Looking for a New Car?

....may I recommend the Skoda Fabia?

The Food Critic: Hank Rates Rasberries A+

Hank has gotten weird about food lately. He used to eat anything and everything - especially if it was from my plate or Baby Daddy's plate. But these days he's become kinda finicky and just wants to nurse a lot. I think that I might have stumbled on a good thing though: frozen raspberries. He loves them, and I think that they're a pretty good snack too. The little seed/segment thingies break apart pretty easily so he can't choke on them and they are great straight out of the bag or dropped into some yogurt or cottage cheese. Yum!

Ten Word Tuesday: Clothes Call

While perusing the goods at Target the other night (let me just say that I adore the Dollar Spot when you walk in the door...) I was fairly surprised to see a man and a woman shopping together in hats, gloves and a down coat each. Their attire wasn't what surprised me though. The fact that it was about 35 degrees outside and all the other shoppers and I were dressed as they were seemed to have little affect on the garb of their baby who was definitely in the range of under a year old. This baby was clothed in a shirt and pants. That's it. No hat. No gloves. No jacket even. Barefoot. I understand that sometimes babies can have severe diaper blow-outs (ask me about the Cracker Barrel incident sometime...), and that mean he's wearing whatever happens to be in the diaper bag. But in this case, I know that it didn't get all over his hat and then down into his shoes by way of a decent coat. I just wanted to ask those people what the heck is wrong with you??

I was reading on the babycenter.com website and stumbled across a blog post where a woman basically takes issue with the same thing I do:

I can not understand, for the life of me, why I see parents outside, when it is cold, in a winter coat and gloves and their children in a shirt, NO COAT or gloves. Is there a scientific explanation behind this? I go to my daughter's daycare and mom and dad will come in to scoop up baby with a coat, gloves and a hat on, but, just throw baby in the carseat, with no hat or anything. For kids that are older, I don't want to hear "he didn't want to put his coat on..." make him!!!

If it's a toddler protesting your wardrobe choice, I would go a step further and ask is it because you are afraid to upset your child and have him/her think you're a mean old ogre? Well, Hank seems to think that I am a mean old ogre and his chance at a fun-filled life is over every time I close the baby gate on the stairs or when I strap him into his car seat and refuse to let him drive. He get's over it quickly though. His average is about 3.14159 seconds.

And so, in keeping with past tradition, I ask you to reply in exactly ten words, no more, and no less, do you feel that if you are bundled, your children should be as well? Or, are you a culprit of the above and explain why??

Example: My child is actually verging on being over-dressed normally. or Who is driving this bus? Spank him if you must.

Abbr. Update

Since I last posted, we:

• Packed up our place in Houston
• Moved all our worldly possessions to Bay City
• Lived with my mother-in-law for a month
• We had our fourth wedding anniversary
  
• Will got a job in Dallas
• Will went to Dallas to start work while I stayed in BC with my MIL (since our new apartment wasn't ready yet and he stayed at my grandma's)
• We bought a "new" car - and paid cash for it! Dave Ramsey and Suze Orman would be proud!
  
• We drove to Louisiana for Thanksgiving to spend with the Harrisons
• Hank had his first birthday
• We moved all of our worldly possessions to Dallas
  
• I had my ..... birthday
• Will, Blake, and I hoisted a beastly heavy sofa over the porch railing to our second story living room since it wouldn't fit up the stairs - in 30 degree weather (where's the global warming when you need it? Oh, yeah: that's crap anyway...)
• Hank has four molars now - they're coming through as I type...

I will try to post some pictures later and try to be better about updating this!

The Newest News

Today Will got laid off. "Nothing personal, just business".

There aren't any posted listings for immigration attorneys here, so who knows what's next?

A Promise of More

It has been an interesting several weeks. I don't even really know how many weeks it's been. I would have to look it up. Hold on a sec, I'm going to check - I'll be right back.................................Okay, thanks for waiting. I also went to get a drink while I was gone. Sorry to make you hold for so long.

So it's really only been just over a month, but it feels like a lot longer. So much has happened. I'm sure a lot has happened for you too and it's going to take me a while to read my blog roll. I'll probably have to set aside a few days for that. And some of you post everyday! I might not get to them all. So much to do.

I have been gone since my last post. I just got home yesterday. I'm not one of those people who really carry on with their life when I go out of town. Is that weird? Probably. When I'm gone, I'm gone. I barely check my voicemail, let alone my email, and forget about blogs! I have a hard enough time posting when I'm home. I am an unfaithful blogger. Or, to make it sound more poositive, I could just say that wherever I am, I am fully present there. Let's just leave it at that, shall we?

I got a new computer (yay!) and it's making me nuts (boo!) that the keys on the keyboard are just slightly off from what I'm used to. You know that feeling? It sucks. But, I love this new machine. We'll just have to get used to each other, that's all.

Also, the kitty-without-a-name has a name now. Drum roll please.......no, wait. This deserves it's own post. That way the winner feels extra special. And so I can take a picture of the prize that I will mail to said winner when I finally make it to the post office. So check back soon!

In other news, hurricanes really suck. Really. And you probably didn't even know that we had a major and majorly devastating one hit us just a few weeks ago, did you? Kinda weird since we're still hearing about Katrina all these years later, but not much about Ike which just hit us weeks ago. We were among the few fortunate ones who didn't have any damage except a severely stinking fridge that smelled like hot death due to the lack of power for about three weeks. Yes, weeks. We have friends who count themselves fortunate that all they have to do is replace a few windows and a backyard fence. I know people who lost everything - nothing left. Proximity-wise, Galveston is to Houston what Flour Bluff is to Corpus Christi and what the Bronx is to Manhattan; they practically blend together. And there's really nothing left in Galveston. You can't drive anywhere here in H-town without seeing the ubiquitous blue FEMA roofs, or the wrecked fences, or the downed awnings over the gas staions, or the massive tree trunks missing it's tree and the roots exposed where it's been pried from the earth.

That's enough depressing news. Thank God that we made it through unscaithed, and that we're moving out of this apartment in just a few weeks! I know, my NYC friends who a reading this probably think that I'm nuts. It seems that for the last few years moving has been my hobby. But this place is terrible in the summer time on the electric bills - we're talking over $650. That was not a type-o. You see, our 1900 square feet uses a lot of air, and our eight 70x70 inch windows (plus the back door and front door) are very poorly sealed and the management won't do anything about it. It's time to move out. The bonus is that the place we found is walking distance to Will's office, and by "walking distance" I mean one block. From doorstep to desk is 7 minutes, including waiting for the elevator. How awesome is that?!? And, I get to paint again. I'm super excited about that. I just realized that I haven't posted any pictures of this place, so I will take some and post them soon, and then post some pics of the new place in the much nicer complex. I'll also be glad to have a dishwasher that washes the dishes instead of coating them and baking on a kitty litter-like substance. That really thrills me. I'm rambling. It's so bed time. It's past mid night now. Ugh.

One Cool Cat

Our cat, The Traveler, ironically enough, is usually the one to get left all alone when we go out of town. Now, if you've met him, you'll know him to be just about the most likeable, affectionate, and personable feline that you could ever hope to encounter. Whenever we get back from the store or from a weekend trip, he is waiting for us at the back door, follows us everywhere, and cries if we close the door to even go to the bathroom; not all the time, because that wouldn't be charming, it would be annoying. Only when we get home from a prolonged absence. So now you can kinda get the picture - we have an emotional eater. He gains weight when we go away. Poor guy.

We have been talking for a while about getting him a playmate, and I happened to catch an ad on the radio about the SPCA having an "Adoption Stimulous Package". That's a cute way of saying "take em, or they die". To make a long story shorter, we thought it was a good time to get a buddy for The Trav, and save $75 while at it.

Both of our cats are tuxedo cats, meaning that they have a black and white coat. But the new one is mixed with Siamese, so his markings are shaped kinda wierd, and his face is a little pinched looking. The Traveler has a really nice coat. His markings are very symetrical. Orderly. I like that. But our new kitty, eh, not so much. He's kind of scrappy looking. It's like we got The Trav at Neiman Marcus, and the new one came from the outlet, or maybe Big Lots. Don't get me wrong, I love Big Lots (sometimes), and I love our new kitty. He has tons of personality, and is super affectionate too. He must think he's a dog or maybe a really big cat because he follows me from room to room, sleeps at my feet, and lies in wait to attack The Trav like he's a lioness jumping a lone, disabled water buffalo calf.

So what to name him? I have a few ideas that I've been tossing around, but I haven't struck on one that really seems to fit him. We used to have a dog named Gringo (he had an impronounceable spanish name when we got him, and he was a welsh dog - not spanish, he's a gringo dog - "OH! How about Gringo?"), and I always thought that any subsequent pets that we might get should have similar caucasian racial epithetical names such as Honky or Cracker. Will doesn't think it's funny. I think Honky is a great name, especially since he's predominantly black. Oh, the irony. And names ending in "y" sound cute, too. Another name I was batting around is Vern. One sylable seems good for a cat. It's just there. The reason I picked Vern is because the guy who played Mini Me in Austin Powers is Verne Troyer, and the name Mini Me is way too obvious and unoriginal for a smaller cat that looks like the bigger one. Boring. Will likes the name The Vagabond since he was a homeless cat when we got him, and it continues the tradition of using an article to start the name. I don't really care for that name. It sounds like too much. We usually shorten the original cat's name to simply Trav (sounds like we might have struck on a name for Sarah Palin's next son...).

That's it. I'm out of ideas. So leave me a comment to cast your vote for the new cat's name. Or better yet, leave me a comment with an idea for a name, and if I chose that name for His Kittenness, you will recieve a prize. A surprise prize. It'll even be a surprise to me since I haven't decided what the prize will be.

So bring it.

Will, The Weekend Warrior

Did I ever mention how great my husband is? I didn't? Well, here's a great example of his awesomeness:
Will gets up on the weekends with Hank, feeds him, dresses him, plays with and reads to him, and lets me sleep in till around dinner (kidding! I'm usually up by lunch...). That's awesome, huh? Well, that's not even the best part. One of the necessary evils of the morning is to change the diaper that Hank's been wearing since about 8:30 or 9pm the previous evening (no, I don't get up in the middle of the night to change diapers anymore). And on the weekends, that might not happen till they get up around 9ish. Uck. That's love, huh?

This past Sunday morning, as per the usual, I slept in, and it wasn't even until that night when we were putting Hank to bed that Will told me what had gone down that morning while I was enjoying the full pleasure that the blackout drapes in our bedroom provide. Wait, did I mention that we got a new kitten? No? Okay, well we did. More on that later - back to Sunday morning: Will was changing Hank's ample diaper (replete with #'s 1 & 2) when the fore mentioned kitty decided to come and see what offerings were brought to him via such a strangely shaped vessel. As the as-yet-unnamed-kitty was sniffing around, Will aptly decided it to be prudent to remove the juvenile feline from the situation. What is the easiest way to do so? Pick the little bugger up and toss him across the room of course! *In the most gentle and humane way possible* So he did. But the kitty-without-a-name wasn't done with his perusal; so his-kittenness sank his talons into the edges of the diaper just as he was taking flight. The thing that happened next, I have imagined to be in slow motion: the cat. The bulging. Wet. Dirty. Diaper. Are hurled across our living room. Spinning in mid-air. Things that I don't want to touch are dislodged and are sent flinging in all directions. His kittendom lands in it. And runs. Tracking it of course.

And Will let me sleep. And it wasn't even my birthday or anything!