Mid-week Randomness

Wheeeew! Ethan is in bed, I'm sipping some Merlot, it's gorgeous outside and the bathroom is clean. 'Tis a good day here at the Mordant Conceit HQ. Tomorrow is Thursday and Friday will follow, at least that's how it usually goes, and that means that THE WEEKEND is right around the corner. Sweet.

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I disturbed myself yesterday when I was weaving in and out of traffic by unknowingly singing along to a Nickelback song. Gah, if there's one thing high on my list of BLECH, it's greasy-haired all-male rock bands that drone on and on about old photographs and love. Unfortunately I seemed to know all the lyrics. Why is that? It always seems like I'm saying Gah, I HATE this song, and then I'll sing along like I wrote the damn thing myself. This happens with most Fergie and Snoop Dogg songs, too. I have a love-hate relationship with trendy top 10 hits, I guess.

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We're going bowling this weekend! Bowling! Mind you, I'll be using my carefully perfected granny-throw technique, but I am excited nonetheless. Lessthenone. I am very much looking forward to it. Gee, has that Merlot kicked in yet? Ya think? D and I are going with my co-worker and her husband, which means that we just might actually have some 100% genuine friends now. Gasp! For the love of gawd, please do not let us act too desperate or eager. I wouldn't be surprised if we ended up humping their legs and begging to make plans for the next weekend by the end of the night, but I'm crossing my fingers in hopes that we come across as cool, calm and collected. Also: I hope D doesn't drink too much and make a complete ass out of himself. Not that he's been known to do that in the past or anything. (snicker, snicker) I'm just sayin'. (Pray for us.) (Thank you.)

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I watched the video that Kek has up on her site and giggled with glee at everyone's unbeatably cool accents. A few weeks ago a daycare worker told me I have a serious Texas twang. I smiled and told her that I had recently moved here from Texas, but secretly I wanted to kick her in the nose for offending me. Today, however, an associate from another office called and we talked briefly, and she asked me if I was from Canada. Yes!, I told her, I sure am!, and she said that she picked up on my accent immediately. I have never been told this before, but it basically made my day. From Canada to Texas to Louisiana. May God have mercy on my soul. (And my accent.) (Yeehaw.) (Y'all.) (Heh.)

Nonsense

My posts nowadays are more random, unorganized thoughts than actual blog entries. When I sit down to type it's like my brain just kind of explodes all over the blank blogger template. Being so busy all the time I almost feel like I have attention deficit disorder. Maybe I do... hey, bring on the Ritalin!

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This morning has been especially crazy. D is still working 6 days a week and it sucks. He doesn't have to, but I think he feels an obligation as his boss's only employee to help when he knows his boss is working. His boss works like 355 days out of the year, 10 or 12 hours each day. It's incredible. He can't sit still. (Speaking of ADD!) This morning I woke up a bit after 6 to shower before E woke up, then I fixed him breakfast and I've been madly dashing around the house ever since. We wanted to get Bogart's shots today, and when I got to the clinic I realized that I didn't have enough cash on me to cover the cost. Ethan demanded that I release him from my mommy death grip and flailed mercilessly as he tried to escape from his seat on my hip. "No. I need to hold you" I told him, which of course made him fight even harder. Take that with trying to keep my yippy, shit-talking dog under control and naturally you get the recipe for disaster. And one stressed out mama. I called Drew to tell him what was up, that I was going home, and he arranged for our babysitter to come stay with Ethan for half an hour while I took Bogart back to the vet. I feel like the worst mom ever. Like, get a grip and suck it up, you know? Also: it's that time of the month. Also: my car is in the shop to have the a/c looked at, and of course (OF COURSE!) the diagnostic computers are suddenly down today, so they have to keep it till Monday or later. Fuck. I love my family, love my job, love my friends... love my life, basically. But it's all those little things, life's little splinters, that make me crazy. And when I get like 5 or 6 splinters in one hand at the same time, well... ouch.

OK! I'm done whining! My car will be fixed and B has his shots and I'll switch to super absorbant tampons or whatever. Everything will be fine. That's my problem though. I totally get frazzled and hyper, not unlike my least favorite dog the poodle, when I have a million things on my plate. I have trouble seeing the bigger picture sometimes and I tend to overreact and freak out instead of taking things in stride. I honestly have a doctor appointment in 2 weeks to see about getting back on Wellbutrin for anxiety. I don't even like taking an Advil for a headache, but I really think a little something-something would help me relax and keep Drew from filing for divorce before we reach our 2-year anniversary.

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I just put E down for a nap. Tonight we're grilling burgers and watching movies. D will drink Corona Extra and I will drink Merlot. I think it will be a nice, relaxing night and I'm really looking forward to it.

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Drew just texted me saying that he just shot a nail straight through his finger. SEE WHAT I MEAN? When it rains it pours, man. MUST FIND UMBRELLA.

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I've been consistently kicking ass with my workouts. I'm really, REALLY proud of myself! I know lots of women who would've used going back to work, having a small child, a house to keep up with, etc. etc. etc. as excuses to slack on the exercise front, but I really crave working out after work. Exercising in the evenings is really working for me. (At least SOMETHING is going right.) (Pity party much?) I have relaxed my diet a bit, and I find that working out hard and consistently (especially lifting weights), lets me get away with more "cheating" food-wise. I think I'm still losing (very slowly), but I love that I can EAT and still look good. When I eat more and lift, I really notice my muscles filling out and I feel strong and much more energetic. My whole life it's been all or nothing, grilled chicken or a vat of crisco, lettuce and cottage cheese or an entire cheesecake. Now I feel like I'm somewhere in the middle, and it's a very nice place to be even if it means that the extra junk in my trunk sticks around a bit longer. (I put on a denim skirt from last summer today, and it is huge! It's stretchy material, so still wearable, but the only thing keeping it up is the jiggle in my wiggle. Can we say BOO-TAY!?) Anyway, things are good where body-image, food and exercise are concerned.

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Something is wrong with our digital camera. I think it needs a new battery. And that is why, my friends, there are no new pics up. How you can go another minute without laying your eyes on the cuteness that is my now 15-month old baby boy, I just don't know. But I'll do my best to ensure that you get your fix asap. (He's cute, yes... illegally so. But I'm starting to feel like I'm out of my league here with some of the shit he's been pulling lately. He's in daycare all week and learns all sorts of new tricks, and then on Saturday when it's just the two of us he puts on his magic hat and outdoes me in every category imaginable.) I think my 1-year old is smarter than me.

Thursday

Hello there! How YOU doin'? Man, I swear... all my favorite bloggers started posting much more frequently since I'm no longer sitting at home all day anxiously awaiting another post. Gone are the days when I could put Ethan down for a nap, grab a cuppa green tea and prop my bare feet up on the table while lazily reading about other people's lives, the majority of whom I'm never even met. Now I hardly even know what the hell is going on in my own life. But I swear this will not be another post where I waste time and whine about how busy I am. (I started school to finish out my Associate of Science degree to top off the working out, working full-time, being a mom and wife and dog owner and cleaning and cooking and generally losing what was left of my freaking mind.) (Heh, ASS of SCIENCE degree. Heh!) (LAME.)

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Ethan got his pic taken professionally at daycare yesterday. They had this easter/spring theme with bunnies, REAL LIVE BUNNIES, and I'm dying to see how they turned out. Am also quite relieved to know that Ethan didn't try to eat/bite/beat the poor rabbit. I wonder how many bunnies they had for these pictures? That furry little guy is probably in some serious therapy right now after a full day of being held by young children, one right after another.
Also, I'm the worst mother EVER. This is the first time we've had E professionally photographed. 15 months later, and the only reason we did it was because it was being done without us having to do much more than write a check and drop him off at daycare per usual. Sad. That Mother of the Year award is really starting to rust.

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Did you all know that my sister Bonnie is a belly dancer? If you're on myspace, find Bonnie on my friends list and click to her page immediately. She's got a short video of her recent bellydancing performance on her page, and you simply must watch how she works it. Talent! Passion! Dancing! (Also, an extremely and NATURALLY flat belly, which, gah. Not fair.) She'll be famous one day.

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I was buying some disks for school today after a run at the gym, and I saw a mother in the check-out line over giving her baby, who couldn't have been any older than E, diet Dr. Pepper. I'll admit that I am an avid diet soda drinker. Diet Mountain Dew, Diet Barq's and Diet Pepsi Jazz Caramel Cream are my faves... but doesn't that poor kid have the rest of his life to pump himself full of chemicals, artificial sweeteners and carbonation? Isn't that what college is for?

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I went to an Indian food buffet with my co-worker and her husband today for lunch. I had one plate of only what I really wanted, plus a small serving of bread & rice pudding for dessert. We finished at around 1:20 pm or so, and I ran at 4:15. I was still full and belching up ghee like a maniac as I pounded on the treadmill, and at around minute 21:42 or so I got THE WORST PAIN in my belly. I had to stop running. I walked briskly at a steep incline until the pain subsided, but man. That was scary. Can you imagine if I'd spewed a plateful of various Indian grub all over myself, the treadmill, and the people behind me? Actually, that would be hilarious if it weren't me. I'll go now.

Friday!

Well, helllllllllllllllllllllllllllllo! I just consumed the biggest sundae you have EVER SEEN. Ever. My rationalization for doing so:

It's Friday.

PMS.

If I DON'T let myself have it I will only end up eating half the kitchen this weekend and then I'll go and get the damn sundae anyway. Because quite frankly, that's what PMS does to me. It literally turns me into a mad woman, one that will stop at NOTHING to get her hands on something sweet and carbohydrate-laden. I've been eyeing the evil Marble Slab Creamery down the road ever since I started my job a month ago, and today I decided that ice cream would solve all my problems. And it DID! AMAZING! I am now as happy as a felon freshly released from prison, and as high as (from the sugar, mind you) the drug-dealer on his way in.

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Yesterday I decided to brave the treadmill at my gym for the very first time. Treadmills scare me. I always have to look down at my feet because I feel like I could be violently flung from the mighty, rotating belt at any moment. Does this feeling go away the more you use it? I hope so. Anyway, my goal was a thirty minute workout. 5 minutes warming up with a fast-paced walk, then alternating between walking and jogging for 20 minutes, then finishing out with a 5 minute cool down. My initial goal was to jog for 5 minutes straight. I gave myself a pep talk during the warm up (You can DO THIS, Sara. Just 5 minutes, then you can walk...), and 20 minutes later it was time for my cool down. I totally high-fived myself like eighteen times. I ran for over 20 straight minutes! Also, I finally decided that I don't hate running. I plan on doing it at least once a week, in addition to step aerobics and the elliptical machine. My new goal is 25 minutes straight, then 30, and I'll increase in 5 minute increments until I am running constantly, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. How's THAT for a goal?

I feel some soreness coming on in my hips, thighs, lower abs and butt, RIGHT where my "trouble spots" are. This is good. Trouble spots, be gone! 'Course, I'm sure I wiped out all the calories I burned running yesterday with today's ginormous ice cream pig-fest, but I feel no guilt. No shame. A girl can eat ice cream AND run, can't she? That girl is me. Nice to meet you.

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My job is going well, oh so well! You know how most of the time when something is good, almost TOO good? And then you wait for something to go wrong, almost so you can say SEE, I KNEW IT. (That's probably just me. Bitter, cynical and negative in every way about everything, all at the tender age of 27. But this way I'm rarely dissappointed! I'm not pessimistic, I'm just SMART, you bloody smiling fools! Wipe that skittles and rainbows grin off your naive little mug!) Well, things just get better and better here. I really love it. Honestly I look forward to coming to work. That has NEVER been the case before. I didn't think work could EVER be something to look forward to. (See? Pleasant surprise! Set your expectations low and you can't go wrong!)

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My mom, her boyfriend, his son and my two (twin) brothers are coming to stay with us tonight through Monday. I'm so super excited, though the fact that there will be a total of 8 people staying in our tiny, TINY, teensy weeny eeny TINY MINIATURE house makes me want to climb the walls and pick at imaginary scabs on my arms, but it will be a great time no matter what. There's a big St. Patty's Day parade and party tomorrow, loads of wine and such for tomorrow night (red wine + me + my mom = good freaking times, always), a possible trip to New Orleans on Sunday, and then dinner at my inlaws house Sunday night. My mom will be BLOWN AWAY by how big and PERSON-like Ethan is now. I can't wait for her to see him teeter around the house and play with his bouncy ball and eat rocks and smash food in his hair and count to ten and call everything in a sippy cup "juice" even if it's water or milk. He melts my heart into an exhausted puddle of goo every single day, and I know it kills her to be so far away from him. It kills me, too. She helped me so much when E was a screaming bundle of anything but JOY, and now that we're at this fun, interactive, turbo-development stage she's not around to enjoy it. (Note to family: MOVE TO LOUISIANA, PRONTO!)

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I will absolutely be posting a million and one pictures this weekend. GET READY. Enjoy your weekend! I'll drink some wine for each and every one of you.

(What no drinking rule? Did I enforce a no drinking rule? What no drinking rule?)

Wednesday

Hump day! (Heeeeee, heeheehee, heeeeeeeeeeeheeeeeeeeee! HUMP.) Ahem. Anyway! Here it is the middle of the week and I'm just now catching up with all my fave-o blogs. Gah! Not to mention that I am seriously slacking ass with my own blog. (Heh, slacking ass.)

I had so many good things to tell you! Random thoughts, silly observations, and at one point I'm quite sure I had figured out the meaning of life. Now, of course, I can't remember any of it. (Probably lucky for you, but I'm kind of bummed.) Instead I'll tell you how freaking BUSY I am these days. How the mornings unfold the exact same way each and every day, and by the clock we stomp around the house like robots. I pray that Ethan doesn't rub too much strawberry cereal bar into his hair (which would set us back an extra couple of minutes and cause a serious toddler fit that would set us back another few minutes... time is precious, precious I say!) (oh, and I KNOW I need to get some new pics up! E is too cute with this short haircut. This weekend, I promise. So please! Check back! Where are you going?). In the evenings I work out, half-way clean the house, pick out tomorrow's clothing for E and myself, pack my lunch, get the coffee maker ready, pack my gym bag, eat dinner, feed E, give E a bath (which he is HATING these days, no lie. You'd think I was submerging him into a tub full of rattlesnakes or something, the way he screams when I wash his freaking hair. Today I had to promise him a brand new car to get him to shut the hell up.), watch t.v., spend some quality time with D and then crash out by 10 p.m. because I must be up at 5 a.m. to rinse rinse rinse and repeat. Anyway, if you have a moment of free time during the day, pause to think of my busy ass and genuinely enjoy your few precious moments of solitude and nothingness.

Oh! I read somewhere that tomorrow Starbucks is giving away free 12 oz. coffees. Check up on it. I'm too busy to find out the bloody details, donchaknow. Free caffeine! What could be better?

Boo!

My sis and her fiance just left. Noooo! Their visit went by way too quickly and I miss them again already. *sigh* My mom and company are coming next Friday, so I have that to look forward to.

Today we braved the mall and got Ethan's very first professional haircut. 'Bout time! It's short but it looks really cute and makes his face appear rounder. I love it! This means that I no longer have to spend 15 minutes wiping peanut butter from his curls. Awesome. Ethan was a mess during the cut, but the stylist was super cool and told me that he was actually being good compared to most kids. (Of course that was a total LIE, but I pretended to believe her.) Anyway, now our baby doesn't look like we picked him up off the street corner. Horray!

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Going out last night wasn't the big sha-bang I expected it to be. We got to the bar too early, they got my sister's order wrong (her PLAIN burger came with the works.... it really seems like ordering something PLAIN is the hardest order to actually get right, oddly enough), D decided to get an impulse tattoo but the tat shop was booked for the rest of the night (probably a good thing, a SIGN to NOT get MY NAME tattooed on his arm... we'd have been divorced by this afternoon, because you know that's just how those things go), but then we headed to down town Baton Rouge where they were filming a movie! My inner star-struck kid sprang to life and I made D park so we could all walk AS CLOSE AS POSSIBLE to see the action. We stood there talking to a rather friendly security guard about fifteen feet away from the set. It was soooo coooool! There were people walking around with food trays, offering snacks to the people on set, and they yelled action and cut and quiet on the set, etc. I giddily bounced from foot to foot to get the best view possible, because surely Brad Pitt would walk out any minute. I honestly don't think there were any really big names in the flick, but it was the real movie-shootin' deal and it was kewl with a capital K just the same.

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I joined a gym! It's a women's gym about 3 minutes from my office. They have other facilities in the area that are for men AND women, but this particular gym is chicks only. I love it. I can't wait to incorporate the treadmill and elliptical and rowing machine into my regime, not to mention all the classes they offer. Spinning! Ultimate fat burner! Advanced step! Body bar! Yoga! I am very, VERY excited. My goal is to go three times a week after work when D picks up the bebe, and then I'll do 2 total body weight workouts at home each week and an additional cardio workout or two on the weekends. Sweetness. I've been working out consistently as ever, but I must admit that I'm growing tired of doing step aerobics and kickboxing in my living room while Ethan impatiently waits in his highchair. This will add some much needed variety and a welcome change of scenery.

Saturday!

Horraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! The weekend! E got up at 6 a.m. just as I expected, my sister and I did a kick-ass kickboxing workout while he ate breakfast, my sister watched him while I took a shower (this is a total luxury weekend with built in toddler-wrangling assistance!), right now everyone is napping (except for me, of course), and the air is crisp and the sky is sunny and I love the way these jeans fit me. PERFECT DAY. Of course, it's only 9 a.m., so I won't hold my breath.

Tonight my sister, her fiance, Drew and I are going to this college-town bar in Baton Rouge called The Caterie. D's parents used to go there when they were 18 years old, and his mom brought him there when he was Ethan's age. A few weeks ago we brought Ethan there for cheese sticks and buffalo wings (and a beer for daddy, of course), and it was neat to think about D sitting at the same table 21 years ago. (It was neat? Who says NEAT? Crickey.) Anyway, we're going there tonight to play foose ball and pool and drink beer and eat greasy goodness. I'm looking forward to it. Tomorrow we are getting Ethan's hair cut because he's seriously starting to look like Ronald McDonald, only without the creepy face paint. I'm sad to see his curls go, but the kid looks wiley. Cute, but in a rugged sort of way. Also, this constant stream of snot that has planted itself on my boy's face from nose to upper lip is bullshit. Ever since he started daycare he's been a walking sinus infection. The shoulders of all my shirts are coated with a clear crust that really brings out my eyes. I don't know what it is about me that screams Kleenex!, but I actually get a little scared when I see him walking towards me with a face full of snot because I know he's about to wipe it on some part of my clothing. (Do I share too much?) (Don't you think I'm sexy?)

So anyway. What a bunch of rambling nonsense. This is what happens when you don't spend all day at home writing in your blog. You start to suuuuuuuuuuck. All apologies.

Sunday

D left this morning to fly to Washington D.C. for a few days for a research group, so I'm left doing the single-parenting schtick until Wendesday morning. So far so good, but it's only been a few hours. There's a chance that I'll be flying to Florida for a week in the next couple of months for my job, so I guess I can suck it up knowing he'll have to do it then. Currently his majesty is napping, but earlier he threw every toy he owns across the living room floor, had a massive number two diaper that burned my eyelashes, dropped his peanut butter and jelly sandwich piece by piece from his highchair with smug disapproval, wiped his runny nose on every inch of my clothing, sat patiently in his stroller while we went for a mile-long walk, spent 5 straight minutes asking to go outside again, ("outside, outside, outside, outside, outside..."), crushed goldfish crackers into the living room rug and threw a fit when I tried to fold a massive pile of laundry. The last few days Ethan has taken to hitting me. He'll slam his sippy cup full of juice into my face, slap me with his chubby little paw, sometimes even pimp slap me when we're out in public. At first this really caught me by surprise. He could tell it bothered me, so of course he kept doing it. Now when he decides that mama needs a little slapping around I immediately grab his arms, look him in the eye and say very firmly, "No. No hitting. That hurts mommy" and then he tries not to smile and does it again. I do the NO thing a couple of times and then I try to distract him with a song or a bottle of windex. I didn't think a 1-year old could count to ten (surprise!) and I also didn't think a 1-year old would hit his mother and enjoy it. I guess we need to start thinking about discipline a bit more, but waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. I don't wanna! I don't wanna have to deal with that shit. We don't want to spank, we don't want to count to 3, we don't want to threaten with belts or spoons or whatever else people use to swat their kids with... we just want Ethan to be good. So. Maybe we'll just let him do whatever he wants, whenever he wants. Yes. Sounds good to me! (I'm totally signing up to be on Super Nanny.)

Hey there!

I can't tell you how nice it is to once again appreciate the weekend. The weekend quickly loses meaning when you're a stay-at-home mom, at least it did for me, because every day starts to run together into one big day of diapers and windex and drool. Now I get excited about Friday and really enjoy being at home, junk t.v., a random 10 minutes to surf the net. I really miss having all-day un-monitored internet access. I'm behind on all my favorite blogs, which is almost like missing a new episode of a favorite t.v. show. Sometimes I stop and wonder gah, I wonder what's new with Sundry? And Skwigg! She just had surgery, how's she recovering? Or Sara, who just published an article on her site about how she pulled herself out of dieting hell. Or Kek, who always has something interesting to say and is really good about posting frequently. I missed nearly 7 episodes of Kek! Anyway, now I sort of see just how bad my blog addiction was. Scary. But I swear I'm going through withdrawal.

I have internet access at work and am on the company's intranet and outlook email all day, but I'm scared to venture outside of anything work related. I love my job too much to risk getting in trouble. Mornings are spent getting everyone ready for the day, afternooons are for doing cardio and spending time with Ethan, and evenings are dedicated to Drew, lifting weights and t.v. While Drew is cooking dinner I usually hop on to delete the eighteen thousand junk emails that have accumulated over the course of the day, but by the time I'm finished Drew is barking at me to get off the computer or die. Life is pretty good right now, so I silently obey. I'll figure something out.

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I looked at Ethan yesterday and nearly lost my mind. He is a little boy. He loves outside and would spend every minute outdoors on a nice day, and he toddles around the yard eating rocks and riding his little bike. The sun makes his hair shine like silk, highlighting the reds and blondes intertwined with his honey brown curls. His eyes are big and bright, his cheeks are full and soft (oh so soft!), his teeth are white and big and plentiful. (He's got like 14 freaking teeth now. Bring on the beef jerky and the taffy, thankyaverymuch.) He has the biggest belly I have ever seen, and it protrudes three feet in front of the rest of his body. I've been telling everyone that he's 13 months, and this afternoon it occured to me that no, he turned 14 months last week. Time is flying.

Did you know that Ethan can count to 10? I find this fascinating, especially since we did not teach him how. What parents thinks yes, he is one year old now, so we should start drilling numbers into his head. I didn't think babies were capable of counting at such a young age. He learned it from watching Dora, which totally makes me feel better about all the t.v. I let him watch when we were at home together all day before. And yes, I am totally bragging. If a 14 month old baby that can consistently and clearly count to ten (ok, sometimes he forgets the nine, but it's RARE) isn't amazing, I don't know what is. He is brilliant. He is a mathematical genius.

And I miss him.

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Wow, I have a 5-minute window of time to blog! AWESOME! I am really, REALLY busy these days. Duh, I know. Ethan had 4 teeth come in at the same time, molars, and it nearly ended the world, tore famalies apart, casting woe unto all. Now the worst seems to be over. Thank you thank you thank you (but also: FUCK YOU) Teething Gods.

The job is still amazing, almost in a pinch me are you for real? kind of way. Everyone at the office is great, they love music and coffee and are just genuinely happy in their chosen careers. It's really refreshing and I leave every day aknowledging just how lucky I am to work there.

I'm still working out and it's easier to fit into my busy schedule than I thought it'd be. At the end of the day I am tired, but my body craves that post-exercise energy boost and I want to move and stretch and sweat. I've been getting 1 or 2 cardio workouts in during the week and 2 on the weekends, and I'm back to total-body strength training sessions which I do for an hour twice a week. Currently I'm doing the Muscle Max dvd and I absolutely love it.

What d'ya know. Ethan is throwing a fit because his daddy tried to brush his hair. Nice talking to ya.