Adventures in Freelance Insanity

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Silence

Sorry to my legions of fans and admirers for not posting in a while. The day before Thanksgiving my grandfather fell and hit his head.

My share in his care has taken up most of my free time, along with caring for an infant and the dreaded Christmas preparations.

He died on the 9th, the same day Jake turned 5 months old.

Ill do a post on my grandfather as soon as Ive caught up on all the seasonal crap.

2:38 p.m. - 2005-12-15
4 comments

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Could this kid BE any cuter?

10:21 p.m. - 2005-12-07
5 comments

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What's On Your Tivo or I Watch Waaay to Much Tv Part 5

For those of you just dying to know, here's what's on my Tivo:

1. The West Wing
2. Real Time With Bill Maher
3. Gilmore Girls
4. Law & Order
5. Law & Order SVU
6. Medium
7. Everwood
8. Law & Order Criminal Intent
9. ER
10. Rescue Me
11. Daily Show
12. 7th Heaven (dont mock me I know you have your own guilty view)
13. Scrubs
14. Criminal Minds
15. Supernatural
16. Rodney
17. Joey
18. The Office
19. The Simpsons
20. My Name is Earl
21. The Bernie Mac Show
22. Curb Your Enthusiasm
23. Everybody Hates Chris
24. Malcolm in the Middle (new & reruns)
25. Extras
26. The War at Home
27. The View
28. Dr. Phil
29. Charmed
30. Friends
31. Friends

On J's Tivo, shows I like to watch late at night in bed:

Lost
Related
The Colbert Report
Grey's Anatomy

Shows I watch cause theyre on J's Tivo:

Gilmore Girls reruns
Stargate (new & reruns)
Stargate Atlantis
Alias
Entourage
Chapelle Show
Desperate Housewives

6:13 p.m. - 2005-12-07
0 comments

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Blog Against Racism

Lauren at Feministe says it's Blog Against Racism Day so here it is...

I have a unique view of racism. My baby sister is biracial, born in the early 70s. The rest of our family were all-white in an all-white neighborhood.

I first learned about racism when the boys driving home from the Catholic school behind our house yelled "Nigger" and threw a rock at my sister.

My dad explained racism to my uncomprehending mind and my response was to ask him if we could move to the place where they hate people with blue eyes because my sister was little while he and I (blue-eyed) were big.

It was my first taste of in-your-face racism.

I believed that this was isolated, the exception for ignorant people. Surely our neighbors (old-fashioned community-type neighbors) were not racist.

As I grew I realized that veiled references and knowing looks concealed a racism just as deep, hidden beneath a veneer of manners.

This was my first taste of racism-lite.

Our town backs against the poorest city in the whole United States and by the time I was growing up, that city was almost all black. Guess where the crime in our white suburban neighborhoods came from? Yet it's never the poverty that is mentioned, just the coloring.

This was my first realization that racism could also make people blind to other realities of life.

My friends could be distressingly rascist in their speech. If I protested or even tried to point out that they adored my sister and yet were slamming her too they said "Well, we didnt mean her."

This was my first taste of what I call Huckleberry-Finn-racism.

My sister got beat up in school by other black girls because her friends were white.

This was my first taste of reverse-racism.

I am known as the Ice Princess and extremely reserved by my family yet found myself shrieking at a stranger on a New York corner calling her a stupid cunt because she called my sister a nigger.

That was my first taste of how racism can cause situations to spiral out of control quickly.

I watched my heavily racist neighborhood become more accepting and tolerantjust by knowing my sister.

I watched 2 neighborhood girls marry black men because they heard less racist talk in their neighborhood and never even realized their parents WERE racist.

I watched my cousin get suspended for objecting to racist remarks of his classmates.

I watched my beautiful, talented sister make men and women adore and worship her no matter how racist they are.

I have watched her rise above the insults to shine in everything she does.

I have loved my sister so deeply and so well since the moment i saw her in her bassinet that being with her makes me breathe better. We are so incredibly alike that on the phone our parents cannot tell us apart by voice or how we respond and the only difference between us is how we look.

I have gazed upon this "twin" sister so often that when I look in the mirror I am shocked to find a pale stranger looking back.

I know we have a long way to go but I can also see the progress we've made towards a time when it will be just as likely that I am hated for being blue-eyed as it is for my sister to be hated for the color of her skin.

11:39 a.m. - 2005-12-02
3 comments

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Are You A Nurse?

I recently went to the hospital to visit my beloved grandfather, who had fallen and was not expected to make it.

I was discussing his treatment with the nurse and was so knowledgable that she asked if I was a nurse.

I realized that my experiance this time around as a mom is different than most so in case you're interested, here's what we (J & I) do every day...

We have an oxygen machine in the hallway (3 feet from electrical sockets) with an extended tube (30 feet)that reaches throughout a good portion of our apartment. The distilled water in the tube must be replaced every day, and the tubes replaced weekly.

There ar also 2 backup small tanks and a portable tank that lasts for 8 hours.

Jake's normal oxygen saturation while on 1.5 litres of oxygen is at approximatly 85-90%. As 1.5 litres is rather high Ive been trying to wean him down to 1 litre. His SAT (oxygen saturation) at this level is 75-80% which is pretty good for him, but I am wary because his nose often turns blue at the lower saturation and I havnt had enough time to monitor him to feel comfortable leaving him at 1 litre.

Normal oxygen saturation for a normal child is 96-100%.

He receives the following meds twice a day:

Lasik, a medicine to help him lose water weight which he may otherwise retain.

Zantac, for reflux

OTC Mylicon, for gas

prune juice, for constipation due to extra-calorie formula

Lovenox, a subcutaneous injection used to thin the blood

every other day he also gets a 1/2 a baby aspirin.

I will admit at this point that J mostly gives the injections and has gotten so good the baby rarely cries but the two times I have had to do it I have cried right along with Jake.

Jake is also on a monitor that tells us if he has PVC episodes, is tachy or is "bradying". If you dont know what these mean, dont worry about it, they are basically times when his heart is beating too fast or too slowly.

The only time this is really alarming (pun intneded) is when it is accompanied by a drop in SATS or is repeated a lot in a short time for a non-obvious reason.

Of course, Jake is also on a pulse-ox which measures his saturations.

So every day I do Ins and Outs (track the fluid he receives in order to moderate his Lasik use), read and monitor his heart, pulse-ox, maintain his oxygen and sats and administer subcutaneous injections.

Am I a nurse? Nope, I just play one in my apartment.

6:03 p.m. - 2005-11-25
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Doomed

The Dante's Inferno Test has banished you to the Second Level of Hell!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

9:42 a.m. - 2005-11-25
1 comments

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Happy Thanksgiving!!!

I made it! Traditionally, Thanksgiving is the cutoff wherein all active Development projects stop, although sometime they last for an additional week.
This year, this morning was my last deadline.
I have managed to work a fulltime outside-the-home job, a fulltime in-the-home job, take care of a brand new baby, do the wash, keep the house reasonably clean and cook for Terror and J.
I myself wasnt sure Id make it.
I feel as if I should fling myself over some imaginary finish line and I certainly would if there was a crowd of people waiting to clap and congratulate me.
Alas, no.
I cant help but compare my life now to my life a mere three years ago. Now I have a crazy professional life that I need to straighten out very soon (a single job would be good), an apartment, albeit a huge apartment, and a crazy schedule and life that never slows down.
Three years ago I had one job, a huge house that was so big that even with 10 people the silence echoed in every room and a predictable, boring life that carried the comfort of sameness with it.
I couldnt be happier to give up the predictibility for the chaos but, as usual, I have flung myself a little to far the other way.
Maybe this year I can find the balance, the eye in the storm, but even if I cant Im forever grateful for everything I have today.

Here's my moment of Zen...

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!!!!!!!!!!

7:59 a.m. - 2005-11-23
4 comments

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Why I Need a New Job

Me: Hello?

Them: They got it first (They = the competition).

Me: What?

Them: They are reporting that the road is jammed. They got it before we did.

Me: Um...

Them: Why did they get it before we did?

Me: Do you SEE camera 58?

Them: yes

Me: There's nothing there, right?

Them: Right. But they are reporting there is. And they got it first. Why didnt you tell us?

Me: Tell you what? Why would I tell you it's jammed if it isnt?

Them: But they got it first.

Me: But they are WRONG.

Them: But they got it first.

In truth, you would think I hung up on this guy but he actual hung up on me- and proceeded to yell bad things at the top of his lungs (i have spies there). He also went to my boss later in the day to report that I was untrustworthy because our competition was getting information before we were.

I soooo wish I were kidding. But as the newest kid (6 months with us) I was training said - "This job makes you knowledgeful."

11:03 a.m. - 2005-11-14
2 comments

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