eee!

I haven't posted in FOREVER. I'm sorry. What I should do is figure out how to get my Twitter feed to show up here every day. I know others of you do this, but I don't know how. I suck.

So let's see, what's been going on? Well, first off, I've become completely addicted to playing Neko Astume. Worse yet, I told another girl at work about it, and she told about ten people, and now there's a whole bunch of us at work who are addicted and try to share tips on how to get the rare cats to show up and how to get more fish. I think we're all just soooooo exhausted with our company that we need something fun and happy to get us through the workday. Because honestly, morale is just SHIT right now. And I miss my old boss. I hate walking past his office and seeing it all empty. We've e-mailed a few times. I hope he's doing okay.

Wow, that got sad quickly.

Okay, what else? The February holidays are coming up, which is fun. This weekend the zoo is doing a Lunar New Year (aka Chinese New Year) celebration, which should be fun for the kids. Then there's a Superbowl party on Sunday. The next weekend is Valentine's Day, so the Scientist and I will be celebrating by attending the Winter Wine Walk that afternoon. In the evening we'll do something fun with the kids, and the next morning I've promised to take VEE out for breakfast. Of course, the Scientist and MDR will come, too. Then later in the month is the Academy Awards, so of course I'll be having local people over for that. Though this year I'm really not giving a crap about any of it other than Mad Max: Fury Road. How I would LOVE IT if that movie somehow won a bunch of awards, just because.

I am absolutely exhausted today. Last night the kids both kept me up for hours and it was terrible. I ended up sleeping on the couch for a bit, because my daughter's coughing was keeping my son awake. I spent an hour getting him back asleep and then he woke up 15 minutes later and I just could not deal with it. So I put him in bed with the Scientist and went downstairs to cool down. Once I fell asleep on the couch I ended up having this terrible nightmare about spiders everywhere (including going down my throat) and it was just terrible. Needless to say, I didn't get much sleep at all and I woke up with a splitting headache. So I called in today. The kids are with their grandma as usual, and VEE has preschool right now. I asked the Scientist if I should feel guilty dropping the kids with his mom and not telling her I'm staying home to sleep, and he was like "Nope!" So there we are.

Otherwise the kids are okay. My daughter's been pretty whiny lately, which is getting old fast. She seems to run in cycles. One week she's great, then the next week she's a bratty monster. I don't get it. She's going to make one hell of a teenager. As for MDR, he's fine. He's starting to talk a bit more, which is great. He'll say "bye" and wave when someone leaves, he'll say some phrases along with his favorite books (mostly "oh no!" when we read Going on a Bear Hunt), and he's cute as a button. He still likes to throw things, though, which is no good when it's food (messy) or board books (painful).

I'm not doing much in the way of entertainment. Despite all the Oscar-bait in theaters, I have no interest in seeing most of the movies that are out right now. I did see a sneak preview of Pride & Prejudice & Zombies a few weeks ago. As someone who hates zombies, I thought it was fun. I'm looking forward to Deadpool. Otherwise I can't really even remember what I've gone to see in the past few months, which is pretty sad. Of course there was The Force Awakens, which I'd like to see again sometime. The nerds at work are constantly coming up with new theories on the characters' backstories. Heh. As for TV, we're lucky to watch anything that's not on PBS Kids or Disney Junior. We've watched some Supergirl, which I like okay. It's got some issues, but it's fun. I've missed too much of The Flash to watch without a major binge/catch-up. I think Castle comes back on next week; I hope they fix what they messed up in the first half of this season. People don't want to watch for Castle/Beckett angst. We had seven seasons of that. Can we just have them solving crimes and being fun for this (probably final) season? Man, losing their showrunner really put a dent in that one... What other TV is good? Obviously we still watch Lip Sync Battle ever week. That's probably the only show we get to watch with regularity. Some day I'll watch Jessica Jones on Netflix and a bunch of other stuff people have recommended, but for now, it's more Wild Kratts and Curious George.

Okay, I'm really exhausted now. I'm going to sleep for a bit. Y'all take care. Hopefully I won't be a stranger as much as I have been.

It's about freakin' time, but summer is FINALLY here. I don't know if I'm excited or worried. Much like aj, I'm not a huge fan of Chicagoland's hot, humid summers. On the other hand, it's finally pool season. Now that June is almost over, it's finally warm enough to take the kids to the pool.

Things around here have been, and will continue to be for the rest of the summer, crazy. The Scientist's youngest brother is getting married at the end of August, and so there's been a lot of wedding-related activities. The bachelor party already happened (a three-day weekend extravaganza of booze), the bachelorette party and bridal shower weekend are coming, then there's a "team-building scavenger hunt" for the entire wedding party so everyone can get to know each other before the actual wedding, and then a day of wedding favor making. Also in there I have a baby shower, MDR has a doctor appointment, there's a zoo trip with my coworker and her family, and at some point we have to go to the Ren Faire because we bought crazy-cheap tickets at C2E2. And all before the end of August. Needless to say, almost every weekend is booked.

To make things even more fun, work has been crazy for the past month or so. I had the big book to finish which turned into a nightmare because the managing editor decided to make a whole bunch of changes at the last minute. We were literally laying out pages the day before it was due to go to the printer. After that project ended, I was immediately put on another project with an even crazier deadline: a 700-page book to lay out in one month. That's creating all the art, doing the layout, sending pages through proofing/editorial/author corrections, making all the corrections, sending the pages to an outside certification group for their approval so that we can link our pages to their certification training, and prepping all the pages for PDF release so that the book can be sent to the Florida board of ed for approval for adoption. Thankfully I've been paired with my company's very best editor. He and I have done many projects before and have a really good working and personal rapport. I think that's why they put me on the project, because they knew he and I work well together and I was his best shot at getting the book done. We have one week to finish all the pages before we want to turn them over to the digital media department so they can prep the PDFs for release. Amazingly, we have everything done except the front matter, glossary, and index (the latter of which take no time to lay out). I only have two chapters' worth of corrections left to do, which I can probably complete tomorrow. So this editor and I are walking around the building like we're hot shit (cuz we are) and I'm blown away by how much the two of us accomplished with this book.

That said, because I've proven time and again that I can crank out really good quality work with few mistakes under insane deadlines, I've now been given another completely craptacular project. As I said to my boss, it's as if I'm being punished for doing good work. ::headdesk::

So what else is up? The family's doing well. Yesterday was the Scientist's birthday, which we celebrated by going to a pool party. Today we're going for a wine tasting. VEE is on her first steps to reading -- sounding out words letter by letter and figuring out what they say. Of course this takes some coaching on our part, but for a kid who's not even four yet I'm quite proud of her. Potty training, on the other hand, is a joke. I'm going to take time off later this summer to do "potty boot camp" with her, wherein I stay home for a few days on either side of a weekend and all we do is practice going to the potty every hour on the hour till she figures this out. Because she's such a tall and big kid she's almost outgrown the largest size diapers they make, plus she needs to be potty trained before preschool in the fall. So boot camp it is. As for MDRE, he's not crawling yet but he's close. He just cut his seventh tooth and we've moved him on to 2nd stage foods. He continues to be a smiley, cuddly little (big) guy and a ton of fun.

Anyway, that's about it for me. I hope all is well with all of you.

Sorry I don't update more often -- just finding time to sit down at the computer and hammer out an update uninterrupted is next to impossible these days. People keep asking the Scientist and I if we've seen a certain movie or watched a certain TV show. We're like, "If we can find more than two hours to ourselves during the evenings it's a miracle. But we can tell you exactly what Daniel Tiger has been up to over on PBS Kids." Every now and again we manage to watch an episode of Daredevil on Netflix, which is making me incredibly happy. I really appreciate that the creators approached the show as a crime drama first and a superhero show second. And how deliciously creepy is Kingpin? It's not as dark and foreboding as the Dark Knight side of the comic spectrum, but it's leaps and bounds more serious than a lot of comic-related shows or movies. That said, I will readily admit that I don't always like my comic shows serious; the lighthearted-yet-earnest approach to The Flash this past season totally worked for me as well. I could go on and on about comic media and how I might be getting burned out on comic movies and how knowing a studio's multi-year release schedule is taking the surprise out of things for me (TLDR-version: I'm currently more excited for DC than Marvel just because I don't know what to expect). But my kid wants me to play with her, so I'm wrapping this up.

Oh, two more things: today I'm wearing this awesome She-Ra shirt, which I love. I've already gotten compliments on it when I went out shopping.

And finally: HOORAY FOR MARRIAGE EQUALITY!!! I couldn't be more pleased. Love love love love love.

Next weekend we're having a Christmas party. I don't really think we're prepared. All of the decorations are up (save for my big china nativity) but the house needs major cleaning. I'm not sure what all food we're serving. I'm not even sure how many people are coming. This year's turnout looks to be pretty small, but that might actually make it a little easier.

My daughter is being a typical 3-year-old PITA. She won't eat her lunch, she won't take a nap, she won't follow directions. We were going to take her to the zoo this afternoon for their holiday light display, but she was being such a pain that we're not going any more. She tried to tell me that MDR was excited to go to the zoo. Nice try, kid. We're still not going because you're not being good. I know she's acting this way because she's tired and needs a nap. But if she'd only go to sleep instead of fighting us, perhaps then we might actually go. So it's her fault if it doesn't happen. Tough luck, kid.

I'm tired. This week has been hard because I've been sick since what, Tuesday? Major sinus congestion, coughing, sneezing, etc. ( Cut for gross stuff. ) So now I'm feeling better, which is good. My voice is still a bit goofy from too much coughing and I'm still congested, but I don't feel as if I'm going to collapse any longer, so that's good. The Scientist caught it as well, though he bounced back much faster than I did. Anyway, it's been a long week and this coming week won't be much better because of trying to get the house ready for the party. At least I can breathe now.

What else is going on? I saw Mockingjay Part 1 last week. I thought it was good. But I agree with every person who said this film consisted of middle, middle, and middle instead of a beginning, middle, and end. The entire film is setup for Part 2. If I hadn't read the books, I'd probably be pissed by this film. I also finally saw Edge of Tomorrow, or as they're now calling it on the Blu-Ray packaging, Live, Die, Repeat. Frankly, that title probably would have brought more people into the theater. I mean, come on, who doesn't want to watch a movie where Tom Cruise gets killed again and again and again? Especially when a bunch of those times are Emily Blunt putting a bullet directly in his head? But it's a good movie and I'd definitely recommend it. It's like Groundhog Day with aliens.

Anyway, that's life here. I hope you're all well.

LOL! The cat just popped a balloon accidentally. That was hilarious. Stupid cat.

About two hours ago we got back from a quick trip to see my parents. We figured if we didn't go to visit them soon, we may not have a chance to go until the baby arrives. Due to major traffic issues, we didn't leave until after 8 on Friday night, and we left late this morning to beat the traffic/construction issues back home. It was a really nice visit with my parents and VEE seemed to have a good time. So now we're home and I'm trying to figure out what needs to be done around the house.

VEE's "big girl bed" has been ordered and will be ready for pickup on Tuesday. That means I have to move more stuff from her bedroom to the playroom. In the meantime, there's a bunch of stuff in the playroom that needs to go... somewhere. The front side of the crib is here and will need to go back on (we converted it down to a toddler bed for VEE), there's a fold-down table that we're going to try to sell on Craigslist, and two chairs (one wooden, one a plush desk chair) that also need to go. Where is this stuff going to fit? Oy vey. We have too much stuff.

And then there's all my music. I need to get rid of my CD collection. Perhaps I'll try ripping a lot of the music to the computer and then see if Disc Replay will buy any of this stuff. Hey, any money is good money, right? Well, not blood money, but you know what I mean.

I need to get back to work. And we need to go shopping. And I need to get gas. Man, there's just not enough time in the day. Or not enough time in the days off.

Oh, in other news, I saw Guardians of the Galaxy on Wednesday night and totally loved it. Just too much fun. And Chris Pratt really is like a human version of a golden retriever. You just want to ruffle his hair and feed him treats and rub his belly. And Groot! OMG, Groot is the best. ::draws hearts:: Who knew a sentient tree-being with a three-word vocabulary would steal the show? Fabulous.

I figured it's about time for a real update, so here I am.

I am officially in my third trimester of pregnancy. It feels very strange to have physical limitations due to my belly. It's getting hard to bend certain ways, I lose my balance putting on pants while standing up, and picking things up off the floor is a pain. Lord help me if I actually sit on the floor. Getting up from that low is not graceful at all (as if I ever were graceful?). But my nesting instincts are starting to kick in. I want to get the house prepared. Next week aj's parents are coming to take the bed from our guest room, and then I'll be able to turn it into the playroom. All of the toys and books from VEE's bedroom will move in there and then we'll have to get her a bed of her own and put the crib back together before the baby arrives. Last weekend we went to IKEA and we got VEE this duvet for when she gets her big-girl bed. I think the Scientist thinks I'm nuts for buying bedding for a bed that doesn't exist yet, but it's one more thing I can mentally check off my list of stuff to do before the baby comes.

My sister will be in town next weekend with her family, which will be great. I can't remember the last time I saw all of them. We Skype occasionally, but not enough. VEE is so excited to see her cousins in person. yakgirl will be bringing us boxes of baby clothes from when her boys were little, so with the bed gone from the guest room I'll have a place to store them temporarily. The Scientist is going to repaint/refurbish a dresser that we got off Craigslist which will go into the kids' room and will hold all of VEE's stuff. Then the baby's clothes will go in the big dresser that we're currently using. I have three boxes of baby clothes that I'll be giving to fava_bean for her daughter, so that's more stuff that will be gone from our house. Phew!

Otherwise things are going well. This summer has been really nice, outside of the PLAGUE OF MOSQUITOES we have near my house. Honestly, I don't remember when they've been this numerous. I got bit on my face, right by my eyes. Not good, mosquitoes, not good! But otherwise it's been a nice summer. Uncommonly mild lately, which means no trips to the pool. Ah well. This weekend is another pool party, so we'll see if we can win another prize. Heh. There haven't been many zoo trips lately, but we'll be going with yakgirl and her clan in a few weeks, as well as again in August for a member breakfast.

One thing that's stunk about this summer is a distinct lack of movies I'm interested in seeing. We saw How to Train Your Dragon 2 a few weeks ago, and that's been about it. I have zero interest in Transformers 4, Dinobots or not. Though I feel badly for the Scientist, as he wanted to go. I thought he'd go see it with his brother, but they weren't able to find a time to go together. I've heard good things about the new Planet of the Apes movie (directed by the Felicity guy who's not JJ Abrams!), but I never saw the first so there you are. Right now Guardians of the Galaxy is the movie I'm most looking forward to seeing, specifically because I have no freaking clue what to expect and it looks totally whacked out and cracktastic. And I'm all for Hollywood making movies that aren't the usual cookie-cutter, by-the-books films that we've been seeing so much of lately. So yes, please give me a movie with a talking raccoon and a walking tree and green Zoe Saldana and Bright Abbott from Everwood looking like a DGAF antihero in space. YES. I am all over that, because it's NUTS.

Man, I'm rambling.

That's really all I've got. I hope you're all doing well.

I honestly can't tell you how glad I am that spring is finally here. To say this winter was brutal is an understatement. Even for us tough Chicagoans who view winter as a yearly "character growth" opportunity had it with this winter. So I cannot begin to tell you how wonderful it was to have a few days where it was warm enough for short sleeves and no jacket. Hooray! Of course, a cold front blew in early this afternoon and it's been raining ever since, but after all "April showers bring May flowers." And our flowers are starting to come up, which makes me very happy.

Things have been good around here. VEE has thoroughly enjoyed the past few weekends. First there was an Easter Bunny visit and egg hunt/free-for-all at church last weekend. She dressed up in a pretty navy blue with flowers dress of her own choosing and then wore her bunny eared headband. Then this weekend was the Easter Bunny party at our association clubhouse, to which she wore a yellow dress with flowers and her bunny ears again. Both times the Easter Bunny was very excited to see another child with pointy ears, which made VEE very pleased with herself. Next weekend there's yet another egg hunt (sponsored by our local Lions Club) and then Easter itself. Hopefully she won't fuss about wearing her pink smocked dress on Easter Sunday, as it has a matching pink hat that her grandparents gave to her. We'll see.

Yesterday we also went to the zoo again. It was lovely weather; sunny and warm but with a nice breeze to keep anyone from getting hot. I'm sure the crowd was crazy earlier since the weather was so good. Thankfully we didn't get there until nearly 2:30, so a lot of people had already left. VEE was very happy to see her beloved clownfish in the "seas" exhibit.

Today I met with an old high school friend for brunch. She only lives a mile away, but she's always insanely busy so we only see each other about once per year. It turns out she's also a zoo member, so we may end up doing a zoo trip with her now and again. That would be nice.

What else is going on... Work is bonkers, but I'd rather not talk about that.

I'm finally starting to show, pregnancy-wise. As of yesterday I put on my big-paneled pregnancy jeans (so comfortable, OMG) and a maternity shirt, and my belly's definitely changing. I feel much firmer than before, which is weird. Tomorrow I go to the doctor for a check-up and to get the results of the genetic testing (looking for trisomy 13, 18, and 21, aka Down Syndrome). Hopefully all will be well there. I may finally be feeling better, otherwise. I'm able to eat more, which is good seeing as how I was basically eating cereal and juice in the morning, snacking on fruit during the day, eating a small lunch, and then barely choking down a few bites of dinner. Thank God the first trimester is over. TERRIBLE.

So yeah, that's the news around here. Oh, and I saw Captain America: Winter Soldier and loved it. I wanted to go see Noah and Divergent, though I never got around to either of those.

Now I have to go out and try to find new shoes for work. I just want a pair of nice, comfortable day-to-day shoes. It seems all they sell out there these days are flats and wedges. I want neither. Why won't loafers come back into style? Even the name is applicable to my lifestyle: loafer. Oh well.

The kid woke up about a half hour ago, calling for me. I found her half-asleep, running from room to room and asking to sleep with us. She was still asleep enough that I had to physically lead her around because while she could make it through doorways, she wasn't recognizing what room she was actually in. And now I'm wide awake. Boooooooo.

Yesterday was my sister-in-law J's birthday celebration. We went out for all-you-can-eat sushi at this place she loves. Holy good God, it was the slowest service I've had at a sushi place in ages. It took us 2 hours and 45 minutes to be properly fed. They'd bring out one roll for the group of us, then we'd wait 20 minutes for the next one. Ugh. I'm never going THERE again. After that it was off to Lynfred Winery, where she's a member. We got a few bottles of wine for the group of us and then went to the members' tasting room, which I'd never been in before. I hope to never go there again, because it's a tiny room with no soundproofing and we were all shouting to hear one another. It was like being in a bar. That said, the company and the wine was good. We ended up buying only one bottle for ourselves. After that was a screening of American Hustle, which the Scientist isn't interested in seeing. So he stayed home with VEE while I went to the movies with J and all of her friends. It was a good movie. Best movie of the year? I don't know about that, but it was certainly good and entertaining. I spent a lot of time wondering how much double-stick tape was applied to Amy Adams' breasts to keep her shirts from falling open and exposing her. Anyway, despite my griping about the slow sushi service and the loud winery, I had a good time yesterday.

As for today, I have no idea what we're up to. Frankly, we should stay home and clean the house. I'd like to get a little shopping done for myself. But at the same time, it's supposed to get up to 42° today, so we COULD take the kid to the zoo for the first time in a month. She's been craving a zoo trip for weeks now. Oh, I just remembered that we're supposed to Skype with yakgirl and her family today. Perhaps we won't go the zoo... I dunno. I should to some laundry and try to clean up the house a bit.

Anyway, that's really all I've got. Sorry I'm dull this morning.

Tonight my sister-in-law J came over to watch The Sound of Music live on TV. I was expecting Carrie Underwood to crash and burn in a spectacular fashion. Honestly, she really wasn't bad at the singing. (My sister and I were texting throughout, and on the "Lonely Goatherd" song I said Carrie was doing quite well. yakgirl replied something like "Of course she is -- it's yodeling." HA!) Of course, everyone else acted circles around poor Carrie. She was high school drama club acting while everyone else was legit acting. Even Bill Moyer came out looking better than poor Carrie, who was just so WOODEN. (Let us not even compare the singing of Audra McDonald or the woman who played Elsa Schrader to the others, as they were far superior. Audra especially -- get it? Har har har.) That said, I must applaud Carrie on trying to even do this in the first place. It's a thankless job to take on such an iconic role as one made famous by Julie Andrews, it's hard to do live productions when you're not an actor, and it's got to be completely nerve-wracking knowing that it's broadcast to every TV in America and everyone watching is just waiting for you to fail. So A for effort, Carrie. C- on acting, but a solid B to B+ on the singing itself. Everyone else, though, was really quite good. And HOORAY for keeping in the Max and Elsa songs! That makes me happy.

Other media-related things that make me happy: Catching Fire. The Scientist and I went to go see it last night, and hot damn if that isn't one hell of a good movie. I thought they did a really, really good job keeping to the book. The casting was fantastic, the effects were great, and even though I knew what was coming and who was going to get it, the movie still kept me on the edge of my seat. The Scientist hasn't read the books, but he came out of this one with far, far fewer questions than he did the first. (In fact, I think he came out with zero questions. He said he was going to ask me about something afterward, and when I queried him after the movie was over he said he'd figured it out.) Jennifer Lawrence came off as rather wooden in the first movie, but here I think she embodied Katniss much more than before. However, that might also be because I've seen so much more of Jennifer on TV acting like a complete screwball, so when she buckles down to be all intense as Katniss it's much more obvious that she's actually acting and not just being one-note. Katniss is, IMO, much more complicated in the second book/movie than she is in the first. I'm really looking forward to what they're going to do with Mockingjay, but I have no idea how they can translate the book to film without an R rating. That will be interesting.

In other news, my Christmas tree is complete. Hooray!

And changing topics completely, I find I'm quite shocked about Nelson Mandela's death. They guy was 95 and in failing health; it was going to happen sooner or later. But it's still sad to see such an important figure pass on. I hope others remember how committed he was to ensuring equality and try to continue stopping bigotry and repression when they see it.

I just read in EW that the 20th anniversary edition of The Nightmare Before Christmas has been released. TWENTY YEARS?!?!? It's been TWENTY YEARS? Hot damn, I suddenly feel really old.

So everyone is freaking out that Ben Affleck has been cast as Batman in the new "Superman vs. Batman" movie. OK, I get the concern, but really people, do you have to be so MEAN? Especially you, Richard Dreyfuss. I assume he read for Alfred. Talking smack publicly about your potential costar is just shitty, and sorry but you haven't done crap in years. At least Affleck has Oscar-winning films under his belt within the past decade.

Sure, Affleck screwed the pooch on "Daredevil." Just because he had one bad superhero movie doesn't mean they all will be. Remember how everyone loved Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool, and then "The Green Lantern" sucked? Besides, look at Affleck's recent acting gigs: "The Town" and "Argo" were fine, if not good performances. Sure, he directed himself in those, but he was actually REALLY good in "Hollywoodland." I'd be more concerned with the director & screenwriter. You can't make a good movie from a bad screenplay or if there's an idiot at the helm.

And finally, remember way back when Michael Keaton was cast as Batman in the very first movie? No one thought he'd be good, and looked how that turned out.

In summation: the fanboys should stop wetting themselves, amd they certainly shouldn't be so rude. I know that's the usual Internet fanboy M.O., but COME ON.