DragonBlog

Coming 'round the bend... &

As I approach my one-year anniversary of official "blogging", I am also approaching the point when I need to write my "blurb", as my husband calls it, for our holiday newsletter/card that we'll be sending out to all our relatives and a few friends. This involves looking back over the year and deciding which bits to say and which bits to leave out. Some things are more important to mention than others - like Brian getting downsized out of his job and his trip to Canada earlier in the year with his dad. Other things need not be mentioned, like the fact that I still haven't finished remodeling our bathroom. Then again, I might mention it anyway, since I remodeled a kid's bedroom instead.

This past year has been a blur. I am trying to make a list in my head of the things I want to talk about. The important or interesting things, not just the usual dribble that ends up in this blog. Do I mention that I've been in therapy? I definitely should mention the art class, and the plan to take more classes (for credit even) in the coming year. Most of this past year has been me trying to redefine myself and find out who I am. Becoming a mother changed me dramatically, and I have different priorities than I did two years ago. Last year this time I was still overcoming the initial shock of becoming a mother - the "wow" factor.

I'll want to mention that I went to work for a month. That was an interesting change and also a distressful period - being away from my son was much harder than I thought it might be. I missed those beautiful blue eyes and those tiny warm hugs.

Perhaps once I finish it, I'll make a .pdf of it and put it up here. I usually do some small fun drawings and include a picture of all of us, so I might not include the cover of the card part, for fear you'll all get to see what I really look like! Eek! I have few enough readers as it is, I wouldn't want to scare you off with that!

Hmmmm.

However, let's not forget that too!

Would you rather:
1. have a severe food allergy to salt OR sugar?
That's easy - salt. I already do most things salt-free or low sodium as it is, so it wouldn't affect my diet a whole lot. I'd loathe being allergic to sugar!
2. have skin that feels like tanned leather OR suede?
At least suede is soft, so I'd have to go with that one.
3. have your picture posted on the evening news as a suspected flasher OR as a suspected peeping tom?
Flasher. No contest. I'm female, so it wouldn't be too embarrassing. You see bare breasts and such in R-rated films these days as it is.
4. lick the underside of a slug once OR suck the teat of a cow's udder for ten seconds?
I think milk would be preferable to sludge, thanks. I guess I'll go with the cow.

Okay, folks...

G'night!

Enough with the Turkey already!!!

I've had it with turkey. Three days straight has worn me out on turkey, probably for quite some time. It didn't help that I'm not feeling my best today. It might be the shifting weather again or maybe I'm coming down with something, but the headache refuses to shake, my ears feel icky, I'm somewhat nauseas half the time, and my sinuses can't seem to make up their mind if they are too dry or in need of an antihistamine!

*grumble, grumble, grumble*

Thus, tonight was PIZZA NIGHT!

Because I said so. So there.

We ordered from pizza hut, because we can point and click and make pizza come. We get the cheese-filled crusts and breadstick sauce to dip it in, and tonight was Jareth's first time getting to "dip" too. It was a messy, messy, adorable scene:

*grin*

G'night!

With Mona, the Monkey-Woman?

I need a vacation.

A real one. You know the kind. One where I don't need shoes because I want the sand between my toes. One where they bring me drinks with the little umbrellas in them. One where I can hear the sounds of ocean waves from my king-sized bed.

*sniffle*

I've had a splitting headache all day, so that's the best you get from me tonight in commentary.

Brownie points if you get the reference in the title of the post though.

G'night.

Awwww!

Twice today our son has done super-cute things that I said to myself "I gotta blog that later"!

The first was this morning, while he was hanging out with us on our bed, peering out the window that is just over our headboard while Brian was kind enough to massage an area on my back that's been giving me trouble for days now. Several times, Jareth turned, bent down, and rubbed his little hands on my back too! Trying to be just like his daddy! It was the sweetest thing!

The second was later in the day, just after his nap. We had gotten ourselves some chips and salsa as a snack, and so we set him up with some snacks as well (otherwise he gets jealous and tries to mooch off our food, which is less healthy for him than the snacks he normally gets). His was some kid-friendly Gerber crackers in one bowl and a smaller bowl with some fruit chews that he likes. I had put them in the smaller bowl so they wouldn't be covered in crumbs from the crackers, but he saw us having a smaller bowl too, of a colored stuff, and dipping our chips into it. After a short while, he was our little mimic - "dipping" his crackers into the bowl that had his fruit chews before he'd eat them!

Also today, he made a show of putting his sippy cup carefully onto one of the tables on top of the coaster, just like we do! I was amazed that he suddenly did that, as he usually tries to take the coasters and play with them along with his own toys.

He's watching everything right now. Trying to be grown-up like us and match our every step with his own little ones.

Oh boy. I'd better be on my best behavior, huh?

*grin*

Mind you, he tries to mimic the cats too! But he keeps seeing the kitten getting squirted with water whenever she gets into trouble, so he's somewhat more cautious with that.

He is so cute!

G'night!

Long weekend!

Well, Brian still worked a few hours today, although it was voluntary and at extra pay, which will help over the next month. Because we just saw everyone for Thanksgiving, we won't be doing the usual Sunday dinner, and since we've got Jareth's room together we don't have to take our Saturday to work on that. So, despite the fact that there are about a billion other potential things we could do with this weekend, we're going to throw productivity to the wind and play instead!

YIPEEEEEE!!!

*does the happy dance (not to be confused with the "I gotta pee" dance)*

So you may not see much in the way of cognitive posts here for the next few days. I'll be busy rotting my mind with roleplay games, dvd rentals, and computer games, in between all the usual times where I'm trying to think like a small child so I can properly relate to my son...

*grin*

Okay, that's all for now. I gotta get back to playtime!

G'night!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hope everyone's Thanksgiving was a safe and happy one!

I'm going to collect my thoughts on this one, and probably blog about it once they've had a chance to simmer a little.

The good new is - the turkey wasn't dry, even though I forgot to do the tin foil tent thingy over it.

That was very good news.

And mashed sweet potatoes, with some butter and a dash of brown sugar added...

mmmmmmmm.

And pumpkin pie too.

But we forgot to even open the wine! Too much going on, I guess.

I'm full.

More tomorrow.

G'night!

T'was the night before Thanksgiving...

Too much work to do...

But first - SNOW!!!!

That pic was from early into the day - we actually got a couple of inches all told!

Somehow snow makes it feel like it is really finally the holiday season.

Also...

In a few moments we will be putting our son to bed in his new bedroom! Not after a few mishaps today, like the grand disassembling and reassembling of the crib, which was somewhat chaotic, the moving of clothes, and the "fixative incident".

Yeah... incident.

Step 1 - spray fixative on a couple areas and stand back to survey.
Step 2 - swear loudly and dab frantically at fixative at areas with paper towel.
Step 3 - swear even louder as some of the paper towel sticks to the wall!
Step 4 - get what paper towel you can off the wall
Step 5 - get wall paint and touch up the wall around the areas you were trying to set with the spray ( because the drawings that had any sharpie pen in them bled!)
Step 6 - touch up sharpie spots after wall paint dries.

Yeah... my day has been great... really...

grrrrr.

Now I have to go make stuffing.

And yes, it's almost always like this the day before a major event at my house. Up all night prepping and full of disasters.

Joy.

Hope yours is going better.

G'night!

And now,

Oof. Feet hurt.

But, the turkey is bought, the liquor is stocked, and the bedroom is painted - it just needs some fixative on the special pieces to give them a chance of surviving small inquisitive hands. Then it needs some airing out. He'll move in Thanksgiving Day morning! Woohoo! More pics tomorrow probably...

But, in the meantime...

Would you rather:
1. have every driver but you be a "student driver" OR have every driver but you be over 75 years old?
The student drivers are usually at least trying to be on their best behavior so that they can get their licenses... Some of those old people drive like maniacs though! I guess I'll take the young 'uns.
2. be dating someone who insists that every electric device in both of your homes be controlled by those "clap on, clap off" devices OR that every piece of furniture have plastic covers?
The Clapper sounds better than the plastic. Uuuch!
3. have regular encounters with aliens and not have any proof OR have your best friend be invisible?
Oooh the alien thing sounds exciting - assuming, however, that there are no nasty "surgeries" or "anal probes"! I'll take that one! If anal probes are involved though, the friend gets invisibility instead.
4. stick your hand into a sealed box of rattlesnakes OR stick your hand into a box filled with unknown contents that are making a mechanical buzzing sound?
I get this nasty image of bladed things in the latter, so I think I stand a better chance with the rattlesnakes. I'll take the snakes.

The Deadline Approaches...

I've realized why it is that I generally hate about 90% of the holiday season. Because in my family (prior to my marrying Brian - just to be clear here) the holidays have always been about dragging people together, whether they want to spend time with each other or not, so we can eat food that people slaved all day over despite the fact that they believed that the people they were cooking for wouldn't even half appreciate the effort and care that went into it. Then we all sit around the table, eating said food, and either edging around conversations that might make one person or other upset for some reason, or bringing them up specifically to piss one person or other off. There was a forced, fake niceness that happened.

And then, at Christmas, we added the horror of gifts...

You buy something for someone, knowing you don't have enough money to buy whatever they really want, but you try to buy something that will satisfy whatever "gift requirement" you think they have of you. Because in my family there was - you didn't dare just give someone "some cheap thing", you went to four different department stores to find the exact sweater that would impress my grandmother - or else suffer the humiliation. I lucked out, since I was little for most of it, and kids can give grandmas anything and it's "cute", but a couple years ago I watched in horror as the gift I gave my uncle (a gorgeous print that I found and had framed and would have loved to put on my own walls) was ridiculed by him in front of me, only moments after he opened it. I spent a fair amount of money on that print and frame too, it wasn't cheap, but I had thought he'd appreciate it.

Most families at least pretend to like the gifts, regardless of what they get. That's how my mom taught me to be, so that's how I've always been.

I guess that's another instance of "do as I say, not as I do" figuring in. Oy.

People spend money at Christmas to impress others, I think. I try to spend my money on items I hope that the recipients will either really enjoy or I know they want. I always spend more than I ought to though. I guess I'm still afraid of being the one with the least impressive gift. My grandmother always bought love.

Overall, though, I think I might just give up this year. I already bought something for my uncle, who doesn't do lists anyway, but most people I will be buying gifts for have lists I can pick something off of. Maybe I'll just quit trying to do the "special" gifts and just pick whatever cd or perfume they wrote down.

This whole damned holiday season has become so commercialized it makes me sick. We don't "give" gifts anymore, we exchange them. Like some twisted barter system that's also supposed to reflect our love for one another. What a bunch of crap. There's a part of me that thinks maybe we ought to outlaw lists altogether - then people would have to actually know a thing or two about the people they are giving gifts to! What a concept!

Want to show love instead? Spend some time together. Play a board game together (just not Monopoly!). Go outside and build snow forts and snowmen if it snows enough. Share stories about your childhood holiday seasons while you decorate for this one. Sing together (church doesn't count, I'm talking just family here) - people used to go caroling, do they even do that anymore? I've never seen anyone do it around here!

Last Christmas is all a blur to me except for one particular point - Christmas morning. My husband and I had our very first Christmas at home with our son. We snuggled up and exchanged gifts and helped him open his. We spent most of the time taking turns holding our son and basking in the joy of being together. We showed him his presents and helped him play with things.

I'm looking forward to Christmas morning. I can't wait to see the joy on his face as he inspects new toys we've carefully chosen for him. He can't make a list - see - so we shall have to choose based on what we know about him. We will have put a lot of love and thought into whatever we get for him.

Thursday is Thanksgiving. I'm going to be giving thanks for my son. He is inspiring me to try and move to new levels and do new things. He is the light in my life. As always, I'll also be giving thanks for my husband. He holds me up when I fall, and doesn't judge me for my mistakes. He is my world.

I wanted to say that now though, as I might be too busy to really remember to give thanks while it actually is Thanksgiving. I'll be busy cooking.

Tomorrow - the grocery trip happens. I go to buy the bird.

I hope it's not a mob scene there.

In the meantime, however, I'll wrap up my rantings and ramblings...

G'night!

PS - just as a note, December 2nd is coming! That will be my 1-year anniversary of offical blogging! Woohoo!

Another Sunday...

I find it interesting when sometimes life goes the way I expect it to, even when I don't expect it to. Cynicism. Murphy's Law. Whatever.

Sometimes I just can't win, no matter what I do.

Some people in my life sometimes say or do things that frustrate or even hurt me. A part of me keeps thinking that I should be used to that by now. After all, no one can ever top my own mother in that department. She held the reign for a very long time. Sometimes I think she still holds it, even though she's dead.

Then again, some part of me keeps thinking I shouldn't have to deal with such things in the first place. That maybe people could learn to respect my decisions and my way of being.

Round and round I go with both of those.

Perhaps one day I'll find a place in the middle when it comes to coping.

But I may never know how to act when people make me feel small.

I recently saw an article that spoke briefly about abusive relationships and recognized the one I had with my mother in it.

I guess it's not just my own imagination.

Although she would have said it was.

Round and round I go...

My mind is awhirl, and my therapist isn't back from maternity leave yet.

*sigh*

Oh, the joys of life.

G'night.

Arts & Crafts Day!

Today we made more progress on Jareth's room. Brian and I got his blinds and curtains up, and put a threshold down to cover the edges of the carpet from the hallway until we eventually reclaim that wood floor as well. Then we began more work on the more artistic touches. We're planning to do more, but we're hoping to get him moved into the room before Thanksgiving, so we're getting all the major stuff done ASAP. I took some digital pics to share:

My first work today was butterflies (and flower) for the spring wall.

Meanwhile, Brian helped the "mouse" move into its house.

Afterwards, Brian added this hummingbird and flower to the summer wall.

While I added this little line of animals to the fall wall (I knew there would be no furniture right there ever - the heat vent is on the floor there too).

We're using stencils for a lot of this. Some are pre-fab, some we are creating ourselves. I made a drawn stencil pattern of this wolf off an image Brian wants to come close to duplicating. Brian then did the cutting work and drew in the stencil pattern on the wall. We haven't decided which of us will do the final painting with the acrylics. It will be neat to see how this one turns out. There's a polar bear we're doing in a similar fashion as well.

After we wrapped up for the evening, my guys let me snap a shot of them while I took the above pics.

Then we tucked the little guy into his bed in his current bedroom for now. But he seems to be excited whenever we give him a tour of the new room! I can't wait until we can get him in there!

G'night!

Ramble, ramble, blah, blah, blah...

Yesterday, whilst traveling about running errands, a bumper sticker caught my eye:

*giggles giddily*

Yeah, I liked that one.

Anyway...

Quick Shtick Writing seems to be going well - in the last couple days we managed to kill off around 150 some odd characters in one fell swoop!

Wait... am I supposed to be proud of that or not? hrmm...

Really, I am a pacifist! Honest! But only in the real world. The kid gloves come off if it's a computer game or in writing. Where else would I put all that violent energy? Mwahaha!

*rubs hands and cackles gleefully*

With the holiday season on, I need all the outlets for violent energy I can get! Far better here than taken out on the poor hapless shoppers who get in my way at the mall...

Yup, I thought you'd agree.

That said, I think I'll go play a computer game for a while.

Oh, and fear not - the WordPress changeover is still coming, it's just been delayed by countless mishaps and backpedaling. We may not see this blog moving over on any permanent basis until after Thanksgiving at this rate. Next week I have some extra cleaning to do and all. But I'm still working on it. (so much for 5-minute installation...*grumble*)

G'night!

Cooking Madness...

I pulled three recipes off of recipesource.com this morning. Three recipes I haven't tried before, which had their ingredients added to my grocery list today. I also added a few of those "quickie" meals that get thrown in the microwave or oven for 10-30 minutes and *poof* it's dinner. Other than the shopping trip for the supplies for Thanksgiving, I think I've got meals for November covered now.

I may hit December and be "cooked out". I tend to make most meals with minimal fuss and components. These recipes call for actuall cutting, slicing, chopping and otherwise preparing of actual ingredients. You know - like potatoes or onions... I usually only break out the big guns like that once or twice in any given week, and wing it for the rest. But I'm trying to get myself all "cooked up" (okay, yeah, that was a crappy one) for Thanksgiving.

Oy. I haven't even called or e-mailed the people coming yet.

Although, actually, that's the part I have the hardest time with. 95% of the people we invite to these things are from Brian's family. He says "they're your family too now", but c'mon - I feel like I need to say "Hi, it's Amy... you know, Brian's wife..." when I do. I probably don't, but I don't talk to these people on a daily basis either. But then Brian is working, so he's only got evenings to make calls with.

My sister's not even coming this year. Apparently my friend's parents in Wisconsin are more important to her than spending time with her own family. I guess moving out on her own and having to learn to fend for herself more hasn't made her feel any less self-important. *sigh* And I have to try and get ahold of my uncle, which is a game of chance on when he'll actually be in to take a call. The man doesn't believe in answering machines. At least he ought to know by now that he's supposed to be with us for Thanksgiving, although he'll probably give me grief over the fact that my sister isn't coming. Arrrgh.

And thus, the holiday season begins. I want so much to build happy traditions around the holidays that my son can be excited about one day. It seems, however, that the closer I get to the holiday season, the further away I wish they really were. There's a whole lot of energy that's going to be expended, and I don't know where it is going to come from. The tree, the lights, the other decorations (did I mention I saw an inflatable, glowing TURKEY in someone's yard around here? EGADS! The horror!), the presents, the shopping, the wrapping, the damned holiday musak everywhere, the food, the festivities in general... I'm the type of person that tries to look my best, do my best, be on my best behavior, and have exactly the right present for everyone on the list if at all possible...

It begins now. It ends December 28th.

No, not the 26th. That day is for sleep and next to nothing else. Not on the 27th either. That day is for cleaning everything up. On the 28th, I can sit back and relax for a few days, before a whole new year begins and I start work on my new year's resolution - to get myself knocked up again! (yes, Brian already knows about this - he helped pick out the timing, we're hoping for an October baby, or late September would be fine too, so we're starting early January)

At least that activity will prove relaxing!

*wicked grin*

Oh, c'mon... tell me you don't just feel wonderfully relaxed for a while right after sex! Mmmmm...

Okay, I'll just stop talking while I'm potentially still ahead here.

G'night!

Yes, reading the directions DOES help, actually!

Okay, so since I've been rummaging through some of my "stuff" and finding some items that I no longer need or want and are still in good shape or better, I've been putting these items up on e-bay. I'm not the first to do such a thing, and I am pretty positive I won't be the last. No big deal.

But what I did do, is go out and spend a little cash on a little shipping scale so I can have some clue on what these items weigh. We recently lost a few dollars when I didn't charge enough for shipping and it cost more to ship it than I got from the guy total on the transaction (including shipping). It was only a few bucks, no huge deal, but I didn't want it to happen again.

I powered the little sucker up and it looked ready to go, with markings for pounds and ounces in the display.

I should have read the instructions.

*smacks self in the head*

So, today, when the bidding ended on all five items I had up and some discussion came up on shipping four of the items together, I discovered that in my haste I had marked the ounces where the pounds should have gone.

Damnit!

So I've been backpedalling, fixing the invoices to read the correct weight (which is considerably smaller than the weights I had listed) and sending out e-mails back and forth to hopefully make sure nobody thinks I was trying to rip them off or otherwise screw them on shipping.

Between being a relative perfectionist and usually honest to a fault, it has been entirely frustrating.

I did, finally, read the directions - it gives me a comma after the pounds. The digit after the period is tenths of an ounce not ounces.

Got it.

*sigh*

At least all the items sold, although I'm not exactly selling anything in a high price range right now. I might find a few items in my boxes that are worth the big bucks, but those are also items I'm going to have to make harder decisions on if I want to get rid of them. I will have a lot of items eventually though, so my paypal account may add up to something someday. My mom always gave me the impression her record collection might be worth something, so I'll have to give that box some extra attention when I find it. I do have a couple of boxes in the garage to look through as it is. I have two piles to make - the one with stuff in decent enough shape to sell on e-bay, and the one for the garage sale with everything else and the stuff that's just too damned heavy to ship.

Too much clutter. And you'd be amazed at how hard it is for me to part with some of this stuff. I'm a third generation pack rat for sure...

*sigh*

Well, that's all for now. I might put another post on DragonBytestonight, or I might not. That blog has never been quite as "daily" as the others are.

G'night!

More writing stuff...

Okay, so I dropped another post to follow the Prologue from earlier over on DragonBytes. Since I'm not posting the other story idea I'm working on, I might as well post this one. I'll see how far it gets. I've no idea how it's going to end yet, see, only some vague ideas. But stuff keeps wanting me to drop it down in writing for the moment, so I am.

No, I'm not doing this because it's "National Novel Writing Month" either. It just happens to be a point when story ideas are flowing inside my head and I want to get them down. I'm not so sure I could finish an entire novel in one month. They suggest that it doesn't matter how good it is, but I really don't want to just write for the sake of writing when it comes to fiction. After all, isn't that what this blog is here for?

*wicked grin*

I think I'm just running off excess energy from how much I'm enjoying the current Quick Shtick Writing story. We're equating it to a "disaster flick", and keep letting everything get calm so we can "drop the next anvil on them". It's actually more fun than violent computer games to get some of the tension out.

Pity my characters... oh yes. Pity them greatly, for they will suffer.

Mwahahaha!

Oooh... two posts here in less than 12 hours! What will people think!

*gasp*

Oh yeah... that I ought to get my ass to bed probably. Oooh-kay.

G'night!

And now,

Today I wrote some. What I wrote is actually posted here on DragonBytes since I haven't posted anything there in a while. It's the prologue to a story/book/whatever I have mulling around in my head lately. By the way, that's the site where DragonBytes is located now. The site the links here go to is still up, but the updates happen on the newer version.

Okay, the update. One. No plural. Yeah.

I just haven't gotten around to fixing links or deleting the old version yet, since it's all supposed to move into WordPress... yeah, yeah... I'll get there eventually.

*grumble*

Anyway, I just thought I'd share in case anyone is interested in my creative genius...

*coughs*

Oh, hush. You'll at least probably find it more entertaining than my usual ramblings here.

Also, without further ado -

Would you rather:
1. be able to speak four languages fluently OR be an expert plumber, electrician, and contractor?
Oooh... being an expert plumber, electrician, and contractor would come in handy soooo much with the remodeling stuff around the house that I'll take that one!!
2. never know your real parents OR find out one of your parents is an escaped convict?
Never know 'em. I've gotten bad enough issues as a result of my parents as it is that I think I'd just be better off not knowing them at all.
3. get stopped by every red light when driving OR always have to pick out a wedgie?
You know, if I knew I was going to get stopped at every red light, I could work with it. That wouldn't be so bad.
4. have hair grow on your tongue OR warts on your nose?
Hairy tongue. I could shave that off. Yeech.

A Day Without Aspirin (but not night)...

Ow...

Tried to go today without aspirin. Broke down and took some at dinnertime and some more later, but it doesn't seem to want to do a lick of good.

The weather broke finally. But it rained. Which is actually worse on my sinuses, actually.

"Thanks, mother nature," she says in her iciest tone of voice. "Thanks ever so much."

*low growl*

Not only did I manage to not get much of anything done today other than the usual childcare, I blew off cooking and ordered us up a pizza instead. I've got meat defrosted though, so I'll have to get my act together tomorrow and actually cook.

I think I'll just not skip the aspirin tomorrow. I may even throw in an extra doseage of the sinus stuff I take every morning, since its only a 12-hour deal and when it wears off the world is becoming unbearable in a migraine kind of way. I'm sitting here blogging and playing mindless computer games, not because I don't want to be hidden beneath my sheets in a nice dark room, but because I want my poor working-man husband to have a chance at some sleep before I go in there to toss and turn. Once he's out, he'll only half wake up when I go in there, so he'll fall back asleep quickly then.

But right now my brain doesn't work very well. It's having trouble seeing through my aching skull.

I really gotta learn to post here midway throught the day, instead of late at night. I have all my really profound thoughts in the early afternoon.

You know - when I'm rarely at my computer, or engaged in some project or other.

Yah. Ooo-kay. More tomorrow then.

G'night!

The Nuances of Naptime...

Sundays always mess with the usual routines. For example, at the point we were headed over and arriving at my in-laws' house tonight our son should have been midway through his daily nap. Instead, his nap was delayed, shorter than it ought to have been, and not in the usual place. It was especially out of synch for him today, as we went early so we could all watch a movie. We were celebrating my sister-in-law's birthday today (tomorrow is the actual date), and she had chosen a movie she wanted to include today. Ironically enough, the movie was one that Jareth could have watched - Peter Pan (the new one, not the Disney animated one) - but he spent the entire time up in his grandparents' bedroom taking a nap in a small corrale with some blankets. It was either that, or he would have been cranky for the entire duration of the movie.

In the near future, we will hopefully be finishing up his bedroom and moving him in. At that point, I intend to move naptime into his crib, since he'll have a bright, cheerful room of his own without all the clutter that is in his current room. Since he already seems to only take proper naps in the playpen we have in our living room right now, once he's adapted to the crib for naps instead I expect we might start having trouble getting him to nap elsewhere at all.

*sigh*

When we have Sunday at our house it's only a little different. He gets to have his nap on time, but it is usually interrupted by everyone arriving. We've found that he usually won't eat dinner on those Sundays at all, but needs to be put into another room in the hopes he will take an evening nap instead. He rarely does though, as we can't put him in the living room where he normally takes naps. I'm hoping that one will be vastly improved by him napping in his room - further away from the mayhem.

Sundays are this wonderful thing - a weekly family get-together where we all share what's been happening over snacks, a meal, and then some coffee with dessert. But sometimes it can also be very frustrating watching my son being cranky and not eating properly because his whole day has been disrupted.

I've got so much more I could say on this subject, really. But it really won't do me any good. In three to five years we hope to move again - into a different type of neighborhood, hopefully smaller and quieter - and possibly even out of state, depending on the job situation at the time. This week, while the weather has been shifting, has been hell on me on a physical level. I need a drier climate. And I no longer believe that the family on my own side will really notice much if I jump ship and move halfway across the country to find myself some desert. Brian's family, on the other hand, are closer. They will miss us. So, for now, I want them to have this time. I want my son to have this chance to spend time with them too - even if he's gotta be cranky and have his whole day disrupted for it to happen. I've made an active choice.

But that doesn't make it any less frustrating when my son is whining and cranky because he hasn't had a nap.

Nope. Not a bit.

At least I was clever enough to take the aspirin again before we left the house to go over there tonight. Foresight can be an incredibly lovely thing!

That's all for now. I've got spam comments on this site and Quick Shtick Writing that need deleting...

G'night!

Movie Night...

Errands today took away our time to work on painting in Jareth's bedroom. Hopefully we'll get some time to work on it tomorrow instead, before we head off to the in-laws. No guarantees though, as I've got a few other things to do tomorrow morning as well.

Tonight, however, we are chucking it all in and we've rented a couple of dvds. We're kicked back in front of the tube (although at the moment it's "bottle time" before Jareth heads to bed, hence my posting here) and relaxing after a rather aggrevating day of shopping where we had a couple of items keep eluding us.

We had to add an additional errand as the kitten, Cinder, caught her first mouse today and cut it off by the tail - or rather the cord. My husband came down this morning to find that his computer's mouse didn't work - Cinder had chewed through its cord! So off we went and bought him a nice new one - I hope that she doesn't just destroy that one too, but one of the items that eluded us was the stuff you can wrap around a bunch of cords to keep kitten teeth away. I'll be looking online for a source instead, as the couple of stores we tried didn't have any. Meanwhile, we have to hope that it was just one instance and that she won't just go right back and munch on the new one too.

Well, bottle's over and they've headed up for that last diaper change before bed. Afterwards they'll brush his teeth and call for me so I want to be ready. Around here, bedtime is one of those little family events as we tuck him in and wind the mobile and such.

G'night!

Lights on... Lights off...

Today is not a good day.

I am melancholy and have wanted to spend the day hiding in the sheets, nesting in the warm of my bed.

I've had a headache for four days straight now. I think it's a combination of stress and sinuses. The weather must be shifting again or something.

I entirely forgot that we had a holiday, veteran's day, and felt bad about it when I realized. That was also my in-law's anniversary, so a belated "Happy Aniversary" to them.

*sigh*

The only real positive note for today was the arrival of the "cloud lamp" that is now hanging from the ceiling in Jareth's room-to-be. It's on the light switch and we let him turn it on for the first time once it was hung and plugged it. Then I turned the other lamp off so we could see the effect.

And the room went dark.

And then light.

And then dark.

Because Jareth enjoys the light switch. He's very proud of himself that he can make it turn on and off.

*chuckle*

I'll leave on that note. Much more fun.

G'night.

Promised Pics...

At long last, here are some pics from halloween:

Our pumpkins - from left to right: Brian's "ogre" pumpkin, Jareth's pumpkin (which Brian basically came up with the plans for and I carved), and my pumpkin (which we realized later looks like it's crying happy tears due to the bumpy texture coming down from one eye).

Jareth, our little lion, playing in the grass outside his grandparents' house before we went to participate in a local neighborhood parade there (grandparents wanted to show him off).

While waiting for the parade to begin, our little lion got in some swing time. Note the tail - I made sure it was showing so it would be in the pictures. I couldn't resist.

So, there they are. These are some of the best I think, although I took a ton of them.

Well, I've got other things to go take care of now, but thought I'd get my post for today in early for once.

G'night!

Busy, Busy...

Too busy to post right now. Will post tomorrow. Got pics ready to post up here, so they will be posted tomorrow too.

Have company now though!

More tomorrow!

G'night!

And now,

Feeling a smidge under the weather today. I woke up late and have had a sinus headache for most of the day, and the usual meds didn't seem to make any difference. I think Jareth is feeling it too, although since he had a vaccination yesterday it's harder to be sure. He was sure loud when he was napping though, breathing through his nose sounded like it wasn't going as easily as normal. I'm hoping this is just a passing thing and won't actually get nasty.

I did get a few things done today anyway, instead of blowing everything off like I felt like doing. I really only got to knock about three things off the list I have for things I want to get accomplished this week. Three out of eleven isn't bad, although there's a couple more I should probably add. We'll see how many are done by the end of the week.

But Tuesday is chooseday, so without further ado:

Would you rather:
1. join a band of rebel fighters in some south american country for three months OR a tibetan monastery for a year?
With the exception that I wouldn't want to be away from my family for that long, I'd rather do the tibetan monastery. I expect I would learn some really wonderful things there!
2. wake up and find your name tattooed on your bicep OR find all your body hair shaved?
Finding all my body hair shaved suggests that someone took my clothes off without my permitting it! I hope the tattoo is small, because I'll be taking that one. I just won't be going sleeveless until I can have the damned thing removed.
3. find a time machine that only goes back to ancient egypt OR only goes back to 1920?
Ancient egypt sounds really cool actually. I'd rather check that out.
4. have the ability to smell as well as a dog does OR see as good as an eagle does?
Eagle. Admittedly it would be cool to have my sense of smell returned, but I think having it enhanced might make some things just too overpowering. Being able to see things accurately from farther away could have plenty of cool advantages though.

Okay, that's all for tonight.

G'night!

Errands and Contemplations...

More errands today. A doctor's appointment for my son where the office wasn't busy made for a good start to the outings today. I had a chance to chat with the doctor about vaccinations - a topic that has been brewing around here since we read some articles in my Mothering magazine. We did get the last dose of one of his vaccinations, but skipped the flu shot for now. I got it for him last year, but that doesn't mean that it prevented him from getting the flu necessarily. We'd like him to build up his own immune system, rather than over-vaccinate.

Brian has been doing a little research online as well, finding out what each of the vaccinations listed in our little book are actually for, and what the possible risks are. Basically, if the disease could flat out kill or debilitate him - we'll be vaccinating, thank you very much. But if it's something simple, like an ear infection, I think I'd rather not have them pumping extra chemicals into my kid unecessarily. Even the sheet the nurse had handed me suggested that most deaths from the flu occur in the elderly. I suspect due to complications relating to other illnesses and the general breakdown of the body as one gets older. But the risk in infants and small children is slim, and it's not like we have him in daycare with a bunch of other kids either. So I think I'll let his body handle this one instead, and keep some chicken soup on hand in case he does happen to get it.

I was kind of upset, however, to find that the schools won't let him into kindergarten unless he's had all his chicken pox vaccinations!?! On one hand, I'd imagine an outbreak of that spreading across a classroom would be a chaotic mess, however... I remember chicken pox being icky, but not deathly. He said it was a state law, and I have to say that I don't like the idea of the state of Illinois telling me I have to vaccinate against something like that. It's not a plague. In fact, I seem to recall having the chicken pox as almost like a rite of passage in a way - comparing stories of calamine lotion and such. I had them twice myself, though the first was a mild case.

After the doctor's office, we hit a Wal-Mart for curtains and blinds for Jareth's room. Hopefully Brian will approve of the choices I made. I wanted curtains too, as I have trouble sleeping when the room's not dark enough myself and his current room gets pretty dark at night. I also want to be able to darken the room when I put him down for naps. Once we move him into that room officially, and he starts sleeping there, we'll be putting him up there for naps and the playpen will likely be retired until the next child. I got white blinds and a white rod, with blue curtains to hang on it. They are a darker shade than the walls, but looked okay for color next to the swatch I had of the blue wall paint.

After that was groceries. Again. Seems like I keep making trips to the grocery store - three times in five days! I'm hoping I won't have to go again until at least Friday, but you never know what will pop up on the list that will be urgent around here. We're not always too good at foreseeing what we're going to need before we need it.

I titled this one "Errands and Contemplations". Mostly because I noticed things today as I traveled about. The woman behind me, tailgating, and picking her teeth. The man in his car with his hood pulled up and tight to his head and making the strangest faces...

I have to wonder sometimes what people are thinking. I've seen people picking their noses at stoplights, while my car is sitting right next to them and I can get a clear view. Do they think that the two panes of ... um... glass between us is somehow keeping me from seeing them, even though they can clearly see me? Or do they just not care who sees them knuckle deep as they pry out a booger? Would they do that in a restaraunt too?

Some people seem to think that their car is some sort of sanctuary that shields others from being allowed to see or make judgements upon them I guess. Personally, I try to be on better behaviour than that when I'm outside of my home.

Then again, some people really are that rude. For them, taking a call on their cell phone in a restaruant is commonplace, no matter who they happen to be dining with, so answering it while driving doesn't seem to be a problem for them either, despite the fact that it's dangerous.

How about the woman who had to go the wrong way down the parking lot aisle even after she'd seen me coming down it to wait for a parking spot going the right way? She gave me dirty looks and drove past me, squeaking between me and the parked cars, risking hitting something instead of just backing up a little to go the right way. She looked pissed at me for goodness sake! I wasn't the moron who couldn't see which way the cars were parked, much less the huge yellow arrow that pointed the other way!

*grumble*

Anyway, I just found myself noticing people again today. Wondering why so many of them seem to just move to and fro without paying any attention to their surroundings or behavior. We stopped halfway through the grocery story so I could show Jareth a balloon with a smiley face on it - which he seemed to enjoy - and I noticed other people eyeing me, as if I shouldn't be stopping to just enjoy a moment with my son. But I don't want to live in their bleak blinder world. And I don't want to raise my son there either. I want him to see the clouds and the colors. And I want him to pay attention - to see the big yellow arrows of life and go the right direction when he's needed to. And step off the path entirely when he can too.

Oh, and thank you - to the guy at the grocery store who wasn't in a hurry and let me go ahead of him in the checkout line when I was trying to figure out where it ended. Most appreciated. *smile*

That's all for now. I got pictures from Halloween back today, so expect some pictures posted soon!

G'night!

Jumble of Thoughts...

The end of the week again.

Lots of thoughts jumbling around in my head again, especially as we head towards the holidays...

Thanksgiving will be at our house this year, so planning (and cleaning) will need to be done to get ready. I'm hoping we will have Jareth's bedroom such that he's using it by then as well.

Note to self: I still need curtains/blinds/shades/something for his room. Measure the windows and put it on the list. Take a color sample of the blue to match against curtain colors.

My sister-in-law's birthday is coming. If I plan to shop online, I ought to get it done tomorrow...

Christmas is coming too. This means it's time to do pictures for the yearly newsletter (maybe I'll make a pdf this year and put it online too) and I might set up a disc of pictures, waves, and movies of Jareth to send out to some of the relatives too. No guarantees on that. We'll see how much time I have. I also tend to do some hand-drawn stuff for the card we tuck the newsletter into, so I ought to think about what I intend to sketch this year.

Christmas also means shopping too. I don't even want to begin to think about that yet - something always lands me in the mall. Always. And if there is anything I really, really loathe at Christmastime - it's definitely the mall. I always end up in a place between tears and rage, with the desire to run about sobbing while I bludgeon people with a baseball bat. In reality it usually just means a lot of aspirin is consumed, followed by Zantac to offset the stomach upset from the aspirin. Yeech. Maybe I'll actually be able to do my shopping online this year. We'll see. I've already got a gift for my uncle at least - that's a start.

Other little things running around in my head too - things to put up on e-bay, as I don't want/need them anymore. Errands that need to be run. Piles to sort through, files to file, projects to finish or start in the first place...

My mind is a jumble of lists.

It's nights like these that I often have trouble sleeping. Maybe by the time I'm ready to hit the sheets my mind will have calmed down some. Time will tell.

Wish me luck.

G'night.

Busy...

Busy day.

Painted - clouds, ladybugs, mousehole (mouse forthcoming), moons (in phases).

Brian did the moons and clouds, as well as drew the dimensions for the mousehole, while I sketched possible ideas and then did ladybugs and shaded in his mousehole. I haven't played with acrylic paints in a while. It was very fun.

After that we went out for some food and then ran errands. We're doing the base shapes for some of the critters and such on Jareth's walls with stencils, as I'm feeling shaky on my abilities to do some of our ideas with only one recent drawing class under my belt and no artistic painting done in ages. We want a more cartoon feel than realistic on a lot of things too, and my drawing class focused more on realistic recreation than drawing out the things I visualize in my mind. So we snagged some stencils while we were out, and some proper stencil brushes too. But we'll be putting in details to make each little critter our own. We're putting a little bit of ourselves into this project - it's part of the magic.

Brian's idea is that each wall should relate to a season. There was some research behind it, I believe. North, for example, is going to be winter - so we're planning to do some snowflakes and other wintery things on that wall. East is spring, South is summer, and West is fall - if I'm remembering correctly. The clouds are everywhere, of course, especially the ceiling. The floor, being a nice brown wood, would represent earth. Most things trimmed or painted in white are portals of some kind - the door, the windows, even the trapdoor that leads to the attic in the closet. The trim around the floor is white too, but that was only because it looks better like that. *grin* Not everything needs to be steeped in symbolism.

Yes - pictures will be put up once we're done. This is the exciting part!

We also ran for groceries and other items we needed, and got back rather late. I'm kicking back with a bowl of ice cream and some solitaire games of one sort or another for a wee bit before bed, so...

G'night!

Digital Distractions...

Being the target of such huge amounts of comment spam has taken some of the wind out of my sails on getting the blog up in WordPress, so it's still in progress. There's also the little problem that it's not compatible with the Opera browser entirely, and so it has some problems when I go to use the interface pages. I'm looking into it. Maybe I can just redo that page so that it works right for Opera folks - it's all open to changing but I'm not sure how into the php code I need to be to change stuff internally like that. I've been reading up on php at my favorite site for looking stuff up - w3schools - which is one of those links I need to drop into the "web tools" category of my links section when I can divide them up nicely like WordPress lets you. There's questions I have though, and it feels like I'm not finding the answers easily, even on the WordPress Wiki.

I've also been slightly distractec by my new digital camera, which arrived yesterday. I've been snapping pictures left and right, and can finally get pics of the couple of items I have waiting to get put up on ebay to pay for already purchased camera. I sold the batteries from the old one already, but that only covered about a fifth of the cost for a whole new camera. I suppose I can toss the old camera itself now - all it does is destroy disks, and now it doesn't even have batteries to make it do that. Then again, maybe I'll put it on ebay for someone for parts. Who knows if there isn't someone out there who needs some other bit to make theirs work properly and actually knows how to fix it.

But my nifty new camera is less than half the size of the old one, and it can do 30 second movies. I shot my first one of those tonight, basically a poorly-lit rendition of my son laughing at me. He seems to be highly amused by people with cameras pointed at him these days.

Here, finally, is a decent picture of our kitten, cinder, taken just last night:

That's all for now.

G'night!

Not even up yet...

I could just cry.

I haven't even linked the blog at the new site yet. I haven't even finished getting it up in WordPress...

And somehow I have one spammer who's managed to use a robot on me and dump comments over 500+ times. I deleted more than 160 earlier today and I just finished deleteing 350+ comments off it a moment ago.

I don't even know how they know to find it, much less access the file they are getting to to do this... I have a lot more reading to do just to figure out how to make it stop.

At this rate, the f---ing spam commenters are going to make me give up blogging altogether. Or at least give up having comments on my blog. Which is sad, as I do actually want the opinions of other people out there. I wouldn't bother putting all this out there so publicly if I didn't have an interest in hearing other people's opinions on the things I have to say.

I feel like I'm being raped on a capitalist and technological level. It is pissing me off more than I really have words for.

I have a life people... I don't want to spend it deleting this crap twice a day!

G'night.

Moving...

I'm in the process of moving this blog over to WordPress and the other server, so I'm not going to really say much tonight. My eyes are blurry from peering at code I only barely understand and the page looks entirely screwy if I open it in Mozilla. At least it looks like all the posts moved okay, although I'll have to drop this one in manually after I'm done posting it here.

That's all. Watch for this to be re-directing to the newer version soon.

I hope.

G'night.

And now,

After several calls to the county clerk's office, who in turn called the secretary of state's office, it turns out that the last time I had my driver's license updated with my current address must have been the only f---ing time they didn't update my voter's registration right along with it.

damn.
DAMN.
DAMN!!!

So, after hours of sending the poor souls over at the Kane County Clerk's office in Illinois (thanks for trying guys! I do understand you're swamped with crap today and really do appreciate the effort) scrambling about for some shred of evidence that might suggest I could fill out a ballot today, and make my opinion heard, in the end they have only this left to say:

"I'm sorry, but if you're not registered, you can't vote."

I've changed out of my "ready to hit the road to go vote" attire, and back into my comfy clothes again, although I haven't bothered to wash the makeup off yet. I'm feeling depressed and I'm hitting the leftover Halloween candy rather hard. I've probably already spoiled dinner.

*sigh*

I will now attempt to distract myself with the usual Tuesday fun:

Would you rather:
1. find out you had your fly unzipped all day OR sat in wet paint which left a mark on your butt?
If my fly was unzipped all day it's unlikely anyone would have actually noticed, as I tend to wear long, comfy clothes that might have kind of hidden it. Besides, a glimpse of underwear fabric is no big deal and paint can be a pain to get out of clothes.
2. assuming you could get all the nutrients you need, eat nothing but canned cat food OR nothing but spam?
There's a difference? I guess I'd take the cat food. It's more likely to have identifiable meats in it.
3. sweat green liquid OR pee blue?
Pee blue. Sweating green liquid would be nasty! Can it be that neon blue that glows in the dark though? That might actually be kind of cool!
4. walk in on a couple engaging in sexual relations in a public bathroom OR walk in on your doctor masturbating?
OMG! I'll definitely take walking in on the couple having sex! I might not be able to get that image out of my head afterwards if I were to walk in on my doctor, and I'd have to see him again and pretend like everything was just normal. That would prove highly awkward!

Okay folks, that's likely all from me today. I did get the frame I ordered recently, so the print of my favorite painting (Avatar, by Michael Whelan) that my husband bought me for our anniversary the year before last is finally hanging happily on our living room wall. That was a positive note for today, so I'm going to leave off on that, instead of continuing to beat myself up for not thinking to find out earlier if my voting registration was current. I assumed that everything had transferred when I changed the address on my license (it always has in the past), and that I'd signed whatever little form they usually have me sign...

*sigh*

So much for not beating myself up any more...

G'night.

Tuesday is Chooseday... no, really...

Tomorrow is election day for all Americans. If you are registered and can physically get to a polling booth, please do. It may feel like your vote doesn't count (it certainly does to me most of the time), but if you don't at least try and make your opinion heard then nothing will ever change. This is the one time the government puts the decision in our laps. I may not agree with how it's done, and I may not like the candidates, but I do want my opinion counted with the rest of them, even if all I accomplish is to let them know I want there to be more choices in candidates in the future.

Alright, that's my shpeal.

*steps off soapbox*

That said, I can't find my damn registration card. I'm going to have to call the county clerk tomorrow to make sure my name is actually on the right list before I drag my kid down the street to the polling place. Although, if it's nice enough weather, I can literally grab the stroller and walk there as it's just down the block. But if it's cold and rainy like today was, I don't want to drag Jareth around in the ick. Hopefully I won't have to wait on hold for all eternity. I know I always say yes when they ask if I want to be registered when I do my driver's license, but I am so behind on filing that I haven't a clue where to find my registration card at this point. I seem to recall not having it before though, and that they had a list and only needed my driver's license as identification. I hope that's still the case. I wish they'd just mail a new one right before the elections. Brian got one in the mail a little over a month ago, so his was still handy. He's got it ready and just has to decide if he's voting before he heads to work or after.

*grumbles about files and organization*

In other frustrations, I've disabled all commenting on all sites I run. Effective already. I had to delete over 60 comments today - each with unique IP addresses. The move to WordPress will happen this week, come hell or high waters. I'll have easier control over comments, deleting them, and banning the spammers in the first place in the WordPress system. Brian is planning to make the move as well, and has disabled his comments too. He got more than 200 spam comments in just a couple of days! He's been in the process of deleting them a little while ago, but since he has to work in the morning he can't stay up for another hour to make them go away. It irks me to no end that these assholes (pardon my french) just waltz around taking advantage of people wherever they can. But I'm not going to delete Brian's comments too. I do the design and setup for his blog, and I'll be doing his move into WordPress, but when it comes to tweaking and managing - it's up to him to keep it going. I've got four blogs going - three of which I post to daily - and I've got my hands full deleting spam comments and making sure they run properly.

ARRRRRGH! ROAR!

I'm not bothering to ban the IP addresses, starting today, as it won't matter once I'm in WordPress. All the comment banning will happen internally so I won't have to block out IP addresses that could later belong to legit viewers anymore. That will be a relief. I'm going to peruse the plug-ins for WP tomorrow too, to see what add-ons I can throw in to make things easier too.

But, for now, I need to kick back and blow off some steam. Once upon a time I got excited when I saw the comments number go up. Nowadays I just groan if it's anything more than two new ones. Today I nearly cried when I saw the numbers on Quick Shtick Writing. This morning it was up 20 comments, which was a pain, but tonight I wanted to weep when I saw it had jumped by 46. Plus there were at least four I had to delete off of this blog as well.

So, all comments are temporarily missing. Sorry. Blame the spammers and their f---ing bots, which I'm sure is how they are doing this.

*sigh*

G'night.