Son of Max: January 2005 Archives

« December 2004 | Main | February 2005 »

January 30, 2005

Tortellini Mama

This weekend was Good Times. I went out with my friend Texas Jenny seeking a simple pint or two in a pub, you know like in the Olde Days, and we ran into a fellow worker bee and his very cool ladyfriend. We all ended up drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon and singing karaoke in a tiki-themed bowling alley into the wee hours. Oopsie! Funny how that works. Note to self: Journey is a racous, sing-a-long crowd-pleaser unlike squeaky, whispery renditions of LeAnn Rimes.

Saturday we went to the zoo and saw elephants getting baths (Elephants! With long noses!), penguins swimming and monkeys howling. It was like one of Cole's many animal-themed books come to life. Very long naps were taken afterward. Then we went to our Friends with Twins' house for drinks made from fresh lemons, and the moms and the babies danced to a mixed CD of songs with an American theme while the dads had their drinks. The differences between Dirt Rock and Butt Rock were debated, and it was determined that the seven of us should take a vacation this spring, potentially on a cruise. Maybe one with a Butt Rock theme! With baby-sitters and buffets!

Also, the Bean slept in until 9am BOTH mornings. The best part of the weekend was when Friend with Twin dad and I confessed to each other that we shared a dark 'n' twisted theory about babies sleeping late: you sort of think well, that's it, they somehow died in the night when you wake up and see that it is so late. However, if there is still no noise coming from the room, you go back to sleep because, well, what can you do? Sleep-lust makes one evil...

The Bean is awaiting two cousins, one due in June and one any day now. He says he can't wait to teach them his song about tortellini, the most effective way to shoot toddler-sized hoops and how to throw gang signs while eating edamame, yo.

Posted by Max at 12:34 AM | Comments (0)

January 25, 2005

The Flotsam and Offal of Sad Young Lives

We got my husband's car back. It is crunched and battered and currently not running, but we didn't have to pay any impound fees due to at last admitted clerical errors. My superhero power is that when I need to, I can wield a phone like a weapon.

Here's what was in it. Note the significant lack of fly-fishing equipment:

1. generic packs of cigarettes (2)
2. Blink 182, U2, Lauren Hill, Natural Born Killer soundtrack cds

3. note from Tanya to Thomas explaining how she never came back to meet him because she had to meet Rob to move some speakers and shit, and that she wasn't driving right now because she had to wait until her trial

4. blank visitor application form for the King County Juvenile Detention Center

5. handwritten schedules of visitation hours for Jeff and Brian

6. scratched out, non-winning Lotto tickets (4)

7. pee smell

8. cigarette butts (lots)

9. Covergirl face powder

10. baby stroller

Sometimes, you don't even need to wait for karma to get someone. They've already been jinxed.

AND BY THE WAY, DUMBASSES, NEXT TIME YOU STEAL A CAR DON'T LEAVE YOUR CDS WITH YOUR LAST NAME WRITTEN ON THEM IN THE CAR WHEN YOU DITCH IT.

Posted by Max at 12:35 AM | Comments (0)

The Flotsam and Offal of Sad Young Lives

Here's what was in it. Note the significant lack of fly-fishing equipment:

1. generic packs of cigarettes (2)
2. Blink 182, U2, Lauren Hill, Natural Born Killer soundtrack cds

Sometimes, you don't even need to wait for karma to get someone. They've already been jinxed.

AND BY THE WAY, DUMBASSES, NEXT TIME YOU STEAL A CAR DON'T LEAVE YOUR CDS WITH YOUR LAST NAME WRITTEN ON THEM IN THE CAR WHEN YOU DITCH IT.

Posted by Max at 12:35 AM | Comments (0)

January 17, 2005

Here comes the rain again

If the Bean were a features writer for a toddler-published magazine, his article this month would be entitled "Choosing Not to Nap". I guess the glory days of two naps are behind us and we are uncertainly entering a one-nap lifestyle. The problem is, none of us can sort out when exactly that nap is supposed to be and also what does that mean for bedtime? So there are a lot of frustrated tears and arched bodies being flung dramatically on the floor, mostly by my husband and myself.

We also got to experience the thrill of projectile vomiting this weekend! Until you actually see this phenomenon in action, it is one of those things you think parents just say, like oh my kid just threw up four feet across the room, or my kid is gifted because he spelled "cat" out of his carrot sticks. My carrot sticks would have spelled out "Wow" after I saw the pukestream fly out of the Bean the other night. We were both almost more impressed than upset although by the third day, frankly it was getting a little old.

My foot currently smells like dog pee. I'm not going to go into it, but suffice to say it is because of my dog.

So it's back to work and to daycare tomorrow providing everyone is well. This afternoon, we plan on celebrating MLK's birthday in the form of a simple yet heartfelt memorial activity: fingerpainting. I am hopeful that the good times we have today can sustain me through what promises to be another torrential and soul-grating week at the saltmines.

Posted by Max at 12:37 AM | Comments (0)

January 16, 2005

Work 1, Life 2

This past week held a series of exciting events, as weeks often do. There was so much drama at work and I guess because I'm a mama, people saved it for me. Without going into it, I will just say that for any young impressionable types who may be reading and thinking about growing up to become managers in corporate environments: DON'T DO IT! Become veterinarians, like my mom always suggested to me. Or beekeepers, bees will sting you at times but at least you get some honey out of the deal. How about owners of small yarn shops? That seems like a nice job.

In other news, two great things also happened: my husband's car was recovered and I discovered that Target is now selling boxed wine *.

On Friday night, my husband and I went on a date, which would have been newsworthy enough. Our Texan neighbors have a boy a few months younger than The Bean and we've recently worked out a system of baby-sitting swapping that means we now have mutual Date Nights once a month...YEEHAW!

So Friday, my husband and I planned on paying homage to my New Wave roots by going to see the Psychedelic Furs, but they weren't slated to take the stage until like two o'clock in the morning. Since we are fast approaching ancient, we decided to bag the rock show in favor of finishing our fancy seafood dinner and going home to bed.

When we got home at around 10:30, the phone rang. It was the police telling us our car had been found. At first, we were happy! But soon we were sad, and mad! Because I've told the story 15 times already and because it is long, I will present just the facts, ma'am:

1. 8/22 car is stolen from in front of our house while my husband and the Bean are home. Suspect is described by my husband as a "man with a well-groomed ponytail and a terry cloth scrunchie".

2. 10/1 car recovered, taken to impound place two miles (!) from our house.

3. 1/20, police call to let us know that the car was found...ALMOST FOUR MONTHS AFTER THE FACT!!!

4. We owe $4,784.00 in impound fees.

5. Ha ha ha, you're kidding us right? Huh? You're not?

Because the Auto Theft Squad division of the police department is only open from 8-4 Mondays through Fridays, we now have to sort through this with them tomorrow. Although this promises to be a Royal Pain in the Arse, my current feeling is that any hour not spent in the office is a good hour.

* The box of wine holds the equivalent of four bottles of wine. It was so good and it is so gone.

Posted by Max at 12:36 AM | Comments (0)

January 12, 2005

Happiness is a Warm Husband & Cold Drinks

I feel like someone has run a cheese grater vigorously across my psyche. And not just any cheese grater, but a really big one, like the size of a bus, or an orca. The gray and the cold and the STOOPID STOOPID work I do are conspiring to make a sad girl hash out of me, with no side of eggs to shore me up.

Um, what’s with all the food references? Darned if I know. I don’t even eat freaking hash.

Around this time of year, the Husband and I generally take tropical vacations, but we haven’t in a couple years due to Bean Bean, Dancin’ Machine. Boy, does that kid love to dance. Today’s notes from daycare said, “He did a really good job of shaking his head to the ‘Shake Your Teeth Out of Your Head’ song”. It’s stuff like that that makes me feel relieved that I don’t really know exactly what goes on there during the day. Although yesterday, when I went to drop the Bean off, there were about sixteen shrieking mini-toddlers, two rather wild-eyed teachers and a general sense utter mayhem about to unfurl. Apparently there is illness going around and many teachers were felled. I asked the director, did she need me to volunteer for a spell since it seemed like things were careening out of control and she said oh god please yes. So instead of reporting to my cube for the usual dose of bad attitude and sourpuss wrangling, I sat down in a ring of beaming, runny-nosed toddlers and sang songs. It was a much more satisfying way to begin a day that inevitably hitched its wagon to the Sucktown Express.

Our dog is approximately 3/4 dead. The Husband and I have been having The Talk, the one that involves the remaining 1/4. Because the Craphound, his hindquarters don’t work so well and he has a hard time getting around and lately he’s taken to peeing himself on his bed where he otherwise just lies. Plus now he is deaf, which I find somehow endearing but it can’t be easy for the old guy. That whole situation is so depressing I can’t write about it anymore. I am so going on a pet-accrual hiatus once the three (how did that happen?) that we have go to the Happy Happy Dancing Place of All Good Pets and their Special Happy Holy Friends.

On a brighter note, today was the first day of our Fancy Corporate Annual Event, and I was one of the people that ran the microphone around the audience, Jenny Jones-style, during the Executive Q&A session. My favorite part was when our CEO was squinting out at the audience and didn’t see that I was waving my paddle to indicate that I had someone with a question. I found myself in a roomful of 1500 executives frantically whispering our CEO’s first name like a lover. Too bad for him I am saving all my love for my bartender, my maker of all things right again, my most beloved and adored husband.

Posted by Max at 12:38 AM | Comments (0)

January 10, 2005

Operation Snowsuit = Success!

Posted by Max at 12:38 AM | Comments (0)

January 06, 2005

She's right you know

Oh boy. The guy from the graphics department just sent me the proofs from our photo shoot and like a gibbering orangutan high on banana chips, I sent the link to someone at work. Now everyone in the whole freaking department has seen them and yukked it up over the Invisiballs and my ability to look simultaneously annoyed and contorted. Stupid computers and their email forwarding capabilities! I’ve kind of had it in general with intraoffice Instant Messaging and gossip and happy hours and inappropriate getting down etc. Folks, if I can’t be in on it, it needs to stop. Get back to work, there’s content to manage!

I decided today that I am, by default, the bad cop at the office. My boss, who I adore, is a crazy mutherfunker whom I am constantly shushing when he starts referring to past LSD binges, his appreciation for gas-huffing and his love of sticking it to the man. Keep in mind we are firmly entrenched in Corporate America where this kind of behavior is frowned upon. However, due to an overabundance of talent and charm, my boss is worshipped by all. That leaves me, as second in command, to do the dirty work of reminding people to log their sick time, listening to and appropriately documenting ergonomic concerns and injuries, and doling out the annual 3% raises. To put it in terms that the Bean could understand, I am Bert to my boss’ Animal. And who wants to fricking party with Bert? Pigeons, that’s who. Down with Bert!

Tonight for the first time since dinosaurs roamed the earth, I exercised. Last weekend, I used the wet/dry vac to vacuum up the dead spider collection that we have been housing in little piles of cat litter around the basement floor. I then bought a rug for $19.99 from Home Depot and set up my treadmill (purchased optimistically just after I got pregnant ha ha ha) on the new rug. Thus begat Fitness 2005. I always forget when I haven’t worked out for a long time how much I actually enjoy it. Now that I no longer have the time or energy to go to the gym, I am hopeful that my dreary little basement home gym will have me treadmilling my way to fitness in no time.

My favorite part of the workout was having to step off the treadmill at one point to dance to that Nelly and Christina Aguilera duet which, until I listened to it nine times in a row on my ipod, I never realized was so good. Note: it is very difficult to dance on a treadmill, I don't recommend it even in the comfort and safety of your own home. I think I might be the only pushing-forty white woman who is into what my younger and million times cooler husband tells me is “dirty south” music. Yeah! Yeah! What?

The forecast calls for a rare inch or two of snow tomorrow, so I bought the Bean a snowsuit. As soon as there is snow on the ground, we will commence with the frolicking. This cop may be bad, but she has Fridays off. Yeah.

Posted by Max at 12:39 AM | Comments (0)

January 01, 2005

Jeepers creepers

Yesterday a book made me throw up! Well, it might also had something to do with the beer I found myself drinking Thursday night, in an unwise pre-New Year's eve spent with a trio of work cronies. Even still. The book was the much-written about, long-ass waiting list at the library Stiff that caused me to rise from my comfortably prone position on the couch and sprint to the bathroom. The thought "This is quite a surprising turn of events!" rang in my head as it was happening, since never before has the written word had that effect on me, and I have read many books in my time, well over a hundred.

I've always been, um, curious about things. My dad was an emergency doctor long before Noah Wiley made it brooding and fashionable, and when I was little I used to grill him: what was the grossest thing that you saw today? He was kind and/or disturbed enough to usually share a few cases with me, although in retrospect I think he must have toned it down. I mean, as a parent, who wouldn't?

As much as I am committed to my love for things science and scientific, when it comes right down to it I think I prefer theoretical science to reality. Put it this way: were it that you were my high school lab partner, you would be the one dissecting the fetal pig my friend. I'll watch 10,000 documentaries about medical mysteries but when I am actually standing before the glass cases at the Mutter Museum, I can pretty much guarantee that I will get light-headed, panicky and weird. Because there are skulls! Where brains used to be! And the people that had them used to think things and be creative and love people and get crabby etc. etc., just like I do now! What does that mean?! Aaaahhhh, no!!!

But as a card-carrying organ donor, I was curious to see just where I might end up. Truthfully I care not a whit, if someone wants to make Slim Jims out of me and feed them to gorillas, I say sounds good. My review for Stiff would read something like "This book might make you throw up and you'll feel generally creepy even if you don't throw up, plus you'll have violent emotionally disturbing dreams yet you will not be able to put it down and read your other crappy book which you checked out on accident thinking the author was someone else."

Son of Max. Do not visit for the book reviews.

Despite the previous night's beers and the whoops-a-daisy, we did manage to pull off Parentpalooza 2005 whereby infant and toddler beds were set up in various parts of the house, infants and toddlers tucked into them, and parental merriment ensued. The best part was when my neighbor, who is some sort of official pyrotechnical city dude wizard, set off these amazing fireworks in the school parking lot across the street and my drunken husband yelled "I'm going outside to pee and watch the fireworks!" He lurched back into the house about fifteen minutes later having stood around chatting with some of our neighbors and he had forgotten to ZIP UP HIS BUSINESS. Hi, neighbors! We are already somewhat infamous in the neighborhood because of the Bean and his colic (born in August, open windows, with the waaa-waaa-waa), our overgrown, not charming to others garden and the fact that our car got stolen from in front of our house. Why not add public nudity to the mix?

Posted by Max at 12:39 AM | Comments (0)