duck ramp

Stuff is just pouring off the trees, being blown by the wind. I now know the taste of pollen—bitter, metallic. No ducks climb up the ramp. The fountain is off, the water still.

wanted: Pied Piper

I saw the mouse tonight. Once out of the corner of my eye, as it ran behind the stove. I said "yikes," or something to that effect and scared the kid. Rats. Maybe not the best choice of words...

After my daughter was tucked in I saw it again, darting across the nook off the kitchen, in that confused, scared, vermin sort of circular dash, and then behind the living room couch, I think. I got a really good look at it this time. This whole situation is grossing me out and pissing me off and all I can hear in my head is DeNiro as Capone, "I want him dead, I want his family dead..."
Yeah, I know, that's terrible to think, let alone type, right? Well, imagine finding mouse poop in the bottom of your toaster after you made your kid an English muffin. Try falling asleep at night imagining this little creature in your bedroom, in your child's bedroom, sniffing around for food, maybe setting up camp in her dollhouse. And what if he has friends? Shudder.

Last week I had the building come up again to look for the entry and they finally found it, after pulling out the kitchen cabinets next to the stove. I lived in a fool's paradise for a few days thinking maybe we actually had solved the problem without anybody getting hurt. So they didn't find all the holes or they sealed him in with us. Either way, this has got to end soon, and I'm afraid it won't be pretty.

Years ago, when I lived in Brooklyn and I had just moved upstairs in the building to a nicer apartment, I had a dream on one of my first nights in the place that my cat, Baby, had brought a mouse to me and was rubbing it against my cheek. It was soft. When I got up that morning there was a dead mouse in the middle of the kitchen floor. Gulp. I never saw another mouse in the house after that.
A few years after that, when I was living in Manhattan with M we had a recurring mouse situation, which he tried to solve with steel wool around the sink, etc. One night I felt myself being shaken awake by M. I was lying on my back, spread eagle, and there was my cat Henry, playing with a mouse on top of the covers between my legs. Yikes. We saw him playing with another mouse on a chair another night. After that, no mouse problem.

Unfortunately, Baby is long gone and Henry is now too old to probably help with this situation. He has lived in "the country" for the past year at my cousin's because the kid and I needed to remove all of our allergy triggers. I've been told that not all cats are mousers, so it might not help to even get a "loaner" when all that might accomplish would be runny and itchy eyes and congestion. And still, the mouse. Hopefully, mouse singular. And even more hopefully, not our uninvited guest for much longer.

kid tested?

There have been lots of alarms sent out lately about products made especially for children that are laced with horrible things like formaldehyde and carcinogens. There have even been some articles refuting these claims. Now I don't usually buy the Dora or Batman or other cartoon-tie-in bath stuff. My daughter has inherited my sensitive skin and we never use any bubble bath. I pour a tiny bit of Dove liquid soap as the water runs to give her some bubbles, but that's it. For shampoo I buy the No More Tears that I grew up on - how can that be dangerous? Sigh. I threw out the almost empty shampoo we had that was (of course!) on the dangerous products list and bought Burt's Bees and put it out of my mind.

Coincidentally a few days later during a bath we sprayed some detangler in her hair and when I wasn't looking she decided to give herself a spritz - on her head and face. When I looked the whole side of her face was bright red with a rash. Luckily a little calming cream took care of that, but it made me think about kid's products again and about marketing products for children (and their parents) and also the strength or dosage of those products.

I try to keep us as healthy as possible, but I don't want to overload my kid (or myself) with too many products. For the most part cleaning your hands with soap and water and just rinsing off in the tub is enough. I don't even think you need all that much soap when you bathe - it just dries out the skin, especially for dry skin types. Of course I'm supposed to then slather her with lotion when she gets out of the tub, many of which were on the no-no list, too.

When I was buying toothpaste for myself the other day I was trying to find just one toothpaste that didn't have extra whitening or mouthwash or peroxide or etc., etc., add-ons. My dentist told me I could buy a whitening toothpaste, but to only use it every once in a while - it's not a good idea to use it every day. When most people walk into CVS or Safeway are they thinking that they might be buying something that will erode the enamel from their teeth? No, they are just trying to have whiter teeth, because that's what we're all supposed to have, right? And I don't like Tom's toothpaste - whatever their mint concoction is, it actually irritates my gums, so "natural" products aren't always the answer. I finally settled on a toothpaste aimed at kids - it was the only one that had just fluoride in it, with no extras. So yes, I'm brushing with Crest Hannah Montana strawberry flavor. Or it might be cherry.

I have found that most over-the-counter allergy medicines are too strong for me, too, so I usually take the kid's doses or even products made especially for children. It's more than enough, and I don't get stuck with as many side effects. My daughter's pediatrician told me at our last visit that she only takes kid's products for her own allergies. This while she's writing a prescription nose spray for my kid. Hmmm...

I know that everybody's different and what might work for me and my family wouldn't necessarily work for others. I'm sure there are plenty of folks who can tolerate or can't get by without the "grown-up" medicines, whether OTC, or prescription strength. But I think we are going to try and dial down when we can all the "extra special" stuff that is available to us out there. Keep it as simple as possible.

crazy book lady...

...or bibliophile. That sounds less compulsive, doesn't it?

I needed to get the books out of my daughter's room, to see if that would effect or improve her allergy situation. Another in a long list of lifestyle adjustments for us both, which has included the exile of my beloved cat of fifteen years to the Virginia suburbs (sigh). But that's another story...

...so back to the books, and boy, there are a lot of them! I was able to get her books into a medium size bookcase and two small storage units for easy access. I also decided to move the three piles of "to-reads" from my bedroom out to the foyer as well, which is now our ersatz library. While I was doing all of this moving around I decided to take a little inventory and see if I could shed some - for donation or trade at my favorite used bookstore. Not a lot of luck. There were a few titles that my daughter was willing to pass on to a baby friend of ours, but not much more. And looking at my books, well, they are divided into quite a few categories, none of which I'm wiling to pare down yet either, if ever:

• My dad's books - not a lot, but some poetry (Wallace Stevens), astronomy and history titles that make me think of him
• Vintage children's books - from my mom's and my childhood, some are pretty fragile, some are pretty amazing (Many Moons, D'Aulaire's Book of Greek Myths)
• Travel and foreign language books - remind me of trips to Italy, Egypt, Greece and France. The travel guides are totally out of date, but...
• Mystery - mostly Agatha Christie from my mom and Lawrence Block from my dad
• Art, Art, Art - catalogs from exhibitions or featuring favorite artists and museums (Botticelli, Musée de Cluny, Bayeux Tapestry, Titian)
• Historical fiction - right now it's medieval England and France that's floating my boat (The Sunne in Splendour, Time and Chance, Mademoiselle Boleyn)
• Cookbooks - mainly Mediterranean Cuisine (The Frugal Gourmet Cooks Three Ancient Cuisines, Mario's Holiday Cookbook)

As I was looking at all the books, I started thinking about connections and how one thing leads you to another. Of course my art education has provided a background for my interest in Ancient and European art, culture and history, whether I have pursued this interest through fiction (Christian Jacq's Ramses and Stone of Light series) or non-fiction (Antonia Fraser's Wives of Henry VIII, Death in Ancient Egypt, Love and Hate in Jamestown). But anyway, I find that a movie or a television program like The Tudors led me to read more about the period. Reading about the Tudors made me want to know about the Wars of the Roses, which led me back to the Plantagenets and how it all started. As I read about the English I became more interested in France, as the two separate countries we know today were in those days completely intertwined. This brought back my trip to the Loire Valley, which was part of a tour of northern France. At the time I was not so interested in chateau after chateau, but now I realize that I was walking in the footsteps of Francois Premier, Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitatine as I strolled through Chinon and Angers, where I saw the amazing Apocalypse Tapestry. Of course now I want to go back to France and England, armed with my better understanding and reference points. The question is, once there, what will spark my fancy and lead me off on another thread, supplemented of course by books, books, books?

felix or oscar?

My daughter has inherited my allergies (sorry, kid.)

When I was a kid I loved to watch the Odd Couple on television. In New Jersey it was on a re-run schedule of I think, two episodes in the early evening. I loved both characters, and especially, the setting of New York City, where I hoped to live as an adult (and I did, for about fifteen years.) When I was first watching it I related to Oscar's sports columnist. I liked to write, too, but especially appreciated his ability to come up with the perfect wisecrack for every occasion. I could forgive him his Mets cap versus my beloved Yankees. I could never be as sloppy as Oscar, but surely I could never be as finicky as Felix, right?As I get older and my allergies change, I can hear myself almost honking as Felix would do. I also find myself relating to his fear of mold and dust and whatever else might lurk in Oscar's unbelievably messy bedroom.

The other day we were watching Clean House, which is the "wise-ass" version of many cable if-you-clean-up-your-stuff-you-will-clean-up-your-head shows. Sometimes these people's homes seem fake, as they are just too messy to be real. Except I know someone with a crazy house like that, and I'm afraid that they could use some mental spring cleaning, too. It reminds me of the Odd Couple episode "A Taste of Money" where the guys meet two older men, also roommates. One of the rooms in their apartment has been completely taken over by a gigantic rubber band ball. Felix looks at Oscar and says, "remind you of anyone?" I wish they'd put that show back into syndication...

Felix Unger: Everyone thinks I'm a hypochondriac. It makes me sick.

Oscar Madison: You want brown juice or green juice?
Felix Unger: What's the difference?
Oscar Madison: Three weeks.

Felix Unger: Oh, Oscar, Oscar, Oscar!