30th July 2010: My Lifeline With Sanity
On the odd occasion - you know, like 90% of the time - when things seem as if they're going from bad to worse, or from worse to desperate, it's good to know I've got friends who'll help get me through.
Take this week, for example. It wasn't enough that my Beloved was working out of town. Little Miss 13-month-old (aka The Destroyer) decided this was a good week to come down with Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease.
No, our ancestry does not include any cloven-hooved beasts. (Though I do have a devilish streak - does that count?)
Who thought of the name for this virus? What were they thinking? Were they thinking? It's bad enough that we have to quarantine The Destroyer for over a week. (Ye Gods!) But suddenly she's got an illness that, by the sounds of it, will result in her baa-ing or moo-ing like a farmyard animal.
Which is quite funny, actually, because this week she developed a serious interest in the different sounds animals make. So at least two hours of every quarantine day has involved her repeatedly thrusting a Hand-Foot-and-Mouth-saliva'd book at me so I could point to pictures and make animal noises.
I studied my butt off, all through high school and university and a post-graduate qualification - for what? So I could make cute animal noises a couple of hundred times a day, that's what!
Who says education is an investment for the future?!!
My saving grace this week has been the daily school drop-off and pick-up routine. I probably would've gone mad(der) if I hadn't been able to laugh about it with other mums who've been-there-done-that with the illnesses, quarantine nightmares and animal noises. These friends have been my lifeline with sanity. You know who you are, girls! Thanks a million!
Comment from our doctor-friend, Paul: There is a big difference between Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease and Foot and Mouth disease. (Oh?) You burn carcasses with Foot and Mouth. (Excellent. Thanks, Paul!)
11th July 2010: Tropical Paradise Holiday
So off we went. Our first tropical holiday in years. Our first ever as a family of four.
We coped with the 5am start. We mostly coped with the first six hours of our seven-and-a-half hour journey, thanks to drugs (for the baby, not us), an in-flight bassinette, and individual in-flight screens which Master Six loved.
Then the baby woke.
If you're a parent, imagine your child at their very worst. Then imagine holding them in your lap while they do it. For an hour, maybe more.
Okay, we won't talk about that.
Our destination was indeed a tropical paradise, with fancy-wancy five-star hotel and super-friendly staff. None of which made any difference when Baby decided she wouldn't sleep anywhere except her own cot back in Christchurch.
We soothed her. We ignored her. We tried feeding her up. We fed her so much she should've doubled her body weight. She should've slept like a… well, a baby.
She didn't. She woke every two hours, all night. EVERY night. For TEN NIGHTS. We ignored her some more. We decided the neighbours would kill her (or us). We ssshed her until we couldn't dredge up another bloody sssh.
Sleep deprivation is a horrible thing. It takes away the sparkle in your eyes, the glow in your skin and, ultimately, your will to live.
Master Six had a fantastic holiday. Why? Because, God knows how, he slept through our nightly hell, woke refreshed each morning and had a great time at Kids' Club.
Myself and my beloved? We paid somewhere in excess of $NZ6000 to lose the will to live. Then flew back without the luxury of baby bassinette. (It went to some tiny days-old scrap of baby who couldn't even roll, let alone create havoc.) We arrived home with bad necks, bad backs, bad moods and a baby who had decided life worked pretty well at two-hour intervals.
The moral of the story: just don't bother. Wait until your kids are five. Better still, make them save for their own damn holiday. In the interim, buy a bottle of non-duty-free, set up a deckchair in the lounge, and drink yourself silly so you don't feel the chill when you strip down to your swimwear.
Lyn's comment: I’m a grandmum now but a trip away with the grandkids... brought it all back to me! The joys of arriving at your destination smelling of vomit and covered with unmentionable sticky substances. The excitement of picking biscuit crumbs out of your hair. The scarf that looked so smart on departure thrown in the trash on arrival due to aforementioned sick and other sticky stuff. The driver grimly clinging to the steering wheel with a do that started out svelte but mysteriously escalated a la punk en route... You’re so right – wait until the baby’s five – or fifteen or maybe 35 before embarking on another holiday!
20th June 2010: The Lure of a Holiday
We could all do with a holiday; I know that. But I needed one urgently. I started obsessing about it. If I didn't get a holiday I'd… what? Throw tantrums? (already doing that) Go mad? (already there) Turn axe-murderess? (hmm, now, there's a thought…)
Would it be murder or a holiday? I took the holiday option and booked flights quickly, before my partner or bank manager could disagree. Hell, I didn't want to be responsible for any wayward axes.
Besides, I'd seen the magic words. CHEAP AIRFARES. I couldn't resist. It sounded too good to be true. Which - I know, I know - usually means it is… A minor detail I forgot in the heat of the moment.
(In my defence, it was the lure of the tropical holiday, with added enticements of Kids Club and babysitting services, that did it. I was desperate. You know I was. Remember my blog about our abortive Christmas camping holiday?...)
So I've learned a few lessons.
First Lesson: book a PACKAGE deal. Accommodation as well as flights. Cheap flights are great, but only if you have somewhere to stay when you get there.
Second Lesson: once you've paid for your holiday, expect an unexpected, unavoidable expense. A LARGE unexpected, unavoidable expense. That way you won't assume the cosmos hates you or it's karma for being an axe murderer in a past life or the government's conspiring to bankrupt you. You'll know it was just part of the plan.
Third Lesson: if you want a no-risk holiday, don't take one. The week you're due to leave there WILL be a nasty international plane crash, there WILL be a tsunami warning in your destination, and there WILL be a typhoid outbreak, too.
Fourth Lesson: if you really want a holiday that leaves you relaxed and rejuvenated, DON'T TAKE THE KIDS. Why? Read my next post to find out!
16th May 2010: Maggie's Easy-Peasy Recipes Launched!
I like my wine. Well, living in New Zealand as I do, it's almost a sin NOT to like my wine. Big, buttery chardonnays… crisp, tastebud-awakening savvies… thumping big reds… liquid nectar late-harvests… yum, yum, yum!!!
And with both my sister and my mother allergic to alcohol - yes! Imagine! - I count myself lucky on the wine front. Of course, thanks to pregnancy and breastfeeding, it's been quite a while since I've been able to enjoy any wine at all…
Which is why I've become a foodie instead. With food, there are no nasty hangovers, no telltale wine spills on the carpet, no OTT liquor store bills. Food is the new wine!
The great thing about food is that you get to enjoy the preparation and the final product. I know, I know, you hate cooking. But restaurant-delicious doesn't have to mean chef-difficult, nor does it have to mean mortgage-expensive. Truly. Let me prove it to you.
Over the next few weeks I'm going to share with you a few of my favourite easy-peasy recipes. I can't promise they'll appeal to everyone's palate every time, but I can promise they won't break the bank.
Click here for my first shared meal, and bon appetit!
***Questions/feedback/your own recipe to share? - flick me an e-mail!
22nd March 2010: Presidents and Assholes
We had some friends around for a friendly (read "hellish competitive") game of cards in the weekend, and I learned how to play Presidents and Assholes. (I have no idea how I missed learning it until now. I must have been very, very busy… writing, of course… )
Now, as soon as you hear the name you know it's gonna be a goodie. And boy, is it a goodie! (Mostly because I became the President in the very first round! And managed to retain that lofty position for so many rounds the rest of the table started muttering about beginner's luck gone mad.)
The gist of the game is that you're trying to get rid of your cards before everyone else. The complicating factor is that if you're the President (ie you won the last round) you get to offload your two worst cards to the Asshole at the start of the round, and the Asshole (who lost the last round) has to give you their two best cards. (Want more details? Google it and you'll find the full set of rules.)
Why do I mention all this? Well, Presidents and Assholes teaches several important life lessons which it never hurts to be reminded of:
1 It's handy to have an asshole in your life.
2 Once you're the President, life gets a lot easier - and if you get ousted it's usually through your own stupidity.
3 Never trust your right-hand man.
4 Never think of the game as a game - it's cut-throat, it's dog-eat-dog, and every player is in it to win.
5 So much in life is luck - but you can still completely screw things up even when you've got it good.
And to my card-shark buddies: when's the next challenge? Bring it on!
9th March 2010: Think You're In Control?
Think again. We all have days that remind us we're not Queen of the chessboard. Days when we feel like we've been backed into a corner, we're about to be taken off the board, and we don't know quite how it happened.
Take Wednesday, for example. My "post-the-Clendon-entry" day. I'm not likely to forget it any time soon. Here's how it went:
* 1.30am (Tuesday night) - got to bed after finishing the novel.
* 3.00am - woken by baby for a feed.
* 6.30am - woken by baby again. Gave up, got up. Sleep is optional, right?
* 8.30am - did the school run. No parking space. Gnashed teeth, grew horns. Still no parking space. Evicted tearful first-born from car to make own way into school. Guilty Mother syndrome.
* 9.30am - began formatting manuscript. Discovered weird paragraph spacing issue. Attempted to solve. Failed. E-mailed Clendon coordinator. Decided weird PS cute. Finished formatting.
* 11.00am - received e-mail from Clendon coordinator. Stop, she said. Go back to the start, she said. It must have this first little step, she said. Gnashed teeth, grew horns.
* 11.30am - reformatted entire manuscript. Baby in search-and-destroy mode.
* 12.30pm - began printing manuscript. Got to page eight (of 318). Out of toner. OUT OF FREAKING TONER????? Are you KIDDING me??????? Shook toner. Vigorously. Ditto printer. Gnashed teeth, grew horns. Still no toner. Braved midday heat and bought more blasted toner.
* 1.30pm - completed printing.
* 2.00pm - braved heatwave once more to buy packaging for manuscript.
* 2.45pm -collected first-born from school. Grumpy kids. Grumpy mother.
* 5.00pm - partner home. Hooray! Shot out in peak-hour traffic to courier. Lost mailing address. Gnashed teeth, grew horns. Miracle: found mailing address. Addressed package, sealed package. Discovered entry form OUTSIDE package. Decided I was OVER today. Gnashed teeth, grew horns, became screaming, wailing, hissy-fit monster. Beautiful, young, unruffled, disbelieving rep blinked at me, slapped packing slip on package, stuffed entry form inside. Oh. Right. Silly me.
Please tell me I'm not the only one to have days like this!
21st January 2010: Yummy Mummies Take A Hike...
I blame the camping. Before camping I was functional. BC I was coping with life. BC I was zen mother and loving it. (Okay, maybe not the zen bit.)
And now? Now it ain't pretty. Yummy Mummy? Hardly. Scrummy Mummy? Not at my place. Instead we have a Real Mummy scale, modelled on the richter scale with slightly less catastrophic results. And I can tell you right now that "scrummy" and "yummy" don't feature (except in the Mummy's-gorging-herself-on-food-again sense).
Here it is. The Real Mummy scale:
1 Dummy Mummy - Nappy brain has taken over. Thinking hurts. Serious thinking brings on anxiety attacks. Even a trip to the supermarket represents a threat to your (barely-firing) neurons.
2 Glummy Mummy - It's too late to shove the kid back in, demand a refund, or get an exchange card. This is your lot. Sleepless nights, sick on your shoulder, sex deprivation (worse, you're happy with that) and a life that doesn't feel like your own. Forever. You've got every damn right to feel sad. Wallow in it, Girlfriend.
3 Crummy Mummy - You've decided you suck as a mum. You're grumpy, you're tired, you still haven't worked out what your baby wants, the washing's been on the line since last Friday, and you haven't vacuumed in a month. It's baked beans for tea again, and don't you think you should get back to work and bring in some money?
4 Numb-y Mummy - It's been so long since you had a full night's sleep you've forgotten what it feels like. In fact, feeling is an optional extra that just doesn't fit into your life right now. You're so tired you can't even rouse the energy to cry.
5 Tummy Mummy - No matter how hard you try for the Yummy Mummy I'm- already-back-in-skinny-jeans image, you've got a spare tyre - no, a flat spare tyre - hanging off your waist. Liposuction sounds good, only it costs way too much and it won't shrink your saggy baggy skin. This isn't what you signed up for, this doesn't feel like your body, and you wish it would all just go away.
6 Rummy Mummy - Okay, so it ain't good for the quality of your breastmilk, but it sure helps calm the (frayed) nerves. It also helps you forget about your tummy (see 5 above) for a short time.
7 Hummy Mummy - It's official: things are really bad. Random tuneless humming indicates a) your brain-cells have completely broken down (what song are you humming, anyway?) and b) your sanity is in serious doubt. Maybe it's time to take a wee break. A week or two on a deserted beach with a good book, plenty of your favourite drink, and no hint of kids should do it.
Sound familiar?
11th January 2010: Hints For Campers With Kids...
1 DON'T be casual about departure time. Packing ALWAYS expands to take up all available time + twenty percent.
2 DON'T assume thick black clouds on horizon won't come your way. They will. Thick black clouds = rain. Rain = misery for five-year-old over-excited campers.
3 DON'T assume swiftly-moving thick black clouds will bypass campsite. They won't. They'll just arrive fast. Swiftly-moving thick black clouds = wind + rain. Wind + rain = bad news if erecting tent and minding over-excited five-year-old and fretful baby simultaneously.
4 DON'T take mobile phone with only one blip of battery left. It won't last the day, let alone the trip.
5 DON'T believe you'll survive without your mobile phone. You won't. You're addicted and needy, just like all those pesky Generation whatever-they-are's.
6 DON'T use five-year-old son's new Transformer mug as handy vessel to transport hot water in. So what if it's handy? It's a TRANSFORMER mug = magnet to son.
7 DON'T forget location of nearest cold water supply. IF son burns himself you need readily available cold water. Especially if it's your fault (see 6 above).
8 DON'T assume you'll sleep longer than 40 minutes in one stretch during night; not if you have six-month-old baby with you, anyway.
9 DON'T believe (even for a moment) that baby needs to adjust to your life. Forget articles and expert opinions. Baby doesn't need, or want, to go camping. Baby doesn't need, or want, to sleep in portacot or tent, to play on hard ground, to amuse herself, to enjoy outdoors or experience weather extremes. Baby doesn't enjoy sand or grass. Baby doesn't enjoy camping. Get it?
10 DON'T expect five-year-old son to eat anything cooked over camping stove. Five-year-old son doesn't like change. He doesn't like charred, or even mildly-blackened, potatoes or sausages. He doesn't like anything that looks different. He doesn't want to expand his food repertoire. He doesn't intend to be less fussy just because he's camping. Son would rather starve.
11 DON'T decide starvation is fitting punishment for son. Son disagrees. And soon, when son's blood-sugar levels get low enough, you will observe carnage and also disagree.
12 DON'T conclude camping is bad idea. Kids will look back on these days with fondness. You will recall sleep deprivation and hard work. Kids will recall endless summer days of trampolining, cycling and playing with friends, long evenings spent playing instead of sleeping, long nights feeling cosy in tent as wind whipped through trees outside.
Oh, the joys of camping!
31st December 2009: Maggie's Resolutions for 2010...
Okay, I know I've said it before, but this year I really need to tone up and trim down. Which means a) exercise and b) self-restraint. Oh God. Suddenly 2010's looking like one long, glaucomic tunnel of doom. I mean, hello. Exercise? When do I ever have time for that? And self-restraint? Can I even say it?
Well, 2010's going to be the year when I learn, right? I can get up at six a.m. and lurch through a workout. Anything will do. Jogging, swimming, circuit training - whatever. Just sign me up. And if my kids have woken me multiple times during the night with a typical repertoire of nightmares/questions-that-just-couldn't-wait/ missing-you's/hunger, I can go out at eight p.m. instead for said workout. And if I'm so dog-tired I can't manage that, either, I will stagger to bed and imagine said workout. Why? Well, apparently thinking is halfway to doing, so although it'll take longer for my body to see the benefits, it's a great fallback option.
Yeah, good plan, Maggie.
Besides, I'll be sure to make up the lost workout later in the week (probably) (maybe) (okay, that's a big fat lie and we both know it).
As for the self-restraint bit, well… that's more of a problem. Short of sewing my lips together I can't think of an easy solution. Me and food go together like fish and chips, wine and cheese, cars and big bills.
Ooh! Cunning plan! I'll use the old reverse psychology trick. Yeah. Perfect! So… my resolutions for 2010 will be to gain weight and get flabby. That should do it. I've never yet achieved a New Year's resolution.
Watch out, body beautiful, here I come!
5th December 2009: Brace yourself. It's the C-word...
Not cancer: Christmas. A word that conjures up such a range of emotions.
Emotion 1. Surprise. Is it that time already?
Emotion 2. Annoyance. The baubles and fake snow are cluttering shop windows, the piped music in lifts/malls/phone calls is Santa-themed, and the street decorations have appeared overnight. Do they really think we need reminding?
Emotion 3. Panic. We're in serious countdown, now. Have I organised presents? Bought Christmas Day's food-orgy fodder? Posted cards? Worked out logistics with in- and out-laws? Dusted off the decorations? Herded my kids into writing letters to Santa?
Emotion 4. Boredom. Blah blah. Do we really need to make all this effort again, and so soon?
Emotion 5. Anticipation. Christmas is a very special time of year if you've got kids to share it with. Mine can't wait! It's beginning to rub off on me, too. :
Emotion 6. Happiness. Am I not the most fortunate woman in the world? I have a great partner, awesome kids, and extended family who really enjoy together-time. We may not be the richest guys on the street, but we're warm, we've got food in our bellies, and we're surrounded by people who love us.
Yep, it's that time of year again. And I'm counting my many blessings. I'm a very lucky girl.
15th November 2009: What's with this word "lollipop"?
So call me naive, but I've only just realised it's also a nudge-nudge wink-wink tongue-in-cheek (hahaha) reference to... ahem... well, you know.
It's not that I'm delicate or easily offended or any of that. It's Grandma (hi, Grandma). She's forever checking this page because she reckons it's the only way she can keep tabs on me. She's probably right, too.
Which leaves me in a spot of bother. How to discuss this "lollipop" issue without offending her? As I see it, there aren't many options. I can either:
a) refer to lollipop's alternative definition by name, then worry myself silly over whether it might give Grandma a heart attack;
b) not refer to it at all, causing Grandma's blood pressure to peak as she conjures up half a dozen meanings, all of which are far worse than anything I was referring to; or
c) scrap the whole comment, in which case Grandma will read a boring and very inaccurate piece on floral arrangements, decide I've finally gone the same way as Great-Aunt Lucy, and ring the local sanitorium.
Not that I'm bothered by the sanitorium. Let's face it, I could do with a holiday.
Maybe Grandma could write GirlTalk while I'm away. Ooh! Now, there's an idea.
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