Six years ago today I was in the hospital giving birth to the monster baby (9 lbs., 1 oz.; 21-3/4" long).

I'm never particularly sentimental about my kids getting older and especially not with Madalyn. Due to her amazing size and her maturity she's always seemed older than she was, making her birthdays rather anti-climactic. Instead of, "I can't believe she's turning X" it's more like, "I can't believe she's only just now turning X" because she's seemed that age (or older) for a couple years already. So you won't find me sniffling about her being the big oh-six today. It feels like she's been with us much longer, our pre-kid days being but a distant, fuzzy memory anymore.

We are having a party at the local family fun center this afternoon. Laser tag will be played, pizza will be consumed, and all the kids who are smart enough to show up will be taking home an enormous haul of party favors which cost an obscene amount of money per child. Perhaps I will post a picture later of the set of favors each child gets. Probably I should refrain from providing visuals and be embarrassed at being so elaborate in overcompensating for the fact that we didn't give her a party last year. Whatever. I'll figure it all out later.

The theme of the party is "Pink Poodles in Paris" and everything is bedecked accordingly. Poodles and Eiffel Towers abound. The sad thing is I think I'm as excited about it as she is. We've had this theme picked out for about a year-and-a-half now and I'm glad we finally get to do it.

The presents are in order, as well. The major item is a FIsher-Price kids' digital camera, which I'm hoping will be a hit. She's also getting a computer game, books, a board game, a card game, Moon Sand and a Leapster game. I steered clear of toys as we have more than we know what to do with, 75% of which don't get played with regularly, as it is.

All in all, it's shaping up to be a good day for celebrating this girl who came along and changed our lives for the better.

This just goes to show how much of a geek I am -- not a geek in a cool, technology-savvy way, I mean like a totally hopeless nerd-type. I am sitting in Panera Bread, blogging. And trying very, very hard not to grin like an idiot and/or bounce up and down in my seat because, y'all: I'm ONLINE. At a RESTAURANT. Will wonders never cease?

So sue me. I have a more-than-three-year-old desktop for my primary computer. It doesn't even have a DVD player, let alone burner, for crying out loud. It's not that I'm anti-technology. I'm actually quite a gadget fiend. If a new product comes out and it does something really cool, chances are I'll either buy it, or I want to. I'd have loved to have had a new computer quite a while ago. Finances just haven't permitted and I've just been glad I had something with lots of free space on the hard drive that could get me online without any problems.

But recently Robert took loan of a new-ish laptop. It's a long-term loan; its owner was given a brand-new laptop for free and she offered to let Robert use this one. Very handy, as Robert's office computer is a thousand-year-old boat anchor that he found in the basement of his parents' old house (origins unknown). Plus with him going to the panhandle to work so much now it's perfect for him to have something he can take along. He can have all his documents with him on the laptop and also get online from the hotel room when he spends the night. It was handy, that is, before I appropriated it.

Week before last I unplugged the old desktop, which has become riddled with viruses, with the intention of taking it in for repairs. Robert let me keep the laptop at the house so I could still get online for as long as the desktop was MIA. However, Staples wants the original discs that came with it and I have yet to locate them (not that I've been looking that hard). And so my posession of the laptop has drug on for a couple of weeks now. It's not that I'm purposely taking my time in order to keep the it; I just lack motivation to return it to Robert. I'm enjoying being able to sit on the couch and be online and the portability factor is, like, way cool.

Soon we will be getting a big, fat check for a case that Robert referred which has now settled and one of the things part of it is (and has been) earmarked for is a laptop for me. I can't wait. Just think! More inane blogging from upscale bakery chains could be coming to you soon!

It's a common subject of discussion between mothers how one's own children can be so vastly different from one another. I know why children who share the same gene pool, the same environment, and the same parentage turn out to be entirely different people -- it's nature's way of keeping their parents from getting becoming too self-satisfied with their own parenting skills.

You have your first child, you do things a certain way because you are convinced it's the best way, and things turn out pretty well. You begin to get a bit big-headed about it, thinking, "Behold! See what I and my superior parenting skills have wrought!" Then, inevitably, child #2 comes along and those unrivaled credentials do not produce anything close to the same results. Mother and Father are humbled, Child #1 continues to behave beautifully, as she would've naturally done even if she'd been raised by a pack of wolves, and Child #2 wreaks havoc and runs everyone ragged. It's the natural order of things.

Not that I know from experience, or anything.

It had been hanging on by a thread for a week, she too chicken to let anyone remove it and Mama too squeamish to really press the issue. Of late, it had begun sticking out at odd angles, giving the impression that the child should be appearing shoeless, wearing overalls, with a straw sticking out of the corner of her mouth.

But today we are pleased to announce its departure, thanks to a lunchtime hotdog. Whereabouts of tooth are unknown, which isn't all bad as it saves the Tooth Fairy a trip (the dumb broad is clean out of cash right now, anyway).

My apologies, in advance, to anyone with fertility problems who might read this and think I'm horrible and ungrateful. I'm thrilled to bits to have a new baby coming. It's what I wanted and hoped for. So don't get me wrong, here.

But, my God, I am SO DAMNED GLAD that, in 25 weeks, I will be done being pregnant and will NEVER have to do it again!!!

I have never been one to get goopy and sentimental over being pregnant. To me it has always been a means to an end. The first trimester has always sucked. There's a brief period during the second trimester, after I get over being sick and before I get enormous, that is kind of interesting and neat, but it doesn't last long. I pretty much spend the majority of the 40 weeks wishing it was over already. This time is no exception. I thought that, in light of what happened last fall, and the fact that I really wanted another baby, and that this is my last pregnancy, I might experience a change of heart but......no. Pregnancy still is basically just a necessary evil. It is no more fun this time than it has been the other two times. Perhaps even less, as this is the sickest I've been out of all three. This gestating? It's for the birds (who've got it right with the whole egg-laying thing).

Every time I find myself hanging over the sink yet again I just keep telling myself, "You'll never have to do this again. In 5.5 months you'll have an adorable little baby and you'll never have to do this again!"

"What if something happens to Robert, God forbid, and you remarry?" people ask. After all, being that he's all old and stuff, you never know. I sure can't pretend to know what the future holds. My answer to that, though, is one word:

A. DOP. TION.

I will not do this again; I just won't. I've passed on my DNA three times now. I know how it turns out: well. I manufacture some pretty fine specimens, if I do say so. I have both genders represented. There is nothing left for me to wonder about. I feel 100% confident that my gestating days will be over, come March 2007. I am happy, nay, ecstatic, with this conclusion. There is no doubt in my mind about sending Robert merrily off to Doctor Snippy in the spring to have permanent steps taken. And, okay, let's say something did happen to him (God forbid, knock wood and all that). Even if I moved quickly I would be, what, 35 by the time I remarried? You've got to shut the factory down at some point. I'm worn out trying to do this again at 32; I don't care to try it at 36, 37, or beyond. Fuhgeddaboutit. I would kind of like to have my kids out of the house while I'm still young enough to have a little fun.

So, yeah. 25 weeks and counting. I hope my uterus enjoys its last big hurrah.

I hate Ticketmaster. I hate them, I hate them, I hate them. Surely they are breaking some sort of anti-trust laws and need to be investigated, convicted and then systematically dismantled. There is some seriously unethical stuff going on at that company, not to mention that they just generally SUCK.

I figured out what a piece of sh** this company was back when the Paul McCartney debacle happened. For anyone who missed it, tickets for most Paul shows for his tour last year were unavailable from the first minute they allegedly went on sale. Thousands of people were on their computers the exact second the tickets went on sale and could not get tickets -- ANY tickets, even crummy ones. Ticketmaster claimed tickets were "unavailable". Funnily enough the scalpers had plenty to go around.

Today I am trying to search for tickets for a Christmas show in Dallas that I might want to go to with Madalyn. I wasn't sure exactly how the show was listed so I guessed twice, doing a search for the words I thought were included in the title. After two searches the Ticketmaster website locked me out "as part of the effort to prevent automatic (buying) programs from being used". After TWO searches it did this. It then suggested I wait "several minutes" before trying again. It has now been twenty minutes and I am still locked out. That's right, scalpers can somehow secure large blocks of seats for any show they want and yet I am not allowed to even look for the tickets I want because I accidentally searched for the wrong thing twice.

Can someone tell me how a company like this remains in business?

If there really is such a thing as karma, Ticketmaster will go down in flames sometime in the next couple of years. I do hope they bury it in some kind of grave so that I can go dance on it.

Okay, so we've established that I am, indeed, mad krazy.

Consider, however, that there are some perks. For example we will be making a side trip to Chicago's Field Museum to see none other than King Tut himself! Well, his stuff, anyway. For those of you who don't know, this is the first time any Tut artifacts have been allowed out of Egypt since the 70's. This exhibit is twice as big as the 1970's version; many of these items have never been outside of Egypt. It was a huge success on its previous tour; back then people stood in line for up to 8 hours to get in and see it. Thanks to modern technology that won't be an issue. The tickets are issued with an entry time on them so you just show up at your appointed time and go right in. The Field Museum has sold over 730,000 tickets to this exhibit!

So, you see, there will be some reward for the hours of torture....ah, I mean, "family togetherness". For an ancient Egypt buff like myself it will be worth the hassle just to see the exhibit. I mean, really, how many times in your life do you get to see something like this in person?

Still, though....would it have killed us to consider flying? Geez.

Who elects to make a 14-hour car trip with a five-year-old and three-year-old in tow? Have we lost our minds? Or, rather, have I lost my mind? It was my idea!!

Just a little pre-trip freakage brought to you by MapQuest. The longer I study the map the more horrified I become. Conversion van with television or not, this is going to be one. long. damned. day.