Inspired by my old roommate’s grilfriend – at 3:45 in the am.

quiet girls make the best lovers.
they express so much more than
the formulaic shrieks of the moaners.

you can read the quiet ones:
they way their breath quickens
the scarce gasp that escapes
the scrape of fingernails
and the legs that clutch

loud girls give the same
performance to everyone
and encores would be more aptly
named: re-runs
complete with
canned laughter
and perfected fade-outs

quiet girls have the charm
of an awkward silence;

loud girls fill voids
with obscene noise

quiet girls have a tender eroticism
wrapped about them,
fed on bedtime stories from
Ovid and Abelard.

loud girls have no mystery;
their primers are founded
on stale issues of Cosmo
and bathroom stall graffiti

and, when that quiet girl
finally escapes
from silence,
you will not question.
you will know.

8.7

I’ve known since September 28th that I was pregnant, and I still can’t really believe it.

We were having the TSTA social that Friday, and I expecting my period – I think all of my pregnancy optimism had been exhausted by this point. Thursday night, Gregg asked me how I was doing, and I grumpily replied that my period was coming – I was cranky and bloated and feeling a little crampy. Normally the conservative one, he surprised me when he said “You *know* your period is coming or you just *think* it’s coming?”

I know it probably didn’t mean anything to him, but for some reason, my stomach went to my throat. If he was being positive and optimistic, maybe I really was pregnant! I was so excited that I woke up at 4:00 am. I forced myself to stay in bed until 5:00, and then I took the test.

Positive.

I had all these grandiose plans on how I was going to break the news to Gregg, but instead I just woke him up bawling.
He made me take a few more pregnancy tests that day, one more on Saturday, and then *another* on Sunday before he finally admitted it.

So here I am. 8.7 weeks pregnant. Tomorrow marks the start of week 9.

I had been feeling ok up until this point, but I just in this last week, I started getting sick. No real throwing up, just nausea and food aversions. I’m hungry, but I don’t want to eat anything. Tonight, my meal of choice was corn flakes. Exciting.  I can also do pretty well with fruit, but anything with any substance queases my my stomach right up. I was totally expecting morning sickness to be a snap: get up in the morning, throw up, brush my teeth, and be superwoman the rest of the day. And then reality decided to bitch slap me. Oh, it’s not as bad as some people have it, but it was definitely a shock. I really wasn’t expecting it.

So far, we have had two ultrasounds – I have seen and *heard* the heartbeat – 160 beats per minute. We’ve told our parents, a few friends, but I think people are starting to suspect. I also have the hardest time keeping it a secret. I’m such a blabbermouth!

Right now, my plan to keep it on the down low for a few more weeks, and then go public with it the Friday before Thanksgiving – I don’t want to showboat people’s Thanksgivings with my news, and this way, I can break it to my school right before a week’s holiday.

So far, my due date is June 5th – a little Gemini. Not only are people already guessing on the sex, they are also taking bets on whether or not it’s a red head!

So that’s that. I’ll keep this unpublished until the reveal date, but for now, I’m off to take a nap. 🙂

A Little Overwhelmed

 

Everything was fine yesterday. I cleaned the shower.

Today? I can’t do anything. The problem is that while I have started to clean, it makes me want to get my bathroom in order. That means declutter the countertops. Easy job, right? Wrong. This requires storage baskets of some sort, which then requires me to buy something suitable for bathroom, but I don’t want to buy anything NOW that won’t go along with the bathroom decor that I want when I remodel the bathroom (whenever that’s going to happen).

First,I decided to start simple and just buy new hardware for the cabinets and some storage containers. And since I’m out, I may as well get a few new hand towels. Simple. But what color?

I then started to look at colors of paint (so I could at least decide what color I wanted my spa-like bathroom to be), but then that required me to know other design elements of my dream bathroom.

This is how my life gets out of control. This is why I can’t simply “clean a bathroom” – because it triggers obsessive personality. This is how I end up sick to my stomach, my bathroom still a mess, my bedroom a mess, and me crying over my shoebox bathroom decorations.

My plants

Can I just say that I love my backyard? Most of the time, it’s too hot for me to fully appreciate it, but today is a temperate 81 degrees, so here I am, admiring my backyard.

I have grand aspirations: I want a tropical paradise in Houston. This is what I have so far:

• potted Bougainvillaea
• potted Plumeria (never blooms, but has leaves)
• planted and potted Hibiscus
• planted Ginger (the standard green leaves)
• potted blooming ginger (love, love, love)
• potted Corn Plant
• potted Calla Lilies (hasn’t bloomed lately)
• planted Canna Lilies (aren’t as fast growing as I had hoped)
• planted Birds of Paradise (haven’t bloomed since I’ve moved in)
• pothos – planted in bog and is GIANT
• Aquatic Mint in bog
• Horsetail planted in bog
• purple Elephant Ear planted in bog
• planted Bottlebrush (first season of real flowering)
• Date Palm
• Red Banana Plant
• Dwarf Banana (lots of babies)
• planted Yucca (we can’t kill this thing)
• Aquatic Lilies

Plants that I would like to try:

• Sweet Olive tree
• more flowering ginger – including butterfly ginger
• more lilies
• more hibiscus
• more bougainvillaea
• more ginger

This is just for the backyard – I have high hopes for my front yard, side yard, and the back area behind the garage.

Other things that needs to get done for the backyard:

• Power wash the patio
• Stain the wooden furniture
• Get new cushions for the wicker chairs
• Trim giant shaggy bushes
• Fix the fairy lights on the oak tree
• Herb garden on the outdoor shelf
• More patio plants

Life.Life.Life.Life.

It goes on. Not much has been happening here. We started doing a little accupuncture. We’re trying to get rid of the processed foods in our diet (harder than it sounds). And we have rats in the attic.

An eventful time in the Riley household.

We have a new cat, Okie, that ran in the house a little over a year ago and she became Gregg’s cat. I also bought a car, so we are now a two car family. 🙂 Gregg has been doing really well at work – he’s been keeping a little *too* busy, in my opinion.

He spent last weekend in Vegas with friends, and we are going to be able to spend Spring Break together. Don’t know if we are going anywhere or if we are just going to have a staycation. I’d love to zipline to the treehouse “hotel” off in the Hill Country, but we haven’t made any plans just yet.

 

I’m still here.

There’s this proverbial doubled-edged sword that comes along with blogging: there’s part of me that doesn’t want things to be kept secret or hidden and I would be perfectly happy with a no-holds barred blog. But there are more people involved than just me. I don’t want to be

 

So what do I do? Create yet another anonymous blog (which I’ve already done) and start another half-assed project, or just continue to use this as a emotional vomitorium?

 

I have no idea. Blast technology.

And, it’s done.

I’m really and truly done – graduation was Saturday, and instead of walking, I had a party here at my house. Last night, the “diploma” came in the mail – may as well have been a cracker-jack box for all I care.

I’m a member of the Lamar Academic Partnership group of Facebook, and someone has the nerve to post the question “Who’s going on for their doctoral degree?” I almost wet my pants.

Do they really think that the program that we just went through PREPARED them for a Ph.D. (or Ed.D.)? Then, someone said that Lamar was actually thinking of doing their own program. Yeah, right, No way in HELL that I am going to be the guinea pig for that program. How long as this Academic Partnership Program been going on and they can’t get that crap right.

I also caught Lamar in a few more lies. I finished my ILD training in March, and was trying to register for the TExES test, and contacted Lamar with my ILD information. I was told that I would have to send over (via gmail) my TEA number and my SS number. I responded back with my TEA number, and said I didn’t feel comfortable giving my social out over e-mail: was my TEA number sufficient? A few days later, I got an e-mail that told me to call “R” to get this taken care of.

While on the phone to “R”, she explained to me that I could have just sent them over my TEA number. I said that I did. *pause* “Well, that e-mail wasn’t to me.”

YES, IT WAS!

In any case, I’m all ready to take the TExES test next month. Wish me luck!

Old routines

Last update in January! I’m slacking.

Actually, I’m not. I’m done with my Lamar classes. Took my practice TExES Exam in Beaumont. Completed my ILD training. Still working full time. Keeping the house clean(ish). Going to write curriculum for 12th grade ELAR this year. Still working on ELAR newsletter.

I think I’m missing some things, too.

Allergies are killing me. It’s that time of the year in Houston when everything is covered with that thin line of greenish-yellow foam.

Got to see Andy on Wednesday when Gregg and I went to Houston. He went to Texas Workforce Solutions again, and again it was a waste of his time. Being back down in Houston, I remembered how much I miss it. Specifically, hanging out with my friends and walking to the Icehouse. Oh, well. Adulthood is all about compromises, right?

Spring Break has come and gone – I go back to work tomorrow. What did I do all break? Work on ILD. I spent some time at the pool on Monday, but that was pretty much it for me. It’s 3:12 now, and I still have cleaning I want to get done. Sometimes I feel like a single mom, without the kids.

Just taking a quick break from laundry and cleaning the bathrooms. I guess it’s back to work for me.

Teeth Grinding

I had fully intended on working on my portfolio tonight, but I’m so upset with Lamar right now that I don’t even want to open the damn program.

I’m trying not to infect Facebook with my loathing, but it’s so hard for me to resist posting nasty comments in the Lamar Academic Partnership student group. I have to refrain from posting updates every day about my status with Lamar. I grit my teeth everytime I see a post about December graduation. I sit on my hands in order to hit “reply” when I get e-mails promoting Lamar.

I am really trying hard not to be “that person”. But I think I am failing.

After much considerating, I think I am going to make an official ethics complaint. I don’t think anything will happen of it, but at least I have the complaint in writing. I don’t even know if what I am experiencing is a true ethics violation or just gross incompetence, but I suppose I’ll let the ethics committee figure that one out.

Degree in December?

Las thing I heard on Friday is that my contact from State U. is still waiting to hear back from the Lamar people, but she suspects that I’ll be in my last class this December.

Honestly, I still don’t understand why I can’t just transfer credit over – I’m sure it’s a money issue, even though they gave some students a $500 “scholarship” so that their first class would be free.

I know the title is misleading because even if I take this class in December, I don’t think that means I’ll have my degree by then. I still have to take my comps and finish my portfolio (which I’m scared to work on until I actually get back into the program – I really don’t trust this institution).

I just want to get it all over and done with and cut all ties with this program. I can’t even bring myself to say the word “university” because it’s not. At least the Academic Partnership aspect.

Taking the class in December of 2009 is much better than December of 2010.