Skedoosh

It's our last day before winter break! Whoo! I'm not real sure what I'm going to do with myself on our days off for the next two weeks. Of course, I will be watching the kids and attempting to keep them full of food and in clean diapers. And I need to take Lil J to get a haircut. Oh, and I need to do a little more Christmas shopping. Well, if I didn't just answer my own question.

I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday! It really is the best time of the year what with all the sparklies, glitter and blinkies.

We do not wash our pits in the pool of sacred tears

I think I'm pretty up-front about the fact that I'm a nerd. I like to read, I always got good grades, and I've always enjoyed going to school. Nerd. J, on the other hand, is a geek. He was much more popular in high school, but he's really into computers, technology and gaming. Geek. We understand this about each other. Now sometimes our nerd and geek worlds intersect: we both like to watch Star Trek and Star Wars, I know how to Photoshop, and J tolerates my analytical dissections of the symbolism in Up and Saving Private Ryan. But I will never understand the whole gaming thing. For the last week or so, J's been going into his basement man cave after the rest of us go to bed (what? He doesn't want to go to sleep at 9? Shocking!) and playing whatever the latest version of Call of Duty is. I do not get the allure of pretending to kill pretend people for 4 hours a day, but as long as he's happy. Occasionally, however, I pick up on some of his gaming lingo and try to use it in daily life. Last night, I asked him if he was going to do downstairs and "frag some noobs" (translated that means "killing newbie players with fragmenting grenades"...I think). But after I said it, I couldn't stop laughing. Not just because I sounded like a moron, but the withering look J gave me was hilarious. Ahh, if only I'd had a camera. That look hovered somewhere between pity and disgust...but I could tell he really wanted to say "Yeah, I am!" Geek.

Are you suggesting I'm not who I say I am?

Lots to tell you, lots to tell you. First off, the party on Saturday was fun. Lil J had a great time playing with his new toys, and it was fabulous seeing everybody who came. My favorite part, however, was the next morning, when J and I were sitting on the couch with Tiny H and Lil J was off playing in the other room. Next thing we know, he toddles over to us with frosting all over his face and fingers and says "Mmm, cake good!" He'd been in the dining room sticking his fingers into the leftover cake. Heh. That's my boy.
And Tiny H has been flipping over like crazy lately! You can't even keep her on her back to change her diaper. Here is evidence:

And, lastly, I got a call from my GI doctor on Friday night with a diagnosis after the biopsies. I have a condition called eosinophilic esophagitis. Basically, my esophagus is getting inflamed with white blood cells for some reason. I'm on asthma medication (except that I swallow it instead of inhaling it) and we're hoping that'll help with the swallowing. As my Mom said, Lil J and I get the weirdest diseases. We're just too cool for lame stuff like, you know, colds.

Great Caesar's ghost!

Yesterday while we were at work, Lil J did about a dozen watercolors with Grandma S., and, far be it from me to make exaggerated statements about my child, but he's the next Kandinsky! Check it out:

I'm guessing I wouldn't see it at all if he wasn't my kid, but I see a good understanding of color concepts here, an interesting use of expressive technique, and a Titian-esque use of unexpected diagonals. And I'm not even joking when I say this is far better than anything I could come up with. All I can draw are tornadoes.

Tomorrow is Lil J's 2nd birthday party, so I'll post some pictures of that next week. The fams are coming over, and we'll be having a Cars cake, so I think it'll be rockin'.

Team Slacking Off

Anybody else in the mood to cut out of here, grab a hot chocolate and go watch a cheesy movie in the theatre? Not that I would actually do that because I have ethics concerning work (plus, we're having cake in here this afternoon), but it's just been one of those days. The kids are great, but everything else seems like one piece of bad news after another. Ugh. So ugh. For some reason, on days like this, I am reminded of the scene from Boomerang where Chris Rock says "First the Fat Boys break up and now this." Yes, first the Fat Boys and now this, indeed. And I haven't even heard back from the GI doctor about my biopsies yet. Although I'm feeling pretty confident they won't find anything there. My GI tract is pretty tricky and mysterious. We've had an adversarial relationship for years, and it enjoys messing with me. Anyway, yes, who's up for an afternoon showing of New Moon and a large bucket of popcorn?

Upsilon here makes a delicious cherries jubilee

I know you all are dying to see this, so I shall wait no longer. Behold! My duodenum!
It kind of reminds me of a cruller. Huh. Anyway, the scope on Monday was surprisingly clean. I didn't have the expected scar tissue (which is good), but that means we still don't know why I'm having all this trouble swallowing. The doctor is getting some biopsy results today, so I'll get to talk to him and hopefully find out more. The scope itself was pretty easy since I was knocked out the whole time. But, man, did I wake up loopy! I was on that Propofol drug that killed Michael Jackson, and I have a whole new understanding as to why that dude was crazy if he was actually on that every day of his life. I may sound like a poindexter here, but I don't get the attraction of prescription drug addiction. They never make me feel good; they just make me feel confused and disoriented. And if I wanted to feel like that all the time, I'd go ahead and move to Portugal, thank you very much. Vodka gimlets make much more sense, if you ask me. So there.

I do not like the cone of shame

My mother-in-law was telling us this morning that there's new evidence out there that it's good for you to only eat one meal a day. If that's true, just KILL ME NOW. I have no idea how people do that...heck, I'm up to eating about 4 or 5 times a day now. Once? The heck?

I actually am quite fearful that my GI doctor is going to give me a bunch of dietary restrictions if my scope is bad enough next week. 'Cause even though I don't smoke or drink, even I know there are things I do that don't exactly help with the heartburn. Like, say, drinking pop, considering chocolate to be a food group, throwing fits if I don't get pizza once a week, stuff like that. But, dang, if he tells me I have to cut that stuff out, I won't have any vices left. I'll have to take up shoplifting or cursing a lot. Ugh. What a pain.

Take a bath, hippie!

So Thanksgiving was nice. I definitely bought too big of a turkey for just me and J, but I'm sure the neighborhood raccoons will appreciate it come this weekend. Last week, I had been kicking around the idea of going shopping on Black Friday because I'm generally up at 3 anyway, so why not, right? Well, I decided to go for it, drove over to Target at 6 a.m. on Friday and rediscovered why I'm not too big on Black Friday shopping. That place was packed. Packed, I say! We shoppers were like Pringles with how on top of each other we were. I didn't even try to go into the electronics section, which turned out to be smart because all the good stuff was gone by 6 a.m. anyway. Sweet cracker sandwich. But the good news is that I got some toys for the kids, a new coffee maker for J, and some time to myself. Why I only get time to myself when the sun is down, I don't know, but I'll take it just the same.

Yeah, and I also watched Up 3 times yesterday with Lil J. It is truly a testament to that movie's quality that I watched it 3 times in 10 hours and did NOT want to kill myself. Ahh, Pixar, don't ever change.

Oh, and in medical news, my esophagus is getting scoped next week! I can't wait to see the pictures!