Want to have some fun the next time you are shopping? Follow these simple directions:

1. Go to your favorite local grocery or department store.
2. Remove one of the security sensor tags from a random product.
3. Find a person with a FULL CART (important part) of items (you know, a person who will need the cart to get out to their car).
4. Place the security tag on an inconspicuous place on the cart.
5. Watch the person using the cart try to leave the store.

It's really, really funny.

Until it happens to you.

(don't ask me how I know...)

Here are the top 5 strangest things I experienced over the past week:

#5: Love Me, Love My Doll
#4: Oppressive Lesbian Judgement
#3: Ninja Cocaine Kitty Butt Spraying Me in the Eye
#2: Man Playing Bagpipes to the Water in the Park Across from My House

And the #1 strangest thing I experienced over the past week?

A billboard for a local funeral home advertising their ability to podcast their funeral service over the Internet with the tag line, "Now Everyone Can Attend" (and a picture of an elderly woman with her laptop).

At the grocery store tonight, I get in line behind 2 women unloading their one cart together. I'm holding Ella and navigating my cart with one hand and one of the women says, "OH! So this is the little screamer I heard earlier."

HM.

ME: "Yeah, girlfriend has some lungs. She really doesn't like to be in her car seat..."
Her: "Well, I guess she got EXACTLY what she wanted then, didn't she? She's being held..."
*insert oppressive judgment here*

You know, never mind that you are judging me for a baby that has been sick since Saturday.
Never mind that she has projectile vomited for the last 3 days and can't keep anything down.
Never mind that when she sits at the smallest reclining position it's completely uncomfortable for her because of her serious reflux.
Never mind that she's had such bad diarrhea for the last 24 hours that it soaks through a diaper and 2 layers of clothes.
Never mind that I've had to sleep with her on my chest sitting up in a chair for the past two nights so that she doesn't vomit every 10 minutes.
Never mind that I had to change me twice and her once this morning due to the volume of her projectile vomiting.
Never mind that even though she's sick, I still have to schlep her around in public to get everything done that needs to be done.

And?
Never mind that you are a lesbian couple looking down on me for my parenting skills.

But no judgment...

As I mentioned previously, I'm logging a lot of baby-created TV time.
Lucky me.
(And now, luck for you!)

Since I didn't watch a great deal of TV BB (before baby), I've been introduced to some pretty interesting things. For example, who knew that The Food Network is possibly one of the greatest channels on TV?!?

While channel surfing in the wee hours this morning, I came across a BBC program called Love Me, Love My Doll. Well, who could resist that, I ask you?

Let me say this:
CREEPIEST. THING. EVER. (in the history of creepy things)

There are men (and I suppose women, but the show was only about men) who spend up to $10,000 to create their own life-size, life-like "doll". For what purpose? I'll let you use your imagination.

The weirdest part to me was not that men bought these just for sex (well, aside from that fact that people actually spend $10,000 on them! That was weird to me...). The creepiest part was that all of the men in this program talked about "being in a relationship" with their doll.

HELLLLLOOOOOOO...
REALITY CHECK: IT'S A FRIGGIN' DOLL!

One guy actually had 8 of them.
EIGHT.
AT $10,000 EACH.
You do the math.

Of course, this is the same guy (who actually seemed semi-normal) that has a GIRLFRIEND. His girlfriend knew about the doll(s), but he hadn't been upfront about how many he had and the extent of his "relationship" with them. So, for his birthday he decided to have a birthday party with his girlfriend.
And two of his dolls.
Which he dressed up.
And put make-up on.
And birthday party horns in their mouths.
(Way...)

When she arrived, she started cracking up and then said, "I need a beer." Later she asked him how many he had and how often he used them. When he said eight and about once a week she was stunned. Flash to them eating and drinking wine at the dinner table.
WITH THE DOLLS.

Flash to the girlfriend saying, "I'm glad he was open about it. I don't have a problem with it..."
BUT YOU COULD TOTALLY TELL SHE DID!
Voiceover at the end said that the girlfriend broke up with the guy a week after the "birthday party."
BIG SHOCKER.

It's creeping me out just to re-live it again and relay it here.
If you excuse me, I need to shower...

If you're intrigued by the creepy, I found a portion of it posted on YouTube. (FYI: It's under the mature audience section, but it doesn't show anything lewd...aside from the general creepiness of it).

What I'm about to describe here is not for the faint of heart. Reader discretion is advised.

This will forever be known as "The Ottoman Incident."

OK.
So.
My dog tried to eat my baby's head.

Ok. Ok.
Let me back up:

A few days after we brought Ella home she was lying inside her Boppy pillow (the greatest invention since onion and chive sour cream, btw...) on the ottoman that goes with the big double chair. I was sitting on the chair part, she was on the ottoman, and my dog Indy was lying next to Ella on the ottoman.

Flashback: We had wondered how Indy was going to react to the baby upon arrival. He is, after all, MY DOG - he sleeps at my feet, he goes from room to room with me throughout the day and he looks sincerely dejected when I go into the bathroom and shut the door. He's always done this. For THIRTEEN YEARS.

So you can see how we would be curious about the effect of a baby addition to the family.

Not to mention he absolutely freaks out every time he hears a baby crying on the television.

Yeah. You think this would've been clue enough for me, but no...

So when we brought Ella home, we were surprised that Indy was less than interested. He really didn't seem stressed at all. The heaven's opened, the birds sang, the bunnies hopped, all was good.

Except for The Ottoman Incident.

So when they were lying together on the ottoman, Ella was doing one of those loud, long baby cries while Indy slept next to her (you know WAH WAH WAH WAH WAH WAH...). All of a sudden, out of a deep slumber, Indy goes GRRRAP and snaps at her head.

And then I proceeded to gently remove him from the ottoman while speaking in soothing tones.
*ahem*

Look, I know it sounds bad and without making excuses for him, if the dog wanted to bite the kid he would've. But he doesn't. I know this because he's done the same move to both Todd and me when he's sleeping and we try to move him. He's just a crotchety old dog when he sleeps. (Who, apparently, doesn't want WAH WAH WAH WAH WAH bouncing around in his head when he's trying to sleep. I COMPLETELY understand...)

Flashfoward a few weeks: I put Ella on the ottoman to play with her and, yep, you guessed it, Indy is there again (I have a slow learning curve). One of Ella's flailing arms accidentally lands on one of Indy's legs, which he looks at and then moves (and he's all like EWWW baby human germs! Baby human germs!). When it happens again, he gives a warning growl (which allowed me to intervene this time).

The saddest part?

Ella just looks at him all like, "Dude...I have NO IDEA what you are, but I SO want to be your friend..."

Poor kid. Nothing worse than being rejected by your own dog.

I guess it's no surprise that my husband and I ended up with a high maintenance baby. (For those of you who know us, I'll give you a moment or two to regain your composure from laughing...)
.....
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...
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Anyway.

I mean, my ADD husband goes 100 miles an hour at all times of the day and night and I'm pretty HM myself most of the time. But who knew that my baby would start to exhibit this behavior as early as 4 weeks?

My baby gets completely bored. How do I know this? She unmistakably raises one eyebrow, sighs a really loud (unmistakably) bored sigh. This is the sign that you have about 34.2 seconds to 1) either entertain her, or 2) move her to another location so she can entertain herself before all hell breaks loose in the form of what I call the "screaming bloody murder" cry.

I looked at Todd a few days ago and said, "Do you think she has ADD?" (I mean, let's face it honey, she would take it naturally). This sparked an interesting discussion about the pros/cons of "Labeling" your kid.

Before Ella was born, Todd and I had a discussion about how we were both really driven with high expectations and how we both needed to be careful about setting these expectations for our kid and instead let her be who she wants to be. We've probably made some mistakes in the past with the other 2 girls (my stepdaughters are 15 and 19). We should probably learn from that, right?

Anyway, it scared me that I may be labeling my daughter already. I'm sure it's human nature, but how do you let your kids be who they want to be without pushing all your learned behavior BS on them?

Coincidence?

I think not...

Wow.

Having a baby takes up some time.

A LOT of time.

I'm no idiot, I knew BEFORE the baby that babies take up a lot of time. I just had no idea how much time. Where the time goes during the day/night is completely mind boggling.

I own a bookstore, but there's no time for reading.

I freelance to make money, but there's no time to bid for jobs that I won't have time to work on anyway (despite the fact that we desperately need the money).

Answer personal emails? Sorry, it just ain't happenin' right now (nothing personal to any of you!).

Update my websites. I don't think so.

Work on my fiction mystery novel? I don't even remember what the file is named.

Write on my blog? HA!

I need to eat right and work out, but WHEN?

Heck, I just now had time to do this (almost 9 weeks after she was born):

OK, out of all fairness, I barely did any of this. Todd and my friend Marilynn painted. Todd put together all the stuff and organized the room. Heck, he even organized the clothing by months (yes, anal retentive is not the word(s) for my husband). I did place that cute green monkey on the little bench and put the diapers in that pink basket on the changing table...

WAIT! And I DID do this (the cute dots to match the bedding):

(notice how little is actually done?!? It'll probably still be that way when she says, "But MOM! I want my room to be *insert latest Hannah Montanna craze*!")

And, oh yeah, I did order that awesome bedding from online.

(Before I get hate mail about how she's not supposed to sleep with anything in her crib, let me just say SHE DOESN'T EVEN SLEEP IN THIS ROOM YET).

Know what I do have a lot of time to do?

WATCH T.V.! (something I barely did before the baby)

When you are up at all hours with an acid reflux baby who wants to be held A LOT, the only thing to do is watch T.V.

I'll save the details about the love affair I've developed with Anthony Bourdain for another post... (it's OK, my husband knows...)