Annnnnd I’m back…sort of

Has it really been so long since I’ve written a blog post? I’ve been back in the paid workforce for about a month now and it’s put a crimp in my internet activities. There are so many blog posts I’ve written in my head, and even drafted by hand on a notepad. Yet, I can’t seem to transfer those thoughts to the actual blog. So here, in list form are some of the things I ought to blog about and probably will in the near future:

• Finding daycare when your parenting style isn’t quite mainstream
• Pumping again when you haven’t done it regularly in a year
• Yes, it’s okay to nurse your toddler…really
• How I realized that my workplace is institutionally sexist (and cis-sexist) despite their commitment to “diversity”
• Toddlers, solids, development and mother blame
• Finding time for me
• My baby’s turning two!!!
• Passing on my cultural heritage to my child
• The zombie apocalypse

I can’t promise that I’ll write about all of these. I can’t even promise that what I write will be any good. But I gotta write, dagnabbit! And so I will.

Unemployment, it sucks…really

Image: renjith krishnan / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Since 2007 I’ve faced unemployment three different times, each period longer than the previous stretch. I can honestly say that the reasons have nothing to do with how good of an employee I was. The first time had to do with me moving to a new city. The second time was because my grant-funded position at a non-profit was eliminated due the agency losing that grant. The third time, well, let’s just say that if I had been eligible to appeal my wrongful termination, I would have won.

Things I Do Instead of Blogging

Things I have been doing in the month of March instead of blogging:

1. Wet nursing, or as my friend calls it, “being a moo-cow”
2. Reading other people’s blogs
3. Watching as Baby E learns new words like “Stop!” –that one comes complete with finger wagging (wonder where he got that from?)
4. Panicking about my continuing, long-term unemployment
5. Putting off writing about mothering through a zombie apocalypse
6. Wanting to write but feeling like I won’t be able to do so in any meaningful way
7. Coming up with awesome ideas and then realizing I don’t currently have the means to implement them
8. Rallying in support of Planned Parenthood
9. Juggling an ever-expanding to-d0 list
10. Letting Baby E sample foods I swore I wouldn’t expose him to intentionally
11. Eating a lot of chocolate
12. Taking lots of pictures
13. Procrastinating
14. Living through the peaks and valleys of marriage
15. Failing to convince Baby E that brushing his teeth is a good thing
16. Wondering if the universe has a warped sense of humour or just hates me sometimes
17. Cursing at my printer because it keeps telling me there’s a paper jam despite all of my efforts to fix it
18. Trying and failing to finish a book that I’ve had for a few months now
19. Wanting to win the lottery
20. Just saying, “F&*% it!” sometimes