I Surrender.

I was welcomed home yesterday afternoon by a little box of compression love on my front porch.  The timing was perfect as I had to stand on my feet for 5 hours while working today.   The act of wedging my bloated self into the stockings was less than perfect though, I’m sorry to report.  It took 15 minutes and almost an entire day’s reserve of energy before I had sufficiently compressed myself. The least they could do for $70 is send you a bottle of Astroglide or something.   As I lie panting on the bed I had to count my fingers to make sure I hadn’t severed one of them off in the process.  After I caught my breath and swung myself off the bed I gave them a little test waddle up and down the hall.  I felt confident though that these were going to do an excellent job of compressing my vein.  As an added bonus, they were also going to do an excellent job of relocating the baby, along with all my internal organs to my throat.  Ahhhh, relief.

 

It’s been raining for days and Sam and I are both getting grumpy and antsy.  He is not yet walking and I am growing larger by the second (in part due to growing baby, in part due to accidental overstocking of ice cream sandwiches).  Picking him up and moving him around all day is killing my back.  The thought occurred to me yesterday that in lieu of waiting for him to walk…I would just start crawling myself.  Then when he crawled up to me, arms up stretched, I could just shrug and say…yea bud, it’s a bummer there is no one around to pick us up.  A friend reminded me to find some knee pads first so I didn’t run my new hose!  Good thinking Fran J

 

On Monday, the pregnancy-induced loss of brain cells caused me to take Sam furniture shopping again.  What is wrong with me?  Seriously. 

You would think that after a year of “parenting” (which can be defined as getting your ass handed to you by someone a fraction of your size) I would know that I am NOT IN CONTROL OF ANYTHING.  Nope…..they should give you this little white flag to wave on the way out of the hospital because sister, your life is no longer in your hands.  Remember how they won’t even let you walk out of the hospital on your own, they have to wheel you out…..yep, that’s the beginning and you didn’t even realize it.  Now, a year later and I’m still trying to do silly things like take a one year old shopping.  I am no longer in control of when I get up, when I get to shower, when I get to pee (which I still maintain I’ve never done on a sofa) and certainly NOT of when I want to go furniture shopping.  But, while the one on the outside is making me nuts, the one on the inside is making me stupid…..So I did it anyways.

Thankfully I had done my research and knew the sofa I wanted to investigate.  It would be a quick run-in, run-out job.  I might even carry Sam and forgo the stroller drama.  So I fix snacks, load Sammy in the car and hit the road.  We’ve made it to the end of the street before he rips his shoes and socks off and starts sucking on his shoe.  This is standard protocol and I will blog later about the other dirty things I let Sam eat.  As we near the beltway I can hear him getting a little antsy back there.  The shoe is old news and it’s nearing lunch time.  Luckily I am prepared with a small buffet of Sammy-friendly snacks.  So I begin by handing him back a little PB&J bite.  “Handing back” is really defined as arching my back as far as I can while thrusting the entire right side of my body into the backseat until I can reach him.  He smacks my hand away in utter disgust and begins wildly fussing and pointing at something on the center console.  I’ve now merged onto the Baltimore beltway.  I grab the snack trap filled with cherrios and give that a try.  Nope…..fussing louder and pointing more furiously.  Here’s how the next 3 minutes go:

 

Oh..you want my glasses?  Backbend into the back seat.  Glasses smacked away and more fussing.

Oh you want this piece of paper?  Another backbend and another smack.

Oh….how about your sippy?  Um…no.

Do you want to listen to “The Ladybug Picnic” song?  Puh…lease….

Shit how do I always get suckered into this game.  I need to look at the road because some might construe it as dangerous to cruise down the highway at 65 mph while trying to climb into your own backseat.  Plus, I’ve come to find out that there is very rarely a successful outcome to this game.  It’s all part of the “making mama look like a circus clown” technique and I fall prey to it more often than I’d like to admit. 

Well, about 30 seconds later I re-shift my focus to operating my enormous, totally un-sexy minivan when I hear this glass shattering, earth quake inducing primal scream.  HOLY SHIT!!!!!  While I was playing that stupid game with Sam I’ve hit something!  I’ve hit something alive on the middle of the highway.  OH MY GOD…I wonder if it’s a dog??  It sounds like a wild hyena.  I swerve the car, narrowly missing the guardrail and brace myself has I slow down into the right lane.  I glance in the rearview mirror to see if I can catch a glimpse of the wounded animal.  I’m so upset I’m almost in tears.

And then, in my rearview mirror, I catch a glimpse of what does indeed appear to be a wild hyena.  But he’s not on the road behind me.  He’s buckled into the carseat.  His eyes are red and he is foaming at the mouth trying frantically to arch his back hard enough to rip through the carseat straps…….Hulk style.  He is shrieking at a decibel that I didn’t know existed and every nerve ending on my whole body is on fire.  He is whipping his head side to side and pounding his little fat fists on the side of the seat. 

It appears that the recent game of “what do you want” did have a specific outcome.  One that I had clearly failed to present him with.

We have also, apparently, come to the point of no return because this Texas Chainsaw Massacre performance continues for another couple miles.  We are almost in front of the store and I'm surprised the windows haven't blown out on the van.  

And there I am, in the front seat, crying while “The Ladybug Picnic” sings along on the cd player.  I guess this trip is over.  No sofa for Mama.  When will I learn???  I AM NOT IN CHARGE!

So we headed home to hang out on our ratty, stained old sofa.  And we built block towers and knocked them over for 2 hours.  And Sam was happy as a clam.  What could be more fun ;) 

But I’m sure I will do this again.  In just a few days I will forget, or some need will arise that will require a shopping trip, and I will do this all over again.  Sigh.