5 Videos!

I have 5 videos. I haven't had a video haul like this since the old days.


Water is Wet from serenity johnson on Vimeo.
An old past time he's more or less given up.


Musicking from serenity johnson on Vimeo.
Dancing and playing his instrument. He could be in one of those marching bands.


Silent Night Again (and Again) from serenity johnson on Vimeo.
He wore the battery out on this book playing it over and over and over again.


Counting Calisthenics from serenity johnson on Vimeo.
Learning how to count (sort of) and getting a good work out.


Choreography from serenity johnson on Vimeo.
He has a toy bus that plays 10 songs. One of them is a pirated version of "Do Re Mi" from Sound of Music. I used to sing him this song in funny voices when he would get grumpy during diaper changes. Now he dances like a maniac to it.


Cracker from serenity johnson on Vimeo.
And here he is saying "cracker."

I am a netbook user, and, somehow, a netbook cord abuser. Without fail, my computer outlasts its power cord, and then you're confronted with the dilemma of replacing an 80 dollar cord or replacing a 200 dollar computer. We replaced the cord, but it came slowly from America, and then Dan forgot to check our mail for a long time, but now I have a powered netbook again and pictures from as long ago as the last blog. I also have videos lurking on devices, but I'll get to them on another day. Probably this week, though, because Dan is in Japan, and that's the only time I can get any work done around here. We still suffer the sickness curse while he's away. This time Joash got a somewhat horrifying infected diaper rash, but I treated it like a proper hippie, and he's very much on the mend.

The weather has been amazing, and we've been going out to play every afternoon. Joash expects these trips now and brings me articles of clothing throughout the day, punctuating their delivery with petitions to "go go?" Along with bringing things to me, he's become quite adept at taking things to their proper resting places. He loves to clear the table after dinner, and he has even started to sort our trash into one of our three recycling bins. We've started the descent into toilet training, and, while I can't get him to pee or poop in any potty, there are marks of progress. Today he peed on the floor when I was in the other room, and then brought me a cloth to clean it up with. He repeats most of what we say these days, and I can't help but laugh every time he asks for crackers, making a sound more like a duck's quack than a word. It makes him sad when I laugh, because, no, seriously, he wanted a cracker.

Reasons I Don't Blog Without Pictures

Do you know what stresses me out enough that I suspend it in my brain space to make sure to talk to Dan about it on our Valentine's date that he surprised me with (meaning he orchestrated a baby sitter and made dinner plans, which, though they went awry, still provided us with a dinner cooked on flames, some fantastic street food, and coffee drinks that we just sat around drinking)? When smart people use the wrong it's/its. I just keep reading all these blogs full of, "the monkey danced in it's pants while it's friends thought about how its not fair." Or whatever. Let's just render the written form of the contraction "it's" obsolete, as it has now so proved itself to be. If we all just resolve never again to type or write the word "it's," then I will never have to read it in smart people's blogs ever again!

Did you know, back in my day, we weren't even allowed to put contractions of any kind in our written word assignments? Can you believe it? I mean, I know blogs are essentially spoken prose typed into a little, white internet box, and I'm not so stodgy as to suggest that we turn it into stilted essay writing, but, still. Down with the it's! Its too easy to confuse!

Oh, and I's isn't a word the way you think it is, ladies of the Bachelor. Sean and you may have a "relationship," but let's not bring that lady I into it. You're gonna want to say, "Sean's and my" or you might as well just give all that coveted alone time to whoever that possessive I is.

Oh, hey, and winter, why don't you just go on be done already? My belly is now so burgeoning that it barely fits into my coats anymore, and the snow you just dumped on the ground is just making me grumpy by now.

And, on account of the baby in this belly, I've been taking naps with the baby out this belly, and he keeps waking me up at the headache spot with his mid-nap fake coughing fits. And y'all know Tylenol wasn't made to actually combat any aches, which is why I'm still allowed to ingest it, so I have to wrap my head up with socks full of ice cubes.

No, but I'm not in a bad mood. I'm about to eat some homemade Indian food that Dan brought me back from one of his trainees. Three giant pieces of naan and a pan full of some sort of curried chicken, and I'm going to eat it all!

Well, Dan's been gone again, and he leaves in two weeks for two weeks to Japan. I spent the last two days crying about it. He comes home in an hour or so, so I guess I'm over it by now. Every time he goes, I find it harder and harder to deal with. I see all these graceful copers all around me (not actually around me, since I have only a few local friends, but, you know old friends on the internet), and I am just not equipped with any of that. I feel this extreme fatigue over the whole thing. I never thought I'd marry and then be without my husband for such consistent chunks of time. And in a place where I have nothing, and, during the day, no one. I hate everything about him being gone, the thrumming aloneness, the propensity of Joash and/or I to get sick, most likely due to his unfortunate habit of truncating nighttime sleep by several hours for at least the first week of his father's absence, the sheer physical and emotional effort of caring for a toddler for days on end without reprieve. I know I am not meant to raise a child alone. Who is? I do not have whatever it takes to be a single parent in a foreign country without even a hint of extended familial support (beyond Skype). I feel like knowing that should somehow matter enough that I won't have to keep facing these times of isolation  Anyhow, it doesn't. And I'm unhappy over it.

But, hey, at least I have a couple pictures to post.

Well, what happened was, we were in America, and I mostly write stuff here so our parents in America can read about it. Our being there made posting temporarily obsolete. But now we are back in Korea, a week and a half in, mostly recovered from jet lag, readjusting to smells and rhythms and sounds. I have pictures for the parents/grandparents to see, so back to posting.