License plate says “DRIVSAFE.” What do you think the driver is doing? Talking on her cell phone, of course.

What ironies have you experienced lately?

I haven’t been wearing my CGMS lately – just too damn lazy – so it feels sort of silly to go in.

He came downstairs and wanted to watch his current obsession, Shaun the Sheep.  I loaded it up on the laptop and we went about our merry ways, until an odd dripping noise penetrated my consciousness.

Water. Dripping. Into the kitchen ceiling light.

Turns out he left the water running in the bathroom sink, with the watercolor cup covering the drain.

And watercolors all over the carpet in the hall.  (Thank you, clorox with bleach spray, thank you.)

And of course, when you forget to turn the heat off under the aforementioned healthy meal while you are mopping up the bathroom floor, you will wind up with a pot of healthy nutritious burned crap.

Calgon, I hear you calling.  But first I have to figure out how to clean the water out of the light fixture…

There are a lot of reasons for that, although mostly I blame Facebook and its instant gratification abilities (which only slightly make up for the letdown when you say something clever and NO ONE RESPONDS no matter how many times you hit refresh).

So what’s new?

P’ito turned FOUR in November.  He is a firecracker – intensely loving and excited one moment, absolutely enraged at the injustice of life the next (no mac and cheese? BUT I WANT MAC AND CHEESE!)

We’re still waiting for Hypothetical Sibling.  We had one close call, where a birthmother chose us, but then the father decided to sue for custody rather than let her make an adoption plan…  So we continue waiting, waiting, waiting…

I got laid off in August and am still looking for work.  It’s very odd to be part of the statistics, when I hear about “the unemployed” and I think wait, they’re talking about me.  Looking for work is tough because there are very few jobs in my field, or even in the larger non-profit world here in Small City, and I can’t go very far afield because of Pili’s work and my childcare responsibilities.

And of course, I’m still naval gazing about adoption.

Shannon wrote something on Facebook the other day about preparing for a multicultural day at her kids’ school and how she needed to find squirrel to represent her culture.  It was all very tongue in cheek, but it made me think: what is my kid’s culture? He is Guatemalan and we have appropriated aspects of that cultural heritage into our family’s celebrations, but our family is what? Jewish/WASP/Guatemalan?  So what is Pito’s family heritage? Do I subscribe to the idea that he is part of our family and thus bring on the lox and shortbread? Or is his connection to our family tree and family heritage less significant than if he had been biologically connected to us and genetically programmed to enjoy his matzah balls? I find that insulting to the strength of the adoptive connection, and yet, to say that bagels and lox is his family heritage also seems to slight the importance of where he comes from and his connection to that place and those people.

So – tortillas and lox for family day?

RNRACHIT

Really???

A really good post that gets into why this is not so is here – and the author’s earlier post here.  I am really pissed to hear that APs and PAPs are attacking her for what she has said.

My feelings about the whole wet hot mess are very nicely summarized by PEAR here. Yes – if you were already matched with a child pre-quake and the Haitian govt has already found that the child is clear for int’l adoption and all you are waiting on is USCIS paperwork, then USCIS should make that happen ASAP.  If a child is not already cleared – then we all need to do everything we can to make sure that that child has a safe place to live, good food to eat, and help connecting with their family of origin FIRST before they get placed.  Even kids who were already in an orphanage may have families looking for them.  International adoption is NOT the best way to deal with kids and disaster relief.

Oh, and um – we just had our profile sent out to a possible expectant mom.  Please keep her in your thoughts – that she is supported and given good resources as she makes her decision about what is best for her and her family -  be that parenting or adoption.

/soapbox

ETA: Another excellent link -

The Dangerous Desire to Adopt Haitian Babies

And now we wait.

p.s. And this is where I am supposed to “network” – the very word of which makes me a little queasy in the back of my mouth – and say that if you are an educator/social workie/medical/barista/works with people who might be pregnant and not interested in parenting type of person, and you would feel comfortable letting someone know that you know someone who wants to adopt… um, drop me an email or something and I will tell you more.  Okay thxbai.

He, opening wide and displaying a lovely yellow thing on his tongue: It’s a booger, Mama!

Me: Well, I guess that’s not a choking hazard…

PLZVOTE

S1NG 1T

HDSHRNKR

SENILE1

And on a tow truck nearby: NEXT WEEK

Spotted closer to home: SIDE JOB2 – makes me wonder – what is side job 1? And did side job2 pay for the car? I assume that’s the story behind the car I see parked in our neighborhood with the vanity plate PKRMONEY.

What is the best vanity plate you’ve seen?

What would you put on a vanity plate if you had one? (Or, what is on your vanity plate, if you’ve got one?)

Everything looked fine, except for the test strips, which said “cash pricing” $360

Every other time I’ve ordered them from MM, they have been covered by insurance.

I spent about 45 minutes on the phone with a representative from MM who finally assured me that yes, they were covered.

Guess what happened next?

Test strips arrive, I start using them and… then

Bill. For $360.  I call Minimed back (another 30 minutes on hold) only to be told that at some point this year (in the middle of the year) my insurance coverage had changed and Minimed was no longer covered as a supplier of perscription supplies, only durable medical equipment.   Ergo, use a different supplier for test strips.

I estimate that I’ve devoted about an hour and a half of time I should be working, not counting the time spent blogging about this (ahem), to fixing this problem, and it isn’t really fixed yet.  I have to get a new script for strips (phone maze at the endos office, at least another hour), send it in to the appropriate mail order source, wait for the strips to come, and then*return* the strips I have not used from MM (paying out of pocket for the others).

The impact that dealing with this crap has on our national productivity cannot be underestimated.

Oh, and further aggravation: I just got a phone call from the adoption agency.  The social worker who is going to do our homestudy is concerned that I have diabetes and wants a letter from my endo stating that I am healthy enough to parent, before she will do the homestudy visits.  I am overdue for an appointment, and if we have to wait for that in order to get our homestudy done, I am going to scream.  The reason she wants a letter from the endo is that we saw her to take about our options for this adoption, and I had a low – just your average run of the mill, stuff a glucose tab in my face low – while I was in her office.  This translated to “and she said that you had an ‘attack’ in her office, so she was concerned about your health.”

ETA: 2 phone messages left, over 2 days, still no endo appt scheduled.