Tag: parenting

The Monday Review – Live from New York Edition

On By BekkiIn The Weekly ReviewLeave a comment

1. A and I are now the proud owners of a bedroom set. In the almost nine years we’ve been together, we’ve had night boxes, night speakers, night crates, and, once, a night fishtank, but never night stands. All that changed last Monday, and let me tell you, it is a life altering experience.Z explores the new furniture2. WTF X-Files? On a scale of 1-Dexter, the last episode in the mini series was about a 7, but that’s only because I refuse to believe it was unintentionally that bad. Memorable quote “He’s too sick for the vaccine! He needs STEM CELLS.” Will Sculley save Mulder? Will Fox commission more episodes? Did Einstein survive? By the time the closing credits rolled, I was laughing too hard to care.

3. Do you have a toddler? Are you watching Masha and the Bear? No? You’re welcome.

4. Bronwyn is kicking my ass. Revisions are always much slower for me than the zero draft, but this is bordering on the ridiculous. It’s why you don’t see much in the way of novel updates from me… Chapter 6, days 7-15: still struggling through the squirrel killing scene.

5. Things I miss about New York: the subway, good pizza, and hole-in-the-wall restaurants.  The wine bar I’m writing this in hits two of the three: it’s a blink-and-you-miss-it set of stairs that I’ve walked by dozens of times, and they serve a proper thin-crust, crushed tomato sauce pizza. There’s also a Christmas story leg lamp behind the bar and a random stained glass mural of an owl and a raven in a tree.  You just can’t get this in Vallejo.

Closing Tabs

I’ve always wanted to live in a house with a conservatory.  As that’s not likely to happen any time soon, I’ll settle for an indoor fruit tree or four.

I totally got tripped up by this guy when I was working restaurants, and it amazes me that, despite the fact that she’s writing about the STEM fields and I was a cocktail waitress, the MO was almost identical – down to the inappropriate use of “shiny.”

On a much lighter note, I came across this list of places to hike with a toddler in the East Bay and I can’t wait to go out with A and Z.

Unfortunately, said hikes are probably going to have to wait a month or so, as it appears that the reprieve from the rain is over with a vengeance.

 

The Monday Review

On By BekkiIn The Weekly ReviewLeave a comment

1. I’ve had a number of conflicting thoughts about Scalia’s death. Mostly, while I think that this is a good thing for the country, I also feel that there’s something inherently wrong in rejoicing in someone’s death, as some people seem to be doing. I think it’s possible to feel that one death will improve the lives of millions without necessarily enjoying the fact of that death. I also have mixed thoughts on the “clearly he was very intelligent and worked hard to get where he is.” Because in many ways Scalia represented the epitome of white male privilege, and it’s entirely possible that he would never have ended up where he was if he didn’t start the game on the lowest difficulty setting. And regardless of what you or I think about Scalia the Supreme Court Justice, at the end of the day he was a man with friends and family who are mourning him.

2. Z is growing up into a real person. It’s about the coolest thing ever to watch. Yesterday, she knocked her water over onto the couch, then went into the kitchen, dragged her stool to the counter, climbed up it, and brought me a handful of paper towels to clean the mess with. Those of you without kids are probably wondering what the big deal is. Those of you with kids are nodding along at the incredible awe and wonder I felt that this two year old, who cannot even get her shoes on without seven and a half reminders most mornings, actually remembered and executed the steps to clean up her mess.

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3. We brought the bikes out today, and it was joyous. I’m looking forward to getting around town with Z in the trailer and to picking her up from school on the bike. I see the city in such a different way when I ride by it – there’s time to notice all her hidden bones and secret places.

4. What are you watching this summer? With the X-Files mini-series almost over, and Outlander not due to start until April – and therefore not ripe for binge-watching for several months – there’s a void in my evenings. Maybe I’ll finally finish Jessica Jones, or maybe I’ll take the plunge and start watching Breaking Bad.  Suggestions?

5. 2016 continues to kick ass and take names. Some old guy ran over (yes, ran over!) the Mabacle two weeks ago, and his insurance wants to total the car for about half of what it’s worth. Needless to say, A and I are both livid. The only upside is that because our insurance company appraised the car just a few weeks ago, we’ve got a pretty good idea what it’s worth. If the car survives this intact, we’re getting vanity place that says Mabacle. Because, reasons.

Closing Tabs

In the event that you have a burning desire to know which companies send the most spam emails.

You kind of have to wonder what would have happened had the second goalie been injured.  Would the Coyotes really have put a bank manager on the ice?

I’m having trouble believing this article titled “Don’t Drink Wine” isn’t a parody of itself.

Yup. I am definitely old. And somewhat sad that Tumblr and the like weren’t around when I was in high school.  The secret lives of Tubmlr teens.

The Monday Review

On By BekkiIn The Weekly Review3 Comments

1. This.

2. 2106 5, A&B 0.  So far, 2016 has pretty much kicked our asses.  A’s mystery bug was finally diagnosed as post-infectious gastritis, which is a fancy way of saying he got food poisoning so bad it seriously messed up his GI tract.  We’ve had the plumber out twice so far, once for a leak that had water cascading into the basement and once because the garbage disposal backed up into the bathtub. The roof needs to be replaced when the rain stops. The garage door broke, and because there’s no other entrance we had to call a repair company to get us in. So if I’m not managing to blog as regularly as usual, it’s probably because we’ve had another crazy week.

3. I’m making the Facebook hiatus semi-permanent. About a month ago, I uninstalled the app from my phone. I’ll admit, it made me a little twitchy at first. I’d gotten used to having those dopamine pings, in the form  of the constantly scrolling news feed. But when it comes down to it, there’s very little of substance in my feed. Back in the days of the 140 character limit, people posted less, and posted more meaningfully.  Now, it’s largely click-bait and life events.  So I log on every couple of days, to catch up on photos and announcements – and thanks to Facebook’s algorithms, they’re almost always at the top – make a few comments, like a few photos, and log off.

4. Austerity month. After seeing the credit card spend for December and January, A and I decided to make February “austerity month.” Our goal is not to go crazy with not spending money, but to hold off on the impulse buys that always end up adding up at the end of the month. Like the Target runs that somehow top $100, or the never-ending Amazon cart. Of course, given the spend on house repair and maintenance this month, it’s looking like we may be trying for an austerity quarter. What I’ve found interesting is that this has made me very aware of all the things I want but don’t really need, like new shades for the ceiling fixture in the office, or a laptop/camera bag, or another pair of sunglasses.

5. This is what Valentine’s Day looks like when you have a toddler. A and I dropped Z with the sister after her nap on Saturday and went to go see Zoolander. In a theatre. With actual other people. Then we came home and promptly fell into bed. Sunday morning we slept in. Until 7 am! We went to IHOP for breakfast, looked at the calorie count next to all the dishes, and split a breakfast sampler. Then we yard-worked for a few hours. The rest of the day was pretty much spent sitting on the couch.

Closing Tabs

An exploration of the rise and fall of waterbeds.

OK Go’s new video takes place in an S7 airplane, in zero-g, and it is every bit as cool as it sounds.

I bookmarked this article on parenting a toddler awhile ago, and recently found it while cleaning out my bookmarks. The advice in here is spot on, at least for my kid, and I’ve found that turning things into games or “contests” has made life easier for both of us.

I’m seriously thinking about going to this writer’s retreat. It’s short, it’s nearby, and it’s fairly affordable.  Bay Area writer friends, any interest?

The Monday Review – Short Form

On By BekkiIn The Weekly Review1 Comment

A brought the Montezuma’s Revenge to Mexico, and ended up being ridiculously sick while we were on vacation. We have spent the last week and change in and out of Mexican and American hospitals. He’s finally feeling a little better, but he’s had a rough time of it.

Simultaneously, Z picked up a cold that has knocked me flat for the past few days. That, combined with a general lack of sleep, has wiped my ability to do much more than keep the two of us fed and dressed and entertained. She and I are also tentatively planning to go to OKC for my grandfather’s 90th birthday a little later this week.

My dad flew out to help us keep things together. It really does take a village.

There may be a longer blog post when all this is done. There may not. I make no guarantees about my ability to get blog posts out for the rest of the month. We’re all going to focus on getting better and getting back to normal.

On the positive side, Mexico was lovely.

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The Monday Review

On By BekkiIn The Weekly Review2 Comments

1. The holidays wrecked me. This was the first year that I felt completely over-scheduled during the holidays. We packed in a ton of family and friends time over Christmas and in the week between Christmas and New Year’s, with something going on almost every day.  By the time we got to New Year’s, I was frazzled and fried and pretty much wanted nothing more than to go to sleep at 8 pm.  I’m not sure there’s anything different we could or would have done – I think that’s just the reality of life with a small kid.  I do know that I’m really excited that I’m going to vacuum the house this afternoon.

2. Smarter than the house. The Philips Hue bulbs are going back to Best Buy. I’m a bit sad about this.  I can’t tell you how much we liked having the ability to change the tone of the bulbs throughout the day, from warm yellow early in the morning to a bluer, daylight color in the afternoon, and back to warm yellow at night. The color part was fun too, although it was hard to get anything to match the color wheel in the green/blue/purple spectrum. Apparently Philips traded in the ability to do true blues for the ability to have more flexibility with whites.* That isn’t why they’re going back, though.  As I mentioned last week, Philips has closed down their ecosystem so that it no longer works with most bulbs or other smart things. In the end, that’s a deal-breaker for us.  I think we’ll be switching to a combination of Z-wave dimmers and Lifx bulbs, and possibly some Hue knock-offs A found on Alibaba.

3. The year of tracking. This is the first year I’ve collected and reviewed stats for the year. I definitely want to do it again, in a somewhat principled manner.  And because it’s easier to decide to do something in early January than it is to actually do it throughout the year, I want to make it simple. That means finding apps that run continually in the background, without me having to do anything about it (Google locations, UP by Jawbone) or that have a ridiculously simple user interface (Clue, the non-pink period tracker).  I’m still searching for a good travel app, and I’d love to see a life tracker type app that let’s me track the “everything else.”

4. I would really like to buy a house with a roof that doesn’t leak. We noticed a wet patch in the ceiling on Christmas Eve, right under one of the solar panels.  The solar company sent someone out to look at it immediately, and he was awesome.  He got all the way into the back of the crawlspace (which is maybe two feet high), poked around, went up onto the roof, did a bit more poking around, figured out where the leak is coming in, and put a temporary patch on it. Unfortunately, it has nothing to do with the solar panels, which means that the solar company won’t cover it.  On my to-do list today:  calling roofers. If you live around here and have a roofer you like, please please please send me their contact info.

5.  We’re taking a toddler to Mexico for week.  I have researched toddler activities (whale watching on a pirate ship! a semi-submersible submarine!), found not one but two babysitting agencies that cater to tourists, and (mostly) penetrated the Mexican rental car thicket. We also bought Z a tapper of her own, a 7″ tablet that will be much less expensive to replace when she breaks it than either of our phones. She’s not one of those kids who will stare quietly at a screen for three hours, but I figure it’s probably good for 30 minute stretches of semi-self entertainment.  Anyone have recommendations for good toddler games?  Especially games that lock the screen so she can’t inadvertently exit out?

Closing Tabs

Questionable Advice and Advertisements put up a fun pie chart of New Year’s resolutions from 1946.

T-mobile isn’t throttling you, you’re just being down-graded.  For all practical purposes, I’m not sure there’s much of a distinction to be made. You’re still getting lower-quality service because we haven’t yet figured out who’s in charge of paying for the Internet.

Season Six of Game of Thrones will be out before The Winds of Winter.  Considering that I stopped around Season 4 of the HBO series, largely because I couldn’t take all the senseless violence any more, I’m not much troubled by this. In happier news, here’s a teaser for season two of Outlander.

CNET compared Philips Hue bulbs to Lifx, and the difference between the two is pretty telling.  If we weren’t already planning to switch, this might have convinced us.

Question of the Week

I got this new poll app, but someone mentioned last week that they were having trouble answering.  I think I’ve got it figured out now, but let me know offline or in the comments if it’s still broken.

[yop_poll id=”8″]