesomer? A small 4-day break, free of diapers, mere months before my life totally implodes when baby #2 shows up and turns me into an unwashed lactating zombie. Man is that gonna rule. And man am I gonna be crying into my breastmilk and vomit stained clothing all summer long as I reminisce about it.

22) Hode has an interesting social life. She goes to cool parties for things like the Winter Solstice. And "Ugly Sweater" themed Christmas parties. And a take a big bus on a ferry to an island and get wasted party. And she is a member of a gun club. I'm not shitting you. She owns a handgun and fires it at targets for leisure. And is lauded copiously for her skill in this regard by a lot of burly men. Despite having the bonafides of a gun nut, she thankfully remains in favor of sensible gun control policy and has no interest in joining the Republican party.

23) Hode dances amusingly. Whereas I bop twice per beat, she bops once per every three beats, which is to say that she slowly floats around dance floors, nine feet of hair swirling, and somehow manages to dance slowly and calmly to upbeat tunes without looking totally weird. This could be a metaphor for Hode's life.

24) Hode could survive in the wild for decades. While part of this has to do with the gun proficiency expressed in #22, she really is the kind of cat who could make quite a run of being a survivalist. If someone asks you what 1 thing you'd take if stranded on a desert island/lost in the woods/being left at sea, I strongly suggest you just mysteriously reply, "A girl named Hode."

25) Hode and I can communicate without the inconvenience of having to use words. Perhaps you have this relationship with your spouse or a friend or whatever and know what I mean. I am telling you that Hode and I are wired via satellite technology or some such shit. I can feel what she's thinking without even seeing her expression sometimes. And we have these very freaky moments where we are both having the exact same obscure thought which we reveal to each other later. This is a nice feature.

26) Hode is awesomeness. You know, I've met a lot of people. I even like a few of them. But Hode is just the most amazing combination of funny, smart, weird, weirder, conscientiousness, heart, and a pinch of salt that you could ever hope to meet. I love that Hode.

So, there you go. Happy 26th to the Hosedog Extraordinaire.

Dreams really do come true

Since my previous post was a pathetic lament about my fundamental unwellness, I'd like to take this opportunity to tell you about the most exciting thing to happen in Big W's holiday world since, like, well, since I believed in Santa.

Ornaments. Now, I love Christmas ornaments. Major big time. My parents picked me out an ornament each year of my little life. And other well-wishers gave me a bunch too as a youngster. So I started out with quite a stash. Just for giggles, I'm going to show you my favorite ornament from my childhood, which I refer to the "Parisian gato." Nevermind the French/Spanish disconnect there. Just focus on his jaunty little beret, rotund belly, and sailor suit (sorry the pic is blurry):


And then we got a lot for our wedding. And for Phook. And, well, yes, I bought 10 million of them. Back when I was in the habit of hemorrhaging cash, I indulged in the habit of ornament collection quite fervently. Whenever Big K and I went somewhere, I always got an ornament from the place. Not necessary a tacky souvenir ornament, but I found a place that sold ornaments and bought one there. So that added quite a few to the pile. My favorite from this category is a little ornament set I bought on our honeymoon in San Francisco. These are (obviously) a bride and groom set of fish, but they each have a magnet in their lips so when you hang them on the tree you smack them together and they make out on the tree all season long. These rule. We always save them for last and then Big K puts on his boy fish and I put on my girl fish and we smack them together and give each other a kiss at the same time. Nothing could be cheesier. Nothing could rock more, if you're my kind of dork. Anyhow, here they are:


But by and large, what I went the craziest on was food ornaments. I love food. I love food ornaments. The majority of my food ornaments are these glass Old World Christmas brand ornaments, such as those seen here. They range in price from a couple bucks to maybe a bit over $10 or so. All I know is that I spent several years on a vision quest to obtain lots and lots of these ornaments. And I succeeded. I probably have, oh, 50 or so food ornaments, plus or minus a couple dozen. And for the past several years, I have been dreaming of someday having a food-only Christmas tree. That would be in addition to the standard issue tree. My husband has smiled and nodded.

When we moved into this house a few years back, I deemed it large enough to justify two trees. So I bought a cheap fake one to put up in our dining room, and I got some cheap red and gold ball ornaments and some ribbon and did it up like that. But it was a poorly constructed tree, and Uncle Growler sat in it all the time, and he crushed the damned thing. This year it was clear that it could not be resurrected. So we're sitting here a week or two ago putting up our real, big tree, and I asked Big K for clemency on the subject of him getting frustrated because there are not enough branches to hold all of our ornaments. And he said to me, yes he did, he said to me, "Do you wanna do the food tree this year?"

Tears sprung to my eyes and I immediately began to assess whether this was a cruel joke or whether the man was actually going to acquiesce to my lifelong request for a food tree. It turned out he meant it. Oh, lordy! So, having gotten on the environmentalist bandwagon in recent years, I determined to get a second real tree, only a wee one in comparison to the major tree. And the other day I finally found it. And then we decked out that whole sucker in food. Man, I can't tell you the last time some stupid object turned my frown upside down like that. I was taking hot laps around the dining room yelping like a bastard. My sister called and attempted to converse with me, but I was pretty much just like, "Oh, there's the red onion!" "Oh, there's the taco!" "Oh, there's the beet!" "Oh, there's the eggplant!" Man, the excitement. Man, every time I look at that thing I skip. Man, I think it will be up until President's Day, at the very least.

Here she is (not quite as pretty as in the dark, but I wanted you to see the ornaments and whatnot):

And, since it's the holidays, here is a gratuitous Phook shot post-nap the other day with a gigantic tuft of hair sticking up off the back of her dome:


So, dudes, there it is. I have a food tree. Aw, yeah. Obituary writers take note: it is imperative that mine should prominently state, "And the bitch had a food tree..."

Bring in the reliever...

...cause this momma is done. I am a dolt. A moron. A fool. An imbecile. Seriously.

So I had gotten all smug in this post about how I wasn't going to rush my holiday preparations so I could enjoy them. Of the things I had yet to do when I wrote that post, the only one that I completed at a leisurely pace with no stress was the shopping. I bought almost everything over the interwebs this year. Believe it or not, delivery trucks do come to The Woods. That went off without a hitch. The rest of that shit I just procrastinated. Well, it wasn't technically procrastinating. First, we had the illness and death of the stepfather-in-law, which will (justifiably) put a cramp in your holiday planning, not to mention your holiday spirits, not to mention your own will to live. Then we have the little matter of the gestation of the as-yet-unnamed creature in my womb. Cue coma. And that's really it. Those two things were enough that when I woke up on Monday morning I just about puked, and not just for the morning sickness. It occurred to me I had a week remaining before said holiday and I had all kinds of shit to do.

Now, for the last couple of months, I have really seriously slowed down the Big W pace. I'm not just saying that because my mom reads this either. I have been so dog tired that there has been daytime sitting. Despite the sitting, I don't even turn on the TV, as that would require far too much effort and attention-paying. I have taken several naps per week during Phook's naps, and I've been going to bed in the neighborhood of 8 p.m. I've even crossed off a few of my Motivated Moms jobs without doing them if they seemed really dumb. And I never fake the funk on a to-do list. Never. So things have been chill here out of necessity.

But then it was Monday. I realized I had to hit the rocket boosters. But, damn, those rocket boosters are malfunctioning. I have killed myself the last three days to get my holiday ducks in a row. And I am dying. The only reason I'm even writing this post is because I have an elaborate cookie dough firming up in the fridge that I can't do anything with for another good 45 minutes. Man, I even gave myself an anomalous domestic injury today. Seriously. I think I pulled every muscle in my left shoulder/upper arm. It is excruciating. It hurts to push down the dispenser on my bathroom hand soap. This is not one of those things that will feel better in the morning. I'd really like to take 300 ibuprofen and a few hearty pulls off of a whiskey bottle, but the March of Dimes really advises against that sort of thing. So anyhow, I have no idea how I did it. But I suspect it was during the day today, during the execution of any of the following tasks (in no particular order):

• Make bed
• Do dishes (96 times)
• Clean bathroom mirrors
• Clean bathroom sink
• Clean bathtub/shower
• Dust all lightbulbs (one of the dumber Motivated Moms jobs, but I did it)
• Declutter office (including bookcase, desk, storage cabinet)
• Clean up Big K's coffee area in the office (just to be nice)
• Go through bookcase and purge a bunch of books
• Go through cupboard and purge a bunch of random shit
• Clean/declutter top and sides of fridge
• Vacuum upstairs
• Sweep office
• Sweep upstairs rooms with hardwood floors
• Wrap 20 presents
• Frame 15 Phook pics for gifts
• Do 5 loads of laundry & put away clean stuff
• Discover cat vomit on Phook's diaper changer thingy, treat stain accordingly and launder
  
• Dust bedrooms
• Make Phook some lunch (what it was escapes me now)
• Eat lunch (Phook scraps followed later by some pita chips & hummus)
  
• Make Phook dinner (bacon, eggs, toast)
• Make self dinner (salad)
• Change 6 poopie Phook dipes (I suspect teething drool is the culprit behind the copious defecation)
• Discover the pregnancy of 16-year-old Jamie Lynn Spears, and contemplate why I have to compete with yet another unplanned Spears family pregnancy for cover space on US Weekly when they do their "bump watch" features
  
• Supervise Phook closely enough to ensure she doesn't fall on a knife, samurai sword, or upturned nail file
  
• Bake 2 batches of Christmas cookies (1 still in progress)
• Drink 19 gallons of sugar-free generic pink lemonade to ensure some sense of hydration
• Piss bi-hourly
  
• Socialize briefly w/ father (who coincidentally turned 60 today) when he stopped to pick something up
  
• Pick up Phook toys 19 times
• Make list of foods to take to various holiday events
• E-mail approx. 5 buddies
• Check approx. 15 blogs for new posts
• E-mail stepmother-in-law to check on recently discovered discrepancy in dates for holiday get together to be held at our house...discover that she e-mailed me the wrong date...realize that holiday get together to be held at our house may thusly occur any day between tomorrow and Valentine's Day
  
• Occasionally check to make sure Phook isn't eating too much paste in the corner
• Clean out purse/wallet
• Change dish towel/dish cloth/hand towel in bathroom
  
• Administer 2 Phook naps (one sketchy, one fine)
• Hose self off in shower
• Regard naked self in mirror briefly, admiring andouille sausage-like form, simultaneously contemplating whether existing stretch marks will do the trick with this pregnancy, or whether they will require friends
  
• Water Xmas trees (yes, trees, plural, more on that in future post)
  
• Repair damage done by Phook in her current favorite harmless but messy "inventory management" projects - Xmas card bin, Big K's video game stash in the entertainment center, pots and pans cupboard - minimum of thrice per each
• Uselessly attempt to tidy room at top of stairs housing a bunch of spillover from Lodge project
• Say hello to husband for 9 seconds as he whisks in between day job and teaching of a class to drop of the lettuce I urgently required for aforementioned salad, which I forgot to mention was a craving
  
• Feed cats, scratch them occasionally, try not to laugh when Phook feeds Uncle Growler from the high chair
  
• Take giant laundry basket full of purged goods out to van for future Goodwill donation

Like, seriously. Is it possible that I actually did all this today? And Lord knows my brain is cooked, so I'm forgetting half the shit. And this is Day 3 of my bonanza. Now, don't worry, Motivated Moms only told me to do a little of it. It's not that irrational of a program. No, I'm the irrational one. You see, I started the day really committed to finishing up my baking, which is probably the heaviest of my ridiculous self-imposed burdens. But then I got busy with some Motivated Moms chores and one thing led to another and I was panicking and cleaning like a total lunatic. God. I wish I could get off my own back.

I've been doing really well with avoiding the freakshow cleaning episodes lately, but I am feeling the (completely imagined) pressure to complete holiday tasks (mainly the baking and present-wrapping at this point). So rather than do the holiday tasks, I find myself on my hands and knees under the desk in the office having some serious words with dust bunnies. What is that? Really? What is that?

So I don't know. I have a domestic injury. I strongly suspect the last item on the list above. I have to complete the cookies previously mentioned. If my husband were home right now instead of teaching his class, I can guarantee you he'd throw me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and haul me to bed with extreme prejudice. He does not stand for the wife and her idiocy when it becomes this extreme.

What I have left to do tomorrow, as far as I can tell, is my final 2 cookie recipes. And I have to convince my dad to stop and pick me up some picture frames on his way home from work (he works in a town with actual commerce in it) so I can frame the remaining Phook pics for their lucky recipients. And then wrap those. And then, I think, I have completed my holiday preparations. Except of course for making non-cookie food for actual holiday events that have yet to occur. But I'm not thinking about that at this juncture. No. What I'm thinking about is all the alcohol I can't drink. This happened with Phook too. I drink like 3 times per year, tops. And then I get knocked up and I'm all crazed for booze. Go figure.

Oh, I'm raving like a jackass. I deeply apologize for the nonsense that is this post. I gotta go. The dough beckons.

Did you notice the giant crevice in the earth?

Because, seriously, I think I split it open with my activities yesterday. For reals.

Now, on this here blog, I tell you a lot of shit. A lot of pretty personal shit. What I don't do very often is talk about how hard it is to be a parent. Sure, I tell you anecdotes about our little daily disasters and I fret about some shit on occasion. But I don't go deep into the places where a parent's mind can go. I sometimes worry that I paint too rosy of a picture of my emotional well-being, and that harried moms might read it and feel guilty that I'm all bed-of-roses about motherhood 99% of the time, when they spend a lot of time feeling crappy. Well, here it is people. Sometimes I feel crappy too.

This mom-ing, it is hard. There are certainly challenges in the day-to-day tasks of taking care of a child or children. Your kid spits out their food, you're tired, it's frustrating. You just want to chill for a minute--you need to--and junior just wants to scream. There are those sorts of things that any thinking person can probably imagine easily. But the part that is truly hard is several layers deeper than that. It's the stuff that people hint at when you're pregnant, that you can't imagine until it happens. It's the fact that you are, by and large, no longer the true navigator of your own ship. Whatever you want to do, from using the bathroom to going outside to taking a trip, has to be processed first through the filter of parent. Do I want to go to the bathroom with an audience for the 9 millionth time or wait until the kid goes to bed so I can toilet in privacy? Is it worth bundling up this kid and dealing with their anger when it is time to come back in in order to spend a few minutes outside? Can the child take this trip without making it not worth doing? Everything. When you wake up, it is not you who comes to mind. Not even a little bit. Your wants, your needs, your self are all in the back seat. Or maybe the trunk. Or maybe they're still home in the garage.

This is hard. I love being a mom more than anything, but there are times when I miss myself a little bit. Like I'm talking to my sister on the phone and she tells me that she is painting her toenails, then she is running out to grab some Chinese food, and then she is going to stop and have a drink at a friend's house, and then she is going to finish a homemade card she is making. And I am so filled with envy that it aches down to my toes. Not the actual things that she is doing per se, but the fact that she can just do them without making plans of how to accommodate someone else first. There is no nap schedule or meal schedule or someone else's mittens to consider. She just goes about her business. Her business. Oh I wish I could have known how awesome it was when it was my own business I was concerned with. But you can never know. You just can't.

Now, I know it has become popular for women to talk about taking care of themselves in order to be good mothers. The oft-cited "put on your oxygen mask before you assist others" sort of thing. You can't turn on Oprah without seeing a well-coiffed woman explain how she used to say yes to everything, and now she says no, and uses that time on herself and is so much happier for it. Mothers of young children, if you can actually do this, I sincerely applaud you. It is the correct course of action. It is true, however trite it may sound, that you have to love yourself before you can love anyone else. I completely suck at this. Suck. Prior to yesterday, I cannot remember the last time I was in the car by myself. I just can't. It is true that I have some time in the evenings after Phook goes to bed, and this is more than a lot of moms probably get, particularly single moms who are just unbelievably awe-inspiring to me, but I don't use the time I do have correctly. I do stuff around the house. I do things that aren't relaxing. I do not use it to focus on myself. The last couple months I've used it to sleep, but that is more of a physiological necessity than an honest effort at self-care.

This occasionally results in me screaming and crying. Last weekend we drove about 90 miles each way in order to spend a couple of hours with my former co-workers at their holiday party, since they invited me as an esteemed alumnus. It was so awesome to see the people who were my closest friends for so many years, and some of whom I quite honestly miss so deeply it surprises even me sometimes when I feel the ache for one of them. Several times during this trip, my husband mentioned what it was costing in gas money to do this. When we got home, I screamed and cried for an extended period of time because it was so gigantically important to me to be able to see these people, and how dare he mention the cost. I railed that I never asked for anything I needed, and I would have paid any amount of gas money to see them. Now Big K had intended no offense in his comments, and he probably didn't deserve the brunt of my psychotic break. But it highlighted for me that I do in fact have needs, and some of them have to even be met on occasion, or this is going to get ugly.

So I made a plan. I actually decided to take some action. I have been hoarding gift certificates. I had a gift certificate for a hair salon I used to frequent back in my more moneyed days. I have been getting my hair trimmed every 6 months or so at a local joint where I pay $10 for a cut, but I haven't dyed it forever. It has been looking ashy brown on top (my real hair) and the other 8 feet of it are bronzy bleached out from the sun on old red dye. So I called and made an appointment. Then I busted out my gift certificate for a prenatal massage that Big K gave me before I had Phook. I went on bed rest before I ever had the chance to use it. So I called the spa and made an appointment for a massage. And then I heard my voice ordering up a pedicure too, on the grounds that I had hoarded birthday money and old cash from Christmas bonuses past that I couldn't ever bring myself to spend. I told Big K and he was clearly proud.

So yesterday, when the earth was splitting open in front of your house, it was because I was off being dyed, massaged, and polished. I was all by myself. I felt very light. It was lovely. I am extremely happy with my hair, which I had dyed a chestnut-y brown and layered a little bit. I paid the extra $5 for a French pedicure even. I love that, and the last time I had it was for my wedding. I deeply resented the mandatory 18% gratuity, but other than that it was gift certificates well spent.

Then I came home and Big K busted out some additional gift certificates we had been hoarding for the movie theater. Grandma N, Big K's mom, had graciously agreed to babysit on short notice, and she seemed happy to do it, which made me happy for her. She needs some happy. Phook was pleasantly playing with her when we left and didn't even cry or show the slightest hint of giving a rat's ass that we were leaving. We went to a movie that I detested, I Am Legend, largely because the dog dies. I do not do well with movies in which the dog dies. But I got popcorn. I got to hold a big hand instead of a little one. We drove around for a few minutes afterwards looking at Christmas lights. When we got home, Grandma N seemed in good spirits and reported that Phook had retired for her without incident. All around good.

While I really wish I had the finances to treat myself to regular spa days, I know that is unrealistic, and what I'm really hoping is that I can just make at least a little progress on this issue. This is a hard thing for me. I am more of a self-flogger, never thinking I have done enough, than a self-lover who can really make good choices for herself. I know it is obvious and important, but it just doesn't come easy. And my financial limitations are very, very real. That gas money was worth considering.

I have a great husband who refuses to use the word "babysit" when watching Phook, because he says you can't babysit your own child. So thank you Lord for that. Now all I need is the personal capacity to put on that cheesy metaphorical oxygen mask more than once every 15 months. If you can tell me how to do that, buddies, props to you.

Henceforth, I would like you to refer to me as Myrtle...

...because it turns out I am ridiculously fertile. Oh, people, I am pregnant. And I have been for a very long 12 weeks. Every single ranting post of NaBloPoMo needs to be edited to add, "And on top of all that, I am pregnant!" Every single boring post of NaBloPoMo needs to be removed and replaced with a tale of hilarity relating to the ten thousand deaths of the first trimester. Every single post needs about 47 comments added to it that read, "Wow, I can't believe you're posting all this when you're pregnant! Way to go, champ!" And that recent post on nearly pissing myself? Read it again with this knowledge, ladies with experience in this matter. Read it and weep.

I can't tell you how sad I am that my nervous need for discretion actually trumped my need to blog. Because I have had a LOT to say on this topic. I could have done a minimum of 20 posts on how the magical combination of pregnancy hormones, the onset of dry winter weather, death-in-the-family stress, and extreme fatigue-induced lapses in my evening skincare routine have resulted in the most offensive complexion I've ever had the pleasure of sporting. My face looks like a coconut pizza, which is to say it is a lovely blend of angry red spots and white, flaking dryness. That's blogging gold right there.

Yes, friends, pregnant. Big K and I decided that we would "see what happened" around about Phook's 1st birthday. What happened, as I recall, was that he gave me a casual high five one day as we crossed paths at the sink while brushing our teeth and then the next morning I felt like barfing. The endless heart-wrenching saga of Phook's long-delayed conception apparently will not have a sequel. And I cannot tell you how relieved and happy I am about this. Being a pre-worrying worrier, I was highly concerned that Phook's appearance on the scene was that one in a billion shot of a predominantly infertile couple actually hitting the lotto. I was prepared for no more children, or for children seven years apart that would forever live in a tent because we had sold our home and all our belongings to pay for in vitro or donor eggs or something. But no, we actually won the lottery. It appears we are bonafide fertiles. I feel that this is the first big thing that ever came easy for us. It is such a tremendous blessing. Oh, pregnant pregnant pregnant. Thank you thank you thank you.

So I am due on June 30. Phook was born into this world to a clap of thunder and some giant lightning. Perhaps this child will be born on the 4th of July to fireworks. That'd be neato, especially if it was one of those big orange spidery fireworks. Let me save you the math and inform you that the kidlets will be about 21 months apart. Let me also note that due to the funny tricks of the school year calendar, they will be in subsequent grades. Man, I can't wait until they are both in junior high. Woof will that be a fun year!

As with Phook, I have been raging a continuous battle against nausea. I do not vomit. I just want to. However, this particular pregnancy's nausea has been easier to manage than with Phook because I mysteriously have no food aversions. With Phook I could eat nothing other than white foods (pasta, rice) and Arby's roast beef sandwiches. With this kid, I can (and do) eat everything, including the ultimate ralph-o-matic of my Phook pregnancy, dairy products. Mmm, yogurt. Basically I feel like chuffing if I don't eat a little something every couple of hours. But that can be managed. What has been much harder this time is the fatigue. Oh Lordy, have I been tired. During my Phook gestation I was working long hours plus commuting three hours per day, and I definitely came home and collapsed on the couch immediately at 7 p.m. With this kid though, I have been in a semi-coma for three months. I could not do my job if I still had it. Never have I known this kind of fatigue. It's like my body is encased in something of jello-like viscosity and yet I still have to attempt to move. Luckily, it's starting to chill the fuck out now. Let's hope that trend continues for the sake of everyone's hygiene.

As for my person, well, I am sausage-like in nature. I can still button some of my fat pants from my larger days (one nice bonus of at one point actually having been fatter), but it's getting dicey. I haven't gained much of any weight yet, but that is utterly mystifying to me since I seriously look like a chorizo. I probably could have hidden my Phook pregnancy until about month 8 if I'd been all after-school-special about it. This is a perceived benefit of being a "big boned" six footer...lots of room to hide that baby. But I actually kind of hated it, because I never got much in the way of pregnant lady courtesy, and some bitch gave me the evil eye when I parked in a pregnant lady spot at a grocery store in the big city when I was like 6 months along. I just looked well-fed for most of the experience. Perhaps this is weird of me, but I want my belly to explode into pregnant giantness whenever it is willing to do so. I don't want people eying me awkwardly in fucking May. The only time I am completely comfortable with my body is during pregnancy. I like it. It's working hard. There is nothing to be ashamed of. I am full of self-love only in pregnant hugeness. Bring it on.

I do have one gnawing problem with this pregnancy. What should I call the child for purposes of blogging? I can't really just say Phook 2.0 or something, because the kid will have a complex. My sister was thinking "The Squatter" since it's living in Phook's previous apartment, but that may also give the kid a complex, as if it has no native rights to the uterus by virtue of its secondness. I don't want anything to do with the word "fetus," because that is what I called Phook throughout my pregnancy with her for the purposes of dehumanizing something I wouldn't allow myself to get attached to, since I lived in absolute terror of losing the pregnancy up until the moment she arrived alive. Possibly I could go with "Changling" or "Manimal." I don't know, what do you think? I'm open to suggestions here.

We will not be finding out the gender of this kid, just as we passed on that info for Phook. In all other aspects of my life I am the ultimate planner, but I just like the ultimate surprise of finding out what's cooking in that belly when s/he shoots into the universe. It's like the bestest Christmas morning ever. Not knowing does have its downsides, but that's okay. After doing the work of bringing that kid into the world I like to get the biggest possible joyous surprise. Big K is certain it's a boy, for the record. I'm certain he is too much of a meatheaded alpha-male to be able to produce anything other than curly-haired girls, for karmic reasons. I have no mother's intuition on the subject and I have had no dreams as of yet. So we shall see.

I went to the doctor today for my prenatal appointment. There was a scary moment where she detected some mild "spotting" (albeit undetectable to me) upon checking my she-bits, and then a very scary moment where she could not find the heartbeat with the Doppler. She busted out the ultrasound though and there it was, a little person with a little heartbeat. Hands and feet and all those sorts of things you like to see on a human. I'm kind of in retroactive panic mode right now, not really having had the opportunity to properly panic in the minute that this all transpired, but I am repeating to myself that seeing a good heartbeat on a 12 weeker is a pretty good sign you're gonna end up with a kid. There is simply no room for thinking of alternatives.

So, pregnant, pregnant, pregnant. Thank you thank you thank you.

Oh, piss

So Phook's naps of late have been "challenging." She never has been an A+ napper, but since we got her in the crib at 5 months of age she has generally taken two per day without putting up much of a fuss. The problem, historically speaking, is that she seems to sleep less than she needs. It's pretty typical for at least one of her two daily naps to only last as long as a single sleep cycle - about 40 minutes. We've tried lots of things to put her back down when this occurs, but it usually ends in at least one person crying a lot and rarely ends in anyone getting more sleep. She is raring to go and wants out of that crib, but then needs another nap long before she really should, but wouldn't be willing to take it if we attempted to put her right back down a half hour or whatever after a mini-nap. She usually takes at least one good nap (meaning 1.5 hours or more) per day, and all in all it isn't really much to complain about. I don't believe that every child can be expected to sleep any specific amount of time...I'm not saying her actual hours slept are problematic. I just think that based on the way her days go, she has fairly often needed a little more daytime sleep than she has gotten. That's just the way things have been around here for a good long while.

However, in the past few weeks, Phook has started a new nap pattern that is uncool. She very clearly demonstrates her Phook-signs of fatigue, which include eye-rubbing, whining, and burying her face in soft things. When asked if she want to "go nigh-night" she lets out a low affirmative growl and runs to the door at the bottom of stairway and starts banging on it. There could be no clearer nonverbal indication that a kid is ready for her nap beyond her banging on the door that accesses her sleeping place. So that part is good. But then we take her up and put her down. She rests quietly for awhile and then revives. Sometimes she will mess around on her own for an hour or more and eventually go to sleep. That's ok. Sometimes, however, she starts howling and has convinced herself that the very idea of a nap was a bad idea. Then I battle her. I go into her room, bundle her up and put her back down, sometimes stand and rock her (something I'd never done before age 13 months or so...which seems backwards and probably a bad thing to even dabble in at this point), etc. Sometimes one intervention along these lines works. However, sometimes about 47 of these interventions are required, and the end result may or may not be a nap. It's kinda hard.

I'm not going to whine about this like a freakshow who really thinks she has it bad, because I am very aware that children's sleep issues can be so intensely bad and so intensely life-altering that this barely warrants mention in a semi-public forum. I'm just setting the stage for my tale. I strongly suspect that these issues are the beginning of her transition into a one-nap kid. If she wasn't begging for that morning nap, she wouldn't even be getting it at this point. So I'm considering this a stage to be lived through.

So yesterday morning, she spent 1.75 hours in the crib...the first hour quietly rolling around and resting and the last 45 minutes with me intervening regularly...and had no nap. The remainder of the morning went poorly. We both have colds...hers waning and draining and mine freshly kicking my ass. I think we're both getting a little cagey without our regular outdoor activity time on account of the weather. She wasn't particularly interested in lunch. So by the time 12:30 rolled around and she was practically passed out on her feet, we decided we'd both go down a little early for a siesta. I took her up and she went right to sleep. I then went into our room with the slight sensation of having to pee. I really, really wanted to collapse into that bed and sleep off just a little of my cold. I didn't want to go back downstairs to pee. Stupid.

I crashed out on the bed and got all nestled in it, and the nagging need to go to the bathroom kept me from fully drifting off. I hate that, my bad decision-making. Just as I was about to go completely coma though despite my increasing discomfort, I heard Phook's wail. It had been about 40 minutes. This would not stand. Despite my relative calm on the overall issue of her napping, 40 minutes in an entire day is patently unacceptable. I went and got her and made an attempt at the thing which NEVER works, despite having attempted it probably about 50 times. I brought her back to our bed and laid down with her. To my complete and utter amazement, she took her Sleep Guy (little lovey dude she sleeps with), put him over her face, and went back to sleep on my arm.

This is my definition of bliss. Fully documented in the archives of this blog, you will find a grand recounting of our days as co-sleepers. The little nugget slept in my armpit for five months. I did not sleep for five months: I stared at her instead. We eventually reached a point where we had to move her to her crib because she developed this pesky little habit of nursing every 45 minutes all night long to fall back to sleep. I cannot tell you how much I mourned that move. I would have let that kid sleep with us until junior high if it hadn't started to impede her own growth. Every single night I go into her room to check on her before I go to bed, and I often find myself plopping down next to the crib and sitting there for embarrassing lengths of time. If her cheek happens to be pressed up against the crib, I will press mine to it or sneak kisses through the rails like a jailhouse lover. You see, the child does not snuggle or sit. And she has a strong preference for using her own wee legs for locomotion. I so miss those months of constant contact. I will miss them when I'm 70.

So back to reality. The child has passed out in my bed on my arm. My heart rate is probably somewhere around 140. I am so happy that this has happened. However, my sheer joy is marred by one big thing. I have to piss. Not a little bit. Major, major piss. I'm talking the kind of piss where you've been bonging caffeine on an overnight road trip and you've been playing a dangerous game of "I can wait one more exit" for about three states. So on the one hand, I am feeling complete euphoria as my little creature, asleep in all her angelic perfectness, is cashed out on my arm. Her cheeks are pink from the warm of sleep, her lips slightly parted, she's making cute little sleep noises, and she is occasionally "starting her farter," which is my name for what I consider to be the endearing nature of her wind-breaking. (Yes, I am charmed by my kid's farts. I need an intervention.) On the other hand, my bladder is about to explode. Or at the very least just completely give way in my bed. I am not exaggerating. It turns out that I sustained damage to my ladyparts during childbirth that will require surgical repair when I'm done with all this child-bearing nonsense. My lady parts are not well. I piss myself a lot in the best of times. So I am torn here between the most blissful moment of the past 10 months and the fact that I'm about to lose the not unsubstantial contents of my bladder all over my relatively new mattress.

I determine that I must do something. I'm thinking that Phase 1 of my plan is to extract my arm from under her head. After fretting about this for probably 15 minutes, I finally make my move. She wakes up with a cry. She turns and starts to extricate herself from our nest. I calmly pick her up and put her back down where she was, sans my arm as a pillow, and pray. A second miracle...she drifts back off. I'm practically weeping with joy here...I get a few more minutes of love. But the bladder. Oh the bladder. You bastard, bastard bladder. I am now technically free of her, but my body is half of her nest. We don't have an upstairs bathroom that I can run to either. At this point, I could think only of the small metal garbage can in the hallway. I spent a good 10 minutes seriously thinking about removing the bag from the can and just peeing into it, thinking that if I didn't have to go down the creaky steps my chances of not waking her would be better. I really almost did it. The honest thing that stopped me? This blog. I had already thought as I was lying there in this quandary that I would have to blog about the situation. And as I got seriously close to squatting over a small metal trash can, the one thing that stopped me was the knowledge that if I did it, I'd have to tell the whole world. You have so much power, people.

I have now passed discomfort and pain and I'm kinda hallucinating. I can't imagine breaking this spell with Phook, but it is no longer a matter of choice. I give her one last snuggle and kiss, pack her in with pillows, and sneak away, creaking every loose board in my ancient house. I get to the bathroom, my belly cramping and screaming, and finally find my relief. It feels like about 9 minutes. But I remain optimistic. I hear no cries of an arisen Phook. I sneak back upstairs thinking, "Maybe, just maybe, I can slide back into our nest and catch a little napper myself." And then I see her. She is sitting up right where she had been sleeping, holding onto Sleep Guy and smiling at me. Rats. Glass shattered. Spell broken. It'll probably never happen again. Me, crestfallen. Oh I rue the moment I opted not to pee on my way up the stairs. We might still be asleep if not for that. Self-inflicted wounds tend to be acutely painful.

Oh, Phook, I love ya.

Let us change the subject

And now I would like to share with you the following:

This photo was taken yesterday at the Packers/Raiders game at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin. As we know, Big K and Phook are Raiders fans. So when I saw these two interlopers cruising around Lambeau, I insisted my husband be photographed with them. They very kindly (and scarily) obliged. We won't discuss the offensive tightness of my husband's peen-like hat. Let's just enjoy the moment instead.

And now I would like to commit the very same offense that got me lambasted in my previous post. I'm going to tell you about Drunk Bastard. Let me start off by saying that this is a post of love, not hate. Of tolerance and appreciation, not intolerance and slander. Is that clear? Okay, then we will proceed.

Drunk Bastard is a longtime attendee of Packers games. I recall seeing him at games during my high school years, so he's probably been attending for at least a decade. And in the years prior to that, I was probably just too self-conscious about my moon boots to notice any other life forms, so he's probably been attending far longer. Drunk Bastard is probably in his mid to early forties. He's got the look of a man who may have at one time been mildly athletic, but has long since had one too many stogies and steaks. This is to say he has a belly and a double chin but a relatively shapely behind (I would know; we sit a couple rows behind him). Drunk Bastard also appears to be of above average means. He wears a fancy gold watch, fancy gold necklace, expensive leather gear, and the like. He always has a fistful of bills he uses to throw twenties at the beer man each time he passes. The woman I presume to be his wife wears diamond earrings the size of peas. At warmer weather games, he has on occasion worn gear bearing the name of a car dealership. And I may or may not have googled this dealership a couple years ago and discovered that he either owned it or was a big shot at it...I can't remember now either way, but suffice it to say he is in all likelihood in auto sales and seems to be doing well.

Drunk Bastard is an enthusiastic cheerleader. Drunk Bastard celebrates each 1st down as if it were a Super Bowl victory. Drunk Bastard gets drunk at every single game. I once counted, and he drank something like 14 beers before they quit serving during the fourth quarter. And I can only presume him to be a tailgater. Drunk Bastard's drunkenness manifests itself in several ways, all of which I appreciate. He frequently mimes the "1st down" hand signal performed by referees when this feat is achieved. However, Drunk Bastard turns to the crowd behind him to begin his signal and then executes a turn to the forward facing with extreme gusto as he extends his hand out in jubilation. As Drunk Bastard gets drunker, this move merely slows itself down and increases in its level of detail.

Drunk Bastard is also a dancer, and seems particularly fond of the YMCA. His moves, although heavily white in their styling as you might expect, are pretty good. He does things like the sprinkler. And the grocery cart. That sort of shit. He also likes to bump and grind with nearby ladies. I am curious about his arrangement with his (presumed) wife, because although she is always in attendance, they rarely sit next to each other. Yesterday they were with another man and another woman, and it appeared to be a wife swap situation. Drunk Bastard's wife was flirting with this other dude and Drunk Bustard was quite cozy with a young lady to his left. She may have been his wife's sister...there was some resemblance. But this is merely the stuff of my imagination.

What I did not imagine was a scene at the last regular season game a couple of years ago. Our section has a regular beer man. Beer man is middle aged and not quite fit enough to be hoofing it up to the heights of row 55 where we sit, but he does it every single game. Beer man is outfitted with this hand contraption that is something of a sling over his thumb and pointer finger. In the middle of the sling is a device to help beer man remove the bottle caps from the beer he is serving. So it is the last game of the season, and beer man comes up to Drunk Bastard. They exchange pleasantries, and then it happens. Beer man slides off his device and hands it, with extreme affection, to Drunk Bastard. Drunk Bastard, I swear, teared up. They hugged a little longer than men usually do and promised to catch up again at the first preseason game of the following year. This is the true stuff of the Frozen Tundra.

One of the cheers done by the crowd at Lambeau is this little ditty played over the loudspeakers followed by the crowd yelling "Go Pack Go!" at the insistence of the giant television screens, which clearly display the preferred wording for the chant. Once during our teen years, my sister and I witnessed Drunk Bastard, in a typically drunken state, mixing up this complicated phrase and screaming, "Pack Go Pack!" in lieu of the standard syntax. We now routinely yell "Pack Go Pack" as a tribute to Drunk Bastard.

Yesterday I saw Drunk Bastard's wife regard her seat, which had been crunched to a smaller size after the crowd rose at one point, and state, "How am I supposed to fit all this greatness (gesturing to her ample behind) in that little spot?" I also read her lips telling the person behind her that she stops drinking in the 4th quarter. She then looked at the game clock, which revealed about 4 minutes left in the 4th quarter, looked at her beer, and chuckled that she had missed her cut-off. Oops. So I suspect her to be saucy as well. I also suspect that I watch people more than I watch the game, and drinking hot cocoa at this sort of event so as to be able to observe the Drunk Bastards with extreme clarity is never a faulty choice.

The Drunk Bastard family has brought my family a lot of joy for many years. We look forward to seeing them, and feel their absences acutely. I love Drunk Bastard. The thing is that Drunk Bastard, although always drunk, is never really a bastard, which is a real rarity at this sort of event. At this special time of year, I give thanks for Drunk Bastard. Let us all rejoice in Drunk Bastard.

Say "Cheese!"

Oh fuck me in the goat ass. Today was one of those days that was a total swing and a miss. Let me tell you all about it.

I had gotten my act together and scheduled Phook to have some pictures taken at 11:30 this morning. I was pleased. A major item off of my to-do list. I had a fucking coupon. The fates chuckled.

I went and got Phook from her crib this morning, and she had snot pouring down her face. My initial reaction was mild panic. But then I realized that Day 1 of a snot-o-rama isn't the worst day for pictures. Generally Day 5 is pretty bad, when the nose/face is entirely red and irritated from the incessant wiping and chafing and general dicking around. So I decided to hold my head high and press forward.

We breakfasted. Phook barely breakfasted. A lack of appetite on a Phook is an anomaly and should be regarded with extreme trepidation. But I ignored the signs. Phook then went about her business. Her business includes pushing various objects around the house. One such object is the metal trash can from our office, which is about 18 inches high. Not unlike laundry baskets, cardboard boxes, and toys of all sizes, a small metal trash can makes a great "car" to drive. We allow this, being reckless fools. So I'm messing in the kitchen and Big K is in the office (still home today for post-funeral recovery), and all of a sudden I hear a crash and the loud, piercing cry which follows only from true injury. Big K's back was to Phook when the incident occurred, so the details are murky, but it essentially involves the can going over and her smashing her face into the rim of the thing.

After some screaming, snotting, and the eventual soothing of the acute situation, it became rather apparent that the child had a giant shiner under her right eye. Being an asshole determined to get those all-important pictures, I put her to bed for her morning nap and thanked the Lord we share a skin tone, and therefore have the same needs in terms of cosmetic spackling. When she woke up (far too early, I'll note, on account of said snot), I applied some concealer to the shiner and we determined to go to the photo shoot, since I wasn't going to "get all anal" about it. (I was proud of this declaration, let me tell you.)

On the way there, I realized her dress did not have the white stripe in it that I had imagined there, and hence the white tights I had packed would be unsavory. So the first thing I did was run into the store and look for black tights, which they only had in size 0-6 months. I bought them anyhow. I come back to the photo area and see my child, whose shiner is deepening by the minute, whose face is puffing by the second, and whose snot is dripping by the gallon, with her freshly laundered hair in horrifying static-filled tufts. I saw the error of my ways, but found the inner resolve to dress her in her formal wear and overly taut hosiery nonetheless.

At this point we shove her on the little dog show stand and attempt to bring out her charming side. No. The child dislikes the accommodations. The assface "photographer" does not snap photos at the moments that seem opportune. She just keeps chirping as the child increases in restlessness. Finally she snaps. The photo is rather charming, but her dress is all messed up and its under-layers of puffery are poking out and it looks kinda dumb. And this being a low-buck operation, we are informed no cropping is available. And we are informed that for our incredibly cheap introductory package, we cannot go back to a photo once we have passed on it. It's like photography Deal or No Deal. Gamble there is more in the next case? Or take our $1 and be done with it? We gambled. Bad call. Each subsequent picture got worse. The child, who I believe to be currently teething about 98 molars, kept shoving her paw in her grill and gnawing on it. The snot started flowing more freely. The drool mechanism was activated. She got tired and started throwing her face down on the little table she was sitting on. It was a complete and utter shit fest.

There was a time where we were of the mindset where we would just keep at this until the desired result was achieved, regardless of how unlikely the possibility of such a result was becoming. We would not be reenacting this nightmare at some point in the future. No we would not. The "photographer" then began suggesting with increasing insistence that we consider rescheduling. Phook began making what I call her "goat faces," which basically consist of scrunching up her features until she becomes unrecognizable, whining in a wounded animal sort of way, and occasionally snorting like a pig. She began to view being seating on the little table as something akin to being seated on a doctor's examining table, crying at the sight of it. (Okay, she's never done that. But kids do at some point. I have my sources, and I know this to be true.) Regardless, we were fucked. Uncomfortably.

By now the next victim is in the waiting area, hovering with their lovely child and sending glances that conveyed both sympathy and the implication that I was an asshole across the room. After singing the alphabet song for the 198th time and playing peek-a-boo with a ratty bear that had been used to taunt god knows how many little bastards into dopey submission no less than six trillion times, I called it.

And then I threw a tantrum. I am not shitting you. I threw my bags of Phookquipment onto the ground in the waiting area, and then I threw myself on the floor. On my back. I laid on the floor and thrashed mildly for a moment and loudly lamented not wanting to have to go through this production again. Knowing the shiner will have deepened and unattractively yellowed by the time our rescheduled appointment rolls around. Knowing we will be to the raw, red nose stage. Knowing that there are times when you cannot make things work the way you want them to, no matter how much of a control freak you are. (Control freaks hate this.)

At this point, my husband lovingly accused me of teaching Phook how to tantrum, and I was forced to collect myself and continue with my business. We then went to lunch. As we were pulling into the establishment, I was saying to Big K, "Man, I just can't believe that my snotty, angry, frizzy-haired, bruised..." and Big K interrupted with, "Ego." I argued I was going to say "child" but he maintained that "ego" was the appropriate end to my sentence. Oh, that fucker. We don't like him to score points such as this.

Phook dined peaceably, and as we were driving away, she started, I shit you not, chuckling to herself in the backseat. Big K turns to me and says, "Is that little shithead really sitting back there laughing?" I confirmed that this was indeed the case.

Score 1 for Phook. The shithead.