Big Fish

You know, in all of my bitching about Sam’s general reticence, I really neglected to mention that she’s awesome at the gym now. So awesome that she starts screaming and squealing with excitement the second we pull up, and my God, she lets them DO STUFF to her now. Today, my girl did a flip on a high (HAHAHA “high”) bar, twice. This is a long-ass way from the first day, when the kid wouldn’t leave my side and wailed through the stupid puppet show and thought the bye-bye hands were some kind of satanic instrument designed to put the bye-bye into her SOUL.

One of the best parts about living back in Boston is that we have so many friends here already. It’s been so cool to run into people I know again, and to reconnect with everyone and their kids (their kids! they didn’t have kids before!) and … oh! I still have so many people left to meet up with again, and really, it’s just so great. Most of our friends, however, work at least half-time on a regular basis (as opposed to my wackadoo freelance schedule), so the people we see the most are Megan and Lila, as Megan has the same sort of wackadoo schedule I do with her photography business.

And dude. DUDE. I never thought seeing my kid have a friend would be so adorable. She recognizes the other kids, sure, but not like she recognizes Lila. Her WHOLE BODY starts wiggling if she sees her, and sometimes, there is yelling. They go toddling over to each other, start touching one another’s faces in weird places (“BE GENTLE!” is a common refrain on my end) and oh, the smiling! The smiling and the squealing and … oh man. MAN. Lila usually says something totally incoherent to Sam, who pretends to understand and occasionally nods and gestures in response and ACK, the little drunk people, they’ve totally run away with my heart.

(Also, since I know many of you “know” Megan, let me also say that she is fantastic, hanging out with her is refreshing and great, and I’d make her hang out with me even if our kids didn’t like each other, and thank God she’s here.)

To totally switch gears, I’ve been trying to give up soda, because I am COMPLETELY out of control when it comes to it, and literally cannot stop myself from downing it in large quantity if it is anywhere nearby. Though I try to keep my food douchery in check, I can’t deny that no matter which way I cut it, soda is awful for me. If you drink regular, you’re basically setting up an IV of HFCS. Drink diet? ACK THE CHEMICALS. Fine! This is fine. I can totally give it up, as I drink a lot of coffee (FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS), and seltzer is quite delicious and conveniently packaged and fine! Yes, fine.

However, my God, what the EFF is it with seltzer that it EXPLODES everywhere like it’s been Mento’d in one of those godawful YouTube bits? If I had a DOLLAR for every time I wore lime Polar seltzer, my GEEZUZ PLEASE, I would have at least a hundred dollars and WHAT? WHAT AM I DOING WRONG? WHAT? No matter what I do, I end up WEARING SELTZER. This is not okay, and totally not conducive to my new, chemical-free habits. It’s as though the people at Polar don’t WANT the extra business! Or — OR! — they want PROOF that seltzer is good for removing stains, to the point that they are just going to spontaneously shoot it all over you and OH LOOK! That olive oil stain you didn’t even know was there is now GONE! WE ARE MAGICAL.

Bee Tee Dub, swim lessons are Friday and today I bought a swimsuit with horizontal stripes and ACK ACK ACK! What’s worse? IT WAS THE BEST I COULD DO. I almost bought a Miracle Suit, but firstly, $150, no thank you. Second? Look, Miracle Suit people, I may be a little on the less-than-superskinny (or ANY TYPE OF SKINNY) side and yes, I may desire a swimsuit that nips and tucks my butt, boobs and belly into nice, friendly little shapes, but I am OVERWEIGHT. I am not EIGHTY. Why? Why must these suits be in petite little polka dots with ruffles — or worse! — crazy animal prints! No, no, I’m sorry, I’m not going to attend my kid’s swim lessons in a leopard-print suit with a plunging neckline, no matter how great it sucks in my ass or lifts my boobs.

This is how I ended up with crazy horizontal stripes that, oddly, are somewhat slimming, likely because you’re staring at the bizarro stripes wondering why in the Sam Hill I would choose such a suit, rather than gazing at my midsection.

Hey, happy Wednesday!

*Jesca Hoop

28 comments June 29th, 2010

This time it’s pee. Oh, and free diapers.

It’s Huggies Time Again, but this time, there’s a win/win. Or a win. One win, to be specific, really. For suffering through my drivel, you can enter a contest to win diapers below. Assuming, that is, you have a person in your house who needs to be diapered. If you don’t, you can still win the diapers, just, ah, don’t tell us what you’re doing with them. We probably don’t want to know.

I’ll have you know that since we talked last, I’ve learned exactly nothing. I fish approximately eleven million diapers out of my dog’s mouth on a daily basis, I still have no idea what size diaper my kid wears, and I … well, I don’t think I’ve told you this before, but you know what I do ALL THE TIME? I forget to put a diaper on my kid post-bath. I know, I know I KNOW. It’s SO HARD, because she loves, and I mean LOVES, diaper-free time. It’s like a GIFT, that diaper-free time, where her little special girly area gets fresh air, and suddenly everything is more interesting, including running at top speed around the living room.

Have I ever told you that we have ceramic floors in our house? Well. We do. Everywhere except the bedrooms. And while this is awesome, in terms of clean up (SWIFFER WET JET YOU ARE MY LOVAH), it’s a little harrowing when it comes to a drunken toddler waddling around the house. This is especially true when I give my kid a little diaper-free time and she, uhh, pees on the floor and then, oh then? SLIPS IN HER OWN PEE and winds up screaming in a puddle on the floor. This is awesome. I feel like a total WINNAH when this happens. I let my kid slip and fall in a puddle of her own urine! Give me a medal!

You can see I take this parenting thing very seriously. I let my dog eat diapers, and my kid falls in her own pee. These are the things I honestly didn’t see coming.

Anyway! Enough. I’m giving away five (5!) packs of Huggies Little Movers diapers, and if you’d like to be entered, just leave a comment below and I’ll choose one at random. If you want to leave a comment, but do NOT want to be entered to win the diapers, just write NO DIAPERS! somewhere in the comment. The contest ends at 10 a.m. EDT on Wednesday. Your diapers will be shipped directly from our friends at Huggies.

Happy day!

*Note, this is a compensated post from Huggies.

140 comments June 29th, 2010