...da da daaaaaaah!...
Our basement pipes have exploded again, so, uh, I guess that makes it official.
Summer 2007 totally sucks!
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Friday, July 06, 2007
Illness, not as Metaphor
...because, quite frankly, I'm just not that deep...
In the last post I wrote something about having some profound thoughts about illness, but if there is one thing I've learned from this 13-day bout of viral hell, it's that being sick is a lot like going on a big boozy bender. You only THINK you're having profound thoughts. In your fevered, delusional state, you're pretty convinced you're bloody Voltaire, Hobbes and freaking Wittgenstein all rolled up into one hot-thinking little sausage. But oh no, trust me my friend, you're not profound. You lie there in a miserable hot fever, a baby screaming in your ear and a fruit fly infestation buzzing in circles around your bed and you think, Oh I get it! I'm -- we're -- in HELL! Hell is life here on earth!! It all makes sense now!! You think you are a genius. But you are not a genius. You're just sick and pathetic.
Two Saturdays ago, June 23rd, while lying comatose in the blackest of sleeps, I was suddenly yanked into semi-consciousness by the presence of a soggy-assed baby sitting on my stomach, purring loudly.
"Ahraaaaaaaah," Baby Fangs meowed, poking her big curly head into my personal space and exploring my barely conscious face with her prodding, sharp-nailed fingers. Blearily I looked over at the clock. It was 6:30 am. I was so terribly tired.
"Oh God," I thought, "I'm going to die."
Just as I was thinking this, High Intensity bounded into the room. "Good morning mom!" she shouted and jumped onto the bed.
"Ooooooooooow," I thought desperately, "Talk about rubbing salt in the wound."
I was so tired I did not even feel human. My brain felt like a bottle of oozy glue. My lethargy went beyond the usual realm of sluggish inertia and into the surreal zone where misery, fatigue and vague thoughts of suicide meld into one terrible, terrible mood that always keeps Mr. IQ hopping to prevent me from killing someone. His efforts come mostly in the form of helpful advice to the kids, warnings like "Just Stay the Hell Away From Her!" and "Get Out of the Room, She's Going to Blow!" Actually, it's moods like these that remind me why we're still together. I could never be a single parent.
But unfortunately, when I woke up that Saturday morning, Mr. IQ wasn't there. He was working an overnight shift at this place where he gets paid to, well, sleep. He wasn't scheduled to return until after 11:00 am, either. There was only one thing to do, and that was to somehow get my butt downstairs to make coffee. It took about 15 minutes to muster my forces, and when I finally got downstairs I discovered to my absolute horror that the worst of all possible scenarios had happened: We were out of coffee. That this was a crisis of epic proportions cannot be overstated. Simply put, my day just doesn't start without coffee.
Hazily, I stumbled my way to the couch and collapsed on it, thinking, "How how HOW am I going to get through the next four hours until Mr. IQ comes home without coffee??" I lay there in a paralyzed stupour while High Intensity destroyed the living room and Baby Fangs crawled over my body and breakfasted on small chokeable lego pieces. (Note: Did you know "chokeable" is not a real word? Weird.) It went on like this forever, and I realized I had to do something. I needed to get it together and fast. Groaning, I asked High Intensity to read me the numbers from the stove. It was 8:13 am. Mr. IQ wasn't due back for three hours. I had no choice. I was going to have to make the trek to Seven Eleven.
Thinking back on our trip I am for some reason reminded of the scene in To Kill a Mockingbird when Scout and Jem are heading home from the Halloween party and there's a sentence like, "And so we set out together on the longest journey of our lives." Absolutely nothing happened on our walk to the local Seven Eleven, so I don't know why my mind conjures up that particular scene.
Except that it WAS the longest journey of my life.
What a sight we made. Baby Fangs, sitting in her filthy, pathetic squeaky wreck of a stroller, wore nothing but a diaper. Conversely, in perhaps an unconscious attempt to balance things out, High Intensity went commando. As for me, barely conscious, I managed to climb into the first items of clothing I happened to stumble upon, a pair of Mr. IQ's underwear that can sort of pass for shorts, and a somewhat soiled t-shirt emblazoned with the word "SLUG".
("Oh boy. I bet you were SEX," said Mr. IQ later that day when he came home and I was relating all this to him.
"Oh God, you have no idea," I said, cringing at the memory.)
So we set off. I have since taken note of the distance on my odometer, and I now know the Seven Eleven is exactly 1.1 km away from my house. How we made it there, I don't know. Each step was torture, and thoughts of the Bataan Death March kept flashing through my head. Well, perhaps that comparison is not quite apt. The Bataan Death March involved intense prisoner suffering at the hands of sadistic Japanese and Korean soldiers. There were beatings, outbreaks of dysentery and malaria, and a malicious withholding of food and water. I know the heat was unbearable and thousands died. It's a crude comparison, I know, but sometimes you just have to work with what history has to offer to make your point, okay? Don't lecture me! Obviously what I suffered on my trip to Seven Eleven for coffee was at least a thousand times worse than any wimpy Bataan Death March! Hello! I'm just trying to give you some generalized idea of what I went through, calm down already! I feel your outrage, really I do, but I've got a blog post to crank out here! Leave me alone!
Anyway, we made it there, and I got my coffee and we left. "We're going to sit here for a minute," I told High Intensity, pointing to the curb right outside the store. "Mommy needs to drink a bit of her coffee first." She eyed the broken glass suspiciously and then gingerly sat her panty-less buns down beside me. (I had bought her an apple juice, a pretty rare treat for her, and obviously the desire to drink it in comfort overrode any safety concerns she might have had regarding shards of glass in her ass. Heh.)
So we sat on the curb guzzling our beverages, a sad, sorry sight if there ever was one. And even after I'd finished my whole liter's worth of java I had to admit my fatigue was still there. Oh, the coffee had taken the edge off, that's for sure, but I certainly didn't have my usual euphoric "Hey Yowza, There's Coffee in my Bloodstream and All is Right in the World!" feeling. We plodded home. I went back to the couch. I waited for Mr. IQ's return like some await the Second Coming. My head hurt. I didn't know what was up.
Of course what was up was that I was in the beginning stages of one DOOZY of a flu bug. Mr. IQ came home and I slept all afternoon. Then he left again for his other job, just as I was entering the crazy fever stage. Baby Fangs spent the evening crawling over my 102 F body. "Oh God," I thought, "if only this baby would fall asleep, then I could possibly stand this." When she finally fell asleep I suddenly became aware that High Intensity was still awake and being particularly obnoxious. "Oh Gee," I thought, "Please, please, please make her fall asleep too. Then and only then can I be happy." When she finally passed out I gave a sigh of relief and sank down onto my bed. Only then did the full magnitude of my illness hit me, and I suddenly realized that I was really sick. "Hey, the kids are both asleep and I'm still miserable!" I thought. "The human condition is to be miserable!" The brilliance of my words overwhelmed me, and I suddenly realized that I was a genius. "Hey, I should write that down somewhere!" I thought. Then I too passed out.
And so it began. My horrible two weeks of hell. Mr. IQ was working what felt like 18 hours every day, so for the most part I was alone with the kids. It was awful. Everything has been a bit of a blur, but briefly, here are some highlights (lowlights?) of the last 14 days:
Day Two: More fever. The house is already a pit. Despite my fairly delusional state, I nevertheless take a vague, purely hands-off interest in what my children are up to, and realize something important. I've read that kids of non-functional adults end up being either super responsible, crazy workaholic types or else super irresponsible. I can see these roles being assumed right before my eyes by High Intensity and Baby Fangs after only 24 hours of benign neglect. Old H. I. is bustling around, telling Fangs what to do, bringing me glasses of water and preparing light snacks every fifteen minutes for herself and her sister. The baby just crawls around, filthy, not a care in the world. It makes me sad, and I cry a bit. This is a precursor to:
Day Three: The weepy stage. Everything, and I mean everything, makes me bawl. ("Ball whom?" my buddy Nitroglycol once asked me politely. Ha ha.) The dirt encrusted on Baby Fangs' neck makes me bawl. A bird on our lawn makes me bawl. A glimpse of my copy of Primo Levi's Survival in Auschwitz makes me bawl. It's all so weird and inexplicable! The fruit fly infestation makes me -- well, actually, it makes me want to kill someone. When Mr. IQ returns from work I am a mess. "I'll take the kids and get them out of your hair," he says, and they go have a picnic. While I appreciate the respite, the fact that he does not stick around to do at least some superficial tidying means that I am left to bake alone in a squalid hovel. I try to get up to clean but find I absolutely can't do it. This makes me bawl.
Day Four: High Intensity gets down the bucket of ice-cream from the freezer. I am too weak and apathetic to stop her. Pow-wow style, she and Baby Fangs sit around it on the floor, eating their way to the bottom. They have a blast. Baby Fangs is wearing a diaper that is swollen with urine to 17 times its regular size. She is surrounded by chaos. I watch them helplessly from the couch. "Hey," I whisper, my voice cracking a bit in self-pity, "aren't... aren't you going to bring me some?"
Day Five: High Intensity stops wearing clothes.
Day Six: I stop wearing clothes too, at least when no-one else is around. I insist on keeping my bra on at all times though. It is a maternity bra, and the flu bug has sapped the necessary energy needed to reattach the flaps that unhook for nursing. This means my naked breasts hang out of it like grotesquely huge hairless rodents gasping for air. This is not as sexy as it may sound, I can assure you.
Day Seven: High Intensity's Last Day of Nursery. I bring her to school not realizing that there is a big celebration planned, and the parents are expected to stay. The other parents and kids are all dressed to the nines. I am wearing Mr. IQ's SLUG shirt again. "I'm sick," I croak at the teacher. "Oh dear," she says, crinkling up her nose in disgust. I look terrible. All the parents stare at me, and give me a wide berth. We watch a video showing everything the kids have done over the school year. There is a nice shot of High Intensity picking her nose and eating it. I am embarrassed, and look over to where she is sitting. She is on the floor with her classmates picking her nose and eating it. She is filthy, and her hair needs a good wash. You are a failure of a parent, I think and then have a coughing fit that lasts for the remainder of the film.
Day Seven: Mr. IQ takes a picture of me at my most wretched. Once again, it pains me to show off like this, but I have to say that no-one, no-one on this planet can take an ugly picture like me; incredibly, however, this particular picture puts all other snapshots to shame and believe me, that's saying something. (I am almost tempted to post it here, but I'm just not that brave. Besides, then all of you would think I look like a monster. I'd have to post a really stunning picture of me alongside of it just to give some perspective. And that would just be dumb.)
Day Eight: Mr. IQ starts getting sick. Or did that happen on Day Nine? Day Ten? I'm not sure. All I know is that he's still sick. Last night, lying on the couch, he started muttering something under his breath. I looked over at him. The room was hot and dirty. Baby Fangs was sitting on his head in a less-than-crisp looking diaper. There were fruit flies buzzing around his mouth. He was naked from the waist up and sweaty.
"What was that you were saying?" I asked.
"I said I just figured something out," he croaked, "about Hell. It really is here on Earth! We're -- we're all in hell!! I'm in Hell!!"
"You betcha, genius!" I said fondly.
It looks like he's getting better. The profound stage means that the fever is breaking.
In the last post I wrote something about having some profound thoughts about illness, but if there is one thing I've learned from this 13-day bout of viral hell, it's that being sick is a lot like going on a big boozy bender. You only THINK you're having profound thoughts. In your fevered, delusional state, you're pretty convinced you're bloody Voltaire, Hobbes and freaking Wittgenstein all rolled up into one hot-thinking little sausage. But oh no, trust me my friend, you're not profound. You lie there in a miserable hot fever, a baby screaming in your ear and a fruit fly infestation buzzing in circles around your bed and you think, Oh I get it! I'm -- we're -- in HELL! Hell is life here on earth!! It all makes sense now!! You think you are a genius. But you are not a genius. You're just sick and pathetic.
Two Saturdays ago, June 23rd, while lying comatose in the blackest of sleeps, I was suddenly yanked into semi-consciousness by the presence of a soggy-assed baby sitting on my stomach, purring loudly.
"Ahraaaaaaaah," Baby Fangs meowed, poking her big curly head into my personal space and exploring my barely conscious face with her prodding, sharp-nailed fingers. Blearily I looked over at the clock. It was 6:30 am. I was so terribly tired.
"Oh God," I thought, "I'm going to die."
Just as I was thinking this, High Intensity bounded into the room. "Good morning mom!" she shouted and jumped onto the bed.
"Ooooooooooow," I thought desperately, "Talk about rubbing salt in the wound."
I was so tired I did not even feel human. My brain felt like a bottle of oozy glue. My lethargy went beyond the usual realm of sluggish inertia and into the surreal zone where misery, fatigue and vague thoughts of suicide meld into one terrible, terrible mood that always keeps Mr. IQ hopping to prevent me from killing someone. His efforts come mostly in the form of helpful advice to the kids, warnings like "Just Stay the Hell Away From Her!" and "Get Out of the Room, She's Going to Blow!" Actually, it's moods like these that remind me why we're still together. I could never be a single parent.
But unfortunately, when I woke up that Saturday morning, Mr. IQ wasn't there. He was working an overnight shift at this place where he gets paid to, well, sleep. He wasn't scheduled to return until after 11:00 am, either. There was only one thing to do, and that was to somehow get my butt downstairs to make coffee. It took about 15 minutes to muster my forces, and when I finally got downstairs I discovered to my absolute horror that the worst of all possible scenarios had happened: We were out of coffee. That this was a crisis of epic proportions cannot be overstated. Simply put, my day just doesn't start without coffee.
Hazily, I stumbled my way to the couch and collapsed on it, thinking, "How how HOW am I going to get through the next four hours until Mr. IQ comes home without coffee??" I lay there in a paralyzed stupour while High Intensity destroyed the living room and Baby Fangs crawled over my body and breakfasted on small chokeable lego pieces. (Note: Did you know "chokeable" is not a real word? Weird.) It went on like this forever, and I realized I had to do something. I needed to get it together and fast. Groaning, I asked High Intensity to read me the numbers from the stove. It was 8:13 am. Mr. IQ wasn't due back for three hours. I had no choice. I was going to have to make the trek to Seven Eleven.
Thinking back on our trip I am for some reason reminded of the scene in To Kill a Mockingbird when Scout and Jem are heading home from the Halloween party and there's a sentence like, "And so we set out together on the longest journey of our lives." Absolutely nothing happened on our walk to the local Seven Eleven, so I don't know why my mind conjures up that particular scene.
Except that it WAS the longest journey of my life.
What a sight we made. Baby Fangs, sitting in her filthy, pathetic squeaky wreck of a stroller, wore nothing but a diaper. Conversely, in perhaps an unconscious attempt to balance things out, High Intensity went commando. As for me, barely conscious, I managed to climb into the first items of clothing I happened to stumble upon, a pair of Mr. IQ's underwear that can sort of pass for shorts, and a somewhat soiled t-shirt emblazoned with the word "SLUG".
("Oh boy. I bet you were SEX," said Mr. IQ later that day when he came home and I was relating all this to him.
"Oh God, you have no idea," I said, cringing at the memory.)
So we set off. I have since taken note of the distance on my odometer, and I now know the Seven Eleven is exactly 1.1 km away from my house. How we made it there, I don't know. Each step was torture, and thoughts of the Bataan Death March kept flashing through my head. Well, perhaps that comparison is not quite apt. The Bataan Death March involved intense prisoner suffering at the hands of sadistic Japanese and Korean soldiers. There were beatings, outbreaks of dysentery and malaria, and a malicious withholding of food and water. I know the heat was unbearable and thousands died. It's a crude comparison, I know, but sometimes you just have to work with what history has to offer to make your point, okay? Don't lecture me! Obviously what I suffered on my trip to Seven Eleven for coffee was at least a thousand times worse than any wimpy Bataan Death March! Hello! I'm just trying to give you some generalized idea of what I went through, calm down already! I feel your outrage, really I do, but I've got a blog post to crank out here! Leave me alone!
Anyway, we made it there, and I got my coffee and we left. "We're going to sit here for a minute," I told High Intensity, pointing to the curb right outside the store. "Mommy needs to drink a bit of her coffee first." She eyed the broken glass suspiciously and then gingerly sat her panty-less buns down beside me. (I had bought her an apple juice, a pretty rare treat for her, and obviously the desire to drink it in comfort overrode any safety concerns she might have had regarding shards of glass in her ass. Heh.)
So we sat on the curb guzzling our beverages, a sad, sorry sight if there ever was one. And even after I'd finished my whole liter's worth of java I had to admit my fatigue was still there. Oh, the coffee had taken the edge off, that's for sure, but I certainly didn't have my usual euphoric "Hey Yowza, There's Coffee in my Bloodstream and All is Right in the World!" feeling. We plodded home. I went back to the couch. I waited for Mr. IQ's return like some await the Second Coming. My head hurt. I didn't know what was up.
Of course what was up was that I was in the beginning stages of one DOOZY of a flu bug. Mr. IQ came home and I slept all afternoon. Then he left again for his other job, just as I was entering the crazy fever stage. Baby Fangs spent the evening crawling over my 102 F body. "Oh God," I thought, "if only this baby would fall asleep, then I could possibly stand this." When she finally fell asleep I suddenly became aware that High Intensity was still awake and being particularly obnoxious. "Oh Gee," I thought, "Please, please, please make her fall asleep too. Then and only then can I be happy." When she finally passed out I gave a sigh of relief and sank down onto my bed. Only then did the full magnitude of my illness hit me, and I suddenly realized that I was really sick. "Hey, the kids are both asleep and I'm still miserable!" I thought. "The human condition is to be miserable!" The brilliance of my words overwhelmed me, and I suddenly realized that I was a genius. "Hey, I should write that down somewhere!" I thought. Then I too passed out.
And so it began. My horrible two weeks of hell. Mr. IQ was working what felt like 18 hours every day, so for the most part I was alone with the kids. It was awful. Everything has been a bit of a blur, but briefly, here are some highlights (lowlights?) of the last 14 days:
Day Two: More fever. The house is already a pit. Despite my fairly delusional state, I nevertheless take a vague, purely hands-off interest in what my children are up to, and realize something important. I've read that kids of non-functional adults end up being either super responsible, crazy workaholic types or else super irresponsible. I can see these roles being assumed right before my eyes by High Intensity and Baby Fangs after only 24 hours of benign neglect. Old H. I. is bustling around, telling Fangs what to do, bringing me glasses of water and preparing light snacks every fifteen minutes for herself and her sister. The baby just crawls around, filthy, not a care in the world. It makes me sad, and I cry a bit. This is a precursor to:
Day Three: The weepy stage. Everything, and I mean everything, makes me bawl. ("Ball whom?" my buddy Nitroglycol once asked me politely. Ha ha.) The dirt encrusted on Baby Fangs' neck makes me bawl. A bird on our lawn makes me bawl. A glimpse of my copy of Primo Levi's Survival in Auschwitz makes me bawl. It's all so weird and inexplicable! The fruit fly infestation makes me -- well, actually, it makes me want to kill someone. When Mr. IQ returns from work I am a mess. "I'll take the kids and get them out of your hair," he says, and they go have a picnic. While I appreciate the respite, the fact that he does not stick around to do at least some superficial tidying means that I am left to bake alone in a squalid hovel. I try to get up to clean but find I absolutely can't do it. This makes me bawl.
Day Four: High Intensity gets down the bucket of ice-cream from the freezer. I am too weak and apathetic to stop her. Pow-wow style, she and Baby Fangs sit around it on the floor, eating their way to the bottom. They have a blast. Baby Fangs is wearing a diaper that is swollen with urine to 17 times its regular size. She is surrounded by chaos. I watch them helplessly from the couch. "Hey," I whisper, my voice cracking a bit in self-pity, "aren't... aren't you going to bring me some?"
Day Five: High Intensity stops wearing clothes.
Day Six: I stop wearing clothes too, at least when no-one else is around. I insist on keeping my bra on at all times though. It is a maternity bra, and the flu bug has sapped the necessary energy needed to reattach the flaps that unhook for nursing. This means my naked breasts hang out of it like grotesquely huge hairless rodents gasping for air. This is not as sexy as it may sound, I can assure you.
Day Seven: High Intensity's Last Day of Nursery. I bring her to school not realizing that there is a big celebration planned, and the parents are expected to stay. The other parents and kids are all dressed to the nines. I am wearing Mr. IQ's SLUG shirt again. "I'm sick," I croak at the teacher. "Oh dear," she says, crinkling up her nose in disgust. I look terrible. All the parents stare at me, and give me a wide berth. We watch a video showing everything the kids have done over the school year. There is a nice shot of High Intensity picking her nose and eating it. I am embarrassed, and look over to where she is sitting. She is on the floor with her classmates picking her nose and eating it. She is filthy, and her hair needs a good wash. You are a failure of a parent, I think and then have a coughing fit that lasts for the remainder of the film.
Day Seven: Mr. IQ takes a picture of me at my most wretched. Once again, it pains me to show off like this, but I have to say that no-one, no-one on this planet can take an ugly picture like me; incredibly, however, this particular picture puts all other snapshots to shame and believe me, that's saying something. (I am almost tempted to post it here, but I'm just not that brave. Besides, then all of you would think I look like a monster. I'd have to post a really stunning picture of me alongside of it just to give some perspective. And that would just be dumb.)
Day Eight: Mr. IQ starts getting sick. Or did that happen on Day Nine? Day Ten? I'm not sure. All I know is that he's still sick. Last night, lying on the couch, he started muttering something under his breath. I looked over at him. The room was hot and dirty. Baby Fangs was sitting on his head in a less-than-crisp looking diaper. There were fruit flies buzzing around his mouth. He was naked from the waist up and sweaty.
"What was that you were saying?" I asked.
"I said I just figured something out," he croaked, "about Hell. It really is here on Earth! We're -- we're all in hell!! I'm in Hell!!"
"You betcha, genius!" I said fondly.
It looks like he's getting better. The profound stage means that the fever is breaking.
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
Still Sick
...can you believe this??...
I'm still sick, and I'm at the point where I can't even joke about it anymore. I'm at the "Coughing So Hard Chunks of Lung are Coming Up" stage of this miserable illness. It's horrible. Mr. IQ is sick now too, he came down with it two days ago. He's in the "Raging Fever" stage, and has spent the last 24 hours lying on the couch, melodramatically taking his temperature every three minutes with the Dora the Explorer children's thermometer we have. Even I was only doing this every four minutes when I was in the fever stage, although I haven't pointed this out to him yet: he's pretty cranky right now. As am I. As am I.
Our children are raising themselves at this point.
And you would not BELIEVE what the house looks like right now.
I think I have some profound insights on all this sickness business, but I can't write about them now, staring at the screen for too long gives me a headache. I just wanted to check in. A lot of people have abandoned their blogs lately, I've noticed, but I suspect this is because they're on fun-filled summer vacations and not because they've succumbed to some nasty virus like me.
*sigh*
Lucky bastards.
I'm still sick, and I'm at the point where I can't even joke about it anymore. I'm at the "Coughing So Hard Chunks of Lung are Coming Up" stage of this miserable illness. It's horrible. Mr. IQ is sick now too, he came down with it two days ago. He's in the "Raging Fever" stage, and has spent the last 24 hours lying on the couch, melodramatically taking his temperature every three minutes with the Dora the Explorer children's thermometer we have. Even I was only doing this every four minutes when I was in the fever stage, although I haven't pointed this out to him yet: he's pretty cranky right now. As am I. As am I.
Our children are raising themselves at this point.
And you would not BELIEVE what the house looks like right now.
I think I have some profound insights on all this sickness business, but I can't write about them now, staring at the screen for too long gives me a headache. I just wanted to check in. A lot of people have abandoned their blogs lately, I've noticed, but I suspect this is because they're on fun-filled summer vacations and not because they've succumbed to some nasty virus like me.
*sigh*
Lucky bastards.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Ugggghhhhhh Part II
...that's, uh, a moany, sick sort of "uggggggghhhhh" there, not a zombie-grunt....
Still ridiculously, hopelessly sick. Some invisible giant has mistaken my head for a large and juicy melon of some kind and is currently trying to hack it open with an ax. Several sadistic, minuscule elves have taken up residence in my throat and are shoving their cute little curlicue knives into it. This makes it difficult to eat, so my one consolation is that when this is all over I will be a light delicate swan. In as much as a person who is five feet ten can ever be considered "delicate."
At least I don't have a fever anymore.
I went to the doctor's this morning and was told I could well have the West Nile Virus; I was then shuffled out of the office and on to my non-merry way. "Make sure you take it really easy over the next few days!" the doctor added as I was leaving. Sure, right. I'll just leave everything in the competent hands of my manservant, Bunsworthy for the next 48 hours while I lie in bed with a box of bon bons and an assortment of Russell Crowe movies. Ha ha. As if. (He knew I had kids at home too, he'd asked!! What a clueless jerk!!)
Mr. IQ came up with a design for the tombstone I wanted. He really enjoyed working on it too, got himself worked up into a right excited lather. You should have seen him bopping around here, holy cow, talk about uncharacteristic behavior! He was even humming! Honestly, he is sometimes so sweet and generous to me, it melts my heart.
See you when I'm finally over this. (Soon, hopefully.)
Still ridiculously, hopelessly sick. Some invisible giant has mistaken my head for a large and juicy melon of some kind and is currently trying to hack it open with an ax. Several sadistic, minuscule elves have taken up residence in my throat and are shoving their cute little curlicue knives into it. This makes it difficult to eat, so my one consolation is that when this is all over I will be a light delicate swan. In as much as a person who is five feet ten can ever be considered "delicate."
At least I don't have a fever anymore.
I went to the doctor's this morning and was told I could well have the West Nile Virus; I was then shuffled out of the office and on to my non-merry way. "Make sure you take it really easy over the next few days!" the doctor added as I was leaving. Sure, right. I'll just leave everything in the competent hands of my manservant, Bunsworthy for the next 48 hours while I lie in bed with a box of bon bons and an assortment of Russell Crowe movies. Ha ha. As if. (He knew I had kids at home too, he'd asked!! What a clueless jerk!!)
Mr. IQ came up with a design for the tombstone I wanted. He really enjoyed working on it too, got himself worked up into a right excited lather. You should have seen him bopping around here, holy cow, talk about uncharacteristic behavior! He was even humming! Honestly, he is sometimes so sweet and generous to me, it melts my heart.
See you when I'm finally over this. (Soon, hopefully.)
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Ugggghhhhhhhhh
...help, I'm dying....
I've got the flu. Holy crap, am I ever sick. And, just in time to fuel my world-famous hypochondria, the newspaper today listed all the symptoms of West Nile Virus. I read the list uncomfortably, while absent-mindedly scratching the mosquito bites on my legs, all 47, 000 of them. (Mosquito bites, that is; although in many ways I AM a genetic freak of nature, I don't have 47, 000 legs...) Even though I appear to have what the paper describes as a "mild case" of it, I still feel like a big bag of hell, and am pretty sure I'm dying. Mr. IQ has promised to write "Whippersnapper Snapping Snapped Snuffed it" on my tombstone, so that has been a bit of a comfort.
Update to follow when (*sob*, IF) I'm ever feeling better...
I've got the flu. Holy crap, am I ever sick. And, just in time to fuel my world-famous hypochondria, the newspaper today listed all the symptoms of West Nile Virus. I read the list uncomfortably, while absent-mindedly scratching the mosquito bites on my legs, all 47, 000 of them. (Mosquito bites, that is; although in many ways I AM a genetic freak of nature, I don't have 47, 000 legs...) Even though I appear to have what the paper describes as a "mild case" of it, I still feel like a big bag of hell, and am pretty sure I'm dying. Mr. IQ has promised to write "Whippersnapper Snapping Snapped Snuffed it" on my tombstone, so that has been a bit of a comfort.
Update to follow when (*sob*, IF) I'm ever feeling better...
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Sunday Night Office Update, Part IV
...oooh, I've just discovered you can do colours with this thing!!!... (and to think last year at this time I hated computers)....
I was going to write this two days ago, but on Tuesday around 10:00 pm, my usual blogging hour, we had the most terrific thunderstorm, and so I sat by the window in our darkened living room and watched all the lightning instead. It was quite spectacular. Hmmm. Reading that over, it sounds like I actually had a choice in the matter. The reality is that whenever there is electricity in the sky Mr. IQ gets all paranoid and insists on shutting the computer down. He is convinced that our last computer bagged it because of lightning and so now, if there is even the merest hint of rain, he's racing in to shut everything off. It's a little annoying, especially given all the crappy weather we've been having around here lately.
Anyway, I was going to tell you why I haven't been blogging much lately...
Because the first step to getting anything done in this life is to make a list, this spring, Mr. IQ and I sat down and outlined all the things we would like to see completed by the end of the summer. Actually (and this should really come as no surprise to anyone who knows anything about male/female dynamics) I outlined them while Mr. IQ looked on, assuming the expression of a sick old man. Lounging around on the deck with an assortment of international beers was not on my list of "must dos" for the summer. This seemed to distress him a bit.
"Summer is going to suck," he said as he stared at my list.
"When the Mama Bear is happy, everyone is happy," I told him.
I received a baleful look. No, it said, when Mama Bear finally keels over and dies everyone will be happy.
Harsh, I vibed back. But I knew he meant it. Had I upped and snuffed it the next day in a car accident, behind all the feigned tears his thoughts would have been, Phew! That was lucky! Building that greenhouse-slash- winery she wanted in the backyard would have really sucked...
But none of this matters now anyway. The Great Sewer Explosions of 2007 have cut short all my plans for an organized office, nicely painted walls and a decently tiled kitchen. Now any free time Mr. IQ has he spends down there in our Hellzone, ripping up boards, sorting through crap and swearing. And bringing up stuff. Sloooooooowly. And here's the frustrating and annoying thing:
All the stuff he has brought up so far belongs to... me.
Now listen: 99.999999999% of the crap down there is his. Really. Okay, maybe 95%. It's a basement for crying out loud, where else do you store seasonal items? OF COURSE I keep some of my stuff down there, and I do so at the risk of never, ever seeing it again, by the way. Last winter, for example, he was unable to locate my super warm winter boots, essential for walks in -40 C weather. To say this was a source of conflict and stress between us would be tantamount to calling Pol Pot A Very Naughty Boy. We never found them. My feet froze. We fought a lot about it. It wasn't pretty.
Then spring came along and he couldn't find my roller blades. I'm sorry, there aren't too many pleasures in this miserable world but roller blading is definitely one of them: Knowing I was going to be spending the spring and summer without my beloved, precious blades sent me swirling into about as black and miserable a rage as any person has known. Each time he went down there I would snarl, "And find my @#$&!! roller blades!" But he never did. Tensions were mounting. I made inquiries about a nice rooming house on
Then one evening, about three days after Great Sewer Explosion #1, he emerged from that hole with a triumphant look on his face, carrying a large, bulky plastic bag.
"I have good news and bad news!" he said happily.
"Give me the bad news first," I said.
"Well, the bad news is, I still haven't found your roller blades," he said. I growled.
"But the good news is, I've found your boots!!" he shouted and dumped my 40 pound, triple layered Kamiks into my lap. This was a June day, mind you. The temperature was about 28 C out with 99% humidity.
"Oh yay," I said, trying hard to quell the sarcasm. He was so proud and happy and all I wanted to do was punch something. (Have I ever mentioned my clever and groundbreaking theory that men and women are not compatible and should never live together? I'll have to outline it for you some time, it's quite original.)
To be fair and true, he did eventually dig out my blades too. But that's not the story here. What I wish to discuss is the fact that while only a modest 5% of the basement contents belong to me, it was those items that were being carted upstairs. Okay, not everything I have down there is a seasonal item. I have a weakness for, um, cheap garage sale furniture with "promise." So, uh, there have been a number of items I've purchased over the years for a song that I really have been meaning to fix up. A chair. A desk. A dresser. A telephone table. Large, bulky items. All pretty ugly. He brought them up one by one and placed them conspicuously in the front hallway. I think this was his silent but damn effective way of making a statement.
A lesser person than me would have balked at the evidence of her own tendency to accumulate things. But not me! No sir! I took a look at that dresser and said to myself: I'll show him! I'll have it redone by the end of this week! And after spending some time on the computer looking for a modest and workable template....
...I spent the rest of the week sanding, priming, purchasing paint, re-consulting my original design, making a few adjustments here and there and DA-DA!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I DID IT!!!!!!!! The finished product!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm kicking myself for not taking a "Before" picture. Keep in mind this was a $15 garage sale find. While staying for the most part true to the original Tibetan design I picked out, yet boldly adding my own personal touches here and there, I must say I really created a masterpiece of a furniture item. It's been cause for some reflection, let me tell you. At the risk of sounding hopelessly immodest and evoking your jealousy, I have to admit that I really am an incredibly accomplished person. I can make a hearty and nutritious lentil and parsnip stew that makes Mr. IQ shed tears of wondrous joy before he's even taken a single bite. I mastered most of the important swear words at an incredibly young and tender age, bringing praise and recognition to my understandably proud parents. I can go for days without bathing and my peers are none the wiser thanks to my well-honed mastery of the perfume bottle. But I have to say, none of these things even compares to my completion of this dresser last week. Really. I'm so damn proud of myself I could cry.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Another Addiction Bites the Dust
...and that's probably a good thing...
It's a sad thing to admit, but my love affair with the "Next Blog" button on my computer screen has come to a rather abrupt end and there is little hope that it will ever be restored.
I used to... well, not really "love" it per se, but I certainly always found it pretty interesting to peruse total strangers' blogs (from an *ahem* purely sociological perspective, of course!) Even dull blogs could be kind of fascinating by virtue of their very lack of zest if you know what I mean (who and why would anyone write about this??) and I loved them all! Kid pictures: Why not? Details of a church picnic: Fabulous, especially the pie descriptions! Chapter 63 of some guy's novel: I'd read it! Corny poetry? The more maudlin the better! The right-wing, fundamentalist Christian blogs sort of got on my nerves a bit, and I usually skipped over them for the sake of my mental health, but other than those ones it was pretty rare for me to really dislike a blog, or judge a blogger harshly. Except for maybe this one time, when I read a blog set up to coordinate a twenty year high school reunion. Yeah, I confess, I read a big chunk of it, and yeah, I found it interesting in a sort of horrifying, I-think-I'm-going-to-throw-up kind of way. (It has, uh, been twenty years this June since I graduated from high school myself, OK? 'nuff said.) Anyway. This is going to sound harsh, but let me tell you: I've read blogs about dog grooming shows, harebrained get-rich-quick schemes and the quest for the perfect burger. I've ploughed my way through a penis reconstruction surgery blog (complete with pictures!) I've even read blogs ostensibly written by Che Guevara and a long-haired cat named Frisky; but believe me, never, NEVER did I stumble upon a blog more pathetic than that one.
My addiction to the "Next Blog" button was mostly an evening thing, although I always had to shut it down when it got really late. After midnight all I'd get was Very Large Tits blogs. These always horrified me, because, damn it, if I'm going to hunt for porn, I'll do it the old fashioned way, thank you very much: I'll look for it under some teenage boy's mattress.
But all that has now come to an end, thanks to the efforts of one totally sadistic bastard of a blog that sent me here last week. WAIT!! Don't y'all go pressing that button until you're properly aware of what you're getting into! Going to this site is NOT for the faint of heart! Without giving too much away, it involves some pretty scary visual images that I don't want you to see unless you're properly prepared. UNLIKE I WAS.
Picture the scene: A cold, rainy, lonely night, and Mr. IQ is out with the lads having a few ales. I am alone in the house with the kids, fiddling around with the computer, idly pressing my favourite "Next Blog" button. The room is dark except for the glow from the computer screen. I click innocently on a link that says something innocuous like "fun site!" or "groovy game!" It starts. The pictures start flashing and the music slashes into my brain. I scream, and soil my pants. I run from the room and spend the night curled up on the couch with a large carving knife clutched in my hot and sweaty hand. Scared? Oh my friends, you have no idea. I was freaking TERRIFIED.
OK, so now that you know what you're in for, you can go. Make sure the volume of your computer is turned up! Have fun! Are you wearing your Depends?
(Doo dee doo, waiting for your return, it won't be long I know!)
Are you back? How long did you last? I made it about 13 seconds into the thing. Remember, I was alone in the house and it was late at night. Can you just IMAGINE how terrified I was?? It was awful.
And so, just like that, Pavlovian style, thus endeth my love affair with the "Next Blog" button.
I'm a little sad about this, naturally. It was through this button that I found The Constant Whiner and DoctorMama, two of my most favouritest blogs ever. All not in vain, I guess. I told Mr. IQ all about it, and after fiddling around for a bit on the same site he found this for High Intensity. She spent at least twenty fabulous minutes playing with it which meant I got at least twenty fabulous minutes alone... dealing with... the other kid. Oh yay.
***
I haven't been blogging much lately. I'll show you the picture of why tomorrow. (I would post it now but Mr. IQ isn't here and I still don't know how to get pictures up by myself.) (Yes, I suck.)
It's a sad thing to admit, but my love affair with the "Next Blog" button on my computer screen has come to a rather abrupt end and there is little hope that it will ever be restored.
I used to... well, not really "love" it per se, but I certainly always found it pretty interesting to peruse total strangers' blogs (from an *ahem* purely sociological perspective, of course!) Even dull blogs could be kind of fascinating by virtue of their very lack of zest if you know what I mean (who and why would anyone write about this??) and I loved them all! Kid pictures: Why not? Details of a church picnic: Fabulous, especially the pie descriptions! Chapter 63 of some guy's novel: I'd read it! Corny poetry? The more maudlin the better! The right-wing, fundamentalist Christian blogs sort of got on my nerves a bit, and I usually skipped over them for the sake of my mental health, but other than those ones it was pretty rare for me to really dislike a blog, or judge a blogger harshly. Except for maybe this one time, when I read a blog set up to coordinate a twenty year high school reunion. Yeah, I confess, I read a big chunk of it, and yeah, I found it interesting in a sort of horrifying, I-think-I'm-going-to-throw-up kind of way. (It has, uh, been twenty years this June since I graduated from high school myself, OK? 'nuff said.) Anyway. This is going to sound harsh, but let me tell you: I've read blogs about dog grooming shows, harebrained get-rich-quick schemes and the quest for the perfect burger. I've ploughed my way through a penis reconstruction surgery blog (complete with pictures!) I've even read blogs ostensibly written by Che Guevara and a long-haired cat named Frisky; but believe me, never, NEVER did I stumble upon a blog more pathetic than that one.
My addiction to the "Next Blog" button was mostly an evening thing, although I always had to shut it down when it got really late. After midnight all I'd get was Very Large Tits blogs. These always horrified me, because, damn it, if I'm going to hunt for porn, I'll do it the old fashioned way, thank you very much: I'll look for it under some teenage boy's mattress.
But all that has now come to an end, thanks to the efforts of one totally sadistic bastard of a blog that sent me here last week. WAIT!! Don't y'all go pressing that button until you're properly aware of what you're getting into! Going to this site is NOT for the faint of heart! Without giving too much away, it involves some pretty scary visual images that I don't want you to see unless you're properly prepared. UNLIKE I WAS.
Picture the scene: A cold, rainy, lonely night, and Mr. IQ is out with the lads having a few ales. I am alone in the house with the kids, fiddling around with the computer, idly pressing my favourite "Next Blog" button. The room is dark except for the glow from the computer screen. I click innocently on a link that says something innocuous like "fun site!" or "groovy game!" It starts. The pictures start flashing and the music slashes into my brain. I scream, and soil my pants. I run from the room and spend the night curled up on the couch with a large carving knife clutched in my hot and sweaty hand. Scared? Oh my friends, you have no idea. I was freaking TERRIFIED.
OK, so now that you know what you're in for, you can go. Make sure the volume of your computer is turned up! Have fun! Are you wearing your Depends?
(Doo dee doo, waiting for your return, it won't be long I know!)
Are you back? How long did you last? I made it about 13 seconds into the thing. Remember, I was alone in the house and it was late at night. Can you just IMAGINE how terrified I was?? It was awful.
And so, just like that, Pavlovian style, thus endeth my love affair with the "Next Blog" button.
I'm a little sad about this, naturally. It was through this button that I found The Constant Whiner and DoctorMama, two of my most favouritest blogs ever. All not in vain, I guess. I told Mr. IQ all about it, and after fiddling around for a bit on the same site he found this for High Intensity. She spent at least twenty fabulous minutes playing with it which meant I got at least twenty fabulous minutes alone... dealing with... the other kid. Oh yay.
***
I haven't been blogging much lately. I'll show you the picture of why tomorrow. (I would post it now but Mr. IQ isn't here and I still don't know how to get pictures up by myself.) (Yes, I suck.)
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Sunday Night Office Update Part III
...screw the office, it's all about the basement now...
So. Perhaps you've been wondering: Did the sewer explosion business last week do a number on Mr. IQ's 40,000 tonnes of crap currently amassed in our basement?
The sad answer to that is no. Damn it all to hell, no. His stuff is doing just peachy, thank-you, and sends you its warmest, non-sewage-covered regards.
How could this be, you ask? Easy. The previous owners of this house, for reasons we don't quite understand, but probably involving the disposal of dead bodies, built a wooden platform floor in the basement. All his stuff is located on the platform. All the sewage has been going under it.
I have not written about the pack-rat situation for a while here because, as per usual, thinking about it makes me want to tear my hair out. Stuff has been moved out of this place, honestly, I think we have removed a minimum of fifty boxes since last February, and here's the thing: It hasn't even made a dent. Not a dent. Not one little motherplucking dent.
What's more: Last week, in an attempt to regain at least SOME order to my life, I decided to clean out the car. Actually, I was inspired to do this after giving my dad a ride. (He'd spent the trip sharing the passenger seat with a large tractor tire inner tube, something I'd found a little mortifying.
"Sorry dad, you know I live with a pack rat," I'd said apologetically.
"Mmphhh," he'd said, uncomfortably suckling on his kneecaps.)
So yeah, I cleaned out the car and discovered to my horror that the trunk was harbouring at least seven boxes of stuff which I thought had been sent to the thrift store in February. Stuff old you-know-who was having trouble letting go of. Stuff like:
1. A moldy picture frame, sans back.
2. An embarrassingly huge pair of bright yellow headphones circa 1981 which plays AM radio stations.
3. A book on Finnish Disco Moves, crumpled
4. A bunny on a stick
5. A coffee mug that says "Still Frisky at 40"
In another time, in another age, I would have found this all hopelessly charming and amusing. But I'll tell you, when I saw that bunny on a stick, I could have... I could have... well, uh, do you know the meaning of the word "gerbilism"? Just for the record, I didn't know the exact word either until I looked it up for the purposes of this post, and my hunt for it is really a story unto itself: sooooooo embarrassing. (There's gonna be a lot of people out there tonight saying, "Guess what sicko came to my site today!!" I really hope no-one confiscates our computer anytime soon.) Anyway. Anyway. The bunny and everything else is gone now. The threat of un petit lapin dans le derriere really got things cracking.
But I've got to go. They've just issued a tornado watch for the city. Oh my God. If I have to spend the evening huddled in that stinking, crap-filled pithole of a basement tonight, someone is going to die.
Probably me.
So. Perhaps you've been wondering: Did the sewer explosion business last week do a number on Mr. IQ's 40,000 tonnes of crap currently amassed in our basement?
The sad answer to that is no. Damn it all to hell, no. His stuff is doing just peachy, thank-you, and sends you its warmest, non-sewage-covered regards.
How could this be, you ask? Easy. The previous owners of this house, for reasons we don't quite understand, but probably involving the disposal of dead bodies, built a wooden platform floor in the basement. All his stuff is located on the platform. All the sewage has been going under it.
I have not written about the pack-rat situation for a while here because, as per usual, thinking about it makes me want to tear my hair out. Stuff has been moved out of this place, honestly, I think we have removed a minimum of fifty boxes since last February, and here's the thing: It hasn't even made a dent. Not a dent. Not one little motherplucking dent.
What's more: Last week, in an attempt to regain at least SOME order to my life, I decided to clean out the car. Actually, I was inspired to do this after giving my dad a ride. (He'd spent the trip sharing the passenger seat with a large tractor tire inner tube, something I'd found a little mortifying.
"Sorry dad, you know I live with a pack rat," I'd said apologetically.
"Mmphhh," he'd said, uncomfortably suckling on his kneecaps.)
So yeah, I cleaned out the car and discovered to my horror that the trunk was harbouring at least seven boxes of stuff which I thought had been sent to the thrift store in February. Stuff old you-know-who was having trouble letting go of. Stuff like:
1. A moldy picture frame, sans back.
2. An embarrassingly huge pair of bright yellow headphones circa 1981 which plays AM radio stations.
3. A book on Finnish Disco Moves, crumpled
4. A bunny on a stick
5. A coffee mug that says "Still Frisky at 40"
In another time, in another age, I would have found this all hopelessly charming and amusing. But I'll tell you, when I saw that bunny on a stick, I could have... I could have... well, uh, do you know the meaning of the word "gerbilism"? Just for the record, I didn't know the exact word either until I looked it up for the purposes of this post, and my hunt for it is really a story unto itself: sooooooo embarrassing. (There's gonna be a lot of people out there tonight saying, "Guess what sicko came to my site today!!" I really hope no-one confiscates our computer anytime soon.) Anyway. Anyway. The bunny and everything else is gone now. The threat of un petit lapin dans le derriere really got things cracking.
But I've got to go. They've just issued a tornado watch for the city. Oh my God. If I have to spend the evening huddled in that stinking, crap-filled pithole of a basement tonight, someone is going to die.
Probably me.
Saturday, June 02, 2007
Brief and Miserable Life Update
...BLAAAGHCHCH...
...oh, and some background info before we begin: 'stines is the cool slang for "intestines"... (or so I always tell my biology students)....
Oh my God, what a nightmare. The basement pipes, ostensibly fixed by the kind plumber man who came here last week, burst again. Once again, it was MY visit to the can that caused the system to overload, giving me the temporary nickname of "Mama 'stines." I resent that name.
Every half an hour or so, at least two of us are trundling off to the nearest McDonald's to use the facilities. It wouldn't be so frequent, but that damn High Intensity has got a bladder the size of a pea. (Get it?) It's quite a situation. High Intensity is getting more and more resentful of the fact that she is being taken repeatedly into a McDonald's but not being purchased a milkshake, burger and/or large order of fries. As the evening progresses, she's getting more and more vocal about her displeasure. Unfortunately for her, Daddy is quite firm about that one.
"No-one's eating a #$%*&!! THING," I believe his exact words were as he headed downstairs with a mop in his hand and a ventilator over his face, "until the @#&%*@!! plumber gets here." Rather inconveniently, he is not scheduled to arrive until tomorrow morning at ten. McDonald's closes at midnight. I think we're in for quite a night.
At least the weather isn't bad, so we can have the windows open...
(WHERE, WHERE, WHERE ARE MY PARENTS?? WHY WON'T THEY ANSWER THEIR @#$^%&!! PHONE???)
...oh, and some background info before we begin: 'stines is the cool slang for "intestines"... (or so I always tell my biology students)....
Oh my God, what a nightmare. The basement pipes, ostensibly fixed by the kind plumber man who came here last week, burst again. Once again, it was MY visit to the can that caused the system to overload, giving me the temporary nickname of "Mama 'stines." I resent that name.
Every half an hour or so, at least two of us are trundling off to the nearest McDonald's to use the facilities. It wouldn't be so frequent, but that damn High Intensity has got a bladder the size of a pea. (Get it?) It's quite a situation. High Intensity is getting more and more resentful of the fact that she is being taken repeatedly into a McDonald's but not being purchased a milkshake, burger and/or large order of fries. As the evening progresses, she's getting more and more vocal about her displeasure. Unfortunately for her, Daddy is quite firm about that one.
"No-one's eating a #$%*&!! THING," I believe his exact words were as he headed downstairs with a mop in his hand and a ventilator over his face, "until the @#&%*@!! plumber gets here." Rather inconveniently, he is not scheduled to arrive until tomorrow morning at ten. McDonald's closes at midnight. I think we're in for quite a night.
At least the weather isn't bad, so we can have the windows open...
(WHERE, WHERE, WHERE ARE MY PARENTS?? WHY WON'T THEY ANSWER THEIR @#$^%&!! PHONE???)
Friday, June 01, 2007
Tonight We're Gonna Gossip Like It's 1899!
...see, that was an eighties' song reference...
So the old bats at the thrift store are really starting to get on my nerves.
They are volunteers, little old ladies who spend one or two days a week selling old faded crap to us poor inner city folk. I don't know any of them personally, but I pop in there so often I've given them all secret pet names (Old Bat #1, Old Bat #2, etc.,) and have come to fondly regard them as an extension of my family. Well no, that's not even slightly true. If I had a family filled with old hags like them I would have definitely thrown myself off a building a long time ago. And this is ME saying this, ME, a girl who, two years ago for Christmas, received not one, not two, but THREE copies of Douglas Copeland's Every Family is Psychotic because everyone who had to buy me a gift that year, including my parents, knew it was just so appropriate. I did not grow up with the Waltons, that's for sure. I'm not sorry though. If I had been raised a Walton, my name would be Whippersnapper Walton. I would have been teased at school and had my ego stomped into the ground. That would have sucked.
Every time you turn on the news these days there's a story about some violent incident occurring in my part of town. Just last week, the local high school had a big lock-down because of some gun thing, and I sense the old volunteer ladies are getting more and more freaked out about hanging out for a day in the "ghetto" slumming with us "junkies." They don't have to worry about me, though, I'm certainly not packing a gun when I go out. Diapers, yes. And wipes. A receiving blanket or two. Plastic spoons, plastic bags. Extra clothes. Paper. Pens. Tylenol. Gripe water. Giant, moon-sized sedatives for the kids. A mortar and pestle to crush them with. Mushy snacks to slip them into. A book, in case I get "lucky" and the kids pass out somewhere en route. When we leave the house to go for a walk, we're so loaded down with stuff we look like 19th century peddlers, shuffling down the street selling our wares. But there's certainly no gun on us. Never a gun!
Of course, the part of the West End I live in is perfectly respectable, all the violence happens east of here, but for good folks who fled to the suburbs a long time ago, this is the Scary Inner City where crime and immorality reign supreme.Those old blue-haired old ladies think I'm a low-bred, drug-addicted criminal. As I was saying, they're all getting on my nerves a bit.
First, way back in January, Old Bat #6 said I was orange. Frankly, I thought that was a little personal. But this week they took it up a notch which has left me wondering: how much crap am I expected to take from my local purveyors of cheap, second-hand goods?
It seemed so innocent. Old Bat #4 said to me, "Nice ring!" I was immediately pleased, because the ring I wear is my great-grandmother's wedding ring. I have seven girl cousins on that side of the family and I got the ring because I have her middle name.
"Thanks!" I said, "It was my great-grandmother's ring. She was from West Virginia, but they moved to Indiana soon af...." My voice faded off when I realized she wasn't looking at my ring. She was looking pointedly at my ring-less LEFT hand, i.e., my naked wedding ring finger. Then she looked over at my kids. What the hell? Had I climbed into a time machine and found myself unhappily transported back to 1943? I couldn't believe this was happening.
"Uh, anyway," I said, a little flustered. That's when Old Bat #11 decided to enter the conversation.
"Your daughters, they look SO different from each other, SO different!" she said. It's true, they do, and maybe, MAYBE I was being paranoid, but really I don't think so. She said it a little too slyly, her beady eyes grasping for information. So I gave her what she wanted, why not, I thought, I don't know her.
"Well, they have different fathers," I said smoothly lying.
"Oh really?" she asked eagerly, rubbing her nasty little claws together in an excited greedy motion.
"Yes," I said, and then furrowed my brow and pretended to think about it a bit. "At least... I think they do..."
No I didn't say that last part, damn it: Typically, I thought of it after I left. For the next few days I stomped around the house kicking myself, feeling almost physically sick that I hadn't been quick on the mark with that one. No worries though. Next week I'm going to go in with Mr. IQ and while he's perusing the book section I'm going to slink over to the Old Bat Patrol and hiss, "Hey, see that guy over there with the glasses? Don't mention the girls having different fathers, OK? Poor fool, I have him so totally duped..."
Yah, that's what I'm going to do! It's gonna be GREAT!
I'll give 'em something to gossip about.
So the old bats at the thrift store are really starting to get on my nerves.
They are volunteers, little old ladies who spend one or two days a week selling old faded crap to us poor inner city folk. I don't know any of them personally, but I pop in there so often I've given them all secret pet names (Old Bat #1, Old Bat #2, etc.,) and have come to fondly regard them as an extension of my family. Well no, that's not even slightly true. If I had a family filled with old hags like them I would have definitely thrown myself off a building a long time ago. And this is ME saying this, ME, a girl who, two years ago for Christmas, received not one, not two, but THREE copies of Douglas Copeland's Every Family is Psychotic because everyone who had to buy me a gift that year, including my parents, knew it was just so appropriate. I did not grow up with the Waltons, that's for sure. I'm not sorry though. If I had been raised a Walton, my name would be Whippersnapper Walton. I would have been teased at school and had my ego stomped into the ground. That would have sucked.
Every time you turn on the news these days there's a story about some violent incident occurring in my part of town. Just last week, the local high school had a big lock-down because of some gun thing, and I sense the old volunteer ladies are getting more and more freaked out about hanging out for a day in the "ghetto" slumming with us "junkies." They don't have to worry about me, though, I'm certainly not packing a gun when I go out. Diapers, yes. And wipes. A receiving blanket or two. Plastic spoons, plastic bags. Extra clothes. Paper. Pens. Tylenol. Gripe water. Giant, moon-sized sedatives for the kids. A mortar and pestle to crush them with. Mushy snacks to slip them into. A book, in case I get "lucky" and the kids pass out somewhere en route. When we leave the house to go for a walk, we're so loaded down with stuff we look like 19th century peddlers, shuffling down the street selling our wares. But there's certainly no gun on us. Never a gun!
Of course, the part of the West End I live in is perfectly respectable, all the violence happens east of here, but for good folks who fled to the suburbs a long time ago, this is the Scary Inner City where crime and immorality reign supreme.Those old blue-haired old ladies think I'm a low-bred, drug-addicted criminal. As I was saying, they're all getting on my nerves a bit.
First, way back in January, Old Bat #6 said I was orange. Frankly, I thought that was a little personal. But this week they took it up a notch which has left me wondering: how much crap am I expected to take from my local purveyors of cheap, second-hand goods?
It seemed so innocent. Old Bat #4 said to me, "Nice ring!" I was immediately pleased, because the ring I wear is my great-grandmother's wedding ring. I have seven girl cousins on that side of the family and I got the ring because I have her middle name.
"Thanks!" I said, "It was my great-grandmother's ring. She was from West Virginia, but they moved to Indiana soon af...." My voice faded off when I realized she wasn't looking at my ring. She was looking pointedly at my ring-less LEFT hand, i.e., my naked wedding ring finger. Then she looked over at my kids. What the hell? Had I climbed into a time machine and found myself unhappily transported back to 1943? I couldn't believe this was happening.
"Uh, anyway," I said, a little flustered. That's when Old Bat #11 decided to enter the conversation.
"Your daughters, they look SO different from each other, SO different!" she said. It's true, they do, and maybe, MAYBE I was being paranoid, but really I don't think so. She said it a little too slyly, her beady eyes grasping for information. So I gave her what she wanted, why not, I thought, I don't know her.
"Well, they have different fathers," I said smoothly lying.
"Oh really?" she asked eagerly, rubbing her nasty little claws together in an excited greedy motion.
"Yes," I said, and then furrowed my brow and pretended to think about it a bit. "At least... I think they do..."
No I didn't say that last part, damn it: Typically, I thought of it after I left. For the next few days I stomped around the house kicking myself, feeling almost physically sick that I hadn't been quick on the mark with that one. No worries though. Next week I'm going to go in with Mr. IQ and while he's perusing the book section I'm going to slink over to the Old Bat Patrol and hiss, "Hey, see that guy over there with the glasses? Don't mention the girls having different fathers, OK? Poor fool, I have him so totally duped..."
Yah, that's what I'm going to do! It's gonna be GREAT!
I'll give 'em something to gossip about.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
No, Really, I am NOT in a 70's Musical Time Warp No Matter What My Friend Jeff Says
......sewage explosion in basement + in-laws in living room = not a lot of time to blog....
Well, I don't know what the weather is like in your part of the world these days, but here in the geographical east/west center of the darkest pits of Canada it has been nothing but rain rain rain for days and days on end. It's so stinking horrible and, I'll be honest here, it has made me crankier than a prettily-frocked bride knee-deep in cow dung. Listen up, Weather Gods, I don't care if we're the stupid breadbasket of the world and the crops shrivel up and dry, as far as I'm concerned everyone can do Atkins next year and carb-starve, just BRING ON THE BLOODY DROUGHT ALREADY!!! NOW!! NOW!! NOW!!!
ha ha.
I would apologize for my foul temper, but most of you who read this are from the same wet and dreary locale as me and will, I know, sympathize. When things are damp and gloomy outside, things become damp and gloomy inside too, and you basically go around wanting to kill everyone. This becomes especially true on buses, especially inner-city buses traveling downtown. Dripping wet, mentally ill men steam up the windows, fart and tell the same stupid jokes that, like mosquitoes, always pop up after a long period of endless rain.
Mentally ill man: (Loudly, after 5 minutes of muttered obscenities): Heh heh. What do Winnipeg and Cher have in common then? Heh? Heh?
All other passengers, including other mentally ill ones: (Unspoken, but because of the collective nature of the plea, pretty audible nonetheless) Oh God, please don't make him look at me, please don't make him look at me.....
Mentally ill man: THEY'RE BOTH NOT FUCKING SUNNY!!!! (Wheezily laughs for the rest of the bus ride.)
All other passengers, perhaps especially the other mentally ill ones: (No words. Wistful looks out of window at independent, single passenger car owners.)
But the worse part about continuous rain is not the damp bus rides spent sitting under moist armpits and cursing your maker for giving you olfactory nerves. No, the worst part is when the radio stations start cranking out those damn miserable rain tunes. Yes, those ones. You know what I mean.
I've done an independent scientific review of this, and I've determined it takes exactly three days of wet weather for those clever DJs to start rolling 'em out onto the airwaves. It's always the same ones. Karen Carpenter curled up in the closet, sawing at her wrist with a sharp- edged, heavily caloric cheese curl, miserably confessing that rainy days and Mondays always get her down; Stevie Nicks warning us to prepare for the worst and stock up on toilet paper because it's raining and that's when all the thunder happens; Annie Lennox and her smooth alto telling us coolly that the rain is coming again and that it's "tearing through her head like a new emotion." I'm wondering if that's kind of like being torn a new asshole: Painful, yet somehow character building. (Annie Lennox seems tough, with a strong and sure personality, so I think the answer to that is "yes.")
The songs that really piss me off the most though are the cheery ones, the Singing in the Rain false optimism tunes that just make me want to go and kick someone in the soggy nuts. The Supertramp Rain Song drives me around the bend, and not just because I've heard it at least 4,876, 756 more times than has been deemed healthy by the World Health Organization. I mean, have you listened to the lyrics? No? I'll give you the two best lines and rest my case:
"Come on you little fighter! No need to get uptighter!"
Uptighter?
One song they never play is BJ Thomas's "Raindrops are Falling on my Head." Even Winnipeg DJs are too cool for that. The song has been running through my mind a lot this week though because, darn it, I just can't help being the cheerful, happy-go-lucky optimist that I am. Despite all the crap that has happened around here lately, I find myself smiling all the time and I JUST CAN'T STOP. It's so weird.
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head
And just like the guy whose feet are too big for his bed
Nothin' seems to fit
Those
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head they keep fallin'
Last Thursday, it was the contents of our basement pipes that got too big for their bed. As a result, piles and piles of steaming poo burst forth in a big, melodramatic Shakespearean swoon all over our lower level floor. It was so horrible, I thought I was going to die.
So I just did me some talking to the sun
And I said I didn't like the way he got things done
Sleeping on the job
Those
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head they keep fallin'
The house smelled like a big stinky poo barn, and I was beside myself with unhappiness. The cold crappy weather just intensified the situation. Basically we had two choices:
1. Turn off the heat, open all the windows to air out the smell and freeze to death.
2. Keep the heat on with the windows closed and asphyxiate on the poo fumes.
It's times like these when one must be thankful for the little things in life, like a big strong male who can take control of everything. I stared at Mr. IQ's unsuspecting back fondly, and then, placing my arm firmly on his shoulder, said, "I'm going to leave all this in your competent hands darling." Then I packed up the kids, grabbed our toothbrushes and headed off to my parents for the night. "See you," were my parting words, "call me when everything is under control."
But there's one thing I know
The blues they send to meet me won't defeat me
When I got to my parents, there was already a message from Mr. IQ lying on the counter. "This is so gross, I'm dying," it said. I phoned back immediately.
"Look, you're not dying," I said. Then I hung up and sank down with a comfortable sigh on the couch with my book.
It won't be long 'til happiness steps up to greet me
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head
But that doesn't mean my eyes will soon be turning red
Cryin's not for me
Mr. IQ spent the night shoveling shit. The next morning as the kids and I were eating bacon, eggs and warm cinnamon buns, he went out and purchased eight bottles of bleach to disinfect the floors. As he told the story later, he had gotten his second wind and was feeling pretty motivated. Bleach in hand, he charged down to the basement, dumped a bunch of it on the floor and immediately found himself overwhelmed by the fumes. Staggering upstairs, he managed to find the phone and gave me another ring.
"I just about died!" he said.
"Nyats oo wad," I said, my mouth full of bacon. (I was trying to say "that's too bad.")
"DIED!"
"Well, calm down, you seem pretty alive now," I said clearly, having swallowed my bacon.
"I HATE THIS!!"
Cryin's not for me 'cause
I'm never going to stop the rain by complaining
Because I'm free
Nothin's worryin' me
It was pretty obvious I was going to have to be a little more encouraging, if for no other reason than because my breakfast was getting cold.
"Uh, come on, you little fighter," I said, "no need to get uptighter!"
[Musical trumpet interlude]
Mr. IQ hung up the phone.
It won't be long 'til happiness steps up to greet me
I finished my book while my lovely parents looked after the kids. It was rainy out, sure, but all in all, it wasn't that bad a day.
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head
But that doesn't mean my eyes will soon be turnin' red
Cryin's not for me
'Cause I'm never going to stop the rain by complainin'
Because I'm free
Nothin's worrying me
Ah life! It's not that bad, even with the rain.
Well, I don't know what the weather is like in your part of the world these days, but here in the geographical east/west center of the darkest pits of Canada it has been nothing but rain rain rain for days and days on end. It's so stinking horrible and, I'll be honest here, it has made me crankier than a prettily-frocked bride knee-deep in cow dung. Listen up, Weather Gods, I don't care if we're the stupid breadbasket of the world and the crops shrivel up and dry, as far as I'm concerned everyone can do Atkins next year and carb-starve, just BRING ON THE BLOODY DROUGHT ALREADY!!! NOW!! NOW!! NOW!!!
ha ha.
I would apologize for my foul temper, but most of you who read this are from the same wet and dreary locale as me and will, I know, sympathize. When things are damp and gloomy outside, things become damp and gloomy inside too, and you basically go around wanting to kill everyone. This becomes especially true on buses, especially inner-city buses traveling downtown. Dripping wet, mentally ill men steam up the windows, fart and tell the same stupid jokes that, like mosquitoes, always pop up after a long period of endless rain.
Mentally ill man: (Loudly, after 5 minutes of muttered obscenities): Heh heh. What do Winnipeg and Cher have in common then? Heh? Heh?
All other passengers, including other mentally ill ones: (Unspoken, but because of the collective nature of the plea, pretty audible nonetheless) Oh God, please don't make him look at me, please don't make him look at me.....
Mentally ill man: THEY'RE BOTH NOT FUCKING SUNNY!!!! (Wheezily laughs for the rest of the bus ride.)
All other passengers, perhaps especially the other mentally ill ones: (No words. Wistful looks out of window at independent, single passenger car owners.)
But the worse part about continuous rain is not the damp bus rides spent sitting under moist armpits and cursing your maker for giving you olfactory nerves. No, the worst part is when the radio stations start cranking out those damn miserable rain tunes. Yes, those ones. You know what I mean.
I've done an independent scientific review of this, and I've determined it takes exactly three days of wet weather for those clever DJs to start rolling 'em out onto the airwaves. It's always the same ones. Karen Carpenter curled up in the closet, sawing at her wrist with a sharp- edged, heavily caloric cheese curl, miserably confessing that rainy days and Mondays always get her down; Stevie Nicks warning us to prepare for the worst and stock up on toilet paper because it's raining and that's when all the thunder happens; Annie Lennox and her smooth alto telling us coolly that the rain is coming again and that it's "tearing through her head like a new emotion." I'm wondering if that's kind of like being torn a new asshole: Painful, yet somehow character building. (Annie Lennox seems tough, with a strong and sure personality, so I think the answer to that is "yes.")
The songs that really piss me off the most though are the cheery ones, the Singing in the Rain false optimism tunes that just make me want to go and kick someone in the soggy nuts. The Supertramp Rain Song drives me around the bend, and not just because I've heard it at least 4,876, 756 more times than has been deemed healthy by the World Health Organization. I mean, have you listened to the lyrics? No? I'll give you the two best lines and rest my case:
"Come on you little fighter! No need to get uptighter!"
Uptighter?
One song they never play is BJ Thomas's "Raindrops are Falling on my Head." Even Winnipeg DJs are too cool for that. The song has been running through my mind a lot this week though because, darn it, I just can't help being the cheerful, happy-go-lucky optimist that I am. Despite all the crap that has happened around here lately, I find myself smiling all the time and I JUST CAN'T STOP. It's so weird.
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head
And just like the guy whose feet are too big for his bed
Nothin' seems to fit
Those
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head they keep fallin'
Last Thursday, it was the contents of our basement pipes that got too big for their bed. As a result, piles and piles of steaming poo burst forth in a big, melodramatic Shakespearean swoon all over our lower level floor. It was so horrible, I thought I was going to die.
So I just did me some talking to the sun
And I said I didn't like the way he got things done
Sleeping on the job
Those
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head they keep fallin'
The house smelled like a big stinky poo barn, and I was beside myself with unhappiness. The cold crappy weather just intensified the situation. Basically we had two choices:
1. Turn off the heat, open all the windows to air out the smell and freeze to death.
2. Keep the heat on with the windows closed and asphyxiate on the poo fumes.
It's times like these when one must be thankful for the little things in life, like a big strong male who can take control of everything. I stared at Mr. IQ's unsuspecting back fondly, and then, placing my arm firmly on his shoulder, said, "I'm going to leave all this in your competent hands darling." Then I packed up the kids, grabbed our toothbrushes and headed off to my parents for the night. "See you," were my parting words, "call me when everything is under control."
But there's one thing I know
The blues they send to meet me won't defeat me
When I got to my parents, there was already a message from Mr. IQ lying on the counter. "This is so gross, I'm dying," it said. I phoned back immediately.
"Look, you're not dying," I said. Then I hung up and sank down with a comfortable sigh on the couch with my book.
It won't be long 'til happiness steps up to greet me
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head
But that doesn't mean my eyes will soon be turning red
Cryin's not for me
Mr. IQ spent the night shoveling shit. The next morning as the kids and I were eating bacon, eggs and warm cinnamon buns, he went out and purchased eight bottles of bleach to disinfect the floors. As he told the story later, he had gotten his second wind and was feeling pretty motivated. Bleach in hand, he charged down to the basement, dumped a bunch of it on the floor and immediately found himself overwhelmed by the fumes. Staggering upstairs, he managed to find the phone and gave me another ring.
"I just about died!" he said.
"Nyats oo wad," I said, my mouth full of bacon. (I was trying to say "that's too bad.")
"DIED!"
"Well, calm down, you seem pretty alive now," I said clearly, having swallowed my bacon.
"I HATE THIS!!"
Cryin's not for me 'cause
I'm never going to stop the rain by complaining
Because I'm free
Nothin's worryin' me
It was pretty obvious I was going to have to be a little more encouraging, if for no other reason than because my breakfast was getting cold.
"Uh, come on, you little fighter," I said, "no need to get uptighter!"
[Musical trumpet interlude]
Mr. IQ hung up the phone.
It won't be long 'til happiness steps up to greet me
I finished my book while my lovely parents looked after the kids. It was rainy out, sure, but all in all, it wasn't that bad a day.
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head
But that doesn't mean my eyes will soon be turnin' red
Cryin's not for me
'Cause I'm never going to stop the rain by complainin'
Because I'm free
Nothin's worrying me
Ah life! It's not that bad, even with the rain.
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Bubble Bubble Bubble
...oh good, it's three in the bloody morning, everyone is finally asleep, I guess I can freaking blog now...(grrrrrrrr)...
Because we are VERY immature in this household with the collective emotional age of about 19, we own a lot of comic books. One book we have is called The Big Book of Vice, and it deals with all the good things in life, namely, drugs, alcohol and sex. In one comic, the life of Hugh Hefner, founder of Playboy, is outlined. One panel shows a drawing of him standing with his first wife and kids in a typical 1950's functional family pose. Because it is a comic, we, the readers, are privy to Hugh's innermost thoughts: As he stands there with his wife and kids, thought bubbles are popping up from his head, leading us to the cloudy-black words that are running through his mind:
"I'm miserable!"
When I first wandered my way through The Big Book of Vice, Hugh's unhappiness with the whole "happy families" charade really struck a chord with me. Now, whenever I happen to stumble upon Mr. IQ unhappily dealing with some aspect of domestic non-bliss, I say perkily, "Bubble bubble bubble!! I'm miserable!" and usually this makes him laugh, (bitterly sometimes, it's true, but bitter laughs are better than no laughs, I always say.)
But when Mama is in a crappy mood, no-one is there to cajole me out of my crankiness. When the egg on the ceiling is getting me down, or the two small demanding children in my life refuse to nap and don't pass out until well after 10 PM on a day when all I want to do is sit on a couch and read, old momburger is left to stew alone in her own sorry little crank juices. Despite many wonderful traits, like the ability to make a really good ham sandwich, Mr. IQ is not particularly gifted at reading the emotions of others. As a result... I am ashamed to admit this, but sometimes I am more than just a little sympathetic with Hugh and his need to flee the domestic scene. Some days, I too, while scraping egg yolks off the ceiling and dealing with two kids screaming in my ear, have to resist the urge to run away from it all. Taking off to establish a magazine empire, live in a large mansion and make lots and lots of money certainly sounds tempting, I must say. Unfortunately, the idea of surrounding myself with a bunch of studs dressed up as bunnies is where my interest sort of peters out. (If, God forbid, in the throes of passion I were ever to reach out to stroke a set of tawny, muscular buttocks and found myself grappling instead with a large fluffy bunny tail, frankly, I don't know what I'd do: scream and sign up for years of therapy seems one likely possibility.)
So running away Hugh Hefner style is not, sadly, an option. Luckily, there are other things one can do to deal with the occasional bout of domestic misery. When, for example, an off-the-handle High Intensity is raging once again through one of her irrational four-year-old rants, I've found that flashing a surreptitious yet soul-satisfying finger her way does wonders to lighten the tension and improve the mood. I've done it so many times now, though, that the effect is sadly no longer soothing. It's an almost involuntary response at this point, and watching my extended digit slowly rise in her direction now does nothing but make me feel vaguely like a priapic teenage boy ( a discomforting feeling I can assure you.)
I'm not the only one around here for whom old tricks are wearing thin. Yesterday I came home to find High Intensity and Mr. IQ heavily engrossed in the Pretty Fingernail Game. Object: Collect pretty fingernails on your hand. Once you have them all, you win! As I watched Mr. IQ unhappily try to move the spinner, his hand crippled with the garish, purple coloured plastic fingernails he had already collected, his unread book lying beside him, I realized it was time for me to step in.
"Bubble bubble bubble!" I said dutifully, "I'm miserable!"
Mr. IQ slowly lifted his unhappy head and stared morosely at my large, moon-like, fluffy tail-less ass. He then flashed me a not-so-surreptitious finger. Then he lowered his eyes and continued to play the game, silently, without looking at me.
I don't believe in the happy family thing. I really don't, I think even functional families can be pretty miserable sometimes.
But I have to say, all this made me giggle. And later... much later... he laughed too.
Because we are VERY immature in this household with the collective emotional age of about 19, we own a lot of comic books. One book we have is called The Big Book of Vice, and it deals with all the good things in life, namely, drugs, alcohol and sex. In one comic, the life of Hugh Hefner, founder of Playboy, is outlined. One panel shows a drawing of him standing with his first wife and kids in a typical 1950's functional family pose. Because it is a comic, we, the readers, are privy to Hugh's innermost thoughts: As he stands there with his wife and kids, thought bubbles are popping up from his head, leading us to the cloudy-black words that are running through his mind:
"I'm miserable!"
When I first wandered my way through The Big Book of Vice, Hugh's unhappiness with the whole "happy families" charade really struck a chord with me. Now, whenever I happen to stumble upon Mr. IQ unhappily dealing with some aspect of domestic non-bliss, I say perkily, "Bubble bubble bubble!! I'm miserable!" and usually this makes him laugh, (bitterly sometimes, it's true, but bitter laughs are better than no laughs, I always say.)
But when Mama is in a crappy mood, no-one is there to cajole me out of my crankiness. When the egg on the ceiling is getting me down, or the two small demanding children in my life refuse to nap and don't pass out until well after 10 PM on a day when all I want to do is sit on a couch and read, old momburger is left to stew alone in her own sorry little crank juices. Despite many wonderful traits, like the ability to make a really good ham sandwich, Mr. IQ is not particularly gifted at reading the emotions of others. As a result... I am ashamed to admit this, but sometimes I am more than just a little sympathetic with Hugh and his need to flee the domestic scene. Some days, I too, while scraping egg yolks off the ceiling and dealing with two kids screaming in my ear, have to resist the urge to run away from it all. Taking off to establish a magazine empire, live in a large mansion and make lots and lots of money certainly sounds tempting, I must say. Unfortunately, the idea of surrounding myself with a bunch of studs dressed up as bunnies is where my interest sort of peters out. (If, God forbid, in the throes of passion I were ever to reach out to stroke a set of tawny, muscular buttocks and found myself grappling instead with a large fluffy bunny tail, frankly, I don't know what I'd do: scream and sign up for years of therapy seems one likely possibility.)
So running away Hugh Hefner style is not, sadly, an option. Luckily, there are other things one can do to deal with the occasional bout of domestic misery. When, for example, an off-the-handle High Intensity is raging once again through one of her irrational four-year-old rants, I've found that flashing a surreptitious yet soul-satisfying finger her way does wonders to lighten the tension and improve the mood. I've done it so many times now, though, that the effect is sadly no longer soothing. It's an almost involuntary response at this point, and watching my extended digit slowly rise in her direction now does nothing but make me feel vaguely like a priapic teenage boy ( a discomforting feeling I can assure you.)
I'm not the only one around here for whom old tricks are wearing thin. Yesterday I came home to find High Intensity and Mr. IQ heavily engrossed in the Pretty Fingernail Game. Object: Collect pretty fingernails on your hand. Once you have them all, you win! As I watched Mr. IQ unhappily try to move the spinner, his hand crippled with the garish, purple coloured plastic fingernails he had already collected, his unread book lying beside him, I realized it was time for me to step in.
"Bubble bubble bubble!" I said dutifully, "I'm miserable!"
Mr. IQ slowly lifted his unhappy head and stared morosely at my large, moon-like, fluffy tail-less ass. He then flashed me a not-so-surreptitious finger. Then he lowered his eyes and continued to play the game, silently, without looking at me.
I don't believe in the happy family thing. I really don't, I think even functional families can be pretty miserable sometimes.
But I have to say, all this made me giggle. And later... much later... he laughed too.
Monday, May 21, 2007
I've Been Tagged!
...wow, now I know what the Constant Whiner meant when she was tagged...I feel... I feel so... popular!!...
Jessica at Jessi's Crochet Cafe has tagged me! This means I have to write seven random things about myself. I think I'll write seven random things about my blog.
1. I angst a lot about the grammar and spelling of this blog. Usually when I read a published post over the next day, my heart sinks a little because something is not right. In my last post, it was my use of the word "span" instead of "spun" that had me freaking out. Hyperventilating while frantically turning the pages of a dictionary is never the easiest of tasks, but I managed, and discovered, much to my relief, that "span" is an archaic past tense of spin, and so technically correct to use. Still...
2. I try not to swear too much in my blog, but sometimes a good F bomb just has to be thrown into a sentence for effect. Having said that, this, too, can sometimes be cause for some serious anguish. Do you say:
a) For fuck's sake?
b) For fuck sakes?
c) For fuck's sakes? OR
d) For fuck sake?
I know only one is proper (probably "a"), but what can I say? I love them all.
3. I occasionally hate my blog. This feeling usually crops up after I've read something by David Sedaris.
4. For all you doubters: My buddy Nitroglycol took up the challenge and mentioned ussell-Ray owe-Craye on his blog too, and guess what: HE GOT A HIT FROM ARIZONA FROM SOMEONE GOOGLING THE BIRDMAN'S NAME TOO!!!! I know it's him. I mean, if you were famous, wouldn't YOU want to know what the blog world was saying about you??
We need a third mention for total confirmation. C'mon you guys, humour me!!
5. That last point wasn't really a random fact, was it? The problem with me is that, despite being a math/science teacher, I'm not really a fact person. I'm a head in the clouds kind of person.
That's why a lot of chemistry experiments have gone awry in my classroom. Grease fires spring up and I'll say, absent-mindedly, "throw some water on that Billy, hey?" It's not a good thing. When my principal told me that working part-time next year might mean teaching classes outside of my area of "expertise", i.e., math and science, I agreed, saying, "I'll teach wood-working if I have to!!!" Then I went home and freaked out a bit: What if they gave me home-ec? But, as Mr. IQ pointed out, a recipe is really no different from a chemistry lab, and I don't know what I'm doing when I'm running one of those either, so it should be OK. If nothing else, teaching cooking will probably make for a good blog post or two...
6. A memory: One day my brother was recording songs from the radio while simultaneously having a massive fight with me. We were about twelve and ten, and the fight, I am sure, was all my fault: Being older and more obnoxious I'm sure I was tormenting him about something, but I've forgotten now what it was all about. While recording Don't Go Changing by Billy Joel, my brother suddenly decided he couldn't take it anymore and totally snapped, smashing a bowl that lay on the counter and screaming hysterically, "I HATE YOU!! I REALLY REALLY HATE YOU!!" This outburst was recorded along with the song and, over the course of the next year or so, played so many times around the house that even today if Don't Go Changing is playing in a mall or something, it sounds all wrong when, at the critical moment, you can't hear my brother freaking out on me in the background.
7. The thing that my brother smashed was a bowl containing friendship cake batter. My friend gave it to me. The idea was to add more ingredients, distribute some of the batter to five more friends and make the friendship cake with what was left. Needless to say, the chain was broken with the smashing of that bowl, and I faced seven years of bad luck, i.e., the fun-filled teenage years.
I'm sharing this story because, um, another chain is about to be broken here. Forgive me Jessica, I totally enjoyed BEING tagged, but I... I just don't feel comfortable tagging others. What if they don't want to be tagged? Then I would feel bad.
Although I DID toy with the idea of tagging Dooce...
Jessica at Jessi's Crochet Cafe has tagged me! This means I have to write seven random things about myself. I think I'll write seven random things about my blog.
1. I angst a lot about the grammar and spelling of this blog. Usually when I read a published post over the next day, my heart sinks a little because something is not right. In my last post, it was my use of the word "span" instead of "spun" that had me freaking out. Hyperventilating while frantically turning the pages of a dictionary is never the easiest of tasks, but I managed, and discovered, much to my relief, that "span" is an archaic past tense of spin, and so technically correct to use. Still...
2. I try not to swear too much in my blog, but sometimes a good F bomb just has to be thrown into a sentence for effect. Having said that, this, too, can sometimes be cause for some serious anguish. Do you say:
a) For fuck's sake?
b) For fuck sakes?
c) For fuck's sakes? OR
d) For fuck sake?
I know only one is proper (probably "a"), but what can I say? I love them all.
3. I occasionally hate my blog. This feeling usually crops up after I've read something by David Sedaris.
4. For all you doubters: My buddy Nitroglycol took up the challenge and mentioned ussell-Ray owe-Craye on his blog too, and guess what: HE GOT A HIT FROM ARIZONA FROM SOMEONE GOOGLING THE BIRDMAN'S NAME TOO!!!! I know it's him. I mean, if you were famous, wouldn't YOU want to know what the blog world was saying about you??
We need a third mention for total confirmation. C'mon you guys, humour me!!
5. That last point wasn't really a random fact, was it? The problem with me is that, despite being a math/science teacher, I'm not really a fact person. I'm a head in the clouds kind of person.
That's why a lot of chemistry experiments have gone awry in my classroom. Grease fires spring up and I'll say, absent-mindedly, "throw some water on that Billy, hey?" It's not a good thing. When my principal told me that working part-time next year might mean teaching classes outside of my area of "expertise", i.e., math and science, I agreed, saying, "I'll teach wood-working if I have to!!!" Then I went home and freaked out a bit: What if they gave me home-ec? But, as Mr. IQ pointed out, a recipe is really no different from a chemistry lab, and I don't know what I'm doing when I'm running one of those either, so it should be OK. If nothing else, teaching cooking will probably make for a good blog post or two...
6. A memory: One day my brother was recording songs from the radio while simultaneously having a massive fight with me. We were about twelve and ten, and the fight, I am sure, was all my fault: Being older and more obnoxious I'm sure I was tormenting him about something, but I've forgotten now what it was all about. While recording Don't Go Changing by Billy Joel, my brother suddenly decided he couldn't take it anymore and totally snapped, smashing a bowl that lay on the counter and screaming hysterically, "I HATE YOU!! I REALLY REALLY HATE YOU!!" This outburst was recorded along with the song and, over the course of the next year or so, played so many times around the house that even today if Don't Go Changing is playing in a mall or something, it sounds all wrong when, at the critical moment, you can't hear my brother freaking out on me in the background.
7. The thing that my brother smashed was a bowl containing friendship cake batter. My friend gave it to me. The idea was to add more ingredients, distribute some of the batter to five more friends and make the friendship cake with what was left. Needless to say, the chain was broken with the smashing of that bowl, and I faced seven years of bad luck, i.e., the fun-filled teenage years.
I'm sharing this story because, um, another chain is about to be broken here. Forgive me Jessica, I totally enjoyed BEING tagged, but I... I just don't feel comfortable tagging others. What if they don't want to be tagged? Then I would feel bad.
Although I DID toy with the idea of tagging Dooce...
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Lady Luck
....Yay! Yay! Yay!....
Several weeks ago, we went out for Chinese food, and at the end of the meal, they gave us more fortune cookies than there were people at the table. Mr. IQ opened one and immediately looked unhappy.
"Mine's terrible!" he complained, looking genuinely pissed off. Moments like this are always cause for great concern for me. Deep down I suspect that a true Alpha male, confident, rugged and wise, would not go into a big sulk over a crappy fortune cookie. Franklin D. Roosevelt would not have crumbled at the sight of a stupid slip of paper, not even one indicating that a Hawaiian naval base was under Japanese attack! Consequently, at such times I feel despair, followed by unspeakable guilt.
"What does it say?" I asked, burying my true feelings under a mask of curiosity, and he passed it over to me. Your lucky colour this week is purple it read.
"Well, we'll just have to dress you up like an Easter egg," I said pleasantly, "and purchase some lottery tickets."
Sometimes Mr. IQ has absolutely no sense of humour, and this was one of those times. Growling, he lunged for another cookie. "Ah, that's much better," he said beaming, and tossed it to me. It said: You will never have to worry about money.
"Yeah, swell, that's a great one all right," I said, glancing at the bill. Swearing, I spent the next ten minutes hunting for my bank card. That damn fortune was right -- during my frantic search, he didn't look worried at all, only a little superior.
"I told you to bring the card," he kept saying, smugly.
I can mock, but the reality is that we are total suckers around here for fortune telling. So yesterday at the thrift store when I found the Where My Heart Will Wander Fortune Box, I snapped it up without hesitation. It had three balls, red, green and black, which would roll into slots indicating, well, where your heart would supposedly wander. Green would happen first, red next and finally black. All three of us were itching to try it, although Mr. IQ, bless him, feigned a certain amount of indifference. I think he knew what I'd been thinking at the Chinese restaurant and was trying to ease my mind, re: the whole Rugged He-Man of the Canadian Prairies thing. Honestly, the way he can read my mind sometimes, you'd think I go around wearing a thong on my head.
We let High Intensity go first. She span the balls around with endearing concentration and ended up with her heart wandering
First: To exotic lands
Then: To something unexpected
And finally: To a cocktail lounge
The last part, naturally, made me giggle.
"What's a cocktail lounge, mom?" she asked and I said, "Where you go for a boozy beverage," because we're not really the types to sugarcoat the truth around here for the young 'uns.
"Oh, like a beer," she said, very pleased with her fortune, and handed the box over to her dad. He got his heart wandering:
First: to beautiful shoes
Then: to solitude
And finally: to cloud nine
Mr. IQ looked vaguely embarrassed. "I DO NOT have a shoe fetish!" he said defensively. Because I have a very pure mind, it took me a minute to understand what he was talking about, and when I did I felt vaguely revolted.
"Ugh," I said, wiggling my toes around uneasily in my (suddenly) damp-feeling sandals. "That's so gross..."
"Let me go again then," he said, and gave the balls a second twirl. This time he got:
First: To a cocktail lounge
Then: To beautiful shoes
And finally: To a deepening friendship
"Someone in the bar is gonna really like your shoes, obviously," I said, and grabbed the box before he could think about that too much. I then spent the next ten minutes trying to manipulate the balls into the places I wanted them to go.
"Where are you trying to land it?" Mr. IQ finally asked, watching my desperate moves with the last remaining ball.
"To chocolate cakes," I choked out impatiently. "Why can't I get it to go to chocolate cakes?"
He watched me curiously until he couldn't stand it anymore. "You know," he said carefully, and only a little bit patronizingly, "the best way to a chocolate cake is perhaps via a car ride to the nearest bakery."
I ignored him. He knew why I wanted things to work out for me in the fortune ball department, just as I knew, deep down, why at the restaurant he had wanted a good cookie fortune. For us, our lives are all about luck luck luck, and fate fate fate. It's how we get through our days, it's our modus operandi: Frankly, it's the only way we know how to live. We are not the types of people who go out and conquer the world, we're the types who sit back and just let things happen. Consequently, good fortunes are excellent and very necessary morale boosters as we weave our unplotted and unplanned journey through life. I blame this pathetic lifestyle choice, incidentally, on the fact that both of us were accidents, people who made it into this world despite no planning on the part of our parents. Consciously or not, we believe that since we both managed, despite some pretty overwhelming odds, to get ourselves conceived, everything else will probably fall into place for us too.
Surprisingly, it usually does.
Honestly, it's sometimes kind of scary how things work out. When we're totally broke and I'm soberly whipping up flour balls for supper because there is no money for groceries, a cheque will suddenly arrive unexpectedly in the mail. If we need a daycare worker because I happen to be returning to work in seventeen hours, an ad will miraculously appear on a telephone pole in front of our house. If I'm craving ketchup potato chips and it's midnight and I really don't feel like jumping in the car because it's -45 C outside, well --- well-- well then I'll probably have to forgo the chips, actually. Most unfortunately, it only works for the really big things in life.
Big things like my job: Back when I was an unemployed bum, living with my parents and fast approaching 30, my friend put my name on the substitute teacher list at the school he taught at. My parents forced me to pick up the phone when they knew the school was calling me to work. (Not rocket science: who else calls at six in the morning?) And then their math/science teacher went and thoughtfully had a nervous breakdown. As a result, I came in to sub for him and just never left. Very tidy. No application letters, no resume, no cruddy interview. Which is very good, because if I am certain of one thing in this world, it is that I would give a pretty lousy interview.
("What's your discipline style, Ms Whippersnapper?" they would ask, and I would bleat out, "Beat them 'til they bleed, ahaahahahaha," and they'd say, "Hey! Thanks for coming in!" and that would be that.)
So back in March when my principal told me he would not consider giving me part time next year, I really couldn't face the thought of sending out my resume to different school divisions. No, I resigned myself to staying where I was and miserably slogging my way through a full time assignment, dealing with not one but TWO daycare workers and living a life of chaos with underwear in the crisper, etc., etc., ugh ugh ugh. Silly me for worrying: given my track record, I should have known something would happen. And it did. My principal called two days ago and, what do you know:
I GET TO GO BACK PART TIME NEXT YEAR AFTER ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
HUZZZAAAAHHHHH!!!!!!!!
I am so grateful, I rushed out at once and got the BIGGEST box of wine I could find (Northwest Territory Estates, 2008) which I plan to give my wonderful principal later this week as a token of my thanks.
Oh, you have no idea what a relief this is.
Wow, am I happy!
Several weeks ago, we went out for Chinese food, and at the end of the meal, they gave us more fortune cookies than there were people at the table. Mr. IQ opened one and immediately looked unhappy.
"Mine's terrible!" he complained, looking genuinely pissed off. Moments like this are always cause for great concern for me. Deep down I suspect that a true Alpha male, confident, rugged and wise, would not go into a big sulk over a crappy fortune cookie. Franklin D. Roosevelt would not have crumbled at the sight of a stupid slip of paper, not even one indicating that a Hawaiian naval base was under Japanese attack! Consequently, at such times I feel despair, followed by unspeakable guilt.
"What does it say?" I asked, burying my true feelings under a mask of curiosity, and he passed it over to me. Your lucky colour this week is purple it read.
"Well, we'll just have to dress you up like an Easter egg," I said pleasantly, "and purchase some lottery tickets."
Sometimes Mr. IQ has absolutely no sense of humour, and this was one of those times. Growling, he lunged for another cookie. "Ah, that's much better," he said beaming, and tossed it to me. It said: You will never have to worry about money.
"Yeah, swell, that's a great one all right," I said, glancing at the bill. Swearing, I spent the next ten minutes hunting for my bank card. That damn fortune was right -- during my frantic search, he didn't look worried at all, only a little superior.
"I told you to bring the card," he kept saying, smugly.
I can mock, but the reality is that we are total suckers around here for fortune telling. So yesterday at the thrift store when I found the Where My Heart Will Wander Fortune Box, I snapped it up without hesitation. It had three balls, red, green and black, which would roll into slots indicating, well, where your heart would supposedly wander. Green would happen first, red next and finally black. All three of us were itching to try it, although Mr. IQ, bless him, feigned a certain amount of indifference. I think he knew what I'd been thinking at the Chinese restaurant and was trying to ease my mind, re: the whole Rugged He-Man of the Canadian Prairies thing. Honestly, the way he can read my mind sometimes, you'd think I go around wearing a thong on my head.
We let High Intensity go first. She span the balls around with endearing concentration and ended up with her heart wandering
First: To exotic lands
Then: To something unexpected
And finally: To a cocktail lounge
The last part, naturally, made me giggle.
"What's a cocktail lounge, mom?" she asked and I said, "Where you go for a boozy beverage," because we're not really the types to sugarcoat the truth around here for the young 'uns.
"Oh, like a beer," she said, very pleased with her fortune, and handed the box over to her dad. He got his heart wandering:
First: to beautiful shoes
Then: to solitude
And finally: to cloud nine
Mr. IQ looked vaguely embarrassed. "I DO NOT have a shoe fetish!" he said defensively. Because I have a very pure mind, it took me a minute to understand what he was talking about, and when I did I felt vaguely revolted.
"Ugh," I said, wiggling my toes around uneasily in my (suddenly) damp-feeling sandals. "That's so gross..."
"Let me go again then," he said, and gave the balls a second twirl. This time he got:
First: To a cocktail lounge
Then: To beautiful shoes
And finally: To a deepening friendship
"Someone in the bar is gonna really like your shoes, obviously," I said, and grabbed the box before he could think about that too much. I then spent the next ten minutes trying to manipulate the balls into the places I wanted them to go.
"Where are you trying to land it?" Mr. IQ finally asked, watching my desperate moves with the last remaining ball.
"To chocolate cakes," I choked out impatiently. "Why can't I get it to go to chocolate cakes?"
He watched me curiously until he couldn't stand it anymore. "You know," he said carefully, and only a little bit patronizingly, "the best way to a chocolate cake is perhaps via a car ride to the nearest bakery."
I ignored him. He knew why I wanted things to work out for me in the fortune ball department, just as I knew, deep down, why at the restaurant he had wanted a good cookie fortune. For us, our lives are all about luck luck luck, and fate fate fate. It's how we get through our days, it's our modus operandi: Frankly, it's the only way we know how to live. We are not the types of people who go out and conquer the world, we're the types who sit back and just let things happen. Consequently, good fortunes are excellent and very necessary morale boosters as we weave our unplotted and unplanned journey through life. I blame this pathetic lifestyle choice, incidentally, on the fact that both of us were accidents, people who made it into this world despite no planning on the part of our parents. Consciously or not, we believe that since we both managed, despite some pretty overwhelming odds, to get ourselves conceived, everything else will probably fall into place for us too.
Surprisingly, it usually does.
Honestly, it's sometimes kind of scary how things work out. When we're totally broke and I'm soberly whipping up flour balls for supper because there is no money for groceries, a cheque will suddenly arrive unexpectedly in the mail. If we need a daycare worker because I happen to be returning to work in seventeen hours, an ad will miraculously appear on a telephone pole in front of our house. If I'm craving ketchup potato chips and it's midnight and I really don't feel like jumping in the car because it's -45 C outside, well --- well-- well then I'll probably have to forgo the chips, actually. Most unfortunately, it only works for the really big things in life.
Big things like my job: Back when I was an unemployed bum, living with my parents and fast approaching 30, my friend put my name on the substitute teacher list at the school he taught at. My parents forced me to pick up the phone when they knew the school was calling me to work. (Not rocket science: who else calls at six in the morning?) And then their math/science teacher went and thoughtfully had a nervous breakdown. As a result, I came in to sub for him and just never left. Very tidy. No application letters, no resume, no cruddy interview. Which is very good, because if I am certain of one thing in this world, it is that I would give a pretty lousy interview.
("What's your discipline style, Ms Whippersnapper?" they would ask, and I would bleat out, "Beat them 'til they bleed, ahaahahahaha," and they'd say, "Hey! Thanks for coming in!" and that would be that.)
So back in March when my principal told me he would not consider giving me part time next year, I really couldn't face the thought of sending out my resume to different school divisions. No, I resigned myself to staying where I was and miserably slogging my way through a full time assignment, dealing with not one but TWO daycare workers and living a life of chaos with underwear in the crisper, etc., etc., ugh ugh ugh. Silly me for worrying: given my track record, I should have known something would happen. And it did. My principal called two days ago and, what do you know:
I GET TO GO BACK PART TIME NEXT YEAR AFTER ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
HUZZZAAAAHHHHH!!!!!!!!
I am so grateful, I rushed out at once and got the BIGGEST box of wine I could find (Northwest Territory Estates, 2008) which I plan to give my wonderful principal later this week as a token of my thanks.
Oh, you have no idea what a relief this is.
Wow, am I happy!
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Letter to Fangs
...how dare your birthday be on Mother's Day??? It's MY day, MY DAY, damn it all...
Happy Birthday Sweetie!!
Just think. One year ago today I was in the hospital screaming my guts out because you had the audacity to start heading out into this world during the nurses' paperwork/shift change hour when no drugs are administered. I shrieked blue bloody murder through the whole miserable ordeal and even, at one point, shouted, "I'm DYIIIIING!!" but not even a measly Tylenol was thrown my way. In response to my anguished cries, your father, always the voice of reason and heavily engrossed in some weighty news article, looked up from his reading and said, very matter-of-factly, "You're not dying, you know," before going back to his paper. Funnily enough, I found this incredibly not comforting at all! So I continued to scream and the Powers That Were continued to not give me any drugs or pain relief until finally you popped out. Well, I'll use the common phrasing there, but really, getting you out was not in any way similar to the opening of a champagne bottle, believe me: It was a lot less fun.
No offense.
When we left the hospital, I was given a questionnaire to fill out. One of the questions was:
How well did we manage your pain? Please indicate all that applied to you.
Epidural _____
Gas ________
Morphine ____
Quick puff on crack pipe (which I MOST CERTAINLY would have brought in with me had I known what lay ahead)______
Cool cloth on forehead ______
My X on the "cool cloth on forehead" option was so filled with bitterness and resentment it ripped through the page. Now, of course, I'm sort of masochistically proud that I did it all sans drugs, but it took a while to get me to that point, let me tell you. I was screaming SO LOUD and all that damn nurse did was continuously shove that wet rag into my face. I could have killed her, and her little wet rag too. But time, as they say, heals all deeply traumatic and mind altering psychological wounds. I'm all over it now. Really.
They say it takes weeks, sometimes even months before a mother truly bonds with her child and falls in love with her, but for me it didn't take that long. On our first night home from the hospital, you were lying on my lap, and yer Pa was off picking up a pizza and suddenly you puked up what seemed like a whole liter of the reddest blood I've ever seen. I panicked, screamed, and started to bawl. Your grandma was there and she shoved me out the door when your dad returned, and we belted it for the Children's Hospital. We didn't bother with the baby seat: I clutched you in my arms all the way there, and, thinking you were dying, stared into your face trying to memorize your features. You were awake and stared back at me in that wise way babies sometimes have. I thought you were dying. I thought you were dying.
When we got to the hospital there was a line-up, but I ignored it and went rushing up to the nurses' station, shrieking, "My baby's vomiting blood!" And the nurses -- well, they didn't even glance up from what they were doing. One actually turned her back on me. The other one just looked very bored.
"So," she asked in a really weary voice, "Are your nipples cracked honey?"
...And... so... they... were...
Ugh! You had been drinking my nipple blood!
When you're old enough to read this, no doubt you'll be even more grossed out by that than I was, but remember this: The whole event was the turning point. It was when you transformed from The Baby to My Baby. That horrific and terrifying trip to the hospital was the moment when I first realized how jagged-rich and cutting-deep my love for you was.
Fangs at three months: "Before the teeth came in"
Happy birthday, Baby.
Happy Birthday Sweetie!!
Just think. One year ago today I was in the hospital screaming my guts out because you had the audacity to start heading out into this world during the nurses' paperwork/shift change hour when no drugs are administered. I shrieked blue bloody murder through the whole miserable ordeal and even, at one point, shouted, "I'm DYIIIIING!!" but not even a measly Tylenol was thrown my way. In response to my anguished cries, your father, always the voice of reason and heavily engrossed in some weighty news article, looked up from his reading and said, very matter-of-factly, "You're not dying, you know," before going back to his paper. Funnily enough, I found this incredibly not comforting at all! So I continued to scream and the Powers That Were continued to not give me any drugs or pain relief until finally you popped out. Well, I'll use the common phrasing there, but really, getting you out was not in any way similar to the opening of a champagne bottle, believe me: It was a lot less fun.
No offense.
When we left the hospital, I was given a questionnaire to fill out. One of the questions was:
How well did we manage your pain? Please indicate all that applied to you.
Epidural _____
Gas ________
Morphine ____
Quick puff on crack pipe (which I MOST CERTAINLY would have brought in with me had I known what lay ahead)______
Cool cloth on forehead ______
My X on the "cool cloth on forehead" option was so filled with bitterness and resentment it ripped through the page. Now, of course, I'm sort of masochistically proud that I did it all sans drugs, but it took a while to get me to that point, let me tell you. I was screaming SO LOUD and all that damn nurse did was continuously shove that wet rag into my face. I could have killed her, and her little wet rag too. But time, as they say, heals all deeply traumatic and mind altering psychological wounds. I'm all over it now. Really.
They say it takes weeks, sometimes even months before a mother truly bonds with her child and falls in love with her, but for me it didn't take that long. On our first night home from the hospital, you were lying on my lap, and yer Pa was off picking up a pizza and suddenly you puked up what seemed like a whole liter of the reddest blood I've ever seen. I panicked, screamed, and started to bawl. Your grandma was there and she shoved me out the door when your dad returned, and we belted it for the Children's Hospital. We didn't bother with the baby seat: I clutched you in my arms all the way there, and, thinking you were dying, stared into your face trying to memorize your features. You were awake and stared back at me in that wise way babies sometimes have. I thought you were dying. I thought you were dying.
When we got to the hospital there was a line-up, but I ignored it and went rushing up to the nurses' station, shrieking, "My baby's vomiting blood!" And the nurses -- well, they didn't even glance up from what they were doing. One actually turned her back on me. The other one just looked very bored.
"So," she asked in a really weary voice, "Are your nipples cracked honey?"
...And... so... they... were...
Ugh! You had been drinking my nipple blood!
When you're old enough to read this, no doubt you'll be even more grossed out by that than I was, but remember this: The whole event was the turning point. It was when you transformed from The Baby to My Baby. That horrific and terrifying trip to the hospital was the moment when I first realized how jagged-rich and cutting-deep my love for you was.
Fangs at three months: "Before the teeth came in"Happy birthday, Baby.
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
Oooh! Oooh! Ooooh!!!
...don't try to discourage me in my delusions here, OK? And do me a favour: Mention him on YOUR blog too and tell me if you get a hit from Arizona...
Oh my GOD you guys, guess, just guess who came to my blog last night!!
USSELL-RAY OWE-CRAY!!!!
How do I know this, you ask? Because someone from Arizona googled the name into Blog Search yesterday and this showed up on my sitemeter. "Who on earth," I asked myself when I saw the referral, "would be checking blogs for HIM??" Then I thought.... and did some checking... and found that the owe-Cray man LIVES IN ARIZONA!! Well, I'm no dummy, I can put two and two together. It MUST have been him!
(Loud girly scream.)
I should point out that I'm not the kind of person who really hero-worships movie stars. But I've seen Master and Commander: Far Side of the World so many times I probably should be named an honorary third lieutenant and, uh, well, he plays the Captain in that movie, and, uh, men in uniform and all that, and... oh jeez, listen, just go and rent the movie. You'll see what I mean.
Once I realized he'd been reading my blog, naturally I went over the post with a fine-toothed comb and to my horror discovered SEVERAL awkwardly phrased sentences that, for the life of me, I just COULDN'T figure out how to correct. (Does this happen to you too?) In fact, I had to go to bed and sleep on it before I knew what to change. Of course, my corrections are too late for Russell to see. Now he thinks I'm just a big lame blackhead squeezer who doesn't see anything through to completion, including a properly constructed sentence! Oh, this is so terrible! Blogging sucks!
(gloomy black cloud of unhappiness)
Off to sulk now.
Oh my GOD you guys, guess, just guess who came to my blog last night!!
USSELL-RAY OWE-CRAY!!!!
How do I know this, you ask? Because someone from Arizona googled the name into Blog Search yesterday and this showed up on my sitemeter. "Who on earth," I asked myself when I saw the referral, "would be checking blogs for HIM??" Then I thought.... and did some checking... and found that the owe-Cray man LIVES IN ARIZONA!! Well, I'm no dummy, I can put two and two together. It MUST have been him!
(Loud girly scream.)
I should point out that I'm not the kind of person who really hero-worships movie stars. But I've seen Master and Commander: Far Side of the World so many times I probably should be named an honorary third lieutenant and, uh, well, he plays the Captain in that movie, and, uh, men in uniform and all that, and... oh jeez, listen, just go and rent the movie. You'll see what I mean.
Once I realized he'd been reading my blog, naturally I went over the post with a fine-toothed comb and to my horror discovered SEVERAL awkwardly phrased sentences that, for the life of me, I just COULDN'T figure out how to correct. (Does this happen to you too?) In fact, I had to go to bed and sleep on it before I knew what to change. Of course, my corrections are too late for Russell to see. Now he thinks I'm just a big lame blackhead squeezer who doesn't see anything through to completion, including a properly constructed sentence! Oh, this is so terrible! Blogging sucks!
(gloomy black cloud of unhappiness)
Off to sulk now.
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Finishing Wood, and Other Things
...gotta stop watching those damn home improvement shows...
Yay! Exciting times here at the House of Whippersnapper. Last night, I started yet ANOTHER project that I will NEVER, EVER, EVER finish!! Stripping, sanding and varnishing all the wood trim in our house is a task that I, blessed with the attention span of a two year old child and the innate, stick-to-it abilities of kumquat, have about as much of a chance of finishing as I do completing a doctorate on solitaire chess moves and yet I MUST start this. The inner masochist in me absolutely COMPELS ME to set myself up for failure. It's a compulsion bordering on mental illness: If Mr. IQ collects books and "neat things," well, I accumulate abandoned projects. Quilts, diaries, baby books, old furniture that needs to be refinished, they're all scattered around this house, serving only one purpose, that being to MAKE ME FEEL GUILTY. Oh, and to make you-know-who feel smug and superior.
Everyone I know likes to rub my inability to finish things in my face. Even my brother. Several years ago, when courting his now wife, he wrote a little love poem to her which I just happened to accidentally stumble upon one day while hunting through the far dark corners of his locked desk drawer. It contained the following lines:
My sister stops doing
Everything she starts
But I'll never stop
Loving you
As you may have guessed, he went on to become an ath-may ofessor-pray, not a world famous poet. Hmmm, it has just occurred to me that people tend to like writing poems which highlight all my personal failings. Suddenly feeling quite resentful.
The difficulty I have completing things hit a new low two years ago during spring break, when the only goal I set for myself was to try out this coconut cream cake recipe I read about in a gourmet magazine. I'm not much of a baker, but for some reason, the picture of this cake just triggered something in the coconut cream pleasure center of my brain, and I HAD to make it. But try as I would, I just couldn't get past the creamy filling stage. I made it at least four times, and each time succumbed to the temptation and gobbled it up before managing to wedge said filling between two light fluffy cake halves and covering it with delicious icing.
So pathetic.
I have to say, though, I'm feeling pretty optimistic about this latest project. I bought this great product called Peel Away, which is ridiculously expensive, but pretty fun to work with. You slap it on the wood, cover it with plastic and 24 hours later just peel everything off. I'm feeling optimistic, because the peeling part of the process really appeals to the grosser side of my personality, i.e., the side of me that likes to squeeze blackheads and pick at the cradle cap on Baby Fangs' scalp. Oh my heavens, did I really just admit to enjoying these things? How absolutely embarrassing. If my grade six teacher or my brother read this, no doubt they'd write a poem about it.
I feel quite ill
Watching my sister squeeze her blackheads
But I'll never feel ill
Squeezing you
Damn smug PhD types!! I'll show him! I WILL finish this project! I WILL get it done! It's like the time Russell Crowe and I were walking on the beach together back in 2001. We were holding hands, and he looked at me and said, "Look Whippersnapper, it's
Yay! Exciting times here at the House of Whippersnapper. Last night, I started yet ANOTHER project that I will NEVER, EVER, EVER finish!! Stripping, sanding and varnishing all the wood trim in our house is a task that I, blessed with the attention span of a two year old child and the innate, stick-to-it abilities of kumquat, have about as much of a chance of finishing as I do completing a doctorate on solitaire chess moves and yet I MUST start this. The inner masochist in me absolutely COMPELS ME to set myself up for failure. It's a compulsion bordering on mental illness: If Mr. IQ collects books and "neat things," well, I accumulate abandoned projects. Quilts, diaries, baby books, old furniture that needs to be refinished, they're all scattered around this house, serving only one purpose, that being to MAKE ME FEEL GUILTY. Oh, and to make you-know-who feel smug and superior.
Everyone I know likes to rub my inability to finish things in my face. Even my brother. Several years ago, when courting his now wife, he wrote a little love poem to her which I just happened to accidentally stumble upon one day while hunting through the far dark corners of his locked desk drawer. It contained the following lines:
My sister stops doing
Everything she starts
But I'll never stop
Loving you
As you may have guessed, he went on to become an ath-may ofessor-pray, not a world famous poet. Hmmm, it has just occurred to me that people tend to like writing poems which highlight all my personal failings. Suddenly feeling quite resentful.
The difficulty I have completing things hit a new low two years ago during spring break, when the only goal I set for myself was to try out this coconut cream cake recipe I read about in a gourmet magazine. I'm not much of a baker, but for some reason, the picture of this cake just triggered something in the coconut cream pleasure center of my brain, and I HAD to make it. But try as I would, I just couldn't get past the creamy filling stage. I made it at least four times, and each time succumbed to the temptation and gobbled it up before managing to wedge said filling between two light fluffy cake halves and covering it with delicious icing.
So pathetic.
I have to say, though, I'm feeling pretty optimistic about this latest project. I bought this great product called Peel Away, which is ridiculously expensive, but pretty fun to work with. You slap it on the wood, cover it with plastic and 24 hours later just peel everything off. I'm feeling optimistic, because the peeling part of the process really appeals to the grosser side of my personality, i.e., the side of me that likes to squeeze blackheads and pick at the cradle cap on Baby Fangs' scalp. Oh my heavens, did I really just admit to enjoying these things? How absolutely embarrassing. If my grade six teacher or my brother read this, no doubt they'd write a poem about it.
I feel quite ill
Watching my sister squeeze her blackheads
But I'll never feel ill
Squeezing you
Damn smug PhD types!! I'll show him! I WILL finish this project! I WILL get it done! It's like the time Russell Crowe and I were walking on the beach together back in 2001. We were holding hands, and he looked at me and said, "Look Whippersnapper, it's
Sunday, May 06, 2007
Fever 'n' Ague
...ugh...
Totally ill, and Baby Fangs keeps trying to suckle from my runny, snot-filled nose.
Yeah, exactly.
Totally ill, and Baby Fangs keeps trying to suckle from my runny, snot-filled nose.
Yeah, exactly.
Friday, May 04, 2007
Sunday Night Office Update (Part II)
...posted on a Friday! I love this! Boy, this will be a fun thing to look forward to next week, huh, guessing which day I'll publish my Sunday office update again!...
Well, here's the situation. He SAYS work has been done. I SAY he's full of shit. He SAYS many, many boxes have been removed. I SAY the room looks worse than it did a week and a half ago. He says "Faaaaaaaaaawwwwk," as another pile of books collapses on him. I say, "heh heh heh." He says, "Time to take a break," and doesn't do anything for many days. I say, "Garrrrrrrr," and, snapping, throw everything that is left in the room ( a considerable pile of crap) outside on the front lawn. He says good naturedly, "Gee, why did you do that?" and hauls everything back into the front hallway. I say, "Yay, we can see the office floor for the first time since we moved in here!" He says, "@#&*%*!!, now everything is disorganized." I say, "Are you KIDDING ME??" and search for a hint of irony in his eyes. He says, "Grumble grumble grumble," and pretends to sort papers. I say, "My blog buddies all told me to drink lots of red wine, and I think I'm going to go do that now." He says, "Not only is everything all messy, but I think several very important papers blew away in the wind." I say, "Yay, more stuff gone!" and take a deep slug from the cheap colostomy bag of Cabernet we keep in our fridge at all times.
("Help get me through all this," I whisper, and stroke the gross, bloody-looking bag fondly.)
In other words, things have gotten a little ugly.
Part of the problem, of course, is this blog. I never used the computer before, so I was never in this room. The door was always shut, and what the eyes don't see, the heart don't bleed. But now that I'm in here all the time, well, things have to change. I want flowers. I want warmth. I want a book-lined study that gives the (incredibly) misleading impression that we are very, very clever, academic types. I want pictures on the wall. I want light music playing and a well-worn but comfortably organized atmosphere. I want to hide all the Mauve Binchy novels and have copies of scholarly tomes strewn casually about. Damn it, I want to stare out of my window as I write my wise, poetic, thought-provoking, Earth-changing, face-of-new-literature posts and see nature, a little forest perhaps, with a stream running through it and an occasional deer or two running by. I want. I want. I want to change my appearance so I look a little less like a crazy, moustached, bigger version of Cindy from Three's Company and a bit more like Noam Chomsky. I want an extra 30 IQ points. I want a WHOLE DIFFERENT LIFE COMPLETELY, AND IT ALL STARTS WITH THE OFFICE, BABY!!!! YOU HEAR ME??? ONCE THE OFFICE CHANGES, LIFE AS I'VE KNOWN IT WILL NEVER BE THE SAME!!!!!
Whoa! Ha ha ha! Well, I guess I let my imagination run a little wild there! Um, anyway.
(so embarrassed)
'Oooooh look, you can see the floor.'
The highlight of the (alleged) organizing process so far occurred on Tuesday, when Mr. IQ came rushing out of the room with something waving from his hand. He looked like the archangel Gabriel himself had descended from the heavens and singled him out for special treatment.
"Look, something stained this paper and made a picture!!!" he said excitedly, shoving it into my face.
I looked at it and refused to be impressed. "If it had looked like Jesus or Richard Nixon," I grumbled bad-naturedly, "we could have sold it for thousands of dollars on eBay and hired someone else to clean out this shithole."
My wise words hit him soundly in the cerebrum. "You're right," he said sadly, and crumpled up the picture and threw it into the recycling bin.
Huzzah! One item down, 7,469,987 to go!!
***
For whatever reason, whenever things get ugly in the office organization department, things brighten up for me in the form of a Perfect Post award. Thanks, CCE! Really, it made my week.
Well, here's the situation. He SAYS work has been done. I SAY he's full of shit. He SAYS many, many boxes have been removed. I SAY the room looks worse than it did a week and a half ago. He says "Faaaaaaaaaawwwwk," as another pile of books collapses on him. I say, "heh heh heh." He says, "Time to take a break," and doesn't do anything for many days. I say, "Garrrrrrrr," and, snapping, throw everything that is left in the room ( a considerable pile of crap) outside on the front lawn. He says good naturedly, "Gee, why did you do that?" and hauls everything back into the front hallway. I say, "Yay, we can see the office floor for the first time since we moved in here!" He says, "@#&*%*!!, now everything is disorganized." I say, "Are you KIDDING ME??" and search for a hint of irony in his eyes. He says, "Grumble grumble grumble," and pretends to sort papers. I say, "My blog buddies all told me to drink lots of red wine, and I think I'm going to go do that now." He says, "Not only is everything all messy, but I think several very important papers blew away in the wind." I say, "Yay, more stuff gone!" and take a deep slug from the cheap colostomy bag of Cabernet we keep in our fridge at all times.
("Help get me through all this," I whisper, and stroke the gross, bloody-looking bag fondly.)
In other words, things have gotten a little ugly.
Part of the problem, of course, is this blog. I never used the computer before, so I was never in this room. The door was always shut, and what the eyes don't see, the heart don't bleed. But now that I'm in here all the time, well, things have to change. I want flowers. I want warmth. I want a book-lined study that gives the (incredibly) misleading impression that we are very, very clever, academic types. I want pictures on the wall. I want light music playing and a well-worn but comfortably organized atmosphere. I want to hide all the Mauve Binchy novels and have copies of scholarly tomes strewn casually about. Damn it, I want to stare out of my window as I write my wise, poetic, thought-provoking, Earth-changing, face-of-new-literature posts and see nature, a little forest perhaps, with a stream running through it and an occasional deer or two running by. I want. I want. I want to change my appearance so I look a little less like a crazy, moustached, bigger version of Cindy from Three's Company and a bit more like Noam Chomsky. I want an extra 30 IQ points. I want a WHOLE DIFFERENT LIFE COMPLETELY, AND IT ALL STARTS WITH THE OFFICE, BABY!!!! YOU HEAR ME??? ONCE THE OFFICE CHANGES, LIFE AS I'VE KNOWN IT WILL NEVER BE THE SAME!!!!!
Whoa! Ha ha ha! Well, I guess I let my imagination run a little wild there! Um, anyway.
(so embarrassed)
'Oooooh look, you can see the floor.'"Look, something stained this paper and made a picture!!!" he said excitedly, shoving it into my face.
I looked at it and refused to be impressed. "If it had looked like Jesus or Richard Nixon," I grumbled bad-naturedly, "we could have sold it for thousands of dollars on eBay and hired someone else to clean out this shithole."
My wise words hit him soundly in the cerebrum. "You're right," he said sadly, and crumpled up the picture and threw it into the recycling bin.
Huzzah! One item down, 7,469,987 to go!!
***
For whatever reason, whenever things get ugly in the office organization department, things brighten up for me in the form of a Perfect Post award. Thanks, CCE! Really, it made my week.
Monday, April 30, 2007
How to be Good
...in which a confusing and exasperating trip to the grocery store is described in great and only slightly fictionalized detail... yes, I know this has been done before, and by much better writers than me, but it's MY blog so I get to do it too....
Purchasing groceries has become so complicated lately, and not just because I'mtoo embarrassed to return standing firm in my decision to boycott Stupidstore. Our food shopping trip last Saturday was a true exercise in 21st century guilt and uncertainty. Who would have thought that good old Harry's Foods could bring out such an stimulating range of neurotic emotion?
As I remember, we wheeled into the fruit and veggie section first.
"Well, I really think we have to start going 100% organic, for the kids' sakes," I said firmly. "All those pesticides, they're just not good for them."
"I don't know," said Mr. IQ, looking worried, "the organic stuff is pretty expensive."
"Are you saying we should save some pennies and risk giving our babies cancer?" I demanded.
"Well, no, but... "
"There you are then!" I said, bustling over to the organic section.
"I want grapes!" said High Intensity.
"Sure!" I said cheerily, and then stopped dead in my tracks. A small tray containing maybe 20 grapes was $7.99. "Ughhfkkgahh" I choked out, unable to speak properly. Luckily Mr. IQ jumped in to save me.
"We can't buy organic food," he said, "it's all flown in from thousands of miles away. It's not produced locally."
I looked at him gratefully. "Yah, think of the fossil fuels being used!"
"That's definitely not something we should be supporting."
"So true," I said. Slowly I scanned the aisles. "But then what...."
"No produce!" declared Mr. IQ decisively. Quickly he moved the cart towards the bakery section. "How's about we buys a pie?"
I snorted. We are not pie-buying people, not even at Thanksgiving. "I don't think so," I said. "Get some bread."
"But wheat is grown with pesticides too..."
"I know but... you know.... sandwiches..." I said helplessly. Mr. IQ grabbed a loaf off the shelf.
"Not that one!" I said, "It has to be whole wheat!"
"This is whole wheat!" said Mr. IQ, confused. "100% whole wheat, look, it says on the label."
"I know, but according to the CBC, that kind of whole wheat is just like white bread. The labels are very misleading. You have to get... WHOLE whole wheat."
"Huh?"
"Um, I don't remember exactly," I said, not wanting to admit that I had turned off the radio discussion to play my Dr. Hook CD. "But just because it says whole wheat doesn't mean it actually is. You have to... look for grains or something."
"Oh for fuck's sake..." Silently, we scoured the bread aisles for WHOLE whole wheat.
"How about this one," asked Mr. IQ, holding up a loaf. Carefully, we inspected it. "Look, there's a grain," he said pointing. On the crust there was a lump of some kind.
"Is that a fiber-filled, colon cancer-fighting lump? Or a white bread lump?" I asked suspiciously.
"I don't know!" said Mr. IQ, poking it tentatively with his finger. That got High Intensity's attention.
"You touched it, now you have to take it!" she said sternly.
"Why?" asked Mr. IQ.
"Germs, dad," she said. She didn't add "Duh" but she might as well have, it was pretty obvious she was thinking it.
"Fine, we'll take it," I said, grabbing it and throwing it into the cart, despite my conflicted emotions. "Where to next?"
"Let's stay here," said High Intensity. "Can we get a cake?"
In the meat section, Mr. IQ's eyes glazed over a bit as he stared at the steaks.
"We should have a BBQ now that spring is finally here," he said.
"Red meat!!" I said, "are you crazy?"
"But you turn into a limp, lifeless worm if you don't eat red meat occasionally," he said, holding the steaks close to his chest defiantly. He didn't add, "And as cranky as a three-balled rhinoceros," but he sure as hell wanted to.
"Yes, but the steroids will give us breast and prostate cancer," I said primly.
"And I'll start menstruating when I'm seven," piped in High Intensity helpfully. No, of course she didn't say this. I whispered it in his ear.
"Fine," said Mr. IQ, hastily putting the meat back, "we'll get chicken instead."
"We certainly will not!!" I said, "I read somewhere that there's arsenic in chicken feed, we can't risk feeding that to the kids!"
"Okay, fish then. How about salmon? Salmon is a super-food: It has Omega-3 fatty acids!"
"But farmed salmon has parasitic lice-y type things growing on them."
"Wild salmon then. "
"Wild salmon is endangered."
"Tuna?"
"Hello mercury poisoning!"
"Luncheon meats?"
"Killer nitrites."
"Cheese, and we can make pasta."
"Saturated fat city, dude. You'd have a heart attack before the meal was over. Besides, milk products cause osteoporosis."
A little tic was starting to become noticeable around Mr. IQ's left eye.
"Get out of here!" he said, "They're full of calcium!"
"I know, but it doesn't matter. That "good for bones" thing is just a big lie being promoted by the dairy farmers. It's actually the vegans who end up with the strongest bones in old age."
"Look, we managed to get bread, can we just find something to put on it?" he asked piteously, "I mean, I'm totally starving."
"Well, uh, I was thinking of some nice tofu."
"TOFU?"
"Yah, I saw a recipe, you just mush it up, and, uh, add some spices and it's supposed to be really... delicious."
"But tofu has estrogen in it."
"So?"
Mr. IQ's voice lowered to a whisper. "Man boobs," he hissed worriedly, "Could... could eating it give me man boobs?"
Half an hour later, our one loaf of bread was starting to look pretty lonely in the cart.
"Let's just circle around one more time," I said, ever the optimist, "there must be SOMETHING we can buy."
"Like maybe something like potato chips," grumbled High Intensity
"Oh GOD," said Mr. IQ, snapping, "GET ME OUT OF HERE, just GET ME OUT OF HERE, I CAN'T STAND THIS ANY LONGER."
"Good idea," I said, "but, uh, can we go by the baby section first?"
"And the candy aisle?" asked High Intensity.
In the baby aisle we didn't make eye contact as I grabbed a box of environmentally destructive disposable diapers.
"Those stay in the ground forever you know," said High Intensity, having been fed all the propaganda by her school last week during Earth day celebrations.
"Hey! That's pretty smart!" said Mr. IQ.
I made a panicked noise. "DON'T CALL HER SMART!!" I whispered.
"Why not?" he asked.
"According to this article I read, telling kids they're smart just kills their work ethic and sets them up for failure!!"
Mr. IQ looked slightly ill.
We paid for the diapers and headed out into the wrinkle-creating, skin cancer-causing/vitamin D forming, cancer PREVENTING sunshine. Then we got into our fossil fuel-consuming, greenhouse gas producing/absolutely fucking necessary vehicle and headed for home. Unhappily, we split the loaf of bread for dinner. Then Mr. IQ broke down at midnight and ordered pizza. It was totally delicious.
As that old wicked witch would say: "Oh, what a world, what a world."
Purchasing groceries has become so complicated lately, and not just because I'm
As I remember, we wheeled into the fruit and veggie section first.
"Well, I really think we have to start going 100% organic, for the kids' sakes," I said firmly. "All those pesticides, they're just not good for them."
"I don't know," said Mr. IQ, looking worried, "the organic stuff is pretty expensive."
"Are you saying we should save some pennies and risk giving our babies cancer?" I demanded.
"Well, no, but... "
"There you are then!" I said, bustling over to the organic section.
"I want grapes!" said High Intensity.
"Sure!" I said cheerily, and then stopped dead in my tracks. A small tray containing maybe 20 grapes was $7.99. "Ughhfkkgahh" I choked out, unable to speak properly. Luckily Mr. IQ jumped in to save me.
"We can't buy organic food," he said, "it's all flown in from thousands of miles away. It's not produced locally."
I looked at him gratefully. "Yah, think of the fossil fuels being used!"
"That's definitely not something we should be supporting."
"So true," I said. Slowly I scanned the aisles. "But then what...."
"No produce!" declared Mr. IQ decisively. Quickly he moved the cart towards the bakery section. "How's about we buys a pie?"
I snorted. We are not pie-buying people, not even at Thanksgiving. "I don't think so," I said. "Get some bread."
"But wheat is grown with pesticides too..."
"I know but... you know.... sandwiches..." I said helplessly. Mr. IQ grabbed a loaf off the shelf.
"Not that one!" I said, "It has to be whole wheat!"
"This is whole wheat!" said Mr. IQ, confused. "100% whole wheat, look, it says on the label."
"I know, but according to the CBC, that kind of whole wheat is just like white bread. The labels are very misleading. You have to get... WHOLE whole wheat."
"Huh?"
"Um, I don't remember exactly," I said, not wanting to admit that I had turned off the radio discussion to play my Dr. Hook CD. "But just because it says whole wheat doesn't mean it actually is. You have to... look for grains or something."
"Oh for fuck's sake..." Silently, we scoured the bread aisles for WHOLE whole wheat.
"How about this one," asked Mr. IQ, holding up a loaf. Carefully, we inspected it. "Look, there's a grain," he said pointing. On the crust there was a lump of some kind.
"Is that a fiber-filled, colon cancer-fighting lump? Or a white bread lump?" I asked suspiciously.
"I don't know!" said Mr. IQ, poking it tentatively with his finger. That got High Intensity's attention.
"You touched it, now you have to take it!" she said sternly.
"Why?" asked Mr. IQ.
"Germs, dad," she said. She didn't add "Duh" but she might as well have, it was pretty obvious she was thinking it.
"Fine, we'll take it," I said, grabbing it and throwing it into the cart, despite my conflicted emotions. "Where to next?"
"Let's stay here," said High Intensity. "Can we get a cake?"
In the meat section, Mr. IQ's eyes glazed over a bit as he stared at the steaks.
"We should have a BBQ now that spring is finally here," he said.
"Red meat!!" I said, "are you crazy?"
"But you turn into a limp, lifeless worm if you don't eat red meat occasionally," he said, holding the steaks close to his chest defiantly. He didn't add, "And as cranky as a three-balled rhinoceros," but he sure as hell wanted to.
"Yes, but the steroids will give us breast and prostate cancer," I said primly.
"And I'll start menstruating when I'm seven," piped in High Intensity helpfully. No, of course she didn't say this. I whispered it in his ear.
"Fine," said Mr. IQ, hastily putting the meat back, "we'll get chicken instead."
"We certainly will not!!" I said, "I read somewhere that there's arsenic in chicken feed, we can't risk feeding that to the kids!"
"Okay, fish then. How about salmon? Salmon is a super-food: It has Omega-3 fatty acids!"
"But farmed salmon has parasitic lice-y type things growing on them."
"Wild salmon then. "
"Wild salmon is endangered."
"Tuna?"
"Hello mercury poisoning!"
"Luncheon meats?"
"Killer nitrites."
"Cheese, and we can make pasta."
"Saturated fat city, dude. You'd have a heart attack before the meal was over. Besides, milk products cause osteoporosis."
A little tic was starting to become noticeable around Mr. IQ's left eye.
"Get out of here!" he said, "They're full of calcium!"
"I know, but it doesn't matter. That "good for bones" thing is just a big lie being promoted by the dairy farmers. It's actually the vegans who end up with the strongest bones in old age."
"Look, we managed to get bread, can we just find something to put on it?" he asked piteously, "I mean, I'm totally starving."
"Well, uh, I was thinking of some nice tofu."
"TOFU?"
"Yah, I saw a recipe, you just mush it up, and, uh, add some spices and it's supposed to be really... delicious."
"But tofu has estrogen in it."
"So?"
Mr. IQ's voice lowered to a whisper. "Man boobs," he hissed worriedly, "Could... could eating it give me man boobs?"
Half an hour later, our one loaf of bread was starting to look pretty lonely in the cart.
"Let's just circle around one more time," I said, ever the optimist, "there must be SOMETHING we can buy."
"Like maybe something like potato chips," grumbled High Intensity
"Oh GOD," said Mr. IQ, snapping, "GET ME OUT OF HERE, just GET ME OUT OF HERE, I CAN'T STAND THIS ANY LONGER."
"Good idea," I said, "but, uh, can we go by the baby section first?"
"And the candy aisle?" asked High Intensity.
In the baby aisle we didn't make eye contact as I grabbed a box of environmentally destructive disposable diapers.
"Those stay in the ground forever you know," said High Intensity, having been fed all the propaganda by her school last week during Earth day celebrations.
"Hey! That's pretty smart!" said Mr. IQ.
I made a panicked noise. "DON'T CALL HER SMART!!" I whispered.
"Why not?" he asked.
"According to this article I read, telling kids they're smart just kills their work ethic and sets them up for failure!!"
Mr. IQ looked slightly ill.
We paid for the diapers and headed out into the wrinkle-creating, skin cancer-causing/vitamin D forming, cancer PREVENTING sunshine. Then we got into our fossil fuel-consuming, greenhouse gas producing/absolutely fucking necessary vehicle and headed for home. Unhappily, we split the loaf of bread for dinner. Then Mr. IQ broke down at midnight and ordered pizza. It was totally delicious.
As that old wicked witch would say: "Oh, what a world, what a world."
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