of bowling balls and kings

We had two birthdays this week.

Oh, yes.

Because one batch of crazy wasn't enough, no sirree, we had to go and serve up two.

On Wednesday, it was official: the Sprout is no longer an infant. I can not pretend anymore that I might could maybe still swaddle him if he would just stay still for the love of GOD stop kicking your legs while mommy wraps you up.

Oh, fine.

One year ago, I was nervous and excited and nervous. Now, I'm just sleep deprived.

Today it was Peanut's turn. (Oh, and no. I won't be going back to fill in the details of the Sprout's birthday because it was made of Suck and Fail. And that is all that will be said, discussion terminated.) We went bowling! It was fun. Peanut had a couple friends over and we loaded them up in the car and took them down to a bowling alley that was, sadly, not seedy at all. I was really hoping for some conversations along the lines of "Well, honey, sometimes people just don't have much to live for and it's the simple things like bowling drunk at 10AM on a Saturday that really mean the world to you when you're lonely and smell bad. And, no, I don't think that you should try to put your nickle in the crack of the man's ass on the barstool." Instead we bowled granny-style very loudly. It was awesome.

Later, we had cake from here. You should go there. It rocks.

Later, my parents took the kids here, which is where my brother works, except he works at the one in Chico, not the one in Petaluma. Which is where the kids went today. To see him. Working. It's a long story. Something about blah, blah, training newbies to work the taco bar, blah. I don't know. All it means to me is that I get to see my brother tomorrow before he has to head back to Chico, and that means we get to try to volley Venture Brothers dialogue off each other. Mostly, I lose. But I do it on purpose. Sssh. Don't tell him.

P.S. I'd like to give a big shout-out to my homies, Mom and Dad. There was much exhibiting of vast stores of patience while watching bowling balls roll at a glacial pace down highly waxed lanes when the Bean was having his turn. I would have been running behind, blowing, but the G-ny and the G-pa were models of kindness and understanding without earthly match.

the way things go

A year ago I was pregnant and we were getting ready to have a new baby in a house where we thought there wasn't going to be another baby. I had fallen in love with the house a year before and the first thing I thought when I saw it was "Thank fucking god we're not going to have to babyproof this place! What a nightmare!" which proves two things:

1. I swear too much, even in my head; and

2. We were wrong and foolish and naive. Babyproofing this jerry-rigged ranch house is even worse than I thought it would be.

To be honest, I haven't even started yet. The thought of the task ahead is too daunting even to consider thinking about beginning. It's 10:30 am and I feel the need for a cocktail. Be right back.

Where was I. Yes. Babyproofing at this point means chasing the fastest crawler I've ever given birth to around the house or putting him in his playpen which, surprisingly, he's still ok with. If we had tried that kind of bullshit with Peanut or Bean they would have looked me in the eye, spit, and then fashioned a shiv out of a vintage Fisher-Price stacking toy to shank me with the next time they had a chance. Sprout will never know how happy I am that he came last.

We call him "Looks with Hands"

GOOD MORNING, MINION. THIS MORNING I REQUIRE SHINY EXPENSIVE TOYS. YOUR CAMERA WILL DO NICELY. HAND IT OVER. I NEED TO SMEAR SNOT ON IT. NOW. NO, DO NOT TRY TO PLACATE ME WITH YOUR BOOBS. ONLY SHINY EXPENSIVE TOYS WILL DO. NO! NOT BOOBS! NOOOOOOO!
OK, WELL. ALRIGHT. I GUESS. BUT NEXT TIME YOU WILL HAND OVER THE CAMERA WHEN I ASK FOR IT OR I WILL SEND THE HYPNOTOAD AFTER YOU, TENDER EARTHLING.

Did I ever tell you that I didn't even go to my graduation?

I started to write a post about my upcoming high school reunion, but it got bitter, and fast. Apparently I'm not ready to see the people I spent four years avoiding and 10 years not missing. Give me another 10 and maybe we can talk.

Also: I am not going to pay 60 dollars to watch people get drunk when I had plenty of opportunities to do it for free in high school.

Ooh! The bitter is back, baby.

And then someday I will grow the fuck up.

Stupid pie.

....So, that's what I did today. Can I tell you how hard it is to take a picture of a charmingly shiny apple pie that doesn't make it look like it came out of a Betty Crocker cook book from the 70's?
Surprisingly hard. I had to mess with it to make it look like anything you'd want to eat, and even now I think you might only want to eat it in your dreams. With Cool Whip and Colin Firth. Riding on a horse. On the beach. Naked.

Ok, ok, what I meant to say was...

Right, so there was some mentioning of a vacation, and it was mentioned in somewhat bitter terms if I remember correctly, which I rarely do.
Let me clarify a few things:

• Yes, vacations with the little ones suck the big one.

• But! It doesn't mean you can't have a damn nice time anyway. What with the enriching of the little souls and all.

We had a good time. Really. We had our own house with our own bedrooms and our own coffee pot where we could brew our own coffee and also there was a Whole Foods down the street and a little further down the street was the best beach I've ever been to period.

Well not the BEST beach I've ever been to, but I'll bet, hands down, that it's the best beach the kids have ever been to, and it is, without a doubt, the best beach I've ever been to with the kids. Too bad it's a 4 hour drive away. A 4 hour drive that I swore last summer I would never drive ever again with the kids ever. But! We did it and it was fine. Also, the beach was awesome.

Pappasan took the kids kayaking (!) in a big kelp bed and Peanut saw an otter and Bean saw...well, he got to help pull garbage out of the ocean, so he had a good time too. Sprout and I sat on the beach while I got a stupid-huge sunburn on my lily white back (Sprout was smart enough to stay in the shade and also stay completely covered in sun block. His mom, however, is a complete moron.) and watch two older English couples turn themselves into nicely roasted tomatoes. Sundried English Tomatoes! Merchant-Ivory (or whoever is doing period English dramas involving characters who "suffer from disillusion and tragic entanglements" (Thank you Wikipedia!) ) should totally get on that. A tale of sunburned love on a California beach complete with harbor seals and hot dog vendors. Now THERE'S something worth driving 4 hours for.

Back.

So. We left. Went on vacation.

Are back now.

Rejoice! For lo, vacations with the little ones are not vacations at all but more like cranky whining hitting pooping cattle drives. But at the end of a cattle drive you maybe are able to perhaps eat one of the cows, thereby making it worthwhile. Also, I guess you get paid for it. While after a vacation, you are so totally not allowed to eat the children you have driven hither and yon and possibly into madness, nor do you get paid for it, unless you accept payment in the form of hideous nasty gashes on your chest inflicted by the baby while riding in the peaceful Ergo carrier which mothers won't give you a hard time for wearing, unlike Baby Bjorns. Because, dude, I totally saw that episode of ER where the whiny doctor with the batshit crazy mom (Sally Fields or something) took her baby to Gymboree or something with her baby in a Bjorn and there was a mom there and she totally took her ass to task for fucking up her baby's spine and hips by placing him (I think it was a boy. I don't remember. All I remember is that she left the hospital without her uterus. Thank you ER!) in anything other than a sling. I hate slings. But I'm pretty sure the bitchy mom would have approved of my Ergo. Which is totally why I shelled out the hundred dollars for it. To please the bitchy mom on ER. Also, I'm in love with Wood over at sweet-juniper, and I'm pretty sure she has an Ergo.

In other words: I need a vacation. Baby herding is not my strong point. Ending up in pointless tirades involving ER is not where anyone wants to find themselves on a beautiful summer day.

Also, there's some fucking asshat in our neighborhood who's been...breaking into people's houses or some shit. Tried to take a 3 year old out of her bed a couple weeks ago. Have I mentioned that I'm not sleeping? Maybe I can blame that ER stream of consciousness bullshit on that.

Tales from the Dark Side

--OR--
Dignity? We don't need no stinking Dignity!

I had a rant all ready to go, but the series of events that prompted the rant occurred a couple of days ago now, so the steam has evaporated and my ire forgotten. Also, it involved Toys R Us and if there's anything worse than actually going to Toys R Us, it's wasting time writing about Toys R Us.

Instead! We had a 4th of July! Freedom reigned! No one I know or love lives in Guantanamo! We haven't been killed by The Terrorists (tm)! We have nothing to fear but fear itself!
Well, that and adult games played by drunk adults at a family 4th of July BBQ.

Oh my holy hell. I haven't checked YouTube today, so who knows? I could totally be a celebrity with my mad hands-free grapefruit-in-the-neck passing skillz and not even know it! Although if there had been a person at the party yesterday with a video camera I most likely would have skinned and eaten them and their children and their grandma before I let them leave with footage of me doing things like:

• Passing a cucumber between my knees to a hot teenage boy, but not before it had been passed to me by an older man with lots of stubble. Did I mention something about grapefruits in the neck?
• Running an obstacle course with a ball clenched between my thighs. Oh, the tits were a-flyin' in my vintage sundress.
• Running full-bore into my friends ass in the hopes of popping my balloon with the force of our collision and then having the aforementioned teenager do the same thing to me.

Oh, yeah. Fun times. I wish I had been waaaaaaay more drunk so that I might be spared the memories.

Also: poor teenage boy. The team next to us was full of hotties his own age and he had to get stuck with the lady with questionable scratch marks on her boobs (the Sprout has got to get a damned manicure!) and beer breath. I hope I didn't scar him too much.

edited to add: Ok, the hot teenager in question? Probably wasn't really a teenager at all. He was a college student and maybe even of legal drinking age. But! He was young. He had braces for chrissakes. In my memory (damn you, drinker of the beer I brought to the party that wasn't me!) he was and always will be a teenager.