Reclaiming My Territory

I've noticed that Murphy's Law takes things a little bit personally where my blogging is concerned. The more excited I am about my latest inspiration for a blog entry, the more spotty my internet connection becomes. Today, I had been saving 4, yes 4, ideas to type up, and of course my internet connection blows out completely for 4 hours.

It figures, right? On the bright side, at least I got my exercising done early today. On the other hand, I didn't get much else done that I had planned. I spent lots of time trying to fix the internet, you see.

Today, I was supposed to perform an exercise I call, "Reclaiming My House." I still have a few hours to get it done before dinnertime, and I might get a little bit further along in the process ... once I'm done talking at all of you, that is. (Then again, I could run and do something in between typing each sentence, and you wouldn't even know, would you?)

But ... enough of this silliness. What is involved in Reclaiming My House? Well, I decided a long time ago that there really should be different names for different kinds of of cleaning/straightening up. If we call it what we really mean to do, then (in my case at least), we will be far more likely to actually do it. When I was living in the dorms in college, I developed a task my roomate and I called, "Room Enlargement Exercises." We weren't cleaning up our stuff, we were making the room look bigger by getting all the crap out of the way. When you live in a ridiculously tiny space with another person, a clean countertop (not to mention laundry put away) can make the whole place look a lot bigger. As a side note, wall to wall carpeting helps, too.

When I was in law school, I created a little routine I called, "OCD Cleaning Therapy." Actually, I wanted to call it, "I Just Spent the Weekend In Someone's Really Messy House and I Am Pretty Grossed Out and Trying to Get Over It," but that got a bit long. The first time I had to engage in OCD Cleaning Therapy I actually scrubbed the bricks of my fireplace. Don't worry, that never happened again.

Now, I have the exercise of Reclaiming My House. This exercise can be triggered any number of different ways, but the most reliable cause is a family overnight trip. When we come back from ... say ... a weekend trip to watch the Penn State game, I find that our chaos footprint becomes almost exponentially large. Somehow our two overnight bags, cooler, and a small bag of toys expands to fill the entire trunk and backseat of the car, and by the time we come home, all of the things in the car take up the entire foyer of my house. That is problem number one.

Problem number two comes from us not taking all of the creatures that live in the house with us when we go. We leave behind the cats, or as I sometimes refer to them, Thing 1, Thing 2, and Thing 3, unsupervised. Even better, we give them extra bowls of food (in special, timed cat food dishes that open at a preset hour) to bat around the kitchen floor. They track litter all over the place without anyone to stop and sweep, and they take those catnip mice and carry them all up to my bed. It's nice to be missed, I know.

Then, as soon as we get back, all the chaos lands in the front room of the house and spills over into the kitchen. In this particular case, the chaos came with lots of mud and grass from the weekend's soggy weather.

So, the day after we return, I have to go about a methodical process of pushing back the chaos to wherever it comes from and re-establishing my imprint. All of the "vacation" stuff needs to go back, the cats need to be reminded who really is boss (Toddler), and someone has to clean up all the mess.

At these moments I remember a rule my mother had ... which frankly drove me nuts. She used to insist that each of us unpack our suitcase before we went to bed the day we got home, provided we got home before midnight. I used to be so annoyed at this rule. I always thought the suitcase could wait until the next day, because what was the rush? After all, emptying the suitcase usually led to mother starting the laundry, which meant we all had to help fold and identify the clothes, and then put them away too. How was this a restful return to home, I used to wonder? One day I asked mom why we had to empty the suitcases out right away, and she said, "If you don't do it right away, it won't get done."

I didn't believe her.

I didn't impose that same rule on myself or my household.

I found out she was right.

Now, I haven't managed to impose a "same day" rule on the suitcase (because I'm the one who has to put away almost all of the stuff, and I'm the one doing the laundry these days), but I have imposed a 24 hour rule. Otherwise the suitcase will stay out until the next trip. I've tested this theory, and my mother was right. There is something about stuff inside suitcases that has incredible inertia and is very heavy to lift and put away. Very heavy.

In my defense, the suitcase is already taken care of today. It's just the mail, the coupons, the winter clothing, and all the other things outside the suitcase that grew in the trunk of the car while we were travelling that I need to identify and sort. These things, too, have tremendous inertia. In fact, I think they are taking root in the entranceway. Their inertia was so great, in fact, that I diverted myself by engaging in Room Enlargement Exercises by rearranging Toddler's toys in the family room.

Tomorrow, inertia will return to it's normal levels. I hope.

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A New Look on an Old Profession? Maybe?

Yesterday I was flipping through Facebook's Networked Blogs application, examining some of the blogs that Networked Blogs thinks might be similar to mine.

I found this pretty interesting post written by a woman who claims to offer instruction on "How to be a Cat Lady Without the Cats." Since I am well on the way to becoming a crazy cat lady myself (with the cats, of course), I was intrigued and took a look, and sure enough, she spoke to me. (Yes, she knew about me and was writing a post JUST TO ME! Well, not really.)

CatLadyLarew has a theory that all humor bloggers are really just massive attention seekers, and that is why we write blogs. Or, to paraphrase her real idea in squeaky clean language, we are all practicing the world's oldest profession over the internet -- blogger style -- without any of the visuals or erotic language. I encourage you to take a look and get a chuckle. You can find the post at:

http://networkedblogs.com/p15009490 or

http://howtobecomeacatladywithoutthecats.blogspot.com/2009/10/was-it-something-i-said.html

I have to admit, CatLadyLarew has confessed something I have been embarrased to admit out loud. I publish my blog and link it in Facebook because I want you to read it. If I were just writing solely to please myself, I would have written it in a diary or in my head and left it at that. But, no ... I want to know I made you chuckle today. (If I didn't, feel free to keep your opinions to yourself, if you'd like. (grin)) Come to think of it, I think lots and lots of my friends on Facebook are little mini-narcissists themselves. After all, we put up status updates about ourselves ... why? So people will read them. If we didn't want the attention, we would ... not be posting status updates for one thing. We would all just still be emailing.

So, thanks to all of you who follow me, post comments, and read regularly. You are a salve to my exposed ego and you help me stay brave. Thanks, too, to those great masses of you who don't formally "follow," who don't post comments, but still read. At least, I like to think you are out there and not fig newtons on the dessert tray of my imagination. (Hey, it's a house with small children. We do fig newtons, not creme brulee -- much less messy.)

Thanks, too, to CatLadyLarew for busting us all.

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Is The Election Over Yet?

I know that election day was two days ago, but I've been afraid to peek my head out from behind the curtains too much in case there were still lingering emboldened (or embittered) campaign workers lurking just beyond my threshold.

I haven't answered the phone in weeks, either. I'm still apprehensive that this-or-that potential Senator/Governor/Delegate's spouse/brother/ sister/daughter/pet dog will be calling me to tell me to go out and vote for his or her spouse, brother, sister, parent, or cat housekeeper. I mean ... wow. Just wow. That election was something. I think I really hate living in a hotly contested state. In the days leading up to it, I was getting between 3 and 5 phonecalls an afternoon. Most of them were recorded, but one I think was live. It was really, really hard to tell. Actually, I think 2 were live, but I hung up on the first one. The second one gave himself away a bit by stammering just a touch in the beginning. Then his monotone came on really strong. Since I suspected he might be a real person and not an audio recording, I listened, quietly. When he got to the end of his script, I wasn't sure if I was supposed to applaud, or state my intentions, thank him (not likely) or just say goodbye. So, there was this awkward silence that he finally broke by saying, "Um, okay. Bye."

As I approached the polls on election morning, there were swarming election workers buzzing around ready to dive at me with draft ballots (which aren't allowed in the polling booth, by the way). My response? "I'm saturated. Go away." The guy I said that to looked at me very strangely. I'm not sure he knew what "saturated" meant. As I kept walking, some super perfect mom-type buzzed over, with her hand outstretched and more colored paper for me. Again, I shook my head. "Too much." She nodded sympathetically for a moment, but as I kept walking, she shouted after me, "Please vote for ____________ for School Board. She's the only candidate endORSED BY PARENTS!!!" (She had to raise her voice against my retreating back.)

Okay, well, maybe that last part was something I needed to know. That school board stuff. Woops. Believe me, I was not going to turn around and descend into that melee again.

On the way out I managed to dodge the exit poller, I think in large part because I had Toddler and DH with me, and we just look really intimidating, I think ... or like the Marx Brothers maybe -- to0 hard to take seriously enough to bother polling. I'm not sure.

I made sure I wore my "I voted" sticker, just in case I got accosted on the streets of our town and kidnapped and sent to the polls. As it was, I felt beady eyes piercing me as I drove about my errands. The local church had a big sign ordering us all to go and vote, as did various banners throughout town. It was all a bit much, and I was relieved to get home.

Once again, however, I managed to underestimate the fanatacism of our local campaign staffers. I got home at about noon, and I received no less than four phonecalls before 3 pm instructing me to get out and vote today. If I hadn't hung up, I think one of them was probably going to offer to come and escort me. Aaaahhh, no. No. And no again.

Have I mentioned that I detest living in a hotly contested state around election time?

Now, two days later, I am wondering where all the campaign workers have gone. Did their families welcome them back with open arms, or are they just lurking out there on the streets looking for something to do? Will I see them with sandwich boards on their shoulders and signs that say, "Will campaign for food?" I mean, with all that effort last week and the week before, and the month before, and the six months before that, can you really turn it off that quickly? I fear not. I really do.

You tell me ... is it safe to go out yet?

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The Silence Is Deafening

Okay, okay, okay (Toddler says I say that a lot -- or at least, I say it sometimes, and Toddler says it a lot). I am getting the message.

You don't like the football posts. The response to my attempts at sporty Wednesday humor has been underwhelming, and for those of you that have responded (all three of you), your comments have not been what a good humor blogger wants to hear. ""You have to really be into football to follow them." "Not as funny as the rest." And, the best one of all, from DH, "It's fine, honey." That last one is the kiss of death -- the blogger's version of "Yes, Dear," the sentence that simply means, "If I say something affirmative, will you be quiet and go away?"

Ugh.

So, just to show that I am reasonable, this will be the last officially scheduled Wednesday Football Wrap Up. From now on, you can tune in on Wednesdays with the same uncertainty as any other day. The catch is that I reserve the right to sneak in football jokes and the occasional monologue without warning, and you'll have to live with it.

Fair enough?

Seriously -- I hope you like the change. I agree that my passion for football makes me think I'm more entertaining then anyone who doesn't share my brain thinks I am. I further agree that most of you probably don't salivate over football like I do (although at least 3 of you do). At least this way I don't have to figure out how to hold a space for the Wednesday post. Nor do I have to keep waking DH up for College Game Day Final saying, "Here. I fixed it again. Read it and tell me if its better or worse."

As for my ego ... it, too, will survive.

And, for the record, in case you were all tuned out and not paying attention: WE ARE........

PENN STATE!!!!!!!!

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You Can't Write a Sit-Com Like This

Today was "one of those days." Honestly, I was the woman everyone felt sorry for every place I went today. This was one of those days why, "If you don't laugh, you'll probably cry," was invented. And, no, Mama never said there'd be days like this, but she should have. Then again, I probably should have guessed.

For starters, DH had to go to work before Toddler finished his breakfast this morning. Breakfast is DH and Toddler's special time together, so Toddler seriously objected. Seriously. Objected. With shoving. And shouting. Eventually hunger won out, and he inhaled his yogurt. I'm not sure if he ate it or drank it, it was gone so fast.

Then, in spectacular craptastic fashion, we had an appointment with a new doctor today. While I would generally say that my child is (reasonably, typically) well behaved in public, he gets a little bit ... unpredictable? in places where there are too many people wearing scrubs. I mean, hey, come after anyone with enough needles and they have the potential to go postal with no notice. Why should Toddler be any different? Just because I want him to be? Right.

On days like this, I'm never sure which facet of "troublemaker" will emerge -- will he be crying boy? shrieking boy? anxious boy clinging to my leg? boy that wants to use the entire hand sanitizer while mommy and doctor are trying to talk? boy that wants to write on doctor's file or prescription pad? What form of defense will I need to use? How will I handle his brand new refusal to remove his coat indoors? If I push the issue, and he screams and has a fit, what will all the other moms think of me?

Well, in the waiting room everything went well for a good long while. We brought Mickey Mouse along and were playing quietly. Then Toddler got a little silly and started walking in circles around the chairs over and over and over, quietly and well-behaved, sure, and dizzying for me to watch. So, I made the mistake of thinking it would be safe to open my book. Bad choice.

Because ... at that moment, Toddler went around my chair ... and didn't come back. I looked up and found him behind me at the registration desk climbing into the chair we were sitting in to check him in. I don't know what he thought he was doing ... un-registering himself from the appointment list, possibly?

Of course, this is not acceptable, so I had to go get him and tell him to "get down and come back." He thought I was kidding. Nope. Tantrum ensues. Again. We aren't even at lunch yet.

Well, since he was already mad, I decided to confront him on that, "I won't take my coat off" issue I mentioned earlier. This action on my part invoked peak screaming from Toddler, which then prompted me to say such inspired things as, "No. That's enough. Mommy's getting really annoyed right now," (all the polite things you say in public when you are embarrased at your kid's behavior and getting really angry -- not annoyed). Thankfully, at that beautiful shining moment of graceful and successful parenting, the nurse comes out and calls our name.

I picked up the coats, our bag, and said, "C'mon. That's us. It's your turn, and everyone here in the room is glad of it." Well, the room laughed (whew), but Toddler was unimpressed. So, end scene with an exit stage right, with much kicking and screaming, Mom carrying Toddler, a diaper bag, his coat, my coat, and Mickey Mouse.

The nurse was one of those people that make you just wonder. She had a fairly blank look on her face, like life has been hard, and she is too detached from the anxiety and stresses of parents and children in a children's hospital to even notice anymore. Either that or she just isn't all that observant. Hard to tell. Anyway, we walked down the hall, with Toddler literally hollering directly into my ear and things falling periodically from my arms and bruises growing on my thights. She continues moving, calling over her shoulder something I can't possibly hear. With great restraint, I manage to say, "I'm sorry, but with him right in my ear, I just can't hear you. She turns around, pauses for a second, then returns walking, saying the same questions again over her shoulder, in the same pitch.

Okay ... that happened. Now what? Apparently this is a test of my psychic skills. What do nurses usually ask parents when they escort them back to the room? Oh, yes. They confirm last name and birthday. I take a shot in the dark and give her that information. Either I'm brilliant, and she is satisfied, or I'm just looking a little bit more like a clueless idiot than I do with a screaming child yelling, "COAT ON! COAT ON!" in a room at least 80 degrees cool. I suppose I got it right, because she didn't say another word. Then again, maybe she just gave up. Or maybe she decided she didn't care. Hard to tell.

It didn't take the doctor long at all to arrive, but by the time he did, Toddler had reversed his mood with lightning efficiency and had switched to being giddy, and giggling, and engaging in violent hugging. After all the climbing and wicked hugs and jumping Toddler was doing, I'm not sure whether that helped my case or hurt it when the doctor asked me why Toddler had a big shiner on his face. I told the truth. We went to a hotel room, he fell out of bed and met the table with his face on the way down. I mean, is there a good way to answer that question? It's the truth, but does it keep the child abuse investigators away, or does it make me look even more like Parent of the Year?

For the most part, I have to think the visit was a general success. I mean, Toddler was giggling and not screaming, so I can't look like the worst parent in the world, right? As a treat, we went to use some coupons at Chick Fil-A down the street. Toddler was great, still laughing and giggling even through the rain until we got inside, at which time he promptly stood by the door and screamed he wanted to go back outside.

By then I was getting whiplash from the reversals. Once again, I tried my "public parent" coaxing routine, which worked about as well as it did an hour before. Unlike Nurse Blankface at the office, though, here there was a restaurant employee who wanted to try to help. Unfortunately, this made it all the worse. At the point where I am trying to figure out whether to drag him to the counter, to slink out in shame, or to just sell him to the nearest passerby, a random stranger decides to start a conversation. Oh, great. Just what I want right now. He looked over at me and said, "He's two, isn't he?" I nodded, and he said, "Yes, I can see that. All he seems to want to say is, "No!"

Okay, maybe this isn't a hostile crowd. This could work.

Again, with an unpredictable U-turn, Toddler cheers up, starts playing, and even apologizes to the nice employee he was so mean to by saying, "I'm sorry, Nice Lady. Bye, bye!" I almost thought that we didn't have to do carry-out anymore, but I wasn't going to be suckered in. We left anyway. I'm not that stupid.

Then, finally, we went home. Toddler once again did his impersonation of a human vacuum cleaner and sucked up lunch like I was starving him. Then he blissfully took a nap. Great, right?

Wrong.

He woke up worse.

He was mad at everything, ate a bag of chips, and yelled at all his toys for not playing well with him. I am not making this up.

In one brief, shining moment of good humor, he brought out some blocks and tried to play blocks with Houdini. Once again it occurred to me that perhaps I should find Toddler some more friends. Human friends. Houdini declined to play, and Toddler went back to creating havock.

DH came home, and things didn't really improve much, so we concluded that for mutual sanity and survival of the family, Toddler needed to get a bath and go to bed. Immediately.

We were hoping he would go quietly into the good night, like he did at nap time, but alas it was not to be. The day ended with the plaintive sounds of Toddler over the baby monitor whimpering, "No night night! No night night!"

Whew. We survived. Barely.

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How Many Times ... A Physics Wrap Up

Last week we counted how many times I proposed a money-making scheme in the history of my blog.

This week I thought it would be entertaining to see how many times I discuss some oddity of physics. (Don't worry ... I won't be doing this flashback time of post every week. It's way too hard to go back and find these links again.)

1. This post introduces the gremlins, In "Water in Lake Erie and Soap in a Soapdish"  I first introduce the gremlins that follow me around and take my things. In "They Are At It Again" I imply that the gremlins are part of an alternate dimension.

2. Of course, entropy and chaos, my archenemies, are also concepts in physics. In "My Battle Against the Forces of Entropy and Chaos"  my battle begins.

3. (I know this one appears in last week's retrospective, but it's worth repeating.) In "What Do You Mean, 'Challenging'?"  I speculate on how to build a trap to prevent socks from disappearing in the dryer. This may not sound exactly like a physics issue, but it is, as Erma Bombeck first theorized. She suspected dryers of being portals from one home to another, transporting socks from one family to another. I also discuss the amazing power of coffee cups to multiply in the cupboards. That has to be a mystery of science waiting to be solved.

4. Then we have the ever popular, "Some Things Just Shouldn't Change" post, (which also featured in last week's recap), where we discuss planets, Pluto, and the Kuiper Belt, all of which are concepts in astrophysics.

5. In "What If?" I ask questions about the multiverse and Schrodinger's cat. You can't get much more "physics" than that. (Hey, it isn't all about falling ladders, you know.)

6. The Science Channel hosts all sorts of documentaries about science topics, and I mention one of them, and their scientific host, in "There Might Be a Conspiracy." 

7. I discuss the interdimensional portal that goes with Tupperware in, "It's More Than Unmatched Socks."

8. Toddler's contact with potential wavelengths from some unknown place appear in "Whose Been Teaching My Kid?"

9. Of course, just recently, I revealed my theory on how soda cans are actually "Mini Warps in Space/Time."

I think that brings us current. Apparently I like to blame my life on random quirks of quarks.

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Sleeping Patterns

Something has gone backwards in our house today. I went in to Toddler's room and found Houdini sleeping on Toddler's bed. (This hasn't happened before, although I don't honestly know why.)

Then, when Toddler went in to take his nap, he asked if he could sleep on the floor instead. More than once I've found Toddler sound asleep behind his door, in a perfect location to get smacked in the head by the door when I decide to come into his room. I've taken to opening the door very, very slowly so as not to give him a concussion.

I must have the weirdest family.

Girl Cat's favorite sleeping places are: 1. DH's chest, 2. our bed, 3. any pile of clean laundry she can find, and 4. (which still baffles me), Toddler's changing pad. (I so don't get that.)

Beds I can understand. I haven't met a cat yet that doesn't want to sleep on his person's bed at least part of the time. This is why the doors to our guest bedrooms are always closed. But on the laundry? I understand the fascination with DH's dirty socks (well ... so to speak) because they smell like him. It's the same reason that Girl Cat starts fawning all over DH when he comes in from mowing the lawn or chopping wood. He smells. She thinks he smells good. When he smells like that, she can have him. (I'm not thrilled with the dirty socks, either, so as far as I'm concerned she can have them too. I just wish she'd share the laundry some times ....)

Houdini and Big Black Cat have taken to sharing the back of the couch -- both the one I allow them on and the one I don't allow them on. I'm not all that thrilled about their sleeping places, and I'm always chasing them off the "good" couch, but I am thrilled that they've stopped trying to beat each other up. This is a good thing.

Me? I occasionally nap on the couch, but I'm really a recovering insomniac and pretty much stick to a regular bed. DH comes from a long line of family members that can sleep anywhere, at anytime, on very little notice. I've never been able to do that. I'm waiting to see which way Toddler pans out. He can sit in bed and talk to himself for literally hours before giving up and falling asleep, but he can also fall asleep on the floor, or sideways in his bad with his feet hanging off. The jury is still out on this one. Let's just say he snores a lot like Daddy. (I don't know if he snores like me because I very seldom hear myself snore.) Heck, even one of the cats snores around this house.

Yep. That's one weird family.

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