Back and stickier than ever
Monkey and Chickadee are safely home again. They arrived yesterday evening, tired and cranky and all hopped up on a long day of travel (because LORD KNOWS there are no direct flights between Boston and Atlanta, nooooooo! I’m certain that flying Boston to CHICAGO, then Chicago to Atlanta made the most sense, and probably saved hundreds of pennies in the process) and hungry but too tired to eat and excited to be back but bereft over saying goodbye to their father and generally at the very edge of their ability to cope.
I squeezed them tight and kissed their cheeks off and went almost an hour before telling them they were making my ears bleed. It was THAT perfect. read more…
I’m not ready, but you didn’t ask me
Attention Young Master Monkeypants:
Today is your birthday. You are eight whole years old! That is—as your sister solemnly informed you a month or so back—the beginning of being a tween. From there you’ll become a teenager, and from there it’s off to college and a life that in all likelihood does not include snuggling your mother at every possible opportunity. I cannot say that I approve of this progression, but I am trying to deal with it.
This is the first time in the 9-and-a-half years since I became a parent that I am not with one of my kids on their birthday. You are still hanging out at your dad’s house, and I’ll see you tomorrow. You’re having a great time. I know this because when I called you this morning your voice practically vibrated with the pride of having managed to live eight years. You informed me that the biggest difference was that you were finding it more difficult to talk in a baby voice. read more…
It followed us home
After 15 hours in the car today (totally uneventful, really, other than the MIND NUMBING BORINGNESS and the fact that I got all loopy on diet coke and started misreading signs all over the place, including INSISTING that there had been a billboard advertising SEXY WAFFLES), I actually cheered with glee when we pulled into the driveway here at home. Then I opened up the car door and said, “ACK! It’s COLD!”
It’s 24 degrees here in Georgia. The water on our pool cover is FROZEN.
Nevertheless, I am looking forward to a night in my own giant bed (having a king bed is lovely except that it completely ruins you for sleeping on anything else) and the temperature is supposed to be back up to the 60s here in a few days. Soon, the snowbank I stepped in early this morning in New York (which filled my shoe with snow and caused me to spew obscenities before the sun was even up) will be a distant memory.
Home is where you torment each other
Happy new year! I hope you had an awesome night of revelry for New Year’s Eve, preferably one that included a stupid hat. I did not have a stupid hat, but fortunately my hair is stupid enough without one. We partied like it was 2008, though. Hooboy.
We were in bed by 12:15. WOO!
Anyway, yesterday we arrived here at my dad and stepmom’s house. This marks the final leg of our little tour. Although this isn’t the house where I grew up, this is the house where I feel most at home and revert to my most obnoxious behavior (though Otto might insist I’m plenty obnoxious at home, in which case I would lovingly suggest that he SHUT IT). Despite having managed to care for myself and my own house for plenty of years, when I come here I suddenly forget how to put dishes in the dishwasher and how to make my own coffee. It’s a wonder they ever let me come back. read more…
Frozen
We are in upstate New York, and after passing a lovely evening with friends we retired for the night. When I got up this morning and peeked outside, everything was covered with a horrible, fluffy white substance. Somewhere in the back of my mind there is a vague sense of recognizing what it is, but I believe I am repressing the memory because it’s so painful.
This morning was the first time I said the phrase “home to Georgia;” as in, “I cannot wait to get home to Georgia where PIECES OF ICE DO NOT FALL FROM THE SKY.”
I guess I’m feeling better
Yesterday was a whirlwind of travel, putting us at one friend’s house for the afternoon, then shuffling off to another friend’s house for the night. I guess Otto hadn’t been entirely clear with this group of pals as to when we’d be where, so although they were delighted to have us (and OH MY GOD I had the best meal of my LIFE last night; I am thinking of asking his friends to come move in with us, because: EMERIL’S POTATO CASSEROLE), the hosts who were keeping us for the night hadn’t actually made up the guest bed yet.
So we’d watched the first half of the Patriots game at the first house (actually, they watched while I glanced up between working, which they were remarkably tolerant of) (that’s why I write for a living, because me write pretty, what with ending sentences with “of” and such) and then driven to the next town over during halftime to the other house. When we arrived, our hostess was making up the bed, and we brought our stuff in and I started to help. read more…
It’s not a vacation. . .
… until somebody ruptures an eardrum!
(What, your family doesn’t have that rule?)
Oh, I kid. No one has a ruptured eardrum. I just WISH I had a ruptured eardrum.
So, um, remember that cold I had? My cold that was getting better? My cold that suddenly sensed I was over a thousand miles from home and decided to morph into FORM OF: EAR WEASEL and commence throbbing and itching and generally making me wish for death? Yeah, that cold. I hate that cold.
Why yes, I DO believe that cold knows I’m away from home and also, you know, not generally a fan of the sensation of a creature trying to nibble its way to my brain via the ear canal. Because colds are bitches like that. read more…
Cognitive dissonance
In the same kitchen where two small children are playing Connect Four with wild abandon (and seeming obliviousness to the fact that this was a really cool toy when WE were kids), there are four adults.
Between the grown-ups, there are three computers, two cell phones, and a video camera in use. All at the same time.
Merry Christmas detox
Good morning! I hope your Christmas was completely awesome. Mine was, except today I am realizing that a few days of not enough sleep + eating whatever looks good + sure, I’ll have another glass of wine + oh yes, more coffee, please = my body begging for mercy.
I wisely processed this confluence of circumstances as I woke up this morning, stretching and rising from the twin bed where Chickadee had slept the night before. (While the kids were here, they slept in twin beds in the spare bedroom while Otto and I slept on the pull-out couch in the living room. Now that the kids have gone to their dad’s, our hosts suggested we move to the spare bedroom to avoid the early morning stampede of nephews. Late last night I flung myself down on top of Otto, on his bed, gave him a hug and a kiss, and then got up and hopped into the bed catty corner from him, while calling “Good night, Ozzie!”) Anyway, as I walked down the stairs this morning, I vowed to set aside the holiday gluttony and get back to some sensible eating.
And then I said good morning to my sister-in-law and the nephews, and helped myself to a cookie from the plate sitting on the kitchen island. read more…
We’re here and we’re hot
The cot did finally show up at the motel, which was awesome because the kids fell asleep right away. And then there couldn’t have been more than three separate incidents of people having loud conversations either out in the hallway or underneath our window during the night.
Chickadee was snoring. Monkey talks in his sleep. And Otto still hasn’t gone in for the sleep study he really needs to go have, but we have long suspected he has some sleep apnea, and thanks to the other noise, I was awake most of the night listening to him rest oh-so-peacefully (which was not, in fact, peaceful, as it turns out, so much as it was him NOT BREATHING) inbetween snorting in great gasps of air on account of that whole forgetting-to-breathe thing.
It was extremely relaxing, except not. BUT! Then we got up the next morning and Chickadee said, “My eye hurts!” and I was certain she was going to turn out to have pink eye, because wouldn’t that be the perfect topper to a night in hell at the SUPERGREAT motel? Oh, but I was aiming low. She didn’t have pinkeye. read more…