Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Positive thoughts

Barely any time to wallow in the Christmas hangover, what with the giant travel day on Friday. I momentarily thought (wished) that I packed our passports in the bag I sent to be put on the cargo pallet, but soon found them in the giant pile of Stuff That Is Never Going To Fit In My Carry-On Bag.

Once I allowed myself to say out loud that I'm kind of scared of this trip, I felt a lot less scared. Letting stuff out of your head to dissipate into the universe usually does feel good. Plus, I asked for a sign and had a dream that was really just sort of a vision of two airplane seats, one big and one little, both glowing green. As in green light, as in "go." Now if I die in some sort of gruesome explosion and they never recover any bodies because we're all 10 miles deep at the bottom of the Pacific, you will know once and for all that all that hooey is a bunch of crap.

Friday, December 23, 2011

Spoiler Alert

My life has turned into such an episode of Lost lately, that I don't even know if I want to get on my Trans-Pacific flight in a week. Although I'm not sure if it matters seeing as I might actually be dead already. Here is the part where, if you didn't watch Lost, you think I have completely lost my mind.

But. Okay. First, we have the whole thing where my high school sweetheart came and sat down in the chair next to me the other day at the salon, out of nowhere. Well, not exactly out of nowhere, because just two weeks ago I had facebook stalked him (oh, shut up. You know you facebook stalk people from your past, too). But I had just done it for the first time and thought how nice it would be to see him and talk and then BLAM there he was, dropped in my lap. Only it wasn't nice and it sucked and I am still all worked up about it.

Exhibit B: I was signed up for a spin class that I decided to ditch, but when I went through the online system to cancel myself out of it, I was already marked absent. It was still two hours before the class was to start. Okay, well, sure, that could just be some sort of clerical error. But!

Exhibit C: A couple of months ago, I found out that my husband's first roommate when he moved to the Seattle area's mom is one of my mom's close friends from high school, and that I in fact went to their house and played with said roommate when we were kids. This probably sounds less weird before you know that our mothers grew up in a little town in the Bay Area called San Lorenzo, and moved to the Seattle area later in life. And it's not like Jeff is just some random guy Mo used to live with, they are good friends. I've known him for years and we just figured this out.

And, Exhibit D: When I recounted the above-mentioned horror story of running into my ex to my girlfriends at our Christmas lunch yesterday, and told them the name of his restaurant, my girlfriend Jamie about dropped her fork. "My dad's been bugging me to go there," she said, "because it's his best friend from high school's son's restaurant."

Say it with me now. What. The. Eff.

So, am I just crazy and making a big deal out of random coincidence? Or does it seem to anyone else like I'm about to walk into a church and find out it's my own funeral. Or whatever the hell it was that happened, that finale aired a long time ago. And kind of sucked.

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

But he wasn't in a shitty band

So, in the great baby-having poll we have three votes for a solid three year gap between siblings from people with one kid or less, and a vote for closer spacing from one person with multiple children. Interesting. I will take some time to evaluate the data before I go doing anything crazy. But I must say I am leaning toward the three year plan. Mostly because I'm selfish and hedonistic. I like the idea of having one more free summer, during which my parents will happily take Marlo for overnights and I can run around pretending I am young and carefree again. Of course that means that I will be stuck in Newborn Land two summers from now, but that is two summers from now Tori's problem. Besides, if the world ends a year from now, I'd be pretty pissed about spending the last months of my life knocked up.

I've got the TV on for background noise, and Jane Fonda just pulled some sort of flash mob on Anderson Cooper. Anderson just kind of stood there going, "wow. okay." I thought it was sort of off-putting for a moment, until I realized that is probably exactly the reaction I would have if Jane Fonda tried to impress me with a flash mob three years after flash mobs were interesting. Poor Jane Fonda and her pitiful attempt at relevance. I do hope to rock leggings and over-the-knee boots when I'm 74, however.

Speaking of awkwardness, I was getting my hair did today, when all of a sudden my high school boyfriend was sitting in the chair next to me. I have not seen him in, oh, fifteen years? It was horrible. I don't know why it had to be so bad. He was my Jordan Catalano. He even kind of had the hair.


Monday, December 19, 2011

To baby or not to baby

I went to a Christmas party last night, and made sure my champagne glass was never empty for more than a nanosecond. Which means I found myself wide awake at 5:30 in the morning, suffering heartburn and playing with the pregnancy app on my phone. It is just about to be 2012, and assuming that the Mayans were just out of room on their calendar and we are going to live to see 2013, it's time to start thinking about the dreaded Second Baby.

To say "dreaded" is to be a tad dramatic. Of course I want a new little baby every time I see one, or hear one squeak, or see my 18 month-old daughter try to get the attention of eight year old boys all night long at said Christmas party (for instance). She's growing up fast and will be screaming at me and slamming doors in my face before I know it.

I've been looking at all of my pictures of her lately and, while totally missing that tiny baby she used to be, I've also been reminded of how much my life used to SUCK when she was new. The random crying jags. The breastfeeding every three hours all through the night. The milk coming in and flowing unbidden all over the couch. Hanging out topless with super engorged breasts. Being fat and wearing maternity clothes well-post-partum and/or never getting dressed. The gigantic production of leaving the house. The lack of independent play ability. Carrying that effing car seat everywhere.

I love that kid and I have loved her every step of the way, but I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that the infant stage is not something that I enjoy. Sure, they are cute and snuggly. But they are also tiny little leeches that suck every ounce of your life force for their own benefit. I'm not real excited to go there again. But they say it's easier the second time, right? Right?

So I'm torn. I can wait to space them three years and buy myself a mostly independent, non-pregnant summer now, but be stuck with a brand new baby next summer and have six years to wait before both my kids are over three. OR I can be pregnant this summer and have them more like 30 months apart. Opinions? I'd love to hear them.

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

The no monster rears its ugly head

Well, I guess I had a good run. It took eighteen months, a week, and two days, but Marlo has figured out how to say "no." I had been holding out hope that maybe she'd be the first toddler in the history of man to skip the "no" phase, but that looks pretty foolish now.

It all started with her doing something she wasn't supposed to - like taking the chapstick out of my nightstand drawer. She would bring it to me and say "oooooooo" while shaking her head. Then she figured out how to make the "n" sound and started randomly shrieking "noooo!" about nothing in particular. Now I can barely make a move without being chastised. As I type she is wandering around the living room, shaking her head and kind of humming "nonononono" to herself. I can't wait for the first time we're out in public and she does her best ladies' self defense class impression.

In other news, I got into a giant fight with my mother yesterday. I suppose it would be passive aggressive of me to keep Marlo awake all afternoon before dropping her off to spend the night with her, huh.