In case you want a little more attention in public

I don't know what it is about bad cell phone reception that causes me to repeat myself louder and louder.

Why do I do this? I know that when I'm the one with bad reception, it doesn't matter how loudly the person on the other end is speaking. It's the signal.

But I forget this when the person on the other end is all, "Hold on. I can't hear you."

And instead of being all, "Hello? How about now?" I'll keep on with the conversation, but continue to increase the volume. And I also get increasingly annoyed.

Kind of like when you're in a foreign country and they don't understand your English.

I kid. Really.

So.

And have I mentioned that I gesticulate while speaking on the phone, just as if I were having an in-person conversation? This gesticulation gets ratcheted up the less I'm heard as well. You know. To really make a spectacle of myself make myself understood.

Yes.

So while I was gone Nick had the unfortunate experience of dealing with a two-person poo. All by himself.

And Big J has gotten very squirmy and very dexterous. So while Nick was grabbing for wipes, Jordan reached down into his poo. And then smeared it everywhere.

It was, as I understand it, like the aftermath of a giant poo massacre. Necessitating a bath and change of clothes for all involved.

Apparently the same thing, only less extreme and more contained, happened when Nick changed him first thing this morning.

Nick and I didn't have any chat time before he left for work, so when we spoke at lunchtime he told me about it on the phone.

I was in CVS, looking for baby-friendly sunscreen. And he kept not being able to hear me.

So at one point I asked, "Had you taken the diaper away? Did he scoop the poo out of the diaper?"

Like this is something I actually needed to know.

"What? I can't hear you?"

So I repeated - at louder volume - the question.

"Hello? I can't hear you. Hello?"

I started to repeat myself uh-gain, when he interrupted with another, "Hello?"

And instead of just leaving it, I bellowed.

"THE POO!"

"What?"

"THE POO! THE POO! HOW DID HE GET HIS HANDS IN THE POO? THE POO.."

"...You don't need to yell. What about the poo?"

"Never mind. Just. Nothing."