Tiny Flags

I have to confess: I am totally addicted to checking out the Feedjit icon on the blog, it's almost better than chocolate or shopping. Five months after I installed it, it still gives me a shiver of absolute happiness to see more flags (for the US readers) or new flags from other countries. Though I did spend time mulling over why someone in Qatar, Greece and even Canada would drop by for even a quick read and how they found my little corner of the blog-o-sphere. But don't misudnerstand, I am happy they did and by leaving their electronic footprint (and flag) on the Feedjit map; it makes me feel like I've won the lottery.

And now this morning, two enormous surprises: Kazakhstan and China. Thank you whoever you are for dropping in, hope I didn't bore you to tears and please come back anytime.

If you're in the mood for a laugh, find a video clip of Eddie Izzard's comedy bit on flags (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTduy7Qkvk8), he's one of my favorite comedians - and the way things have been going with our plans to send Micah to Summit Speech School, I might need to go in search of a laugh for myself.

And it just gets worse. . .

Today was Micah's transition day at Summit Speech School. He spent time in his classroom with Heather and the two children he will be grouped with. We arrived at school on time (for a change), Micah got to go with the school nurse to label his cot and see where he'll be having naps. I brought one of the hearing aid dehumidifiers and a blanket/pillow bedroll that Oma bought him last November at the National Lutheran Home Fall Festival.

While Micah was checking things out in the nap room I told the nurse and the school's executive director who also just happened to be in the room about our situation with Micah's transportation. Their faces just fell, even before they could get the Oh-Nos out of their mouths, I knew that this was worse than I had anticipated, and simply not an appropriate means of getting Micah to school.

That was bad enough. At noon the school district's case manager calls and leaves a message on our answering machine. There was a 'situation' on the bus - but no word on if it was specifically the one Micah would be riding or the details of what occured - and they now are rethinking how to get Micah to school (excellent) but they cannot get any new arrangements made by Monday (bad, especially since we've worked preparing him for his birthday and starting school for the past two weeks).

So this leaves us with me transporting Micah Monday, possibly sending him back to the babysitter's on Tuesday and me driving again on Wednesday. Summit School was very accomodating with this new development. Micah's sitter can take him Tuesday for most of the day, I'll need to cancel work on Wednesday if a schedule was put in for that date. The logistical domino effect just keeps clicking away, and what is irritating about it is that they have had more than adequate time to make appropriate arrangements. This was not one of those 'the IEP was signed yesterday and now the logistics need to be worked out.'

I won't even begin to whine about having made three trips to school in the past three days (one Wednesday, two today). That would be whining and I never do that. Ever.

Then in a further development we ran into the family of another child from the township who went to Summit School, who went through a similar situation with the transportation - and the child's mother said "oh, they tell you the others on the bus are eight to 13 years old, but they've been that age for three years or more"; most are adolescents or older, some have to be restrained (read: not just with a simple seat belt) on the bus and moan and cry for the whole hour's trip to school. Oh perfect. Not exactly the greatest role models for an impressionable three-year old.

So I have gone from we can give this a trial period and see how it goes to NOT MY CHILD. FIX IT. NOW.

This parent also told me that another township family retain the services of an attorney - so just when I thought we could forget about needing the special education advocate, the possibility of having to go that route is rearing its ugly head and aiming its fingers toward our wallets.

On the up side of this rather dismal day, I got some long over due errands done: returning a shirt that was purchased in a fit of 60s nostalgia that was just tragic once it was put on, getting Micah's birthday check from Oma into the bank as well as the contents of Thea's piggybank (so much for that vow that we'd empty it monthly this is the first time since December, I think), mailing off bills, picking up some pants at Target for Micah because all of his 2Ts are looking like capris on him.

Amidst our errands I wanted to go to Toys-R-Us to pick up a present for Thea to take to a birthday party tomorrow - and Micah has been nagging, nagging, nagging for Mavis, one of Thomas the Tank Engine's pals, so after returning the tragic blouse to Bridgewater Commons, I asked the GPS to find one.

And it did. It sent me to the Corporate Distribution Center in the middle of an industrial park in Somerset. So in addition to the school district's transportation department, the Garmin Nuvi is currently occupying a rather prominent spot on my sh*t list.

In between trips to Summit School, we had to return home for Micah's last session with the speech therapist. She brought Micah a really nice Thomas the Tank Engine puzzle, 24 very large pieces that he enjoyed playing with and talking about. Then we picked up Thea at school and went off to the bank - we bank at TD Bank not for its sound fiscal guardianship of the children's money, but because they have nice lollipops. They spent at least five minutes in the bathroom mirror admiring their green tongues and teeth before I made them brush and get ready to go out.

Tonight was Summit School's Family Fun Night. We went last year, and they seemed to have a good time, so I paid for us to attend at one of the Wednesday group sessions. We arrived on time, so we could explore, purchase tickets for the basket raffle (we won nothing), have some hot dogs and junk food. Thea loved the clown/magic show last year - and this year she was right in the front row, heckling the clown when he was trying to fool the audience.

We met a Summit alum who was on American Gladiator (though I am clueless as to what the show is exactly about) and went to a puppet show before settling in for the magic show. Micah's gastrointestinal tract chose this moment to blow; I got a whiff and when I lifted his shirt, the contents of his diaper were at the top of the diaper ready to go up his back. Ick, ick and double ick. And I had just used to diaper I had in my purse to change him when we got to school. So I had to hustle him out to the parking lot to do a major clean up.

So all in all this was a totally karm-less day.

Suboptimal

The school district's transportation department will not be making it onto our family's holiday card list. We did get a call on Thursday, but Micah will be riding a van with a driver and an aide AND four children ages eight to 13 with development disabilities.

(Read in my mommy subtext: four children who are at least twice as big as my little peanut, and whose behavior could be questionable. With a three-year old strapped in a car seat like a turkey on a platter - if the turkey could wear $8K of microelectronics on its missing head.)

I am NOT pleased. And when Steve called the transportation person, even she admitted that this was not the ideal situation, but it's what was available. . . .and she tried to sugar-coat it by telling him that the bus driver and the aide have been working together for nine years, as if that would somehow make it fine. "Your child is being put on a van with a bunch of behavioral unknowns, but the warden and the guard of this little rolling prison work well together"-type stuff. Bite me.

I am at a loss as to what to do: Allow it to go forward and see how the first day goes? Raise hell and wind up with no transportation? If he does go on the van Monday, my car is going to be fired up and ready to go and I'll be driving as if attached to its tailpipe by an umbilical cord.

Top Chef

A topic that is a complete detour from the usual stuff about kids, preschool, whining (though not really), etc.

I hope Carla wins Top Chef tonight. I was royally pissed last week when Fabio got bumped off and Stefan went to the final. Too arrogant, too annoying - and he smokes, a real pet peeve of mine. How can he even get the nuances and subtleties of his cooking with a nice coating of nicotine on his tongue?

Carla's from Washington, DC (yeah!), she became a chef as a midlife career change (let's hear it for those too!) and she's consistently kind yet competitive.

If Stefan wins tonight, I am boycotting the next season of Top Chef, hear me now Tom and Padma.

The last week of almost three. . .

Sunday the wee beasties and I drove to Easton, PA to visit the Crayola Factory and National Canal Museum again. The day started grey and rainy, so it was a good day to get out of the house and avoid all the tidying up it so desperately needs. The kids had a great time with the various art projects - the model magic clay was probably the biggest hit this time. I liked the triarama (a triangular diarama).

Micah got his sleeves thoroughly soaked pushing his canal boat through the locks at the Canal Museum. The upper floor was closed off so the display where the flow of water can be manipulated by putting up various walls and dividers wasn't accessible, which was a bit disappointment.

Overall they were really good, with Micah only pitching a fit once when I wouldn't buy him this hideous stuffed cow. He had to be hauled out screaming, "Want cow, I want cow!" I wasn't going to buy it mostly because the evil clerk said she was closing the shop and it was only 4:50 pm (closing time was listed as 5 pm). We went to the Crayola Store to see the world's largest crayon, blue - Thea's favorite color and with a 'birthday' two days before hers, October 11, 2003.

Monday night I called our case manager at the school district with the "I know the transportation office has done this plenty of times, but this is my first and only preschooler who is supposed to be going to school on Monday and I haven't heard anything about how this will happen" routine. Got the polite phone call back, someone will call on Thursday or Friday, but she did leave the name of the person to contact, so she will be getting the same version of Monday night's phone call. I don't mean to be a jerk, but until proven otherwise and worthy of my respect, I am not giving my trust to these wienies on spec.

Two has been relatively easy, but the early stages of three are going to prove life-threatening for one of us. Micah's become much more stubborn, willful and naughtier - he hears better than ever but isn't doing a great job listening.

Saturday

Today was the get-together for our first adoption travel group: five families from the original 13 who went to ChongQing together, plus two more families in the area who arrived in Guangzhou to start the in-province portion the night we arrived for our US Consulate processing week.

(I should did out the email I sent to friends and family about that night in September 2004: our adopton agency in its selfish desires to minimize trips to the airport, scheduled both groups to arrive at approximately the same time - the late-ish hour wasn't a big deal for the group arriving from Beijing and who would be in Guangzhou for their entire trip, but we had 13 babies in our group. Thea had screamed and howled for almost the entire flight from ChongQing to Guangzhou. Steve was in nervous parent mode so he wanted her safely confined to the car seat, I wanted her in my lap to see if that would settle her down. Whether it was the cabin pressure's effect on her ears, confinement to the car seat that could be used in an airline seat or just general irritation at her lot in life. Everyone on that flight knew us by the time we got off the plane. By the time we got our luggage, were bussed to the White Swan Hotel, got in to our rooms, it was really, really late, and we had to be up and ready to go for visa photos at 8 am.)

The girls are all five years old, three are in kindergarten. They all have changed so much since September 2004. Micah was the sole boy as the one family with a son wasn't able to make it. It didn't seem to phase him much, and he was in the mix and enjoying himself - and he didn't color on the walls or make any other horrific messes. Bonus.

We see these families once or twice a year, yet each time we all do get together we seem to just pick up where we left off. Photos to follow at some point.

Micah is repeating after the GPS, on those increasingly rare occaisons when I have the mute off. The GPS says, "Turn right," then the voice comes from the back seat, "Turn right." So far he hasn't managed to say, "Arriving at destination," though.

Keeping charged up. . . .

I feel like I have become a servant to my gadgets, each with its own charger: the bluetooth headset and its charger/case was out in the car,buried under stuff on my front seat, the charger cord in my backpack; the GPS at the moment only has the car charger - which made it a challenge when Thea wanted her DVD player's charger plugged in to watch movies on the way to Oma's last weekend but one day it may have its own wall charger; the cell phone in my purse, charger upstairs on my dresser in the GPS's box (don't ask), the PDA with its cradle on the computer. And the camera has its charger, and its batteries have a charger as well. Right now, after a ten-minute traipse through the house and out to the car to play the technology matching game, all my elecctronic children are plugged into their chargers.

One day I'd love to have the cell phone, GPS and PDA all in one versus the current juggling act.

Meanwhile, I've got to get the ingredients to bake Nestle Tollhouse cookies for our adoption group gathering tomorrow so it doesn't become a midnight baking project.

Done. . . .

The IEP has been signed and hand-delivered to the CST office at Orchard Hill Elementary School. Unfortunately, the IEP got rained and snowed on in transit from the car to the office. Since we arrived at the school around 2:45 pm, the front of the school (and all the parking close to the entrance) was restricted to school buses only. So Micah and I had to break out the umbrella and walk the length of the building to the entrance, IEP in hand, hence the soggy document we turned over to the CST secretary.

Done. Finished. Minor sensation of good triumphing over evil. Impending feeling that we will be using the word 'transition' in past tense soon, as in we have transitioned to preschool.

So now, will someone from the school district's transportation office please call me? I would like to know the whos and hows of Micah's getting to school, and since we had to be fingerprinted multiple times, scrutinized and interviewed to become his parents, I want to know that the persons accompanying him to/from preschool have undergone the same type of microscopic examination.

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Today was Micah's next-to-last session at Summit School. It was a day for the parents to observe the kids from behind the one-way mirrors, so I took a minute to stop by the school nurse's office to hand in all the forms that she had given to me over the past two weeks. She uses an incremental approach to giving out the forms 'so as not to overwhelm' new parents. I would recommend getting a read on the parent and then deciding; I would definitely prefer to have been given every last thing I had to read or fill out in one serving.

After completing my sacrifice to the gods of bureaucracy and on the way to the observation room, I met the principal in the hallway. He offered to have Micah visit the classroom he'll be joining for a short period while we were there today. So Micah missed out on finishing the project on textures to go to Miss Heather's room for her session with Ava and Tom. After doing such a good job separating from me the day of his interview, he seemed to want me to stick around.

Because Micah's IEP paperwork is complete, the principal offered that Micah can come visit his class a few times before he actually starts school on March 2nd. Now I need to find the time in the schedule to squeeze that in - and email the teacher to find out what times work for her schedule.

GPS Update: Today we dropped Thea off at YingHua, and since I'd put in Summit School's address, I decided to let the GPS plan the route. Bad idea, bad, bad, bad. I have a route that I'm used to (206 to I-287 to I-78). That thing had me taking 27 to a bunch of po-dunk roads to 22 and on up. The only good thing was there was a D-n-D with a drive-thru and the request for an extra light coffee came out just right - though it was miles beyond where I would have normally stopped. And driving up Route 22 and seeing signs that we were 14 miles from Newark was not terribly helpful, I'd rather NOT know how far of a trek it is.

We're back. . . .

Another too short, but fun weekend with Oma.

Thea lost her fourth tooth Monday afternoon, just as we were finished walking Chelsea - my mother's neighbor's Boston terrier. Today was animal day: the kids got to pet Peanut, my mother's friend's cat and then we went to feed peppermints to her neighbor's horses. Thea's been doing this for a couple of years, so she's ok with letting the horses slurp the mint out of her hand, Micah was not game for it last time we visited, but this time he tried it once. He was not pleased with the giant horse lips, slimy tongue and big teeth, so he let Thea and Gertrude to the remainder of the mints.

My mother was exhausted by Micah's constant chatter - which is both funny and wonderful considering he had maybe about 30 words this time last year. We were driving back from Richmond on Sunday and she made the comment, "Does he ever SHUT UP?" And as much as I would like some quiet time, I hope he never does. Micah was consistently banging out seven to nine word sentences (I was counting.)

Thanks to the Presidents' Day sale at Kohl's and Oma's plastic, Micah got a new Thomas the Tank Engine shirt and is happy as a clam. The two choices for getting him dressed in the morning are 'puppy dog shirt' or 'choo-choo shirt.' He loves trains, trains, trains, of any sort. And he has a sense of humor about it: when we read his Thomas the Tank Engine book 'On the Track, There and Back there is a line in it that says, "I'm off to the station, a route I know well; To pick up Annie and Clarabel," which he now substitutes Grandma and Oma in place of the coaches' names. I don't know how Oma or Grandma would feel about this development.

Anyway, that's the fast and dirty. I'm happy to be back home; the Coleman air mattress that I use Mom's may have sprung a tiny leak. What started out as a nice firm air mattress each night deflated to a squishy blob by morning, and I'm too old and creaky to be sleeping on a floor.

Hitting the road. . . .

. . .I'm paroling Thea from school at around 1 pm, if the packing is done and the car is loaded. After a quick stop at the post office (why does one of my half.com books always sell on days like today?), we're heading south, to Oma's.

This will be the second Valentine's Day Thea's been away from home, the first was when my mother had knee replacement surgery when Thea was two, Micah's first. Of course he's pretty oblivious to the whole idea of Valentine's Day. Thea made up her cards for her classmates, the upper graders and her teachers last night, and she actually seemed to be thoughtful in her choices of which card and lollipop for which person.

Micah had a great session with his speech therapist today. She had a card game of sorts focusing on the word 'where' - where does the pillow go? on the bed, where do we go shopping? at the store. I was amazed at how quickly he paired the cards up while saying something appropriate about it. It's really great to watch him when he's on his game and being cooperative.

I tried the GPS out on the way home. After the trip down to work when it was barking at me in Dutch or Danish, I tossed it at one of the medical assistants (who've all had Garmins or TomToms forever) and asked her to make the damn thing speak English or show me the mute button. Being bossed around in harsh Teutonic tones is not the way to start the day, at least not without a nice cup of coffee to soothe one's nerves.

Since the GPS has a mind of its own about how I should go home, and I have my own ideas, we had a chorus of "Recalculating. . ." interrupting NPR, followed by Micah hollering, "Too noisy" from the back seat."

Back to organizing and packing. Happy Valentine's Day, back on Monday night.

Mid-Week Update

Steve went with us for his first visit to Summit School. Micah was excited to have his Daddy along for the ride and going to school, but I think he was under the impression that Daddy was going with him into his classroom. (The routine is that we walk to the room together, I open the door, Micah usually runs in to be with his friends without so much as a backwards glance and I shut the door and go to the parents' meeting.) He looked back a little bit this time so maybe he thought Daddy was going to be coming along (a show-and-tell Daddy? a fellow preschooler?)

Then after meeting the other parents, the preschool principal came in and gave a short talk on the preschool and transition (now that Micah's got his spot at Summit, I sort of spent some of the time arranging my mental sock drawer) and then we went on the tour of the preschool rooms. I did find out that Micah's room is for children with slightly more language than the first room we saw on the tour; his room is small - it looks like a converted small group observation room and uses the Discovery Room as its base of operation/home room.

The good thing is I think Steve really, really sees why we would send a three-year old on an hourlong drive to/from this particular school. I think he did before the visit, but seeing the students and the teachers in action really brought it to life.

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No call from the school district transportation office, yet. Please call, leave a message.

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There are many ways to say, "I love you." My favorite at the moment is, "Mommy, I want to pee on the potty." Followed by the sound of feet barrelling down the hall, the potty seat being slammed onto the toilet seat and pants being dropped in anticpation of Mommy finally catching up and slinging his naked behind onto the seat, and for the grand finale, the sound of liquid tinkling into the toilet bowl. The night time pee-before-bedtime streak was broken, not by the little man, but his father who neglected to offer Micah the use of the throne.

Of course the same wonderful kid who did that about twenty minutes ago just dropped a large brown monster into his Cars pull-up moments ago, so we're having a love-hate relationship with putting our waste products in the proper place.

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Sometimes Steve does good. I've been wanting for a GPS unit for my car, for months and months. But I've not been able to make a commitment - one of the medical assistants at work even had a pink Garmin she was wanting to unload for less than its cost. I wanted it, it was cheap, I wanted it bad, but I couldn't get my brain around that girly-girly pink. High-tech in a cotton candy package just doesn't cut it with me.

So tonight Steve walks in the door carrying something behind his back, a Garmin Nuvi 260

And it was NOT pink. Another way to say, "I love you." He totally rocked it for Valentine's Day. And I was going to put a link to the CNN opinion piece written by a man who thinks we should ditch Valentine's Day as an artificial, retail greed inspired holiday. Maybe next year. I want my GPS Valentine and I'm not giving it up. I'll take gadgetry over roses any day, every day. Now I just need a clue as to what to do for him, especially since the GPS, the children and I are driving down to Maryland on Friday and he's going to be by himself for the weekend. Perhaps that in itself is a gift, he gets three days of sleeping in without his little human alarm clock, three days of freedom from, "Watch Thomas Train!" two seconds after awakening.

Micah's PPD is placed. . .

. . .I had to take my big girl pill to get Micah's Mantoux test placed. It involves taking 0.1 cc of tuberculin purified protein derivative (PPD) and injecting it subdermally in the forearm, raising a little bleb. The babysitter dropped him off and I recruited one of the medical assistants and one of the front desk staff to do holding down part, and I agreed to do the deed. Every one loves the little stinker, so no one wants to be the mean person wielding the needle.

Unfortunately the MA was taking care of patients, so Earla and Mike, the husband of our assistant office manager who was at the office to finish painting, got roped into the job, Mike holding Micah on his lap and Earla holding Micah's forearm.

I actually stuck a needle into my little boy's flesh. I could have never done it to Thea (though now that I've done it to Micah, I could probably place hers.) Micah didn't cry but he had this sad, crestfallen look of "but Mommy, why?" a la Cindy Lou Who in How the Grinch Stole Christmas. The quivering lip just about did me in. Then he had another roll of Smartees from the medical assistants' snack stash and he promptly got over it. Ah, the curative powers of simple sugar with artificial colorings and flavorings.

And as of Wednesday morning, nothing's happening at the injection site. No redness, no induration, nada. 24 hours more before it can be read.

Final Lunar New Year post, for this year at least

The last bows at the January 31, 2009 YingHua Day School Lunar New Year Celebration. (Thea's in the gold outfit, on the left side.)

And if I haven't completely run this topic into the ground, here's the video of the recycled/green fashion show:

A Sunday of Nothing Much Going On

Steve and kids are off visiting Grandma, I'm on call - but managed to run out to the Speedy Mart for a New York Times without my cell phone, and since Speedy Mart's NYT's did not have the Magazine and Book Review I had to hit the road for WaWa. Fortunately things stayed quiet while I was out stalking my crossword puzzle fix. I checked both the Caller ID and my cell phone once I got home, and then the answering service called around 2 pm with the best sort of call: "blah, blah, blah, blah. . . . .No call back needed."

Stan the Handyman is here. The overstuffed foyer closet's shelf and rod has developed a serious sag. He's worked his handyman magic on my closet and the one in Micah's room, so he's back in action again. It will be a good opportunity to sort all of the stuff we've managed to jam in there out, at least that's the optimist in me talking. The negative side is thinking, "Ugh, get a shovel and call a dumpster company." I'm in a purge, purge, purge mood. Clutter is the enemy.

The Wheels on the IEP Go 'Round and 'Round

The case manager at the school district called acknowledging receipt of Micah's letter of acceptance from Summit School. And to tell me to submit his immunization record to the school (already done on the day of his candidacy interview, but he needs a PPD placed.)

Next the transportation needs to be worked out, so that's the next phone call to wait for. . . .

Tomorrow Thea has another Lunar New Year performance with her school, this time in Plainsboro. It's beginning to feel like the Lunar New Year that won't go away. I'm working tomorrow and on-call all weekend. I caught a few really great breaks on Thursday in terms of no-shows so it probably means that tomorrow will be horrible in terms of patient volume.

One More Hurdle Cleared. . .

Micah and I went to Summit School Tuesday for his candidacy interview, and today when we were leaving school after group, Dr. Helfman (the principal) stopped me in the hall to say that Micah's acceptance letter was sent to the school district. He's going to be in Miss Heather's classroom with a former parent-infant group friend, Ava.

So now the school district has to accept the acceptance and do whatever paperwork that entails (which should follow as a matter of course since the district set up the candidacy interview for us) and the issues of getting the paperwork processed and signed in time so that his starting date would be right on his third birthday, then setting up the transportation to make that happen.

And I need to get a Mantoux test for him, which I am not looking forward to - Micah and Thea both had BCG while still in China so there is a chance their tuberculosis tests will produce false positives which will mean that both will need chest x-rays to clear them. Thea's school hasn't made an issue of it, and it's been almost five years since she received the BCG. For Micah it's been less than two years, so he's more likely to get the big welt on his arm.

And as we're on the road to preschool, we're also working on the potty training thing. He's three for three for sitting on the potty and delivering the goods at bedtime. I'm still clipping diaper and pull-ups coupons, but I am more hopeful than I once was that Micah might get through this milestone earlier than his sister did.

The Forgotten Lunar New Year Post

In all the hubbub over the BAHA incident, I didn't mention that we went to the Lunar New Year show/dinner put on by Thea's school. That was going to be the big post for the weekend until it was eclipsed by the brush with disaster. She did perform, and the full-length show featured a 'green' (recycled) fashion show put on by the kindergartners. It was really cute and the teacher put a lot of effort into teaching runway walking and vogue-ing poses. I'll try to put a video clip up later. Getting out of the auditorium and backstage to help her change from her Chinese costume and into her fashion show outfit was a challenge. Fortunately when it was time to change her back, the school maintenance man was in the hall and he had a key to the backstage door. Micah and Steve brought a rose to give her after the show and she was properly excited and asked it it was a real flower.

Micah enjoyed the show, too - and even managed to clap at the appropriate moments with no prompting from us.

After the show there was a dinner and in the cafeteria area there were several artists/vendors. Micah got a puppy dog hat cut from a white paper plate - to watch the artist do it was amazing, it took him seconds and as his scissors flew he did not lop off his own finger tips while quickly moving the paper. He also did a cameo of me - and in my mind I hope that's what I look like when I'm sixty, otherwise he sees me as a lumpy, dumpy old lady. Not flattering, stick to the paper cuts of animals.

Thea and I made little knotted dolls; I love the more complicated Chinese knots. Since we have a few as ornaments for our Christmas tree, I bought a goldfish knot to add to the collection.

Satan Invented Velcro. . . .A BAHA Tragicomedy

Yesterday was Superbowl Sunday, a day that pretty much passes unnoticed in my life. Other than the grocery aisles and checkouts were packed with more people than usual stocking up on quickly consumable carbohydrates and carbonated high fructose corn syrup laden beverages. If it were the Ravens playing, I'd be a little more interested, but then again just barely.

After I returned grocery shopping and unpacking, Steve got ready to go into work for a few hours. Thea and I had decided to assemble the easel/chalkboard that has been sitting in the foyer for more than a couple weeks. Micah was napping. Since Thea and I work well together we had more than 75% of the easel assembled by the time Steve woke Micah up and deposited him in his high chair (too many pieces still lying around, waiting to be screwed into the frame.)

Once our masterpiece was finished, I said that they could use the chalkboard side while I got dinner started. I am not dumb enough to leave a two year old and tempera paints under the supervision of a five year old. After drawing for a bit, they got bored and went into the costume box and got out the tiger masks. Micah whipped off his BAHAs' band and put it on the ottoman, I retrieved it long enough to turn the dials down to "0", but left it there and went back to chopping up the ingredients for chili.

Micah in the mask that started the whole thing off.

Steve returned for dinner and to watch the game and asked where the BAHAs were. On the ottoman. No BAHAs.

So the dining room table was checked since Micah has removed his band and put it there next to the dehumidifier containers. No BAHAs.

Meanwhile Thea is going about her dinner, completely unaffected by all of this.

I am getting fairly wound up because a) the BAHAs, now that there are two are worth about $8K, b) it was a year ago, but Micah has flushed a non-flushable object down the powder room toilet, and c) the laundry closet door is open and the washer was open (to stop the cycle and allow the whites to soak a bit since someone in the house who is not me decided to change the dial on the machine from cold/cold to warm/warm after depositing his fairly new, very dark jeans in with the load thus rendering all the whites in the load a pathetic shade of grey and necessitating a second wash to attempt to get the whites back to something closer to their original color), Micah's bunny bear got washed this week, and he loves watching the first few rounds of the agitator suck the bear down in the water.

The saving grace is that, unlike most times, Micah has not really been in the kitchen or the laundry closet, both he and Thea have been playing around the easel or in the middle of the living room.

Everything is checked: toy box, diaper bags, backpacks, toy bins, under furniture, in the cushions , the recycling bins, the garbage can, upstairs, and on and on and on.

Thea is still unfazed. "But what about my dessert?" Yes, it's all about you. I am ready to dump her strawberries and whip cream over her head.

How am I going to explain this to the audiologist? It's like the damn thing was beamed out of the house and onto an alien spacecraft.

The Super Bowel is on, no one is really watching.

Finally, after almost two hours of searching, it's time to get the children ready for bed, off to sleep and the search resumes.

The upside is that Thea's craft box got cleaned up and organized, the toy bins got cleaned up, a few things were found along the way and put in their proper places, but still no BAHAs.

I started dusting just to give myself a few minutes to think. I did the end table and the bookcase under the stairs. No brilliant ideas.

I get a chair and check on top of the TV armoire, never mind that I put Thea on my shouldes to look and then made Steve get on a chair to look again. Then I pulled the games and puzzles off the shelf above the TV and all the puzzles, the Leapster, and other junk from around the TV and start dusting. Swiffer rocks it as far as collecting large quantities of dust. While I'm putting stuff back and reorganizing a little bit, Steve comes over and points at my feet, where the Leapster is. My glasses are off at the moment, so it just looks like a black backpack strap. With a mesh BAHA band and two BAHAs attached.

Exactly WHAT happened will probably remain a mystery. What I do know is that Thea's Backyardigans Leapster cartridge was on the computer table, and I asked her to put it away. And I found it again in another location and asked her to put it away. Then when I checked and zipped the Leapster backpack, the cartridges were there, but no Leapsters. (She claimed they were in Steve's car.) On one of the first searches of the TV armoire, I found one of the Leapsters behind the TV, and put it in the back, but if the BAHAs were dangling from the Velcro, I failed to notice because I didn't pull the backpack out, I just stuffed the Leapster in while it was still in the armoire. When I pulled it out to dust, I just pulled and dumped stuff on the floor without scrutinizing it, I was looking for a mesh band with two little rectangular black boxes on it, not all of the above attached to a small backpack's Velcro strap.

BAHAs missing: 6:30 pm, BAHAs found: 12:30 am. Years off my life: 3-6.

Then, once order is restored, I'm packing up various cables and wires for Thea's Fisher-Price camera to stuff the container back behind the TV where it has languished for a couple of years. There are a few other cables for the Leapster so I dropped them all into the F-P camera's container. And just after I do this an eerie, deep voice emerges from the container reciting the alphabet. I kid you not.

I pull out everything from the container and it's a keychain burp/joke thing-y that Steve got as a gag gift at Christmas. The button pushed was supposed to be the voice of someone burping the ABCs. So not funny, and how it got into the camera container I haven't a clue. I should've taken a hammer to it.

Where are superheroes when you need them most?