Are We In A Strip Club?

Oh boy!  The Book of Mormon!  I'd been wanting to see this one for two years.

This is not a play for children. This is not a play for closed-minded adults. This is not a play for broke people (but then again, I suppose that applies to broadway in general).  Those Southpark guys are really chargin' ya for this musical.

There are these two geeky mormons in their late teens or early twenties who are sentenced to a two-year companionship as missionaries in Uganda.  Only one of these guys has actually heard of Uganda.  

One of the many unforeseen problems for these two young missionaries is that the Ugandans are more concerned with AIDS and pesky warlords than with religion shopping.  


The soundtrack is excellent.  Some of the songs have hopeful, upbeat punctuations that remind me of the songs in The Little Mermaid.  But the lyrics are nothing like The Little Mermaid.  One example is the song 'I Believe' sung by Andrew Rannells (Elder Price).  

elder price

Some of the funny lyrics of this song include bits like:

I believe......that in 1978 God Changed his mind about black people.....

I believe......that God lives on a planet called Kola.....

and I believe.......that The Garden of Eden was in Jackson County Missouriiii.......

I am a mormon, and mormons just belieeeeve!!!!


During the intermission Matt and I are the first people in line at the bar.

the barman: 'What'll ya have?'

me: 'We'll have a vodka soda and a jack and diet please.'

the barman: 'Doubles?'

me: 'Sure!'

The barman makes the drinks.

the barman: 'Here you go.  That'll be $61 please.'

Matt hands the barman a $20 bill.

the barman: '$61.'

me: 'Wow, $61 dollars, are we in a strip club or something?'

I was in an elated and awnery mood.  Seeing Matt Parker and Trey Stone (or is it Matt Stone and Trey Parker?) exercising the freedom allowed by the first amendment to this great extreme is very exciting.  I also had a confidence boost from my new black 7 skinny jeans.  They are truly excellent.  

Also, I think that Rogers and Hammerstein would balk at these drink prices.


A woman who was standing behind me in the drink line came up to me as we were headed back to our seats.

woman: 'Wow, as soon as I heard how much you guys were paying for your drinks I decided to get a soda instead.'

me: 'I know, crazy huh?

The Scrappy Irishman

this guy is scrappy.  he's ready to defend himself and his stamps.

There is this stamp guy in the East Village. His stamp shop is nothing like the sober rubber stamp aisles in Michaels. This is a raw stamp situation. I saw the store while walking around the east village waiting to meet Matt at Momofuku (a very loud noodle bar) around the corner.  His window display has hundreds of obscure stamps.

casey rubber stamps: they're 'open late' and 'most sundays'.
these guys are serious about their arts and crafts.  

This isn't just any stamp store.  As I'm browsing, two dodgy fellas come down into the small shop. I take notice of these guys straight way for two reasons: the shop is too small not to notice the comings and goings of anyone, and also because they look as if or as though they are packing heat. I hate to stereotype like that, but (at least in this case) it turned out not to be without merit.


The Irish ,Santa Clause-esc proprietor comes up to the front of his shop while remaining seated in his swivel chair.  

Irishman: 'Can I help you guys?'

Drug Dealers: 'Yea, hey, uh you can make customized stamps right?'

Irishman: 'That's right.'

Drug Dealers: 'Can you make some of this?'

Drug Dealers show something to the Irishman.

Irishman: 'No, I don't do that kind of thing.'

Drug Dealers: 'What kind of thing?'

Irishman: 'I don't make stamps for the bags.'

Drug Dealers: 'That's not what this is.'

Irishman: 'Well I don't make those kind of stamps.'

Agitation ensues.

Drug Dealers: 'That's discrimination man!'

Irishman: 'I don't make those.'

At this point I begin to think that the Drug Dealers might pull a gun on the Irishman.  But the Irishman eventually shoos these guys out the door.  

me: 'I thought they were going to shoot you.'

Irishman: 'Did you notice that I kept my scissors in my hand?  I don't want them in here again.'

He then explains to me that Drug Dealers come into the shop sometimes who want him to make stamps to label their drug baggies.  This particular design said 'Don't Worry, Be Happy'.  We both agree that he doesn't have to accept their business.  Then I buy these two stamps from the scrappy Irishman.

This is why I love New York, there's never a dull moment when your walking around the city.  Irish artisans, entrepreneurial drug dealers, just another day-

I started stamping Matt 's business documents in an effort to be more quirky. Maybe I'll buy a record player, a typewriter, and a guide to crocheting as a tribute to Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen and Zoey Deschanel.  



http://www.caseyrubberstamps.com/
http://momofuku.com/

5 Months = More Noise

Welcome back to the Poppy-O Show.  The protagonist (and sometimes the antagonist), Poppy, is 5 months old!!(?)

While we were in New York last week, Poppy learned how to roll herself over.  Once she gets herself rolled over, being face downward seems to stress her out.  Matt thinks that she's stressed because she wants to crawl but can't do it yet.  This new rolling over skill has bumped up the amount of effort required to be her caregiver.  Until last week, she'd sit still in her lavender Nap Nanny for large chunks of the day.  We'd put this Nap Nanny on the table, on the bed, etc..  Now she might sit still in the Nap Nanny for a little while but sooner or later she begins to squirm and push her legs down like she's trying to stand up.  So then I'll put her on the floor in the Baby Einstein play gym thing.  It's this colorful blanket with two bended sticks connected to it.  There are lots of toys hanging from the sticks for her to grab onto, most notably a blue octopus.  After I have placed her on the floor in the play gym it's not long until she starts grabbing the sticks to help her roll herself on over.  The thing is though that once she is rolled over on her stomach she begins to make lots of noises.  These noises are loud and annoying.  These noises are somewhere in-between cries for help and sounds of exertion (and I have trouble telling the difference).  Suffice it to say that there is a lot of noise, a lot of the time.

It's possible that some of this noise is a reaction to her teefers comin' in.  I can feel their ridges along her bottom gums.  I'm going to go get her some baby oragel gum numbing gel stuff.  Yesterday at the gym I asked the Homosexual Anesthesiologist whether or not it was okay to use some type of numbing gel on her gums:

'Oh yea, it's totally safe.  It doesn't last for very long but it may calm her down some when she's hurting.'



The thing about the rolling over skill is that she now rolls over onto her stomach while she is in her crib.  This caused me some anxiety for a day or two.  Beginning when I was pregnant I was told that you should put NOTHING in the crib, and that your baby needs to sleep on her back.  If not, she'll probably die of SIDS.  It even says 'Back Is Best' on her sleep sacks (which we call her sacks'o'sleep).  When we got back from New York on Sunday and put her in her crib for bed, she rolled over.  Sometimes she rolls over and gets kind-of lodged in the corner.  This freaked me out at first.  I kept checking on her and putting her back on her back throughout the night for a couple of nights.  Now it's clear that she wants to sleep on her stomach, and she is going to get back on her stomach, one way or another.  She'll either sleep on her stomach while I get a good night's rest, or she'll sleep on her stomach with me waking up to put her back on her back at dark:thirty all night.

'i can roll over now'

'this is my purple throne'

Tippy Tales

You'd think that, being such a well evolved species, that our babies would be a bit more self-reliant.  A horse that's  fresh out of the chute can stand up and walk around and do all sorts of impressive things.  When a baby is fresh out of the chute, well, it can't do much of anything really.

If you sit Poppy on a flat, even surface with her legs placed neatly in front of her, she'll just tip right over.  Every time...she tips over.  She's nearly 5 months old, and I'm happy to report that this persistent lack of coordination doesn't seem to bother her.  Her facial expression conveys something like:

'I'm really doing all I can here.  Let's try this again later.'

Cinderella's Intermission

Someday Poppy O. will want to watch the Disney film Cinderella.  I will say:

'Sure thing lil' Poppy...let's watch it together.'

We will sit down to watch Cinderella.  We'll be watching Cinderella, watching, watching.  The prince's Grand Duke will be looking for the one girl in the Kingdom whose foot fits into the glass slipper.  The Evil Stepmother will trip the Grand Duke, he will fall and the glass slipper with shatter exactly as it has been shattering since 1950.  Cinderella will shock her Stepmother by pulling the other glass slipper out of her weathered pocket.  It will slip onto Cinderella's foot with an effortless and sparkly magnetism.

This is when I will press stop and turn off the TV.

Poppy: 'Then Cinderella and the Prince get married don't they?'

Me: 'No darling.  Then she gets her masters degree.'

Poppy: 'And then they get married?'

Me: 'Yes.  And then they get married.'

'you see Poppy, after this scene the kingdom awards cinderella a full scholarship for graduate school.  yep, when she's done with that she and the prince get married.  isn't that lovely?'

4 Month Pedi Visit

The Pop-Tart is 4 months old.  At this point we are having pediatric visits every two months.

Dr. Dreiling examined her on the crinkly paper.  He began by putting Poppy on her tum-tum to see if she can hold up her upper body.  It turns out that she is able to hold herself up.  I was nervous about this test as we are certainly negligent with the supervised tummy time sessions.  It stresses me out to see her all squirmy on the floor.  Dr. Dreiling showed me how to help her by holding her bum down to sort of anchor her body.

Poppy came in at 25.5 inches tall (or 'long' in her case since she is generally a horizontal being), which puts her in the 85th percentile.  This is good, tall is good.

She is 16 pounds and 9 ounces, which puts her in the 95th percentile for weight.  Oh boy.  Chunk'a'monk.  Dr. Dreiling said that it's fine and that she will slim down once she begins crawling and walking.  Meanwhile, I think that we'll have to get her some Baby Spanx.

'i'd never spank a baby, but I'd sure Spanx one,' -snl.  

'do you have a fat baby?'

Dr. Dreiling was impressed with the progress that Poppy's belly button has made.  It's becoming less and less herniated and soon it won't be herniated at all.

Dr. Dreiling: 'How's everything going?'

Me: 'Great.  She's great.  She's been consistently sleeping through the night since 6 weeks.'

Dr. Dreiling: 'Wow.  I wouldn't tell a whole lot of people that.  I get some babies in here that are 10 months old and still not sleeping through the night.'


Having recently experienced a victorious and peaceful first plane ride with Poppy, I was eager to tell Dr. Dreiling.

Dr. Dreiling: 'Flying with infants is easy.  In planes, you are effectively flying at 8,000 feet when the equilized air pressure is taken into account.  This makes babies feel drowsy.  Flying with toddlers is difficult; they aren't able to pay attention to a full movie yet.  So they want to run and play in the aisle.  It's for that reason that I say if you don't have to fly with a toddler, then don't.'

It seems that whenever I have a little success story about Poppy's relatively docile comportment, people proceed to tell me about how it won't last for long.  A big bucket of misery is lurking just around the corner.  Coincidently, it was these same people who told me how difficult it was to have an infant: I won't get any sleep for months and months, it will be really taxing on my marriage, I will lose all interest in things like going to the gym and reading the New York Times which will be convenient since I will never have time to read it anyway.  It will take a full 9 months to lose the baby weight (I read that in Vicki Iovine's The Girlfriend's Guide to Pregnancy).  When I was pregnant, I began to get scared that 'when the baby comes', it will be all over.  Youth, hobbies, travel...nope.  All gone.

I know that we are lucky to have a baby who can focus on things and is generally content to do so.  I also know that I am very lucky to have the option to take care of Poppy O. instead of having to work.  Having said that, Poppy lays quietly in bed next to me while I'm reading The Times (I read one article aloud to her), she stares at me from her Bugaboo while I'm on the treadmill, and I'm sure that she'll do fine at Mommy's Day Out a few hours a week while I'm in class.  My point here is this: when you have a baby, it's the baby who is moving in with you.  It's okay to expect to be able to continue your own life alongside your baby's life.

Poppy's Strong Reaction to Music Together

'this isn't your favorite drum, is it?'

Music Together at Tiferet Israel was even more amusing than usual this week.  After having gone through the customary 'Hello Song' and 'Playin' in the Kitchen', Ms. Gila brings out the instruments.  This is fairly routine protocol.  The mommies are supposed to bang on the instruments in such a way that the babies can feel the rhythm or beat (I remain unsure as to what the difference is, but I think that's okay) of whichever song we are singing.

Poppy has just taken about one ounce of milk when the drumming circle begins.  In an effort to show off Poppy's new silver bracelet that we bought from the Native Americans in Santa Fe last week, I begin to tap her right hand on our borrowed drum.  I tap Poppy's hand to the beat of 'Biddy Biddy Bum Bum'.  

tap....tap....tap....tap....bla!!!!

(Refer to the action shot above for an excellent visual representation.)

Maybe this was a reaction to the new (and unsavory) florescent lighting in the classroom this week.  

'get me outta here.  this lighting does nothing for my complexion,'  -poppy.