Letter B

TGID

Well, another NaBloPoMo kicked in the head. I feel like I never really hit a groove this year but I'm still feeling a nice sense of accomplishment, so there's that. Thanks for hanging in there with me. Next up, me doing nothing but knit the next couple nights. And possibly finish the book I've been working on since September. Be back soon.

Elevator, Going Up!

My 20th high school reunion is going on right now but I couldn't make it for a variety of reasons. Ultimately, I am okay with this. (Who needs reunions when you have Facebook?) But I hate to miss a party and therefore I am a little sad tonight. So, I have decided to post the elevator pitch of my life during the last 20 years for you since I can't deliver it there, in person, while cradling a glass of wine and a canapé. Here goes:

Ahem. After high school I went to Madison for my undergrad years. Did a junior year abroad in Budapest, Hungary, months after the Berlin Wall fell. While there realized Kafka's writings were actually non-fiction. After graduation moved to San Francisco. It was fun, there were piercings, but ultimately could not find work so moved back to Budapest. Fell in love with a painter. Took side trips to a war zone and the arctic circle. Wrote a buttload of poetry. Left Hungary after three years and moved to New York City to go to grad school and get an MFA. Hungarian boyfriend followed. We married for love and a work permit. Chickened out of grad school due to enormous tuition and went to work for a software company instead. Spent the Silicon Alley boom in various crazy companies doing various crazy things on the Internet. Divorced Hungarian husband. My best friend moved in and we got a dog. Lost wacky Internet job when company went under in the bust. Watched in abject horror at the World Trade Center burning and collapsing as I stood in Union Square. Best friend proposed. Got my dream job. Married best friend and honeymooned in Paris. We had a baby boy a year later. Started a blog. Quit dream job. Left New York for a small town. Had a baby girl a year ago. Yes, I have a picture of them. I am still blogging and I occasionally still write poetry. Gulp. Nibble, nibble.

So, what have you been up to the last 20 years? One paragraph. Go!

Leftovers Anyone?

Leftovers Anyone?, originally uploaded by LetterB.

Corny

Hope you're having a great Thanksgiving (those of you who are celebrating it today). We were four adults and two kids and we cooked for twelve. Let me know if you need leftovers.

Let me just take this opportunity to say how thankful I am for any and all who take a moment to read this blog. It tickles me endlessly that you do it. Thank you.

My Get Out Of Posting Free Card

It's Wednesday night. I got my smartwools on. Oh yeah, it's business time.

Honestly, It's All Twitter's Fault

Well, the less said about last night the better. Checking Willa's mouth this morning I saw another tooth coming in on the bottom that I hadn't noticed. This is in addition to her top incisors and a molar. Just glad we are not traveling for Thanksgiving because the only way this could be more fun is if air travel were somehow involved.

I read this article over the weekend about "slow blogging." The phrase is meant in the same vein as "slow food" and the upshot of the piece was that less frequent, more reflective blogging equals good and frenetic multiple daily posting ala Gawker or HuffPo equals bad for a certain section of the blogging community. Aside from the ironic timing of it coming during National Blog Posting Month I thought it was kind of interesting that this subject matter would make it all the way to the New York Times (even if it was the Sunday Styles section. WTH? Why are blogging articles always put there?  Weird. Sorry, digressing.) I feel like it is still a pretty fringe activity to have a personal blog and it's hard to imagine a lot of NYT readers would be interested in such arcana. Anyway, it made me feel a little better about not posting here as much as I used to. Now that I am part of a movement I am hoping I will feel smug and superior instead of lazy and inadequate. Yay.

Sleep Is For Sissies, Part 27

Dear God. I cannot take this. Tell me again why I had a baby in my late thirties? I can't hack the sleep deprivation this time around. This morning I was woken up for the day at 4:30 AM by an unhappy, teething baby. I am a mess. Anyway, I swore I would not stay up too late tonight reading posts and writing some half-assed thing at 11:52 so this is all I am posting. Pray for me that she'll at least make it to 5:30 tomorrow.

The Fortress Of Attitude

Hey! I haven't done my obligatory nablopomo "this is what I am watching on TV tonight" post yet! Hooray! Tonight: Superman (The Movie) and then the Stephen Colbert Christmas Special. Neither disappointed. Except during the special when the sound cut out during one of the loveliest versions of "Peace, Love & Understanding" I've ever heard. That blew. Luckily I have a feeling Comedy Central will be replaying it a couple times. And Superman (I watched two-thirds before switching over) is really showing its age. I guess it is 30 years old but it's still an incredibly charming movie. It helped that I watched it with all my favorite wiseacre relatives who were doing a fair MST3K treatment on it. The title of this post? What my sister's secret hideout would be called. Snaaaap!

Four

Lowell turned four today. He's turning into such a little dude. We gave him a bike and he hopped right on that thing and rode it in the freezing cold until his little hands turned blue. No fear, no hesitation, just pure joy. There are no real words to describe the way I feel when I watch him do things like that. He is making giant leaps in abilities and maturity every day and there is barely a minute to sit back and savor it. Milestones like birthdays help you do that and today I was amazed. Happy birthday, my darling dearest boy.

Take Me To Your Eater

The Birthdayminator lives! Okay, going to bed now.

Currently

Totally channeling Jane Brocket with this photo. Right now I am decorating mini cupcakes as if my life depended on it. Lowell turns 4 on Saturday and these are for his class tomorrow. I am getting frosting all over the keyboard right now. My new Momku (you get a sneak preview; it goes out on twitter tomorrow):

Suburban momdom
Complete. Now proud owner of
Cupcake carrier

Wall, Hit.

Jesus f*ck I cannot do it tonight. I am so sick of myself! Blargh!

For The Lulz

1. Just listened to Matthew, who is just not a real wired type, try to figure out my post title from a few days ago.

Him: "Yes We Can... Haz?" What the hell does that mean? [Tries out different emphasis.] "Yes We CAN Haz? YES, We Can Haz?" What? Why is "has" spelled with a "z?"

Me: [lol]

Him: [muttering] I don't get it.

Me: It's LOLspeak. You know, Lolcats?

Him: [The very picture of bafflement.]

Me: The funny internet cats? "Invisible Bike"?

Him: Oh yeah. [Looks back at my blog]... I still don't get it. "Yes We Can HAZ?"

2. This is freaking hilarious and so true. We're all pretty much 21st century sorcerers that sit around bitching about how lame our magic wands and brooms are. Louis CK on Conan. Very funny. [via Kung Fu Grippe]

Cries For Help

1. So tonight I decided to make this white bean and butternut squash soup but forgot all about the soak-the-beans-overnight first step. Not a problem, I thought, I will soak the beans tonight and make the soup tomorrow. (I am so clever). But guess what? Not a white bean to be had in the entire house. Where is the jar of white beans that I was absolutely sure was in the pantry? Why is my brain unable to compute the fact that it does not exist and instead force me to keep looking for it over and over again? So now tomorrow I must go out and buy white beans (even though I know that jar is hiding here somewhere, mocking me). Anyway, my question is, since I'll be damned if I wait another day for this soup, do any of you out there have a good quick-soak method? Does one really need to soak at all? I seem to remember hearing that was passe. Please help me, Internet.

2. I have decided that I need to hire someone just to manage my children's clothing. I feel like I am drowning in outgrown and/or not-yet-grown-into clothing. I try to keep on top of it but it is completely out of control. You should see my basement. It looks like a children's thrift store threw up in there. Do any of you have any good tricks, systems, methods for this madness? Preferably ones that work by magic but I'll take anything at this point. Am I the only one suffering from this? Seriously, the clothing haunts me.

3. Willa has been taking us on a roller coaster ride of sleep / no sleep over the last few weeks. It's been exhausting and demoralizing because every time we think she's turned the corner she starts waking up again. I am also keen to wean her but now afraid to give up my ace in the hole. I rarely nurse her during the day but I still nurse in the early morning to eke out one more hour of sleep. I don't really have a question for you, more a plea: remind me that this will end. Remind me that I will sleep normally again someday. Tell me your own stories about sleepless nights with squalling babies and how you kept yourself from throwing them out the window. That would really help.

Yes We Can Haz

While I type this I am watching "The Wizard of Oz" for the second time tonight. Why? Because I can. I will always watch this movie if it's on. It's not nostalgia (ok, maybe a little bit of nostalgia) but more because I am absolutely fascinated with this film. I love it on several levels, some of which are deeply nerdy so I will stop now before I start spouting insufferable undergraduate-level theoretical analysis. Before "The Wizard Of Oz" I watched Obama on "60 Minutes." (I'm not going to count the brief stop at "Witness to Jonestown" between the two - would like to forget I ever saw any of that. Good lord.) It was the first time in a long time I have watched a presidential interview and only made fun of the host. (Hey, Steve Kroft, you are not Clint Eastwood, stop with the crazy squinting. You looked like you were trying to see the inside of Barack's skull. Also, 1974 called, they want their hairdo back. Oh, snip!) It was so weird to listen to the President (elect, yeah, yeah) and not want to immediately throw something at the TV screen. What am I going to do with my collection of foam bricks? Obama was great, if a little guarded. I can't wait for January. But the real reason for this post is not to talk about my Sunday TV watching but to point you to this awesome little blog Yes We Can (Hold Babies) that I found via Mimi Smartypants. An entire blog devoted to pictures of Obama with kids. There are some pretty cool pictures there. Some funny, some sweet and some seriously moving. I am so excited that he will be the first president that Lowell knows and remembers. Sure beats Ford, kid.

Gone Knitting

Hi, yeah, can't post tonight because I am too busy knitting and then frogging then re-knitting the same 16 rows over and over again. I can't get it right!! It's making me crazy. Pro tip to those of you who are also NaBloPoMo-ing: don't rekindle an old obsessive hobby at the same time. COUNTERPRODUCTIVE.

Funny Ha Ha

I've pimped these bitches before but if you are a podcast-listening type you really might want to check out You Look Nice Today. And if you're not a podcast-listening type then this might be the one that changes you. These guys are hilarious and unrepentantly geeky (no surprise that they met on Twitter). Here is one of my favorite episodes to get you started.  Enjoy. Or not. No pressure.

Too Close For Comfort

I watched "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" tonight. I don't think I have seen the entire movie since it came out. I was seven or eight when I saw it the first time, possibly at a drive-in. My dad took us to see it, that I remember. (My dad always seemed to have a blind spot for movies that were inappropriate for kids. I have a vivid memory of staying up late with him to watch the original "Invasion Of The Body Snatchers" on TV when I was maybe six. I don't think I slept for a week after watching it.) With "Close Encounters" I remember liking it but also being really freaked out by it. And whenever I think about the movie I get this weird uneasy feeling. We lived in Indiana at the time it came out, and that's where the beginning of the film is set. Around that time my own family was falling apart. My parent's marriage was in crisis and they fought constantly. Watching tonight I realized that the movie is about adults totally out of control. The shots of children watching from doorways or windows as their parents lose it would have been, shall we say, resonant for me at the time. I noticed while watching the scene where Richard Dreyfuss and Teri Garr have a huge fight that I was getting very upset and feeling a sensation close to panic. I can remember as a kid identifying the Richard Dreyfuss character with my dad, feeling then that something like what happened in the movie could happen to him. And in a way it did. All through the divorce and the immediate years afterwards he was a completely different person to me. Maybe at the time I had a prescient feeling that everything was about to change. I am glad I watched it again tonight but I think that will be it. Part of me wishes I had just stuck with "30 Rock." Bee boo bee boo boo.

Basic Cable

I am not a good knitter. I hover just above beginner level and I take such long breaks between projects that I forget all sorts of very basic things (like moving the yarn to the front to purl, duh). Because of this I have not really progressed from knitting plain rectangle shaped things. Anytime I want to make something with shape or interest I usually crochet. I grok the hook. For whatever reason two needles (or more) are just harder for me. This does not stop me from buying all sorts of fancy knitting supplies, you know, just in case. Tonight I decided to sit down and teach myself something new. Behold:

I finally put that cable needle to work. This is a very small step but I am feeling like I might be able to try a hat pattern I've been eyeing. I will probably document the whole process over at Roses Are Blue. If you are also novice knitter and want to play along let me know.

Did I Mention She's Walking?

Not sure I ever announced that Willa has been walking with gusto for a couple weeks now. Here is a video from the day she learned to stand up unassisted. She is trying so hard to keep up with Lowell that she now has several bruises on her face. Yesterday she started jumping on the bed. We are so screwed.

Matthew Cracks Me Up Yet Again

Him: [story about really crappy day with ninth graders]

Me: [supportive murmurs]

Him: Well, that was my day in a buttshell, how was yours?

Kersplash! On Etsy! Prepare To Spend Some Money!

You know how I just posted about my sister Kara's mad crafting skills? Well, she done opened up her Etsy shop! Now you can buy her stuff on the Internets. If you have a iPod listener on your xmas list look no further. And if you'd like one of her Joey bags for yourself (because they are super awesome and you will probably want one) I would order right now because those babies are going to sell out fast. Such a bargain too. Buy now before I convince her to raise her prices. This is so exciting.

Listing

Okay, time for my first It's-nablopomo-and-I-don't-have-any-idea-what-to-post-f*ck-it-I'll-just-do-a-random-list post!

1. Currently obsessed with meal planning. This is following the pattern of many of my other obsessions: read constantly ABOUT something but don't actually do it. Past obsessions include interior decorating, several hundred crafting techniques, meditation.

2. Took a pilates class today and spent the entire class wishing it would end. But felt fabulous afterwards and I really want to keep going. I think it may hit me right in the masochistic sweet spot.

3. I thought maybe I would use this nablopomo to stretch a little and do a series of posts on a theme or try to find some kind of ongoing story to write. Several of my friends in the computer have done this and I have loved reading them. I am not doing it because I don't seem to have the bandwidth to settle on an idea (read: I am terrified of doing any serious writing on this blog. What if you stop liking me?)

4. Lowell shouted at me today "I CAN'T HANDLE THE CANDY RULES!!!" It's true, he can't. Thankfully Halloween haul nearly gone. Birthday party tomorrow and praying there is no pinata.

5. PMS is killing me this month. Every single time I think about the election or about any of the Obama family (including the first puppy) I start welling up with tears. Also, spewing profanity-laced invective at the drop of a hat. Lowell repeated some doozies today. His preschool teachers are in for a treat this week!

My Last Two Days

What is better than a one-year-old with croup, diarrhea, and diaper rash? A one-year-old with croup, diarrhea, diaper rash AND 'roid rage. Jaysus. Actually, given how miserable she must be Willa has been pretty copacetic most of the time. But when she loses it she loses it and there is no getting her back. Thank God I am still nursing (wait, did I just say that?) because I have no idea what I would do if I couldn't give her boob. I am exausted.

We've had a bunch of doctor trips lately that involved giving blood and other fun stuff so Lowell has developed a serious phobia. When he had to come with me yesterday for Willa's appointment he was beside himself with fear and anxiety. I kept having to tell him that it was not his turn to see the doctor and that nothing would happen to him but it was pretty much useless. That's one of the difficulties of this age. They sit there speaking very good English, comprehending, saying logical things and you think wow, they are really maturing. You start to forget that they are still tiny maelstroms of emotion that no amount of nascent reason is going to tame anytime soon. That is until they are clinging to your leg across a parking lot, sobbing and begging to be left in the car when IT IS NOT EVEN THEIR DOCTOR'S APPOINTMENT. When we finally did get in to see the doctor Lowell just looked at her with his tear-streamed face and said, in a completely normal tone of voice "Barack Obama won. John McCain missed." He went on to have a nice political chat with the doctor as if nothing was wrong. Four is going to be a long year, isn't it?

Carolinas Are Blue

Blankie.jpg, originally uploaded by Alana.

Totally not into writing a new post tonight so I am going to link over to a post of mine over at Roses Are Blue, the crafting blog I share with my sister Kara. It's a bit about the baby blanket I crocheted for Willa and finished just in the nick of time, right before she stops being a baby. Please click over if you like that sort of thing or if you haven't seen my sister's crafting. Her stuff is amazing. Not surprising since she is amazing. You may not know this but she and my mother were entirely responsible for North Carolina going blue for Obama. They would pooh-pooh that but really, they worked their yankee asses off to make it happen. Bless their hearts.

Croup D'Etat

Willa has a case of the croup so I must keep this brief. Hoping she will sleep tonight, poor thing. Apparently the virus going around is so bad that when I talked to the doctor he prescribed the big guns right away. Very unusual for this practice so I am relieved that I even mentioned it to him. Usually croup is not a big deal. In fact, my first experience with it inspired this particular Momku:

Woke you. You're grumpy
Perhaps pediatrician
Was poor career choice

I'm always nervous about needlessly medicating but I am so glad I will not be spending the evening in a steamy shower with a miserable baby.

Still on a major election high over here. I think it's kind of funny how people are worried that the expectations are too high for Obama, or any mere mortal, to reach. They forget just how low the bar has fallen over the last eight years. The first time he gives a clear cogent answer at press conference or is able to actually discuss an issue with the intelligence and gravitas it deserves people are going to go into shock. He might not walk on water but the fact that he can chew gum while trying is going to mean a hell of a lot.

Yes We Did

When I was seven I got a pony. This is better. President-Elect Obama! Can't stop crying.

Why It's Not Easy Being Me (Or Being With Me): Reason #287

In the grocery store considered not buying bag of (very delicious and convenient) frozen turkey meatballs because the brand name is "Cooked Perfect." I actually stood there thinking "Do I want to support this kind of cavalier attitude towards the adverb?" Also, I can't watch ESPN for five minutes without shouting out the correct usage of "less" vs. "fewer." People in bars love me.

(Can you tell I am trying not to think about the election? La, la, la, la, not sure I am going to be able to sleep, la, la, la.)

Mad Street

Sometimes I get this strange resentful feeling that there was no Google Street View when I lived in New York. I missed it by, like, a month. (Curse you, Google Maps, for not paying your camera-wielding drivers to go just a little faster.) Also? SUBWAY DIRECTIONS. What I would have given to have those tedious minutes of subway route calculations eliminated. Of course I'm sure no one follows the Google subway directions. Probably considered just for tourists. But Street View? Oh, that could have saved my ass so many times. And now you can get it on your iPhone. So basically if you can afford an iPhone you can have virtual psychic powers. And play Tetris whenever you want.

This is all to say that I miss having someplace to be where I would need Street View. A dinner date, a new fun shop, even a boring sales meeting. I am dying for an iPhone but the overkill is so comical that I feel ashamed that I BURN WITH LUST for one. I wish these gadgets had been available when I actually needed them but I think I really just wish I needed them. Sometimes when I am stuck at home and can't leave because someone is napping or the weather is bad I feel like I am on house arrest. I actually pace and stare broodily out of the window. And then when I move around in my tiny orbit of house, school, grocery store, coffee shop I'll often start to feel claustrophobic and irritated. It's an indulgent thing to complain about but I once really thrived on stimulation. I loved the new, the different, the foreign. This is one of the hardest thing about domesticity for me, the crushing boredom of the routine. It's a routine I love on the one hand, one I fought for, one I made drastic life changes for the privilege to have, but it is still boring as f*ck on the bad days. And mildly boring on the good ones.

What the hell? I really just meant this to be a lighthearted post about the black magic that is Street View. Methinks this might be a darker November this time. Last year I was all hopped up on newborn. But who knows, it's almost Tuesday...

Jesus, I Nearly Blew It On The First Day

So I am doing NaBloPoMo again this year. Surprised? I imagine you might be since I've been so absent lately. (And by "you" I mean my 7 remaining readers.) And it's a good thing I remembered it myself here at 11:50 on November 1st because I almost blew it on the first day. I hope to redeem myself tomorrow with something more exciting. Woohoo! Better publish now before I come to my senses.