I'm standing in the bathroom trying to fix my hopeless hair as Maia stands next to me obviously restraining herself from picking up the toilet brush, which I've told her is off limits many times. As I watch her in amazement (amazed that she is actually adhering to rules I've set up) she looks at me and tells me straight up (and I quote): Mom, ...when I grow up I'm gonna clean toilets!"
Oh, perfect. That's the kind of ambition you want to see in your child.
Calm myself with the thought that she's 2 and might still change her mind on her career goals.
Thursday, November 25, 2004
Saturday, November 20, 2004
I don't know how she does it
... has it really been that long that I haven't written. It's frustrating not to have time to blog. I am constantly blogging in my mind. Everything I see I want to comment on. Maybe I'll get a dictaphone so I won't forget what I would like to write down.
Was in training all week. XML. Good thing I don't work in Manhattan, although it definitely would be cool I would have even bigger motherhood guilt issues than I already have working mostly from home. Also, I'd be broke in a minute.
Spent 10 bucks on lunch the first day. I had a small salad and a bottle of water.
So, the second day I skipped lunch and went window-shopping, only that the window-shopping turned into real shopping and I arrived late back at class with a bag full with 250$ worth of clothing.
I can't concentrate. Tv on with strange children show, Maia asking to be fed, Dario not listening for is solely focused on not going outside of lines in one of Maia's coloring-books. Must hide box of crayons from him. Baby is trying to bang on keyboard next to me. ...
Before I log off... one book recommendation for every working mother ... it's hilarious... and at times like an exact documentation of my life.
Another advantage of commuting in and out of Manhattan every day -> get to read (on the train).
... oh... almost forgot here's the booktitle:
"I don't know how she does it"
ok. gotta go now. house to clean. bank to go to. baby to take care of. Maia to feed. work to do (piled up from last week while at training). calls to return.
Was in training all week. XML. Good thing I don't work in Manhattan, although it definitely would be cool I would have even bigger motherhood guilt issues than I already have working mostly from home. Also, I'd be broke in a minute.
Spent 10 bucks on lunch the first day. I had a small salad and a bottle of water.
So, the second day I skipped lunch and went window-shopping, only that the window-shopping turned into real shopping and I arrived late back at class with a bag full with 250$ worth of clothing.
I can't concentrate. Tv on with strange children show, Maia asking to be fed, Dario not listening for is solely focused on not going outside of lines in one of Maia's coloring-books. Must hide box of crayons from him. Baby is trying to bang on keyboard next to me. ...
Before I log off... one book recommendation for every working mother ... it's hilarious... and at times like an exact documentation of my life.
Another advantage of commuting in and out of Manhattan every day -> get to read (on the train).
... oh... almost forgot here's the booktitle:
"I don't know how she does it"
ok. gotta go now. house to clean. bank to go to. baby to take care of. Maia to feed. work to do (piled up from last week while at training). calls to return.
Wednesday, November 03, 2004
Tuesday, November 02, 2004
and so I went to see a geriatrics specialist...
yesterday I threw my back out lifting Maia into her stroller. spent the evening and night in compromising positions wailing about the irony of my rapidly progressing physical delapidation after I had just turned 30 last week or so.
this morning I made my way to the family practitioner, who I had picked out of the provider listing while being rushed by one of the Health Benefits people at my job. Usually I research myself to death about everything. I am a walking information center when it comes to the important things in my life ...well, that was all before I had kids.
Picking a primary care physician then (before kids): weeks of research on internet, thorough investigation of listings in Best Doctors of New York issues, interrogation of friends and family about their physicians, doctor qualification checks, comparisons, browsing of considered doctors' publications and contributions to the medical world, and last, but not least location location location (Upper East Side preferred, for have wealthy clients and thus have to keep their act together...i.e. clean office, comfortable waiting area, professional reception, etc.)
Picking a primary care physician this time (i.e. after having adult life and thus time to research): Check if doctor takes our insurance plan. Check if doctor lives in same zip code, preferably on same block.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, I sure picked one crappy place that way.
First of all, I couldn't find the damn office and ...mind you...they are on the same street as I.
Once I finally located the building, it was a mission to A) find the doctor's office listed (finally noticed small note written with permanent marker next to intercom) and B) to actually get into building (Chinese delivery guy let me in) and then find office inside (had to wait for tenants passing by to tell me where the doc's office was located...i.e. NO signs whatsoever).
Once I walked into the reception/waiting area I kinda wanted to turn right around. It was like walking into someone's living room. I felt like I'm invading someone's privacy. The secretary had secured a small corner of the room (which she wasn't sitting in) where she seemed to collect paperwork on a rather random basis of organization. There was no computer, not even a typewriter. The mail in- and out-box where from the 1960s. Once the surprised secretary showed up (surprised to have a patient, I suppose), she gave me an old clip-board to fill in new patient information onto a form someone must have put together 20 years ago or so. (Why does it matter if I am single, married or widowed ... on a doctor's form?)
She then asked me to sign a blank piece of paper (that made me nervous) and requested the $15 co-payment I owed. "At least she knows about the practice of co-payments", I thought as I was digging for change, for they didn't accept credit-cards, of course.
She wrote me a pretty badly torn out receipt, which I think I'm going to have to scan in for you to believe me.
Not only did she put the date down as 2003 but she also misspelled the word fifteen. Unless she learned to write on her own and that's how she makes f-s and t-s (she wrote Tibteen).
Anyway, if you think the mispelling, computer-illiterate (in this day and age) receptionist was bad imagine her leading you into a dusty, messy, and poorly equipped examination room and then multifunctioning as the nurse. At least, wear the white coat to fool me! Thank God, she didn't attempt taking blood or anything but she did try to take my weight (I had to operate the scale, for she was going the wrong way with the top part of it). I had to work hard not to laugh when she then wanted to measure me. I said, "Honey, I'm 30 years old. I haven't grown in 10-15 years. But feel free. Take my measurements." It should be noticed, that I also didn't have to take any of my clothes off for this so-called physical (THANK GOD). But who takes a weight measurement with clothes on (in a doctor's office?!) and a height measurement with shoes on??
Anyway, the doctor turned out to be a really nice guy (I mean, so was the secretary) but there was no examination and I think he was a bit scared of me. When I read his newsletter ( he has a newsletter? you may wonder - yes. a 4 page edition evidently home-printed), I learned that he specializes in geriatrics (oh, well ... I AM getting old). Most of the newsletter adressed the symptoms and remedies for dementia (=altzheimer's), and arthritis.
I must have looked soo out of place.
I sure felt like it.
Well, I didn't get much out of this whole visit. The doc told me to go take tylenol and call him back if the pain doesn't go away. Did he not hear the part, where I told him I was sleeping on the floor because I couldn't take the pain anymore? Did he not hear when I said I get stuck in certain positions as if someone had just shot me? And what about the fact that I walked in and out of that office as if I were one of his regular patients (i.e. 89 years old)?
ok. gotta go get the heating pad.
this morning I made my way to the family practitioner, who I had picked out of the provider listing while being rushed by one of the Health Benefits people at my job. Usually I research myself to death about everything. I am a walking information center when it comes to the important things in my life ...well, that was all before I had kids.
Picking a primary care physician then (before kids): weeks of research on internet, thorough investigation of listings in Best Doctors of New York issues, interrogation of friends and family about their physicians, doctor qualification checks, comparisons, browsing of considered doctors' publications and contributions to the medical world, and last, but not least location location location (Upper East Side preferred, for have wealthy clients and thus have to keep their act together...i.e. clean office, comfortable waiting area, professional reception, etc.)
Picking a primary care physician this time (i.e. after having adult life and thus time to research): Check if doctor takes our insurance plan. Check if doctor lives in same zip code, preferably on same block.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, I sure picked one crappy place that way.
First of all, I couldn't find the damn office and ...mind you...they are on the same street as I.
Once I finally located the building, it was a mission to A) find the doctor's office listed (finally noticed small note written with permanent marker next to intercom) and B) to actually get into building (Chinese delivery guy let me in) and then find office inside (had to wait for tenants passing by to tell me where the doc's office was located...i.e. NO signs whatsoever).
Once I walked into the reception/waiting area I kinda wanted to turn right around. It was like walking into someone's living room. I felt like I'm invading someone's privacy. The secretary had secured a small corner of the room (which she wasn't sitting in) where she seemed to collect paperwork on a rather random basis of organization. There was no computer, not even a typewriter. The mail in- and out-box where from the 1960s. Once the surprised secretary showed up (surprised to have a patient, I suppose), she gave me an old clip-board to fill in new patient information onto a form someone must have put together 20 years ago or so. (Why does it matter if I am single, married or widowed ... on a doctor's form?)
She then asked me to sign a blank piece of paper (that made me nervous) and requested the $15 co-payment I owed. "At least she knows about the practice of co-payments", I thought as I was digging for change, for they didn't accept credit-cards, of course.
She wrote me a pretty badly torn out receipt, which I think I'm going to have to scan in for you to believe me.
Not only did she put the date down as 2003 but she also misspelled the word fifteen. Unless she learned to write on her own and that's how she makes f-s and t-s (she wrote Tibteen).
Anyway, if you think the mispelling, computer-illiterate (in this day and age) receptionist was bad imagine her leading you into a dusty, messy, and poorly equipped examination room and then multifunctioning as the nurse. At least, wear the white coat to fool me! Thank God, she didn't attempt taking blood or anything but she did try to take my weight (I had to operate the scale, for she was going the wrong way with the top part of it). I had to work hard not to laugh when she then wanted to measure me. I said, "Honey, I'm 30 years old. I haven't grown in 10-15 years. But feel free. Take my measurements." It should be noticed, that I also didn't have to take any of my clothes off for this so-called physical (THANK GOD). But who takes a weight measurement with clothes on (in a doctor's office?!) and a height measurement with shoes on??
Anyway, the doctor turned out to be a really nice guy (I mean, so was the secretary) but there was no examination and I think he was a bit scared of me. When I read his newsletter ( he has a newsletter? you may wonder - yes. a 4 page edition evidently home-printed), I learned that he specializes in geriatrics (oh, well ... I AM getting old). Most of the newsletter adressed the symptoms and remedies for dementia (=altzheimer's), and arthritis.
I must have looked soo out of place.
I sure felt like it.
Well, I didn't get much out of this whole visit. The doc told me to go take tylenol and call him back if the pain doesn't go away. Did he not hear the part, where I told him I was sleeping on the floor because I couldn't take the pain anymore? Did he not hear when I said I get stuck in certain positions as if someone had just shot me? And what about the fact that I walked in and out of that office as if I were one of his regular patients (i.e. 89 years old)?
ok. gotta go get the heating pad.
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