Must Start Carrying Camera EVERYWHERE

Posted on 1/6/2008 by cheesefairy

I went to Value Village today in search of muumuus with which to wrap my considerable girth. The last time I went to Value Village I discovered they actually had a maternity section, albeit a small one filled with size S short pants from Old Navy which, no, don’t serve me so well. However, I started there, because a place to start is as good as a rest, and came quickly across several promising maternity garments lacking in waistbands, even the stretchy kind, even the adjustable kind because anytime anything even brushes against my skin-sheathed uterine habitat, the inhabitant pitches an unholy, many-frenzied fit.

(Dear, Sweet Babby2.0: Enough. With. The. Kicking. I get it: you are the yin to your brother’s yang, you are feisty where he is placid, you will give me no end of trouble until the sorrowful and grey-haired end of my days. Can I please have 10 minutes to sit on the couch in peace before all that happens? Or else I am going to start drinking to slow you down.

Shhhhhh, kidding. Don’t drink and breed.)

As I say, I gathered several promising garments, but these from among some of the most frightening clothes I have ever seen. It makes sense: Value Village is a crapshoot at the best of times and maternity clothes are pretty sketchy unless you’re shopping at Generic Retailer X, in which case they look fine until you wash or wear them more than twice, so if you combine the two and throw in a healthy dose of, I think it must have been 1979, you get:

1. Below-the-knee, long-sleeved UltraSuede dress in “Traditional Native American” style, complete with leather ties at the back and beading around the neck. The whole dress weighed about half as much as me. It was a giant, tourist-shop moccasin of a maternity dress and it was made by a company called “MotherWorld” which startled me at first because I thought the label said “Motherwoman” and I was surprised because I never suspected mo-wo and p-man were insane clothing designers but hey, I only know them ever so slightly through the Internet, so – sky’s the limit, right?

2. Another gem by “Motherworld:” an UltraSuede, beaded tank-top with fringe around the hem. Think Cher. Now think Cher, sans plastic surgery (ie: size XXL, so said the label) and pregnant.

3. A baby-doll style dress in the most shocking shade of orange I have ever seen, Value Village or no. Oh but then, but then, yellow and pink roses plastered haphazardly from root to tip. Psychedelic maternity polyester wahoooo! I would have bought it, actually, but it was sadly a size Twiggy so not for this mama.

4. I have not in the last 20 years seen anyone wearing a jumpsuit. (although an anonymous bystander claims to have seen one lately in the downtown core) Why, then, does Value Village have an entire SECTION dedicated to jumpsuits? (right between Maternity and Scrubs) Shouldn’t they be in the “costume” or “retro” or “loungewear” sections? Jumpsuits should not have their own section, else the hipsters will happen upon it and next thing you know: JUMPSUIT PLAGUE ON COMMERCIAL DRIVE! I almost almost almost tried on a black, velvet, short-sleeved, wide-legged jumpsuit because it looked stretchy enough to swaddle me but then I thought better of it.

5. And again in the jumpsuits: long-sleeved, denim, size “3” (ie: the width of my thigh), with a zipper to the crotch and flight patches all over it. $10.99.

Sadly, none of my positive prospects were just so when I put them on, yes, even the pink, corduroy jumper with the green elastic waist-ties (hey, I thought it might work, in a WHO THE HELL CARES! sort of way) so I moved on to the SPCA thrift store down the way (12th street and 6th ave, for Mizzle-ites and thrift hounds) and bought a short, brown velvet dress-thing that I might wear as a dress or perhaps as a shirt. It is very comfortable, cost $5 and is defiantly non-embellished.

The saleslady patted my (I am actually starting to think it might be a hernia? SA thinks it’s my pancreas trying to get out) belly button, asked when I was due, told me I was huge, then apologized, then assured me that children are a blessing. All in all, a successful hour out of the house.

Posted in babby, clothes, new westminster | 11 Comments

The 13th Circle of Hell

Posted on 1/2/2008 by cheesefairy

In the wasteland of television programming that is a weekday afternoon, this afternoon I came across the country music video station. I stopped at this channel because the woman with the big white hat, Terri Clark – the reason I know that is far too long to go into now – was starting up a song and the words were being printed across the bottom of the screen. I got distracted by her shockingly high-waisted jeans and the line “I suppose I could call you / but then I would miss Donahue” scrolling past and I thought, “Hey is DONAHUE back on? Where’s that?” but then I thought maybe it was an old song – yes, that would explain the high waisted jeans and the ’80s TV reference – but I couldn’t read the little circle on the bottom of the screen that told me what show it was so I leaned forward a little, I didn’t actually want to get off the couch, and then I saw it read “Big 12 Karaoke” and then the next song started, again with the lyrics printed on the screen and with a sinking feeling I realized I recognized the song because SA likes to torture me by playing the country radio station on weekend mornings.

I know. I should really remove his head, shouldn’t I.

This song pissed me off the first time I heard it, for purely aesthetic reasons. First verse:

“I’ve been watching you
Watchin every girl in the bar
Payin no attention to the one on your arm
You’re a dog
Man, she’s smokin
I’ve seen your kind before
And you think you’re so cool
This country boy’s gonna take you to school
Hold out your hand
No man, I ain’t jokin”

annnnd, chorus:

“And hold my beer
While I kiss your girlfriend
Cause she needs a real man
And not a boy like you-ou
Hold my beer
Yeah I”m a man on a mission
You don’t see what you’re missin
But I do, so here
Hold my beer”

annnnnd, 2nd verse:

“Well friend I wouldn’t blame you
If you wanted to fight
If you wanna later we can take it outside
But for now
Do me a favour”

…and then we’re back to the chorus. You see? The first verse is twice as long as the second (and third) verse (s). That means we get to listen to this cocky fuck sing “Hold my beer” 80 quadzillion more times! Yay! I know – it’s a bar song, a drinking song, a “your woman sings it to you when she is playfully mad at you but not mad enough to find someone else to date, just mad enough to lip sync and make everyone laugh” song. But it is structurally unsound and it makes me hurt.

Not to mention the noxious content because it’s a pop song and what do I expect.

But today when Big 12 Karaoke played it, they added insult to insult to injury and actually printed
“Hold my beer / while I kiss you’re girlfriend” complete with INCORRECT SPELLING not just once but every single time we heard the chorus, which, as you may recall from the previous paragraphs, is a HELL OF A LOT.

So I turned off the TV. Because watching the world get stupider by leaps and bounds is not how I want to spend the rest of my day off. I have chocolate to consume and naps to take.

Posted in idiots, language, music | 5 Comments

Now With Extra Cheese Sauce

Posted on 1/1/2008 by cheesefairy

I’m all turned around from the busy December and the holidays which have been remarkably holiday-like in that no one got very sick and we all had time off. Saint Aardvark has been off work for almost 10 days (including weekends) and I have 1 more day off in a 5-day stretch before I go back to my job. I can barely remember what day it is. Did I shower today?

(yes)

Oh, good. What day is it?

(Tuesday)

Still, it has not escaped me that it’s both the first day of the (calendar) year and Trombone’s 18 monthiversary. For these reasons I feel like I should write something significant. Poignant. Worthy. With a photo at the end.

So. Yesterday Trombone fell face-first on the floor and his nose bled. This is the first I have seen of his blood and, like all the people say, it is a shock indeed to see your child’s blood running down his face for the first time. His little clotted, red nostril drew my attention every time I saw him for the rest of the day. I know this is the first of many bloody noses (especially if bloody noses are the least bit hereditary because mine bleeds if you so much as tell it a tasteless joke) and the first of many times I am the recipient of that injured expression, that “hey! how did you let that happen?” look that instantly makes me wonder “hey! how did I let that happen?” even if I hadn’t been thinking it before, even if it wasn’t my fault.

Then we cut his hair. Saint Aardvark gave him a toothpaste tube to worry and I did my best impression of a shearstress, all fleh diving in with the scissors and floooot holding hanks of his hair between my fingers. The results are far from terrible; the main result being that he looks like a little boy even more and less like a baby. Combine the bloody nostril and the boyish ‘do and I am suddenly catapulted across the room, landed flat on my own noggin, thinking, “Gee, I birthed a little person. What. The.”

When I went back to work in July, it seemed that Trombone got awfully interesting all of a sudden. I chalked this up to me being significantly away from him for the first time in a year – you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone, after all. Since July, in my more conscious moments, I have noticed that he is turning into a really damn cool kid. Ask my co-workers. And then my kid did! And then my kid did! And ohhhhhh, my kid! He is so awesome! Some of it is because I miss him. But also, I can tell you (relatively) objectively after spending the past 4 days with him, it’s not just me; he is turning out really damn cool.

He sings (in tune!). He dances. He climbs things (just since yesterday). He eats yogurt like an old Chinese man eats noodles. He hugs everything within hugging radius. If you tell him someone’s sleeping, he whispers. He knows what his name starts with and pretends to type it on the keyboard. He is still strangely obsessed with my friend Joanna. He loves roosters, referring to them as “cock a doos.” I think he thinks the new baby is in my belly button (more of a belly, er, doorknob? at this point) because he greets it occasionally by saying, “Hello! Gagoo!” and poking the protrudant bits back in. Hopefully he is not actually jabbing his sibling’s soft spot. I guess we’ll find out in 3 months.

I do know that 18 months is a hard age. Already this week he has woken 15 minutes earlier every morning since Friday and I have read about 18 month olds and I know that having told the Internet how cool I think he is, I have probably cursed myself with 6 weeks of stomach viruses, temper tantrums, eating nothing but peanut butter and possibly even the descent of a cloud of cackling locusts upon our home.

But today, he saw the cake I made and exclaimed, “Cake!” and when I said, “yes, that’s our cake,” he said, “WOW!” And I thought, he used to NOT EVEN EXIST. That is so amazing. I guess I’ll just have to put on my wide-brimmed hat & tall rubber boots and suffer the locusts and poop storm because he’s totally worth it.

(pre-haircut, you see. And yes, we do take a lot of photos in the bathroom. What of it.)

Posted in the parenthood, trombone | 5 Comments

Oh Facebook. You Sadden Me.

Posted on 12/30/2007 by cheesefairy

From my Facebook “news feed” which tells me who among my friends is SOOOO EXCITED FOR NEW YEARS!!!!!! or “tired of the dumb asses” or “watching TV,” comes this poignant piece of news:

Joe Blowe (not his real name) updated his profile. He is now looking for friendship.

Maybe I will gently remove myself from Facebook for the new year. I was going to quit when I got to 50 friends but then I forgot.

Posted in bloggity!, not funny | 2 Comments

Hott Tipp

Posted on 12/28/2007 by cheesefairy

If you, like me, try to use our local transit authority’s website to figure out how to get from point A to point B and curse in frustration each time when it (the website) does not recognize either of your points even though you live at one of them and visit the other fairly frequently, that is to say

If you, like me, hate with big, snarly hate translink’s website because it never fucking works properly

– so much so that it often denies that the bus you take every day even exists when all you want to do is check the schedule –

please note that there is a google transit site for some parts of the world, including Vancouver and even in its current beta form it works a quadzillion grillion times better than translink’s trip planning function ever has. If google could only drive the buses too. We’d get there faster, smarter and hipper.

Posted in outside, public transit | 2 Comments