before Global Orgasm Day begins!

Yes, you have a full 24-hour period tomorrow in which you can do your share to help create world peace, and have fun at the same time. What's not to like about that?

Oh, it's also the Winter Solstice...the shortest day of the year. That's right, from here on out the days only get longer. There's plenty to like about that, too.

But wait, there's more!

My Cooking Collective is making Chili Con Carne and White River Sour Cream Cornbread, so guess what we're having for dinner tomorrow night? Yum.

TGIF! Enjoy...

Posted by msLaura at 05:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, here's what's going on at the moment:

GRANDPARENT HELL
Bad news about Nanny. Fran called me and said that she is not eating, very agitated and upset in general. She won't allow Fran to do any vacuuming, laundry, or change the sheets on the bed, but she refuses to do any of it herself either. She refuses to pay Fran. She refuses to go anywhere, even to the bank to deposit checks.

My grandfather finally passed away on Dec. 2nd. The cremains STILL haven't arrived at Nanny's house. I guess that's what you get with discount prepaid cremations. Nanny doesn't want any kind of memorial service, which I understand. She says just wait until they're both gone and then hold a joint service, it won't be much longer.

So she's planning on dying. I guess that's what all the lack of eating and other stuff is about. Unfortunately, last time I heard, refusing to deposit checks in your bank account or change your sheets didn't make anyone DIE any faster. It just makes life a whole lot more of a pain in the ass for the rest of us.

I found two forged checks on Nanny's checking account, each for almost $400. She fell for another scam and gave out her checking information to someone who called up and pretended to be the bank. I had to get her account closed down and then open up yet ANOTHER new checking account.

Just a few days ago I found out that the bank is refusing to reimburse the fraud, since my grandmother "conducted business" with the scammers. Um no, she thought they were people from the bank calling. So now I have to go fight with the bank. Argh.

For now Fran and I are keeping her checks hidden away, and anything with her banking information on it. That way she won't have access to any account numbers, and can't give it out to scammers. I don't know what else to do. I thought about changing her phone number and having the old one forward to me, but haven't gotten around to investigating what hassles are involved in that.

BIRTHDAY
I turned 37 last Wednesday. For my birthday I went and got my legs waxed, then had a 90-minute prenatal massage that was absolute bliss. I was able to move my back and hips freely for the first time in ages.

The masseuse said that I was one wrong move away from total spasm. My entire lower back was in perma-clench, shoulders and neck completely rigid, she couldn't get my arms to go up over my head, etc. Pretty sad for someone who used to be a fairly flexible yoga aficionada. But then again, I haven't been taking care of myself, I haven't been stretching, I've just been stressing and getting more and more stiff and tight.

So OK, I promise to do cat/dog pelvic tilts, forward folds, bridge pose, and pigeon pose on a regular basis. Plus stretch my shoulders and do neck rolls.

That afternoon I had an OB appointment, and I set up my C-section for January 22nd. My doctor was not thrilled about that, since my due date is supposedly the 25th. I told him that I went 5 days over with Julian, and I'm from Scandinavian/Northern European ancestry, in which the women typically deliver bigger, later babies. I came late, my brother came late, etc.

He is still convinced that THIS time I'll deliver early and then it won't be a nice, relaxed, planned C-section. Well, whatever guy. I'll take my chances. I'm more excited than anyone to get this baby OUT of my body, but I don't really want him to come out before he's fully cooked.

SICK
This cold thing has gone far enough. While I was at the OB, I asked for a prescription for azithromycin, just *in case* this sinus infection took a turn for the worse. Well, Friday night I suddenly started getting intense tooth pain, and it felt like someone had slugged me in the cheek with a sledgehammer.

Ding! Time for those antibiotics, I'd say. As soon as I started them I immediately felt better and was able to breathe (and therefore sleep) at night. The tooth pain got worse at first, (yesterday I was seriously fantasizing about pulling out some teeth with pliers, even though I knew it was just referred pain and didn't really have anything to do with my teeth at all) but today it feels better. Still tender on the left side of my face, but not too bad.

HOLIDAY FUN
Yesterday we went up to Crest Ranch Farm to go cut down a Christmas tree. It was a lovely drive through the forest, and Julian even took a nap on the way. Once we got up there it was bitterly COLD, even with coats and hat on....maybe in the 30's. But we chose and cut down a lovely 6-foot tree and got it tied onto the roof of our car.

Then we headed to Boulder Creek afterwards and had lunch by the fire at Scopazzi's. I decorated the tree when we got home, and it looks beautiful. Last night was the second night of Hanukkah as well, so we lit the Hanukkah candles and did double holiday time.

COOKING COLLECTIVE
My Cooking Collective is going pretty well. We made 15 pans of lasagna over here last Tuesday, plus a gigantic batch of chocolate chip cookie dough. It was kind of hectic, we had eight moms and their kids, but everyone still had fun. I cut the per-session limit back to five moms though. That way it's more relaxed and not as crazy.

Next on our list is Chili Con Carne and Cornbread. I am trying to stock up my freezer so that I have plenty of food when the new baby arrives, but I keep pulling it out to eat when I'm too tired to cook. Plus I want to *try* these recipes after cooking them.

Last night we had Lemon Glazed Chicken Breasts out of the deep freeze from the first CC session. Delicious. I will definitely make that one again.

Enough updating for now. Julian and I are going to the Campbell Farmer's Market this morning to get some fruit and veggies, and take in the sunny weather and fresh air outside before it starts getting cold and dark.

Posted by msLaura at 11:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have begun to snore.

This happened to me in late pregnancy last time around too. I don't know what it is exactly...cartilage loosening and collapsing into my airway, weight gain, puffy mucous membranes.

It certainly doesn't help that I have had nonstop colds for the past 3-4 months and can barely breathe through my sinuses, especially when laying down in bed at night. When I finally can stop gasping for air long enough to fall asleep, either one of my nostrils blocks up and wakes me up gasping for air again, or else the sound of my airway collapsing in on itself wakes me up.

Suffice to say that I am enormously sleep-deprived lately. I might as well have a newborn already for all the sleep I'm getting. Or NOT getting, rather. I've probably had a whole 5 minutes of REM sleep in the past week, what with waking up every 30 minutes.

I was sleeping with Dan in our bed, but he kept poking me all night long when I would snore, so neither one of us was sleeping. Although one time he was poking me, I woke up, then I couldn't go back to sleep because BUGS was snoring so loud. Not fair...when the dog is snoring louder than I am , I should not get all the blame.

So I went to go sleep with Julian for a while, because he doesn't seem to mind. Once he's out, he's out.

But one night, Julian woke up, crying. "I want that CHOCOLATE!" Apparently he had a dream about chocolate, and was very upset to wake up and realize that it wasn't real.

He had trouble going back to sleep and asked to be cuddled. So I wrapped my arms around him and passed out.

"Mommy, too loud!"

Huh. what? Too loud? Whatever...back to sleep.

"Mommy!"

Out of the depths of unconsciousness I pulled myself back to reality..."Mmmmmm-hmmm...what is it baby?"

"Mommy, that horn is TOO LOUD!"

I had to wake up and laugh, he was talking about my snoring, which strangely enough, was indeed horn-like. I noticed it on the occasions when I woke myself up with the melodic blasts escaping from my tightly swollen sinuses.

The next day I told Dan about it, knowing he would appreciate his son's astute observations. Of course he died laughing and they high-fived one another.

Dan: "Yeah, Mommy's horn is LOUD, isn't it! What does it sound like?"

Julian: "Like a pig! Like a pig horn!"

Dan: (unable to speak, laughing way too hard)

Great, thanks guys. Why don't you two cuddle up with each other and meanwhile me and my PIG HORN will be over in the other bedroom trying to sleep.

And since neither one of you will ever have to go through a bad cold in the 9th month of pregnancy, feel free to just pipe down, both of you.

Although I have to say, I think I laughed harder than anyone. Because kids do say the darndest things. And that WAS pretty funny.

Posted by msLaura at 01:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have had this same "conversation" with Julian more times than I can count in the past six months. The expression on Lois' face is priceless.

Family Guy - Annoying Stewie - video powered by Metacafe

Posted by msLaura at 12:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Sorry, I *thought* that comments had been enabled, but apparently not. I had to set up an authentication system because I was getting about 50 spam comments a day on this blog about Viagra and casinos and growing huge penises. But then the login wasn't working, which I only just had pointed out to me. (Thanks Linda!)

Anyway, to comment you just have to register for free with TypeKey, and then you can comment all you like, not only on this blog but many others. And now you don't have to wait for me to manually approve your comment anymore. Once you're in, you're in.

So comment away!

Posted by msLaura at 07:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The nightmare of geek nightmares happened last week. I came home and had a Blue Screen of Death on my laptop. My hard drive had fried, irreparably.

Of course I freaked out. Me, without internet access? In the midst of the holiday season? Right when I was due to update my website with 4 new products? AAARRGGHHHH!

In the end I was able to resurrect my old desktop from it's buggy, barely-running state, and use that as a temporary solution until Dell could express a new hard drive to me. And it looks like I had most of my important files and data successfully saved onto my backup server.

The only thing that is sorely missing from the backup is my Outlook folder with all emails and attachments from the past, oh...8 months or so. That is bad. Very bad. All of my customer and vendor communications, addresses, phone numbers, emails to and from friends, deep thoughts, etc. PLUS all the faxes that I had just sent while in Southern CA dealing with my grandfather's death and grandmother's Alzheimer's or dementia or whatever it is that makes her not remember things from one moment to the next. Funeral paperwork, all that...gone.

I removed my Outlook files from the backup schedule because I always have Outlook open, and it can't back the file up when Outlook is open. And silly me, I never thought to close down Outlook every once in a while and back things up manually. So now I'm screwed. But not nearly as bad as I could be.

Well, I learned my lesson. Back up, back up, back up. EVERYTHING.

Posted by msLaura at 11:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's always interesting to look at past photos of yourself when look absolutely nothing like that anymore. Right now I'm ALL belly and boobs, and here in this photo I don't have either.

God, it must be great to be so free and unencumbered by enormous protrusions, especially ones that are literally kicking you from the inside out.

Adrian is not a fan of me trying to put socks on, for example. If I bend over for anything he generally responds by giving me a sharp poke in the bladder. I remember Julian kicking pretty hard, but Adrian feels like he's about to bust right through my abdominal wall when he gets going.

Maybe it's just that I had a lot more blubber on me with Julian. So far I'm running about 30 pounds less in this pregnancy. We were over at our friends' house last night and they asked jokingly if I weighed more than Dan yet.

Close! Dan weighs about 175 max and I'm at 170 now. Then I mentioned that I got up to 205 pounds with Julian and they went into shock. I did lose it all, and even 5 pounds more for good measure. But it's still shocking.

Ah, the third trimester. Can't pass quickly enough.

It doesn't help either that everyone who sees me assumes that I'm about to give birth any moment. The mail carrier had a box for me the other day and she said, "Oh no, I'll carry it for you. You look like your water's about to break."

Ha, if only. I have another 1.5 months to go!

Posted by msLaura at 05:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)