Done But Not Done

Finally, I've caught up with The Bonnie Wee One's photo album. This collage is of her ninth month, and since she hasn't completed her tenth month yet, I can let it go for awhile and turn my attention to other things. These pages are taking me a long time. I spend longer on hers than I have on the general family photo album, too long really. Come year two when Smudge's rapid changes do slow down somewhat, I must really make an effort to be more rigorous with my choices and keep it to one or at the most two collages per month — or perhaps even longer sometimes.

Having said that, there are other tasks at which I am far far behind. I have meant to print out some of my blogs for posterity. I don't why: just because we want to leave something behind, I guess. I was doing this in an html sort of way, but it was a chore, so I shelved the chore for awhile. I didn't realize just for how long, however, until I just checked where I stopped printing. Would you believe in the autumn of '05? Good grief: that one got away from me. Didn't it?

So off I go to catch up on that little task.

The Bonnie Wee Smudge ...

... has been spending a lot of time at our house this as Mom does a bit of helping out at work. Thesha's been on maternity leave since last April but will have to go back in a few short months. But it's busy there now, and she's lending a helping hand for a few days.

So, we've had the pleasure of the little one's company, and it's gone very well. This picture was taken after yours truly helped to feed her.

The Stink of Humanity

I previously made mention of The Pillars of the Earth. It is set around life and fictional characters in twelfth century England, and it's a very absorbing read if you like historical fiction and quite probably even if that isn't your usual genre of choice. It's quite simply a fine story. But this isn't meant to be a review.

No, it's about hygiene. The part that I was last reading revealed that women typically bathed only once a month. I leave the timing of said ablutions to your clever little imaginations. But the men! Twice a year! Only twice! The occasions that prompted such leave-taking of their senses escape me now, but I surely remember the number. One wonders how they could live with themselves and each other. And how would you like to cuddle intimately with someone who hadn't bathed for a half year? I guess sensibilities were different for, judging by the fact that we're all here now, they managed the up close and personal stuff quite well indeed. I'm sure we're all rather glad they did overcome the odour because we'd be nowhere without those antecedents. Literally.

But I also wonder if we don't overdo it these days when daily showers are the norm. I was brought up in different times when bath night occurred on Saturday. Period. In fact, in order to save a few pennies, my family didn't even turn the hot water on until sometime on that day. It was an electric water heater in the apartment that I remember most. There was a switch on the wall that got flicked on come Saturday, and we all took our baths. At least we all ran clean, fresh water for each bath. I think. I trust.

Aside: of course, I'd shower after gym class, and I imagine that my parents heated water in a kettle and took sink baths. We take showers for granted and as a necessity now, but when we were young Cuppa and I would often stay in a cottage sans running water. We discovered that you could attend to personal hygiene quite well from a small basin.

Of course it all changed in my teenage years. Teenagers do become fastidious and body conscious after all. We had moved and whether because of my age or changing family finances we now kept the hot water tank on the ready. But even then, although I bathed at home, I only showered at school. For one thing the bath in that cottage was just that — a bath and only a bath. And it really wouldn't have helped had we had a shower head because the water pressure was abysmal enough to have made showering an impossibility or near enough. It was just a trickle — literally. With time and patience we could draw enough water for a bath of sorts but it would have be nigh unto impossible to have been able to shower had the place been so equipped.

Showering daily is the norm for many people nowadays: for some twice daily. Have we gone a bit overboard? Does the typical person working in a typical office really gather a ton of dirt or sweat on a winter's day? I know that the heat of summer increases the need tremendously, but I really have to wonder about the necessity of daily showers.

Still ... I much prefer today's concept of cleanliness and hygiene over what have been a perpetual human stink back them.

Hairballs and Sleep Deprivation

In the blog before this, I just mentioned waking up rather early this morning. I also mentioned that lately I have been experiencing restless hours from about 3:00 to 5:00 AM. This is a new wrinkle in my sleep, or should I say sleep-less odyssey. My traditional pattern, at times when I have been going through sleep problems, is to find it difficult to drop off to sleep. Once there, I have usually been fine. Not lately though.

This morning there was a new and added wrinkle just before 5:00. I was already sleeping lightly, so I quickly picked up the sound of our cat, Rocky, in pre-barf mode. One hears an ominous sort of choking and retching, and one just knows that a gooey and icky hairball is about to hit the carpet. In our somnolent states, we have never made it to the beast in time to prevent this carpet-splat. No, we always a little late for the event ... but just in time to clean up the subsequent mess. There have been a few upchucks in the past few weeks. He goes through spells. He'll have a quiet few weeks, and then he'll have a week or two of more frequent hairball-elimination.

This morning, however, I was awake enough to jump into action quickly. When I first came to, I discovered that he was still on our bed, so the initial action was to kick him off — firmly but not too violently. Secondly: I grabbed a nearby plastic bag and placed on the carpet below his wretched and retching little head. The good cat stayed right there over the bag and continued to retch. But never vomited! Can you believe it? The one time that I manage to act in time to save the carpet, his need passes and the heaves are just that — dry.

And then I was up for the duration. Oh, I tried to get back to sleep, but further blessed repose was to elude me. After an hour of lying there and becoming increasingly wakeful, I arose, ate some cereal and put on the coffee, Normally, I can get back to sleep, even after cleaning cat puke but not this time. Perhaps it was the book that I was reading last night: Ken Follett's Pillars of the Earth. As I was reading, I could feel myself getting absorbed and wired, so I played a calming game of Sudoku and then read a bit of This is Your Brain on Music. I was on a very dry section of the book last night, and it sufficiently de-stimulated me to get to sleep. But after the cat episode, my mind went back to twelfth century England, Kingsbridge, Prior Philip, Jack Jackson and the rest. I guess that means that it's a good book, but I would have preferred not to relive it at 5:00 o'clock in the morning!

Five Things Meme

Donna over at Made in Heaven has tagged me to list five things about myself. Although I've probably revealed a modest trillion or so things in this blog space over the years, let's see what my fertile brain comes up with this time.

1. It continues to surprise me that some people are afraid to retire because they're worried about finding enough to do with their time. Me? I worry about having to work again and how I would ever find the time to do the things that I want to do. Blogging comes to mind, for example.

2. I was present for the birth of our second daughter but not for the first. That was in 1972, and our small city hadn't progressed as far as letting Dads in at that point. Six years later they had, and it was a splendid experience for me. Now you can bring a crowd and a picnic lunch into the delivery room.

3. Some people generate lists easily. I don't. It's hard for me to think of things from scratch. I do much better with prodding of some sort. However, once I have a point in mind, I am tempted to say quite a lot about it. I'm being good (for me) so far today though.

4. As a late bloomer into the world of coffee, I didn't start drinking the brew until I was fifty-two years old. Then, I figured it was high time and began with to coax my palette with three creams and three sugars and eventually settled at double cream. On most days I'm content with my one morning mug (unless we pass by a Tim Hortons at some point during the day). However, I invariably follow my morning coffee with a Diet Coke. To be honest, I have to follow almost everything with a Diet Coke.

5. Although I was a geography teacher, due to financial constraints, I hardly travelled until I was in my fifties when we drove out west in our little, old Corolla. Even then, we did it the cheap way and primarily camped. It was a blast, and my travel journal was what I used for my first web page — which still exists here by the way. I appreciated the adventure so very much, that I am convinced there is really something significant to be said for delayed gratification.

6. Bonus: Sleep is getting weird again. Lately I've been going through restless hours from about three to five o'clock. Before and after than interval I have slept not too badly. But not today. I awoke at five o'clock and gave it up by six. I was tired yesterday too. I don't understand.

There Donna: I've been good, but I will beg off the passing of the torch. I'll leave it up to the readers to pick up or not as they will.

Spiralling

As you know, young parents arise from slumber when baby choses to rise, and they must often sleep when baby sleeps. One minute you're a carefree young adult able to stay up late at night and sleep in late the next day, but, in the wink of an eye, gone are the late hours, and you find yourself thankful to go to bed not too very long after baby.

I clearly remember visiting Cuppa's parents in Toronto, and after some sort of family get-together, Cuppa and I tucked in the wee one, perhaps around nine or ten o'clock as she wasn't always an early-to-bed baby especially in a strange place, and Cuppa's parents' place certainly qualified as strange. Whaever. We followed the little one's suit shortly thereafter and soon trundled off to slumber land ourselves. Hours later, let's say around one o'clock in the morning, give or take, I stumbled groggily out of bed to attend to a certain bodily necessity. There were Cuppa's parents, aka Thesha's grandparents, having a whale of a time with extended family. They were sitting around the kitchen table, finding many things to carry on about and laugh uproariously over. I mean, they were having a great hoot and a holler of a time.

To this day, I remember (or think I remember) almost my exact words to them. I believe that I squinted up my sleep-encrusted eyes and tiredly muttered or groggily growled, "So there is life after kids?" as I shuffled wearily and resignedly past them on my way back to bed.

Of course, as children are wont to do, Thesha grew up, and she became the nocturnal one. As a late teenager/young twenty something, she wouldn't even contemplate going out until ten o'clock. The hours, and I do mean hours, before her grand exit were reserved for the marathon of showering, shampooing, make-upping, and hair-fixing.

Saturday evening, not altogether for the first time, the shoe was on the other foot. Thesha stayed home to tend to the wee one and get a decent night's sleep while Cuppa and I went out to hear a local group at a nearby pub. Somewhat in commemoration of the younger Thesha, I even did the shower and make-ready bit in the hours prior to departure. It was a tame impression of Thesha at her best, but I did what I could. The gig didn't begin until nine o'clock, and we were there ... and Thesha wasn't. It's her turn to stay home with the youngun, just as it is our turn to be more footloose once again.

I'm tempted to say that the circle has spun around, but that's not exactly true because a circle implies that you come back to the same spot. And we haven't. Of course, we're not in the same place as we were more than three decades ago. How could we be? It's impossible on so many levels, but for one thing, we don't have the same energy-level as we used to. And while we find it nice enough to get out and party (if party is the right word, and I'm unsure that it is), we don't experience the same exhilaration, the same rush of excitement.

It's not really a circle, more like a spiral. A downward spiral might I add. No, I'm not attempting to be gloomy. Just realistic. If there's a circle of life it's that the pattern repeats itself generation after generation but not really within one individual's lifetime. As young adults, we stay up late and socialize avidly. Then we enter the tied-down years after which we experience a second round of freedom. Although it's the same in a sense, it's very different too. For one thing it's more of a trial than a joy to push yourself to stay out until after the witching hour.

So, it's official. It's Monday morning, and I'm in a downward spiral. Sheesh! I think I'll go back to bed.

Unmentionables

This is not a meme, but I suppose it could become one.

I bought unmentionables this week. Six pairs (I guess they're pairs because they have two legways). I'm sure you were just dying to hear about my unmentionables. Admit it.

Actually, I mention my unmentionables because the topic does tend to reveal some of my quirkiness.

For one thing, I buy six pairs at a time. Basically, it's out with the old and in with the new. Mind you, it was well past time to out the old. Shoulda done it months ago ... unless I wanted to join the clergy and be as holey as possible.

I will possibly hang onto a pair or two of the less-holey specimens in case of a laundry emergency, but for the most part I'm done wif em.

I do the same with socks: buy six pair and discard most of the rest. It's a quirk. I suppose I feel certain sense of orderliness by doing it this way ... or something akin to orderliness, perhaps. I dunno, it just seems right.

But that's not all. I carefully rotate said garments. Actually, that's not true. I don't do it all that carefully (I'm not that obsessive doncha know?), but if x pair come back from the wash while y pair are still in the drawer, I usually make sure to pick up the y pair and place the x pair underneath. That way, they'll be likely to wear at something approximating the same rate.

Again, I'm not sure what this says about me, and I almost cringe to ponder what dear readers might be thinking right now. But I simply am driven to wonder and ask if anyone else is possessed by a similar habit. You could comment or better still run with the idea in your very own up and personal blog space. Let me know one way or t'other. Will ya?