crooked house

Happy Birthday, Den!

It's my brother's 36th birthday today. As his friend Darren remarked on Facebook, he looks like Dionysus. Come to think of it, it's amazing how much he is like his namesake. While he ate his breakfast in bed, his three children (all under the age of 4), their mother Caro, and our mom performed a dance to Michael Jackson's Thriller. Seems like a perfect way to start the day.

That's me and Den on this day, a thousand years ago.

I don't know how it's possible that my once younger brother is now 36 while I'm still 29. Something's gone wonky with the space-time continuum. Must have been those Russians, trying to get to Mars...

Happy Halloween!

We interviewed a new babysitter today.

Just kidding.

Actually, that's our hairdresser, Diane. Also true: she woke up with a bad headache this morning.

Our H1N1 Flu Vaccination Experience

Registration at our local H1N1 flu vaccine clinic in Bridgewater, Nova Scotia started yesterday at 12:30 pm. They started giving shots at 1:00 pm. We got there at about 12:45 pm. This was the line in front of us. It snakes out of camera range and around the corner. The woman in red was pushing a stroller that held a two-year-old. Luckily, it was sunny and not too terribly cold.

This was the line behind us an hour or two later. We learned that some people had arrived that morning at 6:30 am. (The older couple directly behind us, not pictured here, were the parents of the head of public health for our region.)

 

This was the line behind us around 5 or 5:30 pm. You can see Luke trying to climb up on the wall there and David in his business suit looking at him. (He'd thought he'd get the shot and go back to work.) You can't see Grandpa pushing Sylvie's stroller, but they were there.

Sylvie had a bottle when we first got there and then again around 3. We fed her standing there in line, which was a bit awkward. We were able to go inside the building and change her diaper in a kind of storage closet. She'd had her own four month vaccinations the day before and so she slept a lot. Luke had eaten his snacks by about 1:30. We sent David and Luke to get Tim Horton's sandwiches and coffee around 4. I had to send David home for another bottle for Sylvie around 6. The people in the line were very patient if someone in a group left and came back. I even saw people hold spots for strangers who were alone.

In the above photo, Luke is standing in a playground -- there are swings and a slide behind me -- and it was packed with kids  all day. There was also a soccer field. Luke and David ran around it for at least two hours. Although there were lots of families there with babies and small children, most of them were in good spirits. I think the kids enjoyed the fresh air. Of course, by the time we got inside the clinic -- at 7:10 pm -- it was bedtime for most of them and they were getting extremely cranky by that point. There was lots of crying inside but miraculously, not from our two.

Inside the clinic, the scene looked like something out of a disaster movie. We had to wait to register and then view a film informing us of the pertinent facts about the vaccine. (The video was on repeat the whole day and you could hear the female narrator droning once you got close to the door). Then we had to wait again to get the vaccine. There were about fifteen people giving the shots to family groups behind cardboard screens. Unfortunately, the screens didn't really provide much privacy. I noticed a poor girl, maybe around ten years old, who cried hysterically and flinched violently every time the nurse tried to give her the needle. Her mother tried to hold her down but it looked to me as if they gave up in the end. She had two siblings who did get the needle -- so their seven-hour wait wasn't completely in vain. I spent most of my time trying to distract Luke from watching. He, David, and I had gotten our seasonal flu shots from our family doctor the day before (she didn't have the H1N1) and he had gone to bed crying about having to get another shot the next day. But he did remarkably well -- no tears at all.

After Grandpa, David, Luke and I had all gotten our shots (we adults had gotten them to protect Sylvie, who's only twenty weeks old and so can't be vaccinated), we had to wait fifteen minutes to make sure we didn't have any reactions. We left the building at 8:30 pm. I took Sylvie home and put her to bed, two and a half hours late. David had to take Luke to a store to buy him a Hot Wheels toy I'd promised he could get after the shot, even though it was so late. The child would not hear of waiting until today and frankly, none of us could blame him. He finally got to bed at 10:30, three hours late.

Luke and I have sore arms today. He seems fine. I am exhausted. But happy that we all got the shots.

 

Many, many children passed the time happily ripping plants out of the planters and "planting" them in the sand on the playground. It became a kind of fad. This is one such "garden" around 6 pm. I guess their parents were too tired to make a fuss about it. Or maybe their eyes were too glazed over to even notice.

Possible Halloween Costume Change for Sylvie: Baby Princess, Baby Beauty Contestant Or...

So last year on Halloween Luke went as a prince, I went as a princess, and David went as the dragon I needed to be rescued from. Luke and I decided today, on the spur of the moment, that Sylvie could take my place this year:

 

 

 

 

Disturbing, isn't it? Her father is not amused  -- he thinks she looks more like a contestant in one of those baby beauty pageants than a princess. I told him she would need some blue eyeshadow, a pair of false eyelashes, and a little lipstick before we could enter her in one of those. Right after the last photo was taken, she promptly threw up all over her dress. So maybe she could go as a girl from the Midwest, right after her prom.

Take A Look: A Selfish Giant Armchair, Sequels to Books Whose Authors Are Dead, The Insides of Security Envelopes, And The Dullest Horror Movies Ever

Oscar Wilde's "The Selfish Giant" in the form of an armchair by artist Hannah Wilmot. Via.

Laurie Halse Anderson on how to write a picture book. Via.

Dracula, Winnie-the-Pooh, and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy all get new sequels by someone other than their (dead) original authors. I'm curious, at least about Return to the Hundred Acre Wood and And Another Thing..., but have not yet read anything like this that actually worked.

Pictorial Webster's: A Visual Dictionary of Curiosities (via) looks gorgeous. Bookmaker John M. Carrera restored engravings from 19th century Webster's dictionaries and compiled them in this book. Stamps and wall cards are available, too. It's like a professional version of one of William Davies King's odd hobbies. King, whose Collections of Nothing I read last weekend, has a number of collections of the kinds of things most people would throw out -- one of them is a notebook full of images like these that he cut out of second-hand dictionaries. He also has a collection of the beautiful insides of security envelopes. My only complaint about the book was that I wanted more pictures. And if not pictures, then the address of a website featuring some of his collections.

Speaking of the insides of security envelopes, Design Sponge has a great tutorial about how to turn those envelopes inside out.

I just added The Man Who Lost His Head, to our Christmas wishlist, thanks to Betsy. And Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America, thanks to CAAF. It sounds intriguing, despite the fact that the construction of that subtitle sounds like something FakeAPStylebook might mandate: " 'How the Relentless Promotion of ... Has Undermined America' is a little-used and useful subtitle."

And this morning's twitter fun? Dullest Horror Movies Ever. "Children with Corns," "The Exersaucer," "Benign Cyst," "The Potatoes Have Eyes," "The Curds," "Accountant on Elm Street," "A Lien," and "Resident Card" are some of mine. But my very favourite is fredricktoo's "The Blog."

Baby On Board Update and A Roast Turkey Baby Costume

My mother emailed to tell me I am wrong about the purpose of the Baby on Board sign:

The sign is not just for the safety of the baby.  It's to let the other drivers know that they should keep their distance because there is an exhausted, crazy parent in front of them who may be driving with one hand and trying to insert a soother into the mouth of a howling baby.  Or there may be a parent wildly driving off the side of the road suddenly because the baby just projectile-vomited all over the back seat and rear window and is now howling and choking.  Or there was a sudden explosion of poop and all the passengers in the car are gagging and gasping - especially the crazed parent driver.  So you see, the sign is not for the benefit of the baby but for all those other drivers that must be prepared for the baby on board car suddenly driving erratically or slamming on the brakes.  It's a heads up - give the poor slob parent of the baby a break - the parent is sleep deprived, exhausted, frustrated and trying to do ten things including driving all at the same time!

Oh. In the comments, mbandy echoed my mom's sentiments exactly. And, on a more serious note, Steph Burgis remarked that in the UK the police and fire services recommend that people put them on their cars so they'll know to look for a baby if there's an accident. Makes sense.

In today's news, I am trying (and mainly failing) to start a new diet and exercise program. It's startling how much this affects my mental stability -- I'd remembered that it would be physically demanding but I'd forgotten how psychologically difficult it is as first. I'm ready to kill myself or someone else. And then eat him. Which is perhaps why I found this roast turkey baby costume (via Sara O'Leary) so disturbing.

 

If you want to make one for yourself, the directions are on the Martha Stewart site. Martha's really into Halloween. Perhaps she'll go as the drug-addled babysitter of urban lore and serve this little guy up at her next Halloween dinner party.

Japanese Noodle Waterslide

This is crazy! Of course, Luke took one look and now he's desperate to get this for Christmas.  Via Ohdeedoh, it's a noodle waterslide:

Somen is a refreshing Japanese wheat noodle, traditionally eaten in the summer to cool off from Japan's humid summers. They're most famous for being eaten as "nagashimen," noodles flying down a bamboo pipe as would-be eaters try to catch them with their chopsticks. It's a ton of fun, but feeling sorry for those who don't happen to live in rural Japan, Bandai has brought the fun of nagashimen to the home, with the Home Somen Shop.

Baby On Board

Here is how becoming a parent changes you: before I had a baby, I thought those "Baby On Board" signs were ludicrous. "Yeah, okay," I'd say whenever I saw one. "Sure. If this car suddenly careers completely out of my control, I won't hit you. Even though I won't have any control over the car, I'll be certain not to hit you. Because, you know, you've got a baby in that car. And babies are clearly more important than other human beings. And therefore I'll be able to magically avoid hitting your car."

Shortly after Luke was born, my mother bought one of those signs for our car. And, although I felt silly about it, I let her put it in the back window. Partly out of superstition, but partly because I had begun to think that in some cases, it might actually help. Say the car behind you on the highway suddenly careers wildly out of control, yes, but say the driver of that car has a split second in which to decide to whether to swing the wheel wildly in the direction of your car, the one containing a baby in the backseat, or in the direction of some other car with no one in the backseat, or some elderly person with a terminal disease who has already lived a long and full life in the backseat, or even, say, in the direction of the cement divider in the middle of the road. Or something. Just, say. In those cases, such a sign might actually be helpful. You never know. And so you find yourself rationalizing attempts to control the uncontrollable. Because what appears uncontrollable might actually be somewhat controllable or slightly controllable or even a teensy tiny smidge controllable. This is what it means to be a parent. 

Now, having said that, I realize I haven't addressed the notion that a baby's life is clearly more important than some other, older human being's life. To a parent, that seems self-evident, at least until you start asking Sophie's Choice type questions about the baby's siblings and then don't be surprised when said parent curls up on the floor in the fetal position and starts keening pitifully. Still, I do understand that all human life is valuable. Which is why I have contemplated producing other versions of those "Baby on Board" signs such as "Senior Citizen On Board. I've Made It This Far. Please Don't Kill Me Now." Or "Middle-Aged Person On Board. I'm Not Finished Paying Off the Mortgage." Or even "Adolescent On Board. I Know You Want to Kill Me But It's Against the Law."

Babies in Literature Series: Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall

The Darmstadt Madonna by Hans Holbein, whose paintings are mentioned in Wolf Hall.

Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall traces the career of Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII's closest advisor for a time. The book is written in the close third person, and we are led to assume that Cromwell  is about as pleased with the birth of a girl child to Queen Anne as was Henry himself. Which is to say, not very. There are two descriptions of the infant Elizabeth that are amusing. Here is Cromwell's first view of her:

The princess, unswaddled, had been placed on cushions at Anne's feet: an ugly, purple, grizzling knot of womankind, with an upstanding ruff of pale hair and a habit of kicking up her gown as if to display her most unfortunate feature. It seems stories have been put about that Anne's child was born with teeth, has six fingers on each hand, and is furred all over like a monkey, so her father has shown her off naked to the ambassadors, and her mother is keeping her on display in the hope of countering the rumours. The king has chosen Hatfield for her seat, and Anne says, 'It seems to me waste might be saved, and the proper order of things asserted, if Spanish Mary's household were broken up and she were to become a member of the household of the princess Elizabeth my daughter.'

   'In the capacity of ...?' The child is quiet; only, he notes, because she has crammed a fist into her maw and is cannibalising herself.

   'In the capacity of my daughter's servant. What else should she be? There can be no pretence at equality. Mary is a bastard.'

   The brief respite is over; the princess sets up a screech that would bring out the dead. Anne's glance slides away sideways, and a sideways grin of infatuation takes over her whole face, and she leans down towards her daughter, but at once women swoop, flapping and bustling; the screaming creature is picked up, wrapped up, swept away, and the queen's eyes follow pitifully as the fruit of her womb exits, in procession. He says gently, 'I think she was hungry.'

You'll have to read the book for the other description. And you'll want to -- it is excellent. My only quibble is that, at 650 pages, it isn't quite long enough. I was willing to follow Cromwell to his death. If you need more convincing, check out Levi Stahl's terrific review.

How-To: Homemade Spider Hat Halloween Costume for Babies

 

Here is Sylvie in her baby spider hat. It's a definite improvement on our first attempt at a spider hat for her and it was really easy to make. All you need is a black baby hat (although I had to dye one of ours as we do not live in Urban Babies Wear Black country), four pairs of black toddler socks, some stuffing, sixteen black elastic bands, eight safety pins, and a pair of googly eyes (we used two of the ones that came with our copy of the Googly Eyes book). You simply stuff each sock and tie it shut with an elastic band. You then use a second elastic band to tie the sock again at the halfway point, in order to make the leg look segmented. Next, attach each of the socks to the hat with a safety pin -- or if you want to be fancy you can stitch it on with black thread or even self-adhesive velcro. Stick on two googly eyes and you're done. (I thought of adding two white felt fangs just above Sylvie's forehead and wrapping her in a lacey white blanket so it'd look like the baby was the spider's prey, all tangled up in its web and about to be devoured, but I ran out of time and the inclination. You may feel more inspired.)

In case you're wondering, those are Trumpette ballet socks she's wearing. They get a lot of compliments.