"You could be an astronaut if you wanted to, but you're not!"

I was grieving on February 9, 2010. 

Want to know why?  Because I love Discovery Channel's Deadliest Catch, and most of all I love(d) Phil Harris.  Few moments in reality tv make my heart swell like hearing Captain Phil shouting profanity from his nicotine saturated chair.  

"I love you, too!  Now get the (bleep) out of my wheelhouse!"

Oh, how I'll miss him and his tender, fatherly words of wisdom.  Anyway, the tragedy didn't seem real earlier this season because Phil was still nervously chain-smoking away in his stained sweat pants and faded black concert t-shirts at the helm of the Cornelia Marie.  After his final tribute episode last week, my sorrow is finally setting in.

In honor of his final episode, my dad and I held a makeshift memorial for my beloved Cap'n with a crabby party.  We enjoyed oodles of crab legs, both King and Opi (and now you see my sophisticated Catch lingo.) We let everyone else in the family come, too, even though they aren't on our weekly conference call to dissect the interesting parts after each episode. 

Bug isn't allowed to eat crustaceans yet, but she wanted to.

I generally dislike that Captain Keith, but if you ask if he made me cry in the finale, I might have to admit it.  I did.  A full pot of crab at the bottom of the sea forever for Phil to come back to?  C'mon!  What choice did I have but to cry? I have a heart!

 There is an empty hole in my Tuesday night.  Goodbye, Phil.  Fare thee well. 

Honor code violation

Bug has learned a little about growing hair.  Consistency in her new hair has not been much of a priority, however.  She has straight, soft, extraordinarily fine strawberry-blonde hair on top, with blonde-ish, coarser curls in the back. 

On Saturday, Paddy noted the following growth on the sides:

"Oh no,"  he dead-panned.  "Bug can't go to BYU."

That's my girl.

Sticky-uppy is the correct word.

Bug's hair is long enough for her to have bed head.

Just looking at this makes me want to nibble on her face.

Recovery attempt

Remember that thing where that one part of my life exploded into a flame ball?  Not to whine or anything, but I really needed to back away from the flame for a little bit so my eyebrows wouldn't get singed.  At about 3:30 on Friday afternoon 2 weeks ago, Schmoopsie and I booked a hotel room in Logan for a weekend get-away.  He raced Lupe over to DogMode (which I think she enjoys more than being home) while I threw some diapers and baby formula into a duffel bag.  In less than an hour, we were holding hands on the freeway and singing along to Jack Johnson with our sunglasses on. 

Being back in Logan in the summer doused my whole spirit with a waterfall of love for that city.  Everything was fabulously, wonderfully, incredibly gorgeous.  Turns out hiking in the Wellsvilles is even more fabulous with a baby tied to my body and a husband 2 steps ahead of me than it was when I was in college. 

And even better with the aforementioned baby strapped to the aformentioned husband instead. 

(Doesn't Bug look a little apprehensive about the change in her human donkey?)

It was so breathtakingly beautiful that I honestly had to squeeze my eyes shut on a number of occasions and force myself to envision everything with 6 feet of snow and filthy air before I accidentally made Schmoopsie move there immediately. 

We went to Second Dam up Logan Canyon, which, although I'm sounding completely repetitive, was beautiful.  We ate Aggie Blue Mint icecream on the grass outside the Aggie creamery.  Let me tell you something very important:  you should try Aggie Blue Mint.  Right now.  Or Bull Tracks, but now we're off track. 

We ate at the Bluebird, which has been around long enough that my great grandfather courted my great grandmother at the very same soda counter Bug and I played at while Paddy paid for our food.  The portions are so huge that we ate the leftovers at midnight in our hotel room while Bug snoozed in her Pack N' Play. 

We took the Bug swimming for the first time in the not-very-hot hot tub at the hotel.

You know how sometimes it's irritating when you're reading a blog and author is blabbing on and on about how wonderful her husband is and how he's handsome and patient and thoughtful and yada yada yada and pretty soon you're dry heaving a little over your Cherrios?  Well, I'm actually married to that person she's blogging about.  I won't bore you with the details, but if he was a superhero, he'd be Secretly Pay For My Wife To Get A Massage While I Entertain An 8 Month Old In A Hotel Room Man.  

An 8 month old who is crawling. 

Oh yeah. That's right.  As of our tiny family vacation, our Bug is on the move.

Prepare yourself emotionally for the following.

For Schmoopsie's very first Father's Day present, I tricked him into going fishing one evening in May.  I glued a bow onto Bug's bald noggin and took her to see the ridiculously talented Sami Stanton with the intent of getting a few good snapshots for Paddy's desk.

A few days later, I opened up our online gallery to see the proofs.  And that's when all the air rushed out of my lungs in a giant SWOOSH and my heart almost exploded. 

You're welcome in advance.

I DON'T KNOW WHY WE'RE YELLING!!

You know what I love? Handmade signage that overstates the importance of the message.

For example, today in the bathroom at work there was a new sign on the paper towel dispenser.

"Do NOT (double underline) pull on the paper while still in motion!!!" it shouted.

Shouldn't exclamation points of that quantity be limited to emergencies with more serious consequences than, say, jammed paper towels? Like, "Don't EVER (double underline) put your baby in the microwave!!!" or "Kristie, STOP eating Hostess cupcakes with the delicious waxy frosting IMMEDIATELY!!! (double underline)"

That's what I think.

I bet the driver is a hoot at dinner parties.

Seen on the freeway in front of me yesterday:

A hearse.  With a bobble hula dancer in the back window and the words "Meat Market" in vinyl lettering.

Classy.

Sometimes I hate being right.

Turns out no matter how long I stare at this keyboard, I'm never, ever going to find a word to adequately describe this week.  I'll try metaphor instead.

When I said before that I was unsettled, it was "oooh, maybe that second egg salad sandwich was a bad idea" unsettled.  You know, like maybe I'm chugging my way to the top of a rollercoaster and the pit of my stomach is in knots, but I figure a million people have done this before me and I'll just close my eyes and squeeze my butt cheeks together and it'll all be fine in the end.

This week, though, the rollercoaster car I was in left the tracks completely, took a nose dive in to the parking lot, and exploded in an orange ball of flame.  Forget the egg salad bellyache, I was 4 months pregnant again heaving up chocolate soy milk so fast it was still cold coming out my nose.

What I am trying to say is that this week was simply unbelievable.  You wouldn't believe it even if I spilled all the gritty details, which, unfortunately, I can't dump all over the internet.

For now, I am going to take a deep breath, shake out my arms, and enjoy this brilliantly timed long holiday weekend.  I want to eat myself silly on burgers and potato salad, and show Bug her very first fireworks.  It's going to be great.

Oh yeah, and I'll try to remember to open my eyes and  unclench my butt cheeks.