Do you know, I have not even READ yesterday’s comments yet? There are about four latrillion of them (plus 272 posts in the RSS reader–aarrh!), and I am dying to see what you all said, but I am also engaged in an epic battle with the laundry and the bills and a bake sale I agreed in a fit of madness to contribute to. Plus, Henry is having his 6-month growth-spurt and he is nursing two extra times per day AND eating cereal once per day, and I am about to go berserk with the cereal crusts that adhere permanently to his face despite repeated scrubbings, and the up in the night again, and the oh my god Target you are NOT up at 4:30 a.m. because that would be INHUMANE.

AND I am trying to get Christmas shopping done. In fact, that is what brings us here today. My sister-in-law would like a jewelry box. I would like to buy her one. But damned lawned if I can find a good one.

My sister-in-law likes vintage and Etsy and kitsch and art, and she was putting sky blue with burnt orange and chocolate brown before I saw it anywhere else. So I am not about to get her a varnished wood box with little velvet-lined drawers, much as I may like that kind of thing myself.

My first thought was, “Hey! Etsy! Etsy will know what’s awesome!” But I am having a devil sheep of a time wading through the thousands and thousands of things that come up when I search for jewelry boxes. Gift boxes. Jewelry that comes in little cardboard boxes. Trinket boxes, which appear to be boxes too small to put anything in. Jewelry boxes that are actually recipe boxes. Jewelry boxes that look like a Decoupage Monster barfed on them.

Surely–SURELY–there are awesome jewelry boxes out there. SURELY! And surely you have seen some, and can point me in the right direction.

So tell me. *arranges self into confidence-exchanging pose* If it’s been 6 months since your baby was born and you would like to stop wearing the goddamn gol-dang maternity clothes already, what small and easy changes would you make to get started on that path?

And listen, I do mean SMALL AND EASY. If your idea of a small and easy first step is “Well, first I cut out all sugars and flours,” or, “Well, I run an additional mile,” or, “Well, I have a salad instead of dinner,” then you and I might as well stop this little chat right here and save ourselves the grief of the ensuing “discussion,” much of which would involve (a) weeping and (b) railing, not to mention (c) sarcastic air quotes. Those things would require the kind of lifestyle change that would make digging a quarry look like planting a tulip bulb.

No, I am thinking of something more like all those articles that suggest cheerily that you can become ripped/buff by taking the stairs instead of the elevator. Perhaps this substitution makes a serious difference only if you live on one of the uppermost floors of the Burj Dubai and consistently have to go back for your forgotten keys, but I prefer to think of it as the kind of small adjustment that accumulates, for an overall improvement in health and well-being.

And that is the kind of suggestion I am looking for from you. Do you eat protein for breakfast? Do you make yourself “pay for” each cookie by eating a vegetable first? Do you see if you can wait five more minutes for lunch, and now five more minutes, and now five more? Do you swing your arms madly, power-walker-style, when you go up and down the stairs to do laundry? Do you play games that involve lifting your children up over your head?

And don’t be shy about telling me the ones that aren’t technically very healthy, like skipping lunch or drinking lots of coffee. I want your little nearly-painless tricks, so SPILL.

Yesterday I was telling you about my first attempt to get a Christmas card photo of the kids, and you were like, “Heh-LO, SAMPLES!” So, okay, first a photo that represents the typical photo I take of all five children together, the kind I expect to get roughly 100 of for each photo worth considering:

From left to right:

• William, with an Accidental Dumb Face and also a partial blink
• Elizabeth, with an Accidental Dumb Face and a partial blink
• Henry, looking acceptable but grousing
• Rob, looking tortured and also partially blinking
• Edward, looking away, partial weird eye reflection, and thumb in mouth

Now one of the good candidates:

• William, looking cute even though he’s leaning out of the group and too far forward, and he has his arm between his legs
• Elizabeth, looking cute even though she’s not looking at the camera
• Henry, looking acceptable even though his hand is stuffed in his mouth and his eyes are vacant
• Rob, looking cute
• Edward, looking cute even though his hands are up and he’s not looking at the camera and his shirt is bunched up

What I mostly look for in a Christmas card photo:

• children looking happy
• children looking like themselves
• nobody picking his or her nose

Things I have gradually given up on:

• everyone looking at the camera
• no weird things in the background (example: diaper bag backpack)
• tidy poses
• coordinating outfits

This doesn’t mean I’ve TOTALLY given up, and I do want to do a few more sessions where the kids are wearing red and green or whatever. But if the “good one” above is the best one I get, I’m satisfied with it.

Total photos taken in this session: 22

Number of times I thought, “You know what would make this easier? Getting rid of some of these kids”: 3

Number of photos rejected because of

• someone making a dumb face on purpose: 7
• someone making a dumb face accidentally: 2
• someone blinking: 5
• someone looking tortured: 4
• someone appearing to pick someone else’s nose: 1

That’s 3 out of 22 worth considering, which is the best percentage EVER, including when we had just one child to photograph. None of the three shots are stagger-back awesome, but they look pretty great compared to the ones I deleted.

Clearly you have NOT been studying the script. When I say, “Wah, wah, poor me, I feel like I’m being taken for a sucker on these stupid car repairs,” YOUR line is, “Oh, me too, there’s nothing for it but to pay what they ask and hope they’re not laughing after you leave. Just take it in and don’t think about it.” THAT’S your line. Not, “Your paranoid feelings are 100% accurate, and you should definitely call around / take the car to various dealers / do it yourself / not do it at all.”

My life philosophy is: Do what is easiest, then whine about it. So what I do in situations like this is take the car in and hand over what they say it costs, without arguing or getting another opinion or expending any energy beyond what is required for (a) fretting and (b) complaining. Which is what I had already done by the time I did my complaining yesterday. So now it is time for your line, which is, “Oh, totally, that’s what I would have done too.”

Also: Henry is ready for his close-up.

Our check engine light came on. We took it to Aut0z0ne, because they’ll hook the diagnostic thing up to your car for free, instead of charging $85.00 like the dealer does (dealer of SORROW, more like). But since our check engine light was broadcasting a “dealer code,” we had to take it to the dealer anyway.

And what is wrong? A SENSOR has cheesed out. NOTHING AT ALL is wrong with the car, but the SENSOR that is supposed to DETECT if something is wrong–THAT is broken. And how much to repair it? FOUR HUNDRED SMACKERS. For a sensor. When nothing is wrong with the car itself. Plus, of course, the $85 to let us know which sensor wasn’t working.

Furthermore, the dealer told us that “Aaiemwocn soeimv woien a owxeia aie’aslc, ceiallell!!!!!” Translation: “The sensor might also have welded itself to the manifold, in which case it could easily be another $800.” And ALL OF THIS is for a SENSOR. There is NOTHING WRONG WITH THE CAR. Except for the SENSOR.

So of course I asked whether we could just NOT FIX the sensor. I doubt cars had these sensors even ten years ago, so why don’t we just sense it the old-fashioned way, by NOTICING THERE’S SOMETHING WRONG and taking it in when something is? The dealer said, oh, sure, we could do that–but then the car won’t pass inspection anymore, so we can’t legally drive it.

I HATE dealing with car problems. I always feel like I’m being taken for a total sucker. They could be making this whole thing up. The car could be built to have the check engine light come on automatically at certain mileages, and the dealer code could actually mean “Dealer cash deficiency: please add $500.00.”

Oh, sure: Baby boys are just as good as baby girls. Sure.

I am thankful that my in-laws live so far away.

I am thankful that my bonehead asshole father-in-law never even visits.

I am thankful for answering machines. Otherwise I guess we would have to answer the phone, in case it was an emergency.

I am thankful for the leftover chocolate pumpkin cheesecake in the fridge.

I am thankful for digital photography because, seriously, I used to sometimes throw out a whole roll’s worth of crappy prints.

I am thankful for not living in pioneer times, because that must have sucked.

I am thankful that my fifth baby is a good sleeper. Dear child, you know when to shut up, and that is extremely valuable in a family of seven.

I am thankful for good sales and lots of excuses to shop, and I am thankful that I don’t have to go out there tomorrow when people will be using crowbars to wedge themselves into crowded stores.

I am thankful for you guys–and so is Paul, because I vent a lot of stuff here that otherwise he’d have to hear twice. And the shopping talk I get out of my system! He is a happier man, because of you.

Guess who has 254 posts in her RSS reader? No, guess! YES, IT IS ME! So if you are thinking to yourself, “Why is Swistle not commenting on this post when it is about the very things she normally can’t shut up about?,” that is why.

You know how sometimes all the joy has been wrung from the universe and nothing is left but the dirty rag squeezings, and there is nothing fun to do in the whole world? Well, I am the OPPOSITE of that right now: I have about fifty tasks to do, most of which are fun and interesting. I need to cruise Etsy and and make my Christmas list. I need to decide if I’m going to order some expensive perfume with my own money (Paul and I get allowances–is that too cute for words?). I need to eat a bag of Raisinets. I need to experiment with yummy coffees for a SundryBuzz post. I need to go through a bunch of funny photos I took of the kids. Sample shot of William and Rob:

I need to do some online shopping for Christmas presents. I need to finish watching season 3 of Angel. I need to go through a year of archives and move the sensitive stuff to a new blog I’m calling Swistle Confidential (more on this later). I need to finish Scarlet Feather by Maeve Binchy. I need to take photos of all five kids until I get one good enough to go out with our Christmas cards (who dares me to send out one like the one above?). I need to read those 254 blog posts. I need to do a load of laundry, which sounds boring until you realize it contains a bunch of new clothes for the kids. I need to show you THESE JEANS:

Are those TOO FUNNY? Size SIX MONTHS, baby! They are almost as wide as they are tall! Little square jeans! Target’s Cherokee brand, 50% off, $3.98. So obviously I also need to go back to Target and buy more jeans. Oh, woe is me, a trip to Target!

It was only after the emails started pouring in that I realized what a sad, sorry deal I was offering you: Reveal your real, actual baby names to me! And in exchange I will tell you nothing! NOTHING!

The one thing Paul has made me promise about this blogging thing is that I won’t use the children’s names. At all. Not in the blog, not in an email. He hasn’t even made me promise not to talk about our sex life or certain details of his anatomy (future post material!), but he did make me promise about the kids’ names. Paul is a computer guy for his job and for his hobby, and he’s worried that by having (a) five children and (b) twins, we are already (c) way too identifiable without me blabbing their real names.

But oh! You should have seen me sitting on my hands yesterday, trying to keep myself from telling every single person who emailed me! I even tried giving out freshly-minted pseudonyms that come closer to their real names than the English royalty names I’ve been using, but test subjects reported a 200% increase in tease. (Want the closer-to-real pseudonyms anyway? Owen, Riley, Clarissa, John, Aaron.)

Oh, shoot! I had like five other things I was going to mention, and now this names subject has put them right out of my head. Hm… I don’t think anything was crucially important, but I hate that feeling of forgetting something.

Oh! Here’s one! I’m not sure I mentioned that the SundryBuzz gig is a regular thing: I’ll be posting there 2-3 times per week. Yesterday I reviewed a cookbook that contains recipes for things such as “Bitch Bar Bacon Swimps,” “Fried Dill Pickles,” and “Connie’s Death-Corn Five.” Tomorrow I’m going to do a holiday-related tip.

Paul and I caught ourselves actually looking forward to the long weekend. Paul was like, “I have Thursday AND Friday off!,” and I was like, “Yay!,” and then we suddenly realized what we were talking about here: not a four-day weekend of sleeping in and reading books and watching movies and avoiding stores, but rather four days trapped in a ranch house with five children and one bathroom and no place to go because everything will be either (a) closed or (b) so stuffed with bodies, it may as well be closed for all the good it would do us to try to go there. We have had children in the house for nearly NINE YEARS. When are we going to learn that vacation days are no longer vacationy?