Diary of a SubUrban Housewife

So, my old man (I do love calling him that, even though technically speaking I’m 3 years old than he is), is once again taking part in the Love Ride.

He is shamelessly hitting up his readers for donations for this worthy cause.

And cuz I’m all about sharing the love, I am asking you too, my few meager readers, to kick down in his name. Any amount, from $1.00 to $10,000 would be totally groovy of you.

I would never ask you to do something I wouldn’t do myself so I have already pledged my $50.00.

Chuck’s goal is to raise $600.

I have promised that if he meets his goal I will ride with him and would even wear a black leather halter top for the occasion.

So, if any of you readers kick down and let me know that you did, I will send you a photo of me in a black leather halter top. (Just know that proof of your donation will be required.)

When any couple (or single person, cuz we’re not exclusionary here) finds out they’re expecting, among the myraid issues and questions, one of the biggest is, “What will we name this little bugger?”

Occasionally this is a foregone conclusion, when you’re a III or IV or even if mom or dad is set on having a Jr. My husband is a Jr. (there’s a little known Chuck factoid for ya.)

Usually, however, it is a subject fraught with disagreement and shall we say “issues”. Issues of this variety: Brunhilda was his ex-girlfriend’s name; I hated someone named Milicent so I could never name my daughter that; your ex-husband was Bubba, so that’s really out of the question, etc.

Jewish people do not name their children after living family members, as a rule. As with all rules, there are exceptions. I believe Safartic Jews may, in fact, name after living people. Ashkenazie Jews (of which I am one) name their children after recently-passed family members.

When Zoe was conceived, the only dead relative I had was my grandpa Hymie. The thing with this naming after Jewish thing is it’s kind of freeform. Hymie was his English name, Chaim his name in Hebrew. I could have picked an H or Ch name and frankly used it as a middle name and be done with it.

And for you non-Jews out there, please make that Ch sound deep in your throat, the more phlegm noise, the better.

Then when I was five months pregnant my Grandma Anne, died. (Channah in Hebrew). While I was not at my grandmother’s funeral (busy on vacation in London, thanks for asking), apparently my still-to-be-born child’s name was on everyone’s lips. We knew it was a girl and dear Aunt Joyce who minds everyone’s business decreed that this baby, the first in the family for my generation, must be named Channah. Thanks Joyce, we’ll get back to you on that.

Then six weeks later her husband, Grandpa Ruby died (I don’t know his Hebrew name and I’m not calling my mother or father to find out). I made it to this funeral (7 1/2 months pregnant, thanks) and interestingly enough, Joyce never managed to mention that I would be naming my daughter Channah.

So now we have a whole passel of dead people to either choose from, or not.

Chuck and I sat down with books, printouts from the Internet, and other sources of girl’s names. Some of the top contenders were Sydney and Lily. (I vaguely recall him not liking Lily, but I did, and frankly still do.)

We finally ended with with Zoe. The Hebrew word for grandfather is Zadie and since I had two recently-dead grandfathers, it seemed a good way to go. (See above for the free-form interpretation of naming people with permission to use the first letter only–for those of you who may be lost here.)

As an update here, Chuck insists that we named her after the little girl in the cartoon Baby Blues, which I would *never* have agreed to. Similarly he insists he *never* would have agreed to my version of the story. So there you have that.

As for a middle name, it wasn’t until they were about to rip the birth certificate from our hands in the hospital that we decided. Hannah. After my grandma after all. Chuck’s choice as I recall. And I get kind of misty thinking about that.

So it’s Zoe Hannah. It’s a great name if you ask me. There weren’t many Zoe’s when we named her, and now you can’t spit without hitting another Zoe. There is another Zoe in her class as a matter of a fact. So my daughter is Zoe A. (And that’s how she used to sign her Mother’s Day and Father’s Day cards, just so we didn’t think it’s the other Zoe by mistake.)

But have you ever tried to find stuff with the name Zoe printed on it? You know, those mini-license plates, or key chains, or mugs or things like that? Not so easy I’m here to tell you.

On family outing this evening we ended up at a card/novelty store. There was a rack of those little license plates. Like a moth to a flame I am drawn to those racks. Just to prove that there will be no Zoe. There was not.

There was Catherine, Kathryn, Katherine, and Cathryn; Brianna and Briana, Katelyn and Caitlin; Montana; Autumn; Jesus; Caleb; Brandi; Brittney and Brittany; Destiny; Madaline; Miriam; Crystal and Krystle; and even Javier.

But no Zoe.

1. Bookends:: matched set
2. Compliment:: Me!
3. Gutter:: ball
4. Obsession:: compulsion
5. Heavy:: metal
6. Real:: World
7. Disposable:: diaper
8. Breeze:: mmmmmm, cool
9. Work:: yeah, I do
10. Sweetheart:: ‘s Dance

    As always a big shout out to Unconsious Mutterings.

It is NEVER OK to wear pantyhose, tights, or socks with open-toed shoes or mules.

So I talked to my sister in law today. This would be the sister in law who has three children that she doesn’t discipline or otherwise really take care of. The three children that she and her husband are more than pleased to abdicate responsibility for whenever anyone else shows up and sits still for five minutes in the presence of their truly horrible three children.

Turns out she’s pregnant. Again.

Well, at least this time she told me.

I knew this was coming. I suspected as much last time I saw her. And frankly, the youngest is almost two already so it’s about time she popped another one out for someone else (preferably her mother) to take care of.

One of the times ago that she was pregnant was shortly after (or frankly not so shortly after) Chuck and I dealt with our infertility issues. (If you really care to read about them, sift through my archives here, I can’t be bothered to go through them myself and it’s old, boring news at this point anyway).

But no one wanted to tell me.

Poor barren Beth, I’m certain was what was on all their little minds. No one wanted to “hurt my feelings” cuz sister in law was popping them out faster then you can say Jack Robinson, and all poor barren Beth had was one child. Well, my feelings weren’t hurt. I was pissed off.

Pissed off because: 1. I’m not barren. I’m probably one of the most fertile women you’ll ever meet, our infertility issues were not a result of my issues, it was just one of those things; and 2. I’m a fucking adult and it was a bullshit excuse, so let’s just call a spade a spade and move on with things.

When she told me today I made all the appropriate noises and congratulated her. What the hell, it’s her choice.

Me: I hit the jackpot with the first kid and and more then happy with what I’ve got.

Growing up there were three kids in my family, so on long family trips someone ended up sitting in the middle. It was usually me since both my sisters got carsick.

For short trips, when they couldn’t use the carsick trump card, we used the “I called it” method of determining who got a window. On the way to the car you’d hear screams of, “I get the window, I called it.”

“I called it” is indisputable. End of discussion.

So, sitting in the middle was always something you didn’t want.

Fast forward 35 years. Riding in the car with Zoe, an only child, she prefers to sit in the middle. When I questioned this curious (to me anyway) choice, she informed me that the middle seat gets more air conditioning.

Since I grew up in the age of the bench seat, this perq was non-existent in my middle-sitting youth.

I often find myself with more than one child in the back seat of my car. Usually where you find Zoe, you find Katie, her best friend. I drove them both to and from camp this summer and last, as regular readers will recall.

Now sitting in the middle is the most-coveted position and a whole method of turns had to be established, taking into consideration not only who sat in the middle last, but also the duration of the trip, the alignment of the planets, and other stuff.

I would have banned the middle seat weeks ago but alas the seatbelt in the back behind the drivers seat was jammed so someone had to sit in the middle. With the use of complicated charts and diagrams we sorted it out.

Today I fixed the seatbelt and there was a new rule: when there are two children in the car, no one sits in the middle. (The gray hair is coming in fast enough on my head, I was sick of the discussions, and those charts in the car were getting very cumbersome.)

So we’re on the way home from dinner, me, Zoe and Katie. To the restaurant (OK, it was In-N-Out) no one sat in the middle. After dinner I reminded them that no one is to sit in the middle.

Then I hear a plaintiff plea from the back seat. Katie reminded me that Zoe sat in the middle last time and puleeeeeze could she do it just one more time.

I caved. This one last time. Katie could sit in the middle.

But that’s the last time. I swear. No matter how pathetic they get. I swear.

On the radio station I listen to there is a promo by one of the on-air personalities. I don’t remember what the promo is for. That’s not really important. What is important is the fact that the word “across” is in the promo.

Except when this jerk says it, he says, “acrossT.” He is not the first imbecile I’ve heard add a t to the word. What’s up with this? Is he stupid or just illiterate. Can he not read?

This ranks up at the top of my list of pet peeves along with people who say heighTH, when speaking about how tall someone is. People, there is no TH. Width, i’ll give you that one, but not on height. No h, no th dipthong action there.

Now I’m all about a silent J, but a silent T? Not so much.

So it’s day two of 3rd grade. We’ve been early for two days in a row. Please mark that down in the record books cuz it’s not likely to happen again.

I’ll have to assume day one was good cuz I had to drag my daughter out of her class at the end of the day.

She asked me to walk her into the yard this morning, which I gladly did, and the minute we hit the school yard she was off like a shot. I had to find her to say goodbye. While I was a little saddened by this (she’s growing up so fast and getting so independent), it fiills me with joy that she’s getting so independent in a good way.

It was good to see my mom friends yesterday and a big deal was made over my new hair, belly ring, and thinner, tan body. I’m a hottie mom now and you gotta love that, cuz it’s all about me, now isn’t it.

While my husband is lamenting the loss of his potential stalking victim, oops, I mean love interest, I saw my man yesterday. And he looked as fabulous as ever. Once again, I did not throw my sexy, belly ringed body at his feet, but the temptation was there.

Cuz I’m all about self-control kids.

Go here every day and click. Please

School doesn’t start for Zoe until Thursday and camp ended last Friday. This means that I had to cover for two work days. I’m incredibly busy (as previously reported) so couldn’t take the time off. My mother-in-law graciously stepped up and I dropped Zoe off there this morning. She’s staying with her until tomorrow. I’ll pick her up about 4 ish so we can get home, pack her backpack, have dinner, get bathed, and lay out our clothes for the first day of school.

I’m fairly certain we won’t be late. On Thursday at least. We have a dismal on-time record for arrival to school.

It wasn’t until about 4 this afternoon that I realized that I was going to be both husband and child free tonight. Woo hoo! For the whole night. How weird is that?

What’s a girl to do?

I suppose I could have gone to the movies, or made some last minute calls for dinner plans, but none of it sounded appealing.

I did try to do some shopping after work, but made a poor store choice and found absolutely nothing, not even shoes. I ordered in Chinese. (And how pathetic is it that when I placed my delivery order the guy recognized my voice and address and was surprised that I’d ordered so little and felt compelled to comment on it?) I tidied the house a bit. I gave my pets some attention. I played some cribbage (my addiction), and now I’m writing this boring entry about how I wasted a completely good night alone, doing nothing.

I’m floundering I tell you.