I choo choo choose to take a nap.

This week seems a million years long. I almost passed out this morning when I came to the realization that it was just Thursday. And once I came to terms with the fact I had to wait one more whole day to share the fulltime parenting load, I remembered that Mark has to work on Saturday. Dagnabit. Damn Drexel commencement. I guess I’m feeling particularly worn out because Mark had a neighborhood association board meeting right after work yesterday, and as a result got home two hours later than usual. That was 12 full hours of solo parenting with a one hour break for a nap. And since Mark will likely be home later tonight and tomorrow too – I feel too knackered to make it to Sunday.

Plus my body still feels like a wrung out dishrag from Tuesday night’s yoga class. YUP – I’ve been to two whole classes. Look at me GO. The class was fantastic. The instructor focused on fine tuning poses in long holds, much like my first and favorite yoga teacher. There were only three negative parts of the class. One – again with the sucky music. The soundtrack to this entire class was Natalie Merchant Unplugged. Yuck. I don’t love or hate her (like Mark does) – but I know I don’t want to listen to her whole album while trying to concentrate on my breathing. Two – no sun salutations. There was no vinyasa movement whatsoever to warm you up or keep you going. Weird. Three – I had to intimately touch a stranger. Ewww. And worse yet – it was a MAN. And even worser – he had to touch me. GROSS. There was one damn guy in the class and he got paired up with me because we were similar in size. YUP. I am man sized. Lovely. I miss the days of Mark coming to class with me. I always had a partner for poses and I didn’t have to worry about my stranger-touching anxiety taking hold.

The dieting is going okay. I eat just about the same thing every day, which is getting a little old, but I also like the structure of knowing what I’m going to eat for lunch since I was never a lunch planner. But I think this weekend I’m going to cheat a bit – not go crazy or anything, but a little. That may be the best way for me to diet. Watch every regulated morsel Monday through Friday and then take a few liberties when in social situations over the weekend. I feel a bit thinner which is really nice – and enough to keep me going for at least one more week. We shall see. I know you are dying to know.

Oh and I have to relay this foot in mouth story from a few weeks ago. Or more like thigh in upper intestine. I was at the park with Noah when I saw a young couple with whom I have spoken to before. They had their two beautiful kids with them. Their oldest son is about three and I remembered that his name was pronounced “E-FAY,” though obviously I have no idea how it’s spelled. And I thought I remembered the infant daughter’s name too. So I said to the mother “She’s getting so big so fast. Her name is Hilton, right?” And the mother paused, pursed her lips slightly and then said “No… her name is Hyatt.” I could have just died. WRONG H hotel! Good God. And then the mother said “People think we named her after a hotel but Hyatt means ‘life’ in Arabic.” I was mortified. I must have turned magenta while I stammered “That’s really beautiful” before shuttling Noah to the other side of the park. Honestly the mom couldn’t have been any nicer about it, but I felt so ignorant and ethnocentric. I wanted Noah to bury me in wood chips.

And suddenly Noah is a full-on choo choo addict. It’s all he wants to talk about. So yesterday I let him watch his first episode of Thomas The Tank Engine. He was hooked immediately and has been asking to watch it on the TV all day. He also enjoys looking at the website. We stopped in a neighbor boy’s house yesterday and they had much of the Thomas wooden train set. Noah coveted it instantly. As we left he kept pleading for Ezra’s choo choos. I don’t think he understands that those wooden train cars cost $20 a piece! I might have to get the extender set for his Ikea train real soon, but if he wants the real deal he better start selling plasma.