How Deep?

I just finished a book today called "Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future." It is a very new book, just out at the end of 2007, and it poses an interesting perspective on the comming years and what they hold.

The author who doesn't really quite fit into the liberal or conservative box, (though I think both sides of the coin will find the book appealing for different reasons.) posits the theory that for the first time since the industrial revolution people are faced with the choice of choosing between haveing "more" and having "better" two things which we usually associate as always going together. In a time when people like to throw around the phrase "sustainable future" this fellow likes to use the word "durable." I find this refreshing because to sustain something is just to maintain it as it is, but to build a culture that is not only "sustainable" but "enduring" brings to mind things the things in a culture that do endure, which ultimatley have stood the past of time and continue to do so. Exiting stuff.

Anyway this book puts a whole new face on the "dismal science" of economics and even people who run screaming and running at the mention of Global Warming and Peak Oil should find this an interesting read. Because at last it is a book about answers instead of problems. It is ultimatley a book about hope.

I can just see Pope Leo up in heaven nodding approvingly everytime this guy talks about local economies. Also for being written by a person who is as green as this fellow is there is thankfully very little talk of overpopulation. . . (thank goodness.)

In other news today was a very UNproductive day in which I missed a dentist apointment, managed to almost burn down my apartment, and we all five got stuck at CVS with the car battery dead. . . . though in the end all the troubles landed us at the Schnerre's for a wonderful visit and a very enjoyable and delicious dinner in the company of friends. I suppose today "more" and "better" certainly were very very seperate, indeed.

Okay, I'll stop shamlessley posting pictures of my cute family. . . .

I was poking around on the Cealum et Terra blog again and was reading an article where modern television cartoons (as in the last ten years or so) are described as "creepy." This made me laugh because this is usually my general reaction to any cartoon show on cable made after the year 1995 or so. Has anyone else noticed how strange and offbeat the humor has become and how dissproportioate and jerky the animation style is? Why? . What's the deal with that?

Okay I take it back--that is a broad generalization--there is the exeptional Justice League cartoons and, of course, the Powderpuff girls had some good moments. I guess I'm thinking more of cartoons for young young kids. Like seven and under. . . .

Anyway, this is even funnier in light of the fact that I have just introduced the girls to the old Muppet Show episodes. Ben and I put one on for them last night and I was floored at its sheer overwhelming wholesomeness. Sure it was zany and perhaps, might I venture, even "whacky" but the innoncent fun of it all was what I found so refreshing. So I lift my glass high to Jim Hensen. May his puppet legacy , God willing, long outlive the likes of this decade's bizzare cartoonery.


If you want to see a really cute sketch, go to Youtube and look for a sketch of Julie Andrews singing "the Lonley goatherd" to the muppets. Hillarious.

Quick pics. . .

>Julia in stylin overalls. . .
>We are adjusting to three.

Nonna doing what she does best other than making fajitas!

moo

Sorry to interrupt all the sweetness and light aroud here what with the newborn baby and all. . .

but this article on cloned beef made me pretty queasy. (http://www.livescience.com/health/070102_bad_clones.html)

So I guess now the beef at the store might not only be fattened in a pile of its own filth, fed the remains of its friends, and trucked all over this country to get to my plate, apparently I might be eating the SAME cow over and over and over again for the rest of my life. Ummm i guess one more reason to buy local beef, or else buy myself a sweet storm trooper costume.

Rrrr.

Anyway poor Julia had the sniffles today so I decided not to bring her out to her cousin's baptism. I was bummed because I was looking forward to getting out and seeing little Anja get water poured all over her cute bald head but it was great to have a nice quiet day with just the two of us. I just didn't want to mess with a one week old baby with a cold. The good news is she is nursing, pooping and sleeping just fine despite her runny nose . I am so glad this happened with my third baby and not my first.

Well the babe stirreth. . . .

Julia's first week of life is drawing to a close and I think the thing I love the most about having a baby is how it is one of those rare intervals in the whrilwind of life when time slows down to a more gentle humane pace and the days last a long time.

I am loving every minute of staying in bed, oh so much more the third time around because I know that when this ends the life I have resumes its breakneck speed and tomorrow Julia will be one, Angelica reading, and Zita climbing on trees instead of me.

So for now it is sweet sweet, piano. . . piano.

. . . but we did have some big changes this week. The Christmas decorations came down and Julia lost her umbilical cord stump and my milk came in. BIg headlines around here.

"And now the time has come to speak of Julia. . . . "

Hooray for 100 posts. Alright here is the story of Julia.




Well we were starting to think that the pregnancy would last forever. The midwife was starting to talk castor oil which must have made me freak out and go into labor. The early labor was very long and I mostly ignored it because I had had so many faky patterned contractions for weeks always thinking "this is it" that I didn't want to think it was real. I walked alot downtown and Ben and I went to Borders and out to lunch.

The contractions lasted ten minutes apart for almost 24 hours before things really kicked into gear. I was getting to the point where I couldn't sleep thru them (it was about two in the morning) because they were so strong but they still remained ten minutes apart so I was hesitant to call Mary Ann. I would doze to sleep, wake up, have a contraction, lay back down again and just when I was nodding off, have another one.

Having a history of reaaaaallly long births I thought I had until the following afternoon before the baby would come. I just decided to get in the tub and try and get some releif. When I got out of the tub they REALLY picked up and were feeling like transition. I kept thinking--"this can't be transition it's too soon!" So finally i had Ben call the midwife to come down and I climbed into the bed. All of a sudden I wanted to push and my water broke really violently. It actually almost made me laugh. Everything was soaking wet. The kids then woke up and were wondering what was going on and I was wanting to push. Ben called the grandmothers to come and get the kids and meanwhile Angelica went to fetch me water.

I was sitting there moaning "I want to push" and Ben was on the phone getting directions from the midwife for delivering the baby should she miss the birth. The kids kept badgering Ben and everything was really crazy. Actually, It was all rather comical in retrospect.

The grandmothers came and took the girls and my mom decided to stay and help. Mary Ann came rushing in not to much later and I started pushing the minute she got in the door--I couldn't wait. After a while we decided I should switch positions and squat since the baby was slightly posterior and having a little trouble making it around my bone. Once I switched postions she was out with a few pushes--arriving about forty minutes after the midwife got there.

Despite being two weeks late she was just fine and the placenta looked great too so no worries on that front. Thank goodness for patient midwives.

I was so exited that she was born on January the fifth, which I have always said is a birthday that keeps showing up in my life. It is the birthday of my dear youngest sister (also a third girl) Josepha, my dear friend Regina (houseartjournal) and my husband's best childhood friend. So know we have big reasons to celebrate January the fifth every year and another reason to rejoice every Christmas season!

Hooray for January the fifth!

Oh and Julia was nameless for the first day of her life because when she came none of our girl names suited her and we had to wait and pray and let her name come to us ---which it did. Julia is a name I have always loved as has Ben and it suits her to a T. Her sweetness overwhelms us with joy. She weighed seven pounds three ounces, which is my biggest baby yet.

I couldn't be more overjoyed to have three dear daughters. I told Ben it'll be another wedding to pay for but he couldn't be a prouder or more overjoyed papa.

And that's how Julia came to us.

Oh and Zita got a haircut from her dad.

E UNA BELL FEMININA

She's HERE! AT Last!!! Born at 7:08 on January 5th after a long wait and pretty quick labor!

Welcome Julia Noel!!!

Birth story to follow!