Gardening today

I forgot how much I like the smell of wet dirt.

Hey, look!

I figured out how to make links! And my brain kinda hurts now. Oww. How come so many other people think this is so easy?

Now, if I can just figure out how to post pictures . . .

Alas.

morning conversation

me: "hey sam."

sam: "oh, hi, mommy. you're awake."

me: "how are you?"

sam: "I'm happy. how did you sleep, mommy?"

me: "I slept very well, thank you. how did you sleep?"

sam: [with just a hint of exasperation at having to be so patient with people obviously not as smart as him] "I closed my eyes, mommy."

stomach flu here

the kind with gut wrenching cramping, body shivering, and much, much, praying for death.

holy cow I didn't remember that pain could feel like this.

"Squg"

Word coined by Sam Spencer. It means "A sqeeze and a hug." He loves those.

Everyone's Best Friend

Sam calls everyone his best friend. There's his best friend Andy and his best friend Nate and his best friend Ivy and his best friend Zeeny and yes, even his best friend Mommy. Well, last night I had some students over and the doorbell rang. One of the other students with me said, "Oh, that's Cassie. I saw her pull up." Sam jumped up and ran to the door shouting, "My best friend Cassie?" (He'd never met her before. Ever.) Cassie, who heard what he said, asked, "Am I your best friend?" To which Sam replied, "Oh, yes!"

We're living in the dark ages here

So, it's not enough to have no cell phone. (I'm paying a friggin $80/month for an answering machine. Curses on Verizon.)

But our home phone isn't working, either. Sometimes works. Sometimes doesn't. Sometimes gives no dial tone. Sometimes turns my voice into this creepy robotic freak show that creeps people out so much that they can't understand a word I'm saying. (I'd curse Comcast for this, but I can't because that's were the husband works. I'll just have to sic him on it.)

It's like it's 1865 around here. Without the polygamy. (Except maybe for that cranky old guy across the street who's always suspiciously hanging out with like five old ladies. This did used to be Taylorsville . . . Hmm . . .)

Flushed Away

My cell phone. Down the toilet. Not once. But twice. The first time it was just completely non-functional. This time, it's not even there anymore.

Dang babies.

Sam's Drawing

Sam (three year old) spent a good ten minutes concentrating fiercely on his drawing this afternoon. When he was finished, he brought it to show me.

"Wow," I said. "What is it?"

"It's you!"

"Oh, great! What's that?" I pointed to a small black circle-scribble thing on top.

"That's your face."

"What's that?" I pointed to a yellow scrible below (and not connected to) the small black circle.

"That's your hair."

"What's that?" I pointed to a FREAKISHLY HUGE circle scribble below the yellow scribbles.

"That's your belly!"

And then he just laughed.

A nice piece of pie

Three year old came up to me today with his dad's shoe on a plate. "I made this for you, Mommy," he said. "It's a niiiiiiice piece of pie." [insert dramatic hand wave.] "Take a bite!"


Mmmm.

Going to Sam's Club ten minutes before closing

There's something so exhillarting about rushing into the store and throwing stuff into your cart as if you're on one of those "shopping spree" things where you have five minutes to grab everything you want. And then, your cart is full of $300 worth of groceries and it only took you ten minutes and you just feel like all-powerful or something. I totally reccomend it.

Two grown men at Sam's Club

were standing transfixed. One of them was a contractor--dirty and weary looking at the end of the day. Another was a Sam's Club employee--arms crossed in front of his vest. There was no one else around. No wives. No children. They didn't seem to know each other. The contractor held loosely to his shopping cart and the employee stood a few feet away. Both were utterly engrossed.

What were they staring at?

A TV. Playing the new Cinderella sequel.

That's right.

The princess Disney movie Cinderella. The sequel.

I found something about the scene both touching and amusing all at once.

Cute stuff my kid says

He says a lot of it lately.

1) "Oh, Daddy. You got a hairs cut." (Actually makes more sense than haircut, if you ask me.)
2) Upon my waking up: "Oh, Mommy. Wow. You're alive."
3) Upon my getting dressed for work: "Oh, Mommy. Nice dress up!"
4) When playing with two dolls, one "Mommy," and the other one "Me": Me (in a demure, soft tone): "Mommy?" pause "Mommy?" pause. "Mommy?" pause. "Mommy?" Upon which, the Mommy doll snaps into reality and shouts, "WHAT!!!???"
5) "Mommy, you're the best Mommy ever. AND . . ." [tone softens to indicate true deepness about to be communicated] "You are going to be a girl FOREVER." (That's my plan, kid.)

When you buy a "more accurate" scale

we all know that you're supposed to weigh LESS than you did on the other scale. Because if the scale was TRULY more accurate, it would know that you are NOT THAT FAT. Sheesh.

Back up to 194 (from 190). For goodness sakes.

What I did to get a shower

I hadn't showered in four days and was getting desperate. So this is what I did:

1) pushed Lily's crib up to the bathroom sink.
2) put BOTH kids inside said crib
3) gave them soap, washclothes, and instructions on how to work the sink.

The bathroom is a watery mess and the carpet will probably never recover and I will probably be dealing with mold/mildew/a variety of other things that are going to kill me.

But I got a shower.

I weigh less than 200 pounds!

198, baby! Woo hoo! I haven't weighed this little since . . . Oh, ack. I do NOT want to think about it. 35 more pounds till I weigh what I weighed B.L. (Before Lily.) Note to self: Never, ever, again gain 75 pounds in a single pregnancy.

Memories to treasure

Slow dancing . . . "My heart will go on," from Titantic . . . and my two year old . . . trying to feel me up.

Ah.

I am "promotable"

That's what my agent (ah, I love the sound of that . . . *my* agent) said when she saw my picture. That I was really cute and that she wanted to tell editors how promotable I am and maybe even send the picture along.

Two things:

First, maybe I should be disturbed that books are sold by beauty. But I am not. I just think it is hilarious. I can't stop laughing about it.

Second, I love, love, love, that she thinks that *I* am promotable. I've been saying it to myself all week. Every time I look in the mirror. "You're so promotable . . ." I say. I think it's maybe the nicest thing that anyone has ever said to me. I am vaguely aware that this makes me probably a shallow, vain, horrible human being. But I don't really care. I am promotable!

[insert chuckling here, due to that aforementioned sense of hilarity]

my life is a confluence of other people's disgusting body fluids

My arms are covered in rancid smelling toddler spit. My face still has remnants of all of the snot my toddler sneezed on me. On the floor by my feet was just a vomitted chunk of goey *something.* On the footstool by the computer was diarrhea. That's right. Diarrhea. We're averaging four overflowing with poop diapers a day in my house. About three outfits covered in pee per day and another three smeared with poop. My car smells like rotted baby formula. In my closest we just found a molded-into-the-carpet fruit of some kind. (I am not the one who eats fruit in the closest, by the way.) And then there's all the arm pit sweat. Mine, not theirs. Running around and cleaning up their disgustingness is a sweaty business.

They tell you that motherhood is about joy and love and blah, blah.

The truth is, it's about disgusting smelly body fluids. All day, every day until you drown in them.

Guess who got a call from New York!

I admit, I always wondered what it would be like to see that 212 area code on my caller ID.

Well, now I know that it rocks. Because on the other end of the phone you get to hear this unexpectedly nice sounding agent go on and on about how much she loved your book and how, even though you must be SO swamped with offers of representation (HA!), she really wants to convince you to let her represent the book because it's so freaking awesome. (That was a bit of a paraphrase, obviously :-)

I only sent her the book on WEDNESDAY, by the way. She emailed me the very next day to say that she was loving it and would finish it by the end of the weekend and call me right away, which she did. I confess, when I saw that email I was CONVINCED she must be a scam artist, so I spent a few hours online checking her out. Turns out not only is she legit, but just about everyone out there *loves* her. I was totally shocked. (About the getting contacted by a non-scam artist thing, not that everyone out there would love someone!)

Good times, ya'll!

The best day ever!

Today:

1) I awoke at 7 AM to discover that my baby had FINALLY slept through the night
2) my pants were WAY too big. Embarassingly too big. I'm never going to be able to wear them again they're so big.
3) I got an email from an actually respectable agent about how much she loved my book.
4) I got an email from a professor at the University of Wales going on about how my writing was so "original" and "fluid" and "enjoyable" and how he really wanted me to apply to their PhD program.
5) My colleauge pulled me aside in the hallway to tell me that TONS of my students had won awards in the annual Hon 150 contest.
6) AND BOTH of my kids are napping right now! At the same time! That NEVER happens!

Can this day get any better?

guess who's walking

It's Yi-yi (her nickname) the eight-month-old wonder. She took four steps yesterday. And she's not humble about it, either. Every time she takes a step, she throws her arms in the air and gives this psycho Karate scream.