Bing and Flop

Pottyparty's sister gave us (Raelin) a book called Bing: Paint Day. I had looked at it some time ago briefly, though there are so many board books floating around our house I typically leave it up to Raelin to know which ones are the moment's favorites.

Today, she and Pottyparty brought Bing out from the bedroom. I happened to be upstairs taking a work break as they were reading on the couch; I ended up looking over pp's shoulder. I almost choked I started laughing so hard at this book and the way pp was reading it.

Here's a link to the cover. In short, Bing is a kinda crazy-looking pseudo anime bunny with his side kick Flop. I don't think either of them are particularly sober, myself. I'm also not so sure about the author/artist. Then again, there's Dr. Seuss who was almost certainly smoking something, and if he wasn't, he obviously didn't need to be.

Anyhow, enough of that. This afternoon and evening, Eric Carle's 'the very busy spider' has been our companion of choice. I took raelin and jasmine down to the lake for a walk, seeing as it was a balmy 35. I didn't even need gloves except when we were out on the lake and the wind was blowing. Anyhow, Raelin's in the backpack with the spider book, and telling me about how the spider's getting cold. We came home soon afterward. Fast forward a few hours to post dinner tub time. Guess who was the first in the tub? You guessed it, the very busy spider. I'm not sure we'll be able to salvage it or not....

Breakfast of Champions, Bachelors, & Groggy Dads...

It's 7:45 in the morning and I'm finishing my 4th piece of pizza. I would say it's breakfast since it's the first thing I'm eating, though really, it's more like lunch.

Raelin decided for whatever reason to wake up at 3:00 this morning. Pretty innocent in itself, until she starts hounding pottyparty for dee-dees and wanting to run around on the bed. When denied dee-dees since she is now theoretically night weaned, or brought back to a horizontal position, the crying and screaming began. After some time of this a very frustrated pottyparty "requested" my assistance. So I got up with Raelin, took her into the other bedroom, and rocked her back to sleep. For the first time. With lots of crying and screaming for mommy and dee-dees. But now I'm sitting on the edge of the bed at some ungodly hour with arms that cannot hold a 27 pound toddler for hours on end. And I'm about to fall over asleep too. So I put her down and curl up next to her. This lasts for about 2 minutes. Repeat above until asleep, take 2. Then take 3. Then take 4. I lost track at #4, though there might have been a number 5. All I know is the last one she actually slept until after the sun came up. Well, the sun was on the hills across the lake.

So then groggy dad took her to reunite with mommy since daylight == dee-dees, and tried to fall back asleep. But after getting back up to let the dog and cat out and in, it didn't happen.

So I'm kinda groggy. I went to a meeting thingy last night where there was lots of pizza. Enough that I brought 2 home with me. With our latest nutritional enlightenment, pizza is definitely not on the list of things to eat much of. Then again, neither is the cookie or coke I consumed last night with said pizza. But fuck it, I'll take whatever eating a few pieces of pizza, or a few pizzas, brings. There's always flax oil in the fridge for the steamed chard...

Another funny thing, which is totally unrelated, but a woman I was talking to last night made a joke about rearranging the magnets on her fridge. She was serious, but joking about it. She doesn't have children. All I could think was "man, people have time to do things like that?" followed by "man, some people don't have toddlers that embody entropy and bring chaos and disorder to everything?"

Yo Buzzz Buzzz Buzzz

It's wednesday night. Raelin crashed out at 4:00 (I said 6:00, but pottyparty informed me that it was 4). I've been working like crazy all day. I had a margarita with dinner, cuz hey, after dinner I didn't have to give Raelin a bath. Not that it's a chore or anything; I quite enjoy it, though alas I feel I should be sober when I'm keeping an eye on her.

The other day as I got something out of our pantry I spied the tequila and triple sec up there and thought "some night soon is margarita night." That night was tonight, baby, and I'm feeling quite happy, if you know what I mean...

So like more and more people are blogging now. I got a message from one of my cousins, who is a recent mommy and now has a blog (knoxblox). Check it out. She's crazy like the rest of us with that last name, and well, her daughter will likely grow up to be a freak like us as well.

Anyhow, cheers to yah, go have a pint of guiness or 3.

Rain, rain, fuck off

So winter's winding down. Today's high is 40, which if that weren't bad enough for the snow we're getting rain, a lot of rain, on top of it. Sure, it's supposed to turn to snow before the end, but here on the coast it'll only be a few inches.

So, pottyparty's all stoked and I'm all grumpy about it. Last week at the mountain all the trails were open, and the snow was epic; some of the best they've seen there is years. Even the ellusive "Lookout" trail had been open for a couple weeks straight. Granted between the ice patches and moguls there were the bare patches and gravel to dodge, but what the hell, it's New England and we take what we can get! Plus all the more to hone one's chops.

Anyhow, so the end of the snow boarding season is rapidly approaching, which would be great if we went right into summer, but there's this thing called mud between the two. In many parts of the world it's called spring. Here, it's pretty much mud season. Last year in late mud season I picked up a used road bike since it was obvious the knobby tires wouldn't be going anywhere for many months yet. We'll see what happens with the rains. See, the thing about riding pavement in spring here, is until the head guy at the road yard calls it, winter conditions can still appear. In other words, the road crews may still need to salt and sand the roads. After several months of salt and sand, the shoulders are veritably gritty with coarse sand. In a car on ice the stuff is great, on a bike with skinny slick tires on pavement it's a nightmare. I suppose winter is truly over the day the street sweeper comes out to pick it all up. Until then, road riding is literally dodgey as one must seek to keep tires on pavement as much as possible; no high speed descents, etc, well, at least not on the shoulder.

Hmmm. This post is turning out kind of wanky. "Wah, wah, wah, you're the one that moved to Maine, dipshit, what'd you expect?" This is true, and while the gravity-hound within me may be lamenting the loss of the flow of carving arcs down the mountain, the rest of me is pretty stoked. Because with spring comes (besides the mud) the breaking of the lake ice, which means the osprey will be back. It also means the spring songbird migration, which last year blew my mind. It means the meadows by the neighbor's house will again explode with lupin and daffodil, and the trees will wake from their long slumber with spring leaves.

Quickly we will pass through that crappy part of the year when the only snow left is in dirty brown piles of ice and slush where the plows piled it up, where a step onto the lawn is accompanied by a squish and 1" sink, where the trees are still bare, the days short, and the sun yet to warm the air past 55. For beyond that is late spring and summer, when the faded memories of waking up and pulling on a pair of boardshorts to sit out on the deck in the sun and drink morning coffee while the laundry dries on the line and the birds sing again come to life.

Then, the next natural event to watch is the hurricane cycle to track swells making their way north....but that's for another post...

Hellochair

Raelin has started demonstrating some nice abstract thinking. A couple of days ago we were hanging out and I was getting some food ready for her. When it was all done I asked if she wanted to eat in her tower or high chair. Her response was "hello chair". Being completely baffled I asked again, to which she answered the same, this time climbing into the high chair. At this point I realized that she was indeed saying "hello chair," and made the logic jump that we use "hello" and "hi" interchangably as a greeting, so she was using "hello" and "hi" interchangeably to refer to her high chair.