Just Breathe...and Notice

I do, in fact, pay (marginally) more attention to my children than I do to my blog....

November really took it out of me.  It always does, and yet every year -- usually sometime around December 2nd -- I come up for air, look around scratching my head, and wonder what the hell happened to the preceding 4 weeks.

November actually starts in late-October, with a wedding anniversary (10/29) that slams right into Halloween and the post-Halloween sugar crash.  Zoe's birthday is on 11/4 (and this year her party was on 11/6) and my birthday is on 11/14.  This year's birthday (mine, not Zoe's!) took a lot of hand-wringing and wine to survive.  Then there's Thanksgiving and black Friday (don't mess with my black Friday). This year we also added a super-early Hanukkah, a science-fair project, and a tick infestation.

The ticks (the 8-legged kind, not the facial kind) started after we boarded the dog for a night while Rich and I went to a fancy-schmancy hotel to celebrate our 10th anniversary.  While Rich and I enjoyed an luxurious, ocean-side evening, Bodhi was romping through a lovely barn that, as luck would have it, happened to also be hosting a large hatching of pin-head sized disease vectors. 

A few days after we got home, we found a tick on the dog.  Then we found another and another and another......to the tune of, oh, about a baker's dozen on the first day of picking.  We washed the dog and the bedding, declared both suitably picked clean, and called it a success. 

The next morning, during our pre-dawn puppy cuddle (shut up, you'd do it too if your dog was as cute as Bodhi!), I felt a little bump and naively thought that I had just missed one from the day before.  We armed ourselves with the requisite tools (good lighting, tweezers, and alcohol [of the rubbing variety]) and figured we'd just pluck the stealth straggler. 

How shocked were we to find ANOTHER dozen or so asshole bugs attached to the damn dog?

Apparently not shocked enough, because it took a few days of the same ritual before we realized that we had a serious problem.  The tick walking across the kitchen floor also clued us in.

We tried the natural route  (diatomaceous  earth, clove and cedar oils, plus washing, steaming, and vacuuming anything that could be washed, steamed or vacuumed).  The we moved on to the slightly less toxic route (a diluted pyrethin spray and double-dose advantix plus more washing, steaming, and vacuuming).

I thought we had it -- I had declared dominion over the bugs!!

Until I found 3, blood-filled fuckers crawling on my wall!!  ON MY WALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

At that point I caved and called an exterminator to come and bomb the house and yard with some nasty, DNA-mutating, chromosome-unravelling toxic crap.   To add poison insult to toxic injury, I have to repeat the cycle two more times to make sure we catch all the life-cycles of the bugs.

My grandchildren will probably have an extra-nose where an ear should be.  But, I don't have blood-filled ticks crawling around on my walls.

So, that was my November.  And while I haven't been blogging, I have been THINKING about blogging and all sorts of bloggy things to blog about:

1) How awesome the 80's party was and how I have the most wonderful friends ever

2) How it feels to be 40 (less of a big deal than I thought)

3) Why I don't believe in punishment or rewards for children

4) All the reasons I am a giant pain the ass (my poor husband)

5) My strong dislike of church marquees

6) My equally strong love of black Friday

7) Hanukkah. 

8) My unhealthy obsession with Teen Mom and the entire Duggar family

 

 

Like, TOTALLY failed

My plan to post everyday has not gone well. 

And yes, I blame you.  Yes, you.  Where are my topics?!?!?

Because I have so much time to fritter away, instead of bettering myself and/or the world around me (or hell, even doing the laundry), I drew you this (it's the 80's version of me):

 

You're welcome.

This is not, like, a total non-sequitur because there will be an 80's party this weekend.  Not because it's my birthday or anything.  Just because it seemed like a totally radical thing to do on a Saturday night.  You, like, know?

I have a love/hate relationship with the 80's (don't we all?!?).  On one hand, it was high-school -- and high school sucked.  I was the kid who manage to make myself look more like a dork with each passing day -- and just when I thought I couldn't be any MORE of a geek, I managed to miss the bus on the way home from a field trip. 

This in an of itself would not have been all bad, except for the part where the police officer offered to catch the school bus for me.  And, by catch, he meant chasing it down the Palisade's Parkway -- with full lights and sirens.  Nothing spells "no chance of a prom date*" like stepping out of the cop car and onto a bus of teenager tormentors who are laughing and yelling Blitz (the moniker that stayed with me until after I graduated). 

Did I mention I was wearing clown make-up while this was happening?  And that I wound up in the ER that night because the cop ran over my foot as he sped away sputtering with laughter? 

I only wish I were kidding -- or even exaggerating a bit.

This is basically how the 80's went down for me.  It was one big social gaffau -- I was teased, tormented, and humiliated on a daily basis.  All while wearing lots of synthetic fabrics in fluorescent colors.  You know, so as not to draw any MORE attention to myself.

But still -- it was the EIGHTIES!!  And at (almost!) 40, there's nothing more fun then sitting around trying to convince your girlfriends that your clothes and hair were, LIKE, totally more horrifying than theirs.  And comparing how many cans of Rave hairspray you used a week.  And taking about our crushes on Ricky Schroder and Scot Baio.  My favorite 80's daydream?  I was a back-up singer for Stevie Nicks and engaged to Scott Baio.  Planning our wedding around my touring schedule was no easy task -- it took a full-semester's worth of algebra class to work out all the details.

The 80's also had wine coolers.  God-bless Bartles and James -- I got drunk for the first time on some awful peach-flavored concoction.  I'm still a little hung-over from that night.

And the music.  OMG -- the music!!  Sting, Madonna, Guns and Roses, Bon Jovi, B-52's, and those god-awful dance/rap bands. 

Joy and Pain.  Sunshine (and what else, what else) and Rain?...

Dressed in Yellow, She Says Hello...

It Takes Two to Make a Thing go Right...

Anyway -- there will be a party.  With 80's fashion, 80's music, and lots of great stories about our mis-spent youth.

I hope to escape without the utter humiliation that shrouded my first trip through the 80's.  I'm not very confident...

 

* I did have a prom date, although I'm not quite sure how. He was a Morman, and might have felt compelled to try to save me.

Late to the party. As usual. Oh -- and it's a potluck!

So, did ya'll know that November is National Blog Posting Month?

Yeah, me neither.

It's known to the uber-hip bloggy types as NoBloPoMo . Catchy, no?

The jist of NoBloPoMo (see, I can talk like a cool blogger!) is that you post every single day in month of November.  And while I have a few things brewing around in my brain that might make good blog fodder, I'm not sure that I have 27 consecutive days worth of material. 

So here's where you come in....my NoBloPoMo party is going to be a potluck!  You give me the topic*, and I'll write about it! 

You in? 

*Nothing, you know, "icky".

Blog? What blog?!?

So, um -- Hi? 

I'm sitting here wondering why the blog posts I keep composing in my head never actually make it to the computer screen.  Clearly technology needs to do a better job of keeping up with me.

Look!  the kids went back to school last week:

We now have a first-grader, a third-grader, and a puppy who we assume fell a long distance during the birthing process.  One of the three of them continues to shit on my rugs (care to guess which one?). 

I had high hopes for the first week of school.  I came home on Tuesday (day 1), took a long walk, then stopped home to get the dog to take him for a walk.  I got back sweaty and ready for a shower -- only to find the master bath, master bedroom, hallway, kids' bath, and part of Ean's room under water.  A lot of water.  I freaked out, shut off the water to the house, and ran next door to borrow our neighbor's ginormous wet-vac.  Long story short -- we had a block in our main line and water backed up through the toilets.  I don't even pretend to understand that plumbing mysteries that conspired to cause the disaster.  I DO know that the first day of school consisted of a sweat-drenched walk, 30+ minutes vacuuming toilet water, followed by standing around with all the other moms (simmering in the blazing heat) waiting for the kids.  

Note that nowhere in the description of my day was there mention of a shower (which couldn't happen until after the plumbers did their thing -- on the roof, oddly enough).  I tried to avoid making eye contact with the other moms in Ean's class, but I have a feeling that the sweat + toilet water stench might have been enough to draw some attention to myself. 

I specialize in making good impressions. 

The rest of the week was not much smoother -- malfunctioning modems, dead radiators, and spastic coffee pots (resulting in a 5:30 am coffee flood on my kitchen floor).  And while it was a frustrating and annoying week, during which I felt like I was bleeding money -- I kept reminding myself that any problem that could be solved by writing a check wasn't really a problem.  

It was a good attitude to have, in light of the phone call I got on Friday evening.

Back in July, shortly before we left on our vacation, I found out that a much-loved family member (C) had received a frightening diagnosis (I'm going to be a vague here because I don't want to discuss her private medical condition on my public blog).  I was upset and worried, but was assured that the problem was curable. 

Her care is being managed by an organization that acts as both the insurer and provider. Sort of like the fox watching the hen-house, right?  Weeks (and weeks and weeks) passed by without any treatment -- leaving her in a state of limbo while they ordered (and waited for) one test, then another, then another.  Four months (MONTHS) following the initial diagnosis (after receiving NO treatment), she learned that her condition had become incurable.  The prognosis was given in terms of months -- and that's only IF the palliative care works.

There is, of course, no way to know if the unconscionable delay in care resulted in the shift from curable to incurable.  It's also a waste of precious time to even ask the question.  But still.  Still....

I am surprised at both the intensity and immediacy of my grief.  I've always been a delayed-reaction kind of girl -- I tend to fall apart as everyone else is starting to pull themselves together.  But this Friday night (fueled by a bit too much wine and no dinner) I cried until my eyes swelled shut.  

I am in full-action mode right now -- looking for clinical trials, mysterious Himalayan herbs, acupuncturists, and prayer groups.  I am across the country, so, really, it's all I can do

Except, of course, for allowing this tragedy to remind me to live and love in every single moment I am given.  And to breathe.  Just Breathe.