Girl Detective

Here’s another piece on the British study that asked men what their watershed novels were. The researchers found that many men (surprise!) didn’t read novels. It’s a follow up to a study last year of what women’s favorite novels were.

I found a few things interesting. One, they seemed to conflate watershed and favorite, which, as I’ve mentioned before, can be two different things. There are books I’ve read that helped me make life decisions, and while they’re among my favorites, they might not be the one(s) I name when asked for a favorite. Two, this article notes that while men don’t read novels, they still are in control of most of the novel-producing and -awarding machinery out there.

This article discusses the study as well, but it gets interesting more than halfway down when it talks about why we read. Some literary critics have gotten together with scientists, and they’ve found proof (and use abstruse lit-crit jargon to talk about it) that we read novels in order to try to know our minds, and the minds of others.

There are lots of reasons to read, of course, but the one they name is probably my primary one. Temporary escape of reality is ranking rather high for me, lately, especially on days when both boys cry at once. The screaming toddler plus the wailing baby is so loud, and so awful, that it’s almost, but not quite, funny. It makes me long for a book during naptime.

I was so pleased that I’d gotten into a writing groove on my current novel and was racking up the page count by two a day. But my writing group met Monday, and agreed that I’m still not on the right track after three starts. The bad news is that I don’t have either a frame or a story arc that work, so I can write 2 pages a day till the cows come home, and just be spinning my wheels. The good news is that I trust my writing group enough not to get defensive and second guess it. I agree that the new novel isn’t working, and am going to take some time off from it. Perhaps if I read and write other things, my subconscious will work things out.

Yesterday I packed both boys into the car and took Drake to get a haircut. Then we drove to the mall so I could buy a sun hat for Guppy. Then we drove to the adjacent Super Target to do our household shopping. Then we went home for lunch and naps.

I think there are two morals to the story. One, if the planets are in alignment and the kids are being good, a morning of errands isn’t impossible, or even unpleasant. They key is noticing when they are (or more importantly aren’t) up for certain things. Also, making errands like this an occasional event enables them to be an adventure, and less of a chore.

Two, going to a different Target because it was “Super” did not benefit me. The selection wasn’t much better than at our neighborhood one, and it took longer to navigate because it was bigger and I didn’t know where everything was.

The time came (and really went) to harvest my third backyard rhubarb plant. With the first, I made Rhubarb Tarte Tatin from Nigella Lawson. It was OK. With the second, I made a Rhubarb Crisp from some online recipe. This was barely OK because it wasn’t at all crisp on top–the juices of the baking rhubarb completely overwhelmed any possibility of a browned topping. For the last plant, then, I turned to Cook’s Illustrated. They only have 2 rhubarb recipes in over ten years of magazines, but the success rate of their recipes promised more success. The one I wanted to try was the Rhubarb Fool, which is cooked rhubarb layered with sweetened whipped cream in parfait glasses. I couldn’t give up the idea of a pastry, though, so I combined the recipe with the Cornmeal Shortcakes (one of the easy recipes) from Sunday Suppers at Lucques. The resulting Rhubarb Shortcakes were lovely and delicious. I mix the shortcakes by hand, rather than in a food processor. It’s messier, but simpler.

Cornmeal Shortcakes from Sunday Suppers at Lucques

1 1/2 c. flour
1/2 c. stone-ground cornmeal
1 Tbl. plus 1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. kosher salt
1/4 c. granulated sugar
4 Tbl. cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
1 c. plus 1 Tbl. heavy cream

Preheat over to 425. Whisk first five dry ingredients together in medium/large bowl. Add butter, then with hands or a pastry blender, cut into dry ingredients until there is no lump larger than a pea. Make a well in the middle, add 1 c. cream and fold quickly with rubber spatula just until dough comes together. Knead in bowl a very few times to get dough in ball, then transfer to cutting surface, pat into inch-thick disk, and make four cuts to form eight wedges. Brush tops with remaining cream, sprinkle with sugar and bake about 15 minutes until light golden brown.

Rhubarb topping, from Rhubarb Fool, Cook’s Illustrated 5/2001

2 1/4 pounds fresh rhubarb , trimmed of ends and cut into 6-inch lengths
1/3 cup orange juice
1 cup granulated sugar plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
pinch table salt
2 cups heavy cream (cold)

1. Soak rhubarb in 1 gallon cold water for 20 minutes. Drain, pat dry with paper towels, and cut rhubarb crosswise into slices 1/2-inch thick.

2. Bring orange juice, 3/4 cup sugar, and salt to boil in medium nonreactive saucepan over medium-high heat. Add rhubarb and return to boil, then reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, stirring only 2 or 3 times (frequent stirring causes rhubarb to become mushy), until rhubarb begins to break down and is tender, 7 to 10 minutes. Transfer rhubarb to nonreactive bowl, cool to room temperature, then cover with plastic and refrigerate until cold, at least 1 hour or up to 24.

3. Beat cream and remaining sugar in bowl of standing mixer on low speed until small bubbles form, about 45 seconds. Increase speed to medium; continue beating until beaters leave a trail, about 45 seconds longer. Increase speed to high; continue beating until cream is smooth, thick, and nearly doubled in volume and forms soft peaks, about 30 seconds.

To assemble shortcakes, split each shortcake in half horizontally, spoon about 1/4 cup rhubarb over the bottom, then spoon about 1/4 cup whipped cream. Top with other shortcake half. Serves 8.

I once had a friend from NYC who loved A Prairie Home Companion. I gave a listen, and was bored by its content and physically repulsed by Keillor’s voice. I talked with other friends about it, and formed my first theory, which is that non-Midwesterners like APHC, but people who actually grew up in the midwest (or close to it, as I did in central Ohio) are immune to its purported charm.

Then I moved to Minnesota, and found that plenty of people who live here (and who aren’t transplants, like me) like Keillor and his radio show. So that theory went bust.

I also found that living in Minnesota made it much more dangerous for me to listen to the radio. If I scanned channels, I might come across APHC. “Bad man! Bad man!” I would holler, not unlike a toddler, as I lunged for the button to make GK’s distinctive, smarmy baritone go away.

Then a friend of mine got a job working on APHC. I would occasionally listen because my friend, a nice person and very funny guy, was writing some of the jokes. But they were still told in that same creepy voice, so in spite of my best efforts, I could never listen for long. Eventually my friend and the show parted ways, so I no longer had any reason to hide how much I disliked it.

The reviews of the new film APHC have been mixed, but not in the middle. They tend to be polarized. Critics who like the radio show like the film, and vice versa. Ebert and Roeper did a polar split in their reviews. Since I’m not a GK and APHC fan, I’m not going to see the film even though Altman is one of my favorite directors.

From this, I have conceived a new theory on GK and APHC. It’s love or hate, perhaps because of some genetic, physical predisposition, like this. Some people love it. But many, many people don’t. There’s no middle ground.

My results on the 48 hour book challenge were disappointing, but not surprising. Our family had a lot of things to do this weekend, it was Father’s Day, plus there have been the usual shenanigans with 2 small kids, and there was not nearly so much reading as I would have liked. There was, however, still reading. I was heartened that, even with everything else going on, I kept trying. Here’s when and what I read from Friday morning to Sunday morning:

Friday

8:42 to 8:46 a.m. Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, while nursing Guppy, who seems to be protesting the “read while nursing” thing by popping on and off randomly and in general becoming a far less enthusiastic and conscientious nurser. He’s just four months old, though, and this is consistent with development, as they suddenly become much more aware and distracted by what’s going on around them. It does interfere with reading, though. My 2yo Drake was having some out-of-diaper time, and chose this time to pee on the floor. He did get a towel and wipe it up after I asked him to, though. Total pages read: 3. Very annoyed by Holden’s voice, and aware that if it were written today, all the “goddamn”s would be “fucking”s.

11:10 a.m. to 1:10 p.m. had a friend and her 2yo over so she and I could discuss Sense and Sensibility. No reading done, but definite book talk, in between toddler discipline sessions for jumping on furniture, screaming indoors, throwing toys, not sharing, etc.

1:35 to 1:50 p.m. Read books to Drake before his nap. He chooses from our current selections from the library as well as from his own library.

Sheep in Wolves Clothing by Satoshi Kitamura. I love Kitamura’s art, and this is a fun, clever book with wool-thieving wolves who knit and listen to jazz. It’s a long-time favorite of Drake’s.

Two Old Potatoes and Me by John Coy. Coy is a Minnesotan author, and Drake has asked to hear this library book over and over. The story, about a dad and daughter who try to grow new potatoes from old ones, is told in simple prose with striking graphics; many of the words are incorporated into the pictures. There’s a short interlude that reveals the girl is visiting her dad and usually lives with her mom. It could easily have seemed thrown in, but both the art and sensitive dialogue from the father to the daughter help this spread mesh with the book, and deepen the reader’s appreciation for the characters.

Farmer Duck by Martin Waddell, ill. by Helen Oxenbury. I saw this at Book Moot alongside the Oxenbury-illustrated We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, which was another recent library favorite of Drake’s. Farmer Duck works the farm because the farmer is too lazy. Drake has listened to Farmer Duck so many times in the few weeks we’ve had it in the house that he’s memorized several pages of Waddell’s inviting, poetic prose. I enjoy the cadence of the words as I read aloud, and Oxenbury’s textured watercolor illustrations are charming without being at all cutesy.

1:55 to 2:00 p.m. Read books to Guppy before his nap.

Moo, Baa, La, La, La by Sandra Boynton One of our first board books from when Drake was a baby, with Boynton’s usual cute animals and sense of humor.
See the Rabbit and Baby Sleeps, by Janet and Allen Ahlberg. Simple phrases and illustrations of babies doing all the baby-ish things.

4:34 to 4:40 p.m. Nursed Guppy, read another three pages of Catcher.

5:05 to 5:10 Snuck in another two pages of Catcher while the boys were happy and occupied.

5:30 to 5:50 Read board books to Guppy while he had tummy time:

The Foot Book by Dr. Seuss Seuss’s rhymes, while different in board book form, are still some of the best.
1, 2, 3 by Tana Hoban Great photo illustrations
Go, Dog, Go by P. D. Eastman. Completely different in board book form, but still fun, though the final rhyme is forced.
Hey, Wake Up by Sandra Boynton When Drake was younger, he would laugh and laugh at the “broccoli stew” line. Though he eventually stopped, I will always love this book for that.
Mighty Movers: Diggers and Dumpers One of Drake’s favorites. Hardly an intellectual challenge.
The Snowy Day Beautiful prose and lovely illustrations.
A to Z by Sandra Boynton has some charming combinations: Frogs Frowning and Hippos Hiding are two favorites.

7:55 to 8:00 p.m. Read board books to Guppy for bed, while my husband read to Drake.

Pajama Time by Boynton is a decent bedtime book, but writing it up here makes me realize it’s only OK, and probably doesn’t deserve a permanent spot in the rotation.
The Going to Bed Book by Boynton, though, has both fun illustrations and a good rhyming cadence, with an amusing interlude. This was Drake’s final book before bed for a long, long time.
Goodnight, Moon by Margaret Wise Brown. I love reading aloud Brown’s rhymes, which are never forced. I find the illustration OK, but it’s the words that make me love this book.

8 p.m. to 11 p.m. Various grown-up stuff that I can’t get to while the kids are awake, like showering and watching a TV show.

11:00 p.m. Read eight pages of Catcher to get to the end of a chapter, but was too tired to read more. Depressed to have only made it to page 16 by the end of the day.

Saturday

I didn’t write down the times I read, but I had several errands to run, so there was much less reading in general. I read a few pages of Catcher each time I nursed Guppy, and Drake asked me to read him the graphic novel Scott Pilgrim #3, so I did a few pages while expressing milk. I had to euphemize some of the language, and I read just enough to realize I’m going to need to re-read #s 1 and 2 before tackling 3.

By the time the boys were in bed, I’d read enough of Catcher to come to appreciate Holden, and to see through the annoying bluster of his language. He’s a decent guy, I thought, more empathetic than most. Not a jerk, though certainly capable of aggravating. When I continued to read, another throught crept in, which was an awareness of the writer behind the scenes, creating this character who is vulnerable and kind to women. I began to suspect Salinger of the same thing that is one of Holden’s many pet peeves:

If you do something too good, then after a while, if you don’t watch it, you start showing off. And then you’re not as good anymore.

I finished the night at only page 76, a little more than a third of the way through my mmpb edition, but too tired to read more.

Sunday morning

Guppy woke to nurse around 6, then went back to sleep. I grabbed Catcher and went downstairs and got in another thirty pages or so by the time he and Drake got up, which put me at about half way through. Began to wonder if it was Salinger who hated social artifice and the movies, and if he ventriloquised through Holden.

So for the 48 hour challenge between 8:42 a.m. on Friday and 8:42 a.m. on Sunday, I read 3 picture books, 13 board books, about 20 pages of Scott Pilgrim #3, and 106 pages of Catcher in the Rye. I don’t have either a complete page count or an exact time count, though I think it added up to about 4 hours. I’d hoped to do more reading for myself, but I did persevere in spite of myriad errands, tasks, and interruptions.

Added later: I know mine wasn’t exactly congruent with the book challenge–committing time to check out the unread YA books in one’s life. But since that’s part of my overall summer challenge, and since getting through a busy weekend and re-reading Catcher and reading to the boys is what I have to do to clear the way to the unread YA books, I think I still fell within the spirit of the challenge.

June 16 was the four year anniversary of Girl Detective. I’d hoped to have an updated version of WordPress, new description, new links, the works. As you can see, things look the same. I’ve never been great at deadlines, but I do hope to get to some of these soon. In the meantime, you can check out the previous anniversary-time posts. Starting a weblog has been one of the most significant things I have done for myself as a writer. I have a regular writing practice now, which I never did before. I have one novel sent out, and am working on another. I don’t think those would have happened if I didn’t hack things out here on a regular basis. Thanks for reading, and welcome to year five.

June 16, 2005
June 13, 2004
June 16, 2003
The First Post

A few things have slowed down my comic reading: the birth of Guppy, several deadline-driven books to read, and a slowly growing sense of comics ennui. Lately I’m reading comics out of habit, not for fun. Several of the titles I’ve enjoyed in the past just don’t excite me: 100 Bullets, Ex Machina, Fables, Queen and Country, Y the Last Man. Are they in a rut, or am I? Most comic-book people I know have experienced the ennui, as I have before, and I know that it usually passes.

It could be me. I took the time to read one of the best reviewed comics of the year, Ganges, and I was not blown away. It was good. It was thoughtful. It has very good art and a beautiful presentation. But, truthfully, I was kinda bored by it. It reminded me of James Kochalka’s work. It’s less crazy, and more polished, but also less wackily charming.

But then I read the four issue series Batman 100 by Paul Pope. Pope’s distinctive art infuses a frenetic energy into his dark, future Batman story. The four issues are satisfyingly long, with a lot of text intos and outros. The whole story is great. I can’t say it’s dispelled my comics ennui, but it has reminded me why I love the medium, as did recent issues of Daredevil, and Fell, the latter by my husband G. Grod’s favorite comics author Warren Ellis.

I’ve been checking out a few new book and reading blogs lately. Today at Book Moot I found a link to MotherReader’s 48-hour reading challenge. Since the challenge arose from her reading backlog of literature for older kids/teens, and since I have several of that kind of book already on my summer reading challenge list, I think I’ll give it a shot. I’m also interested in showing when and how I read, because I hear other moms say they don’t have time to read. I’ve got a four-month old and a 2 year old, and I make time to read for myself, in addition to the reading I do to them. Other things go undone, but reading ranks right up there with eating, sleeping, childcare and writing. Most everything else is negotiable.

#36 in my movie challenge for the year, The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill was something of a “should” watch. I’d heard only good things about it, yet I doubted I would be wowed by it, and I wasn’t. It was a well-made, sweet documentary. But some of its charm may come from the anthropomorphisation of its parrot co-stars. Watching Grizzly Man made me acutely aware of the ease of, the desire for, and the danger inherent in, anthropomorphisation. Mark Bittner, the parrot guy, is either luckier or saner than poor, dead Timothy Treadwell in that he chose animals who don’t pose a physical danger to him if he treats them like people. I found WPoTH an interesting portrait of an interesting person. Bittner comes off as a lovable weirdo. He doesn’t have a conventional job, or a means of income, yet he has managed to procure a living space, as well as supplies to help him care for a local wild parrot flock. Also interesting is the distinction some people had between native and non-native species, the latter of which many people believe should be ignored, discouraged, or eliminated. But the parrots themselves were of only passing interest to me, so I think much of the documentary’s charm was lost on me. Then again, I was one of the few people who disliked that other popular animal documentary, so perhaps these cuddly, cutesy animal movies just aren’t for me.

I’ve slowed down the pace of the movie challenge. I wanted to spend more time reading. Also, there’s just not been as much, in theaters or on new release DVDs, that has interested me. My Tivo hard drive is still full, though, and we have a large library of unwatched DVDs we own. They can wait indefinitely for me to return to movie watching.

Aren’t all bags of potato chips, no matter the size, potentially a single serving container?

Asks the woman who ate an entire bag of honey dijon Kettle chips. I feel surprisingly not guilty about it. (I did share a few with Drake, when he stopped throwing a tantrum long enough to eat them.)

“Aah!” I screamed, and clobbered my husband who was holding the remote and scrolling through the schedule. “EZ Streets! EZ Streets!” I’ve written many times before that this is one of my favorite cancelled TV series of all time, right up there with My So Called Life. Great reviews and Emmys couldn’t save it. EZ Streets was written by Paul Haggis, the screenwriter of Million Dollar Baby and the director of Crash. It is being shown on the new Sleuth Channel–”Mystery. Crime. All the Time.” I’m both excited and trepidatious to revisit EZ Streets, which ran in 1996 and 1997 and had only 9 episodes. Will I still like it? And if so, will it make me angry all over again that it got cancelled? If so, perhaps I can console myself this fall with this.

#26 in my book challenge for the year, and #2 in my summer reading challenge was Sense and Sensibility by Austen. I very much enjoyed Pride and Prejudice and Emma, so I was surprised by how little I liked S & S. The first few pages of the book are entirely concerned with explaining in detail why the two heroines, Elinor and Marianne, are poor. The book finished stronger than it started, but I was not at all surprised by its surprise and the characters did not engage my interest. The two heroines and their love interests are the four “best” characters in the book, but I found none of them very complex or compelling. Almost without exception, all the other characters are mean-spirited, stupid, or both. S & S was published before P & P, but parts of them were written concurrently. I think the later publication of P & P allowed Austen valuable time to develop as a writer. Like P & P, S & S is about issues of class, and public/private life. They both began as epistolary novels. But in S & S, Austen did not yet have the light touch with her non-central characters that enabled them to be interesting, sympathetic or funny even though not as well-behaved and insightful as the main characters.

One of my favorite times as a writer is when it’s my turn to hand out to my writing group. The week before I hand out is one of the most difficult, because I’m reading someone else’s pages to comment, plus working on my own pages. (Theoretically I am doing this on all weeks except my handout weeks. I’ll be honest; that’s not always the case. It has been the past several weeks, though, since I adopted my 2-page-a-day goal.) Once I hand out my pages, I have a week off. I don’t work further on my own pages, because I’ll use the group’s feedback before continuing. And I don’t have someone else’s to read either. I’m still reading and writing, of course, but during my week off, it’s all for fun.

On our walk back from the park today, I rounded the corner with the boys in the double stroller. I saw two policemen half a block ahead getting out of their car, guns drawn. I paused, then saw another police car pull behind theirs. A third policeman got out, gun drawn, and joined them as they approached a house. I crossed the street and picked up my pace for home.

We’ve had a rash of burglaries in our neighborhood. I heard two stories last week about two different busts, but I’m guessing the burglars remained at large. Perhaps they are no longer.

or, How a Toddler is like a Vampire, though only a vampire like in the X-Files episode “Bad Blood”.

Connecting straps (as to secure an infant into a seat) are all securely fastened, which will require infant juggling (not a recommended activity) to undo.

Power switches are not in the position in which you left them. My husband, G. Grod, spent all Sunday morning procuring ingredients for and preparing a chili for our slow cooker. Weren’t we surprised several hours later, come dinner time, to find the switch on “auto” and not high. Pizza for dinner.

The shoelaces on your shoes (NOT the toddler’s) are unlaced.

#25 in my book challenge for the year, and #1 in my YA-centric summer reading challenge was King Dork by Frank Portman, which I first saw recommended at Blog of a Bookslut. King Dork is Tom Henderson, a sub-normal high school kid who spends a lot of his days trying to avoid getting beaten up or ridiculed. Things get complicated for him after he discovers his dead dad’s copy of The Catcher in the Rye, kisses a mystery girl at a party, and gets his own guitar. Tom and his alphabetical order friend Sam Hellerman have been talking about being in a band for years. Once they actually get guitars, they discover the real challenge:

I don’t know how real bands manage to have three or more people all play the same thing at the same time–it was clearly beyond our capabilities.

Like David Mitchell’s Black Swan Green, this is a teen-boy story that at times sounds a little too knowing. But I found it so funny and likeable that I forgave the occasional lapse in voice. I was pleasantly reminded of the television show Freaks and Geeks.

A reader review that Portman links to from his blog chided the book for its sexism.

…but what of the ladies? There is not a single admirable woman or girl in this novel, not even any hint that perhaps women are more than simply things to look at. They all come across as crazy in one way or another, with very few (non-physical) redeemable qualities.

I didn’t find the female characters crazy and unredeemed. I think Portman did a good job conveying how baffled Tom was by them, which said more about Tom than them. I found the female characters complex, funny, and demanding, especially his mom, his shrink, and his younger sister. Yes, one of the things the main character obsesses about is sex with girls. But when he actually begins to be sexual with girls, they are the ones calling the shots, and demanding physical and emotional things of him, not the other way ’round. In the first sexual encounter in the book, the girl had Tom bring her to orgasm, and she did not reciprocate. There are some later blowjobs, which the previously quoted review dismisses as meaningless. I saw them as part of teenagers learning about sexuality. Additionally, while it might seem biased or gratuitous that there was fellatio but not cunnilingus, I think that’s for practical reasons–the former is usually lower on the sexual learning curve than the latter.

King Dork the book, and King Dork the character, have a lot going on. While the narrative wanders, the story and its characters are always engaging, and I frequently laughed out loud. I think my favorite character was Little Big Tom, King Dork’s stepdad. “Ramoning” and “glad all over” are hilarious and apt euphemisms. I found the ending satisfying, even while it’s not tidy, and perhaps because it isn’t.

Further reading:
The King Dork Reading List, and Discography, both with Tom Henderson commentary

I had this lovely vision of being able to read the books for my book group, the books for the online discussion of Muriel Sparks, the YA books I already owned, plus a bunch of new and classic YA books from the library. The good news is that I found a bunch of good YA books at my favorite used bookstore. The bad news is that when I made a list of all the books I thought I’d like to read for the summer, there were thirty nine, which is about half again as many books as I’ve read in the first five and a half months of this year. So I’ll limit my to-read list to those I own. The starred books are ones that have been on my shelves for a while. The others are newer purchases. Allowing for the chaos factors of library reserve queues and friend recommendations, I think a list of twenty will be plenty challenging.

King Dork by Frank Portman
*Sense and Sensibility by Austen
*Catcher in the Rye by Salinger
Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 3 by Bryan O’Malley
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Sparks
another Sparks book
*Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
*Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
The Prop by Pete Hautman
*Sloppy Firsts by Megan McCafferty
*Second Helpings by McCafferty
Magic or Madness by Justine Larbalestier
Magic Lessons by Larbalestier
*The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Steven Chbosky
*Satellite Down by Rob Thomas
*Tam Lin by Pamela Dean
Monkey Island by Paula Fox
Baby by Patricia Maclachlan
I Am the Cheese by Robert Cormier
We All Fall Down by Cormier

Once Drake turned two, I needed a diaper bag less and less. I enjoyed my return to a normal purse with one or two kid essentials tucked inside. With a new baby, though, came the need for a diaper bag once again. The chaos factor for babies is less about behavior, and more about physical realities. Babies need diapers, wipes, burp cloths, changes of clothes and distracting toys. Toddlers still need these things on an occasional basis, but not nearly as often or as immediately as do babies.

With Drake, G. Grod and I used a Timbuk2 messenger bag. After two years of diaper duty, it was the worse for wear. I debated what type of bag to get as a replacement. Another messenger? An actual diaper bag? A purse that was roomy enough to hold diaper-like essentials?

I came to similar conclusions as I did years ago. Actual diaper bags charged a premium for things like usefulness and fashion. They were very expensive because they were very specialized, with things like a built-in changing pad and insulated sections for bottles. See an example here. I found the special sections not very helpful. Either I could buy them cheaper and include them in any bag I wanted (the changing pad) or I never needed it (insulated section.) Plus, once you were done with babyhood, you’d be done with the bag.

I found opposite issues with subsituting a conventional purse for a diaper bag. See example here. Most bags were just not sturdy enough to stand up to the abuse that a diaper bag has to endure, and the fashionable ones were expensive enough to warrant more careful treatment.

So I returned to my middle ground of a messenger bag, though this time I opted for the more ergonomically correct backpack, since it distributes weight across both shoulders. It’s sturdy, it’s not ugly, it’s reasonably priced, and it will be useful once Guppy moves into toddlerhood when we can once again, and finally, give up the big bag. And I can always opt for using one of my existing purses in those rare instances in which I need a bag that’s fashionable and fabulous, rather than utilitarian.

Before I had Drake, I read some birth and baby books, some parenting articles, and took some classes. Once labor began, I quickly determined that most of that stuff was utter crap. That feeling continued through Drake’s babyhood. I was bewildered by the chasm between reality and what I’d been led to expect.

The books said Drake would have intense sucking needs that a pacifier would help. He never kept one in his mouth. They said when he made mouth movements he was hungry. He made mouth movements all the time, and only a few of them resulted in feedings. The books also said that Drake would sleep a lot at first. This was just not true. Guppy, though, barely opened his eyes for his first several weeks, and still sleeps away a good portion of the day. Guppy has also progressed to a six hour interval at night. (Don’t congratulate me; it starts at 8 p.m.) Early on with Guppy, I noticed periods where he’d be still and wide eyed. “That’s ‘quiet-alert’, I thought, remembering it from our birth class. I never saw Drake in that mode.

Guppy is the baby I was expecting when I had Drake. All the books and resources weren’t full of shit, but they weren’t useful the first time around. And I’m not sure they’re much more useful this time. What was useful was learning to ignore them and try to figure it out myself. That gave me at least some occasional insight into Drake, and has meant I’m continually appreciative of Guppy, the laid-back Buddha baby.