Quick Takes from the Coolest News Week Ever

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Lent. I love it. I know, that is weird, but I do. To me Lent is like a lovely second honeymoon with God. You get to leave behind all your little distractions and reacquaint yourself with the one you fell in love with long ago. This lent is no T.V. and no Facebook for me because they are my two greatest distractions. But I like to say "no" to other distractions during the day and "yes" to loving a little better and listening to the nudging of the Holy Spirit a little more.

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The pope is abdicating, which sounds very dramatic and scary, unless you are me. I don't know what it is about me that gets excited about the pope throwing a curve ball. Some people are saying this is an end-times situation and that the next pope or the one after that is going to be the anti-pope. My brain can not go there. Pretty much if your soul is in good order, the end of time might be something you wanna look forward to. It's in the Apostles Creed, after all. "We look forward to the resurrection of the body." So, if the end-times freak you out, go to confession and receive the Eucharist more often.

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Then there are people who say that maybe the next pope will catch up with the culture. God, I hope not. I like timeless things, not trendiness. The problem with the wisdom of the day is that it changes with the next sunrise. While our church might be infested with terrible sinners, the doctrine has stood for 2000+ years. People keep rediscovering truths that the church has held for millenia.

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Mariana update: She will be getting the stents in her nasolacrimal ducts. We are in the process of scheduling the surgery, hopefully in March. She will keep the stents for 6 months, rather than the usual 3-4, just to give her extra time to grow. Before that, we'll need to put her on Axid to clear up her wet reflux cough because they will not put her under while she has a wet cough. I'm thrilled to have this plan of action, but I do not look forward to having my baby put under.

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Mariana update #2: She is NOT crawling. Mrs. J. has had her case evaluated by our case worker, and she has been approved for twice/week therapy. Navigating all of this is tough. One one hand,we want her to make progress quickly. On the other, if she does progress she could be dialed back to once a week even though it took twice a week to get the progress. They only evaluate progress and not potential, which means once she's off and running she'll be denied services, never mind what it took to get her to move forward! We also have to be careful not to make too big a deal of what progress she does make, which feels a lot like lying and thus cheating the system. I'm very careful not to lie, but it still feels quite crummy. The day that girl crawls I'm going to want to make t-shirts!!!

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We went to Ohio where Mariana proceeded to stare at family with deep suspicion. Except Uncle Joe. He's a faux-grump, which Mae found delightful. She was fabulous on the plane, made friends with all those seated next to us and received many many complements about her behavior. It helps to give her free reign of the pectoral buffet. She nursed for about 2/3 of every flight except the last one. That flight she just slept.

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I had some of my teeth fixed while I was in Ohio, by the world's greatest dentist. He numbed me up enough, and gave me nitric oxide. I wasn't nervous at all! But then he said my teeth look like I drink Mt. Dew, which is an affront to all I hold dear, but I did discover drinking undiluted apple cider vinegar is the the equivalent on the teeth as Mt. Dew.  Well played Dr. Rewwer. (BTW, the good Dr. is my brother-in-law. He doesn't accuse his patients of drinking Mountain Dew unless he is related to them...)

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