Update, head to toe

So the weight thing... after a couple of weeks of no weight loss, I've finally begun shedding the pounds. My last weigh-in was 157 lb, and last night I weighed in at 156. So, we're getting somewhere! I just need to keep doing as much cardio as I can, and the hot yoga definitely helps. I'm pretty convinced that's the difference.

I feel much better, too. I just bought a dress at Banana Republic in a size 10. Yay! And, it was $150, but I only paid $26. Gotta love bargains, too. My pants are getting to be a little big- I keep having to pull them up. But I'm not complaining!

I had the root canal done redone this past Monday. It hurt like hell. The infected area wouldn't take to the Novocaine, and the hawaiian dentist had left some of the root there, which is why it was always a little tender. So my dentist tried to be gentle, but he really just had to clean it out and I had to just deal with the pain. It was so bad that he had to clean from inside the tooth and through the gum line. Hooray. If the hawaiian guy had taken me seriously (or taken his job seriously), it wouldn't have gotten so bad.

The temporary crown they put on became loose that night. And I don't go back until the 16th for the permanent one. So now I'm just waiting for the crown to fall off. It's not a matter of "if", it's a matter of "when". I just hope it's not in front of a bunch of people, or I'll be looking like this:

This is the actual picture I took from my cell mid-procedure, before the crown was put on. Lovely, ain't it?

The funk

Why is it that every time school starts for Hubby, he ends up bringing home some kind of funky sickness?

JC and I are chilling out at home today, relaxing and trying to get over the snots. Hubby took LB out to the store 1) to get a toddler out of my hair while I'm feeling like crap, and 2) so they wouldn't catch the funk.

I love LB. Everyone knows that. But it's SO NICE to have a quiet house for once. I've been able to actually think and get stuff done, even though I really should be resting. I'll welcome the noise when they get home, but it's also very, very, very nice to have a break from it.

JC is a mellow kid, so taking care of him (even when he's sick) is easy. He's napping now, which is why I'm able to blog, but even when he's awake, I can set him down and not worry about him opening the front door and walking out of the house.... or walking at all, for that matter. Having a toddler thrown into the mix is very challenging. I hear that these are the hard years (at least, until adolesence), so I'm hoping I can make it through with some of my sanity in tact.

For now, it's a huge help that Hubby's on shore duty and able to take LB for an afternoon. When JC gets to be LB's age, we will be looking at sea duty again, which inevitably means another deployment. But hopefully LB will have mellowed by then... if not, we're headed to Grandma & Grandpa's. :)

It really shouldn't surprise me any more.

The trip to the dentist was enlightening. Turns out, I will need a second root canal. Apparently the pain I'd been experiencing since November (which the hawaiian dentist dismissed) is an abscess. Yuck. It's like a bacterial infection in your tooth that can eat your jawbone away if left untreated. That scares me, because it's been like this for over two months now.

Also, the dentist discovered that I have five cavitites!!! They took little pictures of each of my teeth, and even I, with an untrained eye, could see them. Funny- I was just at the hawaiian dentist in November, and they said everything looked fine. *sigh*

So now I will be shelling out $1,000 to fix all this. Correction- I will be pursuing legal paths to get the hawaiian dentist to pay for this. After all, it was either his neglect or just complete incompetence that caused this.

By the way, in case you are wondering, it was Pearl Family Dental in Honolulu. Oh, and I called this morning to have my records sent to my new dentist, and the number's been disconnected. Hooray.

Just hand me my gosh-darn, tootin' hair rollers and call me Bertha.

Well, today may very well be the last day I have all my teeth. So redneck, I know.

Let me start at the beginning. When I was about 9 or 10 years old, I was rollerskating down the driveway. Just as I was going full-speed toward the garage door, I tripped on a rock. No, I didn't fall face-first into the garage door. I fell face-first into the back of my dad's '56 T-bird.

I broke my front tooth in half, which was some of the worst pain I have ever felt in my life (just below childbirth). Ever since then, I've had a partial bonding. When I was preggo with LB, my dentist said I finally needed a root canal, which I reluctantly had done. I mean, who wants a root canal at 7 months preggo?

Anyway, I've had pain ever since, and finally discovered an abscess the other day. I immediately went to a dentist and will be seen tomorrow. Since I made the appointment, though, I've been researching on the internet, and it doesn't look good. Most people need second root canals, and half have that tooth pulled with a fake tooth in place. Since it's my front tooth, I'm assuming that if it has to be pulled, my smile will never look the same again.

Dammit!! I really don't want a friggin fake tooth, even though it's so far gone that 90% of it's fake already. How friggin redneck is this???? I'm not even 30 and already have false teeth! Okay, tooth, but whatever, it's still bumming me out. Check back to see what happens tomorrow.

Keep your hands, feet, and opinions to yourself.

Remember when you were little, and you almost inevitably heard an adult say, "Keep your hands and feet to yourself!" Well, they were right, but I think we should also include "opinions."

I was grocery shopping at the commissary this afternoon with the boys. Since I had left the Bjorn at the house, I had to push both boys in the double stroller while tugging along a grocery cart behind me. With a little finesse, I think I pulled it off (albeit, a little slower than I had hoped). The entire time, I kept running into the same people, most of which thought the boys were really cute and adorable. But this one old, dirty hippie just kept giving me dirty looks. Must go with the dirtiness.

Anyway, as I'm changing the baby in the parking lot from yet another most-poopy-diaper-ever, I walk to the trash can to throw it away. Who comes driving up next to me but the dirty hippie in his dirty, beat-up truck, and he says, "You should really use reusable diapers" then drives away.

Well, I got so pissed that I said, "How about you shut the f*** up?" as he was driving off. The men around me looked shocked (apparently, I don't look like I should be saying those things), and the women smiled really big.

I was so ready to get into an altercation with him. First, keep your preaching to yourself. A stranger in a parking lot at the grocery store is the wrong time, place, and person. The only people one should preach to are people you know well. It's just rude and offensive to preach to strangers. Second, reusable diapers are almost as environmentally-unfriendly as disposable, when you factor in the energy use it takes to clean them. And third, I think I'm doing everything I can to be a good mom, and I don't need a judgemental, condescending asshole to criticize me. I'm already hard on myself- I don't need other people to be. Oh, and fourth, your pick-up truck is about environmentally friendly as burning styrofoam, so take your own damn advice.

Huggies are amazing.

My sister T came to visit for a long weekend. It was GREAT! She got to meet JC and spend some time with him and LB. And, she watched them while Hubby and I went to the spa downtown and had a hot tub & massage treatment. Yessssssss..... so nice!

We went to the aquarium and across the Golden Gate Bridge. We did some wine tasting and ate at Fisherman's Wharf. Very fun! The boys and I drove up to SF to drop her off at the airport, and that's when things got challenging.

After we dropped her off, the apocalypse arrived, I swear. The sky wasn't gray or overcast- it was black and menacing. I had heard about the storms we were supposed to be getting, but this was a little scary. The rain started, which wasn't too bad. I set my GPS to "Home" and started on the route. It took me on some weird roads, but I trusted it. Too bad. After thinking "this is strange", I check the address and it was for the Monterey Motel 6. So we took the long way, and what a long way it was.

One stretch of road had no exits, no shoulder, no breakdown lane, and no median. Not good for someone who has to pee badly, and also needs to change diapers badly. It was also backed up from accidents, snow, and downed power lines. I think we averaged 3 mph for about 45 minutes. I had to pee so bad that I took one of LB's diapers, stuffed it down my pants, and let loose. Unfortunately, I don't have a two year old's bladder, so it didn't exactly catch everything.

When we finally got to a turn-out, I changed the boys. JC had explosive pooped all over himself, but luckily I had a change of clothes. LB had peed through everything, including his shirts. I had extra pants for him, so he just had to bear with a damp shirt. But I didn't think I'd need a change of clothes for myself! I had a pretty embarassing spot in a pretty embarassing place, which some chick was kind enough to snicker at as I was getting back in the car.

The whole ride home reeked of pee. I did my best to sit on a diaper, as to not ruin my carseats, but we all just stank. Luckily, the rest of the drive was okay, just rainy and windy. And Hubby, being a sweet husband, had drawn up a warm bath for the boys, so as soon as we arrived, he took the baby and started cleaning him up.

It was adventurous. It always is. It's always something when I'm traveling with the boys.

Two years ago...

...my baby was born!

What a day that was. Actually, it was two days. Started labor on the 14th in the am, then ended on the 15th in the am. Ugh. It was pretty brutal. But I suppose the whole yin/yang thing was in effect, because for as much as it sucked for me physically, I got the most beautiful boy out of it!

Now he's two, and learning so much every day. He's an independent, smart little boy- so different from the helpless little baby he was.

It's hard to believe two years have gone by....