Why Oming? Part Three

Day Three of our Yellowstone adventure, and Camille was so pooped from all the fun that she passed right out on the way to our morning activity.

What was our morning activity, you ask? A SNIPE HUNT!

Find the snipe! 

Why Oming? Part Two

After we discovered the mouse's night nut-munching, we went to breakfast and made for Old Faithful. I really wanted to go to Old Faithful because, come on, who goes to Yellowstone and doesn't see Old Faithful?

Losers, that's who.

So we went to Old Faithful, which is really just one of dozens of geysers that are all over the place in the caldera of Yellowstone.

A caldera, for those of you who are unfamiliar with the term, is the hole in the ground that's left after a volano erupts. Yellowstone is basically one gigantic caldera, and there's still lava bubbling around underneath. That lava - or magma, I don't know the difference... how about we say "melted rocks?" - heats up the water that eventually explodes out of the ground and does stuff like this:

Ka-pyooooo!

That was Old Faithful, by the way.

Why Oming? Part One

Because Yellowstone National Park is there!

Jake and I left on Sunday and met my mom in Alpine, WY at a place called the Flying Saddle Resort. If you ever need to stay in the Jackson Hole area and you don't feel like spending a billion dollars on a hotel, stay at the Flying Saddle. It's a little bit of a drive, but it beats spending $500 on a mediocre room. Not exaggerating.

 

Hollahollaholla

Camille has begun learning a skill - nay, an artform - that she will continue to perfect as she progresses through life and into adulthood: phone conversation.

"It's Samantha. I really don't want to talk to this bitch."

"Hiiiiiii Samantha. What am I doing? Oh nothing. Trying
to get the milk stain out of my silk onesie. You know, the
one you barfed on because you're a lightweight and you
drank too much trying to impress Kayden at daycare,
even though everyone knows he likes me."

"That bitch hung up on me!"

To make herself feel better, Camille went on a blueberry baby food bender and tried to cover up her shame by fingerpainting her own face.

That's my girl. <3

Homeless Monster

In Salt Lake City, there is an unprecedented number of panhandlers.

If they had signs like this, I might give them change.

When you're driving home from work and you get off the highway, they're perched at the end, near the traffic light. They're also lurking on the corners of popular intersections. Jake and I went to an outdoor mall one evening, and at one intersection, there was a guy begging on one corner, and guy playing guitar on another, a guy dancing on the next, and the final corner had a guy playing a bagpipe for money. It was the loudest corner in the city.

They don't all play music or dance. Mostly, they're holding a sign that says "Homeless and hungry, God Bless You" or something like that.

It's all a racket.

Jake Won

Jake and I kind of had a little contest going: if Camille said "da-da" first, Jake won. If she said "ma-ma" first, I won.

Well, Jake won.

Yesterday, she said "da-da" and then looked at Jake and smiled. I wish I'd known it was coming, because I would have gotten it on video. Maybe I'll get the chance to get it on video soon.

Vacuum Humor

/begin rant

Years ago, I heard a comedian make a joke about vacuuming. It went a little something like this:

"Have you ever seen someone vacuuming, and they'll run the vacuum over something on the floor that is like stuck to the carpet or something. So... they'll bend down, and pull the thing off the carpet... and then drop it and vacuum it up! It's like, hey, you bent down to pick it up, and then just dropped it back on the floor again. Just pick it up and keep it up!"

Every time I vacuum, I think about that sketch, and I get annoyed at whatever comedian said it.

I constantly find things on the carpet that are stuck to it. It's usually a little chunk of Cheerio or cracker that Camille gummed up and then spat onto the carpet, where it dried and superglued itself to the fibers. It's impossible to vacuum up on its own, so what do I do? I bend down, pull it off, drop it, and then vacuum it up.

Because doing that makes more sense than picking it up and... and what? Hold it in my hand? Put it in my pocket? Most of the time when I'm vacuuming, I'm wearing sweatpants with no pockets. So I'd have to hold this chewed-up piece of cracker that would inevitably heat up and get sticky in my hand. That hand, by the way, would be full of cracker bits (because Camille likes to chew on stuff and then wipe it on the rug), so it would be impossible to use it for anything but holding these nasty pieces of cracker.

So what makes more sense? Dropping these little pieces back onto the floor and vacuuming it up, or holding the pieces in my hand while simultaneously trying to do stuff with that same hand?

If I remembered what comedian it was, I'd offer them a piece of advice: try to actually vacuum before you criticize other peoples' vacuuming methods.

On a not-so-bitchy note, a picture of a cat being vacuumed:

/end rant

It's a Job Application, Not a Facebook Profile

I have a job.

I also have a baby.

So sometimes, life gets complicated.

Right now, Jake's youngest brother babysits Camille on my weekday work days (because Jake can watch her on the weekends). The place where I work has on-site childcare, but their wait list extends into September/October. Jake's brother goes back to school at the end of August. So, we have at least a month where we need a babysitter.