mothers on the verge

Me: What do you want to be when you grow up? Firstborn: (after a long pause) I want to be God. Me: (stifled mirth) Hmmmph. Maybe going to Catholic school wasn't such a good idea for Firstborn after all.

More from the Birthday Front: So as you know, I turned (bleep) last week on my birthday and had a surprise bigger than the fact my eyebrows appear to be graying. The Prince suggested I have a small party at our house that night and order some pizza and he would try and get home before it was over from work and grab a cake from the grocery. Surely you know me well enough now to know....I left many raging messages on my friend's voice mail and let him know what a negligent heinous man he was. My birthday came, we had pizza, he came home with a small bakery cake, and it left. Then he decided, "Hey. I'm a huge loser with a luscious wife. I need to invite a few people out for Saturday night and take her to some lame chain restaurant for her birthday." So he asked me to hire the babysitter. And told me not to dress up too much -- it wasn't that fancy of a place. Would you have divorced him yet? In the cab on the way to the restaurant (and we're late, by the way for

Well, another birthday hit last week - all I will say is that when asked how old I am I now answer: "I haven't decided yet." Lest anyone think that's an attempt to hide the fact I've headed over into the land of 40s, it is not. But I am truly trying to prepare myself for when that odometer ticks over. And yes, I don't have many more years to go. "Jeez," many of you will say. "What a lam-o MM is. Who CARES how old you are??" Uh, that would be narcissistic me. There are times when age is important. Getting a driver's license. Being able to marry someone without your parents permission. Buying a margarita (which I seriously need right now.) But I wish we just stopped counting. Because I can see over the hill (yes, pun intended) and I don't think it's going to be that pretty. I can smell ageism just ahead. And please, yes, it exists. So, I am going to stop counting. And given my penchant for forgetting people's names, I am hopin

I was sent this recently and it made me chuckle. Enjoy. Are you ready for children? Why didn't anybody warn us? Follow these simple tests before you decide to have children... Test 1 Women: To prepare for maternity, put on a dressing gown and stick a beanbag down the front. Leave it there for 9 months. After 9 months remove 10% of the beans. Men: To prepare for paternity, go to local chemist, tip the contents of your wallet onto the counter and tell the pharmacist to help himself. Then go to the supermarket. Arrange to have your salary paid directly to their head office. Go home. Pick up the newspaper and read it for the last time. Test 2 Find a couple who are already parents and berate them about their methods of discipline, lack of patience, appallingly low tolerance levels and how they have allowed their children to run wild. Suggest ways in which they might improve their child's sleeping habits, toilet training, table manners and overall behaviour. Enjoy it. It will be the

Well, I have heard from some of you -- and from YLM -- that I have been lame in not writing for nearly a month. And I agree. All I can tell you is that, well, I basically did one of my disappearing acts which when I was in my 20s would cause me to unplug my phone and not return calls for a week. My friends would think something had happened to me, and I would sit in my apartment and try to de-stress. I did the equivalent, except that when you're married, and you have a child and full-time work that it's almost impossible to do that. But clearly I managed to avoid here. Can't say that I have shed my stress coat, but I promise to at least and write more often. Nothing's lamer than a blogger who doesn't blog. I think I almost lost my membership.

Going out is something I don't do well anymore. I don't mean just venturing out of the house -I can manage that quite well if it's a jaunt to work, the school run or the shops - it's the proper going-out-in-the-evening-necessitating-dressing-up-a-bit-and-expecting-to-have-fun sort of going out I have a problem with. You know, the sort of thing you did a number of nights a week B.C. (Before Children) without any apparent difficulty. In those days staying in was something you had to do from time to time out of medical necessity and to avoid bankrupcy. Now staying in is the status quo and going out is fraught with issues. The first thing is that I'm too damned tired/ lazy to haul my behind off the sofa most evenings. I like the coziness of staying in with a movie and Alpha Male primed to cook dinner. I like the fact that the sofa has a dent in it that almost exactly matches the shape of my rear. I like being able to wear my nastiest clothes and not care (after all Alph

It's official. It's winter. The winter coat has made an appearance, I can't be bothered to shave my legs and I'm already starting to suffer the annoyance of tights (or hose for our American readers). Is is just me or is it a universal complaint that the crotch on a pair of tights always ends up halfway down the thighs by midday? And there's nothing less attractive than a thirty-something woman stopping in the street to hoist up their gusset. I don't suit winter. I don't suit summer much either (mozzie bites, sunburn, heat rash, frizzy hair) but winter is definately the worst. My face is a mottled grey and the skin on my body has dandruff, partly a loud protest about the shock of central heating and partly because I'm too tired to exfoliate. At least I can cover up from neck to toe. I'm always jealous of women who have lovely smooth skin all year round. The type that actively embraces the Christmas party season with a tiny black sleeveless dress and n