The coming execution of Saddam Hussein makes me uneasy. I can't really put words to it. It's not that he didn't do some really bad things. I imagine he probably did. I also understand that his death sentence was technically passed by the Iraqi justice system, and so officially, it's not the U.S. executing a foreign leader. But people worldwide are going to blame the U.S. nonetheless. And really, isn't this the most honorable thing that could possibly happen to him? To die a martyr for the anti-U.S. cause? Isn't it going to simply inflame the insurgency and put U.S. forces further in the hole (speaking in terms of both military logistics and public relations) than they already are?

I honestly don't see what point it serves. Does it deter other bad guys from doing bad stuff? Probably not so much. I guess it ensures that he can never escape and do more bad stuff, but that was a pretty unlikely proposition anyway.

Just thinking out loud (kind of). . .

Oh yeah!

You know you're getting old when you have a little celebration because it's "only" an endometrial polyp.

I don't have cancer. At least not of the uterus. And not right now.

Happy, happy day!

Random stuff

I played a concert at the Paramount last night. That was a lot of fun. It was definitely the oldest and most historic stage I can remember playing on. The dressing rooms are underground--pretty much right below the stage--and they're crazy small. We imagine performers' lives being exciting and glamorous, but I've sat in the same dressing room as David Sedaris and Jerry Seinfeld, and I've gotta tell you, it wasn't so glamorous!
*********************
I've got some weird health stuff going on. I actually feel great. I'm fitter and generally healthier than ever. But I've had some funny "girl" problems lately that inspired my doctor to do a endometrial biopsy to rule out uterine cancer. Now I get to wait 4-5 days for the results--which I'm sure are going to be fine. But really I'm just saying that. I'm not so sure at all. How ironic would it be for me to have lost all this weight and gotten fit and healthy--just to get cancer? That would really piss me off. . .
*********************
I like not working better than working. If only I could find a way to earn money while not working. Well, then I'd be rich! In a perfect world, I'd sleep as late as I wanted to, read for at least 2 hours every day, ride my bike more, and play with my kids without being distracted by a bunch of stuff on my to-do list.
*********************
Also in my perfect world??? I'd be able to think of something interesting to write about. . .

Robyn's question for the day:

Do the people at Fox News actually, honestly believe that they are "journalists"? If so, I want some of their denial meds.

Really.

What a bastard. So apparently he had a plea agreement. In exchange for a guilty plea, this guy was going to get to serve concurrent life sentences. The DA's office, the sherrif's office, his own attorney, the Cooke family, everyone sitting in the court room expected a guilty plea. And he says "not guilty."

Are you fucking kidding me? Sure in principal he deserves a fair trial and he's not guilty until proven guilty and all that really important stuff that makes our justice system work (when it does work). But right now all I can think about is Robert and Janet and the rest of the family. They've been through so much, and to think it was over and to end up on a roller coaster like this--it's just not right.

I simply can't imagine. . .

Rachel. . .

On a Sunday evening in early January of 2002, just as we were sitting down to dinner, the phone rang. It was one of Davy's coworkers telling him that his friend and coworker, Robert, needed help. Robert's daughter had disappeared. He knew something was wrong, but he was having trouble getting law enforcement to take it seriously. Davy, like the rest of his team, immediately offered to help look for her, and he and scores of others spent the next week scouring the areas around her neighborhood and beyond. After she'd been missing for a couple of days, if I remember correctly, police finally took notice, but it was too late. Rachel was gone, and nobody who knew what had happened to her was talking.

It's been four and a half years since Rachel disappeared. Robert and Janet have divorced, and Robert was laid off from his job. They're entire lives have fallen apart. Robert has spent the past four and a half years searching for Rachel and helping other families in similar situations. He has participated in several searches for missing people, and spoken at conferences and before government committees. I read his online journal and visit rachel's site www.rachelcookesearch.org regularly, but I can't imagine the hell he's been through.

Tomorrow the Williamson County Sherrif's Department is going to make an announcement about an important new development in the case. The announcement is linked to court procedings scheduled for 10:00 a.m. I imagine charges are going to be filed, and I wouldn't be surprised if they had something to do with the remains that were found in a barrell in Lake Buchanan in September. No announcement was ever made about them. . .

No matter what, I can't imagine that it's good news. Although I suppose that on some level getting answers is better than not knowing. Or then again, maybe not. I just don't know. What I do know is that my heart is breaking for Robert and the entire Cooke family all over again. It's going to be a long night.

Editing to say that my barrel theory was off the mark. Rachel's remains have not been found. But a suspect, who is already serving a life sentence for the murder of another woman in the north Austin area, has been charged with her murder.

Just in case anyone was holding their breath or unable to sleep, I'm back to report that the Scissor Sisters new CD Ta-Dah does not disappoint.

I LOVE these guys!

Random Observations. . .

Expressing one's dislike of the current president of the United States does NOT make said person a "communist." Do a little reading people. Democracy is ABOUT dissent. And besides that, the cold war is over. If you're going to dehumanize everyone who disagrees with you by classifying them as your most terrifying enemy, you might as well choose a relevant enemy. IDIOTS!
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If you're in charge of the jack-o-lantern pumpkin display at the local grocery story, and you actually WANT to sell some pumpkins, don't stack them in huge boxes, in a corner, behind a bunch of bales of hay. Here's an idea---make them accessible to your customers.
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I've finally done some research and despite the fact that he is the most entertaining candidate running for Texas, I'm not going to be able to vote for Kinky. His stance on immigration seems to be, well, a punchline more than the skeleton of any sort of workable policy. And a bad punchline at that. Too bad, though. Texas could use a character. Sadly it looks like Rick Perry is going to take this one. Again. It will be interesting to see which way Austin votes, though.
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On a lighter, and happier, note, my Scissor Sisters CD has arrived and is sitting on my desk as I type. For some reason I haven't put it in the player yet. Perhaps I'm afraid it won't live up to my expectations. I guess it's time to take a risk.
----------------------------------
Oh, and one other thing I need to get off my chest. Rush Limbaugh is a prick. And anyone who is still listening to him is an idiot. What the fuck is wrong with you people???? Seriously!

Hooray!!! The new Scissor Sisters CD is out. I can't wait to get my hands on it!
It's not often these days that I actually get excited about new music, but these guys are so much fun!

We're heading to Plano tomorrow after school and the State Fair of Texas on Friday. I hope it doesn't rain on us. There's just nothing quite as depressing as a soggy Fletcher's Corndog. . .

Today's entry from the department of You Had to Spend Money on a Study to Figure That Out?!?!

Bike Lanes Are Good For Cyclists

A reminder that there are idiots all over the world--not just in America!

Panda Bites Man; Man Bites Panda

One thing nobody tells you about having kids is that they are going to make you sick. I don't mean "that nose ring makes me want to throw up" sick. I'm talking fevery, shivering, "I can't remember what it was like to feel normal" miserable. The thing is, once they get to school, they spend all day with kids from all over the place, coughing and sneezing on each other. Lots of parents send their sick kids to school because they have no other options. Other parents send sick kids to school because the schools are so damned hard-assed nowadays about absences and losing out on state funds.

In any event, my kids are bringing home ebola-strength colds on a pretty regular basis. They recover from them quickly, but I seem to catch every third or fourth virus that passes through, and periodically one of those will knock me flat on my ass. Which is where you'll find me right now. Flat on my coughing, sneezing, achy, stuffy head, sore throat, fever-y ass. Feeling sorry for myself.

If this is my last post ever, well you'll know why.

Willie's still got it!

According to an AP report. . .

"Willie Nelson and four others were issued misdemeanor citations for possession of narcotic mushrooms and marijuana after a traffic stop Monday morning on a Louisiana highway, state police said.
The citations were issued after a commercial vehicle inspection of the country music star’s tour bus, state police said in a news release.
“When the door was opened and the trooper began to speak to the driver, he smelled the strong odor of marijuana,” the news release said. A search of the bus produced 1½ pounds of marijuana and 0.2 pounds of narcotic mushrooms, according to state police."

DAMN!

I was so sad when I woke up this morning to the news that Ann Richards had died. I first met her when I was a delegate to Texas Girls' State over 20 years ago. That was before she became governor of Texas--I can't remember exactly what, if any, public office she held at the time--but she definitely made an impression on me. I didn't see her again until her brilliant address at the 1988 National Democratic Convention, when she nominated Bill Clinton for president. WOW!

I registered to vote via absentee ballot from Germany in 1990, just so I could cast my vote in the Texas governor's election. Thank God she beat that buffoon, Clayton Williams. Sadly, there would be other buffoons to come that put Williams's buffoonedness to shame, but that's another entry.

The last time I met Ann Richards was almost exactly a year ago. I was walking through Nordstroms when I saw a woman I knew. Based on a lightening-quick assessment of her age and wardrobe, I guessed it was probably one of my mom's country club friends--but one I knew pretty well. Maybe even one who had come to my wedding 10 years earlier. As my brain sorted all of this out in a second or less, my body went into auto mode. I greeted the woman with a friendly "hey!", smiled a wide, familiar smile appropriate for a chance meeting with an old family friend, and threw my arms open for a hug--all in the same moment that I realized this was NOT one of my mom's friends; it was Ann Richards. Ms. Richards didn't look too surprised. She smiled with some amusement and said a friendly hello as I stammered and kept on walking. The whole thing literally took less than two seconds to transpire. I was simultaneously mortified and thrilled. I spent the rest of the day thinking about what I *wish* I would have said to her--but I never quite got it right. "Thank you for being so amazing!" "Did you really ride that Harley?" "How in the hell did you, Texas's very own Wonder Woman, lose to Stupid Boy George W. Bush? Were you even trying?"

I showed her picture to my girls this morning and told them all about her.

Rest in peace, Ann Richards. . .

Ya know, I've been on the fence about Kinky. But not anymore. If Chris Bell had a snowball's chance in hell, I might be persuaded to vote Dem, but as it is, I am honestly starting to believe that Kinky is the best choice.

So there.

Five years ago today. . .

Mia was 4 months old. Zoe was almost 2. We were up and getting ready to go to Jazzercise when Tom D. called and asked me if I had the tv on. I did, but it was tuned to Sesame Street, very likely the one program that wouldn't be interrupted with coverage of what was going on in New York (and later, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania). As I had flipped through the channels to get to PBS, I had noticed the same image of a smoking building on every channel, but considering the ridiculous over-coverage the media had given to every real and imagined crisis since O.J. Simson's famous car chase, I assumed it was nothing important and just kept flipping up to more appropriate programming for toddlers.

Tom told me that a plane had hit the World Trade Center, and just as I was tuning in to see what was going on, the second plane hit the second tower. Unbelievable.

What I remember most about that day--and the days that followed-- is being completely numb. I don't remember crying; I didn't feel angry; I didn't feel afraid; I was empty. I realize now that I couldn't make any sense out of what happened. It was so big in that moment, that I simply couldn't grasp it.

With Zoe being much too young to understand what was going on, but plenty old enough to be disturbed by the awful images being broadcast, there was no question of me watching the days-long coverage out of New York, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania. Besides that, our house was scheduled to go on the market on Friday. We'd already signed the papers to buy a new house, and there was no time to spare. So I was forced, for better or for worse, to keep myself pretty removed from the whole thing. I knew what had happened, but I was not inundated with the images and speculation that many others experienced. In fact, today I have watched much more coverage of the events that unfolded on September 11, 2001 than I did five years ago. With both girls at school I felt like I could safely turn it on. MSNBC ran the original 9/11 tape of the Today Show from from about 7:30 until 11:00 CST and I watched the whole thing. Like most everyone else who watched what happened that morning, I couldn't turn away.

I don't know when it happened, but somehow my girls have gotten old enough to invite friends over to play--and they don't need me to entertain them, or really even to watch them. So I'm sitting downstairs, trying to read, while they romp around upstairs. It's so hard for me to stay away, when I really want to sneak upstairs to see what they're up to. Thump, bump, bang, giggle. Their laughter a fairy tinkle of absolute innocent delight.

My wish is that it would always be this way. That they would always be able to romp and play and whisper and laugh with no inhibitions or concerns.

Although Mia just called down, "Don't come upstairs." So now I'm thinking that fairy laughter might not have been so innocent afterall. . .

This whole JonBenet Ramsey circus makes me sick. Of course, her family deserves justice and the law and order folks should be doing whatever they need to do find the bad guy. But why is this "news"? Until he is charged and tried, coverage of this clown they caught in Thailand should consist of nothing more than a short blurb on the third page of the newspaper. It is absolutely beyond me how a "serious" news show can justify interviewing random people who happened to be on the same plane as the suspect--and playing it off as serious analysis.

That's not news. That's uninformed gossip. And if I want gossip, I'll get it from the Star, thank you very much. I expect NEWS from the "news." Call me naive. . .

I think I'll get all my news from Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert from now on. The stories on The Daily Show and The Colbert Report are at least as well researched as the garbage I've seen on the network news shows lately and at least they're up front about pretending to be journalists.

Bleh!

Today I hit a deer. I guess technically the deer hit my car, but in terms of pure force, the poor deer ended up the worse for it. I'm fine. Zoe and her friend who was in the car with us are both fine (although pretty startled), but my car's gonna need some work.

I was only about a minute from home when it happened, so I was able to bring the girls home and return to deal with the deer. It was clearly dead, but I couldn't move it out of the road by myself. Thankfully, a nice man pulled up and helped me move it. Two other people pulled up to see if I needed help in the hour I stood there. To the other 5,000 people who passed by a woman standing on the side of the road in 100 degree heat next to a dead deer and a disabled vehicle, I'd like to say fuck you!

That's all. I need a drink.

And the correct answer is---

KITTEN.

She's a sweet, frisky little siamese mix, and her name is Blue Jade, Jade for short.

I once had a friend (at one time he was much more than a friend) who made me feel more alive than anyone I've ever known. It might have been the timing--I was young, and invincible, and ready to tie the world up in a kerchief and sling it over my shoulder. But the way he looked at me made me beautiful. And the way he talked to me made me interesting. And the way he touched me made me real.

The "relationship" part of our relationship didn't last long--no more than a month at the most. We had very different goals and ambitions (in that I actually had goals and ambitions) and we also had very different ideas of what it meant to be faithful to one another. But the real part of our relationship lasted for years. He saved me when John F. destroyed me during college--quit his job, dropped everything, and spent the only money he had on an airplane ticket to come rescue me from myself. And then he stayed with me, literally wrapped himself around me, until I was ready to go on. He disappeared for a few years and then reappeared unexpectedly in Austin. I was at his wedding and he was at mine. Davy and I sometimes took care of his beautiful son. And then he and K split up (I'm guessing it was that faithfulness thing again). And then he was gone. I realized tonight that it's been close to five years since I've heard from him. I miss Jeff. But mostly I miss the me I was when I knew him.

Kitten or guinea pigs? That is the question. . .

Ode to Trudy's Fish Tacos


Well nevermind. I can't seem to come up with anything, but damn they're good. A perfect combination of flavors and textures. YUMMMMMMMM.

My tummy is comfortably full and I'm enjoying some terrifically bad TV alone in my clean house. I love my husband and kids, but I'm really, really enjoying my weekend home alone. I've gotten a ton of work done and caught up on my sleep. I've done things on my own time and have not had to consider the needs or desires of anyone but myself for the past 48 hours. This is the life!!!

Of course, it's only so good because I know they'll be home and everything will be back to chaotic normal tomorrow afternoon. But in the meantime, back to the sofa for some more awful television.

Overheard. . .

A conversation I overheard tonight between my two angelic little girls. Really--if you've never seen them--they're as cute as kids get.

Mia: Wow. Are you pooping?
Zoe: (with obvious effort) Yes.
Mia: Gosh. That was a really big plop.
Zoe: Oh yeah! I think I just pooped a manatee.
Mia: Let me see. Oh yeah, that's big! But I think Mama could make a bigger manatee.
Zoe: Oh yeah. Definitely!!

Sigh. . . They make me so proud.

Shades of Gray

There's a big controversy in Austin right now concerning a high school art teacher who is facing termination for posing (sometimes nude or semi-nude) in some photographs that were posted on the Internet and discovered by students. All of the media coverage seems to take the side of the teacher, namely that the photos were artistic in nature, and that they have no bearing on her ability as a teacher.

On the other side of the controversy, the AISD, who has been relatively closed-mouth about the whole issue, is taking the position that appearing in the photos violates the moral turpitude clause in the contract that all teachers sign.

Needless to say, the whole thing has people up in arms--and mainly on the side of the teacher who, in their opinion, has been unjustly punished for taking part in an artistic endeavor.

I haven't seen the contract. I have no personal connections with the photographer, the model, or the AISD. But I accidentally know more about the story because before any of this happened, I had been to the photographer's website and I've seen many of the photos. I saw them in a completely different context. I wasn't there to view art. I certainly wasn't there looking for photos of a cute naked art teacher. I was there because I was curious about the source of an interesting photo on a good friend's soon-to-be-ex-husband's my space page. And that's a whole story in itself. But what I found on the photographer's website was a lot of beautiful and edgy portraiture. And a lot of what I would consider pornography.

As defined in Miriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (10th edition), pornography is the depiction of erotic behavior intended to cause sexual excitement (definition 1) or the depiction of acts in a sensational manner so as to arouse a quick intense emotional reaction (definition 3). Completely withholding all moral judgement, I would have to say objectively that many of the images I saw on the photographer's website fit one or both of these definitions. They weren't the in-your-face trashy sex pictures that one might find in Hustler or its ilk, but they were definitely and explicitly erotic. Incidentally, some the photos of my friend's soon-to-be-ex-husband were in-your-face trashy sex pictures like the ones in mainstream sex magazines--and, well, ick.

But back to my point, most of the photos I saw originally are gone. They featured both nudity and sexual activity, involving heterosexual and homosexual couples. The photos that remain are very, very tame in comparison. The photos you can see on the photographer's website are very likely NOT the photos on which the AISD is basing its decision. But they are the photos on which the public is basing its outrage against the AISD. And upon which the media seems to be basing its coverage.

Seeing what I've seen, I can't decide where I stand. On the one hand, I think it is pretty clear that this teacher exercised some extremely poor judgement (as did, I would argue, my friend's soon-to-be-ex-husband--who actually has a child old enough to accidentally find him on the Internet--double ick!) and I'm guessing the AISD is well within its rights to terminate her. On the other hand, she was apparently a good teacher, and bad teachers do much more harm every day than exposing teenagers to nudity or sensuality. AND, she's apparently NOT even the teacher who exposed the kids at all. Allegedly, another teacher with whom she had a disagreement is the one who visited the website--AT SCHOOL and WITH STUDENTS. Is she in trouble too? I wonder.

Anyway, I'm glad I'm not the one making the decisions. I don't know what the answer is. . .

I think my DNA made me stupid.

National Geographic and IBM have teamed up for the Genographic Project https://www3.nationalgeographic.com/genographic/index.html a "landmark study of the human journey." I got all excited when I heard about it, so Davy bought me a participation kit for my birthday. I swabbed my cheeks and sent in my samples and I waited, and waited, and waited. And while I waited, I fantasized about what my results would tell me. Mainly, I couldn't wait to find out about my racial makeup, which would tell me once and for all whether the story my Nana liked to tell about some ancestor (Her grandmother? Her aunt? Why can't I remember to write the important stuff down???) being part Cherokee had any truth to it at all.

Well my results came, and WTF? I don't understand a freaking word of it. Apparently my mitochondrial HVR I sequence varies from the Cambridge Reference Sequence at two points by a nucleotide base mutation in which a pyrimidine base is exchanged for another pyrimidine or a purine base is replaced with another purine. Like me, you'll be comforted to know that this mutation, called a transition substitution, is the most common type of single point mutation.

Oh yeah, and this mutation apparently means that I'm a part of Haplogroup H--which I think means my ancestors came from somewhere in Europe. See for yourself: https://www3.nationalgeographic.com/genographic/report.html

(Really. Log in as fwn95d6c9v and see what you can make of it--free lunch to anyone who can 'splain it to me. . . )

So anyway, I could have told you without a DNA test that I had ancestors from somewhere in Europe. Now, finding out where in Europe I originally came from would have been of interest to me. Finding out whether my I was part Cherokee would have been way cool. But finding out I have ancestors from somewhere in Europe was not what I was hoping for.

Maybe there's more there and I'm just too thick to figure it out. On the bright side, I've never been more sure that skipping a career in genetics was the right move for me. . .

Zoe has a rash. A bizarre, non-itchy, bumpy, red rash that is now covering most of her body. The doctors don't know what it is, and, unbelievably, they don't seem too concerned about it--mainly because it doesn't itch and she doesn't have a fever. But it scares me. It scares me like all her little health idiosyncracies scare me. I worry that they're all interconnected in ways that the doctors can't understand because they won't put it all together. Perhaps it is because I've watched her almost die twice, but I often fear for this child's life. Most of the time I'm able to push the fear aside. But sometimes the most minor fever, cough, or non-specific viral full-body rash brings the fear screaming back to my consciousness. Especially late at night, when I've spent too much time online looking for an explanation. And then I go sit on the side of her bed to make sure she doesn't, in fact, have a fever. And she wakes up and smiles at me and goes back to sleep holding my hand. And I think about what a force she is, and how different she is from most children her age, how much more she sees and understands, and I become convinced that it's all because she's meant to force her whole life into a shorter span. The thought is almost too much for me to bear.

Six years into this gig, I should really know better by now.

Mixed Feelings

This morning I played at the Texas State Cemetery to honor fallen war veterans. Apparently, this is usually the National Guard Band's gig, but they're otherwise engaged this year. I don't usually consider myself very patriotic, but playing the Star Spangled Banner for a bunch of war veterans, living and not, was one of the most moving musical experiences of my life so far. I honestly had a hard time getting to the end.

On the other hand, I can completely relate to the following quote from Mark Twain on a friend's Blog.

"O Lord our God, help us tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it. "
---Mark Twain, "The War Prayer"

So, that about sums it up for me. I'm a Memorial Day hypocrite. I totally don't get war--and I don't buy into what we're doing right now AT ALL, but I'm moved to tears by a group of men and women simply because they went to war. Who the hell am I?

What happened to the good old days when Memorial Day meant the lake, barbeque, and a six pack of beer? Okay, admitedly, those were never my good old days, but still. . .

And because all poop and no play makes Robyn an incredibly dull girl (not too mention a very irritable one), I celebrated Mia's intestinal victory today by listening to a recent edition of This American Life. Generally I only allow myself the pleasure of listening to my favorite public radio programs while I work out, but today I figured I'd earned a reward of some kind. And since I found myself with little appetite for chocolate (my usual reward of choice), I decided to break my own rule.

The episode I listened to today ("Fake I.D."---originally aired on 9/20/2002; reaired on 4/21/2006) included a wonderful short story, "This Blessed House" by Jhumpa Lahiri, from her book of short stories The Interpreter of Maladies. The story was read by Mira Nair, who was apparently the director of the movies Mississippi Masala and Monsoon Wedding. I'm not sure why, but I loved this story about a young Indian couple who find kitschy Christian figures hidden in bizarre places all around their new home. It's a strange premise that allows the writer to develop two fascinating characters with conflicting reactions to the items they discover.

If you want to check it out, it can be heard at http://www.thisamericanlife.com/

It's definitely worth the 27 minutes!

I have never been so happy to see a poopy rock. . .

I just want to live in a world where people take responsibility for their own actions.

"Freezing the beta: How to kill a sick fish humanely" was definitely my best and most useful parenting tip. . .up to now!

Let's call today's tip "Retrieving the stone: How to search through your child's poo."

Oh yes. It's true. Davy and I are currently inspecting each little poo our sweet Mia produces, and we will get to continue this exercise in family bonding and olfactory adventure until we recover the rock she swallowed on Thursday night.

But I'm not writing for sympathy, my friends. I'm writing to share with you some most helpful tricks of the poo-inspection trade, in the event that you find yourself in a similar position someday--specifically, staring into the toilet wondering how in the hell you're going to do this.

Through trial and error, Davy and I have developed the following tried-and-true method of poo inspection. For best results, you'll want to have the following materials on hand and at the ready:
plastic wrap
disposable gloves
craft sticks
empty plastic grocery bag


Step 1: Suspend a generous sheet of plastic wrap across the toilet bowl, under the seat. You'll want to position said plastic wrap far enough back on the potty to catch what you want but allow any liquid to flow freely into the bowl. (This is a really important detail. Take my word.)

Step 2: Allow child to do what needs to be done. Then take a deep breath and prepare to work quickly.

Step 3: Using one gloved hand, grip specimen from beneath the plastic wrap. Holding a craft stick in the other gloved hand, systematically cut or crush specimen completely.

Step 4: Wrap smashed specimen and craft sticks completely in plastic wrap. Drop into empty plastic grocery bag. Place gloves into bag and knot to seal hermetically. Remove to outdoor garbage receptacle immediately.

One last tip: Prepare to stay close to home for 3-4 days, or take a small stash of supplies with you everywhere you go. It turns out that Sams doesn't keep a supply of gloves and craft sticks in their family restrooms. The Czarnecki method of poo-inspection is much less effective with only a paper towel to work with. Again, take my word for it.

So, Mia could have died last night.

The short story: Davy is at the movies with his friends. I'm downstairs reading. The girls are in bed. Mia screams from upstairs. I mean, SCREAMS. I run upstairs to find her sitting up in her bed wailing. It takes a minute for her to calm down enough to tell me she has swallowed a rock. I immediately know exactly what rock she's talking about--a small polished stone she got at a museum gift shop in New York. About the size of a grape. Apparently (she explained this part later, after she had calmed down), she had been rolling it around on her nose and her cheeks to feel how smooth and cool it was, and it rolled into her mouth. She gasped in surprise and swallowed it. From her reaction, I can tell that she's not choking. She's crying and talking, which are both good signs. But she's only four years old, and she can't tell me whether she actually swallowed it or it's lodged in an airway but not blocking it completely.

I call the doctor. Lots of questions are asked and answered, and Mia finally calms down. I am relatively certain that she has actually swallowed the rock and it is not restricting her breathing at all. However, now we must make sure it comes out. She cannot be apart from me or Davy until she actually passes the thing. And if she hasn't passed it in 4 days, the doctor will have to figure out where it is. Which means I'm going to Walgreens today to buy gloves and craft sticks. Use your imagination.

Or don't.

The most awful thing, much more daunting than the ideas of disecting poo for the next 4 days, is the thought that had she choked on the damn thing, I would very likely not have known until it was too late.

Sometimes this parenting gig is much harder than you expect. You do everything you're supposed to. You follow ALL the rules. And then your kid goes and swallow a rock.

Oh my!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12594915/

Oh my gawd!!! Snyders of Hanover Hot Buffalo Wing flavored pretzel pieces. Somebody get me the remote control, a beer, and some balls to scratch. I'm never getting up off the sofa again.

These are SOOOO yummy!

I happened across this quote today, which was attributed to Bill Moyers. I wonder if it's accurate. Either way, it made me chuckle--and then sigh. . .

"Other than the war in Iraq , the Katrina disaster, the deficit, the CIA leak, torture, stopping stem cell research, homeland security, global warming and undercutting science, we've yet to really feel the negative effects of the Bush administration." -- Bill Moyers

And now for some good news.

In some unrelated tests a few weeks ago, a doctor discovered a giant tumor-looking mass growing on my friend's lung. No point in doing a biopsy, the doctor said, since the mass would have to be removed regardless of whether it is malignant or benign. So she went in yesterday to have the thing removed--in a procedure that required breaking her ribs and from which she will need several months to recover.

Today she got the news that the thing (the likes of which the doctor says he'd never seen before) is a neurofibroma, a benign tumor that grows on nerve cells.

Her recovery from the surgery is going to be rough--especially considering she has a six year old and a four year old at home--but this should be the worst of it. I'm guessing the surgical recovery plus chemo and/or radiation plus the terror of living with cancer would have been much, much worse.

When did I get old enough to be having shit like this happen to my friends???

I have to say, April has been quite February-like in terms of relative suckitude. Assuming I and my family and friends all survive the next 10 days, I'll be happy to put up my virtual May pole this year. Hell, I'll be so happy to see April end I might just make May baskets for all of my neighbors and leave them on their front porches in the middle of the night. Goodbye crappy April! Hello May!

Davy's grandmother died last night. I'm so glad we were able to visit this winter. I hope the girls will remember her. It's funny that I felt such a strong connection with her inspite of the fact that Davy says he was terrified of her when he was a kid. Age must have really mellowed her. I enjoyed cooking with Ann, and talking about her life as young girl. We had a lot in common, despite coming from completely different times and backgrounds. I'm glad I got to know her.

Anatomy of My Shitty Day
by Robyncz

8:00 a.m.--Desperate phone call from dear friend having a panic attack. She can't breathe. Her rat-bastard husband of 12 years has been cheating on her the whole damn time they've been married (some of which she knew about, some of which she didn't) and he's decided that now he doesn't love her any more. She's a wreck. I quickly organize a meeting of Good Friends who happen also to be Very Strong Women to try to lovingly beat some emotional sense into her.
11:00 a.m.--En route from pow-wow of Very Strong Women, I have a flat tire. Crap. Desperate Friend turns the tables and rescues me. I hang out at her house while tire is being replaced.
1:30 p.m.--En route from tire place du jour I discover that Underpaid Tire Idiots have broken the sensor that tells my fancy-pants car computer whether tires are inflated correctly. Warning, Warning Will Robinson!
2:00--I pick up youngest daughter from preschool. She's pissed because I forgot to bring her a fresh cup of juice for the ride home. Yeah, well I haven't been home since I dropped you off, punkin'. You're going to have to live with it!!!!
4:45--I take the girls to swim lessons and spend 45 minutes running on the indoor track at the Y. The air conditioning is b a r e l y hanging on. Still, it's definitely the best part of my day.
6:00--Davy's mom calls to say his grandmother, age 93, and a woman I hold very dear, has had a heart attack and is going into kidney failure. She's not expected to live through the night. Davy, the girls, and I visted her in Milwaukee in February. I knew at the time it might be our last chance, but I'm feeling very unprepared for this nonetheless.

Did I mention the three huge projects I'm working on right now--for three different clients? All with major deadlines this week? I had sketched out a critical schedule of the tasks I needed to complete each day in order to make the deadlines. Let's just toss that baby in the garbage. My schedule is screwed, and I can't seem to concentrate on the work I need to do. It might be a good night to catch up on tivo'ed episodes of the Real World Key West (shhhhh, nobody knows my dirty little secret) with a large tumbler of moderately priced pinot noir.

Crap. This day sucks.

Something I didn't anticipate when I set up this whole bloggy thing was that I wouldn't have anything to say. Actually, I have plenty to say, but I double-think everything I consider writing about based on who might read it. Which is silly, really, considering I haven't told anyone I know about this blog, so absolutely no one is reading it. I don't want to write much about my family because "the Internet is a dangerous place" and I've been warned not to give out to much informaton. I'm hesitant to write about my extended family, because like most families, mine is complicated and messy and writing about in public could seriously inflame things--if ever they were discovered. I don't want to write anything negative or controversial related to my friends, because I don't want to publish anything on the web that might come back to haunt someone. And since my friends are the people most likely to see this someday, even if I were to use fictional names, people would know when they were reading about themselves.

I could write about cooking, knitting, music, or politics, but it's been done and done and done. Frankly I've got nothing innovative or compelling to add.

So what does that leave? Not much.

Waiting for inspiration.

(Something else I didn't anticipate when creating this blog was that it would be too complicated for my middle-aged mommy mush brain to cope with. Who knew that if you clicked on the wrong button your carefully composed posts would disappear in some previously unrecognized draft folder instead of publishing itself on the web for all the world to see?!? Well I know now! This post was written [and ostensibly posted] early today when I had no readers. I have since gone out on a limb and invited one, count 'em one, friend to view my blog. Thanks, Jake!) (Baby steps. . .)

I truly hate the word "clinch." As in "Blue Devils clinch playoff berth." Come to think of it, I'm not a huge fan of "berth" in this context, either. But it's "clinch" that causes me to grind my teeth. No particular reason. I'm sure this is a perfectly acceptable use of the word. And it's not like I had a traumatic clinching experience as a young child. It just really bugs me.

That's all.

So here's something I never say out loud--and I'm not sure why. Perhaps because nobody wants to hear it. Or maybe because I'm too busy sweating the small stuff. But here it is. . .

I have an amazing life. It's not perfect. And it's not interesting by any standard, but it's sweet. I have a good, smart, and loyal husband who puts up with an almost unspeakable amount of my shit. Every day. I bitch at him. I complain about everything. I'm annoyed by something ridiculous a good 75 percent of the time. But that's all the surface stuff. I don't tell him nearly enough (well, ever) how much I love and appreciate him. But it's true.

I have two amazing daughters who are beauty, and joy, and everything else that is good. They amaze me daily with their generosity, creativity, their intellect, and the fact that they are complete little people. And very different little people at that. They both drive me nuts in very different ways, but I'm so glad they're mine.

I've been very lucky to be able to manage my career so that I get to do work I enjoy pretty much when I want to do it, and I get to be around for my kids. It's a complicated bitch to organize sometimes, but a luxury that very few people enjoy.

So why do I usually feel like it should be better? Like *I* should be better. At all of it: wife, mother, daughter, friend, individual? Why do I feel like I should be doing more? Why do I continue to moan and complain when I am clearly one of the luckiest people alive?

Answer me that, smart people!

Looky here! I have a blog.

I set it up for the sole purpose of commenting on someone else's, but here it is.

Now what?

I had absolutely no intention of ever maintaining an online journal of any sort. Hell, I'm not even entirely sure what a blog is supposed to be. In as much as I haven't been living in a cave for the past five years, I *do* know that the wordlet "blog" is short for "weblog" but besides that, I have little idea.

So, again I ask--Now what?

I suppose I'll leave it at that while I consider the possibilities. And try to think of a clever title.