Monthly Archives: June 2010

Jun30

Planes, Busses and Taxis

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Planes, Busses and Taxis

I never thought we would get here. Wow. Longest day ever!! And you’ll have to forgive the inevitable spelling errors…I’m typing this on my iTouch while laying on my back. (And surprisingly that sounds easier than it really is.)

We left for the airport at 4:15 this morning, flew to Miami and had a 3 hour layover, then we finally boarded our flight to Cancun at noon. (Someone explain to me how it’s cheaper to connect through Miami when we already live in Dallas. I do not understand.)

With delightfully few problems, we AND our luggage arrived safely. Passport Control always takes so long here, I was worried because I knew our bag was just sitting there waiting for us.

We caught a bus from the airport to Playa del Carmen and Joey fell fast asleep on the hour ride. Then we had to get off and buy more tickets for the hour we still had in front of us to get to Tulum.

I bought tickets on the Third Class bus (W00T!!) for a quarter of the price we’d had to pay for First Class fare from the airport to Playa, which was still not a bad price. I was pleased.

When we boarded the bus, however, it was about 85 degrees, stuffy, and pungent with the smell of cheap air freshener. Overwhelming.

I took a deep breath, hiked my maternity gauchos up as high on my legs as I dared, and started drinking water like a camel from Egypt.

Joey glanced over at me as we careened down the road. “Are you OK?” He asked.

“Hot…” I mumbled. Then, “Don’t sit so close, it makes it even hotter.”

Joey gave me a longsuffering look and pointed out that these weren’t exactly roomy, plush seats. And he had a point. He wasn’t even sitting that close.

I reminded myself that my ticket cost $2.50 every time I was tempted to keep whining. You get what you pay for, and in this case we’re getting a great dinner later because we cheaper out on bus fare. It’s how we roll. Save on the lame stuff so we can enjoy the good stuff.

That’s also why we brought 28 PowerBars, Clif ShotBlox, and bags of nuts and raisins. Guess who isn’t going out for breakfasts and lunches so we have more money for adventures?

Yep, that would be us.

We are not your average travelers. Heck, I don’t think we’re average anything. Our poor daughter.

Speaking of, we had our 19 week sonogram yesterday. She looks great — she’s still completely wild (picture foot up above her head and kicking it while sucking her thumb…) and she has my nose! I love that we could see that kind of detail. She even rolled over so we got the lizard shot of her spine and ribcage; she totally looked like one of the iguanas I’m going to be taming here this week.

I think it’s time we headed down to the FABULOUS restaurant. It’s late and we are starved.

Jun28

I Think We’ll Make It

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I Think We’ll Make It

Tonight, our friends Luke & Becca came over to basically save our lives.  (You have saved our lives.  We are eternally grateful.)  We had to sit on the floor to eat our pizza and salad because, well, the dining room table was in the living room and the chairs were stacked up in the den someplace.

After dinner, the boys headed to the bedroom to completely disassemble (no disassemble!) the bed and drag the dressers out into the now-emptyish living room so they could paint the bedroom walls.  Joey shoved the mattress and box spring up against the formerly red wall and wedged the dressers around it, then he and Luke disappeared into the bedroom.  Basically never to be heard from again, or at least for the next 2 1/2 hours.

Becca and I attacked the kitchen.

We boxed up all my dishes and mugs, the last of my Le Creuset pottery, the All-Clad pots & pans, all the utensils and silverware, all the bakeware, and my cookie sheets and cooling racks.  I think we used about 10 boxes doing so.

I have a lot of kitchen gadgets.  I had no idea it had gotten so out of hand.

A couple of hours later, we went to check on the boys.  We discovered the bedframe is now leaning up against the wall in the bathroom, and I think it’s going to be very scary looking in the middle of the night.

The bedroom was about ten degrees warmer than the rest of the apartment because the door had been closed, and it smelled super strong like paint fumes in there.  I was frankly surprised that neither Joey nor Luke had passed out; they both looked pale but still lucid.  That’s good, I guess.

They weren’t quite done painting yet, but Becca and I had had just about enough of packing, so we decided that since the boys weren’t around to tell us not to, we’d just scootch things around so we could get the bed set up in the dining room – the last empty space in the whole apartment large enough to fit a bed.  And we can’t put it back in the bedroom because first of all, the walls are still wet.  And second of all, and perhaps most importantly, it smells like you just shoved your head in a paint can when you walk inside.

Becca did most of the pushing and lifting.  But I helped every now and then when the amount of pushing/lifting appeared to be less than whatever the limit is I am supposed to be abiding by.

Five minutes later, the mattress and box spring were positioned up against the wall where the table used to be.

I’ve never slept in the dining room before.  This is going to be very exciting.

And, regardless of the fact it is now 10:10 p.m., I think I need to take a shower.  I never got around to that today.  But…OH DEAR…I just realized I haven’t got the foggiest idea where my clean clothes and pajamas are.  I think I packed them earlier today.

That wasn’t so smart.

Jun28

Today’s…progress

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Today’s…progress

Joey and I keep working and packing and moving things around, and every night when we go to bed we look around and we’re all, um…DID WE EVEN DO ANYTHING TODAY?  What did we spend all those hours on because we really can’t tell anything has happened?

Well, finally…we’re getting there.  The room that used to be our study is no longer accessible because it is stuffed full of furniture and boxes.  Joey was about to go all ninja-box-stacker on it and play Tetris to make it fit perfectly in there, until I pointed out that we have two other perfectly empty rooms and we probably didn’t need to squash just to say we could fit it all in one room.

And then Joey looked at me after  I made this suggestion, and he was like, you know what…YOU’RE RIGHT.  And that was the end of the squashing.

I hereby present to you…today’s progress.

Firstoff, I spent the afternoon cleaning out from under the bed, packing the bedthings (bye-bye duvet we weren’t using anyway because it’s so HOT), cleaning out the walk-in closet, and packing for Mexico.

All the business on the right is what we are taking to Mexico.  The large bag and box are clothes and shoes from the closet…and yes, it appears there are rolls of toilet paper on the bed.  I do not understand this either.

Joey informs me that the bed frame will be gone after this evening, I guess he and Luke are going to take it down and pack it up someplace.  It’s going to be super weird to sleep on a mattress on the floor…ten bucks says I wipe out when I get up in the night because I won’t be expecting the floor to be so close.  Hehehe.

And this used to be the office.  Please note Thunder on the bottom of the bike rack.  Thunder is the coolest bike in the world. (Sorry that your bike has to be second best.)  Thunder is eager to get all up in the Monon Trail’s business.

Wow, that was an aside.  Anyway, not only is all our living room furniture smashed back in there, but I guess we’ll be sitting on the floor to eat going forward.  Looks like Joey put the kitchen table in there too.  Somewhere…

Well, I found the kitchen table.  Hello, kitchen table.  This used to be the living room…yesterday anyway.  Today it is just messy.  And also out of focus.

And here are the faithful slaves, I MEAN JOSH AND JACKSON.  Joey conscripted their labor because apparently I am some kind of pregnant woman weenie and when I paint my entire body aches for hours afterwards.  They have been total rockstars because they painted the entire living room and dining room.

And while they did that, I took the car to the shop and got the oil changed and surfed the internet.

We’re making progress.  I think maybe, JUST MAYBE, we’re going to get this all done!

Jun25

One Of Us Is Weird…

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One Of Us Is Weird…

I have big goals today.  I have to pack the hall closet and pack up my Le Creuset pottery, a task which makes me makes me TERRIFIED…I won’t be reopening those boxes for months and what if they are broken in there and I didn’t know it?!  I will probably use a jillion packing peanuts and foam wrap out of sheer paranoia.

I love me my Le Creuset pottery.

Anyway, I am working on the hall closet and listening to (gasp) Focus on the Family, which I haven’t gotten to do in about  3 1/2 years.  I was digging out the games when I realized that we have not one but TWO versions of Trivial Pursuit.  Neither of which we have ever played.

They are Lord Of The Rings Trivial Pursuit and Star Wars Trivial Pursuit.

Oh wait, now I remember playing the LOTR one once with Brother back in Iowa…and it was taking too long so I started cheating (because I couldn’t get any of the questions right anyway) and adding pieces to my pawn so the game could get over quicker.  It didn’t work because Joey caught me when I was adding the fourth one.

Anyway, full disclosure: One of us in this house is weird because who even HAS two sets of Trivial Pursuit, much less Star Wars and Lord Of The Rings?  The weird one this time?  Obviously not me.

(But all those other times, yeah that’s definitely me.)

Jun25

$412.81

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$412.81

It seems like once a year, Henry makes us go broke.  For instance, last year it was the Deer Ticks incident after the backpacking trip that wasn’t.  That was extremely expensive what with blood tests, shots, and prescriptions.  But totally my fault for not even thinking about there being ticks everywhere in the forest that we would need to protect our small, furry dog from.  I think the grand total of Deer Ticks pulled off his body was topping 150, so we were just thankful he didn’t have Lyme Disease.

At that vet visit, they examined Henry’s teeth and told us that his teeth looked terrible for a 3 year old puppy.  Note to self: Shih-Tzus historically have bad teeth and gums.  We were instructed to brush his teeth daily, but that would only be preventative to keep them from getting worse going forward.

They wanted us to get his teeth cleaned, and that would have a sticker price of somewhere in the neighborhood of $300.00.  If dogs teeth get to rotten, they require extraction which costs an additional $100.00 or so, but it’s also important that their gums don’t get all grody and if the teeth aren’t clean, it also leads to gum diseases.  As the vet kept talking, it just kept getting more and more potentially expensive.

Our eyes got real big and glassy when they said that, and we instantly put it out of our minds.

Actually, we didn’t so much put it out of our minds as it got shoved to the back burner.  Because right about the time we were going to scheduled his teeth cleaning, I wound up in the hospital and by the time I was back up and walking around, we had completely forgotten to send Henry to the vet to get his teeth cleaned.

Then, last month, we went to Indianapolis for our Big Long Exciting Week.  Henry came too.  We spent so much time in the car with him, we noticed that his breath was getting really, really bad.  So I looked it up on the internet, and super bad puppy breath is directly related to the state of puppy’s teeth and gums.  It was then that I remembered that we had forgotten to take Henry to get his teeth cleaned.

Oh, and then there was that time Gramps and Grams drove Henry around and Gramps alleged that Henry’s breath was so bad he was forced to air our the Edge when they got home.

As soon as we got back from Indy, I called the vet and scheduled Henry’s appointment for yesterday morning.  They told me I’d have to drop him off first thing in the morning and pick him up between 4 and 5 because they’d need to observe him all day since he’d be under anesthesia.

ANESTHESIA?!  MY TINY LITTLE PUPPY!?!

Joey dropped him off and I called the vet around noon to see how Henry had done.

“Well, we did have to extract a molar,” the tech told me.  ”It was very loose.”

POOR BUDDY!

They also had to inject him with antibiotics and pain medicine (cha-ching, cha-ching) and were sending us home with pill bottles full of the same (again with the cha-chings).  I hung up the phone and related the damages to Joey.  We were both dreading dropping all the cash, but honestly if we hadn’t done it it would have been much more expensive if he’d needed dozens of teeth extractions later.

Once his little mouth heals up (next week or so) he is on an Every Morning Teeth Brushing regiment.  Whether he likes it or not.

When I went to pick the little fluffball up from the vet, I was happy to see the tech carrying him out from the recovery room (Henry hates the vet so he pulls on his leash when we’re there so I just carry him) and he got all wiggly when he saw me.  He seemed to feel just fine.  I paid the hefty bill ($412.81 – OUCH) and carried Henry out to the car.

About 8:00 last evening, Henry started coughing.  He’d hack and hack and wheeze; we just felt so awful for him.  We just petted his head and told him we were so sorry he had to get his tooth out.  His little jaw is swollen.  I’d take a picture but he’s so furry you can’t see it.

He hacked all night.  About 3:00 a.m. when I was up petting him I realized they must have intubated him when they were extracting his tooth, and then I REALLY felt awful for him.  There are few things worse than waking up and realizing your throat feels like it got scratched raw with sandpaper.  I checked his chart this morning, and sure enough intubation was on it.

I got him to take his pain pill this morning, but so far he’s not interested in the antibiotic.  I don’t want to use one of those throat-shoving things since he did just have a tooth out, but he definitely needs to take it this morning because he needs another one tonight.

I think I’ll have to go back to PetSmart and see what kind of lures they have there.

Or maybe just go buy a can of tuna and rub the pill in some tuna…Henry loves tuna.

Jun24

First Day….

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First Day….

So, starting a new job is always kind of weird and stressful.  Yesterday was my last day of Corporate America for a very long time, if ever again.  Today is my first day of not working.  It’s weird.

I was all sobby yesterday afternoon carrying my canvas bag of personal belongings from my desk down the elevators.  I knew it would be hard to leave all my friends, but I didn’t expect to be such a crybaby about it.  (Then again, I didn’t expect to sob and hyperventilate in Toy Story 3 either, so maybe I should just trash my expectations these days.)

Today, so far, I:

  • Slept in until 9, completely on accident
  • Went to the spa for two hours and am now feeling very relaxed
  • Ate my Brisket Taco leftovers from Mi Cocina for lunch
  • Picked up all the random cups we had laying around the house
  • Started the dishwasher
  • Made the bed
  • Started the washer

I am really worried I’ll be lazy until the baby comes.  I’m thinking about making myself a daily schedule so I can be sure I am using my time wisely and not just laying around reading books or watching TV and movies.

With our house in this state of packing upheaval, I am ashamed to say we have let a few things go to the dogs.  For instance, we have two laundry baskets overflowing right now, and we did not dust any surfaces over the weekend.  Actually, I don’t even think I scrubbed out the toilet.  EW.  I am such a dirty person.

Just for “fun” (for you, not for me), I took some pictures of our poor apartment looking all disheveled.  Please enjoy them.  I do not.

This used to be our study/den.  Its walls used to be a nice shade of green.  Now they are barfy white and obviously there is no where to study or sit around in here.  Prior to the demise of The Futon Whose Next Home Will Be The Dumpster, this is where we watched movies.  (Incidentally, some poor person took The Futon from the Dumpster not 24 hours after we set it there.  We are sure they will realize their mistake as soon as they sit on it and they feel the broken support boards poking them in their hindquarters.  We expect to see it back at the Dumpster any day now.)

Our poor living room.  There are almost no words for this.  The computer setup has totally taken over what used to be our coffee table, and Henry’s kennel and toys are pretty much everywhere.  Even the couches look mad about the fact that we’re moving, they look all frumpy.

The only nice thing in this picture are the flowers Joey got me for my last day of work yesterday.  But everything else cluttering the counter up is decreasing their property value.  As soon as I’m done posting this, that counter is going to be dealt with straightaway.

As I mentioned previously, the laundry situation is flat out of control.

Having our home in such a state of confusion does motivate us to do one thing though: pack it up, baby.  Let’s get moved so we can settle in up in INDIANAPOLIS!

I hope it’s much cooler up there than it is down here.  It’s hot like fire and I say, I don’t care for it this year.

Jun22

Unproductive

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Unproductive

Everyone.

Hello.

So, I’m moving to Indianapolis in a couple of weeks. Maybe you’d heard. I need to keep remembering this, though, because packing is NOT GOING SO WELL all up in the Woestman apartment. Last night we had Macaroni and Cheese because apparently I needed to eat it for dinner or my life could not continue. Then I felt so sick from all the chemicals and additives that are in it that we did nothing but watch Invictus for the rest of the evening. And after the movie was over we just kind of sat there looking all confused trying to decide if we liked the movie or if we were just confused by it, or if maybe the poor movie had just left out some parts of its plot line.

We really wanted to like it. We really did.

But we were so tired and basically confused about the movie, so…we just went to bed early. I wish I were kidding you. We didn’t pack a single box, paint a single wall, or really do anything productive last night.

I keep saying “It’ll come. Next weekend. I’ll be AWESOME next weekend.”

This is kind of a-typical of my personality. I think it’s because I’m so overwhelmed by everything coming up. Either that or Dr. Babyplease transferred some embryos AND a batch of the lazies back in February.

In other news, my friend Bianca rocked my face off and gave me a 6 pack each of Limonata and Aranciata San Pellegrino sodas as an (extremely early) birthday gift. I am staring at them right now!! I want to take them out of their package and drink them all at the same time, but I am trying to restrain myself.

Is very difficult.

I am not sure Joey will be able to entice me to share with him. MINE MINE MINE.

So far all that is left on my birthday list is several tempered glass cutting boards in varying sizes. All I need to do is add towels to that list and my birthday is going to rock its socks off this year. It’s still two months away. I have time to add those towels.

Actually, as soon as we buy a house I will have two showers and I will need more towels.   Towels, consider yourselves added to my birthday list.

Now I feel super old. Towels and cutting boards. Who even asks for that stuff for their birthday besides my mom?

(Hi Mom. But it’s true, you DO ask for that kind of thing for your birthday. I remember when you got the blue towels.)

Jun20

And now…a belly picture

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And now…a belly picture

About two weeks ago, I began getting texts from Sister that mostly just said, “Belly picture?” and/or “When are you going to post a belly picture?” and more or less urgent-sounding variations on the theme.

Joey and I have been dragging our feet on the whole belly picture thing.  For some reason, the whole thought just made us feel uncomfortable.  I’m not sure why, maybe because we both maintain a fairly detached view of pregnancy.  Yes, we’re getting excited.  But we really have to work at it and, this probably seems weird to most of you, it’s really hard. And I think if we were forcing ourselves to be disingenuously “excited”, just to put on a shiny happy face like everybody else…that wouldn’t be very good for us.

So we’re happy about it in our own, quieter way.

However.

I am now 17 1/2 weeks pregnant.  Baby Girl is wiggling around in there like the wild child she probably will wind up being.  This is happening.  It’s starting to feel safe.  So over the last week, I thinking about The Belly Picture phenomenon.  I remember absolutely loving looking at pictures of Mom when she was pregnant with me, and started thinking about how I wanted our little girl to have that same experience.

So on Thursday, I told Joey I thought we probably better start getting intentional about taking a picture now and then.  And he agreed that yeah, probably would be a good idea.  We may get all squeaked out by it now, but in 15 years we will be glad we did it.

On Saturday, we finally took one.  I was buzzing out the door to my first baby shower/going away party <sob> and since I actually looked fairly decent it seemed like as good a time as any.  Unfortunately, there was nowhere in our poor house that looked fairly decent.  ”Let’s just go outside,” I suggested, as we looked unsuccessfully for a space of bare wall that wasn’t covered in boxes or random odds ‘n ends.

We went outside.

“OK, now, stand and face me,” Joey said.

I was like, seriously?  I look like a fat cow from straight on.

But I obliged.

And this is actually one of my favorite pictures because, honestly, LOOK AT MY FACE.  I look like I just swallowed 1/4 cup of lemon juice.

Wait for it…

Wait for it…

Wait for it…

Like I said.  Kind of looking like a cow here, not so much in the way of pregnancy proof, mostly I just look like I have 0% waist..  (And really don’t bother commenting to tell me I don’t look like a cow.  Because I will know you are lying.)

Finally Joey took one of the side.  This looks much better, as you will see.

SEE?!  Much better, yes?  And look at that baby taking up all that space!  Good job, little girl.  Good job.

Also, please observe my new and cool glasses.  Joey thinks the frames are a bit over the top, but I say BRING IT ON.  I like flashy glasses.

So.

Now I have posted a belly picture.

(Sister, I hope you are pleased.  You are basically the only reason we even bothered to decide to take one of these, so kudos to you.)

Jun20

The Criminals

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The Criminals

Yesterday afternoon we were gearing up to paint the bathroom and hallway.  I was in the bathroom taking everything out (Joey just about had a coronary when he saw my method for removing the shower curtain, apparently there is a more efficient way to do so) and Joey went to the front porch to fill our little paint buckets.

A few moments later, he came bursting in with the most amazing look on his face, carrying two containers full of paint and two brushes..

He was all, I just overheard half of THE BEST EVER phone conversation involving on of the new neighbors downstairs.

Ahh, the new neighbors.  The ones who leave beer cans and at least 40-50 cigarette butts outside their door at all times, I think they do this just so Henry can chew on them when I’m not looking.  We love the new neighbors.

And I was like, SO TELL ME ALREADY!

Downstairs Dude was standing outside on his phone, and the conversation went something like this.

Downstairs Dude:  DUDE.  I am ON YOUR SIDE.  Stop flipping out like I am going to turn on you or something.  We got this.

…Pause…

Downstairs Dude: I know, I know.  If they subpeona me, I’ll just go in and talk to your lawyer first so I can get my story straight.

…Pause…

Downstairs Dude:  OR I can just skip town, it’s not like they can make me testify if I’m not here.  It’ll be fine, dude.

And unfortunately at this point, Joey had to come back inside so he didn’t get to hear the rest of it.  We are kind of curious what Downstairs Dude’s friend did that he’d possibly get subpoenaed.  And…maybe somebody should explain being held in Contempt of Court for not showing up for a subpoena to the dude before he goes and does it.

We now refer to the new downstairs neighbors as The Criminals, just for fun.

We are not really going to miss them.  I think Henry may miss the cigarette butts though.

Jun18

Name That Baby

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Name That Baby

Rather along the lines of yesterday’s post giving props to Dr. Babyplease for orchestrating this miraculous Father’s Day weekend in the Woestman household, let’s talk baby names. Joey and I were walking back in the apartment yesterday evening after hanging out with some friends of ours. They’d passed a baby name book on to us that they didn’t need, so I’d been flipping through it on the drive home. Some of the names were, like, cah-razy. And I can’t even remember them now, so you’re just going to have to be in suspense about what they were.

“Well, we could just do that theme where people name the child after the place that it was conceived,” Joey said.

I could totally see where this was going, and I knew it was not going to end well. It always gives me the willies when people do this to their kids anyway. As if I want to know geographic location.

“We could call her Presby ARTS Lab Woestman,” Joey grinned.

ARTS Lab, of course, would be her middle name.

“Now that’s promising,” I replied. “Let’s run with that.”

I was kind of surprised he didn’t throw “Petri Dish” in there too. Because it goes so well with ARTS Lab, don’t you think?