Wednesday, April 27, 2016

Beyonce Knows My Name

So you guys. I’ve needed a few days to process all of my “Lemonade” news before blogging about it, thank you for giving me space and respecting my process.

“UM WHAT IS HAPPENING.” Basically, this is the gist of the emails and texts I’ve gotten since early Sunday morning. And one of them was an email from my boss (who is in his 50s but knew enough to refer to Beyonce as “The Queen.”) He proceeded to ask me what on earth all of the hub-bub was about after reading an apparently uninformative article on HuffPo, so I spent several minutes in his office giving him the scoop and I’m pretty sure he’s gonna give me a raise because I’m so impressive and spend my time wisely on important things.

BUT YOU GUYS. Can we just focus on the most important thing that has come out of Beyonce’s new visual album experience (what?): SHE USED MY NAME #ohmygodi’mfamous. Granted, it was in reference to someone who maybe or maybe not cheated with her husband. BUT STILL.

Which is why I love my friends.



Oh! Speaking of music, yesterday I was feeding RJC her dinner while Pandora played, and the Eagles song “Hotel California” came on. I was taking a video of her for our family and happened to be singing along.

“Welcome to the hotel California…..such a lonely place….such a lonely place.”

Which apparently aren’t the words? But I didn’t know that until I posted the video and then my cousin was like:

NK: “One of the many reasons I love you is how badly you fudge up song lyrics bc I too make up my own words! But hotel California is a lovely NOT lonely place.”
Me: “Oh my god I love you. While singing it I was like “not sure these are the right lyrics, whatever.”

Then later, I got this text from her:

NK: “We came out to grab a bite and walk in and hotel California came on…such a lonely place, I hope the food is good.”


Amazing. 

Anyway, lemonade for everyone! Happy Wednesday! 




Wednesday, April 20, 2016

Conversations from Cohabitation

Last night, CB turned to me while we were both playing Solitaire on our phones. Or, as we like to call it, spending quality time together after RJC goes to sleep.

Anyway. We then had this stimulating conversation:

CB: “You play Solitaire on your phone, right?”
Me, holding up my phone to show him: “Duh.”
CB: “Have you ever checked your stats on the leaderboard?”
Me: “Like, my time and how many moves it took me to win?”
CB: “No, no, where you rank with everyone else who plays, not your personal best.”
Me: “Oh. No, I didn’t know that was a thing.”
CB: “Yeah, when you win it gives you the option of clicking on the leaderboard and then shows you the various rankings.”
Me: “Well now I have to play and win so I can see.”
CB, showing me what it looks like on his phone: “See? Shows single draw, three-card draw…”
Me: “Wait, do you play single or three-card?”
CB: “Single.”
Me: “You’re totally cheating.”
CB, laughing: “How is that cheating?”
Me: “That’s not a challenge at all! You literally get the option of all of the cards! No, you have to do three-card. I’d never play with you.”
CB: “Um, it’s Solitaire, it’s kind of the point that you don’t play with anyone else.”
Me: “Whatever, you know what I mean.”

Silence while we both became cooler.

Me: “You don’t have the hints option on do you?”
CB, smiling: “Yeah.”
Me: “OH my god you’re the worst! That’s TOTALLY cheating!”
CB: “No, it’s never even been helpful, it always just tells me there are no more moves.”
Me: “You need to turn the hints off and play three-card. C’mon, step up your game.”

Silence.

CB: “This is so annoying.”
Me: “Three-card?”
CB: “Yeah.”
Me: “I told you. But it’s the only way to play.”

Silence.

Me: “God we’re cool.”

Silence.

Me: “We’re in charge of another person’s life.”
CB: “Shh, I’m trying to win and get on the leaderboard.”

***

This morning, RJC was “talking” while in her crib, yelling (play-yelling, not, like, neighbors-pounding-on-the-wall-yelling), singing, etc. She did this for 15 minutes while she could’ve been sleeping.

Me: “She’s so funny. She fights sleep for no reason, it’s like she can’t not talk.”
CB: “Yeah, every morning.”
Me: “Why is our daughter so crazy?”
CB: “Because she’s biologically half-you.”


Happy Wednesday! 

Friday, April 15, 2016

Friday Wrapup

Let's get to it!

***

First, the book of the week. This book is "Kafka On The Shore" by Haruki Murakami. If you've been paying attention, you've noticed that we like Murakami in this family. So check it out! I'm currently putting "The Snow Child" on hold, reading the biography of The Wright Brothers that CB finished, and CB is now reading "The Girl on the Train" so that we can talk about it, ohmygod.

***

YOU GUYS.

The Gym Sleeper has struck again. And this time, there's video. Because I have zero shame, just like The Gym Sleeper. Also, I find it necessary to text CB pictures throughout the week. But then yesterday, after laying there for 15 minutes while I worked out (and God knows how long prior to me getting there), he moved!

Enjoy.


Oh, also - last night, CB, his sister, and I all spent at least 10 solid minutes talking about this guy, and now they've decided I have to get to the bottom of it. The question now is how I go about it.

Show concern?

"Hey, are you alright? I noticed that you're sleeping at the gym."

Or be a rat who pretends to be concerned?

"Hey, person who works at the gym, I noticed a guy sleeping over on the mats - is he ok?"

Or continue to wonder and silently judge while snapping photographs?

I choose that option.

***

And now, the Video of the Week, courtesy of CB! Happy Friday!



Wednesday, April 13, 2016

Updates!

Ok, so I have two unsatisfactory updates for you:

First – the guy at the gym who sleeps? Still sleeping. Like, every day. I tried taking his picture yesterday but was too embarrassed because there were a lot of people around. Oddly, that didn’t shame him from sleeping/laying around at the gym.

Second – Our neighbors have been silent since I shut it down with my sharply worded letter more than a week ago. By “sharply worded,” I mean that I wrote “please” a lot. And then gave them ear plugs. It’s possible that they’ll bang when they want more gifts, but we’ll see. So far, so good. It’s been 10 days-ish and counting. Oh, and also, RJC hasn’t cried. So there’s that. Because she’s a dream child.

I told you that was unsatisfactory. But a lot of you have asked, so I wanted to give you an update! Also, my life has been a blur and CB and I haven’t even had more than five consecutive awake minutes alone together for the last several days, so I don’t even have conversations from cohabitation to share! Fail.

Mainly, our conversations these days are “Hey, could you change her diaper and I’m gonna hop in the shower?” or “Here’s her breakfast, bye! Love you!” or “Ok, goodnight!”

Not very exciting. But it’s where we’re at right now and we’re working on this whole “balance” and “spend more quality time together” thing. Which, as it turns out, is even more challenging with a baby than it was when it was just the two of us! Balance balance balance. I’m bad at it and I’m working on it. Standby.


Happy Wednesday! 

Friday, April 8, 2016

Friday Wrapup

Let's get to it!

***

This week's book is "To Conquer the Air" by James Tobin. This works in nicely with what CB is reading right now, David McCullough's biography on The Wright Brothers. So, this book review sounds right up his ally - yay air travel! (boo current air travel). Click here to check it out and then browse around for other non-air travel recommendations! (thanks, dad!)

***

YOU GUYS. Ok, so it's not news to anyone who has spent about three minutes on this blog that I get annoyed by random things. However, I'm going to make a guess that what I'm about to tell you will TOTALLY ANNOY YOU TOO.


What is that, you say? Oh nothing, just people working out at the gym. Wait, I'm sorry, no it's not. It's people NAPPING AT THE GYM. And so I took their picture because I was trying to shame them into getting up, which didn't work, surprisingly. So I put my towel (pictured above) as close to Sleeping Man #2, brought out my phone, took this picture, and then texted it to CB.



If you're using deductive reasoning skills, you'll deduce that CB knew what I was talking about because it's possible I've brought this up several times at dinner. BECAUSE I CANNOT DEAL. The guy in the grey hooded sweatshirt does this approximately twice a week. He uses workout equipment TO NAP ON. Yes, I'm yelling. 

But the guy next to him was new! Um, you guys, the mats aren't like in kindergarten, they're NOT FOR NAPPING (still yelling). 

So then I do something that maybe says more about my weird psyche than their extreme laziness - I'm compelled to work out harder. Why? I don't know, maybe to guilt them into feeling bad? But as my co-worker said (oh, um, it's possible I brought it up at work, too) "If they're the type of people who sleep at the gym out in the open like that, they're not the people who are going to feel guilty if you're working out really hard right next to them." 

Which makes sense. But I still can't stop. To the point that I think I maybe pulled a calf muscle? TOTALLY NORMAL. (yelling will commence.)

Anyway. Would this mildly irritate you, moderately irritate you, or extremely irritate you? Notice that I do not give you an option of not being irritated at all, because I cannot deal with that option. 

***

And now, the Video of the Week! Happy Friday, everyone! 






Friday, April 1, 2016

Friday Wrapup

Let's get to it!

***

This week's book is "The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August" by Claire North. Sounds pretty cool, like something I'd read when I FINALLY FINISH THE SNOW CHILD. You guys. Maybe I shouldn't have read the book just after reading "The Girl on the Train," because that book was pretty fast to get through and was a literal page-turner. Ok, not literal, since it was on my Kindle, but you get the gist. However, "The Snow Child" is.....not. It's not bad, don't get me wrong. But I feel like I could actually go take a nap in the snow, wake up, and only have read one more page. So we'll see.

But check out this week's book and browse around for other inspiration - CB and I have been blazing through our family book blog lists (CB more than me, since I go to bed after Jeopardy) and it's fun (if you're cool like us).

***

Speaking of being cool...J-Lo. I don't care, I don't want to hear it! If you don't like her, you're wrong. I mean...yeah, you're wrong. I've loved J-Lo since college and I've hung on for the ride during the "Gigli" years. It's 14 minutes long, but it's Friday, so enjoy. (totally worth it for the text to Leonardo DiCaprio ALONE. Oh my god, Boo Boo.)





***

Also speaking of cool: RJC's parents. We spent 15 minutes this morning Googling "Sesame Street Actors from the 1980s" because we were confused as to why Alan looked familiar, yet too young to have been on Sesame Street when we were watching as kids. But who on earth was running Mr. Hooper's grocery store during our formative years?

These are important questions. A similarly important question is when I look at CB and say "Can you believe we have a child? Like, we're in charge of a person and this is what we're doing with our time." Also, we know that RJC can't understand what's going on at "Sesame Street" quite yet, but she claps and smiles every time she hears the theme song, so we let it run for the 5 minutes it keeps her entertained. Which, apparently, is all it took for us to go into the Sesame Street rabbit hole.

***

And continuing on the cool streak, this week, CB came home to tell me that he couldn't download the boring podcast he listens to each week and so, he stalked looked up the woman who hosts on Twitter, tweeted her that he was having trouble and could she help?, and then was excited when she used his name in her Twitter response back to him about how she couldn't help, but thanks anyway. Like, you guys, he came home and told me about it, that's how excited he was.

SO, I hated to burst his bubble when I one-upped him in the cool person department on Wednesday, but it had to be done. I found out that Leah Remini's reality show, "It's All Relative," was not renewed for a third season. That show was with me during maternity leave and had us laughing all the time. We're oddly attached to them because we don't have actual lives of our own. SO, even though I never use Twitter, I decided to tween TLC and be like "I can't believe you didn't renew it, oh my god" (paraphrase). And then Leah Remini favorited my tweet.

So then I was like "CB, Leah Remini is my best friend" and he legit looked impressed when shown the tweet, and deflated, because he was no longer the cool Tweeter.

WE ARE IN CHARGE OF A CHILD.

***

And now the Video of the Week. This came on during my commute today and I hadn't heard this song in forever, but seemed fitting somehow. So here you go - happy Friday, happy April Fools (is that a thing?) and happy weekend!