I am doing Weight Watchers and have been for about four months.  It’s going okay – not super fast but in a healthy average of one or two pounds a week.  Just like the company goal says.  About a month ago, I hit a plateau and stayed about the same for almost three weeks.  I told the leader after one meeting we had about “preparing for your weight loss road trip”, that on the road trip, I seemed to be stuck on a scenic outlook.

What I needed was an inspiration.  It was the inspiration of hearing my parents talk conspiratorially about how fat I had gotten since Nathan was born that drove me to WW in the first place, and I needed some more inspiration.  Not that I needed to eavesdrop on my parents chatting about how the baby weight seemed to be sticking around again, something different.  I got it today.

I was getting dressed for work and my son came up behind me and began hitting me on the rear end.

“Butt!  Butt!  Butt!”  he said.

Out of the mouths of babes.

I’m really really sorry. I wanted to post everyday – I set myself a goal and everything.

I suck at goals.

But I’m back, and I came armed with excuses! This is why I didn’t post:

My inlaws were in town. I love my inlaws, they’re great and I enjoy having them and all houseguests. I swear – really, I do.

But whenever I have houseguests I lose my office. The computer is in the office and it doubles as our spare room. We used to keep the computer (okay, a computer, not the only one) in the big living room, but it was hard for my husband to concentrate on his WOW. That’s World of Warcraft for those who don’t spend a lot of time staring at the back of the head of their significant other, or who “don’t have a true appreciation….” as my MIL would say. Apparently it’s more difficult to play make believe swordfighting and questing (and smelting and pretending you can fly from continent to continent astride a half bird, half lion creature; hence my nickname of “Eaglebutt” for the entire game) when there is cooking, tv, a child, and other domestic things rudely going on right in front of you. At any rate, the newest computer moved to the office, where the door can be shut, the light can go off, and it is easier to play a game in peace. The old computer joined the second and third oldest computers in the closet. And hence, I periodically cannot get at the computer due to houseguests or a really long swordfight with a slimy sloth demon.

I do not have a true appreciation.

So Nana and Papa came to visit, fun was had and many picture books were read to little Nathan, who is going through some sort of language explosion and demands that books be read constantly. Like over 50 a day. It’s lucky for him that Nana came when she did, since Mommy needed a break before she threw herself under the wheels on the bus that go round and round. I actually took the books and put them in a closed cabinet, partly so that the dog would stop chewing them but partly in hopes that there might be a little out of sight, out of mind benefit. Instead my son gets up, gets dressed, and before even getting a cup of milk in the morning goes directly to the bookcase and hurls his entire body weight against it, screaming.

“Fishy. Fishy. FISHY. FISHY FISHYFISHYFISHY. ” which, when translated means:

“Good morning, mother. Before we begin the day with a glass of milk or a banana, I believe I would like to set the tone for our breakfast by reading the pithy underwater classic Hello, Fish by the lovely and talented Lucy Cousins.”

Thank God Nana came. I told my mother about their visit and not to be outdone, she immediately booked airline tickets for September. Mom gets antsy if she hasn’t seen the grandkid in a few months, and the inlaws live nearby the other grandkid, so they are more patient. I expect my parents will visit more frequently since the both retired last year.

Anyway, expect more soon and be sure to comment and tell me how you deal with the WOW widowhood, or handling your kid’s favorite book or toy obsession. Or even how to deal time fairly between the grandparents.

Sorry about the delay with new posts! I got temporarily kicked out of my study by my ill husband – whenever he gets sick he likes to sleep in the study and I usually post at night. Husbands are funny when they are sick. But mine finally moved back into the master bedroom and I get the computer back (hooray!).

My son has learned many new skills this week, including disciplining our dog. She’s having some difficulty in getting completely housebroken (the dog, not the kid. Well, actually both but we just started with the kid.), and I find myself leading her over to her shit poop mistakes, and telling her firmly, “NO. BAD DOG.” Then along comes Nathan to shake his finger and make the angry face. It’s kind of cute, but not when he tries spanking Shelby. I don’t spank Shelby, so I’m not sure where he’s getting this, but I about had a heart attack the first time I saw it.

She’s a good natured dog, and Nathan’s not very serious about it. I saw him try to spank her yesterday when they were outside and Shelby just turned around and licked his ear. Shelby has her faults, though. She’s been treating Nathan’s board books very poorly – there’s a basket full of them in the entertainment center and she seems to think it’s some sort of yummy buffet. Every morning I would come out of the bedroom to find another Winny the Pooh in pieces all over the living room. So I had to move most of his books to a secure location in my new fabulous bookcase. It’s a little too secure, since Nathan can’t figure out how to open the latch on the door; he just knocks on it like the books inside are going to open the door for him. Then he gets frustrated, cries, and turns around and throws his cup across the room. Fun times. Is anyone else’s 19 month old doing this? Of course they are. But my kid has been good natured for so long that this tantrum tossing of objects is almost shocking. Apparently it’s just a taste of the good times to come.

By the way, fabulous bookcase is in italics because a nice mommy friend of mine, Karen, was moving and decided that it no longer fit in with her decor, so she sold it to me at a very good price and now my whole living room looks perfect. She even got her husband and his friend to come and bring it to my house. I know the living room is perfect because I rearranged it 3 times on Sunday – even moving the SLEEPER SOFA twice by myself. I had to do it myself because my husband was sick. Good thing I’m a loving wife or that shit would have pissed me off….. wait, he reads the blog. Love ya, babe. At least I didn’t go into details about your illness, right?

I went today a brand new book club that had it’s first meeting tonight.  I was really excited to see women that I neither worked with nor raised my kid near.  There were single ladies, and really diverse ages and professions.  We actually discussed the book in-depth.  I am so jazzed.  I was in a book club last year that degenerated into snobby husband bashing and torrid gossip, so this one seems different enough that I will definitely attend regularly.  We had off topic conversation, but afterwards.  Over drinks.

So obviously it’s the group for me!

I am glad to see other women who are voluntarily reading.  I hear so many people who say, Oh, I haven’t read a book in years. . . or When do you find the time. . . or The last book I read was in high school english.  I’m not trying to be snotty and I know it’s not recreational for everyone.  I claim the time.  I love to read, and I’m not particular about the topic or anything.  I read before I go to bed, when I’m in the bathroom, when I take the dog out.  I read during the commercials when I watch TV and while I eat lunch.  It’s just something I’ve always done, and I’ll be damned if I give that particular thing up.  I don’t mind sacrificing things to stay at home with my son.  Or to the altar of marriage, or whatever.  But you would have to pry the book out of my cold, dead hands.

My husband often has to get up in the middle of the night to turn off my bedside lamp, because the noise of the book hitting the floor beside my bed as it fell out of my hand has failed to rouse me.  I think this habit of mine might be a contributing factor to why he feels the need to sleep with two fans aimed at his head while under 3 blankets tucked up to his eyebrows.

I sent my husband to work yesterday in dirty underwear.

Don’t get me wrong – I do the laundry.  I wash every other day or so; everything that makes it into the hamper gets washed, dried, folded or hung up.  The making it into the hamper thing is the problem.  I don’t know why but my husband has some problems with this part.  The hamper is so very, very far away.  I’ve tucked it in the middle of a doorway in between the master bedroom and the attached master bath.

For some reason, he tends to take off his stuff and drop it on the floor beside the bed.  At first, I would pick it up and put it in the hamper.  I did that for a year or more.  Then I would nag him and leave the clothes in drifts on the floor.  But this bothered me after a while – I don’t like being a nag (although I’m sure he would beg to differ) and I don’t like having clothes in drifts on the floor.  So then I tried washing it but putting it away in the wrong spot.  After all, he left the dirty laundry in the wrong spot, right?

So a few weeks after this started he told me – “I’m out of undershirts.”

“No, you’re not.  I put them away in an inconvenient spot.”

“Huh?  Are you changing the bedroom drawers around?”

“No, you left the laundry in the wrong spot, so I just started putting things away in the wrong spot.”

“Jesus Christ, are you on that laundry thing again?  Where did you hide my undershirts?”

So after he found them in the television dresser, he got a bit better about the laundry hamper and I felt exultant about my excellent solution.  But it didn’t stick.  Soon the pile beside the bed had begun to grow again.  I even got him his own special hamper, adjacent to the spot where he habitually left everything anyway.  The pile would grow around the hamper, but when I opened the lid I would discover the actual hamper was empty.

So a few weeks ago I decided that was his way of volunteering to wash his own clothes.  Not all of them, just his own special piles.  I started picking up the piles and placing them in his special hamper.  The underwear drawer got emptier and emptier, his workout shorts disappeared, his supply of jeans started dwindling.  The hamper was filling up, all unbeknownst to my husband.

Finally I woke up yesterday morning to the sound of my husband rummaging through the unused cabinet under the television.  He must of thought I was putting things away in the wrong places again.

“What are you looking for?” I asked from the bed.

“I can’t find my underwear.”

“It’s probably in the hamper.”

He looked into the empty laundry hamper.  Then he left and went to look in the dryer.

“I don’t understand.  Where did it all go?” he asked.

“No, it’s in your special hamper.”

“Please don’t mess with me, it’s 5:30 in the morning.”

I explained that I felt that his inability to find the laundry hamper was frustrating, and we’d talked about it so many times, so I decided that was his way of volunteering to do certain segments of his own laundry.

He opened up the special hamper and found it chock full of his favorite clothes.

“I left all this on the floor?”

“Yep.”

“Oh.”  He didn’t really have a lot to say.  So he dug through and picked out a pair of his underwear, which went into the hamper a bit used and was probably not much improved by mingling so closely with his workout clothes.  He shrugged and put them on.

“Yuck, baby.  Why don’t you wear one of the ones in the other drawer, the old ones without the comfortsoft waist?”

“Nope.”

So he went off to work in dirty undies, his way of taking his medicine or of showing me who’s boss, I’m not sure which.

In the interest of full disclosure, I should note that when he did all the special hamper laundry, he did find two bras and a pair of my underwear intermingled in.

“SEE!  It’s not just me!”  He was so proud of that discovery.

Oops.

My son has had a lot of gas lately. He farts. It’s kind of gross, and kind of funny. He’s farted on his Daddy’s lap, into my hand when I’m changing him, while he’s walking around.

He comes by it honestly. I’m a champion farter myself. I get a lot of gas when I’m at work, inexplicably. I would say that I don’t have any control over it, but I only seem to fart in the common areas and in the sections of servers I don’t like. Never at my own tables. It’s gotten to be so commonplace that I don’t even notice after a while. This completely grosses out my husband, whose asshole is so tightly controlled that he never audibly emits the smallest peep. Mine are sometimes silent but more often they are loud. Not very ladylike, but there you go.

Why the hell am I writing about this? Well, it’s because I was just checking my email and I became convinced that Shelby (our puppy) had done her business in the house again. I was sitting at the computer and *sniff*.

“Goddammit, Shelby!” The hunt was on – I searched the house for the verboten pile of crap that Shelby leaves on the floor on an all too regular basis. I checked the living room, the bedrooms, the hallway. No poop – so I did it again. The dog followed me around, looking confused.

Damn right she was confused. I eventually realized that the smell was actually a stray fart I had let out without really being aware of it.

Beano does nothing. It’s like a disability, except there’s no special tag for your car.

There are quite a few things about my son that remind me of his father.

His bright blue eyes.

How he frowns when he is concentrating . . . or pooping.

The little lines he gets under his eyes when he is tired.

His love of milk.

His marathon napping.

The wonderful way they both sleep on their tummies with their heinies pointed towards heaven.

How they both would be perfectly content to eat the same thing every day.

I love my husband and I love my son so much.  I can’t even write any more because I’m sitting here tearing up.  Go hug your family.

Back in my BC (before child) life, I was a restaurant manager. I think corporate, plus lower and mid management, so it tends to leech some of the personality out of you. I enjoy restaurants and the situations between the staff and the guests; the general soap opera of a big restaurant is a lot of fun. But when you’re the boss – the fun is something you look at and observe, but not really something you DO.

Now I have a child, and for right now and most of the foreseeable future ( I tend not to foresee more than 8 years down the road ) I can’t do what I did before. The hours were grueling and the schedule was crap – 7am to 7 pm on Monday, then 3pm to midnight for two days, then take Thursday off and come back for a lovely 10 am to 10 pm shift for Friday and Saturday. Sunday might be your day off, but we’re having inventory or the truck order or whatever, so we need you to come in anyway. The next week is totally different, and you can’t even begin to schedule child care or even on some days see your kid with a work schedule like this.

But I can’t just stay at home – I need the outside interaction, the soap opera. So I took a job last year waiting tables. I had spent too long on the other side of the spectrum to get into being a server at first. It’s fun, but I wasn’t really having the kind of fun I remember having back before I went into management in my early twenties. I’m also not drunk nearly as much and I go home every night, so many things are different from that time in my life.

But every once in a while I can catch a glimpse, feel the attitude change a bit.

I had a table tonight – four ladies who were obviously close friends and were quite fun. They had candid conversation over the menus and a few glasses of wine. It took them a while with the menu, and I came back a couple of times to check on them before they even got to the stage where they could formulate questions. The first lady asked me about a dish, it wasn’t really one of my favorites, plus it normally has salsa on it and we were out. . . so she was begging to be talked out of it.

“I don’t know, I was thinking about the Orange Chicken,” said Lady One.

“You should definitely get the Orange Chicken.” I told her.

“Why? I’m just curious,” asked Lady Two.

“The tortillas are really forgettable. Orange Chicken, that’s something you’ll dream about at night – if she went with the tortillas, she’d have forgotten what she ate for dinner by the time she goes to sleep tonight. Orange Chicken is definitely the way to go – it’s not too spicy, but the sauce is the perfect blend of sweet and spicy.” I don’t hide my love affair with some of our dishes – if someone asks about one of them I am happy to paint them a picture.

Lady One goes on to admit that the real reason she wanted the tortillas is because of the tamale cakes – and the whole table starts talking about how much they all love them, so I convince them the way to go is to order that as an appetizer and then people can get the main course they really want.

Now Lady Two wants me to help her decide between Orange Chicken and another of my favorites. I tell her to get the other so everyone has something different. It’s time for Lady Three to order.

“I don’t know – what am I going dream about tonight?” Lady Three asks wistfully.

“I am so sorry, ma’am. We are out of sausages.”

You could have heard a pin drop.

For one long, long second I fear I have seriously misjudged this tables comfort level with each other and me, since we have only just started their meal. It’s a bit early to develop the playful side, and I did deliver the line deadpan – which can take some getting used to. But it was so perfect and it just fell out of my mouth – one of those things that most of the time you think of hours later but this time it was right there. . . so I said it.

The ladies looked at me. I looked at them.

We all started laughing at once.

That’s why I can’t seem to get out of the business, even though I’ve changed my path now. That will cheer me up through quite a few bad tips and lousy sections. But it’s little things like that which show me that slowly my brain is moving out of manager mode and into a place which is much more relaxed.

I gave my blog address to some people – time to come out of the shadows and commit to letting my friends read it.  I’m still not going to tell my mom, though.  So leave me a comment if you want – that way I can be sure people are out there.

Green Eggs and Ham

It’s been in my head for a while.  The queer nexus of my former odd obsessions with Canadian folk pop and my current mommydom.  Does anyone else have this perfect mixture hanging around in their subconscious?

It’s late and I have a lot of stuff to read – I just picked up the first selection for my bookclub.  We meet in less than a week.  I’m a quick reader, though, so it should be okay.

I had to take everything out of our house and pile it in the garage.  After the debacle with the dog while I was in Atlanta, the carpets had gone from looking rough to completely unacceptable.  I went through the service listings for cleaning on craigslist to find a carpet cleaner.  Note to all those interested in carpet cleaning:  you may want to be more specific when searching, since just cleaning brings up a lot of nude housecleaners.  Which are interesting ads to look at but I doubt they pack a steam cleaner.

So these guys came to my house to clean the place with a rotovac.  They did the typical thing at first and gave me an estimate that was 50% higher than the advertised price, but they backed down almost immediately when I argued with them graciously pointed out the wording of the craigslist ad.  My husband stands in awe of my negotiation abilities, but he once paid sticker price for a brand new Nissan Pathfinder, so it’s not hard to impress him.  I had them do Nathan’s room first, so after it was done, I snuck him in there and put him down for a nap.  He slept through the whole thing and for a couple hours after they were done, too.  Impressed the hell out of one of the carpet cleaners, a relatively new father who is tiptoeing around his house when his wee ones are sleeping.  I told him the machine was like white noise and actually made it easier for babies to sleep unless you train them to need silence.  Like I know – my kid could sleep through a war; I think he was born tired.

So we went out to dinner and then came home, took the dog out of the cage, and she immediately peed on the floor.  After being taken out, I mean.  So my pristine carpet lasted for all of 6 hours, and only that long because we caged the dog and ran away from the house while the floors were drying.

Dammit.