Birthdate

Most Common Birth Dates
I've obviously not had any personal experience with labor. However, after seeing this chart, I think there's no way to deny that there must be some ability to control birth dates (within reason). Check out Dec. 23 - 26. And July 4 & 5. And then on a "good" holiday like Valentine's Day, there's a spike. It also makes me think that Sara just knew what dates she wanted her kids born on, so she made it happen.

I'd like to see this chart using BD data from 2002 - present. I wonder if Sept 11 sees a sharp drop due to what I presume to be an undesirable delivery date? FYI, these data for these dates is from 1973-1999 in the US.

Fighting the Slide 
I'm currently fighting a downward slide to depression. It's been going on for a few weeks now and has really intensified in the last week or so. Things I find interesting about it:

• Every time I come out of an episode (or whatever you want to call it) of depression, I pretty quickly forget what it feels like. I forgot how powerless I seem to be over the hollow pit inside. I remember "it sucks" but I don't remember why it sucks. And, each time I come back to this point, I have to relearn that I can do certain things to make it more tolerable for others around me and to hopefully lessen it, but I also have to lower the expectation bar for myself for a while. 
• During this slide, I've realized that one of my signs that I'd never put together before was an intensifying of Petty Megan. Petty Megan eye rolls at EVERYTHING and EVERYONE and thinks all things are so.lame and so.stupid. I never quite realized it before because, well, I have a certain amount of Petty Megan that is there all the time. However, depression makes Petty Megan come to the forefront. Petty Megan loathes the hipsters and musicians and celebrities and happy people and sullen people and just people in general. Petty Megan thinks anyone pinning anything on Pinterest, including herself, is a complete idiot who is just wasting their time with stupid crafty things. Petty Megan sees the world with a whole different perspective than Less Petty Megan. 
• I can handle staying on top of about 2 things at any given time. That means a field trip with Avery today resulted in me making it and putting on a happy face, but I forgot to pack a lunch for Avery (RHG had to give Avery her own lunch - thanks RHG). It also means I can force myself to Crossfit like I did yesterday (I'm oh-so-proud of that), but then it means that is my Big Effort for the day. 
• I'm sleeping a lot. Yesterday (Avery was at school and RHG's after that), after a full 8 hours of sleep the previous night, I slept from 9:30 - 11:00 am, then from 1:00 - 5:00, then went to bed at 11 for another full night of sleep. This afternoon, I slept (with Avery) for a solid two hours and will head up to bed soon. And that's just the last two days.

Politeness

Before I get started on this rant, I feel the need to say this isn't just Petty Megan talking - I am always boggled by this behavior from adults. I distinctly remember being embarrassed in one of my HS classes when the kids behind me were talking all through a presenter's talk - and one of those kids was my best friend. When someone stands up to give a speech or a presentation, particularly a one-off thing, you freakin' look at the person, stop speaking to those around you, and at least pretend like you're listening!

Today was a field trip for Avery with her school. We all met at a nearby farm for a tour, hayride, playtime, etc. We had some parts of the tour that were guided where people were speaking to the kids and parents. I was embarrassed several times to be part of a group of parents who felt it was OK to talk quietly (and sometimes not so quietly) amongst themselves while someone was talking. On the hayride, I swear it was me and one other mom who were paying attention. Everyone else was just chatting away while this poor guy is up on the tractor telling us about Christmas trees. When the bee talk was going on, moms were chatting quietly and making jokes while the guy was talking, and the same things happened with the pumpkin seed planting. I didn't even hear what the dairy guy had to say because there was so much chatting around me - and he was CLOSE to me. 

It pisses me off to no end. First off, it's just plain rude. I don't care that we're having a fun field trip. It is not OK to model for our children that whispering while someone is talking to us is OK. Secondly, it's selfish. I don't care if you're not interested. If you're standing near enough that you are taking part in the session by your mere proximity, then shut up. Someone of us want to hear about the bees. Third, it shows a definite lack of empathy. The kid who was doing the dairy talk and the hayride talk clearly had rehearsed what he was supposed to say. He clearly wasn't all that familiar with presenting to children. He clearly was a bit embarrassed. Yet people just kept right on talking while he was talking. 

This isn't a new rant for me. It's the same core issue I had with Little Gym's concept that it was all right to let the kids run around and talk while the leader was on the mat leading games. 

Stepping down from my soap box now. 

Avery!

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Re-entry going well so far ...

... but it's only 10:50 am, so the day could still go horribly wrong. Not that I'm anticipating this. :)

After five days on East Coast time, D and I both woke up early (for us) this morning. Avery went to sleep at the very reasonable time of 8 PM last night, slept in her own bed until 6 am, then slept in our bed until about 7.  She is running a serious sleep deficit, so I'm very grateful for her good sleep last night. I feel reasonably well rested considering how utterly exhausted I was on Monday.

I have much to blog about, as well as some pictures and video to share, but I can't sort through pictures and videos when Avery is with me, so that will have to wait until she's at school and I get a moment.

I'm so happy to be back in Portland.  While I think DC is a beautiful city, and I always love the excitement and adrenaline of visiting large cities, I'm not an East Coast girl.  I'm a PNW girl (who just happened to be born in Colorado, but was always meant to live in Portland). I haven't heard a single car horn since we landed, and yes, I did drive downtown yesterday.

It's now 4:15 pm and the day has been OK.  I haven't been feeling well lately (what's new?) and started feeling really poorly at New Seasons while Avery and I were eating lunch.  I felt so bad that I didn't have it in me to do the grocery shopping, so I just left and came home to nap.  Avery took that time as an opportunity to make a huge mess in the upstairs, but at least I feel better having napped.  

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Birthers

Can they all just shut up now?  My eyes cannot roll far enough back in my head to express my feelings on birthers, Trump, and this issue.  I'm surprised they haven't started questioning whether he was born at all. 

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Portrait

Here is my favorite picture that my uncle, Herb, took of Avery.  To me, it just screams "Avery!" Note: I scanned it from a paper version, then reduced the size of scanned image.

Lazy

Lazy, lazy, lazy

We've had an exceedingly lazy day.  Neither D nor I felt like doing much of anything.  As a result, we ended up watching TV, playing games with Avery, coloring with Avery, and generally laying about all day.  It's now 6:15 and Avery has requested to go to bed early.  Must be out of sheer boredom.  Poor girl.

Update: she was fast asleep by about 6:50.

Football

D watched football much of the day.  At one point, Avery headed upstairs to show D her new hat. I noticed she was saying something weird about hitting people and a helmet, so I went upstairs.  She had taken a bunch of her clothes and her bibs and spread them out on the floor of our bedroom.  Then she would watch the football game, get down into the starting position the guys on the line do (leaning onto one hand), then jump into a pile of the clothes as if she was tackling them.  If she saw a touchdown dance, she'd imitate it.  I once saw her pointing like the quarterback was pointing.  It was hilarious.

Exactly

I'm not a big reader of Huffington Post, however, this op-ed hit the nail on the head.  I can't even type more about this woman.  She makes me so angry.  Angry, angry, angry. 

Leaking

Post written on Wednesday, November 17th

SBR: D's office

After spending thousands on mold remediation, then more on getting the wall and subfloor fixed in D's office, the guy measuring for carpet just noticed that the door is leaking ... which is what the fucking contractor was supposed to FIX!  I'm so angry right now.  Nothing makes me angrier than shoddy work.  I was so patient with the guy doing the work.  I didn't get all bent out of shape that it took 1.5 months to do about 10 hours worth of work.  Now I just want to scream.  The only thing saving my sanity right now is that I still haven't paid a cent for this work.  If I'm remembering right, I was supposed to give the subcontractor doing the work a check for half the amount at the start of the project.  He never asked for it and I forgot about it for quite some time.  I figured I'd eventually receive an invoice in the mail, but I'm certainly not going to chase them down to give them money.  I might have done this earlier in my life, but not now.  If you run a business and can't even be bothered to ensure you've received payment, you deserve to not be paid. And you certainly don't deserve to be paid when the door is letting water through after just a few weeks of being done.  Update on Thursday: they're coming to take a look and fix the issue this afternoon.

Along a similar line, now that we made the last payment for the work done for exterior, that company hasn't followed through on the final items on the punch list they were supposed to do on Monday.  And they haven't responded to my email inquiry about it.  I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt since this is the first time they've been so unresponsive since the work shifted to their part of the company. 

All good things must come to an end

The angelic period ended with a thud this morning when Avery threw a fit because we didn't have dance class today.  We had art class.  She just couldn't understand why I wouldn't take her to dance class, as if I have the power to make classes happen any old time of the day or week.

Now she's whining up a storm, but this is mostly my fault because when I get angry about things like the unfixed leaking door, I tend to try to escape the situation by sitting at my computer and, oh, say, blog about it.

Added Thursday the 18th: and the trend of difficulty continued later in the day.  Sigh.  Oh well, hopefully we'll have more and more periods of angelic behavior and fewer of the difficult ones.

Powerless

Fuck! (Warning: This is a huge bitching section and I'm not going to apologize for that.)

Seriously, I'm so pissed off with my voice right now.  I'm just boiling inside.  It's so fucking difficult to be around Avery when I can't talk.  If she asks a question and I don't answer, she'll just ask it again and again and again.  This syndrome is especially bad in the car.  However, it's really constant throughout the day.  I didn't exactly follow doctor's orders when I kept talking rather than remaining completely silent (how am I supposed to do that when I have a 2.5 yo?), but I'm so frustrated right now.  I think I must be tensing my body as a result of the frustration because I'm getting muscle spasms all over.

I'm able to at least talk when I need to right now, and I can talk and carry on conversations if I need/want to, but the thing is that I pay for it later that night and then next day.  My throat feels like I've swallowed gravel right now because of all the talking today.  Relatively speaking, I haven't talked that much, but it's still awful.  I can't explain to Avery why this and that effectively, so the mini-tantrums are through the roof.  We've also dropped her nap on days she's not in school and she is Cranky with a capital c (in case you missed that capital c there) by 4 pm.

Tomorrow, we have a playdate in the morning followed by dance class at 11:30.  Other than the playdate, I plan to talk as little as is possible.  The rest of the day I'm parking Avery in front of the TV.  My voice just can't handle trying to be a real parent.  I want to cry I'm so frustrated.  I have all this energy (FINALLY!) and I can't make full use of it because of my fucking voice!  ARGH!

Powerless is the word I'm searching for to describe this feeling of frustration.  I feel powerless to properly parent Avery; I feel powerless in terms of getting my voice to work; I feel powerless in removing this frustration. 

Shopping

Given Avery's love of clothing, I'm embracing my inner-shopper.  I wouldn't naturally pick out frilly tutus and pink ruffles, but if she's going to wear them, I might as well find ones I find cute.  My current weakness is Zulily (damn you for introducing me to it, Christie!) It's where I got her purple skirt for the sleeping reward, the purple dress that is her current sleeping reward waiting to be earned, and a yellow princess dress. 

Today, I let Avery pick out a few dresses she liked, then asked her to pick her favorite to be her next sleeping reward.  She picked this one.  I think it's pretty (as pink dresses go ... I dress in olive green and gray all the time, so clearly I'm not a pink person).

Tumble Bugs class

Today was our first of three Tumble Bugs classes.  It is with Miss Erika, the same teacher who will do her dance class tomorrow.  I love Miss Erika.  She doesn't put up with any crap from the kids, but is still enthusiastic and fun.  Thinking about it, she is pretty much what you'd expect a trained dance teacher to be.

Avery had a great time.  She absolutely loved it and dived right in.  From a motor coordination perspective, there was little that challenged Avery.  However, from a following instructions perspective, it was right up her alley and she was challenged to do the stretches and poses exactly the same as Miss Erika. 

Friday

School

Avery went to school today since she didn't go her regular two days this week.  Unfortunately, Teacher Theresa is on vacation, so Avery wasn't too keen to stay.  It's much harder to leave her when she doesn't want to stay.  Of course, she always has a great time and is perfectly happy when I go to pick her up, regardless of whether TT is there, so I shouldn't worry.  But I do.  She was happy as a clam when I picked her up, so I guess all went well.  Of course, a day at school means a whiny evening at home.  Can't win 'em all.

Sick

D now has the stomach bug that's been going around.  I feel grateful to have escaped it and can only hope I continue to do so. I am exhausted today, but I'm guessing that's just my natural, whiny state of always being tired versus actually being sick. It did, though, occur to me that I might have just the exhaustion portion of the bug and not the upset stomach part. Is that possible? 

Haircut

I think I'm done with the hair battles with Avery.  She hates to have her hair combed.  It's just so darn cute when it's up in pig tails that I have a hard time cutting it.  For me, any sort of desire to have Avery be girly is so very rare, but I was clinging to this one.  However, I think it's time for a cut.  Maybe we'll do it this weekend.

Young College Graduates

I stumbled upon this slide show of the youngest college graduates.  Some were reading at 8-months-old and doing math problems at 18-months!  Also, I didn't know that Woody Allen and Mia Farrow's son, Ronan, was one of these types of kids.  He's the second slide.  And, side note, he's very good looking.  Who would have thought Woody Allen would produce offspring that looks like that?

Oprah

I stopped watching Oprah about the time Avery was born.  I appreciated the shows of substance where she brought attention to issues around the world and in the US. However, I got annoyed that I had to put up with four shows with her fawning over celebrities or other crap to get the good show.  I just now read a headline that indicates she interviewed Rielle Hunter, the mistress of John Edwards.  Seriously, Oprah?  Why is she giving this woman a national platform?  She had an affair with a man whose wife is dying of terminal cancer!  

Shock

New Health Insurance

So, I shouldn't be shocked by this, but once again, I'm having to call about each claim.  Since I didn't have our new insurance card when Avery went to the doctor last, I had to pay the full amount for three prescriptions.  When I got our card, I contacted the insurance company to find out how to go about getting reimbursed.  I followed those procedures.  I paid $102.97 out of pocket and expected to get back $72.67.  I got a check for $15.46.

I called the insurance company to inquire.  Guess what?  It appears these claims weren't processed correctly. 

I dare any of you to tell me this isn't deliberate.  Does this not happen to anyone else?  How can it be that we're the only ones who never seem to get full coverage from our health insurance until we ask about it?  It's not possible.

They need to research and will call me back.  Single payer, single payer, single payer.  

Note: I actually wrote myself a note before calling them that said, "Remain calm ... it is what it is." It worked for the most part since I remained calm.

SBR

I'm sitting here trying not to get too mad about the fact that our exceptionally low-class neighbors continue to block our mailbox, even after I spoke with them and left them a polite note explaining our reasons. I have no idea how people can be this inconsiderate. I really don't. It just amazes me. To top things off, they had an exceptionally loud party last night which woke me up as they were drunkenly walking to their cars (or at least loudly ... I assumed the drunk part based on the yelling). This morning, I found beer cans and beef boxes strewn about the street. I am quite confident the builder himself is no longer living there, but is just letting various boys who work for him (and are maybe related) live there. It's so aggravating that they have such disregard for those around them. Goes to show that assholes live everywhere. So here I wait for the mailman to show up so I make sure we get our mail and that our outgoing mail is actually picked up. I may have already missed the mailman.

We're going to see Miami Vice tonight. I'm going in not expecting a great story line or great acting, but a few good action sequences.

P.S. For those not in the know on this one yet, SBR is my long-ago coined abbreviation for "seething ball of rage." It's quite handy when describing feelings associated with asshole neighbors.

Edit: Mailman just arrived and I discovered at least I'm getting to know him with this whole mess. He's a nice guy and his name is the same as D's.