Snakes and other big deals

[la_belle_laide]

Callum will be 12 weeks tomorrow. They say that's the end of the "fourth trimester." There's definitely been a difference, too. Less crying, more laughing. On and off more sleeping, too. Two nights ago he slept for five hour straight! Then he went back to the 2 hour thing. :/ But hopefully that is a sign of things to come.

Two Saturdays ago, July 27th, I returned to work, SUPER part time. It felt so good to be out of the house though, to have some adult time, and to be useful to people again. My first client tipped me $100. O_O WOW. And the two new therapists there said that there were a ton of clients just waiting for me to come back. Felt really nice to be needed like that.

The day after I went back to work, the weirdest thing happened. I took the dogs and Callum outside, like I always do in the morning. The dogs went running to the front yard while I carried Callum after them. They ran straight past this:





How the hell does my SIGHT HOUND miss something like that? Sucker was over 3 feet long!

My first, extremely human reaction was to recoil in horror. Then I grabbed my camera (still holding Callum!) and started snapping some pics. I crouched down to get a little closer, thinking "Dang, that's the biggest garter snake I've ever seen!" Then later, I googled my "garter snake."

WRONG. It is a northern black racer. An effing CONSTRICTOR, known to bite often and hard if you scare it enough.

Yet, it just chilled there (or whatever verb snakes do when they're just sort of there,) and looked at the both of us. I couldn't shake the feeling that it was looking at Callum; yes, I know how wonky that sounds. But interestingly, his birth year is the year of the black Snake. I thought that was super cool.

Right after that, we were sitting outside in the chair, and an osprey (ka 'io o ke kai – Callum's Hawaiian name,) was circling overhead. Pretty neat.

Let's see, what else. HitRECord continues to be interesting and supportive. The TV show is coming up on 70-some-odd days and we're going to be in it. :D I can't wait to see how it all turns out.

I also sent out a bunch of query letters to some new agents. I haven't done that since before Callum (CJ for short, okay?) was born, and it was awesome to get back into that.

The other news is that SB is moving away. He's 25 and I knew this time was coming. Still, my memory is so clear of when he was CJ's age and living with us. I guess a part of me thought he'd always be right there, just a few miles away, coming for day-visits even as an adult. It kind of guts me that he's leaving. But he has this adorable new girlfriend and they are moving in together, in upstate NY. I can hardly believe it. Wasn't I just playing Ninja Turtles with him the other day? (Actually, that's not too far-fetched. As far as I know, he still does pretend to be a Ninja Turtle. ;D ) I just hope that he'll be able to come to Disney with us in Oct. '14. They (he, his GF, and Jo-chan,) are going with Boychild and his Mom and Dad this coming December. Wish I could go, but CJ is way too young.

Jo-Chan will be coming back here to stay for 4 days a week at the end of August, so she can get to school on time. I'm really looking forward to having her around again. She is part of our little family and I want her to be a big part of Callum's life.

Right now CJ is napping (this phase where he can't nap unless he's sleeping on or close to me or my Mom; he's currently on the boppy pillow on my lap as I type,) and the damn crow is causing a huge racket. I can hardly stand the noise but at least he's not screaming, as he's lately taken to doing every time CJ falls asleep. It's like he's got a goddamn sensor. He wakes the baby 9 out of 10 times and I have to spend a good amount of time getting him to sleep again. It drives me up the damn wall because, even though I know it's irrational, it feels like he's doing it on purpose. >_<

Well anyway, so I'm looking forward to Autumn now and all the good things it's going to bring: Jo-chan staying over again, trips to pumpkin patches with my new baby, the HitRECord TV show (and maybe some money from that too! AFAIK we are getting paid in advance!) and who knows what else. I just feel like it's going to be a really good time! ^_^


ETA: Here's something weird: I'm suddenly allergic to eggplant. I used to eat it all the time. Then I had it the other day, and I got this huge rash on my lips. WTF?