Ok, as of noon Pacific time, my sitemeter tells me over 80 people have stumbled upon my blog searching for “Queen of Spain” or “current Queen of Spain.” Over half of those hits came from “university” websites across the country.

So is there some bizzarro college internet scavenger hunt going on I don’t know about? Are you all working on some Royal Spaniard thesis? Someone help me out here.

Oh, and here’s something to help you out. I demand credit in your footnotes:

Information on the current Queen of Spain can be found by clicking that highlighted part.
Queen Sofia looks very nice.

See there, on the right…Actual Queen of Spain…she, and I’m just guessing here, does not blog.

Now..see me…down here??? Not an actual Queen.
Just called Queen of Spain because I once flipped through a bridal magazine, picking out what type of engagement ring I wanted with some friends. When I landed on an obnoxious rock the size of Rhode Island, with gaudy details on the sides and exclaimed “I like THAT one!” THIS GUY said:
“Who the fuck do you think you are? The Queen of Spain?”
and I replied…
“Yes.”
And on my left hand sits a ring very similar.

Good morning blogging world. I’m going to stand on my soapbox just a little today, because Laurie over at Stranded in Suburbia has an amazing post everyone should read. Laurie is my girl. She’s from my hood. And she and I seem to click when it comes to our political leanings. But all that aside, she actually tagged me on Sunday and I will complete that mission in a minute. But first and foremost, YOUR mission is to go read her post this morning about her friend Tabby. I know many of you who read my blog have children, and I hope her real life story may strike a chord.

From Common Sense About Kids and Guns:

Every eight hours a child or teen was killed in a firearm-related accident or suicide in 2001.
On average, 4 children died every day in non-homicide firearm incidents from 1996-2001.
From 1996-2001, more than 1,530 children were killed in firearm accidents. .
On average during each of the last 10 years (1992-2001), 1,273 kids committed suicide with a firearm each year; more than 145 each year were kids under 15-years-old.
40% of American households with children have guns.
34% of children in the United States (representing more than 22 million children in 11 million homes) live in homes with at least one firearm. In 69 percent of homes with firearms and children, more than one firearm is present.
28% of gun-owning households with children do not always keep guns locked in a secure place.
In 72% of unintentional deaths and injuries, suicide, and suicide attempts with a firearm of 0-19 year-olds, the firearm was stored in the residence of the victim, a relative, or a friend.

Now, on with the tag…

Rules of the game:
1) Delve into your blog archive.
2) Search the archive for your 23rd post.
3) Find the 5th sentence, or the closest to it.
4)Post the text of your sentence in your blog along with these instructions. Ponder it for meaning, subtext or hidden agendas.
5)Tag 5 people to do the same: (I think I’ll skip the tagging this time around)

“…And this comes only a day after I recalled the story of how the Kaiser held me down and then farted on me the first time he introduced me to his friends.”

How’s that to lighten the mood????

You know the kids you see at the grocery store…the ones dressed as Batman or Cinderella months after Halloween??? Well, add mine to the list, except he’s wearing my not-so-cheap Poleci dress. No, the Count isn’t cross dressing. He’s flying.

Back in the day before two kids and one income, I bought a gorgeous, sheer, fire engine red Poleci from one of the little boutiques here in SoCal. It was back in the day when I also thought money grew on trees and my debt would just magically disappear.

I wore the dress on my honeymoon. The lightness of the fabric made it flutter in the Tahitian breeze. The dress and its fabric still flutter, to be sure. But its now hooked to the back of my toddler. And if you hum the Superman theme song, he’ll run from one end of the living room to the other, over and over again, with that red, red Poleci flying behind him.

It just seemed to make more sense to me, as I grabbed it off the hanger and helped it onto my son, that he wear it, instead of just letting it sit in the back of my closet. I’m guessing there are a few childless women out there cringing right now. And you same women might swear on your Malono’s that you’d NEVER make that same decision. But I promise you, when your almost three-year old is tugging at your pants wanting a cape…and you rifle through your closet looking for anything appropriate, you won’t even think twice about that silly red dress. And how it looks a million times more fabulous on your toddler than it ever did on you.

Not really. I just wanted to sing that in my head. Sorry.

Yup. Another wildfire in sunny California. North of Los Angeles. But not our north of Los Angeles. This one is west of us.

All the fire trucks and constant news coverage means our phone rings a lot with worried friends and relatives making sure we’re ok.

It also reminds me of Count Waffle’s latest and greatest obsession: sprinklers. Or, to be exact, “pink-or-lores.” The kid dreams about spinklers. He talks about them all day long. And he’s noticed they not only come in the lawn variety, but the ceiling variety as well. Which means a trip to the grocery store tends to include a 20 minute monologue on every single sprinkler on every single aisle in every single department.

“Oh, Mamma. Look at dat pink-or-lore by da apples.”

“Mamma! Mamma! Look at dat pink-or-lore by da fishes! It beautiful!”

Yes, the kid thinks sprinklers are beautiful.

Walks, as of late, take an hour a block because he must (and I really can’t emphasize MUST enough here) touch every single sprinkler on every single lawn all the way down the street. Think about how many sprinklers are on your front lawn. Enough said.

I had the privledge of being around when a good friend of the Barron Family got a phone call from Cruz’s heroic Mommy, telling her the little guy’s counts have gone from 49 to 638 overnight! So whatever happy thoughts everyone is sending upward, please continue.

This means Cruz can be breastfed, once again. His favorite source of comfort while he goes through this fight.

As a breastfeeding mother, my heart sank and I felt ill when I found out they had to abruptly stop nursing a week or so ago. I can’t imaging having to suddenly and unexpectedly take away the one thing that never fails to calm and soothe my children. Let alone take it away while battling painful mouth to rear end sores as a result of aggressive treatment. But I was told Cruz’s mommy had her “boobies out and ready to go” just awaiting the final ok from a doctor. I am constantly in awe of the power of nursing and the comfort, closeness, and healing it can bring. For those of you who have managed to breastfeed, even briefly, my hat’s off.

Updates on Cruz can be found, almost daily, on his website.

I was also in awe today of my little Count Waffles. Despite my worries about his emerging aggressive boy behavior, he has the biggest heart I know. He willingly and happily handed over one of his favorite toys because he wanted baby Cruz to play with it in the hospital. I cried tears of joy that Cruz’s condition seemed to be improving and that my little boy understood another little boy was sick and wanted to help. Even after his father and I made sure over, and over again he understood that his toy was not coming back. Goodbye and safe journey to Harold the Helicopter. May Cruz spin your propeller twice as much as the Count.

My baby boy seems to be racing to drop the “baby” and stick with just the “boy.” And it’s killing me. The older he gets, the more “boy” he becomes. I really started noticing it with the whole Lego/gun fiasco and every day since, there seems to be something new.

Apparently he now slides down slides head first. What’s the big deal? Right? I’ll tell ya’ the big deal:

I’ve never seen him do it.

I was told, by my dear Kaiser husband, that Count Waffles the Terrible not only launches himself, head down, on his belly on the slide…but seems to do so with an expert force. Like he’s been doing it all his life.

I’ve been around his whole life. Aside from the 6 hours a week at school this Fall, I’ve rarely missed a moment of his life. I gave him his life. He’s not allowed to do things that I don’t know about.

Did he miss the Queen’s memo? I get to see him do things first. I get to tell others what he does and does not do. And if you were to ask me if he has ever gone down a slide head first, I’d flat out tell you “no.” In fact, I’d tell you he’s seen other kids do it and looked on terrified.

And where does all this head first sliding crap lead too? MORE things I don’t know about. Like tongue kissing girls and smoking pot behind bleachers. If I didn’t know he was up to this Evil Kenievel Act on the playground, how can I count on my Mom eyes-in-the-back-of-my-head sense when he’s stirring up some meth in our garage?

Yeah, yeah. It all starts with going head first down a slide. That slippery slope of a playground slide.

People has named Mr. Matthew McConaughey its sexiest man alive. Agreed.

My doctor is great. But he really has no sense of humor. At all. During my biopsy the nurses and I were yukking it up. And I was totally appreciative that they were playing along with me. When you are getting three needles jabbed (and when I say “jabbed” I’m really not kidding…they have to MOVE them around continuously to get a good sample) in your neck any sort of humor can really help the situation. The only time my very bland doctor cracked a smile was when I had to STOP him before the third and final needle insertion because he forgot the numbing spray. When there are needles going in your neck, believe me, you REMEMBER the numbing spray comes BEFORE the needle. Anyway. Thank you nurses everywhere for making jokes.

After the biopsy many conversations took place including this one with the Kaiser:

“…yeah, but if your dead, you won’t have to worry about it…”
“Ok, no making dying jokes after I’m being tested for cancer for a second time in a year.”
“…but it was funny”
“NOT funny.”
“A little funny…”

Then he went and got tequila, ibuprofin, and chocolate. So I guess I’ll keep him.