Anne Lamott says “coincidences are just God's way of working anonymously.” Well, baby's first birthday is Sunday, November 19th. The proposed sermon title for that day at my church? “Giving Thanks for Birth Pangs.”
In other news, this Sunday is Laity Sunday at my church — the laypeople are doing the entire service so our pastor can sit in a pew with his wife. And I get to preach the sermon. I'm both excited and terrified. I'm excitified!
Baby and Monstro have been to the ER twice in as many days. The first time because baby did a header out of his crib. No more keeping the crib rail down as I turn to dispose of a dirty diaper, no sir. And then today he did a major projectile vomit, which was something to watch for as a sign of further head-injury complications, so back to the ER we went. This time they had us out of there in 1.5 hours, much better than the three hours we spent last night. We'd hardly sat down when they called our name this time, and then when we went back to the waiting room to, uh, wait for a room, they called us within one minute. To mitigate the bitterness that immediately pervaded the atmosphere, I announced, “Don't be too jealous, we were here last night, too.” The laughter from the other wait-ers broke the tension.
The funny thing is, baby has been super healthy from pretty much Day One, knock wood, and then this weekend while baby and I were out of town for a wedding in Bethesda (Congratulations, Sean and Kristen!), he ran a 103.1 fever Friday night, then got hives on Sunday, and when we got home was when he fell out of his crib. Monstro missed most of the fun as he had to stay home, but I did keep him in the loop by calling him at 3 a.m. Saturday morning for the UMass urgent care line. No, I have not developed Munchausen's by Proxy. Though after reading this, if you'd like to pass a little sympathy for my baby my way, I wouldn't mind. Honest.
Does this guy give alcoholic homosexuals a bad name or what???
Remember how I posted a few posts ago how Rhythmball was featured on “The Amazing Race” and “I could not be more excited”? Yeah, well, last week I sent out 35 press releases, followed by 35 Rhythmball informational DVDs on Saturday, and had just been sitting back waiting when I got an e-mail yesterday from one of my targeted recipients. A recipient who writes for one of the most widely distributed print-media outlets in the whole nation. He watched the DVD and is “enthralled.” His word, not mine. So if y'all could please cross your fingers that he writes about us, I would appreciate it. And in return, I will invite every one of you to my Retiring-at-35 party. OK? OK.
Baby has learned how to clap, and has turned it into a fun communication game. He starts to clap, see, and then Monstro and I clap with him and say “yay!” until he stops clapping, and then we stop clapping. And then he starts again, and we resume the game. It's really fun.
And he's also been shrieking, which is not such fun, but I'm trying to look on the bright side.
So tonight, he cried and hollered and cried when we put him to bed. Monstro decided we should try to feed him, and he sucked down a pint of formula and then he was pretty happy. I put baby into pajamas, and, with the help of blankie and the red paper lanterns and Rascal the lamb, into bed.
He made intermittent happy-baby noises for about 20 minutes, and then I went into his nursery to turn off the lanterns. His feet were at the head of the crib and his head was in the middle. Hearing me enter, he turned his head sideways, gave me a slow, sleepy smile, and clapped.
Tai Chi Rhythmball was featured as the “Leisure Detour” on last night's season premeire of the Emmy-award winning reality show “The Amazing Race.” I could not be more excited!!!!
So I was just despairing that I have a pretty cool post on my other blog and nothing for this one. And then Monstro was talking to me and I was kind of ignoring him, watching the baby instead, when the baby stood unassisted for FOUR SECONDS! And then he grabbed on to the side of his baby pen and was very, very happy, and I told Monstro, “Baby just stood by himself for FOUR SECONDS!” and we both raced over and lifted the baby high over our heads in celebration. And I think that's good enough for today.
I have just finished writing a new play, ripped from the headlines… a two-person one-act that illustrates how people can overcome even the most overwhelming challenges, how people persevere through the hell that other people put them through, about triumphantly surviving the most daunting odds. It is called “Lindsay Lohan's Birkin” and is available for production.
Busy Phillips is going to be on “ER” this season as a medical intern who is also a “devout Christian.” Now, do you suppose this means she's going to treat others as she would like to be treated? Or will she just be there to refuse an abortion to someone and maybe refuse to treat a gay person? Talk amongst yourselves.