12 years

It continues to rain and sog here in our neck of the woods. My rosemary has rotted and the grass and hostas look like some sort of mixed-up fairly tale creation. They are HUGE. Last week was very tough and had this weekend not been a special one, I dare say I would stayed in bed obsessively playing Bejeweled.

However, my dear T and I celebrated our 12th anniversary instead. We felt so youthful and free that even our crazy-ass Uber driver last night (he demanded I get him a cupcake from Baked & Wired too; I don't think he was joking; I didn't take a chance; don't even ask me how many children by different mothers this man has) said, "Boy, y'all still have some fun."

By and large, that is really true. We do have fun together, always have. We've worked through some tough patches, hung by our tired toes, but overall, we are a great team and are deeply wild about each other, and that counts for a whole lot.

Ol has been asked to sleep over at a friend's and when that darling boy's mom found out it was our anniversary, she asked Jack to come along too. Friends, this was an epically generous, amazing gift that parents don't often get. H picked both J and O up at 2:30 yesterday afternoon!

T and I hardly knew what to do with ourselves. At 3, just because we could, we popped open a bottle of Prosecco and drank it while lazing in bed. Then, inspired by the realization that we were on no clock and really hadn't eaten much, we decided to get dressed (just LOOK at my shoes!) and head down to Little Serow, a very highly regarded, 28-seat, first-come, first-served northern Thai restaurant on 17th St NW. When you're paying $20/hour for a babysitter, standing in line for one doesn't seem as compelling. 

But when you're not? We had a ball, even in the spitty rain and on wet steps in front of a restaurant with no sign and a fairly uninspired entrance. I like joints like this.

Little Serow is owned by Johnny Monis, first of Komi fame. We ate at Komi, a much pricier, modern Greek establishment, several years ago, also for our anniversary. It's a lovely, quietly elegant spot, and while most people are beside themselves about it, we didn't find our meal terribly memorable. Truly, I can hardly recall an ounce of the evening. 

Like Komi, Little Serow offers only a set meal- no substitutions, nothing a la carte. You need to be somewhat adventurous but the lack of choice is actually pretty liberating if you know what you're getting into beforehand.

I chose the drinks pairing which included fortified, regular and sparkling wines, cider and beer. Each and every glass was a delightful, helpful accompaniment to the degree of spice and breadth of flavor in each dish, some of which fully cleared our sinuses. I love spice but I hate when all I taste is heat. Not so last night; everything was beautifully balanced. And let's give it up for crisp, watery cucumbers. 

My four favorite of the seven dishes were the: 
-khanom jin sao nahm, or dried shrimp / pineapple / fresh noodles
-yam makeua yao, or eggplant / cured egg / cilantro
-tow hu thouk, or tofu / ginger / peanut
and the
-si krong muu, or pork ribs / mekhong whiskey / dill

Afterwards to Baked & Wired and then home. At that point, feeling fat and happy, we watched All The Way, the new HBO movie about LBJ. It was quite enjoyable and well done, but I simply must say that I cannot for the life of my find any positive feelings for Melissa Leo. 

After enjoying anniversary coffee and a Nutmeg snuggle, waving lovingly to T as he left to pick up the kids and take them to swimming lessons, I decided that as it was still raining and still chilly, tonight would be a great one for family gumbo dinner.

Gumbo is a foolproof kids meal in this house, and it never fails to make me happy and sated in a very deep way. I also made my rhubarb-cherry-hibiscus crumble (rhubarb and Bing cherries don't overlap in season for long, y'all; go get some and make this!) and some almond whipped cream to go alongside, and we opened more champagne, just for fun because today is our actual anniversary. Cheers!

Lawd a mercy Monday

I don't have too much for y'all other than:

we closed on our old house today (finally! amen!);
I was finally able to write and widely disseminate my scathing thoughts about the environmental remediation firm that gave us a $4000 estimate for an imaginary problem (see below in case you live in the DC area);
I made a lovely rhubarb-almond coffee cake and got to share with my neighbor who just returned home from a week with her grandkids and I was so happy to see her;

AND I found out that yet again, my identity was used to attempt to get a credit card, this time at Kay Jewelers. Because I'd alerted Equifax, Trans Union and Experian after last week's JC Penney's and Toys 'R Us episodes, the credit card was denied to the thief at Kay. Jack immediately sang, " 'Every Kiss Begins With Kay' and that is a lie because you and Dad have never kissed at Kay." That cracked my business up. Still is.

May.Mercury(in retrograde).Monday. That's all I can figure.

PSA:

Now that we've finally closed on our old house (yay!), I wanted to alert you to a very bad experience we had with an environmental remediation firm, Envirotex, LLC, based in Virginia. Following what turned out to be a wildly wrong and dramatic claim by the buyer's home inspector that pigeons had turned our attic into a waste-filled "biohazard" that needed immediate remediation, we had Envirotex (the firm recommended by the inspector; interesting) come out to assess the situation and give us an estimate for clean up. They stated that the following was needed:
-Set up work area include 6-mil poly barriers and 2,000 CFM negative air machines to provide for four air changer per hour.
-Clean up pigeon waste using the proper EPA approved chemicals.
-Remove the affected insulation located by the attic vent.
-HEPA Vacuum and wet wipe the work area.
-Encapsulate with an EPA approved White Encapsulant to prevent future bacteria growth.
and that they would happily do the job for $4000.

Subsequently, we called two different trapping companies to come out as we had never heard birds in our attic, had had squirrels removed last August and suspected they'd have noticed the "biohazard" then AND because Tom went up and saw no evidence of bird waste.

Both firms confirmed our belief that not only had our attic NOT been breached by pigeons, there was NO waste to be found. Not even a feather. The only evidence of disruption in the otherwise pristine insulation was human footprints. There was a nest of sparrows (parents and babies) ON THE OUTSIDE of our attic. Not pigeons. Not even close.

We suspect that if the inspector isn't criminal, he's at the least very incompetent. We're considering filing a report to the Home Inspector licensing board but in the meantime feel most taken advantage of by Envirotex who would have done an unnecessary $4000 job seemingly without qualm.

I urge you NOT to use this firm or to at the least get a second opinion should you need this type of work done.

And then the tides turn

Shit.

Just when I'm certain we're finally all coasting on the same smooth path, the sidewalk ends, and we tumble into a dark and mysterious crapstorm in which I find it hard to see the boys' inner lights.

Sometimes this happens with one child but not the other, but on extra-special occasions, like today, we all fall together. 

It's possible this started yesterday when the exceedingly loose tooth Oliver's had for weeks now went down his gullet. I'd been warning him of the possibility of swallowing or losing that bad boy if he didn't let me pull it, but no dice. And then one bite on a Nutella-coated breadstick, and away went the tooth. 

Sobs wracked his body. "How will I get the tooth back? Can I use a baby potty and look in my poop? Let me call Poppy."

Now Poppy, my dad, is a gastroenterologist, and so really, it was wise of Oliver to think of calling Poppy to discuss the possibility of reclaiming the tooth. I'll give him that. But...

"Hi Poppy, it's Oliver. Can you tell me how to strain my poop?"

I swear to y'all that was the actual telephone conversation opener. Poppy said he could send a strainer but I refused delivery. I don't need to indulge this craziness, y'all. That tooth is gone!

Additional Nutella-crusted carbs plus one of his best buddies being over to play (and, might I add, looking rather askance as Oliver wailed about poop straining) plus the excitement over his class play being this morning helped appease the tragic feelings. He was cast as Gorilla 1. 

Hours later, Jack could.not.sleep. and so I ended up reading Belly Up (Stuart Gibbs, natch) to him until nearly 10. This is all well and good except that Jack is a hangry bear when he's sleep-deprived, and so I reckoned I (and he) would pay for the late night today.

I was right. 

The boys were wild animals from the time I picked them up at school until the time I stormed downstairs hours later and told Tom he best leave the grill to me and DEAL with those children. Our neighborhood is hosting a multi-house community yard sale tomorrow, and I spent a huge swath of time today organizing, cleaning and pricing things AND making a preposterous number of extremely delicious chocolate chip (milk and dark) cookies for the boys' lemonade-and-cookie stand. They want to earn some money and donate a third of all their proceeds to The Fresh Air Fund, and I fully support their endeavor. 

But still, y'all. Those cookies don't make themselves. And a mad-eyed fatigued child who will not put down the giant branch that fell from the tree during yet another rainstorm but instead waves it about like a poky javelin and has zero awareness of just how much of said poky javelin is flailing behind him, nearly decapitating you, is really not the optimal icing on the cake.

Long story short, it is the whiplash feeling I experienced between Monday-Thursday and today that I tire of and which blindsides me in the worst way. It's exhausting. Parenting is so inconsistent and yet so consistently taxing, and really, that is a tough and often disappointing energy suck. It is for me, at least.

I give my kids my all every day, and sometimes, it's hard to keep going. It really is. I don't remember the last time I had a real break from parenting in any significant way, and that is awfully wearing at times. 

Did I mention that I also found out today that my identity was stolen last weekend and used to purchase more than $2000 worth of goods at J.C Penney and Toys "R" Us? What morally bankrupt asshat pretended to be me?

Anyway, this scrumptious meal and a decent amount of wine smoothed out this feisty Friday. 
*While you might think "butt" when you see that darling potato in the bottom right corner, I want you to see "heart." Just that.

The sun actually showed itself which was exceedingly remarkable given that it has been in hiding most of the past sixteen days. I joked recently about my grass turning, alchemically, into slugs, but I today found that for real, two of my doormats are sprouting like chia pets. It has got to dry up!