What getting to "sleep in" really sounds like

6:41 a.m.

Pitter-patter of little feet down the hall.

Junior: Mom? MOM? I'm awake.

Me: It's still early, Junior. Try to go back to sleep.

Junior: Okaaaaaay.

Pitter-patter of little feet back down the hall.

Chuck: Why must they get up at the ass crack of dawn? Why? [Immediately falls back asleep]

Me: I'm soooooooo tired.

Chuck: Zzzzzzzzzzzz. Huh? You sleep in. I'll get up with the kids. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.


6:52 a.m.

Everett: Moooooooooom! Daaaaaaaaaaaaad! Waaaaaaaake!

Me: Damn them!

Chuck: Huh? I'll get up. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Pitter-patter of little feet down the hall. 

Junior: Mom? Everett's awake. Can I get up?

Me: It's still the, um, middle of the night, Junior. Go back to sleep.

Junior: But Everett's awake. And I can see the sun.

Me: Just try, okay? Both of you.

Pitter-patter of little feet back down the hall. 

Chuck: What time is it?

Me: Not even 7.

Chuck: Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.


7:04 a.m.

Cat: Meow. Meow. Meeoooooooooow.

Everett: Meeoooooooooow! Kitty! Meow! Kitty! 'Mere, kitty!

Me: Damn that cat!

Chuck: Huh? I'll get up. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Pitter-patter of little feet down the hall. 

Junior: Mom? The cat's keeping me awake.

Me: Guys? It's still really early. Everyone please try to rest for just a little more...

Pitter-patter of little feet back down the hall. 

Cat: Meow. Meow. Meeoooooooooow. Meow. Meow.

Everett: Kitty! 'Mere, kitty! Meow, kitty!

Me: That mother fucking cat!

Chuck: Huh? Go back to sleep, honey. I'll get up. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.



7:13 a.m.

Everett: Knock, knock!

Junior: Who's there?

Everett: Banana!

Junior: Banana who?

Everett: Knock knock!

Cat: Meow.

Me: Sigh.

Chuck: I'll get up. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.


7:26 a.m.

Pitter-patter of little feet down the hall. 

Junior: Mom? Is it morning yet?

Me: It just turned morning. Like seconds ago.

Junior: My clock says 7.

Me: That's really early.

Pitter-patter of little feet back down the hall. 

Everett: Knock, knock.

Junior: Who's there?

Everett: Knock, knock.

Me: Chuck, remember you said you'd get up?

Chuck: I am. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.


7:31 a.m.

Everett: Down! Downstairs!

Junior: Ssssssssh, Everett. Quiet!

Everett: Downstairs!

Me: I'm coming, Everett.

Chuck: I said I'd get up. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Me: Honey, you're not even awake.

Chuck: I am. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Everett: Down, now! Downstairs!

Junior: Everett. It's still night!

Everett: Downstairs!
 
Me: I'm soooooooo tired.

Junior: Everett's keeping me awake! Moooooooom!

Me: HONEY??????????

Chuck: Huh? Right. I'm getting up. Right now.

Plodding feet down the hall.

Everett: Dad!

Junior: Hooray!

Stampede down the stairs. 

Chuck: Guys, guys, quiet down. Let's let Mom sleep.

Me: [to cat] You let out one fucking meow and you're toast.

On the hunt for sexy beets

I miss this blog. I really, really do.

Last year at this time I made the switch from being a full-time working mother to a part-time working mother, and I thought I'd hit the jackpot with that most precious of commodities: time.

More time with the kids, more time with the groceries and laundry (ah, domesticity), more time with my failing brain.

Then my husband, Chuck, got laid off and I started saying yes to every freelance job that came my way. And now here I am again, a full-time working mother except now I shove Cheerios into my kids' mouths so they don't scream during conference calls. Now I ask them if they want to watch TV —"Don't you?! Don't you?!"— so I can sit down at my computer and type furiously—furiously!—to the backdrop of Curious George.

I'm not complaining. I swear I'm not. The flexibility of this new life is priceless. I rue the day that this routine becomes the norm and I stop appreciating the extra time I have with my children.

And Chuck. Yah, he's freelancing too, so we're driving all over the state of Connecticut (and sometimes New York) and our fucking monthly health insurance payment is a mortgage but we're both home more.

I can't lie, there are a lot of days that feel pretty damn good in Mulletville Lite.

But I mean what I said: I miss this blog. I miss all the shit that's happened that I haven't been able to write about. I miss my old job at Mulletville Corp if only because I would spend entire days writing blog posts.

I want to get back here, physically and literally. I want to get back to blogging and to that delightful place where I had time to reflect.

(And breathe. Breathing is good.)

Except it can't be now. I have to find photos of beets and broccoli for a magazine spread. If, after you finish reading this post, you stumble across a hot beet picture, could you send it my way?

Thank you.

And where the heck are the chickens?

"Chuck, honey? I'm in the mood for barbecue chicken. Can we fire up the grill?"

"I don't think—"

"Don't tell me we're out of propane!"

"No, we—"

"I'm dying for it. Please?"

"It's not really—"

"Fine! I'll just light the grill myself."

 

 "Suit yourself."

"Um, Chuck? Where is the grill? Chuck?"

 

The post flu nightmares, care of Disney

My gawd we're finally better. It took almost two weeks but we've all joined society again. For the first time since I've had kids, I actually was thrilled to get out of bed (usually I'm clamoring to get back into it) and put on actual clothes.

We let the kids watch a disgusting amount of TV while we were sick. I'm usually super vigilant when it comes to limiting TV time, but I was too ill to care. From the confines of our bed (seriously, we just laid on each other, whimpered and slept), life was a steady stream of Curious George, Thomas the Train, Arthur, Martha Speaks, and more Curious George.

Oh, and we did let the kids watch a few movies on Netflix. Yes, after scrolling through the "So you're fucked up from watching cartoons and need a movie with real people" category, we decided on Santa Paws, a G-rated movie with this description: "Magic dogs and an elf team up with two children to rescue Santa who has lost his memory." It had this cover:

Perfect.

I assured Junior it would be just as fun and happy as that stupid monkey and the talking dog. I promised him, "It's a happy movie about puppies and Christmas. Fluffy puppies, Junior!"

Fluffy puppies indeed. The movie opened with a little girl getting dropped off at an orphanage.

"What's an orphanage, Mom? Why is she crying? Her parents are dead? She doesn't have a mom?"

"Hang on," I said. "It gets better." Chuck shrugged his shoulders.

We turned back to the TV. After getting dropped off, the little orphan girl learns that the mean woman who runs the orphanage hates toys and dolls—and that if she catches any of the children with toys or dolls she will burn them in the basement's incinerator. Guess what the newly orphaned child is hiding in her pocket? A stuffed angel given to her by her mother.

Even Junior could see where this was going.

He clutched his puppy and cried, "No! Turn this off. Please!"
 
"Just give it a few more minutes," I said. "It has to get better. It's a G-rated movie from Disney. There's a puppy in it. A happy little puppy." I looked over at Chuck with a what-should-we-do look but he was comatose again.

We carried on. A few minutes later, the mean woman who runs the orphanage finds out that one of the children has a doll. She confiscates it and puts on the incinerator's conveyor belt. We watched in horror as it fell into the fire and burned to a crisp.

"Noooooooo!" Junior cried."Turn it off!"

I did. Immediately.

Then I fell out of bed and crawled to the hallway, where I cursed Disney from the safety of my floor (who can stand after puking for two days?). Shouldn't the movie's write-up mention a toy-killing incinerator on the cover? Surely Disney, who devotes millions of dollars to market research and focus groups, understands that the most coveted items of children in the G-rated age group are stuffed animals, lovies and other security items.

And there you have it: after going to two wakes for family members in December, seeing another beloved family member undergo open heart surgery, hearing about Sandy Hook and learning that innocent children died, and seeing our cat sick with a visible tumor, guess what's keeping Junior up at night?

Fucking Santa Paws. Junior won't put down his stuffed dog. I caught him whispering to it, "I would never let anyone take you." He needs the comfort, and the dog seems to need it too.

I don't blame either of them.

Ping ponging your way through the flu

I remember it so well. It was the winter of 2005. Chuck and I were renting an apartment together ("shacking up" as my mother called it). Out of nowhere, I got the flu.

I spent the next week on the couch, swigging NyQuil. I slept. I watched talk shows and sitcoms. There was no Facebook, so I couldn't gross people out with my status updates—"Just hacked up a lung! Puked again!" No tweeting either.

How did we communicate?

When Chuck got home from work he would lift up the blanket and poke me, just to make sure I was alive. He may have tried to poke me in other ways, I can't remember. It was the sickest I've ever been and yet, looking back on it, it was bliss.

I've been thinking a lot about that week.

The kids both came down with the flu on Saturday. Over the last few days, Chuck and I have been sneezed on, puked on and coughed on. We've endured hours of Thomas the Train and Curious George. We've made Jello and toast and held the kids while they whimpered and moaned. We've tried to sleep while the kids slept on top of us.

Then, a glimpse of hope: the kids started to feel better. Then, reality. I started sneezing. Mother Nature is a sly devil. She keeps you healthy just long enough for you to nurse your kids back to health before whacking you with it. It's the bitch-slap of being a parent: you get slapped on the way in and you get slapped on the way out. 

I was fortunate to come down with it first. I told Chuck I was going to bed and I did—for almost two days. I swigged NyQuil. I slept. I watched talk shows and sitcoms. There is Facebook, so I could gross people out with my status updates—"Just hacked up a lung! Puked again!" 

Every time I heard Chuck sneezing and coughing from downstairs I furrowed down deeper under the covers. Yes, he was sending me SOS's—like letting the kids throw ping pong balls at the stairs and yelling "Kids, your mother is trying to rest!"—but for a few days I was blissfully untouchable. Like I'd been in 2005. Like any time, really, we're able to lie down and take care of ourselves for a change.

Alas, all good things must come to an end. This morning Chuck announced that he was going to bed. He has a fever; I can't contest a fever. I'm going to have to slog through until I'm better. I'm going to have to visit the Island of Sodor even as I hack up a lung. 

But I'll always have the sweet memories of my couch and bed. Of hiding and furrowing, furrowing and hiding. The proverbial good ole days.

Now where are those ping pong balls?

Free fun in Connecticut (yes, it's possible)

If your kid is into trains, the Connecticut Cellar Savers Fire Museum is a definite must-see. It's in Portland, Conn. and features an entire room of working model trains. Best of all it's free (and there's a bathroom on the premises). You can easily spend an hour there, but probably not much longer.

The man who sits behind the counter is really nice, which is a rarity for the area. Last time we went, he told Junior to hug me and then said, "You only get one mom, so hug her and tell her thanks!"

Melt my heart.

Bonus: Sometimes the next door neighbor's chickens and hens wander the parking lot and the kids can kill another 15 minutes trying to catch them.

It never stops raining fun in this state. Am I right?

Reaching that way cooler, even better "Not tonight, honey" place

I'll never forget one of my first days on the job at Mulletville Corp. My boss—a slim, golf playing, 60-year-old narcissist ("Don't you like my new outfit? Don't you?")—popped into my office and offered me some homemade cookies.

Normally I skeeve homemade foodstuffs, but I had to accept a handful ("Don't you like my banana nut cookies? Don't you?"). No sooner had I swallowed the last morsel than she said, "There's a hefty dose of flaxseed in the batter. So good for you!"

She hopped merrily away. 

%^&@*

Because I am a master at-work pooper (it's true, I wrote a poop manual), the flax seed injection wasn't the harrowing experience it could have been. Others weren't so lucky.

Fast forward to this morning's breakfast.

Last night, after reading the latest issue of Healthy Living magazine (is it just me or is everyone and their dog detoxifying?) and slugging back three—ok sevenish—glasses of wine (it's been a rough couple of weeks) I decided I had to make homemade granola bars.

HAD TO.

I found some online recipes (like these and these) promising homemade granola bar nirvana. Seriously, based on the number of sites I found extolling the titillating pleasures of homemade granola bars, I don't think anyone who is anyone is actually having sex anymore; I think they're all in their kitchens making homemade granola bars.

Anyway, I used the recipes and tweaked. Slugged and tweaked. Tweaked and slugged. At one point Chuck stumbled in and, seeing all the seeds and nuts on the counter, begged me to add chocolate chips.

"Of schlourse, Schluck!"

As the bars sat in the fridge overnight, hardening and congealing and shit, I lay in bed, nightdreaming. I could see it all before me: At neighborhood picnics I'd pull a granola bar out of a baggie. As it caught the light, someone would ask, "Where did you get that granola bar?" and I'd smile sheepishly and admit, "I made it." I'd offer them a bite and they'd eat it, oohing and ahhing.

Word would spread. The PTO would call. Then the principle—"Bake enough for the next school function? Why, of course!"—then, the mayor. Next up? Why, Shark Tank, of course.

Pay.Dirt.

Fast forward again (or is it rewind?) to this morning's breakfast. Ta da!




They look good, don't they? Well, don't let 'em fool ya. They're a crumbly mess of poop-inducing flax and dried fruit. As in, seeds are still stuck to your teeth and gums even after you swallow. As in, "Mom! I have to poop again! What's going on?! Mom!" and "Honey? Do we have any more toilet paper in the downstairs bathroom?"

As in, Miralax would kill for this recipe.

No, it's not quite the product I was hoping for but hey, Rome wasn't built in a day. I'm going to make another batch, this time sober. An even better batch! And, after I've tweaked the recipe to perfection and I've finally reached that elusive summit of homemade granola bar nirvana—"Oh gawd, yes!"—I can proudly say...

"Not tonight, Chuck. I made granola bars." And he'll understand.