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I am brimming with excitement because after nearly ten years I am finally getting new glasses! I went to the eye doctor on Saturday and ordered new contacts, which I am also in dire need of since I had been in my last pair for way too long and they were all cruddy. I also picked out a cheap-ish pair of frames that will house new lenses that are actually my current prescription. And I promise not to fall asleep in them this time, since that was part of the downfall of my current pair, seen here in a rather bizarre picture of me eating birthday cake with my hands while dressed as Carrie at a Halloween party in an abandoned store in the South Side in 2000:

That’s just how I roll sometimes. Those glasses were something of a trademark of mine and I heard howls of protest from both the husband and our friend Jwan when I announced that they needed to be retired. But, the new glasses are very similar. Fear not.

I’m excited at the prospect of actually being able to wear glasses from time to time since my old ones were only good for seeing me from the bathroom to my bed without walking into walls.

I also had my massage on Saturday and I told the masseuse about my problems with sleeping weird and waking up immobile. When she initially ran her hand down the left side of my back, she said, “Ew.” She found and worked on nine knots and strongly suggested that I buy a new pillow. I repaid her good advice by drooling on her shoes through the face hole thingy.

The baby spent the night with my mom and the husband and I went to see Choke. It was only alright. Palahniuk’s novels are, I imagine, a tough thing to translate to the screen and Clark Gregg just didn’t…get it. Plus, there’s a lot of stuff going on in that book and he tried to fit all of it in and just present it as it is. It didn’t work.

Actually, the more I think about it, the more I hate it and really wish we had just waited until it was on DVD. We should have gone to see Blindness, but that’s another book that I love and if they fuck that up, too, I may go ballistic.

But to remedy that, the husband and I are going to see the premiere of Zack and Miri Make a Porno. Kevin Smith is doing a special screening at The Oaks and I’m really excited about this new movie.

To veer off into another direction in this already scattered post, I am very happy that the Steelers won but these late Sunday night games are totally messing up the one night that I have shows to watch. True Blood, Entourage, Californication, and Mad Men are all on Sundays and I missed all of them to watch the Steelers. I recorded them, of course, but I hate waiting. I need to know the latest on Betty and Don and I want to hear more about Joan and her fiance! God!

“The Husband.”

“Mmph?”

“Turn the light off.”

“What?”

“Turn the light off!”

“What light?”

“The light! Turn it off!”

“What?”

“Your lamp! Turn it off!”

“What lamp? What the hell are you talking about?”

“YOUR BEDSIDE LAMP! THE ONE THAT’S ON EVEN THOUGH IT’S THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT! TURN IT OFF!”

“*snore*”

“DUDE!”

“WHAT?!?!?”

“TURN. YOUR. LAMP. OFF.”

“YOU ARE SUCH A PAIN IN MY ASS!”

Or something along those lines. That was the argument that we had ’round about 3:30 or 4 a.m. The husband fell asleep with the light on and I woke up to help the baby to the bathroom and then had that infuriating exchange. What light? Give me a goddamned break. The light that is replacing the darkness that I should be seeing right now, you ass. God. It’s not like I asked him what newspapers he reads.

Anyway, I used to have this big old Toshiba laptop that I bought with some of my college graduation money. It turned out to be a bit of a lemon and a few years ago I brought it into work so that the computing people here could at least get it to function a little bit and I could get my pictures off of it. I put all of the pictures onto a bunch of zip discs. Yes, zip discs. I intended to take them home and transfer them to a functioning computer, but just never got around to it.

Yesterday, I was poking around in my office and came across both the discs and a zip drive. So I spent a little bit of time transferring them to my computer and uploading the pictures to flickr. They go back to 2003 and it’s really neat to see so many pictures of the baby being all little that I had totally forgotten about.

I have another big post in me about how looking back at these pictures has also been very upsetting, because in a lot of them I’m very thin. It’s been drudging up a lot of stuff that I really want to get off my chest, but I can’t do it right now.

Meh. In the meantime, my kid is cute as HELL.

We are jam PACKED this weekend. Tomorrow at noon, the baby is going to hang out with the husband at the record store while I go to the eye doctor, then after that I’m getting a massage! I’m in dire need, really. My neck and back have been totally messed up. Then we have a kid’s birthday party to go to and the baby is going to some Magic Tree House show with my mom.

30 days until I turn 30.

It really doesn’t occur to me to feel old until I mention that I’m turning 30 and someone suggests that I should feel old. I’m not insulted by it, per se, but isn’t that attitude a little…dated? Like if this were, say, Medieval Britain…sure. I would fully expect the, “Christ, you’re ancient. Watch out for that wave of plague!” treatment.

There’s a great scene from an episode of Roseanne, when Jackie and Roseanne had spent the day looking at a retirement community for their mom and were overwhelmed to say the least. Roseanne asked Jackie how old she felt. Jackie thought for a second before responding.

“Thirty-…Twelve on a good day. Eight most of the time.”

That’s pretty much where I’m at. I can’t possibly feel old because I’m so obviously a pre-teen.

Of course, I do start to feel weary when I think about the fact that, deep down, everyone feels the same and we’re out here just…doing shit and affecting people’s lives and messing everything up.

I wish I was old enough to drink.

We took the baby to the Regent Square Theatre last night to see the original 1954, Japanese Gojira, aka Godzilla. The baby loves Godzilla movies because there’s a big monster who smashes stuff, but the screening last night also served as a platform for Remembering Hiroshima.

It seems that many Americans are still surprised to learn that the original Godzilla was actually a very serious film and commentary on the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings during World War II, and on the neverending nature of the arms race and destroying The Enemy. In the film, there are two scientists: one who holds the key to destroying Godzilla, even though further H-bomb tests will simply create another monster somewhere else, and another who wants to study the creature and learn from it. Though how one would go about capturing a seemingly indestructible dinosaur and studying it, we don’t know.

Pthpthptthpthpth. I intended to go on here about the empty notion of triumphing over evil and how it’s still VERY relevant today(*cough*everywhere in the Iraq such as therefore *cough*) but frankly, I’m not up for it and I get the impression that the only audience for my philosophical rants are those two or three crickets that happily chirp away and the one or two of you who bother to say, “Nuh uh.”

Anyway, the baby obviously wasn’t that interested in the post-film discussion, but I think it’s good to at least give him the opportunity to hear these things.

If you aren’t already keeping a list of things that I demand that you check out, you should start one and add the following items to it: Bill Burr’s latest stand-up special, Why Do I Do This?, and Chris Rock’s latest special, Kill the Messenger. The husband and I often describe Burr as, “The red-haired, white guy on Chappelle’s Show who was one of the commentators on the Racial Draft.” We’ve actually seen him live a few times through those underselling, free-ticket deals through the Improv, which is cool because I think he might actually blow up a little bit fairly soon. Rock’s special isn’t as good as his earlier ones and seems to slack off into recycled material and generic “Let me tell you about the nature of black and white women,” schtick, seasoned, I would guess, with bitterness over his marital problems, but whatever. Dude is still hilarious.

Rest in peace, Paul Newman. I never really knew much about his acting until fairly recently. I have a hard time getting into movies from before I was alive. No real reason for that, really. I think it’s mostly a mental block, but I also think that the realism in acting had a long evolution, so a lot of earlier movies are too theatrical. Not that that’s necessarily a bad thing, I’m just not partial to it.

Anyway, the first time I really got Paul Newman was in Road to Perdition, which is an oft overlooked masterpiece. Newman was already pushing 80 by then, so playing the role of a weary mob boss who carries all of the disappointment of life on his shoulders wasn’t a great stretch. But Newman really knocked it out of the park.

In particular, there was this scene. By the way, if you haven’t seen this movie, here be spoilers. Newman’s character’s biological son is a despicable and traitorous human being while Tom Hanks’ character Sullivan, who he raised as his own and who is closer to him than his real son, is on the run from Newman’s minions. The family is slick with betrayal and what they did to Hanks’ character was wrong. Newman’s character, Rooney, knows this and knows that his adopted son must make things right.

On a very dark and rainy night, Sullivan waits in the shadows for Rooney as he departs a restaurant. It takes a few minutes for Rooney and his men to realize that something is wrong, but as soon as the first shots are fired, Rooney knows immediately who it is. Director Sam Mendes beautifully frames Rooney as the men fall around him and the pouring rain drenches him, spilling off of his hat and sloped shoulders. Rooney turns to face Sullivan. He looks at his boy, the one he should have protected, the one who now has to be on the run forever with his own son, and knows that this is right. “I’m glad it’s you,” he says, and Sullivan, fighting back tears, mows him down. When it’s over, he looks up to see illuminated windows and shocked spectators witnessing the act.

In other movie snob matters, the husband’s birthday was on Thursday and it unfortunately was kind of a bust. He had rather un-fun exams on that day and it was otherwise a typically annoying weekday. I couldn’t get it together to do something special for him, but hoped that the gifts that the baby and I gave him at least made up for it. We gave him Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass, Sade - Lovers Live, and the Criterion edition of the original Russian version of Solaris.

Last night, after the debates (ugh) were over and the baby was in bed, we put in Solaris. Now, Criterion is supposed to be on top of things. So why is the aspect ratio set up so that if you want to watch in widescreen and see the subtitles, you have to set it in subtitle zoom, which makes it all stretched out and wonky. There’s no 16:9 setting in which the subtitles are viewable, so we had to watch it in 4:3 with the letterbox. Grrraaarrrgggh! Unacceptable, Criterion.

Alright, I have to get moving. I’m in a book club! Look at me, all being sociable! Today we’re talking about The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, which I just finished reading last night and LOVED, even though I was initially irritated that it had a quote from Michiko Kakutani right on the front cover, but whatever. I guess when you get such accolades you show them off, right?

Started this post last night:

I’m avoiding doing my homework because, well, it’s homework and I don’t wanna. Also, I made some chili earlier and cut up some kind of hot pepper from our CSA box to put in it. As you’re probably aware, the oils from hot peppers stay on your hands for awhile and I was, uh, digitally adjusting…something in my nostril. Now that delicate membrane is all burny and, according to the internet, vegetable oil will cut that spiciness.

I’m actually being very academic this week. On Friday, I’m going to a lecture with Scot Brown about funk music from Dayton, OH.

Ahem. Where I was going with that is I went to a lecture by Steven Greenhouse yesterday evening. Greenhouse is the labor reporter for the NYT and wrote a book called The Big Squeeze: Tough Times for the American Worker. It was a very timely lecture, considering all that’s been going on in the past week.

I will state right now that I could probably be accused of a bias. My dad’s been a postal worker for forty years and has always been a union member. Unions are good, not just for blue collar workers but for all workers, and contrary to what I hear most people my age and younger saying, they are definitely still needed nowadays.

While I have gripes with my job, just like anyone, I realize that I am pretty lucky. I have guaranteed paid time off days, good insurance, excellent job security and it’s paying for me to get my master’s. But it’s really mind-boggling to think of myself as lucky. Aside from the possible exception of tuition benefits, time off and insurance should not fall under the category of luxuries. But they do for millions of Americans.

As Greenhouse spoke last night, he would expound on a point and would make projections about what he thought would need to happen in order for American workers, blue and white collar, to have more rights and not get screwed over so much, and then would apologize for moralizing. But it is a moral issue.

I am not an economist. I am fascinated by economics and took a few classes in college whenever I could, but I will be the first to own up to the fact that I will never fully understand how we keep this machine running. But I think on a very basic level we have people who want money and things and power and then there are people who just want to live a decent life and not get stepped on. And, yeah, I think there’s something severely messed up with the moral compasses of people who will stop at nothing to get more.

Greenhouse said that as preposterous as the Wall Street bailout sounds to those of us who will pay for it, he believed that it was necessary in order to avoid a tremendous collapse. I think he’s probably right. So I’ll hand over my share. But, I think we should be honest about what it is. It’s welfare. It’s cash assistance. And you know that I believe in welfare.

So now that the richest among us are receiving it with the full support of the government, I demand that no broke person be given shit for the pittance that they receive. The next time that I pay for groceries with an EBT card, don’t glance at my selections and judge my character. The next time that I go into the hospital and have a baby and use my Medicaid, don’t bitch about “paying for my mistakes.” Don’t get all indignant about your tax dollars and don’t gripe about the irresponsible behavior of “those people.” Because what we’re seeing on Wall Street is the ultimate in irresponsible behavior and it’s not just fucking with the lives of one person or one family, it’s fucking all of us. We’ll pay for it. We’ll fix it because that’s what we need to do. Now hopefully that minuscule percentage of your tax dollar that goes toward social services won’t seem so outrageous. Because it isn’t.

And now back to our regularly scheduled pictures of not-jizz and innuendo-laden homework.

In somewhat stark contrast to the picture below, in which my brand-new son and I clung to each other, skin on skin, I report to you that I spent a good portion of the evening bellowing, “DO. YOUR. HOME. WORK. NOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWW.” And throwing in a, “There will be no TV ever again and if you think I’m joking, just TRY IT!” for good measure.

Gah. Today was perfectly fine until we tried to drive home and got stuck in the most horrendous traffic ever. We didn’t actually get home until 7 and I was just going to make us some grilled cheese sammiches, because what’s better after a stressful fall day than grilled cheese? But, lo, there was no cheese.

In the midst of this meal angst, the baby was just being…I don’t know…purposefully and infuriatingly obtuse about his homework. I went to help him and read the directions aloud: “Read the words in the box…Come. Good. On. That….Uh.”

This post is part of the Mo’ Babies Shower Extravaganza. Catherine put a call out for posts reminiscing about the first days that people had with their babies as a gift for a few mamas who have new little ones getting ready to make their debut.

The first night that the baby and I were home from the hospital was probably one of the toughest nights of my life. I’d had a c-section and I was still in a lot of pain and somewhat immobile. The baby had slept for a long time in the days leading up to that and I vaguely hoped that we would have a smooth night as we adjusted to feedings and whatnot.

Nothing seemed to go right. He wouldn’t stay asleep no matter what we did. He was fussy and didn’t want to nurse. I thought my breasts might explode.

I can remember hobbling into our bedroom with him and plopping onto the bed. I finally sobbed and confessed to the husband (then the boyfriend) the thought that had been whispering in the back of my brain for nine months but that I was too ashamed to utter: “I don’t think I can do this.” I was sure that the night would never end, that I would never get any of the rest that I so desperately needed, and that I had made a grave mistake.

The husband looked at me and bluntly said, “You have to. You have to do this.” It wasn’t gentle and it didn’t necessarily make me feel any better. But I did it. I nursed him and soothed him and finally, as the sun was just starting to peek over the horizon, we fell asleep.

The husband woke me up hours later. My eyelids creaked open and I squinted at him through the pale sunlight. It was almost noon and he had to go to class. He asked me if I wanted him to put the baby in his crib. My brain was still scrambled from exhaustion and pain and I worked to interpret his question. “Baby? Crib. I was asleep.”

My eyes finally drifted from the husband’s face to the tiny boy curled up next to my chest. I think I forgot that he was real, that he was actually here with me and would be my son every morning when I woke up and every night when I fell asleep, forever. He was so small. He’d rejected his sleeper during the night and was dressed only in a diaper and an undershirt. His arms were only an inch or two around and his hospital bracelet worked to cling to him still until we relieved it of its duty. His hands were curled into fists the size of marbles and his chest rose and fell with his satisfied breaths.

“No, he’s okay,” I finally replied. The husband and I smiled at the baby. He finally headed to class. I pulled my child closer and went back to sleep.

*As a special bonus gift, I present to you the Pittsburghese pronunciation of “showers.”

Hi. I just got back from the doctor’s office and getting my breast ultrasounded. Everything is cool. I had to wait forever, but I really didn’t mind since I walked out of there relieved and I really can’t say the same for a few of the women that were also there.

I hopped on the bus back to work and after squeezing out of the crowded bus past a few Pitt students who were “from Philly” (read: King-of-Prussia, because if you’re from Philly, why do you look like you were just dropped into the middle of Baghdad when you’re only in Oakland?), I scrounged around my office for a little snack since I was starving. But since I had been at the hospital and on the bus, I didn’t want to just eat something without sanitizing my hands a little bit first.

Now, it’s no surprise to anyone that knows me that I’m a little immature and much of my humor is of the Beavis-and-Butthead variety. So, it’s really unfortunate that we use hand sanitizer that is “hand lotion formula.” What this means is that it has the same liquid consistency, but it’s a translucent white color. And it looks like…well, you tell me:

What’s really bad is that the cheap pumps on the hand sanitizer bottles tend to malfunction and squirt this substance on whatever or whoever is in its aim. Believe me. I’ve accidentally squirted this stuff on my shirt before and tried to hide both my snickering and my blushing, since I’m not sure anyone gets (or wants to get) what is so funny. This morning I got it all over the office couch which luckily has vinyl seats. It just looked rather gross when I wiped it up.

I’ve bitched about our neighbors before and, shockingly, I still hate them.

For whatever reason, they can’t get their act together enough and put their garbage out the night before, like you’re supposed to, or even early in the morning before the garbage truck comes. No. They wait until after the garbage truck does their half of the street and then they trot their crap across the street and put it with our garbage.

I really can not articulate how angry this makes me. It’s silly, I know, because garbage is garbage and whatever. I’m neighborly. But this is every week that they do this. And god knows what kind of shady shit they have in their garbage.

I think my rage stems from earlier this summer when they missed both garbage pickups and instead of just holding onto their garbage for a week, they put it on our curb anyway. Where it killed our grass and stank up the whole block because there was a bag of poopy diapers.

AND this week they have two bags of garbage in blue grocery store bags and let me tell you that this is a huge problem. The garbage men won’t take blue bags because those are the recycling bags and it is not recycling week. So help me, if I get home and those two bags are still sitting there I’m going to do something really immature.

Like, it’s not enough that these assholes forced me to listen to Creed for an hour one night and just generally seem like shitty people and don’t comfort their crying baby EVER. I have to be responsible for their trash??!?!?!?!?!? THIS IS SERIOUS DRAMAZ!