I Don't Understand

Mystery #1: My husband's theory on underwear.

I love him, but I don't understand him. Earlier this week, he was dressing Ethan for school and asked, "Why do you put out clean underwear for him every morning?"

'Scuse me?

This seems to be a no-brainer for me, but K. is genuinely puzzled by this.

K.'s Theory:
He says Ethan just took a bath the night before, so he's clean... plus, he only wears them for a few hours.

Hmmm.

My theory:
1) Ethan is 3. Three-year olds are not neat, spotless creatures. This includes their underwear.
2) Better safe than sorry. He may not have wet the bed the night before, but he has been known (on occasion) to think he's able to wipe himself after a serious visit to the potty. He's getting better, but that's still not one of his most mastered skills. I'd rather not have his teacher find any surprises once he gets to school.
3) 3-years olds tell everything... like, "My daddy says I don't have to change my underwear." These confessions often come at inopportune moments, like in the middle of church.

I think my dad had a similar theory... which explains why my mom didn't often leave my dad in charge of getting us dress.

This also makes me wonder how often K. has sent Ethan to school without changing his underwear...

I used to laugh at my guy friends in college who were staunch supporters of recycling.... underwear, that is. They'd rotate wearing the same pairs of underwear until they felt like doing laundry... which goes a long way to explain the funk in the typical college male's apartment/dorm/etc.

I never dated those guys... but, you know, I don't remember asking K. to define his position on underwear changing when we started dating...

On a mission...

While pregnant with Ethan, I came across an article in a baby magazine about losing baby weight. I remember not being too concerned -- I was pretty happy eating any and everything and hadn't given much thought to losing any weight --, but I read it any way.

It struck me as odd that it usually takes a year or more to lose all pregnancy weight.

What?!? I thought it just all came out with the baby!

Now, before you snort at my silliness, let me go back over how all of this happened.

I was almost three months pregnant before I even realized what was going on. Now, I'm an educated woman, but I did apparently fall asleep during sex ed. My best friend mentioned, when she called in December to announce the news that she was expecting, that her doctor told her that it could take as long as six months to a year for birth control to get out of a person's system.

It seems that I didn't really understand that "could" doesn't mean "will definitely."

Over the next few months, K. and I started talking about when we'd like to start a family, and we decided that we'd start thinking about it within the next year. With this in mind, I decided that I'd go off of birth control at the end of the month.

That was in May.

Fastforward a couple of months to the beginning of September.

It's the Sunday morning after the Clemson-Georgia game. I roll over, not feeling so great. K. has to go to work after staying up late for the game, so he's not very sympathetic as I lay in bed, moaning and groaning.

Me: "My stomach feels gross. Geez, my boobs hurt. I must've slept funny."

He just looks at me. "Maybe you should take a pregnancy test."

I feel better immediately. "Are you kidding? I'm definitely not pregnant. I don't even have any symptoms!"

K: "You just said your boobs hurt."

Me: "Well, they do, but not like pregnant hurt. Geez."

K. leaves for work... and my mind starts going through all of this over and over.

I roll out of bed, throw on a ball cap, and head to the local drugstore... bought one test...went home.

Imagine my surprise when the two lines start forming in the little window. (2 lines = positive)

I thought for sure I'd done something wrong, so I go back to the drugstore...buy another test...go back home.

By this point, I'm pretty sure I'm going to die... or at the very least, vomit. In my head, I know the first test is wrong, but I've got to make sure. Get home, take the test... just about pass out when, again, the results scream, "YOU'RE PREGNANT!"

I'm home by myself, and I don't know what to do.

So I go buy a third test.

As I sit on the bathroom floor with positive tests, directions, and empty boxes scattered around me, I think, "How did this happen?"

That's a rhetorical question. I know how it happened, but I am the least maternal person ever. What am I going to do with a baby?

To make an already long story short...

Turns out that the "six months to a year" estimate the doctor gave my friend concerning birth control's exit from one's system was quite generous. For me, it only took five weeks. After finding a doctor and going through my first exam, I started calming down and accepting the idea of having a baby.

In fact, I accepted it so much that I gained 60 pounds while pregnant with my son. By the time I read that article, I'd already gained 40, so I figured, "What the heck?"

To quote my delivering doctor when I returned to him for my six week postpartum check-up..."Next time, you might want to consider only eating one biscuit with gravy for breakfast instead of three."

So noted.

For the next two years, I battled to get that weight off. I ran. I lifted weights. I dieted. Nothing worked... until the fall of 2005. I started a variation of South Beach, and the weight just started melting off. I was pumped!

Two weeks after I hit my 1st weight goal, I found out that I was pregnant with Laney.

Yay for baby. Boo for big belly.

On a positive note, I only gained 30, and up until 7 months, I'd only gained about 15. My body seems to produce good sized babies -- 9 lbs. and 8 1/2 lbs. respectively -- so my doctor was actually concerned that I hadn't gained enough weight up until that last 15 lbs. arrived.

I was so proud of myself, and I felt so cute during my pregnancy... when I wasn't face first in the toilet... not so cute then... Once Laney was born, I dropped 20 of my 30 within two months, and I was ready to break out my cute clothes.

One thing that article didn't mention was that after babies, your body is not even close to the same shape.

Right before the end of summer, I started going through my closet, pulling out my business clothes, but even though I weighed less than I had after Ethan, I still couldn't get in most of my clothes.

I'm a little vain, so you can imagine what that did to my ego.

The problem is that while I love to wear cute clothes, I also love to eat... hence my nickname in Knox-Vegas -- Big Girl. Let's suffice it to say that I earned that moniker while pregnant with Ethan.

I told you I ate a lot.

My pals there weren't being mean; I ate enough to feed a small country for a year... on a daily basis.

In college, I'd go eat with the boys and out-eat all of them... Maybe not always an impressive feat, but when you're out-eating offensive and defensive linemen weighing 275 at the least (some were as big as 350), it was something to be proud of... or it was for me at 5'5", 130 lbs.

The whole idea of watching what I eat is ridiculous to me. I always watch what I eat... every single bite that goes into my mouth gets a good stare down as it approaches my lips.

So, I've enlisted the help of the bariatric clinic here in town, and I'm on my way to my pre-Ethan weight, which was my lowest adult weight. Since they prescribe appetite suppressants, I'm cool. I'm not hungry, and that keeps me from overeating to avoid eating bad stuff... and then ending up eating the bad stuff anyway. :)

We'll see; my goal is to be back to my pre-Ethan weight before Laney's 1st birthday in the spring...

I mean, really -- I have to be able to eat birthday cake without feeling guilty... :)

Incredible but true...

First, I am losing my mind. I just published a blog post that I wrote back at the beginning of January and forgot about. I didn't even remember writing it; I've been thinking how slack I am because I haven't posted anything yet this year. I'm apparently not slack, just senile.

Second, I find some people annoying.

Let's start with this example.

Over the Christmas holidays, we went to visit K's family. While there, we took the three grandkids to have their picture made together. At the end of the session, the photographer/salesperson was putting the final touches on the package that K's mom ordered.

This package included photo cards, which K's mom wisely decided to send out as New Year's cards.

Here comes the issue.

The photographer/salesperson had to enter the text for the card and typed in the kids' names as "Ethan, Laney & Ashtin."

Now, I'm not great at a lot of things, but I am a grammatical freak. I do make mistakes on occasion -- you'll probably find several in the history of this blog; however, my mistakes are accidental -- not from a lack of knowledge.

I piped up (very nicely, I might add) -- "I'm sorry, but can we change that? It's not grammatically correct." There was a lot going on; it would have been very easy to make a small mistake.

The photographer/salesperson almost literally sneered. "It's correct."

I sneered back. "No, actually, it's not."

What?! Don't challenge me in that tone, you brazen little hussy! I hadn't been the least bit rude or condescending to begin with, but it was on.

FYI: One of my biggest pet peeves in the entire world is being talked down to like I'm stupid. You can correct someone's mistakes without making it seem it seem like a personal attack.

I know. I do it on a daily basis. It's a part of my job -- the job that I've been trained to do.

K's mom stepped in and asked the woman to change it so that I would be happy. K. was giving me The Look, and I'm pretty sure his mom was just trying to keep me from making a scene.

The photographer/salesperson snidely asked what I would like on the cards.

"Ethan- comma- Laney- comma- and Ashtin -- with the 'and' spelled out."

Now, I would have thought she would have let it drop, but no. She continued to try to convince me that she was right. I could tell she thought herself to be above this job and those who would employ such services.

(Well, I took a hint from the fact that she had quickly let us know that she has a degree in graphic design and was capable of fixing a small problem in the photo herself but couldn't due to company policy.)

"I used to work for a greeting card company, and the way I had it is correct," she explained. "It was in a handbook we used."

Her tone wasn't explanatory or even kind. It was snide and hateful.

Sidenote -- If you don't like your job, find another. If you don't want to find another, then don't be hateful. Make the best of what you have.

Besides, if you're that good of a graphic designer, you wouldn't be working in a children's photography studio.

Anyway, I was so flustered by her nasty attitude, that I couldn't make much of a logical argument, but I wasn't about to let her continue in her ignorance.

"Well, I teach English," I began, "and regardless of what your 'handbook' stated, it's not correct. Many common mistakes are now accepted in writing and publishing, but that doesn't make those mistakes correct."

She mumbled something.

Girl, I thought, don't make me get up out of this chair.

I continued, "Many people think that because newspapers and magazines don't use commas at the end of a series, this is ok for common usage, but the fact is journalism has its own set of grammatical rules created mostly to save space. I know this because I taught journalism, too. Printing a card and printing a newspaper are two entirely different things. If my kids' names are going to be on this card, then it's going to be correct."

(Sidenote: I'm pretty sure I stuttered and stammered all through this speech because my first reaction in situations like this is to be flabberghasted, which affects the flow of my speech...)

Buddy, I was hot!!! My nostrils were flaring, and I was sitting ramrod straight on the edge of my chair, but I was about ready to stir up a brouhaha.

I try really hard to be a peaceful, civil, dignified person most of the time -- I've never been in a physical altercation with anyone except my brother --, but y'all, I was born out in the country where people drive trucks with big tires, some women dip snuff, and my family was out of the ordinary because the four of us -- me and Mom included -- didn't hunt.

I might look prim and proper and have a college education, but I am as scrappy as they come, and this dog will hunt when put in the right (or should I say, "wrong") situation.

Needless to say, K. was ready to crawl under the train table where he and Ethan were playing, and my mother-in-law had this really awkward smile pasted on her face.

With this, I stood up, and the girl decided to drop her argument.

I, of course, was riled up.

I ranted and raved all the way to the car, on the way to lunch, and while at the lunch table.

I immediately set out to make sure that I didn't just make this stuff up, and my suspicions have been confirmed.

I'm not crazy, but I am a grammatical weird-o.

There are various types of grammatical rules. Standard rules are what most people are taught in English class in school.

In this case, commas are technically supposed to be used in a series. Many people have stopped, and thus this practice has become accepted, because publications do not use a comma before the last item in a series. For publications, this is a way to save space, much like the common journalistic practice of only spacing once between sentences.

Second, the "&" was improperly used. If the card had read "Ashtin, Ethan & Laney" this would have been ok because Ethan and Laney are a pair -- they're siblings. They belong to the same family or group. Since the card read "Ethan, Laney & Ashtin", this implies that Laney and Ashtin are somehow a pair, which they are not.

People often insert the ampersand (&) because it does, in fact, represent the conjunction 'and', but its connotation is that there is some sort of relationship between the connected names/items. People also often use this as an abbreviation to save space on cards, like this girl was trying to do, but it isn't correct. You wouldn't connect two sentences with an ampersand, for example. It may look more clean and neat, but grammatically it isn't proper.

Now, some of you may argue differently, but my response is that there is a difference between what is socially accepted -- like the lack of a serial comma or the incorrect usage of an ampersand -- but By Bob, just because everybody does 'it' doesn't make 'it' right.

So to you, anonymous photographer girl, I may not have made much sense to you that day, but I know my bleepity-bleep grammar! I was right, and you were wrong, and I hope all of your picture appointments are with mean, screaming kids.

Oh, and I also hope that one day I'll outgrow my tendency to get tongue-tied when I get frustrated so I can tell the person to whom the ranting applies instead of having to use my blog...

Reflections and a Drive-through Daiquiri Shop

***Uhhh, I wrote this back at the very beginning of January and apparently forgot about it...

Ok, for a moment, let me be sentimental.

(If I knew how to create spectacular blogs, I'd put a photo show up to recap the year, like the one on www.whoorl.com, but alas, I am only an amateur...)

I am constantly amazed at my life. I mean, God knows who I am, and He stills likes me.

A lot of people know me much less intimately than God... and they don't even pretend to like what little they know...

I never cease to marvel.

Anyway, my blessings are more than abundant, and my brain just cannot comprehend how the likes of me can be so completely blessed.

My parents, although strange beings, are wonderful and have blessed me with lots of positive traits to go along with the wide nostrils, bump on the nose, flat rear, and way-too-big boobs. I see so much in the way of kids who parents just don't care, and I am more and more grateful every day that mine did and still do.

We won't mention that I was a head-strong, defiant child from the time I could talk until... well, I turned into a head-strong, defiant adult... and that even DSS probably wouldn't have blamed them for giving me a good, swift kick in the butt.

My brother and I have finally outgrown the beat-each-other-until-there's-blood phase... good thing, since he's in Special Ops.... Turns out, we like each other! Seriously, we did stay in that phase longer than most... until I went to college, I believe, but we've actually grown into a civilized, loving friendship. He makes me laugh, and he makes my kids laugh, and he's marrying someone who is convincing him not to wear his pants under his armpits. I love her because she loves him, jacked-up pants and all, while trying to help him understand that combat boots don't really go with everything. Life doesn't get any better!

Then, there's my wonderful husband who is one of the hottest men on the planet, even when his hair has grown out past any length I'd ever hoped to see. He also makes me laugh, partially because he's random and partially because he's still amazed that I'm not normal after 6 years of marriage. He has a beautiful smile and a loving soul, and I am so, so lucky. It took me a while to realize it because I used to think that I was completely self-sufficient, but I've realized that what I am alone is a shadow of what we are together.

I'll pause while you vomit in the nearest trashcan.

That brings me to my kids. They are hysterical, full of personality and life. Both are very happy children... usually. (Both also inherited my temper, which isn't a plus.) Being biased, I think that both of my children are exceptionally gifted, but they are also real. Both have quirks that make them unique, and I love that they are not carbon cut-outs of the Gerber baby... this makes for lots of good stories. Of course, I don't always love their behavior, but as a friend once told me, "Interesting children make interesting adults." I can deal with a few tantrums, I guess. :)

In my younger days, I didn't plan on having children... until Ethan turned up as a surprise. God knew that I would need children to ground me and to make my life full. Ethan opened my eyes to an entire world I would never have experienced, had I stuck to my original plan. I didn't think it would be possible to love a second child as much as I love him, but then Laney came along, and I'm amazed how love grows. She is her own little person, even at 7 months.

Recently, K. and I were snuggled on the couch, watching TV, with both kiddies snuggled between us. I thought, "I love my life." I was kind of stunned once I realized this thought was in my head because I'm not a sappy person, and I sort of felt like I was in a Lifetime movie for women.

The truth is, though, that I do love my life, and maybe it's because I'm getting older, but I am often overwhelmed to the point of feeling suffocated because I just can't get my mind around how all of these blessings are mine.

Growing up, I would have laughed if anyone had told me that the light and love in my children's eyes would make my entire existence worthwhile. I would have dismissed the idea that I would ever be truly happy as a wife; I thought marriage would interfere with all of my plans. I've always valued my friendships, but I never imagined how much my friends would enrich my life -- guy friends, girl friends, fleeting friendships, lasting ones, my friends from The Ville where I grew up, my Clemson girls, my Knox-Vegas family... with a kaleidoscope of others from here and there that season the mix just right.

Anyway, I do thank my lucky stars (and God) every day, although I realize this will never be enough. I try to give back as often as possible, although I realize I'll never be able to make a dent in what I owe.

On top of all of these things, I get bonus blessings -- like the drive-thru daiquiri shop near my in-laws house in Baton Rouge. Who knew that these sorts of things existed?!?! Where I live, you don't even drive your own car to the liquor store... or at the very least, you park in the back and enter through the secret entrance... :) I'm amazed that this drive-thru -- which looks very much like a converted slushy stand -- can operate since there is an open container law in Baton Rouge (from what I'm told). Hmmm...

Here's to 2007! :)