ad hoc MOM

Aug9Movin’ On Up?
Tonya

It’s been so amazing here at adhocMOM but, sadly, we are moving on. Moving up.

I can now be found at my new blog: Going To Mensa and on twitter: @Going2Mensa.

I can also still be found at The Mouthy Housewives.

Unlike Weezy though my move won’t come with an apartment in the sky.

Anyway, since Gwyneth Paltrow has a cookbook and J.Lo seems to be up for Single Mother of the Year award I’ve decided to branch out into poetry. After a few attempts with a “Man from Nantucket” I moved on to the haiku.  I’ve written one for all you lovely folks out there in the blogosphere:

A train to catch. Now.

I know not where it travels.

Maybe back to you?

I know; it’s pretty damn deep.

Seriously, I just want to say I feel so lucky to have met such amazing people! I will miss everyone so much! And I really hope that you all come over and visit me on Going to Mensa and The Mouthy Housewives. But most of all, though, THANK YOU for all of the awesome comments, the wonderful advice, the amazing support, and, most of all, the huge laughs!!!

Love,

Tonya

 

Filed Under: Milestones


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Apr21Mousegate 2011: Run For Your Lives…Over to The Mouthy Housewives!
Tonya

I’m guest posting at The Mouthy Housewives today (check it out here) so I should be over the moon! I can’t tell you how excited I was when Kelcey from The Mama Bird Diaries bestowed this honor upon me! Let’s just say I held my head pretty high and I might have told a few of the riff raff to suck it. (Note to self: the cat doesn’t know the meaning of the phrase “suck it”)

But what happened to all that euphoria? Well, at the moment it’s been replaced by mind numbing fear. It’s midnight, the hubs is out of town and there’s a…mouse…in the kitchen, or at least what I think is a mouse, it could be a serial killer, same thing really. Currently, I’ve barricaded myself and my son in his room. While he sleeps soundly, completely unaware that we could be ripped to tiny little pieces at any moment, I’m curled up in a shaky ball of anxiety and perspiration, rocking myself back and forth in the corner trying to figure out how the hell we’re going to get our breakfast in the morning! If we are still alive, that is.

Some people tell me (my best stink eye is currently aimed in my spouse’s direction) that there’s nothing to be afraid of…they’re more afraid of you than you are of them…blah blah blah…lies lies lies…I know for a fact that this is not true! And by fact I mean gut instinct/psychic intuition. Rats and mice will totally devour you in 30 seconds flat! I know! I’ve seen what they can do on documentaries like CSI and Supernatural. And can you just imagine the kind of survival instinct it takes to be vermin in New York City??? Seriously, whoever it is that’s making all that noise behind the fridge, they’ve probably already done hard time at Rikers. And not Lil’ Wayne-like time but grim, solitary confinement because you-just-killed-3-men-with-an-inch-of-dental-floss kind of time!

So, I guess, while I try to MacGyver our asses out of this place without angering the beast, head on over to The Mouthy Housewives and take a gander at what may be the last advice I ever give! Also, can you send me some gum, tin foil, and a hanger?

Filed Under: Blog Love, Fear, Insanity, Rants
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Apr20Do I Have Any Taste? Any Taste At All?
Paula

My husband and I went on an actual date last Saturday.  And I have to say it might have been the best one we’ve been on in ages.  There was no fancy restaurant involved. . . no reservations.  What we did turned out to be much more fun.

I was tired, and so close to saying “Can’t we just stay in?  It’s raining!” that I hadn’t even bothered to ask where we were going.  Turns out we were seeing a movie.  Yeah okay.  I remember those.  I was kind of suspicious that the theatre was full of people who fit into that mysterious age bracket known as “the tween.”  I asked my husband if there was a new Twilight movie out.  He told me we were seeing a scary movie called “Insidious”, but not to worry, because it was only PG-13.  ARE YOU F-ING KIDDING ME?  This is how you use our precious babysitter time?  This is what I am thinking, but I don’t say it because I’m too busy shoving popcorn in my mouth.  My husband can read my mind (really, he can, it’s spooky) and he tells me he swears it will be good and if it isn’t he will buy me some sort of present.  Long story short, the movie is horrifying, but in a super fun way.  I actually scream.  Scream!  But then I am laughing because it’s hilarious that I am so scared that I’m screaming.  I am jumping in my husbands lap out of terror.  I now see why that theatre is full of 13 year olds.  Being scared is fun.  I know it seems weird, but it’s true.  Just ask the theatre full of eighth graders.

It’s been a few days since we’ve seen Insidious and we’re still scared of certain parts of our house.  I made my husband stand next to me in the bathroom while I brushed my teeth that night.  We couldn’t believe how much we enjoyed the movie.  But then we were wondering if it wasn’t the movie as much as it was us, and our lack of exposure to the world at large.  I mean hello?  The theatre was full of “tweens.”  We never managed to see The King’s Speech!  We are totally out of touch!  Are we at risk of falling into that horrible place where we’re just completely out of it?  Did we like this movie because it’s simply been so long since we’ve actually seen one?  What’s next?  Not changing our hairstyles for the next thirty years?

This toddler, who is making an “insidious” face, has seen way more movies than her parents, who are basically total losers.

And speaking of style. . I had a frightening experience at the mall earlier that very day involving a pair of designer jeans.  Since I’m smaller than I was when my daughter was born, I wondered if I could finally stuff myself into those fancy $200 jeans.  It turns out I kind of can, some of them anyway, but the ones I could get into LOOKED AWFUL.  I’m not talking about a muffin top situation I’m talking 100% pure muffin.  I like to think I have enough fashion sense to know to “just say no” to a pair of ill fitting pants – even if they are ONE FOR ALL MANKIND OF THE WORLD or whatever.  However, my friend, and some skinny sales girl were absolutely convinced I should buy them.  “Tighter is better” they kept saying, “it makes you look thinner.”  Yeah, I get that. . . “EXCEPT WHEN IT MAKES YOU LOOK FATTER.”  I hate that I’m second guessing myself.  Shouldn’t you be more confident with your choices as you get older?  Is this how we portray mothers?  As unfashionable, totally out of it, senseless, and so uncool to the point where I’m not going to let myself think I have enough sense to know what kind of movies I like or what kind of pants look good on me?  The sales girl said “you’ll be back for those jeans.”  I won’t be.  Unless I loose about twenty pounds, and if getting older has taught me a anything at all, it’s that I look just fine the way I do, and I’m not going to let some Tween convince me otherwise.

Filed Under: Fashion, Fear, Worries
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Mar23Whatever it Takes, Which May Include My Sanity
Paula

We are moving.  Any day now.  Really.  However, we’re at that horrible point in the selling/buying process where terrible glitches pop up and I’m now pretty much convinced my family will soon be living in a tent in Prospect Park.  I’ve spent a good portion of the day either on the phone or scanning documents.  I hate my scanner.  It’s old and overly complicated.  I can also use it to produce fake IDs make toast and pop popcorn.  Every time I started to use it June would become fascinated by the device and demand to get involved.  Since I don’t know how to build a wig-wam, and I really like to shower, I decided I would do whatever it takes to get this situation resolved. . .  which means June was going to have her way.  This is how I kept the peace today.

BREAKFAST: Chocolate cupcakes.  My friend Jess pointed out that this really isn’t all that different than a muffin.  I figure, why start the day off with an argument?

FIRST-AID: No less that twenty spider-man themed band-aids are applied lovingly to a non-existent “boo-boo” on child’s foot.  For some inexplicable reason (namely child insists on removing them) the band-aids will not stick.  Constant attention to fake injury seems to placate child.

ENTERTAINMENT:  Toy Story 3.  I rewind crucial “barrel of monkeys” scene about 17 times.  Toddler rolls on floor in hysterics first few times. . . then stands directly in front of tv as if dissecting every second of scene.  Is she future Sofia Coppolla? Or future Judd Apatow?  Or is she just ruining her eyes?

DINNER: Pizza is ordered at her majesty’s request.  The first slice has “too much sauce.”  WTF?  Second slice is “funny.”  Huh?  Third slice is actually second piece simply walked back into kitchen and returned. . .  Third piece is eaten with enthusiasm allowing me to spend an inordinate amount of time fighting with ancient scanner.

BATHTIME: Since I admittedly spent a good portion of the day ignoring my child, I decide not to get mad when she pours a large measuring cup of water on top of my head during bath time.  There’s nothing that says “this is pay back bitch” like a giant cup of luke-warm sudsy water running directly down your back and into your jeans.

I’m sure that if paired with a bushel of organic apples, a box of bran cereal and a pile of tofu this delicious chocolate cupcake is part of a nutritious breakfast!

This is when I realize I’ve really let myself be taken for a ride.  Why do I feel so guilty about having to take care of some stuff?  Yeah, obviously it’s easier to deal with mortgage brokers and real estate people without your child screaming in the back ground, but it’s probably time I teach her that when mom is on the phone it’s time to play quietly with Mrs. Potato Head.  Tomorrow is another day and there will be more drama.  Instead of cupcakes for breakfast – I think I’ll go back to cereal.  Unless I feel like oatmeal.  But whatever we have, it’s going to be my decision, and I’m not going to be afraid of a little arguing.

Filed Under: Food, Insanity, Motherhood: The Job, Shortcuts
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Mar22Lunch of Champions
Tonya

I’ve reached a new low in my culinary undertaking:

Yes, Lunch, Snack #1 and, even, Snack #2 are all foods made for toddlers. I have stooped to stealing my son’s food because I’m much too busy (ok, maybe, lazy) to make any actual food. In my defense the 2 mashup packages (lunch and snack #1) contain veggies so there’s no way on earth P would ever touch them. As for snack #2, please don’t tell him I ate his apple slices.

I’d love to say that this has happened because I’m watching what I eat, you know, taking to heart that Kate Moss saying: “Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.” Except, I’d be totally and utterly lying given that:

1) Apparently, she’s never had cake. No one who’d ever had a cupcake would say something so ridiculous!

2) Kate Moss is a coke whore and, frankly, I can’t afford that habit.

3) After this picture was taken I ate a Snickers bar and, later that evening, an entire pizza.

So, really, I’m just very very very cooking-challenged, i.e. lazy and completely phobic of the kitchen. If you’d like to donate to the Help Tonya’s Family Eat Properly Fund simply send a chef to my house, one whose willing to also go to the grocery store…I hate that too.

Filed Under: ad hoc LIFE, Food, My Neuroses
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Mar21My Trash, My Treasure
Carrie

As regular readers here know, I had a minor crisis a couple of weeks ago when my laptop acted like a slatternly wench and made away with all my data without so much as a “maybe we could get coffee sometime.” Well, gladly, the story has a happy ending! For a nominal fee (err…I mean a mind-numbing notable fee), all of my data has been recovered!

In the interim, I spent two weeks recreating files. For the files I couldn’t recreate, I went back to the drawing board. I tried to see the loss as an opportunity to make stuff that was even better than the originals. I kept on thinking (through the tears and hysteria) of the writer Maxine Hong Kingston who lost the only manuscript of a novel in the Oakland, California fires of 1991. She mourned, but recovered by writing something she felt was better than the original.

Maxine Hong Kingston, I ain’t, so I was tremendously relieved to get all of my files back last week. But you know what I found out? I spent a whole lot of money getting back a whole lot of nothing. I would say that 10% of what I paid to get back was important. The other 90%? Weird garbage. Drafts. Downloads. Roads to nowhere.

My computer is choking with files. I am buried alive in my data. I don’t know what I have. The only thing I do know is that I need to have it, whatever it is. The problem is–it’s not just my computer. My house is overflowing with information and papers that are impossible for me to throw away. Behold–these monuments to minutiae, these records of irrelevance, this stuff I can’t throw away:

IMPORTANT!

Lots and lots of cd’s and dvd’s of panicky backups made in the dead of night. Most are from 2003 and 2005. They are named helpful things like “IMPORTANT! Carrie Harvey” and “THIS IS IT!” Thanks to myself for labeling them so usefully. I also love the floppies. Maybe if I send them in a time machine someone from the past working in a data processing plant will be able to tell me what’s on them?

I'M READY TO GO!

Should my husband plan an impromptu trip to Central Asia and our internet service is down, I can grab a book off of my shelf in the blink of an eye and be armed with the best travel tips (past their fresh date) around. Need to find an editor’s cheap eats pick (now closed) in Naples circa 2004? I GOT IT! Let’s go!! Move it, move it, move it!

ENLARGE THIS! (AT SOME POINT...)

If an acquaintance of mine from 1996 should call me in search of some pictures for a slide show on the occasion of his 40th birthday, I’m his gal! I have lots and lots of unlabeled, slightly damaged negatives from 1995-1999 that are just waiting for their moment in the spotlight.

IDEAS 'R US

You know why I’m smart? Because I don’t ever need to have an original idea again. I save all of my notebooks, so on the off chance somebody asks me to come up with something, I just have to peruse through years of illegible, half-assed explorations to get me started. Even though I have never actually referenced one of the 73 notebooks that I have stashed in a drawer, that doesn’t mean the day isn’t going to come when I will MAKE IT RAIN with stuff (stuff spelled $$$tuff) I dreamed up on the F train, OK?

CONSIDER IT...FIXED. YOU'RE WELCOME.

Someone, somewhere is worrying about what will happen if they suddenly forget how to operate their ceiling fan. They bought it at a Salvation Army (where I donated it 6 years ago) and its operating manual was missing. Now, all they have to do is track down and interview a dozen or so former Salvation Army employees from 2005. One of them will be able to provide them with a visual description of me. A couple of police sketches and 3 neighborhood canvases over the course of several years later and—BAM! Just like that, the guy will be in possession of a Hunter Douglas fan operating manual. And that’s what it’s all about folks–keeping the ceiling fans of the world running.

HERE'S A CASSETTE. IT'S NOT LABELED. LET'S SPEND THE DAY TRACKING DOWN AND BUYING A CASSETTE PLAYER TO LISTEN TO THIS TAPE (WHICH COULD VERY WELL BE BLANK.)

Undeveloped disposable cameras. Unlabeled blank tapes. Defunct electronics. They are not garbage. They are poetic vessels of undiscovered potential and discarded dreams. OOOh. That sounds like a cool idea. I’m going to scribble that in a sketch book and shove that sketch book in the back of a drawer. In 2048 someone will read it and say “Wow, that chick was deep.”

Alas, did this blog entry teach me that I have too much useless stuff? Yes. That I hold on to things like a psychopath on Hoarders? Yes. After the photo shoot for this post, did I gather up all the junk, and with a smug smile and a knowing peaceful grin that speaks of closure and life lessons, throw it all away? No.  I shoved it all back into a canvas bag, which I then crammed into a drawer in a filing cabinet in the back of a closet in a room that I rarely go into. You’ll thank me one day.

Filed Under: Disorganization, Fear, Insanity, My Neuroses, Uncategorized
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