The Monster Mash

We had a delightful trick-or-treat experience last night. Jon the Fireman stayed out waaaay longer than I expected, and Heidi the Pooh fell asleep in the stroller, so all was good. I handed out candy on the porch while J went with the kids from house to house. That was interesting. All the kids were very polite and I saw a lot of cute costumes, but the highlight had to be a young man dressed like Bruce Lee who did a running backflip off our hickory tree. That is something you don't see every day.

But now we have Thanksgiving to look forward to. Nice. I love me some Thanksgiving. Of course, in the next month we've also got two doctor's appointments for Tiny H, 3 more exams to grade and the grind of getting classes ready every week. So it'll probably go by way quicker than I realize...shoot, it just occurred to me that I'm already behind on thinking about Christmas shopping. Dang it!

Why I'm quitting tobacco

Whoo Nelly, have I gotten out of the habit of this. I switched from staff to faculty and, consequently, I am on campus only a couple days a week. So, sure, you'd think that would give me more time to blog, but it turns out that watching a 2- and 1-year-old all day long is really time-consuming. Huh. Note to self.
Anyway, besides Heidi's epilepsy, things really aren't that interesting. I mostly watch Disney during the day and try to sneak in some recorded programs at night. Oooh, that's new though--I'm finally done nursing and getting up in the middle of the night, so I don't have to go to sleep at 9 p.m. anymore! Score! It's the little things.
I have to go grade my Romanticism midterms now. Fun stuff. But I will leave you readers out there with this thought: is it self-loathing of me to never want to eat my own cooking? Or am I simply just bad at it?

You should have died. You should have laid down and died.

Man, I got one of those skull-cracking, nausea-inducing, had-to-lie-down-on-the-couch-with-the-baby-propped-up-on-my-gut-because-standing-was-too-difficult headaches last night. It was so bad that I actually took a Tylenol. People, I haven't taken an over the counter drug in something like three years. That's how bad I felt. And you know what? That Tylenol made me feel better in about 30 minutes. Anytime I hear people trashing modern society, I will always point out how much worse it was back in the day when there was no Tylenol, tampons or frozen pizza. Take that, nostalgia. You lose.

And I'll also tell you that I had insomnia from about midnight until 3:30 this morning, so when Tiny H woke up at 2:30 and Lil J was up at 2, I was actually pleased to go check on them, as it gave me something to do. And I'm being completely serious. That's my life, folks.

It was like a 4-year-long Iditarod race

I woke up this morning, turned on the news and saw that Alabama won the BCS title game last night. I had completely forgotten it was on. Geesh, what have I become that I'm forgetting big football games? Well, I guess the easy answer there is that I became a mom. I'd like to blame my forgetfulness on the fact that we got a distracting 4 inches of snow yesterday afternoon. It took us about twice as long to get home yesterday, and that was even with the school letting us out an hour and a half early. I'm so glad they did that, because I'm pretty sure driving home in that kind of weather during rush hour traffic would have suuuuuuuucked. Days like that make me really glad that when I was going to college in Rochester, I never really had to drive anywhere. They know what they're doing when they discourage kids from living off campus. I see that now.

"That was before you became a miserable miser, consumed by greed." "Well, nobody's perfect"

I need some input about what to do when your 4-month-old keeps flipping onto her belly at night and then crying because she's stuck and doesn't know what to do. At first, I was impressed when Tiny H learned how to roll from back to belly, but it would have been really nice if she'd figured out how to roll the opposite way at the same time. I was up 4 times last night helping her calm down and return to her back so she could resume sleep. I'm so out of it. We have a meeting this morning, and my only hope is that I don't snore LOUDLY in the middle of it. The good news? My boss brought bagels today. One day, I look forward to drowning my fatigue in a nice, hot vat of overly sugared coffee, but while I'm nursing, complex carbohydrates will have to do.

I saw a bright light...I thought we were on

Well, that was a nice break. We had a delightful Christmas Eve and Christmas, although I have to admit we didn't do anything for New Year's Eve at all. J came into our bedroom at 11:45 on New Year's Eve to wake me up and see if I wanted to watch the ball drop, and I just smiled at him and went right back to sleep. Yeah, it's 2010. Good for it.

I'm also happy because I finally stopped going to my old optometrist (who seemed to think he could cure my burning retinas by lecturing me about Obama's health care plan), went to a new one, got new contacts, and now my eyes feel totally fine. See, here's the thing: I have a job, so I'd much rather pay $170 for new contacts than listen to a conservative talk to me for 45 minutes about how generous insurance companies are. Really? Even if they are, I don't care. My eyes are on fire!

And in 13 days, I stop working in the library and start teaching 3 art history classes here. This affords me more time with the kids and more opportunities to spread my thoughts to today's youth. First up, no more emo music.

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.