because the baby is asleep, i got to 1) unload the dishwasher, 2) move stuff from the washer to the dryer, and 3) hang the diaper covers outside to dry in the sun. if paul were here today instead of spending time with cam's dad, i think i'd be sprawled on the floor in front of a pile of lincoln logs. that sounds more fun.
my mother got into a minor accident today -- one of the rear doors on her pt cruiser swung open and smacked into a parked car. she didn't even realize it until someone following her stopped and told her to go back because it was the nice thing to do. she went back and knocked at the door of the house where the car was parked. no answer, so she seemed to feel she was off the hook.
when she told me about this, i just looked at her. jesu cristo. i told her to go back to the car and leave a note. how can she assume a car parked in front of a house belongs to the owners of that house? and just because no one answered the door, how does that absolve her of responsibility?
me: i know if you went outside and saw your car had been damaged you'd be mad.
her: [wheedling] but it's not really a dent.
sometimes i feel like the parent in this relationship.
working from home is turning this week into a fog filled with couch-sitting and overeating. what day is it today?
another weekend has passed by and i have managed to remain pregnant. this is both a good thing (my jewish doctor would have missed the birth) and bad (my work baby shower is today and i hate being the center of attention).
yesterday was my last full(ish) day in the office. rather anticlimactic. i'm not sure what i was expecting, but the day was blah. got in late because of a morning appointment with my ob/gyn, then got stuck at at work until 6:30 pm because our new couch wasn't delivered quite when we expected it would. i know that people in my dept. don't consider me gone until next week (and i will be back in the office on monday for the baby shower), but c'mon, make me feel like i'm going to be missed... four months is a long time.
as we drove past the harbor this morning, the rising sun shining behind the shadowed cranes made me think of the bookcover of an old copy of my antonia. and i was strangely content for a moment.
in retrospect, the spilt milk incident was kind of funny.
i have taken ten days off work (including sick days) in two years. such behavior in a department where people seem to take off A DAY A WEEK.
"both my kids got in trouble yesterday at the same time... can you tell i don't beat my kids enough?"
there is a woman here who keeps declaring to no one in particular that it's really hot in the office. since she's not pregnant (god knows i'm overheated almost all the time), i firmly believe that early menopause has set in.
legoland is a nice place for little kids. i'm surprised how well the day went. (even though there's not a whole lot for a pregnant lady to do there -- not that pregnant ladies are the intended audience, of course.)
i'm also surprised how many people brought newborns with them. i mean, i understand wanting to appease your older kids, but i swear i saw more than one baby that was little more than a fetus.
i think paul had a good time. he really enjoyed this room where kids got to build cars and send them down little ramps. i think he could have stayed there all day. he wasn't so big on rides (and was only interested in rides he could ride with cam), but he did enjoy crashing a little motorboat multiple times.
we ended up paying an extra dollar a ticket to get three more full-day passes. they're good for nine days. we might end up going back on sunday, i don't know. we'll see. legoland didn't look like much fun for kids older than six, but hey, ours is only four.
it's 11:30 pm. the washer is running, the dryer is running, the dishwasher is running -- and i am run down. i need to go to bed, but i have stuff i need to do first. funny how a day off from work takes so much planning. if i were going to work tomorrow, i'd already be asleep. the only thing i'd need to think about would be what to pack for lunch and snacks for the workday. instead i have to think about what to pack for our impromptu trip to san diego. legoland tomorrow, balboa park the day after and back home the day after that. what to pack? what to wear? what to eat? what to bring to entertain a boy on two long car trips?
i'm already thinking that work sounds less stressful.
this must be why we rarely take days off for anything but the most practical of reasons (like preschool and doctor's appointments).
i am not to be trusted in the house alone. even at seven months' pregnant, i move furniture for fun.
it's friday morning. two of my coworkers (including one of my assistants) is out sick. paul is sick. cam was well enough to go to work, but had to stay home because cam's dad is sick and therefore can't watch paul. i feel okay now, but my cough is making me a little self-conscious. just ran out of kleenex. sigh.
i went to bed early last night, so hopefully that'll be enough rest to get me through this. there's too much to do -- a viewing tonight, a wedding tomorrow, a long weekend to enjoy. there's no room for the flu. i just got over (mostly) a cold in that charmingly unmedicated way that pregnant women do. the flu could finish me off.
my ob/gyn is very cool. he decided that he doesn't want me to test my blood sugars anymore, which is really nice. not that i minded it too much, but it's nice to not have to deal with that. of course i need to keep to my diet, but that's fine because it keeps my weight from going out of control (but i was very bad last night -- paul brought me a big heart-shaped cookie that he had frosted and decorated at school).
plus he's hot.
but i wish he wouldn't be quite so... frank with the sex talk. cam was too sick to come in with me to my appointment, so he waited in the car. after i met with the doctor, i told cam he was lucky he missed out because this appointment was twice as embarrassing as the last one. i swear, do we look like bunnies or something?
coworker: you look very pretty today.
me: thanks.
me: i'm going to my doctor today.
me: [dramatic pause]
me: he's very good-looking.
coworker: [dramatic pause]
coworker: [laughter] maybe you could ask him out for a drink.
me: riiight.
i am remarkably unobservant. didn't even notice my blackberry was out yesterday.
we are all very happy for little eli.
pretty sad that my first acts as a 33-year-old were to drink a glass of milk, eat a piece of toast and watch the last few minutes of "what not to wear." i think it's bedtime.
have been perusing pictures of children's rooms from all over the world to get ideas. it's a little comforting to see that no matter where you are, there must have been an ikea in your life at some time or another.
just read -- teased -- sang -- snuggled -- paul to sleep, then i cut his fingernails. returned to cam to discover he was asleep, too. am thinking i ought to do the dishes, but because of my eczema i fear that cam would yell at me in the morning. maybe i'll just sit here and contemplate sleep.
why do i always end up on pancake duty on saturday mornings?
one of my coworkers in another office is boring me with details of the weather. look, i know the weather there is awful. i get it.
another christmas over and done with (except for the clean-up of decorations and the writing of thank-you cards). now i'm back at work and wishing i could be sleeping. or shopping.
apparently my contributions to the party were not so popular. i must be a terrible cook. i should have slept instead.
when the holidays are over, i think i will sleep for three days straight.
i just read an article on a local paper's site about city officials requiring a $65 encroachment permit from a man who had decorated a little grassy parkway in between his home and the street.
now, i don't care for flashy holiday decorations. i usually find them kind of tacky. paul loves them, though, so i tend to keep an eye out for them so i can point them out.
because the decorations are on city property, okay, i can see why a permit would be necessary. $65 is pretty steep for decorations that are only going to be up for two months, tops, but i don't know how cities assess the rates for these things, so... whatever.
normally i'd just read this sort of thing and not really think anything of it, but today i feel enough irritation at one comment to write about it. in fact, i'm not really here to write about the permit or the fee or even the fact that somewhere nearby a man loves flashy decorations so much that he ran out of decorate-able space on his own property. i'm writing about one line in one comment by a person who couldn't even bothered to use his real name.
the majority of comments were directed at the city for their meanness and lack of holiday spirit. considering that the homeowner in question had decorated this little strip for four years' running and had even won awards from the city's own beautification committee, it does seem to me that this was something that could have been brought to his attention a little earlier. perhaps they could have mentioned it last year? i'm guessing this isn't something new, but because holiday decorating only comes around once a year, maybe the city should send out a little notice each year reminding people of the city's rules and regulations. but who knows, maybe they already do that? i don't live in that city.
one person objected to the homeowner's decor, felt it was "jumbled" and a "blatant disregard" of city policies. this is fine. taste is taste, and apparently someone knew about city policy. but this one line -- "happy holidays and way to go on spending your son's college fund" -- rankled beyond belief. i don't know which i object to more -- the idea that someone who knows nothing about you can criticize your spending habits, or the idea that every parent needs to have a college fund for their children. either way, ugh!
happy birthday, joel. hope you had a nice day.
today i played with playdoh. i have never really played with playdoh-brand playdough before, so i think i understand why its appeal now. the smell i can live without, but how surprised i was to discover the smooth color-blending ability, silky texture, and best of all, the lack of residue on my hands. astonishing.
is there any way that "you look like my ob/gyn" could be construed as a pick-up line?
a normal day in my office.
assistant #1: [looking around my office] it's kind of messy in here.
assistant #2: hmph.
assistant #2: he's not looking for a raise.
assistant #2: i've been thinking she [me] needs to see the addams family movie.
assistant #2: the second one.
assistant #2: she reminds me of wednesday addams.
me to assistant #1: he's not looking for a raise, either.
assistant #1: yep.
assistant #2: what did i say?
i need to buy some maternity clothes. at 14 weeks, my pants are officially too small. i already have some in storage as i was clearly pregnant before, but at this point of my pregnancy with paul, it was early spring. of course, we don't really have seasons here in southern california, so i suspect that i just want to go shopping. regardless of locale, surely one dresses differently in november than in april, yes?
but the problem is that i'm not sure where to go. recent stories about child labor have crossed old navy and gap off my list, and i've heard such awful things about motherhood (and related businesses) that i refuse to go there. local targets don't have the greatest selection, and the local kohl's is pretty ghetto, my mom says. (okay, maybe those aren't her words, but that's the gist of what she told me.) maybe i should really just dig out my stuff from storage and assess my current belongings before i fling my money into the wild.
i've been watching my blood sugars for over a week now, and i have to say that this experience has been extremely enlightening.
for one, it's kind of hard to be a bread-loving vegetarian diabetic. figuring out my starch intake is harder than expected -- i had no idea that some of my favorite vegetables and protein sources were so carb-heavy.
two "proteins" worth of tofu is too much for me to eat in one sitting, but two "starches" of rice only covers the bottom of my bowl.
two "vegetables" worth of raw carrots is overwhelming.
restaurant portions are really out of control. insane. i knew there was a reason why i always averted my eyes from nutritional information brochures and websites. how utterly disturbing to see that my favorite la salsa black bean and cheese burrito is worth almost six "starches" and only two "proteins."
can i live like this?
"i TOLD you -- she's like yoda, man!"
i have a new blue pen. i think my old pen got rather scratchy after about a month and a week. i must do a lot more writing than i realized. what is the normal lifespan of a pen, anyway?
cam saw a woman in a raincoat walking a pug in a raincoat. how i would have loved to see that.
i guess it was a good thing that there was a second round of recalls from learning curve because it reminded me that i still hadn't sent in the first batch of thomas toys.
today i am wearing a babydoll-ish dress. i've never worn it to work before -- in fact, the only time i've worn it was to a wedding when i was definitely NOT pregnant. (because, honestly, when you see a bride and a pregnant woman taking a smoke break together, something is really not quite right with that picture) for a while, i was thinking about wearing it to work, but couldn't decide on work-appropriate shoes. then when i discovered that people were speculating about my pregnancy, well, i definitely wasn't going to wear it to give them ammunition.
but today i decided to wear it because the news is out anyway.
him: hey, that's kind of nice.
him: i've never seen you wear that before.
me: why are you critiquing my wardrobe?
but the funny thing is that i'm a little too self-conscious to even stand up because it makes me look so totally pregnant. while i was getting dressed, i realized that wearing a light-support shelf bra with the dress made me look round, so i ran away from the mirror in horror and put on an underwire bra to bring the girls up a bit.
me: [to the mirror] nice -- i'm stacked.
but when i got to work, i suddenly felt like i was a little too much of everything. too busty, too puffy, too silly. i was wearing a muffler when i arrived in the morning, but after an hour of a cold chest, i ended up putting it back on and wearing it all day.
it's a very nice dress, but i think i'll wait until i'm much more pregnant-looking before i wear it again. with my luck, of course, it probably won't fit by then.
if i were about six inches taller or had a good tailor (or if they sold petites), I'd buy all my clothes from boden. and if i shopped at boden, i'd also shop for cam and paul there. we would be so colorful.
happy birthday, dad. hope you liked the flowers we brought last saturday.
my new ob/gyn is all kinds of hot.
because i'm hormonal and hungry, i just placed an order for two bottles of bacon salt. not that i really need salt (or bacon, for that matter), but for some reason i just had to have it.
it will never cease to amuse me how easily and often people claim to lose faith in humanity -- usually all it takes is for a favorite to lose out on american idol, or an emmy, or whatever the award of choice might be....
i was awakened very early this morning by a sudden burst of static. in a panic, i woke up cam, who informed me in a remarkably non-sleepy voice that the power had just gone out. ah, i thought, that explained the static (the baby monitor we still use) and the somewhat unearthly glow of the green and blue candeloos right next to my head (they went on when the charger died). i went right back to sleep.
a little while after that i woke up -- still in the dark -- because paul was crying. crap! i didn't even think about the fact that his nightlights would be out, too. green candeloo in handm i went to his room and tried to comfort him. as usual when he's upset, he was in a big anti snit.
paul: i want nothing.
paul: i want the power to just stay away.
me: okay, then we'll just stay in the dark.
paul: okay.
paul: i want light.
i stayed in his room with him and tried to sleep, but it was hard because every 15 minutes or so he'd kick me and sob something about the power. finally he decided it was time to be up and around.
paul: does the tv use electricity?
paul: does the floor use electricity?
paul: does the potty use electricity?
i stuck it out as long as i could, but i felt so crappy that i ended up waking cam and making him take over. then i went back to bed. cam brought me some toast he made on the stove. what a sweetheart.
the power didn't come back on until almost noon. by then i was starting to lament the potential loss of our freezer contents (again), so i was much relieved to see all was still nice and frosty in there. cam had already taken paul over to his parents' house with two gallons of milk in tow.
it's funny how life feels put on hold without electricity. it's nice and quiet -- jumped when everything went back on! -- but we depend so much on power for just about everything. occasionally i'll read about people and their planned electricity-free days and think that it sounds like such a liberating experience, but really, if you haven't planned for it, it's just a royal pain in the ass.
i am not a creature of habit. in fact, i am now using a blue pen at work. it may be the same old micropoint rollerball type of pen i've been using since 1998, but for the first time ever, this time it's blue. the fact that i can do this without freaking out is a testament to my increased flexibility in years gone by...
insane heat + long nap = wide awake at 2 am.
cam and i are taking the day off because we're seeing crowded house tonight. i know that sounds backwards -- we should really take the day off after the concert, right? -- but there is a reason for this madness. rather than be gone from 6 am to midnight, and therefore pissing off a toddler greatly in the process, we're spending the day with paul. i think we'll be going to the aquarium later today.
this weekend i went to a local bass outlet to try to find some replacement everyday work shoes. i found a pair fairly quickly -- black mary janes, flat, with white top-stitching (that vaguely reminded me of a pair of docs i wore back in the day). there was one pair of size six in black hidden in a tall stack of boxes of the same shoe in brown. feeling rather victorious, i modeled one for cam. he gave his approval, then ran away to chase paul down another aisle.
as i was putting my shoe back on, a family came up right next to me. the mother pointed at the shoes in the display (MY shoes) and told her daughter (who was maybe 12) that those would be perfect for school. the girl agreed and started to scan the sizes.
mother: what size are you?
girl: aren't i a five?
mother: i think that was last year.
girl: oh, that's right, six.
with a slightly guilty feeling i picked up my shoebox and walked away. i made it as far as the corner before i turned around and asked the mother, "excuse me, you're looking for six in black, right?" then i handed over the box to the slightly mystified woman, smiled and walked away.
cam laughed ruefully when i told him how i had lost my shoes and made some remark about karma. (but i'm not earl.) i'm not particularly sad to have lost out on those shoes -- sure, it would have been nice to be able to replace the shoes i've been wearing out over the last six years. but i do remember what a drag the back-to-school sales could be, so i was happy to help speed these folks along.
found $3 in the dryer. am taking it as my tip.
in honor of grace paley's death, i reread enormous changes at the last minute last night.
it was different reading it this time. i read it once in grad school, and until last night, i had only read it once since graduation -- even then, it was just a quick read to purge the academia from it. this time i just read, and i liked it even more than i remembered. it's fun taking the english major out of the girl.
yesterday i had a migraine. had to leave work early because, well, i couldn't see.
cam: mommy's not feeling well.
cam: mommy's head is going to explode.
paul: [sobbing] mommy's going away forever?
cam: oh, no!
cam: her head isn't really going to explode!
me: [thinking] i can't believe you just said that to someone as literal-minded as paul -- plus he's three, for crissakes.
discovered this morning (in the elevator, actually) that today is rick springfield's 58th birthday. 58!?! how is that possible?
when we got home, paul's little ikea plastic step-thing was in front of the kitchen sink. i don't know why.
when i went to wash the dishes post-dinner, i decided to use it instead of putting it away. (it reminded me of the little step we had at my parents' house. my aunt used it when she washed dishes. she's maybe 4'9"? i think i stopped using it when i turned 10.) holy crap. if that's what it's like being six inches taller, i'm glad i'm short. the sink looked so very far away. my back started to hurt.
scrub, scrub, scrub. ache, ache, ache.
then i heard footsteps. i jumped down and kicked the step-thing to the side... but i was too late. cam had already spotted me. he laughed. i felt sheepish.
cam: give little mommy a hug.
paul: little mommy!
me: feh.
me: stop calling me that.
cam: hey, i wouldn't have even noticed if you hadn't jumped and kicked the footstool.
little mommy: feh.
i don't really know why, but i am rather looking forward to the return of "trapped in the closet."
no, cam, I DON'T HAVE ANYONE IN MIND.
this is utterly stupid, but i think i kind of want someone at work to have a crush on me. maybe i've spent too much time on trueofficeconfessions.com where people are always talking about secret crushes. who knew the workplace was such a hotbed of emotion? (oh wait, i did know that.) it might be because i've watched my assistant go through a very high-school-type infatuation.
i know it's hypocritical because i totally panic over the possibility of ulterior motives (you know, like sex) and i tend to get all sad when i think that someone won't just be a friend, goddammit, but today i just like the idea of an innocent little crush. maybe i'm just tired of wasting my sassy wit on gay men, i don't know. i don't need eye candy at work and i don't necessarily want to be anyone's eye candy, but when i'm feeling miserable at work, i'd like to know that someone might be blushing and stammering and looking forward to a two-minute chat with me.
as far as ego boosts go, it's not perfect -- and no, i don't need the approval of men to validate me -- but really, something, anything even remotely smile-inducing at work has got to be worth something.
i got some good news at work yesterday (i'll be getting more help), but i'll be damned if i'm not somewhat disappointed that the request was approved. i actually was looking forward -- in a tiny way, mind you -- to a scene.
on saturday i ceased to be a pekingese.
sure, my hair isn't all that short -- if i slouch, my hair is practically shoulder-length -- but it is a lot shorter than it has been since paul was a wee tot.
paul whined in the car on the way to the hairdresser: "i DON'T want mommy to get a haircut."
paul screamed when he saw the finished product.
paul: i don't like your haircut!
paul: i don't like your haircut! [runs out the door]
me: i'll get him.
me: cam, PAY! [runs out the door]
he was more or less fine with it within ten minutes. i guess it didn't hurt that within that ten-minute span we bought him a pair of spiderman light-up flipflops. (hey, he needed a new pair -- his heels were hanging off the backs of his old ones.)
later than evening, i decided to test his haircut tolerance. putting on my glasses, i observed aloud that if i cut my hair shorter, i'd look like bre pettis.
paul: get another haircut.
suffice it to say that my hair was no longer a sore spot for him.
sometimes i feel self-conscious at work because i know i dress kind of blah and boring -- and because my hair is a tangled mess -- but today i decided to feel self-conscious for a totally different reason.
yep, i wore a miniskirt... and then i was cold all day... but at least i was cold and leggy. i don't know too many women under five feet that can say that with a straight face.
i can't, so that's why i'm typing this.
eyeing my skirt:
i don't think i've ever seen that much leg on you!
standing in front of the elevator at target, a heavyset mohawked woman started talking to paul. first she admired his purple crocs.
woman: those are cool.
woman: but do your feet get sweaty?
paul: [silence]
cam: i don't know, i've never worn any.
paul showed her his fading jellyfish tattoo. she admired it, then proceeded to show him hers -- red handcuffs (i think?) on her wrist, then she pulled her shirt open (much to my horror) to display a brightly colored tiger above her right breast. then the doors opened and we got on the elevator.
another woman got on the elevator before the doors closed. mohawk says to her, "we're showing off our tattoos." good god. paul piped up, "mommy has one, too." then he tried to pull up my sleeve, but i was smilingly uncooperative. mohawk laughed. "kids," she said, "they're always saying things they shouldn't."
when we got off the elevator, mohawk went off cheerfully to a motorized scooter cart. cam, paul and i went straight to the railing. cam expressed some disbelief about how, um, open she had been about her chest art.
me: say hi to the girls!
cam: seriously.
paul: hi! [waving]
me: i didn't mean literally.
i was glad we didn't run into her again. god only knows what else she had to show.
the things we do for love. i cooked a dairy-free, gluten-free beef stroganoff. it turned out pretty good -- or so i was told -- but i'm not sure it was worth the total disgust i felt while cutting up the raw beef. vileness.
there are few things i like to see more than a child with child-sized furniture -- it is almost as damnably adorable as a pair of 2T boxer briefs.
i've been meaning to write about this since friday night, but i was kind of either too busy or too drunk or too asleep to do so.
so. on friday night, cam and i went to dinner after work (standard for the every other friday that paul spends with cam's parents). before cam picked me up, i went to the work open bar with my assistant and a few other folks from our floor. cam showed up before i finished my drink, so i downed my g&t and left.
a g&t on an empty stomach. mmm. i was pretty happy before we even left downtown.
we ate at red robin. two beers each. mmm. i could have curled up and gone to sleep.
on our way out, we passed through nordstrom. a girl in a red "usc girls rock" t-shirt walked past us. cam and i squeezed hands (the universal signal for "get a load of that").
me: now, the question is -- did she buy that or did she have it made?
cam: she had to buy that.
cam: if she had it made, it would be in puffy paint.
me: no, it would have been in puffy paint if she had made it herself.
i then went on to describe a shirt i had once owned as a child with the same kind of velvety lettering as on usc girl's shirt. part of the way through the story it hit me that i was drunk-babbling because nobody but my mom (and the friend who gave it to me) should know about this shirt.
cam: you can't start talking about this and not tell me what it said.
me: [sheepishly] on the front, it said "grace..."
me: on the back, "... is cute."
cam: har!
me: [desperately] i didn't buy it!
while we were chatting, i caught a glimpse of an odd sight. i clutched cam's arm. walking in our direction, not too far from us, were two young men. one was dressed in an ordinary shirt, so ordinary i couldn't even tell you what color it was. the other was in a bright blue tee with the cheerful text, "i love hot moms."
as they passed by, cam murmured that he'd tell me a secret.
me: what?
cam: he checked you out.
me: what?
me: who?
cam: i love hot moms.
me: [snort]
cam: i wasn't going to tell you which one, but you had to ask!
i laughed all the way home. god bless alcohol, self-aggrandizing girls and oedipal boys.
went out to dinner with cam. after the waiter carded us (which, once we hit 30, became a bit of a treat), he looked at my ID, smiled and said i looked younger than that. i giggled like a schoolgirl.
it's a good thing he started out strong, because he messed up my order and then took a little bit too long getting us the bill at the end of the meal. a less smiley waiter would have received a subpar tip at that point, but me, well, i like flattery.
waiter: see you next time.
cam: [mimicking waiter] see you next time.
me: shut up.
during a smoke break with the bride (how funny that sounds), we laughed somewhat artificially at a bumper sticker-type phrase that came up in a conversation about our identically-aged toddlers: "mommy drinks because you cry."
her: [looking off into the distance] i would insert my name right there.
it was a very cheesy, very bumper-stickery moment. i felt slightly superior. surely that couldn't be me, too.
yet here i am, a week later, just realizing that when we get to eat out sans child, my dinner choices are often based on the booze offerings of our local restaurants. yes, it has been those kinds of days/weeks/months lately. i stand corrected. one day, i will iron that phrase onto a t-shirt and wear it proudly.
hopefully it won't be a maternity shirt, though, or i will get lots of lectures.
x: you are a completely different person on the dance floor.
me: that is hardly surprising, considering we're in the office right now.
me: i don't think i know anyone who is exactly the same on the dance floor AND in the office.
x: aww man, erase what i just said.
all started out well at the wedding cam and i attended last night.
we went from cocktail hour in a nice little indoor courtyardesque area with a fountain, a bar and bizarre stretchy black slipcovers turning ordinary bar tables into pillars to a brief yet sweet ceremony in a pretty garden with waterfalls and greenery -- to sped-up 80s hell in a dark ballroom decorated with white lilies, black linens, a dummy kneeling before a guillotine, a headless marie antoinette (foam head looking up, bewildered, from the floor) and a large toile screen depicting the storming of the bastille. (the screen was situated behind the dj table; a smaller version of it graced the front of said table.) it was a little bewildering, to say the least.
plus they had a really painfully bad dj with a michael jackson fixation.
that said, we had fun. i finally met some of cam's newer coworkers, had four strangely weak (yet impressive looking) gin & tonics, danced to new order and smiled at a wobbly-legged ten-month-old daughter of clown/juggler/magician/mime.
considering the bride and groom worked for the same company (which is owned by the bride's brother), i was surprised that it was more of a family party than a company one. i admit it, i was expecting a slightly sunnier version of the company christmas party. there were quite a few kids. one of cam's coworkers asked us why paul wasn't with us. i pictured paul screaming "too loud!" and was glad it hadn't occurred to me that we could bring him.
the bride tried to set up one of cam's coworkers with a friend of hers from the peace corps. we deemed her too sorority. i think she probably deemed him too geek.
we smoked too much and mocked lots of people. cam tried to convince people to watch "burn notice." i liked watching the kids dancing. cam's newly married boss looked really happy. when we left, the dj was spinning "don't stop believin'." it was like the end of sopranos, i think. when you think about my first impression of cam's boss' boss, it was an appropriate ending.
in the lobby, a kid hefted a headless dummy (sans guillotine) and grumbled, "jesus, this is heavy."
cam and i smoked and sang at the top of our lungs ("our volume is controlled by the volume of the radio," he pointed out) all the way home. it was sort of like being young again -- not that we're old, but, well, parenting kind of changes your idea of fun. we were planning to hit an arby's on the way home for potato cakes, but the local one was closed by the time we got there. oh well.
paul was awake when we got home. late naps mean late bedtime, unfortunately. i crashed in his room while trying to get him to go to sleep. thanks to a 2 am tylenol run, i woke up surprisingly hangover-free. good times. i let cam sleep in.
best wishes to the newlyweds and family. our thanks for a good party.
my assistant mentioned to me the other day that his brother thinks i'm cute. i've never been anyone's hot boss before. it's kind of amusing.
just bought a few songs off itunes:
"skin" (alexz johnson/instant star)
"but not for me" (elvis costello)
"best i ever had (grey sky morning)" (vertical horizon)
"slow dancing in a burning room" and "gravity" (john mayer)
yeah, yeah, i AM an adult contemporary station waiting to happen. yes, cam, i know my taste in music (conventional) doesn't exactly float your boat these days... but at least i didn't buy any more of the "high school musical" soundtrack.
sometimes i am a little robot.
a few weeks back, we saw a one-man show about george gershwin. certain songs made me feel a little funny -- like i wanted to cry. i was going to tell cam about it, but the sentence that instantly formed in my head was all but impossible to get out because, well, i started to laugh each time i tried to say it. i even snorted once.
a day or two later, i managed to express myself.
me: some of the gershwin songs made me feel what i believe is the sensation commonly referred to as "chills."
cam: you don't know chills?
cam: [astonished chuckle]
cam: it's like you don't know love.
yesterday i had another one of those moments.
i was talking about crossing jordan and i mentioned that i might have an episode saved because it contains the HUGE bug/lily moment. i started to say something, but then began to laugh helplessly. cam demanded to know what it was i was going to say, but i couldn't say it. i told him i'd tell him later, but i suspect that it would still be very hard to say, "yes, i have permanently saved that particular episode because the ending is marked by the moment when, in common parlance, bug grows a pair."
me: [laughing at toddler's attempts to avoid her mother]
me: oh, this is so much fun when it's not mine.
toddler's mother: [gritted teeth] yeah, isn't it?
on the fourth of july, several bugs in my in-laws' backyard decided that i might be a tasty treat.
today i am crippled by a red, painful and swollen right knee. i don't know what bit me, but man, it got me good. shit.
me: did you hear?
me: my boss is on vacation again.
x: he must be doing something right.
me: no kidding.
x: is his significant other rich?
me: i believe so.
me: once they got together, suddenly he was always going on vacation!
me: i need me a rich boyfriend.
x: well, i'll give you a call when i make a lot of money...
i got my review and a nice little raise. to reward myself, i paid off the balance of my grad school loan (wasn't much left, just a little over a thou). i'm so practical sometimes it makes me sick.
cam and i went to south coast plaza to try to find a dress for a wedding that we'll be attending next month. while i didn't find THE dress, we did buy an orange short-sleeved cotton dress (with pockets) from h&m. even though it wasn't a petite dress, it still fit quite well.
one day i'll have to wear it to work -- and everyone will die of shock. because. it's. not. black.
i promised cam i wouldn't work on friday night. since i've been covering for my friend on vacation, i've been working every day and every night, trying to get my work done, his work done, and, for the last three days, my assistant's work done.
i kept my promise with the aid of wine, frozen garlic bread (decadent stuff, that frozen garlic bread), and tivo'd csi: miami and crossing jordan.
but the funny thing is that when i finally checked my email, there wasn't really anything new from last night. the same has been true all day today -- it's eerie. i wish i could enjoy the silence, but i find myself nervously gearing up for a storm.
i have said in the past that i like doing jigsaw puzzles because they are a relaxing kind of pastime. but i'm working on one right now and it's pretty far from relaxing -- it's annoying -- so i don't know how longer i'll be feeding myself this particular line of bullshit.
happy memorial day, y'all.
the best way to get over a song is to buy it. and that is why i now own katharine mcphee's "over it." damn that vapidly catchy song.
i just can't find robin thicke or his voice sexy. i just can't. and his lyrics, laid bare by the joys of closed captioning, just leave me gawping in astonishment at the tv. oh well. i must be too old.
am playing with an alter ego emulator. good god, this certainly brings back memories. the intro text is so familiar. i remember how my brother and i snickered over it.
we loved alter ego when we were kids -- partially because it was interesting and partially because there were naughty bits. okay, mostly because there were naughty bits. we'd play until the disk drive on the commodore 64 would heat up enough to justify turning on a fan and putting a damp towel over the back of the drive, over the vent, i think. (yeah. i know.) we had both the male and female versions because, well, we had to get both.
i've been feeling a little nostalgic for my brother lately, so i decided to look for an emulator. lo and behold, it was so astonishingly easy to find i was kind of sad i hadn't looked before.
when we first started playing, we tried to answer the questions truthfully, but that wasn't always the most fun:
Of course you are. All babies are beautiful. You do not have a very good self-image.
duh, it's us. of course we had image problems. it was more fun to try to be truly an altered ego. to be the jock, the jerk, the opposite. but... of course, it's hard to maintain that level of lie upon lie (so to speak) and we'd inevitably revert to type, dying peacefully with the clearest of clear consciences.
one of the first things i need to do in order to be happier at work is figure out my place/role/whatever at work and then take three steps back. i suspect i give myself too much credit.
a friend from work recently loaned me a book -- year's best sf 4. it's the 1999 edition of a yearly anthology of published science fiction short stories/novels. he recommended it because of ted chiang's "story of your life."
it's been a long time since i've read sci-fi. i read blogs. i read magazines. i read children's books. when i want to read an adult book, i dive into hercule poirot mysteries and meander through dick francis thrillers. in and out in two hours. no subtlety. no nuance. (if there's any, well, i ignore it for the familiar idiosyncrasies and beloved locales.)
this story was amazing -- i loved it. and many of the stories were entertaining. thanks, my friend. i owe you one.
did you hear about the story of the geek squad tech who used his phone to tape a girl in the shower? it's like revenge of the nerds. dude, how painfully '80s of you. eeew.
um, let me clarify the whole "really long time" thing of the last post:
when was the decision made? a few days ago. but we've been debating the second child issue since the day paul was born -- and, honestly, there's something funny going on timewise because i suddenly feel five years older.
it embarrasses me a little bit that in all the time we've been wavering, people have had multiple children. both cousins with kids paul's age have already added additional little people to their brood. paul was beginning to be -- simultaneously -- too young and too old. i could see myself explaining to strangers one day, "yes, i know he's only ten and therefore a little young for merlot, but he's fluent in four languages and has been seeing a marvelous therapist since he was four." that would be the end of it. paul would wear a little tie and carry a mini tumi briefcase and we'd be a tiny family of workaholics.
but now that cam and i have made the decision to have another child, it's kind of amazing how relieved i am. i finally admitted to cam that as much as i didn't want to say, "i want a baby," i even more so didn't want to say, "that's it, no more babies for us." the idea of it, the finality of it, the enormity of it, was more than i could bear.
a friend told me about a little story about her year-old daughter.
apparently she had been finding random loose hairs and various bits of carpet lint on her daughter's head. she'd be combing her hair, and next thing you know, there'd be bits of stuff just coming off of her little head. for the life of her, my friend just could not figure out how all of this was getting on her head. she wasn't rolling on the ground or anything like that.
then one day, she caught her in action. examining the floor closely, the baby found a hair. she picked it up with her tiny fingers, looked at it -- and then put it on her head.
i nearly fell over laughing. guess she thought it was her own?
today i took the day off to spend it with my mother. trip to the cemetery, brunch, shopping. we had a nice time. it was my first day off work since october. imagine that.
the most decadent -- and rarest -- of snacks would have to be the fresh plain raised doughnut. i know of only one place that will sell these if you catch them before they glaze them all (bob's at farmer's market on third street, mid-wilshire), and oh my god, what a treat. forget fresh krispy kreme originals... these plain doughnuts are divine.
i am a ridiculous prude. a coworker told me a story yesterday about "toy porn" (unintentional bump 'n' grind between a tickle me elmo and a talking dog) and i was so embarrassed i was all but speechless. she just told it again to someone who had been out of the office yesterday and i was embarrassed again -- albeit from a distance. eeesh.
today is my nine-year anniversary at work. how am i celebrating? i'm so stressed i'm smoking again. lovely.
today at expo cam startled me greatly by expressing a fondness for angela adams' kenga wool rug. i had never pointed this rug out before because i thought cam wouldn't like it.
apparently you don't know me very well," he said, laughing.
the salesman started the hard sell right away. we asked if they carried it in a smaller size -- and they didn't, so he tried to explain to us that the larger size was really what we wanted, and trust him, he knew what he was talking about. there are few things i like less in this world than salespeople who say that. i find it insulting. good lord, is it so hard to fathom that i might have a notion of how i'd like to spend my money? he then went on and on about sales prices and expo credit cards. cam said that while he wouldn't advocate the purchase, he also wouldn't fight if i really wanted to buy it.
by the time we left the store, i was all fuffled. sure, i loved the rug, but at what price? i had just found THE rug just a few days ago, and here i was, potentially spending three times as much on a different one?
me: i'm just not very good at the expensive impulse buy.
cam: that's a good thing!
eventually i decided against buying the rug that day -- which is cool because i found out that everyone and their grandmother sells that rug cheaper than expo. maybe their final prices won't be as cheap as expo's sale price, but it's totally worth it to me to not feel railroaded.
i still see daylight when i get home from work. imagine that. the novelty has not yet worn off.
i look ridiculous smoking a cigar.
between mr. rogers and "how it's made," factory work looks positively seductive.
cam: this is kind of fascinating.
me: i think "mesmerizing" is the right word.
many years ago cam and i stayed at the ace hotel