But My Baby Needs Those Platform Heels!

Over the past few months, my husband and I have come to the realization that no, we’re not going on that over-seas trip because we’re having a baby!  We’re not installing new kitchen cabinetry because we’re having a baby!  We’re not fencing in our backyard because we’re having a baby!  You’re not going on that sky-diving trip because we’re having a baby and you can’t die and leave me here alone.  What?

The money we would be spending is now going to nipple cream, butt cream, blankets that you receive things in, blankets that you wrap things up in, blankets that are annoyingly called “lovies”.  Swings, play-pens or yards or packs or boxes, onesies – twosies – threesies.  If you’re a new parent, the list is overwhelming.  Will my child die if I don’t buy this brand of wipe?  Should I be concerned about this pacifier and the manufacturer’s evil plan to confuse my baby?  Is this my mother’s nipple?  IS IT? I’m so confused!  Maybe my baby should have this type of toy so that he is intellectually stimulated at a very young age, which will prove to be beneficial when he is sitting for the MCAT in 20 plus years. 

Check these out:

Staring rabbits.  Any way you turn this puzzle, the rabbits just keep staring.  Is this really interesting to a toddler?  Where are the fun colors and the cute bunny faces?  I get it.  There are several different ways to solve this puzzle.  Thank God.  I wouldn’t want my child to get his feelings hurt when it didn’t work on his first try.  Now, to go and find a little league soccer team where the coach cheers when a player runs away from the ball and tells him, “Hey, great job recognizing your feelings about that ball.  Who needs to score? Or play the game, right?  High-five.”

Look are that pretty green paint.  So soothing.   Cute bassinet, right?  Hmm…wheels may not be a great idea.

OH MY GOD.  WHAT’S WRONG WITH THAT DUCK?!

I phone, you phone, we all phone for ridiculous apps.  Hey, hun, we should totally buy that app that analyzes our baby’s cry.  I mean, I definitely want to put my overly expensive phone in the crib where our child can have explosive diarrhea all over it and then I’ll be like, Oh, no.  Baby is crying.  Let me go check my phone and see why.  Wait.  I can’t because it’s covered in poop.  What do I do now?!!  I just want to know if the app recognizes the cry of a baby who is sad she was born to such f-ing idiots.

Oh, Glory Be!  Do you think she knows there’s a baby coming out of that hole in her vest?  Maybe you’ve seen this picture before.  I searched for its origin and could not for sure connect it to www.togetherbe.com, but it seems likely they are the ones to blame.  And, they’ve taken this particular product off the website.  Wonder why?  I love alien baby heads.  This particular baby head is consuming this woman from the inside out.  But at least they are both warm.

Microorganisms and A New Camera

 

It’s almost time for second breakfast, so I’ll keep this short. 

Destro went swimming in the river.

Destro went swimming in the river and got a microorganism up his you-know-what.

Destro went swimming in the river and got a microorganism up his you-know-what that caused a bladder infection.

Destro is now on antibiotics.

I got a new camera.

And some dirty looks.

Give Me Cookies And I’ll Show You My Rack

One of the members of my writing group wrote a personal essay about taking her 85 year old mother bra shopping.  What an experience.  Can you imagine?  It was a great topic and got me thinking about a bra fitting my mother made me go to when I was 12.

“Mom!  Close the door!”

“Oh, please.  Nobody’s paying you any attention.”

Did anybody else’s mother do this?  Just pull open a dressing room door or jerk open a curtain without any pause to see if you’re dressed?  Oh, and then invite in a stranger to feel you up?  Not only was I 12 with boobs bigger than my classmates, but I also had hips and was at least two inches taller than my male counterparts.  It was awkward being 12.  My mother’s solution to my “boob problem” was taking me to Belk’s annual bra fitting.  Really?  Is it really necessary for a stranger to see me topless?  How hard is it to pick out a bra anyway? 

I remember standing in front of the dressing room mirror waiting for my mother and the bra consultant  to bring me the appropriate selection of underwires, seamless shapes, and double clasps.

I hope at least one has butterflies on it.

And then I realized I hadn’t shaved my armpits.  And it was quite possible that I’d forgotten to put on deodorant.  Yep, no deodorant.  Shaving and wearing deodorant were still new tasks that I sometimes forgot.  I was also not good at brushing my hair, but that’s another story.

Oh, no.  What if she gets stabbed by my pokey pit?  I wonder if anyone else can smell that?  I want to go home.

Before I had a chance to throw my floral polo over my head, my mother flung open the door and she and the consultant entered the room.  So much for my escape.  I covered myself with my polo.  I mean, could we sit down and have some cookies, get to know each other before I show you my rack?

“Alissa, this nice lady is going to measure your bust to make sure we’ve picked out the right size. “

The consultant pulled out her measuring tape and asked me to put my hands on my hips.

EEEEEK!!!! POKEY POKE POKE POKEY AND NERVOUS SMELLS…GAH

And just like that she was done measuring.  And I was thinking we were done.  Nope.  Next thing I knew she was wrapping me up in a bra and instructing me on the proper way to wear one.

“You’ve got to get in there and situate them.  Bend over and pull them up and over and into the cups.”

I got lost in the middle of word problems in my math class and this lady wanted me to remember how to navigate the proper steps to putting on a bra. 

The first couple of bras didn’t work.  They were uncomfortable, they were too pointy, they were too grown up.  Finally, we found one.  I didn’t look like a tramp.  I wasn’t lopsided.  I was held in place by an off-white, seamless, slightly padded underthing.  And even though it didn’t have butterflies on it, it did, somehow make me feel a little better.  Even though I had five o’clock shadow under my arms and no one wanted to stand down wind of me, I felt a twinge of confidence.  Of course, that could have just been the AC kicking on.

ANGRY NURSE

Do not, whatever you do, do NOT NOT NOT piss off the nurse with the giant needle.  Let’s start here: My medical history involves a few fainting spells.  My mother would correct me by saying, “Those weren’t ‘spells’. You dropping to the ground like someone had suddenly ripped out all of your bones and replaced them with packing peanuts, white as a ghost is not a ‘spell’.”  Duly noted, Mother.  It would happen occasionally, mostly spurred on by some sort of pain.  The first time I remember fainting, I was in the line for the water fountain in preschool.  I was probably four years old.  I tripped on a piece of upturned carpet and my chin broke my fall.  After getting up I fell again, this time out cold.  Awesome.  Way to make the cute boy notice you.  Oh, well. He was focusing on some other four year old – a hussy whose mother hadn’t made her wear the hood on her jacket.  There was also a boy Henry who made fun of my hair.  That has nothing to do with my fainting.  Henry, I just want you to know that I still remember.

I fainted in a Wendy’s once, too.  This one…I can’t remember if there was pain.  I think maybe I was just hungry?  Please.  Like the idea of a juicy hamburger and a frosty has never made you a little light-headed.  I’m sure, if this were to occur today, my older brother would this time choose to catch me instead of moving out of the way and letting me fall to the floor.  Sure of it.  And the other times, well, I was very sick with chickenpox, had an ingrown toenail (Hi, my name is Alissa.  Nice to meet you.  I will now tell you personal tidbits that will make you want to vomit that burrito you just ate on your lunch break.  Thanks for stopping by!)and, oh yes, had my blood drawn.

Which brings us to Angry Nurse.  I had a routine appointment the other day.  I knew I was scheduled for blood work, so I made sure to hype myself up.  Guess what?  I’m a grown woman now. I can totally handle this. Needles are fun – in a non-druggy kind of way.  No fainting from this girl!  EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE FINE.  And the truth is it’s not the needle.  It’s the fear of looking like a peanut packed ghost-idiot on the floor of the lab.  I made sure to drink a lot of water before the appointment because I was once told that my veins are limpy (Yeah? Well, you’re a whore, so there you go.) and extra hydration can help plump them up.  I wish this also worked for boobs.  I had a positive attitude and felt pretty plumped up.

ENTER ANGRY NURSE STAGE RIGHT.

ANGRY: You can sit right there.

ME: Oh, great.  Thanks.

ANGRY: Name?

ME: Alissa Miles

ANGRY: Birthdate?

ME: 9-17-82

ANGRY: Which arm?

ME: Oh, uh.  My left, I guess.  I’m a righty…so, my left.

ANGRY: (snarl) Put your hand out.  No, like this.  And squeeze this ball.

ME: Puppies.

ANGRY: ?

Squeeze squeeze slap slap prod prod.

ME: Your scrubs.  They have puppies on them.  Cute.

Squeeze squeeze slap slap prod prod.

ANGRY: Your veins are worthless.

ME: But I drank like a gallon of water.

ANGRY: Really?

ME: Well, not really a gallon.  But a lot.

ANGRY: Doesn’t look like it.

ME: (inner thoughts)What? I’m lying here? I just gave you the clearest pee sample in the history of pee samples and I’m lying? You could drink that, dammit. (To ANGRY) Perhaps you could try my right arm?

ANGRY: grumble grumble

Squeeze squeeze slap slap prod prod. 

ME: Looks like we’ve got a winner.

ANGRY: Yeah. (inner thoughts) And now I will take all of your blood because you seem to be a smart ass and way too happy and because I am ANGRY and stabbing people with needles is the only thing that makes my life worth living and I will never crack a smile or pretend to be happy. I prefer to scowl and share my displeasure with the world.   I wear these puppy scrubs to remind me how much I hate puppies and want to drown them in vats of hot oil.

Several vials of blood later, I made it out of the lab alive and conscious (and possibly a couple of pounds lighter – how much does blood weigh?), which only proves to my mother that I don’t need to lie down every time I pluck my eyebrows.  I CAN handle pain and not faint.

That’s Not Paint. That’s The Stain of Death.

Honestly.  People need to leave some projects to the professionals.  Just because you can’t afford new hardwood floors doesn’t mean you should try to put down carpet yourself and in the process accidentally staple-gun your girlfriend’s bischon frise to the floor because you like to consider yourself a “man’s man” who can drink beer and operate pneumatic machinery.  Fluffy is not a dust bunny. And your pair of sunglasses is not the proper eye protection.  I found this post on Apartment Therapy’s site this morning and I had to laugh.  All the DIYers out there never mention the projects gone wrong.  This is somewhat of a relief for me as I am not great at “doing it myself.” I also love this comment left by a reader:

“There is the wall in my living room that I tried to paint so it would subtly mimic the clouds in an adjacent painting. Instead, the wall looks like an unfortunate victim of a party where some one drank too much Blue Curaçao and threw up all over.”

Here is my follow-up question: Was there ever a point that you stopped and said, “Huh. This sort of reminds me of 1990 – 1992.” No? And who says, “Hey, those clouds in that painting would look great on my wall. I would like to “subtly mimic” them by painting my wall the color of Blue No. 1. Let’s give her a go!”

Someone should stop me if I ever:

1. decide to “subtly mimic” the pattern Destro’s crusty dried drool makes on his water bowl mat.  That will not add a classy feel to the walls.

2. decide to blow up pictures from the wedding.  That one where the camera caught my crazy eye will not get any better cropped and larger.

3. decide to make pillows out of the jeans that no longer fit.  The pockets could hold my used tissues after I cry myself to sleep.

4. decide to make miniatures of  The Hubbs and me and our hypothetical children.  Playing with dolls is #6 on the Reasons To Get A Job/Someone Should Be Worried list.

5. decide to upholster our armchair in recycled hospital linens.  That’s not paint.  That’s a stain.