In Contrast to Thing 1's Food Habits This Week....

BFF has been crazed going from therapy to therapy with the our Tobin. Today it even included baby jars filled with foods he is allergic to in order to desensitize him from them. After desensitization comes tolerance, removal of metals, and so many steps I can't even begin to understand. Interested? Try Jenny McCarthy's book... it'll give you some serious hope and perspective about food allergies and the Autism Spectrum.

Physical Therapy, Occupational Therapy, Acupressure, Behavior, you name it.

Damn that kid is going to be alllll right.

Now if BFF could just get one night's rest.

Growing Up, Bite by Bite!

Thing 1's dinner tonight:

One GoGurt (yoplait yogurt in a tube)
Big bowl of Four Cheese Ravioli topped with parmesan cheese
Four stalks of broccoli
1/3 lb of baked Tilapia
Three bowls of Kix cereal
...topped off with 4oz of strawberry milk.


My boy is growing weed-style!

Vactioning Things

Five days with Grandma and Granddad included:

-- Making homeade ice cream
-- Going to the pool
-- Going to the pool some more
-- Going to CMT summer camp
-- Making cookies
-- Building a model war tank
-- Baking Shrink-E-Dinks
-- Cruising around the Lexus with the top down
-- Watching Peter Pan
-- Sleeping in Grandma and Granddad's big bed
-- Pitching a tent in the backyard with Uncle M's real tent
-- Going to Bonfante Gardens

...really, they had no fun at all. :)

Desert Notes

This lady came running up to La Gringa and me walking down the near-abandoned Palm Springs strip singing, "Free at Last! Free at Last! Thank God! We're free at Last!" I swear to God himself, I thought she was a runaway from a nutso farm.

Alas, no. She was referring to gay marriage becoming legal this week -- coincidently the week of our vacation. Everyone thinks we're on our honeymoon. La Gringa has taken to snorting with laughter every time someone asks us. We were busting at the seams when a couple of gay guys got married yesterday here in a $38,000 wedding for 100 folks. I hope to God that didn't include a wedding dress...

I'm surprised by Palm Springs being so, well, deserted. I am certain this is not what wordsmiths meant by the word desert. Or they did, but they didn't realize it involved a bunch of empty kitchy shops and old boarded-up fag haunts. A few old gay guys were buzzing on at Coffee Bean & Tea (yum) this morning about the heyday in the 'P.S. I Love You' they used to know -- cool cars, cute men and Bloody Marys for breakfast.

The Palm Springs I remember was family reunions, my grandmother holding court with all of her siblings, children and grandchildren at the then-posh Hyatt; zillion Miss California pageants (not me, for goddsake, but my cousin, who in fact, won Miss California after four attempts); water fights, cold--freezing cold -- condos of our friends; lots of liquor and the one and only time I tried magic mushrooms and saw stars that were so bright that I still remember the desert sky.

I'm not sure which memory to take home from this trip. At the half-way point, I'm in limbo between the Palm Springs I used to know, the Palm Springs of Tab Hunter and Frank Sinatra and the hot, dry, quiet one in front of us.

The Vacation Gods Heard My Plight

...and rescued our vacation.

We moved yesterday into this tiny B&B where there is no service, no telephones, no TVs, no food, drink or fruity pool drinks. The Korakia saved our pitiful holiday.

Somewhere between the all-white Moroccan minimal decor, the absolute silence of the property and natural rock waterfall, we have found some peace.

Mom thinks that we are so burned out that my body just gave way, and although I am still reeling from the stomach flu (even bursting a blood vessel in my eye from chucking so much -- pretty), we are never far from knowing how rare this chance is to be still.

Shit, Shit, Shit

Day two of our vacation and all I want to do is go home.

In the past 24-hours of vacation:

1. Pulled over on the side of the road for La Gringa work in 107-degree weather.
2. Had La Gringa freak out over not being at work and not being able to not work and not being able to work.
3. Checked into the absolutely insane Viceroy Hotel where it looks like Alice in Wonderland with L.A. folks creeping all over the place.
4. Breaking point went to broken point when I realized the droning techno music at the pool was NOT.EXACTLY.RELAXING.
5. Drank Long Island Iced tea then threw up for three hours.
6. Ordered room service and food was completely inedible.
7. Tried to go for a walk but the front door of the room was stuck and the back door is a giant sliding glass door leading out to the pool (yes, the techno music runs all night long).
8. Written two contracts for work.
9. Dealt with furious client. Then realized my mail server will not mail out, only in.
10. Finally fell asleep at 2:20 a.m. and woke up at 5:20 a.m. (so much for rest).


In an attempt to turn the tide of this awful would-be vacation, we're checking out of this hotel and going to a Morrocan B&B where it's quieter. We're going to try stick to only working in the a.m. for the next three days and work our asses off at trying to spend some time together.

So far, this fucking blows.

My Extraordinary Things

Not Shakespeare Tonight....

It is such a busy week, couple of weeks, that I cannot seem to put my words together. Even my Twitters are misspelled and I actually showed up at preschool the other day with a dozen bagels on a day the school was closed. (When I checked my iPhone calendar, sure enough three listings in this order: "SCHOOL CLOSED. Bring Bagels to School. School 9 a.m." -- ugh.

We're headed for a completely desperate vacation in an attempt to actually look at each other in the eye and not be tugged on (physically) by children and work. We need this. It's beyond want. Palm Springs is nothing exciting, but trying to regroup is essential. La Gringa doesn't really want to go -- too much work, too far behind, too much going on -- but there is not going to be an opportunity for another year since she's starting her new job two days after we get back. Another ugh.

The kids have had an extraordinary and emotional week; they graduated from PreK and headed to Kindergarten. The school they've been at for three years was much harder than the pre-K they've been attending for only a year (yes, two graduations x two children x two days). They'll be in a fully immersed Spanish education starting in just two months... it's daunting, scary and exciting. My goal right now is to not cry in front of them (when did this super-accelerated growing-up happen?); enjoy the summer and let them relax.

Like I said, my words aren't clear tonight. We're on a work schedule to get everything done. We're on a personal schedule, to, well, get everything done. I've got an agenda to not let my neurological system completely freak out on me and try to take it one hour at a time.

I've Been Trying Not to Curse too Much

But this deserves it.

Hey, you, E.D. Hill: YOU'RE A FUCKING DIPWAD.

Read This

My Big Little Garza

Bye, Bye, Love

La Gringa is leaving me... for a hot little number called Startup. She's a mobile sweet talker and La Gringa is whipped.

It's a good thing; it is. It's the right thing. We've lived our fantasy of having our own business and being parents so well that anything different that our current gig seems adulterous.

I miss you already, sweetheart. But I'm thrilled you're going to go knock 'em dead for another little startup-that-could.

He's Got a Crush on a Girl Named Tyler

I guess I knew the day would happen.
I suppose it's totally healthy.
But, today came at me like a carpenter bee in June.
My son has a crush.

It wasn't even subtle, I tell you, it was right at me... he walked up to me, hand-in-hand with a blonde curly haired beauty in a blue hawaiian dress and said,

"Mom, I have a girlfriend."

She beamed.

"What's her name?"

Um, he said, holding her hand tighter and nuggling his face into her curls, "What's your name?"

"Ty.ler." She said, annoyed at her man.

"Her name is Tyler, Mom."

"Okay," I said.

And they bounded off, her curls bouncing on his head, him walking double-step to keep up with her long legs. Your average day at the park? Oh, I guess. The day my son introduced me to his first girlfriend? Whew.

Hug Everyone. Hell, Hug the Grocery Clerk

In the oddest twist of fate, a friend of ours fell off his horse on Saturday and is in a coma. It's not good. In fact, it's pretty very not good. On a scale of 3-15 on the Glasgow Coma Scale, he's a 4. Man, that even hurts to type...

Here is my shout-out to you to send positive vibes, prayer, good juju, whatever... please, please send them to Juan, Liz and their four children Juan, Ricky, Isabel and baby Juliana. That's right, I'm using real names. Use real prayers if you've got 'em.

"Hug everyone you love", Mrs. Grizwald told me tonight.

MASSIVE HUGS OUT TO YOU.

Work Life is an Enigma

...well, not really, but sort of.

Client meeting. Rush. Afterhours. Must.get.to.the.City. Thing 1 is on a playdate in whoop-whoop Evergreen. Thing 2 is at a playdate in Willow Glen. La Gringa went to pick up Thing 1 and, well, I thought she was going to pick them both up.

I am half-dressed, one eye make-uped, hair half up in rollers when it hits me: SHITMOTHERFUCKER.

I go running out the door, snap this photo in the car on my way to get Thing 2; got to love the empty car seat in the back.

I am not great at the work/life balance thing this week.

Family Day.. Every Day

There is very little in La Gringa and my life that screams, heck, whispers gay. I think both of us feel that there is no need for us, personally to be married, have rainbow anythings, go to marches or have the kids wear t-shirts that say, "I was hatched by two chicks." -- the lifestyle we have is just as suburban as can be. It's almost, well, boring.

That said, there is a reason we live such a free and peaceful life and it's because there are families out there blazing the trail for the life we are reaping now. The life that Thing 1 and Thing 2 have because of those who are out there pounding the pavement for same-sex families.

Today is same-sex Family Day for the blogging community. This entry this morning is to thank those out there working for extraordinary freedoms we have. We hope to do you proud by being boring, normal, suburban moms with a couple of well-reared, beautifully souled children.

-- Garza G.