And This Was BEFORE They Handed Out the Vibrating Pens

I just got back from a parents' workshop thing at Noah's school. And it was a very useful workshop, really, about how to encourage fine and gross motor development through toys and play at home. I was especially pleased to learn that I can totally do all of Noah's Christmas shopping at the $5-and-under store, along with like, some bubble wrap. The problem started when one of the therapists demonstrated a toy hanging from a doorway, designed to turn a regular balloon into a sturdier punching bag. Another parent requested the brand name, which was Balzac.

"I guess they mean like, ballsack," she said, kindly providing us with a handy mnemonic device, while jiggling the thing idly in the palm of her hand. I choked on the inside of my lung, briefly, before clearing my throat and muttering apologies for startling the grown-ups.

Then we moved on to wheelbarrow walking. A very helpful handout was provided.

DM me if you want to buy the TV rights...

Oh my God!

You guys!

In between all the craziness of...uh...sleeping and eating and taking like, THREE WHOLE SHOWERS IN FIVE DAYS, I completely forgot to tell you about the most exciting thing to happen to me ever in my whole life:

 

AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

PHHHHHHFFFFFFFFFFFFTTTTTBBBBBB!

...is pretty much what I said when I got the notification on my phone, right before involuntarily flinging the thing upward, like it was on fire (VOLCANO FIRE), where it collided with ceiling of my car, teaching us all an important lesson about Checking Twitter DMs While Driving, i.e. Don't Do It, It Could Be A Celebrity.

I drove home with this huge dorky grin on my face, composing hypothetical replies in my head that included the somewhat embarrassing factoid that I was a devoted Reading Rainbow watcher until the age of 12, maybe 13, SHUT UP YOU, and that I record the show for Noah whenever our PBS station decides to air it, and that a rerun this past summer was about composting and I sat there watching it BY MYSELF, with GREAT INTEREST, shouting to Jason in the next room about how we were TOTALLY gonna plant us some potato chunks in our backyard this year, because one potato turns into like, 45 potatoes according to Reading Rainbow, and think of how much money we'd save on potatoes? MILLIONS, probably. Also, yes. Reading was more of a strong point for me than math, as a child. Or ever.

Obviously, I planned on...editing all that down once I got home. Into one concise, non-crazy-fangirl reply, embodying both the reverence a Really Important Childhood Idol deserves with the grown-up understanding that we're all just regular people and stuff. 

Then I call Jason and screamed into his voice mail: I JUST GOT DM'D BY GEORDI LAFORGE. JEALOUS MUCH?

(For the record, he SO WAS.)

Then I loaded up TweetDeck to actually compose my masterful reply and found that I couldn't. Because LeVar Burton doesn't actually follow me, because I am endlessly baffled by the Direct Messaging Rules of Twitter, always asking people to DM me and then they're all: I can't, Dipshit.

So I thought...well, maybe he plans to follow me and just hasn't gotten around to it. I should wait a couple hours and see what happens. Play it cool. Yes. I am cooooool.

Of course, he didn't follow me, because...why would he? I am a terrible Twitterer. Tweeter? Twit? I would probably use it solely to keep the world abreast of my children's bowel movements, if I could. I mean, I'm aware that I could, I just often forget that Twitter even exists for days at a time, while everybody else seems so much more...into it and plugged into the whole concept and @ @ @ RT RT #hashtagcakes.

My point is, Twitter makes me feel patently uncool, and we all know that my fragile vagina flower ego simply cannot handle that. So, when faced with the LeVar Burton Direct Message Quandary of Doom, I opted to simply ignore Twitter for a few days until it came to its senses and LET ME SEND LEVAR BURTON A DIRECT MESSAGE, DAMMIT.

Then Jason asked me why I didn't like, just thank LeVar Burton for his message on Regular Twitter, talking to him like everybody else does. And I fretted about that, because you know, he sent the message awhile ago, so I felt WEIRD bringing it up, plus wouldn't that seem kind of obnoxious, like I was BRAGGING to everybody else that OH HAI, LeVar Burton sent me a DM and not you, let's all bask in how AWESOME I AM?

Jason: Seriously, do you not get how Twitter works AT ALL?

Amy: Not really.  But remember that time you asked me what the hell "RT" meant? I totally knew the answer to that one.

@LeVarBurton: *is just really wishing Amy had just sent the danged public tweet because OH YEAH, a whole blog entry about this is soooooo much less creepy*

Anyway. I'm writing this because today TweetDeck crashed and I opted to go crazy old school, using Twitter dot com...where I suddenly discovered that I do indeed have the option to reply to LeVar Burton's Direct Message, even though he doesn't follow me. And that I could have replied to him ALL THIS TIME. ALL ALONG, I had the power. And then I went back to TweetDeck to yell at it, maybe kick it a little bit...and discovered that I actually could reply there too, but I'd simply been looking for the wrong icon:

 

In my head, the lack of a little arrow box in the top left corner meant I couldn't reply. I checked the little gear wheel setting and all the little drop-down menus, but for some reason, THE BOX WITH THE ENVELOPE, THE ONE THAT SAYS "DIRECT MESSAGE LEVARBURTON" WHEN YOU PUT YOUR MOUSE OVER IT, never once came to my attention.

No. Seriously. This is the dumbest thing I have ever done. I admit that. Worse than getting off the train in Newark. Worse than the Not-Pregnant Mistaken-Identity Lady. It's failing at TWITTER. Topped off with a bonus of it involving a VERY MEANINGFUL CELEBRITY CHILDHOOD ICON.

But what could I possibly say at this point, because I would feel the need to explain WHY I hadn't replied earlier, which was so RUDE of me, because Oh Em Eff Gee, he's LeVar Burton and he took the time to cure me of a lifelong phobia and I couldn't even be bothered to come up with a single 140-character reply? Like, I don't know: "THANK YOU." That's only like, 34 characters, or something.

Clearly, my only real option was to turn to my blog and 1) tell you guys about what a freaking dumbass I am (again) (some more) (six bloggy years and counting!) and 2) go ahead and completely freak poor LeVar Burton out and get myself blocked on Twitter for the very first time.

So it is written, indeed.

Blah Blah Zah Zah

Listen, we're kind of busy over here today, but Zah really wanted to say hi.

 

HI.

 

HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII.

 

I have four whole molars now. JELUS?

 

Oh, he also wanted to write a comment about the terribly underwhelming final three Project Runway designers. While he appreciates Althea trying to design roomy pants for the bulky-cloth-diaper set, he thinks her technical skills are lacking. I might let him write the finale recap for me this week. 

 

And why are they all so afraid of prints? Rescue vehicles are so hot this season.

 

Anyway! That's really all he wanted to say. Besides his favorite word ever: ALLDUN. We're ALLDUN with this. There is no more food on his tray and that is sad because it's ALLDUN. From his crib, mournfully, in the morning: ALLLLLLDUN!! Leave the room and YOU are ALLDUN. He is ALLDUN with you now!  ALLDUN, sir. I SAID ALLDUN.

Life in Color

Honestly, he's done it for as long as I can remember -- as soon as Noah had the vocabulary down, he described songs in terms of color. One day he asked for the "yellow song," and sobbed while I offered up track after incorrect track of Raffi and Dan Zanes, desperately trying to figure out what the hell song he was talking about. A song about rainbows? That paint-mixing song from Blue's Clues? Big Bird? I finally gave up, assuming it was probably some blasted Moose and Zee segment from TV with a yellow background or yellow flower or something similarly random.

Then, later: a scary movie theme. Violins in minor key. Ominous timpanis. His eyes grew large and he fled the room. "NO RED SONG," he said. "OFF. NO."

For awhile, we assumed he was assigning colors in lieu of how the song made him feel. Yellow = happy songs, red = angry, scary. Then came pink songs and purple songs. And he learned how to express how he was feeling with real words, but the color thing persisted. I cycle through my iPod or the radio pre-sets in the car and he regularly makes his requests from the backseat. "No, Mommy," he says politely and articulately, "I want the yellow song."

Once a song has a stated color, it never changes. Yellow songs tend to be upbeat, playful. Most children's music, Jack Johnson. Although his current radio favorite, You're Gonna Go Far, Kid by The Offspring, is also a yellow song. Red songs are usually in a minor key, or somewhat dramatic sounding. Classical music, the theme from The Incredibles. Anything with a strong bass line or heavily orchestrated with woodwinds and strings is either purple or pink. Everything from The White Stripes to Coldplay to Beyonce has been lumped into the purple/pink realm. 

Songs are never green and only rarely blue. Some songs don't have a color, Mommy. I mean, God. 

Sometimes I catch him squinting, idly attempting to pinch or swat at the area in front of his face. 

He is left-handed. He has a near-photographic memory for things he hears, and near-perfect pitch when he sings. I am officially pretty sure we can add synesthesia to our list of Quirks That Make You Go Hmmm.

It seems both entirely logical and yet grossly unfair for a kid who already struggles with ordering and processing his senses to be given the added complication of synesthesia.  His teachers and therapists (all of whom I've had to educate on my theory; most of whom seem to think I'm talking New Age psychobabble nonsense) report that as noise levels go up, Noah's coping skills go down. He hides, he covers his ears, he wanders around in circles or becomes utterly fixated on a soothing, repetitive task. Amateur singing, whether by me or a teacher or anyone without a record deal, pretty much always drives him bonkers. "STOP!" he shouts. "YOU DON'T. YOU CAN'T." Certain music has the opposite effect -- simple piano music soothes and centers him, though so far his perfectionist nature has kept from experimenting very much on his own keyboard.

And yet, when I read about it, and about all the amazing musicians and artists and great thinkers who have had variations of synesthesia and used it as a gift, an enhancement, a privilege to see the world in a completely different way than the rest of us, I can't help but be more than a little impressed at just how much wonderfully mysterious potential is inside that quirky little brain.

More From the Mail Bag. Or Comment Bag. Whatever.

Hmm, okay. So yesterday's post was kind a of preachy "we're all fucked and going to die" thing, wasn't it? Let's change the subject. More topics and questions posed by you, the people:

From Danielle:

I remember you mentioned doing the 30 day shred a while ago.. How did that work out? Did you stick with it for 30 days? Did you do it more than once a day? Have your abs been shredded?? Should I try it? Would you ever even in a million years consider posting a before and after pic? Am I being way too forward??

My all-time record is doing it once a day, every day, for a week. Then maybe once every other day. Then there was something on TV that I really wanted to see and I decided I needed new sneakers but never bought new sneakers because sneakers cost money that could otherwise be spent on more wine. In other words, I've failed each and every time I've committed to the workout, for no other reason than the fact that I am one lazy ass motherfucker. It's a short workout, it's diabolically effective (seriously, the difference in your energy/endurance/strength between day one and day four and five is insane)...and yet. Couch. Mmmm, couch. I love you, couch!

From Kathlyn:

How did you pick your kids names? And what are your grammar pet peeves (if you have any)?  (I have my own, but am still awful with certain rules - just tried to figure out if it should be "kids names" or "kids' names" and failed miserably. MS degree = worth NOTHING!!!)  OR are there any grammar rules/spelling rules/etc can you never remember??

Both of the boys' names are from the Old Testament, which for whatever reason was the only source of names that Jason and I could agree on. Neither of us are much for the uber-modern off-the-wall names, but while I preferred classic names that have simply fallen out of recent favor, Jason liked boring names that all belonged to jackasses I went to high school with. While neither of us are actively religious anymore, we both found we had a high amount of nostalgia for the names we grew up listening to in Sunday School, and I was pretty hellbent on finding names that didn't have an obvious nickname that would eventually be pointless to fight. Noah was perfect.

Ezra was our number-one pick from pretty much the beginning (I especially loved it because of the literary connotations: Ezra Pound and Ezra Jack Keats, and because it seemed unlikely to rocket up in the top 10 like Noah did), but we did alternately take turns panicking over the idea of it being too weird. (Even though it's a freaking BOOK of the BIBLE, and not some random name we picked out of a endless genealogy list or something, like Heppiziah begat Harppiziah begat Asghdkvoieofjdlasiah. But most people aren't familiar with the lesser-known book names.) Even after announcing his name, we almost backtracked when he was three days old and almost wrote Elijah on the birth certificate, after two separate people heard the name and assumed he was a girl. (Ironically, Jason wanted to name the baby Ezra either way, boy or girl, because he is a filthy name poacher who leaves zero good names for boys.) (We've met at least three girl Noahs already. If the "old men with long white beards" names aren't safe, the world has truly gone mad.) Anyway, we obviously stuck with our first choice and the Mighty Ez is here to stay. ZAH!

Middle names: Corbin is the Latin version of my maiden name, and Harrington is Jason's mother's maiden name. And with that, we're officially out of decent family names. It's all Elmers and Mortimers and Ediths after that.

As for grammar pet peeves, the misplaced plural/possessive apostrophe drives me BATSHIT. Jesus Lord God. Here, people, IT'S EASY:

RIGHT: I don't like blogs because I don't think bloggers are good writers.

WRONG: I don't like blog's because I don't think blogger's are good writer's.

RIGHT: I cannot stand that blogger's overuse of the caps lock key.

WRONG: I cannot stand that bloggers overuse of the cap's lock key.

Got it? Good. Please don't ever do it again.

That said, I have always struggled with the "i before e except after c" rule, and totally have to pause and recite the rhyme and squint at the word for awhile. And usually the word is "piece." I don't know why, but I always, ALWAYS type "peice" the first time and have to correct myself. Oh, and correct use of lie/lay/lying. Trips me up all the damn time.

From Bliz:

I always love a good embarrassing puberty story...

Oh, God. Okay. So at some point in early high school I realized that my boobs were probably never going to...you know...BLOOM. I was quite...small. ("WAS." HA HA. HAAAA.) So I did what every hugely insecure girl does at one point or another: I bought a ridiculously padded push-up bra and stuffed it with tissues.

The problem was that, since I didn't exactly have much money and I didn't want my mom to know I was buying lacy devil black underthings, I bought my ridiculously padded push-up bra at, like, TJ Maxx or something. It was an IRREGULAR ridiculously padded push-up bra. It hooked in the front and sat like four inches of rigid boob armor under my clothes, and the front hook had this bad habit of coming undone.

Now, most women, after realizing that a bra has a tendency to UNHOOK ITSELF, would maybe think: I should not wear this bra anymore. I should return it. Or throw it out. Something, anything, other than wearing this bra out in public in front of people.

Me: But it adds TWO WHOLE CUP SIZES. Three, if you add tissues! I will wear it and just like...not move my arms much.

Wait, sudden backstory! I was also -- Oh, God -- a total drama nerd and was part of this church acting troupe that specialized in Abstinence Sketches. Seriously. Everything we ever did was all about Sex, and the Not Having It. We performed for youth groups and churches and occasionally a public school would have us visit their sex ed class and talk about how pointless it was to use condoms and birth control because of the failure rates. Don't even BOTHER, man. Abstinence! Jazz hands! We were "directed" by some grad student from Princeton who was really into avant garde theater, so most of the sketches were like, waaaay symbolic and shit, involving people tying red strings to each other's wrists to represent your emotional and physical tie to everybody you ever had sex with, and by the end of the show we were all twisted up in the strings and couldn't move and one time I had to pretend that the string strangled me and I died. Of premarital sex and disease and a broken heart and probably a back alley abortion. ANYWAY. IT WAS DEEP. ALSO CO-ED.

Since avant garde abstinence theater troupes are like, totally the place to land yourself a totally not-gay boyfriend, I had a crush on one of my fellow actors. I don't remember anything about him except that his father sold Amway. And the time that we were talking after rehearsal (IN THE CHURCH, IN FRONT OF JESUS) and I was telling him a story and made some kind of big, swooping arm gesture...

...and my factory-second push-up bra unhooked, sending the four-inch molded cups flying into my armpits, and when I frantically snapped my arms back down and folded them desperately across my chest, praying to Jesus that I looked somewhat natural and that he hadn't noticed, mentally repenting for the sin of vanity and secular underwear...

...all the tissues fell out of my shirt and landed on the floor. 

Yeah, he noticed. A little bit. There's just no coming back from that one, you guys.

In Which a Good 75% of You Will Glaze Over By Paragraph Four

Since you guys proposed SO MANY awesome topics yesterday Tuesday, I shall continue to mine them for awhile, or at least until something actually important happens in real life that requires a veryimportantblogupdate!, and no, I'm not counting last night's Tuesday night's all-night preschooler-puke-a-thon. (He's just fine now, of course, which is good because we are plum out of clean sheets.)

From Cagey:

I have been reading The Unhealthy Truth and seem to remember you mentioning it on one of your Advice columns. The book is blowing me away and I am shocked at how few folks realize how food can really affect us - say, Red #40 for example.

I was wondering your thoughts on this and if you have seen whether certain things affect Noah. For example, artificial colorings are the devil now in our house because my son flips his lid every time he has them. And this is the same kid who can eat ice cream and go right to bed! For him, Red #40 is like main-lining a bit heroin.

Yep. I did write about this book, mere HOURS after I'd finished reading it, while I was freshly seething with rage. I have since gone back and re-read sections and pondered it some more and guess what! I AM STILL ANGRY.

(Hold on, 'cuz it's about to get screedy and caps-locky up in here.)

(I mean, more so than usual. And about other things besides an overflowing coffeemaker, or something.)

For the record, I am not a big conspiracy theorist. I am more of skeptic than a believer, and while I certainly gotten crunchier in recent years with the cloth diapers and homemade baby food and all, I still am a BIGFAN! of things like modern medicine and scientific advancements. I'm allergic to most antibiotics -- HIGHLY SO -- thus personally have always had to depend on alternative treatments for myself, and I'm not trigger-happy with the prescriptions when it comes to the kids. But both of the boys have gotten both seasonal and H1N1 flu shots this year and I would jab 'em in the arm again in a heartbeat. We fully vaccinate, falling on the "debunked" side of the vaccine/autism fence, although I think the chicken pox one is bullshit. (I never had it, and have to depend on the half-assed, temporary protection of the vaccine myself. Glad it exists; disagree that it belongs on the childhood schedule; worry about kids not getting their boosters and getting sick as adults.) I've seen the Feingolding gone amok at Noah's school, am a bit weary of suddenly every problem in the world being blamed on yeast and gluten, though I have nothing but sympathy for parents and child dealing with honest-to-God allergies and am extremely careful about sending Noah to school with clean peanut-butter-residue-free hands and non-triggering snacks, and would hope others would do the same for us. So basically, I was expecting to agree with some of what this book has to say...but also to roll my eyes at a lot of it too.

My eyes bugged out of my head, but they sure didn't roll. I'm not going to get into all of it -- the genetic engineering and corn refiners and the FDA's refusal to protect us from stuff that's long since been banned or flagged as dangerous overseas (soy baby formula, anyone?) -- but seriously, IS GAH HEAD EXPLODING TIME NOW.

Anyway, the whole artificial coloring thing. Yes, they affect Noah big time. They are banned in our home. Red 40 and Yellow 5 are just like...I don't know. Tiny seismic earthquakes through his neurological system. Artificial flavorings, too. He gets hopped up and agitated...while also weirdly shutting down at the same time. Loss of eye contact, anxiety, tantrums. He defaults back to echolaic speech or just goes silent. Anecdotal? Coincidental? Totally, sure, maybe. But it's so fucking scary, you guys. So why even argue, when it's a pretty safe assumption that Red 40 and Yellow 5 are two little things that we can all live without just fine?

And they are in EVERYTHING. It doesn't have to be garishly candy-coated. It's stuff that should technically, be healthy. Yogurts. Granola bars. Fruit snacks. Boxed cake mixes (seriously, why the FUCK does a CHOCOLATE CAKE need both red and yellow food dyes?). Toothpastes, kiddie vitamins and cold medicines. It's BULLSHIT, trying to shop at a "regular" grocery store when you need to avoid this stuff, even more so when (like us) you've also cut out high-fructose corn syrup and partially hydrogenated oils for various other Frankenfood reasons.

We're lucky that we live in an area where Whole Foods is about as common as any grocery store, along with Trader Joe's and several year-round farmer's markets where we buy pretty much everything from produce to grains to meats and fish. (Up where my parents live, you either live on one fancy organic aisle at the Acme or drive close to an hour to the nearest Whole Foods in New Jersey.) We're also very lucky that we can afford to shun the processed foods and eat organic, local, humane, sustainable and all those other hippie food buzzwords. I'll sacrifice plenty of other columns in our budget before I cut food corners, particularly for the kids. (She says while wondering if it's too early to switch from coffee to Coke. And fun-sized Snickers.)

And it took us a long time to get fully here, by the way. Hell, we potty-trained with M&Ms, fed Noah Flintstones vitamins, brushed his teeth with sparkly blue Disney-branded toothpaste. It really wasn't until we stopped giving him anything artificial that we really saw how little it takes to really affect him, be it candy or fast food chocolate milk or a fruit-flavored Triaminic strip. We don't deny him the occasional treat or get hysterical if friends or family offer him something we wouldn't necessarily feed him at home...we just sort of know what we're in for and up our focus on the rest of his diet for a day or two.

If you are unsure of how or where to start, The Unhealthy Truth is a great book for this as well -- at least after scaring the pants off you the author devotes a chapter on how to prioritize your grocery list and budget, taking baby steps to avoid the "worst" things and slowly get your kids to accept healthier versions without feeling like you've just ripped the rug out from under them and clobbered them with a Deprivation Hippie Stick.

Anyway. I actually wrote the bulk of this entry yesterday, right before my parent-teacher conference at the public school program. And finally, OH GOD FINALLY, I got to sit there in front of a team of teachers who had nothing but lovely, wonderful things to say about my child. What a delight and a joy he is, how smart and funny he is, and how much progress he's already making. I'm certainly not all, "OH, IT'S ALL BECAUSE WE THREW OUT HALF OF HIS HALLOWEEN CANDY. ARE BEST PARENTS EVER."

In the grand scheme of things, it's admittedly a tiny part of the puzzle. Though WOW, did I ever have a lot to say about it.

In other news, Noah is kicking ass at school. And I'm committing that phrase to published type: NOAH IS KICKING ASS AT SCHOOL. We celebrated by not coming right home so I could sit around and finish this entry. I hope you understand. It's been a long time coming.

Post-Nasal Block

I've been sitting here all morning -- yes, actually physically here, in this virtual white space of my publishing platform, it's kind of like Tron -- trying to think of something to write about. And having a bit of trouble. I'm tired, I'm congested, I've just discovered that this "parent-teacher conference" thing is just a thinly-veiled excuse for schools to force you to parent your own children for two days in a row, and somehow our personal math means two schools x two days off = THREE days of scheduling fuckuppery.

(And only ONE actual parent-teacher conference. RIDDLE ME THAT, expensive hoity private school. EXPLAIN YOURSELVES.)

Anyway.

It's punt time. I could use a little writing exercise, so how's this...YOU GUYS post questions/topics in the comments -- any old random topic you want! the more off-the-wall the better! -- and I will pick some and update this post each time I write a little bit about it. Live, in real-time! Or...you know, whenever I get around to it, in between the whole keeping-children-alive thing.

I have actually done a variation on this before, a long, looooong time ago, if you would like to refer to that post for inspiration. Yeah. That's dryer lint. And multiple paragraphs about a kitchen sponge. I'm hoping we can come up with something a little more interesting than that.

Okay. Go!

(Oh, God. Nobody's going to ask me ANYTHING, and it will all crickets and silence and I will not only be forced to come up with my own post topics ANYWAY, I will also have to spend mental energy on creating sockpuppet commenters to hide the fact that no one asked me anything and maybe I didn't think this through very well.)

***

Whoa. Well. Oh em gee and all that. I guess my little attempt to guilt y'all into participating worked better than I anticipated! While my plans to rapidly update "live, in real-time" did NOT work as well as anticipated, what with the immediate and simultaneous arrival of Thing One on the school bus and the wide-awake caterwauling of Thing Two from upstairs. So there was much lunching and some sobbing when I had to break it to Noah that his afternoon school is closed today.

"But whyyyy I miss my friends, Mommy? Whyyyy my friends are all gone, Mommy?"

"Because it's Staff Development Day, sweetie." 

"..."

"I know, dude. Laaaame."

THEN I got momentarily derailed by the sudden appearance of an itchy, bug-bite-like thing on my boob, which required much Googling. Turns out it's a bug bite. Okay then! Now we are ready!

First up, by nature of her being FIRST!!!1!!1 is Allisone's suggestion of irrational fears.

Yes. Look. I'm still very, very scared of volcanoes. I've told you this one before. It's nothing I made up to be cute or calculatedly quirky on my About Page: I once had a full-on anxiety attack at the Mirage in Vegas while watching the beginnings of the outdoor laser/lights/fountain volcano show they do. THE GROUND RUMBLED. IT WAS OMINOUS. I FREAKED THE FUCK OUT. IN FRONT OF COWORKERS. I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT THIS ANYMORE.

And yes. It really is thanks to an episode of Reading Rainbow. Hill of Fire, to be exact. Farmer finds a bump in his field, bump gets bigger and bigger and then eventually erupts and like, I don't remember. Everybody dies. Some with puppies. I think I was cowering behind the couch by the end. The WORST parts, honestly, were the scenes with LeVar Burton at the site of an erupting volcano in Hawaii. I kind of had my first girl-boy crush thing with LeVar. (Or maybe second, after Magnum P.I.) I was also maybe seven. My memory put LeVar like, RIGHT THERE, on the very edge of the volcano's mouth, gazing into the fiery abyss with his usual non-threatening enthusiasm, but according to the PBS website he was actually 2,000 feet away. 

That night I had a dream that my class was going on a volcano-climbing field trip, and we were all lined up and tied together at the waist with rope, when the girl in front of me turned around and told me that we were SUPPOSED to wear closed-toe shoes, AMY, way to follow the RULES. I looked down at my feet and saw that I was wearing flip flops. Then I woke up. I spent the entire day after in my backyard, looking for bumps. And probably a lot of other days after that. 

Fun update to this story! I now follow LeVar Burton on Twitter, but have never worked up the nerve to tell him this story and/or ask if he knows how I can obtain a copy of that episode. For like, therapy, and stuff. 

Next!

***

Okay, next question, from Mary, who wants to hear how I discovered my love and/or talent (AIRQUOTES talent AIRQUOTES) for writing. 

I'm actually one of those cheesy Tracy-Flick types who ALWAYS knew exactly what she wanted to do. I was going to be a writer. I'm not sure I ever remember seriously wanting to be anything else, beyond the usual "actress/mommy/astronaut" phases. I wrote my first "book" when I was five or so. It was called "The Pink Bunny." My mom still has it. Aside from the questionable design choice of writing a book about a pink bunny on pink construction paper using primarily pink crayons, it honestly was not a terrible first effort.

Pink Bunny is lonely. Pink Bunny goes out to find her friends. She finds one (who I think was a purple cat or a blue bear or some other dubious, carnivorous companion for a bunny) and invites them over to her house. They eat popcorn. The end. I even made a cover and additional title page, asking my mom how to spell each and every word. "How do you spell 'written'? And how do you spell 'and'? And how do you spell 'illustrated' And how do you spell 'by'?" On and on, this went, and my mother never once let any trace of boredom or OMGness into her voice as she patiently went along with it.

I even made a back cover, where I drew long squiggly lines to represent the book's synopsis and publisher's information. 

I routinely started and abandoned book ideas all through elementary and high school -- usually whenever I came across a really cool notebook that I just HAD to write something in. Most of the results were predictably horrible, so, so horrible, but my parents never, ever stopped telling me that I was a good writer and to stick with it.

It also helped that my dad was a high school English teacher and our house was almost hoarder-levels full of every classic piece of literature in the WORLD, and I was encouraged to treat his office like my personal library, and also to write "book reports" for him on the books that his much-older students were reading.

Later, I started mixing in funny short stories based on people and teachers from school, or big controversial events that I thought needed to be diffused with a little humor. I'd pass the stories around and even the snotty popular kids would laugh and tell me that I was soooooo funny and should write a book or for a magazine and I would nod seriously and then go back to whatever crap-ass "serious" novel I was currently attempting to write longhand in an obnoxiously twee leather journal. 

In college I tried my hand at "real" journalism and absolutely HATED IT. I wasn't good at it. The style and form and pace didn't come naturally to me at all, and two weeks after landing a super-prized position at the Penn State student paper, I quit and switched my major to English, even though I had no idea what the hell I would do with it. But clearly, I was not cut out to be a writer after all. I guess maybe I would teach? Or be some kind of editor? Eh?

But! Then! (Oh my God, this story. It is so looooooong. Where's a goddamn editor when you need one?) (Oh. Right.) I took a literature course in American Comedy. Mark Twain. James Thurber. Erma Bombeck. Garrison Keillor. David Sedaris. While I was sort-of famous for being one of Those Students who regularly wrote A-level papers on books that I didn't even READ (hello, HEART OF DARKNESS, YOU ASSHOLE), I read every scrap of assigned reading for that class, and even all the short stories in our textbook that we never actually covered. I still HAVE all the books from that class, to this day. Changed my life, this realization that writing "funny" could still actually "count."

I toiled away for a few more years after that, more aborted novel attempts, some short-story and essay rejection letters, struggling to keep myself disciplined to KEEP WRITING even after a long day of editing investment advice and stock market commentary.

So I decided to maybe start a blog, just to have a dumping ground for my existing stuff and maybe a place to write something new, and just to see what would happen. The end!

(Still haven't written that blasted novel yet, though. Sigh.)

Surfacing

Update! I survived Swine Flu 2009. Or...Faux Swine Flu 2009, probably, since my fever never cranked up much past 99 degrees and I was feeling mostly human again by Sunday. (Although if you take my temperature on a perfectly healthy day you will likely get something like 96.6, so it's all relative, or at least that's what I was FOREVER trying to explain to the high school nurse, that 99.6 is actually 102.6 in Amy Degrees, or something. I wanna go home! I have cah-raaamps!) I survived Really Bad Cold With A Side Of Stomach Unpleasantries 2009.

Anyway. I owe my recovery solely to the fact that I actually took a goddamn SICK DAY. Like, I stayed home. In bed. In my pajamas and everything. I ate chicken soup for lunch, people. I outsourced everything child-related and watched 80s movies in the afternoon and took an honest-to-God nap.

Do you know the last time I did that? Sometime circa 2005, I think. I up and had a BABY last winter and still insisted on going downstairs and mouth-breathing at the toaster, making breakfast and feeding pets and answering emails, while a double ear infection leaked out of my eyeballs. All while insisting that I was Happy and Fine and Whoops, Walked Into The Wall Again.

So let me tell you, it took EVERYTHING in me to call down to Jason and beg him to please, pleeeease stay home. Even though I didn't really need to beg, of course -- TWO full anniversaries ago, a year where we both insisted that there would be no presents, he presented me with five of his vacation days. Five days where he would stay home and I could go shopping or see a horrible chick movie or visit a friend...or...you get the idea. Days off, of my very own.

Two years later, and Friday was the first time I ever cashed one in. What is wrong with me? Oh right, the whining and the martyrdom. I would miss them so. I would have nothing to write about without them! Except: I got sick one time and stayed in bed until I was better.

You see how that will simply not do. Quelle horreur!

Anyway, AGAIN, let's move on with our collective lives. What else happened...I lost some weight from all the illness, bought a killer pair of jeans and some new eyeshadow to celebrate, will probably have to return the killer jeans because my appetite is now all officially better, judging by the pile of fun-sized Snickers wrappers sitting here next to the computer. Noah seems to be doing really, REALLY well at his school programs, which means it's time for parent-teacher conferences to come and knock me off my optimistic ass this week, and also he has suddenly decided that he will indeed be a Good Boy, because if he is a Good Boy Santa will bring him a giant $200 dollhouse that he saw at the store and has not stopped talking about since. A $200 dollhouse that makes the small dollhouse we already got him for his birthday look like TOTAL CRAP.  He wants the other one. He wants both. He wants a city. A tiny town! Then he shall don his monster costume and terrorize all the little hand-painted wooden people on their eco-scooters or whatever the hell. I LOVE YOU, MOMMY. I'M BEING A GOOD BOY. JUST BECAUSE. YOU SEE? LOOK, I HUG YOU. HUG! IS IT CHRISTMAS YET?

Ezra, of course, wants a jet pack. Probably. I bet that's what he'd ask for, if he could talk. 

Or at least if he could talk that much, because he continues to freak me completely out, with the fact that he talks at ALL.  Babies who talk! And gesture! And sign! Instead of like, telepathy and smoke signals or however the hell we communicated with Noah for all those months. He's added "all done" to his vocal repertoire, along with "yeah yeah" and "uh oh" and "Dada." We're working on "oh wow" and "light", which are currently in the iffy category of Things One Parent Swore He Said But Have Not Yet Been Independently Verified. I am pretty sure that "mum" means "more."

I walked out of the room this morning and immediately heard his slappy little hands furiously crawling across the floor after me, and then some distressed bleating of "Mama! Mama! Mama!"

 

Yep. I feel much better now. Must've been that chicken soup.

Sick Day

I appear to have, as Sundry put it, a touch of the Hamthrax. Or some kind of flu. I went to bed with the beginnings of what I assumed was a cold and woke up in the grips of some horrible, lung-hacking, breath-sucking, stomach-purging, body-aching, I'm-hot-no-I'm-cold-so-cold-oh-my-God-get-these-covers-OFF-ME type of illness.

It's awesome, let me tell you. I managed to drag my diseased ass out of bed and onto the landing where I begged Jason not to go to work and leeeeeeeave me with The Children, Oh God, Not The Children. Then I went back to bed and moaned piteously for awhile. I'm still doing that, actually. Here:

meeeeehhhhhhhhhhiiiiiiiiiiiuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuggggghhhhhhhh

I know! I write just like I whine. It's a gift!

ANYWAY, so I had Other Plans for today's post -- another chapter of the When You Marry book, some discussion on what educational toys can be manipulated into saying profanity, maybe microwaving some Halloween candy just for the hell of it -- but alas. It's going to be another redirect day.

• I kind of wish I'd chosen a more interesting topic at the Advice Smackdown today, like somebody's sex life problems or major parenting dramz, but no. At some point this week I decided to devote an entire column to laundry detergent. Hmm.
• You could, alternately, read about all the really, really stupid stuff you do when you're newly postpartum and sleep-deprived over at Bounce Back. Unfortunately, I still haven't figured out a way to blame that time I got off the train at Newark instead of New York on my lousy children. I will keep trying, though.
• My second entry for the Slideshare MS Office Parenting Toolbox I Don't Remember The Official Name So I'm Including Them All is also up.
• Over at Mamapop, you know we're doing a little video roundtable thing? Where we all ramble about some pop culturery topic into our webcams and everybody else is so much funnier than me and I swear, I don't really wear as much eye makeup as it appears in these things. Past editions are here. I think the next one goes up on Monday. I hate my voice.
• Also, a Project Runway recap that I wrote (last night, so it's only half-infected with swine flu, though you might not want to touch the photos, which I added this morning) will go up at 2 pm ET. I would link to the specific entry here, but I cannot. Because you cannot link to the future. Yet. Oh, man. That's a good idea. I should totally write that down in my dream journal under Brilliant Ideas I Had Under The Influence Of Theraflu. 
• mmmmmmeeeeeeeeeeuuuuuuuuuaaaaaaauuuuuuggggg, etc.

Five Toys That Are Made of Magic

FULL DISCLOSURE: These are not paid product reviews. If they were, I probably would not get paid, because I'm not sure toy companies appreciate being compared to monstrous black magic hell demons. The links are Amazon Associates, meaning if you decide to buy a monstrous black magic hell demon today, you can click through and reward me with a shiny 1/8th of a penny, or you can open up Amazon in a different browser tab and navigate to the toys yourself, muttering "fuck you, Amalah" the whole time. I am totally fine with either.

1. Hasbro Playskool Busy Ball Popper

The Busy Ball Popper works thusly: you drop some balls into a chute, press down on a lever and and the balls pop up and out and back down the ramps as a merry little circus theme plays. And your kids. Go. Apeshit. They lose their ever-loving goddamned minds over this thing. Babies, toddlers, preschoolers. Even a jaded emo teenager would be powerless to resist squealing and clapping and jumping up and down because OMFG BALLS. Do you remember that scene in Knocked Up where Paul Rudd wishes he liked anything as much as his kids liked bubbles? I don't think there's anything in my adult life that has brought me as much crazed joy as the Ball Popper brings to my children, and I'm including the battery-operated stuff in the nightstand. The Ball Popper is a breakdancing TiVo, an iPhone that shits unicorns, the last faint beacon of hope between this generation and a smoldering pile of war and toxic air and financial ruin.

Cost: $27.99  Alternatively, you could probably make your own with some bent PVC pipe and a hair dryer, but I'd be worried that my neighbors would see the effect it has on their children, and then they'd storm the house in the middle of the night, with torches and pitchforks and their best witch-burnin' stake.

2) Ocean Wonders Soothe & Glow Seahorse

Okay, so I know this thing doesn't really resemble a seahorse. I think it looks more like a Care Bear crossed with My Little Pony sperm, but NO MATTER. You press the beetle-like shell of a belly and it lights up and plays music, just like dozens of other toys that light up and play music, except that this one has apparently been bewitched with magical sleep powers. Yesterday I put a squalling, protesting baby in his crib while I went to retrieve some socks from a nearby laundry pile (shut it), and he kicked and cried and somehow sort of sat on the Spermhorse and the music played and he went into a dazed, silent, thumbsucking trance. Within 30 seconds, he was sound asleep. I honestly keep waiting for an indicator light to come on and tell me it's time to replace the vaporized opium packet located somewhere near the battery pack.

Cost: $14.99. Also available with an extra X chromosome.

3) Ocean Wonders Aquarium

Also bewitched with magical sleep powers of simulated ocean sounds, but be warned: It will eat through your soul at pretty much the same rate it eats through batteries. It will become the bulky, heavy bane of your existence as you feel compelled to drag it with you everywhere that your baby MIGHT POSSIBLY need to sleep, never once encountering a crib design that actually seems compatible with the straps on the back, leading to various precarious jury-rigged arrangements on Pack-n-Plays and relatives' nightstands, because your baby CANNOT SLEEP WITHOUT THE AQUARIUM. NO. NOT EVER. It will demand nightly sacrifices at 2 am of four fresh D batteries, and of course you have no choice but to placate the bubbling, lullaby-playing monster, because without it your baby might wake up at 2 am, or something.

Cost: $49.99, sucker.

4) Fisher-Price Laugh and Learn Learning Piggy Bank

You know a toy is educational when they manage to cram the word "LEARN" into the name twice. (Just wait until the Fisher-Price Busiest Busy Ball of Poppin' Pop Balls hits the market. It's gonna be awesome.) And yes, while both of my children were uniformly delighted by this toy, I must admit I am really including it because 1) its red curly tail looks EXACTLY like a baboon's ass, and 2) one of the song lyrics says "you can put coins in my slot and you can take them out." 

Cost: $18.72. Slot. Heh.

5) Goodnight Moon

In the great green room there was a telephone and a red balloon and a picture of the cow jumping over the moon and there were three little bears sitting on chairs and one little boy on a big wheeled bike, and an elevator that flooded the hallway with blood and REDRUM REDRUM REDRUM...wait, what? My point is, kids really like this book. A lot.

Cost: $8.99, though don't be surprised to look around one day and realize that you own no less than seven copies of it, even though you don't actually recall buying it in the first place. You back away, a little unsettled. You trip over three or four copies of Guess How Much I Love You. The lights grow dim. And then the bunnytaur is upon you. Goodnight. NOBODY.