Things Brainiac gave me today:

1) A cord for our new (to us, from Craigslist) dryer

2) Reimbursement checks for our moving expenses

3) A dozen red roses

Things I gave Brainiac today:

1) A paid trash hauling bill

2) Uh...

Hm.

Onward. A friend of mine recently made some mention of my "mommy blog" in an e-mail he sent to mutual acquaintances. I know I'm late to the party on the whole controversy here, but I have to say that the phrase felt like an insult, a smackdown designed to make me feel as small and insignificant as possible. And it pissed me off.

When a blogging man writes about his fantasy football league is he a "would-be jock blogger", I want to know. Is his blog transformed into a eroto-blog when he shares his dreams of cavorting with whoever is on this month's lingerie catalog? Or maybe he's just another MBAlogger when details of his latest business plan hit the screen? Or why, if he hasn't declared his blog about any of these exclusively would we impose such a designation upon him? We wouldn't, because men are allowed to have multi-faceted lives and I'm pretty sure even Laid-Off Dad was never accused of having a "daddy blog". He's just called funny.

It's true that I write about my kids. And my husband. And my house. And canning and crafts and cooking and shopping and work and school and clients and friends and travel and politics and media and religion and reading and movies and business plans and recipes and health and...I don't know, have I left anything out? Oh, sewing. I forgot about sewing.

I love being a mom and I love being called a mom, or mommy, or mama - even by people I don't parent. I find it charming when someone holds the door for me and the kids saying with a smile, "How you doing today, mom?" But when such an emotionally loaded word becomes dismissive and serves as cause for removing my words from the realm of serious consideration for no other reason than I share my life with two young lives well, that just plain sucks.