Four Years

It's funny, as he gets older, my determination to stay away from mushy, embarrassing sentiment wavers more and more. He's no longer a baby or a toddler but a KID, and yet when composing this entry in my head, my first impulse is to fill is chock full of pet names and flowery goopy declarations of love and pride. "Mo-oo-oom," I can already hear him saying...but when? Two more years? Longer than that? Less?

We spent so much time this year focused on the future. Worrying about it, planning for it. Determined to prepare him for the next step, the next year, the next experience. We became Mama and Papa Bear, growling at anyone who dared question the potential of our cub, demanding that the forest clear a safer path for him...while also tearing our fur out because holy crap, this is hard.

And yet, oh, this boy. He is still my heart. He is still so smart and adorable and funny. He is such a kind, loving big brother and a kind, loving person. He surprises me every day, every hour, sometimes, with the things he says and thinks and can suddenly DO, just like that, and I am awed to be tasked with a child with this much potential.

"Are you happy?" he asks, whenever I look upset or worried. "Are you happy, Mommy?"

Yes, Noah, my love. Yes, I am. I am so happy.

Noah's Fourth Birthday from amalah on Vimeo, music: M79 by Vampire Weekend

Happy birthday, baby.

Scootastrophe!

So Noah fell off his scooter yesterday. Skinned both of his knees up.

And you know, THE END.

Unless you are his father. Remember the fruit sticker? This was way worse than the fruit sticker. Because not only was a fall off a scooter -- a three-inches-off-the-ground scooter -- the worst thing that could ever befall one's precious snowflake offspring, it was totally MY FAULT, YOU NEGLIGENT MONSTER.

My fault, his version = holding precious snowflake #2 at top of a deceptively slopey hill, allowing precious snowflake #1 to fly past me on scooter, shouting at him to "turn into the grass" when he picked up a little too much speed instead of...I DON'T KNOW. Dropping the baby on the curb to run after Noah, perhaps hurling my body onto the pavement underneath him at the exact second of impact. Stopping the scooter with my mind powers, thus revealing ourselves to be a family of telekinetic mutants to the entire neighborhood. Writing letters to the county four years ago to have the sidewalks replaced with packing peanuts. Because I really should have seen this coming.

My fault, my version = I think he was mostly mad because I was entirely too calm about it. I made him look totes uncool, you guys. There was blood and and I was all, yep, whatever, that's why we wear helmets, dude, and Jason was all, OMFG SMELLING SALTS.

We brought Noah inside and offered various bribes in exchange for calming down -- ice cream sandwich? candy? chocolate milk? -- and after awhile he mournfully accepted some chocolate-covered raisins. Jason poured himself a scotch while I hissed at him that oh, you know, IN THE FUTURE, I would prefer if he NOT shout "What the fuck were you thinking?" at top volume in front of the CHILDREN, in front of the NEIGHBORS, and on second thought, could he just go ahead and not spazz out over skinned knees, like we have BOYS, TWO OF THEM, which equals about 4,500,075 skinned knees, lifetime. Also: YOU PANSY.

(Also. ALSO! Who is the parent who vetoed the elbow and knee pad set as being "dorky"? And was upset that the bike store didn't have the skater helmet in Noah's size because it was more "badass" than the bike helmet?)

(Hint: The same parent who was now sobbing helplessly into a sofa cushion because BLOOD! BLOOD! HE COULD HAVE BEEN KILLED!)

Noah finished his candy and turned his tear-stained face towards me. I launched into a cheerful pep talk about falling down and getting hurt and the importance of Getting Back On and Trying Again. He nodded solemnly and announced that he also needed that ice cream sandwich, after all.

Later, Jason asked if I planned to "write about this" and I asked if he meant "this" as in, the time Noah fell off his scooter or the time you revealed himself to be a total wuss, worthy of much Internet scorn and derision because HAAAAAAAAAA YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN YOUR FACE?

The second one, he said. I kind of deserve it.

DONE, I said. Also, you're adorable and I love you.

***

I should probably mention that prior to the Great Scooter Crash of Aught-Nine, we took Noah shopping for his very own big boy birthday bike. (SPOILER: Noah is getting a bike for his birthday. Nobody say anything to him. At least not in the...say, two hours right before we give it to him.) His favorite one was pink and had butterflies on the seat. I hope he won't be too disappointed when he gets the blue version, as I enjoy crushing whimsical individuality in favor of gender stereotyping. I can't raise a boy who screams like a girl at the sight of a bloody knee, you know?

BOY MUST BE WARRIOR. GO OUT AND SHOW THAT SIDEWALK WHO IS BOSS. THEN WE SHALL CUDDLE AND I WILL PINCH YOUR BUTT AND FEED YOU MORE CANDY BECAUSE AWWW, LOOK AT THOSE POOR LITTLE BOO-BOOS.

My Infestation, Let Me Show You It

A couple years ago, shortly before we moved from DC to the Stupid Suburbs, my recently-transplanted-from-California friend sent me a camera phone photo and a hysterical text message.

WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS FUCK YOU EAST COAST

The picture was of the most hideous insect I had ever seen. Including the time I found a cockroach in my bathtub.

(Although cockroach encounters are almost like a bizarre form of street cred for City People. It reaffirms that yes, I am so hardcore in my desire to Walk To Things (translation: Starbucks) that I am perfectly okay with spending half a million dollars to live in a 800-square-foot hellhole.)

Anyway, this bug was ugly. It was obviously some kind of beetle but the kind of beetle that would eat ladybugs for lunch and then poop out some kind of flesh-eating disease. All over your face. While you slept.

I texted back.

HOLY FUCK KILL IT KILL IT I AM THROWING SHOES FROM HERE.

My phone was silent for a few minutes. And then.

FUCK IT CAN FLY IT CAN FLLLY FUCK

And a few minutes later, she called.

"Cilannnnntrooooo!" she wailed.

"WHAT?"

"Cilantro! I squashed it with Skip's shoe and now the whole room smells like rotten goddamn cilantro."

(Skip is her husband.)

We both got on our computers and started Googling "cilantro smelly rotten egg beetles" and quickly determined that it was a Brown Marmorated Stink Bug. A nuisance bug accidentally introduced to our continent from China, like a plague of mass-produced lead-painted Thomas trains. And we learned that by squishing the sucker inside her house, my friend had essentially broadcasted to every other stink bug in the area that her house was a nice warm place to infest.

"That's stupid," she said. "That's the stupidest thing I have ever heard. Come to this house, bugs! They have shoes! It smells like death!"

Then she fell oddly silent, and asked if she and her son could come over for awhile.

"Amy," she whispered. "There are like, five more of them on the outside of the screen door. They're just...sitting there."

"Oh my God," I whispered back, for some reason. "Grab your keys and the baby and get out of there. Don't worry about anything else. We have diapers and blankets and you can borrow clothes if you need them. Just GET OUT OF THERE."

When she arrived, I immediately told her about the time I found a cockroach in the tub. To this day I will never understand why she moved back to California.

***

And now we live in the suburbs. And every fall it's the same disgusting thing. Stink bugs all over the outside of the house and window screens, waiting, plotting, inevitably finding their way inside. Mosquitoes, too. They sense their imminent wintery death and go completely berserk in September, biting you through seventeen coats of DEET, making every trip outside to drop wine bottles in the recycling bin an exercise in terror. This year, we have a nest of yellow jackets in the flower bed right outside our front door and Jason found a dried-out snakeskin near our dryer vent. And then there's the fucking CRICKETS. And then! Three days ago I noticed some other giant (HUGE) mysterious beetle-bug-thing on one of our windows, and as I have considerable problem-solving skills, I simply closed the window to trap it, because it just looked entirely too substantial to crush with a tissue. As of right now, the thing is STILL NOT DEAD YET.

It's all so gross, this stupid nature.

This year seems like the worst one yet, though. Almost Hitchcockian. The stink bugs just all simultaneously APPEARED yesterday. I noticed one on the crown molding in the living room...right as I heard the telltale buzzing of another one taking flight behind me behind me don't land on me don't land on me gaaaah. I lowered the window shades and HOLY FUCK, they were everywhere, just sitting there. First-floor windows, second-floor windows. I checked all our screens for points of entry and armed myself with the Shop Vac. 

We have a service contract with a pest control company, and twice a year they come out and spray for termites and check the perimeter and windows and set out little sticky traps to see if we can figure out how the fuck all these bugs are getting in and twice a year the visit ends with a baffled shrug. 

Yesterday, I think I cracked the mystery.

(Oh hey, if you're still reading at this point but are like, itching from head to toe a little bit? You might want to finally cry uncle and bail.)

So ever since the Great Fertilizer Dog Buffet Debacle and subsequent shutting down of the Canine Liver Contingent, we've been diligent composters. Yesterday, however, I left the pile's offerings (bruised section of peach, apple core, lettuce) sit out on the kitchen counter for juuuuust a bit too long, as we've yet to buy a suitable indoor container. I went to toss a banana peel on top and OH MY GOD, a fucking mushroom cloud of fruit flies sprang from its depths. I gagged and grabbed the nearest bowl (Sorry, Dora the Explorer), swept everything into it and bolted outside to deposit it in our composter.

(EXHIBIT 28430290 OF WHY HIPPIES ARE STUPID, DAMN DIRTY)

As soon as I opened the back door, the stink bugs attacked. Five or six of them flew towards the opening at top speed. I shrieked and slammed the door shut. The motion once again disturbed the flock of fruit flies who were following me and my bowl of mush like the Pied Piper, and a stink bug ricocheted off the door frame and landed on my hand. I dropped the bowl and shrieked again, and the bug fell off my hand...and into my shoe.

(Gardening clogs, okay? That I promise I only wear for GARDENING. And picking up dog crap. And fine, maaaaaybe taking Noah out to the school bus sometimes but it's just because they are usually right there by the door and that's just really convenient.)

At this point I probably looked and sounded like I was being attacked by bees. Or sharks. Or hell demons. I kicked off my shoe and sent it sailing across the yard and stood there for another three or four minutes shaking my limbs and hair and clothing while gasping out stuff like "ew ew ew ew ew shit shit shit."

When I stopped to catch my breath and retrieve my shoe and Dora bowl (opting to allow the compost to stay where it fell, providing all kinds of essential nutrients to the wood of the back deck), I made the mistake of surveying the back of our house.

Stink bugs. Everywhere. On the brick, on the windows, on the gutters. I slooooowly reached for the screen door handle and I SWEAR, they all fired up their wings, ready to attack. 

I dashed in as fast as I could, slamming the storm door closed (AND LOCKING THE DEADBOLT, BECUZ I ARE SMARTER THAN THEM BUGS). I walked over to the sink to deposit the bowl...and felt something on my ankles.

Two mosquitoes. I smashed them, leaving smears of blood on top of the already-forming welts.  (FOUR BITES, already. FOUR.)

And that's when I noticed something in my hair. Multiple somethings.

You guys. They rode inside the house IN MY HAIR.

By my count, THREE OF THEM. I have since vacuumed up one, another is MIA (shakes hair shakes hair shakeshair), and I have cornered a third one inside the living room blinds, unable to coax it quiiiiite close enough to where my vacuum can get at it.

No, seriously:

The way we live now.

(And just for the sake of completeness, besides the two mosquitoes that used my ankle as some kind of illegal border crossing van, minutes later I found a third one, BITING MY BABY ON THE FACE. Without thinking, I smacked it off him [AND THUS, HIS FACE], which shocked him so much that he did the whole heartbreaking face-melting-sobbing-real-tears thing, and then STILL woke up this morning with EIGHT gigantic angry red bites on his face and legs. Obviously, the suburbs are dirty, disgusting and absolutely no place to raise children.)

An Ezra Interlude

And then, there's this guy.

He's good. He's real, real good.

Some people like to remind me that his first birthday is coming up soon, but I heard that those same people hate America and God and puppies who wear American flag bandanas as collars.

In other words, I don't want to talk about. Also, die in a fire.

So. Ezra. What are you up to these days? A new EP, perhaps? Drawing on your latest obsessions with Live at the Greek, That Singing Dog Thing and the theme from Blue's Clues? A little Vampire-Weekend-slash-Mozart-Magic-Cube fusion?

Working on some new performance moves, then? Pointing, clapping, signing "more" and "all done," playing "soooo big" and throwing your arms in the air like you just don't care? Making a "wah wah wah" sound with the back of your hand until all adults in the area are mimicking it like it's the goddamn macarena?

Or maybe you're on a bit of a science kick? Conducting important research in the fields of How Fast Can The Baby Get Halfway Up The Stairs Before Mama Notices OMG or Uncovered Electrical Outlets And Oh Look A Fork?  I know we, your devoted constituents, are especially looking forward to reading your paper on the nutritional breakdown of microscopic crap-you-found-on-the-floor particles.

Okay, okay, you aren't here to discuss your work. How about your personal life? I assume you and Orange Toothbrush are still hanging out a lot? Any new love interests besides BlaBla the Stripey Wonder Cat and Our Extra Wii Remote Jacket, Yes I Let Him Sleep With It Last Night, Whatever, Because He Likes It, Okay?

Oh, OF COURSE. I would never tell Noah that you're the one who ate the corner piece from his dinosaur puzzle. Totally off the record, that.

Been to any good restaurants lately? I have to say, you're in amazing 25th percentile shape for the amount of food you eat. I read another interview that said on a typical day, you eat a waffle, a scrambled egg, a banana, a peach, two handfuls of grapes, half an avocado, a hummus-and-pita-bread sandwich, two meatballs, pasta, a ridiculous number of peas, tomato or pickle slices, maybe a lentil burger or salmon cake with some broccoli spears for dessert? Is it true that you once had to be forcefully removed from the vicinity of some creamed spinach because seriously, YOU HAD ENOUGH. YOU ARE FLAGGED FROM THE CREAMED SPINACH. THUS SPAKE THE WOMAN WHO CHANGES YOUR DIAPERS.

Is there anything you won't eat?

Chicken? Not a fan of chicken. Unless it's tandoori chicken. Interesting.

I gotta say, for someone with only seven-and-a-half teeth, you're doing pretty well for yourself.

Well, I think I've got enough here, so thank you for sitting still long enough for us to get a few photos that don't involve 1) you covered in food from hair to chin, or 2) the back of your diapered butt crawling away at breakneck speed towards the open baby gate gah gah fuck fuck fuck stop. You are really quite the little charmer, you know that? I hope, on your birthday, you get the perfect obnoxiously dangerous ride-on toy of your little daredevil dreams.

PS. Just wait until you try chocolate. Your head will explode and you will instantly become incredibly suspicious because WHAT ELSE ARE THEY KEEPING FROM YOU? BROCCOLI FOR DESSERT? WHAT THE FUCK, WOMAN?

Yes He Can

The Out-of-Sync Child describes a child with dyspraxia as the "I Can't Do That" child. They sit on a bike but have to stare at their feet to get them to pedal...stare at their hands to make sure they are steering...and when they raise their head to see where they are going...the pedaling and steering stop, and the bike doesn't go anywhere. They climb stairs slower, they jump later, and the worst part is, they know it. Their friends can draw things that actually look like things with crayons, their peers skip happily around the playground, the toddler next door races around on his tricycle, and they know it. They remember the frustration, the falls, the failure.

So they look at the bike and say, "I can't do that."

And the parent of a child with dyspraxia shrugs, and says okay. He can't do that. Or he won't do that. Is that the same thing? Are we expecting too much or too little?

We ask the teachers and the therapists and get different answers. He can't process who/what/when/where/how questions. He can't pedal a tricycle. Eh, that's pretty common. I wouldn't worry about it. Here, practice some writing some letters with him this weekend.

Conversely: Letters?! Handwriting?! He's not ready for that. We need to focus on the gross motor skills first, the pragmatic speech, his receptive language processing.

***

Last week he met a little boy his age at the park. The little boy had a scooter. He chased Noah around and around on the scooter. He didn't speak English, so they didn't talk. They just chased and chased and chased and laughed and on the way home Noah announced that he wanted a scooter.

I said something non-committal about his birthday -- yeah, I would just LOVE to go out an spend money on another damn toy that he won't actually get on or go near in real life, like the big wheel and the tricycle  -- but Jason, ever the optimist and big giant SUCKER when it comes to that boy, went out and bought him a scooter.

And he loved it. He was cautious at first, and kept his foot on the ground more often than not. He would only go in a straight line, and then jump off in a panic right before it collided with the sofa. He was adamant that he only wanted to ride it inside, not outside.

But a neighbor's little boy rode past our house one morning. He had the same little scooter. Noah saw him out the window and shrieked in delight and he needed his scooter he needed his SCOOTER. We all dashed outside and holy crap, look at him riding his scooter. He can do it.

"He needs a helmet," Jason fretted, and I groaned again. Art-project visors are one thing, but a helmet? He'll never wear one.

He accidentally crashed into the back of our neighbor's legs and fell down. He was fine. And he got back on the scooter.

***

We refinanced our mortgage this weekend. A better interest rate, lower payment, all around a good thing. We'd originally talked about the possibility of getting some cash back to renovate the kitchen, but now it's going towards the first installment of Noah's tuition. We couldn't find anyone to watch the boys during the closing, so I'd brought some toys and puzzles and hoped it would go quickly before they started getting too antsy.

Sure enough, Noah finished the little puzzle I'd brought in no time, and was not interested in anything else. The closing agent offered him a legal pad and a pen and he made some halfhearted scribbles. In desperation, I drew a capital L...the letter his teacher had told us to practice. Noah immediately shifted his grip of the pen and copied my lines.

"Dowwwwn, and across," he said. "And that's how you make an L!"

He then covered the paper with L's of various sizes, dowwwwwn and across.

When the closing was over, the guy collected his pad and pen. I asked if I could keep Noah's doodling page. I pressed it between the stacks of loan documents because I didn't want it to get crumpled.

***

Later, a stranger fitted him for a brand-new helmet and he did not protest. He just wanted to get back on his scooter. Until, that is, he spotted someone else's brand-new bike by the cash register. A big-kid two-wheeler, with training wheels attached. He climbed on it and slowly, surely, steadily...began to pedal towards the door. Jason and I just stood there stupidly, too shocked to actually do anything. A salesman intervened before we managed to snap to attention.

"I can ride a bike!" Noah shouted. I have to admit, he sounded a little surprised.

***

He spent the rest of the weekend on that scooter. Down hills, around corners, laughing as other little boys chased after him. He puts his leg out acrobatically and glides, trying out figure eights and perfect circles and wanting to go a little further from home each time, finally having fun like any other kid, because he is, and he can.

Ephemera Friday

And here we go again, with your weekly update to When You Marry. I'm skipping ahead to the "Where Babies Come From" chapter, mostly because the previous chapters (on marital strife and quarrels) were kind of normal and borderline helpful, especially if you need to know EXACTLY how to verbally abuse your wife over her bad cooking.

(HINT: Tell her "Get a cookbook, sister, get a book and start studying. This is the last lousy meal I'm eating here, understand?")

(No, seriously. That's totally marked as a productive approach to quarreling. And here I thought this class was gonna be an easy A. Stupid girl-brain!)

Anyway, despite the chapter title and all the many touchy-feeling reference to intercourse found elsewhere in the book, NO WHERE is there any actual description of...you know, where babies come from. Sperm meets egg in his local fallopian tube...somehow...and then ta-da! A brand-new American citizen! I guess they cut out the facts of life chapter (which exists in the 1953 version) to make more room for all the talk (SO MUCH TALK) about genetics and skin color, as white people in the 60s apparently lived in dread fear of Spontaneous Black Baby Syndrome. 

(On that note, some of the pages in this chapter are rather offensive. Without the "rather" part. Old tyme-y racism! It's not funny because it was true. Consider yourselves warned.) 

Additions start here. Read from the beginning here.

Yesterday @ 1 P.M.

So...yeah, OBVIOUSLY it went way better than that. I mean, I knew it would, even while lying in bed at 4:07 A.M., all saucer-eyed and tense, like WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT ABOUT, because I honestly had no idea I was that worked up over it. This is...what? Evaluation number five or six this year alone? The seventeen-dozenth since this all started over just about two years ago?

Up until last night I hadn't even double-checked the appointment time, so I guess my subconscious decided to SURE SHOW ME how entirely NOT used to this shit I am after all. Triple-check and obsess while you're AWAKE, next time, sweetcakes. Or face our nocturnal wrath. And...imaginary stressful haircut scenarios.

(I have been putting off getting a trim for a few weeks, actually. Maybe I should put a reminder in iCal, just so I don't have to wait for my brain to inform me that my hair looks like ass.)

ANYWAY.

It went well, as they tend to go whenever I am left out in the waiting room rather than brought along to sit there and apparently provoke all kinds of horrible uncooperative behavior. We get the full report tomorrow (TOMORROW. as in THIS CENTURY.) but it definitely sounds like Noah's speech delay has been bumped up out of "severe" and into "moderate"...or possibly even "mild." We are like, the valedictorians of quirk! 

And oh. Yeah. There was one other mother in the waiting room and...she...she totally reads this blog. And it was really nice to have someone to talk to and joke around with and help keep Ezra from disappearing down hallways at rocket speed, but the whole time I was desperately hoping I was just coming across as even slightly normal because secretly I was FREAKING THE FUCK OUT, BECAUSE I CAN SEE THE FUTURE I AM TOTALLY PSYCHIC YOU GUYS.

(Last night I dreamt something about having to protect Ceiba from some kind of insane feral cat, but the worst part was that the whole thing was secretly videotaped and posted to Gawker, like MOMMYBLOGGER IS SO MEAN TO KITTY CATS OMG SCANDAL.)

(In other news, I have decided that Unisom is Not For Me.)

Today @ 1 P.M.

It starts off badly, right in the parking lot. It's crowded, very crowded. I see someone pulling out of a spot on the end and am halfway in before another car appears out of nowhere, honking and yelling. I protest meekly before backing out and taking another spot down the row, only to realize that it's too narrow and I cannot open the doors and get the boys out of their seats.

I stand there, panicking. We are going to be late. Suddenly, three girls appear and offer to help. They know our names and I realize they know us from my blog.

Somehow, we're all inside. It's bigger than I remember -- more like a cavernous warehouse than a waiting room. There are dozens of people milling around rows of chairs and cafeteria tables. I check in with the front desk (Noah Storch, speech evaluation, 1 P.M.) and we're instructed to wait and listen for our names.

We wait. And we wait. There are books and toys but neither of the boys wants anything to do with any of them. Names are being announced over an echo-y loudspeaker that I can't understand. Noah has climbed up a bookshelf and when I leap to retrieve him I notice he's wearing a Pull-Up. Why is he wearing a Pull-Up? He doesn't wear Pull-Ups. I look at his face and hair and...it's like he's morphed back into the two-year-old version of himself. And what's that awful sme...oh, GOD.

A woman appears, clearly annoyed. They've been calling our name for 20 minutes, why didn't we respond? I stammer an explanation and ask for five minutes and a changing table and am informed that if we forfeit this time slot we go to the back of the line. She questions the state of Noah's potty-training and I stammer again -- no, seriously, I'm so confused, he's totally trained, I don't know what's going on today -- she simply scribbles something on a clipboard and storms off.

Our turn comes up again and we're directed to a random set of chairs in the middle of the warehouse, and after I sit down I realize I have left the baby behind. I frantically look over and see that the three blog readers have appeared again. They are holding him, and nod to me reassuringly. It's okay, it's all okay.

I don't remember anything about the actual evaluation. It was too loud and I couldn't hear anything. We're waiting again. The toy area has been changed into some kind of stage, like for a puppet show. Ryan Seacrest hands me some sheet music and orders me to sing. I stand there and face a bored-looking audience, all uncomfortably perched on tiny preschooler-sized plastic chairs. Clipboard Lady comes midway through the song -- a showtune from Little Shop of Horrors, though not one I've ever heard before -- and tells me that the evaluation results indicate that I need a haircut. Luckily, they have someone on staff who can handle it.

I'm whisked out of the huge waiting area and through a series of cluttered rooms -- they look nothing like a school, but more like a grandmother's house, full of not-particularly attractive knickknacks. A woman surveys my hair and shows me some photos of other bloggers. Their hairstyles are all very short and I tell her that I don't look good with short hair. She tries to insist but I finally hold my ground. NO SHORT HAIR. I MEAN IT. She sighs and rolls her eyes at me, but wraps a brightly-colored knitted afghan around my neck and begins cutting, assisted by a cranky old man who looks like Noah's morning school bus driver. She makes about four snips with her scissors and my hair looks absolutely amazing. Then she asks for $750, plus another thousand for the evaluation. I gasp and tell her I don't have that much, and she removes the afghan and I'm in my underwear and Clipboard Lady asks about the whereabouts of my children and I realize I don't even know the names of the three blog readers but suddenly they are there too, without Noah or Ezra, and they shrug and say they can't help me anymore and I start crying and then I wake up and it was four in the morning and I've been awake ever since.

***

Noah has yet another evaluation today. For speech, at The Preschool. Starts at 1 P.M. I think it's going to go great!

In Which Wii Bowling Ruins My Life

Or, What Happens When You Let Your Wii Bowling Pro Status Go To Your Head

Or, Not To Be Overly DRAMATIC, Or Anything

Scene, Bowling Alley, Saturday Night

Amy: Ew. Bowling shoes? Hasn't technology rendered community shoes obsolete yet?

Jason: Wait, did you forget to wear socks?

Amy: *pause*

Amy: Yes.

Jason. EW.

Amy: Also, none of these balls have sparkly stars on them.

Jason: And?

Amy: So how will anybody know how awesome I am? That I am their better? They should put my face on a blimp, at least.

Game One

Amy: *bowls*

Ball: *gutters*

Amy: *bowls*

Ball: *gutters*

Amy: *makes lighthearted jokes at her expense, trying to mask how DEEPLY and GENUINELY rattled she is, OH MY GOD, she cannot LOSE AT THINGS, gaaaaaaah*

Ball: *gutters*

FINAL SCORE: 34

Game Two

Two couples arrive, including one guy who is already slurring his words at the top of his lungs, and are assigned to the lane next to us. The one we share tables and a score machine with. I am immediately thrown even further of my game by the presence of other actual human beings who are not part of my Mii gallery and shockingly, do not exist solely to cheer when I bowl a strike. Am so unnerved I send the ball backwards into the seating area on my next frame.

Drunk Asshole: WHOO HOOO WAY TO GOOOOO.

Jason: Hold the B button down longer next time!

Drunk Asshole: (to the waitress) Your goal tonight is to get our wives druuuuunk. The druuuunker they get, the hiiiiiiiigher your tip, okay, Peaches? (continues in graphic detail to describe WHY, exactly, he needs his wife to get druuuuuuuunk)

Amy: *bowls*

Ball: *gutters*

Amy: That one was because of FEMINISM, by the way. Not because I suck at this.

Jason: *not bowling particularly well, but at LEAST manages to knock pins down most frames*

Drunk Asshole: *is obsessed with returning unused balls in our lane to the racks, keeps trying to take our balls away, has also started referring to us by our first names, thus illustrating the reason why you always go with initials-only for the scoring screen in real-life bowling*

Amy: *bowls*

Ball: *gutters*

Drunk Asshole: Niiiice. Try aiming for the pins next time.

Amy: Really? You're going to heckle me? Because...no.

Drunk Asshole: *opens mouth, wisely closes it, appears to sense he has been outmatched in assholery*

Jason: Holy shit, what did you say to him? You actually said something to him? We've been together over 12 years and I've never seen you confront so much as a laundry hamper.

Amy: I hate him. I hate him so much. I hate this game. I hate everything going on right now and WHY AM I SO BAD AT THIS? PEOPLE CAN SEE HOW BAD I AM AT THIS AND IT'S FREAKING ME OUT, MAN.

Amy: *bowls*

Ball: *strike!*

Amy: *OMG POINTS! POINTS! LOOK*

Drunk Asshole: *too busy rearranging the tables to notice*

Amy: *storms back to seat, pulls HER table with HER mozzarella sticks back towards HER side of the lane because it is HERS and NOT HIS and PERSONAL SPACE and ALL THAT*

Drunk Asshole: *bowls a turkey, like an ASSHOLE*

FINAL SCORE: 19

Amy: Fuck this, let's go home.

Amy & Jason: *go home, to find both children still awake and ornery and needy, thus defeating the WHOLE POINT of getting a babysitter, but whatever, our rockstar lifestyle is what it is, yo*

Jason: Maybe next weekend we'll go play some ping-pong.

Epilogue

Amy: *gets on the Wii and bowls a 217*

Drunk Asshole & Co.: *are probably still trying to figure out what was up with that raging bitch at the bowling alley last weekend, Jesus H. Christ, her husband should try getting her druuuuuuunk next time or something*

Ephemera Not-Thursday

Okay, so I know it's 5 pm on a Friday and there's absolutely no point in posting at 5 pm on a Friday but I cannot stand leaving that pointless, neurotic post up all weekend and anyway I spent all afternoon scanning and it always takes so much longer than I think to produce four minutes' worth of entertainment but what I am trying to say is that I updated the When You Marry gallery with two more chapters. Newlyweds and Money Matters. New additions start here.

Also, a reader found the original 1945 edition online for a DOLLAR, and I ordered it and I was all excited but then I got an email from the store and they said that it had already been sold but they were trying to find another copy, and then it arrives and I was all excited AGAIN, but then I realized it was the 1953 edition, not the 1945, and I composed this long complicated email to the store about why this wasn't right (especially since it is virtually word-for-word IDENTICAL to the 1962 version, which means all the crap in the forward about being completely re-written and expanded for today's modern American teen-agers was LIES, NOTHING BUT LIES)...and then I stopped and realized I was about to really confuse some used bookstore's poor summer intern and spend five bucks to ship the book back across the country just so I could get my DOLLAR back. So...if you're a friend of mine who plans to get married anytime soon, well. Mwa ha ha, baby. Have I got an awesome wedding present for you. Yes, indeed.

(It cost a freaking FORTUNE. Like, a hundred dollars. It's an antique!)