OPERATION CHOCO-TOILET

DT,

You know this is for you. I will finally recount the tale of operation choco-toilet. Tomorrow that is... I don't think I have it in me to do it justice tonight. I know you are all waiting with baited breath.

I burned my elbow, cookies, new neighbors, and various musings

I made an exceptionally tasty Chicken Parmigiana this evening. Thanks Tyler. I saw this yesterday morning and had been craving it ever since. I used all organic ingredients, including organic chicken, and it was very much restaurant quality. I also make my own marinara sauce:

1/3 cup olive oil

garlic cloves, thinly sliced

salt and freshly ground pepper

(28-ounce) cans crushed plum tomatoes

10 basil leaves, chopped

1 tablespoon chopped parsley leaves

In a medium saucepan over medium-low heat, heat the oil. Saute the garlic, salt, and pepper for 5 minutes or until the garlic is softened. Add the remaining ingredients, then raise the heat to medium-high, and bring to a simmer, stirring often. Simmer for 30 minutes. The sauce can be stored for up to 5 days in the refrigerator and several months in the freezer.

Thank God for the nice all-clad cookware set we got as a wedding gift. Unfortunately I burned my elbow on the hot handle while I was reaching for something else after taking it out of the oven. It feels like it had the white-hot intensity of 10,000 burning suns. Note to self: never burn your elbow again, and try your damnedest not to bend your arm at all! Who the hell burns their elbow?

Because I am the best wife and mother I also made chocolate chip cookies this evening. I know, I know, I should be sainted (I also made a nice brunch this morning)! Hey Vatican, I am still waiting...

I was looking through the oven door to see if they were done and Quinn walks over and peeps in as well, as he likes to mimic everything he sees. He added his own special flair by screaming very excitedly, "cookies, cookies!". He rarely gets to eat cookies and yet this was one of the first words he mastered. Guess he has inherited mom's and dad's sweet tooth.

So we had new neighbors start moving into the house next door that had been sale for quite some time. They must think I am partially insane as they noticed me digging up and replanting some sod in our yard at 10:30 pm Saturday night. Hope they didn't think I was getting rid of a body or anything (our neighborhood is very much like the set of Desperate Housewives); it was just a convenient time to get it done. As a side note, the yard looks great. Like I would even bury a body in my own yard.

Places I have been

No, I am not writing a country song. I can guarantee that will never happen.

Here is a world map of countries I have visited.



create your own visited countries map
or vertaling Duits Nederlands


Apparently I have visited 16 countries (7% of the world). Guess I have a way to go. I already have plans to visit several Asian countries; now if only those plans would come to fruition... SIGH. Momma wants to take a vacation.

Quinn's first in-store

So we took Quinn to his first in-store concert a few weekends ago. Don't get all bent out of shape people, it was acoustic, and he can still hear (though he seems to choose not to listen) just fine. Our little rocker has a broad musical palate; from the Wiggles (see previous entry) to Pete Yorn. Mommy and daddy love Pete Yorn as well. The Electic Fetus in Minneapolis was having an in-store with both Pete Yorn AND David Ford (who is so good both musically and lyrically that he probably deserves another post), AND it was free! We got there fairly early so I could get as close to Pete Yorn as possible, and boy am I glad we did because I got a spot with Quinn right in front of the stage and the store ended up being packed. Both performances were amazing and Quinn really got into clapping and cheering after each song. He was such a good boy the whole time. It got pretty warm in there and Quinn wanted as many of his clothes removed as possible and he ended up in just his onesie. He can get away with things like that still, mommy wanted to strip down as well but held off as she didn't want to be ostracized from society *and* I wasn't wearing a onesie.

This was a good rock star in training lesson for Quinn and mommy enjoyed the eye candy.

Is it wrong

to despise Britney Spears for being PG again? Where is the order in the world? This just throws off all my notions of good and evil, right and wrong, etc. what have you...

Oops she did it again my ass! K Fed must have the world's most potent sperm- not that I want to find out with him, I think he is dirty, and not good dirty. Just yucky dirty.

Well Britney, I hope you really pork out after this one. Okay, I feel better getting that off my chest.

Who doesn't love hunky firemen?

Yes, Quinn and his new friend Stone will be posing for a new 2006 1/2 calendar, Hunks in Uniform. Order early for best availability. All proceeds will go to support their moms' Dunn Bros addiction. Will try to crop out mom's arm as she holds Stone in place; it is damn near impossible to get a decent photo of the two of them sitting nicely together so just use your imaginations people. They had such a good time at their play date and it was fun to hang out with another cool mom; well, I will just be cool by association.

Blame it on the rain

If loving Milli Vanilli is wrong, I don't want to be right.
Fakers. Frauds. A blatent marketing scam. Sure. True. No contest. Damn good music though. Blame it on the Rain, Girl You Know it's True, Don't Forget My Number... who couldn't listen to these gems over and over singing at the top of your lungs because you know you still know all the words as well. Ah Rob (r.i.p.) and Fab, I won't forget your number, and you will always have a Grammy in my heart. If I could find my Walkman and your cassette tape I would listen to you right now.

Don't miss next week when we discuss the political ramifications of Debbie Gibson's Lost in Your Eyes, and Nelson's (Can't Live Without Your) Love and Affection.

So, I'm not living up to my humor potential

I have a friend, let's call her "DT" because after all those are her real initials; well, she doesn't think I am entertaining you all (yeah, like the 2 of you who actually read this) with my dirty and clever repartee. Me so sorry!
This is her threat:

"I like your blog, but I won't consider it yours until you post some
of the raunchy humor of which I know you are capable. Please paste, in their entirety, some of the epic white trash jokes we laughed over.
Now if that doesn't put a smile on my face, nothing will.
Damn political corretness."

I will currently cull through my email files as I believe I saved most of the pee-in-your-pants funny emails we exchanges while we were still working at the AAOS. Since neither one of us is still there I don't believe we have anything to fear. Though, if you read these you will realize that we obviously didn't fear "the man" while we were working there. I am fairly convinced that the whole IS department must have wept continually for about a month after we left because if they were reading our emails they would have recognized and mourned the loss of our collective comic genius.

Damn, I can't find the emails. Did you save any DT??? I hope so because my memory isn't what it used to be.

Welcome to the world

My sister recently had her third child, a baby girl she so desperately wanted.

Welcome Megan:
a life of possibilities - a tiny smile - even tinier toes - and such great potential

This card my sister created cracks me up and makes me think, "Damn, why didn't I think of that?"

I can't wait to meet you during your summer visit.

Momma has an addiction too

To be fair to the little dude I feel as though I should confess my serious love and addiction of Dunn Bros Coffee (local coffee shops in the Mnpls. area). So, so good to momma. It is my freshly-roasted, with room for cream, DARK MASTER. My sister is just as bad, and when she comes to visit from Australia for a month every summer we littlerally go there at least once a day. Can I also give a shout-out to Jesus for putting the good sense into the local franchise owner to put in a drive-thru? With her 3 kids and my 1, it would be near impossible to get our fix otherwise. Okay, must cut this short so I can go and physicially get some.

Are you ready to

WIGGLE??? The little dude loves to sing and dance to the Wiggles, like it is going out of style. He must be some kind of savant or musical genius because although he is just 21 months old, he knows all the words and dance moves to all their songs, and has know them for several months. There is nothing better than watching him shake his little booty and sing his heart out. So mommy and daddy decided we love our little dude so much that we would drive over 200 miles in each direction to go and see the Wiggles live stage show in Iowa yesterday. Was it worth that much time in the car? Totally. Just being able to watch him experience the Wiggles in person was something I will never forget. We got some great photos of him shaking his money maker. I seriously thought he might spontaneously combust out of sheer excitement; he was wired all night long.

My boy loves CHOCOLATE

Seriously, if we would let him he would eat it all day long in place of everything else. We now refer to it as his DARK MASTER and Eddy and I have resorted to eating any and all chocolate desserts late, late at night while he is sleeping. Mommy needs the chocolate to keep her happy. Apparently I must not be eating enough. Here is the little chocolate fiend:


Can you guess what that is on his face? Funny, funny boy.

My newest purchase

How lame am I that I find this completely exciting? Here she is:

What do you mean, "what the hell is that?"?








It's my new lawnmower! A manual push reel mower. And no, I didn't steal it out of some ancient tool museum. I bought it, on sale, at Menards. She works like a beauty- 18" cutting blade, adjustable height, etc. I feel really good about my purchase because it requires no gas or electricity of any kind; my own little contribution to saving the earth.


What hit me in the head and caused me to think this purchase was a good idea? Well, our yard isn't all that large (which is good because coming from Chicago with no yard at all, this isn't too much of a shock to our never done yardwork systems), and PBS made me feel really guilty.

I watched this NOVA program last week, "World in Balance" and it made me feel bad about how much energy the US consumes. It was a fantastic program about radically changing populations in rich and poor nations.

Here is a description:

In the first hour, "The People Paradox," NOVA investigates three countries where social and economic forces have produced starkly different population profiles. In India, women still bear an average of three to four children. Within a few decades the country will overtake China as the world's most populous nation. NOVA interviews a young Indian woman who nearly died delivering her eighth baby. Three of her children have died, and another pregnancy may jeopardize her life. Nevertheless, her husband and mother-in-law want her to try for another son—a highly prized asset in traditional Indian culture.

Meanwhile, the population pyramid in sub-Saharan Africa is beginning to resemble an hourglass. Adults between the ages of 20 and 60 are dying in the prime of life, largely due to AIDS, leaving the very old and young to fend for themselves. In a powerful personal story, NOVA interviews a 19-year-old Kenyan woman who suffers from AIDS. Her parents have died, and she is raising her four brothers and sisters as well as a nephew. Like many teenage girls in Africa, she is a victim of predatory sexual behavior by an older male, through whom she contracted HIV. Funding cuts in family planning assistance from the United States are putting many young women at risk for unwanted pregnancies, HIV infection, and illegal backstreet abortions.

In the second hour, "China Revs Up," NOVA takes the pulse of China's hyperactive economy, which is the fastest growing in the history of the world. During the last two decades, China clamped down on its population growth through its controversial one-child policy, but in recent years it has relaxed those rules, moving in the direction of more reproductive freedom. As the sprawling country develops from a poor nation and aspires to a more middle-class lifestyle, China's air, land, and water are beginning to suffer. Already, a massive dust cloud of eroded soil from Mongolia has darkened the skies over North America, and air pollution from Beijing and Shanghai regularly wafts as far as California.
The prospect that all Chinese will strive to live like middle-class Americans is daunting, since it has been calculated that if all the world's people had an American standard of living, two more planets the size of Earth would be needed to support them. But one planet is all there is, and "World in the Balance" shows that it will take our best scientific and technological efforts to make this one do for all its inhabitants—present and future.
Carbon Emissions, 1995
The amount of carbon dioxide polluting our atmosphere has risen 30 percent in the last 200 years as a result of increasing industrial and automobile emissions. Plants convert carbon dioxide back to oxygen, but human activities are now releasing more carbon dioxide than the world's plants can process. This map shows in magenta today's greatest polluters—the United States, Europe, China, and Japan. In the next 50 years, as industrialization increases, many of the purple areas on this map will turn to magenta and the green areas to purple unless stricter emissions standards for factories and cars are put in place.

I mean, I'm not going to stop shaving my armpits and buy a VW van to live in, but I will think twice about how much energy I use.

Maybe I should try a lighter subject next time...
like homelessness or the child sex slave trade?

What am I thinking?

Am I nuts to be statring a blog? I am a mom with a 21 month old (as of yesterday) who may have enough energy to solve the world's energy crisis (if only we could harness all his potential). The boy doesn't sleep very much at all and napping is a completely foreign concept to him. Mommy on the other hand wishes she had napped more when she had the chance. I was always too worried to nap, especially while in college, because of the few times I did (mostly in winter when darkness seemed continual) I would wake in a panic not knowing what day it was or even if it was AM or PM. I was just sure I slept too long and missed some life-altering exam and was therefore destinted to wander the earth with no real profession.

Yes, my name is Kerry and I am a little high-strung. My husband likes to blame me for our son's apparent disposition: Wound really tight with a temper exponentially larger than his body mass. He is so zesty and fun though (and I can say this now, as it is midnight and he is finally sleeping; in bed with daddy of course). Here is my little firecracker:

"Wow, what a bad mother you must be to have such an unhappy child", is what you are thinking, right? This is Quinn, mad at mom and dad because we are making him leave the playground after an extended period of fun and frolick. He didn't want to say "bye bye" to the playground, this time or any other. Bad mother? Maybe, but we can live at the playground because momma loves indoor plumbing and all the benefits that come with it. I love my angry boy!





I should probably apologize now because if you have made it this far you will realize that my mind tends to jump around quite a bit and I have a hard time focusing my thoughts. I make no promises of prose which flows like water- my mind just doesn't work like that. I swear I think I must have adult ADD, and social anxiety, and regular anxiety. I don't want to take any drugs though, because if you have seem those commercials for such curative products, you will know that the side effects seem worse than the disorder itself. Yes. I want explosive diarrhea and excessive sweating. That will surely help me feel more comfortable in social settings. I could really be myself then.

I will confess that I am partially starting this blog to help keep my mind off current events in my life. I don't know if I am PG??? I won't know for a few more days and it is driving me even more insane. I want to be PG more than anything else in the world (so much so that it is probably a sin). It occupies my every thought, all day long. I wasn't always like this. Quinn was a honeymoon baby so I didn't have to obsess about wanting to get PG. NOW. I was so fortunate. Not anymore.

We lost a baby girl in February, and it almost broke me past the point of repair. Sometimes I wonder if it didn't. I think about *her* all the time. It is hard to lose a baby in our society (and others as well I am sure). People don't know how to react or act around you. Most people are really wonderful and say how sorry they are and that helps heal. It is those people who are not close friends, maybe not really even aquaintances that have been the worst. Saying things like, "Don't worry, you can try again", and the ever so popular, "It wasn't meant to be". Why don't you just cut out what is left of my heart? Or don't you think I even have one. You will also never notice more PG people out in public than after you have lost a baby. You think they are somehow out to taunt you even though they don't know you or know what has happened to you. Your mind tells you crazy things. But then when you are at your lowest point you can read the words sent to you by your dear friend's mother; a woman who has suffered much more than you have (you don't even feel like you should be able to feel sorry for yourself), lost several babies, and a grown son. She said exactly what you needed to hear, what you felt, what you couldn't express verbally to anyone else, and for that gift you are eternally greatful. I hope that the gift of another child won't elude us for too long.

This makes me think of my favorite quote in all of the world:

"The quality of mercy is not strain'd.
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath.
It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes."

--From Merchant of Venice (IV, I, (184-186)
Shakespeare

Okay, I should probably go to sleep before anyone decides I should be committed.