Another one bites the dust

Life changes

2012-01-04T18:13:00.000-05:00

In 2000-2001, my life changed dramatically. I took a year off school and got an internship in another state. In the process of leaving my life behind, I discovered a new life with a happier, better me.

In 2010-2011, my life changed dramatically. I got pregnant. I gave birth to a wonderful baby boy. I've redefined my normal once again, and while this new life is less indulgent and more structured, I've had the honor and privilege of creating a new life, and I am lucky enough that I can watch him grow up.

Between you and me, I'm a little scared about what 2020-2021 has in store for me. Luckily, I have a long time before I find out.

Everyone tells me about how fast time passes when you have a child. I understand it. The past eight months have gone by quickly. (Though I have to say that the first 8 weeks of those 8 months were among the longest of my life.) I think time is passing so quickly because we haven't had many fun adventures to break up the monotony of bottles, diapers, and naps.

I'm looking forward to going on adventures with E. I ask B all the time where we should take E for his first vacation. That we are even contemplating a vacation with him is a huge step. I don't see myself hopping into an airplane with E any time soon--I'm not that brave--but maybe we can do a long weekend somewhere this summer.

A lot of people really enjoy the baby phase, but I am really looking forward to E being more like a mini human and less like a baby. I want him to be able to eat the food that we're eating and tell us what he's thinking and offer opinions and engage with us in a way that his little brain just can't do now. But whenever I find myself wishing for him to be older and more self-sufficient and frankly, a little less in need of so much sleep (seriously...15-16+ hours/day is nice but inconvenient), I try to remind myself to sit back and enjoy his baby years because they'll be gone soon.

Putting an end to the suffering

2012-01-04T17:34:00.000-05:00

When I suffered my second bout of mastitis just days after completing the antibiotics course for my first bout of mastitis, I decided it was time to re-evaluate the pumping situation.

I like the idea of providing E with the very best nutrition, but my pumping was distancing me from him and potentially interfering with my ability to care for him. When I pump, I cannot pick E up, feed him, or even bend over. When I'm home alone with him, I pump during his naps, but when I have mastitis, I have to stick to a more strict schedule, so I need someone else to be available to take care of him while I pump (and when I'm unable to get out of bed or pick him up).

My mother took care of E both times that I got mastitis. I'm so lucky that she was able and willing to do that, but not being able to take care of your own child is a daunting position to be in.

I decided that 7 1/2 months of pumping and 2 bouts of mastitis was enough. I had suffered enough. (A touch dramatic, perhaps, but I was in rough shape.)

I am now slowly, slowly, slowly reducing the time that I pump, with the goal of stopping pumping all together at some point in the near future.

I drop a minute from each pumping session every 3 or 4 days. B and I joke that I will still be pumping on the day of E's high school graduation. Ok, probably not, though it could be months before I'm able to stop completely. Going slowly is the key to avoiding another run-in with the big M, mastitis.

My weaning myself from the pump means that E now has to drink some formula. I thought that I would feel guilty after giving him his first bottle of formula, but interestingly, I did not feel guilty. I felt relieved. I was no longer solely responsible for producing his nutrition. And luckily for us, he is willing to drink formula, which he gets only at school for the time being. We still have enough breastmilk that he doesn't (yet) have to drink formula at home.

My pumping journey has been long and difficult, and it's not over yet, but I'm proud of myself for making it this far, and I am so looking forward to the day when I no longer have to pump.

The most wonderful time of the year, or know thy limits

2011-12-06T17:23:00.000-05:00

It was the best of times; it was the worst of times. It was...Thanksgiving 2011.

I worried how E would handle Thanksgiving and Christmas this year. Mostly, I was concerned about his sleeping. Now I know that there are so many other things to worry about!

For Thanksgiving, we traveled during naptimes, and E slept reasonably well in the car - hooray! However, after a few hours of socializing and people and chatter and attention, the little guy was so wired, he couldn't fall asleep that night.

His normal bedtime (4:45 now, or 5 if I'm running late) came and went, and he was nowhere near ready for sleep, though not because he wasn't tired. He was exhausted, but the overtired state is complicated for babies. Babies have a lot of trouble falling asleep when they are overtired.

After much rocking, crying, and hand chewing, he eventually fell asleep around 7. We were both pooped.

Meanwhile, the extended day away from home combined with E's super-late (for him) bedtime messed with my pumping schedule. Thanksgiving night, I felt feverish and sore and decidedly unwell. By the next morning, a call to the doctor confirmed my fears - I had developed mastitis.

I haven't felt that bad since I had the flu. I felt like I had been hit by a truck. B had to delay his work day and my parents had to come up and watch E because I could barely get out of bed, let alone take care of a baby. I started on an antibiotic and round-the-clock Motrin and was starting to feel more like a human within a couple days. I just took my last antibiotic today and feel completely better.

We learned our limits. I now know not to push the time between pumping sessions. And we now know that 3 hours is too long for E to socialize.

I apologize now to everyone we'll be seeing for Christmas. We'll show up, but we won't be able to stay long. I hope by next year, we'll be able to resume more of our holiday activities.

To procreate or not to procreate

2011-11-16T17:48:00.000-05:00

This was the question I asked myself many times before B and I plunged into parenthood.

We (ok, I) deliberated long and hard for years and years about whether having a child was the right decision for me.

The difficulty with this decision is that you can easily identify the negative aspects involved in becoming a parent, but the positive aspects are more difficult to understand, particularly when you hear such wishy-washy wisdoms as "Your life will never been the same - for the better!" and "You don't understand your purpose on earth until you become a mother!"

So, let's start with what I knew. I knew that our lives would change. I knew I would get less sleep. I knew that vacations would be more difficult and that simple things that we took for granted, such as running out to the store, would no longer be as easy. I knew that our days of sleeping in and watching TV on a rainy afternoon would be over, for a while, anyway. I knew that my time would not really be my own anymore and that my priorities were going to shift dramatically.

I thought I was prepared for all the difficulties, but the truth is, you can't even begin to fathom the challenges until you experience them. Everything that you think will be hard is actually much harder than you expected. I've done my best to convey this information in previous postings, so I won't belabor the details again.

Because this post isn't going to be about how difficult it is to be a parent. I've written a lot about that, and for this post, I want to talk about the good stuff that comes when you become a parent. If you are on the fence about being a parent, you might benefit from my attempt at clarifying the wishy-washy wisdom.

Here is my clarification: In short, it feels good to be a parent. When you create an environment in which your child is happy and is thriving, you feel like a better person. You receive positive affirmation every time your child smiles at you or laughs because of something you did, whether you thought it was funny of not. In life, there are few opportunities to receive positive affirmation so many times in a single day. Imagine receiving 60 compliments in an hour? That's what it's like to take care of a smiling baby!

Every time your child reaches a milestone, from rolling over to sitting up to swallowing his first mouthful of mashed peas, you feel proud of yourself because the achievement happened under your love and care. Every time your child does something cute, you wish you could capture it in a little bubble and relive it over and over again, and again, you feel pride that your offspring has done something so memorable and wonderful. (On a side note, you sort of lose your mind regarding the awesomeness of your child's achievements and think that everything from a hiccup to a toe grab is the cutest thing ever, so you get to experience these moments all the time.)

Every time your child does something that reminds you of yourself, you receive more positive affirmation. After all, if there are two of you in the world doing the same thing, it must be a good idea! And when someone compliments your baby's cuteness or good behavior or skills, you feel as if the person is complimenting you.

When you sneak into your baby's room at night to watch him sleep (and perform your paranoid-mom is-he-still-breathing check), you feel wonder that you and your partner created the most perfect human being on earth, and you feel grateful that you have 18 years with him before he leaves and starts his own life away from you.

And part of you looks forward to that time, when you can sleep in again, vacation easily, shop when you want to, watch TV on a rainy day, and call your time your own. But part of you knows that no matter how difficult the 24/7 parenting days might be, you will miss them when they're gone, and so you try not to focus on the difficult parts and try to enjoy all the smiles and giggles and hugs.

You have the right to remain silent

2011-11-15T18:03:00.000-05:00

B and I were discussing our significantly scaled-back social lifestyle recently and decided that having a baby is a little like being placed under house arrest.
Sure, sometimes we leave the house. On weekends, we usually take turns. One person goes to the grocery store, and another person gets the oil changed. (Or B goes to the grocery store and then gets the oil changed - whichever.)

When my parents are kind enough to babysit the little man on weekends, we both can leave the house together. Sometimes we even (gasp!) go to a restaurant. Usually we run errands. I know, I know--contain your envy.

Rarely do we both leave the house with E, as he usually falls asleep and then his naps for the rest of the day are thrown off.

Knowing that this lifestyle is somewhat self-inflicted makes it a little easier to tolerate. A few months ago, after reading several books about infant and child sleep, I chose to put E's naps first whenever possible. And so we do, but my goodness, it's difficult.

How do we cope with this huge lifestyle adjustment? First, we accept that it's how our lives are going now, but it's not how they will always go. We hope that by the time E is down to 1 nap per day (which usually happens between 12 and 15 months), we'll have a little more freedom.

Second, we buy as much as we can online. Amazon is my new best friend. I joined Amazon Mom, which is a free program that offers 2-day shipping on nearly everything. (It's amazing.)

And finally, we do our best to enjoy this time with E. Life with a new baby presents many challenges, but witnessing these early months and all his discoveries and firsts is pretty amazing. He gets more and more charming every day.

And some day, we will be able to take him out so he can show off this charm to the rest of the world.

A twenty-six moo salute

2011-11-04T18:12:00.000-04:00

Today marks twenty-six weeks from E's birth. This occasion should be celebrated: I have achieved my pumping goal.

I have pumped at home, at other's homes, and in hotel rooms. I have pumped in parking lots, on highways, and by the side of the road. I have pumped at work.

I have pumped in the middle of the night and in the middle of the day. I have pumped while E napped, and I have pumped while trying to juggle a crying E. I have woken forty-five minutes early for the past 6 months so that I could pump. I have stayed up later than I wanted to so that I could pump.

I overcame the challenges that arose so that I could continue pumping. I pumped during an earthquake, a hurricane, and a snowstorm. I pumped during a 50-hour power outage. I pumped when I left my charging plug behind in a New York hotel room. I pumped after my first pump wore out and I had to get a replacement.

I pumped for hours a day, every day, for the sake of my baby, with the help, assistance, and encouragement of family and friends, and especially of B, who supported me in my goal, despite its numerous inconveniences.

So what now? I'll keep going, for a little while at least. I recently reduced my daily pumping sessions to 3 and consequently have to thaw some of the stockpiled supply to keep E fed each day. Probably by the end of the month, we'll start supplementing with formula. Eventually, I'll drop to 2 pumping sessions, and then 1, and then stop completely, whenever I decide that I've done as much as I want to, and we'll switch to 100% formula. By then, E will be eating more solids and won't be drinking quite as much as he is now.

To all my pumping sisters, both full- and part-timers, I raise my single, small, celebratory drink to you.

Phantom baby cry

2011-10-19T18:02:00.000-04:00

Perhaps you've heard of phantom limb, a sensation in which an amputated limb seems still to be attached to your body. I've uncovered a similar phenomenon: phantom baby cry.

Phantom baby cry manifests itself in several ways. When you're sleeping and your baby starts and then stops crying, you continue to hear the crying in your head. Only when you look at the baby monitor and see that it is not lighting up like the Fourth of July do you realize that your baby has settled down and is no longer crying. Yet you continue to hear the crying in your head.

Phantom baby cry doesn't always begin with your own baby crying, though. Any sound that resembles your baby's cry, such as children playing outside, certain types of music, and even birds, can trigger it, and then you stare at the baby monitor, trying to figure out if your baby is in distress.

I first experienced phantom baby cry in the hospital after delivering E, and it interrupted my sleep then as much as it does now. I simply cannot return to sleep after experiencing phantom baby cry.

I am hopeful that phantom baby cry will fade, just as the baby-in-the-bed dreams have mostly gone away. In the early days, I woke several times per night to B patting, hugging, and jiggling a pillow, attempting to soothe it because he thought it was E. Other times, he'd wake in a panic, patting around the bed looking for E until I explained that he was in his crib. These moments were somewhat funny until I started having the same dreams, waking up and thinking that I had lost E in the bed.

Anyway, the baby-in-the-bed dreams mostly went away when E started sleeping in his own room, and I hope that when E's sleep becomes a little more predictable and less fraught with tears, phantom baby cry will go away.

Please let it go away...

My latest obsessions

2011-10-12T17:50:00.000-04:00

And now for some non-baby chatter.

My latest obsessions...

Pandora
I'm late to the party on this one, but I'm rarely an early adopter of anything, so no surprise there. Pandora, if you are also late to the party, lets you create your own radio stations. You start with an artist, a song, or a genre, and by liking or disliking music, you can take your station in just about any direction. Or if you want a low-touch experience, you can skip the liking and disliking and listen to what they throw at you.

I have been going through phases. For a while, it was Time to Say Good-bye radio, and I walked around the house pretending to be an opera singer. (I suspect that B is glad that my Sarah Brightman phase has passed - for now.) Now I'm listening to Halleluja radio; I think I could listen to that song all day.

My Billy Joel station is also a fav.

Having a working cell phone
Perhaps "obsession" is too strong of a word. In fitting with my what-is-technology theme, I use a Blackberry that B bought before we were married. About a month ago, I learned that it was no longer receiving incoming calls. Shortly after, I found I could not send text messages.

Unfortunately, this situation is no longer tolerable. I need to be reachable, and I'd like to be able to send text messages. Maybe I'd even like to take a picture or two.

B and I decided that we'd buy new iPhones when the iPhone 5 came out, except...yeah, the iPhone 5 didn't come out. I decided I could live with the bargain-priced iPhone 4, and B ordered the 4S for himself, and our new phones should arrive in the next week or two.

I have mixed feelings about this purchase, considering my new phone is a year old, and do I really want to jump on the bandwagon before the rest of the world has had a chance to vet it, but I am taking a gamble on Apple. Apple, don't make me regret this decision.

My Kindle
I bought my Kindle over a year ago but didn't start appreciating it until E came along.

I went back to work after 6 weeks of leave (a story that I suppose I ought to share, perhaps sometime, if I'm feeling very brave), and B stayed home with the little man for a while. B watched him during the day, and I took over at 4 o'clock, after my workday ended. Part of the evening involved, obviously, putting E to sleep.

I wanted E to learn to fall asleep on his own, but this task is not an overnight process. I'd rock him, and then I'd put a drowsy-but-awake baby into his crib to see if he could fall asleep on his own. If he started to cry, I'd pick him up and start rocking, and try putting him down again in a few minutes.

Sometimes he'd fall asleep, only to wake up a few minutes later and need more rocking.

This process could easily take a half hour at night, sometimes more, in a darkened room. My Kindle and its booklight-equipped cover provided me with entertainment and an opportunity to do something that I enjoyed each day while teaching E a valuable skill.

The Fremont Jones books by Dianne Day will probably always remind me of that time period, as they were my main entertainment. I ran out of Fremont books and have since moved on to the Mary Russell books by Laurie King. Both books feature strong female protagonists who investigate crime. I would more strongly recommend the King books, particularly if you are a fan of Sherlock Holmes.

Buying a Kindle has transformed the way that I buy and think about books. Before, I carefully considered every book acquisition because I would need to find a place to store it, and our bookshelves are already full. Now that my books are digital, I can buy as many as I want and never have to worry about storage.

My book expenses have, needless to say, skyrocketed. On the other hand, since my clothing is frequently covered in drool, snot, and spitup, my clothing purchases have been radically reduced. Why buy nice stuff if it's only going to get baby-gooped?

I miss Anthropologie...

Baby as handbag and other misconceptions

2011-10-07T09:19:00.000-04:00

We booked E into a daycare center before we told family and friends that I was pregnant. I had heard about lengthy waiting lists and didn't want to be stuck without daycare options for him.

At our orientation, we learned that they were open from 7 AM to 6 PM. These hours gave us pause.

In the olden days (pre-Rooster), we both left the house before 7, and B always got home around 6:30. Depending on traffic, I usually got home between 5 and 6, but epic traffic days could involve a 2-hour ride home and an unpredictable arrival time.

For pickups after 6 PM, the center charges $1 per minute. Timeliness is of the essence at the end of the day.

We realized we were going to have to make adjustments in our lives. At the time, I reasoned that B could take the later train, dropping E off at 7 AM on the dot, and I could pick E up, arriving by 6 each night. In my mind, I thought of E a bit like a handbag that one could drop off and pick up at will and who would happily adjust to whatever schedule we needed to keep for work.

Parents of babies, feel free to snicker at my naivete. I certainly do.

After E came along, reality set in, and I realized that a baby is not at all like a handbag and he does not happily adjust to anything unless it's something that he wants.

I now know that his being at daycare from 7 AM to 6 PM would be difficult, if not impossible, since he usually does not wake up until 6:45 or 7 AM and usually goes to bed for the night between 5 and 5:30.

Yes, he really goes to bed for the night at that time, and he sleeps the whole night through (in his crib!) without needing a feeding. We have a sleepy baby.

In other sleepy news, he needs 3 naps a day. Most but not all babies eliminate the third nap by 9 months. If I had to guess, I'd say that E is going to be one of those babies who still needs a third nap.

He can't be awake for more than 2 hours without needing another nap, and 2 hours is pushing it. Usually, he needs to sleep after being up for an hour and a half.

As a result, we are frequently housebound. Sure, we could take him out in the car, and he'd fall asleep, but he wouldn't have a good nap; he'd wake up frequently; and any sleep that he might have had in his crib would be lost. I feel guilty doing that to him.

So we stay home almost all the time. If we need to run an errand, one person goes, or my parents watch Eli while we leave together.

Did I expect to be housebound for the first year of E's life? No, certainly not. Again, I thought he'd be like a cute, smiling handbag that one could take about during one's day, and that he'd nap when it was convenient for me.

On the plus side, E is more charming than I anticipated, and he brings me more joy and happiness than I expected. Every night before bed, I peek into his room and see him curled up on his left side, sleeping away, and I smile and say thanks that he's in my life. When I go into his room in the morning after he's woken up and he smiles up at me and is genuinely happy to see me, I accept the tradeoff that I've made - freedom gone, but new joy discovered. The sacrifices are worth it.

And I am grateful that B and I had 6+ wonderful, travel-filled, and delightful years before we undertook this adventure.

Successes, tempered by horrific frozen breast milk

2011-09-28T18:31:00.000-04:00

A couple weeks after we got home from the hospital with little E, one or both of us went grocery shopping. (Those first few weeks are hazy in my mind.) When we (or B) returned, we brought in groceries and had nowhere to put them because on the counter were two dishtowels, covered in drying bottle and pump parts. We had to put the grocery bags on the floor and unload them from there.
I remember thinking, "Is this how my life is going to be from now on?"

The answer is, yes! Life is, in general, more difficult with a mini human. But we are learning to adapt.

For instance, with regard to the counter, we've figured out that we can fit said bottle and pump parts on one towel. And now that I pump less frequently, we don't have to run the dishwasher two or three times per day, so there are occasionally stretches of time in which there are no drying parts. That having available counter space in our kitchen is a success is testament to how carefully one will look for anything resembling success during trying times.

Another success is E's sleep, not that we can take credit for a sleepy baby. He started sleeping through the night at a young age. We can take credit for breaking two habits (which, in the interest of full disclosure, we imposed upon him)--sleeping in his swing, and sleeping in a swaddle. I worried on a daily basis about how we were going to get him into his crib and out of his swaddle. Last week, feeling inspired (ok, guilted, whatever) by daycare, I declared to B that E was sleeping in his crib that night. And he did.

Did he sleep through the night? No! He woke up frequently. However, we turned the baby monitor off, and I put in ear plugs, so my night was not too horribly interrupted.

Perhaps you think I am a neglectful mom for being honest about our sleep training. However, I read Weissbluth's book about childhood sleep twice, and he convinced me that his "extinction" method is the best way to break babies of bad sleep habits. Teaching E how to fall back to sleep on his own is a skill that he will need for the rest of his life, and the sooner he learns it, the better off he will be.

He's been in his crib, sans swaddle, for about a week now, and it's going well. Last night he was awake between 4:30 and 5, singing to himself. I'm considering turning the hated baby monitor off for good, but I'm worried I won't wake up if he starts crying and something is genuinely wrong.

(In case you're interested in sleep training, I highly recommend reading a book about it. Some people are under the mistaken impression that sleep training means that you can put your baby down if he's crying and you don't want to deal with him, or that you never go to your baby when he cries, or that you don't have to do your part to get your baby ready for sleep. I recommend learning the rules before you play the sleep-training game.)

One final success is pumping, though even that success is tempered with the horror of spoiled breastmilk. B has already covered this story well in his blog, so I won't go into much detail, but we spent over an hour last night defrosting, sniffing, and dumping an entire month's worth of frozen milk. Tonight we work our way through August's milk and hope that not all of it has turned soapy/metallic/horrific.

This post is as scattered as my mind is lately.

Achy breaky mom

2011-09-14T17:44:00.000-04:00

I gave birth over four months ago, but I'm not finished with my pregnancy rants yet.

I expected to be a little creaky during pregnancy, when everything spreads out a little. But I expected the creakiness to be over after little E greeted the world.

The creakiness did not end. In fact, it only got worse.

I feel as if I have aged 30 years in just a short period of time. My knees ache when I walk up the stairs. My first steps of the day after getting out of bed are tentative, delicate, and painful. My joints crack when I walk. This is my reward for giving new life?

A quick internet search revealed that I am not alone with my achies, and they might be related to breastfeeding, a painful irony to accept. Isn't the breastpump punishment enough? Must I feel arthritic, too?

Motherhood: Not for wimps.

Spitup saturation

2011-08-12T12:15:00.001-04:00

Events in recent weeks have led me to ponder thoughts that have never crossed my mind. For instance: How much spitup needs to be on my shirt before I decide I have to change it? How long will it take before the carpet in the second-floor hallway is completely worn down from my pacing back and forth, trying to get E calm enough so that he can fall asleep? Most importantly: When I am ready to stop pumping, can I throw my breast pump into a bonfire and watch it burn, baby, burn?

Deep thoughts for a Friday morning.

News in the world of Little Man...

Playing
He's sort of grabbing toys now. Significance of this milestone: He is now sort of interactive. Emphasis on the "sort of."

Muscular development
We are seeking treatment for his crooked neck (medical term: torticollis). Torticollis occurs more frequently in boys and is more common now that babies sleep on their backs rather than their stomachs. Before he entered the world, E was in the same position for the majority of my pregnancy, so it's not surprising that his head tilts one way.

The issue been present since birth but seemed to be getting worse, so now we have a nurse/personal trainer coming to the house to stretch him out and help him strengthen the weaker side of his neck. We also have stretches and exercises that we do with him every day. We've already seen an improvement in his neck strength and range of motion.

Schedule
We're off the old schedule. I didn't like waking E up from naps. He didn't like it either. Now he sleeps more and almost never cries. (Except when he gets overtired or is not ready to be put in his crib for sleeping.)

Bonus: Since we no longer wake him at 6 AM, we get the chance to sleep in a little bit. And he's sleeping much better in his crib now that he's sleeping when he wants to sleep.

Downside: Everything's a bit more loosey goosey these days, until he becomes more consistent with his sleeping. (Allegedly, he should do that by 12-16 weeks. At 14 weeks, he is not yet there.) However, he still goes to sleep between 5:30 and 6 each night, so our evenings still belong to us.

School
E has been attending daycare three days per week for the last two weeks. He picked up a cold in his first week. He might have another cold now, after his second week (or maybe he's just not over the first one?) Our pediatrician assures us that this is just the beginning of his immune system becoming stronger. The sad truth is that even though I like to pretend that I am Wonder Woman, his eating my breastmilk has not turned my son into Superman, and he is still susceptible to colds just like all other kids.

His first day of school was difficult for me, but dropping him off is getting easier. My wanting to be back at work has certainly helped that situation.

Hungry

2011-07-23T08:47:00.000-04:00

I am 42.9 percent of the way toward completing my 6-month pumping goal. Precise, yes, because I run this calculation nearly every day. One does what one must to keep going.

B is fond of presenting to me hypothetical situations that require a choice, and I am generally unable to choose. However, I presented such a situation to myself the other day and found that the choice was surprisingly easy.

Would I rather pump for 6 months or go through labor again?

I choose labor. If labor could somehow produce 6 months' worth of the best nutrition for little E, I'd take it in a heartbeat over pumping. (Assuming, of course, that I could get an epidural.)

But I don't really have that choice, so I continue to pump and to deal with the inconvenience, physical discomfort, and the feeling that my body is not really my own.

And I have to deal with the hunger. I thought that I was extra hungry during pregnancy, when you're supposed to eat 200-300 extra calories per day. Having to consume an extra 600 calories per day is unexpectedly difficult.

I'm hungry all the time. Only on several occasions in the last 11 weeks have I felt really, truly full. (Side note: Both times occurred after large meals of hot salted meat.) I have to eat several breakfasts and lunches each day, and I consume ice cream at night by the gallons. (Ok, usually by the pints--I am an ice cream snob.)

I eat as much as B does, sometimes more. He hasn't been able to finish one of my meals in ages. Sad for him, perhaps, though I think he doesn't mind the nightly ice cream.

My body's increased calorie burning did mean that I lost my 30 pounds of pregnancy weight very quickly. I'm back to my pre-pregnancy weight, though not my pre-pregnancy size. My waist and hips are both 2 inches bigger than they used to be. I suspect that this change is permanent. My pants still fit, thank goodness (you have no idea how difficult it is for me to find pants), but I have had to say good-bye to most of my fitted dresses.

As for my feet, I'm not sure if they've changed. I haven't got around to trying on all my shoes yet, but the shoes I wear all the time still fit. I bought my first pair of post-pregnancy shoes recently and had to go a size up (11 now--gah), but they run small, so it's tough to say whether my feet have really grown.

I had sort of been hoping that my feet would get bigger so I'd have an excuse to throw out all the uncomfortable shoes I have and start over. Perhaps the hidden animosity I have toward them is reason enough to get rid of them and start anew.

Useful baby books

2011-06-26T09:41:00.000-04:00

I wanted to share the books that have helped guide us along the parenting path.

The Contented Little Baby Book
Does the idea of putting your baby on a schedule appeal to you? Do you like the idea of knowing that you'll have several predetermined chunks of time each day to yourself?

If so, consider checking out Gina Ford's book. She's a famous nanny in Britain, and lots of British (and now American) parents have adopted her ideas.

Most books say that you can't put a newborn on a schedule. However, we've had a lot of success. Sure, everything doesn't always go as planned, and sometimes he falls asleep earlier than he's supposed to or wakes up before he's supposed to, but we do our best to get back on track and usually can.

If the idea of a highly structured day is overwhelming to you or if you are committed to feeding your baby on demand, no matter the time of day, don't bother reading this book. But if you like the idea of only 5-7 feedings per day and of getting your baby to sleep through the night at a young age, check it out.

(For the record, Rooster is not yet sleeping through the night, but most nights, we get a 5-hour stretch, which is good for a 7-week-old.)

The Happiest Baby on the Block
This book frequently offers opposite advice from Gina's book. The author says that there's no way you can put a baby on a schedule until at least 8 weeks and that your job as a parent is to adapt your life to your baby and do what he wants.

The book focuses on getting your baby to stop crying, theorizing that a non-crying baby will sleep well. The author offers a few ideas that we know that Gina would pooh-pooh, but they work for us.

For instance, Gina says that the baby should sleep in his crib, as sleeping elsewhere will encourage him to develop bad sleeping habits that you will then have to correct down the road. However, she doesn't address what to do when your baby will sleep for only 30 minutes at a time in his crib. The Happiest Baby book tells you to let your baby sleep in his swing, all night if necessary, until 4 or 5 months or whenever he is ready to move back to his crib.

We put Rooster in his crib for each nap, and sometimes he sleeps there the entire time, but most of the time, he wakes up crying after only a half hour. At that point, we calm him down and put him in his swing, where he sleeps like a contented little baby for the rest of his nap (not always, but most of the time).

You do what you must to get sleep.

Another side note--at some point, you will have an inconsolable, screaming baby on your hands. And the tricks in the Happiest Baby book will get him to stop crying. Buy this book, learn about the 5 S's, and your baby will cry less.

What to Expect series
These books are great for the paranoid preggo and mom who wants to know every bad thing that could possibly happen and who wants to commit many hours to reading the books cover to cover, as the books are not designed to be scanned or used as reference material.

Are the books useful? Sometimes. Are they annoying? Definitely. You make the call about whether you can handle their overcautiousness.

The Baby Owner's Manual
If you have very little experience handling babies, consider buying this book. Most baby books provide theoretical information, but this book provides step-by-step instructions for all your baby-related tasks, from getting into breastfeeding positions to giving a sponge bath. Plus it's well-written, scannable, and fun.

Am I biased because I have written a few manuals myself (admittedly, not nearly as fun as this one)? Perhaps. But I suspect that this book is appealing to non-technical writers, too.

Baby 411
We bought this book on our Kindle, a decision that I regretted at first, as it's enormous and the Kindle does not allow for easy scanning. However, the Kindle has a Find feature, allowing us to search the book when we have questions about anything from cradle cap to thrush.

The book provides a lot of detail, perhaps too much. Reading it while I was pregnant gave me nightmares. Purchase if you want too much information about everything or if you want a comprehensive reference book.

Milk Memos
If you want to know how what it's like to return to work and still try to breastfeed your baby, consider buying this book. It will also provide encouragement if you are pumping.

Great expectations

2011-06-02T15:32:00.000-04:00

B is frequently frustrated by my inability to play "Let's Pretend." He enjoys throwing out hypothetical situations to find out what I'd do in them. Invariably, I respond to his questions with more questions, probing for details, and in the end, my answer is usually, "I don't know," or "That sounds unlikely to happen."

My brain just doesn't process hypotheticals.

It should come as no surprise, then, that I had no idea what to expect from my new role of "mother," so I didn't think I had many expectations before entering this new role. However, I apparently did have some expectations, perhaps unspoken even to myself, because I am constantly surprised by my new role.

Here are a few areas that have taken me by surprise in the last month or so.

Fun
The secret that no one tells you is that the first few weeks of parenthood aren't much fun. People hide this knowledge in statements such as, "It gets better," or "It gets easier." What they're really saying is, "There are limited opportunities for fun in the beginning."

Sure, there are elements of fun and wonderful, particularly when your baby is cute and provides you with adorable photographable moments of cuteness explosions. But a lot of the time, it's diaper blowouts at 3 in the morning and the need to change the bedding and the diaper and swaddle blanket of a screaming newborn.

That situation probably doesn't sound like fun--because it isn't!

Now when people tell me, "Oh, the early days are so much fun," my answer is, "Actually, they're not that much fun." And it's amazing how the conversation changes afterward! Invariably, the woman (because men do not feel the need to pretend that newborns are a barrel of laughs all the time) lowers her voice and admits that she herself did not enjoy the early days that much, and then she offers the age when the fun actually begins (usually somewhere in the 2 to 4 month range).

I am doing my best to maintain an even keel until the fun increases. It must get better, or people wouldn't have multiple children.

Baby blues
They warned us in childbirthing class about the baby blues, and naturally, I assumed that I would be immune to them.

This situation illustrates the danger of inflated self-confidence.

The baby blues usually start a couple days after the birth of your baby and are the result of your hormones going haywire. You can go from laughter to tears within minutes and have very little control over your emotions.

I first experienced the baby blues when I nearly started crying while we were leaving the hospital. Make no mistake--I couldn't wait to get home. But actually walking down the hallway with Rooster in his carrier, knowing that we'd soon be flying solo with him, left me overwhelmed.

Many situations left me overwhelmed those first couple weeks. I cried...a lot. A couple times, I felt like I couldn't stop crying, a scary situation because the baby blues can turn into postpartum depression.

Now, four weeks later, my baby blues are mostly gone. I still get overwhelmed taking care of a newborn by myself while B is at work, but I feel like I am much more in control of my emotions. I think that my baby blues were very closely tied with my physical recovery, another unexpected result of this thing they call childbirth...

Lengthy recovery time
I did not expect to be in so much pain following the birth. I thought that lengthy recovery times were for c-sections only. Wrong!

In the days following Rooster's birth, I could barely get out of bed. I watched the clock religiously and requested my Motrin every 6 hours. Two weeks later, I was still taking Motrin and walking like a bit of a gunslinger.

A month later, I still have not fully recovered. During pregnancy, I thought that classifying pregnancy leave as a short-term disability was a little odd, but now I understand because I genuinely do feel like I am physically disabled much of the time.

It seems awfully unfair to have to deal with the physical recovery from birth at the same time that you have to learn how to take care of a newborn, but that's the way it is. I don't know what I'd do if I didn't have B. Single mothers, you amaze me.

Breastfeeding difficulties
Breastfeeding is natural and easy, right? You and the baby instinctively know what to do, and your baby gains weight and thrives with very little effort from you while you still manage to get lots of sleep.

That's how it's sold, anyway. The reality was quite the opposite.

My baby didn't know what to do, he only lost weight, and no one got any sleep.

I've already written about this subject, so I won't belabor the point, but anyone who says that breastfeeding is easy is either extremely lucky or is lying.

Exhaustion
I knew I'd be tired. I just didn't know what tired really felt like until now. I leave a room to grab something and forget what I needed. I start sentences and stop speaking in the middle because I've forgotten what I was going to say. I forget how much milk I put in Rooster's bottle. I find my eyelids getting awfully heavy while I'm rocking and feeding Rooster.

Sleep is at a wicked premium in our house these days (for everyone except Rooster, that is). Getting 6 hours of sleep--not consecutively, mind you, total--in a day is now a luxury.

We are lucky that he wakes up only twice each night and that he is rarely fussy during the night. (He saves that behavior for me during the day.)

Apparently, it will get easier.

Moo

2011-06-02T14:42:00.000-04:00

We've had some challenges, our new family, during this "transition" period. One of the biggest challenges has been feeding our child.

I was committed to feeding breastmilk to Rooster, but he and I had some difficulties with breastfeeding. He had trouble latching, so I got a shield, which helped somewhat, but he still had a terrible latch that left me in pain. If I removed him, he wouldn't relatch, so I had two options--deal with the pain, or let him starve. I did my best to suck it up and deal with the pain.

At the hospital, we had several visits with lactation consultants. The visits were unpleasant at best, traumatic at worst, leaving Rooster screaming and no more able to eat than he had been before. Seeing my baby being manhandled in an attempt to get him to eat left me feeling resentful and angry towards these women and made me distrust lactation consultants.

I also felt like I was a challenge rather than a human being to them. "I'm going to get him to eat without the shield," one consultant declared on our last day at the hospital, grabbing hold of his neck and of me and leaving both of us in frustrated and in pain. (She did not succeed. I knew she wouldn't.)

It was the visiting nurse, who stopped by the day after we got home from the hospital, who put the final nail in the breastfeeding coffin. She brought her portable scale and weighed him, and he had lost weight since leaving the hospital.

"Feed him every two hours," she recommended.

Something you should know about this "every two hours" recommendation--it doesn't mean that you feed him, and then two hours from the end of the feeding, you start again. No, no, no. If you start feeding at 10 PM, your next feeding begins at midnight, even if your 10 PM feeding takes 45 minutes (or longer!).

Further complicating matters was that it took two of us to attempt to get both Rooster and me into the right position for a feeding, so B, Rooster, and I spent one horrible, sleepless night with lots of tears and screaming (mostly but not exclusively from Rooster). At the end of each feeding, Rooster and I were covered in breastmilk, but very little actually made it into his belly.

The next day, we started charging the breastpump. It took 24 hours to charge, so we all suffered another horrible, sleepless night during which I felt guilty for (gasp!) going 2 1/2 hours between feedings so that I could get maybe 30 minutes of sleep at a time.

Finally, the breast pump was charged. The first time I pumped was a glorious, wonderful experience. Rooster drank the contents of the bottle in about 5 minutes and was ready for more when he finished. For the first time in days, he looked like a content baby.

As for me, I felt free for the first time since his birth. "You mean," I asked rhetorically, "I can still feed him breastmilk, but don't have to breastfeed in public? Other people can feed him, too? I can leave the house and not worry about taking his food supply away? We'll know exactly how much he's eating? Sign me up!"

So for the last 3+ weeks, I have been pumping. In the online world, this setup is called "exclusively pumping," or EP, and seems to be most popular among women whose babies are born prematurely and can't breastfeed, and others like me, who attempted it but couldn't deal with the stress of the early days.

The situation is both the best and worst of the breastfeeding and bottle-feeding worlds. I already mentioned some of the benefits, but there are downsides, too, mostly logistical. Between bottles and breastpump parts, we have a ton of washing up to do, so we run the dishwasher multiple times per day. I have to find time to pump 6 or 7 times per day, and each pumping session lasts a long time, 20 minutes or more (the longest I've gone is 50). When I'm flying solo at home, I have to pump during his naps, but if he wakes up crying, I have to either quit or try to juggle a baby and a breastpump (an acquired skill...I am still acquiring it...).

And while I'm not exactly chained to Rooster, I am sort of chained to my breastpump, as I have to pump every few hours. During our road trip this past weekend, I pumped in a mall parking lot and in a parking lot just off the side of the road while B fed Rooster. I wouldn't call it a fun experience, and it's not one I'd like to have every day, but it's doable when you have to travel.

In hindsight, should I have persevered with breastfeeding? Maybe, maybe not. Even though it was overall dissatisfying and humbling, I appreciated the idea of it and even sometimes enjoyed it. But at this point, pumping is the path that I have chosen.

It's not an easy path, and I have on occasion thought wistfully of the free jar of formula we received at the hospital. My goal is to continue for six months, but six months is an awfully long time, so I approach the activity with a "one day at a time" motto. Every day I wake up and make the decision to pump that day. I'm glad that I've stuck with it, and I'm going to carry on for as long as I can.

Plugged in

2011-05-18T11:20:00.000-04:00

"There's a look in your eyes that I've never seen before," B told me. "It looks like you've been plugged in."

Oh, labor. You have the oddest effects on us ladies.

I awoke a little after midnight on Friday, May 6, feeling some discomfort in my belly and lower back. "This could be it," I thought, and knowing that I likely had a long road ahead of me, I attempted to fall back asleep. Alas, sleep wouldn't come. I stayed in bed for another 45 minutes or so, trying not to time the contractions but realizing that they were closer together than I expected, 5 minutes apart or so. From what I learned at our childbirthing class, most first labors start with contractions that are spaced out further, 15 minutes or so.

I decided to get up around 1 AM. If this really was labor, I wanted to be prepared for it. If not, well, a shower and blown-out hairstyle never hurt anyone, even when they are undertaken in the middle of the night.

I hopped in the shower, hoping that the hot water would alleviate some of the pain. Nope! Nevertheless, I washed my hair and tried to linger in the hopes of distracting myself from the discomfort.

And then I blew out my hair and put on makeup. Appearances matter, even when one is about to have a child.

Ten days have passed, and it's already difficult to remember exactly what the pain felt like. I guess it's true that you really do forget. The pain in my stomach was sort of like severe diarrhea cramps, and the pain in my lower back was right around my tailbone. I'd say I felt the pain was evenly split between belly and back.

When a contraction started, I'd make my way to the foot of the stairs and crouch down on all fours, a position I learned in childbirthing class. It helps when you have back labor (labor pains in your back--it can be from a backwards baby or a confused brain sending the wrong signals).

When the contractions started getting more intense, around 2:30 AM, I went into our bedroom and told B, "You need to get up." I thought that maybe the sound of my shower would have woken him, but he was sound asleep. He asked if he had time to shower, and I said, yes, absolutely. First-time labors are always lengthy, and I planned to stay at home for as long as I could.

He showered while I continued walking around, sitting on my balance ball, kneeling in front of the couch, lying on my side, attempting any position to help with the pain. I also used the breathing technique I learned in childbirthing class--deep breath in through your nose and then deep breath out through your mouth. I know I mocked the breathing technique a little bit, but it really did help and was a helpful distraction.

B warmed up the heat wrap for me and helped apply it to my back during each contraction, and it helped a bit. He also rubbed my lower back during the contractions, another helpful tool (or at the very least, another distraction).

By the time B finished eating breakfast and drinking his coffee, contractions were still somewhat irregular but were mostly less than 3 minutes apart. The pain was getting intense, so we decided to call the doctor.

We left a message with the answering service and received a call back almost immediately from the doctor on call at the hospital. He said that it sounded like I was in active labor and asked what my strategy for pain management was. I told him that I wanted to let labor progress as far as it could and that I wanted to wait as long as I could, and then I'd get an epidural. He said that I could hang out at home for another hour or two and come to the hospital when I needed help with the pain. It sounded like a plan to me.

We stayed home for another hour or so, but then by 4:30, I decided it was time to head to the hospital. B packed up the car with our bags, the car seat, and the balance ball, and we were off.

I didn't realize how bumpy the road to the hospital was until I had to ride on it while in labor! Being confined in my seat during each contraction and not being able to move around was difficult, but I did my best to breath through each one and remind myself that we'd be there soon.

We arrived at the hospital, parked in the garage (Second floor! Stairs!), and entered through the ER. They directed us to an elevator; we took a wrong turn (neither of us was thinking straight), but luckily a nurse pointed us in the right direction before we went too far. Walking during a contraction was nearly impossible.

As we pulled into the garage, we saw another couple--the woman obviously in labor, too--enter the hospital just in front of us. She clearly had had a more difficult start to labor than I had. My doctor told me that I couldn't go to the hospital until I had tears running down my face from the pain, and I never reached that stage, but this poor girl did.

We saw them waiting outside the check-in room when we arrived. We checked in and were told to wait outside. I walked around between contractions--walking helps keep things moving--and knelt in front of a chair during each contraction. After a few minutes, a nurse came out and called my name. However, no one had come for the other woman, who was clearly in worse shape than I, so I told the kind-looking nurse to take the other woman instead, and that I could wait for the next available person.

My nurse came out a few minutes later. She seemed a bit less kind. Oh, well--she was one of 3 nurses that we had, due to shift changes, so she didn't stick around for long.

She seemed doubtful that I was actually in labor. She wanted to know how far dilated I was at my last appointment and seemed to think that I couldn't be in labor. She reluctantly took me into a large triage room with individual cubbies that had curtains for privacy. She gave me a gown and belly band to change into, and then I returned to the little cubby.

Moving around in the cubby was nearly impossible--not enough space, and who wants to walk with a johnnie hanging open behind them, anyway--but the excitement of being in the hospital helped distract me from my contractions. The belly band held monitors that checked my and the baby's heartbeat, and one of them had an unpleasant nub that dug into my stomach, so I had to keep readjusting it, and then it would stop picking up a heartbeat, and it had to be adjusted again, prolonging the monitoring phase.

After a little bit, a resident arrived to examine me. Everyone took my situation much more seriously when her exam revealed that I was 5 cm (10 cm means you're ready to push) dilated.

"You're going to have a baby today!" she said.

"When do I get a room?" I demanded.

"In the next hour or so," she said. But just a few minutes later, my nurse returned and took me to my room, where I had a little more privacy. (And when I say privacy, I mean privacy from other patients, not from hospital staff, as I can confirm that there is no privacy when one is birthing a baby.)

I had tested positive for some bacteria or other that 40% of people happen to be carrying around at any given time, so as soon as I got to my room, I had to get an IV with penicillin, further hampering my movements. Kneeling on a cold floor in a johnnie during contractions while trying not to impede my IV and monitoring wires was expectedly unpleasant. My mind started thinking thoughts of epidurals, but I tried to hold off as long as I could.

The nurse offered a drug that doesn't help with the pain but makes you feel a little drunk, but I passed, as I wanted to keep my wits about me. I was holding out for the real pain relief.

Eventually, the pain was too intense, and I was unable to breathe through it anymore. "Perhaps now would be a good time for an epidural," I said. The doctor's exam revealed that I was 6 cm dilated, a perfectly acceptable time for receiving pain relief. The anesthesiologist arrived quickly, and the insertion process took probably 15 minutes, and then I had to wait another 15 minutes or so for the pain relief to kick in. I think he was finished by 7:30 AM.

The anesthesiologist kept warning me about feeling bee stings and pressure, but I barely felt anything at all during the epidural insertion. I guess my mind had bigger pain to think about. An epidural consists of a catheter in your back that somehow makes all the pain go away. There is a button that can be pressed if you need more pain relief. (It came in handy later on.) The worst part of the epidural was its removal, as the anesthesiologist had put a huge piece of what felt like tape on my back and it had to be taken off. But that didn't happen for several more hours.

After the epidural kicked in, I had to lie on my side. My legs felt numb, sort of like the pins and needles feeling but without any pain, just delightful numbness. I could still feel each contraction, but it wasn't nearly as painful. The epidural did leave me shaky, a normal side effect that I was able to tolerate very easily.

I sent B off to get some food and tried to sleep. Sleep didn't happen, but resting with my eyes closed and not feeling any pain was lovely. Around 9:00, another exam revealed that I was at 9 cm. "Already?" I thought. I was not mentally prepared to push. At 9:45, another doctor came in, did an exam, and said that I was fully dilated and ready to go. She took what looked like a crochet needle and broke my water (painless), which ran clear (a good sign--big smiles from all the hospital staff), and then left me with the nurse.

The nurse asked if I felt like I had to push yet. I said I didn't know what that meant. She said it feels like you have to use the bathroom. I said, no, not yet, so we waited for another 10 minutes, and then I decided it was time to get the party started, so I started pushing a little after 10 AM.

The first 45 minutes or so of pushing was a bit anticlimactic. My contractions were spaced out pretty far apart, and it is possible that I was not giving the activity my full effort. I sort of wanted to see whether my full effort was really required.

As it turns out, it was. Eventually the doctor showed up, around the same time that the contractions were getting really intense, as painful as they were before the epidural. This part of the experience is a bit fuzzy. I kept looking at the clock and seeing time pass, all while feeling this enormous, crushing pressure in my abdomen. My third nurse, about as nice as the first, didn't want to give me another shot of the epidural because I was so close, but as things progressed and I was clearly struggling, the doctor told her to give it to me. I'm not sure if it kicked in, but it gave me the mental fortitude to keep going.

Around 11:30, I asked the doctor how much longer this was going to be, as I was not having fun and really wanted to get the whole ordeal over with. She said that if I pushed really hard, I could be finished in 30 minutes.

I took that as a challenge. She ordered some pitocin to make my contractions come more often, and I kicked my pushing effort into a higher gear. Within 15 minutes, our little Rooster entered the world, and the most severe pain was over.

Everything that happened next is fuzzy. I saw Rooster come out, and he was kind of slimy looking and gray (so not the romantic view of things, but it's true). The hospital staff got him crying (crying in a newborn is a good sign) and he got some color to him. I remember holding him for a little bit, and then the staff took him away for various tests and other activities while the doctors turned their attention to me.

There were a lot of stitches and a clot that had to be dealt with. I won't provide any more details, but moving around was very difficult for several days, and today is the first day that I have not had to take Motrin. It was one of many unexpected results of this whole baby thing.

Because of my late epidural shot, I had the shakies and had to stay in bed for another hour and a half or so until its effects wore off. B ordered lunch for us--I expected that I'd be ravenous afterwards, but I was somewhat unenthusiastic about food still--and then the nurse took me to the bathroom for a tutorial on how to use the bathroom for the next couple weeks. Again, I will not share details, but I will say that I was not mentally prepared for the physical damage of pushing a baby out.

Next I got into a wheelchair, and we rolled to the room where we'd be sleeping for the next two nights. It was much more spacious than some of the others (I think my post-delivery complications helped score us a bigger room, one positive result...). It had a private bathroom that was very poorly planned (no shelving!) and a few chairs and tables, including one horrible chair that converted into a "bed" for B. He was in pain for days afterward...

There is obviously much more to tell, but it has taken me 3 days to complete this posting, so I am just going to post it and continue on with my story when I have some free time.

Upping the efficiency ante

2011-04-13T17:49:00.001-04:00

In the last couple months, we've made a few purchases that have significantly improved our lives.

Roomba vacuum
Neither of us likes to vacuum, but with a little one on the way, we need to have clean floors all the time. I considered my options and came up with a few ideas:

1. Vacuum more.
2. Hire a cleaning service.
3. Buy a Roomba.

I was able to dismiss Option 1 immediately.

Option 2 would provide many benefits other than clean carpets, but now is not the time to take on another considerable monthly expense.

Option 3 costs about the same as a month's worth of house cleaning--not cheap--but a Roomba comes with a yearlong warranty, so we can assume that we can enjoy the benefits of the Roomba for at least a year. Plus one of the benefits of a cleaning service is that it inspires you to neaten up for them, and a Roomba offers the same motivation because you don't want to run a vacuum when your shoes are littering the floor.

Our Roomba arrived a few weeks ago and seemed pretty easy to set up. (B did it.) The biggest hassle is the need to clean it out after every vac. As B pointed out, you don't necessarily save time over traditional vacuuming, since the cleaning-out process can be time consuming, but the Roomba is appealing to people who would rather clean out smaller parts than push a vac around.

B uses one of those air cans to help clean the little guy out, and so far, Roomby is working like a champ. We ran it for the first time when we were home so we could figure out where he'd get stuck. It's a little noisy, no worse than a regular vacuum, but its cleaning cycle is about 30 minutes, a long time to listen to a vacuum, so now we run it as we walk out the door.

The Roomba is lightweight, so you can easily move it from floor to floor, set it off, and come back to nicely vacuumed carpets. It even leaves vacuum marks in the carpet.

The Roomba probably can't replace our regular vacuum, and I wouldn't recommend it for houses with pets unless you were willing to run it and clean it out every day, but we're very happy with the purchase and our always-clean carpets.

New toaster
We didn't have a toaster in my city apartment; there was no room in my bathtub-sized kitchen. After we bought our condo about 5 years ago, we ventured to Target in search of a toaster oven. There were shelves upon shelves of them, and I declared that I was willing to invest in the cheapest toaster oven they had and would consider upgrading to a better model later. Mr. Cheapy came home with us.

He rattled and ticked and wasn't very good at toasting or reheating, but he was easier and faster than the oven, so we stuck with him. He repaid our commitment to him by continuing to work despite the occasional conflagrations that resulted from heating pizza slices directly on the rack.

However, life is too short to have to keep an eye on your bagel to make sure that it does not become burned. I decided I was ready for a grownup toaster oven.

My cousin raved about her Breville Smart Oven, and Cook's Illustrated concurred, giving it their top rating among toaster ovens. I was sold. B, who is not a fan of depriving himself, either, agreed that we deserved a better toaster and ordered it.

We love it. It is surprisingly easy to use, considering its complex settings. The crumb tray is a breeze to empty. And our bagels are toasted the way that we want them to be, no supervision required.

One minor issue is the oven's size and weight. This appliance is made to live on a counter top, whereas our old toaster lived in the pantry and came out only when we needed it. However, the size is also a plus. It's an extension of your oven and can fit surprisingly large pans inside. And it preheats in just a couple minutes, saving time and energy when compared to your oven.

The other major downside is the price tag. The Smart Oven is not a cheap investment. Sure, you're saving some electricity from not using your oven, but are you saving that much electricity? Probably not. However, if you can justify the cost to yourself (or if you don't even feel the need to justify the expense), I recommend considering this oven for your kitchen.

Clothes lines
Great convenience can sometimes come at a low cost. Don't you love staying at a hotel and finding the convenient clothes line in the shower?

I do. I have a wooden drying rack from my college years, but the glue has worn out in several places, and it can't stand upright on its own anymore. With all the baby laundry we have ahead of us--including our crib linens that can't go in the dryer (argh), we needed a better drying solution.

B suggested the clothes lines that hotels feature, and I loved the idea. Hotel living at home? Sign me up!

We bought 2 retractable clothes lines, and B installed them in my shower in a snap. I washed a couple of bassinet sheets last week and was very pleased not to have to drag out that horrible drying rack.

There is one minor issue with installing the lines in the shower, though--you have to remember that you have items hanging in there before turning the shower on. Going forward, perhaps I ought to leave the curtain open when items are drying...

Pregnancy essentials

2011-04-08T15:21:00.000-04:00

We have another month or so (plus or minus 2 weeks) before we meet Rooster, and I thought I'd share a few items that have been essential for maintaining my sanity and comfort during my pregnancy. This list is short because I wanted to include only the items that I could not have lived without during this time.

Peace of mind essentials
My mother sent me a Consumer Reports shopping list, and I used it to create a checklist (ok, the document I created was a bit more complex than that) for shopping for Rooster. Most of the checklists in the freebie baby and pregnancy magazines that I've received from the doctor and from childbirthing class have been longer, more intimidating, and full of stuff you don't actually need right away. The CR list was clearly put together by someone who doesn't want to waste your time or money.

The second item in this category is difficult to categorize, but it comes down to getting your house in order in anticipation of your new arrival. Every weekend, we have a lengthy to-do list that we tackle. We accomplish many tasks, but the list does not seem to grow any shorter because I keep adding items to it. However, we're finally finishing chores and tasks that we've been ignoring for a while (in some cases, for years).

Sleeping essentials
I had a lot of trouble training myself to sleep on my side, and my Snoogle Total Body Pillow, a recommendation from my cousin, has made my nights so much better. It's shaped like a long C, and it allows me to sleep on either side. Before I committed to the Snoogle, I propped myself up with pillows, but after you dance the Snoogle dance, you realize that traditional pillows are far inferior. One note - you don't need the Snoogle until you have to start sleeping on your side (around the fifth or sixth month).

My second item is simple and inexpensive - a nightlight for the bathroom. You can expect multiple trips to the bathroom each night, and all that waking is difficult enough to overcome without having to deal with jarring and bright bathroom lights. Buy one as early as possible.

Finally, a humidifier has been invaluable. My congestion has improved since my second trimester, but I still wake up congested every morning without the humidifier. A note - the hot humidifier turns our bedroom into a bit of a sauna, which was great in January, when the room temperature fell below 60 degrees some nights. The sauna experience is a little less desirable in warmer months. A cold humidifier would have been a more flexible option.

Comfort essentials
My belly has been itchy since practically Day 1, and I don't know what I would have done without my Bella B Tummy Honey Butter. It's a little greasy, particularly if you use a lot, but it helps with the itching and has thus far helped me avoid stretch marks.

For the last trimester, I recommend a balance ball and a microwaveable (grain-filled) neck wrap. Both help with the upper-back pain that has become a hallmark of my third trimester.

Clothing essentials
If you're tall, you're going to have trouble finding maternity pants. Even if you're not tall, I can't recommend the Gap gBalance pants enough. They're comfortable and wash and dry well.

I also recommend a couple of cheap maternity tank tops--mine are from Old Navy--in black, white, and any other colors you like. They're great under loose and low-cut maternity tops.

Food essentials
Still no food cravings, but I have been snacking on Cheez-Its since almost day one. When morning sickness or hunger strikes, fight back with carbs!

Ice cream has been another essential food, though it's more of an evening than a daytime snack for me. And because you are supposed to eat extra calories each day anyway, it's a guilt-free experience!

There isn't much I will miss about being pregnant, but I will miss the guilt-free calories...

Estate planning

2011-03-29T19:40:00.000-04:00

A couple years ago when we purchased life insurance, our financial advisor recommended that we also get wills. We agreed that we needed them but never quite got around to getting them. However, there's nothing like impending parenthood to jump start one's plans for the future, so now we're researching the estate-planning process.

We met with a lawyer last week to discuss the four components of an estate plan, and here's what we learned.

Wills
A will determines how one's assets are distributed in the event of one's passing.

When you're married, your will is straightforward: everything goes to your partner. It's nice to take into account what might happen if you both die together, but if you're gone, do you really care? Probably not, which is why we have avoided creating wills until now.

However, when children enter the picture, you have to care. If you both die together and leave your child or children behind, you can set up a living trust. More about that later.

You need to name an executor for your will. That person is in charge of filing the will at probate and collecting assets. Your spouse is typically the executor of your will, but you should come up with at least one backup. The law firm that creates your will can appoint a family member if the named executor is no longer around.

Living trust
A living trust, also known as a family trust or revocable trust (because it can be changed at any time) is used for the health, education, support, and maintenance of a child (or children) that you leave behind.

You have lots of options for setting up a trust, including imposing restrictions (such as no distributions for x years after marriage, or higher-education requirements, or specific amounts set aside for education). However, restrictions can be risky because you never know what might happen after you're gone.

Rather than imposing restrictions, most people write letters of intent so that others know their wishes for the distribution of the trust. The letter is not legally binding, however.

You can also specify when distributions happen. For many trusts, distributions are available in chunks at ages 25, 30, and 35. When the child reaches one of those ages, he can request distributions, and the person overseeing the trust is not allowed to say no.

You have to designate an overseer for the trust and several backups. You can appoint multiple overseers, but they have to reach agreement in order to pay out from the trust, and that can be risky. Typically, the overseer is in charge of managing the investments of the trust, but this task can also be handled by investment professionals.

You also have to designate a guardian of your children, in the event that something happens to both of you (not sure if this info is part of the will or the trust, but I'm guessing the former).

Medical proxy
This document allows someone to make health care decisions for you. The document is invoked only when a doctor says you cannot act on and communicate decisions.

You can create a personal wishes attachment for this document. The personal wishes are not legally binding, but they address situations with no hope of recovery. I expect that giving the plug-pulling order would be much easier when you have a document signed by the person telling you to do just that.

Your spouse is your medical proxy, but you should also come up with 2 backups.

Durable power of attorney
This document allows someone to sign for you and essentially be you with regard to financial and contractual matters. This document is invoked when you're alive but cannot make decisions, either because you're medically incapacitated or are for some reason unreachable (for instance, hiking the Appalachian mountains when something important comes up).

You can make the power of attorney a "springing" document, which means that it can be used only when you have legal proof that the person is unable to make decisions. This adds an unnecessary complication when you are giving these rights to your spouse, though.

You need 2 backups for this document, as well.

What you have to do to get all these documents
First of all, you have to set up an appointment with a lawyer, preferably one who specializes in estate law. They'll probably send you a questionnaire in which you list all your assets, debts, dependents, and other personal information.

Next, you have to prepare to say good-bye to some of your assets. These documents aren't cheap. However, I'm a proponent in investing in one's peace of mind, which these documents bring.

Our lawyer is going to draw up a proposal, and then we'll send her 1/3 of her fee and the information for our documents. Then she'll create the documents, collect the remaining fee, give us paper and electronic copies, and store the originals in the law firm's vault. The originals belong to us, and we can access them at any time and put them in a safety deposit box, if we prefer (I like the sound of the vault, though).

Our lawyer recommended revisiting the documents every 3 to 5 years, a great plan, assuming we remember. I'm writing it here now to ensure that I do...

If you don't have these documents, I highly recommend considering getting them. Even if you think a will and trust are unnecessary, a medical proxy is relevant to everyone over the age of 18.

Facing your mortality isn't easy or fun, but making life easier for those who remain behind is a worthwhile activity.

Coming into the home stretch

2011-03-22T18:30:00.000-04:00

My belly button continues to teeter on the edge of being an outtie. Heartburn strikes several nights per week at bedtime. Strangers freely ask me about my pregnancy--even when I'm wearing a jacket and think that maybe, just maybe, no one can tell.

Welcome to the home stretch of my pregnancy.

I now have to seriously consider whether squatting down is necessary, and if it is, who is going to help me stand up again. My toes have become particularly agile at picking things up. Dropping the razor in the shower? No problem. Dropping the razor in the shower and having the blade come off? Time to call it quits on shaving for the day.

I can no longer see the lower half of my belly unless I sit down and really stretch forward, or if I look in the mirror. For now, I am working under the assumption that all is well down there.

Rooster continues to be an active mover, roller, kicker, and hiccupper. When he's on the move, it looks like there's an alien moving around beneath my skin. He likes to push either his head or his bottom (tough to say) against the right side of my belly so that it sticks out. His kicks are increasingly aggressive. The other night, I was lying on my side in bed, and he was jumping on the bed and pushing his head up in the other direction. I tolerated this activity for as long as possible, and then I rolled over to my other side. Sorry, Rooster, but as long as you're inside me, I'm in charge.

His movement used to be gentle and somewhat soothing, but now it is mostly uncomfortable and wince-inducing. I feel a little like I'm being beat up from the inside. I know, I know...just wait till he wants to come out...

I'm avoiding thinking about that, for a few days more, at least until our all-day childbirth class this weekend. I know that it's a good idea to be prepared for childbirth, but part of me doesn't want to know what I'm in for. I am least looking forward to watching graphic videos of other women's birth experiences. I've seen those baby story TV shows on TLC, and they are graphic enough for me.

I'm trying to prepare for life with Rooster by reading books recommended by family and friends. I've read about hundreds of events for which a doctor is needed and twice as many events for which a doctor is not needed. How on earth can anyone keep all of this information straight? It doesn't help that every book offers different advice. Maybe figuring it out on our own would have been easier.

It seems that figuring it out on own own is how parenting goes, anyway. Of all the millions of books written on parenting and taking care of babies, not one is written about your very own human, so all you can do is keep trying until you figure out what works.

Lessons learned from a mortgage refinance

2011-03-11T12:53:00.000-05:00

You might remember that we started the mortgage refinancing process back in August. I said that I would provide an update and share my lessons learned, and I never did, but only because I didn't have an update. The sad truth is that we just closed on our mortgage refinance this week.

That's right. August to March is a 7-month process. To put this in perspective, we started the process before I was pregnant (or at least before we knew I was pregnant), and I am about 8.5 weeks from my due date. It should not take the same amount of time to refinance a mortgage and grow a new human...but it did.

So, here we go. Lessons learned. Neglect and incompetence on the part of the bank were the general themes of the process. They asked for documents in November. We sent them a link and offered to mail the docs, and they never asked for paper copies or acknowledged receiving it. They never acknowledged anything we sent, so we assumed all was well. Then they asked for the same docs in February. We sent the same link with a friendly reminder that we sent them the docs four months ago, and here they were again. They said they couldn't access the docs online and we had 36 hours to mail or fax the docs or the mortgage refinance would be cancelled.

The docs were too big to email (a fact that we noted in both emails about them), neither of us was able to get to the post office in time, and we don't have a fax machine. However, I came up with a solution that allowed us to make the deadline and had the potential to be very annoying to our incompetent mortgage processor, a double win. I split the documents into 1-page PDFs and emailed them individually.

Yes, this process took a long time and was annoying, as I had to create about 85 documents and then send 85 emails. But the thought of leaving our mortgage processor with a full mailbox and maybe even a paralyzed computer as all the emails arrived was enough motivation to keep me going.

When he first made his demand, I might have sent an email response that was more heated than what one would expect from me. I almost certainly used my go-to phrase in times of duress, "This is unacceptable!" I might have thrown out words such as "incompetent" and "unreasonable" in an accusatory kind of way. Such tactics are not the best way to win people over, and in hindsight, perhaps I ought to have tempered myself.

Or not! Because we actually had forward progress on our refinance after they received the docs. Sure, they tried to put up another roadblock, demanding additional docs, but B was able to track down the PDF copies of them from our town's website (thank goodness for modern technology).

Several more weeks passed, and then early this week, I received a call from the guy who locked our rate. He explained that (despite all evidence to the contrary) the bank really wanted to close the mortgage. However, all the delays meant that they owed money to Freddie Mac because they weren't able to close the deal in the time allotted. They very generously (sniff) offered to pay half the fee, but they expected us to cough up the other half, about $700.

This put us in a very difficult situation. First of all, our amazing rate is long gone and will probably never return in my lifetime. Secondly, if we were to start the refinancing process over again, we'd have to pay over $300 to lock a new and higher rate and pay for a credit check, plus we'd be paying our current high mortgage interest each month while we waited for the loan to close.

I asked whether there was an appeal process, as we had responded to all requests in a timely way, so therefore, the delay was not our fault. He said we could appeal, but we'd be taken out of the queue that we were in and put in another queue. The appeal could take 30 days, and there were 3 possible results: the bank could cancel the loan entirely, they could deny the appeal (and then we'd owe about twice as much for the extra delay), or they could approve the appeal.

What could we do? I agreed to pay the fee. I am contemplating using the small-claims courts as my own personal appeal, but first I will have to do further research to determine if I have a case.

While I had him on the phone, I asked for the closing costs, which he gave me. Incidentally, they didn't match the actual costs on the docs we signed. Details, details.

I asked if we could bring a check to cover the closing costs. He said that any modifications would only delay the process. Again, all I could do was say ok and go along with it.

Although we weren't allowed to pay any closing costs, he said we were required to bring the $700 fee to the closing. He couldn't give me the exact amount and said we'd have to wait for a phone call on the day of the closing to get the number. Around 3 PM that day (after B had called and emailed everyone we knew at the bank trying to get the number), we received a phone call and email saying that we didn't have to bring any money to the closing and would in fact be receiving a check back from them. For what, we don't know.

For our closing, which took place at our house, a lawyer arrived with the docs. We signed them all, handed them back, and then it was over.

On the one hand, we feel as if we ought to celebrate. But the process was so long and horrible that we just want to feel grateful for our new rate and try to forget the drama that we went through to get it.

Now that we've got our mortgage finished, it's time to move on to other adulty tasks, including setting up a living trust, getting wills, and starting a 529 plan for the Rooster. Let the excitement begin.

Sad but true: There is no nursery theme

2011-03-10T18:00:00.000-05:00

Last weekend, B and I traveled the state in search of home decor items.

First, we purchased some steer horns and a coordinating skull, cast in resin but remarkably lifelike. This item is not for Rooster's nursery. It joins the vejigante (mask) from Puerto Rico and the eyeless Venetian mask in our Items That Will Likely Terrify a Child collection. We're hoping that Rooster will be a brave little boy who is able to handle our decorating choices.

Next, we purchased curtains for the nursery. Before this weekend, I thought of buying curtains as a straightforward task. I now know that nothing is straightforward at Pottery Barn Kids.

Because of their high prices, PB is not my go-to store for items, but I knew we needed blackout curtains for Rooster's room, and PBK has a lot of them. The prices at PBK are more reasonable than at PB, so I chose a set I liked and decided to try to buy them in a store to skip the shipping charges.

The store we visited was not big but was divided into lots of little rooms, so I felt like I was hitting a dead end every time I turned a corner. We eventually found the curtains area but couldn't find the curtains I wanted, so we had to get in line and ask for help.

I had been going back and forth between green and white curtains, and I decided that white might be best for versatility. Unfortunately, the woman who helped us told me that they didn't carry the white curtains in their store, either for display or sale. Bummer. She said she could order them for me, but it would be the same as if I ordered them myself (that is, I'd have to pay for shipping).

I asked if she could show me a similar curtain to the kind I picked out, and she did. I wasn't crazy about the look or feel of the fabric, but I reasoned that I could always exchange them. I decided to buy the curtain rings that we needed at the store and to buy the curtains from their website.

Curtain rings were not on the floor, so she disappeared into the back storage office to get them. While she was gone, we started looking at other curtains and I started warming up to the idea of green curtains once again.

She returned empty handed and explained that they didn't have the silver-colored curtain rings and I'd have to buy them online. I said ok and said we had reconsidered our curtain color, and would she mind showing us the options that they had in green. She said sure but first wanted to know the decor of the nursery.

You might need to look at the PBK website to understand her question. They sell bedding, wall decor, curtains, floor rugs, and probably many other items in coordinating themes, such as sports or elephants. All the colors match perfectly, and the end result is a bit of a Stepford nursery. It's a fine look but it's not what we're going for.

I told her that we have an animal theme. It's true, sort of. We have four framed prints from the ABC Canadian Rockies children's book we picked up in Banff, and a Noah's Ark-themed tapestry from Peru with (obviously) pairs of three-dimensional fabric animals. We've also picked out some sheets that feature animals, and we're going to get some animal wall decals for the wall that will feature pictures of family and friends. However, our goal is not to design a color-coordinated room, and how do you explain that to someone who believes that a nursery should be color coordinated?

My animal-theme answer was not good enough, so she wanted to know the color of the floor. I explained that it's pink wall-to-wall carpeting. She seemed to disapprove of this choice for a baby boy and tried to direct us to the rack containing their rugs. I pooh-poohed this suggestion; why invest in a rug that will only be destroyed in a baby's room?

She reluctantly returned to the curtain racks with us, probably wondering how on earth we passed up the Dr. Suess-themed room, and she pointed out a few options in green. We chose a set with white polka dots and built-in blackout panels. But of course these curtains were not available on the floor, so she had to return to the back room to find them.

By some small miracle, they had them in stock. After she returned, I remembered that I wanted to buy sheer curtains to go behind them. Sheer curtains provide privacy while allowing light to filter in. But, you guessed it: these curtains were not available on the floor, either. It was another five-minute disappearance.

Eventually, she returned and rang up our purchase, and we were able to return to the safety of the mall. B declared that he hated the store and all the people in it and never wanted to return. Even I, a lover of shopping, felt that my patience had been tried by the experience.

Our curtain hardware just arrived in the mail yesterday, so we haven't hung the curtains yet to see how they look. If the green polkas are too much for a room that already has some attention-grabbing decor, we'll buy the white ones online and return the green ones to the store. I am ok with B waiting outside the store for that adventure. He has already paid his PBK dues.

Feel the burn

2011-02-28T18:33:00.000-05:00

One night this weekend, an hour or so after I fell asleep, I awoke to a most unpleasant sensation in my throat. If you're queasy, consider not reading any further.

It felt as if acid from my stomach was creeping up my throat and trying to make its way into my mouth. Yuck.

I tried to ignore it and went back to sleep, but I awoke 30 minutes later to the same sensation, this time worse. It was unpleasant enough that I did not want to continue lying down and dealing with it.

I got up and rinsed my mouth with mouthwash to try to get rid of the taste in my mouth. I cannot gargle; whenever I try, I always end up choking and swallowing most of the liquid. Oh, how I wished I could gargle!

Luckily, the swishing of the mouthwash was adequate for erasing most of the unpleasant taste.

I knew that I could not return to bed, though. Lying down clearly worsened the situation.

Not wanting to wake B up, I meandered upstairs to the loft and curled up on the couch, using pillows to prop myself into a sitting position, and fell asleep. Several hours later, I awoke feeling less acidic and decided to give sleeping in a bed a try. Sleeping on a couch is uncomfortable, at best; sleeping while hunched over a pillow on a couch is an experience to be missed.

I was wary about returning to a supine position, though. I grabbed a couple pillows and tucked them under the top half of my snoogle, hoping that even a slight elevation would be helpful. The elevation and likely the passage of time helped, and I slept the rest of the night in relative comfort. (Exhaustion helped.)

The next morning, I was recovered, but I suspected that something had taken a turn for the worse and that pregnancy was to blame. I remember telling my doctor last spring that I didn't get heartburn, and (knowing that I was planning to get pregnant later that year) she said, "Just wait till you get pregnant!" Alas, Dr. H, you were correct. I suspect that I now suffer from it.

The culprit that evening was likely the pineapple juice that I gulped down just an hour or so before bed. Pineapple juice, I hope I have not ruined you forever and that I'll still be able to drink you after this phase passes.

The next morning, feeling like tempting fate, I had a couple glasses of orange juice and suffered milder effects, probably because I was not lying down. Later that day, a can of ginger ale taught me that perhaps it's time to remove soda from my list of drinkable beverages.

I countered the effects of the OJ and ginger ale with Tums, which, despite their chalk-like consistency, are quite delicious and satisfying to eat. Thank goodness, too, since I suspect I'll be eating quite a few of them in the upcoming months.

I now keep a bottle of Tums on my bedside table, just in case, and we have another bottle that floats around the house, ready to be grabbed at a moment's notice. I should probably also pack a bag of the little treats for work.

Heartburn is the pits.

The nesting instinct

2011-02-25T16:58:00.000-05:00

I can officially confirm that I have succumbed to the nesting instinct.

My nesting tendencies came on so gradually that I didn't distinguish them from my usual tidiness, at least in the beginning. However, my activities in the last couple of months are not normal, even for me.

Each weekend, I tackle a new area of our house, from the hidden to the in-plain-sight, and I create piles: Keep piles, Trash/Recycling piles, and Give Away piles.

Many of the items that end up in the Give Away pile are sellable, but selling an item on craigslist is time consuming. The goal of these purging exercises is to rid our home of unnecessary items as quickly as possible.

My first project was the walk-in closet in our spare bedroom, soon to be our nursery. The closet is about six-feet square, with shelving that previously held lots of our stuff. I knew that we'd need the space for baby gear, so I accepted early on that not all the treasures would be able to stay.

In general, I'm not an overly sentimental person with regard to possessions, so I was able to identify many bags full of items that I could live without. B tackled a pile that I created for him and was able to say good-bye to many of the items, as well. If we were unable to part with an item but knew that we would rarely need to use it, we packed it up and put it aside for safekeeping it in the attic above our loft or storage space in the wall behind our loft.

Speaking of the loft, it was my next project. Probably most houses have a room where stuff seems to accumulate in corners and crevices, and for us, that room is the loft. This project was particularly satisfying because I got to review over a year's worth of paper that was set aside for filing, and we didn't need to keep most of it. That's right, I got to shred, an enjoyable activity when one is nesting.

I also packed up a ton of stuff to be moved into storage, so much that we had to go buy more storage totes. When I ambushed B after work one day with the task of putting the stuff away--not as easy as it sounds, as our storage areas are difficult to access, are unfinished and unheated, and are generally unpleasant and dusty places to be--he reluctantly got out the ladder to investigate, only to declare that we didn't have enough space for all of the new storage totes.

Yes, that's right, it was another purging opportunity! He brought out everything that we had stored away, and we realized that we didn't need most of the stuff. The plastic tote full of cables that we thought we might someday use was particularly satisfying to say good-bye to.

Our next project was the kitchen. One of the reasons we bought our condo was the surprisingly large amount of storage space in the kitchen. We have a large walk-in pantry with great Ikea shelving, a bottom-level double cabinet with lots of open space, and a corner cabinet with a narrow opening and space that goes waaaaay back.

Having a lot of storage is only helpful if you use it wisely, and we weren't. The volume of stuff we had and its lack of organization made finding frequently used items more difficult than necessary. It was time to purge.

It's not easy getting rid of kitchen equipment. You are bound to ask yourself, "What if I want this some day..." about so many items. However, facing reality and one's own limitations is helpful in the purging process. Once upon a time, I thought that having a collection of cookie cutters was part of being female. However, the reality is that I really dislike rolling out and touching dough of any kind, so becoming a mother is not likely to transform me into one of those women who bakes cookies cut from cookie cutters. And you know what? I am happier now that I have acknowledged that fact and moved on.

The kitchen reorg was a multi-day effort that involved taking everything out of its storage space, either cabinet or pantry, deciding whether to keep it, and figuring out the best place for it to live. We had to reconfigure some of the shelves in the pantry, an activity that was fun for only one of us (I suspect you can guess who).

For the keep-it-or-dump-it triage, I found that giving ourselves a few days to think about an item was helpful. We ended up finding space for quite a few items that I thought I could live without, even if we rarely or never use them. Sometimes just-in-case is a legitimate reason to keep an item.

The end result of our reorg was a pantry that we once again love. And we love it even more than we did after the first reorg before because we no longer need to keep the rolling cart that held all the spillover items. We had to remove the cart every time we wanted to access any item on the lower shelves (such a pain). Now we have no idea what to do with the cart, but we're thinking that it will likely be useful in the closet in the nursery (which is currently in disarray due to the ongoing painting project in that room, to be completed this weekend, we hope).

I've learned a few lessons from all these exercises.

Just because items can be organized doesn't mean that they should be organized. An organized collection of stuff you don't need is just as unhelpful as an unorganized collection of stuff you don't need.
My impulse purchases usually eventually get donated to the Salvation Army.
If you donate anything made after 1965 to the Salvation Army, you are a rockstar.
The nesting instinct is merciless. Before getting rid of an item that you're on the fence about, run the idea by someone else to make sure you won't regret it later.
Getting rid of a lot of stuff is a messy, cluttered process. The bags sit in your living room for days until you're able to make a Salvy drop. Accept that your house will be in a state of chaos until all the purging and organization is complete. The clutter has to get worse before it can get better.
When in doubt, pack an item away for a year or two and then revisit. If you haven't thought about it the entire time, you probably don't need it.

Super taster, super feeler, super duper

2011-02-17T17:59:00.000-05:00

I am a super taster. Biologically speaking, I have more taste buds on my tongue per square inch than most people. Practically speaking, I taste foods more intensely than others, or so I am given to understand. An article I read once say that it's a neon-taste world for us super-tasters, and I suppose it must be true, though I can't say for sure, since I don't know what it's like to be a normal taster.

Some parts of ourselves, such as our five senses and our emotional states, establish themselves and then don't change much. What annoys you or makes you happy one day typically annoys you or makes you happy the next day. Once you've established a norm for yourself for how you react to situations, you frequently keep to that norm.

But not, as I am learning, when you're pregnant. Under normal circumstances (that is, when I'm not pregnant), I would not consider myself an overly emotional person. I feel emotions, frequently strongly, but the rational part of me is still almost always in control.

Pregnancy land, however, is a super feeling world. I no longer get a little happy; I dance around the room while singing. I don't get a little upset; I swear and stomp. Rarely am I a little annoyed; my facial expression and body language scream that I have no patience for fools.

I feel emotions much more intensely than before, but the situation is even more extreme because my rational mind is no longer in control. I can't hold myself back from dancing and swearing and withdrawing physically. Not only that, but my verbal inhibitions are significantly lower than before. I freely speak my mind, voicing complaints that I would otherwise stifle and expressing opinions that I might otherwise phrase much more carefully.

I feel like I'm getting to know a whole new me, a me that I never thought I would be, but one that has offered an intriguing perspective. As it turns out, speaking your mind does not result in catastrophe. In fact, contronting a difficult situation and saying how you feel about it is unexpectedly cathartic. Confrontation gives you the opportunity to acknowledge a problem, and if the situation goes well, you feel better afterwards and can begin anew.

I have about 12 weeks left of my pregnancy, so everyone around me can expect to interact with an increasingly honest, moody, and temperamental individual for the duration. I am on the verge of losing my previously very cute innie belly button; as soon as it pops out into an outie, all bets are off, and I make no guarantees that I will exhibit any rational behavior from here on out.

Not my style: Bargain basement baby gear

2011-02-12T15:56:00.000-05:00

Our home is too far from the city to be considered urban (hence the title of B's blog), but the distance doesn't mean that I can't adopt certain yuppie tendencies. One of my newest tendencies is indulging my whims with regard to baby gear.

Baby gear, I'm learning, comes in a range of prices and offers various levels of safety. A few years ago, I might have thought that the bargain basement crib was the way to go. After all, a child sleeps in a crib for only two or three years, so choosing a moderately priced piece of furniture seemed like the best decision.

It was a nice idea. But you know, those bargain basement cribs are not necessarily the safest, the most attractive, or the most versatile for one's needs. However, you'd be amazed at the cribs that are being turned out by some northern European countries; they are safe, beautiful, versatile...and, unfortunately, expensive.

When we were doing early stroller research, I acknowledged to myself that bargain basement simply isn't my style anymore (was it ever?). I asked B if he was ok with spending amounts of money that, on paper, are fairly ridiculous, given how long this gear will be used. He said that I should get what I want, and if the stroller that I want costs more than the value of my car, so be it. Rooster is worth it.

And I agree, Rooster deserves good-quality pieces, of course, and the safety of the items we plan to buy can't be beat, but let's be honest: The person that I am indulging is myself. I have chosen these pieces because they offer conveniences to us. For instance:

The crib we ordered converts from a bassinet to a crib, is on wheels, and is narrow enough to fit through doorways. Additionally, the crib is considerably smaller than some of the behemoth cribs that you see in The Store That Shall Not Be Named (you know what I'm talking about...the big box baby store that I avoid like the plague). I saw our crib in a catalogue a few years ago and loved it, and I'm glad that we chose it.
The stroller we plan to buy features a lightweight but very safe car seat with a comfortable carrying handle. The seat is safely attached to the frame of the stroller but detaches easily, and you can fold the stroller frame into a compact shape using just a flick of your wrist. These great features mean that I could, in theory, carry the seat and stroller frame up or down a flight of stairs all by myself. (I don't know if I have the strength for such a feat, but perhaps I will after a few months of baby lifting.) The car seat is also easier to fit into its car base than others, allowing for less back strain, and that's a big plus.

As I mentioned, the crib is on order, as are the glider and ottoman. They should all arrive in about a month, and that's when we'll buy the stroller/car seat and a few other necessities. I'm trying to buy only what I think we'll need, at least to start, and am holding off on the might-be-nice-to-have items, at least until we have a better idea of what life with Rooster will be like.

Weight, weight...don't tell me

2011-02-11T18:08:00.000-05:00

Today, I weigh more than I ever have in my life. This statement will continue to be true for the next few months. It makes me a little uncomfortable.

I've never had problems maintaining a steady weight, but I try not to be one of those women who gleefully declares that she can eat whatever she wants and not gain weight. That statement is partially true but only because what I want to eat is usually healthful food in reasonable portions, and when I do indulge in something that is not so great for me, I do so in moderation. Eating an entire box of Ring Dings makes me feel sick, so I much prefer smaller indulgences.

Self control is a big part of my being able to maintain a steady weight, though the more important part is having a neutral relationship with hunger. Hunger is neither friend nor foe: When I'm hungry, I'm not happy that I'm hungry, but I'm not upset about it, either. It's just the state that I will be in until I eat again, and I don't need to get out of that state immediately.

Pregnancy has required me to readjust me relationship with hunger and food, though. I'm supposed to eat 200-300 extra calories per day. Normally, when I overindulge by a few hundred extra calories, I cut back on what I eat for a day or two. Now, I can't cut back and still have to keep up the extra calories.

So when I find myself with a food craving--and I still haven't had any that are any different from my pre-pregnancy cravings--I usually give in. If I want a burger, we make burgers for dinner. If I want carrot cake, I buy a piece at the grocery store. If I want Ring Dings...well, no, I probably won't be buying a box of Ring Dings. My self control is stronger at the grocery store than at home, and that box would not be long for this world after it entered our home. My self control has its limits, and I've learned that I have to buy all junky food in single servings only.

The occasional single serving of junk food in combination with the other extra calories I've been eating have contributed to what I think is a substantial weight gain. I've gained 12 pounds since my doctor began weighing me in October, but I'm pretty sure I gained a few pounds before the monthly weigh-ins began, so I would estimate that I have gained at least half of the 30 pounds that my doctor told me I should aim to gain. I now top the scales at (gulp) 162 pounds, a number I never thought I would see.

Yes, I weigh 162 pounds, and I wore a size-12 wedding gown. I'm not as skinny as I look!

So what's my strategy going forward? I will continue to eat when I'm hungry, sooner than I used to. I will continue eating bigger portions and snacking more frequently.

And I bought a scale. As soon as the Rooster greets the world and my doctor gives me the ok, I'm figuring out a plan that will get me back to the person that I used to be, and I can't wait.

A sartorial lesson relearned

2011-02-01T18:42:00.000-05:00

Not all maternity clothes are created equal. I finally broke down and started wearing my maternity clothes (tops in addition to bottoms), and some of them are just awful.

And by "some," I mean just about everything that I bought from Old Navy. For example:

The maternity jeans don't stay up. Perhaps I should give them another try now that I am a bit bigger in the belly area, but it's difficult to work up motivation to wear uncomfortable clothing.
I'm having trouble imagining a world in which I would be tempted to wear the black trousers. Perhaps they would be appropriate in a world without standards and expectations.
The maternity tops make me feel like I'm wearing something that is 6 sizes too big. Perhaps I will appreciate this roominess in a couple/few months, but for now, I just feel frumpy.
The tags on the tops could also be used as torture devices. Ladies, break out your stitch ripper or a pair of scissors with sharp points because those tags have to come out.

In the beginning, I thought that Old Navy was the best place to buy maternity clothes. After all, Old Navy is a good store for buying cheap, disposable clothing, and those are qualities I thought I wanted in maternity clothes. As it turns out, however, pregnancy has not eliminated my sartorial vanity, and cheap and disposable are the last qualities that I want in my maternity (or any) clothing.

My clothing from the Gap is significantly better than my Old Navy clothing, but the best clothing of all is from A Pea in the Pod. Now, I probably wouldn't have even attempted to shop there (due to the high prices), but I received a wonderful and thoughtful gift card for Christmas, so I jumped in and bought a few pieces from their online store.

And I love them. "Stylish" is perhaps going too far, but they are stylish enough, considering the physical limitations with which I am working. They are much more fitted than the Old Navy pieces, and the fitted look is perfect while my bump is still in the cute phase. I'm not sure how they will look when I move from the cute phase to the big-as-a-mountain phase, but I have confidence that they are designed to grow with me.

I was initially put off by the Pod's high prices, but I shopped only the sale items, and the prices were comparable to Gap sale prices. I liked my pieces so much that I returned for a second order. I got free shipping on both orders, and they were offering a 10% off promotion for my second order, so I saved even more.

I don't know how many times I have to learn this lesson before it will stick, but I have learned it once again: Buy only clothing that you love, even if you're going to be able to wear it for only 4 months.

Road warriors, I bow to you

2011-02-01T18:11:00.002-05:00

A couple weeks ago, I developed new respect for the road warrior, the business traveler who regularly leaves home and family to conduct business while on the road.

I developed the respect, as one would expect, by walking (albeit briefly) in the footsteps of such a warrior. My two-night business trip, which became a three-night trip due to the blizzard and the cancellation of our train home, taught me a lot about business travel. Here are a few tidbits that I picked up.

1. Always pack extra underwear and socks. I already follow this policy, but this was the first trip I've taken in which I actually had to use my spare clothing. If you need to do sink laundry, wring the item out and then roll it up in a towel or two to remove excess moisture before hanging it above your heater for faster drying.
Tip: Don't hang the item from a sprinkler, no matter how conveniently placed the sprinkler might be. (For the record, I did not do this.)

2. Delays aren't fun. Being delayed while you're on vacation with your family is unpleasant, but it's even more difficult when the delay means that you're separated from your family for even longer. On the plus side, you can be reimbursed for all your expenses, so at least you aren't losing money.

3. Most business travelers are men. Most of the diners in the hotel restaurant and club lounge were of the male persuasion. If there had been any doubt, the selected TV channel in the restaurant--ESPN--was a dead giveaway that there are way more men on the road than women.

4. Dining in restaurants is not always great. I do like eating out, but if I had to choose between only eating out and only dining in for the rest of my life, I would choose to dine in, even if I had to cook every meal. It's much easier to eat your fruits and veggies and to control the ingredients and calories in your meals when you cook them.
Tip: Most restaurants will accommodate off-menu requests, but first, study the menu to make sure that they have all the ingredients that are needed.

5. Business travel is more stressful than personal travel, for me, anyway. Probably others have different opinions. There are perks to business travel; for instance, everything is free, allowing you to have a variety of experiences and build status with hotels and airlines at no cost to you. However, I learned that when I travel, I rely upon B's presence, conversation, insight, ideas, common-mindedness, and ability to carry lots of luggage. Travel is harder and less fun without him.

6. Pregnancy makes travel more challenging. Since I took the train, I didn't have to worry about turbulence and security machines, but I still had to manage my luggage myself. I packed lightly, but you can pack only so lightly and compactly for 3 (as it turned out, 4) days away from home. Plus it can be really hard to get the sleep that you need when much of your schedule is not in your control. Further complicating the situation was our trip to NYC, which immediately followed my work trip. I arrived home Thursday afternoon and we left the next morning, leaving only a couple hours for unpacking, laundry, and repacking. It was a difficult week.

In conclusion: Road warriors, I don't know how you do it week after week, but you have my respect.

The odd couple: Pregnancy and sleep

2011-01-09T19:14:00.000-05:00

Oh, sleep, how do I love thee and how I have missed thee these past few months.

You might have heard that when you're pregnant, you're supposed to sleep on your side, for medical reasons that I won't get into. It's been a difficult adjustment.

I became a back sleeper about 10 years ago after hurting my back while moving and then sleeping on a horrible mattress night after night (ah, college). Sleeping on my back resulted in less pain the next day, so I adapted.

Adapting back to being a side sleeper has not been an easy task. Night after night, I'd wake up on my back and force myself onto my side. Then, unable to sleep, I'd wonder whether I should persevere or just put off the challenge until I absolutely had to start sleeping on my side.

I bought some accessories to help me along. First off, I bought a feather bed topper for our mattress, using the reasoning that it would probably be easier to sleep on my side if I had some softer cushioning beneath me. I suppose it is, a little.

I also bought a Snoogle body pillow. I think it will be helpful later in my pregnancy, but in the earlier days, it felt more like a contraption designed to make my middle-of-the-night bathroom trips even more difficult than they already are. Having to extricate oneself from the Snoogle and then maneuver oneself back into it (and the rest of the bedding) at 2 AM while wearing head-to-toe flannel footie pajamas is a challenge that I dare even the bravest amongst us to accept, pregnant or not.

Eventually, after my tactics proved to be less than completely successful, I decided to chill a little on the sleeping position. It was a good decision, for several reasons.

At my last doctor visit, I asked about when I needed to start sleeping on my side. She said not for another month or so (which is around now). I explained that I was having difficulty with it, and she said that I didn't actually have to sleep completely on my side, and that if I just propped one hip up with a pillow, it was good enough.

For the past few weeks, I've been attempting the pillow trick, and while I don't stay on the pillow the entire night, I can always adjust the pillow back when I wake up (an event that happens frequently throughout the night). And interestingly enough, I find that it is now much easier to sleep on my side than it was before--perhaps it's because I've been trying to train myself all these months, but more likely it's because my body knows that it's best.

I'm not sure if I'm sleeping any better, but I am resting easier.

How pregnancy feels

2011-01-09T18:50:00.000-05:00

Before I became pregnant, I used to wonder how pregnancy felt. I'm not talking about the symptoms I described in an earlier post. I wondered whether I'd be able to tell if I was pregnant, and if not, when I would be able to tell.

Five months in, I can say that, unfortunate symptoms aside, being pregnant doesn't feel much different from not being pregnant, from a day-to-day perspective, anyway. However, I have experienced the following physical changes.

Skin that is even more transparent than it was before
Ok, my skin is not really more transparent. The change is that my body is creating lots and lots of extra blood, making my arteries and veins stand out more and making my skin seem more transparent.

(You would think that all of this blood would make me warmer, or at least less susceptible to cold. I am neither.)

In fact, my more-noticeable veins in the palms of my hands were the first sign that I was pregnant, before the pregnancy test said so. Of course, the books and online resources don't offer this tidbit as a "helpful early pregnancy sign" so I ignored the change.

A significantly less glamorous walk
My strides have always been long and focussed. I place one foot in front of the other as if I am walking on a straight line and can place my feet only on the line.

It has become harder and harder to maintain this walking style. Early on in my pregnancy, something in my lower back felt like it was was...widening. This change made me want to modify my walk so that my feet didn't quite make it to the line. My feet preferred plodding along parallel lines in a walk that could best be described as a...waddle.

Sometimes, in the middle of the night as I drag myself out of bed and down the hall to the bathroom, I give in to this waddling tendency. However, when I am fully in control of my senses, I do my best to maintain my previous walk, or at least a semblance of it.

I'm not sure how much longer I will be able to keep this up, but I am not ready to say goodbye to my old walk yet.

The end of running up stairs
Continuing with the less-glamorous changes, I feel...heavier. I have gained around 10 pounds since August, and this weight along with my more sedentary winter lifestyle probably contribute to my becoming out of breath earlier than I would have before. However, it feels more like I'm carrying around something heavy in my belly.

Perhaps because I am.

Anyway, I don't feel it when I'm walking or lying down or anything like that. I only feel this increased heaviness when I try to do something a little more active, like run up the stairs. Even walking up the stairs two at a time is no longer possible; I can't lift my legs as high, and I just can't generate the necessary momentum to keep myself moving up an entire flight of stairs.

Baby movements
This change is definitely the most fun. For a few weeks now, I've been able to feel the baby moving.

How does it feel...well, sort of a cross between gas and other "intestinal activities." Except more magical, of course, since it's a human being rolling around in there.

But magic aside, it really just feels like gas.

You can feel the kicks and movement from the outside, too, so B has been able to feel the little guy rolling around in there. Some kicks are a bit more aggressive than others. Apparently, they're only going to get more aggressive as he gets bigger. That should be interesting.

Just before I go to sleep and whenever I get up in the night, he starts moving. And I feel him rolling around periodically throughout the day. If I am very active (for instance, going for a long walk), he is definitely less active; I read that my activity rocks him to sleep.

I suspect that getting him to go to sleep will not be as easy after he enters the world, so I am enjoying the power that I have for now.

Yes, these are maternity pants

2011-01-02T19:10:00.001-05:00

Maternity clothes and I have an uneasy relationship. Maternity tops...I'm not there yet. However, I have dipped my toe into the maternity pants pool.

I haven't fit into most of my real pants in quite some time. My Bella Bands have allowed me to make them work, for the most part.

I have worn a pair of Old Navy maternity jeans. They are not ideal. Either I need to get bigger, or they need to shrink, or perhaps they're just not meant to stay up. A belt did not help. I have considered throwing them into the dryer to bring about some shrinkage, but I worry that they then wouldn't be long enough. You can get away with too-short maternity pants in the last month, when people should just be happy that you showed up to wherever you are, but I'm not there yet. I still have to make some semblance of an effort. Perhaps suspenders...

My other stand-by maternity pant is from the Gap and is that stretchy black yoga-y type material that I see all the time in my doctor's waiting room. These pants arrived in the mail, and I wore them every day for...well, quite some time. These pants might not be dressy, but they're so darn comfortable. And because they don't really look like maternity pants, I'll be able to wear them in the weeks after the Rooster arrives.

But it's much harder, mentally, to start wearing the tops, perhaps because they are all so obviously maternity clothes. I think part of me is pretending that if I ignore them, I won't have to wear them. And by "part of me," I mean most of me, even the normally rational part (though I haven't started crying over them...yet).

However, it's time to face facts. B hasn't asked me (jokingly) in quite some time, "Are you sure you're pregnant?" because, well, I'm starting to look like I am. I've bought some ~~tents~~ maternity shirts, and they're hanging in a closet. Eventually, I will have to try them on and remove the tags and maybe even wear them.

In my defense, at my last visit, my doctor agreed that it was too soon to wear them, as they are still too big for me. For now, it's best to continue wearing my baggier tops, which I tried to stock up on in preparation.

If you're considering pregnancy in the upcoming months or years, now is the time to start buying some less tailored clothing. You can wear Bella Bands and low-cut maternity pants after you start getting bigger, but it's so nice to have pants that give a little (my favorite is Lucy's Walk About Pant, which come in long sizes). And if you're reluctant to wear maternity tops, make sure you have some not-too-fitted tops that will stretch. Open cardigans and empire-waist tops work great and feel like better investments because they're not specifically for your pregnancy.

How long can I last wearing my normal clothes? Only time and my growing belly will be able to answer that question...

Christmas songs I don't miss

2010-12-30T18:16:00.001-05:00

I love Christmas music. There is nothing like a rousing Hallelujah Chorus or O Holy Night to get me excited for that magical time of the year. However, not all Christmas songs are created equal, and some are so annoying that they make me wish that radio stations did not offer 24-hour-a-day Christmas music. Here are the worst offenders, the songs that I do not miss now that Christmas is over.

Baby, It's Cold Outside
I actually like this song, but in my head, I think of it as the Date Rape Christmas Song. Christmas songs should not evoke visions of date rape.

Christmas Shoes
Taking over for I'll Be Home for Christmas and Blue Christmas as the saddest Christmas song ever, this one features a dying mother. Nothing like a little impending death to bring out the generosity of others, eh? I change the station every time this comes on and keep hoping that other people will catch on that this song does not belong on the radio at Christmas time (or any other time, if you ask me, but clearly no one has).

Anything by Wayne Newton as a child
The Sirius 40s station, which plays Christmas hits from the good old days, introduced me to these classics. His voice grates on my nerves. If you aren't familiar, take a listen on You Tube. I dare you to listen to a song in its entirety.

Jingle Bells "sung" by barking dogs
I had to stop listening to the pop Christmas station on Sirius because they played this song multiple times each day, and I couldn't bear to listen to even a few seconds of this horror show. Jingle Bells might not be the finest song ever written, but it deserves better than to be barked to.

Do They Know It's Christmas?
Sigh. Where to start with this one?

First of all, I hold it at least partially responsible for would-be Vice Presidents and Miss Teen USAs who think that Africa is a country.

Second of all--and I understand that philosophies regarding philanthropy have changed over the years, and perhaps it's not fair to judge the writers based on today's standards--but one of the best ways to bring relief to an area is to increase tourism. Did the writers of the song believe that "a world of dreaded fear," "where the only water flowing is a bitter sting of tears," and "the Christmas bells that ring there are the clanging chimes of doom" portrayed Ethiopia (or rather Africa, since Ethiopia was never mentioned by name) in the best light?

And that's not all. Since the song mentions only Africa, we have to evaluate the words for the entire continent, and it is simply not true that Africa is the place "where nothing ever grows, no rain or rivers flow." Furthermore, parts of Africa do receive snow!

I don't want to disparage the fund-raising efforts of those involved, and I'm sure that most of them participated because they wanted to help. However, a more positive and accurate song might have raised the same amount of money and have helped beyond just a check.

Pregnancy: The bad and the ugly

2010-12-23T17:11:00.001-05:00

I haven't written much in the last few months, mostly because I had a lot to say but wasn't ready to talk about it. But now I am ready, so prepare for the deluge! The happy news is that I am pregnant with an active baby boy that my husband wants to name Rooster. (So not happening.)

And so for my first pregnancy post, I'm going to tell you about all of the bad stuff that comes with being pregnant! I hope that this post does not set the tone for future posts; I intend at some point to write about all of the positive side effects of pregnancy, if I can come up with more than two of them, anyway.

Pregnancy introduces a new normalcy of health that frequently feels far from normal. Here are a few of the symptoms that have characterized my pregnancy thus far. I suspect that more are still to come...

NAUSEA
I am very lucky that this stage was short-lived for me, though while I was in the middle of it, I had no way of knowing that its worst would last only 3 weeks.

My nausea was not as bad as it could be; for instance, I did not break my twenty-plus-year streak of a vomit-free existence (I don't know why I don't vomit; it just doesn't happen). However, I did spend much of my time lying on the couch, wondering why on earth women willingly have multiple children.

At its "best," my nausea was similar to the seasickness I felt on our Caribbean cruise, or to the way that I feel after I consume dairy without a Lactaid pill. This feeling was constant and stayed with me most of the day.

At its worst...this is difficult to describe. Do you know the feeling you get in your stomach just before the stomach cramps tell you that it's time to find a bathroom, and fast? It was like that, only there was no way of making it go away.

I probably should have mentioned this, but as you can already tell, my blog is not going to offer The Sexy Gal's Guide to Pregnancy-type of information. But if you've been reading for any amount of time prior to this, you probably already knew that.

I discovered that frequent eating of small meals helped. After I ate, I usually felt better for about 15 minutes, and then the nausea returned. If you wait too long to eat, you feel terrible and the last thing in the world that you want is food. However, if you can convince yourself to eat, you will feel better, or at least I did.

The worst of my nausea was over within three weeks. However, I didn't really feel like myself for several more months. Standing for long periods of time was difficult, and I still felt a general malaise that was difficult to kick. (More about my sleepiness later.)

A side effect of this nausea was a mild case of the blues for which I was unprepared. I think there were a few causes.

First, I had no idea how long the nausea would last; for some women, it's a few days or weeks, and for others, it lasts the entire duration of their pregnancy. I couldn't imagine 9 months of feeling as bad as I did.

Second, I had to hide it as best as I could, as I was not ready to share the happy news with everyone so early. Pretending to feel great when you don't is exhausting.

Finally, my nausea was not something that I could treat, as most drugs are off-limits, and I felt powerless in my sick feeling.

I feel lucky to have had such short-lived nausea.

STUFFY NOSE
The nausea ended, and the congestion began! However, I will take a stuffed-up nose over sickness any day.

The medical cause of this congestion isn't known, but it's fairly common among the preggos. I dealt with it for as long as I could and then convinced B that we ought to get a humidifier. He was amenable, so we hit our local Target in search of relief. There I learned that there are both hot and cool air humidifiers, and the hot humidifiers are best for congestion. Hot won.

A hot humidifier boils the water, so it sounds a little like a hot pot while it's running, but it helped immensely and minimized my usual wintertime dry-weather cough, so it's a keeper. Plus my congestion is much better, though I'm not sure whether I should credit the humidifier or simply the passage of time.

SLEEPINESS
I have always been an enthusiastic and needy sleeper. I used to require a minimum of 8 hours per night to not feel tired during the day, and this need has only increased since I became pregnant. My typical bedtime is now around 8 PM, and I sleep until 5:30 or 6 AM. On weekends, I have been known to go to bed at the same time and sleep even later (and sometimes take a nap, too).

It's possible that this sleepiness is at least partially related to my next symptom:

SLEEPLESSNESS
This symptom comes and goes. When it comes, it usually sticks around for several nights. I can always fall asleep when I first go to bed, but if I wake up in the middle of the night, I stay awake for three or more hours. I'm usually able to fall back to sleep around 5:30 or 6, but if it's a weekday, that's when I have to get up anyway.

I have no idea what causes my sleeplessness, which feels like jet lag. I'm sleepy but unable to sleep.

Last week, several nights of sleeplessness left my defenses down, and I came down with a ferocious cold, which I unfortunately shared with B. I'm mostly over it now, over a week later, but he is still fighting the worst of it.

IRRATIONAL CRYING
I am nothing if not rational...most of the time. But these pregnancy hormones are tricky little buggers. Minor annoyances that I would--if I were able to think rationally all the time--be able to ignore and forget about become major grievances for no reason whatsoever, and the only response that I am able to muster is an immediate emotional breakdown.

I slipped and almost fell down in the lobby at work one rainy day and had to go spend some quality time crying about it in the bathroom. I had to spend similar time in the bathroom at the symphony the other night after they made me throw out my tea. Who makes a pregnant, sick woman throw out her tea??? Jerks. Though in their defense, I suppose they couldn't tell that I was pregnant.

It's best to succumb to the tears once they start coming on, or they stalk my eyes for hours to come. However, giving in has its downside because once the crying starts, it's very difficult to make it stop. I read a sad book a month or so ago (The Friday Night Knitting Club?) and cried after the end for a solid 30 minutes. You can do stuff like that when you're home alone. When your husband is home, he's likely to be scared by such behavior.

Lucky for me, my irrational crying is not an everyday or even everyweek occurrence, so most of the time I do not feel like a weeping, blubbery mess.

ITCHY BELLY
I did not expect this symptom. My belly is itchy practically all the time. I got some "tummy honey" by Bella B; it's supposed to prevent stretch marks (sigh), so I've been applying it liberally, and it helps with the itchiness. But it doesn't make the itch go away completely. I just have to deal with it and try not to scratch too much.

FREQUENT BATHROOM TRIPS
Remember the sleeplessness? The reason I wake up so much in the middle of the night is because I am constantly running to the bathroom. Each night involves a minimum of one and sometimes as many as three trips to el banyo. It's not unusual for me to use the bathroom multiple times within a span of 10 to 15 minutes.

A couple weeks ago at our last ultrasound, the technician told us that the baby's head was resting right on my bladder. That explained a lot. He's getting big enough that I can now feel when he presses down on my bladder. I won't attempt to explain it in detail; I'm sure you can imagine the sensation. It seems to happen the most when I'm in the car.

So there it is, all the bad stuff, or all the bad stuff that has happened to me so far. More tales from the bump to come...

Cashmere aspirations

2010-10-24T11:25:00.000-04:00

Last winter, in the midst of the cold, rain, fog, snow, and other atrocities that January and February bring, I decided that as long as I was going to put up with winter, I might as well start wearing more cashmere.

Cashmere is lightweight, warm, soft, and very expensive. Even the sale prices of 100-percent cashmere sweaters are very high. Not surprisingly, my efforts at developing my cashmere collection were dampened by the high cost of each cashmere piece. It's difficult to justify buying one cashmere sweater when I can buy two or three (or more!) other pieces for the same cost.

By the end of the winter, I had added only one cashmere-y piece to my collection, a black long-sleeved turtleneck sweater that isn't even 100-percent cashmere. Despite its shortcomings, it's a staple piece that I wear throughout the winter, so it was not a bad place to start.

However, I have a long way to go. My goal is not to achieve cashmere mafia status but perhaps a few more cashmere pieces would make winter more tolerable.

A couple weeks ago, I was scanning the sales at one of the online daily boutique stores (this time, ideeli, though I also belong to Gilt, Rue la la, and HauteLook) and came across a boutique of winter essentials. The boutique included several cashmere items--clearly I am not alone in my quest--including a gray duster (like a sweatercoat, but no buttons) that was begging to come home to me.

Ordinarily, gray is not my go-to color when it comes to sweaters, but a cashmere sweater is a basic piece that should last for years and transcend the cuts, colors, and styles of one season's fashion trends. Therefore, I willingly and happily bought it. The free shipping credit I had received earlier in the week from ideeli made the purchase even more worthwhile.

The sweater fit perfectly and is now hanging in my closet, awaiting the arrival of more cashmere friends, whenever they might arrive.

Hello, fall

2010-10-15T17:57:00.000-04:00

Just now, as I was putting our Love Actually CD into our stereo, I realized that we're getting close to the time when it's ok to play Christmas music.

For the record (har har), the CD features only a couple of Christmas songs, but they feel a little off in May. The rest of the CD is so awesome that I play it all year, but now as the weather turns colder, other people (including my husband) won't think I'm so strange for listening to the occasional Christmas song.

The falling leaves are bringing other changes. Throughout the last week, skeins of Canada geese heading toward warmer climes and fruity drinks with umbrellas have darkened our dusk skies. Some are better than others at observing the regulation V-shaped flying formation, but even the shape-challenged birds noisily announce their presence. I could happily live without those dirty birds and their tendencies to wander into traffic and make annoyances of themselves, but I look forward to their annual cacophonous melody, and not just because their departure heralds fireplace season.

That's right - it has arrived! We have adopted the winter configuration of our living room, with one of our leather chairs placed perilously close to the fireplace. Well, not so perilously, as there was a minor incident last winter involving a pillow falling between the chair and the glass of the fireplace. Technically, there were no flames. However, B seems to think that my insatiable quest for warmth could lead to danger, so I have been instructed to keep myself and my accoutrements a safe distance away from the hot glass.

Just right now, for instance, I am nearly a foot away. Safety first!

Chilly weather also brings an excellent excuse for shopping - Christmas gifts! If I can't shop for myself all the time, the second-best option is shopping for other people. We started our Christmas shopping this week, entirely online so far, as most of my shopping seems to be these days, unless I have a craving for mall food court Indian food with peshawari naan. The stuff we cook at home pales in comparison.

Anyway. Enjoy the fall. Pick an apple, photograph a leaf, and enjoy the beautiful sunsets because rumor has it, snow will be here before we know it.

The importance of a second opinion

2010-08-25T18:04:00.000-04:00

You might remember that in May, I inquired about refinancing from a local mortgage broker, and she offered only bad news - that we didn't qualify for the government mortgage programs and that we'd have to pay PMI if we refinanced. I don't believe I mentioned that she said she'd call me back with more information and never did, but that combined with her not knowing the difference between an area code and a zip code made me wonder if a second opinion would be worth obtaining.

These many months later, I finally got around to finding a second opinion. The local broker had recommended calling the company that holds our mortgage and asking for a better rate; I didn't think we'd have much luck taking that route, but I figured a phone call couldn't hurt.

I called to ask about refinancing, expecting to be told the same story, but the man on the phone was actually very helpful. He was some sort of pre-screener, and he quoted me a rate in the 4s (a whole lot better than what we have now) and said he we wouldn't have to pay PMI since we didn't have to pay it originally. Excellent news!

He asked if I wanted to speak with a loan officer; I said I'd rather wait till B got home, especially since the mortgage is in B's name alone. I made an appointment for someone to call later that evening.

When the phone call arrived, we put the loan guy on speaker phone so we could both chat. And he was even more helpful than the first guy!

He checked a couple of things and told us that we do in fact qualify for the Fannie/Freddie government program as long as we have at least 95 percent equity in our house. We're going to receive a phone call in the next couple days about an appraiser coming over; that meeting will determine how much we'll have to bring to the closing to reach that number. He also confirmed that we do not have to pay PMI.

He offered more great news - the rate that we locked is below 4 - shockingly low! I was happy with the rate that the first guy quoted and didn't think that it could possibly get any lower. But it did.

The best news of all? We're going from a 30-year mortgage to a 15-year mortgage, and our monthly payment is only going up a smidge. Oh, happy day.

One negative is that I'm not really sure of next steps that will happen. When I asked questions of that sort, his answers were typically, "Oh, they'll call you about that." We haven't received any phone calls yet, so I guess we don't have to do anything other than collect the paperwork he requested.

Stay tuned...if I learn any lessons from our refinancing adventure, I'll be sure to share.

Banff wildlife: Bear, moose, and others

2010-08-24T18:48:00.000-04:00

That last one, in case you're wondering, is a porcupine.

Banff wildlife: Elk and deer

2010-08-24T18:43:00.001-04:00

Banff wildlife: Bighorn sheep (aka Rocky Mountain sheep) and a goat

2010-08-24T18:40:00.000-04:00

Of all the wildlife we saw in Banff, the bighorn sheep were the most plentiful. They were everywhere! They appeared mostly in groups but sometimes flew solo. They were able to climb the steepest of rock with ease and were most frequently seen mineral deposits from the rocks and roadside.

Here are a few of my fav sheep pics, plus the one goat we saw.

In case you're wondering, both the males and females of the bighorn sheep have horns.

Banff recap

2010-08-21T20:17:00.001-04:00

It's been a while!

My summer has been busy but great. B and I spent the start of summer in Banff, a glorious 2 weeks of jaw-dropping jocund days, misty mountaintops, and...I don't know how I'm going to work in standing tiptoe into that one. Apologies to R&J fans for my inadequate allusion.

We landed in Calgary and hopped in our rental car, a Hyandai Accent that we affectionately called the Silver Bullet, though it resembled a bullet more in size than in speed. No matter; it was an adequate vehicle for which I have greater fondness than is rational because of the wonderful adventures we enjoyed in it. Now I see these silver (and green and blue) bullets everywhere and feel wistfulness and nostalgia for our journey.

The drive between Calgary and Banff crosses unremarkable cow country. If you're heading east, it's dull. (I can confirm this fact because we did it on our drive back to the airport at the end of the trip.) If you're heading west, the mountains peak through the far-off clouds and promise great aventures ahead.

And we did have great adventures. We visited 4 national parks (Banff, Jasper, Yoho, and Kootenay) and one provincial park (in Kananaskis Country), walked on a glacier, saw countless waterfalls, rode up a couple mountain gondolas, saw turquoise-blue lakes, were chased by bees, saw the continental divide, and waded into 40-degree water. Ok, only B did that last one.

There aren't many roads out there, and they're mostly highways, but they have a set of rules and expectations that are wildly different from what we have at home.

First of all, bikers ride in the breakdown lane of highways because, as I mentioned, it's the only road available. There was very little traffic on the highway so it wasn't a big deal.

Second of all, stopping on any road is commonplace and expected. Everyone tries to pull over and put their hazard lights on, but everyone who comes behind them stops, too, because we all are there to see wildlife. And we saw a ton of wildlife.

We saw grizzly bears, black bears, moose, elk, bighorn sheep, moutain goat, mule deer, white tail deer, hoary marmot (dressed in a scandalous pink and lace outfit - haha just kidding), regular marmot (attired much more conservatively), porcupine, big-earred rabbit, and maybe a wolf. We saw the wolf on our first afternoon there; he was running down the median of a highway, and I assumed he was a big, black, wild-looking dog. Oh, to go back in time and take a picture!

We saw so much wildlife we became complacent about it. "Oh, it's only one elk," we would say dismissively, having seen many groups of elk previously. Or, "Oh, it's just some more bighorn sheep," since we saw over a hundred of them over 2 weeks.

We have the Silver Bullet to thank for all of our wildlife spotting. People on big-bus (and even smaller-bus) tours see much less wildlife. We know that because we spoke to some such people and their wildlife counts were significantly less impressive than ours.

Not that it's a contest. But if you're interested in seeing lots of animals and being able to choose your daily adventures, consider going it alone.

We had a solid itinerary to guide us through our trip, and we mostly stuck with it. It ensured that we didn't miss the best sights and provided us with back-up options for when the weather was less than ideal.

The weather was good. Most of our days were overcast; a couple days were beautiful and sunny; and a couple days were rainy. Temps were on the chilly side most of the time, 50s and 60s, and cooler at night. Days were long enough that we always had to fall asleep in the daylight and never saw a single sunset. We did see a sunrise on the day we flew home. Early flight.

I recommend a trip to the area to anyone who wants to see beautiful vistas and wildlife. There's a peace of mind and a level of relaxation that come with a nature-oriented trip, a feeling that you can't get in a city. It was a great change of pace from our usual trips.

Good hair

2010-05-24T18:06:00.001-04:00

I get my hair cut and colored every 4 months because (a) I'm still growing my hair out from the last big chop, and (b) Such visits aren't cheap, but I am (about some stuff, anyway). This weekend, at my thrice-annual salon visit, my hairdresser tempted me with a new texturizing treatment called Keratin. She said it eliminates frizz and will leave my hair straight and easily manageable.

Another stylist at the salon had just had it done. She said she went from spending 120 minutes (!) blowdrying her hair to only (!) 45 minutes, and her hair was now straight. She was clearly blissfully happy with her new frizz-free hair.

"Just think of all the time you'll save!" she said. I kept to myself that my blowdrying sessions rarely reach 10 minutes, but I was tempted by the treatment anyway. The older I get, the wavier my hair gets, and sometimes I wish for the bone-straight hair that is all the rage these days.

"Does it hurt?" I asked of the treatment.

"No, not at all," my stylist said.

"How long does it last?" was my next question.

"On your hair, probably 6 months," she answered.

And then, the all-important question: "How much does it cost?"

She paused (for dramatic effect?). "$470."

You might think that the price tag was a dealbreaker. Instead, my first thought was, "How can I convince B that a $470 hair treatment is a worthwhile way to spend our money?"

"How can I convince my husband that I need this?" I said aloud.

She said that she had it done, and her husband was thrilled with the results--not so much with the appearance of her hair, but because he no longer had to help her blowdry her hair, and they could leave the house in a reasonable amount of time.

Because I am able to get ready in a reasonable amount of time as it is, I didn't think this argument would hold water with B. However, surely he would understand that the opportunity to get the hair I've always dreamed of was worth $470, maybe even more. (Ok, it would definitely have to be more, especially when you considered the tip that would be required for such a treatment.)

I told my stylist I'd seriously consider the treatment, all the while calculating how long it might take for me to save up my monthly allowance for such an extravagance, and whether I would be able to stop spending for long enough to do so. Plus I decided that perhaps I ought to research this magical Keratin treatment to determine whether it was actually safe.

The research idea turned out to be a good one. My initial review revealed only happy customers who loved what the treatment had done to their hair. But, as with any beauty treatment, Keratin had its naysayers. I paid particular attention to them and dug deeper.

The main problem with Keratin is its active ingredient, which you might remember from biology class--it's formaldehyde. What you might not remember from biology (or perhaps chemistry) class is that formaldehyde is a carcinogen, and that you're supposed to wear a gas mask if you're anywhere near it. Since my stylist didn't mention a gas mask accessory to the treatment, I determined that safety protocols with this treatment were perhaps not the best.

Some companies advertise formaldehyde-free Keratin treatments, but it seems that most, if not all, contains other variations from the aldehyde family, which is essentially the same ingredient with a different name. It's no less dangerous, and perhaps even more so because people think they're opting for the safer product when they are not.

The question of how to pay for this treatment no longer needs an answer, as I have decided that I'd rather have wavy hair than cancer. But now I am even more concerned because I will have no way of knowing in advance whether my salon is performing the treatment on someone while I am there, and just being in proximity of it is dangerous. Luckily, I am no wallflower and will speak up should I see it being performed.

Speaking of spending enormous sums of money on hair--if you haven't seen Good Hair, the Chris Rock documentary, I highly recommend it. It opened my eyes to a hair world that I didn't even know existed and raised great questions that people ought to think about. The documentary, along with the formaldehyde revelation, are convincing me that being happy with what the hair that you have leads to a simpler and easier life.

Coming up for air

2010-05-23T13:59:00.000-04:00

This month, we have two house-related events to celebrate: first, the fourth anniversary of our closing, and second, the paying off of our second mortgage.

We took out a second mortgage rather than pay PMI, or rather, B did all of these things, since we weren't married when he bought the condo. The second mortgage was necessary because we didn't have a 20 percent down payment. It wasn't due to general slackitude - real estate prices around here are high, and they were even higher 4 years ago.

You would think that we would now have equity in our home--but if you thought that, you would be wrong. You see, real estate prices have also dropped about 20 percent. So we've worked very hard these last few years to...not be underwater anymore with our house. 'Tis a bittersweet accomplishment.

I thought that an appropriate reward would be a little refinancing action so we could lower our rate and make our payments toward our primary mortgage count even more. However, a call to a local mortgage broker turned up only bad news. First, our mortgage is not through Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, so we don't qualify for the government programs that require only 5 or 10 percent equity to refinance. Instead, we'd have to wait to refinance until we had 20 percent equity, or refinance now and pay PMI.

Yes, PMI, even though we've already paid down 20 percent. If we refinanced, we'd essentially be starting from scratch, as if we were taking out a loan for 100 percent of the value of our condo. All of our efforts for the past 4 years would not count. And we'd be stuck with PMI for 5 years or until we paid down 20 percent of the new loan.

Now is a good time to remind myself, as I have been reminding myself since real estate prices dropped, that life can still be great even when parts of it aren't fair, and that expectations of fairness in life will lead only to disappointment. And technically, we won't realize a loss on our condo until we sell it, and we don't plan to sell for several more years at least. By then we'll have more equity.

On the bright side, my Dunkin Donuts index tells me that the economy is coming back. People are back to paying for their daily morning coffee. Parking lots of local area shopping complexes are full again. The bargain basement hotel deals of last year are difficult to find this year.

That last one isn't really part of the bright side, but I appreciate that it is a sign of a recovering economy.

Ice cream iniquities

2010-04-19T20:33:00.000-04:00

Some things in life aren't fair, and I've recently discovered another injustice to share with the world. This iniquity is among the worst because it is related to ice cream.

B and I have a favorite ice cream stand that offers reliably large portions and delicious ice cream. However, after our last visit, I noticed that one of our portions was a bit more generous than the other. Tonight's visit confirmed my hypothesis.

The teenage girls who work at our ice cream stand appear to have taken a fancy to my husband and have decided to show their appreciation through extra large scoops of ice cream. We both order the same size, but his ice cream is noticeably larger.

I proposed a number of experiments to test my theory. B proposed several of his own that mostly consisted of his acting silly without attempting to prove anything. Sniff.

I'm going to have to continue to ponder the best experiment to prove my theory, but until then, B is going to place both of our orders, and then we'll see who gets the bigger ice cream.

Finally, a camera decision

2010-04-18T18:07:00.000-04:00

You might recall that I've been camera shopping for some time now. I've been taking my time because digital cameras are big investments. I wanted to be sure that I got the right model.

I'm partial to Nikon because they created my film SLR, which took dreamy pictures despite my limited photography skills.

I had been trying to decide between a superzoom point-and-shoot model and a digital SLR. The most appealing aspects of the superzoom were its size and weight. It would be an easy camera to schlep around the Canadian Rockies. On the other hand, I suspected that I'd be paying a lot of money for a good but not great camera that might not do those scenic vistas justice.

An SLR, on the other hand, was amost guaranteed to take amazing photographs. However, I dreaded the back pain that would reliably come from carrying around a heavy camera, and I couldn't ignore that an SLR would be a more expensive purchase.

I found myself unable to decide, and so I ignored the problem for several months and waited for my mind to make itself up. And this weekend, my mind decided, and off we went to the mall to buy the DSLR.

The Nikon D5000 was our camera of choice. It's a step up from Nikon's entry-level model (the D3000) and has an overwhelming number of options. I'm not sure if I will ever understand all of them, but I've figured out the basics since yesterday, when we brought the camera home.

At the store, we bought the camera, a couple of memory cards, and a UV lens cover--all I needed to get started. After we arrived home, we bought a camera bag, a backup battery, and another memory card from Amazon.

I've taken lots of pictures, all indoors due to the enormous raincloud that has settled over the area this weekend, and am really happy with all of them. As soon as our bag arrives, we'll venture outdoors and really see what she can do.

Vacation news

2010-03-30T18:50:00.000-04:00

Not much new on the Banff front. I've booked a couple of activities, including a boat trip on Maligne Lake in Jasper and a ride up the Jasper tramway. My guidebook threatened a two-hour wait for the tramway and didn't mention the possibility of advanced reservations, so perhaps the online reservation system is new. I'm all for time-saving strategies, especially when they have liberal cancellation policies.

I still haven't booked our final car rental. I'm avoiding this task because I'm not ready to accept the large sum that we will likely spend on a car rental and insurance, which I always say I will skip and then buy at the last minute because I'm paranoid. Another reason why we stay in cities and take trains while vacationing in Europe.

Speaking of Europe, the euro has been tanking against the dollar. On the other hand, the Canadian dollar (CAD) and US dollar are flirting with parity. Parity occurs when two currencies trade on a one-for-one basis. Once upon a time, the thought of the USD and CAD approaching parity would have been cause for riotous and condescending laughter (by Americans). In other words, we haven't chosen the best time to vacation in Canada. However, one US dollar still buys at least one CAD and only $.75 worth of euros, so we're still coming out ahead.

So will Europe be our next destination? Unlikely. B and I both have a lot of vacation days this year, four weeks' worth or more. However, the Banff trip is not going to leave much in the vacation budget for 2010. We find ourselves in a unique position--plentiful vacation days and a piddling budget. Right now, I'm considering a couple of options:

Renting a house on Mount Desert Island in Maine. Mount Desert is where Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park are. Weekly rentals are reasonably priced (that is, they are less than our monthly mortgage payment) and come with kitchens for preparing meals. I've been wanting to visit Acadia for a while now, but I'm not sure if I want two national park trips in one year.
Visiting Chicago. I desperately want to see a taping of Wait Wait Don't Tell Me, which is taped on Thursday nights in Chicago and aired on NPR stations on Saturdays and Sundays. And the city is full of interesting attractions, both indoor and outdoor. We would either fly or drive for this trip--probably fly.

No decisions yet - one vacation at a time.

So this is love: My visit to the library

2010-03-29T18:55:00.000-04:00

Sometimes ideas get stuck in my head and refuse to leave until I indulge them. Luckily, most of my whims are harmless (except on my budget) and involve vacations, cultural outings, and other activities.

Recently I decided that I wanted to read the Kathy Reichs books upon which the TV series Bones is based. I enjoy the TV show, mostly for the characters, as I see a lot of myself in Temperance, or maybe the other way around, and a bit for the science (not very much for the dead bodies). I assumed I'd like the books, too, but I didn't want to buy them new, just in case they didn't live up to the awesomeness of the TV show. I decided to pursue other options for acquiring them.

First I investigated the used options on Amazon but didn't find anything in the price range that I had deemed acceptable. Next I turned to the used section of bn.com. This site had many options; however, the shipping costs were prohibitively expensive, and I couldn't find any sellers offering discounts for multiple books. For instance, a book might be $.50, but shipping is $3.99. If you buy a second book from the same seller, you have to pay $3.99 in shipping for the second book, even though the seller is likely to package the books together.

I suspect my reluctance stems from an illogical but unavoidably human trait about not wanting the other person to get a better deal than I was getting, even if the deal was still good for me. I decided to move on.

My next stop was ebay. I became aware of ebay eleven or twelve years ago while in college but never got around to establishing an account or buying anything. When my apartment was broken into a few years after college, the police officer warned us all against ebay ("It's full of stolen items!"), and I continued my indifferent boycott.

I decided that books were unlikely to be stolen items and were a safe purchase. Any burglar who tried to make his living by stealing mystery novels would quickly learn his lesson.

And it was on ebay that I discovered book lots. Book lots, where have you been all my life? Apparently, you've been on ebay, and I've been ignoring you.

Knowing about these magical lots would certainly have been useful these past couple months as I have been collecting all of the Amelia Peabody books by Elizabeth Peters and reading them in anticipation of the next novel coming out next week. Alas.

Back to Kathy Reichs. I found several lots, some priced by reasonable people, others priced by burglars who haven't discovered that used books are not the pot of gold that they had hoped for. I chose one of the reasonable lots, sent it to B, and asked him to work his ebay magic.

He put in his bid, and then we forgot about the lot until several days later, when he checked his account and saw that we had lost. I could have looked for another lot, but ebay was more work than I wanted. Ebay needs a complex wiki-style taxonomy, and until it exists, the site is simply too frustrating for me. I can deal with many inadequacies on websites but poor organization is not one of them.

Out of ideas and unwilling to spend more than $2 per book, I decided to do what I should have done in the beginning--go to the library, where books are plentiful and free.

One night last week (one of the non-rainy nights, of which there have been few lately), we hopped over to the library, applied for library cards, and got lost in the stacks for a while. Ok, we didn't get lost; the library is teeny, even by my small-town standards. But they had Deja Dead, the first book in the series, as well as The Geography of Bliss, which I've been meaning to read, and a Rosamunde Pilcher novel that I haven't read.

Reading three books in three weeks is ambitious, especially since I was only halfway through a lengthy Peters book at home and have more on the way, but I reasoned that I could always renew or return and try again later. B picked up a book about basketball that he secretly wanted to hate but has actually been enjoying immensely.

While at the library, I learned that my collection of travel books rivals my town's. I suppose if one is going to have an addiction, buying travel guides is one of the more tolerable ones.

After arriving home, I enthusiastically dove in to the Reichs book. I quickly learned that the Tempe in the books is not very much like the Temperance in the TV show, and I was woefully unprepared for the graphic descriptions of violent deaths that characterized the first 75 pages of the book. Perhaps the remaining pages feature similar accounts, but I don't intend to find out. I no longer feel the need to finish a book for the sake of finishing it.

I put down Reichs, grateful for having lost the ebay auction. I picked up Bliss and have been learning about happiness ever since. The book is making me want to travel even more than I already do (dangerous).

The near-constant rain that has been plaguing New England these past few weeks, on the other hand, is making me want to stay home and read, so I am glad that I am prepared for hours (days?) of this activity. Spring came early this year, and so, apparently, did the April showers.

While I wait for the rain to end, I'm sitting in our comfy armless leather chair, which during the winter months lives as close to the fireplace as I can get without actually sitting in the fire, devouring my books one at a time, listening to Jimmy Buffett and dreaming about the sunshine.

Maybe next I'll learn how to do hair

2010-03-09T19:30:00.001-05:00

This weekend I visited Sephora again. I had to exchange some blush that I purchased online.

I bought the Sephora brand blush a couple months ago and have been happy with it, but as I reached the bottom of the container, I noticed that pieces were breaking off. I didn't spend $12 on a small blush container to lose the last quarter of it in my sink. I wanted to exchange the unopened replacement with something else.

At the mall, B and I were alerted that we were approaching the Sephora store by the small army of men gathered outside, lounging on the railing and trying to look casual. B joined the ranks and I headed in.

I feel weird browsing around a store and then bringing my return to the counter, as if the sales person will suspect that I simply brought in my receipt and grabbed a replacement item from the store to return something that I didn't actually buy. Of course I would never do this, and it's likely that the sales people at the counter don't pay attention to my behavior before I reach them, but I waited in line with the rest of the buyers, only to hand over my blush and then start browsing.

I attempted to look like I knew what I was doing, but I suspect I fooled no one, and a sales person was quick to ask if I needed assistance.

"Yes," I said. "I'm looking for blush." I showed her the blush I returned, explained why I didn't like it, and asked for a recommendation. She corraled a fellow sales person, who thought for 5 seconds and then led me to the Clinique counter and showed me a blush.

"It seems a bit brown," I said. I don't do brown. She disagreed, and put some on her hand. There was not even a hint of brown.

"I'm not crazy about the sparkles," I said. She said that it had the same exact luminosity as the blush I was returning. I was skeptical. She brought me over to the display, and I put some of the sample on my hand. Sure enough, they could have been the same color. (And perhaps they are...)

I laughed and apologized and said that it was clear that she knew far more than I and that I was sorry for doubting her expertise. She laughed with me (or was it at me...) and said it was fine, and she offered to put some on me so I could see it, since I wasn't wearing any blush.

Except I was. I said so. She ignored me and proceeded to put blush on half my face, demanding all the while that I smile. She told me to go look in the mirror. I walked over and saw myself, but with a much rosier cheek than I'm used to having.

"Isn't it a bit...too much?" I asked. "That looks like a lot of blush to me."

Not at all, she explained. Rosy cheeks bring attention to the right part of my face. Or something. I forget the argument. She also said that I wasn't wearing the rest of my make-up. I was, but I decided to remain silent with my protest.

I walked back to her and she blushed up the other half of my face. Again, I was taken aback by the color in my face.

"You mean," I said, "you're supposed to put on enough so that you can actually see the color?"

She pursed her lips and looked at me like I was some hungry animal that refused to eat the food placed in front of it. She then explained where and how I was supposed to put on blush. I realized that no one had ever explained this information to me. I felt almost as if I should latch on to this woman and beg to be taught everything she knew.

Instead, I thanked her for her help, took the blush that she offered, did my exchange, and returned to rescue B.

"Do I look like I'm wearing too much blush to you?" I demanded. B said no, but it's possible that he said that to protect my feelings (as he should). I was again left wondering.

I decided to experiment with this concept of having more than a hint of color in my cheeks, and while I can't quite reproduce the Sephora sales person's skillful application, I think that I have perhaps struck a compromise between her method and my previous method (which, truth be told, was not exactly methodical).

I'm still working my way through the crumbly Sephora blush, but I'll try to remember to report back my satisfaction with Clinique.

I wasn't prepared for the violence

2010-02-28T18:56:00.000-05:00

Back in college, I used to go to hockey games with some frequency. I wasn't much of a hockey fan but was unable to turn down free entertainment. Games were exciting but the occasional check was the extent of the violence that I saw.

College hockey was a child's tea party compared to the American Hockey League (AHL) game that we recently attended. Several minutes into the first period, two players got a little too close to each other and exchanged words. I waited for the refs to get in the middle, as they do in every other sport--but they made no effort to interfere. Moments later, gloves and helmets were thrown to the ice, and then the fisticuffs began!

The crowd jumped to their feet, clearly excited at this development. They shouted and demanded that the young men seek vengeance for the slight that had occurred.

I didn't hear the sentiment phrased quite like that; the overwhelming chorus came from the party of blood-thirsty seven-year-olds in front of us shouting, "Fight! Fight! Fight!"

I wondered if the fight was just for show, but upon closer inspection, I determined that the players were throwing real punches! I've never been in a fist fight, but their ferocity looked like it would hurt.

The punching continued until the gentlemen fell upon the ice, and then the referees interfered and stopped the fight. I assumed that everyone had got the excitement out of their system and that play would continue as usual.

Play continued, but the fighting was not over. There were several more fights and many more near-fights throughout the rest of the game. The penalty boxes got plenty of use.

During the calm periods between the fights, I interrogated B about all of this fighting, which made me very uncomfortable. (I can't even handle fake movie violence.) My understanding is that fighting isn't allowed in college or the NHL but for some reason, it is encouraged in the AHL. This policy discrepancy doesn't make any sense to me, but so it is.

If you go to a game, prepare yourself in advance.

Badly done, Toyota

2010-02-25T18:06:00.000-05:00

I have always been a big fan of my Corolla and of the Toyota brand in general, but I am starting to question my fangirl status.

If you've been following the news, you can't have missed the news about the Toyota recalls due to a tendency to accelerate suddenly.

Moving forward, indeed.

As investigations mount, the news that's coming out is damaging. Scores of people have died--and the numbers keep growing as cases are reinvestigated. Others are sitting in prison because their out-of-control vehicles killed someone.

The news and the breadth of this recall makes you wonder how long Toyota knew about these problems before deciding to do something about them. Which ruined life was the tipping point for them?

My car is not included in the recall, but I've come across reports of people who experienced the sudden-acceleration problem in other vehicles that are not included in the recall. If a company put finances before ethics and was willing to ignore a fatal problem like this one, isn't it conceivable that they would try to limit the financial fall-out by not recalling all of the vehicles that are actually affected?

I'd say it's possible.

As I drove home this evening, I wracked my brain trying to think of a time when my car accelerated suddenly and uncontrollably. My car has over 113,000 miles on her, and I've been in the car for most of them. I can't remember a time when she accelerated suddenly without my touching the gas.

But Toyota's reluctance to address this issue in a timely manner leaves me wondering about both the safety of my car and my loyalty toward the company. I used to trust that the company would do the right thing, but now I actively distrust them and assume that they are doing the wrong thing.

Toyota, you have a long way to go before you can count on me to buy another of your vehicles.

Not much of an Olympic athlete

2010-02-21T17:19:00.000-05:00

Like the rest of the world, I've been engrossed by the winter Olympics these past two weeks. While watching, I realized that when I was a child, the Olympics were my only "interaction" with people from different countries. The Olympics helped shape my expectations about people from around the world.

Now that I'm older, I know that not everyone from Belarus is a gymnast, not everyone from Russia is an ice skater, and not everyone from Germany is a skiier.

Or maybe everyone in Germany does ski, though I suspect there is someone there like me, living in a snowy clime and growing up on the ocean but having zero interest in snow sports and refusing to eat seafood.

Some of us like to defy expectations.

Do you ever watch competitions and wonder if you can do what the athletes are doing? As I watch, I try to figure out the sport that would best suit me.

Short-track speed skating, I learned, is out. The crowded racing conditions would be overwhelming. Plus those competitors appear to be on the shorter side. I think I would face a similar struggle in figure skating, especially partner skating. A six-foot-tall woman is likely not a male figure skater's first choice for a partner.

Long-track speed skating had some appeal, and competitors look to be a bit taller. I like that you get your own lane, and the race is based on your time and not on judges' scores. But I have practical concerns. I have enough problems as it is trying to buy pants. If I had the thighs of a speed skater--forget it! Perhaps all types of skating are out.

Skiing, then? I learned during my only foray into skiing that I don't like going fast. (This news is probably not a surprise to anyone.) Maybe cross-country skiing, then? Did anyone watch that race where the competitors who crossed the finish line immediately fell down in exhaustion?

I don't want to have to work that hard.

I guess the Oympics aren't for me. And that, along with the more obvious reason (lack of skill at all Olympic sports) is why I'm sitting and watching them from my couch rather than competing.

Banff update

2010-02-20T21:44:00.000-05:00

It's been a while since my last Banff update, but my lack of updates is not an indication that I have not been planning. (But then, you know me well enough to know that.)

Here's the process that I usually follow when planning a vacation:

Identify all of the attractions that we would like to visit in each location. I usually copy the information from the guidebook and include location, cost, hours, and other helpful information. This task is finished.
Based on our interests in each area, decide how many nights we will stay in each location. This task is also finished. I would much rather explore a location semi-thoroughly than visit many places and spend hours traveling each day, so most of our stays are 3- or 4-nighters.
Research and book hotels. This task is also finished. I'm used to staying in larger hotels with lax cancellation policies, but not so with these smaller hotels. For instance, one hotel demands a $25 fee if we cancel at any time, even months in advance. I sympathize with smaller, independently owned hotels and understand that they can't stay in business if they allow last-minute cancellations, but I think that such a cancellation fee is as unjust as the so-called "resort fees" that you encounter at some of the bigger hotels.
Scope out a rough itinerary for each day. I used to plan days more thoroughly (schedule and everything) but now leave more flexibility. (See--people can change!) I've planned all of the legs except Jasper.
Research restaurants in each location. For this trip, I've been using the guidebook (Moon's Canadian Rockies) and tripadvisor. I didn't used to perform this step, but finding a restaurant is frequently a source of stress on vacation, and having a list from which to choose alleviates stress when hungry bellies are a-growling.
Plan transportation. I have a rental car booked (through 2 companies actually) but I need to do further research. Some rental companies impose mileage restrictions if you leave the province from which you rent. We plan to visit both Alberta and Britich Columbia and are not interested in calculating miles to avoid fees.

Most of the itin is now planned. I still have to book a few activities, including a bus to Lake O'Hara (apparently amazing, though I'm concerned that there are no bathrooms) and an Oh Canada Eh! dinner show (sometimes I can't resist camp). But all in all, we're in good shape.

The Dunkin Donuts index

2010-02-18T18:54:00.000-05:00

Like many New Englanders, I pass several Dunkin Donuts restaurants on my way to work each day, and I always look at their parking lots. I'm not a coffee drinker, and I can't think of the last time I ate a doughnut, but I think that the DD parking lot is a good indicator of overall economic health.

When we first moved here--nearly four years ago now--the DD parking lot was jammed in the mornings, even very early in the morning. The drive-through lane frequently backed up into the street, and every parking space in the lot was full. Times were good. However, times have since changed.

The thinning of the crowds happened gradually, but a year ago, you could find only a small handful of cars in the lot.

Around the same time, the crowds at our favorite mall were similarly sparse. Finding a rockstar parking space was never a problem. Waiting in line at the cash register? No way.

The economy wasn't prosperous, but there were signs of hope. Our nearby shopping center was always crowded on Friday and Saturday nights, and restaurants had wait times for tables. People were still spending money, but they were being choosier about how they spent it.

Now, a year later, signs of an improving economy are all around me. While it hasn't resumed its glory days from 3+ years ago, the DD parking lot has seen an increase in traffic. Our favorite mall, which was tediously busy before Christmas, kept up the trend into January, a promising sign. And while the people in the mall from a year ago had empty hands, today's shoppers are weighted down with their purchases.

Additionally, last weekend during our drive to the museum, we were on very crowded highways. A crowded highway on a weekend tells me that people have money to spend, since it's difficult to leave the house and not spend money (at least for me). We also passed a mall in which nearly every spot in the lot was occupied (by either a car or a giant snow pile--the snow wasn't there to spend money but the cars' drivers certainly were).

My unscientific observations tell me that the economy is in recovery.

What do the French Laundry and NASCAR have in common?

2010-02-17T19:05:00.000-05:00

Around 12 years ago, Jeff Gordon appeared on the cover of TV Guide, and my interest in the sport of NASCAR was piqued.

I knew nothing about cars, but hey, Mr. Gordon was a good-looking guy! I began watching races here and there, learning a lot from commentators about the sport and growing to appreciate the skills that are required to do well in it.

After college, the lengthy weekend commitment required of true fans became overwhelming and I mostly stopped watching races. However, my fam's interest in the sport has not waned, and they recently challenged B and me to a fantasy NASCAR competition.

The rules are simple: We each pick 5 drivers for each race. There's no draft, so you can pick any drivers you want. You can have the same drivers for the whole season (the tactic that I'm trying, though my choices did not outperform at Daytona) or change up your drivers each week.

There's no entrance fee, though T offered the great suggestion of the winner being taken out to dinner by the rest of the group. B promptly demanded dinner at the French Laundry, which is not exactly a bargain, even if the rest of us order only water. However, the restaurant's location in California makes it likely that he will have to choose another restaurant in the event that he wins.

Based on my performance in the first race, I have decided to hold off on choosing a restaurant because it doesn't seem likely that I'll be treated to dinner.

If you want to monitor my pitiful progress, check out the Vroom Vroom blog link to the right.

Be my valentine

2010-02-11T18:08:00.000-05:00

Valentine's Day has never been one of those big-deal holidays for me. In my personal ranking of holidays, I place it between New Year's Eve, which I not-so-secretly dislike, and Labor Day, which involves zero celebration but does merit a day off.

Ranking holidays sounds like an interesting activity, but I'll have to save it for another time. Perhaps I'll be rewarded with a marshmallow for my ability to delay such fun. Where oh where will I place Arbor Day???

Back to V Day. Prior to B, I spent the vast majority of Valentine's Days as a single lass. I felt obligated to publicly diss the holiday but didn't care that much. (Or so it seems now. If you had asked me then, I might have offered a lonelier response.)

For our first V Day, I bought a couples French cooking lesson for B and me. I thought an activity together might be more memorable than a gift. And it was. While making souffles, we learned how to break cream. It wasn't part of the class; we just overboiled the light cream. Lesson learned: When in doubt about your ability to regulate heat, choose heavy cream, which is practically indestructible.

After our cooking adventure, we took the more traditional gift-giving route for subsequent V Days, but this year I wanted to find another activity that we could do together.

I wasn't interested in going back for another cooking lesson. I booked a night away at a quaint town we'd visited while attending a wedding and wanted to explore more, but I decided I'd rather visit during warmer weather, so I cancelled. I considered another trip to NYC, but again, the weather inspired me to save my pennies for a better time. Any warm location would require flights and wouldn't fit into the V Day budget.

B suggested seeing a show, so I looked around, found a promising jazz performance, and bought tickets for this upcoming weekend. We're also going to a museum that neither of us has visited.

It will be a low-key Valentine's Day but I am looking forward to it.

The marshmallow experiment

2010-02-10T18:02:00.000-05:00

The marshmallow experiment frequently comes up in conversation in our house.

If you're not familiar with it, the marshmallow experiment was conducted in the 60s. Researchers gave 4-year-olds a marshmallow apiece and told them that if they could wait 20 minutes to eat the marshmallow, they'd receive a second marshmallow.

The children who were able to delay gratification were rewarded with a second marshmallow and, as it turns out, many more benefits later in life. As they grew up, they were considered more well-adjusted than their marshmallow-devouring peers and scored higher on standardized tests. Being able to delay gratification is a skill that has widespread benefits in life.

I frequently find myself in situations in which I want to eat the marshmallow right away, metaphorically speaking. I recently convinced myself for a period of about 48 hours that my next car purchase was going to be much more extravagant than I originally planned. Why upgrade to a Camry when I could get a Lexus instead? They have great safety ratings and are so quiet inside! Who wouldn't want a Lexus? I deserve a Lexus!

(Beware of all sentences that begin with "I deserve" and end with an exclamation point.)

After 48 hours of Lexus-induced euphoria, I did some calculations and came back to reality. A Lexus is not in my crystal ball, and another vehicle won't even be part of the plan for at least 3 more years.

At first glance, this situation doesn't seem like a close match to the marshmallow experiment. It might seem like I am delaying gratification only to delay gratification further, never receiving a second marshmallow. However, if you consider the financial bottom line, the situation is a close parallel. My first marshmallow will be my new (to me) vehicle and my second marshmallow will come in the form of money that I would have spent on a Lexus that is instead available for other life expenses.

Another area of life for which gratification is difficult to delay is retirement, or, more specifically, saving for it. B and I both contribute to 401k accounts and opened up IRAs a couple years ago. However, after our initial contribution, we haven't made any more contributions to our IRAs.

The tanking of the stock market soon after we opened our accounts did not help our motivation. But I quickly recognized that this reasoning was actually an excuse. When our financial advisor asked what we'd want to do when the market lost 30 percent of its value, didn't we say that that was the smart time to add more money?

Theory and reality didn't quite meet up on that decision.

It's difficult to justify setting aside funds for a retirement that won't happen for another 30 to 35 (or more!) years when there are so many expenses that could be paid now, from student loans to an underwater mortgage. However, we have come to the conclusion that not eating this marshmallow now will mean a better, easier future for us. It's time to start making regular deductions into our IRAs.

Do these fiscally responsible decisions sound boring? That's because they are! Delayed gratification is by nature unspontaneous and dull in the moment. When you get your second marshmallow, life will be exciting and thrilling, and you will be so happy for your hard work or sacrifice or whatever.

Until then, you're sitting at a table with me, and we're staring at marshmallows that we can't eat.

To my fellow former nightclubbers who now go to bed at 9

2010-01-31T18:23:00.000-05:00

I believe that I have stated on several occasions that I am interested neither in traveling back in time or in reliving my younger and more exuberant years.

If one were interested in defining the more exuberant period of my life, I would direct them to ages 21 to nearly 25. As I approached 25, I began to realize that the exuberant lifestyle was not as appealing as it once was. Conveniently, that was also the time when B and I started dating.

The summer before B and I started dating, I moved in with a fellow fun-loving roommate. Our apartment, while extremely affordable, was located in a hoody area but was within walking distance of a vibrant part of the city that featured every type of food that you can imagine and more than a handful of night spots.

My roommate and I enjoyed our last call of bar hopping that summer. The details of such outings are not necessarily relevant here so I shall omit them but you can rest assured that we had an enjoyable time.

And as I mentioned, it was my last hurrah. Much as I admired the ladies in Sex and the City, I didn't see the bar scene fitting into my life on a long-term basis. A sour apple-tini, despite its ingredients, is simply not an adult beverage.

I gave up that scene and quite willingly, too. Friday morning breakfasts no longer consisted of bacon, egg, and cheese McGriddles, and Friday mornings were easier in general. I woke up refreshed and ready to enjoy my free time on Saturday and Sunday mornings. Life was better.

But I have to confess that I still have one link to my more exciting past and have not been able to get rid of it, despite all logical arguments that its existence in life is pointless and useless.

You see, I have a VIP card to one of the bars that I used to frequent. How I acquired the card is a story for another time. However, its existence granted me front-of-the-line privileges at an establishment that frequently had out-the-door waits.

I am not holding out hope of someday using the card. The bar, despite its awesome Sunday brunch buffet, is long gone from that location. (Though a sister bar does still exist in NYC. I assume they are related - same name and same font - but one never knows. However, my VIP card clearly states the bar's former address.)

So why am I unable to let go of the card? The fondness with which I view that time of my life has certainly not taken on a hint of wistfulness; I am not sorry to be done with that entire scene. But perhaps there is a part of me that wants to be assured that should I want to venture back, I could, and the transition would be seamless.

And so I continue to hold on to my VIP card, using it as a bookmark as I read in bed before going to sleep. And yes, I go to bed at 9, and yes, I get very cranky when life tries to keep me up past my bedtime. But my VIP card reminds me that once upon a time, I could--and did--shut 'em down with the best of them.

Looking back on the decade

2010-01-05T18:15:00.000-05:00

Since I was born at nearly the end of 1979, my ten-year age milestones coincide nicely with the turning of the decades. As we say good-bye to the oughts (an unfortunate name but I haven’t heard anything better), so I say good-bye to my twenties.

The oughts and my twenties, they were a tumultuous time: wild at the beginning for me, and downright unruly toward the end for the oughts.

Ten years ago, I had no idea who I was, but I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to get get away, and so I did. First to England, for a summer abroad, and then to Florida, for a bacchanalistic year of shaking my emotional groove thang. I fought hard to figure out who I was and vowed never to lose myself.

As my confidence grew amid controversies of hanging chads (of which I was blissfully ignorant, thanks to a steady TV diet consisting of early, bad reality television and the occasional episode of Blind Date), the tech bubble sputtered its last breath. While earning my $5.65 per hour (yes, really), I was surrounded by liberal arts grads making little more than I. A game plan was in order.

Back to school I went, and then down came the towers, right in the middle of my English class. Our world was never the same again.

But onward we went because that’s how it has to be. I bought my first car, the sturdy and reliable Island Corolla. Next came interviews, a job offer, graduation, and then a move to the city, a studio apartment of my own because every magazine I ever read said that you had to live by yourself at least once.

I lived paycheck to paycheck, trying to pay off college credit card debt—an experience that taught me that credit card debt eats away at your soul and is to be avoided at all costs, and the definition of comfort is an emergency fund—as the economy struggled to recover, as people mourned the loss of stock options while taking jobs with significant pay cuts.

I paid off my debt, found roommates and a cheaper apartment, learned to offset my reality television intake with the study of current events, and tried to come to terms with the fact that my job was killing me slowly.

And then I met B. Rather, since we had worked together for over two years, I cast my eyes in his direction, and our story unfolded.

Time flew. My soul demanded an escape, so it was time for me to find a new job. Inspired by a life outside the castle, B followed suit. And as the housing market, the second major bubble of the decade, became more and more inflated, the lure of real estate was difficult to resist.

Oh, hindsight. But how I do love our house, despite our lengthy commutes and the overly aggressive neighbor who broke our doorbell. (Long story.)

And then came a proposal, on the evening of a blizzard, and wedding plans began in earnest. A honeymoon in Paris and Nice followed, and a year later, we watched the financial markets collapse from the comfort of our Florence hotel suite. Farewell, Lehman and Bear. Farewell, healthy 401k plans.

The next year, we elected a new president. I felt more comfortable traveling in other countries. I vowed to continue traveling as much as I could, for long as I could. And so we have.

The decade has come to a close, as have my twenties, and I can honestly say that if I were allowed to travel 10 years back in time to the beginning of the decade, I would smile, relive some fond memories, and politely decline. I’ve earned my place in life and have no intention of giving it up.

Here’s to the next decade; maybe it be as informative and fascinating as its predecessor.

Paying for hotels: Not awesome

2009-12-21T18:36:00.000-05:00

Our recent vacations have featured free or majorly discounted hotels courtesy of B's membership in the Starpoints program from Starwood hotels. We've stayed in Paris, Nice, Venice, Florence, Madrid, Barcelona, Munich, Frankfurt, and Salzburg for nearly 40 nights (over 4 trips) and paid a song for it all. Times were good.

Our upcoming trip to the Canadian Rockies will be a relative hardship compared to the golden times of the past, though. The only Starwood hotels in the Rockies are in Calgary, and we're not flying all the way to Calgary to actually stay there (no offense, Calgary).

The current hotel plan involves only 2 nights in Starwood hotels, in fact. We'll stay in one near our local airport for the night before we leave--and can't even use points to pay for it because you "can't combine promotions" (stupid)--and one near the Calgary airport for the night before we fly home. We will have to pay cash money for the remaining 13 nights of the trip.

And even though I threatened/hoped to book some of our nights at one of the glamorous Fairmont hotels in the area (specifically the Fairmont Banff Springs or the Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise--ooh la la), I just couldn't bring myself to pay $400--even if it's $400 CAD--for a night in a teeny tiny room. The exchange rate, while favorable for the US dollar, isn't that good.

As of right now--barring an amazing sale courtesy of Fairmont, a proposition that is not out of the question--there will be no castle experience on our trip. However, we have found no bargains when it comes to hotels for Banff, Lake Louise, and Jasper.

There are a limited number of hotels, and an even more limited number in the areas that we want to stay in. They can and do command steep prices. I have booked all of our hotels and gasped a little when I added up the total cost for all of them. It was a small comfort to know that the number will be reduced slightly when CAD is converted to USD. Here's hoping the dollar continues its current rally well into next year.

Our hotels, while pricier than what we're used to (though what isn't, when you're accustomed to "free"), offer a nice mix of accommodations. Our very own log cabin, in one instance. Part of a chalet in another. A one-bedroom suite with laundry in the unit and a full kitchen. A more traditional hotel that's smack in the middle of the action in Banff. All of the places have onsite laundry and most have their own kitchens, so we won't have to dine out for every meal.

And--this is an important distinction--we chose the hotels ourselves. With Starwood hotels, we have a choice of maybe 2 or 3 hotels in any given city, and even then, we usually opt for the lower-category hotel, since they cost fewer points. Whether reviews are good or bad, we have to live with the hotel because it's our only option. For the Canadian hotels, I scoured the guidebook and tripadvisor and compared prices and amenities and locations and everything that I don't have to think about when I book a Starwood hotel. The planning process involved more work but I feel like I was able to choose hotels that suit us and our vacation style.

However, paying for hotels is not and never will be awesome. I protest.

Abused by Mother Nature

2009-12-16T20:18:00.000-05:00

This morning, I received my daily weather forecast, as usual, from The Weather Channel. Once upon a time, I wanted to become a meteorologist and work for TWC. My career aspirations changed and oriented themselves toward a path that was more suited to my natural abilities, but my interest in weather has not waned.

I look forward to the daily forecast, even if it brings only bad news. I especially like the severe-weather alerts (though if you sign up for them, prepare yourself for being on the receiving end of a high volume of emails whenever a storm is a-brewin'). Today's forecast looked unlike anything I had ever seen.

Sun! Sun for the foreseeable future, with barely a cloud in sight! Did I mention the lack of precipitation? We still have snow on the ground from the last 2 "weather events," and receiving snow upon snow is enough to make you want to pack up and move south.

There was a catch, though. (Isn't there always.) Check out the temperatures that accompany this "fabulous" weather. While not quite single digits, we'll be dangerously close to them on several days. We might not see any new snow, but our old snow isn't going anywhere.

Oh, New England. You could have at least waited until winter arrived to deliver this frostiness to us.

Setting the bar too high?

2009-12-11T18:14:00.000-05:00

Despite my recent brave trip to Sephora, I've never been much of a make-up person. Or, more accurately, I never really learned how to put on make-up.

But I have to wear it because when I don't, people ask me if I'm feeling ok.

I feel fine. I'm just pale, people.

So a little blush is always required to avoid people's sympathy. And while I'm at it, perhaps some powder to balance out the shine from my (SPF 15, which contributes to the paleness issue) moisturizer.

And recently I've been using some mineral makeup, which seems lower maintenance than the liquid foundation that I used to use.

Is it possible for an item of make-up to be called low-maintenance? What if it is replacing a less expensive type of make-up?

We'll leave those questions unanswered for now. Feel free to answer to yourself at home and make fun of me.

So powder and blush are usually the extent of my morning efforts, and I spend approximately a minute and a half on that part of my morning routine.

Sometimes I'll spend an extra 15 seconds applying a lip gloss. I usually eat it off when I have my morning yogurt, and I don't bother reapplying. But I still feel like I went above and beyond that day. Bravo me.

Some days, when I'm feeling particularly plucky, I'll apply eyeliner. A few years ago when I was working at the-company-that-shall-not-be-named, one of my harmlessly flirtatious coworkers (he was older and from South America, so it seemed normal, if that makes any sense) asked me, "M, why are you so beautiful today?"

It was the eyeliner. I realized that perhaps I was setting the bar too high with my eyeliner efforts, so I put the pencil in the back of my make-up box (a plastic Q-tip holder). I can't have people expecting me to put a full 5 minutes into my make-up routine on a daily basis. Next thing you know, they'll expect me to wear mascara. The last time I wore mascara was on my wedding day, and that was over 2 years ago. (Note to self: Perhaps it's time to throw out that mascara.)

But (there is a point) I bought some new eyeliner at Sephora earlier in the week, and it's amazingly easy to apply, so much better than the stuff from Target, that I've actually worn it several times this week. No one has asked me why I look so beautiful--that compliment likely won't come my way ever again--but I am coming around to the idea of setting the bar a little higher for myself.

Conquering your fears: My visit to Sephora

2009-12-07T15:45:00.000-05:00

Today I took a day off to tackle a few of the items on my to-do list. Conveniently, all of my tasks could be accomplished in one location--the mall.

Now you see why I had to take a day off from work for these tasks. If you've been to a shopping mall on a weekend in December, you have probably sworn never to do it again. After we got stuck in gridlock in a mall parking lot for an hour a few years ago, we avoid it on Saturdays and Sundays.

But I figured a Monday was a safe time to go, and I was correct. The mall was more crowded than I expected--though it's always good to see people spending money--but I found a parking space without a problem and was off and running with my to-do list.

My first stop was the camera store to print our PR photos and to inquire about a digital SLR. I love my little point-and-shoot camera but I think the Canadian Rockies might be worthy of something more sophisticated. I'm a Nikon girl and am eyeing the D3000, which is their entry-level model. I love photography but I'm not a sophisticated photographer, so I'm looking for something that's easy to use and that will shoot good-quality photographs without my having to know too much about aperture and other technical talk. A purchase like a digital SLR shouldn't be impulsive, though, so I'm going to hold off, watch prices, and see if I can convince B that a camera is a better purchase than a computer, flat-screen television, and new water heater. (That last one will be a tough sell.)

After the camera store, I went to Sephora. Well, first I walked past it because I was scared to go in. But I convinced myself to go back. They had sent me a coupon for $15 off a $35 purchase, and I had never ventured into the store and wanted to pick up a few makeup items.

Sephora is an intimidating store. I always feel like I should have better hair and more make-up to be able to enter. But I tiptoed in and saw that there were other normal-looking women there and decided to stick around.

The store was mobbed. If you're feeling bad about the economy, just hit up your local Sephora to be reassured that all is well. There are also lots of helpful associates around (I think at least 5 asked how I was doing).

I wanted to buy blush and eyeliner. My blush is so old I don't remember when I bought it, and ditto with my eyeliner. I think you're supposed to replace every 6 months, but at Sephora prices, I think I'll hold on to the stuff for as long as I can.

The store organizes items by brand rather than type, so you can't just walk up to a display of all eyeliners to compare all of them. You have to walk from display to display, find the eyeliner, try to figure out from the sample whether it's what you want, and then hope it's in stock.

After about 15 minutes, I was ready to give up, but I couldn't leave because I had not yet found $35 worth of items. When the next associate asked if I needed help, I said (with more than a hint of desperation), "I need eyeliner and I'm overwhelmed!"

She looked sympathetic and asked if it was my first time in the store. I said it was and she gave me a little tour and took me over to another display (with cheaper eyeliner than what I was looking at) and used the samples to draw on her hand and show me how the liner looked. I chose the brown option, thanked her for her help, and hopped into the line.

She told me that Sephora associates do not work on commission, so they won't steer you to the brand that will make them the most money. Having never worked on commission, it never occurs to me to wonder if someone who is helping me is making their money that way, but I'm glad to know that their associates are offering bias-free assistance.

For my purchase, I was rewarded with a free sample and could choose from 3. There were 2 moisturizers and 1 lip gloss. I have a history of never using moisturizer samples so I went with the gloss. A girl can never have too many glosses, right?

Overall, my Sephora visit went all right, and I now know that the first thing I should do upon entering is ask for help.

Failure

2009-12-05T16:16:00.000-05:00

To celebrate her eighth birthday, my car failed her annual inspection. Perhaps it was a passive-aggressive reminder that she's not getting any younger (though who of us is).

I try to take care of her as best as I can. I take her in for regular checkups when she starts making funny noises or running oddly. I get her oil changed more frequently than the recommended 5,000 miles.

I am somewhat remiss with taking care of her outside, though. The hail damage lives on and will never be fixed--not under my watch, anyway. I never get her washed in the winter unless my windows get so salty that I can't see through them. I never wax her exterior, and now there are some sticky-like patches and the occasional small rust spot dotting her exterior. But she's an eight-year-old car, and these things will happen.

Before inspection, we warm her up, and we take her to the place that doesn't seem to look too closely when they perform the inspection. But they still failed her. Her emissions were fine--phew--but the guy said that she was missing a tie rod. I didn't know what a tie rod was but I felt certain that my mechanic would.

And he did. He also said that tie rods can't be missing, or a car won't steer. This particular tie rod was just a bit worn and needed to be replaced, which it was.

And today she passed inspection with flying colors, and the big red R sticker has been replaced with a sticker that indicates she's good to go for another year.

Another interesting note--if your car fails inspection in November and you bring it back for reinspection in December, you still get a sticker for November. I was hoping to skip ahead a month, but I guess that's not how it's done.

Not so sweet charity

2009-12-02T18:09:00.000-05:00

This weekend, I learned a valuable lesson about charitable donations.

Ever since we cancelled cable and started watching more public television, I've been meaning to donate. Every year, they have their big campaigns and I think, I ought to donate. I enjoy a lot of programs on PBS and it's a great go-to station when nothing else is on.

(C-SPAN is another oft-overlooked but surprisingly entertaining network. Seriously, check it out some time. I watched it almonst nonstop the weekend of Kennedy's funeral and was very pleased with the coverage.)

However, I had yet to donate--until this weekend. Rick Steve's European Christmas episode was on, and it brought back great memories of our trip to Germany and Austria a year ago, and I grabbed my laptop and wallet and decided that there was to be no more dillydallying. The season of giving is upon us, so it was time to give.

But I let selfishness creep into the situation. The good feeling that you get after making a donaton wasn't enough. PBS offers great thank-you gifts and I figured, well, why not get something back for my donation? Rather than just become a member ($40), I kicked up my donation a notch to $150. In exchange, I'd receive 9 (!) seasons of Rick Steves' Europe shows. What a fabulous thank-you gift! Who could resist?

People with sense, that's who. I received my confirmation email, thanking me for my donation and informing me of the "fair market value" of my thank-you "gift." Their assessment of the value of the DVDs? $105.90. That means that we can claim a donation of only $44.10 on our tax return.

If you think that $105.90 seems steep for the value of the DVDs, you're not alone. I checked out their going rate on Amazon. They're currently selling for less than $63.

It's calculator time, boys and girls. Had I bought the DVDs straight out from Amazon and donated the remaining funds from the $150 allocation, my donation would be close to $87. Same cost to me but my deductible donation would be nearly doubled. The obvious downside to this proposition is that PBS would end up with less money, and shouldn't this donation be about PBS and not me?

Yes, yes it should, and that's why I didn't cancel my donation and reorchestrate this whole deal. But I have learned a valuable lesson to just buy the darned "free gift" outright. Donater beware.

Bending the rules for Banff

2009-11-27T18:51:00.001-05:00

Ever feel like you're breaking the law, or at least the rules, even when you're not? And by "not," I mean you're operating within the boundaries set by a company when making a purchase.

My heart is still beating a little bit fast. I'm just not used to taking these kinds of risks. But it was a risk that paid off.

I've booked flights for our next trip, and we're going to the Canadian Rockies. Banff, Jasper, and Lake Louise, here we come! Purchasing our flights was a somewhat convoluted and complicated process (with me, what isn't...), but the tickets were cheaper than they could have been.

The vacation-planning process started before we left for Puerto Rico when B checked to see his status with the airline we were flying. His lack of travel on the airline in the last year and a half left him with no status whatsoever (bummer), but he somehow had over 50,000 miles in his account.

You know what 50,000 miles means. If you fly during the cheap times, you can get 2 round-trip tickets to a North American destination.

I'm sure you can imagine the tizzy that this newfound bonus got me into. Free airline tickets? To anywhere we wanted? Did I mention the free part?

Then I began analyzing the situation to try to figure out how to get the most out of these miles.

We could go to one of the places we've been thinking about, such as New Orleans or San Antonio or Jackson, but the flights to these destinations are relatively cheap. I wanted to fly somewhere expensive to get the most out of the miles.

Enter Banff. Oh, Banff, how I have worshipped you from afar, your glaciers (ok, they're in Jasper) and your lakes and scenery and animals and outdoorsiness (which can be observed from the comfort and glamor of one's Fairmont hotel room). Banff, secret honeymoon contender, faraway land, where the dollar can still buy something and the locals speak my language. Oh, Banff, how have I ignored thee for so long?

I'll tell you why. Because it's expensive to fly there! A ticket to Banff costs about the same as a ticket to Europe. But--aha!--it's the same cost, miles-wise, as any other domestic ticket.

Bang! Bang! Bang! (That's the sound of more bang for my miles buck.)

After we got back from PR, I started investigating our options. To purchase 2 round-trip tickets, we wouldn't be able to fly on our ideal dates, and dates were literally being snatched up from day to day. If you fly on "super-saver" days, a one-way flight for one person is only 12,500 miles. But those dates go fast, and most routes have only the 25,000 one-way flights available.

However--interestingly enough--there were several first-class options available for only 25,000 miles.

I soon realized that 50,000 miles might not be as awesome as I hoped. But I still had hope.

I reasoned that at least we could use the miles for one-way travel. One-way flights on other airlines were reasonably priced, and I decided that I could suck up the extra security that would likely accompany us and our one-way tickets. And maybe if we were lucky, we could get first-class flights for that one way.

I called the airline earlier in the week to explain my plan, but their stupid policies thwarted me. The first agent explained that a one-way ticket costs the same number of miles as a round-trip ticket (that is, 100,000 miles), and her computer was not showing the same availability for miles awards as their computer system was showing me on their website. She also said that there were no first-class options available for our route.

I didn't like what she had to say so I hung up and called back. Sometimes this policy works, as you might reach a more experienced person who can help the next time. Unfortunately, the second person, though perhaps more competent, was not any more helpful than the first.

I went to bed that night with a heavy heart. Would we have to--gasp--pay for our tickets? The trip, which in the beginning involved free flights (in my mind, anyway), was suddenly getting more complicated.

That night and the next day, I pondered the situation and came up with two options:

We could pay cash for our flights. The disappointment I felt at being unable to book the one-way flights told me that I really wanted to take this vacation. Sometimes, it's worth it to pay more than you expected for something you really want.
We could buy miles and use them to attempt to buy flights. This proposition was risky because we didn't know if flights were actually available, and if they weren't, we'd be stuck paying for miles we couldn't use. The website said that the flights we wanted were availalbe, but when the people on the phone give a different story, you start to wonder.

I proposed the options to B, and he was willing to try whatever I wanted, so I went with the second option. It involved greater risk but greater reward. I wanted to buy one ticket just to see if it would be possible, but B convinced me to wait until the miles cleared in his account. Having 100,000 miles would be better than having one ticket, 50,000 miles, and no more availability on the flight.

I called the airline and spoke to one of the less competent representatives, asking how long it would take for purchased miles to appear in my account. After I explained the situation 3 times, she said that they'd appear within 24 hours. It seemed like a long time to wait, but I was in a gambling mood.

Back to the computer--bought the miles--and bang! (there it is again)--the miles showed up right away. I selected the flights, chose our seats, put in the card number, and waited for the website to tell me that it sensed I had scammed the system and it wasn't going to let me buy the tickets.

You see, the cost of the miles plus the taxes on the tickets (even the free ones aren't free) was still several hundred dollars less than the cheapest airline's service for that route. In coach.

And we're flying first class.

But the confirmation is in my inbox, so it's official--Banff, here I come, and I'm coming in style.

Favorite photos from Vieques

2009-11-25T18:14:00.000-05:00

Favorite photos from Old San Juan

2009-11-25T18:11:00.000-05:00

Back from Puerto Rico

2009-11-25T17:41:00.001-05:00

And we're back from Puerto Rico. We actually got back more than a week ago, but November has been busier than usual and I haven't had time to recap the trip in my head yet.

It was a fantastic trip and enjoyable for its own merits and for the differences between it and the last few vacations that we've taken. A few key differences made the trip feel easier than a trip to Europe. First of all, we had no issues with communication. Everyone that we encountered spoke English well and willingly. Second, we paid in dollars and therefore didn't have to think about exchange rates. A corollary to this bonus is that items were cheaper than in Europe (not that we did a lot of shopping--I know, shocking). Third, we had amazing food experiences for not a lot of money. In Europe, you seem to have 2 options for dining--there's the $50 (for 2 people) microwave-special dinner or the $120 maybe-gourmet-maybe-not experience. In Puerto Rico we regularly found delicious meals for bargain prices.

We arrived in PR on a Saturday and stayed for 2 nights at the Sheraton Old San Juan. Next we flew to Vieques for 3 nights and then flew back to Old San Juan to stay at the same Sheraton for the remaining 2 nights of our trip.

About the Sheraton Old San Juan...we had some spotty service experiences with them before we arrived and expected the worst but were happy enough with the hotel, especially the enormous buffet breakfast that was included in our rate. On several days, eating a monster breakfast meant that we could eat a late lunch and skip dinner, thus saving a few more dollars.

Old San Juan feels like it should be pedestrian only, but it isn't, and the constant car traffic on the main streets feels out of place. Streets are narrow, with room for a row of parallel-parked cars and another row of one-way traffic. Sidewalks are narrow (though not as narrow as some in Florence) so you feel a bit on top of the traffic. At night, cars sit in gridlock on the streets, barely moving but sending waves of exhaust at passersby, making the evening feel even hotter. (As a side note, rarely do the drivers honk their horns, even if they move only 10 feet in 10 minutes.)

During the day, the streets are much calmer, and you frequently can walk several blocks without encountering a single running car. Houses are painted gorgeously in tropical rainbow colors. Many houses feature balconies with wrought-iron decorations and impressive potted plants.

Everyone that we spoke to was friendly and helpful. We wanted to buy a traditional mask and went to the post office to investigate our options. The man at the counter was very patient with helping us and even recommended a store that sold masks and would ship them for us. He wrote the name and address of the store--unfortunately, the address was wrong--and while we were wandering the streets (far from the post office), I asked a man who worked for an extermination company for help. This man was walking to a job but stopped to help for 10 minutes. I challenge anyone to find someone in Boston who is (a) willing to help, and (b) willing to help for more than 15 seconds. (Unfortunately, we weren't able to find the store with him, but did find it later on, further down the road).

The weather was, surprisingly enough, pretty cooperative. Early-to-mid November is the end of rainy season, and we experienced a few showers, both in San Juan and on Vieques. However, rain is not necessarily a full-day commitment in the Caribbean as it is in other parts of the country. Most of the time, a rain shower meant that half the sky was covered in gloomy gray clouds and the other half was blue skies and sun. Showers usually lasted no more than a half hour and were followed by brighter skies.

Temperatures were hot, but not the overwhelming summer-in-Orlando heat that I am all-too-familiar with. Daytime temps ranged from 86 to 88, and evenings cooled by no more than 10 degrees. Days felt generally more comfortable on Vieques and nights could be chilly (for some of us, though 74 is "chilly" to me). Nights might have been cooler in Old San Juan, but if you were walking on a congested street, there'd be no way of knowing because the heat and exhaust from the cars made the trek uncomfortable and dizzying.

The food...the food was good. We spent the first couple of days eating traditional Puerto Rican cuisine, but because most traditional foods are fried, we soon started seeking out other options. Traditional PR food has much to recommend it. Mofongo--which is a ball of plantains stuffed with some kind of meat and then deep fried--is fantastic. There are two types of plantains--amarillos, which are fully ripe plantains that are fried and sweet. You can also get immature plantains that are fried and more savory. No matter where we got them, they all tasted just like the boxes of Goya frozen plantains that you can buy from the grocery store. Does Goya do an amazing job, or did all of our side dishes come from the freezer? Who knows.

After I placed a moratorium on fried foods, we branched out and ate at Spanish, French, Italian, and Asian restaurants--all were excellent. We didn't have a single bad meal on either island (though I could have lived without the jalapeno in my veggie sushi that last night--big pain).

Yes, I am avoiding writing about Vieques. Why? Because it was that amazing. Have you ever been to a place and felt like you had discovered something that not many people knew about? That's how Vieques was. I suspect that in 5 to 10 years, the island will be overdeleveloped and overrun with my fellow tourists, but I'll always have my memories of empty white sand beaches and crystal-clear waters.

We flew to Vieques on Vieqes Air Link--half the price of Cape Air, and worth consideration if you're staying somewhere in PR for a day or more before you continue on to Vieques, since you depart from the local airport rather than the international airport. Air Flamenco offers similar good rates. Luggage is majorly restricted--25 pounds or less per person--so resist the urge to overpack, or throw clothes out as you go (our technique, which is why you might see me in a dinosaur tee shirt in some of the vacay photos).

Security is light in the local airport. By "light," I mean nonexistent. There are no x-ray machines or any security counter to speak of. They don't ask for ID when you check in. They do, however, ask your weight, which determines where you sit on the plane. For the ride back to PR, I was in the last row (of 5) and B was in the first, but you can't really be upset about being separated for a 22-minute flight.

Though you can be upset about being placed in the back row of the plane, as it was bumpy and scary. I was not a fan. However, the experience was better than riding into a wall of water--a crazy thunderstorm--which occurred on our way to Vieques.

Your other option for getting to Vieques is taking an unreliable, sometimes-running-sometimes-not ferry which leaves out of Fajardo. Plus you have to figure out how to get to Fajardo from San Juan or wherever you're staying. The airplane, however scary and pricey, is your best and most reliable bet.

After we landed safely in Vieques, we took a publico (taxi) to our hotel. I have to say that I experienced some misgivings on that taxi ride. We rode with 3 locals, who were not in possession of all of their teeth. They exited at maybe the most ramshackle house I have ever seen. I think it was being held up with sticks and empty plastic plant pots.

Most houses had a bit of a rundown, tired feeling. Roads were narrow and winding and wild horses were everywhere--walking on the road, grazing by the road, or hanging out in a pack.

And then we got to Hector's by the Sea, our hotel, and our taxi driver had to get out of the car to check on the driveway to see if he could make it down. I unfortunately didn't take any pictures of this driveway, but it was unpaved, steep, narrow, twisty, and scarred from 6 months of heavy rainstorms.

I'm not going to lie; I was a little scared of Vieques at this point. But from the moment we set foot on Hector's, everything got better.

We "checked in," meaning Hector showed us around and showed us our room, and then we walked to Hector's private beach while we waited for our rental car to arrive. There's something about sitting on a beach all by yourselves that makes any vacation better.

After our car arrived, we got lunch at a cafe, Bananas, in Esperanza, one of two towns on the island. Esperanza is the more laid-back and tourist-oriented of the towns. The other town is Isabel II, pronounced Isabel Segundo, and sometimes called simply Segundo, and it is more of a local hangout.

Our next stop was one of Vieques's many beaches. We drove to the Blue Beach and then realized how private our vacation was going to be. There were just 2 other groups on the mile-long, gorgeous, amazing beach. We walked down the beach, feet in the warm water, and were immediately grateful that we had taken a risk on Vieques.

We spent the next few days going to the beach, swimming, relaxing, eating, and appreciating our island paradise. The wild horses became the mascots of our vacation, and we saw the charm in the houses. We appreciated the four-wheel drive on our rental car, a 99 Isuzu Trooper. The Check Engine light was on from the moment we turned on the car until the moment we dropped it off at the airport, and the left mirror was held on with an elastic (after duct tape failed), but we fit in a lot better with the locals than the other tourists who were driving shiny and sparkly Jeeps.

All in all, we enjoyed a fabulous trip. I'll try to get some of the highlight pictures up and will try to resist posting all 20 or so of the sunset pictures I took one evening.

And now on to the next trip...?

Epic battle: M vs. the sweet potatoes

2009-10-30T21:43:00.000-04:00

This afternoon featured a momentous battle. I went up against 5 pounds of sweet potatoes, and I'm pretty sure I lost.

But I put up a good fight.

I was steaming the cubed sweet potatoes in cream and butter (a delicious start) while poaching some pears. This attempt at multitasking did no good for either vegetable or fruit.

The timer went off for the sweet potatoes, so I turned it off and promptly forgot about them as I continued my pear activity. Many minutes later, I remembered the sweet potatoes, so I grabbed the masher, removed the lid, and began the battle.

The potato masher is plastic and was in no uncertain terms an underperformer. Its design is impractical and not good enough. I mashed and mashed for a long time and was able to mush some of the sweet potatoes, but most remained solid. I did, however, hurt my shoulder.

I was tempted to throw the masher away, but instead, I put it in the dishwasher and turned to plan B.

Out came the food mill. I've used the food mill for mashing regular potatoes, so I figured sweet potatoes were easily mashable, too.

Except the sweet potatoes broke the food mill.

Stupid food mill.

It went in the trash.

I began to wonder if the problem was perhaps not my kitchen tools. Perhaps instead I had not cooked the sweet potatoes long enough?

A fork proved that my concern was real. However, my sweet potatoes were in an awkward half-mashed, half-not-cooked-enough state. I wasn't sure if putting them back on heat would help to soften them further.

At this point, I had two options--carry on or cry.

I paused and waited for the tears to come, but they didn't. I sighed and decided that carrying on was my only option.

Years of cooking had prepared me for this moment. I looked around the kitchen to figure out which tool to use next.

The molcajete (like a mortar and pestle) was in front of me, so I grabbed the pestle part (hand-held part), put it in a plastic freezer bag (to keep it from getting gross), and started smushing.

It should be noted that by now small mounds of mashed sweet potatoes were scattered around the kitchen.

The molcajete effort was a failure. The hot sweet potatoes and hot dutch oven nearly burned my hand. The molcajete went into the cabinet.

My last and final hope was my immersion blender. When in doubt, find a tool that plugs in.

My blender was significantly awesomer than the other tools that I had tried to use. It didn't get rid of all of the lumps, and it didn't solve the problem of the potatoes being just slightly undercooked, but... it hid most of the problems...after about 20 minutes of blending.

Thank you, technology.

Some photos from NYC

2009-10-22T20:36:00.000-04:00

Here are some photos from our trip to NYC.

Here's B at the Museum of Natural History, getting his dino on. I highly recommend the planetarium, as well, even though we had some difficulty finding the entrance.

Here are B and me with the Brooklyn Bridge and the New York skyline in the background. It was a cold evening. My scarf made a nice lap blanket when we were on the bus.

Here we are on the tour bus for a daytime tour. The openings at the front and back made for a brisk ride, but the overhead covering was a godsend for when the sprinkles started.

Here are the ladies in from of FAO Schwartz, home of the piano from Big. We were lucky enough to wander into the room just in time for a demonstration and got to watch two girls play a couple of impressive tunes while dancing and even cartwheeling. B said that he wanted to buy the piano, but since it came with a price tag of $250,000, we decided to pass.

I'm a female tourist, so please rip me off

2009-10-22T20:23:00.001-04:00

This past weekend, B and I scooted out of town for a long weekend in New York City with my family. Within an hour of landing in the city, I experienced my first I'm a female tourist so please rip me off moment.

Because it was my parents' first trip to the city, we decided that our main activity of the weekend would be riding the red double-decker buses. There are 4 routes: uptown, downtown, Brooklyn, and night tour. The lower-floor of the bus is enclosed, but the upper deck, exposed, is where the action is at. Being able to see the towering skyscrapers is key to feeling connected to the skyline and buildings that you see in movies and TV shows.

We didn't buy tickets ahead of time and were heading to the office to buy them when we encountered on the street a salesperson from what I thought was a rival company--the blue buses. The map in his brochure was different from the map I had printed from the red company's website, but when I expressed hesitation about buying tickets for a different tour company, he assured me that they were the same.

"The same?" I questioned. Yes, he declared. He said that the companies merged, and if you bought tickets for the blue bus, you could get on either the blue bus or the red bus.

Now I am not an expert on mergers and acquisitions, but I would think that having double buses--in different colors, with different names--would not be conducive to a successful merger or acquisition. There was something definitively fishy about his story.

Especially when his coworker came along and he waved him away with an expression that I can't quite define, but if I had to pretend to be on Lie to Me, I'd say it said, "Don't mess up my little scheme by telling this girl the truth."

Our little dialogue on the street, in the rain, went on for some time. As the buyer, you have the advantage of not having to give someone any money unless you're sure it's the right decision. Eventually, the sales person's friend joined the conversation, as did B, and our sales person admitted (while acting as if he had never made his false claims) that a ticket for the blue bus was good for the blue bus only.

In the end, we all bought tickets for the blue buses because their top decks were covered, and rain was predicted for the entire weekend. I think they might have overcharged us for the tickets. Rewarding a man (with an overpriced sale) who deliberately tried to mislead me leaves me with negative emotions, but [insert an appropriate cliche here; there are many options].

We took 3 of the tours, saving Brooklyn for another time. The top was covered but open in the front and back, and the low-40-degree temperatures combined with off-and-on sprinkles from a lingering Nor'easter inspired us to ride a single loop of each tour and then make way toward something warmer, preferably with hot drinks. Perhaps for the next visit, we'll make use of the hop-on, hop-off option.

So I had a somewhat negative experience with the agressive blue-bus salesperson. Transportation continued to be a source of difficulty throughout the trip.

When we weren't bussing (in a transportation sort of way, not in a kissing sort of way), cabs were the chosen mode of transportation, as they were the easiest method for transporting 6 people across wide swaths of the city in a short amount of time for a low cost. The ladies (my mother, sister, and I) rode in the first cab that B hailed, and the gentleman (B, my father, and my sister's bf) rode in the second cab.

One would think that the cab that left first would arrive first at the destination, and sometimes, we did win. However, for the majority of our cab rides, the ladies left first and arrived last, even when we had a significant head start.

Surely we were not unlucky enough to catch the slow cab drivers in town. No, more likely, the cab drivers saw three women and decided to take the leisurely route to our destination.

These experiences are disheartening. I can't say for certain that people thought they could scam us because we are woman, but that's the conclusion that I have come to. Sadly, no matter how confidant, prepared, or intelligent you are, sometimes people see that you're a woman and assume that you will buy what they're selling or not realize that they're trying to steal from you, in either small or larger ways.

Regardless of the negative tone of this post, we all had a fabulous time in New York and enjoyed our time immensely, even the overpriced transportation.

Counting my hailstone blessings

2009-10-09T17:16:00.000-04:00

You might recall that a mighty hailstorm blew through town many months ago while we were watching Star Trek in the movie theater. The Subie remained undamaged, but the Island Corolla did not fare as well.

I didn't think that I'd repair the body damage, as it was entirely cosmetic, and she's getting up there in years--nearly 8 now--and nobody really cares about a little body damage on an older vehicle. But I called the insurance company to report the damage and get an estimate for the repair.

A week or so later, I received a sizeable check in the mail. I might have even danced a little jig around the living room after I opened the envelope. The best part was that the check was written to me and came with no requirements on how it had to be spent.

There were some caveats, of course. Insurance companies don't give checks like that without getting something in return. My insurance rate didn't go up--hail is considered an act of God, and God can't be billed for it, and I certainly can't be billed on behalf of God--but if I didn't spend the check to repair the damage, the insurance company was going to deduct the check plus my deductible from their valuation of my car. It seemed like a reasonable trade-off to me. I deposited the money into a savings account, sat back, and waited for disaster to strike.

Disaster is supposed to strike, after all, after you've received a windfall--right? I lucked out, I suppose, because no disasters have occurred thus far. However, soon after I received the check, my mechanic pointed out some maintenance that I should consider.

He asked if I planned to keep my car for a while, and I said I planned to keep it for as long as I could. Life without a car payment is fantastic! Plus my roundtrip commute to work is close to 75 miles; there's no point in buying a new car only to start racking up the miles. The Island Corolla is the best mode of transportation for me right now. And I love her.

Back to my mechanic. He praised me for wanting to keep her, and said that she was a great little car and that she's still worth a bit of money, relatively speaking, and that people who drive those Corollas love them and never want to give them up. Amen to that. But he did say that if I plan to keep her for a while, I might consider replacing her struts. He said that struts help keep her balanced and help keep her tires in the right place on the road. I said that I was planning to replace my tires before the upcoming winter, and perhaps I should just have my struts and tires done all at once. He agreed it was a good idea.

And so that's what I had done today, tires and struts and a new serpentine belt and an oil change. There was also a rattle in my exhaust that he took care of.

And what, might you ask, was the grand total of all of this work? Well, it was exactly $19 more than the check that I received for the hail damage. Sometimes windfalls come to you for a reason, and I'm glad that I was able to resist temptation (spending it) long enough to realize that money that comes to you for an item is best spent on the item, even if you spend the money in a different way than originally intended.

Lesson learned: Hail is not so bad after all.

Nola 2010?

2009-10-08T18:54:00.000-04:00

Our next vacation, Puerto Rico, is coming up, so naturally I have started looking ahead to the vacation that we'll take after that.

If you're wondering if I spend too much time planning and not enough time living in the moment, you have a reasonable concern. However, I don't think that the ability and tendency to plan (for the short-term, long-term, and unforeseen) is necessarily exclusive of the ability to live in the moment. The moment I'm living in now is fine enough; I'm eating pizza crusts at the kitchen table, listening to the dueling sounds of a running dishwasher that sounds as if it has trapped a mouse (squeak squeak) and New Orleans jazz on the radio (public radio, of course). The house is a bit on the cool side but not quite cold enough to justify turning on the heat for the first time this year or even flipping the switch on the gas fireplace.

If you think this moment is sounding peaceful and a tad on the dull side, I'm not offended because that's exactly the point I'm trying to make. Living in the moment is great, but what if not much is going on in the moment and you can make it more exciting by working toward creating better moments for the future?

I have convinced myself. It's easy to win an argument when there's no one to offer a counter argument. But let's get back to my favorite topic, vacation.

I had been feeling a tad distraught lately because no city's siren call was loud enough to catch my attention. "Where, oh where will we go for our next vacation?" I shouted out my window into the darkness each night. Well, perhaps it wasn't as dramatic as that, but there might have been a little moping and the occasional, "I don't know where I want to go on vacation next!" whine to B, who takes a much more laid-back approach to travel and doesn't understand the agony that such a situation brings to me. It's ok. He falls a whole lot closer to "Normal" than I do on this scale.

Jackson Hole has not fallen off my radar. However, B told me recently that the summer months could be difficult for travel because of work so we might have to go away in the spring. Jackson would be cold but doable in March or April, but the nearby national parks would likely be difficult to visit due to road closures from snow and/or melt. Summer and fall are much better months for that area. So Jackson is not off the list but it's probably not going to be the next destination, not if we want to go away in March or April.

I decided to try the old sit-back-and-wait approach. We weren't going to book anything until after we got back from PR anyway, so why torture myself with the once-daily flight check (has it gone up?? has it gone down??) until we're actually ready to buy flights?

My strategy paid off. A city has popped into my head and won't go away. I saw a little of the city when So You Think You Can Dance visited last week (or rather, aired the episode last week from when they visited this past summer) and thought it looked nice but didn't think any more of it.

Until earlier this week, that is, when I thought, "What would be a good place to go for a long weekend?" And there it was--New Orleans--strutting through my head with cajun music, wrought iron, Mardi Gras beads, jazz brunches, and beignets.

I broached the subject with B, who was interested, so I visited the local B&N to pick up a guidebook. Pickins were slim but I found an acceptable guidebook that I have since read cover to cover, growing more and more excited by the page. Similar to PR, New Orleans feels like another country, from its architecture to food to music to language/accents. However, just like PR, it isn't another country, so you can pay with the dollar (a nice perk; the dollar is weak weak weeeeeak these days) and get there in a reasonable amount of time (flying, of course).

The trip has grown from a long weekend to a five- or six-night adventure, in my mind anyway. I haven't booked anything so I can make all of the plans that I want to. But there are so many activities that I think we could easily fill five or six days. Here are a few good options that I've found so far:

Visiting the zoo.
Taking a ride on the Natchez riverboat.
Taking a Katrina tour.
Riding the streetcar (named Desire?) through the Garden District. Brangelina sighting optional.
Kicking it in the French Quarter.
Taking a boat ride through a swamp.
Visiting a plantation.
Listening to live jazz, cajun, and zydeco music.
Eating beignets, muffaletta sandwiches, po'boys, and other quintessential Nola foods (though I must confess, I am a little concerned that seafood plays such a significant role in the diet - I will have to stock up on Larabars if we go).
Shouting "Stella!" at random balconies while clutching my head. Overdone, perhaps, but amusing to me.

New Orleans has promise, that's for sure, but now it's time to wait to make sure that this infatuation will stick around to keep me excited for the next 6 months until we're able to go. Booking a vacation and then losing interest in it several months before you even go is not an experience I'd like to have.

Ten months of hair neglect followed by a blowout

2009-10-05T17:33:00.002-04:00

Last week I had my first haircut since last December. December! Almost ten months. When you chop off a foot of hair, some time has to pass before you're comfortable going back to the hair salon.

I usually wait until I hate my hair or can no longer brush it and then make an appointment, and this time was no exception. Luckily I can still brush it (it is only down to my shoulders, after all) but had started wearing my hair in a bun almost exclusively--never a good sign. I booked a cut and color a few weeks ago but had to wait longer than expected because my stylist was on maternity leave (something I didn't realize since I hadn't seen her since last year).

My stylist offered light scolding for waiting so long to return. She says that if you cut your hair frequently, even just a little bit, it grows faster. How does the root know what's going on at the other end? It's a mystery that someone else will have to solve. I asked the absolute longest that I could wait between cuts, expecting her to say 4 months or so. She said 8 weeks.

Does anyone who doesn't color regularly make such frequent appointments? Aside from the lengthy time commitment (last week's visit was a 3+-hour activity), the cost adds up very quickly. When I started going to my stylist, she was a junior stylist, so cuts were cheaper. However, a cut and color is more and more expensive every time I visit.

Perhaps I can aspire to visit every 4 months--that seems like a reasonable commitment (both in time and finances), though I bet I could stretch it out to 6 months without much of a difference. To return in February or April? Stay tuned, eager reader; suspense like this is difficult to handle.

Before I left the salon, I asked for a shampoo recommendation. I knew it would be pricier than the hair products that I buy at Target, but I was willing to gamble on the $15 bottle of shampoo. I left the salon with $60 worth of shampoo, conditioner, and hair oil (to be applied before and after blowdrying--I was unsure about this one but am easily persuaded when cosmetics are involved). The brand is Moroccanoil, which is screaming out for an extra space, but that's how they spell it.

I've used my new hair products twice and am sad to say that my hair-care budget is likely going to have to go up. These bottles are half the size of most drugstore brands and about four times as expensive, but after I shampoo, my hair feels the way it does after I condition it with the drugstore stuff. After I condition it, my hair is happier than it has been in a while. I'm still undecided on the hair oil, but I'll keep using it and assume it's doing what it's supposed to (whatever that is).

Of course, these new products don't mean that I can style my hair any better than I could before. If miracles like that can be bought, I suspect they cost more than $60. However, I am nothing but pleased with my new hair. Here's a pic. It looked better after I returned from the salon, so use your imagination and pretend I look like a cover model.

Framing pics

2009-09-28T18:04:00.003-04:00

My negligence with posting photos is unacceptable! Motivation has won the day today. (Perhaps only because it gives me an opportunity to show off? Feel free to draw your own conclusions.)

Below is our first framing project. B picked up the painted-suede piece of art in Mexico while we were on our Caribbean cruise in 2006, and I had it framed for his birthday that year. In the background you can see the new color of our upstairs hallway, painted 2 weeks ago, though it really doesn't look like that in person. It's much more like mint ice cream.

Here is the first honeymoon print, which we picked up in Mougins (I mistakenly typed Mougin in the previous post). Does that scene not look like a honeymoon? I suppose ours was a bit short on sunflowers (they weren't in season), but we did see lots of blue, in the south of France, anyway.

Here are the other 3 honeymoon prints. As you can see, they are currently propped up against our coffee table in our living room. We are still prepping the wall upon which they will hang; we removed a floating shelf from it this weekend and had to repair about 8 sizeable holes in the wall and still have to sand and paint them. And by "we," I suspect you know that I don't mean me.

Below are 2 prints we picked up in Venice last year. I thought the colors were interesting and liked the gondolas, especially since we celebrated our first anniversary with a gondola ride (and a $5 pizza dinner).

And here are the newest members of the family! We picked them up in Vermont and have not yet brought them in for framing, though we have already identified where they will live in our house. If you're wondering about the prints from Greece that we recently brought in for framing: they're not ready yet. This weekend, I hope.

And since we're doing pictures, I figured I'd post our new whale. I have stopped worrying that he will fall on my head in the middle of the night and maim me. Plus I lost the battle for moving him to the living room, so above our bed he remains. He's a dashing fellow and I'm really glad we picked him up, no matter how much he (and the silverware and the shoe armoire and the framing) have put a hurt on the September budget.

To frame or not to frame?

2009-09-25T18:22:00.000-04:00

Being possessed of an incompletely decorated house, B and I engage in a magical treasure hunt with every trip away as we search for the newest acquisition to adorn our walls, tables, and shelves.

Home decor excites one of us perhaps more than the other. As B pointed out to me recently, "There aren't many men out there who get excited about framing." Perhaps that is true. I don't mind leading the charge (stampede, bulldozer, whichever you prefer) toward decorative nirvana.

Did you know that thesuarus.com presents "nonfunctional" as an alternate for "decorative"? The suggestion is a bit hurtful. True, the pursuit of things is a questionable hobby, one might even call it superficial, though as it turns out, the definition to which I refer appears fifth in the list of definitions for "superficial" on dictionary.com, so perhaps I need a different word.

Some synonym options: Cosmetic, exterior, trivial. None seems all that bad, does it. Home decor might present a cosmetic exterior, but I refuse to believe that surrounding yourself with beautiful things that remind you of great memories is a trivial activity.

The framed print in our dining area brings me back to Mougin, a small town in the south of France popular with artists. We visited early in the morning on our honeymoon on a Monday--if you've been to France and are a shopper, you are all to aware that most stores are closed on Mondays. We wandered the narrow, cobblestoned streets, awake with only the cats and restaurant owners who were putting out empty wine bottles that had been enjoyed that weekend, peering into the windows of stores that wouldn't open for 24 hours and enjoying the golden and gorgeous early-morning Cote d'Azur sun.

As we were leaving the town, we happened upon an open gallery/studio. The artist, a dark, long-haired, and 40-something scruffy man who could only have been a French artist opened his doors and headed to an outdoor table to enjoy his espresso, cigarette, and newspaper with his young-enough-to be-his-daughter leggy girlfriend. B and I tiptoed in and admired his art, lovely and colorful and perfect for us and our house, or it would have been, if the price had been within our budget. We consoled ourselves with a print of his work and managed to travel many thousands of miles home without wrinkling it too much in our suitcase. Upon arriving home, we brought it to a local store for framing.

Those who have had anything framed--but especially a large print--understand the sticker shock that comes with such an activity. The framing always costs more than you think it should, and you reach a critical crossroads at the framing counter, wondering whether you really want the picture framed that badly, or whether you ought to just wait and see if you can find a frame in a store that will look fine enough, even though it won't be the right fit, even though the mats won't match.

When I reach those crossroads, I close my eyes, dig deep (in my purse, for my debit card), and remind myself that money is only money, and while it can't buy happiness, it can help create a heavenly home. And, two weeks later, when I pick up my frame, take it home, and hang it on the wall that was made for it, I never feel regret for a single penny.

Yesterday we dropped off a couple of prints, acquired in Greece a year ago, to be framed. They'll be ready in a couple weeks and will join the rest of our treasures. I've already chosen their location--the bottom of our stairs, a location that previously held three other framed prints, also from our honeymoon, picked up from a street market on our last day in Paris (also a Monday, a week after the first acquisition--hey, I can find shopping even when all the stores are closed).

Yes, I do believe that pictures are in order. Coming soon.

Hotwire: All that and then some

2009-09-17T18:22:00.000-04:00

Bargain hunter though I strive to be, especially for travel, I had never tried bidding or blinded travel sites until recently.

I liked the idea of a bargain--who doesn't?--but not finding out critical information such as the time of the flight and the name and address of the hotel until after I booked and paid was way more adventurous than I like to be. For a short vacation, the time that your flights leave and your total time in the air are critical. Similarly, the location of your hotel can significantly improve or hurt your vacation experience.

But I recently found an occasion for which buying a hotel room "blindly" was not such a bad thing.

We're heading back to NYC shortly and decided to find a hotel room in Stamford, CT for the night before so we can get a jump on the day's activities. We didn't care where we stayed, as long as the hotel was close to the train station and was in a safe area. A three-plus star rating was not required but was certainly a bonus.

I started investigating on hotels.com and found some acceptable deals starting around $80, which is not too bad. Most of the nicer hotels were priced at $120 and up, though. On a whim, I decided to check out the deals on hotwire.com and found a 3.5-star hotel for $59/night--bargain! I returned to hotels.com to investigate the 3.5-star hotels in the area and found 3--a Hyatt, a Marriott, and a Holiday Inn. All three looked nice enough from their websites and were advertising prices that were close to $200/night. I knew that I had stumbled upon a good deal.

I didn't book right away, though, and good thing--because the price fell $4 more by the next day! At $55/night, I knew I couldn't pass up the deal, so I booked. Hotwire told me the total amount of the taxes (at $55/night, they weren't too high). The booking page said that sometimes hotels charge additional fees, such as a resort or parking fee, and they would be due upon arrival or checkout. I suspect we'll have to pay some nominal parking charge, and that's ok with me.

After I clicked "Buy," the page told me the hotel that we are staying at (and I was right--it is one of the three I suspected).

So far, I am very pleased with Hotwire. Of course, everyone has heard a horror story or two about online travel agencies, so I'll try not to get too enthusiastic until we check in and the hotel actually has a room for us. But I intend to call the hotel to confirm the reservation with them (always a good idea when you book through a third party) and to inquire about additional fees.

Hotwire isn't for everyone, of course. First of all, you have to pay all of the charges at the time of booking. They offer some level of trip insurance, but it doesn't cover you if you change your mind. Definitely read the fine print before you decide to buy their insurance. Second, they don't offer you a choice of rooms; they recommend that you call the hotel after booking to tell them your requests, such as one king or two double beds. Third, I've read online reviews of people who book hotels through discount sites and end up in the smallest and worst rooms in the hotel. Finally, even if you book a hotel that offers a frequent stay program, such as a Starwood hotel, your stay doesn't count as a stay and you don't earn any points from the stay.

Now I've tried Hotwire--perhaps someday, I will be brave enough to bid on a flight or hotel on Priceline.

And then we bought a whale

2009-09-16T19:31:00.001-04:00

We headed to the Cape for Labor Day weekend and came back with a new acquisition for our home - a copper whale.

On the one hand, who buys a 3-foot, 3-dimensional copper whale and then hangs it from a ceiling in their house? It's kind of a strange acquisition.

On the other hand, who hasn't walked into a store, seen an item, and thought, "I can't leave the store without it!" That's how it was with the whale. It (he?) called our names. B didn't need much convincing for that purchase.

The whale has two circles about a foot apart on his back for hanging. He was hanging by some clear plastic string from a hook on the wall. The woman at the store recommended that we not hang him directly against the wall because he is three dimensional. He's only about an inch and a half wide, but he still can't lie flat against the wall.

We had a few ideas for hanging him and headed to Lowe's to buy the hardware. We decided to hang him from hooks in the ceiling and as decorative a chain as we could find. "Decorative" is maybe too generous of a word, but it looks fine enough.

When we bought him, we figured we'd hang him above our bed because we don't have anything on that wall. That's where he hangs now, but I'm not convinced that it's the best place. We might need to install a couple more ceiling hooks and try him out in the living room.

What this post really needs is a picture. I'll get to it, as soon as we decide where his permanent home will be. Until then, we're still trying to come up with a name for him. If you have any ideas, send them along.

Shoe nirvana

2009-09-14T18:11:00.003-04:00

As I mentioned in my last post, September has been a month of spending.

I already talked about the silverware. It's nice to use grownup silverware. Moments like these make my upcoming milestone birthday a little easier to accept.

In addition to the silverware, I also bought a new shoe armoire. I have discussed our shoe issues in the past. B and I own quite a few pairs of shoes between us. Mine fit nicely into little (ok, not that little) plastic shoe boxes from The Container Store and live on the top shelf in my closet. The remaining pairs--the ones that get more frequent use--hang from a shoe rack on the back of the door of our coat closet.

B's shoes are a bit bigger than mine. They don't fit into my plastic shoe boxes, and they are too big for the door shoe rack. We use a metal wire rack that now lives in our spare bedroom and is devoted exclusively to his sneakers, shoes, and boots. Unfortunately, they don't all fit, and the chaos is just too much for me.

I have a very low tolerance for clutter, especially of the shoe variety.

While cruising the Hammacher Schlemmer site--the store that sold the shoe box that I originally intended to buy--I discovered a fabulous bigger shoe box that was on sale (how convenient!).

I proposed the purchase to B--we generally consult on non-necessary purchases--and his feelings were neutral. He isn't as bothered by the shoe mess as I am, but he understands that it bothers me and was open to buying the shoe armoire. I didn't need any more convincing.

Thanks to Retail Me Not, I didn't have to pay shipping on what turned out to be a very heavy item - over 70 pounds. The armoire did not arrive fully assembled, but we put it together without needing any tools, and you'd never know when looking at it that it arrived in a box, Ikea-style.

The box holds 25 pairs of shoes, and B is kindly sharing the space with me. He has 15 slots and I'm taking the remaining 10. We can finally repurpose (or perhaps donate) the metal rack, and the back-of-the-door shoe rack can also probably go away.

We have achieved shoe harmony.

I expected better advice, Vera

2009-09-11T19:04:00.006-04:00

The past two Septembers have featured decadent trips to European countries, which were ideal for spending binges. When we saw something we wanted--or rather, let me clarify--when I saw something I wanted for us, we bought it.

"B..." I'd say in a particular tone of voice that he is good at mimicking, "Can I have some money?" (I always carried euros but it's a pain taking them out of my money belt.)

At this point, B would sigh and ask how much I needed, but he generally didn't put up much of a fight. He sometimes thinks my proposed purchases are unnecessary but in hindsight, agrees that they are worthwhile.

This September, we have no big European trip planned. In fact, we have no trip planned for the entire month. Home we shall stay, but that doesn't mean that I can just give up my annual spending spree! Good habits like that are difficult to break.

The spree started with the flatware. Remember the flatware I wanted to buy ages ago? Well, I finally got around to buying it. It's by Vera Wang and it's called Equestrian, and it's been discontinued. I feared that if I waited any longer, I wouldn't be able to get it anymore. We ordered a single set from Amazon to make sure we liked the weight and feel, and we did, so we ordered a full set from Replacements.com. It arrived yesterday, and we've already started using it. It came with some interesting instructions:

1. Wash thoroughtly prior to first use.
No problem. This one is pretty common sense. We were able to fit about 3/4 of the set into the flatware slots in our dishwasher, and the remaining pieces will get washed next time the dishwasher fills up.

2. While Vera Wang stainless steel is dishwasher safe, we recommend stopping the cycle prior to drying and removing the knives to hand dry the blades.
Really? Really?? This recommendation reminds me of those ads with the woman running down the stairs, frantically clutching her fabric softener bottle, but always missing the point in the cycle when she's supposed to add the magic softener. I'm not going to set the alarm so I can wake up at 3 AM (which is when our dishwasher cycle usually ends - we have a 6-hour countdown timer on it and usually run it in the middle of the night to take advantage of what we hope are cheaper electricity rates) so I can dry the blades on my butter knives. Lame advice.

3. Do not allow your flatware to soak, even in plain water, or remain unwashed overnight.
There are some days when we have to run the dishwasher on a nightly basis, but we frequently can go 2-3 days without running it through. And the whole point of a dishwasher is to not have to wash annoying things like forks by hand. Definitely not practical.

4. Do not wrap in rubber bands, plastic, newspaper, or any high sulphur material.
I wonder if the plastic that the pieces came enclosed in is excluded?

Bad instructions aside, we're loving our flatware. The spending spree continued with a whale and a shoe armoire - I'll save those treasures for another time.

Five years of awesome

2009-09-11T18:54:00.003-04:00

Yesterday marked the five-year anniversary of B's and my first date, and I was reminiscing about the time we spent together before our first date.

You might say that our relationship developed during a series of after-work happy-hour outings to local bars, back when you could smoke in bars, back when one of us did smoke.

I always drank Coke, Sprite, or water because I was a driving commuter. B was a Bud guy.

The first time that B asked me out, I had to say no because I was joining a group of coworkers for a harbor cruise that night. We were going on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend. Wasn't he going, I asked. He said he wasn't because he got seasick on boats.

After LS and I boarded the (disappointing, dark, and dingy) vessel, I saw him. He showed up in spite of the threat of illness at sea. I stopped worrying that our boat would sink at any moment and realized that the night was full of potential.

We spent the whole evening together, talking and laughing. I knew from time spent together at bars that I was interested in getting to know B better, but I wasn't sure if we were a good match for each other. He seemed impulsive and much braver than I and had lived much more raucously than I. I wondered if he would be too wild for me and if I would be too sedate for him. But that night on the barely seaworthy boat, I realized that there was something between us that I needed to explore further.

Later that night, while I was in the ladies room, B told LS, "I like your friend." She said, "I know." He replied, "No, I really like her." I still smile when I think about that exchange, even though I wasn't part of it.

At the end of the night, when he tried to put us in a cab and we stubbornly refused and insisted we could take the bus home, he asked if I would go on a date with him. I smiled and told him that I didn't date smokers. He smoked his last cigarette that night, and we had our first date the following Friday, an outing to a driving range and a local burger place.

And in case you're wondering, he managed to avoid seasickness the entire evening. And in the last five years, his wildness has rubbed off a little on me, and the equilibrium that characterizes my life has evened his keel a bit.

A few pics from Newport

2009-08-30T18:33:00.004-04:00

Here I am, standing in the back yard (har, har) of the Elms. Yep, that's my new red raincoat; she performed like a champ. Also note the new glasses. I'm still getting used to them but I think I like them.

And here's B and me, same location. B has new glasses, too. He actually got 2 new pairs so you can expect to see lots of variety from him in the upcoming months.

Here's a closeup of the back of the Elms.

Here's a side view of Chateau sur Mer. So many windows...

Adventures in Newport

2009-08-30T17:20:00.005-04:00

This weekend, B and I spent some time in Newport, Rhode Island, home of the famous summer "cottages."

Newport is a great little town with a quaint shopping area (with the usual recognizable stores but also some locally owned places), tons of outdoor dining, and a hip-and-happening vibe. Summer weekends can get busy, especially when a cruise ship is invading, but the less-popular mansions weren't too crowded for us.

The mansions offer a variety of ticketing options. I investigated them before we left home and decided that becoming members of the Preservation Society was the best deal. For $75, we could tour all of the mansions for an entire year. In addition, because the society is a nonprofit organization, we can claim the membership as a charitable deduction on our taxes.

Our first stop was the Elms for the Rooftop and Behind-the-Scenes tour, which was included in our membership. The guided tour took us to places that you can't see on the regular tour, including the roof (obvious from the title) and servants' quarters. Sadly, their rooms were much nicer than nearly every apartment I ever lived in. Life as a servant was difficult and unpleasant, though; they worked long hours, had only a half-day off per week, were always on-call, and could expect to make only $300 per year. The butler enjoyed a significantly better life, for a servant; he had a private bedroom and bathroom and his own pantry and was in charge of all of the other servants.

Because the Elms is one of the bigger mansions and is open through the end of the year--and is even decorated for Christmas, along with the Breakers and Marble House--we decided to skip the regular tour and see some of the mansions that have more limited schedules. We're hoping to return at Christmastime to see the seasonal decorations and will take the tour then.

Our next stop was Chateau sur Mer, a 30,000 square-foot masterpiece with an amazing entryway (unfortunately for us, photos aren't allowed inside the houses) and decadent decorations.

A side note: If you go to Newport, you might be tempted to skip some of the smaller mansions, including this one (yes, in the land of Newport mansions, 30,000 square feet is "small"), but keep this in mind: every mansion tour takes you to a limited number of rooms, so a visit to a smaller house means you're more likely to see more of the house. Additionally, because everyone wants to see the Breakers, you're more likely to be among a smaller crowd at the smaller houses. Also, if this matters to you, the tours at the smaller houses are largely child-free as most kids want to see the ridiculously big houses. Plus, if you prefer a guided tour over an audio tour, stick with the smaller places.

After the Chateau, we headed to Kingscote, which was an interesting enough house but didn't feel that homey to me. It was my least favorite tour but was by no means dull or not worthwhile.

Our last tour was the Isaac Bell House, and I had trouble deciding whether I'd rather live in it or Chateau sur Mer (hypothetically speaking, of course). The Bell House is considered a work in progress; it was acquired by the Preservation Society in recent years and came completely unfurnished and unrestored. The house remains without much furniture and is not well lit (to replicate lighting conditions when the house was originally built), but its natural light and built-in furniture features were gorgeous. Many of the windows on the first floor doubled as doors and opened onto porches that looked out over Bellevue Avenue, where many of the more famous mansions are located.

I highly recommend Newport for a day trip or a long weekend, maybe even a full week if you want to take your time and get to know the town more. Tours at the mansions take about 45 minutes each; the tours at the larger houses are now conducted by audio guide. Three tours are tiring; I think five tours in a day might be too much for most.

For schedules: I wish the society offered a daily schedule with the times that tours leave from each house. Some leave every hour, and others leave every half hour. But the society doesn't offer such a schedule, so you can either try to figure it out yourself or hope for the best. We opted for the latter option and lucked out, arriving just in time to start all of our tours or join a recently begun tour. Keep in mind that if you miss an hourly tour, you'll have a long time to wait.

Photos from VT: Hildene

2009-08-24T17:20:00.004-04:00

Last set of pics from VT (I think). Here are some pics from Hildene, the house of the son of Abraham Lincoln and family. The first pic is the back of the house, which is almost as impressive as the front.
Inside the house, in the library. Flash photos weren't allowed, but my cam rose to the challenge. I covet these bookshelves. My folding shelves from Staples, while nice, are woefully inadequate in comparison.

Here's a sandstone (?) sink in the kitchen. A similar (though more impressive) sink belongs to B's brother and sister-in-law and maimed his hand earlier in the summer. He has recovered, and their sink lives on as a planter.

Finally, a picture of the gardens. One of the daughters went to Europe and, upon her return, gifted this garden to her family. It sounded like the ultimate gift that keeps on giving.

Photos from VT: Zipline adventure

2009-08-24T17:16:00.001-04:00

Here's the impressively high platform that we had to climb up for our zipline adventure. Daunting, yes. Good thing neither of us has issues with heights. A teenaged girl behind us made it up the stairs but refused to let go of the railing and looked like she might pass out at any moment. Not every adventure is suited for everybody.
Here's the view of the cable from the top of the platform. My palms are sweating just looking at this picture, and I've already ridden the ride! Scary stuff for the non-adrenaline-junkies among us.

And here's the view up the mountain, after you've completed your ride. Scary, it was, but also a very efficient way to get down a mountain.

Photos from VT: Fly fishing

2009-08-24T17:10:00.002-04:00

Next up - pics from our fly fishing adventures. We fished in Equinox Pond, which is just a few miles away from the resort and at the foot of Equinox Mountain (are you noticing a naming theme?).

Beautiful scenery. I was overwhelmed trying to picture how this place must look when the leaves are turning - just amazing. A few overachieving trees were already starting to turn; our instructor predicted that leaves would change early this year due to all of the rain. Only time will tell.

You can have weddings and other events in the boathouse on the water. It's so gorgeous that even a rainy day couldn't ruin the scenery.

The view of the boathouse from the pond.

Here's B, casting. I never quite got the hang of it but he was very good. Had the weather conditions been more cooperative, I suspect he'd have landed himself an impressive fish or two.

Photos from VT: Our hotel

2009-08-24T15:23:00.002-04:00

Here are a few pics from our Vermont trip.

First up, our hotel, the Equinox. It was lovely, huge, and old.

Here's the view of the back.

And another view of the back.

I had hoped that we wouldn't get reception, but we did.

I loved the blue and brown ottoman/chairs in the corner and would love to get a similar set (in different colors) for our living room, in front of our fireplace. I guess I should have thought to ask who made them before I left...

Back from Vermont

2009-08-20T19:17:00.004-04:00

We're back home again from a five-day, four-night sojourn in Manchester, Vermont. Manchester is in southern Vermont, on the edge of the Green Mountain National Forest. We stayed at the Equinox Resort, which is lovely and charming, an older resort that fell into disrepair for a while but has been renovated to be better than the very bestest that it once was. Our stay featured perhaps the hottest weather that Vermont has seen and will see throughout the entire summer. Ninety-plus-degree heat coupled with swimming-through-air humidity inspired us to avoid strenuous outdoor activities after 11 AM or so, but we still made the most of our time there.

Manchester attracts people from all over the country and world--our tour of Hildene, the home of one of Lincoln's sons, included people from Germany, England, and Dubai--but most cars feature Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey plates. The town has only a couple of token chain restaurants (McDonald's and a Dunkin Donuts in a gas station)--though locally owned restaurants abound--and features a plethora of outlet stores, from the usual (Gap, Banana, Pac Sun) to the higher-end (Burberry, Coach, Armani) to the unusual (Peruvian Connection, Overland). Parking lots are overrun with Land Rovers and Lexus SUVs, though Subies were represented well, especially among cars with green plates.

The options for activities are somewhat limited--at times I wondered if we had taken the vacation 30 years too early, though we did see other people our age at the hotel--so we tried to spread them out over our time there. Here's what we did.

Hiking
We hiked up Equinox Mountain. By "up," I don't mean all the way up; we later encountered two women who had taken on the challenge and were glad that we chose a less strenuous challenge. We walked up to a scenic overlook that offered a nice view of the valley below.

Fishing
We took a 2-hour fly fishing lesson from an Orvis instructor. We had a few nibbles but no catches. I am far from a master at the technique, but I enjoyed learning something new, and the pond that we were fishing in was gorgeous, like something out of a movie.

Shopping
Despite the heat, I managed to convince myself to try on and buy two new jackets. One is a winter ski jacket, not as puffy or heavy as the EMS jacket that I wore in Germany and a bit more stylish. August is apparently a good time to buy winter wear in Vermont.

I also found and bought my dream raincoat, for which I have been searching for years. It's red, reaches to mid-thigh or so, has long-enough sleeves, includes a hood, and is waterproof without feeling like rubber. Even at 50 percent off the original price and an additional 30 percent discount, the price of the raincoat was 2 or 3 times more than I wanted to spend. But I couldn't leave the rainwear behind, or I'd regret the decision, potentially forever, or at least until I found a replacement raincoat, a task that could take years to accomplish, considering that I've been searching for at least 3 years and have in that time purchased 2 inadequate--but not inexpensive!--substitutes.

My coat collection has grown quite a bit in recent years and is too large--the overflow has moved out of our downstairs coat closet and into the closet in our spare bedroom, so it's time to cull the herd. I identified 4 jackets or coats that no longer make the cut, and I'll be passing them along to family members, friends, or anyone who is willing to take them off my hands. I've also started culling my shoe herd and found 4 pairs that I no longer wear; they're also getting passed along the way. Slowly, slowly I work toward owning only clothing that I love...

Adventure
Bromley Mountain offers skiing in the winter and adventure-like activities in the summer. We rode the alpine slide (wicked fun) - I rode on the first-time rider track (aka the slow track) and had a blast. I saw a little girl nearly fall off her sled on the track next to me and decided not to push my sled or myself too much.

We also rode a new ride, their zip line flyer, which is a chair on a half-mile-long zip line. You can reach up to 50 MPH as you fly down the mountain. It was a bit terrifying, being strapped into a chair by a couple of sullen teenagers as I thought, "what if they make a mistake or forget to attach something?" However, they were careful, and I survived and enjoyed it. B and I were released at about the same time but he still beat me down to the bottom.

Culture
Yes, there's always time for cultural activities on vacation. As I mentioned earlier, we toured Hildene, the summer estate of Abraham Lincoln's son. We also visited the Southern Vermont Arts Center, which featured an exhibit on canine art. We bought a couple of prints from the gallery across the street. More items that need to be framed...

Golf and spa
One of us golfed, and the other one went to the spa. You can probably guess who did what. My tension tamer massage was excellent. B played a great round of birthday golf.

Lounging
There was plenty of time for lounging. The Falcon Bar on the property of the hotel featured a deck area, complete with fire pit. The deck faced at Equinox Mountain and featured a menu with gourmet cheeses and chocolates each evening. Mmm - I preferred the chocolates but the cheese plate had some fun accoutrements, including salted, oily almonds (yum). We played some games, including Five Crowns (always awesome) and Yahtzee (mostly a game of luck, but strategy plays an important part, as I learned).

Overall, it was a lovely, relaxing trip, and I recommend the Equinox Resort and Manchester if you're looking for a low-key getaway.

Pain tolerance for vanity vs. health

2009-08-13T20:14:00.002-04:00

This evening, as I was lying immobile in the dentist's chair, wondering if I have that redhead gene mutation that causes you to feel more pain (or is it that you're more resistant to painkillers? I'm not sure) and wondering why the time between dentist visits always seems so short, my mind started to wander to other painful activities that I undertake.

Getting a facial came to mind. I willingly sign up for this "treatment," despite the physical pain it causes and the not-insignificant dent it makes in my wallet. The obvious difference between a facial and a dentist visit is that one is strictly for vanity and the second is for health. However, I would much more willingly get a facial than go to the dentist, even though the pain from the facial is arguably worse (though in fairness, the pain from a facial is fairly quick; the pain from the dentist was seemingly neverending).

Why is the pain from vanity more acceptable than the pain from healthcare? Perhaps dental visits feel like a medical requirement, an onerous responsibility I cannot shirk without feeling copious guilt. On the other hand, facials are strictly voluntary. And because you have to pay for them--pay a lot for them, in fact--you convince yourself that it is a pampering experience.

Clearly there is a large market for pampering. Perhaps if dental offices could make their cleanings feel more like spa visits, going to the dentist would be more popular. Well, maybe only if they were willing to put away those sharp tools.

About those tools - they were scraping plaque off my teeth. Apparently I have plaque issues. The hygienist recommended that I buy an electric toothbrush because my manual brush, despite my best efforts, was insufficient. In better news, the hygienist, after reviewing my dental x-rays, said that my teeth were "like rocks," which is apparently a compliment.

Endings and beginnings

2009-08-06T17:52:00.002-04:00

Less than two weeks ago, I dreamt about my grandmother, whose health was remarkably good for her advanced age but had been declining in recent weeks, a not-altogether-surprising change considering that she was several years from graduating from octogenarian status.

In my dream, she was an uplifting vision of a woman I hadn't seen in years, the Grammy of my childhood. She was spry with carefully curled hair and a quick smile for her grandchildren. Her positive energy was palpable, and I couldn't get over the transformation from my grandmother of the present and my grandmother of my dream and the past. The dream made me happy in my sleep and brought me comfort the next morning when I received news that she had passed away in the night.

The dream could be a coincidence - we had been planning to visit her that day, so she was on my mind - but I don't think so. I feel very blessed that my last "memory" of my grandmother is of the spirit that she embodied for most of her life.

She loved her family above all else, though candy was a close second. I suspect that my sweet tooth comes from that side of the family. She was laid to rest with hard candy and M&Ms, her favorites. I'm sure she appreciates the sentiment.

My sister and I used to spend summer days with her while my mother worked. She was willing to play card games with us for hours and played like any girl our own age. She introduced us to fabulous food combinations, such as cream cheese on Ritz crackers. Healthy, perhaps not. Delicious? Absolutely. I dined on cream cheese on crackers the night of her funeral in her honor.

When she and my grandfather would take us out for shopping adventures, they always bought us each a toy, which we could pick out ourselves. It was like Christmas all summer long! Christmas itself was a bacchanalia. She'd shop from Thanksgiving until Christmas and then stay up all night Christmas Eve to wrap all of the gifts. We probably decimated the gift pile in 20 minutes or less. Great memories.

My grandmother is no longer with us, but she's now with my grandfather, keeping an eye on all of us from afar. We miss her.

In happier news, B's and my niece was born the day after my grandmother's passing. (Crazy weekend? Yes, you could say that.) She's adorable and generally calm, except perhaps when I'm holding her, but what can you do. I am looking forward to watching her grow up.

Too early to start planning for 2010?

2009-07-20T17:40:00.002-04:00

Perhaps it is, perhaps it isn't. The other day, I asked B where he'd rather go for our next (after Puerto Rico) vacation, Jackson Hole or Europe. He said that Europe was a bit vague; could I be more specific, so I offered up Italy, the country whose light has stolen my heart. He thought about it for a moment but came back pretty quickly with "Jackson Hole."

You can't phrase a question as I did and then ignore the answer and go ahead and plan the trip that you want to take, and I knew before I asked that B's answer would probably be different from my own. And believe it or not, I'm ok with that. Jackson Hole is maybe not at the top of my vacation list, but if it's at the top of B's, it's worth strong consideration, especially since he has expressed an interest in going since our honeymoon-planning days.

If you're not familiar with Jackson Hole, you're not alone. Here's what I've learned in the last few days. Jackson, Wyoming is the city; Jackson Hole is the entire valley. The city of Jackson is located (I believe) in Grand Teton National Park and is several hours away from Yellowstone. To the south, Salt Lake City, Provo (home of BYU), and Park City (home of the Sundance Film Festival) are about a 5 hours' drive away. Oh, and some pretty famous people live or have houses in Jackson, including Harrison Ford and Dick Cheney.

Since Jackson is so close to Utah, I figured we could extend our trip by a few days and visit some of the national parks in southern Utah, including Bryce, Zion, and others in the area, and maybe we could stop off at Park City on the way down. And since we'd be in the neighborhood, why not swing by Las Vegas for a night or two? I haven't been there since early 2005 and B has never been there (well, never been out of the airport, anyway), and it'd be a shame to skip it since we'd be so close.

I planned out a careful itinerary, starting in Vegas, working our way across and up Utah through some national parks, finishing in northern Wyoming at Jackson, Grand Teton, and Yellowstone. I figured we could visit most places we were interested in in under 2 weeks, as long as we were ok with not diving in too deep at any of the parks (and we are, especially since it's our first visit to most of these places).

I assumed we'd fly open jaw, into Vegas and out of Jackson, and we'd get a rental car that we'd pick up and drop off at the two airports. Air prices were reasonable enough for the itinerary, but rental car prices, not so much. The first company that I tried didn't allow drop-offs at the Jackson airport. Ok, no problem - I moved on to another company. The pricetag on our proposed little excursion was actually laughable, over $4,500 (!) for a two-week rental of--yes, this is the kicker--a Chevy Aveo. Keep in mind that we could buy a not-too-old Chevy Aveo for that price and we'd get to keep it after two weeks. That itinerary was clearly not compatible with our rental-car plan.

Luckily, logistics are sort of my hobby--give me a problem that involves organization, creative thinking, and logic, and I'll be happy as a clam until I've figured out the best solution--so I identified a few alternative options. Here's what I've come up with.

Our first option involves flying into and out of the same airport, probably Vegas (highest demand of the area airports, and therefore more frequent and cheaper flights ) and completing the same itinerary but instead of flying out of Jackson Hole, we would spend a day driving back to Vegas and fly home from there (according to Google Maps, Jackson to Vegas is about 10 or 11 hours). We'd have to add an extra day and night to the trip, which would add to the expense, but a round-trip flight to Vegas would be cheaper than the open-jaw flights that we investigated. The main downside is, obviously, spending an additional day driving.

Option two involves less driving and more flying. We'd fly open jaw into Vegas and out of Jackson, but we'd buy a one-way ticket between the two cities and split the trip into two legs: the Vegas/Bryce/Zion leg and the Jackson/Grand Teton/Yellowstone leg. We'd spend 5-7 nights in each location and get a different rental car in each location. With this itinerary, we'd miss out on a Park City stop, but as B has visited before and I'm not itching to go, I'm ok with it. A variation on this theme is to fly round-trip to Vegas, and fly round trip to Jackson and then back to Vegas to fly home. The second flight option would be preferable only if it were cheaper, which it might be because the pricing of one-way flights is unpredictable.

B also offered a couple of ideas. He looked into the cost of shipping our car out to Vegas, driving it around, and having it shipped back home from Jackson. This plan, while cheaper than the $4,500 quote, was still too pricey, close to $1,000 each way. He also proposed buying a cheap car in Vegas and selling it when we got to Jackson. I have vetoed this suggestion, mostly because the cars that he has proposed and found on Craigs List are junky pickups and Monte Carlos, and because driving a clunker across empty desert roads sounds like more adventure than I'm looking for.

I suspect that we will have adventures a-plenty with any of the itineraries that we are considering.

Junk food: Not the treat it once was

2009-07-17T16:31:00.002-04:00

Once upon a time, junk food such as chips, cookies, and candy was a big treat, probably because my access to it was so limited during my younger years. However, times have changed, as I learned last night. I got home and attacked a package of gummi bears that we got in Spain (I know, I know - I've shown restraint for this long so I don't know why things changed so suddenly). After eating about half the package, I felt no pleasure and only pain and regret. Junk food is supposed to be a guilty pleasure, but it just makes me feel sick.

I'm not sure when I started falling out of love with junk food. I think the change was gradual. After college, when I was living on my own and working some ferociously long hours, the unlimited soda fridge and chips rack tempted me on many a day, and the occasional bacon McGriddle made many a Friday morning easier to get through. But eventually I cut the soda (and McGriddles) and realized that I felt much better.

While B's and my early relationship involved a lot of restaurant food, we slowly started cooking more and using fresher ingredients. Now the highest part of our grocery bill is from produce. On any given day, we each eat yogurt, three or four pieces of fruit, sandwiches for lunch, and a vegetable-heavy dinner (and the occasional ice cream snack - I'm no saint). I'm trying out a reduced-meat diet (and I don't mean that word in a weight-loss way) and am trying to eat meat at only one meal per day; so far, I'm really happy with how I feel.

But all of these fruits and vegetables have my body spoiled, and she's just not sure what to do when I throw half a package of gummi bears or a box of peanut M&Ms at her. I can't say that I'll never eat so many bears in one sitting, but I will definitely think twice about it next time I am tempted.

Pics from second NYC trip

2009-07-14T17:37:00.003-04:00

We didn't take many pics during our second trip to NYC, but here are a few.

One of our first activities was a trip up up up to the top of Rockefeller Center. While pricey, this expedition was worthwhile to me. We lucked out with great weather and enjoyed some great views of the city.

Here is how you might feel after eating at Daisy Mae's BBQ. Note the frozen custard in B's hand; perhaps if you're able to show more restraint, you won't feel as full as we did.

Here I am in front of the Plaza hotel. We didn't stay there, but we walked around inside--tres posh. The Rolls sitting in front of the hotel has Plaza vanity plates; we were hoping that someone would offer us a ride (to anywhere, really), but it didn't happen that time.

Here is B, happily full of pastrami after a delicious meal at Katz's Deli. Big yum at that place.

And finally, here's a non-NYC pic. We (or rather, a thoughtful stranger) took this one in Wood's Hole on the Cape (I believe it was after lunch but before ice cream).

Sorry, I eat only fancy food

2009-07-13T19:37:00.002-04:00

As I mentioned in my previous post, we spent one of our days in NYC at the Fancy Food Show, held at the Javits Center. If you stay in a hotel in NYC, you'll likely see a Javits Center fee on your bill as part of the taxes; I wonder who decided that the city's tourists should have to pay for this facility...

Our hotel, located near the bus terminal, was easy walking distance to the food show, so we trekked over mid-morning on Sunday to get the party started. We didn't know what to expect from the show but were eager to find out.

First, let me say that the Fancy Food Show is for trade people only; you have to be a food supplier, buyer, or other cog in the food wheel to get in. We were able to get passes through one of B's friends and were so glad that we did. It was an experience unlike any other.

As we approached the building, we passed a man giving away bottles of some beverage on the corner; it set the theme for a day of gimme-gimme-gimme freebies.

We entered, picked up our badges from the registration desk, grabbed a program, and headed in to what we learned was the second (international) floor. Signs hanging from the ceiling proclaimed the regions of the world from which the food in the area came; countries from Europe and all over the globe were represented. We decided to save the international flavor for later and headed downstairs to the domestic food and slowly ate our way around the country.

Every booth offered free samples of a specialty food item, from chocolates to candy to chips to hot sauce to soup to casseroles to sodas to ice cream to nuts--if it was a specialty food item, or even a mainstream item like Jelly Belly, they had a booth and were giving away freebies. Because you couldn't take any food out of the building, there was no reason to save anything--and so we ate, and ate, and ate.

Our very first stop was at the Larabar booth; Larabars are one of my favorite snacks and a must for every trip, from an outing to the mall to an international vacation. They have three new flavors coming out soon, including a tropical flavor and peanut butter and jelly (and a chocolate one, but I'm not that crazy about their chocolate flavors), plus a new kids' line that involves crispy rice coming out (didn't try it, but I probably will buy when I see it in stores). I learned that most specialty chocolates, while they might look different from one another, generally taste the same, at least in my mouth, and I don't think that I could tell the difference between the high-end chocolate and the bags of semi-sweet chocolate chips that I use for baking (though if someone wants to set up a taste test for me, I'd more than willingly participate).

Other than Larabar, my favorite booth was of hot chocolate because it brought me back to Venice. We had hot chocolate every night, and the flavor and consistency, while nearly impossible to find here in the States, was replicated perfectly at that booth. Now if only I had written the name of the product down... Oh, hindsight. Perhaps we'll have to go to another fancy food show to find out.

The Fancy Food show was both lunch and dinner (we left for a mid-afternoon nap and then returned) and was a rollicking good time. If you ever have the opportunity to go to such an event, I highly recommend it. The next event will be held in San Francisco in the winter; mark your calendars!

Slacker

2009-07-13T18:58:00.002-04:00

It's been ages. I'm embarassed, ashamed, etc. But I'm also back from the land of no blogging, ready to share my tales of the last few weeks.

The past month has been busy. June 13-14, we went to NYC. Two weeks later (that was two weeks ago), we went back. And then the following weekend (July 4), we went to the Cape. This most recent weekend we were home (and therefore ill-equipped with an excuse for the lack o' blog but I'll do what I can to make up for it).

To start with the beginning - NYC. It was fabulous again, as always, like the glamorous friend who is too overwhelming to step out with on a regular basis, but who is always there and ready when you want to get dolled up. We enjoyed a feeding frenzy of decadent treats, starting with a lunch at Daisy Mae BBQ. They have a street cart and a cafeteria-style restaurant that features long communal tables and restroom keys on giant keyrings. As you can tell from my expert detail, we visited the restaurant.

I think the key to getting your money's worth at Daisy Mae is to bring an enormous appetite or, if you're not in the mood to eat till you feel ill, bring friends and split a couple meals among the group. With giant tubs of meat and sides coming in each meal, no one will go hungry. The food is delicious, and the sweet tea in a mason jar is pure heaven. Don't forget to leave room for the frozen custard (like soft serve, but much thicker and maybe less sweet), but again, it's a treat best split with someone else.

For dinner that night, we headed down to Katz's Deli, where that famous scene from When Harry Met Sally was filmed (you know--"I'll have what she's having"). Everyone who enters the door gets a ticket, and when you place an order at the counter, they write the cost of your meal on the back of the ticket. If you lose your ticket (or pretend to lose it after losing your head and eating all the pastrami in the house), you face a hefty fee.

Because we weren't all that hungry after our awesome BBQ lunch, we decided to split a pastrami sandwich (at $16 a pop, splitting is not such a bad idea even if you are hungry). We also got a side of potato salad and some pickles. When you place your order, the man who prepares your sandwich gives you a little plate of the meat that you ordered for your sandwich; we observed others contributing to the tip cups for this thoughtful gesture and followed suit. From our first nibble of the fatty, amazing, mouth-watering pastrami, thoughts of BBQ were driven from our head and we quickly forgot that we weren't very hungry. The restaurant seemed full when we entered but we were able to nab a table in the back; the cafeteria-style serving encourages people not to linger after their meals are complete.

Our sandwich was pure heaven, if your idea of heaven is a sandwich so full that you can't fit it into your mouth and whose filling falls out onto your plate (mmm...like a second course). Needless to say, dessert was not necessary after that meal.

For our second day in NY, we passed the time at a food show, which is worthy of its own post, so I shall save the details for another time.

We enjoyed one more fine meal at an Italian restaurant called Cellini, which I chose randomly while walking back from Pinkberry one afternoon while B was working. (FYI - Pinkberry has new flavors, coconut and passion fruit, and a swirl that combines the two. Passion fruit was *amazing*; this time I got it without any toppings and was not disappointed with my purist decision.)

Well, not entirely randomly; I think it had a Michelin sticker in the window, and if it's good enough for Michelin, it's good enough for me. It reminded both of us of a European restaurant for a few reasons. First, our fellow patrons were all American (har, har), and second, it had great ambience. Of course, we were eating at 6 PM and the restaurant was crowded, so we knew we couldn't be in Europe. Yay for familiar dining customs.

For my entree, I got the envelope pasta filled with a combination of meats and cheeses (and maybe even a--gasp!--vegetable or two). It was pure heaven, as was my caprese appetizer. B's homemade ravioli looked delish as well, but its seafood interior convinced me to enjoy it from afar. The Black Forest cake for dessert was probably good for those who like it, but I don't like the Kirsch flavor, so it was not the highlight of the meal for me.

All in all, it was another great NY trip, made even better by two Pinkberry outings. We're hoping to head back later in the fall with my family to enjoy more of the NYC experience (and maybe Pinkberry will have a new flavor by then...).

The sun can't hide forever

2009-06-26T17:28:00.003-04:00

Gloom pervades national and local news lately. Yesterday we lost Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson. Aside from my family, Michael Jackson was maybe the most important person in my life during my younger years. He was my first celebrity crush, and his red-leather-clad action figure was a prized toy. The Thriller tape (back when you bought music on tapes) was perhaps the only popular music I enjoyed until my teenage years (though the video was way too scary for me to handle). It's been a sad week.

And a dreary month. It has been the cloudiest June in recorded history. If this is how Pacific Northwesterners live, you have my deepest sympathies. All of this grayness gets you down, and it also makes you worry about the health of your tomatoes.

Not that we're growing them. Last December, we joined a CSA, community-support agriculture program, and we've had a few pickups already. New England CSAs challenge you to remember your New England strength during the month of June, in which lettuce, bok choy, spinach, beets, radishes, swiss chard, and kale play a significant role. Luckily, strawberries are available to remind you of the goodness ahead. LS promises me that better veggies will be available the second week of July. though who knows how their quality will be since they've been drowning these recent weeks. Wasn't there a pumpkin shortage a few years ago due to an unusually rainy spring? I shall have to stock up on pumpkins early in the season to guarantee some festive fall cheer.

But all in good time - for now, it's time to put an end to my little doom-and-gloom party and buck up, cowgirl. This weekend promises to bring at least a little sun, and it can't rain all summer (right?). July 4 is around the corner, and with July 4 comes sunshine, hot dogs, fried dough, watermelon, fireworks, Cape Cod weekends, and summer fun. I've already moved my summer clothes to the top rack of my closet, and one of these days, we'll be able to eat dinner on our patio, and we might even work up the courage to put screens in our front and back doors. Come on over, summer, we're ready and waiting.

Pictures from NYC

2009-06-21T18:35:00.005-04:00

As promised, here are a few pics from our NYC mini-break.

First up: The view of Manhattan from Brooklyn Heights - very cool.

You can see the Brooklyn Bridge in the background.
Here we are on the Brooklyn Bridge. If you can deal with the chaos of noisy cars underneath, daredevil bikers sharing a lane with you, and a slow-moving crowd, it's an enjoyable walk. Otherwise, take the subway.
Il Cinghiale! He's our fourth sighting. What a handsome devil. And the piggy is cute too.
Here's B, getting aggressive with his carousel horse.
We enjoyed a lovely rowboat ride in Central Park. The Boathouse Cafe is in the background of my pic.