And The Nineth Ring of Hell is....

Jetlag! Beelzebub, the Prince of Darkness' worst punishment has GOT to be jetlag. I'm so tired my eyelashes hurt. I'm so wrecked my cuticles have bags. I'm so...well, I can't think of any more ways to describe how tired I am because I'M TOO FRAKKING TIRED!

I've begun to believe Thailand is Heaven and apparently Heaven is a warm, relaxing and tropical 15 hours ahead of Vancouver's cold, drab and dreary Rainfest of a timezone (boo rain!).

There were times I (semi)seriously thought about running away from Rainfest and staying in Heaven but then I remembered my real reason to come back to Rainfest. She's 14 months old, likes cats, balloons and long walks down our hallway. Her pet peeves are baby food, the word "No" and naptimes. No matter where I was or what I was doing, her little blue eyes and devilish smile would always call me back.

I have to say, this time I wish she had called me back on a different airline.

Scott and I flew Korean Airlines from Bangkok to Vancouver via Inchon, Korea. Well, actually we flew Asia Airlines from Phuket to Bangkok with a layover and transfer to Korean Airlines but that's details without much relevance to my true complaint. Oh, and did I mention I spent more than 32 hours in transit. Ohhhh yes...32 uncomfortable hours.

We hopped in a cab at 7:45 PM Thailand time (4:45 AM Vancouver Time) and didn't arrive back in BC until after well after 12 PM Vancouver time two days later. At the best of times, this is a long trip but we spent a ridiculous 9 hours in the second most beautiful, but absolutely most boring airport in creation before being forced to sit on a jam-packed airplane toddling around the tarmac for 2 hours past its scheduled take-off before finally taking off on its 11 hour flight, only then realizing that the chairs in the emergency exit row don't even come close to reclining the (puny) standard 33 degrees. OH MAH GAWD.

I loved Thailand. Looovedlovedloved it. I luuuuuurve Thailand but I detested the trip to and from more than usual this time. The Inchon airport in Korea, while lovely and clean, is a shopper's paradise...but only if you are Paris Hilton: Gucci, Prada, Cartier or, for the truly poor, Coach (shudder). It was one of the most repetitive places I have ever seen in my life: there were endless stores but they were quite literally all the same. I felt like I was being stalked when I kept looking around and seeing Gucci signs, Cartier stores, and Prada purses no matter where I walked. It was a bit like Groundhog Day meets Clueless.

Of course, if I were rich, I would probably be babbling on about how great Inchon was and how much I enjoyed my layover there. My 9 hour layover.

Sadly, in the absence of my Lotto Max win, it's still on my list of most boring.

Road Trip 2010

Over the Christmas break Scott and I loaded up the car, cinched our baby into her car seat, and headed out for what I now call "Road Trip 2010."

We were on our way to spend Christmas with my parents who live about 5 hours away. Of course, that 5 hour trip time does not take into account bathroom/diaper breaks, meal breaks, snack breaks, freak out breaks, or the now infamous " 'Hey, look at all that fluffy snow' while mommy cries into her pillow" break. In other words, this trip doesn't exactly take 5 hours now that we've got a baby on board.

This trip was tough but I know it could have been much, much worse. My poor sister BJ had to deal with my niece Jordyn screaming until she literally puked every time she got in the car when she was a baby - No, I'm not kidding. LITERALLY. That kid actually yakked every time they went farther than the corner store after screeeeeeaming her lungs (and her mom's eardrums) out. I have to admit, even though it wasn't a walk in the park, I'm a damn lucky woman 'cause even though my child is stubborn and vocal, you put her in a car and she's pretty chill.

Anyway...please note that I said Brynn is "PRETTY" chill. Not chillin' and definitely not mad chill, shorty. She was pretty chill for an active 1 year old hogtied to a plastic chair covered by a thin layer of padding in the backseat of our car for what we'll euphemistically call a "5" hour drive. Let's just say I'm encouraging my parents to seriously consider moving back to Vancouver - or at least the Lower Mainland - because that drive was...interesting. And by "interesting" I mean something I don't want to repeat in the foreseeable future.

It certainly wasn't all butterflies, smiles and Disneyesque musical numbers, but...we survived. Merry Friggin' Christmas Everyone!

Thailand Calling...

We're going to Thailand!

FYI: when I say "we" - I mean Scott and I, NOT Brynn, Scott and I. Now don't judge me but I have to admit that I can't help but to say "we're going to Thailand" in a singsong and I swear I hear birds chirping and angels plucking their harps as I do.

Oh. Niiiice! There you go...all judgey judgey.

Sadly, this is the portion of the blog dedicated to my defense of myself for doing something I think is normal and healthy. Sigh. Here goes...

I love my child.
I love that kid so much I spend a laughable (or rather pathetic) amount of time obsessing over whether she likes me or not.
I love that kid so much I do the most ridiculous things just to make her smile...in public...in front of strangers and people who know me, no less!
I love that kid so much I've actually (gasp!) gone to the grocery store without makeup to buy something she needed when it wasn't a 3 alarm emergency. I KNOW. Without makeup? Not even lip gloss or eye liner? "Good God," you must be thinking, "this woman sure looooooooves her baby." And believe me, anyone reading this who knows me, knows that this is something I would never do under normal circumstances, so yes, I love my child.

I do, however, think you can love your child and still go away on vacations without them. I've seen what happens to a person when her whole life is her kids and it ain't pretty. Women need to have more in their lives than diapers, scraped chins, and feeding schedules. So, my life in less than 2 weeks will revolve around beaches and bevvies. And curries. Lots of curries. (Shlurp) .

Of course, this unbridled hedonism will all be scheduled around my daily Skype conversations with my child, but that's beside the point. (disclaimer: This is NOT a picture of my child looking studiously at a computer screen. Mine would be pounding the shit out of the keyboard while laughing maniacally. No Google images photo corresponding to that, strangely enough)

zzzzzzzzzzzzzz - huh?

I'm beginning to wonder if the stories I've heard about children sleeping through the night are a societal boondoggle - a nice, tidy little flotable ring of a fable everyone quietly agrees must be thrown out there to help drowning parents stay afloat until their kids do finally sleep like babies supposedly do...and apparently don't.

When Brynn slept in the bed with us for the first couple of months, she often did sleep through the night but since then????

Not so bloody much.

Given the chance, she sleeps in but instead of our old "roll out of bed, fumble around looking for a bathrobe, stumble down the stairs and feed her a bottle once a night" routine, we're now getting up to do it twice! Ummm...how is that a step towards the mythical night of uninterrupted sleep, dammit!

The hard truth: it isn't.

I don't know if she's getting up more often because she's growing.
I don't know if she's getting up more often because she's teething.
I don't know if she's getting up more often because the wind is changing direction outside her bedroom window or because the temperature/dew point spread is not to her liking.

I don't know and I don't care. I'm too tired to care. I'm too tired to do much of anything except say, "Sleeeeep, baby sleeeeep."

Jingle Bells, Batman Smells...

OMG I loves loves loves this picture. Dude who runs the I Can Has Cheezburger blog is Brrrrrilliant!

Year One: Back on Blog

So this last couple of years have been one heckuva trip - from stick peeing, to fattitude, to birth and baby to early toddlerhood.

Yeesssss, I said toddlerhood. She's walking. She's walkingupabloodystorm! Of course, I WOULD like to attach a braggy video showing my babes acing the Tour de House but as I have said before, this stupid blogger site doesn't seem to want to load my damn videos. (insert pissed off maternal mumbling here) Just picture the cutest kid (ever!) walking all over the place with her mommy chasing after her whisking cat food bowls out of her way while preventing an archeological dig in the cat pan and you've pretty much got the picture.

Motherhood is all about this kind of Glah-mah! Oh yeaaaaaah.

Sadly, I kind of lost my blog for awhile. I didn't forget about it. I didn't stop caring about it. I just sort of lost it. I was busy with a baby who seems to be on developmental overdrive and when I wasn't chopping, chasing, folding, playing, cleaning, feeding, sorting, changing, planning or shopping I was unconscious. What can I say? It happens and I'm a mommy so I've gots myself a good excuse. Now I'm back at work and the siren song of time wasting is a callin'. "Blog, anyone?" Whay yehs! I'll have me one of thohse, thahnk yeh verrah much.

So here I am. Back again. Working until my lottery boat comes in (come on, Lotto Max!) with the desire to write about my crazy new life.

Welcome back on blog.

Sooo...How's it Going?

Strangely, Google images doesn't have a picture of a shamed looking blogger shuffling around trying to explain why she's been MIA for weeks and weeks. I'm afraid you'll just have to buck the technological revolution and "use your imagination".

I know, I know. - Insert collective Aaaaaugh here -

I was on vacation. And then I just took an intellectual vacation. No thinking. No writing. No nothing that didn't involve dealing with Brynn teething (boo teething!) and other, more happy baby related activities. It was fun (except for the teething part 'cause that mostly involved a lack of sleep) but I actually did miss blogging it up for y'all so I don't think I'll be doing that again anytime soon.

I know, I know. - Insert collective Aaaaaugh here -

Well I'm working on a number of posts that are about slightly more than nothing so I'm going to sign off for now...but expect another post soon.

sigh. I know, I know. - Insert collective....blah blah blah.