Stardate: 7:15AM

Lately each time I sit at the computer, one (or both) of my children have some sort of catastrophe. Then there’s the regular stuff, like bills and emails and whatnot. I guess the short short version is that I’m 1 handed typing (again) and this post has taken, wait, thirty minutes?

1 handed typing takes 4 eva

So, instead of taking another six hours to say my plans for my website (I have planzzz! Finally! A PLAN!) let me tell you of some great people who say things better. And probably use both hands to do it:

Marie talks about the difficulty in finding mom friends.

Jenny at MamaDrama brings up the question of cash for blogging.

El-e-e talks about their holiday traditions including her fake tree.

Rhima makes me pee myself reading about postpartum depression. I almost feel bad for laughing but this is one of the funniest posts I’ve ever read. Ever.

My co-hert at Mamaspod, Michelle, launches a new site Your kid says What?. Please submit your funny kid sayings. If they’re like mine, you have a plethora and you don’t want to forget them.

Amy says good-bye to her her club mom blog.

Find out if you’re drinking 700 calories a day and how easy it is to do that. (I forget to count wine calories)

And lastly, one of my camera phone pictures ended up at this website (thank you for the notification and obeying the creative commons license). And I laughed. Laughed and Laughed. Next stop? The post office!

Now, before the house catches on fire from the stank of my son and the flammability of his personality, I’ll let you go read.

What are you waiting for? A picture or something? Oh, Ok. If you insist…

Stardate: 10:08AM

Total time? Almost three hours. For this. One post. Which is why I don’t ever edit/spellcheck/grammercheck. That’s another six years…

Somewhere along the way I got it all wrong. Somewhere I got so competitive with myself that I decided to fail before I started. Somewhere I decided if someone else already did it, I might as well not even try. Because why put myself through the agony and not get the job? Why work on a business when others do it better? Why start a podcasting site when it’s been done. (And maybe even better.) 

Why you ask? Because General Mills and Kellog, that’s why.

Because Firefox.

Because Apple.

Because Tullys.

We teach our children that each one is unique. Each one is special. You are SPECIAL! We tell them. Then we hope they don’t log on to the Internet and find out they are exactly just like a gob of other people who are living their life better than they are.

Second best isn’t always bad. Especially when you follow up some pretty great people.

So, I guess I’m OK with my own mediocrity. It feels like I’m just another ant in the anthill, sometimes. Just another voice in the blogosphere. Just another podcast in the sea of iTunes. But for some reason y’all are here. And I guess that makes me pretty OK. Because someone needs to be the generic cheerios.

I am. I’m the generic cheerios. Excelling at being average since 1975.

Mr. Flinger and I often take turns with Baby O’s night feedings. There’s the 12-2AM feeding and the 3-5AM feeding. I have the unfortunate side effect of staying awake for hours if my sleep is interrupted while he can pass out pretty much the second the baby is back in his crib, regardless of the status of the baby. This same quality, I noted, is what makes a man fall asleep .2 seconds after sex. There’s magic testosterone, I swear.

I remember thinking that regardless of which “shift” I took with LB, I would inevitably get screwed. If I took the first shift, she’d be up screaming until 2:59AM and pass out through his shift. If I took the 3AM shift, she’d sleep until 3:01AM and scream my shift again. That kid hated me. I know it. She tried for two years to be an only child.

She’s not.

So here I am again counting the hours. “He took the 4AM shift, was up for thirty minutes and got to go back to sleep. So why the fuck am I still up after the 6AM shift? And why is he still asleep at 9AM? Hey, LB, go tell Daddy you need to poop.” It’s an evil game, I know, but damn if I haven’t gotten the short end of the stick for the past ... well… hu.. lemme see here… what, six months?

Not that I’m keeping score.

Hey, could someone pick up the girl in the back? She just fainted. Apparently she didn’t expect Mrs. Flinger to ever post again.  But look! I’m here! I’ve been here. Well, I’ve been here, actually. I’ve been there for hours upon hours getting ready for our grand opening. I’ve also been here a lot, too.

It’s totally paid off.

LeanneIam won the challenge. My thanks to everyone of Y’all who participated and made this goal a little closer this holiday season of really bad temptations. (You didn’t think I could do that, did you? HA! I life in the face of long sentences! And punctuation! HA. HA I say!)

And here’s the fun part.. there are things. THINGS to be had. THINGS you can have for FREE. Or, maybe, some blog love and a few clickity clicks. And, in accordance to my blogHer ad policy, I can tell you this: Go here. GOOOooo HEeerrreeeee. There is a very lovely prize basket to be had thanks to these ladies simply by playing a little Seuss-ish game. Seuss! Like the doctor! Not her. But she’s cool, too. (And also up for a freakin’ EMMY, people. AN EMMY. I’m famous by proxy. Well. Sordda.)

It’s easy and fun and really, I know I KNOW how annoying self promotion is, I am fully aware. But I promise not to do it too much. Or, like, ever. Except maybe this time. Here. And Here. And! Oh!! look! HERE.

Ok. I’m done. Just go play, yes? So I can stop. with. the. linking?

Don’t forget to go here, too. There’s more freebe giveaways. But do it quick.

And NOW I’m done.

Cough

It feels so long ago now, the beeping of the monitors, the worry, the stress. So long since I sent updates from my phone from his NICU bedside. Eons since I spontaneously went in to labor. So long since that first time I held him, two days later.

Vdog’s recount of her son’s birth sounded so much like our own. At the time, you’re alone. You’re guilty. You’re scared. You sit in a room of silence knowing it’s not right. Something is wrong.

In reality, everything is wrong.

We grew to know each beep, each nurse, each procedure. We were there one week and we grew comfortable in an often scary and life altering environment. Some people are not as lucky.

I’ve stopped proceeding Baby O’s actual age with his adjusted age. I usually never mention his prematurity. Often because I almost feel guilty that he’s done so well. At first I was worried, sad, and scared. Now I have a thriving little man. I have a smiley baby. I have my complete family. If I share our NICU experience, I sometimes hear stories so much harder and worse than ours. I only relate on the fringe of their emotions. I can not comprehend the real struggle their baby had to fight for his or her life. Baby O was just always going to make it. He just needed time.

That’s hard to say to someone whose baby needed so much more.

I know there are people with struggles and stories I’d never wish on anyone. They both shine with strength and love in light of loss. It amazes me. 

So this month, I’m supporting the families who sit in the NICU and hold hands with baited breath. Families who hear the beeps and do not find them as comforting as we did. Families who’s baby stays far from home for far too long. For us, six days was an eternity. I can’t imaging 6 weeks. OR worse.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again:

If God gives you as much as you can bear, then he knows I’m a huge pussy.

And I am. And I know I am. I am because I cry when I read their stories and I cry when I think of what could be.

But I cry big, fat, wet sloppy tears of joy when I watch this video I made the day Baby O was due: Five months ago today.

We never looked back. That baby keeping us up at night is a blessing. Even at 4:30 AM.

Baby O has slept through the night four times in nearly six months. The man is assuring his status as a last child. He’s assuring his status as “sex killer.” He’s coming dangerously close to pissing me off. At some point you have to think to yourself:

“What the fuck did we do?”

Don’t get me wrong here. I love my son. He’s singlehandedly turned me in to an ooey-gooey baby person. He’s made me fall in love with a helpless, tiny being that can do nothing more than eat/poop/sleep/scream. The smiles, laughes and talks now are all bonus to me. I’d love him as a blob.

I’d love him more if he slept.

I’m so fucking tired, Internet. I’m tired, I’m cranky, I’m sick of being sick. Not sleeping combined with germs “out there” make for a sick Flinger Family. I’m tired of it. I’m sick of it.

I just want to fucking sleeeeeeeeeeeppppppppppppp.

Fuck the “IUD/NO IUD” debate. I’m going in. If all it means is five years of no chance of “oooops!” then I’m in.

Well, if we ever have sex again.

It’s a good thing he’s so cute.

i

As long as people keep getting stupid, there will be a Mother F.U.C.K.E.R movement. So people? Here’s installment #2:

Apparently, get this, You aren’t supposed to eat your iphone. Right. Wanna hear that again?

Don’t. Eat. Your. iPhone.

“SURGEON GENERAL’S WARNING: Ingesting or inhaling your iPhone or iPod earbuds may be hazardous to your health.”

Ok, I get that people are in to burning things or sniffing things or whatever. But since when is eating your iPhone worthy of CNN reporting? Isn’t there, like, a war going on? Global warming to report about? Socialized medicine? Anything? Beuhler? No? Eating your iPhone it is, then.

Good choice, CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta. Here, this is for you:

Take this and stick it to your forehead and repeat to yourself several times a day “Mother for using common knowledge everywhere. Mother for using common knowledge everywhere…”

In the mean time, I’ll keep reminding my five month old not to put his iPhone in his mouth. The rest of the family, though, is pretty much up to speed on this. Apparently your viewers are at the level of a five month old. God bless this country if this is the future of our nation. We need it.

One day in the bath, while Mr. Flinger bathed LB and I bathed Baby O (the “usual” night time routine), he told LB to get up, stand up. I started singing, “Get up, Stand up! Stand up for your rights!” We all sang this song, or rather, this one verse, until bedtime and again the next night feeling so smug with ourselves.

About a week later LB starts singing it on her own. “Get up stand up! Stand up for your lefts.”

At least she knows her opposites.

I came to the coffee shop to get some work done here and here and here. I got comfy with my decaf, sugar free, fat free milk creamer Americano (per this.) and replied to a couple of emails. I opened a new browser tab (thank god for this) and typed in “T-W-I-T…” thinking my browser would bring me to twitter from the history list.

It didn’t. I ended up here. And, well, I love him and I subscribe to her and their podcast and go to bed at night praying ours will be that good one day.

I saw he was up for a weblog award and I clicked over to vote. Then I realized, “hu, weblog awards? Again? Dude. I NEVER know when these things are coming up. I’m like the weblog award bastard child. I’d LOVE to nominate some people, damnit!” This is true. Luckily, though, I went this category and saw someone I adore in the running (er, rather, lead). Then I saw she was nominated here and voted. And she is nominated here. And then it hit me.

I read a lot of kickass blogs

Which explains, in a very roundabout way, why I’ve neglected this here blog, this here website and this here website.

I also have a note from my mother.

(You can thank me for all the time you just spent clicking on those links. See? Procrastination makes us all work better. Not harder, just smarter.)

Well, whaddy’a know? I missed Day four. Day. Fucking Four, people. And by F’ing four I mean Frogs. (Wait, I’m getting ahead of myself, hang on.)

So, it turns out I chose naked time over posting. I chose a date and a clean house and grocery shopping over posting here yesterday. I picked out the Mexican Restaurant, The Movie, and The Place To Do It, but I did not pick out a topic to write about here. So I won’t be winning any stunning prizes this month. But that’s ok. I got to Do It.

Not that I’m one to kiss and tell.

.... moving on ....

The cursing has increased tenfold here. Have you noticed? Yes, Yes you have. You said to yourself, “Well, effing holy hell! Look! I can say fuck and not get banned!” and then you laughed and cussed and clicked your heals together because it’s fun to cuss, even if it’s just you, your innocent self typing dirty words alone like some reformed prison mate caught with his hands in the cookie jar. Well, shit.

I have to cuss here because around The Kidlets now I say things like, “Oh, Poo!” and “Darnit!” and “What the Frog?!”

What the frog?

Yes. What the frog.

It’s not the same ring as what the fuck, but it gets the job done in a pinch. It’s not as easy to make an acronymn to “F.R.O.G.” as it is to Mother F.U.C.K.E.R. I’ve tried, trust me. “What the Flogging Red Oddball Goatbutt” is that?” See? Not the same.

Feel free to come up with something lovely for What the Frog and I’ll make up a button for you. No! It’ll be Fun! Funolicioius! Like Delicious but Funner. Funolicious. Write it down, that’s a keeper. Darnit.

All of this leads up to my outburst today while shopping. This caused me to first laugh, frown, and say, “WHAT THE FROG” in front of my two children. LB replied, “What’s wrong, mommy? What is it?”

“Nothing sweetie. Nothing is wrong. The world is just Flogging Ridiculous, that’s all. Frogging Natural Water. Dear God.”