I can't do it. I can't do it! I can't buy my eight-year-old daughter a bikini. Or even a tankini. I do not want to see her exposed midriff!

I see other little girls at the pool wearing bikinis. They look cute. My mom friends let their girls wear bikinis and tankinis. I'm not judging.

But there we were in Target looking at the swimwear selection. She was begging for a bikini, and I kept looking at her and looking at the swimwear, and looking at her.

"Nope. Not happening," I said, and picked out eight super-cute one-piece swimsuits.

I'm that mom. The mom who won't let her girl wear heels even though Suri Cruise has changed little girls' footwear selections until she gets old enough to just have her Playboy cover and be done with it. I'm the mom who pulled her daughter out of a dance academy after seeing the nine-year-olds dressed like Katy Perry at the recital. The mom who won't let her daughter get even a tankini.

I told Beloved about my decision when I got home. He paled beneath his tan. "I can't take it," he said. "No way is she wearing a bikini."

At least I'm not the only prude parent in this house.

I wrote a post today for BlogHer admitting that I really can't stand being plugged in all the time -- so I'm not. I know many, many "normal" people who have no problem avoiding social media and email, but not too many people like me -- bloggers, people who work in new media. Am I the only one?

I have a confession to make: I have no problem unplugging. Hello, my name is Rita, I work on the Internet, and I frequently leave the house without my phone. There, I said it.

I started blogging in 2004 and remember vividly sitting next to Liz Gumbinner at the BlogHer Business '07 in New York City watching her use this crazy thing called Twitter on her new-fangled iPhone. I didn't really get immersed in Twitter until 2009 when I joined BlogHer and no longer had to hide my social media use when someone walked by. In fact, I had more of it than ever -- trying to keep up with Twitter, Facebook, internal IM, two e-mail accounts, my blog, everyone else's blog and BlogHer.com was something that took some getting used to. I started having those work dreams about being assigned to catalogue the Internet again, and that's when I knew I had to get a handle on it.

Read the rest on BlogHer.

My doctor told me I should do yoga for my upper back pain. She told me this on the same day that she gave me a referral to a surgeon and a gastro doctor. Me not really being the yoga type, I bought Jillian Michael's version. It's a half hour of teeth-gnashing, panting hell, and that is the beginner version. For someone who has been lifting weights for the past fifteen years, Jillian Michaels can be quite humbling.

I had to take about two weeks off from Jillian due to the incisions in my leg. Of all things exercise, I was most concerned yoga would actually stretch the areas so much it would cause problems, so I waited until it was way healed before I tried it again ... yesterday.

I did not realize you could lose muscle strength so damn fast. I took five days off after my surgery before walking a few miles. The minute my surgeon cleared me after ten days, I went back to weighted squats and all that jazz with The Firm. I didn't expect any problems from Jillian, other than you know, her being JILLIAN.

As I was attempting not to fall off my hands during the side planks, the little angel walked over to me. She sniffed and stared at the sweat rolling off my red face as I sucked in air like a vacuum cleaner.

"You know, Mommy," she said. "It's a choice to do that to yourself."

I started laughing so hard I did fall. Off my pride. Ouch.

I'm not going to go into details, people, don't worry. But many commenters mentioned having tummy problems often amped by anxiety, and I've had really bad tummy problems for the past several years. Two years ago, I got a colonoscopy and we never quite solved them (but at least I know I don't have Crohn's or celiac disease or colon cancer, at least I didn't two years ago). 

Around the time I told my primary care doctor about The Lump (cue DJ Nibbles!), I told her about my tummy problems and she sent me to another gastro doc. The man was wearing a full-on, two-piece, blue-and-white pinstriped seersucker suit. With a bright blue tie. He reminded me of Bert Cooper on Mad Men.

His suit looked like this, only imagine it on a man of about 50 with little round glasses.

The suit was so distracting I nearly couldn't describe my symptoms.

So as I told him, yes, this problem is worst in the morning and it happens right after I eat anything and yes, it's really interfering with my life. He listened and started spouting something I totally didn't understand about bile malabsorption, which is a totally nonthreatening and mostly annoying problem that happens when some bile doesn't get absorbed in the small intestine (natch) and goes shooting into the large intestine, where it is the equivalent of Mentos in Diet Coke.

Guess how they treat it? CHOLESTEROL PILLS! Of course!

Don't ask me. SCIENCE.

So I have these four huge horse pills that I take each day, and I can't take them at the same time as my other meds because of ABSORPTION, so now I have to go buy a BIGGER daily pill pack thing because I swear I can never remember if I took the blasted things or not and I don't want to be the writer who dies from cholesterol pill overdose. I haven't even published my damn novel yet.

But ... so far it's working. It's not a perfect solve yet, but I just went jogging without fear. And that, my friends, is worth seersucker any day. So if you're having chronic tummy problems, don't give up. It might be as simple as ABSORPTION.

Scene: Gas station. Vicki is parked, and I'm pumping gas. Vicki's top is down. Stop it -- she's a convertible.

Little Angel: (with a clear view of the pump since the top is down) $1, $2, $3

Me: Yup.

Little Angel: That's going really fast.

Me: Yup. Vicki's got a fifteen-gallon tank. It's going to be like $50.

Little Angel: $15, $16 ... (on up to $48).

Me: Huh, gas prices must've gone down.

Little Angel: It costs that much money just to put gas in the car?

Me: Ha. Yes.

Little Angel: No wonder you're not a stay-at-home-mom.

Ba-dum, ching!

Speaking of not being a stay-at-home-mom due to financial necessity, I wrote a new post on crying vs. yelling at work over at BlogHer. The comments are great, go check it out!

---

Struggling to get your kids to exercise? Check out my review of Geopalz on Surrender, Dorothy: Reviews!

[Editor's Note: I hesitate to even write this because it will confirm my mother's suspicions that black helicopters follow you everywhere on the Internet. But I feel compelled to share in case you live in fear of identity theft and have a good bank.]

The other day I was trying to withdraw money to throw away on overpriced food at the Royals game when the ATM machine was all I don't think so and spit an 800 number at me. We tried Beloved's card and it went through just fine. After a quick call to Bank of America, I learned that my account was restricted because of unusual use. 

As much as I have complained and hated on Bank of America, I have to admit they have a killer fraud department. This is the second time they have caught someone trying to use my card before any money escaped. Someone made a $1 charge at a hotel in another state and immediately reversed it, then a few hours later bought something for less than $30 on the Internet. That is how identity thieves take a test bite of you before annhilating your account. 

As a result, I haven't been able to use my debit card since Saturday. I need to get a new one. But it was more fun to drag Beloved around with me to the grocery store and Walmart on Sunday with a huge pile of stuff and then smile sweetly and say thank you and run away when it was time to pay.

I do worry about identity theft, but I also realize it's impossible for me to move through life never using my cards. I remember when my sister lived in Oregon, she got her checks washed (I didn't even know that was a thing), and even that righted itself in time. So thank you, Bank of America, for being so on top of my checking account. Even though I hate your fees.

---

Speaking of shopping online, now that you're thoroughly either a) freaked out or b) feeling all nice and warm and safe, you may have noticed the little store I've got going on in my left rail. The folks at mphoria asked if I might like to make available some stuff for sale related to what I write about. If there is anything interesting in there, I may point it out from time to time. I don't pick everything, but I do pay attention. For example, there was a subscription to US Weekly and I asked them to remove it due to the whole misogynistic body bashing thing. I also asked for as much hardware and home improvement-related stuff they could get their hands on. The last time I looked, it contained a flashlight, "sleeping pants," water bottles and Harry Potter DVDs. If you buy something, I get a cut of some sort. Capitalism!

Hello, friends. I'd like to introduce you to a new character at Surrender, Dorothy. Meet DJ Nibbles.

The little angel introduced me to DJ Nibbles last night when she was getting ready for her bath. He was rocking it old school on the manual turntable/hipster baby belt buckle I got when I used to review stuff for the ever-fabulous Liz and Kristen at Cool Mom Picks.

DJ Nibbles didn't even know what he was excited about last night, but he knew it was going to be big enough to bring back-up dancers.

Would you like to hear why DJ Nibbles is excited? He's excited today because it's my sister's 35th birthday, because it's the little angel's last day of second grade and because the pathology report says The Lump is BENIGN, baby. Which is good because I couldn't handle one more day of wondering if I was going to have to reschedule summer plans around my chemotherapy. 

It may happen someday. BUT TODAY IS NOT THAT DAY.

What is DJ Nibbles celebrating for you today?

We moved to Chateau Travolta in 2007. Memorial Day. Which means we're coming up on our five-year anniversary here. 

I'm sitting on my deck finishing up work and watching my girl ride bikes in the cul-de-sac with her two neighbor friends.

I never imagined I'd be suburban. 

The boom box spewing nineties music is vintage, though. I got it when I was 16. Way to go, JVC.

---

I remember how much work it was when we moved in. We're still not done, but I understand this is very common. 

A friend came over recently when I was staking my lilies and took in the deck we've festooned with bubble lights and hanging baskets and vegetable plants. She watched her daughter and my girl collecting worms for the terrarium, and she looked at me and said, "You've got yourself quite an oasis here."

It was one of the highest compliments I've been paid. 

I never set out to be a gardener.

I never set out to be suburban. City, yeah. Rural, I could see. But not a CUL-DE-SAC. Of course, I didn't realize that for an eight-year-old, a cul-de-sac means freedom.

Honestly, I tried to get my tubes tied when I was 18.

I never even set out to be a mother.

---

Somewhere along the line, I learned the value in things that come back. Neighbors that return the favor. Flowers that sprout back reliably, year after year. Birdfeeders that don't break. Friends who write me after months of silence. Books that continue to fascinate me when my eye catches their spines on my shelves. Songs that bring me back to a golden moment.

I just don't see the point in planting anything that won't last.

---

I used to see so many of these things as horrifyingly banal.

Now I see no point in doing anything that won't leave a mark, that won't come back after I'm gone and whisper with its existance she was here.

Thank you for bearing with my through yesterday's whining. Despite waking up at 3 am realizing I might still be at a doctor's appointment when the school bus arrives outside my door today and not being able to go back to sleep for an hour, I feel better today than I did yesterday. I've even already solved for the school bus problem! Yay, me.

As I'm currently moping around wishing I had an energy level commiserate to vacuuming, it's funny that this is the week that I've been selected to write about keeping up with kid clutter for BlogHer's Life Well Lived series. Ha ha ha ha ha. But actually, I do normally hate clutter with a passion, and as soon as I feel better for realz, I'm going to attack the following.

The Question: What are your best tips for keeping the clutter at bay with kids in the house? How do you help your kids develop good organizing skills?

The Answers:

1) Have one kid. I'm sort of kidding. On the serious side, kids bring home a steady stream of papers, pencils, wads of gum, extra shoelaces and various cheap plastic crap they will declare essential to their existence. This stuff multiplies exponentially per child. If you haven't started your family yet and you seriously hate clutter, just be aware of how your personality may or may not jibe with a big family. Kids are cluttery. Yes, we can try to combat it, but a certain amount is normal and reasonable and it's not fair to try to contain them within the bounds of an adult. 

2) Make sure everyone has containers for his or her stuff. Downstairs where the school-related clutter backs up most, we have a homework box and a crate we use to house all the library books. Yes, there are two things sitting on the kitchen floor at all times, but at least the piles are minimized. We have a few other baskets for my husband and me -- one is for bills that haven't been opened yet and another is for bills that need to be filed or shredded. 

3) Act on piles every day. My husband and daughter get sick of me walking around the house, picking up their shoes and tossing them in the hall closet. See also removing recylables to the garage immediately, tossing school assignments not keep-worthy and demanding my daughter decide if yet another wacky wall-walker is necessary or expendable. However, I've noticed in the weeks I don't do that, the piles take over every surface of the house within a mere three days, putting algae to shame.

4) Make garage sales pay off for the child(ren). In exchange for ruthless clean-outs, I let my girl keep the proceeds from our yearly garage sale/lemonade stand. It's her version of watching us sell stuff on Craigslist and use the money for something else.

5) Find a personal hand-me-down recipient. If your kids know where their outgrown clothes are going -- to which specific kid -- they're much more likely to relinquish something than if it's just going in the Goodwill pile. At the first sighting of a too-high hemline or extra ankle exposure, remove said item of clothing and put it in a sack for your favorite little neighbor or relative or friend. 

6) Hang shelves. My girl has a snow globe collection that made it so frustrating to dust in her room that I finally begged my husband to hang some shelves on her walls. It's so freeing to be able to access the surface of her dresser -- I can't even tell you what this does for my soul. For some reason, clutter on the floor is infinitely more annoying to me than clutter on a shelf. Why? I do not know.

7) Group like objects. We have spaghetti jars full of googly eyes, pipe cleaners, beads, paint brushes, etc. in the basement, along with an old dresser full of craft stuff. Being able to see what you have makes it less likely you'll buy the same thing twice. I try to teach my girl to look first before we buy anything. Nobody needs 42 tubes of Elmer's Glue. No, you don't. Back away.

That's pretty much it. I feel like my house is overcome with clutter most days, even though it's not as bad as it could be. I find making a swoop around the house every afternoon before dinner does a lot to calm my soul. How do you handle kid clutter? 

Here's what Alicia from Get Buttoned Up had to say at BlogHer.

As always, I want you to win some stuff. This time you can win an iPod Touch and a $50 iTunes gift card. So go enter! (and hurry, I was late on the pick-up and the sweepstakes ends TOMORROW MAY 16)