Fun and games

Why is it that when I’m short on time, I’m shorter on ideas? I just want to dash off a quick post today and I’ve written about 600 words on four different topics – none of which will coalesce into anything worth posting.

(I suppose I should have known I was scraping the bottom of the blog-fodder barrel when I admitted to the Interwebs that I wet my pants in Loblaws. Pretty clear sign in retrospect that maybe I need to restock the ideas cupboard!)

And now I’m completely out of time, and have nothing. Nothing!

So, in lieu of an actual post, I will resort to the laziest of devices and turn it all back on you.

Tell me three things about you. Any old three things at all. Your three favourite colours, three favourite foods, names of three pets you have owned, three vacations you have taken or want to take or would never dream of taking. Three books you want to read. Three shows you wish were still on TV. The three best toppings on a pizza. Why three? Because I’m thinking in threes lately – three sons, three boys, three children.

Don’t be shy – speak up! Surely there are three of SOMETHING rattling around in your brain.

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Back in the day, before I had all things bloggy (and Facebook-y) to satisfy my online urges, I spent a lot of time on bulletin boards – in particular, on IVF Connections.

One feature I always liked was the brag thread, where people would talk about how baby rolled over for the first time, or ate her first cheerio, or slept more than two hours in a row. Sometimes it was something major like ‘we just bought a new house’, or ‘I just earned my dream job’, but sometimes it was as simple as ‘I managed to take a shower and feed the kids breakfast before the schoolbus arrived this morning.’

We don’t do enough bragging, in my humble opinion. We need to speak up more often about the simple joys and subtle victories in our daily lives. Want to play along?

I’d like to know what’s going on in your life today that makes you happy. What’s worthy of commentary? What are you proud of? Why do you (or someone you know) deserve a pat on the back? Share an anecdote of how life is good in your little corner of the universe right about now.

Here’s a simple one for me: my pants are too big. I have had to give up many, many pairs of pants in my life because they were too small, but aside from maternity clothes I don’t think I’ve actually had to stop wearing a pair of pants because they were too large – and I’m not averse to wearing baggy, oversize clothes either! But the pants I bought just after Christmas to accomodate my burgeoning butt are no longer fit for public consumption. I knew they were getting looser, but I’ve been trying to keep them in circulation until the weather improved enough to transition into my spring pants. After two colleagues pointed out (with great kindness) that they were more than a wee bit saggy in the butt, I’ve had to face the truth. The pants are too big.

Yay me! I’ve only lost about 6 pounds in total, but I’m getting there.

Edited to add: another thing that makes me happy – I just found out that Loukia nominated me for one of the Blogger’s Choice Awards!

Thanks Loukia! And if you happen to feel like wandering over there and voting for me (you have to sign up to do it – what a pain!), then make sure you vote for Marla while you’re at it!

And now – what about you?

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I wish I was better with Photoshop or those other photo editing programs. If I were, I’d mock up a rolled up rim from a Tim Horton’s cup, and somehow put the blog of the person who won the Great Rimroller Contest on there.

Perhaps it’s just as well, because “Tales from the Fairy Blogmother” is a pretty long title, and I don’t think I could fit it all on there! Congratulations, Shan – you’re our big winner!

In the end, I couldn’t bring myself to choose one entry over another. I simply numbered the entries in the order they arrived, and asked Beloved to pick a number.

Hats off to Trixie, Suzanne, Renee and my cousin Mike, who all saw through my ruse on the ‘liar liar’ post from yesterday. While I came very, very close to getting my navel pierced after I got divorced, I never did. I still wish I did it, back in the day, and frankly I probably would have if someone had actually told me I couldn’t. But I had so much trouble with my pierced ears (25 years after the fact, they still close up if I don’t wear earrings almost every day, or wear less than gold posts) and I never got around to it.

The other stories are all true. The guy on the train scared the hell out of me, to be honest, and I was just about to ask the conductor to find me another seat when he came by to collect the tickets and the guy tried to pass off his handwritten ticket. He was escorted off the train at the next stop. I wrote about it here.

The pie story is also true, and has become the stuff of family lore. Thank goodness I have understanding in-laws! I was completely mortified, but with an excellent sense of humour my mother-in-law Dee simply made new pies for the auction, and my father-in-law and Beloved made short work of the unlicked halves of the remaining pies.

Beloved and I did meet in a bar one night, twelve years ago tomorrow, as a matter of fact, and he did proposition me with his sketches. And it’s also true (and very exciting!) that our whole sordid infertility and fertility story will be featured in the Mother’s Day issue of Chatelaine next month. I have no idea what to expect of the story, which I think is about infertilty in Canada. I’ll let you know when it’s on the stands, and hopefully online.

And now, back to cleaning the house.

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I know, I still owe you a post for Tristan’s birthday. It’s okay, as long as I get it in before he’s old enough to read, I’m good.

In the meanwhile, in lieu of anything particularly thought provoking or time consuming, I thought I’d steal this idea from Mama Tulip. Four of these five statements are true; one is a fib. Can you tell my fact from fiction? (Those of you who know me well likely know the truth – if you do, don’t tell!)

1.) In a fit of defiance and independence, I had my belly button pierced despite my ex-husband’s opinion that I should not get it done. It became horrendously infected and I had to take it out after less than a month. I still have the scar.

2.) While traveling solo through Europe, on a train from Munich to Salzburg I was propositioned by a man who told me he had just been released from prison. He was escorted off the train because his ‘ticket’ was hand-written on a cocktail napkin.

3.) Beloved and I met in a bar. He was in the Fine Arts program at the University of Westen Ontario at the time. The night we met, he invited me back to his apartment to “see his drawings”. I said yes, and we’ve been together ever since.

4.) We were visiting my in-laws one summer weekend for the first time. My mother-in-law had just baked two lemon meringue pies for a charity auction and had left them on a shelf in her utility room to cool. We went out for dinner and in our absence, my exhuberant puppy-brained dog licked exactly half the meringue off each of the two pies, leaving the yellow lemon base. I walked into the utility room and froze when I saw the half-demeringued pies, and contemplated for a long minute simply packing the dog into the car and returning home without a word, never to return.

5.) Our long and convoluted fertility and IVF stories, from the first miscarriage in 2000 through the IUIs, the IVF, Tristan’s birth, Simon’s surprise arrival, our Frostie adventure and even the miscarriage last November will be featured in a story in the May issue of Chatelaine magazine.

I’m a terrible liar in person – can I pull it off on the blog? Which one is a fib?

Edited to add: only one day remains in the Great Canadian Rimroller Contest! Enter today!

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