A new mom living an
ordinary life in the 'burbs.
|
|
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Thanks to Dooce for this fabulous T-shirt idea. Get one for yourself at ThinkGeek.
The cat hair appears courtesy of our WHITE cat. White cats: cute in the pound but completely impractical in the house. For the record, when this picture was taken, this shirt had not lived in our house for more than 24 hours and had not yet been worn.
I wore this shirt to the grocery store on Sunday without giving it a second thought. Let me remind you that we don't live far from Boston, a rather high-tech city, which is why I didn't much give it a second thought. Well, O.K., actually I did, but I figured if anyone would surely get it, it would be "the younger generation" (oh my Lord, I'm turning into my mother), and yet here is the exchange I found myself having:
~18 yr old Grocery Store Check out clerk: "What's buh-logging?"
Me: Oh... it's...kinda hard to explain. (chuckle chuckle)
Check out clerk: "Is it a sport?"
Me: Sort of. (chuckle chuckle)
(Pause)
Cleck out clerk: Oh, I get it! You're British. It's a British thing.
Me: (chuckle chuckle)
Note to readers: I am not British. So go figure.
Posted at 8:18 pm by Suburbia
Link here
Thursday, March 24, 2005
So I don’t even want to get into the circumstances that led us to be in the Emergency Room again this week, except to say that the baby & I are fine and I was not in early labor, thank goodness.
Don’t let the term “Emergency Room” fool you. It is only a coincidence that the word “Emergency” appears to be related to the word “urgency”. It is not. It is, however, related to the word “Emerge”, because after you check in you slowly emerge about 7 hours later having spent 5 minutes with a doctor while the rest of the time is spent either nursing your symptoms with the rest of the general public in a germ-ridden waiting room, or with your husband in an exam room listening to hospital intercom chatter while surreptitiously checking out the contents of all the drawers and cabinets. (What do you suppose this is for, hmmm? Any bets on what will happen if I turn this dial?).
Because I am becoming an expert in Emergency Care, I feel that I can give some important constructive feedback to the medical community at large and also to my sister-in-law, who is studying to be an RN. Here is my feedback: don’t be bitchy to ER patients. Some of them would rather go to second base with John Ashcroft than find themselves sitting in the Emergency Room. Try to understand that after waiting 2.5 hours to receive nothing but a plastic bracelet and instructions to return to the waiting room, your patient just might be hungry enough to want to plan for lunch. They may approach the desk to politely ask, “Do you know how much longer we’ll need to wait?”, and when they do, don’t respond with this bitchy comment: “This is an emergency room.”
Oh, really? My God, we thought this was heaven! Seriously, we looked around and said what is this Magical Place of Happiness, where one can watch Regis and Kelly followed by Days Of Our Lives and Animal Cops at a maddeningly high volume? This place where there are no magazines -- not even a single, antique version of Highlights or Field and Stream -- and where a crazy lady keeps talking to you about how attorneys are ruining the medical community, and where an entire family with Tuberculosis and no sense of personal space camps next to you? Are you telling us that this…this utter Nirvana is, how you say, an Emergency Room?
You see, when you give that response to a sick, pregnant patient you’ve no right to be surprised or offended when the patient looks at her husband, they both laugh with surprise at your callousness. I spent the next few hours beating myself up for not being quick enough to respond in kind. I'm just not that quick on the verbal draw; it's a problem I’ve struggled with since high school, but that's another blog entry. Anyway I spent the next few hours crafting witty, cutting responses such as: You, my RN friend, are in the wrong career. Try the Division of Motor Vehicles. I'm considering faxing these responses to her.
On a completely separate and happier topic, the American version of The Office is on NBC tonight. I am so excited because the British version is just about the funniest thing I’ve seen on television in a million years. I hope the US version is as good.
Posted at 10:26 pm by Suburbia
Link here
Sunday, March 20, 2005
There are about six weeks left until our child's birth day and I'm starting to put together The Hospital Bag. Our Hospital Bag is actually just the corporate-looking suitcase that is used in this household for all travel, and for which I will surely lose points with the La Leche League mother set.
In childbirth class and in all the books they list what you should bring to the hospital with you in your "Hospital Bag". They never say "suitcase", which leads me to believe that once again I am missing the mark on something innate to all real mothers -- that a Hospital Bag is yet another pastel-colored, hundred-dollar baby thing to be purchased from BabiesRUs. My "Hospital Bag" does not have Winnie-the-Pooh stickers on it, it has airport sticker tags on it. Will the hospital staff peg me as a bad mother? Will they whisper about how I am surely going back to work to let my child be raised by wolves at a daycare center? Probably. Do I care? Perhaps if I had more energy, I might.
But that's the thing, see. I'm tired, so I care just a little less about things like this. I'm good for about 3 hours of productive energy in a day, but after that my feet start to ache, then I have to replace my contacts with my glasses, and then I really need to be put down for a nap or else everyone around me will suffer my cranky wrath.
Why does this surprise me? It certainly makes sense as to why I might be tired. I think I'm just surprised when it interferes with my standard way of life. For example, last week I went to the mall to buy pajamas (matching pajamas) for The Hospital Bag. I had the entire glorious evening to shop. I left the first department store empty-handed and with every intention of cruising around the rest of the mall in search of pajamas that were not either a) floral or b) wedding-night silky/lacy or c) festooned with Garfield or Tweetie Bird. (Why are there no solid color pajamas for women? Some of us are actually serious people. ) I made it about 15 steps past the department store entrance and into the main mall before spotting the Man/Waiting Chair area.
Those chairslook comfy, I thought. So I sat down. Just for a minute.
Since I was so comfortable I decided to call Sandie. Just for a minute. I sat there for about an hour, having a lovely chat with Sandie for much of that time. Next, I called Fabulous Husband to tell him that I've lost my shopping chops (he found it difficult to hide the relief in his voice). Then I did some people watching before getting up and going home.
I had the entire evening, yet I made it to one department store and ultimately could not fulfill my shopping mission. Do you think the hospital staff will judge me if I wear non-matching pajamas? Probably. Do I care?
If I had more energy, I might.
Posted at 10:52 am by Suburbia
Link here
|
|
|
