In Which We Have More Of The Same

It was another lively day of moping around on the couch for everyone's favorite Connorbot.  His cough seems to be getting worse-- he threw up several times today because he coughed so hard he gagged-- and he spent most of his time asleep yet again.  His fever is doing one of those "now you see me, now you don't" acts, and I'm not finding it particularly amusing.

I did have some company today though, as our pastor stopped by to say hello, which was lovely for me and probably not so great for her, as I spent basically the entire time she was here whining about how hard my life is right now.  But she was very gracious even though I made her late to pick up her kids, and not only was she fantastic company but she even brought me chocolate, which was much appreciated.  I was running low enough that I'd started eyeing the candy bars Eden got for her birthday from a friend, which she keeps in the pantry out of a misplaced sense of trust that I won't go insane from lack of chocolate and eat them all.  You'd think she'd know me better than that by now.

My parents also watched the kids for a couple of hours while I went to choir practice tonight, which was also very nice.  It was basically the first time I'd left the house to do anything except take Eden to school and buy more Tylenol since Saturday, so I was really ready for a change of scenery.  I felt a bit guilty leaving the house with the little guy feeling so punky, but I really needed the break.

The PA at Connor's doctor's office did call with some good news in the late afternoon; Connor's chest x-ray came back normal.  Hopefully that means that this is just some sort of especially nasty bug and not aspiration pneumonia.  They want me to bring him in tomorrow morning for another x-ray if his cough continues to get worse overnight though; hopefully it won't be necessary.

Feel better soon, kiddo!

~Jess

In Which We Play Some More And Connor Doesn't Sleep

Today we drove down to the farmer's market in Olympia for some shopping and sightseeing.  Connor's favorite market regular band was playing, so he was pretty excited about that!  The baby seemed to enjoy the music too; he cracked up whenever the flute started in.  It's always nice to start appreciating good music early, right?

And that's about all I've got; Connor stayed up until two in the morning last night, and tonight he seems to be sleeping in ten minute intervals.  So my brain is fried!  Good thing I've got a lot of caffeinated tea, right?  Luckily his night nurse is back tomorrow, so I won't have another late night.  I don't want our adventures cut short because I keep falling asleep!

~Jess

In Which Connor Sees A Musical Big Top

Connor had a fantastic time at the symphony today! 

He seemed to be feeling much better today, so I decided it would be okay join our friends there.  The program was circus themed, and there were a lot of sing-along songs.  It actually had a bit of sign language included, which was nice for us!  Connor danced and clapped through most of the show, and it was just long enough to hold his attention without him getting antsy.  He got pretty excited and started signing "Daddy!" when the tuba came out on stage; he knew that's the instrument Jer played in college.  It was pretty cute.  It's definitely something I'd take him to again.

After the show was over we spent a little bit of time in the Soundbridge building, where they have a variety of instruments for kids to explore.  Connor tried out a tambourine and felt the vibration on the strings of a bass, but we ended up heading outside pretty quickly because the sound of twenty toddlers pounding on instruments in a relatively small space was a bit much for him. 

After that we all took a nice walk down to Pike Place Market for some lunch.  The staff at the restaurant we ate at were pretty taken with the kids, and they all ended up with balloons.  Loki tried to eat Connor's the moment we walked in the door, so it's been sequestered away in his room, where the cats aren't allowed.  Connor fell asleep in the car on the way home; I guess all the activity wore him out! 

~Jess

In Which Connor Has Some New Shoes

Connor got his new ankle-foot orthotics today!  They're pretty spiffy looking and with their blue, green and black mottled foam and their bright orange straps they coordinate pretty well with his hearing aids.  I need to get him some new socks that come up higher on his legs as the AFOs are mid-calf height, but otherwise they're ready to use.

He won't be wearing them all day for a little while yet; they'd like us to break him in slowly on them.  So he'll be wearing them during his home standing time and for his stretching until Thursday when we can get some more specific instructions from his physical therapist about exactly how she'd like his wearing schedule to run.  He seemed pretty excited about them today; he was actually up in his stander a little over the time he normally is while he watched his "hat music" again today because he wasn't protesting at all.  I think they give him a nice sense of stability that he's probably been missing.

We'll try the walker again with them on in a few days and see if they help with that too.

While he's otherwise in excellent health, the little guy's eczema is acting up in a big way right now.  The outside and inside of his right ear, a strip on his neck, and a bit of the skin around his temple all look like they've been burned as they are bright red and the skin is peeling off.  I'm going to try and get him into the doctor soon to get something to help with the rash and to make sure that it isn't something else.  Lotion doesn't really seem to be helping, and it certainly looks very uncomfortable.

Otherwise he's doing great!

~Jess

In Which Connor Loves Hat Music And Makes An Excellent Dog Whistle

Today our night nurse came over to do some day time respite care, which was very nice!  I spent pretty much all four hours of it at Thai lessons, and they were still going when I left. 

In addition to language (which I'm still very bad at as I'm learning to write Thai before I speak it) the teachers are discussing Thai culture and etiquette with me right now, which I think will be tremendously helpful both for the trip and for helping us better understand Ellen when she comes home.  I knew a lot of the big things, like not pointing at anything with your feet or touching anyone's head, but there are a lot a little things to learn too, like how you should never write a living Thai person's name in red ink and it's considered bad luck to have your hair cut on a Wednesday.  Interesting stuff!

Connor got to watch Phantom of The Opera again during respite care while he did his knee extension stretches, and I think it's his new favorite musical.  He's even come up with a name for it-- he calls it "hat music," which I think is his way of referring to the phantom's mask.  I'm pretty sure that means it's passed up Les Misérables for top billing in his mind, since that hasn't been assigned a name.  I'm not sure what a good nickname for Les Mis would be in his vocabulary, which is probably part of the problem.  "24601 music" would be a bit past his signing ability.

So anyway, if you throw in church too it was a very busy day.  It was the Blessing of The Animals service today, and so a lot of the congregation brought their pets.  Connor approves of short sermons because then the breaks between the hymns (his favorite part of the service) aren't so long, and so towards the end of the sermon he decided to help wrap it up by emitting a series of ear-piercing yelps, which set all the dogs in the congregation off.  He's big into the "making a joyful noise" part of things!  Oh well-- luckily no one minds.

He crashed right at seven, and I'm not at all surprised by that.  We've got another busy week coming up, so hopefully he'll sleep well!

~Jess

In Which We Visit The Farmer's Market

We took advantage of the gorgeous day to take a trip down to the Olympia Farmer's Market.  It was one of those absolutely perfect crisp-but-sunny fall days, and since the Olympia Art Walk was due to go on that evening, the streets were filled with art exhibits and musicians. 

If there's one thing Connor appreciates, it's good music, and that was to be had in abundance.  The folk band at the market place included a bass and a set of bongos-- both of which are on Connor's list of Favorite Instruments Ever.  We sat down and listened to the last ten minutes or so of their final set.  He was very disappointed when they finished their last song, and couldn't figure out why asking for more music wasn't immediately making said music happen.  Oh well.

Fig season is apparently over because I couldn't find any more at the market, which was very sad, but I did pick up some tiny seckle pears, which are as sweet as candy and nearly as good as the figs.  Washington, while more famously known for its apples, actually produces about half the nation's pears and so the farmer's markets are absolutely chock full of the winter varieties right now.  It's time for the second strawberry crop of the season too, so of course I had to pick some of those up.  They didn't last the ride home.

Finally I bought an enormous slicing tomato to eat all by itself with just a little bit of salt.  Huge sun-ripe tomatoes were one of the things I took completely for granted when I lived in Texas, and now they're one of the few things I miss about living there besides my family and friends.  The season is so short here that they're a luxury, and I have to eat as many as I can before the rain starts up again.

Connor now has a little prism to hand in his room from a booth he was completely fascinated by.  He ended up with something else too; on the way home we stopped at Best Buy and picked up a copy of the 25th anniversary edition of Phantom Of The Opera.  It's another one of those not-a-kid's-movie-but-I-know-Connor-will-love-it sort of things, and sure enough he was riveted through the whole thing.  It's a great way to keep his mind off his knee extensions and/or his stander, which is what he's usually doing while he's watching television.  I just covered his eyes at a couple of strategic points and we were good. 

And of course Colm Wilkinson sang as a special guest at the end of the program, which made me extremely happy.  I swear it's a good thing that man is almost forty years older than me, happily married with four children and living in another country, or Jer would have competition.  The man could sing an accounting textbook and make it sound amazing.

Anyway, so it was a good day!

~Jess

In Which Connor Watches Things Beyond His Ken

Today I tried to clean up a house a bit, as I have been neglecting chores recently and it is rapidly approaching the point where it is less a Welcoming Home and more a Slovenly Embarrassment, and I'll have to step out on the front porch to visit with the neighbors rather than inviting them in.  So I set Connor up to do his stander time, turned on the 25th anniversary version of Les Misérables, and got to work.

Les Mis may not be the most appropriate musical in the world to let a six year old watch.  It's chock full of depressing themes like prostitution and suicide and the looting of dead bodies and such, which are not generally things Sesame Street addresses (T is for Tuberculosis, kids!).  However, Connor absolutely loves Les Mis-- probably because literally the entire thing is music.  He also probably likes it because there aren't any visual depictions of any of the action to distract him from the music, and to top it all off there are tons of flashing light effects.  I doubt he's picking up on the fact that all the people who step away from the microphones are dying, because he's not so good at subtext, he's not picking up all the words anyway because of his hearing loss and also, hey, he's six.  He probably just thinks I'm weird when I start bawling every time Eponine opens her mouth. 

It's not like Disney hasn't done Victor Hugo before.  I still wonder who the heck read The Hunchback of Notre-Dame-- a book in which almost every main character dies in despair in a horrible, horrible way-- and thought it would make a fantastic children's movie.  I mean for Pete's sake, Esmerelda is tortured into a false confession and is hung, and Quasimodo starves to death embracing her dead body in the cemetery after murdering his father figure and a couple dozen other people.  It's a cheery story. 

Connor has never seen Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and there are plenty of other Disney movies he won't be seeing any time soon, either.  The whale scene in Pinocchio terrified him, and the wildebeest scene in The Lion King had a similar effect.  He doesn't like the voodoo skulls in The Frog Prince, and he isn't a huge fan of the end of Hercules, either.  I think it's the visual stuff that really gets to him; Les Mis in his mind is simply good music.  This is why even though he loves the musical, he will absolutely not be watching the new live action version when it comes out at Christmas.

I need to find some opera DVDs.  He'd probably love them too.

~Jess

In Which We Watch A Tear-Jerker And I Survey My Shelves

So today Connor and I watched the 25th anniversary DVD edition of Les Miserables in between loads of laundry.  Well, I watched it, anyway-- Les Mis is not the most exciting movie ever for a five year old, though he did enthusiastically participate in some of the musical numbers.  It's been a while since I've seen it because my 10th anniversary edition is VHS and we don't have a player for it right now, so I was psyched when I got the DVD for Christmas.

Les Miserables is my favorite musical of all time, despite the fact that it makes me weep uncontrollably for several hours.  I've never seen it in person, but the 10th anniversary edition came out on video when I was 13 and I remember having sleepovers with my friends where we'd watch it together, sometimes multiple times a night.  We'd all read the book, and we'd sit around and discuss it and the musical with passion most teenagers at the time reserved for the latest episodes of 90210.  Nothing like a little 19th century literature to get the girls squealing, right?  We were kind of strange kids.

Oh, and also we watched it because we thought the guy who played Marius was totally hot.  So maybe we weren't that strange after all.   

Anyway, so I was watching while folding laundry and bawling, and I realized that John Valjean, the character the book and musical revolve around, is an adoptive parent.  That made me wonder just how many of our movies and books involve characters who are orphans. 

Answer: a lot. 

Out of curiosity I made up a list of the kids movies we have on our shelves that involve a main character who was either an orphan or a foundling, and here's what I came up with: Lilo and Stitch, The Sword And The Stone, Jungle Book, Tangled, Snow White, Enchanted, Cinderella, The Little Princess, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Anne of Green Gables, Harry Potter, Oliver, Hercules, The Rescuers, All Dogs Go To Heaven, Peter Pan, James And The Giant Peach, Tarzan, Anastasia, The Secret Garden, Stuart Little, and of course, Annie.  Whew!

And that's just the movies.  Orphans in books-- especially young adult and childrens' books-- are so prevalent that I actually studied the Orphan Archetype in one of my literature classes.  If I listed all of the books I have on my shelves that contain orphan protagonists we'd be here all night.  And I'm pretty sure it's not just because I have an insane number of books and an eye for fictional characters that are plucky young orphans. 

I wonder which of the books and movies Ellen will identify with!  Of course I hope she'll enjoy Les Miserables (and there's a chance she will, because the DVD version I have stars one of the Jonas Brothers and I've been informed by the teenage daughter of a friend that he is "like, still totally hot, even though they are so not cool now").  I'm kind of curious now as to just how many kids books and movies are out there that feature a Plucky Young Orphan protagonist.  I looked for a list online, but haven't been able to find anything.  If one of you knows of a list, will you point me in the right direction? 

~Jess

In Which Connor Shakes Things Up

Well, Connor has once again demonstrated his ability to keep me on my toes.  He had five seizures today, and a couple of them were of a kind I'm not used to seeing.  Basically he starts breathing really quickly, and then he starts shaking like he's got hypothermia.  Then for the last ten or fifteen seconds of the seizure he just. . . stops.  No moving, no breathing, eyes completely fixed and pupils totally dilated-- he looks a bit like a wax model of my child.  Then he snaps out of it. 

Whee!  This kid certainly likes to keep me on my toes.  I still prefer these to the completely-non-breathing-through-the-whole-thing kind of seizures, but now I'm going to start freaking out every time the kid is just cold. 

Oh well.  Guess I'll be keeping him extra warm and cozy until I can tell the difference.

So needless to say he had a quiet, low-key day today.  Our respite care worker came over this afternoon, and Connor spent most of the rest of the day snuggling with her and watching Peter Pan, starring Mary Martin. 

Mary Martin happens to be one of my favorite actresses of all time, not because she's necessarily that skilled of an actress (though she was, and also her voice was amazingl) but because she always seemed to be having so much fun when she was doing it.  Also she was a pretty classy lady.  So If you've never seen the 1960 version of Peter Pan, you're missing out.  Now I'm happy to say that it's become one of Connor's all time favorites too! 

It's really nice to be able to pass down something like that. 

~Jess

In Which Connor Does The Chica Chica Boom Chic

Short blog tonight-- Connor stayed up until three in the morning last night, and I need my beauty sleep!  Thankfully it sounds like he's actually gone down tonight.  Let's hope he stays that way.

So it turns out that he does like Carmen Miranda.  We danced around to "Chica Chica Boom Chic" and some of her other songs for a while in the living room, and he greatly admired her collection of fruit hats.  Perhaps I should get some plastic fruit and make one for myself.  If it will make him pay attention to me while I'm trying to teach him something I will gladly wear bananas on my head.  I will even learn a bit of Portuguese.

I don't think I'll be learning his favorite song of hers, though.




~Jess

In Which We Take Advantage Of The Weather

Yesterday was yet another one of those glorious fall days, and Jeremy and I just couldn't stay inside.  So we drove down to Bradley Park, where Jeremy and Connor played on the accessible playground and I zoomed along the paved bike trail on my skates.  It's been a while since Connor has been on an outdoor swing, and he was absolutely delirious with joy over it.  Jer had to slow the swing down every once in a while because the little guy was laughing so hard he'd make himself go into a coughing fit!  It was great to see him having such a wonderful time; that's the first family outing we've been able to take for a while.

It makes me really happy to visit our local park because there are so many different people there enjoying the space.  There were groups of dreadlocked skateboarding teenagers dressed in black, a troop of boy scouts playing baseball, children like Connor mingling with neurotypical kids on the playground.  Elderly couples were out holding hands and walking their dogs.  Toddlers wobbled down the bike trail on their tricycles.  A group of LARPers (Live Action Roleplayers) had set up an impromptu archery range and were dressed up in medieval outfits, slinging cloth-tipped arrows covered in chalk at a target manned by an enthusiastic eight year old.  Nearby a couple of teenage boys dressed in preppy clothes picked out pop songs on their guitars.  Nobody seemed particularly out of place.

This is what a park is supposed to be like, I think.  I love this town.

The happy mood from yesterday carried over to today, which also dawned sunny and gorgeous.  This morning I listened to Jeremy puttering around in the kitchen singing to Connor while he made his coffee-- something he often does when he's in a good mood. 

We're a really musical household; pretty much anything that can be sung will be sung when we're in the comfort of our own home, and most of what we are singing is relatively ridiculous.  My songs are usually about what we are doing at that particular moment (a song about chopping potatoes to the tune of "Home On The Range").  Jeremy's songs usually involve a whole lot of killing people.  Also explosions.  I believe this morning's selection involved something about me becoming a zombie and hunting for brains to the tune of AC/DC's "Thunderstruck." 

No doubt this is imparting some sort of important life lesson to Connor, such as what to do in the event of a Zombie Apocalypse.  And also that there's not a whole lot of words that rhyme with "zombie," but "mommy" comes pretty close.

It's great to see my family so happy!

I know that we're coming on to winter here, and pretty soon the days will be rainy and dark again.  Maybe that's what makes these days so precious; we know that they're few in number and so we're determined to make the most of them.  And it's nice to set aside thinking about how dreary things will be in a few weeks and just enjoy the time we have now; we'll save up these sunny moments so that we have something to look forward to at the end of the long dark winter.

That's not a bad philosophy for life, I think.

~Jess

In Which Connor Rocks Out

We are never, ever doing a "Fun With Music" weekly theme ever again.

I'm not sure I will still retain my sanity by the time the week is out. This is because Connor has decided that the super-fancy keyboard, which came in the Theme Box of The Week, is his favorite toy ever in the history of the universe. Basically he has decided that he loves it more than any other toy in the world, and my increasingly frantic attempts to replace it with something else that is less annoying have met with complete and utter failure.

I mean, it's really cute, for the first twenty minutes or so. Cute in a loud and extremely violent fashion, anyway. The first thing he does is turn one of the percussion buttons on; you know, the kind that is labeled "salsa" or "funk" and that is supposed to provide a background beat for the music you play. Then he starts smashing the keys with his hands and (if he wants more precision) his elbows. Finally he begins emitting ear-piercing shrieks of excitement at pitches that at the lower volumes make the glasses in our kitchen vibrate and at the higher volumes also vibrate my teeth. When it becomes too much work to smash the keys down, he picks two notes, usually in the highest register and right next to one another, and leans on them for about five minutes. Then after taking this refreshing break, he smashes his elbows down on random buttons near the percussion area until he gets a new rhythm to emerge.  This inspires more incredibly enthusiastic musical carnage. Rinse and repeat. For hours.

Yes, I know that I am his parent, and about 8 times bigger than him and also equipped with functional opposable thumbs and limbs that all operate in the manner originally intended, so I could easily take it away from him and make him play with another toy. But he's so darn happy and excited about the thing, and I've been dealing with a lethargic, grumpy, attempting-to-die-on-me child for the past two weeks, so I don't really have the heart to do it. Yes, I also know that I'm probably spoiling him horribly-- not to mention running the risk of possibly shattering my eardrums, glassware, and tooth enamel-- but I'm just so thrilled that he's actually vocalizing and acting like his usual happy self again that I can't help but give in. So I'll suffer through his epic, multi-hour "concerts" with a grin on my face for the week, and then at the end of it I'll take the box back to the library and save checking it out only for very, very special occasions like when someone else is watching him and I am far, far away. Preferably in Bermuda. With chocolate.

Anyway, I'll try and get some video tomorrow, so you can see part of the adorable, nails-on-chalkboard performance!


~Jess

In Which Connor Has A Parade

Tomorrow is the annual Daffodil Parade, which is a major event in the local area-- the parade has over a hundred entries every year and actually travels through four local cities in one day.  Many of the schools in the area participate, including the marching band of our local junior high schools.  They decided to practice for the big event by marching through our neighborhood today, and apparently paraded past our house twice, playing at full volume.  While Jeremy and I missed it, Connor was here with his respite care worker, and when the band passed they dashed outside to watch.

Connor was convinced that they were holding a parade just for him.  He loved it.

Apparently he was really, really into the music-- throwing himself from side to side in Joanna's arms, giggling, and grinning from ear to ear.  The music was loud enough that he could hear it even without his hearing aids in (the first time they came by he had just woken up from a nap and so ended up outside sans both hearing aids and pants) and he was completely enthralled.  The band members seemed to enjoy the enthusiastic audience-- several of them apparently waved to him.

So we'll be attending the Daffodil Parade tomorrow, and we'll be cheering loudest for Connor's marching band!  Perhaps we can convince them to come down our street and give us a performance about once a week from now on, as he enjoyed his private parade so much. 

I'm sure the neighbors won't mind.

~Jess

In Which The Martians Have Landed

There's a new epidemic going around town, and H1N1 has got nothin' on it.  Run in terror, folks, because it's Martian Death Flu season, and our household is contaminated.

That's right.  You'd better burn your computer after reading this, because the dread disease is so contagious that I'm pretty sure it can be transmitted by Internet contact.  Martian Death Flu is coming for you all.

First identified by eminent scientist Dave Berry back in 1986, Martian Death Flu (MDF) has been a minor problem, affecting only two or three people a year until now, when lax regulations on the importation of Martians caused an outbreak of the disease among fourteen year old girls across the nation.  From there it rapidly spread to the rest of the population, and now we're on the brink of a pandemic.  Once MDF is contracted, there's nothing to do except take to your bed or couch for a week and hope that a meteor will fall on your house and put you out of your misery. 

I'm sure my research on the origin of MDF is accurate, because watching Lady Gaga videos to figure out which one to link to this post also made me wish for death.  And here's another important fact: 1986, when Mr. Berry wrote his groundbreaking article, just happens to be the year that Lady Gaga was born.  Coincidence?  I think not. 

With any luck today was the worst day for Jeremy and me, and we'll have the weekend to recover slowly.  I'm really hoping I'll have regrown all of my taste buds by Monday, as my favorite holiday of the year-- Half Price Chocolate Day-- is happening then.  I burned the entire top surface of my tongue off by drinking copious amounts of scalding hot tea with lemon in a misguided attempt to melt my lungs to the inside of my body in order to prevent myself from ejecting them while coughing.  For future reference, this does not work.  All it does is make everything you eat taste even more like cardboard than it did when you still had taste buds.

Connor, I'm sad to say, is definitely not over the worst of it yet-- he's still running a low-grade fever and his nasty, lung-ejecting cough seems to be taking up residence long term.  I'm kind of hoping at this point that he doesn't end up with bronchitis. 

Bronchitis, for those of you who don't know, is when a brontosaurus stomps on you, making it hard to breathe.  At least that's how Jeremy explained it to Connor earlier today.  Apparently not very many people get it because brontosauruses (brontosauri?) are few and far between, making it very difficult to catch.  I'm not sure exactly what the correlation between the Martians and the dinosaurs is, but apparently they work together or something.  No doubt the government has covered it up in an attempt to prevent widespread panic.  We'll have to ask the velociraptors about it when we have the energy to drag ourselves out to the van.

But there's no need to panic, folks: while a vaccination for the direct transfer of Martian Death Flu has yet to be developed (so if you come into physical contact with us you are DOOMED) there's a simple inoculation available for the electronic transference of the disease.  Simply barricade yourselves in your homes, turn off your computers, and listen to eight hours or so of public radio programming.  This should stave off any ill side effects you might experience after coming into contact with Martians, brontosauri, or fourteen year old girls for at least a good forty five minutes.

One final note: I'm pretty sure that when my children are adults, rather than spending hours explaining why they were so traumatized by their childhoods they'll just direct their therapists to this website. 

It'll save everybody a whole lot of time. 

~Jess

In Which Jer Proves His Sainthood

Tonight Jer and I went out on a date to see A Prairie Home Companion broadcast live in one of our local movie theaters! 

For those of you who don't know about A Prairie Home Companion (and if you don't, shame on you!), it's a comedic variety radio show that's been on the air in one form or the other since 1974, and its heart and soul is a man named Garrison Keillor.  The man is a incredible sort of English major Jack of All Trades, a tireless promoter of the English language in general, and one of my personal idols.

Jeremy taking me to see the show?  That's proof right there that the man really, really loves me-- though I could have told you that already, of course.  It was raining and nasty outside.  He doesn't really like folk music or gospel music.  The man mostly listens to 80's heavy metal.  He could care less about the news from Lake Wobegon (even if the children are all above average), and yet he not only willingly went with me to sit in a dark theater for two hours to listen to all of the above, he actually encouraged me to buy the tickets, and he went without a single complaint. 

Major brownie points earned, right there. 

He's getting around much, much better these days-- spending as much time as possible up on the crutches.  I'll have to take another video so that you can see the drastic improvement!  He's still having some issues with swelling and he's still in the wheelchair most of the time, but he's really making some major progress.  We can often be found together in the mornings in cycling class, and while he has to lean on the handlebars quite a bit he's able to stand up on the pedals!  The next big step will be to transition to crutches full time, and from there he'll be going to a cane.  I think it's a big relief for him to actually be able to do something; he likes to keep busy and it was pretty hard for him to be off his feet for so long.  Can you believe that on February 11th it'll have been six months since I got that horrible phone call?  It just doesn't seem possible.

I bet he'll be using a cane by the time I drag him to the live production of A Prairie Home Companion when it comes here in March!

~Jess

In Which I Display A Little More Of My Unhinged Creative Side

Because I have a wildly out of control bad habit for making up terrible song lyrics that has raged for years (No really-- my brother and I rewrote the entire Little Mermaid song "Under the Sea" when we were seven and nine respectively and made it about cats. It was entitled, as I recall, "Under the Chair." It was horrible.) guess what I just spent entirely too much time working on?

Rowbert's theme song is set to the theme music of Transformers: The Movie, which came out in 1986. I was horribly disappointed the song (the Transformers one, not Rowbert's) didn't make its way into any of the new movies, even if it did have lousy lyrics. You can find the original lyrics in all their glory here, and the music over here. I suggest you listen to it while you read these to get the proper effect.

In case you miss the reference in the song, by the way, Parking Duck appeared in an earlier post and will guard the space that we need next to our van in order to deploy the ramp. He's in Phase I of our Rowbert Defense Modifications. Phase II involves growing some velociraptors from extracted DNA and raising them with surrogate duck parents to avoid potential tragic infighting within our combat team.

Anyway, enjoy!

Rowbert Van

Rowbert Van!

Stupid people walking right past you
Comin' from the mall
There's something you can do

Prepare to strike
There'll be no place to run
When they’re caught within the beam
Of our giant ion gun

Rowbert Van
More than you can see
Rowbert Van
Wheelchairs and weaponry

Run from these human infestations
Who are staring and pointing
And asking rude questions

Cornered now with them our captors
Until off of the roof
Come our velociraptors

Rowbert Van
More than you can see
Rowbert Van
Wheelchairs and weaponry
Rowbert Van

Parking Ducks wage their battle to destroy the evil forces of
The Idiotocons

Rowbert Van

It's judgment day and now we've made our stand
And for now the powers of darkness
Have been conquered with our van

The Battle's over but the war will begin soon
So watch out when we deploy our awesome ramp of doom!

Rowbert Van
Rowbert Van
Rowbert Van
Rowbert Van

More than you can see!

Rowbert Van!

Okay. I've gotten it out of my system and I'm done, I swear-- you can quit backing away slowly now.

~Jess

In Which Connor Does Not Like Bells

Connor was a real music maker today.

Since he generally only chooses to play with his toys that have plenty of lights and sound, the kind of toys that will drive a parent absolutely nuts if they have to listen to them for more than seven or eight minutes straight, I've been trying to introduce him to some other fun things to do. I'm especially trying to get him away from his current favorite toy: the Leapfrog Fridge DJ, which is known in our household as the "Annie Ooo." This is the title of the most annoying song on the thing. Can you guess which song is Connor's favorite?

So today I decided that he could try a few other toys, toys that are normally of no interest to him because they don't contain batteries. First up was a maraca.

Now, Connor thinks maracas are funny, provided someone else is shaking them. As long as I was the one doing the holding, he was fine with the thing, but the second I tried to put it in his hand was the second that the maraca was no longer fun. Now it was the Evil Maraca of Doom, and shaking it would bring on the Apocalypse. He would do his very best to jerk his hand away from the maraca as quickly as possible, and on the few short occasions I got him to hold the thing he only wrapped his fingers around it long enough to get a good wind-up so that he could throw it as far away as possible, perhaps in the hopes that I wouldn't be able to find it again.

So much for the maraca. I moved on to the bells.

Connor's jingle bells have a distinct advantage over the maracas, not because they sound any better or anything, but because they can be strapped on. While Connor could get them off his right wrist fairly quickly, he's not coordinated enough to shake them off his weaker left arm. So here's the sequence of events that followed.

Connor would attempt to shake the bells off his wrist. The noise would make him laugh, but it would quickly become overwhelming. He would then attempt to do one of his "self-stim" movements to calm himself down. The one he invariably tried to do was the one where he flaps his arms around wildly. The arm flapping would cause the bells to jingle even louder, which would excite Connor even more and cause him to flap harder, escalating the volume of the bells again.

This created a vicious cycle so that after about five minutes Connor was flapping his arms up and down so hard it looked like he was fixing to take off, and was on the verge of tears. At that point I took pity on him, took the bells off, cuddled him for a little bit, and then gave him the Annie Ooo back. He pounced on it, and for the rest of the time before our respite care worker arrived to let Jeremy and I leave for sign class the melodious strains of "Annie Annie Ooo, ooo ooo ooo ooo" could be heard wafting through the house.

Oh well.

~Jess

In Which I Succumb To The Latest Craze

Tonight at the YMCA, I tried Zumba.

This was not a good idea.

Now, first of all you have to understand something about me. I was not a cheerleader or on pep squad in high school. I don't go clubbing. The entire extent of my dancing resume consists of those awkward junior high and high school dances, formal dances where one wears a very long dress and allows the guy to do all the leading, and the obligatory dances one learns when one lives a large portion of one's life in Texas, such as two-stepping, the Cotton Eyed Joe, and the Chicken Dance. In addition to my minimal amount of experience and my shocking dearth of natural talent, I have really big feet which I am forever tripping over. As result I dance with all the grace and beauty of a water buffalo suffering from gout.

Well, that's not entirely true, I suppose. I have taken one dance class before, just a couple of months after Connor was born. I was still trying to get used to the fact that my formally svelte and athletic body, due to the extreme amounts of extra amniotic fluid that Connor's kidney issues in utero created, was now covered in stretch marks and was considerably, and probably permanently, saggier in places that one does not expect a 23 year old to sag in. So I was looking for a way to get a little more comfortable with what I had to work with, so to speak, and signed up for the class on a whim. It was entitled, I kid you not, The Art Of Exotic Dance. And when it said Exotic Dance, it was not referring to dancing from foreign climes.

Despite leading to one of the most awkward conversations I've ever had with my father ("Exotic dance? Is that like salsa or something? No? Oh. Oh.") the class turned out to be a ton of fun and just what I needed to get my self esteem back on track. I walked into the class, which was for women only, and discovered to my delight that I was the youngest and thinnest person in the room, even counting the instructor. This is something that will cheer a recently pregnant woman up considerably. Also, due to the fact that a good number of the women in the class were there for a fortieth birthday celebration and had steeled themselves for the rigours to come by consuming a large number of jello shots, I was also one of the most coordinated, which is saying something. The class ended up being pretty fun, too, though the instructor did become a little exasperated with the drunk forty-somethings, who kept attempting to stick their feather boas up each other's noses and sneaking off to the restroom to imbibe more liquid courage.

So I guess I don't really dance like a water buffalo with gout. I dance like a water buffalo with gout who has taking a class on the art of the striptease. I'm not sure that this is an improvement.

But back to Zumba. Zumba, for those of you who don't know, is the latest aerobic dance craze. According to the official Zumba website, it "fuses hypnotic Latin rhythms and easy-to-follow moves to create a one-of-a-kind fitness program that will blow you away." I was not there to be blown away. I was there because it was the only cardio class going on at the gym this evening and I didn't really feel like riding the stationary bike or running around the track. I figured I could just stand in the back and sort of fudge it.

I knew I was in trouble the moment I walked in. For starters, I apparently wasn't dressed properly. While there were a few non-conformers like me, the correct uniform seemed to be spandex tank tops, tiny bike shorts, and heavy waterproof mascara. I was also supposed to be about nineteen years old and a size two. The second problem was that the room was a fairly modest size, and there were around sixty women crammed into it. This meant that not only was there was no way I could hide in the back, but since we were standing almost shoulder-to-shoulder there was a distinct possibility I might seriously injure one of my fellow Zumba dancers (Zumbers?) with an out-of-control flailing limb if I kicked right when I was supposed to be kicking left. I arrived ten minutes before it started and the place was packed. By the time the class began they were actually having to turn people away at the door.

I somehow ended up in a position almost guaranteed to produce maximum amounts of humiliation. In front and on either side of me were tiny, spandex clad, mascara-wearing girls who had obviously been spending some considerable time on the dance floor and already knew all of the moves. Directly behind me was one of the two men in the class-- both in their late sixties or early seventies-- who would have a full and unobstructed view of my athletic pant-encased rear in all its glory. About ten feet away was a large window, where a number of teenage boys had lined up and stopped to observe the proceedings and flex their biceps in a kind of frenzied mating dance of their own. I briefly thought about elbowing my way to a better position, but it was too late.

Despite my growing apprehensions as the doors clicked ominously shut, I decided to stick it out. And so the lights went down, they pumped the volume on the stereo up, and class began. And you know what? It was pretty fun. Perhaps it was the peppy music and the cheesy multicolored lights. Maybe it was the incredibly enthusiastic instructor, who was kind of an interesting combination between a drill sergeant and a cheerleader. Maybe I just got dehydrated and kind of delirious. At any rate, it grew on me.

Okay, so there was a whole lot of flailing and lurching around and being out of step on my part, and I had a narrow miss where I nearly brained the girl to the left of me after I tripped over my own shoelace during an attempt at a pivoting turn, but it ended up being a really good workout and once I stopped feeling so self-conscious I even managed to sort of catch on to the routines just before they ended and the instructor went on to something entirely new and different. Also the old guy behind me left half-way through the class, which was nice. He was really good, which didn't help me feel any better about my total and complete lack of coordination.

There's another Zumba class tomorrow morning. I just might go, provided I get there early, stake out a corner, bring a lot of water (60 women dancing in a small room makes it hot in there) and stand somewhere on the other side away from the gawking teenage boys. Who knows? If I went often enough I might even pick up some modest dance skills.

But I'm still not wearing spandex.

~Jess

In Which We Have Returned To Washington

We're back!

The wedding was absolutely beautiful and I think that everyone had a fantastic time! The newlyweds were absolutely glowing with happiness and my sister looked gorgeous. Connor hung out with my mother-in-law, who was nice enough to pull babysitting duties yet again even after spending so much time helping us out up in Washington. What a sweetie! I lucked out on the in-laws, huh?

And yes, as predicted Connor was ridiculously adorable in his wedding suit and hat. I can't wait to see pictures!

We were only gone for six days, and I'm amazed to see how much progress Jer has made just in the last week-- he's moving around better and has a lot more energy. It's nice to see the improvement; it's harder to see when I'm there every day, so it gives me some perspective. I can't wait to see what he's doing in another month!

Anyway the plane flight went well today, and we're now back up in Puyallup, where I am surprised to say it is still sunny and nice outside. I'm really hoping that it stays that way long enough for us to get the roof cleaned on the new house before the rain sets in! We'll just have to see how it goes.

The inspection and appraisal are both in, our underwriting approval is finished, and it looks like our closing date will be bumped up to some time between the 22nd and the 25th! That means we potentially only have eleven days before we own a house! I will now be catapulted into frantic planning mode-- we'll need a permit to put a ramp on the house, which we can't apply for until we actually own the house. This means we have to find a contractor ASAP so that we can start work pretty quickly. We plan to do the same thing we did with the last house and take 30 days to move in, so it's not like we'll be out on our ears or anything if we don't get the permit taken care of immediately after we buy the house or something, but it would probably be a good idea to already have someone lined up. And since you have to pay a fee for each building permit, it might be a good idea to write the permit for everything we intend to do to the house so we're only paying one fee. I'll add it to the list of things to do.

You know what I'm looking forward to? Besides not sleeping on the floor and having half my furniture in a storage unit, I mean. I'm looking forward to being able to sing my bawdy Irish drinking songs at the top of my lungs while I'm cleaning the house and not worrying about disturbing the upstairs neighbors. I'm not worried about any of them seeing me through the windows, as they probably already think I'm crazy, but they work the night shift and so they're trying to sleep during the day and the walls are pretty paper-thin. Hearing me belting out an off-key rendition of "Rattlin', Roarin' Willie" is not likely to help them get some shuteye. While this has been a great apartment complex and we haven't been here very long, it's hard to feel totally comfortable in a space that's not entirely your own. So it'll be nice to have a big space to dance around and be silly in without worrying about disturbing anyone.

I believe Jer is still mostly looking forward to that wood stove. We'd better get that thing cleaned quickly so he can cozy up to the fire. He's looking forward to that kitchen too-- there's a pull-out cutting board that might be just about his height, so he may be able to do some cooking right away!

But we only have eleven days! Guess I'd better get packing.

~Jess

Texas: Day 3

I went down to the hospital and visited for a good long while today. My grandfather isn't able to talk right now, but he can nod yes or no and obviously understands pretty much everything that's going on. He was awake when I got there and stayed awake the whole time I was there.

It's funny, but since I have a child who is non-verbal I'm very, very comfortable with keeping up a one-woman monologue. I told him all about Jer leaving for Afghanistan, family news, how my garden was looking-- I basically rambled on about anything I could think of. I told him to blink or nod if he wanted me to stop. Occasionally he'd close his eyes and I'd think he was falling asleep so I'd stop talking, but then he'd open them up again and when I'd ask him if he wanted me to keep going, he'd nod. We're going to bring him up an audio book to listen to tomorrow; he nodded when I asked him if he'd like one and it's got to be terribly frustrating and boring being in there and not able to move around or hold a conversation with anyone.

This evening my mom was sweet enough to watch Connor again for me and I went out with my brother and his wife to sing some karaoke. We picked the wrong night and the wrong bar for it; I have no idea where these people came from, but there wasn't a single person who got up in front of the microphone that didn't sound like they could sing for a living and actually make money. It was terrible; not a single group of drunk women singing "Baby Got Back" or "I Got You, Babe"-- I got sandwiched in between the guy with a voice that was a dead ringer for Eddie Vedder and the chick who sounded exactly like Patsy Cline. I love to sing, but I get nervous even on a typical evening when I'm following the Baby Got Back Chicks, let alone when I'm by far the worst singer getting up on the stage, and being nervous never does good things to your singing. I have a decent voice, but these people were good. At any rate, we enjoyed ourselves (and listened to some ridiculously awesome people sing) but I think I'm more comfortable with private karaoke rooms and tiny little dive bars.

They did have this longhorn head mounted on the wall that blew steam out his nose when the DJ pulled on a rope, though. That was pretty cool.

~Jess