tiny first world problems

So, yesterday I went to Tar.get.  [As an aside, let me say that I truly adore Tar.get.  I mean, I try to resist rampant consumer materialism, but Ta.rget has such cute stuff and my only big problem is that I go there to buy one thing, spend $100, and then forget the one thing I came for.  Like yesterday: q-tips.  But I did get an awesome clearance-priced t-shirt for the baby girl.  $3.00!  Come on!]

But I digress.  I went to Tar.get and parked my car.  Now, let me say that I have a pretty ordinary-sized car - rhymes with Hubaru - one that should be amply provided for by a basic parking spot stall.  And the two cars next to me - also non-Hummer sized - were parked within their lines, as was I.  And yet, I could barely squeeze myself between the two cars to retrieve the child from her back-facing carseat and get her out without a.) ramming her head onto the top of the car or b.) scraping the crap out of the car door next to me.

HEY, TA.RGET PEOPLE: until we all start driving Smartcars, YOU NEED BIGGER PARKING STALLS.

I was all hot and bothered about this and used a lot of language that, fortunately, my child cannot (yet) emulate (I'm working on that) when, all of a sudden, this fantastic post from the brilliant women at Rants from Mommyland popped into my head. If you don't have time to click over there (trust me, come back to it later when you have time, it's worth it), I'll summarize: while we all need to rant from time to time, about very significant and life-altering things like the inadequacy of parking stall sizes at Targ.et, we also need to realize that those problems may be, occasionally, overstated. We need a little perspective. Or, a lot of perspective.

Such as: "This m$%^erf&*#ing stall is too bloody damn small; what is wrong with these idiots? What am I supposed to do, ride a freaking bicycle over here and strap my purchases to my head?" could be assisted by an additional internal monologue, like: "Boy, I sure am fortunate to have a car and enough money to put gas in it and go to Target in the middle of a Monday afternoon on my day off (because I am fortunate to have a job) (and a job that I like) to buy q-tips and six things from the clearance bin."

In other words: I spend a lot of my ranting time on tiny first world problems. So I am working on that. It is, however, helpful to get them out there. Just acknowledging them gives me a little perspective for the next time a HUGE GIGANTIC PROBLEM comes marching my way, like, say, when the drive-thru line at Star.bucks is too long.

In no particular order, then, here are my current tiny first world problems:

1. Seriously. Those stupid parking stalls. TOO DAMN SMALL.
2. My child has everything she needs so I can't figure out what to get her for Christmas. But getting her nothing seems kind of heartless.
3. I kid you not: every single road I could possibly use to get absolutely anywhere from my house is currently under construction and has been for the past six months. GAAAAAAAAAH.
4. My kid takes 2-3 hour naps at daycare every time she is there. Every. Time. At home? 45 minutes, tops.
5. I can't figure out where to put the stroller in the garage. Every conceivable spot somehow makes it impossible to get the child out of her carseat. I don't know how this is possible, but it is.
6. I still love breastfeeding, but I am really, really, really, really tired of pumping. Really.
7. After three months of waking up between the grand old hours of 4:30 and 5:00am, we had finally gotten our child to sleep until 6:00 (sometimes 6:30! WOO HOO!) and then daylight savings time hit and we're back to 4:f@#cking30. DAMN IT.
8. Some kids took the carved pumpkin off my porch on Halloween night and smashed it in the street and, over a week later, I am still resentful about it. I want to hunt them down and explain to them that I carved that pumpkin by myself during a day when my child took hardly any nap at all and that is a real feat, you bloody hooligans, and then threaten them with the future someday they are home by themselves with a baby and they look back at their wasted childhood of pumpkin mischief and weep about what they have done. But I do not think they will find this all that scary.
9. The email on my phone keeps shutting itself off randomly and then I have to start over again.
10. The other day I had to rush home to pump because I had forgotten it at home, and I only had 10 minutes to get it done because the house cleaner was coming over and a.) I didn't want her to catch me with my boobs attached to the milking machine, plus b.) I had to pick up the toys and the massive pile of clothes at the bottom of our bed so that she doesn't think we are complete slobs.

See?  Tiny problems.  Tiny, tiny.  Ridiculous, mostly.  And yet I spend a lot of time being very het up about stuff just like this.

Today's goal: perspective.

We'll see how that goes.