The more I listen to the election coverage and leader debates (such as the debate being broadcast tonight), the more I must resign myself to the fact that most of the time, politicians are big lying bullshitters. It’s discouraging and kind of makes me feel like writing in Jimmy Hoffa as a candidate and voting for him on the 23rd.

Also, Gilles Duceppe is driving me batty with his constant references to “all the provinces AND Quebec” in almost every question. What the fuck? The provinces AND Quebec?! Dude, the referendums in Quebec always ended in NO. We did not, in fact, separate from the rest of Canada. There is no “provinces and Quebec” statement to be made seeing as how we ARE one of the provinces. Christ.

I hate politics.

Breanna loves bath time, as proven in this post-bath photo.

This was immediately made into my desktop background. Can you blame me?

Hayley sometimes gets peeved – understandably seeing as how she’s only three – if she wants something when I’m busy feeding Breanna, and she’s not always thrilled to have to share the limelight, but she definitely loves her sister. She’s always asking to hold her and I can’t say boo to Breanna without Hayley immediately coming over and poking her face in to kiss her sister, sing to her, and touch her.

I think she’s made to be a good big sister. It should be really fun for her when Breanna can sit up on her own and interact a bit more.

I went into Hayley’s room to get her some clothes and I noticed that the lid for the rat tank (which had already cracked ages ago) had collapsed completely and fallen into the tank. Annoying. Except then I noticed that only one rat was sleeping in there. The other was gone. Oy.

Only panicking a little, I didn’t say a word to Hayley and convinced her to go get dressed in the living room while watching Treehouse. I put Breanna in the stroller in the room with me and began my search. I figured Nicodemus is a bit of a doofus animal but he’s smart enough to know that for his entire life, his food has always been brought to him and so he wouldn’t be likely to leave. If he had escaped into the rest of the apartment, it would have been a nightmare.

I looked under both dressers and under the crib to no avail but then spotted his twitching whiskers hiding behind a few little stuffed animals. I tried to catch him but he ran further back. I ran to the kitchen and got a few pieces of chicken and used that to lure him out. Once he came out a bit further, I grabbed him and although he squeaked loudly, he didn’t struggle and I think he was relieved to find himself back in his tank. As I constructed a temporary lid out of cardboard and a piece of wood, I saw Mozart frantically giving him a bath; getting rid of the human germs, I presume.

Whew. I lost a hamster once and found him under my sister’s bed, eating a piece of fluff. I also lost a very unfriendly bite-your-face-off gecko years ago, only to find her a week later, clinging to the inside of the coat cupboard door; I screamed, she ran into the closet, and luckily my sister’s ex was there and managed to catch her and take her home with him.

I was just worried that this rescue mission would not end as well. I wasn’t scared of the idea of a rat wandering around since it’s not like he’s a sewer rat full of disease. Still, even though our cat is a total moron, I was worried she’s find the rat first. I was also worried that dehydration would kill him before I found him and I would end up finding a rat carcass somewhere in a couple of months – eww.

I think that whole ordeal woke me up even more than my coffee did.

Breanna just had a five-minute cooing conversation with my nipple. I’d like to think that she was saying how wonderful the milk was, but I think it’s possible that she was expressing her disgust over the fact that, before supper, I placed her in the bouncy seat in the bathroom and then when I noticed she was asleep, I turned out the light and left her in there to actually eat my supper while it was still hot and my family was still at the table. When she woke up, I went in and found that she was sitting there, eyes scrunched up, tiny fist shaking in the air while she babbled, “Alala! AH la la!” angrily at me, which I think translates to, “I can’t believe you left me in the goddamn bathroom, bitch!”

And also after supper tonight, Hayley was singing to herself but she was singing so softly that I couldn’t make out the words and I didn’t recognize the tune as any of the songs we normally sing or listen to. I asked her what she was singing and she looked me straight in the eye and said, “oh, nothing. It’s just an old camp song.”

Just an old camp song?! From when? The days you worked on a ranch and camped out at night with your horse and a can of beans over the campfire?

I have strange children.

Note to self: If I want to avoid too many more cases of Hayley swearing, perhaps I shouldn’t be listening to Rage Against the Machine at top volume. I really don’t need her to adopt “fuck you, I won’t do what you told me, motherfucker” as her new mantra.

I’ve been posting this around a few places, so forgive me if you’ve read this already, but I know that a vast majority of people who read my weblog are parents themselves.

I’ve been having some trouble adjusting to being the mom of more than one kid. I think it’s because I have no real routine. We never had one that was set in stone before with just Hayley but we had a basic routine going. I guess it’s still too soon to have a ton of structure.

Still, if you have any tips on making life a little easier, that would be great. For example, one of the best suggestions was to prepare stuff the night before for Hayley that she can get herself. I usually put a sippy cup with juice, one with water or milk, and some fruit in the fridge for her, and I put corn flakes (luckily she prefers them dry) in a bowl and cover it with foil then leave it on her table. This has been great because she tends to want her breakfast just when Breanna wakes up and needs to be nursed. This way, everyone is taken care of (well, except for me but I get my coffee eventually!).

Suggestions of other things that made life easier when you increased your family size would be greatly appreciated, whether they’re related to the kids or to general stuff around the house.

When you have a baby, there’s one common question that seems to come up all the time. Everyone seems to ask, “So, is she a good baby?” I know that when they ask, they fully expect to hear a jubilant “yes!” and maybe a few details like how many hours the baby sleeps at night or how many naps a day she takes – because the whole good vs. bad seems to revolve around sleep, even if the poor thing is only two weeks old.

I hate that question. I think it’s probably some reflex that makes people ask, but I still hate it with a passion. Hayley was a horrible sleeper, and still has a tendency to fight sleep like it’s a life or death battle, but she wasn’t a BAD baby. Breanna sleeps three or four hours at a time at night and (if left alone by her noisy big sister) will take a two hour nap twice a day on top of little half hour snoozes, but that isn’t what determines her to be a GOOD baby. Both my kids are good.

So I’ve always had the horrible urge to answer that question with no. Probably not if it’s someone I’m related to or close to, because I guess it would be offensive to mock them, but it would be fun with the stranger in the grocery store who must ask if Breanna is a good baby.

Just once, I would love to have the nerve to look stricken, maybe get some tears to well up in my eyes, and pretend to wail a little as I hysterically shriek, “No! Oh GOD, no, she’s not. She’s a terrible baby. I’ve been drinking vodka by ten each morning because of it. She steals money from my wallet, burns my books, slashes my clothes with razors, and sold all my jewelry at the local pawn shop! She’s just a BAD BAD BABY! I don’t know what to do. I tried to take her back to the hospital but they won’t let me return her or have her re-inserted into my uterus, so now I’m stuck with this living hell. HELP ME!”

I figure that should make the poor unsuspecting person to back slowly away from me, perhaps shifting their eyes nervously to the left and right. If I’m loud enough, it should stop anyone else in the vicinity from asking the same question. Too bad I’d never actually do it.

Really, though. Wouldn’t that be fun, just once?

(And honestly, how could you suspect a baby with this smile to be anything BUT good anyway?!)

Excellent movie. I didn’t remember much of the story because it was so long ago but watching the movie was fun. The battle scenes were amazing and I really enjoyed all of it, especially the adorable little girl who played Lucy. Totally worth watching again.

Two entries are up in the journal.