I am eating my first mug cake.

I doubt it is my last.

Damn you people. Damn you to hell.

I'm eating broccoli slaw in prep for a cleansing fast. But I do have the recipe for mug cake bookmarked.

He's getting good at pronouncing Evander but it comes out more "Evaner".

He was sooo cute yesterday. Dad's built a shed type thing on the back of the house, and there's access under the beach house (it's a modular home). So Dad was showing it to Grandma and Aunt J -- since it's almost finished. and E wanted to go down there.

So we did and he got so excited. Evidently he's really into hiding right now. So he went inside "Evaner is higing". (hard g instead of the d).

And then he said "Baba come inside. Lala come inside. J come inside Grandma come inside. Evaner inside"

So we all went and he looked around and starting laughing and shaking his arms (which means he's really really happy) "We are HIGING!!! We are HIGING! Lala is higing, Baba is higing, J is higing Grandma is higing Evaner is higing. We are higing!"

It was so cute! And he would do something and want everyone to do the same thing.

Of course there was still plenty of "No Lala come in! No Lala say 'you okay kiddo'". He'll tell you "No Lala/Nina/Daddy say" and then repeat whatever he didn't want to hear. "No Daddy say quiet time!"

And its frikkin' huge.

I need a life partner with whom to share them.

"Bouncing Souls fan seeks single, heterosexual, male to share mug cakes with."

"Love of higing a plus."

I doubt it is my last.

Great reward to effort ratio, no? And minimal cleanup. I just baked a normal cake, and I'm kinda wondering why I went to all that trouble.

Which mug cake recipes are you people using? Not that I should be asking this question AT ALL, but I'm curious.

Nutella mug cake.

Oh, my piece of excitement over the weekend: while on the way to meet friends at a playground (two other Chinese-Austtralian couples, apparently we joined a club while I wasn't watching), we got a flat tyre. In the car were Wallybee, Ryan and Waipo (grandma), who all got to stand around and watch me change it (with the added fun of dampening Ryan's eagerness to help). Wallybee was very impressed, she wasn't aware that we had a spare, or for that matter that I knew how to change one. (I'm not quite sure whether to be flattered or offended on that point.)

Vituperative VENT ahead:

My husband's ex want us to move to PA because M misses his dad. OK, I get that. I really do. Of course he missed his dad. Of course it would be wonderful if they could be together more.

But she's applying pressure, says M is having self-esteem issues (which, frankly, I see as something coming NOT from missing dad) and that M is expressing that Dad isn't moving to PA because of me.

Aside from that fact that even if D and I split tomorrow, it's ridiculous. This woman has lived in three cities, 3 states in 4 years, M has changed from a crappy public school to a competitive private school, has been an only child for 8 years and has a 1 year old baby brother, and bio mom and bio dad both got new spouses in the last year.

She has a new job that has her out of the house all the time, a new baby and...I'm not moving. Aside from the fact that D has a steady job he likes and has been at for 7 years, his family is in Iowa, we have a house that we are slowly digging out of the financial mess SHE left behind when she moved two states away following the lover she had an adulterous affair with...I'm not moving.

I don't want to, it would be HORRIBLE for me, I would be terribly unhappy, our marriage would suffer and I would resent M for it. It would be a disaster, and it's not going to happen.

GRR. Woman, sometimes I fucking hate you. When you pack up and leave shit behind, you leave a trail of disaster and chaos. We want to be stable, I want to be HERE, with my elderly parents, my close-knit circle of friends that's 20 years old and we are just going to have to make the best of the life choices YOU made.

YOU fucked around. YOU left the marriage. YOU followed your lover to MN. YOU followed him to PA when he got a job. YOU took a stressful job. YOU had a baby. Ok. People have the right to make choices that would make them happy. But you don't think. And you were towing a 4 year old along in your irresponsible wake. And now there is a "hole in his life." Of course there is. And your choices lead to this.

We are not moving, and it's cruel of you to keeping putting in into your son's head.

D doesn't want to move either. I flatly will not. I will compromise on many, many things, but I won't on this. Anyway, with her peripatetic past, there's no guarantee they wouldn't up and leave anyway.

I am suggesting to D that several things happen. (1) We make it clear moving is NOT on the table, and she needs to not bring it up to M as a possibility. You moved away. Your choice. D could have not let you, according to KS child agreement laws, so suck it the fuck it.

It would be optimal if D were closer to M. Of course. Life? Not optimal. Not fair. Not perfect. And sometimes you just have to do the best with what is in existence. We can work on visiting more, work on getting M out here more. Money is an issue (mostly because you completely fucked everything to shit for D, and I am not exaggerating -- a business she left behind abruptly when she moved, abandoning the house after she told D to move out so she could live her with her lover, leaving behind years of unpaid mortage, utility and doctor bills.)

(2) M needs to go to a therapist, someone who isn't mom or dad, or stepmom or stepdad, someone who is objective and who he doesn't feel like he needs to hide emotionally hurtful feelings about. Now. I think he should have been in therapy for a little while, because of all the chaos and changes going on in his life. I will be researching area therapists. If she doesn't agree, then we will contact the mediator, and make it happen. She's done this, for stupid shit like requiring M be enrolled in summer camps when he's here on summer vaca with dad.

(3) All conversations of this nature will be now done on Skype or speakerphone, since her husband is in on all calls of this nature to D. You have been selfish and hauled your kid around, following any whim you felt at the moment and you want to make D feel like a bad dad? The man who cries because he missed his child, he man who calls and (continued...)