outsidevoice

Well, we finally heard from the Swimmy. Yep. We got two letters yesterday and they read as follows: Dear Ben, Are you still scareming (screaming) alot? Love, Sissy Yes, Swimmy, he is. A LOT. But the next letter was the kicker. Dear MOM, MOM?! MOM?! Four days ago I was Mommy. Now I’m Mom. If [...]

By the numbers: Number of miles driven: roughly 320 Number of diaper changes along the way: 4 Number of glasses of wine consumed: 4. No, 5. Maybe 7. Number of boat rides: 2 Number of hours spent in the water: Not nearly enough. Number of mystery bruises sustained: 3 Number of blues bands heard: 1 [...]

The other day a favorite blogger returned after a very extended hiatus. There was an audible roar from the internet when she hit publish and RSS feed readers hit tilt across the world. In a very brave post she announced that a long relationship ended which was crushing and to some extent embarrassing (as the [...]

Dear Benjamin, Today you are two years old. That’s the most unimpressive sentence every written here because you have been acting like a two-year old for well over a month now. Daddy and I are really not looking forward to the next several months if that is going to continue. This month you went to [...]

My academic career looks better in hindsight than it did in real-time. A bunch of fairly good high school grades got me into the University of Texas at Austin on probation. Landing in Austin with no sense of how to study or be disciplined landed me back in Houston with a 1.25 grade point average [...]

Reasons your 2 year old could be inordinately cranky: 1. Fever or general illness. 2. Didn’t sleep well. 3. He’s TWO, dumbass. 4. Rampant Obama commercials. 5. He stuck a raisin up his nose and no one noticed. Yep. 45 minutes later. He’s a genius that one.

I would like the world to know that I just got paid for writing. Real money. I’d bite it to check for authenticity like they used to do in old cartoons, but it’s a check. And that ink runs. I saw my first words in print this week. It was…meh. Kinda anti-climactic really. Here’s the [...]

I don’t read many books. It’s not that I don’t want to, it’s just that I don’t have a ton of time and, sadly, reading for any length of time actually makes me fall asleep. Instead, for years now, I’ve developed this habit of re-reading books. Or at least the ones that “spoke” to me [...]

So, The Swimmy has been on her medication for a week now. The best way for me to describe this week is to tell you I’ve gotten my little Swimmy back. I cannot tell you what a difference this little blue pill with sprinkles inside has made. I will tell you that the first day [...]

You may remember that in times of random, uh, randomness, I tend to sell things. Like, oh, say, my house. Well. Has anyone seen gas prices lately? Yes? Right. GOODBYE SUV loveliness. Hello practicality. But I’ve skipped ahead. A week ago I did the math on what I was spending for my car. This totally [...]