I took the little angel to Great Clips last night to get her hair cut.  We had to wait about forty minutes for the moment of truth, which was okay because there were some toys and books for her and Cosmopolitan for me.  Usually we go to Shear Madness, because I adore overpaying for a service while surrounded by toys and hair baubles I can't afford, but the little angel was in danger of being confused for a sheepdog, and I just didn't have the energy to haul her down south or make an appointment or anything like that.  Not after learning yesterday at 4:30 that it will cost me $2,214.57 to fix my cleaning lady's car. ARGH.

So there I was, feeling pretty defeated and useless, thinking how we could've installed new carpeting upstairs if I hadn't backed into that lady's damn car, which is probably worth exactly $2,214.57, when one of the "stylists" started using a hairdryer.

The little angel has developed a fear of loud noises in the past six months. When she was wee, she used to love it when I blew the hairdryer on her, making her little red strands dance.  Now she hates it with a passion I usually reserve for George W. Bush.

Anyway, someone fired up a hairdryer, and she looked up, frantic as a deer caught halfway across the highway, the exact same expression on her face that I see on our favorite bunny's when he catches us watching him out the kitchen window.  I got ready to launch into the comfort mantra that I have repeated ever since they put the little angel on my chest when she was thirty seconds old.

But I didn't have to.

She looked around, saw me sitting there reading an article about Dr. McDreamy Patrick Dempsey, and proclaimed to the waiting room, "Mama's here. Mama's here."

And then, I didn't feel so worthless anymore.

The little angel has added a new act to her late-late-late night antics.  This is sort of the appetizer version, the preview of coming attractions.  Yes, the wee one who before only gave us trouble between the hours of 1 and 4 a.m. is now REFUSING TO GO TO BED. 

I was unprepared for it on Friday night, the first night that she has ever refused to go to bed in her twenty-one months.  She faked like it was all going to be okay, then she popped up, stuck her foot in her mouth and beamed at me.  "Hi Mommy!" she said brightly.

I sat there in shock while she struck various cheerleading poses on her bed, auditioning to become a Harajuko Girl. The reality that she was not going to sleep anytime soon began to sink in.  I decided if she was going to party, I was at least going to read (considering my Saturday night and the possibility of a DVD were rapidly fading). 

I cracked her bedroom door and shut the baby gate.  I plopped a pillow against the hard, cold wall and pulled out John Irving's latest, Until I Find You.  I wondered again how long this exercise in parental futility would take. 

Pretty soon she appeared on the other side of the gate, completely unafraid of the darkness behind her.  She had a musical instrument in her hand.  It's a xylophone, and she can never get the little wand to beat on it out of its slot.  "Mama, help," she said, tossing the xylophone over the gate. It narrowly missed my head.

"No, go to sleepy.  Shhh," I said.  This particular method is from The No-Cry Sleep Solution, for those of you who are scoring at home.  I made no eye contact.

Pretty soon she came back, this time with her Cabbage Patch Kid.  The CPK was not wearing her shoes.

"Silly baby.  No shoes," the little angel said, tossing Bethany over the gate at me.  She landed on the xylophone, which made a tired ping.

"Shhh," I said, not making eye contact, trying to read about tattoo artists and not think about that DVD and my wine, which I had foolishly left downstairs.

Next the little angel appeared with Elmo and Fox in Socks. 

"Read, Mommy.  READ BOOKS." 

"No, sleepy.  Shhhh," I said, reading my own book in denial of my wishes for her.

She wasn't bothered by this.  She plopped Elmo down (a feat, considering he is bigger than she is) and started reading the book to him.  "Fox and socks and toxy moxy ONE TWYO TREE FOUR fox and socks and shoes SHOES SHOES foxy blocks FIVE SICKS SEBBEN ATE NOUN TIN!"

It was getting very hard not to laugh. My shoulders were shaking with effort.  I called for back-up.

My beloved and I took turns, every ten minutes, until she started becoming destructive and called that she had a poopy.  I changed her diaper and rocked her with some milk and she FINALLY FELL ASLEEP at 9:45.  This party had started at 8.

Last night I put her down again, this time at 8:15. I use this term loosely, since it was a repeat performance of the night before. This time I tried the rubber-band approach (this is from another book, but I can't remember the name) and put her back in her bed every time she got out. I did this four or five times until I realized she thought it was a game and was screeching in delight each time I put her back.  I left to let my beloved deal with it after about forty minutes.  He got pissed after she knocked over the Diaper Genie and started clearing out the changing table like an extra on Roadhouse.  I was reminded of the episode of Super Nanny when the children climbed the bookshelves when they were supposed to be sleeping. The problem was that I couldn't remember how the nanny handled it.

I went back in again, seized the angel and rocked her again.  She stared blankly at the wall for about fifteen minutes, then passed out.

We're going to be moving back her bedtime, though I'm not sure if this will help. We ran her around Lowe's for about an hour yesterday trying to pick a new wall sconce for her room so that we can actually see to change her diapers when it's dark outside.  I would've thought she'd be exhausted.

But OH, NO.  This one, she's going to be the Queen of the After-Hours in college.

Before I begin today's rant, a few random notes:

• Lest anyone think I am a horrible person who runs over cleaning ladies' plastic cars with no remorse, I did send my cleaning lady flowers yesterday afternoon. I haven't heard the verdict yet, but I do feel terrible about crunching her car with my apparently indestructible Explorer bumper.
• Little angel sleeping status update:  Well, let's just say I've ended up on her floor every night this week, but she has made startling progress in the "ability to fall back to sleep in her own bed with no cuddling" category.  She is going back to sleep in an average of ten minutes.  And that, my friends, is a victory in and of itself.  Next challenge:  NOT WAKING UP.
• I have registered for BlogHer!  I'm going with Jane and Cagey.  Terribly excited. 

Okay, on to the ranting.

What's up with this wah-wah over James Frey?  First, they decide his memoir is full of shit.  Then, Oprah calls in to Larry King and says, "Blah, blah, I'm Oprah and I say it's okay so shut up, American public."  Then the American public writes her a bunch of nasty e-mails, saying she has no heart and why doesn't she start clubbing with Martha Stewart already, and Oprah freaks out and grills old James on her show like she was Barbara Walters' evil twin.

My thoughts:

• "Memoir" is a loose term.  Anyone who has ever dabbled in creative writing knows that fiction is truth and truth is fiction.  It's called "poetic license."  I don't care who you are and what you saw - you will remember the EXACT SAME THING differently than another person who was there.  Yes, fabricating a story about having dental surgery without Novocain is probably stretching the limits of poetic license, but the whole "a memoir should be fact-checked" thing is going overboard, in my opinion. 

• "Truth" and "fiction" are relative.  Does everything I blog about actually happen?  Yes.  Do we say the EXACT SAME WORDS that I write?  Most of the time.  But sometimes, yes, it's true - sometimes writers remember things as they wish they happened, or in a wittier way than they actually did happen.  If we all sat around and wrote about our trip the grocery store exactly as it was, nobody would read it. (Well, I don't know if anyone reads it or not - TypePad stats have been down for a day and most of the people who come here were looking to buy ruby slippers on the cheap, but anyway, point still valid.)

• Good writing is good writing.  I read in that Yahoo story I linked to earlier in this post (for those of you unaware - they faintly gray words in my posts are links - I wish they would use a different color) that they are also now attacking Augusten Burroughs, who wrote Running with Scissors.  It's a book about a guy whose mother lets him live with her shrink and their insane family.  Was it all true?  Dude, if it is, it's amazing this guy is still alive.  Do you wonder if it's really true that a 13-year-old kid has an affair with a 30-year-old guy and nobody seems to think anything of it?  I'm thinking statutory rape, child molestation and some other nasty thoughts, but the way Burroughs writes it, it's easy to accept as feasible, if not morally correct.  The fact is that Burroughs is an amazing writer, a good storyteller, and for that, we should all read his book.  I haven't read his others, nor have I read Frey's, so I'll reserve judgment on those.  My point here is that people should read books because the storyteller is worth his weight in ink and royalties, not because they won't touch the pages unless they've been fact checked.

• Fact checking is for journalists. I was terribly disappointed in the Dan Rather debacle.  I don't believe in sensationalizing basic news stories, especially health stories designed to scare the shit out of America.  I especially think we need to be truthful in the areas of war (damn you to hell, W), children, health and heroism.  But if we fudge a little in the area of mainstream books, an area where adults have a choice as to what to read, not what they are depending on for a truthful and constitutionally  protected, unbiased view of the world, then let the reader beware.  Who is going around basing their lives on people's memoirs, anyway?  So different from deciding whether or not a drug is safe to give Grandma based on the latest reports in a medical journal.  SO DIFFERENT.

Okay, I'm off my soapbox now.  But I just couldn't handle it anymore.

Before I begin today's rant, a few random notes:

• Lest anyone think I am a horrible person who runs over cleaning ladies' plastic cars with no remorse, I did send my cleaning lady flowers yesterday afternoon. I haven't heard the verdict yet, but I do feel terrible about crunching her car with my apparently indestructible Explorer bumper.
• Little angel sleeping status update:  Well, let's just say I've ended up on her floor every night this week, but she has made startling progress in the "ability to fall back to sleep in her own bed with no cuddling" category.  She is going back to sleep in an average of ten minutes.  And that, my friends, is a victory in and of itself.  Next challenge:  NOT WAKING UP.
• I have registered for BlogHer!  I'm going with Jane and Cagey.  Terribly excited. 

Okay, on to the ranting.

What's up with this wah-wah over James Frey?  First, they decide his memoir is full of shit.  Then, Oprah calls in to Larry King and says, "Blah, blah, I'm Oprah and I say it's okay so shut up, American public."  Then the American public writes her a bunch of nasty e-mails, saying she has no heart and why doesn't she start clubbing with Martha Stewart already, and Oprah freaks out and grills old James on her show like she was Barbara Walters' evil twin.

My thoughts:

• "Memoir" is a loose term.  Anyone who has ever dabbled in creative writing knows that fiction is truth and truth is fiction.  It's called "poetic license."  I don't care who you are and what you saw - you will remember the EXACT SAME THING differently than another person who was there.  Yes, fabricating a story about having dental surgery without Novocain is probably stretching the limits of poetic license, but the whole "a memoir should be fact-checked" thing is going overboard, in my opinion. 

• "Truth" and "fiction" are relative.  Does everything I blog about actually happen?  Yes.  Do we say the EXACT SAME WORDS that I write?  Most of the time.  But sometimes, yes, it's true - sometimes writers remember things as they wish they happened, or in a wittier way than they actually did happen.  If we all sat around and wrote about our trip the grocery store exactly as it was, nobody would read it. (Well, I don't know if anyone reads it or not - TypePad stats have been down for a day and most of the people who come here were looking to buy ruby slippers on the cheap, but anyway, point still valid.)

• Good writing is good writing.  I read in that Yahoo story I linked to earlier in this post (for those of you unaware - they faintly gray words in my posts are links - I wish they would use a different color) that they are also now attacking Augusten Burroughs, who wrote Running with Scissors.  It's a book about a guy whose mother lets him live with her shrink and their insane family.  Was it all true?  Dude, if it is, it's amazing this guy is still alive.  Do you wonder if it's really true that a 13-year-old kid has an affair with a 30-year-old guy and nobody seems to think anything of it?  I'm thinking statutory rape, child molestation and some other nasty thoughts, but the way Burroughs writes it, it's easy to accept as feasible, if not morally correct.  The fact is that Burroughs is an amazing writer, a good storyteller, and for that, we should all read his book.  I haven't read his others, nor have I read Frey's, so I'll reserve judgment on those.  My point here is that people should read books because the storyteller is worth his weight in ink and royalties, not because they won't touch the pages unless they've been fact checked.

• Fact checking is for journalists. I was terribly disappointed in the Dan Rather debacle.  I don't believe in sensationalizing basic news stories, especially health stories designed to scare the shit out of America.  I especially think we need to be truthful in the areas of war (damn you to hell, W), children, health and heroism.  But if we fudge a little in the area of mainstream books, an area where adults have a choice as to what to read, not what they are depending on for a truthful and constitutionally  protected, unbiased view of the world, then let the reader beware.  Who is going around basing their lives on people's memoirs, anyway?  So different from deciding whether or not a drug is safe to give Grandma based on the latest reports in a medical journal.  SO DIFFERENT.

Okay, I'm off my soapbox now.  But I just couldn't handle it anymore.

Scene:  Dorothy's parking lot. (Some people have garages - Dorothy and her beloved have a garage-sized chunk of crumbling concrete. It parks six vehicles. It sucks.) 

Dorothy gets in her Explorer, realizing she is late to meet friends for lunch. Dorothy is preoccupied with thinking that she doesn't actually know the name of the restaurant in which she is lunching, she is still upset about having to wear pants because she discovered the day before that none of her jeans fit, and she has generally high anxiety to begin with.  (Dorothy always refers to herself in third person when she is upset.)

Dorothy turns on the car, realizes her beloved has set the radio to SPORTS AM RADIO, AGAIN, and with annoyance turns it back to NPR.  She checks for her cell phone to call friends to see where the hell the restaurant is.  As she is dialing, she hits the gas to back up.

You see it coming, don't you?

RIGHT INTO THE CLEANING WOMAN'S CAR. The cleaning woman, who earlier that hour had broken a picture frame in the little angel's room. 

THANKFULLY, Dorothy had responded well to the breakage and told her not to worry about even replacing it.  THANK GOD Dorothy did not care much about the picture frame and did not make a big deal about it, because a picture frame is oh, so much less important than someone's main form of transportation.

Dorothy immediately calls her beloved, who of course does not answer the phone, because men do not answer their cell phones when caller ID tells them it's their wives calling.

Dorothy mea culpas to the cleaning woman, who is more than gracious.  It is a big mess.  The hood is dented.  The bumper cover is dented.  The driver's side light is dangling from a cord.  The entire front of the car was made of plastic, and plastic does not respond well to being hit.  It cries out melodramatically and crumples to the ground, sobbing. 

Dorothy calls her mechanic, conveniently located two blocks away.  He comes down and looks at it, says it's drivable, and (Dorothy thinks to herself) witnesses the fact that the only damage on the much-damaged car that Dorothy caused is the front stuff. This may come in handy when the bill comes.

Dorothy realizes she's going to have to pay for this outright during a lean period.  Dorothy knows that if her insurance company is asked to pay for it, they will take it out of her ass in myriad ways not worth the cost of repairs at a downtown repair shop.  The cleaning woman says she knows someone who will do good work, even though (insert racial epithet that Dorothy pretended not to hear).

About the time that the mechanic was helping Dorothy pick pieces of shattered plastic off the driveway, Beloved finally showed up.  He went over and assured the cleaning lady of the exact same things Dorothy had previously assured her.  She held up the broken picture frame.  "It's a bad day for breaking things," she said.

He looked at Dorothy,fixing her with an evil grin.  "Now why can't you be more like her and break PICTURE FRAMES?'

I have been writing a few articles an issue for KC Weddings for about six years now.  In that time, I've seen three great editors tackle the job in their own unique way.  I'm by far the happiest with the current editor, who kicks major ass and edited for Slate, as well as sharing my penchant for sarcasm and need to schedule things within an inch of their lives. 

Anyway, one editor ago (she ran off to California to get married, and I've never gotten a better wedding announcement in my life), I had the honor (ahem) of serving as the magazine's editorial assistant when I had the WILD MISPERCEPTION that I might be able to work part-time after the little angel's birth.  hee hee, ho ho ho  At least not part-time as an editorial assistant, that is for sure.

I've written about losing weight, favors, bridesmaids, cakes, dresses, flowers, rings, etc.  Sometimes more than once.  However, even though I will never grow wealthy from the money I make writing these articles, the interviews for them never fail to amuse me.

The wedding industry...it's insane.  You can slap some white ribbon on rubber dog shit and sell it for $25 if it says "bridal" or "wedding" somewhere on the packaging. I am so not kidding. When is the last time you voluntarily wore that horrible shrimp-colored sheath with puffy tulle sleeves you have in the back of your closet?  Yeah?  And it cost $300, didn't it?  The bride told you she was being nice because you could wear your own shoes? And she gave you rhinestones to go with?  Yeah?  I thought so.

Anyway, I'm working on a current article on the subject of rings. I don't want to be a spoiler for all of you potential brides who will run out and buy the magazine when it comes out this summer, but I will share that at the end of an interview, one contact told me her brother had recently purchased a ring for his fiancee.  She said he started out with a $5,000 budget, but that didn't work out for him.  The actual price of his fiance's two-carat rock?  Yes, folks, $30,000.  More than we spent on our wedding AND our 2005 Ford Explorer with the sports package.  I was slightly blown away by how a 35-year-old man could go from $5k to $30k without much additional stress. 

I saw a tagline on the side of my hotmail the other day about banishing your holiday debt.  Is this how one could blow a budget by $25k?  Am I ridiculously conservative in that spending that much money for anything, even a car, makes me kind of want to throw up my breakfast?  Maybe it's because I grew up in Iowa.  I just can't embrace it, the freewheeling spending.  Oh, hell, I'm not perfect - I covet and crave, I spend when I can, but then I spend three weeks in Lutheran Guilt/Buyer's Remorse Hell.  I even regretted buying the Explorer, even though we intend to drive that bad boy into the ground and then some and then give it to the little angel go terrace jumping when she's 18 (I just heard that you have to be 18 to get a driver's license in Missouri - this can't possibly be true).

Anyway, what do you think?  $30k?  Too much for a diamond? Or am I horribly bourgeois?

My new year's resolution (well, one of them) was to quit bitching about how the little angel never sleeps. The Good Lord must have been waiting for me to quit bitching, because she has slept more in the month of January than she had in the months of August through December, I swear. I will now most likely be struck dead for the hubris of even typing that. 

Anyway.

It has been a little hit or miss. Tuesday nights seems to be bad.  This is, consequently, the night I teach.  The little angel, she is a lover of both parents. Both parents must be present and paying attention to her at ALL TIMES.  One parent must not go persue independent interests at ANY TIME.  THE WORLD MUST REVOLVE AROUND THE ANGEL. DO YOU HEAR ME IN THE BACK?

One Tuesday night, last Tuesday night to be precise, it was my beloved's turn to deal with her in the wee hours.  He has not yet learned my approach, which is to go in to her room, look through her blankly as though she didn't exist, throw my pillow and the extra, fluffy white comforter on the floor and promptly go back to sleep. I like to model sleeping for her.  I have excellent technique from which she could really learn a lot.

My beloved makes the mistake of making direct eye contact, listening to her requests, etc.  This is how he was pulled into this conversation last Tuesday night.

Little Angel:  "MIL!  MIL!"

Beloved:  "No milk. It's night-time.  Here's your water.  Go to sleepy."

(dramatic pause - head pops back up)

Little Angel:  "READ BOOKS.  DADDY READ."

Beloved:  "No."

(head goes back down - sound of water being slurped and spilled all over bed from sippy cup)

Little Angel:  "CHANGE DIAPER."

This was the request that sort of threw him over the edge.  The little angel typically howls like a hyena if you try to change her diaper, secure in the knowledge that her diaper rash can only be cured by keeping the same sopping diaper in direct contact with her poor, mottled skin at ALL TIMES.  Her requesting a diaper change is akin to George Bush asking the American public for a little feedback. 

After he refused that one, she started crying until finally I yelled at him, hell, it's 4:30 a.m., just take her downstairs and give her the whole damn cow, I don't care, just MAKE THE NOISES GO AWAY.

So I guess, in a way, it worked.

My new year's resolution (well, one of them) was to quit bitching about how the little angel never sleeps. The Good Lord must have been waiting for me to quit bitching, because she has slept more in the month of January than she had in the months of August through December, I swear. I will now most likely be struck dead for the hubris of even typing that. 

Anyway.

It has been a little hit or miss. Tuesday nights seems to be bad.  This is, consequently, the night I teach.  The little angel, she is a lover of both parents. Both parents must be present and paying attention to her at ALL TIMES.  One parent must not go persue independent interests at ANY TIME.  THE WORLD MUST REVOLVE AROUND THE ANGEL. DO YOU HEAR ME IN THE BACK?

One Tuesday night, last Tuesday night to be precise, it was my beloved's turn to deal with her in the wee hours.  He has not yet learned my approach, which is to go in to her room, look through her blankly as though she didn't exist, throw my pillow and the extra, fluffy white comforter on the floor and promptly go back to sleep. I like to model sleeping for her.  I have excellent technique from which she could really learn a lot.

My beloved makes the mistake of making direct eye contact, listening to her requests, etc.  This is how he was pulled into this conversation last Tuesday night.

Little Angel:  "MIL!  MIL!"

Beloved:  "No milk. It's night-time.  Here's your water.  Go to sleepy."

(dramatic pause - head pops back up)

Little Angel:  "READ BOOKS.  DADDY READ."

Beloved:  "No."

(head goes back down - sound of water being slurped and spilled all over bed from sippy cup)

Little Angel:  "CHANGE DIAPER."

This was the request that sort of threw him over the edge.  The little angel typically howls like a hyena if you try to change her diaper, secure in the knowledge that her diaper rash can only be cured by keeping the same sopping diaper in direct contact with her poor, mottled skin at ALL TIMES.  Her requesting a diaper change is akin to George Bush asking the American public for a little feedback. 

After he refused that one, she started crying until finally I yelled at him, hell, it's 4:30 a.m., just take her downstairs and give her the whole damn cow, I don't care, just MAKE THE NOISES GO AWAY.

So I guess, in a way, it worked.

Our technology labor-saving devices are killing our marriage.  Well, maybe not killing it, but from time to time they take a few unsportsmanlike whacks to our knees, maybe nibble at the ankles a bit, usually when we're short on time and highly in need of good entertainment.

Our two biggest foibles?  The iTunes library and the Netflix queue.  My beloved has more of his stuff in the library, he being the one who came into the marriage with more than 400 CDs and more into music in general.  I have more opinions in the category of cinema, having grown up in a family that went to the movies a few times a month and considered it to be high entertainment.  Plus, as a writer and reader, I'm always looking for someone who can tell a fresh story.  He taught himself to play the guitar shortly into our marriage ("Hey listen to this! It's 'C'.")  So it makes sense, this division of technological labor.

However, sometimes one of us chafes at the other's clear dominance in a category, backstabbing each other with the line-up like the cast of Desperate Housewives. 

I've started turning on the iTunes library while I work in my home office (sometimes as much as nine hours a day).  I don't LIKE to hear Kenny Rogers or Metallica more than once in a week. If I have to interrupt my train of thought to banish "To All The Girls I've Loved Before" one more time, I swear I'll delete it.  I feel pretty strongly about this forced introduction of country music into my little sheltered bubble of singers/songwriters and "Hollaback Girl."  I don't want to think about the small town of 5,000 I grew up in and ran screaming from at 19.  I don't want to be reminded of dead-end jobs, pick-up trucks and borderline alcoholism as an entertainment form.  GAH.  MAKE IT GO AWAY.

My beloved, on the other hand, chafes against the documentaries featuring aging academics, the estrogen movies, the alt/indie, Memento/Eyes Wide Shut fare.  So I knew I was in for it when the latest DVD arrived yesterday. 

I was upstairs, innocently working on my spreadsheet. 

Beloved: (bellowing from downstairs) "YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!"

Me:  "What?"

Beloved: (rushes up stairs and waves red envelope in my face)  "SYLVIA????"

Me:  "What about it?"

Beloved: "First Mean Girls, and now this? Why don't you just snip my vas deferens now?"

He leans over me and brings up the Netflix home page on our home computer. I attempt to ignore him.  Sylvia Plath was a great writer, dammit.

Beloved:  "Sign in."

Me: (feigning indifference) "What's the password?"

He is now purple.  "LIKE YOU DON'T KNOW THE PASSWORD WHEN YOU'VE BEEN SECRETLY GETTING IN HERE EVERY DAY AND MOVING UP YOUR CHOICES?  THEN YOU THROW ME EIGHT MILE AND THINK EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY?"

Me: "Calm down. You're really making too big of a deal out of this."

Beloved:  "Easy for you to say. You can watch Gwyneth Paltrow without throwing up."

Me:  "I'm sorry, I can't hear you over Willie Nelson here."