Lazy Friday

Kyle has a cold.

I seem to have caught it, too.

So, after a long night of up-and-down for Kyle and Mommy, I faced a long Friday whose only bright spot was the midday nap.

I took him to the park, which was deserted because it’s up in the foothills where the Santa Ana winds were blowing with fury. He wasn’t a happy camper. I stuck it out there for 45 minutes before giving up and driving home. Luckily, even that much activity was enough to tucker him out. We both went down for a nice long nap at noon, up again at 3pm.

I am still exhausted, so I decided to only do the bare minimum of housework today (which means put clothes on me and the child before we leave the house) and just make sure Kyle doesn’t hurt himself. He played in the backyard for a while as I sat at the table trying to stay awake (a three hour nap for me only includes about 1.5 hours of sleep. The rest is tossing and turning.) I let him harrass the dog, climb in and out of the sandbox, break his sidewalk chalk in half, open and close the back door 1,456 times, etc. I tried to interest him in his toys. The whole time I was chasing him with a Kleenex, because his nose has been running all day.

Finally, around 5, I gave up and put on the Baby Einstein words around the house DVD. I laid down on the couch and Kyle sat with me, and I tried to get him to repeat all the words. He only says “chair” and “ball.”

…

It’s 8pm now and I have retreated back into the office with the door shut because Kyle kept following me around and trying to climb on me. Which normally would be fun and cute but somehow today he is all elbows and they dig into my stomach and uterine type area and I don’t want him to hurt his little sibling before the kid even has time to finish developing.

I tried to go through my blogroll real quick before finishing this post, and it’s been 30 minutes since I started reading. I only got halfway down. There’s a lot to read when you don’t read every day!

I was inspired to write about writing by this post of Tina’s. I can relate to her ritual because I have my own. When I have a writing assignment (which sometimes is my full-time job) I must have everything around me neat and clean. If I am really procrastinating, my whole house has to be neat and clean, there must be food to eat, and the laundry and bills must be done. Only then can I embark upon a project with a clear mind. If I’m writing at work, it’s a lot easier because I only have my office or desk to clean up. Then the procrastination turns to the internet and I read all your blogs before I start working.

In recent days, when working at home, it’s gotten kind of weird. For example, last Sunday I had two things I had to finish: my next article for The Mommy Times (it will be up November 10, I’ll put the link here then) and a pitch for a tv show idea I am working on. They’re both important, so of course I put them off all weekend and used Kyle as my excuse for not working on them. The office wasn’t neat, the house was certainly a disaster, and Kyle was running circles around me and shrieking. How can I work like that?

Stewart actually took Kyle with him to visit a friend and I was left home alone for the first time in…I just can’t remember. My first thought was for sleep…but somehow I sat down at the computer and got into a groove and didn’t stop until I had finished everything.

Maybe, then, it’s the solitude that I need. And all along that’s all I really needed. Everything else is just an excuse. Didn’t Virginia Woolf say something about a room of one’s own? (I think I actually borrowed that book from Tina.) I guess it’s true for me.

…

Because I’m on a roll, I have to share some recent observations about what I’ve seen on television:

-After my emotional freakout, I have stopped watching all violent or serious television and now I only watch Ugly Betty, certain episodes of Oprah, and Bringing Home Baby (new episodes, including the ones I wrote, start airing next Monday on TLC at 2:30 ET – set your TiVo!)

-Has Oprah passed the golden baton to Lisa Ling? I mean, can’t Oprah get out there and “meet the people” anymore? If I want to see Lisa Ling so much I’ll tune in to the Lisa Ling Show. Oh, wait. Maybe she’s just waiting around for Oprah’s under-eye bags to explode so that she can’t go on the air anymore, and she’ll just take over, and every episode will be about some starving mother in Africa and Lisa will say things like “It’s amazing how these women survive. In the 48 hours we spent there, we only got to eat one maggot each” every day and try to make you feel guilty for even existing.

-I saw an excellent documentary the other night on PBS called “The World According to Sesame Street,” which follows teams of Sesame Street producers as they help other countries set up and produce their own versions of the show. They went to Bangladesh and Kosovo and South Africa. I was wrought with emotion watching the show but in a much different way than when I’m watched”House” or “CSI:” this time I was really jealous. These producers have the coolest job I’ve ever seen. Working in children’s television and changing the world. What could be farther from making trashy reality tv?

Now I’m out of things to say. Thanks for stopping by.