Bringing Up Bobbin

Looking forward

Bobbin's favourite question as I'm putting her to bed at night is "Momma, what we gonna do after dis sleep?". Of course, if it's a school night, the answer is "School" but we already know about all the cool things happening at school all day for the whole week, thanks to her teacher's regularly weekly emails that list out the full week's lesson plan. Have I mentioned how much I love this new school? So we're able to get jazzed about all the fun things she's going to do at school, which eliminates (most times) the protests of going to school. And now, when we get there, she runs full speed down the walkway ahead of me, to go find her friends and start playing. I had to ask for a kiss and a hug and no sooner than it was issued, she was back with her friends, back turned to me.

VICTORY!!!! She turned and glanced back as I was leaving, but I had put my arms back down and wiped the look of scary happiness off my face and just smied, waved, and called "I love you sweetie! See you after school!"

Tim went to pick her up and she didn't want to leave.

I'd say we're over the transition badness.

12 hours of sleep last night - she slept from 7:40 - 7:30. Would have slept longer had I not awakened her. She was happy when she got up though. No protests

She's been coming home with this knowledge and these ideas /that have not come from Tim or I. I know a lot of songs, but I had not heard "Doggy Doggy where's your bone? Someone took it from your home! Guess who? It might be me or you or you!" or how about

There are Seven Days
There are Seven Days
There are Seven Days in the week
Sunday Monday
Tuesday Wednesday
Thursday Friday
Saturday

Ah yes, and there is also

Pumpkin, pumpkin, I've been thinking
You're the finest one I've seen
Soon to be a jack-o-lantern
All lit up for Halloween

And she's recognizing numbers - the number 4 in particular (there have been several recent birthdays in the class of kids who are turning 4). And there must be someone in her new class who likes Batman because she's been into watching superhero movies, and pretending she's batgirl on her swing and calling me BatMommy ,and Tim BatDaddy. It's pretty comical.

I'm barely making it through my exercise goals. Haven't failed, but just squeaking by. And it's just been a generally rough 3 weeks or so, but I think I'm getting back on track. Looking forward to taking some copious time off in December.

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Begin Anew

New car today. Tim's car. Audi is gone. We got $4K for it towards the new car. The entire time, from haggling down to paper signing took 3 hours. But we got the price we wanted. We won!

Picture day at school today. Bobbin dressed up, and yelled, or so she told me, "COOKIEMONSTER" when the photographer asked her to smile for the camera.

No surprise that I start out the new cold season with a cold. Icky. I didn't do my 60 minutes today as I had hoped. Didn't even do my 30. This could be the first week in 11 weeks that I miss my goal. But I'm sicker than a dog.

Grey's Anatomy is on. Season Premiere.

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A load off my chest

A week ago, I made a vague reference to an unspecified problem that had caused me to miss my workout on Tuesday. Well, I'm happy to report that the unspecified problem turned out to not be a problem at all, and with a sigh of relief I'm able to actually talk about it now.

Last Tuesday after work I drove myself to the ER to get my shortness of breath checked out, given that I'd been experiencing at that point for 3 days straight. They did a series of tests from bloodwork to an EKG to a CT scan to eliminate any possibility that I was experiencing a clot or fluids in my lungs, an enlarged heart, a collapsed lung, an irregular heart beat or any of the other medical stuff that can lead one to experience shortness of breath. All the tests came back negative for any sort of problem that would cause my shortness of breath. I have great blood pressure, I have an excellent pulse (that is in fact slightly lower than average, more than one medical professional commented to me). I have a strong and regular heart beat, and I have healthy happy lungs. The ER doctor and my therapist both think that the shortness of breath may have been anxiety related. It was a stressful week for me on many levels. And the problem appears to have resolved itself; I've not experienced it again since the ER trip which is great.

However there was something they did find that was unrelated. The CT scan detected a 14 mm nodule under my left breast and the ER doctor referred me for a diagnostic mammogram. My first ever mammogram. Because I'm still more than 2 years shy of my 40th birthday.

I was very very scared and broke down into tears in the ER when he told me. He also told me that 95% of the time this turns out to be just a normal, benign thing. As we age we get "lumpy". He said that in the very rare chance that it was not benign the fact that it was caught at such an early stage before any other symptoms presented meant that it was highly likely to be resolved by whatever appropriate treatment was required. All the same, I was worried. I got up the next morning and scheduled the mammogram. And this morning I went in to have it done.

I have to say, of all medical procedures that I've endured this was the least pleasant. I got through it only by reminding myself constantly that by doing this, I was potentially saving my life. I say with all seriousness that I would rather get a pap smear than a mammogram any day. While I enjoy neither and find both to be physically uncomfortable, for a variety of reasons, for me, getting my upper half checked is just much more emotionally and psychologically uncomfortable than getting my lower half checked. The technician who was assigned to me, however, gets my undying gratitude. I'm sure she recognized my angst by my tightly clenched arms around my chest, and my iron-fisted grip on the ends of the cape that they gave me to cover myself. And the tears rolling silently down my face as she adjusted both me and the machine to get us positioned correctly were the dead give away. But she was the utmost professional, and treated me with great gentleness, respect and dignity. She didn't comment on my tears or my posture. She didn't utter any reassurances. She didn't try to "lighten the mood" or get me to ease up. She just kindly and gently went about doing what she does and rewarded me with "great job" after each picture was taken. And before sending me back out to the room to await the radiologist's diagnosis and/or request for additional pictures she gave me a big, fluffy, full-length white bathrobe to put on over my cape and I instantly felt more relaxed and comfortable. None of the other women waiting got a robe, and they were all there as long as I was. I don't know what her name was, but I really really appreciate what she did.

I ended up getting 2 rounds of pictures (6 pictures total), the radiologist wanting a couple more after seeing the first four. But finally, after what seemed like several hours but was in reality only 1 and a half hours total including wait time, I was finished and they were ready with my results. The nodule was benign. Nothing to be concerned about. No additional tests needed. And they said they don't need to see me again until age 40.

I've been smiling and practically skipping down the halls at work all day. I'm so very grateful it wasn't more serious. I know the odds were with me - we have no history of breast cancer in our family, and I don't have any of the other factors that are associated with a higher risk of the disease, but was still so relieved to get the official diagnosis that everything was ok.

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The contents of my purse is worth a thousand words

Cleaning out my purse this morning and I came up with

• 2 domino pieces
• 1 orange plastic cupcake
• 1 crushed green lollipop still in the wrapper
• 1 almost-empty tube of kids sunscreen
• 1 long-lost grocery list
• 3 pens that don't work
• 1 bluetooth ear bud in need of charging
• 1 wadded up daily report from Bobbin's school
• 1 slightly sticky recipe for "Monkey Bars"
• My therapist's business card

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There's a coffee table game out there somewhere that I'd be really good at.

Ever wonder why I sometimes have that glazed look in my eyes - seeking some place far away; a dream place where there is no sound. Ever wonder why my answers to your relatively easy questions are met with lame responses that do not answer them like... "that's just what it is. It's that."

96% of the time it's because I've just spent 20 minutes in the car with Bobbin with no plausible exit, and am recovering from being bombarded with 104 questions about every possible range of subjects, many of which I didn't even know existed or happened. My creative juices had long run out my ears about 10 minutes into the trip. So by the time I get to you, I am a mere husk. A shell of the being I was just a few minutes ago.

I am not exaggerating. I've been meaning to quantify for you, with real data, just what a typical 20 minute car ride is like for me and Bobbin. So I bought one of those little counter clickers - you know; the kind you see people holding at doors to events to count the people entering. I bought it and set it in the car, primed and ready to click when I picked her up.

5:06pm. This is the point at which she entered the vehicle with me. The questions started long before, but I left the clicker on the dash. She was in good form so I knew I wouldn't run out of questions before we got home.

Exactly 20 minutes later we pull into the driveway. The questions are still coming.

Final tally: 104 questions at 5:26 precisely.

104 questions in 20 minutes.

That's 5.2 questions per minute.

I answered every one, but by the end of it they were mostly lame answers.

• "Why the digger tracker isn't moving, Mommy?
• "The driver's gone home to dinner"
• "It's not dinner time yet"
• "Maybe she's gone potty"
• "Did she go in the yucky potty?
• "If she felt like she had to go bad enough, probably"
• "What do they do with the pee pee in the yucky potty"
• "A truck comes by to clean it"
• "How?"
• "With a mechanical arm; the same kind of arm they use in space. They have to use a robot arm because no one can get close enough in person because the stench is so bad it will knock you unconcious. So they build these potty robots whose job it is to toodle around the city and empty all the yucky potties.
• "How they empty them? Where does all the pee pee and poopy go?
• "They suck it out"
• "like a straw?"
• "Yup. It's kinda like a milkshake at that point. Like maybe an oreo cookie mango smoothie milkshake"

How did I get here - from digger tractors to poo milkshakes, There's a coffee table game out there somewhere that I'd be really good at.

Oh... what about the other 4% of the time? They are questions that I get asked and answer around 9:30pm; half an hour after I've taken my daily dose Zoloft and Ambien. Making me happy and sleepy and not even a little bit capable of focusing both eyes on a single object at the same time. Try reading any blog post published after 11pm but before 3am. You'll see what I mean.

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So clean you can eat off them

I spent today recovering from my 24 hours in hotel solitude bliss by washing the kitchen and dining room floors. On my hands and knees. In preparation for Sunday's preschooler extravaganza, a.k.a Bobbin's 3rd birthday party.

All told we're expecting about 8 kids including the guest of honour, and 14 or so adults. The floors - they will not be clean at the end of the party. I know this. But at least I can take comfort knowing that when the kiddos start eating the food they dropped on the floor - 'cause they do that - they're likely not going to be ingesting toxic spores from the year-old mold that's been growing on the sticky spot where Bobbin spit her oranges that day last summer, or where the cat puked up the piece of pasta that she had stolen from my plate last fall. 'Cause it'd been about that long since I last washed these floors.

All the same, if it's a nice day, I think we'll just serve the cake and ice cream outside on the deck.

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And I care, why?

Apparently the company I work for is conducting a conference on the first floor of the hotel in which I am staying. It is entirely within the realm of possibility that I will run into someone I know. Or that someone I know will spot me without me knowing.

I should have thought of this possibility. I am mildly surprised I did not.

For some reason this stresses me out. It harshes my mellow. Part of it is that I am on vacation and am trying hard to not think about work (it's actually not been that hard). But the other part is that I'm worried about what they will think if they see me. I live not 5 minutes away. What logical reason do I have for checking into a hotel? Marital problems? An illicit affair? I can imagine the rumours.

Of course, I freely recognize the silliness of this worry, and the unliklihood of it actually coming to pass. And in the end, why should I care?

Ok. Put that one behind me. Off for a walk on the trail.

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Hotel bloggin'

I am lying in bed in my hotel, hair freshly done, waiting for room service, having just finished watching a pay per view movie. It's not even 6pm yet. What do I do with all this free time? I simply don't remember.

It's not utopia, but it's not too shabby either. You would think that for $239/night (the cheapest rate; but I felt I could splurge since $150 of it is going on a gift card I got from work) there'd be a hairdryer in the bathroom and a bathrobe hanging on the door (not to take home, of course). However neither was to be found. Not to be derailed from my mission of hanging out in my room all afternoon in a bathrobe, I walked down the street to the nearby department store and bought myself a robe. I needed a new one anyway.

The sparkling water and wine did not get delivered as promised either.

The hair appt was only so-so. Colourist was great and I like what she did but the cut is blah and the stylist didn't utter more than 8 words ("what are we doing today" and "thank you Heather") the entire time. I did not tip her. The manager came out to ask why I was not happy with the service and gave me a card for a free cut and style as well as a list of alternative stylists she recommended. Hey... Maybe if I complain about the lack of hairdryer, robe, sparkling water, and wine, the hotel will give me a free night and I can do this again in a month :-)

All said and done, it's the piece and solitude I was really after. And a good night's sleep. So not really complaining. I'm pretty relaxed :-)

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Because I deserve it

In exactly 55 minutes I am going to be sitting in a salon chair at Gene Juarez, discussing the cut and colour of my hair with my stylist. Well - she's not really my stylist; I don't really have "a" stylist. I take whoever is available when I want my appointment. But still. I'm looking forward to it.

After my hair appointment I will then be walking across the street and checking in to a hotel, where I will spend the afternoon and evening lazing around. Just me, myself and I. I intend to have a 20 minute shower AND a deep, long bath, and lie around in a nice warm fuzzy bathrobe the rest of the evening. Not ecofriendly, I realize, but I think it's ok to indulge. I am going to order room service. I am going to watch a chick flick on pay per view while lying in bed. I'm going to go to bed early and wake up late. I'm not going to make my bed when I get up, nor will I tidy the bathroom.

This, I deserve.

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Tee hee... I'm on vacation!

I started vacation at precisely 2:24pm this afternoon. I'm off all week. No special plans - just exercise and relaxing. Towards the end of the week I'll have to get ready for Bobbin's b-day so there will be some house cleaning, but I'm cool with that.

The BEST part though - giggle - I can't believe I DID this but Tim was the one who suggested it - I booked a room for one night next week at a nearby hotel - near the trail and across from a spa. It's all mine. Me. Alone. 24 hours. I even went online to their web form and requested a bottle of sparkling water and a glass of wine be delivered to my room upon arrival. giggle. I'm SO decadent ;-)

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The cookie wagon and other stuff

No cookies. 30 minutes on the elliptical. Just for the record, since I'm finding that posting my efforts are keeping me somewhat honest.

But surely there's other stuff happening in my life besides cookie counting and running in place? Yes, there are. But it's hard for me to focus on writing about them when I'm concentrating on the exercise front. Let's see:

- Bobbin retired her little potty today. All her idea. She's done with it and wants to box it up and see if little Zed wants it (it's got a nice cushy seat, Zed, and it looks like a real potty! ;-)) because she's decided "It's too small for me, mommy".

- We're a completely pullup-free household. It's undies all the way, even at bedtime now, for Bobbin. This is our 3rd week doing undies at night, although she's stayed dry at night for several months now even in her pullups. We've only had two accidents and both were on no-nap days; she just slept right through the usual signals.

- Tim sold his car a couple of weeks ago.

- I start a one week vacation at precisely 3pm tomorrow. Long over due. Mid-week I'm packin' a bag and checking in to a hotel for one night about 10 minutes away, across the street from a spa and next to the walking trail. In doing so, I'm going to treat myself to an entire night's uninterrupted sleep alone, a 5 mile walk, a hair appointment, and possibly a facial or massage.

And because it's been entirely too long since I posted a photo - here's Bobbin playing golf on our deck.

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Hurdle 1: Cleared

Bobbin exploded tonight as we were getting ready for bedtime. She has really bad eczema covering her entire lower body from her waist down to her ankles. I think it's a combination of the summer heat and the dirt that she gets caked in at school (bark dust and grime has a real affinity for sun screen). So we've been treating it with Aveeno 1% hydrocortisone, followed by a layer of Eucerin cream. This is what we've done since she was a baby, and it's always worked wonders. It still works. Only difference is that when she was a baby she'd fall asleep while I put cream on her. Now she hates it. What she hates is putting her clothes on while the cream isn't fully absorbed, so we give her some "drying" time, but that is not enough to convince her that this is a good thing that we're doing. Some nights are better than others and she'll allow me to put it on without much of a fuss, even exclaiming as I do it that "See mommy? It doesn't hurt! I'm a big girl!" Tonight was not one of those nights.

Tonight she went ballistic, screaming and running away. I know it is fear of pain that is driving her so Tim and I patiently waited it out and finally managed to convince her to come to me and let me put the cream on. She stopped crying and calmed down, I got the cream on, she agreed it didn't hurt and then when I was done and ready to give her a hug she promptly turned around, faced me, and smacked me hard on the head angrily.

After more screaming protests as I put her in a time out, we reconciled and she apologized, we cuddled in the big chair, and I tucked her in to bed.

By this time, however, it was 8:30pm. 30 minutes past the time when I usually go downstairs to exercise. Up until this week, that would have been my excuse to skip the elliptical. The time had past, it was too late, no work out for me. Tonight I forced myself to go down to the basement and work out for 30 full minutes, followed by my usual stretches with the exercise ball. It was mental agony. Because it had been such a difficult evening all I wanted to do was just go back upstairs and cuddle with her. I knew that she'd be calling out to go potty about 10 minutes after I tucked her in; and that 10 minutes after that she'd be asking to be covered up; and about 10 minutes after that she'd be calling out that Ginger was making noise and it was scaring her, followed by a call that she was thirsty. This is what she does. Normally I'm drained by the 3rd call and Tim and I end up tag-teaming to give each other a break. But tonight, all I wanted was to be upstairs so I could go in and take care of whatever it was she was calling for. I guess because I wanted to make up for her being so upset before bed, or because I wanted to feel better about it myself, or something. All I know is I worked out for 30 minutes and my heart ached the entire time.

BUT I did it. There will be a LOT of evenings in the future that don't start "on time" at 8pm for a variety of reasons. I need to be ok with that. I need to find a way to exercise anyway, and not let the lack of schedule adherence be my excuse for not working out. I cleared the hurdle tonight. Maybe that means I can clear the next one too.

AND... I ate no cookies today.

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I thought I was past this; is this my fate?

Insomnia. Rarely had it pre-pregnancy. Lots of stuff was different then. I exercised for about 2 hours a day every day - got the stress out and made me tired. I ate big lunches and tiny (if at all) dinners. Didn't go to bed completely full.

When I took my time off a couple of years ago the doctor prescribed a sleeping aid. Ambien. It worked GREAT. Probably too well. After weaning myself off it several refills later, I had a short bout of insomnia and then was able to get back to sleep. Slowly though, as months past, I have returned to the full-blown inability to fall asleep again. I long for that sleep aid I gave up. But it pisses me off that I can't get to sleep any other way.

I have some vacation coming up soon; maybe I'll use it to kick start me back into some good habits. Like eating better and exercising daily. I usually attempt this with any vacation with marginal success. Most of the time I end up whittling away my vacation with household chores. Day 1: The 6 piles of laundry I've been letting build up. Day 2: Wash the floors so I don't stick to them; scrape off the 3 inches of gunk that have accumulated since my last vacation and floor washing a year ago. Day 3: clean out the closet. Day 4: my god, it's almost over - better get out and do some kind of exercise. Day 5: sleep in because I haven't crossed that off my vacation list yet and maybe go to the hair salon and get those greys coloured. Then it's Saturday which doesn't change regardless of whether I've been on vacation the previous week or not. And Sunday is spent getting ready to get back into the grind.

I've been having wacky, and very telling dreams lately too. Like last night - I dreamed that Tim had left a surprise in the form of a plane ticket to visit my parents. The note with the ticket said that Tim would meet me there in a few days. I got so excited I jumped in the car right away still wearing my towel from having just showered and my bathrobe to cover the towel. Feet were bare. Got to the airport to discover I actually had 5 or 6 hours to kill before the flight but was glad just to be free so decided to go shopping and have a nice lunch. Looked down and noticed I was actually not dressed and determined I'd better fix that. Found myself in one of those airport souvenir shops that sell over sized sweatshirts and boxers with an emblem of whatever the town you're in is famous for. I picked out some pink and yellow fleece lined with terrycloth. Fashionable. Found some flip flops to match. As I was walking up to the checkout counter I passed through the children's section and that made me realize I didn't have Bobbin with me. I panicked. Was I supposed to take her with me or was Tim going to bring her? What if I was supposed to pick her up at daycare and take her with me? What if I wasn't actually getting a 2-day head start ahead of Tim and Bobbin? And why was I feeling angst about it? Did the fact that I assumed I would be traveling on my own that mean I don't love my daughter enough? I searched my pockets for my cell phone to try and call Tim and clear up my confusion and realized I had left it at home. I glanced at the clock and I had just enough time to drive home, get dressed, pick up Bobbin, and get back to the airport before the plane left. I was running madly through the airport trying to find the entrance to the parking garage when I woke up.

I have about 6 interpretations of this dream, but it all comes back down to me feeling stressed and guilty. The endless cycle - I get stressed; I act stressed; I regret acting stressed because invariably I'm acting stressed with people I love; I feel guilty for succumbing to stressed behaviour and stressing out my loved ones in the process; I feel inadequate for feeling guilty and for not having better management of my stress; I feel stressed about being inadequate. And so on.

It's 1am. I promised Bobbin we'd go to the parade with Miss E in the morning. We're even going to take the bus. Bobbin's never been on a bus so she'll be pretty excited. Tim is working the fireworks show but we'll pop by to see him in the afternoon. We're going to have fun. If I can find a way to get a bit of shut eye so I'm not tired in the morning. Because being tired makes me... stressed.

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What does THIS say about me?

Every morning after dropping Bobbin off at daycare, on my way to work in the morning, I stop at the local Starbucks and get a tall, non-fat, no-whip peppermint hot chocolate. I've been doing it for a couple of years. Everyone in the shop knows me and they usually have my drink ready for me by the time I get to the cash register to pay. I don't even have to tell the cashier - he or she just knows what to ring up.

The only time that this routine falters is when there's a new barista at Starbucks. Whenever they train someone new, invariably for 2 weeks I can expect to get the hot chocolate without the peppermint; or get a peppermint mocha instead of a peppermint hot chocolate (that's actually the most common mistake; I can live with hot chocolate without peppermint although since I paid 30 cents for it I usually think I'm entitled to ask for them to make it right) or it's made with whole milk instead of non-fat, or it's oozing whip cream through the drink hole. Or they charge me too much or too little (yes, I'm *that* honest) because they ring in the wrong size or wrong syrup or wrong beverage.

Eventually though, after a couple of weeks of totally screwing it up, they catch on and it becomes smooth sailing again until the next new barista-in-training gets to serve me.

I think for the most part I handle the mistakes in stride. It's not life or death. It's not going to ruin my day. It's not worth me ruining their day. Sometimes though if it happens 4 or 5 days in a row with the same person each day, I am less than enthusiastic and may not smile when I say "thank you" after they remake my drink for the third time on that last day.

So I walked into my Starbucks friday morning, surveyed the all-vetran barista crew behind the counter, and stood in line waiting confidently waiting for my turn. When they finally got to me, the woman on the counter looked up and smiled and said "Tall, non-fat, no-whip peppermint hot chocolate?" and I smiled and said "Yes, thank you". And then she froze, and an a split second I could see her recall a memory of something and her face clouded, and then she burst into fits of giggles and said

"Oh my god, I'm sorry. And I probably shouldn't tell you, but I had a dream about you last night! The peppermint hot chocolate. Oh yeah... it was a 'work-mare' for sure!"

And then she flitted away to mark my beverage choices on a paper cup with her sharpie.

And I was left wondering just what impression I leave any number of strangers with as I pass through their lives buying groceries, pushing elevator buttons, pumping gas, getting lunch.

I can say with all honesty I've never had a dream that I remembered about my Starbucks barista. No matter how badly they screwed up my order that day.

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Random acts of blogging

I recently joined the blogher.com community. I've been reading the blogs of some of the members for a while now and enjoying them immensely and so I finally thought why the hell not. I'm a woman, I blog (hehe... I almost wrote glob there. I'm eating chocolate cake as I type so my hands are a little sticky), I'm literate, my run-on-sentences and overuse of commas aren't the worst writing offenses one can commit. I have stuff to say. I'm told that a little tiny bit of it is even moderately interesting. So after being somewhat silent for several days in the forums and just watching the dialogue , reading the various contributing editor posts and browsing through the recent entries, I found one article about working moms and the sharing of duties that I felt resonated with me and my own experience. And so heady with the idea that I had information worthy of sharing with this group of women, I took a bold step and decided to go ahead and add my comment.

And oh, I wrote a glorious comment. I was eloquent, relevant, personal. I regaled my comment with tales of my own perseverance and inner turmoil and life struggles. I bared my soul. I was so proud. I even managed to minimize the comma use and keep my sentences to a reasonable length. And I included a link here, to my blog, to see if maybe some of those who read my comment might be interested enough to want to read more stuff I had written.

Yes, I was ready to join something and be an active participant. I haven't tried joining anything, I mean really joining with the intent of actively contributing, with the exception of the friday night gang which well, you guys know... you're special (and you can interpret "special" any way you think appropriate :-)) since attempting (and failing miserably) to fit in with the popular kids in high school. Even when I joined the Heart & Stroke foundation marathon training group I still trained alone - running by myself at my own pace, and choosing to warm up and cool down in my own little patch of green grass. I didn't try to learn anything about anyone or share anything about me with anyone. I was content just doing my own thing and not trying to forge new friendships or relationships or whatever.

But this... this time I was going to contribute and share. I was tingly with excitement. I read and reread my comment and then I clicked "submit".

And instead of seeing my comment appear at the bottom of the page, I was redirected to a maintenance page where I was told that the blogher site was down temporarily and they were very sorry for the inconvenience.

And it was lost. Forever. No amount of clicking the back button or searching my local hard drive for a cached copy of the web form would bring it back. And by then the moment and emotions were gone and it was too hard to recreate. And I was just feeling pissy and not so much like "sharing". And the second time around wouldn't result in anything nearly as good as the first draft.

The moral of the story is of course the same as for functional spec writing, really good flame mails (that you've already decided you were committed to sending), the C++ code you wrote all term for your honours project in computer science, and tax returns: Save often and save often. So you'd think I'd have learned that lesson multiple times over by now.

But I want you all to know - Wow did you miss out and you're all a little less for not having read what I never submitted.

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Someone... somewhere... must appreciate the crap that I am doing for them.

Yes, with this post I am indulging myself in a nice, warm, comforting bubble bath of self pity. If you don't like it, go find another blog to read.

I work hard. Hard hard hard. I try hard. Hard hard hard. I work and try hard to be a great mom. I try hard to be a great wife. I work and try hard to be a great manager. I work hard to be a great employee, I try hard to be a great human being. I try to be a good sister and daughter. I have 30+ years experience at the latter two and so these ones I feel I'm actually doing ok at and not as worried about as the rest. My sister, I'm sure, will let me know if I'm offbase here ;-). The rest though... don't have that 30+ years of experience to help me feel confident that I know what I'm doing and am doing it ok. Even the wife part, despite Tim's constant reassurances and sweet support when I get into these funks. Because if I was a good wife I wouldn't make him have to reassure me so much and prop up my confidence. Therefore I must suck.

I know don't work hard to be a great cousin/neice/aunt/daughter-in-law and I feel bad about that. I love my extended family members dearly but man, it is hard. I also admit I don't work as hard to be a great friend as I used to. I don't keep in touch with people outside family really well; I am not as approachable as I used to be; I tend not to have much time to spend with friends outside of work and family.

But all that work and trying that I am doing is making me tired and really really really cranky.

Because it seems that no matter where I turn or who I am working "for" at that moment in time or how much time I am devoting to them, someone is always wanting something more than what I am giving.

More time.

More help.

More sympathy.

More empathy.

More devoted attention.

More 1:1 time.

More listening.

More problem solving.

More road unblocking.

More moral support.

More representation.

More opportunity.

More visibility.

More work group health.

More productivity.

More money.

More advice.

It's all about what more I can do for them. It's never about what I have done or are already doing for them.

And so, I sit, unable to tell people to back off; to tell them to go find someone else to care; to go do something about their own problems; to go get a better job/manager/career/mentor/representative/friend (note: mother and wife are NOT substitutable) because I aim to please. That's me. And it sucks.

I have 24 hours in a day. During the week, this is how I get to spend it on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays:

7am - 8:10am: Bobbin time. Get Bobbin out of bed. Get Bobbin dressed. Get Bobbin breakfast. Help Bobbin brush teeth, go potty, pack her napsack. Spend a bit of time cuddling with Bobbin and getting some quality 1:1 time in with her. Check email briefly and respond to urgent stuff and verify my schedule for the morning. Then put Bobbin in the car and head off to daycare.

8:10am - 8:30am: Drive to daycare. Take advantage of the time by singing with Bobbin, talking with Bobbin, answering questions, and having fun before having to part ways for the bulk of the day.

8:30am - 8:40am: Get Bobbin settled into school - knapsack and coat put away, yogurt snack ready, Goodbye hug and kiss.

8:40am - 9:00am. Stop at starbucks and get my hot chocolate and bagel. Revel in the momentary silence and then instantly feel a pang of guilt because I really do want to spend every waking moment with my daughter but at the same time need to have a little bit of me time and that's not selfish is it? Arrive at work at 9am.

9:00am - 9:30am. *IF* I am lucky, I get 30 minutes to get settled in, catch up on email, and respond to priority emails before having to spend the bulk of the day in various meetings. I manage a team of 30 people at this point in time. Of those 30 people, 7 of them report directly to me. 1 of my direct reports is on parental leave until mid-summer which means I also am having to allocate some portion of my time to helping to manage his 5 direct reports. Of my 7 direct reports, 1 of them works out of Europe, the other out of Asia. The other 5 are US based. the rest of my 30 employees are distributed across the US and Europe. IIn addition to having a team of 30 people to manage located in multiple regions, all of the projects that my team owns require heavy cross-group and cross-team collaboration and so we have a pretty complicated dependancy and relationship matrix that also must get managed. And of course, I myself have a manager who expects me to be able to deal with all of this stuff pretty autonomously because he himself has 3 other teams reporting to him and mine is one of the smallest of the four total that he is responsible for.

9:30am - 12pm. Meetings. Which are usually anything ranging from 1:1s with my direct reports, to impromptu meetings with non-direct reports within my team, to recurring meetings with other teams and/or managers that cover any range of topics from particular project reviews to business reviews, to quality of service reviews, to external partner meetings, to business deal reviews, etc.

12pm - 1pm. I try and reserve this for lunch and am pretty successful, but it is important to note that lunch consists of me running across the parking lot to the cafeteria, grabbing whatever is ready-to-eat, and coming back to my office to eat it and catch up on email at the same time.

1pm - 5pm. Meetings. More of the same.

5pm. Leave work to pick up Bobbin. Non-negotiable. I have a hard stop at this time. For the most part this works and I no longer feel bad about declining meetings that people schedule for me after 5pm, or up and leaving a meeting at 5pm that is running late. Regardless of who is in the room, including VPs. And for the most part this is respected.

5pm - 5:30pm. Drive to daycare. Traffic sucks so it takes longer to get there than it does to go from daycare to work in the morning. Leaving a bit later makes this worse. I tried it to see if I could sneak in an extra 10 minutes at work. I ended up picking up Bobbin at 5:45. My hardcore rule is that Bobbin gets picked up no later than 5:30pm period.

5:30 - 5:45pm. Round Bobbin up at daycare, have her say her goodbyes, collect her blanket, daily report, and any artwork she created, and get her into the car.

5:45pm - 6:10pm. Drive home. Take advantage of the time by asking about her day, singing songs, making up silly rhymes, and listening to her chat about who had potty accidents, who got in trouble for throwing rocks, who she played with, etc. I love this time of day.

6:10pm - 6:30pm. Get home, get her unloaded, get her settled with a snack. If Tim's home he's started dinner. Sometimes I'm a bit later because we stop at the store to pick up something for him to cook. Set the table, unload the dishwasher, chat with Bobbin and Tim about their days.

6:30pm - 6:45pm. Eat dinner with Tim and Bobbin.

6:45pm - 7pm. Clean up from dinner - wipe table, counters, load and start dishwasher. Bobbin usually likes to help here, which is sweet but also tends to require a little extra cleanup afterwards. But I encourage her to help - maybe it'll stick :-)

7pm - 7:30pm. Quality time with Bobbin and Tim. Reading, singing, playing, etc. If it's a bath night, I'll start the bath running, get towels etc, ready and pop her in the tub by 7:15.

7:30pm - 7:45pm. Start the bedtime routine: Have bobbin go potty, help her brush teeth, get her room ready (pull shades; start music, straighten bed); get her changed into her jammies.

7:45pm - 8pm. Night time bottle in the big chair with Bobbin, watching the Shushy-byes and then Harry Bunny sing Twinkle Twinkle. I have to tell you I am actually NOT looking forward to Bobbin no longer having a bedtime bottle. It's our cuddle time. I love it.

8pm - 8:30pm. Mommy time. Sometimes I work out. Sometimes I lie on the bed with my eyes closed and listen to music. Sometimes I take a hot bath. Sometimes I indulge in some tv in the bedroom. Sometimes I spend this 30 minutes going into Bobbin's room every 10 minutes while she complains of some sort of owie or other, or insists on trying to go potty again, or reassuring her that the sound that she heard was just me or Tim or Tommy and not a monster coming to get her. When this happens, it is not Mommy time anymore.

8:30pm - 10pm. Tim time. We watch TV, we talk, we relive some of the wackier phrases or antics of our sweet little daughter. We surf the internet, show each other pictures or videos we've taken, etc.

10pm. Tim usually heads to bed to watch the news. I will sometimes stay up to watch TV or download photos from my camera, or update my blog. I also usually check my work email for 30 minutes - 1 hour between 8:30 and 11pm to catch up on stuff that's happened since I left at 5pm. Because a lot of stuff does actually happen after 5pm. Moreso than I'd like to, but part of that is the geographic diversity. On rare occasions I too will head to bed at 10pm.

11pm. Lights out.

7am. start again.

Wednesdays are special days. I mentioned previously that I have employees in Europe and in Asia. I also have other groups I interact with in both regions as well. So Wednesdays are my "extended work days". I work from 7 or 8am (depending on whether or not I have a 7am meeting scheduled) so I can catch the Europe crowd before their day ends; and I work until 7pm so I can catch the Asia crowd when their day begins. These people usually have to sacrifice THEIR own personal time schedules in order to interact with folks in the US and so I figure this is my way of trying to at least acknowledge that and make it a little easier for them to catch me. some of the 8am and 6pm meetings are ones that I have scheduled - 1:1s or team meetings to try and get most of my team together. I will admit that the morning ones are the hardest ones to maintain on a recurring basis especially if I've had a rough night of it with Bobbin the evening before. And so one of the complaints that the folks at work have is that these meetings are not consistent enough. Fair complaint. I just don't know that I'll really be able to get much better at it.

Wednesdays as a result are also my highest stress, lowest tolerance, and highest mommy-guilt days. I don't drop off or pick up Bobbin on Wednesdays. Two parts of my daily routine that I do really enjoy. I spend less time with Bobbin on Wednesdays than on any other days and I already feel that Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays I'm not spending as much time with her as I should or want to, and I only put in 8 hours a day on those days at the office itself plus 30 minutes - 1 hour on work email total from home at either end of that when Bobbin is either sleeping or occupying herself of her own volition. I rarely will actually work out on Wednesdays (although to be honest, for the last month I've rarely worked out on any other day as well) because of the extended schedule, and given that it is my highest stress day it is the day I most need to work out for pure health and sanity reasons. So the fact that I don't usually means that stress is accumulating and spilling over into Thursdays.

Saturdays and Sundays is quality family time. Bobbin and I go to L'il Kicker's soccer and have a blast; then mcdonald's for lunch, then home for quiet time. During quiet time I'll either take a nap myself if it's been a rough week and I need to catch up on sleep, or I'll do some housecleaning and chores. Afternoon we'll usually head out to a nearby park or playground, or we'll stay home and play games and colour and read and play in our back yard, or have friends over for a play date, or do errand outings to get groceries, etc. Sunday mornings are free-time; we do what we want when we want to. usually go ride Bobbin's trike at the playground and feed the ducks and then home for lunch and quiet time and afternoon if it's night we'll spend it playing on the deck or out on the climber and I might get some weeding or flower watering or planting done while Tim mows the grass (if he's not working the weekend).

And then it's back to the grind.

Family is important to me. The fact that I spend so little time with them compared to the time I spend at work is a constant source of angst, guilt, and pain. Despite the fact that I actually have a pretty good balance of work & family life. I typically work 45 hour work weeks. Most people would think that is awesome. Most would be surprised that my career is progressing as much as it is given that I am not putting in 60-80 hour work weeks. I do worry that I am close to stalling that progression; at some point 45 hours will NOT be enough, regardless of how hard our HR and diversity groups work to convince managers and employees alike that it should be and that balance is important regardless of your level. At any rate, family is important. It is in fact #1. When I'm not working I'm home with Bobbin and Tim. I usually can work in a little me time to exercise or veg or read or bathe. I can't do all of those me-things though. I have to choose each day which I will actually do. That's been the difference pre-Bobbin and post-Bobbin. I feel guilty even acknowledging that there is a difference, because acknowledging it somehow implies that I am dissatisfied with the current situation or somehow missing or longing for the former. Which is not true; I would not turn back the clock. But it is different and that requires adjustment and in almost 3 years I still have not quite found that right balance of me-only time. And every once in a while if I've been out of balance with my me-only time for a while, I get weird and cranky and unpredictable, and on occasion will even have to end up taking a vacation day from work just to recoup and get back on balance. And then I feel guilty that I'm taking time off work even though it is TIME THEY ARE GIVING ME - a bonafide vacation day that I have the right to take when I want to, yet I somehow feel that by doing so, I am skimping on my work responsibilities.

The kicker today was sitting at work reviewing feedback I recently received, and while I was reviewing it and trying to be as empathetic and objective as I could, and trying to look at it as constructive and informative for me as a professional, all I could actually think was damn, I guess I just totally SUCK as a manager, how am I even still employed and responsible for this stuff if I'm falling short in all of these areas, and at the same time I'm also thinking damn, what the hell do you people WANT from me, don't you see what I AM doing for you and don't you appreciate it and don't you know you actually have a pretty darn good deal here? Can't you just be happy?

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Harnessing the power and adreneline of emotion

Ever wonder what anger and moral outrage is worth? An hours worth is approximately 80 calories, I've discovered.

I did my usual 60 minute workout this evening on the elliptical. I've been averaging about 580 calories per 1 hour workout. Normally I watch The Daily Show followed by The Colbert Report. It's an easy hour filled with laughs and a pleasant way to work up a sweat and burn 580 calories without really noticing it too much.

Today, however, is Saturday. And neither show airs on the weekend. So I found myself surfing through the channel guide and landing on The Lifetime channel, watching a teen angst movie called "Odd Girl Out". Yeah, it's about exactly what you think it is about. Mean girls singling out the quirky and smart girl (on tv they're always cute too; totally unfair); completely ostracizing her by posting crap on the internet, luring her to fake events and then video taping her disappointed face, and eventually driving her to attempt suicide by sleeping pill overdose. It's a Lifetime movie, so it has a... uh... "happy" ending, in that the odd girl out recovers and regains the mental strength to go back to school to graduate from 8th grade with her class despite the continued mental and emotional bullying, and at the end in a crowd full of her peers, she finally confronts the main instigator and equates her to a flesh eating disease, ending the movie with the line " You have nothing I want", and walking away triumphantly with the one friend that stuck by her through everything (well, the last 15 minutes of the movie anyway; she never made an appearance in the first 45 minutes I watched. Weird. well. not really).

I ran the gambit of emotions - recalling my own pre-teen angst in grades 6-8 in particular and the constant insecurity I still maintained through high school and even university to some extent. I thought of Bobbin, today only 2 1/2 years old but someday having to run the marathon obstacle course that is middle and high school and hoping like hell she has a better time of it than I did, and is a better and strong person than I was, and that she is spared the pain and self doubt that I suffered through it all. And I was angry. Angry at the characters in the movie, even though I recognized the movie for what it was, and at the people in my real life back in middle and high school that I could cast in those same roles. And disgust and moral outrage that this crap continues in perpetuity. Lessons are never learned. Things never change. And worry because now there' s the internet, mobile text messaging, multi-party conference calling, instant video and photo uploads and mobile blogging (many technologies I am helping to sustain in the daily work I am paid to do), online "social networks", a PC on every desk and a mobile phone in every pocket, and a myriad of other "advances" that can do so much greater damage than the note passing and wall graffiti and prank calls of my youth. And how are you supposed to combat that?

And before I knew it my workout was over, and I had burned a total of 630 calories. And I was still raring to go. Luckily, the movie had another 5 minutes left so I moved over to the stationary bike and burned another 30 watching the grand finale.

It's apparently Teen Drama Weekend on the Lifetime channel. An opportunity exists for me to burn another 80 extra calories tomorrow. Of course, there's the question of whether it is mentally healthy to expose one's self to this much teen angst even if you are burning off the extra energy as you do so.

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And while I'm on a blogging roll, if I won the big lottery...

I don't know if it's 'cause Tim's working way late tonight or because I've got all this creative energy flowing now that I've worked out every evening for 45-60 minutes for a total of 10 straight days (I refuse to step on a scale until I've reached day 30 though), but I find the words just spilleth out my fingers and over my keyboard these days.

And so, while I'm in the mood, I thought I'm publish my revised list of Stuff I Would Do If I Won The Big Lottery. Because it's changed a bit. As you might have guessed.

I wouldn't do all of these at once, but I would do them all at some point.

1. Quit my job. It's not that it's a bad job. It's not. But it's not my dream.

2. Start showering in the mornings instead of the evenings. Don't ask why I have to wait to win the lottery to be able to do this. I just do, ok.

3. Go back to the gym and train for 2 hours every day like I did when I was in marathon mode.

4. Run another marathon at Disney World.

5. Go back to school part time to study early childhood development and learning I'm particularly interested in how children learn from birth --> preschool.

6. Open a bookstore that specializes in children's books. There would not be a single "Goosebump" or "Sweet Valley High" (or whatever the hell the going pre-teen angst series is these days) among them. Bobbin would help me pick the winners. There'd be a snackbar area that caters to kids - healthy snacks but fun ones, and there'd be a puppet show area, a reading circle area for scheduled storytimes, a bunch of kid sized comfy chairs for reading on their own and "big chairs" for snuggling up with a parent to read together. There'd be tables and chairs for scheduled craft activities, and we'd do lots of totally fun art projects, and draw pictures of the stories and characters after storytime.

7. we'd completely finish the basement and build a detached garage and a workshop for Tim

8. we'd take a trip to Europe, the three of us, and I'd show Bobbin all the castles in Germany that I visited and played in when I lived there as a kid. And we'd time it so that we could catch a formula1 grand prix.

9. Volunteer at an elementary school (Great suggestion from Debra, and one I'd like to find a way to do even if I don't win the lottery. It's just a lot easier to do if I don't have to work full time too ;-))

10. Go visit family! Or have them come visit us for a long time (since we'll have the basement completely redone :-)

11. Do some major landscaping outside. We'd hire someone for the heavy lifting but I'd want to work with a designer and actually design part of what we'd do and do some of the planting and stuff too.

12. Keep Bobbin in daycare only part time. And when she started kindergarten, I'd time my day so I could drop her off and pick her up so I have more time with her every day.

13. Get a full spa treatment once a month: hair, massage, facial. Aaaaaah.

14. Read more books (books with lots of pages, small print, and no pictures :-)).

15. Maybe try my hand at writing a children's book. And illustrating it ;-)

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Out with the old; in with the not-as-old

Tomorrow I officially start my holiday vacation. I don't go back to work until January 7th, 2008. I love that it's in 2008. Makes it seem even further away than it really is :-)

This time last year I was about 2 weeks into a medical leave of absence to deal with depression. Whether it was still officially postpartum depression at that point, or just your plain ol' garden variety depression, not sure. I was seeing a therapist for the first time in my life, my doctor had doubled the strength of my antidepressants and I was relying on a prescription sleep aid every night to get a decent amount of shuteye.

This time last year I was trying desperately to get back into an exercise regimen that didn't eat into my Bobbin-time or Tim-time or work-time or sleep-time or vegetating time and failing miserably at it. So I was even more down.

This time last year we were just getting our power back after 8 or so days (maybe it was 7. It felt like 14) of being without it in the aftermath of the big "Wind Storm of 2006". And my sister was about to arrive. Or maybe she had just arrived. So I was stressed.

This time last year Bobbin was getting over a really bad bout of the stomach flu. Its onset coincided with us being in the dark after the windstorm and relying on a generator to supply the power we needed to sustain a livable temperature and turn on a couple of lights. And so this time last year I was fearing that Bobbin's stomach flu was actually a case of carbon monoxide poisoning like we had been hearing about so much in the news. So I was even more stressed out.

This time last year, I hadn't even started Christmas shopping for anyone in our immediate or extended family except for my parents because they live so far away and I wanted to be sure their gifts arrived on time. So I was panicked.

This time last year at work I was managing a team of 8 full time employees and a hand full of agency temps. And I thought that was more than enough to keep me challenged and stressed for the rest of my life.

So... what about the present?

I am no longer seeing a therapist. I've been completely off my antidepressants for 3 weeks now. I no longer take prescription sleep aids to fall asleep, but I do depend on OTC or naturopathic sleep aids on a nightly basis. Still, I consider that a step in the right direction. I remember my dreams in the morning, which is kinda cool and not something you think about until you stopped remembering them and then start again. And being off Zoloft is like having a fog lifted from my brain and my senses. My sense of humour is slowly returning. Drole witty sarcasm as opposed to biting and hurtful witty sarcasm is returning to my repertoire. I can take a kindhearted jab from someone who loves me with a little more tolerance and less self-doubt. Things look and sound clearer and crisper. It could all be psychological. Wait... of course it is. We're talking about the brain, afterall.

I am on legitimate vacation right now, as opposed to a medical leave of absence. Which means that I'm getting paid my full salary to not think about work and focus on me as opposed to just 80% of it :-) Seems to me that I'm in a better state of mental health to be just getting 80% of my salary whereas last year I could really have used that additional 20% that I couldn't have. This is America, afterall. I was lucky to be getting any salary and to have a job to come back to at the end of it. Still... the illogic and irony that I only get my full salary when I least need it does not escape me.

I got an elliptical trainer and an exercise bike for my birthday and I'm averaging every other day so far... granted, that was only 6 days ago, but that means I've worked out 3 times in less than a week, so mathematically I'm doing about 10,000% better than this time last year, where my exercise consisted of crawling out from under the covers to the bathroom when I had to pee. I weigh exactly 25 lbs more now than I did this time last year, but I think I'm happier not being depressed than I am weighing less. Which is odd, because my weight definitely has a significant impact on my state of mind and self image. HOWEVER, I also feel the need to say that I weigh 3 lbs LESS than I did 6 days ago, which means my increase in exercise is having the desired effect, and things are moving in the right direction.

Not only am I exercising, but I actually have a plan to ensure I still get my necessary bobbin-time and tim-time and tv-vegging time and work-time in. Bobbin and I get our time from 5:30 - 8:00. I even get to cuddle with her in the big chair before I "head off to bed" and Tim takes over. 8pm-9pm I work out downstairs. Tim's promised me that no matter how tired he is, he won't go to bed before 9:30 so that from 9pm on, I get some quality Tim-time in too. And we've been hiring the babysitter more frequently this year (although still not as frequently as we should :-)).

We were thankfully not impacted by the heavy rain and wind storms that have swept the region. Many others are not so lucky. We haven't lost our power in a long time (knock on wood), our basement is dry as a bone, and although our wetlands are now more wet than land, we've not suffered any property or material damage.

My sister visited at the beginning of December, which was way cool, although not NEARLY long enough :-) But I was just glad that she had the window of opportunity and chose to use it to come and spend time with us! I miss her still. At the same time, as much as I have loved Christmases at my parents' house, or having family come visit us I must say that I am looking forward to a christmas eve that consists of just the 3 of us. NOTE TO SARAH, MIKE, MOM AND DAD: YOU STILL BETTER BE PLANNING TO GET YOUR BUTTS DOWN HERE FOR NEXT CHRISTMAS (Sarah & Mike, you get a get-out-of-christmas-free pass seeing as how you have two families you need to make time for and next year may not be our turn to monopolize you :-) but Mom, and Dad, I'm holding you to your plans to come out here. we're building you a room, afterall! No pressure there :-))

Some things, however, stay the same.

Bobbin is actually just getting over a bout with the stomach flu just as she was this time last year. However this time I know it isn't carbon monoxide poisoning, so it isn't quite as stressful. And her body seems to be shaking these things off faster now (testament to all of the doctors and parents that told me that 2 is the magic age when their immune system is pretty well established). And now it's not an automatic that Tim and I will come down with whatever she has; our immune systems have been well fortified too as a result of the last two years, it would seem.

I've got Tim's presents finished (this time last year I hadn't even started him and was adding that to the list of reasons why I was a completely useless human being not to mention wife), Bobbin's too. My parents' gift is going to be late because... well... because I'm actually making it myself and the only quality time I have to work on it is after Bobbin and Tim go to bed and when I'm on vacation. Sorry Mom & Dad! But I thought you'd appreciate the fact that it's of my own making, not something I bought, and I know when you do get it (end of Jan) you'll really really love it. I have my list made for the rest of the family (Yes, I even know what Tim & I are giving you, Margaret, despite the fact you refused to give me a list on our phone call a couple of hours ago. You parents; you are ALL alike. The conversation was revealing enough though; I think you'll enjoy what Tim and I decided on for you :-) and I know exactly where to get everything so I'm not stressed at all.

On the work front, I now have 25 full time employees spread across 3 US locations and 3 European countries, 5 open positions I'm recruiting for one of which is in Asia, and about 10 vendors. I laugh when I think I was stressed about work this time last year. HAH. Let's just say, my vacation couldn't have started at a better time. That said, I do love my work. I still would love winning the big lottery better, but I'm pretty darn happy doing what I'm doing, and I plan to keep doing it for a long time to come.

So... things change, things end, things begin, and things stay the same except for minor twists. All in all, it's been a pretty full year. Lots of stresses, frustrations, happy times, sick times. I expect this next one to be full in different ways but still full of lots of stresses, frustrations, happy times, sick times

As for my personal hopes and goals for this next year, I hope (in random order)

- that Bobbin enjoys an even healthier year next year

- that I can maintain my exercise regimen and the balance between me-time, bobbin-time, tim-time and family-time that I seem to be starting to finally strike

- that I can continue to cope even better with life's stresses & surprises when they happen

- that I lose 50 lbs (via the healthy way - exercise and smart eating :-))

- that I can ditch my OTC sleep aids finally and get back to a med-free daily life

- that Mom, Dad, Sarah, and Mike come for a nice long visit over the Christmas holidays next year.

- that I get promoted at work (if I don't then I want to be clearly on track for one next year)

- that we win the big lottery :-)

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Birthdays and Christmas Trees and Big Girl Beds

Been a busy week or so. Wednesday we got ourselves a Christmas tree; Thursday we celebrated my 37th birthday - Happy Birthday to Me! (and it was!!); Friday Tim and I got a sitter and went out on a birthday date. Dinner and a movie in an actual theatre. Saturday we stayed home from Soccer due to Bobbin's growing cough, and instead moved Bobbin out of her crib and into her brand new Big Girl Bed. Sunday we were going to go see Santa Claus, but the cough morphed into a high fever and mucus-y mess so we stayed home instead and alternated between doses of tylenol, motrin, and corn syrup , jacked up her humidifier to high, and spent most of the day listening to our poor, whiney, girl coughing up her lung and snoring like a freight train when she could manage to catch a few Zzzz's.

Seems to be doing much better tonight though so far. Knock on wood.

Here's a few sneak preview photos.

Bobbin decorates the Christmas tree:

Bobbin helps Mommy blow out her blazin' cake:

Bobbin tries out her brand new Big Girl Bed:

For the whole shebang, including a bunch of stuff from the beginning of the month like our snow day, our trip to the Ballet, our Saturday soccer practices, a recent football game, and more photos of this weekend, click here!

I still have to post pictures of Aunt Sarah's visit too from the week before. So stay tuned! :-)

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Assimilation

Well, it took just over 13 years, but I have finally been fully assimilated into american pacific northwest culture.

The final step?

I now have "a drink" at Starbucks.

No... not a drink named after me. But a drink that is associated with me. As in:

Barrista: Chonga with 2 cheeses to eat, right?
Me: Yup!
Barrista: And what's your drink again?
Me: Grande non-fat no-whip peppermint hot chocolate
Barrista: non-fat no-whip... ah yes. Gotcha!

Barrista: Grande non-fat no-whip peppermint hot chocolate?
Me: Yes please!

I could resist the borg no longer. The starbucks stop has become a standard ever since I took my leave of absence. I drop Bobbin off at school, and then run next door to the Starbucks on the corner to grab my breakfast. Which consists of... well... now you know.

Seattle, I have (finally) arrived.

I take small consolation in the fact that while it is a multi-adjective drink, it's not even half as long as some of the ones I usually hear being rattled off by the east-side techno-yups in line in front of me. You know, like

Vente non-fat no-whip 2-pump caramel light-ice triple-shot macchiato. With room, double-cupped.

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The dreams of youth

I am awake because I had a nightmare. It's been a stressful couple of weeks at work - my team has more than doubled in size in both full time and contingent staff due to a recent reorg, my area of responsibility has expanded considerably, and what with Tim working late most of the week of the 4th, and Bobbin fighting recurring ear infections, it's also been a tad stressful at home. And when I stress, I get nightmares. Tonight's nightmare found me driving in the passenger seat of a bright red convertible speeding down some desert highway with Paris Hilton at the wheel. She was giving me career advice. And I was listening. I remember at a distinct point in the dream, I thought to myself "I have hit an all time low". I'm not entirely sure if that was my subconcious making commentary on my dream material, or if my dream-me was acknowledging that if I was sitting there taking career advice from the ultimate career party girl, it must mean my professional life had hit rock bottom.

But as I lay awake in bed awake preoccupied with self analysis, I heard Bobbin through the baby monitor having a dream of her own. "Patty cake?" she called out excitedly. And then the sound of clapping hands, followed by a giggle, followed immediately by the sounds of her snoring. A rousing game of patty cake. Now that's something I'd much rather dream about!

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This is snot happening

I was just sick with the flu a couple of weeks ago. Down hard for 4 days, 2 of which were days I had to take off work. And now I've got a cold. I can't afford this. This sucks.

My energy level is good and my body feels fine, but I've blown more snot out my nose in the last 24 hours than I thought humanly possible. The amount of snot that has come out of my head this morning alone is greater than the entire volume of my body. I have so much snot I have to keep a kleenex up to my nose constantly. I actually dripped snot onto my keyboard at work while I was grabbing a new tissue. and when I walked down the hall to the bathroom without a tissue, I couldn't even make it into the stall to grab some toilet paper without snot dripping on the floor.

Despite the fact that my brain is functioning, the rest of my body feels fine, and I'm not in any pain (excluding the red raw nub that is now my nose and upper lip) I had to go home because I couldn't get any work done because I couldn't do anything except blow my nose, even for a second. Not to mention the fact that I was completely grossing out my coworkers.

There. Now, aren't you glad you checked out my blog today?

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Taking stock

I go back to work tomorrow, returning from a medical leave that started Dec 6th.

While I didn't have any formal list of goals or to-do's, I did have sort of a list in mind, and I'm pleased to say that more on the list got accomplished than not. Of course, a lot of stuff happened that wasn't on any list at all, but all in all, I think I came out a little more than even :-)

So... how was it?

I started my leave with a severe upper respirtory infection. I was miserable. I thought I'd never be healthy again. For the first entire week I was off work, I was pretty much bed-ridden. Not what I had planned.

In my 2nd week of leave, just as I was getting over my cold, we had the record wind storm that knocked our power out for 6 days. 3 of those days were spent sleeping in places other than our freezing house. Daycare was closed. And the other 3 days, while they were spent in the relative comfort of our house powered by generator, we were still in the dark and it was still a major downer. Also not what I had planned.

The 3rd week of my leave was spent hurriedly preparing for christmas and the arrival of my sister (whom I was very excited to see!). Christmas shopping right up to the day my sister arrived. Cleaning of the house. Wrapping of gifts. Decorating of tree. Doing of laundry. Not a lot of me time.

The 4th week of my leave was spent celebrating the holidays. it was an extremely fun, happy, and special holiday this year (moreso than previous years for a variety of reasons, not the least of which was Sarah's visit, and the fact that Bobbin is old enough to really be able to be an active participant in the festivities now), it was still a tad stressful in that it was yet another departure from a routine I was so desperate to establish during my leave, and it came right on the heels of 3 weeks during which I had accomplished absolutely nothing except to maintain the high stress levels that were causing me to have to take medical leave in the first place.

And then we rang in the New Year, and the holidays were officially over.

My 5th week, I got down to the business of getting myself back into a healthy state of body and mind. I started walking 4 miles a day most days. I started eating more healthfully. I took daily naps. I listened to music. I started writing in the journal Sarah had given me for my birthday. I got my hair cut, I got my brows done, I went to the dentist, and I got a facial. I took a lot of really hot bubble baths.

I spent more time with Bobbin. I spent more time with Tim. We even went on a couple of dates!

I got our christmas thank-you's sent out. I bought myself some new clothes for work. And while I'm not thrilled about the size on the label, I am pretty satisfied with the way I look in them. And today, I treated myself to a massage, and got the car washed.

And so, tomorrow, I think I'm about as ready as I ever will be to return to work. Of course, if we win the big lottery that plan will change drastically, but in the meantime it's hi-ho, hi-ho, back to work I go!

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5 for 5

I went for a 4 mile walk today! Did it all in exactly one hour. It was actually more like 4 1/4 counting the trek to and from the car. It was absolutely exhilerating!

Then I came home and stretched for a full 20 minutes while watching the "Ellen" show which I haven't seen in... oh... about 18 months. The stretching felt great.

Then I ate a healthy lunch.

Then I took an hour long nap.

And then I had... drum roll... a shower! A long one. I even deep conditioned my hair.

And the best part? I plan to do it all again tomorrow :-)

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Happy Birthday to me!

#36 this year. Older. and in many ways much wiser. But in many more, still not nearly wise enough :-)

I spent a perfect day having lunch with Tim at our favourite thai restaurant, doing some last minute christmas wrapping shopping, enjoying a nice snooze and quality tv-watching in bed with my husband, I picked up our daughter and came home to a dinner, cake, balloons and presents on the counter waiting for me. I opened my presents and used them right away - Tim got me everything I've been dying for for the last several months. A nice back massager, and some soft cotton hankies, and a shopping spree at the local deptartment store for when I'm ready to go back to work. Sweet and thoughtful and beautiful and sorely needed and treasured by me. I am a lucky mommy, wife, woman.

And here i sit slightly... stoned is the only word that I believe applies but having never actually been stoned I can't confirm its appropriateness in this context... after having taken over the course of the last 3 hours or so the 2nd of 2 daily doses of the antibiotic and the 2nd of 2 daily doses of the perscription strength sudafed, my 1 daily dose of perscription sleep aid, my new increased daily dose of antidepressant and my favourite little pill that will do its best to ensure I don't find myself in a situation where I need to start worring about a possible 2nd round of this 16-month rollercoaster I've been on (I've lost count... that's...5 medications. 7 pills total. Until I hit PMS and then you can throw a couple of Immitrex and Tylenol in there too for a couple of days. I think I still don't beat Mom yet. But I'm getting closer! :-))

Seriously. I'm good. Over the worst of the code. Tim graciously took it from me. Bobbin's snotty but not as sick as she's bene in the past pre-tube-surgery. She gets her 2-week checkup on friday so we'll know for sure.

I'm not going to tell you what I was wishing for when I blew out the candles, but I'm sure those of you know know me, Tim, and Bobbin well can guess what the one thing I wish more than anything else. So keep your fingers crossed and lets hope we get it :-) And in the meantime, Yet another wondeful year filled with wonderful memories, and ending on an another special and precious note.

I should try and spread them (the perscriptions) out just a tad more, I think. I'm still trying to find the right balance of them all. But I confirmed and reconfirmed with the doctor and pharmacist that it's ok that I be taking these at the same time, and that at the same time meant, typically at the same time of day too.

My head is having a party right now somewhere, but I don't know where it is. Luckily my hands don't know that so they can sit here and tell you about. However we'll see tomorrow when I read this for the first time end to end how much sense it actually ended up making. For the time being, I'm off to bed to sleep some of this cotton out of my head.

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I *love* good customer service

Mistakes happen. It's just human nature. I don't get upset when they happen. I do get upset when people try to place blame (by definition, mistakes do not warrant blame) or refuse to acknowledge that a mistake was made. Unfortunately this happens more often than not in customer service related businesses.

It takes very little for me to be turned back into a satisfied customer again after a mistake has happened. But for some reason customer service reps more often than not just don't get that. So on the rare occasions when I do get a customer service rep who understands his/her job and makes me feel like a valued customer again I feel the need to call attention to it. Sad but true :-)

Last month I exercised some of my remaining, and admittedly meager stock options. When asked how I wanted to receive the proceeds I opted for the free check to be mailed my house vs the $25.00 wire transfer directly to my account (when I said meager, I meant it. It wasn't worth the $25.00 wire transfer fee). I was told it could take up to 10 business days after the exercise was completed, for the check to be mailed. After the requisite time had passed and I had still not received the check, I called the financial institution who issued it and asked what's up.

The customer rep on the phone researched it and ended up issuing a stop-check and then said they would reissue a new one, have it delivered to my home address via fed-ex, with a delivery date of today, and that I would need to be home to sign for it. She then suggested I call back this morning to get the tracking number.

Great!

So I re-aranged my schedule so I could work from home today and wait for the check (it was meager, but enough of an amount that I wanted to get my hands on it and get it in the bank as quickly as possible). And then I called the financial institution again this morning to get the fed ex tracking number.

when I explained what I needed, the customer rep on the phone politely asked if she could put me on hold for 1-2 minutes while she researched the case. No problem. When she came back she said she had some bad news. The check had not been reissued. the reason it had not been reissued is because when the last customer service rep put the stop-payment on it, the funds got redeposited back into the wrong account, and the department that issues the proceeds checks did not have permission to withdraw funds from that account.

So rather than call me to explain what had happened, they just left it sitting there.

The customer representative apologized sincerely for a) the mistake and b) the fact that I was never called to be notified the check would not be arriving today and c) that the situation was never corrected by the original customer service rep who had screwed up in the first place. She then offered to have the check reissued, and undrestanding that I had already arranged to take work off and wanted to get my money, arranged to have it wired to the nearest branch to my home, which she located for me, and gave me the address and phone number, and then called the branch to confirm.

While it would have been nicer to have the funds wired directly into my bank account, this was a good solution. And the customer rep was appropriately apologetic, and most importantly, figured out how to resolve the situation and get me back to the "satisfied customer" state. And it was all within her power to do; no need to bring in management or ask for approval etc. She made the decisions and she solved the problem. That too is rare; usually I have to go through 3 levels of management to get any action.

So yes, a mistake was made, it inconvenienced me, but I'm still a satisfied customer and I'm happy with the outcome.

See? Doesn't take much :-)

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Do you remember where you were?

I was in bed, starting the first day of my vacation, still dozing and savouring the feeling of sleeping in past 6am. I was fully awakened by the phone ringing. It was Tim, telling me to turn on the TV. I was slightly disappointed at having been roused so early on my first day off, but also puzzled. It's not like Tim to call me early in the morning and his voice sounded... odd. I reached for the remote control on the bedside table and flicked it on. My eyes were still blurry and trying to focus when the image of the first world trade center tower, smoke billowing out of the side, appeared on screen. As I watched, Tim was explaining what I was looking at. A plane had just hit the world trade center. At this point, it was just the one tower. None of the news stations had confirmed what had happened. Many of the reporters were speculating that it was a horrible accident. Until, as I watched in disbelief with Tim still on the phone, a second plane hit the second tower. Live. On TV. While I watched. The news reporter was stunned into silence. So were Tim and I. And it was clear then, that this was no accident.

I sat in my bed, in my pjs, glued to my television for the next several hours. I watched as one and then the other tower collapsed. I watched the collapses repeatedly. Over and over again on multiple stations. I watched them switch to the pentagon, confirming a plane had just crashed into it. I watched them switch to the flight 93 debris field, smouldering. I watched the footage taken by cameramen from inside the cloud of the world trade center debris after the collapse, cameras rolling as they ran for cover and their lives. Then I watched footage of the pentagon wall collapsing. And then of the smouldering flight 93 debris again. And then I watched as they announced the grounding of all civilian aircraft, and the closing of the stock market. And then I watched the replays of all of the footage. Again, and again and again.

After a while I got out of bed and looked out the window. It looked like any other day outside my window. I was still not sure what had happened.

At some point later in the day I felt compelled to do something. But I had no idea what. I called work to check in with my team. At the time I was the operations manager for a personal finance web site. I offered some unneeded and completely irrelevant guidance to my extremely capable team on how to handle the deluge of traffic on our web site wanting the latest news on the attacks, and then the news on the stock market closing. And then I decided to get dressed and go donate blood.

The rest of the week is a blur, and I don't remember much. Other than it wasn't much of a vacation. Although I do remember for several days afterwards, the eerie silence in our skies, broken only by the faint roar of a fighter jet somewhere high above, patrolling. Every hour it seemed.

That's where I was when 9/11 happened. That's what I was doing. As I commented on my sister's blog earlier today, when I was growing up I would sometimes wonder what "the event" would be during my lifetime for which I would remember where I was and what I was doing. The way we hear our parents talk about JFK's assassination and how they remember exactly where they were and what they were doing when they first heard the news he had been shot. Or the way our grandparents remember where they were and what they were doing on December 7th, 1941.

I watched a documentary on 9/11 yesterday. Not the ABC piece-of-crap fiction that they heavily publicized and had the nerve to broadcast despite the public protests, but actual interviews with victims' families. My heart wrenched. I cried. I... We... Tim and I are so blessed. So lucky. To have each other, and Bobbin, and our health, and our families, and our friends. Whatever little daily dramas we act out and stresses we experience are not even molecule-sized blips on the radar screen by comparison. What these victims, their families, and the few survivors have been through, it puts things in perspective. And their strength gives me strength. And hope.

One of my hopes is that "the event" for which Bobbin's generation will remember where they were and what they were doing, if there has to even be one, is a happy one. A victory for humanity. A glorious achievement. But not one of violence or deep sadness.

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TMI

So I ran out of deodorant recently. We were out shopping at PCC for a bunch of other stuff when I remembered I needed some. So I figured I'd pick some up there. All they have is the natural / organic stuff so I picked up one out of the several brands there, read the ingredients, and decided it was as good as anything.

But it's not working. I'm not sure if I'm the only one who can tell. I hope so! But I think I'll be making a stop at our non-organic run-of-the-mill standard drug store on the way home to buy some non-organic and all-unnatural deodorant that works. And in the meantime, I'll sit far away from people in meetings.

Yeah. It's a slow blogging day ;-). But at least I'm not talking about the colour, texture or odor of Baby Girl's poops (Gracie). All of which are normal, btw.

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I'm into somethin' good

Woke up before dinner feelin' fine
Gotta good buzz goin' in my mind
Percocet's got me feeling better than I should
Somethin' tells me I'm into something good

(Somethin' tells me I'm into somethin')

No... really... I'm ok. Just a little drowsy is all ;-) She also perscribed massage which I think is what I really need. Gotta find out if our health insurance covers that.

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Just call me FlexiWoman. Able to leap tall specs in a single bound.

The division that I work for is implementing a "Flexiwork" program. It's really just a formalization of the flexible work arrangements that have always existed in the company, such as flexible hours, telecommuting, working remotely, job sharing, part time or reduced hours, but that haven't necessarily been applied consistently from group to group. Formalizing it ensures the employee is treated fairly, that the business needs are still getting met even under the flexible arrangements, and allows the employee to take advantage of other aspects of the program like getting reimbursed for expenses relating to telecommuiting, like high-speed internet, phone bills, etc.

So I'm taking advantage of the program to work from home one day a week - wednesdays to be specific. I'll still be putting Baby Girl into day care on Wednesdays (otherwise there is no way I'd really get any work-related work done) but by working from home one day a week I'll be able to simplify my life in a lot of little ways that add up to a lot, such as

- getting an earlier start to my work day because I don't have to get dressed appropriately for work or even have a shower, for that matter. Yeah, ew, gross... but you KNOW you skip showers on occasion too! It takes time to be presentable! Even for the "casual" atmosphere of the company I work for. At least it does for me ;-)

- being able to tackle household chores during lunch - like tossing a load of laundry in, or doing the dishes, or mixing up formula and pouring it into bottles. So then I don't have to stay up late doing it, or miss out on family time because I'm stuck doing chores out in the kitchen.

- not having to waste time finding a parking space once a week. That's 30 minutes saved right there!

- eating healthier (I hope! That's a goal, anyway :-))

My manager's signed off on it, as has our VP and HR. I've switched cell phone providers to ensure I have great coverage at home so people can reach me without calling the home phone, and so that I can call out without worrying about long distance on our home phone bill. I've rebuilt my laptop and have all the connection software installed and configured so I can connect to our corporate network securely. I'm pretty much ready to go!

So starting the first wednesday after I'm back from Spain, I'll be working from home! We'll see how it goes :-) It may not make any difference, but it's certainly worth trying!

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Parking Gripes

Our parking situation at work is abysmal and getting worse every day. I went to visit Baby Girl at daycare at lunch and when I got back it took me 27 minutes to find parking.

People have resorted to parking illegally (in visitor parking, in carpool parking, and even in spaces that are not actual parking spaces) and consequently are getting their cars towed (as they should) because there is just not enough parking anywhere.

Half an hour is way too long for finding a place to park. I fear I'll have to give up my lunchtime visits with Baby Girl because I just can't afford the extra time it takes when I get back to park my car.

I suppose you could argue I have no right to gripe because I'm part of the problem. But the reality is I need my car. I have to drop Baby Girl off at daycare every morning and pick her up in the evenings, and I need my car, with her car seat in it, to do that.

Our VP recently sent out a memo saying they're "addressing the situation". But I'm not convinced that the things he outlined in his memo is going to make any sort of difference.

I'm not ready to give up my lunch times with Baby Girl! They are precious to me, as is every minute I get to spend with her. But I just don't see any alternative.

So I'm bummed. And annoyed.

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