Fooling myself into thinking I post more than once a week.

In classic form, I just received a notification from my Vice President that they've approved my maternity leave. Yes, the maternity leave that started November 26. Nicely done. Glad to hear she's ok with my having not shown up to work for the last 6 weeks. Of course, now I'm going to have to call them to let them know I'll be taking two more weeks of leave, per California law. (One good thing about a C-Section, two more weeks of "Pregnancy Disability Leave").

How much of a nerd am I? I'm REALLY looking forward to doing my taxes this year. Especially since Warren was so kind as to join us before the new year, and I get to claim him for all of 2007, even though he was only breathing air for 11 days of it. Hurray! God, how sad is that?

My brother is finally in a treatment program. I say "Finally" because he was supposed to have checked in on the 3rd of January, but somewhere something went awry and he didn't. How much was misunderstanding and how much is straight dishonesty is not clear. It's been a really tough month with him. The whole family kind of came together and made a stand, we couldn't give him any more money, and my parents took back their car and their house keys.

My brother had been planning on coming to Oakland for Christmas with everyone else, and I had to call and tell him that while I love him, I can't have him staying in my house. That happened while I was in labor. (I didn't know that I was officially in labor at that point, for the record). A couple weeks ago, after his first treatment placement fell through and he'd already moved out of his apartment, he discovered he had nowhere to sleep. My parents had already told him he couldn't stay with them, but he apparently didn't take it seriously. So, one stormy Friday night, my dad had to take him to a homeless shelter.

It took two weeks before my sister was able to make a few phone calls using her "Nurse Voice" and get him a place in a program in Sacramento. He checked in last Friday. He's in the midst of a "blackout" period where he's not allowed communication with anyone. I'm almost relieved about that. It was so hard to talk to him for the last several weeks, and I'm ashamed to admit that it kept me from calling him as often as I should have.

I think I've officially reached my limit of "shit I can handle." Between having a baby, all this shit with my brother, and my MIL going batshit insane, I'm done. Nothing, not good or bad, nothing is allowed to happen for the next month at least. If it's more involved than going out to dinner, I'm out. Not for me.