Yellow Wallpaper

Yesterday S-Boogie finally woke up without a fever and was feeling much better. I decided that we should get out of the house, so yesterday evening we went with Skye to the fair. It was probably one of the most exciting events in S- Boogie's life so far, since she kept talking about it on the way home and even while we were sitting in the dark trying to get her to go to sleep ( both times she went to bed). First we spent a lot of time looking at the animals. S-Boogie literally screamed with delight upon viewing the cows and was quite impressed by a large pig that was trying to use its nose to get out of the pen. She also got to have french fries and lemonade for dinner and watch a clown make balloon shapes. Then we went to the carnival and Skye generously bought a ton of tickets for her, so S-Boogie got to ride the cars, the boats, and the motorcycles various times. We also took her on the Ferris wheel, but I think that scared all of us a little too much. S-Boogie went into dan...

I think that tonight I hit the wall. I just couldn't do it any more; I put her bed as usual around 8 but then she woke up crying about 9, so we came and sat on the couch for an hour. I just couldn't summon up the energy to go and do what it takes to get her back into bed. And all that involves is rocking in a chair with her in the dark, but it didn't happen. Sad. The really sad thing is, she's not tired tonight because she slept for most of the day because I couldn't deal with her being sick. Mommy can't deal with life=extra nap time for S-Boogie. I really need to get myself together...

Everyone in America should have a washing machine in their home. We really should be more like Spain, where they are just a standard feature in the kitchen. And, they should be those nice, small, highly efficient European front loaders that get your water really, really hot and your whites nice and sparkly. But, then again no one in Spain has a dryer and you have to hang your underwear out the window to get it dry and then iron it so it isn't crunchy. Last night I was once again filled with gratitude for my washing machine when we had another middle of the night barfing incident (not me, S-Boogie). Luckily I was there to make sure no barf got in the hair or anything like that, so it was a simple matter of putting the sheets and pajamas in the washing machine and cleaning them thoroughly. Ah, convenience. I love the 20th century. I also realized that I have mostly gotten over my barf issues. I used to be deathly afraid of barf, but I can now say that it really doesn't bother me ...

Just found this picture of my mom and me at eighth grade graduation. The sad thing is, I remember making an effort to look really cool that day, I guess it didn't work. Not that I'm that hot looking now, but man, I was such a dork!

Last night we ended up spending two hours watching VH1's countdown of the "Top 40 Most Awesomely Bad Dirty Songs". Yeah. It really was kind of funny, but there were a few songs in there that suddenly brought me back to the horrible world of junior high. First there was "Whoomp! (There it is)", then they played "Come on Ride the Train", and finally the ultimate favorite of all 13 year old boys in 1991: "Do Me" by Bell Biv DeVoe. All of a sudden I felt like I was back in the gym of my junior high school hoping someone would notice me, or, even worse, at PTA night at Skate Palace trying to look sexy on roller skates. Ah, memories. I still haven't met anyone who thought junior high was a fun experience. I was a flat-chested white girl with big glasses, big hair, and braces. And I cared way more about dolphin safe tuna than sex. There was this group of boys who used to torment me every day by asking me if I was still a virgin. It made me feel ...

I really, really don't like conflict of any kind--it makes me physically ill. I will go out of my way to avoid conflicts, because as soon as a disagreement comes up I start to shake, sweat uncontrollably, and feel nauseated. I've gotten good at lying about how I feel or avoiding situations just so I don't have to deal with differences of opinion or things like that. It is a sucky way to live sometimes, but life keeps giving me opportunities to try and realize that I can disagree with people and not die. (Yeah, I and know conflict avoidance is not the best thing for a marriage, but we're working on it, I swear.) Once on my mission I got transferred to a new area with a very strange companion. She totally refused to talk to me; she would get up early and shut herself in the spare bedroom to study for most of the morning. After a day or two I gave up on trying to have companionship study. When we were out on the street or riding the bus, she'd read a book (even walking...

OK, I'll admit it: I really, really, really want to have another baby. I think I might be crazy, since I already know what it's like to experience your body growing to unnatural proportions, then spending the next 11 months chronically sleep deprived and being unable to go anywhere for very long because you have a small creature that needs to suck on your boobs every 2 or 3 hours. But, little babies are so sweet and beautiful, and there's some weird primal need that screams "get pregnant, now" somewhere inside me. Maybe it's due to the fact that S-Boogie is no longer a baby. Don't worry, we love her and she's totally adorable in her own way, but she doesn't make those cute baby noises or spend hours cuddled sweetly in our arms anymore. It seems like I keep running into people who have kids younger than S-Boogie and are already pregnant again. I think my worst nightmare is having kids super close in age, but I just realized that she's almost 2 a...

Now that I am not in school, I am not sure what to do with my life. I have no idea what I should be doing right now. Today I tried getting up early and exercising because I hoped that it would help me feel better, but instead I have felt tired and brain fogged all day. And now I am starting to feel sick to my stomach, which is a problem because I should begin to fix dinner about now and nothing sounds good at all. Even though S-Boogie is almost two, I still have a hard time adjusting to the whole staying at home thing. I have always worked or been in school or stuff like that, so I feel kind of weird just hanging out in my house without some sort of higher purpose in mind. Today I thoroughly cleaned the bathroom. I even washed the shower curtain. It feels so sparkly and nice in there--if anyone wants to come use my bathroom sometime in the next day or two, please do. I think the best use of my time right now would be to work on my reading list. I have to take my specialty exams next Fe...

I usually try to be polite to phone salespeople, I really do. I worked in a call center for a while and know that is a supremely crappy job. But I just hung up on a lady because I was getting really, really frustrated by trying to understand her English. It was one of those things where your credit card company calls and tries to sell you extra things that you don't need. The connection was bad and she kept reading me these really long descriptions of what it does, what the terms are and everything else. Plus, no matter how closely I listened, I could barely understand what she was saying. I knew she was speaking English, but I just couldn't quite get it because the accent was so foreign. I finally figured out that she must be calling from India, hence the bad connection, and so I felt bad for not getting it, but she was unintelligible! I finally hung up because I realized that she was saying something along the lines of "So I am going to charge your card now" so I fi...

S-Boogie was released from the hospital this morning and is now a free baby. We have a nebulizer, which is a little machine that dispenses medication in mist form so she can breathe it in. She really hates having her breathing treatments, but we will continue doing them for the next few days just to make sure that everything stays cleared up. Also, we can now use the nebulizer when she starts wheezing and hopefully nip any problems in the bud before they get too serious. I'm just glad she's doing better and is back to being her normal little self again. Part of me is still having a hard time adjusting to having a child with a chronic illness, even if it's not that "serious" of one. It's just not where I thought I would be; I never anticipated that I would be spending days in the hospital with my two year old or that I would be receiving visits from those home health care people in the little white vans. I know that S-Boogie will be fine and that there are much...

That was the title of the Mary Chapin Carpenter song that was playing on the radio on my way home from campus today. I thought the chorus was especially fitting: "It's so hard to know when it's quitting time". I just dropped my summer term classes and won't be back until fall. I've been feeling really unmotivated since the term started, and now this whole thing with S-Boogie has really set me back. I was nervous about not going to school because this will put off my graduation even more and because it was the "plan", but I think it's good for me to practice doing what I feel good about instead of what I had planned on. I think I need to use the time before fall semester starts to really examine my life and make some decisions. The last few months have been hard because I've been feeling so undecided and like nothing is sure in my life. I feel way more insecure right now than I have for a long time, and I need to do something about it. I don...

I think I watched more television today than I have ever watched in one day during my entire life. This morning we watched several hours of PBS kids programing, then this afternoon was Fantasia , then I got tired of kids stuff and went ahead and watched Law and Order , and then we watched some game shows and then we watched Veggie Tales and then we shut the TV off and S-Boogie got in her bed and I thought to myself "free at last!". S-Boogie may get to go home tomorrow, but it may not end up being until Thursday. They seem to make the decision in the morning and then stick with it, which kind of bugs me. She had a bad night last night, but was much perkier this evening and keeping her oxygen levels up nicely. The problem with being on oxygen is that they have to wean you off of it slowly, so it might take a while before the tube comes out of her nose. I really hope that tonight goes better and that we can make a little more progress. Last time she had a pretty steady upward c...

I'm home for a brief break to get something for our dinner and to get a change of clothes to take back with me to the hospital since I get to sleep on the folding out bed tonight. We were hoping that S-Boogie could come home before tomorrow, but she's not quite back up to where she should be. When she falls asleep, her oxygen levels go back down and the little alarm goes off, so we know things aren't totally better. She had an OK day today: her reaction to this hospital stay has been to withdraw into her little shell. It's been weird to see her so quiet, and her poor little thumb is getting a nasty red spot from being sucked on so much. I think it's been more traumatic for her this time around and she's having a harder time dealing with it. But, she had a few good moments today. Skye stopped by with some fun balloons, L and L came by to say hello, a special "helper dog" visited and got S-Boogie to talk a little bit and pet him, she got to take a bath, ...

S-Boogie is in the hospital. Again. I hate being home alone, but supposedly I'm going to class tomorrow and stuff, so I came home to sleep. I don't think I will sleep any better here than on the recliner chair there, but it's worth a try and someone needed to come home to get the toothbrushes. I also feel bad because she was kind of wheezy all day and we didn't feel like taking her in to see the doctor since she was perky and talking. At least the nurse at the doctor's office was kind of reluctant to admit her also and they tested her oxygen several times before decided that it would be better to keep her overnight for observation. I hope that she will be better in the morning and that they'll just send her home. She has a much lower tolerance for tubes poking in her nose now, but is unable to be reasoned with either. I should probably go attempt to sleep so I can get back to see my baby as soon as possible.

Why can't I keep from giggling every time we talk about clitics? I just can't help myself, it sounds naughty. I have a hard time with "deictic" too. Who ever thought that linguistics could be so fun?

I haven't posted for a while because I was hoping that something funny would happen to me, since I feel like this blog has been kind of a downer for the last few posts. But then I realized that it's that unfortunate time of the month when absolutely nothing is funny and nothing will ever be funny again, so just get me some chocolate ice cream and leave me alone.

Once again I have survived the first Sunday in July and now do not have to deal with another patriotic onslaught for an entire year. I really have been thinking about why I start to cringe when the Fourth of July rolls around and why I just can't bring myself to jump on the bandwagon and wave the flag with everybody else. I think that today I managed to clarify some of my thoughts and I think I am starting to understand what bothers me so deeply about the mingling of church and patriotism that we endure each year. I really don't have any problem with the proposition that God helped the American Revolution happen and wanted to set up the United States as a free nation that would allow for the creation of a new religion. I know enough about history to realize that in 1820 there weren't very many spots on Earth that would have provided such fertile ground. But, I really hate it when people still get up and talk about how blessed they are to live in such a free nation out of al...