It's Friday night and Husband's asleep: HELLO, Mr. Pinot G!

This morning I was reading Babytalk magazine, which I get each month because I filled out a whole bunch of GET THIS FREE cards at the pediatrician's office one time. This month's issue had two things that I MUST share. The first is a "how to prepare for nursing" spoof. Here are a few of my favorites:

• Gently rub your nipples with sandpaper.
• At bedtime, set your alarm clock to go off every two hours. Each time it rings, spend 20 minutes sitting in a rocking chair with your nipples clamped in a pair of chip clips.
• Draw branching ilnes all over your chest with a blue-green marker, then stand in front of your bathroom mirror and sing "I Feel Pretty."
• Fit the hose of a vacuum cleaner over one breast and set on "medium pile." Turn off vacuum when nipple is three inches long. Switch.
• Obtain "CAUTION" tape from your local police station, then wrap firmly around your chest. When your spouse asks about it, say, "Get used to it."
• Record your mother proclaiming, "Just give the baby some cereal like God intended, and he'll sleep right through the night." Play in an endless loop at 1 a.m., 3 a.m., and 5 a.m.
• Slather your breasts with peanut butter, top with birdseed, and stand very still in your backyard.
  

And my personal favorite:

• Suckle a wolverine.
  

I love it. Why can't I think of funny stuff like that and make money getting it published in magazines? Hmph.

The other great thing I read was about germy strangers trying to touch your baby. The advice was to say, "Oh, you might not want to touch him, he's got a little cold," rather than something like, "Keep your viral paws off my baby." So today while The Goose and I were out for our morning hike (he was in the backpack carrier), we happened upon one such germy individual and I tried the advice. Here's the conversation that followed:

Happily Hiking Female Virus Carrier (heretoafter HHFVC): Oh, look at him. Hi little fella ... oh, you wanna shake my hand?

Kim: Oh, you might not want to touch him, he's got a little cold.

HHFVC: Oh, don't worry about it. I don't get sick. I do energy work.

Kim: Oh. Well. Ummm.

(uncomfortable silence)

HHFVC: Yeah, my nine-year-old son gets those throwing-up-on-the-living-room-floor viruses and I take care of him and I never get sick because of my energy and frequencies.

Kim: Oh. Well. Ummm.

HHFVC: Do you know what I'm talking about?

Kim: Ummm. Well.

(uncomfortable silence)

Kim: I guess not.

HHFVC: I work with the energy fields in my body to allay sickness and disease. I never get sick. I just tap into a frequency and channel energy into the part of me that is diseased, and the energy frees my blockages and cures me.

Kim: Oh. Well. Ummm.

(uncomfortable silence)

Kim: Do you do that to your son when he's got the throw-up viruses?

HHFVC: I don't have to ... he has the energy too. I gave it to him.

Kim: Oh. Well. Ummm, so why does he get sick then?

HHFVC: Do you want to try it?

Kim: Oh. Well. Ummm, I'm not sick.

HHFVC: It doesn't matter. But I don't want to scare you. I mean, what's your background?

(Writer's note: How the hell was I supposed to answer this question? I thought of several options, since I had plenty of time to think, since uncomfortable silences were starting to get more and more comfortable. I considered, "Well, I grew up Baptist but then went to a Methodist college and now I read a lot about Taoism (but don't tell my parents) and do yoga." What would YOU have said? I asked Husband this same question and he answered, "Kim, I wouldn't have made it that far into the conversation.")

Kim: Well, ummm ... I do yoga?

HHFVC: Oh, OK, so your energy fields are probably open a little already. Hold out your hand.

(Kim holds out hand. HHFVC puts one hand above and one hand below (hovering above my hands) and begins moving them in a circular pattern.)

HHFVC: Can you feel that?

Kim: Oh. Well. Ummm.

(uncomfortable silence)

Kim: Yes?

HHFVC: See ... that's what it's like. I do workshops. Here's my card. Have a great hike.

Lord God in Heaven! How do I manage to get into these conversations with crazies? Every crazy in the city limits will eventually find me, I'm sure of it. It does make for good stories, but I just hope I don't catch some disgusting virus from them.

Later today, I turned The Goose loose in the backyard with his push cart (looks like this:)
and freed the chickens from their coop. I fed them some leftover capellini pomodora (sp?) and then sat there drinking wine and watching him chase them around and cackling sadistically each time he got close to a tailfeather bump. Then he fell over and I had to go attend to him and one of the chickens ran up to me (everytime you move from a stationary position, they think you're bringing scraps to dump into the yard for them to feast on). I wasn't really paying attention to the chicken because I was trying to upright The Goose when all of a sudden that blasted chicken pecked my left ring toe and drew blood.

Prior to this event, I have never been unkind to animals, even when dogs play bite or cats claw gashes into my arms. I've never lashed out. But today I lost all control and I kicked that damn chicken across the yard.

Now before you get all uppity and start calling the Humane Society, please go to your nearest library or bookstore and read the article on bird flu from the latest issue of National Geographic. This article explains how some Thai people suck the wounds of their prize fighting cocks and thus get infected with the virus and then pass it on to other humans and then people die and then one day one of them is going to get on a plane and bring it over here to us. Or either some infected bird will stow away on a ship or a plane and will infect the U.S. wild bird population, which will, in turn infect free-range poultry like our girls and then PECK, Kim gets pecked (and it draws blood!) and then BAM, Kim gets bird flu. However, it probably won't matter because by that time I will have already contracted Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (Mad Cow Disease) and will be gnawing on my own fingers somewhere in a middle Tennessee mental hospital.

So that's why I kicked that stupid chicken. She had poop caked on her tailfeathers anyway and the blow knocked it loose, so she should be happy that I helped her out. And if anyone of those bitches goes anywhere near my Goose then I will ring their necks like Renee Zellweger's character, Ruby, in Cold Mountain. Don't think I won't. Don't think I can't. Even if I couldn't, there's a loaded .22 in the closet upstairs.

Have a good weekend.

It's Thursday night & Husband's working: HELLO, Mr. Red Stripe!

Tonight I'm just sitting here drinking red stripe and listening to the baby cough in his sleep through the monitor. What's new?

The big news is that we are now minus one wedding ring. Don't worry, it's not my antique engagement ring. It's the one that I gave to Husband. The one with "put it back on" engraved on the inside. The one I spent my hard-earned Delta teaching money on.

It all started with this Tuesday-morning basketball obsession that he has. He makes the trek down south to Williamson County to play ball at this rec center where he gets in for $3 even though he should pay $5 since he is not a Williamson County resident. To avoid this fee, he always pays cash. He's sneaky like that. While he's down there in Suburbia, he does our grocery shopping and picks up the chicken feed at the Co-op. Lovely little ritual.

Well last Tuesday he broke his finger during some ball exchange with a big red-headed fella. The ring was already too tight ("but not in the winter" he says), and of course when you break a finger, it swells. He said he was getting claustrophobic about the ring. I know first-hand that this ring claustrophobia stuff really does happen to people (normal people, I mean) because one time when I was teaching music history at T.L. Weston High School in Greenville, MS, my student Romelda Robinson had a nervous breakdown in the middle of a class on Medieval monophonic Gregorian chanting because her ring wouldn't come off.

So Husband dealt with it for a couple of days but then came home yesterday with the ring in his hand, not on his finger. He said, "I'm really sorry, Kim, but it was getting to me. I was in the shop and I realized I couldn't even turn the ring around anymore and then I looked over and saw the grinder and I just had to do it." He cut most of it off with this thing he calls a "grinder" and then used pliers for the rest. So now I guess I'm expected to get another one ... anyone please feel free to advise on the protocol here.

He says that he wants to get a ring tatooed on his finger. I have already vetoed this idea once, during our engagement, at which time he was convinced that he didn't really need to wear a ring at all. It didn't take long for him to figure out that if he wanted me to change my name, he would be wearing a ring on his left hand. He didn't want to wear a ring. I didn't want to change my name. That, ladies and gentlemen, is what you call compromise. It is the only case of such a glorious accomplishment in the history of my relationship with this man. We are both Aquarians, if that means anything to you.

ION ...

I have been getting better in my nasty little give-the-baby-inappropriate-items-so-he-will-shut-his-mouth syndrome. Today I only gave him one dangerous thing: A Schick Intuition razor. I love Schick Intuition razors. Do y'all know about these beauties? It's a razor with a bar of shaving cream surrounding the blades ... so you don't have to use any foam or gel ... just take the cap off and glide. In my opinion, this is one of the better inventions of the 21st century. It is such a beautiful, beautiful device that it can make even the crunchiest of granola girls want to be slick and hair free. But I have a devil of a time getting the cap off the damn thing, so I figured it would be OK for him to play with it. And indeed, nothing bad happened. He abandoned it after spotting the toilet paper, which he dropped into the toilet. Then he banged the lid down onto his hand. Then I had to get outta the tub and actually take care of him. Can you guess my method of consolation? Yep, breastmilk available in two convenient locations near you.

ION ...

We have just finished painting the top portion of our bedroom (we have a chair rail). We chose a nice medium khaki color last October and have just now gotten around to it. We're hoping to have the bottom half done in a darker khaki by Easter.

Painting is so very therapeutic that I just might paint my entire house in the near future. Husband's boss, the park manager, has recently announced that he hates the color of the outside of our house (bricks painted gray with kelly-green shutters -- I like it) and so it will be painted a tannish-green color pretty soon (I'm hoping to at least choose the shutter color ... suggestions?). But for the inside, I'm thinking bold: mustard and brick for the living room, eggplant in the foyer, and one turqoise wall in the guest bedroom (we have a southwest theme in there).

Lord have mercy, is this ever a boring post! At least it doesn't involve musing about the texture of turtle eggs or a diatribe about the importance of avoiding produce from Mexico. Especially strawberries ... have y'all read about the stuff they put on strawberries?

Let's see, what else boring information can pour forth from my brain?

Right now I'm simultaneously reading Courts of Love by Ellen Gilchrist and Sin Killer by Larry McMurtry. The latter book was a gift from Husband, who says that the main character, Tasmin (the daughter of an English nobleman who brings his entire family to America in the early 19th century to hunt large game), is just like me. Tasmin is hot-tempered and impetuous and she ends up married to a missionary-like thing of a man who has two Indian wives and hardly speaks at all except to call forth the Holy Spirit to scare away hostile Indians. Now what does that say about me? Better yet, what does that say about Husband? He's reading some book about a South American shaman and we just got the most recent National Geographic in the mail. Feature story: Bird Flu H5N1. This is not good news, people ... we have chickens. People in Asia who have chickens are DYING from this awful stuff. I'm convinced it is all related to Americans' obsession with antibacterial products. Doesn't everyone know that that shit breeds supergerms?!?!?! I mean, I'm not innocent. When I was in Spain I got stuck in a really narrow stairwell of a castle with some germy-looking Europeans and I wasn't too shy to spray a little on them when they weren't looking. But come on! Now that I'm older and wiser I avoid that stuff like the plague. The plague. That's not funny at all is it?

Enough of this nonsense. I'm off to eat peas. Purple-hull peas. Mixed in with some butterbeans and a couple stalks of okra. Yum, yum. And then I'm after the Nilla wafers (anytime my parents come they bring a Sam's Club box of Nilla wafers. They're intended for The Goose but I just cannot help myself when there's some hormone-and-antibiotic-free 1% milk in the fridge.

The Party & Life as a MoaT

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Other than the refusal to nap and the subsequent fussiness prior to the festivities, The Goose was an angelic mess during his party. The candle was lit, the song was sung, and the cake was destroyed while I was in the other room, so I missed a good bit of the important parts and got no pictures or video not that I'm bitter. So we reenacted the whole thing the day after the party (sans guests) so that I could take some pictures, make a video, and get outta my funk about missing it the first time.

The best part about the party was actually after all of the caking and singing ... we let the Birthday Boy loose in the backyard with the chickens. He went ballistic, chasing them all over the yard and even smacking them in the butt a few times with his "walker"(they are beggars and view any human in the backyard -- no matter how small -- as a potential giver-outter of leftovers, so this was not all that difficult to accomplish). Then, to everyone's horror, the cutest little frog hopped across the backyard and was spotted by one of the chickens. I had just said, "Look at that cute, hippety hop frog" when the girls surged toward the poor creature, pecking at it fiendishly, and finally beaking it by the leg. Then they tore off into the frontyard to partake of their prey. However, chickens are not all that great in their predatory skills and as a result, the frog didn't die immediately; rather, it kept getting loose again and into the beak of another chicken time after time before one of them finally decapitated it in front of all the party guests.

So that was that.

John's brilliant babysitter (and her entire family -- they are all family friends) came for the festivities, and this conversation (regarding the fact that the babysitter's brother is taking Latin at his shee-shee prep school)was overheard not long after they arrived:

Babysitter's Mom: Andrew is taking Latin this semester.

My M-i-L: I think it's so ridiculous that they still teach that.

Babysitter's Mom: Well, it's a classical education system there and they've got the good test scores to prove that it works.

Babysitter: Yes, but I think that they would see the same results if they taught a Germanic-based language.

Yeah. This is the same girl that saw me in the low-cut shirt attempting to have a conversation about a movie I had not seen after quite a few "To Godiva For" martinis.

Otherwise, I am just my usual neurotic self these days. My mindset alternates between the following two options:

1. Staying home with this darling child forever
2. Going back to work full-time (in other states or countries that aren't accepting families, just single, working women)

The infant days are over and the toddler days are in full swing (hence the term "MoaT" in my title -- Mother of a Toddler). Even though he is not yet walking without help, I can already tell that it's just going to get worse. But it's not the systematic destruction of prized household possessions that gets to me. It's the fits, the nap boycotts, and just the general upkeep of him that makes me nuts.

For example, yesterday when he had a dirty diaper, I said, as always, "Goosey, you stink. Mommy needs to change you. Let's go upstairs." I then picked him up to go upstairs and The War of the Worlds was enacted in the living room (to the tune of "Old McDonald Had a Farm" blaring from the DVD player). It takes all my strength to wrangle him upstairs and onto the changing table where I have to strap him down (literally) while singing happy songs and pretending this doesn't make me want to apply for that job I found on the Internet that asks for a single, female teacher in Egypt. I frequently go into the garage and SCREAM at the top of my lungs, or wait until Husband returns from work and then run down the road at full speed until I get shin splints from pounding the pavement so hard. Or I power-hike up to the top of Ganier Ridge and sit on a bench in the pouring rain, watching the chickadees stare down at me from the branch above my head. They turn their heads sideways and cock their eyes downward to watch me sitting there, heart pounding. Endorphins can make it all go away (so can cheap wine, but I'm trying to stop doing that so much).

I have never overcome my inability to deal with the crying. That is the #1 reason why I have nursed him for so long and will continue to do so indefinitely. Forget the health benefits -- it stops the crying immediately. Husband doesn't seem to have this problem. He can endure the crying and whining and repeated attempts to climb out of the high chair while smearing food all over everything and whining (did I mention the whining?). He deals beautifully when The Goose lays down on the floor in a kicking tantrum whenever you prohibit his access to the ketchup bottle in the refrigerator door. But I still have some instinct leftover from the Pleistocene Period wherein my body reacts to the crying as if there is a predator lurking just outside the cave and I must quiet the baby immediately so as not to provoke attack. To that end, I will give him all manner of totally inappropriate items to quell his cries. Dangerous items. Items that could blind him (or me) or poison him. I tell myself it's OK because it's "supervised and temporary," but I realize that THIS IS NOT OK!!! But it does stop the crying at important times (like for the few seconds it takes to change a diaper). Other times it doesn't and so I whip out the boob. The boob always works. Wean him? I wouldn't dare? I couldn't cope.

The inappropriate-object-giving habit that I have developed has raised concerns from those around me, but I seriously cannot stop. If he will stop writhing around and screaming on the changing table, then I will give him anything within my reach: A bottle of Shout, an emery board, beer bottles, ink pens, a tube of toothpaste, his cough medicine, ANYTHING. It makes no sense, this habit. And sometimes, I'll take away one dangerous thing just to turn around and hand him another. The other day I took a sharpened pencil out of his hand and then allowed him to play with the space heater (it was off, but still!) just so I could go to the bathroom in peace.

I know this is most counterintuitive. But I really cannot stand to hear him cry. I know that no one wants to hear their child cry, but I think that I really have a problem. Clearly, it's one of many. Yesterday he wouldn't eat breakfast and kept trying to jail-break out of the high chair. I was making him some oatmeal and turned around to sing a song and just happened to notice that he was standing on top of the high chair tray, holding on to the back of the seat and bouncing his butt up and down in the air. So I put him back in the chair and tightened the restraining belt, only to endure more cries for freedom. Here's the crazy part: Likely he's just hungry, right? Because it's morning and he hasn't eaten in 13 hours, right? But I can't stand even the one minute of fussing he is going to do during the oatmeal preparation, so I take him out of the highchair altogether and let him play on the floor with an empty wine bottle. See what I mean about counterintuitive?

OK, I'll stop. Please don't turn me in to DHS.

On a happier note, our friends Mo & Ju-Ju are going into the hospital to be induced today. Yay for them! I hope they are blessed with a healthy baby and an intense talent for dealing with crying.

Oh, and I almost forgot: SUMMER IS OFFICIALLY OVER, so ...

"Happy Fall, y'all!"

Note-writing Pie Tins & Gobbling Snails

I don't have much to say, but I had to share a couple photos. I woke up to this one morning this week. It was sitting on the counter by the coffee pot.

Additionally, I wanted to moan a little about this damn gobbling snail that is JEB's best pal. It seriously gobbles like a turkey and then it sings "This Little Light of Mine" with a rhythmic beat that is more fitting for "Copa Cabana." Don't get me wrong, I do love me some Barry Manilow ... it's just the ad infinitum part that is a bugger.

Tomorrow the family is arriving for the first birthday party of The Goose. While the guests partake of the soccer ball cake, sausage balls, veggies, chips, dip, softdrinks, beer, wine, and party hats, I will be in the bathroom popping pills. Don't worry, I'm going to drink white wine so that it won't stain anything if I spill. The combination of inlaws, parents, and alcohol requires the combination of pills, prayers, and liquor for me.

Well, I better go mop the floor and suck up the dust offa the base boards. I'll check back in on Sunday night after the coast is clear.

Parents, Whitewater, Balloons, Ducks, Methodists, & Free Gifts

They're gone. No major breakdowns on my part, no major political tirades from my dad (or me), no crying episodes upon departure (mostly because next weekend is The Goose's party and they'll probably be back -- unless my aunt goes out of town and then in that case they'll stay to take care of Pappaw). So anyway, it was good and that's always a relief because there is potential for DISASTROUS family interactions every time we meet.

Husband is away this weekend doing Swiftwater Rescue Training. The state pays for him to go to the Ocoee River in east Tennessee where all the trainees practice saving each other by willingly jumping into gigantic rapids. Before we moved to Arizona, when we were living here the first time, we took a rafting trip down this same river.

Now don't get me wrong, I am not all that scared of water (except the ocean, which my mama said would suck me out to Cuba), but this is where the Olympic whitewater team trains and I had on open-toed shoes and you have to lodge your foot up under the seat of the person in front of you and and if you do this while wearing open-toed shoes then the seat in front of you will rip off your toenail but if you don't then you will fall out into the rapids and likely DIE from getting bashed against a rock. And do you see that man on the back of our raft? He was scaring the everloving shit out of me. We got in the raft, practiced a little and he said, "That's not good enough!!!" and then pushed us off into the water. Then he continued to narrate the whole trip ... "That there's Big Mama Rock -- she's killed 97 % of the people who've floated down this river. And the next one coming up is where my cousin Norma Rae got her head bashed up. Looked like she had run headfirst into a barbed wire ball, fought a good fight, and then lost."

That's me with the sunglasses in the middle row on the right. Also in there from left to right starting in the back are my friends Hot Frenchy & DP, then beside me is Ayurvedic Ann. In front is Ann's husband Real Estate Dave and, of course, Husband. Look at Hot Frenchy (AKA wannabedean) and Ann: they are actually SMILING. If you blow up the picture and examine my face, you will see big, real Tears of Terror making their trek down into the Ocoee.

I will never, ever, ever do that again. But if I do, I will definitely wear an old pair of tennis shoes instead of my $85 Chacos, which I should've gotten in a fun, bright-color instead of black, but I am boring sometimes and make bad decisions because black matches everything. You don't need your Chacos to match everything. Nobody cares whether you match when you're hurling yourself down a river in an inflatable device with nothing but a flimsy piece of plastic protecting your brain.

And another thing that guide did that really annoyed me was that everytime we made it through a rapid successfully, he would yell, "Everybody high-five!" which meant that we were supposed to hold up our paddles and slap them in the air above the raft. I never once participated in that bullshit. I was too busy mourning the loss of my toenail and life as we knew it.

So anyway, Husband is there ENJOYING this and called last night to report that all was going well and that he was learning a lot and that next time a hurricane hits he will likely be headed down to rescue people on account of his new skills.

TRANSITION???

The Goose scored big on his birthday even though we told people not to send gifts. His favorite so far is a friggin' 99 cent balloon with Thomas the Tank Engine on it even though there are all manner of bright plastic toys with speakers and buttons and annoying, really loud voices screeching out off-key songs. I hate loud, plastic toys, but if you sent one then we sincerely thank you from the bottom of our hearts because we know that not everyone is as lucky as we are.

TRANSITION???

They still have not found that owl but two white ducks have shown up on the lake. Husband suspects that they escaped from the Greek Festival at the Orthodox Church up the road. The rangers have all taken turns going out into the lake wearing waders to attempt to rid the natural area of these damn domesticated ducks. Have you ever seen someone in waders in a lake full of leeches trying to trap two white ducks in a net? Funny, funny stuff.

ION ...

This morning I tried another church. I'm in the process of looking for a church because that's the way I grew up and I like the ritual of church even if I don't believe a lot of the things I was taught to believe as a child. So today I went to a Methodist church near our house and it was relatively uneventful except for the passing of the visitor sign-in book. The woman beside me, Petunia, who must've been old as Methuselah, had on a lovely purple dress with gold sequined belt and hat and at first I thought I had found a soul sister because, apparently, she too likes Almay's i-color series! However, I think she had attempted to apply ALL the colors at once. So anyway, I signed the book and passed it on to her and then she passed it back and the man to my left, who was on the end of the pew, just stuck it down behind the hymnal. On we go with the service.

Then, in the middle of "You Don't Need a Phone to Call Jesus (and you'll never get a busy signal if you do)" by the Seraphim Choir of middle school girls wearing jeans and white t-shirts (except for one poorly-informed, little pink-clad thing), Purple Petunia decided that it was appropriate to tell me to tell the man next to me to please put the book "up where they can come by and get it." Now, would you know what that meant? I was raised in church, people, I understand the lingo ... I can recite all the books of the Bible OT and NT and I can find any Bible verse in less than 10 seconds due to my Bible Drill training in 4th-6th grades. I was the state champion in Bible Drill during my 6th grade year and if you quote a famous Bible excerpt I can likely tell you what book, chapter, and verse it came from even though I haven't attended church regularly in about 10 years. But I was clueless about this one.

She just kept saying, "Tell him to stick it up where they can come by and get it." I didn't know what to do, he didn't know what to do, and she was being really loud and parents of the members of the Seraphim Choir were starting to turn around and give us dirty looks. Finally I just grabbed the book and handed it to her, hoping that she could just do whatever needed to be done. But lord have mercy that was the worst idea I have ever had. She then stood up and started pointing to the end of the pew and saying, "Look, look how the other people have got there's up where they can come by and get it." But I still didn't understand because I couldn't see any other books. Finally the person in front of us grabbed the book and saved the day by placing it in its rightful place on the edge of the pew. The choir finished their song, AMENS were muttered all around, and PHEW! the deacons got the sign-in book. I thought it had passed.

After the service, after the holding of hands and swaying back and forth and singing of "Let There Be Peace on Earth," she caught my arm and said, "I'm so sorry you didn't understand ... I didn't know how else to say it." Then she turned around to the man behind her and said, "Billy, how would you have told her what to do? I didn't know how to say it!" Billy and I both tried to ignore her and move on but by now she had moved over in the pew in front of my purse (I had shifted down during the hand-holding event and as a result was at least four feet from my personal belongings) and she was holding onto both me and Billy trying to figure out what went wrong. Then the preacher saw me.

Now, not to brag, but I am PRIME scarfing up material for any good Bible Belt church. Not only am I well-versed in evangelical theology, but also I can sing and play the piano, I have a relatively stable family life, and, let's face it, I am capable of cleaning myself up to look cute and bubbly and conservative. Whenever I visit a church I have to BOLT and RUN to keep from being accosted by all manner of preachers and deacons and welcome committees and blue-haired women wearing peacock brooches. Petunia had ruined my escape plan.

"Are you new to the area?" the minister says.

"Oh, yeah ... I mean, uh, we've been here for almost a year now but we used to live here before and then I went to grad school in Arizona and then I got pregnant ... I mean, I was married and all, I mean, I'm still married, and then we were homeless and jobless for a while but finally got a job back here after living with relatives and having the baby up in Wisconsin and being on Medicaid and so yes, now we live here and thanks for having me but I've got visitors in town and need to get back home to fix lunch, but I loved your sermon on being in the boat with Jesus! See you next week!"

Eloquence and composure just drip offa me like water from a freshly dunked convert in the baptismal tub. I made a dash for my car and screeched out of the parking lot before I gave away any other Kimmy secrets ... these people know how to ask all the right questions and they can figure out that you can play the piano without even bringing up the subject of music. They are sneaky sneaky sneaky, these people.

Next week: a Methodist church near a local university where there might be an academic or two in the congregation who may appreciate or even share my concern about historical inaccuracies and missionary work. I'll keep you posted, as always.

Until then, remember that you don't need a phone to call Jesus, he answers knee-mail instead.

And p.s. don't go anywhere near Dillard's because lord help us all they have got a free gift at the Estee Lauder counter and they take credit cards.

And p.p.s. "free gift" is redundant and anyway the gift is not really free.

Grammar Alert

Ummmmmm, how come no one told me there was a grammar error in my birth story post? People, the use of the first person "I" as the object of a preposition is an overcompensation tactic. One I pride myself in NEVER failing to edit out of my writing. And as I read back through my post, there it was, sitting there glaring at me just like a big ugly mean English teacher. Just like Mrs. Risher, my first grade teacher who, when I asked the meaning of the word spelled "b-e-t-w-e-e-n," which I read and pronounced in my little six-year-old head as "BETT-ween." The question was on a Red-level Concepts card ... the reading was about the Earl of Sandwich:

What did the Earl of sandwich have in the middle of his bread?
(a) ham
(b) between
(c) crust
(d) fur

Sweet little Kimmy, pointing to letter (b): "Mrs. Risher, I think the answer is (b), but what does that word mean?"

Big ugly mean teacher: "Buh-twEEn? You mean buh-twEEn? You think the Earl of Sandwich put buh-twEEn in the middle of his bread?"

Sweet Kimmy: "Oh, no ma'am. I understand now."

Where are my big ugly mean READERS when I need you? My reputation is at stake, people!

And p.s. I have fixed the problem.

and p.p.s. My parents are here. And my dad has already cleared the room twice not from farting; rather, from announcing his opinions on how the President is going to save New Orleans and how they needed this to clean up the politicians there and get some good decent republicans in that Catholic state! And my mom has been going on and on about how Goose is now a year old and how that is entirely too old to get that picture made that she wanted me to get made when we were home last but it was just too hectic and now none of those white gowns that Kathy Stevens has in her photography studio will fit him anymore because you have to do those mother/child, everybody's-wearing-white pictures done BEFORE they get into size 18-month clothes.

Some Reminiscing

December 31, 2003, Austin, TX
B and I are at his sister’s house for New Year’s and I’m late. I’m never late, so we do the pee test and oh yes, this will be a boring New Year’s Eve for the Kimster.

There’s a party, but I’m totally sober and am starting to realize that no one is as funny as they think they are, so I say, “Who wants to learn a cheerleader dance?”

There’s an outpouring of affection something akin to Beatle mania as I turn on “How Do I Know?” from Whitney Houston’s best album ever (as far as I’m concerned). Five, Six, Seven, Eight … these girls are really bad at learning this cheerleader dance that was choreographed for an ACDC song but is also great with Whitney Houston.

Most of the time I was pregnant we were jobless and homeless, floating around amongst relatives who all had to endure my crying spells, incessant nesting, and heartburn. Between May and July of 2004 we moved from Flagstaff, AZ to Austin, TX, then to Milwaukee, WI, and then to St. Croix Falls, WI. But despite our instability, Great Grandma Ellie (after whom JEB would've been named had he been a girl) kept saying to us, "Your luck will change as soon as the baby's born ... you'll see."

Indeed, we had been sent other signs that we had a lucky baby. For our first pre-natal visit, we walked to the doctor’s office, and on the way there, a crow pooped from a tree branch. The poop hit a lower branch, ricocheted, and splatted all over Husband and me. We went to the doctor covered in poop. Later that day, I went to class and told my friends that I was pregnant and about the bird poop. My friend Lindsey, who had been a Peace Corps volunteer in Namibia for two years, said, “OMG! In Africa that is the best sign of luck EVER.”

But then I graduated and didn’t want to get a full-time job with a baby on the way, and no jobs had turned up for B. So we started the moving party, and although we weren't jobless and homeless when he finally arrived, we didn't have a permanent home or job and were waiting to hear about the position that Husband has now. At the time, we were living on the border of Wisconsin and Minnesota where Husband was a National Park Ranger at the St. Croix Scenic Riverway (and I was a regular at the public library and the Holiday Inn swimming pool). Husband had an interview scheduled for the Tennessee permanent job—a job he had waited on for MONTHS—on the very day that Goose was born, and so he had to reschedule it. Then, when Goose was less than 24 hours old, Husband left the hospital to go home and shower, and in the middle of his shower, he got the phone interview call ... so he interviewed for this job standing in the middle of our dining room with a towel around his waist, dripping water everywhere and soaking the floor. But he got the job! And then he started saying that The Goose’s Indian name was going to be "Little No Worries." Great Grandma and the crow were right.

The details of The Goose’s birth follow, so if you’re squeamish, be forewarned:

September 15, 2004, St. Croix Falls, WI

9 .

So The Goose is 9 days late and I am going out of my mind. I'm desperate. I've OD'ed on prune juice, had lots of sex, and have been walking several miles a day when it suddenly occurs to me that we should just begin talking directly to the uterus. So B gets us a translator, called 2 ounces of castor oil mixed with OJ (supposedly it's a "mid-wife's cocktail" which, as it causes the bowel to contract, also causes the uterus to do the same) and about one hour later I am on the toilet (and didn't get up for 3 hours). We went to bed (thinking the castor oil didn't work), and I woke up at 5 a.m. in a pool of amniotic fluid.


We went straight to the hospital and got a fabulous room with two bay windows. There I was hooked up to the monitor and a bag of antibiotics to ward off my strep infection (harmless to me but serious for babies passing through canals). I have not felt any contractions yet, although according to the monitor, I am having them and the nurses are going, "Don't you feel that?"

At about 10 a.m., my labor had not progressed and the doctor suggested I begin nipple stimulation, which causes the release of oxytocin -- the hormone which causes the uterus to contract. So I sat in the bed rubbing my nipples (while nurses came in and out -- quite embarrassing) to no avail. Finally at noon the doctor said she wanted to start giving me pitocin, the synthetic oxytocin which DEFINITELY starts labor. I cried a little (I was afraid that my contractions would be unbearable and that it would cause me to have to have some pain medicine and thus didn't want to go this route) and then finally gave in when she told me that otherwise I might be in labor all night. So I took a nap and at 2 p.m. they started the drug.

My contractions picked up almost immediately but they still had to double the level of the hormone three times before I really got going. It felt like bad menstrual cramps for several hours and about 5 p.m. I got in the Jacuzzi tub. The nurse was coming in periodically to ask if my contractions were getting longer or louder and it was at this point that I was really starting to feel them in waves of strong pain throughout my pelvis. She stuck her head in the bathroom and asked how I was doing and I replied, "They're getting badder. I said 'badder'. Don't tell anyone I said that, I'm an English teacher." To which she replied, "I'll call the doctor and tell her they're getting worser."

I stayed in the tub until I couldn't stand it anymore and got out and got on a birthing ball (looks like those exercise balls but larger and you straddle it and hold on to something in front of you). B made sure I got a red ball to match my red toenails, which were being touted as the best in the unit. At this point I am really starting to use the breathing, visualizations, etc., and B is coaching me like mad. The nurses were so impressed with him that they were asking my mother-in-law (who was waiting outside) if we had taken some special class. Nevermind the laboring mother, it's the husband they're impressed with. Figures.

So it's about 6 p.m. and I feel like I'm going to die and am begging for drugs. And B keeps saying, "Just make it through one more ... I know you can just get through one more and then the doctor will be here and you can ask her for drugs." I totally fell for this crap even though it was a while before the doctor came back in, checked me, and said, "During the next contraction I want you to push." For some reason, I really thought that the pushing was practice for when I was really ready. So I said, "How long until I can really push?" She said, "You're fully dilated now -- PUSH!" It was about 7 p.m. And the whole time I really thought she was lying and that the nurses had all been lying the ENTIRE time they were telling me about my dilatory progress. I was convinced they were all liars ... even B, but I was so out of it that he was having to hold my face toward his and almost yell at me to keep breathing. He was a total star.

So I pushed for 45 minutes, which I consider to be the worst part of the whole thing, even though most women find it to be a relief after all of the hard contractions. Finally the doctor said, "There's the head ... do you want to feel it?" My eyes were rolling back into my head ... feeling the head was the last thing I ever wanted to do. The doctor said, "The next thing you're going to feel is stinging pain ... like burning." I didn't know what this meant, but apparently that was her way of warning me that I was about to split open. Which I did. Then, she and B switched places (she by my side and Brian at the foot of the bed) and The Goose popped out into his arms and emitted only one cry. B said it was almost as if he were thinking, "They're expecting me to cry, so here it is." And then he got very calm.


It felt exactly like you would think it would feel to push out a baby: slimy and squirmy and the biggest relief. Then I grabbed him and yanked him toward me and nearly cut off his oxygen because the cord wasn't very long. The nurse is yelling, "Stop pulling! His cord's not very long!" and B is saying, "Look at his balls ... they're as big as mine!" (boy babies are born with swollen testicles due to high hormone levels.) And I'm saying, "He has hair! He's not bald! Look at his hair!"

Then B cuts the cord so that I can hold him closer and after just a few minutes, the doctor says it's time to push out the placenta. So Brian and the nurse take John over to the incubator to be weighed and measured (it's in our room ... he never left the room) while I push out the placenta ... easy as pie.



By then I'm totally a mess ... I'm soaked in sweat and blood and amniotic fluid and have now gotten so cold that I'm shaking violently. The doctor is injecting my "area" with numbing medication so that she can repair the tears and I feel like I'm going to die of shock. They kept trying to put the baby back on my tummy but I just couldn't even deal with holding him because I was shaking so badly and felt like road kill. The doctor was assuring me that that is normal.

B is holding the baby and standing beside me trying to calm me down and I'm having a total guilt trip because I'm not nursing him immediately like all the books said to do. It took the doctor almost an hour to sew me up and that was not fun. Then I had to pee, which was scary, and no one told me how much blood comes out of you post-partum. While I'm trying to pee (a huge effort), they changed the sheets and cleaned up the room and then I was back in bed with the baby trying to nurse him ... toe-curling pain there (until your nipples harden up -- which takes several weeks even though they say it's not supposed to hurt) ... and B is flying high.


I kept saying, "I did it ... I pushed him out." And I'm still saying that to myself every time I look at him. It is such an amazing, unique experience and yet it happens millions of times every day. The most striking part about it was just that: the contrast of how globally common and at the same time individually uncommon and life-changing it all is. And you think that you will be filled with this gentle, loving feeling toward the child but really what I felt was anything but sweet. I was overwhelmed by an almost vicious feeling of being his protector and thinking that I would never let anyone hurt him.

And then there were months of absolutely NO SLEEP, numerous breakdowns, two bouts of mastitis, cracked nipples, and a cross-country move. But finally ... just as we were thinking that we couldn't deal with the little alien anymore, he started sleeping longer and smiling. And I know those two things are survival tactics because it's just in the nick of time that they both happen to almost every baby.

The fastest year of my life just went by, and baby, look at us now!

Wishy Washy

I just couldn't part with the pink theme. It was just so feminine, so sweet, so ME! I mean, I think red would've been PERFECT, but alas, Blogger doesn't have a red template and lord knows I cannot configure any html coding to rig it up. I do like green (nature, envy, spring), but somehow pink (roses, salmon, baby lips) is just better here. Also, I've added my links again, so you can all rest easy.

Yesterday was eventful ... I had a blind date with a mommy friend, I taught a class totally unprepared, and had some very insightful conversations with colleagues at work about various issues integral to the world: plagiarism, homosexuality, Methodists, terrorists, standard deviations, and poop.

Happy Tuesday ... here's the ad I wrote about earlier:

BOO!

I decided to be green for awhile ... let me know how you like it ... pink just really isn't my color all although it seemed to fit for a while. Now, I'm changing. Hair color. Blog color. And if I'm lucky like Michael Jackson, skin color as well.

WARNING: This is what happens when you drink too much red wine with leftover lasagna and then watch sad Dustin Hoffman movies from the 70s while Husband is at his boss's house watching football on a 52-inch TV.

Ah, the good ole days: Northern Arizona. Mountains. Biking everywhere. Size 4 shorts. Now it's babies and big bluejeans and Budweiser.

I was reminiscing about my old life today and found this picture. It's when Husband and I climbed the highest mountain in Arizona (and nearly died at the top ... thank GOD for PBJ sandwiches). I fell on my butt four times on the way down. Later this same year I got pregnant.

I miss the Wild West and my friends and grad school and easy street. I don't miss our 400-square-foot married student housing apartment, or snow in April/May, or morning sickness in Second Language Acquisition class. But I miss Flagstaff, and I miss hiking in Sedona, and I miss yoga classes and teaching freshman composition and Beaver Street Brewery.

I have yet to look back in my life and wish to be be in some past time. And I hope I never do. But I still miss it, and I think that's OK.

Just call me a MOP

Yesterday I woke up and realized that I have only ONE friend my age in the Nashvegas area and she doesn't have kids. I love her, don't get me wrong, but I need some close mommy friends. So I got online and started researching mom's groups. I discovered that one was actually meeting in just a few hours, so I girded my loins and went.

I'm not sure how cool it is to associate myself with a group whose name is the same as the house cleaning implement that I hate the most, but at least I made an effort. I went to a mom's group called MOPS (moms of pre-schoolers) which meets at a local Baptist church. Unbeknownst to me, MOPS is a Christian group, which is fine ... I just didn't know that ahead of time and wasn't expecting the devotional time and the Bible verses and whatnot. And because I may go back, and because I may make some friends there (instead of staying home and blogging and being a scary internet mom stalker -- sorry to all those people who are victims of this -- now you know why), I will resist the urge to make fun of the meeting.

OK, I can't stand it. Following are quotes that entertained me:

"In the battle of David and Goliath, David succeeded and Goliath failed because while Goliath was focused on the battle, David was focused on the strength of Jesus Christ."

At this point I was really tempted to raise my hand and say something like, "I hate to play Devil's Advocate, but wasn't the story of David and Goliath in the OLD Testament ... and wasn't that before the birth of Jesus Christ?" I'm just not sure how welcome that would've made me.

"Hey y'all, my name is Krista and I have two kids-- both boys--and one on the way. This one is our last. My husband would like to just keep having them until I'm blue, but I have finally put my foot down because he's not the one that has to take care of them all the time and it is just exhausting."

Ummmmmm ... no shit. And which part of you is it that would turn blue if you kept having kids?

"The thing that I like about quilting is that you can be as 'by-the-book' or as 'off-the-wall' as you want and IT'S ALL OK. It really is OK to do it the easy way and use a sewing machine or use NO PATTERN AT ALL. I know that sounds crazy, but it really is OK. You can even use BLACK fabric."

This is just classic. I just nodded and nodded and added "sewing machine" to the Christmas list that my mom makes me give her in October of every year.

I really may go back even though it is horribly mean that I have made fun of this group here on the WWW. I have never claimed to be that great of a person. Maybe that's why I have no friends here. Note to self.

ION ...

One of my old officemates from NAU has accepted a professorship at Middle Tennessee State University and has moved to Murfreesboro (30 minutes from us) with his 37-weeks-pregnant-with-stripped-membranes wife. We had them over for dinner tonight and Husband and I managed to finish off most of two bottles of wine BY OURSELVES while congenially chatting about epidurals, electric breast pumps (can you believe that I didn't even tell the NWA story??), cribs, co-sleeping, etc. Luckily, I did not say anything embarrassing about how I can shoot milk across the room from my right nipple (the left one can only go a few feet), or ask if they wanted to see the pictures of the Goose's placenta, or tell them about how long it took my vagina to heal after labor, which is what I have done in the past during our dinner parties involving wine. That's what happens when you stay home all day with no one to talk to but a whiney baby ... WHO, by the way, has again won over my heart by discovering my toes and laughing everytime I wiggle them or say, "Whooo-wheee--you stink!" while wiping his butt.

I wish that I had a funny country or rap lyric to leave you with but due to this Katrina stuff, I have been glued on NPR. However, I do have a story that you might enjoy ...

My mother's gynecologist ...

You know it's going to be good when it starts like that!

... just recently retired and she had to get a new one after some 40 years of seeing the same doctor. She was VERY nervous about the change because the only doctor who had openings for new patients was rumored to have had an affair with one of his nurses. She had been telling me that the first visit with the new doctor was impending and I had been trying to reassure her that everything was pretty standard amongst gynecologists and that it probably wouldn't be that different than the old one. To this, she replied, "Yes, Dorcas (a colleague at her work) has been to him and has told me that, but it doesn't make any difference, I'm still nervous. Dorcas said that he was very charming and gentle, which makes sense, given his track record. Also, she said that it was better than Dr. Lindley because at this new doctor you don't have to take off all your clothes and sit on the table totally naked while waiting for him to come in ... they give you a sheet or something to cover up with."

At this point, I interrupt her and say, "Dr. Lindley had you sit on the table with NO CLOTHES ON while waiting for him to come in?"

"Of course," she says, "Sometimes for more than an hour, and it's really cold!"

OK, so her old doctor made her sit naked on the examining table while waiting for long periods of time and she's worried about the new doctor because he supposedly had an affair with a nurse? Am I the only one out there who thinks that's weird? I have never had to sit on a table naked at ANY doctor's office, and I've been to quite a few. Even the ones who have to walk you out to your car with a loaded gun (like my psychologist in Greenville, MS) definitely don't do anything that weird. I used to call him my mental masseuse (sp?).

One more thing that I must say, which is positive, and thus important (because there are so FEW positive things here):

AUTUMN IS HERE! It's cool at night and in the mornings and yay yaya yayayyayay AMERICA!

Also, one last funny thing:

I saw an ad in a coupon clipper magazine for a hot-air balloon ride that said, "FALL IN MIDDLE TENNESSEE." They meant like the season, like "autumn," but chose this unfortunate word instead. I'm sending it in to Jay Leno.

Tah-tah.

Antibiotics, Probiotics, & Prozac

Warning: This post contains highly NEGATIVE energy.

I have been diagnosed with a bacterial infection in my left tonsil. According to my doctor, I probably got Goose's croup virus, which then turned into a bacterial infection. So now I'm on antibiotics. And probiotics. And I think I'm in need of some Prozac as well because this baby is about to make me jump off a high bridge.

All he does is whine. He just whines and whines and whines. And that's it. Occasionally he laughs at something. Sometimes he'll watch a video or read a book or stack the rings or play with a puzzle. But mostly he just whines. We have to avoid opening the refrigerator or dishwasher when he is in the kitchen because he has a back-arching temper tantrum unless allowed to plunder through the appliances and pluck out everything. He especially likes the ketchup bottle, spoons, and bottle nipples.

Everyday I say to myself, "OK, today I'm going to interact with him in such a patient, loving way that he won't get bored and whiney." But at about 4:00 p.m. I'm out of ideas and convinced that he must be hurting somewhere since nothing else works to quell his dissatisfaction, and I give him a dose of Tylenol. I don't know what else to do. I am considering getting a second job just to pay for him to be in daycare because I cannot deal with his whining. Is this normal? Him, not me ... I know that I am not normal. Moms out there, please give me some advice!

ION ...

Well, there IS no other news. Happy freakin' Thursday.

At a Kimpasse

I think I'm taking the prefix "-im" + "K" thing a little too far, but just indulge me here because I am on a tirade: Husband has suggested that I limit trips to Target (and Walgreens and the DSW Shoe Warehouse -- why do they add the "shoe warehouse" on the end ... isn't that what the "SW" stands for? That's like saying the SAT test. Ugh!) on account of the price of gas. What did you say? No, no, no, of course I don't have to actually do what he says. But he's right, because I HAVE NO MONEY (i.e., I'm "Kimpecunious") to pay for gas (or eye makeup or bondini or Absorbine, Jr.). But my lack of funding and the price of gas or my striped hair or any of my other nonsense is definitely not what I'm on a tirade about.

I'm on a tirade because I'm at a Kimpasse: WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS COUNTRY? We ignore the poor until we are forced by nature to deal with their plight, and then we gasp and gasp and oh what misfortune! how horrible! what will they do?

Disasters are happening all over the world all the time but if it happens in the U.S. then God bless America, let's hang out our flag. Hello? Did y'all hear about the famine in Niger last month? Or the stampede in Iraq that killed a thousand people and wasn't even directly related to all the bombs that we've been dropping there? Or that little epidemic they've got going on in Africa ... what's the acronym? DISA? SIDA? ASID? Oh yeah, AIDS.

I have been hearing about the poverty in New Orleans for several years now, ever since I became friends with people who teach there through the Teach for America program. As you may or may not know, I was a corps member in the Mississippi Delta for two years and never missed a day of marvelling at the fact that I grew up in that same state, but in a very different kind of place. The poverty there and in New Orleans has always been unbelievably stupendous. And guess what! Believe it or not, it's horrible even when we don't hear about it because of a hurricane. The "poor victims," of Hurricane Katrina (the ones who couldn't evacuate) were "poor" WAY before and will likely be poor WAY after this is all said and done. The fact that it took a monstrous act of nature to bring this to our attention is (now sing this to the tune of that song, "D-I-V-O-R-C-E" by Tammy Wynette) T-Y-P-I-C-A-L.

The only glimmer of hope I have been able to find in this whole situation is from the fact that these people are being taken away to other places. Maybe it's naive of me to think that they will be shipped off to somewhere better (hell, Texas is already saying NO MORE REFUGEES). But isn't it possible that getting out could be a really good thing for them? Isn't it possible that wherever these people end up, it could look something like this: the kids could be placed in good school districts, the adults could be enrolled in job training programs, and the elderly/disabled could be taken care of through well-run state programs? Or is that just wishful thinking? I hope not.

Enough.

ION ...

I broke my right pinky toe trying to jump over the Goose and his "cart" (see below):

OK. So maybe it was just my toenail, but it seems like a major injury and has prevented lots of things today (mainly cleaning up, but other things too like exercising, cooking, etc.). Why do little concentrated things like that hurt so much worse than say, LABOR? Four weeks after The Goose was born (sans epidural, sans demerol, au naturale in other words -- not that I'm bragging or anything ... I had a really short labor and a fantastic coach (Husband) who kept saying tremendously encouraging things like, "Kim, your red toenails are being touted as the best on the L/D wing!), I had to be hospitalized for mastitis and while I was there they discovered that I was also low on potassium. I had to have an IV potassium drip and Jesus H. Christ on a popsicle stick! I was skuh-reaming and writhing around and Husband was yelling for the nurses and finally one came in and turned off the drip. This is the same nurse who, prior to hanging the potassium bag, said, "It may sting a little." Just a titch. A teensy little sting.

I remember saying, "Isn't potassium what Dr. Kervorkian used to kill those people?"

She said, "I'm not sure" and left. When she returned, I was not in good shape. She kept saying, "Hon, I cain't suck it back up outta there, you're just goin' to have to wait 'til it runs through a little." When it finally stopped, I asked if there was any other way I could supplement my potassium stores (a crate of bananas?) and she left to go ask the doctor. A few minutes later she came back in with some orange liquid for me to drink. Oh, OK. Next time can I have the option of DEATH by POTASSIUM IV or kool-aid? Thanks.

My toe doesn't hurt quite as bad as the potassium drip or the baby delivery thingy, but it's getting close. Especially when I wear high heels like I did last night when we went OUT ON THE TOWN!!! Can you say Babysitter?!?!?!?!!? Can you say TO GODIVA FOR chocolate martinis? I CAN!!!

p.s. Am I starting to look (and/or sound) like Maureen Dowd?

STRIPES

STRIPES
Originally uploaded by Kimpossible, HEM, PWTPI.

Here's something to laugh at in the midst of all this devastation of the hurricane. I'm too absorbed in the news to write much. I'm trying not to be sad. I couldn't sleep last night. I can't stop looking at photos online and then when I get to the ones with the babies and old people I have to stop and find a distraction.