Yesterday I mentioned that Thing Two had an oozy icky arm thing going on. When she came home from school yesterday afternoon it was much worse. It was all purple-ish and she was running a fever. So at 20 to 4 I called our GP. They were not accepting any more patients for the afternoon. I should have expected this since it was the monday after a long holiday weekend. But hey, this is my emergency. Who cares about you right? After I got kind of snippy with the poor receptionist (sorry nice lady. I am usually not so *itchy) It was suggested that I take her to the ER.

ugh.

the ER in this town sucks.

I was not dissapointed.

We checked in and triaged  in about 15 minutes and I was happy with the fairly quiet waiting room.

Fast forward SIX HOURS to nearly 10 pm

no dinner. nothing to do for kids… and  a now standing room only waiting room. The shift in the ER is changing and we are still waiting. Nearly every patient in the room has to have thier vitals checked again since they have been waiting more than 4 hours since triage.

It was absolutely unbelieveable. Normally I would have just given up and taken her either to another ER (there is one in the city about 45 minutes away) or home to get an appt first thing in the morning with the GP.But I was beyond the ability to have wasted all that time and energy waiting to have given up! So we waited it out.

Soon after we were seen by a very efficient ER dr who lanced the offending bite. Took samples for the lab and sent us on our way with a script for anti-biotic cream and instructions on leaching out a septic infection. (ew). 24 mintues from start to finish. We waited over 6 hours for 24 minutes of health care. That thanks to the fact that there is such a limited GP practice in this town will likely cost the state of SC $500-1000 bucks. Not to mention a $50 prescription, and a follow up visit with her GP.

Somthing is very wrong with the way we handle health care here.  I dont want to complain too much.. simply because 3 out of 4  in our familyare  in the “blessed” minority that falls into the income brackets that qualify us for State medical programs. (Because Steven and I dont have a child in common he doesnt qualify, even though we have custody of Thing One, and if we were counted as one complete family he would more than qualify *%^&$&%$&^!!!!) Barely. Were we to make a sqootch more a month? We’d be pushed into the desparate place that WAY to many Amerians are in. They make too much money to qualify ( a shockingly low amount per month) , yet not enough to afford health insurance. They are forced to push medical care off until they are forced to use the ER as thier only source of care, since most hospitals are required to treat you reguardless of your ability to pay.

Enough of my soap box today. Thing Two is feeling much better (laying on the couch in her PJ’s eating salt and vinegar chips and watching Disney Channel.. what a life huh?) and should be back in school tommorow or the next day. I was shocked that the Er doc said she could go to school today. With an open sore that has a septic infection and staph infection having recently been in the news?? ugh. My Mommy alarms went off and I chose to keep her home..her Gp will give her an excuse when she see’s him later this week.. (likely friday)

Marvin’s hot dogs. Make me so darn happy. Marvin, since none of you will know is the owner of Marvin’s Convenience Store here in Dillon South Carolina.

I realize that hot dogs are a matter of taste. Where I grew up hot dogs came from a wierdo roaster at the 7-11 where they had been on spin cycle for god only knows how long, with a packet of mustard, a packet of ketchup and possibly a packet of uber-processed pale green relish. Here in the south you order them “all the way” wich means an alarmingly pink hot dog of unknown meat origin, mustard, ketchup, no-beans chili sauce that has been in a crock pot for ummm possibly more than is likely sanitary,( I think it only tastes good after they have to scrape the top of it a few times) and pureed onions. It all comes on a steamed hot dog bun that gets all squishy and mooshy when wrapped in a sheet of paper.

Here in town there are several places to obtain said “hot dog”. My dad, prefers Bill Cowards dogs. To me thier chili sauce is to sweet. Thing Two loves hers from Marvin’s. Ketchup and chili only. My in-laws will drive 25 minutes to near-by McColl, South Carolina for thier convenince store fix. Thing One swears you havent lived until you try one from there.

How does your hot dog come?

I cant believe thanksgiving is behind us! The holidays are already going to fast for me. I want everything to just slow slow down!

We had an “eh” weekend. Steven worked black friday at home depot. (This is his LAST WEEK! yay yay yay *does little happy dance*) And reported that even at a home decor/hardware store the shoppers were insane. Myself, I didnt do any shopping. I plan to start our shopping next pay period.

 Saturday, Steven was working and Thing One took advantage of the day off from school to spend an extra day with her Mom and her family.  I dont begrudge her that, but I sure miss her when she is gone.

  Thing two spent a fittful day wandering back and forth between our house and my parents home, not really very happy anywhere she landed. She is very very allergic to bug bites. She swells up at the slightest mosquito bite and gets hard lumps and runs a fever..in fact we had a scare when she was about 18 mos old with a fireant hill. She fell hands first into it and we didnt realize that the “dirt” she was playing in was in fact an anthill, at least not before she had rougly 50 bites. Scared me to death, especially when she swole all up and started getting wheezy. ANYWHO, she was bitten thursday by what we assume was a fire ant or a spider of some kind on her forearm. Her arm has a big purple welt that is all hot with a fever and oozy. Poor baby. By last night it was very painful and I debated taking her to the ER. But I had her soak in a hot bath and was able to poke at it enough that it ruptured. (ew) It looks some better this morning., but if it rises back up at all by this afternoon I may take her into the pediatrician just to be safe.

I didnt feel all that hot saturday either. I kept thinking that it was my meds being particularly aggressive, or that since its time for Aunt flo ,for all you fertility trackers, I am +2 today! (for all of you who are not, that means that I am 2 days late)  wayyyyy to early to get excited. but mayyybe, it could happen.

Anyway, lots of bunny trails today. I woke up sunday all achy and running a fever. I decided to go ahead and go to church, but by the end of the sermon I was decidedly ill-ish. I spent the rest of the day puking and laying in bed. UGH. I am NOT a good patient. But thankfully today I am feeling much much better. One good thing about the stomach flu is that its usually short lived.

So today my goal is to 1. get laundry taken care of. 2. find out if my insurance co covers chiropractic care. 3. if it does find one in the area that doesnt run his practice out of a bait and tackle shop.

I wanted to wish all of you a very Happy Thanksgiving…

We had a wonderful day. We slept late and lazed around. The girls enjoyed time with thier Daddy, and played games with him. It was sweet to be standing in the kitchen listening to them giggle and holler.

I finished up my contributions to the dinner and about 2 we headed over to my Uncle Jim and Aunt Geri’s house.. they live just at the end of our road so it was nice not to have to travel too far.

 I come from a really huge family. REALLY. My dad has 10 siblings and my mom has 7. I have something close to 40 1st cousins alone. But today we had about 25 or so at my Uncle’s

Actually it was kind of odd. My Uncle is not in good health and he recently got the news that his kidneys are failing. We were all keenly aware that this might be our last thanksgiving together. It was like the elephant in the living room. But we took lots of pictures and enjoyed one another. My cousins who live in Seattle were here visiting and they are really fun people. I know I caught myself purposely making mental photographs. Taking deep breaths and pausing to make the moments a memory. I wish we would be aware enough to do that every single day.. not just on holidays or when we think someone we love is dying… because after all… every single day could be the last one.

ugh. enough sappy stuff.

We had a really nice dinner. Some things were a little off.. but I think that is the price you pay with a potluck. I always forget that I am in the South and well… yall cook stuff wierd. I was left craving my Mom’s creamy candied yams and her awesome BREAD stuffing (cornbread? ugh. No offense to all yall cornbread stuffing eaters.. but, you eat cornbread with chili or put it around a hot dog on a stick. NOT in a turkey. ew)

Deserts were awesome.. we had a TON to choose from. Including my coconut maccaroon pie. That thing was perfection. The “crust” was chewy and sweet. The filling was thick and creamy… mmm mm. I keeper for sure. I may tweak it just a tad to make the “crust” a little thinner so it might crisp up just a little on the top.. but other wise it was AWESOME.

I took a ton of pictures.. but I will have to post them tommorow as I left our camera accross the street at my parents house.

I am so excited that the Holiday’s are officially almost here. Every year I totally ignore everything holiday until after Thanksgiving. I refuse to give in to the whole Thanksweenmas maddness. So I am always glad to get things started at THE RIGHT time.

Usually we plan to put up our tree the day after Thanksgiving, but this year Thing One will be with her Mother for the weekend, so we will wait a couple weeks to get it up.. probably the weekend of the 7th or so. I may start some of the other holiday deco sooner than that though. I have had the fall stuff up for a really long time (like since the 1st of sept)

I am also getting geared up to bake. My sister and a really close Aunt live in Alaska where I grew up, so I have to be ready to ship earlier than I would if they lived closer. Likely by the 15th or so. This year I plan to make

1. pumpkin spice loaf

2. kissmass cookies

3. traditional sugar cookies w/ hard icing

4. pineapple cookies

5. ranger cookies

6. peanut butter balls

7. chocolate dipped pretzels

I think that will be plenty to ship.. for here I may also make some fudge and some kind of cranberry bread.

As far as Thanksgiving I dont make to much. We are planning to go to my Aunt and Uncle’s house where the menu looks like it will be

Fried Turkey

Sweet Potato casserole

broccoli casserole

sunshine salad

green been casserole

mashed potatoes and giblet gravy

collards w/ fat back

potato salad

bisquits

and a selection of deserts.

I am making the sunshine salad and a pumpkin spice cake with cream cheese frosting as well as a coconut pie.

The pie is something I have been thinking a lot about. I am not a pie fan. I just cant make myself learn to like pie crust of any kind. I dont like even graham cracker crust. The mouth feel to me is not acceptable. yick. SO I have been working out a pie crust alternative in my mind. Whether it will work or not is another umm pan of pie.

So this is my idea. Since I plan to make a coconut cream pie what if I made the “crust” out of a maccaroon batter? I have Ina Garten’s recipe for coconut macaroons and it doesnt look to hard. So I lay out a layer of that and blind bake it.. then after it bakes off add the pudding filling and then top it off with the whipped cream layer. Then the toasted coconut. The bottome layer WILL be chewy. NOT flaky or crumbly like other pie crusts. hmmmm Im going to try it anyway. If it falls apart, that will be ok since it all goes to the same place anyway. We’ll see how it goes. I know that the Sunshine Salad is a hit and I made the pumpkin spice cake and litterally it was the first thing to dissapear off the desert table at church sunday night.

Pumpkin Spice Cake

2 1/2 cups sugar

2 1/2 cups flour

1 cup veg oil

1 can pumpkin puree

3 eggs

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp vanilla

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp cloves

1/2 tsp nutmeg

nuts to your taste (I use walnuts)

place in a bundt pan well sprayed with PAM. Bake at 350 for about 45 minutes to 1 hour.

cool well and turn out on a plate. frost with cream cheese frosting and sprinkle with walnuts.

This is a tradition from my Nana Faye and weve ALWAYS had it on our holiday table.The recipe makes A LOT of fruit salad.

Sunshine Salad

3 large cans of fruit cocktail

3 cans of mandarin oranges

3 cans of pineapple chunks

2 small jars of marshino cherries

2 bags of mini marshmellows

1 large container of cool whip

1 cup sour cream

The night before you plan to serve the salad. Place marshmellows into bottom of large collander. Over marshmellows pour all fruit (except cherries, they will make the salad pink) reserving juice for punch. Cover collander with plastic wrap and set overnight in fridge.

next day fold together cool whip and sour cream. Fold into fruit, lastly adding cherries. 

You COULD add coconut to this salad.. but I think its against my religion.

 What are yall fixin’ ??

I dont know what got into me. I started out friday with really good intentions to totally participate… and I blew it. Steven was off on friday and let me sleep in (until 9 that is) and was so sweet surprising me with breakfast…then we took off speedy quick for Lumberton to grocery shop.Leaving the camera on its dock. errrg.

So anyway we rushed around and grocery shopped, stopped at Super Walmart and then stopped for lunch at Cracker Barrell.  I had the YUMMIEST broccoli and cheese soup. YUMMO was that so good. It was like a bowl full of steamed broccoli with a cheesy broth poured over it. mmmm It was PERFCT for a light lunch and for the chilly weather. On the way home we stopped at a really authentic mexican store/resturant to look into picking up a tres leche cake for Thing One’s birthday dinner. EmmaGrace was alseep in her car seat so I went in alone leaving Steven in the car. When I walked in the place went SILENT. It was so funny. I just kinda waved at everyone and smiled really cheesy. So, I approached the counter and asked about the cake (we had it at a friend’s birthday party once and she said they’d gotten it from this particular place) NO one spoke english. My spanish is EXTREMELY limited.. I basically know how to order a beer, ask where the bathroom is and to say a few naughty words. Since none of the phrases I know fit the situation I was kind of stuck. Luckily I was able to call Thing One’s mom and have her make my request over the phone.  Unfortunatly they didnt have the cake I was looking for that day and all my craziness was for nothing.

 So we headed home cake-less. This of course bolstered Steven’s arguement that we should head to the beach that night instead of waiting until the following day.  So I ignored a waiting homework assigment and booked us a beach front room and we loaded up the youngin’s as soon as they got home from school and headed to Myrtle Beach.

 I was able to find us a really really reasonable deal at the resort where Steven and I went on our honeymoon.. so that was kind of fun since I dont think we have been back there since (there is a HUGE assortment of places to stay at the beach.. and we often try a new place when we go…sometimes at our own peril.. ugh!)

 We didnt hot very much traffic at all wich was really nice. Often you get stuck in traffic in some of the outer suburbs of Myrtle Beach for long periods of time, but we must have timed things just right since I dont remember sitting in traffic even once. When we arrived (its about a 1-2 hour drive) we headed for our favorite burger place.. River City Cafe.. they have the BEST fries there. I always say that the next time we go there I should just order fries and forget the burger because I never finish my burger and always fill up on fries. They are sooo good.

After eating we went the short way to our resort and checked in. The room was nice and clean (wich to me is THE most important issue. I can deal witha  bad view or noise, but it has to be SPOTLESS) and swimsuits were on in a flash and we headed to the pools and hot tubs.

I am a sucker for a hot tub. We really need to just buy one.. and I think we would except I cant see us using it in the summer..and since it is hot here probably 80% of the time its impractical. If we lived in Alaska we’d TOTALLY have one. Something incredibly sexy about snuggling up to your honey in a bubbly hot tub under the northern lights. YES!

We didnt have northern lights but the beach sky was romantic and we were left just the two of us in a beach front outdoor tub. The kids were more than pleased to find that several boys soccer teams that were in town for the Allstar championships were staying with us at our hotel! Thing One, and her friend had WAY to much fun giggling and rough housing in the pools with those boys. Remember being 13? How fun. Thing Two was rather annoyed at the whole situation. But enjoys the water so much that she wasnt to detered.

Next morning we slept in as late as our early bird Thing Two would allow us and finally decided on attending a China Buffet that featured 120 items as well as seafood. Everyone was SO full and with a winter price of $4.99 with a coupon I had you couldnt beat it!

After lunch we headed back to the resort and water features.Where I found a quiet steamy corner of the HUGE pool area and retreated to my OWN private hot tub. I donned Thing One’s IPOD and read my book whilst bubbling away. It was heavenly.

The Things and thier friend were soon prune-ish and Steven took them for a walk down the chilly winter beach. In that time I took a leasurely shower and discovered a coupon in one of the tourist publications for my favorite romantic resturant. On a whim I called to inquire about a reservation assuming that I wouldnt find one.. but HOORAY. The melting pot could fit us in at 930.. generally I am totally against eating at such a late hour.. but I couldnt turn it down. SO, we got the girls settled in for the night. Armed with popcorn, junk food and Sweet Nibblets! A Hannah Montana marathon on Disney Channel.

I have a love affair with the Melting Pot. If you have never been it is a fondue resturant that is SO yummy. I cant tell you how happy that place makes me.

We arrived a few minutes early for our ressie and were soon seated in a cozy little table. Our dinner was sooo good. I wish Id taken the camera with us to take pictures. The highlight of our dinner was of course the chocolate fondue desert. We ordered a milk chocolate fondue with a swirl of baileys irish cream swirled in. OH my gosh, I was SO full by the time it came, but WOW it was so good. I wanted to just drink it.

Sunday we woke earlier and headed to a pancake house for a quick bite before heading home. It was called Grandma’s and let me tell you.. Grandma can’t cook. We were totaally unimpressed. (it seems like all we did all weekend was eat huh?) We ate quickly and headed out. We made great time and were home in time to for me to cook chili and a pumpkin spice cake to take to our church Thanksgiving Dinner.  More food. Ugh. But I always love chatting with our church family. Playing with the babies and catching up on everyone. We made it home just it time to see the new iron chef debut YAY for Iron Chef Symon!

Copy blogging from Lisa… in no particular order are some things that are going on.

1. I have school today and I am totally unmotivated to do it.. that is why I am blogging two days in a row.

2. Emma Grace and I went on a walk today. She walked almost a half mile… and then wanted me to carry her. I got within a quarter of a mile of home and wondered who was going to carry ME.

3. I am trying to pin down weekend plans to celebrate Thing One’s 13th birthday. It was officially last weekend, but since she was with her Mother, we are celebrating this weekend. Our plan is to take she, and a friend as well as Thing Two to Myrtle Beach. Since my kids are little pool fishes I thought to just get a hotel room that had cool water features at the resort. Most rooms are running around $45-50 a night wich isnt bad.. here is my debate.

A. Go down saturday afternoon to stay one night and allow Thing One to choose an upscale resturant (well upscale-er than McDonalds or Taco Bell) to eat at and come home sunday mid afternoon in time to make it to our Church’s annual thanksgiving dinner.

B. Leave friday night to stay two nights, and get a room with a kitchen in it, so I can cook our meals for at least most of the weekend.

I am leaning kind of to the one night thing since the friend Thing One is bringing is so VERY thirteen. LIKE OH MY GOD LIKE THAT IS TOTALLY LIKE SO UNFAIR. like. I am not exagerating. She is a nice girl, but to be frank? She gets on my nerves after so long, and when she has been around a lot, Thing One begins sounding a lot like her. LIKE NO WAY!

The one night way we can sleep in saturday morning, pack up and head to MYB. Check in and laze around the pool and hot tubs. Head to dinner and then back to the pools. Wear the girls totally out and then crash em out on sugar and junk food.

I think one night is plenty… To bad Steven keeps trying to talk me into 2 nights. Lame head.

4. Here is the recipe for the shrimp pasta dish I made saturday.

Shrimp Pasta Ala Michele

1 big bag of pre-cooked shrimp

3 heaping tbsp crumbled feta cheese

5 or so big leaves of fresh basil sliced very very thinly.

about 1/2 cup EVOO

2 cloves garlic smashed up (or about 2 tsp of the already minced up garlic from the jar.. thats what I used)

zest of one lemon

juice of said lemon

1/2 pint grape tomatoes quarterd

salt and pepper to taste.

1 box of thin spaghetti cooked al dente’ and drained (reserve a little of the pasta water in case the sauce siezes on you)

In a large nonstick fryingpan type pan heat olive oil. Add lemon zest and garlic. Stir around a few mintues until you smell the lemon and garlic. Add tomatoes. Cook until tomatoes soften.Add thawed shrimp.Toss until warmed through.

Toss mixture with pasta. Toss in cheese. Allow a couple minutes to melt feta. Squeeze lemon juice on pasta to taste. Sprinkle with basil and toss. If pasta is sticky add some pasta water until you get the consistency you like. Serve with baguette or garlic bread. mmm mmm

5. I was thrilled to see that XM put up the holiday music stations on directv I of course am blasting “Run run rudolph” and singing along on with Nat King Cole, when I am sopposed to be doing school work.

6. Speaking of the holidays, I am getting more and more excited. I love it all. decorating, shopping. wrapping, baking, cooking, cheesy holiday movies and this picture of my Dad. It makes me laugh every time I see it.

Monday went by SO fast. Mondays and tuesdays always do for me. I am such a creature of habit and usually do laundry on Monday and then tuesday do the rest of my cleaning like bathrooms and changing sheets and vaccuming and stuff. I am so stuck in a rut with that stuff. In fact friday morning Thing One asked me if I would do a load of jeans for her while she was at school (She knows how to do it herself, but I usually like to do that stuff for them, I know. spoiled spoiled kids, I am a stay at home mom. Get over it) and Thing Two goes “No. Ja-ja, Mommy only does laundry on Monday.” smart butt.

So any way I had just about finished the laundry when the kids got home and I noticed Thing Two itching her head. It made me want to throw up.

In case you are new here, we have been battling a lice infestation at Thing Two’s school. I have had her completely lice free FOUR times, only to have her re-infested at school. So I dragged her into the sunlight and sure enough. Poor baby had her wildlife friends back. ARRRGH! She was in tears, and I nearly was.  I did cry a few tears when she said “Mommy, Im so sorry.” Like a knife in the heart huh?

 In case you dont have kids, or have never experiened this nightmare, finding lice is the begining of a LOT of cleaning, washing, laundry and insecticides. Anything that the child may have layed on or touched has to be washed. Bedding, clothing, toys, people. So after running the washer all day long I was treated to a line up of 7 loads of bedding and blankets. All the decorative throws and pillows from the living room and den as well as coats and hats and dress up clothes and and and and. My washer is still thumping away.

Thankfully my mother who is an old hand at this was gracious enough to help by chemically treating our hair for us. After using so much RID and NIT and whatever else we decided this time to try an old folk remedy and use KEROSENE. I cant tell you how good it worked! Aside from walking around smelling like a camp stove Thing Two is clean headed once again. The smell however is making me sick. Erring on the side of caution I demanded everyone be treated.. even though Thing Two was the only one to be found with wildlife. After the treatments she remained the only one to have even a sign of the little satanists. In two weeks she’ll need to be treated again. But here’s hoping that we have finally won this long battle.

Here I am behind again.. I dont know how it happens. I get all involved in reading other blogs and then here its been days and days since I updated.

This weekend was pretty good. Friday evening Thing One left to spendd the weekend with her mom and Thing Two went to spend the night with my parents.. she spends at least some of every weekend with them. She loves to hang out with those guys.. Im not sure what they do, but she loves to be over there.  Being child free Steven and I went out to dinner at our favorite Mexican resturant. I had chimichangas and they were AWESOME.. they always are. BUt friday they tasted exceptionally good. Then we shared an order of fried ice cream and of course that was yummy.

We ran into friends there and the wife asked me how our fertility thing is going. Its getting to be that I can’t go anywhere without somone asking me the condition of my womb. Its an odd feeling. I know people are just concerned and want to know how we are, since this has been such a big issue for us. But its wierd when people ask about such a touchy subject. 

Saturday we slept in and Steven and I enjoyed breakfast together before Thing Two came home . Then Steven got ready for work and headed off leaving the two of us to our own devices. I am getting really really excited for Steven to be able to quit at Home Depot. Two more whole weeks. It will be so fun to have him home on weekends!

 After a while Thing Two got bored and went in search of my cousin’s little girl and they played most of the evening together. I spent the day finishing a blanket I was crocheting for a christmas gift and watching a Danielle Steele movie. They are such a guilty pleasure. Like a 5 hour made for tv movie. I should get them on netflix so I can watch without commercials. Thing Two ended up back at my parents house for the night and I made a really yummy shrimp past dish with grape tomatoes and garlic. I could live on seafood.

Sunday the girls were getting baptized at church. So Thing One’s mom dropped her off for sunday school and then met us to watch the baptism. Thing Two was so little that the minister had to lift her about the wall of the baptistry so people could even see her. It was a sweet service and of course I got all weepy. After church Steven, Thing Two and I went to Shoney’s for lunch. They have a pretty good buffet on sundays, plus we know the managers and they gave us a nice discount. I love a really nice salad bar and they have the best one in town. (Wich in Dillon isnt saying a LOT, but it was yummy) After lunch we headed home and Steven and I crawled in bed and had an AMAZING nap. A really awesome snuggly LONG nap. LOVE that.

Unfortunatly by about 3 my medicine was making me REALLY regret the cinnamon pumpkin pancakes I had eaten off the buffet. (carbs are not my friends) By church time I was feeling so ill that I didnt even go. But since Thing Two had christmas play practice and Steven was running cameras (our church services are televised locally) they went off to church and I FINALLY finished the blanket I had been working all weekend. While everyone was gone I put a chicken on to roast and some of our favorite Ina Garten potato wedges. I was feeling some better by the time everyone got home. And we enjoyed hearing all about Thing One’s birthday weekend with her mom while we ate.

So all in all it was a pretty good weekend.

Did you ever have a situation where you have emotion that you dont have a right to? Of course we all have the right to feel any way we want to about any situation in our lives.. but maybe through our own actions we lost the right to feel a certain way? I dont know that I am even making sense..

Today I have some undeserved meloncholy… I feel sad about something that I have no right at all to feel sad about.

Thing Two and her biological and his family have no relationship. I chose it. I made a conncious choice to exclude them from my life. When Thing Two was concieved it was quite by accident. I am not proud of that fact.. and its’ one that comes to mind from time to time though. I was being self distructive, made a bad choice and ended up pregnant by someone I barely knew. Somone whom 7 years later? I dont know at all. Not even a little. He doesnt call, he doesnt write. We have no contact. It was my own choice. Her father asked me. “what do you want me to do?” when I informed him of DNA test results identifying him as the viable choice as her biological. He asked me if Steven was a good Daddy to her… my answer was of course a resounding YES. He is. (really is) The biological’s response was, “Then lets not confuse her, because I promise you, if I pay child support? I will get visitation, its only fair.” I wont go into whether THAT is an accurte view of what fatherhood should be or not. But at that point I agreed that Steven would be her father and that I wouldnt persue anything further. With those words? He was gone.

And that is just fine. It works for us. I didnt think much about him…Until on occasion an aquaintance started  giving me an update on the biological’s new wife’s myspace page. Usually I am mildly interested since she sometimes posts pictures of Thing Two’s half siblings, and its interesting to me to see as they age if they resemble one another (they do)

But today a certain picture nailed me. It was a photo of his 7 year old daughter (she is only 7 months younger than Thing Two. Do the math, yep. He had both of us pregnant at the same time) and HIS mother. Thing Two’s paternal Grandmother. Im not sure what hurt me about it, maybe that she seemed to be so tickled by her grand daughter, and that she doesnt even know about Thing Two? (that I know of). Or that Thing Two DEFINATLY resmebles her. I not sure.

Im not sure where to file this emotion. Where do you send a hurt that you inflicted on yourself? OR one that really shoudnt exist in the first place? Thing Two is happy. She has a Daddy I never even imagined for her. His parents treat her pretty much like the rest of thier grandkids (except Thing One.. but THAT is a whole other kettle of fish)

I may have to think on this one some more.. or I may have to blame it on the hormones and upheaval I am in with our meds and assume that I am just nuts