Delude Yourself...amen

It seems that there's not enough craziness in the world, so PBS is showing a bit of it this week. The Mormon show is on and my wife is spewing expletives at the tv over a Shiner Bock. What a hoot! I don't see how anyone can believe that some kids uses a seer stone in a hat and comes up with this crap.....then says that Methopendence Missouri is the garden of eden....oh, crap - you'd have to be a half-wit to buy this garbage. Sheeesh....you'd think they'd lump this stuff into the Abraham, Jones, or Hubbard craziness category, but it seems to feed on itself, a snowball of paternalistic mass delusion. Someday, folks will look back on societies of our age, and sadly read about all of the silly stupid things people of our day were duped into doing because of some crazy beliefs. Will society ever get over this superstition.... crap?

The LW and I went over to our local Y and joined tonight. I was just kinda rolling along with it - you know - yeah yeah, this'll be ok. We got our cards and got set up for an orientation on the computerized trainer system. The joy of this place really hit me when we set CP down on the floor of the Child Watch room with the two wonderful ladies that run it. There was a room full of little kids there. CP was sucked into the whirlwind immediately and began playing and enjoying herself. We were able to walk out of the room and she was perfectly fine.

Leaving the room, I didn't really know what was happening...it was disorienting and I just started to laugh. CP was safely in someone else's hands and the LW and I had some free time. It was amazing. Free time....free of worrying that we're bugging our friends by having them watch her. Free...that she was away from us, but still easily within reach. It's the first time we've put her in someone's hands who is not family, but a paid professional. Free.

Beautiful Garden

Just went out in the garden to log things down and found this while perusing the AP headlines. How can anyone in their right minds think that TerraCycle packaging looks like a Scotts product. You'd have to be nearly blind and completely unable to read. Sad stuff......they can keep their damned miraclegrow...my garden will grow without it.

New Sounds

I'm sure there's some teeth grinding racket in the fundie camps over this man's story. I feel for him and his wife and it's exactly what the LW and I had planned for and planned on doing if faced with a worst case situation. I remember the lovely wife telling me that if she was incapacitated that I should save her so that we could have another chance at making another little person together or helping another little person who doesn't have anyone.

In other news, CP has started making word sounds. Three in the past two days. Yesterday was toes and today was light and....at lunch...hat. Soon she'll be throwing the LW's wordy logic right back at her like a handful of peas.

Weekend Away

I spent this past weekend helping out with a motorcycle race in order to get my "work points". Everyone has to work their club's respective race in order to qualify for placement at the end of the year. Since riders can't race their club's event, it doesn't make sense for racers not to work. It was a long drive (almost 5 hours - each way) to and from Prescott Valley. I found Prescott Valley to be eerily similar to that strange place we called home for a year, Canon City Colorado. Strange strip/frontage road layout with wierd turn/no turn lanes, chain smoking hillbilly women, etc....

I had fun working the race, but the rest of the time it was just cold. Cold while bored followed by sleeping in a tent while cold doesn't make for a stellar weekend. I got to work on some folks that were there and it really made my afternoon fun. I got the usual comments while people were on the massage table from the homophobic fox news/dittodummy fan club that seems to inhabit this sport, but other than that, it was good.

I thought that I was going to hold out and eat a pancake breakfast there with the gang this morning, but I just could'nt stand to be away from CP and the LW any longer. Snuggling CP at the door was enough to wash a weekend's worth of dust out of my eyes.

More Teeth?

CP's a bit cranky this morning and I think that she has more bottom teeth coming soon.

This past weekend was full of gardening stuff. 3 garden meetings, one steering committee meeting, and a great potluck. We had a good time and CP got to visit with everyone. Things are growing well all over and the newest gardeners are learning by doing - the best way. I'm a bit worn out with garden stuff this week and I feel like I need a break from all things garden.

Saturday morning we fell into a bit of livestock. 2 laying hens and a duck. We'd been planning on having hens for eggs and this deal was too good to pass up. We got the coop and some feed as part of the deal as well. "The girls" have been laying one egg a day each and it's been wonderful to watch them...well, be chickens. CP loves them! Yesterday Lemon (the duck) decided that he'd had enough of our hospitality and that he'd move along down the road. He evidently flew the coop and hasn't been back. He's a funny little thing and I hope that he comes back. One of the hens, Veronica (Lakenfelder), was quite attached to him. We look forward to having two more hens for eggs and that'll be it for us.

The LW has been getting out of the house this week and heading downtown on the bicycle to work. It's good to see her out and about although I worry about her in traffic with all of the bad drivers that inhabit this town. She rides on a main street that has wide bicycle lanes and really enjoys it. I told her yesterday that it is good to have her out of the house. When she's gone, it's just CP and me....and that's nice. I don't have to worry about CP bothering her while she's working and I'm doing chores. It all works out fine this way.....except for that whole mammary gland thing........

CP's first birthday is coming up fast. 5/4/6. I can't believe a year has passed already. It seems like a sleepy blur of crying, nursing, and sleep deprivation. Wouldn't trade it for anything though.

So sad to hear this morning about all of those folks that got shot yesterday. Parents and children left behind to find their way. What a senseless mess. Why don't the people that do this type stuff just save us all some trouble and use just one bullet to end their own misery? Why erase the future of people who are moving forward? I just heard a story on NPR about people praying about this and can't really understand that either. Pray to the supposedly omnipotent entity that allowed this to happen - that seems to me to be the height of foolishness and I don't know who to feel more sadness for - people who lost their loved ones from senseless violence or people who lose loved ones to a half life of supernatural servitude hoping for the promise of redemption of some variety or another.

It's a nutty world we live in....

Shangri La

This morning is chocolate chip cookies and Mark Knopfler on the wave radio. I didn' think the LW had the CD, but I found it misplaced in the book. Today was CP's first taste of the sugary chocolate goodness that is warm chocolate chip cookies contrasted by cold milk. I think that it's obvious from the picture that she absolutely loved it. She's been holding on for later naptimes these days. It's 11am and she just wound down for the morning.

this is all the heaven we've got
right here where we are
in our shangri-la

I've been trying to follow George's advice about planning and recording in the garden. It sure helps to know what's what, but also to tell where things were planted so I can guess about what the volunteer plants are. I really use it to know how late I can get away with planting various things....or maybe not.

Furrowed Brow

The furrowed brow is CP's latest trick. She's been employing it regularly of late, and I have no idea where she got that from. She's been exerting her will lately and is becoming quite the little person. Her sign for food is being used more and more, which has made things easy for the LW and I as our mind-reading skills only work on each other.

I got out and did some riding yesterday. As a friend put it, worshipping at the church of rotating mass. Pretty funny stuff. We put in about 20 miles, then I left the others to head home to the LW. I got home to find that the LW and CP had gone up the mountain to Molino Basin to try out the swanky backpack unit that Ma & Pa sent out recently. It was a big hit and everyone who saw them smiled. CP was evidently a vision of cuteness perched above her mom's head and was waving at everyone and everything. She started it when watching the Teletubbies (her favorite and just about only show).

Nights have been rough for the LW (and I) lately. CP's up and crying a good deal lately and she'll be standing up in bed when we go in to get her. The same, but different.

Blur

CP is all over recently. She doesn't want to crawl and will prompt you to pull her up by her hands so that she can walk with you. Funny little stinker. Tonight she and I went to the GABA meeting to see Ralph and Sherry talk about their cycling tour of Italy. It was great! We got to see some old faces and they were all smiles when CP rolled in the door.

The LW has been battling flats on the bike lately and can't seem to fix them. I think that I may slice an old tube and wrap the new one for an added layer of insurance against the little "goat's head" thorns that we have here.

I got out and took the little XR for a 27 mile spin yesterday morning. It was a fun ride and the terrain looked a good deal like Fantasy Island, the local MTB spot. It was great to get out of the house, even if I did suck up dust from the fast guys most of the time.