sueeeus

1. Band :: on the run
2. Tan :: not me
3. Mount :: oh dear, where is my mind besides the gutter
4. Arcade :: game, how boring am I
5. Customize :: your slogan (I get way too much spam)…
6. Hamburger :: and fries
7. Solid :: as a rock
8. Forbidden :: knowledge
9. Deter :: and desist
10. Torment :: love

from Lunanina

I can’t get enough of this unbridled bliss. 

How I love the way laughter consumes him.  He squirms, kicks his legs, giggles, squeals, drools, splutters, and shrieks.  It’s an all-encompassing thing, and a beauty to behold. 

If only I could drink it in and find a way to make it last.  To make it permeate all of my own being.  The way it permeates all of his.  The things we can learn from children.  They are so pure.

This has been sitting in draft for quite some time.  Our anniversary was April 1st.  Deliberately.  So as not to forget.  (Somehow, we nearly manage to forget, all the same.)  We ventured out with our little one and caught ‘the dinner train.’  Destination: Winery.  Dinner is served enroute, there is wine tasting and souvenir shopping at the winery, and dessert is served on the return trip.  It’s a nice little outing. 

We had some fun moments while waiting for the train.  Me and my blue eyed boys.  I can’t imagine life without them.  I have a family of my own, after all these years.  It was a happy anniversary. 

I am very blessed.

It’s that day of days, 060606.  At least, in my neck of the woods.  So far, the world hasn’t ended.  Today is tomorrow, somewhere else, and today isn’t yet today, someotherwhere else.  Just for fun, I’m making my time stamp 0606.  It’s totally fake though.  It’s more like 21:47, but that’s not nearly so dramatic.

Of note.  Nothing.  Well, we went to dinner at an Asian buffet.  It’s breakfast, lunch, and dinner, here out West.  Not breakfast, dinner, and supper.  To my delight, they had kimchee.  Kimchi   However one spells it, I love it!  And never get it.  And haven’t made it in years.  Korean kraut.  How a fermented spicy cabbage dish could be so tasty, is beyond me.  It’s p’raps a cultural thang, what with my half-blood-princess genes and all.  Well, there are actually no princess genes that I know of, but I am a half breed.  Of that I am certain.  The food was quite decent, for an Asian buffet.  It’s always alarming to see the enormity of the average diner, though, in places like that.  There is much denial on my part as I pretend that I couldn’t possibly ever become like that.  Ever.  Ever   Ever.  Ahem.

I have yet to learn restraint.  It’s a shameful thing.

I now have a cough.  An annoying tickle in the throat.  A sharp, wheezing, annoying tickle.  It’s penance, I’m sure, for indulging in one, two, maybe three, or possibly even four of the seven deadly sins.  All for dining at an Asian buffet.  Was one of my many allergens lurking in one of the various delights I tasted   Or is it a lightning fast transference of toddler germs from a shared fork   I took two Benadryl, and am now hoping for the best.

The fortune cookie assures me that an unexpected pleasure is coming my way.  I showed Mr. Gadget, and he knew exactly how I interpreted it.  To prove it was a sign, I had another fortune cookie.  It also said an unexpected event of glad tidings and good fortune awaited.  I am convinced.  It’s a sign.  Yes, it will be a girl.  And we shall name her Harmony.  I’m not sure how we will contend with a conception date of 060606, though.  Hopefully the latter fortune and the former fortune don’t cancel each other out.

Sigh…  Dreaming, dreaming, dreaming.  I would very much love to have a girl child.  Or another boy child.  I want my Mr. Snazzy Pants to grow up with at least one sibling.

Eeeeegads, it’s 2:30 and what have I accomplished   Apart from a marathon blog spill, or spew (whatever), the trinkets have found a new home, the dishwasher is sloshing merrily away, I’ve downed three cups of coffee, and successfully transferred images from the new camera to the computer.  Which also means that I had to modify my cable bundle, which is becoming quite something:

• Camera charger cable
• Camera transfer cable
• Phone charger cable
• Camcorder charger cable
• Camcorder transfer cable
• Wireless keyboard receiver doohicky cable thingy
• Telephone cord

I have them bundled so that they don’t fall off my desk and get lost in the rats nest of cables at my feet.  Yet another tidy-up item for my to-do list.

After perusing JCPenney’s online catalog (the Joke towels), I let my fingers do the walking and called our local store.  Seems they have the now-famous towels in stock, and if I drop in after 4 p.m. tomorrow, I can purchase said towels and get $10 off if I spend $50.  So.  I just might wander over to Penney’s on the morrow.  But I won’t be buying hand towels or wash cloths.  Because I am cheap frugal industrious.  Instead, if I buy said towels, I will buy one extra, and cut it up to make two hand towels and two wash cloths (thereby saving $26 or thereabouts). 

Meanwhile, in other news.  It appears that the boy child does not think much of his safety gear.

He’s not always his boisterous self when he’s at Grandma’s house.

But with a little coaxing, he’s all smiles again.  My beautiful boy(s).

These pictures are proof that I can transfer photos from the new camera.  I think I prefer my old camera, but am not displeased with the new one.

So now I’m off to Target, to finish my errands and collect my bundle of joy.  I don’t feel caught up one bit.  Hrumph.

…or…  …List Friday…   …or…   …catching up…

• It’s Friday.  I’m taking a vacation day today, because I’m in a use it or lose it situation again.  Some time ago, our company switched its vacation accrual policy so that it accrues constantly instead of once a year.  We can have up to two year’s worth of vacation accrued at any time, but it caps off if we don’t use it by the time the hours accumulate.  My number is 320 hours, and yes, I know it’s pathetic that I have that much time saved up.  I had planned to use it up as part of my maternity leave and return to work schedule, but I ended up working from home and the baby slept all day and the job demanded so much at that time, etc etc etc.  So, I didn’t end up using it, and it accrued.  And it keeps accruing.  And Mr. Gadget’s job gives him only one paltry week a year, so it’s difficult for us to plan much of a hiatus as a family.  I treat myself to a day off here and there, during which I do whatever I want.  Which is usually catching up on housework, running errands, and blogging.  Because these things help settle me.  A clean and tidy home.  No loose ends.  These things bring harmony to my life. 
• Today, I plan to catch up on blogging.  I’ve been away for a while…  …Not so much away, but I have a toddler and a full time job and a household to run, so I don’t get much time to blog.  Plus, my husband recently rattled off some statistic that he heard on the radio about blogging interfering with couples, marriages, or some such blather.  (He made it up, but it was his special way of telling me that he thinks I spend too much time blogging, or really, that he wants more attention.)Things I’d like to blog about today:
1. The wonder of feeling connected.  Check.  Did that already.
2. My silly bathroom window situation.  Check.  Did that already.
3. Sleep apnea.
4. Coffee, and, even better, the gorgeous receptacle that holds it this morning.
5. The things that I want or need to do today.

• I have sleep apnea.  What a DRAG!  I have probably been living with it for many years.  Now I’m making cpap a part of my life.  CPAP.  Continuous Positive Air Pressure.  Or something to that effect.  It’s a machine that forces air in, keeping the airways open all night.  It takes some getting used to.  Mr. Gadget lovingly says, “May the Force be with you,” as we drift off to sleep.  It is very Darth Vaderesque.
  
  For the first several days I felt more tired than ever, but have since perused many forums and learned a few things:
1. Sleep debt.  Some people theorize that one’s sleep debt needs to be repayed, and until that is done, one won’t realize the benefits of a full night’s sleep.  Seems like a bunch of hooey to me.  How many mothers have years and years of sleep deprivation, yet function very well on limited sleep   Why would only people with sleep apnea have to repay a sleep debt, and not the general population.  Hopefully I won’t get a tirade of angry comments from the multitude of readers (ha!, do I have readers   I flatter myself, she says, with much sarcasm) about how little I know (which is true, I know very little about sleep deprivation, sleep apnea, sleep debt, and sleep disorders).
2. Humidity.  Aha, that humidifier thingy that is built in to the machine should be used.  Like an idiot, I had it set at zero, thinking I’d get cool air through these hot summer nights (oh, that reminds me, how I love Neil Diamond!), but lo, one needs heat to humidify, so now I have set it to 5, max heat, and amazingly enough, the air is not hot, but nicely moistened, and whodathunkit, I’m sleeping much better.
3. Masks.  People with allergies and general respiratory challenges that accompany germ-laden toddlers who attend day care with other germ-laden children tend to need a full face mask, because sometimes it’s nigh unto impossible to breathe through one’s nostrils.  Now I have two masks.  For bad days, the full face mask.  For days when my nostrils work, a nose-only mask.  Either way, the Force is with me.
• Today I’m drinking coffee from a bowl.  Because these bowls   I love.  And I had to have them, and I didn’t know what I could use them for, but I had to have them.  Because I love them.  They’re from Target, and they’re an exquisite crackled turquoise glaze on the inside, and a smooth matte slate color on the outside.  Zazen, they’re called.  Gorgeous!  There’s a whole line of plates, bowls, mugs (too thick around the rim, they’ll never do).  While I adore them, I couldn’t justify a set of plates.  We have many plates.  Or more bowls.  We have many bowls.  But I had to have something, so I got two of the rice bowls.  I use them for green tea, or today, for coffee.
  
  Sigh.  Coffee.  I have a Senseo machine, which is very overrated.
  
  Here it is in action.  I like the one cup at a time deal.  That works for me, as I’m usually the only coffee drinker in the vicinity.  I like the foamy froth.  That part is aesthetically pleasing.  The problem– is that it requires pods.  And pods have many problems:
1. They’re pods.  Pods.  ??
2. Pods are tres expensive.
3. Pods are too small to hold sufficient coffee to make a decent cup of appropriate volume.
4. Pod manufacturers don’t produce pods that contain good coffee.
5. Inserts that bypass the pod, thereby allowing the coffee drinker to use her own grind of respectable coffee, either don’t hold sufficient coffee to make a decent cup (and make a giant mess), or bypass the frothing effect (which is the only redeeming quality of this machine, rendering it a complete waste of time, effort, and emotion).
6. It takes two pods make a reasonable cup of coffee.
7. See items 2 and 4.
• Today, I have many things to do, besides blog.
1. Find a safe home for my chotchkies.  I still don’t know how to spell that word.  My mobile young man can now reach beyond the barrier that we temporarily placed in front of the glass cube display that they currently call home.
   
   If it looks tres department store-ish, it’s because it is.  In point of fact, when one of the old glamorous department stores of the region closed its doors several years ago, I bought a portion of their display cubes.  I’m not so sure how I feel about them any more, but I’m not quite ready to put them on Craigslist, yet.
2. Return sundry items to Target, and p’raps find others to take their place.
3. Sort through my closet and collect items to donate, as the donations truck is making its rounds next week.
4. Housework.  The usual.  Dishes.  Laundry.  Finding shoes that a certain young man has absconded with and since forgotten.  Water plants.  Dust.  Tidy up.
5. Relocate the surface of my desk, which is buried somewhere beneath a bunch of crappe important papers and whatnot.
6. Learn to use my new camera.  Yes!  I got a new camera.  A video camera.  Oooooh.  It’s a Canon (I’ve been quite pleased with my Canon PowerShot G1 that I’ve now had forever).  Optura S1.  Yes, it was on sale.  The footage taken in daylight is exquisite.  Indoors with low lighting…  Jury’s still out on that one.  I need to read the manual and find out how to use the thing before I judge it harshly.
7. Take a timeout, just for me.  (Oh, I forgot, this entire day is a timeout, just for me.)

…and I’m spent.

A list of lists of lists.  I’m blogged out.  But by the looks of things, I should also spend a little time cleaning up my blog’s style sheet, what with the embedded lists and such.  Perhaps another day.

…or…   …corners of my home…

…or…  …Show and Tell – windows (v.late)…

In the infinite wisdom of modern home builders, our luxurious master bath with its huge window faces a very busy street.  There’s nothing more relaxing than a nice hot sudsy bath, and waving to the semi-truck drivers, or better yet, the high school kids who gather just outside that window as they wait for their bus.  It’s a beatiful, cloudy, blue sky day today.  And every day.  Thanks to the artscape window film.  I could have frosted the glass, but decided to go a bit whimsical.  It’s easily removed, should I grow tired of it.

Its sister has the stained glass pattern, because I wasn’t very thrilled with the direct line of sight from our neighbor’s busy home into my bathroom, and bedroom beyond.

My towels are various colors that match the greens and blues in the window, but now, I may have to retire them, if I am overcome with desire once I learn more about Joke’s towels*.

*Good Grief!  Having not kept up with Joke, who is, by the way, a very entertaining fellow, it took me forever to find the towels post, and why oh why is my broadband being so darn slow   Exasperating!  And now I am hyperventilating as I realize the famous towels are on closeout, online only, and I must must must go see if I can’t live without them.

…or…   It’s a small world, after all.

Yesterday I got a post on our family message board* from one of my nieces, my deceased brother’s first born, who has been tapped in to our family for only a few years, as she was adopted at birth to a fine family who lived across state from us.  I’ve waited all her life for her to reach that age where she could meet us, the rest of her family, and when she did, it was a beautiful thing.  She is a beautiful thing.  She’s one of those people that you find it hard not to stare at, because she is simply breathtakingly beautiful.  When I look at her, I clearly see her mother, and I clearly see her father.  She is such a perfect amalgamation of the two of them, and it fills me with wonder, every time I even think of her.  She’s intelligent, has a great sense of humor, carries herself with confidence and dignity, and can play the piano like nobody’s business.  All that, and she’s in, to boot.  As in, she’s totally cool, man.  I’m not in, you see, so I don’t know how one would say that one is in, in today’s youthful crowd.  I digress.  Suffice it to say that I am pleased that she has welcomed us into her family.

Meanwhile, I work for a gargantuan company that employs thousands and thousands of people, worlwide.  In its heyday, it employed over a hundred and fifty thousand people.  People!  That’s alot of people!  In fact, in a few short weeks, I will have logged twenty years with this company.  Twenty Years!  Goodness, where does the time go   Somehow I’ve survived all the downsizing efforts and mass layoffs throughout the years.  I’ve wrestled with the idea of this working life not being what I had dreamed, and come to the realization that the grass may not be greener elsewhere.  I work with very fine people, who I love, and twenty years of experience and stability bring with it a decent wage, a stable daily schedule, health benefits, and a month of paid vacation each year.  Things could be so much worse, so I am grateful for what I have.  I digress.

So the conversation goes like this…

…I hadn’t even considered that my niece was a barista when I made the first espresso comment.  I was just being a bit flip, because I did remember a guy with a name like that, and I remembered talking with him about his dreams of brighter pastures, back when we were much younger, kids out of college with only a few years under our belts.  It was the late Eighties or early Nineties, layoffs were looming, and he was going to move to another city to try out the gourmet coffee scene.  I was going to open a bed and breakfast.  He followed his dream, I’m sure he worked his a$$ off, and now, now he’s done it!  I am SO pleased to hear this news. 

This story, though long-winded, is important for me to write about, because the bottom line is that I am filled with such a beautiful and wonderful feeling that stems from being connected.  I feel connected.  It’s a big thing, really.  We live in a world filled with millions of people living their lives, and somehow, somewhere, somewhen, we are connected.  It makes me feel so good, so happy, knowing this. Feeling this.  Experiencing this.

*We’ve had a message board for many years, thanks to the illustrious duo of C&D, my sister and her man.  It’s like an original blog, or a pre-blog.  This wondrous thing has kept my family connected in so many ways, for so many years.  Our family dynamics wax and wane, and it’s all there, all captured in our message board.  It’s a precious thing to me.

Well, today is the day.  Twelve weeks ago I joined the office pool.  I bet $40 that I could lose 18 lbs by today.  It shouldn’t have been too hard, in theory.  But for some reason, it wasn’t a bit easy.  Did I win   Did I lose  

According to my scale at home, this morning, I’m a bit shy of my goal.  According to the scale at work, I’ve made it with some to spare!  How I dislike discrepancy and inconsistency!  I’ve weighed at work before, and it’s been close to the home numbers, and sometimes even a bit higher.  I was going to surrender my defeat, until I stepped on the work scale.  Now I want to doublecheck the home scale.  It can’t be off by that much.  Can it  

The challenge ends today.  It’s still today, all day long.  Technically, I may still be in the running.

It’s such a head trip, to feel like a failure when a goal isn’t met.  I’ve been crabby all week, frustrated that no loss is registering, when it should.  It should!  Mathematically, it should, considering what I’ve been eating.  It doesn’t help when the know-it-all-male-coworker says, “You can do it.  Just don’t eat that much.”  And proceeds to explain to me that if I only eat X calories a day, I will lose Y pounds.  As if I don’t understand that one needs to cut calories to lose weight.  Hello, I know exactly what I’m eating, and the math isn’t a simple linear equation.  And I’m not a man.  And I don’t burn at the same rate.  Etc.  Very annoying.

Plus, what overweight woman wants to hear ANYBODY lecture her on weight loss   My ears are closed.  I don’t hear you.  lalalalalalalallalalala.  Yes.  Very annoying.  (I should be above this, this quick descent into the mire of annoyance and crabbiness, but regretfully, I’m not.)

I should remind myself that I’m a winner, no matter what, because any loss is a win, in this case, and I have lost a true 15 lbs.  Of that much, I am certain.  Hooray!  That’s excellent!  It’s a great thing!

But is it more   According to the work scale, it’s a whopping 21 lbs, plus another 1 or 2 for the clothing.  Can that be right   It’s amazing how happy that made me feel, the thought that I might have lost over 20 lbs.  Even if it’s not real, and that scale is off for some magical reason today, my mood escalated when I saw that number.  Glee!  It was a moment of glee!

I am such a fickle creature.

And I’m going to re-weigh when I get home.

So, I lose but I win and I win because I lose.  The work scale was a fluke.  The grand total for my effort is 17.5 lbs.  Not bad at all.  I don’t get to split the winnings, but I can still congratulate myself for doing what I’ve done.  Something is better than nothing.  Anything is better than nothing.  If I continue to plod along, one of these days I shall be fit.  And deeeeeeeluxe.

Show and Tell, via Blackbird, for Poppy, is our least favorite piece of furniture.  I present…

…the behemoth

…which I hate

…because

well…

…for one, it’s teal.  V. eighties.

…for two, it’s made for people constructed like giraffes with very long necks.  If a person of normal stature sits in it, the top pillow lump thing pushes one’s head forward so that one is forced to look at one’s lap.  V. uncomfortable.

…for three, it’s ugly.  Look at it!

…for four, it’s Mr. Gadget’s, and I can’t get rid of it.

My helper.  We don’t have a child lock on the dishwasher, and he’s very good at pushing the buttons and turning the dials.  He loves to open and close doors.  He has even opened this and crawled onto the door – all it takes is a split second.  I have to be SO vigilant with this little guy.  Note the neatly folded stacks crumpled piles of kitchen towels on the cart behind him.  Another fun thing to do is help fold unfold things.  And put things away.  Sometimes I find toys and household miscellany in wastebins, laundry baskets, cabinets, and drawers.

Having a helper is the best!