![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Dec. 11th, 2006 01:37 pmOn the one hand, I am SO DONE WITH...
-being the creator and mod of![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
booju_newju. The old booju crashed and burned in a storm of racial drama last week and I just wanted to make a new place for the old people to gather and do what they've always done, including people who got banned in the hoohaw and would be otherwise missing. What I got was a nonstop headache. Apparently the only way to get your point semi-across about any given mod issue or deal with anything with other mods is to devote hours of every night to hundreds upon hundreds of lengthy comments that go around in circles and really, if there was a way to bow out without the community being deleted, I would do it. I think I'm just going to lurk in the shadows, participate when I want to in debates and let ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cynica and radioactivetoy control everything. I think a part of the communication problem is that there is almost no overlap between that community and my friends' list, and most of the heavy players in there have completely opposed opinions to mine on, like, everything, so I'm seen as someone suspect.
-Toddlers and their personal injuries. I know that sounds bad, but really, get a grip you clumsy little wackos. Isaac is SCREAMING and howling, stumbling around and gasping for the air to say "Hurt" anywhere from 2 to 10 times a day. Because he stubbed his toe, Aaron rolled over on him on the couch, he fell down running, he bumped his head horesplaying in my room with Ananda, whatever. This has been going on for a year and a half. Jake's been doing the same thing now - the silent, long pause before all that air being sucked in is released in a whoosh of noise, red face, arms up to be held - for about 5 months. Generally when they are stumbling around angry and newly injured like that, it's about 5 seconds before they fall down again and renew their rage and frustration. If I can't get to Jake within the first 30 seconds after he starts, he can fall 3+ more times trying to get to me with his eyes closed and so much energy devoted to howling that way. Between the two of them I am becoming coldly unaffected and starting to think things along the lines of "Suck it up and let's get on with the day, damn!" after I've scanned for blood and written them off.
On the other hand, I am REALLY enjoying the holiday season. Thanksgiving was great - heck, pumpkins and Halloween were great, let's go back to the beginning. But now Christmas is approaching, and it makes me happy. We're staying at a hotel near my Nana and Pa's house in Lakeland from the 22nd to the 25th, and it sounds SO GOOD AND LONG OVERDUE to have a roadtrip and be out of here for awhile. I love the lights all over our house and the big tree all decorated with edibles out here, and the little tree that's all white and manger ornaments, in the kids' room. I love that my sister and Frank will be at Nana's for about a week, too, with Brian (the baby), and that my mom and Todd and brother will be there, and all of it. I love shopping for presents. We went and picked out a baby lovebird at The Aviary yesterday, that is still on handfeedings but should be ready soon after Christmas. We decided to try that one more time and know the kids will be thrilled. We're getting Aaron a new bike, a transformer robot like he's been wanting, and I have a sweater almost knitted for him. Ananda we got a scooter for, and a pretty dress, and she keeps begging us for this Inuit Art calendar they have at Wild Oats so I don't know how I can say no to that. THey're both getting stockings full of chestnuts, fruit leather, dark chocolate and rubber chickens (they see them at Publix and play with them everytime we go grocery shopping...don't ask me). Isaac will have the treats and a Dora toy in his. I'm trying to find a carseat toy for Jake - one of those across the bar in front of them things, but not made for a 6 month old. Both of them are also getting knitted sweaters. I want to tell you all what we got my mother and my sister but, well, they read this.
I think this will be the first year we've ever sent out Christmas cards, though they are only going to relatives who we won't be seeing. I admire those of you who manage to send cards to every friend, acquaintance and LJ user in the world, but I don't think I'll be at that level until next year or the one after ;) Aside from the organization to gather so many addresses, the sheer cost of the cards, the printing of photos and the postage gets kind of nuts when you're already over-budget.
Other things:
-We watched one of those Duggar specials on TLC last night. I've never seen one before, though I've seen about a million online posts about them. Anyway, yeah, from everything I'd heard I expected something different - way more boredom and misery on the part of the kids, way more puritannical stuffiness, way more uber-nerdy "they can't be serious"...but I thought they were awesome. I personally want to be able to devote more personal attention to each child than that, but everyone in that family really seems - beyond having all their basic needs met - like they are happy, healthy and well adjusted. Those kids ALL play the violin! ALL have a sense of personal responsibilities! She takes all 16 of them to the grocery store, and the only disruption they cause is in people staring! And I think that between doing school work with mom during weekdays, building a house with dad on the weekends, and being read to before bed (even though it is all in groups) those kids are way less "neglected" than the average upper middle class only child. Obviously things are edited and presented a certain way for tv, but I don't even think the mom's crazy dead animal hairstyle looks as bad in real time as it does in still shots - when she's talking she sounds like a regular, nice person and it helps.
-Jake got really sick Friday night - fever of 104 for HOURS, I actually sent Grant for tylenol because he was so miserable and it was freaking me out, but he threw it all up as soon as I gave it to him anyway. I still don't know what caused it, but he spent Saturday with a lower grade fever, very clingy and affectionate and semi-lethargic. That night was better though, and then Sunday he was basically fine again. Nobody else has had anything, I don't think he's eaten anything we haven't, etc. We did go to a Christmas party Friday evening, but he was slightly warm before that, and Grant or I held him the whole time we were there. I'm just glad he was better...both of us were more freaked than normal by his illness and realized a couple of hours in that, silly as it seems, it's because we just dealt with sudden-onset BIRD illness that immediately led to death a week before. I'm just glad he's all better.
-And, last, my husband makes some damned fine jambalaya.
-being the creator and mod of
booju_newju. The old booju crashed and burned in a storm of racial drama last week and I just wanted to make a new place for the old people to gather and do what they've always done, including people who got banned in the hoohaw and would be otherwise missing. What I got was a nonstop headache. Apparently the only way to get your point semi-across about any given mod issue or deal with anything with other mods is to devote hours of every night to hundreds upon hundreds of lengthy comments that go around in circles and really, if there was a way to bow out without the community being deleted, I would do it. I think I'm just going to lurk in the shadows, participate when I want to in debates and let cynica and radioactivetoy control everything. I think a part of the communication problem is that there is almost no overlap between that community and my friends' list, and most of the heavy players in there have completely opposed opinions to mine on, like, everything, so I'm seen as someone suspect. -Toddlers and their personal injuries. I know that sounds bad, but really, get a grip you clumsy little wackos. Isaac is SCREAMING and howling, stumbling around and gasping for the air to say "Hurt" anywhere from 2 to 10 times a day. Because he stubbed his toe, Aaron rolled over on him on the couch, he fell down running, he bumped his head horesplaying in my room with Ananda, whatever. This has been going on for a year and a half. Jake's been doing the same thing now - the silent, long pause before all that air being sucked in is released in a whoosh of noise, red face, arms up to be held - for about 5 months. Generally when they are stumbling around angry and newly injured like that, it's about 5 seconds before they fall down again and renew their rage and frustration. If I can't get to Jake within the first 30 seconds after he starts, he can fall 3+ more times trying to get to me with his eyes closed and so much energy devoted to howling that way. Between the two of them I am becoming coldly unaffected and starting to think things along the lines of "Suck it up and let's get on with the day, damn!" after I've scanned for blood and written them off.
On the other hand, I am REALLY enjoying the holiday season. Thanksgiving was great - heck, pumpkins and Halloween were great, let's go back to the beginning. But now Christmas is approaching, and it makes me happy. We're staying at a hotel near my Nana and Pa's house in Lakeland from the 22nd to the 25th, and it sounds SO GOOD AND LONG OVERDUE to have a roadtrip and be out of here for awhile. I love the lights all over our house and the big tree all decorated with edibles out here, and the little tree that's all white and manger ornaments, in the kids' room. I love that my sister and Frank will be at Nana's for about a week, too, with Brian (the baby), and that my mom and Todd and brother will be there, and all of it. I love shopping for presents. We went and picked out a baby lovebird at The Aviary yesterday, that is still on handfeedings but should be ready soon after Christmas. We decided to try that one more time and know the kids will be thrilled. We're getting Aaron a new bike, a transformer robot like he's been wanting, and I have a sweater almost knitted for him. Ananda we got a scooter for, and a pretty dress, and she keeps begging us for this Inuit Art calendar they have at Wild Oats so I don't know how I can say no to that. THey're both getting stockings full of chestnuts, fruit leather, dark chocolate and rubber chickens (they see them at Publix and play with them everytime we go grocery shopping...don't ask me). Isaac will have the treats and a Dora toy in his. I'm trying to find a carseat toy for Jake - one of those across the bar in front of them things, but not made for a 6 month old. Both of them are also getting knitted sweaters. I want to tell you all what we got my mother and my sister but, well, they read this.
I think this will be the first year we've ever sent out Christmas cards, though they are only going to relatives who we won't be seeing. I admire those of you who manage to send cards to every friend, acquaintance and LJ user in the world, but I don't think I'll be at that level until next year or the one after ;) Aside from the organization to gather so many addresses, the sheer cost of the cards, the printing of photos and the postage gets kind of nuts when you're already over-budget.
Other things:
-We watched one of those Duggar specials on TLC last night. I've never seen one before, though I've seen about a million online posts about them. Anyway, yeah, from everything I'd heard I expected something different - way more boredom and misery on the part of the kids, way more puritannical stuffiness, way more uber-nerdy "they can't be serious"...but I thought they were awesome. I personally want to be able to devote more personal attention to each child than that, but everyone in that family really seems - beyond having all their basic needs met - like they are happy, healthy and well adjusted. Those kids ALL play the violin! ALL have a sense of personal responsibilities! She takes all 16 of them to the grocery store, and the only disruption they cause is in people staring! And I think that between doing school work with mom during weekdays, building a house with dad on the weekends, and being read to before bed (even though it is all in groups) those kids are way less "neglected" than the average upper middle class only child. Obviously things are edited and presented a certain way for tv, but I don't even think the mom's crazy dead animal hairstyle looks as bad in real time as it does in still shots - when she's talking she sounds like a regular, nice person and it helps.
-Jake got really sick Friday night - fever of 104 for HOURS, I actually sent Grant for tylenol because he was so miserable and it was freaking me out, but he threw it all up as soon as I gave it to him anyway. I still don't know what caused it, but he spent Saturday with a lower grade fever, very clingy and affectionate and semi-lethargic. That night was better though, and then Sunday he was basically fine again. Nobody else has had anything, I don't think he's eaten anything we haven't, etc. We did go to a Christmas party Friday evening, but he was slightly warm before that, and Grant or I held him the whole time we were there. I'm just glad he was better...both of us were more freaked than normal by his illness and realized a couple of hours in that, silly as it seems, it's because we just dealt with sudden-onset BIRD illness that immediately led to death a week before. I'm just glad he's all better.
-And, last, my husband makes some damned fine jambalaya.
