Numbers oozing from one's ears

"I got numbers comin' outta my ears. For instance: ten. That's how many months old my baby girl is. Six. That's how old my other daughter is, eight is the age of my son, two is how many times I've been married - and divorced; sixteen is the number of dollars I have in my bank account. 850-3943. That's my phone number, and with all the numbers I gave you, I'm guessing zero is the number of times you're gonna call it."

I love that scene in Erin Brockovich. It's inspired this post, because I too have numbers coming out of my ears, although mine are a little less "Les Miserables" than hers are.

Eight is the number of drinks I was served At My New Favorite Restaurant On the Planet for my birthday two weeks ago - six glasses of wine, a shot with the funny name the bartender gave us on the house and one glass of sparkling shiraz, also on the house. It was spread out over many hours. I do not admit this lightly.

One was the hour that Saturday afternoon I found myself sitting next to my husband in a class about resiliency. It was a less-than-riveting experience for both of us. We'd had a celebratory night the night before and the topic was mandatory and the speaker unengaging but then suddenly I was flooded with a squishy, giddy, teenagery love for the man on my left who was complaining about his shoes and having to tuck his shirt in all day. None of these set the stage for an outpouring of affection, but there it was, and I could not throw my arms around him and kiss his face. All the energy a husband and wife are supposed to have for each other and their marriage is totally bogarted by the children, and I forget how much I truly like the man until we're away from the kids.

Thirty is the number of pounds of mirror I dropped on my own head this morning when I knocked into my dresser and the mirror resting on it flipped over me and onto the floor. It did not break. Not only do I not have the capacity to be a wife, I am also having trouble caring for myself. Last week I put a glob of hair conditioner in my palm and applied it enthusiastically to my armpit. This week I put my Blackberry in the garbage, folded a used paper plate in half and stuck it in my purse and made it to my car before I realized I had just completed simple tasks out of order.

Four is how many loads of the boys' laundry I washed, dried and folded last night because we did NO laundry last week and here's why. By the time I've worked all day, driven 30-45 minutes out to Gonzales to pick up the boys from school and 25 minutes home (I don't control traffic), cooked supper and fed it to my children and my husband who has walked in the door from HIS all-day job just in time to eat it, studied for tests while Corey cleaned the kitchen, then got the boys clean and in bed, there is nary a household chore being done in this house. Corey and I sit in our respective chairs and watch mindless television and not talking to each other for the ninety to 120 minutes between their bedtime and ours. The other night I was on the phone at 9:30 at night and sweeping the entire downstairs after I got pissed off watching the balls of cat hair tumbleweed across the living room floor. But I do not care because

Eight is also the time at which my boys lay their heads on their pillows, with the safety and security of knowing where they will be and what will happen to them tomorrow, which is not something I was able to give them this time last year. And I know of other children whose parents are not able to provide this for them today. So I will not lose sleep over cat hair and multiple loads of laundry.

My housework doesn't get done in a timely manner so my boys can look like this when they watch Men in Black with their dad.

Two-hundred-twelve is the number of approximate bursts of laughter Jake and Landen had watching Men in Black for the first time last night.

Two is the number of vehicular accidents that occurred in my driveway TODAY. The first was when Corey Daniel Allbritton knocked his side mirror off his new car when he hit the fencepost whilst backing out of our driveway. The second was when Corey Daniel Allbritton said he was going to bring the 96-gallon trashcan on wheels up from the curb and his wife did not check to see if he had actually done it before she backed down the driveway and knocked that bitch straight into the street.

Zero is the inches of hair that Murphy has left on his body. No, really he has about 1/4 of an inch of hair. This happened to us last year when we grew out his mane and he launched a full-on assault of the hairbrush. The resulting matting required a close-body shave of the entire dog. Even though we didn't let his hair get that long this Spring, it has happened again.

This is what he looked like yesterday.

This is what he looks like today.

Twenty is the amount of money I spent on snow cones last week, not including the two I had for free at Jeff and Emily's wedding in New Orleans on Saturday. My high school bestie - a snazzy, savvy, creative, Southern Baptist list-making fashionista - married her Sugarbaby - a younger, Jewish, midwestern, problem-solving finance wiz in a "best of both worlds" ceremony and party last weekend. I'm not posting pictures I took of the wedding because she's honeymooning in Costa Rica and will post pictures when she's ready to reveal them. There was also a photo booth, and I'll post the photos we took in that.

Justin and Corey are on the left. They don't make a cuter couple than we do, right?

Thirty-eight represents the percentage increase in tuition we are going to experience when Jake and Landen start their new school in the fall. Yes, we got in! We still haven't told the boys. I'm not sure Jake is stable enough to hear some planet-shaking news like that and not have a violent outburst in an inopportune place, so we're going to wait until school lets out. Or right before school lets out. I have HUGE anxiety about them changing schools, for various reasons. Because I graduated with the same group of students I started kindergarten with. Because Jake does not take to change well and I feel we have wreaked enough havoc on him to earn the pain he is sure to cause us in his teenage years. Because their current school is the only church and school family they've ever known. Because they have a high level of tolerance for the grieving process these kids have brought to school with them every day this year. These people took special care of them when their mother was dying. Hell, these people took special care of their mother when she was dying.

On the other hand, if I'm correct in my assessment that what they crave most is to be normal, to be like everybody else, then there is a positive spin to be placed on this. At St. Jude, they will not be those boys whose mom died of cancer while their dad was in Iraq. Maybe it's good to have no history somewhere, to start the same as all the other boys in the class. That's how we're going to spin it. That, and

Sixty is the number of additional minutes everyone except Dad will get to sleep in the mornings when we start the new school.

.....

March(ing along) in photos, and I had a birthday

So we started out the month with Jake's Saber Tooth. He never complained about it, just casually mentioned that his tooth was loose and hurt him enough that he could not chew on that side of his mouth. That weekend, he looked like a chipmunk with a nut in his cheek. On Monday, I took him to the dentist, who promptly removed the tooth. It was a baby tooth and the root was not dissolving as the adult tooth grew in, which created an abscess.

Last weekend we went to visit Corey's mom and brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews in Florida. Corey's brother Zack and his wife Brittany just had a new baby girl, Rylynn. She's the tiniest baby I've ever seen. Just delicious. Jake said he was ready for one of these tiny babies at his house. Landen tried to rub her head like she was a puppy. The boys know that we're going to try to grow our family, but we want to settle in as the four of us for a year or two first. I have four years before shit starts getting difficult.

One of the great things about where my in-laws live in Florida is that it's bigger than Jena, but rural like Jena, and the kids have a huge yard to run around in and a private street that gets little traffic. So cousins Xander and Max and Dad were able to help Landen with the bike-riding he has to master before he can put a foot on the skateboard he got for his birthday. We still have a lot of work to do on this.

Adults control the TV at my in-laws' so the kids have to stay outside and entertain themselves. Even though we limit the amount of both the boys are allowed per day, without television or computer games, Jake was much more relaxed and social the entire time we were there.

The Corrao cousins drove up from Orlando with their Razor Drifter, which is a little go-kart that the kids went crazy for. Little kids and big kids.

We got some great cousin pictures. Here are Jake and Landen with Corey's sister's sons Xander and Max.

And all the grandbabies - Rylynn (held by her mama), Elle, Landen, Zoey (Elle's twin) holding little sister Stella, Xander, Jake and Max.

The twins had a softball game while we were there and the Allbritton family went to the ballpark to cheer them on. Those girls moved too fast for me to get pictures, but here's a sweet brother shot from the bleachers.

School was out for Mardi Gras last week, so when we got back on Tuesday, they boys left to spend the rest of the week and the weekend in Beaumont. Corey had a mandatory soldier conference (we'll just call it that because the name's uninteresting) in New Orleans on my birthday weekend so my choice was to go with him or stay home all alone. On Friday I turned 31 and that night we went to Byblos, a Greek restaurant on Magazine Street with some couple friends of ours and two other soldiers that are like Corey's family. We laughed a lot and drank a lot and I sent a hungover SSG Allbritton over to his conference Saturday morning while I lolled about in bed trying to stop feeling like arse. Saturday night Corey and I went to have the best pizza in New Orleans, at Slice Pizzeria on St. Charles. We got back this afternoon, reunited with the boys and had belated birthday pizza and birthday cake, with candles and singing.

A family post would not be complete without Audie Murphy Daniel Allbritton, shown here snuggling with Daddy in the bed, before he was tucked into his own bed for the evening.