What's Another Word for Dolt?

After a dinner date I had with my husband and one of our good friends, it became glaringly, embarrassingly clear to me that I have yet to regain any of those IQ points I lost between my maternity leave for 2003 and, oh, today. My friend - let's call her Tara, since that's her name - was chatting me up about her talks with other moms, and how they feel like they lost the cognitive skills that made them a formidable contender in any snotty coffee clatch/cocktail hour/dinner soiree that forced visitors to one-up everyone else on the latest book read, latest military coup one is appalled/elated with, etc. It's true, I don't have that knowledge at my fingertips, anymore. It's sleep deprivation, pure and simple. Well, it's sleep deprivation, plus lack of alone time with which to ponder, peruse and otherwise piss away time (and by that, I mean that of course I am jealous - I vaguely remember having time to watch reruns of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, finish a book, pluck my eyebrows, write crappy novels during the month of November). These days, I can recite to you the lexicon of "Snow!" and "Five Little Dinosaurs," but ask me about what's happening in the world, and I struggle. I recall the salient points, sure, but I have neither time nor energy to argue any fine points about - erm, anything. I don't pity myself, because I am having a blast (though I wouldn't mind another 70 or so extra hours of snooze time. However, I would like to sharpen my conversational/cognitive skills, so I decided to take a freelance gig with my old paper for a subject I would have normally cringed at, had I still been regularly working there. But should I be embarrassed to admit I am actually enjoying myself, writing a BJ piece? I am. I enjoy it. It's over in a week, which probabl helps with my overall attitude towards it, but yeah, I enjoy talking to people about something other than my kids. I can yammer on about them until sthey close up the joint, but still, it's not all of who I am, and so, I am enjoying exploring some other sides of life through this interview/writing process. Not getting into specifics in case this blog is found by one of the interviewees. I'm sure you understand.