Pross Collinate.

Scroll down to the bolded text if you feel like de-waffling me today. A waffle-ectomy may be in order!

…alternatively entitled the post in which I succeed in amusing only myself with  depressingly unoriginal and rather too obscure attempt at wit. Geddit?

Huh?

Eh?

Oh.

Do excuse me, I’ll right with you when I finish making only myself chuckle at the little joke in the title there.

Actually, since it’s only me laughing despite my best efforts to involve all of YOU too, I think I’ll stop right now and pretend I never said it. Can I also skip the inevitable tidal wave of blush that is conquering my torso as I type this missive and any second now shall burn the paint clean off of houses in the next postcode?

Nevermind, it’s too late, and I guess you can’t see the phenomenon anyway.

Just take it on faith that should you ever be in my company and short of something to fry your eggs on, simply pointing out that my skirt has been tucked into the back of my tights for the last hour IN PUBLIC will do the trick. Even if it’s not actually true. I take a while to work things like that out.

Unfortunately I am actually also quite talented at getting my upholstery all confused in that sort of manner and at least some of the burning glow I emit is from bitter memory. Also, recently I emerged from an end-of-long-haul-flight slighty lively plane loo with a big piece of soaked-in-something bog roll stuck to one foot and a dirty baby wipe on the other.

I have no idea why I told you that, but you will be very pleased to note that I did the only thing possible in the circumstances and pretended I had no such accessories attached to my shoes and hid them in the seat pocket in front of me at the earliest opportunity.

Anyway.

I’m guessing that nobody has the faintest idea what I’m blithering on about, so I shall get to the point.

Once a year I gird my disorganised self into some semblence of organisation and I do my best to introduce new bloggers in the community to all of us by hosting the Great Blog Cross Pollination.

Except THIS year I inconveniently went and scheduled International! Travel! With! Three Children LS! and Twins! right when I should have been nagging you all to merrily swap entries for a day left, right and centre. 

Because I know full well my organisational limitations (you will note that I remain slightly disorientated to time and place despite having been home for, what?, several days now, although person has reassuringly remained rock-steady though all of my recent travels), I didn’t even try this year.

Yet.

So, here’s the deal.

Please, pretty please with a cherry on top participate in the Great Blog Cross Pollination this year.

It’s open to EVERYBODY in the ALI community, and divided into two groups of blogs, those that reference children (hereon known as ‘avec’) and those that do not (the ladies and gents of ’sans’). The idea is to swap posts for one day with a matched blogger so that you BOTH meet new bloggers and everybody finds new readers. Old blogs, new blogs, infertility, loss, pregnancy and parenting blogs (and anybody else I haven’t covered) are more than welcome.

Actually, having crossed into the dreaded muh-’ummy’ (or ‘ommy’) blog territory myself I especially welcome meeting new bloggers still in the trenches.

Here are the details, it really is easy. I do most of the work. Really.

1. Leave a comment here (ensuring that your blog url and email address are written the appropriate fields, you don’t have to write them in the comment itself and this stops spam filters eating your words, too).  In your comment, all I need to know is if you fit the AVEC or SANS group. You can write as many other nice things about me as you like (or not, I shan’t be offended), but the AVEC or SANS is handy to know.

2. This one bites me in the posterior every year- please make sure the email address you have entered is one you check, because I shall be in further contact with you about your match via that email address. Also, if you change your mind about participating, let me know. I’d never be offended because sometimes circumstances change, but it is hard for your match-ee on the day if you bail unexpectedly.

3. Periodically I shall send out an email acknowledging receiving your entry. Please reply so I know your email addy works (see above point about deal addresses) Get cracking on that wonder post with which to bedazzle new eyes and introduce yourself to a new audience.

4. Closer to the date (at least a week beforehand) I shall email you with the name of your match. You then email each other your posts.

5. On the 9th december, you post the cross-pollinated entry WITHOUT SAYING WHO IT IS FROM, but WITH a ‘click here’ hyperlink to THEIR blog (so your own readers can find where YOU are hiding on that day). Just for fun, ask people to see if they can recognise the guest blogger in a different home in the comments section.

See? Easy.

I will keep a masterlist of participants here, so on the day, EVERYBODY can have fun clicking hyperlinks and guessing who posted what, and where. Hopefully along the way everybody shall make lovely new bloggy friends.

I really do adore hosting this, so please sign up. The more the merrier. It really is fun.

For those who like buttons on their sidebar, this is this year’s linked button. Feel free to grab the code and put it up on your own blog. Actually, that would positively fill me with delight.

Here is detailed instructions as to how to snaffle it, if you need a hand.

Now, please sign up? Pretty please?

Only a man…

May I utter the universal cry of truly browned-off women everywhere?

Men!

Humph.

Bloody silly creatures they are, really.

Honestly, I  actually happen to love LS, despite my many written allusions to possible acts of physical violence upon his person, really I do.

Most of the time, at least.

Even if  he dosen’t have the faintest idea just how it is his underwear drawer never runs out, or that the fridge is always full of food. Let alone a sensible understanding of how to hold a vacuum cleaner the right way up. I think he might do himself an injury if he turned the blasted thing on successfully, so it’s probably a good thing he doesn’t even know which cupboard it lives in.

It must be jolly nice living in a world where the sorting fairy, washing fairy, shopping fairy, cleaning fairy, dusting fairy and diary fairy keep your life neat and tidy all on your behalf behind the scenes like that. Really, it must.

Typing the above paragraph makes me wish I fancied the fairer sex, because surely a two woman household would run MUCH more smoothly.

Just think of all the loo seat  and piddle on the floor palaver I wouldn’t have to deal with.

But, anyway. My weekend point is the following belated observation.

Men come without and not in any way WITH the tact chip in the factory standard model, don’t they?

Because otherwise, I think mine has a broken one.

How else can I explain LS telling me that I am, and I quote ‘moody and grumpy’ before bidding me goodnight to retreat to my decidedly-separate-shall-not-be-poked-all-night bedroom and then being shocked when I tell him to get stuffed?

I mean, really?

What part of calling your spouse a cranky witch in those sort of circumstances doesn’t deserve cutting the crotch out of every single pair of jocks, simply as a warning shot?

I think I was quite restrained in the circumstances.

 

Rant-End-Rant.

Dear Internet,

I am home, I have slept (although see below for further details on that one), I have been blissfully reunited with my mascara, deodarent and (praise-be-to-the-dental-gods) toothbrush, and now I have a question for you.

I do so hope you can help.

So, Internet, oh wise and all-knowing Internet.

Can you tell me something?

Because I really need to know the answer.

At what point in a marriage does a quirky trait in a spouse shift from endearing to more irritating than wearing sandpaper underpants horse riding? 

If I am alone in my dilemma and your own loving spouse never does anything to cause your eyelid to twitch convulsively, just where do I get a Husband 2.0 upgrade from? Should I try reading the user’s manual for the version I have again first?

Can I reboot the sucker?

Or am I simply an uncaring bitch?

Also, how do you make it goddam stop already?

Is electroshock therapy even legal?

Would it really be too juvenile to file for divorce on the grounds that your spouse irritates the living snot out of you?

Because something is REALLY chafing my bum and I am this close to, oh, I don’t know, probably simply fuming impotently between my own ears about how bloody pathetic LS is when it comes to his precious SLEEP, combined with a little gentle week-old-kipper fishwacking of the facial region the very next time he refuses to get his arse out of bed in the morning on accounts of how tired he is.

Like, say, tomorrow.

I can forecast this with complete-and-absolute 100% confidence on accounts of it happens every day. Every. Single. Morning. I get to hear how he is just exhausted and tired and has not slept a WINK all night.

I am possibly a small and petty person, but oh BOY and I fucking sick to the back teeth of hearing that whine.

I am also fornicatingly-unwell to the point of dental caries in my molars with the current status quo of picking up the slack, being almost literally drowned in baby shit solo before midday and making excuse after excuse to the universe at large when people ask about why husband almost never appears in public. Seriously, I have friends that don’t even know what he looks like.

So, what the flipping feck is wrong with LS and why the hell do I always end up the bad guy because I cannot remain forever sympathetic to his dozy plight?

After so many groundhog-day years of this rubbish every damn morning I just have this irresistable urge to kick his lazy arse until he gets it out of bed, is all.

Is that not perfectly understandable?

Send help at once, because I now refuse to even contemplate sleep in the same bedroom on accounts of I cannot take any more bleeping fingers poking me in the arm, chest, back and eyeball at random and all night, nor will I endure repeated nocturnal wake-ups and interrogations as to which position I may or may not be choosing to enjoy my repose.

Also, he turns the fucking light on to check I am telling the truth. If I don’t divorce him I may possibly kill him. With a blunt spoon. Slowly.

Seriously.

Mayday.

Or at least a supply of ready-matured old kippers, please.

Home is where my luggage isn’t.

Alternatively entitled ‘What I Did On My Holidays: The Extremely Edited Edition’.

Dear Internet,

Did you miss me?

I am HOME, praise-be-the-jetlag-that-permits-me-to-be-a-grizzelling-insomniac-in-my-OWN-bed, but I shall be brief.

Because, well.

I’ve just spent several days travelling with two small children. One of whom is now officially A Climber of anything not nailed down and, additionally, is a lover and not a fighter and thus half the plane have been snogged to loving death. The other requires a fairly hands-on approach for different reasons.

Jen can attest that I do not exaggerate when I make cracks and Saag and Naan’s temperaments. She’s now seen the evidence first-hand.

Regardless, coming back to the fact that we all inconveniently can’t have the same amount of night and day at once and the issues this may or may not cause the average frazzled thirty-something travelling with twins, because I think I had a point to make.

Ah. Got it.

I have indeed learned that it is true that relatively small and unobtrusive time zone changes, designed to be gentle to the smaller traveller, actually suck much MUCH harder than the big ones where you just suck it up, grit your teeth, and push on regardless until collapsing in a sleepy heap at the other end.

THIS version has had me trying to explain to two fifteen month olds that it is dark and not breakfast-time on accounts of it is THREE-Bleeping-AM ForTheLoveOfAllThatIsHolyAndWhyWon’tEitherOfYouSleep?

Also, my (and please note ONLY my) luggage did not make the last connecting flight and is due to arrive some time today in a more leisurely fashion. Presumably after enjoying a nice lie in, a cooked breakfast and taking in the local scenery. Unlike me.

I’m quietly convinced this means the universe hates me, because now I have to go and retrieve the blasted container of fresh underwear, toothbrushes, MAKEUP and clothing without having the prior benefit of access to the aforementioned items.

So, do excuse me.

In summary, I went to WALMART and I LIKED it.

Is that so very bad?

Discuss.

Gone Fishing.

….to the land where you all talk funny and persist on driving on the wrong side of the road.

Could you all try the left for, say, the next two and a bit weeks? Thank-you in advance and all of that.

Also, I would like to request a few jargon amendments for you all:

The ‘bathroom’ shall temporarily be known as the ‘dunny’, or ‘can’, and in a pinch, possibly the ‘bog’.

‘Diapers’ are now ‘Nappies’. Don’t argue.

The plural of ‘You’ is now ‘Youse’. None of this ‘y’all’ business, okay?

Vowels will be returned to the words from which they have been stolen, for example ‘coloUr’ needs it’s ‘U’ returned immediately.

Also, psst, it’s al-ooo-min-eee-um. Try it on for size, because you always cut a bit out of that word. Refrain from any references to ‘Al-oo-min-um’, if you can.

Finally, ‘Thongs’ are something that goes on your feet. Also, in  reference to the item below, Naan likes to eat it. Consider your collective selves warned.

Any questions?

Another open letter to the world at large.

Dear World,

It’s Geohde and I have a bone to pick with you.

Yes, again. Do try and pay attention this time, please.

I propose a small lesson in milestone attainment.

Are you ready, class? Here goes:

FORTHELOVEOFALLTHATYOUHOLDHOLYANDPOSSIBLYMANYTHINGSYOUDONOTASWELL being SMALL or, ahem ‘Tiiiiiiiinnnny!’ does not mean a child is not entitled to ambulate bipedally if the fancy takes her. Trust me, the fancy takes her many places indeed.

The little snot machine is always running off in the supermarket and getting herself almost inextricably jammed in the soft drink fridge or under a shelf. The park is a veritable treasure trove of escapism from parental supervision. Our own street is an item that has the distinct potential to prove that road safety is learned, and not instinctive after all (even if it would be more useful than an inbuilt fear of moths), any day now if I am not continually vigilant.

The kid gets the whole walking idea, trust me. She’s been at it for some time now.

Small does not automatically equal ‘four legs good, two legs bad’.

Little people can walk, too, even if the pavements are much closer to their bottoms that the average experience.

Please let Naan do so in public without so much gobsmacked attention, or at least be fair and congratulate Saag on sticking both fingers right up her nose at once while she jumps backwards.

Now THAT’S talent.

Love,

Geohde.

BOTW, edition 11.

BOTW, more comprehensively known as Blog Of The Week (ish, usually very ‘ish’). I post because giving back just a little bit of unsolicited niceness to others makes the blogosphere a friendlier place.

Once again I commence another un or semi-solicited blogaview. Blog of the week, the eleventh spin of the carousel….where does the time go?

Ta-Daa!

And so it begins again, the eleventh edition of BOTW. Double figures it is! Not sure what I’m talking about? Click on the logo to be taken to the reasoning behind my unsolicited blogaviews and previous BOTW’s.

BOTW. An unsolicited admiration of blog-ness. An acknowledgement of the road travelled. Putting my excessive Google Reader activity to good use. On some level, we all write to be read, don’t we?

This week (roll with it, please, and try not to point out that my personal sense of time must be rather distorted if I think I can continue to get away with calling this sort of frequency or rather INfrequency ‘weekly’.) I choose to review:

CharmingB!tch: by Deels and Shannon.

Firstly, the quickfire version:

In a nutshell?

A brilliantly sharp, witty as hell and at times tear-jerking blog about two truckers, life, kids, infant death, pregnancy loss and now, ovarian cancer.

The clever search terms version?

Guardianship, Children, Parenting, Pregnancy, Infant Death, NICU, Grief, Loss, Miscarriage, Ovarian Cancer, Surgery, Marriage, Difficult Family Stuff.

In more detail:

Again, I shall not over-revise The Charming Ones’s history (In case I stuff it up. Check out their blog for the story in their own words rather than my clumsy paraphrasing), but I shall borrow from their very well written ‘about’ page.

2005: Great except for round 1 with MRSA infection and Katrina eating my whole house.

2006: Banner year that included getting pregnant (and not finding out until 10-12 weeks along), getting married to my baby daddy and giving birth in September to Jackson. He was doubtlessly the most precious and perfect baby in all the land but sadly he died a little over a month later. It’s been incredibly hard as I think there isn’t a comparable loss to that of a child and if there is, in fact, anything worse I hope we never experience it or even hear of it, to be honest.

2007: Today though we (Deels and I) are doing our level best to get on with getting on. My sister and her family have already moved to the North West and we will be following them (along with my parents) shortly. Hurricane Katrina fucked us up but good and it’s time for a change, as much as I do dearly and truly love the South.

Deels and I are back on the road (he’s a trucker, too) and that will be evidenced amply with terrible quality camera phone pictures until we upgrade to a proper digital camera. I also love my new bras with what is likely an unnatural passion. Plenty of proof posted already and you can expect regular updates.

And now, as of October 2007, another update. We made the move to the Pacific Northwest in April. This was after I quit my job (all dramatic like, heh) in March and we bought a house (one mile from my sister) site unseen in Vancouver. Moving was great, initially, and things seemed to be, finally on the upswing. I started therapy and then the final blow to our combined dignity was (another) unplanned pregnancy that ended in miscarriage and with Deels getting a (planned for but obviously delayed) vasectomy for his birthday in June. The miscarriage made me again sick with systemic MRSA and a hostage to a port and intravenous drug therapy for months on end. About this time my sister went into inpatient rehab and we had a truck-ton of responsibility for her three kids during that time. Good times, had by all, right?

Picking up from the studio in Portland, we separated in January of 2008 because D had an affair. I know, right? Was horrid. But we lived apart, fixed ourselves, worked too, too much and made things right again. Just in time for my dad to break not one but BOTH ankles in March 2008. And for my sister to chronically relapse, regardless of three trips to rehab in one lonely year. Her husband was also revealed to have a substance abuse problem his own self so we got guardianship of the kids and hauled ass back to Mississippi. Just after getting there, we discovered my former sister in law (I know, I know you need a chart to keep up with this shit) is in the throes of meth addiction so her 14 year old daughter lives with us now, too.

You tired yet? Fuck I am just updating this piece, dang. So. Yeah. Back to Mississippi, moved twice in a MONTH (w/o D being there either time, btw, b/c I AM BAD-ASS) and how we’ve settled into a 104 year old house that is both lovely and awful, is drafty as all fuck but full of so much character we think we’ll stay here awhile.

I mean unless the cancer means we’ll have to move. Ha! Gotcha. Yeah, shortly after all this kid collecting, moving cross country and such, I was diagnosed with Stage 2 Ovarian Cancer. It sucks, hard, especially b/c D is back over the road and home really sporadically but it was caught early, is treatable and a year from now will be just another fucked up memory buried amongst so much joy.

So. Yeah. That’s us and our family (C-14 girl S-6 girl H-5 boy J-3inJanuary-boy) – We rock pretty hard given the circumstances, I think.

I have to confess I’ve been lurking this particular blog for some time, mostly because they’ve been through the absolute wringer and the story really pulls at me. I don’t know of many people who can write about cancer surgery and be as funny as hell at the same time, I just don’t.

Care to read and support?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Want to see YOUR blog featured? Like to be in my blogroll? Let me know in the comments section below and I’ll gleefully add you, after all a girl can never have too many hyperlinks in her sidebar.

Family Planning.

Dear Internet,

I may possibly indulge in just a little bit of light hearted sarcasm today, or at least (to put it another way) say things that I do not really mean merely in order to make my point.

I am working on my Manners and Deportment in public situations which by definition kills my fun by precluding me from being intentionally rude.

This means it is officially out of order to splutter and holler ‘You want to know WHATTTTTT?’ almost exactly as if somebody had asked me my feelings with regards to fell.atio on a particularly crowded train (due to express the next ten stops) whenever I am quizzed about my future reproductive career. Minus the blushing, obviously. Oh, and the almost irrepressible desire to make some crack about Italian Opera not being my kind of music.

Fell.atio is just such an awfully flowery word in just that kind of cultured, snobby opera sounding way. Or at least I have always thought so. I do welcome other opinions on the matter.

So, since I have digressed enough, let me regroup.

I am trying to explain why it is I feel I need to whinge to the Internet at large about people publicly taking an almost proprietary (You’re not getting any younger, you know! Wink, wink!)  interest in my future plans for my uterus, and therefore indirectly at least, a vaguely creepy curiosity about my probable future trysts with a transvag.inal ultrasound probe.

So. Take note.

The best, the very best, time to ask a woman when she plans to spit out more children via either a natural or scalpel-generated orifice is ABSOLUTELY at that fun point in a supermarket visit where both spawn are screaming at dental drill frequency in the pusher over custody of a bag of unpaid-for grapes (which they only have succeeded only in ripping open and squashing half the contents all over themselves), precisely half of the shopping is already up on the conveyor belt, a badly timed spouse has chosen to call with a particularly urgent request to nick back inside to acquire bog roll, something essential has just turned out to be missing a barcode, andyou’ve just realised that there is no way to bend down and get the remainder of the groceries out of the pram baskets without showing an almost professional degree of Plumber’s Crack.

Really, keeping it to a look of stunned horror and the quip that I thought I got time off for good behaviour for having a two-for-one deal in the first place was quite restrained in the circumstances.

When it rains.

Otherwise known as ‘How do you know when your child is ready for toilet training?’, a helpful primer in one easy step.

Listen up, Internet, it’s simple.

When your fourteen month old takes the, ahem, golden opportunity to piss all over you on the change table, right when you are dealing with a messy explosion from the other main active orifice, it probably isn’t time.

For oh-so many reasons.

Especially if she doesn’t stop cooing at you while she’s at it.

Geohde.

PS. It turns out that girls can indeed generate enough of a stream to hit even the longest-upper-limbed parent. Don’t ask me how I now know this. Also, never EVER duck down to get something of the change table unless you are generally in favour of receiving unexpected mouthfuls of fresh off the press WARM infant urine.

Don’t ask about THAT, either. The rain is Spain may fall mainly on the plain, but around these parts it also falls snack-bang in your open gob.

The central requirement.

Dear World,

I hate to be all pissy with you again, yes again, about this matter, really I do.

But it seems that you just can’t let it go. I have begged of you all under my breath on more occasions than I care to count in the last year to please refrain from presumptive gender assignment of my children, sadly to no avail.

You just can’t resist calling a baby without hair a boy, it would seem.

Gleeful erroneous cries of ‘OOOHhhh TWIIINS! A BOY and a GIRL, how positively LOVELY and generally splendiforous to have one of each!’ abound whenever the Twinmobile and I venture out in public.

You do tend to gush a bit, world. You could work on that, you know.

Even when I’ve coated both poor infants in head to toe matching pink in an attempt to subtly clue you in that there is no penis in the pram, you can’t help it.

Actually, you can’t help it almost especially when Naan is wearing a bleeping pink skirt and a t-shirt that all but says ‘Proud owner of a v.agina’. I do consider my views on the dress of my spawn relatively open, but trust me when I say I wouldn’t do that to a son of mine.

At least not until he was adult enough to independently decide he’d kind of like to get around in that fashion. Then we’d crack out the Master.Card with gusto. I like to shop.

To be honest I never understood exactly why people coat their daughters in pink until you all decided to summarily change Naan’s sex without consulting us first.

I have seen the wang-free-code light and now I own a lot of pink.

Just ride with it, please world. They’re BOTH girls. Trust me on my analysis of this one, will you?

I mean, sometimes you even have the temerity to exclaim ‘No!’, try to correct me, or look shocked when I gently explain that bald heads and Y chromosomes are not synonymous, even before the age of sixty.

One year is a wee bit early for the old male pattern to strike even the most unlucky of chaps. Just ask my husband.

So, in conclusion, to the three cretins who yesterday all exclaimed ‘Did you see the TWINNNSSS? They’re a BOY and a GIRL! Look! Over THERE!’:

1. I’m not deaf.
2. It’s rude to point.
3. No, they’re not.
4. The central requirement for boyhood (loosely speaking and with exceptions) is having your very own willy.

Now shove off, will you?

Love-and-iodised-salt,

Geohde.

I just wouldn’t…

No, really.

I wouldn’t be the vaguely revolting blogger I seem to be if I did not duly release a Tale of Poo on the unsuspecting Internet once in a while, completely unbidden.

I just wouldn’t.

I do so hope that you all know what you’re in for, now that suitable warning has been issued, and the more delicate constitutions and/or current eaters (most especially of unfortunately brown items as chocolate) can cease and desist.

As an added bonus, I can inform you that this particular Poo Story involves Saag, Naan, another baby and an adult.

You could say it got about a bit.

Let me explain.

To put it another way, let me explain what I have now learned about changing the (as hinted at heavily above, um, log-filled) nappy of another infant in the presence of Saag and Naan.

Don’t.

At least don’t do it at ground height, lest you wish to become witness to Saag reaching in and helping herself by grabbing the fun brown toy right out of said nappy. Then running off waving the blasted thing in triumph. Very closely followed by a squawking Naan, hell bent of having her piece of the action, too.

Insert brief tussle between the protagonists and a change of fecal custody, followed by five horrified adults getting it together enough to howl a belated chorus of ‘nOOO…Ohshshshisthhhit…ohNOOOOOOO’ as the mother of the poo-grower concerned reflexively snatches it out of Naan’s victorious grasp without really thinking matter through all that thoroughly.

Then you can watch the expression on the poo-wrangler’s face change to sheer horror as she looks down at the contents of her own fist and back up at the rest of the room. Slow realisation dawns.

By the time the poo-whisperer is up to the point of screaming for help because her hand is literally full of shit, everybody else is completely useless in the assistance department, having gone strangely red-faced, tear streaked and being fully occupied choking back howls of laughter.

I must say that I found apologising for my children making off with a turd one of the strangest apologies of my parenting life to date. I don’t think the laughter made me very convincing.

If it helps any, I cleaned Saag and Naan’s grabby paws very thoroughly afterwards.

More things that annoy me.

Ack, I hate spring. 

Rebirth? Not so much. Joyous beginning anew? Nope. Same whatsit, different bucket Chez MII. Gazelle-like leaping about fields? See below. Fertility? Please don’t make me laugh.

I’m typing this missive with a visual field more commonly associated with the ‘before’ picture in blepheroplasty advertisements for bloodhounds.

Additionally, everything on  my beleagured anatomy that isn’t red itches anyway and therefore soon enough will be. When I get around to scratching the buggery out of it.

In other words, my eyelids are (interestingly if it’s not YOU itching like mad) hive covered and swollen. To the kind of fun dimensions used as cautionary photographs in hair-dye packets for those optimistic unsuccessful attempts they make to convince punters to allergy test before gleefully coating the scalp in dye.

On the plus side, it’s hard to have wrinkles when your eyes are swollen shut. On the minus side, however, they’re practically REALLY swollen shut. To the point that my racial origin is difficult to determine. I have to work tomorrow.

Pollen can just suck my proverbial.

Wait.

That didn’t precisely go as planned.

In an attempt to avoid a spate of comments pointing out the obvious, let me try again. Since I don’t actually have a ‘proverbial’ to suck, then pollen can kiss my ASS.

Before my morning shower and AFTER my morning something else.

That is all.

(Zyr.tec. Stat.)

Sometimes I despair.

Otherwise known as yet another random anecdote or two from the Giant Mental Filing Cabinet of Stupid Things I Keep Inside my Head.

I’ve got plenty more from whence this one comes, too. One day at the rate I am going I shall have to alphabetise the blasted thing.

Regardless, let me recount some recent verbal output Saag and Naan have effortlessly managed to extract from the mouths of others. You know, since they’re currently (touch wood, touch wood, I hear no protests as yet….heck, jump up and down and have a party) napping. For the second time today.

The first stretch was two hours, but you think I would have learned my lesson about bragging by now. Besides, lest I forget, Naan did a giant, liquid (but oddly odourless)  poo in the middle of the night. She, oddly enough for a child who is mostly content to lie in her own waste, screamed like a banshee with buttocks pasted in battery acid until her stupid maternal unit thought to inspect her nappy. Only to discover the poor kid’s  buttocks that did look rather like the aforementioned acid etched variety.

Oh.

In my defence, it was 2am, a time at which I am not precisely my fastest mentally, and the jet-engine shrieking was rather off-putting.

So.

Recently-ish, Saag, Naan and myself as the transporting parental unit went to a children’s party. Fascinating thus far, I know. Do humour me as I add a little background, without which the punchline may fall a little flat.

When we go to such events I generally pre-emptively dress the Indian Takeaways in the same outfit, albeit with a minor tweak or two between spawn. This is so that I can airily wave my arm to those who keep on insisting they cannot possibly tell a small blonde and a giant brunette apart and mutter something about Saag being the one in silver shoes. You know, as I drink wine, or at least wish there was wine.

I do this because I figure that it should fulfil the unwritten Second Law Of Twin Identification (the first law is that two children must belong to one woman and look the same age), i.e. Thou Shall Not Dress Your Spawn Matching Unless They Are Twins.

It’s a heavy hint.

It also means that if I need to rapidly locate my flock, I only have to remember one outfit, and my memory is not all that flash these days.

Anyway.

I usually also dress them to within an inch of their life in pink, on the basis that this is the almost universal code for owning a vag.ina and being a girl.

This way, most of the inevitable ’Are they twins?’ and the erroneously chirpy  ’A boy and a girl, how lovely!’ is avoided.

On this occasion, I even went one step further and dressed them in a particularly well loved shirt. Shrts that, ever to the point, read ‘I Am Not A Boy’. Written on a pink background smack bang across the middle of the chest.

You can imagine my confused look when almost the very first thing that happened after I unleashed Saag and Naan was that somebody walked up to Naan, looked down jovially at the pink jean clad self-proclaimed ’I am NOT a boy’, patted her on the head and uttered the following immortal words:

‘Why, HELLO young man! Is that your older sister over there?’

Sometimes I despair.

I had another story about a comment in the park that Naan could not possibly be the same age as Saag because she is, and I quote, ‘tiiiiiiiny!’, but I really cannot be bothered anymore.

You get the idea. At least there was champagne.

The Antipodean Invasion.

Also known as ‘The blog entry in which I give the game away’.

In other words, should you happen to live in a certain country that likes to hang out on the northern side of the equator, well, expect your population to shortly temporarily increase by about four people, two of whom are admittedly a little on the short side.

The logistics of the planned shenanigans avec twins on several long-haul-tin-can-with-wings-on jaunts has had my overly list-dependant self in a busy world of planning check-box heaven, much to the detriment of this website.

Are strollers included in baggage allowance (Very Bad, since ours weighs about a metric ton, give or take), or extra (super awesome)? Do airlines let enterprising parents take litres of shelf stable milk on board with which to placate spawn and stop their ears exploding at takeoff and landing? What do you do with two one year olds on a plane for fourteen solid hours after the fiftieth repetition of ‘Mary had a little lamb’, anyway? Why do American street numbers start in the thousands for a perfectly normal sized street (answered, just because they do)? How terrifying might it actually be to be a passenger in a car that Geohde absent-mindedly keeps trying to drive on the wrong side of the road? Do alligators really eat people, or just snack on unguarded limbs?

The questions are legion.

DId I mention that Chez MII is going mobile, and we’ve just been on the almost-phone-with-extra-dropouts that is Skype to the wonderful HereWeAreAJen planning details?

As for Jen, she is as lovely as she types, although possibly with a bit more accent.

I expect that she thinks the same of me, and that additionally I am Very Red at the moment. Most Loudly Red. I shall, however, go ahead and assume that she is probably much less pixellated in real life.

In conclusion, Holiday! Jen!  Whee.

Thank you, Jen, you absolutely rule and now I must attempt to conquer Mt Washing before Saag and Naan (who waved dutifully at the computer screen when prompted and even blew kisses before a thankfully kept off camera defcon-10 naptime meltdown) re-emerge from their cots in search of lunch.

Ooh, I’m excited.

Agony Aunt, Edition 19.

Otherwise known as the ‘where has the time gone?’ edition. Nineteen already? It seems like only a couple of years ago that  a much younger Agony Aunt still had that pesky nappy-requiring double incontinence problem. It wasn’t ALL verbal diarrhoea back in the day.

Regardless, the nineteenth spin around it is. Bring on the Googlers. My snotty nose and cranky mood is more than up to the task.

….and so it begins again. I decide that I cannot let Goog.le proclaim me the font of all knowledge with regard to ‘huge t.its’ and the overly optimistic like without planning the Early Sag and Backache lecture, right there and then.

As always, click on the button for previous editions of my snark advice to the frequently illiterate. Or click on the Bad Google tab at the top to see a more comprehensive list of what can only be described as Really Dumb Stuff.

Ahem:

• beautiful girl with huge t.its.
• not that shit again.
• suppository rectal movie.
• lost scrotum photos.
• photos of vag.ina been shagged.
• dull back ache black tarry poo bloated.
• which hole shall penis can lead to pregnancy?

Item #1 (beautiful girl with huge t.its):

As a card-carrying member of the IBTC*, I stand firm in my fried-egg position that they’re over-rated, anyway.

Also, see above remarks with regards to the National Geographic Phenomenon and the like. I thought that might put you off of your stroke a bit. I know how to Talk The Dirty, oh yes I do.

Besides, sweetheart, if it’s boobs that float your proverbial boat, do you really need a pretty face too?

Perhaps I’m just jealous. Now, bugger off, okay?

Item # 2 (not that shit again):

Yes, it IS that shit again. What more is there to say? Drink less beer and eat less curry and you won’t be so troubled in the mornings.

Item # 3 (suppository rectal movie):

Okay, Googler, apart from the fact that I now feel an overwhelming urge to bathe as this query is even kinkier than an experienced reader of The Misdirected Kink is accustomed to reading, well.

Apart from that, um.

Why?

Item # 4 (lost scrotum photos):

Lamp-posts and milk cartons everywhere now hold new horrors for the unwary.

Item # 5 (photos of vag.ina been shagged):

I am going to take a flying leap of intuition and assume this is a mildly humorous search for po.rn. Again.

Here’s the thing, oh Google-y one, I admire your single-minded specificity in what gives you the maximal amount of jolly factor, really I do. But. If you are grammatically challenged, stick to typing ‘po.rn’ or ’s.ex’ in the search box. Both are tried and true favourites.

PS. You meant ‘being’ back up there, I think. If you didn’t, I don’t want to follow that line of past-tense horizontal folk dancing enquiry any further at ALL.

Item #6 (dull back ache black tarry poo bloated):

I’m sorry to hear that, but it probably shan’t be lethal.

Speak to item #2, will you?

Item #7 (which hole shall penis can lead to pregnancy?):

Easy.

Without going overly dull and anatomical, I’ll give you a clue. It’s not the mouth and it’s also not the Bottom. In most women, that leaves only one real option.

Now, what do you plan to DO with that information?

G

PS. It’s been a disturbingly slack while, are there any lurkers or new bloggers out there potentially interested in a little blogroll addition, or being BOTW? Don’t all rush at once, now.

*Itty Bitty T-rhymes-predictably Committee.

New things that annoy me.

Actually, they simply skip merrily over point ‘annoy’ and downright piss me right off.

In other words, I was at work today running around a mostly unfamiliar hospital like a slightly useless blue bottomed fly trying to do my level best to decrease the general illness quotient floating around. Please note that this was in the face of some impressively determined effort on the parts of the patients to really, really, screw up their health, usable veins, pawn-able items, pinch the Un Fun drugs off the resus trolley, and nick off with half the clean linen as well.

If you’re going to pinch something, people, try the morphine. Adrenaline probably isn’t quite the buzz you’re looking for.

Regardless.

If I get one more flipping bleep-and-run page asking me to ‘review the patient in bed 5A’ without the helpful addition of the following items as a minimum, namely:  the bleeping ward, nurse name, extension number, patient NAME, diagnosis and the eternal optimistic query of why they need to be seen now (and not more happily, for me at least, tomorrow, when I am not working), well, I shall simply have to hunt down the cretin responsible and drown them in iodised salt.

Or possibly I may strangle them with my voluminous handover sheet while calmly repeating the mantra ‘ESP is Not Scientifically Validated as a Means of Communication’.

That is all. I’m not even asking anybody to say ‘please’, or ‘thank you’ for that matter.

It’s been a very long day of investigating multiple 5A false alarms.

Well, I never.

If I did bore all and sundry to tears yesterday with what I now concede is an extremely long winded and rather uninspiring account of how I posted a letter without stamping it first (see I did it in ONE sentence, I can be to the point, sometimes), then I guess today’s brief missive may fail similarly to hit the mark.

Not one hour ago I received a rather amusingly confused phone call while in my personal trolley-pushing nirvana, the supermarket (‘Ooooh! Three for the price of TWO!’). It was a phone call from a bemused individual in slightly baffled possession of what appear to be on the surface of things two identical time sheets.

She took great delight in asking if I had intended to send two time sheets for the last fortnight, or whether I did it just to check they were paying attention?

I did briefly quip that I had rather hoped I would be paid twice this way, because being terminally vague gets expensive on the household budget what with all those nasty late fees all the time, but then confessed that one of the sheets arrived sans stamp. The postal gods apparently took mercy on the frazzled soul of yours truly and delivered it for free.

Well, not quite for free. Unpaid postage is delivered at cost to the recipient it would seem.

Fortunately it’s only local post and therefore cheap.

The next time I forget to stamp something, I should think bigger, though. I now plan to return every single unwanted local newspaper foisted upon my poor letterbox since I have moved to this address to the companies concerned. Unstamped, obviously.

More like a colander.

I would like to think I have a mind like a steel trap. Sharp, fast and never EVER prone to letting small details slip.

The kind of mind that can recall the dose of warfarin that every single patient on it on my ward (a percentage that varies with the particular Unit of Malady I am working for at that point in time, ranging from ‘what’s warfarin?’ to ‘everybody and their dog’), remember their last three INR’s and adjust the therapeutic rat poison dosage appropriately. Before being paged fifty times about it.

Not that doing so in any way stops the inevitable pages by several somebodies guilty of not actually reading the drug chart lately, but you know. It’s still much nicer to be able to be righteously irritated at having your valuable! damnit! time wasted, rather than feeling like a naughty child who hasn’t done their homework that day being asked to explain by Teacher.

I prefer having a grasp of things before they have a grasp of me. Especially if it’s the short and curly hairs.

To put it another way, I take pride in getting the little details right, even if nobody notices. No matter what your turn in trade, people only notice your screw ups and not the things that first graders get gold stars for.

For a different example, when not gainfully running around a hospital clutching papers like a blue arsed fly, I like having the kind of mind that remembers when bin night is without prompting and never fails to put them out in the right order on the right weeks. I like being able to go grocery shopping and only acquire a trolley full of relevent items we need (chocolate is extremely relevent, even if we already have some). Sans list, although making lists is yet another thing I dorkishly adore doing.

Nothing fills my heart with greater joy than a neat list with happy little boxes next to every single item, all ticked ‘done’. It makes me feel like I’ve really achieved something that day.

Don’t snicker.

Anyway, for the longest sleep deprived time after Saag and Naan made their protesting way into the world, right out of the lower half of my surgically unzipped abdomen this all went to hell in a handbasket.

I was lucky if I could get the day of the week right, and pure necessity forced my red-eyed self to engage in the most insane list making known to obsessional-compulsive mankind. I had lists, and then lists of lists. I had lists for my purse, for in the car, for by the bed and so on. Reminding me to shower, wash clothes, change underwear, attend appointments et cetera.

I have a sinking suspicion I murdered half a rainforest in my desperate attempt to keep the wheels of Twin Central churning, but it worked surprisingly well as long as I didn’t lose my list(s). Losing a list prompted some rather impressive headless chicken impersonations, digging though the house in a futile attempt at recovering the irretrievably lost, followed by a predictable crying jag. In case you’re wondering.

Then, as Saag and Naan became rather more gracious with regards to the general concept of nocturnal shut-eye, I improved. The lists got fewer and limited to a few items only. In one diary.

I’ve remained at this happy box-ticking medium for some time now, but after yesterday’s efforts, I’m rather concerned that I am experiencing a sneak preview of dementia. Perhaps I should up the list ante to include such items as ‘Put stamps on envelopes before attempting to send through the postal system’ and ‘Do not queue hopefully at the closed register for five minutes before working out the cause of the hold-up’. Also ‘If I really MUST stand around waiting for divine intervention to step in and scan my goods, don’t load them all on they conveyor belt first’.

Just in case. Because you feel like an utter ass as everybody watches you restock your trolley and sidle ten feet horizontally to the open register. As for the envelope, well.

I’ve just got back from posting a replacement. Yes, avec stamp this time.

Clearing something up.

 

….in case my last post caused any confusion, or there is lingering doubt about the number of tenants in Hotel Uterus.

To put it another way, I could say I was pregnant, as long as I immediately followed that statement with ‘Ha! Opposite day!’. We all know I’m far too mature to do something of that nature.

I don’t like being pregnant.

There, I said it.

I do not like being pregnant. Gravid. With child. Gestating. Incubating. I do not feel all warm and fuzzy when my proverbial oven is cooking buns, and I can think of about a million things that are more physically pleasurable than the elegant condition known so charmingly as being ‘knocked up’.

I. Do. Not. Like. Being. Pregnant.

Please don’t hate me. I know it is not in the best of taste for an infertile woman who has hit the baby jackpot to admit it, but I just don’t get off on being the approximate dimensions of a planetary satellite. I like to be able to turn over in bed at night, unassisted. Heck, I like to sleep on my stomach. Apart from the superficial physical aspects, being pregnant mainly makes me feel alternately terrified my babies have died while I wasn’t looking, or simply inescapably enormously fat.

I am a traitor. I do not ‘glow’, I ooze sebum and I collect backne. I sweat like a pig-wrangler on a busy day. My nose develops a non-disguisable (by even the most enthusiastic hairstylist) collection of pimples. I snore. Loudly.

Even in the first trimester, when the whole shebang is physically easy for a non-porcelain phone conversating type, I do not like it. I am crippled by horrifying anxiety. I have weekly scans, because magical thinking tells me my baby shall die if I do not peek as often as possible. I own a doppler and spend literally hours finding a heartbeat at  early gestations. I cry if I am not successful.

I do not like being pregnant.

My grooming suffers in exponential concordance with my expanding girth. I stop brushing my hair. I gain forests in areas that are normally heavily logged. I wear items more conventionally recognisable as tents, as apparel, and in public.

I do not lovingly stroke my belly as I sit, but wince as a contraction reminds me that bending in the middle is yet another item ranked rather highly on my personal uterine verboten list. Unmedicated with contraction stopping Fun Drugs, I go to the toilet about fifty times an hour, more than half convinced I shall prolapse an infant whilst sitting on the can because the pressure in my pelvis dictates that not even a millimetre of urine and a baby can coexist peacefully. Medicated with drugs that should drop my blood pressure, I become horribly hypertensive anyway and I swell until I am cursed with Fat Fingers to go with my Fat Arse.

I am hungry all day long and additionally at 10pm, midnight, 2am, 4am and 6am, but the insane reflux means that I have to choose between enjoying a second, more acidic, version of each meal or spitting partly digested food and stomach acid into the bathroom sink. Sometimes a bucket, because I cannot walk beyond a waddle.

I get ravenous appetite derived stretchmarks on my ass, and when the blasted thing duly shrinks post partum, I am left with cheeks that could hold pencils up. Hands free. But that’s okay, because so can my stomach. Also, my bowels can really hang out, thanks to the wonders of a diastasis recti. I do not like what being pregnant does to my body. The first time I saw myself post partum, I almost cried. My stretchmarks and muffin top bother me, they fail to fill me with warmth that I mostly successfully (2/3 of efforts to date) grew human beings.

I do not like being pregnant.

There.

Now that I have said it, I can feel simultaneously heavily relieved to have gotten that small confession off my chest and mildly terrified that the heavens shall open up and the rain of judgement shall pour forth heavily upon my ungrateful head. I love my children, but I do not like being pregnant. That is all.

A Wry

Dear Internet,

Do please forgive me, for I must confess that the story I was planning to spin about my cat eating all my recent blog entries just before I could victoriously press the ‘Publish’ button might actually possibly be a lie.

In a small aside, bashing ‘Publish!’ is an act that always gives me positively enormous amounts of virtuous satisfaction. Even more than surveying the appearance of my house after a long-put-off vacuuming or being entirely caught up on washing. Goodness knows why raising the general quotient of written mediocrity available on the entire planet by an oh-so-small amount pleases me so, but it would seem that I love inflicting yet more mindless dribble on you all, well at least I do right up until that distressing point where I inevitably spot the plethora of typos and spelling errors, three days later. Then I cringe in shame at being so very poor at proof reading and try to restrain myself from going back and fixing it.

Regardless. The cat ate my blog, really it did. All that wit has VANISHED and I am inconsolable. Ahem.

Oddly enough, the general paucity of, you know, minor items like content worth discussing, or new stories of personal humiliation to recount (just so I can re-live the experience TWICE and hopefully in doing so learn not to do something so very daft the next time. This is an approach that never ever works, in case you wondered) usually fails to stop me unleashing some form of verbal diarrhoea or other on second daily basis.

Daily, if somebody really pisses me off.

Actually, it’s not odd at all. I blame the Takeaways.

Over the period of ages ranging from ten to thirteen months, they have decidied that daytime sleeping is increasingly for losers, and shall (loudly if I push my luck and have an optimistic crack at Horizontal Cot Time, regardless) not be dissuaded from that point of view. The price of developmental progress appears to be the shedding of my favourite two naps per day, leaving me with a blue-bottomed fly single precious nap-time in which to A: Bathe, B: Win a small but critical battle in the endless War on Household Entropy, C: Eat, D: Prepare food for the Twin Army.

The little buggers not only march on their stomachs, they march on the intended contents of everybody else’s as well. I’ve been vaguely mortified by my spawn Seagull-ing and sometimes outright snatching the supplies of other people in public more times than I can count lately.

When an utter stranger looks at your children pityingly and gives a clamoring Naan half of their sandwich, you know their finger is about a millimetre off of speed dialing Child Services. I’ve given up pre-emptively explaining that they are simply utter scabs who have learned all about soft targets, and I think I may simply move on to installing a ‘Do Not Feed The Children, No Not Even If You Think I Am a Bad Parent’ sign on the pram.

It doesn’t help that Naan’s legs do bear a disturbing resemblence to pipe-cleaners. Honestly, I really have no idea how the child manages to use them to walk successfully, let alone balance approximately fifty percent of her body mass not-so-far above them in her head like she does.

Regardless.

The other reason my contributions have been less frequent than is my wont of late is because I find it rather disconcerting to read the screen at a 45 degree angle.

No, I’m not experimenting with some kind of new-age PC balancing device, I have a wry neck and I’m rather over looking at the world crooked and with a Zoolander-esque inability to turn in one direction. Left is fine, in case you wondered, I can talk to people on my left all day, no problem.

Stand on my right however, and shall either wince mightily if I forget my afflicted state and attempt to turn, or sigh heavily at the cruelness of fate and stomp manually around until I can bring you into my field of vision.

So, perhaps next time when I am All Better, if you can restrain your excitement for that long (or at least until I can legally acquire some valium and relax this damn spasm), I shall tell you revoltingly boring stories about Naan’s cool new moves a.k.a The Kid Has Rhythm Despite Being Whiter Than A Vampire with Vitamin D Issues and Saag’s newfound love of handbags.

Seriously, Naan already dances better than her two-step shuffling father. Yes, LS agrees. He knows his limitations.

PS. This time the spellchecker really IS broken and I am not merely being carelessly lazy if there are any amusing misspellings remaining after my manual search-and-destroy mission. Additionally only the editing window marked ‘HTML’ seems to be working, and so the ultimate appearance of this entry with regards to formatting is an event that shall be as much of a surprise to me as it is to you. I shan’t know until I bash that ‘publish’ button.

The cat ate my blog?

Things that annoy me…

I hereby dedicate this post to the following things that annoy me the very most in the world. Well, at least as of today, at 7 pm, plus something minutes and something-else-divisible-by-60 seconds. Just so that tomorrow when I am at work and something annoys me more, I can rank it appropriately with regards to my feelings on having run unexpectedly out of chocolate because LS has eaten what I though was the last bar in my cleverly concealed secret stash.

Also, it is raining and too bloody cold to go out for more.

Pity me. I am a (insert discrete whisper that menstrual events may be happening) woman without chocolate. Thank goodness for wine.

1. People who treat nauseous and nauseated as synonyms and thus in one fell swoop tell the world that they make other people feel sick. Actually, they make me feel incredibly unwell in a grammar nerdish way, so perhaps they are not so very far from the truth, after all.

2. People who do not know that their vehicle posesses these clever things called ‘indicators’ that help other drivers bereft of ESP divine that they intend to possibly turn into the path of their innocent car. You know, so that the rest of us can save on the unexpected tyre wear, rear view mirror middle finger action overuse injury,  foot-to-brake-pedal reflex testing and general brown trousers wearing.

3. See above, but insert ‘accelerator pedal’ and ‘working eyes’ when the ass in front of you is blithely driving at half the signed speed limit in a zone marked No Overtaking.

4. Point 2, but with reference to ‘keeping within one’s OWN lane’ (because wanting more than one is considered greedy by most motoring authorities) and refraining from ’Honest-to-be-jeebers shaving on the go’, because whilst I like to make friends, I do not like to make them at the freeway speed-limit. Neither does the paintwork on my car. Besides, isn’t carefully crafted stubble considered sexy these days, rather than merely unkempt? After all, it is the approach I take with regards to my very own legs.

5. All the numerous sad, twisted searches that goog.le now proclaims me Ass Lady of The Internet with regards to, about thirty times a day. I swear a good proportion of my traffic is now about rec.tums. People, it is simple, so do listen up. Your bottom is solely designed to release chocolate hostages, back out a log or two a day, park a brown buick in the odd porcelain garage and so on. Really. There is no earthly need to get so very creative with regards to the Hershy Highway. Traffic is strictly southbound. Trust me on this one. Now bugger off somewhere else, please.

Yes, I mean figuratively with regards to that last point.

Protected: A lovely thing happened on the way to the blog.

This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below:

Password:

Some days are easier than others.

My thousand words for today, in diagram:

Yes, in case you were wondering, I do still love the kid. She could poop less, though.

A LOT less.

When in doubt, take your trousers off.

Well, isn’t that what we all do when confronted by a difficult situation?

Take a lead from Saag and the very next time you inadvertently jam yourself in that oh-so-tempting three inch vortex of fascination between the Baby Jail and the bookcase, push on and through regardless. It’s only compression, after all, and beings made up of largely water when it comes down to brass tacks can be surprisingly malleable with sufficient motivation.

Then, when you realise you have erroneously just imprisoned yourself in a very dull area possessing approximately the dimensions of a toilet cistern, but regrettably enough without all that fun splashy water, decide that you don’t really want to risk rubbing limbs off by attempting the return journey. Out of other ideas for entertainment, take your trousers off.

Then put them on your head.

Believe me when I say that fifty percent of the available sample of one year old’s in THIS household can contentedly rotate in circles for some time thusly attired, completely devoid of visual input because the crotch is remarkably deficient when it comes to eye holes. Normally.

Also, because the above activity is surprisingly quiet on the Chez MII  infant noise scale of  ’doing something forbidden (zero decibels, right up until the inevitable  crash)’ to ‘where’s my lunch? (jet engine at full thrust)’, rescue is profoundly slow in coming. But that’s okay, because you have your trusty cranial bifurcated tubes to keep you occupied.

So, in conclusion, the very next time you have the misfortune to be jammed somewhere dull just take your trousers off and put them on your face.  When in doubt, drop ‘em.

That makes everything* okay**.

*Only if you wear underwear and your trousers are clean, obviously.

**Perhaps not so okay if the ambient temperature is low, and/or there is an abundance of that nasty crystallised water that happens below roughly zero centigrade. You might lose bits of your anatomy that you quite value, on accounts of being all attachedto them. Hur hur.

Bad Blogger Mathematics.

…Alternately entitled We Weren’t Quite Done with The Gastro and THIS Time LS Copped It.

Alternately Alternately entitled I Find Above Events Perversely Amusing Because I Am Clearly A Sadist.

Agony Aunt, edition 18.

Legal to shag*, drink*, smoke*, vote* and spend far too much money on sticky alcoholic drinks in trashy nightclubs before vomiting profusely in a handy bathroom stall, it’s Agony Aunt now with Added Majority.

Bring on the googlers.

It’s late in the week, piddling down a serious g-dly incontinence episode of rain from above, and it’s bloody windy to boot.

A heady combination of construction site dust and plain old mud keeps getting in around my front door, and if it keeps it up I may have to concede defeat and begin mowing the inside of my entryway.

So, since Saag and Naan (bless their snot ravaged, tear streaked, screaming, unhappy teething cotton socks!) are finally down for a nap thanks to the powers of pharmacological intervention, I figure it’s as good a time as any to break out the crank at the, well, amusingly misspelled.

Analgesia, and not sedatives by the way, in case you had a brief flicker of ‘I wonder…?’  when reading the above sentence, although it did cross my mind. I am but human.

….and so it begins again. I decide that I cannot let Goog.le proclaim me the font of all knowledge with regard to ’sweaty balls’ and the unhygienic-sounding like without mentally wanting to take a shower. Right after I finish making fun of those running a constant risk of a serious case of jock itch due to being cursed with perpetually damp genitalia.

As always, click on the button for previous editions of my snark advice to the frequently illiterate. Or click on the Bad Google tab at the top to see a more comprehensive list of what can only be described as Really Dumb Stuff.

Ahem:

• fucking worried im pregnant
• how i can remov my penis forskin?
• Can sweaty balls cause infertility?
• I stuck a hose up my va.gina and filled m…
• fancy dress fake pe.nis.
• A list of what not to say to an infertile.

Item #1 (fucking worried im pregnant):

Big breath in…..For-the-sweet-love-of-all-that’s-holy-probably-WOMAN….and big breath OUT.

Piddle on a stick, will you?

Then you can either be:

A: Fucking worried about the next eighteen years (conservative estimate)/ forever (worst case scenario), OR

B: Very relieved.

See?

You have a 50% chance of feeling much better than you do now.

Now, go forth and tinkle.

Item # 2 (how i can remov my penis forskin?):

It’s called circumcision. It’s a procedure where somebody hopefully possessing a very steady hand cuts it off for you. Kind of like you did to poor, defenceless ’e’ in a few words above. Vowels are not the enemy, by the way.

Oh, and I guess I better make the following point quite obvious, so pay close attention. Don’t try it at home.

Item # 3 (Can sweaty balls cause infertility?):

Only in the vaguely sporting sounding sense that nobody likes to play games with damp balls.

Plus, jock itch, much?

Item # 4 (I stuck a hose up my va.gina and filled m…):

Uh. Urgh.

Um. Gosh, even. I’m slightly lost for words for once.

Well, golly.

You did?

Would it be rude to enquire why the blue blazers you chose to attempt a very personal recreation of the local-harbour-of-your-choice?

Item # 5 (fancy dress fake pe.nis):

Personally, I always think you can never go wrong with a bow tie when it comes to fancy dress.

Just don’t ask me how to stop it falling off, because I have the feeling that ’superglue’ is not the correct answer.

Item #6 (A list of what not to say to an infertile):

When ARE you planning to have a baby, then?

I want grandchildren!

I have this tea/concoction/pill that makes you pregnant as soon as you look at the packet.

My friend XX got pregnant by doing <insert stupid unscientific non-conceptually assistive item>

Are you sure you’re doing it right?

Why do you want kids? They’re so irritating. Here, have one of mine.

I’ll get you pregnant.

Have to tried a holiday?

Oh, and pay close attention to my final point, class, never EVER suggest relaxation. Unless you have a burning desire to die in the very near future.

G

*In some jurisdictions.

A small note to self.

Dear Geohde,

Hi, me, how are you doing? Long time, no internal dialogue typed out for the world to derive amusement at your tiny mind and all of that. I apologise deeply and come prepared to make it up to you, really I do, me.

Don’t look so stunned, you. Yes, you, I’m talking to you, err, make that ME.

So, since it’s just the inside of your head and the entirety of the Internet, me, let’s ask some really searching questions. I promise that I am deeply interested in your answers. I’d never commit the crime of boring myself to tears, would I?

Besides, I like to take an interest in myself now and again. I hear it’s healthy to be a bit all about ME upon occasion. It’s good for the self-esteem to mentally re-centre the entire Universe on one’s cranium from time to time.

So, sit down, have a coffee and a muffin and spill. How is it really going, me? You can tell me, I won’t judge.

Oh.

I see.

Well perhaps I’ll judge that one just a little bit. It’s considered vaguely antisocial to go around in public belting people who have innocently enough verbalised the first stupid thought that came into their heads when their retinas encounter two babies the same age clearly belonging to the one woman at once.

Yes, even if you (me) tape a sign on Saag and Naan’s pram warning that the first person to ask if they are twiiiiins will receive rec.tal whole chili therapy until they have more, um, pressing matters to be worried about. Nobody bothers to read anything these days. No, not even if they do click the box to say fifty pages of Terms and Conditions on the Product Disclosure Statement have duly been processed.

Any other pressing thoughts?

No? Oh.

I don’t want to sound all judg-y, but there’s not really much going on in-between those ears today, is there, me? There’s quite an echo in here, really.

Okay, then. Go back to picking toasted vomited porridge off of the washing if you must, me.

Just remember to clean the damn stuff off preferably before you wash things in future. Or at least before you tumble dry the lot on ‘hot’.

Until next time,

Geohde.

Piece of a.ss

Dear Internet,

Do excuse the big, black raincoat. Oh, and the shadows. We wouldn’t want to get caught doing something naughty, now, would we?

So, psst. Wanna see something interesting? Is arse your thing at all, because if so, Internet, it’s your lucky day. I’ve got not one, but TWO arses on offer today for your viewing pleasure. So, want to see?

You do? Okay.

Ah, well, sorry about that, I didn’t mean to get your hopes up only to dash your vision of some truly impressive arse. It’s just the good people at Photo.bucket tell me that I would be dispensing po.rn to the world at large if they let me keep a photo including Golden Arches on their site.

The fact that it is the arses of two one year olds taken by their maternal unit at context-appropriate bathtime notwithstanding.

Shame, really. It’s actually a pretty darn cute shot.

Honestly, I think the world may have gone a tiny bit mad when a mother cannot store future embarrassment for her spawn online by keeping a picture of such squeezable dimply cheeks in her own very obscure URL.

It’s not like I even went to the trouble of tagging the bleeping thing with children! nude! arse!, or any other slightly unsavoury combination of terms for easy discovery. I’m not nuts, and that may attract the wrong kind of Indian Takeaway fanclub entirely.

Shoot, since clearly taking a photo of an infant’s bottom means one is behind the subject (so to speak) you can’t even see their faces. It’s anonymous infant arse. So thank-you, Photo.bucket, for the above message and the heads up that I shall be in Big Trouble if I continue to use my account to post po.rnographic items.

But tell me, would one cheek only per infant get past your filter?

What precisely is the maximum level of ass allowed? Curious minds and their cameras now badly want to know, just on general principles.

Finally, good puritans of Photo.bucket, while I have your attention and before I depart, can I enquire as to your views with regards to, say, folded elbows shot up really close?

Busy.

Dear Internet,

Do please excuse me, for I am busy.

I am busy doing the third lot of vomited-on washing today.

I am busy retrieving half of the first load from my neighbour’s yard where the wind has helpfully blown my knickers into a puddle.

I am busy swearing creatively that I didn’t peg things more securely, while idly wondering just what I should do with the sopping wet second load sitting in the basket.

I am busy placating a cranky (teeth, if I did not already have enough on my plate) Saag and Naan with offers of sultanas, and wondering what I shall do to keep the fragile peace when I run out of them after the next handful.

I am busy writing a list of things that should be in our cupboard and fridge, but mysteriously aren’t, because we ate them and they do not magically replenish themselves no matter how wistfully I hope that one day they shall.

I am busy ignoring all the dirt on the carpets because I do not have time to vacuum today.

I am busy wondering if I can get away with feeding all of us left over prawn crackers for lunch.

Finally, I am busy forcefully restraining myself from manually stranglating LS with one of his old ties (or possibly drowning him by placing him head first in the loo and flushing repeatedly) because he is still in bed at nearly midday and I know when he does finally emerge from his cave of blankets, the first words out of his daft mouth shall be about how very tired he is.

I am a busy woman.