BlabberMouse

We Interrupt This Royal Wedding Day to Bring You This Important Shcvirgelty Smlatphrix Baba Marathon Pants!

So, this post should be coherent and well organized MARATHON IZ TOMORROW HAH LEH SHIH UH MUH GAH SUH NER VUSS.

Larry, who as you may or may not know, has just been named The Husband Laureate of the United States, offered to sleep upstairs with the boys last night AND tonight so I can get some rest. The main reason for this is that Gus has strep throat and OH MY GOD COVER YOUR MOUTH, DUDE! (Whenever the boys get sick, they like to sleep riiiiiight up next to me, with their hot little faces breathing streptococcal vapors directly into my eyes).

I took young Gus to the doctor yesterday for a strep test, all the while growing more and more convinced that I felt something a little funny and strange happening in my OWN throat. When his test came back positive, just to be on the crazy neurotic safe side, I went upstairs to see my own doctor, who wouldn't so much as listen to my wild-eyed plea for a preventive penicillin shot talk to me, because my strep test came back negative.

The nurse stood in the doorway staring at me.

"Your test is negative."

"So ..."

"Sooooo, you can leave now and come back when there's something actually medically wrong with you. And you know, wash your hands, because your son has strep and it's very contagious."

I imagine my eyes were like the windows of a slot machine rolling around and around and landing on *NO SHIT, LADY!*

I tried to explain my predicament for the third time.

"You see, I am running the marathon on Saturday. So surely there are some preventive measures we can take?"

What she heard---> Crazy lady. Real big crazy eyes (!). Crazy crazy marathon on Saturday. Crazy crazy crazy crazy ooh I just remembered I have a Reese's peanut butter egg in my lunch. Sweet.

Not helpful at all, my doctor's office. No perspective.

So! If you know a healthcare practitioner in Nashville who doesn't list "Running a Marathon" in their Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, I would appreciate a referral.

Last night, sensing that I was a little nervy, Larry asked me what I'm most afraid of:

Let's see ... what am I afraid of?

• Getting sick
• Getting injured
• Getting up too late
• Missing the shuttle
• Missing the start
• Feeling off my game
• Leg cramps
• Foot cramps
• STOMACH CRAMPS
• Stopping to use the bathroom and losing time
• Not stopping to use the bathroom and losing DIGNITY
• Chafing
• Bloody, bloody, chafing
• Drinking liquids on the fly ... missing my mouth entirely ... 
• Severe dehydration
• Running too slow
• Running too fast
• Hitting the wall
• Not knowing I've hit the wall until I see my 82-year-old grandmother cheering and realize I CAN'T CATCH HER.
• Not being able to find the emotional sledgehammer to bust down that motherf*cking wall and FINISH THE RACE SMILING. 

So those are my fears. 

And I'm going to leave them right here. 

*Wish me safe travels!*

Is Your Marathon Half Full or Half Empty?

Over the past 16 weeks, I’ve mentioned to a number of people that I’m training for a marathon. And without fail they ask, “Are you running the half or the full?” 

Without fail.

The fact that everyone asks for this clarification leads me to believe that there is a commonwealth of asshats who run the half marathon but refer to it in conversation as “the marathon” for short. (Because “the marathon” takes way too long to run, but “the half marathon” takes way too long to say, apparently.)

With all due respect to the half marathon, it is not a "kind" of marathon. Just like 50 cents is not a "kind" of dollar, and my middle finger is not a "kind" of friendly hand signal. 

They are two different things.  

That is all.

Anyway! (Bygones.) The marathon is on Saturday! So I’ve been taking it easy, sitting in my reading chair, hyperventilating, checking the weather forecast on my iPhone every ten seconds, filing lawsuits against every child who coughs or sneezes in my vicinity, pretty much overreacting to everything anyone says or does to me, because DON’T PEOPLE KNOW I’M RUNNING A MARATHON ON SATURDAY? GOD.

The marathon anxiety dreams started Sunday night, which was a little early for my taste. In Sunday night’s nightmare, I overslept and missed the start. (I dream this before every race I run. And in the dream, I am always staying in a fancy high-rise hotel. I should try staying home in my dreams. Where the sheets aren’t so nice and there is an alarm clock.) Last night I dreamed it was the night before the race and I almost forgot to put my racing bra in the dryer and it would have been sopping wet had the Scottish computer programmer from my work not been there to take it out and remind me. (Thanks, Kris!) Then the foreign exchange student who was interning at my house (because I have foreign exchange students interning at my house all the time. ALL the time.) got a horrible case of the FLU, and I was all NOOOOOOOOOOOOO! GO BACK TO AUSTRIA!

No I wasn’t. I was more like, “Oh poor you, I hope you feel better (just do it OVER THERE BEHIND THAT CLOSED BEDROOM DOOR, please, thanks.") And then I slathered my whole head in hand sanitizer.

So the whole “get a lot of good sleep” part of my taper has not been going that well, but I am trying to make up for it during the day with positive thinking.

This is where I picture myself at mile 22, grinning from ear to ear and perhaps doing a little Samba, because I’m ahead of pace and feeling SO SO GOOD.

I’m pretty sure that’s going to happen.

The Box

I love my in-laws. I really do. 

They are wonderful, kind, loving and supportive people, and I genuinely enjoy spending time with them. You would like them too. They happen to be exceptional grandparents, who despite living a thousand miles away, are an active presence in the boys' lives. Naturally the boys adore them both, but they idolize their Pop Pop. 

To them, Pop Pop is everything a man should be. Because Pop Pop is The Sender of The Box.

The Box is a hefty affair that arrives at our doorstep every two to three months via UPS, packed with various toys and treats and books and games and crayons and perhaps a few dollars for each boy to leave haphazardly on the floor until their father or I shriek MONEY IS NOT GARBAGE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD WHEN WILL YOU TWO KIDS LEARN THE VALUE OF A DOLLAR? 

The toys in The Box are not all shiny and new (thank God). Each May, near the New Jersey town where Larry grew up, there is a famously massive rummage sale, where Pop Pop makes his annual purchasing trip. He warehouses his treasures on a shelving unit in his garage and carefully (and privately) hand-selects the items to be included in each Box. 

While much of what he scouts is traditional kid fare, Pop Pop does have one genre of toy in which he specializes: Electronics that have no off switch.

He managed, for example, to procure for Gus a Harry Potter Wand that hisses and pops at the slightest proximate vibration. Should you need to use the bathroom in the middle of the night when not a creature is stirring--SHIZAHHHHHH!--prepare to shit your pants full of Bertie Botts. The Harry Potter wand is as loud as evil itself. You can't turn it off. The batteries are the kind that never die. And to remove them would require a teensie weensie screwdriver the size of a ladybug teat.  

Another characteristic of The Box is that its arrival nearly always coincides with the completion of one of my Domestic Realignments, in which I become overwhelmed with clutter, decide the boys have entirely too much "stuff", give 90% of their possessions to Goodwill, alphabetize the remaining 10%, and lecture everyone about how This Is It I'm Serious From Now On We Are Only Going to Own Things That We Absolutely Need.

We are going to choose quality over quantity!

We are going to use our imaginations!

We are not a bunch of crazed pack rats hoarding piles of mass produced crap because IT'S OUR FAVORITE! 

In giving this lecture, I am so persuasive and so convincing that I actually emit a fragrance. It is the smell of COMPLETE AND UTTER CONTROL. And it is a scent so powerful that it wafts northward across the eastern seaboard to alert Pop Pop that it is time.

 

Time his deprived grandsons had their very own rubber potty eraser sets.

 

Thank you, Pop Pop.

We love The Box.

So a Boy Walks Into a Shoe Store With His Mother ...

Gus gets a lot of press here. Most of it good. He is the sort of boy who likes attention. The sort of boy who sees a Dalmatian mascot at a local street festival and asks it to dance. 

 

Patrick gets considerably less coverage on Blabbermouse. That is his preference. He does not like me writing about him (or talking about him, or looking directly at him). Sometimes, I will forget myself and begin to gush about how handsome he looks in, say, a rugged 4T Henley and faded blue jeans, and he will slap me, like I’m a drunk talking crazy.

You think I jest.

Patrick would sincerely like me to get a hold of myself.

Gus would sincerely like me to buy him a pocket mirror.

Guess which kid is easier to shop for?

I took Gus to buy new shoes the other day. He’d worn out his Pumas and been begging me to buy him new sneakers all week. I came home from an 18 mile run, and he started in on me before I even got out of the shower CAN WE GO NOW? PLEASE? PLEASE? PLEASE? MOM, YOU SAID … REMEMBER YOU SAID? … MOM, MOM, MOM … PLEEEEEEEASE I KNOW EXACTLY THE ONES I WANT …

Fine.

“I’ll take you to get new shoes, but we need to be quick. You have a friend coming over.”

“I will! I will be so SO quick! I know exactly the kind of shoes I want.”

By this he means “the kind that go on your feet.” That is all he knows. The particulars he will work out later. Much  later. After he sees me lying down in the aisle of Academy Sports amidst boxes and boxes of size-one sneakers, with a cold compress on my head and a Saint Anthony prayer card clutched to my bosom. 

The boy tried on every single pair of sneakers in the store, with the exception of the chunky black leather basketball shoes that weigh about eleven pounds apiece (each shoe must weigh less than your leg; that is where I draw the line), and no pair he tried on was quiiiiite right. This one pinched. That one was too big. These ones were too uncool. "Plain boy shoes" "Farmer shoes." Etc. Etc.

I kept suggesting he try on regular running shoes and grabbed a pair of Nikes. They fit perfectly, of course, but the trouble was ... none of his friends would have HEARD of that kind of (crazy! weird!) brand. He needed something cool. And Sketchers are cool. Sketchers are what ALL the kids wear. Alec wears Sketchers. Darius wears Sketchers. Calvin wears Sketchers.

I hate Sketchers. I don't want to buy my kid Sketchers. I want to buy my son SHOES. Not a cheap amusement park for his feet.

So there I am watching Gus attempt to jam his toes into a pair of glow-in-the-dark, light up "SLIME" Sketchers and he looks up and sighs with exasperation. "Why are they all chimping my feet?"

BECAUSE THEY ARE JUNK. SKETCHERS ARE JUNK. 

By this he was deeply offended. 

"Mawm!" he said. "SKETCHERS. ARE NAWT. JUNK." And then he scampered off to try on a pair with a Ferris Wheel. 

I kept thinking about calling my friend Ashley, who is a therapist and has an outgoing message on her voicemail that says, “If you are having a mental health emergency, please hang up and dial …” YES! I AM HAVING ONE OF THOSE I THINK!

Sensing my frustration, Gus started to panic.

“I’m the worst,” he said. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

Naturally this made me feel awful. What kind of mother makes her son feel like he is "the worst" simply because it takes him elevendyberfuckedymillion hours awhile to pick out a pair of shoes? So I calmed myself down a bit. I assured him he is not the worst. That he’s just a typical kid, who wants cool shoes that feel good on his feet. LIKE THESE! I grabbed a pair of Adidas running shoes from the shelf and set them down in the aisle.

“If these fit you," I said. "Whether you love them or not, we are buying them and we are leaving this store.”

Gus paused for a second, closed his eyes, hand on the box of shoes, as if in prayer (which he later told me he was.). He tried them on. They fit. (Prayer works!) “GREAT! FABULOUS! PERFECT! LET’S GO!” I whisked him and the shoes to the cashier before he could change his mind.

I looked at my watch. We'd been trying on shoes for one hour and forty-eight minutes. 

You guys.

I can run a half marathon in one hour and forty-eight minutes and still have three minutes and 49 seconds to spare. 

Just enough time to buy a pair of shoes for Patrick.  

And then he buttoned his pants just a *smidge* below his nipples ...

I was in the bedroom getting dressed. Larry was in the adjoining bathroom, chuckling merrily. "These birds!" he said. "I love them. They're so cute!"

I went to the window to behold a fat robin on our deck, with a twig in its beak, which reminded me of a fact I'd learned the night before about bird feeders. Evidently sparrows (I think the person said sparrows, though I know one of you will correct me if I have it wrong) will eat their weight in mosquitos and are attracted to a certain kind of bright white bird feeder.

"I'm on it!" Larry enthused. "I'll pick one of those up this weekend."

He stepped out of the bathroom then, puffed out his chest, and said:

"You know you've reached a lame age when you can totally understand why someone would become a bird watcher."

As if the high powered binoculars he asked for for Christmas last year weren't the first clue.