Office space?

So, if you've been reading, you probably know that my workplace has some...uh, challenges. Mainly our boss. In an interesting turn of events, an organizational expert has been hired to "help" us. We think this was mainly HR's idea because my boss's boss isn't very objective where my boss is concerned. You see, she convinced the company to pay all his relocation expenses and to pay the rent on his apartment for him when he was staying in the area. This went on for about two years. So I guess she feels pretty defensive over her position and his, to the point where, if he sexually harasses an employee he gets a stern talking to - off the books, of course. Nice, huh?

Anyway, HR was getting so many complaints about him that I think they "recommended" this particular path. I had an interview with the lady yesterday. It reminded me so much of the movie Office Space it was hilarious. It started out with me providing an explanation of what I do. After that, it was, "So, what do you you think contributes to the issues in your department?" It was spectacular. And almost everyone who had to do an interview gave the same answer: our boss.

I have no idea where this will go. Maybe he'll get an even sterner talking to after this. My guess is that they'll get us all involved in a BS teambuilding exercise where we're forced to role play. Anyway, after yesterday's fun and games, it's nice to be home today, even if it's only because Evelyn has a wicked cold.

35

So today I turn 35. Interesting. I don't feel any different than I did when I was 11 or 12. Maybe a little more tired and definitely more clueless. I remember thinking 26 was old and that I'd somehow know what I was doing. I don't feel rudderless or anything, just a lot more like the village idiot than I used to.

I can pinpoint exactly when I realized that I could never possibly know everything about any one thing. It took a long time - I was in grad school, in the middle of an Eastern European History class and writing a paper on "The Albanian Question" (for the curious, the question(s) is, is Albania a country? Does it exist? Who lives there? Caught between Serbia and Bosnia, it's a little like Kashmir, but more ambiguous. In case you want to know, the answer is sometimes yes, sometimes no to the first two and to the second, it depends on whether you ask Albanians (when it exists), Bosnians or Serbians or other Eastern Europeans.). Anyway, I was wishing I hadn't picked something so darn complicated. Maybe if I chose something else it'd be easier.

So I sat in class and thought about looking into something else, then the professor started talking about the significance of economic theory and its role in various countries and suddenly I was thinking, "Holy crap! The sum total of everything I know isn't even a drop in the bucket." I was in grad school, had traveled and lived in other countries and suddenly I felt like I knew absolutely nothing. Even worse, I didn't know squat about what I didn't know.

It's kind of nice, knowing nothing - it makes me want to know more.

Other than feeling more clueless, I just have a few more visible lines, but at least they're laugh lines. Oh, and my butt is bigger, my stomach headed slightly south thanks to children, but it's better than it was two years ago (I'm leaving out last year since I was pregnant). So that's progress. And tomorrow I celebrate the birth of my second, the best birthday present ever.

But for today, I have the day off work, though I'm technically on call. My sister is coming from Charlotte, so I pick her up in a couple of hours. The kids are in preschool and daycare for part of the day - Rags has a field trip he didn't want to miss and Evelyn gets cranky when her schedule is messed with. So the plan today is eat, spend time with the kids, probably eat more, then take a walk after they're asleep tonight. All in all, more than I could've hoped for for a good birthday.

Who's hiring?

No, I'm not out of a job. Well, not yet anyway. If you know me, you know my boss is a douchebag. A big one. After a few months of relative quiet (well, except that particularly disgusting comment about white shirts, band-aids, women in our department and the fact that it was raining), I got the smackdown today. I used to call it the Friday night smackdowns because I tended to get some sort of talking to every Friday until he apparently became afraid I'd leave when I got pregnant.

You'd think that getting insulted would be upsetting. But the thing is, when it happens so frequently for so many stupid reasons, it really starts to roll of your back. I wonder what would happen if he actually had a good reason for giving me the smackdown. Would it even make a dent?

Anyway, the last time I got a talking to it was because I left my computer on. I thought I was in Office Space. The cause of today's smackdown was... Wait for it... I had the unmitigated gall to e-mail his boss and ask her a question about a product. The issue wasn't the product I recommended we develop. It wasn't the price I recommended. And it had nothing to do with the policy behind the development of the product. Nope - the problem was that I hadn't followed the "chain of command," even though his boss had asked me to go direct to her. So, the very fact that I had e-mailed her was the problem. The horrors!

So, I'm done. Just done. I'm going to work there as long as it takes me to find a job unless I go postal one day. Then I'm leaving. I hate it there. It's soul sucking and actually makes me miss my previous job where they wanted to give me a Blackberry to take with me on maternity leave.

This might actually be pretty decent timing. Unless healthcare reform gets repealed, I know something about the changes that are supposed to take effect. Anyone need a senior product manager for government entitlement programs? A regulatory affairs manager perhaps? An editor? Writer? Anybody?

Perhaps I need some Prozac.

I have been soooo uptight lately. I got upset again today, though not very much. Still, it bothers me when I lose my cool, mostly because it hardly used to happen, but it's been happening a lot now. These things always have multiple sources. I know what things are probably causing the problem, but I'm not quite sure what to do about it. I can talk 'til I'm blue in the face, but that usually isn't a solution because it doesn't generally accomplish anything. So I type 'til I'm blue in the fingers instead. Aren't you lucky?

Anyway, getting upset is annoying. I don't like to be that person. So I'm going to try not to be. I especially need to calm down because my birthday is coming up, as is Evelyn's first, so the house is going to be full of people coming to celebrate her special day with us. My mom, particularly will be here. I've suggested she stay in a hotel because she gets extremely tense lately because my house is so chaotic just with the two kids and me and my husband. But of course, she's insisted, "Oh, I have so much fun when I'm there!" That's news to me. What will really happen is that she'll hang out here on my couch, asking pointed questions about when I'm going to cut out the breastfeeding already ("I mean, really, Andi, she just doesn't need it anymore. You were on skim milk at six months. And you were just fine. Besides, it's really...de classe.") and getting more and more upset about the noise and activity until she throws up her hands, declares, "I just can't do this anymore!" then, sobbing, flees for the guest room downstairs.

Oh, well. Guess it's time to stock up on tissues. I'm not sure who needs the Prozac more - me or my mom.

Workation?

Or should I call it workaday? It doesn't matter. Whatever you call it, despite taking the day off, I wound up working just as much (if not more) than I would've had I just gone in to work. The day started with an Early Childhood Education screening, courtesy of the Parkway School District. It's a free screening to everyone in the district for kids 3-5 so they can make sure that kids are where they need to be prior to starting formal education. If they're not, they can refer you to an occupational therapist or counselor or whatever type of specialist your child might need. Anyway, other than some minor issues that are common for kids (especially boys) his age, Rags was normal, which is really all I ask for. Excellence we can worry about later. Right now I just want him doing what he's supposed to be doing when he's supposed to be doing it.

After that, we took him out for a snack, I went to the bank, met the husband for lunch, dropped off the kid, went to get an oil change, came back to pump, got my license renewed then came back and did laundry while monitoring a situation at work from home. I haven't figured out yet whether I should be happy or upset that I didn't go to work today.

After the scant four hours of sleep last night, I'm kind of glad I didn't, especially since I wound up having to forfeit my last planned day off. I'm not sure I could've stayed still if yesterday was any indication of how today went. We have multiple personnel issues and some other problems that evidently all came to a head today. Yesterday was just brutal, but I hear today was even worse. It makes me glad I'm not a manager.

So, that's that. Still to do: do more laundry, go to the grocery, pick up the kids, make dinner and start the slippery slope to bedtime. What I'd really like to do, though, is crawl into bed.

And, since you asked, there really wasn't any point to this post. If you've read this far, your life might be more boring than mine (unlikely) or you could be a glutton for punishment.

I'm done.

One of the dangers of being online is that you can have a meltdown in private and online. If you haven't noticed, my blog is just another venue for self-indulgent ranting. It was bad, but it felt oh, so good.

Hopefully you haven't found out that I'm secretly a terrible person. Oops - did I type that out loud?

Anyway, today is better. Not fabulous, but at least I'm not falling apart.

Torn.

Another day, another meltdown. Ever feel really guilty when you're mad, even if your upset is completely justifiable? That's exactly how I feel, which makes feeling this way even more uncomfortable.

I don't know if it's a woman thing or just a me thing, but I normally deal really well with the crap-ton of stuff that needs to be done around here, but I just lost it today for some reason. Maybe it's the dishwasher being broken, resulting in about four times the dishes I usually wash. It could be that my husband was planning to work all day - again - leaving me alone with children all day. Again. And he slept until 11 a.m., which pissed me off because I'm sick and I only got to sleep until 8 yesterday, even though that was the worst I've felt in a long time.

Which leads me to another possibility - it could be that I feel like hell from a cold. Or that everyone seems out of sorts, resulting in lots and lots of yelling and backtalk today, which results in consequences, which results in more backtalk, then tears when Ragsy realizes that, no, it's really not okay to throw things in the house. Or maybe it's knowing that we have a deadline to keep today since there's a party to go to and a gift to buy before.

I'm sure it's a combination. But I really, really lost it today and I feel very, very guilty. My husband announced that he's not going to work, which makes me feel additionally guilty. And I scared the crap out of the kids, which makes me feel even worse. But I still feel torn - did you know that I feel guilty? But another dirty little part of me feels a tad bit satisfied that I finally got my family's attention. Since I raise my voice so rarely, even Ragsy finds me losing it very, very memorable. The Borders incident a month or two ago gave me so much traction, Ragsy still uses it as an example of what could happen if he doesn't listen and I didn't even raise my voice above a whisper then.

Urgh. I hate this. I hate directing everyone sometimes - deciding when people will get up, what will get taken and where, what our plans are, what we're eating, where we're eating it and when. And who's going to which event and what the other person who's not going to the event will be doing. Today is a good example - there's a party at 4 p.m. For some reason, I'm supposed to decide what we're getting this kid (don't know him), what we're bringing it in, when we have to leave, who's going and what the other person who's NOT going will be doing? Then there are the questions: what are we doing? Why? When? Why? Where? Why? Why? Why? Why? And this isn't just from Ragsy.

And the thing is - I don't give a rat's ass. I really don't. So I'm torn: do I feel terribly guilty for flipping out and just suck it up and deal with it or do I hope to God something changes so I'm not somehow the boss?

Nightmare.

Work today was...rough. No interpersonal issues today (okay, some, but they were overshadowed). But given what I do, every day the importance of good healthcare is really hammered home. Today we had a suicidal caller. Given the fragile state many people are on by the time they file for SSDI, it's not uncommon where I work. People run out of money, can't pay their bills, can't go to the doctor, etc. Unfortunately, you kind of get used to people being in dire straits, especially people without long-term disability.

But today, all I can say is fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. I know - bad language. But this person is in hell, about to lose everything she ever owned, all for want of decent healthcare.

Ain't life grand?

Waiting...

Until I had kids, I wasn't a type A personality. But my tendencies seem to have run amok with all the logistics that having children entails - getting up, showered, bags packed, kids fed and changed, etc. in time to leave in the morning, dropping kids off, talking to teachers if necessary, making a ridiculously long drive to Belleville to get to work (usually late), only to hurry home at the earliest opportunity at 5 or later to make dinner and start the slippery slope of evening routines. When something breaks my schedule, I get ticked. Which is why the past week has been especially painful.

Over the past week, my husband needed minor outpatient surgery. So I went (what - I'm selfish for complaining about it, but not so selfish I'd leave him on his own). Said surgery is in a location he cannot easily reach, and even if he could, he couldn't clean it thoroughly. So I do it twice a day, which again breaks into my carefully constructed schedule. It's also extremely painful for him since you're required to keep the wound open so it heals from the outside in and doesn't create another cyst.

Then there's the broken fridge, which requires daily trips to the supermarket for ice and fresh food (because I think I'm going to hurl if I eat much more takeout - I've certainly gained back two pounds). And now I'm waiting for the fridge repair guy to show up, which almost never turns out well. I'm hungry - since the fridge is broken, we haven't been keeping food overnight, and I've been giving the kids whatever healthy, fresh food we have - and so hopped up on caffeine I think I might explode. Which doesn't help my tension levels.

This isn't a big deal. I know this. And I should consider the quiet time I've had, both Wednesday while my husband slept after his cyst was removed and now while I wait, a gift. After all, when do I get to enjoy quiet, alone time? I could clean - I never get to do that without getting swarmed by children, and I actually enjoy cleaning up when I'm by myself. I could also work. At my job, since I create products that are used in a call center, I'm pretty much smack dab in the middle of a call center so I can hear what's going on. It's unusual and heavenly to have it quiet enough to read new legislation without having to put my fingers in my ears. What's getting to me, though, is that I know I should be somewhere else. This wasn't on my schedule, blast it.

And I keep going through what I need to do after the fridge is looked at. And what happens if it can't be fixed today? Then I'll probably have to do this all over again at some point this week, and dammit I still have some condiments in there that need to be tossed and it'll take forever to get to work if this guy ever gets here, and once I'm at work I've got a dozen meetings and an interview with a national publication if I can make it and what the hell are we going to do for dinner? Then there's the wound to clean, the kitchen is filthy and, bloody hell, when was the last time I worked out? *pant, pant, pant*

Did I mention that I hate waiting? The only thing I hate worse is schedule changes. I need a set schedule almost as much as my four year old.

Bad Mommy.

Ragsy has been trying to play me for several days now. It'd be really irritating if it weren't by turns funny and guilt inducing. Funny because he comes up with the most ridiculous requests to cure his crying and guilt inducing because it feels wrong to have to try not to laugh at someone who is crying, even if they're crocodile tears.

Case in point: two evenings in a row I've put him to bed. Both nights, just as I'm about to leave the room, copious crying ensues. I mean, he really worked himself up. But when I asked him what the problem was, his response was, "I want to go to the Pirate Festival!"

Ok. Normally I'd say yes, provided that going was convenient and the request made politely. After all, I like pirates as much as the next guy. Unfortunately, after an incident at Borders, the Pirate Festival has since been removed as an option. So, after quietly explaining to him that we can't go to the Pirate Festival, I made the mistake of asking, "Is there something else wrong?" After all, after I had to carry him screaming out of Borders, once I got him calm, I was able to draw out of him that he was hungry.

Silly me. So, crying ensues again. This time, "Yes, Mommy."

"What is it, sweetie? How can I help?"

"I also need to go to the zoo!"

Right.

"And I need to go to the India food shop (Taj Palace) and the Big Red Food Shop (Bread Company) for breakfast. Then we need to go to India."

Why do I even ask?

Awkward.

At work today I gave another presentation on healthcare reform and had an interview with the Wall Street Journal. And, no, I'm not particularly special - it was a transitional interview, so I really didn't do more than sit there and pass notes across the table to my boss, who was doing the talking. The idea is that I'll eventually take over all public speaking for our product - our VP has asked my boss to relinquish all media interviews to me, so I sat on this one with our PR director and observed, I'll do the talking next time and after that, it'll be just me and the PR director.

The whole situation is really odd and uncomfortable, but apparently while I was on maternity leave and my boss gave interviews to certain well-known publications, he let some of his ignorance and political views seep into the discussions, so he was barred from interviewing without me, the PR director or both to serve as chaperon until I received more formal media training to take over the interviews entirely. I was also given three of his speaking engagements for next month and October and asked to attend the AARP conference to exhibit. I don't know what to make of this. I'm flattered, but it's weird and I don't like it.

Long time, no write.

I need to get my act together again. I'm gaining weight, falling back into disorganization and not writing again. It's funny how when one area of discipline falls apart, the rest follows in short order. I don't think it's about to get any better in the next few days. Evelyn has a sore throat, complete with oogey red tonsils. It doesn't look like strep, though.

One thing I have to wonder about sick babies - why is having an illness akin to feeding them rocket fuel? They wake every 30 minutes at night, won't nap during the day, yet somehow are cheerful and can run circles around their parents despite having a relatively high fever. I'm exhausted and, though she has the runs from all the mucous and won't stop rubbing her eyes, every time I try to put her to sleep, she starts playing with my breast, eating my arm or trying to climb out of her crib. How is she not at least crabby as hell? Not that I'm complaining. Ugh. I'm jittery from all the coffee, but think I need more caffeine to stay awake.

Love, luck and blight.

My sister called a few days ago, asking all kinds of questions about how I'd felt and what happened when I was pregnant, when I asked if she was pregnant. There was total silence on the other end of the phone. I was so happy for her. Unfortunately, just a few days can change everything. She is in the throes of a miscarriage now. Her gestational sac was empty, something they also call a blighted ovum. Interesting choice of words. Blight. It's a much larger word than the object it describes. Her pregnancy hormones are falling and she now has to take Plan B or have a D&C to flush her uterus. She has chosen Plan B.

I have no idea how to describe how awful I feel for her. During Christmas, she held Evelyn and cried because she said she didn't know when she'd be able to have a baby herself. There was no end in sight - her husband hadn't been employed in more than two years, they had student loans to pay and a mortgage and she was trapped in a job she hated because she was carrying everything financially and had been for two years.

Then, like magic, things began to come together over the last six weeks. Her husband got a job, which allowed them to feel comfortable starting a family. She discovered she was pregnant, got a new job and quit her old one. Then the part that meant the most to her was taken away.

I know miscarriages are very common in early pregnancy and that she will probably go on to have a healthy pregnancy. And if she was only five or six weeks into the pregnancy, but still. It represented a lot to her and now it's gone. And it sucks.

Breathe in, breathe out.

I totally forgot how much this part of motherhood sucks. Our daughter just got tooth #2. With it apparently comes a remarkable desire not to sleep. It's not only pain (only from the shrieking in there, it's probably partially pain) - it's also that switch that went off in her head that prompted her to wake me at 3 a.m. to have a three-hour long attempt at a discussion. Sadly, I haven't slept since.

What's worse for me, though, is the guilt. Yeah, I really can't do anything than give Tylenol to make the tooth feel better. But, the muscles in my back are aching, burning and just generally not in the right places. I had to hand her off to my husband for a few minutes. My husband, lucky man, doesn't have the same visceral reaction I do to my daughter's crying. I want to find what's causing it and obliterate it. He calmly puts on some muting headphones (he can hear her, but it's not as piercing) and carries her around until she's done crying and ready to sleep. Unfortunately for me, she cries a lot more with him.

So, while I'm out here feeling miserable, guilty, exhausted, frustrated and sore, I'm also treated to her shrieking, something I know I could alleviate just by walking in there and taking her from my husband. Seriously, I pick her up and it's like someone hit the off switch. God, I hate this. It's even worse knowing Ragsy is probably laying in bed with his hands clamped over his ears.

I know I should let the two of them figure it out. After all, it's not like I left her all alone. Someone who loves her is carrying her and quietly talking to her. Ugh. How sad is it that I'm trying to rationalize taking a much-needed break to avoid screaming myself and scaring the daylights out of a baby and setting a stellar example for my son? Oh, well. I hope she stops crying soon. I'm tired, sore, have an incredibly bad headache and I think my blood pressure is probably sky high by now.

Long time, no write.

It's not that nothing interesting has happened to me. It has. I just forget what it was by the time I go to make a blog post, so I haven't written in a long, long time. But, since I'm rapidly forgetting how to string two sentences together, I thought I'd write.

Not much is going on. Like I said, I forgot all the interesting stuff than happened to me. At the moment, the worst thing that's happened this week is that Ragsy's been a bit out of sorts and there's been a tuition hike at preschool & daycare. Fantabulous. I love having children, but they're so freaking expensive.

The best thing that has happened this week is that I was asked to serve as an expert on healthcare reform for two magazines who found a white paper I wrote for my company on managing retiree healthcare costs. But this is a mixed bag. I'm still waiting for people to realize that I'm not an expert. I'm just some chump who read all 2500 pages of the healthcare reform bill and was fortunate (or unfortunate) enough to retain some of it. Oh, well. At least I get the credit for these.

Other than that, I'm still completely sleep deprived and feel a slight malaise (that only the genius possess and the insane lament). You know how you've achieved one goal, then you're in between goals? Yeah - that's about where I am. Both Adit and I are pretty sure we're done having children, so we're both struggling with ideas on what we do now. Of course - raise the kids. But what else? We'd both like to be rich. Wouldn't everyone? But how do you do that? And is what we would have to do something we'd be willing or even interested in doing? And if we decide not to do that, then what?

Ugh, anyway. So tired. Too bad Evelyn woke up three times last night. I was up way too frequently for my well being. Thank goodness she's begun to eat some solids. She still eats every hour and a half during the day (even with a meal in the middle of the day and the evening), but she's finally accepting something that's not me. Cereal of any sort really hurts her stomach, but the fruits & veggies are finally starting to have some appeal. I swear, by the time she's actually eating solids reliably, she'll be on finger foods. Not that that's a bad thing. So far when she does eat solids, she eats what we do anyway, so she's usually a cheap date.

Lazy Thursday.

Well, not really. Evelyn is sick. She cut a tooth last night (or rather, around 4 this morning) and is in the beginning stages of an ear infection, thanks to all the tooth-related congestion. We're not doing a whole lot, but sometimes not doing a whole lot takes a lot of time.

First, there was a half hour wait before we got our things together to go to the pediatrician. Then there was the visit itself. Then the trip to Schnucks (did you know they have free generic antibiotics?), then we got home around 11. Evelyn's been sleeping in roughly half-hour intervals, but even that sleep isn't particularly restful. It's punctuated by coughing and snorting. Then when she wakes up enough to fuss, I nurse her because she hasn't been eating much. Then she falls back to sleep because she can breathe at last and we do the whole thing over again.

Her pediatrician told me that she was healthy enough to go to daycare, but I made the decision early on not to take her. It seems silly for her to be miserable at daycare when I can give her my undivided attention, time at the breast and carry her around as much as she wants and get her to sleep more frequently (if not better) than they can at daycare.

I think I'll try to take a nap. Note that the operative word here is try. I'm smart enough to know it ain't gonna happen, but hopeful enough to try.

This boring post brought to you by the letter S for SLEEP (I need some) and the number 4:30, which is when I went to bed last night/this morning.

Attach this.

So, for the first time, I read Attachment Parenting by Dr. William Sears. I wasn't impressed. It wasn't the ideas I had a problem with them. Actually, I think that attachment parenting makes a lot of sense. But the whole book could've been summed up with:

1. Breastfeed if you can for as long as you can.
2. Bedshare if you want to.
3. Carry your kid a lot.
4. If something's not working, try something else or get help.

I suppose the above wouldn't have sold well, but my problems with the book were as follows:

1. As with any book advocating something "unusual," it's preachy and defensive.
2. Much of the "evidence" it referred to was anecdotal, taken from Dr. Sears' practice. I think that some amount of this would've been helpful, but I know from prior research that a large and growing body of actual, scientific data backs up most of the ideas in the book. That was very frustrating because it seemed as though the author was too lazy to do any external research himself, almost as though he had all the answers already, or thought he did.
3. The suggestions Dr. Sears gives for decompressing are irritatingly stereotypical. For example, in several sections, he recommends that to relax, the mother go take a bubble bath or sew. I actually enjoy sewing and it does help me decompress when I think to do it, but... Honestly? Sew?
4. Some of the anecdotes in the book were completely unbelievable.
5. It was way, way, way too long for a book that offers just a few ideas and only anecdotes to back them up. I felt like the same thing was being pounded into my head over and over.

So there. Love the ideas in Attachment Parenting, hate the author's style.

So very tired.

I'm just about wiped out. Evelyn either had a really weird cold that involved only congestion, or she's teething. Regardless, in addition to lots of hand gnawing, said stuffy nose coincided with another little *click* in her brain. Normally that's delightful, but I've noticed that as children get older, clicks also mean that whatever you'd been doing before that was guaranteed to get them to sleep suddenly doesn't work anymore. Seriously - one day it works, then the next day it never works again ever. So frustrating!

Anyway, until Thursday night I've been able to just carry her around for five minutes, jiggling her gently, to get her to sleep. Then Thursday night, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, yesterday and now today, I've spent two hours or more alternately carrying her and gently laying her down while I walk away for a few minutes so I don't get too tense from carrying around a screaming baby, then coming back to pick her up. Only after she's wiped herself out a bit will she sleep. It sucks because she's never been a screamer and she doesn't get upset about anything else. She screamed so much yesterday, I was convinced that she had an ear infection from all of last week's congestion and took her to acute care, only to be told that she was completely healthy.

Anyway, none of this is particularly important. I'm really putting this here because it bothered me that every time I come to this page, the first thing I see is the post about having to put my cat to sleep. I really ought to be going to bed. Last night I got the most sleep I've gotten in one stretch in a week and that was only four hours without interruption. Sad, isn't it, when four hours of sleep is cause for celebration? Huh.

Or not.

I had to put Cricket to sleep a couple of hours ago. She would eat, but not drink. They think she probably had cancerous tumors. They said I could wait two or three days if I wanted to, but she was losing weight so quickly and hardly able to breathe, so I asked them to do it before she got truly uncomfortable.

Back from the dead?

So, I had made an appointment to euthanize my cat after she refused to eat or drink for almost 24 hours (the statute of limitations I was given by the emergency vet - basically, if she's not eating or drinking after 24 hours, it's time to consider euthanasia or surgery). Then, as though she understood what I was doing, she began eating the tuna I left out for her and drinking the juice. She still refuses water, but will drink tuna juice or chicken broth. I think she's getting a bit dehydrated, but not as dangerously so as she was last week. I guess I'll give her another day or two and see what happens.

My weekend has pretty much been spent watching the cat for signs of imminent death and trying to get a growing infant to sleep. I think she must be on a growth spurt or something clicked in her brain again. She ate for a good three, almost four hours last night, woke for maybe 30-60 minutes, then ate for another two. I'm glad I'm no longer shy about bringing a baby to bed with us. Last night could've been a lot more uncomfortable. It doesn't help that she's got her first tooth coming already. It's one of her upper eye teeth. Go figure. Now we'll have a vampire baby.

Her four-month checkup is tomorrow. I can't wait. I used to think, "Jeez - how many doctor's appointments can I justify anyway?" I no longer care. Just like with Ragsy, it's exciting as heck to go and see how much weight they've gained, what someone else thinks of what they're up to, etc. Oh, well. Such a boring weekend, but exciting to me. So far, the only thing "major" we've done is go to lunch and Babies R Us today. Whatever. It didn't involve animal hospitalization, screaming, vomiting or snot. So I'll take it.

Silver lining?

This week has been...almost indescribable. I may need to put my cat down. Actually, she's doing much better, but I'm still trying to decide what kind of quality of life a cat with pancreatitis, kidney failure and high blood pressure can have, even though the kitty version of the intensive care says she's doing much better. Did you know that high blood pressure can make a cat hemmorage behind her eyes? I didn't. I didn't want to know, either. On a more practical note, I'm also wondering how much cash I can legitimately shell out to keep my cat alive. Not a whole lot more.

Unfortunately, the near demise of white cat had an impact - a bad one - and Ragsy hurt a kid at school. Not intentionally, but his habitual throwing led to someone else getting injured. Then, instead of being remorseful, he apparently tried to hit a teacher, started spitting (thank God the only way he knows to spit is blowing raspberries) and screaming.

Anyway, things are not necessarily better. But they seem to be stabilizing anyway. While I was stressed out over the past few days, I managed to misplace a check from my FSA for a substantial amount, so right now I'm ticked, feel really stupid and am ready to pass out, all at the same time. But maybe there's a silver lining. Maybe. Right now I just want to go to bed and pretend this week never happened.

Keee-rap.

Week 1 after maternity leave was...anticlimactic. At best. Day one was nice. I was provided with a really nice lactation room, which was an absolutely wonderful surprise. I was seriously considering whether I wanted to quit sooner rather than later over it. It may sound stupid, but I really don't want work dictating how I can feed my baby, and I'm not a huge fan of pumping in public bathrooms. I was planning to buy Whisper Wear so I could just do it in my car, but they went out of business.

Anyway, the lactation room was a huge load off my mind, and the place they set up for me was really nice - two comfy chairs, a desk, a fridge, a bookcase. Much nicer than ESI. Unfortunately, though, that was the best thing about coming back. All my work was waiting for me. How is it possible that someone is gone three months and nothing gets done? I was gone during the single busiest time of the year for my product. Plus, I woke up Tuesday to two flat tires. I only found out they were flat after I realized I'd lost my security badge and got into my car late. So, here I am stomping around, I get in my car, drive about two blocks and pull over, check my tires and drive home. I'm waiting for the tow truck to arrive and searching the whole house for my badge when I decide to just drive on my rims to the tire place down the road. I go to my car door and there, frozen in the ice, is my badge. On the street. So I break the ice with my shoes, pick it up and go on my way.

So that was Tuesday. Now Evelyn has RSV. Well, I guess she's had it for a while - it just took a while to show up. It's not as terrifying as it was with Ragsy. She hasn't stopped breathing, thank God. Though I think she might have yet another ear infection. Anyway, I think the RSV peaked last night and is subsiding. Unfortunately, if she won't nurse on one side tomorrow, I'll probably have to call the doc or go to the pediatric acute care center for an ear infection. And did I mention that I now have RSV, too? I'm sure that being up for nearly 24 hours two days in a row didn't improve my chances for holding out.

I hope this week isn't going to set the tone for things to come in the future.

Speaking of health insurance...

Ours is going to get a workout this year. Already Evelyn has had conjunctivitis, an infection in each ear and Ragsy has also had a double ear infection. This morning, he woke with a fever of 104, stating that he was really tired, which is always a huge warning flag for us. He's never tired. Ever. Anyway, after a visit to the doctor, he was proclaimed healthy, even though I couldn't get his fever to go down earlier, which figures.

The way his illnesses usually work: he wakes up, burning hot with chills and acting really off - super whiny, exhausted, clingy, not hungry, etc. I take his temperature and find it's some ungodly high number, so I dose with some Tylenol and, if it doesn't got down, call the doctor. They tell me to bring him in. I bring him in and, by the time we get there, the fever is gone, he's happy and well rested (because he slept late that morning since he was feverish), and proclaimed healthy as a horse and I'm advised that he can go to preschool. Then I have a kid bouncing off the walls all day. The next morning rolls around, I'm excited because he can go to preschool, and his fever is back, along with weird behavior. Rinse, repeat until late Friday morning when it all goes away and he makes like the Road Runner in Wile E. Coyote cartoons until Monday when he's out the door. Good times.

Time.

The more I contemplate going back to work, the more depressed I get. I can't believe maternity leave is almost over. It's as if just a few weeks ago, it was just me, my husband and Ragsy and now we have this other little life enmeshed in ours and it's wonderful and I don't get to spend nearly enough time holding her and watching her play and grow. Dammit.

I'm still going, but I'm not going to like it (not that I did beforehand, but I think I'll like it even less this time around). Unfortunately, between me and my husband, I'm the only one of the two of us whose employer offers reasonably-priced insurance, so quitting is not an option right now since I have a pre-existing medical condition. We've worked it out and found that we save about $700-$800 per month on insurance alone if I work. Then there are the investments we're hoping to build up, education to pay for, bills, etc. I think I need to work harder on a longer-term plan and my own business. What that business will be is so far up in the air. Medicare or writing? If writing, what type? If I do that, who takes on insurance? So far, my husband really likes consulting, and since I freelanced already, I'd like him to have the opportunity to build up his own business.

Yeesh, being a grownup sucks sometimes. I really miss not having to worry about all this crap, but I sure as hell don't miss not having children. I still remember when getting up at 7 a.m. was ungodly early. Now I find I need to get up at 5:30 when I go back to work to make sure I get a workout in, a shower, kids up and dressed and fed and ready to go so I can leave them with my husband with a clean conscience. And bedtime isn't usually before 12 or 1 a.m. because, once we've gotten everyone into bed, it's 9 p.m. Once everyone is actually asleep (I'm looking at you, Ragsy) it's 10 p.m., leaving us precious little time to talk, relax and get ready to do it all over again the next day. Still, it's worth it. I hope working turns out to be worth it, too.

Good grief.

So, I admit it. I was completely irresponsible. While I renewed my license plates in December, I kept one of the old ones on until today. But I had a somewhat good reason: the screw was so stripped I couldn't get it off without a mechanic's help (it needed bolt cutters and a few other specialized tools I don't have and don't want to buy) and, with all the illness in the house, got distracted. Nonetheless, I did have some time in which I could have gone to the dealership and had the offending plate removed and the new plate attached. Anyway, I had attached the front plate and put the rear new plate in my rear window so at least it was visible. But I get it - I didn't meet requirements. So I wasn't terribly surprised when I found a ticket on my windshield last week citing me for failure to display two current plates. Okay, I thought - Evelyn's first day at daycare is Monday, so I can get the rear plate replaced then.

So, today after I dropped her off and made a belated visit to the dentist for a teeth cleaning, I headed to Starbucks (have to have coffee while I wait) and was turning into the dealership when a cop flipped his lights on behind me. I knew exactly why - expired plates. But still, what timing! What...I don't know what. I was lucky he didn't give me a ticket, but I'm sure he stayed in the parking lot to make sure I actually drove into the dealership.

I should've expected it. After all, today was a day for expected unexpecteds. You know, those things you talk about, then say, "That figures." Getting pulled over for the very thing I was on my way to fix was one. The other was how happy Evelyn was when I dropped her at daycare. No, I didn't want her to be upset. But she usually does her scalded cat impression when anyone else but me or my husband holds her. Instead, when Tina pulled her from her car seat, she cuddled up to her, let Tina swaddle her without a peep (I suggested a nap since she'd gotten up early), then lay in her crib grinning and kicking her feet. I called to check in - surely she'd gotten upset when she realized I'd gone. Nope - the only time she'd gotten bent out of shape was when she was hungry and was offered a bottle instead of a breast. I was completely nonplussed. Even now I'm still going, "huh?" When I called she was sleeping, so I decided to give her a little longer before I pick her up. Good grief.

Is it over yet?

I'm hoping against hope that our bout with illness is at least temporarily over. My husband feels better, the pickle in Ragsy's ear is gone (for some reason, an ear infection somehow equals having a pickle in one's ear) and Evelyn is not sick. Yet. But she starts daycare part time on Monday and I go back to work a week from Monday, so Murphy's Law would indicate that she'll come down with something spectacularly bad by Sunday, so I'll have to stay home all the following week. Oh, well - things could be lots worse.

Anyway, everyone is getting healthy just in time for a couple of people to drop by tonight. On the one hand, I'm very much looking forward to it. I love having people over. I'm a lot like my mom in that I'm a feeder. I like to feed people, though I try not to be as persistent about it as she is. With my mom, if you don't eat what she makes, you don't like her. I've never taken not eating something personally, especially now since many of my friends (me, too!) are making efforts to have a healthier 2010.

On the other hand, having people over means I have to clean. This is actually not a negative since I need to organize the house and would like it to be in such a state where it's not hard to have people over with short notice; however, it does highlight two things for me: a) we're slobs and b) Evelyn really doesn't sleep that much. We haven't read the same books apparently. No matter - that's what slings were created for, I suppose. She'll just have to get acquainted with the vacuum cleaner.

Only tangentially related, I've found that our Parents as Teachers educator, combined with Evelyn and Ragsy's pediatrician together make the perfect childcare advisor. I think I'm in love with both of them. We had a visit from our PATNC educator yesterday and she actually helped me a LOT with some of Evelyn's sleep issues (i.e., that she would refuse to sleep during the day, making her so tired she'd stay up until midnight and crash for seven hours).

Although Evelyn is still not a fabulous napper, some of the suggestions I've received have already begun to pay off, with no tears necessary (on either side). And she delivers them in such a non-judgmental, calming way, which is worth its weight in gold. Then there's our pediatrician who always makes me feel like I'm making good decisions, even when she's somehow getting me to change my mind or when everyone else tells me I'm a whack job or spoiling my kids. Hats off to you, ladies.

Underwear.

I forgot how depressing post-pregnancy can be, and often for ridiculous reasons. My new gripe is that I not only have to shop for clothing, I also must buy new undies. I hate clothes shopping, especially after having given birth. The waist of everything is tight, while the butt and thighs are disproportionately loose, and spending so much money on good professional-looking shirts is a bit painful, given that my breasts are Pamela Anderson sized, so I'll need something large enough to accommodate them; however, anything large enough to do, unless it's fitted, will make me look like a tube from the boobs down.

Buying new underwear, however, is even worse. My current undies are all stretched out from accommodating an unwieldy belly. My midsection is still unwieldy, but it's even more bizarrely shaped than it was previously, thanks to all the stretching. Grrrr... This is something only plastic surgery can correct, too - snapping back into shape after pushing something the size of a watermelon out of your body isn't as easy as it was only three and a half years ago. Oh, well. Hopefully my acquisitive side will come out to play. Sadly, I only get acquisitive when it comes to things for my children and facial cleansers (I'm a junkie).

Sicko.

My husband has now come down with whatever it was that Ragsy had. I also have it, but to a lesser degree - just a mild headache, scratchy throat and tiredness, but I'm always tired, so it's tough to tell whether that's illness-related to just normal motherhood. Plus, I seem to have a stronger immune system than everyone in the house, unless, of course it's a serious self-induced illness like shingles where my body decides to attack itself. My body is its own worst enemy. Maybe fate has decided to give me a break on external illnesses because of it.

Anyway, my husband is home with me and Evelyn today. He feels "weak," has a sore throat, headache, cough, snotty nose, etc. Normally I'd giggle at him for his choice of words, since whenever he says that it reminds me of Scarlett O'Hara, but in this case, I'd buy it. I just hope that this is what Evelyn had two weeks ago, but I'm not usually that lucky. So if she's going to get sick, hopefully she'll do it before I have to go back to work. I'd feel more sympathy for my husband than fear for her normally, but he's an adult and she's not.

The weekend went well, though moreso for me than my husband and Ragsy. While my method of getting Ragsy to sleep worked, it didn't help that I went out for the first time on Friday night. I had a great time (it was our holiday party - a tad belated) and awesome food, but came home to find that Evelyn had been up the whole time, alternately fussing, dozing and outright crying. The next day, Ragsy was irritable and out of sorts from having to be so patient while Evelyn gave her dad hell, so he spent a lot of time in time out. I've read books that say you're supposed to be tender and patient with your kid if they're acting out, but I disagree that I'm supposed to avoid discipline when my kid starts hitting his father.

Anyway, yesterday was a bit better and this morning even better, probably because we all got up, had breakfast together, then I took Ragsy to preschool instead of his father. My next experiment will be to start getting Ragsy out of bed earlier. His dad likes to stay in bed until the last possible moment, then rush out the door. I had been getting Ragsy up at 7, sometimes a bit before, so he'd have time to have breakfast, play a little and get dressed, but he'd been sleeping until 7:45 or 8, getting stuffed into his clothes and rushed out the door. I'm pretty sure that has something to do with his inability to sleep at night. We'll see.

Urhg. Evelyn's up again. So much for her sleeping better in her own room. I put her in there so my husband's coughing wouldn't wake her up. I guess she's just wired to wake up, probably because she sleeps so well at night.

Parenting experiments gone wrong.

Every parent performs certain experiments on their children. I'm not talking about injecting them with things or seeing what happens when you throw them in for a cage fight. I'm talking about what you do when something clearly isn't working. Case in point: bedtime at our household. Things go well from dinnertime to bathtime to book reading to lights out. But after that? That's when things get bumpy. Not only does Ragsy not want us to leave, he won't go to sleep after we're gone. For two hours. This doesn't particularly bother me. After all, he's in bed. He'll pass out eventually. But it bugs the crap out of my husband. It's one of those things that eats at him and eats at him until eventually he goes back and demands that he close his eyes, relax his arms and legs and, for God's sake, go to sleep so he can feel good in the morning. He'll go back again and again and eventually get so frustrated he sits and simmers. It can't be good for him.

And it never works. Now it's a control issue. Ragsy is wonderful and very well-controlled with Evelyn, and though he throws intense tantrums with us, everything boils down to us being bigger and therefore able to control the situation until he gives. So, when he falls asleep is really the only thing he can control absolutely, which makes me feel awful.

I talked about this with my husband and we decided we'd experiment with a couple approaches - he would suggest one and we would try it Tuesday. I would suggest one and we would try it tonight. Yes, yes, I know - you have to give an approach longer to work. But we're impatient people, which probably doesn't help the whole situation. Anyway...

My husband's: let him tell us when he's tired. I wasn't a huge fan of this approach, but it's really common in India. Most children don't go to bed until well after midnight when the whole family goes to sleep together. That's just the culture - dinner is usually at 9 or 10 p.m., then people sit down to chat for a while, get ready for bed, etc. and by the time people are winding down, it's usually around 12:30 or 1 a.m. Putting children to bed at a time other than when the parents sleep is virtually unheard of. Many kids simply pass out wherever they happen to be after a while and are carried to bed whenever the parents go to bed. I'm pretty sure that's why a siesta is built into the day. Everyone's so tired from staying up so late.

Mine: more textbook, but with a later bedtime to accommodate more transitions from one activity to the next. So far, he has a really tight schedule. Get home, play for 10 to 20 minutes, dinner. Immediately after dinner, bathtime. If he's lucky, he might get to play for 5 minutes between dinner and bath. After that, bedtime. So I'd like to try something that'd hopefully benefit both kids, with dimming lights, longer quiet (emphasis on quiet) playtime and, once Ragsy is in bed, informing him that he can sleep when he wants but needs to stay put (what? it worked with toilet training).

Last night's results were not that great, though I did cut things short. I probably shouldn't have - presenting other than a united front in front of your child is just not cool - but, dammit, I'd been trying to get Evelyn to sleep for two hours. She was starting to get upset and I was tired of laying in a dark room with a baby whose eyes snapped open at every frenetic shriek. At 10:30, I had to call it quits. When I finally went to the living room to tell Ragsy to go the heck to bed, I found all the lights in the house (other than the dark room where I'd been putting Evelyn down) blazing and Ragsy, looking a little wired and with dark circles under his eyes, helping his dad do laundry and take down our Christmas tree. Anyway, after he got into bed, Ragsy stayed up singing for another hour anyway and was impossible to get up this morning and once he was up, was stumbling a bit for a few minutes. He was also whiny and had very little time between waking and getting out the door.

Sometimes I feel like we're torturing our child. Oh, well - I guess trial and error is how you get to what works. I really, really hope my approach works. I don't care about being right. All I want is a little freaking peace, fewer tantrums and better quality sleep for everyone.

So, it's going to be one of those weeks.

Ragsy spent the weekend alternating between angel and demon. It seems that the rest of the week will be the same. And it sucks, for him (lots of time outs, and I can't imagine being that upset for so long feels good), for us (I've begun grinding my teeth at night again from the stress and have raised my voice far more than I like) and for Evelyn (who isn't a huge fan of noise to begin with; she'll just have to get used to that, though). Anyway, on Sunday for about a three-hour period, every time me or my husband addressed Ragsy, he would fall apart and begin these ear-shattering screams. We talked briefly to the pediatrician about it yesterday and his teachers, who advised us that yes, it's normal, no, he's great at preschool and to be calm throughout. I'm trying. Really, really hard. I know that raising my voice does not magically make him listen better. It scares him and all he hears is yelling. But, Christ on a cracker, I sometimes understand why people spank their kids, even if I'd never do it.

I'm glad that Ragsy chose preschool instead of us yesterday, even though he had the option of staying home. I was initially depressed, but after this morning, I got over it. Oh, well. I guess I don't always have to like my kid as long as I always love him.

Where is the sun?

This is such a stream of consciousness post, but... I can't wait for spring. Cannot wait. I don't have SADD, but I still feel much more alive in sunlight. I used to be a night person, but I love watching the sun come up. Which is a good thing, given Evelyn's appearance in our lives.

I'm so excited to start running with my son in the evening and to show Evelyn the garden. I can't wait to start planting, Evelyn permitting. One thing I can wait for is going back to work. At least it won't be in the dark - I was fortunate enough to miss the crappiest part of winter at work, where everything is black when you walk inside the office and again when you leave - but, I really, really don't want to go back.

I never thought I'd say that. With Ragsy I couldn't get back fast enough. I loved him then and now as passionately as I did Evelyn, but there was definitely some resentment, both from labor and also just adjusting to the idea that my body was no longer my own, even less so than it had been during pregnancy. Going to work was like regaining my old self. Coming back was like losing myself again. Horrible way to look at things, isn't it? But after a while, I grew to need him - he was something we never knew we were missing until he was born and my husband and I settled into our roles as mother and father and husband and wife.

Having Evelyn has been the same, both in roles and in just her integrating into our family. There have been some moments when I thought, "What have we done to ourselves? What about our son?" But then Ragsy makes some offhand comment and I realize that, in some ways, he's integrated her into the family better than I have and I need to calm then hell down because he's taking the addition better than I am, even though he's letting us have it.

Another unexpected side effect of parenthood was that I started to assume not just the one role, the one I played with my husband, but three. I'm one person with my husband and another alone with my child. Then there's that other person I am with my husband and my child. They're all very similar, but subtly different.

Oh, well. Blah, blah, blah, right? No matter how much I ramble, it doesn't change that I have to go back to work. I can change what I do and where I go, though. I guess I ought to work on that instead of complaining about it and waxing philosophical about parenthood. It is what it is. Sometimes it really, really sucks. Strangely, the endless walking at 4 a.m. is the least of the suckage. But sometimes you have a transcendent moment that just makes it all worth it.

I think I'm going to hurl.

I haven't overeaten in a long, long time, probably six or seven months. And you wouldn't imagine that, with a dinner of fruit and cheese, I would. But I crammed myself full of brie, manchego, strawberries and cantaloupe, then indulged in some chocolate cake afterward and now I feel like I'm going to explode. I'm glad I wore my maternity jeans today. Oh, well. It was really, really worth it.

Sadly, that was the highlight of my evening. Ragsy pitched a fit today. Well, two fits, which set Evelyn off - once in the car and again when I had to hand her over to her dad so I could deal with said fit. Blargh. What a day.

I'm still a little unsettled from a dream I had last night, too. I think I must have been partially awake, too, which made it all the more weird. In the dream, I was walking Evelyn to sleep after a feeding. Not too weird. The weird part was that I knew that I was dead and that my reality overlay someone else's who was living in my former house. I was the ghost they heard pacing up and down the halls, into their bedroom and through the family room. My footsteps and Evelyn's cries were keeping them awake and afraid. I couldn't see them, but a couple were laying in a bed right where ours used to be, huddling in fear. From me. It was very much like the end of The Others.

And so it begins.

We'll need to start transitioning Evelyn out of our room sooner than I had originally thought. She detests her co-sleeper and has grown so long her feet touch the end of the bouncinette, even when her head is where it's supposed to be. Plus, she's already kicking out of her swaddle and trying to sleep on her side. By the time she wakes up for a feeding or in the morning, her butt is where her feet should be and her legs are dangling over the edge of the bouncinette. Funny, yes. Safe or comfortable? Probably not.

We had also thought that we'd found a way to comfort her when she'd really lost it in the form of a pacifier. Not so. Yesterday I was completely frazzled after a long day of dealing with her. Then Ragsy came home and began screaming bloody murder - you know, the type of shriek that makes you wonder where you've gone wrong as a parent and makes your ears ring and causes temporary hearing loss. Anyway, that freaked her out further, her dad started yelling to get Ragsy's attention and I just needed to put her down and leave the room temporarily before I began screaming, too. So I tried to give her a pacifier because I didn't want to leave her panicking. Yeah, right. How she managed to spit a pacifier out of her mouth, over the edge of her bouncinette and six inches away onto the floor will always remain a mystery.

Worse was that she calmed down and laughed at me, then blew a raspberry at me. Good grief. Someone save me.

Work again, work again, jiggity jig.

I need to face it: I'm going back to work in less than a month and starting Evelyn in day care in less than that. Bleh. I'm really not looking forward to it. Not only has this maternity leave been night and day compared to leave with Ragsy when I was so sick when my husband went back to work, I'll be going back to a long commute without the anticipation of a mental challenge and will be thinking about my kids while I'm there. I've actually grown to like my boss kind of, but I really need something more difficult if I'm going to stay, or he'll need to let me work from home sometimes.

Plus, the cost is just astronomical, but I really like our day care and preschool. Oh, well. Time to create that budget.

And, of course, Evelyn is waking up because I had the unmitigated gall to get online. Contrary little girl. I like that, but it'd be nice if she'd resume her predictable napping schedule. At least she's feeling better. The seepage is gone and nursing is going smoothly again, so I can only assume her ears feel better. Here's hoping it lasts.

Oh, hell.

I bring disease and pestilence to whosoever shall come into contact with me. And here's why:

So, I put Evelyn down for her nap today at 9 a.m. She was clear-eyed and calm. She woke up screaming at 10:30 with her left eye sealed shut and seeping. I picked her up, called the doctor's office and went in, knowing already that it was pinkeye. So they prescribed some drops and I picked them up and went home. I tried to eat lunch, but Evelyn wasn't having any of it. So, I chucked my sandwich and we played for a while (like Ragsy, she's apparently a happy patient when alert) and she seemed...off. You know that feeling you get where your spidey senses start tingling? I kept putting it off, thinking, "I've already been to the pediatrician. They're going to think I'm insane." So I waited, then thought, "I really don't want to have to go to urgent care. I'd rather they think I'm nuts than want to kick myself when she's really in pain and shrieking on Saturday." So I called and they patiently made room for me and I brought her in again.

My pediatrician, who I love, told me not to worry, that she understood (and would happily bill our insurance). She took a look at Evelyn's ears and, lo and behold, fluid and redness in both. More antibiotics, this time oral. And now she has diarrhea. And she can't sleep because her ears hurt, her eyes burn and she can't nurse for comfort because, well, her ears hurt. I'd give her Tylenol, but I can't remember how much the doctor said to give, so we (or mostly me since she won't let anyone else touch her) are up a creek without a paddle. Tonight is going to be a fun one. Still, I can deal with diarrhea and sleeping on the couch for a night or so as long as the antibiotics kick in soon.

Mental miscellany

I have so much random stuff floating around in my head, in part because it's my nature and also in part because I don't get much adult company during the day and I'm too much a coward to leave the nice, warm house with my seven-week old to go somewhere more exciting like, say, the mall or Babies R Us (I'm thinking of getting a baby seat for the kitchen; the stroller takes up way too much room). Sad when that's my idea of excitement.

Right now, I've got a kid on my chest and have for, oh, about two hours. I think my butt is creating a trough in this chair. Ah, well. I guess that's what maternity leave is for. Partially, anyway. Maybe I can watch Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog again. I'm really glad a friend suggested I buy it rather than borrow it again (you know who you are) - I got two copies and gave one to my brother-in-law instead of having him watch it over the holiday. He loved it.

This'll tell you how lame I am: did you know that they now make Snuggies for dogs?