Conservation of mess

If you took chemistry in HS or college, you probably remember the concept of conservation of mass. I now posit there is a corollary: despite how much you clean, purge, declutter, and generally empty a space, children will achieve Conservation of Mess. I cleaned most of the downstairs today and a good portion of the upstairs. To compensate for this loss of mess, the kids managed, in the space of about 45 nanoseconds, to trash several previously cleaned spots.

What. the fuck?


OT: Dude just peed standing up and said, "It's a good thing when I pee potty. Rock on!"

OT2: I contemplated washing the kitchen floors today. No, not mopping. Washing. On my hands and knees. Perhaps I nest?

Oh. Um, EWWW

When you flush the toilet, ideally all the products therein flow merrily downhill through the stack and into the sewer/septic/holding tank/whatever fetid locale you happen to have. Right?

I'm just checking, because right now? If you flush the upstairs bathroom toilet, massive quantities of ick flow up through the tub drain. Into the tub. Which we generally use for cleansing our bodies.

There are no words.

Husband made a valiant effort and tried to snake the toilet, but my theory is that the issue is in the tub's line and it's moved far enough down that now it's affecting the toilet, too.

PS, my god we poop a lot.

In other news, I called our local meat guys and am waiting to hear back on when they're coming out to do the pigs. They won't be nearly as big as Breakfast and Brunch, but we got them late (thanks, local meat guys!), so our timeline was shorter.

I feel bad because unlike pretty much any other animal I can think of, when the pigs encounter the electric fence, these guys charge THROUGH it instead of backing AWAY from it. So we haven't had any luck moving them to greener pastures (literally). They're still in the chicken yard, which thanks to several days of rain and the handiwork of our rootertillers, now measure about 5" of muck. I know they'd rather have nice cushy grass but they're too effing stupid/stubborn/bizarre to accept that white lines = pain and hey, STAY AWAY FROM THE WHITE LINES AND EVERYTHING WILL BE FINE.

Next year, we learn them young and early.

Perp started preschool last week and is already home with a cold. Swell! I know she's really feeling pretty bad because she's willing to just flop on the couch with Noggin on, and even spent several hours upstairs in her bed with no complaint. People, that's huge.

Dude has mastered the art of pooping on the potty. This morning, he dragged Husband in to show him and said, "That certainly is a big poop!" Too bad we couldn't flush it down the freaking toilet.

Very satisfying

I whipped up three batches of blueberry muffins that I'm putting into the freezer against the fall and winter. I usually just freeze the batter in trays, bag the nuggets up, and then bake them as I need them. You don't miss out on crunchy muffin tops that way. <---- clever!

I also got a copy of Fix, Freeze, Feast and put 9 bags in the basement. It took about 4 hours, but I was wrangling kids. Solito, you could crank them out in about an hour, I think. It's basically the same thing you do at Super Suppers or Meal Time, but you do all the prep and shopping yourself. I don't mind the shopping or the prep, so it works out well.

A few friends and I are trying to make a date to whip up a few more meals and share them. So far I can tell you that Swimming Rama is tasty, though I added a lot of ginger and a few tablespoons of peanut butter to the sauce. It really makes a difference. Sweet Asian chicken was a hit, too, but again, ginger, and if I knew the kids weren't going to partake, I'd add the pepper the recipe calls for. The honey-glazed chicken thighs are okay, but I don't think I'll repeat that one.

I also plan on putting a shepherd's pie away (LAMB! not beef!). I could eat that just about every damn day.

I lovelovelove having a ton of food already set up and just needing heat to make it into dinner. My favorite thing about this book (and the meal prep places) is that you don't have to prep, COOK, and freeze. You just put it away raw and cook it when you want it. I think that's the secret to freezing a lot of meat dishes, frankly. But I'm making that up as I write it, so feel free to disagree.

100 Item Challenge

I find this interesting. I was just saying to Husband, who brought an article about Dave Bruno home, "If we could categorize a few things, like books, I could do this." Even better, I think WE could do this. If each person were allowed 100 items, and necessities like diapers/underwear, weren't counted individually, I think it's entirely doable.


I may just give it a try.

Categories might be:
books (even this I could purge quite a bit)
cooking items (ditto)
pants (say a max of 10 pairs per person, dress and street combined)
shirts (same, but maybe 20 what with the spillage)
shoes (considered 1 item since we have such radical weather swings here)
movies (hard one; this could take up a big chunk of the list)
knitting (MUST be a category or I'm already done)

And do you consider personal items like deodorant? If we don't share, it's not a household item, right?

Does the tractor count as a household item even though I'm the only one who uses it? It contributes to our food since I mow the field to move the pig fence..

My GOD, the stuff we could get rid of! And I don't even need to sell 99% of it, just get it OUT of my house.

Let us praise

the Magic Eraser. Yeah, it's good for cleaning walls. It's suitable for removing crayon from various surfaces. It's even showing up on the heads of mops (though that seems like a spectacular waste, given how fast they fall apart). All this is true, yes.

But.

Here's what I bet you didn't know: the Magic Eraser, glory of glories, will remove ground-in, dried-up poop from your bathroom grout.

Don't ask; I have no idea, either.

Here's why Dooce sucks

Flor

Snow day

We got a little snow overnight.

Upstairs view:

She's standing here. On her feet.
With snowshoes:



Out our hall window:

Back in bidness

So. We have this well. It's 500 (five HUNDRED) feet deep. Waaaaay down in the murky depths, near the bottom, a wire wore through and shorted the pump out. Our lovely well guy came out and spent 6 hours on a cold, snowy Saturday fixing it all for us. So I can do laundry. And bathe. You know, fun stuff.

Huzzah!

Well, well, well

Ours doesn't seem to be working.

Okay technically we think it's the pump but still. So we've decamped and are squatting at Husband's parents' place. Where they have water. Which one can use to flush a toilet, say. Or bathe oneself. Or make smashed potatoes and carrots (nummers!).

Nothing to do with our lack of water:
Last night we were watching Grey's Anatomy and I was saying that there are only a couple of us on my moms' board who think the show has jumped the shark and that most everyone else was clucking about how great the last few episodes were (you know, the Huge Disaster! OMG Meredith is drowning! one).

I said, "There are only a few of us who think it's time to dump the show."
In his best 8-year-old boy voice, "Girls are stoopid."


Weather Dude (welcome back, George!) says 8-10" of snow by Sunday night. That means we're only about 25" short for the year. sigh

Husband Officially Sucks because he's eating ice cream (and chocolate) in front of me while I'm on an elimination diet. Fucker. I'm going to smear the rest with dog shit and see if he notices.

A change gonna come

Masher's body is starting to failing her; she has cataracts on both eyes, and I rather suspect her hearing isn't what it used to be.

Last night Perp was doing her hugkiss routine: "Hugkiss donkey; hugkiss stove; hugkiss piano; hugkiss Masher." Mashy was curled up in her wee bed and Perp clambered over the side to deliver the goods and M lurched up and snapped. One small, single-drop-of-blood scratch and a broken heart. Hard way to end the day, man.

It's totally not the dog's fault, but she's out of the hugkiss circle now.

sigh

DH on meds

Husband has been given a prescription for his heartburn; I'm glad because it's about time, and seriously? guys don't do sick too well. But I'm so pleased with him for even going to the doctor that I don't diss him for it as I should. Much.

He just came in and asked whether he should take the dose he missed this morning. I said that the next dose is far enough in the future that he should probably just pop today's now and go on his merry way. Because I'm a doctor. No, really, I am, I just haven't gone to school for it. But really, you should take the pill. On time. Every day.

"Good thing I'm not a girl; I'd be pregnant a lot."

To sleep, perchance to, you know, uh...

Okay so yesterday I was going on about sleep and how Dude's not so much into it and then he had a pretty good night. I went and blew it by missing his cues this morning. He had about half an hour's nap, late. Then it was ridiculously difficult to get him down for his nap, but I managed to sneak him, asleep and snoring ever so cutely, into his cribby. I can only imagine his outrage when he wakes up. "This is NOT where I fell asleep!"

I have done just about a complete 180 on the sleep tip. When Perp was born, I was all, "Crying it out? Barbaric!" And actually, if you're talking literal cry-it-out, pop-em-in-and-go, I am still against it. And it's still barbaric. But if you're talking fading techniques, going in at regular but longer intervals to soothe and comfort, well hell, I'm a convert.

Part of it is just that I have a lot more on my plate, and taking naps every day with him, sleeping in late with him, having him next to/on me close to 24 hours a day just isn't really feasible. Perp lucked out on that, no doubt. I worry sometimes, since I can already see that Dude is not nearly as elastic as she was. Don't get me wrong, he's able to bounce back from most insults fairly easily, but it takes longer and he's just more ... I don't know, closed than she was or is. The other day we stopped by a friend's house to say hi, and her dogs came rushing at us, barking, wagging, slobbering. You know, doggie style. He
f r e a k e d out. Lost it. Cried. Screamed. Tried to climb up my arm onto the top of my head. Perp just never got scared by anything. She had her first stranger danger moment when she was about 18 months old, for God's sake.

It's hard to know what to think. Is he like this because he doesn't get the time she did? Is it innate and it wouldn't matter what the birth order? Both? Whatever it is, I'm at a loss. I don't know how to deal with it. He is clingier, whinier, harder to please, tougher to cheer, generally the opposite of his sister. Hell, even I have to work to get him to smile or laugh. He goes about his day with a suspicous look on his face. "Are you allowed to do this? Are you certified? DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING, LADY??" It's a bit insulting, frankly.

I suspect he needs more of a routine to his day than P did. I'm not sure how to make that happen and still get her out of the house for activities and playgroups. I'm starting to think a regular babysitter who stays with him while she and I go out is the way to go. And oh, how they laughed. As if. The only sitters around here are in high school. You know, during the day. When we need to go out.

Anyway. So I've been letting Dude work it out a bit in his room at nap- and bedtime. There have been a couple of days when I had to go in multiple times to comfort him before he falls asleep. But yesterday at naptime, I wasn't out of his room more than five minutes before he crashed. Go Dude! Progress, perhaps.

In other news, I'm cleaning like a mad thing, including scrubbing the bathroom floors which hasn't happened since the cleaning lady started. Remind me why I pay for a service that I'm not getting?

Crazy: NPR is doing a Science Friday on fatal insomnia. Eerie.

Down the rabbit hole

What with the grand day of turkeys coming up, and famdamily coming to visit, my NaBlo posts are going to be - can you believe it? - even shorter. And with even less interesting content!

But I'm sticking it out since I'm so miserably far behind with my NaNo. I'm immensely proud of myself for cranking out as much content as I have, though. Eighteen-thousand-plus words. Not bad.

I'll bring the laptop with me when I go to pick up my dad & stepmother; I figure if nothing else I can try to write when/if Dude is napping. Oh, and that's a whole new post. Sleep training. I hate the term, it's not like babies don't know how to sleep. They just don't know how to comfort themselves. Maybe it should be called comfort training. Whatever, Dude's experiencing it and I'm actually kind of surprised by how sunny he's been today, given the miserable night we all had last night.

I went out and bought the bird today: 21+ lb of organic goodness. I hope it's enough.

Save Big Money at The Nards!

We're (still) fixing up our house. We've been here four years now and the finish line is in sight. And yet, it doesn't feel done, if that makes sense. I'm already thinking about what color to (re)paint the living room, how I'd love to rearrange the furniture if we didn't have such a ridiculously laid-out floorplan, and what I'd build in its place if the current house were to, say, blow away or take off for the winter without us.

Husband is busy-beavering upstairs to finish the guest room before my dad and stepmom come for the day of turkeys. I ran errands with the Dude today and brought home what we hope are the last few touches for the room. Then we finish our bathroom and we're done. Done. Finished. Amazing.

This place was the Museum of Bad '70s Carpet when we bought it. Because the average buyer doesn't seem to have the imagination or congenital insanity required to give a house a complete makeover, we were able to buy it for a song, really. A poorly sung, but heartfelt song we were required to make up on the spot. Good thing I took those improv classes years ago.

Most of what we did was strictly cosmetic. Well, depending on what you consider cosmetic. We turned a spare bedroom into our master bath so now we have a master suite. Sweet! Other than that, and adding one wall, it's all pretty much just prettying up the place. We know that the former owners, who drop by from time to time when they're in town, don't think much of what we've done. They did like that we took out a massive length of cabinets and countertop and put in a pantry, which seemed like a no-brainer once I thought of it. It's wonderful to be able to stash all our crap behind some pretty white doors, I tell you what.

I wish I could show you what it looked like before and what it looks like now. It's a completely different place. And that's a fine thing, since we are completely different people. You have to make your mark where you can.

On freaking myself out

I'm starting to wig out. I am becoming this organized person, sort of, anyway. So I decided that in order to save myself from having to go to the store every day (or making Husband run an errand on the way home from work), I'd sort out the meals we generally eat and I'd make a list of ingredients we need to have on hand for said meals.

I'm about to make a spreadsheet.

Somebody stop me. I need help.

Yes

that is an emu in our driveway.

No. We do not own an emu. Anyone who says Wisconsin isn't an exotic wonderland can suck me sideways.








Apologies for my filthy windows.