Didn't Davy Crockett Die There?

Now I will readily admit that remembering historical dates is not one of my most intense forte's. Nor was it during middle or high school when I was actively learning it. How I managed to get through those classes without failing, is still a mystery up there with MJ's toxicology report but at least it's over, right? However, I do have some sort of sentimental need to visit historical sites and imagine myself living through whatever battle or march or wagontrain adventure that once took place there. Hence my intense desire to see the Alamo when we were in San Antonio a few weeks back.

My best friend from high school, (and coincidentally college as well) and the only one who can make me scream laugh instantaneously by imitating yours truly, got married to the cutest Texan podiatrist you have ever met. And we all know how those guys grow on trees down there, am I right? So we trooped the fam down south for the main event and had an awesome 3 days catching up with friends, tubing down the Gruene River, and 2-stepping our pants off at the reception. It went way too fast and everyone was gone before I even had the time to get sick of them. The nerve.

When I booked the trip to the Great State, I decided to give us a late flight out on Sunday so we didn't have to rush around totally hung over in the morning only to realize we missed our flight which left us time to sightsee for a hair or two. All weekend we had been trying to find something to do that day until someone casually mentioned they had went to see the Alamo the day before. WHAT? You mean there's actually an ALAMO? And it's in my near vicinity? And there followed several straight hours of me chanting: MUST SEE ALAMO. MUST SEE ALAMO. So that together with Griffin screaming about the heat and his dislike of his rental car seat, directly led to Grant's head exploding several times that day. Holy Matrimony, Batman.

Eventually, we worked our way to downtown San Antonio and found a parking garage relatively near where we thought the Alamo was. ALAMO. ALAMO. ALAMO. We pack up Grif in the stroller and laden ourselves down with 80 million pounds of shit and no I don't know why, but we're parents and that is what parents do. And we've walked two steps out of the garage before the heat of Satan's Inferno descends on the 3 of us and we almost spontaneously combust right there on Main Street. Did you know that about San Antonio in July? I guess I should have been tipped off when I learned San Antonio actually means Satan's Inferno. (Yeah-huh.) Somehow we make it the 3 blocks to the ALAMO and we enter the grounds. The gardens are beautiful and there are these huge big billowy trees giving shade to the crumbling old stone walls that you can tell were hand stacked way back in something-07. The place was packed and we tried in vain to wander around taking it all in as quickly as possible before death overtook us in the form of a Flaming Grim Reaper. Grant kept asking to leave but I hadn't quite had my historical site fix so I kept inventing things to show him so we'd have to stay a little longer.

Finally, after a grueling 2 hours of the heat I give in and we walk back to the car. We're sitting in the cool of the air conditioner waiting to pull out of our parking spot when Grant goes, "What the hell happened at the Alamo?"

Though I really wished I could scream at him for an insensitivity to the sweat, toil, and sacrifice of our forefathers, I could only say, "Hell if I know, that's why I picked up this brochure".

Ah history. I can only hope to impart such a keen sense of nostalgia to our son someday.

Downward Facing Dog Sleep Manuever Expert

Air conditioner, I love you.

Last night was the first night of the season for our AC to be on and it was the most glorious night of sleep I've had since I discovered Jamocha shakes at Arby's. There's something about the loud whirring white noise that puts me into a coma. The bambino loved it as well, because listen to me now, he's still asleep. Do you understand what it's like to sleep till 9am when that hasn't happened in over a year and a half? It's like chocolate covered strawberries for breakfast followed by banana walnut pancakes swimming in banana butter. (Whoa, I'm heavy into the junkfood analogies this morning, my apologies). I'll I'm trying to say is, hell yes in a handbasket.

Though I drifted off to sleep ticking off dollar amounts that will be reflected on our next Con Ed bill, I don't even care about the money. That's right, it's not your imagination, I said I don't care about going broke to pay an electric bill that is insanely offensively high because of my selfish need to sleep in air conditioned spirituality. It's just the way it is. I'll bitch about paying $1.29 for a fountain diet pepsi at Wendy's, but I will not utter a word about the electric bill in the summer. No, siree. You can't put a price on sleep quality in this house. It's a mythical being right up there with unicorns and no national deficit.

But what makes my day is seeing Griffin's pose of choice during sleep these days. One night he was sleeping scooted all the way up against the end of the crib, with his feet straight up in the air. Another favorite is face down in the mattress on his elbows and knees with his butt up in the air. Two days ago he was completely passed out sitting Indian style. We have one of those video monitors and watching his night time routine is better than 30 Rock. Yeah, I said it. Eat that, Tina Fey.

Know What I'm Doing?

I'm sure as hell not going to Hawaii on a free trip this week because of the kumquat/squash/perpetually rolling ball encased inside my uterus currently. Now, don't get me wrong and P.S. your panties are starting to bunch, we totally would rather have a brand spanking new healthy baby boy than go on vacation for a week, for free, anywhere in the world, but can you agree that it kind of hints at blowing? Not to mention that I just heard a woman who had her baby last week is taking it's 11 day old self all the way across God's green earth to make sure she attends the conference in Hawaii. Talk about insanity. And she's a doctor no less. But who am I to criticize? I drag my poor fetus through the slums of New York City's worst hell hole for hours every day commuting back and forth to work. I'm pretty sure that ranks high on the "Best Gestation Environment Ever" list.

In other news, everything is going well with the baby so far. We still have not arrived at a name yet, though we're drawing closer to narrowing it down to any male names that are no more than 2 syllables - thank you, G. I keep forgetting to take this glucose tolerance test that is supposed to be done in the next two weeks - mainly because they told me I can't eat anything sweet at least an hour before the test and it's rare for me to go an hour abiding by this rule. Hmm. Maybe tomorrow.

Also, do you care what I had for lunch today? Because I just burnt the hell out of my tongue on clam chowder and boy does it feel nice. I'm running out of things to eat for lunch around here that will satisfy my meager attempts at eating healthy, well-balanced meals for the fetus. In the past two weeks I've had cheese pizza, a grilled cheese, clam chowder, a spicy chicken sandwich a la Wendy, fries, cheese pizza, spaghetti with cheese melted on it, and veggie pizza. Before that I was packing my lunch every day and avoided consuming so much freaking cheese. Now, there are no groceries in my frig and until my husband cries uncle and orders them himself, I'm stuck with the cheese diet. Cheese. Say it. You really want to go to the frig right now to see what kind of cheese snack options you have. It's okay, you can, you're a grown up.

I'm off to fill my water bottle. AGAIN.

Saks Gave Me the Sh***

I did a noble thing for you today, Internet. I decided to rescind my post on diarrhea. Consider yourself spared for the time being.

I also wanted to tell you that me and Crazy Talkative Anti-American French Lady have made up and we now have certain boundaries at work that allow us to live peaceably with each other. Namely, everything she says is fair game for me to instantly disagree with and argue persistently until she throws in the towel or decides to jump out the window herself. Coincidentally, she's been interrupting me far less frequently than she used to. Huh...?

At first I was weary of her new found attraction to me because I'm 99.72%positive it's because now she can talk to me about the baby. And that stinks of Middle School Attempt at Achieving Popularity Through Association to Popularity, which I am totally against, have been my whole life. But in the interest of keeping the peace, I've decided to let her trip all over herself telling me over and over and I'm not kidding over again about her one child and all the things associated with that pregnancy and birth experience. However, never one to pass up an opportunity to trash talk America and make out with French Culture, she shares with me all of the reasons why she's glad she had her son in France and not in bleh-America-bleh.

Soon, I feel I will be tired of keeping the peace. As in like tomorrow soon. Then we will resort to the awkward and stuffy relationship that existed pre-pregnancy announcement in our 2 foot by 2 foot cell (read: office). Ahhh well. Just like my Pappy used to tell me, good things weren't meant to last...*

*Sike, I made that up.

I Love That Lemon

Today my inbox held my weekly update from Babycenter.com - a very good and helpful website. Here's an excerpt:

"Welcome to the second trimester! {Uh, thanks for inviting me?} Your baby can now squint, frown, grimace, pee, and possibly suck his thumb. Thanks to brain impulses, his facial muscles are getting a workout as his tiny features form one expression after another. His kidneys are producing urine. {Hey, I don't need any help in that department little one, I'm doing a-okay with my own overactive Herculean kidney function. Thank you very much.} He can grasp, too. In other news: Your baby's stretching out. From head to bottom, he measures 3 1/2 inches — about the size of a lemon."

So, let me get this straight... Right now I have a frowning, squinty, peeing, grabbing, lemon swimming around my uterus? That's sweeeeeeet! This procreation job is ten times better than my real job. Besides, otherwise I'd just be blogging about how damn hot it is in my office. Damn hot.

I'm Sorry, Did You Say TENANT RIGHTS LAWSUIT?

I have a crazy, crazy landlady. Her name is Sally I-Love-to-Overreact-to-Complaints Johnson. Her main goal in life is to cry at her tenants when they call her about miscellaneous maintenance issues. Sally is working hard to become the very best cry-at-tenant landlady there ever was. I feel it my obligation to assist her in her endeavors, because I'm a closet feminist who thinks all elderly women should take up a second career late in life. Who's with me?

Let's start oh, 5 months back, shall we? That would make it March, which was the month I decided I had had enough of the troops of GIGANTIC child-eating "Waterbugs" (we all know what that cozy little word means) parading around my apartment, and so I put in a friendly call to Sally. Needless to say, Sally was not emotionally stable enough at that time to deal with the Waterbug Issue. She did, however, feel comfortable enough to expound on the depths with which I was forcing her spirit, by inquiring if there was an exterminator whom she knew of who I could call about our little infestation problem. Far.Be.It for me to assume that a landlord or lady (read: crazy lady) is responsible for keeping giant cockroaches from taking over the apartment building where her tenants are paying kajillions of dollars to live in BUG INFESTATION FREE. *Editor's note: Kajillions is not a word, as per my spell check, but gazillions sure is.

Maybe there are woes of the money-grubbing apartment owner lifestyle that I am not aware of. If so, please share them with me, because not having enough free time in between counting the piles of money you have painfully extracted from your tenants does not sound like it warrants a depressive episode on a daily basis to me. ! After Sally, begrudgingly gave me the information for the exterminator, she slipped in a nice, "Oh by the way, you've gone and caused me a small coronary infarct with your nagging naggingness, thank you very much," closing comment. Since I pride myself on using Pavlov's theory on anyone and everyone I come in contact with on a daily basis, I start buttering up old Sally over the coming weeks with notes and cookies, even visits from our pup which everyone loves!

So then May comes around, and I notice the actual movable space in my bathroom has diminished to about 8 square inches due to the impressive amount of Black Mold growing on the ceiling and walls of the shower that has no outside vent. Eh-hem, Sally? I wouldn't even have mentioned it, but there were painters traipsing up and down the hallway stairs re-painting from the smoke damage that I will have to use at least four posts to tell you the story about THAT one, but just know there was smoke damage that needed painting over in the hallway for a year before it actually got done. Sorry for the side-tangent, mid-tangent there. Anyway, the painters were so nice and right there ripe for the picking to ask about our bathroom situation/disaster. After one of the guys took a look at our shower, he said he'd be happy to fix it in a jiffy if it was okay with Sally. That night I called Sally and once again unaware of the precariousness of her emotional stability, kindly tried to rip her heart out by inquiring about the paint job. Again with the wailing and the sobbing and the tearing to shreds my dark, black soul. But eventually, after she had decided I had endured enough, she gave in and huffily conceded to tell the painters they could re-paint my mold infestation. (Wiping sweat from brow.)

May = Me spotting what I think is a mouse fece in the dog's bowl, and flipping out for the millionth time since we moved to this beloved little city a year and a half ago. Call Sal, she flips out in turn, I flip out again, Mr. G loses half of his hair. Exterminator comes back, and Sally says that's it, she's sick of being bothered by me and my home-care issues. Dear Sally, how I want to see you treated with heavy medication and possibly shock therapy.

Which brings us to June-July-now August, because I am too afraid of my 85 year old landlady to even ask her about what the hell is wrong with our air conditioner and is it supposed to be completely still as a ghost when plugged in and turned to the ON position? Is this some kind of new invention that is designed specifically to not give any indication that it works while it is in fact in working order? I'm thinking no, because it's hotter than 12 Lesbian Whores in Church in my apartment right now, despite the mute air conditioning units in two windows. I finally decided that I'd had enough, and bought a damn air conditioner that I then had to pay 40 bucks to get delivered to the apartment because that's what you have to do when you live in a city as big as this one with no car because the car insurance people and the street cleaning police are in conspiracy to steal all of your money and fly to Tahiti together. God Bless America.

I Won't Be Ready To Make My Television Debut Anytime Soon

Make-up and subways do not mix. This is a little disclaimer(slash)warning to the people of New York: I do not wear make up in 110 degree heat. It is physically impossible to accomplish the make-up-putting-on-at-home without arriving at work resembling some sort of Creature from the Blue Lagoon, only oilier (because oily definitely needs comparative form status here). Plus, I love love extra G-Love and Special Sauce, the feeling of a fresh-washed face. Yummy. It's like I'm saying 'Screw off dirt and grime! I don't need your lazy ass hanging around here anymore.' Then I kick out the dirt and grime's clothes and furniture so he has to move in with his new girlfriend who bleaches her hair every day and watches Judge Judy, for educational purposes.

I also do not blow-dry or fashion my hair in any way, shape, or form in the summertime. It only amounts to fruitless attempts at convincing the raging, out of control, animal living on top of my head to conform to mediocrity. And let me tell you, my hair is no mediocre. It is manic, in a whole new genre of insanity thanks to the heat and moisture. But I'm proud of her for standing up for what she believes in, and I won't stifle her creativity with hairdryers and straightening irons, oh no! Every morning I wake up, take a look in the mirror at the Cirque du Soleil going on upstairs and say, 'You go on with your bad-self, Hair. It's all you.'

So here I am mid-July, no makeup, no hair-do. It's like my image went on Summer Break, and I was glad to see it go. Now I understand my elementary school teachers so much better.

Like working in a Full Blown Sauna

Let me tell you about the heat in my work space. It's unnatural. 365 days a year it is skin blistering, perspiration gathering, all-around wretchedly HOT in my tiny little office. It may be 7 degrees outside, as it is right now, but have no fear, it is close to 80,000 degrees in here. My office may be single-handedly contributing to the green house gases of the global warming disaster. And I can't do anything about it! The gnomes that live in the aquaducts of this building have disabled my thermostat to see at what temperatures humans actually begin to boil. So, if you were ever curious about that question too, I will gladly blog you my boiling temperature as soon as that happens, which will not be too long now... I can feel something tingly...
!!!