musings of Mother Hood

Self-Awareness

Among my group of girlfriends at work, I’ve always secretly considered myself The Normal Friend. I didn’t really spend time dwelling on it, and I honestly never put it into words before now, but I always just assumed they all thought of me that way. We eat lunch together at least once a week, and after a few years of soaking up the lovable idiosyncrasies and quirks of these girls, I guess I built a false little sense of security that I was the normal one.

And last week, it all came crashing down.

Four of us were at one of our favorite local Mexican restaurants, sharing some queso and complaining about work. We all pretended to look at the menu even though we're all predictable enough we could order for each other. Our food came quickly, like always, and we settled into our normal lunchtime dance of talking about our kids, our bosses, and any new gossip.

"Could you please explain to me your method of eating a quesadilla?" Suddenly interrupted our exchange of nonsense.

I half-thought she must be talking to someone else at the table. But after a quick glance around the table to confirm that I was, indeed, the only one with a quesadilla, and a raise of the eyebrows as if to say, "who? me?" I realized I was suddenly the center of attention.

"I'm fascinated."

At this point, my friend Amanda put down her fork to better focus on my reaction to her pointed question. And the entire table had stopped to watch the scene unfold.

"It's like your skinnin' it."

I just sat there. Speechless. Didn't she know that I'm The Normal Friend? I don't get asked these questions. We HAVE that friend. The member of the group who consistently eats strange things by strange methods, and has no reservations about it. I am not that friend. So I just sat there, kinda stammering around. I think I was hoping she would smile, admit to joking, and we would move on with lunch.

But she just stared at me. Waiting for my answer.

"Please. Tell me. What's your plan, here?" Motioning to my plate.

I found voice enough to start defending myself. The words just kinda fell out of my mouth in a stream of barely coherent gibberish. I quickly explained how I didn't want to eat all the bread-not-covered-in-cheese, so I peeled the quesadilla apart and picked the insides out with a fork. The part of this process causing the commotion, I suppose, was that I systematically peeled each crescent of quesadilla apart, ate the insides and any necessary tortilla (so as not to waste any heavenly cheese), and then discarded the unwanted tortilla into a little pile of scraps on my plate.

This is the way I've eaten quesadillas since the beginning of time. And I'm sitting here - even now - wondering what in the world is the problem. I'm not a picky eater, and I don't have weird food aversions. And I don't insist on THIS restaurant or refuse to eat THERE. When it comes to food, I thought I had all the kinks worked out.

While I defended myself with an unrehearsed, poorly considered monologue, my friends all stared at me. And snickered. They knew they had me. And they went for the kill. I could barely eat the rest of my lovely quesadilla, knowing I would be studied and scrutinized until the check arrived. I stared confused at my plate, replaying the many, many lunches I have shared with these girls. Had they been watching me and wondering this whole time? I asked them - "how long has this been an issue?" They laughed. I tried to give them my "I'm The Normal Friend" theory. They laughed harder.

Is it possible I'm not as normal as I think I am?

fyi

Several people have asked so I thought I'd just give you the skinny.

You may have noticed there are a few new features on the blog these days. I've decided to cooperate as part of the Beta Team for TypePad, which means I get to try new stuff before it's widely available. Sometimes it's stuff I can use, sometimes not. But the most recent new stuff is Facebook-related -- and who can't use THAT?

So you'll notice two new buttons. One is in the upper right corner of this page, under the heading "become a fan". Fairly self-explanatory... but if you push the "like" button, it will turn blue and you will be a "fan" of musings of Mother Hood (AND my new best friend!). You only need to click it once -- or it will "unlike" and turn white. What this means to you: musings of Mother Hood will show up on your Facebook wall like so:

 

And you can share with all your FB friends how much you loooooooooove musings of Mother Hood. I know, right. You do not have to be "friends" with me to do this. It links directly back to this site - not a Facebook fan page. You only have to do this once, and you'll get my blog updates in your facebook window as well - in the form of a link.

Next!

At the end of each post, you'll notice a new button next to the "Tweet this!" button. Eerily similar to the button in the upper right corner, right?? Yes! But it's tied to that specific post. SO. If you click this button (same drill - white to blue), a link to that specific post will show up on your Facebook wall like so:

  

It's essentially sharing the link with all your FB buddies, and you can click it on any post you choose. No fine print. No strings attached. It's actually a nice, not-obnoxious little line of text, huh? No crazy graphics. No ridiculousness. And, again, we don't have to be Facebook friends for you to take advantage of it and share fun stuff.

And that's what THAT'S all about. Have a great week!

Two Tons of Oats In a One Ton Truck

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Organized Chaos

I HAD a plan.

The plan was to organize the craziness on our fridge. Not IN the fridge. ON the fridge.

 

The plan was to show you Before, During and After photos of my fridge transformation. I went out and bought supplies and got all "in the mood" to get organized. And...the plan slowly unraveled.

They say it's the heart of the home, right? The fridge is where it all goes down. Bearer of food, displayer of works of art, central location for grocery lists and family snapshots and appointment reminders.

Our fridge is actually much more than that. It's like an archaeological dig.

Non-Exhaustive List of Things I Found On Our Fridge:

• Nearly every holiday photo card we've received in the last 5 years. (Lynn, I found yours from 2003!)
• Bi-yearly dentist appointment reminders that I suspect started piling up when Jeff moved to Fayetteville. In 2002.
• A photo of me on my first day of Preschool.
• Every magnetic Razorback football schedule since 2001.
• A picture of a kangaroo a little boy named Foster colored for me one night during a shift at Outback.
• Various photos of Jeff's nieces and nephews as small children and BABIES. Note: Most of them are at LEAST teenagers by now.
• Every wedding Save-the-Date/Invitation/Announcement we've received in the last 5 years.
• Our OWN wedding announcement.
• Breastmilk fridge/freezer storage guidelines.
• Voter registration cards from 2006.
• Christmas card my Mom mailed while she was deployed to Kuwait. She's been back since July 2006.
• A magnet that reads "Northeast Louisiana University - Indians". Jeff's alma mater. A magnet that is so old... that it represents a school that is no longer either named "Northeast Louisiana University" OR represented by the "Indians"...

As I peeled things off the fridge, it became painfully obvious to me that I was not quite ready to purge these things. It seems like garbage and clutter - and honestly, some of it is - but it is OUR garbage and clutter and I decided I like it right where it is. So just like that - my plan of cleaning and organizing and starting fresh with the fridge was derailed. Each layer of nonsense that I unearthed from the surface of The Heart of Our Home was important enough to keep. For now.

So I carefully put each piece of our lives back on the fridge. Maybe I'll be ready another day.

In the interest of full disclosure - I did, however, take Before and After photos for you. ("Before" is on the left...)

   

You see it, don't you?!

   

The order?! The organization?! The completely obvious difference I made?!

   

Yeah. Me too.

In Which I Gratuitously Babble On About TV

We are arguably fickle with our TV series loyalty here in the Hood household. DVR (and adding a munchkin to our family) has changed our habits slightly, but we still have a pretty standard weekly TV routine. We have been fiercely loyal to a handful of shows over the years: The West Wing, The King of Queens, Big Love, The Sopranos, King of the Hill, and - obviously - Seinfeld. Sure, we have the occasional meaningless fling with such guilty pleasures as MTV's 16 and Pregnant or My Big Redneck Wedding. But they don't mean anything. Honest.

We also have a heart for the classics. We've been known to watch M*A*S*H and The Andy Griffith Show. (I'll NOT go into detail on the number of Jimmy Stewart and John Wayne westerns I've seen. That's another story...)

I've never been able to put my finger on it, but we just can't seem to get behind a reality show - with any consistency. We followed the last few seasons of The Biggest Loser - until the Winter Olympics completely chopped up the season and we lost all momentum with the contestants. I'll probably get kicked out of the country for admitting this, but I've only seen about 30 cumulative minutes of American Idol IN MY LIFE. I saw the final minutes of the very first season - when Kelly Clarkson won. (And I periodically get "A Moment Like This" stuck in my head for no identifiable reason.) And, like a good little Arkansan, I watched the final minutes of this past season - when Kris Allen won. (And, admittedly, I just had to Google him to be sure I was spelling his name correctly.) But that's it. It's not my kind of music, I guess. And is it on EVERY DAY? Or is that just me?

But what really, truly makes a show for us are the characters. Once in a blue moon you get a character that is just brilliant. Timeless. Cosmo Kramer. Hawkeye Pierce. Barney Fife. David Puddy.

And I'm prepared to say that there's a new candidate for the club.

Dr. Sheldon Cooper.

If any of you do NOT know who that is, stop what you're doing and get to the nearest store that will sell/trade/rent you a copy of the first season of The Big Bang Theory. Right now!

It's brilliant. It's tough to describe that kind of thing, but trust me - you will laugh. Hard. The show, set in California, is about two young, freakishly smart Caltech grads (one is an experimental physicist and the other is a theoretical physicist) who live across the hall from a cute blonde waitress (The Cheesecake Factory) named Penny who wants to be an actress (because don't all cute blonde waitresses in California want to be actresses...?). Anyway, Sheldon and Leonard are too smart for their own good and lack social skills, etc. while Penny has said social skills and "street smarts". The contrast is hysterical. And the dialogue is amazing.

Sheldon needs to be around a few more years before he officially makes it to the inner circle that includes Kramer and Hawkeye and such -- but oh, he's on deck.

We don't watch THE shows. Not intentionally, we're just not cool kids. We've never seen 24. Or Lost. Or The Office. Or Grey's Anatomy. Or Heroes. I know - kick me out of the country. But I've seen almost every episode of The Ghost Whisperer! Does that count?

Now, since Mr. DVR joined our household a few years ago, it's possible for me to record and watch shows that don't interest "the rest of the family". Glee, for example. And Jon & Kate. (I miss them terribly.) And Nurse Jackie. And most recently, Parenthood. Sunday afternoon naptimes that aren't otherwise spent frantically updating blog posts are spent with a cold Diet Coke and the remote control.

And precious, precious peace and quiet.

No Barney allowed.

In the most unlikely of places

You know how people say that it doesn't matter what you "do" or what your gifts are - that you can use what you have to serve a greater good? You don't have to be a preacher or a teacher to make a difference to someone. I never believed that applied to me. I work in marketing. Marketing. How in the WORLD do you use that to help someone? Or minister to someone? For a long time, I thought I had the one job in this world that was just that - a job.

Last November when I was visiting Laura in Africa, we were waiting for our transfer one morning out in front of our lodge and struck up a conversation with a guy out there feeding the monkeys (which you're NOT supposed to do). He was from the US too, and was taking a few days off from the work he was doing in the Zambia/Zimbabwe area. I was floored when he told me he was working as an electrician for a group called Towers for Jesus, building and repairing towers all over the area. He told me that the electrical work he was doing was his ministry and that he hoped it helped people in the area in some small way. SMALL way? That's huge! And so practical. Hmm.

Later that same week, when we got to Botswana, I couldn't help but notice this guy:

 

Let me explain.

Botswana suffers one of the highest rates of HIV/AIDS in the world. And Laura serves as a Peace Corps Health volunteer in support of prevention and education efforts to change that. But it's an uphill battle. They are fighting generations and generations of cultural challenges and years and years spent moving in the wrong direction as far as preventive health care. What a daunting task. But Mr. Willy - he's their mascot. And yes, he's a condom.

Mr. Willy, the condom, taught me a big lesson that week. Somewhere there's an agency who manages Mr. Willy and his message to the people of Botswana. That's marketing, folks. And as silly as he seems, Mr. Willy is probably doing all kinds of good for the prevention efforts there.

I live in a family of do-gooders. And I've always joked about being the black sheep. The sore thumb. My family does noble, honorable things with their lives - like serve in the military or volunteer for the Peace Corps. And I work in advertising. And it's not as if I'm marketing cigarettes here, but sometimes I feel like I'm not really "part of the solution" - you know?

But Mr. Willy gives me hope. Towers for Jesus gives me perspective. During the span of one little week spent visiting my do-gooder sister in Africa, I was educated. In the most unlikely of places - you got that right.

Distractions

I can't help it. It's not that I don't have anything to say. You probably don't need me to remind you of that. But I've been supplied with a steady stream of distractions this week and I just can't seem to focus. 

First, there's the blog redesign I mentioned a few weeks ago. I was serious about that. Honest. I'm tirelessly teaching myself enough web coding to be dangerous and having a friend help me do a complete design overhaul of my little website. I am so excited I can hardly stand it, and I hope to have all the changes live in the next ten days or so. Keep your fingers crossed.

Second, I have had a dream come true. I don't know how many of you read The Pioneer Woman, but if you don't, take a second to check her out. Go ahead, I'll wait.

Cool, huh? She is one of my blogging heroes. Heroines? She does more with her 24 hour day than seems humanly possible, but is brilliant and funny and, well, lovely. She also provides some of my favorite photography and Photoshop tips and tutorials. Seriously, she talks Photoshop like a normal person. It's refreshing.

So. The distraction. Well, first you have to understand that most of the photo editing knowhow out there is for fancy pants people with real Photoshop. Those of us with Photoshop Elements are often left to our trial and error (and drooling) in order to recreate some of the edits and effects. But I've really enjoyed clicking around in PSE - and, honestly, it does nearly everything "real" PS does. So I don't even know what I'm missing, most of the time.

Except actions. I have coveted The Pioneer Woman's actions for months. I have learned about layers and masks and all that crazy talk, just to recreate some of the things those fancy PS people can do with ONE CLICK with one of her actions. I thought the day would never come.

But! Actions! For Elements! It's like Christmas!

(I've probably lost some of you. What with all the PSE and action and masks/layers talk. Sorry. Just have to get it out of my system.)

PW (Pioneer Woman) posted two full sets of PSE actions that act JUST LIKE the "real" PS ones! So I followed the 47 step installation instructions and waited 100% impatiently for them to fully load, but I am now the proud owner of my very own PW actions for Elements. What used to take me 7 million layers and endless adjustments and A LOT of time - now takes me, literally, one click. It's like cheating.

Here. Let's pretend you asked, and I'll show you.

Here's one of my favorite photos of our family. Nancy took it when Colt was about a month old.

Cute, huh? I know. 

But now that I'm armed with actions, I will probably find it increasingly difficult to leave things well enough alone.

Here's the same photo after applying two different actions:

I love the faded color. As if it's an old family favorite I found in a shoebox in the attic. There was nothing wrong with the photo before, but the action added a little oomph. See?

 

So. Distractions. Yeah. The web design thing. And the Photoshop actions thing. Add the sick toddler thing and - what can I say? - I've slacked with the blogging. I hope hope HOPE I'll be able to unveil the new blog design soon so I will be forced to stop fiddling with it. And I'll eventually get over the shiny-new-toy-ness of the actions, right? Yeah, probably not.    
  

Tooting My Own Horn

I'm getting old. Well, my blog is anyway. 5 years, people. Happy Blogiversary to me! Yep. This week marks five whole years of this wonderful nonsense.

All of it's there, but I don't really recommend you go back and read any of those early posts as the literary merit is, well, arguable. And the pictures are blah. And the (at times) surly attitude leaves something to  be desired. But, you know, I wouldn't trade it. I wouldn't trade my "humble beginnings" on Xanga or my somewhat bitter bartender/waitress/college student persona or my random, random rambling.

I have loved this little blog. I have nurtured it and grown it from its original purpose as a landing place for all of my immature rantings and grainy cellphone pictures to a medium that I rely on to share my family - and myself - with all of you.

I've learned to write fewer things like this and more things like this. You've been with me through times like this and even this. And I dare say I've grown. In the last five years I've grown from The Single Gal to a Wife and Mama. And the more I read back through some of my (sometimes painfully embarrassing) old posts, the more I learn about myself, both who I am and who I want to be.

In honor of the occasion, I'm doing some refreshing of the ole blog. You might notice some design changes over the next few weeks. Don't be alarmed. Just doing a little makeover. And don't forget to check out things like the (gajillions of) photo albums along the right hand side over there and the links page for some of my personal favorite blogs.

Happy Blogiversary! Here's to the next 5 years!

Diagnosis: Not (Completely) Crazy

I have often been told I am easy and fun to tease. I have never really known whether that's a compliment or just more mocking, but I've heard it for years. And truthfully, I probably deserve it. I tend to say things out loud before thinking about them enough and this often allows me to paint myself into a corner defending one outlandish claim or another because Lord knows I couldn't just cut my losses and say those vile words - so maybe I was wrong.

Moving on.

My knee started to hurt. Quite a bit, actually. And it had been steadily getting more painful for the last six months. I vaguely remember having slight knee pain as a kid, but since I was that girl that played softball and soccer and basketball up until the year it was actually important to know the rules and have some talent (which, if I recall, was pretty early on) it was never really an issue. So my knee hurt once a year when we had to run a mile in P.E.? No biggie.

And when the pain came back in a big way when I was pregnant, I dismissed it as "just one of those things". It certainly wasn't the only thing that hurt for some mysterious, seemingly un-baby-related reason so I still didn't think much of it. When Colt was born and I lost (most of) the (undisclosed) baby weight, it seemed to go away again. Ok.

But you know this story wouldn't be very good if the pain just went away, the end. So fast forward to Summer 2009. I started noticing a bump on the inside of my right knee. After several weeks of the bump, I started to get a little worried but assumed it would go away. I hadn't fallen or hurt myself in any way, so I assumed it was just some randomness and it would find its way back to wherever it came from.

The bump started to feel tender. Really tender. The kind of tender that made me shave my legs reeeeeally carefully and avoid kneeling and take GREAT care when getting up from my desk at work so as not to bump it on the edge of that drawer. Again.

And I may have made the mistake of mentioning all of this to a few friends at work. And I MAY have followed it up with some online "research" I had done to self-diagnose my problem. See below for the softball I lobbed up there for them:

Osgood-Schlatter Disease or Syndrome is a rupture of the growth plate. The condition occurs in active boys and girls aged 11-15, coinciding with periods of growth spurts. It occurs more frequently in boys than in girls. It has been suggested the difference is related to a greater participation by boys in sports and risk activities than by girls.

Following an adolescent growth spurt, repeated stress from contraction of the quadriceps is transmitted through the patellar tendon to the immature tibial tuberosity. This can cause multiple subacute avulsion fractures along with inflammation of the tendon, leading to excess bone growth in the tuberosity and producing a visible lump which can be extremely painful when hit.

Did you get all that?

Basically, I managed to Google my way to a knee disease that accurately described my painful lump but occurs in pubescent boys because they are active in sports.

Let the teasing commence.

Well it finally hurt bad enough to get me to a doctor. And I successfully resisted the urge to begin the appointment with "so I read on the internet...". And after taking a few rounds of X-rays, it was determined that I was suffering from a bone bruise. The doc suggested I "rest it" and it should feel better in a few weeks.

Hmm. So a pain I've had off and on for YEARS will suddenly feel better in a few weeks because now I've seen a doctor about it? And what exactly does "rest it" mean? Should I take a break from all running and exercising and any physical activity more grueling than a flight of stairs in my office building? Check!

I was starting to ease up on my Osgood-Schlatter diagnosis (though the teasing at work did anything but ease up), but wasn't convinced that a bone bruise was the culprit either. So I took advantage of the "you don't need a referral to see a specialist" condition of my insurance policy and made a date with (and learned how to spell!) an Orthopaedic. A handful of appointments and two MRIs later and the mystery bump was still just that. And I started to get a little worried.

And then my doctor suggested I go see a specialist. A super duper specialist. An Orthopaedic Oncologist. Of which there is ONE in the entire state of Arkansas. So we trucked it down to UAMS in Little Rock to see the super duper specialist, who poked my knee bump and scheduled some surgery.

I had just enough time between my consultation and the surgery to get pretty darn worried about this thing. I'm in charge of all the panicking in this family and I was in overdrive. I TRIED not to dwell on the fact that my stupid knee bump required a trip to an Orthopaedic ONCOLOGIST at the Winthrop P. Rockefeller CANCER Institute. But I couldn't help it.

So yesterday.

We checked in about 7:15 and after discussing my name with each new person I met in Pre-Op -- "Yes, my name is Sarah Hood. No hyphens. No double name. Just Sarah Hood. I have tried for three years to convince my insurance company that it is not, in fact, Sarah E. Martin Hood. I don't know why it's weird, but I promise you are about to operate on the correct person." -- I was ready to go.

I vaguely remember being wheeled into the Operating Room with all the big shiny lights hanging from the ceiling. They started sticking little white nodes all over me and the Anesthesiologist kept asking "Are you OK? Are you OK?". I remember there being WAY more people in there than I thought was really necessary. You know, since I'm some sort of expert... 

And then I woke up. And within a minute or two Jeff was there telling me that the Doctor had given him the news that it was nothing cancerous. In fact, of the three possibilities he'd narrowed it down to - it was none of the above. It was a mass of tissue and blood vessels and most importantly - it's gone. And will not be back.

So the only other time I was in the hospital and had to do the gross stuff like IVs and hospital gowns, I got to bring home a baby. This time, not so much. This time, all I really got was a black mark on my otherwise spotless medical record. I used to fly right through all those forms - allergies? none!, past surgeries? nope!, hospitalizations? not me! When I was pregnant, my OB doctor told me I was "medically uninteresting" and I just beamed at such a compliment. But now, 27 years of perfect health - down the drain!

So I lived. Obviously. I survived the Knee Bump. And I don't have Osgood-Schlatter's. And I don't have cancer. And I'm spending today (and probably tomorrow) in bed with my knee propped on a pillow and my laptop propped on my...lap. The Boy has been showering me with hugs and kisses, and that's better than the Hydrocodone any day of the week.

Cars are People Too

I was well into adulthood before I became aware that not every family names their cars.

I grew up with Suzie, my Mom's Subaru station wagon, and my first car (and Tom's first car before me) was Fred. Fred was a Ford Festiva. And he was a gem. For those of you not familiar with the engineering brilliance that was the Ford Festiva, you can just picture an over-sized roller skate. It was one of the smallest cars ever made. Two doors, hatchback. Fred was originally silver, but became patchworked over the years as Tom's teenage driving skills were hard on him. By the time I inherited Fred he had a dark blue hood and a lighter blue grill. I desperately wish I had a picture of him.  

Fred was old school. Not even a cassette player. And toward the end of our relationship, his radio signal was getting weak and I experimented with different methods of "tuning" including banging the top of the dash as hard as possible with my fist. This worked about half the time.

Fred was not one for crowds. In fact, though he technically seated 4-5 people, if any of my friends were to sit in the backseat they would be asked to lean forward so the tires wouldn't rub when we went over a bump.

Oh Fred. Fred was part of the family. And all of our friends knew him by name. He was a special guy. So special in fact that when my senior English class was given a writing assignment and asked to write an ode to anyone and anything we chose - I didn't hesitate. Yes, somewhere in my attic is a crudely published "book" assembled by my senior AP English class that includes "Ode to Fred".

Fred eventually moved on, and from time to time I'll see one of his little brothers chugging along the highway and I just smile. Since Fred, there has been a handful of characters, including: Heidi (Honda Accord I drove in college), Stu (Laura and Becky's Subaru in high school), Teddy (Mom's Acura TL), Polly (my parents' Prius), and Annie (Laura's Oldsmobile Alero). Some of you may have noticed the comic book-esque alliteration trend we've got goin' on. We're creative like that.

It honestly never occurred to me that other families don't get together after the purchase of a new vehicle and deliberate on an appropriate name. Is it a boy or a girl? Is she a Polly or a Peggy? Sadly, I am not making this stuff up. 

And with that - I need your help. You see, the Hoods have a new car.

Well, new to us. It's a Toyota Highlander and it's heaven.

Things I love about the new-to-us car:

• Oooooooooooooh the space. I could park my Civic in the cargo space of the new car. Well, if I laid the seats down, of course.
• The seats lay down! Like, alllll the way down. I could have a square dance back there.
• There are cupholders EVERYWHERE.
• Three letters. AUX. That's right. It has one of those little plugs (which I'm sure the rest of you have had for 10 years...) that lets me plug my iPod right into the dash and jam to Sugarland. On demand. And as I blast "Baby Girl" on my way to work in the mornings I think, Let them stare, the louder the music the easier it is to imagine my voice sounds exactly like Jennifer Nettles. Please don't ruin it for me.

Things I don't necessary love:

• New car = trip to visit the little rays of sunshine who work at the Revenue Office.
• The numbers on the gas pump when I filled it up for the first time.
• The look on Colt's face when his fingers got shut in the car door this week. (Yeah, I know. I considered not telling you that, but I guess you deserve to know. For the record, I feel wretched. And, though I was certain I had broken his poor little hand, somehow, he's not even bruised.)
• So far - she's nameless. (At least I think she's a "she". I'm open to discussion.)

I thought about Roxie. You know, Roxie Recall. But I don't think it's quite right. Surely you can come up with something better than that. Let's hear it.