Spider Count 2008

Oh, forget it. This year has been so busy, I've forgotten to count, and I encountered rather a few ripping open the walls anyhow. You know you're crazed when you can't even stop to pay attention to the spiders! But I will leave up this link because it is pretty indicative of how they like to come to me in strange ways:
• In my beverage: 1

Drowning in Chocolate

We, I, got a ton of chocolate for Christmas. Sticks, bars, eggs, oranges, cookies, you name it. So I've been nibbling away, trying to keep my consumption at the balance of enjoying by eating some, but not so much that I overdo it. (Yes, it is possible, I've been there once before and it was not pretty.) A few bits at a time, then. So tonight I sat down for a late night pumping session with a few crackers and a few sticks of orange chocolate.

Have I mentioned my computer to you before? Well, we have an old laptop. The same laptop that I spilled tea on and partially disabled. We were able to open up the case, clip the wire connecting the integral keyboard, and plug in an external one, which is clunky, but functions at least. Add to that the fact that this laptop has absolutely zero battery, and it is really a laptop in name only, as it is not portable in the least. (Fortunately, as this laptop limps towards death, we have this past month got a decent desktop running upstairs, so the laptop is now ancillary.)

So anyhow, I sat down at this so-called laptop with my crackers and chocolate, hooked myself up, and surfed a bit while nibbling on crackers. I reached for a bite of chocolate. My fingers went through the stick, touching each other, rather than closing on solid sweetness. I had laid my chocolate sticks down on the keyboard, forgetting how the laptop warmed up, and they were now melting among the keys. This keyboard is destroyed anyhow, so it's not going to impair its functionality, but this poor machine now bears, despite my best efforts to scoop up and scrub off every trace I could reach, traces and dribbles of melted confectionary between its keys, forever gluing together the opposites of delete and insert, page up and page down, home and end.

I do hope Misterpie finds this funny...

One-Liners

Doesn't it seem like that Botox ad with the woman talking about "freedom of expression" is really in fact about lack of expressions?

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I think Barbie might just make the perfect mother. With no parts, she would never have to pee or eat, so she'd never have to put down her baby. Pumpkinpie wants a Barbie for Christmas, and I think The Bun might just want a grownup-sized one, too.

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Misterpie [to me]: I don't think you're supposed to yell "Fuck off!" at the cat when your infant son is sleeping just a couple of feet away.

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When you're writing a holiday card to the diaper service people, doesn't it seem appropriate to wish them a crappy new year?

And I quote...

Pumpkinpie this weekend has both cracked us up and annoyed a too-tired mother with the things that have come out of her cute little mouth. Cases in point:

Grandma, who is reading with Pumpkinpie, calls out to Misterpie: I smell gas! Is your stove on? [it was]

Pumpkinpie [earnestly]: It might be my bum, because I'm very stinky.

The next day at lunch, the cat dropped a feline stinkbomb (which are, indeed, very stinky) and Misterpie and I wrinkled our noses.

MP and I: Whew, henry, was that you?

PP: Actually, it could be me, because I'm pretty stinky.

Wha?

KP: Why do you keep saying you are stinky? You're not stinky.

PP: Well, I toot a lot.

okay, then. I don't think we even tried to stifle the laughter the second time.

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As I blearily changed The Bun's diaper on arising this morning, Pumpkinpie at my elbow told me she was hungry.

kittenpie: One kid at a time, PP. You can be next, okay?

I finished changing the babe, and we three began down the stairs to the kitchen. As she bumped down the stairs on her wee behind, she began to chant:

PP: Hun-gry. Hun-gry. Hun-gry.

kp[getting irritatd quickly]: Okay, enough, I'm about to feed you.

PP: Hun-gry. Hun-gry.

kp: Enough, PP! We are on the way to getting you breakfast!

PP: What? It's just the name of a country!

It's moments like this, when too tired to take things in good grace, that make the precocious talker seem a questionable blessing.

christmas shopping goes astray... again

It happens every year. I'm out buying gifts for other people. I might be thinking a bit about what I want but haven't decided for sure, when I trip across something, or some things, while I am out and about. Things I must have. Oh yes, they will be mine! And there goes what I was thinking or planning, as I've now spent my Christmas money.

So this year? I was out picking up a nice deep violet cashmere turtleneck sweater for my sister-in-law when I found a sweater for myself, too. A soft, rich cherry red cashmere cardigan with a drawstring at the right level to create an empire waist, which actually does a fair job of covering up my residual tummy. (Although! Stepped on a scale last weekend and have 8 pounds to go! Whoot!) And then... Oh, then I hit the shoe section of my favourite bargain store, Winners, almost by accident. I was just there for the sweater! Honest! Ahem.

But I had seen some gorgeous Kate Spade heels there at my last visit, and they were too small, I found. I thought I would just peek in and see if they had them a size larger. They did, so I sat down to try them. They were too narrow, still. But across from me were some really very cool shoes. Flat, D'Orsay style, camo pony skin shoes by Daniel Barbara. I tried them on - perfect with khaki, olive, or brown. Awesome! (and I was curious about the brand, so I looked them up when I got home and discovered I got $300 shoes for $70! Extra awesome.) They went into my bag.

I walked around in them as I looked at them in the mirror and checked them for comfort, and walked by a pair of basic but good for everyday Hush Puppies mary janes. Nothing special, but good shoes for kicking around in, and on clearance for a mere $32. Check.

And before I made it out of the area, I also noticed a pair of cute T-strap wedges. Nturalizer, so comfy, too. Oh, I know, they often make some butt-ugly shoes, but tucked among those are, on occasion, some hits. Like these ones, which would look great peeking out from under a pair of jeans or trousers, or even with a skirt, I think, though it was hard to tell how well the strap hit for certain with my pants on. The roll-them-up test looked promising, though. I'll be wearing these with the red sweater on Christmas, thankyouverymuch.

So my idea for a small, cute purse has flown, but 3 pairs of good shoes for $140? You couldn't beat that if it bent over and handed you a paddle. I'll throw in some good chocolate (also found at Winners, and maybe the best thing I have ever tasted - dark chocolate with orange and cinnamon. purrrr.), and I'm shopped for. Now if I can only figure out how to wrap up shoes for under the tree...

Three Dozen and More

Three Dozen

I'm so wrapped up these days, I'd be late to my own funeral, as the old joke goes. Really, I think this is true, too, as here I am late to my own birthday, which was a couple of weeks ago now... I turned 36.

Thirty-six. This is getting to me. I don't know why it should be, but somehow 35 felt okay, but 36 feels, well, OLD. Maybe because it's past the halfway mark of the thirties and into LATE thirties? But for whatever reason, I'm in a bit of a funk about it. I'm noticing more greys, especially as I had to put off my hair appointment for a week for a scheduling conflict. I'm noting the way less sleep is taking its toll on my face. I'm feeling the postpartum pudge and feeling more alarmed and frustrated by it than I remember feeling last time, perhaps because Baby Bun allows me just enough time to worry about these things, where his sister didn't. Whatever the reason, so far 36 is not winning me over.

Anyone have good reviews on this year?

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Christmas is Coming! Christmas is Coming!

Although I actually shop year-round and start holiday shopping in earnest in October, I try not to let the holidays bleed into before my birthday in terms of taking over my activities and head and time with cards and sorting out gifts and stocking stuffers and advent cabinet treats. But now, now it is all Christmas all the time. More on shopping adventures of my gifts later.

I've been thinking, though, about how everyone likes to grumble every year about th commercialisation of Christmas and how it is all about the buying and the Santa and whatnot. I've been thinking about it in a bit of a different light, too, maybe in part because I am reading about a man who is exploring religion a bit in an experiment (will write about books later, too). And I was realizing that really, increasingly, being secular is the new religion. And as with the religions that came before, people are taking parts of the religion that was most prominent and using them in their own ways, morphing them into their own traditions, molding them to suit their own purposes. So just as Christians took the pagan Solstice and many of its traditions and rolled them into Christmas, so Christmas is being changed from a religious celebration into a time for celebrating family and sharing gifts and making merry in the dark of winter. So yes, I think it may be no accident that Santa really took hold a bit less than a century ago and has become the central figure of Christmas for many, no surprise at all that, as many people lament, the Christ is being drained out of Christmas. (Hey, my birthday wasn't about me this year, either...)

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Mother And The Pride

We had our very first ever parent-teacher interview recently. It seems that Pumpkinpie is not only one of the stronger readers in the class, but also has a good head for numbers and is a "little leader" in the class. It's enough to make a mommy combust with pride. Way to go, kid!

Wordless Wednesday: Lords of Hogtown*

(* Hogtown being one of Toronto's nicknames, for the non-locals.)

(Also, working on real posts, promise!)