A Typical Conversation Between Mad Mama and Babyzilla

Mad Mama: “Babyzilla, why do you always have to be so contrary?”

Babyzilla: “I’m NOT contrary!!”

Touché.

And for those of you who read Sunset magazine…..

… or just like cake, I give you the Cranberry Obsession Snow Cake, lovingly baked by yours truly:

I rawk.

I see bread people

I pride myself on having a good memory. Or I should say, I used to pride myself on having a good memory. That was before Mad Mama Dementia set in. Now I need to make lists and lists of lists just to keep from leaving my own head somewhere. Babyzilla, on the other hand, has a memory that’s downright uncanny. It’s always been my understanding that before about the age of about four, kids just don’t have the capacity to recall events from very far back in the past, unless they experienced something particularly traumatic. And Babyzilla certainly doesn’t remember everything, my admonishments to “keep your hands to yourself” being a prime example, but he surprises me quite often with the recollections that come to his mind, seemingly out of nowhere.

About a month ago, we were getting ready to read a bedtime story –’Sasha The Sea Lion’, if my parenting-addled memory serves me correctly. I had just gotten through telling Babyzilla, that, no, I really don’t enjoy having his ratty stuffed dog shoved in my face, despite what he may think to the contrary.

Suddenly he asked me, “Where’s my gingerbread?”

Gingerbread? Whaaa?? Sasha The Sea Lion had a penchant for fish, but there wasn’t any mention of gingerbread. I had no idea where this was coming from, but being a parent who likes to encourage the intelligent and diligent exploration of thoughts and ideas, I eloquently replied, “Huh?”

“My gingerbread man,” Babyzilla said again. “The one with lots of frosting. What happened to it?”

I trolled through the scrapheap of my mind, trying to recall any recent conversations or events that concerned gingerbread men or even gingerbread or just any sort of comestible in human form. Nada.

And then I had a sudden inkling of what he was talking about.

“Do you mean a gingerbread man that you made?” I asked him.

“Yes, at the place with the sand toys and animals,” he responded.

About a year ago, Hubby and I took Babyzilla to a little Halloween fair being put on by a school out in a rural area of our county. It had attracted my interest because the theme for the fair was based on bringing characters from books to life. Most of the activities and entertainment centered on various classic stories, like ‘Alice In Wonderland’, with the participants dressed for and acting the part. Attendees were also encouraged to dress as their favorite story character. I’ve always been an avid reader and love the classics, so I thought this would be a great way to introduce Babyzilla to an essential part of every childhood. I imagined he would be enthralled by the whimsy and wonderment of it all.

Needless to say, he was unimpressed. The costumes and cute games and story themes were decidedly lacking in entertainment value for him. The thing that interested him the most was a sandbox in the back of the school that contained a nice collection of sand toys left out for kids who didn’t have an appropriate appreciation of literature. Babyzilla has sand toys and a sandbox at home, not to mention two parks close by our house that also have sandboxes and at least a few communal sand toys scattered around. You’d think that he’d have had more than his fill of sand toys, that sand toys would be old hat, while a re-creation of the Mad Hatter’s tea party would be, quite literally, new hat. But these sand toys were different. These sand toys sang an irresistible siren’s song because Babyzilla had not played with these specific toys before. When it comes to playthings, the new-to-me factor seems to rank high with the preschool set. Apparently the same can’t be said for a human-sized rabbit with a pocket watch.

So we spent a lot of “quality time” with the plastic shovels and pails and dump trucks and whirly funnel contraptions. The other activity of moderate interest to Babyzilla was a small petting zoo set up in the corner of the playground, across from the exalted sandbox. I paid a couple bucks so he could pet a chicken. Or try to pet a chicken. It seemed like he wanted to pet a chicken, but then another kid picked up the chicken he wanted to pet, and suddenly that chicken was an Untouchable. Babyzilla didn’t want to pet that chicken while the other kid held it. He didn’t want to pet a different chicken. All chickens were now taboo. In short order, poultry was out and a hasty retreat was made back to the sandbox.

I sat there withering in the heat of ‘Indian summer’ (Mother Nature’s evil trick on those of us who prefer the temperature to stay under eighty degrees and look forward to the arrival of Fall), trying to figure out how we could separate Babyzilla from Sand Nirvana and depart without him making a scene. There’s something about being at an event yet not participating in any of the activities whatsoever that I find wholly unappealing, especially when I have to sit in a puddle of my own sweat. If Babyzilla wanted to play in the sand, I could sit in my sweat in our backyard or the park near home.

Then Hubby decided we should take a shot at an activity that involved one of the only things more interesting than scrabbling around in the dirt with plastic toys: FOOD. Decorating a gingerbread man to be exact. The cookies were already made, so all the kids had to do was glob on the frosting, sprinkles, candy corn, etc. The obvious draw here is not artistic expression through high fructose corn syrup, but consumption during creation. Have to make sure those miniature marshmallows are of the highest quality before one is employed as a nose. Needless to say, this was the one “real” activity that Babyzilla enjoyed.

Shortly after Mr. Bread was all dressed up, we were able to leave. He was wearing at least a half cup of frosting, which immediately started to liquefy in the afternoon heat. Even the air conditioning of the car couldn’t save him –the final throes of departure and the walk through the parking lot did him in. I had his burial planned before we hit the main road. Surprisingly, my son seemed to forget about his sticky friend rather quickly (or so I thought), and Mr. Bread now has his final resting place in a landfill somewhere.

Whatever made Babyzilla think of this, how he ever remembered it at all, is beyond me. Nothing we were talking about at the time of his recollection had anything to do with gingerbread men, quaint school fairs, or anything of the like. It was September and Halloween wasn’t even on the radar at that point. And his relationship with Mr. Bread had been sweet but very short –nothing, in my mind, that would make a lasting impression, particularly because my son was essentially still a two-year-old back then. He didn’t even ask about the dearly departed after his hasty disappearance. But Babyzilla has done this on a number of occasions: Recalling things that I would never have imagined him remembering. Or even stranger, expressing knowledge of something about which there was seemingly no way he could know.

Really, the kid’s a little spooky sometimes.

Going to the….

It’s one thing to talk to the dog. It’s another thing to talk to the dog with the vague notion that he’ll answer you.

Further Observations On Hannah Montana (Somebody shoot me now.)

Why does her little friend look like a Polly Pocket on speed? It hardly seems fair. Hannah gets to sport the teenage tartlette look, while Lola appears to be channeling really bad ’80s New Wave crossed with Britney Spears in one of her manic episodes

Ok, I’ll stop now.

Really.

I swurr.

Damage Done

My husband gave me a kick-scooter for my last birthday. No, it wasn’t a subtle hint that I should get more exercise….. uh, maybe…… but really, it was so I could keep up with Babyzilla, who’s a mad, mad scootin’ maven. He goes so fast on his little Razor, it literally scares me. There’s no way I could just walk after him and yell, “Slow down!” the way I see other moms doing it. Nope –I scoot after him as fast as my aging mommy-bod can go and yell, “Slow down!!”

I’m pretty sure I’m the only scootin’ mom in the neighborhood, quite possibly the whole county. Of course I absolutely require that Scooter Knievel wear a helmet, but I give myself a bye.

Recently Babyzilla asked me, “Mommy, why do I have to wear a helmet but you don’t?”

Why?  Because Mommy’s a mommy, which means she’s already brain-dead. A sidewalk thump on the noggin ain’t gonna make any difference at this point.

Now, go make Mommy a cosmo, kid, and stop thinking so much. You’re going to hurt yourself.

Kids say the darndest things

While I was driving him home from school yesterday, Babyzilla took it upon himself to inform me, quite emphatically, of the following:

“You have options, see? You can make a choice between birthdays and having a birthday party or just getting some old trucks. Then you won’t be bad for speeding.”

Well okay then.

Maybe this was a roundabout criticism of my driving.

I guess it’s true what they say about insanity running in families….

And now for something completely different…

An Ode To Lists

You keep me from forgetting things,
Even through my worst mood swings.

When I’m confused and full of doubt,
You get my life all straightened out.

I make lists, yes, lists galore,
And then I need to make some more.

Though not just numbered 1, 2, 3,
But parsed down to Part 6, Section B.

My life is a list, this much is true,
So if I finished my lists, what would I do?

From past experience I’d take heed.
I’d make lists of all the lists I need!

Down the rabbit hole

The internet is freakin’ insidious, isn’t it? A few hours ago I started to do a search on ‘BlogHer’ (an online community for women who blog) because I was thinking of becoming a member, but I didn’t know the specific URL. Well, Google likes to give me helpful suggestions when I start typing into the Search box, and one of them was ‘blogher dooce drunk’. Well, who the hell could resist that? I read Dooce (for the uninitiated, a blog written by a woman named Heather Armstrong) sometimes; I’m familiar with Heather’s appreciation of adult beverages. This sounded like fun.

So, I gamely click ‘blogher dooce drunk’, and one of the results leads off with “Dooce vs. the Drunk Volcano”. This immediately conjures up an image of a very sauced Ms. Armstrong straddling a model volcano (a la high school science project) and riding it like a mechanical bull in a honky-tonk bar during an alcohol infused BlogHer event. Yes, I realize that it’s supposed to be the volcano that’s drunk, but the ‘random and disturbing images’ part of my mind doesn’t always line up all the pieces in a logical order.

Turns out that Dooce was not the slightest bit drunk, and the volcano was actually another blogger making a comment to Heather at the last BlogHer conference, held in San Francisco. There was an awkward exchange between the two of them, and a number of people construed this as some sort of blog-eat-blog smackdown. From the video I watched, the whole thing seemed fairly benign to me, and, in my opinion, other bloggers are just being petty about it, but I couldn’t help thinking, “Damn! I should’ve gone to BlogHer! Oh, the drama!” San Francisco is basically on my doorstep after all. I practically could’ve hosted my own drunk volcano-riding party. But when I first heard of BlogHer, I was pretty new to the blogosphere and not part of the social scene. The only other bloggers with whom I’ve had any personal exchanges at all are Kristen at Mommy Needs A Cocktail (LOVE her t-shirts) and Kristen at Motherhood Uncensored (she’s wonderfully ballsy and I think she’s Da Bomb). No, I don’t have a thing for people named Kristen….. Or at least I don’t think I do. Hmmm….

Anyway, ‘blogher dooce drunk’ and the drunk volcano led me to lots of other interesting posts about the weirdness of the BlogHer conference, how much people love/hate Heather Armstrong, Jon Armstrong’s defense of his wife, people who seem drunk when they’re really not, magical hobbits…….

Hours later, joining BlogHer has been all but forgotten. Never mind that it’s been on my ‘To Do’ list for over a month now. In fact, I’m about to do my celebrity morph. What could be more productive than that? That’s what I love about the internet –you suddenly find all these things you need to do that are so much more important than what you initially set out to do. After all, everybody needs a celebrity morph.

The Mad Mama Horror Show

I do not sleep well. I blame this partially on my propensity toward insomnia, but I think the real problem is that there are things that go on in my house at night. Disturbing things. No, the walls don’t bleed Amityville Horror-style or anything like that. It’s much worse: Hubby snores like a damn chainsaw in a slasher flick. And the dog barks in his sleep like his life depended on it. He’s probably hearing hubby and dreaming that Leatherface is after him. (RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY!) Additionally, Babyzilla has a tendency to wake in the middle of night and start chatting to himself loudly, occasionally even bursting into song. Once it was ‘Happy Birthday’. Another time it was Journey’s ‘Any Way You Want It’. This kid is going to be the life of the party in college.

The Olympics aren’t helping either. The other evening I stayed up well past midnight to watch the U.S. women’s gymnastics team have their perky little asses handed to them on a Chinese platter. My heart went out to the girl who fell during her balance beam and floor routines. How devastating for a 16-year-old, or anyone at any age for that matter. Whether it’s true or not, I’m sure she feels like she single-handedly lost the gold for the entire team. She certainly helped drive the final nail into the coffin and will probably be losing sleep over that for some time to come.

My own sleep problems have also been exacerbated by TMTD (Too Much To Do) Syndrome. My newly frugal self decided to join in on a neighborhood-wide garage sale planned for this Saturday, so pulling out all my old crap and trying to make it look like something someone else simply CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT is keeping me up late as well, crashing gymnasts aside. We’re also taking a trip out of town next week, and, as anyone with children knows, the preparation for going on a vacation with a young’un takes five times as much effort as it would with another adult. I’m looking forward to the airplane ride with as much enthusiasm as a Death Row inmate looks forward to the electric chair. Since Babyzilla completely lacks the ability to sit and color quietly like apparently EVERY OTHER THREE-YEAR-OLD IN THE ENTIRE WORLD, this will be our own horror movie in the making. I can hear the blood-curdling screams already. Babyzilla will probably get upset too.

So, my weary and macabre (‘cause lack of sleep makes my brain do weird things) apologies to anyone who might be checking in here on a regular basis, hoping for a fresh shot of Mama Madness and not getting your fix. I can’t guarantee a daily post right now, but I’m trying to keep up, much like an ax-wielding psychopath with a buxom teenager. That is, an ax-wielding psychopath who could really use a nap.