{ shope.ism }

This friend of mine had the idea to sell tshirts relating to this tea party thing that's been going on. So he set up an LLC and found some distributors and asked if I'd design the shirts. To which I said, sure. Why not? So I designed a couple shirts, and got a website up and running to sell them in exchange for a cut of the profits.

So I've spent the last three days up to my earlobes in tea party, right-wing extremist craziness. To be fair, I'm not a liberal. I'm a big fan of capitalism and the free market and think it's dumb as hell to prop up companies that got themselves in a mess in the first place (GM, I'm talking to YOU). However, these right-wing conservative crazies scare me just as much as Nancy Pelosi. I've definitely gotten to interact with some scary rednecks who give the right-wing conservatives their back-woods, gun-toting stereotype. One day over drinks I'll tell you about some of the emails I've gotten this week. It's really frightening.

The ugly truth is, I really like to be a "moderate" fence-sitter and not get involved. And this is the opposite of that.

But, like a good capitalist, I am joining right in with the crazies to make some bank. For the record, I only designed the smiley teabag - somebody else did the angry shirts. Check out the site: www.teabagwashington.com.

I just had a conversation with the counter guy at the gas station that ended with him saying to me, "In Texas, it's so hot you gotta walk around in your bikini or bra. It's too hot for clothes. You'd like that, wouldn'cha."

Didn't see that one coming.

Hayes got shots this morning which he handled well. He cried of course, but by the time we got to the front desk he was fine again. The ensuing stiffness not so much. He's been pretty unhappy in between his naps today. Fortunately the baby Tylenol has knocked him out a good bit.

Hopefully this foray into IV drug use will [emotionally] scar him. Is it weird that I'm opposed to Judgement Houses that scare you into Christianity by showing you the horrors of hell, but I think that every teenager in America should be forced to watch Requiem for a Dream at age 12? I guess that's how the Baptists feel - fear is as good a motivation as any.

Anyway, I stopped at the gas station to get a giant ice cream Snickers bar, because this day has warranted it. Guess that's a perk of being a parent. Whenever somebody gets a shot, you get ice cream. Works for me.

I officially get the parent thing now. Against all rationale, I completely believe that I have the sweetest, most brilliant, wonderful, best looking child on the planet. Because it's true.

Anybody know about canine laws? Can I shoot one if it's threatening me on my property, just like a person?

This morning I was in my living room, on the front of the house, when the guy down the street let his dogs out to run in the neighborhood. He does this every day. The guy has company staying at his house, so there were three dogs instead of the two who usually live there. Well I see them right outside the window, and one squats to poop. So I opened the front door and yelled for it to stop. The other two dogs (the ones who live here all the time) came running up the steps on my front porch growling at me. Very aggressive. Of course I shut the door. The owner heard me yelling and started calling the dogs, but of course the squatting one wasn't going to stop mid-poop.

The owner did walk over and pick up the poop, but that was only because he heard me yelling. He lets his dogs out in the neighborhood twice a day because "he doesn't want all that poop in his backyard" (HIS words). I did not go out and talk to the guy, because having a confrontation in the front yard with my sleeping kid inside and no one else around seemed like poor judgement.

Letting your dogs poop in everybody else's yards is one level of dickhead; letting your aggressive and therefore possibly dangerous dogs run loose is another.

Stupid asshole.

You know how LJ will remember something you typed and ask if you want to restore from a draft? Well this is the last thing it remembers me typing:
--
Today is my due date and I am fucking miserable. My left side just below my ribs is shooting pain pretty much constantly. I've woken up the last two mornings almost unable to breathe because of the pain. Wednesday I still wasn't dilated, so they scheduled an induction for Tuesday morning. I'll have to check in tomorrow afternoon and spend the night.

So on my last day as a free woman, I've been sitting/laying/walking around in pain. It sucks. And the rest of the week isn't looking any better. Since I'm now scheduled with a check-in time, every inch of my family will get to be there with me from the minute I go in the hospital until the time I leave. And their plans do not include leaving at any point in time - the last baby born in Rory's family was born just after everybody left to grab dinner because supposedly nothing was going to happen.
--

God, I am so glad I'm not pregnant anymore.

So...I feel like I should post something un-baby-related so I don't bore the crap out of you.

Larry Langford is an idiot.

I'm starting to do some work again, which is nice because I like having some spending money.

And now I have to go because somebody is being bitchy. Like it's MY fault he poops on himself.

Tomorrow is Hayes' two week birthday. It feels to me like he's been here forever, but Rory thinks it feels like no time at all.

The difference I think is that I'm the one feeding the little boogerbutt every three hours. My milk did in fact come in (on day seven), so I'm nursing. However I'm still not quite producing enough to do it exclusively so I'm also giving him a bottle afterward. AND pumping. All that takes at least an hour, and he eats every three. So I don't do much else in my day.

What I do know is that there's nothing on tv in the middle of the day. Even HGTV gets boring. So one day this week I'm headed to the library. I'm thinking about looking for something about being the mother of a boy, since it's kind of on my mind these days. But I'm scared of parenting books in general and especially gender-specific stuff. I thought Wild at Heart was horrendously offensive and cheauvanistic. Any other suggestions?

It's 3:45 am and I'm drinking a beer because Google told me to. (You may want to skip this if you're uninterested in breastfeeding.)

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So here's the story on Hayes: last Monday I checked into the hospital so they could start dilating me, because I wasn't at all. I was slightly nervous that they wanted to induce me so soon after my due date, but I trust my doctor. (Samuel Gray, fwiw.) As of Tuesday morning I was about 3.5 cm, and they started the hormone that causes contractions. By noon I was having contractions, and an epidural, but had not dilated any more. So Dr. Gray told me he thought it was a really big baby and we should do a c-section. To which I agreed, because hell, I already had the epidural going on. They could have amputated my head for all I cared.

In retrospect, if it had turned out any differently I would have been irate at how things went down, but fortunately Dr. Gray knows his shit. Hayes was 9 freaking pounds, and if I'd waited another two weeks I would've still had to have a section. And have been much more miserable. I may be taking the man some brownies at my next checkup.

The only real speedbump so far was Friday night. I have this insane arrogant streak that sometimes makes me think that I won't struggle with things that other people struggle with. For example, I was feeling good Friday morning and thought to myself that I might not have any hormonal "baby blues" at all. Then I found out my child wasn't getting enough to eat, and spent the rest of the day distraught because I was a horrible mother and couldn't perform the one biological function he relied on me for and he probably hates me and THE SKY IS FALLING. Irrational, much?

After that one night though, it's been much better. I'm back to normal brain function; i.e., NOT attributing rational thoughts and adult emotions to a week-old infant.

So the kiddo's healthy, and other than the fact that feeding him stresses me out, he's really handling life in the world well. He's sleeping like crazy and even on a semblance of a schedule - which basically means we can predict his actions, not that he does anything because we want him to. Par for the course, right?

So far no change - still looking like I'll be on time. Yay!

When I went to the doctor this morning, I also had him look at my index finger - I got a blood blister last week that I popped, and since then it's looked really horrible an hasn't healed up at all. So I figured it was infected.

HOWEVER, as it turns out, I have on my finger what's called a "pregnancy tumor." No lie. It's a random collection of blood vessels that hurts like hell and bleeds profusely and goes away after the baby's born. If you have a strong stomach, you can google it and see what the worst case scenario is. He gave me a dermatologist's name and I'm seeing her tomorrow anyway, just because going into the hospital with an open wound on my finger sounds like a great way to get MRSA.

I "interviewed" a pediatrician today and really liked her. I've got one more appointment with Rory's pediatrician, and I've heard he's good too.

While I was in the "well child" waiting room before my appointment, I realized one more way being a parent will be difficult. As I was sitting down, a 3-4 year old girl in the room zoned in on me and started asking her mom, "what she doin?" The mom of course said "sitting down," and the next thing I know the little girl is next to me. No big deal, right? Well I was rummaging through my purse on my lap, and the little girl started peering into my purse. So I'm kind of talking to her, and then she stuck her hand in my purse and grabbed my wallet. I started telling her she couldn't have that because I needed it to drive, and as I'm holding onto the wallet and she's pulling, with her other hand she begins prying it open. So I finally had to actually remove her hand from the wallet and get the whole purse out of her reach. Fortunately about that time she got called back.

The whole time this was going on, the mom was mildly saying things like "No, you can't have that, she needs her wallet," etc., but never actually made a move to do anything about it.

I have the feeling becoming a parent is going to make me much more assertive.

If YOU had to spend a few days in the hospital to have a person removed from your uterus, what would you pack? Difficulty: the epidural means less screaming but more opportunity for boredom.

I'm told all the necessary medical/baby stuff they provide. Like diapers. And some really sexy underwear.