I am Over the Cell Phone Shaming

Okay apparently I have more crabbies to get out. This one has been brewing for a while.

So suddenly (well, gradually) everywhere in my life, there are signs prohibiting cell phone use in x or y or z situations. My OB's office has them in the waiting room. So does our pediatrician's office. Actually almost every medical provider I can think of. Also, waiting in line to vote. Restaurants where one might procure takeout, or feel like eating a quiet lunch alone.

And the new director of the girls' preschool requested in her back-to-school letter (yes, months ago, yes I am still annoyed) that parents refrain from cell phone use while we drop off and pick up our kids. Her reason? Not because it slows down pickup/lines (which I could allllmost understand), but because our little ones are excited about their days! And want us to listen to them!

Ummmm y'all, did I just get parenting shamed about my phone? Not cool.

Of course it's nothing new, the whole "dear mom on her iphone at the playground" open letter trope is done and re-done and done again. Phone shaming isn't news. I think I'm just officially... over it.

Look, I get to determine which ways and times are good for ME and MY kid to communicate. MOST people are not ignoring their kids at school pickup to text or tweet (any more than if they are having a real human conversation with a fellow parent or a teacher or flirting it up with the cute dad in the hallway), but if they were, and their kids learn that sometimes mommy is talking to someone else and it'll be their turn in a sec (because OTHER PEOPLE ALSO EXIST), then... that is okay.

Also, if you're the kind of parent who is legitimately ignoring your kid at a time that is legitimately harmful or hurtful to said kid, then that is not a PHONE issue, that is a HUMAN issue, and people blaming the phone is a cop-out.

ALSO. If I am waiting on YOU, I get to use my waiting time how I want. This goes for waiting in preschool pickup times and medical offices alike. I'm sure it would be more CONVENIENT for the doctor if, when he came into the room, I was standing with bated breath, questions at the tip of my tongue, children patiently silently nearby. But, dear physicians of America, YOUR convenience and time is not more important than mine* (it isn't! I promise! it really isn't!) and if I have to wait twenty minutes for my appointment, I will treat that time as MINE. If, after my loooong wait for you, you have to hold on four seconds for me to put my phone away when you come in, YOU WILL SURVIVE.

(Again: having patients who cannot or will not disengage from their phones for a whole appointment, or who miss their name being called when they are distracted, or whatever - those are HUMAN problems, not PHONE problems.)

My friend A'Dell wrote last year that her take is: anywhere it's socially appropriate to read a book or magazine, it should be socially appropriate to use a phone. Lines, waiting rooms, airport lounges, traffic jams, etc.

Actually you should just go read that whole post because I basically agree with every word, and she is such a good ranter. Get on board, folks. The future is now, etc etc.

*No really. It isn't.

Seven, No Ten Quick Takes

1.) Anneliese picked out a new winter hat with some Amazon birthday money. Raise your hand if you never could have guessed she'd pick one like this:

2.) I took Nathan on a date to the symphony last weekend. It was a super crappy day and a really lovely break from the super crappy day. He was cellodorable, admiring all the instruments.

3.) I read the Astronaut Wives Club this weekend and it's far from brilliant writing -- mostly a series of vignettes about the first astronaut families in the sixties -- but I didn't need it to be a great novel, I was totally captivated anyway. I am now craving anything about the space race, I kinda want to watch Apollo 13 tonight, and I can't stop wikipedia-ing all the folks for a dose of Where Are They Now. Also I want to go back to the space center at Cape Canaveral (Mark and I visited in 2010 and it was great, but I think it would be even more great for me this week). 

So yeah, I'm hoping they make this into a tv show as has been promised (then delayed, but we'll see). The stories might actually tell better as a series instead of a book.

4.) Anneliese and Ali and I went for a fall walk a few days ago, just as the leaves were starting to change. You would not believe all the things a five-year-old has to tell her infant cousin about leaves changing, but it's a lot.

5.) We closed the pool last week and I miss it already.

6.) Nathan just read the "junior novel" version of the Lego movie and he seems to have internalized its message differently in print than on the screen. He now considers himself a Master Builder and keeps building things and telling us how he VISUALIZED them and that's how he designed them and oh man it cracks us up. (In a good way! He is sweet and smart. I'd hire him for all my aeronautical engineering needs, and no I'm not kidding.)

PS I got a haircut and highlights, as per my pre-birthday usual.

7.) After the slowest loudest construction project in the history of history, and many early-morning and late-night trips in my PJs to fuss at workers causing a ruckus outside of approved times ("I know you're just doing your job, but WE LIVE HERE" = me, sick of hearing myself talk), the house across the street is finally done! It was featured in a Parade of Homes thing, so we went to check it out, and it was nice in the way that fancy houses are always nice, but not our taste at all: some odd mashup of clean/modern and also totally dowdy. It's hard to explain. But anyway, if you want to live directly across the street, the house has a million dollar view!

Yes really.

8.) A few weekends ago when I was in Charlotte, I stopped at Ikea for some new cubes/shelving, which are lovely. (I got a teal cube system! TEAL! For my bathroom! Which I am now 99% sure won't fit but whatever, it's TEAL.) While I was there I also got Anneliese a new duvet, which I have been wanting for her since we rearranged all the bedroom furniture in our house A YEAR AGO, but the one I coveted for years before that has been discontinued, and anyway I never could find one that I liked AND she liked, and then this happened at Ikea, and now she has a very Anneliese bed.

Here is a thing I absolutely did not need but absolutely wanted, and I didn't buy it, but I'm pretty sure I might. It's a neon yellow stool! I mean, I need that, right? Someone talk me into it. Where should I put it?

9.) I have a new-ish phone case, and I love it. This is called a Loopy Case. It is just a case, with a loop in the back, which you can adjust to fit whatever finger you want. It is so simple and SO GENIUS.

It helps me hold my phone much steadier (I was a two-hand typer on my bigger android, and the smaller iphone is still an adjustment - slightly too small for two hands, but slightly too big for one -- and this makes it totally doable). It also means I never drop my phone on my face in bed anymore YES THAT IS A REAL THING. It also means I can knuckle it on the back of my hand and also carry a kid/purse/car seat, which keeps me from sticking my phone in my pocket instead, and that's always a good thing.

PS with the loop on the back you can stand it up for such purposes as alarm clocking. Or facetime dates. Or everyone trying to watch a video at the same time.

Anyway I love it, and I get asked about it all the time, so I am blogging about it. (My first one cracked, and I emailed them and they sent a new one -- with the loop holes now slightly offset, in their updated version, which I think will prevent that stress fracture from happening again -- and anyway with the recplacement they sent me an EXTRA. It's black, and I have a pink and a purple and a gray loop for it, so if you have a 5c and you want it, tell me and it's yours.)

10.) This post barely mentions Charlotte, but she's still the best Booler ever, so here, enjoy a delightful picture Mark took of her swinging out back.

Yes, she is wearing a sundress and some shorts and a tutu. Why, what do YOU wear to go swinging?

Some Other September Things

Here are some other things we did in September (alternate title: let's take a journey through my phone's camera roll) --

One Friday night when Marky was working, the kids and I made popcorn and turned the lights off and snuggled on the couch and watched a movie together. We had never seen Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs. It was delightful.

I snuggled with Ali a lot. Because she is also delightful. She's turned into a super happy baby recently. I'll take it.

We took a lot of pictures at the bus stop. Some days, even in non-yellow shorts.

(Anneliese now has a carpool ride two days a week --
they pick her up from N's bus stop!)

Anneliese learned to brush her own hair and suddenly she's a teenager.

Charlotte did her first round of swim lessons. She can't swim on her own yet but she also didn't poop in her swimsuit at all, so that's a hearty win.

Nathan got a bad case of swimmer's ear (seven years! three kids! our first ear infection!) and we barely slept for several nights and he was generally miserable and in pain but it's over now.

I did some more preschool homework FTLOG.

Another Nathan came for a weekend to visit, he and Mark shucked some corn fresh from Minnesota and grilled dinner and we played with the kids and ran errands and it was all right and normal and good, and then we waved bye til next time.

Anneliese and I painted our toes yellow.

We set up Mark's old phone with Nathan's email so he has a way to text/call us (through google hangouts) and we can leave him home alone for an hour or so when we need to. One night he was home doing his homework and practicing, while I hopped over to church for a few minutes for preschool orientation, and Mark had the girls at dance. This is what texting with a seven-year-old looks like:

Anneliese's cutie friend Beatrice has been with us for a few afternoons, and as always, we love having her around. (Especially when she can pull some cheerfulness out of Anneliese these days.) We decided these two are competing for the best-dressed award at the weekday school.

Charlotte got in the habit of wearing a cape to go poop. Like you do.

Nathan graduated out of his first cello (from this eighth-size to a quarter-size, coming soon). He's very excited but I am mostly sad. His first cello! Aw. I will miss this tiny sweet thing.

Some Things I Have Been Mulling

Here are some things I have been mulling in my head this week (brace yourself, this is bound to be profound) (*shakes head no*):

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I do think overall, I like my iphone better than my android phone, but that is MOSTLY because of imessage. And it isn't that imessage is inherently better than anything else, it's just that everyone else is on it, so it is therefore convenient. Herd mentality something something. And the stream/cloud photo sharing feature is also kind of great. I find myself using that a lot with various people.

BUT I will say these things about the iphone vs my old android:
1. The camera is not better.
2. The battery frankly sucks.
3. The auto-correct on the keyboard thinks it is super smart but it is not as helpful as it could/should be, and not nearly as smart as the android spelling corrector.
4. I am about to have a big ol' fight with my home button, because I have one of those glass screen protectors on it, which means I need a button cover, yet good button covers (which go flush against the curve of the button DO NOT EXIST. Can someone please get on this?
5. Why can you not purchase content from within the kindle app? (Or even link to the mobile site to do it?) (Or purchase downloadable content from the Amazon app?) Stop forcing me into Safari! Just whyyyy?
6. I have this new chevron case for my phone (my other one got dyed blue in my jeans pocket and I keep forgetting to run it through the dishwasher), which is cute but cheap and hmmm I'm still deciding.

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These are all very first world housewife problems, so I should share here with a pic what I already told facebook: Charlotte dropped a crayon in the potty while she was pooping the other day, in case you think three-year-olds don't have problems too. (Like... nine seconds after I took this pic.)

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Nathan has been asking a lot of questions about coffee recently. Like, how to make it. And what is that brown dirt stuff in the bag? And then trying to clarify it all -- so, the brown stuff is the coffee, and the water you pour over the brown stuff is just water that tastes like coffee, but that's not the actual coffee, just the coffee you drink? When I told him the coffee itself was actually ground-up beans that had been picked and then cooked, it blew his little mind. We had to look up a YouTube video. Coffee comes from farmers! So does chocolate! It's also beans! And they look very similar as a plant but then they make foods that look very different by the time we eat and drink them, and isn't that cool mom? And sometimes you can put coffee in chocolate! -- so anyway, now he calls it my liquid coffee which isn't actually coffee, just water that tastes like coffee because you poured it over some ground up beans. "Are you going to drink more coffee mom? Like the liquid kind." Yes, sweetie. People know what you mean when you say drink coffee. In related news, BUDDING PEDANT UP FOR GRABS, LOVES WEEKEND VISITS.

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Also, those look like children who need their own tervises, yes? They want to drink coffee "coffee" like mommy, which is sweet and I will indulge it forever, but maybe I don't want my cups all dirty every day, and maybe we should find some kid-sized ones and splurge, finally? I think I shall procure them for Christmas maybe.

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Everyone else is using the Timehop app, right? This app really speaks to my soul, since I have basically been my own walking Timehop for years. I've been using it for some time, like (I assumed) everyone else in America. But then I mentioned it to a friend, a very smart friend (who is sometimes admittedly clueless when it comes to the thumb of pop culture) (like, maybe once he asked me who Taylor Swift was? I can't remember the details) (*cough*) and he had never heard of it so maybe other people haven't either?

Anyway. It's a simple premise. It tells you what you were doing x number of years ago today. If you're thinking this is information you might not want or need, let me help you understand something: YOU ARE WRONG. Because of this app, I know that seven years ago today, my current second-grader was exactly a month old, and looks like this:

So. It's an app you need, is what I'm saying.

That's all I got today. I will go have some more liquid coffee now.

Meanwhile, Back At Home...

I am home! I am weary (hey, let's drive across the country and then have a super emotional good-bye and then fly home to land in the middle of the night and get up and hang out with four kids, that probably won't be exhausting!) (it was actually really fun and I would never complain because I'm not the one who did all that and has to start a new job/life this week), but weary is okay because I am home.

And meanwhile, on the home front:

Nathan has new cool sunglasses he is extremely pleased about (thanks Marmie!) --

Anneliese has taken* to wearing her hair with her bangs pushed to the side and it makes her look older (and highlights her fivehead) so I don't thiiiiink I am a huge fan but maybe someday I will be convinced? No bangs is certainly easier but I don't know if it is a good look for her yet. Jury is still out. (*This mostly just means I have taken to forgetting to trim them. You guessed that already, right?)

Charlotte got an early birthday present from Another Nathan  last week before we left and apparently she has barely put it down. A puppy! Wearing a tutu! I do love how easy it is to delight a two-year-old. Also, someone tell me my kids will never outgrow their love of stuffed animals. Sure, they take over the house or whatever. But they're cute and the kids love them and this is totally a thing I thought I would roll my eyes at as a parent, but I don't! I kind of love it actually! (Yes, even that giant sperm whale.)

And Ali is kind of, sort of, holding her own bottle which is a GAME CHANGER. I would not hate becoming a hands-free feeder for a while before she starts solids. Three cheers for a happy baby who is feeling better enough to learn new things!

And one small weak half-cheer for an excellent friendship photo stream and long-distance blue moons in new NC glasses. Old people, roll your eyes at smartphones all you want, but texting and video calling makes far people feel close, so I am just going to sit over here and feel happy for that on my first night back to choir without my bestest friend to have a beer and chicken dip with afterwards. Okay? Okay.

Daily Anneliese: FaceTime Version

Nathan and I have been having a lovely week at Montreat.  The girls have been with my dad for most of it, but they are home now with Mark and we got to video call them this afternoon. Nathan and Anneliese were SO sweet and chatty that I had to take a screen grab of my phone to post.

They haven't seen each other in weeks and weeks and their smiles and giggles totally fueled some happy energy into my afternoon.

Love these two so much. Can't wait to see them reunited in a few days.

Eleven Questions

Okay apparently we are being meme-y on the internet this week and I am not complaining because these things are fun to read, fun to write, and easy on mah brain. Elizabeth tagged me. So. Here goes.

1. What is your favorite type of cheese? I have no real feelings about cheese. Maybe... any cheese that is not smoked? And preferably melted. For to dip things like chips.

2. What are you excited about? Hmmm I... don't know, actually. Sad. I have spent the last few weeks so filled with nerves and dread and worry that I don't think I have been looking forward to anything. Let's remedy that now! *brisk clap* Okay, I think I am excited about summer, at least the kids being home from school part. (I miss them.) I am alllllmost excited about my new iPhone coming this week. (I have never owned an Apple product, and now I will. I don't even know who I am anymore.) And I might get to go on a road trip in August to the midwest which will be weird but also fun and I could totally get it up to feel excited about that. Oh! Oh! And we are taking a day trip to the beach on Monday! Okay I just hit legit excitement. Good talk.

3. How did you celebrate your last birthday? What awesome thing has your dad done this week? (I think I answered the birthday thing in the New Year survey, so I changed the question, don't mind if I do.) Y'all! My dad is retiring from teaching! Teaching, which was a late-ish-in-life career change for him (when I was a senior in high school), after many years (and several master's degrees) in corporate America, which was after several years in the military, and anyway it turns out he is pretty awesome teacher, and has been for almost twenty years now. And he is retiring and his kids and colleagues love and respect him, and we do too. We are super crazy proud of his work and (warning: cheesy ahead) the difference it makes. You should watch this sweet and funny video some of his students made for/about him. Love it.

4. What is on your bedside table? A lamp I used to love and now find incredibly ugly, an alarm clock blinking the wrong time, a booklight, a baby monitor whose mate was abandoned months ago in Charlotte's room, a bottle of gatorade, and all these books. (I am currently reading all of these, save one I haven't started yet. Yes really. I tend to read one novel at a time, and nonfiction type stuff a chapter at a time, rotating through each of them once a week or so. I don't know why. Now that I am trying to explain why I have all these books on my nightstand it doesn't seem like a very good system.)

I am also reading another but I took it off the nightstand before I took this pic because some shiz is private from Some People Reading) (not to you, you can ask and I will gladly tell you).

NOT on my nightstand: my glasses. Even though they should be. I can't find them, again, story of my life, whatever.

5. What do you order from the movie theater concession stand? Small popcorn and the largest size of diet coke (for to share!) because only the largest size gets refills, and I want the option for the refill, even though I never actually get it refilled.

6. Do you have a garden? What’s growing? I have some flowers in some boxes on the deck, planted by the previous owners. (They couldn't pay their mortgage and a third of the house was termite-destroyed, but sure! Keep the flowers alive!) Other than that, I do not garden. Although, Nathan wants to plant some dinosaur garden this summer, some something about prehistoric plants that would have grown when dinos roamed? I might humor him on that. He put it on the summer bucket list! It is now sacred!

7. Any summer plans? Well, the dinosaur garden, apparently. Especially now that I have told the internet about it, I have to. Also learning to get into a rhythm with Ali. Also sitting by my pool and reading, hopefully a lot. Also, a week at Montreat with Nathan again for youth conferences. Also, probably more crying than in some other summers. Just putting that out there.

8. Which TV couple(s) are you rooting for? Julia and Joel. (And, in case we never get to see them again, I will put my emotional cheering into Mindy and Danny instead.)

9. What’s the last thing you bought? I can't remember, so I will go out on a limb and say... something from Starbucks? (Oh wait! The new iPhones. I bought those today.) If I wait til tomorrow to post this, I can maybe say new jeans. I think I might need to make a jeans purchazzie tomorrow, because none of my pants fit, because mono. (Not that I recommend the mono diet. I stridently dis-recommend the mono diet.) Hmm I should take a picture like in a diet ad. Should I do it?

(I did it.)

10. What’s one thing you are passionate about? I feel like I always answer this type of question about apostrophe usage, but that is mostly a joke. (Not really. I am dead serious about it.) But also, I think: inclusive language. I am more and more bothered/ranty/willing to fight about how we talk about things, especially in terms of privilege, and propagating stigma. I know that all sounds like a bunch of nothing but I don't have it in me to be more articulate about it right now. Friday! Lazy! Language! Passion! Something!

11. What are you grateful for this week? My awesome Marky who lets me be as chatty or as quiet as I need to be, always. Another Nathan who makes time for me and our creature-of-habit habits, even when his own life gets crazy. My sister who is always in my phone and understands me. My minivan. My guest house fridge full of gatorade. And warm spring weather that is freaking gorgeous. Oh! And a pool to sit beside in said weather.

The rules say I must now tag eleven bloggers: Emily, whose answers to these things always crack me up. Arwen, who hasn't blogged in too long for my taste. Elsha, who (apparently) already knew I would tag her. And Emu, who can use this bloggity survey to kill time while she is in labor any day now.