Get lost.

You know, I think I would post more if I had a way to upload photos to my work computer. Of course, then I would probably get fired for misappropriating corporate assets or something, but with photos there is always something to base a post around. A piece with no pictures is, well, an article. And if I classify it as an article, well, then I start to imagine there’s a deadline, and rules about the quality of my writing, and all of a sudden I feel the pressure to be a New York Times-caliber blogger. If I could just slap up a picture of Eeyore looking cute, or of me eating my 346th bowl of ice cream of the year, or of the snow on the Rockies, the prose becomes not much more than supporting text and more accessible to my enormous readership.

You know, I think that someone outside my office is clipping her fucking fingernails right now. I hear that nasty, telltale little metallic “chht” that one should normally only hear as she clips her OWN nails in her OWN bathroom. You can add any sort of attention to one’s nails in public to the list of déclassé activities that I look upon with scorn, which such list is headed by the ever-popular CHEWING OF GUM. Chewing, popping, slurping, general making of spitty sounds – ohhhhh, God, it makes me ill just thinking about it. Yes, I have been reminded that with two kids I will be forced to grin and bear it through the consumption of veritable mountains of Hubba Bubba, but I will cross that bridge when I get to it. Plus, there’s a difference between a kid smacking his gum, as gross as it may be, and an adult who can’t be bothered to hold her slack jaw together enough to mute the wet, rubbery sounds within.

I’ll admit that I am hypersensitive to silly things like that right now. A couple of nights ago, I was in bed checking out LCD TV reviews on my computer, and R. was sitting next to me with his face next to my bent knee so he could see the screen. I could feel his breath all hot on my knee through my pajamas, in that steamy, damp way breath has when it comes through fabric, and I kept jerking away and making desiccated old schoolmarm faces. He quickly tired of my antics and left the room, but episodes like that are more and more common as I get to the irritable heffalump stage of my pregnancy.

This is where a photo of me would go if I could put one – smiling broadly so you could see both chins, wearing a short sleeved shirt as I held Eeyore so you could see the pale, flabby expanse of my upper arm flattened against my temporarily fabulous rack. I’ve actually got some pretty good arm muscles under all that flesh (flesh that reminds me an awful lot of the gelatinous interior of a fried turnip cake you’d get off the dim sum cart), but daily cookies and ice cream make it kind of a moot point.

The Big Bad Wolf.

Who is scared by this whole “economic downturn” business? Yes, me, too. I don’t have any reason to think that I am going to be laid off in the immediate future, but I still think about the possibility all the time. In fact, money, food and shelter seem to be all I think about these days, and those thoughts have become all-consuming and occasionally depressing. After spending my days working and/or rushing around after my baby trying to make sure he doesn’t lose an eye, picking up the never-ending food and other detritus he incessantly flings around, and putting him to bed with a last pass around the house to clean his dishes and Windex his smeary prints off the coffee table, then I settle into the couch for an hour of self-defeating, tense-necked ruminations about money, and fear, and fear of no money. I can’t watch TV, or get involved in a book. I might scan a vapid magazine if I can manage it. I often fall asleep early, which could have something to do with the current pace of my life, but which I suspect is more likely a way to avoid these overwhelming thoughts. I feel paralyzed; we can’t make any plans. Forget about indulging in the idea of a vacation or even of a night away in the mountains; should we even waste money on a Christmas tree? The baby doesn’t know what Christmas is, and surely we will just spend all our time prying the ornaments out of his fist.

I know I can’t be the only one who feels this way. In fact, to read about it in the papers, millions of people feel the same way. Unfortunately, this mass trepidation is compounding our economic woes. We’re scared to spend the money we do have, which sets off a chain reaction. When I decide not to buy any new clothes or books at my favorite stores, or to eat at my favorite restaurants, the combination of my reticence with that of so many other consumers translates into lost jobs at those establishments. That in turn results in less people with money to stimulate the economy. The government keeps trying to shock the system with injections of fantastical sums of Monopoly money, but so far nothing seems able to stem the tide. Consumers are going to have to be willing to risk putting some of their money out into the marketplace to keep things from grinding to a complete halt.

The most immediate economic decision my husband and I are facing right now is that we want to remodel our house, but for every argument in favor of forging ahead there is a counterargument that says we should just let it ride for awhile: our family has already outgrown our tiny house, but didn’t American families manage to cram into small houses in the fifties? Maybe we are just being greedy Americans. We might be able to do the remodel for less right now while contractors and manufacturers are hurting for work, but does that really matter when I might lose my job or R. might not be able to get more architecture projects? The increased mortgage will have to be paid somehow. But the finished product would be good marketing for his firm… we go around and around on this until I end up back on the couch, staring into space with a clenched jaw.

Just so you get an idea what we’re talking about, here is a picture of what our house looks like today (well, really a few years ago, but it hasn’t changed).















You can see, perhaps, why we might want to make some changes.

Here are snapshots of the front and back of the new house from a 3-D mock up my husband knocked up based on his detailed architectural plans.















Now, maybe modern is your thing, maybe it isn’t, but it is ours! The dark gray portion will be concrete board panels arranged in some aesthetically pleasing design. The brick will be painted not sure what color yet – somewhere from a grayish off-white to a light taupe, depending on what looks best with the other materials we use. Then there’s wood siding, which we’ll probably do instead of the Finnish wood panels we would both prefer but which are prohibitively expensive. It all looks a bit stark here, but imagine it with plantings below the windows and other signs of life. See the little window that’s like a porthole? That is a floor-level window in the playroom designed for two little boys and a couple of cats to lie down and look out. I don't want the economy to huff and to puff and blow it all down.

What's in a Name?

One of the most difficult decisions about having a baby is what to name it. Here I am, 27 weeks pregnant, and R. and I have only just decided on a name for the new kid. When we had our first child, we went around and around on what to name him, too, but as soon as one of mentioned Ian we were both sold. This time, it was even harder.

Kate: “Ian is a Scottish name. Should we choose another Scottish one? I think I might be an eighth Scottish.”

R.: “Sure. I really like Duncan.”

Kate: “Oh, uh, OK, ‘Duncan.’ Maybe we should call him that for a week and see if it starts to sound like something I would like.”

A week later:

Kate: “What about James? We could call him Jamie.”

R.: “Uh, OK. I don’t really like that, but I guess it’s OK.”

Nosy Friend: “I never knew a Jamie that didn’t get his ass kicked.”

Another week and several perusals of the baby name book later:

Kate: “I wish our cat weren’t already named Alix. I quite like Alexander.”

R.: “Who gives a crap what that cat’s name is? She’s useless.”

Kate: “You’re just mad because she won’t come near you.”

R: “She won’t come near anyone! I guess Katrina must have traumatized her, but Jesus. Just because she had to eat people until she was rescued doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be able to pet her. You’d think it would be the opposite. I should be fighting her off to keep her from clawing my eyes out in the night.”

Kate: “Would it be weird to have a cat named Alix and a son named Alex? It’s the only name that sounds right to me, and it sounds good with Ian.”

R.: “We could re-name Alix. It’s not like she answers to her name, anyway.”

Kate’s Mom: “Oh, Kate, you HAVE to rename the cat. You’ll give Alex a complex if you don’t. He needs to have his own name.”

So now we have a son named Alex and a cat named Alice. She hates us all so much these days, anyway, I wouldn’t be surprised if she just moves into the basement permanently when we bring the new baby home. It’s a shame, because she’s awfully cute.

Living the Dream.

My life seems like such a set of women’s magazine clichés these days:

“Mommy, Do you Have to Work?”
“Nanny-Cams – Invasion of Privacy?”
“Why is My One-Year Old Already Having Tantrums!?”
“Hot Wire Your Sex Life!”
“Double Coupons on Wednesdays”
“Costco or Sam’s Club?”
“No Time to Look Like a Goddamned Human Being”

It’s surreal. For so many years I skipped over those types of articles in magazines, and steered clear of impromptu meetings at my law firm on “balancing work and kids.” It wasn’t pertinent to my life at the time, but regardless - who the hell needed advice on making time for a 30-minute bath, needed suggestions on how to “set the mood for love” or had to use coupons? Not me, that was for sure. But what the fuck did I know? Nothing, that’s what. Which doesn’t make life any easier now that I find myself in the thick of it.

My mom reminds me that when I was small, life wasn’t about going to Paris, or out to the newest restaurants. She put that stuff on hold for years while instead there were beach trips and shared Stouffer’s frozen dinners and an ongoing roster of child care workers, each with her own set of quirky problems to deal with. It’s both a blessing and a curse that I had so much time as an unmarried woman with a reasonably lucrative career: now that I’m in the vortex I know what I’m missing since I had it for so long, but I also know that it will all be there when these crazy, early years of my children’s lives are over.

Because even though so much of daily existence right now is just squeaking by, frequently punctuated by fakey crying and a constant demand to be picked up by a 3-foot tall tyrant, if I choose to look at it from the other direction it can sometimes even seem idyllic. My house, which at one point not so long ago seemed so cold and empty I had to feng shui the whole place (shortly thereafter resulting, I like to believe, in a husband and a promotion at work), is now a cozy, lived-in nest that protects me and my family from the cold, cruel world. My husband, though busy doing more than his fair share to keep the whole machine running smoothly, appears to still love and want to be with me in the midst of all our chaos. And then there is our baby, who is simultaneously a pill and the smartest, most adorable little boy I have ever seen in my whole life.

Now if I only had time to even read those magazines for some pointers…

Now Here We Are.

I can still hardly believe it’s true. And sure, I know I’m pregnant and hormonal and all that, but I just can’t seem to stop tearing up every few minutes when it crosses my mind again. We have a black president! We have a president who actually thinks before he speaks, can string a compelling sentence together, doesn’t have a VP who plans to destroy the world from behind the puppet theater’s curtain, has a beautiful family that includes a strong, smart wife, who believes in working hard and pitching in and making the world a more peaceful place…. it’s just such a victory in so many ways.

Even though it’s hard to imagine this administration truly solving all the terrible things going on in the world right now, at least I know that one thing is going to stand very, very strong: civil rights. Among all the problems we have to solve, setting America back on the path to protection of our freedoms is paramount. We have a president who knows that.

Maybe one day soon this feeling of cautious optimism will feel natural again.

Happy Halloween.

I know it’s not the time for it, but this is where I would like to be today. Europe’s largest urban mall opened today in London, and all my favorites and more are located together under one roof. I can’t imagine it will ever replace the pleasure of popping into the shops along the various high streets, but it looks pretty fabulous all the same. I fully plan to devote an afternoon to its exploration on my next visit in 2030 or whenever I next swing it.

I know I haven’t posted here for a few weeks, but hopefully you’ve been reading Rocky Mountain Liberal, my other blog. I’ve managed to be pretty prolific over there; what on earth will I do when the election is over? Hopefully I won’t be crying into my cups over being forced to live through another Republican administration, in which case I will still have plenty to write about but it will probably just sound whiny and defeated.

So it’s Halloween, in case you haven’t noticed. Eeyore is still small enough that we won’t be taking him trick or treating this year, but we will probably at least dress him up for answering the door for others. His “costume” isn’t much – my stepmother bought him some little mini-scrubs at the hospital where my dad had his recent heart surgery (he’s doing great) that say “Doctor in Training” on the back. He happens to own some of those revolting Crocs, which I did not buy him, and since hospital workers often wear them so they can just hose off the blood and guts, so shall he.

I’ll be sure to post a picture of him, as well as of the “Eternal Forest Tree Bark” I made for a Halloween party at work today. The recipe for this ghoulish delight came to me in a dream, but I can’t say the taste lives up to what I had imagined. It’s basically peppermint bark, but I used food color to tint the white chocolate orange, then instead of candy cane shards I used toffee bits. The whole thing is a little much, really, but the point was pretty much just to have something orange, and at that I succeeded. I’m sure it will all be eaten, since anything anyone ever makes and sets out on a table at work unfailingly is gobbled down. Even weird vegan shit.

Cooking for Two.

I had read that a way to keep spice in your marriage is to do things together that are outside your regular routine. So last night, R. and I went on a date to a cooking class. As we drove over, we both sighed that we wished we were just going out to dinner and then back to watch some TV – a sign that doing something different was definitely a good idea. As we parked, we could see that the brightly lit kitchen where we were heading was full of people milling about:

Kate: “Yuck.”

R.: “Look at all those people. Do we have to talk to them?”

Kate: “No way, man, we’re on a date; let’s just talk to each other.”

R.: “Why are we doing this?”

But we walked in, got our menus and sat down, and proceeded to have a most excellent time. Not only did we learn a new cooking method, a patented process called “Glorious One-Pot Meals,” but I discovered that what I had read about romance was true. R. looked, well, hot with his messy haircut, gray long john t-shirt, jeans and an apron. I liked watching him get into preparing our dish, chopping garlic and tomatoes and brushing olive oil on baguette slices for the crostini. I especially liked seeing him relaxed and distracted from the awful economic news of the last few weeks, which has consumed our household like a flesh-eating bacteria.

As the night went on, I found myself hanging all over him like a lovestruck teenager; grabbing his elbow or sticking my face in his for a quick peck. And hey, so what if as soon as we got home he fell asleep without so much as a kiss good night for me; the benefit of doing something different was clear.

Aside from the lovey-dovey aspect of the evening, the next best thing was the class itself. First, the instructor was awfully cute and engaging as she described this method of cooking she had come up with in response to the discovery at age 29 that she had multiple sclerosis. She decided that one of the best ways to combat it was to eat as healthily as possible, but with no nutrition background she had no idea how to do that. Nor did she have any time to make extensive meals. One night she decided to just throw a bunch of ingredients into a Dutch oven, stick it in the oven at 450°, and let it cook. 45 minutes later she took it out of the oven, and saw that everything was cooked perfectly. She experimented with this way of cooking for awhile, and basically learned that this was a whole new method of cooking– so she patented it.

We made several recipes with her process, but the basic idea is that you take a protein, vegetables and a carb, and whatever herbs, spices, etc. that you want, layer them in a 2 quart, cast iron Dutch oven in their whole state (just cleaned, trimmed and scrubbed, or cut up if you want), then stick them in a fully pre-heated 450° oven. Exactly 45 minutes later, everything is cooked perfectly. Strangely, this is apparently even true if the meat or vegetables you are using are frozen.

I was definitely skeptical about the whole thing, but every single recipe we made was excellent. We made a ginger-citrus chicken dish, honey spiced pork, eggplant parmesan, a Portuguese shrimp dish with quinoa, edamame and tomatoes, a sausage and polenta dish – even a chocolate, coconut and hazelnut bread pudding. What was neat about all the dishes is that the ingredients didn’t seep into each other to make a big, messy stew, but instead stayed separate while still infusing everything with the flavors of all the ingredients. And SO easy: you just clean and assemble everything, toss it in the pot, and there you go. The only thing you really need to make sure of is that your oven is exactly 450°, which apparently is often an issue.

I immediately reserved her current cookbook from the library, and if the dishes continue to turn out well at home, then I’ll order her new cookbook when it comes out in January.

Idle Thoughts.

Most of you kids are probably too young to remember a time when Neil Diamond was played on the radio as more than an example of an oldie, but indeed there was such a time. Now, I’ve never been a particular fan of Neil Diamond, but when I was little my dad certainly was. Neil was always crooning from my father’s turntable, or from the 8-track in the car. I was reminded of Mr. Diamond today when someone sent me a note to say he is on a world tour and that surely I would be going. And… no, but it did remind me of a cheesy story. When I was 6 or 7 years old, for a talent show at school a friend and I did some sort of ridiculous tumbling routine to "Lonely Looking Sky" or whatever it’s called from Jonathan Livingston Seagull. We hadn't really planned it out that well so it was this sort of interminable few minutes of little girls doing somersaults to music on a stage in front of an awful lot of people. I cringe to think about it, but at the same time it sounds kind of sweet and innocent – more so than the idea of today’s little girls shaking their money-makers along with Miley Cyrus.

Speaking of work, as I was rather peripherally, it bugs the shit out of me when someone walks in to my office and walks over behind my desk. My office is set up so that I face the door, so it’s quite an invasion of space to join me behind my desk. There is one person at work who does it every time she comes in, and I’m getting so irritated by it I’m almost ready to say something to her. The only other person I can remember ever doing that to me was a young guy at one of my old law firms, who not only came around behind my desk, but tried to give me a shoulder rub. I told him to get his hands off me, and that was that. I wasn’t the only person he acted that way with, however, and not surprisingly he was canned. I’m not suggesting this woman needs to be canned, but she does need to stay away from my frigging desk.

Life Goes On.

A lot of small things have been going on in my small life:

1. I went to Florida for the weekend to visit my dad. He had open heart surgery about three weeks ago, and he is doing great. I don’t know what I was expecting when I walked in the door, but I was scared he wouldn’t look like himself. I was secretly expecting him to look older, thinner, frail; vulnerable. But I walked into the room, and he stood up from his chair, looking just like his same old self, and gave me a hug. Not a bear hug, mind you, as he is more than tentative about anyone getting near his scar, but enough of one that I felt overwhelming relief.

While in Florida, I was able to have lunch with our blogging friend, Broady. We had a very nice visit, and I even found time to have lunch on a balcony overlooking the water in St. Augustine. That’s the second time in 2 months we’ve been able to hang out, so not bad for living across the country from one another!

2. There have been layoffs at my job, and it has been unpleasant and upsetting. People I know pretty well were let go.

3. I got a new car. In the interest of downsizing, I traded in my 2006 Audi wagon for a 2008 Hyundai Santa Fe. I got it “used,” with a whopping 2100 miles on it. It even still smells new. Basically, the only difference between it and a new car is that someone else took the depreciation hit on it for me. I can’t believe it, but I actually like it better than my Audi, and my car payment is HALF of what it was for the Audi.
















4. I’ve been tending to this. As you can see, he is in something of a stage.

When Will I Learn?

Pregnant women are not supposed to make rash decisions, and I just did. In fact, I made the classic fat pregnant woman mistake: I just went in for a haircut at lunch, and instead of getting a nice little trim of my lovely long hair, I chopped it off. It’s a perfectly nice haircut, but all of a sudden I feel like my entire, pregnant self is exposed in a way it wasn’t with long hair. Maybe I was able to hide behind my curtain of long hair, but now everything seems on display. I HATE when I do shit like that.

Escape.

If I weren’t pregnant, I firmly believe I would be putting the full court press on my husband to pick up sticks and move elsewhere right now. For me, “elsewhere” always means London or Paris, and I think he’d be alright with that if it didn’t cost so stinking much money to live there. Of course, it costs a lot less to live there than it does to visit, and soon our currency might be worth so little that we would be doing better if we were paid in euros than we are now. But… it’s not an option.

I did suggest the other day, however, that “wouldn’t it be fun!?” if we rented a house in London for the last month of my maternity leave. It would be a nightmare getting an 18 month old and a 2-month old over there, but once we were there I think it would be great! I could serve up pre-fab dinners from Marks and Spencer every night, and push the kids all around town in their stroller as I “researched” my first novel. I have no idea what this first novel would be about, but it would be set in London and I’d need to know on what corner my protagonist’s favorite Prêt-à-Manger was located.

Of course, this fantasy overlooks some basic facts, such as:

1. It would cost $6 or $7000 to rent a decent, furnished house for a month.
2. Getting around London with a stroller would be horrible. I’d end up spending hundreds of dollars on taxis.
3. The first three months after pregnancy were a little bit of a nightmare for me. Not only did I remain a beached whale/sharpei for rather a long time, I was depressed, confused, and overall not very functional.

Add a toddler to that and I might be spending the last month of my leave in a psych ward. But it’s a wonderful fantasy, and I’ve been trotting it out in my head a lot lately; especially at this time of year where the leaves are starting to change and the evenings are crisp. I love London in the fall.

Maybe we will give it more serious consideration if McCain is elected. Then again, at that point maybe we will really need to start looking for jobs abroad. I know that’s the cry of the over-educated liberal, but fuck it. If it’s an option, why not? It’s not like I’ll be able to tolerate being around the Colorado “moral compass” for another second.

Which reminds me (and really, this is my final non-sequitur of the day): one thing that pisses me off most about the whole Republican vs. Democrat thing is the way that the Republican party paints Democrats as a seething mass of amorality, and themselves as these pillars of righteousness, guided at every turn by the strength of their “morality.” First of all, it’s absolutely absurd to argue that they are “moral” as a group and we are not. Second, just what does “morality” mean, anyway? To the Republicans, it seems to mean a rigid set of rules about what is “right” in a religious sense, and which should in all cases be imposed on everyone else. To me, it means knowing what is “right” in a more fundamental sense, and knowing that the pool of what is right is a lot more broad than what a certain church says. An example might be that the love of another person, given freely and with compassion and understanding, is “right,” regardless of the gender of the lover and the one who is loved.

Er, how did I get there? I guess that’s all I have on my mind these days.

The Days Ahead.

This morning I made the mistake at looking at pictures of myself during my last pregnancy. As I was getting ready for work, I thought that for 17 weeks pregnant I’m looking much better than I did last time. I figured I could give myself a nice boost by looking at my old pictures for confirmation, and so I did. And… it turns out that at 17 weeks I was looking reasonably intact last time, too. But by 24 weeks… not so much. Then, I looked like someone had blown up a body-shaped balloon under all of my skin, but solidly; I looked a bit whalish, if truth be told. So as I shove a chocolate-glazed doughnut into my maw, I realize what’s in store for me. Why does eating everything in sight have to be a part of my personal pregnancy process?

In other news, I bought a ticket yesterday to visit my father, who had heart surgery last week. Apparently everything went very well, and it was surprising to hear him sounding just like himself the next day. I must have caught him at the end of a cycle of painkillers, however, because each time I’ve spoken with him since he sounds rather loopy. Still, it keeps him from feeling the pain of a 67-year old sternum that’s working to knit itself back together, so there you go.

My weekend in Florida will be the first time either R. or I have had an extended period alone with the baby. I know how tired I am at the end of a weekend day chasing him around, so I feel a little guilty saddling R. with 3 nights and 2 full days of it. Still, we’ve got to do it sometime, and I need to see my dad. Too bad the circumstances aren’t better, with me heading off for a weekend in London or Paris (I can’t believe there was a time in my life when that was not uncommon for me.) But despite how bad my last flying experience was, which left me very relieved I had no trips at all in my known future, I’m trying to look at the positive: several hours ALL ALONE, just me and my books and magazines. As long as I can read the words through my tears of panic, which I’m not allowed to smooth away with blessed vodka, it could be rather nice. It’s been an awfully long time since I’ve thought a flight might be nice.

Other Things on My Mind.

I’m having a hard time lately with the whole “working” thing. My brain is everywhere else, and yet it’s needed at my desk, where it’s paid to think about stuff. And by stuff, I don’t mean:

Presidential politics;
Dreaming of winning the lottery;
How my dad’s chest is now wired together;
Why my fingers still smell like garlic from cooking dinner last night;
Why my pregnant tummy just looks like a sloppy beer belly;
How I will starve myself to a size 4 after this baby is born, and
What to name the new kid.

Not one penny of my salary is allocated toward analyzing these things, not even the clearly important issue of the garlic smell. Which, I’ll have you know, comes from a rather nice dinner I prepared last night: chicken breasts with roasted figs, gorgonzola and prosciutto, as well as a lovely, basic risotto – all drizzled with a balsamic reduction. I didn’t take a picture, which is just as well, because it was basically all just kind of reddish, but it tasted great. Who knew a balsamic reduction was so easy to make?

On another topic, let’s talk about the whole Baby Number Two thing for a moment. As you may recall, before I found out that Eeyore was a boy, I had my heart set on having a little girl. A girl was just always what I had assumed I would have, probably because I had never known anything different. I’ve always had a close relationship with my mother, and I wanted the same thing with a daughter of my own. So when it became clear we were having a boy, I cried for a little bit, and then I got over it. Once I actually met Eeyore, I couldn’t imagine him being anyone different; he’s a perfect little person.
















When I got pregnant again, I proclaimed that I would be fine with another boy; in fact, I’d probably prefer it because now I know how wonderful it is. But for some reason, since the beginning I have just felt that this one is a girl. And last week, I found out just how excited I had actually been by that prospect. Unfortunately, I found that out when my doctor told me we are having another boy. “Oh, honey,” she said, “That’s a penis.” “Oh, okay,” I said, and then I burst into tears.

And I’ve had a hard time getting my mind around it ever since. I look at my beautiful son’s open, adorable face, and know that as soon as the new baby gets here everything will fall into place, but for now I’m still mourning the loss of a relationship I’ll never have; just a little bit.

Happy Anniversary to Me.

I realized this morning that it has been three years this month since I started this blog, or at least its predecessor. In honor of that, I thought I'd post one of my favorite old posts today, which is not likely to be one of yours. It's ridiculously juvenile, but I remember laughing when I wrote it and I could use a laugh today, so here you go:

I think it’s safe to say that a good time was had by all!

Huh. “Yankee Swap.” I had never been to one before. It was a very nice party, as parties go, and it was reasonably amusing to have the fake competition over the crappiest shit you have ever seen in one room. Except that there was one woman there who was subconsciously asking me to pull her hair out by the roots and make her eat it. She kept picking this revolting, plug in leprechaun that everyone kept pretending was a “gnome,” and when people would choose it on their round and come to take it away from her, she would cling to it for too long and generally be a bad sport about handing it over. Then she would pick it again whenever she had a chance.

I happened to have chosen a high number, Number 28, and for those of you unfamiliar with the Yankee Swap, that means that my turn came late in the game such that I was permitted to choose from all gifts that had previously been opened. When Number 28 was called, I pretended to look around like I had all this wondrous bounty to choose from. Then I announced that I was going to choose my own gift under the tree, which had yet to be opened. The hostess said, “You are?” I said, “No,” and smiled at the bitch clinging to the fucking gnome; just enough so my incisors pointed out daintily over my bottom lip like the sweetest little fangs. She looked at me balefully.

“I’ll take that,” said I. She clung to it like a life raft. “Pass it over, honey,” I said. She held it tightly, perhaps thinking she looked really cute as she clung to the rotten fucking leprechaun. Everyone was watching us. I reached out and pried the hideous, plastic figure from her grasp. She still held a sweaty piece of paper in her hand. “It’s no good without the instructions,” she said. “Then give me the fucking instructions,” I replied. The party broke up soon after.

My Wheels are Grinding.

Apparently people aren’t so interested in my other blog. I have only the merest trickle of traffic there, which perhaps ought to tell me that not everyone is as up in arms over the state of the nation as I am. I think I’m so focused on politics right now because it gives me something to think and write about that is outside my everyday routine. Because let’s face it; my everyday routine is not only dull, but I’ve pretty much run it into the ground as a topic for discussion. What, am I going to tell you yet again about how I watched CNN from my couch last night? How we wanted to take Eeyore on a walk before dinner but got home too late? How R. and I have barreled into adulthood and sometimes want to cry from the perceived limitedness of it all?

Going to work and raising a child and worrying about one’s parents and finances and future are perfectly normal components of a life, but I’m having a hard time right now thinking of ways to spin them into daily reading material. I can tell you once that my child’s laugh has some strange connection straight to an actual, physical place in my heart I had no idea existed, or that after I give him his bottle before bed he likes to turn over on my chest, hug me and lie there until he falls asleep, so that I never, ever want to get up, but then I’ve told you those things and they don’t really need to be repeated.

All this is why writing about politics is working for me right now, even if it does lead to a very Washingtonian, unhealthy obsession with politics, the media, the whole kit and caboodle. I’ve needed something to write about to try to pull myself out of the torpor I’ve let myself sink into – a catalyst to feeling more involved with the rest of the world outside the protective four walls of our little family home.

A Weekend in Hell.

Have you ever had a weekend where you could have just died and that really would have been OK? This was one of those weekends. I woke up Saturday morning to find Eeyore had had an awful blowout; the kind where you pretty much have to scrub everything within the vicinity of the crib. Thankfully, he seemed none the worse for wear, but I, on the other hand, had some sort of flu. I laid in bed all day long, unable to really move, while R. took care of Eeyore. I couldn’t even watch TV, which is when you know things are really bad. Then, during the night, R. came down with whatever I had, times 2. He spent today in bed while I took care of the baby in a decidedly half-assed manner. When I had a second to think, all I could think about was how I’m behind at work and how I really need to hunker down this week and just work and not piss around thinking about politics or anything else.

But hey – on the upside, my mom is having surgery on her shoulder next week and my father is having open heart surgery – should be a banner week for all. I haven’t been focusing on my dad’s surgery the way I should; I think I am in some sort of denial. It’s a valve replacement and single bypass, which are very common and have a great recovery rate. Still, that’s all well and good when it’s somebody else’s dad. I’m in a very large vortex of Catholic guilt around both of these operations. I know I should be there for both of them, lending moral support – especially for my dad’s. And I’m not, and my guilt tells me my excuses are feeble. I don’t have any more vacation days, we are careening towards the end of our savings, how can I be both places at once so why not neither. I’m just sort of paralyzed – I don’t even check fares because I know they’re high and I think if I don’t look the whole issue will disappear.

I know; it’s screwed up. Believe me. Even if you’ve turned your back on Catholicism, there’s no turning your back on the accompanying guilt.

I feel like I am in the most bizarre state of limbo I cold ever have imagined, and it just keeps going on, and on, and on. It takes me forever to take any action, and I keep waiting for the day when I wake up and know how to behave like a functioning member of adult society again. One who writes thank you notes, returns phone calls, buys plane tickets and deals with family responsibilities outside these four walls. Instead, I have turned completely inward, unable to take care of the simplest things. How is going to get better with another tiny baby on the way?

Well, enough pissing and moaning for one evening. I did start another blog, although I haven’t added anything new to it yet – it’s in my links list.

We All Need a Break Sometimes.

I’ll just tell you: I didn’t even watch McCain speak last night. For once, R. and I were actually in the land of the living, and had people over for dinner. Plus, what did I need to watch it for? I knew how it would go. There would be some smirking, some shoulder shrugs reminiscent of George W., and then some statements about bipartisanship that would stand in glaring contrast to the slash-and-burn, liberals-are-lazy-and-hate-America tone delivered by his “pit bull in lipstick” the night before. And who cares what he has to say? That nightmare with a beehive and tacky glasses will be president within two years, and she already rendered him completely obsolete with her “New Star of the GOP” speech the night before that the pundits are slavering over, so why not just spare myself the boredom?

Not that I’m over it. Au contraire – instead, I’ve decided that I need another blog; one devoted to politics (or what politicians wear, of course). I doubt everyone who comes to this blog wants to read about my liberal-leaning musings, and I’d like a place where I can write solely about politics and another where I can keep writing about anything else I feel like. That still might include describing my desire to beat Sarah Palin around the head with her own peep-toe pump, or it might involve a pie that I bake, but I don’t want to be limited on either front.

So now I just have to find a good name for this other blog, which is never really a fun task. Maybe I’ll call it “Maureen Dowd” just to see if I can bring traffic my way.

Sarah Palin Cows the Media, but Not Me.

I don’t even know where to begin. Sarah Palin’s speech was divisive, belligerent, smug, and at the same time totally lightweight. So why is the goddamned media fawning all over it like it was the best thing since sliced bread? I can see how it was effective for all the people who are already inclined to vote Republican, but I found her completely repellent. After everything I had read about how engaging she is, how personable, how charming, I was expecting to be greeted by someone that I might have a tough time resisting on a personal level, disagreeable though I might find her views. Instead, she seemed dead set on whipping up a nasty partisan frenzy; punctuated repeatedly by her pursed schoolmarm smirk. By the end of her tirade, I loathed her and her “I represent the little people” B.S. with every last boiling blood cell in my veins.

Let’s review:

1. She came out and spent a good 10 minutes introducing her hillbilly family, as if we haven’t read enough about their sluttish and/or unethical escapades (oh, sorry, that’s the escapades of “real families, just like yours”) in the news the last few days. I thought it was particularly charming that the pregnant teenaged daughter’s boyfriend was trotted out on the stage in his Sunday best after the speech, chewing gum like the child that he is. What a nice touch to validate the pre-marital sex that she deplores in order to show what a loving mother she is.

2. Her first “political” statement was to tell America she would be there as a voice for special needs parents in government. While that is certainly a laudable sentiment, positioning it at the top of her speech seemed designed to show what an understanding, sensitive mother she is. Again – fabulous – but perhaps not the most important issue on the country’s agenda this year. And arguably not on hers, either, as the entire Republican Party seemed to take a pass at babysitting poor little Trig during her speech. He was trotted out on the stage at the end, too – couldn’t one of her precious family members have stayed in the hotel room and made sure he was safely tucked into bed, where he should have been at that hour, instead of surrounded by the bright lights and screaming crowd in the arena?

3. Finally, Sarah started the mud-slinging. She compared her own experience to Obama’s, belittling his work as a community organizer and championing her own extensive qualifications as the mayor of a small town as the sine qua non of executive experience. She followed that up with a contemptuous dose of “I don’t trust the liberal elite,” and there you have the substance of her speech.

4. Oh, wait, she did talk a lot about drilling in Alaska as her way to address our energy crisis, so that was pretty useful.

5. Oh, yeah, and then told some lies: namely, that she didn’t support taking federal money to build the “Bridge to Nowhere,” and that Barack Obama never authored a law in Congress.

Ugh, that’s enough. She was nasty, and her speech (along with everything else I’ve heard coming out of the Republican Convention) sought to perpetuate the partisan divide in this country. Contrast that with Obama’s convention speech, in which he enumerated several issues on which the parties traditionally disagree, but on which he believes we can surely find common ground. He spoke about rebuilding a nation that is sorely divided; Sarah Palin sought to drive that stake even further into the ground. The Republican Party seeks to wrap that up even tighter in a soft blanket of sexism – simultaneously sporting their buttons that say “Hottest VP from the Coolest State” while accusing the Demorcats of sexism at every turn for daring to challenge Palin’s qualifications.

And speaking once again of qualifications, if I ever thought there wasn’t a danger she would actually find herself in the highest office in the land, seeing the tiny, waxen figure of John McCain come shuffling out at the end of the speech disabused me of that notion. I think he might already be dead. So watch out, lucky world.

Fun 'n Games in Minneapolis.

For the most part I can leave the charming Sarah Palin alone for the day, since there will surely be plenty to say tomorrow after she makes what amounts to her debut to the American public tonight. It’s only a debut because even though her candidacy was announced several days ago, the McCain campaign thinks it is appropriate to keep her from having to actually sit for an interview where she would have to answer a few questions about herself. Why? Because the “hostile media” clearly has it in for her, so they will bring her out “when the time is right.” I’m sorry, WTF? John McCain thinks this woman is capable of running our country, yet she can’t handle a few pointed questions from journalists? Of all the paternalistic crap I can imagine from the Barefoot-and-Pregnant Party, this takes the cake. Not to mention, for all the disagreements I have with Sarah Palin on the issues, she strikes me as a woman who could more than handle herself in an interview. So cut the nonsense and require her to give one. Jesus.

While I’m throwing a bone to the ladies here, rather than at their heads, I’ll toss another one to Cindy McCain. I feel kind of bad for her. She is clearly a perfectly lovely woman, as long as I don’t get into any kind of political discussion with her, and she never looks like she wants to be anywhere near this mess of national politics. She hangs in the background, looking reasonably chic in her throwback sort of way, and smiles when she needs to. I don’t know if it’s shyness or sadness, though, but there is something about her that seems pretty self-protective and closed in on herself. So, I might say some not-so-nice things here that I extrapolate from her Republicanism, but the truth is I don’t have much of a bone to pick with her other than I don’t want her anywhere near the White House.

Speaking of which, guess who will never be anywhere near the White House, or even Capitol Hill ever again, unless McCain picks him for a Cabinet post? That’s right; Joe “Stick a Fork in Me” Lieberman. Wow – that man is going to be the biggest pariah in town when he gets back to D.C. I can’t believe he had the nerve to stand up there and exhort Democrats to “think” about the choice they have to make here. Sorry, buddy, some of us have already thought about this in pretty great depth, and we decided that this wasn’t much of a decision at all. We aspire for a little bit more than the world your candidate promises to leave us with. And Lieberman’s poor wife, Hadassah, sitting out there in the audience next to Cindy McCain: you can’t tell me she wasn’t sitting there wondering what planet she was on. Did she really sign up for this, too? Maybe she could have taken a page from the Todd Palin book of political spouse behavior and kept her membership in her previous party. Of course, in his case that would be the Alaskan Independence Party, of which he was apparently a member until 2002.

This should be quite an administration.

Sarah Palin: Not the Pick of a Maverick.

I read over and over that John McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate highlights once again his “maverick” status, but I can’t see how that is so. How is it “maverick” to choose a running mate straight out of the conservative base of his party? How is it “maverick” to choose a woman as your running mate then sit back and watch as the world is distracted by the soap-opera of her family drama and the continuously evolving list of her potential drawbacks?

Maybe it’s maverick to choose someone who would be singularly unprepared to take the reins when you die in office, but other than that this is all just classic, old-school Republican tactics to me. John McCain didn’t have the strength of his own convictions to pick one of the two pro-choice people he supposedly wanted most as his running mate until it became glaringly clear that the fire-and-brimstone crowd would hang him out to dry if he did so. Instead, without properly vetting his last-minute decision, he offered the iron-fisted evangelicals Sarah Palin on a silver platter, hoping he’d be killing two birds with one stone by choosing a woman for whom lots of independent-minded women surely would leap on board the Straight to Oblivion Express.

Nothing about all this is maverick other than to show just how badly a hastily made decision, one that shows a distinct lack of good judgment, can turn out. Shouldn’t we already know that from 8 years of watching George Bush shoot from the hip, using his own “maverick” style to take us into a needless conflict in Iraq? Don’t we need someone to make decisions for our country that result from genuine, thoughtful reflection, maybe a little consultation with someone other than the Dark Lord of Observatory Circle, rather than someone who keeps us on our inexorable march down this dangerous path?