June 2007

I got up way too dang early for a Saturday. Someone forgot to give Liam the memo about sleeping in on Saturdays. We were up late with him again last night; this time it was swimming. My sister in law and her husband are staying at a hotel here in town and invited us to come over and let the boys go in the pool. Since I don’t think I own a swim suit that fits and even then I’d be hard pressed to wear it in mixed company, I didn’t go in the water. But Kile took Liam in and he LOVED it. As far as he was concerned it was just a big bathtub and he loves himself the bathtub. Still, it was 9:30 before we got out of there, the second night in a row that Liam was kept up so late. And if we do end up going to the drive in tonight to see “Live Free or Die Hard” then it’ll be the third night in a row that Liam is up late. Whoops. Still, the kid could have at least slept in a little this morning, you’d think.

Anyhow, I’m here to do a meme that I saw over on Rocks In My Dryer and you know I can’t resist a good meme. Especially on the weekend when it’s hard to come up with posts sometimes. So here we have “Five Random Questions”. Wee!

1. If you could only eat one food for the rest of your life, what would it be?
   That would probably be something unassuming like grapefruit. I wouldn’t want to pick one of my most favorite foods because I would hate to get sick of lobster or shrimp scampi or something. This is a really, really hard question though. Diversity is the spice of life, after all. No matter what I pick I’m guaranteed to get sick of it within a week’s time.
2. What’s the most nerve-racking “close call” you’ve ever had?
   I’m going to assume this means any “close call” and not just the kind you have when driving. Of course, I’ve had those too. I don’t know, that incident with Liam and the teeny, tiny Lego from a week or two ago was pretty bad. Then there was a the time those speed demons tried to run us off the road. I’m not doing so well at these questions, am I? I blame having to get up at 6:30 on a Saturday morning.
3. Name five features your ultimate dream house would have.
   Ah, now here’s a question I can really get behind. I could write a novel.
   • Hardwood floors. I detest wall to wall carpeting. While I know with wood floors I’d be wiffering right and left, at least I would know when they are absolutely clean. You can’t get carpet absolutely clean. It’s just NASTY.
   • A landscaped backyard. Or the funds with which to landscape it. I’m sick of looking out the back door at a yard full of weeds. We can’t ever have anyone over for barbecues or anything. It’s just embarrassing.
   • A three car garage. Garages are so puny these days. Ours is technically a two car garage but even if we had nothing stored in there, it’d be hard to fit two vehicles in there. At least a three car garage would be able to hold two cars PLUS all our junk. Sweet!
   • Five bedrooms. Four would be good too, but five would cover all the bases. That way Harry and Liam could each have their own room, we’d have one for guests and one more if we do have another baby. Perfect! But dang, that’d be one hell of a big house.
   • A hot tub. I’m a fool for a hot tub. A pool? Eh. But a hot tub? OMG, YES. I could sit in a hot tub until I’m one giant prune surrounded by wrinkles surrounded by more prunes. My love for the hot tub is great. This would go great in the landscaped back yard!

   There’s only about a billion more features Id like to have, but this will do for now, don’t you think?

4. Who has been the most influential non-relative in your life?
   Oh jeez. Let’s see here. Outside of some of the obvious choices (i.e. God, George Washington, Eleanor Roosevelt, etc) I’ll have to say it was probably a teacher or two. Actually, I know it was. It was Mrs. Flanagan, one of my third grade teachers. I had two, and they traded of which days each of them taught the class. The other teacher, Mrs. Haifly, was probably no less influential but I had a teacher’s pet thing going with Mrs. Flanagan. Both of these teachers really encouraged my love of writing. I remember Mrs. Flanagan sent me a postcard that summer from her vacation and I think I still have that around here somewhere.
5. What one non-physical feature would you most like to change about yourself?
   Ooh, non-physical. That’s harder.  In light of recent events, however, I have to say it’s my wishy-washyness (yes, that’s totally a word).  I need to speak up when I’m not down with things, even if it might cause a conflict.  I need to not be afraid to say “no” to people.  And when I do get stuck doing things I don’t want to do, I just need to suck it up and do it instead of freak out and curl into the fetal position.  Actually, I could probably go on and on and on with this question, couldn’t I?

So that’s my answers.  In the tradition of this meme, I’m supposed to come up with five more questions for anyone else who wants to do this meme to do.  But since no one will probably do it unless I specifically tag them, I doubt the questions I have come up with will matter that much.  Nevertheless, here they are and if you do do this meme, drop me a comment below and let me know!

1. If you had to choose one season to endure for the rest of your life which would it be?
2. Do you prefer apples or oranges? (ha!)
3. Name three movies that you consider to be the best movies of all time.
4. Name three movies that you are embarassed to admit that you love with all your heart.
   
5. If you could travel to any country in the world and spend a month there doing whatever you want, where would you go and what would you do?

Enjoy!

So. VBS is over and done with, at long, long last. Now, I never want to hear mention of it again. Tonight was “performance night” for the parents. They served up hot dogs and chips and such and then the kids were going to sing some songs they had prepared for us. We, perhaps against better judgment, decided to go ahead and go. I felt semi-relaxed from my trauma of yesterday and I had told OtherFriend that I would indeed be there. We showed up a little late, because Kile had his gosh-darned Halo practice, of course. But we got there. There were about a billion people there and both OtherFriend’s family and NewFriend and her family were there. I saw them across the room and while Kile stood in line for food, I went over to say hi.

By the time I made it over there, NewFriend had disappeared so I chatted briefly with her husband. I didn’t think there’d be room at the table, which was fine. I toyed briefly with the idea of grabbing on of the extra tables that was up against the wall and setting it up but decided against it. I noticed NewFriend was talking to someone else and it occurred to me; she’s avoiding me. Honestly, the idea that she might be upset with me hadn’t really crossed my mind until that moment. I’d sent her a couple text messages that hadn’t been answered but I wrote those off, I guess. It just surprised me. So I saw an empty table on the far wall and went to sit over there. Soon as I sat down, NewFriend returned to her seat and that just cemented it, as far as I was concerned. She didn’t come over and say hi, was another hint. I may need to be hit over the head a couple times to “get it” but I got it.

And you know, I did it to myself. I really did. Sure, I didn’t sign myself up for VBS and I never would have in a million, billion years. But I should have spoke up when OtherFriend signed me up. At the time, I didn’t want to say anything and seem like a selfish jerk. Looking back at how everything turned out, I really should have taken that chance because I don’t think there’s any way I could have come across as being a bigger jerk than I did this week. I didn’t go on Monday, and I didn’t go today. Turns out that NewFriend ended up going today when she wasn’t supposed to. I suspect that when she learned I wasn’t going to go (via one of my unanswered text messages), she decided she would need to go in to cover for me. So she rearranged her plans, which would be aggravating to her because she would be losing out on money she could earn AND she had to go back to VBS which no one wants to have to do.

So I feel like a prize idiot. Of course she was ticked with me. I would have been ticked with me too. I really did try to handle this the best way I could, though. It was just an incredible, awful trainwreck. I will always regret this week. Thinking of it makes my stomach turn. I felt so awful tonight, realizing that my friend was upset at me and I suddenly couldn’t stop the tears. I tried to keep them in but I couldn’t. So Kile gave me the keys to the van and I went and sat in the van until the performance was over. I felt awful not getting to watch Harry sing, but Kile recorded a video of it on his cellphone for me to watch which was nice. And leaving there felt about as good as anything ever has.

Will I ever do VBS again? I think we can say a big ol’ “HELL NO” to that one. I don’t think I’ll sign Harry up for it again either. He didn’t enjoy it that much and I might feel that if I put him in there and didn’t help out that I’d be a sort of freeloader and I don’t want to go through THAT whole slippery mess again. Nope, from here on out, NO VBS for us. Shoot, I’ll be lucky if I feel like I can show my face in church again after this whole fiasco.

I hate making people mad at me.

Yesterday, while largely a very stressful day for me (one of those cases where five hours just set the tone for the rest of the day, despite my best wishes), was quite possibly the best day Liam has ever experienced.  Look at it from his perspective: First thing in the morning, he’s off to vbs where he gets to dodge naptime and play with other babies and munch on Kix cereal all morning long.  Then, after a too-short nap at home, he’s off again to have lunch with his mom, brother, aunt and cousins.  And there, he samples a buffet like no other he’s ever sampled.  He had scrambled eggs, hashed browns, sausage, strawberries and funnel cake.  The kid was in HEAVEN.  After that, a relaxing afternoon at home with mom and dad, getting to rip it up in grand fashion around the living room (we NEED a BABY GATE).  That evening, falls asleep in the van only to wake up on papa’s shoulder amidst the greatest place he’s ever seen in his whole 11+ months of life: Toys R Us.

We’ve never taken him there before and we were killing some time and decided to scope out some of the baby toys, for present ideas for Liam’s first next week (DO NOT WANT).  Liam came awake and took a look around at the aisles and aisles of toys and I swear to you he actually gasped.  You know that intact of air babies sometimes do when they’re laughing?  It was like that, but more STUNNED than amused.  He was immediately charmed.  He laughed and clapped at all the toys we showed him and showed a particular preference for stuffed animals.  He would squeal and throw his arms out and hug these stuffed animals, all the time laughing like a maniac.  It was the funniest damn thing I’ve ever seen.

After that, we met my sister in law and her husband and her kids at Chuck E. Cheese for dinner.  Harry was rapturous and Liam was agog at all the activity and bright lights and screaming children.  He got his first taste of pizza, but could hardly concentrate on it for all the gaping he did at everything around him.  Kile and I walked around with him, let him ride on some of the kiddie rides and whatnot.  He LOVED that.  He also had a great time throwing empty soda cups around like a maniac hopped up on speed.  That was when I glanced at my watch and noticed it was 9 o’clock.  That’s at least an hour past his bedtime, if not two (probably two, considering the long day he’d already had at that point).  It was another half hour before we could finally tear the boys away from all the fun.  Predictably, Liam conked out in the van.  And despite my predictions, he stayed asleep when Kile laid him down upstairs in his crib and didn’t wake up once all night.  Maybe that was him thanking me for such an awesome, fantastic day.

So this week was the much dreaded “vbs”.  That stands, officially, for “vacation bible school” but I’m starting to wonder if there aren’t meant to be some swear words in there.  If you might recall (and you might not) I was signed up to help out with vbs.  I thought I was going to have to work in the “4’s and 5’s” room, but I got a last minute reprieve and have been in the nursery.  I’m sure it’s a better situation, if just barely.  Because there are no less than 11 children in that room every day.  And some of them don’t like to be separated from mommy.  One, actually, in particular.  And that child, being closer to 2 than to 0, can really SCREAM.  Or so my migraine tells me.  Tuesday and Wednesday weren’t so bad, and we thought he was improving.  Today we were told he’s coming down with a cold and he was decidedly worse.  By 11 I was starting to wish for a lobotomy, anesthesia or no.

I’m plain exhausted.  I’ve made no secret on here that I’m not good with taking care of other people’s children.  And this has been three VERY LONG days worth of other people’s children.   The thought of going back tomorrow makes me want to pull my lip back over my head and hide under it.  When I told NewFriend today that this was my punishment for something I’ve done wrong, she suggested that maybe it was God calling me where he needed me.  Nope.  God knows I’m not good with other kids.  No, this is definitely punishment.  I just wish I knew for what.

I may not go back tomorrow.  Right now I’m leaning towards not.  Considering that I got home today and proceeded to have a mini-breakdown, the result of pent-up nerves.  I’m just not made for this stuff, people.  But my sense of social duty might get the better of me and I may drag my ass back over there tomorrow.  I’d rather be boiled alive.