oh here you go, cal.

a few things have gone on around here.

1. dear universe: please, please, PLEASE right yourself again, this business of whatever has been going on lately is NOT pleasant. neptune in or out of my financial house (or matt's) needs to beat it or fix itself and soon. too many random ridiculous occurances have been going on that have made me scratch my head and wonder WHAT ARE THE ODDS that this is all happening at the same time. it's like, IS THE DUKE OF ASH GOING TO RANDOMLY SHOW UP AND WRECK THE HOUSE AGAIN TOO, WHILE WE'RE AT IT?

2. class at the U this fall is out. financially it's just not the right time.

3. vito snagged a woodpecker yesterday and brought it to the back deck door to show us. the thing was still alive and wiggling and matt somehow distracted vito to scare it out of his mouth, flying all crooked the hell away from us. poor thing. vito was of course pissed that his "kill" was taken from him.

4. i love the fall. i can't wait for a big delicious PUMPKIN SPICE LATTE and a shit load of mums on our steps and deck that i will of course finance with money that would be better spent on other things.

dentists and other unpleasantries

we went to the dentist yesterday, bub and me. it went really well, good reports for both of us but i was a little on edge during the electric scraping procedures. i had to tell her to stay the hell away from my upper two eye teeth because of the sensitivity. . .i almost gagged a couple of times during the x-rays, but all in all, not a bad visit.

the best part of it i think, was when i asked her about coffee and coffee stains on teeth. she explained that the tannins in coffee were actually a benefit for the mouth. . . why, i can't really remember right now, but then she added, "That's as long as you don't dump a bunch of milk and sugar into it. . . " What i said was, "OH no, I use any of that stuff. . . " What i WANTED to say was, "Oh no, I TAKE IT BLACK. LIKE MY MEN."

i dreamed about boiling live chickens in water the night before last.

then also, a regular customer from starbucks and her daughter in either k-mart or target.

also that i left the kids at home alone to go somewhere, thinking matt or leah would show up and it wasn't that big a deal. they may have been sleeping, i can't remember.

seriously.

craziness in my dreams

my boss was unhappy.
he became my mother who was also unhappy.

i was disturbed at how unhappy my mother-boss was
and so my aunt and i staged an intervention

then the mother boss became my old previous boss.
who was yelling at employees in chinese.

updates.

I just the whole week off. It was quick and very enjoyable.
We hit Lake Harriet yesterday morning and the State Fair today. It was relatively painless but the kids
were worn out for the rest of the day. Bub actually fell asleep on the couch at 830pm.

I created a new blog, for the parental items I seem to have so many of. . .
for anyone who's interested, it's www.ThatChickwholikestoProcreate.blogspot.com

Freddy Rodriguez is fricking HOT. Even if he's a little short (as in -er than me).

very telling.

you can tell EXACTLY where i am in my "cycle" by a few things actually, but if i'm ever confused, all i'll have to do is go back through these blogs and see what i was dreaming about. if there are hot man dreams, i am waxing toward ovulation. bitterness or mother issues? heading toward surfing the crimson wave.

last night beebins FINALLY slept decent. i was THRILLED. however, when she did decide to wake up at 5am i was seriously right in the middle of a Clooney dream. I haven't had one in a really, really long time. it wasn't major it was just that i was going to get to watch a screening of ocean's 13 with him on his laptop on the floor of his hotel room. oh, what could have been!!!

some discomfort

two things. both involving high school chicks from back in the day.

1. one has to do with a friend request on facebook that i am unsure of how I will respond. . .
this after blogging pretty explicitly about my "issues" with said person, how I should at least try to remain honest about my
feelings about this person. . . honesty is all i have right now, since i clearly have no money or status or power when it comes right down to it. i don't want to deal with it. . . .i may just disregard it. . . forever. . . (!)

2. i dreamed last night that a family of a friend of mine (nameless) moved into our old house at 1315 w. fairview avenue. the dream was that instead of the ehlers buying the house, this family did. i was super SUPER pissed about it since the house and property and all the things (blood, sweat, tears) my parents put into improving it were completely ignored and they just went in there and started bulldozing shit and making it all gaudy and "new modern" carmella soprano style with a bunch of disgusting faux-artistic CRAP. charlie and i barged in, probably illegally, to see what had gone on inside and there were random, gaudy fireplaces, horribly ridiculous hanging art pieces everywhere, etc., etc.

i don't mean to sound snotty about the artistic/cosmetic things people do to their houses, but let it just be known that anything done to modify the 1315 west fairview house from its last remaining condition from when we lived there will of course be met with UTTER DISDAIN, be it in a dream or reality. i am this girl with a steel trap memory, i will remember EVERYTHING THAT EVER HAPPENED, ever. by messing with my (old) house, you are messing with my memories, which are equal to a money hungry person's millions of dollars accruing millions of dollars in interest. these are the things that i have, these things are MINE.

this dream was disturbing because instead of some random couple getting the house, it was displaced onto someone i actually know and had spent time with in high school (and am still in contact with today). jealousy issues never dealt with? perhaps.

a trip down memory lane. . .

to remember the kind of mood i was in at this time last year, pregnant and without a house, here is a blog i did on myspace:

Wednesday, August 15, 2007


mia’s first cat fight.

little brat.

was probably around 2 and 1/2, i saw it just as it developed, girl yanking on her head, pulling hair, and clawing at her face. i don't know if mia provolked her, I FUCKING DOUBT IT, but she may have gotten in her space or something minor.......i went over to the scene to rescue my baby as the brat's mother was no where to be found, and i almost had a moment where i wondered if i would have to pull her off mia but she ran to me with her arms out, bawling WITH BATTLE SCARS of a little fingernail gouging her cheek and a red mark under her jaw...........

before i knew what was going on or could start giving this little shit the what-for some OTHER spazzy kid, a boy, who had been seriously annoying everyone in the area not 5 minutes prior to this started beating up mia's assailant, and i mean SERIOUSLY CLEANING HER CLOCK. grabbing her, pulling her hair, body slamming her and pushing her to the ground. girl brat was about 2 or so, boy probably about 4. i don't even think thkey knew each other. soon i had to break those two up and go WHAT IS GOING ON HERE? STOP FIGHTING! all the while trying to comfort my own daughter.......



again. no parents of either of the other 2 kids were anywhere around, only me and alisha, looking at each other as if to say WTF JUST HAPPENED!?!?!?? little girl brat ran off to find her mother, little boy disappeared somewhere.

i try to not to get too judgemental with toddlers' behavior, but what i saw was this girl BEATING on mia, not pushing her out of the way, not giving her one single slap, but WAILING ON HER.
it's making me mad talking about it.

maybe i need to get my own LAMB OF GOD t-shirt or just start carrying a wooden spoon around with me? all matt would have to do would be to look gruffly at the child or do a death metal yell and that would be all she wrote. unless of course her mother was one of the regular edina moms who get all flirtatious and SEXUAL when they see him all pierced and alternative, trying to get all over his stick...........


FUCK EVERYONE IN EDINA AND AT EDINBOROUGH PARK. CONTROL YOUR OBNOXIOUS, UGLY CHILDREN. NEXT TIME YOU MAY JUST EXPLODE BEHIND A BOX OF KABOOM CEREAL, IF YOU GET ME, OR I MAY SPLIT YOUR ATOMS WITH MY DEATH GLARE.

I'M THROUGH FUCKING AROUND WITH PEOPLE WHO ANNOY ME.

did i mention. . .

that while very illuminating and beautiful to look at, i really am beginning to loathe full moons?

the chaos around here is 10 times its normal level. the only thing semi-holding things together is that bubby, in effort to secure himself a rubber snake and rubber shark from the rainforest cafe, has been really trying to be good, so his role in this is for once, minimal.

zizzy has 20030404303 fits per day about clothing, changing her outfits, and not being able to get into them properly. SCREAMING fits. she gets super mad and wants my help but doesn't want my help and then gets madder at the fact that she knows that she NEEDS my help. all her clothes are now taken out of her drawers and on hangers. the rest of the clean laundry that i had folded and sorted in a laundry basket is on the top shelf of her closet. i am not dealing with it anymore.


beebins. has not slept in approximately 3 days. the tooth has finally started to ridge out onto her gum line but the thing is, she is not just teething/tired/crazy, she has become the master sleep fighter. kicking and flailing and writhing around like a goddamned SNAKE. i thought the constant sleep interruptions were actually going unnoticed (in and by me) but right after lunch today i had a trademark SPAZ over something small (the telltale sign i have not had enough sleep or am just really really hungry) and i realized that THIS FUCKING SUCKS. she's getting the tylonal tonight, for sure. ugh.

zizzy got all of her teeth without so much as a peep. but this is also the child that slept through the night at 2 months, weaned herself a 8 months, ate every morsel of anything ever put in front of her and basically smiled her way through baby-hood. Oh and spoke in sentences at 13 months too, so if she ever did get upset about something, she told us IN WORDS what she was pissed about.

onto the more interesting items (not really). . .

1. dreamed about joey from work again 2 nights ago. this is getting a little. . . weird. again, not a sexual dream, but the implications of what happened in it are. . . disturbing. we were working at starbucks, i was the shift and he was the barista. then soon, MATT (my husband) comes in and HE's the shift and he's coming in to relieve me and he is going to close the store. so i'm leaving him this massive list of things that need to get done and pretty soon i realize that joey is leaving too, with me. as in, we're leaving together. i don't know if i'm giving him a ride, or if he's coming with me for some other reason or what, but the real issue is that I'm leaving work, leaving all my responsibility on matt, and i'm leaving with some dude. weird.

2. last night, i dreamed about lee gemlich (old manager from northwest that i though was hot). the dream also was not sexual or inappropriate, as far as my dreams normally go, but very random and strange. i was in some sort of detention at the U of M, for something, i don't know what. i think i was supposed to be a grad student. but a group of us were being interrogated for something and some creepy Mrs. Danvers lady was leading the questioning. I was getting mouthy and she was not impressed. soon i see from up in some little observation booth, lee gemlich is up there watching this whole thing. i saw him and wondered what he was doing there, like did he become a professor or something? then he came down because i guess he was the main guy in charge, and he had to get involved. i noticed he was wearing a red coat and goddamned riding boots or something (which now that i think about it, would make sense because he does bear resemblance to the actor jason isaacs who has played the main bad guy in the mel gibson film THE PATRIOT in which he would deffo have had on a red coat and riding boots. . . he is also the actor that plays LUCIUS MALFOY, who i also find intensely hot) and soon HE'S the one questioning me. but when he came down i had to sit down on this weird bar stool and face away from him while he paced around me in circles. the only awkward part of this whole thing was when i suddenly realized he was touching my back, as if to give me a back rub or something.

which, in my hierarchy of wants and needs right now, would rank WAY above sex.

rationalizing

i have not been very productive this week so far. i have not gotten up early to write. i have not done any denise austin. i have not
restrained from using my credit cards (my most recent and excitable purchase being THE MONSTER 1200 STEAMER, but i am justifying it because i am paranoid about germs, bugs, bed bugs, and germs from bed bugs after the maggot situation going on outside in the dumpster).

i have been eating a bunch of utter SHIT and all of these things I am telling myself are because A. "Her monthly bill came early,"
and B. Beebins has not been sleeping. Like, AT ALL. Waking an average of 4 times per night. her cold is much better now and on its way out, but seriously. snotty nose, developmental achievements and . . . i don't know what else do not make for a restful baby. today when i tried to put her down for her nap she literally FLAILED and WRITHED IN MY ARMS for the entire time the bottle was being given in effort to keep herself from falling asleep and submitting. annoying.

so really, i'm just blabbing and declaring to myself that i get some passes when it comes to being efficient in my misguided effort to try and be some sort of writer. i have set of short stories i am going to work on, bit by bit (bird by bird), but they haven't "sat" long enough in my mind for me to know them. so many of the things i write are kind of born on their own, coming to life and mutating a million different ways each day i spend with them. . . i just can't force this stuff. so in the meantime, i will be cross stitching, playing guitar hero, and waiting for inspiration.

and my baby to sleep.

thoughts

1. this has been with me for a while: many parents out there are stressed out way too much and really don't seem to enjoy their kids. i see this all the time, but mostly when we go to places like the children's museum, zoo, or park. i will never understand the parent who just lets their children tear ass around unattended while they (the parent) sit and do nothing but talk on their cell phone. this seriously makes me livid. I don't know why, i just have a physical reaction every time i see it. PUT THE FUCKING PHONE DOWN AND GET YOUR KID DOWN FROM THE WALL! or stomping around after the kids, clearly in a pissed off mood and having no patience at all for kids (this is mostly true of parents of toddlers).

news flash: toddlers are ridiculous. expect them to be. this is especially true when you take them places where they will see other children, will be out of their element, will be hungry/tired, will be excited, etc.

2. matt's mother dreamed i was pregnant last night. the last 2 nights i dreamed about peeing on pregnancy tests. i know i said something along the lines of an immaculate conception being possible after seeing The Dark Knight the other week but this is getting a bit silly. . .

Bubby

gets beebins' nuk when it falls down.

breaks up pieces of soy crisps on her high chair tray so she can try some (without being asked)

asks me last night, "WERE YOU MAD AT ME IN MIA'S ROOM, MAMA?" (when in fact YES, i was, since they were screwing around and messing with each other) and is genuinely concerned that i may have been mad at him. . .

says to me just now (when i told him to get down out of the refridgerator) WELL IF I WAS A NECKLACE CARPET SHARK I COULD EAT YOU UP YOU KNOW. . .

rally round the family

I bested Tom Morello on expert battle mode yesterday. It was very VERy gratifying. I kept on with the next few songs, and wouldn't you know it, I'm onto some of my favorite ones now, Scorpions, Rock You Like A Hurricane, ZZ TOp, La Grange, and Pearl Jam, Even Flow. I am not actually playing these songs **well** when I do them, but I'm getting past them all the same. Even though I cursed him many times, the battles with Tom Morello really really improved my. . . technique, if you could call it that.

I was flipping through Facebook's pieces of flair application yesterday and doing a search for guitar hero flare, and most of the buttons that were on there were negative ones, as in, circle with cross through (guitar hero in the middle), or I PLAY REAL GUITAR. seriously. why people gotta hate? and if it's the musicians doing the hating of this game, well, GET OVER YOURSELVES. it's fricking fun. maybe it's not actual musicianship, but you definitely get a better score for being able to perform little rhythm things correctly, you have to memorize all kinds of patterns, be able to gauge where your hand needs to be, when to move it, invent finger board patterns to get a better score and do things faster, etc.

When kids do suzuki violin method (proper), they are supposed to spend the first year practicing ONLY on a little cardboard faux-violin contraption before they can get their real 1/10 size violin. this supposedly prepares them for the weight of the instrument, where to put their hands, and just hanging onto it in general. granted, every single guitar hero nerd out there is not going to run out and buy themselves an ibenez just so they can do it for real, but i know at least one guy who did it that way because he apparently enjoyed the game so much he wanted to rock out an ACTUAL GUITAR. i think that is cool. I probably won't ever be a real guitar hero, but i may just try fiddling around on an electric someday to pretend.

2. by practicing a little guitar hero each day, i seem to get better and better. I am going to try to do the same with writing, it's gotta have the same effect, eventually, right?

3. caramel frappucino last night. i was sooooooo bad. but it was very delicious. matt thought it was wretched. MORE FOR ME!!!

4. i got the brangelina twins people magazine yesterday at lund's on penn ave (thanks for the tip, lisha). i hauled ass up to walgreens 3 different times this week trying to get it only to find that they either weren't carrying it or they weren't putting it out until the other people magazines (about some abducted girl?) were gone. i got it home and looked at it outside on the deck and pretty much bawled at how cute they all are and how much I love those beautiful kids. So many people I know really hate angelina (and pitt), and honestly, i suppose i can say she's not my favorite person ever (pitt even less so) but that one shot, with the whole family lined up, sitting down, pax flinging his foot out towards the camera, and maddox holding shiloh laying down? That was the best, true, chaotic picture of a family, ever. suddenly 4 kids doesn't seem like too many (!) :)

(none of this can be breathed to my mother, who literally would SLIT MY THROAT if/when I ever get pregnant again.)

5. i am pretty much dashing the entire idea with this small short story i started and taking a completely different approach with it. that anne lamott book (bird by bird) really is a great inspiration. i enjoy her very much. now, if only she wasn't so damned negative and depressive.

6. i bought a star trib yesterday just to have something to buy at walgreens (when they didn't have people). I get the dumb thing home, glance slightly at the twin cities section, of course see something about PEOPLE BEING BEATEN WITH BASEBALL BATS AROUND SOME GODDAMNED LAKE PHALEN IN ST. PAUL and promptly pitch the fucker into the garbage. well, to be fair, i let beebins play with the sports and business section, but i definitely shit-canned the news sections.
what is going on? i haven't been able to read a paper for probably a good year, because every time i do, i read about some death or child abuse situation. ENOUGH!!!

my new favorite things

1. getting up early, before the rest of the family. i got up at 530 today and monday and it was actually wonderful having all the free time I wanted to do all my things. Granted, i went to bed at 1030 both nights but on nights i actually get enough sleep, i think i might do this all the time

2. guitar hero, on expert. it's wonderfully hard. i am obsessed. matt calls me KWAN the little prodigy that hacks the game in 2 tries. i still have not been able to beat tom morello on the battle, but i'm improving.

3. TONS of caffeine. (not new i guess).

4. um, fricking malibu rum and cranberry juice. have to be careful here.

5. beebins inch-worming all over the house. and pointing. and doing raspberries. NOT NAPPING RIGHT NOW i could do without.