Friday, June 27, 2008

Dr Foster Went to Gloucester

Here's what I would tell teenagers about avoiding pregnancy (the why, not the how).


When we became parents, my grandmother sent a card, and it was a little different from all the "Congratulations!" cards. She said,

"Welcome to the constant worry, sleepless nights, and never ending fear."

I know it doesn't sound nice, but it was intended in love and that's how I took it. I was actually very grateful for it, because it validated a lot of the feelings I was having at the time, which the usual "babies are so fun and cute!" didn't.

When you have a child, you worry every second of every day, at some level. You fear accidents and disease; you fear you're doing SOMEthing wrong; you fear the future. When they cry, it breaks your heart a little every time. You may have had a stressful life before, but it will seem carefree compared to waking up six times a night listening for breathing just to make sure he isn't dead. Every child, in every horrible news story, takes on the face of your child, and scares the bejeezus out of you.

The emotional weight of parenting is far greater than the physical and logistical problems and annoyances. I am sure that message is not getting across with egg babies or abstinence lectures or even birth-control demonstrations.
Being a parent can make you very scared and very worried and very sad sometimes, too.

Thursday, June 26, 2008

Things The Geneva Convention Would Explicitly Ban, If My Child Were In Charge

-putting on shirts
-taking off shirts
-putting on pants
-sandals
-baths
-leaving the park
-sharing toys

Friday, June 20, 2008

chow

I was a moderately picky eater child. My parents felt that this was both a character flaw of mine and a terrible indictment of their parenting, and gave me a hell of a lot of static about it. Because I was also a more-than-moderately stubborn child, this made things a hell of a lot worse and I was quite old before I ate widely. Which I mostly do, although there is a list of things I will not eat.
So my child, who as an under-one ate a tiny bit of everything that crossed our table, is now 18 months old and will eat:

hummus (IF he gets to hold the spoon)
frozen mixed veg
frozen corn
raisins
crackers
rice (IF he gets to scatter rice to the four winds)
applesauce (IF it is made by grandma)
yogurt
soup (SOMEtimes)
peas (IF we are in the field and he can eat them off the plants)
milk

Here is a list of foods often eaten by children which he will take out of his mouth and throw back at me:
chicken (any form, including nugget)
green beans
ok, any kind of meat
bread: regular or pita
bananas
potatoes
all the rest of the vegetables

I'm not going to make a huge deal about what he eats or not but he can't keep filling up on raisins and crackers, can he? and his "acceptable" list is not terrible but I feel like I'm in a rut and I'm not convinced there is enough protein in there. What are some ideas? He is allergic to eggs.

I kind of want to ship him to grandma's to be fattened a little because he eats nearly all of what she makes for some reason. Likes her better I guess!

Thursday, June 05, 2008

"at" "work"

The cat seems confused and I don't blame her, as I'm mighty confused myself, since I'm officially at work, yet my ass is in my own desk chair in my own bedroom. wha??? yah, today is a work from home day, so I'm "working" from home. I say that because I have no idea what I'm doing yet.
Also, we communicate with IRC, which is like 1993, and I forget how to use it! I used to be cool, what happened??