Übergeek

I found this website on the Haragen's blog. Being married to Christoph I always wondered how much of a geek I truly am. I must say I was a little pleased with the results. 51% isn't bad. Then Christoph took the test. Oh my gosh! He scored 93%! They designate that as supreme nerd, while I am only lightly nerdy. Maybe I'm only as geeky as I am from living with him for the past (almost) seven years. I suppose I'll never really know.

My only beef with the test is the designation of nerd. While Christoph and I were dating, he quite seriously informed me that there is a difference between a nerd and a geek. They are not the same thing, as the layman might think. My personal definition is a geek has all the intelligence of a nerd, is perhaps a little more tech savvy, with none of the social awkwardness. So I have decided to change my husbands designation from Supreme Nerd to Übergeek. (Insert cheesy romantic sigh here) My hero!

Caffeine, the bitter-sweetness

I'm writing this post at the risk of opening myself to a barrage of criticism. Although, just saying that is probably really flattering myself. I don't think I have enough readers to get too criticized. :)
The other day the girls and I were running around town doing errands. It was way past lunchtime and we hadn't eaten so I swung by Burger King. Emily chowed down her chicken nuggets and kept saying she was thirsty. Since I had nothing else to offer her, I made an exception and let her have a sip of my Coke. In my defense I will say that she had no soda before the age of two and has had very little since. So, she takes a big sip and hands it back to me, then says, "That drink makes my eyes watery, Mommy. Does it make your eyes watery?" It just struck me as so funny. How many times have I taken a big drink of ice cold Coke and had my throat burn and my eyes water? Too many to count. Does it stop me? No, no a thousand times no. Emily, by the way hates to have her eyes water. She avoids it like the plague. It just made me think and wonder about the thousands, or maybe just hundreds of things we do that cause us some discomfort, but the reward causes us to do them anyway. Life is funny.

Can't...Look...Away

I was driving to work the other day listening to NPR and a spot came on that I found amusing and at the same time very weird. I will issue a warning right now, I quote "More than a million people around the globe have been sucked in by an anime clip on the internet." This song does get stuck in your head. There. You can't say I didn't warn you. Continue at your own risk. I must admit my intrest was piqued. So, once I got home I looked it up and found the actual clip they were talking about. Oh my gosh. It really is true! It sucks you in. Maybe it was my linguering post-pregnancy brain fog. Maybe it was just that it was after 10:00pm, but I just couldn't look away. In a sick way it's almost relaxing. Apparently people are actually taping themselves going into a trance watching the thing. I also find it interesting that it is most popular in Russia. I'm not sure what that means, but I love the closing line of the article.

"This is basically a joke for someone who spends all of their time staring at a computer, made by people who spend all of their time staring at a computer. It's possible to read deeper meanings into it, but it sort of defeats the purpose because in the end it's just this hypnotic clip of animation."

I'm not sure which is sadder, people video taping themselves staring at a anime girl spinning a leek and singing, or people wasting brain cells trying to figure out deeper meanings to some random video clip. Sometimes all you can do is shake your head and laugh.

New Eyes

Have you ever seen the movie Dumbo? It's always fun to see old movies from my childhood from an adult perspective. You notice things that never stood out as a child. Emily was watching Dumbo a couple of days ago and suddenly the lyrics of the opening song really stuck out. I heard Look Out For Mr Stork and just started laughing. Always before I've been focused on the cute scenes of Mothers being united with their new babies. This time I thought of certain friends who are childless and determined to stay that way, which made me laugh even more..."don't try to get away, he'll find you in the end". Christoph sees me grinning and pipes in, "We're currently employing a Stork radar interceptor". Oh, Geez. And yet, it's true. Can't have Mr Stork making his deliveries too close together. However, I do love the two bundles we've gotten so far!

Speaking of Dumbo, there is no other movie that can make me cry quite as easily. The scene with Dumbo visiting his Mother while she's locked up gets me every time. I never used to cry this easy before having kids. When I started college I could count on one hand the number of movies AND books that had made me cry. Then when I was pregnant with Emily it started. I cried watching Veggie Tales, Rack ,Shack and Benny (Jr Asparagus singing the song his Mother taught him). I figured, I'm pregnant, it's the hormones. Well either the hormones never got back into balance or being a Mother just opened me up to a whole new emotional level. Seriously, it gets a little pathetic when TV commercials make you cry! You should have seen me pregnant with Katrina, trying to read Emily a book about becoming a sibling. I paused, trying to get myself under control, and she looks at me and says, "Is the story over Mommy?" Poor kid, no wonder she was a bit apprehensive about getting a sister! Luckily I can always count on my sympathetic husband to put things into perspective. We were considering trying a new form of birth control and I had expressed concern with it potentially causing mood swings. He came home one afternoon to find tears running down my face because of some sappy scene in a cartoon Emily was watching, and says, "Well, this will give us a basis of comparison for the mood swings you were worried about." Good point, honey.

That's ok. As long as I can still laugh at myself I know my occasional cloud bursts won't drive Christoph crazy. Just don't get me started on forgetfulness after having kids!