Get some rest. If you haven't got your health, you haven't got anything

Have I ever mentioned how much I hate the political season? I actually have nothing against politicians themselves or the American political process. I just hate the thousands of people who apparently have nothing better to do than wait in the wings of the various news shows until they can tell us their opinions of the candidates. Who are these people? Why are they so opinionated when they are, by the looks of it, unemployed? Freaks. Get a real job! I have decided that I'm not even going to turn on the Today show until 7:10 for the rest of the year since they have that stupid section at the beginning of every show when either a Republican or Democrat comes on and tells us what we should think. So annoying. They're like the telemarketers of broadcast news. You know what, guys? If I have a question about an issue, I'll call you. Otherwise, shut it. Oh, and I hate political commercials, too. How dumb do they think we are anyway that they believe we're going to vote based on a commercial? Do people actually do that? It would be like buying a Budweiser because Clooney does the commercials...well, ok, maybe I've done that...but it's Clooney! Clooooooney!

Takhomababy

It's too bad Ashley's in San Francisco and probably won't see this, because I feel like she, especially, would appreciate this (chili mac!). We went out to dinner on Saturday. They gave Lil J a hat. View the resulting cuteness:

"Mike thinks I'm a dork." "Mike IS a dork."

My first class teaching art history went well last night. The students seemed especially grateful that I'm not making them give a presentation or write a research paper. Apparently, I'm old-fashioned about this, but I just don't think freshmen in an art history survey class need to be delving that deep into any one issue yet. I'm going to be scrambling to teach them 600 years of art history in 15 weeks. I don't want to waste any time listening to them give presentations on obscure Flemish Mannerist painters and their weird alien baby Jesuses. That's just how I feel about it. Oooh, but the cool thing is that I had a student on my roster (and she didn't show up so I'm wondering if this is her stage name) named Skye Dalrymple. How cool is that name?!? I told J that this morning and that if we ever have a daughter, I wanted to name her Skye, but he informed me that Skye is a very popular porn star name. Dang it! Foiled again! But that reminded me of how I used to have this plan to write a series of English-style mysteries featuring a free-spirited, artistocratic Englishman named Hedgerow Witherspoon. I need to get on that. Just so I can keep typing "Hedgerow Witherspoon." I love it.

Dang it, Mom, I'm wearing my head gear!

I was listening to Little Red Corvette on my way to work this morning. I don't know why I bother listening to lyrics anymore, since none of them make any sense. I'm pretty sure that this particular song is an extended metaphor about things I don't want to think of Prince doing (ewww!), but I'm not sure exactly what. This is why I never did well in my English classes when we studied poetry--I always wanted to shake those Emily Dickinson/Sylvia Plath-types and yell "Stop babbling and get to the point!"

Lil J's been doing better with sleeping the last few nights. In fact, I would say he's been doing excellent except for the fact that the neighborhood morons, oops, I mean kids have been waking him up playing basketball at 11 p.m., 3:30 a.m., etc.... Last night, they woke him up at 10, and as I was sitting there trying to calm him down, I was actually envisioning setting those kids on fire. Only for a second, but I'm still kind of disturbed with myself. Normally I only fantasize about maiming celebrities, which doesn't count as a bad deed since they're not actual people and all.

I cannot stress this enough: "brung" is not the past tense of "bring"

I think I'm going to take a short sabbatical from posting for the next few days because I fear that my "I'm so worn out, I could cry" mantra is getting old. And since I'm also exceptionally cranky right now, I can't even find the joy in making fun of celebrities, so I don't have much else to talk about. Pitiful.

If Muffy goes to Harvard, she'll ruin her life

In addition to the two bottom teeth we noticed coming in last week, Lil J is now getting his upper left front tooth. Egad. He's going to have a full set of teeth by the time he's 8 and a half months old at this rate. And, let me tell you something, he did NOT sleep well this weekend. But, geez, three teeth coming in all at once? I'd probably be curled up in a ball in a corner, crying, so I'm actually impressed at his mental toughness.

Oooh, we also went to two open houses this weekend. Ahh, these homes were glorious. Nice, big yards with mature trees, nice bedrooms with big closets, plenty of room, and one even had a Florida room. Of course, we can't really afford either one, but it was nice to look and dream for a little while. We also drove by a couple enormous mansions outside of town that looked like they had about 5000 square feet IN THE GARAGE. We just drove by and laughed. Ha ha. Rich people. They are amusing.

I'm not here for you, man. I don't care about your crime

We have confirmation: Lil J is getting teeth! J was playing with him last night and helping him put this little plastic toy in his mouth (but, trust me, it's bigger than a toilet paper roll so he can't swallow it...unlike the little plastic flower I was letting him chew yesterday that he stuck entirely into his mouth, started gagging and consequently threw us into hysterics...whee!), and he heard a "click." So we felt his gums, and you can feel at least two teeth breaking through his bottom gum. Neat! I was starting to wonder if he was ever going to be able to make the "th" sound. Now I can rest easy that he will one day be able to say "THank you, Mom, for taking care of me when I was a baby and getting up so often at night THat you drove dangerously in traffic, were tempted to THrow forks at Dad every morning and once almost kicked a kitten." That will be gratifying.

Great gravy!

Things seem to be improving with Lil J's sickness, so we're grateful for that. His temperature isn't near as high as it was on Monday and Tuesday. Unfortunately, it's still around 100, so the pediatrician wants me to call the ENT today to talk to him. And every time I have to make one of these phone calls, I start mentally packing to stay in the hospital for four days. I've got to stop doing that. The power of positive thinking!

We took Lil J out for a car ride last night because he finds it relaxing (although how he manages to relax while J drives, I'll never understand. Zing!), so we drove around some neighborhoods looking for houses. It totally seems like the houses we can afford are complete junk, and the ones we like (and are actually made of something more sturdy than cardboard) are about $30,000 more expensive than we can really spend. How does that happen? Is this some sort of conspiracy to make us live beyond our means? Should we make J get a second job? Will I have to sell a kidney to live in a nice house? Cause I like my kidneys right where they are, thank you very much.

Touch me and I yell "rat."

I think I might be a robot. Otherwise, how could I possibly be surviving another night of Lil J being up, fussy, crying and only wanting to be walked and held? I'm a robot! Or, to be more precise, I'm an ANNdroid! Yeah, the poor little guy is still dealing with that fever. Even when the Tylenol is working, he's coming in at around 100 degrees. I really had no idea how hot babies can get when they're sick. I can't even remember the last time I had a fever like this...probably because it's been like 32 years. But Grandma S. is watching him this morning, and she's got lots of experience with the sick kids, so she'll probably figure something out that J and I never even thought of. Grandmas are cool like that. They are veritable fonts of information...not like us robots that can only do what we're programmed to do.

Be afraid. Be very afraid

I should have known something was up with Lil J yesterday when he was sitting at the table for dinner and only had his cereal and half a container of baby food. That right there should have told me something was up. Plus, he was really tired yesterday and had a little cough, but I was still thinking that it was coming off the medications that was causing all that. Boy, was I wrong. He was up at 1 last night, and I could tell he was a little warm, but having my gift for denial, I figured he'd get better. Then at 4, he woke up again, I picked him up, and he felt like a furnace. Turned out he had a temperature of 103.1. J just took him to the pediatrician, and it turns out it's probably just a mild virus, but we still have to keep an eye on his temperature because if it spikes or keeps going up and down, we have to get him back to the doctors. I was going to post about the Olympics and how I'm reading Twilight, but now all I want to do is keep hitting myself for being so stupid and then hope that the beating makes me go back to sleep.

My Dad's favorite joke: "Did you hear about the lady who shaved her legs and wrecked 'em?" Say it out loud

I was just reading this article on Yahoo about the country's fastest-dying cities (fun!) figuring I'd be reading about places like Detroit (which, to this day, I still associate with the movie Robocop), but it turns out Ohio is home to 4 of the top 10 dying cities in America. Score! We're number 1! Yeah, they said Cleveland, Youngstown, Canton and Dayton have four of the slowest economies and dwindling populations in the entire U.S. of A. Dayton is where I was born, so this makes me glad I live in Columbus, where we've always got Ohio State and Nationwide Insurance to keep people employed. Dodged a bullet on that one! I'm also interested to learn that Ohio is considered to be in the "Rust Belt." I thought we were in the Corn Belt. Huh. Learn something new every day. Maybe we're actually in the Rusty Corn Belt or the Corny Rust Belt. Ba da bing!

My cans! My antique cans!

Well, Lil J didn't exactly sleep through the night last night, but at least he went back to sleep the times he did wake up. I'll take it. In fact, right now I'm happy just to get two hours of continuous sleep once a night. How's that for lowering one's expectations? I remember back in my single days of insomnia when I was mad that I only slept 5 hours. 5 hours! I was so spoiled, and I didn't even realize it.

They're painting my office in the library today. I could be back there right now getting dizzy off the fumes, but I decided to be responsible and work out front instead. I'm no fun anymore.

On top of spaghetti

I have some questions today. Can the mother of an 8-month-old still get postpartum depression? Or is that just called "depression?" Can an 8-month-old actually have insomnia? Why else would a baby be up and wired since 3:30 in the morning? Is it withdrawal from his medicine? Is he deliberately trying to drive mommy and daddy to the asylum? Is this heavy, sharp pain in my chest simply stress, or am I having a heart attack? Where in my medicine cabinet....[Mom fell asleep while typing. I am going to go eat a fly. Sincerely, Wubbiss]

How dare you break wind before me!

So last night J, Lil J and I went to look at a house in the neighborhood where we'd like to move. In the ad, it sounded like it would be a pretty good fit for us. And walking through the upstairs (it was a bi-level), everything seemed pretty nice. But then we walked into the lower level. People, there was a jacuzzi bathtub just sitting in the middle of the room. Well, ok, it was in the corner, but it was just out there in the open. What in the world is that about? There was a complete bathroom on that level that had its own door and everything, but the owners still installed a tub in the middle of the family room? I'm sorry? I was trying to reason out why somebody would do such a thing, but we've basically concluded that there were some parties going on in that house of which we don't want any more information. Ewww. Bathtub in the middle of the room...who does that? So the house search continues. Maybe the next one will have a horse just standing in the kitchen. It is a weird world out there, folks.

Good grief

I saw the news story yesterday about the 22-year-old kid who was sleeping on a Greyhound bus in Canada and was stabbed and beheaded by his 40-year-old seatmate. And I cannot stop thinking about it. It's one of those completely random crimes that makes no sense, which is horrific enough, but now that I have Lil J, I'm already afraid he'll be on mass transit one day and have something like that happen to him. What I'd like to do is make sure he never leaves the house and/or never sleeps in public, but I'm guessing that's going to be a hard rule to enforce. Seriously, though, how can a person do that to another person? I can't even eat a chicken leg because I feel bad for the chicken it once belonged to. How in the world does a person treat another person like that? How does someone's mind get that far gone? Video games? Drugs? Is he just completely insane? Can there even be an explanation that would make sense?