Seis Puerqueños

You probably thought I was going to say debt, but I wasn’t.

First, a week or so ago I got a call from a 402 area code, and decided to answer it. A nice recording told me I should stay on the line so I could get my credit card rate lowered. I thought, I don’t have a balance, but what the heck, why not! But then before I got a person, I thought, hmmm why didn’t they say which credit card it was for? Then a lady answered laughing and said “hello”. First thing I asked her what credit card she was calling for. No response, she hangs up on me. Later I call the number back and get a recording that says thanks for calling back, and if I wanted on the do not contact list then I could leave my name and address after the beep. Ummm, no thanks. And also I won’t be giving you my credit card numbers either, scammers.

The real problem with credit cards is online shopping. I don’t mean that I do it too much (ok, I do) but that when you shop online, even at reputable places, they keep your card on file. Just for fun of course. Or because you “may” want to use it next time. No thanks, I can enter it in every time just fine. Anyway. Last week I got a call from my credit card company (it was actually them!) saying there had been some flags for fraud. We went through the charges and there were things like googlekit and easycheck and other strange but small charges. Credit card canceled, problem solved.

But then, my mom called me. As it turns out, I received some packages at her house. Rather Kelsey Fox received some packages at her house, including Acai potions, colon cleansing products, a google kit on how to make money, and other various spam items. What??? The best we can figure is spammers broke into somewhere that my credit card was stored from at least two years ago when my name was Kelsey Fox and I used my mom’s address, and used it to buy things on their website. I guess the good news is that now I can get skinny like Oprah and be cleansed and make millions on google. The even better news? Apparently they didn’t think I needed any viagra.

Dear Passport Agency,

I trusted you. I was so trusting I told Aaron we didn’t need to expedite Harmon’s passport application for our trip in 6 1/2 weeks from submission. But I listened to Aaron, and paid the extra fee, but still in my heart knew it wasn’t needed. I even went to the Medina post office like my parents suggested, because they are ultra-fast. I knew that passport would be in my hands within a week!

But you lied to me Passport Agency, you lied. 3 days short of the promised two week delivery my mother informed me you sent me something to my post office box. A passport? No, a letter. I don’t believe I paid lots extra for a letter. A letter that says you want my street address instead of my post office box? Probably you should have put that on the form, and told the person working at the counter who checked my application. So I sent you back my “real” address.

And I trusted you again. I told Aaron that surely it would come on Monday when promised, because they probably just needed to enter in the address into their system. You had already cashed my check, so surely you had a product ready to send to me. You just needed that last bit of info, right?

Wrong, you lied to me again. So I waited. I checked the post office box. I checked the house mailbox. Nothing. I asked my mom if by chance she had picked it up. Nothing. Two more weeks of waiting, and nothing.

Now it is TWO weeks from travel Passport Agency. I have waited almost 4 1/2 weeks for something I paid to have in 2 weeks. I remembered you could check the status online. And so I did. Status: here is your tracking number, it should arrive on the 16th. What! The 16th is hardly over a week from our date of travel!!! 5 weeks from when I applied! It cannot get worse!

But wait, then there was a button to the USPS tracking system. What was the status, maybe it would come earlier? Status: we have received a note from the passport agency saying they will be giving us your item to mail, but they haven’t given it to us yet. WHATTTTTTTTTTT!!!! (Can you feel the fury?!)

I find the passport agency hotline and sit through 20 minutes of your babble passport department. Finally you let me talk to a kind sounding human, making it almost impossible for me to be angry at her (sure it’s not her fault, but my rage is like infinity). I tell her my situation and she calmly replies: Well, our system is down right now, can you call back in a couple of hours???????????

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Passport Agency, really? All I wanted was a passport for my wee child so I can take him to Ecuador. I even took 3 photo retakes for you. And paid you EXTRA money so you would make it happen faster. And I told you when I was traveling, so you can’t even claim you didn’t know. And now you won’t tell me where my passport is, or what is wrong with it, because your system is down? And I have to call back and sit through 20 more minutes of recording to get to a person? Shouldn’t you call me back???

Anyway, just wanted to say the friendship is off. I though I knew you better than that, but you have changed, you have changed.

With fond memories of past passport experiences and hopes of not having to leave my child behind,

Kelsey

You read that right. I slacked on my Friday post, but lo and behold when I went to Ross yesterday to try to find an identical pair of jeans to my husband’s new beloved jeans, something horrifying happened. So horrifying I didn’t love it at all.

Aaron was in the dressing room trying on 17 pairs of jeans, hoping that one would be similar enough to the ones recently bought that are ever so comfy and good looking. Every so often he would come out and model them for Harmon and me. Meanwhile, we were minding our own business looking at the baskets, thinking about how nice our laundry would go into them, when I smelled a very awful smell. I first accused my child, but thought it couldn’t be since the smell was so horrifying. I took a smell of the alleged source, but it was not to blame.

After a few more minutes I looked down to see that I had stepped in poo. No, I didn’t bring it in with me, there was a pile that I had unknowingly found with my foot. In shock I again checked my child, his pant legs, wondering if by some horrifying chance we had done this. We had not. So now, I had stepped in poo, in the very back of the store. Where had this come from?

Hypothesis #1: someone tracked it in. This is not possible due to the generous amount and no other footprints leading to or from it, other than my own walking away.

Hypothesis #2: someone pooped on the floor??? I can’t imagine this could be it, because how would they do that right by the dressing room door where a kind lady is working?

Finally upon exiting, Aaron offers Hypothesis #3: Dog. This theory obviously has to be right because right next to the baskets and dressing room? Pet aisle.

People, this brings me to my next point. DO NOT. That’s right, DO NOT bring your pets into the store, unless it is a pet store which seem to welcome it. That means if you are in Factoria Mall going to the pet store, walk outside to get there, that’s why they have an outside entrance. Dogs are not people. Even good dogs will poop when they need to poop. They are dogs. And I for one don’t need to be stepping in any more piles while enjoying my lovely day shopping at Ross or Target or anywhere else I choose to shop.

I suppose this should have been entitled “why dogs should wear diapers in public” but that really would have just given the surprise ending away.

Is blaming anything wrong with you on the baby. I don’t mean in a scapegoat kind of way. I am the type of person who when I have a stubbed toe, a sideache, or headache, I suddenly become convinced that I am dying. Generally I keep this to myself, as to not appear insane or a huge hypochondriac. Plus I’ve never died from any of these things, so I realize it’s totally unfounded. But while pregnant I find I never worry. Ouch, sore knee, must be pregnancy. Ugh my head hurts. Baby’s fault. Strange pain in my mid-section. Obviously I know what’s causing it.

So inside baby, thanks for making me worry a little less about dying. Even though I wasn’t really going to anyway.

PS “Alf” is what we call the inside baby, because when asked if he wanted a sister Harmon made no response, but when asked if he wanted a brother he smiled and when asked what we should name said brother he replied “Aaaaaaaaaaalllf”. Also good is that growing a baby is much like growing an alien inside of you, like an Alien Life Form for example. Aaron has just proposed “Another Little Fetus” would work too. Or Another Large Fetus.

A week ago Harmon turned 6 months. But being a neglectful mother I never made a post about it. This month Harmon has been busy. He took a nice long road trip (which he hated) to Montana and Idaho. He loved meeting most of his cousins, several aunts and uncles, and especially seeing his grandparents again. Ok, but probably he loved the cats most of all. This month he is into giving raspberries, waking up a million times in the night, growing more teeth, rolling and scooting to get to where he needs to go, and eating any food he can get his hands on. He seems to love mangoes the best, although bread or anything mom or dad is eating is the most favorite of all. Our giant has slowed down a bit in the past month, at least in terms of weight gain. But he’s still tall as ever.

The stats:
Height: 28 1/4″, 95%
Weight: 18 lbs 1 oz, 60%!!!
Head: 47 cm, 99%!

We continue to love our long bean, and daddy is especially proud when taking him out in public when all the ladies want to flirt with the kid. He’s trouble, and we couldn’t be happier!

Really, what is the most annoying way to get ratings? The words “suspected cases of swine flu”. Suspected. Not confirmed. Also, I don’t need you to interrupt my tv watching to show me a press conference of a doctor who is the head of a clinic where another doctor has a “suspected case”. That’s not breaking news. Unless her head turned into a pig head and she is running through all the grocery stores throwing out all the bacon. That would qualify as breaking news.

Is anyone at any news station aware that lots of people die from the “regular” flu as well? Like old people, and little kids? I’m just saying.

Anyway, not much else needs to be said, other than the mass hysteria created by the media is ridiculous. And I don’t love it.

PS My mom just sent me this warning:

Harmon was awake. We were both asleep. He nudged me and I woke up. There he was next to me, with a big smile, eyes wide open, feet firmly planted in mommy’s side. Don’t ask me how he got into the middle of the bed. For all I know he crawled out of his crib and jumped over mom. He’s got the legs for it, though our bed isn’t very springy.

He wanted to play. He’d roll back and forth between me and mommy, gently touching us, smiling, and of course kicking mom right where baby ALF was growing. I’d move his legs and he’d immediately turn back sideways.

This went on for about fifteen bleary, happy, tender minutes and I really wished he’d let mom sleep and be content to play and cuddle with me. Mom got up to get a snack when he was turned my way. When Harmon noticed she was gone, he started to fuss. So I got up and changed him, he cried, mom fed him, and we all went back to sleep.

This week Harmon hasn’t slept much. That means mom hasn’t slept much either. They’ve both been champions, and Harmon rarely complains during the day. He is his usual happy self until about 6:30, and then wakes up all through the night.

Just now he started crying, but I think that’s more that he wants to use mom’s computer and she won’t let him. Things like that set him off more.

We figured he was teething, but it didn’t even look like his top teeth were budding yet. But yesterday, on the way home from Caelin’s baseball game (pop fly to right field — caught, and line drive past first base, RBI, two stolen bases, and a score) Kelsey found a tooth… off to the left side on top. Not one of his front teeth at all.

We were concerned, but her friend Billie (a pediatric dental expert) and the internet both assured us it’s okay, if not exactly normal.

He’s moaning, not exactly crying, again (maybe mom’s torturing him). When he was with me a few minutes ago in the middle of this post, he didn’t complain. Although he doesn’t seem to like blackberry jam, he keeps coming back for more.

Last night Kelsey was exhausted. But not Harmon. He was wide awake. Or so he tried to convince us loudly, sadly.

So I got up, went over to to crib, and lifted the fussy boy out. He immediately stopped fussing and cuddled against my shoulder. I silently congratulated myself as Kelsey stared bleary-eyed in envy at my “magic touch”. But Harmon know better. He wasn’t going to go to sleep. Or so he tried his best to avoid.

He’d almost drift off, leaning on my shoulder and then sitting bolt upright in a moment of vertigo that we’ve all experienced on the edge of sleep. Then he’d bob his head several times. I composed a song about it, to the tune of a Beach Boys hit Barbara Ann:

Finally he leaned out and over, away from my body — usually an indication that he wants to lay down on his stomach across my arms and rest his head on my forearm. Which he did. He was going to go to sleep. Or so I thought.

Harmon closed his eyes. He was silent for a minute. He was going to sleep, but I didn’t want to move him just yet. He stirred a few times, then lifted his head, then laid it back down, drooling on my forearm.

Then he breathed out a sigh, making a small noise. Then he did it again, a bit more forcefully. Finally he got it. A big wet raspberry*, and then another, and another.

We were all laughing, and he was definitely wide awake. Finally, I gave him back to Kelsey, who was also wide awake now from laughing. She had the magic touch and put him back to sleep.

*Note: other names I’ve heard for “raspberry” are “zerbert” and “bronx cheer”, though the former is usually performed on the belly and the latter using one’s own hand.

I hereby put myself in the blogging hall of shame. I apologize to all you kind readers who haven’t abandoned us in our time of no blogging. I vow to return to the blog with renewed vigor starting this week. I won’t even make excuses about how we’ve been out of town or how my inside baby is trying to take over my body. I will just be better. I promise!!!