Today is my mother's 50th birthday. She's sleeping above me, wiped out after an all-night shift at the hospital. I hope she sleeps well today; she's been pulling shift after shift and she's been kind of grumpy this week in general. Yesterday she had a crying spell in the livingroom when my dad asked her to help me clean up Mount Olympus tonight. (His proposal was for no good reason other than I was planning to do it today and for some reason known only to himself, he likes to matchmake the two of us.) I've seen that kind of I-can't-believe-you-forgot-my-birthday disappointment from the inside...in fact, while packing, I found the Boy's birthday card from 2001 that apologizes for blowing off my birthday completely (he's scoring 1-2 right now, having made me cry last year as well).

We're supposed to be having dinner with my often-challenging grandparents tonight, so I really hope that she gets at least 7 hours of sleep and punches up her resiliency.

mom & her 2 greatest creations: myself & the chocolate chippendale

I'm having a pretty good morning. The Boy was off to school at 7:30 a.m., and I was able to go back to sleep for another couple of hours. (Huge victory; I'm having so many problems sleeping through the night that a 7-hour night is a good night.) When I got up, the house was silent & darkish, the rain beating down outside the windows. I read a little Woody Allen, turned on some pristine-sounding Radiohead, then, in an ecstasy of nesting, set up the Boy's desk more-or-less as he would like it. I'm feeling a little guilty about his desk; although he gets the good one, he wanted to set it up facing the room and I argued with him until he agreed to rotate it 90 degrees. Yeah, I am a ball-breaking bitch, and it's not the kind of thing that can be fixed with 20 minutes of crate-unpacking. Still, he was in an excellent mood this morning, and I can grovel appealingly. Verrrry appealingly.

I have to say, I'm enjoying this move much more now that there are a few less people in my space. For the whole weekend, there was hammering & adjusting, wiring & belt-sanding, screwing in & fitting up. It's nice to have a few hours to sit in the blue painted silence and think about where to put our stuff and what to do next. It also helps that my parents & their various helpers did an A-plus job of outfitting this basement. It's gone from an admittedly-charming 70's holdout of silver reflective wallpaper and orange shag carpeting that reached halfway up the wall to a blue and white beauty. The bedroom is yellow, and it fits all of our bedroom stuff plus the Sprout's growing collection of chattel (not even out of the womb and tied to samsara, poor babe). The kitchenette is all-new white n' blue, from the cabinets to the counter to the bar fridge to the sink. The main room is has light blue walls, brand-new dark blue carpeting & white trim. It's fucking swank, my friends. No wonder my mother has to work night shift after night shift to afford the renovations.

It makes me happy to think that Nic may move into the space after we're gone. And then, it's all Dad's. He'll be able to fulfil his destiny as a middle-aged Italian male and watch teevee in the lowest level of the house.

But for now...it's ours!

Last night we took a break from the moving madness to sit in geeky splendour and devour the extended version of "The Two Towers" at Loftwyr & Gilamonstre's house. Not only was it a fine social occasion, but I discovered something important. To whit: I had almost no comprehension of the movie when I saw it last year. I think that I remembered and understood no more than 15 minutes of the theatrical release, as so much of what happened last night seemed entirely new to me. I floated a few theories to explain this gap: it was Christmas, I was with a lot of my extended family, my uncle was dying, I was still suicidal & had suddenly gained 20 pounds, the theatrical release wasn't as coherent as it could be, etc. etc. etc. Truth is that I have no idea what happened. I thought that I had seen and enjoyed a movie, but it turns out that there was almost no long-term processing. Interesting.

Stacy was there with candy-themed gifts for Sprout (which I'll admit, is a much more lasting present than actual candy). Now that I'm in a thank-you card writing phase, I'm finding it hard to keep up with her generosity - much like Scout, she's a constant fount of good things.

I have agreed to go into labour this weekend so that I can evict Loftwyr & Gila's houseguests. This should be interesting.

Booty Call: Day 262 - In the words of the Cohen Brothers, the Sprout endures. I'm trying to educate a whole new set of people about my pregnancy symptoms - my dad has a distressing tendency to freak out when I become breathless.

5 years ago today: i discover that i no longer wish to be touched