342. Shots

1/31/13

I took Miles to the pediatricians by myself today, and I can truthfully say one of the worst experiences to go through is being asked to hold your child down while something that hurts is done to them.  While he was getting his shot, he was looking at me like "why in the hell would you let this happen to me, you garbage smelling piece of poo!"  All I could do was hold him afterwards and tell him I'm sorry, which basically amounts to a whole lot of too late.   Then, when I tried telling him that it was for his own good, since babies can die from the flu, he threw his snack trap right at my face.  I deserved it though, I did. 

341

1/28/13

I can't seem to stay away from education for too long.  After agreeing to come do a spoken word presentation for a group of high school students today I was offered the job to run the group.  All things as they are, I would love to do this - and I am gearing myself up to take the job. 

The kids I met were really awesome, some had some serious issues, and that's why they were there, but they were kind to each other, really into the group itself, and ready to try some poetry on for size.

I am pretty stoked.  That's the truth.

340. The sickness

1/22/13



Ok, so everybody's sick. Our house sounds like it is inhabited by chain smoking walruses with sinus problems and a penchant for whining. To top it all off today Tegan had to work until 9. I knew it was going to be a rough one, but ooooooweeeeeee, I had no idea. Miles was vacillating between screaming because I put him down and screaming because I wasn't holding him the right way. Isla was fully engrossed in a feverish whine festival, or asking me how long every single thing we did was going to take. I couldn't think straight and had a temper about as long as a nervous person's fingernails. These combined to make for the dinner from hell. I got a brief respite during a timely airing of "frankenweenie," but found myself facing the most impossible bedtime ever conceived. I needed miles to be asleep, since trying to read to Isla while he was screaming was like shoving hot needles into my already aching mind, but he couldn't lie prone due to his cough, and I couldn't sit up with him due to my lack of boobs. He finally decided a fair compromise would be for me to sit next to him, propped up on pillows with my forehead pressed against his, while whispering the lyrics to "cold hearted snake" by Paula Abdul. Anything that altered this formula slightly would send him into hysterical cry-coughing fits. This lasted 40 minutes. When he finally fell asleep, Isla came running into the room, and woke him up by jumping onto the bed. "I just wanted to help him sleep!" she said. I may or may not have lost my shit at this point. After a repeat performance of the sleeping trick I was finally Able to read to Isla...and he's awake again. Like right now, literally. Goodbye

340. Sick Sick Sick

1/24/13

Holy cow.  The last three days have been horrendocious.  Every last human being in my house was sick as hell.  It started with Miles running a fever on Monday, then Tegan fell to it, and Isla, and finally me.

Heres the thing though, Tegan has had to work late for the last two days, and when kids are sick, they don't get to go to school and be out of my hair.  When I'm sick, this is necessary. When we're all sick, it's nearly impossible.  I have no idea whatsoever how single parents do it.  None. 

339. Monday games

1/21/13

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, which means Isla didn't have school, and we went to her school's performance in the park.  She decided not to sing, which didn't seem to be pushed very hard by the preschool teachers, so I went with it.  She did tell me on the way there all about MLK, and how he was the "man who wanted everybody to be treated the way they deserve to be treated" and how he "did lots of talks and walks so that the United States would change the laws about treating black people different."  I thought that was a pretty good summation for a four year-old. 

After the park, we had time to chill while Miles napped, so I pulled out the lego starwars set I got for my birthday (yeah, I said it), and we put it together.  It only took a few minutes, so then we decided to make her room into an alien planet so that the star wars characters she has could have somewhere fun to play.  We covered books and boxes with blankets to make mountains, and turned some baskets on their sides to make caves, and we were off.  First Isla decided to bring her Goblin King doll (AKA David Bowie from Labyrinth) into the mix so that she could have somebody other than Darth Vader or the Emperor to Kidnap Princess Leia.  In this parallel Star Wars universe, those guys were good.  He did a pretty good job of devising a plan to use his pet shark on a leash to go bite Princess Leia's gown, and then drag her to the prison he had built out of Miles' walker and a dictionary, but the twin Han Solos quickly came to her rescue.  Then, the stormtrooper, Darth Vader, Obie Wan, and Luke decided to stand guard over Leia's cave, but they didn't realize it had a back entrance, where David Bowie was able to send Greedo to cast a magic spell on Leia and Queen Amidala, who also happened to be visiting at the time.  Then the two of them just walked out of the cave and right back to the jail, where David Bowie was gleefully laughing.  Luckily, young Anakin had witnessed the entire ordeal, and attempted to relay what had happened to the twin Hans, but was almost intercepted by a flying alien creature and a "Star Wars Cow" that were lurking nearby.  He narrowly escaped being trampled and eaten, and came upon the Hans twins enjoying their tea in a nearby cookie shop.  They hustled and made short work of David Bowie, placing him in his own jail so he could never try and make off with their beloved princess again. 


These games are exhausting. 

338. Reading.

1/20/12

I had a rough weekend - 2 late nights in a row, the first being probably the weakest show the Wild Stallions had put on so far.  We hustled hard for a gig in Ventura, and got one for a Thursday throwback set.  That was super exciting, and Jon passed out over 500 flyers in VTA, we took out an ad on facebook, and were expecting a good crowd.  5 people came.  5.  All night.  We made 12 bucks. 

The next night I was super tired and we had a set at the Jester until 2AM - the show was fine, but I was wrecked.  So, when it came to the third night, a poetry/spoken word reading that was set up by my sister and done super underground style (no address, you had to know somebody to get in), I was a little wary of my performance ability.  It has been a couple of years since I have performed a poem live, and I felt really rusty. Luckily, the vibe at the spot was really really nice, it was set up like a speakeasy, with a farm feel, having rosemary pots all over and lots of plants inside. There was a really nice crowd, and I was super nervous when it was finally my turn to go. And, when I started, I forgot most of the first two poems I chose to read, and had to improvise... by the time I had gotten to the last one, I was definitely feeling in the groove.  It was a great time.

337. poop n' coffee

1/16/13

After talking to Isla's teacher, I feel better about the situation at school - although she is still processing it.  For the first time today she said "I don't want to go to school tomorrow - I'm starting to get bored."  I don't really think she's bored, I think she's uncomfortable around other kids for the first time, and that sucks.  We will both learn from this, and become better people I'm sure. 

Today was our coffee shop day, where we all go down to the local spot for bagels and hot chocolate - I really enjoy Wednesday mornings.  As we're leaving, all bundled up against the cold, Miles stopped mid toddle on the sidewalk as if transfixed by his shoes.  He was literally staring down at his shoelaces for a good ten seconds before I started to get concerned and bent down to see what was up.  This is when I recognized the almost inaudible poop-grunt that accompanies a particularly epic bowel movement from my bright eyed little boy.  He basically had stopped himself in his own tracks with a poop, then got physically stuck once he realized the poop was not leaving his diaper on it's own.  He couldn't move his feet, it was as if the poop had medusa-like properties and his legs were stone. 

After I was done laughing like a maniac, I picked Miles up, releasing him from his poopy prison.  Then I realized I didn't have the diaper bag with me.  Then I was rendered statue-like for a quick second myself.  Luckily I carry a spare diaper in my glove box for times like these. 

336. Dad anger

1/14/13

I experienced my first actual seething anger over the treatment of my daughter today.  Isla got into the car after school and then told me how several older boys (kindergarteners) and one of her classmates surrounded her by the swings and accused her of throwing woodchips.  Then, she calmly described how they wouldn't let her leave when she asked, and kept closing the circle in on her, until she cried.  This lasted until a teacher saw her and the kids moved on their way. 

Now, as she told me this, I had to fight with every fiber in my body not to turn around and knock some kindergarten heads together for this.  This is my daughter.  She is an innocent four year old girl.  She will not be subjected to the evils of evil people on my watch.  After calming myself for a minute or two and realizing that these 4-6 year olds are probably not evil, I think I can safely go into school tomorrow and have a measured, meaningful conversation about how little boys learn to treat little girls with the teachers there. 

My brass knuckles will be in my pocket, however.

335. Weekend

1/13/13

I really wanted to get some sleep on Friday night, since I knew I'd be out late at a gig the next day, so I was excited to get to bed by 11 - virtually unheard of in my realm of reality.  I dug into my current post-apocalyptic dystopian novel (not to be confused with any of the most recent 25 or so post-apocalyptic dystopian novels I've been reading), and it did the job a bedside book is supposed to do, which is put me to sleep within half an hour.  I closed my eyes, and had just slipped consciousness when Miles decided it was time to be up.  Now this kid is a sleeper, he usually never wakes me up at all, thanks to Tegan's lightning fast boob reflexes.  This time, he was not looking to eat, he wanted to hang out like it was an episode of Friends.  Since Tegan handles all the night time baby business, I grudgingly agreed to take Miles, who was now flopping all over the bed and calling the cat a "dog" as loud as he could, out to the living room.  My mind was still reeling from being pulled straight out of the tender embrace of sleep, so I'm not sure exactly what we played, I just know that it involved trucks, a book about crabs, a plastic trumpet, and a ball of hardened Play-Doh.  After about two hours, he was ready to sleep again.  I however, was all amped from our game of crabtrumpettruckball that I couldn't sleep for about an hour after that.  Oh well, there went my sleep. 

Our gig the next night ended up being pretty crappy too - the power at the club was all wonky and kept shorting the equipment out, this with a sizeable crowd for the Deer Lodge as well.  We did get paid, and the people had fun once we got started so it was all to the good at the end.  It came nowhere near to the amount of fun I had playing pirate back at home the next day with a dough hook for a hand kidnapping baby Miles while Isla tried to rescue him with a lightsaber and a toothbrush (apparently my oral hygiene skills were significantly hampered due to the hook). 

334. goat

1/10/13

Miles has little to no fear of real animals.  This is surprising, due to his illogical fear of gloves and stuffed squid.  Actually, I have to check myself - he is afraid of dogs' paws.  Just their paws though. Today we visited my sister's goats, the ones that came from a defunct school, and now are simply fabulously calm and well-adjusted critters.  Miles straight off the bat decided he would like to grab handfuls of the goats' fur and be dragged over the grass for awhile, then he settled on slapping the goats on the nose over and over again, to which they either benignly turned their backs on him, or just let him keep at it.  He really does love those animals, and I'm glad I have this great little sunny area to take him.  Plus, it is completely gated, with very few toddler dangers and contains bonus chickens.  It's kind of like a big farmy pack 'n' play I can set him in while I enjoy my coffee or three.

333. scrapes and scooters

1/9/13

Today Isla got her first skateboard injury.  We were having a driveway scooter/tricycle/skateboard party after getting her new helmet shaped like a cat's head.  She saw me skateboarding and wanted to try it, so I put her on one, and rode her around the driveway a couple times.  Then she did what every self-respecting kid would do with a skateboard:  put the helmet on a stuffed dog wearing high heel boots, and skate it around while singing "American Pie."  This went swimmingly until she decided to do what looked a little like Jazzercise on the skateboard.  At one point, her knees tucked under her on the skateboard, doing some kind of Yoga pose, she pushed down too hard on the nose and it drug her fingers on the concrete.  She got a huge scrape down one of her little knuckles and I felt a little bad, but a little proud that she held it together while I did the whole wash, hydrogen peroxide/dry/bandaid thing.  Overall she was a trooper, and had her little cat helmet back on in a couple minutes anyway.

332.

1/8/13

Isla asked me to play guitar today, so she could dance right before bed.  She asked for three specific songs so she could dance to them - Eli the Barrow Boy, by the Decemberists, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, and Purple Rain.  It turns out that in her head, she had choreographed this entire trilogy of songs involving the drowning of a young boy, the resurrection of his lost lover who then turns into a mean robot killing machine in search of the boy, and finally her tragic realization that he is lost forever.  There were lots of flourishes and dramatic pauses in the dance, much rolling about and an entire Karate demonstration rolled into the performance as well.  I lamented not having three hands so I could record as well as play the soundtrack, but believe me, it was awesome.

331. Oh Miles.

1/7/12


My little boy walks now.  All over the place.  He sort of looks like a drunk gorilla, especially when he waves his arms up in the air, or holds his head while he's walking around the living room (he finds this intensely hilarious).  Also, his dramatic flop when something hasn't gone his way is made all that more dramatic when he does it from a standing position, like a fainting spell or something.  Also, he seems to only be happy when walking if he is able to hold two of six squeezy rubber animal toys he got for Christmas this year - a cow, bear, raccoon, penguin, pig, and something else I can't remember - it doesn't matter which two he has in his hands, as long as they are both full.  Most of the time, he looks for my daughters pink shopping cart to place said squeezy animals into, then push them around the yard, because that's what you do, dummy.  This mostly works to his benefit and enjoyment, until he runs into something, wherein having not mastered the art of the pink shopping cart turn, he reverts back to the aforementioned dramatic flop until I have come and rescued his shopping cart.  When he's really frustrated, he will give his little rubber animals a stern look, then throw them one at a time in opposite directions and storm off to read his book about crabs with googly eyes.  We can all relate to that though, can't we.

Year of writing 330. New poem

1/2/13

The neighborhood is quilted in quiet.
Doves and dogs and children,
acorns dropping, the wind.
The sun cuts across the
frosted lawn this morning
in a thin corridor,
warming the denim on my knee.
Coffee sits in a mug at my feet,
like an old dog, tendrils of steam
inching toward the sky.