Another great thing about Jackson is that he has no idea when he's done something utterly disgusting. Like plunge his hand into wet kitchen garbage to fish out a cork (or, as we call them, Infant Esophageal Blockage Devices). Or the other night when I was bathing him and he took a big shit in the water. Thank God I'd already scrubbed and shampooed him squeaky clean so I could get him away from the chunky floaters toot sweet. And he has no clue, he's just like, Here's the "poop" hand sign and now I'm going to run out of the bathroom wet and naked and go stick my hands into the cat litter box. Which is especially treacherous because my hilariously elderly cat likes to take these two-part dumps. She'll squeeze out a nice turd, climb out of the box, and scratch at the floor in a civilized manner, and then she'll go, You know, I need to go in for one more round but, whoa! it stinks in there! Hmmm, I could lay log #2 here on the newspaper in front of the box, but what if someone wants to read those stock market tables? I think it's best if I just explosively deposit a quart chocolate pudding right here on this tangle of electrical cords. Ahhhh. And Jack wonders why I always want to go straight to sleep at night with a pillow over my head.

Other husband-related observations: When I first met Jack he was a rough-and-tumble construction worker driving around with his tools in the back of a car he'd borrowed from his sister, wearing a $1,200 watch, whose hair always smelled great. Other things Jack owned in 1995: 1. A quilt bedspread with matching pillow shams and a bed skirt 2. Not one but two bread baskets, a long one for baguettes and a little round one for rolls 3. A bulimic Abyssinian cat named Auda Abu Tayi He's got a studly truck now, the cat went to the Humane Society (they have a no-kill policy, don't worry), and the quilt is trashed, but we still use the baskets every day.

Yesterday, Jackson and I joined our downstairs neighbors and their son, daughter-in-law, and almost-three-year-old granddaughter for a ride up to the Santa Ynez Valley. We had lunch with the cowboys at the Longhorn, where it seems to be a cultural imperative to gun your engine several times before shutting it off, thus awakening any babies who might be sleeping in other cars, thereby depriving the parents of said babies a chance to eat anything substantial before they have to get up to prevent baby deaths-by-drowning in decorative barrel-fountains. Then we drove to the Melville winery, which was closed for Columbus Day, so we just skipped the whole wine tasting thing, even though Jackson's developing a taste for local pinot noir. Then we looked at some property near the water that we might all move to, our downstairs neighbors taking the big house and Jack, Jackson, and I taking the double-wide trailer across the highway from the beach. I only got to see the trailer from the road, but it's supposed to be old and funky in a good way. At first I was excited, but now I'm having second thoughts. I know it's so ultra hip around here to live in a done-up trailer, but I don't know. Do they have insulation? Heat? Water? CABLE INTERNET SERVICE? Or will I be beating our clothes against a rock down at the creek for entertainment? These and other questions will be answered, if not tomorrow, then sometime soon, I'm sure.

We are angrily awaiting the Great Pumpkin, because he gypped us last year.