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With the metaphorical microphone passed to me by Mrs. Chicky earlier this week via an Interview Meme, I am carrying on the tradition with a different spin. In addition to interviewing a few bloggers who posted their answers on their own sites , I opened up the line of questioning to interested parties without blogs. Taking advantage of the opportunity was a regular reader named Kate. I am pleased to introduce her to you now. Me: You are in a room full of strangers--different sexes, ages, ethnicities, backgrounds, professions, familial statuses, etc., are all represented. They want to know who you are. How do you identify yourself? Kate: This is a difficult question to answer because I need more context. Why am I in a room full of such a diverse group of strangers? Am I mingling and just introducing myself to individual people along the way, or am I addressing a crowd for some reason as a leader/keynote speaker? Even so, I would need to know the reason everyone is gathered. If I ...

What is wrong with this picture? (Besides the fact that I have no photography skills whatsoever?) Did you get it? Did you? If not, here's a bit more of the scene: No, it was not a freak of nature that caused this. No blustery wind, no driving rain. It was The Boss, the dog and I on the way to the park. Well, actually, it had nothing to do with The Boss, except that she was there and could quite possibly have been killed if the porch ceiling wasn't so capable of remaining suspended practically by its lonesome. I was walking out the front door, helping The Boss down the steps with one hand and holding Roxie's leash in the other. That's when our pit bull saw the cat in the neighbor's yard and bolted toward it. I lurched forward, struggling to hold on as Roxie put all of her 50 pounds, plus the strength of momentum, into the chase. That's when I did the stupid thing for which The Parnter is currently not speaking to me. I grabbed ahold of one of the porch's ric...

Charming Historic Cape w/Commerical Possibilities A taste of old and new. Set on 1 acre; offering 1862 sq.ft. of living wiht beautiful, wide board flooring, soapstone kitchen sink and center chimney with newly lined fireplace in the living room & great garage/workshop! Will somebody tell me what it is about this home that attracts only the rudest, slimiest and most ignorant of prospective buyers? One freak show at my door is not unexpected, but two, three, four...the parade is endless and wholly unproductive. We had one offer that fell through and another that's falling. Our agent held a showing with another gentlemen who spent over an hour on the property before he told her he hated the house, but loved the yard. Then he said he doesn't much like to mow. Where the hell do they come from? How many more of them are out there? We have an open house on Saturday, and I have a feeling I just might find out.

Special correspondent Mrs. Chicky , of Chicky Chicky Baby , is here today with a few hard hitting questions for yours truly. Stay till the end to find out how you can participate in the interviews sweeping the blogosphere. Mrs. Chicky: Where did you meet your husband? Me: Funny you should ask. Funny because it's true. I met The Partner via the Instant Messenger function of AOL v. 3.0. As a college sophomore with nothing better to do than send random IMs while I should've been studying for mid-terms, I typed the keywords "Connecticut" (for my home state) and "78" (for the year of my birth) into the member directory search. When his profile popped up, I saw that this 19 year old male, born and bred in Connecticut, attended the same university as a friend of mine. With nothing more to go on than those three apparent commonalities, I fired up the IM. "Do you know so-and-so?" I typed, using my friend's name as a shot-in-the-dark impetus for conversa...

My friend's daughter is a pre-schooler who likes to write songs. I think she's got what it takes to go far. Don't believe me? You be the judge. "I ask my mom for a chore, She says sure, how ‘bout four. So I do the dishes And she acts suspicious." ~ Bella, age 4 It's a bit unnerving to feel as if I have to move over for the next generation before I've even taken a seat.

I've written before about a local court case with international implications. Coast to coast, sea to shining sea, hopping continents and bouncing off satellites in space. Read about it , because it could happen where you are, too. You might think it can't, but it can happen to you. Here's the meat of the nutshell as I cracked it earlier: "Julie Amero, a substitute teacher, was convicted on four counts of risk of injury to a minor for exposing middle school students to pornography on a school computer. The conviction came after she testified that the sexually explicit material on her computer popped up as a result of adware , not from any prurient searches of her own. She faces up to forty years in prison." She will be sentenced this Thursday. There's someone else around these parts who will not face a day of jail time, however. It's a man who sexually assaulted a three year old girl. Under a plea deal, he will get five years' probation. According to t...

When she really wants something, The Boss calls me by my name . "Bink! Binky! Biiiiiiiiinky!" She sits in her high chair and bangs on the tray as she imitates her father. I mean, that has to be where she got it from. He's the one who says my name on a regular basis in her presence. As it happens, it's usually when he wants something, too. Or when he's annoyed. Or when he finds it hard to believe that something I said actually came out of my mouth. " In a withering tone" is the best way to describe the most common utterance of my identifier around these parts. "Binky!" Today The Boss called me out at the supermarket when I strayed too far from her in search of a plastic bag for the chicken. "Bink. Bink. Binky." She stared at me from her perch in the front of the cart, looking all baby blond and munching on a cookie. "Binky!" she repeated, in between bites. Call me narcissistic, but there is nothing cuter than hearing my daug...

Today's a lazy day. Gray and cold and dreary in typical New England March-ness. I went to my usual list of bloggers in search of easy inspiration. It came to me from Mary-LUE , who tagged a few specific peeps for a meme, and then opened it up to Everyone. Well, I'm one of the "every," so I'm playing. Here goes: 1. Go to Wikipedia and type in your Birthday Month and day only. July 30 2. List 3 Events that occurred that day. 1619 - In Jamestown, Virginia , the first representative assembly in the Americas , the House of Burgesses , convenes for the first time. I like the idea of sharing my birth date with this one. 1954 - Elvis Presley makes his debut as a public performer. Any friend of Johnny Cash is a friend of mine. 1975 - Jimmy Hoffa disappears from the parking lot of the Machus Red Fox restaurant in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan , a suburb of Detroit , at about 2:30 p.m. He is never seen or heard from again. The mysterious 7/30. 3. List 2 important Bir...

After racking up almost two years on the job, The Boss is now comfortable in her position. She no longer feels the need to impress The Partner and I with her even-keeled temperament and sense of humor. Confident that we're not going to hit up Monster.com for new opportunities, she has taken to ruling with an iron fist. In fact, she throws herself onto the floor and flails the clenched metal of her hands roughly every five minutes. It's tantrum time in the workplace. I would be better prepared for all this if she hadn't been so darned nice up till now. Consistently pleasant. A joy to be around. As a newborn, she mostly slept and ate. As an infant, she slept, ate, and rolled around a little. Once mobile, she toddled with grace and dignity. Now she is four months removed from the nefarious age of two and suddenly decides she wants a head start on the villiany. And as her subordinate, I have every reason to believe my performance review is going to suffer. It will look someth...

Actually, this post has very little to do with moms and sex. But I am getting addicted to the Statcounter spike I've encountered ever since I employed those two terms in relation to each other a couple days ago in the title of my response to the Real Moms meme . Yesterday this blog experienced the single largest number of unique hits it has ever known. All because of moms having sex. What is it that a famous anthropologist once said? "Never doubt that a small group of moms having sex can change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." I mean, if that's not the truth. I'm going to go do my part to change the world.

After many months of secrecy, I can finally release the story of my just-printed book. This past Saturday, I attended the launch party for a new publishing company. Its first line, titled One True Romance , is a series of real life romances about engaged couples. It fits into the wedding planning market alongside photography as videography as a permanent marriage memento. Picture you and your other half on a Harlequin for all your friends and family to read. I wrote the inaugural tome. Yup, I said it. I wrote a book. It is 120 pages of Boston-based reality, outfitted with all the trappings of a traditional romance novel. My name's right on the cover. My words lay prettily throughout. It is the centerpiece for the publishing venture's marketing campaign. How 'bout them apples? The best thing about writing a book is that it proves I can, well...write a book. What was once daunting to the degree of paralysis is now attainable. This particular effort was creative non-fiction, b...

The sale of our home fell through already. To all of you who told me from the beginning to be positive and upbeat about the whole process, and for those who tried to convince me that negativity does not sell houses, I respond with a hearty I told you so . Looks like optimism doesn't cut checks, either. I am just glad I only wasted about two weeks thinking things were actually going well. On the buying side, we actually put an offer in on another house right before our own sale fell through. There was a Hubbard clause on the bid and we are still waiting to hear if the owners will entertain such an uncertain prospect. I have to keep reminding myself that I don't care anymore. Que sera, sera. We have a roof over our heads and solid walls surrounding. Everything else will eventually fall into place around us. But there is something I can be upbeat about. Almost a month into the game, I am still managing to keep a clean house . It's all about momentum--that's what a frien...

Read my VisualDNA ™ Get your own VisualDNA™ I discovered this VisualDNA thing over at Whirlwind 's blog today. I clicked on a picture that most represented me in a bunch of different categories and, voila, there was my personality, deconstructed. According to my VisualDNA, I: ~ Like to think differently, always from another perspective. ~ Have a high sex drive and appetite for "lurve." ~ Love to be in charge of where I'm going--the freedom of choosing my own direction. ~ Like to unwind after a long day--nothing beats relaxing the shoulders, loosening the tongue and letting the day go by. ~ Think of technology when I think of freedom. Ah, technology. The freedom to bore untold numbers of people with my personality. You know you want to do it, too.

Now, I'm no control freak by any means. I'm pretty damn go-with-the-flowy. But the process of selling our house is driving even me crazy. Though we accepted our first offer after the house was on the market for just a week, that by no means indicates a smoothness to the proceedings. I spoke this afternoon to our real estate agent, who informed me that our buyer is having trouble finding financing. As is the case with many home seekers looking in our starter price range, he needs 100% financing. On the heels of recent news in the national media outlets about mortgage lenders going belly up because of so many people defaulting on such loans, it's become more and more difficult to procure them. This buyer has a tiger of a mortgage broker working on his behalf, but it's still extremely uncertain. Combine that with the fact that the buyer has only been at his current job for two weeks, and it becomes even less likely that a loan will come through. And so, we are in limbo. I ...

How's this for irony? Kristen at Motherhood Uncensored put me on her list of Thinking Blogger awardees just as my last thought left my head. Now I don't know what to say.* *Except for "thank you, Kristen," obviously.

Next time I even think of bringing both the dog and The Boss on the trip to the veterinarian's office, I hope someone shoots me with a tranquilizer gun. This afternoon I brought Roxie in for a skin condition that has rendered her itchy and reeking. We were not even through the door when she went all a-twitter, her paws tapping the linoleum at the sight and smell of the two other dogs in attendance. She was gagging against the pull of her leash as I tried to rein her in. Putting down The Boss, I fell into a chair and ordered my other baby to sit. She ignored me. I waited a few beats and said "sit" again. She continued to tap dance and retch. I pushed down her wiggle butt till a connection was made. Then one of the other dogs must have moved, or yawned, or twitched a whisker. This set Roxie off again, and she darted to the side, almost decapitating The Boss with the taut line of her leash. Hysterics ensued. The Boss threw herself down on the floor and wailed. The dog opened...

My hopes have been dashed. My heart, broken. The house I want so badly doesn't want me. We submitted a low-ball offer and, though we still haven't gotten a formal response, our Realtor gleaned from a talk with the seller's agent that he is unlikely to come down as low as we'd need him to go. It's no shock, really. Our offer was $100k below asking price. The problem is that my imagination went ahead and moved in anyway, throwing open the shutters and slapping down a dog-paw Welcome mat in the brick entryway. My imagination is a sucker. We're going to look at two more houses over the next couple of days, and there's one we've already seen that we may very well bid on. The latter is a perfectly lovely; it's solid and unique and full of amenities. It's just that it doesn't inspire any new feelings in me and it doesn't remind me of old ones. I think the problem is that I'm spoiled. By The Partner. You see, he was the first person I fell i...

It's not too bad a cold, as far as those things go, but The Boss is run down. This morning while The Partner was making toast, he asked me if I heard The Boss coughing last night. In yet another sign of bad mothering, I had to say no. I slept well. "She was croaking like a frog," he said. Today she is not croaking so much as mini-hacking. At breakfast, a Cheerio got mired in the booger glue of her upper lip. She didn't seem to notice as she continued to insert individual "o"s into her mouth. Again with the bad mothering, I laughed out loud. Right now she's resigned herself to the couch, watching her new favorite DVD, Go Potty Go! . I have high hopes for this cartoon. Between that and the potty song I made up (P-O-T-T-Y to the tune of B-I-N-G-O), I'm saying potty prayers that she'll learn her way out of diapers fast. Please excuse the poor photography. My artistic flair is limited to words.

If any of you are not familiar with Ittybits & Pieces , now is the time to visit the blog. Toyfoto's two most recent posts discuss the death of the family dog, Maggie, and the effect of that loss on the rest of the household. Bring Kleenex, or, at the very least, a highly absorbent shirt sleeve.

Lately when I look at The Boss, I don't even recognize the little girl staring back at me. She's no longer a novelty in her cute, ill-fitting jeans. Instead, she fills out the denim and runs it ragged. Her face is taking kid-shape. She's sucking up experience and spitting it back out in the form of personality. The Boss likes to put "back." Blocks are played with and returned to their box. She brings her unfinished cup of milk to the refrigerator when she's done and personally sees to it that the door is shut with a satisfied "closed!" Items she deems unnecessary are relegated to the garbage can. Just now she tried to throw out the newspaper before The Partner got his local fix. She is unlike I ever was: neat and focused. Maybe it's a phase and maybe it's not, but it is wholly unique to my frame of reference. I suppose it stands to reason that she throws tantrums, too, when life hands her things that aren't easily assigned a proper place...

Just when I was beginning to think this whole blog was devoid of thought, none other than Redneck Mommy comes around and bestows upon me the Thinking Blogger Award. I would be flattered to have received this button from anyone but I am tickled especially pink to have been tagged by T , a favorite blogger of mine and a fellow nose-picker on the playground of life. It's all part of the " 5 Blogs That Make Me Think " meme started at The Thinking Blog . Thanks for thinking I think, T. I think you think, too. Not for nothing, but "think" is one of those words that starts to look really funny when you see it written out more than once. Anyhoo, it is now my sacred duty to pass the torch to five other bloggers I consider especially adept at running their gray matter through its paces. Thinking bloggers. That means different things to different people, but to me the title signifies writers with unique ways of articulating themselves while remaining addictively relatabl...

I fell in love today. I am aflutter with waterfront wonder. The Partner came out at lunchtime to join my mother, myself and The Boss for a showing of a house that had looked appealing in its online listings. It was every bit as unique and remarkable in real life, I'm happy to report, albeit a bit more...spackled. And somewhat moldier. And shifty. But don't let my realistic portrayal of this home's flaws give you the wrong impression. I'm seriously in love. Attracted as I am to grandiose imperfections, this place is nirvana. I feel like I did the day I first met The Partner in real life after having made his acquaintance via a random, fateful search of AOL user profiles. For those wondering about the style of the home, I will tell you that I have coined it Caligula Contemporary . Built in the year of my birth, it's an homage to an expansive, party-loving lifestyle. There's a dock leading into a small pond where the owners of adjacent properties shine spotlights ...

The Partner and I attended our close friends' wedding this weekend. Over the course of the three-day festivities, we stayed in contact with our Realtor, counter offering, re-countering, and finally accepting the bid on our house. The final paperwork has yet to be signed. While I start to detox from the weekend, here's a picture that, while probably not worth a thousand words, will have to suffice for the purposes of this Sunday night blog post. The Partners

In a victory for positive thinkers everywhere, I have been knocked off my pedestal of pessimism . Yes, you guessed it: we got an offer on our house! And a reasonable one, at that. We're countering this afternoon with a price that meets them halfway. Of course, I'm not getting my hopes up. Falling from that pessimistic pedestal just means I'm now more firmly grounded in reality. Feet on the earth, expectations in check. But I'm not gonna lie to ya. I'm pretty damn excited.

I know this is my earliest memory because grandma died when I was two. Before that, she was frail on a living room recliner. There were plastic prongs in her nose. There was a long tube. She sat attached. I do not remember being unbelievably small, but I was. I think they told me to give her a hug. I think I cowered. They pushed against my pull-back. I was crying. Grandma was dying. I was two. ___