Stuff that is up

1. Poor Elliott has a full-on spring cold. Is there anything worse than a cold right when the weather finally gets nice? Yes, there is...a BABY with a cold right when the weather finally gets nice. He's all snot-nosed and stuffed-up and pitiful and I feel bad that he's really too big to sleep propped up in his bouncy chair this time around.

2. Said baby is now taking fairly stable unassisted steps. Never more than three or four, but steps. It's exciting and sad all at once!

3. Another thing that might be worse than a spring cold is that our furnace went out two weeks ago. The furnace guy came and tinkered around and said that because the furnace was 26 years old, there weren't really any parts available. He thought he'd be able to round up a bunch of pieces from the shop and cobble something together that might last another year for about 500 bucks. Since a whole new working and warrantied furnace only (ONLY. HA.) cost $2500, we decided not to gamble on the Frankenstein option. It hasn't ruined our year or forced the cancellation of our (very, very modest) vacation plans, but it has left us tightening our metaphorical belts and sighing a lot over our credit card balance. Adding insult to injured finances, we had to get it fixed because it got down to 20 degrees the night it was broken and 17 degrees the next night after it was fixed...but we haven't had to use it since. If the thing had managed to hang on for two more damn days, we could've put off fixing it until the fall. Not that there's ever a good time to have to spend thousands of dollars on an unexpected home repair, but still.

4. Despite being pretty well-behaved on the "no unnecessary spending" front lately, I found these on sale at JC Penney the other day and could not resist getting one for each kid. They're totally wearing these for any and all camping trips we take this year.

5. I have had a major itch to write fiction again lately but I can't think of anything to write. I keep hoping inspiration will strike.

6. It's been storming off and on for about 24 hours, plus we had heavy rain for most of the day. I do love a good thunderstorm, but they turn Indy into an excruciatingly whiny mess. I try to be sympathetic but the constant panting, whining, and clinging is seriously wearing on my nerves. It would be easier if anything we've ever tried to help him worked in the least, but nothing does. We even tried getting him one of those thunder shirts and the shirt itself gave him anxiety. Dog, I'd send you to therapy if I could...but since I can't, please stop panting at me. Please.

7. The amount of rain that's fallen today is nearly unbelievable. I just flipped on the TV to check the weather report because the storm sirens went off and apparently we're supposed to get 3 1/2 inches per hour for the next three to four hours. Knowing that the water cycle is a closed system, I'm beginning to wonder if there's a lake somewhere that's drying up or something. (Okay, not really, but on a scale of 1 to 10, it's a HOLY SHIT amount of rain.)

8. MB has been making fun of me for how often I listen to this Pink song, but it's his fault since I'd never heard of it until he told me to put it on my driving mix. Apparently we have listened to it in the car enough times that Nico has been wandering around singing it after MB picks him up from my parents' house. You'll have to excuse the boring / typo-y lyrics version of the video here...the real video is semi-NSFW due to lots of Pink in her scanties, per usual. I can't help it; I love her anyway.