heebie-geebie

Lefty, he can't sing the blues

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 03:33:12 GMT

Thanks for all the warm congrats!

We spoke with our agent today. Because now we have an agent! Actually, it was a conference call so that we could meet and assess our new agent.

We said that Mom had laryngitis. So Dad put the phone on speakerphone, and when Mom had something to say, she whispered it and Dad repeated it for us. We were worried that the ICU machines would start beeping, or a nurse would walk in. But nothing happened. And so the agent never knew that she was talking to someone who can't be released down from intensive care until they can remove three tubes from her chest. To keep the liquid draining from around her chest. She is easily out of breath - like from eating - when the fluid accumulates in her chest.

Mom and Dad do not want either the agent or the editor to know that she's in the throes. I'm not sure I would be so secretive, but then again, I type up my dirty laundry and air it publically. Like Pancho, I wear my dirty undies outside my clothes, for all the honest world to see. I respect their decision, though.

This Saturday I am taking students to a conference. I didn't want to spend the night, but the dang thing is four hours away. So we're leaving at 5 am, and getting back at 11 pm or so, and there are eight hours of driving in between. I really resent it. I want my weekend. I have a bunch of shit to get done. I don't want a long, exhausting day, another day of pumping and not seeing Hawaiian Punch. I don't want a one-day weekend, and then to dive back in to another week. I resent the unspoken charities that you do to get tenure.

This semester seems particularly full of these faux-charities. I've got five students that I'm doing senior research projects with. There are scavenger hunts and Honors Book Clubs and conferences. And committees, and IM soccer teams, and grading. And whenever there's a break, we've spent it flying to see Mom and Dad or getting married.

Eh, ignore me. I'm just tired.

Hawaiian Punch Gets a Bug

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 02:15:49 GMT

Hey, I have big news!

1. This morning, when looking up the website of the awful bookclub book, I noticed this in the top paragraph:

"Glenn Beck said, “It’s Evans’ best yet…a fantastic book and a fantastic message…It is really the spirit of what I’ve been talking about for a while now.”

Well, it all makes sense now why it's such a terrible book. I'm giving the host the benefit of the doubt here - perhaps she just wanted something holiday-themed and chose rashly. I am now beginning to gleefully hunger for how I will rip this book into a bloody mess. I am the predator, and this book is my prey, and you all are turned to the Discovery Channel to witness the smell of bad book blood as it wafts up my nose and rouses me from my slumber. I snuffle, sneeze, and cock one eyebrow. My belly rumbles and we all know perfectly well that this book is in for a severe disembowelment. Stay tuned!

2. Mom and I officially got a double book offer, for our two children's books. Remember the ten lines or so that I posted last spring? Mom has been illustrating, and plus we did this before, a couple years ago, so there are two whole books. Over the summer, a publisher bit, and today we got a real live offer. So cool.

3. While I was on the phone with Mom and Dad, revelling, Jammies called to say that daycare called to say that Hawaiian Punch had been puking all day and needed to be picked up. So I rushed there to get her. For the next five hours, she slept on me. We just stepped off the daily routine. I kept the radio and TV off. I watched the shadows and absent-mindedly played online with one hand. Every twenty minutes or so, she awoke and screamed a little. And then she'd abruptly fall asleep, mid-scream. I gave her some pedialyte, which she has kept down.

She has had a cold for most of her life, but I've never seen her so exhausted. Poor sweetie Punch.

WHOA! SIX!

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 01:34:59 GMT

I talked to Mom for the first time today, which was heartening. She is still in the ICU, until they can take the tubes out of her chest.

(I think) I hate the book we're reading in book club. (I think) I detest it. (I've barely started it.) I think the only way I'll be able to stand it is to blog it, so that you all can marvel along with me. On the inside cover, the author says that he wanted to write a Christmas story of redemption, like A Christmas Story.

The dialogue is packed with backstory until it pains me. "Mom, are you meeting with Dad and the divorce lawyers today even though you have chemo?" "Yes, son," his mother said, trying not to let on that she would die sooner than her son realizes. "Are you finalizing wedding plans with your fiance?" she said, hoping her face didn't betray that her dearest wish was to see her son married. "Yes, mother," he said, wondering how he would juggle final exams and wedding planning, hoping his mother didn't realize how worried he was about her.

Evil dad who schedules divorce meetings while his wife has chemo is the subject of the redemptive journey. We are still revealing what exactly makes him such an evil cad through detached chapters about people whose lives he's ruined. That fucker. "Henry, even though you're only seven, I hope you have the best Christmas ever," said his single mother, hoping Henry wouldn't realize the stress she has been under as a single parent working three jobs. Henry said, "Mama, all I want for Christmas is for you to be happy and for us to be back in our home." Henry's generic mama thought of the evil, wicked man who had sold them a house they couldn't afford. She put all their money into the down payment and they were evicted for nebulous reasons within five months and it's clear that their misery is a result of this one man's greed.

That's all I've read so far. But I'll keep you posted!

I'm playing mega-soccer. Guess how many games I'm playing in one week, if you count from Thursday to Wednesday: six. WHOA! SIX! I'm playing on an intramural team at Heebie U which has games last Thursday, and this Tuesday and Wednesday, as well as the regular three leagues. At some point something is going to have to give, but we don't know what.

The last time we hung out, I just kept looking down

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 20:48:46 GMT

I ~~proctored~~ ~~chaperoned~~ baby-sat a bunch of college kids last night as they turned down the alcohol and up the scandalous outfits, at a campus Halloween party. They seem so sober and unlike my own college experience. So many girls tottering on stilletos, arching their backs and displaying bustier cupfuls of breasts. Or bowlfuls. Or even more. So many fishnet stockings and boyshorts, or hanky-lengthed skirts, (or skirts with many petticoats, depending on the costume. But still crotch-high. "See my bloomers!") They all give nominal homage to a real costume, though. And they're all so sober. The whole thing seems like a mysterious exercise in unfun patriarchy.

I st-st-stuttered when you asked me what I'm thinking 'bout.

When I was pumping the other day, some students called me on the phone. They had a question about the scavenger hunt. It seemed faintly undecorous to be milked while talking to students.

I've continued to use the electric pumper, even though I replaced the handpump. I'm getting huge results. It works better, I'm forced to admit. My personal best is 8 oz in a single sitting. (Who knows, I might be pumping while I write this very entry!) (I am.)

Felt like I couldn't breathe. You asked what's wrong with me.

A funny thing from the wedding: a family friend cornered me, delightfully drunk, and began talking about childbirth. "The vagina!" she proclaimed, "Is a GODDAMN rubberband! Springs right back in place! It's magic!" She paused for effect and looked me dead in the eye. "The pooper never recovers." She then repeated this whole thing several more times. We talked about the sad fact that labor causes hemorroids. It was kind of awesome.

My best friend Leslie said, "Oh, she's just being Miley."

Dad left a message on my phone yesterday, which he handled with extraordinary diplomacy. He began with a long detailed list of how, medically, Mom is doing wonderfully. Finally, he said "Subjectively, she's in a lot of pain," and described some problems they're having. Without the long leading perspective, I think I would have had a hard time. As is, it's still kind of hard. (I've talked to him every night. This just happened to be the message last night.)

The next time we hang out, I will redeem myself. My heart can't wait till then.

I just ate the rankest, stalest, Twix. What a disappointment. It came apart in the wrapper, and the caramel was glued to the wrapper, and the chocolate crumbled off.

Raining and Complaining

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 22:04:36 GMT

Now Mom is about to have surgery. Last week was just a fake-out. I'm strangely detached from the whole thing at the moment, but I'll talk to them tonight, which will probably make it seem more real. I don't really want to think about it too much.

We decided it was time for Hawaiian Punch to learn to put herself to sleep. We plotted our tactics. We decided we could handle five minutes of all out wailing. At that point, the first time, we would try to soothe her without lifting her out of the crib. After five more minutes of wailing, we would lift her out, and soothe her, but put her back down, awake. Repeat for the rest of the night.

On Saturday, for her nap, Jammies put her down and walked out of the room. She murmured for a little bit, and went to sleep.

On Saturday night, we put her down awake, and she made muffled sounds briefly and went to sleep.

On Sunday during all her naps and when she went down for the night, it could not have been easier.

And then, when I went to transfer her to our bed, when I was going to bed, she woke up. This is about 11:00 last night. And I swear to god, she more or less stayed up until she went to day care this morning. Joke's on us, suckers! She probably dozed, but every time I opened my eyes, she was wide-awake, and she started fussing and getting progressively more upset around 3:30 am. Jammies stayed up with her from 3:30 until morning, (because he is my hero.)

More griping.

On my way to soccer yesterday, I passed a bike race. Neat! Bikers! Be safe, have fun! About three miles later, traffic stopped. We inched forward over the next twenty minutes. The bike race path crossed over the road. Whenever there was a sufficient gap, the traffic cops would say Go! Go! Go! and wave their arms, and one car would scoot across.

I made it through, eventually. The line was full of cars with little soccer balls hanging from the rearview mirror.

Then traffic stopped again. It turned out that the bike race crossed this road twice, about two hundred yards across from each other. Sonofabitch. Seriously. (Oddly, at this point, some cars turned around. You realize you're going to have to re-cross the crossing you just crossed?)

I made it to the game on time. The other team had one player. About 30 minutes after gametime, there were enough people. I was most worried that they'd cancel the game and send us back into the horrible traffic again.

I played soccer four days in a row. It was kind of too much, but kind of fun.

Less griping

I spent the past day putting together a scavenger hunt for the kids in math club. They have to solve problems and it takes them all over campus to different professors' offices. I hope they show up. I hope I didn't make it too hard. I hope I think of a prize before any team finishes.

Steampunk breastpump.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 18:11:04 GMT

I hosted book club on Wednesday. Each guest got to take home one gallon bag of meat. Would you like a gallon ziploc of sausage? Or brisket, ribs, or turkey? I gave away five gallons of meat, which put a sizable dent in our leftovers. Also each guest got a tupperware container of barbecue sauce. Meat bags! A meat bag for all!

I joined this book club via my doula. We are finally starting to make friends in town, instead of always having to drive up to Austin. This is a relief.

One of them told this story: She was driving her child to kindergarten, and the kid said, "There are four slaves in my class!" Wow. Good luck detangling that one during your three minute car ride. Apparently she had been reading or watching something about a runaway slave, and was not quite putting all the pieces together correctly.

My hand pump broke, so I am back to pumping with the big, heaving electric breast milk pump. It is such an elaborate contraption, and it feels vaguely humiliating to hook your disembodied breasts up like that. I prefer the convenient, simple little hand pump, both for the dignity and for the pretentious analog-ness of it.

This weekend promises to be full of soccer and not much else. I would like to celebrate what fun Hawaiian Punch is right now. Six months is a wonderful age.

Remind me to lock up this entry.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 20:43:00 GMT

I am writing a letter for the rank and tenure committee about someone I find very difficult. And who I often have to work with.
(For example,
Person A: You all need to have webpages. Here's an example.
Difficult B: This example has the person's CV on it. What if we're uncomfortable with that?
Person A: You don't need to include anything you're uncomfortable sharing.
Difficult B: Good. Because of identity theft.

Right. Because nothing is asking for identity theft like a list of conferences you've attended and courses you've taught. That's like bringing your own roofies to the frat party.)

Anyway, I cringed when I recieved the letter requesting my recommendation. It was not from her, but from the committee. So I decided to watch her teach, and base my recommendation on that. Happily, it turns out that she's excellent. Which makes the letter writing much easier.

When Jenny Humped Sean

In precalculus today, I was discussing conversions. I made up units, called Jennys and Seans, based on students in the class. I said there were 40 Jennys to a Sean.

I asked them what the conversion factor would be - which unit is on top? - if we're converting Jennys to Seans. Someone answered that Sean is on top and Jenny is on bottom. The class erupted into laughter and Jenny and Sean turned bright red and I put my face in my hands for not having seen that one coming.

It really wasn't even that funny, or else I would have run with it. And I'd already written on the board that next we were converting Seans to Jennys, so we all got a chance to put Jenny on top and Sean on bottom. They were roaring with laughter. (At the end, I said "So: one on top, and one on bottom makes multiplying easy!" and they laughed some more. Oh, sex.)

Mops Is Feeling Down

Mom is very down about having the surgery postponed. Which is entirely reasonable: she was braced and prepared and now has to occupy herself for another week. But it's very out of character for Mom. I've never known her to withdraw and opt out of her weekly social engagements, which she is doing. I would have withdrawn, as well, so as to skip everyone asking questions and re-explaining. But Mom never makes judgement calls like that - she usually plows through life without relinquishing anything. It's kind of hard.

I bet you're wondering how I knew

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 01:10:15 GMT

We're married. I made an honest man out of Jammies. It's so ordinary to be back at work today that the contrast is surreal: was I really standing up in front of everyone two days ago?

Today Hawaiian Punch is six months old. Happy birthday, Sparvey twins!

Tomorrow Mom's insides are being removed. This is a very harrowing set of days we are wading through.

I like wearing my wedding ring. It feels steady. It's very solid and works well with my dislike of having skin-on-skin, by giving my fingers a nice texture to rub against.

We came very close to walking down the aisle to I Heard It Through The Grapevine. Boy, would that have been perplexing to hear in the imminent moments of a wedding.

The plan was to walk in to Marvin Gaye's You're All I Need To Get By, right? Jammies called me about one in the afternoon, after he'd left to go shower and watch the football game. I was in the reception hall with friends, baby-sitting the electronics and the laptop.

Jammies called me and said, "I just decided to play the CD, to see how long the song is.We've got I Heard It Through The Grapevine on there." Holy smokes, was that close. But I'm wildly tickled by the averted confusion. Well I heard it through the grapevine not much longer would you be my baby. Yeah, yeah. Jammies went home and downloaded the correct song.

I got dressed at home with my three best friends and two cousins. The house felt dreamlike and unreal because I was full of butterflies, and strange people who don't live here were preening at the mirror, and the photographer was sitting in the living room. Earlier he had asked if I wanted photos of us getting ready. I hemmed and hawed. It seemed weird to be documented, but perhaps nice to see the photos later on.

He admitted that he was expecting to see more of a production. I said "This is it!" He didn't snap too many photos and left for the ceremony. I didn't think ill of him for that.

I was very nervous about two things: carrying Hawaiian Punch in high heels through spongy grass, and having the officiant read a letter I wrote during the ceremony. I still have no idea if the letter was actually that great, but your friends and family will dutifully compliment everything, and so later I felt good about it. It was really long. I didn't realize how long it takes to read one page out loud. Regular reading is so speedy.

* * *

Mom and Dad just called. The surgery has been postponed a week. That is anticlimactic. The surgeon said he wanted to have a heart surgeon there, too, because of the location of one of the lymph nodes that they are removing. So good for precautious docs, but tough for Mommy to have to wait in suspended animation for another week.

Also, we ordered a dozen times too much barbecue for the rehearsal barbecue, and by "we" I mean not me. The fridge and freezer are all packed full of meat. I don't love meat that much. So much meat. Meat meat meat.

The whole weekend was wonderful. I loved everyone being here. I am happy that it's just the three of us again and I also miss everyone dearly.

I can't believe I still feel so awful.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 01:49:30 GMT

Oh look, I'm updating again. From my lofty position as a fevered soul.

I felt so awful when I got home. It turned out my fever was 101.5. Today was so tiring. Today was so long and tiring and so many students had so many questions. But that's not the only reason I felt awful.

I started fretting about Mom's surgery, and how much work I've got to do at school, and how sad it is that this weekend can't live forever. Plus my eyes were hurting and my skin was prickly, and I was very upset.

It's so sad that this weekend hasn't even started, and it will end on schedule, next Sunday, just like every other weekend. So many friends and family who I'd like to keep by my side, and they'll all be dispersing and we'll go back to our life. I like our life. But I miss everyone and want to keep them close and shower them with love.

If you need to buy expensive Italian gear, go to Etro at the San Marcos outlet mall and ask for Brandon. Then you will be helped by Ira Glass Turned Salesman. He's our new best friend. He even offered to come over next Saturday and help Jammies' arrange the hanky in his suit pocket that offsets the green in the tie. He's very helpful without being overbearing, and just has the right mix of debonair and friendly and intellectual that you want when Ira Glass helps you pick out a tie.

The Trousers land at 3.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 17:11:00 GMT

Wow, this goddamn flu just keep lingering. Lingerin' and malingerin'.

Last week, Jammies and his mom picked Hawaiian Punch up at daycare, and her mouth had a deep impression of a pacifier. Which she never would take for us. But I guess daycare got her to take it, so perhaps she was excessively upset one day. So she pacifies, now. I guess it's not a big deal. I'm sure they use an organic, BPA-free, dye-and-detergent free pacifier made of kidskin.

Speaking of daycare, I can't figure out how they stay afloat, financially. At least the baby room must be hemorrhaging cash. There are three babies, and we pay $610/ month. So they are bringing in $1830/month.

They staff the room from 7 am to 6 pm. I guess Miss Annie and Miss Priscilla probably aren't fulltime with benefits. But that's roughly 220 hours/month. Plus administraitors's salary, supplies, buidling lease...it does not seem like enough. I am sad that Miss Annie and Miss Priscilla must make minimum wage, parttime, no benefits.

I assume the older rooms subsidize the baby room, because you can have more children per adult. But still.

Mommy-pants and Daddy (-trousers?) arrive tomorrow. Mom's surgery is next Tuesday. She talks about getting her will and affairs in order before surgery. I know that people sometimes don't pull out of anaesthesia, but I prefer not to think about that, MOM. At any rate, the wedding is fast upon us.

I'm very excited. I'm a bit stunned that everyone I love is coming to celebrate. It's kind of incredibly amazing.

Little naked butts all over the board.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 01:01:37 GMT

After a trip to the doctor, a friend's three-year-old daughter said, "If it's a boy nurse, does he still have a penis?" Oh how rich when children inadvertently trip cultural hot spots. I laughed.

The administrator of our building is being unreasonably dumped on by the rest of the school, and she's also becoming kind of a pain in the ass to work with. (Of course these are integrally one and the same.) We did away with having deans, and she was one of the dean secretaries, and now she has taken over the work of the other dean's secretary. She is also being asked to take care of stuff that used to fall to the deans. It is absurd and exploitative, and she has been very stressed out.

On the other hand, she keeps leaving the sink full of her nasty ass dishes and food-chunks. She went on vacation for a week and left the sink grody.

It's determined that I'm en-swine-ulated. Be-swined. Pigged out. Flu of Pork. I honestly don't feel that bad, but I've been running a decent fever for a few days, and my throat is sore and I'm lately developed a hacking awful cough. There is phlegm rattling just south of what I can cough up.

This is perfect timing, because I'll be better by the time the guests arrive next week.

Apparently I forgot to tell one of the bridesmaids that she is a bridesmaid. The thing is, I vividly remember the e-mail conversation. But she does not, and neither of us can find the old e-mails. And believe me, I don't get around to deleting e-mails. Maybe it was over texting.

In precalculus, we're graphing. When I want them to fill in coordinates, I write an empty coordinate pair on the board next to the point I'm talking about. Like so: ( , ) . I make the commas bigger than the typeface does. They look like little naked butts to me. All over the board, little naked butts. I haven't said anything to the students yet.

There is just no way that you are the pine-scented air.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 02:35:07 GMT

We ended up going back to ACL. Whattya know. It didn't rain a drop. But if it had, we were all set with ponchos and umbrellas and dry-making strategies.

Instead, we found four inches of mud. It stunk, too, from the compost they had used to get the grass to grow. Poor two million dollar grass. But we had fun. My favorite acts were The Dirty Projectors, Raul Malo, and GirlTalk.

This is what we bought for Hawaiian Punch to wear to the reception:

But not during the ceremony, because I have a trace of decorum.

We found a poem that we like for the ceremony. It makes us laugh.

Litany, by Billy Collins

You are the bread and the knife,
The crystal goblet and the wine...
-Jacques Crickillon

You are the bread and the knife,
the crystal goblet and the wine.
You are the dew on the morning grass
and the burning wheel of the sun.
You are the white apron of the baker,
and the marsh birds suddenly in flight.

However, you are not the wind in the orchard,
the plums on the counter,
or the house of cards.
And you are certainly not the pine-scented air.
There is just no way that you are the pine-scented air.

It is possible that you are the fish under the bridge,
maybe even the pigeon on the general's head,
but you are not even close
to being the field of cornflowers at dusk.

And a quick look in the mirror will show
that you are neither the boots in the corner
nor the boat asleep in its boathouse.

It might interest you to know,
speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world,
that I am the sound of rain on the roof.

I also happen to be the shooting star,
the evening paper blowing down an alley
and the basket of chestnuts on the kitchen table

I am also the moon in the trees
and the blind woman's tea cup.
But don't worry, I'm not the bread and the knife.
You are still the bread and the knife.
You will always be the bread and the knife,
not to mention the crystal goblet and--somehow--the wine.

I like to say to Jammies, "There is just no way that you are the pine-scented air." Because it's true. Other than this poem, most of the ceremony is some Unitarian mumbo-jumbo.

(Although there is one hidden joke: the officiant is going to begin by saying - without lisp, just straight delivery - "Marriage. Marriage is what brings us together, today. Marriage is a dream within a dream.")

We're walking in to You're All I Need To Get By. We're walking out to My Summer Vacation, up there on the side bar. I guess I just ruined things for a few of the guests. Who now have to feign surprise because they are under strict orders to keep my secret identity secret.

Perhaps they could identify each other with a keyword or gesture. Perhaps if you're attending the wedding and are reading this post, you ought to wear a red fez, so that you can ferret each other out. Then you can nod slyly to each other. But please don't speak of it, unencoded, for fear of busting my secretive ass.

When the Geebies got very wet.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 14:16:27 GMT

We had about an hour or two of beautiful weather at the Austin City Limits festival, yesterday. It was overcast and 75. Hawaii sat on a blanket with a friend's baby and they lunged at each other and tried to put each other in their mouths. It was pretty cute.

I gazed at Jamaal, in our chairs, and felt quite content. We even had a flag, waving high above the chair on a tent spine, proclaiming our allegiance to New Mexico State University. Jammies went to school there.

Then it started to drizzle, and then pour, and we were still game. It was still okay. Hawaiian Punch was dry because our chairs had fancy attached little roofs, which worked very well. A friend came by and shared a bit of smoke with me, and it was mellow and great.

Then it just kept raining. The water dripped off the attached roof, into the edge of my seat, and I abruptly realized that the reason I was fucking freezing was that I was sitting in four inches of water. After about three hours of solid rain we decided to pack it in.

I don't know if I want to return today. It's supposed to pour some more. Maybe I'll stay at home with The Punch while Jammies frolics, unencumbered. Maybe if Jammies really wants to go as a family, I'll rally. I'd certainly go if we weren't trying to keep a baby warm and dry.

It seems like baby toys were designed with five month olds in mind. She is just fascinated by them. It's like she's the right age for everything for babies. Hawaii is so much fun these days. I feel very strongly that the Mommy Wars - whether to work or stay at home - are being massively side-tracked by not considering individual variations between families. Having miserable parents is hard on families. Do whatever makes life sustainable and content for your family.

I should say that I wasn't miserable over the summer. But I did feel like I was going batty by the afternoon, each day when I was home alone with Hawaiian Punch. I think I would have been miserable if I hadn't known the summer would draw to a close in finite time, and I'd go back to work. If the summer had no shelf-life, I would have been quite cranky.

Jammies' Mom arrives on Wednesday. The wedding is getting very close, indeed.

Look at the core muscles on that Punch.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 22:29:38 GMT

Thank you all for the cheers and hoorays! I've the warm fuzzies, guv'nor.

On Tuesday, we went to the Open House at Hawaiian Punch's daycare. Sure, why not. Miss Annies squirted a glob of orange paint onto a paper plate with a jack-o-lantern face. Hawaiian Punch merrily slapped it all over her hands and the plate, and so we have more artwork.

Then we sat around with two other sets of parents and let the babies roll on the floor. Hawaiian Punch sat up, unassisted, for the first time. I made sure everyone knew and applauded this achievement. I am still very impressed with her.

The other two babies' fathers are cousins, apparently. The fourth baby did not represent at Open House.

This weekend is Austin City Limits festival. It's supposed to rain. The whole next few months are supposed to be unusually rainy. It is likely that we'll have a very ironic wedding. That will make the whole weekend a bit harder. I really hope the barbecue is not drenched.

So relieved and elated.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 20:37:26 GMT

The tumor responded beautifully, and Mom is officially scheduled for surgery the Tuesday after our wedding.

The Aftermath Club

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 14:47:42 GMT

Yesterday I stayed late for Math Club. I hate arriving home after Hawaiian Punch has gone to bed. It makes me feel just awful.

I ran a bunch of errands after Math Club, since I was already arriving home late. First I went to the Gigantic Double Outlet Mall, which weirdly sometimes lifts our small town onto top ten national lists of great places to shop. (Not according to me.) (There is a steady stream of very rich Mexicans from Monterrey who drive up to shop here.) It is open until 9 every night. On a Monday evening it is deserted. At the Neiman Marcus outlet I bought Jammies a back-up tie for the wedding. It is green with orange roses on it and I quite like it.

Next I went to the pet store and bought aquarium gravel to put beneath our little rubber duckies, for the centerpieces. The girl at the check-out counter asked me if I had an aquarium, so I lied and said yes.

Then she asked how big my aquarium was, and I squirmed and said "Mediumish" and she said "60 gallons?" and I said yes. Then she said, "Wow! That's big!" and I felt like I'd been set-up. I waited uncomfortably while the credit card machine took its sweet time, hoping she didn't ask me about saline content or bubble viscosity or the names of our fish. Instead she said, "Planning on replacing the gravel?" and I said "Yes." She looked at me expectantly, so I lamely added "I like these colors better."

At the gas station, I listened to a phone message from Grandma saying it was terribly urgent that I call her tonight. It turned out she had a question about distant cousins who were left off the invite list. Grandma kind of calls wolf on her use of urgent.

Last I stopped at the drug store, where nothing happened. They didn't have any Hawaiian Punch sized costumes, which was not why I stopped there, but as long as I'm there, I thought I'd linger in the candy and costume aisle. There are now Double Peanut Butter Reeses peanut butter cups, which sounds like it'd make you very thirsty.

If it were so easy that it practically just fell in my lap, I'd put her in some sort of seaside-themed Halloween costume for the wedding. Like a squid costume, perhaps. We'll see.

Today we find out whether Mom qualifies for surgery or not. I'm kind of on tenterhooks here.

Unpacking the trip home last weekend.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 15:28:45 GMT

Here's a partial post that I wrote while I was at home last weekend:

Everything from my childhood is old and grubby, or brittle. Or gone. (I'm so melodramatic.) I'm feeling very melodramatic. I feel like the neck of an hourglass: my childhood and my parents growing old and grubby and brittle, (my parents aren't grubby though) and my future and babies and family stretching out in front of me.

I was thinking about everyone that my Grandma knows and loves. None of them were more than toddlers when she was my age. She has said goodbye to everything she knew and loved in the first half of the hourglass, and replaced it with children and new friends and grandchildren and great-grandchildren, in the second half of the hourglass.

I went jogging through my parents' neighborhood this weekend. I jogged by a big house with light blue siding, and saw the window to a room on the left, and remembered that it was dark, and all brick, like a dungeon, off the side of the kitchen. You had to go down three steps from the kitchen. The couch and rug were plaid. I watched Little House on the Prairie in that room.

All the houses were old and grubby, or totally rennovated, and I felt melancholy.

Here is a catalogue of the wallpaper in my parents' house:

This means you just entered the back door, which is to the left of the bathroom you're looking at, and turned around to see where you came from. Let's enter that bathroom:

This is the same mirror that was visible in the previous photo, and you can see the top of the toilet in the lower left. It's hard to see the wallpaper because of the museum-quantity of artwork on the walls. This is how the whole house is, and I find it comforting. Here's another view of the bathroom, this time over the sink:

It takes so long for my puny laptop to upload each picture that I fear I'll never get this post up. Hawaiian Punch is napping, I'm grading, and Jammies is spending the weekend at the lake with his boyz in a bonding bachelor partyish homage. I'll keep uploading until she wakes up, but then I'll save the rest for later.

From the view in the first photo, we will now turn right, where the wood of a bookcase is visible. We're crossing the reading room, of which there are no photos today, because it is not wallpapered. This is a tour of wallpapers. On the far side of the reading room is the Dog Bathroom, where we bathe the dogs.

Just out of sight, under the window on the left, is a bidet. Directly above the bidet on the ceiling, it is moldy because we used to turn on the bidet full blast and it would hit the ceiling. And mom never noticed and so never made us stop. To the right, also out of sight, is the bathtub where we bathed the dogs.

The study and the playroom, and the piano room, and the kitchen do not have wallpaper. It is a big elaborate house frozen in time. The last room downstairs is the dining room. Let's visit it.

and a close up of the wallpaper:

There are a lot of faces hiding in the wallpaper.

We will save the upstairs for another day.

I am extremely attached to this gigantic house filled to the gills with treasures that Mom has accumulated. I am terrified of the day when it comes time for me and my brothers to disassemble it. Jammies and I don't have very much space. I can't acquire all these things, and my brothers aren't sentimental.

Mom mentions this future disassembling on a regular basis, and I get quite upset. She wants me to advocate for the worth - financial and sentimental - of all these treasures. I will but I'm scared that there is no home for everything besides this one. And plus I'll be in the throes of grief. I'm scared the whole thing will consume me.

Amid the boughs

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 01:28:15 GMT

Grandma was in rare form over the weekend. Lecture, lecture, lecture. So many monologues. And then more monologues about how rude we are to interrupt. We spent hours each day - Mom, Dad, Jammies and myself - parked around the kitchen story while Grandma lectured. She even schedules these talks. She announces, "When would be a good time that everybody could listen while I shared about my recent trip?"

Topics that Grandma lectured on:
1. When we drop Hawaiian Punch off at daycare, we should say "Be kind!" instead of "Be good!" because I can't even remember why. But in the course of that lecture, she managed to interject her "Good Enough" speech. Her vision could be better, her hearing could be better, but she's good enough.

2. We're giving Hawaiian Punch broken neurons, a nervous temperament, and restless leg syndrome, because we bounce her on our knees. We got many many lectures about this.

3. I should have validated some point she made instead of saying that the research I'd read contradicted her point. There's good parts in everything, and I should have first validated her comment instead of just shooting it down.

4. We all interrupt a lot. Because Grandma loves a silent, nodding, captive audience, but the audience was brought in on the pretense that it would be a conversation, and they're bored. Grandma tells us how it is petty and immature to redirect the focus of conversation away from the person who is talking and onto oneself. It's hard to take her seriously when your father is snickering.

5. The airport security should not be streamlined, because what about the shoe bomber? This was a total deliberate set-up. She asked me if I thought airport security should be streamlined, and I said yes, and talked a little bit about international diplomacy and diffusing anger of marginalized people. But I got a lecture about how you need both. She even interrupted me. I squawked indignantly, and she waved her hand and said "I know what you're going to say." She didn't, either, but if that's the test we're using then she would never get to finish her Good Enough lecture ever again.

Down, down, down

A friend was over, and the old yearbooks were brought out. At one point she said, "Hey, do you remember [John Smith]?" I didn't remember him at all. She said, "He's a registered sex offender in town." We flipped through my sixth grade yearbook to find a photo of him, and I had taken a Sharpie and blacked out his photo and name. I was a mini-archivist child who felt very strongly that the yearbook should be a historical document kept in pristine condition; it was way out of character that I blackened out this kid.

I remember blacking it out, too. Afterwards I wondered if I'd regret it, but I was so revulsed by him that I did not want to risk inadvertently glimpsing his picture, and so I was glad I'd done it.

He'd never done anything skeezy to me. I know we were friends, and I think he made some romantic overture, and instead of merely being not interested, I had this visceral revulsion and suddenly hated him with a passion. I felt guilty over this reaction, though.

Swing, swing, down

Anyway, we're home and I was exhausted at work today. And I'm still exhausted. Everything is hard.

I write a lot more about Grandma than Mom. Grandma is more of a self-parody and says more outrageous things. Mom is quieter and more measured and, I don't know, my mom. There wasn't enough of her to go around this weekend. Next Tuesday we find out if her tumor is operable. I didn't realize that it was possible that it wouldn't be. (I knew, I just decieved myself for the past few months.) There's only a 10-20% chance that it will be inoperable, but that is still way too scary.

Wrap-around sunglasses are out.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 21:22:27 GMT

We are in Florida again. Jammies, Hawaiian Punch and I met up with Grandma at the Jacksonille airport yesterday, and we fly out tomorrow. It is not a very satisfying home visit because Mom is so tense around Grandma.

Mom is illustrating the children's book that I sent her in the spring. All the people have no noses or mouths, kind of like Holly Hobbie. (Upon googling, I see that Holly Hobbie's face is generally obscured by a bonnet. So, mom's illustrations are just like my erroneous memory of the Hobster.)

For months now, since Grandma first saw the sketches, she has been arguing about the lack of noses and mouths. She does not like it. At one point she told Mom, on the phone, "Well, if you leave them without noses and mouths, that's your decision. It just means it won't get published." Thanks, O Supportive One!

Yesterday, we all gathered round so that Mom could show us the most recent updates of the illustrations. At one point, Grandma says, with a sugar-can't-melt-in-her-mouth dose of kitten innocence, "I notice that none of the people have noses or mouths. What does everyone else think about that? Could we discuss this?" I nearly toppled over at that one. Mom glowered.

Grandma also informed Jammies that he would give Hawaiian Punch restless leg syndrome, because he was bouncing her and patting the soles of her feet absent-mindedly.

Also she wants me to wear wrap-around sunglasses because the sun gets in the sides of regular glasses and damages your eyeball. I explained that I am fashion par excellence, and don't want to risk cramping my rep. Grandma responded that she also values fashion, and she finds her wrap-around sunglasses to be quite fashionable. I suggested that they are all the rage among seniors, but that I am young and modern. Grandma countered that she knew young people who wear wrap-around sunglasses. But I explained that by definition, then, they must not be hip and fashionable. Then I said "Don't shoot the messenger - I'm just reporting the news. Wrap-around sunglasses are out." Grandma sighed and gave up, because she was being bitten by mosquitos and wanted to go inside.

Mom's pain from the radiation is more intense than it was last time I was here, but she is feeling better from the chemo. Having Grandma around makes this visit feel like a near-miss. I'm home and should be logging quality time, but Mom keeps slipping away so that she doesn't have to deal with Grandma. Grandma is unusually needy and clingy (me too!) and it shows up as picking, picking, picking at Mom. Grandma is so upset that her daughter is sick.

That's why we're here. Grandma desperately wanted to see Mom, and Mom did not want to deal with Grandma's full force. So I offered that we could dilute the situation. Mostly I wanted and excuse to come visit again. I wish we weren't leaving so soon. It's kind of gut-wrenching.

I just wanted you to know

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 14:05:38 GMT

I am doing a really great job ignoring the roach I just saw in the kitchen, here at work. I'm practically whistling, with my hands shoved in my pockets, staring at the sky, emitting musical notes a la the jaunty cartoons. This must be partly because I went to bed at 8 pm last night and so feel marvelously well-rested.

Sometimes driving home at night, I let your memory take control

Let's list bagel flavors that I like: pumpernickel, sesame, poppy-seed, those bialy things which are basically everything bagels, sun-dried tomato, parmesan, any cheese flavor actually, salt, spinach, jalapeno cheddar, and I don't know, a million others.

Here is my criteria for bagel flavors:
1. I am so-so on sweet bagels.
2. Garlic and onions make my mouth feel grubby for the rest of the day, so not those.
3. ..... not even a third criteria. Just those two.

Guess how many types HEB carries that match my conditions: zero.

Isn't that utter bullshit? They carry plain bagels, but that's really the absence of flavor, like the empty set. It trivially satisfies the conditions, and thus trivially sates my voracious hunger. I call shenanigans. Or rather, goyanigans. Where are my heeb-peeps at?

Ach, let's cut the insanity with a Grandma story.

And you're sitting by my side, I turn up the radio

Grandma decided that there ought to be nutritional information available at the cafeteria of her retirement complex. Grandma cornered the chef, or whoever, and got the run-around. Finally he told her that legally he wasn't allowed to release the nutritional information and he didn't want to risk getting sued. (I always love it when you get to the place in Grandma's story where it's clear that the other person is so sick of being harangued that they are just tossing out random nonsensical arguments.)

Anyway, Grandma accepts this legal fear of being sued mumbo-jumbo. Until she happens to tell the story to a fellow resident who was formerly a lawyer, who cocks an eyebrow and informs her that the chef's reason is total bullshit.

So Granmda gets back on the case. She makes appointments to meet with the chef, but he doesn't show up. She gets into it with an evasive receptionist, and explains to her - in a very stern tone - the value of keeping appointments, contacting a person if you're forced to cancel, and always leaving a contact number available.

The story gets a little fuzzy here, which probably means that Grandma lost interest, but eventually they agreed to print "Ask your server for nutritional information" at the bottom of the menu. Grandma ended the story by saying that she asked her server what was in the mashed potatoes, and he replied "Potatoes", and she said "Nothing else, to help with the mashing?" and he didn't know. So she is uncertain about the efficacy of the solution.

Cruise down old route 59. Girl it's solid gold.

Here is a picture of the wedding band I bought off Etsy:

It arrived yesterday and I'm very fond of it.

We could pretend it's fan dandruff.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 02:31:42 GMT

We just realized the ceiling fan in our bedroom has been rotating to blow air upwards, for circulation, instead of to blow air downwards, to cool us off in these blessed hundred degree goddamn days. (Two more days over a hundred degrees and we beat the current record for a single summer! We've only had 68 days over 100 degrees. Glory comes at 70.)

The ceiling fan has a light fixture underneath it, and we used to stare at the three little lampshades and the mountains of cobwebs connecting them, and we'd say "That's gross. We should really do something about those cobwebs." Never did it dawn on us that if the fan was blowing down through the light fixture, the cobwebs wouldn't have been able to hang on.

So just now we switched it to blow downwards and congratulated ourselves, and then turned it on for its virgin blow, and the whole room snowed with dustbunnies and cobwebs that had been merrily accumulating on top of the blades, riding the merry-go-round for years. Wheee! I mean, gross.

I am having fun picking out centerpieces for the wedding. We thought it would be Oceanic to have fishbowls with bride and groom cake-toppers inside them. But I worried that this was kind of morbid: Sleep with the fishies, you married people!

Most cake-toppers seem to be $15-$30, so you know, fuck that. But then I found these creepy little fellas:

for only $1.99. I'd be down for drowning a pair of these heavenly little cheeseballs at every table. They look like incestuous sibling lovers who fetishize kewpie dolls.

Either that, or we could go with these little fellas:

(and then we could put a third little ducky in each bowl to represent Hawaiian Punch.) There's a little note on the website saying that the ducks don't actually float upright, so maybe we're destined to have dead-seeming centerpieces. Or maybe there are bride and groom duckies out there that do stay upright.

This coming weekend we fly back to Florida, and meet Grandma at the airport, and then all drive to see Mommy- and Daddy-pants. (The Pantses.) Grandma desperately wanted to visit Mom, understandably, and Mom didn't really want to deal with Grandma, also understandable. And I wanted an excuse for another visit. So we're all crashing together to help dilute the force that is Grandma.

My clinginess is not lessening one iota. Almost every day I want to talk to mom, and I want to have a visit planned at all times.

Hawaiian Punch Does Art

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 03:26:36 GMT

Our budding artist.

I am incredibly amused that Miss Annie, at daycare, drew an ice cream cone for each baby, and sprayed a dollop of whipped cream into the middle of each, and let each baby go to town. Hawaiian Punch was intrigued, but did not taste the whipped cream. Or so I am told. She puts everything else in her mouth, though.

The photo is bad because the artwork was preserved in a Ziploc bag, and we feel it should forever live in that Ziploc bag.

I grilled my carpoolmate to death about the degree to which Christians believe in hell, the other day. He is a theology professor. In fact, we asked him to officiate our wedding. Somehow I was under the impression that almost most denominations, as a matter of maturity, had outgrown the idea of hell, save the most evangelical ones. But he said, no, all denominations of Christianity have hell as part of their central tenets. He said some are mushier about it than others, and let the individual define it as the absence of God's love or having no afterlife, or something, but it's there in some form.

I hadn't realized that. Historically I judge people who profess traditional hells awfully hard, and now I wonder if I have cast too large a net. But I just can't shake the opinion that a blind faith in hell is appallingly cruel and insane.

Someone's in the saucer with Shorty, playing on the steel guitar.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 13:52:05 GMT

We've been fantasizing about moving, just a little bit. In a small town, there are very big houses for fairly cheap. I think we mostly like the novelty of wandering around a new space, having different shaped windows and not yet having discovered the irritating quirks.

If I were to stop, I'd think that I love our house very much, and that a bigger house means more to keep clean, and more to pay for utilities, and that expenses end up snowballing when you think you can afford a little more.

More groundedly, we talking about an addition from time to time. I always feel the need to qualify that I know families in big cities do just fine in apartments with even less square footage. (I think this house is about 1300 square feet.) It is three bedrooms, (but we use one of the bedrooms as a TV room. Luxuries, luxuries.) I'm fine with doubling kids up in a room, too. But it sure would be nice to have three kids, and I'd need to get the last of my clothes out of the nursery, and we start thinking about adding on again.

The real reason not to move is that our location is just dreamy. Our neighborhood is kind of gritty and crappy, but you can walk to both ends of the horse-shoe shaped portion of the river, and drink all you want while you tube, and there is a huge park along the river, with more than one playground, and then next to the tubing entrance is the community activity center, where a year-long membership costs $80, and there's a pool and treadmills and a weight room and basketball courts and racketball courts and art by local high school kids hangs on the walls. Next to the activity center is the library, which is next to a drug store and grocery store. On the other end of the horseshoe, where you get out with your tube, is a handful of Mexican restaurants, and a pub which has live music outdoors on Sunday afternoons. If you follow the riverside path to the middle of the horseshoe, you're about a block from the town square. These distances are all very small.

We did not go tubing once this summer. This baby is really cramping our style. She does have a bathing suit, and I've taken her to go splash in a shallow part of the river a few times. But we don't yet own an infant life jacket. I bet if we had one, she'd be fine sitting in our laps. Maybe we should take her just once this year.

Shorty is in her exersaucer, and the batteries are dying, making The Itsy Bitsy Spider sound like it's being played on the steel guitar. The perky voiced "Let's play MUSIC!" is all warbly.

I have flea bites

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 20:01:44 GMT

Hawaiian Punch's feet are so chubby that when she stands on the ground, her toes don't touch the ground. Or at least, not unless she is rocked forward on her feet. (Her feet are so round that she can rock forward on her feet.) Probably this is true of all babies. No wonder their balance is so awful.

Right now she sounds like Darth Vader on helium when she breaths. What a snotster. I guess she's still sick. She's been perky, just chock-full of snot. So much snot. It would drive me apeshit to let it rattle around up in my nostrils, but your options are limited when you're four months old.

Mommy-pants is officially feeling incrementally better. I'm very pleased. September 1st came and went, but on September 3rd she made a point to let me know that she has turned a corner. Somehow when we got the diagnosis, I thought that the fear of Mom dying was the hard part. I somehow didn't expect treatment to be hard (on me), because hey, it'll make her live longer. It's fighting the good fight. But of course it's hard to watch someone go through chemo and radiation. I don't know why I didn't think it would be hard. Sillie heebie, trix are for fighting cancer.

At school they are fumigating my building. My building has fleas. la-la-la-la-la-la-la. me-me-me-me-me-me-me.

How very Wednesday it is.

heebie.geebie@gmail.com — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 21:56:31 GMT

Several people are telling us to introduce cereal to Hawaiian Punch. They don't realize that I am change-averse when it just seems like more work. Isn't spooning cereal into a four-month-old's mouth generally slow and messy? Whereas I understand pumping and milk really well.

Perhaps it would help her sleep through the night. And eat less frequently during the day. But neither of these is really a problem. Now if it helped her eyes not go BING WIDE AWAKE at 5:00 am, then we might start talking. (She actually starts waking up in the 4s. The FOURS! Usually Jammies and I trade off giving her one of our hands to investigate and stick in her mouth, and we can more or less keep her down until the 5s.)(My mom said that my brother woke up between 4:00 and 5:00 am for years.)(Jammies - bless his goddamn amazingness - usually gets up with her at 5:00 am. I usually sleep till 6:00 or so.)

Today I am wearing pre-pregnancy pants. They are my biggest pair. It's a little premature; I've got a bit of a muffin top around the waistband, and it's a little uncomfortable. But who can resist too-snug pants when you've missed them for a whole year? I am still very excited.

I calculate that Hawaiian Punch is awake for roughly 98 hours per week, excluding naps. If she were at daycare from 7 am to 6 pm every weekday, she would spend 55 hours per week at daycare, which is more than half her life. But not much more! All we need to do is find 6 hours a week to spend with one of us, and she'll be spending at least half her days with us. I decided that is my cut-off for feeling guilty - she just needs to spend at least 49 hours a week with Jammies or me.

We just got an e-mail saying that a colleague is out sick, and who can cover her classes? I am free during her 8:00 am slot, but I sure as hell don't feel like subbing. My conscience is having a quarrel with my laziness.