In motion. And sick.

I know I have an urpy kid. I know it. I know it so well that, after learning a hard lesson on a plane somewhere above Richmond last summer, I now pack extra outfits in my carry-on. For everyone.

I now carry a big box of wipes with us in the car and often, throw in a roll of paper towels just for good measure.  Just like his daddy, my boy needs to keep his eyes on the horizon in moving vehicles. And when he can't, well...have the barf bag ready.

It's not that Lil E always pukes in planes and cars. It's just that when he does, it is so much better not to be totally taken by surprised or totally unprepared. I can handle cleaning nastiness from the crevices of the car seat (why oh why, car seat manufacturers do you make it so fucking difficult to wash a hurled-on cover?) but wearing spots of re-emerging breakfast is just a big no-go. For all of us.

Just like most things parenting, no matter how superiorly prepared I feel, urp happens. And on Sunday, it happened no less than three disgusting, hurling times. In the middle of God-awful traffic on the way out of town with my mom to see my grandmother, then again five miles from the closest exit and then again just when we thought the kid was emptied out and too exhausted to register motion sickness (or maybe that was me).

The first time, once he was stripped down, given the proper baby whore bath with wipes, redressed and placed back in an as-clean-as-it-can-get on the shoulder of the Dan Ryan, I turned to my mom and said, "You know how, as a parent, puke and stuff just loses its disgusting factor? You know how you stop thinking about how nasty it is and just clean it up because you have to?"

She nodded and that led to a big conversation about parents - celebrity and otherwise - who get all oogied out about changing diapers. The reality is, we decided, you lose the investment in the bodily function because your job is to clean it up and take care of the kid.

But after the third time, which came in a sequence of four parts marked Crying, Screaming, Projectile and Oh I Guess He Really Did Eat a Lot of Mango this Morning, I recanted that whole little apt parent sermon.

"You know that whole thing I said," I turned back to my mom, "about kiddie puke losing its nastiness for parents?"

She nodded, eyes closed, as if processing the previous scenes as I talked.

"Total bullshit. Complete and total bullshit. It really is still nasty."

"Yeahhhh," she admitted. And we laughed.

Thank God we could laugh. Because there is nothing else about a 2-1/2 hour trip turned four hours with a toddler who is so busy vomiting and crying they can't nap and the faint smell of aloe wipes and otherwise, that's humorous. Or not nasty.

On the way home from Indiana, we got a little more prepared with a sheet of plastic my grandmother suggested we tuck into Lil E's shirt (so any further nastiness would - wait for it - roll right on down to newspapers on the floor to be rolled up and tossed right on out), refilled wipes, a little lighter lunch this time and a box of children's Dramamine.

So tired from the day before and with a bit of drowsiness-inducing help from the miracle drug, the boy and I slept nearly all the way home. And when we woke up to see the skyline on the horizon, I sighed in relief. It was good to be a little more prepared and good to be home.

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MotherTalking Notting Hell: The longest post ever about the shortest conversation of all time

Rachel Johnson is funny.

If I were to place her on the grrrlfriend spectrum, I'd guess she's the one who would be quite frank about how often her kids were bathed when they were young and could turn a few quick pomtinis into one of those nights you long for with your favorite women, lingering over politics and parenthood and the why itsy-bitsy panties are fabulously inappropriate to wear when you're preschool mommy of the day. 

At least that's what I imagined when I got the invitation to interview her as a part of her tour across America to promote Notting Hell.

After actually reading Notting Hell months earlier and giving way too much late night debate with myself over the boom of questionably-called "mommy lit" and whether I was being very American in thinking this very well might be Bridget Jones all growed up, I jumped at the chance to chat with Rachel Johnson, if only for a few minutes in between signings.

I admit, my inner Brenda Starr came running -- clicky heels, eyelash extensions, steno pad and all -- to the surface.

True to my J-school preparation, I spaced my three serious and two cheeky questions (prompts, really, a la Charlie Rose or JuJu Chang) on my yellow notepaper, ready to listen, nod, uh-huh and write down furiously.

Alas, the interview barely happened.

Thanks to time zone confusion and a packed schedule, my moment of glory gave way as Rachel* ran from one event to meet her agent and I heard the cry from the crib, "Mommy, I'm all done with nap! I want to GET OUT NOW."

I put my pomtini back up on the bar (OK, we all know it was my third cup of coffee and I carefully balanced it on a pile of co-op schedules, calendars and a file folder full of post ideas, but for a brief lapse in real time, it was felt like a shiny walnut gateway to me).

Maybe another time. Interviewing British columnists-turned-fanfared-mommy-authors one moment, wiping a tush the next. It's a glamorous life, this blogging mama thing.

And then as Lil E and I zoned out with a fishy cracker snack to a little post-nap Bob the Builder, the great bartender in the blogosphere nudged my drink back toward me. Rachel called.

"JESSICA!," she yelled enthusiastically into the phone. And then apologies and chatter about her crazy schedule and something I expected less than her actual return phone call, "You're the blogger! You're my first blog interview!"

I beamed. It's not like I am some kind of blogebrity or any of that craziness. I am quite a newbie and honestly, it made me smile to be in good company.

Rachel answered one of my questions, something about all the product name-dropping in Notting Hell and the culture of consumerism among mommies in that book and many, many neighborhoods. In the whirlwind of finally speaking and a conversation that reminded me of when I catch my best friend from grad school in the midst of one of her doggie walking business "client appointments," I think I wrote down three random quotes. My notes read: Baby Gap practically gives clothes away for free -  Character friendships/competition (which is actually part of a question I intended to ask but never squeezed in) - Yummy mummy group with perfect hair and...?

Not exactly the investigative stuff of award-winning human interest features. But it was easy to just listen and laugh as Rachel talked a mile a minute for just about four miles/minutes before she landed in her literary agent's office and had to hang up.

I was dizzy when I said goodbye. And I was glad, even if I didn't gather up blog-propelling goodness in a 300 second interview, I got a bit of Rachel on the phone.

I did have enough time to tell her I'd be at a MotherTalk salon later in the week where she'd be leading a circle of women in a book discussion. There'd be another chance to get all that note-taking in, not that it really seemed to matter.

Hours later, as the witching hour before dinner approached and I was on hold with the pediatric nurse to discuss Lil E's emerging seasonal allergies, an unfamiliar number beeped in on the other line. When I checked my messages later, I smiled to hear Rachel's voice for one more brief moment.

"Jessica!" she launched again and then left her apologies and cell phone number and abbreviated travel schedule should I like to call her back for another interview attempt.

And really, it didn't sound at all like an author whose book I powered through and wondered about and took note of the pleasingly unsuspected ending. It sounded like that grrrlfriend who wants to talk but is so in her own life that you can't be frustrated at all you've only chatted in passing; you're cheered up a wee bit just to hear her on your voicemail.

By coincidence or divine timing or the crazy way this city strings people together, I had that MotherTalk event ahead of me.

I'd been following MotherTalk since I met Andi Buchanan, who gave new life to virtual book discussions and literary salons among bloggers and authors and the women who read them, at The MotherLode last fall. Since then, I'd met my friend Danielle of Foodmomiac fame.  Danielle got the invitation to the salon and asked me to join her at the event hosted by Kim from Hormone-Colored Days and Scrambled CAKE on Chicago Parent.  Kim, who I'd emailed about meeting in person last year but could never make work. It -- and we -- all came together out in the suburbs with a room full of women, a table full of local snacks and bottles of wine opened exactly at the right point of a Friday night for a mama.

We met, we mingled, we scribbled each other's names into an ice breaker sheet with descriptors written down like, "I work outside the home" and "I'm a blogger" and "I believe No Child Left Behind is ruining our educational system" and "I have a really fat ass." 

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Don't forget to take your extensions with you

Oh. Thank. God.

I thought my lovey Beat Box Boy was going to be the next sacrifice to the Sanjaygod. That might've meant a full-scale attention diversion to Pussycat Dolls and the very real possibility of being called to surrender my feminist card. Phew.

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