i am america (and so can you!)

I have a thing for smart asses, they make me swoon. If I were single I would probably have a few more cats, own the Pride & Prejudice DVD, and would be a round robin stalker of Stephen Colbert, Jon Stewart and Ricky Gervais (he would be a bit harder to stalk being across the pond and all). Seriously though, I love these three guys. They are so smart and so so funny, which beats looks any day of the week in my mind. That sounds like I think they're homely, which I don't. I think they're all good looking, but I guess, I'm just trying to say that wit trumps looks. It's sort of silly that I like them so much since I don't have cable, I just get to appreciate them through youtube videos and NPR podcasts. Toby got this book for me for Christmas and at first I was less than enthused, but this is the best present I got for Christmas. His all-purpose counseling session for a family of four had me in tears. You circle the choices that apply and at one point it's the mother's turn for scrutiny and it mentions that she's always been their emotional (pillar of strength/powder keg) I was laughing and crying in the car while Oona slept, fearing that the joggers who pass the car in the park would think me insane. The whole chapter on religion is absolutely brilliant, he calls agnostics atheists without balls and shows a picture of waffles near his definition, for cults he has a picture of the mac apple. To really get a feel for the book I'd suggest finding it in the book store and reading pages 16 thru 17 (all-purpose family counseling session) and the 'know your class' chart on page 163 another one that had me in tears it's so damn funny.

Times like these that I'm glad I'm not a squirrel.

What can I say, you gotta love the neighborhood.

You've probably figured it out by now that most of the pictures I'm taking are shot through the car window while Oona naps. I wish they were more arty but I have a tough time when I'm confined to the car.

Maternal ADD

I fear that my last post might have sounded a bit shrill but, last night I came home from the gym and went to grab my sweater out of my gym bag (which is a cloth eco-bag with a floral patch because the eco bag split on the seam, don't even get me started on the eco oriented books I've bought that are falling apart because they must have used green glue to bind the pages to the book's spine). Anyhow, I'm shivering and ready to get my sweater when it dawns on me that I left my bag in the parking lot at the gym. Shit shit shit! I run out to check my car praying that it's in there but it wasn't. My neighbor says 'hi' and wants to chat but I'm too busy freaking because Owen's getting picked up for the karate carpool in twenty minutes but I have to go back to the gym to see if my bag is still in the parking lot (there's a sign on the door to the gym 'Do not leave anything in your car' and I'm thinking my bag is on the street and it's not looking good) because the New Balance 992's that I just bought last week are in the flipping bag and if I lose those sneakers Toby is going to kill me. I'm punching my thighs thinking how I put those damn expensive sneakers in a bag after working out because I didn't want to ruin them too soon and now they're probably gone. I mutter incoherently to the kids about getting shoes and coats on and call the carpooler to rant about my predicament and that we might be a bit late when they come to pick Owen up. Somehow luck is with me, traffic is minimal and I don't hit red lights. As I approach the parking lot I see a bag on top of a car. I slow down near the car and see that it's my bag as a man who's a gym regular (he always arrives a half hour after me. I don't talk to anyone at the gym but I'm like rain man when it comes to noticing the regulars when I work out and their predilections) looks at me with a bemused expression as I smile, make some crazed gasp/sigh/strangled cat noise, run for my bag, try to open the passenger door but it's locked and tear around my car back into the driver's seat. I looked like a complete spaz, but I made it home before the carpool arrived!

Earlier that day I went to the dentist. I had stopped at Whole Foods earlier to have a coffee, probably not the most polite thing to drink before a cleaning but I needed my caffeine. I was trying to have a relaxing thirty minutes to myself and read about the Oscar's in the Times when I knocked over my coffee cup, the cap flew off and the whole table filled with coffee (it was really hot so I had only had a couple sips). I was totally mortified as it's dripped down the side of the table, remarkably it didn't get on me at all. The woman at a table next to mine was so wonderful. She brought over napkins and helped me clean up. She even said 'my paper's only the local one but you can have it if you want.' Ah, the kindness of strangers. So much for my relaxing morning cup of coffee. When I got to the dentist's the hygienist asked me if I was a student and I was like 'no, I'm a stay at home mom.' I was sitting with my dentist after the appointment (he's amazing how attentive he is) when he asked my age, because was referring me to an orthodontist. When I told him 39 he shook his head and said 'no.' When I told Toby this he's like 'I'm telling you, you look a lot younger than your age.' I don't know, that might partially be it, but I think a larger reason people think I'm younger than I am is that I come across as a huge dork. I mean I act like a teenager in terms of how awkward I am with my body (I'm such a klutz it's pretty remarkable that I haven't killed myself in some Darwin awards type of accident) and how self-conscious I can be at times. But this is straying away from the title of the post. Seriously I believe I've become like the worst sufferer of ADD which I acquired after having two kids. I used to be forgetful occasionally but now. Well here's my list of observed symptoms.

times I've ...

started driving while my coffee cup is on top of my car - 4

left my keys in the lock of either our back or front door - too many considering we live in a city, this one drives Toby nuts!

tried to find my cellphone or wallet - easily three times a week, every week. Although, to be fair, my kids can take them and move them around on me, like elves.

forgotten expensive items in a public space - 3 I 'lost' the two pairs of jeans I had just bought and left in the supermarket. But thankfully, no one took my sneakers or the I-pod I left at the gym last year, there must be some theft deterrent angel looking after me there!

gone out in public without brushing my teeth - it's more than once and isn't that more than enough?!

gone out with my hair looking a lot less than stellar - often

had trouble concentrating on conversations - if my kids are with me there's a high chance I'll retain little of what's said to me

and even with a list I always forget to buy something at the grocery store, it's like that environment lobotomizes me, maybe it's the tabloid rags that I read for as long as Oona will let me.

i made it through

So I survived the visit with my Dad and he was very well behaved. That's awful of me I make him sound like a mutt. He didn't drink, although all we had in the house was three bottles of champagne (new year's leftovers gathering dust) so I'd think he'd have to really be desperate to toss back the bubbly. We played Scrabble. I won, I'm quite cunning at the two letter words on spaces where you can rack up major points. But can I just say that whenever any of our parents leaves our house after a visit I am exhausted. The kids tend to act up when any grandparent comes to visit, they're only worse when we go to my Mom's house or Toby's parents and when we went to visit my Dad in the fall we spent the day in our tiny hotel room, that was the absolute worst. At one point the guy at the front desk came in to use our microwave because the one up front was broken. We ordered pizza in and watched 3 or 4 movies back to back and Oona bounced around the room like she was never going to stop moving or for that matter sleep. Anyhow, my Dad left on Saturday morning and I took Owen sledding later in the day. We met up with a friend of his from school and his Mom. Owen's viking heritage might be kicking in because as soon as he hops in the sled he treats it like a luge and leans all the way back. My heart was in my throat watching him shoot down the hill so fast, a couple times he entered a woodsy area at the far side of the hill and at one point I was running down the hill shouting because his sled turned around and he had gained so much momentum he was going back up another hill and came close to hitting a tree head first. So I spent the afternoon chatting with the friend's mom all the while having this internal debate over whether I should buy Owen a helmet for sledding (if he's going to be sledding near trees I think definitely). I have a hard time gauging this stuff with myself because I'll constantly justify why I want to, say, get Owen a helmet for sledding but I feel embarrassed of my decision by more laid back moms, and they don't have to even say anything, I just feel freakish at times. I know I'm a nervous mom and I tend to overprotect and one of my huge issues is being okay with what I think or how I feel but it's so hard and I'm mystified by people who have no problem criticizing when I'll beat myself up trying to finding the least threatening way to say something. Two years ago I showed my mother-in-law how to put Oona in her car seat and when I was done she just looked at me nonplussed and said 'but that's too tight, she looks uncomfortable' and I knew she'd ignore what I showed her and I started to seethe thinking, better she's a bit uncomfortable than ejected from the car. Like I can still get angry about that but it's just spinning my wheels and all this worry and internal debates and the anger and all of it just hurts me and makes me very very tired. I didn't even mean to bring this post in that direction but with my worries about the kids I sometimes feel like I gave birth in order to kick my anxiety up to the stratosphere. I do this horrible dance of sadness, anger and frustration wondering if what I feel and do for them is the 'right' thing. Oh well, Owen and I also had a special date where we went to see The Spiderwick Chronicles together, it's nice to be able to spend time with just Owen occasionally. Although he was a little upset that I ate all his popcorn, can't blame him for that really. But I paid a heavy price, my jeans are ruined because the butter soaked right through the container onto them. I tried Shout on them but they're still stained. Good thing they were only $13 and not $150.

monday monday

When it comes to posting photos I'm going to need to take a three day weekend because Mondays are a living hell for me. Toby's at work then goes to school until 9:00 and I go to pick him up with the kids in their pj's. Monday evening Owen also has karate. Fortunately I carpool with someone so I don't have to take him there with Oona, I would lose my mind, believe me, I've had to do it a few times and it's positively harrowing. But, suffice it to say, by 9:15 my mind feels like a hairball the cats would cough up and all I want to do is drown my stress and sorrows in chocolate and then call it an early night and collapse in bed by 10. Tomorrow my Dad is coming to visit for a few days, that's if he has enough gas in his friend's car to make the 2 hour trek from Cleveland to Pittsburgh. Of course he let me know that he'd need help paying for gas for his return visit. Oh, I love my parents and I know it's not terribly evolved and mature to be mortified by them but at times I am. My Dad is most likely a bipolar who has self medicated for, oh about 45 years, with alcohol and pot. This is my armchair shrink diagnosis but believe me, based on his pathological lying, the many times he's been fired from excellent jobs, his ginormous amount of debt, and deluded ego I'm pretty sure it fits. When I was about ten I found my Dad's stash of pot, in a baking tin under the couch, and scolded my Dad for smoking. I was naive enough not realize it was pot or what pot was for that matter. I always have been a bit clueless about certain things. My Dad has been taking me to bars since I was little, The Lion's Head in Greenwich Village as a child and the local bar in the suburbs where the bartender would make me a real drink as a preteen. When I was young I thought my Dad was the most handsome man, so smart and charming and infinitely cool. But really how cool is it to bring you child to a bar? The Days of Wine and Roses lifestyle is never a good one for child rearing. When I grew up (meaning my late twenties) I realized that he's incredibly intelligent and very charming, when he's not drunk, but he's a sick sick man who is never going to change no matter what I say or do. It's a shame because in many ways he's wasted a mind that was full of such potential, although, to be fair, he does complete every day of The New York Times crossword puzzles, no easy task I'll tell you. Agh... so I'll let you know if he shows up and how the visit goes in a few days. Thank God Toby helps me out when my parents drive me a bit mental. He can always make me laugh about the relative absurdity of my family, not in a mean-spirited way, he's wonderful with my Dad and loves him in spite of his faults. He's more like my cathartic jester, who keeps me on an emotional equilibrium during a perfect storm of stress.

hives update

Thanks for the kind concern about my itchy hives. I stopped the prednisone after one dose because that stuff is awful. I feel bad for anyone that needs to take that stuff long term because it made me feel like absolute crap. I switched to claritin and that seemed to help with the itching. My hives are no longer swollen and a good many have disappeared but I've still got a couple nasty big splotches on my stomach and chest. I feel like I have to explain that when I was panicking about what itching illness might have afflicted me that I came off as a hypochondriac, which I honestly don't think I am. Hypochondria by proxy I totally am, as my mind has an uncanny knack for imagining the gruesome worst, with respect to medical conditions or horrible accidents, that might befall my children. But I don't really worry about me getting sick or dying. Don't get me wrong, it would totally suck to miss out on time with my husband and children if my life was cut short and I'd lament all the good books I hadn't gotten around to reading and places I haven't visited yet. But I don't really worry about dying, which is odd considering everything else that I worry about. I panicked about possibly having contagious itchies because 1. I wouldn't be able to go to the gym and I've become quite the gym junkie, that 1 hour and five minutes of cardio and weights is my daily 'me time' which I rely on to keep me sane. So, contagious itchies - gym (it would be a little unseemly to be scratching myself nonstop while exercising) = me bouncing off the walls. 2. I was worried that I might have given something to the kids in Owen's class. I had just volunteered at Owen's school a day before I broke out in hives and I was like 'what if I've given his whole class lice or chicken pox or shingles?!' don't think the teacher would want me to volunteer again. and finally 3. I'd feel awful if I'd inadvertently exposed someone who's pregnant (we have a friend due next month) to chicken pox or shingles. So those were the three main reasons I was panicking about what I had, plus the whole disinfecting your house if you have lice would be a nightmare (and we have cats would they need to be deloused as well?!), but mostly I was flipping over getting other people sick or not working out. Alas, I just have hives so no worries, unless I have chronic hives which last for more than 6 weeks. Wikipedia says (so I can't say how accurate this info is) that 20% of chronic hive sufferers have them for longer than twenty years! That seems completely insane that hives could last that long,my kids would both be done with college by then. But I'm not really worried about that, seriously.

itch

Didn't get a photo up yesterday since I spent a good portion of the day scratching various parts of my body. See that little rash on my neck, that's my PG version of what I can show you, the rest of my rash is covering a good bit of my scalp, torso and backside. I was panicking yesterday that I might have shingles, chicken pox, a really bad case of body lice (which would be awful what with all you have to do to delouse a house of nits, a nightmare!) or worst case scenario Morgellon's syndrome. I kept thinking of the movie Bug (Don't watch it, trust me your life will be worse if you watch this. That the director of The French Connection could stoop so low, it's horrible.) where they're picking at invisible bugs on their skin constantly. Alas, after a visit to my dermatologist this morning (my primary care doctor would not fit me into his schedule yesterday even though I said I had a bad rash that I was worried could be contagious, they said I could go to the ER - will be switching to a new primary care doc pronto) I learned that I have a wicked case of hives. He said it was a good thing I came in when I did as it was bad to begin with and letting it go longer would only make it worse. I've never had hives before and he can't say for certain what caused it, virus, stress, environmental factors? Who knows. So now I get to take prednisone for the next ten days and hopefully it will clear up. He said the prednisone should make me feel better right away. I was leery of taking steroids but at this point I'm miserable with itching so much, it's affecting my sleep.

Yes I did use photoshop to tweak with this picture. The daily photo thing seemed like a good idea until the reality of trying to take a daily picture when my daughter is always with me (and the difficulty of finding a good shot when I'm stuck in the car with her for an hour and a half while she naps, it's not like I can leave her in the car while I hunt down a great picture) was fully realized. Oh well, we'll see how much longer this lasts.

no country for old men

I actually bought this book for Toby for Christmas because Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian is his all time favorite book. I decided I'd start with this book because it seemed a bit more accessible than Blood Meridian - just reading the back cover of that book depresses me. I read McCarthy's All the Pretty Horses years ago, long enough that I'm fuzzy on most of that story. So I figured I'd reintroduce myself to McCarthy with this book, especially since the movie has gotten such great reviews and now, since Toby and I have both read the book, we can go see it together. Cormac McCarthy is masterful at writing in a style that is pared down and spare, just like the austere landscape of Texas and Mexico, where this story takes place. His writing could easily be compared to Hemingway, they're both manly writers with short, muscular sentences, although I think Hemingway writes from his heart whereas McCarthy writes from his head (any lit critics who stumble upon this can feel free to disagree with me). This book is very well done. At first glance it seems to be a hard-boiled, man on the run story. It is action packed and adrenaline rich. But there are also significant questions of good and evil, predestination and morality, especially good people making not the best choices that chart the course of their life. I took a 1/2 plum off because the ending made me feel like a helium balloon after it's been sitting around for a week; you know how they get, small and puckered, hovering a foot off the ground. The ending is really depressing but it would be hard to end it any other way without it seeming like a Hollywood happy ending. It's easy to get sucked into this story and you'll stumble out at the end of the book with the wind knocked out of you.

Toby's back. He made it in without delay or cancelation, even though we experienced freezing a rain storm that left everything coated in ice early this morning. My partner in parenting has returned, whew. Happy weekend everybody!