Let me begin by saying I have had too much coffee this morning. Couple that with the Sudafed and I’m completely out of my mind on speed.

The baby is down for his morning nap and so I’m going to try and squeeze in a few paragraphs.

Let’s see, I’m still sick. It’s been five days and I still feel awful. The first few days were brutal, however. I had hives and I was freezing no matter what I put on. I could barely keep up with Emory. Having to go to work sick is one thing but being a mom and taking care of a baby is far, far worse unless, of course, your job is taking care of babies or kids.

To top it all off, we still don’t have a place to live come June 30th. If that doesn’t scare the pants off someone, I don’t know what will. As of right now, I have no idea where we’ll be living when Emory celebrates his first birthday. Perhaps that’s why my body is having trouble shaking this sickness, stress induced hives? If all else fails, we’ll move into The Hobo Nest.

We do have an offer in on a house we really like but we’ve been told they are planning on countering out offer, which we will not agree to. The house is awesome, sure, but it lacks a garage, the basement is unfinished, there is no real yard (it’s small compared to all the rest), and the attic is unfinished. (Many of the houses in that area have finished basements and/or attics.) I think we offered a fair price and I think that if they don’t accept it, they’re going to find themselves paying the difference in two mortgages. We’ll see, but I’m not getting my hopes up, not this time.

Real estate is a strange business and real estate agents make me feel a little sad. Lately, I have had the scene from American Beauty in my head. You know the one where Annette Bening is shown in the middle of a very dated looking home declaring that she “WILL SELL THIS HOUSE TODAY!” while she’s down on all four scrubbing its surfaces.

I swear to you I could smell the desperation.

I have been reminded of that scene a lot lately especially as we trudge through some homes and listen to these poor real estate women (yes, they’ve always been women for us) try and ignore all the horrible things. I have no idea how they do it. The whole experience makes me feel really sad sometimes, sad for everyone—the agent, the people who once lived there, the people who will, the emptiness. What good is a home without voices?

Ah well.

Our Emory is incredible. He’s now pulling himself upright. Everywhere. I discovered this one day by interrupting a potentially dangerous moment. We put Emory down for a nap. He was fussing and fussing and fussing and then he just stopped, just like that, silence. I peeked into his room to check things out and there he was, standing upright in his crib, arms holding onto the top bar. A mere head-thrust forward and he would have toppled out. Needless to say, his mattress was lowered immediately. And I get the feeling he’s going to skip the whole proper crawling thing and move directly from commando baby to standing upright and walking.

It’s Friday. It’s raining and I am dead tired.