a poopy afternoon

The weather is amazing today. So nice that I took a walk in a t-shirt. It was great to be outside in the sun (a rarity here in good old Rochester) and we met lots of neighbors. It seems that having a baby makes people far more interested in you than if you're on your own. We've lived in our house for about six years now, and people are just now approaching us and introducing themselves. Anyway, I met a man who told me to introduce myself to another neighbor, Fanny, who was outside doing yardwork with her kids, because she "has a new baby." I think this is a funny saying, and I told Nate so much, as we walked over to Fanny's house. I mean, can you really have an "old baby?" I say hi to Fanny and mention that Joe Shmoe from down the street said to say hi because we both had babies. Turns out her's is three weeks old. So I guess Nate now qualifies as "old." And I qualify as a "slacker" because not only is this woman home with three children (ages 5, 3, and the infant) but she is doing YARDWORK. And I still haven't figured out how to take a regular shower. How can this be?

So home we trot, stopping to talk to the rest of Nate's fanclub on the way, and my old baby goes down for a lovely nap. Feeling pretty lame that Fanny can garden already, I head out to conquer one of my least favorite annual chores - picking up dog poop that has accumulated in our yard over the winter. If you think cleaning a toilet is a lousy job, this is infinately worse - like one gigantic, quarter-acre toilet. My brave mother-in-law actually began this rite of spring on her last visit, leaving a small mark on the chore. Pounds and pounds of poo later my back hurts and I give up. How is it that poo has this amazing ability to just get all over the place? I think we probably have one more major cleaning to do before things are back to normal.

Inside, little Nate is happily swinging away, and, appropriately, has pooped all over himself. So if I didn't have enough fun cleaning up four months of dog poo, I then got to extend poopaganza a bit longer. Hooray!