Catherine has indeed entered her ditty into Second Annual Feral Living Romantic Valentine’s Day Limerick Contest.
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Watch out, for she is a pro when it comes to philosophers. Especially those French ones.

I love Google. I saw the most beautiful bird today when I was taking The Baby to school, and now I know what is was. Via The Dutch Birding Association, it was an Ijsvogel.

A Common Kingfisher.

Here I pause to gloat. Tonight we are going down to Belgium for dinner ( click on eating and drinking, fool page). Mr.Jo will be following with his truck, which will be transporting the fork-lift that will be necessary to lift me out of my chair, for I plan on committing one of the seven cardinal sins.

You know, this morning I was remarking to Catherine that during my school days I often paused and wondered of what possible use anything that I was learning could be in the real world.

I have certainly put my education to good use this week.

Location : the laundry room. Mummy Dearest is folding laundry when The Girl walks in. She lounges up against the washing machine and asks :

The Girl : Can I ask you something personal ?
Mummy Dearest : Uh, yes.
The Girl : Do you and Daddy still do sex ? ( The Girl has no idea how to use the word ’sex’, grammatically)
Mummy Dearest : Uh, yes.
The Girl : When do you do it ?
Mummy Dearest : That’s too personal.

This was a few days ago, and now, when The Girl and The Father start one of their teasing fits, she throws ‘And you are sexing’ in his face.

She says it in the same tone of voice that one would use saying : ‘And you eat boogers !’

While I find being open fine in theory, at times it rather makes me blush.

I should be at the OB’s right now, sitting on a plastic chair, waiting for about 2 hours as they are always running late.

In fact, I woke up on Monday with my stomach in knots at the thought of today, of going there.

I should have shaved my legs last night and debated whether or not to wash my hair. I should have laid out a pristine selection of clothing and ransacked The Girl’s sock drawer again.

I should have bought a bus ticket yesterday.

I should have been on the bus an hour ago, hoping The Baby wouldn’t get ‘bus sick’, and then walked with her the mile or so to the hospital, leaving The Boy- who is sick- at home alone ( well, Mr.Jo is here ) and The Girl to eat her lunch at school, which she loathes doing.

But yesterday when I was walking through town, having done my shopping, I thought, why bother ? Everything is gone, this is all just about wrapped up, there are no complications.

So, why go ?

This afternoon I needed something from our bedroom, I don’t really recall what. I entered the room , flipped on the light switch and walked over to my side of the bed.

And there, in her usual territory ( for I am convinced that she is indeed a she ) was the mouse that lives in our bedroom. Usually, when I make my grand entrance, she scuttles away, running for the safety of the dark place beneath my chest of drawers, or that knot-hole over by the chair.

But today she simply finished up whatever mousy business that she was engaged in, then casually weaved her way about the shiny, red buckets, and disappeared once again.

Perhaps I need to read Casino. Learn how to be more assertive, less wishy-washy. I mean, even the mouse in the bedroom ignores me.

Right now, I am reading the book Casino. I know, I know, a rather embarrassing confession for someone as pretentious as I am to make, but true none the less.

Before all of this baby gedoe ( a Dutch word I am very fond of, and I use it when I mean ‘nonsense’. One can stress it so well, like a sneeze : ge- doe!), I was plowing through my usual sort of reading fodder. I had started with some of my books about Maximilian and Charlotte and was going to move on to Rudolf, when, boom !- no baby and I reached, mid-page, for Casino.

This happened to me once before, this sudden aversion to my usual favorites. For some reason, when pregnant with The Boy I simply had to read Stephen King. Nothing else would do. I worked my way through most of his books in those 9 months.

And I wonder why The Boy is so fey.

I have been contemplating entering the Second Annual Feral Living Romantic Valentine’s Day Limerick Contest.

While waiting for the children’s playmates to leave at 5, I worked on the topic :

A tart who knew Thomas Aquinas,
A bit of a grey, faded Venus,
Said that short before slumber
He pondered what number
Of angels could dance on a p….

I don’t know that I could actually write out such….naughty words, given how huffy I’ve been about the same the last few days.

But it was diverting.

Along with everything else, by the weekend I have to decide how we are going to ‘do’ the girl’s bathroom. Because it is a small, windowless room, I’m thinking of yellow and white.

I came across this nifty room planner, though, in my travels. Very nifty.

And have you uploaded that work yet, Mummy Dearest ?

I finally finished all of the work-work that I have been moaning and groaning about for a cootie’s age. I’m going to upload it today.

I could have uploaded it yesterday, but I find myself facing the strongest case of ‘fear of failure’ that I have ever experienced. I’m so very sure I’m going to screw everything up.

But I will do it. Today.