I don’t spend much time looking at my blog statistics, but once in awhile, I get curious and go digging around.

Here are my favorites from the last ~6 weeks:

aleck johnson lesbian — This is my favorite search EVER! Aleck, is there something you neglected to tell me?

breastfeeding balloons — Stick to breastfeeding babies. The balloons are not so hungry.

fuzzi bunz costco & fuzzi bunz sams
— I doubt it. But cheap ones are available online. I recommend Fuzzi Bunz Factory Seconds, or looking for sales here. Yesterday someone told me about a site called Diaper Trader, but I wasn’t able to find it.

usb sim card reader meritline — I don’t speak this language. But welcome to my blog.

lion holding a flag tattoo — I am the last person who could possibly help you. I have a needle phobia.

shai david calculus teacher — I never took calc, and I don’t know Shai David. At least not as far as I know.

scalinis didnt workfor me either!

infected breast implants — YUCK, and I have no helpful information, and I hope NEVER to have any.

is jill pregnant – No. In fact, that’s not the plan any more. But I am in the top 10 search results for that — long after the many announcements of Jill Hennessy’s pregnancy. Congratulations, Jill! Incidentally, she and I share a birthday, although a year apart.

animatronic breasts — I think I know what’s going to appear in my nightmare this evening!

our first threesome — is so unlikely to ever take place that the idea of it being a blog search leading here makes me laugh.

bring me some water
— Still or Sparkling? I’m all about the customer service.

how to tie dye tee shirts with mickey mouse
— I’m sorry, how did you come to find this blog???

is tuesdays with morrie abstract or concrete — I don’t know, I haven’t read it. I think you should read it and form an opinion. Frankly that would probably be just as fast as looking on the Internet.

my period came and gone and came back. could i be pregnant — Probably not. But if you’re worried, I would take a pregnancy test, not try to figure it out on the Internet.

liza kidnapped
— I hope not!

wedding crossdress aunt — My aunts looked lovely at my wedding! And also at my sister’s wedding. None of them was crossdressed.

when on a maturnity leave can i skip my car bill — No. You also have to pay your mortgage or rent, your credit card bills, your phone bill, your student loans (er, maybe that’s not an issue for you) etc.

lord peter wimsey quiz — Do I have one of those? I don’t think so. I’d love to do one. I Heart LPW. But I don’t think I have one, and frankly, google failed me when I looked. The only ones were boring and unblogworthy.

As always, there were MANY many many many variations on “atlanta eggplant scalinis labor restaurant induce,” “tallest baby in the world,” “lesbian pregnancy” and “pumping breastfeeding review.”

Incidentally? While he is tall, Noah isn’t and wasn’t actually the tallest baby in the world. That honor appears to belong to a baby in China. But Noah is the #1 search result on google for that inquiry. The others, as you might imagine, produce a lot of “adult” results before you ever get to my blog.

 

The project of cleaning and organizing (well, getting started on organizing) the garage made us think more about our impact on the environment and the vast quantity of crap that passes through our lives.

Even though we cloth diaper overnight, we still produce an absolute shitload (pun intended) of diapers for the trash every week. Plus wipes, plus just tons of stuff.

What else could we do, though, that we trust ourselves to stick with doing for more than 3 days? We tossed around a few ideas, and decided to try cloth wipes.

Cloth Wipe Experiment:

  1. Cut most boring flannel receiving blanket (blue, no designs) into dozens of wipe-sized pieces.
  2. Put piles of flannel wipes into reusable wipe dispenser.
  3. Look up cloth wipe recipes on the Internet.
    • The first site wanted tea tree oil. Surely there is a more “average consumer” option.
    • The second site had 4 choices, basic, aloe vera, antifungal, and essential oil.
  4. Clearly this essential oil thing is part of the subculture. Decide to mix the basic and antifungal recipes. (Yeah, I think we have thrush again.)
  5. Mix:
    • 2 tablespoons vinegar
    • almost 2 tablespoons baby wash
    • top-off 2nd tablespoon baby wash with Mrs Meyers geranium scented laundry detergent containing essential oils
    • 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
    • 6 drops grapefruit seed extract (I think that’s what they really meant, not grape seed extract; according to breastfeeding guru Dr. Jack Newman, “Grapefruit seed extract (not grape seed extract, ACTIVE INGREDIENT MUST BE “CITRICIDAL”), when treating thrush.)
    • 2 cups water
  6. Pour mix over flannel. Happily realize it is exactly the right amount.

I’ll report back on how the experiment goes.

 


You’re the United Kingdom!
You’re a much weaker person than you used to be, but you still act like you did when everyone looked up to you. Despite this, you’re probably a better person than you were when you had so much power over those around you. Though you do have a strange fascination with jewels and monarchs, which lets you play in castles, but also end up leading a sort of tabloid lifestyle. You really like the Beatles, even more than you like Oasis.
Take the Country Quiz at the Blue Pyramid

This quiz cracked me up! The idea of playing with shiny objects in castles does sound like fun. But Oasis? I’m such a non-music geek that I think that’s where desert animals go to have a drink of water. And tabloid lifestyle? Well…you be the judge.

 

Yesterday, I asked Jill to take Noah out for at least 2 hours (she gave me 3) so that I could work on cleaning our room and closet, which had gotten a little clogged with unused items. Like clothing that is never going to fit again.
I anticipated finishing the job while Noah napped. So naturally, he didn’t nap. The good thing is that not napping, he fell asleep around 7:30 pm, giving me time to race to the Container Store for expensive but nearly indestructible shelves for my other forthcoming house project, The Garage.

Jill carved out enough space for her new car, but at the moment, that means that the other half of our garage is occupied by (mostly) uncertain-looking stacks of boxes, bins, and stuff.

I am literally unsure where to set up the first shelf, which will be key to the reverse-tetris-like project of organizing these things.

Phase 2, incidentally, is going to involve a lot of eBay, Craigslist, and freecycle. But first we need to figure out what all crap we have, and get it onto shelves instead of in piles.

But! Clearly I cannot be building shelves or organizing toxic chemicals and random sharp objects in the garage with Noah’s adorable and enthusiastic help.

So what to do?

 

I’ve blogged some about my unusual high school experience, and my thoughts leading up to reunion, but I haven’t blogged about the Rufus King High School Class of 1987 reunion itself yet.

My thoughts about it are kind of scattered and surreal, much like the experience itself. Incidentally, someone I knew in high school, but don’t think I ever saw that evening, did an radio show bit about it the next week. (The first half is mostly about beer.)

There are a bunch of people I still see or otherwise communicate with on a regular, if not as much as we’d like, basis. Some from my class, some from the few years ahead or behind mine, most who don’t blog or otherwise have websites.

Seeing those people who were able to make it or who live in Milwaukee, and their spouses and children, was wonderful. Only hearing Noah say Grandma and Grandpa was better, for the whole trip.

The real point, I think, of high school reunions, is to see and talk with the people you aren’t still in touch with regularly. And that was fabulous.

Thoughts (last names omitted, in case they want to protect their privacy):

I wish I’d been able to talk more with the organizers, Heather, Terri, Michelle, Craig, and Geneva.

I talked to a few of my old neighbors, like Steve, and people I knew all the way back to kindergarten, like Heidi. Why do you suppose we didn’t speak to one another in high school?

It was so wonderful to catch up with Colleen and her husband Mike. I wish we’d had more time together. I love that Jill calls her “smokin’ hot Colleen.”

One of the funniest moments of the evening for me was standing with Colleen and John, talking about Mike Cudz*?, with whom John is still friends. Colleen and I both liked Mike in the 8th grade, which put something of a strain on our friendship. Alas, Mike did not feel that way about me, and his “going with” Colleen didn’t last terribly long either.

As Colleen drifted away from the conversation and Judy drifted in, we told her that we’d been talking about Mike. She announced that he’d been her first kiss, back in middle school also. John and I cracked up, and I hope John has given Mike a lot of shit about that particular segment of the evening.

Most flattering moment for me? Robert said something to the effect of my being one of the top five girls he wished he would have asked out but didn’t. What a sweet and brave thing to say; I feel badly that we didn’t really wind up talking after that. And for the record, I probably would have said yes. I still remember hanging out after school at the library in 7th grade, and having a lot of fun.

Seeing Jeni, Tracy, Megan and Clare brought back so many memories, mostly younger than high school — elementary school and middle school. Katie, I so wish you could have been there with us. (Although really, you would have had to come to my parents’ and caught up with the whole family over more time.) Becca, you too! And Kelly & Shannon, the rest of the 5th grade posse.

Robin looks amazing! And she works for Noggin/The N, and has a toddler near Noah’s age. Even though we didn’t hang out a lot in high school, there was always a connection — her brother managed my Dad’s first Congressional campaign in 1982.

Tracy (the other Tracy) looks amazing too. I don’t think we’d connected in several years, and she’d lost tons of weight.

One of the most fun people to reconnect with was Michelle N, who has a cochlear implant! In high school, she was an amazingly articulate lip-reader and brilliant student. Now she hears well enough to have a conversation in a loud bar, and has a great career as a family practice & obstetrics doctor.

Incidently, Michelle, if you read this, did you know that your old neighbor Erin who went to University School is one of my closest friends? I don’t think she and I realized we both knew you until I was telling her about reunion and mentioned you by name. Her sister Clare is over there in the blogroll, and if you leave a comment, I will send you her email address.

It was great catching up with Dr K and hearing about his new adventures launching an IB elementary school.

Kimberley married a fellow King alum, but only 3 years ago, and now they have children just older and just younger than Noah. That was a fun conversation!

Dave, I did have the errand-for-Richard conversation with Carrie that you asked me to try to have. Give me a call and I’ll tell you all about it.

Regrets: Sad that Dave & Liz weren’t there with the rest of our buds. Sad that Eric & Otter didn’t make it and that I’ve completely lost touch with him. Sad that we didn’t get to catch up with Dr Stark during the trip.

There were so many people I talked with briefly — I don’t even want to start naming names because I’m sure I’ll forget half of them and then I’ll feel terrible. The amazing thing was how great people looked!

I think Jill had fun talking with Meredith, Gina, Eric, Dave, and Karen, all spouses who were wonderfully supportive and tolerant of our reunion ramblings.

I can’t wait for the 25th. The only thing I hope is that we have a few more activities, and a few that are quieter, like a picnic or school tours early in the day, so there’s more time to catch up.

 

Sorry for the radio silence this week. Noah has taken to waking up at 5 am, which is prime blogging time for me.

This morning, I crept down as quietly as possible, and although from 5:10 am – 5:17 am were filled with murmured repetitions of “Mommy mommy mommy mommy,” it is quiet again for now.

I blame the person who delivers the paper, with her bright headlights and repeated “thunks” just outside his window. That and the sliver of light from downstairs and small sounds of the coffeemaker and the computer. And NPR, temporarily off while we work through Noah’s overly early hours. I miss you, NPR. I promise I’ll be back, and I’ll listen in the car!

Things I have been thinking about this week:

  • My ovaries. We did an “ovarian reserve” test this cycle, to make sure I still had plenty of good eggs left. That means, basically, taking Clomid and doing lots of blood tests to make sure it’s working exactly the way it should.

    I think there’s a reason they call Clomid the bitch pill, and also, it made my ovaries swell up like oranges. I don’t remember even thinking about my ovaries before. Even when I was trying to get pregnant with Noah.

    And I’ll be taking a higher dose next month. Don’t you wish you were Jill?

  • Last night I had a nightmare that Jill told a family with quads who were Noah’s age that we’d be happy to babysit them overnight, and then didn’t tell me until our house was filled with screaming toddlers and way too few parents. I woke her up to tell her not to do that.
  • I actually think that was a work dream, more than a TTC dream. I’m not saying anything out of the public domain — there’s a wired blog link I can’t find that discusses it — but work is crazy with rumors about forthcoming layoffs and major changes. I don’t *think* I’ll be directly affected, but even if not, work is certainly going to be more chaotic and difficult after the fact. And I might be wrong, of course. While someone has to do the work I do, it doesn’t have to be me.
  • I’ve been having the funniest debate on another blog. One of my closest friends, Erin, is not a blogger, but her sister Clare is. Clare did the personality test meme flying around just now, as did her parents (in the comments), then we all speculated as to Erin’s Meyers-Briggs personality type.

    I called Erin, as I often do, on my commute home yesterday. My plan was to tell her that she had to go read the comments and take the quiz, but Clare had already done that. Her first words to me were those three little words we all love to hear: You were right!

Click to view my Personality Profile page

 

Jill’s birthday was Sunday, and I imagine I would have blogged about it by now if we weren’t addicted to Rock of Love, Army Wives, The Closer, and Weeds. (The book review post was written earlier, but was scheduled for today.)

Noah and I got up early and drew Mommy some cards:

All the Birthday Cards

It’s fun to watch how much Noah likes drawing, and also putting away the crayons. Until it gets difficult to fit them in the box.

After Jill got up, I made apple muffins, which turned out ghastly. It was from the last version of Joy of Cooking, and I swear they called for wayyyyyy too much salt. We actually had salt-apple muffins, which I don’t recommend, but Jill was very nice about it.

Saturday evening, she and I and Noah all went out to a “cruise-in” held by a local car club. Noah liked the running around in the street more than he seemed to like the cars, but Jill had a good time, and that was the most important part. I had fun too, although maybe not as much fun. ;)

The rest of Sunday was pretty low-key. Jill got some quiet time around the house — and time to get ready for The Car’s arrival (tomorrow!!!) — and we took Noah to the local B&N children’s area to play with the trains. He was mad when we left after 2 hours, having driven away outlasted half a dozen other children.

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