Last night we went out to dinner with an old college friend and his partner (Yes! We had a grown up dinner out! With another couple! But that’s not actually the point of this post!). We spent half of the evening talking about their wedding plans, and the other half engaged in political debate. Poor M was highly outnumbered…

But somehow I mentioned my blog, and it turns out that our friend’s partner (who I’ll call Groom, after his blog) has his own blog too. And quickly we launched into frantic discussion over our blogs, our great commenters, the most bizarre Google searches, and who else we know who blogs. And M and old college friend rolled eyes and discussed how horrible they think they come out sounding on our blogs.

So of course I ran home last night and checked out the blog, and it was just like talking with him! Except I wasn’t! So go check out Groomzilla if you have a moment, he’ll make you laugh!

Tomorrow we leave for a week down the shore on vacation. The first of two beach vacations this summer. And I have not even started packing. I have not even thought about packing. I have no idea what I am packing. And what am I doing instead of packing for my trip? Packing winter coats and boots into boxes. Because, you know, my house isn’t selling because the closets have, gasp, coats in them.

I suppose today I need to think about packing. Oh, and grocery shopping, because God forbid we discover that the grocery store local to our destination does not have the right brand of yogurt or mac and cheese. And I guess I should start in on the mountain of laundry too. Going on vacation seems like a lot more work than it used to be back in the day when it involved fruity drinks delivered to a beach chair…

I believe M is bringing the wireless modem, so you may see me sporadically this week. But that assumes that the card actually makes it from the in-laws apartment to my car, which requires an awful lot of transfers in and out of briefcases. And I suppose there is a chance that some idiot doesn’t have their network secured. One summer M actually drove around Nantucket until he found an unsecured network so he could log into the office…fun times, fun times.

Anyway, if you don’t hear from me, have a lovely week, and if it rains, you’ll hear me wailing in the distance.

Has everyone who is interested in participating in the book club this month started reading? Does anyone need more time because of library loan issues, etc? If so, let me know, otherwise, get ready for June 19! I think I’ll just set up a post and we can go comment happy, unless someone has a better idea on how to work the logistics of it all…

So apropos of nothing, my phone, which rarely rings during the day and NEVER rings past 6pm unless it is my father calling, has rung five times since 7 pm. And none of the phone calls were from the RNC! The first call was my father, which was unexpected since I had just seen him over the weekend and it is rare that I hear from him twice in such a short period of time. But then I got phone calls from friends! Real people! Calling me at 8 and 9 pm at night asking me to do things! Not that I was able to do any of them, as M is out of town and really, if I’m going to leave my house after 6pm I need to psych myself up for days, but it is the thought that counts, right? I will go to bed happy knowing that I could have had plans not involving my children every night this week. These are the things dreams are made of…

Yesterday as we were driving home from school, I broke the news to the kids that their favorite person in the world, the babysitter, would no longer be a weekly angel appearing on our doorstep. After reassuring C that it wasn’t because she didn’t like him anymore, but because we needed to save some money to help pay for the new house, he grew silent for a minute. Then-

C: “Mommy? Next time I go to the bank with my piggy I will save the money and give it to you and daddy to pay for the house instead of buying a Thomas train.”

Mommy (trying hard not to cry): “Oh, sweetie, you don’t have to do that. Mommy and Daddy can afford the house without your Thomas money. We just need to be more thoughtful about how we spend for a while.”

C: “No, really, I want to help pay for the house. But there isn’t much money in my piggy right now because Daddy and I just went to the bank. (pause, then rather sadly) Should we return Thomas? I’ve already played with him though…”

Mommy: “Oh, C. No. Thomas is all yours. And really, your piggy money is yours. We’re fine without it.”

C: “Well, OK. But since we bought the new house so I could have a bigger room that doesn’t bounce, I feel like I should help pay for it…”

I feel like I’ve done something right and wrong all at the same time.

I took A into the ped’s office this morning, and we were seen by a colleague of our regular doctor who I have seen a few times with C, but obviously doesn’t know my children at all. As she watched A climb up and around all the furniture in the room, sing her three different versions of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, and demonstrate her jumping prowess, the pediatrician asked “And you brought her in why?” I explained about the blood dripping out of A’s tushie, and the explosive diarrhea as we traveled down the eastern seaboard. She examined A dubiously, and found nothing to be wrong. Which I could have told you would happen, because my children are never actually sick when I take them to the pediatrician’s. But I always feel obligated to take them as the one time I didn’t take them in it turned out several days later that they had double pneumonia.

So we were sent on our way with poop collecting vials, and I was instructed to scoop the poop only if more blood appeared in her next stool. So I waited, and waited, and waited some more. I gave her juice, and fruit. Still no poop. Finally she deposited a miniscule amount into the potty, and I had the joy of trying to determine whether it was blood tinged or not. I finally went with not, but am awaiting another poop of regular proportions to pronounce her blood free.

So, thank you all for your concern and well wishes, but at the moment it looks like one of those things, and yet again I feel like a stupid over-reacting mommy for bringing my child in when in fact she was not sick. But there was blood! In her poop! I swear! I think that’s worthy of a visit, don’t you?

We finally made it home yesterday (or should I say the kids and I made it home, M winged his way off to yet another conference/meeting/presentation/insert boring business reason for traveling here. And I believe I might have set a record for number of potty/diaper breaks between Boston and New York. Between C, who needed to poop but does not poop in potties other than his own, and A, who developed a sudden and horrific case of diarrhea, I think we hit every rest area, gas station, and fast food joint along the Pike and Merritt Parkway.

I will have to post about the wedding later, but in short, it was lovely, and M and I have never felt so old. The dress worked out well, once I spent another $30 on a sweater since the temperature plummeted 30 degrees after I packed my bag. And I didn’t even spill anything on it! But we returned home to a house that still hasn’t sold, and then last night A started dripping blood out of her tushie. So while I had all good intentions of writing many fabuo entries last night, I instead spent the evening consulting with doctors via phone and trying to estimate exactly how much blood was being lost and where it was coming from.

So yet again, my good intentions to be a productive member of the blogsphere were foiled by the randomness of life. So sorry, perhaps tonight will be a little less eventful and you can hear all about how I was tackled from behind by my old field hockey coach and M realized that small town life was all that he didn’t want out of life. Right now I’m counting the hours until our pediatrician’s office opens so I can be reassured that really, all children drip blood out of their tushies at one point or another.

We’re off on a whirlwind trip to Nana’s for the wedding of my sister’s best friend, who spent so much time at here house I call her my “other” sister. I even purchased a new dress for the occasion. With a gift card so as not to break the fragile J-E piggy bank….

The kids will not be attending the wedding, so my dad and my step-mom will be watching the kids at Nana’s. Which led to an interesting conversation with C about family relationships. When I told him that Grandpa J would be coming to Nana’s, he started freaking out because Grandpa J didn’t know Nana. Why that was an issue, I was a little unclear, but I stupidly launched into an explanation of how Nana and Grandpa J were mommy’s real mommy and daddy, and that they used to both live at the farm. That led to a long awkward pause, during which I frantically searched my mind for ways to calm C if he put two and two together and asked if his daddy was ever going to leave. But thankfully his mind didn’t head that direction and he just seemed pleased to know that Grandpa J would know how to find the bathrooms and bedrooms.

Anyway, no real point to that story except to say I probably won’t be around much this weekend but will be able to regal you all with tales of a long, long drive back home with two children by myself as M is flying out to a conference from the wedding on Sunday. Yeah! Can you see the happiness in my face as I contemplate several hours of sibling bickering and Laurie Berkner? Perhaps this will be the drive during which I convince the kids that the car is a no crying zone…

Head over to Unity ’08. It’s an intriguing concept. Their blog has already been bogged down by partisan debate and political rants, but the actual concept of the coalition has some merit. I wouldn’t put money on how far off the ground this will get, but I’m planning on following them for a while to see how it all pans out. Even if it is only to keep the political scientist in me engaged in some fashion while chasing two kiddos around the town pool.