10.31.02

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Posted in Uncategorized at 9:55 am by Anne

So last night I fell asleep while the history Channel was on with a program about Area 51, aliens, and hush-hush government projects. What is my problem? Once again, I have no reason at all to complain about alien dreams or waking up in the middle of the night all freaked out and expecting to be immobilized by the light beaming from a UFO on the roof. gahhhhhh.

On a different note, I baked these last night but I am afraid they look a lot nicer than they taste. I was enamored with the whole wheat flour, vegetable oil instead of butter, and egg whites in the recipe but here’s the thing: Healthy cupcakes aren’t cupcakes; they’re whole grain muffins. I brought a dozen to share around at the office and I cringe at the thought of the other women speaking in hushed voices, “Well, these aren’t near as good as the LAST cupcakes she brought in!”

This year I think I am going to dress up as a pregnant woman. A crazed pregnant woman who hates the way her maternity jeans keep falling down at the crotch and who eats way too much of the candy which had been pre-designated for the kids.

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10.30.02

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Posted in Uncategorized at 12:26 pm by Anne

This morning my phone rang right as I was stepping out of the shower. It thought it was a client but it turned out to be someone from the Presbyterian Hospital. She called to confirm the childbirth classes Shan and I are signed up for in mid-November and to remind me I hadn’t paid for them. Here I had to correct her. Though I did not pay by credit card, I did pay by check on Monday. What is the crisis? She let me know, after getting the check numbers, that she would make a note to my file that payment was forthcoming. I guess I’m a little irritated that they are so pushy about it, when I had only signed up for the classes a few days before, and when there was still a chance that they would be canceled due to low turnout.

Maybe I am just grumpy for other reasons.

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10.29.02

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Posted in Uncategorized at 12:48 pm by Anne

Ok. This morning I turned into a baby. I woke up, struggling to breathe out of my nose and with a wretched sore throat. Shan suggested I take a hot shower and let the steam break everything up so I did, but it didn’t! In fact, I kept trying to blow out through one of my nostrils and it wouldn’t budge, instead the pressure reverberated back to my throat and made it hurt worse. Suffice to say I got out, put in my contacts, and sprayed copius amounts of this mentholated saline nose spray up there. It was a miserable experience that wasn’t going away. While I was in the computer room, Shan called my Dr to find out if there was anything I could take and glory-be, I wish I had thought of that! This is why parenting will involve the both of us. Jeez.

Now I am back to normal, mostly, having taken a Claritin-D and some Rhinocort up the old nose.

It is getting awful close to lunchtime and the jolly ranchers (purchased for the sole purpose of distributing this Halloween!) I brought from home aren’t doing the trick.

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10.28.02

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Posted in Uncategorized at 4:24 pm by Anne

An interesting thing happened today. Since I had brought some equipment from the office, over the weekend, I worked from home this morning. At one point, I caught a little movement out of the corner of my eye and immediately looked over to the floor. At first I thought it was a scorpion, the mass was large enough and moving at a steady pace. It was actually one of the biggest dustbunnies I have even seen in my house AND it was connected somehow to a medium sized house spider. This poor little spider was DRAGGING a hairball around my floor! If this doesn’t speak loudly of a need to clean the house, I don’t know what does.

And yes. I am embarrassed.

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10.27.02

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Posted in Uncategorized at 10:27 am by Anne

This morning I made some chai tea utilizing dried cardamom pods, 2 broken cinnamon sticks, 10 whole cloves, some black pepper corns, and a little more dried ginger than I should have. The fresh ginger got tossed out when I saw it was almost completely covered in Penicillium colonies, though it could have been Aspergillus. Crushed them all up with my mortar and pestle and steeped them in hot water for 10 minutes. Added some milk and sugar, brought to a simmer, and tossed in a few teaspoons of Darjeeling tea. Next time I will bind the loose tea up in one of those little cloth bags so that I can control how long it steeps better, and less ginger!

Then I organized a whole cabinet. I took everything out of the shelves, wiped them out and culled certain items I knew I’d never use. Finally my spices are back in alphabetical order! Now I thought that was a pain in the ass but the biggest pain came when I looked at the side of the fridge and decided it was time to take down the magnetic poetry. Has anyone had to take down two different sets before?! Shakespeare and Erotica, which we thought were really cute nearly 5 years ago! These little words and numbers and punctuation marks took so long to pry off the refrigerator! gahhhhhh. And what did I think once I had cleaned the side of grease and dirt and magnets? I thought how nice it would be to have a pastel set of alphabet letters for Lily! When I was little I had a few sets of those big plastic lettters (in primary colors) but I didn’t get to keep them on the fridge at all times because my Mom thought they looked too messy. Instead they stayed in one of those big Folgers coffeee tins much to my childish chagrin, and I had to drag them out of my room when I wanted to play. This will not be the case for Lily. Mark my words; I am going to keep my eyes peeled for the perfect set of letters and I think I already saw a set with Cecily in town a few months ago.

sighhhhh. pastel letters.

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10.26.02

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Posted in Uncategorized at 2:31 pm by Anne

Last night around 11:30 I really wanted some Whataburger fries so every few minutes, I’d say as much. ‘Don’t some french fries and ketchup sound good to you?’ Then, after it was agreed that we would drive out and get some, Shan got all health-conscience on me and ruined the whole idea. I wound up eating a tiny bowl of fresh pineapple instead. I could tell he felt a little guilty about 86-ing the fries idea especially when he negated his whole argument by pomising to pick up some donuts in the morning. I will say this, the glazed donuts were so fresh they were still a little warm when he brought them home today. Sweet Providence!

My question is this: Are the three glazed donuts I ate for breakfast this morning more or less healthy than the fries I passed up last night?

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83554889

Posted in Uncategorized at 9:53 am by Anne

Shan finished the closet project a few nights ago and the new layout is better than ever. I organized all of my clothing, hanging up the pregancy elastics and folding into neat piles all of my other ‘normal’ clothes so that everything in there is neat and tidy and organized! I had no idea how wonderful being married to a builder would turn out as far as ‘projects’ go.

Thursday I took a sick day and spent most of it in bed sleeping and drinking water. This was all in hopes of not catching whatever hideous sinus infection Shan just got through and it seemed to work until friday when I came down with a sore throat. Then, this morning at 5, I snapped awake with an awful sore throat. These have got to be the worst cold symptom in my book because there isn’t really anything to take away the pain. So I woke Shan up; isn’t that evil?
He was very sympathetic, and fixed me a glass of hot salt water to gargle. This was followed by 2 tylenol, a glass of normal water, and some phenol-based cough lozenges. By the time the coughdrop had melted completely we were both wide awake, and he clanged around in the kitchen to make some coffee. I dragged a few pillows and blankets into the living room and read the New Yorker (I couldn’t not put down this depressing article about how the medical establishment is dealing with the notion of telling a patient when there is nothing more they can do to save his/her life, apparently most doctors don’t.) after Shan built a small fire and began sewing (with a sewing machine I don’t even know how to operate for sure) a patch into a pair of old jeans. Despite the content of the story I read, it was just so completely comfy-cozy to be snuggled down in front of the fireplace with my husband closeby. I really am not sure if no sore throat would have made it even better since it was more or less the cause of the whole thing.

Now I need to get ready and return to the office to complete some analysis I didn’t do yesterday. sighhhh. At least my throat feels better.

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10.23.02

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Posted in Uncategorized at 5:42 pm by Anne

Ok. So the Drs visit went fine. I even lost one pound…no small feat, although it could be because I was wearing sandals instead of my usual clodhoppers. Dr. checked out a mole on my bosom that I was worried about but he said it was perfectly normal so I am not going to sweat it. He said, ‘Let’s see it.’ and I popped it out in front of he and Shan. Just a little breast weirdness for Wednesday.

We did get a packet of information about birthing classes and breastfeeding seminars and since the dr reccommeneded we attend, I registered for them just a few moments ago. Starting in mid-November, 4 Tuesday evenings in ar ow, Shan and I will attend what is called ‘Preparation for Childbirth’ classes. Then, after the last Tuesday class, we’ll go to one ‘Breastfeeding’ class. I notice under the description of this class there is an indent with ‘A father’s role in the breastfeeding family’. I hope this includes instructions for foot and back massages. I was surprised to see my hospital had a webpage. Unfortunately, this location was full as far as classes went so we are having to drive a bit south. No big deal.

Shan has just dismantled the Master Bedroom Closet since the ignoramuses who lived here before us jury-rigged the inefficient space. We moved every single thing out of there and into the baby room (a big freaking mess from hell!) and he is on his way to Home Depot for all the stuff he needs to build new shelves, and racks, and boxes to keep our shoes. I am really looking forward to getting more organized! Plus, this way he can buy the necessary stuff to run a shelf along the top of Lily’s room, too! yippeekiyay! You may wonder why he is doing it and this should answer your question. He got it as a birthday/Christmas gift a few weeks ago.

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83412523

Posted in Uncategorized at 12:01 pm by Anne

Today I have a doctor’s appointment, I am at the start of my 29th week of moosehood, and Lily has been very active lately. My latest favourite thing to do is to bare my rotund belly and watch her moving from one end to the other, with a few additional boots or jabs thrown in. I do it at work, at the gym, on the couch, in bed at night.

oops. lunch.

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10.19.02

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Posted in Uncategorized at 9:39 pm by Anne

Today after taking my superyummy cupcakes to the picnic, Shan and I went to the local petstore and bought a new training collar for Darwin (as the book reccommended.) Here is a list of the slight changes we are in the process of making with Mrs. PooterMcPotamus (Darwin’s nickname):

1) making her ‘work’ for everthing from going outside to getting dinner and or affection. This just means we tell her to sit, stay, jump up, etc. This morning I wouldn’t let her back in the house until she ‘waved’. The problem was that she didn’t want to wave so I had to withdraw my attention from her. This is considered to be a very effective tool on the canine psyche but it was very hard on me! I went back after 15 minutes to make her try again. She refused although I know she wanted in the house. So I bitched to Shan and he suggested I try it with a treat and then after she waves, make her do something else. This worked like a charm although I don’t know what the author would say about it. (The author says this just gets her used to the idea that she has various jobs to perform due to her position in the ranks.)

2) We picked up her toys so that she can’t chew or play whenever she wants to chew or play. Instead we are in charge. This falls in line with the dog trainer’s belief that dogs will respect and love us more if we clarify their position in ‘the pack’.

3) Shan learned he plays too rough with her sometimes by allowing her to take his arm or hand into her mouth when they rough-house. Naturally this would be a bad thing for her to think she could do with Lily.

4) As another form of placement, the book suggested I make a big production in the morning when I’m getting her breakfast together. It said to exaggerate and overdramatize putting food in her bowl, and to get her worked up over the notion of eating, and then to put the bowl on the counter out of her reach. Then I’m supposed to fix myself something to eat, eat it at a leisurely place, and then finally feed her, since in a pack the most dominant eat first etc.

I think that’s it so far, I am only a little ways into the book, but it’s a thin one to begin with. So far so good and Shan says that she really responds to the new collar. the reason why this collar is important is because it replicates better the pressure associated with a dominant animal nipping her on the neck when it is putting her in line. That would be me or Shan.

Fortunately, from some of the stories and references in the book, Darwin is a pretty well-behaved dog and these things won’t be too much of a shock, I hope. Although it says that even if your dog goes into a depression, it will only last a few days (3-7) and when it comes out of it, your relationship will be much better because it will have adjusted to it’s ‘new’ position…or something like that.

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