Book Review: Here I Go Again by Jen Lancaster

I was offered a copy of Here I Go Again by Jen Lancaster to read for the BlogHer Book Club ... wait, let me just get this out of my system:

Here I go again, on my own
Goin' down the only road I've ever known
Like a drifter I was born to walk alone
And I've made up my mind
I ain't wasting no more time
Here I go agaiiiiinnnnn

Okay, thanks. And yes, there are many Whitesnake and 80s rock references throughout the book, so rock on.

If I could sum up this book in one sentence, it would be to say that this book is Mean Girls meets Back to the Future meets Wizard of Oz meets Thirteen Going on Thirty. You totally know what I mean, right?

So let me get a few bothersome things out the way first before I tell you all the things I liked about this book.

1) It's the story of a mean girl who gets a chance to go back and do things over to make her life better. Having been the victim of many mean girls, I would say I do not think they should be the ones to get a chance like that.
2) Did I mention it's the story of a mean girl? So you hear all her horrible mean thoughts? And you hate her until pretty much the last few pages of the book, and even then, it's hard to really like her, because you remember all the horrible things she did? Yeah. That.
3) The book makes some pretty bold statements about bullying and high school that I do NOT agree with. But, I'm not the authority and my opinion is not the only one, so, whatever.

Okay, now that I got that out of the way, can I just say that I should have been reading Jen Lancaster a long time ago? Her writing is biting and hilarious, and ... what's even better than hilarious? Whatever is funnier than hilarious, that's what she is. I can understand why she chose to write the voice of a mean girl, because it made for some interesting dialogue and inner monologues. On top of that, Lancaster is a master of character development. There was not a single character in the book that I didn't feel like I had met in person and had known for years. I have to hand it to her, even though I was having a REALLY hard time in the first third of the book suspending disbelief (Okay, she's ... going back in TIME? Good lord.), once I was halfway through the book, there was no way I was putting it down until I was done. 

Bottom line: Hilarious, well-written, great characters. If I can read from the point of view of someone I dislike and still want to devour the book .... that's some dang fine writing. Excuse me while I go out and read all the rest of Lancaster's work.

If you want to read more about the book, you can do so at the BlogHer Book Club. You can learn more about Jen Lancaster on Twitter, facebook, and her blog.

I was provided a free copy of this book and compensated for this review, but the opinions are my own.

I Added Numbers to Distract You From the Fact that There is no Common Thread

Is it wrong to hope that the girls have some sort of bug? I mean, I'm 99% sure it is wrong, but hear me out. They have been INSANE lately, and everything is messed up -- sleep, diapers, attitude, etc. I have a runny nose and just started coughing today, so maybe if they just have a virus or something, then in a few days they will be back in tip top shape and I can forget some of the horrors that I have witnessed over the past few days.

At any rate, here are some of the other things on my mind lately:

1. Genevieve ... well, the kid just won't freakin' sleep. At all. It's been two months of her refusing to sleep for longer than ten minutes at a time -- with three exceptions, two of which were during the day, natch. We have tried to adjust every single variable -- temperature of her room, amount of clothes on her body, sleeping position, level of darkness, white noise versus no white noise, EV. ER. EE. THING. And before you give me the, yeah, kids don't sleep, suck it up speech, let me just say -- shut up. Some kids sleep. In fact a LOT of kids sleep. And at this age she needs a LOT more sleep than she is getting to stay healthy, so not only am I worried about my precarious sanity (you try not sleeping for longer than ten minute intervals for two months and get back to me), I am worried about my little biscuit. 

Oh sure, she might be fine in a few days, or in a few weeks, in which case you can tell me that I was a big lame complainer and everything is fine now and I should have just shut up about it all. But she might still be doing this for another year or maybe -- heh -- maybe she'll never sleep for longer than ten minutes at a time, but if that's the case, then one day she will be old enough for me to put in her room and let her talk to herself and read herself books when she doesn't feel like sleeping. So, either way, I suppose it WILL come to an end. I just wish I had one of those kids who slept. Is that too much to ask (apparently, yes, yes it is).

2. Have you seen the last Mission Impossible movie? Ghost Protocol? Well, my dear husband decided to try to watch it two weeks ago on Thursday night when I teach. He got both of the girls to sleep, started it, then had to hit pause every ten minutes to go get Screamy McBaby, rock her to sleep, pray she didn't wake up Josephine, put her down, creep back to the living room to watch ten more minutes, and on and on until I got home. 

Anyway, it ended up taking him three weeks to finish the movie (so sad, our lives, am I right?), but he was obsessed the the term "invoking ghost protocol" -- even before he knew what that even MEANT. So, the past three weeks have been full of Jeremy doing fun things like beginning to answer a question I have, saying you should "blah blah blah, and then ... INVOKE GHOST PROTOCOL! Wait! Where are you going? That's FUNNY!" or teaching Josephine to say "invoke ghost protocol," which, yeah, it's cute because of how she says it ("Indoke dost protocol") (she also calls "dinner" like "ginner" -- Ds and Gs are hard, yo), but really, not that funny when he laughs so hard after at me trying not to sigh and roll my eyes. He didn't say it at all yesterday, for the first time in three weeks, mostly because he went in to work early and got home late and was exhausted, but I'm still on edge. If he got a lot of rest last night, he might spring it on me tonight. GUH.

To answer your question, NO, I have no idea why I hate the phrase so much. But I CAN tell you why he is using it so much -- because I HATE IT SO MUCH.

3. A new phrase in our house that IS adorable is Josephine saying "SURE DO!" when I ask her something. Love it. 

"Do you want to play with blocks?" 
"SURE DO!" 

She has also started saying (prepare yourself for the cutest cuteness) "My sure do love my mama!" (pronouns are also hard. "My" means both "I" and "me" when used at the beginning of a sentence lately). I mean, COME ON. You could have knocked me over with a feather the first time she said that.

4. That reminds me a few other things she is saying that have been cracking me up: 

She has been saying "That's a funny one!" when she thinks something is funny or when she thinks something she has said is funny.

When I turn on the lights in the morning, she covers her eyes and says "Too shiny!"

Instead of just asking for bandaids now, she tries to convince us she needs them. She says "uh-oh!" bends down, touches the floor for a millisecond, then stands up, shows us her finger, and says "Got a boo boo! Need a bandaid!"

She has also been singing a lot lately. The other morning she made up a song about me cooking an egg in a pan and how much she loved eggs while I was making one for her.

She's something else.

5. One last thing. I don't know what it is, but no matter what time Josephine wakes up in the morning, EXACTLY one second before Josephine starts wailing in her room for me to come get her, Genevieve fills her diaper with swamp water. But only on weekdays, when I am home alone and they both need me simultaneously. 

Timing. She has it. 

How to wrap up something that had no focus? How about I tell you that I just tried to put Genevieve down for a nap and she refused. Oh good, let the overtired baby cycle begin again today! I'm ready! 

(Good ending, right?)

It All Comes Together At The End There

The story hour at our library is 9:30 AM on Monday mornings. I'm not gonna lie -- I often lay awake Sunday nights thinking of reasons that we shouldn't go. I know, dreadful parenting all around, yada yada yada. 

Josephine LOVES it beyond not only her capacity for words but mine as well. As we drive to the library she sings "Goin' to the library! Gonna read books! Gonna sing songs! Gonna see my FRIENDS!" but it's rough getting there. Even though she is out of bed by eight, the kid is not really awake until nine, at the earliest, which makes the day pretty dramatic and awful, right from the get-go, if I try to get them both out the door on time. 

I know, you hate me now because I can't even get my kid ready by nine AM, and oh my god, what a lazy woman I must be, but she is a SLOW waker-upper, and if you rush the process, you risk a day of awful. 

Did I ever tell you that I finally figured out one of the things contributing to our mornings that began with nine or ten full-blown meltdowns in the first five minutes she was awake was that I was talking to her too much when she first woke up? Seriously. 

In the morning or after nap, I would traipse in there, all chatty and happy to see her after all those hours without her, and I suspect it sounded a bit like "GOOD MORNING MY LOVE! HOW DID YOU SLEEP? IT'S MORNING! MAMA'S HERE! I LOVE YOU! WOULD YOU LIKE A FRESH DIAPER AND A NEW OUTFIT AND FOR ME TO FIX YOUR HAIR AND BRUSH YOUR TEETH AND THEN YOU COULD HAVE SOME BREAKFAST? HUH? WOULD YOU? IT'S MORNING! I MISSED YOU!" because she would stagger around and not be able to focus her eyes, and then fits, fits, more fits, which would taint the whole day. 

So now, I go in, quietly say "Good morning my love. Come on out to the living room whenever you're ready, and we'll start the day," and she nods, I leave, and in a few minutes, she comes out, all smiles and good attitude. She just needed some GD space, MOM. 

I told Jeremy about this, and he was like, "Well, duh. There was a pretty strict rule in my house when I was growing up that no one should talk to me or look at me in the morning." Uhhh.

So anyway, this morning every school in the state (basically) was closed because of a terrible ice storm last night, but we were going to have to leave the house later to take the dog vet anyway, so I figured, eff me, let's go to freaking story hour even though everyone else will stay home. We got there just in the nick of time, but I should have known, I just should have KNOWN, based on the level of "MY DO IT!!" that was flowing from her tiny mouth, that things were about to go awry, and I should have just driven away while I had the chance.   

Yes, we are at that glorious age where she must do everything herself, and in theory, and for the most part, I think it is adorable and wonderful and am very proud of her for being so big and strong and competent and wise, but then there is the other part of me -- the one that is desperately trying not to rip my own hair out of my head the fiftieth time she says, "NO MAMA, MY DO IT! STOP TOUCHING! WALK AWAY A ME!" when I forget and try to do something for her or have to do something for her because I don't care what Montessori says, I'm not going to let my 2.5-year-old do certain things. Sorry. 

Anyway, the shouting. OH, THE SHOUTING. This morning she wanted to climb up into the SUV and then into her seat, which took about ten minutes in the freezing cold while her sister screamed in her carseat and I desperately tried not to say "hurry up!" over and over. Then when we got to the library, parked, got everyone out, and I went to grab her hand (as I explained earlier she would have to let me do), she shoved her hands in her pockets, shouted "MY HANDS IN MY POCKETS, MAMA! INNA POCKETS!" and when I tried to compromise by holding onto her hood, she screamed "NO TOUCHING!!" and tried to run away. Yeah, that would have worked out great -- walking with your hands in your pockets right after an ICE STORM. I know I could have let her face the consequences of her decision (fall face first into the ice and snow), but I just wasn't up for that.

As predicted, she was a bit ... wild ... at the library. Usually she has a lot of energy and whatnot, but she listens to 98% of what I say. Today she listened to about 1%, and as we were checking out books and getting ready to leave, she ran over and pushed the handicap door opener which someone (ahem GRANDMA ahem) taught her to use, and I had to dash out after her, holding the crying baby, all our coats, a bag of books, my purse, and the craft with wet glue and glitter (Seriously - every week! "I'm going to put some glue on this, two-year-olds. Don't touch the glue until it's dry!" THANKS.). I was not amused.

Then we had to rush home, pick up the dog, and rush to the vet, because apparently I excel at choosing the worst possible time to schedule things. 

Of course Cleo already knew where we were headed and was panicked, and by the time we got there, Genevieve had fallen asleep, so I couldn't even strap her into the Bjorn, which was my master plan so I could have one hand to grasp Josie's little hand and the other to hold my scaredy-dog on a very short leash and navigate her through the scary world of other dogs and cats and smells. So I had the thirty-pound carseat, big kid, and huge scared dog. It was a blast. 

As we were headed out, I had to take them all up to the counter to pay, and three of the cats who live in the office came over to torment Cleo. They stood right between her and Josie, and Cleo was torn -- get as far away from the cats as possible or get between them and her child who was in danger? (I don't even know. She's not afraid of our cat, but she doesn't want any other cat near her family.). 

So I shoved the dog between my legs and try to hold her there while she is lunging around like a bull on a leash, and I'm also trying to keep Josie away from the cats because one of the receptionists kindly informed me "two of those cats hate kids -- watch out!" and then Genevieve started crying so I rocked her carseat with one foot while I signed the credit card slip.

And now, here it is: the story I set out to write and took a few thousand words to get around to (lucky you):

One of the vet techs offered to walk Cleo out to the car so I could hold both of the kids as we walked through the ice, and the other said, while this whole shit-show was happening "Wow! You make it look so easy!"

PAUSE.

I looked right at her and said, "I make it look easy?" (*quizzical eyebrow raise*)

PAUSE.

"Well, you make it look GOOD," she countered. 

I looked at the scene around me, at my hastily thrown-together outfit, and imagined just how bad my bushy, frizzy bun and half-assed make-up must look. 

I waved the pen in the air, like you might expect a graying British man in a laboratory to as he exclaims "By George, I think he's got it!" and said "I'll take it!" 

Then we staggered out while I laughed and laughed and laughed. 

Indeed; I'll take it.

On Love

Thankfully there had been a big storm overnight and Jeremy called in to work -- the hour drive in roads these bad just wasn't worth it. I was happy to have him home, and happy to have him around on a day when both my little angels needed to get a shot at the doctor.

I hadn't expected Josie to cry, since she never has, even once, when getting a shot. I especially didn't expect it, since she had been talking for two days how she was excited to go to the doctor's office, she was going to get a little poke, and it was no big deal. When we got in the room, she climbed straight up onto the table and said "All ready!" 

But then she cried. Big, fat tears. And opened her mouth in a deep, deep wail. I scooped her up and rocked her, and then had to trade off -- giving the big girl to her daddy to hold and taking the baby so I could hold her while she had her turn. 

I knew Genevieve would cry. She's not like Josephine, who barely noticed the shots when she was tiny. She feels the pain and cries and cries and can't be consoled. 

She got her shot and wailed. I lifted her up to hold her, then took her over to Josie. I told Josephine, "Your sister is sad about the shot." Josie lifted her head off of her father's shoulder, where she had been crying, and looked right in her little sister's eyes, grabbed her chubby little hand, and said, "It's okay baby sister. Don't cry!"

And Genevieve stopped crying. They smiled at each other through their tears, and it was all over. They were both fine. 

That moment: Jeremy is holding Josephine and I am holding Genevieve and they are looking at each other with love while Jeremy and I look down at our girls with all the love we had no idea we were capable of having in our hearts -- they're exploding, our hearts! -- I want to freeze that moment and keep it forever.

This is why I ask her to help the baby and talk to the baby and think of the baby's feelings -- not because I want her to feel like her new role in the family is to be the baby's keeper, but because I want her to learn how wonderful it feels to make her sister happy so she will give love freely and get it in return. Like this. This perfect moment where Josephine saw the opportunity to comfort her sister, did it willingly, saw how happy it made her sister, and that, in turn, made her happy.

I still worry that Josephine will feel like she is a helper-to-sister above other roles in her life, and I will work hard to ensure she doesn't feel that is her only role (she is also Much-Loved Smart Funny Beautiful Fearless Angel Daughter of My Dreams), but this is one of the big reasons we wanted more than one kid. That moment, right there. The love between them. I could see it. 

I want to keep that moment forever.

It Was All Warranted. Don't You Agree?

I have a tendency to be overly-polite. No, not on this blog, OF COURSE. Mostly to strangers. Which is usually a good thing, in my opinion, because, well ... why not, right? However, it's not always a good thing, because other than a whole lot of me saying "please," "thank you," and "of course, it's no trouble at all," what it really amounts to is that I don't stick up for myself when I'm being treated poorly. 

Except that one time when we were at a fancy-schmancy event and I was seated pretty close to a buffet line, and a lady decided it was too much trouble to stand in line and leaned up against my back. She started putting so much pressure on me that it felt like she had actually taken a load off and was sitting on me. I freaked a little and said under my breath, "No, please, press your ass a little harder into my back. That's normal," to which she responded (I KNOW), "Oh, sorry," and took a step away. Everyone at the table looked at me in abject horror until I turned, looked at the lady, and said, "OH, ha ha. I wasn't talking about YOU," and then got really interested in my salad.

That went well.

Anywho, I'm not one for resolutions (as you already know), but I would like to start sticking up for myself more. I'll still be very nice to strangers, and I probably won't mention people's asses, but when strangers (and even people I know) say mean things to me, instead of standing there with a smile on my face until I can find a way to change the subject, I would like to stand my ground and let them know I don't care to be spoken to that way.

As an exercise, I thought I'd share a few things that people have said to me recently, to which, in EVERY CASE, I responded "......" 

I would like to insert what my response SHOULD have been in place of awkward silence. This way, when the situation arises again, I will be all practiced and have responses ready in my head. Clever, no?

Okay. Here we go. Remember: All real things people said to me recently. ALL. REAL.

Person in question: Another mom at library story hour

Her: Are you Italian?

Me: Ummm ... yes.

Her: Yeah, I could tell by the arm hair.

Me (revised response): *HEADBUTT*

Person in question: Someone who is not a stranger

Her: God, I don't know how you do it! I could never sit around on the couch all day! I need to be busy, so I could never be a stay-at-home mom!

Me (revised response): *KARATE CHOP TO THE WINDPIPE*

Person in question: Someone who has never met Josephine. Ever. Or knows anything about our finances. At all.

Her: It's really too bad you can't afford day care, because Josephine could really use some socialization, don't you think?

Me (revised response): *KICK TO THE CROTCH*

Person in question: Someone I just met at a work function

Her: So, is your baby sleeping through the night yet?

Me: No. God, no.

Her: Ha! I know, why did I even ask, right? You certainly don't LOOK like you're getting any sleep at night!
Me (revised response): *THROAT PUNCH*

Next up: I try to quell my violent tendencies.