I Need A Nanny. For Myself.

I locked myself out today, which wouldn't be all that notable had I not also locked the baby in.

Background: Baby Razor has been getting up between 5:30 and 6 a.m. for a week (instead of her usual 7:30ish). In theory I should be adjusted to this by now, but I'm still a tired wreck. But after a weekend of doing nothing, I was determined to get my ass in gear today.

So as soon as Baby Razor went down for her nap, I dragged our new patio set out onto the porch and set about assembling it. I figured I'd take a shower after I finished, so I left my PJs on. It was hot and the sun was right on top of me, so after putting the table together I decided to take a break before putting the umbrella up.

That, of course, was when I realized the door was locked. Okay, I thought, I have the tool kit. It can't be that hard to break into a house when you've got a shit-ton of tools, can it? YES. IT CAN. I tried unscrewing the storm window. Turns out it's also screwed in on the inside and painted to the side of the house. I tried picking the lock. Yeah, the producers of Supernatural will be getting a stern letter from me, because that shit is WAY harder than they make it look. I tried to bite the bullet and break the glass on the back door with a hammer. No go--it's apparently shatterproof. Which is good from a homeowner standpoint, but bad from a crazy, locked-out mother standpoint.

I psyched myself up to go next door and ask to use the phone. In my pajamas. Barefoot. Braless. It's okay! I know my neighbors! They're a really nice older couple. They were not home. All right. The family across the street? Nope. My friends down the block? Nobody there.

By this time I'd been outside for nearly an hour. I was starting to panic, covered in sweat, still barefoot and braless, and knocking on strangers' doors. I finally got an answer four doors down from my house, from a woman I'd smiled at a few times but never talked to. She let me use her phone to call Mr. Razor, who pretty much lost his shit, not that I blame him. In fact, while trying to find his mother's work number, he accidentally disconnected me.

As I was redialing, my neighbor was like, "So, I have some things to do? Errands to run?" Yeah, she clearly wanted the sweaty, frantic, half-dressed stranger out of her kitchen as soon as possible. I told the mister to get ahold of his mother, who has a key and works five minutes from our house, and I'd be on the back porch.

Then I waited. It was only about fifteen minutes, but I kept imagining I could hear the baby crying for me, which was pretty much the worst feeling in the world. I have never been so happy to see my mother in law. She opened the door, observed that our plants looked good and the baby didn't seem to be crying, promised to buy us one of those fake rocks for our extra key, and left.

I don't even remember closing the door and going upstairs to the baby's room. Baby Razor was standing there with her arms hanging over the edge of the crib, dry-eyed and singing to herself. When I walked in she looked at me like, What the crap, Mama. I've got a poopy diaper here. I managed to get her to the changing table before bursting into tears and dripping all over her.

Then, of course, I told twitter what a dipshit I am. And thank god I did, because my friends were like, pssh, that's nothing. My mother forgot me at home/left me in the car/accidentally knocked me down the stairs and I turned out fine! They really did. None of them have meth labs in their basement or anything.

So I guess the moral of the story is that no matter how good or careful a mother you are, you will occasionally do something horrendously stupid.

That's not reassuring, is it? How about this one instead: Try to limit your major parental fuck-ups to the kid's toddlerhood, which she won't remember anyway. That's useful advice, anyway.

Apocalypse Now

(Photo via Sushiesque, who spotted this RV in Harvard Square this morning.)

All right, I have to talk about this whole Rapture thing. In case you've somehow managed to avoid the worldwide media blitz, there's a fringe Christian group that has spent bonkers money to make everyone aware that God will be playing favorites on Saturday and bodily yanking His Chosen up to Heaven. The unsaved, of course, will not be allowed to continue on their merry way, but will suffer and die horribly in a series of epic natural disasters until God gets bored and destroys the earth in October, sending all the Unsaved to eternal damnation in Hell.

That's Family Radio's version, anyway. I think it's based on the Apocalypse in the Book of Revelation, but they're not emphasizing all the four horsemen and anti-christ stuff, which sucks, because that stuff is amazing. PSA: If you've never read the Book of Revelation, you really should no matter what your belief or non-belief system. I read it in college, and the best way to describe its effect is that I had to pause every couple of pages to re-affirm that I had not accidentally ingested a massive amount of drugs.

I read it for a class about millennial apocalypse predictions. I learned that early Christians thought the Second Coming was imminent, which was good for them, since they were being horribly persecuted. End Times cults got popular again around 1,000 AD, maybe because it was a round number, maybe because it was The Dark Ages. So we've gone from I'd like to be raptured so I don't get fed to lions to I'd like to be raptured to leave my short, squalid life to I'd like to be raptured because ...what? "I don't like the gays"? "Those Mexicans frighten me"? Your guess is as good as mine.

Anyway. Everyone is having fun with the latest prediction. I've heard of Rapture parties, people planning to release blow up dolls filled with helium at the appointed hour (6 pm, your local time), leaving piles of clothes and shoes in random public places, and, of course, the ever-popular post-Rapture looting. Of course, maybe I shouldn't be laughing too hard. Remember Y2K? I didn't sell all my worldly possessions or anything, but I had a few extra cases of water on hand, just in case the computers did...whatever it is they were going to do. I was never really clear on that, honestly.

I actually have a Secret Apocalypse Plan, just in general. (Oh, don't look at me like that. You do too, even if you call it your "Emergency Plan" or whatever.) It's not a very good plan. Mostly it involves strapping Baby Razor to my back with a bed sheet, deciding what we have that can be bartered for food, and rounding up all of our garbage bag twistie-ties, because, seriously, those things can do anything. I think I'll have them handy on Saturday, just in case.

Someday She'll Say She Doesn't Have The Patience For Me Either

Yesterday morning, I heard myself saying, "I do not have the patience for this, Baby Razor!" as she shrieked at me for no apparent reason. I started laughing before I even got to the end of the sentence. I can't be sure, but it knowing myself and my mother, it definitely sounds like one of those things I heard a lot during my early childhood, along with "Come back here!" and "Don't touch anything!"

It made me laugh because, really, what kind of a ridiculous threat is "I don't have the patience for this?" What was I going to do? Leave? "All right kid, you're on your own. Have fun figuring out how to open the fridge!"

So I sang a "Grumpy" song to drown out her whining and got her some ham & cheese.

But it got me thinking about other phrases I heard from my parents as a kid. "Sugar!" was a favorite. I think I was in college before I realized that it was their swear-substitute. Thank goodness they had one, because it got used all the time.

"This is not a democracy!" was my father's favorite, sometimes followed by "It's a benevolent dictatorship," a point teenage me liked to argue with sarcasm, which always led to "Quit being facetious, you!" I still hear that one, usually when I'm visiting them and arguing with Fox News.

These days, I hear myself repeating the phrases Baby Razor will remember. "This is not a democracy" has morphed into, "Do you have a vote here? No." And I gave my girl a first and middle name combo that's seven syllables long partially in an attempt to avoid yelling her full name when I'm annoyed at her. But I totally use what came after the full-name treatment, the most spine-chilling phrase of my youth: "I'm only going to say this once."

Of course I realize now that my parents were, for the most part, totally blowing smoke. They were never actually going to lock me in the basement if I got caught underage drinking. But they'd spent enough years putting down whatever they were doing and taking us home, or turning off the tv and sending us to our rooms that we had no idea they were bluffing on the bigger stuff. Or, as my sister put it when her son was a toddler, "The key is to be really badass when they're little, before they figure out you have no idea what you're doing."

Mother's Day 2011, Featuring Morris Dancing!

All right, I admit it: I barely know what morris dancing is. But for some reason once I read that it was to be featured at the Arnold Arboretum's Lilac Sunday festivities today, I was all excited for it. Possibly because I love archaic British things (I was a Medieval Lit major, after all), and possibly because an anonymous commenter on my favorite cranky townie website, Universal Hub, claimed that "we fought a couple of wars to be rid of" it. Yes, that's right: the British burned down the White House in 1814 because Americans no longer wanted to dance around with hankies and sticks.

We ran into the morris dancers almost as soon as we entered the Arboretum. Baby Razor loved them, so we watched for awhile and I took pictures:

Morris musician!

Leaping!

Twirling!

These are the Ladies of the Rolling Pin

I liked their costumes

My geeky heart also enjoyed their Green Man.

I loved seeing all the families out enjoying themselves.

And I might be a little biased, but...

I'm pretty sure this was the cutest kid there.

Thrift Shop Buy of the Week

For Melanie at BBCAmericanGirl, pictures of the vintage Liberty of London silk scarf I got for $1 today at Boomerangs. I'd love to get an idea of how old it is, if any of you might know.

A Confession

(Why don't I own this book?)


I would love to tell you that I've been MIA because I won the lottery and am now writing to you from a private villa on Bora Bora, but the truth is that something in my wrist popped while I was doing yard work this weekend and I've been trying to rest it. Sadly, Baby Razor doesn't understand that I can't pick her up and clings to my leg until I manage to shake her off break down and pick her up while going, "OW" and hoping eventually she'll catch on.

This weekend, the hubby and I spent five hours in our postage-stamp-size back yard and managed to take it from "disgraceful" to "kind of sad." We want the kid to have somewhere to run around and we want to have people over without being embarrassed, but holy hell, we are not plant people. Actual conversation:

"These are weeds, right?"
"I don't know. How do you tell?"
"They look...weedy?"
"No, look, they're planted in a pattern."
"Oh. So I should stop raking over them?"

Thankfully, we had beer. And during our lunch break, we visited the Staff Meal food truck for a meatloaf & bacon sandwich (him), headcheese & pecorino sandwich (me) and arepa with watermelon slaw (split). My non-expert review is that they were delicious, filling, and cheap. I'm looking forward to going again, perhaps to try the foie gras baklavah.

Ah, guys, I wish I had something more entertaining to write about than my weekend, but the truth is that adulthood has been kicking my ass lately. We made a list of big projects for the spring and all of a sudden, oh shit, it's spring! We need to get grass and rakes and paint and sandpaper and figure out what to do with them. Meanwhile, I'm also trying to figure out how to work while simultaneously keeping Baby Razor from banging her head into things. I don't know how to do it all.

Do you know? CAN YOU TELL ME?

Well, until I figure it out I'll take solace in a friend's recent Facebook status: [Friend] is dreading the day when the kids are no longer excited about fruit salad and toast for dinner and turn to me and say "Really Mom? You didn't go food shopping AGAIN????" Yup. That about sums it up.

Amusing Word Choice of the Day

(So then I said, "You don't even control oil in the T-zone! Hard labor for you!")


(Originally titled "Typo of the Day," but a little research changed that.)

Skimming the Benefit website for more beautifully-packaged, expensive shit to put on my face, I decided to read the FAQ for their new skincare line. Yes, I'm the nerd who reads FAQs, even when I know that they are not really frequently asked questions. Anyway, I came across this (bolding mine):

What’s the ideal order or routine of the skincare collection? What do I start with?
You can mix & match the collection with your current regime but one example of using the products together is: remove it makeup remover, foamingly clean facial wash, refined finish facial polish, either total moisture facial cream or triple performing facial emulsion, it’s potent! eye cream, ultra radiance facial re-hydrating mist (although mist can be used any time throughout the day).

Regime! I love it! I am now picturing my soap & exfoliator as tiny dictators in aviator sunglasses and sailor caps, ruling the sink-top with an iron dispenser pump. The tubes tell me that "regime" is actually an accepted synonym of "regimen," but is that going to stop me from imagining that my Sephora samples are fomenting revolution in my make-up drawer right now? No, it is not.

Worst. Beauty Product Review. Ever.

***ATTN: More JEM adventures later this week! Less WTF, more Girl Power, karate, and PRINCESSES.***

When I decided to come back to blogging, I thought about focusing on one subject as a way of differentiating myself from the eight million other personal blogs out there. The following exchange pretty much defines why I couldn't do it:

Me: I am in a total froth over [a well-meaning but clueless essay to which I am not linking but which contained the sentence "Sometimes I pretend I am black."]

Jasmine: Understandable. SOMETIMES I PRETEND I AM BLACK.

Me: Yet I am also totally admiring the gorgeous packaging of the moisturizer I just bought. I am large. I contain multitudes.

That's right: I quoted Walt Whitman while talking about racism and beauty products. I am shallow, socially aware, AND snobby.

Anyway. Look at the pretty packaging:




It's nice stuff--smells good, makes my skin soft. Yes, it's hideously overpriced. I was going to try to justify spending that much money, but it boils down to: sometimes I just like putting expensive shit on my face, okay?

"It's Your Fault!" Friday

The first unofficial thing new mothers learn is that, no matter what happens, It's Your Fault. Can't nurse? Your fault. Colicky kid? Your fault. Dingo stole your baby? Your fault.

In what I would love to be a one-off, but will surely become a reoccurring feature, I present this week's societal F You's to moms everywhere. To get yourself in the proper frame of mind, go read these unsolicited comments to parents and know that every mother I know has heard a variation of at least two of them.

1) Hey, remember how your doctor told you to eat lots of fruit when you were pregnant? Well, I hope you had access to 100% organic, free-range, picked-by-virgins fruit, because otherwise your kid is doomed to be a moron. What's that? You're a migrant worker? Sorry, you're fucked.

2) Okay, you've cut out pesticide-treated fruit. You're all set, right? Nope! Put down those Cheetos or your kid will be fat and it will be All Your Fault. The headline of that article is actually "Your Mom Is Why You're Fat."

Okay, I realize these are scientific studies controlling for a very specific set of circumstances and testing one small part of the zillions of things that affect intelligence and weight, but the way they're reported and the way they filter into the culture is as DON'T EAT THAT APPLE OR YOUR KID WILL BE DUMB and DON'T EAT THOSE MCNUGGETS OR YOUR KID WON'T BE ABLE TO SEE HIS FEET.

Finally, 3) kind of breaks my heart. I adore Neko Case and, in fact, sang her songs to my infant to stay awake during late night feedings when I was so tired I was afraid I was going to pass out, keel over, and smother Baby Razor with my boobs. Then she went and tweeted this:

Parents of SF; your child walks AND talks, get it out of the fucking stroller!!! Ick!

It was a joke. I get that it was a joke. But as the parent of a walking, talking child who enjoys nothing more than darting out into busy intersections, it didn't make me laugh so much as it made me grind my teeth. And when I let her roam free? People ask me why she isn't in a stroller. So, Neko, I love you beyond all reason, but kindly STFU.

Self-Promotion

I'm working today in an actual office. On the one hand, there is no natural light; but on the other, nobody has pooped their pants. So far.

In lieu of my adventures in corporate America, here's some writing I did for the Boston Phoenix's Best Reader's Poll 2011:

Best Local Nonprofit
Best Barbecue
Best Burgers
Best Gluten-Free Menu
Best Pies Vs. Cupcakes
Best Restaurant, Romantic

This was very much not a case of writing for the paycheck. I honestly love and recommend all of these places. I'm just sad that I didn't get to do the Boomerangs write-up too. Although given how much of my home is decorated with pieces scavenged from there, it's entirely possible my write-up would have been, "It's terrible. Don't go there. MORE FOR ME, MWA HA HA HA."