The Tires

Good evening, dear readers

Today was the day we FINALLY got the tires changed! Thanks to a number of delays and missed opportunities, we didn't get the other tires until last week and one of them was shredded from a blowout. This morning, my husband went to our favorite neighborhood "llantera" (Mexican tire shop) and got the blown out tire redone. The second tire we were given had a leak, so the boys at the shop patched it up and made sure it didn't leak.

Man at work

When he got home, it was time to get rid of those damned spoked rims and replace them with the proper balloon tires that were just fixed up. My husband also rearranged the tires, putting the larger tires on the back and the smaller ones up front in a more traditional arrangement.

How to take off a cholo tire

As part of my continuing education in car repair and maintenance, my husband let me have a go at changing one of the rear tires.

This tire was changed just in time. The spoked rims were beginning to shred these bolts too.

Out! Out, damned tires!

Unfortunately, I had to stop after one tire. The baby was becoming fussy, but it was also very sunny, windy, and incredibly hot. I suspect the heat was messing with her a bit too since she was throwing up and had diarrhea all afternoon, though it was conceivable that she may have ingested something which didn't agree with her (being a VERY active 10 month old baby, she puts EVERYTHING in her mouth). I spent the day intensely hydrating the baby with water, Pedialyte, and breastmilk. She's been keeping food down and had no runny stool all evening, so I think she's in the clear.

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Protesting Planned Parenthood

Today was the big nationwide protest against the infamous abortion provider, Planned Parenthood. While I've been fairly quiet about the controversial videos released which proport to show Planned Parenthood executives and staff engaging in illegal activities (organ trafficking, infanticide, etc), know this: I am, and will always be, pro-life. My pregnancy and subsequent birth served to reinforce and enhance that which I had been taught regarding the sanctity of life, both in AND out of the womb.

A card my hubby picked up from the registration table. If you don't respect life in utero, you'll view it as worthless outside of the womb too.

It's one thing to see a picture of an ultrasound baby on a poster or hold a plastic fetus at various stages of development. But it's also something totally different to actually see the fetus wiggling and floating around in utero, real-time in front of your eyes and instinctively know "wow. That's mine. I made that."

It would be one thing if Planned Parenthood actually did what it claimed to do and offered STD testing and treatment, counseling, women's health care, etc. But it doesn't. Abortion is ALL that Planned Parenthood does, and the dishonesty put forth by that organization is an injustice to women everywhere. That has always been my beef with Planned Parenthood, even when I did not have the vocabulary to articulate it in the way I wanted to.

While I am largely in favor of crisis pregnancy centers as a means of giving women an alternative to murdering their offspring in utero, I've gotten away from blindly supporting them like I used to. When I got pregnant, I went to a crisis pregnancy center (CPC) not because I wanted an abortion, but because I was a low-income individual seeking to get low-cost prenatal care. I was hoping a CPC could assist me with that.

Bold Hair Day

I took a break for a few days to take care of something I'd been meaning to do for a while: my hair.

Yarn twists

Since my hair tends to get dry and brittle, I've experimented on and off with protective hair styling, like twists and braids, as a means of preserving and encouraging growth. While typically reserved for People of Color, my experience with protective styling is that for Caucasian hair like mine, protective styling is something that's more work than it's worth. While it's bound up in twists and braids, I certainly don't have to waste time or energy combing my hair and keeping it clean is pretty minimal too, the amount of labor involved in the installation is hard to justify the benefits. It's also kind of hard to do stuff like yarn twists with Caucasian hair because our hair tends to have alot of slippage, so the yarn doesn't hold its place well.

Occasionally, I get the itch to do something with my hair, especially now that the weather has become pretty hot and dry at the end of summer. So, out came the yarn.

Black yarn for the base color, hot pink yarn for the highlights. Both skeins were the size of that pink one before I undertook this little project. Yarn extension hairdos require alot of yarn

And then I'm reminded why I rarely do these sorts of hairdos. With the yarn extension twists I did this time, it took me two days to install them, partly because my natural hair is pretty long (it comes just above waist level) and my extensions have to be longer to compensate, and partly cuz no matter how fast I try and be, I always wind up working slow.

Unfortunately, my arms aren't long enough to show the true scale, but I can sit on the ends of my extensions if I wanted to

The good thing is, these will last about 6-8 weeks. I also put a special leave-in conditioner made from coconut oil in each twist, and finished the job off with an olive oil spray to seal in the conditioning for extra moisture. It does feel a little heavy on my head, but not so much as to restrict movement of my head and neck muscles. I did get a tension headache from having to do these twists though, so for anyone out there wanting to attempt these, do so at your own risk. But, for a little while at least, my hair is out of my face and my scalp is more exposed for better aeration.

Also, to any People of Color who might come across this blog, please do not take offense to the sight of me, a White woman, wearing a typically Black hairdo. I did this more for practical reasons than style reasons, and do not wish to disrespect anyone. Unlike Kylie Jenner and her cornrows, I do not appreciate, or wish to engage in, cultural appropriation of any sort.

Will Someone PLEASE Turn off the Oven?!

Like the title of this post suggests, it's been hot as hell outside.

Being a desert dweller, having lived in this state since 2008, you would think I'd have gotten used to this hot climate by now. For each year that I've lived here, I've gotten better at adapting to the hot, dry climate, but even then, I don't think I will ever 100% get used to it. Everytime I try, something happens that exceeds my tolerance (like humidity!).

So like any sensible person, I adapt my habits. Any excursions for groceries or other stuff must be done either at sundown or in the very early morning. Since I'm not an early riser (despite my baby waking up at 6:30 AM on the dot every morning wanting to eat and then PLAY!), our outings are restricted to after sundown. While it sometimes sucks from the grocery shopping standpoint cuz the day's sales have typically cleared out anything worthwhile, gas and comfort-wise, I find it more tolerable. For the times we do have to go out during the day (mostly to church), we try to make use of whatever shaded parking spots we can find and limit our time out of a cooled environment as much as possible. Just common-sense stuff.

Hopefully soon, we here in the desert will get one final monsoon storm or two in these last few weeks of summer. The humidity from these storms makes things uncomfortably sticky, but it cools things off for a little while. Plus, you get cool pictures, like this one taken just north of Tucson

Taken in Marana, a cotton suburb north of Tucson, AZ. Picture found here

Come on, Autumn! I'm tired of this heat!