I'm giving new meaning to the term "Verbal Diarhhea." I've started talking and now I can't shut up.

Whilst I was doing the dishes (yes, I actually did them! Mmmm, that pomegranate dish soap.... soooo delicious I could eat it) Angus let forth a heartbreaking cry from where he was sleeping in his swing. It set off the "My baby is being eaten by a dingo!" alarm bells in my head, and I ran over to him, my heart pounding in my throat. He was asleep. He was still sleeping! What the hell?!

Angus, please stop having these schizophrenic outbursts. You are giving your mother high blood pressure.


I can't stop daydreaming about our Big Move To The Atlantic. Those of you who don't know, we are shipping off to Nova Scotia in September, to start a new life for ourselves. We will be amongst family, and Aaron will hopefully have better oppurtunities to find better-paying work.

Nelson is a beautiful, mountainous hippie town, but it's also a black hole for us. And for a lot of people. It is impossible to get ahead here. Which is probably why there are so many transient hippies, because they're quite happy to NOT get ahead.
There are no jobs here, especially for Aaron, who is a pipe-fitter. Also, neither of us has family here, which has been quite difficult for us lately with a new baby. We do not have the luxury of haveing relatives we can pawn the baby off on when we want to go out and get shit-faced and be irresponsible.

I have been swinging back and forth between extreme excitement about starting a new life in a new place, and crippling anxiety about all the work involved in packing all our shit up, and then travelling with a perpetually pissed-off baby. I fear I'm going to be that "woman-on-the-plane-with-the-screaming-baby-who-everybody-wants-to-stab-with-their-nail-clippers-that-luckily-are-packed-with-their-checked-luggage-and-not-with-their-carry-on-luggage."

Also stressing because I HAVE to visit MY family, who are all on the West Coast, before we go, otherwise they will all disown me for whisking their grandchild across the country. That means driving the eight hundred kilometres to Vancouver with a perpetually pissed-off baby, then hopping from island to stupid island with a perpetually pissed-off baby, then selling the car in Vancouver, then getting on a plane and flying from one end of the country to the other with our perpetually pissed-off baby.

Dear Mom: Why the hell do you have to live on an Island that involves first taking one big ferry ride, then driving up the Island, then taking another ferry to another island, then driving across the island, then taking ANOTHER ferry to get to YOUR island??
I miss you SO MUCH and I'm sad we're going to be so far away from each other, but at least I know you will visit me, because you always do, no matter where I go. You even visited me in Australia, even though you ended up hating it and ditching me for New Zealand instead. It's okay, I should have gone there too. (I didn't like Australia either, come to think of it. Much too boisterous and sunny and loud.) Also, you know we will come visit you too.

Dear Dad: WHY DO YOU HAVE TO LIVE ON AN ISLAND TOO? A whole different island than my mom, so that means taking all those goddamn ferries and hopping from island to island, and then back, and then driving DOWN the MAIN island and taking another ferry to get to YOUR island? Well maybe you have your boat working, so at least we can have a hair-rasing boat ride instead of a boring old ferry.
I'm so sorry I'm taking your grandson so far away from you... and I know it's harder for you because you can't travel so easily. I PROMISE to come visit. To be fair though, we haven't even been able to make the trip yet since last march because of financial reasons and that whole being pregnant and having a baby thing. I think it might actually be easier to hop on a plane from Halifax and flying right to Nanaimo, rather than driving through three sketchy mountain passes from Nelson and taking all those goddamn ferries to all those goddamn islands.

Dear Tanya and Chris, my out-laws: Thank you for bailing us out again and again. We are trying to do better, I promise! Thank you for all the hard work you're doing to make us a nice place to live. Thank you for all the future times I intend to stick you with the baby so Aaron and I can go out and get shit-faced and be irresponsible. Just kidding. But it sure will be nice to have Angus's loving and doting grandparents around to give me a break from him. I mean, to spend time with him. Who am I kidding. I can't WAIT to pawn him off on you!

Dear Anneke and Mel and Natalie and Heather and Chas and whoever else that is such a wonderful friend to me that I'm forgetting because I'm selfish and forgetful: thank you for being my sisters, for thinking my baby is charming even though he's often an asshole, and for offering to baby-sit simply because you love him so much. Words aren't enough to express how much I love you ladies, and I'm gonna miss you SO. DAMN. MUCH.

I'm also going to really miss all your children.

(Natalie, I'm going to miss your Touli too, but I will not miss your snakes.)

I know I'm forgetting someone. Please give me shit if you're the one I missed.