Pity, Party of One

Um, you know how when you haven't written for a few days you feel all, "Damn, I better make sure that when I do post it's really good, to make up for the time that's gone by"? But then you don't have the time/energy/whatever to write that "really good" post, and then another day has gone by? Yeah. Pardon our dust here, folks, but this is just an attempt to not get out of the habit of posting. Quality is most assuredly not guaranteed.

I am (wait for it) STILL SICK. I am feeling better than I was last week, but I can't get rid of the sore throat and headache. Tankbaby is also still sick, and letting neither of us sleep well, so neither of us are recovered. I'm not exaggerating when I tell you that, despite neglecting you all to go to bed early each night, I've been averaging about four to five hours of sleep per night. Since last Wednesday. And that might be almost doable if it was four to five hours in a row. Sadly, they are broken up into chunks ranging from 15 minutes to two hours. In between these chunks is the tossing and turning of one Tankbaby, who, in addition to having a cold and teething, is apparently learning to sleep on his stomach. However, every time he rolls to his stomach while sleeping, he automatically starts crawling, because his poor baby brain is all HANDS DOWN PUSH UP ENGAGE LOCOMOTION, even while he's sleeping. And yet, this same sophisticated machine cannot seem to also point out that, if your nose is all stuffed up, BREATHE THROUGH YOUR MOUTH. You know, instead of, say, whimpering for upwards of an hour.

Argh, argh, argh. I've had three different paragraphs written at this point, all describing (with varying degrees of humor vs bitterness) the sleeplessness that has occurred and is likely to occur again. But I keep deleting them, because, really, if you've had a baby you know what I'm talking about without me having to spell it out, and if you haven't had a baby, you probably don't care about this new parent goo anyway, unless you are debating whether or not to have kids, in which case I think my testimony at this point would be a wee bit biased.

If I were to write what I'm really feeling right now, you'd get a long diatribe about how I can't get my act together, and how can I be a good mom and a good spouse and a good friend and a good teacher when I can't even GET FUCKING WELL, but that seems a little heavy, not to mention of interest to exactly no-one, not even really me. So, let's just see what's left. Consider this, if you will, the crumpled Kleenex in the blogosphere's pocket. Not terribly pretty, but useful if that's all you've got:

• Today I lost my voice entirely for a while, and the rest of the time had something akin to the voice of one gasping for their last breath. Yesterday I was all sexy Jessica Rabbit voice, but today I was like one of Marge Simpson's sisters (and thus ends our cartoon character vocal comparision section of the post). I received two suggestions from coworkers about the best way to handle this. One recommended hot Tang. I said, "Does my throat feel better before or after I throw up?" She insisted it was yummy, "like hot orange juice." I replied, "Yyyeahh...that's the 'throwing up' part I was referring to." She almost convinced me, though, when she said, "You get to feel like an astronaut." Well, hell... The other suggestion was, "Take a swig of hydrogen peroxide and tip your head back. Don't gargle, just poke your tongue up through the peroxide." I, again, made reference to vomiting, and he said, "Yeah, I do every time, but it totally works." Um, okay, then.

• It is a special kind of humility that settles upon you when you listen to a new CD of an old musician boyfriend and realize that, once again, none of the songs are about you.
  

• I had a kid yesterday ask me if I knew that Michael Jackson had died. I said, yes, I knew. "Because you saw it on your news show, right?" Well, sure. By the way, kid, do you know who Michael Jackson was? "I dunno. He's, like, an adult. But he had kids." And with this epitaph, she was off, pretending to be the mayor. "But I'm a nice mayor," she reassured me. I'm dying to know what they're watching on TV in that house.
  

• If you want to inject a little joy in your life, buy a box of old-fashioned gum drops. Then put them in the console of your car. Then, because you are sleep-deprived, forget that you've done this. For the next couple days, randomly reach for your cell phone charger, a CD, or a pen, and instead find...gum drops!! Be amazed each and every time.

Oh, people. Y'all are writing such neat stuff and I haven't commented. I do, in my head, as I lay there in the wee hours, compose pithy, yet brief comments for all that I've read. And I have been reading your kind words on this site, and yet responded not at all. Perhaps one of us isn't quite ready for the responsibility of a blog with readers, hmmm?

Don't give up on me! I will feed you and walk you and clean up after you. I promise. I just need a few more days. Eventually both me and the boy will run out of mucus and go back to Ordinary Shitty Baby Sleep, instead of EXTREMELY Shitty Baby Sleep. In the meantime...can I offer you a gum drop?