Under an umbrella
Things aren't looking too sunny around here, and i don't mean the weather, which is now providing a summer-like day. It's been a week since the very bad news poured over our roof and we've been coping. My mum is sick. She's going to get cured but time must go by first. I feel like we're all sitting under an umbrella. Also, i need a baby-sitter. Two little facts that are threatening to take my sanity away. I'm holding on to the handle but i might lose my grip every so often. Again, please bear with me.

PS: Muffin came down with pharyngitis and otitis yesterday. He's still keeping his spirits up, though, this wonder kid.

Update
Too lazy to erase the post. I just realized the comment thing is fixed. Kindly ignore the information bellow.

No comments
Have you tried leaving a note here lately? I don't think my comments are getting published. If you're experiencing commenting troubles in ambivalence, give us a , please.

Souvenir workout
I'm stealing this meme from me pal Juan because i want to. And because i feel my memory needs a workout.

10 years ago
I was happily unattending classes at university. I was 22. I spent most of my weekend nights at El Sol, poisoning myself into a dancing bliss. I was neither fat nor thin. I drove a 1987 black Opel Corsa. I was planning my second trip to Canada.

5 years ago
I was moody. Unhappy about many things, namely my job. My life soundtrack could've been Garbage's 'When I Grow Up'. I lived at a cooler than cool apartment in a cool luxury building that i still miss as one misses a long lost friend. The year, of course, was the highly confusing 2001.

A year ago
I dragged my 8 month belly up and down the three stories of our then brand new home. I've moved 11 times, for the record. I was happy and slightly scared of the labour ahead, but otherwise doing fine and mellow. My life was starting to slide into the quietness that surrounded me for the next months.

Yesterday
Spring sprung with the traditional sunshine-rain routine. I negotiated stuff at work. I got sick on my way back home. I attacked a particularly dangerous pile of laundry and cooked green beans with tomato and bacon for dinner. I played with Muffin who was cheerful and into random clapping. I talked to my friend Morgana and giggled while Bruno ate a pair of (clean and still wet) knickers knicked from the washing machine.

5 special places
- Our sunlit sitting room on Saturday breakfasts
- Québec in my mind
- The Freeway Bar counter with Pat rolling her eyes over anything and serving us shots
- Port Ripaille house (filed in memory under 'Holidays with LovelyV')
- A movie theater right before the film starts

5 reasons for joy
- Bruno smiling back
- Sharing a laugh with Pablo
- The beach
- A recipe that turns out well
- Getting a good hair cut

5 favourite toys
- Laptop playing: Blogs, flickr, netmoms
- DVD (now that it's broken i miss it inmensely)
- Muffin's cement truck
- Books
- MP3 player

5 people i'm passing this on to
- You
- Arwen
- Kurt
- Dwalks
- Amber

Amnesia or just plain bliss
I'm reading 'Harry Potter and The Half Blood Prince' (thanks darling Arwen). Just before that i read 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix'. Not getting any wiser, but i'm highly entertained, so. I loved 'The Order of the Phoenix', despite the fact that i had already read it.

I remember holding that very book in my hands, lying on the sofa-that-turned-into-a-bed on my palace apartment back in the summer of 2003. I remember it was also Arwen who lent me the copy of the book. I remember my mum showed up with a new copy she had bought during one of her recent trips to England. I clearly remember turning the last page of the book and reaching a conclusion about it. Something along the lines of "that was great".

I picked it up again before starting 'The Half Blood Prince', in order to refresh my mind. Turns out i didn't need a refreshment as much as a complete memory menu, with dessert and wine. I couldn't remember a thing about the story, just bits and pieces of the (newer) characters and some situations. It's such an odd feeling, reading something you know you've read, and still be surprised at the end of every chapter.

I wonder why my memory has erased that novel entirely, and if it has done the same to other books, films, conversations. What do i remember of the summer of 2003? What is left of it? Selective amnesia? Was i in such bliss to just delete all files? I'm mentally running my eyes through my library as i type. Perhaps i'll be saved from further visits to the book store. I'll live on reruns of books and Friends.

Give us a break
Sometimes you have to get away. Even from this blog.
Back tomorrow.

You do it, luv
My niece, Big M, who is now the astonishing age of 13, was admitted into hospital a few years ago. She had a mysterious disease that eventually turned into some virus, in doctor's words.

Poor M was in hospital for days, and my sister spent almost 24 hours a day by her side. She got to know everyone's shifts and even some of the staff's names. There was a woman who'd come in every morning to bring her breakfast and make the bed. Except she didn't do it. This worker would look at my sister, manage a half smile and say: "Here are the sheets. You do the bed, luv, will you?". And she'd freshly proceed into the next room. My sister couldn't believe it, but nevertheless she complied.

After a couple of days with the same routine, sister was waiting for this woman. As she strolled into the room with the clean set of sheets, my sister said: "Here, luv, i figure if i have to make the bed, i might as well use my own covers". The woman was taken aback a little but then muttered that it was ok with her.

That's how Big M ended up with her cute Ikea fairy duvet in a hospital bed, surrounded by her own drawings and a few posters on the wall.
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The baby blog has been updated. I'll let you know here as of now.

Out of Kenya
Oh hi. I'm surprised to find you here. I was assuming there would be no traffic whatsoever in this page, except the odd lurker lured by some strange google filter such as "Harry Potter's favourite investment bank" or something. But this really is the best i can do in my updates with the spare time i don't have. Try closing a magazine with the disorganized despair we call client. Try balancing that out with having a family. Try missing Muffin's bath three times in a row, perhaps four. But i promised myself i wouldn't break this long silence by moaning.

Watched 'The Constant Gardener' last night. What a magnificent way to finish the long weekend. It's one of those films that reconcile you with the world, touching you in ways that include happyness, sweetness and infinite sadness all at once. I'm not surprised that Weisz creature got the Oscar. I think Fiennes should have been up for an award too. Beautiful acting, wonderfully written film, amazing landscapes. I want to go to Kenya. I want to return to London.

Returning to watching films and updating Ambivalence will do for now, though.

Things that make me smile

1. Baby.

2. The boy i married.

3. A new bottle of Coco Chanel.

4. Deciding to wear high heels for no particular reason.

5. Wearing mountain boots instead.

6. Saturday mornings.

7. Little m's comments.

8. Cooking tasty comfy dishes.

9. Big M's smile.

10. Planning a trip.

Have yourselves a merry little end of weekend.

Seeing white
We've had our share of hospitals. Bruno's tests went all right. I mean, they were awful, but the results were great. Then mum was admitted into hospital on Sunday. That went more or less all right, too. We've been seeing white. Hospital white. I reached almost 39ºC last night. Temporal fever, i was fine this morning. I guess it was my body's own way of seeing white.

Metacalendar
Got my domain and hosting service renewed. Got the time to update the library area. Got my act together and finally made the transition into the new year. Here's what happened in 2005. For the record.

No match
I accidentally kicked some dog shit yesterday morning. That's supposed to bring good luck. Then again, you're not supposed to openly talk about good luck cause you might jinx it. I kicked the doggy turd with the tip of my boot while i was returning to the office from an errand.

I love my errand time. Within yesterday's errands i managed to buy something beautiful for myself. Shopping for self is not an activity i've been doing much in the past months. Yet, it is something i've practiced in the last two weeks or so. Yesterday at lunch time i was on my way to change a pair of tennis shoes i got for Muffin (wrong size: we'll go into baby's shoe sizes in another post). A handbag caught my eye from inside a shop. Please note that it didn't wave at me from the window, it simply gave me a look from the far left corner of the store. One could never resist a call like that.

The handbag, sitting next to my keyboard, is just beautiful and it screams "i'm superficial and fun to look at" from my desk. It is a big, leathered, very dark pink bag with a suede lining and a more than reasonable price (thank you March for your last day sales).

I had a similar call last week. Except that time i didn't rush into the store, heart racing, to retrieve my soon-to-be posession. It was a 50s looking silk dress with polka dots and straps. Black and white. I was trying it on and anti-posing (this is what some of us do: we try our best to look our worst, just to see what the clothes can do in 'extreme' situations). Then the phone rings and my significant Pablo tells me to buy the dress. "I'm sure it looks great and it's been ages since the last time you actually liked a piece of clothing".

But i didn't buy it. My reasonable self decided that it was probably too expensive because i wouldn't wear it every single day of my life, and besides, who would want to buy a summer dress when it was snowing in the centre of the city. So i left the shop and went to get a burguer instead.

As i was munching on my fries, the phone rings again. He's texting me: "Buy the freakin' dress". I giggle and feel great. I finish my lunch, get back into the store and come out with a brand new polka dot 50s style dress.

Pitty it doesn't match the handbag.