Where to begin?

Which stories to tell? What news to relate? Which curse words to fling?

1) The birthday that began as day from hell (complete with crippling back pain and projectile cat vomit and near-confrontation with aging naked socialite at spa) but got better (lovely meal prepared by lovely husband) but then went hellish again (projectile husband vomit from over-indulgence in super-rich chocolate cake and/or secret Vietnamese lunch that he snuck in while I was at spa staring down saggy-titted Rosedale matrons)?

2) The flight westward? With Energizer-charged WonderBaby, now with EYES THAT DO NOT CLOSE, not even after endless hours without sleep? During which the so-not-helpful flight attendant commented, after observing WonderBaby’s amazing ability to sit up on floor near bulkhead with a soft book and hoot, loudly, FOR HOURS, that “it’s always the skinny finicky ones that develop most quickly.”?

Insert multiple curse words here.

(Am trying to train myself to minimize cursing. Am in presence of small children. And increasingly, freakishly, alert WonderBaby. Goddam.)

3) Our arrival in British Columbia’s beautiful Okanagan Valley? The lovely greeting from WonderBaby’s little cousins? Tanner’s query (oft-repeated) as to why his auntie wears glasses? And why auntie looks like Velma? And could she please take off her glasses and not look like Velma? For the record: a taller, blonder, thirty-something Velma. And could someone please explain to him, in terms that a six year old will understand, that this is a look that many a latter-day feminist hipster girl strives for?)

The long, difficult discussion on the drive home about where WonderBaby came from, exactly? (Auntie’s tummy. Why? Because she grew there. Why? Because that’s where babies grow. How did she get there? She, ahem, grew from a seed. How did the seed get there? Um… How did she get out? Um…)

From the cabbage patch, dudes. From the cabbage patch.

4) WonderBaby crawling? Backwards, but still. On hands and knees and MOVING.

I can’t do any of these stories justice in the five free minutes that I have right now. Especially without the cursing (cursing makes storytelling immeasurable faster and easier. A well-delivered what the fuck would summarize that my commentary on that flight attendant story quite nicely, thank you very much. But I’m cutting down.)

Saints preserve me. It’s going to be a long twelve days.