The Stay At Homer

Damn computer pirates. If you have been wondering why I had some random page with strange writing that said something about hacking….well, that’s what happened.  They got me.  Apparently it wasn’t malicious, it was just some jerk-off taking over my site and letting the world know how cool he is.  So I’ve been dealing with this crap for the past few days.  SERENITY NOW!!!! On top of that, my modem broke, and AT&T wanted $100 for a new one, so I had to go through the whole “screw you, I’m switching to Charter” process.

Now I just have to get all my pictures back online, and get the header back up there.  But I kinda like that picture of the dude walking down the country road.  Reminds me of what it feels like when you have no internet….completely cut off from the world, and actually getting outside and connecting with nature.  How very strange.

But I’m back online now!  Woo-hoo!!

Why is changing a diaper so damn difficult?  You don’t have to answer that. I know why.  It’s because my little dude, who used to lay on the changing table with a big ol’ smile on his face, has recently decided that laying on his back is an insult.  He has made it perfectly clear that the process of changing his diaper is one of the worst things that a human can do to him. His response is to squirm, kick, and do whatever it takes to roll over onto his belly.

So there I am, trying to wipe poop off of a child who is kicking his feet into the poopy diaper (my bad for not getting it completely out of the way) and trying to roll over.  I am forced to hold both legs together with one hand and make desperate attempts at grabbing his attention so that he’ll stop from twisting his body around.  Lately, I’ve been setting toys on his chest.  This works 50% of the time at holding his attention.  The other 50% of the time, the damn thing gets thrown and the rolling over starts up again.

My largest frustration with all of this squirming and rolling business is that I don’t have a very large window of opportunity to get the fresh diaper on before he lets loose with a pee stream. Something about the open air on his tenders must create a sort of valve release.  So in order to beat the stream, I work like a surgeon in a life or death scenario.  Everything is STAT! The biggest difference here is that my “patient” is awake and uncooperative.

Once I get is butt placed on top of the fresh diaper, I act quickly to wrap it over the front and attach the flaps.  Usually I have to place his butt a few times because the squirming magically creates a sort of ejecting move that pushes the diaper out from under his butt.  It’s like when you put a dollar bill in a vending machine and it sliiiiides right back out.  Same exact frustration!!

You would think that the victory dance would occur once the diaper is successfully put on the kid.  Not for me.  I still have to go through the rigamarole of putting his pants on.  You would think this is the easy part; put two legs in, slide the pants up the waste, and done!  Because of his squirming and lack of cooperation, I end up putting both legs into the same pant leg.  The other scenario is more out of a Chaplin movie, where I put one of his legs in, and then as I attempt to put the second leg in, the first leg pops out.  Now, with the second leg in, I attempt to get the first one back in, and in doing so he forces the second one out!  This goes on and on, back and forth, until I decide that he’s a baby and he doesn’t NEED to wear pants.  A onesie is enough.

Oh how i miss the days when Alistair would just sit there and smile while I changed his little diaper.  Maybe I just need a new technique.  Anybody got any bright ideas?  Besides anesthesia?

I guess if you were to ask me my current views on the perfection of God’s creation, the human, I would have to say that I think there is one monumental flaw.

I have been contemplating this flaw for the past few days and I just can’t seem to piece together the logic.  Let me just put it out there and maybe you religionistical folk can help me out.

My child is almost 8 months old now.  We have just gotten to a pretty awesome point with him, as far as feeding and sleeping goes.  We pieced together a pretty nice routine for this kid, and everything seemed to be going great, and then…..

A pain begins in his mouth; a pain that increases and turns everything into a total nightmare.  Sleeping is impossible, eating sucks, and his general demeanor is one of frustration and irritation.  And then, maybe a day later, maybe 3 weeks later, a large sharp object jams it’s way through his gums; gums that have no convenient slits or openings for this sharp tooth.  It literally punctures a hole in my child’s mouth!  And then, once that is over with, once the calm comes back, another tooth stabs it’s way through his gummy flesh.  This repeats for TWENTY teeth!

Why the hell do they have to rip through the gums?  Couldn’t the top layer of gums lovingly peel back and dissolve like those breath strips and reveal these nice teeth that can now easily slide upward without any pain at all?  Seems that would be ideal.  As it stands, we “poor baby” and hold and comfort our child as they go through this massively torturous experience.  Seriously, contemplate a bone punching a hole through your gums.  Ouch, right?  I think the current method of “teething” is outdated and should be updated in the newer model of baby.  I think we are all ready for a next phase of evolution.

No offense to God, of course.  I’m just thinking out loud.

I’d never been to a Renaissance Faire before.  This was fun!  We were offered some free tickets to The Renaissance Pleasure Faire from a mommy friend, and couldn’t pass it up.  It was a great way for Noble to hang out with his buddy Alex and for us to see some crazy people dressed up in medieval garb.  And let me tell you….the garb was the breast part, I mean BEST part.  Seriously, the majority of the Renaissance women had their boobs so smooshed in their “authentic” dresses that they seemed like they were gonna pop!  Interesting style back in the days of ye old booby squishers.

It was certainly a fun time.  It was like going to a contemporary fair, but everything had to abide by medieval standards….to the best of their ability, of course. We were still able to buy a Coke, and water bottled a magical container known as plastic. But apparently the rules were strictly enforced.  While walking past an amazing medieval musical talent, tapping his strings with his wooden sticks, an authentically dressed lady asked the man, “Awesome! Can you play Stairway to Heaven?”

Her friends ‘ooh’ed.  ”He can?!  Can you play it for us?”

The man nodded that he knew how to play it, but did not vary from his current performance.  Knowingly, the first gal spoke up again, “He can play it, but he has to wait til after hours.”  Apparently there was no Stairway to Heaven during the Renaissance.

It was entertaining seeing these authentic looking people break character to discuss real life.  I overheard a group of big, scary, very intimidating looking vikings talking amongst themselves.  In high pitched voices that didn’t match their bodies, they all inquired with each other about all things Microsoft.  It’s not everyday you can witness a viking discussing peripherals.

I don’t know what made us think that getting the kids swords was a good idea.  Alex and Noble are two great kids, but give them a weapon, and you can kiss your ass goodbye.  We bought them both these foam swords, and for the majority of the walk back to the car (about 5 miles, it seemed) I was beaten, stabbed, sliced, chopped, Hi-yah’ed, you name it, if it was a sword move, I got it.  Kayla (Alex’s mom) also got her share of a beating, as well as a ferocious head butting (literally, they repeatedly smashed their heads on her butt while she tried to push the stroller.)

I doubt that I’ll ever return to the Renaissance Faire.  Perhaps without small children it would have been easier, because I really do love that time period.  The swords alone!!  But it definitely feels like there’s two faire’s going on. There’s a large community of dressed up folk, many playing the part with the kind of conviction that usually requires delusion therapy, and then there’s the tourists coming to watch. When the faire closes, I can only imagine the kind of partying that goes on:  goblets of ale, large turkey legs, and those boobs probably burst forth for ye old air.  That, and Sherman plays Stairway to Heaven.

The good wench Kayla enjoying her Renaissance feast

There’s not much to write about here, but there’s so much to see.  Is it evil of me that I enjoyed this image so much, it caused me to race for the camera?  Here are mother and son, in the middle of making some damn good ratatouille. They are clearly working on the onions.  (By the way, this is not a staged photo!  All I had to do was stand there and keep snapping!) Quite the troopers.  They persisted.  They got the job done, and that ratatouille was amazing!

As a parent, you are expected, in a timely manner, to reach milestones like introducing solids, crawling, walking, algebra, invent green energy, etc.  I feel like I’m faced with a constant barometer of how shitty I am at parenting.  For example: even though Noble is ridiculously smart, and as well behaved as a 4 year old can be, he still finds his way to our bed at night.  I, personally, don’t see this as any kind of problem, yet.  In a year or so, he will most definitely be too big for that bed, and we will kick his ass out.  According to the popular literature, though, we are dooming our child.  My thinking: maybe kids need a good dooming every now and again.

In Alistair news: we were starting to take some heat about Alistair’s binky use at around his 4 month mark.  Our pediatrician mentioned we might want to think about breaking the binky, and we talked to some people who didn’t use binkies, and we wound up feeling like we needed to eliminate it.  We didn’t really want to, but it’s so damn easy to get caught up in comparisons that you start feeling like you are doing something wrong if you aren’t part of the mainstream herd.  So we went for it at 4 months.

The result was that after breaking the binky, all hell broke loose. Our home went from peaceful to prison riot. We lasted 3 or 4 days before Gayle and I, during our nightly “what the hell are we doing wrong” meetings, came to the conclusion that Alistair wasn’t ready to have his binky “broken.” So we de-brokened it.  Wow, I’m a wordsmith!

But wait!  Three months later:  Gayle and I noticed that Alistair was waking up multiple times at night and it was clearly because he just wanted the binky back in his mouth.  That was our sign that he was ready to have the binky broke:  it was causing more harm than good.  He is 7 months now, and he’s been off the binky for 5 days.  Guess what? He sleeps better!  Not perfect, but better.  Putting him down just takes an additional 10 minutes or so because of his binky cravings. And even that is getting better.

My conclusions: 1) Everyone has a theory that works, because everyone has a different child. 2) Parenting is best when it’s done from the gut.  3) When the “right” one eludes, it’s refreshing to invent words (de-brokened).

If there’s one question I get asked all the time, it’s, “Hey Russ, first of all, you look amazing in that gray sweatshirt!  I’m so glad you wear it every day!  But more importantly, I’m thinking about having a kid!  My only issue is that all the information I’m finding on the subject is very specific.  I was wondering if you could give me a vague explanation on what parenting is all about.

Sure I can!

Parenting is taking 2 steps forward, then five THOUSAND steps back. Then 5 more steps back.  Then it’s 3 amazing steps forward, with a freaky side step, and then a step back that’s surprisingly a relief.   Then you cross a bridge when you get to it, and there is a crossroad waiting for you on the other side. Doesn’t matter which way you travel, it will be wrong.  You accept that and make your choice.  Then you come to a fork in the road and realize it’s just a big crapshoot, life’s too short, so you should just enjoy these forks when they present themselves. Every once in awhile you pick the right fork, and that will make up for the 10 you got wrong. Your body will age exponentially;  you will want to murder anybody who claims to be tired, because they have no idea; and the best way to tell if you are doing it right is if you feel like you are doing it wrong.

Patience is key.  Alcohol helps.  Remove your sense of smell and all will be well.

Hope that helps.

One of the biggest changes from a childless life to one with children has been my relationship to poop.

Before children, I did not think about poop. I did not talk about poop. I did not desire to look at poop.  Poop and I weren’t really friends.  We hung out at the same places, but the second he showed up, I left.  I couldn’t stand to be in the same room as poop.  He stunk the place up.

Without kids, pooping is just pooping.  You do it, you leave. If you are at a dinner party, you light a match and  pray nobody notices the wafting stink. It’s that simple.  Sure, sometimes maybe you realize you clogged the toilet at the party and you start to panic. This can’t be happening to you, not tonight, not with these new friends you wanted to impress.   And maybe you stare for minutes at the nearly overflowing toilet for signs that the water level is dropping; a sign that you might be able to attempt a second, more productive flush.  Meanwhile you scour the bathroom for a plunger.  There isn’t one.  What kind of idiot doesn’t keep a plunger in their bathroom, you think to yourself.  You turn to the toilet to see that the water is slightly going down.  There is hope! You have a couple minutes to spare so you check your zit in the mirror.  It’s still there; still kickin’ it.  You think about popping it, but decide that because it will most likely turn bright red, you’ll opt to keep the whitehead.  But the whitehead looks bigger than when you arrived at the party.  Maybe if you just pick at it a little….then the top pops off and blood streams down your face.  You picked too hard! Well that sucks!  But you turn around and see that the water level has dropped; you flush again.  SUCCESS!  With a piece of toilet paper on your bloody zit wound, you make a promise to yourself to never again use that much toilet paper;  especially at homes of cheap ass people that don’t buy hardcore power-flushing toilets.

Wait a minute, I have a feeling I’m off topic.  Um….poop!  Right!  Ok -

Now with kids, a large portion of my life is dedicated to the size, amount, color, texture and smell of my kids’ poops.  You never truly understand how important poop is until you have kids.  From very first black tar poops that require a chisel to remove, to the sweet yellow cotton candy poops of the infant, you deal very intimately with it.  You are concerned with every facet of it. Is it too chunky?  Too runny?  Does it smell different?  The same? Should I be worried?  Are those mustard seeds?!  Who fed my kid seeds?!

I can honestly say that I smelled zero butts before I had Noble.  It just wasn’t in the cards.  I really didn’t care if anybody had crapped their pants.  And if somebody’s child pooped ‘em, I was more than happy to become grossed out and make my exit. Now, whenever I remove Alistair from his car seat, whether I’m arriving home, or I’m in a crowded parking lot, the first thing I do is lift his butt to my face and I take a large whiff.  It’s a parent thing. It’s what we do.

Yes, I have a close relationship with poop.  My own butt isn’t the only one I’m wiping these days.  It’s not my ideal scenario, but these are the days and years in which I’m supposed to “cherish every moment,” according to all parents that approach me on the street.  So cherish I will.  No matter how much I may gag, these are the poop days, and I embrace it!

Oh who am I kidding? I don’t cherish that crap.  It’s one of the biggest parenting pains in the ass. Seeing floating poops in the toilet because Noble didn’t flush, wiping poo off of Alistair, god knows how it got out of the diaper and onto his shoulders, trying to figure out if a poop is healthy or not based on a lengthy visual examination, it all is a big pain in the ass…

Alright, that’s enough about poop, I think. Time for some lunch!  Who’s hungry?