So You Would Think

Oh, Those Dang New Year's Resolutions!

2012-01-04T23:05:00.016-06:00

This morning I woke up at 6 A.M. to start some of my resolutions.

For the first time in years, I made a real breakfast with omelets, toast, and a fruit smoothie for my family instead of pouring cereal or toasting a bagel. Well, who knew you can't make an omelet with 8 eggs and vegetables and it not get done in 5 minutes. So we had scrambled eggs instead. (Besides, I can never get it to flip over right.) To tell you the truth, I don't make very good eggs. The dogs ate half of them.

Another resolution, make sure the dogs get to have a walk everyday. Last night, I put on my Eskimo coat I never use (a friend gave it to me and it's covered in fur, and I don't do fur but it's warm) and took the dogs out for a walk at yes, 11:30 P.M. in the freezing cold. I walked them up and down our small street, watching for any strange man or big white van suddenly jolting to a stop to snatch me up, dogs and all. And I said to myself, watching everyone in their warm houses with their lights off and probably asleep, "What the hell am I doing?" But you know, it's good for the dogs and it's good for me and finding time to get out of the house is pretty non-existent. So in order to get out of the house, if I have to walk the dogs during the graveyard shift up and down our block in a burly fur coat, so be it.

Getting back to this morning, I was quite proud of myself that I gave my daughter a good breakfast, got her dress, painted her nails and even put little flowers on them and got her to school ON TIME. While I was making breakfast, I asked my husband if he could walk the dogs. So he got their leashes and walked the dogs again down the street and back.

This pride in myself lasted until I dropped my daughter off at school and got back. I fell asleep. I slept (in between watching Escape to Chimp Eden, three bottle feedings and several diaper changings) from 9 A.M. to 5:30 P.M. My goal was to be super woman and get the house cleaned, renew library books, and get my sleeping schedule back on track. Well, obviously it didn't work this day! (In my defense I was up all night. Couldn't sleep. Once it took me a year to get back on track.) So here I go again tonight, walking the dogs at 11:00 P.M. at night in my Eskimo coat up and down the small little street. I told my husband that as many times as we walk those dogs up and down the same street (because it's dang cold), they are never going to get lost.

Why do we make resolutions? To feel hopeful. I asked my husband if he was making any resolutions (well, ones that I don't make for him :o) and he said no, he doesn't believe in them, "What's the point." I told him it makes us assess what we want in life, how to be better, gives us hope that we can make our lives better. I know, sounds like a "I've Got a Dream" speech and I think he was already in the other room by the time I finished my little New Year's speech.

So here is to tomorrow. Where I'm going to wake up again and try to make my family a good breakfast, get my daughter to school on time and try to stay awake to the appointed time normal people go to sleep. More than likely, I'll be walking those dogs at 11:30 P.M. again, in that Eskimo coat hoping that the next day, I will be able to get things on track. With resolutions it's not always about being perfect but knowing we can do something to make our lives better and at least, trying.

Yo-Yo Ma's wife, First Lady, or Beyonce?

2011-12-29T23:04:00.003-06:00

We watched the Kennedy Center Honors on TV where Yo-Yo Ma, the famous cellist was being honored. Next to him was Michelle Obama. My mom said, "Is that his wife?" My husband said, "Emilie, don't you know the First Lady?" Olivia, our 5 year-old said, "No it's not, it's Beyonce!"

The Arrival

2011-12-08T23:57:00.049-06:00

Noah has arrived! 8 pounds 10 ounces

Sorry for the delay but when I said I wouldn't get much sleep, well, I haven't had much sleep! Instead of watching zombie shows at night during the month of October when I was pregnant and couldn't sleep (I love the Walking Dead on AMC) I now look like a zombie myself. Oh and breast feeding, that's a whole other beast. So here's the story. With all the guts and glory.

On November 9th, I started having contractions before I went to sleep. On November 11th, at around 3 or 4 P.M., they got to the point where I needed to go to the hospital. I waited until I had to because I learned with my first pregnancy it's better to stay at home in a nice environment than to stick it out in a hospital.

When I arrived, the nurse told me I was dilated to 7 cm. She couldn't believe how relaxed and calm I was as I was making jokes, talking as if we had been friends for years. She told the other nurse, "Boy, she really has a sunny disposition for 7 cm." Well, in about 15 minutes, let me tell you, those mild contractions changed and I said, "Where is my epidural because I'm about to lose my sunny disposition real fast."

Everything went pretty well for the most part. The doctor came in and broke my water. If you are a guy, there is nothing like having a doctor ram his arm up you with some kind of hook to break your water when you have a baby. It gives a whole new meaning to pain.

And then it happened! The Ultrasound doctor has been telling me for several months I had a lot of amniotic fluid. My OBGYN doctor who was there told the nurse to get extra towels. Boy, did she not know what was coming! I had three times, yes three times the amount of amniotic fluid more than a normal pregnancy. It soaked up about six towels and actually spilled off the bed. Now, this may seem like "yuck" to some, but I actually in a weird way felt like I had my own little Guinness Book of World Records type thing happening. It was weird, gross and fascinating at the same time.

My husband pointed out Noah in the bible went out with a flood and our Noah came in with a flood. And considering that Sebastian (our baby who died) didn't have hardly any amniotic fluid, it's sort of ironic that this baby had 3x as much. Almost as if God or the world was making sure I had more than enough this time.

Another fact my husband pointed out - there was a full moon. For some reason, many women have babies during the full moon. As mentioned in a previous post, when I worked for United Airlines, we would always get the "crazies" calling for reservations during the full moon. So, I'm sure it has some relevance.

At some point, the baby wasn't coming out fast enough and the doctor decided to use forceps. As he was doing it, I had visions of the baby coming out with a squeezed head but it wasn't bad. He had a few bruises but the pediatrician said (a few weeks later) he actually had a perfect head and it looked like he was born by cesarean. So overall, it was a really good birth. Sure, I seriously hurt my back and it's getting better and the doctor had to use forceps but I had more good things happen than bad.

If you read my other posts, you know I was worried sick about having to be induced. Well, he came two weeks early at the 38th week so being induced at my 39th week didn't even come into play. I had prayed a lot about that one, hoping he would come early and he came at the perfect time. I still think he was meant to be born on 11/11/11 but the doctor gave me a drug to induce my labor a little (I'm not sure if he was tired of waiting or I think he mentioned he was worried about the baby's heartbeat) but Noah was born on 11/10 at 9:36 P.M.

And the aftermath? Let's talk about good ol' breast feeding. This paragraph should be entitled Whipping It Out. Now if a man whipped it out in public he would be going in jail, if a woman whips it out, she is sanctified in the halls of "good mothers" by the La Leche League and may have a few weirdo men stare at her as they walk by. Breast feeding is hard business and when you have to get up at 2 A.M. and whip it out to a crying kid, the kumbaya music and pat on the backs by breastfeeding mothers everywhere is seldom on your mind.

Now sure, I do see the part where it's nice because it creates a bond with your baby, and it is better than formula and it's the best thing to do. But Lord help me, there's nothing like having a wet shirt suddenly appear when you go to dinner (which I had and said, "Stephane, we have to go now!", or trying to figure out how to cover your hoo ha's in a public area with some kind of fabric contraption or the best part, having a nurse grab your breast at the hospital and maneuver it every which way to make sure the baby "latches" on. Yes, I'm being a tad been dramatic. The benefits outweigh the problems but I'm not sure I can keep it up. It really leaves you exhausted and you can't do pretty much anything else except be relegated to sitting in a chair and again, watching more zombie movies and late-night infomercials.

And another aftermath, circumcision. When people tell you to cover the penis because it can pee straight up, sideways and probably even create an art piece on the side of the wall if so inclined, they aren't lying. We couldn't cover it for the first week because he was raw from being circumcised. We were peed on a total of 12 times! I would hear, "Oh man!" from the changing table and I knew our baby had baptized my husband with his daily urination dosage. (We finally figured out why I had 3x as much amniotic fluid. The amniotic fluid is made from the baby urinating in the amniotic sack and we found out, this kid goes like there is no tomorrow!) Now that he is healed, when we take off the diaper, there is a race to cover it and get the diaper on. A penis can do damage!

As for the good things, he is a great baby. He loves to be held and he is pretty relaxed as long as you don't put him down or change his diaper. So sleep is hard to come by. But we're working on it. I feel very fortunate to have him since many people have problems with having a baby and we lost one last year. In fact, he looks just like Sebastien which is a good thing and bad. It's nice because it reminds us of him and it's bad because it makes us miss him. When you have a baby die three hours after he is born you don't have time to see facial expressions, how he would look at you, little cute things he would do. So when I see it with him I wonder if Sebastien would have acted this way or looked like this when he smiled. For the most part, I don't think about it, just every once in awhile. You never forget the child you lose, it comes back to you at different times in your life but you live your life and you get through it.

So, even though this posting is all over the place I'm going to leave you with a few funny things my daughter said. She's five.
----
"Olivia, you have to go to bed in a few minutes."
"No, I want a hundred minutes."
----

We are trying to get her to sleep in her own bed in her own room rather than with us. I told her, "Shannon (her friend) sleeps in her own bedroom."

She said, "Shannon's bedroom is next to her mom and dad's room, mine is a half an hour away!"
-----
At the hospital when I had the baby, the nurse noticed she was wearing a hat, the nurse said, "Oh, aren't you wearing a nice hat. Are you making a fashion statement."

Olivia looked at the nurse like she was crazy, "No, I'm wearing it to keep my head warm."
----

When we were preparing to have the baby I told Olivia she was going to stay the night with Shannon her friend. It would be the first night staying at a friend's house. I said, make sure you know where her mommy and daddy are sleeping so if you wake up and you are really scared you can go to see them. She said, I can't do that, it's inappropriate to wake someone up. (Yes, she said inappropriate.) How come that doesn't work when she wakes us up?
----
Last night, I ordered London Broil (steak) for dinner. She told the waiter, "I want Lemon Broil, too."

It's Coming!

2011-11-10T13:37:00.013-06:00

I'm going to the hospital. Having contractions. I guess the induction issue is no longer a concern since I'm at 37 weeks. Thank goodness. The baby might be born on 11/11/11. Who knows?

Yesterday, I went to have an ultrasound. As I was looking at the screen, I said, "Oh there's an ear. It's fully developed."

The ultrasound tech cleared her throat, "That's the scrotum."

Oh," I said. I didn't know what to say so I said, "I guess I don't look at those every day to recognize it." (Maybe not the best answer.)

Well, wish me luck for an easy delivery. The ultrasound doctor said he will be either 9 or 10 lbs.

And no more late night television because I can't sleep! Last night, I was watching an animal show at 2 A.M. in the morning where a woman in Australia was keeping 3 alligators as pets in her house. One drove around in her backseat with a collar on. I was yelling at the T.V., "Are you nuts!" And then I realized, I'm the nut for watching pet alligators on T.V. at 2 A.M.

Maybe after the baby, I can sleep agai. Oh wait, that's right, the baby will be up in the middle of the night for feedings. Okay, maybe in a year? God help me. :o)

Don't Get Caught Under the Cherry Tree . . .

2011-10-28T14:55:00.008-05:00

(I forgot to publish this posting in July. I still have a hard time believing this happened.)

Yesterday, our neighbor politely informed me we have a fruit tree thief in the neighborhood and her husband saw it first hand. The woman came into our front yard and picked ALL the cherries off from our cherry tree, cupped them in the bottom of her shirt and took off.

If someone wants a peach, an apple or a few cherries, fine! But the whole dang tree. Come on. It's a good thing I wasn't there. I would have sent my dog out there first to scare her (Emmy would have probably just ran past her to chase some squirrel) and then I would have ran after her, with my pregnancy belly and all. It's the principle, our yard isn't your yard and if you need some cherries, buy them at the dang grocery store like normal adults do. They're in season for crying out loud.

Anyway, I hate thieves.

When I went out to inspect the tree, there were a total of three cherries left on the top branches. Obviously, she couldn't reach them or they would have been gone too. I decided to taste one and luckily, they were really sour. I hope our cherries give her a nice stomach ache.

Next year, just like the postings I did called the Beverly Hillbillies of Scrap Iron, I will have to be watching behind my window when the culprit comes and this time, she'll learn not to mess with my cherries.

Follow Your Instincts When Seeing the Doctor

2011-10-26T13:33:00.005-05:00

Yesterday, I went to see my OBGYN. He said if the baby doesn't come by the 39Th week he is going to induce that week. I told him I didn't like being induced with our daughter (which was necessary because she was 10 days late) but he said he is worried the baby may be big and could lead to a c-section if I wait. I should have said, I absolutely hated being induced.

Meanwhile, I did some searching on the Internet. The majority of websites, pretty much all of them, say a baby shouldn't be induced early based on the assumption it will be a big baby. Furthermore, I read on several websites that an ultrasound, especially toward the end, is not necessarily accurate regarding a baby's size and therefore, it's not recommended to induce early based on this. Many people have been told there baby is going to be 10 lbs from an ultrasound, are induced and it ends up 7 or 8. And there are plenty of women who have given birth to 10 lb baby's because the body prepares for this. However, I do agree a baby should be induced if it is medically necessary, like the woman has HBP or the baby is in distress, etc. Also, if the baby is past 42 weeks.

So I am a little upset. I'm due the day before Thanksgiving and my doctor will be away on vacation. He has every right to be with his family and should be but am I being induced for convenience because he's not going to be there? I have to believe no. I don't think this doctor would do something like this just for his own benefit.

Now the hard task is to tell him. He is very strong in his opinions but I have to do what feels right and to go to my next appointment with a strong attitude. Actually one of the risk factors with being induced is a stronger probability to have a c-section!

I can tell you, I'm pretty tired of seeing any doctors at all. When I went to see another doctor for something else last year, he prescribed a medication and told me it was fine even if I wanted to get pregnant or did get pregnant. Then I did some research and talked to my OBGYN before going to the pharmacy (I had a bad feeling about it/instincts) and low and behold, it can cause blindness for the fetus. I've also wrote about my doctor nightmare stories in an old posting several years ago on my blog where one prescribed me an addictive medication and then told me he never prescribed it when I asked about it. He was also 80 some years old and had suffered a stroke before I saw him so I can't totally say I was surprised.

Here's the point: Always trust your instincts and don't take medications or advice blindly. If something doesn't set well with you look it up on the Internet or ask other people. We need to believe in doctors because let's face it, without them we wouldn't have a chance and the majority try and get it right. But it doesn't mean you should follow someone blindly. Your instincts are usually right. You have choices. We all do. And if we don't look out for ourselves, who will?

When you're eight months pregnant, what do you do?

2011-10-24T18:25:00.004-05:00

I have officially went into another phase of my pregnancy. I can't sleep for more than thirty minutes without waking up. If I stand for more than ten minutes, I feel nauseated and hot. I hate going to bed because every part of my body hurts when I sleep. I'm up until 1 in the morning watching endless zombie and Halloween flicks on AMC, FX and SyFi. (Don't ask why I like scary movies, my husband doesn't understand either. I have to literally make him watch them with me.) And the infomercials on at 1 in the morning are not much better: dehydraters, plastic wall moldings, The Magic Bullet, The Baby Bullet, and the Thunder Coat for Dogs. Not that I watch them for more than five minutes.

Yes, the world of the midnight, early morning people who are up and about (usually in a recliner) is not a fun world to be in. The television sucks, everyone in the house (including the pets) are either snoring or dead asleep. And I am here, waiting. Waiting for five weeks to come so I can breathe and sleep again. But it is part of the journey, right? I know I sound like I'm complaining a lot. But being eight months pregnant is hard. You're more than ready to get the job done.

I went to another ultrasound last week and the baby is NOW 7 lbs. 10 ounces. The doctor said I'm just going to have a big baby. Maybe he's going to be as tall as a basketball player, who knows? Our daughter is really tall. The doctor isn't worried about diabetes because he said the head and stomach are the same size. Meanwhile, I guess it's back to sitting in a chair, waiting for a contraction to start.

If only men knew what they were missing.

An Update on Baby 3

2011-10-10T15:36:00.004-05:00

I do not have gestational diabetes. Quite happy about it. I was on the borderline with the one hour test and I had to go back to the hospital for the three hour test. It was not fun!

I had to fast and then drink a bottle of fruit punch that tasted like half of it was sugar. Each hour they tested my blood. By the time I was done, I was like get me out of here. Three hours sitting in a hospital waiting room is boring no matter how many good magazines they have, and they didn't have very many. After reading Golf Digest and some medical magazines describing the advances in medical technology for the first hour, I was ready to move on or fall asleep. Then I wandered around the hospital for the next hour. Finally, one of the nurse's took pity on me for the third hour and led me back to a break room with a recliner and television. Now that was waiting in style.

So it came back fine. I guess I'm just going to have a big baby or an early baby. Apparently, big babies run on both sides of our families, along with a thick head of hair so it's a given I'm going to have a big baby with a mohawk. But at least he will be healthy and after you have one that isn't, it makes a difference.

How cute and hopeful

2011-10-08T15:35:00.017-05:00

Yesterday, my 5 year-old daughter and I were watching Animal Cops on Animal Planet. If you think about the people with the 30 uncared for cats, it's pretty much the circumstance. Anyway-

She asked why the humane society was taking the woman's cats away. I told her the woman couldn't afford to take them to the vet so she asked the humane society to come and rescue them. She said, "Doesn't she have any lemonade?"

"Lemonade?" I ask.

And then I got it. In her 5 year-old mind she thought the woman could set up a lemonade stand and get the money.

Children are pretty cute.

Finding Hope: A New Kind of Bachelor/Bachlorette

2011-10-04T22:42:00.020-05:00

Set-up: At the end of the book when everything is resolved, Hope finds out Gina is leaving the company to start her own business: a dating service for the other half of society. This is just the dialogue without the extra stuff added in yet.

“Hope, you’re the one who gets an adrenaline rush from business deals. I just happen to get mine from uniting societies’ misfits. Strange and degenerate people are out there looking for relationships just like everyone else.

“And who would be the model for your brochures, Quasimodo?”

“Laugh my friend, but the beautiful people in this world only make up a small percentage. The rest of us deserve to find love, too.”

“So now you’re including yourself in this strange and degenerate category?”

“Well,” Gina reasoned, “I do have to relate to my customers. I feel I can go either way.”

“Fine, you’re going to do what you want no matter what I say.”

“You’re right, so let me try some slogans for my new company out on you. First one,” Gina said opening her notebook, “for the lost, lonely and confused.”

“Yeah, I’m sure that will hit it big.”

Gina looked through her notebook, “Okay, how about this one. There is someone for everyone, even you.”

“Well-”

“Fine,” Gina said, “here’s my third one. Don’t let your looks get you down because that special man can be found.”

“No, excludes the men finding women scenario.”

“I have one more. You might be ugly, you may be homely, but there is someone just like you out there to love.” Gina looked up and smiled. “I like that one.”

“Nobody wants a homely person Gina, even if they look homely.”

“Well, then which one is my best one?”

“I think you better keep working on it. But I’m proud of you, Gina. I think everyone should pursue their talents and you really do have a talent to see the potential in all kinds of people.”

“So you think I’ll make it,” Gina smiled proudly.

“No.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“Sorry, Gina, I just don’t think there is a market out there for weird people. Don’t get me wrong,” Hope said, “I think there are plenty of weird people out there. But do they know they’re weird? Now that is a different matter.”

It's a Boy!

2011-07-12T20:55:00.010-05:00

I had another ultrasound. It's a boy! The tech even gave me an ultrasound picture with the "thing" blown up and the word BOY typed in beside it. As if I need a visual. Oh well, I guess I can pull it out when he is older and embarass him.

I haven't blogged in a long time because I went from "oh this pregnancy isn't so bad, maybe I'll do it again," to "what the hell just happened." I feel like an inflated helium balloon is sitting under my chest. I have to turn over throughout the night because I am so uncomfortable and when I flip over it's not easy to carry a big baby/stomach with it so where I land is where I land. So Stephane, poor guy, is sleeping with his head at the end of the bed and his feet are where his head is supposed to be just in case I land on him. And then he cannot have any of his body touching my sore stomach so there you go. Not to mention the two 15 year-old cats want their fair share of the bed somewhere in the mix.

I went to the ultrasound doctor last week and he said the baby is measuring 2 weeks early or larger than what it usually should be. Plus, I have more amniotic fluid than normal. He said I could have diabetes (which is something you can get just while you are pregnant) or the baby is just going to be big. Olivia was 8 lbs 15 ounces and I've had two diabetic tests already which turned out negative. So hopefully, he's just goinig to be a big boy. But on the otherhand, the thought of having a large baby at delivery won't exactly feel well. Thank goodness, I'm getting an epidural! But those do eventually go away.

Anyway, I have a few more stories or happenings coming your way once I have some more time. Like, how this nice passer-by decided to pick ALL the cherries off our tree and ran away with them tucked in her shirt.

Until then -

Excerpt from Finding Hope - Purse Snatching Scene

2011-06-15T17:42:00.014-05:00

Set-up: A purse snatcher approaches Hope and Gina while they are walking home from a movie theater in San Francisco.

“Good evening ladies, I believe you have something I want,” the man smiled looking down at their purses.

Hope looked at Gina, “Is he doing what I think he’s doing?”

“Oh, you don’t want this purse,” Gina said holding her purse tightly to her chest, “you might think this purse is worth something because it’s a Coach original, but I’ve had it for over ten years. You’re not going to get nearly what its worth on the resale value. So I suggest you mosey on down to the next street corner and take a look at what those ladies are carrying. I think an off Broadway show may be letting out,” she smiled back, trying to hide her purse under her coat.

“Listen lady, I don’t care if you're carrying an old Coach bag or a purse from Wal-Mart. It’s what’s in it that I want.”

“Then you’ll probably want her purse instead of mine,” Gina said glancing toward Hope, “she’s the one that makes the big bucks around here. All I have are some Weight Watcher coupons, a few pieces of sugar free cinnamon candies, a credit card that is almost to the limit, maybe a $10 dollar bill and some expensive lip gloss – but you don’t want that, unless you like lip gloss,” Gina said matter-of-factly, “which my cousin, Barry, does but it’s supposed to be a secret; although I don’t think the color Moonbeam Cream would quite be your color,” she said studying his face.

“Lady, shut your yapping trap. Don’t you see I have a knife?”

“Gina, what are you doing trying to get us killed?”

“Let me handle this Hope,” she said, throwing her purse behind her and putting her leg forward to create a wide stance. “I know Kung Fui so you better watch out,” Gina yelled as loud as she could, holding her hands out.

“I think you’ve watched too many movies Gina. Besides, I think you’re combining your words. It’s Kung Fu and Chop Sui. Not Kung Fui.”

“Well my other cousin Marcus told me that if anyone ever tries to attack you to yell loudly that you know some form of martial arts and they’ll leave you alone,” she said, “and if that doesn’t work my momma said to scratch his eyes out and kick him in the ding dong.”

“Oh and your mother said it exactly that way I’m sure," Hope said.

“Well she called it something else but…”

“Excuse me ladies,” the man said impatiently, “there will be none of that kicking in the, in the,” he paused, “in that particular area. Now I do have some business to get done here.”

“No just a minute,” Gina said angrily, “I’ll have you know Hope that my cousin and mother both took combat defensive training courses so they do know what they’re talking about.”

“What, were they both in the Navy Seals or something? Who takes a combat defensive training course?”

“It was a two for one special I bought my mother for her birthday one year.”

“Well it would have helped if you were the one who took her instead of your cousin. Then maybe you would really know karate.”

“No, couldn’t do that, would have seriously ruined my nails,” she said smiling down at her recent manicure.

“Give me your purses for heaven sake,” the guy yelled.

Gina raised her purse behind her head and threw it at the mugger. It hit him as if a football had been directly propelled at his stomach.

He glared at her as he opened up the purse and put his face inside to see what was in it since the streetlight was out. “Oh man,” he said rearing his head back, “what the hell is in this purse? It smells like something died.”

Hope turned toward her, “Gina, please tell me that’s not the purse you brought to the work seminar? The one where you stuffed those extra salami sandwiches and a stalk of over-ripe bananas into it?” Hope asked.

“Yes,” Gina said angrily, turning her back to Hope.

“The same one you brought to the meetings in Mexico where you stuffed all the bread products into it?” Hope added.

“Yes,” Gina said loudly.

“Well,” she said to the man, “the smell could be from one of three things: salami, rotten bananas or an array of moldy bread products,” Hope said calmly.

“Why did you have to tell him that now he’s going to think I hoard old food?”

“He’s a purse snatcher Gina, who the hell cares?”

“Because my mother told me you should always give your best impression. That’s why you’re always told to wear clean underwear in case you’re in a car accident. As my momma said, ‘nobody wants to see you in torn stinky drawers.’” Gina glared at her, “Giving a good impression at all times is the key to finding Mr. Right in an inopportune time. You would know about that if you weren’t stuck at home on Friday nights watching people having operations on the Discovery Channel.”

“I’ll have you know Medical Miracle on the Discovery Channel is a highly rated show so I’m not the only one sitting there watching it on Friday nights. And besides, the E.M.T isn’t going to care that you have clean underwear Gina. He might prefer it that way, but if you are laying there in need of oxygen he’s not going to ask you to change your underwear first. Come on.”

“But it’s the impression,” she whined, “and now because you had to tell him about my purse he’s going to perceive me to be crazy and stinky.”

“It’s already too late for it, you two are complete nut jobs” the man said.

“Oh no, he didn’t just say that. No man with hair coming out from the top of his shirt collar, who is so lazy that he can’t get a job and now is robbing poor defenseless passer-bys is going to put this woman down. I eat men like you for breakfast honey,” Gina said going into a karate stance, “I’ll chop you up with these hands. Slice your head off before you can say ‘boo’.”

“Okay Bruce Lee calm down” Hope said, putting Gina’s karate ready hands back down to her side. “Let me try and talk some sense into this guy,” Hope whispered into Gina’s ear.

“Listen whoever you are; they have this show on the Discovery Channel on Friday nights about the troubled cases that come into the E.R. One happened to be a purse snatcher who held someone up with a knife. And you know what happened?”

“What?” the guy said ill-amused.

“He held up the wrong person,” she pointed at him, “the man he held up had a gun. To make a long story short, the purse snatcher was shot and now he has to wear a colostomy bag the rest of his life. Do you really want to have to wear a colostomy bag the rest of your life cause it ain’t so pretty.”

“I thought I told you not to tell anyone that you stay at home and watch the Discovery Channel on Friday nights," Gina said.

“He’s a mugger Gina, it’s not like I’m ever going to see him again.”

“You never know, maybe his cousin is the next guy you’re going to end up dating and he’ll tell him.”

“I’m sure I’m not going to want to go out with a mugger’s cousin Gina.”

“Well let’s ask him then if he has any reputable cousins,” Gina said.

“Fine, go ahead and ask him, I bet they’re all in prison,” Hope snapped.

“Mister,” Gina turned around but the man had disappeared, leaving Gina’s purse on the ground.

“See what you did?” Gina said, “You showed him how desperate you were by watching those Discovery shows and now you chased him off.”

“I didn’t chase him off it was your stinking purse.”

The two walked home, arguing about who chased off the purse snatcher.

Just a quick update

2011-06-15T16:29:00.004-05:00

We had another ultrasound. The bladder looks fine. So I think the same problem will not happen with this baby like Sebastien. We couldn't tell if it was a boy or girl because the baby was crossing its legs. Hopefully, with the next ultrasound in July we will be able to tell in order to get ready.

Olivia is doing fine. We have a summer pool pass for the community pool. It has a large swimming pool and a really great sand play area. This is what we do most days, either go to the pool or the library, sometimes the park. It's not a bad way to experience the summer. When I have time to myself, I like to go out in the backyard and read either a magazine, a cookbook or most often, a novel by Dean Koontz. I try to walk the dogs everyday to get them out and because they like it so much.

A few weekends ago, we went to Warren Dunes and stayed in a very small cabin. It was nice but not as fun as I hoped. It rained most days and after seeing a picture by the bathroom of a snake that could be around (even though it was harmless) I woke up many times during the night thinking there was a snake on me. (Don't give me a visual of a snake if you don't want me to dream about it!)

More later -

Deb

Ultrasound Test May - So Far So Good

2011-05-11T17:02:00.000-05:00

We went in for a Level Ultrasound II test. So far we've been optimistic the baby will be fine this time. But this morning, my nerves got the best of me. All I wanted was it to be over. We went into the same doctor's office (a specialist) where we first heard about Sebastien, the same room. It was like it was yesterday. I said a prayer while the nurse was checking on various measurements of the baby then I realized, saying these same prayers did nothing for me last time.

The baby moved quite a bit, kicking it's legs, putting it's hand next to it's face which Olivia does when she sleeps. Then the nurse left.

When the doctor finally came in he said, "So far, everything looks fine." I felt like I could breathe again.

The Level II Ultrasound is primarily to tell if the baby has Down Syndrome. The doctor measures various parts of the baby. He said he didn't see any indication of Down Syndrome from his testing. (Rates increase for this as the mother gets older.) I still had to do some blood tests for it which I get back in a week. Last year I had the blood tests done and it showed a high probability for Down Syndrome. After the amniocentesis though, it showed that the baby was fine in this respect. So if you ever get the blood test and it comes back positive, don't stress out. There is a false-positive problem sometimes.

Anyway, we are scheduled for another Level II Ultrasound in the beginning of June. This is where the doctor can see the kidney function, where the baby takes over producing the amniotic fluid, where the problem with Sebastien occurred. This is the big one, for me anyway.

So for now, I'm living off of today's news and I'm thankful the test was okay. The weather was nice and warm outside, the air conditioning is on (which I love the sound of) and summer is coming. I'm pretty happy.

When Bad Things Happen, Good Always Follows

2011-03-30T16:23:00.057-05:00

Chewie and Tigger 15 yrs old next week

Some good news. I'm pregnant. Due Thanksgiving. Thank God it took only two months because I was mighty tired of checking ovulation strips and yelling out, "It's time." Not fun when you're tired and just want to go to sleep. There is a small window of opportunity when you can get pregnant so telling your husband we have to suck it up and try six times in the next 24 hours to increase our chances (especially, when he has to work the next day) doesn't usually go down well.

I questioned whether to tell people because even though the doctors said Sebastian's problem was a fluke, essentially it could happen again. We have no idea why it happened. But for some reason, I don't feel it will and if it does, I will deal with it just like I dealt with it last time. Maybe, even stronger. One thing I learned from last year is that hardship is all around. People don't share it with you until you open up to them and I learned there are a lot of lost babies and even grown children in the world to morn. I am no different than anyone else.

So we are pretty thankful. We found out on March 18th, the night before Olivia's 5th birthday. We told her that God gave her a birthday present early. She has wanted a baby sister or brother for awhile and although she handled Sebastian's death pretty well for a child, I don't want her to have to go down that road again. She asked what the baby will be named. In a joking manner, I said Snicklefritz. (This is a German pet name people call children sometime. Like if you called a child, Sweetie Pie or something.) Olivia said with that name she could name the baby Snickers or Fritz. And then told me if I let her name the baby she'll call him or her Cinderella. The demons that kid would have with the name, Cinderella. Two weeks ago we went to see our neighbors, Bob and Donna. They are older people, in their 70's who live nearby. Olivia watched part of a Western with Bob. Later that day, at nap time, she said, "Why does Bob watch Westerns. I don't like them." I said, "Grandpa watches Westerns, too." She said, "Do they watch those shows because they want to be cowboys when they grow up?" -It's funny, the stuff children say.

Being pregnant is a feat in itself. I get really tired, have bad dreams, I'm starving and then don't want to eat. My husband has already been on two weird food runs where he has to get one thing from this restaurant and something else from another. Last night, my nightmares consisted of my cat getting stuck in a car and having a heat stroke, trying to dial a number for emergency help and the phone not working and aliens dropping down monsters on the planet to chase after me. The last one was sort of cool, like a sci-fi movie but still not totally a refreshing dream.

My novel, Finding Hope takes place in San Francisco and today, after watching Andrew Zimmerman's Bizarre Food in San Francisco, I think it's the perfect location. I think he said something like, everyone is accepted in San Francisco and in a way, this is what the book is about: crazy/quirky people just trying to get by in life.

This is where I got the premise. Several years ago, while I was at a staff meeting, a coworker talked about a documentary or a news segment on the Golden Gate Bridge and how it's the most common suicide destination. It's almost ethereal that a bridge so beautiful is connected with such tragic loss. And somehow I felt there was a story there. Not a journalistic story, but my kind of story.

I remember in some show or article, a man said he was going to the Golden Gate bridge to jump and if someone said hi to him or asked how he was doing, he wouldn't jump. No one said anything. All he was looking for was one person to care. I think a lot of these people who go there have lost their hope in humanity, maybe in themselves. So the story begins when a woman stops a man from jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge.

Although the inherent message behind the story is, there is hope (which later I found out these words are on an actual sign on the bridge to stop jumpers) the story is told in a light-hearted way.

Here is an excerpt. Again, it's not polished and I have to add in some transitions and revise and... you get the picture. You might wonder how this excerpt fits in with the Golden Gate Bridge theme but it does. It's just hard to show you when you don't have the whole story in front of you. And posting bits and pieces out of sequence really isn't a good idea, but like I've always said, this is an informal site and I don't even know who reads this so said in a polite manner, what the hey?

Background: Hope is an acquisitions manager and two people on her sales team are Gina (her best friend) and Corbin (nobody likes.) They have to go to Mexico for a business seminar. Gina calls a reservations 1-800 number to book a hotel and gets a man in India who says his name is Elvis. (Now, if you have booked airline flights, have had customer service problems or most anything else, you know the US has outsourced most of their call centers to places like India where the representatives say their name is Bob or Judy or Mike in order to be more approachable to the US customer) so she gets a rep named Elvis and Gina (who is the comedy sidekick per say) books a hotel in Mexico which translates to The Pretty Little Hacienda. And it's anything but.

It's a farmer's house (an hour outside of the city) where the farmer is renting a room. By the time they get to the place, they have no time to change hotels. The Marriott where the conference is being held is booked. Through the course of the week, Corbin is attracted to the farmer's daughter and goes on a date with her. They find out this was the farmer's plan to begin with, lure visitors to stay there so he could find someone to marry off his daughter. This scene takes place when they are sitting around the kitchen table eating dinner at the farmer's house.

“You stay here, you marry my daughter, you run the farm.”

“Um, no, don’t think so,” Corbin said picking through the stew, trying to separate the carrots from what he thought were residuals of the sheep head meat.

“You stay here, you marry daughter, you run farm,” Mr. Sanchez said louder, pounding his fist against the table. Corbin looked straight up at him, mouth open and scared.

Gina decided she would save the day. “Listen Mr. Sanchez," Gina said, "Corbin can’t marry your daughter, he ah, he,” she thought for a moment, “he has a wife back in San Francisco. Yeah, that's it.”

Mr. Sanchez’s face turned a bright shade of red as he threw Corbin’s bowl of stew across the kitchen, “You went on date with daughter and you married!”

“What are you doing?” Hope whispered as she kicked Gina under the table.

“I will kill you!” Mr. Sanchez screamed, getting a butcher knife from the sink.

Suddenly Corbin turned pale. “You’re not going to cut my head off like you did that poor sheep are you? Really, I’m sure I wouldn’t taste the least bit good in a soup pot.”

“No, no, Mr. Sanchez,” Hope stood up, “what Gina was trying to tell you and couldn’t is that Corbin can’t marry your daughter, nor would you want him too. He can’t because,” she thought about her Discovery programs and what disease, situation, or ailment Corbin could have to change Mr. Sanchez’s mind, “well, you see Mr. Sanchez, Corbin is really a transvestite.”

“A what!” Corbin yelled.

Hope whispered over to Corbin, “Do you really want to live here ‘cause I will leave you here if it gets ugly.”

“Um, yeah, that’s it, I’m a trans, a transsexual,” Corbin bellowed.

“That’s not the same thing,” Hope said angrily. “A transsexual has a sex change and he already saw you peeing standing up, you idiot.”

“How am I supposed to know? And how would you know anyway?” Corbin said looking her over.

“Because I saw a program on the Discovery channel called Switching Sexes: The Aftermath.”

“Well excuse me!” Corbin snapped back.

“Is there something you’re not telling us Hope?” Gina smiled.

“No Gina, now both of you be quiet and let me handle this. “Yes, unfortunately, Mr. Sanchez,” Hope spoke louder, “Corbin’s a transvestite and therefore you see he couldn’t possibly marry

your daughter. You wouldn’t know which one of them to put the wedding gown on. Now in San Francisco anything goes, but I don’t think in Mexico it would be welcomed with open arms to have two brides.”

“What is this transvestite?” Mr. Sanchez said slowly.

“Well I guess the best way to describe it is that a transvestite needs to cross-dress to achieve full sexual and emotional release. In other words, Corbin would be caught wearing your daughter’s underwear at some point.”

“What!” Corbin yelled again. “I will not be known as a guy who wears womens underwear. I have a reputation to uphold.”

“Who cares if they all think you wear womens underwear in Mexico. Just don’t come back.” Hope turned back to Mr. Sanchez. “It’s just not going to be good Mr. Sanchez, until Corbin accepts his sick perversion and figures out what sex he wants to be.”

“Thanks a lot,” said Corbin.

“You Americans crazy,” he said.

They hatch a plan which involves Corbin wearing one of Gina's thongs (he has to buy it, she doesn't want it returned) to prove the point and a whole mess ensues.

It's a New Year : Sebastien and excerpts from my stories

2011-01-16T23:42:00.024-06:00

Well, I'm back. It was pretty much one of the worst year's of my life but I survived and I am still here to live another day.

For the first few months after Sebastien's death it was pretty hard. Grief is an individual thing and nobody can tell you how long or how you should grieve. But after a few month's, it started to get better and I was quite surprised at how resilient I am. Now if it had been an accident why he died rather than there was nothing I could do, it would have been a lot longer. The "what if's" can kill you. The one thing I realized is when my time comes (and hopefully, it's not soon) and I head for the pearly gates of heaven, I will not be scared. It will be a joyous occasion because I firmly believe I will see him again, when the time comes of course. Along with about twenty cats, eight dogs and a rabbit named Alfalfa Sprout.

In other news, we have been looking for a kindergarten for our daughter. We have to go to a private school because our local public schools here are pretty bad. Half the kids in third grade at the school she would go to failed the state reading exam. So like other parents, I have to not only pay taxes for a school system which is failing but now we have to pay private tuition. For a middle class family, it's a frustrating concept.

And let me tell you, touring many, many schools is quite exhausting. In one day, we toured four and by the time we got home, I couldn't even think straight. I think we found the right one and we get a discount if we become church members so we plan to go to the church and school. Today we went to church for the first time in probably fifteen years. We went to a Lutheran church. First of all, I do not sing well and we had to sing about 10 songs. There's nothing like trying to mouth the words of a song and then when you get up the nerve to start singing, you hear your voice out of tune and go back to mouthing the words. I could hear my husband finally getting the courage to start singing and he didn't sound good either but I didn't say anything or else he would never sing again in his life. Pride you know!

Then we went up for communion to take the wine and the wafer. I thought he knew what he was doing because he grew up Catholic. We were the first two in line and went for the benches to kneel down by the main alter and the woman behind us said, "No, no not yet." Then I followed him back to the pews and he went back to the wrong row. I was thinking, "I don't remember sitting behind this woman with the green sweater," and then the lady who helped us said, "No, you sit over there." Let's just say we made an impact, especially when it's a small church.

I've been working on my novel again. Not as much as I would like but it's progress. My husband says he finds me most attractive when he hears me laughing hysterically as I read over it. First, I don't laugh at something unless it's really funny and then it's just usually a smile. So sometimes in the middle of the night or such, all of a sudden he'll hear me laugh quite loudly as I say, "Oh my gosh, this is so funny" and I clap my hands like a weirdo. I guess he's attracted to women who are a little off. Maybe I should post a chapter here sometime from Finding Hope. Maybe the scene where the two female friends, Hope and Gina, go to The Lady Devine Love Club to find the men of their dreams only to encounter a class full of crazies including a stalker named Arnold who Hope refers to as her somewhat demented guardian angel.

Or the other main character, John, who ends up with one of those designer dog's (Mr. Bob) that his model/actress/Bloomingdale's part-time saleswoman girlfriend (and aren't there a lot of those in Hollywood?) made him keep when she left him. Apparently, she got Mr. Bob half-price when the Chihuahua was returned to the breeder for an erratic temperament. And boy does Mr. Bob cause problems. Just try to put him in one of those designer doggy suits!

And of course we have "Bab's", John's 65 year-old annoying neighbor who wears mu mu's and high-heeled slippers with pink feathers and wants to take John up as a young lover. (Don't all men need one of these in their life? Since so called "cougars" are in right now. :o)

There's a little of everything in it: Weight Watcher Meetings with the crazy "spandex queen" woman who lost 100 lbs, the Antiques Roadshow where a Grandma to a mob member tries to see how much a stolen painting is worth (let's just say she runs pretty fast in those support hose), Lady Devines Love Club with a "How to Find the Love of your Life" textbook with charts and cross-analysis sheets, an L.A. trip where Gina and Hope break into a star's home looking for Denzel Washington's house and encounter a Doberman named "Jaws"

Speed dating events with themes including Gothic Night where a man dressed up as a vampire has a hand licking problem, or a Cartoon Speed Dating Grand Gala Event where a very short Asian man is dressed up as Daffy Duck and tells Hope, "You pretty American lady." Hope finally gives in and they dance to Barry White's "Let's Get It On" as he lays his Daffy Duck head against her chest. And she responds, "Why not, what else do I have to do tonight." Or when Hope trusts her friend/coworker Gina, to book a hotel for a business conference in Mexico and instead of staying at the Marriott they end up at a broken down hacienda in the middle of the Mexican desert where the father of the farm/house is booking reservations to try to get his daughter and son with one rolling eyeball married off. Apparently the roof in their room isn't complete for which the father, Mr. Sanchez, argues, "It an American Skylight!"

So that's just a part of it. And that's why it's 500 some pages and needs to be cut down. There are so many funny situations they end up in and it could go on forever if books could be thousands of pages. But who would read them, right?

Also, I have a start of a book and some ideas written down for a comedic novel called, The Writer's Resort. A woman quits her job to become a writer and goes to the Writer's Resort on the coast of Florida. When she gets there she meets a lot of misfits, all with the passion to be great writers. Here are some excerpts to The Writer's Resort:

Set-Up: When Nora, the main character is talking to Mary Alice, the owner.

Nora: "Some of these people here are rather strange and a few, I think, have some diagnosable mental problems. Bernie washed his hands six times during the class and the dark haired girl with the big glasses chewed away her pen cap. Did she eat it? I just don't think these are the type of people I expected here. I thought real writers were professional and half-way normal. All I see here are people with problems."

"Imagine that, people writing because they have a problem with life," Mary Alice laughed. "Honey, you don't know the first thing about writers. Creativity and crazy go hand-in-hand. Welcome to the club."

Set-Up: Nora and the owner, Mary Alice, are sun bathing on the lawn chairs at the resort by the pool. Nora hears a commotion and looks up at the roof of the small resort.

"Mary Alice, there's a strange old man on top of your roof staring out at the ocean with a pair of binoculars. He's not a writer is he?"

"Oh, the Corporal? He's harmless." Mary Alice looked up at the elderly man dressed in an M1 helmet and army battle fatigues. "Yeah, he lives up in the attic. He was here when we bought the place. I think he was the owner's uncle or something."

"So what? He just came with the property?"

"Pretty much," Mary Alice said as she casually sipped her drink. "It was basically, either take him too or lose the deal."

They watched as the elderly man loaded balls into a small cannon on top of the roof. He picked up a bullhorn and shouted, "All clear! Get your heads down men!" A couple in front of them ducked suddenly wondering what was going on.

"Well then," Mary Alice said taking another sip of her drink.

Nora wondered why Mary Alice was taking this so casually. How many resorts had an 80 year-old man in an army uniform shooting a cannon on their roof. "I've heard of taking in a neighborhood cat with the sale of a property, but an elderly man who lives in the attic?"

"He's really not bad once you get used to him blowing his bugle at 5 A.M. to announce the invasion of Normandy," Mary Alice said.

"Great, I'm going to have to hear that tomorrow morning?" Nora asked.

"Just consider him a hands-free alarm clock." Mary Alice looked over at Nora's expression and laughed.

"This isn't funny," Nora said, "the man is obviously demented and needs help." She looked back up at the Corporal, his hands on top of his helmet as if an oncoming bomb was about to approach, "that or he's shell shocked."

"Listen," said Mary Alice, "when you buy a house, or in this case a broken-down resort, you always end up with more than what you bargained for: things the owner doesn't quite tell you about. Some people find out the place they bought has a bug infestation, some a leaky basement with mold spores; we just happen to end up with an 86 year-old World War II veteran living in our attic who on his off days, still thinks he's fighting in the war. If you ask me," Mary Alice reasoned, "we came out pretty lucky."

Next-

Disclaimer: I have nothing against the people mentioned below. In fact, I value that they live their life in honesty. But if I was scared to write because I might offend someone then the crazy characters in all of my stories would be pretty boring. And they would lose their charm.

Set-up: There are classes at the resort being offered by genre. One is called, "Gay and Lesbian Fantasy Fiction Class." Stewart, Nora's friend and a fellow attendee, tells her about the first class at lunch:

"There are only two people in the Gay and Lesbian Fantasy Fiction class and I am one of them. The other woman, and I use this term loosely, is an overly tanned Lesbian who is a weight lifter by day, writer by night and of course, just my luck, really hates men."

"Gay men, too?" Nora asked.

"All men," he said. "She is writing about this love affair between Maxi and Barbara, these two women who wear flannel shirts and stir-up pants and somehow, all the men keep hitting on them in the story, despite the two women's lack in fashion. Well, every encounter ends up where Maxi and Barbara are beating up the men: pulling on this, twisting that. It's just so not publishable. And let me tell you," Stewart continued, "she sure doesn't like it when I read the sex scenes between Garry and Larry in my book and mention the word penis. I really think she's going to throw me out of the window. She's really not an attractive lady."

"Sounds like you're going to have fun this summer, " Nora smiled.

"Wait, here she comes," Stewart said. "Her name is Billy," he whispered across the table.

"Are you sure she isn't a man," Nora said as they watched Billy walk across the pool patio in her string bikini. "I swear she has an Adams apple."

"No, she said it's from an unfortunate overdose of steroids in her youth. She actually wrote a short story about it and said it was published in Weightlifting Mania."

"You mean she shared it with you?"

"Remember, I'm the only other person in there," Stewart reminded her.

"And Professor McConnell? What did he think of her short story?"

"I don't know? He left at the beginning of the class to get a drink of water and returned right before we had to leave. Come to think of it, he had a full water bottle on his desk before he left."

"You don't say," Nora said sarcastically.

"It's okay now," Stewart said. "Billy and I have found out how to work together. When she reads her stories she omits the parts where she is bashing in men's testicles and I substitute the word vagina for penis when I read my stories. You see, it's all about finding common ground."

"I bet psychologists would love to be in the room with you two."

He laughed, "It's totally crazy, isn't it."

"Yeah, I think most people would say so."

Final thought: So by the end of it, Nora finds out that the owner is going to sell The Writers Resort because it's in disrepair and she wants to retire. Nora decides to make a big decision and buys the resort with the savings she made from her corporate job. Last excerpt from Nora's journal:

We came to The Writers Resort thinking we would be able to write our great American novel. A dream we all have as writers, to be welcomed into the sanctified halls with Chekhov, Fitzgerald and Hemingway. These were dreams of ours which carried us so far until one day, we reached out for help and hoped the strength we couldn't find in ourselves, others would be able to find in us. And that is why we came here. When I first entered this dilapidated resort, with its torn shingles and the water dripping from the ceiling, I wondered who would own such a catastrophe. And more than that, what was I doing here? I thought for sure, this was either a joke or some scheme to get hopeless writers money.

This place that I thought was rundown and needed to be torn down is now the place I call home along with many other writers. I learned this building may have lost a lot of its structure and glory but the dreams of thousands of writers have passed through its doors. I will continue the resort just as the original owners did when they opened their doors in 1920. And the magic of this old ocean side resort will live on so future writers will have a place where they will not only learn how to write, but will be encouraged to dream. #

Well, I'm done. It's way past midnight and I have to get up with my daughter tomorrow which means, I'm going to be really tired. The grammar isn't perfect, it needs revising but this is an easy-going website and at 3 in the morning, one just doesn't feel like editing copy, am I right? It needs more description and punctuation checks, but that's for another time. So I'm off to bed. Hopefully, you'll get at least one laugh.

Goodnight. Man, I shouldn't have drank that cup of coffee. My schedule is going to be so off.

The Flight of the Butterfly

2010-09-08T15:21:00.013-05:00

It has been a hard road since Sebastien’s death on August 14th but each week it’s getting better. It’ll never be okay but life must go on so you do what you can to move forward.

We received his autopsy report back this week. Most parents begin to know their baby after birth, but the only way we can know our baby is through his few hours of life and a detailed description of various body parts in an autopsy report. But even those details, morbid or not, make up the whole of who he was as a unique little baby, details which every parent covets when it’s their own child.

When someone dies (or even a pet) we all have a tendency to seek things we can hold onto. My husband and I decided we would each get a tattoo, something to remind us of him, a permanent mark to show that he existed. What tattoo to get is another question? We thought of angels, crosses, his name, a heart, and everything else. Nothing seemed exactly right.

Today, I was sitting outside reading a novel, The Sound of Butterflies. For the past week, we’ve seen many butterflies. We went to the lake for a few hours. The wind was quite harsh that day and small white butterflies flew down the shore bobbing up and down in the breeze. At a festival this past weekend, we passed a craft booth that sold frames with real butterflies pinned inside. (They claimed no butterflies were killed and they died naturally. Whether that’s true, I do not know and I don’t believe in having art or wall hangings of dead animals.) But they were beautiful and I saw a few butterflies which were described in the novel I am reading.

As I was sitting outside today, I saw the white butterflies again and I remembered reading somewhere when you see a butterfly someone who has died is coming to see you. I looked on the internet and it says that ancient Greeks considered butterflies as the souls of those who had passed away. There are many references to different meanings but it also means rebirth.

I guess sometimes you just have to look around to see what life is telling you. So I found my perfect tattoo, a butterfly. Although I don’t necessarily believe they are souls, I would like to believe they could be and that one of those souls fluttering by would be Sebastien: free, happy and basking in the sunlight. Butterflies also signify rebirth and if there is anything I could want for my son is that he has some kind of rebirth one day, so he can experience life and maybe, see a beautiful butterfly of his own.

Our little son, 4 lbs 10 oz

2010-08-23T02:14:00.018-05:00

In memory of Sebastien Lafrance

August 14, 2010

I just wanted to update you about what happened with our baby. Last Tuesday I went to Rush in Chicago because I started having mild contractions. I stayed overnight, ending at 4 cm. They said I could be induced or go home and wait to see what happens and I decided to go home.

On Saturday, August 14, I woke up at 1 in the morning and couldn’t go back to sleep. At 3 A.M. my contractions started to get worse. I tried to wait until Olivia woke up and by 8 A.M. we were on the road. By the time I arrived at the hospital, I was 8 cm and yelling for an epidural. Sebastien (Stéphane wanted to name him the French spelling) was coming out just as they had put the epidural in, hands first.

I heard the doctor mention that he may need to do a C-section. We knew the baby was breech but we didn’t know the hands would be out first. He did an ultra sound to see where the baby was positioned and actually took the hands out, then he went inside and grabbed the feet and then I pushed the head out. The baby was 4 lbs 10 ounces and had soft bones because of the lack of amniotic fluid so the doctor was able to get him out without any tearing which was a miracle in itself.

The baby looked a lot like Olivia with her lips, chin and chubby cheeks. He had light brown hair. He had some deformities because he didn’t have any amniotic fluid to shelter him but he still looked like a little cute baby. He didn’t wake up but he was alive (with a heartbeat) for 3 ½ hours so he was pink and rosy and we got to hold him which was a blessing. He passed away at 3 P.M.

We believe he made a frown when Stéphane touched his stomach (Stéphane is very ticklish also) but we aren’t sure if it really happened or it was that his head may have been moved to where he appeared to made a frown. At one point while he was laying down, his hand was up by his mouth like he was trying to suck his thumb and the nurse said she hadn't positioned it that way. So again, we weren't sure if he did that or not. It would have been nice if he had been alert or awake so we could see his character but on the other side, he may have been in a lot of pain if he was awake because of his physical issues. We aren’t sure. Olivia was there and she was a great big sister, stroking his arm and kissing his head, telling him how cute he was.

So those are the facts but of course, it was very heartbreaking. Despite the outcome, we couldn’t have asked for it to have gone any better except for him to be alive. The nurses were amazing, it was pretty much a miracle how the delivery went and that I arrived on time (Can you imagine Stéphane having to deliver a breech baby in the car?), Olivia was able to get to see him, we were able to hold him, we don’t think he was in pain and based on his physical problems which were evident when he was born there wasn’t any doubt that he couldn’t have lived with them so there wasn’t any second guessing or should we have done something differently. It was a nice day outside and it seemed very peaceful.

The hardest part was leaving the hospital without him. We went outside with fast traffic in Chicago, the day bright and sunny, people going about their daily lives and he was never even able to leave the hospital. There is something very wrong when a baby is left behind and never gets to go out into the sunlight.

Hopefully, he will get a shot at life some other time.

For the first night I kept dreaming I was giving birth over and over and the babies were passing away. It was pretty horrible. However, in the dream one baby came out talking which was strange and one baby was delivered by Dr. Oz from television. Even in the worst of circumstances it seems I still have a crazy imagination.

I thought it would be easier after the hard part of the birth was over. But the hardest part started after he was born. During the eight months, I always had that 1% hope that a miracle would happen. After your child passes away, all hope is gone. He is gone and nothing is going to bring him back. We see what might have been with his little chubby hands, his tiny fingers and his body which even though it's frail is still the baby we wanted. We can have other children but they will never be the one that we lost.

We will be okay. We dont' have any other choice. It’s hard but there is nothing we can do but get through it. Our story is one that many parents have gone through and yet it's very individual because the child you cry for the most is always your own. As you know, our cat Ghost died a month ago. I told Sebastien while he was still alive that a fluffy gray cat was waiting for him in heaven so he won't be alone. It’s sort of nice to think they will have each other until we can see them again.

I hope God exists or else we are all in this cruel joke called life together.

A Disconcerting Year

2010-08-04T12:47:00.006-05:00

In January, I found out I was pregnant.

In April, I left my job because I wanted to be there for our two young children.
In my office at home, I wrote down, "2010 The Best Year Yet."
I was going to start writing more, I was going to take care of the baby and be there for our daughter, I finally had enough courage to leave my job without feeling guilty. I was ready and excited for a change.

In May, we found out the baby's bladder was blocked. The urine somehow helps produce the amniotic fluid so with his bladder blocked, I didn't have any amniotic fluid for the baby's lungs to develop. I remember the last words the doctor said that day as we were leaving, "I wouldn't have much hope."

We started having a bunch of tests and we were sent to a specialist in Chicago. We were ushered to a room with a conference table as a team of people filed in: a social worker, a doctor, a nurse and a chaplain. We were told there wasn't any chance. Our baby was going to die. I was 5 months so we could either have a late stage abortion in another state or the baby would end up stillborn or die after a day. Those were the choices. There wasn't a reason why, just a fluke of nature.

Ghost, his last month
Around that same time, another one of our cats started losing weight, Ghost. This time it wasn't as simple as a thyroid problem like with our other cat. For several months we did every test the vet could think of. After about six vet visits, $1000 dollars and many months of worrying, Ghost died on July 8th. He waited until I came home from a trip, I brushed him for a hour (his favorite thing) and I held him as the light went out of his eyes. We were never able to find out what was wrong with him which was the hardest part. A cat that sat on my computer desk for 10 years while I did my writing, a cat that looked at me like I was everything was suddenly gone without any explanation.

In June, a stray cat came up to our front porch when my daughter was watering the plants and he stayed on our porch for three weeks. He wouldn't leave and if he walked off the porch he would run back as soon as he could as if he found his home and that was it, he wasn't budging.

My daughter named him Cutie Pie. We didn't want more pets, we had enough. But by the third week of him trying to get in the front door and his health going downhill from being outside, I finally gave in. When nobody will do anything it is when somebody has to step up and do the right thing. We took him to the vet and they told us he has FIV, Feline Aids. People and other animals can't catch this, it's a species specific disease. Other than that, he was quite healthy. Cats can get this who roam outside. It's from a cat biting another cat, usually males protecting their territory. Cats with FIV shouldn't really be with other cats which meant I wouldn't be able to keep him. More bad news because now I was attached.

The vet told us we should probably put him down given the circumstance. It's hard to adopt out an FIV positive cat. For a moment I thought about putting him down. I was tired of everything bad happening and I couldn't take anymore. How would we find a home for this cat and I didn't know much about FIV. But clarity came back and I told him no, my baby was dying, my cat died and this cat deserves to be saved because he can be.

So my 2010 Best Year Yet on my dry erase board is still there in my office. But I can tell you, this will not be the best year yet, this will be the worst year. Life has a way of showing you that you are not in charge of it, it is in charge of you. The only thing you can control is your response to the events that happen. So I am waiting. Waiting for the last bad thing to happen in September, when the baby dies and hopefully, we can hold him for a few hours and tell him goodbye. That we held out and let God take him rather than deciding his fate early on. I wasn't going to be the one to end my child's life.

We all have bad years. Someone said we see people everyday, pushing carts in grocery stores, walking past us at work, but we never know the tragedies they've had to deal with in life or the ones they are dealing with at the moment. The best thing and the only thing to do is to wait it out and put one foot forward because the one thing that gets you through it all is time.

Cutie Pie, the saved cat

Back in Black

2010-01-01T21:44:00.018-06:00

January 1st is the one day most of the world feels hope. Hope that we can wipe the slate clean and through our own individual resolutions conquer whatever problems plagued us last year. Hope that this year will be the one that changes everything. Hope that people will be kinder, our jobs will be easier, the economy stronger and the world a happier place-we all believe that on this day, change for the better is possible.

I have neglected my blog for a while now. A child, housework, the job, after preschool activities like swimming and ballet have started for my daughter. Everything has to be done and nothing seems to progress except daily living-one day at a time. Looking back a few things have happened that have been good. I now write a column for a small newspaper which reaches about 110,000 people. My husband lost his long time job only to find a better one six months later. My beautiful 13 year-old cat, which is smart enough to hit me with his paw when he wants to be pet (and unfortunately, it comes about when I am already sleeping in bed) was losing weight drastically. I was worried it was kidney or liver failure and it turned out to be a thyroid condition where he just has to take a pill everyday. God was with me on that one. And of course, the best, my daughter is healthy and happy. We take children's health for granted because they are young, but at any moment life has a way of changing. Ask those who have experienced it.

So what are my resolutions? On our way to Canada to see my husband's parents, I wrote in my notebook my resolutions. I separated mine into categories: health, house, financial and of course writing. With each category, I had about five to ten resolutions underneath them. My husband, well, my husband ended up with one and a half. Actually, he made up the half one since I told him one of his resolutions should be not to forget things all the time. He said he's going to check out a book on memory techniques someday from the library. Um, right.

How long will they last? I don't know, but with resolutions we try and we hope and that's all we can do. If we ever stop trying, then we should consider ourselves perfect and frankly, I don't believe that exists in anyone.

So here's to 2010. Where it will lead us, we don't know yet. But just like last year, I will hope that we will all be better by the end of it.

A LIttle Girl in Pigtails

2008-10-06T20:01:00.005-05:00

This past weekend we went to the Gap Casting Call, a contest which is across the country for babies and kids. You can enter at home or go to the sessions at the store where a professional photographer will take your child's picture and you can download it at home and then enter. They pick twenty finalists and then people vote on the website for the winner. There were so many adorable looking children at the mall that I can't imagine having to pick twenty among hundreds if not, thousands of children.

We arrived at the mall at 10 A.M. and they gave us a ticket to come back at 4:00 P.M. The exact time she happens to take her nap. When we came back at 3:30 P.M. they were running early so we had to immediately wake her up to take the picture. Poor girl. But I think it turned out quite well considering she was still tired.

Let's Celebrate. You've Gone Potty!

2008-09-27T10:09:00.005-05:00

We are training our two year-old daughter to go on the potty chair. If you are a parent, you remember those days of potty dances, treats and the like just for the great achievement of either aiming in a precise spot or sitting on the potty "like the big girls/boys do."

A few weeks ago, our daughter wanted to celebrate and cheer on another person who has reached the achievement of going to the bathroom by herself: a Sam's Club worker. I took her to the public bathroom in the store where she listened intently to someone going to the bathroom in the stall next to us. After the toilet was flushed, she opened up her eyes wide and sent a barrage of cheering and clapping to the woman next to us. Consequently, doing the "potty dance" in an extremely small bathroom stall and then throwing a cheer to the woman next to us: "You've gone potty! Yeah!"

To Find Prince Charming You Must Kiss a Frog, or Two, or Twenty

2008-09-27T09:56:00.004-05:00

My track record with doctors has been all but deplorable these past years. Here is an outtake from the X-Files.

My first jaunt into the unknown came several years ago when I needed to go to an urologist. I pick out a doctor on my insurance list that sounded like he has a nice name and his office was close to my house. The first warning should have been that his office was in an outlet mall and that he drove an old banged-up black Buick which he parks in the parking space directly next to his front door. I believe one of his windows was broken out.

I end up having my doctor’s appointment not in a room but at the receptionist’s desk because he only has two rooms and both are occupied. Apparently, these two rooms are separated only by an array of carefully stacked filing cabinets, with no ceiling in site. How do you like that for patient confidentiality!

On another visit, I noticed that he had all of his equipment, patient files and machines in the patient rooms. Yellow spots of God knows what and dirt were usually on them. I gave him the benefit of the doubt because he had newspaper articles written about how great he was and they were framed poignantly on the walls in his office. At another visit, a patient tells me, “And why do you come here if you don’t have to?” Apparently, the doctor is the Mecca for patients with no or low-cost insurance plans, which luckily, I’m not part of. She said, “If I were you, I would run, not walk out of this office.” After that visit, I left for good. And it didn’t finish there. He starts leaving messages at my house at 8:00 P.M. at night telling me I have to come back for more appointments. “We’re not finished yet!”
I think I met the ultra-ego of Dr. Frankenstein in that man.

Second incident, The Dentist X-File: I pick a dentist out of my provider list. I start to have doubts when I go to my appointment and it is in the back of a low-cost clinic and he has no receptionist, no nurse, nothing. As I walk in, he has one dentist chair which is consequently right in the middle of his one-room office, with a light streaming down above onto the middle of the chair. It looked very close to one of those sci-fi movies where the aliens strap abductees in a chair with mental equipment all over and then stand around and experiment on them. He tries to sell me a toothbrush for $5.00 that he picked up from Walgreens for a dollar (I saw the tag) and keeps asking me in broken English, “Are you sure none of your teeth hurt?”

Then I go to a new dentist, who again I pick out from the insurance list. After that visit, my tooth that she fixed starts to hurt. I call the office. She apparently sold her office to a new dentist who didn’t have the decency to tell me this important fact until I’m sitting in his dentist chair about to get serviced and that my chart has been lost, so we’ll have to start all over. By the end of the visit, he wants to refill all of the cavities and dental work I had done five months ago by the other dentist. I file a complaint against the second dentist. The insurance company calls me and says they have to drop the complaint because the second dentist has disappeared.

Yesterday, I went to see another medical specialist for the first time, again picking his name out because it sounded professional. As I park in the parking lot, I see a somewhat dilapidated old building. I walk by a window and notice what appears to be duck tape holding a crack together on a window. I go in the office and notice a patch of dirt on the wall, the kind which seems prevalent in the bathrooms of fast food Chinese restaurants. My instincts tell me it’s a foreshadowing of what’s to come. I say to myself, “Oh God.”

I’m in the waiting room. Out from the door pops this 80 year-old man in a lab coat asking for Mrs. Collier. I’m the only one there so I assume it’s me. I follow behind him as he shuffles through a security door like you would find in the ER and into a room which again, has a little dirt on the wall and some paper clips loose on the floor. He didn’t introduce himself and I’m thinking, “Is this some elderly 80 year-old nurse or is he the doctor?”
He immediately says in a perturbed voice, “So what’s wrong with you?”

It just got worse from there. I think he had a previous stroke or an onset of dementia because he kept asking me the same questions, then looking at an old coffee stained doctors manual he kept in his pocket and then only looked up when it came to thinking about what he had to say, never at me.

I told him I get migraines before my period. And here it is. At the end of the visit, when he is telling the receptionist what to do for my follow-up he says, “Here is a prescription for your migraines. This should help you when you get your surprise.” Surprise? I never thought I would here an 80 year-old male doctor refer to a period as "the surprise"???

I do have several good doctors in my repertoire now. Some I’m still working on. So my advice: don’t pick a dentist or other type of doctor from your insurance website just because the name sounds good or you’ll end up with a lot of frogs. So if the doctor's name is something like Dr. Arnold Finklestink, based on his name, he just might be your prince charming of a doctor in disguise.

A Moment of Reflection

2008-05-01T13:19:00.038-05:00

Life has been busy lately.

I have been asked at work if I want to increase my hours from 19 to 30 per week.

A choice between receiving more money (which we need), or spending my normal two days with Olivia a week when she is not in daycare.

It is a dilemma many women face and my enthusiasm that somehow we are going to win the lottery or that my book will sell a million copies when I am finished has come to a bitter halt.

Reality has set in, life isn't so easy.

So I was going through my computer files one day and came across this little diary entry. I was going to start The Journal of My Life and as you can see, I started and finished at one entry. And after you read it, the answer is no, I was not on any drugs.

I guess we all have moments of contemplative reflection. When life doesn't go exactly the way we want it to and suddenly, we question if we made the right choices and what is life to mean, anyway?

So excuse the brief intermission from the humor, but life can't always be the fun ride that we want it to be.

Meanwhile, the temperature is a nice 73 degrees. So, I think I'll publish my post and go enjoy the day.

JOURNAL OF MY LIFE

May 18, 2005

I am 33. What is that supposed to entail, I do not know. It is an age of uncertainty surely, or at least for me. It is an age where you analyze: Do I make enough money, do I have the job I’ve always wanted and am I good enough?

As I organize my office, a task that I am still working on four years after we have bought the house, I see letters and photographs of times which seem so long ago: high school yearbooks, love letters to college boyfriends—words which were so innocent and unassuming. I long to go back sometimes, a world full of tomorrows and a life with less responsibilities.

But as I remember quite well, they were times that were filled with heartaches as well, from the dissolving of relationships with boys—which at that period in life meant everything—to nights filled with homework and social systems which made you ask also, am I good enough?

Time now passes by so quickly and I still don’t understand quite why I am here in this world. Many people had their identity set during childhood from being raised with strong independent parents; others, still wonder aimlessly trying to find what it is that makes their life original. I am part of the latter, existing in life always wondering when my tomorrows for getting it right, run out.

I recognize my blessings as so many others do, but still, life is filled with chaotic moments and a never ending feeling of uncertain anxiety. Anxiety for how we are living our lives, diets which are an ever present concern for the majority of women, the house and yard work that never seems finished and people, pets and children who always have a need to fill. If in the old days, just the basic necessities of living were a concern and now, we are challenged to examine every aspect about our lives, what mind blowing hang-ups will future generations have to worry about? Too much, I would guess.

We as a society wait for the next big thrill: the closing of a deal, a bonus on our paycheck, a new guest arriving, shopping on Saturdays, the yearly vacation, the finale of a reality television show. We wait, our moments strung together by surges of excitement hoping for the next big event to come soon or else, what would the alternative be but to sit and contemplate whether we are doing justice to our life. We are bored with reality and easily discontent with normal happenings. Our ancestor’s anticipation came by just surviving another winter without disease or lack of food; our anticipation comes from a Christmas sale at Marshall Fields and if we will be able to lose the five lbs we gained at an overly abundant Thanksgiving.

So I end up taking out yet another blank piece of paper, a blank slate, which to me represents one more chance to plan and get it right. Lists abound, days with tasks and things to remember, times to do duties, ways to get things done, all indicating an unsettlement of the spirit and a need to be productive in a world where the end result is always measured by what you do in life, rather than what type of person you are.

Does anyone else fill this way, I wonder? So many people dawn the look of glamour, cell phones in various shades of color, clothes which show they are important and stylish, nails perfectly manicured assuring to everyone they know their worth. People buy monolithic houses they can't afford. Everything to allude to perfection on the outside, but what do these people do when they are alone, in the silence of these homes or cars, do they understand life? Do they wonder who it is they are trying to impress? Probably others, but more like themselves. Because if we have everything we dreamed of what is there left to still inspire our dreams.

If only we could understand what life is supposed to be, if we could be told what it is we search for as human beings, what we should be in life to bring about understanding within ourselves? Years go by and age sets in, I am 33, still trying to figure out if I am good enough and for whom am I trying to be good enough for?

Signs of Spring

2008-04-10T13:26:00.012-05:00

Slowly spring is coming. And it's about time.

It has been a back and forth winter in the Midwest. One day we will have warm weather-making us believe spring has finally arrived-the next day we will have a full fledged snowstorm. Our morale here is all but failing.

This past weekend, with a brief warm temperature, we were finally able to open a window for the first time.

As you can see by the picture, humans are not the only ones waiting for spring to arrive. Moe, Larry, and Curly (actually known as Ghost, Chewie, and Tigger) made a decisive move to crowd into the one window that I had opened, forgoing their usual discomfort and general dislike of being this close together. To further add to my point, even Tigger, the cat to the far right, was willing to have a wooden spoon crammed against his back (there to keep the window up) in order to take full advantage of his allotted space.

But fear not, if you don't have cats to crowd into your windows to show you spring is coming, there is another simple method which doesn't include waiting for a groundhog to forgo seeing his shadow. (Which is overrated if you ask me.)

Just simply wait for the expensive convertibles with their tops off, to take their rightful place on the road. If you see an older man (similar to a Donald Trump look-a-like) with sparse hair flapping in the wind, it is then you know without a doubt that it is truly, spring.

It's a . . .It's a . . .What Did You Say It Is?

2008-03-31T14:26:00.012-05:00

This is what I told my daughter and then to the man who was making balloon representations at the Easter Egg Hunt.

I asked him for Elmo, her favorite scruffy Sesame Street character, and this is what the man gave me.

I guess abstract art not only applies to paintings, but balloon renditions of Elmo as well.

My daughter looking at her balloon trying to conceptualize Elmo. As we walked back past the long line that had gathered for the balloon man, I overheard a woman tell her husband, "Oh isn't that cute. The little girl got a lobster balloon."

The Beverly Hillbillies of Scrap Iron Part Two

2008-03-25T21:41:00.010-05:00

From a previous article: http://soyouwouldthink.blogspot.com/2007/03/beverly-hillbillies-of-scrap-iron.html

Yesterday, we arrived home to find the yearly garbage festival in full swing. I don't know who planned it on Easter, but it sure seemed like a dumb idea. Who wants to go through their house and haul out garbage, old appliances, furniture and the like on Easter Sunday?

Anyway, we arrived back in town in the late afternoon to find that either the garbage ghouls had already gone through the trash that day or people were not putting much out. Now here's the funny part.

My husband started to gather our wares to throw away: a mattress set, yard equipment, an old T.V. As my husband carried the first item out to the curb one of those monolithic garbage trucks appeared like a bat out of hell. Do these trucks have honing devices or what? The man parked the truck right at our curb so they could go through the junk exactly as my husband brought it out. I thought, surely this can't be happening.

Then, slowly trudging up the street, another one of these trucks came and parked on the other side of the street across from our house. The men from the two trucks got out and a huge shouting match in Spanish took place between them. And it was evident, it was all over who could go through our junk!

After some time went by the man from the first truck, obviously upset that my husband wasn't bringing out any prime garbage or appliances, picked up the van mat that my husband placed on the curb and then abruptly left.

I thought I had seen everything at last years spring cleaning garbage day but this takes the cake. And I even arrived late in town to bypass the event because I figured I pretty much covered everything I could in last years article. It just goes to show you: stories and situations will happen regardless if you are looking for them or not.

Finding Hope

2008-02-25T18:25:00.022-06:00

Today was not such a good day. As most of you know, I am writing a novel. And for everyone else, I'm sure you've already guessed as much by the link that is so strategically placed to the right of my website which says Book in Progress/Finding Hope.

I have been working on this book for three years alongside a job and a baby.

The website, dedicated to the book, will be finished in a few months thanks to the help given by my computer savvy husband. And yes, normally book websites are made after the book is published, let alone written. But I have always been one to go full force.

When I started writing the story back in March 2005, I did a search on the internet for the title Finding Hope. I wanted to make sure there was not a novel by the same name.
There were a few self-help books but no fiction. I told myself, “I’m good to go!”

Now I admit, the title Finding Hope could be considered a tad overly dramatic and one can easily assume it to be the title of a Sunday night movie on Lifetime Television. However, my story is far from it. True, it is an inspirational story but the characters would be more in line with a Saturday Night Live episode rather than a Lifetime movie.

Today for some reason, I did a search for the title again. I not only found out that a romance book had been published by the same title but another book called Finding Hope is due out in December. There went my "good to go" feeling.

Another bit of information which I read is that titles of books can’t be copyrighted unless you make it a trademark or part of a business which can be quite expensive. Therefore, I will continue with the title of Finding Hope. And it’s not for a lack of creativity on my part. I can think of titles and story lines in my sleep.

So we’ll see. I’m not averse to changing it if it will increase the possibility of the book being published. As I’m sure someone somewhere would say, “Just get the book written. Everything else comes after that.”

Since the title is more popular than I thought, one day you may very well see me at a book signing telling a reader, “No not that one, no not that one either. It’s the last Finding Hope on the shelf: the one with the bridge on it. "Yeah,” I would say as I pointed to my name on the book, “this one’s mine.”

Happy Valentine's Day!

2008-02-14T13:11:00.014-06:00

Since January 1, we have been on a steady initiative to eat better, healthier food. Today we decided to go to The Cheesecake Factory for lunch to celebrate St. Valentine's Day. For dessert, we reluctantly ordered a piece of Godiva chocolate cheesecake.

If you have ever been to The Cheesecake Factory, you know what I'm talking about when I say "cheesecake". It's not your run-of-the-mill homemade graham cracker crust in a tin pan with a Jell-O brand whipped cream type cheesecake. It's the grand daddy of the good cheesecakes.

Now this was all to celebrate Valentine's Day of course. Chocolate and Valentine's Day go hand in hand together, right? To have one without the other would be criminal, just plain criminal.

(I know, being overly dramatic is my second nature.)

And yes, we could have easily skipped that beautiful piece of Godiva chocolate cheesecake (if a cheesecake can be called beautiful) to go home and eat an individualized cup of sugar-free Jell-O chocolate pudding but somehow, they just aren't the same.

Here is our conversation:

"Boy, I bet there's a ton of calories in this bite," Stephane said holding up a piece on his fork.

"But it's dark chocolate. Dark chocolate has lots of antioxidants."

"This really blows are diet," he said.

"But," I reminded him, "we are sharing one piece. That's good."

"I guess," he said.

"You’ll go back to work and feel euphoric all day. And isn't that what Valentine's Day is for?"

"This is really good," he said taking another bite.

"Mmm, this is really good," I said.

So in honor of St. Valentine's Day, shun the guilt, go for the gusto and enjoy something rich and chocolaty because we all deserve one day to feel warm, cozy, and euphoric.

Lost and Found

2008-02-02T18:26:00.002-06:00

Yesterday I called my mother, "We found your teeth!" Enthusiasm erupted. The long saga of the missing partials had been solved.

A month ago, my parents had come up to visit. An hour before they left, my mother started on her missing teeth crusade.

"They were in an apricot jelly jar, inside of an orange newspaper bag. Right there," she said pointing to a shelf in the dining room.

"What was?"

"My teeth!"

"What teeth?" I looked at her mouth.

"I had put my partials right there and they aren't there anymore."

I thought about asking why her teeth were in an apricot jar in the dining room in the first place. I mean, isn't there some lack of etiquette there or something? But I have learned that the less I say to my mother in a disagreement, the better.

For the next hour, we went about the house in a mad flurry all through the two story house, looking for a jar of teeth in a washed-out old jar of apricot preserves.

"Are you sure that's where you put them?"

"Yes, right there," she pointed to the shelf in the dining room.

"Are you sure you didn't leave them somewhere else and you just forgot?"

"Those are $500.”

They had to leave.

"We'll keep looking for them," I told her. (I volunteered my husband as well because I didn't want to be the only one looking for a jar of teeth. I hate looking at weird things: poopy diapers, throw-up and a jelly jar of floating teeth is included in that list.)

"They're in an orange newspaper bag. I left them right there in the dining room on the shelf."

"We'll look for it. I promise."

"Okay," she said with an overwhelming sadness. They left to go back to Indiana, my mother forlorn and my father more than ready to leave.

That night we received the first phone call. We heard the voice message when we got back from the grocery store.

“Debbie, are you there? Have Stephane go through the trash before he puts it out tonight. My partials could be in there. That’s $500 dollars.”

Stephane, my great and helpful husband, grimaced as he untied the trash bag, which was ready to go to the curb, and with latex gloves, sifted around for a plastic newspaper sack that contained a jar of false teeth. Nothing.

And then the looking started. For weeks we looked everywhere. I looked all over the all-purpose guest room/craft room/exercise room/anything that doesn't have a place room.

I looked under the bed where they had slept. I looked in the drawers. I looked in the upstairs bathroom several times. I followed the path from the bedroom where they slept to the bathroom that they used. I looked all over the dining room, behind books, on the ground, up on ledges. I looked in every place where she was and still, no jar of teeth.

Two weeks later and eight urgent phone call reminders from my mother asking if we had found them yet; I receive a letter in the mail - from my mother.

Inside the envelope was a piece of orange plastic newspaper bag with a note stapled to it: This is what the plastic bag looked like that my teeth are in.

A week after that, my husband was cleaning the island in the kitchen and said,”What is this?"

He was holding up an old apricot jar with a pair of partials.

"You found her teeth!" I declared.

You know how she said the teeth were in an orange newspaper bag in the dining room?

They were in a white Hobby Lobby sack in the kitchen.

And even though I’m nowhere near the age to have partials yet, I’ll now forever know they cost $500 dollars.

Mothers.

The new line, "And What Planet Did You Come From?"

2008-01-21T01:40:00.000-06:00

If you haven't heard, there has been quite a controversy over the Tom Cruise Scientology tape which is out and pretty much everywhere. If you haven't seen it. It's on YouTube at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFBZ_uAbxS0

After watching the video, the first thing I thought, is this guy crazy? I love Tom Cruise in Top Gun and Mission Impossible but clearly, what is he thinking because none of it sounds coherent. Especially the bit on why he can't go on vacation because of, what?

The second thing I thought is, what is Scientology really? I know it's a religion that was started by the late L. Ron Hubbard who was an author of science fiction books. Just that fact alone makes you wonder? So I googled the name and found some very interesting, yet very frightening information about it.

Is it fabricated and do all of these countless people just have an axe to grind? Or is it a cult? Click on the links below and see for yourself.

I would be interested in knowing if anyone has ever met someone who joined Scientology and what your take is on the subject by posting a comment.

Tom Cruise is another person which should be asked the question from one of my posts, "Where Did You Come From?" And according to the Scientology theory, I guess the answer would be

- outer space. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenu

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-scientology18dec18,0,2963052.story?page=1

http://www.holysmoke.org/cos/inside-the-cult.htm

http://www.xenu.net/archive/personal_story/paulette_cooper/

Come out Come out Wherever You Are

2008-01-10T23:10:00.000-06:00

A ceremony was held to mark the completion of the first public toilets located on the streets in New York City, the first of which are located in Madison Square Park.

It costs 25 cents. The only thing you should be aware of is that after fifteen minutes, the doors open automatically - whether you’re finished or not.

It gives a whole new vantage point for the people who purposely expose themselves in the park.

So beware and take a watch with you.

O Canada!

2007-12-18T22:38:00.000-06:00

And we're off for our yearly road trip. To the French side.

To all my Canadian snowbound friends

with their cars under makeshift white tents in their driveway

who frequent all of the Tim Hortons across the land

where the typical "huh?'" is replaced with the Canadian "eh"?

and where I don't know a lick of French except what my husband says to my daughter:

Change la couche? (Which means change your diaper.)

Somehow, I don't think I will be able to use that phrase much to illustrate my illustrious French skills.

We are leaving tomorrow for a 16 hour drive, with a toddler in the back seat who is only pacified (for ten minutes) by her favorite sticker book. It'll be National Lampoon's Vacation - French style. Please pray for us that she doesn't get bored twenty minutes after we leave the driveway. Otherwise it's going to be a looooooooooooooooong road trip.

Have a great holiday everyone

Au revoir (well, at least I can use that word!) But it gets old fast.

Here Comes Santa Clause

2007-12-13T21:31:00.000-06:00

Ah, the joys of taking a toddler to see Santa Clause.

"No, no, no!"

Happy again!

Anyone? Anyone?

2007-12-13T00:06:00.000-06:00

Long office meetings. Daunting work seminars.

Has anyone ever experienced them? If not, you've been hiding under your desk for the year.

Some of these never ending seminars remind me of the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off when the pesky teacher, played by Ben Stein, notices half the class asleep and decides to ask a question. When nobody answers, he says, "Anyone, Anyone?" in a monotone voice and the camera pans the classroom where most of the students are either chewing their gum, sleeping or looking out the window.

Today, I had to go downtown for a work seminar. Right now, my job is typically working with seniors and setting up community based services.

For the first seminar (lasting three hours), it was all about baselines, probabilities, statistics, formulas and ratios. After the fifth chart regarding statistical evidence and formulas of whether Adult Day Service leads to precursory nursing home placement, I decided to peruse the room a bit with my eyes.

My attention first came to a woman who was chewing her nail tips off and then looking at them (which didn't hold my attention long), then I decided to write down the supposed work out schedule for my upcoming New Year's resolution of joining a gym and working out every morning (which was quite overblown when I put that I would wake up at 5:00 in the morning and go exercise for two hours along with walking the dog, then doing ab exercises at night and so on and so forth), then I looked at my neighbor who was trying to figure out how many words she could come up with from the word Marriott (Hotel).

Finally, a break for lunch.

The later half of the day and the second session (of three hours again) was the Disaster Relief seminar. Everything you need to know and then some of how to prepare your Adult Day Center for an upcoming natural disaster or threat. First of all, I don't own or work at an Adult Day Center and second, three hours of listening to how we have to be prepared for any kind of threat and what to stock our Emergency kits with started to get to be a little too much.

The first half of the afternoon session was interesting but after the break, it slowly went to "Is it over yet?" Toward the last hour, I again decided to peruse my eyes around to see what people were doing. But it's more like I heard what someone was doing.

Down at the end of our row, a woman had fallen asleep and was snoring outright like a grizzly bear inhaling deep breaths and then spewing out a loud, "Argh!" The woman even had her head tilted back with her mouth wide open. Several people noticed, especially when she was exhaling her loud snore. I don't know if the speakers heard her or not, but I don't see how they couldn't have noticed. But they went on, never missing a beat which I guess is a mark of a true meeting presenter.

In all fairness to myself, I tried to listen to what they had to say. But not only was it not relevant to what I do but it was long. Really, really long.

Meetings. Seminars. They are an American right of passage into the business world. Great things can come from them: detailed to do lists from the organizers, doodles and portraits from the creative thinkers and daydreaming for those who are neither.

So the next time you go to one of "those" seminars or meetings, do what I do. Look around at the people and what they do when they are bored. And perhaps a smile will come across your face because we are all more alike than you think.

Christmas Gift Exchanges

2007-12-12T22:38:00.000-06:00

Gift exchanges.

Whether you have to buy gifts for people at the office or extended relatives that you really don't know, they always seem to come around faster than you think at Christmas time.

And what do you receive? You either end up getting the typical black glove and scarf set or the ever so popular Christmas paraphernalia (that went on clearance the day after Christmas last year) such as the singing stuffed Santa that lights up and drives you nuts or a candy cane striped coffee mug that you'll use one month out of the year. And my least favorite, a musky cologne that can kill anyone who comes within ten feet of you. We all look at the gifts and say a little prayer before we open them but often you are secretly wanting to ask, "Is there a gift receipt for a return on this?" Which people never seem to include for Christmas gifts.

This year for our office Christmas party, instead of buying a gift for the person whose name you drew out of a box, they opted for everyone to buy a general $10 to $15 gift for a man or woman. Do you know how hard it is to buy a $10 dollar gift that suits either sex and 20 some people with different personalities?

I thought about chocolate, but what if the person is on a diet? I thought about candles but what if a man received it? I thought about the typical black glove and scarf set but it's so overused. So I thought long and hard about it, found nothing and at the last minute opted for buying a super duper ultra snow brush and ice scraper. The deluxe version that will never leave any car under scraped during an ice storm. (Yeah, laugh my friends.)

Yesterday was our office Christmas party. Due to a potential ice storm (which the ice scraper might actually have come in handy for, see I'm so intuitive) we canceled the party at our coworker's house (which is all decorated and welcoming) and decided to have the party in the staff meeting room. We had several people bring wine but that had to be replaced with Diet Pepsi because it was at the office.

We were instructed to put all of our chairs in a circle with the presents in a pyle in the middle of the room. At the same time, we were told to go to the center and get a gift. We each opened our own gift and then had to say what we received. Now the stealing part started. All of us received two playing cards and one person had an extra deck of cards and called out the numbers so we had two chances to steal somebody's gift when our card came up.

You can tell a lot about people by how they play this game. You can tell who the really kind people are when they keep their gift which is obviously something they aren't thrilled about just so they don't hurt peoples' feelings. You have the people that just don't care. It's $10 dollars, what really can I get out of this? So they take whatever comes. You have the people that take it seriously and stop at nothing to try and keep their present. And the list goes on.

The gifts included: numerous lotion sets (which I didn't try for because you never know if it's a good lotion unless you know the brand or smell it), a Chia pet herb garden, wine, the Christmas nick-knacks which end up being added to your attic and the one gift which everyone tried to avoid: a pot which strains the fat from gravy.

As for which type of player am I? I'm the over thinker. I analyze who will probably take what so I can end up with a gift that I like. The fun is actually more in trying to predict how it will play out.

Thought process: If I steal the $25 dollar gift certificate that most people want, than my chance of getting a gift I don't want is greater because I'll be stuck with whatever they have. If I go for another gift I like, but isn't the best one, then I'll probably get to keep it because nobody is stealing it. It worked. I ended up with a nice black picture frame that holds 5x7 photos which was perfect for Olivia's Halloween portraits. Unfortunately, my best friend at the office and coworker ended up with the gravy de-fatter. And she doesn't cook.

But it was fun and I highly suggest the steal a gift scenario if your extended family (or office) is tired of buying a boat load of gifts for so many people. Other versions include: drawing numbers and then the person with number one gets to pick a wrapped gift, then number two can either pick another wrapped gift or steal number one's and then number three can pick a wrapped gift or steal any of the people that went before him.

Another family does the same thing but nobody opens the gifts so it's more based on the anticipation of what that gift might hold and at the end everyone opens what they end up with.

And one of my relatives family bring gifts under $5 dollars (gag gifts) and does this so it's more fun than anything else. As for my husband's family, they have a spending amount of $30 dollars for the gift. So it can go anyway you want it. When you can pretty much get whatever you want during the year, it's a fun and memorable way to enjoy Christmas. With less emphasis on buying a ton of gifts which Christmas shouldn't be about anyway.

Ten Things

2007-12-09T19:43:00.000-06:00

Kriss, a fellow blogger, had tagged several of us to post ten known facts:

I hate dipped food. Ever since my daughter first learned that food can be dipped, EVERYTHING has to be dipped: in ketchup, in mustard, dipped in ranch dressing and in any kind of liquid, spread or configuration which something can be dipped in. Last week, on a long tumultuous two hour drive, we had to get something for dinner on the way. Looking for the easy way out, we went to McDonalds. For twenty minutes, I had to continually turn around and present my daughter with sauce for her chicken McNuggets or she cried. (I would never trust a 21 month-old with holding honey mustard sauce in the backseat of a car.) After many times of turning around, I realized, she wasn’t eating the chicken, she was just licking the sauce off. There wasn’t any chicken being eaten at all.

I laugh continually when I read the book I've almost written which either means it’s a damn good book or I’m a borderline lunatic.

I love chocolate, way too much. But what woman doesn’t, really?

I hate changing diapers so much that my husband has probably changed 75 percent of them. Especially the stinky ones.

I hate going to bed because I don’t want tomorrow to come.

I never thought I would be a baby person but I fell in love with my daughter when she smiled at me. And gradually, when I see babies, I’ve now become the motherly schmoozy person by saying, “Ah, look at that baby!” Before I was like, “Yeah, so what?”

I’m way to idealistic for my own good. I believe everyone should operate on a basic of good ethics, sound principles and a kind heart and many times, because of this idealism, I’m let down.

My greatest luck came about with my husband. He looks at me like I’m the best thing that happened since apple pie. And everyone should have someone who thinks they are better than apple pie!

I believe in God and that we should be tolerant of all religions, sexual orientations, differences of opinions and life as long as it doesn’t cause physical harm to others. Who are we to be so sanctimonious to judge others and then use God as the catch phrase for the reasoning behind what constitutes as our own opinions or translations of what he stands for.

I am a grouchy Christmas customer. I now like Christmas shopping for the first twenty minutes. By the time I have been poked, ran over by a cart, stood in a long line for some “limited release” toy, have seen too many people drop stuff in stores and not pick it up and have been ran over by people in a hurry and people not keeping the flow moving in the aisles, I say, “forget this” and I grab the closest present on the shelf and I’m gone. So what if Grandma is going to get an electric knife in a dented box that was on the clearance shelf next to the front lobby. After Christmas, she can be my guest and mosey on over to take it back with her walker in tow and peruse the limitless aisles in search of a left over fruit cake or a foot warmer.

(Actually, I don’t have a Grandma. I’m not THAT mean.)

Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday to Me

2007-12-09T18:28:00.000-06:00

My birthday weekend was great! Yesterday, we went to see Wicked, the untold story of the witches of Oz. There was a man that laughed like a horse throughout the whole musical who sat next to my husband, but other than that, it was pretty damn good. Well worth the bazillion American Express points it took to see it.

Then we went to the Melting Pot for a four course fondue dinner. Today, we went to see the movie, The Golden Compass and then to Sam's Club to get groceries. (Okay the Sam's Club thing wasn't so great but hey, you have to eat.)

And tonight, I am blowing out my candles and making a big ol' wish. Perhaps it'll be the typical Miss America beauty pageant wish for "world peace" however, I doubt it.

Congratulations Olivia!

2007-11-01T20:57:00.000-05:00

This is a professional picture and cannot be copied

On Halloween, after trick-or-treating, we entered the mall's Costume Contest. Each child had to go on stage and model their costume. When her time came, Olivia (dressed as a lady bug) walked on the stage by herself, gave her card to the announcer, went to the front where the judges sat and gave a big toothy grin.

She actually came in first for the Cutest Costume out of 100 plus children who entered. Way to go Olivia!

I learned three things:

1. I am of course very proud of her ability to make even the grumpiest people smile.

2. Cracker Barrel has become the newest and greatest place to buy halloween costumes. (Go figure.)

3. I've turned into one of "those" parents.

The Lost Child

2007-10-28T23:33:00.000-05:00

To those who left us behind too early

Yet so visually have never escaped our minds

We wait in anticipation for the day

When remembrance becomes completion

And we shall be reunited

As if time had never passed

And love was never lost

-D.K.

(For Jackie)

Bite-Size Brown Bits of Joy

2007-10-10T19:14:00.000-05:00

Now I have heard of individually wrapped chocolates, individually wrapped popsicles and even individually wrapped pieces of cheese, but individually wrapped prunes? Where does one even start with this?

Sunsweet, a company that produces and sells most of the dried fruit and juices that you see in grocery stores came out with a new product Sunsweet Ones. The hype: you can now buy your prunes individually wrapped! Boy, how lucky we are that science and technology has advanced us.

The upscale bourgeois eat with your pinkie up name:

Pitted Dried Plums

The name which parents used when they made us eat them:

Prunes!

I still remember when I ate my first prune as a child. It was like eating a beetle, once you bit through the tough skin, the ooze came out. I pointed to the roof of my mouth where it had stuck itself and yelled, "Yucky!"

And where does one eat these "individually wrapped" prunes?

People at offices bring in goodies to their fellow coworkers all of the time; candies, cookies, and especially chocolate if you work with a bunch of women. But who is going to be the one to bring in a can of these babies and say, "Would you like an individually wrapped pitted dried plum?"

And the parties. "There's a bowl of Cheetos and a bowl of prunes on the table. Help yourself and enjoy." But as one website mentioned, "Prunes are well known for their ability to prevent constipation." (Which may be a hint that it isn't such a good party or group food if you don't want your bathroom stool in use for the whole night.)

The product is actually targeted to people who want a boost of energy and vitamins without gaining weight. But let's be truthful, if you are starving and trying to lose weight it's not a prune you want to reach for, nor do you want to take the umpteen seconds it takes to unwrap just one. No, if you are starving, you'll be taking the half an hour it would require to unwrap each individual one from the can, just to feel semi-full.

And then of course

running to the bathroom.

So I ask you? Would you buy and then take the time to individually unwrap a delectable, downsized, delicious Prune?

And what's next?

Individually wrapped raisins?

(And since it's Halloween and all, try putting one in the kiddies napsack or jack-o-lantern on Halloween night when they ring the doorbell and say, "Trick-or-treat".

And then you can reply, "Here's a nice delicious individual prune for you."

I'm sure they will just love it. Now your house may be egged at a later point in time, but I can't be responsible for that.)

To Get You in the Mood for Halloween

2007-10-07T01:09:00.000-05:00

You have to click on the link below and see these pictures from a fellow friend's website showing "Why Pets Hate Halloween"

Hilarious and definitely worth the time. I promise.

And if that doesn't scare you, you can always scroll down and look at Phil Spector's picture again.

http://zookins.wordpress.com/2007/10/05/why-pets-hate-halloween/

A Face (And Hairdo) Only a Mother Could Love

2007-09-26T19:43:00.000-05:00

We all remember the perms of the 80's. I do, because I had at least eight of them in my school career and I still have the smell of a freshly new perm in my mind.

Let me tell you, when you left the beauty salon, the smell of fried hair lingered with you, that is until the beauty salons went new age and got in fruit smelling perm solutions. Now when I left with a new perm, I could smell like both strawberries and burnt hair. I don't know which one was worse.

But with Phil Spector, somewhere amidst the perm solution and the curl relaxer, damn it, someone got this one wrong. And if you haven't noticed the elephant in the room, I'm talking about yes, that particularly charming looking fellow up above.

Phil Spector, a famous music producer back in the 1960's, is charged with shooting Lana Clarkson. (Which many journalists so politely denote her as "B actress Lana Clarkson" - as if her life was only mildly important.) http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_7005994

Five women from his past came forth and said that Spector threatened them with guns so he obviously has a fascination with firearms, which may or may not be compensating for a lack of something else he may not have elsewhere. (I don't know? Big hair, big guns - you be the judge.)

So here is what I think - the perm is being used to house a small pocket pistol, like the one you see James Bond sporting in his earlier movies. I mean really, it could fit in there, right?

If a person is going to court and especially if he is being charged with murder, I have always felt it is in their best interest if they dress up a bit, do their hair, clean their nails and such. It is not however, the time to get a fresh perm.

However, once the deed is done and there is no going back, it's time to use styling products to diminish the damage. He could sprinkle some water on top of it to flatten it down a bit and take out the frizz or perhaps another option, take a hand full of Pantene hair mousse and run it through so the poof relaxes a few feet. In any case, he certainly shouldn't have appeared in court with a hairdo which could have been easily achieved by sticking his finger into a light socket.

Here is the clincher: The court had to declare a mistrial because the jury did not come back with a unanimous verdict.

It had to be the hair.

In other news, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (or as Whoopi Goldberg on The View called him, Mahmoud I'm-a-dinner-jacket) spoke at Columbia University to a fiery crowd. Not only does he deny that the Holocaust happened which is baffling but he also thinks that being gay must be strictly an American thing.

Ahmadinejad told the audience: "In Iran, we don't have homosexuals like in your country. In Iran, we do not have this phenomenon. I don't know who's told you that we have this." http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nation/bal-te.ahmadinejad25sep25,0,4057721.story

And there you have it. Obviously, someone never asked either of these interesting gentlemen: "Where did you come from?" Because these two certainly fit the bill. http://soyouwouldthink.blogspot.com/2007/09/where-did-you-come-from.html

And with that smile and wave, perhaps the now deceased televangalist, Reverend Jerry Falwell, would have a different take all together for Mr. Ahmadinejad as well.
http://soyouwouldthink.blogspot.com/2007/06/quote-of-day.html
and
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/276677.stm

SHIT HAPPENS

2007-09-18T22:16:00.001-05:00

Our House and the soon to be "crap" sidewalk

2:00 A.M.

Olivia has a severe cough, we are both up all night.

7:00 A.M.

Dog chews her cast from her leg. (She had a $700 operation last month.)

7:30 A.M.

Call vet and make an appointment for 8:00 A.M. for a new cast.

8:30 A.M.

Drop off baby at daycare and go to the office for a full day of work.

2:00 P.M.

My eighteen-year-old niece came up to stay and help with the baby while my husband is on a business trip in Virgina for the week. She has my father drive her three hours back to her house because she misses her boyfriend and I yelled at her. Go figure.

5:30 P.M.

Pick up Olivia from the daycare for which I am told that she had a diarrhea blowout and her new pink pants and white shirt are sitting in her daycare cubby hole in a sack fermenting since lunch time.

6:00 P.M.

I arrive home and I find that the new partial sidewalk in the front of our house has been finally put in by the city. (Our tree uprooted a segment many years ago.) Where upon I became aware that some kid had pleasured himself by writing CRAP in big giant letters on our newly wet cemented sidewalk. I, being the creative solution solver, go over and try to make CRAP into four large squares but give-up when I realize the cement had completely dried about a half an hour ago. Therefore, I can always tell someone who is looking for my house, "Just look for the house where the word "crap" is on the sidewalk.

11:30 P.M.

Go to bed and hope that tomorrow is a better day. And as long we all wake up - I guess that's something.

Side note:

As you can see by this last picture, for the first two years we moved in I went crazy on planting flowers. Anywhere and everywhere.

"Stephane, can you dig a hole here?" "And one here?" And how about over here?"

"Is there any method to this madness?" he would say. Finally, he said firmly, "No more flowers or plants. There isn't any space."

And that's when I started sneaking in the flowers and planting them before he arrived home.

Yes, I was a closeted flower maniac. I was seriously suitable for some Garden Center Anonymous, for people who had addictions to garden centers. Finally, I can say I'm four years clean. I now only buy enough to fill the urns in front and to plant a few herbs and I didn't even do it this year. It shows you what you can do if you fight the urge! I bypass the garden centers and if I go, I look straight ahead and close my eyes to all of the bright beautiful "real" flowers or else I'm sure that would be on the divorce papers, "wife obsessed with planting". But no plastic ones! http://soyouwouldthink.blogspot.com/2007/07/flowers-flowers-everywhere.html

Where Did You Come From?

2007-09-06T11:14:00.000-05:00

Every once in awhile, the full moon comes out and the crazies abound everywhere. And for those people who do not have a full moon to blame their abnormal behaviors on, well, perhaps they are singing to a different tune. So you would think.

On Labor Day, the four of us went to the Lincoln Park Zoo, to the Chicago History Museum, to the lakefront and finally, out to eat to Sweet Tomatoes. In other words, it was a labor intensive non-stop day with my husband and I taking up the lead, an over extended grandpa in the back and a toddler in desperate need of a good nap taking up the middle. It was fun, but alas, this is not the true nature of this story.

As we were driving out of the parking lot near the lake, a young boy, probably around ten, had his pants down and was mooning us from the sidewalk. His pants were clearly down to his kneecaps, his derriere showing for any passerby to see. Worst of all, his father and mother were by the side of the car laughing at him. Stephane and I agreed, if we had a son at that age who thought it was funny to show his backside to cars as they went by, he would have quite a slap on that backside to convince him otherwise.

On our way back, we stopped at Sweet Tomatoes, the salad bar buffet, where at dessert time, I took a small bowl of tapioca pudding, and while in line, I put it down beside me to get something, and a young little preteen girl runs up to me, sticks her finger in my bowl of tapioca pudding and licks off her finger. I must have given a look of shock, because she stared up at me with an ice cream mustache, probably ice cream from some other person’s ice cream bowl, and said, "Sorry" and then hopped away.

Then tonight, I went to Sam's Club to get some groceries. It wasn't very busy and very few people were there. As I took my cart and started pushing it down the long aisle, this fuzzy headed middle-aged woman with a long brightly colored skirt, bobby socks and 1950's shoes walked up to my cart and stayed glued next to me while I went down the aisle. At first I was like, someone must have lost their mentally challenged aunt and for some reason she's hanging out with me, but then after several minutes, up from her side came a clip board and binder and she said in a thick Eastern European accent with some kind of speech impediment, "Would you like to buy a sunroom?"

Now if you've ever been to Sam's Club or Costco, you know as soon as you step an inch past the checkout counters, these people come at you, trying to sell you sunrooms, cell phones and whatever else they can attack you with right when you get into the door. So I relaxed a bit once I knew I wasn't being followed by some crazy lady but instead was being followed by a weird woman selling sunrooms.

"No thank you," I said as she went on with her spiel. "See," she said. She flipped through the pictures, quickly trying to keep up with me while I was trying to get away with my cart. "No," I said, "I'm not interested" and turned the cart immediately to the right to enter another aisle and to hopefully, be out of her selling zone.

Fifteen minutes later, I'm on the other side of the store looking at outfits for Olivia and I see the fuzzy headed woman heading straight toward me again. I move into the hanging clothes a bit more, hoping she doesn't see me however, there are only around ten people in the entire Sam's Club so I guess she felt she had to be persistent with a low volume of customers to badger.

She stopped directly beside me. Obviously, me hiding behind the clothes rack didn't work. "Would you like to buy a sunroom?" she said again in her thick accent and meaningless expression.

"You already asked me," I pointed out and with no response she immediately left and was on to a new customer she spotted coming down the aisle.

I know there are crazy people out there - people with no social discretion, people who think everything is their domain to claim like the tapioca pudding girl, people that are, as the saying goes, "two colors short of a rainbow" which can certainly describe the fuzzy headed sunroom saleswoman from Sam's Club. (And her kaleidoscope of a skirt I might add.)

The world is filled with people that you wonder, "Where did you come from?" Because sometimes it sure doesn't feel like they came from planet Earth.

When I first started working at United Airline's answering phones, we blamed it on the full moon. We all knew what kind of customer phone calls we were going to get when there was a full moon that night.

Like clockwork, they would call us. And we knew it would always be an interesting night when we worked the late shift.

The only thing I can say is there must be a full moon out this whole entire week because I certainly had my fill of strange people.

So the next time you run into one of them, someone you consider crazy, strange, peculiar, a little bit off - because you know you will, we've all seen them out there - stop and say, "Where did you come from?" and then thank God nobody classifies you as one of them.

Bubba This and Bubba That

2007-08-31T17:43:00.001-05:00

All day last week, Olivia kept on shouting, "Bobbie, Bobbie." We were like, "Who is Bobbie?"

Yesterday, at her daycare, the teacher said, "Oh you know what? She must mean one of the toddlers we have in here named Bubba. You know him don't you?" "No," I said. "Everyone knows Bubba," she went on. "Are you sure you don't know Bubba?" "No, I don't know Bubba."

She looked puzzled. "He's the really, really big baby. His mother calls him Bubba because the child eats all day." And Olivia loves to eat therefore, I guess she has an eating buddy and is quite fond of Bubba. So our daughter now can say five words: mama, daddy, kitty, doggy and the ever popular Bubba!

She must be thinking of her buddy, Bubba.

Atlanta Falcons Quarterback Pleads Guilty

2007-08-20T16:16:00.000-05:00

From an article posted on AOL by Larry O'Dell:

"Michael Vick's lawyer said Monday the NFL star will plead guilty to federal dogfighting conspiracy charges, putting the Atlanta Falcons quarterback's career in jeopardy and leaving him subject to a possible prison term."

http://sports.aol.com/nfl/story/_a/vick-accepts-deal-will-plead-guilty/20070820145009990001?ncid=NWS00010000000001

Included in the story, "About a dozen bright red Vick jerseys have been donated - often accompanied by financial contributions - to the Atlanta Humane Society since he was indicted last month. The shelter uses them for dog blankets, and to clean up after the animals."

Utterly befitting if you ask me.

Previous article: http://soyouwouldthink.blogspot.com/2007/07/accountability-is-it-just-word.html

Who Ate the Cheese?

2007-08-13T22:10:00.001-05:00

It is starting to become quite the episode when my toddler and I enter through the mechanical doors into a world that Olivia loves - the unassuming grocery store.

She has been on a crusade of exploration. First (and still), it's her thumb in her mouth. Then to soothe herself, she started the habit of rubbing her ear. Next, it was down to sticking her finger into her belly button. It is an interesting show when she decides to do all three at once and it certainly shows that she is a multi-tasker.

At the grocery store last week, she was on to a new venture. She discovered she had a left nipple. Up went the shirt in the frozen food aisle. "What are you doing? Put that shirt down." She laughed of course, since she rarely takes me seriously and up went the shirt again. This happened all through the store, in the grocery section, the baby food aisle, the dairy case, the checkout line and then again out to the car. It was as if she discovered something amazing.

Today at the grocery store, I had it all planned out. I was going to buy a chicken tender at the hot food counter for her to eat while I shopped. I figured it would keep her occupied at least to the checkout lane. It went faster than I thought. So I looked in the cart for some food item she could look at, something that wasn't a jar made out of glass or a can that she could drop on my foot since I went through that experience a few months ago.

I found a block of cheddar cheese in the bottom of the cart. I figured she would look at it, admire it, and that would be that. I bent down to buckle my sandal, came back up and she handed me the cheese, only with a large exposed chunk bitten off plastic and all.

Lord does that child have some teeth.

I could have put it back but what kind of surprise would another customer have when they held up the package and a part of it was gone. Or, I could have given it to the cashier and told her I think they may have a mouse running about in the cheese aisle. Which I'm sure would have made the store and the Board of Health so happy. But alas, I'm too much of an honest person so I had to tell the cashier to ring up the cheese and immediately put it in a bag because, well, my child bit off the end.

But Olivia loves the grocery store and she is a very friendly baby when she is inside. She says a firm "hi!" to every customer who passes by our cart and if they don't respond, she yells after them, "HI!" until they say hello back.

I think her destiny is to be a greeter at Wal-Mart. I just hope they don't have any blocks of cheese there.

Baby Buffalo Versus Lion Versus Alligator

2007-08-09T10:51:00.000-05:00

You have to watch this amazing video called Battle at Kruger on YouTube. A man captured this while on safari. It definitely shows you the power of resilience.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LU8DDYz68kM

It starts out slow so you need to watch it to the end.

Side note: The outcome is good, otherwise, I couldn't watch it.

That Old Black Magic

2007-07-31T23:52:00.000-05:00

Photograph by Gordon and Cathy Illg/Animals Animals—Earth Scenes

Tonight it happened again.

Our dog, Emmy, has been skunked so many times she can pass herself off as an honorary skunk. Five times in four years.

We first became aware of this phenomenon when we were at the family farm on one cold Thanksgiving night, right before we were to leave for a holiday party. We were outside in the dark rubbing her fur down with cans of tomato juice. Since then, we've moved onto bigger and better things, namely industrialized strength skunk shampoo.

An hour ago, my husband came running through the living room, “Where are the dogs!" He said he could smell the skunk odor through the air conditioner in the kitchen. (After having a dog sprayed five times, he has developed quite the nose for that particular smell. It has become his enemy.)

He ran outside and I heard this loud, “No, no!” I knew what was coming because I had heard this "No, no" many times before. He walked through the door covered with dirt and said that Emmy had shook her fur (and consequently her odorous perfume) right as he took hold of her collar and then added that he was now covered in skunk dust.

Poor Stephane, he is in the bedroom once again, changing into his worn out shirt and old shorts at 10:30 P.M. on a Tuesday night to go outside and hose down our dog with skunk shampoo.

He deserves an honorary award.

The Amazing Skunk Cleaner Upper

Somehow, I don't think this is the best time to mention the award.

Emmy is now considered the largest skunk in the world.

Accountability - Is It Just A Word?

2007-07-19T18:14:00.000-05:00

Michael Vick, a famous NFL quarterback, is in the hot seat for pit bull fighting.
The article http://news.aol.com/sports/story/_a/vick-case-sheds-light-on-dogfighting/20070719101509990001 said law enforcement officials found a dog fighting ring along with many pit bulls and indications that dogs were hung, shot, and electrocuted if they did not win.

According to this article on AOL, by Kevin Johnson, “After a meeting involving NFL commissioner Roger Goodell and the Falcons, the league will let Vick keep playing, the Associated Press reported. The AP reported that a person with knowledge of the meeting, who requested anonymity so the case would not be influenced, said the NFL would stick to that position for the foreseeable future, despite its new personal-conduct policy.”

Please post how you feel regarding the NFL and other affiliates that are still supporting Michael Vick by allowing him to play. Michael Vick’s money making capabilities have overshadowed that using animals in any form of fighting is unethical and illegal and all those who participate, regardless if they are star athlete players, should be held accountable.

If you look at the comments at the bottom of the AOL article, you will see that as of this date, there are over 11,000 reader comments in regard to this case. This is just a small amount of the overall opinions on this matter. Most are asking that everyone email Roger Goodell and state they do not approve of the NFL allowing Vick to play until proven guilty. (I mean really people, it was at his house! How could he not know it was going on.) There is an opinion section at the bottom right corner of the web page where people are writing their negative comments. http://www.foxnews.com/sports/football/indes.html

The only way Michael Vick will be held accountable with the NFL is if people hold him and any of his supporters accountable. There are 11,000 angry comments on AOL. If everyone emails their opinion on the Fox website then perhaps it will matter. Address it to NFL commissioner Roger Goodell. Take the time right now because there are dogs out there that will never be given any time - to live a good life.

Botulism in Its Finest Form

2007-07-16T22:41:00.000-05:00

Today, I forwent my motherly duties and went to judge the Foods Competition at the 4H fairgrounds. 4H is a state wide organization where children enter projects such as foods, sewing, crafts, home decorating, demonstrations, and other areas where they are judged in their own county and have the chance to go on to the state fair for state champion in their division.

I was in 4H for 10 years. I loved it and I was quite happy when they asked me to judge one of the competitions. This afternoon, I was the judge for International Foods which included international cookies and quick breads. I had to taste around 15 cookies, but it was much better than the judge on my left who had to taste around 15 yeast and quick breads. How would you like to eat 15 bread products? And last year she said she had to taste well over 15 "bran" muffins! She said she was seriously sick for two days. By the time we were done, neither of us wanted to taste anything for quite awhile.

We also had the participant sitting in front of us while we judged. We had to ask the child questions and then score the product in front of them.

The majority of my cookies that I had to score were pretty good. In fact, I was worried it would be hard to pick a winner. Everyone was receiving a blue ribbon which is the highest ribbon. After four hours, when I thought we were done for the day, in comes “the one”, which Lord help me, I should have stayed clear away from. It didn’t necessarily look bad, but the taste, oh man, the taste.

It was a Polish kolacky cookie which most people have tried before since it’s a popular cookie. So I cut a bite size piece off one of the cookies and tasted it in front of her. Once it was in my mouth, I could clearly tell something was definitely not right. It was so awful I could hardly keep it in my mouth; all the while I’m sitting there smiling while this young girl who worked hard on these cookies is watching me. So I did what any moral person would do – I shared the cookies with my fellow judges.

I mean, what if it really wasn’t that horrible? Clearly I needed a second opinion. Maybe it was my imagination that I was eating something as nasty as curdled milk. The second judge (who didn’t have to judge my group, but I so graciously offered her a sample) tasted a piece and after seeing the look on her face, I knew I was right.

So usually, I’m supposed to tell the child their ribbon color before they get up, but this time, I told her she could leave and that I would fill out her evaluation later. I just didn’t know what to say it was so awful.

Once the girl was gone, I thought; why not share in the tasting? So I had the judge on the left of me taste it. She started chewing, let out an “Oh” groan and gave me a nasty look. She opened her mouth with the cookie chewed up inside and kept saying, “Oh, oh,” chewed a few more bites and said, “I think I need to spit this out.” I told her I would get her a paper towel but she looked around, realizing that we were in this big auditorium and someone such as the girl might be watching her so she continued to chew it up and said that it was the worst cookie she had ever tasted.

The conclusion – the judge on the right side of me thought the problem was spoiled cream cheese and the cookies could have been left all day in the girl’s car and the judge to the left of me thought the girl maybe didn’t wash her hands and they were not baked enough to kill the bacteria. But all three of us agreed we might end up with food poisoning. I felt really ill afterwards for several hours but luckily, I have had no real signs since then. And the sick feeling could have been from the fact that I had to taste 15 cookies.

It is now later in the evening and I can honestly say that I’m never eating another Polish kolacky cookie without looking it thoroughly over. And somehow, since I dream of things that bother me, I know I will end up dreaming of some giant raspberry filled kolacky in the sky with cream cheese that has gone bad.

Overall, I had fun and met some interesting people. I would do it again anytime.

Flowers Flowers Everywhere

2007-07-13T20:08:00.000-05:00

Today, I went to visit a client for work to set up services. Their front yard abounded in flowers - that is plastic flowers. I must say, when I go to The Dollar Store and see their unique variety of plastic flowers, my first inclination is not to landscape my yard with them. In fact, my first thought is, didn't putting plastic flowers ANYWHERE in or around your house go out in the 90's?

But, whatever floats a person's boat I say.

My mother did this before, or I should say, she had my dad do it. Planting plastic flowers that is. All I could say is, "No mother, just no. You're really not fooling anyone."

I mean, do people who do this really think other people can't tell the difference?

"Oh, your garden looks so beautiful. It's amazing, all the flowers are in bloom at the same time. But heh, weren't they also in bloom when we visited you at Christmas?"

"I just use an industrial strength fertilizer. They come out looking the same everytime."

So I go to my client's house, divert my eyes from the plenitude of plastic petals and safely make it into the house.

And then I go in and I see -

the green shag carpet.

Perhaps this topic, in all of its elegance, is best saved, for yet

another post.

A Short Story

2007-07-01T11:06:00.000-05:00

Babies love water.
Babies throw things in the water.
Babies throw EVERYTHING in the water.
These are just a few.

Olivia received a Water Wheel for her birthday.

She figured the doll baby needed a bath. So first it went in.

She then figured the baby had to have a stroller in the water. (She couldn't quite lift it up to get it in.)

And then went in the remote control which she kindly brought back to me, dripping with water. (She must have thought the baby wanted to watch T.V.)

Everything in our house will soon be in the water.

May they all rest in peace.

Quote of the Day

2007-06-17T11:24:00.000-05:00

My parents are visiting us this weekend to help watch the baby while my husband puts up our much needed fence (our dogs always think the grass is greener on the other side, in this case our neighbors yard), while I work on in house things.

My seventy-four-year-old dad, due to his age, was designated the "official babysitter" for the weekend. So he can sit down and take it easy while making sure our toddler doesn't put her fingers in the light sockets, doesn't eat anything off the floor, and doesn't get into anything that she shouldn't.

But since Olivia loves to run and be chased, it's more of him sitting down in a comfortable chair, her running into the kitchen, him getting up to bring her back, him sitting down, then her running into the library, him getting up again to go get her, him sitting down again - the process never ending. After awhile, what's the use of sitting in a chair at all he says. Poor dad, oh well, Happy Father's Day! Anyway, in the midst of his anxiety he yelled, "Someone turn on that purple boy show!"

I guess Barney, the dinosaur, has a new name - the illustrious Purple Boy.

But I ask you, does anyone really know if Barney is indeed a boy? Or perhaps the now deceased televangalist, Reverend Jerry Falwell, would have a different take all together: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/276677.stm

The Things We Try Even Though There Isn't Any Damn Way

2007-06-14T21:37:00.000-05:00

Picture of Emmy
Tonight, just after my husband arrived home, we decided to head for the park with two dogs and a toddler in tow. Olivia has finally learned to walk by herself and it took about ten minutes to pass two houses just to get to the park with the two dogs wanting to walk a million miles a minute while the toddler was well, toddling along behind – slowly.

At the park, Stephane headed over to the tennis court on site. He had the great idea for all of us to go inside, lock ourselves in and let the dogs and baby run free, uninhibited. After a few minutes, my husband gets the crazy idea that our dog, Emmy, who is a Labrador/Greyhound mix, can intuitively, if challenged, jump over the tennis court net, just like a poodle would do jumping through a hoop.

Now we all know how high a tennis court net is (unless you’ve been living under a rock all your life), and we all know that even for us to get over a tennis court net, we have to walk up to it, slowly put one leg over and then manipulate our other leg over, all while balancing ourselves and not falling over. So how is a medium size dog that took me a whole year just to train to sit, going to find the ambition to suddenly jump over a tennis court net, and the second question is, why?

But in any case, my husband felt she would do it. So he ran around the tennis net to the other side, called her, and then she came bounding toward him, went to the side where she could walk through between the two nets, and arrived next to him. Wagging her tail and happy as a clam.

“See I told you she wouldn’t do it. She’s not that dumb.”

“No, I think she will.”

So he ran again over to the other side of the net, yelled for her to come, and just like before, she ran around and met him there again. Wagging her tail, happy as a clam.

“How many times are you going to try this?”

But my words mean nothing when my husband is trying to prove something. After several times, he had Emmy, Daisy, and our toddler, Olivia, all coming to him when he called only now all three of them were walking to the end of the net and going through the opening of the two side by side tennis courts. Even Olivia, who just turned 15 months, was smart enough to know it would be a lot easier to follow the dogs and walk around than to try to jump over the tennis court net like “daddy” was proposing. There was no jumping the net for any of the three.

So I give my husband credit, because he tried, but even if he put two dog biscuits and a baby teething biscuit on the other side, there wasn't any damn way, any of them was even remotely considering jumping that tennis court net. But the good thing is that he tired them out with walking several times around that tennis court and right now, all three are sound asleep so I can write this. Now that’s progress.

Getting Ready for Grandma's House

2007-06-08T20:22:00.000-05:00

How I long for the days when we grabbed a change of clothing, bagged up our toothbrushes, jumped in the car and left for places unknown and of course “the parents house”. That was before family hood. Now it’s a regular event just to get ready to go to the actual event.

This weekend, a three hour drive away, will be my niece’s and nephew’s graduation party on Saturday. Both my husband and I just got home from a long work week and several things need to be done before we can leave for this trip: the lawn has to be mowed, the baby has to have a bath (her hair is sticky on one side), the litter box needs changed, all the pets need food for the weekend, we have to eat dinner and then we can start packing. Clothes for all, diapers (not for all), diaper wipes, toys, socks, clothes if it gets cold, clothes if it gets hot, pajamas, baby barrettes, camera for the party, two cards and two graduation gifts. I have to find a good book to bring because my sister doesn’t have cable, makeup, a brush, throw away any food that won’t make it until Sunday from the refrigerator, and we have to do laundry because I am out of underwear and we all (at one time in our life) have thought well, we’ll just go without it until we have time to do laundry. And that one experience was all that we needed to know, to never do it again.

And that is just the precursor to leaving for only a weekend trip with a baby. Maybe we just shouldn’t go and spend a nice relaxing weekend at home. (And the second I make this decision I know my mother will find out and I will start to receive a plethora of phone calls on my answering machine saying, “Debbie, where are you!”

And how do I know this? I received a guilt trip for the past month for deciding to go on our vacation (which we planned a year in advance) instead of going to the yearly family reunion. Let's see, a family reunion in the country eating fried chicken and sitting on fold away chairs or a Florida resort drinking margaritas and sitting on the beach. Hmm. Such hard decisions I have to make.

“But are you sure you don’t want to change your plans to come home a few days early and go to the family reunion?”

“No mother.”

“But. . .”

“No mother.”

Stay tuned because I have two vacation stories to post, and they are quite funny if I do say so myself. Just to give you a little idea so you will come back and read it.

The first story is about our Vacation in 2006 in Williamsburg and Hilton Head. I wrote this awhile back and never published it because I couldn’t find the pictures. And believe me; you have to see the pictures. I couldn’t figure out which title is better for this one. Either-
A Hurricane, a Cockroach, and a Cat
-Or-
A Hurricane, an Immensely Hairy Man and a Cat
(Cast your votes now. No, really don’t. I'm not as advanced as American Idol where you can call in and vote. And pay a $1 for it of course.)

The second story about our Vacation last week in Florida is,
Hotel Ceiling Chains, a Kentucky Faith Healer and Yes, another Cockroach

There were a lot of crazy things that happened. I’m not sure if I’m just around when craziness happens, or that I have an aura that draws this craziness to my life. Maybe it’s a unique perspective to see the insanity in everyone and everything. In any case, I hope it doesn’t indicate that I’m going to have some mental disability when I’m old and gray and be one of those people who end up in a mental ward, where I talk to myself and look out of iron barred windows saying, “Birdie, birdie.”

Shopping With A Toddler - The Dressing Room

2007-05-03T20:08:00.000-05:00

Today, I went to a clothes store, figuring I could tire out Olivia and find a few clothes for my vacation at the same time, multi-tasking at its finest. I would put her in a stroller, push her around and she could be visually stimulated while I looked for some summer tops.

As soon as I arrived, I realized it was a bad idea. As I looked at the clothes on the clearance rack I kept noticing clothes were falling off the rack that was a few feet over. One slowly went off, then another one with a little more speed and then another one.

I moved over so I could see what was messing with these clothes. As other customers have a propensity to see clothes on the floor and either walk over them or leave them there, I have the nagging sensation to pick them up and I didn't feel like dealing with some thoughtless shopper today.

I turned and looked down over by the other rack, and there was my one-year-old daughter pulling clothes off the hangers as she innocently sat in the stroller. "Um, no, don't do that," I said nicely. She turned away, slowly put her hands on another pair of hanging pants, looked back at me and slyly smiled. "No Olivia, don't do that."

Boom! She pulled the pants down and looked back, smiling. I knew there was no rationalizing with a semi-non-verbal toddler who only knows the words "do do" for doggy and "ditty" for kitty so I figured I was left to my own ingenuity to figure out how to solve the situation.

I moved the stroller over to a vantage point where she couldn't grab anything and went back to look for some summer tops. I looked back at her for some reason (call it mom's intuition that something must have been happening because she was too quiet) and there she was, standing straight up in the stroller. "No, sit down, you'll fall and get hurt." There I was again, trying to rationalize with her.

I finally found a few tops and went to the dressing room where the woman kindly told me that there weren't any dressing rooms big enough to fit a stroller inside so I could use the one at the end and leave the door open, while changing my clothes and while watching her in the stroller. I said to myself, "We're all women right?, I can watch a baby and change at the same time, right?," and since I've entered my 30's I really don't care anymore about a lot of the things I used to, so I blocked the open door with the stroller and was able to get my arm out of one sleeve until, the banging started.

Olivia was close to the door and thought it made a great noise to consistently and repetitively bang the wooden dressing room door against her stroller. I took her hand and said "No, don't do that Olivia." I tried to be have an even tone and look straight in her eyes. Where upon she slyly smiled at me again as she rested her hand on the door, and once I turned around, yes, the banging started once more. Okay, my multitasking session was not working. I was not wearing her out, but rather she was wearing me out.

I pushed the stroller out of the door, took her out and put her inside with me and then shut the door so we were both inside. "Ha ha," I said, "you're not going to get to bang on the door anymore." For which she fell to her knees and quickly crawled underneath the door. I, still in my bra, had to open the door, go outside (thank God I was still in the dressing area) and capture a fast moving toddler which was headed toward the outside of the store. I brought her back in, blocking underneath the door with my legs and then she decided to go back to banging again, only this time it was the dressing room mirror.

I thought I was losing it. I had been in the dressing room at that point for a half an hour and had only tried on two tops so I put her back in the stroller, strapped her down, and shut the door. Well actually, I kept the door cracked open an inch. I've learned you can never leave a toddler totally out of your sight.

Shopping with a toddler can never be confused with multitasking, it is more like multi-insanity.

Somehow I believe that later, I will see these as precious times instead of a stressful day. So many people say that children grow up quickly and to treasure each moment you have while they are young.

I know though, I will save this story for when she is older and she will be like any other teenager who says, "Mom, don't bring up that story again, your embarrassing me." And I will reply, "Until you have to run out of a dressing room chasing a baby in your bra, I think I have a few more times that I can remind you of the first time we went shopping together."

It’s A Bird, It’s A Plane, No, It’s a Black Hairy Tongue

2007-04-08T11:25:00.000-05:00

Ah, side effects. Every medication has a side effect, but do you ever really notice the side effects or care about them when you’re in the doctor’s office feeling like crap? And those beautiful drug commercials where the side effects are given at the end of the commercial in one of three ways: in fine print smaller than the human eye can see, told to us by some super sonic speed reader or gently flashed at the bottom of the screen while a woman in a bikini runs above to avert the commoners’ eyes.

But have you ever seen this side effect?
And no, this is NOT my tongue.

One which looks so gruesome it could be used in a midnight B movie on the Sci Fi Channel with some title like, Attack of the Killer Tongue or The Mutation Project.

On Saturday, I was prescribed penicillin for a cold and throat infection. After a few days, I finally decided to peruse the side effect sheet, you know the one that is on the medication bag and is consequently stapled shut from every angle. It stated, “Although uncommon, you may develop a black “hairy” tongue while taking this medication. This effect is harmless and usually goes away after treatment. Maintain good oral hygiene and brush your tongue with a soft toothbrush twice a day.”

“Stephane,” I yelled, “what the hell is a black hairy tongue? Quick, look at my tongue. I don’t want hair on my tongue!” I must say, I was not handling it well.

My husband grabbed the flash light and peered into my mouth. “I don’t see anything. What is it supposed to look like?”

“I don’t know,” I whined, “they call it a black hairy tongue so I guess it looks like a black hairy tongue.”

“I don’t know what a black hairy tongue is?”

“But do you see any hair on my tongue, any at all?”

“Well I don’t think so but I really don’t know what to compare it to?”

I run to the mirror in the bathroom and stick my tongue out as far as possible. After ten minutes, I concurred that I did not thankfully, have the dreaded black hairy tongue.

A week later, I am happy to report, I still do not have any kind of hair on my tongue. But it may be due to the fact that I have brushed my tongue more times than I can count - all to avoid looking like a space alien or monster from the deep. I did notice my husband hasn’t kissed me much this week. He says it’s because I have a horrible cold but I wonder?

I mean really, the sheet said it’s harmless. I shouldn’t worry - so you would think? But tell me, if your tongue turned out like the one in the picture, would you say to yourself, “Oh well, it’s completely harmless,” and then saunter off to work with your business suit and your black hairy tongue. I think not.

It may be physically harmless but nobody wants to be known as the Black Hairy Tongue Girl. Can you imagine how many of your friends would no longer let you taste any of their food because they can’t get that visual out of their mind? It's social suicide I tell you. On the other hand, it would make a great Halloween prop.

Happy Birthday Baby!

2007-04-05T17:20:00.000-05:00

A child's first birthday. Either you host the birthday party or you are part of one at some point and they are always, always over the top. When we started to plan our daughter's first birthday party we thought it would be something small, no fancy decorations, just an easy homemade cake. Well, that's how it was supposed to be anyway.

The whole event started at The Party Store where there are rows and rows of childhood necessities to make the ultimate birthday party. You're roped in when you hear the saleswoman say, "Oh, I've seen people spend $400 on their child's first birthday party."

You look in your cart where you have one Happy Birthday Banner, the cheapest invitations you could find, and a package of balloons to blow-up.

By the time you leave, you have everything matching in a certain theme of course, whether it be Strawberry Shortcake, Winnie the Pooh, Elmo or the tons of other child themed cartoon characters that are out there. By the time we left, we had matching napkins, hats, invitations, thank you cards, two banners; one for the kitchen and the living room, tablecloths, cake candles with press on figures, first birthday bib, first birthday sippie cup, first birthday crown and the ever dreaded piñata.

All for a small family affair, that is until your mother realizes you aren't inviting Aunt so and so, or the cousin who just moved back to town that you haven't seen since you were eight, or her friend from work who would love to attend because she says, "What a cute grandchild," every time your mother flashes your daughter's picture.

We decided to have dinner at the party which included a whole other set of issues. My sister-in-law doesn't eat certain types of meat and the meat she does eat, my only sister pretty much doesn't eat. And that pretty much leaves hamburger.

So I run down the list of what we could easily make since all of my family live three hours away in South Bend and all parties have to be there otherwise, I don't think anyone would attend.

Hamburgers would be okay, but it is too cold to grill outside, there's spaghetti which is pretty much the poor man's dinner (I mean really, you don't go to a special event and eat spaghetti with Prego sauce dumped on it), meatballs which personally I have no idea how to make, lasagna which takes a long time, so that left tacos. All of the high school/college kids that would be there like them, my nephew engulfs them and voila, it has hamburger! Not much in the way of gourmet food but I figure it'll pass.

The party was going to be held at 4:30 P.M. so the plan was to go and buy the balloons and then buy the groceries. The party/balloon store was very busy and when we finally arrived at the counter to buy balloons the cashiers were ready to get the order and get us out.

"We need some balloons," I told them.

And then the questions boomed out at me, "How many, what kind, how do you want them attached, did you want to order the twelve for this much or the four for this much, what kind of weight do you want them attached to, blah, blah, blah."

Since I have never bought balloons for anything before I started asking questions. This was where it started to go wrong. There wasn't room for questioning, not with a line of ten people behind me. After the balloons were added up, the cashier overheard me saying to my husband that we have to go to the grocery store now.

"You're not going to leave these balloons in the car are you?"

"Um," I said, "I was."

"Oh no, no, no. You can't do that, they'll pop."

I made a mental note to myself to check out a book called Ballooning 101 the next time I was at the library because obviously there is some science and preanalyzing that needs to be done before you step inside a balloon store.

I thought I would start the party with a few games. I happen to love party games, most of the adult population (and older relatives) do not like party games. Me asking the guests to write down on a piece of photo safe/acid free paper "Why is Olivia special?" for the scrapbook I was going to make was probably asking a bit much. By the time we got to how many M&M's are in the jar, I pretty much lost them.

After the games, we moved on to the taco dinner. Just saying "taco dinner" sounds like I had a trailor park birthday party. It's like those charity luncheons where you pay $50 dollars and expect chicken or steak and all they have is a table long sandwich from Subway. I guess that's why I wrote appetizers and dinner will be provided on the invitations instead of get ready for a taco dinner made from a Taco Bell kit.

After dinner, Olivia blew out her candle on her Care Bear cake. As you can see by the picture, she was not fond of having her hands covered in frosting. She first thought it was neat to stick her fingers in the cake, then looked at her fingers like, "How do you get this stinky junk off my hands?" and then it escalated to, "Someone get this stuff off my hands now!"

By the time we got to the presents, the party had been rather long. My brother was yawning and people were looking pretty bored. But the main thing is that we have pictures and when she grows up, she'll see that she was loved, even at the age of one little year.

The Beverly Hillbillies of Scrap Iron

2007-04-01T16:03:00.000-05:00

One trash day a year, our city has a free-for-all day, where citizens of an otherwise modest community group together to throw away their trash: busted television sets, broken refrigerators, rusted bicycles, stained mattresses and outdated computers – absolutely free of charge. No one garbage can maximum, no expensive yard stickers to buy, it’s a pure unadulterated garbage fest and people come out sliding, pushing, and carrying anything and everything to the curb that is both attached and unattached to their house for the next morning’s pick-up.

But here’s the clincher: before any city worker, recycle center or garbage truck can pick the stuff up the next morning it’s gone, all gone, or if you want to be exact, mostly gone.

I had heard of these zen masters of the recycle world. These phantom garbage men who slowly venture into the night when everyone is asleep, to scour the streets for trash items which can be recycled for profit, reused, or are being kept for some world’s greatest garage sale that nobody knows about. And I was bound and determined that day to see what all the commotion was about. Why did they come out when nobody was around?

Today, I knew they would be at their best because it was the one day they would be able to collect to their heart's content. They were sure to be on a regular rotation schedule, wanting to get all of the unwanted goods before the next day. I thought for sure I would be able to hear them coming, the truck shifting into high gear or at least jerking to a halt to deal with the excess junk in their trunk. But these were the Gods of garbage hunting. They knew how to swiftly drive by and collect without anyone ever noticing.

The morning started out well. My husband and I decided to first clear out the excess from the attic and upstairs. Out went an old shower door, a painting of a woodland scene on particle board that the previous owners so graciously left us, tubes from a make-shift outdoor cat cage and one bag of trash. After two hours, we decided to go down to the corner restaurant to eat breakfast and when we arrived home, the shower door was gone, snatched up in broad day light without me ever getting the chance to see who were these wanderlust collectors of well, crap.

Although I was dismayed, I was also undaunted. I told Stephane we had to put out more collectible and recyclable trash. I went to look around the house for products of value for which Stephane reminded me it's supposed to be stuff we don't want, not something we actually still use.

We decided to head out to the garage. There was an old stationary exercise bicycle, a rusty Schwinn bicycle, a garbage bag of plastic flower containers, and a bird house that leaked. And of course, plenty of those someday items which everyone stores in the garage, you know the ones that are kept there just in case someday you are in a situation where you might need them: renegade screws, plant food for the garden you never planted, lose boards, a left-handed work glove in case the mate is ever found. Yes, we got rid of it all. I had a monolithic mountain by the curb, bigger than any of garbage heaps on on the block, and I knew the truck had to be coming by soon, figuring that by some unknown ESP or hunting sense, the truck would know some irresistible treasure would be lurking in the vicinity and they would use their radar to find it.

Alas, this second round of trash Olympics was not going to be mine to win. Somewhere between walking twenty feet from the curb back to the garage, the exercise bicycle had been snatched. I went back again to the garage to tell Stephane and when we went back to the curb, the rusted Schwinn bicycle had been snatched too. That truck must have been on some super mega rotation schedule.

These people were playing hard ball and now and I had another plan in mind. I yelled back to my husband who was in the driveway, “Stephane, we need some major aluminum bait!”
We looked through the garage and there it was in the corner, almost as if it had a shining aura of godliness cast upon it, the piece de resistance - the bent aluminum tire rim from my car.

I first must admit, that with every item we hauled out, I asked the typical question that at least one person in every couple asks, “Can we use that for anything? Can it be fixed? What if we need it one day?” For which the sane person of the couple immediately replies, "no, no and no” and runs to the curb with it before the other person can think of some reason to save it. But with my bent aluminum tire rim, I was sacrificing it for an important purpose, to catch the Garbage collectors.

As I put my found treasure on the curb, I thought of how quickly the truck knew when I had put something out. There surely had to be some resident spy staged on every street, somehow being paid to look out of their window. I could just see the elderly woman down the street, the one who didn't like that we had our Christmas lights out after the snow melted, using a walkie talkie to inform Pedro or Bud, "The goods are out, the goods are out! Run and get the wheel rim from the white house!"

So I immediately looked at peoples' windows (especially hers) and glanced down both sides to see if some truck was posted at the end of the street, conveniently concealed by the trees, ready to make a quick drive by. But there was nothing.

I ran back into our house, went inside and concealed myself behind the window curtain. I was going to see what or who it was that came by and I had my camera just in case it was some ghostly garbage ghoul which plunged out of trash hell just to grab the goods.

I took a moment to stop and reflect, “What the hell was I doing? This had to be the lamest way to seek entertainment.” But then I realized most of my amusement had to come from our toddler, so by rights, I had a reason for this insanity. And then it happened, from the beginning of the street, I heard it coming. I knew it was coming. The abominable truck. There was no mistaking it, for if you looked at the picture, there is never a truck like this one parked next to you at work. It was slowly inching itself towards my shiny aluminum tire rim.

I ran out the door to take a picture of the truck, maybe to prove to myself it really did exist. If the men wondered why the crazy woman on her front lawn was taking pictures of them picking up trash, they did not seem to care. They were on a mission. I would have loved to go on their adventure, interview them for some newspaper column, "What junk is valuable? Has their truck ever turned over from too much poundage? Have they ever ran into a homeowner running out the front door with a shot gun yelling, 'Get away from my yard.'" You know, the usual questions. Just as reporters like to go on beats with cops so too, would I like to see the peril and personage these people commit to once a year.

They ended up coming around about ten more times before I finally got bored and went to take a nap. I guess they were desperate to get the best goods from a day that was almost done. After I woke up, Stephane told me that he took out the broken dryer to the curb. The man stopped again and actually called for back up for our monolithic appliance that he could probably get top dollar for and didn’t want to leave behind. I went to drop off some library books and noticed everyone who had been hauling things outside had stopped for the day and most of the items had been taken except for the real trash. I guess you can’t get any money for banana peels, dirty diapers and old coffee grounds.

So in reflection, I take my hat off to you O Beverly Hillbillies of Scrap Iron: for being the purveyors of Al Gore’s initiative, for saving unwanted stuff from certain doom in the junk yard, and for taking the time to do the hard work so you can make the money to feed your families. And if you remember the long ago show, The Beverly Hillbillies, you will see that they ended up filling their truck with junk too, hoping for a better life. (Although the truck I saw contained junk and scrap iron and apparently, the Beverly Hillbillies truck contains junk and grocery bags of Kellogg's Cornflakes. A product placement if I ever saw one.)

And somewhere near or far, I believe my prized bent aluminum tire rim is being melted into something better and its life will again be of value. So when you go to a tire store or used car lot, be on the look out for a tire rim which has an aura of Godliness shining upon it, for it just may be my treasured bait, all shiny and new because someone valued it enough to save it.

So in honor of my day of free entertainment with the hillbillies of Scrap Iron, I say a fond farewell, with a verse from the Beverly Hillbillies song:

Well now its time to say good-bye to Jed and all his kin

And they would like to thank you folks fer kindly droppin in

You're all invited back again to this locality

To have a heapin helpin of their hospitality

Hillbilly that is. Set a spell. Take your shoes off.

Y'all come back now, y'hear?

Dogs - The Houdinis of Food

2007-03-10T13:09:00.000-06:00

A dog’s bed is not merely for sleeping, but a catch-all for every little conquest your dog has made for the day: your brand new shoes, a dirty wash towel from your laundry hamper, the Styrofoam container from the trash that holds the meat you buy, chicken bones and any scented wrapper, peeling or paper towel that had fallen off the counter or was conveniently left head deep in the trash container. As you can see by the picture, even if the cat ventures to take a nap in their sleeping quarters, a dog will claim him too.

Dogs' beds are their sanctuaries and they believe anything they can find in the house and cleverly put on their mat before you notice is their domain to claim – it’s dogs law.

Yesterday morning, before work, I noticed a conspicuously concealed EMPTY box of Cepacol cough lozenges located in our dog’s bed, six of them in total were missing. Knowing that medication can be poisonous to animals, I did what any woman would naturally do in this type of situation, I called my husband.

He of course, had no idea if it would cause any harm, after all he reminded me that he isn’t a pharmacist, a vet and never worked for poison control. He did say that since Cepacol is a numbing agent for the throat, our dog wouldn’t be able to feel her mouth for several hours.

He told me to call a vet, which was an obvious answer, but still, aren't husbands supposed to know everything? How to repair a drain leak, how to install wood floors, how many tablespoons of flour are in a cup, how to drive to a place three states over, how to disinfect a dog after she was sprayed by a skunk and how to program the DVD player? (Okay, maybe not, and maybe not any of the things I just typed either.)

The first vet said to call poison control and there would be a $50 dollar charge. So far we have shelled out countless amounts of money for our pets, the emergency room visit when our little cat, Chewie, sat down near a lit candle and suddenly poof, his tail was smoking, which is just one in many, many incidents. So I called another vet who kindly told me that Cepacol shouldn't be poisonous, but to watch and make sure the dog isn’t lethargic and doesn't throw-up.

So I go outside to get our two dogs after their potty break and luckily, Daisy, our dog, doesn’t seem lethargic. She is doing her usual thing, sitting at the bottom of a large tree, waiting for a squirrel to venture down so she can chase it and humor herself into thinking she's going to be able to catch it. After five years here, and no squirrel caught, you would think she would give up but I guess it all has to do with the thrill of the chase. (She wouldn't know what to do with it anyway if she caught it.)

I was pretty happy that she was okay until I saw the three big white spots on the back porch. I freaked out; my dog must be throwing up or worse, foaming at the mouth. After inspecting what appeared to be throw-up and looking for half-digested throat lozenges, I soon realized I was looking through residual snow. Not one of my finest moments.

The moral of this story: don't leave anything anywhere that your dog can root through (like the trash), sniff around and grab (like something on your bedside table), nothing on the counter they can slide off with their tongue (I found our big dog licking the steaks in the frying pan once and yes, we did throw them away), don't let your dogs have access to your cat's or rabbit's food (I have found countless Collard greens in the dog's bed because they "think" they like it, they know they want it, but after chewing it, they realize they aren't too enthused about it, yet still they want it near their dog bed for ownership purposes), and never ever leave a tuna fish can (empty or totally sealed shut) anywhere in the vicinity because they will bite through the steel for their absolute favorite – tuna fish. Believe me, the can will be chewed up and licked clean. (They even like it more than chocolate, the absolute food they can't eat, but they'll try everytime.)

So the next time you find something missing, scamper over to your dog’s bed and if it’s not there, it’s probably in their next best hiding place – their stomach.

Never a Boring Moment at the Library

2007-03-05T23:34:00.001-06:00

Okay, this isn't one of my better life lessons. But it will teach you all to be leery of the library and to certainly bring a Glade scented spray can with you. I wonder if that would be flammable around a fireplace?

As many of you know, I took a much needed break for part of the week from work. Since my sister is watching Olivia (my daughter), Stephane (my husband) and I decided to go to the library for the first time since Olivia was born. We went to sit in the quiet room, an ultra modern enclosed room with plenty of seats and four fireplaces, all to create the perfect ambiance for reading a great book. I was ready for a long hour of silence: no baby crying, no dogs barking, no dishes to be done. The perfect atmosphere.

As we sat down in two vacant chairs, Stephane announced that he had to go to the bathroom.

"But I don't have a book yet to read," I told him. I didn't want to just sit there looking at the two other people in the room on a Sunday afternoon.

"There is a book on one of those fireplaces," he said and turned around and left.

"Well at least there is something to read," I told myself, never liking to be without a book if I have nothing to do.

I went to pick the book up and was able to get to the second sentence until I realized I had no idea what I was reading. It was called Exercises in Electrical and Magnetic Measurement. I put that book down faster than I found it. I looked around and found Stephane's work notebook near his coat. Maybe I could find something illicit and not for me to see in it. For the next fifteen minutes, I read notes and entries regarding computer programs. I've never been so bored in my life.

After Stephane came back twenty minutes later I went to get some books and came back. The fireplace was going full blast, which made it extremely hot. I pushed my chair back, further back, and then further back again, until I was sitting right next to a man who I presumed was homeless based on his fashion sense and well, he was sleeping.

Now I first encountered snoring from our dog Emmy, then Stephane when he's tired, then Olivia when she has a cold. It's a regular musical production at night in our bedroom and now I went all the way to the library to hear the homeless man snore. Not the quiet, even tempered snoring that could possibly go with the crackling of the fireplace and the slow cascade of water from the Zen fountain in the corner, but the deep guttural snoring where occasionally one gets tripped up in their breathing, coughs something up, looks up for a moment wondering where they are and then hunkers down in their chair again, dead asleep and snoring once more.

I look around to see if anyone else found it funny that this man is snoring in the "quiet room" where the silence is deafening. Stephane looks at me, notices it for a brief moment and then goes back to reading his book. Finally, I'm into the whole rhythm of the snoring, the Zen fountain and the fireplace, combining them until they all cancel each other out, until suddenly a bang erupts and I look at Stephane to ask him what it was. Stephane looks at me and whispers, "I think he just tooted."

Oh the joys of communal places.

Everything else went well. There were only two other incidents that happened. I went to walk three dogs in the freezing weather and they ended up all getting wrapped around a telephone pole. It took 15 minutes weaving three leashes in and out until finally the dogs (and me) weren't all attached to the pole anymore. The other thing that happened was that we heard this loud boom one night. We had thought one of our pets knocked something over until around midnight, I yelled from the bathroom, "Stephane, the bathroom ceiling fell in!" (And yes, it really did.) So besides those three things, everything else went quite well.