the storming continues

no, i am not dead

2006-06-15T07:54:00.000-04:00

just super ridiculously busy and additionally, saturday is my birthday.

kid go!

2006-05-27T20:05:00.000-04:00

i had a huge backlog of pictures due to the move, so as much as i'd like to blame it just on being sick, i believe the dates on some of these early ones speak for themselves.

we moved into our new house when avi was right about nine months old. he settled in quickly, doing all the important things he does every day.
like eating. he's quite good at that. usually.

and playing.
something made far more amusing when the camera's out, apparently.or at least the game becomes more about the camera and less about whatever it was we were playing before.

on mother's day we visited d's parents and although this picture doesn't show it, there was much celebrating of all the moms, grandmas, and greatgrandmas.
but holy cow, how cute is this?

my parents also brought us dinner that evening, and we celebrated my dad's birthday,
and avi went for a walk with nana.
ahem. i got roses. awesome.

as far as milestones go, in addition to the whole walking-with-assistance thing (where assistance is defined as any individual, certified "walking-toy", or laundry basket that might happen to be in his way), avi is the fastest crawler in the west. he can also stand on his own.
although i can only provide evidence of what happens after he stops standing, since at the time i was still too awestruck to document it properly. i have since recovered.

avi also continues to be very gracious when it comes to humoring my fashion whims. with careful cultivation, i seem to have raised my son to actually love hats as much as i do.
rememember the chicken viking hat?
as i posted yesterday, it has made its reappearance as part of avi's playtime wardrobe.
which of course i think is absolutely hysterical.

so the tadpole was ten months old on thursday. damn. and since we're all feeling much better, this is definetly starting to be fun again. it's going to be an excellent weekend.

today's title is from the show bring in 'da noise, bring in 'da funk

i know things now

2006-05-26T15:05:00.000-04:00

stuff i've learned over the past week:

avi definetely had an ear infection

turns out i had bronchitis and a sinus infection as well

it's a poor choice to realize this while your temperature is 101

but even that is not as awful as the first time you read your son's temperature at 104.4

apparently babies do that

it's (what?!) not that big a deal

bubble pack antibiotics are the shit

multiple vials of bright pink amoxicillin and an industrial syringe are not

two days off of work is just enough to make me miss it

it's also just enough to make me woefully behind upon my return

i shouldn't try to work for 15 hours the first day back, however

(exhausted all over again)

it's also unadvisable to work 12 hours the next day

lo, a four day weekend awaits my well-deserving self

oh, and it's always a bad idea to promise updates (with pictures) because the natives get restless and leave snarky comments

more tomorrow.
today's title is from my old standby, into the woods.

bali hai

2006-05-17T12:50:00.000-04:00

quick snippets while i gobble down my lunch at work:

my dear elana had her baby boy jonas samuel on monday morning! all are doing well and are right this very moment on their way home.

i got my hair cut and it's way too short and i hate it because the lady cut off all my curls even though i told her not to and then i overtipped her because i'm too nice.

avi slept straight through last night thank the fucking lord. he had a nice bath and six (six!) bedtime stories, and went down around 8:15pm with no ibuprofen but with nice clean sheets. we heard him a wee bit around 6am but he didn't get up and he was still sleeping (albeit restlessly) when i left at 8:20 this morning.

today's title is from south pacific and it has nothing to do with anything, i just have it in my head for some totally random reason so i decided to subject it to all you people too. so there.

mother and son

2006-05-14T09:18:00.000-04:00

happy first mother's day to me, to me.

in celebration, avi only got up twice last night AND slept until 8:30am. his new lullaby-spouting cd player also made its debut, hopefully soothing him back to sleep until we confirm if he has an ear infection or not.

today i get to hang out with family, hopefully go to target for some new shirts (holy shit, has it really come to that?), do more laundry, hang out with more family (it's also my dad's sixty-fifth birthday, go dad!), and maybe, just maybe get some take-out sushi.

because after all, it's my day, dammit.

i came downstairs with a whole list of things to write about, but i must have left them on the stairs or something. because yes, it really has come to that.

today's title is from the rock opera tommy.

agony

2006-05-12T11:25:00.000-04:00

yes, i know i used this song before. it's from into the woods, which is a very good show, but that's not why i picked it out again.

avi still can't sleep.

we're heading into our fourth week of this, and it's the most frustrating and excruciating thing i've ever dealt with.

i feel like a zombie.

i think it's time to call the doctor.

bye bye baby

2006-05-10T21:20:00.000-04:00

avi waved bye bye today for the first time. alot. and totally in an appropriate way, so don't give me any shit about him just moving his fingers without realizing what he's doing. we've been signing with him for months now, and he's nine and a half months old, so right on target to start responding. it's totally fucking awesome. i cried. seriously. i mean, i had a very emotional day regardless, and i had driven all the way out to my mom's house to see him because d took him out there before i got home from work and i wasn't going to see him until tomorrow night when i went out there to get him but oh. my. god. he waved bye bye to me.

my mom said he did it earlier in the day when d dropped him off too.

genius.

it almost made up for the fact that last night he went to bed at 8:15pm, woke up screaming at 12:30am, went back to bed by 1am, woke up screaming at 4:45, and then continued to scream until almost 7am at which point d finally magically somehow got him to go back to sleep until 8:30.

we're heading into our fourth week of this madness, and it's really starting to wear us down. we don't know if it's the move, my return to work, his beginning-walking skills, his ninth fucking tooth coming in, or a combination of all of these things. i was spoiled rotten that he slept so well for so long, that is for sure. holy shit this part sucks.

but he waved! my baby waved!

turns out it was an okay day afterall.

today's title is from the show gentlemen prefer blondes.

i'm back in circulation

2006-05-09T20:37:00.000-04:00

whew. i'm back. we're moved and settled and mostly unpacked. work is good, avi is still not sleeping well, and we finally got the internet alive and kicking at home. i feel like it's been ages. oh, i guess it has.

so not only have i not kept up with anyone else's news, i am not about to sit here and read three weeks (three weeks!) worth of backlogs. if something was really important, i'm sure you emailed me about it.

why is there cat litter on the desk?

so there you have my entirely uninspired return. i'm going to go find a dustpan.

today's title is from the show redhead, which i am no longer.

museum song

2006-04-25T10:41:00.000-04:00

work is good. i am busy and the people are mostly excellent and i think it's going to end up being a pretty great match.

we are moved. no internet at home yet, but we're working on it. hopefully in the next three days or so.

i am doing better today. it was easier to leave avi this morning since he got up at 5am. not so endearing. plus we got to hang out for almost two hours before i headed off to the museum.

which is where i am now. which is why i am going back to work.

today's title is from the show barnum.

da-doo

2006-04-22T08:01:00.000-04:00

friday morning avi got up super early so i got to see him before i left for work. by the time i was heading out the door, he had fallen back to sleep in our bed.

when i got home again in the evening, the scene was somewhat similar.

see all the boxes stacked up behind them? it's moving day. computer is going down in about ten minutes.

today's title is from the show little shop of horrors.

starting again

2006-04-19T21:49:00.000-04:00

two days into my two year position...

it is really really really really really hard to leave avi at home every day, even with his dad - which i know is so lucky of me that i have no reason to complain.

but i like it. work, i mean. so far.

we move on saturday.

this is a really tough week.

i miss my baby.

today's title is from the show evangeline.

passover redux

2006-04-16T14:39:00.000-04:00

whew. i'm all seder'd out.

i think avi had a pretty successful first passover. he even found the afikomen all by himself. seriously. we'd all forgotten where it was until he stumbled upon it later in the evening. not bad.

the table was absolutely beautiful. look at those roses.

we actually had a real shank bone this year. and dyed eggs. hmmm.

avi got lots of kisses from mimi like always.

before we all sat down for dinner, there was time to play. avi has a great exersaucer at jojo and pop's house. (that's where he found the afikomen later)
this is also the super cute outfit he demolished later, but we don't have to rehash that part.

dinner was amazing as usual. avi's great grandma makes THE BEST matzoh ball soup ever, and this was the first time avi was able to eat it with the rest of us. or eat it while mine got cold. same difference.

there are these new matzoh sticks out now - i had seen them at the grocery store but didn't get any, so i was greatly amused that someone else had. they're the perfect size for small hands.

after dinner there was time to play patty cake and other important games.

avi was introduced to the piano for the first time! what an awesome toy!

and what a very special night for my best little boy.

packing song

2006-04-14T12:21:00.000-04:00

lessons i have learned this week include how to turn a quick trip to the doctor into a three hour visit, why it is advisable to separate the baby from the packing-in-progress, how to clean up infant projectile vomiting, and how to spend ridiculous sums of money for cable internet you're only going to have to disconnect in a week anyway.

ah yes, it's been grand.

my last week home before i start my new job on tuesday has been full of frantic errands and missed sleep opportunities. avi and i went to the playground on tuesday, which was awesome and dirty and helped me forgive him for wednesday and thursday's subsequent antics. even the throw up part.

our apartment is so fucking hot without the air conditioner running full blast that even the simple act of loading oh say fifteen metric tons of books into box after box after box after box leaves me drenched.

did i mention that i'm color coding all the boxes? i haven't decided if the Real Movers will find that helpful or condescending.

i have spent the past two days fighting off a whopper of an anxiety attack, as i calculate our diminishing funds and upcoming bills. how soon after i start my job can expect to start swimming in the massive cash rolling in? ha ha. or at least how quickly can i stop worrying about paying everything on time? i also haven't decided how to get that answered from the hr people. excuse me, can you tell me when i'm going to get paid? sounds desperate. right.

i underpaid our rent for april by eighty-seven cents, which is NOT related to my money concerns. i got a nice note from the property manager telling me to "just add it to your next month's rent check". glad she's keeping so on top of things.

gah. just as i was typing that i caught another wave of panic over all that i still need to do. time to get off the damn computer while the bug is still napping.

today's title is from the show beauty and the beast, but i cannot for the life of me recall when it occurs.

i feel like i'm not out of bed yet

2006-04-13T08:18:00.000-04:00

could have been worse. 8:30pm to 6:30am. no real reason to complain.

except.

in order to best observe the first night of passover, i stayed up super ridiculously late cleaning out our file cabinet and desk drawers because i cannot stand to perpetuate disorganization when we move. and even though i got it all finished and i feel really good about that part, avi was absolutely my least favorite son this morning when i first heard him start to call out, "hey guys, come and get me out of this fricking crib already!"

although.

there is much packing and insanity today, but my mom is here to help. this is a Good Thing, and i need to remember to tell her that more often. between her inability to not buy avi every cute thing she sees and her constant availability to assist me in a crisis, i really don't have anything to complain about today.

today's title is from the show on the town.

i believed it all

2006-04-12T07:59:00.000-04:00

okay, i lied.

i used to say i thought it was cute when babies learned to pull up and stand up on their own. i used to say i thought it was cute when they'd start doing it all the time. i used to say i thought it was cute when they did it in the middle of the night - waking up, practicing, and getting stuck, with the only recourse to scream uncrontrollably until rescue was imminent.

i lied.

this is not cute.

not at 10:30pm.
not at 12:30am.
not at 1:30am.
not at 4am.
not at 5am.
and certainly never, ever at 7:30am.

not. at. all.

today's title is from the show stop the world, i wanna get off.

let's have lunch

2006-04-10T14:17:00.000-04:00

we appear to be back on track. green beans were eaten. cottage cheese was consumed. cheerios were thrown. and they all lived happily ever after.

in other exciting news, my nose is still exploding.

i start work in a week. we move in two weeks. i need to purchase new clothes and pack a bunch before next tuesday, so i'm not overly consumed by that during my first couple of days on the job. and we're getting real movers this time, so that helps with the actual, well, moving part.

also, avi got new shoes.

that's all i got.
today's title is from the show sunset boulevard

eat a little something

2006-04-08T20:45:00.000-04:00

breakfast: half a container of yogurt with oatmeal (got my hopes up...)
lunch: what? we don't need no stinking lunch, mom!
dinner: oh fine, i'll have some applesauce if you're willing to persist for the better part of an hour.

oh, he ate cheerios too. and had lots to drink. he's full of boundless energy and smiles all the live long day while i suffer through this terrible horrible no good very bad sinus/ear infection bullshit i can't seem to shake. and he's clearly not dehydrated with drool like this.

today's title is from the show i can get it for you wholesale

boy for sale

2006-04-07T23:23:00.000-04:00

because we are such rotten parents, tonight we gave avi nothing but bread and water and a little gruel for dinner.

no really, we did.

he seems to have a bit of tummy sadness, and ate poorly all day today. he's drinking alot so i'm not worried about dehydration, but he's a little...runny...hence the mild dinner diet.

it's been several months since the poor guy had to have boring plain cereal, so he ate about three bites and staunchly refused any more. we were mildly successful with some animal pastas, but he refused to eat those with a spoon and prefered instead to be handed each one individually. dinner. took. hours.

finally i just handed him a piece of bread. threw is more like it. i pulled off chunks and tossed them onto the tray of his booster seat like hansel and gretel leaving a trail of crumbs. only we weren't going anywhere. because avi wasn't eating. right.

he doesn't have a fever or anything, just a bit of a head cold. i still feel like absolute shit, of course, but avi seems basically fine. he played hard all day at nana's house while i cleaned out boxes and tried to ignore the searing pain in my right ear. i found a certificate of somethingorother from my a.p. american history class in eleventh grade. that should tell you how long those boxes have languished in my poor mother's basement.

avi so doesn't feel lousy, in fact, that he very excitably and loudly read the little man dressed in red with us before bed. what a crazy book. d grew up with it, and it's alot of fun to read to the kiddo - very repetitive build up, patterns in the pictures, etc. i just can't quite get past the feeling that they oh i don't know, stone the little man in red at the end. that may have been influenced by avi's screams of delight at every page turn. did i mention how much my ear hurts? apparently he didn't get the memo.

today's title is from the show oliver

the worst pies in london

2006-04-06T10:26:00.000-04:00

i brough home leftover donuts yesterday because i'm sick and feel like crap and everything tastes like snot and blah blah blah haven't i written this post before? anyway, i thought leftover donuts would sound good to eat under the circumstances, but they didn't, so i only ate like 17 or so.

we were supposed to go and play with my friend emily and her son gabriel today, but i cancelled because of the donuts. or was it because i'm sick? or maybe because on top of the snot-induced sore throat from hell i was also up having unpleasant state of the union discussions with d. perhaps that is d, all the above.

avi is too big for his swing so i have to sell it on craig's list, because that is apparently what we do with outgrown toys. i've never actually sold anything that way before. i hope it is not difficult, but i assume it can't be since many millions of morons have done it before me.

today rules, as you can tell, and the above title is from the show sweeney todd in case you care.

nothing

2006-04-03T22:18:00.000-04:00

when i was little, i had a ramona quimby diary. i ordered it from the scholastic book club in second grade, and although i couldn't find a picture of what it looked like then, apparently this is what it looks like now.

it was more of a fill-in-the-blanks diary than a true journal, but as a seven year old i wasn't too much of a snob about it. i still have it, just like i have every single other journal i've written in since that time. it takes up an entire shelf of our bookcase, and i'm terribly embarrassed of approximately 95% of anything written therein.

i remember in the ramona diary there were little excerpts from the ramona books peppered throughout the pages, and in one, ramona or beezus reads their mother's childhood diary. page after page is filled with "nothing happened".

i feel like that tonight.

i had a pretty good lazy sunday - daylight savings time kicked us in the ass so i missed both my playwriting master class AND the reading i was going to go to. i went for rita's and suprise chinese food with elana, but that was about it. today i taught all day, came home and hung out with avi who is so cute these days it's probably illegal, and then went to studio.

b.o.r.i.n.g.

quite possibly the worst time to be affected by such malaise is right before a new job and a big move. i'm going to have to kick myself in the ass to get out of it immediately. i delibrately left my printmaking materials in the car tonight to motivate myself to clean the car out tomorrow afternoon. and i brought home two new books from school to read.

perhaps it's the shitty weather. what's up, april? nice show flurries you're having.

eh, whatever.

nothing happened.

today's song is from the show a chorus line, and i'm sure i've used it before.

gone

2006-04-01T19:48:00.000-05:00

avi went to his very first concert today!

of course, it was a small show by our favorite, ben folds, and i happened to learn about it by chance this very day. most unfortunately i was not able to attend, and if you heard a wail of agony around two o'clock that was me simultaneously hearing about the show and realizing that i had already committed to my friend monica's baby shower.

i raced home from teaching to drop off the stroller and car seat for d so he could hook up with his parents and take avi. i listened to ben folds almost exclusively while i was pregnant, and i can't wait to start taking my son to concerts and shows he can appreciate - and so he can be one of those adorable babies who dance in the aisles! taking avi today will hopefully kickoff a long and glorious interest in excellent live music for my little one, before we get sidetracked by the wiggles and other such things. please oh please let they might be giants tour with their kids show sometime before avi is three!

this is a silly picture d took of the baby at the show.

and here is just a little taste of what i missed, recorded rather shoddily by d on his phone:

(it's a .wav file.)

it made me very very happy to hear that in the car on the way home from the shower.

today's title is one of the best singalong songs by ben folds, which d so sweetly recorded for me.

chew-chewy chow

2006-03-30T23:07:00.000-05:00

i bit the side of my cheek today. as in, blood was tasted, chunk is missing. i was eating a maple walnut cookie from the grocery store that so distinctly reminded me of going to the same store as a child and getting a free cookie from the bakery. it's such a pleasant viceral memory that i have eaten the cookies faster than my body likes to pleasantly digest them.

in other related news, avi woke up this morning extra super duper early, no doubt due to his very full diaper. now as it was rather early for said diaper state, i let him fuss for a bit when he first woke up, thinking he'd go back to sleep like he often does. instead it turned into fullfledged wailing, and i had no choice but to rescue him, whereupon i discovered the problem.

here's the worst part - he has gotten over his irrational fear of the koosh ball and is now harboring an intense and irrational fear of the changing table. let me just tell you, the most awesome part of being a mom is physically restraining your screaming, writhing eight month old (who is pretty damn strong for his age, thank you very much) while his crazy full - surprise! - diaper sits precariously half open around his flailing legs while you call desperately for d to come help before you, the baby, and the changing table all need a serious scrub down at seven thirty in the morning. not just awesome, but hawesome.

and finally, i think i have a cavity. i don't understand, because i was JUST at the dentist. like three times. what the fuck is up with that?

today's title is from the show balancing act

thursday show and tell

2006-03-29T20:48:00.000-05:00

i don't really eat chocolate bars, per se. i mean i do, i just prefer they come surrounded by ice creamy goodness.
i think this counts, i really really do, because it contains not one, not two, not three, but FOUR different candy bar-like concoctions. and be honest, which would you rather reach for on the worst of days, a boring old chocolate bar, or crunchy bits of four chocolate bars in an ice cream extravaganza?

incidentally, our freezer is bordering on ridiculous right now.
next to the edamame and spinach is a wall of endulgence that can only be justified by the insanely low prices said wall was purchased for. if your grocery store sold breyers for $1.99 a gallon, you'd go nuts too.

chocolate bars, schmocolate bars. only when they're pulvarized and covered with goo, thank you very much!

i can't find a song that evokes "printmaking"

2006-03-28T11:02:00.000-05:00

but it was fantastic to be back in the studio last night. emily and kerri are back again, and it's pretty much a ridiculous gab fast the whole time. i can't quite decide if i've turned into one of those people that everyone in the room envies, or is annoyed by...but honestly for real i think it is the former. crazy, eh? it was too primarily to me having excellent luck with the monotype gods.

this print makes me happy because of the great line quality i managed to coax out of the figure. i am not as pleased with the sky. it needs way more depth.

and i am also generally pleased with this one, although it is alot brighter than i would have liked. we have new white craft paper in the studio, and strangely enough i am so used to working against the brown background (since the plates are clear plexi blah blah blah), that i was a little startled to see how colorful the textures were in this print.

off to lunch at city theatre, and then mountains of shopping must be accomplished this afternoon coz we ain't got nuffin t' eat!

getting to know you

2006-03-27T14:39:00.000-05:00

i am out of books to read since my students are still on spring break. goodness knows what i'll do when i'm finished teaching over there. luckily, i was able to make an emergency stop at babelbabe's for five new-to-me books. i think i will tackle fever first.

avi went with me, mostly because i think that it is starting to become more important for him to be exposed to other people (and kids) than it maybe used to be, and bb conveniently has three lying around that she graciously allowed us to borrow. wait, no, those were the books. the kids were not so much lying around as they were running, yelling, rolling, and eating cookies, but all in a very good way.

i do believe avi was a little freaked out at first, but it's difficult to tell if the cause was the newish place or newish faces. it's been awhile since we were there, and i doubt very much he can remember the last time anyway.

yes, that's avi wearing the same outfit he had on the last time i posted pictures. a friend of the family made it for him, and he's about to grow out of it in like a minute, so i did laundry over the weekend so he could wear it again today. i didn't plan ahead for this particular photo op.

anyway, he got down and dirty with the boys pretty quickly, though. making himself at home crawling all around, licking the furniture, and pulling the wall apart. yes, clearly my son is sending my friends the message, "don't invite my mom over anymore, i will wreck your house." thanks, kiddo.

when do babies learn to share? he kept taking toys from bb's youngest, and i know i can't expect him not to understand why that sucks, but dammit i don't want a bully for a baby! in the end, he and the baby bonded.

and it was even cuter when her middle son got in on the act.

and all was well until some of us decided we were damn tired of sitting around and it was time for lunch.

in other good news, printmaking hiatus is over, and i'll be back in the studio tonight after tutoring.

today's title is from the show the king and i

much more

2006-03-26T23:16:00.000-05:00

i feel a little like everything in my life is done to excess at the moment.

first, avi isn't just crawling, he's pulling up on things. now he isn't just pulling up on things, he is walking when he has something to push in front of him!

then the whole job thing really ended up rather in my favor, what with not one but three job offers - and one accepted, as you all know. still trying to work out the painting thing part time, just for the extra cash, but we'll see.

and i have a cold, but not the suck-it-up kind. more like the holy-shit-i-just-literally-went-through-an-entire-box-of-kleenex-in-half-an-hour kind. and there is nothing cute about an excess of snot.

and oh my god could i possibly eat any more junk food? i don't really have that much of an appetite during the day anymore, but i am mad craving things like ben and jerry's everything but the... and chocolate in general. i didn't even do that when i was pregnant. clearly i gained seven thousand pounds eating other things (besides the ice) but it wasn't chocolate. and those seven thousand pounds? they have easily multiplied to oh about nine thousand since avi was actually born. which is excessively heinous.

i'm staying up way too late, too, even though avi has successfully battled through his strange bedtime horrorshow from last week and is back to a predictable schedule.

i guess in general i am not taking great care of myself, and i'm certainly showing precious little self restraint. it is easy to fall into a state of complacency since avi is so fabulous and i am not yet working and we often don't really have to leave the house for several days. on the other hand, i am really looking forward to the new house and my plan to put a treadmill downstairs (no matter how hard i try, i cannot walk muchless run in the humid hayfever season we call spring and summer in pittsburgh) and my new job requiring regular working hours again.

there a both good and bad kinds of excess, i guess. avi is always the good kind.

today's title is from the show the fantasticks.

h-a-p-p-y

2006-03-25T11:06:00.000-05:00

avi is eight months old today, which - as a separate notion independant of the baby as an individual - is pretty amazing. and when i think about who he is as a living, breathing personality, it's even more remarkable.

he can do so much (and has mastered it so fast) that it really blows my mind. sometimes i go through older baby pictures to remind me how much he's changed. it is difficult to keep track of physical changes - his face especially - because i see him every day. sure, i know his cheeks are thinner now, and his hair is certainly longer and darker and more prominent on his forehead, but i often don't realize how drastic it is without the photographic proof in front of me.

i wish i knew *how* big he is. avi has been an exceedingly healthy baby, and our wonderful doctor doesn't need to see him again until he is a year old. trying to measure him at home is pretty awkward, but i think we're going to try if only to confirm that he is indeed big enough to turn his car seat around, since his poor little feet don't have room against the back of the bench! i also wonder if he'd be willing to sit on the scale long enough to get a semi-accurate weight measurement. things i can judge are the sizes of his clothes (9-12 months in rare cases, 12 months in most cases, 12-18 months, in a few cases, 18-24 months in a couple odd ball items!), shoes (3), and the fact that i consistently underestimate other babies' ages because avi is larger than the average bear! he is most decidedly *not* fat, though. his whole torso has thinned out as he's grown longer (taller?) and the cute little pot belly is almost completely gone.

now let's talk about the teeth...seven! i can't believe it! he has four on top and three on the bottom and i can't find even anecdotal babystory evidence that this is in any way even remotely normal. he is definitely cutting the fourth on the bottom, and we estimate he'll have eight teeth before he's nine months old. you know, for all the big game he is chewing, right? actually, he has no teeth for real chewing - molars don't come in for awhile. he certainly has teeth for biting, though. far less painful than fingers (and more amusing too) is the way he tends to bite of tiny bits of cracker when he's feeding himself. we're talking crackers the size of cheerios, but in the shape of a star. he'll bite off two or three star points with all those teeth before popping the rest of the cracker in his mouth (or getting it lost in his fist).

he's eating three full meals a day, and still has about 18oz-24oz of formula. it's absolutely freaky that he can put away as much as i might eat for breakfast - a full container of yogurt, half a banana, and some cereal. of course, i mix his all up together, but it is still substantial. i guess to be completely fair, i don't have any idea how much cereal he actually eats - i use his yummy dry cereal flakes to thicken alot of his other food now that he is trying to chew. for lunch he usually has turkey and vegetables, or chicken and vegetables, or vegetables and cheese, or something along those lines. lunch time is also star cracker time, along with anything else random we happen to have around the house that he is allowed to have or try. dinner is often the rest of the meat+veggie concoction plus more fruit thickened with cereal. there is no dessert in the world of a baby, poor kiddo.

avi is a world-class crawler, and will most certainly be representing the united states in the next olympics. he's is so fast and so...crafty. the other day, d pulled the cat food in from the living room to the kitchen in the hopes that it would fool the baby but not the kitten. unfortunately for all, avi just came right in after it, and the poor cat was left eating a lone dry food bit that had fallen onto the floor. he can also get himself into a sitting position, and will often pause his pursuit to sit for a bit before continuing. i am very pleased that we are moving - the baby can have alot more room to play without d and i worrying about potential interaction with computer wires (or cat food). he's started pulling himself up as well, so i know it is only a matter of time before his range of motion increases even further. sometimes we let him practice in the laundry basket - he sits in it and pulls himself up by holding on to the sides. it's very cute, and not at all worth calling child services about, really.

moth actually has alot more to worry about than missing her food now that avi is so fast. he will chase her into a corner, no doubt hoping to score some time with his friend "tail", so the poor cat has no option left except stealthily running away. she's a lot better at turning than the baby is, but she's also A LOT more patient with him than she used to be. i think we are blessed with a relatively tolerant cat afterall.

d and i have been signing with avi for two months now, in a combination of conversational signs between the two of us and reinforced signs at key times (eating, changing, playing, etc.) with the baby. d is taking his second asl class, and he has such an aptitude for languages it makes me insanely jealous. i think he's probably surpassed my skill level, and will only continue to improve since i am not taking class or working at the school for the deaf anymore. we are both excited to see where this takes us with avi, however. it is usually around nine or ten months that babies start to make the connection between the signs and the objects or actions they represent, and shortly thereafter some babies begin to attempt signing themselves. since neither of us speak "avi" - a combination of yelling vowels and consonant combinations, peppered with clicks of his tongue - i think we both look forward to the day avi first associates the signing with communication.

the bug seems to have completely gotten over his terrible sleep issue, and is now sleeping from about 830pm to 930am. yesterday he took a two hour nap, but i think it was probably a fluke. still, i know we are very very VERY lucky that he has such superior sleeping skills at this age.

1 vcbt xngf
0000000604

and he's also an excellent typist.

(the title to this lengthy and lofty post is appropriately from the show grand hotel)

i think i'm gonna like it here

2006-03-24T15:48:00.000-05:00

here it is, my official job announcement!

i will be starting my new position in the art studio of a local museum on april 18th! i'll be developing standards-based school programming and professional development for teachers in the tri-county area! this is a two-year, grant funded full-time position that i first interviewed for months ago. i am totally excited about the opportunity, and understandbly relieved about the timing! i am definetly ready to return to work full-time to support my amazing family!

today's title is, embarrassingly enough, from the show annie. i promise this will never happen again.

i'm sick of the whole damn problem

2006-03-23T12:40:00.000-05:00

my congestion is back again. and no, it has nothing to do with going out two nights in a row. (i figure i gotta get it in now since i'll be starting a real job soon - with a real bedtime)

i am so tired of being sick. this isn't even bad sick, it's annoying sick. a cold, nothing more. but by this point, it's the principle of the thing - why can't i go longer than two months without another bloody illness?! i'm taking flonase for my allergies and such, but i can't even get it up my damn nose since there's all this snot blocking the way. seriously, it's gross. and now you all have a mental picture of it too.

i put down half of the security deposit down on the new-maybe-house in forest hills. it is pending new carpets and new tiling in the bathroom, and i have final approval of both or they'll refund the whole check. that makes me feel much better about the whole deal, since we're no longer committing ourselves to something that isn't ready yet, but we're not allowing it to get snatched away either. the other place i saw yesterday morning was bunk. too small, poor location, crappy bathroom, and deadly steps to the basement. and get this - it was NINE blocks down and another SIX blocks back from the park. i specifically told the guy on the phone that i wasn't interested if the park wasn't within walking distance. i guess technically that is traversable, but sheesh, it's a helluva jaunt just to get to the swing set.

oh, avi is sick too, but luckily also in an annoying-rather-than-seriously-ill way. in fact, multiple things about his highness are somewhat annoying these days. our perfect sleeping angel has taken it upon himself to scream endlessly at bedtime now. he falls asleep with a bottle in the usual way, but the minute his body comes in contact with the crib, he is suddenly wide awake and totally pissed. last night he cried bloody murder for seventeen minutes before falling asleep. it was awesome. no, really, you should try it. who on earth other than an almost-eight month old can get away with that?! but as much as it sucks, i know it's the best thing for him, so he can apparently re-learn to put himself back to sleep - something he's been able to do since he was four months old but apparently got replaced with new skills like crawling and sitting up by himself and standing while holding on to things. hopefully he'll be able to remember all of them before bedtime terrors continue too much longer.

today's title is from the show fly blackbird

then we are decided

2006-03-21T10:52:00.000-05:00

i think we have chosen an apartment. it is a duplex in forest hills - not the house in regent square of my dreams, but a sufficiently nice place with most of the amenities on the list.

it's a two bedroom, but there is a large basement we can use as the computer room/studio. also, the washer and dryer down there would be ours, to use and take when we move.

the kitchen is small, but d approved it as perfectly fine and a huge improvement over our current kitchen. there is a large covered deck in the back, but no yard - so we can go out for fresh air but not really to play outside. it's definetly big enough to put a grill and small table on, though, and d is looking forward to that.

to make up for the lack of yard, there is a park two blocks away with a playground and trails. there is also a larger park with ballfields and pavillions and the like about a two minute drive away.

no garage, but there is a driveway in front of the house.

there is only one bathroom, but we don't use our second one very often as it is. i have mild worries that will change as avi gets older, but i don't think we're planning to be in this house for longer than three years or so - we'd like to buy one of our own.

i am seeing one more place wednesday morning, in the edgewood area of regent square. it's the first floor of a duplex. it has a small yard, and laundry hookups in the basement. i am not holding my breath, since i think it will likely be much smaller and therefore not practical. still, i can't completely give up on my hope of finding someplace near frick park.

my new job is on the north side - and yes, details will be coming soon as soon as it's all for real and actual factual - so in some ways i wish we were moving closer that way. back to lawrenceville, or something like that. it's not really practical or fair, though, since my parents are in monroeville and they help out so much with the baby - and potentially even more soon after i start my job (mid to late april, by the way)

i just want to be settled so much...in our own house one day, but for now i am okay with someone else's nice little house in forest hills for avi to grow in.

today's title is from the rock opera jesus christ superstar.

working my way back to you

2006-03-20T10:35:00.000-05:00

there is ALOT going on re: jobs for andrea right now, and the most exciting news can't really be announced yet. suffice to say that i am now in a position to not only negotiate but also obliged to TURN DOWN not one, but TWO positions i've been offered. quite a crazy turnaround from a couple weeks ago when i was pretty sure i'd be freelancing until summer at least.

i really really want to share the best news ever, but i just can't until it's all firmed up.

today's title is from the musical jersey boys

in three-quarter time

2006-03-15T15:26:00.000-05:00

the past couple of days have been an absolute whirlwind, but mostly in a good way.
quick list:

dinner at d's parents' house sunday
teaching all day monday
class monday night
out with friends after class
interview tuesday morning
tutoring tuesday afternoon
dinner at my parents' tonight

and we'll cap that list off with the fact that i'm doing my taxes over there this evening also. awesome!

i've been reading alot of young adult literature lately, since i can snief it from the library at SSA. last week i read sabriel by garth nix. i'm not actually sure i would call this a young adult book - it scared the hell out of me. it was good, just...intense. i'm reading the sequel this week but it's actually a little disappointing. i don't like the characters as much at all - they're not quite sympathetic enough, or smart enough or something. on friday i hope to be able to trade it in for the third and final book.

i also re-read the giver by lois lowry. i was - i am - absolutely floored. this book bothered me so very very much. i'm not sure if it's because i'm over empathizing now that i have a child now, or what, but i actually had to turn on the tv and watch something stupid just to get the overwhelming sense of loss out of my head. i did not feel uplifted at the end, i was just horribly horribly sad.

avi's up, i'll finish this later.

today's title is from the musical pardon my english.

apartment number-nine

2006-03-11T23:10:00.000-05:00

crazy week, i say.

ah well, it is over, and ended on a good note. today i saw two apartments and drove by four more that may (or may not, in one case) be worth taking a closer look at. i am no longer petrified about finding a decent place in time for us to move.

i began the apartment quest this morning in swissvale, looking a two bedroom duplex that was actually on floors two and three - begging the question what, exactly, is a "duplex"? seems to me this was more likely just a house divided into apartments, but that was just my impression. my other impression was that i am not interested in lowering my standard of living at this point in my life, therefore this apartment is not for me. the steps were so steep i needed to hold on to the railing, and i couldn't even imagine navigating them with a baby in tow. the bedroom layout was doable - although avi's room would have been exceedingly tiny - but the bathroom is on the second (first) floor and the bedrooms are on the third (second) floor, and we swore we would never do that again after our first house in lawrenceville. the basement was disgusting, and although it contained laundry hookups, the state of things was such that i would be very concerned about my clothing becoming more dirty down there, and that doesn't seem to make such sense.

because i am incapable of dealing with slum landlords in an honest manner, i dutifully took pictures the whole time, and even took a rental application. it was just easier to play along than admit OH MY GOD ARE YOU KIDDING? I WOULD NOT HAVE LIVED LIKE THIS IN COLLEGE!

on my way back down the hill i stopped and took pictures of the outside of the place i'm seeing tomorrow. it is not the most perfect location, but it does have a deck. it is also very well kept from the outside (something the previous place was lacking as well - and i consider that a very good early warning sign). for those two reasons it is at least worth taking a look at 10:30am on a sunday.

i drove down into swisshelm park and took a couple more pictures of the outsides of places i'm going to see next week. i also tried to find a specific three bedroom condo on wayne street that i'm very excited about, but i didn't have the house number and it is a very long street. driving around over there did make me feel better about the neighborhood, though. since i was originally looking for something in regent square, it is pleasing to know that much of what i wanted can be had in a different form elsewhere.

i decided to stop in forest hills on the way home and see a duplex on avenue a that is right around the corner from my dear friend monica and her husband pete. monica is eight months pregnant, and it is hard not to play the wouldn't-it-be-fun-if-i-lived-here-with-my-baby-while-you-lived-
there-with-yours game. david and marisa also live in forest hills, so we figured it was worth taking a second look at if we got the bonus of nearby friends.

what a darling little house! it was made so much better by the fact that the current tenents were showing me around, so they got to really share all the idiosyncracies (not many) and issues (very few) they've experienced over the six years they've lived there! it is a two bedroom with an unfinished basement, but my goodness is it in excellent condition! i would have no problem whatsoever putting my desk and art stuff and computer things down there, or perhaps putting some mats down on the floor and creating a play space for avi. really, i was amazed at this basement. there is a fireplace in the living room, tons of closets, and a huge deck off the living room (huge for us, anyway). it has forced air heat and central air. the kitchen is small, but it has a dishwasher and disposal, and it's way more intelligently laid out than our current small kitchen. the bathroom needs a bit of caulking, and the carpet needs to be replaced, but both of these are things that the folks living there were confident would be done after they moved out. all in all, i spent almost an hour there, taking many pictures and trying to picture our things rather than theirs in every room.

later this afternoon, my mom and i took avi to an arts and crafts show at the expo mart, because sometimes it's fun to be the coolest kids in the room, you know? seriously, places like that you get about 5% useful stuff to look at and about 95% absolute crap, but my mom and i have a good time making fun of people and occaisonally finding a gem. today it was wine, believe it or not. quaker ridge winery was there with samples (holy fuck! at a craft show?!) and we ended up buying three bottles of wine. the apple spice is really amazing, and we also each got a bottle of burgundy. what fun! who knew?

finally on the way home, i ran through regent square searching for this supposed duplex that i'm seeing on tuesday. i was pretty dismayed to discover that it is much further into wilkinsburg proper than i'm interested in, so i guess i saved myself the trip next week. after seeing the wonderful little house in forest hills today, i feel like i have a better understanding of what's out there, so i'm not willing to waste my time seeing places i can tell from the outside aren't worth it. i should have done that this morning, but the landlord was RIGHT THERE, but this time i can head him off at the pass and just skip the unpleasantries.

whew, that was just today. i'm not even going to delve into the previous few days. i'll go see the apartment tomorrow morning, then we have family night with d's family in the evening. monday is hell day - teaching, tutoring, then my last printmaking studio till the next session. everyone's on spring break next week and the week after, so i better stock up on my young adult fiction from mrs. meyers' sixth grade classroom. i'll have plenty of time to read.

today's title is from the musical stand by your man

picture postcard poifect

2006-03-07T18:19:00.000-05:00

especially for gina, and anyone else who cares, here are some of the prints i've been working on in the printmaking studio.

i've added a couple different aquatints to the etching i've been messing around with for the past several weeks. last week i printed it again in sepia tones on handmade paper.

i have to go back now and rework the curtains, since they're getting lost now with the other shading. there's also way too much ink being picked up over near the stocking, so i might have to scrape and burnish that down so i don't have so much ick down near the toe.

last week i also started working on some monotypes of avi's name in hebrew. i was very happy with the results of the first letter, aleph.

but unfortunately, i had some difficulty with the other two.

i spent alot of time playing around with color and shape on the second letter, bet, and i didn't notice until much later that i'd essentially dropped the necessary little bump out separating it from the letter kaf.

even worse was what happened with the last letter, yud.

i used a thinner plate for this one, but when i ran it through the press i forgot to account for that, so in comparison to the other two, this looks like a ghost image. very very frustrating. i tried some more this week, but i had paper sticking issues, so only d got to see them. i'll try one more time next week.

i did do a test print of a photo transfer etching i've been working on, featuring everyone's favorite baby.

d and i were looking at these late last night after i got home from rock bottom and we thought that in black tones on white paper, it looks alot like a picture on a milk carton! to avoid that, i'm going to reprint it next week in sepia on the same paper as the other etching. we think that will make it look sort of old or rustic, rather than a little bit freaky and kidnapped. still cute either way, though.

and finally, i had time for another quick experimental monotype.

i'm playing around with layers in this format, trying to see how much depth i can achieve with a very painterly method of printmaking. i think the best way to test this out is with natural foliage, so that's what i keep working with. i'm pretty pleased with it, and should i mention again how much i love this homemade paper?

today's title is from the musical postcards on parade

drink this wine that i pledge you

2006-03-07T10:51:00.000-05:00

last night i experienced first hand why there is a warning about mixing ritalin with alcohol. which is not to say that i got smashed or anything - far, far from it. however, i definetly was more sleepy from one beer (one beer!) than i ever thought possible. that's fine with me, since that's all i'm really reccommended to consume anymore. and i guess to be fair it was a british pint, so slightly more than a single beer, but still well below what i would typically drink if i wasn't being so responsible and taking my meds.

right, just to clarify, that was prescribed ritalin, not hey-wanna-check-out-this-great-stuff-i-got?-from-some-guy-in-
the-parking-lot ritalin. there is a huge difference. as val and i were discussing yesterday, i don't get the benefit recreational users get because um, well, it just pretty much does what it's supposed to for me, which is clear my head and allow me to focus on well, life.

thus endeth today's bearing of the soul.

anyway, today i am also tired and sluggish, mostly because mondays are so insanely booked anymore, AND i went out after studio. i had good and frustrating results with my prints yesterday. i think when avi takes his next nap i'll post them, but i do believe that i will take advantage of this particular slumber with a short nap myself.

today's title is from the musical (who knew?) beowulf

meme craving

2006-03-04T17:00:00.000-05:00

i want ice cream so bad, but we don't have ANYTHING in the house that can even be misconstrued for dessert. it's really a shame. so i did this instead:

FOSSIL FUEL!
You scored 70% SWEET, 70% CHUNKY, and 85% UNIQUE!

sweet cream ice cream with chocolate cookie pieces, fudge dinosaurs and a fudge swirl

Rock out! You are quite the unique flavor with the added touch of yummy little dinosaurs and things. You're a nice person with a bit of a wild side, and very creative. Your mind works in wondrous ways and you have no problem sharing your unique thoughts with others. You know how to have fun without being an outright nuisance. Very nice.

My test tracked 3 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 31% on SWEET
You scored higher than 61% on CHUNKY
You scored higher than 96% on UNIQUE

Link: The Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Flavor Test written by weered1 on Ok Cupid, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

but it actually didn't help. even worse, d was eating ground meat in red sauce in a recycled container that could have been mistaken for an ice cream pint so i was terrifically disappointed when i tasted it.

zip a dee doo dah

2006-03-01T20:25:00.000-05:00

how sad is avi? soooooo sad!

there's no way to transcribe the "melody" of that baby game in text, but that's okay because it doesn't actually go that way anyhow. normally around here we sing it as big rather than bad, but after the past two days, it's sad all the way.

poor avi is having a rough time with his two front teeth. the left one is visible now, and we expect the right one any day now, but my goodness another day like the two we've had might just push us over the edge. he is so obviously in pain, and i also suspect that the ibuprofen is not doing enough because he's larger than the highest dosage (meaning i think he weighs more than infant ibuprofen is meant to really work on). tomorrow i am going to call our awesome doctor about this theory, because it's basically waring off about two hours early and then he is miserable until the next dose. guess what? we're miserable then too.

tonight he got himself so worked up at the end of dinner (chicken, brown rice, and apricots! what a big boy!) that i couldn't change him. he kept arching his back and he was crying so hard and his face was getting all red and he'd try to roll away from me on the top of the dresser, so i had to stop because it was just too heartbreaking! i walked around and hugged him and sang to him (zip a dee doo dah is still THE song to calm him down, no matter what the circumstances) and eventually we sat down and tried some more of his bottle. he almost put himself to sleep right there, but unfortunately i couldn't let him do that since i still had to get him ready for bed. we went through the whole sad ritual one more time only i successfully managed to put his his pajamas on and he finished his bottle and was out like a light.

poor poor bug.

tommorrow morning he goes to my mom's house so i can go get a haircut and then we're going to our rescheduled appointment at the infant lab at cmu. i teach tomorrow evening so d will be on his own (like i was tonight since he has class) so hopefully tomorrow is better all around.

today's title is from the musical review that'll be the day

apology to a cow

2006-02-26T14:56:00.000-05:00

i've been really negligent about posting for pretty much the entire month of february. i don't have a very good excuse - i'm not in grad school, and i'm not working full time. i am teaching four classes (two mcat, one reading comprehension, and one playwriting) and tutoring three students. i'm also taking a printmaking open studio on monday nights.

oh right, and there's this seven month old whirling dervish who lives with us!

so for those of you who've asked what on earth we've been up to, here goes:

avi is doing fabulously. he has two huge bottom teeth that are all the way in, and two more on top that are about half way in. the catch is, the teeth coming in on top are not the top middle (central incisors), but are instead the outside two (lateral incisors). to make this more clear, it looks like avi has already lost his two front teeth, but in fact he hasn't gotten them yet. apparently this is a rather unconventional teething order, but nothing to be concerned about. we can feel the top two middle teeth under his gums so we assume we'll see them soon, but in the meantime it is rather silly looking.

in the world of eating, avi has progressed beyond nasty cereal and into a variety of mashed meats, vegetables, fruits, and grains. he's an excellent eater and we also recently started with finger foods. let me just tell you, watching him try to put a little star-shaped cracker into his mouth has become one of the highlights of lunch and dinnertime. it's also remarkable how quickly he's gotten better with this skill. seriously, at the beginning of the week we were just showing him the crackers and he was picking them up and missing his mouth entirely. he'd eat them only if we put them directly into his mouth. this afternoon, he was all about just feeding himself and occaisonally needing some redirection (they get soggy fast and stick to his palms). soon he'll be scarfing down his snacks just like his parents do.

as far as mobility goes, avi's mastered rolling over as well as rolling across the floor. some of you have seen the insane upsidedown inch worm thing he does to get from place to place too. he can tentatively crawl backwards, and will occaisonally go a little bit forward, but it seems that he still just has all the skills in place and has yet to really get it enough to put them all together. this is a very entertaining stage to be in (from our perspective), but he also gets frustrated quickly. most amusingly, he will be trying trying trying to crawl forward, and the act of reaching for something (usually put in his path for incentive) will cause him to roll over onto his back, and then he gets distracted with something else or a new viewpoint or whatever, and then he eventually rolls over again onto his tummy and the whole cycle starts again.

next week, avi goes to the infant language and learning lab at carnegie mellon to participate in a study that my friend sarah designed the stimuli for. d and i are both excited to see the whole process, mostly because we're geeks like that.

i'm still looking for a full time job. i keep applying for great grant-funded positions with organizations who decide halfway through the search process that they actually don't know quite what they're doing with the grant yet. it's happened twice, both times after three interviews, and it's a little disheartening even though i know it has nothing to do with me. my pasa drawings are all complete (and have been for several weeks) and so now i'm just teaching and hanging out with the baby and getting fat. it's awesome. except for the fat part.

i am ready to go back to work, though. i have anxieties about money frequently, and i want to move, and i feel like we can't plan to do that until i have a steady income planned out. it's a little bit crazy, but not yet worth getting crazy over.

and that's pretty much it. not really alot on our end, but as i said, that avi kid sure is a keeper. for my sake, i'd like to do a better job of keeping track of what's up with the bug and his daily accomplishments. it's nice to have a written record of it. i guess i just need to be more disciplined. surprise.

today's title is from the musical bat boy

and again

2006-02-25T08:47:00.000-05:00

this one is scary. it's the opposite of the positive window that i put up a couple days ago.

thursday show and tell

2006-02-23T11:33:00.000-05:00

we eat many meals, all day long, so i wasn't sure what to share this week. avi is really digging his many varieties of real actual gummable/chewable food (with his big boy four teeth! at almost-seven months!) and of course anyone who knows me can see that clearly i enjoy my dinner as well.

there is also alot of snacking around here lately, which is unfortunate for d and i, but rather amusing for avi. he has little apple wheel thingeys, and little sweet potato stars.

mostly though, i'd say his favorite thing to eat is worms. well, caterpillers, to be exact.

way to show that very hungry bug who's boss, avi!

and as always, thanks, blackbird

today's meme

2006-02-20T11:11:00.000-05:00

joining the club

thursday show and tell: a total cop-out

2006-02-16T09:47:00.000-05:00

presenting an actual extreme closeup:

and a simulated one:

created from this:

thanks blackbird

art for art's sake

2006-02-14T11:11:00.000-05:00

last night i started the aquatint process on my zinc plate. i didn't get enough accomplished to print another proof, but i did get some monotypes printed to quench my fix. i just really like the feel of bringin home a finished product, even if it's just an experimental one.

i played around with paper types and layering. i like alot of the effects.

then on the way home from the studio, i was sitting at the corner of penn and braddock and witnessed a car accident. not just any kind, mind you. a total hit-and-run. two cars ahead of me in the right lane, the guy just GUNNED IT BACKWARDS and went into the car behind him. then he TOOK OFF SUPER FAST, turning into the gas station and tearing out of the other side of the parking lot and onto braddock in the opposite direction. this was all during a red light, so when the light turned green a went on through and started to process what i had just seen. as it started to make as much sense as something like that can, i turned around and went back to make sure the guy who was hit was okay. our conversation went something like this:

me: are you okay?!
guy: i'm a little freaked out!
me: what the fuck was that?!
guy: i have no idea, i've never seen anything like that before!

the front end of his car was totaled, but he managed to get it up and into the gas station parking lot while we waited for the cops. he was also brilliant enough to get almost the entire license plate number. i was pretty useless as a witness - all i could attest to was the fact that it was a blue sedan and that everyone had been stopped at the red light right before it happened. we agreed that that would be more useful to the insurance company than the police, so i gave him my number and headed on home.

insanity.

today's title is from the musical the cradle will rock

he's a genius

2006-02-11T10:43:00.000-05:00

this infuriates me.

and the double-bonus ironic title is from good news!

nothing more than this

2006-02-11T00:10:00.000-05:00

it's been a pretty uneventful week. right? hasn't it? now that i'm sitting here actually writing that, i'm worried that i'm leaving something major out...

nope, i don't think so.

i taught at shadyside today. tutored yesterday. hung out with friends last night. no classes to teach this weekend. went grocery shopping.

seriously, pretty lame.

maybe i'll be more inspired later.

today's fitting title is from the show candide

let me entertain you

2006-02-06T23:21:00.000-05:00

my printmaking studio time went better this week, but it's still frustrating to have to do things piecemeal. i managed to print a couple proofs of a zinc etching i'm playing around with. i have an ear infection and almost didn't go to class, but i'm glad i did. here is the print.

and today's title is from the musical gypsy, of course.

fourth quarter

2006-02-05T21:19:00.000-05:00

i've been meaning to share this picture of d for awhile, but this is truly the most perfect time. i have alot of trouble actually watching the game fully - it makes me extremely nervous, and as some of you know, extra anxiety is not a good thing for me at the moment. i keep hiding behind my computer screen or my fingers or something to block out the game during tense moments.
anyway...

d during super bowl XIII in january, 1979

avi during super bowl XL in february, 2006

like father, like son.

hope the steelers have the same success tonight against the seahawks that they did against the cowboys twenty six years ago...but i better stop now or my superstitious nature will catch up to me.

friday show and tell

2006-02-03T15:30:00.000-05:00

i love my purse.
it's made by vy&elle out of recycled vinyl billboards.
it's totally waterproof and has a spot for my phone, and of course the colors are awesome. no two are alike.
it wasn't big enough for full documents though, for meetings and interviews, etc., so i got another one in a larger, boxier style.
it has the most identifyable design i've ever seen on a vy&elle bag, but the back is my favorite.
and the sides are a nice accent, while maintaining the over all sleekness of the bag.

homemade meme

2006-01-30T22:48:00.000-05:00

this is stolen from babelbabe, who in turn got it from someone else who made it himself. that's right, kids - witness the birth of a meme. the thing that is important to note is that this is NOT a list of favorites. i don't know how other people have approached this, but for me, this is a list of items that shaped me into who i am, and a couple of them are not positive memories (though many of them are!)

Movies You Need To See To Understand Me Better
the princess bride
the emperor's new groove
notting hill
fight club
snatch
eternal sunshine
moulin rouge
the breakfast club
teenage mutant ninja turtles
american history x
meet the feebles
**what dreams may come
clerks
disney's robin hood
high fidelity

Albums You Need To Listen To Understand Me Better
anything ben folds
king of yesterday, by jude
stormfront, by billy joel
big river soundtrack
anything bad religion (bonus points for recipe for hate)
rent soundtrack
frankenchrist, by dead kennedys
flood, by they might by giants
brige over troubled water, by simon and garfunkel (is that the one with the sparrow song?)
xo by elliot smith
less talk more rock, by propaghandi
rites of passage, by the indigo girls
...and justice for all, by metallica

TV Shows You Need to (Have) Watch(ed) To Understand Me Better
the daily show
good eats
venture bros.
weeds
mythbusters
kids incorporated
punky brewster
star treck:the next generation
the young riders

Books You Need To Read To Understand Me Better
cryptonomicon, by neal stephenson
the source, by james michener
agyar, by stephen brust
the vlad taltos series, by stephen brust
sarum, by edward rutherford
everything you always wanted to know about sex but were afraid to ask, by david reuben m.d. (old school 1969 version)
survivor, by chuck palahniuk
frog and toad are friends, by arnold lobel
the very hungry caterpillar, by eric carle
the myth series by robert asprin
crime and punishment, by dostoevsky
the adventures of huckleberry finn, by mark twain
the plague, by albert camus

Toys or Games You Need To Play To Understand Me Better
cranium
pictionary
euchre
matchbox cars
fashion plates
mancala
**capture the flag
rugby

Musicals/Plays You Need To See To Understand Me Better
rent
falsettos
sweeny todd
fences, by august wilson
west side story
*anything by ibsen
into the woods
the emigrants, by slawomir mrozek
grimm tales, by the young vic company
*******smile
the clockwork orange (preferably a certain specific production in the hamburg eight years ago)

Periodicals You Need To Read To Understand Me Better
the new yorker
time magazine
brain, child (just got my first issue, oh my goodness it is amazing)
pc world

Places You Need To Visit To Understand Me Better
pittsburgh
canton, ohio
celina, ohio
portland, oregon
seaside, oregon
bethany beach
long beach island, new jersey
niagara falls

Comestibles & Libations Of Which You Must Partake To Understand Me Better
sushi
chocolate milkshakes
cheese
a nice wheat beer with lemon
latkes with sour cream
****shots of aftershock
sushi
the salad bar at sweet tomatoes in portland
cheese
buffalo bites from the sharp edge
sushi
frankie's oooooooooohs
tuna tartare from soba
ethiopian food
vodka and hot chocolate in 33
sushi
new year's eve dinner at tsunami in buffalo, ny
mint chocolate chip breyers ice cream
coke icees
cheese
and sushi

*so i think i'm going to code the unfortunate ones - you know, the ones that taught me to suck it up and deal :)

grandma's song

2006-01-28T11:46:00.000-05:00

avi celebrated being six months old in a big way this week, by staying over night all by himself at nana and grandpop's house! my parents were awesome enough to undertake this unique opportunity so i could work friday, d and i could go see his sister in a chorus line friday night, i could work again saturday, and d could go help his sister move to an apartment in bloomfield saturday afternoon. avi is such a rock star that he of course slept fine at my parents' house, and is now hanging out with nana! what a big boy!

indeed, what a big boy - we went to our new doctor on thursday and these are the numbers:

20lbs, 4.5oz (85th percentile)
28.5 inches (95th percentile)

she proclaimed him in great health and the whole staff was taken with how absolutely beautiful and happy he is. clearly with those numbers, though, we need to be thinking seriously of getting him an agent when his pro career takes off! he was almost as big as a SIXTEEN MONTH OLD baby we saw at kazansky's the other night!!

so in addition to being the best mom ever, and therefore the best nana ever, my mom also got avi several fabulous steeler outfits for the super bowl. i haven't really talked much about the upcoming game because we're pretty superstitious around here. we'll just say that the bug will be quite festively attired next week and leave it to that until after the results are in.

back to work on what is hopefully my last round of redos and additions for the state assessment tests. (and for those of you keeping track, this is at least the second time i've thought that. they keep needing more!)

oh and today's title is from elton john's new musical billy elliot.

i am so proud

2006-01-24T12:23:00.000-05:00

i went to my first printmaking class last night. it is great to be back in the studio again. of course right now i am so exhausted i can't possibly come up with enough descriptive adjectives to do it justice. i went out before class to buy a new printer and i needed it set up for this morning. setting it up after class pushed my work-start-time to ridiculously late, and once i finally got to bed i couldn't make my brain stop thinking. i am literally counting the days until i go back on meds to help with this very issue.

anyway, here are my two favorite prints from last night's class:
i think this might be the first in a series. we'll see. it's decidedly un-andrea in style, but that's sort of the point.

this was an attempt at a specific style i use in photoshop frequently. i'm not super thrilled with the results - it's being shared for comparison sake, though. the colors are weak and the layering was just not as powerful as an effect as i can get digitally. more finetuning is necessary.

i also taught my first playwriting class today. it's easy to slip back into teacher mode, and today was an excellent opportunity to reaffirm that i'm actually quite good at it. more on that after tomorrow, the second of two three hour workshops that kick off the class.

today's title is from the musical the hot mikado

wishful thinking

2006-01-22T08:18:00.000-05:00

so a week and a half ago, i got absolutely blitzed in the privacy of my own home. it was completely unintentional - i was drinking 9% beer and didn't realize it - and the result was me lying in bed with the room spinning like i was nineteen all over again. the only good thing to say is that i didn't throw up, but man i wanted to.

the next morning i was obviously seriously hungover, and in no shape to deal with myself, much less my son. d, who had obviously witnessed my ridiculousness the night before, was both sympathetic to my head and completely failed to reprimand me for my utter stupidity. i guess he felt i was being punished enough as it was. he got up early with avi (i'm *always* the one that gets up first) and let me sleep until oh, i don't know, ten or eleven o'clock. he even brought me ibuprofen and fully supported a nap later in the afternoon.

i didn't deserve any of that, because it was my own dumb fault, but it was soooooooo awesome.

well last night i went out and had a great time and got home quite late. i had exactly one beer, which i nursed over about an hour, and was decidedly un-drunk, or even buzzed. and this morning, avi decided that instead of sleeping until 9am like he has been doing, he'd get up at 7:15am - probably because i've been telling everyone what an awesome sleeper he is, or perhaps because he knew i went to bed close to 3am.

anyway, i found myself almost wishing i HAD been drunk last night because then when his royal highness called over the monitor that he was awake, i could have rolled over groggily and let d take this one, instead of obligingly getting up to greet my happy baby on four and a half hours of sleep.

i'm now trying to "play him out" so he'll take his morning nap early. then it is back to bed for me!

today's title is from the musical the secret garden

friday show and tell

2006-01-20T14:10:00.000-05:00

avi's good hat.

oh, and here's another one too because it's just plain silly!

the interview

2006-01-16T16:04:00.000-05:00

i think i used this song from ziegfeld follies before, but i had another interview, and it's not like there is a large cache of musical songs about seeking gainful employment...

i had my second interview today at a place i choose not to reveal until i know one way or another. i'm also not going to delve into too much detail, because i am tired and hungry and feeling kind of roller coaster emotion-y.

i had a really great first interview. i knew when i left that it was. i thought i had a really great second interview. now i'm not so sure.

it weirds me out that i can't tell. it makes me second guess myself.

the interview itself was with one woman who i met with before, and who i've known from previous interactions at...this place, and with one new woman who i think was underwhelmed with me or my experience or my ideas or something. the thing is, everything i brought (they asked me to prepare something) was totally in line with what she said she wanted, and so i don't know if she was just tired of interviewing or it was something personal about me specifically.

and i was late for the interview itself, because there was no place to park because they were super busy today because school was out...but they knew that, and they met me at the door, and i apologized, and i think it was okay...

except i don't really know, and i just want a job so i don't have to worry about it anymore, even though we're okay for for awhile, i just don't want to be concerned with what comes after that while.

i'm going to go make some lunch.

sleep, [elise] laura, sleep

2006-01-11T21:59:00.000-05:00

don't know the show, don't know the song, but it IS her middle name!

last night, elise and i had a sleepover, since d was in d.c., and she was in from d.c. (funny how it works like that). we had a delightful time drinking some beer and then some vanilla vodka and cranberry juice just like old times - only with a darling boy asleep two rooms away. he is so fantastic, he had oatmeal before bed right when lisi got here, and then slept until 8:30am this morning. he's slept through the night for over a month now.

it was so fabulous to just sit and talk with an adult (albeit one who's still a kid at heart, thank goodness!) with no pressure about getting home or checking in with d or worrying about the baby. since we were just here at home, we could be totally relaxed and just hang out. i made us grilled cheese at about 1:30am and we sat on the couch with our sandwiches and reminisced about...let's just call them crazier times, eh?

when we finally snuggled down in bed, neither of us was very sleepy right away. we talked and giggled (okay, laughed hysterically) for another hour or so before eventually falling asleep. what fun!

so now d is back and lisi will be here until sunday, so i look forward to more happy times to come. tomorrow we are meeting elana for dessert at the walnut grill in shadyside. i am very excited for them to meet, and to see how hugely pregnant elana is by now. hooray for new babies! AND she's having a boy, which is also great news! too bad she and her husband are moving back to cleveland to be near her family.

anyway, lots coming up - i finished a round of revisions to my pasa drawings, and tomorrow i go to the dentist for the first time in ages. friday i have a meeting at city theater about my upcoming playwrighting residency. saturday i teach at w&j again, as well as tutor...and in between, hopefully a visit to the children's museum and carnegie science center with lisi and the bug!

today's title is from the musical goblin market

nine

2006-01-09T21:41:00.000-05:00

is what time the baby went to bed tonight. because he's awesome. and because he knows i can barely keep my eyes open.

last night i was up until about 4am finishing my drawings for pasa (some of which i added to yesterday's post if you're interested) and so of course today was very very difficult. add to that the unfortunate coincidence that d is again leaving for washington d.c., this time to help his sister load up their pods for the big move to texas. he'll be back on wednesday, but it still meant i was basically on my own with avi and completely exhausted all day long.

elise is coming to visit this week, and i am so very much excited. it will be excellent to show off how gigantic and genius avi has become, as well as hang out with another girl for an extended amount of time. we plan to cause trouble in at least three museums, with and without the bug, and promise to get trashed like teenagers with their parents' stash at least one night.

i think that i am going to do the only appealing-sounding thing possible...i am going to retreat to the bedroom with a double issue of the new yorker and read until my eyes can't stay open.

i'd say, fifteen minutes, tops.

i'll probably be back up later, though (i think this is probably just a nap), and i told d he could call if i had to play onstar again. perhaps i'll have something more interesting to report then.

today's title is from the musical - what else? - nine.

i know things now

2006-01-08T19:14:00.000-05:00

man, if i had been able to accurately forecast how my day went yesterday, i would have stayed in bed!

i was scheduled to teach at washington and jefferson college (in washington, pa, mind you) from 9am to 6pm, with an hour break at one. that of course meant leaving the house at 7:30am so i could get there with enough time to set up my board and get my ducks in a row. the morning session was a freshmen class, the afternoon was sophomores.

i could go on and on about the actual details of the first problem, but all you really need to know is that they sent the wrong books for the freshmen, and so we had to cancel the class. (i'll just have to do a double session with them next saturday.) the result was poor me, stuck in scenic washington with nothing to do and four hours to kill. it is just far enough away to be too far to justify driving home and since my boss was paying me regardless (which meant d DID say it would be ok to drive home if i really really wanted to) i decided to just hang out...somehow.

i had the brilliant idea to get my haircut and eyebrows done, because hey - when the hell else am i going to do that? i am very happy with the resulting thin sculpted brow, but my hair looks...the same. d swore he could tell i got a trim, but whatever. it was not expensive, and i did tell her i'm trying to grow it out (why? i look terrible with long hair! mark my words, it will get long enough to pull every last strand into a sensible ponytail and i'll lop it all off again), but i couldn't help but feel disappointed that it wasn't more drastic. i messed around some more, made some phone calls, ate a colby cheese sandwhich i'd brought (you know, because i'm trying to lose weight...ahem) and read the boondocks anthology i bought myself last week. eventually it was time for my afternoon class, or at least close enough to it that i could justify going back inside the building.

again, i could go on and on about the actual details of the second problem, but all you really need to know is that i was told the sophomores would be using one book (and prepped with said book), but in reality they had the same damn out-of-date book i had just refused to teach the morning class! so, i winged it. i lectured for about three hours straight (that is A LOT of talking) and they took copious notes, and i filled three blackboards. it was nuts. and then i luckily had a handout of the passages we were going to go over from the book i have, so we did that for the last hour. what a mess.

needless to say, i made it very very clear to my boss (who was horrified at all the disasters i had to deal with) that there's no way any of the other teachers would have been able to handle that. they are damn lucky to have me, and damn lucky i agreed to go to w&j in the first place, and that is NOT me just being cocky.

today i taught from 10am to 2pm at cmu - brand new class (i can teach the first class blindfolded, i swear) and really interesting all-female dynamic. after that it was home, pack up the baby, send him to d's parents' house with d, and draw draw draw the last six pictures for pasa. i have three left - i thought that was a reasonable breaking spot - and when i scan them later, i'll post a couple.

edit: finally finished them, so i thought i'd share a couple of the little ones and a detail of one of the large ones. remember, these are images specifically used in the testing of special needs children in third, fifth, eighth, and eleventh grade. all the drawings i did were in response to a written test question prompt, and almost all of them will be paired with verbal directions from the test proctor.

this is part of a series where students are identifying action. hopefully you all can tell what she is doing...

same series - he's going to an amusement park. i am recalling now that in actuality, the students taking the test have to identify which action takes the longest time to accomplish.

hopefully you can vaccuum faster than you can spend all day at kennywood...

this is detail of a larger image, identifying objects and people at a fast food restaurant.

and this is the same idea, only at a swank bakery cafe.

today's title is from the musical into the woods, and is sung by little red, the part i played the first time i did this show. the second time i designed it, but i sang it in my head :)

friday show-and-tell

2006-01-06T18:39:00.000-05:00

i'm a little slow on the up-take, but i'm having a lazy day despite getting six drawings finished. six more to go by monday, no problem whatsoever.

so a little backstory - this is another game i've totally sniefed from babelbabe. for some reason i am deciding to play RIGHT NOW at 6pm friday night, instead of earlier in the day when most people could enjoy it. the topic of the week was "share something you've crafted." problem is, i don't really "craft" but i do make stuff. i do draw stuff. i do paint stuff. hell, i'm a designer, right?

anyway, this is what i came up with - things around the house that i've sculpted, painted, or created in some fashion.

this is about 12"x12" and made of thick sculptural clay fired twice to be super beefy. i made it when i taught ceramics at peabody high school in east liberty.

this is the same size, but sadly broken (not so beefy afterall, eh?) during one of our moves. i'm totally disappointed because i love the blue and i love the design and i love the texture. one of these days i'll get around to seeing if it's repairable.

this painting hangs in our bedroom - do not adjust your monitors, that IS indeed the color of the accent wall in that room! the painting itself is about three feet across. it's printed on muslin and then stretched. the rest of my paintings can be viewed at the picture link in the sidebar.

and this is a picture of a show i designed forever ago while still in school. incredible inane show, as a matter of fact, but i really dig this picture. it makes it look cooler than it actually was.

drink with me

2006-01-05T01:18:00.000-05:00

i haven't been posting publicly much. i haven't even been posting friends-only that often, though i've been doing a lot of writing i've kept private. no, i'm not gloating or dangling this in front of anyone like oooh look what andrea can write about and not share! i would hope very much that no one out there feels that they're missing anything whatsoever. i just feel the need to explain that though i've been doing alot of thinking and composing, very little of it has felt ready to be read by anyone else.

i got out of the house tonight, though. it was really great to go and hang out and see friends and drink beer. we decided we definitely need to make an effort to do it more often. i think mentally it will be really good for me to get out of the house more than i have been, and i had an excellent time this evening. i left the house at 7:30pm really expecting to be home around 10pm at the latest, and i got back after midnight. d was totally awesome about me having this time to go out, too, which is certainly to be appreciated.

i have a really busy teaching schedule coming up with mcat classes, and i'm starting a new playwrighting residency with city theater, but other than that, i'm still just waiting to hear about some dangling job prospects and just lying around with the boys at home. anyone back from winter break early, or in town visiting, or naturally residing here is encouraged to call and email me repeatedly to get my lazy butt off the couch and out to a bar to drink deelishus beer and socialize. come on, you know you want to.

today's title is of course from the musical les miserables

a model of decorum and tranquility

2005-12-23T21:56:00.000-05:00

isn't he, though?

avi samuel chetlin, wearing wrybaby, with background by miss elise.

this went out with our holiday cards this year, but since i always have more people i want to share with than cards, pictures, or stamps allow, here he is in all his digital glory.

and the title is from chess, with tongue firmly planted in cheek

15 things about books

2005-12-22T15:48:00.000-05:00

totally sniefed from gina and babelbabe, over here

1. i had already read so many of the books my english class was reading in eighth grade that my teacher started to get annoyed. her final choice for the year was tom sawyer, but i had read that several times over, so i suggested an independent study of huck finn instead. she reluctantly agreed, and i spent the final month and a half of school sitting in the back, reading on my own and answering long pages of short answer essay questions, blissfully nonparticipatory.

2. for as long as i can remember, i have always been tremendously character-oriented. i fall for characters so completely that i will actually put down a book if i disagree with the author's choice of path for a particular individual. two recent cases (with spoilers)- wicked by gregory macguire - i stopped after elphaba's lover was killed - and quicksilver by neal stephenson - i stopped after eliza and jack separated. the upside of this is that i will put up with shoddy plots or lazy writing if a character is particularly intriguing.

3. speaking of neal stephenson, cryptonomicon remains one of my absolute favorite books ever in the history of all mankind. d sent it to me my senior year of college. i received it on a friday afternoon, the weekend before a 1/2" color model was do for scenic design II. incidentally, i hadn't started on the model. i read all friday night and all day saturday - i literally couldn't stop. i was so engrossed in the characters and the plots and the timelines, i was physically and mentally unable to focus on anything else. i finished it saturday night, and worked all day sunday and monday on the model - which was done in time for class, of course. as a side note, this episode is one that we later found out truly illustrates the extent to which i've developed compensation techniques for my ADHD. my ability to hyperfocus on cryptonomicon and then hyperfocus on the model has similarly served me well throughout the years.

4. i assume i'm no different from alot of you in that i get a kick out of hearing my favorite authors read from their own work. i saw neil gaimon read from stardust, and i still can't read the first part of that story without hearing his delightful brogue. and i've seen chuck palahniuik several times, mostly because we lived in portland for awhile. we have an inscribed copy of survivor - which i strongly believe is his best - where he congratulates d on being one of the few to actually "get it". and i am very thankful that i saw douglas adams speak at cmu before his untimely death.

5. i have been a faithful reader of the new yorker since i was in high school, and for all the flak it gets for being high brow, i can't fault a publication that introduced me to jhumpa lahiri or susan orlean.

6. i cried solidly through the final 60 pages of john irving's a prayer for owen meany.

7. for some inexplicable reason, i collect books on the black death. i love history books in general, and i find that part of european history to be fascinatingly dark. i also include in that subject any fiction books on plague experiences, and i my two favorites are daniel defoe's a journal of the plague year and albert camus' the plague.

8. the last thing i ever bought at powells books - in person - in portland was a western civilization text book. it's took me three years of non-constant reading, but i finally finished it over the summer.

9. when my brother bought pat the bunny for avi, i cried, because i have such vivid memories of my mom reading that to us, and then me "reading" it to michael far before i actually could read it for real.

10. two books i remember strongly from my later childhood and adolescence are a national geographic picture atlas of our universe, and gnomes. the universe book was on my parents' shelf in the family room, and the section on hypothetical life forms was much loved by both my brother and myself. i bet everyone in my immediate family would be able to tell you what an "oucher poucher" is. the gnomes book was the first book i'd ever seen that wasn't written in a traditional text-picture-text kind of way. it is almost completely hand written and illustrated, and the whole style of labeling drawings like that influenced my pre-teen artwork in a major way.

11. i still have every journal i've ever written - intermittently from second grade to well, this one. they stopped being in book form about two years ago and have their own shelf on the bottom of my largest bookcase. my sixth and seventh grade journal is probably the most entertaining because of course i was a total dork, and most of the entries are about books i'd read or characters i'd liked. for awhile, i wrote to "diane", after reading the twin peaks spin-off book about agent cooper's diary. later i wrote to sam, a character in a comic book i read right around that time.

12. i don't weed out my book collection intentionally, but inexcusable carelessness has caused us to be missing a disastrous number of books. when d moved from portland, he had two large (like tv sized) boxes of books he was going to ship here, and he never got around to doing so. and i'm notorious for willingly lending out books i'm excited to share, but with no record of who they're going to, or even that they were lent out at all. i tried to find two books by harlan ellison the other day (angry candy and slippage, two amazing short story collections) and failed, and then i remembered i'd lent them to d's younger sister. when i asked for them back, she graciously brought me an entire shopping bag full of books - some of which i'd lent her three or four years ago - that i'd forgotten about.

13. i guess i also have alot of books about wwII and the holocaust, although it's not a "collection" per se. many of the war books are fictional, or fiction but based on an author's personal experiences. many of the holocaust books are survivors' stories. i really am a huge history buff, and i prefer stories of conflict over pastoral existence because i can't relate to the situations of conflict at all, but i feel driven to suck up as much information about them as possible. that's true for other wars too - i have a number of both fiction and non-fiction books about the civil war, and one of the best field trips i ever went on was to gettysburg after studying michael shaara's the killer angels - incidentally, another book that's been lost over the years.

14. my parents bought three pieces of furniture for avi - a crib, a dresser, and a bookcase. and many many many people have given us books or gift cards for books for him. i am so lucky to have not one but two families that place such a strong positive emphasis on reading. one of the saddest things about the school i used to teach at was hearing how few kids were read to, or read on their own for fun.

15. and i, too, am an avid reader of shampoo bottles. i was pretty taken aback when you mentioned that, gina! it was one of those moments i think nicholson baker captures so well in room temperature, the first book d ever sent me, which made me cry then and made me cry again when i reread it after our own bug was born. on almost every page of that book, he makes an observation with such clarity that you're like, oh wow, i have also always thought that! it's amazing because many of them (at least for me) were things that i truly believed were aspects of life that only i experienced. the idea that both gina and bb (and, i'm sure, countless others) read bottles of conditioner when they're bored in the bathroom like i have been doing since i was little makes me howl with hysterical laughter at how alike we humans really are.

you gotta die sometime

2005-12-21T06:54:00.000-05:00

in what should come as no surprise to anyone who has ever had winter contact with me, i am now officially sick.

we're talking hacky cough, sore throat, thick nasty foul-colored gunk in my lungs, nasal congestion - the works. it's bad enough that i'm having alot of trouble sleeping, and last night i literally sat in the recliner with a tshirt, sweatshirt, wool socks, sweat pants, and a down comforter just waiting desperately for my fever to break, and then when it did i was so instantly covered in a cold sweat that i put my head in the freezer to get some fast relief.

there's this liquid tylenol severe cold and flu blue stuff that i had to wait ten minutes to buy at the pharmacy since it contains ingredients used to make meth, so all of us normal sick people have to pay the price and show our drivers' licenses in order to purchase it. anyway, it seems to work somewhat. it tempers the cough, which is good, and softens the sore throat, which is good, but does nothing for the snot or the gunk, which is bad. still, it's better than anything else i've tried. clearly i need some delicious nyquil at night to help me sleep, though. why do they all have to be liquid and taste so foul? can't someone harness the power of nyquil in a pill? and don't tell me those liquid capsuls do it, because they don't.

avi and i went to get coffee today with meghan, because i am a glutton for punishment. he was awesome, but i suffered later and felt like crap when we got home - and then guilty on top of that because i hadn't gotten any work done. it was, however, quite excellent to get out of the house and hang out with miss meghan herself, and hear about crits and other news in the lives of graduate students at cmu. and the other day we had a short visit with marisa and david also, so it's been quite the week for social calls. marisa baked cookies, and she and david brought them by on sunday while i was working and avi was at my parents' house. it was fun to see her and david - i had to cancel a playdate with marisa last week that hopefully can be rescheduled after "the holidays" - even though the house was a mess. and cookies for lunch are always welcome!

so now that i am in the throngs (throes?) of my first winter affliction, i will be that much more excited about spending the next two days drawing like the wind to get my pasa contract completed. um, right. not really something i'm looking forward to, especially since i saved all my least favorite drawings for last. oh well, guess i'll go lay down for a bit before getting up to face the drafting table.

today's title is from the musical falsettoland

steppin' out with my baby

2005-12-17T21:11:00.000-05:00

the past several days have been full of baby milestones.

1. avi is eating two - uh, servings? - of rice cereal a day now, where 'serving' is defined as some flakes of rice cereal mixed with some formula til it reaches a consistency just slightly more watery than would be appealing for oatmeal. i sent out the first batch of pictures to most of you. it's pretty amusing stuff. we've made some adjustments, set up his booster seat, bought some new rubber coated spoons (in bright eye-catching colors) and the difference is remarkable. tonight he was grabbing for the spoon and helping pull it to his mouth! genius!

2. yesterday, avi rolled over a total of seven times in two sittings. we put him on his tummy in front of his baby mirror, and he eventually sees himself and it goes something like this: fuss, smile, shy face, look up, smile, giggle, shy face, smile, look for baby behind the mirror, poof! - roll over. so we put him back on his tummy and the whole thing repeats. it's good for about three times max, and then it's more like fuss, smile, fuss, fuss, smile, fuss, smile, fuss, fuss, fuss... which is his way of letting us know it's time for a new position.

3. today, avi started sitting by himself for up to about 15 seconds at a time. this is a big deal, since he's been sitting with our help for awhile, but tends to start to topple (in any direction, really. it's pretty unpredictable) as soon as we take our hands away. this afternoon and tonight, though, i took away my support hand and he stayed! in fact, he stayed long enough that we played several rounds of peekaboo with d and i only ended up reaching out to catch avi when he jumped with delight at a particularly strong boo from his daddy!

i am getting sick, and this is my crunch weekend for pasa, so it's a bad combination. i'm drinking theraflu as i type this, which i hope will allow me to get through at least three drawings tonight before bed. we'll see.

today's title is from the musical there's no business like show business

thank you, madam

2005-12-14T11:51:00.000-05:00

i did a poor job of communicating thankfulness at thanksgiving. i listed what we did over the holiday weekend, but didn't laud the people and things that made it possible. this past weekend, and then yesterday in particular, i was reminded of how absolutely awesome and amazing and supportive my parents are. they top the list of things i am truly blessed to have in my life.

1. my incredible parents, who are always understanding no matter what my crisis, and the first in line to lend a hand to see me through
2. d, with all our ups and downs, ins and outs, and upsidedowns. there is no one else i can imagine sharing my life with.
3. my brother and his wife, who i appreciate so much more now that they're so far away, and who i can't wait to help move back to pittsburgh hopefully some day soon
4. d's family, who have been nothing but welcoming and loving to me since the day i walked into their lives, almost six years ago
5. my education, which i have such little persective on sometimes that i tend to take it for granted, re-realizing almost daily that not everyone walking around has had the chance to stuff their minds full of the knowledge i've had access to
6. my friends from college, like the ones probably reading this right now, who have seen me grow as a person - and still like me! - much as i have been able to share in their growth as well
7. my friends from work, which is a shorter list by choice, but an important part of my life here in pittsburgh
8. my friends through work, like all the new growing theater folks, or some of the performers or designers i've worked with once and then stayed in touch with because of a personal connection outside of the job
9. my work experience - even the crazy hellish parts - because it's definitively shaped who i am today, and who i want to be in the future
10. my talent, which has been enhanced by education and experience, but that i would be loathe to leave out on a list of what i have to be grateful for.

and of course, the obvious new addition,

11. my son, who continues to amaze me daily with how beautiful, bright, and remarkable he is. the whole time i was pregnant, i couldn't wait to meet this new person, and now that he's almost five months old, every day i learn something more about who he will become. and it's the best thing that has ever happened to me.

today's title is from the musical she loves me

help yourself

2005-12-12T10:26:00.000-05:00

so last night, my friend elana (who is five months pregnant) was driving back to pittsburgh after a weekend in ohio with her husband (they are moving to cleveland, and he's already started his job there). she came into town right at the worst possible point of snow and ice on the roads, after they'd realized that we'd accumulated three inches without public works doing squat because they were expecting "flurries".

so elana's car spun around on shady avenue, right by the center for the arts, and ended up on the opposite side of the road stuck in a bank of snow in the path of oncoming traffic - which, luckily, was not there at the time the accident happened, and was going very slowly when it did drive by.

she was understandably totally freaked out, and right as her car got stuck, a kdka news van pulled up. she got out of her car and yelled to them for help, but they got out of their van, ignored her, and started filming!

eventually, another driver stopped to help her, and she and her son pushed elana's car off the road the rest of the way, and then drove her the three blocks to her house. kdka tried to interview the woman who helped her, and she finally answered several questions, but then they turned to elana and said something like, oh we didn't ask you any questions because you looked upset!

elana was safe and sound at home, relating the story to me as i'm positively fuming at the audacity and ridiculousness of our local "news" reporters, and i told her that i wanted to watch the 11 o'clock news last night, just in case they went even further and put any of this on the air.

sure enough, there her car was, spinning and getting stuck on shady avenue. the announcer comes on and says, "this car on shady avenue slid right across oncoming traffic into the opposite lane. inside, the driver, five months pregnant and literally stuck!"

then they cut to the woman who helped her, showed a very brief interview, cut to the woman helping elana across the street, and then showed the car stuck one more time.

elana's already written a letter to the editor about the whole fiasco - just the fact that kdka would witness an accident, refuse to help - or even inquire as to whether the driver was okay - and then FILM IT! makes my stomach churn.

and that, ladies and gentlemen, is why i make it a point never to watch our local news.

oh and today's title is from the musical the last laugh

question

2005-12-09T20:53:00.000-05:00

read this and come back and answer the question below.

now, what's a "dummy"?
oh, i know the answer, i just want to know if you can figure it out!

gifts of love

2005-12-07T19:48:00.000-05:00

this idea is blatently stolen from val, so she gets her strictly-virtual-only gift first:

this is my favorite bookstore ever, and we were lucky enough to live in portland, so i can tell you that shopping there in person is even better than online. that being said, i guess you need a way to get there. just make sure you watch out pulling into the parking garage - it's hell on your clutch.

for lisi, i wish this let you take him home with you, but you'll get to spend all semester over there anyway!

for david, the first one is totally not-so-secretly for me (for you to use to make the bigger one), but the second is to help you come to terms with the inevitable :)

for alisa, i think that you could have alot of fun playing around with this in the privacy of your own home - and no, it's not anything sexual!

for my sara, 'nuff said...

for katy, with the understanding that you're going to have to solve the problem of storing it yourself!

for shannon, it's not really a gift so much as an idea of where i think you should go after school...or instead of school!

for sarah, just don't read the fine print! the point of the gift is that you don't ever have to pay them back!

for cousinmegan, whenever you guys think you're up to it.

for heidi, because even though i've never been here, it's always fun to have a place like this to take your kids!

and for gina, another portland-inspired gift: this was THE best place to shop out there, and i searched high and low for any evil corporate policies, but i think you're in the clear! trust me, it's even better than target!

happy non-denominational winter holiday!! today's title is from the musical the baker's wife, just for the memories!

big "d"

2005-12-06T01:03:00.000-05:00

well it must be his doing, anyway, because that's the only explanation i can come up with for avi's officially humungous size:

18 lbs, 26.5 inches at just under four and a half months old!

let it be known that i myself was 19 lbs, 26.5 inches at NINE MONTHS! and my brother was 17lbs 7 oz and 26.5 inches at SIX MONTHS!! so clearly, the bug is ahead of his time by quite some much!

he is all in proportion, though - 90th percentile across the boards. just a really big baby!

today's title is from the musical the most happy fella

a visit

2005-12-03T12:42:00.000-05:00

i think on monday after avi's doctor appointment (newly rescheduled after i added him to my COBRA), i am going to swing by campus to show off the bug. a number of people have asked to see him recently (and anne is always up for it!) and i want to touch base with susan tsu, a professor who wasn't there when we were because she used to teach at ut-austin (ahem...) it's also been decades since i've visted the treehouse, and i want to see the gorgeous murals that were painted in the hallway for playground in person.

i'm a little stir-crazy, but still not properly motivated to do much about it. it's an odd feeling. i have so much drawing to do still, but it is coming along nicely. avi is at my parents' house today, so that is helpful for work, but not for stir-craziness. next week i teach three sessions of playwriting at carlynton high school, and i have plans to see a movie with elana and hang out with marisa boevers nee dollinger, so i think if i can just get through the weekend i will be fine. i'm just feeling cooped in, so it will be nice to get out - even with avi - for awhile. it's not d, we're fine too, i think it's just that when all i see is the three of us over and over again, well, we all need some fresh air once in awhile, right?

today's title is from the musical kiss of the spiderwoman

thanksgiving day

2005-12-01T20:57:00.000-05:00

so we were up in the mountains for thanksgiving this year, and yes i know i'm a week late in reporting about it, but hey - it takes us at least three days to get resettled with the bug and all after any long trip, and this was a doozy!

let's talk about how much snow we had! oh my goodness, it was also the WORST timed snowstorm ever - so that both those of us coming from pittsburgh and those traveling from philadelphia were slammed wednesday evening. we assumed we were going to be the last ones there - as usual, only this year with a good excuse for the first time. we packed up the scion with avi and all his accessories and spent an hour and a half getting somewhere that usually takes about 40 minutes.

the last hill - the driveway up to the house - was the worst. we got stuck barely a third of the way up. d thought we should give up and call for backup, but i wanted to try it some more. he got behind the car and i revved it up as high as it would go and he pushed and...we chugged along in first gear, spinning snow all over the place but sloooooooowly moving up the hill. he kept yelling at me to just keep going, don't worry about him, and i did until i got almost to the top and tried to put the car in second gear. not so smart! we did the whole push/spin/rev thing again, and eventually made it to the top where a warm fire awaited us. we learned then that jessie and tim and jenna had wrecked (minor-ly, thank goodness) on the way, ron and sue and ben and emily were still en route, and josh had missed his exit coming from the airport - but had brilliantly thought to upgrade his rental to a four-wheel drive!

all arrived safely eventually and though i tried to keep avi asleep, both he and his aunts and uncles and cousins weren't having it! appropriate oohs and ahs resulted, and when we finally all got to sleep, it was both very late and very well deserved.

dinner on thursday was delicious as usual, made more complicated not by the addition of our son but by the unpredictable power outages. nothing like cooking turkey in an electric oven when the power is intermittently going out!

it was awesome to see ben and josh again (though just between me and...the entire internet, they both seemed a little intimidated by the bug!) d usually keeps atrocious hours over the thanksgiving weekend, and this one was no exception. he and josh were often up until 7am or so, and then of course they have to be functional by the next afternoon to hang out with everyone else. one thing that was definitely great was the help we had offered from nearly everyone - d's mom especially would poke her head in our room in the morning and offer to take avi when he got up (for good) around 8am or so. though i could never compete with d and josh, i did manage to stay up until 2 or 3am a couple times, so those morning reprieves were definitely appreciated!

on saturday afternoon almost everyone else went out to see the new harry potter movie. we stayed back with avi and d's sister and her boyfriend (they'd seen it already), so although i wish i'd gotten to see the film, it was great to spend some time with just jess and tim too, especially since they're moving to austin in january.

saturday night we went out to a fancy dinner for d's grandparents' sixtieth wedding anniversary. isn't that awesome?! it was a fabulous place and avi was so wonderfully behaved the entired time - not even sleeping, just totally docile and chilling during dinner, and then wanting to be held a bit after by all the willing family members.

it's certainly way more difficult to travel with avi, and i look forward to when he's even just a bit older and can just be set down some where for a bit while we get things together or load the car or whatever, but all in all, trips like these really reiterate to me why he is such an awesome baby! just a complete doll the entire time, showing off his new-found hand skills, and sleeping like a champ. go avi, go!

here are my favorite pictures from the weekend. email me if you want to see the whole album.

today's title is from the musical the good old bad old days
i don't have a CLUE what that is, but i like the song title!

better days

2005-11-30T17:09:00.000-05:00

well some good things happened today, to make up for yesterday's fiasco.

i learned that because propel is switching health care providers, i too will also switch to the new provider. and because it's open enrollment, i can just add avi to the new policy, thereby eliminating the need for dealing with county assistance ever again. not only that, but the new provider is considerably cheaper AND better, so i can't really see any drawbacks at this point.

i have approximetely 60 drawings to do for pasa before the 18th of december. this would not normally fall under the "better" category, but if you keep in mind that the more i draw, the more money i make, well then it's all good, eh?

the bug went to my parent's house today and i was secretly glad to go back and nap for a bit before getting to work. he is in such pain from teething, and last night he cried and cried and finally fell asleep around 7:30pm only to wake himself up screaming (no kidding) about an hour later. he ate a bit and went right back to bed nice and easy until about 4:30am, and though he sort of slept from 5am to 8am after eating, he was so fidgety and his whimpers so mournful that i didn't really sleep well the rest of the night. again, none of this falls in with "better" exactly, except i got to nap today and it seems that he had a pretty good day with my mom so that's always good.

we're going grocery shopping and then to pick him up, so the final absolute best thing is that we will once again have food in the house rather than leftovers. i have been craving frozen-banana-and-chocolate-soy-milk shakes, so all will be right in the world again.

and at some point i'll post the pictures from thanksgiving too.

today's title is from the musical the hunchback of notre dame

angry young man (and woman)

2005-11-29T19:34:00.000-05:00

today was the first day i ever felt like a complete failure as a mother.

we tried to take avi to the doctor today - something i'd been looking forward to, even though it meant a second round of shots for the bug, because i desperately want to know just how gigantic he really is. unfortunately, when we got there we learned that he couldn't be seen because we didn't have any of his new insurance information.

some of you might remember that last month, i went to take care of this and came home feeling demeaned but accomplished. it was supposed to go into effect retroactively back to october 3 - plenty of time for a november 29 appointment.

not only is he not in the system at all, i learned from a very snippy supervisor that there was no guarantee when he might ever be. excuse me? what the hell is the point of sucking it up and applying for county assistance programs if they don't actually fill the gap when your child needs coverage? ed rendell and his "no child should be without insurance" commercial can kiss my ass.

so of course i ended up bawling in the doctor's office, and they were very understanding and we just left because after an hour (seriously) of phone calls to everyone possibly involved in this process i had made zero headway. my doctor called when we were half way home to say she'd cover the cost of the vaccinations and we could just pay for the office visit ($45), and while that is totally awesome of her, it doesn't change the fact that d and i are so furious with the system not working for two bright, educated people in between employment that provides benefits that we don't think the regular working poor of this country have a chance in hell.

today's title is from the musical movin' out

mountain duet

2005-11-23T18:41:00.000-05:00

we're off to the mountain house for avi's first thanksgiving. i am taking so much work with me - i got a new drawing assignment today with a crazy-close deadline. i hope i'll be able to get at least a little bit finished while we're up there, and i think i might come back early by myself on sunday to work before going back to pick up my boys.

anyway, happy thanksgiving to all of you. there will of course be a whole slew of new avi pictures upon my return, since this will be the first time josh and ben have seen him!

today's title is from the musical chess, one of my favorites.

sleeping beauty

2005-11-22T20:38:00.000-05:00

bedtime: 10:30pm
waketime: 7:30am, drank 7oz of breakfast, back to sleep until
for real waketime: 10:30am

good job, avi!

to be completely fair, he woke himself up at 2:20am and again around 7:30am because he can move himself all around the crib - we put him down on the right side, he ends up on the far left up against the corner bars (we've recently taken down the bumper) - but we just re-binky-ed him and tiptoed back to bed.

it's all good.

and the song title? of course, it's from sleeping beauty, also.

doctor finkelstein

2005-11-21T15:32:00.000-05:00

i am very frustrated with the whole search for insurance situation. avi is covered so i'm not worried about him, but i was trying to avoid signing myself up for cobra - which essentially extends my former coverage - because it is so astronomically expensive. it will be close to $400 a month for continued medical, dental, and vision coverage, and because i have to backpay, we're looking at about $1200 to get me through the end of the calender year.

i've looked at four other policies, but none of them cover pre-existing conditions, of which i have several. i guess i understand the business logic for that, but the reality is that people sign up for cobra when they leave their job and don't have coverage anywhere else. why is it okay then for cobra to be three times as expensive as the other plans a normal, healthy individual could choose? for those of us with issues and prescriptions to fill, well, we just get royally screwed.

i STILL don't know about mcg - i sent an email wondering what's up just this afternoon - and i applied for a position at the children's museum (it's an art educator curriculum development position, so we'll see. i might not actually be qualified enough for it on paper), but other than that, i don't have any obvious options. the pasa job has been great, but it's going to go away after december. and while i'm teaching a TON for the princeton review, that can't exactly support us on its own, especially if i have to pay so much for my damn medical coverage!

i want to make it clear that i do not in any way regret quitting my job. i am soooo much happier now, and it's been amazing being home with avi. but i hope everything else gets straightened out soon so i can stop having all of these floating anxieties.

but i just want to be able to go to the doctor and find out why i'm still so sick and so congested and feeling crummy, and it makes me extremely depressed to know that i can't. unless i cough out $1200 with all the mucus.

sorry bout that visual.

today's title is from the show nightmare before christmas

cheek to cheek

2005-11-21T05:41:00.000-05:00

i have nothing more to say than this, really:

well, that and today's title is from the musical there's no business like show business.

lonely house

2005-11-19T15:09:00.000-05:00

well not really lonely, just quiet and totally weird.

d and avi are up in the mountains, helping his parents get ready for thanksgiving up there. i am drawing all day with no distractions - except for the desire to take a computer break now and then. i am hoping to go out tonight but it will depend on if a friend of mine is available after the hockey game and if i get enough accomplished to be allowed out! i also teach tomorrow morning at 10am, so it's not like i'm going to go out and get trashed just because i can. seriously, the idea of sleeping uninterrupted for as long as i like is way more appealing!

i had a great conversation with elise and ben krall (two seperate discussions, actually, but occuring simultaneously) about a number of crazy cmu memories we all had. a (not) surprising number of them centered around various modes of intoxication. good times. but wow do i feel incredibly old! there's no way i could do even half of the stuff that i did without thinking about it during the good old school of drama days. and i'm not talking about the fact that now i have avi and so it's alot more difficult anyway. my how time flies.

today's title is from the musical berlin to broadway, and is particularly in tribute to our freshman year...

hold your head up high

2005-11-17T14:03:00.000-05:00

anyway, lots of new pictures posted here. delightful ones of super strong avi holding up his head like a champ, and drooling all over his toys.

today's title is from the musical honk!
i have no idea what show that is, but i know the song...

chow down

2005-11-16T21:40:00.000-05:00

avi is teething. this is both very cool and very frustrating for d and i. we're in the beginning stages - no visible tooth, just a bump on his lower gum and lots and lots and lots and lots of drooling. he is sporadically in fussy pain (i type 'fuzzy' literally every single time i try to type the word 'fussy' - i just did it again, making that point) and d particularly is affected by the combination instinctual desire to make things better and instinctual sense of overwhelming that we can't yet figure out immediately what is wrong with the bug. we are getting better, but i know we both can't wait till avi can start signing back to us.

(oh, speaking of which, my friend john stopped by tonight and was signing to the bug also [i met him when i worked at the school for the deaf], and it was reassuring to watch the bug study john's motions so intently - in other words, the signs themselves attract him, not just mommy and daddy doing it)

anyway, the good thing about avi teething is that he can soonish start with solid food, and that's going to be excellent. if this kid is messy now, i can only imagine what havoc he will wreak when he has rice cereal and sweet potatoes to spit up!

today's title is from the musical the lion king

crazy 'bout ya' baby

2005-11-16T00:16:00.000-05:00

i had three conversations recently about my caesarean when avi was born, and each time i was reminded how absolutely INSANE the process actually is. then i opened the paper online tonight to read this.

i just can't get past the part where she says, "'the public gets the sense that it's like a zipper - they open you and then close you back up.'"

oh, today's title is from the musical forever plaid.

the newly organized brotherhood of marching babies

2005-11-15T17:54:00.000-05:00

from the musical: three million billionaires

i can't believe the title is really a song. fantastic!

so i'm going to be posting simultaneously to my lj account since i have more people over there that i'm reading/talking to, etc. i'll just keep putting everything in both places until it becomes utterly ridiculous to do so.

i still like alot of the lj features so much better, so i'm not abandoning that anytime soon - far from it.

call this expanding my horizons...

hypothesis

2005-11-15T16:55:00.000-05:00

i have this crazy scheme (there's alot of that going around these days) to transfer all of my livejournal posts into this here blogger place. i figure i can start with my august 2004 archives over at lj and do maybe a month or so a day until i'm all caught up and both livejournal and blogger will then be consistently updated. i have more and more friends using this site - though none of the lj folks are so i can't abandon that - so it would be nice to post in both places until it becomes tedious.

or is it already? there are so many things i like about livejournal - most especially the photohosting interface. maybe i'll just start now with the dualposting, and continue to draw everyone's attention to the older, cooler, prettier locale of having fun storming your castle

enticement

2005-11-15T12:38:00.000-05:00

get all the dirt on this little guy, before he gets all the dirt on you.

seriously.

he is one messy kid!

for more details on avi and his fabulous escapades, follow the link to my journal below.

come on over to the dark side

2004-10-10T12:04:00.000-04:00

http://aerdin.livejournal.com