My New Gig

Uh, no, there will be no more babies. At least not mine!

The title is sort of ambiguous here because it seems like I have multiple gigs at any given time. Mid-mid-life crisis, I'm trying to cut down on them and really figure out what I want to be when I grow up. I don't know that I'm making much progress on that.

In the meantime, a fantastic part-time job fell out of the sky and into my lap. It uses my genetics degree and all that writing training. And it pays well. And I can work at home most of the time. Or I can go into the office and interact with human beings, rather than sharing some passing words with the guinea pigs and having a very large cat sit on my keyboard. I'm excited...and completely daunted. I haven't worked in an office with any regularity in almost 10 years. And when I took this job, I'd conveniently forgotten that my kids have full weeks off school...including one at Thanksgiving and two weeks around Christmas. Those times are coming right up. Well, best to set the bar low early on, right?

But that wasn't really what I wanted to write about, because although it's a great job and it'll be a nice change for me, I know it's not going to be something that scratches whatever itch I've got going on. It won't be wildly fulfilling. It won't fill that unnamed void in my life. It's a fun new challenge, but it won't be challenging forever. And let's face it, tech writing will never be exciting.

What's far more exciting is that a while back, my friend, K, asked me who takes my Christmas photographs for my holiday cards. Well, that was flattering. If you've been around my blog a while, you know I take them all myself most years. And I have fun doing it too. A few weeks later, K e-mailed and asked if she could pay me to take some photos of her daughters. Pay me? To take photos? You've got to be kidding! But I was thrilled to have the opportunity.

So, last weekend, I showed up at her house bright and early. Her younger daughter, R, was just getting up when I arrived. Fortunately, she's a happy morning baby, so she was fun to photograph.R's big sister, M, was asleep during most of this photo shoot and wasn't altogether thrilled about getting dressed up all pretty just to have her picture taken. She wasn't about to sit still for it either, but that's just as well, I suppose. And in a way, it made for some more interesting photos.It was a little challenging and I can't claim to have much knowledge of what I was doing, but I liked the results and I think K did too (unless she was just being nice!). I'm pretty sure M was more than a little relieved when I left!Now, I've got a whole host of fun little activities to turn into little side businesses! Tech writer by day, photographer in the early morning and cake decorator at night. And don't forget pumpkin carver in October. No clue who's going to pay me for that yet!

And for the record, I didn't actually charge K for my time. Since I neglected to successfully get her a gift to celebrate the birth of R, this is it. I think this'll last a whole lot longer and be more appreciated than those flowers Teleflora failed to deliver anyway!

The Great Guinea Pig Adventure

There will come a time when my children no longer remember how we came to own a couple of guinea pigs. So, it seems only right that I should write a little something about it so it's not forgotten...although it's hardly the kind of story you pass down from generation to generation.

A couple of weeks ago, I was at one of Smunch's baseball games, trying to stay out of the blaring sun, when Gram arrived and told me that her friend, Mary, had found a guinea pig in her backyard. In fact, this guinea pig was so brazen that it wandered right into her house. But Mary and her husband didn't know what to do with a guinea pig and weren't williing to try picking it up. My mom had taken them a cat carrier with which to try to trap it. But, as far as I can tell, they didn't really try that either. I told my mom that if they caught it and couldn't find the owners that I'd take it before they gave it to Animal Services. Somehow that turned into the suggestion that I go over to Mary's and catch the rodent myself.

Now, I'll admit that as I drove over there I sort of wondered if it was actually a guinea pig at all. After all, people are forever misidentifying animals "in the wild"...or in the backyard. This critter was supposed to be living in the bush under their living room window. By the time I showed up, it had been there for three days.

Mam went with me and we camped out outside the bush. We peered in where we could, but couldn't see a thing in there. I put a little pile of carrots out in hopes of spotting the critter and we sat on the lawn and waited. Before too long, there was a suspicious rustling in the bush and moments later, a furry little face peered out. It was a guinea pig and it was cute, but skittish, with long, multi-colored hair.

In a long series of events, we managed to get the guinea pig in the carrier after about 45 minutes...using the classic trick of leaving a trail of carrots into the carrier and a string on the door with which to close it from a distance.

So, now we had a guinea pig and we took it home with us. I quickly posted a query on our elementary school e-bulletin board asking if someone had a guinea pig cage I could take off their hands. And I was fortunate enough to find a great big cage...for free. The guinea pig, who we eventually named Roamer, was very, very happy to be back in a cage where someone would feed him hay, lettuce and oranges.

It took a couple days before we managed to put up signs in Mary's neighborhood (which is not our neighborhood). And a couple more days went by before we finally got a call from a family over there who'd been missing their guinea pig, Rooster, for two or three weeks. And they weren't particularly close to Mary's house either. Rooster must've had a grand adventure before being returned to his family.

Although we all got a little attached to the furry fellow, it was nice to see he had a good home with people who were thrilled to have him back. They even gave us some pictures of him to remember him by. Nice folks.

We sped off to Mam's soccer game, lunch and then straight to the pet store...to look at guinea pigs.

The first place we went had a number of guinea pigs. They were all part of a group of about 150 that were rescued from the home of a hoarder. They were mostly adults and all extremely skittish. It was hard to tell if a feral guinea pig or two would ever warm up to a couple of kids. Although both of the kids already had their hearts set on one of the piggies there, we headed to a more traditional pet store to see what they had.

They had little, young guinea pigs. They had cool markings. Mam picked out a very calm one with brown, orange and white. She seemed like a very sweet little piggy.Smunch had a pale calico one picked out, but the sales person couldn't catch her...a sign that maybe she wasn't going to be very calm at home either. We thought we'd check elsewhere, but the sales clerk said she was going to get a few more from the back. And oh, were they cute! Gavin picked one out right away and we took them both home with us.

At my suggestion, Smunch decided to name his guinea pig Rita.I thought it was funny that he accepted that suggestion...which came from the name on a random e-mail in my inbox. I didn't even know the Rita who sent the e-mail. Mam temporarily named her guinea pig Mocha, although the next day, her name was Butterscotch. I liked the idea that they'd be named after two of my favorite drinks, but I figured having one named something purely kid-like was really more appropriate. Butterscotch remained sweet and calm while Rita was a total spaz who sprinted laps around the cage at unpredictable moments.Now, what we learned a couple of days later is that you don't want to pick out the super calm, sweet guinea pig. Because it means she's not healthy. And I found myself taking our new guinea pig to the VET on Halloween night, where she was promptly diagnosed with Bordetella...otherwise known as kennel cough...and given a prescription for Baytril. She really wasn't very well, her sides heaving and looking pretty depressed. The vet warned me that she might not survive. Bordetella can be really hard on guinea pigs. And, of course, it's very contagious.So, Rita made her own trip to the vet last night as soon as we spotted symptoms. Her eyes were a little crusty and she'd stopped sprinting around the cage. She seemed a little bummed, herself.

These have become very expensive little rodents. But Butterscotch appears for all the world to be on the mend and after a day of medication, Rita's pretty much back to her old self. Mam is smitten.Smunch likes them but the novelty seems to be wearing off already. They're funny, squeaky little critters and I'm kinda looking forward to having them around...

Blue Sox

Creative name, huh? Despite his love of baseball, Smunch is new to playing in the Fall. This is the first year he's tried it and, at least from my perspective, it's been a lot of fun. It's much, MUCH more laid back than PONY baseball in the spring. He has some of the same rather intense coaches, but even they seem more relaxed. More than anything, it's about developing skills. It's not about winning. They don't even keep score.And that's a good thing because Smunch's team is full of boys who are the youngest in the division. Given that Smunch is a little guy himself, that means he barely reaches the shoulder of some of the boys out there. He's still nine. Some of them are 12. And some of them are BIG 12-year-olds! Of course, that doesn't make him less serious about the whole thing.He's still no power hitter, but he's impressive in other ways. He knows how to back up a play better than a lot of the kids out there. And even when he flubs a play, he's likely to recover. His head is in the game, even if his body isn't necessarily big enough to cooperate. His strike zone is so small that he gets a lot of walks. And at this level, there's a lot of stealing, so as long as he's on base, he's got a good chance to score. Here he is, safe at second. He just wants to make sure you know.These games are kinda fun, even though it's obvious the Blue Sox are usually getting obliterated by their opponents. But they're still long. It gives me pause to know I really encouraged Smunch's passion in baseball. I encouraged it and now he loves it...and now we spend hours and hours a the baseball field...in the sun, the cold, the wind...whatever. I think even Smunch, who has thoroughly enjoyed the game, is relieved when it's time to go home.

After the Rain

Something about the rain makes me want to go out and take pictures as soon as I know my camera might survive. Prior to that, sitting in a coffee shop sounds awfully nice.And October rain is especially cool around our house because October is spider season and every web in the yard is suddenly gleaming.Perhaps autumn has come at last...

Whiskers

Our remaining cat, Skimble, is a monster feline. When I took him to the vet the other day, she agreed that he needed to lose some weight, but said that given his frame, she'd expect him to be 14 or 15 pounds regardless (he's more like 17 or 18 pounds). So, although he's sort of oozy, he's pretty magnificent. He's got great markings and terrific orange stripes. And he's got fantastic whiskers. I set about trying to capture them in the sunshine the other day.Doesn't he look regal? Well, he looks sort of noble at least until he rolls over on his back and then he's just kinda cute...and oozy.He's not the brightest cat we've ever had, but he's awfully sweet.

Remembering Oliver

We lost our cat, Oliver, to cancer early Saturday morning. I don't usually make a big point of blogging about our pets. And you'd be pretty annoyed if I blogged about every guppy or goldfish we'd killed. But the cats are different. Both of our cats had been members of our family since Smunch was just six months old. So, they're his contemporaries, in a way. As much as the kids have taken over my life, it still hard to believe how difficult it is to lose a pet.

When we got them as kittens, Oliver was the little one. He was quickly nicknamed "Smalliver". He was such an adorable little kitty.He had a neat little patterned nose...part tabby, just like his coat. And on one of his first nights with us, he declared his love for Scott by crawling up on his shoulder and falling asleep.To some extent, he was Scott's cat from that moment on. But as Smunch got older, he also became Smunch's cat. I guess sometime more recently, he became Mam's cat too.He had a magnificently expressive, long tail that always waved around to greet us. And he was the cat who was always on my office chair or in my face while I tried to work. His claws have pulled loops out of the thighs of many pairs of pants. He talked a lot, but was very sweet. He also liked to run from window to window when he spotted another cat roaming the backyard. And although he was always an indoor cat, he took every possible opportunity to slip out an open door, sometimes not turning up again until morning.

We'd sometimes find him in unlikely places...on top of the armoire, on top of the kitchen cabinets, upside-down and stuck down behind the furnace. He was a great jumper...most of the time.

And he was the only cat I've ever known who was obsessed with access to the sock drawer. He managed to figure out how to open at least two of them, as the claw marks on Scott's dresser drawer will attest. He would open the drawers while we weren't around, so that there were often clean socks strewn about the house. At his most lovable, he would saunter into the family room in the evening, while we sat on the sofa, and deposit a sock at our feet. He was so proud to be able to deliver us his kill for the evening. And it was so, so funny.

He loved to hang out on the back of the sofa in the evening (or any other time, really) when we watched TV, too.Back in April, he was vomiting a lot and we took him to the vet. They ran some tests that looked like he might have lymphoma. But we changed his diet and his follow-up bloodwork, just two months ago, looked normal...or so they said. And although he lost some weight (which was a good thing, I thought), he seemed fine.

When Oliver stopped eating on Wednesday night, I didn't think much of it, but by Thursday night he still wasn't eating and he was getting lethargic. I took him to the vet first thing on Friday. Smunch was really nervous about it and asked a million questions as we walked to school.

Oliver was at the vet all day being poked and prodded, running up an astronomical bill. Each call from the vet sounded more dire...his white blood cells were through the roof, his bilirubin was high, it looked like he also had leukemia. But the vet was also very positive about the treatment options for lymphoma. I was secretly skeptical. We were looking at months of chemotherapy to extend his life for...months.

Scott was out of town. I asked plenty of questions, but under the pressure of losing our cat, I approved everything the vet suggested. When I picked Smunch up at school, the first words out of his mouth were, "How's the kitty?" I told him the truth...that Oliver was very sick and we'd need to make some really difficult decisions about him. And that he was going to die. It was awful.

The vet gave Oliver steroids, a first dose of chemo and some anti-nausea medication before I picked him up around 6 p.m. I brought him home. He stumbled out of the carrier and laid down on the floor. He still refused to eat. He drank a little water and laid back down on the kitchen floor.

By the time Scott arrived home around 9:30, he was sleeping in the laundry basket in our closet. And he looked bad. The night was miserable, Oliver was more lethargic, he cried in pain every half hour or so. I sobbed while he suffered. And by the time I realized he'd been quiet for a couple of hours, I already knew he had died in the night. At least he didn't have to suffer anymore.

I'm grateful that we were spared difficult decisions about chemotherapy and euthanasia, but it was such a hard, hard night and a harder day, watching my sweet little boy absorb the news that his favorite cat was gone. He was so sad and it made it so much more difficult.

So, now we are a one cat family. Although Skimble sniffed at Oliver's lifeless body before it was taken back to the vet, he appeared to search for him for the rest of the day...looking as though he expected to be pounced on every time he turned a corner. Since then, however, I think maybe he's realized that this means he's the only cat to bestow attention upon and that he's getting a LOT of it from his sad family members. I'm pretty sure he's going to embrace this new role with gusto.Rest in peace, Oliver. You were well loved and will be dearly missed.

Girls Getaway

I can't say that I'd ever spent a weekend away with just my girlfriends...not since high school anyway. But a couple of my high school buddies decided that since we're all turning 40 this year, we should celebrate by getting away from our families for a while and hanging out together somewhere...anywhere, really.

After much deliberation, we decided to take the cheaper option of staying at my friend K's father's house in Sausalito...and just for one night. When there are seven of you and there are nine young children under the age of 10 among you, it's hard to schedule anything where you can all make it for more than a single night. But you take what you can get.

I took off right after Mam's soccer game. It's easy to get to Sausalito from here, but it turned out the house was a little harder to locate. And no big surprise with a view like this:We hung out for the rest of the afternoon, then went out for a fun dinner on the water.And although we're no great partiers, we were still up 'til 2 a.m. yakking about one thing or another. When you've known each other as long as we have, it doesn't seem to matter much that we don't get to see each other all that often or that we've all taken different paths in life. There's always something to talk about.

We had a mellow morning around the house...before taking a nice walk down many, many stairs into town for brunch.

We'd prepared for a foggy, chilly time, but the weather couldn't have been more beautiful and the walk back up the hill was actually kinda hot!The whole trip was far too short. Fortunately, there were more birthdays and birthday parties to come. It's been a great year for getting together! We're hoping maybe we can make this an annual thing...Who wouldn't hope?

Blue Angels

Around these parts, when someone mentions the Blue Angels, most people think of the performing team of fighter jets operated by the U.S. Navy. These aren't those Blue Angels.But they don't look like anything you'd want to mess with either, do they?

Mam had a fairly lackluster soccer season last year. Somehow, the fiestiness she showed during her first year of playing soccer had worn off. This year? It's back.She's right in there, taking the ball up the field and taking shots on goal when she gets them. It's a lot more fun to watch this way.

Truthfully, her team is struggling a little. They're a great team with a lot of girls who have Mam's spunk, but each Saturday, they seem to lose by a single goal. Last weekend, that goal (the only goal of the game) was scored during Mam's tenure at goalie. Fortunately, that wasn't the case this weekend...although they lost 1-0 again.

They'll win one of these Saturdays, I'm sure.Mam certainly isn't giving up. She's just refueling.

September Garden

I know. It's not even September anymore.

After lamenting that things grew so very slowly this cold year, my garden did finally grant me some yummy fruits and veggies. And, as usual, I couldn't help but photograph them. Why not, right?

Our little apple tree did well in its inaugural year of fruit bearing and produced four different kinds of small, but delicious apples.And after the pear tree was raided by squirrels last year, it had a pretty good crop this year, thanks to some bird netting. The pears are always fantastic. The tree now as some sort of blister mite infection that I can't seem to et rid of, so the pears turned out bumpy and mutant-looking, but they tasted great anyway.And although my tomatoes clearly don't thrive in whatever kind of soil we've got (I'm thinking it's probably infected with something that tomatoes can't handle and I need to stop planting for several years or find some seriously disease-resistant plants) we still got at least a few tomatoes off each of the plants.There were a few dinners worth of beans and three or four cucumbers as well.

And here it is October. There are just a few apples left out there and summer is already feeling like a distant memory. Guess I'll look forward to some lemons and grapefruit!

The Bestest Gift

Although the San Francisco Giants' season may be all but over at this point, the Little League Fall baseball league is just getting started. And this year, Smunch thought he might like to give that a shot. As luck would have it, the coach of his Mavericks team decided to coach "Fall Ball" this year and asked Smunch to join his team. Score.

So, while some little boys might revel in a new erector set, a new bike, a new scooter or even a nice big ice cream cone, this little boy could not have been happier that his parents decided he'd outgrown his baseball bat...and needed a new one.

A First for Second and Fourth

I'm so glad we managed to get away for a few days before school started. And I was tickled pink to be in Yosemite when the call went out to help sort school supplies this year. Thank goodness that was something I couldn't help with at all. I got roped into helping with a coaching clinic for soccer, but that was fine.

I took Mam out to see if I could find her a cute dress for the first day of school. She's always resistant to going out. No matter what she's up to at home, it's always more interesting than anything involving getting in the car. We went to Kohl's. Nothing. We went to Target. Nothing again. I sighed and asked if she wanted to wear clothes she already had or go to the nearby mall...expecting a swift end to shopping. We went to the mall. She found a dress at Macy's. I hated it. I made her go to Gymboree. Nothing she liked and nothing I wanted to afford anyway. I dragged her to JCPenney. Nothing. Finally, I had to suck it up and tell her she could have the dress at Macy's. I hadn't checked the price tag. At least it was on sale.

When we got back to Macy's, she went right back to the dress she'd found and then chose its neighbor...which still wasn't something I would have picked out, but was a whole lot cuter than the original choice. I agreed quickly and we checked out as fas as possible, before she could change her mind.

She may have been overdressed for the first day of school, but at least she was cute.Smunch wasn't thrilled with the teacher he'd been assigned for the year. I was pretty happy because she was the only fourth grade teacher who wasn't new to the school and she has a good reputation. It didn't show that much, but I think Smunch was pretty anxious about the first day.Mam, on the other hand, got just the teacher she wanted...except that that teacher now has a shared classroom, so she'll only be there part time and is sharing with a former kindergarten teacher. I like her teachers, but I wasn't super thrilled about another shared contract. Mostly, I was relieved that she didn't get one of the other teachers...who is also a terrific teacher, but I thought Mam would be particularly poorly suited to her style.

Mam couldn't wait to get to school. She really missed her friends over the summer and was just so excited about everything!As is tradition...in many families, I suppose...Daddy and I walked the kids to school.They chattered happily the whole way. It's so nice to have them be excited about school. When I look at what other parents deal with in terms of first-day jitters and separation issues, I have to admit that I'm very fortunate. My kids clearly love me, but they're also happy without me. I must've done something right somewhere along the line!This year was strange because the kids wait in lines all the way across the blacktop from each other. So, I couldn't easily go back and forth between them. I missed meeting any of the teachers. But that was fine. One of them knows me and the other two probably know who I am as well. I've been a known quantity at school for a while now.

Both kids seemed perfectly happy in line for their new classes. Although I'm sure he had no qualms, Daddy carefully questioned Mam about whether she was really ready for second grade.Mam gently reassured him that she was indeed ready for the year and all it entailed.

As if I needed more proof that I burned out almost every volunteer impulse last year, I took one look at the annual back-to-school coffee (where the year's volunteers are recruited) and decided that I'd really like to go home...to my eerily quiet house, eat breakfast and read the paper.

Mam, predictably, had a great first day and to my great relief, Smunch was thrilled with his class too and reports that he really likes his new teacher.

It's going to be a good year.