I just wanted to wish my Muffin a very happy Father’s Day… so, Happy Father’s Day, Muffin!

In honor of this special day, I thought I would list five LITTLE KNOWN FACTS about the Muffin.  Here you go:

1.  Muffin’s favorite sandwich is cheese and jam.  When Muffin was in grad school, once a week his class would have sort of a lunch potluck where one person was responsible for bringing a main dish for the class.  On Muffin’s appointed day, he brought cheese and jam sandwiches.  Out of the entire class, I believe there was only one taker.

2.  Muffin is afraid of horses.  I myself like horses and used to ride as a kid, so when we were on our honeymoon and one of the fun activities we could partake in was a horseback ride on the beach, I was pumped.  And then Muffin was all, “Horses?  I would never EVER ride a horse.  They’re the only animal dumb enough to run into a burning barn because that’s where their food is.  NO WAY!”  I wondered in that moment how we had gone through our courtship without me ever knowing that Muffin hates horses.  WHO IS THIS MAN I MARRIED?

3.  Muffin is not much for dancing, but he can bust a move here and there.  One of his favorites is one I taught him, this one right here (the “move” can be seen at about 2:54, if you are CRAZY and don’t want to watch the whole thing).

4.  Muffin, like all men, hangs onto his boxer briefs for WAY TOO LONG.  The other day I was folding laundry and the underwear I was folding had a hole so gaping that my entire fist went right through it.  I tossed them aside to be thrown away when I was done folding the rest, and Muffin picked them up, flashed me a look of horror, and said, “These underwear are still good!”

5.  Muffin is the world’s best dad, from playing cars, AGAIN, with Michael to dressing Jenna, albeit in mismatched clothes and without understanding how tights work.  Today I watched as he held Jenna sweetly in his lap while doing flashcards with Michael, and I realized that my life is perfect and I could never wish for more.  Thank you, my love.

Still not going to eat a cheese and jam sandwich, though.

Yesterday was the Muffin's 29th (!) birthday, and I would like to use this public forum to loudly confess my undying love and devotion.  Happy birthday, my love, and remember that no matter how old you get, you will always be older than me.

We had a big family birthday dinner to celebrate the occasion and for an appetizer I prepared some melted brie cheese and some French bread bites for dipping (by the by, if you're ever caught entertaining on the fly, brie cheese is a quick, easy, inexpensive appetizer that everybody likes).  As I got the cheese ready I was reminded of a moment in our early days of courtship involving melted cheese.  Hey!  Get your mind out of the gutter, will you?

I was hanging out at Muffin's apartment in Forest Grove (affectionately known simply as "The Grove").  Muffin used to live with two other dudes, and it was for all intents and purposes a "dude" apartment.  There were posters on the wall of scantily clad chicks, the only food in the cupboards was Top Ramen, and the bathroom resembled something out of the movie "Deliverance."  That bathroom had so much hair in it, more hair than I believe three men could even produce, that I believe the bathroom may have actually been growing the hair itself.  But I digress.

Anyway, we're hanging out and I mention to Muffin that I am hungry and could use a snack of some kind.  His eyes instantly lit up and he said, "Ooooh!  I know!  I'm going to make you my favorite snack!  You're going to love it!"   And with that, he dashed off to the kitchen.

He returned a few moments later and with a grand gesture handed me a plate.  For a moment I wasn't even sure there was anything on it, but I looked more closely and saw that there appeared to be cheese, perhaps mozzarella cheese(?), melted on the plate.  That's it.  No crackers.  No fruit.  No meat.  No bread.  Just melted cheese, on a plate.  Yes indeed.  One of the Muffin's favorite snacks is plain ol' cheese, whatever cheese you have handy, melted on a plate.  You microwave it and then just peel it off the plate and eat it.

I teased Muffin for years about this "cheese on a plate" snack, along with some of his other quirky food likes, including cheese and jam sandwiches and fruity jello with milk on top.

The first year we were married we threw a New Year's Eve party and I prepared all kinds of party fare on platters, and just as the guests were arriving I brought out a plate of gooey brie cheese with fruit and bread.  "What is that?" the Muffin asked.

It's brie cheese, I told him.

"Call it whatever fancy name you want," he chided, "but Carole, that is MELTED CHEESE ON A PLATE!"

I love you Muffin.  Happy birthday.

Read any medical website and they'll tell you that it's harder to recover from a tonsillectomy as an adult than it is when you're a kid.

Please, for the love of all that is holy, if you are an adult who is considering a tonsillectomy, RE-READ THAT LINE.

The Muffin underwent a tonsillectomy last Wednesday and at first everything seemed to be fine.  His surgery was completed without incident, and even in his drug-addled post-op state, he was still feeling well enough to ask me, moments after surgery, if I wanted to "get it on," you know, since he was already in a bed.  The first day or two after surgery he seemed better than ever and was all, "Adult tonsillectomies are supposed to suck?  This is a piece of cake!"

And then there was Sunday, which was painful.  And Monday, which hurt worse.   And then the bleeding started.  Now, the doctor who spoke to me after Muffin's surgery told me that a little bit of bleeding was normal.  But bleeding is one of those things that's hard to measure.  To squeamish types like myself who are sickened by the sight of a paper cut, any blood seems like a lot of blood.  But when you're spitting it in the sink periodically for a few days, it's difficult to say.

Still, after the Muffin spent an hour on Wednesday night spitting blood into he sink, after bleeding off and on all day, I got a little concerned.  Plus, the Muffin had been extraordinarily grouchy and saying some really off-the-wall, nonsensical things that made me consider the possibility that his brains may have been located in his tonsils.  So around 7:30 pm I insisted that he get himself to the ER (which, luckily, is perhaps a thirty-second drive from our house).  I felt guilty for not going along, but it was time to start Michael's bedtime routine, and the Muffin was adamant that he would be fine.

The phone rang about half an hour later and to my surprise it was the ER doctor.  He informed me that minutes after arriving at the ER the Muffin passed out, and that he suspected the he had lost a great deal of blood.  "Jarrod is not really coherent right now, but I need to know," he said, "exactly how much blood would you say he has lost?"

I told him that the Muffin had been spitting blood off and on for the last two or three days, but this evening it especially seemed like a lot, which was why I urged him to go to the emergency room.  "It's a good thing you did," he told me, "because if he hadn't gotten here when he did, we could have had a very dire situation on our hands."

Shaking, I hung up the phone and immediately went to the Internet (caution: wrong thing to do!) and typed in "adult tonsillectomy, complications," after which I went on to read about the five or so people who die every year from having their tonsils removed.  Death from a tonsillectomy!  And the cause of death?  Excessive bleeding from the surgery site.

Since Michael was in bed I called Jarrod's dad, a retired RN, and caught him up to speed on the situation, and he drove over the ER to stay with the Muffin.  My rational mind told me that since he was at a hospital everything would be fine, but then my crazy, pregnant brain would chime in that it was possible that my husband might die.  I was understandably upset and spent the next several hours fervently praying to God to not take my husband from me.

Luckily the Muffin was in quite capable hands and after some testing, it was determined that the Muffin had indeed lost a TON of blood and had to be given two units of donor blood.  He had to stay overnight at the hospital and arrived home in the morning feeling much better, though the source of the bleeding (a giant blood clot in his throat), would still have to be removed.  I shudder to think of what Ilwaco-ite is now the Muffin's blood brother (perhaps the mullet-wearing dude from the Go-Kart tracks?  Maybe the confused one-legged cross-dresser who likes to hang out at the bus stop and wave his fake leg at traffic?), but I was grateful nonetheless.

So today the Muffin went back under the knife, where his original surgery site was cauterized, the clot removed, and his adenoids removed, just for good measure.  You might say that the Muffin lost his T&A (wish they could have removed some of mine while they're at it… ha).  He is back at home now and is back to his former state of Muffiny goodness, which is a good thing since it looks like I'll have to put up with him take care of him at home for a few more days.

All in all it has been a rather harrowing experience and my guess would be that if you asked Muffin his opinion on adult tonsillectomy right now, he would not have much positive to say.  I for one am glad that it's over, and that my husband was returned safely to me.

I love you, Muffin.

I realized today that it’s been a while since I graced you with some commentary between Buddy and the Muffin. So here you go, everybody… Christmas has come early!

“Buddy, I don’t understand where your penis even is. Do you have one? Carole, can we look up cat genitalia on the Internet? Because I, for one, am EXTREMELY CURIOUS.”

“As a matter of fact, I don’t believe that Buddy is even a dude. Hey Carole, what if we found out Buddy was actually a girl?”

“Here comes Buddy, Michael. Pick up your stick.”

“I know a certain kitty kitty who is about to get BITCH SLAPPED.”

Though it comes a day late, I would like to wish all the dads out there a very happy father’s day. So… happy father’s day!

After having a harrowing birth experience and then several days of little sleep, c-section recovery, and severe baby blues, it occured to me that there are women out there who are doing this all by themselves. All. By. Themselves. And in those difficult days, I realized that there is no possible way I could do this by myself. I need my husband so much. I need him to hold me at the end of a difficult day. I need to see his smiling face coming up the steps at 5:30. I need to see him scoop up our son, that look on his face that says there is nothing more perfect than this moment. I need him, Michael needs him, and there is no possible way we could live our lives without him.

Happy father’s day, Muffin, and to all the other dad’s whose significant others need them.

I have made it no secret on this blog that Muffin holds the world record for loudest snoring, snarling inhalation so forceful I have to roll him over just so he won’t inhale the drapes.

Last night he snored loud enough to wake up not only myself, but Michael too, so I gave him a poke and shout whispered, “Hey! You’re snoring! Roll over!”

The half-asleep reply…

“Someone wants to sleep with the fishes.”

Ah, that’s my man. Husband, father, Tony Soprano.

Honey, will you give Buddy a treat? He hasn’t had one yet today.

“Yeah, I’ll give him a treat, alright. Treat him to a nice kick in the ass! Put him in a football tee and punt his ass right through the uprights.”

(Buddy runs beneath the newspaper and hides.)

“Hey. Dipshit. We can see you. Buddy! Can I read the sports section when you’re done with it?”

Last night Muffin, Michael and I attended a mandatory “baptism preparation” course. The course featured about ten minutes of useful material wrapped in an hour-and-a-half of time that I could have been at home watching reruns of The O.C. on the Soap Network. God might strike me down for saying that, but if God is truly omniscient then he knows that they’re re-running the first season of The O.C., the golden era, and he would say, “Duuuude. I would totally have skipped that class if I were you.”

Michael clearly enjoyed it too, as evidenced by the non-stop wailing, punctuated by him farting loudly during the closing prayer.

I don’t wax religious too often on This Blog, because really? If I can ellicit such controversial responses to the announcement that I’m going back to school to be a teacher, then I don’t even want to venture a guess as to what kind of comments I might receive about my Catholic faith:

“Um, I’ve never commented here before but I just wanted to let you know that being Catholic is horrible and wrong and you worship idols and you’re going to hell. But hey, do whatever you want, I’m sure you’ll be great.”

Anyway, Muffin and I are Catholic, got married in the church, and are now fulfilling the part of our marriage vows about accepting children lovingly as a gift from God and bringing them into the fold. Are you getting this, St. Peter?

So while I enjoyed learning about the roots of baptism and all that, the class could have been accomplished in about ten minutes. Instead, the teacher made us participate in a litany of mundane worksheets, including one that would take me far too long to explain. Let’s just say that we were to “brainstorm” some Catholics in the “larger world” that “surround our lives.” Muffin and I looked at each other like, “Did you understand a word of what she just said?” and “Can you believe we’re missing The O.C. right now?” I glanced around at the papers of my neighbors, who had written such things as The Pope, Mother Theresa, etc.

And then I glanced at what Muffin had written.

“Whoopi Goldberg in Sister Act.”

We are definitely going to hell.

The great debate over what to name the bimmer has closed. Upon the heels of a recent Seinfeld re-run, in which Jerry can’t remember the name of his girlfriend (except that it rhymes with part of the female anatomy), we’ve decided to call her Delores.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Who knew that when we got a new baby it would come equipped with seat warmers, navigation, and a TV?

Here is the Muffin proudly standing in front of his new baby. You know, because Michael’s carseat didn’t really match the interior of his old car, and we can’t have that.

We are now accepting names for the bimmer, the new leader of the Karnofski fleet. I suggested the “silver bullet,” but that’s kind of a recycled name from my old silver Honda. Internet, your thoughts?