learning

Just when I thought I knew how to manage life with a 17 month old, reality, that cruel mistress, slapped me in the face.

I should have known. I was foolish to think a trip with a toddler would go smoothly.

Day 1 in California: Blake throws up when the plane lands after a 5 and a half hour flight. Then again in our friend's car on the way to Evan's house. Then a third time in the car. And a fourth time once we get to the house.

Day 3 in California: Blake throws up in the car on the way to this. Needless to say we turn around and head for home. Unfortunately that means our friends who are riding with us don't get to go either. Oh, did I mention these are the same friends that picked us up from the airport? Ya.

Day 4 in California: Date night with Evan and airport pickup friends. Apparently Blake cries forever before he falls asleep.

Day 6 in California: The airport pickup friend watches my barf-tastic son for 6 hours. Oh, did I mention she has a 2 and a half year old? Ya.

Evan's brother gets married in a beautiful ceremony here.

Texts from concerned friends and family about the east coast earthquake while I'm in the middle of earthquake-ville.

Functioning on a 40 minute nap, Blake does pretty well at his first wedding reception. We duck out early, get a ride home from our friends who have seen way too much of the contents of my child's stomach only to find that the front door is locked. The front door that I was positive would be unlocked is locked. A few phone calls and swear words later, I manage to make way through a dark garage and find an unlocked door. Bath time and stories follow, and then Blake drifts off to dreamland and I start some laundry so we can return home with only few dirty clothes.

Rehearsal dinner. No vomiting. Cute dress.

 

Day 7 in California: We board the plane and Blake refuses to take a nap despite being exhausted. After 2 hours of trying to get him to fall asleep, he finally lays down on my arm and goes to sleep for the remainder of the flight. No barf this time. Thank goodness.

On our way home, in true New York City subway fashion, the train we need isn't stopping at the station at which we happen to be, so we have to figure out a different route home. After a ridiculous amount of stairs to walk down (stupid 4th Ave-9th St station), we get on the train that will take us within 2 blocks of home. But not before seeing a sleeping man stretched out along a seat on the train with his hand down his pants.

Welcome back to reality...and to Brooklyn.

(I promise there were some fun, non-barfing moments on our trip to CA. I'll save that post for another day.)

barf-tastic!

It's a known fact (among my friends and family) that I hate flying for various reasons. The biggest reason is turbulence. There's nothing like turbulence to make you repent of all your wrong-doings, swear you'll be a saint for the rest of your life, and plead with God that the turbulence will stop and that you will land safely.

Now, tied with the biggest reason I hate flying is this: barf. I guess Blake inherited my I-hate-anything-that-feels-like-a-roller-coaster gene. He hates the way elevators make his tummy feel. He doesn't really enjoy being thrown playfully into the air. And he HATES turbulence, just like his mom. This was made glaringly obvious when he spewed the contents of his stomach all over himself and me as we landed in Washington D.C. on Tuesday night. I could tell the turbulence was making him feel funny but had no clue that he was about to refund his dinner (and all associated snacks I had pumped him full of hoping to keep him happy during a 2 hour flight delay and 1 and half hour flight).

The flight attendants and cleaning crew were not too happy that this little 1 year old had ralphed all over seat 20C. But frankly, I couldn't care less. I had to wear said ralphage off the plane, walk through a crowd of people waiting to board the plane I had just flown in on, get my luggage, and change my clothes and my baby's clothes in an airport bathroom. As far as I'm concerned, they should be thanking me that I was able to make a neat little pile of his vomit on the floor. You're welcome, cleaning crew.

So, while I can't control turbulence or know exactly when Blake will get sick on a plane, I WILL be prepared next time. I will be taking a few gallon ziplock bags and have them as ready as I can in case this happens again. I just know the barf bags on the plane won't do the job I need them to do.

I'm also considering getting one of these, just in case.

Reasons I Hate Flying

1. Fear of the plane crashing. It's happened before and I'm sure the people on airplanes that have crashed thought it could never happen to them. But it did.

2. No matter what I do, by the time I get to my destination I look and feel like crap. I don't usually get dressed up to fly on an airplane. I try to be as comfortable as possible. But no matter how much time I spend on my hair, make up, and outfit I usually stop in the an airport restroom only to look in the mirror and wonder what happened.

3. Turbulence.

4. The headache and nausea I experience 75% of the times I fly.

5. Smallest bathrooms known to man.

6. No leg room.

7. Disgusting airplane air.

8. Possibility of my baby a)crying the whole time or b)barfing all over the place 5 minutes before the plane lands.  Blake did pretty well on this trip considering it was an all day adventure. Because Jetblue discontinued their direct flight from JFK to Richmond we have to go from JFK to Boston and then to Richmond. And that basically took us 11 hours to do yesterday. So I was pretty understanding when Blake was antsy the last half of our second flight. But when he projectile vomited right before we landed I decided that an all day flying adventure would not be in our future after this trip unless absolutely necessary. It was disgusting. And sad. Let's just hope that doesn't happen on our flight back when I'll be going solo. I'll keep the barf bag ready just in case.

nervous

I don't like flying, mostly because boarding a big metal bird o' death isn't at the top of my to-do list. But, I'd like to spend Christmas with my family and since driving there really isn't an option, I have to fly. I guess if I had a true fear of flying I'd just drive...or never go anywhere that was far enough to fly to. Look, I just don't like flying, ok!

Sorry, flying makes me nervous and now that the airports I'll be flying through have the new "this is what you look like with no clothes on" scanners*, I'm even more nervous. I've flown with Blake a lot and have a routine when it comes to making it through security. But that routine allowed me to carry Blake through the metal detector. With these new "hey she's got cottage cheese thighs" scanners*, I don't think I'll be able to hold Blake. Whenever I see people going through them they have their hands above their heads. Ummm, I have a baby and he currently doesn't possess the ability to hover in mid air so does that mean I'll have to go through the pat-down procedures? Honestly, I don't think I really care if someone looks at a black and white image of my love handles and other lady bits on a computer screen in a secure room. But, I do care if someone has to do a groin check on me, even if it's a lady.

On a recent trip I had to have a full body pat-down because something in my diaper bag... looked suspicious? The question mark is because no one told me why they were patting me down and rifling through my stuff. So a lady gave me the standard pat-down. But that was a few months ago and I think the new "standard" pat-down involves a lot more patting. So I'm thinking the hubs is going to have to take one of the team this time and get the pat-down (if necessary) because I'm flying back by myself with Blake so I know I'll probably be getting one that time around. I shouldn't have to be violated twice at Christmastime, should I?

So if you've flown with an infant and had to go through the new "Dang! Baby got back!" scanners*, let me know how it worked. Did you have to get a pat-down?

*I'm referring to the new full body scanners at airports that a lot of people consider an invasion of privacy. Check out the images they produce here.**

**I think they chose 2 really physically fit people for those images because I know my images aren't gonna look like that!

A note on rudeness

Dear lady I sat next to on the plane,

I could hear your phone conversation. I know you weren't talking to me, but you were sitting two inches away from me, so I could hear what you were saying. And I thought it was rude. Maybe I just don't have a thick skin, or maybe I just have manners and you don't. I knew you didn't want to sit by me when you gave me that nasty look as I politely smiled and shoved my diaper bag under the seat in front of me. Many people worry when they see a baby boarding a plane. "Oh no, will it sit by me? It's probably going to scream the whole time. Or, it's going to poop and I'm going to die from the smell," is probably what was going through your mind when you saw me checking which seat was mine. I understand. I prayed that my baby would sleep the whole flight, but I can't promise he will or that he won't make a peep. Was it really necessary for you to get on your phone before we took off and say, "Ya I'm in my seat. I'm sitting next to a baby." (long pause) "We'll see."? I gathered from your annoyed tone that the person you were on the phone with said something like this: "Ugh. Just your luck. Hope it doesn't cry the whole time. Or barf on you." Well, I think that was very rude of you to say with me sitting right next to you. I decided to just ignore you for two reasons 1) I'm sitting closer to you than I sit next to my own husband when we sit on our couch so I'm not really in the mood to argue about your rudeness and then have to sit next to you for an hour. 2) I don't need to apologize for having a baby and needing to use air transportation to get back home. You were a baby once. And frankly you were acting like a baby. If you wanted the perfect flight you should have bought all the seats around you to ensure that you didn't have to sit by someone who might disturb your magazine reading.
I could have been rude, too. I could have gotten on the phone and told someone that the person sitting next to me was taking up their whole seat and about 1/4 of mine. I could have asked one of the flight attendants if there were any open rows so I didn't have to sit next to you. But I didn't for 1 reason: you were the one that had a problem, not me. You can move yourself to a new seat.

Love,
your seat buddy (and the baby who slept the whole flight. You're welcome.)

this just in...

So I was checking my husband's email today (slow day at work) and saw that JetBlue gave us both $25 vouchers because of problems with the flight we were on coming back from CA. (the post below will go into great detail as to why this flight confirmed my detestation for flying) But hey, I'll fly JetBlue again knowing I have $25 towards a flight even if that means we have a little turbulence. The voucher is probably a result of a passenger complaining that the plane was an hour late and no one let us know what was going on. Looks like we'll be taking another trip soon! Where can we go for $50?

oh and did I mention I hate flying?

After my last trip back from VA, I decided flying in an airplane was at the bottom of my to-do list. This was probably because the crazy pilot decided it would be ok to drop from 25, 000 feet to 15, ooo feet in a matter of two seconds. For more on this story, scroll down. After much contemplation I decided that maybe I didn't like flying for more than two hours rather than not liking flying at all. I guess I imagined that the longer I am in the air the more time there is for something bad to happen. Like maybe four hours gives the engines just enough time to overheat and blow up sending little old Whitney plummeting to the ground as opposed to two hours where the engines stay nice and functioning.

Alas, I have confirmed that I do not like flying at all. I don't like waiting in the airport. I don't like rushing to line up when the plane is ready to board. I don't like sitting in a seat that is really designed for one butt cheek, not two. I don't like sitting by people I don't know. I don't like breathing airplane air. You would think that being so high up in the sky you would get some fresh air. No. You don't. I don't like the take off. It always feels like the butt of the plane is going to scrape the ground. I'm constantly thinking, "Get it up, get it up!" I certainly don't like having to yell my drink order at the flight attendant. Personally I try not to drink anything before and during a flight because there's no way I'm crawling over two people to use the tiniest bathroom known to man. But as of late I've felt nauseous while flying and need a little carbonation to settle the ol' tum tum. I don't like not being able to move at all. The whole seat reclining thing is a joke. You go from here, to here. (If you could see my hand it would be pointing straight up, then only slightly to the right but still basically up.) And don't get me started about the time my head was crushed when I tried to fall asleep on the tray table and the lady in front of me reclined her seat. I should have punched the back of her seat as hard as I could and said, "Oh by all means, take up the whole dang plane!" But probably the thing I hate most about flying is turbulence. If I were a pilot I would avoid turbulence at all cost. I would fly around turbulence. Actually if I were a pilot I would probably just keep the plane on the ground and drive to the destination. Do you know how big a plane is? Seriously. Who would stop us? I'm sure that pilots try to avoid turbulence as much as possible. But it seems like the last two flights I've been on have been turbulence bound. The last flight I was on got pretty bumpy towards the end. The flight was only an hour and a half long, but I felt like I was two minutes from death. The flight was ok because I got to watch TV (whoever decided to do the personal TV thing on JetBlue was a genius) so I wasn't really focusing on the big metal bird of death that I voluntarily boarded an hour ago. But of course the turbulence started. It wasn't just a few bumps. It was continuous bumping and dipping like you are driving on some back country dirt road that has potholes. At one point during the flight of death I could feel the wind pushing the plane. At this point I knew I was done. I just doubled over and put my head on Evan's lap. Of course he's cool as a freakin' cucumber. I bet if the plane was really spiralling out of control he'd still be saying, "It's ok. You're fine." while everyone else, including me, is screaming and trying to grab the oxygen masks from the ceiling. (by the way, are those oxygen masks real or are they just there to make you feel like you can still breathe?) Of course the lady next to me is looking at me like I'm crazy. I think she was a little nervous too. She actually took my seatbelt so when I sat down it was awkward having to act like I didn't notice that she had incorrectly buckled her seatbelt using my strap and try to dig under her for another flimsy strap of fabric that we all know isn't doing anything if that plane goes down. When I started to struggle to get the belt she said, "Oh, sorry. I don't know why it's like that." I wanted to say, "It's like that because you are sitting on your belt and grabbed mine by mistake. That's why it's like that. But we're all gonna die anyway. You might as well be strapped in for it." Anyway so we eventually land. I looked at Evan and told him I was never flying again. I don't care how far I have to drive, I'm not flying. But we all know that's not true.

Check out this website for turbulence info. I feel a little better about flying after reading some of the questions and answers. I still hate turbulence. http://www.geocities.com/khlim777_my/asturbulence.htm#More

"please return your seats and tray tables to their upright and locked position"

I really don't like flying. I know it's supposed to be safer than driving, but there's something about boarding a large metal bird and flying thousands of miles above land that makes me a little nervous. Maybe it's because I watch LOST and the images of people being sucked out of the back of a plane that has broken in half and falling into the ocean are burned into my brain. Anyway so flying is not my favorite thing to do. My husband and I were flying back from Virginia and we were landing in Denver and then on to Salt Lake. Of course there was a storm and the captain told us that it might get bumpy. As the plane descended through the storm there was a lot of turbulence. At one point the plane dipped down really fast. I grabbed my husband and buried my head into his shirt. The other passengers reacted by saying, "Wooooooooooooaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!" It wasn't the good woah when you are having the time of your life on a roller coaster. It was the type of woah when you think, "We're gonna die, we're gonna die, we're gonna die." Well at least that's what I was thinking. Of course Evan laughs at me for being so scared and the guy next to him is looking at me like I'm crazy. Maybe he was looking at me like that because he felt the same way and wished it was socially acceptable for him to react the way I was reacting. So we finally land but then we took off again twenty minutes later. So flying is still not something I want to do for a while.

On a lighter note, my husband stole my pillow last night...and I was sleeping on it! Usually after I get up he'll take it and use it along with his pillow. But last night Evan rolled over and pulled my pillow out from under my head. Of course this woke me up and I had to take it back. Of course he doesn't remember this and I swear it wasn't a dream. I'm 98% sure that it wasn't a dream. It was pretty hilarious.