Fit or unfit? [From last year about this time]

When people ask the Big Bad Bean about how best to get in shape, he always responds with, "in shape for what?"  This past week has made it clear that I am not in any decent shape to be a mom to the Bumble Bean.  We bounced Tuesday morning [ow, sore], went skating Tuesday afternoon (haven't done that in over a decade and never in hockey skates) [crippled, broken, swollen feet] followed by play ground running and climbing and sliding.  Fortunately the Bumble Bean noticed that I was broken and gave me kisses to fix me.  Maybe not so fortunate since he was so darn cute and sweet that I was inspired to keep going instead of collapsing like any moderately intelligent adult.  Then, Wednesday, we decided to take it easy and go on a family walk about at the Sheepfold.  Two hours later, we limped home and I took a bunch of glutamine.

My kid is Winnie-the-Pooh

The Big Bad and Bumble Beans went for a walk the other day.
The Big Bad Bean asked the Bumble Bean, "What are you thinking about?"
And the Bumble Bean replied, "Words that end in 'ing.'"
"Like what?"
"Like 'walking,'" replied the Bumble Bean.
Not to miss a teaching moment, the Big Bad Bean asked, "And what does 'walking' start with?"
"Home."
"And what does it end with?"
"Lunch," was the very firm reply of the Bumble Bean- ending in 'ing' forgotten for more important things.

Potty time with Pooh

Tonight, as the Bumble Bean was waiting for his bath to fill he was sitting on the potty and he said to me, "Oh bother!  Mommy, you can never tell about poops."

Muse

I am becoming utterly self-obsessed.  It doesn't feel like self-obsession, it feels like being driven, but I can see that the sensation of wanting to push everyone and everything away and just focus on what's inside certainly looks like self obsession.  In fact it is, but it's also described as in the grip of one's muse.  I don't recall ever having it this bad before.  I should ask the Big Bad Bean. 

I dutifully took the Bumble Bean to the beach for his solar system adventure.  Castle Island was full of police and people in silly green things, so we had to drive up to Revere which was mercifully full of nothing at all, not even much water as the tide was lower than I have ever seen it.  Revere Beach on an eighty degree day two days before the start of spring at very low tide dimpled all over with sand dollars, not white, but somewhere between milk chocolate and rust, with dog tracks and people tracks and seagull tracks and what the Bean decided were ocean tracks, the hollows full of sloshing water and what I strongly suspect was clam poop but the Bean determined were worms, the ridges crushing under foot and full of clams, some with grass growing from them and some with sea weed.  I pulled a few out for the Bean to see and he got very excited and silly about the "noses" being gulped and chewed right up with big teeth.  He also pick several enormous bouquets of seaweed, some to set sail in his crocs, some to weight down with sand and other ooze, some to stomp, some to release into the ocean.  It was fun and he was fun and I had fun, but I was really waiting to be alone with my...me? To write and draw and learn to draw and practice drawing and formulate Artemis Winter.

Today I went along so the String Bean could practice his driving.  He drives like an asshole and this is good for me to observe because he doesn't drive this way because he is an asshole, just because driving around here makes no sense whatsoever and he is inexperienced.  We passed a man who was getting dressed on the sidewalk.  He pulled up his pants just as we approached him, but he pulled them up no higher than the bottom curve of his buttocks.

Dutifully, I will meet tomorrow with the childish lecher at work and go for coffee and talk with interest and intelligence on whatever he wants to discuss.  Dutifully, I will meet with the angry mom on Friday, I will go to dance, I will go to science.  Saturday, my duty will take me to lunch with ... someone who i don't feel able to describe.  Sunday with the Bean again, then work again on Monday. 

I will not design half a dozen dresses.  I will not make much progress on my drawing or story.  I will get almost no house work or home projects done or even started.  Was waking up such a good idea?

Losing it again, but I don't care

I have again lost a piece of writing that I had scrawled on a random piece of paper.  It was about either the Bumble Bean or Artemis Winter as a cat apprentice.  I need it to complete the Early Adventures portion of the Artemis Winter book.  I will attempt to recreate it unless someone can tell me where I put it.  I have three more chapters to write: Artemis Winter writes a book, Artemis Winter decides to be happy, Artemis Winter's mom gets fed up and changes his life.

The reason I don't particularly care is very much the continued existence of the Bumble Bean and his infinite silliness.  I was gone from Sunday through Wednesday night at a Library conference in Albany, NY. It was beautiful in Albany and beautiful in Boston, but I was not in Boston with the Bumble Bean to enjoy the beauty.  So we made up for it.

On Thursday, we blew bubbles, we made pancakes, we met a new person, we made tortillas, we went swimming, we took a bath (actually he took the bath, with his little planets and when it came time to get out, he put them all in the drain so they could swirl around with the outgoing water and said, "look Mommy, it's the Milky Way." 

On Friday, we went to dance class, he danced by himself, he danced with his teacher, he danced with me.  Much silliness ensued.  As we left dance class in the rain, the Bumble Bean decided that he needed my shoes so that he could walk them across the street.  So there I was in my socks, cold wetness seeping in, and the Bumble Bean crouched in the cross walk, walking my shoes, one after the other, clomp, clomp across the street.  He was very pleased with himself, so we went home.

He becomes more fun every day.  Today is Saturday.  I am at work, not having fun with Mr. Bumble.

Happines IS a choice

I got this book (Happiness is a choice) as a side effect of ordering some other books and I though t it might be useful for the Big Bad Bean.  I started reading it last night and found it...not poorly written, but not incisively written either... kind of fluffy in fact.  However, i was thinking about all day and decided to try the first short cut to happiness and found the day more fun, the Bumble Bean more fun, me more fun.

And that was a good thing because it has been A DAY.  I had a really hard time waking up this morning.  I probably should have tried harder (as in 4-5 cups of coffee.)  I burned my bacon.  I got my vitamin adhered to the side of my esophagus.  I boiled over my noxious tea (after Berg the dumbest cat ever, had chewed a hole in the package that I didn't notice before I shook it...all over my feet.  Ding was very offended and stalked around my dripping, reeking feet with her head turned aside.)  Then, the Bumble Bean and I went on our adventure.

He refused to have his diaper changed when we got to the T station, but my happiness pulled us through gracefully.  I did however decide that I would rather not bring my purse as well as his bag, so I took out everything that I thought I would need and tucked the rest beneath the seat.

We had a very fun adventure at the aquarium.  In fact we were in the gift store before I realized I didn't know where my keys were.  They should have been in my pocket.  Happiness on hold for a moment, I passed backward through all my actions in a panic, and realized... I had not lost my keys.  I had decided when going through my purse that I had no need of them while on the trip so I tucked them away in their own little pocket in my purse.  And indeed it was true that I wouldn't need them on our adventure.  I did not think far enough ahead to realize I would need them to get back in the car and eventually back into the house.

No one would be home.  I had left the phone at home and I wouldn't be able to call anyone anyway since i haven't put anyone's number in the phone.  Also, the only other person who has a key is the A Bean (maybe...assuming she can find it) and I was pretty sure she was in NY or PA.  So, we took the bus home and attempted to break in through the window into the basement next to the back door which i was pretty sure I had removed the lock from.  It is a very small window.  I got it open and was trying to convince myself that I would be able to fit through it and all its accumulated grime, but the Bumble Bean would have no part of it.  He was very firm in refusing to let me try to go through or going through himself.  So what next.

I knew that our door jam was in shaky shape, so I broke in by prying away all the wood that held in the latch and opening the door once it was completely insecure.  Happiness still going strong but feeling in need of a Martini even though I gave up drinking last week.  Out of Vermouth.  Hmmm.  Happiness.  Drambuie.

I still have a birthday party to get through, my car to retrieve, milk to pick up, and I was hoping to finish the dragons tonight.  I will continue to choose happiness because the only other option today is to hide under the couch which doesn't have room for me.  A little boy at the bus stop asked me why the Bumble Bean was so happy and I replied, "Why not?  He has to be something and better to be happy than miserable."  The kid didn't look convinced, but I felt better and still do.

Trumping "The Chipmunk"

As anyone who has followed my blog is aware, the Bumble Bean has been slow to use verbal language to express himself and the world around him.. When he was two and didn't feel like crying when something hurt or upset him, he would clench his fists by his side and say "dit, dit, dit, dit" until the urge passed.  DSS characterized this as toddler swearing.

Later, as in the past year, the Bean developed another unique verbal ploy which was that "The Chipmunk" was what he used to trump any argument.  It would go like this:
"It's pajama time!" said Mommy.
"No," said the Bean.
"Yes," said Mommy.
"No," said and signed the Bean.
"Yes," said and signed Mommy.
"No," said, signed and head-shook the Bean, "The Chipmunk."

Neither the Mommy nor the Daddy had any idea what this had to do with, but clearly the Bean felt this was the ultimate argument.

Recently, we tried to turn the tables on the Bean and we introduced "the chipmunk" on our side of the argument.  The Bean came right back with something like "the frazier."

Today, my birthday, I had a call from the Big Bad Bean who said that he tried a different counter and was soundly recountered by the Bumble Bean:

"No," said the Bumble.
"Yes," said Big Bad.
"No," said and signed the Bumble.
"Yes," said the Big Bad (he doesn't do the signing escalation.)
"No," said, signed and head-shook the Bumble.
"Veto," countered the Big Bad Bean.
"No comment," recountered the Bumble Bean.

He's the light of my life and definitely too smart for his own good.

Spellcheck, such as it was, seems to have given up entirely.

"Are you OK, Stick"

For the Bumble Bean's 5th birthday we did not have a birthday party because he didn't give a damn and we didn't care for the hassle.  Instead, we played with the Flip video camera: http://www.youtube.com/user/laughingatus?feature=mhum and then we built him his very own birthday fire in the back yard. 

Since then, he has from time to time asked for a fire and I have dutifully gathered all of the fallen sticks from around our yard and built a fire which he has played with/in for 10-20 minutes and then gone on to other forms of backyard entertainment.  I, of course, then have to keep an eye on the fire to make sure it doesn't run away.

A few weeks ago, a very large branch fell off the sidewalk tree in front of our house and some civic minded individual pitched it into our yard so it would be our problem rather than the city's.  Naturally, I dragged it into the backyard for future fire starting activities.  This branch is easily 3 times as long the Bumble Bean with forks and general branchiness. The Bean has taken to standing it on its spindly end and letting it fall over and then rushing up to it and saying, "stick, are you OK?  Are you OK, Stick?" giggling, and then doing again.  Then he balances this long unweildy thing across the swing and pushes it for awhile, reciting, "not too high (I know, I know) not too fast (I know, I know) make sure I don't fall off (I know, Stick!)" then pushing it so hard that the whole thing gets tangled up.

He is more fun every day and I am more besotted with him everyday.  I can't imagine ever converting that into something that a self-respecting man would feel comfortable with, nevermind an angst-driven teenager.  Hmm.

Potty, potty

The Bumble Bean peed in the potty for the first time yesterday!  It was a day full of potty things after that.  He refused to wear clothes most of the afternoon and evening.  I missed my mom acutely when he used the potty and I had no one to call who would be just as excited without judging.  I finally called the A Bean once I thought she would be home.  She was appropriately happy and proud of him.

Later that evening, when he was without a stitch of clothing he gave a series of three little farts, and said, "uh-oh, need more bubble gum!"

Big bonus of big boobs

When you are at a public pool with your child and he wants you to keep his floaty toys safe from the hoards of other children, you can stick them in and around your cleavage and not even look deformed.

In case you have been wondering where I've been since mid-December

I feel somewhat responsible to this blog to keep writing it.  I don't feel responsible to Facebook.  While I took on both in a voluntary fashion, both I believe inspired by Martinis, I don't login to Facebook if I can help it, but do feel bad about not blogging.  Weird, since there are a lot more people who read Facebook than even know that I have a blog.  Also, because I am so strapped for time, I read my friends' blogs once I post an entry of my own and if I don't post then I don't keep up on the doings of my friends.  Bad friend, sit!

A whole lot of what I have been up to is the Bumble Bean.  I'm working from home 2 days a week now which means that on Tuesdays and Fridays I wake up at 4 am and work until 8 or 9, then start having fun with my little buddy and try to squeeze in a few more hours of work throughout the day as well as working through most lunches, going in early-ish, and leaving late on the other days. 

He is more fun than there is any reasonable way to describe, so here are some vignettes I have been jotting down meaning to blog about.

At the moment he is using the splatter guard as a "tennis racket" to launch a variety of toys down the back stairs and commanding the Berg-kitty, "go get it!" "no, you go get it."  As I write this the "tennis racket" has turned into a banjo, then a lily pad, and now abandoned for his true love - alphabet games & spelling.

We are in the kitchen.  I am cooking bacon.  On the table is a collection of toys representing two things for each letter of the alphabet.  On the counter next to me is another collection of toys, one for each letter of the alphabet.  The fridge is covered with magnetic word strips in runs like "moon cloud laughed" and "after one here cha cha is asleep."  On the floor are his alphabet blocks, abandoned for now, and a collection of foam letters which he is licking so they will stick to the side of the cabinet.  He is spelling rhinoceros.  He is spelling it wrong and I point out that it should be "os" at the end instead of "is."  He sounds it out for me, and sure enough, he is correct.  That is exactly how we all say it in this house.

The Bumble Bean is sitting on the floor of the kitchen while I'm making bourbon chicken.  He has his toys drum and is hitting it while flinging his head back and forth shouting, "Animal, Animal, Animal!"  It is really an amazing imitation of the great Muppet drummer.

The Bumble Bean started drawing stick figures this weekend.  he makes two circles for eyes, a big crescent for a mouth, then draws lines from the mouth to represent arms and legs.  I wonder if that means he's an optimist?

He has started arguing a lot more.  If I say no, he'll say, "the yes."  If I say yes, he'll say, "the no."  We will go on like this for a while, the Bean become more heated and then he will deliver, as the clincher in the argument, "the chipmunk."  So far, no one has been able to figure out what the chipmunk is, where it's from or what it means, but the Bean has decided that it trumps.  He is of course wrong in that but not because it is a chipmunk.

Ribs bruised, belly sore

Not really, but it feels like someone has been pummelling me in the upper belly region.  I guess I had an upper ab workout Friday night.

I wasn't feeling particularly great but took the Bumble Bean to the Therapy Pool at the Malden YMCA since it has a ramp so you can walk in.  One of my goals for the winter is to get the Bumble Bean over his fear of water on his face and hopefully start him on actually swimming.  I suspect he will take to it like a fish once he gets started. 

So we got there and it took 25 minutes to get through the registration process.  He was very good and patient and only reminded me every 30 seconds or so that there was water on the other side of the glass and that we were going on a swimming adventure.  Once we finally got in, of course, he wouldn't go near the water.  So I had to be over-the-top silly to coax him in the water.  When he finally consented to go in, we did everything and kept doing everything for an hour and a half.  He kicked around while I held him, he waded up to his chin, he jumped off all of the walls to test the various depths (I caught him of course which is why my belly hurts.)  There was a little girl there who was six years old and came up to the Bean's shoulder.

Potty training adventures

The Bumble Bean is now really interested in potty training.  Specifically, the potty training DVD I picked up as sort of a joke.  It has really catchy tunes like, "You've got to wipe, wipe, wipe your bottom, after going poo" and "scrub the bottom, scrub in between, scrub the top and get them really clean" which get stuck in your head and repeat endlessly during meetings at work. 

He has taken up the practice of carrying his potty chair about from room to room and putting his anatomically correct male doll, Titus, in the potty when he is not actively playing with him.  He has also started lifting his shirt to show you his belly, then dropping his pants to show you his knees.  We assume that this is going along with the song about how you know when you need to go, "it may feel like a push or a squeeze, just below your belly, just above your knees, it's your body's way..."

He is now tummy surfing on the back of the couch with his potty chair asking for hugs so I will go. Toodles.

Life is good

Not to say that there isn't room for improvement.  The Bumble Bean got up at 4:30 this morning which means I did too.  Then he wanted to go back to bed, seemingly just to be more comfortable as he wiggled his way through the next hour and a half.  Now we seem to be up for the day and he is playing a very silly game with the Ding-kitty which includes dancing a string, throwing it, trying to get her to bring it back to him while she thinks he's trying to pet her and occasionally interjecting, "Oh, my toes!"

Yesterday, the Apol-i-giant made his first appearance.  The Bumble Bean quickly corrected him into the not very interesting apologize, but we are keeping him alive.  He may make his way into the Martini Manuscript except that I am out of vodka.  Maybe I'll switch to gin martinis.

Meanwhile, the exceptionally pitiful Berg-kitty is sitting in a ball on the puzzles looking forlorn.  I'd feel worse about it if he wasn't such a drooling, vomiting, non-grooming fur ball.  I think I will make him a three-eyed catnip fish.

Talking up a storm

We have been up for just over 2 hours this morning.  So far, the Bumble Bean has:

• warned me to "Stay right where you are!  I'll be right back."
• advised me, "Oh, you in trouble now."
• directed me to, "move, move, move," and when I reminded him of "excuse me please," he responded with, "move, move, move, excuse me please."
• asked me, "Where is Daddy-cakes?" and I replied, "California.  He'll be back tomorrow," he reaffirmed, "Daddy-cakes home tomorrow.  Weasel-ball, please.  I want Weasel-ball, please."
• I said, "but Gammy and Grandpa will come over this afternoon, he sang, "Grandpa, Grandpa, Grandpa! Frog, frog, frog!"  I'm not really sure of the connection there or if there is one.

Hats and Weasel-balls

This morning while I was priming the back stairs, fixing the door and figuring out how to replace the window, the Bumble Bean went exploring in the basement.  He found a stack of empty boxes which have no reason for being there except that they have not been thrown away.  He found a lot of spider webs.  He found the box of extremely ugly tiles for our first floor kitchen.  He also found the Little Tykes basketball hoop.  We dragged it out into the backyard.  He threw the ball through the hoop.  Once.  Then he experimented with different ways of knocking it over.  Finally, he called, "Hat, hat, hat. Mommy, hat, hat, hat!"  I looked out the door I was trying to fix and there he was with whole thing leaning against his head.  He was very pleased with himself.

Once we came in and showered we went exploring through his old toys.  We found many things, but most especially the Weasel-ball which he is now crawling around after calling "Here, kitty kitty!"  Off to the What the Fluff? Festival!  I wonder what adventures we will find there.

Is that a pig? No, it's a dog!

The Bumble Bean and I went to Beaver Brook Reservation on Saturday and then again on Sunday at his insistence.  There is a very nice sprinkler deck there, one of the best we've seen.  It has natural rocks secured in the cement and is not painted a hideous antiseptic greeny-white.  The water is chlorinated and it all makes a nice balance between being natural and being sanitary.  There is also a playground structure and bathrooms.  Most of the children gather there.

However...

Just down the hill is the actual Beaver Brook.  It is not at all sanitary partially because it is natural despite its urban existence and partially because of the dogs who, also leading an urban existence, let off the leash in a huge field with lots of other dogs and a brook go a little insane and engage in the doggy equivalent of a royal rumpus.  It is good practice for the Bean to get over being afraid of dogs, not because they are particularly well behaved, but because they are sublimely not interested in human beings in the midst of their little doggy bliss.

Naturally, the Bumble Bean is attracted to the stream.  There are many rocks to throw, many slippery spots to fall down and get wet and covered with slime, and of course many opportunities to experiment with physics.  This means that we always spend several hours ankle deep in the brook.  But this weekend, after the "hurricane" the stream was particularly high and either because of that or because his world view and spirit of adventure are growing, the Bumble Bean decided that we had to walk all the way up stream.  This is actually not an easy thing to do.  There are many signs that other people simply don't do it. 

Not that such a thing would ever stop the Bean since Mommy will figure out the logistics for him, never interfere with him getting filthy and save Kermit when he slips over waterfalls and gets tangled in debris.  Mommy of course does this because she feels guilty that she is raising him in a confined urban environment (see the doggy bliss above) and her childhood adventures and magic were centered almost exclusively around the stream that ran along the bottom of her hill.  When the time comes, she will undoubtedly foster the Bean in tree-climbing. 

I think the urge to go up stream, the urge to find the source is actually much stronger in humans than the urge to go down-stream and find where it ends.  There may be some deep mystical reason for this concerning our own mortality, our seeking for union with something greater or maybe it's just that things get more civilized down-stream and we're not very good at civilized.

On Saturday, there was a whole flock of dogs from extremely large Saint Bernard type dogs to Corgies and Jack Russells.  There was also a hairless dog which the Bean regarded with horrified fascination for quite awhile and then turned to me and suggested "pig?"  I replied with "No, it's a dog" at which he promptly started barking at it.  The dog was small enough that he could have probably launched it half way across the field, but for the entire visit (except when we were lost in the tangle up-stream) he was especially wary of the hairless one.  I wonder if he will try barking at pigs the next time we see them?

A couple of years ago when he had made another leap in some aspect of mental development, we went to the Museum of Science via the T and came past the T. Rex.  We had come that way before, but he had never noticed the giant lizard.  On this particular occasion, he saw it, stopped and considered it for quite some time before turning to me and saying (as if he really didn't believe it but was going to give it a try) "Kitty cat?"  Thereafter, for almost a year, he would say "meow" when gazing upon a dinosaur.

Co-sleeping = World Championship Wrestling

The Bumble Bean was in rare form last night.  He fell unconscious horizontally across the bed, which is not unusual, but shortly after two in the morning he sat bolt upright, scanned the bed topography and whumpled to me.  He had to climb over the herd of pillows that I routinely sleep with, but climb he did until he was wedged between me and the slumbering beasts.  Then he started hurling them over one another until he had enough to room to start what turned out to be a monumental sparring experiment. 

He tried the heart-to-heart snuggle in every possible arm and leg configuration.  He rolled over and tried the spoon snuggle in every possible and some impossible arm and leg positions.  He tried various drape-over-mommy snuggles across my side, then rolled me onto my back and tried the various drapes across my tummy.  He rolled me the rest of the way over and went back to the heart-to-heart, both of us on our other sides.  Finally, after several hours, he settled into the ball-snuggle, nestled in my arms with his knees tucked up into my tummy, my thighs under his feet, my knees supporting his bottom, wrapped around the little Bean with my heart.

Failed but fun

This afternoon's stated intention was for the Bumble Bean and me to bring all my craft accessories down and gather his and coordinate them into a cohesive, orderly system in the book room while the Big Bad Bean learned the rest of the Eagle Form.

What actually happened is that the Big Bad Bean learned his form (super sexy) and the Bumble Bean and I played with rubber stamps and then rediscovered the water colors and spent 2+ hours water-coloring the wooden storage bins from IKEA.

Not quite sure how that happened, but we had so much fun and encountered his very determined and individual aesthetic sensibility. He started with the typical mud-toned-camouflage-after-a-blood-bath theme, transitioned through a rainbow confetti look into his blue period.  We now have 2 boxes in beautiful shades of blue with some green highlights...also some purple splotches.  I wonder if those were indicative of how cold he was the day before at the pool party.

He couldn't stop talking about his experience at the pool party yesterday, especially while he was painting his blue boxes.  When you consider that this is a kid who doesn't talk, you have to admit that must have been one incredible party.  He refused to get out of the water even though his lips were purple, his fingers were blue and he couldn't stop shaking.  I finally hauled him out using brute force (lots of silly tickles) dried him off and bundled him up in sweat pants, wool socks and a sweat shirt.  I really felt for him.  When I was a kid, I could never see any reason to stop doing something just because I was cold.