You know what this blog is like? It’s like that one free spirited friend who has the BEST stories but also some really crazy ideas and disappears for months, MONTHS at a time.

Anyone heard from Leonard? Last I heard he was backpacking in the Himalayas with a Swedish yoga instructor and a goat named Greg.

Really? I thought he got that internship in London. The one at the artisanal coffee shop/art collective run by mimes……

Nah, he texted me from Vegas. Won big at Caesars Palace and he’s gonna move to Texas and open a taxidermy warehouse.

All I know is he said he’d call me in two weeks, when he got to Amsterdam. And that was six months ago.

Huh. Well…… he’s probably dead.

But he’s NOT dead, and one day he turns up at your door with a wild look in his eye, a couple of new tattoos, and a bag of dirty laundry. Hi Leonard, there you are.

…….And here we are. First, an update from the last post, which was almost seven months ago.

A. The Ex is still up to legal and general shenanigans. And it’s still (mostly) not funny.

B. A fortunate combination of cash and Black Friday sales allowed us to replace various broken appliances, so I no longer have to clean my petticoats by beating them on a rock down at the local creek.

C. The Kicker turned two, and is trying to be the twoiest two ever. Good thing she’s super cute.

D. The Drama went ahead and Got A Girlfriend, who is actually adorable, and will probably get her own pseudonym here by the next bi-annual post. No motorbikes or tattoos yet. Yet.

E. I went ahead and had Surprise Baby Number Eight…. and of course she is the cutest thing EVER, and we figured out where to put her, and no it’s not in a cage hanging outside the window (relax, The Sicilian).

And she is also ABSOLUTELY THE LAST BABY WE ARE EVER HAVING NO REALLY WE ARE TOTALLY SERIOUS THIS TIME.

I seriously considered calling her “The Ninja”, but in the end I’m going with “The Cherry” because not only is she the final topping on our Super Nutty Hot Fudge Sundae of a blended family, but she came out with her stem tied in a knot.

Ok, umbilical cord. Which is basically the same thing for the purposes of this analogy. She also appears to be making Matthew 20:16 her life verse: “The last shall be first, and the first shall be last”

Because although being the VERY LAST BABY I AM HAVING I AM SO SERIOUS ABOUT THAT, she was also the first…..

-first premature baby, first born in a hospital, first to spend time in the NICU….. and of course first to have her umbilical cord/stem tied in a knot.

However at a labor of about two hours duration she did NOT beat The Drama’s record of half an hour, which pleases him. “NO ONE BEATS MY HALF AN HOUR” he bellowed, strutting through the kitchen. No really, that kid was not so much born as torpedoed out like a rocket ship on his way to Mars…

Anyhoo, The Cherry is almost 3 months old now, and has apparently decided that she made her point with that super dramatic entry, and is now a “good baby“. Also she is better in the car than The Kicker was. We DID eventually discover that The Kicker would stop crying in the car if we played Harry Belafonte’s Day-O for her. Over and over. And over. Well, it worked about 9 times out of 10. On at least a few other occasions she responded instead to Hot Chocolate’s You Sexy Thing.* But most of the time all she wanted was to hear about that big pile of bananas. And how Harry wanted to go home. And the tarantula. Believe me I could write a dissertation at this point on the lyrics of Day-O.

So The Cherry doesn’t want any classic calypso tunes, but she does have one specific requirement. We need to be going FAST enough. She’ll start to cry if we drop under about 40 mph. It’s like some bizarre infant version of Speed, but with a lot less Keanu Reeves and more regular stops for breastfeeding.

Speaking of Keanu, Holy COW that dude is winning the Internet right now. More popular that Jesus (as John Lennon allegedly once said but Keanu never would, because he’s apparently so endearingly humble). Seriously, everyone is loving him at godlike levels and……… ah crap. Keanu Reeves had better not turn out to be the antichrist. I will be seriously peeved if he is, because along with everyone else in the known universe, I love me some Keanu.**

But, according to my conservative evangelical Christian upbringing, that’s exactly the type the antichrist is gonna be. A super duper popular messianic figure. Well that’s just great. I guess if Keanu runs for president I’m building a bunker and prepping for the apocalypse.

Just something else for Leonard to drink about.

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*the lyric is, “I believe in miracles”. You’re welcome.

**and Elon Musk. Who is another serious contender according to the theology espoused in really bad Christian literature.