This is week 131 of The Life of Riley, a weekly post detailing my activities since I ended a thirteen year career as a corporate drone. These posts are usually long, personal, and geared more for my own memory than the reader’s entertainment.

Sunday (Day 910): My Crackhead Wreath

We returned the crappy mini Christmas trees to the home megastore, and then went to the mall to get the baby’s first picture taken with Santa. #1GF! dressed the baby up in a red velvet dress with white fur lining, and twelve bucks later, we had the baby’s first Christmas picture.

Although the dress was heating the baby up, she didn’t complain. She just sat and stared straight ahead at the camera like a tiny member of the Claus family. No one could get a smile out of her, but at least she didn’t cry. You can see the result on the Vetoed Dyer Family Christmas Card.

I went to take the baby back from Santa, and he tried to ignore me. When I started taking the baby out of his arms, he said that he wouldn’t mind holding her more. I took her back semi-forcefully while #1GF! collected the card.

The baby was hot, so instead of putting her back in her car seat, I carried her through the mall in my arms. A lot of people smiled at the baby as we passed, and even though I hadn’t done much in making her what she was, I couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of pride.

We picked up some aspirin and a bunch of red bows at Walmart, and then went to a craft store and picked up thirteen fake wreaths for under $50. The wreaths and bows were for #1GF! to decorate our windows, and the aspirin was for me because the baby screamed in Walmart until we were forced to change her in the middle of one of the aisles when no one was around.

When we got home, #1GF! put the bows on the wreaths and fluffed them up. My job was to stick them on the windows. I didn’t fluff them or put bows on them because I am no good at that sort of thing. I did one wreath, and while the other twelve were saying “Merry Christmas” to passersby, mine was yelling “Street Pussy!” and trying to sell itself for crack.

#1GF! went to bed at normal time, and I stayed up and watched two hours of Pumpkin Chunkin’, an annual contest where people spend an inordinate amount of money building machines to shoot pumpkins thousands of feet. I cannot explain why they do this, or why I watched, but once it was over, I felt a distinct lack of satisfaction before I went to bed.

Monday (Day 911): Flicked Like A Wayward Booger

#1GF! worked from home because we were going to refinance the house in the afternoon, and even though she spent her day working, it was nice to have her around.

I ran out at midday to photocopy our licenses for the refinance, but the library was closed. If they needed a photocopy, we’d have to send it later. The lawyer showed up in the afternoon, and stood at our kitchen table trying to figure out where to put all of his papers. A spider tried to scurry across the table, and as illogical as it sounds, my only thought was that the lawyer would somehow see the spider as a sign that the house was a spider infested death trap and something would go wrong with the refinance. Before the lawyer noticed, I stealthily squooshed it with my index finger and quickly flicked it on the floor like a wayward booger.

We sat down and refinanced, shaving a couple points and a number of years off of our mortgage. During the flurry of signing, the baby shit not once, not twice, but three times in the half hour that we sat at the table. They were uproariously loud poops, too. We were withholding our laughter like schoolchildren because in a business situation, you’re supposed to pretend people with ties are impressive and that bodily functions aren’t funny.

The baby had been up and down all day, but not sleeping. After the lawyer was gone, we thought she’d crash, but she was still going strong. #1GF! was working from home for the first time, and I think having her home piqued the baby’s curiosity and threw a wrench into our typical daily pattern.

#1GF! took over baby duties after work, and I called and ordered another replacement fire alarm. I wasn’t sure why three fire alarms had gone bad in the last year, but I was tired of talking fire alarms telling me that there was an error. If I wanted to listen to machines complaining, I would’ve gone to the basement and sat with the robot.

Once the fire alarm was on its way, I sat at my desk to write a Mabegromo kick off post. Inevitably, that led me into making up a few advertising banners for the event. With me, wasting time is an art form because it never looks like I’m wasting time from up close. I ate dinner late, but it was nice to have an uninterrupted stretch of creative time. It was also nice to click the publish button on a post for the first time in months. At 9PM, I rejoined the family as the evening wound down.

Tuesday (Day 912): Burp Cloth Ahoy

I got a couple of weeks of LOR transcribed in between the flurries of feeding and changing. There wasn’t much else going on, and the biggest thing that I accomplished all day was to trim a wallet-sized picture of the baby and snap it into a key chain.

Everything was running smoothly until #1GF! came home. Suddenly, the baby was propped up on pillows on our bed without a burp cloth under her, and wearing only one sock.

#1GF! looked at me with a raised eyebrow.

“Listen, lady,” I said to #1GF!. “I run a tight ship around here while you’re gone. I battle the tides of chaos all day, and fifteen minutes before you show up, a wave washes over the bow.”

#1GF! laughed. “Nice metaphor. Now, where’s her sock?”

“She kept taking it off, so I finally let her keep it off. The decision increased productivity around here by seven point eight percent.”

“And you’re pretty confident that she’s not going to spit up all over my new comforter.”

I stared. “The wave must’ve washed the burp cloth overboard.”

“The wave…”

“..of chaos. Yes.”

#1GF! shook her head and picked up the baby. “I’m going to get a new burp cloth.”

“Ahoy?”

“I’m going to get a new burp cloth ahoy.”

“No, you’d say…” And she was gone. Even though I thought that there was a pretty good chance that #1GF! was lowering a life boat to take the baby to find higher ground, she returned, and the rest of the evening went as it usually does: put the baby to bed, rustle up something in the galley, and hit the rack.

Wednesday (Day 913): Fonzie The Pimp Vs. The Mouth Of Dr. Deuss

The baby took a couple of hour long naps during the day, and I spent that time quietly transcribing weeks of LOR out of my notebook. I spent the other eight hours trying to find ways to entertain her. She sat on the mat. She sat in her swing. I carried her around while pointing at things. “Oh, yes, that’s the sink, and that one’s a cup. And look, there’s the floor where you like to throw up.” I read her a book, I know not which one, but gazungle gazingle, it wasn’t much fun. I looked at the clock, I hadn’t the skill, I still had a good seven hours to fill.

I had plenty of time, questionable sanity, and a baby who wouldn’t sleep, so I decided to tackle the baby’s cradle cap. Cradle cap is a mass of crusty scales on top of the baby’s head that is fairly common in newborns. It isn’t caused by hobo dads who fail to wash their kids. The doctor said it wasn’t a big deal, but I didn’t want to wait around for the months that it took to go away on its own

I had some cradle cap medicine, so I massaged it into the baby’s scalp as directed. The baby sat quietly while I combed out some of the scales. When I was finished, there were so many scales stuck in her vaselined hair, that I decided that I had better shampoo her hair out in the sink.

I cradled the baby’s head over the kitchen sink and washed her hair. She seemed to be enjoying herself, but I didn’t want to push my luck. I got all the loose scales out, but not all of the medication. Her greasy head still smelled like something out of an unmarked, silver tube of salve from your grandfather’s medicine cabinet.

I dried the baby off, and over the next hour, she threw up all over two onsies and a pair of pants. The onsies weren’t a problem. I just grabbed another onsie that was pretty close to the color of the one she was wearing. The issue arose when she threw up on her pants, and I needed to find a new pair. That matched. I’m the guy who the fashion impaired call fashion impaired.

I dug through the pile of tiny pants, looking for something close to the color of the pair that she threw up on. Nothing was remotely close. I then tried to think of what #1GF! would want the baby to wear, and came up blank. I stared at the various colors without any idea of what would match. I held pair after pair up to the baby, and didn’t think any of them looked right. Finally, I tried to think of what the baby might like to wear. I instantaneously pulled out a pair of pants and put them on her, and she seemed pretty happy with my choice.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t sure if the pimptastically fuzzy lime green pants matched even a little bit. If I had picked them, I knew that there was a good chance that they didn’t. I rubbed my beard and thought, “Who cares? It’s not like we’re going out. Sometimes, it’s better to feel good than to look good.”

It was getting late in the day, so after I put the baby in for a nap, I cleared a path up the attic stairs (which had been recently converted into a baby accessory hiding facility) and grabbed all the Christmas decorations from the attic. I wanted to surprise #1GF! by having a couple Christmas decorations unpacked and set up before she got home, but I only got as far as getting the boxes into the living room.

I started dinner so that it would be timed almost perfectly to coincide with when #1GF! would be home and settled. When #1GF! got home, she noticed her baby before the dinner or the boxes of Christmas decorations.

“Um, what’s going on with the baby?”

“What do you mean?” I asked, trying to be nonchalant.

“Her hair is greased up like Fonzie…” She pulled the blanket off of her and saw the fuzzy lime green pants. “…if he was colorblind. I guess Daddy dressed you today.”

I have never claimed to know about fashion beyond monkey to monkey and giraffe to giraffe.

After dinner, I put the Christmas lights in the windows, and we were short one bulb. To make matters worse, I dropped one, shattering it all over the floor. We were then down two bulbs. I put two of the lights on a table to get them out of the way while I cleaned up the paper-thin glass shards that had exploded in every direction. While cleaning, I bumped the table and broke another bulb as the candles tumbled to the floor.

“Are you kidding?” asked #1GF! from the kitchen.

“Fuck. We’re now down three lights.”

“Yea, I heard.”

“Shit. Shit. Shit.” I crouched to start picking up the larger shards. “You know what the engineer asked me yesterday? He wanted to know if I was aware that I needed to start coming up with code words for swears. I told him, and I quote, ‘Fuck that shit.’”

“He’s right.”

“Oh, bumfarts.”

“What?”

“See? It’s bullshit. My swears are like a Chinese combo platter. If you want them to come out right…No substitutions.”

The baby stared on while #1GF! and I cleaned up the glass dust that the final two inch bulb had spread over an eight foot area. I sliced my hand on a tiny shard, and it looked like a war wound by the time I finished cleaning.

All the glass cleaning taught me a good trick though. If you need to clean glass off of hardwood, lay a flashlight on the floor. Every little particle will be picked up by the beam as you move it across the floor.

I cleaned up dinner, and the baby started making weird angry noises and wouldn’t eat. I took her in to change her, and she vomited on me like a spitting cobra, hitting me on the chest from two feet away while lying down. Then, she smiled at me. I mentally upgraded the baby from barf ninja to barf sensei.

I went to change my shirt, and #1GF! took over burping the baby. I walked back into the room to find #1GF! leaning forward, and the baby smiling. “Is there anything on my back?” #1GF! asked.

I leaned over her to look. There was a one inch wide line of barf running from shoulder to ass. “I’m afraid so. Barf Sensei!” #1GF! looked at me. “It’s her new name. It’s a step up from ninja.”

#1GF! went to change her shirt and put the baby to bed. I sat down and noticed that Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer was on television. My first thought was that I wasn’t about to sit and watch a Christmas special at my age. I soon found that I couldn’t look away.

Have you ever realized how much facial hair that special has? Santa had a really amazing beard, as did Yukon Cornelius. Even Frosty the Snowman had a badass goatee.

#1GF! returned and sat down next to me.

“Look at that beard,” I said, not bothering to hide my amazement.

“What?” asked #1GF!.

“Santa”s beard. Look at that thing.” I pointed at two spots next to my eyes. “If I had that beard on my face, my mustache would go up to here!”

“Why is Santa so thin?” asked #1GF!.

“I don’t know. That’s sort of weird.” I pointed at the screen as Mrs. Claus spoon fed Santa some soup. “Mrs Claus doesn’t have white hair! And she’s like thirty years younger than Santa. She must be the trophy Mrs. Claus.”

“Maybe the old Mrs. Claus got sick of Santa staying out all night, year after year,” offered #1GF!. Suddenly, Santa was putting on his coat over his suddenly fat body. “Jesus,” said #1GF! “What the hell was in that soup?”

I shook my head. “I can’t imagine,” I said through a mouthful of ice cream that was being spooned directly out of the carton.

We eventually shut off Rudolph… and watched another episode of Rescue Me, which I get less interested in every time I see it. Sure there are a few funny scenes, but it’s just not worth the effort if you have to spend most of the show trying to scrub the image of Dennis Leary having sex with middle aged women out of your head.

Thursday (Day 914): Corn Flakes

The temperature was in the upper 60′s and it was raining. I took the trash out and fixed all the downspouts to keep my robot quietly sleeping by his window.

Thanks to a constant autumn wind, I walked across a lawn that looked as if I hadn’t raked it a few times already. I emptied the dead mums out of their pots and filled the pots with bricks so that the wind wouldn’t take them away.

Once #1GF! was off to work, I gave the baby more scalp medicine and combed the corn flakes off of the top of her head before washing her hair and giving her a bath. Babies don’t care about cradle cap, but I wanted it gone.

The rain cleared up in the afternoon, and I thought about taking the baby for a walk. The baby’s sleep times were erratic, so I decided against it. Instead, I decided to start tracking those seemingly erratic sleep times to see if I could find a pattern.

I filled the small amount of time that the baby actually slept with writing. I managed to get a couple of weeks of LOR transcribed.

Before #1GF! got home, I put red, plastic lobsters in the garland over the mantle, which we did last year as a joke. I was hoping to make it a tradition for our little house near the beach without opening the door to lobster trap lamps, boat wheel tables, and porthole mirrors.

When #1GF! got home, I watched Thursday night TV while she slept on the couch. She eventually went to bed, I caught the tail end of Beyond The Valley of the Dolls. I forgot what a period freak show that movie was.

The baby was up to feed before I went to bed.

Friday (Day 915): Weeding Out Suitors Decades Ahead Of Schedule

I worked on clearing up the cradle cap, and the baby’s head looked a hundred percent better than it did a few days before. I stopped using the vaseline medicine, and started using a small travel sized bottle of dandruff shampoo. It smelled a heck of a lot better than the medicine, and the doctor said that it should work just as well.

The baby was seventeen weeks old, so I took a movie of her to commemorate the occasion. It ended up being eight minutes of me beatboxing while the baby swung her arms and legs. For some reason, she liked bad beat boxing. I figure that it will be good to force on the poor chump who tries to marry her. Knowing that I’m eventually going to be beatboxing in your in-law apartment might weed out some of the less kind suitors.

The baby slept for long enough during the day that I almost got caught up on transcribing my LOR notes, and slept so long at night that #1GF! brought home pizza and we ate it while it was still warm.

Saturday (Day 916): Reverse Theft

It had been raining all night and the wind had been strong enough to flip our sixty-four gallon trash barrel, so the first thing I did when I got up was to check on all the downspouts. They were still doing their jobs.

When I got back in, I started getting the baby’s bath ready. I was on autopilot, and didn’t realize that #1GF! wanted to be involved in the process. I was simply running a pattern that I run every other day without thinking that she might want to give her baby a bath. Every day is like a weekday when you’re the stay at home parent because the routine doesn’t change. I finished setting everything up, and got out of the way so that #1GF! could give the baby a bath.

We dropped into the library before hitting a sports store and the giant warehouse store to get some Christmas shopping done. Once a couple of people were checked off of our list, we went to #1GF!’s mother’s house to haul Christmas decorations down from her attic and help set up her tree.

#1GF! took care of the baby, and #1GF!’s mom and I went to the attic so that she could tell me what to haul down. “Do you want a breadmaker?” asked #1GF!’s mom.

“I had one once. I used it, but not very much.”

“So, then take it. It’s just sitting up here.”

“Thanks, but I won’t use it.”

“Well, take it down anyway.”

I thought it was weird, but the conversation repeated itself regarding a box of mugs. The mugs and breadmaker sat in the living room, and while I was doing a health check on #1GF!’s mom’s PC, she tried to get them into our car by telling #1GF! that I wanted them.

Unfortunately, the plan was foiled when the PC turned out to be cleaner than anticipated and I returned to the living room ahead of schedule. #1GF! was about to haul the stuff out to the car, until we stood repeating back and forth, “No, I thought you wanted them.” The items went back into the attic.

After #1GF!’s mom’s house, we went to my parents’ house for a quick visit. The baby was doing well for not having slept all day, but we were pushing it. I made her laugh for my parents. You don’t think that laughing is a big deal, but at seventeen weeks, my parents hadn’t seen the baby laugh, yet. It takes longer than you’d expect for babies to turn into fun machines.

My parents gave me a couple of books, and gave me back my manuscript. I forgot to ask what my father thought of it. We hadn’t eaten all day, and I was noticeably slow.

We went home and put away all the giant cereal boxes that had filled our trunk since the warehouse store. I made broccoli alfredo for #1GF!, and there weren’t any leftovers.

We went to bed without the baby in our room because she fell asleep in her crib and we didn’t want risk waking her to move her. It was really strange not having her in the room with us.

What I Learned

• Christmas dresses heat up babies.
• Keep your eye on Santa so that he doesn’t run off with your baby.
• If you need to clean broken glass off of a wood floor, laying flashlight down will allow you to locate even the tiniest pieces of glass.
• If you let me decorate a wreath, it will not look right.
• Pumpkin Chunkin’ is not worth two hours of my time.
• The library is closed on Mondays.
• Fuzzy green pants don’t match a pink onsie.
• The baby can throw up like a spitting cobra.
• There is some awesome facial hair in Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer.
• Cradle cap medicine or ordinary dandruff shampoo can clear up cradle cap in less than a week.
• It’s weird not having the baby in the room with you for the first time.

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