by 4:30 butter was a reasonable plaything

So, I finally joined a gym again after almost two years without regularly scheduled exercise. The first year after Henry’s birth, I was too tired to care and last summer we got out and about fairly often. This winter however, I have been a total sloth and it’s time to fix that. I hate few things more than having my options restricted and there’s no way I can even think about trying to get pregnant again without losing some significant weight. The good new is that I love this gym. It’s a racquet club that must have been all fancy in the 70s and is now a little dated but well-equipped and has funny little features like a sunken seating area with fireplace in the lobby stocked with middle aged guys drinking bear after killing themselves on the racquet ball court, and a tv in the women’s locker room.

The only time I can get in to regularly work out is around 7pm as Henry is headed for bed. The only major issue I’m having is figuring out how to eat dinner at a reasonable time so I don’t get on the treadmill stuffed and lethargic. So, the goal is to eat dinner around 5:30, which is actually probably a good solution for Henry too. Nice idea but the execution so far is lacking. Henry gets harder to entertain as the afternoon wears on and he is no longer content to play while I cook. Instead, he must be at counter height to observe everything I am doing and discuss whether or not every single item in the kitchen is hot or not multiple times. Generally I am fine with this. I like having him interact with me and experience new things and I love the idea of teaching him to cook. But tonight when a freelance graphic design client called to discuss a new project while I had my hands in the sink and looked over to see Henry simultaneously grabbing for my open drink bottle, the meat thermometer, an open can of tomato sauce, and a stick of butter, I quickly swept all but the butter away from him and it felt like a perfectly logical decision. At times like these I have to wonder if even considering having another child is a good idea.

In the end, the kitchen was somewhat trashed, dinner was done and eaten by 6pm, little harm was done to person, property or dairy product and my child remains happy. I do have to ask myself though if parking him in front of Blue’s Clues for a half of an hour would have been such a bad thing. Honestly, I’m not sure.