Archive for the ‘The Nonsense’ Category

Today was not my finest day.

This morning, I got ready and stumbled downstairs at 6:45 to heat up 2 small cinnamon rolls as I have done every morning for the past several weeks. Don’t judge me. Cinnamon rolls are as close to a craving as I’ve ever had and I cannot get enough of them. I’m sure the results of Tuesday’s glucose test will make that come to a screeching halt soon enough.

Anyways, I realized as I was descending the stairs that I had never covered the cinnamon rolls I baked last night. Under normal circumstances I would not be all that worried. Maybe they’d be a little stale. But no, I live with the cat who has no self control. So all the tops of the cinnamon rolls were gone. He ate THE BEST PART OF ALL MY CINNAMON ROLLS. I may have come close to shedding a tear over this.

My favorite part of this story was that my husband didn’t even notice and ate two of them for breakfast. His only comment when I pointed out what happened was that he wondered why I had only put frosting on the sides of the rolls.

From there, I got in the car and found way more traffic than I expected and as the traffic came to a sudden stop, I watched in abject terror as the car behind me continued to speed along, unaware that I was not moving. Finally he saw and slammed on his breaks. There was NO chance he would stop in time and my only saving grace was that the car in front of me moved like 10 feet, so instead of a big accident, I moved forward as much as I could and got a friendly little love tap from the guy behind me. There are 2 very tiny circular scratches on my bumper from his license plate and I’m not pursuing it. I’m going to put way bigger scratches in my car than that, and I do not want the hassle.

Then I finally got to work, where I opened my locker door and then bent over to grab the water bottle I set on the ground. And then I stood up right into the locker door. There are almost no words to describe how surprising and painful that was.

And just when I thought the ugly part of the day was complete, I ruined my Easy Mac at lunch. Well, the water machine did it. It didn’t stop dispensing water when it was supposed to and so for lunch I had macaroni and cheese soup. It was really kind of awful.

And the worst part of the day was that though I saw my life flash before my eyes (what, I’m not dramatic at all) in my car and have a huge bruised egg sized knot on my head, I realized that I was far more upset about my cinnamon rolls and Easy Mac. The universe and my cat should both know better than to mess with a pregnant woman’s food.

So, I have gone back and forth about writing a year end post and had mostly decided not to because I just didn’t have it in me to delve through the year and find links and blah blah blah. And then I stumbled across Sundry’s yearly recap and decided that I could totally answer 27 questions about 2011. And that will be a good way to finish out 2011. And it allows me to stay lazy, which is obviously key.

1. What did you do in 2011 that you’d never done before?
Got knocked up. I promise that won’t be the answer to everything. I also bought my first new car all by myself. Okay, so my husband was there, but it was my hard-assery that got us the price we wanted. And I only had to call my dad 800 times for support. Whatever.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

Nope and yes. My resolutions last year were to be healthier, which hilariously included more fruits and vegetables and fewer carbohydrates. I would argue that I have actually made some pretty decent headway on my fruit/veggie consumption. I think the fact that I’m not discussing the carbohydrates while I sit next to a virtually empty box of See’s Candy can fill in the rest of that for you.

For 2012 my resolution is to try to worry less. Because I can see how being a mother is going to make me a basket case and I’m trying to slow the crazy train down before it reaches the station, so to speak.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

I had a few friends in real life and on the internet, but no family or close friends. 2012 is going to be the year of the babies, I’m pretty sure.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
Thankfully no. A great-aunt on my dad’s side, who I was fortunate enough to see (for the first time in YEARS) just a few months before she passed away.

5. What countries did you visit?
None. We went to New York twice, New Orleans and I got a trip to San Diego, but no passports were required in 2011. Nor for the next 20 years.

6. What would you like to have in 2012 that you lacked in 2011?
Financial security. ahahahahahahahaha. Because obviously graduating from graduate school and having a baby in one month is likely to bring about exactly that. Check back with me in 20 years when our loan forgiveness has finally come through.

7. What dates from 2011 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
August 29th, 2011. The day I woke up and decided to pee on a stick, not because I thought I was pregnant by any means, but because I just wanted to double check. And I was. And I woke my husband up 5 minutes before his alarm to tell him and spent the entire rest of that day floating outside myself, because holy shit, a baby.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Finishing my last semester of classroom learning (EVER) and getting straight As in my last 2 semesters of graduate school.

9. What was your biggest failure?
Not being able to spend as much time as I would like with my family.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Ahahahahaha. The headaches persist, I fractured a bone in my hand (which healed beautifully), though I have to say that 2011 required many fewer medical tests and bills than the years preceding it. Even with ultrasounds and OB visits.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
My car, my phone (on a cellular network that actually gets service).

12. Where did most of your money go?
Rent, to pay for my air conditioning habits, new car, MRIs.

13. What did you get really excited about?
Feeling my baby kick for the first time. Finding out we’re having a son. Tamales.

14. What song will always remind you of 2011?
Fix You by Coldplay or by Mr. Shuster.

15. Compared to this time last year, are you:

– happier or sadder? Unquestionably happier. Absurdly happy.
– thinner or fatter? Waaaaaay fatter. I can only blame the baby for some of it.
– richer or poorer? About the same, though I would argue we’re doing better at managing our finances.

16. What do you wish you’d done more of?

Cooking at home, spending time with my husband and family.

17. What do you wish you’d done less of?

Worrying. Dry heaving.

18. How did you spend Christmas?
With my family, freaking out because they baby decided to sit completely still for 24 hours.

19. What was your favorite TV program?
Everything on the Food Network, Modern Family, Up All Night, Glee

20. What were your favorite books of the year?
I read very little in 2011, but I think I got through and enjoyed all of James Patterson’s new books.

21. What was your favorite music from this year?

Don’t judge me, but I never listen to new stuff, I always listen to music on my iPhone. So pretty much the Glee soundtrack, the Spider-Man Broadway soundtrack and a few others here and there.

22. What were your favorite films of the year?
The final Harry Potter, Rise of the Planet of the Apes and I literally cannot remember seeing any other movies. That’s so sad.

23. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
28 (though about 80% of the time, I’m still sure I’m 27) and I played in a softball game (I got an out for the other team and two for mine…) and went out to dinner with my husband and several of the other softball players.

24. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Booze. No, I’m kidding. Aside from better management of the anxiety in my brain, I cannot think of anything that would’ve made this year more satisfying.

25. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2011?
Couch comfortable. I know what I like, it can usually be found at Gap or Ann Taylor, and leggings and tights are not pants unless your shirt can be confused for a dress. Just saying.

26. What kept you sane?
Zofran, my sister, sleep, good friends.

27. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2011.

I think I finally began to see how invaluable worrying is. I haven’t managed to eradicate it from my life by any means, but I’ve really realized that it gets me no where and that staying calm makes almost everything more manageable. I think I realized that I’m a lot stronger than I’ve given myself credit for. And that my marriage, my family is immeasurably important to me.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Tonight we did something I don’t think we’ve done since we lived in New Orleans- we had friends over for dinner. I know that sounds so sad and anti-social, but well, we’re sad and anti-social. The only people who have been in our current apartment (that we moved into in late June) are my parents and my husband’s parents and us. Seriously, that’s it. Okay fine, the lady that fed our cats and one of my husband’s friends once for an hour, but that’s really it.

So tonight we changed that.

One of my husband’s coworkers and her husband and their 10 month old daughter came over for dinner. They live pretty close and are super fun people, so we were happy to have them. I cooked a big dinner (chicken, macaroni and cheese, salad and apple/cranberry cobbler) and we sat around our table and had a great time. The baby had an especially fun time pulling all the bottles of wine out of our wine rack and ruining my husband’s pattern, it was awesome. It turns out our house is just not really baby friendly, but she didn’t get hurt, nor did she get to drink any wine, so we’ll call it a win.

Our anti-social behavior has had one major side effect though. My cat. He doesn’t like other people. He is absolutely as sugar sweet as he could be when it’s just us. He snuggles, he purrs, he is just the best cat. But when people come over, he loses himself. He hisses and spits, he usually stays on the landing of the stairs and watches, coming down periodically to hiss and remind us that he is unhappy.

He doesn’t seem to be protecting us (or if he is, he’s terrible at it), and sometimes he’ll rub against a person’s leg, while hissing. I think he doesn’t even know how he really feels but he knows he is uncomfortable. He let the baby pet his head once before hissing and running away, so maybe that’s a good sign. He better get used to that stuff real quick.

Most of all it was just nice to have adult conversations with people who are in the same stage of their life as we are. I get to talk on the internet to people all day, but the act of conversing in person is irreplaceable. This couple knows what we’re going through with residency and pregnancy and they have a great sense of humor. They gave us good advice about the first year of having a baby and even helped my husband move a table in anticipation of the upcoming office/nursery furniture moving festival. It was really great.

And they even got us to clean our apartment, which, let’s face it, does not happen often. In fact, I’m seriously thinking that we may need to have friends over more, just so that our apartment stays at least something close to its current state of cleanliness. That’s the adult thing to do, I’m pretty sure.

So we’re home after a weekend of celebrating winter holidays. It was a really nice weekend, but I’m not going to lie, it is also really nice to be home.

On Friday we went to my in-laws and had a lovely Chanukah dinner. It was really good food (latkes!), overall nice conversation and it was great fun to watch our nieces open their presents. Granted, it made us feel like absolute crap that my SIL’s best friend came and brought each niece at least 10 presents while we only bought them 1 a piece. At least the girls were happy. We were extremely fortunate that in addition to wonderful gifts, we received a huge Rubbermaid container of toys and books my SIL is handing down to us.

Saturday we drove to my hometown where we had Christmas Eve dinner with my dad’s side of the family. We did something a little different this year and it mimics what we do at my mom’s family. Instead of buying everyone a present, which is difficult when you don’t see these family members more than 2 or 3 times a year, we did a name draw, so you only buy one present (and then we all bought one for my grandma) for your assigned person.

The fine print of the name draw is that the presents have a 50 dollar limit so that everyone gets relatively equal presents, though occasionally people spend a little more when it’s something special. It was largely successful save for the part where everyone got 50 dollar presents except my sister’s husband who received a 25 dollar gift card. He’s a good sport and is grateful for the gift, but apparently we need to be clearer with our instructions next year.

Christmas day was back and forth between sides of families, culminating in a very calm drama-free dinner with my mom’s family. It can’t tell you the last time we had a purely drama free Christmas, and it was just SO nice.

The only not so nice part of the weekend was when the baby decided to not move at all. He has been really consistent the past week+ with when he’s active and what gets him moving. So it was REALLY stressful when he went a full 24 hours without making his presence known. Not a single kick or noticeable movement. I tried orange juice, Lemonheads, I laid down, I stood up, I sat, I relaxed, I poked him. You name it, I did it. And he did. not. move.

On a scale from 0 to 10, this ranked about a 40 on the terrifying scale. Thankfully at around 5 on Christmas evening he started kicking again and as I type he’s thumping away at my insides. He’s totally already messing with me. Clearly he’s related to his father. There are just no words to describe the relief we’re feeling today.

Today we went and looked at strollers and carriers and sheets and all thing baby at a Babies R Us before heading out of town. We are starting to narrow some things down and nearing the point where we can actually register, but strollers remain a challenge. I drove one around today that handled really well, was totally reasonably priced, has great reviews, and has the absolute worst basket. You can’t get into it, it’s small and shallow. It’s very possibly a deal breaker. The other strollers I’m interested in are not available at BRU, so I’m going to go look at another local store later this week.

There are just too many different strollers to choose from.

And now we’re just unpacking and doing some tidying. Tomorrow will be a big clean up day because we’re having friends over for dinner on Wednesday and our apartment could not possibly be more of a mess if it had to be. I’m sure it’ll be worth it for fun company, but ugh. And then it’s gift card shopping time. Because I think I have approximately 6 shirts that cover all my girth. Pregnancy and a long torso are not the easiest combination to dress, just FYI.

In all, we had a lovely weekend. We are so very blessed with wonderful families and friends and we are grateful for the time we got to spend with them this weekend. I hope you all had nice holidays and are relaxing and gradually coming out of your food and present comas.

Happy holidays again, friends.

As I sit here still digesting last night’s epic Chanukah feast and preparing to drive to my parent’s house for Christmas, I just wanted to take a minute to stop and wish you all a Happy Holidays. I hope that whatever you’re celebrating, even you’re not celebrating anything at all, that you are happy, healthy and with the people you love.

Merry Everything.

xo

4 years ago Meghan began a tradition of sharing holiday cards across the internet. Frankly I love the idea because it lets me see everyone’s super creative cards and steal ideas for next year. And even though ours is not nearly as creative as it was last year, I’m still excited to get them sent out to our family and friends and to share it with you all today.

Aside from my husband’s name and the addition of the s to happy holidays, this is the same card our friends and family will be receiving if they ever actually finish being produced and arrive. And we are happy to share it with you. The text is a little tough to read at certain sizes, so you can always click on it to zoom in.

And of course, happy holidays to you and yours.

(Sidenote: if you’re looking for a way to give back this holiday season, I have put together a list of ways to help families out, I’m always open to more ideas!)

Today has just not been my day.

Southern California is experiencing a bit of a wind problem. And by wind problem, I mean that last night they recorded a 97mph wind gust in a city across town. This is some real wind here, not like how pretend to have a major storm when 3 drops of rain fall from the sky and life comes to a screeching halt. Trees have fallen over all over town, power is out everywhere, it’s a serious situation.

We are extremely fortunate in that we have had power and no damage has been done to our place or anyone we know so far. We’re still under a high wind warning until 2pm tomorrow, but so far we’re okay. The only real problem is that the wind is very loud. It is so loud that I have been awake since 3 this morning when the wind woke me up. And when it continued to be loud and scary, it was pretty clear that returning to sleep was not even an option.

So, with minimal sleep, I made it through my very last full day of classes, and was so excited that we got out 30 minutes early. It meant I might miss some traffic and I might actually get to spend some time with my husband.

As soon as I got on the freeway, I saw a sign warning me about an accident and traffic jam that was about 30 miles ahead. I checked my traffic app (while I was sitting still on the freeway, not actively driving, I promise) and saw that it wasn’t just an accident, it was a huge accident with at least one fatality. It had occurred at 2:15 and it was still not cleared when I was checking at 4:30. But the app showed that the traffic slow down wasn’t terrible and that it shouldn’t add a huge amount of time to my drive. I doubled checked with google maps who said that with traffic it was only an hour and a half drive home, which is entirely reasonable, in fact, it’s kinda good.

And before I continue, let me just throw it out there that I know that the severity of this accident and the tragedy of a loss of life today is so many thousands of times worse than the frustration I experienced. Please know that I do have some sense of perspective.

So I drove on. Traffic was pretty light until about 5 miles before the accident when everything stopped. I checked my traffic app again (with my car in PARK this time) and it said that the cars at the exit I was at were going 55mph, which, pretty clearly, we were not. It also showed that the accident had been cleared. I kept thinking, okay, surely this is going to clear up. Surely I’d be going 55mph soon.

After an hour wherein I traveled literally less than a mile, I realized it wasn’t going to clear up.

20 minutes later, we moved about 20 feet and we were at the entrance to the carpool lane. The five other lanes were not moving. Not even a little bit. The carpool lane was empty for miles. Every once in a while, a car would drive down the shoulder and hop in the carpool lane and drive off into the abyss. Many of them did not have 2 or more people in the car.

I wanted to. I desperately wanted to. For 45 minutes I stared at the carpool lane, exhausted, starving and wanting to be home or even just out of my car more than anything in the whole world. I saw the sign that said that the minimum carpool fine was 321 dollars, and you know what? I decided that that was the price I was willing to pay.

I knowingly broke the law and I drove in that carpool lane.

I’m not proud of this, but I had reached a point where I needed to get off the freeway and out of my car. I was not driving safely, and there was no end in sight, literally. And if I had been pulled over, I would’ve happily paid those 321 dollars. The only thing I regret is that I didn’t get in the carpool lane 45 minutes earlier and saved myself the stress and tears.

Judge me if you must, but that is literally the first time I have ever intentionally broken a law. Of course I have sped before, but never intentionally. Today, I voluntarily broke the law. And it saved me at least another hour or two, because there were still 4 miles of standstill traffic that I bypassed.

I do not think I am above the law, I do not think I did the right thing, but internet, today I broke a law, and I do not feel even the tiniest little bit bad. Except for all the people who didn’t do the same thing.

And now, I’m going to bed. Because I’ve been awake for 17 hours and I am completely without coping skills. Hopefully I’ll be back to my law abiding ways tomorrow. And hopefully this wasn’t a gateway crime. You never know what will happen next.

One thing you should know about me: I am a procrastinator. I’ve always been one, will probably always be one. It’s just my way. So that’s why I’m not sharing this information until a week before the event instead of any time in the past month that I’ve known about it. My only excuse is procrastination. Also a small bit of denial because I’m a little nervous to be perfectly honest.

I’m going to be speaking at BlogWorld Expo in Los Angeles next week with the lovely Kerri, Jenny and (the I’m sure more rugged than lovely) Russ!

We’re extremely fortunate to be involved in the Social Health track of the conference and we’ll be speaking about what companies can do to support patients. Frankly, I’m ecstatic to be a part of a conference that gives so much time to patients and to our needs, I’ve been waiting for something like this for a long time. And this panel is something I feel pretty passionately about and something I’m really excited to have an opportunity to speak about publicly.

And by excited, I mean terrified. Okay, I also mean excited, but terrified for sure.

If you’re planning on attending BlogWorld next week, I really hope you’re stop by the panel, and if you can’t, I hope I can find you and say hi to any of you reading this. Because otherwise I’ll be standing alone a lot. I mean, also because you’re all lovely and awesome, obviously.

If you’re not coming, or heck, even if you are, I’d love to hear what YOU think companies can do to support the needs of patients. This panel isn’t about me, it’s about the community of patients, and when you get down to it, we are all patients. I’m interested to hear some perspectives on this, because it is with your help that we can hopefully help revolutionize the relationship between patients and companies.

Last night I began making the coffeecake I linked to in my last post. I got all my ingredients lined up on the counter, got my computer set up close enough so I could see if but far enough so I wouldn’t coat it in pumpkin and began baking.

It was only about two steps in, as I was scraping pumpkin out of the can that things went awry.

I have a long and tenuous history with cans and last night was no exception. I somehow dragged my fingers along the can and within an instant I knew that I had done something bad. It was one of those cuts that you don’t even really have to look at because you KNOW it is deep and gross and holy crap please don’t let it qualify for stitches. It was like a stomach churning cut, in addition to the fact that it hurt like hell.

Thankfully the husband was home and was able to assess the cut. He agreed that it was deep (seriously, seriously deep), but that because it was pretty small and missing a few other qualifiers, I didn’t need to go to the ER. I would just need to get the bleeding to stop and then not bend my finger.

The cut is *right* on my knuckle, so every time I even come close to bending my finger it splits open again. Which feels really outstanding, by the way. So I hydrogen peroxided it (because it was a can after all) and bandaged and then 2 minutes later when it bled through the bandage, rebandaged and taped my finger straight.

This would not really be blog worthy (and arguably it’s totally not but I’m fresh out of interesting tonight because of the storm of crazy I created at Babble yesterday), if it weren’t for the fact that it’s my middle finger. And it’s my middle knuckle. So I can’t bend my finger which results in me flipping everyone off all day long.

Because it couldn’t have been any other finger or any other joint. Don’t be silly. That wouldn’t be like me at all.

This past weekend was my 10 year high school reunion. I tried to go in without expectations because I knew that there were things that could go right and things that could go entirely wrong. I just went with the goal of having a good time, even if I didn’t know a soul there. Or if no one remembered me.

Thankfully, I knew several people. My graduating class had over 500 students, I would venture to guess that at graduation I knew about half of them. At the reunion, I knew maybe 1/3 of the 100 people that showed up. If that. And there were some who I recognized, but who I could never have named if my life depended upon it.

Throughout the night I caught up with friends, I told stories to my husband of friends from my childhood and teenage years. It was a lame party in general, with relatively crappy music, a completely empty dance floor and the worst lights ever, but all of that was inconsequential. It was still fun (for me at least).

Toward the end of the evening I was talking to a very old friend of mine. We met the first day of 5th grade and were instant friends for years. While we were talking another girl I was never great friends with but knew well enough came up to me to say hi. And then she said something entirely unexpected.

She told me that a classmate of ours (whose name I did not recognize AT ALL) had texted her that day to say he wouldn’t be coming to the reunion. He said that he was bummed and that he really only wanted to know what 3 people from our class were doing, and one of them was me. When I inquired, she said he had explained that it was because he just knew the 3 of us were going to do something impressive with our lives.

(Side note- I was a huge dork. I got straight As in all my honors and AP classes, I was nominated (but did not win) Most Likely To Succeed. I was a relatively big academic fish in my high school, but by no means was I the smartest.)

And I couldn’t help but laugh when she told me he wanted to know what I was doing. What am I doing? I’m still in school. I haven’t done anything with my life, let alone anything impressive. I got a teaching credential, started teaching and then quit because I hated it. I am now in school and am in no way at the top of my class. I will graduate in May, but in 10 years, my accomplishments are very few. I’ve gotten married, I’ve lived in a few cool places, I’ve racked up a metric fuckton of student loans, but I have done nothing noteworthy.

And I kind of felt…deflated.

I’m happy with my life. Unquestionably, I am. I know I’m going to love my future career, but now I feel like maybe I could’ve or should’ve done more with my life. I feel like I’ve disappointed people I didn’t even know were watching. I didn’t live up to expectations, expectations that I didn’t even know were set for me.

I’ve been reliving this conversation over and over and I just feel kind of sad. I feel like I should’ve done something bigger or better. Or like I’ve somehow wasted 10 years of my life even though until this weekend I wouldn’t have traded most of those years for the world.

And now I find myself wondering what this person thought I would become. And what they would think of me if they had actually made it to the reunion as planned.